Our favorite male movie stars of the moment are flirty, fun and a much-needed breath of fresh air
In a time marked by division – over politics and pretty much everything else – Pascal and Bailey have seemingly united the internet by abiding by a fairly simple principle: It's ok to have fun being a celebrity.
Case in point: Bailey matched wits – and clutched pearls – with one of the web's most gifted in the art of the flirt, Amelia Dimoldenberg, who on Friday welcomed the fellow Brit on her popular YouTube series 'Chicken Shop Date.' Their blush-inducing conversation ranged from Dimoldenberg calling their relationship 'tantric' (Bailey qualified that description with, 'From afar') to her asking him about the chaps he was planning to wear to Beyoncé's Cowboy Carter tour show that evening.
'Are they going to be with the bum, or without the bum?' she asked, to which Bailey responded, 'We'll see, maybe they'll evolve as the night goes on.'
For those who don't know him, Bailey was first introduced to most after an enchanting run on three seasons of 'Bridgerton.' He then caught our attention when he starred in 'Wicked' part one last year as the dashing Prince Fiyero.
Next up, Bailey is starring in 'Jurassic Park: Rebirth' alongside Scarlett Johansson, out this week, before he reprises his role as Fiyero in 'Wicked: For Good' in November.
What has made audiences fall in love with Bailey offscreen though, is that he can be devilishly flirty and disarmingly wholesome all in the same breath.
Further proof: The viral craze that was Bailey's so-called 'slutty little glasses,' a moniker for the eyewear that he sports in 'Jurassic Park: Rebirth' coined by internet personality Blakely Thornton. The moniker stuck after audiences saw Bailey's eyeglasses in the first trailer for the film.
Fully embracing the moment, Bailey told Entertainment Tonight at the London premiere of 'Jurassic World: Rebirth' earlier this month that he's 'thrilled that people are having a hormonal explosion linked to optical supports.'
He also saw his viral moment as an opportunity for good. Bailey and spectacle maker Cubitts recently partnered to launch a limited-edition pair of sunglasses, inspired by his eyewear worn in the film, according to WWD. A portion of the sales will benefit Bailey's charity The Shameless Fund, which he established last year in support of the LGBTQ+ community to 'live authentically.'
Bailey is also busy living out his dream of playing in the 'Jurassic' orchestra when they recorded the score for the new film at Abbey Road Studios. Bailey was able to perform the clarinet solo that played over a scene where his character interacted with a dinosaur for the first time.
'I'm sort of shaking,' Bailey said in a featurette for the film after recording his solo. 'It's a total dream come true.'
And then, of course, there's bee-swatter and Internet 'daddy' Pascal, who is literally everywhere lately.
He not only recently appeared (and absolutely broke our hearts) in the second season of HBO's 'The Last of Us,' but he also showed up in Celine Song's anti-rom-com 'The Materialists,' out now. If that weren't enough, he will also be appearing in the Ari Aster-directed drama 'Eddington' and Marvel's 'Fantastic Four,' both out later this month.
He'll also be reprising his role as the titular helmeted hero in the 'Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu' film next year.
Outside of being one of the most sought-after movie and TV stars of the time, Pascal, like Bailey, is an outspoken advocate for LGBTQ+ causes.
In April, Pascal set the internet abuzz when he attended Marvel's 'Thunderbolts*' premiere in London wearing a white t-shirt that read 'protect the dolls' to show support for the transgender community, including his sister, Lux Pascal, who came out as a transgender woman in 2021.
The t-shirt was designed by London-based designer Conner Ives. All profits from the shirt benefit Trans Lifeline, a charity that offers emotional and financial support to transgender people.
The Pascal craze came to a boiling point last month when a lookalike contest was held in New York City, as part of a growing trend that brings out doppelgängers of our most sought out celebs.
'It's the Pedro takeover,' Emma Stone, who stars alongside him in 'Eddington,' gushed about Pascal during an appearance on 'Jimmy Kimmel Live!' last week. 'He's so wonderful. He's talented, he's gorgeous, he's nice, he's funny.'
We can see it, too, Emma.
Even Robert Downey Jr., who will appear alongside Pascal in Marvel's upcoming 'Avengers: Doomsday,' can't get enough of Pascal.
'Pascal's slow trajectory to becoming a household name who is on a wildly hot streak kind of reaffirms my faith in our industry,' Downey said in a Vanity Fair interview published last week.
Pascal celebrated his milestone 50th birthday in April and spoke playfully and modestly about the renaissance he's currently having at this age.
'Stepping into my 40s felt adult and empowered,' Pascal told the publication. 'Fifty felt more vulnerable—much more vulnerable… What a silly thing for a 50-year-old man—to have all this attention!'
'Silly'? Not quite. More like superb.
