Though I don’t much follow these things, I hear that Brooklyn Beckham has recently been in the news again — presumably because his £15.99 hot sauce is doing really well at Whole Foods and quite right too. But it got me wondering what else the photographer, chef, and career-husband might turn his hand to next, now that I’m told he’ll be spending much less time answering his dad’s question “but I could definitely pass for 35, right?”
A recently vacated role as a member of a hugely influential family beset constantly by infidelity rumours, intergenerational tensions, and — checks notes — matriarchs who dance provocatively at weddings. Should be straightforward, straightforward for Brooklyn, then. See also…
Another suddenly-very-free-slot, now that Guardian journos have learned how to operate the search function on Justice.Gov, the geeks. Brooklyn is amply qualified for this: American name, American wife, presumably a decent understanding of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, etc etc.
I actually happen to think that AI is going to be really massive in the future, and Brooklyn now has the opportunity to get in on the action from the ground floor. His AI could be used to answer highly specific questions with almost-passable humanity, like: “why is it so hard to take photos of elephants?” and “how long does it take to cut open a wheel of parmesan?”
It seems to me that Brooklyn’s problem thus far is that he’s been far too sincere and uncynical in his career choices. Instead, perhaps, he could write weekend listicle columns like: “Five Job Ideas for a Slightly Overweight Minor Public Schoolboy.” Sample entries: “Doctor”, “Carer,” or most accurately, “Anything that will make him feel the way he did on that one day when he won the tennis tournament at St Edwards against the odds and his mum collected him and bought him a lemon Lucozade on the way home and everything was okay and no-one had died yet.” Or something like that.
Because perhaps, you know, Brooklyn Beckham is not simply the lampoonable outlier in this late-capitalist moment — but is, in fact, no more or less than simply one of us: a frail being forced by powers far bigger than ourselves to commodify our lives and our relationships in service of a pandora’s box that wishes not simply to sell us products but to turn us into them, too, so that all private life is now public property, all experience is simply material, and that all children are little more than sub-contractors to some metastasising brand of synthetic authenticity marketed by parents who are just as lost and bewildered and terrified as they are. Or, you know, he could try the chef thing again.
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As the club sandwich goes mainstream, this guide tracks down the finest examples around the world, from alpine hotels to the Riviera, celebrating those that balance indulgence with structural integrity.
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