“The Art of Play, or: Mom + Pop Gay (?) Twin Brother Magician Shop” (w/ Matt + Bowen)

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The answer to that question is coming. At this time, it's really Christmas. I'm playing all over the country and in London and in Canada. That makes it a world tour. Harry Styles, you're on burn notice. I'll see you soon. Oh my God, Matt, no. I was so excited to make my acting debut with you. I know they brought me here to sing because that's what I do. I guess I'll act another day. I don't know if I'll come back to the show. Go off, Izzy Stevens. Go off, Katherine Heigl. Look, Matt. Oh, I see. I see. My eye, oh my. Bowen, look over there. Wow, is that culture? Yes. Oh my goodness. Wow. Las Culturistas. Ding dong. Las Culturistas calling. You know, we were just discussing, is it the fall of roller coasters? It's curtains for coasters to me. Curtains for coasters? Yeah. Where I was, I just kind of grimly brought up, well, because it was news yesterday. You're so grim. I do think, well, I'm just going to say for six months, Six Flags. That's the whole other story. Six Flags has to do some, has to go to the reflecting pool. I think they need to go to the reflecting pool, which is often where you go to look at yourself. And that's actually roller culture number eight. Make it a hard, long look. But also, it's where Narcissus died. Oh, shoot. He looked at himself and he drowned. So is that sort of poetic and beautiful, or is that like, that's one of the great, one of the great Greek myths? The greatest being? The greatest, one of the great, you're asking me what the greatest Greek myth? What's the greatest Greek myth? We came prepared to talk about this today. Hercules. Well, yes. Bless my soul. Herc was on a roll. Person of the week in every Greek opinion, boo. Hey. What a pro. Herc could stop a show. Hey. Born a man, a monster, and you're talking SRO. Oh, yeah. That was my little R.E. Oh, that was R.E. That's really good. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, sort of R.E. coded. Is that all we want to talk about? Is that all we want to talk about in terms of Six Flags? Well, there's, you know, there's more. So, first of all, they shut down nine coasters across the country because this was preemptively. Six Flags over Georgia, in Georgia. Yeah. Goliath. The Goliath coaster. Someone passed. And you know what's really grim? What? I tried looking up, surely there's an article out there that tallies the casualties in total at Six Flags. I just want it at Six Flags. Yeah. And they've kind of done a great job of scrubbing any tally of those. But, like, it does seem like lately there are more headlines having to do with injury or death on roller coasters. And especially as I gear up to go to Dollywood in just two weeks. Oh, don't perish the thought. Not the person. Well, I will be, I will be sort of doing that. And this is just hot off the heels of you describing your Fast and the Furious holiday. Hollywood Drift experience. I can't be stopped. I can't be tamed in the words of Miley Cyrus. You know what I mean? Like, I'm still gonna go for it. Man. But you never think it's gonna be you. You know, Six Flags is actually opening a great adventure is opening up a crazy new one. It's called Crazier than Kingda Ka. Literally in the place of Kingda Ka. It's called Bakunawa. First of all, these syllables. B-A-K-U-N-A-W-A Bakunawa. I believe it means some sort of sea beast. Becca, can we look up what Bakunawa means and also some general information, statistics about the coaster? I think they need to allow one gay Bakunal at the park before they open. Oh, honey, we're gonna have sniffies open. Are you on that? Certainly not. Yeah, I mean, neither am I. Well, we'll discuss this. It's 382. It goes over 100 miles per hour. It's a spinning floorless coaster. It's free spinning. Yeah. Every ride is uniquely different. Every detail worse than the last. You're gonna want to go on a POV and you're like, they have like a sort of, you know, this is my special stuff. So I go on YouTube and I like see what's, I watch like the virtual animations of the rides. Yes, well established. This one's crazy. Not for you. Floorless. Record-breaking. 100 miles per hour. I'm just recalling the details that you just said. I don't know about all this. I actually don't even want to go do that one. I'm telling you, I watched the video and I was like, that's too much for me. Okay, well, this actually dovetails nicely into what the main pop cultural story is and I do think the Lord above that this has happened and this is a quite sticky story because I feel like both parties have a lot to do with it. I feel like both parties are now stuck in this escalation trap. Like a coaster. Like a coaster. Well, you know, we're talking about places that promise delight and yet fall short. And I'm talking, of course, about the art of play. A neighborhood store near me that I've walked past many times on my way to the pier and I thought just last week before all this went down with Kelly Clarkson, I was like, I'm going to take my nieces there. What a wonderful whimsical place. Which to me says a lot about the clientele. This is a place where Bowen Yang brings his nieces. It's where Kelly Clarkson drives in from Manhattan. What's the clientele? NBC? Former NBC employees? Wealthy white people. Wealthy whites. So basically what I'm saying is it's not just some little store that's being bullied by a celebrity. It's a bunch of like, you know, it's adult toy people. It's adult toy people. There is a 22, I believe a 22 seat magic theater in the back. It is owned by, people think it's a mom and pop shop. Technically it's a brother and brother shop. Yeah. Two brothers who are both sleight of hand magicians. Yeah. Two twin brothers. Sleight of hand magicians. Probably gay. Probably both gay because that sounds all like gay stuff. Twins and magicians. It's gay to be twins. It's gay to be magicians. It's gay for Kelly Clarkson to talk to you. Yeah. It's gay to be like, ooh, I'm not that one. It's gay for, to be by Bowen Yang and have him come in and be like, hey. It's gay to be on Atlantic Avenue for sure. Definitely. There's like a lot of gay elements of this queer elements that, have not really been on top of that. I wouldn't say queer elements. I think they're gay elements. Okay, okay, okay. They're gay, hard G elements. Gay guy stuff. Gay guy stuff. Gay guy magicians. Okay, so just to talk about this actual thing because if you don't know, now you know. Kelly Clarkson is, you know, sees at some point on the internet this store, Art of Play, thinks it looks amazing, drives over to Art of Play, has an interaction with them, wherein, she expresses a desire to purchase a one-of-a-kind singing and dancing automaton that is vital to the magic shows at Art of Play. And is the mascot of the store in their words. And it did have a $15,000 price tag. That was labeled as such. So Kelly Clarkson inquired about purchasing, by the way, the bird's name is Molly. Molly. Molly the singing automaton. And so they said to her, let's not for sale. We can give you something else that's like cheaper. In so many words. Yes. And I think this is important to really drill down into this. She asked about that particular automaton. Yes. I. Molly. Molly. The. It that. It that. And the, but actually no. She her. No, because the store in the statement would kind of personify or gave it some life by referring to it as who. A one-of-a-kind singing and dancing automaton on who is vital to. - So it is she/her. - It's, well, it's it/that, but it is, who whom you know what i mean it's fab euless yes yeah and so uh i think it's important to drill down that kelly inquired about that particular automaton yeah there is the artist the artisan behind that automaton lives in is based in the pacific northwest there is another automaton that is not bolted to the wall and is therefore not for sale right in seattle that kelly inquired about that i think they were not they didn't the store did not have the means to ship that they then suggested an alternative german automaton that was two thousand dollars right so in the translation of all this it felt to kelly like a pretty woman's situation like a pretty woman's situation and if you don't know what that is basically it's where you walk into a store and clearly by the energy you're giving or the way you look you were treated like it's not only odd that you would express desire in certain items but that you're kind of there at all so she "so she felt a certain type of way and got on i believe it was x to basically call them out" "so the first time in a long time she took to to tweet it" "she doesn't do this kind of thing no so then it became a back and forth there were some patronizing responses from the store as of today which is tuesday october 12th october 13th we don't have any new updates but this is a developing story my favorite thing about this was just jared said they were reporting on it and it said it's an october 12th update so what i'm saying is this has been i it's the only thing that's amazing it's so good it's kind of a victimless i love a victimless crime it's a victimless crime yeah some would say oh my god you know she's going after a small business no not with fifteen thousand dollar items in the store i'm sorry not with a price tag that says fifteen thousand dollars next to anything is the store in jeopardy and clearly they're not because here they were able to make a huge sale if they wanted to they could have sold her this that's the fact but they decided to be the way they were about it and this is where i want to just push back on but it's just these nice guys who own a store if you don't think that nerds can be mean you've never been on the internet i feel like i can literally see what happened she you said this she walked in and you and we're just saying this because this is like kelly driving into brooklyn from the upper side and people are you know making a meal out of that but you know it's sure like for her brooklyn is far away she first of all and can i say this is someone who she's a single mom now she saw this thing that she liked she's got two children who have been through hell she's got two kids who don't have their dad like you know there's a lot going on their mother's very very famous she saw this thing she probably got excited about it and drove down and was like i'm gonna look at that because i think i would like it for my kids she went and she was like i'm gonna look at that because i think i would like it for my kids she went and she was like i'm gonna look at that because i think i would like it for my kids she went in there probably wasn't wearing makeup probably didn't look like the kelly clarkson that everyone sees every day she's got a thick accent she doesn't really give a i don't know if you've noticed about kelly clarkson but she doesn't seem to give much of a she walks in there asks about the bird and they probably treated her a little crazy that's that's just what i think because i don't think that someone who doesn't make an issue of things is suddenly making an issue of things if it's not apt i'm gonna go you did try to yesterday they were closed because of columbus day which i guess we're still doing in the year of our lord 