'Summer House' star West Wilson says it's 'weird' and 'bizarre' to navigate the attention on his personal life
When Summer House star West Wilson was in Toronto earlier this year, he shared with Yahoo Canada that he never watched last season's reunion, where he famously got frazzled having to address his relationship with costar Ciara Miller. This time around for the Summer House Season 9 reunion (on Hayu in Canada), Wilson came prepared with notes.
"I don't think I'm very good at funnelling my thoughts," West told Yahoo Canada. "TV kind of helps, ... where everything is condensed."
"This show is therapeutic in a way where you kind of have to deal with what's going on."
Early in the Summer House reunion, we looked back at how Wilson was greeted by Miller in the house in Season 9, with Wilson also facing questions about what he said to The New York Times about their relationship, defending how he handled the breakup.
Wilson apologized to Miller in this season's reunion, but she was quick to point out that if Wilson could comment on their relationship to the media, he should be able to talk to her honestly, face-to-face. While they don't get to a point of close friendship, there was a sense of understanding by the end of the reunion.
With Wilson being relatively new to the reality TV space, there's certainly a lot to get comfortable with, not just in terms of sharing ones personal life on TV, but managing reactions and responses from fans of the show, and rumours spreading about who he could be romantically connected to next.
"Weird to navigate. It's fun, until it's not," Wilson said. "It's bizarre. And nothing I've really been involved in has been that serious, but it's kind of become talking points, I guess, whether that's my fault or just how the internet works."
"It hasn't been dating or breakups or anything. So it's all very juvenile. ...I think because I had a public breakup already, people are going to care no matter what. ... I feel like I'm still learning. A lot of this stuff I think I'm learning it by the day, for better or for worse. ... Now you have to be hyperaware of people being nosy, people doing research, people just caring more than I do."
While several Summer House fans weren't on Wilson's side for how he handled the breakup with Miller, one interview he did earlier this year resulted in a lot of praise for the reality TV star and sports reporter.
Back in March, Wilson spoke to Uncloseted Media about "manfluencers," toxic masculinity and voting for Kamala Harris in the last U.S. election. Wilson said he was "softly promoting" his liberal stance on political issues in the last American election, but stressed that he really wanted to make "positive" actions in addressing these topics publicly.
"When I get negative feedback on stuff like this, ... it always makes me feel better about what I said to begin with," he explained. "So almost kind of like soft-launching where I stood politically, getting shit talk back, kept me moving forward, and more comfortable and confident in what I believe in."
"I do think because I'm a white dude who has a cowboy dad and I'm from Missouri, I think a lot of people expect me to be a ... Trump-y redneck. ... I'm not a confrontational person, ... but I think now, it's not even really politics, it's just being a human. A lot of the feedback I've gotten that says, 'Thanks for doing this. Not a lot of people in your position do talk about it.' Made me feel good. If I can do anything positive right now, it's that."
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Talk about a perfect storm. On Wednesday, Giancarlo Guerrero's much-fêted debut as principal conductor and artistic director of the Grant Park Music Festival was dampened by relentless rain. Audiences scrunched under the Jay Pritzker Pavilion fringe, only to play musical chairs dodging the structure's many (and ever-changing) leaky spots. When they weren't doing that, seat shuffles and squabbles competed with the evening's violin concerto. But if Guerrero appeared unflappable onstage, it's because he's been there before. He made his sophomore appearance with the orchestra in 2014 under nearly identical circumstances, down to the solo string showcase and contemporary American opener. Despite the lousy weather, that appearance impressed festival musicians enough to fast-track Guerrero to the top of their director wishlist a decade later. 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The Grant Park corps rose above the usual downtown backing track with a fresh, focused Mahler 1. Guerrero cued the unearthly, whistling first bars with an ambiguous gesture that invited the orchestra to melt in freely. Offstage trumpets were piped through the crown of the pavilion stage, sounding mysteriously heaven-sent. When the theme arrived in the cellos, Guerrero maintained their levity and grace throughout the movement — and, in fact, throughout much of the piece, bringing an aerodynamic lightness even to the symphony's final cadence. Because Grant Park 'does things a little differently,' per Guerrero, Friday's performance reinserted Mahler's discarded 'Blumine' movement. Through a complex change of hands, the only surviving manuscript copy of 'Blumine' ended up in in New Haven, Connecticut, where it was rediscovered as part of the Mahler renaissance of the 1960s. 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