The Spill: Thursday's best entertainment and gossip news.

1. “There was a lot of judgment and criticism.” Megan Gale just opened up about falling in love with fiancé Shaun Hampson.

When you think of Aussie power couples, model and businesswoman Megan Gale and her partner, Australian Survivor star and former AFL player Shaun Hampson, are sure to spring to mind.

But their relationship earnt them a fair share of “judgment and criticism” at first.

Megan recently spoke to Now To Love about falling in love with Shaun, and it turns out it was “a slow burn”.

“It wasn’t that instant, see each other, fall in love, inseparable,” she told the publication.

“It’s not that my first impressions of him were that he was shallow. I just found out after talking to him for a while that he had way more maturity and depth than I initially thought.”

The pair ended up exchanging numbers and eventually started Skype calling each other at night.

“We’d start Skyping around 8pm, then look at the clock and it would be 4am. It was that giddy, high school thing where you could sleep for two hours then wake up and feel refreshed and energised.

“You’re glowing and bolstered by this new connection,” she said.

 

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Stay close to people who feel like sunshine. ⁠ Tag that special someone in your life who makes you feel like this.

A post shared by MINDFUL LIFE (@yourmindfullife) on Oct 28, 2019 at 1:20am PDT

But Megan ended up copping criticism for moving on with Shaun after splitting from much-loved comedian Andy Lee.

“It wasn’t a long time between drinks in terms of relationships,” admits Megan.

“There was a lot of judgment and criticism around that. It wasn’t nice… Whether you’re a public personality or not, you’re still human, and things like that still hurt.

“I think there was this assumption that I’d moved on too quickly.

“That I was a cougar and he was a toyboy – all those horrible labels. Maybe the right thing to do would be to wait, until the appropriate time, whatever that is, or ’till he’s older, but if you find someone that you think could be the one, why wait?”

And it turns out Meghan made the right call because she and Shaun are now happily engaged and have two kids.

The Spill is Mamamia’s daily entertainment podcast that catches you up on everything in entertainment and pop culture. It’s snackable and perfect for your commute home. Post continues after podcast. 

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2. Shannon Noll responded to Guy Sebastian’s ARIAs dig and his response is… a little much.

When Guy Sebastian hosted the ARIA Awards yesterday, he took the opportunity to make a couple of witty comments about his fellow celebrities.

It all started with Guy making a pretty innocent joke about him beating Aussie singer, Shannon Noll in the first season of Australian Idol.

“Now, if you do win, please just be gracious or at least pretend. I’ve gotten pretty good at it,” Guy said. “I’ve been nominated about 30 times. I’ve only won three. But there’s no shame in coming second. Just ask Nollsy!”

Later that night, Shannon took to Twitter to respond and share his heartfelt feelings.

“When I met you brother I knew you would win, have always been proud that I came 2nd to you cause you are amazing,” he tweeted.

But then Shannon decided to share a little… too much.

“But I’ve always come second, just have to ask my wife!”

Responding to @GuySebastian comment at the Arias tonight ‘There’s No Shame In Coming Second’ ‘Just Ask Nollsie’ when I met you brother I knew you would win, have always been proud that I came 2nd to you, cause you are amazing, BUT I’ve always come 2nd, just have to ask my wife!

— Shannon Noll (@NOLLSIE) November 27, 2019

Yep, it sounds like Shannon Noll just told the world he likes to make his wife, erm, finish first. And we definitely could have gone without knowing that.

At least there are no hard feelings between the two singers, with Shannon joking, “Guy’s my friend, mate, and he deserved to win Idol 2003. I just wish he’d stop rubbing it in!”

3. “Gosh, this isn’t going well.” Actress Dakota Johnson appeared on Ellen and wow, was it awkward.

So, Dakota Johnson was on Ellen yesterday to promote her new movie, The Peanut Butter Falcon, and things went from bad to worse.

It all began when Ellen DeGeneres asked about Dakota’s birthday by saying, “Happy belated birthday. How was the party? I wasn’t invited.”

Dakota responded with, “Actually, no, that’s not the truth, Ellen. You were invited.”

This continued to go back and forth until Dakota asked for Ellen’s producer to come out and confirm she was indeed invited but didn’t attend.

Ellen responded by asking, “Why didn’t I go? It was probably in Malibu, that’s too far for me to go to.”

And then… things took a turn for the worse.

#RT @TheEllenShow: Dakota Johnson. pic.twitter.com/vvhqByRDms

— Harsh Israni (@Israni_Harsh_) November 28, 2019

Dakota started talking about said birthday party and explained her favourite comedian Tig Notaro performed.

Ellen responded with, “Wow, I was just talking to my favourite actress the other day, Jen Aniston.”

It doesn’t end there…

Ellen realised that Dakota would’ve met comedian, Tig Notaro, at her own birthday party the previous year.

However, Dakota said bluntly, “I had left your birthday party before that happened. Gosh, this isn’t going well. I was out of town.”

And finally, they discussed Johnson’s love life. Which, to no one’s surprise, didn’t go well either.

“Recently you came to our Gorillapalooza event, thank you for being there,” Ellen said.

“I don’t know if you saw, but Chris Martin was there. And he performed and he was brilliant. Did you see him?”

All Dakota responded was, “I think I saw him from afar.”

Okay wow. That has to be the most awkward interview on Ellen ever.

4. Claire Foy will be making a comeback in The Crown’s fourth season and we are so here for this.

Hooray! The original Queen Elizabeth II will be back for another season of The Crown, well, not the real Queen Elizabeth but you know what we mean.

Rumours have been circulating that Foy, who played the monarch for the first two seasons, will be reprising her role in a series of flashbacks in the fourth season.

 

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A post shared by The Crown (@thecrownnetflix) on Dec 8, 2017 at 6:04am PST

Paparazzi images from the set seemingly confirm this theory.

From what we know so far, the flashbacks will take place in 1947 around the time of Queen Elizabeth’s 21st birthday, before her reign as queen.

As long as she is back on the show, it doesn’t matter when it takes place. We cannot wait.

5. Empty chairs, a live snake and rimming jokes: The 9 most cringeworthy moments from the ARIAs.

Yesterday, the who’s who of the Australian music scene (and reality TV community, let’s be honest) settled in at Sydney’s Star Casino for a day of performances, award-giving and… awkwardness.

Poor ARIAs. With fancy award nights comes big personalities and alcohol… lots of alcohol. Mix that in with being the poor cousin of the Grammys (we’ll expand on that in a sec), and it’s the perfect recipe for a whole lot of weirdness.

Look. Nothing is going to beat that time in 1995 when Silverchair’s drummer knocked himself out on stage, or that time Axle Whitehead flashed his peen in 2006. Or even that time Bob Katter pronounced Aria… ‘Ariaria’ on stage.

Wonder why that was the last time the event was held at the Sydney Opera House. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

But the 2019 ARIA awards certainly did deliver some gold to add to the history books.

1. Everyone left… early.

Nothing gets past Twitter fans.

During a particularly long camera shot while British pop singer Dua Lipa announced Album of the Year – they noticed a hell of a lot of empty rows.

It was towards the end of the night to be fair, but who leaves right before the most important award of the night?

Everyone. Apparently, everyone.

2. Guy Sebastian tried to compare us to the Grammys.

Guy, we bloody love you.

Guy asked American pop band Why Don't We how we compare to the Grammys and the response was giggling, smirking and a very awkward, "well, it's different".

Honestly, that's so sad for us.

Guy tried to save it by saying "they don't have eskies in the aisles," and the Americans, just, looked at him.

For more cringeworthy moments from the ARIAs read our earlier article here. 

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