2026. is that is that what they listed on the site and rather than indigenous peoples they said they were closed because of columbus no i didn't see that what they listed so i can't persecute them based on that but i i was a little bit like oh they're not they're not open today i can't go down there and search for evidence like i did last week with the fast and the furious you're like you want a roller coaster oh my god i said i want to see art of play but i i want to see art of play i said show me molly show me molly and i have searched for ice for a placard i don't know where it goes i kind of hope that everyone drops it because now it is becoming a thing i don't think it needs to become which is like who's picking on the small business and like it's like a thing about like you know celebrities who think like they're bigger than all of this i really don't think this is what that is no no no no like she's someone who grew up dirt poor very poor and so and also being from where she's from i think she's probably seen a lot of in her life people being treated like they don't belong absolutely i mean i for i'll i'll share a story which is first of all i love it nothing more than to give it right back to someone in a retail space if they're giving me government this happened very recently oh it's my favorite thing yeah because i'm not like whatever i bought my dad a nice watch for his engineering honor and then he wanted to look at other options so we went back to the store um and this young associate comes by and i just kind of politely i think sorry i'm not like that kind of rich but i was like do you guys do exchanges yeah young associate was like um we don't really do that here and i was like and then the rest of and then the rest of the time i was like great i went dead in the eyes and i didn't treat him like but i was just kind of like okay whatever whatever dude like yeah i'm just here with my dad yeah buying him a nice watch yeah and whether or not like you make a sale off of this in addition to whatever like i'm willing to spend a lot of money on this watch for him like what are you doing i guess it's different when you've had these ex like everyone oh trust me everyone's had these experiences which is why i think initially people were like team kelly about the whole thing because and then when it escalated it felt like she was picking on them but i remember when i was you know my family we didn't my mom's a hairdresser my dad's a pe teacher one year when we were young we went in to see a broadway show and my mom wanted to go into like macy's so we walk over to the counter and there's a woman behind the counter working at um donna karen and my mom said um oh i love donna karan she said it wrong and the woman behind the counter i will never forget and she said it in her accent or whatever and the woman looked at her and said you mean donna karan honey she said it wrong too but in but in the in the moment of like needing to be superior to this person and i i know it was because of the way that like you know my mom was speaking and you know like we were obviously from long island it just like when you fee when you're made to feel a certain way yeah like when you've gone out of your way to do something or put yourself out there like an is for an interest that you have yes and then are told are spoken to in a way that feels like someone's talking to you out of your name it's very triggering honey it's not it's a lay person's shopping experience it's not a private showing it's like there's no need to do to flex on that from the other side of the counter yeah really none and i was like bro yeah you don't have and then later on he was like uh when you came in last week did you know who you were i was like don't do it it doesn't matter don't don't now now you're gonna acknowledge that like you know who i am and like it you don't give a but you're bringing it up shitty exactly i was like shut up so so you think that now you're gonna appeal to my ego when it's gonna matter also i look i look him up and down he he's bitten his nails down to the cute down to the like frayed edges and i'm like i'm not gonna be disrespected by someone who bites his nails on his hands period take your hands out of your mouth baby how about this next time next time you go back in there and i think you should i think you should just walk right over and go why don't you take your hands out of your mouth and then what would he say to that he wouldn't know what to say that's the whole point you would leave him shook i would leave him shocked i see you've been biting your nails take your hands out of your mouth filthy it's disgusting i i i'm and you're looking at two nail biters but i think big time but i think we keep them take we don't we this guy was it was crazy it was like it was it was it was like it was like a dog's bitten rope toy it was not horrible for those of you who don't know dogs and can i say when i have a good experience in retail i love it never forget it i haven't many i listen i i love my good experiences how delightful would it be to go down to art of play and have a good experience you go to a delightful store they treat you delightfully well that's what it is it's like uh nerd culture is is precious nerds that's the thing nerds are so like it's not it's not it's not nerds it's like i'm gonna liken it to like hello milady hello milady i'm gonna liken it to like i have a gumball machine in my apartment when you walk in sure or this is a picture of an owl a cabinet of curios yeah that kind of person here's here's a little bar and above it there's little light bulbs that spell out drink right right right um but anyway i i do think part of this whole it is bringing up a lot of interesting things where kelly clarkson you know going after a business is like is not like the is the symptom of the larger thing which is like everybody we we all again story of your life kathy she has a whole chapter about grievance about grievance social media about how people like we're still doing that thing where we're tweeting at airlines when our flight gets delayed because that is our only recourse i mean and we need help there because i i can't say it again here about delta and the wi-fi and so it like it is this like it is one of the it is weirdly one of the last remaining politically unifying things that we have where it's like a soulless corporation and again this is different from a mom and pop shop or a you know twin brother magician shop yeah but it's like you mom and pop and twin brother magician twin brother magician is a new it's it's everything is oh and also and we the initial thing and everyone's kind of everyone's kind of harping on this now in a great way where it's like they insist on calling it an automaton but is that not the right word for it it is the right but it's it's just a more obnoxious word for a robot it's like it's what video games and like don't you love the nicer at more better words for things sure but i don't be consistent i i am consistent i don't dig my heels into the usage i don't always insist on calling it like a fucking i don't know like what what's the example like you know what i mean i yeah i i i hear what you're saying i don't just challenging you because because this is a point counterpoint show of course when we face opposite each other we debate this ad is sponsored by veve healthcare time for some prep wisdom but first some common sense people everyone is different every one yes even you yes even your situationship especially your situationship and just like people injectable prep options not all the same that's why you need to talk to your doctor and know what to ask so here's some prep wisdom did you know there's more to consider about long-acting injectable prep options and how often you get it also why you want to take it matters your lifestyle matters your routine your chaos and your level your i might forget my own birthday energy all of it counts basically talk to your doctor have the conversation ask the questions be a little nosy about your 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it's less award-winning cruise line and more do we just engrave it in the description below and i'll see you in the next one bye bye on the trophy they've won so many travel awards the ships might sweep our culture awards slay of the sea excellence in poolside looks outstanding achievement and top deck behavior over 20 eateries epic entertainment fitness classes wi-fi all included luxury without the nickel and diming virgin voyages sailors consider yourselves called so if you're ready to trade the group chat drama for glacier views poolside looks and zero children head to virginvoyages.com say it with me virginvoyages.com or hand it off to your travel advisor and let them do the googling um okay yeah uh kelly i mean you know i didn't know she'd be the most controversial celebrity of the month she's the most controversial celebrity of october 2026 and i mean i i think part of this maybe if we want to just briefly mention it it does dovetail on the week that she had prior to that which is after she came on the show i think people really went after her for how she was evangelizing and boosting ai in a way that makes me think like she is doing the thing where i think a lot of the conversation around ai is about like the what the technology can do rather than what the technology is doing to the user right and like i think she was making this interesting articulation about like ai art being categorized differently but it's like ultimately ai and i'm reading this book right now sorry this is my thing i read a book and i talk about on this podcast that's fine i i don't know why that's bad i don't know i don't know the reverse centaur's guy to ai after oh i'm sorry the reverse centaur's guide to life after ai corey doctor he's the guy who wrote and certification which is i can think we're all we're all kind of like using now in the lexicon where it's like oh like everything's being in shitified um well and and he just writes this whole book in a really interesting way where it's like ai like he doesn't he doesn't think that using ai is bad on principle right it's like you're either a centaur with technology or you're reverse centaur you're a human from the waist up if you're a centaur or you're a horse from the waist up and a human on the waist down if you're a reverse centaur right you're a centaur if you use technology in a way that augments something or helps you do something if you're riding a bicycle you are a centaur if you are um like using an abacus you're a centaur yeah if you're using ai to help you do some research and you're verifying that research independently that is in some way like in an isolated way like an ethical use of ai right now the way that ai boosterism is happening the way that people are saying that it's inevitable is a way to basically draw drive up stock right like stock investments and to keep these these tech companies as growth companies i think that what's that is so dead on i think that what we're going to be facing is a massive stock market crash at some point no it's the it's it's it's ai is just broad enough and abstract enough for like the reason why like all these tech companies who are coming in from different angles