Hi team, Mon here.
I've been chatting shit about showbiz as an entertainment reporter for yeeeears, and today is no exception. We hashed out this whole drama on the latest episode of our podcast 'Talking Out The Trash', and it got me good and fired up, so here's my rant about why Addison Rae's mum needs to take a seat.
The VMAs red carpet is always an opportunity for outrageous fashion choices, awkward interviews and of course, disturbing levels of PDA between celebrity couples.
This year was no different, but the newest romance causing a stir by kissing for the cameras certainly was. It was TikTok famous rapper Yung Gravy, 26, and Cheri Nicole Easterling, the 42-year-old mum of another TikTok star, Addison Rae.
The unlikely pairing put on a rather icky show for the press, sharing a smooch on the carpet and later dialling things up by full-on making out and feeling each other up during the show.
Yung Gravy referred to his date for the evening as the "Queen of the MILFS" in one interview.
In my humble opinion, it was not all good, to put it lightly.
But why does anyone care? We asked the question on this week's episode of the 'Talking Out The Trash podcast', and you can hear the debate that followed between me and Edge Workdays host Steph right here:
Steph wondered what the problem was, pointing out that there are blokes like Leonardo DiCaprio who refuse to date girls over the age of 24, and couples like Olivia Wilde and Harry Styles who have a 10-year age gap difference between them.
For me, the problem is less about the age gap, and more about the well-being of Addison Rae. Addison's parents, Cheri and Monty, split recently after video footage went viral showing Monty copping a feel of another woman at a bar.
Addison, the third highest-earning TikTok user in the world with over 88.5 million followers, already tried to shield herself from the drama unfolding between her fame-hungry parents by unfollowing them on social media.
There would be no chance of avoiding this latest display from her mother, though, which made hundreds of headlines, and understandably, left her "mortified", according to a source.
Yung Gravy defended his date, later tweeting: "She’s newly single and living her life. leave her alone," but this isn't about a heartbroken woman getting her groove back.
It's about a stage mom taking advantage of her daughter's fame and jumping on that bandwagon in a really selfish way.
When her daughter is clearly in distress about her parents divorcing publicly, her message to Addison is: 'You know what 'I'm gonna do? I'm gonna go to the VMAs on the arm of one of your peers'.
It's not just the kind of embarrassing faux pas most people suffer through at some stage with their parents - this is career-defining and likely devastating for Addison.
I don't begrudge anybody going through a break-up the opportunity to try out the 'if you wanna get over someone, get under someone else' ethos, and if Cheri and Yung Gravy have a true connection (she slid into his DMs on TikTok, so not likely) then they can do as they please - they just shouldn't do it at the VMAS.
What really rubs salt in the wound here is the fact Sheri is TikTok famous in her own right, with over 14 million followers, just for being Addison's mom.
This would all feel a little less sad if she had earned her fame herself rather than piggybacking off her daughter's success, then trying to eclipse it with what is realistically probably just a shitty publicity stunt.
