Well, this was the staff at Narnia Dispatches (all two of us!) on Friday, May 7, when fresh, new pap pics of Jake Gyllenhaal appeared online. If it hadn't been for the recent Cartier ad release, this particular staff member might've had to get out her roster card to see who had now entered the playing field! Oh yes, that's Jakers!
Because when last we saw Jake in a pap photo,
lol. Yes indeed, well, just about! The last time we saw Jake in the wild outside, was on location on the Ambulance movie set a few months back. The pictures distributed to remind everyone that he was in Los Angeles with the beard, Jeanne Cadieu. Remember the dirty Audi sedan from 2020?
49 photos in that album on I Heart Jake, and 46 of the snapshots were of solo Jake with the remaining three including a
So we are looking at nearly a full twelve months since Jake's image was used to pretend he was with the beard.
So what on earth was this out-of-the-blue sighting all about?
Hmmm, anything special going on this time of year?
Indeed! Glad you asked. Despite the initial release of the photos vaguely stating that the pics were taken "this week", later press releases were more specific and told us that the snaps were taken on Thursday, May 6. The question begs to be asked, why not release these photos later in the evening? Or, maybe a pap sighting of Jake closer to Mother's Day, a special occasion which often would lure Jake into the public square to be seen with the matriarch, Naomi Foner. Here he was with Naomi, father Stephen and Atticus (Boo present but not pictured in this particular photo!) on Mother's Day, May 14, 2006, in Malibu, California
Alas, nope, the pictures were instead released May 7. Straight out of nowhere. Or were they?
May 7. A date which was timed around what event? Right around auditions for the film The Day After Tomorrow, when Jake and Austin reportedly saw each other for the first time and fell hook, line and sinker. Let's review that legendary blog comment.
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| from Waiting for Toothy blogspot via Oh My Godot blogspot |
I mean, to directly address Jake and Austin, um - it sounds like,
LOL! As Al Delvecchio would say, "Yep, yep, yep."
Let's take it a step further and re-visit that lovely, painstakingly detailed timeline of our own Methodical Muser's, shall we? Oh yes, because this is for archival purposes more than anything. This is "the month that was" for Jake Gyllenhaal and Austin Nichols in May 2002, the month they met for the first time.
💕💘💕💘💕💘💕💘💕💘💕💘💕💘
by Methodical Muser.
• 1/28/2002 Jake Gyllenhaal set to star in a West End (London) revival of This Is Our Youth.
• 2/14/2002 - 4/20/2002 Jake in rehearsals and stage performances of This Is Our Youth (London) Play was set to run for 8 weeks, but it actually ran only 6 weeks. Previews were begun in late February. Jake’s actual live performances were from March 15th-April 20th.
• 04/22/2002 The Guardian & Dealmemo released two press releases about Jake being cast in Bertolucci’s, The Dreamers:
Jake Gyllenhaal, who garnered rave reviews for his recent London theatre performances opposite Hayden Christiansen in This Is Our Youth, is set to star in Bernardo Bertolucci's The Dreamers. The Hollywood Reporter says the 21-year-old will start filming in Paris on July 1. He will next be seen on the big screen opposite Jennifer Aniston in The Good Girl. via The Guardian - April 22, 2002"JAKE GYLLENHAAL IS IN NEGOTIATIONS TO STAR IN THE DREAMERS"
Jake Gyllenhaal is in negotiations to star in Bernardo
Bertolucci's "The Dreamers" (aka "Paris '68"), a
feature film set against the backdrop of the real-life student uprising that
took place in France's capital during the late 1960s.
Gyllenhaal, wrapping the critically acclaimed stage production of "This Is Our Youth" in London, will begin shooting "Dreamers" on July 1 in Paris. Fox Searchlight is distributing the picture.
"Dreamers" reunites Gyllenhaal with Searchlight, which also is distributing his upcoming feature "The Good Girl," in which he stars opposite Jennifer Aniston.
"Dreamers" revolves around the friendship of an 18-year-old American (Gyllenhaal) studying in France and a French brother and sister, both of whom also are 18.
The trio, who share a common interest in the history of cinema, see their story unfold against the backdrop of the real-life events that occurred in 1968 when thousands of university students began to protest their moribund system, leading to a bloody battleground between students and police. (source: Dealmemo April 2002)
• 4/28/2002 9th Annual Kids for Kids Celebrity Carnival (New York) Jake w/Natalie Portman
• 5/1/2002 CAA put the TDAT script up for auction. (Sidenote: Jeffrey Nachmanoff (TDAT) is a notable alumni from the USC School of Cinematic Arts. He and Emmerich are both repped by CAA. - EW Weekly
• 5/05/2002 Jake at Movieline's 4th Annual Young Hollywood Awards at The Highlands (Hollywood, CA)
• 5/06/2002 20th Century Fox picked up The Day After Tomorrow after an aggressive bidding war that included offers from five studios (HR 5/6). An immediate preproduction start is promised. Preproduction means that the script is finished and now location scouting, assembling the crew and casting begins. Production for TDAT set to begin in the fall.