are all doing ai at the same time the reason why every billboard in the subway or every billboard in san francisco is about ai even though it's advertising not it's not being advertised to the lay person it's being advertised to investors and to advertise to the broader public that i guess ai is the thing that we all have to live with yeah it's just that is a fallacy that is a fallacy so that ai companies can be like look it's a thing everyone put all your chips into us and that's really more to protect themselves because they have put all of their chips into it already which means that our economy relies on this thing that they're trying to do which is to make it something that's like already a foregone conclusion because our economy is has come to now rely on and correct exactly and it's because it is a way to affirm to companies of whatever sector that they don't have to pay for labor as much if they switch over to ai stuff so ai has generally gone after low income low wage labor yeah you were saying the truck drivers so yes so like the first frontier the first sort of litmus test for ai companies was to say like we're going to replace truck drivers everything about truck driving is going to be automated because truck drivers are like the number one most common job across all 50 states apparently or something like there's some like thing about truck driving that is like essential is very essential we're going to make a self-driving truck it's going to handle everything it can't a truck driver has to inspect cargo load cargo drive to the place unload cargo handle paperwork make sure it gets handed off in the right way improvise when things go wrong do all these sort of quick human computational things and assessments that ai just can't right it is it has not come to pass we still have truck drivers in a very healthy sense their wages have gone down because ai stock has gone all the way up for these truck companies right it's it's just this thing and it's same goes for illustrators also a low a low wage job in essence same goes for creative jobs in hollywood um it's to it's to make it so that you reverse centaur in a way that like now amazon drivers are experiencing where it's like oh they're being they're if they're on a route they're being surveilled by their brakes by when they go to the bathroom by mistakes that it's like the technology is bearing down on the human being in a way that is not what it's meant to be not what it is sort of the ideal way which is the human being gets to like dictate what the elements in the terms of the technology are that's so in the kelly clarkson of it all she i think is coming at this from a way of like oh like isn't ai helpful but it's actually even if you separate ai songs from the human charts from human songs ai music still competes with human attention and it still is this thing for labels to sort of salivate out where they're like we don't have to pay for health insurance and tour buses and recording studio space and they are all globally they are all looking for ways to spend way less money on workers on workers and this is a way for them to do that surefire yes and so devastating devastating and so i think i think that we can come at it from there without like fully i mean i think it's good that the public opinion of this is so sensitive and people are like really up in arms you should react strongly i think it's not necessarily you can make an example out of someone for saying that it's great i think you should just also think of it in terms of a collective like worker labor issue yes and that was not what was being thought of i don't in that moment because it wasn't the point she was trying to make just to be candid i knew it would be a problem the day before i was texting all of our producers and you i was nervous about it because she said the words i love ai and then i said no i don't think that's really what she meant no but that is what she said she also said the words this is going to be controversial but i don't care and i don't think it's i didn't think it was our you know responsibility to edit her words nor do i think it's our responsibility to push back and reprimand a grown women a grown woman while she's on our show absolutely so i understand why it took the turn that it took in regards to the public discourse about her it was frustrating i was bummed about it you guys know how much i love her and how much we love having her on the show and i really did think it was a great episode outside of that but i think everything that you said is true i think that like i knew this was there was going to be strongly reacted to because it deserves strong reaction and i think what people were reacting to is this idea that it's here and so we're gonna have to deal with it i mean even she herself was saying i don't think it's going anywhere that is because they need us to believe it's not going anywhere because we are really fucked if they can figure it out economically well i don't think they will like like this is the thing ai is making all these promises it's and it's it ties into elizabeth holmes i'm so jealous you're seeing i can oh my god i'm going tonight and also this also ties into the double feature i did which is social reckoning and digger okay so let's get right into that so i mean it's just i'm thinking about her a lot it's all about responsibility of people who are fucking us who look to throw that responsibility somewhere else and i will say that like elizabeth holmes was made the example for this but this this just happens in under our noses in front of us every single day where it's these just to differentiate it's a lot of men like yes making all these promises like mark zuckerberg did this with the metaverse it did not work he moved on to the next growth frontier which was ai like all these all these tech companies are moving on from one sector to the next because they have to keep growing in order for their stock to sort of accrue and whatever um the the last thing i'll say is that like the ai bubble will burst because it is making all these promises to investors that it cannot it can't do it like the truck driver thing is that is the example my i mean i i work with someone now to to sort of handle like my finances and about a year ago he told me ai is the next thing that will burst the bubble and it's going to be something we all have to ride out because they are not being truthful about it yes and so they're not so when someone says ai is here to stay uh or ai is inevitable that's not true that's just kind of boosterism to help the investors and then it's to may be true in that the bubble will burst but the technology will remain in place in a way that will still keep worker wages so low yes like we like that's the thing that has to serve that we have to survive which is that like this completely rearranged labor market where all of us are being paid less for our labor right right like that is what is scary the ai bubble will burst and that is maybe for the best definitely for the best but i think the lasting impact will be kind of felt long after that anyway it's also interesting how like when ai does everything right if that's what they're saying it's going to happen we actually will have to be a socialist society then because there just won't be enough jobs for anyone so we in order to take care we'll make enough money yeah no one will make enough money to do anything so you're gonna have to like we're gonna have to socialize it in some way if you're just going to give all the power to the machines exactly anyway so i think that's why that's like a bigger thing and i also wanted to say thank you for saying that thing about how because the thing with elizabeth holmes is and again seeing the movie tonight she made all these promises that she made promises and people with all of the money in the world did not do their due diligence to make sure that their money was going in the right place to make sure that she was worth any lick of salt she wasn't she was a grifter and like you know i'm i'm sure we'll some find out some form of flavor personality disorder like that but i think that's the thing that's later tonight when we see the movie and her husband seems iffy as well but it is the men with the money who took that money and did this with it without knowing shit yeah that's the same thing i know and and but she was made it was easier to make an example of her because it's like she's a woman because we can laugh at her for like dropping her voice and for having these crazy eyes she's a blonde woman who doesn't blink and has a weird voice and dresses weird and because that was true it's optical and not to say that she wasn't no no that she didn't do something terrible felonious person but you know what i'm saying it's like you don't think about that you think about these men as people that got taken advantage of by her no they willingly did shit with their hundreds of millions of dollars to make her a billion dollar fraud and she doesn't do that by herself no um i'm so excited that you get to see it and then talk about your double feature okay so i had so people i posted that i did a double feature of the social reckoning and digger and people were like why and i would say there were two reasons one time yes i had saturday to do this i wanted to see both these movies especially because you know in thinking about last week we talked we spoke on digger i don't like that the movie bombed you know what i mean i don't want to see any movie that gets that much money put into it bomb and also you know i got some feedback that maybe i spoke on it and should see it so i thought okay i'm actually gonna see this movie brilliant director that i'm a fan of i really like birdman like i like his work and i thought oh social reckoning and digger might be kind of interesting companion pieces they were so i saw social reckoning first and it's just really fascinating because what i love about the social network is it's really a character study that sort of makes you understand why someone like mark zuckerberg would dig in and want to create a social networking platform anyway and it's really about what happens when the anti-social becomes in charge of something social dictates the terms of society correct and so what's so sobering about that movie is where it would go right and aaron sorkin and david fincher in terms of the duet of that movie david fincher because he's directing it he's finding so much character subtlety he's bringing out the nuance in sorkin's dialogue he's the score is incredible you know what i mean everything about that movie is both the product of its time that was really cool and fun and smart and also similar to some things of that time which i think like girls work better as a time capsule i think it works incredibly well as a time capsule because it acknowledges yet still doesn't know how far all of that is going to go yeah facebook becoming meta etc what the social reckoning is not is it is not a character study and that is i think the thing that is that makes it mid and it is kind of aggressively mid so you have mikey madison who plays the whistleblower francis haugen and she's sort of in a storyline with jeremy who's the journalist at the wall street journal to sort of try and expose