celebrity

Celeb in 5: Friday's best entertainment and gossip news.

 

1. “There were very tense negotiations…” Apparently Jasmine Yarbrough seriously wasn’t invited to the Logies.

Ummm… so this is where we are with the whole ‘was Jasmine Yarbrough invited to the Logies or not’ thing.

A quick summary of the situation: this Tuesday Karl Stefanovic publicly slammed tabloid magazine Woman’s Day for spreading false rumours that Yarbrough wasn’t invited to the Logies this year. Earlier this week, the publication published a cover with the headline “Karl’s girlfriend BANNED! Why his bosses forced her into hiding,” and the Today Show host was not pleased.

However, three days after his Instagram post, Woman’s Day are standing firmly behind what they said.

And now we’re here.

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Speaking on the Woman’s Day Uncensored podcast, editor-at-large and host Phil Koch stood behind the magazine’s claims.

“We have really good sources at Channel Nine. We were told there were very tense negotiations going on in the weeks leading up to [the Logies],” he said.

“I understand Karl paid for a whole styling team out of his own pocket for her.

“Jasmine wasn’t seen on the red carpet. Channel Nine also didn’t show any vision of her on TV that night, even though Karl is one of their biggest stars.”

Woman’s Day writer Lucy Manly said she was reporting from the Logies on the night and confirmed she did not see Yarbrough on the red carpet.

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Instead Koch said Channel Nine wanted to present Karl and his co-host Georgie Gardner as a “united front”.

“It doesn’t matter whether Channel Nine are accepting of Jasmine. They just wanted to project an image of public unity between Georgie and Karl,” he said, referencing the reported tensions between the two hosts since ‘Uber-gate’.

“The way to do that was have Karl walk the red carpet with Georgie, not Jasmine.”

2. Former Bachelor-contestant Elise Stacy says the show is ‘staged’.

Former Bachelor contestant Elise Stacy says the reality dating show is staged and honestly, we’re not that surprised.

The former Hockeyroo player, who was runner-up on Matty J’s season of The Bachelor last year, admitted she believes part of the show is staged on her Instagram story last night.

Despite believing the show is staged, Elise maintained that her feelings for Matty J on the show were still genuine.

When a fan asked if the show was staged, Elise responded: “Some parts yes.. I’m sure they were. My feelings no. Feels like a life time ago!!!”

Image: Instagram.
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On The Bachelor, Matty J chose his now-girlfriend Laura Byrne as the winner over Elise.

Earlier this year, Elise announced her new relationship with boyfriend Justin Kosmina on Instagram.

3. Ben Fordham comments on Karl Stefanovic's drinking habits on the Today show.


During a live weather segment on Friday morning’s Today show, fill in host Ben Fordham said reporter Natalia Cooper was “about to do a Karl Stefanovic” as she raised a shot glass, supposedly about to drink on air.

In celebration of Croatia’s win against England in the world cup, Natalia was sampling Croatian liquor and said, “This is traditional alcohol, it's a little bit early in the morning - but if we were going to say cheers, what would it be in Croatian?”

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Co-host Sylvia Jeffreys replied, “It’s never too early for Rakija, especially not on a Friday.”

This is when Ben Fordham cut in, alluding to Stefanovic drinking on the job, potentially as a reminder of his infamous post-Logies segment in 2009, where footage of a very drunk looking Karl went viral.

“Did Natalia drink that? We'll watch her progress, she's about to do a Karl Stefanovic!”

However, Natalia quickly shut down his comments by saying her shot glass did not contain alcohol, and adding “no, it’s a bit too early for me.”

Despite Fordham’s tongue-in-cheek comment towards Karl, it’s clear it was only intended for banter, as the two are longtime friends.

Fordham and Stefanovic pictured with ex-Today show host Lisa Wilkinson. Image: Getty.
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4. My Kitchen Rules villain Sonya Mefaddi says she was "never friends" with teammate Hadil Faiza.

After being dumped from My Kitchen Rules back in April for bullying other contestants, and being crowned the 'villians' of the season, MKR contestants Sonya Mefaddi and Hadil Faiza at least still had each other.

However, this week during a Q&A on Instagram Sonya announced they didn’t even have that anymore, claiming the pair were “never best friends”.

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“Firstly, Hadil and I were never best friends as the show suggested. We are in fact family friends,” Sonya wrote.

“I decided to distance my self from Hadil after the show…I felt her energy wasn’t a positive one to have in my life.”

Sonya also confirmed the pair have not be in contact post-production.

We can’t help but think that maybe it’s for the best.

5.The Project’s Waleed Aly just unleashed a furious smackdown on Kylie Jenner.

 Waleed Aly has some feelings please and he’d very much like to share them.

You see, The Project co-host is not impressed with Forbes Magazine’s decision to feature Kylie Jenner on its cover.

According to the publication, the youngest of the Kardashian clan is set to surpass Mark Zuckerberg as “the youngest ever self-made billionaire” by the time she turns 21 in August this year.

And Aly’s not… into it.

“So in what way is she self made?” Aly asked on Thursday night’s episode of The Project.

“She didn’t have a lemonade stall somewhere and build it up.”

Weirdly, Tommy Little then defended the reality TV star and accused Aly of “knocking her down because she’s young”.

“That’s not why I’m knocking her down,” Aly replied. “I’m knocking her down because she is part of an empire that doesn’t do anything.”

Little then replied, “Well, they make money” and touché.

You can read the full story right here.