Brad Pitt made a rare comment about one of the teenaged daughters he shares with his ex-wife Angelina Jolie.
While at the Los Angeles premiere for his new action movie Bullet Train on Monday, the 58-year-old Oscar winner said that Shiloh is ‘beautiful.’
And the actor also told ET’s Nischelle Turner that the 16-year-old’s incredible dance moves are so good ‘it brings a tear to the eye, yeah.’
Dad talks: Brad Pitt made a rare comment about one of the teenaged daughters he shares with his ex-wife Angelina Jolie. Seen Monday at the Bullet Train premiere in LA
Proud papa: While at the Los Angeles premiere for his new action movie Bullet Train on Monday, the 58-year-old Oscar winner said that Shiloh is ‘beautiful’
She has star power! And the actor also told ET ‘s Nischelle Turner that the 16-year-old’s incredible dance moves are so good ‘it brings a tear to the eye, yeah.’ Seen in 2021
Shiloh has been seen recently on social media performing dance moves with her pals.
‘I don’t know where she got it from. I’m Mr. Two-Left-Feet here,’ he added with a laugh.
In June Shiloh was seen in a black Beatles T-shirt when dancing to Doja Cat’s song Vegas in a video posted on YouTube by Los Angeles-based choreographer Hamilton Evans.
Shiloh loves dancing. She’s seriously talented and she has been going to these classes for a few years now, ‘an insider told Us Weekly.
The family: From left, Shiloh, Zahara, Angie, Vivienne, Maddox and Knox in 2021
Earlier days: Jolie with Shiloh , Vivienne, Zahara and Knox at the Dumbo film premiere in 2019
So long ago: In 2010 in Paris with dad Pitt; they were shopping at Bonpoint
‘She’s made some good friends through the dancing community too, and they’re all in chat groups and share their favorite playlists and that type of stuff.
‘The teachers are all very impressed with her and say the sky’s the limit if she wants to take it to the next level, and Shiloh may just do that.’
When asked by ET on Monday if he thinks his kids may go into acting like he or Jolie, he said he just wants them to be happy.
‘I love when they find their own way, find things they are interested in and flourish,’ Pitt said of his children.
Shiloh sure can dance: here she is seen center in a Beatles T-shirt as she danced
He has three bio kids with Angie: Shiloh and twins Knox and Vivienne. And three that were adopted: Maddox, Pax and Zahara.
This comes after Jolie said Zahara had landed a place at the historically black liberal arts college for women and will be relocating to Atlanta, Georgia, in the coming months.
Angelina shared a photo of her 17-year-old daughter and some of her fellow students, some of whom were in Spelman shirts, and wrote on Instagram:
‘Zahara with her Spelman sisters! Congratulations to all new students starting this year. A very special place and an honor to have a family member as a new Spelman girl. #spelman #spelmancollege #spelmansisters #HBCU.’
The former couple’s eldest son, 20-year-old Maddox studied at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea, though his classes moved online and he returned to the US during the COVID-19 pandemic. Their second son, Pax, now 18, graduated last summer but is not believed to have taken up a place at college.
They were a Hollywood golden couple: Jolie and Pitt attend the World War Z film in 2013
Meanwhile, the 47-year-old actress previously joked Zahara is a better organize than her.
She said: ‘I want to give them a bit of structure. I try to make schedules at home. My daughter Zahara is better at organizing things than I am.’
She has also opened up about how she adopted some of her children, and how exciting and wonderful their journeys have been.
She previously said: ‘Each is a beautiful way of becoming a family. What is important is to speak with openness about all of it and to share. ‘Adoption’ and ‘orphanage’ are positive words in our home. With my adopted children, I can’t speak of pregnancy, but I speak in great detail and love about the journey to find them and what it was like to look in their eyes for the first time. All adopted children come with a beautiful mystery of a world that is meeting yours.’
Bullet Train will be released in theaters on August 5.
Ready for college: This comes after Jolie said Zahara had landed a place at the historically black liberal arts college for women and will be relocating to Atlanta, Georgia, in the coming months. Seen in 2021
Let’s hope the estimable Brad Pitt isn’t giving us his leading-man swansong with this weirdly exhausting and overwhelmingly unfunny gonzo-violent action comedy set on a Japanese bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto – with the film’s frantically hyperactive tempo cranked up in homage to the locomotive speed. This film would be an awful way for Pitt’s performance career to hit the buffers and he is given lines like: “He follows me around like… something witty.”