this thing about facebook which is that it may it may have changed its algorithm to sort of prey on people and radicalize people in an interesting way for to drive up engagement right like that might have happened meanwhile you're watching it in the year of our lord 2026 and we're like we know get to this part we know what happened and they treat that like they sensefully they treat the idea that the algorithm started to reward sharing and like anger on in the algorithm like it's more of a reveal than it is and unfortunately for a modern audience that understands this already it makes the movie not very compelling like social network never did that no because social network was interested in something else which is attempting to excavate this person and i think this would be a much stronger movie if it was just about mikey madison's character francis haugen because there's a lot of people who are like oh my god i don't know what to do with this there's a really interesting parallel to draw between what this anti-social person mark zuckerberg created and the kinds of people it emboldened to want that system to work there's a moment where mikey has a really interesting line where she says i believe in what we're doing here at facebook i don't want to destroy it because facebook gave people like me a voice not everyone is good face to face and i thought that's actually really interesting that's great there's a line to between sort of like frankenstein and his monster which is like you've now emboldened because you are anti-social and you think about this from an anti-social perspective where all you can think about is growth and engagement you have allowed people to work for you and establish this kind of thing where it actually would take them a second to think hey is there something wrong here are we emboldening and radicalizing people and you know mikey's character in the movie only really does something when she has something personal happen to her she loses a friend to online radicalization and haven't we all yeah but they don't do enough with her with well because the movie for some reason needs to have jeremy strong playing mark zuckerberg and it goes back and forth between 2021 which is mark zuckerberg preparing for his you know deposition and to 2019 where mikey is wrapping her head around exposing them and unfortunately the movie is like not strong in the mark zuckerberg part because you can't really watch him and not think two things and i'm and i know this would probably bum him out because i know how much he cares about yeah disappearing into roles but that's jeremy strong in a weird wig and he's older than mark and he's not jesse eisenberg right and especially in something that is pretty much directly speaking to as a companion piece this other thing i think what's going on is that jeremy strong is a weird wig and he's older than mark and he's not jesse what would have been most strong is if mark zuckerberg was only in it at the end and it was played by jesse eisenberg i don't think we need both stories here i think it felt like maybe something on paper we should do and we end up just not developing mikey as francis haugen who doesn't i really think she's so talented i love her in an aura i love her in most things she's such an actor who plays her objectives the supporting performances are really strong betty gilpin is amazing in this she has always there's a scene like where you know francis haugen comes in to speak to um betty gilpin who plays like the chief like the deputy of the wall street journal and there's a very sorkin moment that happens where betty gilpin turns to all the men in the room and is like can i speak to her alone for a second and then the men leave the room and you leave with the men you don't even see the conversation between betty and mike that's what i'm saying you know what i mean it's like it's not he's just not that interested in the compelling part of this he's doing like a journalism movie because i think aaron sorkin is very good at like a courtroom thing and he's trying to make it compelling whereas the character is compelling and i think he forgot that that's so interesting that's a wonderful breakdown and then i went right into dagger okay yeah talk to us about dagger so i still feel the same way i felt last week which is i don't know why it costs that much and i do think the marketing is is bad but now the sort of narrative around it bombing and the fact that it costs that much works for me even more as a meta thing with the movie which i think is kind of brilliant okay so i go in after the social network right which is totally kind of pretended at the end of the movie that like we don't have as much to worry about as we do whereas digger slaps you in the face with the reality of our world and where it's heading again and again and again it's a very cruel movie it's a very meta movie it's not pleasant to watch but it's very surprising and you leave the theater it's like if if the social network is like anyway anyway that's our movie go about your day reckoning digger is like we're sending you back out into a world that's fucked literally in an immersive way i would rather have that well it makes it more important art yeah the movie is one thing for the first full hour and it's incredibly hard to talk about this without giving spoilers so sorry for being vague maybe if you see it in the coming weeks like we can at some point like talk about it a little bit differently i would love to i would love to but it stops being what it's being and sort of reveals its its bit like halfway through and it becomes way more interesting the the movie that i thought it was which is sort of like a farcical because this is the way it's being marketed marketed it's like a farce about social social issues sort of but really it feels like maybe it's a little bit about like you know the blowhards in charge of our government and in charge of you know these big industries and the effect that it has on us through climate change it's really more broadly about like the way that you narrativize tragedy for people when you are the person responsible for that it's like it's like all about how people in charge shirk responsibility and all the things that come at our material like disadvantage in crazy ways so basically so interesting yeah it is and it makes it even more interesting to me that tom cruise is the lead of the movie because you remember this is in your etu who cast michael keaton as birdman this is a guy who knows the narrative in this type of meta narrative so tom cruise being the star of this movie which is all about how people who are at the heads of institutions sometimes like put out narratives that would make you feel like these things are not what they actually are is to me either the most brilliant artistic move of his life and i think makes me look at his legacy differently or shows he's the biggest egomaniac in the entire world and if he's holding an oscar at the end of this i think it's the funniest most meta thing about the movie because the movie is all about people protecting what's important to them at everyone else's expense and so this guy is the star of this movie and he gives an incredible performance he is a fucking superstar no one can argue with it he is also the figurehead of scientology to this day and so i thought for a second like wow i'm walking in here and i'm really gonna be like virtue signaled and lectured by this guy like who i know people who have lost their lives and i'm like i'm gonna be like i'm gonna be like i don't know why we need to see another documentary about it like we know we have scientology's number yeah and still like the he just kind of like is tom cruise still but what in your ito is doing casting him i think is genius and i'm getting that performance out of him and getting that performance out of him and i think if tom cruise is self-aware about it go off king i guess if he's not woof and i mean either way it doesn't do anything to like absolve the past right exactly so yeah exactly oh yeah yeah and so i think it's almost like because basically this movie is about like a world where like our earth is rapidly deteriorating and this guy digger is like responsible for it and it's sort of a farce that's like how do i get people to believe that this is like not really my fault or how do i point fingers and put blanks on it and i'm like i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know and every character in the movie is sort of doing that in some way and then it has an even bigger reveal about the way in which we're watching the story which i can't ruin okay i can't wait to see it it is really layered i think i was i stand by my sort of incredulousness about the whole thing but it actually was giving me tar vibes i love that in that i thought i was gonna see one thing it unfolded to be something completely different i laughed i laughed a lot at the end when i realized what was up and the more i thought about it the more i realized that this director is operating on so many levels in a way that i hadn't even considered that's awesome and i'm actually yeah i actually like people people make you know whatever i'm not i was gonna make i was gonna make something about me i'm sorry what i was like it's a classic thing on this podcast where like i don't see something and then you're describing it to me and i'm like whoa but like i i do I do think it is like a nice, like, and like, I think like maybe the listener gets a little annoyed at that some exasperated with that sometimes that like i like it's a culture podcast and like one of the co-hosts doesn't even watch stuff well you're doing a lot and that's what i want to reiterate and i'm not saying that that's the excuse but like i i really made an honest effort to go and see this movie before we taped today and i just couldn't well that's fine i mean you know what i like about but i do well i like i'm just saying i like that we can extend this into next week okay go well what another thing i like about it is i fully came on this podcast and i i last week and i almost feel like i was coming from the perspective of someone who was the economics of it this market this movie was being marketed to me right and then the narrative was it flopped and i think what the fuck like how does it cost that much and i still don't understand how they expected it to make money right i i just don't like especially considering how maybe that's another genius level of a new reach where it's like this will flop because it is it is laying it's laying bare all the the wastefulness of this and i actually think if we continue discourse about it in this way and talk about how interesting it is it doesn't necessarily have to have that label of like flop fabulous i'm but not in that you really i really want to see it this ad is sponsored by vive healthcare time for some prep wisdom but first some common sense people everyone is different everyone yes even you yes even your situationship especially your situationship and just like people injectable prep options not all the same that's why you need to talk to your doctor and know what to ask so here's some prep wisdom did you know there's more to consider about long-acting injectable prep options and how often you get