It certainly is nice to read some profiles in glossy magazines that are not about whatever movie the subject is contractually obligated to promote; I always enjoy this yearly feature from T&C, the only glossy magazine I still receive at home, and worth every cent.
You can check out the entire package here; there are a ton of folks profiled who aren’t objectively “famous” the way Jennifer Garner, for example, is. The subhead on the piece reads, “[i]ntroducing our favorite antidotes to news cycle–induced cynicism,” and that’s certainly welcome lately, no? Speaking of Garner, who is from West Virginia, she comes across like such a good, hard-working egg in her profile. (I did not know she often calls Joe Manchin about stuff. I have notes for Joe, Jennifer!)
The piece about the Currys is lovely, even if I did feel about a million years old when I saw how big their kids are getting. This was so thoughtful:
Part of their goal is to remove the negative connotations of assistance programs. “There’s such a stigma attached to it,” Ayesha says. “Nobody wants to say they’re getting a handout, whether you’re a child or an adult. So, for us, we want to make it feel fun. We wanted to make it feel like it was just a part of the community, just something that’s there. If you need it, you need it. If you don’t, still come say hi. Reducing the stigma really helps with our efforts.”
It’s no shocker that Questlove’s profile is really, really interesting — and written by Ruth Reichl! He’s so insightful and smart:
On how his interest in food started when he was touring with the Roots and how he learned it could be a way to change the world: “It began as something personal. There was a moment in the life of the Roots when we decided to move to the UK. We had to move to an environment that cared about musicians and live music. Once we came back to the States and were making our fourth album, our label was looking at the record contract and asked, ‘Why do we have a full-time chef, and why is this giant food budget here?’ We explained that collaboration was such an important part of our creative process, that the only way to trick other musicians and songwriters to do work on our album was to have good food, because every true artist is starving. So we had hired one of the best chefs in Philadelphia to create food in my living room every Friday night. Of course, everyone comes for the food, but they leave writing songs. That was always in my back pocket, like, ‘Okay, if you have the best food, then people will come, always.’”
I also did not know he was working on a plant-based cheesesteak.
If you have some time, it is really worth clicking through to read these profiles; it’s just a pleasure to listen to people talk about important things they obviously feel very passionately about. (The piece about young voters is more of an essay than a profile of the kids — it’s written by Selina Fillinger, who wrote Potus, and she calls it “a personal piece on youth activism.” It certainly fulfills that brief, and I’m sure that was her assignment, but I wish we’d been able to learn more about the kids who were featured on the cover!)
