You know Samir's girlfriend Carly on Adults who had you singing the wildly catchy song "Hiccups (Body Go Crazy)" on repeat after watching season 2? Well, now she's your favorite bestie in The Love Hypothesis. We're talking about Rachel Marsh, the scene-stealing actress and comedian popping up everywhere we turn and who is behind some of the funniest moments on television right now. The L.A. transplant—who has also appeared in The Morning Show, Fallout, and the Netflix comedy Unstable—is stacking up an enviable acting résumé and plenty of laughs along the way, making her our latest one to watch.

In this month's The Love Hypothesis, the Prime Video book-to-screen romance adaptation from director Claire Scanlon, Marsh plays Anh Pham, a lovable biology grad student, the outspoken best friend to Olive Smith (Lili Reinhart), and the catalyst for Olive's fake-dating plot with professor Adam Carlsen (Tom Bateman). When Marsh read the best-selling novel on which the film is based, written by Ali Hazelwood, she was immediately drawn to the character Anh. But it isn't just Marsh who loves Anh. She belongs to an entire (massive, we should add) fan base. "I was very aware of the fact that people have in their heads a version of Anh," Marsh tells us over Zoom. "Once something is public, it's everyone's character. I hope that fans will like the fact that I made it my own."

Below, Marsh speaks with Who What Wear about The Love Hypothesis, the women in comedy who inspire her, and her favorite rom-com tropes.

You had an unusual path to acting. Can you tell me about your early days living in L.A. and how that pivot happened for you?

I really was not trying to be an actor in L.A. at all. In a cool way, I feel like it all really came together very organically. I have a lot of respect for people who know exactly what they want to do and just pursue it at 18 years old. I'm from a very small town in Seattle and had done a lot of improv and theater in high school and had no idea that it was a career choice. So moving to L.A., I went to a really small school in Azusa and wanted to get a business degree and work at a nonprofit, which I did for a long time. Then I worked in marketing, and I co-owned a coffee shop. I did a lot of things in my career that I feel really helped me to become a full adult. When I was trying to hustle a little bit in L.A. and figuring out what I wanted to do, trying all these different things, I had some friends that were doing improv, and just being in L.A., you go and see shows and stuff. I just became obsessed with improv and comedy in general. From there, I started auditioning for shows and got a manager. My first show was NCIS: L.A., and it was the perfect first job.

NCIS is like a rite of passage for many actors.

It is! You have to do an NCIS or a CSI or something. I have a lot of respect for people who do those jobs because it is a machine. It really teaches you how to work within the flow of a set, understand what a director needs from you, understand what a script needs from you, and just how to be a professional on a set.

So you did improv and theater in high school. What did that kind of performance work unlock for you personally?

Everything, especially at a time in your early 20s, when it's like, Who am I? You really are finding yourself, so for me, being able to perform on a stage and being able to be seen and have a comedic voice and have people laugh at me was everything. It helped me develop my sense of humor, my confidence, what I found funny, and it helped me to put into words what my taste was. Going into the industry [and] having that as a foundation only helped me in a positive way to be like, "This is the kind of project I really want to do one day. This is the kind of comedy that I really want to pursue." Even in auditions, [I'm] able to pick out the comedy and be like, "I find this funny" or "I don't find this funny." Even something as simple as that was everything when I was first starting.

Who are the women in comedy you look up to?

In terms of actors, growing up, watching films a lot, there were a lot of women that I looked up to, like Sandra Oh, for instance. In my early days of comedy, funny women, to me, were Anne Hathaway. The first movie I remember laughing at was The Princess Diaries. Even Amanda Bynes. I remember just being so blown away by women that could have attention in a way that wasn't for how they look but for making people laugh. I think I still really gravitate toward that in the industry, that what's impressive about you is that you have this talent and you have this charisma.

You mentioned NCIS being foundational for you as a first project, but were there any other early acting projects that had a major impact on you?

Oh, that's a great question. I think my first series regular was this show called Unstable for Netflix. It was Rob Lowe's show, him and his son being together. I was a scientist, and it went on for two seasons. I loved that show because it showed me the potential of what I could do in this industry—being a part of a script and being considered as a character throughout the season and having a character arc. It really set the standard for what I wanted to do from that moment on, and it gave me a lot of confidence to be a series regular and to be on set and to get to shadow directors and see how everything works behind the scenes and to see how a show is built from the ground up.

Let's talk about The Love Hypothesis. So many people are excited about this movie. How did the project make its way to you, and what stood out to you about the script and its origins?

I had known Claire [Scanlon], our director, from Unstable, actually. I shadowed her because I want to direct eventually. But I knew she was directing, and I auditioned for it. … A few weeks before we started shooting, Claire called me and told me that I got the role, and I was so excited because it's my first film. It's just such a cool summer-camp experience of getting to make something and being collaborative in that way—and with the most awesome people too.

I'd heard about the book because I had read some romance-genre books, but this one was on my to-read list. I use Libby a lot for audiobooks, and when I booked it, I was like, "Yay, I get to read a book that I get to be in." It's such a special and rare experience. The book is really amazing, and also, I think Sarah [Rothschild], our writer, did a really amazing job of honoring what was so great about Ali [Hazelwood's] writing and transitioning it to screen in a way to honor the central story of it really well.

The book has a massive fan base. Did that built-in fandom make you feel nervous at all in terms of their expectations?

Yeah, definitely. I mean, myself included. I really loved Anh. I was like, "Wow, what a great character." It's such a privilege to say that I get to do my version of Anh. Even when I was shooting it, I was very aware of the fact that people have in their heads a version of Anh. … Once something is public, it's everyone's character. I hope that fans will like the fact that I made it my own. Elizabeth [Cantillon] and Claire really allowed me to make Anh a version of myself, which you don't always get, so I feel very lucky that it was collaborative in that way. Adding in my heritage of being Filipino and what I do at Christmastime with my family, it was really beautiful to get to do because it just feels very rare on a set that people let you do that.

Do you think you would be friends with Anh in real life?

Yeah! I really would. In my life, I really gravitate toward people who are fully themselves, whether people like them or not, even if they're someone who is a little bit of a large character. Anh is so fully herself, and I think that's so admirable. I admire someone who's able to put themselves out there like that.

Lili Reinhart plays your on-screen BFF. How was it working with her as a scene partner?

Lili's awesome. Throughout this process, she was so committed to being like, "The fans are really gonna want this. Let's make sure we do this for them." I think she really did a great job honoring that. When we first met, we went straight in, in Montreal and were like, "Let's rehearse," which is a luxury in films. I'm used to TV, where you don't really get anything. It was fun to be able to hang out and talk about the scenes. I think it really helped our chemistry on-screen and really believing the closeness of these characters.

Did you two have a favorite Montreal activity?

Montreal is so incredible. It's like Europe. It's like New York. The food scene is incredible. We just all had the best time being like, "Let's go try this new restaurant. Let's go to Cirque du Soleil, Let's go to breakfast, or let's walk around." It's such a walkable city. Lili and I would go to breakfast sometimes and just talk about the film or get to know each other. She rarely had a free day, but it was fun to share meals together because that's what I do in my normal life with friends. That's my priority—going out to a good restaurant.

Any Montreal restaurant recommendations?

Le Violon. It's where Justin Trudeau took Katy Perry. Mon Lapin, that was so good. And [Montreal] has really good coffee. It is a very trendy city.

What is your perfect rom-com?

It's hard because rom-coms, to me, are so nostalgic. I feel like nostalgia is a big piece of it that we don't talk about. … It was almost like whatever your first rom-com is, that's your favorite. For me, my first rom-com was My Big Fat Greek Wedding. It's a perfect movie because, like I talked about with Anne Hathaway, it's a trope of a girl who's a loser who, for some reason, is adorable to this guy, and he becomes obsessed with her, and then they fall in love. I love that trope.

Speaking of rom-com tropes, The Love Hypothesis centers on the "fake dating to lovers" trope. Do you think that can actually work in real life?

I said this recently, but I tell a white lie because it protects people. And I think that is admirable sometimes. I think that's realistic: to be able to withhold information for people that you love or like [or] lie to them if it's for a greater cause. So in that way, I think it's realistic.

You've talked briefly about your directing aspirations. What does that look like for you? What would you love to direct in the future?

I'm someone who came from sketch comedy and improv. I still do that today. I have a show that I want to make and do have a lot of things that I still want to do, but it's all a timing thing. Right now, I'm so enjoying acting and being in these projects and getting to collaborate in that way. I think the right opportunity or the right partnership will come along that I'll naturally get to do that in. But I write all the time, and writing, for me, is what makes or breaks the project. It's why I was so attracted to [The Love Hypothesis], because the script was really great. I really want to be involved in projects with funny, great, intelligent women, and I think that's what people are going to take away from this film. … Wow, a lot of women made this great movie, and hopefully, it sets a tone for the next women-produced, -directed, -led film in this genre.

The Love Hypothesis is now streaming on Prime Video.

Photographer: JJ Geiger
Stylist: Katie Bofshever
Hairstylist: Barb Thompson
Makeup Artist: Hinako

If Italian sensuality manifested itself in female form, it would be Irina Shayk. It's not that the supermodel is Italian. No, the viral clip of a 2014 interview on The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson, in which the model and actress tasked the host with pronouncing her proper last name (Shaykhlislamova), proves that she is thoroughly Russian. But her ripples of espresso hair, divinely sculpted lips, and near-regal demeanor embody the torrid tales of Italian love stories, the heavenly features of Vesuvian frescoes, and the fiery spark of feisty nonnas. She shifts effortlessly between sumptuous sophistication and sizzling seduction.

It's the same intangible essence found in Italian actor Michele Morrone, who is the physical embodiment of Roman ruggedness; the textbook definition of tall, dark, and handsome; and Shayk's costar in a newly released short film for Dolce & Gabbana. Yet by some witchcraft, the Italian fashion house managed to siphon this fantasy into a solar, fruity gourmand so devastatingly romantic that it rivals the stuff of Hollywood classics. Meet my new obsession: Dolce & Gabbana's Your Devotion Eau de Parfum Intense.

On a blazing afternoon beneath the Neapolitan sun, I walked into the cerulean-washed lobby of the De Bonart Naples to meet the storied supermodel ahead of the evening's soirée. The party, complete with an all-black dress code (lace highly encouraged), was being thrown in the famous Palazzo San Felice, where a long string of mobster movies and dramatic romances have been filmed, to celebrate the launch of Your Devotion. Fittingly, the fragrance's campaign film—directed by Gordon von Steiner, scored by Gino Paoli's "Sapore di Sale," and starring a "will they, won't they?" Shayk and Morrone—would be projected onto flowing white bedsheets hanging from the windowpanes just hours later.

After staring off at the glittering vista of the Tyrrhenian coastline (speckled with buildings made from volcanic rock, red terra-cotta roofs, and throngs of natives bustling through the narrow streets), it was time to meet the glamorous star. The doors to her suite opened in a flash of set lights and a blur of team members speaking in fast Italian, but Shayk sat perfectly still amid the chaos as a makeup artist flitted silently around her head like a dragonfly. Melon, vanilla, and orange blossom perfumed the air, warmed by my sunned skin and fresh on her robe-clad limbs. Before we exchanged warm hellos and small talk about our apartments in New York City, our identical scents met in a frenzied embrace.

"I've always felt like Italy is my second home," Shayk says, leaning back in a plush white leather chair. We're discussing her latest accolade, the Filming Italy Venice International Award, which she'd clinched during the 83rd Venice Film Festival just days before our interview. "It was a very special, emotional evening," she tells me in her velvety accent. "It's a beautiful time to celebrate art, music, and artists in front of and behind the cameras." The star has flexed her acting chops in projects like the 2014 action film Hercules as Megara, alongside Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, though her latest role as the face of Dolce & Gabbana's Your Devotion strikes a more personal chord with the multi-hyphenate.

The model, who has worked with the Italian fashion house on both the couture and beauty sides since 2023, has borne witness to how the brand fuses fragrance and fashion together to fit into its sexy, lace-clad world. "Dolce & Gabbana always associates with a lacy, sexy Southern [Italian] woman who is elegant, modern, and feels very comfortable in her own skin," Shayk explains. "When I think of the fashion and perfume, I feel like it's one big thing that comes together."

It's not just any perfume that the supermodel is alluding to—she feels a particular synergy with the sensorial profile of Your Devotion. "My first memory of fragrance is not even fragrance itself. It's of my childhood garden and its little sweet notes of pear and flowers," she tells me, her pillowy lips curving into a remembering smile. Your Devotion is, essentially, an aged-up version of this nostalgic scent, spiked with Sicilian melon, sensual vanilla, and soft orange blossom. It's a blend of home and Italian escape.

"I always try to reach the DNA of Dolce & Gabbana," says Olivier Cresp, the master perfumer behind Your Devotion. The prolific perfumer has brought several of fashion's favorite designer fragrances to life, including Dolce & Gabbana's Light Blue and Mugler's Angel, and this new concoction is poised to become another household name in his portfolio. Cresp sells me the scent—a warmer, less sugary extension of Devotion Eau de Parfum—as a fragrant re-creation of the "warmth and sexiness of the Mediterranean Sea."

Cresp credits his lifelong affinity for Southern Italy—its people, its environment, and its joie de vivre—as a driver behind this scent. "I try to connect with the sea, the luminosity of the sun, and the warmth," he explains. The scent opens with a gentle squeeze of lemon ("I use a hint of Sicilian lemon in every fragrance for Dolce & Gabbana," he tells me) and a splash of "sensual" home-grown mandarins. In the next whiff, you catch the late-summer sweetness of Sicilian cantaloupe. So far, so good, Cresp thought.

The heart and base layers go a bit deeper than local produce. Sea spray and white-petaled orange blossoms (which decorate the coastal regions of Sicily and Puglia) dance with delicate gardenia before settling onto the skin, giving way to a comforting blend of oakmoss, vanilla, and sandalwood. There's a "black-lace effect," Cresp explains, to this balance of ripe sweetness and solar warmth.

Shayk has learned the importance of having a few easy beauty essentials to rely on with a jet-setting lifestyle like her own—perfume being number one and mascara coming up second. "I'm a girl who doesn't use a lot of makeup, but definitely, I love a touch of mascara," she tells me. It makes sense, seeing as her piercing blue eyes and smoldering gaze are the first thing you notice when you see the supermodel in real life. "I also like to use one product in a few different places—a blush on my lip, my cheeks, and sometimes on the eyes," she adds. Makeup isn't her go-to, she elaborates, but skincare, SPF, and fragrance are nonnegotiables, especially while on the road.

It's been only two weeks since we chatted in her glam room, dined in the Palazzo, and flew back to New York on the same flight (there, we griped about plane delays and the humid Italian rain, which held out until our departure), but she's already landed back in Italy for Milan Fashion Week. So naturally, when I asked her to describe her life at this very moment in three words, she gave me "sleepless" and "jet lag." With a small laugh, she waves her hand at the hardly untrue joke. "No, I'm in a really good place. [I'm] happy, grateful, and just a little sleepless," she adds.

"With a busy schedule, being a mom, and being able to travel and work, I think you always have to remember to enjoy the moment," Shayk says knowingly. "It's hard to be in the moment because my brain is already like, 'Oh, I have to travel to New York tomorrow!'" Her eyes widen in animation. The model's goal, when her mind starts to spin, is to "meditate, be in the moment, and try to be present, even though it's very hard." It turns out that one of the easiest ways to escape and unwind—whether on a plane to New York or a beach in Naples—is with a spritz of Your Devotion.

Shop the Dolce & Gabbana Devotion Collection

The '70s had Saturday Night Fever. The '80s had Dirty Dancing. The '90s had Strictly Ballroom. The early aughts had Save the Last Dance. Now, we have Best of the Best, Netflix's joyful comedy centered on the cutthroat world of collegiate Bollywood-fusion dance.

Billed as Bollywood meets Bring It On (need we say more?), the film follows childhood best friends Maya (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan) and Anjali (Priyanka Kedia), who join UCLA's competitive dance team, only to have their skills and friendship tested on the bumpy road to winning the U.S. championship. It's a story about sisterhood and self-acceptance coupled with high-impact, heart-pounding Bollywood dance sequences that are quite literally a feast for the eyes.

With this kind of South Asian representation on a platform like Netflix, the weight of this moment is not lost on Kedia, the project's rising star. For the actress, it's an incredible opportunity for audiences on a large scale to see the culture she grew up loving and that represents so much joy. That was immediate from the moment she received the script and saw her whole world reflected on the page.

On the heels of a major summer starring alongside Colman Domingo in Steven Spielberg's Disclosure Day, Kedia steps into her leading-lady era this month with a performance that is sure to have everyone talking.

This has been a big year for you. You made your feature-film debut in Steven Spielberg's sci-fi film Disclosure Day and are now leading the Netflix dance film Best of the Best. What impact did Disclosure Day have on you personally and professionally?

That was truly the coolest place to start. I'd done a film before, but it was an indie. This was a whole different scale. Everybody on set either had an Oscar or was nominated for an Oscar, which is really funny, but at the same time, [they] were somehow also incredibly humble and grounded. Steven Spielberg is an angel on Earth. He calls everybody a kid, no matter who they are and no matter how old they are. I asked him why one time, and he was like, "I call everybody kid. That's what we're here to do. We're here to be kids again. That's what making movies does for you."

Colman Domingo is a walking angel on Earth. He carries himself with so much grace and compassion and empathy and understanding, and there's this warmth that just comes off of him. And honestly, that, to me, was maybe the most inspiring thing that I took away from [the project] because I went from that to Best of the Best, where I was going to be part of leading a movie. To see how important it is for the leads of the film to have that kind of warmth and to set that tone for everybody was so important.

Netflix describes Best of the Best as Bollywood meets Bring It On. How was it presented to you, and what really excited you about the opportunity?

Nobody had to present anything to me. I read the script and was like, "Oh my God, please get me in this room." I know this world. These are my friends. These are the people I went to high school with. Everything off every page resonated so much, and I was shocked because I'd never read something that was that accurate to my experience growing up and what that world feels like. I immediately called my agent and was like, "I'll mop the floors. Let me in there." And she was like, "Why don't you try auditioning first?" It's hard to even compare it because I feel like I haven't seen something exactly like this before. To me, the closest comp was Pitch Perfect in terms of taking something really niche and just fully sending it into that world.

That's a great comparison. It made me nostalgic for the great dance films of the early aughts. Did you grow up on any dance films?

I grew up on Bollywood, and in Bollywood, everything is a dance movie. I have home videos of me dancing in front of the screen to all of these different Bollywood movies. … A song that I would always dance to, I actually got to dance to [it] in the movie too, so that felt really full circle. But yeah, there's a whole world to the Bollywood musical. That's our bread and butter. That's one thing we know—a musical, a dance movie. A classic is Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge. It's iconic. But honestly, you could almost start anywhere, and it's just a fun time.

I didn't realize how massive the collegiate Bollywood-fusion dance world is. Did you do a deep dive into that circuit yourself, and what did you discover?

I grew up dancing Bollywood for fun. I was never that great. It wasn't a super-technical endeavor, but it was a way to connect with the community and to stay connected to our culture. So my brother and I grew up doing it. I had seen it, so I know this is cutthroat. And that wasn't even at a collegiate level. That's just community dance competitions where you're 11, and it's like, "Everybody get in line!" I think anybody that's ever done dance at any point in their life knows how insane it is or even if you've done theater or musical theater. It is life or death.

What did the dance prep look like for this?

We had two and a half months of dance training. It started with a few weeks of boot camp in L.A., and that was just me and Maitreyi. We were taking—I don't even know—eight hours of dance classes every day, six days a week. We would go from contemporary to hip-hop to classical to K-pop to jazz funk. It was like five different dance styles every single day and then also partner work and getting comfortable moving together. … These girls have danced their whole lives together, and we had to build that really quickly. And then we resumed rehearsals in New Jersey for two months. It was two months of a skeleton dance crew, and then the other actors joined.

It's really fascinating to get to see what a professional dancer has to go through. They are professional athletes. I was bruised everywhere, every day for months. It's no joke. The hours are long, and you have to relearn how to eat, how to hydrate, how to sleep, how to take care of yourself. I was like, "Are we training for the Olympics?" But I'm really proud. By the end of it, it was very much like, "I did that." I didn't even think that was something my body was capable of doing.

Was there a dance number in the film that was particularly challenging for you?

Maybe the wedding dance. That was challenging for a lot of different reasons. That's the one where I was being thrown up and moved around and all these things. The costume I'm wearing is a real wedding lehenga, not a costume one, so it's like 10 [pounds]. I tried it right before the cameras were rolling. They were clipping all these things into my hair, and then it's like, "Okay, go." But that's part of the dance world. You just gotta go with it.

On the flip side of that, did you have a favorite dance number?

I loved every single one for a different reason, but I loved the finale [dance]. The energy on set was electric, and there's that moment in the finale where all of us are in this V formation, and we're all moving together and battle-crying, hyping each other up. When I think about it, I still get goose bumps. It was such a beautiful moment. It felt like the culmination of everything we've been working up toward both as these characters and as actors ourselves.

Anjali has some beautiful looks. You mentioned the wedding look, but take me into these wardrobe fittings. What was that like for you?

Our head of costume design, [Liz Vastola], is incredible. From day one, she was like, "This is a collaboration." So I would walk into this room full of racks, and she'd be like, "What speaks to you?" We had a lot of fun crafting everything really intentionally together. Anjali starts off in this place where she's cute, but it's not screaming personality. It's not "I know who I am." There are no big risks being taken in terms of what she's wearing, and I actually drew on my teenage cousins that grew up in SoCal, even down to how I got my nails done.

In the Bollywood dream sequence where she's in the blue lehenga, that was a conversation with our director that was really intentional. It is this big dream sequence, and you would think she'd be in this insane outfit, but what she's wearing is relatively simple for South Asian clothing. But that was intentional because she's in this dream world. She still doesn't know who she is. She still doesn't even fully understand her place in this world that she's made up in her head. And then once she got her haircut, that was a big turning point for her. That's when we initiated a shift in her style, and it was like, "Okay, if she's thinking for the first time about who she is and she's questioning the roles that she's played blindly so far, what does it look like for her to start trying to step out of her comfort zone? … What could have been in her closet already that she's remixing? What could she have thrifted near UCLA?" And from there, we came up with the [looks for the] latter half of the movie. You see her come into style that feels like her.

How was it working with Maitreyi as a scene partner and off camera?

We were trauma bonded instantly. Being thrown into these dance classes together, we would pull up in our matching little cars with our matching bobas, and we'd walk into Millennium Dance Complex in L.A., which is where all the professional dancers train, and we would put our bags down in the back and look at each other like, "Okay, let's go." That's the beautiful thing about dance. … It was almost like we worked our way outside in. We broke this physical barrier so quickly, and a lot of our training, those first couple weeks, was about having to literally physically support each other and hold each other and not let each other fall and to literally lean on each other to our absolute extremes. So we had to build that trust that these girls have immediately from the outside in. We had a lot of fun, and we were the only non-dancers for a really long time. I'm really proud of what we made together.

This film is such a win for the South Asian community. What does it mean for you to be a part of this project?

It means the world. I could not have dreamed of a more special project to get to be part of. Like I said, the second I read the script, I was shocked that this was being made, and then I was shocked that I was being considered for it, and then I was even more shocked that I got to be a part of it. I woke up every single day thinking that maybe I was dreaming, and I would pinch myself. I've been a fan of Hasan [Minhaj] since I was a teenager, since I was in middle school. I got a DM from someone when the movie got announced, and they were like, "Oh my God, you're the one that made us watch his Homecoming King special every time we came over to your house." I'm like, "Yeah, that was me." It's something me and my brother grew up watching together. All of his specials we would watch together. We went and saw his tour like eight years ago when it came through the Bay Area. We were in the back row. I worked at a café that Hasan was a partner in. That was the job I had when I booked the movie, so I had met him a couple times as his barista, and every time, I would totally put my foot in my mouth and not know what to say because I was so starstruck.

Getting to work with someone that I looked up to for so long… There was this day he came up to me on set, and he was like, "Hey, can I get a picture with you?" And I literally just froze. I was like, "Me?" But he and [Prashanth Venkataramanujam] have worked for five years bringing this project to life, and it was never lost on me how special it was that it was landing someplace like Netflix, where it would have that mainstream accessibility. So many people would get to be exposed to it that maybe don't know anything about South Asian culture, and it could be a really special introduction. Also, for South Asian people, this is a movie that, if I had had growing up, it would have been playing on the TV all day, every day. I'm really excited for South Asian kids, or anybody of any age, to watch this movie and to be able to feel pride in their culture. At the end of the day, it really is just a celebration of South Asian culture, food, music, clothing, everything, friendship.

The bar has been set high with Disclosure Day and now Best of the Best. What are you looking forward to next?

Listen, I feel incredibly blessed. It's not lost on me any moment of any day. I went to school for theater. I worked three minimum-wage jobs at a time for a couple years after graduating. My life has changed a lot in the last year and in ways I never could have even imagined or anticipated. So I just feel incredibly grateful to be here. I feel really excited that the work I've done is also something I can be proud of and something I would have chosen to do regardless. I honestly think that is the most meaningful thing to me, and if I can keep doing work that I'm proud of and that excites me and that challenges me… Our directors said, "Listen, after this movie, you're gonna feel like you can do anything." And it's like, "Yeah! Let me do my own stunts. Let me Tom Cruise it." Honestly, after doing that, I was like, "Let me jump off a building. I can do it." I would love to keep learning new skills for things. I think that was so special. I'd love to do a dark comedy. I want to work with Yorgos Lanthimos. That's my dream.

Best of the Best premieres on Netflix on September 18.

Photographer: Kat and Mariel Tyler

Stylist: Sarah Slutsky Tooley

Hair Stylist: Rena Calhoun

Makeup Artist: Pircilla Pae

Welcome to The Glowdown, the series where we dive into the beauty secrets of our favourite celebrities as they get real about their routines and non-negotiables exclusively with us. Join them as they sit in our beauty hot seat, and we fire off a round of quick questions, giving you never-before-shared insight into the products they can't live without, their secrets to getting red carpet–ready, beauty pet peeves and the genius tips they've picked up along the way. This is no-holds-barred beauty at its finest.

This month, we sat down with Camila Cabello. The 29-year-old singer-songwriter has just been announced as Tommy Hilfiger's latest global ambassador and the face of the brand's newest fragrance, Freedom. The launch marks a fresh chapter for Tommy Hilfiger fragrance, and we asked the star to share more about her exciting new venture.

Below, Camila talks go-to makeup products, her best beauty advice and, of course, her signature scent.

1. Which beauty product gives you the biggest mood boost?
I will say fragrance. Before I go to a big event, [I wear] Tommy Hilfiger Freedom. I don’t really wear perfume, so if I’m going out, it makes me feel like, "oooh, this is special."

2. If you could steal someone else’s makeup bag, whose would it be?
I think I’m going to say Dua Lipa!

3. You’ve got a spot. Are you team pop it or team leave it alone?
If it’s yellow, pop it!

4. You only have one product to use for the rest of your life—what is it?
Probably conditioner. I’m really into the Amika Soulfood Nourishing Hair Mask right now.

