Post by spencer rita kelly on Feb 23, 2015 5:53:00 GMT -5
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SPENCER RITA KELLY
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How does one describe Spencer Rita Kelly? If you ask the mainstream media, she’s a troubled, loose, barely-functioning alcoholic who’s not talented enough to overcome her issues and survive in the industry. If you ask her mother, Spencer’s just a kid who left the nest too early and didn’t get the support she needed. If you ask her father, she’s where he messed up the worst. And if you ask Miss Kelly herself, she wouldn’t really know where to start.
But we have the inside scoop and we do know where to start: at the very beginning. Spencer was born in Chicago, IL on February 3rd, 1991 to Renee and George Kelly, at the happiest point in their marriage. For the first four years of her life, things went as smoothly as they possibly could for the small family. Spencer was not a particularly finicky child, and though she tended to be on the rambunctious side, most of her energy went into finger-painting or other creative outlets. She wasn't sickly and made friends easily. Spencer had been a smart kid and she’d always made her parents proud; very rarely did anyone have to raise their voice at her or scold her for misbehaving. Sure, she could be a little mischievous at times, but she was like any other child in that way.
However, shortly after her fifth birthday, Spencer’s paternal grandfather passed away. It was an incredibly hard blow to her father and he did not handle the death well. Having been a recovering alcoholic, Spencer’s father turned back to his main vice after his father’s death. Spencer was too young to understand what had been going on, but she vaguely remembers how worried and stressed her mother seemed those couple of months and the transparent, usually empty bottles that were left scattered around their home. She also remembers her mother picking her up from kindergarten one day in their car with several suitcases in the backseat. Her mom was teary-eyed and kept forcing smiles but Spencer didn't feel comfortable with anything and she almost burst into tears when her mother told her to get in the car, but her best friend was watching her leave and she didn't want to look like a big baby. Her mom explained to her that they wouldn't be seeing Daddy for a couple of weeks and Spencer didn't question anything but she knew something was wrong.
She and her mother stayed with her grandparents in Aurora, IL during those weeks and Spencer missed school and stayed at home all day and was mostly miserable, but her grandparents were really sweet and entertaining so she didn't have too bad of a time. Still, she missed her dad and whenever she mentioned this to her mother, her mom would get all tight-lipped. After the few weeks had passed, they packed up their suitcases and went back home, something Spencer was very excited about. Before she'd even gotten inside, her dad assaulted her with a great bear hug with tears in his eyes, murmuring into her hair that he'd thought he'd lost her and that he was so sorry and it would never happen again. He did the same to her mother but her mom had a much stonier reaction than Spencer did.
In coming years, Spencer would learn to understand why. Her dad's drinking problem seemed to get better initially, but by her ninth birthday, he was back to at least three beers a day and around her eleventh birthday, he stopped hiding his drinking habits entirely—not that he had been doing a great job of that to begin with. Spencer was disgusted by her father's drinking and hated what alcohol turned him into. She knew who her real dad was and it wasn't the man who looked about the house suspiciously and hoarded his beer as if everyone was out to take it from him. One weekend while her mom was at work and her dad had the day off, Spencer caught her dad drinking again and she told him what she thought of his nasty habit. He hit her for her insolence and Spencer ran to her room in tears. It was the first time her dad had ever violently laid his hands on her and he came upstairs half an hour later to apologize to her, but she wasn't hearing it.
Spencer told her mother about the incident immediately and her parents had a huge fight about it before her mother told her to pack her stuff. They were leaving for good this time. They stayed at Spencer's grandparents' again and Spencer's mom announced that she was divorcing Spencer's dad. Half a year later, they moved out to New Jersey to start anew. Life was a little difficult for Spencer ever since then. She'd been really close to her father (when he wasn't drinking) and she still misses that closeness now. Spencer still keeps in touch with her father and her mother tried to keep all relationships at least neutral if not good. Her mom hasn't remarried since the divorce and she kept her husband's last name. Years later, when Spencer started partying, she forgave her father for the incident and ever since then, she's started to confide in him things that she could not tell her mother for fear of the disappointment. Her father claimed to have tried rehab several times, but said that it just wasn't for him.
