Hannah Marder
1.
Robert Downey Jr. once referred to Hugh Grant as a “jerk,” “asshole,” and “self-important, boring flash-in-the-pan Brit.”
2.
Lisa Marie Presley once said of Tom Cruise, “I fucking hate Tom. I met him 20 years ago. I said I never want to be in a room with him again.”
3.
Richard Harris is another actor to have insulted Tom Cruise, saying, “He’s got very nice teeth, but has he ever read a book?”
4.
Richard Harris also once called Michael Caine “an over-fat, flatulent 62-year-old windbag, a master of inconsequence now masquerading as a guru, passing off his vast limitations as pious virtues.” He also said that Caine was charmless and without sex appeal, and “about as dangerous as Laurel or Hardy or indeed both, and as intimidating as Shirley Temple.”
5.
I will never be over this 1998 Jennifer Lopez interview where she spills her thoughts on a TON of celebs. For example, she called Cameron Diaz “a lucky model who’s been given a lot of opportunities I just wish she would have done more with,” and said, “When directed, she can be good.”
6.
About Gwyneth Paltrow, Lopez said, “Tell me what she’s been in? I swear to God, I don’t remember anything she was in. Some people get hot by association. I heard more about her and Brad Pitt than I ever heard about her work.”
7.
About Madonna? “Do I think she’s a great performer? Yeah. Do I think she’s a great actress? No. Acting is what I do, so I’m harder on people when they say, ‘Oh, I can do that — I can act.’ I’m like, ‘Hey, don’t spit on my craft.’”
8.
On Claire Danes: “I feel like I see a lot of the same thing with every character she does.”
9.
On Winona Ryder: “I was never a big fan of hers. In Hollywood she’s revered, she gets nominated for Oscars, but I’ve never heard anyone in the public or among my friends say, ‘Oh, I love her.’”
10.
On Salma Hayek: “We’re in two different realms. She’s a sexy bombshell, and those are the kinds of roles she does. I do all kinds of different things. It makes me laugh when she says she got offered Selena, which was an outright lie. If that’s what she does to get herself publicity, then that’s her thing.”
11.
In Brian Cox’s autobiography, Putting the Rabbit in the Hat, Cox did NOT hold back his thoughts on a bunch of different actors. He says of Johnny Depp, “Personable though I’m sure he is, is so overblown, so overrated. I mean, Edward Scissorhands. Let’s face it, if you come on with hands like that and pale, scarred-face make-up, you don’t have to do anything. And he didn’t. And subsequently, he’s done even less.”
12.
Of Edward Norton, Cox said, “He’s a nice lad but a bit of a pain in the a** because he fancies himself as a writer-director.”
13.
He called Steven Seagal “as ludicrous in real life as he appears on screen”…
14.
….And called David Bowie “not a particularly good actor.”
15.
Elisabeth Moss, who used to be married to Fred Armisen, once said about him, “One of the greatest things I heard someone say about him is, ‘He’s so great at doing impersonations. But the greatest impersonation he does is that of a normal person.'”
16.
Orson Welles once said he hated Woody Allen “physically,” saying, “I can hardly bear to talk to him. He has the Chaplin disease. That particular combination of arrogance and timidity sets my teeth on edge.” When director Henry Jaglom, with whom Welles was speaking, suggested that Allen was just shy, Welles replied, “He is arrogant. Like all people with timid personalities, his arrogance is unlimited. Anybody who speaks quietly and shrivels up in company is unbelievably arrogant. He acts shy, but he’s not. He’s scared. He hates himself, and he loves himself, a very tense situation. It’s people like me who have to carry on and pretend to be modest. To me, it’s the most embarrassing thing in the world — a man who presents himself at his worst to get laughs, in order to free himself from his hang-ups. Everything he does on the screen is therapeutic.”
17.
In the same conversation, Welles also said, “I never could stand looking at Bette Davis, so I don’t want to see her act, you see.”
18.
He said of Wolfgang Puck, “I don’t like Wolfgang. He’s a little shit. I think he’s a terrible little man.”
19.
He also called Norma Shearer “one of the most minimally talented ladies ever to appear on the silver screen, and who looked like nothing, with one eye crossed over the other.”
20.