5. What’s the best piece of beauty advice that you have ever received?
Drink water. It makes such a big difference to everything, which is so annoying because I hate having to go to the bathroom.

6. What's your signature fragrance?
Tommy Hilfiger Freedom, for sure. I love vanilla, so I love that about it. It’s fresh, and it’s not too intense!

7. Strong lip or a strong eye?
A strong eye. I’m definitely a strong-eye girl. I like a smoky eye, but I honestly do it less and less. I’m into a more natural bronzy brown.

8. You’re having your nails done. What’s your go-to colour?
I do a nude with chrome on top.

9. What's your favourite lipstick colour?
I like the Mary Phillips lip liner. I like anything close to my natural lip colour. I love a lip tint. I love the Sacheu one.

10. Candles, reed diffusers or nothing at all?
Candles. I like the Diptyque ones.

11. Name one beauty product that is always in your handbag
Probably a lip liner and the Gisou lip oil. I like to have a little bit of a gloss or an oil.

12. Are you team dewy or matte?
Dewy all the way.

13. The greatest drugstore product for under £10?
Cheap mascara! It's better sometimes.

14. Describe your brows in one word
Healing. The more I don’t do anything to them, the more they’re actually growing. I had spots that weren’t growing. I’m not touching them, and they’re growing in the places they weren’t! I like a more unkempt brow to brush up; I think it gives a youthful, wild look that I like.

15. What beauty rule do you always break?
I’ve realised that trends that look good on other people don’t [always] look good on me, and I think it’s good to be aware of that. I don’t know if that’s a beauty rule that I break, but it’s something that I’ve realised. Just do what works for your face!

16. Which celebrity’s hair would you love to steal?
I would steal Rosalía’s hair because, to my knowledge, she is someone who has gorgeous hair and doesn’t have any extensions, and that’s really rare in our industry.

17. Best beauty hack?
Patrick Ta is a really great friend of mine; I love him so much. I’ve learned a lot from him; I’ve learned about how important it is to really moisturise your face right before you do your makeup.

Shop Camila Cabello's Favourite Beauty Products:

On July 8, 2026, in the dead of night in Fiji, Ariana Madix got a call from her team letting her know she had just scored her first Emmy nomination as the host of Peacock's Love Island USA. It was a career-defining moment for the actress and TV personality, but the celebrations could wait. Madix, in the midst of filming season 8 of the hit reality dating show, needed her beauty rest.

In the weeks since, the good news kept rolling in for Madix. Season 8 of Love Island USA shattered Peacock viewing, making it the streamer's most-watched original season, and last month, the 41-year-old announced her return to Broadway this fall playing Connie Francis in Just in Time.

This weekend was all about the 78th annual Creative Arts Emmy Awards. With her mom as her date, Madix indulged in a glamorous evening complete with a glittery pale-pink Yara Shoemaker gown with cascading crystal and beaded embellishments. Dripping in Sophia D jewels, she finished the look, styled by Jordan Dorso, with Gianvito Rossi heels and a spritz of her go-to Fiji fragrance. (More on this later.)

Madix invited Who What Wear into her getting-ready suite for an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at how her stunning Emmys look came together. Keep reading for more.

What was the first thing you did when you heard about your Emmy nomination?

It was the middle of the night when I found out from my team, so I went back to sleep. It was amazing to celebrate with the whole Love Island family in Fiji—"Lush Life" dance included.

Take us through your Emmys morning.

[My boyfriend] Dan made me some breakfast and then went to pick up my mom so we could get glammed together, and I had an iced coffee. I was so excited that my mom was going to share in the day with me, and she looked fabulous in her gown. Dan and I had flown in from New York the night before, so we didn't plan on doing anything else.

This is a very exciting career milestone. When talking with your team, what was your vision for your red carpet look?

I never get my heart set on an idea too early because it might not be available or might not fit. That being said, I wanted to look like a star.

Tell us about the look you ultimately chose for the evening. What made it a standout among other options?

I had shown Jordan a Yara Shoemaker dress I loved. We had a fitting at my temporary Broadway apartment in New York and narrowed it down to two dresses we loved. Ultimately, we felt like this one was a perfect Emmys nod to Love Island because it felt like a glamorous mermaid.

Any favorite details to note?

The jewels really set the whole look off. We went for an asymmetrical look with the earrings and the most gorgeous rings. When Jordan sent me a photo of the ring, my response was just, "I'm dead."

What's your red carpet dressing philosophy?

I have to feel confident. It doesn't matter how amazing something is. If I feel unsure of myself in any way, you'll see that all over my face.

What was the direction for your glam look? Did you and your team look at any specific references?

I sent a bunch of inspo pics in our group chat, and [my makeup artist Afton Williams] and [hairstylist Carl Bembridge] took it and made it into something completely new. Afton created her own blush shade with all the different things she was mixing, and Carl is truly a sculptor of hair.

What are your essential red carpet beauty products?

Once I leave the house, I'm on my own, and it can be a while before photos are taken, so I always bring a clean brush to press any spots where I'm creasing, extra lip product to reapply, and sometimes a small hairbrush.

What fragrance did you choose for the evening, and why?

I wore the Sol de Janeiro perfume mist in number 59. I have it in Fiji when I'm filming, so it felt right to wear it for the night.

Who were you most excited to see/run into tonight?

My mom and my team, fellow nominee Kristen Kish, and Queen Latifah!

What did the end of your night look like?

We went to the gala afterward with my team and my mom. After that, we went home to get ready to fly back to New York!

Right after this, you are returning to Broadway as Connie Francis in Just in Time. What are you looking forward to with this performance?

Connie's music has resonated with so many people, including myself, and it's an honor to tell her story. Every day, I wake up grateful that I get to do what I love for a living, surrounded by people who inspire me creatively every day. We used to pray for times like these, and I'll never forget that!

Photographer: Andie Jane
Stylist: Jordan Dorso
Hairstylist: Carl Bembridge
Makeup Artist: Afton Williams

Andrew Garfield is having a "weirdly unbusy" day, or so he tells me when he phones in from the grocery store, where he's doing his post-flight foraging. He's just returned from a trip to New York, packed with downtown sushi spots (he recommends Bar Miller), Cats: The Jellicle Ball ("Have you seen it? You gotta make time for it," he says after I tell him I live here), aimless Central Park strolls, and press-junket stops. "Can you hear me okay? You're catching me in transit a little bit, so if things get cut out… I just landed on a plane to L.A.," he says in a flurry of apologies, somehow made sophisticated by his velvety British accent. I assure him I can hear him just fine and that I understand the need to multitask. He's on a generational run, after all.

Garfield just wrapped his stint as Roy Horn, one half of the Las Vegas big-cat magician duo Siegfried & Roy, in Apple TV's Wild Things, which will debut in early 2027 (hence why his hair is now chin-grazingly long). His NYC trip included pit stops at news outlets and magazine headquarters to promote The Magical Faraway Tree, a fantasy film in which he stars alongside The Crown's Claire Foy, and now he's preparing to take on the press gauntlet of his two upcoming projects: Paul Greengrass's The Uprising (I'd just white-knuckled my way through an early viewing) and Luca Guadagnino's controversial Artificial about OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, which comes out later this year.

I've always been drawn to Garfield's interviews just as much as his work. Whether I was reading a beautifully built profile about his worldly musings or watching a 15-second video clip, the 43-year-old actor is a gravitational force. Los Angeles born and Surrey grown, the star flits effortlessly between cracking brain-rot jokes ("I'm aura farming," he very Americanly tells a confused Foy in Vanity Fair's Lie Detector Test), dodging compliments (very British), and philosophizing about the world as he knows it and the role he plays—both literally and figuratively. With bookish charm and deep, knowing eyes that silently tell you he understands, Garfield cleaves open conversations about the mundane until the core matter spills out. He's heartbreakingly raw about grieving his mother, Lynn, whom he lost to pancreatic cancer in 2019. When asked about The Social Network and Artificial, he champions the human shrapnel wrought by power-hungry tech oligarchs. In 2026, he's still touched by the fact that he has "any association at all in anyone's consciousness" with Marvel's Spider-Man. In short, he's helplessly allergic to small talk. He'd rather get down to the stuff that matters.

He's making his way through the aisles now, which I can only tell because our conversation is peppered with—but never disrupted by—polite "Excuse me!"-s and "Pardon me"-s. "I love New York," he tells me, a smile staining his voice. "Whenever I'm there, I'm just very happy." It makes sense, seeing as he spent years in the Big Apple while filming The Amazing Spider-Man franchise and the award-winning musical Tick, Tick… Boom! and performing on Broadway in Death of a Salesman and Angels in America, the latter of which earned him a Tony. After this laundry list of critically acclaimed projects that occupy just a fraction of his IMDb page, it shocks me that the A-lister still runs his own errands. But his ability to simultaneously and thoughtfully delve into the throes of his upcoming films informs me of three things. One, Garfield really is all the good things you hear about him from fans and industry insiders alike. Two, he has the distinct and deeply endearing ability to turn his to-dos into the backdrop for thought-provoking conversation. Three, stars, they really are just like us.

It only takes a few minutes of casual conversation with the veteran Spider-Man to realize why something as simple as an errand run is so high on his priority list. It's the same reason why he finds himself drawn to the sprawling grounds of Central Park and why he told Esquire UK Editor in Chief Teo van den Broeke that he giddily agreed to snap a shot of two oblivious girls at Glastonbury when one handed over her phone—not for a selfie, but for him to capture them on the festival grounds. You see, after more than 20 years in the industry (and becoming an award-winning actor at the 2008 BAFTAs for his lead role in Boy A at just 24 years old), Garfield is all too used to the impromptu photo ops, burning spotlights, and ceaseless media attention that comes with fame. While most fresh-faced 20-somethings a few years post-grad are running up tabs at pubs, navigating new careers, and maybe still living at home, Garfield was dipped in Hollywood gold and subsequently thrust into the very scrutinizing public eye. So when he gets a chance to meander about the aisles, fade into throngs of NYC tourists, and be the nameless photographer behind an Instagram shot, he can finally breathe.

It's these rare moments of blissful regular-personhood that he has chased over the last year while wrapping consecutive projects and pouring his blood, sweat, and tears (literally) into The Uprising. It's the snippets of normalcy—like time spent with his nephews and the serenity of meals cooked at home—that he holds dear, but while his idea of heaven has graduated from glittering awards to quiet nights at home with a good book, that's not to say his ambition has taken a back seat. In fact, The Uprising adds an impressive new notch to Garfield's belt and tells a story just as profound as the ones padding his personal library.

After long pining for a chance to work with Greengrass, the director behind blockbusters such as The Bourne Ultimatum and harrowing action films like United 93, Garfield clinched the role of Ploughman in The Uprising, which premieres on September 11. "He's on that very short list of filmmakers that I've longed to work with," Garfield says of the project's spearhead. In it, Garfield portrays a farmer-turned-insurrectionist who incites the Peasants' Revolt of 1381 against King Richard II—a true story of rebellion instigated by the Crown's tyrannical taxes on England's working class, cruel labor laws, and residual tensions from the bubonic plague. Within the first few scenes of the film, Garfield's character gives the name "Ploughman" to a corrupt tax collector with a simple explanation: "I am what I do." As it turns out, this plain introduction is one the actor could have used himself over the course of his abundant career.

Having started acting professionally at age 21 after graduating from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London, Garfield has a longer career than the years of his childhood and adolescence combined. He compares his relationship with his vocation to "standing on a seesaw." In a healthy way, the act of storytelling feeds his spirit. "In an unhealthy way, I don't know who I am unless I'm making things that feel expressive of my own soul," he says pensively. "I think that there's something beautiful about that level of devotion. But there's also a dark side to it."

Choosing a project and inviting new characters in requires a hard-earned level of discernment that Garfield has honed over decades in the industry. But when the star read Ploughman's story, he didn't just realize it was a good fit. The cultural relevance hit him squarely in the chest. "There was something universal in what the character and these people are going through, which is the question of, What happens to the human soul when it's pushed beyond what it can take?" he muses. "The feeling of 'Either things change, or today is a good day to die'—how do you get to that place?"

This level of introspection is normal for Garfield. Sure, he admits that he was partially attracted to the story due to its connection to his own ancestry (his maternal heritage comes from Essex, England, where much of the Peasants' Revolt began), but what he couldn't escape was the stark parallels in disenfranchisement between two eras separated by a millennium.

"It doesn't get any more profound than that—when the human soul is treated with such a lack of dignity. And we see it around the world right now," he says solemnly. "I'm so fascinated by what it is to be in a revolution. Can you have a revolution without violence? Is that possible? Is that naïve?" These weren't just questions Garfield asked himself as he prepared to take on the role of a poverty-stricken farmer beaten down by life and loss. They're also questions worth considering with every newscast and war update today.

This is evident in a live taping of writer Josh Horowitz's podcast, Happy Sad Confused, in 2024, where Garfield called for the support of Palestinians amid the ongoing war in Gaza. The actor has also voiced concern about Donald Trump throughout his tumultuous terms as President of the United States, critiquing humanity's general inability to be honest about the bad parts of themselves and the inclination to engage in celebrity worship—a camp in which he's included himself.

"Look who's in the White House. It's an idiot celebrity, and we enabled that. It's not just the people who voted for him; it's the whole culture. We started worshipping things that are empty and false, and you know, here we are," he stated in a 2017 interview with The Times. He spoke openly in a recent interview with Esquire UK about the perils of confronting the unconscious "shadow self," per Carl Jung, and how we all could use a bit more of these ugly self-assessments—especially when it concerns government authority. "But then the argument is that if we weren't all less rejecting in the first place, less 'That's not us,' then Donald Trump wouldn't have been voted in twice, and Nigel Farage wouldn't be anywhere near a position of power," he told Esquire. It's a tale as old as time, Garfield tells me, as he details how 14th-century commoners regarded then-14-year-old King Richard II as a "conduit for God"—and Lord help anyone who went against him. It's a soft reminder that this story, and its bloody message, isn't an ancient one.

"That kind of prevailing attitude is going to keep people so scared of stepping out of line," Garfield explains. "It's an incredible tactic of oppression and fear-mongering." When our modern-day news often reads like an AP world history textbook, the star found this narrative imperative to tell and be heard on all sides. "It feels like a really important story now for all of us to reckon with, no matter where we are on that spectrum—whether we're benefiting from a system of oppression or not," he continues.

The range of emotions Garfield and his castmates display in this film radiates off the screen, permeating the room in hair-raising ripples of fury, heartbreak, and hope. He likens soft moments of dialogue to the sanctity of prayer and says those rare moments of stoicism required a special kind of presence on set. "It takes concentration, preparation, and then a lot of surrender," he states, emphasizing the importance of "letting go" not just in the filming process but also in the project as a whole.

While his gut-wrenching performance in The Uprising is a testament to Garfield's prowess, the actor's personal experiences also quietly shaped the character. "As an actor, the raw material of what you're using is you," he explains. Ploughman's grief over the loss of his family, taken in one fell swoop by the bubonic plague, runs parallel to his own grief following the death of his mother. He was incredibly vulnerable about this world-altering event in a 2021 appearance on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, in which he touched fans' hearts with his wisdom on life after loss. "We never get enough time with each other, right?" he told the attentively listening host. "So I hope this grief stays with me because it's all the unexpressed love that I didn't get to tell her." In 2026, he credits the film's overarching theme of surrender to loss—and, more notably, how one continues on after waving the white flag—as what made the experience so transformative.

"I think about when my dad went bankrupt, and he realized that he was still loved. His big fear happened, and he realized, 'Oh, I still have my family. They're not going anywhere,'" he says, pausing in a moment of reflection. "I think there's something quite profound—and difficult, of course, but very beautiful—about entering that very raw space of having nothing to lose."

Garfield understood that it would take some world-building to ease himself into the smoggy atmosphere of 14th-century England, especially since he'd completed his stint as the temporarily ousted Altman just two weeks prior. I call that transition whiplash; he laughs knowingly. There's something almost biblical about going from a film called Artificial to a story that's so human, I add. "It feels like the two extremes of what it is to be a person," he agrees.

Music played a vital role in Garfield's transformation during that two-week intermission, which is unsurprising for someone who started their career in theater and dabbled in musicals like Lin-Manuel Miranda's Tick, Tick… Boom! "I was listening to a lot of songs of revolution, like Nina Simone and Billy Bragg," he explains, "but I was also listening to a lot of English folk music." Perhaps he was directly referencing the upbeat outcries of Simone's "Revolution, Pts.1 & 2" or Bragg's "Take Down the Union Jack," but something in these sonic cues inspired a spiral about what it actually means to be English. "Is there such a thing as being indigenous to the United Kingdom? And what's the indigenous spirituality? It's not Christianity," he says in a bubbling stream of consciousness. While he may not have all the answers now, he knew one thing to be true by the time he wrapped The Uprising: Given the choice between being a battered revolutionary and becoming a tech leader, he'd choose the former. "It was much more pleasurable being part of the Peasants' Revolt in medieval England, which says something, I suppose," he laughs.

You see, Garfield desires to immerse himself wholly in the psyche of the characters he plays—to adopt their mannerisms, understand their thoughts, and embody their essence until the lines between self and subject blur. Usually, this leaves the actor with a sense of understanding, even if the character has a villainous streak. But after playing the role of Altman in the summer of 2025, Garfield walked away from the project more confused than ever before.

"I really wanted to understand what it takes to 'win' at that level—what you have to sacrifice," he explains. "When you're at the forefront of creating new technology—the human costs, the people losing their jobs—what does it take to keep moving forward, knowing it's part of what you're creating?" It's a question that's lingered in Garfield's mind since taking on the role of Eduardo Saverin, the ejected cocreator of Facebook with Mark Zuckerberg in the 2010 film The Social Network. "I think I was playing the more human person in that relationship by playing Eduardo," he speculates. "It left a kind of unmet curiosity in me that was dangling around—like, 'Ah, fuck! I still want to understand what it takes to win'—because Eduardo famously didn't 'win' the capitalist game in that particular moment."

This fascination didn't stem from any desire of Garfield's to adopt a tech-bro mindset, per se. Rather, he craved the chance to explore a spirit so opposite to his own. Ask, and you shall receive. Nearly 15 years after The Social Network debuted, a script for Guadagnino's film about Altman, a satirical Silicon Valley film for the modern day, came across Garfield's desk. But what he found on the other end—the "winning" end—was a dull emptiness that couldn't be filled with material things or excessive liquid assets.

Recently, the film has been shrouded in some controversy. Its original distributor—Amazon MGM Studios, which has invested in OpenAI—dropped the project. It was later reported by Deadline that Neon acquired U.S. rights to the film. It's also worth noting that the AI giant has no connection to the project, and Garfield and Altman have never met. Though Garfield admits to having "a lot of very healthy fear" around taking on the character, he figured he'd discover Altman's essence somewhere along the way. "I'm a competitive person!" he exclaims, trying to find a semblance of common ground. "I love games. I love sport. I love winning. But winning at all costs in that world feels dangerous to the soul and, maybe more importantly, dangerous to the world."

A summer in Altman's shoes passed, and Garfield closed out his second film about big tech with more questions than answers. "I can never know the inside of [Altman's] head or the inside of his heart," he says diplomatically. "But I still remain very, very curious about what part of yourself you have to access, or maybe dissociate from, in order to achieve what these mostly men can." He uses the word "achieve" quite loosely. "It's fascinating to me as maybe someone who's too bleeding-heart."

It's this heart that has felt the disorienting effects of filming emotionally heavy projects in such close succession, but Garfield credits his costars and directors as driving forces behind the positive experiences within such "profound and challenging" films.

"Luca is someone who's so artistically free and kind of radical and punk," he rattles on about his Artificial director. "He just cares about expressing himself in the purest way possible, which I find deeply inspiring."

When speaking about Artificial costar (and girlfriend) Monica Barbaro, there's reverence in Garfield's tone. "I think Monica is a supremely talented actor," he starts. Fresh off a successful few years of high-profile films like Top Gun: Maverick, A Complete Unknown, and, most recently, the rom-com One Night Only with Callum Turner, Barbaro joins Garfield as former OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati, and he isn't shy about commending her portfolio of work. "I think what she did as Joan Baez [in A Complete Unknown]—what she accessed in that project—is nothing short of transformational, extraordinary, and deeply mysterious," he continues. "I think she is truly incredible. I could wax lyrical more, but I'll leave it there."

For The Uprising, he commends Thomasin McKenzie's "pure and soulful" demeanor and Jamie Bell's performance, which he lauds as "so fierce and rageful in its purity." With boyish joy, he shares that "[Greengrass] is the kind of person that you want to get covered in mud and go sprinting take after take for, to the point where you might vomit."

Garfield jokes that balancing several projects in quick succession felt "a little bit like Robert Downey Jr. in Tropic Thunder, when he's gone from character to character and has no idea who he is." Though these upcoming films are the topic of much intrigue, all roads lead back to his stint as the Amazing Spider-Man from 2012 to 2014—a role he reprised alongside Tobey Maguire and Tom Holland in the 2021 installment Spider-Man: No Way Home. "I'm grateful for the connection to a character that may be one of the most beloved fictional characters in the modern world," he says humbly. He holds in high regard the fact that anyone—regardless of skin color or gender identity—can project themselves into the suit. "I find it very moving that I have any association at all in anyone's consciousness with the ultimate beautiful, human, 'trying to do good' character," he beams. "I kind of can't believe that I had the chutzpah to even try to be part of that, but here we are." He continues, laughing at his own audacity, "I feel very, very lucky."

With numerous projects wrapped and a flurry of press junkets looming over the horizon, Garfield is enjoying the present, but that doesn't mean his mind never strays toward the future. He tells me of his "definite desires" and "vague plans" to return to the theater after his last run in Angels in America in 2018, though he's tight-lipped about specifics. "I'm always, God willing, going to be able to make theater," the actor muses. "That's where I feel most purposeful. … It's the place where I feel most happy and connected to that mysterious 'thing' that's bigger than me, that I get to give myself, my energy, and my love to. I feel I can make a difference in that space in a way that I can't anywhere else."

Though there's no telling when Garfield will return to the stage, the actor still feels there are hidden opportunities coming when he asks the universe what else is out there for him. "I'm wondering 'What do I do now?' in a way that feels very possible and exciting," he imparts, emotion lapping at his words. "I hope to bring new things into the world that haven't been done before—things that feel alive and, hopefully, healing for people, like an awakening of their own souls [and] of their own wrongings and desires and stirrings."

He's nearing the checkout line now, and I can only imagine what the cashier must be thinking as Garfield muses about one's unending search for self between pleasantries and passed produce. But that's the thing about Andrew Garfield: He knows how to turn the mundane into a masterpiece. "I just want to be of service through storytelling," he concludes.

In "Internet Files," Garfield is wearing a Giorgio Armani jacket, Michael Kors shirt, and Louis Vuitton tie.

Photographer: Emmanuel Sanchez Monsalve
Stylist: Jake Sammis
Groomer: Christine Nelli
Editor in Chief: Kat Collings
Creative Director: Amy Armani
Set Designer: Lizzie Lang
Entertainment Director: Jessica Baker
Producer: Erin Corbett
DP: Kyle Hartman

Shop the September Cover Story

Step into the universe of the coolest creatives in the fashion industry with our series My World, where readers will discover how the top stylists, designers, and tastemakers built their careers and get a peek into their favorite restaurants, beloved albums, fashion finds, etiquette rules they stand by, and so much more.

There are celebrity stylists, and then there are the people quietly shaping the way an entire generation wants to dress. Dani Michelle falls firmly into the latter camp. As the stylist behind some of the most influential wardrobes in Hollywood, Michelle has spent years creating the looks that end up everywhere—from red carpets and paparazzi photos to mood boards, Saved folders, and, inevitably, our own closets. Hailey Bieber and Kendall Jenner are among her longtime clients, but Michelle's influence extends well beyond any single name or viral outfit. Her particular brand of polished, effortless cool has become part of the visual language of fashion today.

Michelle has an uncanny ability to make clothes feel both aspirational and entirely wearable. She can turn an emerging designer into a name worth knowing, make a forgotten silhouette suddenly feel essential, or put together an otherwise simple outfit that sparks a thousand imitations. That instinct has made her one of Hollywood's most sought-after stylists and, perhaps more importantly, one of the industry's most influential tastemakers. When Michelle decides something looks good, it's worth paying attention.

That eye isn't limited to fashion. Over the years, Michelle has expanded her creative world into jewelry with her line Méga and into interiors, where the same fascination with proportion, texture, and balance that defines her styling comes into play. This fall, she's bringing that perspective to a partnership with Lulu and Georgia, spotlighting pieces from the brand's fall 2026 collection that feel at home within her own distinctly refined aesthetic.

It's that broader definition of taste that made us want to step inside Michelle's world. Behind the viral celebrity looks and enviable wardrobes is someone whose job, in many ways, is knowing what feels right before everyone else does. Ahead, Michelle discusses personal style, interiors, inspiration, the things she considers timeless, and what's catching her eye right now.

Give us a peek into your world. What does a typical day in your life look like right now?

I wake up with the sun. We keep our curtains open, and I think it's best for the body and mind. The morning always starts with checking my WhatsApp and emails from Europe and NYC for anything urgent. Then goes to a straight hour of kid cuddles, food, and family time. Usually, a few more emails get sent, and from there, [it's] school and a day's work—unless it's the weekend and we go into pool mode and play!

You've built a career around having a very distinct eye. Looking back, where do you think that taste came from? Were you always someone who cared deeply about clothes and how things were put together?

My taste, for certain, comes from my upbringing in Washington, DC. I had this duality of an incredibly proper influence and my skater friends on the edge that made both worlds become one for me. My taste is always classic and chic but cool.

You work with women who each have such distinct personal styles. When you begin working with a client, how do you figure out what their fashion language is rather than simply imposing your own?

That comes from us talking, having creative conversations about the art of clothing before we start, and then getting to know each other and what makes us swoon. I always build off of them as my inspiration.

We're living in an era where a celebrity outfit can be photographed, posted, dissected, and turned into a trend within hours. How much—if at all—do you think about the internet when you're putting together a look?

I don't.

You work with major fashion houses, but you're also known for introducing smaller or unexpected brands into your clients' wardrobes. What makes you stop and pay attention to a new designer?

It's never about who makes it for me, but what it looks and reads like. I always tell clients to take the name out of the look and just focus on how they feel.

Was there a specific job, client, or moment early in your career when you first thought, "Okay, I might actually be good at this"?

I've always known what I'm capable of.

You've expanded beyond styling with Méga, your jewelry line. What made jewelry feel like the natural next step for you creatively?

I've always looked at jewelry as something really sentimental and long-lasting. Jewelry is so meaningful to me and such a way to express your individuality and taste. It's something I'm passionate about always and forever.

You've been open about your love of interior design and styling in the past, saying it's akin to your work with your clients. What is it about interiors that scratches the same creative itch for you as fashion?