It’s a semi-westwashed version of the bestselling 2010 novel by Japanese author Kotoro Isaka, and directed by David (Deadpool 2) Leitch, all about a bunch of wacky assassins aboard the train, their murderous destinies all chaotically colliding, and all turning out to have more to do with each other than they think.
With the whip-pans and crash zooms, the sudden flashbacks, the voiceovers, stylized punchups, shootings and stabbings and inter titles introducing the zany characters and geezer crims – two of whom are cockneys and serious West Ham fans – this is worryingly like something by Guy Richie. (Although Brad Pitt’s eccentric performance as a traveler in Ritchie’s film Snatch is better than anything here.)
Be on guard … Brian Tyree Henry and Brad Pitt in Bullet Train. Photograph: Sony/Scott Garfield/Allstar
Pitt himself, in goofy bucket-hat, nerdy glasses and superannuated surfer dude gear, plays a laidback hitman codenamed “Ladybug” whose handler (Sandra Bullock) gives him an easy job, to ease him back into the game after an uproarious series of calamities in previous missions.
All he has to do is grab a cash-stuffed briefcase belonging to two other killers: Tangerine (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Lemon (Brian Tyree Henry) who have just rescued the son of a noted mobster from a kidnapping and this money is the ransom they didn’t need to pay. They both talk with poundshop Laarndaarn accents and Lemon has an obsession with, of all the quirky-cool things, Thomas the Tank Engine – an elaborate yet perfunctory character touch which is about 47% as funny and well-observed as it needed to be.
Meanwhile there’s another bloodthirsty Brit aboard, codenamed the Prince: a psychopathic high-schooler played by Joey Prince, who has attempted to kill the infant son of a fellow passenger, Japanese killer Kimura (Andrew Koji) and retains a sinister hold over him – but may yet have to reckon with Kimura’s own father, known as the Elder, in which role veteran player Hiroyuki Sanada comes closer than anyone in the cast to actually being cool.
There’s another killer on the train called the Wolf (Benito A Martinez Ocasio) with a grudge against Ladybug, another called Hornet (Zazie Beetz) and towering over everyone in legendary evilness is the White Death (Michael Shannon) waiting on the platform at Kyoto.
It rattles strenuously on and on and on with unexciting and uninterestingly choreographed fights, cameos which briefly pep up the interest and placeholder non-lines where the funny material should have gone. Pitt’s puppyish good nature keeps it from flatlining entirely but he doesn’t have anything like the script and direction that he got from Soderbergh or Tarantino or Fincher. And the Japanese setting is handled really cursorily; there are gags about Japanese toilets which should have gone out in the 1980s. This is a tourist ride to nowhere.
Meghan Markle has reportedly been advised not to pursue legal action over a damning new book, as its author provides more insight into what he calls the “unraveling” of the so-called Harry and Meghan show.
Royal biographer Tom Bower made a series of claims in his book – Revenge: Meghan, Harry and the War Between the Windsors – and he appeared on Channel 7’s Sunrise on Tuesday to spill new secrets.
WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Royal biographer slams Meghan Markle in new biography
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Bower doesn’t hold back in the unauthorized biography, for which he says he interviewed more than 80 sources.
The author claims it was difficult to speak with people who viewed the Duchess of Sussex in a positive light.
Bower spoke with Sunrise hosts David “Kochie” Koch and Natalie Barr on Tuesday, and was asked a question he does not usually encounter.
David Koch and Natalie Barr speak to author Tom Bower. Credit: Sunrise
Does he have anything nice to say about Meghan Markle?
“I think she’s an ambitious, successful woman in her own right, I think that she can be nice if she wants to be,” the author said from the UK.
“She’s intelligent, she’s sassy, I think she’s one of those people you take with a pinch of salt.
“Sometimes she can be nice … depending on how she wants to behave.”
Bower said that, while researching the book, he had spoken to people who worked on Meghan’s show Suits, her school friends and London friends.
Meghan Markle, Prince Harry and Queen Elizabeth II in 2018. Credit: WPA Pool/Getty Images
While friends of the duchess painted her in a positive light, the author said her “victims” told a “different story about her than the one she wanted published”.
Barr asked the author why attitudes towards Meghan were now different from when she married Prince Harry in 2018.
