The Way They Were

In 2015, Bad Blood turned a rumoured fallout between two pop princesses into the biggest cold war of the 2010s, Taylor Swift and Katy Perry became locked in a feud fuelled by stolen dancers, subtweets, stan armies and forensic lyric analysis. This week on The Way They Were, Gráinne and Chantal revisit the glittery, petty, weirdly addictive feud that defined pop’s Tumblr era and ask: was any of it...

This week, Gráinne Maguire returns from SNL UK as we slip into the fallout between Sarah Jessica Parker and Kim Cattrall. On Sex and the City, Carrie and Samantha felt unbreakable. Off-screen? Pay disputes, mean girl accusations and contract disputes. We look at one of the most high profile hollywood feuds in a special platonic edition of The Way They Were!

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Gráinne is back for a very special edition of The Way They Are book club, diving into Famesick by Lena Dunham. A memoir that reads less like a victory lap and more like a slow, uneasy unravelling, it takes in blind-item anecdotes, her breakup with Jack Antonoff, and behind-the-scenes drama with her on-screen love interest Adam Driver. Chantal and Gráinne dig into the unreliable but captivating nar...

On this special episode, Chantal and guest Michelle Shaughnessy zoom in on the glossy excess of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and size up the franchise’s newest arrival, The Real Housewives of Rhode Island!

Plus over on the Patreon we get into the Summer House drama, Jen Shah's post prison interview and Carole Radziwill's problematic relationship with Ghislaine Maxwell.

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Barry Keoghan and Sabrina Carpenter looked like one of those modern celebrity pairings that somehow made sense: the brooding Irish actor and the pop star with the sharpest tongue on the charts. Two pint-sized superstars with the world at their feet, until it was all over.

This week on The Way They Were, we pick apart the short-and-sweet romance between the Saltburn star and the Espresso chanteuse, from whirlwind beginnings to a bre...

Love might not cost a thing, but this one came with a lot of receipts. When Jennifer Lopez (back once again!) fell for Sean Combs in 1999, it felt like pop had engineered its own super-couple. She was shimmering on the brink of full-blown world domination; he was the Svengali of west coast rap. Tracksuits, champagne, Versace dresses and so much white clothing.

Then came the nightclub shooting, the arrest and the cheating. This week,...

The original short king meets the ultimate revolutionary party girl and sparks one of history’s most chaotic love stories. Napoleon, the obsessive letter-writer who conquered Europe but couldn’t quite conquer matters of the heart falls hard for Josephine: glamorous, widowed, and a real good time girl.

Comedian and actress Rosalie Minnitt joins Gráinne and Chantal to unpack the passion, politics and spectacularly messy b...

Kanye West and Kim Kardashian were never just a couple they were a full-blown cultural event. From Paris Fashion Week to reality TV, Instagram meltdowns and frequent attempts to break the internet, their relationship blurred the line between love story, brand strategy and performance art. But how did two people from such different worlds become the defining celebrity power couple of the 2010s?

This week on The Way They Were, Gráinn...

The Beckham family feud feels less like a falling out and more like a prestige drama about what happens when you are born into a brand. This week on The Way They Were: Gossip Edition, Gráinne and Chantal dive into the Beckham family saga, from wedding dress dramas and strategic Instagram silences to the (girl) power of Victoria’s Spice Girls nostalgia and David’s all round awfulness, asking whether Brooklyn is real...

Tiger Woods sold perfection: serene, disciplined, surgically controlled. Golf’s ultimate good boy, engineered from childhood to never miss a shot. Off the course? A very different game was being played. On The Way They Were, we revisit the scandal that destroyed Tiger Woods' spotless image. Drugs, over 100 different women and the fateful night when Elin Nordegren smashed up his SUV with a golf club. This week, Gráin...

It’s the first episode of the year and The Way They Were is back with a special GOSSIP edition.

Gráinne Maguire and Chantal Feduchin-Pate get stuck into the delicious weirdness of celebrity mum friendships, as we look at the fallout of Ashley Tisdale’s toxic mom group revelations. Then, Chantal's faithful status is under fire as she reveals she doesn't 'get' the national treasure Claudia Winkleman or the n...

This week on The Way They Were, we’re unlocking one of our most popular Patreon episodes of the year and sharing it on the free feed.

We’re doing something a little different today. Chantal swaps her mic for a magnifying glass and Gráinne pulls her fedora low as they step away from the usual romantic nostalgia and into the glittering golden age of Hollywood. This time, our sleuthing duo turn their attenti...

This week on The Way They Were, Gráinne and Chantal hang the tinsel, spike the mulled wine, and take a sleigh ride through Christmas past, present and future via Crimbo movies. From Judy Garland’s golden-age yearning, through Jimmy Stewart’s moral reckonings, to Cate Blanchett’s ice-cool elegance and Alicia Silverstone teaching us that even Netflix makes mistakes .

Along the way, Chantal reveals herself to be a Gua...

This week on The Way They Were, we do the unthinkable: we go back to Love Actually. Gráinne and Chantal rank the couples from least offensive to “maybe we should call the police”, asking the big questions Richard Curtis never did. Who do we hate the most? Are half these characters quietly unhinged? What exactly is going on with Keira Knightley’s extremely youthful bride? And is the secretary secretly a f...

Back in the early 2010s, few celebrity romances burned brighter (or faster) than Khloé Kardashian and Lamar Odom. She was the breakout star of reality TV’s royal family; he was the NBA hero. One month in, they were married. Soon after, their love life was a franchise. For a moment, it looked like reality TV had actually delivered a fairy tale but it was not meant to be.

This week on The Way They Were, Kardashian super fan and ...

Effie Gray and John Ruskin looked like the perfect Victorian power couple: she, bright and brilliant; he, the era’s leading art critic. But behind the portraits was one of history’s strangest age-gap marriages. Unconsummated, uncomfortable, and the sort of story that would make Gen Z turn away in horror.

This week on The Way They Were, Gráinne and Chantal team up with one of Britain’s best stand-ups, Ian Smith, to ...

Now this is a right royal mess. Before it all went spectacularly wrong. Before Epstein, before the exile, before the Palace decided Prince Andrew should probably just be Andrew: there was “Randy Andy” and Fergie. The cheeky, chaotic couple who briefly made the monarchy look like a Jilly Cooper book. From their whirlwind courtship and tabloid scandals to the toe-sucking! This was a love story that had it all. I...

This week on The Way They Were, we’re catching up on all the heartbreak, hair dye, and high drama of the celebrity world. Lily Allen’s West End Girl has landed, a sharp, funny, furious record that lays her split from David Harbour bare. We talk through the fallout, the shock, and the pussy palace.

Elsewhere, Ariana Grande’s got 'new' hair but no ponytail. What does it mean? Finally we’re checki...

This week on The Way They Were, we’re diving into the breakup that everyone’s talking about: Pop Princess Lily Allen and Stranger Things star David Harbour. It was the lockdown love story that looked like a rom-com London girl meets Hollywood nice-guy, until it all went a little bit strange. 

Now Lily has a new album out which is going to set the record straight about the hottest romance to come ...