Angela Bassett Revealed the Secrets of Celebrity Zoom Set-ups

Often things in Hollywood aren’t as they seem. Some stars change their appearance with makeup and injectables, and even those images are later Photoshopped, with sometimes unintentionally hilarious results. But, not everyone in Tinseltown is interested in maintaining secrecy about the facades. Actress Angela Bassett has just revealed the truth behind celeb Zoom interviews — turns out, all those picturesque backgrounds of lush gardens and serene forests could be fake. Yes, even celebs get creative with their Zoom backgrounds.

In a post on her Instagram Stories, Bassett shared a behind-the-scenes photo of herself doing virtual press events for her upcoming Netflix film, Gunpowder Milkshake. She’s seated at an adjustable desk (gotta get that right angle), facing a large Apple screen, and is beautifully lit with two ring lights — but, as you can see, Bassett is definitely not sitting in a room with two grand windows. It’s a photo background held up with hardware clips, so that on the other end of the Zoom call, she looks like she’s casually lounging in front of a sunny backyard. Very clever, and also very uncanny.

At the beginning of the pandemic, many of us were glued to the news. As viewers began to see the home spaces that TV news anchors and specials were broadcasting from, the books on display in their office Zoom background became an entire discourse. Politico reported on a Maryland bookseller who found a cottage industry in curating visible books for TV talking heads. Even us plebians have thrown on a filter or added a plant or two in our rooms for the Zoom group chat, so Bassett is simply doing the celebrity equivalent of setting your Zoom background to outer space. Though going forward, we’ll look a little closer at too-perfect vistas from remote celeb interviews.