A Geek History of Time - Episode 173 - L Frank Baum, Accidental Allegorist and Prophet Part III

Episode Date: August 27, 2022

And while we have a through line that states, Authorial intent means dick, right? I don't want to have to have the same haircut, you have dad. Sorry, I'm pretty something. Aww. Aww. So was this before or after the poster and you vomiting all over the couch? For those of you that can't see, Ed's eyes just crossed. It is fucked up. But it's not wrong. Oh, huh. Music This is a geek history of time.

Where we connect here to the real world. My name is Ed Blaylock. I'm a world history and English teacher here in New-Azure and California. And just in the last 48 hours, I'm gonna say 48. I have had the opportunity to be very happy about the way that I am raising my son in the faith. And when I say the faith, I don't mean my Catholicism,

because I'm doing okay there, but what I am apparently doing a really good job of is raising him as a geek because the last night, not early this evening, but last night. So actually it's not 48 hours, it's 24. But anyway, I was having a conversation with him, and I don't even remember how it got started, but we were talking about superheroes and powers. And the conversation somehow came around to me explaining to him that Green Lantern is an example of a superhero

who creates things with his imagination and his courage and his willpower. And if he thinks real hard about something, or if he visualizes something, you know, is something, you know, confidently enough, he can use his magic ring to create that, to make it appear here. And so he can create a vehicle if he needs one, or he can create a big shield if he needs to defend himself, or he can make a giant hammer, whatever he needs. And I told that to my son. And then this evening, my mother, his Gigi, called. And he was talking to Gigi, and he was showing her a couple of things

that were new in his room. And I overheard him apropos of nothing saying, hey Gigi, you want to hear something cool? Green lantern can make anything he needs using his magic ring. I was like, oh my son, you remembered. I got all of her clamped, it was the thing. So I'm pretty pleased with that.

And by the way, that's about the only time you're gonna hear me talking, well, okay, that's one of the one of a few occasions on which you're you're going to hear me going into any kind of lore with my son about anything DC related. Because otherwise we're north of the dark's Marvel house. But you know, and and Spidey is his favorite character right now. He'd be as a spider-man guy. He also likes ghost spider and spin. Spin, of course, is the Disney nickname for Miles Morales because of Spidey and his amazing friends. I don't know if you Damien are familiar entirely with that particular series, but to explain for anybody

who isn't. So yeah, he's Spidey versus like that's a thing. And I'm hoping over the years I'll be able to coax him into understanding that Captain America is the exemplar that he needs to be reaching for. But, you know, Spidey's pretty good, and if that's as far as we get,

at least it's not Ironman, so, you know, there we go. Yeah. How about you? What are you got going on? Well, I'm Damien Harmony. I am a Latin and high school US history teacher up here in Northern California. Um, and I actually this, this update will be just about me mostly. Uh, as you know, you got me into, uh, playing the Woodrow.

Yes. And so I, then by Providence, I think that's the right word. Okay. Okay. I went to the Capitol of Rhode Island. Is that how it's pronounced? No, but by Providence, I ended up dating a gal who is a musician, a music teacher. Yeah. And one of the things that we like to do is play music together. Yeah, and one of the things that we like to do is play music together Very cool. So she brought her banjo laly over She uses that to teach the kids And I was playing on my wood row the one that I got that basically you play the melody and I'll play the chords

Yeah, and we've yet to do so Yeah, and then last night we spent about an hour with her teaching me how to play dead skunk in the middle of the road. Nice. So I've got, you know, the strumming pattern down, I've got the chords. The chords aren't really that bigger problem. It was pretty simple. And then we decided to change the key for it because I can't hit an F. I can hit an F minor. Okay. Or an F sharp. I'm sorry. And then I was gonna say dead skunk minor key. Yeah, I don't know. I don't like all the crap. But yeah. And so now I can I can do that. And then right. Anyway, sorry. So yeah, I can I can now play that song, which is awesome, because I can also play wagon wheel. Okay. Yeah. I can do the backup chords for several songs that you and I both enjoyed. So yeah, I'm happy about that. And now you mentioned wagon wheel and because my wife is a country

music fan, I now have lyrics to that running in the back of my head. Oh good. So have me over and we will play those songs for her and there we go. The samurai game that I got you. Hey, yeah, there you go. Perfect. All right. Well, when last we left, Elfranc was either a certified genius or an authentic wacko. Yes.

Although, no, I'm, you know what, neither. I don't think he was a wacko at all. No. I was just quoting the Ghostbusters. Oh, yeah, yeah, good point. But, yeah, I, I, yeah, quit. It's keep, I keep coming back around to. Yeah.

Yeah, cinnamon roll over glass to it yeah so so okay so yeah he's writing I think he ends up writing what did I say 14 14 based on it and it's and it's funny I vividly remember as a kid I got I think my grandparents I think my father's parents, for Christmas gave me, I don't even know what edition it was, but it had, it was a reprinting of one of the early editions that had vintage illustrations as part work. Right, with all the original artwork.

Yeah, but I mean, it was not, it was not, you know, an antique book by any stretch. Right. But it was a reprinting of an old edition. Sure. And it included wonderful wizard of Oz and the Land of Oz, okay. Which was the immediate sequel, right, which was the immediate sequel right which involved tip

And I'm forgetting the witches name Glinda anyway Glinda no, no, no evil witch evil witch. Oh, oh And it's and it's something sounded like moglie, but it wasn't what not because that's obviously that's that's And they're blanking, but but yeah that's jumble book. I would say Dickens but I know I'm wrong. That's gonna be crazy for the rest of the night. But anyway yeah. So they bought you those? Yeah and I remember being very, very invested,

like incredibly invested in Dorothy's story and then being really pissed off and not liking TIP very much. And where our listeners TIP is? The protagonist of the second book. Okay. Who at the opening of the second book, okay. Who at the opening of the story is essentially a slave, although I don't think the word slave is used,

he's the prisoner of the evil witch. And he always struck me as being kind of mean-spirited and kind of, I didn't like him. I never got around a liking him, even through the whole story. I always thought he was jerk. But yeah, so that was, yeah. And I don't know where I was originally going with that, but yeah. So we've talked about the book. And I know you were saying that we were