it also why you want 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w-a-y-f-a-i-r.com wayfair every style every home okay readers we gotta discuss a vacation that's not just a vacation it's a statement virgin voyages adults only yes a child-free sanctuary at sea it's giving serenity it's giving sexy european summer it's giving i deserve this they're sailing the caribbean and the mediterranean obviously but now they've added the west coast and alaska so whether you want golden hour off california or full cinematic glacier core main character energy they said range and the awards and at this point it's less award-winning cruise line and more do we just engrave their name on the trophy they've won so many travel awards the ships might sweep our culture awards slay of the sea excellence in poolside looks outstanding achievement and top deck behavior over 20 eateries epic entertainment fitness classes wi-fi all included luxury without the nickel and diming virgin voyages sailors consider yourselves called so if you're ready to trade the group chat drama for 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have on hand while watching the culture awards yes the best part is they've got that classic m&m's caramel flavor and they're also flavor it's available in stores now um i did have i think another movie we should see together is verity i would love to see very because bruce havoc last night uh and hanukkah lewinsky when we were preparing and getting ready for i put a spell on you to benefit the alifornia center which was great which is so fun but they completely lit up when they were getting into drag and explaining to me beat for beat the plot they spoiled all of verity for me and i still want to see it yeah it just sounds insane it's can i can i say lovingly it sounds a little bit like a movie we watch at your house oh yeah yeah we can do that it feels like the substance vibes but the substance i loved watching at home not but i would have watched the theater too i would have but i just remember when we watched that together this feels like verity feels like a good companion piece to that and it is fun because we will have both not seen it unlike the substance where you were watching me watch it yes yes yes yes oh but i love it i love to do that i know i know but i just want to i just because i feel like this is in the culture like the i i the biggest film i've ever felt in my life was not being at radio city for the 20th anniversary of 30 rock oh yes it looks like so much fun yeah manuel did werewolf bar mitzvah jenna maroney did a medley of i think every song she's ever sung on that show i love that um or jake rickowski i see myself in you i mean i just i just think it's i i've said this before i just i think it bears repeating it is the funniest show ever made the show ever the best show the the best funniest just funniest yeah every i just i know we were at dinner last night and then jared and i we were all quoting i was just like it just okay let me just some underrated jokes jack's mom eating um with liz's family elaine stritch's character eating with liz's family you love christmas uh like uh you know like a family restaurant she's like a rich rich it's like a she's getting a lot of money and she's getting a lot of money and she's getting factory i bet she's and she's this rich wealthy woman who's so out of place she goes it's so hard to choose the photos of the food look so good can i say they always do like well yes of course the pictures of the food always do look amazing and that's but that's a specific menu but i don't think people should be able to get away with the food looking as different as it does in the commercials and in the pictures like when you watch like a when you watch a taco bell commercial or a burger king commercial of course it's not like that when you go but it's not even about the commercial this is about the menu photo no of course right but even but that should be even more accurate absolutely because you have the camera probably in the restaurant with you i think that's a different shoot honestly i don't know how it all works production wise but i think the commercial shoot yeah on film you know they want to you know the shrimp to bounce and yeah they want it all to look extra juicy so juicy up close a tight shot but i think yeah in terms of the photography and the framing on as it's being printed to scale on the menu yeah is is its own it's its own separate day that i think you're probably right i guess i just i want things to look as advertised and that's why at a restaurant that doesn't have photography of the food it's it's kind of more of a it's a fun surprise what's your what's the best menu oh that you like okay you go into a restaurant i want to know how many pages is it how many items is it in each section what's the best type of menu well i i was i was always in i remember like when a tool gawande wrote a whole essay in the new yorker about like the cheesecake factory menu being really impressive in both its scope and its consistency in the franchising of it yes but i think the cheesecake factory has been certainly private equitized in a way that's like well the quality is down and the costs are up but it's like i don't know yeah i want to say in theory cheesecake factories menu has always been supreme so you think it's not too many things you think ideally for you you go in and it's and then you like that it's like an encyclopedic encyclopedia no but wait what's the question well i'm just saying in a perfect world perfect restaurant when you go in yes what's the menu giving in terms of like how many items are on it i want a fold i don't want a fold i don't want one big double-sided plaque a placard i want i want folds maybe even a little elastic to separate some multiple pages go this is where this is where i think i differ okay i like this is what i like like an appetizer um what do you call it when it's when it's two two columns two columns like four here four here like eight appetizer items right yeah a little bit of everything and it has raw bar it's actually a different section yeah three things in the raw bar one is a shrimp cocktail one is clams one is oysters gotta have east and west coast oyster things then an entree you have seven seven maybe eight entree options a burger and a pasta steak steak something for the vegans yes of course then we're talking about salad big salad three salads caesar salad fun salad burrata okay not burrata as a salad no no no because is burrata a salad because people will it's often under the salad i think the cheese is it can be a salad sure i'm sorry i'm i'm sorry about burrata salad is a salad okay never mind i'm sorry so it's and then like probably like three dessert things but i i'm okay with one side and then the back is like cocktails i take it back you know it has a perfect menu is a perfect formatted menu is uh via corota via corota one page and it's it's what you're describing it's like you know columns yeah really well laid out favorite 30 rock joke favorite 30 rock joke i mean i will say it it does it probably is jenna and there's a reason why every single time she comes up i do that thing with her singing into the mirror i see myself in you i just that to me is so it's just i i love it's a it's a it's a character joke and it's just a funny joke joke on it and i and i just just anything having to do with her narcissism and ignorance i really gravitate towards and i would say it's such a successful character in the tina fey robert carlock sort of little stranger world that it's like it's it's um it's jenna it's jane krakowski and kimmy schmidt it's um yeah i mean my favorite thing it's it's wiki and gross i've ever yeah it's like jane krakowski and a regular commission when she goes would you like a water and then she it's the it's the water but she goes no thanks and she just throws it in the trash perfect joke and then my other my other favorite underrated 30 rock joke is um dennis shows up to liz's apartment to tell him about to tell her about his latest business venture he goes one word coffee one question where do you get it and liz goes everywhere no she goes anywhere you get it anywhere one word coffee no no one question where do you get it any he wants to make a car his new business venture is a coffee vending machine i love dennis even more now after i've had sex with that guy uh just saying like once you've been with a dennis you get dennis more oh totally like she kind of we've been with her for a long time and she's been with her for a long time and she's been with her for a long time and she's been with her for a long time and she's been with her for a long time like sexually addicted to someone that you're like fuck oh god no of course no that happens all the time all the time only went on a date with a guy the other night i'm gonna say this he said we were talking about pop stars right and i mentioned taylor swift and he goes well she's not a pop star and i go okay i'm thinking thinking he means he doesn't like taylor swift he goes i love her though she's a singer-songwriter i was like well i mean she is a pop star like she's both she's both i was like she's a singer singer-songwriter she's a pop star he goes no she's not a pop star and then i start to realize i'm gonna have like a devil's advocate conversation and i go okay and i can't really leave this shit alone so i go okay so she is the biggest pop star in the world and then he was like no but she's not a pop star she has no sex appeal she has no chutzpah and i was like okay so you're a pop star you can say you don't like her as a pop star did he say the word chutzpah he said chutzpah in the year of our lord 2026 right as a gay millennial i'm assuming you don't know the age of the people that i'm doing no he's a millennial um but um so chutzpah so he said he's got she's got no sex appeal she's got no chutzpah i was like well that doesn't mean she's not a pop star it means that you prefer other pop stars he said robin is a pop star i said correct totally she is absolutely a pop star but you can't say that taylor swift is not one because she's not the kind of pop star you like if we're gonna break it down popular star correct like that's all it is so then then it became a thing where he was like no i'm serious i really like her and i was like well that's fine it's just that like we're not talking about that i'm talking about your terminology being incorrect and now i feel like a crazy person having this conversation on a wild sex with him it's it actually no i wish oh because it felt like it was actually fueling me in that direction it's like when someone is being just like oh i incorrigible yeah and um it reminded me of the time i was on a date with a man and he said i'm well i'm actually straight and i was like you're not we had sex we had sex you liked it yeah and then i'm saying he liked it yeah both of us liked it a lot so we were on the date but you're not saying you're straight yeah so i was just like okay i'm not saying you're straight i'm not saying you're straight i'm not saying you're okay you're you're not straight i was like we had sex he was like i mean like i'm gay i'm straight i was like so are you bi he was like no i don't like labels i was like but you just labeled yourself