“She voluntarily came to England and married into the Royal Family and she must have known what that required,” the author told Sunrise.
“She had to be part of the team and support the Queen and play her part.
Tom Bower, author of Revenge: Meghan, Harry, and the war between the Windsors. Credit: Sunrise
“And all she really did was complain because she wanted the spotlight, she wanted to be number one.
“She wanted to turn the royal family into a Hollywood celebrity game.”
Bower said he believes Meghan never wanted to stay in Britain.
“I think she wanted the title, she wanted the fame, and then go back to California,” said Sunrise.
Prince Harry marries Meghan Markle. Credit: PA Images via Getty Images
“It was really because of that, and because she allegedly bullied a lot of her staff, she made them very unhappy,” he claimed.”
Bower also alleges Meghan “turned Harry against his family and Harry was the most popular of all the royals, besides the Queen”.
“On the whole (she) did what Meghan wanted, and not what the royal family expected… and it all quickly unraveled,” he said.
“And it didn’t unravel because she wasn’t being helped, it didn’t unravel because of racism, it unraveled because Meghan didn’t get what she wanted, which was the spotlight on her.”
Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, Prince William and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. Credit: Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images
Bower also makes other intriguing allegations in his book, including that Meghan made Kate Middleton cry before Meghan’s wedding in 2018 – contrary to what Meghan said in her Oprah interview.
He claimed the Queen was relieved when Meghan did not attend Prince Phillip’s funeral in April 2021.
Another claim he makes is that Meghan suspected Victoria Beckham was leaking stories to the media.
‘f***ing nuts’
Meanwhile, UK publication Express has reported that Bower claims in the book that Prince Harry’s pals from Eton had thought he was “f***ing nuts” for dating Meghan.
During a “shooting” weekend, the couple had joined 16 of Harry’s friends for dinner on Friday.
Bower claimed in the book that, like other such weekends, “Harry was looking forward to endless banter, jokes — and a lot of drinking.”
The jokes involved “sexism, feminism and transgender people”, and “Meghan challenged every guest whose conversation contravened her values”, Bower wrote.
“’She lacked any sense of humour,” he wrote.
”Driving home after Sunday lunch, the texts pinged between the cars: ‘OMG, what about HER?’ said one. ‘Harry must be f***ing nuts’.”
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The previously announced Batgirl film starring In the Heights actor Leslie Grace, Michael Keaton and Brendan Fraser will not be released at all, Warner Bros Discovery has unexpectedly announced, despite shooting already being completed and the film being in post-production.
Directed by Ms Marvel directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, the film was initially greenlit in 2021 as part of a wider move at Warner Bros to create feature films specifically for the streaming service HBO Max. But the studio confirmed on Tuesday that the film would never get any release, either theatrically or on HBO Max.
It declined to provide further comment.
Batgirl was to have Keaton reprise his role as Batman, alongside Grace as the titular hero Barbara Gordon, JK Simmons as Barbara’s father, Commissioner Gordon, and Fraser as the villain Firefly.
The Hollywood Reporter said Batgirl’s budget was a factor in the decision, having risen to nearly $90m (£74.1m, A$130m) due to costs relating to it being shot during the Covid-19 pandemic. While the budget is lower than the average DC superhero film, it was reportedly decided that it did not have the “spectacle that audiences have come to expect from DC fare” and would not recover its losses from being released.
However, the New York Post, which broke the story on Tuesday, cited an unnamed source who said the budget had actually exceeded $100m and that the film had performed so poorly during early test screenings that Warner Bros decided to cut its losses.
“They think an unspeakable Batgirl is going to be irredeemable,” the source told the New York Post.
A minute after this story posted got a call from a rival studio exec who was floored by move. “Worked in this town for three decades and this is some unprecedented shit right here.” https://t.co/A3aBLPulWz
The decision means the film ranks among the most expensive canceled cinematic projects ever.
The move comes amid a change in leadership since Warner Bros merged with Discovery in May 2021. Warner Bros Discovery CEO David Zaslav, who recently oversaw swingeing cuts at CNN including shutting down its $300m streaming service CNN+ one month after it launched, is reportedly prioritizing cost-cutting and refocusing the studio on theatrical films over streaming projects.
