AGE GAP SUMMER! No thanks.  

Hello all. I've been woken from a Nosferatu-esque sleep, called out of the void of my cigarette summer haze by this very photo. Richard Gere, 76, was spotted getting close with his much younger co-star, 28-year-old Diana Silvers, while filming their new romantic drama, Asymmetry. And I'm not kidding you the very moment I sat down at this café to write this article, an old British man with a gold watch asked me if I was “a local” to which I smiled at him and pretended I was a swedish exchange student. “Jag älskar svenska köttbullar.”

Maybe he peered at my screen, saw this photo, and thought, Huh, I'll shoot my shot. This could be us, babe.

The problem isn't that a SOME age-gap romances exist. It's that Hollywood keeps insisting older men remain romantic leads while women are considered "older" the moment they turn forty. Richard Gere isn't just playing a man in love like he use to he's still being sold as a heartthrob- a silver fox. I have no problem with silver foxes or old people in love, i actually LOVE seeing two older people in love. It warms my stone cold heart but this is NOT that.

As a culture, we are not new to the age gap. It's practically everywhere. I remember watching Sabrina with Audrey Hepburn as a kid. I was completely taken by her beauty. During filming, Hepburn was 25 years old (playing a character around 22), while her co-star Humphrey Bogart was 54. A nearly thirty-year age gap. I didn't know the numbers back then, I just remember thinking, Why is she with that old man?

Old Hollywood made these relationships feel inevitable. The older gentleman would provide security, wisdom, stability. Women, meanwhile, were expected to be young, beautiful, and grateful to be on the screen. Now, I know films like Babygirl and The Idea of You exist. But that's kind of my point. Their entire marketing campaign is built around the reversal. Ooh, scandalous! Anne Hathaway is forty and has a younger love interest! even though she's still SUPER HOT and young looking! Clutch your pearls, everyone! The dynamic only feels radical because we've spent decades accepting the opposite without question.

Even then, the men often still hold the power. Whether it's the dominant younger man threatening Nicole Kidman's carefully constructed life in Babygirl, or the cocky rock star in The Idea of You who's a huge jerk to her, the fantasy is still largely structured around what the man represents. Power.

Now you may be saying, Author, you're a hypocrite. We see your Lana Del Rey music posts on instagram. Isn't she the queen of the age-gap aesthetic? To which I say: yes, I'm aware. But a Lana Del Rey music video full of mysterious older men on motorbikes is fantasy. Chalk it up to Well placed props, while as Richard Gere being marketed as a believable romantic lead opposite a 28-year-old woman is presented as reality. This could be you girlie! call up peepaws friends! age gap summer!

The expectation underneath it all that a young woman should naturally desire, emotionally support, or even become the romantic caretaker and actual caretaker of a man nearly fifty years older than her.

ART LESSON TIME, CLASS.

I reference Between Wealth and Love by William-Adolphe Bouguereau because the story it tells feels as old as time itself. A woman stands between two men: an older man offering wealth and security, and a younger man, perhaps her own age offering love. The choice isn't really between two people. It's between financial stability and desire. Centuries later, we still tell versions of this story. I may eat my words. I may be completely wrong, and this film may turn out to be a fantastic take on the very points I'm bringing up BUT it will be a hard sell.

Now, not all age gap films and shows are bad. When done correctly, they can become a powerful commentary on culture itself. An age gap can reveal so much about power, desire, wealth, and the expectations we place on men and women.

Shiva Baby, for example. The film doesn't ask us to swoon over the older man or view the relationship as some glamorous fantasy. The age gap becomes part of a larger conversation about power, sex, insecurity, validation, and the pressure young women feel to navigate a world where older, established men often hold more social and financial power. The awkward status between a woman struggling in her 20s and an older man with a family and stability. Its perfect cause its stressful as all hell as an age gap can be.

Two paths diverged in a wood. I take the one less travelled.

As a young woman, there will always be an older man offering you money and diamonds, and a younger man promising you love. But I think the path less travelled is realizing you needn't choose, no matter how broke you are. Who knows? Maybe one day you'll be the financially independent one, and you'll never have to choose between wealth and love at all.

Then you can ride off into the sunset on your own motorcycle.