Questlove Throws Janet Jackson a Top Secret Birthday Party at The Divine Lorraine

Today, May 16th, is Janet Jackson's birthday.

Ms. Jackson (if you're nasty) is currently on the East Coast leg of her Together Again Tour. Our favorite Philadelphia social chronicler, Philly Chit Chat, tipped us off that Janet's friend, Questlove, threw her a little birthday bash on North Broad St.

HughE Dillion was at the late night party capturing the stars' entrances. He described the scene:

Monday night at Broad Hall inside the Divine Lorraine, Questlove hosted a birthday party for his friend Janet Jackson, whose birthday is today 5/16/23.

The evening started with rising star, Philly’s own  DJ, Joshua Lang spinning for the crowd. Janet arrived at 11:20 . shortly afterwards Questlove arrived to greet her, as well as to start his, set at midnight.

Janet wore a leopard coat and arrived with three bodyguards and three friends. Questlove arrived alone.

The party continued until 2 AM.

Janet Jackson has two tour stops in the area this week. She will appear in Allentown on Thursday and at the Hard Rock Casino in Atlantic City on Saturday night. Tickets are still available.

We weren't at any of the three Taylor Swift shows this past weekend, but more than likely someone on your Timeline was there. Each night, over 69,000 fans shook Lincoln Financial Field, and thousands more partied outside.

If you are going to be in the company of one of those people this week, we put together a cheat sheet of interesting things that happened. These moments and fun facts will help you navigate through a conversation without having to hear about which secret songs she played or how many outfit changes happened in the 3+ hour show.

During her Friday night intro to the song, "Betty," Taylor told the crowd that she named the "characters after real people in my life who I love more than anything. And their names are James, Inez and Betty.” She then looked into the crowd and mouthed, “hi, James, hi, Inez.”

James and Inez are the oldest daughters of Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively, and they were there with their mom in a VIP tent.

Watch the stage shout out here, a dark video of Blake Lively dancing here, or this cute video of them all exiting together below:

The song "Gold Rush" from Taylor's 2020 album, evermore, mentions an Eagles T-shirt. No one knew if she was talking about the band or the team... until this past weekend.

"Gold Rush" made it's made its live debut on Friday night during Taylor's acoustic secret song set. With a single spotlight on her, on the same field where they play, she told the crowd, "I love the band the Eagles, but guys, like, come on, like, I’m from Philly... of course it’s the team.” 

The Birds shared the video:

The east side of Lincoln Financial field turned into an auxiliary standing room only space for Swifties without a ticket. Tens of thousands of people gathered on Friday night to listen to the entire show a football-field's-length away from the stage. Any word that the gathering would be shut down for Saturday and Sunday's shows was just a rumor, the outside crowd grew each night.

During "Bad Blood" on Saturday night, Taylor was filmed deescalating a situation from the show. Mid-song, she shouted “hey stop... she wasn’t doing anything... hey... stop!” while pointed at the Security Guards along the barricades next to the stage.

The fan at the center of the attention, Kelly Inglis, spoke out the next day explaining the situation. She said that it was not a huge ordeal, but every her and her friends merely touched the barricade while dancing and singing along, the security guard reprimanded the group. Taylor noticed and gave Kelly tickets to Sunday's show.

Watch Kelly's explanation here.

Freelance Sports Writer, Graham Foley, shared an adorable video of his aunt. Apparently she went viral Friday night for bringing printed out the lyrics to every song in the Taylor Swift setlist to help her sing-a-long. "81 pages! With a reading light!"

Gigi Haddad and Lena Dunham were at Saturday night's show. Jennifer Lawrence, Busy Philips, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban were all spotted at the Mother's Day concert. Katniss was taking photos and talking to fans before the show started.