as straight and he was like i feel like you're trying to force me into an identity and i was like you're you're identifying i was like you're on a date with a gay guy we had gay sex you hang out with all gay men and then he goes and then he i don't know he got into a whole thing and he was like i just don't like it when people tell me who i am i was like yeah but you're identifying as straight which is like the the sort of like weird colonizer version of the things you can identify as like you're putting a label on yourself as straight despite the fact that you had horny gay sex with me he's he's he's avoiding something about about the label in terms of like power and i think he just i think it's also like unfortunately i was on a date with like a gay guy contrarian and i was like he seems like you're on a date with multiple you're on dates with a lot of them i don't mean to be like i really don't mean to be i just i don't want to continue a conversation with someone that's like well taylor swift's not a pop star i like her but she's not it's like in terms of just using words correctly and in terms of apt descriptors you are incorrect sir interesting that he kept doubling down on i actually like her it's like you're allowed to not that's not what we're discussing and then it became a thing where i was like i understand you like her and he's like no i feel like and he goes no i feel like you think i don't i was like no i mean i'm hearing everything you're saying i feel like i'm the only one here listening to what everyone is saying because if if if you hold it all in one hand like it gets too heavy like she is a pop star you don't like her as a pop star you prefer her in a different mode it doesn't mean she's not a pop star because she's not robin it's so interesting that robin was his first not that she's not yeah top of mind like who is anyway and then it became a thing where he was like oh so you really like taylor and i was like i mean yes but that's not the basis for my argument the basis for my argument here is that you can't just say someone is not a doctor when they have like when they're taking house calls you know what i mean it's like this person when they've got an md you might not like their bedside manner they're a doctor you know i'm saying you might think this podcast sucks it's a podcast right right it's like you can't say they're not a podcast because they're not you can't say they're not a podcast because they're not because they don't have they're not the daily right they don't have like their side hustle like bottle like beverage next to them yeah it was just a very fascinating conversation to have with another gay man which sometimes they take such lefts and i feel like i'm usually i'm talking to like one of the great gay guys capital ggg who's that you oh you know that you know you're one of the great gay guys you know in the past i would have pushed back very humbly yeah i think i am you and choice of on oh let's get into it let's i love him i think it's bro so so just to show just to kind of say brett aka leland did fully show us way too much months ago like we did and i didn't want to tell troy that but i was like i think we've heard the whole thing and i knew then it was going to be a moment you knew that it was going to be a moment yeah and it is i mean it's so it does feel like it does feel like a throwback to sort of like 90s late 90s like that kind of talk pop do you remember fastball no it reminds me of like fastball like marcy's playground like oh yeah marcy's playground some shit that i was listening to like late 90s early 2000s almost like vertical horizon coded yeah you know what i mean like a little bit like there's something back in there totally yeah and it feels like it's like a little bit like a little bit like a little bit like it feels like it's that sort of like alternative experimental pop almost i did say this to him but i stand by it even more now like even like ray of light coded oh interesting you know what i mean like when pop started to turn away from it's interesting because so troy is in the conversation with all the pop girlies right because he's like the only like real like gay pop star we have who's like trafficking in a lot of their same imagery like error error creation and stuff like you know really dancing stuff like that and yet it almost calls back to that time in the late 90s when i feel like because the pop girlies were such a thing then there's something that was a little alternative so there is something that feels very alt alt pop about this he knows how he's positioned where he was even saying on the podcast where he was like i know that i'm scrutinized differently the standards are not right as damn like excruciating for me as a male like so i so i think he like i think i think it's really nice that he understands his positioning and then is taking advantage of that yeah is able to make it a very risky lush thing that harkens back to this very experimental time in music yeah where you could you could i mean because it was alternative it was still in some way mainstreamed yeah we were all listening to it well correct especially because there's something extra cool about and he just has his finger on the pulse as does brett and everyone they're working with but there's something really cool about the fact that it does sound really kind of deconstructed but it's also very musical like ff like that is melodically a really beautiful song and he did his i don't think so honey on singing when he came here which i feel like is you know funny and cute as a way to like you know for him to knock himself or drag himself or intro into the album here because a lot of it relies on different parts of his voice and different techniques he's using to get his voice across as a recording artist but he's such a lovely singer and his melodies are so pretty and if you stripped down ff and like performed it like in a space it would sound so beautiful and gorgeous and like the musicianship is worth crediting because i feel like in a time when it's a lot about the aesthetic and it's a lot about the way it's not hyper musical it still is great incredibly musical and i was even talking with brad about this where it's like i was like oh my god congrats on the album it's phenomenal by the way let's just and i was explaining this to a friend a straight guy who loves music i was like i think you should listen to this new choice of an album it's pretty cool and i was like oh my god brad is incredible yeah he can really work at every single level of whatever musical needs need to be met in a way that i don't know is is like human yeah but he was even like oh thank you and i can't wait for these songs to be with a band totally and i'm like me too yeah um and i just think the sort of ethos of the album is so interesting too because i think like not so not so much was she's the best but the party was like okay we're getting like another like horny dancey troy album which i don't think he really ever had i think people were mischaracterizing his past work as like they are party i mean he's had incredibly successful dance pop singles but but but like the bodies of work have not been exactly dance pop but i think they've matured so well like you know blue neighborhood is just him being a teenager or you know a youth as it were yeah and then like it's just like i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know he's grown so much and and he's really hitting on this thing now where i think we can relate to this and maybe even like younger queer men can relate to this where it's like i want a party and i want domesticity the party thing is just veiling this deeper emotional need i have which is to be loved to be some to be with someone who comes home to me like that is the thing that i'm like wow this is really powerful and that's like the finger on the pulse emotionally culturally in terms of in addition to the musical stuff it almost is a companion piece to brat in that way you know what i mean it's like we are partying there's even the song called party you know three six five party girl etc it's like but but in a way it's like that is not a mask but it's something that exists over it's something that is covering real desire and this idea that a lot of it is about a person that doesn't necessarily exist you know what i mean this idea of his affection being this sort of like creation because even he he was on the podcast being like yeah like am i gonna find my husband in new york maybe it's like oh so like i even wanted to ask him like who are the who are the now i want to ask him even more like who are the songs about because it's like this is so specific and what you want is so yeah beautiful and profound and yet like is this about someone you've already found and who has gone away or is this someone that you like are like imagining up in your mind in a way that we all we're all doing that yeah well especially now as you know dating gets more and more difficult because i'm sometimes you date someone and they're like taylor swift is not a pop star and then you have to talk about that um but like i think that what i was identifying with it is like almost because and i think if i'm not mistaken like ff is sort of about an idea and not a person and in that way it can be really hyper romantic or it can be really even more like you can explore even more because you're not beholden to the image of a person or like a the the style that a person sort of gives you like in terms of a vibe it's i don't know i i can't claim to know what his inspirations are but they feel grand which makes me feel like maybe they're well yeah big in that way and it's good i think that's what a lot of the back half or the middle oh my god and i love cowboy and embarrassingly it's my favorite yes yeah and then the other thing is like i don't know if you've ever heard of him but he's like just if the stuff tells nicely into the next album we want to talk about briefly and shout out before we finish the episode which is um i just think the middle of the album is so strong yeah like embarrassingly cowboy la boy which i think is very yeah is kind of cousins with ff and sex star which is like i have my stuff figured out but like what is missing yeah like a partner yeah and i think like sex star is this thing of like i love sex star sex star is so good and sex star and and fuck you and and and ff are like very sonically similar i actually actually i went on his spotify merch tab and i was like what do they got and there are a pair of like boxer shorts that say sex star it could be kind of cool they were a little long which i think we're still living in that world of like long shorts it feels like it's going away but you know what i mean like it's it's kind of giving like okay there's a pair of long shorts you can say i just i that is not a stylistic thing i like sure this ad is sponsored by veve healthcare i'm for some prep wisdom but first some common sense people everyone is different everyone yes even you yes even your situationship especially your situationship and just like people injectable prep options not all the same that's why you need to talk to your doctor and know what to ask so here's some prep wisdom did you know there's more to consider about