Ever since she was little, Spencer's father has had a problem with drinking. As she grew older, it became more apparent and after the incident and the divorce, Spencer really came to terms with it. Before junior high school, she used to be terribly afraid of alcohol and would sniff at it and turn her nose up, but as she grew older, she began to develop a curiosity for alcohol. She began wondering why her father chose it over her and her mother, and in junior high, when she started gaining popularity and going to more parties, Spencer managed to get her hands on a couple of drinks occasionally. In high school, the alcohol only became more readily available and she was by now familiar with more than a few mixed drinks and had undeniably developed an addiction. Of course, Spencer will deny it—publicly, at least—until the day she dies.
While her drinking habits have certainly had a negative effect on her life, they haven’t kept all the good things out. Since she was little, Spencer has always been a creative girl, and she loved most of all to act. She was a talented storyteller and would make up characters for herself, which she’d then act out in front of her mirror or for anyone willing to lend an ear. Theatre became a constant in Spencer’s life. No matter where she moved, there was always a community theatre around or at least a school play she could be a part of. She found solace in living vicariously through other characters, and sometimes pretended her own life was a drama, just to make herself feel better about things. Money hadn’t ever been an issue in Spencer’s life, and her mother had made sure to put Spencer into whatever acting camp or program she could find, to keep Spencer busy. Her mother thought it would be a productive thing to take Spencer’s mind off her father’s absence. Spencer just liked acting, and it was a nice way to meet new people anyway.
After starring in a high-school play her sophomore year (which was not unheard of, but still pretty rare), Spencer realized she could make a real career out of acting. It wasn’t as if she could really see herself doing anything else anyway. A 9 to 5 job office job definitely didn’t appeal to her at all. Through all her partying and socializing, Spencer had established herself as a happy-go-lucky party girl who was up for anything; she thought of herself as some kind of free spirit, sometimes held back by circumstance. There was always something bigger out there for her. Still, Spencer had always been a big dreamer, but after she started getting heavily into the party scene, her motivation and drive seemed to take a fall and her dreams remained distant goals.
Instead, outside of acting, her only focuses were parties, drinking at parties, and making out with boys at parties. Spencer had insisted on going to boarding school in New York City for high school, and that was a big catalyst for her party girl persona.
But sometimes the party girl façade slipped. There were the nights of drinking to forget, the blackouts, the mistakes in love and lust, and all the confusion and drama that comes with generally being a teenager and young adult. Well, amplified of course, by the constant lack of sobriety. Spencer was still smart, but she just barely applied herself enough to pass her classes in high school. Lucky for her, Spencer had a bit of a privilege cushion to fall back on: her mother and grandparents had enough money for Spencer to live comfortably for a while without a job, but if need be, she could always join her mother’s marketing company. Of course, the free spirit that she was, that was the last thing Spencer wanted to do. So she moved permanently to New York City and went to college there to study the arts, so that she’d have some legitimate credentials when she joined the professional acting world. Not only did she actually do well in her classes this time around, but she managed to snag a main role on an off-Broadway play after graduating. College didn’t help her drinking problem, but she managed to keep herself productive with her theatre classes, so it took a backseat. Now she was only blacking out once or twice a month at the most.
After the off-Broadway play ended, it took a while for more offers to come Spencer’s way. With her newly gained free time, Spencer became a regular in the New York City nightlife circuit. She wasn’t big enough for Page 6 just yet, but there were club owners she could call herself friendly with. She met a whole spectrum of people on her night crawls and started doing that networking thing they talked about so much in college. By the end of her twenty-second year, Spencer was slotted for a role on a cable sitcom and things were looking up. The sitcom was cancelled after just eight episodes, but Spencer received her first movie offer four months later. The rest was history. Spencer has since acted in six movies, had recurring roles on two sitcoms, and guest starred on countless more. She works best when doing several projects at once because a busy schedule means less time for her shenanigans. When work slows down is when Spencer gets in the most trouble, which only makes it harder for her to get work later. Unfortunately, Spencer has recently built up a reputation of being just another irresponsible party girl starlet wannabe; she’s been late to work, not showing up for auditions, and has ended up in far too many magazines and twitter mentions that only criticize her.