Writing in Variety, Adam B Vary and Brent Lang noted that the decision to cancel Batgirl entirely would allow the studio to “take a tax write-down”, citing sources who said it was “seen internally as the most financially sound way to recoup the costs (at least, on an accountant’s ledger).
Several shows including Full Frontal With Samantha Bee, The Last OG and Chad have been canceled since the Warner Bros Discovery merger, while a DC Comics film of The Wonder Twins that was in development has also been canned.
Although he’s navigated onscreen situations as dicey as being lost at sea with a tiger, Dev Patel recently faced a real-life incident straight out of a thriller. The actor and his friends reportedly intervened in a “violent altercation” outside of a convenience store in Adelaide, Australia on Monday night.
Per 7News Australia, the fight occurred just after 8:45 pm, and during the altercation a woman stabbed a man in the chest. Patel, who was last seen in David Lowery’s 2020 fantasy epic The Green Knighttook a page from the film’s chivalrous book and stepped in to prevent any further violence.
“Dev acted on his natural instinct to try and de-escalate the situation and break up the fight,” Patel’s representatives shared in a statement. “The group was thankfully successful in doing so and they remained on site to ensure that the police and eventually the ambulance arrived.”
After emergency services were called, 7News reports that the victim was treated for non-life-threatening industries, while the aggressor was arrested and charged with aggravated assault causing harm. She has been denied bail.
The statement from Patel’s reps continued on to stress that the actor is not a hero for stepping in, and hoped that the altercation is getting attention would bring attention to a larger issue.
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“This specific incident highlights a larger systemic issue of marginalized members of society not being treated with the dignity and respect they deserve,” Patel’s reps concluded. “The hope is that the same level of media attention this story is receiving (solely because Dev, as a famous person, was involved) can be a catalyst for lawmakers to be compassionate in determining long-term solutions to help not only the individuals who were involved but the community at large.”
Another major British event means another one of Kate’s cuties to steal the show.
This time, it was Princess Charlotte who was the picture of excitement on an outing with her parents Duchess Kate and Prince William at the Commonwealth Games.
Kate and Princess Charlotte at the Commonwealth Games. Credit: Chris Jackson/Getty Images
The seven-year-old appeared thrilled to be watching the swimming in Birmingham, struggling to contain her enthusiasm, gasping and leaning on the edge of her seat.
Charlotte appeared thrilled to witness the action at the Games. Credit: Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP
Wearing a striped dress and her hair in pigtails, she was seen at one point giving the thumbs up to her father.
Little Charlotte appears just as sporting mad as her parents.
Only days earlier she appeared in a video message to England’s women’s soccer team, the Lionesses, before their win against Germany in the Euro 2022 final.
Charlotte sat with her parents William and Kate at the Birmingham event. Credit: Chris Jackson/Getty Images
“Good luck, I hope you win, bye!” she said in the message.
Charlotte’s animated display in Birmingham was reminiscent of her younger brother Prince Louis’ famous appearance at the Platinum Party at the Palace for the Queen’s platinum jubilee in June.
The four-year-old created international headlines by pulling faces, sticking out his tongue through the lengthy performance, during which he sat alongside his cousins and grandparents Prince Charles and Duchess Camilla.
Charlotte gives the thumbs up to Prince William. Credit: elsa/Getty Images
The display, in full view of the television cameras filming the event, drew a mixed response from viewers, with some dubbing it Kate’s most relatable parenting moment
The seven-year-old was on the edge of her seat during the swimming. Credit: Chris Jackson/Getty Images
However, some royal watchers criticized Prince William and the Duchess’ parenting methods.
The Cambridges were also joined by Prince Edward, Sophie Countess of Wessex and their children Lady Louise and James for the Commonwealth Games, which run until August 8.
The Cambridges greet the Wessex’s at the Games. Credit: Chris Jackson/Getty Images
Prince William was even stopped for selfies by some members of the crowd and appeared to oblige, despite royals tending to avoid pictures.
Prince William posed for a selfie with fans. Credit: Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP
The DC Comics film batgirl will be completely “shelved” by Warner Bros, a top Hollywood source told new york post.
That means it won’t hit theaters or the US streaming service HBO Max. Fans will not see it.
The reportedly $100 million movie (the source said the budget was actually more than $140 million), which was doing test screenings for audiences in anticipation of a late 2022 debut, would rank among the most expensive cinematic cast-offs ever.