CNN's Dan Heching contributed to this story.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
29 minutes ago
- Yahoo
How the sequel '28 Years Later' shows a 'compassionate' side of horror
In 2002, the British horror hit '28 Days Later' helped repopularize the zombie subgenre, leading to post-apocalyptic entertainment like 'The Walking Dead' and 'The Last of Us.' Ever since, director Danny Boyle has been saying to anyone who'll listen that the people infected with a rage virus aren't zombies. They're just like us but sick, not undead. And in the new sequel '28 Years Later' (in theaters June 20), the infected have changed a lot, even showing qualities that hint they're much more than mindless, flesh-eating machines. 'Obviously, 28 years is quite a compressed amount of time for evolution to really establish itself. But they are evolving just like humans evolve,' Boyle says. Join our Watch Party! Sign up to receive USA TODAY's movie and TV recommendations right in your inbox With '28 Years Later,' Boyle and original writer Alex Garland have returned to this post-apocalyptic world with something akin to the recent 'Halloween' revamp. The new film is a direct follow-up to '28 Days,' pretty much ignoring the events of 2007's '28 Weeks Later,' and begins a planned trilogy that will continue with director Nia DaCosta's '28 Years Later: The Bone Temple' (in theaters Jan. 16). Garland sees 'Days' and 'Years' as coming-of-age stories of a sort with 'a young person in a state of innocence who's then having that innocence robbed,' the writer says. In the original film, it's bicycle courier Jim (Cillian Murphy), who wakes up in a hospital after an accident finding a London devoid of people. He learns the hard way how much the world has changed since the rage virus started, with the infected running and biting at him, and Jim in a sense 'becomes an infected' by giving in to his own rage to save people important to him. '28 Years Later' fast-forwards nearly 30 years, with the rage virus contained to the borders of the United Kingdom. Twelve-year-old Spike (Alfie Williams) lives with his parents, Jamie (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Isla (Jodie Comer), in a small, heavily defended community on Holy Island. In an old-fashioned society where everyone has a job to do, children are taught what life used to be like and 'the infected play a role in their mind. They're being told that they will one day meet them,' Boyle says. "So they mythologize them a little bit.' Jamie takes Spike on a rite of passage to the mainland for the first time to kill an infected. Father and son barely make it back alive, but when Spike learns of a mysterious doctor who could help his sick mom with her undiagnosed ailment, he returns to a dangerous landscape on a journey more about protecting life than taking it. 'He chooses not to follow in his father's footsteps,' Boyle says of Spike. "That's one of the things that always gives us hope with teenagers. Even though they might drive you mad, they want their own challenges." Spike ultimately meets the man he's searching for, Dr. Kelson (Ralph Fiennes). He's built a Bone Temple of skulls as a memorial to victims of the infected, and Kelson sees survivors and infected people as alike. 'A key thing about how we approached the zombie genre was we didn't make them supernatural. They're not reanimated dead people. If you were a doctor, that would be the correct way to look at it," Garland says. One of themes of the movie is "how much should a sick person be differentiated from a healthy person? And why is that differentiation fair?' Over three decades, the infected of '28 Days Later' – the fast-running "zombies" that freaked moviegoers out in 2002 – have evolved and organized. Most of them are still scary quick, skinny and now naked. Bigger, stronger Alphas have emerged like the leader Samson, while 'Slow-Lows' are fat, bloated and 'closer to the ground,' Boyle says. 'They expend a lot less energy but they're nevertheless very dangerous if they're provoked or disturbed or stimulated.' And like the original film, the '28 Years Later' trilogy explores humanity in inhuman times among its pockets of survivors. Whereas Christopher Eccleston's Major Henry West in the original film "28 Days" is a soldier "who has gone crazy and collapsed into a more violent, degenerative state than the infected have,' Garland explains, Kelson is the inverse to him and creates "a different kind of commentary on people, which has something to do with being reasonable and compassionate in the face of an incredibly difficult situation." This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: '28 Years Later' sequel explores horror and post-apocalyptic hope
Gizmodo
36 minutes ago
- Gizmodo
‘Doctor Who' Will Keep the Fifteenth Doctor Alive with New Comics