Early in her high school career, Spencer realized there was power in promiscuity. Not being attached to one person or another meant Spencer could stay true to her free spirit mentality, and it also meant no one got too close to her. Spencer couldn’t see herself having a family, and in her mind, that was the only thing marriage was good for, so long term commitment wasn’t something she found necessary. There’d been one guy she fell for in high school, but he was too old for her and out of her league. He was the one guy she could see herself actually being with, but he didn’t feel the same. Their romance had been all over the place and passionate, but had ended with Spencer’s inevitable heartbreak. To this day, she has never really gotten over the breakup or the boy, and if anything, her romantic apathy has only increased. She’s definitely been sleeping around more in recent months, which led to a brief pregnancy she didn’t actually know about until she miscarried two weeks in. The miscarriage was more of a relief than a crushing blow for Spencer, but she hasn’t felt like herself since. It felt like a wake-up call in some weird way.
Spencer had come to terms with her dad’s alcoholism, but she still didn’t trust him enough to be around him. They’ve talked on the phone, but Spencer has not seen her dad since she was eleven. Part of it is that she knows he hasn’t fully recovered and is too afraid to see him in a state; but part of it is that she doesn’t want him to see what she’s become. She feels like seeing him in the flesh would make her problems real. She’s afraid that she’s just like him. Things with her mother haven’t been perfect recently either. After a few too many tabloid stories about Spencer’s drinking and partying habits and how they were affecting her work, it was hard to hide her problems from her mother. Her mother had called once to ask her about it, but Spencer had very quickly—and very angrily—shut that conversation down. She knew her mom was just concerned, but Spencer didn’t want to talk about it. In her mind, her mother was one of the last people in her life who loved and supported her unconditionally, and she couldn’t bear to disappoint her mother by admitting the truth. So instead, Spencer just pretended like there wasn’t a problem at all. Everyone else just needed to loosen up. She was fine.
What’s next in the cards for Miss Kelly? At the moment, she’s home in New York City, not currently working on any big projects, and volunteering as a Zumba instructor once a week at a local community center, as per her manager’s suggestion. Ever since the miscarriage, Spencer’s been taking a little better care of herself, but it’s still unclear if she’s strong enough to make it on her own.
But we have the inside scoop and we do know where to start: at the very beginning. Spencer was born in Chicago, IL on February 3rd, 1991 to Renee and George Kelly, at the happiest point in their marriage. For the first four years of her life, things went as smoothly as they possibly could for the small family. Spencer was not a particularly finicky child, and though she tended to be on the rambunctious side, most of her energy went into finger-painting or other creative outlets. She wasn't sickly and made friends easily. Spencer had been a smart kid and she’d always made her parents proud; very rarely did anyone have to raise their voice at her or scold her for misbehaving. Sure, she could be a little mischievous at times, but she was like any other child in that way.
However, shortly after her fifth birthday, Spencer’s paternal grandfather passed away. It was an incredibly hard blow to her father and he did not handle the death well. Having been a recovering alcoholic, Spencer’s father turned back to his main vice after his father’s death. Spencer was too young to understand what had been going on, but she vaguely remembers how worried and stressed her mother seemed those couple of months and the transparent, usually empty bottles that were left scattered around their home. She also remembers her mother picking her up from kindergarten one day in their car with several suitcases in the backseat. Her mom was teary-eyed and kept forcing smiles but Spencer didn't feel comfortable with anything and she almost burst into tears when her mother told her to get in the car, but her best friend was watching her leave and she didn't want to look like a big baby. Her mom explained to her that they wouldn't be seeing Daddy for a couple of weeks and Spencer didn't question anything but she knew something was wrong.
She and her mother stayed with her grandparents in Aurora, IL during those weeks and Spencer missed school and stayed at home all day and was mostly miserable, but her grandparents were really sweet and entertaining so she didn't have too bad of a time. Still, she missed her dad and whenever she mentioned this to her mother, her mom would get all tight-lipped. After the few weeks had passed, they packed up their suitcases and went back home, something Spencer was very excited about. Before she'd even gotten inside, her dad assaulted her with a great bear hug with tears in his eyes, murmuring into her hair that he'd thought he'd lost her and that he was so sorry and it would never happen again. He did the same to her mother but her mom had a much stonier reaction than Spencer did.