Fashion and interiors have always influenced each other for me. Interior design is the exact same art of balancing textures and proportions to create an aesthetic. Both are really an expression of your personal style.

You've described both fashion and interiors as being about finding the right balance of tones, textures, and proportions. Where do you notice those worlds overlapping the most?

I see the most overlap in tone and textures. I think the same colors that I'm drawn to in fashion usually show up in my spaces too. A neutral palette really calms me, and that's so important in my lifestyle.

To you, what makes an exciting and creative home brand, and what ticks those boxes for you when it comes to Lulu and Georgia?

I have loved Lulu and Georgia for years. When I got my office that I work in today, I styled the whole space with Lulu and Georgia pieces, using a big dining table as my work desk, chairs, side tables, and all. Now, I'm so excited about refreshing my own home with pieces from their fall collection. I love how the brand is really a design platform that has such a range of elevated designs and really allows you to make a space your own.

What's the interior equivalent of the perfect white T-shirt or pair of jeans—the piece you think every room needs?

A Diptyque candle and fabulous wood accents. I think every room needs the warmth and texture of wood, new or vintage. Most recently, I've styled the Winston Side Table from Lulu and Georgia's fall collection in my space, and I've been loving the natural striped pattern.

If you had to build an entire room around one Lulu and Georgia piece from the brand's fall collection that you love right now, what would it be?

I love the Hatton scalloped bedding. I think it adds such a pretty, subtle detail to the room without feeling overdone, which is something I often look for in my clothing too. I love when one small touch can change the whole feeling of a space or an outfit.

When you're putting together a room, what's your version of the styling high-low mix? What do you think is worth investing in, and where can you have a little more fun?

Just like with my clothing, I like mixing investment pieces with things that feel of-the-moment. I think you can always mix high-low in the home as long as the fabric and design are elevated and fit the story of the space.

What's the biggest decorating mistake you've made in your own home?

Just being nervous to take a risk. When in doubt, I keep it minimal, and if I'm being more daring, there would be more wallpaper, more metals, just more.

Finish the sentence: My space feels like home when it has __________.

My kids in it.

You have access to an extraordinary amount of clothing through your work. Has that made you more selective about what actually earns a place in your closet? What's one item you think every woman should own, regardless of trends?

Yes, I have a very particular eye for what I like for myself and all the versions of it, but my "can't live without piece" in a closet is a great blazer.

Is there a piece in your closet you've owned forever and will probably never get rid of?

My Fendi Baguettes from my mom.

Whose closet—past or present—would you want to raid?

Kate Moss's wardrobe in the '90s.

If you had to rebuild your closet from scratch and could only buy either vintage or new, which would you choose?

Probably new. I'm most inspired by vintage pieces but normally wear new.

You've helped create plenty of trends over the years. Is there one you secretly wish you could bring back?

Kitten heels forever.

What's one unexpected piece or trend you think is about to be everywhere this fall?

Big sunglasses.

You spend your career defining and anticipating taste. How do you know when you genuinely love something versus when you've simply seen it enough times that it starts to feel right?

I know the minute I see something if I love it or not.

You're constantly traveling, running to fittings, and working long days. What are the rituals you refuse to skip, no matter how busy you are?

Coffee is my biggest nonnegotiable.

Is there a beauty product you first discovered through one of your clients that has since become a staple in your own routine?

Cyklar bodywashes and oils, M.Ph Le Skin, and Rhode bronzer.

What's your everyday makeup uniform when you have five minutes to get ready

Moisturizer, foundation, bronzer, blush, lip liner.

What's one wellness habit that actually makes a noticeable difference in how you feel?

As simple as it sounds, drinking water.

You're constantly absorbing visual references for work. What's inspiring you outside of fashion right now?

Seaside life: the ever-changing waves, the slow rhythm of life, the beauty in the undone.

A person's algorithm says a lot about them. What's the strangest corner of the internet you've found yourself in lately?

Outside of fashion, mine is all AI, aliens, and cooking.

End-of-the-year music recaps are still a few months away, but if you had to guess, who will be your most streamed artist of 2026?

Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

If we opened your camera roll right now, what would we see the most of?

Fitting photos.

What's the last thing you saw—online, in a movie, on the street, anywhere—that immediately made you want to create something?

I wanna make my own AI fashion research agents.

What's a small thing that instantly annoys you?

When someone texts, "Call me."

Is there an etiquette rule you always stand by?

Saying "Thank you."

What's something people treat like a luxury that should really just be standard?

Healthcare.

What's something everyone seems to have in their home that you would never put in yours?

Colorful plastic toys. Of course, I have them, but they are all tucked away in drawers, and you would never know.

What's something considered "bad taste" that you secretly love?

Animal print.

What's one interior trend you think we're going to look back on and immediately know it was the 2020s?

Unintentional clutter that doesn't feel curated or thoughtful. I'm all for more in the home, but only when it feels purposeful and styled.

In the modern world, sports aren't just about what happens on the court, field, or track. Much of the buzz around athletes actually takes place before their events—that is, when they arrive at their respective venues and showcase their latest fashion creations. In basketball, that's referred to as a tunnel 'fit; in Formula One, a paddock 'fit; and so on. What athletes wear when they're not in uniform matters, especially to fans who might never get to speak to their heroes. Clothes are the perfect form of communication—a window into who your favorite athlete is and what they stand for. That's what Go Sports is all about. Yes, we care about box scores, the results of Free Practice 1 (even if it is at 3 a.m.), and RHOSLC-level rivalries, but today, sports fashion matters too. We're not ashamed to say so.

The US Open has officially begun, and with it, the tournament has brought buzz, chaos, and style to the tennis world and New York City. Fortunately for us, we snuck in five minutes with Italian star Lorenzo Musetti before things really kicked off. Musetti, an ambassador for both Asics and Bottega Veneta, is quickly becoming a fan favorite, and though he's had a tough season so far—struggling with injuries that have kept him out of two of the major Grand Slams in 2026—his performance in Cincinnati has put the odds back in his favor. Plus, after he made it to the quarterfinals at last year's US Open, we know he favors the hard courts at Arthur Ashe, and they favor him right back.

Ahead of his round-one match against Arthur Fery on September 1, hear Musetti talk about the energy he always feels when he arrives on the court in New York—particularly after dark. From there, read about the impact he believes feeling good in what you wear can have on your play and the tennis icon he's always looked up to, both for his on-court play and his off-court style.

Talk to me a bit about the US Open and what it means to you. What makes it such a special tournament?

This year, especially for me, it's really important because I missed two Grand Slams, so it's the last opportunity to do well in a Grand Slam. New York has [also] always treated me well as a city. Even in my down moments, New York, with its energy, always brought me back again. So I'm really happy to start and to be back here in New York.

As a spectator, there's nothing better than watching a night match at the US Open. As a player, what separates a night match from one in the daytime?

Well, the tension rises when you play a night match, especially in [Arthur] Ashe in front of a packed crowd of more than 20,000 people. Last year, I had the opportunity to play a match like that, and it was really, really intense emotionally for me. [It was] probably one of the most beautiful stages that I have played on. And of course, the conditions [change] from a night to a day session. Maybe at night, [it] could get more humid, so the balls can be a little bit rougher and a little bit slower. It's pretty different.

How does wearing the Asics Night Energy collection add to that experience?

When you feel comfortable in what you're wearing in your outfit, you have more authority on the court. That's what I personally feel. And with Asics, especially even last year during the night session with the black outfit, [it] was really cool. This year, hopefully, I will get to play a night session too. The outfit is really cool, and you can get energy even from that.

That was a perfect segue into my next question about the "look good, feel good, play good" mentality that so many athletes either totally agree with or don't resonate with at all. What's your opinion on that, and how do you feel an outfit can affect your play?

I feel that for sure. If you feel happy in what you're wearing, happy with yourself, and … okay with everything, you have more chances to feel okay when you're playing. It's an advantage to have. On the opposite side, if you feel that you are not really comfortable with what you're wearing or you feel uncomfortable physically, you have fewer chances to win the match.

You have people whose playing style you have looked up to that you've watched your whole career. Are there any tennis players who you've looked up to for their off-court style?

[Roger] Federer has always been my idol, not just in terms of [his] elegance of style. He was playing one-handed backhand, and I'm playing one-handed backhand too, so [I've] kind of always tried to mirror a little bit of myself in Roger. Of course, I'm not even close to him, but I recently had the chance to hit with him—to play with him. It was really, really fantastic for me and, you know, just a moment with my childhood idol.

"Sometimes, people just see me as a significant other," Ayan Broomfield tells me ahead of the 2026 US Open. "[They] assume that's why I'm in the tennis world." If you've only seen photos of the 29-year-old cheering on her partner, Frances Tiafoe, at the French Open or Wimbledon in a vintage Pucci set or a Cult Gaia minidress, that would probably be an easy assumption to make. "But I've actually had 20 years in the game," she assures. Broomfield is a spectator. She is a WAG (the nickname fans and media personnel have given to the wives and girlfriends of professional athletes). But neither descriptor defines Broomfield completely. If you look a little closer, you'll discover she's actually a Renaissance woman with an NCAA doubles title, a small part in King Richard, and two decades of experience playing the game. While she may have hung up her racket (professionally, at least), Broomfield's impact on the tennis world is far from over.

As an athlete from a young age, Broomfield never saw tennis as just a spectator sport. It was the foundation of her life. She grew up playing in Canada, eventually taking her talents to UCLA, where she won a national championship and established herself as a serious competitor in her own right. Then, the pandemic happened, as well as a slew of hard-to-overcome injuries. After giving her life to the tennis court through her childhood and collegiate years and stepping into the professional field, Broomfield traded the daily demands of athlete life for a new venture that allowed her to explore the sport from a different angle.

"I feel like I've done everything possible in tennis as a player," she tells me, reflecting on her career on the court. "At this point, I think of myself more as a storyteller—sometimes through content, sometimes through hosting, sometimes through building communities like Ayan's Aces. Everything I'm doing right now, especially in tennis, is about bringing people together, and I want to keep growing that."

Tennis has historically been a buttoned-up sport, but Broomfield believes that's changing. Her tournament wardrobe used to be dictated by comfort and function, but once she began attending matches as a spectator to support her partner, she realized fashion gave her a new way to express herself.

Over time, especially as fashion has become more integrated into the sport, she started showing her personality through her looks in the stands.

She now gravitates toward bold prints, designer looks, and statement-making pieces, and Thom Browne, Cult Gaia, and LaQuan Smith are among the designers on her radar for this year's US Open. "I really wanted to lean into the word 'bold,'" she explains, sharing a preview of her wardrobe for the tournament. "Bold silhouettes, tailoring, [and] fun accessories." Upon noticing this shift in fashion as it relates to the sport and adopting it herself, Broomfield realized something else: There is plenty of room to grow the tennis audience too.

Ayan's Aces was inspired by many moments where Broomfield saw a lack of diversity at tennis matches and events. "Once I started coming as a spectator, I realized there weren't a lot of women who looked like me in the stands, especially women of color," she says. When women told her they didn't feel like tennis was "for them," she knew she needed to take action.

What started with five tickets grew to 10 and eventually became a much larger initiative designed to help more people step into the world of tennis. Brands and tournaments now work with her to provide tickets and suites for a diverse community to enjoy the sport. Her goal? To get more women of color attending tennis tournaments. "Can you imagine the girls going to Paris for a week—shopping, sightseeing, going to a tennis tournament—just being together and building community?" The growth of the initiative has been fast, now reaching sports like Formula One and golf. Next, she hopes to take Ayan's Aces global.

For Broomfield, that evolution is about more than what people wear to tennis matches. It's about creating a space where more people feel like they can show up as themselves—whether that means donning a runway-worthy look in the stands, wearing a matching set on the court, or simply seeing someone who looks like them sitting beside them. "I want to use my platform and voice to keep pushing the envelope with how I present myself so more people feel comfortable wearing exactly what they want instead of conforming to typical tennis attire," she explains. Tennis might have been buttoned up during Broomfield's first 20 years on the court, but she's determined to leave it in a different state, one that's a little less proper and a little more open to interpretation.

Among the many things the Kardashian-Jenners are known for—enviable commercial instincts, unswerving loyalty, astounding ubiquity—lavish birthday gestures surely rank near the top. They have been throwing money-no-object parties for so many years, since long before they were famous, that entire industries have sprung up around them. If you count all the siblings, parents, grandchildren, significant others, and exes who are still in the picture, that's something like 25 birthdays a year, which, mathematically speaking, is one every 14.4 days. The reality for everyone in the family is only slightly less rigorous. For example, the entire month of September is a rare birthday-free zone on their calendar. November, on the other hand, abounds with cakes and balloons—four celebrations (Kendall, Rocky, Kris, Dream) in the span of a week! And then there's August, which Kylie owns.

Indeed, Kylie and I are on the phone the very Thursday of the party she's throwing for herself later at her concrete mansion in Beverly Hills, even though her birthday isn't until Monday. "I'm pretending my birthday is today because I'm going away tomorrow," she says. "So we're having a little get-together at my house so that my kids are a part of it." (A "little get-together" in King Kylie's world means a strictly enforced hot-pink "princess kitty" theme with three cakes. See Instagram.) It's 11 a.m., and she's taking a break from her preparations—Stormi and Aire in the background occasionally interrupting—for a meandering conversation about her year of being brave, testing the waters, and pushing herself to spend more time in the flow of normal human life.

For the sake of argument, let's agree that Kylie is the first Zoomer—patient zero of cohort Gen Z. She was born on August 10, 1997, three weeks before Princess Diana died and Netflix was founded. Chelsea Clinton packed off to Stanford that year, Ellen DeGeneres came out on the cover of Time, and J.Lo got married for the first time. The premiere episode of South Park, "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe," aired when she was 3 days old.

In some ways, she embodies many of the quirks of her generation. For example, she has an aversion to small talk. I first met Kylie over the phone in March 2022 as I was working on my forthcoming book, Citizen Kim, about her big sister. I spent years around Kim and had interviewed almost everyone in the family—except Kylie. The call lasted no more than 20 minutes and was the very definition of pulling teeth, a lot of long, awkward pauses and monosyllabic answers. At the time, I took it almost personally because it felt impertinent. Show some respect, young lady. But looking back, I see that it was just a combination of shyness and circumspection.

This time is different—although she still won't indulge me in small talk. (Whenever I share a personal anecdote, she says, "Yeah, same.") Kylie 2.0 is less suspicious and, relatively speaking, effusive. I had read the YouTube comments from the podcast she did with her sister Khloé Kardashian in late 2025, and the very first one said, "1 hour of Kylie just talking. This is what we have been waiting for all these years." And that is when I realized that even her superfans find her inscrutable. When I share this with her, she says, "Sometimes, I don't realize how much I don't share? So when I do things like that, I feel like that's always the reaction." In other words, she knows. She doesn't seem to care about relatability, which is probably the result of having been on a TV show since she was a child. As she said in a recent interview, "Not a lot of memories. I was 9 years old. [Cameras] were there one day in the house." You, too, might not want to bond with strangers after nearly 20 years of reality-show surveillance.

Kylie once said she feels like she lost her most "amazing traits" because she listened to "ignorant people who are bullies" on the internet. Today, she says, "I'm a confident person in my private life. I think it's just hard to be a woman and a human because of this very singular experience of having so much attention."

"She's always been the most, I would say, individual of all of us," says Kim Kardashian. "She's always known what she wanted to do in life, always known who she is at a young age, and has always been very confident. She's a wise soul. I've always seen that side of her behind the scenes. But she's coming into her own, and I think the world can see what our family has always seen."

One of the occasions for this profile is the rebrand of Kylie's accessible, collab-centric fashion label, Khy, into wardrobe-first minimalism. In addition to the launch of its upcoming fall collection, Khy is expanding into shoes for the first time in a collaboration with the Italian label GiaBorghini, which launched August 21. (More on this later.) But I could not help but think that it is Kylie herself who is in the midst of a rebrand. She is suddenly popping up on podcasts, acting, and sitting for interviews for British Vogue and Vanity Fair.

"I think it's more of a personal refresh," she says. "I think there's something that happens when you're turning 29—I'll be 30 next year—and you almost feel like the clock is ticking, even though you're still so young. So you're trying… I'm trying… I don't want to look back on life and be like, There's things that I wish I did when I was younger. Even though I already have children—so young—I feel like I lived such an adult life when I was young, and I'm trying to make sure that I don't have any regrets and to do brave things and give myself more opportunities or take advantage of the ones I have." She goes quiet for a minute as I learn in real time not to rush her. "Kim inspires me in that way because she does a lot of things that excite her but, at the same time, scare her. And it's amazing to watch her achieve and chase her dreams. I'm just trying to do more things, choose a few things a year, get out of my comfort zone, and just go for it."

Can you describe your comfort zone? "I think I've gotten really good at protecting myself and knowing what feels really safe and what I can handle," she says. "So I just kind of know—even down to how to leave my house and the safe places to go to. You know what I mean? How I present myself on the internet, what to say. I think there's a lot that I do to protect myself, and I just stay in this comfortable bubble. And I think it's because I've been so judged on the internet. Now, I have this big fear of embarrassment or something—more than ever. When I was younger, I just didn't really think about it. So when I was 16, I put myself out there, and I shared a lot more of my life. But the world is just different. Now, there's all these platforms. There's TikTok, Reddit, Substack…"

I'm afraid to start a Substack, I say. What if no one subscribes?

"I'm kind of into it," she says. "I might start one. It seems fun."

There were glimpses of the new swashbuckling Kylie last year. My first clue came in June 2025, when a fan asked her on TikTok what she requested when she got her "boobs done" because "it's like the most perfect, natural-looking boob job ever," and Jenner, to the world's great surprise, responded: "445 cc, moderate profile, half under the muscle!!!!! silicone!!! garth fisher!!! hope this helps lol." By the end of last year, she did her very first podcast interview in the safe space of Khloé's living room, with martinis in hand. In December, she and Timothée Chalamet went to the premiere of Marty Supreme in matching neon orange. Fun! When 2026 kicked off, the couple (together now for three years) hit the award-show circuit, from the Golden Globes in mid-January (making out!) to the Oscars telecast two months later. Then she appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair smoking a cigarette in a bustier and Hermès riding jodhpurs in a Madonna by Helmut Newton homage. In April, she was the first guest on the new podcast Big Bro With Kid Cudi—entirely winning and hilarious. A month later, she went on Therapuss With Jake Shane and went viral with this flawless bit of repartee: "Sometimes, I think I'm depressed, and then I get a spray tan, and I'm like, 'I was just pale.'"

But the revelation came with her cameo in the Charli XCX mockumentary, The Moment. Vulture described it as the best scene in the movie: "Kylie Jenner, it turns out, has legitimate chops as a comic actress. Nobody tell Kim." When I ask Jenner about it, she says, "I was playing a heightened, bitchier version of myself, so I kind of just turned up the volume." I ask her about the process (Did you rehearse? How many takes?), and she surprises me with a burst of candor and verbosity. "So I got the script," she says. "I was really nervous, so I called Kim, who was doing the Ryan Murphy show [All's Fair] at the time. Do you think I should do this? At first, she was like, 'Okay, just make sure you're prepared for this—blah, blah, blah.' She was a little more iffy. And then I read my part to her, how I planned to do it, and she was like, 'Oh! Kylie! You got this. Do it just how you did it on the phone. It's great.' And it gave me that confidence."

Kim—who, as Kylie said, is "in her actress bag"—was thrilled that her little sister called for advice. "Kylie is so funny," says Kim, "but you know, she was really shy for a while there. I told her that if she was going to do it, I wanted her to be her. So I just talked her through that: Are you gonna be shy? Is this one of those experiences? Or are you going to be you?"

Once Kylie signed up, she spent the next several days running her lines with friends. She felt good enough that she cancelled plans to work with an acting coach. The night before filming, Charli came over to her house, and they rehearsed it a few times. On set the next day, "they shot it maybe 10 or 12 times," says Kylie, "and then I started improvising a bit. It was just these little things that we were playing with and paying attention to what was making everyone laugh in the room, what felt funny." Spoken like a true comedian.

In July, she shot the King Kylie Dunkin' commercial with Dave Meyers, director of untold ad campaigns and music videos. "I had lines, and I had to act," she says, "and even though it wasn't a television show or a movie, I had to act in front of 40 people—all those actors plus the biggest crew you've ever seen in your life. I've never seen more people in a studio before. I was so nervous, but it was a test for myself to see if I could do this or not. Like, can I act in front of all these people? And it was great. So now, I'm like, Okay, I am good to go."

Indeed. The offers have started trickling in. "I haven't found the right thing yet," she says. "There were two scripts that came to me that I passed on. But I read something recently that I'm kind of interested in—the best I've felt about something so far. It's just a pilot; it hasn't been picked up yet. I'm feeling more precious about what I do next because I want to make sure it's the right fit, especially if I'm going to do something major and have to travel and be away from my kids. I want to make sure it feels right."

I tell Kylie that when I started working on the book about Kim—in 2021—I first watched every single episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians back-to-back over a period of six months, sometimes three episodes a night. "Oh my God!" she squeals. "I'm so happy for you! Isn't it the best?"

It's the most underrated documentary in history, I say, and we laugh.

I bring up the show to tell her that you can see—in later episodes and especially in the Hulu version, The Kardashians—Kylie getting funnier and funnier. Khloé, it seems to me, always held the mantle of funniest sibling. But maybe Kylie is the funny one. "I think Khloé and Rob and I are really similar in that way, but yeah…" She trails off and then whispers, "It's secretly me."

I wonder if she has a theory about what changed. Why did she become more self-conscious as she grew up? Was it getting older and raising children? Caring more about how she's perceived? Or was it something external? "I think social media is a big part of it. It's just changing," she says. "Now, it's more How far away can I get? You know, I delete my apps a lot. I try not to be on my phone all the time. I'm not a teenager anymore. It doesn't feel right for me to just scroll on TikTok all day when I have kids."

Having children so young forces you to grow up fast. You miss out on some things; you become both an early and late bloomer at the same time. Did Kylie experience that? "Yeah, absolutely," she says. "COVID was my college experience—when everything was shut down and no one was really working. It was the first time that I slowed down, and the world started to feel safe again. For the first time in my life, there wasn't a schedule. Sometimes, I feel like a robot, where everything is planned out for me. Khy meetings on Wednesday, blah, blah, blah. But COVID felt like I had a college experience—friends over all the time, and we were always celebrating something or trying to just be together. I was like, 'Wow, I never had that thing of, like, no other outside responsibilities—except Stormi.'"

Stormi was born on February 1, 2018. Kylie was 20. Exactly four years later, on February 2, Aire was born. "I made a promise to myself at 25,” she says, “that I was not going to have any more children—right now—and really just enjoy the last half of my 20s because the first half was like, 'You're pregnant,' and then it's the year of recovery, and, you know, my mental state, my postpartum depression, and all those things. It felt like I lost some of those young years of my life.”

More than once, Kylie says, "I'm almost 30," and it seems to be an indication that she is very eager to exit her 20s. Is there anything she'd like to leave behind? Something that once seemed important that she's changed her mind about? "I think having an enormous life," she says. "I changed my mind about that. When I was younger, I got really excited, and I got the craziest house I could in Beverly Hills, and I just kind of went for it. I've realized that my life got too big, and I said, 'Yeah, never mind.' I think I lost control of my life a little bit for a while there."

The reason for this is almost certainly to do with the fact that she became nearly a billionaire in 2019 when she was just 21. The 10th anniversary of the first Kylie Lip Kit was last November. She was 18 when she posted it to Instagram, and it sold out in minutes. Four years later, she was giving the official video tour of the brand-new, custom-designed pink HQ on Agoura Road in Calabasas with a giant pink neon KYLIE sign and her now-controversial "Youngest-Ever Self-Made Billionaire" Forbes magazine cover hanging in the lobby. (Besides the fact that she wasn't quite yet a billionaire, people got caught in the spokes of self-made. "None of the money I've ever made is inherited, so it's technically true," says Jenner, "but people just feel like the privilege I've had was a major stepping stone.")

Looking back on the 10-year journey, what's the big takeaway? "I wouldn't change it for anything," she says. "I learned so much, and I'm just so happy that I'm still doing it. It's definitely the thing I care about the most. If I had to choose—you can just do one thing—it would be Kylie Cosmetics because it's just such a real passion."

This is perhaps one of the reasons why the early iterations of her fashion brand, Khy, felt like a work in progress—because it was and, in some ways, still is. When the brand launched in 2023, the first collection sold out within days and generated $1 million in sales within its first hour. She admits to me that, unlike Kylie Cosmetics, it wasn't her idea: "It was an opportunity that came to me, and then I realized how much I love it." Earlier this spring, she steered the brand into its new, more grown-up era with a complete creative transformation. "I'm so excited about the future of Khy, and the rebranding is more about creating timeless forever pieces, moving a little bit away from collaborations, and trying to identify just who we are, what we stand for, the clothes that we want to make," she says. "So I think we're still building it, and it's a challenge to build something with so many people watching."

Besides expanding into shoes—which she's been working on for two years—Kylie is most excited about opening a brick-and-mortar Khy store in a couple of years. "For clothes, you really need something physical, a building, to create a world," she says. Perhaps, here, she is taking another page out of Kim's book.

There's a shopgirl legacy on her mother's side that goes back nearly 100 years, to when Kylie's great-grandmother, Lou Ethel, and her great-great-grandmother, a woman everyone called Tiny, opened a beauty parlor in Mississippi. Lou Ethel was the mother of MJ, the beloved grandmother to the Kar-Jenn clan, who died at 91 in July. She herself was the owner of several stores in San Diego for years, including a bikini shop, a women's fashion store, and a children's clothing boutique that was a La Jolla institution for more than 30 years. It's in their blood: When a marriage falls apart, open a shop! Kim and now Kylie, are keeping the legacy alive. "I'm very aware of that," says Kylie, "and I think we absolutely got it from MJ, and MJ got it from her mother—that work ethic and looking up to strong, independent women."

Kylie has gotten a bad rap over the years for not working hard enough, not being a serious person, and people thinking she's not really that involved in her brands. It couldn't be further from the truth. There's always a suspicion about celebrity brands: Is it really her? Kylie set the record straight on Kid Cudi's Big Bro podcast, saying "I go to work every day in the office. I'm super involved and am really crazy about everything. I do the Instagram myself. I do all the posts. I do the marketing, all the shoots, picking the models, knowing all the factories. It's hard for me to hand it off, because it's my baby."

As our conversation is winding down, I bring up Kim's super-viral moment from March 2022 ("Get your fucking ass up and work!"), and Kylie lets out a mordant chuckle. Like Kylie, Kim was born on the cusp of, in her case, the millennial generation: 1980. She is the living embodiment of hustle culture—something Gen Z, like small talk, rejects. Indeed, Kylie once said, "The public will be like, 'You're just like Kim,' and I'm like, 'I am nothing like Kim.'"

Kylie takes a minute to think about what she wants to say. "Kim embraces that narrative about herself," she says. "Because she does work really hard, she's like a superwoman. She just has such a great work ethic, and she handles so many things all at once, which is really impressive." She takes another second, "How I present myself to the internet maybe doesn't show the businesswoman side of me." One more long pause. "So maybe I'll lean into that."