• 5/6/2002 – 5/26/2002 Jake disappears from public view for 20 days.
• 5/10/2002 Austin graduates from USC
• 5/26/2002 “Candid” Photos of Jake strolling in the Park w/Natalie Portman– (Los Angeles, CA), which appear to have been taken in Runyon Canyon. The pictures definitely look staged - [do paps really hang out in the brush, after all?]. Since Natalie is a friend and Jake was last seen with her at that children’s charity event on April 28th in NY, it makes sense that she would be the willing, go-to “beard” for the day.
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| Natalie Portman - one of Jake's first beards |
Things must have been hot and heavy with Austin already by this time to prompt the need to speed dial in Natalie Portman as a beard.
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| Is Jake pulling the Olivia Wilde penguin move here? |
Back to the timeline.
• 06/04/2002 Screening of The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys at the Arclight (Hollywood, CA) – Austin has indicated that this is his favorite theater.
• 06/06/2002 Jake attended Commencement Ceremonies at Harvard for David Modigliani who was in the Class of 2002. (Cambridge, MA)
• 06/06/2002-06/20/2002 Interview indicates that Jake is leaving Los Angeles to spend a couple of weeks with his family in Martha's Vineyard (Martha's Vineyard MA)
• 06/19/2002 Suddenly, Michael Pitt is now announced for the role of Matthew (instead of Jake Gyllenhaal) in Bernardo Bertolucci's next film, The Dreamers.
• 6/24/2002 Lovely & Amazing NYC premiere (New York)
• 6/26/2002 Club Lotus Jake is seen at the party w/Austin (New York)
• 7/17/2002 Jake Gyllenhaal in final negotiations for The Day After Tomorrow
• 7/21/2002 Announced. Maggie to film Mona Lisa Smile with Kirsten Dunst
• 9/18/2002 Jake at Secretary Premiere, and supposedly is “introduced” to Kirsten Dunst by his sister Maggie at the after party.
CONCLUSION: JAKE MEETS AUSTIN IN MAY 2002 [sometime after Monday, May 06]. Once casting begins for TDAT there are no sightings of Jake around Los Angeles until he suddenly resurfaces in public for those "candid" -- "Strolling in the Park" -- photos with Natalie Portman on Sunday, May 26.
________________________
To be continued in Part II here.
pic sources: Giphy, IHeartJake, pinterest, OhMyGodot blogspot,
tenor, Daily Mail, wiffle gif
our playlist: Across the Room - Odesza (featuring Leon Bridges)
I Got You, Babe - Sonny and Cher
The Day We Fell in Love - Nick Kingsley and Danny
Farrant
I Live For Your Love - Natalie Cole
1 comment:
Oh my gosh! A stroll down memory lane. I remember compiling that timeline and it became so obvious why Jake disappeared until May 26 and then resurfaced with Portman for a Runyon Canyon "I'm heterosexual" stroll, with paps conveniently at the ready. LOLLLL! And that bizarre pic of Jake "behind" Portman the sole alleged PDA between them was also the only pic that was blurred beyond recognition. It is indeed another "penguin" shot like the one "released" recently of Wilde and Harry Styles. Fake, fake, fake. But, certainly entertaining.
And the Bertolucci interview that appeared in 2004 just to provide a written excuse, ahem, I mean record, of why Jake didn't do "The Dreamers" makes one shake their head. Talk about gaslighting because we are fed the tale that Jake chose to do a run of the mill studio-produced disaster film when he had already been cast in the Oscar winning director Bertolucci's The Dreamers; an artist considered Italy’s greatest auteur of his generation. Oh, and the reason Jake didn't do the film was because "Jake would have been so tortured about showing his body." LOLLLLLLLLLLLL! Anyone who knows anything about Jake, or Maggie for that matter, knows they love to take their clothes off with a snap of the finger. Just look at Jake's filmography, if you can do so without blushing. And, the fact that Austin showed up in NY with Jake on June 26 at Club Lotus, a mere 7 weeks after The Day After Tomorrow's [TDAT]auditions, is hardly a coincidence. Neither was Jake getting his first official beard in September 2002 right before he begins filming TDAT. Got to have het cred for distraction when you are about to begin filming for 6 months with your new boyfriend.
Great post, PG. It was fun reliving that time period. Portman to Cadieu. Nothing has changed. Jake always does the bare minimum.
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