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Hollywood celebrities&#8217; frozen faces are damaging their performances.
Fans are in an <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-ancient-lesson-christopher-nolan-may-have-completely-stripped-out-of-the-odyssey">uproar</a> over Christopher Nolan’s new movie &#8220;The Odyssey,&#8221; but this time it&#8217;s not about the casting; it&#8217;s about a skilled actress’ inability to emote after what appears to be cosmetic surgery. After seeing the trailer, <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DYAKVjtm1qI/?hl=en&amp;img_index=1">a critic compared</a> Anne Hathaway’s performance as Penelope in the movie to another role of hers years ago, concluding: “Having Botox is like a disability for actors.”
In &#8220;The Odyssey&#8221; trailer, Hathaway&#8217;s character is clearly meant to appear distressed. But her face is remarkably smooth; it lacks the creases and lines Hathaway showed while crying in the 2010 movie &#8220;Love &amp; Other Drugs.&#8221;
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Sixteen years ago, you couldn&#8217;t mistake her emotions. But if you take away the sound in &#8220;The Odyssey&#8221;<a href="https://youtu.be/f_bKjZeJBBI?t=120"> trailer</a>, it becomes difficult to understand what feeling Hathaway is trying to express. Instead of obvious hopelessness and grief, Hathaway&#8217;s character might be angry or accusing instead.
This is happening all the time now. New York dermatologist Dr David Colbert got <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/celebrity/articles/face-doesn-t-move-hollywood-110004318.html">chewed out</a> a few years ago by a director who was shooting a scene with a high-profile actor. The director scolded Colbert, who has treated famous actors such as Sienna Miller, for plumping the actor’s face “with so much filler it wouldn’t move.”
<a href="https://www.dazeddigital.com/beauty/article/65946/1/is-botox-ruining-cinema-nicole-kidman-the-substance-babygirl">In a Dazed article</a>, culture editor Halima Jibril wonders, &#8220;Is Botox ruining cinema?&#8221; From Arianna Grande in &#8220;Wicked&#8221; to Kristen Bell in &#8220;Nobody Wants This,&#8221; actresses are failing to emote. &#8220;An actor’s main job is to convey to the audience the emotions, thoughts and feelings the character is experiencing and tweakments block the face from producing the expressions and micro-expressions which help portray these,&#8221; Jibril writes.
The article also calls out Lindsey Lohan in &#8220;Irish Wish,&#8221; sharing a TikTok that shows Lohan crying — or at least trying to — but her face is so stiff that it feels rather laughable instead of moving. 
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<section><a title="@hlevin" href="https://www.tiktok.com/@hlevin?refer=embed" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@hlevin</a> Lindsay Lohan botox Irish Wish movie <a title="irishwish" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/irishwish?refer=embed" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#irishwish</a> <a title="lindsaylohan" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/lindsaylohan?refer=embed" target="_blank" rel="noopener">#lindsaylohan</a> <a title="♬ original sound - Yarden Kushnir" href="https://www.tiktok.com/music/original-sound-7346865675496868609?refer=embed" target="_blank" rel="noopener">♬ original sound &#8211; Yarden Kushnir</a></section>
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A viral clip from &#8220;<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hollywoods-most-sinful-show-ends-with-a-moral">Euphoria</a>&#8221; illustrates how desensitized we have become to cosmetic surgeries’ influence on acting. Fans pointed to Sydney Sweeney, noticing the difference between her and another actress’s performance. The clip highlights how Sweeney, who has said under a lie detector test that she has <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVYXM7qIM2s">never had</a> any work done, can actually convey emotion. One viewer <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/entertainment/sydney-sweeney-euphoria-botox-scene-season-three-11891747">commented</a>, “with sydney’s acting you can literally see that cassie doesn’t care in her facial expressions but the other lady’s face doesn’t move at all like if you watched without sound you wouldn’t know she was mad.”
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the difference here is striking. actresses without botox are quickly becoming an endangered species <a href="https://t.co/6HZrjGNXdh">pic.twitter.com/6HZrjGNXdh</a>
— mary morgan (@maryarchived) <a href="https://x.com/maryarchived/status/2048883479081869438?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 27, 2026</a></blockquote>
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The difference between the two actresses is shocking: complete human emotion versus an expressionless face with only an angry tone to convey frustration. True, Sweeney’s face has lines and wrinkles, but the audience can actually feel her emotion.
Facial treatments to achieve Hollywood&#8217;s brand of beauty are destroying the actors’ skills. Even slight expressions in the forehead, eyes, lips, cheeks, and brows allow the audience to feel what the actor expresses. By stifling these abilities, Botox and other treatments make actors&#8217; performances less moving. Unfortunately, <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/kristenharris1/celebs-pressured-to-get-cosmetic-surgery">not all of these actors want these cosmetic surgeries</a>; some are ironically forced into them for the sake of their careers.
Hollywood’s immovable faces reveal its fear of “ugly.” Actors and actresses seem to believe that if their faces make one exaggerated or unattractive expression, audiences will despise them. They fear failing to meet today&#8217;s unachievable standards by maintaining a face that makes expressions that require wrinkles and lines. Even characters who are meant to be ugly — or at least not show-stopping — are played by actors with “perfect” modern features, such as <a href="https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20240925-wuthering-heights-hollywoods-worst-casting-decisions">Margo Robbie</a> in &#8220;<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hollywood-promised-a-love-story-what-it-delivered-was-something-else">Wuthering Heights</a>.&#8221;
These actors may have perfect aesthetics, with features designed based on what is most attractive by today’s standards. But there is something lost through the procedures. These cosmetic surgeries, through removing the full range of facial expressions, strip away movies’ essential ability to connect with audiences and characters&#8217; ability to move them. If actors continue to prioritize “perfect beauty” over real faces, they will sacrifice the rawness and realism necessary for a good story.
Botox, fillers, and other cosmetic surgeries have had a dramatic effect on cinema. It&#8217;s as if Hollywood wanted to distance itself further from its viewers by making its characters not only stiff-faced but disconnected from the average audience. Movies are supposed to present stories designed to inspire and stir the viewer; the best films call people to a higher standard and morality. But how can a film be expected to move an audience if its characters can&#8217;t connect with people on a basic human level?
Julie Andrews&#8217;s Oscar-nominated role in the 1965 film &#8220;The Sound of Music&#8221; exemplifies how true emotions should look on screen. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9v85Bc1fR0">When Andrews&#8217; character</a>, Maria, argues with Captain von Trapp, you can see the creases between her brows. Mute the sound, and the subtle differentiations in her expressions become pronounced: concern becomes frustration, which then turns into exasperation and pleading, and finally into hurt.
The best actors&#8217; emotions are etched into every wrinkle and line on their faces; that is how emotion touches us. Good performances show us how Hollywood is terrified of the truth: people are imperfect. We do not possess flawless, un-aging faces; we grow old, wrinkle, and decay. And that makes great cinema.

