\u201cBut sometimes, there\u2019s something that happens that\u2019s amazing, that\u2019s not something you can plan for and not something that you can manufacture,\u201d she says in a voiceover. \u201cThere\u2019s still gotta be some, like, magical, beautiful mystery to life.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fourth episode kicks off with Swift in the studio recording her 2024 album, The Tortured Poets Department, a deeply melancholy reflection on recent romantic disappointments spanning 31 songs \u2013 a \u201cpurge\u201d, she says, of \u201ceverything bad that I had felt for two years\u201d. Fans already know she split with longtime boyfriend Joe Alwyn and short-lived fling Matty Healy during the first year of the tour. She says she relied on adrenaline to keep her going: \u201cMen will let you down, the Eras Tour never will.\u201d<\/p>\n
The series details how Andrea Swift helped play Cupid with her daughter and Travis Kelce. Photo \/ Screengrab \/ Disney+ Youtube<\/p>\n
Yet the scale of the tour and her chart successes could make her feel like she was a conglomerate whom no one perceived as a real human being \u2013 particularly the men she dated. \u201cNothing works,\u201d she says. \u201cThere\u2019s no one for me in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tonal shift as the camera cuts to Swift sitting backstage in a bathrobe with her family and publicist in a stadium dressing room. It\u2019s also a football locker room, which inspires her mother, Andrea, to share that the first time Swift ever heard of her now-fiance Travis Kelce was when her cousins took a photo in front of the NFL superstar\u2019s locker at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo you want me to tell the story?\u201d Andrea asks.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you want to tell the story, then you should tell the story,\u201d Swift says, grinning. \u201cShe wants to tell the story \u2013 Mom, tell the story.\u201d<\/p>\n
This, too, requires a backtrack over well-established Swift lore: how Kelce in July 2023 confessed on his podcast that he had tried but failed to deliver a friendship bracelet with his phone number to Swift when she played at Arrowhead.<\/p>\n
Andrea says she learned about this when scrolling her phone and saw headlines about the podcast excerpt. Intrigued, Andrea called a cousin who follows the Kansas City Chiefs. The cousin raved about Kelce and added the magic words: \u201cHe really loves his mom.\u201d<\/p>\n
So Andrea called Taylor to urge her to try to give this American football star a chance.<\/p>\n
Her daughter remained sceptical. She had never been drawn to athletes, \u201cbecause I\u2019m not one, and I\u2019ve always just been, like, \u2018Well, what would we talk about?\u2019\u201d Swift says.<\/p>\n
She recalls her mother saying, \u201cYou gotta start doing something different\u201d. Until Kelce, Swift had largely dated actors (such as Alwyn, her boyfriend of six years) and fellow musicians (Healy is the lead singer of the 1975). <\/p>\n
This fills in what had been a puzzling gap for Swift scholars: the couple had previously acknowledged that people in their lives had been \u201cplaying Cupid\u201d for them but never divulged who they were.<\/p>\n
On their first date, Swift recalls, Kelce patiently explained the game of football, which he compared to \u201chigh-speed, angry chess\u201d. Something clicked for her. \u201cThen I just sort of became obsessed with him and therefore became obsessed with learning about football,\u201d Swift says. \u201cGreatest surprise of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fourth episode reveals Swift’s new album and how Kelce’s support balances her career and personal life. Photo \/ Travis Kelce<\/p>\n
We then get a peek at Kelce rehearsing for his onstage cameo at Wembley Stadium in London in June 2024, where he appeared in a tuxedo and top hat during a lead-up to I Can Do It With a Broken Heart. Swift says she didn\u2019t want him to feel pressured into it, but \u201cTravis \u2026 he\u2019s a real yes-guy, like in terms of life itself. He\u2019s just up for anything\u201d.<\/p>\n
We see him again, watching the concerts from the side, singing along, waiting for her under the stage so she sees him as soon as she exits and greets her with a kiss. <\/p>\n
Swift says that in the past, she struggled with balancing relationships while she was on tour, because no matter how hard she tried, she was never able to nurture both. But Kelce just gets it.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomehow, there\u2019s been this dynamic shift with Travis, because it\u2019s shocking how many similarities we have towards our jobs and how we view them, and how we view each other,\u201d she says, noting they have both been chasing these dreams since they were little kids, and that Kelce is comfortable being in the spotlight. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve realised that with this person in my life that was just the right fit for me, you can have the two passions co-exist, and they actually fuel each other.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sign up to Herald Premium Editor\u2019s Picks<\/a>, delivered straight to your inbox every Friday. Editor-in-Chief Murray Kirkness picks the week\u2019s best features, interviews and investigations. Sign up for Herald Premium here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cBut sometimes, there\u2019s something that happens that\u2019s amazing, that\u2019s not something you can plan for and not something…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":193002,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1443,859,156,51126,9517,1364,11209,12858,12027,130,6178,111,139,69,1517,1551,11208,50419,163,1361,208,4942,810,4524,102],"class_list":["post-193001","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-about","tag-documentary","tag-entertainment","tag-eras","tag-fans","tag-her","tag-kelce","tag-knows","tag-learn","tag-more","tag-mother","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-reveals","tag-set","tag-swift","tag-swifts","tag-taylor","tag-that","tag-tour","tag-travis","tag-up","tag-want","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193001"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193001\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193001"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}