Mamamia Out Loud
Brooklyn Beckham, That ‘Inappropriate’ Dance & The Downfall of a Family Brand
21 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: What recent drama surrounds Brooklyn Beckham and his family?
You're listening to a Mamma Mia podcast. Hello and welcome to Mamma Mia Out Loud. It's what women are actually talking about on Wednesday the 21st of January. Oh, I wonder what women are talking about on Wednesday the 21st of January. I'm Holly Wainwright. I'm Amelia Lester. And I'm Jessie Stephens. And you'll be very surprised to hear that on our agenda for today, the Beckhams.
That is one of the things. If you are an Outlider subscriber, and increasingly many of you are, you will have heard our episode yesterday with Mia Friedman where we had an emergency meeting and unpacked lots of Beckham drama.
We decided how we needed to do it was go line by line, analysis, get our red pens out, discuss. Holly, you couldn't even read a full sentence without stopping and providing commentary. You got in trouble. It was, look, it was very meaty and a lot of fun.
And yet the fallout continues. So we will be unpacking that today, including how normal is it to trademark your baby's name, whether this is the end of boy-mom culture, and an update on that wedding dance.
Plus, is every 40-somethings must-have accessory a 20-something friend? I want to talk about age gap friendships and why they still feel a little bit taboo.
and shark attacks. You've probably seen the headlines over the last few days. We discuss what specifically is going on and if we are kidding ourselves about the element of risk when we're entering the water. But first, Jessie Stephens. In case you missed it, did we see Naomi Osaka, former champion of the Australian Open, did we see what she wore to her match last night? Holy mokes.
I am not a big tennis person. You are. You are a tennis correspondent on Out Loud, regular Out Loud as well now. But that got my attention and made me go, oh, I believe there's a tennis tournament going on.
There is. And there's been lots of chatter about fashion at the Australian Open in particular and And what Osaka wore has been called the boldest fashion choice in tennis history. Do you agree with that? I do. And I think it's a big call though, because look at Serena and Venus, like they have been pioneers when it comes to what you wear on the court.
Is it right, though, that I don't think I've seen before, but again, I might not have been watching, like a sort of catwalk entrance like that where you're wearing an outfit that then you take off to play? So she did take it off.
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Chapter 2: Why did Brooklyn Beckham trademark his name to Victoria Beckham?
Yep. And a butterfly blessed her in that year. Is that right?
Yes. So what happened was she was playing. Yes, that was the year she won. And there are these pictures, you'll remember them if you go back and Google them, of this butterfly like sitting on her face. And she paused the match and she took the butterfly and kind of had it on her hand and just let the butterfly fly off. That is pretty amazing, right?
It was amazing and one of the fashion designers who worked on this look then did this whole inspired range and it was about, it was jellyfish but it was inspired from that butterfly moment. The jellyfish weren't also at the winning tournament. She didn't, no, and Osaka didn't have a jellyfish on her face.
Chapter 3: What happened during the controversial wedding dance?
That would have been so surprising. It would have been very Aussie to have a jellyfish on your face.
She says the jellyfish is inspired by her reading a book to her daughter and her daughter loving jellyfish.
That's so cute. But the butterfly and the jellyfish to me represents like the grace and the precision and just the incredible skill that these athletes have. And so for her to walk in as this jellyfish, I just think it's a really, I mean, she won the match.
Chapter 4: What are the benefits of having age-gap friendships?
And I just think that that vibe must be very good for your headspace.
One final question on this. Do you think we are going to start seeing these kind of catwalk entrances more often? Because we've talked a lot about how tennis, like all sports, is in a battle for attention, is in a battle for viral moments, is in a battle to make it to our feeds.
Do you think that people coming out in an outfit and then the reveal of the moment zipping the outfit is going to become more and more of a thing?
Yes, and I think it's really good for designers. And a lot of players as well, their connection with designers is very strong.
Chapter 5: How do shark attacks impact public perception in Australia?
They work really closely with like a Nike or whatever.
We should say that Naomi herself co-designed this with the designers at Nike. And I have a Meghan connection for you, Holly.
Exciting.
Which is that on With Love, Meghan, which I watched the complete latest season of, Naomi Osaka appears as a guest in one of the episodes and she mentions as they are making some kind of pastry or doing some sort of craft that part of what she loves about working with Nike is that they let her design stuff herself.
Yeah, right. Okay. So I reckon that from some players, the stylish ones, we are going to see lots of moments like this where we're getting all the pictures of them in their fancy outfits. And I guess parasols back.
Well, and parasols are very sensible.
They are.
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Chapter 6: What insights can we gain from Naomi Osaka's fashion choices?
Very sun-safe, sensible, no question. In our harsh climate, go Naomi.
And we should mention that Naomi is Japanese and East Asia loves a parasol, always has. That's why they have such beautiful skin. It's time that they come across to the west.