Photographer/Director: Aidan Zamiri
Cinematographer: James Beattie
Stylist: Alexandra & Mackenzie Grandquist
Hairstylist: Iggy Rosales
Makeup Artist: Ariel Tejada
Manicurist: Zola Ganzorigt
Set Designer: Grace Surnow
Projector Artist: Will Wharton
Production Company: Object & Animal; Ted & Jane
Executive Producer: Emi Stewart
Producer: LE Seydel
Creative Producer: Reese Layton
Editor in Chief: Kat Collings
VP of Creative: Alexa Wiley
Style Director: Lauren Eggertsen
Entertainment Director: Jessica Baker
Director of Production: Erin Corbett

It has arguably been the summer of high school dramas, but none is more stylish, erotic, and deadly than Ryan Murphy's latest offering, The Shards. The steamy thriller based on Bret Easton Ellis's best-selling novel of the same name promises all the makings of a great summer watch: an attractive cast of newcomers (the official calling card of a promising YA show), a murdery mystery, and fashion and beauty excess.

Set against the vibey backdrop of early-'80s Los Angeles, The Shards follows a stylish social circle at an elite prep school. At the center of the group is the show's narrator Bret Ellis (Igby Rigney), an astute senior and aspiring writer tracking a menacing serial killer targeting affluent teens. His cohorts are a glamorous trio consisting of his girlfriend Debbie Schaffer (Hayes Warner), who descends from Hollywood royalty; class queen bee Susan Reynolds (Kaia Gerber); and her boyfriend and school quarterback Thom Wright (Graham Campbell). Navigating a life of parties, drugs, and sex, the group's seemingly alluring lives are interrupted when smoldering new student Robert Mallory (Homer Gere) arrives.

Maybe it's her Debbie Harry–esque platinum-blonde locks or her sharp-tongued insults or her seriously enviable wardrobe, but we're kind of partial to Debbie. Hers is a complicated story worth digging into. Hayes Warner, the actress who plays her, completely agrees. Debbie, too, was her favorite when reading Ellis's novel for the first time. "She's spicy," the 27-year-old tells us over Zoom. The New York native was in the midst of a burgeoning pop music career—releasing breakout singles such as "Predator" and playing Lollapalooza—when the audition for Debbie came her way. While quietly auditioning in the background, Hayes hadn't felt this passionate about an acting role in a long time.

Now, with a hit summer series under her belt and all-new original music for the show's soundtrack, Hayes is right where she wants to be as a rising multi-hyphenate in Hollywood.

Did you want to be a performer from a young age?

I grew up acting and singing and doing musical theater and dancing. I ended up going to Northwestern for musical theater, so I was acting all through college, taking acting classes and taking it really seriously. My love of songwriting took me on this journey, and I ran with it. It is my first love. The past few years, I've been able to tour, and I signed a publishing deal, and I've been doing sessions and performing at things like Lollapalooza. I was still auditioning, looking for the right roles, but music was really my main focus because it felt so authentic to me and right for me. That's the way I felt when I saw this audition for The Shards.

I grew up on Ryan Murphy. I had read The Shards. I loved Bret Easton Ellis's work. And this character, when I read the book, I was like, "Oh, I love Debbie. She's spicy, and also, there's a lot more going on. She has depth." So the way that music felt so authentic to me, this part felt perfect for me, and I was just as feral about getting it as I have been about getting touring slots or releasing a single at the time that I want to release it. That same passion I had for music I really had for this particular part.

So you loved Debbie from the jump. What excited you about Ryan Murphy's interpretation of the character, and in what ways could you relate to her?

Even when I read the book, it's so clear Bret's perspective is not really reliable. Everything is from his perspective. And not to be biased, but when I read it, [Debbie] was my favorite character because I was like, "What does she know? She's got to know more than what she's giving off or what Bret thinks she knows." And I think she just gets pushed to the side by him. There's a lot that she's dealing with with her family, and he observes it, but he's so in his own mind about what's going on with Robert.

What I was so excited about [when] getting the script is that there was a scene with Liz, with [Debbie's] mom—who's played by Evan Rachel Wood, who is so iconic—in episode 2, and it was clear. Oh, Ryan is gonna bring you through Debbie's backstory, and you're gonna understand more what Debbie's going through and why she's the way she is and what she knows in a way that the book doesn't allow you to, but while staying really authentic to the book. And that's what hooked me immediately.

It sounds sad, but I am someone that likes to push things down and really just put on a façade that everything's fine and not deal with it and let things build up. Everyone's like, "That's really sad." And I'm like, "I'm just being authentic." Another thing is I like to store things in a mental cabinet. Whether it's behavior from someone or someone's lying to me, I don't have to start an argument or fight. It just informs my behavior, and I file it away. I think Debbie does that a lot. I had a lot of fun playing her.

You grew up on the Ryan Murphy universe. What was it like to actually meet and work with him?

I keep saying this, but it was a dream come true. It was like me working with one of my creative idols growing up. No one in my family is in entertainment. It always was seen as a part-time hobby until I started to show my family, "Hey look, you can make money." At the premiere, my mom met Ryan, and he was so sweet about me. I fought so hard for this role, and he talked about that with her, and she knows because she was there with me and sees how much this changed my life, having to move to L.A. on a whim. It was like this dream of Hollywood really happened to me, and my family all saw it. My mom was so emotional meeting Ryan and getting to talk about it.

So on one hand, I am so grateful to him for giving me that opportunity and believing me and trusting me with this part. And then, on the other end, he really was involved in The Shards. He was on set all the time. He directed multiple episodes. We'd go to dinner with him after we were done with scenes. I went to dinner with him two days ago. We are very close, which is crazy. It's given us a chance to see inside his mind and how detail-oriented he is. He has such an eye for everything.

Is there a Murphy project that stands out as being quite influential for you?

I think it's the obvious one for a theater kid. Glee changed my life. I believe it was the first TV show I ever was down bad for. Every Tuesday, I would watch with my parents. I thought it was just incredible.

Talk to me about being transported to 1981 to this world that Murphy and Ellis created.

What's so insane about these productions is there's no stone left unturned. When we're filming episode 1 and [the Pacific Coast Highway] is rented out for us to film driving in these old Mercedes, it's like, "What the hell?!" Or when they're doing the car-chase scene and every storefront looks like an '80s storefront… It's such a gift as an actor because there's a lot of scene work you have to do in prep and character work, but getting these clothes put on you that are from the '80s, the hair, and everything is completely transformed to be like the '80s. Even little things, like lunch boxes or Ruffles packages, everything is '80s. It just takes you to that time. So much of the work is done for you.

You are a late-'90s baby. Is there anything from the early '80s you appreciate or wish was still around?

I'd say it was really interesting how much communication face-to-face had to happen with no cell phones. There were landlines, and we used phones in the show, but a lot of the interactions that happened, even characters showing up at people's houses, wouldn't happen now. It would just be a text. I think so much of that helps inform people's relationships. Doing more face-to-face, awkward, clunky interactions and less texting was really fun for the story. And then the big-volume hair, the side parts, it's so much work, but if I don't have to do the work, I appreciate how it looks a lot. The boys really took the short shorts a little too far.

That's where you draw the line.

I was like, "No, none of that."

You became quite close with your on-screen BFF, Kaia Gerber. Tell me about first meeting her and how your friendship evolved while working together.

We all met as a group, and I could tell I liked everyone, which is actually crazy. I was bracing myself because everyone has different personalities, and you never know with actors. Same with me. And immediately, we're all like, "Okay, Ryan is really good at seeing chemistry and feeling out people's personalities." We clicked immediately. Me and Kaia went to Lolo Wine Bar two days later in L.A., and it was like, "Okay, we're good." One thing I immediately appreciated about her is that… When I moved to L.A., I didn't know anyone. I was a little frazzled. I felt really lost, and she really grounded me and became like a second family to me. Anything I needed in L.A., if I needed a doctor or somewhere to go, she was so supportive and helpful.

People, especially when there are just two girls, want to pit them against one another, and both of us came in with [the attitude that] that is not happening with us. If we had not meshed, who knows what would have happened. I will always be so appreciative of how she and her family took me in. I would have had such a different experience without that. And the same with her—I just want her to win. When she's doing a scene and she needs something from me, I want to make sure that I'm there for her and doing anything that I can. We became best friends, and I'm really grateful that she was Susan.

Thinking back to filming, was there a scene or a day that stands out to you as being very memorable?

We were early in shooting. It was like January, and Ryan, out of the blue, put us all in a group chat and was like, "The pilot is incredible. I'm so proud of all of you. Let's get dinner." None of us had really hung out with him socially, so we're all nervous. We went to Chateau [Marmont], and it's so iconic. All the writer's rooms are there, and he has a bunch of rooms there for different purposes. We all got drinks and sat around the table and laughed. He's so funny, and just seeing him as a person made us all so much more comfortable on set, knowing we could go to him with questions. And then we went up to the writer's room, and he's like, "I'm showing you guys the pilot." We all had our martinis and were sitting around his old laptop to watch the pilot in the middle of shooting, and it was really exciting.

Is it true that no wigs were allowed on set?

Oh my gosh. There were wigs, but we didn't have wigs.

Talk me through the process of becoming Debbie.

My hair, if there's backlighting, it's not the cutest thing. So thank God Ryan knows how to light. But I will say they all took great care of my hair. Being full platinum—like "it's never blonde enough" type platinum—was really hard to get. Every three weeks, I would go get my roots touched up in Pasadena by my incredible hairstylist.

In the morning, me and Kaia would be there three hours before everyone else, and we would have our rollers in and then go to makeup, and then after makeup, we take the rollers out and do the teasing. And then the boys would show up, and we're like, "Hey, sleep well?" We'd get there at 4 a.m., and you just completely transform into this character. The hair is something I can't re-create. What they did was just so incredible and so perfect—and the different styles of it. The fittings were actually really big. In preproduction, I had probably 15 fittings just trying to find Debbie. They did a super-preppy Debbie, a kind of rock 'n' roll Debbie, and we landed on a really edgy, rock star–inspired [Debbie] that I really relate to and love. It was a lot of finding it and a lot of trial and error and a lot of hair.

It gives you an appreciation for what women did back then to do their hair.

Me and Kaia always laugh. The one question both of us asked our moms was, Is this how much effort you guys did every day before school? My mom was like, "Yep, every day."

Who would be some of the women on Debbie's mood board?

Michelle Pfeiffer, especially in Scarface, would definitely be on there. She has this beautiful, slightly dangerous, cool-girl femininity that feels very Debbie (glamorous and feminine) but with an edge. Patti Smith for her attitude and refusal to conform and Jodie Foster, who has this intelligence and intensity that I think would really resonate with Debbie.

I also think the mood board would have a lot of women who weren't necessarily fashion icons but who embodied a certain independence and confidence. Debbie is constantly trying to figure out who she is and prove that she's more than what other people expect her to be, so I wanted the women she looked to [to] feel aspirational—not just aesthetically but in the way they carried themselves.

Do you have a favorite look of Debbie's?

It's really funny because some of my favorite ones on-screen were … the hardest to wear. They were very tight.

I heard about some zipper panic attacks.

When Kaia and I were interviewing each other, the truth came out—like, let me talk about the zipper panic attacks. The pink [look] in episode 4, I love. The dance-off [episode], I love that blue [look]. It was so easy and also moved so well. Those are my two favorites, I'd say.

You contributed a couple of songs to the soundtrack. Was that something that was discussed with you early on, or how did that come to be?

That was really natural, and that's part of how supportive Ryan is of his actors and how invested in their lives he is. He knows how important music is to me, so he was like, "I would love to have you in the soundtrack." And it was a huge deal for me. He gave me some direction, and I was listening to '80s music all the time on set. I knew the different scenes, so I could write it with different things in mind. I sent him a bunch of stuff, and I think the two that made the show are really the ones I wrote from the perspective of Debbie, which is really fun. One of them is called "No One Takes Me Seriously," which is all the things that I relate to her with. There's a lot of Debbie in there. Also, Troye Sivan did a lot of original music, and I work closely with his collaborator, Leland. So while I was shooting, I got to hear what he was doing, and I got to talk to Troye and hang out with him. He would watch the episodes and give me what he liked about them. It was very collaborative.

Now that you have The Shards under your belt, what does the future of acting look like for you?

I am completely in love with acting and have different projects in the works and am in the early stages of talking to people. So I'm gonna 1000% continue acting and working on projects that feel really passionate to me. I'm getting a lot of the question of "If you had to choose," and what's funny is so many of the artists I look up to and aspire to be like are doing both and have come from one and still are involved in acting and singing and dancing and producing. I want to be a multi-hyphenate. I want to take on projects that feel passionate to me, and I think they'll inform each other.

The Shards is now streaming on FX on Hulu.

If you've been following Paige Lorenze for a while now, you're probably used to calling her that name. But these days, she's Paige Paul, and with the new name comes a new era. After marrying professional tennis player Tommy Paul, moving into a new home, expanding her Dairy Boy team, and opening her first brick-and-mortar store in Nantucket, she's entering a chapter that feels distinctly her own.

Consider this your reintroduction.

Paul has spent the past several years building a life and career in public—first as a New York City It girl, then as a businesswoman who moved away from the city to start her own fashion brand. And then came her bridal era. The role that most distinctively stuck with her through it all is being the founder and creative force behind Dairy Boy. What started as an apparel brand has evolved into a lifestyle built around nostalgia, Americana, comfort, and the slower pace of summer days. But perhaps the most interesting evolution is the one happening behind the scenes. "I really believe that everything has gotten better with time and age," she tells us. She's learned so much about what she's good at, what she's not, and, most importantly, who she is.

Yes, Paige Lorenze became Paige Paul, but this story isn't simply about a new last name. It's about everything that has come with it: becoming a newlywed, growing Dairy Boy into the brand she's always dreamed of, stepping into in-person retail, and figuring out what the next version of herself looks like.

Ahead, Paul opens up about her new chapter, the evolution of Dairy Boy, why Nantucket was always the place she wanted to open her first store, and what she's dreaming up next.

How has your life evolved as you step into this new chapter?

My life has changed so much every year in such a good way. I really believe that everything has gotten better with time and age. I am learning more about myself, and that's made me more confident. Learning what I'm good and bad at has really helped me in business as well. The better you know yourself, the better you are as an entrepreneur. Also, a lot has changed. I'm in a new house. My office has expanded at Dairy Boy. I opened a store in Nantucket and am working on opening a store in other locations. I have a feeling that every year is going to be exciting and inspire lots of change.

You wear a lot of hats as a founder, creative director, and content creator. Which role are you most excited about lately?

I'm excited about every part of my business, but opening in-person stores has been incredibly rewarding and important for me. Living so much of my life online as a creator brings out a sense of disconnect from real-life experiences. Being a founder and opening brick-and-mortar has been the hat that I've been most proud of.

When you launched Dairy Boy, what gap do you think existed in the market that you were trying to fill?

I was looking for pieces that feel very American but are affordable and feel special. We care so much about tiny details like special hangtags, embroidery, little buttons, and more. Usually when those special details come into play, people jack up their prices, which is fine, but I just felt like there wasn't a brand that had this sort of style that was affordable. I feel like we've really accomplished that, and I want to continue to push that and push having high-quality, thoughtful goods that are affordable.

What has surprised you most so far about building the brand?

There have been so many different things that have surprised me. Being a public-facing brand founder has been interesting, and it shocked me. I know what I signed up for with social media, but the challenges that have come with that can occasionally include hypocrisy and double standards, but it hasn't deterred me. It's been eye-opening.

As a founder, what's something that you wish you knew from day one?

The fashion industry is very gatekept. It took me years to figure out how to put a design team in place. It wasn't until I hired recruiters to help me build my team that I was really able to build it out. I didn't go to school for design, and I wish I had known a little bit more about how the fashion industry works. I've learned so much, and honestly, it's probably a good thing that I had to learn it all myself. I didn't inherit any contacts or leg up in the business that I'm in, but I think that it's allowed me to learn a lot and make the connections myself. It would have been nice to even have someone in my circle that knew about different factories and about how production and manufacturing work. That all took me a while to learn, but I'm very grateful that we are where we're at now.

What do you think people connect with about Dairy Boy? It's evolved to be more than just apparel. It's become a lifestyle.

First and foremost, everything that really inspires me is the feeling of nostalgia. Nostalgia is such a strong emotion. I really try to tap into that. The brand is constantly reminding people to slow down. It is a lifestyle, and I think that wherever people are in their lives—whether they're living in the city or they're living in the suburbs—that sense of peace and groundedness and unfussiness is what people relate to. There are so many exciting high-fashion brands right now, but we all need something in our wardrobe that is more casual and that is more comfortable. That's where Dairy Boy comes in.

What has been one of the most exciting moments this year?

Opening the Nantucket store and the collection we designed around it. It was the most exciting to me and definitely the proudest moment in my career. The collection being tied to a physical space that means so much to me … was a "dream come true" moment.

Why Nantucket?

It's just such a special place to me. I've been going there my whole life. My mom's been going there her whole life. It's one of the most magical places in the world, and for me, just opening a store in New York would have been the more obvious, less risky business decision, but all of our best memories are made in the summer with family or with loved ones. Being able to tie someone coming into my space with those memories as a part of their time visiting the island just felt right. I've been working in retail there my whole life and worked in the restaurants as well, and it was always a dream of mine to open a store there. The second I had the opportunity to be able to, I jumped on it.

When people walk into the store, what do you want them to notice?

The thoughtfulness and that it feels like a home. It doesn't just feel like a store with racks. A lot of the woodwork is really special. We had some amazing local carpenters work on the space. That part was the biggest labor of love.

What made now the right time to open it, and is it open year-round?

I just felt confident enough in the community that I've built online to take a risk and open a store. It's going to be seasonal, but it's also going to be open into the fall and first stroll, which is the Christmas Nantucket event. We're going to have regular programming, like what all the other stores in the area do.

How are you feeling now that your wedding's behind you?

All the emotions. I'm just really excited for this next stage of my life. There's definitely a little bit of the wedding blues and just feeling sad it's over. It's just so nice to have everyone I care about in one place. Now, Tommy and I want to try to throw a party every year to get all of our friends together because, just with our busy schedules, it's hard. With Tommy's friends who run on a tennis schedule, it's very hard to get everyone together, as there's no tennis offseason, and all the guys are based all over the U.S. We're gonna definitely try to make an effort to do something like that every year, which is really fun.

What was your overall vision for the big day?

I did it at this really old estate, but the way that I decorated everything and the looks I did were also modern. It was authentic to the time period that we're in and the style that I'm living now with my partner. It felt timeless and elegant but also modern. My dress encapsulated that alongside the event itself. The result was a modern-bride approach in a nostalgic setting.

Do you think your experience working in fashion influenced the decisions you made about what you ended up wearing?

Definitely. Having the opportunity to work with Wes Gordon and Carolina Herrera on my dress was a real honor. If I wasn't where I'm at in my career now, that wouldn't have been an opportunity that would have been presented. I'm very grateful.

What advice would you give brides who are currently planning their own weddings?

While you're engaged, make mood boards on Pinterest and collect inspiration, but then about six months before the wedding, put that all away and just try to stay true and make your own vision [in] your own head. Because of social media and Pinterest, we're being told what our weddings should look like, what the florals should be, and what your dress should be. However, the most beautiful weddings are a true reflection of the bride and the groom. You don't want to just copy and paste something that you've seen online. Making an event that feels 100% true to you will allow your guests to enjoy it and, of course, reflect in the way you look back at it.

I wanted to ask about your plans for the US Open. What do you have in mind for your personal style this season?

I was just texting my stylist for the US Open because we'll have a fitting soon for it. Our inspiration for our fitting for the US Open this year will definitely be casual but refined. No crazy looks, but just something that feels confident and elegant.

How do you think your courtside wardrobe has evolved over the past few years?

It's definitely evolved. I have so much fun with it. If anything, I would say I find myself dressing less fancy. At one point, I felt like I was having so much fun with it, where I was leaning in so hard into the glamour of it all—wearing dresses and gowns and tweed to every event. I find myself dressing more casual now but still dressing up. That's what is most true to me.

Do you think Dairy Boy or your new DB Sport line will have a presence at the tournament?

Yes, we'll be around. We're going to be doing a pop-up before the US Open, [and] we've made some fun sport things that you could wear to the matches that people will really enjoy.

Looking ahead to the future, what are you most excited about for 2027 and the Paige Paul era?

I plan to continue to grow my brands. There are so many exciting things on the horizon, and I feel like we're in a great spot as a brand, but there's also so much room for growth, and I'm just excited to keep getting better and bigger.

Where do you hope Dairy Boy is a year from now?

The same thing but bigger and in more people's hands. Every month, there's a new product we're developing. Continuing to dive into home goods is definitely a priority to me. Hiring out a team to help produce home goods is definitely going to be an investment I'll make in the future. It's something that we've done before, but our focus will always center around the clothes.

Photographer: Jingyu Lin
Stylist: Maren Taylor
Hairstylist: Erol Karadag
Makeup Artist: Andi Bisbal
Location: Waldorf Astoria New York

One of our most viewed TikTok videos of 2026 is of actor Keen Ruffalo arriving at the Dior cruise show in Los Angeles. Dressed in the fashion house's slouchy deep-V gray sweater, a blue button-down shirt, and light-wash jeans and sporting his floppy haircut, the 25-year-old posed nervously for the cameras with a boyish charm about him. The clip quickly racked up 1.5 million views and over a thousand comments, with adoring fans calling him "awkwardly cute" and begging to "put him in a rom-com right now." A star was born.

Little did they know at the time that Ruffalo, the son of Mark Ruffalo and Sunrise Coigney, would be the breakout star of the next big teen drama, Sterling Point. The latest in Prime Video's wildly successful YA summer series and the brainchild of actor-turned-writer/director Megan Park (My Old Ass and The Fallout), Sterling Point is a coming-of-age romantic drama that follows 17-year-old Annie Jacobson (Ella Rubin) and her twin brother Connor (Ruffalo), whose lives take a turn when they discover their estranged grandfather left them a small island in Canada.

After devouring the show's first eight episodes, I walked away with both a new TV obsession that I'm telling everyone to watch and wanting to see more of Ruffalo, whose emotionally conflicted Connor injects the show with some of its funniest moments. Luckily, the actor also has the road-trip buddy comedy Nimrods coming out this month.

A scene-stealer with his sights set firmly on a future filled with indie dramas and maybe a period piece or two, Ruffalo is the Hollywood breakout star to watch.

I don't know if you realize this, but our readers went wild for a video we posted of you from the Dior L.A. show earlier this year.

I saw that. I didn't really check my phone the day after the event, and then I went on to my Instagram two days afterward, and I was like, "Why do I have a few hundred new followers?" I was so confused. And then my friend sent me the TikTok [video] like 10 minutes later. I was like, "Oh my god, what the fuck is this?!"

Did you have fun at the show?

Yeah, I had a lot of fun. It's my first fashion show. I was so anxious, and I didn't know there was a red carpet thing.

When did acting become a serious pursuit for you? Were you quite young?

Obviously, I grew up around my dad doing it. Me and my sisters were kept pretty separate from it all. I grew up on a farm, so I didn't really understand what it was until, I guess, probably the Marvel stuff. I had some kid come up to me like, "Hey, can you have your dad sign this Hulk toy?" And I'm like, "No, man, you're mean to me." But yeah, I didn't really see the appeal in it for a long time. I was much more interested in what my mom was doing. She was more into fashion and stuff like that. For a long time, I was actually doing fashion and jewelry-making.

Tell me more.

I started going to college for [jewelry-making], and then COVID happened. I ended up dropping out of college and didn't have the facilities to make jewelry anymore. And then it got to that weird point of COVID where I'm questioning everything I'm doing and being like, What do I want to do with my life? The COVID depression started hitting, and I was like, "I need to try something new. … Acting makes my dad so happy, and he loves doing it." I never really considered it before, and I was like, "I might as well try it and see how I like it." So I started taking online classes, which is the weirdest way to learn how to do anything. I started to really enjoy it, and I ended up doing Zoom classes for a little while with a tutor, and then I was like, "I want to go to an actual conservatory and study techniques." I ended up going to HB Studio in New York and doing the Uta Hagen [program]. And that's where I really fell in love with it because I was getting to perform in front of other people. What really drew me to it is being able to be these different people. I feel like everybody wants to be someone else sometimes, and it was a nice outlet to get out of myself.

I became a huge nerd about acting technique. That's my whole thing now. … Every time I meet an actor, I'm like, "What technique do you use?" I ended up studying at all the major conservatories in the U.S. because I wanted to learn all the techniques. I went to RADA for a little while, and after a few years of doing that, probably around 2023, 2024, my dad saw a play that I was doing, and he was like, "Alright, I think you've put in enough effort, and you're ready to start auditioning." He gave me the go-ahead on that. But he's an old-school actor. He was like, "You need to be yelled at. You need to be told not to do this by an acting teacher." I started doing that, and eventually, I was able to finally land something after auditioning for a year or so. It was a small part in Nimrods, this Green Day film. Actually, when I auditioned for Sterling Point, I was still shooting [Nimrods].

Did you find that first year of auditioning insightful or defeating?

You'll work so hard on something, and you'll want the role so badly, and you'll go in. You'll be like, "I killed that one. That's the best one I've ever done." And then you'll just never hear anything. You won't even hear "You didn't get it." It'll just be nothing, which is even worse.

Ghosted.

Yeah. I just kept on going and persevering through it. God, I probably did upward of 100 auditions before I even got that one role. It's demoralizing. You're like, "I've studied all the time. Am I any good at this?"

Did your dad offer you any good advice during that time?

Yeah. He's a big believer in you gotta do it yourself. I'll learn things that I'm like, "Why didn't you tell me about this?" when it comes to industry things. He'd do an audition with me or work on it with me, but that's the extent of [how] much he's willing to help me, which I can appreciate. I feel like I've done the work on my own to be able to be here. My name is obviously something that's helped along the way. There's no denying that. But what kept me going was probably just that I really wanted to do this. I couldn't imagine doing anything else, especially since I found acting at such a dark point in my life that it seemed like the only option. I just really loved doing it and wanting to be able to make a living from it.

Sterling Point is the latest in a line of Amazon summer romantic dramas, and I don't know if you realize, but they're on a hot streak right now. Are you aware of the viral potential of this moment for you?

I'm sure it'll feel more real once it comes out, but right now, it's like, "Oh boy, I hope I get more auditions once this comes in."

You are such a standout in this show. The writer-director Megan Park also wrote and directed My Old Ass. Were you familiar with that movie before, or was this your introduction to Park?

This was my introduction to her. I went and did my research prior. Finding out just how much she lets you go and play with the character is something I wasn't expecting. Coming from a theater background, that's not really a thing. You're the character that they want you to be, and there's no deviating from the lines, or your director will come and strike you. I remember my first introduction to it being okay was during the Nimrod shoot. That was a bit of a crash course, and thank God I had that experience going into Sterling Point because then I felt comfortable with the improv. I got to do it on my first day.