Those tests were said to be so poorly received by moviegoers that the studio decided to cut its losses and run, for the sake of the brand’s future. It’s a DC disaster.
“They think an unspeakable batgirl is going to be irredeemable,” the source said.
The Post has reached out to Warner Bros. for comment.
It’s been a months-long walk of shame for the movie. Batgirl, directed by Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah (Bad Boys for Life), received not a single mention at DC’s Comic-Con panel in San Diego in July — an unusual move that raised industry eyebrows. The much-publicized event, after all, is designed to boost exposure for forthcoming projects just like this one.
Marvel’s Comic-Con presentation, on the flip side, announced more than a dozen films in the so-called Phases 5 and 6 of the MCU, to be released through fall 2025, with even more surely in the hopper.
batgirlwhich stars Leslie Grace (In the Heights) in the title role, alongside JK Simmons, Michael Keaton and Brendan Fraser, was originally planned for a release on HBO Max. The Puck newsletter reported in April that WB’s then-chair, Toby Emmerich, was considering a theatrical run for the film too.
But Emmerich stepped down in June to form his own production company — not long after Warner Bros. merged with Discovery and David Zaslav became the CEO of the new entity. He replaced Emmerich with MGM’s Michael De Luca (who likely had to deliver the “Bat” news) and Pam Abdy.
While the film’s co-directors have done some scattered interviews about casting, the studio has been mum on plans for batgirl ever since.
Shelving a multimillion-dollar effort would not be unusual for Zaslav, a ruthless cost-cutter. Remember, he’s the same guy who gave the $400 million streaming service CNN+ the ax just days after its splashy launch because it didn’t snare enough subscribers.
The budget-conscious CEO, according to Varietyhas split WB into multiple segments, including a reorganized “DC-based film production” group.
With that in mind, WB is said to be searching for a head honcho to run the flailing DC Extended Universe and whip it into a coherent shape, like Kevin Feige did with the far more successful Marvel Cinematic Universe, which is owned by Disney. The current president of DC film production is Walter Hamada. Warner Bros. Discovery will report their Q2 earnings and announce future plans on Thursday.
DC urgently needs all the help it can get.
Unlike the behavior that is Marvel Studios, whose movies occasionally get bad reviews but reliably print money, DC is a disorganized, confusing, not-very-profitable mess. Aquaman and Wonder Woman 1984 got mixed reviews from critics; birds of prey and Suicide Squad were admired flops.
batman performed OK at the box office for Warner Bros., netting $1.1 billion worldwide with an R rating, and got good notices. However, the only DC Extended Universe film that has managed to beat the $1.45 billion box office gross of Dark Knightwhich came out 14 long years ago (joker with Joaquin Phoenix was not part of the DCEU), was Aquaman.
Meanwhile, Marvel’s pandemic-era Spider-Man: No Way Home has grossed $2.75 billion worldwide and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness you have managed a solid $1.4 billion.
Lately, DC’s nasty star drama has eclipsed the buzz — such as it is — surrounding its movies.
Ezra Miller, who plays the Flash, has caused a string of embarrassing controversies this year. In the spring, the actor was twice arrested in Hawaii — first for disorderly conduct and harassment, then for second-degree assault. Then in June, the Standing Rock Sioux tribal court issued an order of protection against the 29-year-old for allegedly using “violence, intimidation, threat of violence, fear, paranoia, delusions and drugs” to groom an 18-year-old whom the actor has known since she was 12. (Miller has not publicly commented on the latest allegation; a police investigation into the Hawaii incidents are reportedly ongoing.)
Ben Affleck, meanwhile, consistently claims he’s done with playing the Caped Crusader — even going so far as to allow Robert Pattinson to take over the role in this year’s batman — but keeps coming back like a bad ex-boyfriend. It was reported this week by Screen Rant that the actor will appear yet again as Bruce Wayne in Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom. Perplexing.
And Gal Gadot is said to be starring in Wonder Woman 3, but the actress and director Patty Jenkins have said nothing — including a title or release date — beyond that they’re throwing around script ideas. DC, which squanders legendary properties with abandon, appears to have no grand plan whatsoever.
Soon, however, Wonder Woman won’t be the one holding the golden lasso anymore. Instead, power will be wielded by an all-controlling DC film production head who will attempt to turn things around. Before they arrive, killing batgirl is Step 1.
“This is the end of DC as a hobby,” the source said.
