In hindsight -- or so to speak -- they looked
like a couple of Batman villains.
August 25, 2013: MTV holds its annual Video Music Awards (VMA) ceremony, at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York City. Not even on The Honeymooners, or in Ebbets Field with its Brooklyn Dodger Sym-Phony Band, had there been an entertainment spectacle this bizarre in Brooklyn.
Justin Timberlake, no stranger to controversy, had been nominated for 6 awards, tied for the most with Macklemore and his musical partner Ryan Lewis. Timberlake won 4, including Video of the Year for his song "Mirrors"; while Macklemore and Lewis, responsible for the Number 1 hit "Thrift Shop," won 3.
After what happened with Miley Cyrus and Robin Thicke, people could be excused for forgetting that Timberlake, Macklemore and Lewis, or anybody else, were even on the broadcast.
Cyrus and Thicke were each nominated for 4 awards, but neither won any. Both were the children of legendary performers. Cyrus was born in 1993, a few months after her father, country singer Billy Ray Cyrus, became a star with the song "Achy Breaky Heart." From 2006 to 2011, she starred on the Disney Channel series Hannah Montana.
But with her 2013 album Bangerz, she blew her previous squeaky-clean image away, with songs like "We Can't Stop," with its rear-end-shaking "twerking"; and "Wrecking Ball," with its video showing her riding one -- naked in the main video, barely covered in the safe-for-TV version.
Thicke was born in 1977, the son of singer-actors Alan Thicke and Gloria Loring. He had been better known as a songwriter and a producer until his 2005 album The Evolution of Robin Thicke. It was also in 2005 that he married actress Paula Patton.
In 2009, he released an album titled Sex Therapy. That title reminded people of Marvin Gaye's 1982 song "Sexual Healing," and Thicke admitted Gaye was a big influence on his music. But he took it took too far: In 2013, he released the album Blurred Lines, and was accused of copying Gaye's 1977 Number 1 hit "Got to Give It Up" for its title track. Two years later, a jury awarded Gaye's family $7.4 million in copyright infringement. Gaye is now listed as one of the authors of "Blurred Lines" the song, along with Thicke and his co-performers on the song, Pharrell Williams and Clifford Harris, a.k.a. T.I.
If that had been the only problem with "Blurred Lines," it might have been a footnote. After all, bigger artists than Thicke had been accused of such things. Even two of The Beatles: John Lennon had to pay Chuck Berry royalties because "Come Together" copied a line from "Too Much Monkey Business," and George Harrison had to pay The Chiffons because "My Sweet Lord" had a melody way too close to "He's So Fine."
But that wasn't the only problem with "Blurred Lines." The oft-repeated line "I know you want it" seems to fly in the face of consent, ignoring that "No" means "No." At one point, T.I. raps, "I'll give you something big enough to tear your ass in two." The video made things even worse: The not-safe-for-TV version showed 3 models -- Emily Ratajkowski, Elle Evans and Jessi M'Bengue, who is black like Williams and T.I., while the other 2 are white like Thicke -- topless and dancing with the 3 men. The video closes with mylar balloons spelling out, "Robin Thicke has a big dick."
Feminists jumped on Thicke, and not in a good way, claiming that the song supported "rape culture." At the very least, it was completely demeaning to women, especially the 3 in the video. Thicke tried damage control, saying the video was directed by a woman, Diane Martel; that all 3 vocalists were using the song to celebrate the women in their real lives; and that he'd gotten Patton's permission to do the video after explaining what he wanted to show in it.
So the 2013 VMAs were held while both Cyrus and Thicke were embroiled in sex-themed controversy, the former being a bit too "sex-positive," the latter for his ill treatment of women, both the easily-seen and the even worse suggested.
The show began with Austin Mahone singing "What About Love" -- not to be confused with the 1985 Heart song of the same title. Next up was Ariana Grande singing "Baby I" and "The Way" -- not to be confused with the 1975 Peter Frampton song "Baby, I Love Your Way." Next up was Lady Gaga, who'd already had her share of controversy, singing "Applause." So far, so good: There was no public uproar about any of these performances, nor was any necessary.
Then Cyrus took the stage, and... uh...
She stepped out of a giant teddy bear that wore a visor similar to the superhero Cyclops of Marvel's X-Men. She was wearing a bustier with a picture of a teddy bear on it. Then she sang "We Can't Stop" with a bunch of dancers holding up smaller (but still large) teddy bears. All the time, her tongue was hanging out like she was Gene Simmons of Kiss (or basketball star Michael Jordan attempting a dunk); and half the time, she was shaking her tush or grabbing her crotch. She closed by tearing the bustier off, revealing a flesh-colored bra and panties, and that was it. If she was trying to titillate with that performance, she really missed the mark: It was too weird to turn anybody on.
Then Thicke came out, wearing a suit of black and white stripes, like he was playing soccer for England's Newcastle United or Italy's Juventus. And that was the least ridiculous part of it. He and Cyrus did a duet of "Blurred Lines." Cyrus sang the raunchier lyrics, with considerable gusto. If Thicke thought having a woman sing that part was going to ease the pressure on him, he thought wrong.