I [improvised] the line where I come into the room and Annie's talking with her boyfriend, her gay boyfriend. I say, "Sup, pimps, grandpa died." It was originally like, "Hey, guys, grandpa's dead." I heard our DP literally break. She laughed while we were shooting the scene, and then Megan was like, "You know Connor so well. Let's just do one clean take and then improv, and we'll come in and tell you what to keep and what not to keep." A lot of my lines [that made it in] are actually improv. I'd never done comedy prior to it, so I wasn't sure what to expect. I was really worried that Connor would just be this funny guy, but in my head, I knew that he was going through his own stuff. I was afraid that it didn't really show, so I'm glad, from what I'm hearing, people are like, "[He] seems to be very conflicted."

Yes! Connor does bring levity to the show, but it is clear he is harboring his own issues. What conversations did you and Park have about Connor's journey?

She was like, "Just do whatever you think is right." I was like, "No one's just funny. No one that's had a perfect life is a funny person." People find humor and darkness in it all, and Connor masks that when he's uncomfortable or feels that he doesn't belong. He tries to cope with that by being funny and wanting to be likable and making people laugh. I think it's his own way of dealing with himself feeling like an other in the family dynamic. He loves his dad, and he loves Annie, but I think he really only feels any familial connection with Annie. There's a scene that actually didn't make it in the final cut, sadly, but it's where they have this huge fight, and he begs [Annie] to go and find their biological parents because he's like, "You found your family. I don't have that yet." I definitely tried to bring some of that in, and I'm glad it's showing.

We're in this era of YA romantic dramas right now. What really grabbed your attention about this story?

It's an interesting take on a summer romance because those never last. That's not really what they're for. And seeing two people really trying to make it last and then really trying to change, I think, was appealing. In the whole grand scheme of things, I like the "love finds a way" trope. I don't want to rag on YA shows, and I'm sure a lot of this doesn't feel relatable and real to a lot of people either, but it felt more connected and grounded than I find a lot of YA shows where it's these very extreme gestures of romance. That's what was really appealing for me.

And then the fact that I got to play Connor, who is such a large character… He's really dominating, just his entire being. It's so uncommon to get roles like that. He's very out-there and almost not normal. A lot of the time, you want to be subtle when you're on film, and it's different when it comes to theater. You need to be large for the audience. So then being able to play a character who's, by nature, large like that is really cool.

Talk to me a little bit about filming on location and working with this young cast. Did it feel like a summer-camp vibe?

This job is interesting, especially with the social dynamics of it all, because you'll get so close with these people that you're hanging out with and working with every single day. We're all in the same age range. We're all hanging out outside of work. There's like five months of this every single day where I'd see at least one person from the cast. And then suddenly, you don't see them, and they're gone. It really is bittersweet wrapping a show like that. Me and Jacob [Whiteduck-Lavoie], every time we had a day off, we'd go and play pickleball together. Me, Bo [Bragason], and Nikko [Angelo Hinayo] would go and watch movies a lot and just go hang in the park or go have a picnic. Especially when we were in Muskoka, we were all staying in the same hotel, so then it became even more like we would just bump into each other when we were going out to grab breakfast or something. So yeah, it did feel a bit [like] a summer camp.

Do you still have a group chat with the gang?

Yeah, we do. It's become a lot more active recently because we're all gonna see each other again, which is very exciting. Super stoked for that.

You were filming Nimrods when you auditioned for Sterling Point, and now, they're both coming out this month. What was it like working on that project?

It was cool being on location for two months and working with Mason [Thames], who's been doing this forever—that kid is an animal—and getting very close because, again, we were all very similar in age. Me and Ignacio [Diaz-Silverio], who I did pretty much every scene with, me and him got extremely close and were hanging out every day, and me and Mason got very close as well. We formed an interesting sibling-dynamic bond because I played his older brother in the project. I really loved doing an indie [film]. I think that's where my heart is when it comes to the industry, doing these smaller projects. I think it's important to do that, especially just to get stuff like that the attention it deserves. They just don't get that, sadly. So that was a good one to start on because I got to see that and then doing Sterling Point, which is so far in the opposite direction of an indie. On Sterling Point, we had three buildings in a studio, each with three different houses in it. On Nimrods, I shared a honey wagon with the guys, and I just opened up a little sliding curtain, and Ignacio would be sitting there, and I'm like, "What's up?" There's a camaraderie that builds in that kind of environment, for sure.

What do you want to do next?

I'm gonna probably stay away from television for the time being. I don't think I'm writing it off. I just think it would have to be a limited series. And I really want to do a period piece at some point. I'm really into history. I want to do a medieval project at some point, but they just don't hire Americans for that.

You need to work on your British accent.

Oh, I've been trying! It's been in the process. I have a goal here. But yeah, I definitely want to be doing more dramas. I've done this YA thing with Connor, so I got to do that. Now, I just want to play a very different character. For me, that is where the fun comes in—just being able to experience and give a voice to all these different people.

What about jewelry-making? Do you see yourself picking that up again?

I might. It's definitely very appealing. I would do blowtorch, heating up the silver and then molding it, hammer, everything, so I do need a certain amount of space to do it. And I really want to try silver clay. That always looked very interesting. But for the time being, I just need to focus on acting. Strike while the iron's hot, you know?

Sterling Point is now streaming on Prime Video.

Elena, Stefan, and Damon. Belly, Conrad, and Jeremiah. Jackie, Cole, and Alex. Now, Lauren, Lucas, and Kit. Ransom Canyon, Netflix's Western drama, is the latest to throw its hat in the ring of messy brotherly love triangles as its sophomore season sees Russell siblings Lucas (Garrett Wareing) and Kit (Casey W. Johnson) vie for the affections of down-on-her-luck cheerleader Lauren Brigman (Lizzy Greene). Who will get the girl? Or maybe the more important question is, are you #TeamLucas or #TeamKit?

After some gentle prying, Greene has taken a stance. She's #TeamKit for now—emphasis on "for now." The former Nickelodeon (Nicky, Ricky, Dicky & Dawn) and ABC (A Million Little Things) star admits Lauren is acting messy this season, but that's somewhat Greene's doing. After season 1 concluded, Greene told showrunner April Blair she wanted to see Lauren suffer a bit in season 2. She asked; they answered. This season, we find Lauren dealing with the fallout of her career-ending cheer injury and her mother's bombshell revelation, and it's not going well. Her relationship with Lucas is on the rocks, and the return of his older brother stands to drive a further wedge between the young couple.

On a sweltering July afternoon, we caught up with the actress to discuss her kismet role in Ransom Canyon, turning up the drama for season 2, and starring in the highly anticipated film The 99'ers.

Coming off season 1 of Ransom Canyon, what was the biggest response you got to Lauren Brigman?

I was pleasantly surprised by the young people that watched the show. I think that was really sweet. When it came out, me and Garrett spent days on my couch just watching people's responses and reading things. We really loved all the fan edits that people made. Obviously, Lauren, she's a little messy because she's a 16-, 17-year-old girl, so she's figuring stuff out in real time.

The Western drama has been having a big resurgence lately. Why do you think it appeals to audiences?

I think it's because it is so niche in America, like farmers and ranch life. I'm saying this as someone from Texas. I grew up in Texas, but I grew up in the suburbs. I think it's pure escapism. That's why people have come to really love it. It's been really sweet to see how it's now become a cornerstone in media. Nowadays, we have a lot of media that's very intense and very deep and dark, and I love that. I love to sit down and be really impacted by something that I'm watching. But I also think it's really nice to have a fair share of shows [whose] only job is to let you just sit and really zen out watching something, and I think that Westerns have become that for people. Again, as a Texan, I love to see it. We're having a moment.

You are a Southern girl at heart, growing up in Dallas. Was that an easy entry point for you to Lauren? What other ways are you and Lauren similar?

When I first got the audition for [Ransom Canyon], I remember it just felt so kismet because [Lauren] wanted to be a UT cheerleader, and my mom was a UT cheerleader. It was going to shoot in New Mexico, and my dad grew up in New Mexico. I grew up in Texas, and it's a show that takes place in Texas. So I have so many things to pull from there in relation. Also, she's a cheerleader, and gymnastics was such a big part of my life. It seemed like there were so many little idiosyncrasies that really resonated with me. And it was cast by an amazing friend of mine, so it was this "lightning in a bottle" situation. I'm so blessed that I got it and I'm here now.

Lauren is going through a lot this season, to put it mildly. I read that you told the showrunner that if season 2 did happen, you wanted Lauren to suffer and to give you the hard stuff. Well, you asked, and she delivered.

She gave it to me! From the beginning, I thought that she was on this high [in] season 1—until the end when she breaks her arm and she finds out this thing about her mother, this bombshell. It was only fitting for her to have a bit of this struggle in season 2, and that's why I was really spearheading and wanting it. I was like, "Please, please!" As an actor, [I] love difficult things. I also just selfishly was like, "Give me some stuff that's hard. Give me some mess. Give me some drama." And they happily delivered.

I was also like, "You should go for the Kit thing" because I think that if you get an emotional response out of your audience—whether that be immense frustration, which I'm sure a lot of people are probably feeling after watching season 2, or just any kind of emotional response at all—it means that everyone's doing their jobs correctly. TV is supposed to invoke some sort of emotional response, so I wanted her to struggle through season 2 because Lucas is in a great time in his life. … That's probably really hard on her, and that's why she finds solace in Kit, who's also going through a very similar struggle just in life and trying to provide for his brother. I think that's probably why they found a connection there.

What was most exciting for you in terms of picking things up with Lauren for season 2?

Honestly, I think knowing where they were going was really exciting because I love drama. I love dramatic work. So being able to come into this season, you can see she has this level of discomfort within her body because she just doesn't feel like she provides value anymore to cheer. She had that scholarship she was betting on getting, which didn't end up happening, and now, she feels this level of guilt with Lucas because he's soaring in his life, and she doesn't want to feel jealous of her boyfriend. But also, she doesn't really even know how to relate to him anymore, because she has gone through this massive struggle in her life with her family and her friends and future career. Knowing that that's where we were going this season, I was really excited. I think it was necessary, given season 1. She was on such a high, and Lucas was the one who was struggling. I think having that switch really impacted both me and Garrett and what we got to do, and we had a blast.

As if things weren't already rocky between Lauren and Lucas, Lucas's brother Kit is home, driving a further wedge between the two. What is the deal with all these brother love triangles?!

Girl! You know what? The people want the love triangles with the brothers, and I'm happy to be part of the crew now.

Is it even fair to ask who you personally are shipping between Lauren and the Russell brothers?

I feel like it's always so taboo when the actor plays into it, but then again, I like to watch these interviews and be like, "Wait, I want to know who she's actually rooting for." At the moment in her life where Lauren is, I don't think she can be a really great partner to Lucas. And he's such a golden retriever, so it really stings to watch. The way that she went about this relationship ending was a bit messy. I think Kit just makes sense for her right now. However, I don't think I'm gonna rule out Lucas coming back to the table in the future, because there's that scene where they say, "Maybe someday. We're not okay right now, but we might be some day." I honestly think that they're so young when they're together in this show, and in order for them to really grow and get to know themselves, they have to do that apart for a while. I think there's a world where they come to the table in the future, and they're both more mature, more solidified in who they are as people outside of just being a couple. So I think it was necessary. Maybe not in the way it went down, but I think that the heart wants what it wants, and Kit was that in season 2.

I did see Garrett say, "If Lucas and Lauren aren't endgame, I'm never believing in love again."

I think they are endgame. I really do. Their love story is so pure and so innocent and has this level of mutual care and understanding for each other. But again, I think the place where Lauren is in her life, she can't be that person for him anymore, and I don't think she wants to drag him down and be his Achilles' heel when he is soaring in his personal life. It needed to happen in season 2. But season 3, who knows?

So much is happening this season. Are there any other storylines you loved watching play out?

Oh, I love Josh [Duhamel] this year. He's always great. I think him being able to have comedy this year, and where his character was this season, was such an enjoyable watch, and he's phenomenal. Honestly, I really enjoyed watching him squirm a bit, seeing that Quinn is now seemingly good, and she's taking care of business, and she's with this new guy, and he's providing for her. Getting to see him be like, "I don't like how this feels. I'm supposed to be this masculine, unbothered person," and then this girl gets under his skin, I was just like, "Ah!"

Well, you are busy with a capital B. Next year, you are starring in The 99'ers, which is about the 1999 U.S. Women's World Cup final match against China. With the Women's World Cup taking place next year, what does it mean for you to be a part of this project?

Oh my gosh. I can talk about this all day. My dream as a kid was to be a soccer player. It's all I wanted to do in life. When I got on Nickelodeon, I still was not letting go of my dream, and I told Nickelodeon how much I loved and wanted to be a soccer player on the show that I was on. They got Alex Morgan to be on it, and that made my life. It's been such a large part of my life, and as the years have gone on, obviously, acting has become my forefront. But I've always kept a soccer ball in the back of my car, and when I was in Vancouver on the ABC show I was on, I would go play in Chinatown at the field out there all the time, and in L.A., during the [actors'] strike, I would go to the Autry Museum. There's a little grassy field there, and I would play. It's always been therapy for me, and when this came in my inbox, I was just like, "Oh my God, what I would give to be any part of this project, big or small—just the idea of getting to do soccer camp with these girls." Thankfully, everything worked out, and we did six weeks of soccer camp, and it was the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. But us girls were forged in fire, and we had the best time, and it was such a wonderful experience. I have so many mementos around my house. I can't wait for everyone to see, and with soccer fever everywhere now, hopefully it'll resonate with people.

Catch up on Ransom Canyon season 2—now streaming on Netflix.

Photographer: Raul Romo
Stylist: Jenna Filingeri
Hairstylist: Eduardo Mendez
Makeup Artist: Kara Yoshimoto-Bua

For all intents and purposes, Juno Temple's Ted Lasso chapter came to a close following the show's season 3 finale. She said goodbye to Keeley Jones and moved on to other projects, such as the animated buddy adventure Swapped and dystopian sci-fi comedy Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die. Then Jason Sudeikis turned back the page—he wasn't quite done with the game-changing feel-good comedy.

When Ted Lasso arrives on Apple TV on August 5, don't expect to see the men of AFC Richmond. Instead, the series will focus on the Lady Greyhounds, the football club's new against-all-odds female team—a notable pivot given increased interest in women's sports and the lead-up to next year's Women's World Cup. The season will introduce some fantastic fresh faces, including Tanya Reynolds and Faye Marsay, and fan favorites like Keeley, Rebecca Welton (Hannah Waddingham), Roy Kent (Brett Goldstein), and Coach Lasso (Sudeikis) are all coming back.

"I was really nervous," Temple says candidly of reopening the Ted Lasso chapter. "I was like, 'What if I can't do it anymore?'" It had been almost two years since she stepped into Keeley's eight-inch stiletto heels. Nerves were to be expected.

Coming from a place of intense care rather than fear, those thoughts were quickly brushed away when Temple met up with costume designer Jacky Levy for a five-hour fitting. Suddenly, all the joy of Keeley Jones came rushing back to the actress. "We were all reminded of how much fun it is to create Keeley from the toes up to the top of her hat," Temple says. "She's like a weird surrealist yet classic painter with the way she presents herself in the wild, and that's something that I really love about her."

Temple hints at an unbelievable number of looks this season, including one standout moment consisting of a bubblegum-pink Alexander McQueen blazer that Levy sourced the night before at Selfridges and a special pair of pajamas featured later in the season that were designed by a friend. It's not surprising to learn Elle Woods has been and continues to be a huge inspiration for Keeley as a similarly career-focused woman who embraces her favorite color as pink.

Piecing together Keeley's "bonkers" wardrobe was a fresh reminder to Temple of how once-in-a-lifetime special the character is. "I don't know if I will ever have an opportunity to inhabit someone like that again," she says. What fun it is to embody someone who says yes to everything, whether it's wearing an animal-print suit or launching their own PR firm. We could all learn a little from Keeley's determination and eternal optimism. While Temple and Keeley share a love of the color pink and being part of a team, Temple admits to wishing she could take more of Keeley's attitude into her regular life. If she's taught the actress anything, it's to believe in herself in ways that she doesn't always.

Temple's on- and off-screen friendship with Waddingham, who plays AFC Richmond owner Rebecca, was just another perk of returning to the show. A beloved dynamic duo, Rebecca and Keeley showcase a beautiful portrayal of female friendship and how two women can lift each other up. "I love everything about her," Temple says of Waddingham. "Sometimes, I wish I was genuinely taller so I could make better eye contact with her because those eyes are very beautiful." Temple goes on to affectionately describe Waddingham as a nurturing mother figure and a force to work with, adding, "Being in front of that and having that around you and so alive is something that will forever be inspiring for me."

As for Keeley and Roy's "will-they, won't-they" dynamic this season, Temple is keeping mum on any details for fear of slipping up and revealing too much. Instead, she leaves me only with this: "I'm excited for people to see where it goes and what happens, and I hope people enjoy it as much as we did."

At a time when joy on our screens is a welcome distraction from the crazy world around us, the return of Ted Lasso feels fitting. What makes the show so great—genuine optimism, writing that delivers both wit and deeply emotional moments, and an underdog story—is all there. "People that I've spoken to so far say that it feels kind of like a throwback going back to season 1," Temple says. "I'm not sure we could get a better compliment."

Stream season 4 of Ted Lasso on Apple TV starting August 5.

Photographer: Tiffany Brodman
Stylist: Raquel Paiva
Hairstylist: Christopher Naselli
Makeup Artist: Gita Bass
Set Design: Lauren Bahr at Walter Schupfer Mgmt
Postproduction: Kassie Jackson

The ingredients that make a winning Mindy Kaling comedy are a cup of charming and relatable characters, a pinch of complicated relationships, and a strong helping of comforting nostalgia. These are all qualities her latest offering, Not Suitable for Work, has in spades. The workplace sitcom about a group of ambitious 20-somethings trying and notably stumbling to achieve career success while navigating personal relationships in NYC will hit home for anyone in close proximity to Murray Hill's finance bros and anyone who has ever tried to make a name for themselves entering the workforce—basically everyone. But the show's real chef's kiss comes from its core five played with impeccable chemistry by Ella Hunt, Avantika Vandanapu, Will Angus, Nicholas Duvernay, and Jack Martin.

For us, Martin was a particular standout this season as Josh Teitelbaum, an aspiring journalist who uses his last name to land a job at a large media company of which his father is the CEO. At first glance an entitled nepo baby with daddy issues, Josh ultimately proves himself a good friend and idealist who uses his connections for good. Not to mention, Martin's comedic timing is effortless throughout, delivering some of the show's best one-liners.

To hold us over after season 1's major cliff-hanger involving Josh, Hunt's AJ, and Angus's Davis, we caught up with Martin to discuss his own wobbly career journey, the prestige TV that shaped him, and why rich-people satire makes for comedy gold.

How's your summer been so far?

It's really good. You know, a lot of promoting the show, which has been awesome. And it's been great to see it come out and get the reception and everything. I just took a trip to Europe, which was really fun.

Yes, you went to Copenhagen, which is one of my favorite cities.

Oh my God, it was incredible. My friends were getting an Airbnb in Sicily, and I wanted to meet them, and they were doing Copenhagen first. I was like, "I guess I'll just join for that too." I was blown away. I think it's the nicest city I've ever been to. The fashion's crazy. I got some really nice clothes. The subway system is the nicest subway I've ever been on in my entire life. The food is really good. I jumped into [one of the harbor baths]. That was great.

Sounds amazing! Well, let's talk about Not Suitable for Work. The show is about career-obsessed 20-somethings. Speaking of your own professional journey, when did you realize acting was the career for you?

I wanted to do it when I was a kid. I just pretty quickly believed that it wasn't possible, so I didn't get back to it until I was a lot older. I took an acting class [in college], and I was reminded of how much I loved it. I was doing this monologue and repeating it over and over for fun and getting way too into it. I signed up for this summer program at NYU, and it was great. I got my first agent there because they'd have these industry nights where you could audition for people, and I got signed. I graduated early because of that, and then COVID started immediately. That was awesome. So I started making sketches online because no productions were happening, and I had basically bet my entire life on acting. My current manager, who is the best ever, cold-emailed me, and I literally thought it was spam. I was like, "Why would a guy this great cold-email me?" He's an amazing guy, and he saw all sorts of things for me—probably more than I did for myself—and signed me. I got my first show pretty quickly after that.

What were some of the earliest influences for you in the industry? Were there any characters or actors that really shaped you?

I've always loved film, but I think what I was really die-hard about as a kid was prestige TV. I loved HBO. I would watch everything on HBO. I loved The Sopranos, loved Game of Thrones and Curb Your Enthusiasm. I think Succession is the greatest show of all time besides Not Suitable for Work, of course! Those are the kinds of series where I watched them 1000 times.

I love satire. Not to sound like a pretentious actor, but I love when art speaks to something really effectively. Sometimes, satire doesn't even have to be funny. Or it's not meant to be funny, and then I find it funny anyway. I find that Succession, The White Lotus, Sopranos, and those sorts of things are really funny because they are so close to a real truth. Well, I guess I can't say that as much about Sopranos because I'm not in the mafia.

Fair. I was gonna say that most of those are pretty heady dramas. Did you not initially see yourself as a comedic actor?

I mean, no. I always loved comedy. I loved Arrested Development, Always Sunny [in Philadelphia] (I think Glenn Howerton is the greatest comedic actor ever), The Office, Mindy projects. I'm a Nathan Fielder disciple. I've seen everything he's ever made. There are so many great comedies that I love. I truthfully just didn't think I was funny enough to do comedy. I think it's because I revere these people so much, and I thought I could never do what these people do. And then I started making the sketches, and they were comedy because you can't really post dramatic acting, crying online. People liked it, and I was like, "Okay, I guess I'm a comedian."

How did Not Suitable for Work find its way to you?

It was so crazy. It was both the most random thing and the most "meant to be" thing ever. I've been a big Mindy fan forever, and I heard about this show comically early. I saw it probably before the Deadline announcement. I think I was hearing about it from reps and stuff, but I heard she was making a show about Murray Hill, which is where all my friends from college moved to after graduation, and they did the finance-bro thing. So I was so familiar with that world. That's what a lot of my sketches were about, these finance guys and LinkedIn and that whole world. I just think it's so funny and so performative. When I heard she was making that, I was like, "Oh my God, I gotta be in that show."

It's actually a crazy story. It's kind of a story where I feel like I'm not supposed to tell it, but I think [Mindy] mumbled it in public, so I think I'm good. It's not bad or anything. They were looking at someone, and they called… I don't know how to put this without really specific names. They called him, a guy I know, about this other guy, and he was like, "Well, what about my friend Jack?" which was crazy. I didn't know this was happening. I didn't know he was going to do this. I didn't tell him to do this. It's the biggest friend move someone's ever done for me. But he did that, and literally, they called me that day. I did a Zoom, then I got a test deal that night and flew out to L.A. and met Mindy and did my final read in person and got it. It was like a four-day process. It was also literally my birthday.

The universe was really out there working for you. What do you love about a Kaling comedy and what she brings to the table in terms of writing?

Because she's so smart, if I could just put it simply. This is the kind of thing I could talk about for 10 hours, but that's really the bottom line of it. She's just brilliant and very thoughtful, very intentional. Every single line is very thought-out. She's very precise, and she's threading a very specific needle in this show, which is a skill that she's incredible at—making something that is for everyone but it's also about something very specific and is true to that specific world. It's so hard to do both of those at the same time because they're literally opposites. It's very impressive to me. I'm very grateful to be part of it.

What about your character Josh felt like an exciting or unique challenge for you as an actor?

What I was saying earlier about Succession and stuff like that, I love things like that. I love The Menu. I love Triangle of Sadness. Rich-people satire, you know? Because it's about power, and that's a very playable thing as an actor for a character. It can lead to a lot of comedy. This is a different character, different show. It's not the same at all, but he reminds me a little bit of Kendall Roy, and that was really fun to play because [of] the whole dad dynamic, where he worships his dad but he also hates his dad but he also wants his dad's approval. It's like one million things at once, and it's so essential to who he is. My thing with comedy is I always try to take it seriously and play the character as I think they would really be in real life and play it earnestly and not try to be funny. Hopefully, that reads as funny. But you need good writing to do that, and luckily, this is an incredibly well-written show, an incredibly well-written character. So that made it easy for me.

How can you personally relate to the experiences of these characters?

Truthfully, I relate the most to Kel [Washington], an actor. [There are] definitely a lot of differences, for sure, but just the whole actor experience and choosing not to do the prestigious job and everyone thinking you're crazy and doing the acting because you love it and practicing your monologue in your living room, annoying your roommates because you're doing vocal warm-ups or whatever. I think all of us would say that on the cast. Also, Nicholas Duvernay is a phenomenal actor. He makes you want to relate to him.

The season ends on a big cliff-hanger with Josh seeing AJ and Davis kissing. How would you imagine Josh handles this situation?

You know, the true and real answer is I have no idea what they're gonna do, so I can't even spoil it if I wanted to, but I think it'll be interesting. He's someone who is so focused on everything else. He's focused on being successful and having a great career. He's focusing on being the man he wants to be. He has this vision of the perfect guy, and he's trying to be that. He's trying to appease his dad and figure out all that, get promoted, be a person, change the world. There are so many things on his mind, and love is not one of them at all. You can tell because he has two breakups in the season that are basically because he's not invested. What's cool to me about that kiss moment is I think it's the first moment of the entire season where he does care. I think that'll be interesting because, obviously, it ends there, so we have not seen that version of him at all. My assumption is just based on what I know about the character. … I think that you're going to see more of that and that version of him where suddenly love is more of a priority.

It looks like you had a genuinely good time working with this cast. What are some of your fondest memories?

It was incredible. I feel like it's always gonna sound like PR when everyone's like, "I had a great time." I really had a great time. We're all such good friends. Will Angus, who plays Davis, I've been close friends with for years. We met in 2020 doing sketches, and we've done a bunch of stuff together. When I found out he got it, I was over the moon. We lived together when we shot the show. And Nicholas I met right before we started shooting, and we just instantly hit it off. Avantika and Ella are awesome. Everybody is—Victor Garber, Mindy, obviously.

One moment that was really special to me is [that] those sets that we shoot on the stages are real buildings. It's not like there's only one wall. After we wrapped, we all went into the guys' apartment, and it was just the five of us, and no one knew we were there. So it was this very private moment. We popped a bottle of champagne and just hugged each other, and it was so nice. I feel so lucky. This is such a special cast. They're kind. They're generous. They're humble. They're respectful. They're funny. They're incredibly talented. They're phenomenal actors.

Well, here's to hoping a second season happens because they can't just leave it there. That's rude.

It's funny. I'm the same. I'm, at the end of the day, a fan. I hope we keep going. I hope we keep going for a long time.

Not Suitable for Work is now streaming on Hulu.