While BBC determines what to do with Doctor Who after its latest season, the comics are hoping to give you more Fifteenth Doctor adventures. The upcoming Prison Paradox miniseries comes courtesy of returning Who comics writer Dan Watters and artist Sami Kivelä (Abbott). Waters previously wrote the 2024 miniseries starring the Fifteenth Doctor, and in this new tale, he's putting Fifteen and Belinda Chandra on an 'unlikely team of allies' looking to infiltrate an alien prison holding 'monsters and villains from across the cosmos.' It's Fifteen's latest miniseries to be announced following Editor Jonathan Wilkins teased Paradox as Titan's 'most ambitious yet,' and promised 'an incredible adventure featuring some familiar faces and some exciting new characters making their debut in the Whoniverse.' Interestingly, a pair of dossiers for the Doctor and Belinda from the unnamed prison warden mention 'a planet known as 'Earth' and have no idea where it is. In last season's finale, the Rani succeeded in vanishing Earth out of reality and trapping it in a time loop. Paradox seems to be set between the planet's disappearance and eventual restoration later in the episode, which lets it do something Doctor Who fans wanted from that past season: give them more time with Fifteen and Bel. Even before his latest, confusing transformation, a common criticism was how little time Ncuti Gatwa got compared to his predecessors, ditto Varada Sethu as his latest companion. The two may be gone from screens for the immediate future, but at least comics and eventual books can help make up the difference as the show sorts itself out. Doctor Who: The Prison Paradox will begin its four-issue run later this year. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what's next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Celine Spring 2026: Scarves, and Other Keepsakes
The ivory-and-black silk scarves artfully wrapped around Celine's runway invitations were out in force on Sunday, guests winding them around their necks, threading them through belt loops, or dangling them from handbags — buh-bye Labubu. The choice of this keepsake was very considered and intentional, like everything about Michael Rider's strong debut at the French house. More from WWD Rene Caovilla Introduces Opulent Couture Capsule Collection Celine North America Has a New President Celine Has Your Ticket for the Wolfgang Tillmans Exhibition 'Scarves are something I wear and everyone wears differently,' he told a clutch of reporters after the show. 'It's also something you tend to keep and something maybe you give to your children, or a friend. But I liked the idea, particularly at Celine, where scarves mattered so much at the very beginning.' Rider kept the best bits of the Hedi Slimane era, and the Phoebe Philo one — of which he was an integral part — and threw in some of his own recent past as creative director of Polo Ralph Lauren, tossing sweaters over a few shoulders, preppy-style. He left some things behind, notably the recent rash of Rue Cambon references, but it was fun to spot such Easter eggs as a Luggage bag elongated into a weekender with a zippered pocket now curved like a smile, or a logo T-shirt and skinny jeans on a gangly, long-haired guy, also shown in a looser version. Like many of the designers making debuts at houses this season, Rider has a lot of stakeholders to please, and billions of business at stake at a moment of luxury doldrums. So this was a crowd-pleaser of a collection that balanced heritage and novelties in the right measure. The show was staged on a rainy afternoon at Celine headquarters on Rue Vivienne, models whisking in two directions across the limestone floors to propulsive hits by The Cure. The tailoring was distinctive: strong-shouldered jackets with a high-button stance, giving them a pinched and pleasing Empire line — and narrow, buttonless coats with elegant, cutaway openings. The pants were cool, cut slim as leggings or loose as culottes, some with cuffs and satin stripes like tuxedo pants. Pleated carrot shapes and harem pants tucked into glove-soft wrestling boots fed a vague '80s mood. This coed show also covered all the categories, from day to evening, Rider's LBDs trimmed with garlands of jet beading; his ivory infanta gown as simple as a T-shirt and unadorned but for the cutest little chest pocket. Some of the bags and costume jewelry dangled too many charms and gewgaws, but you could discern new shapes and colors in Triomphe canvas, and raffia totes in all sizes, too. His design successor at Polo, Karen Brown, and a small crew from Lauren headquarters came to cheer him on, as did designers Lucie and Luke Meier, Jonathan Anderson and Raf Simons, adding to the electric atmosphere at the show. While unaccustomed to the spotlight, having worked behind the scenes his entire career, Rider seemed at ease talking to reporters backstage, while not giving too much away. He spoke about the values of Celine — quality, timelessness and style — aligning with his. 'I was thinking a lot about something very real,' he said. 'Also, there's a foundation here that we're building on… We were as much about the beginning of the company as the nine wonderful years I was here, as well as the last six years.' Founded in 1945 by Céline Vipiana and based initially on shoes, Celine has been part of the LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton stable since 1996 — and has seen its ups and downs. While American Michael Kors revved up the house when he was at the design helm from 1997 to 2004, it struggled to reclaim that buzz under former Burberry designer Roberto Menichetti and Prada alum Ivana Omazic. Philo and Slimane ultimately propelled Celine into fashion's big leagues, and Rider seems keen to make it a byword for classics with plenty of panache, and the right degree of zing. It's becoming nearly customary for designers to write a letter after the show, rather than typical show notes, and Rider's tells you where his head is at. 'I've always loved the idea of clothing that lives on, that becomes a part of the wearer's life, that may capture a moment in time but also speaks to years and years of gestures and occasions and change, of the past, the present and the future, of memories, of usefulness and of fantasy — of life really.' Launch Gallery: Celine Spring 2026 Ready-to-Wear Collection Best of WWD Windowsen RTW Spring 2022 Louis Shengtao Chen RTW Spring 2022 Vegan Fashion Week Returns to L.A. With Nous Etudions, Vegan Tiger on the Runway