It’s not as bad as some on this list, but Gwyneth Paltrow once threw some shade at Reese Witherspoon, saying, “Even actresses that you really admire, like Reese Witherspoon, you think, ‘Another romantic comedy?’ You see her in something like Walk the Line and think, ‘God, you’re so great!’ And then you think, ‘Why is she doing these stupid romantic comedies?’ But of course, it’s for money and status.”
21.
Speaking of Gwyneth, after Gwyneth Paltrow mocked Sharon Stone in an SNL skit, Stone said of Paltrow, “Gwyneth Paltrow is very young and lives in a rarified air that’s very thin. It’s like she’s not getting enough oxygen.”
22.
And Martha Stewart once threw some serious shade at Paltrow and her Goop brand when she said, “She just needs to be quiet. She’s a movie star. If she were confident in her acting, she wouldn’t be trying to be Martha Stewart.”
23.
Stewart was also shady about Orange Is the New Black star Taylor Schilling, saying, “They could have done that so much better. That girl is not good enough, the lead actress. I met the real Piper [Kerman]. She was in prison either the same time or after me, and I talked to her about it.”
24.
After James Dean’s first big movie role in East of Eden, Marlon Brando famously said, “Mr. Dean appears to be wearing my last year’s wardrobe, and using my last year’s talent.”
25.
Johnny Depp’s Cry-Baby costar Traci Lords said he was “the kind of guy that would be really sweet to a girl and bring her flowers, but still take a pee in the alley.”
26.
Harrison Ford once called Shia LaBeouf a “fucking idiot” after LaBeouf criticized Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, though the full quote is more forgiving: “I think he was a fucking idiot. As an actor, I think it’s my obligation to support the film without making a complete ass of myself. Shia is ambitious, attentive, and talented — and he’s learning how to deal with a situation which is very unique and difficult.”
27.
Alec Baldwin also had some not-so-friendly comments on LaBeouf after they were both cast in a play together. Baldwin said, “When he showed up, he seemed like a lot of young actors today — scattered, as he was coming from making six movies in a row or whatever.” The two didn’t get along during rehearsals, with Baldwin saying LaBeouf had a “jailhouse mentality” and “You could tell right away he loves to argue,” and Shia was fired. Baldwin said Shia seemed shocked. “He had that card, that card you get when you make films that make a lot of money that gives you a certain kind of entitlement. I think he was surprised that it didn’t work in the theater.”
28.
In an interview with Vulture, Quincy Jones had plenty to say about a number of iconic musical artists. First, he claimed that Michael Jackson “stole a lot of songs” and was “greedy.”
29.
He then called the Beatles “the worst musicians in the world. They were no-playing motherfuckers. Paul was the worst bass player I ever heard. And Ringo? Don’t even talk about it.”
30.
And when asked if U2 was still making good music, Jones simply shook his head.
31.
Mariah Carey was famously shady when she was on the Breakfast Club in 2014. Asked about then-rising star Ariana Grande, she was slightly shady when she refrained from commenting on Ariana’s talent or career, saying, “I wish everybody all the best of luck and if this is the career path they choose, hope that they can achieve longevity.”
32.
At one point, one of the hosts asks about a rumor that Nicki Minaj was often late to filming American Idol, and Carey asks, “Who?” She also said that she wants to forget her time on the show. “I don’t even remember what that was. That was a moment in my life that I want to press delete.” There had long been reports of a feud between Minaj and Carey, and in another interview, when asked if a lyric in one of Minaj’s songs referred to her, she said, “Don’t know. Don’t know what she’s singing. … I didn’t know she sang, I thought she rapped, or whatever.”
33.
But most of Carey’s shady comments are about longtime rival Jennifer Lopez. For example, she responded to reports that J.Lo got eight hours of sleep a night with, “If I had the luxury of not actually having to sing my own songs…I’d do that, too.” In a different interview, she said Lopez had nothing to do with her, saying, “My whole thing is singing [and] writing songs. … Singing is, first and foremost, it’s a God-given talent that I’m grateful for. Her thing is something different.” And of course, there’s the time she was asked about Lopez and claimed “I don’t know her.”
35.
Mariah replied, “I haven’t paid attention to Madonna since I was in seventh or eighth grade when she used to be popular.”
36.