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Why Hollywood’s Beauty Obsession Is Ruining Great Acting

Botox

euphoria

Plastic Surgery

Sydney Sweeney

Upstream

Sydney Sweeney posted a snarky reply to her critics on Instagram on Sunday. 
“It’s called … acting,” the 28-year-old actress <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DZAgyfuES3r/?img_index=20">wrote</a> in the caption alongside a carousel of behind-the-scenes snapshots from the HBO drama series “Euphoria.” The most recent season was just announced to be the end of the show. It has also been the most controversial.
The season 3 finale, “In God We Trust,” was actually the series finale, series creator and director Sam Levinson confirmed on the podcast “Popcast.” Levinson had hinted at it before the season 3 premiere, saying he writes “every season like it’s the last.” 
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He also didn’t commit to doing a fourth season, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/08/arts/television/sam-levinson-euphoria-season-3.html">telling</a> The New York Times in April, “I don’t know. As of right now, all I want to do is hang out with my wife and kids and read some Elmore Leonard and watch ‘Mrs. Miniver’ again.” 
The official “Euphoria” description says it’s about “a group of high school students as they navigate drugs, sex, identity, trauma, social media, love and friendship.” The story skips forward in time for the third season as the characters “wrestle with the virtue of faith, the possibility of redemption and the problem of evil.”
One major controversy for season 3 has been the storyline involving Sweeney’s character, Cassie, creating an OnlyFans to help fund her upcoming wedding. She acts out strange fetishes, including dressing as a dog on a leash and a baby in a diaper, plus sends one fan her underwear. These antics drew the ire of sex workers, who say it makes them all look bad.
“In the climate we’re in, that they dressed her up as a baby to make pornographic OnlyFans content was beyond troubling and again serves to perpetuate stereotypes that sex workers have no moral compass and that they will do anything for money,” former “Boy Meets World” actress Maitland Ward told Variety last month. “And there’s always this untrue stigma that somehow sex work is synonymous with sex trafficking and abuse. And they just said, let’s make a joke of it. That is so funny. I’m not laughing.”
Levinson told The Hollywood Reporter back in April that the story arc was never meant to be flattering, as The Daily Wire previously <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/onlyfans-creators-rage-against-sydney-sweeney-over-sex-work-stigma?author=Amanda+Harding&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=OnlyFans+Creators+Rage+Against+Sydney+Sweeney+Over+Sex+Work+%E2%80%98Stigma%E2%80%99">reported</a>.
“[Cassie] has got her dog house and her little dog ears and the nose, and that has its own humor, but what makes the scene is the fact that her housekeeper is the one filming it,” he said at the time. “What we wanted to always find is the other layer of absurdity that we’re able to tie into it so that we’re not too inside of her fantasy or illusion — the gag is to jump out, to break the wall.”

Sydney Sweeney Trolls Critics With Racy ‘Euphoria’ Finale Photos

Entertainment

Television

OnlyFans creators are big mad at “Euphoria” for making sex work look seedy and gross. 
Several prominent “content creators,” including former “Boy Meets World” actress Maitland Ward and popular OnlyFans personality Sydney Leathers have publicly slammed Sydney Sweeney for her character Cassie’s storyline on the HBO series. 
In this season, Cassie creates an OnlyFans to help fund her upcoming wedding. She acts out strange fetishes, including dressing as a dog on a leash and a baby in a diaper, plus sends one fan her underwear. These antics have the real OnlyFans creators seeing red.
“There’s just a lot that’s ridiculous and cartoonish about it,” Leathers <a href="https://variety.com/2026/tv/news/sydney-sweeney-euphoria-onlyfans-hbo-sex-worker-nude-1236741946/">told</a> Variety in an interview published Sunday. “There’s so much that they have her doing that is not even allowed on OnlyFans, and that alone is infuriating: the age-play stuff where she’s dressed as a baby in a diaper, for example. Credit card processors have very strict rules that you have to abide by, and the rules are getting stricter all the time.”
Ward also expressed her frustration over OnlyFans creators being portrayed in a negative way. 
“In the climate we’re in, that they dressed her up as a baby to make pornographic OnlyFans content was beyond troubling and again serves to perpetuate stereotypes that sex workers have no moral compass and that they will do anything for money,” she told the outlet. “And there’s always this untrue stigma that somehow sex work is synonymous with sex trafficking and abuse. And they just said, let’s make a joke of it. That is so funny. I’m not laughing.”
Showrunner Sam Levinson <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-features/euphoria-season-3-premiere-feature-sam-levinson-interview-1236561251/">told</a> The Hollywood Reporter back in April that the story arc was never meant to be flattering. 
“[Cassie] has got her dog house and her little dog ears and the nose, and that has its own humor, but what makes the scene is the fact that her housekeeper is the one filming it,” he said at the time. “What we wanted to always find is the other layer of absurdity that we’re able to tie into it so that we’re not too inside of her fantasy or illusion — the gag is to jump out, to break the wall.”
“Some of these scenes we only lit with these ring lights that she would use. When you’re inside, it’s a beautiful, glowing front light, but then you jump out of it and it’s just a pool of light and everything surrounding it is dark. It’s just gnarly and jarring,” Levinson continued. “We wanted to capture what she’s trying to show the audience and be inside of it, but then also pull back wider and see how depressing it is.”
In the latest episode, which aired on Sunday, Sweeney’s character weighs in on politics and appears to lean Right. During a fictional press tour, Cassie tells an online talk show host, &#8220;If a man today were to say that he wants a girlfriend who can cook or clean, he might as well be screaming the N-word.&#8221;
Someone off camera replies, &#8220;You sound like a Democrat,&#8221; which makes Cassie laugh and say, “I’m not retarded.”
At another point, Cassie says, &#8220;I just feel like American men have been treated like second-class citizens … In the past, men used to be hunters, gatherers, and protectors. Now, they’re being forced to walk around on their tippy toes. It’s not natural.&#8221; 
Her manager, Maddy, offers her take on the situation. “You know what’s funny?” she asks Cassie. “The angrier these idiots get, the more money you make.”
Many commenters pointed out how Cassie’s storyline mimics what people really think about Sweeney’s personal politics, which she refuses to confirm. They believe she’s secretly conservative, especially following the viral <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sydney-sweeney-says-trumps-support-was-surreal-during-viral-jeans-ad-controversy">American Eagle jeans ad controversy</a>.