going to now get into the movies. Yeah, and I'm only going to get into a few of them, because there were way too goddamn many for me to really be interested in telling you this clone version or this clone version in the early studio system for making movies when they would turn out 40 in a week. And since he's got 14 books, and since he's written a play, and since, and since, and since, you know, it's too many. So I'm just going to stick to a few. So the movie that we all know and love is obviously not the first movie of that name. In 1925, Chadwick Pitch Shurs went bankrupt producing the first version of the film. Now it's 1925 so it's a silent film. One of the L Frank Baum's sons was actually a scriptwriter for it. Larry Seymon, SEMoN, I hesitate to call him Larry Seaman, but it could

be Larry Seaman. He directed it and he also starred as the scarecrow. Oliver Hardy played the Tin Woodsman. And in a remarkable instance of typecasting, Dorothy was played by a woman named Dorothy Dwan. So she was 19 at the time of filming and was married to Larry Seaman until he died in 1928. The plot for this movie wildly different than the play or the book, and it's remarkably convoluted for being a silent picture. And I grabbed a quote describing what happened. A toy maker tells a bizarre story to his granddaughter about how the land of Oz was ruled by Prince Kinn, but he was overthrown by Prime Minister Cruel.

Okay. Oh, kind and cruel. Yeah, yeah. Dorothy learns from Ann M. that fat cruel Uncle Henry is not really her uncle via a note due to her on an 18th birthday, her 18th birthday, and instead identifies her as Princess Dorothea of Oz. Of course, this means that Dorothy is married to Prince Kind, but then there's a tornado in which Dorothy, shitty and fat Uncle Henry, as well as two farmhands are born to Oz. Snowball,

the black farmhand, because of course it's going to be racist, it's a movie in 1925. Soon joins them after a lightning bolt chases him into the sky because it's fantasy and he's black, so of course lightning and all the farm hands try to avoid capture Prime Minister cruel blames the farm hands for kidnapping her in orders the wizard to transform them into monkeys which Which they cannot do or which the wizard cannot do they flee they're chased by the guards and by semen They flee, they're chased by the guards and by Seaman. Oh, I'm sorry, and Seaman playing a farmhand then turns into a scarecrow. Hardy dons the Tin Woodsman disguise like you do. And they're still eventually captured by the soldiers that end up on trial.

Here, the Tinman, or a Hardy, accuses his fellow farmhands of kidnapping Dorothy. Prince Kinds then has the scarecrow and snowball put into a dungeon. Cruel likes the cut of the Tin Man's jib and declares that the Tin Man is now the knight of the garter and Uncle Henry the Prince of Wales but with an H. Ambassador wicked who is supported by lady vicious says that of course, cruel should marry Dorothy. Then the wizard gives snowball alliance suit, which he then uses to scare the pumper dink guards like you do.

Scarecrow manages to reach Dorothy to warn her against cruel, but the tin man shases him back down into the dungeon and into a lion cage with real lions. Scarecrow and snowball finally escape. When Prince kind finds Prime Minister cruel trying to force Dorothy to marry him, they have a sword fight, Prime Minister cruel's loyal henchman disarm Prince kind, but then the scarecrow saves Dorothy and kind, defeated by this escape Prime Minister cruel begs off claiming and pleading that he took Dorothy

to Kansas to protect her from court factions of politics, but she orders that he be taken away anyway. The scarecrow now sees that Dorothy has fallen for the prince that she was supposed to marry and he is now crushed. So he flees up a tower from the Tim man who tries to blast him with a cannon. Snowball no longer a lion flies a biplane, which is also a triplane in some scenes overhead and the scarecrow manages to grab a

rope ladder dangling underneath it. Sadly, the ladder breaks and he falls. And at this moment, the grandpas little granddaughter wakes up and leaves. The grandfather finishes the story from the book that Dorothy Mary's Prince kind and they live happily ever after. There was a whole plot line there. And that's what dialogue. That's that's that's most of what I can say about that. Yeah. Is wow. And one of bounds. Sons was a script writer.

Uh huh. You know what that puts me in mind of. Sons was a script writer. Uh-huh. You know what that puts me in mind, if? Hmm. Do you remember when we talked about Dune? Yes. And the fact that Frank Herbert's son cooperated with Kevin Anderson in writing a bunch of prequels and secrets to the Dune series? Yes. They are fucking his corpse. Well, sand has a way of preserving things. Like I'm just

saying. Wow. Yeah. Okay. There's like like like like like Belm, Jr. needed cash. Maybe the the trope is money dear boy. I'm just like, wow. Well, I don't know if I can convict him because this wasn't actually the first adaptation to the screen either turns out in 1914. His majesty, the scarecrow of Oz was actually produced by L Frank bomb. Okay. Well, canonically, after the wizard leaves, his majesty, the scarecrow of Oz, he does wind up taking over because now he has the brand and pins in his head, which is brains. Right. And in what even now, I have to admit, it's a pretty clever, you know, play on words. Brand and pins, you know, brains, you know, hey, um, so I mean, I mean, that's at least from the

title there, it's at least canonical, but yeah, I mean, it's from it's taken straight from the ninth book, the Skurko Vos. Yeah, it opened in late September 1914 and it did okay, which I can kind of understand why it would only do okay in late September of 1914. Then they renamed it and they re-released it as the new Wizard of Oz in 1915 and it did it better. The plot's also totally different and like I said, it's based on the ninth book. I'm not even going to try to wrangle this shit for you because it's not even the earliest Oz movie. The earliest was a pair of shorts that I found in 1910, Jesus fuck. Then there was the patchwork girl of Oz, which came out before September of 1914, but I couldn't find a, I just know that it came out before September. Even though there's nine months to choose from, I couldn't find the actual one.

I couldn't find the actual one. Good find the actual one. Yeah, okay. There's so many movies prior to the 1931, but I'm just gonna stick to the 39 one because you saw how painful that was. Yeah. So we've covered allegory, right? Yeah.

Now we're on to prophecy. This movie. Okay. This movie, 39. this movie, the 19th and the 19th and I movie, yeah, has been called cursed for years and years and years, and rightly so, if your name is Judy Garland. Well, I mean, the poor woman had, I mean, there's a girl. Okay, yes. I'm talking about later in her life. Sure, sure. But, you know, it was awful. The poor girl, you know, I mean, the filming experience of this movie was bad.