Cyrus got a big foam "We're Number 1" finger, and fondled herself with it. Then she fondled Thicke with it. And she told him, "I know you want it." And she bent over so that her scrawny butt was at his crotch level, and twerked in front of him. And then she licked his face. And then she blew on the foam finger, as if it was a smoking gun. The shoe was on the other foot, or so to speak.
Afterword, Thicke was angry, saying Cyrus was "going too far" and had "hijacked the performance." Cyrus responded that he'd specifically asked her to be "as naked as possible." Unlike when Timberlake had humiliated Janet Jackson in the Super Bowl halftime show 9 years earlier, this time, Robin got most of the blame; while with Miley, half the viewers were disgusted, and the other half were concerned that, maybe, her mental health was an issue.
At the time, I read a news article quoting a woman (I forget her name, but she wasn't another major singer) saying, "She's just exploring her sexuality." Okay, I understood that -- but on live national television?
As it turned out, her mental health was fine. She had the right perspective on things:
There's a couple of cute postscripts. In an attempt to regain some of the fans she lost, Cyrus hosted Saturday Night Live on October 5, 2013, during the federal government shutdown. Playing big-mouthed, small-brained Congresswoman Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, with some regular castmembers impersonating other Republican leaders, she twerked through a song titled "We Did Stop." It showed that she knew to take the American political situation much more seriously than her own image, and it helped.
And on July 15, 2014, the living master of song parody, "Weird Al" Yankovic, turned "Blurred Lines" into "Word Crimes," a 3-minute-46-second English lesson. It may be his best song ever, and it concludes with the on-screen words, "'Weird Al' Yankovic has a big dictionary." It works because "Yankovic" sort-of rhymes with "Thicke."
But there is another postscript, and there's nothing cute or fun about it. In 2014, in order to make amends to his wife, Thicke recorded a new album, titled simply Paula, full of love songs about her. It didn't work: In 2015, Patton divorced Thicke. In 2017, she filed a restraining order against him, to keep him away from her, their son Julian, and her mother Joyce Patton, because he'd become an alcoholic and a drug addict, and had been abusive to them.
Cyrus has become a bigger star than ever, and has outgrown her provocateur phase. Approaching her 30th birthday, and having since been married and divorced, she still wears skimpy outfits onstage, but she otherwise seems to go out of her way to avoid controversy. Thicke has recovered as well, and is now part of the regular panel on the Fox game show The Masked Singer.
Following this incident, "Nice" Peter Shukoff and "Epic" Lloyd Ahlquist, the creators of the YouTube series Epic Rap Battles of History, decided they had to use Miley in a battle, but had trouble thinking of a proper opponent for her. It would have to be someone who shrank from publicity and sexuality. They chose Joan of Arc, who was played by YouTuber Jessica Vazquez, a.k.a Jessi Smiles. Miley was played by actress Michelle Glavan.
With some irony, Jessi became the 2nd ERB performer to have a baby, after Kimmy Gatewood -- who had played Marilyn Monroe, who had only unsuccessful pregnancies. As of August 25, 2022, Miley has been married and divorced once, and is not known to have ever been pregnant.
*
August 25, 2013 was a Sunday. These Major League Baseball games were played that day:
* The New York Yankees beat the Tampa Bay Rays, 3-2 at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida. Yankee starter Ivan Nova pitched into the 7th inning. Robinson Canó went 3-for-5 with a home run and 2 RBIs. Derek Jeter did not play. Nor did Alex Rodriguez, who had recently been suspended for steroid use. Curtis Granderson won the game with a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the 11th inning, making a winning pitcher out of Boone Logan -- to my shock, as Logan blew a lot of games for the Yankees.
* The New York Mets lost to the Detroit Tigers, 11-3 at Citi Field.
* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Arizona Diamondbacks, 9-5 at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia.
* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Oakland Athletics, 10-3 at Camden Yards in Baltimore.
* The Colorado Rockies beat the Miami Marlins, 4-3 at Marlins Park (now LoanDepot Park) in Miami.
* The Cleveland Indians beat the Minnesota Twins, 3-1 at Progressive Field in Cleveland.
* The Milwaukee Brewers beat the Cincinnati Reds, 3-1 at Great American Ball Park in Cincinnati.
* The Chicago White Sox beat the Texas Rangers, 5-2 at U.S. Cellular Field (now Rate Field) in Chicago.
* The Atlanta Braves beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 5-2 at Busch Stadium in St. Louis.
* The Kansas City Royals beat the Washington Nationals, 6-4 at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City.
* The Toronto Blue Jays beat the Houston Astros, 2-1 at Minute Maid Park (now Daikin Park) in Houston.
* The San Diego Padres beat the Chicago Cubs, 3-2 at Petco Park in San Diego. Nick Hundley singled home the winning run in the bottom of the 15th inning. In spite of also being a catcher, he is not related to father-and-son Cub catchers Randy and Todd Hundley.
* The Boston Red Sox beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 8-1 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.
* And the San Francisco Giants beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 4-0 at AT&T Park (now Oracle Park) in San Francisco. Ryan Vogelsong pitched 8 innings of 2-hit shutout ball, before Sandy Rosario finished a 3-hit shutout.
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