Met Gala 2017 and politics: Why Amy Schumer, Lena Dunham, Gwyneth Paltrow chose to return

An invitation to the Met Gala is a big thing. Attended by the crème de la crème of Hollywood, its not easy to get an invite just because you have money or pedigree — tickets start at $30,000 per person and, according to sources, go as high as $50,000 — the Met Gala is Anna Wintour’s party and she’ll invite whom she wants to. Anna Wintour, the editor of American Vogue and the artistic director of Condé Nast, took over as chairwoman of the gala in 1999. Since then, she has been instrumental in transforming a local philanthropic event into the ultimate global celebrity/power cocktail: Take a jigger of famous names from fashion, add film, politics and business, and mix. It’s such a heady combo that President Trump proposed to his wife, Melania, during the gala in 2004. (In case you are wondering: No, they are not expected this year.) Hundreds of celebs, designers, moguls and tech titans — all vetted by Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour — descended upon the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the 69th Rei Kawakubo/Comme Des Garcons themed gala. And this year, t he list was tighter than ever. A few celebs, who had promised never to return again after a bad stint at the gala, made an appearance at the ball, and have made news since then. Among more shocking guests were Lena Dunham, Amy Schumer and Gwyneth Paltrow, all who have vocally expressed disdain for the star-studded event. The most puzzling return of them all is Lena Dunham who had remarked that the other guests didn’t make her feel welcomed at all last year.“I was sitting next to [football star] Odell Beckham Jr., and it was so amazing because it was like he looked at me and he determined I was not the shape of a woman by his standards. He was like, That’s a marshmallow. That’s a child. That’s a dog. It wasnt mean — he just seemed confused,” she said in an interview with Lenny Letter. She continued writing: “The vibe was very much like, ‘Do I want to f–k it? Is it wearing a … yep, it’s wearing a tuxedo. I’m going to go back to my cell phone.’ It was like we were forced to be together, and he literally was scrolling Instagram rather than have to look at a woman in a bow tie. I was like, ‘This should be called the Metropolitan Museum of Getting Rejected by Athletes.’”

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Meanwhile, comedian Amy Schumer had echoed Dunham’s thoughts and vowed never to return again. But Schumer returned wearing an off-the-shoulder sweetheart neckline gown by Zac Posen, which came as a total surprise considering her conversation with Howard Stern on his SiriusXM radio show last year. She said the  event felt like “punishment” when she attended last year with Alexander Wang. “It’s people doing an impression of having a conversation … I don’t like the farce,” Schumer told Stern. “We’re dressed up like a bunch of f—king a–holes.”

Another shocking return was Gwyneth Paltrow who wore a a pale pink sequin, one-shoulder Calvin Klein by Appointment dress (paired with $2.5 million Harry Winston diamond earrings) as a nod to her first Met Gala appearance in 1995. Paltrow told USA Today after her last Met Gala in 2013 that she never thought she’d be back. “I’m never going again. It was so un-fun. It was boiling. It was too crowded. I did not enjoy it at all,”  Paltrow said at the time. A few celebrities who have actually stayed away from the Met Gala are Michelle Obama, Meryl Streep and Adele, all of whom have graced the covers of Vogue.  While Meryl Streep stays away from the Gala because of the bad blood with Anna Wintour (after her portrayal of the tough as nails editor in Devil Wears Prada) we wonder if Michelle Obama and Adele chose not to attend or were not sent an invite.