The New York Times, the BBC, CNN. Australia's recent spate of shark attacks are being reported all over the world. There have been four shark attacks in 48 hours in New South Wales. And add to that, a 19-year-old Canadian woman was found dead this week on the island of Gari, surrounded by a pack of
of dingoes and a man was taken to hospital after a crocodile attack in a creek in North Queensland. That is literally all in the last few days. If you'd never been to Australia, you would be forgiven for thinking it is a very, very dangerous place.
But I want to speak specifically about the shark attacks today because a great deal of expert commentary has been coming out about why now, why we're not imagining it, there has been an increase in shark attacks. I first want to acknowledge, though... the tragic and unthinkable devastation that a family in Sydney is going through.
That is the family of 12-year-old Nico Antic, who was jumping off a rock west of Shark Beach on Sunday afternoon when he was bitten by what is believed to be a large bull shark. And his heroic group of friends, who are his age,
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Chapter 7: How can families navigate conflicts between in-laws?
jumped in and pulled him from the water. But those injuries that he sustained are reportedly so significant, with a close friend describing this heartbreaking event as having led to the worst possible outcome. I just think it's important to say this little boy did nothing wrong. He did nothing irresponsible. So many kids jump off those rocks. You would not think twice about it, right?
In the following days, there was a boy whose surfboard was bitten. Then there was a man attacked at Manly Beach. He is in a critical condition and another man injured while surfing near Port Macquarie. So... Why is this? Have we been hearing the word brackish water a lot lately? We have. Well, in relation to this. Yes, yes.
So brackish water means a mix of fresh and salt water and it happens after heavy rainfall. Apparently Sunday in Sydney was like the wettest day in nearly 40 years, right? So much rainfall. And our dated sewage pipes in Sydney mean that when that happens, you get faecal matter, raw sewage in the harbour. And I've never really understood why that would impact sharks.
You are generally advised to not swim in the ocean after a heavy rain.
I thought that was because of bacteria.
Yeah, yeah, but that's what I mean. Sorry to finish that sentence. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You are generally told not to swim in the ocean after heavy rain because of how dirty it is, because everything's flushed out into it.
But I also think, and we'll get to this, but that when you live around water and you're in and around it all the time, it's very easy to become deaf to those kind of warnings and also the idea of it being related to sharks is not something that feels particularly common knowledge.
I grew up in Sydney and there are so many things that I am just learning this week. And maybe that's my fault. In fact, it probably is. But I think we do need to increase our literacy around sharks and how to coexist with them. Because things that I learned this week included that if you really want to minimize your risk, you shouldn't swim at dawn or dusk. Did not know that.
You didn't know that? I didn't know that. Yeah, I mean, maybe it's my fault. But these are things I learned this week. I think I knew that from Jaws, though. The opening scene is always.
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Chapter 8: What does the future hold for the Beckham family brand?
popular culture and celebrity culture. And that does inform an enormous amount of our lives to what we buy and, you know, what we watch and how we feel about things. This does feel a bit like the Super Bowl or the grand final or something. So we are looking at it a bit like sport. But then, of course, also it's being seen as what it actually is, which is a very human, very sad family drama.
And a lot of people who have rifts with their family's feel very sensitive about this story. I think it's a bit of both, to be honest, because as I said on yesterday's subs episode, this is a very sad episode for the Beckhams but it didn't need to be played out in public the way that it has and I think that there is no question that when Brooklyn Beckham Loaded those stories to his feed.
I can only imagine the deep breath he took before he posted share on those that this was going to happen. I don't think anyone could be like, oh, I didn't expect that kind of reaction. Anyway, we are going to address a couple of things because I think what everybody is talking about out there is... Who's side are you on? Who's to blame? Where should my sympathy go?
And I don't think there's an easy answer to that question, but we're going to present some of the latest developments that might assist. First of all, do we think that this is kind of the end? of the argument about kids as brands. I would love to know that. We have talked about, said it on the sub show, we have talked about it before, how Brooklyn Beckham was a brand before he was born.
The pictures of his mother pregnant with him were sold. The baby pictures were sold. Christening pictures were sold. The wedding pictures were sold. His name was copyrighted. We're going to get to that in a minute. He has been a brand since before he was born. That has brought him enormous advantage without question in terms of finance and the lifestyle, but also a whole lot of heartache.
There's always been an argument about whether or not this is good or bad. Do you think this closes that book?
When we say it's brought him enormous advantage, and Mia talked about that in yesterday's subscriber episode earlier, Yes, but isn't some of it his? Like, as you say, he was commodified as a fetus. He was earning that money. He was earning that money, right? So it's kind of like, look at everything your parents gave you. Well, they didn't just give it to you.
Like, you were part of the brand from before you were born. And I wonder if this is a reckoning for family brands that I don't think anyone in this story is evil and I don't think that casting Victoria Beckham and David Beckham as narcissists is necessarily very helpful because 30 years ago they had no idea.
They had no idea that this is what celebrity would become or that that brand would be central to selling their products and therefore their Instagram feed would which is pictures of their family and I love you, Cruz, and I love you, blah, and I love you, Harper, and all that kind of stuff. People are invested in that and therefore they go and buy eyeliners.
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