12/29/2023 0 Comments Tatums ok writerIt's definitely a perishable skill, but it comes back. It's not like I go to the club or anything. Tatum: I can still dance, but you know, I don't dance really anymore. Q: Do all the “Magic Mike” moves still come naturally? But I can lose being in shape in like four days where it took like two months to get there. I actually think I'm close to being healthier now than I've ever been, even though I might have looked better before. It's just kind of the nature of the beast: The machine slows down. I played 10 years of football, I've done extensive training now just through all the movies I've done (and) my cartilage in my knees is gone. Q: Are you feeling the training more now as you get older? You need to be able to do the dancing, but it's more an aesthetic than it is physically able to do something. After Fabio gave us all those passionate embraces, it seems only fair that we embrace him right back.“Magic Mike” shape, it's all for looks. It’s an appreciation of romance that has nothing to do with the loftier issues the genre wrestles with, but it’s also an appreciation that finds power and freedom in romance’s silly side. He says he used to be embarrassed to be a cover model-to be Fabio-until he saw how thrilled a fan was to pose with him. What does it mean to take romance seriously? The Lost City arrives at its own answer when Alan chastises Loretta for calling her work “schlock” when it has brought joy to so many people. What’s Fact and What’s Fiction in The Good Nurse, Netflix’s Movie About Serial Killer Charles Cullenīut does that mean we shouldn’t? The Fabio conundrum speaks to a tension that has come to define romance’s modern identity: It’s a billion-dollar industry that demands to be taken seriously and is about so much more than hunky, shirtless men sweeping ladies off their feet-but a lot of the time, it’s also about hunky, shirtless men sweeping ladies off their feet. The White Lotus’ Second Season Is About Something Totally Different.Listening to Bob Woodward’s Trump Interviews Might Be the Only Cure for TrumpismĮvery Horror Short in Guillermo Del Toro’s Hit Netflix Series, Ranked In Dangerous Books for Girls: The Bad Reputation of Romance Novels Explained, Maya Rodale-herself a romance novelist, and one of my favorites-has a theory that “it’s what we don’t talk about when we talk about Fabio” that’s the problem, pointing out that it’s easier to make jokes about this one hottie than to engage with the complex ideas romance novels address: “class, love, women’s sexuality and pleasure, rape, virginity, money, feminism, masculinity, and equality.” That is true! It is certainly easier (and a whole lot of fun) to crack jokes about this dude’s pecs. No one symbol could possibly hope to encapsulate all of romance, with its many sub-genres and styles. What is it that has made the image of Fabio endure for so long, to the consternation of fans of the very genre he has come to represent? Those frustrations have some merit, after all: He’s a relic from a bygone era a straight, white, conventionally attractive man representing a genre that is often referred to as “by women and for women” and where authors from marginalized groups have long fought to have their work included and recognized in the face of romance’s homogenous public image. As a journalist who also happens to be a romance fan, I admit, it’s a tough balance to strike! Fabio is a reference point even non-romance readers can understand and appreciate, and often, that’s a major chunk of our audience-plus, both of the references to Fabio in the pieces Popp mentions are talking about romance stereotypes, a subject in which he would seem to be more than fair game. (Words to Fabio in this story: Either five or 176, depending on whether you count the headline.) Two of Slate’s pieces about romance, both of which I edited, receive not-so-flattering shoutouts for their Fabio mentions (at least our profile of romance writer Alyssa Cole spent 2,000 words before invoking the name of the dread spokesman for I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter). Isabelle Popp, in her delightful Fabio-by-the-numbers piece for BookRiot last year, proposed a “words to Fabio” standard for mainstream romance coverage that boils down to: the sooner he’s mentioned, the less effort or expertise went into the story. Fabio is the He Who Must Not Be Named of the romance fandom, earning eyerolls whenever he’s mentioned in a story about the genre.
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