And then she went on to have, as a grown woman, went on to have a rough go of it. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of it due to the abuses of the studio system. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's not a good story. This is why, you know, I get into arguments with people all the time about if it's worth it for art, for people to actually suffer. And my answer is always no. We can always do with 90% of what we get in terms of quality. If it means not hurting people. Yeah. And I'm a wrestling fan. Oh, yeah, but you're not, but you're not a Japanese wrestling fan. It true. I was never big on ECW. So Judy Garland was 16 years old at the time of filming and had, as most 16 year old girls,

been well on her way to developing into a woman's body. Given that Dorothy is supposed to be new-bile, they taped down her breasts, put a rubber disc in her nose to change its shape, and put her in a binding body corset to hide her curves. Okay, wait, back up. Okay. Okay. So she's 16.

Yep. She's, let's say, more than halfway through physical development by a puberty. Okay, the binding of her chest, I can see the whatever, you know, hiding her curves. Okay, I'm gonna see. A disc in her nose? Well, our noses do change through puberty.

So they put this disc that basically flared out her nostrils and pushed her nose up a bit. I mean, you can see her nose and it's a button nose. Okay. Didn't naturally have a button nose. Okay. The attention to detail for this abuse is quite staggering. Wow.

Okay. Yeah. Studio head Louis B. Mayor. You've heard of him. Yeah. He called her a fat little pig with pig tails. Because that's what adults do. What a brick. Oh, it gets, that's the more benign thing he did. He then restricted her to a diet of black coffee, soup, cigarettes, and diet pills. The cigarettes and diet pills were mandatory. He also regularly groped her and broke down crying

when she finally told him to stop. And he said, quote, how can you say that to me? To me who loves you? It's about to get darker. What? Okay. I mean, I believe you, but got almighty. Yeah. This is not a, this is not a fun story.

I found a way to depress myself through this. It's like, God damn it. Okay. Hold on. Yeah. Yeah. Can we just, can we just pause for a moment to, to, for me, for me to point out that I I just looked up Judy Carland. Mm-hmm because I was trying to remember it because I know I know in broad strokes that the rest of her life after this film was

Kind of a kind of a horror show. Yes, but I don't remember the details. And so I looked her up. And she was born in 1922. Yes. She died in 69. Yes. Yeah. She was she was 47. Yeah. Yeah. God almighty. This poor woman. Okay. And we framed all the suffering into that. But hey, you know, all right, she did have a four octave range. So, yeah, well, okay, well, you know, now she was on a steady diet of uppers and downers that were given to her by the studio and administered by her own mother. Which would, you know, cause fits of hysteria, uh, from time to time. Those fits, of course, led to the, the director of Victor Fleming, who was the fourth director of this film, by the way. Yeah. Slapping her in the face on one occasion.

The male munchkins, not to be outdone, they were played by little people, right? Yeah. Who were men in their 40s. They would regularly put their hands up her dress and pinch her. They would proposition her and they'd make nude comments about her breasts. This is what she worked with. I mean, I get that it was the late 30s, but what the fuck, man? Right. Right. Like, she's a 16 year old. Well, okay. in the 30s, a 16 year old, I mean, my grandparents got married, I think in the 40s or 50s,

and I think grandma was 16 or 15. Like you did have that weird, there was that weird time where a 22 year old could absolutely marry as 15 year old student after school was out that year. Like gross, super hella gross. Like I'm okay being a presentist. But it's, but it's, but it's, it's, it's, yeah. But what you did on the one hand, we're okay being presentest, but we also have to recognize,

recognize the reality of what the attitude was at the time. Yes. Yeah. Like we can judge it, but I mean, I'm actually married to 16 year olds. Not at once, but, you know, he did. Yeah, no we can judge it, but I mean, I'm actually married to 16 year olds. Yeah, fuck. Not at once, but, you know, he did. Yeah, no, yeah. So yeah, which by the way, like, and this is, I feel gross saying this,

but it's like he married to 16 year olds. So the first time he married a 16 year old, that's fucking gross. But the second time he married a 16 year old, she claimed to be pregnant by him So he had to do the right thing I Know mother

Yeah Yeah So he was even older oh, yeah second time. I was What is he doing? Well, I think his fourth wife, I think she was like 18 or 19. And he was in his 50s. I don't quite know. I think her name was, I forget the last week. Yeah. But yeah. Yeah. Oh my god. Yep. Yeah. Right. So Garland later said of her experience working for the studio. Quote, they had us working days and nights on end. They'd give us pills to keep us on our feet long after we were exhausted.

Then they'd take us to the studio hospital and knock us out with sleeping pills. Mickey sprawled out on one bed and me on another. That's Mickey Rooney. Yeah. Rooney also had some experiences there as a child star. Yeah, and I'll finish quote, no, I'll say a little more. Then after four hours, they'd wake us up and give us the pet pills again, so we could work 72 hours in a row. Half of the time, we were hanging from the ceiling, but it was a way of life for us. Now, if you asked him at different times of his life,

Now, if you asked him at different times of his life, he said that she got into the addictions herself and that she was over exaggerating. And at the same time, if you look at interviews of him much later in life, he's clearly a victim of elder abuse. So I think he's in many ways internalized the system that was breaking him down and therefore projecting and attacking for. Yeah.

Yeah. So I don't, I don't consider him to be a very reliable narrator. There's also, there's also some sexism. Yes. Going on there. Absolutely. Because standards being different from. Yeah. Well, and he was kind of fixated on that kind of stuff to like if you

Listen to the interview of him when he's watching there was a Twilight Zone episode that he was in about a jockey having one last, you know, Hurrah. Yeah, and The he gets you know, he's it's it's uh, I've got it on DVD. So it's like, you get commentary. And his commentary, he just starts spinning out into talking about pornography and how it's the reundation of society. And but he doesn't call it porn. He says, you know, sexy movies. And he gets these like really better

and just sounds like it's bad. It's none of it's good. And these are people who are working. Yeah, horribly abused for really good art. So Garland wasn't the only one who suffered from onset production nightmares, by the way. Let's, let's see, the, the Tin Woodsman wasn't originally played by Jack Haley, famously buddy, Ebsen of later Beverly Hillbilly's fame. He was. And he actually wasn't even supposed to be the Tinman. Ebsen was supposed to be the scarecrow and Ray Bulger was going to be the tin man.