OnlyFans Creators Rage Against Sydney Sweeney Over Sex Work ‘Stigma’

OnlyFans

Sex Workers

Actress Sydney Sweeney is once again appearing in an American Eagle ad campaign, months after a previous promotion sparked widespread backlash. 
&#8220;What brand am I wearing?&#8221; Sweeney asks in the new commercial while sporting denim shorts. &#8220;Yeah, that one,&#8221; the “Euphoria” star says as the words &#8220;SYD FOR SHORT&#8221; flash across the screen.
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<a style="color: #c9c8cd;font-family: Arial,sans-serif;font-size: 14px;font-style: normal;font-weight: normal;line-height: 17px;text-decoration: none" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DXJtgNYkwG8/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A post shared by Sydney Sweeney (@sydney_sweeney)</a>
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The new ad spot references the original jeans campaign, which made headlines for months and delivered a significant boost to the company&#8217;s sales. 
Last summer, all hell broke loose over the campaign featuring Sweeney in various seductive poses while saying she had “good jeans.” The double entendre with the word “genes” made leftists deem the ad racist, noting that Sweeney is white with blond hair and blue eyes.
In one of the ads, Sweeney says, “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality, and even eye color. My jeans are blue.”
American Eagle responded to the backlash at the time with a statement defending the campaign. 
&#8220;&#8216;Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans’ is and always was about the jeans. Her jeans. Her story,&#8221; the company said. &#8220;We’ll continue to celebrate how everyone wears their AE jeans with confidence, their way. Great jeans look good on everyone.”
Despite leftist calls for a boycott, the denim collection did exceptionally well, with most of the featured pieces selling out. 
American Eagle’s chief marketing officer, Craig Brommers, <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/2026/04/15/sydney-sweeney-american-eagle-ad-jeans-controversy-new/89605439007/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told</a> USA Today that the company’s stock jumped by 22% thanks to that campaign.
&#8220;A vast, vast, vast majority of Americans understood that the campaign was about jeans,&#8221; Brommers told the outlet, crediting Sweeney’s “duality” of being both casual and glamorous as the reason for the campaign&#8217;s success.
&#8220;American Eagle has a store in all 50 states and during that campaign, we saw new customer acquisition grow in every single county in America,&#8221; he added. &#8220;It is a fact that it was the most successful campaign in the history of the American Eagle brand.&#8221; 
&#8220;The world is curious and the world will be talking when we launch the campaign,&#8221; Brommers said. &#8220;As we learned in the fall campaign, there is noise, but there are also facts as well, and we&#8217;re excited to see where this campaign takes our brand.&#8221;

American Eagle Doubles Down On Sydney Sweeney After Failed Boycott

advertising

Business

Celebrities

Leftism

Actress Sydney Sweeney just addressed the viral backlash against her following the American Eagle jeans campaign, not explicitly admitting to being woke but instead saying she is “against hate.”
Mostly, the 28-year-old star just expressed confusion about why everyone was up in arms over the ad campaign.
“I was honestly surprised by the reaction,” Sweeney <a href="https://people.com/sydney-sweeney-shares-emotional-response-to-american-eagle-jeans-campaign-exclusive-11863206">told</a> People in an interview published over the weekend. “I did it because I love the jeans and love the brand. I don’t support the views some people chose to connect to the campaign. Many have assigned motives and labels to me that just aren’t true.”
“Anyone who knows me knows that I’m always trying to bring people together. I’m against hate and divisiveness,” she continued. “In the past my stance has been to never respond to negative or positive press but recently I have come to realize that my silence regarding this issue has only widened the divide, not closed it. So I hope this new year brings more focus on what connects us instead of what divides us.”
The comments come after many assumed Sweeney was a closet conservative, as evidenced by her being <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/leftists-melt-down-after-report-that-sydney-sweeney-is-registered-republican" target="_blank" rel="noopener">registered as a Republican</a> and her unwillingness to comment on the American Eagle controversy when it happened, including when <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sydney-sweeney-praised-for-keeping-her-cool-as-gq-reporter-tries-to-shame-her" target="_blank" rel="noopener">confronted</a> by an aggressive GQ journalist last month in a viral exchange. 
Controversy erupted over the summer over an ad campaign featuring Sweeney in various seductive poses while saying she had “good jeans.” The double entendre with the word “genes” made leftists deem the ad racist, noting that Sweeney is white with blond hair and blue eyes.
In one of the ads, Sweeney says, “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality, and even eye color. My jeans are blue.”
American Eagle responded to the backlash by issuing a simple statement: “&#8217;Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans’ is and always was about the jeans. Her jeans. Her story. We’ll continue to celebrate how everyone wears their AE jeans with confidence, their way. Great jeans look good on everyone.”
The denim collection did exceptionally well, with most of the featured pieces selling out despite calls from leftists for a boycott.

