Author: Jawdah Hannad Basara

Finding out that Wayne Rooney, a man who once terrorized the best defenses in Europe, spent the night before his pre-season weigh-in sweating on an exercise bike inside a steam room while fully clothed, not eating or drinking, just sitting there hoping the numbers would drop, is strangely reassuring. It doesn’t fit the myth exactly. However, the myth never fully conveyed the narrative. Compared to most professional football players of his generation, Rooney has been more open about his weight. He wrote in his 2012 book that one July, when he arrived at Manchester United’s Carrington training ground for the…

Women in public life are subjected to a specific kind of cruelty that seldom makes a loud announcement. It shows up in Facebook threads, comment sections, and the moment between watching someone on TV and grabbing your phone to type: “What happened to her? She’s gained a lot of weight.” One of Britain’s most subtly talented comedic actresses, Rebecca Front, has recently been the focus of this well-known scrutiny. The more you consider the whole picture, the more difficult it is to tolerate the casual way her appearance has been scrutinized online. For over thirty years, Front has been a…

When Gabriel enters a scene in Season 4 of Emily in Paris, there is a subtle but noticeable change. Not the illumination. Not the viewpoint of the camera. He is the one. The French actor Lucas Bravo, who was discussed in glossy magazine close-ups and thirst-tweet threads for the better part of three seasons, appears to have changed physically. He is fuller in the face and broader in the shoulders, less like the sculpted catalogue fantasy of Season 1 and more like a real man who has been living his life. The internet did what it does, and fans took…

Viewers anticipated seeing the same fragile, porcelain-skinned Betty Draper when Mad Men returned for its fifth season in April 2012, but they were taken aback. She weighed a lot. Noticeably, purposefully, and uncomfortably heavy. The woman who had spent four seasons as the epitome of a 1960s housewife, complete with frozen smiles and Grace Kelly cheekbones, was now sitting by herself in a dimly lit kitchen, spooning through two bowls of ice cream and eating Bugles straight out of the bag while the rest of the family moved around her as if she were a piece of furniture. For a…

Seeing an actor transform on screen and wondering if it was the role or life itself that changed him is subtly fascinating. Since the release of Series 6 in late September 2025, Callum Woodhouse—best known today as the amiable, mischievous Tristan Farnon in Channel 5’s All Creatures Great and Small—has drawn a particular kind of viewer attention. He has a different appearance. He seemed heavier, fuller, and more at ease with himself. Additionally, people have opinions about it. Woodhouse has never sought attention or courted controversy. His breakthrough role as Leslie Durrell in ITV’s The Durrells, a sun-drenched comedy-drama set…

In public life, women are subjected to a certain kind of cruelty. It doesn’t make an announcement. It appears subtly in Facebook threads and comment sections, where “then vs. now” photo comparisons are posted without any kindness or context. The most recent victim of that specific sport is Natalie Maines, the lead vocalist of The Chicks, one of the most renowned acts in country music history. Additionally, the way it has developed says something important to consider. Since the mid-1990s, Maines, who is currently 51 years old, has been a prominent figure in American music. At the age of 21,…

A version of the Prince Naseem story concludes satisfactorily in 2002 with a post-fight pledge to return and a points victory over Manuel Calvo at London Arena. That return never materialized. Instead, a life so different from the featherweight showman of the 1990s emerged gradually and then all at once, to the point where people stopped scrolling when they saw pictures of Naseem Hamed in London ten years after his last bout. Hamed was a fighter who trained for years at Brendan Ingle’s Wincobank gym in Sheffield, doing things with his hands and feet that no one else was doing.…

The way Millie Bobby Brown’s body became the subject of public discussion is unsettling; it wasn’t because she asked for it or made a statement, but rather because she was raised in a public setting. The majority of people first saw her on Stranger Things as Eleven, a child with a shaved head, a bloody nose, and an intense gaze. When filming started, she was ten years old. Sitting with that number is worthwhile. Ten. And now that she’s twenty-one, married, promoting movies, and walking the red carpet, it seems that this change has been enough to spark a wave…

The fact that Noah Cyrus somehow became the story after leaving a Lady Gaga concert last summer is subtly telling. She wore a beanie, a leather jacket, hot pants, and a bra top, just like any 25-year-old would on a hot night out. It was an easygoing, self-assured ensemble. There was nothing especially calculated about it. Nevertheless, she was all over the place by the following morning. The pictures quickly gained popularity. She appeared to be a typical person, not because she had done anything especially noteworthy. Apparently, that was sufficient to go viral on its own. There was an…

The moment someone takes a before-and-after picture of you, posts it without any context, and asks the internet to comment is one type of cruelty that only affects women in public life. Bebe Rexha experienced that at the 2026 American Music Awards. With the caption, “Be honest… what’s your first thought?” a user on X shared a side-by-side photo of the singer that showed how much she had changed over the years. To put it simply, Rexha’s response was flawless. “My idea is that my new album, Dirty Blonde, will be available on June 12th. Preorders are currently being accepted.…