In coming years, Spencer would learn to understand why. Her dad's drinking problem seemed to get better initially, but by her ninth birthday, he was back to at least three beers a day and around her eleventh birthday, he stopped hiding his drinking habits entirely—not that he had been doing a great job of that to begin with. Spencer was disgusted by her father's drinking and hated what alcohol turned him into. She knew who her real dad was and it wasn't the man who looked about the house suspiciously and hoarded his beer as if everyone was out to take it from him. One weekend while her mom was at work and her dad had the day off, Spencer caught her dad drinking again and she told him what she thought of his nasty habit. He hit her for her insolence and Spencer ran to her room in tears. It was the first time her dad had ever violently laid his hands on her and he came upstairs half an hour later to apologize to her, but she wasn't hearing it.
Spencer told her mother about the incident immediately and her parents had a huge fight about it before her mother told her to pack her stuff. They were leaving for good this time. They stayed at Spencer's grandparents' again and Spencer's mom announced that she was divorcing Spencer's dad. Half a year later, they moved out to New Jersey to start anew. Life was a little difficult for Spencer ever since then. She'd been really close to her father (when he wasn't drinking) and she still misses that closeness now. Spencer still keeps in touch with her father and her mother tried to keep all relationships at least neutral if not good. Her mom hasn't remarried since the divorce and she kept her husband's last name. Years later, when Spencer started partying, she forgave her father for the incident and ever since then, she's started to confide in him things that she could not tell her mother for fear of the disappointment. Her father claimed to have tried rehab several times, but said that it just wasn't for him.
Ever since she was little, Spencer's father has had a problem with drinking. As she grew older, it became more apparent and after the incident and the divorce, Spencer really came to terms with it. Before junior high school, she used to be terribly afraid of alcohol and would sniff at it and turn her nose up, but as she grew older, she began to develop a curiosity for alcohol. She began wondering why her father chose it over her and her mother, and in junior high, when she started gaining popularity and going to more parties, Spencer managed to get her hands on a couple of drinks occasionally. In high school, the alcohol only became more readily available and she was by now familiar with more than a few mixed drinks and had undeniably developed an addiction. Of course, Spencer will deny it—publicly, at least—until the day she dies.
While her drinking habits have certainly had a negative effect on her life, they haven’t kept all the good things out. Since she was little, Spencer has always been a creative girl, and she loved most of all to act. She was a talented storyteller and would make up characters for herself, which she’d then act out in front of her mirror or for anyone willing to lend an ear. Theatre became a constant in Spencer’s life. No matter where she moved, there was always a community theatre around or at least a school play she could be a part of. She found solace in living vicariously through other characters, and sometimes pretended her own life was a drama, just to make herself feel better about things. Money hadn’t ever been an issue in Spencer’s life, and her mother had made sure to put Spencer into whatever acting camp or program she could find, to keep Spencer busy. Her mother thought it would be a productive thing to take Spencer’s mind off her father’s absence. Spencer just liked acting, and it was a nice way to meet new people anyway.
After starring in a high-school play her sophomore year (which was not unheard of, but still pretty rare), Spencer realized she could make a real career out of acting. It wasn’t as if she could really see herself doing anything else anyway. A 9 to 5 job office job definitely didn’t appeal to her at all. Through all her partying and socializing, Spencer had established herself as a happy-go-lucky party girl who was up for anything; she thought of herself as some kind of free spirit, sometimes held back by circumstance. There was always something bigger out there for her. Still, Spencer had always been a big dreamer, but after she started getting heavily into the party scene, her motivation and drive seemed to take a fall and her dreams remained distant goals.
Instead, outside of acting, her only focuses were parties, drinking at parties, and making out with boys at parties. Spencer had insisted on going to boarding school in New York City for high school, and that was a big catalyst for her party girl persona.