‘I’m Against Hate’: Sydney Sweeney Speaks On Viral Jeans Ad Controversy

Sydney Sweeney Speaks On Viral Jeans Ad Controversy, Says She's 'Against Hate' 

Hollywood

Liberals

Congress gears up for a fight over the fate of Obamacare, Hollywood suffers a monstrous slump, and a federal contracting program aimed at minority-owned businesses fields fraud accusations.
It’s Friday, November 14, 2025, and this is the news you need to know to start your day. Today’s edition of the Morning Wire podcast can be heard below, and the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/mrn-251114-member-exclusive">video version can be seen on The Daily Wire</a>:
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<h2 style="text-align: center;">Lawmakers Prepare For Battle Over Obamacare</h2>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-1000675" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Obamacare-Reckoning-300x169.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="169" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Obamacare-Reckoning-300x169.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Obamacare-Reckoning-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Obamacare-Reckoning-768x432.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Obamacare-Reckoning-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Obamacare-Reckoning.jpg 1920w" sizes=" (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Topline: With the shutdown finally ended, the fight between Democrats and Republicans over healthcare subsidies and the fate of Obamacare is only ramping up.
Obamacare subsidies were expanded in 2021 during the COVID pandemic. The subsidies, which are technically tax credits, were supposed to last only 2 years, but Democrats extended them through the end of this year.
Currently, about 24 million Americans are on Obamacare plans, up from 11 million at the start of the pandemic. It’s a considerable increase, mainly due to subsidies. It’s <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/how-would-eliminating-0-marketplace-premiums-affect-insurance-coverage/?utm_source=chatgpt.com">estimated</a> that about 42% of 2025 Affordable Care Act (ACA) enrollees pay less than $10 a month, with a vast majority paying nothing at all. Notably, Democrats removed the income cap on subsidy eligibility, so people earning over 400% of the federal poverty level qualify for these subsidies, too.
The cost: The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) says that extending the subsidies through 2035 would increase the federal deficit by about $358 billion.
Democrats’ message: Democrats reportedly want to make the midterms about healthcare. Their message is that inaction from Republicans will drive up healthcare costs for millions of Americans.
Morning Wire spoke to Ryan Long, a Senior Research Fellow at Paragon Health Institute, to explain all of this. He said that if these subsidies expire as scheduled, people on ACA plans will once again return to paying something, even if it’s just a small amount, instead of having access to $0 plans. Those $0 plans, he said, have actually led to widespread fraud and abuse.
GOP’s message: Republicans generally want the subsidies to expire when the Democrats scheduled them to expire. They argue that Obamacare is a failure and needs serious reforms or a complete overhaul. Premiums, for example, rose <a href="https://www.cms.gov/cciio/resources/forms-reports-and-other-resources/downloads/uninsured-affordability-in-marketplace.pdf">143%</a> in the first six years after the ACA took effect. Next year, premiums are set to rise another <a href="https://www.kff.org/quick-take/aca-insurers-are-raising-premiums-by-an-estimated-26-but-most-enrollees-could-see-sharper-increases-in-what-they-pay/?utm_source=chatgpt.com">26%</a>.
As for the fate of Obamacare, President Donald Trump has ramped up calls to move on from the “Obamacare madness.”
&#8220;I am calling today for insurance companies NOT to be paid. But for this massive amount of money be paid directly to the people so they can buy their own healthcare,&#8221; <a href="https://x.com/EricLDaugh/status/1988810290767548793?s=20">said</a> Trump.
<h2 style="text-align: center;">Hollywood’s Serious Slump</h2>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-1000673" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Silver-Screen-Slump-300x169.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="169" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Silver-Screen-Slump-300x169.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Silver-Screen-Slump-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Silver-Screen-Slump-768x432.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Silver-Screen-Slump-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Silver-Screen-Slump.jpg 1920w" sizes=" (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Topline: Hollywood is in a major slump, with October marking the worst box office revenues in nearly 30 years. Even Halloween weekend, usually a horror cash machine, failed to draw audiences.
With the exception of the COVID-19 shutdown year of 2020, when theaters were closed, October was the worst box-office month since 1997. Halloween weekend had the worst earnings in 31 years. The biggest culprit appears to be the lack of must-see content.
The numbers: Disney’s &#8220;Tron: Ares&#8221; opened to $38 million — the franchise’s worst debut. A24’s &#8220;The Smashing Machine&#8221; with Dwayne Johnson got $11 million. The Bruce Springsteen biopic earned $9 million. The total October take was $425 million.
The first couple of releases of November aren’t faring any better. &#8220;Christie,&#8221; starring Sydney Sweeney, came out last week and was a major flop. Some are suggesting politics played a role, but given Sweeney’s popularity, that isn’t very likely. The most probable explanation is that Sweeney’s young male fan base wasn’t especially interested in seeing her look nothing like herself playing a boxer.
Expert says: Veteran Comscore analyst Paul Dergarabedian <a href="https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1489424842344237">told</a> finance outlet, Cheddar News, that a couple of Japanese anime movies outperformed expectations, and without them, the story here would be even worse.
“There was just nothing commercially exciting enough to mainstream audiences to drive them in huge numbers. And you know, last year, there was a Venom movie that opened at $50 million in October. We didn&#8217;t have that this year. And so I think that definitely hurt the box office,” said Dergarabedian.
The deeper issues: The ongoing disruption of streaming and social media is always at play, but not necessarily in the way typically thought. Many veteran filmmakers are starting to talk about the problem of what gets greenlit — they say studios are playing it safe and aren’t willing to gamble on creative, out-of-the-box ideas, so audiences are getting tired of seeing the same old thing.
Directors like Michael Bay and James Cameron are warning that something bigger may be broken. In an interview a few months ago, Bay voiced frustration over what he called “a system afraid of risk.” Now, he’s the king of big-studio blockbusters, but he said he’s moving into independent filmmaking so he can be more creative.
And he said that Cameron told him that no individual executives are empowered to greenlight anything anymore. The result is too many sequels, too few original ideas, and a growing reliance on algorithms to decide what gets made.
<h2 style="text-align: center;">Crackdown On Minority Contracting Fraud</h2>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-1000671" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Contracting-Crackdown-300x169.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="169" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Contracting-Crackdown-300x169.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Contracting-Crackdown-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Contracting-Crackdown-768x432.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Contracting-Crackdown-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/11/Contracting-Crackdown.jpg 1920w" sizes=" (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Topline: The Trump administration is <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/feds-crack-down-on-minority-contracting-schemes-d-c-s-worst-kept-secret">turning</a> its eye on a long-running DEI program that may be one of Washington’s most corrupt. The federal government awards a percentage of contracts to companies whose owners are “socially disadvantaged.” But they might not even be the ones doing the work. 
At issue is a process known as 8(a) contracting or “set-aside” contracting, where certain contracts, which could be for tens of millions of dollars, are either given to one company with no competition, or limited so that only “disadvantaged” companies are eligible to compete – essentially, racial minorities and women-owned companies.
This way of contracting is likely behind much of the poor performance in government, such as websites seeming old-fashioned and broken. But this has been the way Washington works for decades. Typically, GOP-favored interest groups such as disabled veterans and Alaskan native corporations have gotten a share. And then big, non-minority-owned companies end up doing much of the actual work as subcontractors.
ATI: One company, ATI Government Solutions, seemed to admit to the cozy dealmaking in an <a href="https://x.com/JamesOKeefeIII/status/1981042870460252398">expose</a> put out by undercover activist James O’Keefe last month.
ATI is a company that gets contracts because it’s owned by Native Americans, though on ATI’s website, all the executives listed appear to be white.
The website is almost entirely focused on selling the idea that it’s easier for government officials to skip holding a competition to find the best company for a job. Meanwhile, big companies can get a shortcut to a government contract by working with ATI, which essentially has an automatic in because it’s partly owned by an Indian tribe.
Seems sus: Kelly Loeffler, the head of the Small Business Administration, said there’s a “full review of the 8(a) program” underway that has found “institutionalized abuse” to the tune of billions.
Loeffler said ATI’s CEO, Firmadge Crutchfield, had a network of seven companies, all of which had been suspended from receiving new contracts, and that their names were provided to law enforcement. 
Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), chair of the Senate Small Business Committee, said the Biden administration tripled the goal for minority set-asides from 5% to 15%, and did little to make sure they were actually doing the work, instead of serving as pass-throughs. 
“Small business contracting programs were never intended to function as welfare systems for favored classes or give no-bid contracts to do-nothing companies,” Ernst said, adding that over the decades, “penalties against rulebreakers have not been swiftly and resolutely imposed.”