long-acting injectable prep options and how often you get it also why you want to take it matterless if you're a doctor and you're not a doctor and you're not a doctor your lifestyle matters your routine your chaos level your i might forget my own birthday energy all of it counts basically talk to your doctor have the conversation ask the questions be a little nosy about your own health it's allowed encouraged even okay did you write all that down no don't worry just head to get prep wisdom.com to learn what to ask your doctor that's get prep wisdom.com you know we've been talking about refreshing our living rooms recently so we went to wayfair.com top of mind stuff i got an elroy modern abstract machine washable area rug with non-slip rubber backing what about you beau no way i got a hertford wide mid-century upholstered solid wood accent chair with an extra pillow i was hoping you'd get the hertford wide mid-century upholstered solid wood accent chair with an extra pillow good on you babe now our living rooms feel like completely different spaces wayfair helps you create a home that stands up to real life with quality products great value and trusted reviews products are hand vetted by product specialists using a 10 point quality inspection shop thousands of products across every style and budget whether you're simply replacing an 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and the mediterranean obviously but now they've added the west coast and alaska so whether you want golden hour off california or full cinematic glacier core main character energy they said rain and the awards at this point it's less award-winning cruise line and more do we just engrave their name on the trophy they've won so many travel awards the ships might sweep our culture awards slay of the sea excellence in poolside looks outstanding achievement and top deck behavior over 20 series epic entertainment fitness classes wi-fi all included luxury without the nickel and diming virgin voyages sailors consider yourselves called so if you're ready to trade the group chat drama for glacier views poolside looks and zero children head to virgin voyages.com say it with me virgin voyages.com or hand it off to your travel advisor and let them do the googling introducing m&m's caramel you already love now popped into a totally new texture i'd say m&m's are one of those truly iconic snacks they've just been released and they're going to be on the market for a while so launched a brand new free freeze-dried innovation that brings a whole new vibe to the m&m lineup i mean come on what's not to love about m&ms and if it's freeze-dried i feel like i'm in space m&ms continues to be that girl the crunch is unexpected in the best way way crisper than you'd think like you bite into one and there's the little pop that you don't see coming from something that still tastes like classic m&ms caramel sure they don't look exactly like the m&ms you know but they are the m&ms you love they're perfect for snacking when watching television scrolling on your phone or settling in for a movie and i'm already thinking they'll be great to have on handle watching the culture awards yes the best part is they've got that classic m&ms caramel flavor it's available in stores now speaking of stylistic things we're walking by the elizabeth street gardens yes and there was some sort of fair or festival happening so her book club yeah so i'm she actually sent me exactly what this did you see her apartment tour no what it's gorgeous it's like there's clothes and toys everywhere it is so messy oh my god and i said thank the lord i fucking love her okay so rosebud's reading collective fundraiser at elizabeth street garden so this is basically like we need julia fox on the pod now i i've been saying we've been saying this for years so basically we go there and yeah she's basically her her endeavor here is to support women at rikers who are they have a book club and so we walk in and we're basically like okay let's we we got in the gardens or whatever we're like walking around it's cute and they go oh we're gonna bring julia over didn't realize it was julia fox julia fox come over she was selling her clothes yep melissa got one of julia fox's shirts amazing two fabulous like and then it was just cool because you're just looking through julia's stuff she was there she came over said hello she says hello oh my god and she has won the julia fox award for overall excellence at the last culture racist culture awards in the past um she's a friend of the show who was not yet done the show but would hope that caught happened soon but it was just like this fun random night where i'm walking by and they're like oh yeah come shop in julia fox's closet it was so random you need to watch this apartment tour yeah okay it is a real new york apartment yeah and think because i'm actually sick of the tours of the other tours i'm sorry i'm sick of why because they're too i mean and not they're so now we're just so like disillusioned or we're we're just so disillusioned with the show we're just so disillusioned with the show we're just so disillusioned with the show we're just so disillusioned with the show we're just so disillusioned with the show it's demystified for us where it's like okay you're putting this up for sale yeah or it's like i don't it's it's giving look at this thing it's a one-of-a-kind singing and dancing automaton that is vital to the magic of art of play yeah it's like enough yeah yeah give me real um did you want to say remy wolf yes remy wolf mud it's so good we will not let remy wolf be forgotten on this podcast no never singing like janice joplin singing like janice joplin doing i think this is like her most like instrumental in terms of like guitar drums like just she's like shredding instruments all over whereas in the past i think a lot of her songs her music was electronic yeah which is i love just as much love like but i love that she's really going analog her voice so like really really really what she's capable of vocally is something that is like worth noting and and she made me nod along to a john mayer feature so not bad not bad not bad at all i haven't um there's also a new victoria so excited about i haven't gotten to dive in yet but i just wanted to say i don't know what they're called i don't know if they have a name maybe because the fan group isn't large enough yet but holly humberstone oh she's like if you mixed sabrina carpenter with coralline my god she's a tim burton sabrina carpenter coralline is back in a big way wildwood isn't always i was like who does this girl remind me of and i'm like oh the girl from nightmare before christmas and sabrina carpenter collided she has a new song called too cute to be lonely yes obsessed and y'all got mad at me well because we were telling you to listen to cruel world for months yeah but i i eventually did you know what i mean you said nothing well that's okay and now i'm saying something we're in this place where we share so much can barely get you to read a book i ordered the book i read the book weeks ago no i do things on my own time you always know that about me i always do things on my own time i i just i don't know i'm way too cute to be lonely don't you know no i'm so cute i really what i really want to have a space to talk about kingdom hearts you have this space for when but but not with someone who understands but when when i just spoke to you about digger and every detail i share with you about and and and guess what i i took that information i said i'm gonna go see it i i tell you that this is a video game that has britney snow hayden panettiere jesse mccartney you want me to play the game mina suvari mandy moore i love all of this and you know that i love all of this it's just that mark hamill i just don't have the software with me you you have access to the software he's gonna have access to the software he's gonna start yelling um it's just what do i need to play kingdom hearts i switch to you need to switch to and then i plug it in and you sort of don't pretend to be obtuse you're up to i don't pretend to be obtuse yes you do you're you just gave a stunning cultural analysis of digger vis-a-vis the social reckoning you are a very smart person i don't like this thing that you you're i'm i'm dumb only when it benefits me like had this guy been the one the other night which i don't think he was nice guy but had he been the one and was like i don't think taylor swift is a pop star i would have been like who's taylor swift i don't think i know her who's that um who is that even do you want to do a quick top five yeah did you want to do top five witches yeah we'll do top five witches okay so do you do five and i do have we go back and forth we go back so that we make it a ten we go back and forth and okay so no we go back and forth and then if we if we both say the same number one then we win a prize okay love this okay then i heart pays us an extra okay number five witch who's who's your witch sabrina sabrina the teenage teenage so she brought witchdom to a whole new generation sabrina what you know was just like us she wanted britney spears to show up to her house she was you know friends with rupaul yeah she was she she i mean she had two aunts hilda and zelda that we both loved yeah yeah yeah like they would open a magic a great magic store in brooklyn that would sell to real magicians real magicians that would who are witches love to sell uh a five-figure automaton to kelly clarkson i mean it wouldn't even be a thing it wouldn't even be they wouldn't even need to have strife about it they were just like of course and i just want to say her beautiful rivalry with libby was iconic libby and she had the hottest boyfriend harvey ever harvey so that number five is sabrina featuring hilda and zelda yes okay number four i'm gonna say stevie nicks absolutely i was on a date with a man at some point in the past and he told me that he was conceived at a stevie nicks concert they were fucking while she was singing silver springs apparently so apparently so that's that's amazing and i was like wow how do you know this and he was like well my parents are the kind of people that i know and i was like well my parents are the kind of people that i know and people who fuck at a stevie nicks concert so they're gonna be the kind of people who tell me that i was conceived at a stevie nicks concert stevie nicks being four is really there's a lot of witches in the world but she i think she's i think she's at least top two oh that's okay all right number three oh i was gonna say maleficent but she's a fairy oh so yeah we can't we can't say that she's canonically a fairy she's a fae she's fae okay i'm gonna say and i and we don't have to i'm just gonna say like the ip is you know the people but the person behind the ip is tough but she is an iconic witch hermione yeah i mean you have to give it up you have to give it up hermione brought witchdom to a whole new generation said about sabrina did i yeah i don't remember okay it's almost like someone as talented as hermione cast a spell on me so i can't even remember and hermione was actually a gorgeous i mean yeah hermione was an amazing sort of story about uh your upbringing does not dictate your future a hundred percent you