The White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, that much-maligned evening of political and media smoozing formerly known as the “nerd prom,” returned Saturday night after a two-year hiatus due to Covid-19. It might not be the most obvious place for an obsessively followed, fairly new celebrity couple to make their red carpet debut.
But if that obsessively followed, fairly new celebrity couple was trying to be, say, taken seriously as thoughtful people in their own right, outside of their gossip fame; if they were trying to suggest that they should be dealing with real issues rather than reality TV; if they were trying to convey the idea that their relationship was not just about harnessing two kinds of fame for viral attention, but also about a meaningful connection — well, the White House Correspondents’ Dinner might be the smartest choice for such” a disclosure.
Enter Kim Kardashian and Pete Davidson: Pair of substance. If not just like us, then just like everyone else in attendance!
The two playfully posed as a couple on the evening’s step-and-repeat, much like Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his wife, as well as DailyExpertNews’s Jake Tapper and his wife, did. Unlike Drew Barrymore, who wore a Lanvin dress with flared sleeves, Mrs. Kardashian and Mr. Davidson didn’t rant for the photographers, or were caught taking giggling selfies with other attendees like Gayle King and Norah O’Donnell. . mr. Davidson didn’t even make funny faces, as his “Saturday Night Live” characters often do.
In a series of prep photos posted to Ms. Kardashian’s Instagram account, the couple walked hand-in-hand down a hotel hallway, Mr. Davidson helped her into a limousine and relaxed on a couch.
Mrs. Kardashian wore a balenciaga crystal turtleneck mermaid dress with a train, relatively simple makeup and her hair down. Compared to the all-black Balenciaga dress she wore to the Met gala in September, which covered her from crown to toes, it was a remarkably understated choice, just to the right of showy — just like Mr. Davidson’s black Prada suit, skinny tie and black Vans sneakers.
Next to President Joseph R. Biden in his black tuxedo; dr. Jill Biden in her white tuxedo; the evening’s host, Trevor Noah, in his black tuxedo; and guests like Evan Spiegel (in black tuxedo, natch) and Miranda Kerr (in pink princess dress) and Brooke Shields (in gold), they actually fit right in.
It was a pretty clever way to reframe their story, which so far has been largely co-opted by Mrs. Kardashian’s former husband, Kanye West, now known as “Ye,” and his increasingly unhappy social media posts about their relationship ( not to mention the music video for “Eazy” in which he buries a Pete look-alike alive).
Perhaps it was also intended as a subtle reminder of Ms. Kardashian’s work with prison reform, the fact that she recently passed the California baby bar exam, and has ambitions to open her own law firm. And it threw Mr. Davidson in the role of calm supportive partner.
After all, they could have made their red carpet debut at the Met gala, which takes place just two days after the Correspondents Dinner, and most likely in a much more extreme way (literally and figuratively). They should have known that that’s where all the lenses of the fashion celebrity’s power complex would be trained on the guests.
The fact that they chose to start in Washington was a pretty clear indication of how they wanted to be seen by the world (and the move will become even more important if they attend the Met gala).
The Beltway media world has always had a celebrity jones of sorts, and celebrities have often loved them right away, a society of mutual appreciation that reached its zenith during the correspondent dinners of the Obama years. On the one hand, Washington is drawn to the glitz and glamor (and millions of Instagram followers) of the Hollywood celebrities and their ability to make the essentially uncool seem exciting. On the other hand, the Hollywood celebrities are drawn to how interacting with policymakers and DC insiders can ease their intellectual insecurity complexes.
The relationship suffered during the Trump years (Donald J. Trump was the first president to refuse to attend the correspondents’ dinner since Calvin Coolidge showed up in 1924), but if any of this is any indication, it’s on an upswing again.