This story originally appeared on Page Six and is republished here with permission
when Home and Away returns later this month, there’s a baby bombshell for Ziggy and Dean, while a strange package in the mail suggests Marilyn may have a secret child.
Home and Away is currently off the air in Australia until after the Commonwealth Games, and a number of promos have been released teasing the drama in store when the show returns on Monday 8th August.
The first shows a favorite fighting for their life – Read more here. Now, a further promo has been released, indicating what looks to be two baby bombshells for the residents of Summer Bay!
The first surprise is for Ziggy (Sophie Dillman) and Dean (Patrick O’Connor), with Ziggy seen holding a positive pregnancy test in one version of the promo.
We’ve already been expecting this news in the coming months, with Sophie Dillman having been seen filming at Palm Beach with a baby bump recently, by attendees of Celebtime’s Home and Away tour.
Photo courtesy of CelebTime’s Home and Away Tour
Back in 2019, Dean had told Ziggy that he never wanted to have children, worrying that his mother Karen’s (Georgia Adamson) schizoaffective disorder could be passed down through his genes.
However, he seemed to change his tune after discovering he already had a son, Jai (River Jarvis), who he’d never known about. In a brief rekindling of his relationship with Jai’s mother Amber (Maddy Jevic), Dean even suggested having more children.
So how will Dean react to the news that Ziggy is expecting, and is Ziggy herself even ready to become a mother? At the moment Ziggy is quite settled working as a mechanic at Justin’s garage, whilst also having committed to being Theo’s (Matt Evans) mentor through an apprenticeship.
Dean and Ziggy had also planned to take another road trip, this time up to Cairns to see Ziggy’s sister Coco, before Ziggy chose to stay and help Theo. If they’re soon to have a baby to juggle, the two can probably say goodbye to any other such activities in the near future!
The promo also shows a newly single Theo sharing a kiss with newcomer Kirby (Angelina Thomson). Theo broke up with Chloe (Sam Barrett) following her sudden departure from Summer Bay two weeks ago, which Tane (Ethan Browne) had organized for her own protection of her.
Whilst Chloe went to New Zealand to be with her mother Mia (Anna Samson), Tane warned Chloe that she shouldn’t tell Theo where she is for the time being. With Chloe’s continued refusal to give Theo any details, their relationship came to an end.
We’d previously reported on Theo and Kirby getting together, after the two were spotted holding hands on several occasions whilst filming scenes at Palm Beach.
Photo courtesy of CelebTime’s Home and Away Tour
The most intriguing snippet in the promo, however, revolved around Marilyn (Emily Symons).
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Channel 5’s commissioning editor Greg Barnett recently teased that there would be a huge storyline involving Marilyn, and what looks to be the beginning of this has been cryptically hinted at.
Marilyn is shown opening an envelope, in which there is a photo of a baby. She appears to recognize the child, and on turning the photo over, she finds a message written on her back…
“Guess who?”
Does one of the bay’s longest-serving residents have a dark secret that’s about to come to light?
Let’s take a look at some of the possibilities…
Is Byron Fisher alive?
Now there’s a question that we’d never expected to be speculating on.
Marilyn and Donald Fisher’s (Norman Coburn) baby son died nearly 23 years ago, and it was this heartbreak that led to the breakdown of their marriage.
While Byron’s death occurred off-screen in the US, which would be an obvious advantage for storyliners tempted to go down this route, it would be hugely controversial with long-term fans if the show were to undo one of 1999’s most emotional storylines. As such, we find it a rather unlikely option.
However it wouldn’t be the first time in recent years that a retcon had occurred, given the return of Martha Stewart (Belinda Giblin) in 2018—whose apparent death back in 1985 (now explained to have been faked) provided one of the foundations that the very beginnings of the show were built on.
So, let’s take a look at what we know about Byron…
After marrying Donald in 1996, Marilyn was keen to start a family. They fell pregnant with a son, Oscar, in 1997, but Marilyn sadly suffered a miscarriage.
With fibroids meaning that she’d be unlikely to be able to carry a child to full-term, Marilyn underwent surgery to remove them in 1998, and later that year the pair were delighted to learn she was pregnant again.
Marilyn gave birth to Byron Vincent Fisher in February 1999, but after being placed under anesthetic in order to have her son delivered via an emergency caesarean, she struggled to bond with her son. Marilyn disappeared for two months, suffering from post-natal depression, whilst Donald placed Byron under the care of live-in nanny Ellen Porter (Anne Grigg).