Photographer: Max Montgomery
Stylist: Jake Sammis
Groomer: Simone Kogen

Romance-novel lovers could rest a little easier when they saw Belmont Cameli's dark head of curls come into frame as the first episode of Off Campus, the book-to-screen adaptation of the best-selling series by Elle Kennedy, colored their televisions. Cameli, 28, is the latest fresh face to step into the role of BookTok boyfriend—a title more desirable than ever as New York Times best sellers like Heated Rivalry and Every Summer After continue to seep onto the small screen. Joining the ranks of Connor Storrie, Hudson Williams, and Christopher Briney, the star has seen how quickly internet fandom can flip one's life on its head. But rest assured, the tall, dark, and handsome brunette from Chicagoland is up for the challenge.

Since giving dedicated book fans the physical manifestation of the womanizing collegiate hockey star Garrett Graham—one half of the lead couple in Off Campus season 1, accompanied by Ella Bright as Hannah Wells—Cameli's career has shifted into high gear. With the show's massive success (Amazon Prime Video reported a record-breaking viewership of 36 million streams within its first 12 days, according to Variety) came magazine spreads, first pitches at Chicago White Sox games, and now beauty campaigns. Remember those umber, scene-stealing curls we talked about earlier? Yeah, they landed their own Tresemmé deal.

Ahead, Cameli fills Who What Wear in on life after the show's splashy debut, the shrouded happenings of season 2, his future career goals, and his simple routine for those signature curls.

I've seen pictures of you in your high school football jersey with some not-curly hair—how and when did you learn to embrace your natural texture?

I didn't have a natural curl until later in high school—maybe around 18. I started growing it out more. It started getting wavy, and then I would cut it down and grow it out, and it just kept getting curlier.

Growing up, my hair was poker straight, so there was a whole period of time that I suddenly had curly hair and could not figure it out for the life of me, which is why I'm really happy to have Tresemmé on my side today. They make it so easy, so I don't really have to think about it. I just go in with their three new products in the Bouncy Curls line, and it takes no time at all. I can just go about my day. But I've struggled—learning the curly-hair [routine] later in life with no help was difficult.

We just spoke with your costar Stephen Kalyn (Dean Di Laurentis) about season 2. How is filming going so far?

It's great! We're having so much fun. We're all very busy, and we're just really proud of the show. We're working on episodes 3 and 4 right now, and these scripts are really impressive. It's just nice to be back with everybody—the cast, the crew, and our creators. It's been a blast. We love shooting the show.

Kalyn told me that you once called him on a day off just to tell him about your high school football experience.

Oh, I call him randomly every single day, and he calls me too! We talk all the time; we just get along so well. He's from the suburbs of Toronto. I'm from the suburbs of Chicago. We have similar trajectories and stories. We're the same age, we started acting at the same time, and obviously, this show happened to us together. But yeah, I gave a 30-minute soliloquy about my high school football team. He was like, "Okay," and honestly, I've heard him talk about hockey and his hockey teams for hours on end, so whatever!

That's how friendship works! How does this season—both the filming process and show itself—feel different than season 1?

It doesn't really feel all that different. It's almost the same crew, so it was kind of like we took a break and came back home, you know?

Obviously, we're aware of the attention the show has gotten, but that doesn't really affect us while we're working, so the days on set feel very familiar. It almost feels like no time passed at all between season 1 and season 2, which has been really nice. I'd say the biggest difference is that when we're shooting on location, there are more [fans] around.

If you could describe season 2 in three words, what would they be?

Ensemble, love, and friendship. I haven't had time to think of a good three yet, but those three are definitely in there—lemme tell ya.

They definitely count. It must have been nice to jump back into filming after such a crazy press run of a summer.

It was. It was so nice to have work and to be all together right after the press run and the release of the show. We got to come back into our bubble. For me—and I think for them too—having work is a real privilege.

How does it feel to have your career explode the way it did this summer—to not only be in such a famous role but to also land campaigns with brands like Tresemmé?

It's been really interesting. I think a lot of actors hope for the audience that we've garnered now. I feel really honored to have new fans of my work. I'm really grateful for the opportunity that it's presented me—when it comes to my next jobs, when it comes to partnering with Tresemmé and their great line of Bouncy Curls products, and getting to talk about my hair. It's really nice, and it's been an adjustment, but it's been cool. [But] my day-to-day is pretty much the same. All the things I'm seeing with my eyes are no different.

Since you've been acting for a minute now, is there a beauty hack that you learned on set that changed the way you get ready?

Eye patches go a long way for me. I'm a tired boy most of the time, so letting those soak in is totally cool. When it comes to my hair, turning my head upside down and scrunching is essential to getting those curls right. You've got to do your hair upside down a lot of the time.

And if I want my hair to look good, I usually have to use a diffuser somewhere in the process. If I want to completely air-dry my curls, they end up looking incredible, but that takes so much time. Once you get the Defining Cream in there and put a little mousse in, give it that shape, then go in with the diffuser, and set it and forget it, it's great.

I know you're busy shooting Off Campus until early fall, but do you have any other upcoming projects that you can share with us?

I do, but not [ones] that I can share. There's some really fun stuff that I'm looking at with my team right now, and hopefully, we'll get season 3 for Off Campus. In the time between, I'm really looking forward to going to work and shooting some features. There's some fun stuff I can't say, but I'm really just excited to be on set more. I want to spend all my time on set—literally all my time. So hopefully, that's what I'll get to do.

I'm curious—do you guys see the TikTok edits? Are you sending funny comments to each other? Can you laugh at everything?

We definitely can laugh at it. I'm not on TikTok. I'm not on the internet, really, unless it's, like, woodworking videos on YouTube. But there are a lot of pink-helmet videos that go around that we really enjoy. People have really given the pink helmet the life that it's deserved online. I've seen some of the edits of the show, and a lot of them are extremely impressive, [even] just from an editing standpoint. I've seen plenty of it. It's all fun, weird, and cool. It's just wild, honestly.

There's been a lot happening this summer. Between the World Cup, your breakout show, and filming, there's a lot to obsess over. What are you obsessed with right now?

I'm so predictable: It's Chicago White Sox baseball. The Cubs and the Sox are both doing really well right now. There's a lot of good baseball happening on the South Side. I'm obsessed with driving my car. I bought this 1994 Toyota Land Cruiser from Japan. It's this little diesel engine with four-wheel drive, and I love driving it so much. Vancouver is a gorgeous place to drive around, and I'm also obsessed with getting eight hours of sleep whenever possible.

I hear you guys are up early doing hockey practices!

Yeah, we do a lot of boot camps. We are in the throes of filming right now, so when we're shooting, we're on the ice for 12 to 16 hours, which ends up really hurting your feet but being good practice.

The shooting schedule, on top of other fun stuff we have going on outside the show, keeps us pretty busy, so when I know I have a night when I can get eight hours of sleep, I get so excited. I'll have, like, 100 dreams and try to write them all down in the morning.

Speaking of dreams, your life is opening up in big ways these days. What are some new personal and career goals that you've set for yourself?

I really want to wear multiple hats at some point as a filmmaker. I never really knew when the next step toward directing would be, and right now, I'm realizing that if that's going to happen, it won't be in a way that I foresee. … I really just want to go to work as an actor, build out a diverse body of work, play unpredictable characters, and work in different genres and arenas, so right now, my vision is honestly the same as it's always been. I want to do things that are different from the others that I've done.

I've done a decent amount of comedy television now, and I've done some genre films, some drama. I've played in this YA space a couple of times, and I really just want to protect the vision of doing different things and work with cool filmmakers that I like. It's a pretty broad goal, but my goal is just to work. I really love being on set, so that's where I want to be.

Shop the Tresemmé Bouncy Curls Collection

Reality television fans know her as one of the latest additions to Bravo's Summer House, a series that follows a group of New York City friends and their many dramas in a seasonal share nestled in the exclusive, coastal Hamptons. Rihanna knows her as a close friend and trusted confidant. Las Culturistas hosts Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers just awarded her the title of Best Vibe, Hands Down at the 2026 Las Culturistas Culture Awards. If that wasn't enough to decorate her résumé, she's also a bona fide makeup lover, so it was only natural for Mia Calabrese to divulge her summer beauty secrets to us.

On a balmy summer day in late June, Calabrese curls up on a couch in a sprawling downtown Brooklyn hotel room, her face gently sculpted in a flurry of Fenty Beauty. "I feel like she and I have a very similar energy," Calabrese tells Who What Wear of friend and Fenty Beauty founder Rihanna in an Instagram Reel. The reality star and real estate salesperson credits their compatibility to the stars (Calabrese is a Cancer, and Rihanna is a Pisces), though she confesses to being a Fenty makeup stan for years before the duo met.

We asked the burgeoning star for her summer makeup tips ("How does she keep those looks locked in place in the Hamptons heat?" we often wonder), discovered what's on her beauty restock list, and dished on her sisterly relationship with costar Ciara Miller. Keep reading.

First, we asked, What's one beauty product that at least someone needs to have on hand in a share house? Calabrese's response—the Fenty Beauty Invisimatte Instant Setting + Blotting Powder—nearly came out before we finished the question. "It's so hot in the Hamptons in the summer, so I put the Invisimatte all over my skin," she mimes, dabbing the product on her face. The translucent pressed powder extends the life of your look, controls oil, and keeps sweat at bay for hours. "So you're glowy, never oily!" she tells WWW.

She also shares that sunscreen, specifically the Fenty Beauty Hydra Vizor, is a nonnegotiable. "It makes your skin so glowy and beautiful," she adds. "Some SPFs break me out, but this one doesn't. It sits on my skin perfectly. It gives my skin this natural glow, and I know my skin is being protected. I'm very serious about my SPF." Calabrese also calls out bug spray as a must in the house. "I can never pick just one!" she exclaims. Continue on for more.

You and Ciara famously live in the same apartment building—do you ever share products or clothes?

We joke that our closets are extensions of each other's. We're like sisters that don't fight. If I need to borrow anything, I'm like, "I need to go upstairs," or she'll come down [to mine] and be like, "I need to borrow these paper towels." I actually cannot think about not living in the same building with her; it makes me anxious.

Your friendship with Rihanna is iconic. What's your relationship like nowadays?

She actually texted me two days ago. I love her. That woman knows so much about my business. She's so sweet, such a good friend, and so thoughtful. She's just always checking in, which I appreciate as a water-sign girlie.

We know Rih's a reality TV lover. Did she watch your season and keep up with you as episodes came out?

She did! She was late to the reunion, though, and I had to text her. She's a big Summer House fan. When we were out, she was introducing me to people like, "Everyone, this is Mia from Summer House!" I'm like, "Everyone, this is Rihanna, period."

Do you remember your first Fenty Beauty purchase? What was it, and do you still restock?

Of course, I do!

Calabrese shouts out the Fenty Beauty Gloss Bomb and Match Stix Contour Skinstick as her first purchases from the brand, though they are far from her last. "I still restock, obviously!" she adds.

What's your beauty vibe this summer?

"Bad bitch" is my look this summer. I'm going for glowy skin and overlined lips.

(Duly noted.)

Shop Fenty Beauty Picks Inspired by Mia Calabrese

In the modern world, sports aren't just about what happens on the court, field, or track. Much of the buzz around athletes actually takes place before their events—that is, when they arrive at their respective venues and showcase their latest fashion creations. In basketball, that's referred to as a tunnel 'fit; in Formula One, a paddock 'fit; and so on. What athletes wear when they're not in uniform matters, especially to fans who might never get to speak to their heroes. Clothes are the perfect form of communication—a window into who your favorite athlete is and what they stand for. That's what Go Sports is all about. Yes, we care about box scores, the results of Free Practice 1 (even if it is at 3 a.m.), and RHOSLC-level rivalries, but today, sports fashion matters too. We're not ashamed to say so.

According to Sports Illustrated, WNBA point guard for the New York Liberty and University of Oregon legend Sabrina Ionescu was responsible for the third most-worn basketball shoe in the NBA this past season. Her Nike Sabrina 3s were played in for a total of 26,125 minutes, with wearers including Steph Curry, Derrick White, and more. The only styles worn more? The Kobe 5s and 6s, created by the late Kobe Bryant, one of Ionescu's biggest mentors, in collaboration with Nike during his storied career in the NBA. Ionescu's 1s (2023) and 2s (2024) were just as popular, both in the NBA and the WNBA.

This morning, her fourth Signature shoe, the Sabrina 4s, debuted, continuing her journey with Nike and no doubt ushering in a new favorite among star players across the basketball landscape. It's the partnership's most innovative collection yet, according to Nike, with "a TPU FlyPlate inspired by the feel of a sprinter's launch off the starting blocks." Nike engineers then reworked the technology to gear it toward basketball. "Together with a responsive forefoot Air Zoom unit and plush Cushlon 3.0 midsole, the technology provides the support and stability needed for quick reaction times on the court," Nike stated in a press release.

To get the backstory on the Sabrina 4s, available now on Nike.com, I caught up with Ionescu midway through her season with the Liberty. Scroll down to read our conversation.

How does it feel to be releasing a fourth signature shoe and collection?

It's an honor. I can't believe we're on four. Time has just like flown by, but every single one has been so meaningful, and we've been able to create so much change, so it's an honor. I'm so blessed to be in this position—to be on the fourth—to continue to improve and want to get better every single year with the Signature line. So I'm excited for the world to be able to put them on their feet really soon.

What’s been the biggest takeaway from your experience creating now four signature shoes and collections with Nike?

You can't please everyone. At least for me, I am always like, okay, I want to create the best shoe for everybody. And then, so many people have so many different needs, and their feet are different, and what they like and what they don't like. So I think it's just been the understanding of you can't please everyone, and you just have to go out and do your best in terms of what works for you, what you think will work for the majority of basketball players—young and old—and how you can continue to improve every year. But it's just hard. Some people like them; some people don't. I think when you go out with the mindset of wanting to please people, you're not focused on what's most important: doing the best you can in the design of the shoe. So for me, every year, it's obviously collecting insight into what basketball players are saying—what they like and what they want to see different—but always knowing that I gotta just do what feels best and what we think is best as a team.

At the end of the day, you have to wear them. How much is it you and how you play and your style when you're making the shoe and how much is it looking the broad scape of basketball players?

It's really based on my needs and how I play. The feel, the weight, the traction, the comfort, and the cushioning—all of that is really based off what I need and what I feel is most important when I'm stepping out on the court, especially as a guard. So I'd say that is always the foundation and the principles of when we're pushing innovation. That's always at the forefront of what we're doing. But I think it's understanding that technology is growing every day, and we're learning more and more. So I think it's finding a great balance between pushing, but not steering too far away from what makes it a Sabrina's shoe.

What makes this particular collection special/different from the last three? How does it represent this unique stage in your basketball career?

I think it just continues to tell a really fun story. You can go out there and accomplish what you want, be who you want to be, while also enjoying the process, believing in yourself, and putting in a lot of hard work. You know, you don't get to where you are by chance, but you get there through a lot of hard work, believing in yourself, and continuing to tell that story. So, for me, it's been fun seeing the evolution of [Nike and I] being able to tell that story as I've continued to evolve in my career.

Aesthetics-wise, tell me about how you made some of the decisions you did for this collection.

I'm always tweaking a little bit, but also trying to keep what I really love in the shoe the same. So the vertical swoosh is the same. The S pattern that we have—like the haptic on the entirety of the shoe—is different. There's an eye, kind of like a gradient eye on the back, which we've always had. The traction, like pattern, is different. So we've just added a lot of different new and improved things while also keeping it the same. And then in the clothing, which is what I'm really excited about. The Aerofit is something that I haven't had in clothing and hasn't been done. So that's something I'm excited for everyone to feel when they're training and how it feels on.

Are there any pieces in the apparel collection specifically that fans of your style and your tunnel 'fits can expect to see make an appearance?

I'd say the Icon Hoodie is something that we had in the Sabrina One, which is just the hoodie that you're able to tuck the cords into the S label, and that's something that was in the 1 [collection], and then we brought it back in the 4 with obviously a different technology and in a different sweatshirt. So I'm really excited, but I would say the new Aerofit in the apparel collection, especially for training, is something you can wear. I can't tell too much, but it's sleeveless, so you're able to train in it. It's breathable. It's obviously Nike's newest material. So I'm really excited for consumers to be able to wear it and feel really, really good in it.

These collections often have little, minute pieces of personalization that you can incorporate for fans to find and experience a bit of who you are. So does this collection have any of those touches?

Definitely, like on the fly plate, it says everyone everywhere. That's something that I love because for the first few, it's been anyone anywhere, and we've evolved it. Just as we continue to grow my business globally, the shoes [are now] for everyone, everywhere. So that's been really exciting. And then I would also probably say the chrome logo that we have on a lot of the clothing reflects like a mirror, and it's to be able to see yourself in it, and you can see your own reflection. It's you versus you. You have to look in the mirror and see yourself, and you're able to go out and accomplish whatever you want because it's your own journey of finding your own purpose.

If you could have any player wear/play in this shoe, who would it be?

I think I would pick a young player, like I love Jazzy Davidson. She's been wearing a lot of my shoes. She's at [the University of Southern California], but she's an Oregon kid, as well. So I feel like that's always been fun. I've known her for a really young age, from when she was young. But I think she's the future. So it's really exciting to see how she's continued to evolve in her career. I hope she wears them.

Paige Lorenze has great taste. As the founder and creative director of Dairy Boy and a content creator with over two million combined followers on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok, she's built an impressive personal brand grounded in individuality, authenticity, and stylish fashion and beauty picks. Although her picturesque New England lifestyle doesn't hurt either.

If you've watched her YouTube vlogs for as long as I have, you'll know she's no stranger to a GRWM video. She often does her own makeup while chatting to the camera, whether it's ahead of an important brand meeting or before supporting her fiancé, professional tennis player Tommy Paul, courtside at a Grand Slam match. Because she has great taste, I'm always taking notes, ID'ing the specific products she uses and how she applies them.

If there's one makeup product Lorenze seems to use most often, it's Clinique's cult-classic Almost Lipstick ($25) in Black Honey. The shape-shifting raisin has been around since 1971 (yep, that's an impressive 55-year history), which is why it continues to transcend generational lines. A quick scroll through TikTok is all it takes to prove that it's just as beloved by baby boomers as it is by Gen Z. Lorenze has been a fan of it for years. In fact, she was introduced to it by her mom years ago.

Cut to 2026, and she's the face of Clinique's new Black Honey campaign, The Difference Is You. It celebrates the enduring popularity of Black Honey, as well as Lorenze's personal taste and organic love for the product. Ahead, I chat with Lorenze about all things beauty, including her formula for a quick five-minute face, how she stays confident in the public eye, and what we can expect from her highly anticipated wedding.

Clinique's Almost Lipstick in Black Honey

You're a longtime, organic fan of Clinique's Almost Lipstick in Black Honey. It's such an iconic product and collection. What do you love about it, and why do you keep coming back to it despite having tested so many beauty products over the years?

I love that you organically follow me because I'm sure you've seen me use it. It's definitely been a staple of mine forever, so this campaign is beyond my wildest dreams. Originally, I stole it from my mom. My mom is very much a "no-makeup makeup" girl, and I actually wear more makeup than her. When I stole it from her, I thought, "This is such a good product, whether you're not wearing makeup or you are wearing makeup." It was a fun entry into makeup because it's hydrating and balmy, but it has color and is buildable. Now, it's everywhere. I have one in my car, one in my purse, and one in my makeup bag.

Even if I'm not wearing makeup but want to look fresh and healthy, I'll put it on. But if I want that perfect dark-purply shade of lip—which is honestly my lip color but better—I can layer it on with a lip liner. It's very effortless but also very multifaceted. You can use it for so many different things.

I always say Almost Lipstick in Black Honey is one of the most versatile makeup products. Also, moms have the best beauty recommendations. They always have the simple, good things.

Yes, exactly, 100%.

Let's say you're short on time. You woke up late and have to be out of the house in five minutes or less. How are you using Almost Lipstick in Black Honey to create a quick makeup look?

I think doing your eyebrows, having a nice facial mist, and putting Almost Lipstick in Black Honey on your cheeks and lips is enough. If my eyebrows are brushed up, my skin is looking fresh, and I have Black Honey on, I feel like I'm good to go.

Do you have a favorite brow gel or face mist at the moment?

My favorite face mist… I feel like I use so many different ones. Honestly, I've been using Clinique's Moisture Surge ($33) for years. It's really, really good, and it's nice because they have it in so many airports around the world. They usually have a Clinique in TSA, so I've bought Moisture Surge a million times while traveling.

I've actually been using a brow oil that's meant for growth and fullness. I bought it at my local lash and brow place, and I've been using it to brush up my brows. I feel like it's been making them look really healthy. People also use things like Vaseline and castor oil.

Those are all good. Using a brow serum to brush up your brows is a good hack. It makes them look good while also giving them the growth benefits. Clinique's Almost Lipstick in Black Honey has a 55-year history, which is really impressive. What about it feels timeless to you?

I think the packaging feels really timeless. I think [Clinique's] graphic identity and the way [the brand] has stayed true to itself are very authentic. I also love that it's science based and backed. Everyone feels comfortable using Clinique products because they're universally known, loved, and have been around for so long.

Finally, I think it feels timeless to me because my mom used it and because you can find it in so many places—at the airport, at the mall, or wherever you shop for beauty products. It's accessible, which makes it feel classic and very American to me.

Speaking of timelessness, I feel like Dairy Boy captures a sense of timelessness in its design portfolio, and your home design and lifestyle content on YouTube does as well. How have your personal style and, especially, Dairy Boy's brand identity evolved throughout the years? Do you intentionally try to capture that sense of timelessness?

Definitely. I think growing up in New England has given me so much source material to pull from and so many inspirational people to look to—whether that's public figures, family members, women I grew up around, or just the people who shaped my taste over the years.

I feel like I was surrounded by so many beautiful properties. I rode horses a lot, spent a lot of time in Vermont, went to boarding school there, grew up going to Nantucket, and was born in Boston. I grew up all along the East Coast, and I've always seen the beauty in loving where you're from and taking inspiration from those places.

I think the East Coast has a very classic, timeless sense of style that values things collected over time and things with history. Those are the things that inspire me a lot in my brand, my home, and everything that I do.

I love that. It's like that quote I always see: "You're a collection of your favorite things."

Yes, totally.

What's next for Dairy Boy? Can we expect it to expand into any new categories, whether that's home, lifestyle, or beauty?

We've been developing a perfume for about a year and a half, and I'm really excited about it and looking forward to launching it. I'm going to be wearing the scent on my wedding day, so that's a category we're really excited about.

That's so exciting. Speaking of your wedding, I wanted to say congratulations. How have you approached the beauty element of the wedding? It can be a lot of pressure for people when they're putting together their wedding look. Can you share any insight into the look you wanted to create or any inspiration you've drawn from?

That's such a good question. … Because I'm both a creator and a consumer of content, I tried at the beginning of the wedding-planning process—whether it was beauty or décor—to stay away from Pinterest. I think it's good to collect a Pinterest mood board over the years, even before you're engaged, of the things you love and then put it away when it's time to actually plan. I feel like I've seen enough. I've seen so many beautiful weddings and beautiful things, and I really wanted to put that mood board aside and create something that was completely ours.

It's so easy now, with how many beautiful weddings you can find on Pinterest, not to create something that feels individual. I think the most special weddings—regardless of the beauty, the money, the dresses, or the looks—should just feel like the bride and groom. If you spend too much time looking at other people's weddings, it won't actually end up being a true reflection of the couple. That was challenging because there were so many decisions where I thought, "I would love to see how this looks, and I'm sure there's a photo of it somewhere."

I really tried to push myself with my dress, makeup look, and hair to do things that felt flattering to me and aligned with the things I know and love. I wanted to keep things simple but also romantic and a little more whimsical. For the beauty side of things, from the skincare part of my wedding journey to my wedding makeup trial, I've just tried to keep things simple. I wanted to use the things I know and love and not try anything new.

That's why working with Clinique around my wedding is such a dream. It's also a sense of comfort on your wedding day to know that you're using products you've already been using, that you love, and that you trust.

Absolutely. Wedding planning can be so overwhelming, and I think there are so many different avenues you can go down with beauty. I love the idea of keeping it simple and relying on your tried-and-true products to feel like yourself. I love your Pinterest hot take about having your board but not relying too heavily on it. Do you have any other wedding-planning tips or tricks?

Yes. I would say if you're going to spend money on anything, spend money on your planner. You cannot buy peace of mind. There's no price on that. I would say cut back on other expensive things and invest in a good planner because if you can pass off your vision to someone who will execute it and you don't have to micromanage, it allows you to enjoy this season of your life so much more.

Being a bride isn't only about your wedding day. The entire year that you're engaged—or, for some people, multiple years—is such a beautiful season of life that you'll hopefully never experience again. It's so important to enjoy that process and not dread planning your wedding or feel like you have to micromanage every detail.

It's universally known that brides get incredibly stressed during the year of their wedding. For me, my wedding planners were Easton Events, and they were the best of all time. They are expensive, but it was so worth it. They're not just expensive because of the weddings they've done. They're expensive because they have incredible organizational processes, detailed systems, programs, and technology they've invested in to make the wedding-planning process easier for me and my entire family. That's made a huge difference. Especially as a business owner, I'm like, "Oh my gosh, I'm sad that I won't have meetings with them anymore because they're so sharp."

I can understand that. Peace of mind is the biggest thing. I want to know more about how you relate to Clinique's The Difference Is You campaign. It celebrates individuality at its core. What does individuality mean to you, and how do you keep it central to everything you do—whether that's content creation, Dairy Boy design, or your foundation? How do you celebrate your individuality?

I do that through my work. I love pouring myself into my work because, with owning a brand, especially a lifestyle brand, the more authentic and true to myself I've been and the more I've gone back to my roots and stripped away any layers that weren't me, the more I've been rewarded and the more I've found my community.

It's really nice that, in my work, being authentic pays off. That's been such a fun thing over the years. I love what I do for a living, and I feel like I'm able to be really self-expressive through that.

Totally. You're in the public eye a lot as a businesswoman, brand founder, and content creator. What makes you feel confident, and what do you do to build your confidence on days when you might not be feeling your best?

I think confidence does come from within, but feeling and looking good and refreshed never hurts. If I'm not feeling my best, I'll do an everything shower, get a facial, do my makeup and hair, and give myself a blowout. That usually helps a little bit.

I also spend time with my family, but … if I'm ever feeling off, it's usually a sign that I'm not doing the things I love or spending enough time outdoors. It's easy for me to recenter myself now that I live in Connecticut because I'm surrounded by so many of the things I love.

Speaking of Connecticut, since you moved back, has it influenced your beauty routine?

Yes, I would say everything is much simpler—my skincare routine, my beauty routine, everything in my life. I think that has contributed to my happiness.

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If you're a fan of the illustrious Lupita Nyong'o, you'll be pleased to know that we spoke to her in an in-depth interview for our July cover story. The full story dives into her dual role as Helen of Troy and Clytemnestra in Christopher Nolan's highly anticipated The Odyssey. As a preview, we have a sound bite of what your read will be like, as we take Nyong'o through some quick-hitting, lighthearted questions.