MRN_251114_V1

Morning Brief: Obamacare Battle Brews, Hollywood Slump, & D.C.’s DEI Rackets

Donald Trump

Kelly Loeffler

Morning Wire

Obamacare

Small Business Administration

Washington D.C.

Actress Ruby Rose, who was allegedly passed over for the lead role in the boxing biopic “Christy,” came out swinging with a derogatory social media post against Sydney Sweeney.
The sports drama about competitive boxer Christy Martin was a massive flop at the box office, earning just $1.3 million from 2,011 theaters.
“The original Christy Martin script was incredible. Life changing. I was attached to play Cherry,” Rose <a href="https://www.threads.com/@rubyrose/post/DQ5-UJnDSE7">posted</a> on Threads. 
“Everyone had experience with the core material. Most of us were actually gay. It’s part of why I stayed in acting. Losing roles happens all the time,” the “Orange is the New Black” star went on. 
“For her PR to talk about it flopping and saying SS did it for the ‘people’. None of ‘the people’ want to see someone who hates them, parading around pretending to be us. You’re a cretin and you ruined the film. Period. Christy deserved better.”
Rose was referencing comments Sweeney made following the film’s lackluster opening weekend. The actress defended the film being a flop, saying she was still “proud” of her work and insisting that art films didn’t need to make a lot of money.
“[T]hank you to everyone who saw, felt, and believed and will believe in this story for years to come. if Christy gave even one woman the courage to take her first step toward safety, then we will have succeeded,” Sweeney <a href="https://www.instagram.com/sydney_sweeney/p/DQ4OYqPEeN1/">wrote</a> on Instagram Monday. 
“So yes I’m proud. why? because we don’t always just make art for numbers, we make it for impact. and christy has been the most impactful project of my life. thank you Christy. i love you,” she concluded.
Sweeney recently made <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/sydney-sweeney-praised-for-keeping-her-cool-as-gq-reporter-tries-to-shame-her?author=Amanda+Harding&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Sydney+Sweeney+Praised+For+Keeping+Her+Cool+As+GQ+Reporter+Tries+To+Shame+Her">headlines</a> for refusing to take the bait when a liberal journalist tried to force her into apologizing for how her viral American Eagles ad campaign was perceived.
“I think that when I have an issue that I want to speak about, people will hear,” the actress said, shutting down the conversation. 
It was also <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-delighted-to-learn-sydney-sweeney-is-a-republican-now-i-love-her-ad">reported</a> this summer that Sweeney is a registered Republican.