But Ray Bulger said, well, since I'm a song and dance man, the scarecrow is a better fit for me. So let me do that and then Ebson can be the tin man. And smart move considering what ends up happening to Ebson. But also Ray Bulger's childhood hero had been Fred Stone. Fred Stone was the guy who played scarecrow on stage in 1902. So Bulger was scarecrow, but Ebsen was testing to be the Tin Man,

and he had a major allergic reaction to the aluminum dust that they used to coat his face. Yes. Because in 1938 and 1939, they coated your face with aluminum dust that they used to coat his face. Because in 1938 and 1939, they coated your face with aluminum dust. He complained, but because the studio system was something along the lines of polite galley slavery, he was ordered back to the set. Wow. Now, why he didn't just say, fuck you, no, I have no idea. But, you know, I mean, I'm a teacher, I'm a part of a huge bureaucracy, there are times where I've probably been told to do dumb shit that I didn't say fuck you know,

too, that I really should have. Especially in first two years of your career. Yeah, yeah. Now, once back on set, medical personnel, which I was surprised to find that were actually on set, they noticed what was happening, and they took him to the hospital. And he had breathing problems for the rest of his life, by the way, because of this. Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. I think he was in there for like six weeks or some insane number. Oh, yeah. Yeah, long period time. Yeah. So Jack Haley then gets cast as the tin woodsman and they switch out dust for paste.

See? Better. So Jack Haley then gets cast to the tin woodsman and they switch out dust for paste See better. You saw the problem. It's still aluminum by the way Which gives him a huge eye infection which actually shuts down production for a while and It's almost like the cruelty is the point because clearly they don't care about making their bottom line bigger because they had to shut down their production because they gave the guy a fucking eye infection which they could have come up with something different. And Cecil Bidemille called. He's wondering why you haven't drowned people yet. He wants to know when you're actually going to start like you know abandoning people in horses to die. Can't have a good film without it being a snuff film.

Speaking of Ray Bulger, he also didn't escape unharmed because of how active he had to be as the scarecrow and how wonderfully insulatory straw can be. He was always on the verge of fainting several times due to overheating. And he had permanent scarring on his face because the glue that they used to keep the newly developed latex mask on his face basically gave him like a rash

which then broke down his skin and he had scarring. Like you can look at pictures of Ray Boulder and you can see the tint the uh, scarecrow scar. Wow. Yeah. Which is, which is actually kind of ties in with the Lord of the Rings films because um, God damn it. Do you go Mortensen? No, dimly. Um, and I love the actor and it's driving me crazy. and I love the actor and it's driving me crazy. Tell the story anyway. The anyway, he had a terrible time with the prosthetics

for his, for playing the role, January Stavis. He had a terrible terrible time to the point that it's one of the stories that come off of the set is that his eyes were, were swelling shut. Oh, wow. And so, so it was a unique challenge for all of the stuntmen playing the Orcs that he was going to fight was that he was fighting blind. Wow. and playing the orcs that he was gonna fight, was that he was fighting blind. Wow. In several cases. And, you know, and this was not, this was not, the situation was not helped by the fact

that of course, John Wright's Davies is actually a fairly large guy who, when he was fighting against the orcs was usually like literally fighting from his knees to get the shot right. And and I'm trying to remember which one of the hobbits it was. It was whether it was Mary or Pippin, but one of the actors in an interview said, and so John would look at the stuntman and go, all right.

So I'm going to come at you and I'm going to hit you like this. And then I'm going to come over at you and I'm going to smack you like this. And I'm going to go at you. And the stunt guys are like athletes. They'd be like, yeah, okay, sure, John, yeah, all right, yeah, fine. You know, and like metaphorically be like patting him on the head in their own minds. And he'd come at him full bore, like not pulling any punches.

Well, you know, it's a rubber axe. So it's not gonna kill anybody, but like he'd knock these guys on their ass. I was going to say that'll dent the shit out of your favicle. And so very quickly, there was, okay, when John says he's going to hit you like, that's how he's going to do it. Yeah. And, and you need to be prepared for the fact that he's swinging And you need to be prepared for the fact that he's swinging 70% blind. Right. You know, and yeah. Well, and now the difference is that the production team was like, oh shit, John, because

this was now in the 90s, early 2000s, they're like, oh shit, you know, we got to figure out some way to solve this. And John was like, no, no, no. This is, this is what works. And I don't want to be holding up the production and, you know, I'll take a break every three days and, you know, let the blisters heal or whatever it was. Jesus Christ. You know,

so, but, you know, it's not just producers and managers who have this idea about suffering in art. It's also actors. Yeah, but they were brought up in a system. I mean, John, I know, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, this is going to scar your lungs permanently, Mr. Ebson. Yeah. And we're not telling you, and we're not telling you.

And we're not telling you, and like we don't give a shit, get back, get, you know, back to the front. Yeah. You know, Stan Hansen, wrestler, cowboy, broke Bruno's Amartino's neck. Yeah.

He is famously blind, or he was, and could barely see. His move was the Lariat, which is basically a closed line, but done by a cowboy, so it's called a Lariat. You had no idea where he was getting it? No, no, he body slammed know where he was gonna hit you. And he came at you full force, because he was blindish.

To the point where he and Big Van Vader in Japan, so you know, I mean, everybody loves to hands anyway, because he hits really fucking hard. But, and so everybody's fine with it for the most part, right? Well, he and big van Vader, they get into it and Stan and Vader always works stiff too. And so Stan, he comes to the belt to the ring with a rope and a cowbell. So he takes the cowball and he hits Vader in the head with it. Shattered his orbit bones so that Vader's eye popped out and was dangling and they kept going.