Marilyn eventually returned and came to terms with motherhood, before tragedy struck again when Byron was diagnosed with liver cancer at six months old, which had already spread to his lungs.
Byron was taken by Donald and Marilyn to a prestigious private clinic in the US, with Donald returning to Summer Bay two weeks later in order to raise further funds whilst Marilyn and Byron stayed in Seattle, initially lodging with Colleen’s cousin Charlie.
Early news was good, with Byron responding well to chemotherapy, but he soon took a turn for the worse. In the final week of the 1999 season, Donald was devastated to receive a call from the hospital to say that Byron had died as the result of an infection.
Marilyn was said to have been sedated in the hours after Byron’s death, but just as Donald was preparing to fly overseas, he learned that she had gone missing.
With no sign of Marilyn on his arrival in the US, Donald spoke to a chaplain she had befriended, Father MacGuire, who had been asked to perform a service if anything happened to Byron. In accordance with Marilyn’s wishes, Byron was laid to rest in the states, with only Donald and Charlie in attendance. Donald later received a letter from Marilyn stating that it would be too painful for her to return to Summer Bay, putting an end to their marriage from her.
If this were proven to be untrue, it begs the question as to how it could be done in a realistic fashion—could there have been some outlandish baby-swap/cover-up at the hospital?
There’s also a storyline from 2010 to consider, where Marilyn saw a vision of an 11-year-old Byron in a dream. While it could be argued that this doesn’t prove anything regarding Byron being dead or alive, the sighting had only come as a result of Marilyn dreaming about Miles Copeland’s (Josh Quong-Tart) deceased daughter Amber, affectionately known as Rabbit.
Marilyn did not know Rabbit’s true identity until she saw a sketch that Miles, who had been seeing visions of Rabbit himself during a period of depression, had drawn. She immediately recognized her as being the same girl from her dream of her, indicating that it had not merely been part of Marilyn’s imagination of her.
Does Marilyn have a secret child?
While still potentially controversial, a somewhat less drastic theory is that Marilyn has at some point given birth to another child during her years away from Summer Bay.
Marilyn first appeared in Summer Bay in 1989, as the girlfriend of Lance Smart (Peter Vroom). At this point Marilyn was 20 years old, and had spent the latter years of her childhood being brought up by her aunt Jean (Maggie Kirkpatrick), who had taken Marilyn out of the children’s home she’d been placed in by her parents de ella .
In 1991, Jean delivered the bombshell that Marilyn’s good-for-nothing parents, George and Heather Davidson (Doug Scroope & Lynn Rainbow), were actually alive—and had simply put Marilyn in the home as she didn’t suit their life as carnival workers—but she at no point mentioned Marilyn having given up a baby.
If Marilyn were to have had a child pre-Summer Bay, they would now be around 34-37 years old.
Marilyn and Lance / Marilyn departs with Phil and Toni in 1992
Although Marilyn previously had a three-month break from Summer Bay in 1989 after turning down Lance’s marriage proposal, she didn’t leave the bay again until her exit with fiancé Phil Bryant (Vince Martin) and his daughter Toni (Kathryn Dufty) in 1992 .
Marilyn was away for nearly 3 years until her return in 1995, having left Phil as soon as she discovered he had been cheating on her. There was certainly no mention of her having left a toddler with Phil, and we imagine he’d have shown up in Summer Bay if she had done so.
Following Marilyn’s departure in 1999, it would be nearly two years before we saw her again. Could Marilyn have been pregnant when she left Summer Bay with another of Donald’s children, who she chose to give up? That would seem unnecessarily cruel on Donald… and undermine their later conversations about how she was dealing with her grief from Ella over Byron, so we’ll count that one out.
When Donald met up with Marilyn in London in 2001, after spotting her at the launching of his book “A Letter to Byron“, Marilyn had two primary school aged children with her as well as one in a pram, but soon explained to Donald that she was working as a childminder.
Did Marilyn go on to have a child at some point in the early-mid 2000s, whilst in the UK, who would now be in their late teens or very early 20s?
This would perhaps seem the most likely option given the timeframes. There were 8½ years between Marilyn’s first meeting with Donald in London and her eventual return to Australia in 2010, in which time she could have left behind a new partner and child, or had a baby put up for adoption.