Ruby Rose and Sydney Sweeney

Gay Actress Who Lost Role In Boxing Biopic Lashes Out At Sydney Sweeney, Calls Her A ‘Cretin’

Actress Who Lost Role In Boxing Biopic Lashes Out At Sydney Sweeney, Calling Her A 'Cretin'

Box Office

Movies

A clip from Sydney Sweeney’s interview with GQ has gone viral on social media, with most viewers applauding her refusal to take the virtue signaling bait.
In the clip, interviewer Kat Stoeffel scrunched up her face and pressed Sweeney on her viral American Eagle ad campaign. Stoeffel tried a variety of different tactics to get the actress to apologize and denounce white supremacy. Commenters praised Sweeney for remaining cool and collected.
“This is the slimiest journalist I’ve ever seen. This entire &#8216;interview&#8217; is a bad faith gotcha where she’s trying to trap Sydney into admitting she’s conservative lol what a psychopath,” TP USA podcast host Alex Clark <a href="https://x.com/yoalexrapz/status/1986703753605751061?s=43">wrote</a> in response to the clip.
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This is the slimiest journalist I’ve ever seen. This entire “interview” is a bad faith gotcha where she’s trying to trap Sydney into admitting she’s conservative lol what a psychopath <a href="https://t.co/xX8HU7I0Ox">https://t.co/xX8HU7I0Ox</a>
— Alex Clark (@yoalexrapz) <a href="https://twitter.com/yoalexrapz/status/1986703753605751061?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 7, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
“GQ Reporter: why aren’t you ashamed that people will think you’re a conservative? You should be. Sydney Sweeney: Next question,” Jennifer Sey, founder of XX-XY Athletics <a href="https://x.com/jennifersey/status/1986556246627897714?s=43">wrote</a>. 
“To me, the most interesting aspect of this conversation is the smug progressive woman who lives in a bubble and says stupid stuff because it seems to her like the most natural thing in the world,” Dinesh D’Souza <a href="https://x.com/dineshdsouza/status/1986563463695515781?s=43">shared</a>. “I’m sure she’s still wondering why Sydney Sweeney didn’t go along.”
Another commenter pointed out that liberals don’t expect conservatives to be real people, but instead assume they are just caricatures as the media portrays them.
“The thing you have to remember about this woman and those like her is that she genuinely doesn’t know that anyone disagrees with her basic worldview. She doesn’t even see it as a worldview. It’s just the obvious truth,” Hunter Ash on X <a href="https://x.com/artemisconsort/status/1986551356673687697?s=43">observed</a>.
“Of course she knows abstractly that half the country voted for Trump. But those aren’t people. Those are cartoon characters. They’re either fat slobbering rednecks in klan hoods, or mustache-twirling robber barons manipulating the rednecks for profit,” Ash continued. “Anyone she might actually sit down and talk to is, of course, a person, and therefore agrees with The Obvious Truth. It is inconceivable to her that anyone capable of being a pleasant dinner party guest would not share her basic beliefs and values.”
The commenter argued that the question wasn’t meant to be a “gotcha” but rather came from the interviewer assuming that Sweeney “got mixed up in the whole jeans/genes fiasco by mistake.”
At another point in the interview, the actress was asked what it was like when President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance weighed in on the campaign. Sweeney gave a one-word answer: “Surreal.”
Controversy erupted over the summer over an ad spot featuring Sweeney in various seductive poses while saying she had “good jeans.” The double entendre with the word “genes” made leftists deem the ad racist, noting that Sweeney is white with blond hair and blue eyes.
In one of the ads, Sweeney says, “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality, and even eye color. My jeans are blue.”
American Eagle responded to the backlash by issuing a simple statement: “&#8217;Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans&#8217; is and always was about the jeans. Her jeans. Her story. We’ll continue to celebrate how everyone wears their AE jeans with confidence, their way. Great jeans look good on everyone.”

Sydney Sweeney Praised For Keeping Her Cool As GQ Reporter Tries To Shame Her

Journalism

Actress Sydney Sweeney is making her first public comments following the significant backlash to her viral American Eagle ad campaign.
The 28-year-old celebrity discussed the drama during a newly published <a href="https://www.gq.com/story/sydney-sweeney-gq-cover-story-interview-men-of-the-year-2025">interview</a> with GQ. When asked by the interviewer what it was like when President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance weighed in on the campaign, Sweeney gave a one-word answer: “Surreal.”
She also said not to believe the lies being circulated about American Eagle losing business because of it. 
“I was aware of the numbers as it was going. So when I saw all the headlines of in-store visits were down a certain percentage, none of it was true,” she told GQ. “It was all made up, but nobody could say anything because [the company was] in their quiet period. So it was all just a lot of talk. And because I knew at the end of the day what that ad was for, and it was great jeans, it didn’t affect me one way or the other.”
Sweeney deflected when asked if “there [is] something that you want to say about the ad itself” because “the criticism of the content was basically that, maybe specifically in this political climate, white people shouldn’t joke about genetic superiority.”
“I think that when I have an issue that I want to speak about, people will hear,” the actress said. She also said she put her phone away and stayed busy with filming the entire time she was making headlines for appearing in the ad.
“I didn’t really see a lot of it,” Sweeney said of the critical comments.
Controversy erupted over the summer over an ad spot featuring Sweeney in various seductive poses while saying she had “good jeans.” The double entendre with the word “genes” made leftists deem the ad racist, noting that Sweeney is white with blond hair and blue eyes.
In one of the ads, Sweeney says, “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality, and even eye color. My jeans are blue.”
American Eagle responded to the backlash by issuing a simple statement: “&#8217;Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans’ is and always was about the jeans. Her jeans. Her story. We’ll continue to celebrate how everyone wears their AE jeans with confidence, their way. Great jeans look good on everyone.”
Trump’s response to the ad campaign was positive after the president discovered that Sweeney was a registered Republican. 
“She’s a registered Republican?” Trump confirmed with a reporter in August, as The Daily Wire previously <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-delighted-to-learn-sydney-sweeney-is-a-republican-now-i-love-her-ad">reported</a>. “Oh, now I love her ad. Is that right? Is Sydney Sweeney? Yes. You’d be surprised at how many people are Republicans. That’s what I wouldn’t have known. But I’m glad you told me that. If Sydney Sweeney is a registered Republican, I think her ad is fantastic.”
Vance also weighed in on the controversy during an appearance on the &#8220;Ruthless&#8221; podcast.
&#8220;My political advice to the Democrats is: continue to tell everybody who thinks Sydney Sweeney is attractive is a Nazi,&#8221; Vance quipped.
&#8220;You have like a normal all-American, beautiful girl doing like a normal jeans ad, right? They’re trying to sell… jeans to kids in America and they have managed to so unhinge themselves over this thing. It’s like, you guys, did you learn nothing from the November 2024 election?&#8221;