Mother, walker. Oh, when you look it up, you don't look up the picture because I know you, but when you look up the account, Vader talks about this gush of warm. Um, and it's just, oh my god, hey, God. Right. Yeah. So. That's all anybody needs to do, but Japanese wrestling right there. Right. Like, yeah. That's it. We're done. Like, I could elaborate, but it was the point. Yeah. So. So yeah, no, the, the, I don't think we as a society, talk enough about just how abusive the studio system was. No, we don't. We always talk about the artistry.

And as though, if we talk about it in such a way that it makes it so that all that suffering led to this really great art and therefore it's okay. And that's again, why I get into those discussions where I'm like, no, no, I'm fine with being 90% of magnificent. If it means that like she didn't break her rib for that scene, you know, or whatever, which brings us, by the way, to the cowardly lion played by Bert Larr,

whose son had Jack Haley as Godfather. These guys stayed friends. Okay. The cowardly lion costume was actually, it was how to put this. It was two lion pelts for real that were stitched together. Because what? Yeah.

And I don't know which lions it is because I know that by 1939, MGM had already gone through two lines. And I'm not sure if it's them, I hope, because at least you're, yeah. By the way, one of those lines, there's some hard core trainer. Yeah, there's some hardcore necromancer shit going on there. Yeah, but either way, wow two actual lion pelts so because of course Of course why would you 39? Yeah, fucking of course. Come on. Yeah, it weighed 60 pounds Okay, well, I mean, you know if it's genuine lion pelt, I can see it. How it would. But it's a full body suit of 60 pounds. Like Tina Turner wore 70 pounds of chain mail for

beyond Thunderdome. But you could take that shit off pretty quick, right? It's on a frame. Yeah. And she was badass as hell. Well, yeah. But also, when could go through it? Well, man, she can do that. Yeah, but wind could go through it too. These are two lion pelts that are zipped all the way up. Since it's made of real lion fur and lion skin, it's hot as fuck and add to that the studio lights being their own sons. Clean the lights.

Yeah. And Bert Larr was also in danger of fainting on the regular. Also, heat exhaustion. So, and there's a few scenes where you look and he is just sweating. Oh, yeah, oh, yeah, buckets. So, they turned the lights down for his sake. But because the needs of technicaler required the set to be so well lit that it was over a hundred degrees on set. And because of the prosthetics on his face, he wasn't able to eat solid foods when they were filming. So his lunch came through a straw. And after the first day of filming, he'd sweat so much into the lion skin, that the studio brought in an industrial dryer so they wouldn't have to wait for it to dry out normally.

So you got two people eating liquid diets. I cannot, I cannot, I cannot put words. To just how fucking horrifying that is. So there's your four principles, right? The one that gets off the light is the sawman. So we're using paste instead of dust because, you know, like almost killed the guys longs. Yeah. Yeah know, you cuz he's gonna breathe but fuck your eye, but fuck your eye. Yeah, you know, whatever. Um, conjunctivitis by the fucking deal with it. Um, and then, and then we're gonna put it up with some posture problems too because the way he had to stand. Because the way he had to stand in the suit, yeah, it makes sense. So someone else is going to fuck up your spinal column while we're at it.

Right. And then, so we're going to then put a mask on this other guy that's going to literally rip the flesh off of his face. Yes. And also, by the way, we're going to heat him up to, you know, to avoid to human, human stew. Yes. And then, and then the lion isn't going to be human stew.

He's going to be human fricacy. Yep. And we're going to add to that by, you, everything's got to be, you're going to eat shakes for the whole time of your hair. But we're not even going to make them like ice cream shakes to cool you off because, you know, and then on top of that, on top of that, the cherry on top of the, of the Sunday of moral suck is we're going to

sexually harass and simultaneously humiliate. Emotionally abuse. Emotionally abuse. Yeah. A 16 year old girl. Who we're going to pump full of drugs? Yes. Like like at both extremes, go pills and stop pills, which by the way, I'm taking those those terms for the US Air Force, right, which is notorious for similar things, although they don't do it to 16 year olds. Right. And it's kind of justifiable because that could keep you alive. Yeah. Yeah. In this case, no. Right. You don't need to give to life is depending on this. Exactly. You don't need to give to child what you would give to a man to keep him from dying from a machine in a war. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and yeah. And by the way, since she was, since she was 16 at the time,

wasn't there? Well, okay, this was 1939, so I don't know, but I know, I know, modernly, there are practices regarding, well, if you're working on a movie set, there's, you know, a certain amount of the time that like you're going to school on a movie set, there's a certain amount of time that you're going to school on the movie set because you're 16 years old and you're supposed to be in high school. Yeah, it didn't work that way back then. There were laws that were made later. I think they were made specifically because of the boy who played out Falfa and the horrible way that he lived and died. And I think it came out in like after this. Yeah. So, so what happened was the studio essentially owned human being children and was kind

of their guardian. But really they, they just sweetened the pot for these children's parents parents. And it's really easy to do. So yeah, now these, these four did not have the most deadly things happening to them on, on, on set, or, or even the most deadly costume, the most deadly costume has to have been the wicked witch of the West's. Right. Right. Because what color is her face? Green. Which means, copper. Copper. Ooh. And if you said highly flammable copper,

you'd even be more right. Yeah. So she also has to drink her food through a straw on shooting days because of how toxic copper is when you eat it, apparently. So I can just imagine Judy Garland, Bertlar and Margaret Hamilton all standing around drinking what was just a normal meal for Judy Garland.

See, all this shit is why I will never tell you that art is totally worth the abuse. So anyway, Margaret Hamilton, the woman who plays a wicket witch of the west, in a normal day, the copper-based paint was so toxic that it had to be cleaned off with alcohol. So already out of the gate, really good for the skin, right? When the witch leaves munchkin land, there is a cloud of flame and smoke and a trap door helps her disappear behind those things. Take one, no problem, okay. But Victor Fleming said, you know what? Let's do it again.

