Is Amanda Bynes '25 Things You Don't Know About Me' the Weirdest Story Us Weekly Has Ever Printed?
Every issue, Us Weekly runs a feature called "25 Things You Don't Know About Me," in which a celebrity, ostensibly, writes up interesting 25 facts about themselves (and then an intern transliterates their incomprehensible hieroglyphics into human letters). Normally, these lists give readers a chance to learn 24 things they already knew about a celebrity (Zooey Deschanel started "a comedy website" called Hello Giggles) plus one weird, new fact (Zooey Deschanel hates papaya).
The one that ran about Amanda Bynes today, though, was chilling.
The list starts off pretty innocuously: Amanda Bynes' first concert was the Spice Girls; Amanda Bynes loves to draw. Then, in the #3 slot, there's this:
"I went on Accutane and it really helped my skin clear up."
In case you don't remember, Accutane's manufacturer pulled the medication off the U.S. market in 2009 under a tidal wave of lawsuits, after it was revealed to cause side effects like Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, and birth defects. Amanda Bynes might as well have endorsed Arrested Development's Cornballer.
Further down the list are disturbing comments that hint glibly at serious food issues, if not a full-blown eating disorder:
"I gain weight quickly so I need to work out constantly."
"I moved to New York City and I love it! I lost 4 lbs. since I moved. I'm 121 lbs — my goal is 100 lbs."
Various websites (and the human eye) judge Bynes' height to be between 5'8 and 5'9. With 100 pounds on it, her frame wouldn't just look thin – it would look skeletal.
(If you still put stock in BMI calculations, a 5'8, 100 lb person would have a BMI of 15.2. Anything below 18.5 is considered "underweight.")
These dark fun facts are interspersed with such revelations as "I love going to the Bahamas," and "I would love to start recording an album."
I enjoy tropical vacays.
My favorite season is fall.
I believe food is the enemy and dream of blood that runs clear like water.
My favorite color is purple.
Some of the 25 things we didn't know about Amanda Bynes aren't even things about Amanda Bynes.
"Rag and Bone makes the best jeans," reveals Amanda Bynes about herself (#5). "Alexander Wang makes the best T-shirts" (#21).
Weirdest of all is that Amanda Bynes hasn't appeared in a television or film since 2010's Easy A. Getty Images has 3 images of her from 2012 and one is a mugshot.
She appears to have been chosen for the feature just because she seems to be in the middle of a very public nervous breakdown.
There's also this, at #16:
"I survived Hurricane Sandy."
Stars: They're Just Like Us! (They're not dead right now.)