How To Support Your Significant Other, Even When You Don’t Want To

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[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ojx_5n0VXZU&w=560&h=315]

I watched that Saturday Night Live 40th Anniversary thing and it was cute in that way that inherently lame things are. Just a bunch of famous people sitting in a room congratulating themselves on their outside inside jokes and embarrassing Paul Simon by not letting him know that his shirt was transparent. Paul Simon not exactly Scheana from Vanderpump Rules right now, you know? That was fucked up.

But mostly everything was funny or cute or understandably present. At one point, Jerry Seinfeld came out and ran a Q&A that was exactly what you think it was. He’d point into the audience and call on James Franco or Dakota Johnson (there to promote her hosting appearance at the end of the month) and at one point, Michael Douglas who was sitting next to his wife, Catherine Zeta-Jones. The audience participant would ask a jokey question, Seinfeld would answer it and everyone would LOL.

In general, don’t have feelings about Michael Douglas. I am decidedly non-committal on just about everything in his life except for the whole thing with his son being some maniac criminal/drug addict. That’s actually pretty unfortunate.

But anyway, he gets picked out of the audience (probably a week ago when the producers were putting together bits and seeing who RSVP’d) and asks a question that was CLEARLY not written by him. He said, “Jerry, I was just wondering why I only hosted the show once. You know, you got Charles Barkley, he’s hosting the show all the time. He can’t even act, so…”

Then Jerry said something no one who wasn’t reading written dialogue would ever say outloud, “Well, Michael, come on, you’ve really had an amazing career.”

Then Michael Douglas, again inoffensively reading the material that was written for him in a thirty second bit, “Well, I don’t need any information like that. I mean, I’m Hollywood royalty, I’m a sexual icon, so, uh… It’d just be nice if they’d ask.”

Fine. Totally acceptable. But here’s what is NOT acceptable: Catherina Zeta-Jones’ face when he referred to himself as a sexual icon. Her face read like, “YEAH, RIGHT,” and girl? That is not cool. At all.

She looked fucking gorgeous as usual and was just sitting there being the supportive partner and all of a sudden she decided to take a little acting moment during her husband’s second of two lines in a three and a half hour show, and make a face. And the face just happened to belittle him and make her look like a dumbass for being with a dude who doesn’t sexually satisfy her. That’s what the look implied to me, anyway. All, “Sexual icon? This guy? PLEASE, SIS!”

I can hear people arguing that she wasn’t given a bit or had to have some sort of reaction to her husband announcing publicly that he’s a widely known sex god, but to you I say, “Fuck off.”

Her husband was asked to participate, therefore making it his special night. And I don’t know how many special days CZJ gets a year, but I’m guessing it’s a pretty above average amount. So she should know, dude. When it’s your man’s special night, you shut the fuck up and let the light shine on him. You can run around on your birthday and be a complete cunt—that’s the whole point of having birthdays—but if you’re there to support your man, you need to act a certain way.

Also, I’m pretty sure that a good portion of the population believes that Michael Douglas got throat cancer from going down on Catherine Zeta-Jones. Even if that’s not the case and the cancerous HPV came from a former lover, a lot of people think that. And when you know everyone thinks you’re walking around with an attempted murderer between your legs, you gotta be political about that. She should assume that people’s thought process is this, “Michael Douglas, sex icon, sex, HPV, Catherine Zeta-Jones.”

So when her husband is asked to read a joke in which he refers to himself as a sex icon, among other things, the correct reaction would be to laugh or to make a face that affirms that in a positive way but isn’t grody as hell (although, TBH, they could have used the laugh if she’d gone creepy overboard/sexually eager).

The reverse of this situation is Marc Anthony being a complete dick blister on American Idol. He took every chance he got to pick at Jennifer’s judging skills and musical ear. At one point he said something about how the wrong person went home because Jennifer didn’t listen to him. I fucking hate Marc Anthony now that I’ve seen that shit. You gotta lift your loved one up, man.

It bugs because this is just a display of narcissism coupled with a relationship that should probably be over. In a way, Spencer Pratt had it right when he’d use his self-serving nature by going to extreme lengths to prove his love to Heidi Montag. He needed the relationship to work for his own gain so he’d buy her purse dogs and sunglasses. That made her feel loved; they have this whole symbiotic thing down.

But yeah, you should probably break up with someone if you feel the need to shit on them when you’re sole job is to shut up and smile. Jessica Seinfeld did a great job at that. For a woman with a very distinctive look, she smiled and blended and remained focused on the task at hand, which was to not take away from her husband’s 3-minute bit. She needs to invite Catherine Zeta-Jones over for a pan of spinach brownies and a cup of $30 coffee and tell her how it’s done.

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