Fresh.

Everybody’s cracking jokes about how it’s a desperate attempt to stay relevant in the age of Amazon.

The stage itself was turned into a cafe:

You can’t even begin to comprehend the massive amounts of money this place makes, despite the fact that they turned the theatre boxes into reading nooks like this:

I’ve literally spent days holed up in there reading books for free while also consuming massive amounts of coffee and pastries.

@lola-fabian

Wonder why women are fine with this when he does it, but they find you opening a car door or offering to carry stuff for them annoying? Well, wonder no more! It works like this:

A large number of women have had to learn how to dodge and swerve and sometimes even slap away men’s hands from the time they hit puberty - and sometimes before. Ladies, cis and trans both, are unfortunately experienced at being groped, poked, prodded, “helped”, and otherwise humiliated and threatened by men. Then also there’s the condescending attitude that of course we need a man’s help, and we should be grateful he offered it.

No thanks.

Chris is doing something very different here, and you’ll see it in similar video clips of him at other events. You can read his mental process in his body language. He starts with just clapping and congratulating. He offers nothing until there is a need, which doesn’t happen here until Regina’s shoe gets caught on her dress. Since women have literally tripped up the stairs at this ceremony several times over the years (because the shoe and clothing requirements are ridiculous), it is reasonable at this stage to think that my-shoe-caught-on-my-dress is a problem that actually needs to be addressed. This is when Chris offers.

How he offers matters. He starts with an open hand toward her, but this is a big no-no. Open hands are a red flag. Open hands grope and grab and shove. He quickly corrects by flipping his arm over and offering his forearm instead. This makes it her choice whether to grab on or ignore him. She doesn’t have to contend with a potentially threatening hand while she’s also contending with her dress.

He also bends down a bit to do this. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Chris is kind of a tall, beefy guy. Guys like that can be a bit intimidating without meaning to be, at least when they’re up close. Also, his arm is a bit too high to be useful to her if he stays at his full height. So he bends down. This is even more visible in the video from him doing this for Betty White at the 2015 Oscars, because she’s shorter than Regina, I guess.

He offers his arm for exactly as long as she leans on it. When she lets go, he steps back. This is a guy who isn’t interested in showing off how much she needs his help. He’s just interested in helping, and when he’s not needed, he’s done. He goes back to sit down. He doesn’t hover.

Also, Regina King knows who Chris Evans is. His behavior at work thus far has certainly made it into the rumor mill, thus factoring into whether she accepts help from him. Is he a dudebro or jerk to women at work? That doesn’t appear to be the case.

Women are not helpless. Compared to men, our clothes are more often obstacles to getting where we need to go safely and with our dignity intact, but conversely, we’ve also learned to deal with that better than most men have. It’s not that we never need or want help; like all people, we do sometimes need a hand. It’s just that “some kinds of help are the kinds of help we all could do without.”

THE WRITING IN THIS SHOW!!!!!

“Don Cornelius did not want to see how I really danced, I was doing Hip-Hop and it was foreign to people out in California. Don was like ‘oh no no no no no no no no, you’re a girl’. And I was like ‘what!?’”.  

My mind was spinning the first time I stood on the Soul Train line. I didn’t know what to do. Don Cornelius didn’t like hip-hop or house dancing. He kept telling me to dance like the other girls, meaning like a vixen. In fact, after my first day he suggested that I dress more appropriately—you know, tight-ass minis and high heels. I was cool with the minis, but three-inch heels? Yikes! I could wear one- or two-inch heels. Three was a whole other story. 

I couldn’t do more than stand there and gyrate. All the regulars had routines; all the girls had their signature sexy moves. I didn’t have shit. When it was my turn, I started nervously pumping my body back and forth, trying to look like the other ladies, praying I wouldn’t fall off those damn heels. While pumping I kept thinking to myself, I look like a fucking idiot! To my surprise, everyone started cheering me on! Even Don Cornelius told me to go down a second time! 

We didn’t get paid, just a Kentucky Fried Chicken two-piece lunch box—not kidding. I didn’t complain, I was just happy to be there, and my ass was always hungry anyway, living on cans of tuna fish. But I left the show after only being on it for maybe a year or year and a half. I say “only” because most of the regulars were there five, ten years plus! All waiting for their big break into the entertainment industry, like Jodi Watley and Shalamar. […]

I had gotten into a fight with Don Cornelius during a taping. He didn’t like Keith Sweat coming over during his performance and dancing with me. But that wasn’t the reason why he went at me. Don was trying to form a new singing group and asked me to be a member. I was excited, even though I told him I couldn’t sing that good—’Your inability to sing is insignificant. It’s how you fill that dress and how the camera loves you.’ Wow. Okay. But I declined the offer after he wouldn’t let me take the recording/management contract asking for 60 percent to a lawyer. I wasn’t anyone’s fool. 

Things were tense after that, but shit really hit the fan when an A&R executive from MCA Records, Louil Silas, Jr.—who unfortunately passed away in 2001—had brought an act on the show and saw me rehearsing some hip-hop moves with Ricky and his older brother on the side. Louil was African-American and medium height and had a potbelly, scruffy aftershave; he was well-dressed, arrogant, confident, and funny as shit. 

He waved me over. ‘That’s hip-hop, right?’

‘Yes, sir. But Don doesn’t like the girls doing it on the show.’

‘Really? That’s weird. I want you to teach it to my new artist, Bobby Brown, from New Edition. He’s going solo. But don’t tell anyone yet.’

My heart went up into my throat! ‘Here’s my card. Come up to the record label on Monday.’ 

‘But I’m not a choreographer.’

‘I’ll pay you fifteen hundred.’

‘I’ll be there Monday morning.’

Of course news got to Don. How dare I not sign with him and go off and make money elsewhere? That’s when he started to pick on me during the tapings. So Keith kept humping, Don kept yelling “Cut!” and I was getting heated. By the time I went down the Soul Train line things were going from bad to worse. Excited that Louil liked and saw the future in hip-hop, I went down the line doing the Pee-wee Herman. 

‘Cut! Rosie, do it again.’ 

I went down doing the Roger Rabbit. 

‘Cut! come here.’ I walked over. 

He pulled me in close and whispered sternly. ‘You walk back down that line nice and sexy like you’re supposed to.’ I walked back to the head of the line, paused, then strutted down as if I were Naomi Campbell on the runway, continued walking past Don to my seat, grabbed my things, and told him I was out. Don grabbed my arm, pulling me back. ‘You don’t quit until I tell you you can quit!’ 

Wrong move. 

I grabbed the first thing I could get my free arm around, which happened to be one of the two-piece KFC chicken lunch boxes, and threw it at him. A chicken wing smacked him dead in his forehead. I was escorted out by security.”