Let's make sure we get multiple shots so we can stitch it together, right? So we got two really good takes. That's even better. Let's do it. Oh, no. Oh, there was a miscube. Yeah. The crew set the fires too early and Hamilton didn't have a chance to get away and her hat,

her coat and the broom caught fire. Well, this then burned her face and her hands, which were coated with green fuel. And this ended up quote, scalding her chin, the bridge of her nose, her right cheek and the right side of her forehead. The eyelashes and eyebrow and her right eye had been burned off her upper lip and eyelid were badly burned. Oh my god. You get the fire put out. She's all burned to shit. What do you need to use to take the makeup off again? Oh no. Oh John Ringo. No. I can imagine the pain, but only barely. When Hamilton looked down, her skin had been burned off of her hand. Her friend had to pick her up from the movie set and take her to the hospital. And Hamilton even later

said, quote, that was always amazing to me that the studio didn't send me home in a limousine. Margaret Hamilton spent the next six weeks in the hospital. The studio called the next day asking her when would she be back to work because of course they did. Are you? No, you're not fucking getting made up. I'm not. Not. And they pressured her to the point where she came back before she was fully healed because

it's the movie studio and they're not happy unless someone is everyone is sacrificing their lives for celluloid. The nerves. Oh, Jesus, God. The nerves in her hand were still so exposed that in order to avoid putting green paint on burnt ass hands, she wore green gloves for the rest of the filming. And you can actually see it in a few scenes. What the fuck man? She considered suing but then she realized that meant she would never work in movies again

because that's fair. Yeah. Now, Margaret Hamilton was the sole source of income for herself and her son having divorced to your prior from her husband. And because of this, she refused to take part in the sky writing stunt. She was supposed to sit on a pipe that belch smoked behind it. So they paid a stunt double $35 to do that shot instead. The stunt double, named Betty Danko, had a problem with how it was rigged, seeing that it was in danger of catching fire, since the fire was inside the pipe that would create smoke. Still, the studio was paying her $35. So Danko, Acquist, and promptly caught fire herself on the third take after the pipe exploded

in gulping her inflames. Quote, I felt as though my scalp was coming off. Betty Danco later recalled spending 11 days in the hospital. Quote, I guess that's because my hat and my black wig were torn loose. Danco never worked with fire again. And because they weren't done with the scene, the studio hired another stunt double to finish scene named Aline Goodwin. And Aline Goodwin never got the credit.

Like I feel for Aline Goodwin not getting credit because that's bullshit. She should get credit with that being said. I think she got off easy. Giving all of the share and leave that we complain about. Yeah, like wow. Yeah. And also, um, it's, it's very sobering to, to hear that that happened over $35. Yes. happened over $35. Yes. We're going to pay you $35. Now, I know.

It's 1939, $35 translates to at least a $100 box house. Yeah. Yeah. You know. Well, I don't know in this market. But, you know, I do recall housing being like $600 for a house sometime around then. OK. Yeah, Yeah. Yeah.

Could be. But anyway, it's still like, you know, it's still, you know, holy shit. Yeah. So, so what what we're getting around to saying here is that the filming of the Wizard of Oz could be turned into a horror movie in its own right. Good have been. Yes, yeah. Now costumes weren't the only danger, by the way. You remember the snow that fell on them

to wake them up in the poppies? That was a spestus. It was like June 39, of course it was a spestus. Yeah, I mean, I fucking knew and pretty sure people in garnish their sandwiches with a spiced back. Yeah, you know, and also, and also I'm going to point out, going to point out that's the first thing you've mentioned so far that it wasn't to God, the Empire has. Yeah, I know.

I thought the same thing. I'm like, oh, it's a little too little too late. What? Like, where was all that asbestos when people were catching fucking fire? Right. Oh, you need to keep it safe. You know, you want it to look like snow. Also, the women were obviously paid less than the men. Ray Bolger and Jack Haley both got $3,000 a week. Judy Garland got 500. Little people were lead character. I know. I know. Yeah. Yeah. Little people got paid less than half of what total got. Okay, wait. Total got $120 a week. The little people got less than half that. I think they got like 40 bucks a week. So that's the production. The silver slippers

get changed into ruby slippers because it shows up better in Technicolor, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. When the movie came out, it was moderately successful. In 1956, MGM sold the TV rights to CBS for $250,000 per broadcast. And it was really successful on TV, getting more than half of the watching audience the night that it was broadcast on the Ford Star Jubilee. So successful that CBS ranted around Christmas time again in 1959, and this time it got almost 60% of the total viewing audience.

And after that, it became an annual occurrence, embedding it into the American zeitgeist. Now, once VHS and Betamax came out in 1980, it was available on those formats as well. And then, of course, laser disk and DVD and so on. And it's been a staple ever since. But what's especially fascinating to me is twofold. First, that the Wizard of Oz went from unintentional

allegory to prophecy. Also unintentional. When the wizard is giving gifts to each of the characters, brains, heart, and guts, he's really actually leading the way from the top to the bottom, from, you know, the, basically the top of the head, bottom of the grondle. Before taking off his balloon, he predicts several things.

First, the scarecrow's brain. He says, quote, anybody can have a brain. That's a very mediocre commodity back where I come from we have universities seats of great learning where men go to become great thinkers. And when they come out, they have they think deep thoughts and with no more brains than you have, but they have one thing you haven't got a diploma. He predicts the commodification of education in the early 2000s. Okay. In 1940, a year after this movie came out, the percentage for white people completing high school was around 30%. For everyone else, it was about 10% and remember by this point, even Mississippi had free public compulsive education. Yeah. For both groups, whites and everyone else,

the completion of college to the point of getting a college diploma was hovering around 5% with an enrollment of about 15%. So a third of the people who go to college come back, come out with a degree. Everyone else is just about 1% and white males specifically are about 6% as far as college graduates. Those who go to college and come out with a degree,

it's about 6% of the population. OK. At that time, the median income was $956 for a man. OK. In 2010, the high school graduation rate was 86% of which about 68% were enrolled in college went on to college. Total college graduates is about 30% in 2010. And in 2010, the median income for a man is about $33,000.

Okay. Now for the difference between the two, I had to do some math. So with a diploma in 1940 Your salary was about $1,380 median, okay, adjusted for inflation Compared to adjusted for inflation up to 2010 numbers so I can compare apples. Yeah, 21,494 So that's with the diploma With a bachelor's degree in 1940 you were making $2,494. So that's with the diploma. With a bachelor's degree in 1940, you were making $2,240. Adjusted for inflation in $2,010. That's $36,600.