Donald had also visited Marilyn off-screen, as she battled cancer in 2007, so any child would likely have come before then.
Marilyn’s return to Summer Bay in 2010
Again, a secret child for a long-established character isn’t something that’s unusual to Home and Away. Alf (Ray Meagher) has had two of his own (Quinn and Owen) come to light over the past 34 years, with his wife Ailsa (Judy Nunn) also revealing that she’d had a daughter, Shauna (Kylie Watson), whilst in prison in the 1970s.
Even in more recent years, Summer Bay stalwart Irene (Lynne McGranger) confessed that she had a long-lost child, eventually revealed to be Mick Jennings (Kristian Schmid), who she’d been forced to give up after being abused by her uncle in her teens.
A Wicked Hoax?
Could it just be the case that someone has something against Marilyn, and is playing mind games by trying to convince her that Byron is alive?
It’s easy to see how Marilyn could start second-guessing herself given her fragile state at the time of Byron’s death, particularly if she’d had to be sedated in the hours immediately afterwards and hadn’t attended his funeral—but could Marilyn really have such an enemy out there, cruel enough to see her suffer like that?
Whatever the reason, we’re sure that Marilyn’s world is about to be shaken up, and it surely can’t be long before the person behind (or in) the photo shows their face in Summer Bay…
Home and Away returns to Australia on Monday 8th August, 7pm on Seven.
Yon April 1993, Mark was excited to be traveling to Glasgow for a comic-book convention. At the time, he was working for a magazine, and had a huge passion for comics. “The magazine was half music, half comic,” he says. “I was going to do signings with all the artists and writers.”
While having a drink with friends at the hotel bar, I spotted a beautiful girl. “There was another convention going on for orchid growers and I assumed she must be with them. There weren’t many women at comic conventions back then,” he says. About halfway through the evening, Mark’s friend Paul told him he was going to look for his sister from him, who was in Glasgow studying French and would be joining them for a drink. When he returned, he brought Ingrid. “She was the girl I’d been looking at earlier in the night,” says Mark.
They began to chat and hit it off straight away. “I really liked him,” says Ingrid. “He had a very deep voice because he’d been drunkenly singing the night before, I think. He was a friend of my brother’s too, so I thought he must be OK.” They sat in the hotel bar and talked until 3am. “I had come out of a long relationship and had been feeling a bit low,” says Mark. “When I met Ingrid, it was like the clouds parted and the sun came through. She was so bright and funny.”
The next day, they met up for another drink. “I was desperate to see Mark again,” says Ingrid. “I’d never really had a proper boyfriend before and it was all exhilarating and exciting.” By the end of the evening, they were holding hands under the table. “It turned into a naughty weekend,” laughs Ingrid. Mark was sharing a room with a friend, who kindly switched rooms to give them privacy. At the end of the convention, they exchanged numbers, but Ingrid admits she wasn’t sure she would see him again. “I lived in Glasgow and he was in London, I just thought it was a bit of fun.”
They stayed in touch and Ingrid agreed to visit London in the summer, after her exams were over. “I was a diligent student and I wanted to get my studies over first,” she says.
She arrived on a hot day and they spent the weekend exploring London. “I remember when I first saw him in the distance. I forgot to lick my fingers to take my chewing gum out and it stuck to my hands,” she says. “We both had a laugh about it, which was a great icebreaker.”
After that, they began a long-distance relationship, before Ingrid moved to London in 1997. “We were living life to the full in the city,” says Mark. “We went to loads of gigs, festivals and drinks events through my work, and all our friends were in creative industries.” Ingrid says they were “always” going out. “Life seemed very free, and it was really easy to find temp jobs.”
They married in Glasgow in 2000, and had their son, Felix, the following year. In 2004, they moved to Leeds, then to Glasgow in 2009. “I wanted to be closer to my mum,” says Ingrid. They have worked together to support their son, who was diagnosed with autism. “Felix is absolutely amazing. When you share something like that as a couple it’s quite empowering but it can be scary too.”
It has been almost 30 years since they met, but Mark says his wife is exactly the same. “She’s incredibly funny and she always surprises me. All the things I found irresistible when I first met her are still there.” Ingrid feels the same way. “He makes me piss myself laughing and we never pull each other. He’s a really good person and it’s been quite a ride.”
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