Sydney Sweeney Says Trump’s Support Was ‘Surreal’ During Viral Jeans Ad Controversy

Sydney Sweeney Says Trump's Support Was 'Surreal' During Viral Jeans Ad Controversy 

JD Vance

In the most recent flashpoint in the culture war, American Eagle showcased actress Sydney Sweeney in an advertisement with the caption “Sydney Sweeney has great jeans.”
The ad is overtly sexual, with the camera highlighting sexual features more than the denim itself, with suggestive poses that frame Sweeney as an erotic object of desire.
“Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality and even eye color,” Sweeney says, back arched, while zipping up her pants. “My jeans are blue.”
The reaction to the ad was a Rorschach test. The Left, locked into a hermeneutic of suspicion with a reflex to read nefarious messaging into things that seem anodyne at a cursory glance, were outraged at the perceived fascist signaling of the ad (Sweeney is thin, blonde, and blue-eyed). Some on the Left interpreted it as a dog whistle for eugenics and white supremacy.
The Right, which often settles for cultural scraps, celebrated the ad as a win against “woke” culture for featuring an attractive, thin white woman after years of brands being influenced by the Left’s ideological fixations with inclusivity. One commentator <a href="https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/the-war-on-hot-women-why-the-woke-mob-hates-sydney-sweeney/ar-AA1Jz1Vf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">claimed</a> the ad was a sign that “the American people are done with ‘woke,” and another said it meant that “woke is dead, and beauty is back.” The X account <a href="https://x.com/EndWokeness/status/1948383505974510061" target="_blank" rel="noopener">End Wokeness</a>, juxtaposing a picture of an American Eagle ad featuring a heavy-set black woman with a picture of Sweeney immodestly posing, commented, “woke is dead.”
For us social conservatives, much of the Right’s reaction was a bleak cultural bellwether. One can argue that the big-budget designers who created the ad knew exactly how the “great jeans” innuendo would be received, and that it was intended to create the media buzz it has. I personally don’t believe that American Eagle, which has a <a href="https://www.aeo-inc.com/inclusion-diversity/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">pride flag on its website</a>, is engaged in Nazi dog-whistling.
The Right’s reaction, however, should alarm conservatives who are concerned with the erosion of family-friendly culture. The celebratory reaction to the ad demonstrates just how steeped in liberal paradigms and assumptions the American Right is today. The ad treats sexuality as public, performative, and consumable. It’s revealing and immodest, something I would try to shield my children from seeing at the mall. It’s not a rupture from “woke” in the slightest, rather an embrace of the liberal anthropology that detached sexuality from marriage and procreation during the 1960s sexual revolution.
Much of the contemporary Right now swims in these waters, too steeped in liberalism to even realize that by cheering the American Eagle ad as an “anti-woke” victory, they’re participating in and enabling a culture that the left created.
The ad demonstrated the triumph of liberalism and its assault on the religious right in particular, which, through different kinds of grassroots activist groups, has long campaigned against the kind of sexualized media that brands like American Eagle promote because of the harm it inflicts on families and children.
At the heart of Christianity is the belief that each person is made Imago Dei, in the image of God, and that the human body is not an object of consumption. Pope Saint John Paul II expresses this in “Theology of the Body,” a set of teachings he delivered between 1979 and 1984. He explained how sexual pathologies like pornography distort human dignity and invert the body’s purpose of self-giving love. When this fundamental truth is rejected, it comes as no surprise that the prevalence of sexualized media<a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00224499.2016.1142496?src=recsys&amp;journalCode=hjsr20" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> leads to</a> consequences like higher levels of body dissatisfaction, a greater tolerance of sexual violence toward women, and diminished views of women’s humanity.
For social conservatives who believe moral guardrails are necessary for human flourishing, mainstream culture is still hostile terrain, and the American Eagle Sydney Sweeney ad exposes the cultural captivity of much of the Right.
Being “anti-woke” is not enough, even if the campaign against wokeness generally aligns with the objectives of any socially conservative movement.  Anyone serious about making the public square welcoming to children and families must work to reclaim modesty as the standard cultural norm, and they must have the courage to oppose the liberal foundations of our sexualized marketplace itself.
Marlo Slayback is the Executive Director of the Collegiate Network for the Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
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The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
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Sex Sells, And The Right Bought It: The Hollow ‘Victory’ Of The Sydney Sweeney Ad

