What Could Guy Pearce Possibly Have Against Cate Blanchett?
Alert your butcher: new Australian beef just dropped.
Babe wake up, new internet beef just dropped.
In some unexpected celebrity news, actor Guy Pearce appeared to take aim at fellow thespian Cate Blanchett on Twitter, and no one really knows why.
The Memento actor began by quote replying to a tweet that was gushing over a Cate Blanchett photoshoot and urging users to “go look” for the rest of the photos, to which Pearce inexplicably responded thus: “Ah no thanks”.
Pearce also responded to a more recent tweet about Blanchett’s win for Best Actress at the 2023 Critics Choice Awards, prompting Pearce to write “fascinating choice,” followed by eight full stops.
Why does Guy Pearce have beef with Cate Blanchett lol 😭 pic.twitter.com/uSEiQ55n0g
— Chris🏳️🌈 (@Proofpoochie) January 22, 2023
After some puzzled Twitter users questioned why Guy Pearce seemed mad at the well-liked actor, Pearce deleted his tweets and responded to the screenshots with a meandering stream of compliments.
“Fear not,” he began, as though reading from the Old Testament. “No beef at all. I was merely being sarcastic.” Hmm, why am I not convinced?
I mean, who pranks their friends by quote-tweeting their successes from three years ago with a sneaky sarcastic comment? Come to think of it, I would absolutely do this — but if it’s sarcasm he was going for, this could not have been less clear.
Oh, and there was more. “I adore Miss CB,” Pearce added. She’s incredible….. one of our best!”. Yup, three rapid-fire compliments in a row — and this time they actually did sound sarcastic. Also, the Miss CB is very much reminiscent of last year’s Miss Flo situation, which lends even more weight to my theory: the man has beef!
This is to say nothing of the five full stops in between the words ‘She’s incredible’ and ‘One of our best!’, which feel excessive. What aren’t you saying with those full stops, Guy Pearce?
I decided to do some digging, and according to this 14-year-old article from New Zealand outlet Stuff — which details how Pearce shunned the glitz of LA after getting a taste of fame in the early 2000s — the two go way back.
The 2009 article also includes Pearce’s assertion that he wouldn’t perform in the Sydney production of a play unless Blanchett, who was the co-artistic director of the Sydney Theatre Company (STC) at the time, paid him the same amount that she earned. “If she does it’ll be the most the STC ever paid an actor, I’ll guarantee,” he said.
Based on these reviews of the play in Melbourne and Sydney, it looks like Pearce didn’t perform in Sydney, meaning he didn’t end up with that bag of cash.
Is this the experience that meant Guy formed a long-held grudge against Blanchett, that we now get to enjoy through the magic of Twitter and screenshots? We couldn’t possibly comment. But what we can say is that it’s about time Australia’s best and brightest started stoushing on the main.
Photo credit: Amy Sussman / Getty Images