In the video, you'll get Nyong'o's thoughts on her most iconic characters and costumes, from Black Panther's Nakia to her role as Viola in William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night opposite her real-life brother Junior Nyong'o, who played Sebastian. She also dives into the moment she found out Beyoncé, your favorite celebrity's favorite celebrity, name-checked her in her renowned song "Brown Skin Girl," telling us, "I was name-checked in a song about embracing our complexion, which is legacy-building that I didn't know I was going to be a part of." Watch the full video below.

Watch Our Video Interview

Read Our In-Depth Profile

Click here for our Who What Wear cover story and photo shoot with Lupita Nyong'o.

Lupita Nyong'o arrives to lunch at Sukh, her go-to Brooklyn Thai restaurant, in incognito mode: dark glasses and a black pashmina looped around her head like an Old Hollywood starlet. But when the Oscar-winning actress sheds her scarf and shades, her cover's blown. Standing in this quaint dining room in a denim micromini, a white oxford shirt, and beaded necklaces from her native Kenya, Nyong'o is—unmistakably—the most beautiful woman in the world.

This month, Nyong'o plays Helen of Troy, the mythic face that "launched a thousand ships," in Director Christopher Nolan's much-anticipated, much-shrouded summer blockbuster adaptation of The Odyssey. As arguably the industry's most influential director, Nolan makes movies that are not so much theatrical releases as Cultural Events. (Remember "Barbenheimer?") Nyong'o is part of an all-star cast: Matt Damon as Odysseus, Anne Hathaway, Tom Holland, Zendaya, Robert Pattinson, Charlize Theron, and many more. Opening-weekend tickets are largely already sold out, some a full year in advance.

Yet on the Tuesday in June when we meet, Nyong'o herself has not been consumed by bubbling Odyssey mania. "If I could be very honest with you, I haven't been in New York," she says shortly after sitting, nothing but waters and menus on the table. "I've actually been recuperating from a surgery, so I've been away, in nature, taking care of myself."

In May, Nyong'o underwent her second myomectomy, a major surgery to remove more than 50 fibroids, or noncancerous tumors, growing in the lining of her uterus. Her first myomectomy came after she was diagnosed with fibroids in 2014, the same year she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her breakout role in 12 Years a Slave. Nyong'o shared her private struggle with fibroids in public for the first time last year: the "seasons of constant pain"; the heavy, prolonged periods in which she lost "dangerous amounts of blood each month." Earlier this year, she revealed her fibroids had returned.

The surgery is still "very fresh," Nyong'o says. She's not quite ready to talk about it yet. First, she suggests, "let's warm up."

Many women struggle to take a simple compliment. Nyong'o is not many women. When I ask how it sits with her to be cast as the most gorgeous minx of all time, she replies with an enthusiastic "Really well." Nyong'o laughs a little, but she's not kidding: "No, I do love this for me."

Here in our snug corner booth, Nyong'o is wholly owning the role.

"Listen. I'm not going to be mad at anyone calling me beautiful," she tells me. "I grew up feeling kind of like an ugly duckling." She references her 2019 children's book, Sulwe, inspired by her own experiences with colorism: "It took me a lot of conscious work to get rid of my insecurities and to free myself from the discrimination of my skin color."

Regal, striking beauty is inextricable from Nyong'o's public identity: as Nakia, the warrior/spy and love of the late Chadwick Boseman's King T'Challa in Black Panther; as the first Black face of Lancôme and a suited Chanel ambassador. The "jarring" attention started when Nyong'o moved to her birthplace of Mexico to study Spanish at age 16: "I was like, 'Wait a minute. I'm odd enough here. I'm singular enough that people are translating it as beauty.'"

At 43, Nyong'o speaks with the steady, almost mesmerizing conviction of a woman who has done the work. "When people compliment me these days," she adds, "I embrace it."

Early Odyssey discourse has been so preoccupied with Helen, it's largely glossed over that Nyong'o pulls double duty as her sister, Clytemnestra, the tortured queen who murders her husband, Agamemnon (Benny Safdie), as payback for sacrificing their daughter to the gods. It's a role that Nyong'o first played as a student at Yale School of Drama in a class called The Greeks. "Her story is so tragic," she says. "It's hard to forget."

In some versions of The Odyssey—including Nolan's, Nyong'o reveals—Helen and Clytemnestra are twins. She immediately agreed to play the more storied sister during her first meeting with Nolan. ("I never ever thought that I would be offered a chance to play Helen of Troy.") When the Oppenheimer director doubled down with Clytemnestra, Nyong'o "almost fell off the creaky chair [she] was on," but it helped that she'd already played doppelgängers in Jordan Peele's psychological thriller Us.

"I had the reassurance that I had done two roles before," she said. "My role in Us, I was the Odysseus. It was more of a heavy lift to do Us than it was to be a really, really valuable and pivotal part of Odysseus's journey."

To tackle the twins, Nyong'o knew she had to craft key physical and vocal distinctions for each character, an approach she says "Michael" (as in Michael B. Jordan, her Black Panther costar and the Oscars' reigning Best Actor for playing twins in Sinners) has also discussed. How, specifically, did Nyong'o approach Helen versus Clytemnestra? "I can't tell you that," she says slyly.

Inevitably, we've reached the point in our interview when Nyong'o must maintain the mystique of a new Nolan film. The director famously rejects the modern movie-marketing machine, a gauntlet of appearances, interviews like this one, and a deluge of TikToks and Instagram Reels promoting—and potentially overexposing—the project. When Nyong'o and I meet in June, there have been no glimpses of her in character as Helen. Two Odyssey trailers have dropped, neither of which feature her. Journalists typically screen the film their celebrity subject is promoting; not this time.

"I actually think that a lot of filmmakers want to be guarded about what they're making, but the industry doesn't allow them to be," Nyong'o says. "Chris has that power. He is that power."

Nyong'o is a director's darling, consistently working with the new masters, including Peele and Black Panther's Ryan Coogler. Even so, the mythology (pun intended) around Nolan felt different. "There's so much lore that goes with the Chris Nolan experience," Nyong'o says. In reality, she found him to be remarkably open, inviting her into three-way discussions with him and the costume, hair, and makeup departments. She praises Nolan's no-phones-on-set policy and the fact that he didn't coddle The Odyssey's constellation of stars.

Even before The Odyssey, Nolan's and Nyong'o's careers were creatively aligned. Both have a way of elevating blockbusters, bridging the gap between Best Picture and box-office hits. The Oscars have toyed with adding a "popular film" category, but between Oppenheimer and The Dark Knight (Nolan) and Black Panther, Us, and Wild Robot (Nyong'o), the synergy between art and commerce is already being realized.

For Nyong'o, filmmakers like Nolan and Coogler mean she doesn't have to view her career in terms of the old industry juggling act of "one for them, one for me" (projects that pay and others that feed your soul). "They do work that means something to them. They're not just collecting a paycheck," she says. "That's a gift, to have artistic convictions that happen to correlate with a popular movie." She could just as well be talking about herself.

Nyong'o has gravitated to iconic IP (Marvel, Star Wars), but her meteoric, Oscar-winning debut came in a comparative indie. In Director Steve McQueen's 12 Years a Slave, she played Patsey, a young enslaved woman immortalized in the memoir of the same name. I wonder how it's impacted the rest of her career, to get everything she's supposed to want, upfront, at age 31.

"That is the only life I know, right? The version of life where I won an Academy Award for the first movie I ever did," Nyong'o says. "It's unbelievable that it happened that way, but I'm so glad it did because it happened before I had a chance to want it and now I get to be grateful for the rest of my life." Some say it's a curse, but Nyong'o credits the Oscar's weight, and not just because she sometimes uses hers as a dumbbell. "I would not be in a Chris Nolan film were it not for that," she says. "It legitimized my presence in an industry that has a very short attention span."

Growing up, she never dreamed of acting as a viable career path. She can't seem to stress this part enough: "I come from a very different world, Michelle." The daughter of a Kenyan politician/professor and a public health advocate, she was raised between Kenya and Mexico City, born in the latter after her family fled political unrest at home. "My options for what I could be were very narrow," Nyong'o says. "I had internalized that women were secretaries and business women." But her mother, Dorothy, clearly saw her potential, signing her up for public speaking, improv, and poetry recitation classes.

"I remember seeing Whoopi Goldberg in more than one movie, and I was like, 'Wait, you could do this?'" she reenacts her childhood enlightenment. Especially "because she was dark skinned, I really took note of her." It's moving now for Nyong'o to imagine her career providing the same kind of recognition for a new generation: "I feel very honored to be anybody's Whoopi."

Still, Nyong'o's bright-burning breakout was not without complication. "The years after winning were very challenging for me, psychologically, because I was riddled with the question of, 'What does up look like from an Academy Award?'" She aimed to give herself permission to fail.

"That's what got me to a place where I was eligible for an Academy Award, because I approached 12 Years a Slave with courage," she said. "It cannot be about the accolades. It has to be about the boldness with which I go about my work."

Maybe it's because Nyong'o grew up a world away from Hollywood that she's managed to approach its gilded trap with grace. "Trying to maintain other people's regard of you is not sustainable," she says. "The Academy Award was external validation, but it cannot be the prerequisite for self-appreciation."

Nyong'o knew too well that winning an Oscar isn't a cure-all. Fans saw her in plunging, powder-blue Prada, statuette in hand. Behind the scenes, 2014 was coupled with the crushing low of her first fibroids diagnosis: "It was just a very brutal reminder that no number of red carpets will protect me from poor health," she tells me.

Over her colorful salad and my plate of branzino, Nyong'o is ready to go there. She's been listening to Lena Dunham's memoir, Famesick, and relating closely to the story of a buzzy young star privately grappling with a chronic health issue.

It's tempting to write that Nyong'o has suffered in silence, but she now describes her experience with fibroids as something more specific, something all too female: She did not recognize her suffering was remarkable at all.

Though her period was going longer and she was experiencing cramps, abdominal pain, and clotting—all fibroid symptoms—"I didn't know I was sick," Nyong'o says of the lead-up to her diagnosis in 2014. "I didn't know there was an alarm to sound."

It was only after she insisted to doctors that the toughness in her abdomen signaled a deeper problem that an ultrasound confirmed she had 30 fibroids growing in her uterine lining. "I blamed myself because it had been a stressful year, and fibroids grow in a stressed-out body," she said of the dizzying high/low. "I was the thinnest I've ever been, and that was not by design. There was not enough time to eat, and I didn't have an appetite. My diet was cortisol and adrenaline."

Nyong'o says no one could explain why her fibroids had developed or if they'd return. Doctors repeatedly shrugged at a lack of research. Despite affecting 80% of women by age 50 and disproportionately affecting Black women, fibroids were—and largely remain—"under-researched, underfunded, and routinely dismissed," according to a piercing description by health policy nonprofit The Commonwealth Fund.

Nyong'o's treatment options sounded more like an ultimatum: surgically remove her fibroids or continue to suffer. She says hysterectomies—the only certain cure for fibroids—have too often been recommended as an extreme first course of action. Facing her first surgery, "I felt very alone, and I also felt like I had to deal with it in private," she recalls. Overnight fame was disorienting enough without publicizing her medical records. After a myomectomy that removed 23 fibroids, Nyong'o continued to grind. Ten days after the procedure, she honored a prior commitment to speak before 10,000 women in Boston. "I didn't know that I could say no, and I think a lot of women do that," she says. "Taking care of their bodies is not on the agenda, because the world does not create an environment where your pain is considered."

Post-op conversations about prevention felt similarly bleak. Nyong'o recalls two options: go on The Pill, which can alleviate symptoms but isn't a cure, or accept that it would only be a matter of time until her fibroids returned. "I lived praying that my fibroids weren't coming back," she said, "so when I learned that they were, it was this inevitable tragedy."

Nyong'o was mostly able to live her normal life in the years since her first surgery, but over time, her symptoms flared. "It wasn't until my period lasted more than 30 days that I finally crumbled," Nyong'o said. In early 2023, she learned her fibroids had returned and more than doubled: There were over 50 tumors, the largest being the size of a peach. This time, she was almost a decade older and full of fiery resolve: "I realized this system has failed me, and I got to try and understand the female body for myself."

Playing a cancer patient in 2024's A Quiet Place: Day One proved a turning point. "That movie where I had to look ill actually made me more well," Nyong'o said. To safely lose weight for the role on a short timetable, she worked with a healthcare facility that dialed into her nutrition and bloodwork. She learned that fibroids feed on estrogen and eating iron-rich foods could improve her liver function and, therefore, her hormonal balance; that getting vitamin D via sunlight and supplements could inhibit fibroids from growing (which is notable for Black people, who can be vitamin D deficient, as the melanin in their skin decreases sun absorption); that reducing stress and inflammation can make your body a less-friendly host for fibroids.

Nyong'o approached her second myomectomy this past May empowered by information. "Last time, I felt completely helpless and at the mercy of the medical industry," Nyong'o said. This time, "the fibroids don't have the same power over me."

Instead of racing back to the grind, "I went away for a month, and I stayed in the countryside, and my mother came and she took care of me," Nyong'o shares. She ate well, walked every day, and got tons of sunshine, "like a wounded cat." Nyong'o is still healing, including discomfort and pain from the surgical wound, but she says her body seems lighter already.

Even on set of The Odyssey, she strove for sleep, rest, and maintaining her anti-inflammatory diet.

Nyong'o doesn't feel alone after this second surgery, either, in part because of the community she's created by going public. Nyong'o has established herself as a truthteller. In 2017, she lent her voice to the #MeToo movement, alleging in a stinging New York Times op-ed that Harvey Weinstein made sexual advances on her while promising to boost her career. When she broke up with boyfriend in 2023, she skipped the typical, pat statement, instead vulnerably writing on Instagram about "a love suddenly and devastatingly extinguished by deception."

She decided to share her fibroids story last year. "Honestly, I just had it," she tells me. Part of her advocacy is awareness. "Why is this thing that's so common a mystery?" Nyong'o asks. "We should know about fibroids as much as we know about impounded wisdom teeth. Every single girl should know about the risk of fibroids in their teens when they're learning about their period and their reproductive system."

In March, she announced a Make Fibroids Count campaign with the Foundation for Women's Health, creating a grant to research less-invasive treatments; it has surpassed its $200,000 goal, raising more than $230,000. "I would love for there to be more solutions for women than just cutting us open," Nyong'o says.

This is the true beauty of Lupita Nyong'o: her resolve to do something productive with her pain, and her fame. "It's the delight of my soul," she says.

The Odyssey is in theaters July 17.

Photographer/Creative Conception: Kenny Germé
Creative Director: Natalia Sztyk
Stylist: Jan-Michael Quammie
Hairstylist: Vernon François
Hair Assistant: Batiseol Gomis
Makeup Artist: Nick Barose for Exclusive Artists using Chanel
Makeup Assistant: Naruedom Putipan
Manicurist: Bagir Hasanov
Set Designer: Lane Vineyard
Video Director: Sarah Al Slaity
Entertainment Director: Jessica Baker
Producer: Nick De Bellis

"A fellow blonde! I love it," a bubbly Lexi Minetree exclaims as she logs on to our Zoom call. I let her in on a secret: Mine isn't natural. "Neither is mine," she tells me. Here we are, a couple of natural brunettes bonding over the high-maintenance upkeep of golden tresses. Fortunately for Minetree, though, she has a team of pros on hand to keep her buttery-blonde blowout looking fresh at all times. It's one of the many perks of playing the iconic Elle Woods in Amazon Prime Video's Legally Blonde prequel series, Elle.

Minetree looks strikingly similar to Reese Witherspoon's Elle Woods—the aforementioned blonde locks, a heart-shaped face, crystal-blue eyes, and a petite frame. But that's half the battle when bringing such a beloved and internationally recognized character to life. There's also Elle's high-pitched inflection, enthusiastic mannerisms, and unapologetic confidence, which I can confirm Minetree executes effortlessly across the show's first eight episodes. (Season 2 has already been shot.) It's easy to see why the 25-year-old actress was a standout among thousands of submissions.

In Elle, we meet our titular character in 1995, long before she defied the odds at Harvard Law School, navigating the highs and lows of a much higher-stakes institution—high school. When her family is forced to uproot from their sunny Bel Air life to gloomy, grunge-inspired Seattle, Elle finds herself (fully clad in pink) as a fish out of water. But Elle Woods never backs down from a problem. With a young Bruiser by her side, the teen will overcome any obstacle, all while trying to land her dream internship at Cosmopolitan magazine.

What, like it's hard?

First things first, your Elle Woods blonde is perfect. What was the process of getting to this shade?

I actually went blonde before the open call was even announced. A lot of people think I went blonde after I booked it. It was more of a very random kismet thing that occurred because I'm the kind of girl who will be like, "I want to cut my bangs," and then I do it the next day because I have no willpower and then regret it immediately. I had just graduated college, and I was like, "I'm entering a new era of my life." I want a big change because I naturally have brown hair, and I'm a college student. The money that I have is questionable, so I kept going to salon schools to do my hair. You pay $30, and they'll do your hair. They do a wonderful job, but to be fair, they're students, and you have multiple people doing your hair. So my hair was a mosaic of different artists. When you looked closely, it was not a pretty sight.

When I booked the role, the hairstylist was like, "Oh dear God, what have you done to your head?!" They called in a bunch of different pros to help adjust my hair to make it look good.

I know Reese Witherspoon has talked about the color being quite specific.

They call it a buttery blonde. Nowadays, ashy blonde is in, and if you rewatch the movie, her hair has warmer tones underneath versus ashy blonde, [which] has more silver tones. So they really want to keep that warmth in there. They are truly masters of their craft. People even think that I'm a natural blonde. I tell them that I'm brunette, and they're like, "Really?!" My roots will be showing and everything. That's when you know you nailed it.

Let's take it back to the beginning. Your audition tape was pretty special. How did that come together?

I think it was first announced that they were doing an open call at the end of September, early October, and … when it first came out, five of my friends immediately texted me and were like, "You have to audition for this. You look just like her." And I was like, "I'm, of course, gonna audition, but everyone and their mother is going to be going for this." But … if you're gonna do something, don't half-ass it. Go all the way. They asked for a self-tape and a slate, which is your name, your height, where you're based, and 30 seconds on why you would be a good Elle Woods. I remember having this light-bulb moment, like when Elle Woods gets her light-bulb moments. I was like, "I know what I have to do. I have to re-create her Harvard admission video." They're not actually wanting to know why I would be a good Elle Woods. They're wanting to find someone who can embody Elle Woods. And what's more Elle than being so extra that you make your slate the craziest thing of all time, like a whole production? I was home at the time filming something else, and I literally wrote the script. I filmed it and edited it myself. I put music over it. I spent hours on it. I remember thinking, "Oh gosh, casting will probably never see this, but if they do, I think they're going to like it." And I think they did.

Legally Blonde came out the year you were born. What's your earliest memory of the film?

Oh gosh, it feels like one of those movies that I always kind of knew as a kid. What's great about Legally Blonde in particular is that I feel like you can watch it at any age. You can show this to a younger kid, and for the most part, any of the mature jokes will go over their head. Or an adult can watch it and really enjoy it. I think I watched it at a very young age, and it's just one of those movies that has so much rewatchability, which I think is why, 25 years later, people are still quoting Elle Woods and talking about Elle Woods and are going to law school because of Elle Woods, which is crazy to think about. She's such a relatable character, especially to women who are often shamed and looked down upon or trivialized by society. In fact, that ends up being her superpower. As women, we have to remind ourselves that no matter what people are saying, we are far more capable than people give us credit for.

I loved the video of Witherspoon breaking the news to you that you got the part. What advice did she give you ahead of filming?

Oh my gosh, so much. It's crazy because she gave me her number, and we'll send each other voice memos. That's a sentence I never thought I would ever say. But she's been so encouraging. … One thing that's really special about this project to me is how involved she is in it. I know Legally Blonde is so important to people, and they're very precious with it, and they don't want anyone to mess it up in the legacy. But I think, particularly because she is so involved, people are going to be so happy with where we have taken Elle Woods. It's very much a collaboration, and everything we do is to honor this character. Reese herself sent me many clips from the movie, and we talked about things that she loves about Elle. For example, she sent me the clip when Warner asked Elle to get back together, and Elle shut him down in a very kind way. Reese was saying, no matter how cruel the person was to her, she's never a bully. She always takes the high road, but she sets a boundary. I think that's important because you don't want to teach people to be a doormat and let people do bad things to you. But you also don't need to sink down to their level. That's one thing that really stuck out that she pointed out to me.

One of the first things that stood out to me watching the show was how you really nailed her voice. Did you spend a lot of time perfecting that?

I feel like her voice in particular, even over her movement (which I did work on a lot), was the thing that I really wanted to nail the most and really focus on because it's such a specific cadence. It's really easy to go into a stereotype of a Valley girl accent or something, which I didn't want to do because she doesn't have that. I watched the movie a lot, and I noticed that when she asks questions, she has this thing in her mouth where she makes this little tisk sound. When she's excited, she goes really high. I love voice-over, and I love doing accents and dialects, so it was really exciting for me and very fun to get into it and discover it, especially with dialogue that hasn't been said before by this character. I didn't have a reference for young Elle Woods.

When I was in high school, my voice was a little bit higher, so I thought maybe she has a little bit of a higher-pitched voice because she's in high school. Our voices do change from when we were younger to older. And then there are certain things like her cry that's so iconic that I was like, "I simply have to do this." My voice can tend to go a little bit lower than Elle's, so every morning, I'd do a vocal and body warm-up before set. Sometimes, I'm called at 4 a.m., and the voice is not there yet. It's doing scary things. I sound like Gollum, so I'd make sure I do all these different vocal warm-ups so that I can be able to reach that right lifted place.

Elle Woods is such a cultural figure to so many. What else was important to you to get right in terms of the interpretation?

There are two big things. One is Elle's earnestness. She approaches the world with such openness and brightness and joy. And I'm gonna be honest. She says some diabolical things that if anyone else were to say it, they'd give them the biggest side-eye of all time. But she means it with such good intentions, and she means it with all love that you can't really be mad at her. I love that she sees the bright side of everything, and I wanted to do that.

The other thing I really wanted to emphasize is to not judge her as an actor and play her stupid because I think that the whole point of this character is that people think, because she is optimistic and bright, that she's not intelligent. And that's not the case at all. She's very capable and very smart, and both those things can exist simultaneously. The thing that Reese did—and, again, why this character is so iconic—is that when you see her play this character, she doesn't judge her character. She doesn't play her stupid. I wanted to bring that same energy. Of course, she's in high school, so there might be a little bit more of a naïveness or maybe a little bit less self-assuredness than you'd see in the movie because when I was in high school, I was not nearly as confident.

The show is set in the '90s, which lends itself to a lot of nostalgia. How was it stepping into that world?

First of all, a car phone—can we bring that back? We are thoroughly lacking. I love how tactile everything was. It's funny. A lot of Gen Z are going back to a nostalgic era that we never even had ourselves. There's something about having the physical thing in your hand and putting the CD in the CD player. It's rewarding and slows you down a bit. The phones, I'm obsessed with the phones because there are so many different variations. Long antennae that you pull out. There are the ones that have the cords. I'm learning so much from my costars who lived through the '90s. It was a whole other world then, and I think that it's a world that forces people to confront the place they are at because they didn't have the crutch of ultimate connection that we have now with the internet and with FaceTime and calling.

Can you take me inside the wardrobe fittings for Elle? It feels like a fashion-person fantasy situation.

Oh my gosh, it is a world of beautiful, beautiful pink. I have worn nicer clothes in the past two years than I have ever before in my life. I'm a thrift girl. I thrift most of my clothes. So to be able to wear all these designer clothes and couture, it's mind-boggling. It's really been fun to dive into this world of fashion because the fashion in the movie is so important. You get to see Reese's style evolve and adapt to where she is in the movie. I think it's going to really surprise the audience in the best way to see how Elle's style evolves because she comes into Seattle from Bel Air, and it's very obvious. She sticks out like a sore thumb. She doesn't wear any jackets. She wears skirts and dresses, much to my chagrin. I was freezing cold. But it's fun because you get to see her fashion start to evolve as she adapts to Seattle's little isms and things involved. She still stays true to herself, but as the season progresses, she takes inspiration from them.

Did you have a favorite look of Elle's from this season?

Oh goodness, there are so many. There was this one dress that I wore in episode 8, the last episode. It was this Vivienne Westwood dress. I felt like a pretty, pretty princess in it. I had this gorgeous updo. I think that might be one of my favorites just because I felt beautiful in it.

How do you feel about the color pink personally?

I love the color pink. I love a baby pink, like a soft pink. Do I think I can wear it as much now? Probably not. My favorite color is green. Green is great, but pink is also lovely. I love pink, and I'm surprisingly not sick of it yet.

We have to talk about your beloved costar Bruiser Woods. You recently said he is your spirit animal.

He's a little baby. He's adorable. I'm obsessed with him and his matching outfits. I don't think you will ever see him naked. We won't let that happen. He'll always be wearing something. He is a baby Chihuahua. As you can imagine, there are some moments where he'd be a little feisty. But he gets lots of treats, and we take very good care of him. He's our little star.

The cast is all over your Instagram, and it seems like you all have grown so close. How was that dynamic on set, meeting these folks and building that friendship both on-screen and off?

It's kind of scary how well we get along. We like each other so much. It's the dream. It's always great when you get along because you're spending ungodly hours together, sometimes up to 15 hours a day. You really have to be like family if you're going to be spending that much time together. Honestly, being on set, it feels like summer camp in a way. And it's really great because you have some of your closest friends so close by. We're all a bunch of theater nerds, so it's great. We started a play-reading club together where, every Sunday night, someone would pick a play, and we'd read it together and assign characters. We would just nerd out about how much we love storytelling. Also, it's always nice to stretch the muscle for other characters and stuff because we're obviously in this world now, but it's nice to remember there are so many different stories to tell as well. Last night, we literally were up all night playing hacky sack. I did win. I have to make that clear.

It's amazing that you guys have found that. You're already filming season 2, right?

It's done.

Oh! I know you can't say anything, but what can you tease at all about what's to come?

Dare I say, I might like it even better than season 1? It's crazy because season 1 is so, so good. But season 1, for most shows, you introduce the world, and you introduce the characters. And season 2, if you're doing it right, you get to really dive in headfirst. I think people are gonna get to see so many more dynamics in season 2. I feel like the tone of our show… We get even wackier and funnier, and I have a blast. I get to do things I never thought I'd get to do. I think that people are really gonna like it, and I'm really glad we're doing it because so many times with shows, people have to wait so long [for the next season]. Fans can watch peacefully knowing that season 2 is already done.

Stream Elle on Amazon Prime Video on July 1.

In the year 2026, the world has no shortage of internet boyfriends. From silver-screen regulars like Jacob Elordi to the actors playing beloved BookTok characters (Every Year After's Matt Cornett is the latest to step onto the scene), fans have been well-fed this year. But there's another slightly unusual place the chronically online have turned their attention lately: the world of sports. And we're not just talking about the New York Knicks' historic NBA Championship win or the FIFA World Cup.

