When Trump called Meryl ‘overrated,’ I just could not stop thinking about how insane that sentiment is, given her accomplishments, and so I wrote a thing about it. I’m a political satirist now OKAY BYYYYYEEEEEEE!
To: info at the Hollywood foreign press dot com.
Bcc: hellomeryl at aol dot com.
Subject: My Lifetime Achievement award dot dot dot.
To Whom it may Concern:
Meryl here.
First and foremost, I would like to thank you for the honor of the Cecile B. Demille Lifetime Achievement Award. I saw my acceptance speech as an opportunity to voice to what basically everyone has been thinking. Given what our country has endured over the last few months, it didn’t seem right to take that stage time to thank my mentors and children. I can send them emails and flowers give my children hugs and college tuition. They all know how I feel about them. I tell them daily. I also saw it as an opportunity to bring back bedazzling. Both, I thought, were effective. Until this morning.
This is awkward, but.
This morning I received word that I am ‘one of Hollywood’s most overrated actresses,’ which I first read as ‘Hollywood’s most overrated actress,’ but even though I’m just ‘one of,’ it still stings. I must say, I am deeply embarrassed. I think I can feel the very nudity of Eve. Here I was, parading myself around political fundraisers and charity events and cozy Italian restaurants and sometimes Nordstrom Rack thinking that I was, maybe, I’m embarrassed to admit – a woman of some talent. I’m not supposed to read my own reviews, but who truly does not? Show me an artist who does not secretly read their reviews alone in their bathtub and cry or scream or laugh quietly into the water and I’ll show you a liar. Or at least, an artist more self assured than myself. I once read someone describe me as the best actress of my generation, and I ashamed to admit that I believed it. And I have believed it for quite some time.
Until now. I feel an — inadequacy. A lack thereof. I feel a 4 on a scale of 1 to 10, I feel certainly not hot. Blood coming out of my wherever. I suddenly hate my nose again and it’s been years since I put that to bed. I am a nasty, nasty mess.
And so, after some deep reflection, I have decided that I must humbly give back the Award. I hope you understand. The Lifetime Achievement Award should and must go to an actor who is under-rated, or at the very least regular rated. Not to me.
Sincerely, M.
PS. Just a heads up, I will be sending similar emails to the Emmys, the Oscars, and to The Screen Actor’s Guild, regarding all of those awards, too.
PPS. Oh and also BAFTA, Critics Choice, People’s choice, Cannes, AFI, Kids Choice awards, Elle women in Hollywood, The National Society of Film Critics, the British Independent Film awards, The Palm Spring International film festival. And my honorary Doctors of Arts degrees from both Princeton and Harvard. All going back via UPS mail.
PPS. Oh and the National Medal of Arts. I always forget about that one. OH and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, too. I am not worthy. I will have my hand prints paved over while I’m at it, too. All shall be righted; all shall be returned.