can be a muggle you can have muggle parents and still have the gift yeah what does she say at one point she goes expelled that's why she says it or worse before we get killed or worse expelled this is very hermione coded um great number two is well the scarlet witch wanda of course elizabeth olsen turned the gig Brought witches to a whole new generation. Moms. Did Stevie Nicks bring witches to a whole new generation? No. Witches are centuries old. Okay. All right. Scarlet Witch. Centuries. House of M. Oh, you don't know House of M. Do you remember when I named my car the Scarlet Witch, Wanda, because I was driving during the pandemic? A red Elantra. A bright red Hyundai Elantra. I miss her. I once picked up Jill Kim Booster in the car and I said, what do you think? And he said, it's a little ostentatious. All right. An Elantra is ostentatious. I guess at that. He was like, you know, you're going to get pulled over every second. He's like, because it's a red car and the way you drive. Oh, I see. That's why number one is Jill Kim Booster. Is the top witch? No. I'm just kidding. Who is the number one witch? We have to say it on three, right? Oh, hold on. Hold on. No, but let's give it a moment. Number two is Scarlet Witch. If you're going to build this list. With me, you have to accept where I put things in. I know, but I was saying the order is so disordered. These are the pop culture witches. Number five, Sabrina featuring Hilda and Zelda. Number four, Stevie Nicks. Number three, Hermione Granger. Number two, the Scarlet Witch, a.k.a. Wanda when she's not wearing her crown. Who is the witchiest witch? I know there's a right answer, but I'm not. I think we know who it is. And it's not necessarily. It's not necessarily an individual and culture. It's more okay. One, two, three, the one on the bag with the broom and on the Halloween store. Like the witch, the witch. Yes. That's interesting. I heart $50. Yeah. You guys said, oh, that's $50. So don't you agree though? Like the one on the bag, the one, the, the, the witch you think of who go, what does it sound like? Go ahead. No, I was staring us in the face, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, Matt, Matt, we have to, and I think this adds on, we were not wrong, but we need to go deeper. The number one, which the number one, which you're looking at me and you're saying the number one, which Elphaba see Elphaba. I was thinking about it. Elphaba. Elphaba is the number one. So does Elphaba include Miss Gulch? Elmira Gulch? No, Miss Gulch is, Miss Gulch is just the real Kansan woman. I'm talking about Elphaba both, I'll get you my pretty and that little dog too. So the Wicked Witch of the West. Also known as Elphaba, Throp. Wow. Still trying to make that second movie happen, huh? There were two. What do you mean happen? Well, flop. That second movie flopped. Aw. Sad. You spent so much time on it. It's like two years of your life. So I guess that means one whole year was a flop. So shitty. I'm the greatest witch. If you know, you know. Well, that's been another amazing culture catch up. I mean, I love, I love for good. I saw it like four times. Can I just say more than I've done? So what should the title of this episode be? Art of Play. Oh, okay. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I'm not sure. Art of Play. Um, Art of Play. Absolutely. Matt and Bowen teach the Art of Play. Art of Play or Art of Play, parentheses, um, mom and pop shop, question mark, or gay or, or gay twin magicians. Gay twin magicians is good. I like gay twin magicians because people get, it's like Digger. People are going to click it thinking it's one thing. This is going to be. Matt and Bowen as like gay magicians, but it's about so many more other things. If we call it Art of Play, that, that, that will, no, that will get, that will, that, that's the way in. And then I think that the, after the, the post colon is gay twin magicians. Art of Play, colon. Gay twin magician shop. Gay twin magician. Shop. Shop. A lot of magic in this episode. A lot of magic in the air right now, being the season of the witch. And I'm, and I'm, and see, I think if we call it Art of Play, gay twin magician shop. It will kind of paper over the fact that I started this episode talking about the six slacks death. I mean, you know, current events are happening as we speak. We can't control the weather. Just Elphaba can. Only Elphaba can control the weather. No, that's Madame Morrible. Okay. Well. I never saw Wicked. I think we are, we are not talking enough about the fact that Rosalia turned an amazing performances and that she sang her entire first song on point what on her fucking tippy toes. I think there is an argument to be made. She is the world's most talented person. Or I think that she, there is an argument to be made that she is the most gifted person that we are blessed to have access to as an artist. And I think Grammy season's coming up and there's a lot of FYC happening. Yes. Lux is. Gotta reconsider Lux. She's a front runner. Lux is definitely in the mix. I, I've shared. It's gonna be her versus Olivia. I've shared my story on this podcast many times about how I disappointed her. Right. When did you disappoint Rosalia? I want, I want this to be on public record. This week. Yeah. Let's go. We have time. SNL. Let's see. 2022. I wanna say Rosalia was the musical guest with Zoe Kravitz. We write a sketch where I. Play this character at a brunch who kind of freaks out over the Ohio State Marching Band rendition of Don't Stop Believin'. And then Zoe and I both like are, you know, just move by it and then it just ends in this whole beautiful dance performance to the Ohio State University Marching Band version of Don't Stop Believin'. Yeah. In the original draft, I was, I have always been since day one. Yeah. A huge Rosalia fan. And I was just so excited and I was like, we have to write Rosalia into this. Oh. And she has to come in at the, she has to come in at the end and be like, are you guys talking about the Ohio State University Marching Band of Don't Stop Believin'? Obsessed. Yes. And then we all like, you know, sing it together. We all like, you know, dance to it together at the end. Easy little cameo for her. She wanted to be in a sketch. No one else like, you know, was writing for her. I was like, I want her to be in a sketch. Yeah. Just in an easy way. This is why you, Bo and Yang were on SNL to provide experiences for Rosalia. Exactly. Yeah. In a way. Yes. Yeah. I know. So, we got the no. I'm going to say, from Lorne Michaels, he was like, who is that no? She doesn't need to be in the sketch. The sketch works without her. The writers inform me of this. I go, that is devastating. Can one of you please relay this to her? I am. And at that point, she and I had like rehearsed together. We like, I was. So rough. We had like developed this really nice rapport. I like, you know, was. Someone's got to tell her she's cut from the sketch. I was like, Malamente is one of the best. Whatever. The writers did that for me. Mike DiCenzo did that for me. God bless you, Mike DiCenzo. I love you. We do the sketch on air without Rosalia. I am riding high. I'm like, well, it went great. And then we go right up to good nights. I am the first steps on stage with Rosalia. And I feel like I must go and apologize to her personally. I go, Rosalia, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry that we could not include you in the sketch. She turns to me. In front of an audience. They couldn't hear this. She goes to me. Well. And I have never forgiven myself since. She goes to me. I know literally, Matt, she was doing this. She goes to me. She goes to me. She goes to me. She goes to me. She goes to me. She goes to me. I know literally, Matt. She was doing this. It was, she was crestfallen being like, I was so excited to make my acting television debut with you. Oh my God, Matt, no. I guess I just thought maybe today could be my acting debut. I know literally. I know literally. I know literally. I know literally. I know literally. That's what I was thinking. I was gonna say, I have tears. You are giving Katherine Heigl at season two of Grey's Anatomy. I guess I thought I was a surgeon, but I can't. I thought I was an actress, but I'm not. I thought I'd be in the sketch, but I'm not. So I quit. So I'll still sing. I'll come back in several years and save an episode of this show from being complete horse shit. Oh. And the Rosalia Stans can come after me. I don't feel personally responsible, because the weekend it was Lorne Michaels' fault. But I will say that I did really take it on the chin when she. First of all, bravo, Matt Rodgers. That was an amazing performance. Well, first of all, I'm gonna say that I'm a huge fan of the show. I'm a huge fan of the show. The last thing I'm going to say, FYC, Rosalia, Album of the Year, Lux, and this podcast for Golden Globe. For the 86th. For what just happened. No other podcast is giving you this, okay? No other podcast is giving you Catherine Heigl. Unless she has one. Whilst doing a comparative literature breakdown of Social Reckoning and Digger. Whilst talking about the Art of Play incident. Hey, good hang. Your move. Bye. Lost Culture Aces is a production by Will Ferrell's Big Money Players and iHeartRadio Podcasts. Created and hosted by Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang. Executive produced by Anna Hosnier and produced by Becca Ramos. Edited by Hot Dog Sandwich. And our music is by Henry Kapurski. Hey everybody, it's me Matt and my tour is on sale now. This time it's really Christmas. Podcast. I'll see you soon. Lisa, tell them about our new show. We have a new podcast. It's called Don't Lie to Me. I'm Lexi Iwanyu. We're two best friends, 22 years apart, but so close at heart. And I'm Lisa DiGiulio, the old one, which means we have wildly different references, occasionally different opinions. And at this point in my 50s, I've lived it all. Now in my 30s, being the founder of New Shoes, good taste is my business. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is your girl, T.S. Madison, coming to you live, live, and always and forever. In color from the Outlaws podcast. National Coming Out Day is in October, and we've got stories from all your favorite LGBTQ celebrities to celebrate. Check out our episode with comedy legend, Wayne Brady. My daughter was actually the one. She said, Dad, you may be pansexual. The iconic Billy Porter and Terrell Grice and I talk about family and chosen family posts coming out. I don't like statements like that. That's Dad or that's Grandma. No, no, no, no, no, no. It should never come at the cost and expense of your own sanity and your own mental health. Download the free iHeartRadio app. Search Outlaws with T.S. Madison and listen now. In February of 2024, celebrated illustrator and children's book author, Petra Mathers and her husband, Michael, mailed letters to dozens of friends and family members to let them know they had died by suicide. Dear honeys, this is goodbye. By the time you get this letter, both Petra and I will be dead. Next stop, Wonderland. Why did they do it? And what did it do to the people they left behind? Listen to Death of an Artist on the iHeartRadio app. iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Guaranteed human.