Kylie Jenner covers the latest issue of Vanity Fair. You can really tell that VF has a new editor, right? At least I can tell – Radhika Jones probably wouldn’t have considered putting someone like Kylie on the cover. Now Mark Guiducci is trying to make VF relevant with the youths. VF actually takes pains to emphasize that the cover interview was conducted in January… back when people thought Timothee Chalamet would win an Oscar. That explains the timing. Except now that Chalamet’s Oscar chances have been crushed, this interview reads like “well, at least Kylie Jenner is bringing home the bacon.” I’m pleased that VF focused a lot on her business acumen and her professional success, but they went overboard talking about her fame. Some highlights from the interview:
Kylie finds social media draining at times: “It’s harder to grasp people’s attention because there’s so much out there, they might see my perfume ad and then the next 30 minutes they’re seeing all these other ads. Everyone kind of has a brand now.”
Her first movie, The Moment: “The first movie premiere that I’m in—I’m thrilled. I’m really thrilled. This is the most excited I’ve been for the red carpet. Usually I’m not…. I feel like there’s so much pressure, but I’m so excited to be there.”
Whether she’ll act in more movies: “I’ve actually gotten a few scripts, nothing that I feel is right yet, but I 100 percent want to do more. I really like comedy. I think I’m good at it. Maybe next time I talk to you, I’ll be the lead of an action movie!”
What she wants next: “In the last years of my 20s, I want to focus on just me, my businesses, my work, traveling with my kids, enjoying my kids, and then.. I do want to have more kids….”
On Timothee Chalamet calling her his “partner of three years” on stage: It’s the only time in our interview that Kylie gets flustered, but in the most charming way possible—she gets legitimately heart-fluttery, shy about how to truly answer. She wasn’t expecting any direct questions about the relationship. But hadn’t he gone in front of the goddamn Critics Choice Awards and told her he loved her? Hadn’t she posted his Golden Globe statuette in a carousel of after-party pics to Instagram, and as such, to the whole world? It was a far cry from the years of tabloids reporting every sighting of them together and tracking the couple’s efforts to maintain a level of absolute secrecy. “Is it fun?” “Of course,” she says, blushing.
Her abnormal childhood: “I don’t think any of us knew what we were getting ourselves into in the beginning. I was nine [when KUWTK started], I have a daughter now who’s turning eight, so it’s crazy to see her and how young she is. And this is when you start creating your first memories. It’s almost like I just don’t know anything else. I never got a taste of normalcy as an adult. Growing up in it almost was a benefit to me because I don’t have anything to compare it to, really.”
Creating Kylie Cosmetics: “It was probably, like, half the money I had in my bank account. I just went for it,” she says, recalling the $250,000. “My mom was like, ‘You are going to be left with lots of lip kits in your garage if this doesn’t work out.’ And it wasn’t even a thought that it wasn’t going to work out.” Kris wanted a traditional marketing strategy: newspaper ads, TV spots, the works. But Kylie had other plans. “I remember telling my mom, ‘No, no, no. I’m just going to post on my Instagram.’ ”
Are Kylie and Timmy a real couple? Yes, they are. And besides the recent surge of PDA, maybe the most endearing sign of their shared affection is…poker night. “I grew up here, but I don’t really have, like, a nightlife—I play a lot of poker,” Kylie says. After our interview, she tells me she hosts poker nights at her house with Chalamet and his gang, a mix of Hollywood types and art-world card sharks. (She actually hosted everyone at her pad the night before I visited, but there were no lingering signs of degenerate gambling on the premises.) I mention to Kylie that I had seen the most recent post on her Instagram story from the night before: a poker table with some chips on hand, a flop, some money. “Last night wasn’t a good night for me,” she laughs.
I’m not going to watch The Moment, but from what I gather, Kylie basically just has a cameo where she delivers some fame-wisdom to Charli XCX. You’ll have to tell me if she pulls it off, because I strongly suspect that Kylie is like all of her sisters – completely dull on-screen when they’re “playing” a character. Kim sucks as an actress too. It’s the Madonna thing – when someone has painstakingly built their celebrity persona, they’re incapable of playing any other character. Anyway, Kylie seems fine here, and I think she adores Chalamet and I actually really hope they get married and she has a Chalababy. Go wild!
Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Kylie’s Instagram. Cover courtesy of Vanity Fair.
