EgyptAir Hits Turbulence over Bizarre Purported Interview with Drew Barrymore

CAIRO (AFP) – EgyptAir stood by its story Thursday after US actress Drew Barrymore’s spokesperson denied she took part in an interview with the airline’s in-flight magazine that went viral over its bizarre content.

“This interview with Drew Barrymore in the Egypt Air in flight magazine is, umm, surreal,” journalist and Yemen expert Adam Baron wrote on Twitter.

The post, which included pictures of the three-page interview in the print edition of the magazine, has been liked or shared more than 10,000 times since Baron tweeted it on Tuesday.

A spokesperson for Barrymore told the Huffington Post website that the actress “did not participate” in the interview and that her team was “working with the airline PR team”.

But EgyptAir insisted the interview was legitimate.

“This a professional magazine interview conducted by Dr. Aida Tekla Former president of the HFPA (Hollywood Foreign Press Association) and one of the voting members of the Golden Globes,” it tweeted back at an aviation journalist who asked if it was “completely false”.

A spokeswoman for EgyptAir told AFP on Thursday that the article was authentic, without giving further details.

The journalist Tekla also defended the story.

“The interview with Drew Barrimoor (sic) which took place in New York is genuine &far from fake,” she tweeted.

“As far as Drew we interviewed her several times I saw her grow up before my eyes she is charming and talented.”

The article in EgyptAir’s Horus magazine is also sprinkled with grammatical errors.

It opens with a commentary on Barrymore’s private life, suggesting she had been “unstable in her relationships most of her life” and that she had been in “almost 17 relationships, engagements and marriages”.

“Psychologists believe that her behaviour is only natural since she lacked the male role model in her life,” it says.

Barrymore’s reported responses to the questions also raised eyebrows.

“I feel overwhelmed when someone tells me that I have regained my image and managed to lose that extra weight,” she was quoted as saying in answer to a question about being overweight due to pregnancy.

“I find this a great opportunity to encourage every woman who is overweight to work on regaining her beauty and body.”

Asked about the status of women today, she was quoted as saying: “I cannot deny that women made a great achievement over the past century; there is a significant progress recorded by people who study women status throughout history.”