Christianity

Conservatives

Liberalism

Wokeness

The internet exploded with viral complaints about American Eagle&#8217;s latest ad campaign — featuring actress Sydney Sweeney — but the poll numbers suggest that the outrage was driven by a very small number of people whose influence is largely limited to cyberspace.
The ad campaign featured <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/dunkin-donuts-hitches-ad-wagon-to-sydney-sweeney-and-the-left-melts-down">Sweeney</a> in a number of still photos and videos, wearing American Eagle jeans in several different styles. The tag-line was simple: &#8220;Sydney Sweeney has great jeans.&#8221; But critics harped on the obvious play on words and claimed that because Sweeney is white and has blonde hair and blue eyes, the ad was a Nazi-esque dogwhistle suggesting that her &#8220;genes&#8221; were superior.
Indeed, a poll from The Economist/YouGov indicated that overall, only about 12% of respondents believed the ad campaign was offensive, while the vast majority either found it clever (39%) or had no strong opinion (40%).
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
YouGov has Sweeney data &#8211; 12% of Americans find it offensive.
The gender gap is bigger than the political gap on whether the ad is “offensive” (7% of men, 17% of women)
Men are also more likely to find the ad “clever” (49% of men, 31% of women). <a href="https://t.co/SMQGsWM66S">pic.twitter.com/SMQGsWM66S</a>
— Will Jordan (@williamjordann) <a href="https://twitter.com/williamjordann/status/1955261317167608037?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 12, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Democrats (18%) were more likely than Republicans (7%) or independents (13%) to find the ads &#8220;offensive,&#8221; But even among Democrats, more found it &#8220;clever&#8221; (22%) than &#8220;offensive.&#8221; Far more independents (38%) and Republicans (57%) said that they&#8217;d found the ad to be &#8220;clever.&#8221;
The gender gap was also pronounced, with 17% of women saying that the ads were &#8220;offensive&#8221; compared to only 7% of men who said the same. On the opposite side, nearly one third of the women polled (31%) said the ads were &#8220;clever&#8221; compared to nearly half of the men (49%).
By race, black Americans were more likely to find the ads &#8220;offensive,&#8221; but only slightly. According to the data, 16% of black Americans found it so, compared to 12% of white Americans and only 7% of Hispanic Americans. Across all three demographics, more found the ads to be &#8220;clever&#8221;: 21% of black Americans; 43% of white Americans; and 40% of Hispanic Americans.
The poll was conducted between from August 9-11, and posed the questions to 1,635 adults in the United States

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By The Numbers: Only 12% Found Sydney Sweeney Ad ‘Offensive,’ But Democrats Didn’t Get The Joke

By The Numbers: Only 12% Found Sydney Sweeney Ad 'Offensive,' But Democrats Didn't Get The Joke 

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Genes

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Politics

In a culture notorious for rewarding victimization, Sydney Sweeney is going viral for symbolizing something we’ve all been missing: sanity. She’s not loud or radical, and she’s not trying to make a statement. But somehow, just by acting normal, she’s become one.
All she had to do was dress in head-to-toe denim and lean over a car to make the internet go absolutely bananas.
The <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/new-sexy-sydney-sweeney-ad-campaign-has-internet-celebrating-the-end-of-woke">campaign</a> in question is a new ad for American Eagle, and anyone who spends any time on social media has certainly seen reactions to it over the past few weeks. The ad is washed in soft nostalgia, with a vibe including a gas station stop, American denim, and a once-ubiquitous girl-next-door look.
Sweeney’s ad is like a love letter to everything American culture supposedly outgrew. And that’s why people can’t stop talking about it.
The ad racked up millions of views in days. It’s the most viral moment of Sweeney’s career, even more than her Emmy-nominated turn on the popular HBO drama “Euphoria.”
In one of the ads, Sweeney says, “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality, and even eye color. My jeans are blue.”
This messaging has led to absolute meltdowns by mainstream media and leftist social media influencers, who insist the Sweeney ads are nothing but “Nazi propaganda.” Backlash got so bad that American Eagle responded, but instead of apologizing, they surprisingly doubled down.
“‘Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans’ is and always was about the jeans. Her jeans. Her story,” the company <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/DM0tMjaTBll/?hl=en">posted</a> on their Instagram.
“We’ll continue to celebrate how everyone wears their AE jeans with confidence, their way,” the statement continued. “Great jeans look good on everyone.”
The reaction has been telling. Fans are celebrating the campaign as a breath of fresh air — it’s not just a fashion ad, it’s a vibe shift. In an industry that runs on provocation, Sweeney is quietly proving you don’t have to reject femininity, tradition, or wholesomeness to be relevant. You just have to stop pretending you’re above it.
That shouldn’t be controversial. But in Hollywood today, it absolutely is.
Sweeney grew up far from the glitz of Los Angeles. She was born and raised in Spokane, a small city in eastern Washington, and comes from what the media might call a “conservative” family — though Sweeney has never commented on politics.
But she has alluded to them. Leftists were <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/euphoria-actress-responds-after-shes-attacked-for-family-photos-with-pro-police-shirt-maga-like-hat">furious</a> in 2022 when she posted photos from her mother’s 60th birthday party. The pictures, which included a relative wearing a “Blue Lives Matter” shirt and a MAGA-style hat, sparked immediate outrage.
Sweeney didn’t take the same path as many before her by issuing a groveling apology. Instead, she posted a follow-up post on X <a href="https://x.com/sydney_sweeney/status/1563660155425673217" target="_blank" rel="noopener">saying</a>, “You guys, this is wild. An innocent celebration for my mom’s milestone 60th birthday has turned into an absurd political statement… Please stop making assumptions.”
That act of defiance, refusing to apologize, was rare enough. But it’s what she hasn’t done since that’s even more interesting. She hasn’t become a political mouthpiece. She hasn’t branded herself as “anti-woke.” She’s just stayed normal. And for some reason, that drives people crazy.
It’s rare to see a Hollywood star so universally embraced without selling a political message, trauma story, or carefully calculated ideology. But maybe that’s the point.
Conservative commentator Megyn Kelly summed up what many have been saying on a recent episode of her podcast.
“She’s all woman,” Kelly said of Sweeney. “She has a great pair on her that would be the envy of virtually every woman, and they’re obviously natural… and so she’s in some ways, the opposite of a Kardashian,” she added. “She’s petite … she’s buxom, but they’re natural, and her face is not overly prodded or manipulated. She looks normal. She looks like just a pretty American girl.”
Hollywood doesn’t know what to do with someone like Sweeney because she’s not trying to be anyone else. She’s not reinventing herself for every season. She’s not jumping on trends to stay relevant.
It all speaks to a growing hunger for authenticity. It’s not the kind of curated authenticity influencers serve up with a wink and a sponsorship deal. People want real. They’re over the Botox looks that have dominated for years.
That’s the sweet spot Sydney Sweeney has managed to occupy.
Her critics don’t know how to handle it. She’s a reminder that the pendulum is swinging in the hearts of viewers who are tired of being lectured. Sweeney isn’t fighting that culture war directly, but she’s proving that jeans, normalcy, and charm still resonate with most of America.

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