JANA HOCKING: What's with the outrage about Leo Dicaprio and his younger ... trends now
If you've ventured anywhere near Twitter today, you will have seen the outrage at news Leonardo DiCaprio may be dating 19-year-old French Israeli model Eden Polani.
Shock horror, a famous good looking movie star is dating a beautiful young woman. Haven't we seen this story play out a million times before?
If it's at all true, guess what? Eden isn't being manipulated. She's not being forced to hang out with him. She knows Leo's track record of dumping women once they hit 25.
It's exciting.. and it's also transactional. He gets some gorgeous arm candy to flaunt around town, and she gets the glitz and glamour of dating a movie star. We're talking holidays on yachts, access to the VIP sections in bars, media attention, and a revived modelling career.
Eden Polani's profile has skyrocketed in the past 24 hours - regardless of whether she's dating Leo DiCaprio or not, says Jana Hocking
Leonardo DiCaprio, 48, and Eden Polani, 19, (seen together on January 31). While insiders say the movie star and model are just friends, many people were disturbed by the idea of them potentially being together
As someone who has been papped with a famous person before, I can tell you exactly how it's playing out for Eden right now.
First of all she will have journalists sliding into her DM's offering interviews, she will have paparazzi asking if they can come take some pictures of her, she will have old school friends reaching out 'just to say hi'.
She will have brands offering to send her free clothes (for those inevitable pap shots) and modelling agencies who may have once turned her down will be clamouring to get her on their books. At first, it's a little overwhelming, but then it gets pretty darn exciting.
Never would she have experienced so much attention. People want to know her!
And Eden's not dumb. She's posted cheeky tweets of herself in New York, where Leo just happens to be right now, before taking them down. Why? Because it creates intrigue. It keeps the story going. It keeps her relevant. Whether he told her to delete them, or she was teasing the media, it worked.
Because you see, the 19-year-olds of today are savvy. They know what creates good engagement on their social pages and thanks to celebrity mentors like Kim Kardashian, they know how to turn that 15 minutes of fame into a lifelong career
Eden Polani (pictured) is no doubt savvy enough to turn her 15 minutes into much more, writes Jana Hocking
Just ask Gisele Bündchen who was 18 when she first dated Leo. She was a relatively unknown model who, thanks to the exposure, went on to land a Victoria's Secret contract, multiple Vogue covers and became one of the highest paid models in the world.
Would she have got there on her own? Perhaps eventually. Did dating Leo take her career to a whole new level at a much faster rate? Absolutely.
And let's not diss the benefits of dating an older man. I've spoken about it very fondly in the past and the benefits are endless. They seem to get better looking with age, they've got a steady income, a better idea of who they are