Okay. With a bachelor's degree in 2010, it's $52,000. Okay. Okay. In 1940, if you only had a diploma that still made you only 30% of the population and you'd earn about 41% of what someone was a bachelor's degree would earn. In 2010, if you only had a diploma, that makes you about 80% percent of the population, so much greater chunk, and you'd earn about 70% of what someone was a bachelor's degree would earn. So you're catching up, right? Yeah. And before we log this as a positive catching up development,

the consumer price index in 1940 was 14. And in 2010, it was 218.1. Yeah. So we get into earning potential and suddenly it's fucked. The average dollars purchasing power in 1940 was 15 times what it is today. So that compression doesn't actually mean that a diploma is catching up to a

bachelor's, it means that a bachelor's is falling further behind. And part of that is due to the commodification of higher education. Because we could look at college tuition. Now if we only take a look at college tuition in 1940, it's a bit of a misdirect because many colleges were free. a bit of a misdirect because many colleges were free. Let's look at CSU Sacramento when you see Berkeley. In 1940, CSU Sacramento did not exist. Yeah, it starts in 1947. So I have to use 1947 numbers. Now in 1947, tuition for an entire year at CSU Sacramento

was $13. And there was an additional student fee of $11. So a total of $2 a month or $24 a year. So if you enrolled in 1947 and you went through 1951 and you got a four-year bachelor's degree, you would have spent $96, which is the equivalent to $806 in 2010 for an entire four years. Yep. Now, the best price I could find, the best thing I could find, and I looked for a long time, in 1940, for UC Berkeley was $25 worth of incidental fees, and tuition was free. I'm going to say it again,al fees and tuition was free.

I'm gonna say that again, tuition to UC Berkeley was free. Now, if you were out of state, it was $75 a year, plus the incidental fees, which means that out of state folks paid $100 per year for a UC Berkeley education. Okay. So if you went from 40 to 44,

and you were an out of state person, you would pay $400 over four years, which in $2,010 is $4,959. All right. The California resident, because shit's free, would pay a total of $100 over four years, or in $2,010, $1,239. Now, tuition in 2010 at CSU Sacramento was $4,400,

which in 2011 increased to $5,472. Just apparently that was a watershed year and then it held steady through 2018. So just for tuition alone, by the way, this is not for parking, not for housing, not for food, not for books, no student fees, just tuition alone for four years, which in itself is fucking stupid

because only 47% of CSU students graduate in four years. Yeah. But if we're gonna compare apples to apples, you get a four year degree at CSU students graduate in four years. Yeah. But if we're going to compare apples to apples, you get a four-year degree at CSU Sacramento in 2010 through 2014, you're going to pay $20,816 for four years. At UC Berkeley, tuition in 2010 was $8,353 for in-state and $31,022 for out-of-state. I had no idea it was that cheap. Oh, there's Walker. Yeah.

Okay, out-of-state was, that's pretty good. 31,000 a year, yes. Okay. Now, of course, it's going to increase annually. So assuming that you can get a four-year degree and only ever pay tuition, which is impossible. Yeah. And only 64% of UC Berkeley students can actually get a four-year degree. And I do find it interesting that more UC students can get the four-year degree than the

CSU students. And that speaks to that. There's a whole there's a whole lot of factors involved. Yeah, including financial background. Exactly. How many of them need to be working and going to school at you see four year bachelor's tuition just tuition for four years 40,195 dollars for four year degrees out of state tuition 131,499 dollars in the way that's being financed for a majority of students is by taking out loans, right? Which then, you know, saddle them with debt for, yeah, over many years. Yeah, I don't want to date this podcast, but I literally this month just finished paying off my student loans. I got my master's degree in 2006. Yeah. I had been going since 1999.

Jesus. So the wizard hit it on the head and with no more brains than you have, but they have one thing you haven't got a diploma. Now, how does the scarecrow respond to not having to spend any money at all in this diploma, which will make a difference of 41% in a salary and Times 15% He says how can I ever thank you enough? Well the wizard knowing the future knowing what this super price index will be in the 21st century says quite plainly well you can't so Then he goes to the cowardly lion

Which always kind of bug me because it was out of order, but whatever. He gives him a lot, he gives a lion a medal. He says, back where I come from, we have men that we call heroes. Once a year, they take their fortitude out of, they take their fortitude out of mothballs and parade it down the main street of the city highway or the main street of the city hypothesis. And they have no more courage than you have, but they have one thing you haven't got, a medal.

So I searched and I searched and I couldn't find any actual aggregated data about how many police every year get a medal. It's as easy to find as how many police shootings there are as it turns out. Now that said, in 1962, John F. Kennedy said that May 15th shall be National Peace Officer Memorial Day with the weeks surrounding that being National Police Week.

That's been 60 years and a quick search shows us that there's over 900,000 police officers in the United States. There's spread over 17,985 police agencies if you count the city, county, state, and federal agencies. The wizard predicted the support and fetishization of the thin blue line by his speech and subsequent awarding the line of metal for among other things, conspicuous bravery against wicked witches. The one he went and helped kill in her own home without a warrant without any due process and at the behest of the leader of another city. I'm going to quibble here. Sure. Like I totally get where you're going with that. And that is one interpretation. I'm going to counter that again, the lion is not the, uh, is not law enforcement. The lion is imperialism. Or the military in an imperialist state. Have you seen pictures of Ferguson

because you're showing me the same picture? It is. Okay, yes. But have you seen the parades when an officer is fallen? Oh, which again, that is a fucking tragedy and that is awful. But have you seen the parades where they marched down the street?

The thick-ass blue lines. So yeah, I would agree with you that all the things you said are also true. I'm going to co-opt it. I'm going to do that thing. So rather than limited to either one, the fetishization of armed agents of authority. Yes. Whether, whether military or law enforcement. Yeah, I'll go with that. And in 1900 soldiers were far more ubiquitous as a visible force than were beat cops.

But in 1939, I think it's switching, quite quite honestly because you had cars. So you had just traffic cops alone, you know, yeah. And finally, and most insidiously, he comes to the tin man. The wizard's prescience knows no bounds in talking to his galvanized friend. He says, quote, back where I come from, there are men who do nothing all day, but good deeds and their hearts are no bigger than yours. But they have one thing that you haven't got, a testimonial. And remember, my sentimental friend that a heart is not judged by how much you love, but how much you are loved by others.

