Why Watson is no longer silent

Deshaun Watson is done biting his tongue, said Tim Keown in ESPN.com. The 24-year-old Watson, the face of the Houston Texans, entered the NFL knowing there was a long-standing bias against black men playing the cerebral, high-pressure position of quarterback. After Houston lost a game in 2018, an East Texas school superintendent wrote on Facebook, “When you need precision decision making, you can’t count on a black quarterback.” That attitude haunted Watson off the field, too. “Whenever a black quarterback speaks up, the outside world doesn’t think they’re educated enough to know what’s going on,” he says. “They’re like, ‘Hey, y’all black quarterbacks, shut up. Y’all don’t know what y’all talking about.” During his rookie season, his team’s owner, Bob McNair, told fellow NFL owners, “We can’t have the inmates running the prison,” in reference to protests from black players. At the time, Watson refused to comment. Now, as the second-highest-paid player in NFL history, Watson has found his voice. After the killing of George Floyd, he joined NFL stars in demanding that the league respect the right of its black players to protest, and the league changed its policies. “It feels like a change is happening,” Watson says. “Voices are getting heard.”

Winslet’s quarantine consolations

Kate Winslet has always hated the red carpet, said Julie Miller in Vanity Fair. Sitting at home in her bathrobe—“None of my pants fit me at the moment,” she admits—Winslet says that one of the pandemic’s few benefits is that the award shows, movie premieres, and publicity tours have been canceled. “It’s always pained me, the money that gets wasted on flying journalists, actors, glam squads all over the world,” she says. “Why the hell is any of that important? The dresses, the dress fittings, it’s so stressful.” The British actress, 44, concedes that it may sound elitist to gripe about award shows at a time like this. But, she says, “it’s always been so baffling to me—the hoopla and the wasted money that could be better put to making more independent films, number one, or building classrooms.” She’s also been reflecting on her decision to work with two directors accused of sexual assault: Roman Polanski, for 2011’s Carnage, and Woody Allen, for 2017’s Wonder Wheel. “What was I doing?” she says. “It’s unbelievable to me now how those men were held in such high regard. And I have to take responsibility. I worked with them both.” Winslet now wants to set a good example for younger women. “We’re handing them a pretty f---ed-up world, so I’d like to do my bit in having some proper integrity.”