But sometimes the party girl façade slipped. There were the nights of drinking to forget, the blackouts, the mistakes in love and lust, and all the confusion and drama that comes with generally being a teenager and young adult. Well, amplified of course, by the constant lack of sobriety. Spencer was still smart, but she just barely applied herself enough to pass her classes in high school. Lucky for her, Spencer had a bit of a privilege cushion to fall back on: her mother and grandparents had enough money for Spencer to live comfortably for a while without a job, but if need be, she could always join her mother’s marketing company. Of course, the free spirit that she was, that was the last thing Spencer wanted to do. So she moved permanently to New York City and went to college there to study the arts, so that she’d have some legitimate credentials when she joined the professional acting world. Not only did she actually do well in her classes this time around, but she managed to snag a main role on an off-Broadway play after graduating. College didn’t help her drinking problem, but she managed to keep herself productive with her theatre classes, so it took a backseat. Now she was only blacking out once or twice a month at the most.
After the off-Broadway play ended, it took a while for more offers to come Spencer’s way. With her newly gained free time, Spencer became a regular in the New York City nightlife circuit. She wasn’t big enough for Page 6 just yet, but there were club owners she could call herself friendly with. She met a whole spectrum of people on her night crawls and started doing that networking thing they talked about so much in college. By the end of her twenty-second year, Spencer was slotted for a role on a cable sitcom and things were looking up. The sitcom was cancelled after just eight episodes, but Spencer received her first movie offer four months later. The rest was history. Spencer has since acted in six movies, had recurring roles on two sitcoms, and guest starred on countless more. She works best when doing several projects at once because a busy schedule means less time for her shenanigans. When work slows down is when Spencer gets in the most trouble, which only makes it harder for her to get work later. Unfortunately, Spencer has recently built up a reputation of being just another irresponsible party girl starlet wannabe; she’s been late to work, not showing up for auditions, and has ended up in far too many magazines and twitter mentions that only criticize her.
Early in her high school career, Spencer realized there was power in promiscuity. Not being attached to one person or another meant Spencer could stay true to her free spirit mentality, and it also meant no one got too close to her. Spencer couldn’t see herself having a family, and in her mind, that was the only thing marriage was good for, so long term commitment wasn’t something she found necessary. There’d been one guy she fell for in high school, but he was too old for her and out of her league. He was the one guy she could see herself actually being with, but he didn’t feel the same. Their romance had been all over the place and passionate, but had ended with Spencer’s inevitable heartbreak. To this day, she has never really gotten over the breakup or the boy, and if anything, her romantic apathy has only increased. She’s definitely been sleeping around more in recent months, which led to a brief pregnancy she didn’t actually know about until she miscarried two weeks in. The miscarriage was more of a relief than a crushing blow for Spencer, but she hasn’t felt like herself since. It felt like a wake-up call in some weird way.
Spencer had come to terms with her dad’s alcoholism, but she still didn’t trust him enough to be around him. They’ve talked on the phone, but Spencer has not seen her dad since she was eleven. Part of it is that she knows he hasn’t fully recovered and is too afraid to see him in a state; but part of it is that she doesn’t want him to see what she’s become. She feels like seeing him in the flesh would make her problems real. She’s afraid that she’s just like him. Things with her mother haven’t been perfect recently either. After a few too many tabloid stories about Spencer’s drinking and partying habits and how they were affecting her work, it was hard to hide her problems from her mother. Her mother had called once to ask her about it, but Spencer had very quickly—and very angrily—shut that conversation down. She knew her mom was just concerned, but Spencer didn’t want to talk about it. In her mind, her mother was one of the last people in her life who loved and supported her unconditionally, and she couldn’t bear to disappoint her mother by admitting the truth. So instead, Spencer just pretended like there wasn’t a problem at all. Everyone else just needed to loosen up. She was fine.
What’s next in the cards for Miss Kelly? At the moment, she’s home in New York City, not currently working on any big projects, and volunteering as a Zumba instructor once a week at a local community center, as per her manager’s suggestion. Ever since the miscarriage, Spencer’s been taking a little better care of herself, but it’s still unclear if she’s strong enough to make it on her own.
LEIGHTON MEESTER - CELEBRITY - WRITTEN BY SHAZI
