THE WASHINGTON POST: Kelly Clarkson sparks backlash after bird sculpture dispute with Art of Play goes viral

On Saturday afternoon, Kelly Clarkson complained on X about an encounter at a fancy Brooklyn shop specialising in puzzles and curios.

She says the “idiot” who worked there looked at her as if “I couldn’t afford it,” instead offering to “find something comparable for me.”

Her post ended, “y’all should go check out Art of Play in Brooklyn if you enjoy being treated like Julia Roberts character in Pretty Woman.”

The next day, Art of Play responded in an Instagram post.

In their version of the incident, Clarkson had inquired about a kinetic sculpture of a bird that was not for sale.

“It’s been a surreal experience to be the focus of such widespread outrage after just one mention by a celebrity,” they wrote.

Clarkson clapped back on X, saying that someone in the store “elevator eyed me saying in a condescending tone ‘yes, it’s for sale but it costs 15,000 dollars so if you’d like me to find something comparable for you I can.’” She included a blurry photo that another internet user had posted, identifying it as a price tag on Art of Play’s wall that read “Singing Bird $15,000 Automaton by Bliss Kolb.”

The internet went - if you’ll forgive the bird automaton pun - cuckoo. How could they not? This was a fable come to life.

Of course, there’s the scene from “Pretty Woman” that Clarkson referenced, in which Julia Roberts’s character is mistreated at a boutique while wearing her Hunza G bodysuit. She then returns in society lady drag carrying bags of expensive clothes while exclaiming, “Big mistake. Big. Huge!” I also thought of Elle Woods at the beginning of “Legally Blonde” and Brenda’s mom in an episode of the ’90s TV show “Beverly Hills 90210,″ both of whom gave the business to snooty shop clerks.

But I was most reminded of the prologue to “Beauty and the Beast,” in which a beggar is turned away by a cruel prince, only to reveal herself as a beautiful enchantress wearing a crown. She curses the prince by turning him into a beast and turning his staff into household objects.

This trope of the powerful person testing strangers’ hospitality goes back several thousand years. There’s the myth of Baucis and Philemon, a couple who welcomed the gods Zeus and Hermes when they were disguised as beggars. In return, the gods turned the couple’s house into a temple and flooded the village where their neighbours had rejected them. In the Old Testament, Abraham is hospitable, the people of Sodom are not, and everyone is punished or rewarded accordingly. The Hindu god Vishnu and the Norse god Odin also disguised themselves as travellers in need.

But you don’t have to be Joseph Campbell to see why the internet got so wrapped up in this Clarkson story. There is something so raw, so hurtful, so disproportionately humiliating about feeling judged or mistreated by a retail employee.

I’m not just talking about the actual injustice of being racially profiled in a store or followed around by a shopkeeper who thinks you’re a shoplifter. Even small rude experiences can leave wounds that last for a long, long time.

Seventeen years ago, I asked a JoAnn Fabrics employee where I could find the crafts section. To this day, I can still see her scowling face as she shouted, “I don’t know, maybe a craft store??” Last year, when I found out JoAnn was going out of business, my very first thought was, “Good. I hope that lady lost her job.”

But here’s the thing: I didn’t really mean that. Even though I left JoAnn Fabrics cursing that woman (“May your fun fur fray forever. May your festive decorative buttons turn dull and utilitarian. May your rickrack run straight.”), beneath my embarrassment and anger, I understood that there was a strong possibility that that woman needed her job more than I needed to be treated kindly.

Does Clarkson understand that?

I reached out to Clarkson, Art of Play and its owners and the artist Bliss Kolb. None of them got back to me. So I’m going to analyse this situation based on the evidence at hand.

Let’s suppose that every word Kelly Clarkson tweeted (heh! Tweeted! Like a bird?) was 100% factually accurate. What is she saying happened? She “literally was looked at as if” she was poor. The man at the store “elevator eyed me saying in a condescending tone ‘yes, it’s for sale but it costs 15,000 dollars so if you’d like me to find something comparable for you I can.’”

Apart from his gaze and tone, isn’t that … actually good customer service? Even in a bougie shop in a bougie Brooklyn neighbourhood, I think it’s pretty safe to assume that most people who wander into your store aren’t looking to drop $15K on a bird robot. Even if you’re a recognisable pop star.

In my 20s, I worked at a record store. The owner knew that record stores were notorious for being judgmental. He actively worked to make sure this wasn’t the case at his business. On my very first day, the owner warned me, “All those ‘High Fidelity’ clichés about making fun of customers’ tastes? That’s not how this works.” Like most successful retail businesses, we knew how important it was to not alienate our customers. And it worked: I’m happy to report that Mad City Music is still in business.

Unfortunately, there is no universal blueprint for a happy retail experience. “Let me know if you need help finding anything” was usually met with “Thanks.” But it was sometimes met with a curt “I’m fine.”

Occasionally it was met with “LEAVE ME ALONE!!” You can do your best, but your approach simply will not please every customer. And that’s okay.

In her second X post, Clarkson seemed to be hedging against accusations that she was unfairly targeting a small business: “I obviously support small businesses because I was literally at a small business trying to purchase things. I love small businesses and know they are important and I always support them.”

OK, but any living, breathing person who has used the internet in the past 20 years would understand that her first post wouldn’t be taken as an innocuous gripe about one particular interaction. She had to understand that at least a few Kellebrities (that’s what her fans call themselves) would be moved to retaliate against the small business she mentioned by name.

Clarkson ended the post with, “Your store is really cool. Unfortunately, you aren’t.” But her response wasn’t directed against one uncool employee. She didn’t ask to speak to the manager or send a private email to explain her experience, both of which are routine and reasonable reactions that would actually allow the store to make things right with Clarkson and ensure the employee is not a jerk to future customers. Heck, Art of Play may have even kicked her a discount and sold her the automaton for $14,950!

But, alas, that’s not how these stories work.

In “Beauty and the Beast,” it never sat right with me that everyone else had to suffer for the prince’s rudeness. Sure, turn him into a beast, but why did she have to turn his maid into a teapot and his butler into a clock?

My guess: She just never really thought about it.

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