Sticking with Madonna, Cher once said that Madonna is “not beautiful” and “not unbelievably talented.” She also called her mean, saying, “I remember having her over to my house a couple of times, because [Sean Penn] and I were friends, and she just was so rude to everybody. She acts like a spoiled brat all the time. And it seems to me when you reach the kind of acclaim that she’s reached — and you can do whatever you want to do — you should be a little bit more magnanimous, and little bit less of a c**t.” Also, when an interviewer apologizes for “dragging” Madonna into the conversation, Cher replies, “How about dragging her in by her hair!”
37.
Elton John once blasted Madonna being nominated for “best live act” at the 2004 Q Awards, saying, “Madonna, best live act? F*** off. Since when has lip-syncing been live? Sorry about that, but I think everyone who lip-syncs on stage in public when you pay, like, 75 quid to see them should be shot. Thank you very much. That’s me off her Christmas card list, but do I give a toss? No.”
38.
Patti LuPone once called Madonna a “movie killer,” saying, “She’s dead behind the eyes. She cannot act her way out of a paper bag. She should not be in film or onstage. She’s a wonderful performer for what she does, but she is not an actress.”
39.
One last Madonna one — when Janet Jackson was asked about comparisons between her music and Madonna’s, she replied, “It’s dance music, I’ll say that…which is very similar,” then added, “I think what I do has class to it.”
40.
Aretha Franklin was once asked about her opinion on artists such as Taylor Swift, Adele, Alicia Keys, and Nicki Minaj. While she had positive things to say about Adele and Keys, many felt she was throwing shade when her only comment on Swift was “Great gowns, beautiful gowns.”
41.
Though it was much shadier when she straight up refused to comment on Nicki Minaj. “Nicki Minaj…hmm. I’m gonna pass on that.”
42.
Naomi Campbell similarly refused to answer a question about Kendall Jenner being the highest-paid model on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, saying, “Next question.” But her comments on basically everyone at the Harper’s Bazaar ICONS Party — including Nicki Minaj and Cardi B — were much more scathing: “It was called the ICON party, but there were no icons there,” she told Andy.
43.
Whitney Houston made a few shady comments over the years, including about Mariah Carey: “What do I think of her? I don’t think of her.”
44.
And in a documentary on Houston, Whitney, she says of Paula Abdul: “One thing — Paula Abdul ain’t shit. That girl is singing off-key on the record.”
45.
Nick Nolte and Julia Roberts traded insults after appearing in I Love Trouble together, with Roberts calling Nolte “completely disgusting,” adding, “He seems to go out of his way to repel people. He’s a kick.”
46.
Firing back, Nolte said of Roberts, “It’s not nice to call someone ‘disgusting.’ But she’s not a nice person. Everyone knows that.”
47.
John Wayne once called Clark Gable an “idiot,” saying, “You know why he’s an actor? It’s the only thing he’s smart enough to do.”
48.
Wayne also called Montgomery Clift “an arrogant little bastard”…
49.
…And called Gene Hackman “one of the worst actors in Hollywood.”
50.
James Caan once called Bette Midler “very stupid.” He continued, “She’s not a bad person, but stupid in terms of gray matter. I mean I like her, but I like my dog, too.”
51.
Nick Cave reportedly once threw shade at the Red Hot Chili Peppers by saying, “I’m forever near a stereo saying, ‘What…is this garbage?’ And the answer is always the Red Hot Chili Peppers.”
52.
Kurt Cobain once called Axl Rose “a fucking sexist and a racist and a homophobe,” saying, “You can’t be on his side and be on our side. I’m sorry that I have to divide this up like this, but it’s something you can’t ignore.” Also, he added, Rose’s band Guns N’ Roses “can’t write good music.”
53.
After Kanye announced Kid Cudi would not be on his album Donda, Cudi took to Instagram to call Kanye a “fucking dinosaur.” He wrote, “Too bad I don’t wanna be on ur album u fucking dinosaur hahaha. everyone knows ive been the best thing about ur albums since i met u. Ima pray for you brother.”
54.
And finally, we’ll end on one of the most brutal comments a celeb has made about another, IMO — after Joan Crawford died, Bette Davis, who she had famously feuded with, reportedly said, “You should never say bad things about the dead, only good. Joan Crawford is dead…good!”
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