People have been all about the fictional happenings inside and out of the hockey rink (or "boy aquarium"—IYKYK) since the late-2025 debut of Crave's Heated Rivalry, a TV adaptation of the enemies-to-lovers series by Rachel Reid that shot its leads Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams into superstardom. The latest spicy hockey sports-mance to enter the chat—Off Campus, which is based on the NYT best-selling college romance series by Elle Kennedy—is doing the same with its cast of fresh faces.

The show's slam dunk of a first season broke Amazon Prime Video's viewership records with 36 million streams in its first 12 days, according to Variety, and now, lead actors Ella Bright (who portrayed Hannah Wells) and Belmont Cameli (Garrett Graham) are passing the main-character torch to their costars Mika Abdalla and Stephen Kalyn, who will take center stage as spunky Allie Hayes and playboy Dean Di Laurentis. While both casts of Off Campus and Heated Rivalry continue filming their respective second seasons in Canada (no, they haven't yet run into each other—yes, Kalyn's heard the Storrie comparisons), we caught up with the faux-blonde burgeoning star to discuss his flourishing career and past life as a real high school hockey player, his style evolution, this hotly anticipated second season, and, of course, that sexy dance party scene.

First of all, how are you? How's your day so far?

It's been really good. We had a hockey rehearsal today. My one day off, they had to throw something in there! I just had my morning coffee, I've been sitting on the couch and doomscrolling for a minute, and now, I'm here.

A healthy morning, honestly. Since you have your morning coffee, let's get into it. Do you remember where you were when you learned you got the role of Dean Di Laurentis?

I was in my parents' basement when my agent called me and told me that I had to get on for another meeting. [I was thinking], "What, another audition?" Then he said, "No, no, no, no," but he kept it quick. He never keeps it quick. When we talk, we talk for like 25 minutes. This was 90 seconds, and he says, "You just gotta get on the call. Bye!"

In my mind, I took it as them just calling me to let me know that "You did a great job in the audition process, but unfortunately, we're gonna go with someone else." But then I thought, "Wait, why would they call me just to tell me that I didn't get the role?" But they told me on Zoom in the basement—I had all my hockey equipment and weights around—and then it all changed from there.

That feels authentic to the character.

I remember in between takes in the audition—because it was a three-hour chemistry read—I had a mirror right beside me, and every time they'd give us a break, I'd turn and go, "You're f*cking Dean. You're Dean! You got this!"

You were manifesting! I know hockey was a big part of your life growing up, but when did acting come into play?

I went to drama camps as a kid if I wasn't playing hockey, but I did a play in high school. I remember doing the rehearsals and auditioning, and I just loved it. I stepped onto the stage—there were about 500 parents in the crowd—and I loved every minute of it. I did that for two years in high school and thought, "Okay, I know what I'm going to do." Hockey was wrapping up, and I knew I wasn't going to the NHL. I could see more of a future in a career as an actor. Even though I knew it wouldn't be easy, I could just see it happening.

You're like a hockey Troy Bolton.

Pretty much! That's exactly the story. "What am I gonna do, Dad? Hockey, performing?!"

It's great that you were encouraged to do both growing up.

My parents have been so supportive in the sense of, "Whatever you want to do, go after it," and I'm very thankful for that. I know for a lot of people it's like, "No, you can't do that. It's not gonna work out. Just go get a serious 9-to-5 job somewhere." But they always respected this, and I'm very thankful for that.

My dad's always said, "You're gonna make it. Just keep going and banging out those auditions, and one of them is gonna stick." And then [it] ended up being a hockey-player role.

They've got to be so happy about that.

Oh, they're extremely happy.

Especially teeing up to this season! I know you're in production for season 2 of Off Campus right now—what has your preparation process for a role like this been like?

I read a little bit of The Deal because I had heard about the series, and I wanted to audition for Garrett. And then no audition came in for Garrett, but one did come in for Logan. I'm like, "Oh, here we go. Now's my chance." I sent it in, and then I never heard anything back. "All right, well, there goes that one." But then I got Dean, and within a day after getting the role, I read his book.

It's an easy read; you can fly through it.

Very easy read. I'd never read a smut book before, and I actually really enjoyed it. Well, technically, I read Fourth Wing before that, and this book was kind of like it, in a way. I just wanted to know what was next, you know? It was intriguing.

You have good taste in books. If you really want to commit to a series like that, try Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas.

Is it spicier than Fourth Wing?

When you get there! It takes a few books. But speaking of books, we've seen bits of Allie and Dean's storyline in season 1. What can fans expect in season 2?

I think you get really great, iconic moments from the book that fans love, but you're also going to get a lot more in-depth situations that these characters go through. You get more into it. It makes it much more interesting, heartbreaking, and very, very sweet at the same time. You really get to see why they are the way they are, and you start to feel it for them even more.

What does it feel like to step into the lead role of such a hotly anticipated season?

I love it. It's so much fun. I was very nervous at the beginning, but this is our third weekend of shooting. We're just about to wrap up episodes 1 and 2, and it's been great so far. I've been working a little harder, but I love that, and it's been really fun.

You got to see fun party Dean and some emotional stuff toward the end of last season, but this time, you don't just see the playboy anymore. You start to strip the walls down a bit and see his vulnerability, which has been so much fun to play with.

There's also a lot more ensemble stuff, too, which has been great. We have so much fun filming these scenes together.

It's probably cathartic. You all went through this major change together and then went right back to filming.

It couldn't have gone any better, honestly. I'm so grateful and happy that the show has been received in such a positive way, but it's nice to get right back to work and focus on what we have to do—to do what we did last season but find ways to make it even better. I think our writers and our showrunners know our characters that much more now, so they can write toward how we would do them as us, as actors.

Every time I read the new scripts that come in, I can see what we learned from season 1—what worked and what didn't—and that we're really applying that this season. I think we have a really damn good season coming.

This is definitely getting me hyped up for the next one.

Yes! I just read a new script recently, and it was a page-turner. There was so much going on, so much happening, and I was like, "I can't wait for people to see this."

You had a wild press tour for season 1. I've seen you guys everywhere, from Off Campus–themed bars in New York to red carpets. How do you feel your sense of style has changed in this time?

Big shout-out to my stylist, Amanda Lim, for knowing what I like and making it come to life. Before I started this, we met over Zoom, and I sent her all my inspirations: a little Jacob Elordi, some Drew Starkey, a little Austin Butler. She really, really nailed it and found a way to make it more Stephen at the same time. We've been working together for a bit now, and she's been amazing. She's done a great job. She works really, really hard, and I love her. She's the best.

What's the Stephen touch? Do you take inspiration from pop culture, maybe even other actors?

I've always loved the classic '90s Hollywood stars, that '90s vintage style—Johnny Depp, DiCaprio, Keanu Reeves, all those cool guys, I love their style. They've been huge inspirations to me in the fashion world and as actors.

Going back to the show, it's hard to convey chemistry, but you and Abdalla nail it. How did you find your stride as scene partners?

We're both very similar in the way we work. We didn't really talk much at the very beginning because I didn't have many scenes with her, but then Louisa [Levy, the showrunner,] was like, "You guys need to get to know each other." The only scenes that we had done [at that point] were for the audition, which was already somewhat tough because we did it on Zoom, and everyone else she did chemistry reads with was in person in L.A. for the screen tests. Dean and Allie's relationship at the start is very physical and touchy, so it was hard to navigate that over Zoom in the audition process. But we somehow made it work and made it believable.

We ended up going out. She invited me to a Pilates class with her, and I didn't make it, and she was not happy about that. Then I said, "Well, let's go get a drink." So we had vodka sodas, talked for two or three hours, and I really got to know her. She got to know me. I learned her process of how she works, and it's very similar to mine, and then it was pretty cool from there.

The classic Pilates-to–vodka soda pipeline. You did owe her for the no-show fee, though.

Yeah, I actually still have to pay her back.

You've been playing Dean for about a year now. Are there any aspects of Dean's character that you feel overlap with yours? Where do you separate?

I think Dean loves to put on a show, and [it's] something that Steven likes to do too. … If Dean wasn't this hockey guy, he would be in the arts and performing. I feel like that's where we click: that performance style and always wanting to be "on." And, of course, hockey and coming from a good home.

Briar University is the backdrop for this entire series, and watching it made me nostalgic for my own college days. Did you get a university experience before beginning your career?

I did! After I finished high school, I was accepted into Humber College, their acting for film and television program. I met some really great people there that I still speak to today, and I studied there for two years. I learned the basics of acting and the structure of the business, and it helped catapult me into auditions and getting an agent, so that was a huge help.

Would you say there were any parallels between Dean's college experience and your own?

Literally no, not at all. So experiencing this through the show was definitely interesting.

Fair! Your life has changed drastically in the last few months—millions of Instagram followers, a hit show, and a season focused on yours and Abdalla's characters currently in the works. What does life feel like nowadays?

It feels the exact same. The only difference is when I walk around, I get the odd head turn and "Are you in Heated Rivalry?" And then I'm like, "No, no, no, no—other show." Then they say, "Oh, Dean?"

Wow, they think you're Connor Storrie.

It happened once! The other day, I was walking down the street with Victoria [Lovatsis, Kalyn's fiancée], and this guy was listening to "Since U Been Gone" by Kelly Clarkson—no, he was blasting it. He looked at me; I looked at him. He kept driving, and then he pulled over and goes, "Hey bro, are you in Heated Rivalry?" I'm like, "No, different show." He goes, "Oh, cool" and just drove away.

No follow-up or anything!

Nothing. Everything was a little overwhelming at first, but it's been really cool, and I'm so happy that people have felt connected to the show. I want to get these episodes for season 2 out there right now because I just know that we have such a good season coming. But maybe the wait is good, actually. Maybe this will make people really excited. We want to feed the fans.

You guys definitely are—I saw countless TikToks of that J.Lo scene before I'd even watched the show.

I can't believe that was the scene that people felt so wowed by. It felt so awkward doing it, but sometimes, you do a take, and you think, "That was the best acting I've ever done in my life," and then you go watch it, and you're like, "That's it?"

We did a quick rehearsal for that too—an hour of Mika just learning some moves and me just kinda swaying in the back. It's just so funny that that was the scene that people felt really connected to.

Fortunately, they were able to blast "On the Floor" [by Jennifer Lopez] when we filmed. At the beginning, Silver Tree, our director, was like, "You need to loosen up a little, man." I was like, "I'm f*cking loose, Silver, I'm loose!" She said that, on camera, I was too tight, so I was like, "That's it." I went to Mika and said, "On this one, I'm dropping it low, and you just gotta go with it. You can do whatever you want, but I'm dropping low."

We were shooting it in slo-mo, and I remember Belmont afterward saying, "You're so hot." He was watching it on the monitors in slow motion and said, "Man, this is gonna be good."

Was that the take that made the final cut?

I think it was!

I heard you received the Most Likely to Win an Academy Award superlative in your high school yearbook. What's your wildest career dream?

Living in the Amazon and taking photos of animals for National Geographic. Something to do with animals and filming them. In an imaginary world, it might be fun to do that.

When this is all said and done and you get a great camera, you should go off and do it.

Maybe I might! Might have to retire after season 2 and move to the Amazon.

If you could go back and tell that kid in your yearbook what life looks like today, what would you say?

I would have told him, "Hey, man, you were right—not that you won an Oscar but that you chose the right path. Continue. Keep doing what you're doing. Don't give up, and just keep trying to get better every day."

Photographer: Max Schultz
Stylist: Amanda Lim
Groomer: Colleen Dominique

When the music video for Hayley Kiyoko's viral female queer anthem "Girls Like Girls" debuted on YouTube 11 years ago, Thai American Myra Molloy was 17 and living with her family in Bangkok. On the corners of the internet of American pop culture, Molloy, an aspiring actress at the time, came across Kiyoko and saw in her an idol. Watching Kiyoko, who is Japanese American, out there doing her thing was inspiring. Ten years later, an audition for Girls Like Girls, the feature film directed by Kiyoko, arrived in Molloy's inbox. It was a full-circle moment that still has the rising star floored today.

Inspired by the breakthrough 2015 music video and 2023 NYT best-selling novel of the same name, Girls Like Girls is the coming-of-age story following 17-year-old Coley (a fabulous Maya da Costa), who is forced to move in with her estranged father in rural Oregon after the sudden loss of her mother. Grappling with grief, she meets Sonya (a captivating Molloy), a popular girl with an on-again, off-again boyfriend. The two develop an immediate spark after spending a summer together and must confront the truths and fears of their feelings.

In their first lead roles, Molloy and da Casta are fantastic, delivering some of the most authentically vulnerable and heartfelt performances we've seen in a while. We immediately zeroed in on Molloy and couldn't take our eyes off of her. In casting the two newcomers as Coley and Sonya, Kiyoko not only shows Hollywood that two half-Asian women can lead a film with themes of queer joy and identity, but she also turns the spotlight on two exceptional actors who have exciting careers ahead of them.

Here, we speak with Molloy about exercising free will, feeling deeply with Kiyoko, and all the ways Girls Like Girls made her dreams come true.

What was your first impression of the "Girls Like Girls" music video?

Oh my goodness, it's so nostalgic—that era of YouTube too. I feel like anyone born in the '90s or early 2000s… YouTube was our home pre-Vine, pre-TikTok, pre–all these things. I felt so transported, and I thought the music video was a cinematic masterpiece. I was like, "This woman has a vision, and this song is a banger," and it was just so beautiful to watch. It's such a testament to Hayley's very crystal-clear vision and perseverance that she was able to take that essence and turn it into a feature film over the course of 10-plus years. I really commend her. I start some things, and then the next day, I'm over it. And she stuck it through in such an insane, beautiful way and really stuck the landing. I'm just constantly in awe of her. It really is so cool that this song was brought to life in so many different mediums and how she was able to expand on the story for each of them. No one's doing it like her.

I heard you originally auditioned for Coley until Kiyoko saw your tape and immediately said, "She's Sonya."

When you get the email as an actor, you see the project, you see the role, and then immediately, my brain was viewing it through the lens of Coley because I was like, "Okay, I'm gonna lock in with what they're requiring of me." Even reading the scripts, I was reading it through the lens of Coley, and I was so touched. I was so moved by it.

I wrote something out for Hayley, which I don't usually do because I'm embarrassed, but I think the message for me, if I can impart anything, is we should all exercise our free will more. If you feel something, you should say something. And I expressed to her how moved I was by the script and by Coley's story. When she told me that she wanted me to read for Sonya, initially I was like, "Oh my goodness. Wait, that never even crossed my mind." And then reading over it again through Sonya's POV, I was like, "Yeah, you're right." I think I see myself in both characters, and that's the beauty of this film. … No matter where you stand in the relationship or in your life, you can see yourself in both characters. But I really resonated with Sonya. I was so excited to bring a misunderstood character to life. As humans, we all experience things for the first time, and we make mistakes, and we stumble. I really saw so much of myself in Sonya.

How did all the different mediums of Girls Like Girls influence your performance? Did you have a conversation with Kiyoko that really put things into place for you?

Having the reference with you at all times is kind of wild. … Hayley is the director and writer and was always there as a sounding board of like, "Hey, what if we did it this way?" Or I would try something, and Hayley would be like, "Actually, I liked what you did better." I'm so lucky to have Hayley as my big feature-debut director because she is so collaborative. She's probably the most empathetic person I've ever met. Every time I see her, someone's crying, either me or her. She just feels so deeply, and I feel so deeply, and the story has such emotional depth.

Whether it's referencing the book or referencing the aesthetic of the song and music video or just her personal story, having her there and being able to talk to her and ask, Does this feel true? Is this working, or is what I'm bringing to the table as Myra and my choice working for what you envision for Sonya? Sometimes, it didn't work; sometimes, it did work. It was an amalgamation of both, but it was just really cool to have her there. Beyond her being the encyclopedia of all things Girls Like Girls, it really shows in a project when a director really cares, when a writer really cares, when the actors really care. And not to be corny, but to be corny, I think that's [Hayley's] superpower—being able to conjure the care and love out of people because that's just who she is. We just wanted to do Girls Like Girls justice.

Talk to me about working with Maya da Costa, who plays Coley. You both are newcomers in this industry.

She's the sweetest girl in the world. We got to hang out a bit off set because [Kelowna, Canada] is such a small town. We would spend the weekends going to the lake together. Also, sometimes with Hayley, we would get coffee. We would get to know each other, but I feel like the bulk of getting to know each other was through the story, and by the end of the film, we were really close and had shared a lot of things. It's special how you get to know someone, and it's tangential to your character getting to know them too. So it felt method-y in the sense that I'm sussing you out, and you're also sussing me out, and it's also happening on film and in my life. But I felt our chemistry and our friendship [were] always there. Everything felt very divine. Everything felt like it was meant to happen. I felt very lucky and blessed in that situation.

Did you have a favorite scene that you worked on together?

I have favorite scenes I worked on with Hayley, and I have favorite scenes I worked on with Maya. Maya is such a gracious scene partner, and you're lucky when the coverage is on you, if you get an actor that really delivers and really is still there with you. Maya is such a wonderful actress and scene partner and person, so that was very effortless. Shooting the train track scenes where they're laying on the ground just having that heart-to-heart, it was truly a moment where I felt the world stood still. You could hear everything, and everyone was so quiet and so locked in, and I was locked in. I was just so moved by Maya, and I thought that was so special.

But also, working with Hayley on the scenes where we had to do pickups was so fun. Hayley was always like, "Myra, my girl, you're my closer," because I work super well under pressure. Maybe I'm a masochist. I love working under pressure. Put me in an Instant Pot. I will deliver. We would always do B-roll scenes or extra footage, and I would be at the end of the day, and we would just bang them out, and me and Hayley would be like, "Yeah, we got it." It was just so fun to do that with Hayley. I really had the best time that summer.

Kiyoko has spoken on how proud she is that both leads of the film are half Asian and to have that representation. What does being cast in this project mean to you?

Oh my goodness. It's still so surreal. I can't believe that it's happening or that it even happened. I think that's why I went up to [Hayley] at the end of the chemistry read and was like, "Thank you so much. Have a great life." … I was like, "Maya is half Asian. I'm half Asian. I don't know if Hollywood is gonna allow that." I just wanted to be a supporter of the film, so when I heard that I was also cast, I was so shocked because I was like, "Oh my goodness, is this really happening—us in a studio feature representing our culture and our upbringing on the big screen in America? That's crazy." That's something you dream of but never thought would happen because my narrative for most of my 20s was "I'm always just gonna play the supporting best friend. I'm always going to play a small, minor character" because I feel like they're not ready to see two Asian leads. They're not ready to see that kind of representation that actually reflects our reality. So when this happened, I was floored. I'm so excited for people to come see the film and feel seen alongside themes of queer joy and coming of age and identity and first love and all that. I'm so glad I get to see it in my lifetime and be a part of it.

The soundtrack for the film is amazing. Do you have a favorite song?

My favorite song off the soundtrack is actually "Lakeside." It sounds very Imogen Heap–y. I also produced and wrote a song on the soundtrack as well. I scored one of the songs—no big deal. Just Kiyoko making all my dreams come true. She's crazy for that. She did the whole sound [for the film]. I just don't know if she's a human being. Sometimes, I'm just like, "Let us crack under there."

How was it seeing the finished film for the first time?

It's so surreal because, of course, when you're in front of the camera, you have no idea what's going on behind the camera. It's not like they're showing us playback on set because there's no time, so the first time seeing it was crazy. I always say the film is made in the edit. I don't think the general patron of cinema knows how powerful the edit is. The editor genuinely can make or break a film, and I think they did a banging job. It really hit me how beautiful the film is—not just aesthetically but sonically and emotionally. The entire world-building of it is so cohesive and so genuinely expressive and colorful, and that's Hayley in cinema form. I was crying. We were just a small crew, short shoot days. We're making an indie film. And then you see it, and you're like, "Oh my goodness, we made a film film. This is cinema." I just know that's a labor of love if I've ever seen one.

It's dreamy, summer nostalgia vibes.

This might be the hottest take, but I'm so sick of seeing iPhones and seeing your age. I'm sorry. I don't wanna see it. But the flip phones, the desktop, the AIM of it all—that was also my childhood, so I was like, "I love that." Like waiting for my crush to come online.

I was perusing your Instagram and got the sense that you're very comfortable and talented behind the camera with your photography. Do you have aspirations to direct one day?

This is my favorite question. I'm not even lying. I love framing a shot. Films that people usually don't like I love because they're really slow and really beautifully shot. Perfect Days by Wim Wenders is one of my favorite films. I always say in another life, I would have loved to be a cinematographer. I would love to be a DP. But I did say that after seeing [Hayley] direct this film, I never want to be a director. Oh my god, that is so hard. She has the patience of… I don't even know what to compare it to. I thought I had a lot of patience, but we saw her deal with every department—front, middle, behind, back camera, people not even there—and having to manage and make all these micro-decisions and have it all together and also be emotionally available and support us and have time for herself. I was just like, "Bro, I don't think I can be a director. I'm happy to assist the director." So [I'll] be in front of the camera or help frame something up, but doing the conducting? Absolutely not. I'll just stick to home videos and film photography. … Shout-out to all the directors.

Girls Like Girls is now in theaters.

Photographer: David Dickenson
Stylists: Anna Huger and Lauren Gray
Hairstylist: Madeline Campagnolo
Makeup Artist: Marla Vazquez

Three years in, Cyklar—the multisensory beauty brand offering a range of bodywashes, lotions, oils, and fragrances—is not just hitting milestones. It's blowing past them. Since its launch in 2023, the brand has been an Allure Best of Beauty and Who What Wear Beauty 100 winner and a recipient of Marie Claire's 2025 Prix D'Excellence Award, and it was included on Oprah's 2025 Favorite Things list. This spring, it announced its first major retail distribution deal with Sephora, rolling out in roughly 450 U.S. stores, a game-changing next step for the brand.

So to what does Cyklar and its founder, Claudia Sulewski, owe its success?

If you look at the Venn diagram of Sulewski's career, you'll see that great storytelling is at the intersection. Through her many successful endeavors, we've come to learn that Sulewski is a master storyteller. It dates back to 2009, when she launched her YouTube channel, BeyondBeautyStar, at 13. The platform—where she shared makeup tutorials, product hauls, brand reviews, and unedited vlogs—taught her how to build a powerful community and, in many ways, informed the launch of Cyklar 14 years later. And then there's the more literal version of storytelling as an actress and director. It's all to say Sulewski knows how to speak authentically to audiences and consumers, making her an anomaly in an oversaturated market.

"My years of making YouTube videos have really taught me how to tell a story, both in a small way and also in a big-picture way," Sulewski tells me over Zoom on a beautiful spring morning in Los Angeles. "And so much of owning a brand is telling a story through your product launches, through your marketing, your imagery, everything."

Sulewski likens her YouTube content-creation days to beauty boot camp. Not only did she watch some of her favorite brands evolve and grow and see what worked and what didn't for them, but experimenting and talking about other brands also allowed her to better speak on her own. "YouTube has been such a great, great vehicle to help transition into this next chapter of my life," she adds.

From the beginning, Sulewski set out to create a brand that combined high-performing formulas with a luxury feel. The decision to launch bodycare over a cosmetic or skincare line is explained by Sulewski's personal relationship with taking care of herself and listening to her body. "There is something so inherently intentional and luxurious about putting on body cream or a body oil. Oftentimes, we're so focused on the face, the hair, the nails, the things that you see, but underneath your clothes, our skin is our largest organ," she says. Sulewski was answering the question of, How do we turn those rituals into moments of nourishment and stillness? Thus, Cyklar was born.

Coupled with a sleek, gender-neutral design; a "luxury feel for less" approach; and tight product launches, like its recent Rose Bud scent, the brand immediately appealed to Gen Z and millennial consumers, leading to an estimated $15 million in generated revenue in 2025, according to Forbes.

With Cyklar's third anniversary approaching this fall, I ask Sulewski about her biggest learnings in this time. She half-jokes that owning a beauty brand is "to be putting out small fires at all times," but in all seriousness, she says she's truly learning through every phase and chapter and product launch.

"I've learned to not be too precious about anything because, wow, do you need to stay flexible, nimble, and not sweat the small stuff," she tells me. "Perfection is the thief of joy, and it cannot exist within owning a business. We are constantly evolving and growing. And what's been really fun is I've been bringing that mentality into my own content and in my own personal life and just not tripping up about the thing that I said at dinner. We can't sweat the small stuff."

Now with Sephora in the mix, it's a whole new world, and Suleweski tells me the partnership with the beauty retailer has elevated everything. Her favorite thing is walking into a Sephora store and seeing the Cyklar endcap a mess. "It means that people are coming up, and they're interacting with it and experiencing it physically, which is so satisfying because up until now we've been a direct-to-consumer brand. You can only describe a fragrance so many ways online versus someone actually being able to smell it," she says. Indeed, fragrance sales have boosted since, she tells me.

The support of Sephora also means eventually expanding internationally, which Sulewski can't wait to do. Her fans around the world have been clamoring for it, so it's the number one goal she thinks about when growing the brand. Product-wise, though, Sulewski's dream is to continue to innovate formulas that cover skin concerns in different areas of the body.

How Sulewski has time for a personal life, much less additional jobs, I'm not quite sure, but in between running a multimillion-dollar business, she can be found in front of and behind the camera as an actress and director. As we said, she is a storyteller at her core.

Sulewski made her feature-film debut in the 2022 comedy I Love My Dad before landing a recurring role in the Apple TV+ series Shrinking. "If I'm looking at the priority list or the pie chart of my life, Cyklar is certainly sitting at the top, and acting is right next to it or maybe, let's say, number two," she says. What acting offers that Cyklar can't is access to a completely different side of her brain and creative process as well as a surrendering of control. So many of the final choices in film and TV are out of her hands. It scratches another itch for Sulewski.

She tells me she's a sucker for those "slice of life" movies that are kind of about nothing but also about everything and hopes to one day be in one, but right now, she's taking things day by day and is open to anything that comes her way as long as she can continue to flex her acting muscles.

When I ask about stepping behind the camera, she flashes a grin and says, "Oh my gosh, yes, I dream of it!" She's already building a résumé thanks to the two music videos she directed, "2001" and "Mona Lisa, Mona Lisa," for fiancé Finneas. (The two plan to wed this summer.) She again credits her YouTube days for informing that process and making her feel qualified to do it. "It was like a mini master class and [experience of] something that I've always dreamt of doing being a YouTuber for so long and really appreciating cinematography, lighting, storytelling, editing," she says. While she's not sure where directing on a larger scale will fall in the grand scheme of her life, she's putting out a call to people: "If anyone needs a music video or if someone has a script!"

Telling thoughtful and exciting stories—whether it's via a great script, a new Cyklar product launch, or an in-store activation—is at the heart of every strategic move Sulewski makes. And with her proven track record of success, whatever Sulewski is selling, we're buying it.

Photographer: Lauren Leekley
Stylist: Thomas Christos Kikis
Hairstylist: Ericka Verrett
Makeup Artist: Jen Tioseco