Yeah. My girlfriend and I were watching this with my kids, and we both looked at each other were like, what the fuck is this? That is some codependent ass shit right there. That is that is anti-Christian. Oh yeah, that too. Like. And it's prophetic as hell. In 1939, he called out a significant tent pole of our culture and he gives him a heart as a small token of esteem. The wizard clicks like and tells him

that it's about how many likes he can get. I'm gonna paraphrase a couple of articles here that talk about social media. The first one is a Mayo Clinic analysis of the impact on kids. Quote, social media allows teens to create online identities, communicate with others and build social networks.

These networks can provide teens with valuable support, especially helping those who experience exclusion, or have disabilities or chronic illnesses. Teens also use social media for entertainment and self-expression. And the platforms can expose teens to current events, allow them to interact across geographic barriers, and teach them about the variety of subjects, including healthy behaviors. Social media that's humorous or distracting or provides a meaningful connection to peers and a wide social network might even help teens

avoid depression. However, social media can also use also negatively, the social media use can also negatively affect teens, distracting them, disrupting their sleep and exposing them to bullying, rumour spreading, unrealistic views of other people's lives and peer pressure. The risks might be related to how much social media teens use. A 2019 study of more than 6,500 12-15 year olds in the United States found that those who

spent more than three hours a day using social media might be at heightened risk for mental health problems. Another 2019 study of more than 12,000 13 to 16 year olds in England found that using social media more than three times a day predicted poor mental health and wellbeing. Other studies have observed links between high levels of social media use and depression or anxiety symptoms. A 2016 study of more than 450, 450 teens found that greater social media use, nighttime social media use, and emotional investment in social media, such as feeling upset when prevented from logging on, were

each linked with worse sleep quality and higher levels of anxiety and depression. How teens use social media also might determine its impact. In a 2015 study found that social comparisons and feedback seeking by teens using social media and cell phones was linked with depressive symptoms. In addition, a small 2013 study found that older adolescents who use social media passively, such as by viewing others' photos,

reported declines in life satisfaction. Those who use social media to interact with others or post their own content didn't experience these declines. So that's the Mayo Clinic. The second one here is from an author named Venus Roots who is writing for medium on the connective tissue between the culture, between the light culture and capitalism.

They say, quote, even for social media users, artists and thinkers looking to deviate and produce disruptive content, we must grapple with the reality that even vulnerability, rehashing of trauma and radical political analyses are encouraged by this commodification process in our all forms of currency within capitalism.

This framework has used the media to explicitly dictate that profitability and proximity to profit is a measure of success in our society. In the current system, 71% of businesses exist on Instagram. We've had discussions about whether or not you put this podcast on Insta and Facebook. And it's not like we've actually figured out how to make money off of your brilliance and my hilarity, right? So, you know, and I do this for the love of it, but I absolutely have caught myself

trying to justify it to people because I'm like, oh, what's it about? Oh, it's about this. You know, someday we're going to turn this into money. Oh, and that is okay. Like that whole connection between the amount of exposure and whatnot. So. Well, okay. The commodification, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, yeah. Not quibble, but I think the commodification aspect of both social media and any kind of content that we're creating and commodification of popularity in the sense of how much you are loved by others. To paraphrase the wizard, the commodification of that

and the commodification of university education. Yep. Both, both come back around to the ingrained Protestant to the ingrained Protestant capitalist idea of material success as an indicator of virtue, that if you're making money at it, then it's okay because that shows that it's just worthwhile, that it's meaningful. It is meaningful if you are making money at it, it is meaningful because making money means you are... It gives it meaning. Supporting your family that there is a tangible value

associated with it. And that tangible value is measured in, affordability is measured in capitalization. Right. To capitalization. And that all comes back to a very American. And I think this is one of those things that unfortunately we've exported to the rest of the world. One of the aspects of culture that's gone global, that is toxic,

is the very Puritan idea that the elect, that there are certain people who are going to have them there predestined. And everybody likes to talk about how, well, we don certain people who are going to have them there predestined and Everybody likes to talk about how well we don't know who the elect are nobody bit God knows who's the elect but We're all going sideways. We can kind of see that it's yeah, but we're all we're all going to agree To not say out loud Right the part the part we're not gonna say out loud. Right. The part, the part we're not going to say out loud is, if you are prosperous, then you must be one of the elect because that's a sign of God's favor. Right. And that has been secularized in our society into this idea that, well,

if it's making money, then it's worthwhile. If it's not making money, then you've got to find some other way to justify it like you were talking about. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And like, why get a university education? Well, I'll tell you why to get a university education. You should get a university education because it'll give you the ability to think clearly and rationally and use logic. And it'll make you a more well-rounded person. Like there's so many spiritual and intellectual reasons to getting university education. But the one that we harp on kids about, the one that constantly comes up is as a commodity, if you have this diploma, you're going to make more money. If you have this degree, you can go into these fields.

deployment, you're going to make more money. If you have this degree, you can go into these fields. And it all becomes materialized. And the idea that, well, if you're not good at something, why are you doing it? Because if you're not good at it, you're not going to be able to make money at it. Well, okay, look, I am made deeply happy every year when when December 1st rolls, it's a day when I'm not even December 1st, the day after Thanksgiving. I am made deeply happy by the fact that I can walk around my house singing God, Resty Mary, gentlemen, top of my lungs. I am not a singer like I have never taken voice lessons. I know that I am not by any objective measure a good singer. Quotes around good. But it makes me fucking happy. Yeah. Or I mean, you and I both took up a musical instrument.

Yeah. Now performing invariably people are, well, are you any good? But no. And then the question is always, well, why do you do it? Well, because I like it. But very often, if you take up a performance art of some sort, I say this as a comic. It is intrinsically

tied. Your success is intrinsically tied to your ability to make money at it. And I don't ever intend to make money at music. I absolutely, and I think you as well, we both wanted to make money at this podcast and still hold out some weird ass hope that it will. Like big. But not all of us is doing anything about that. No, yeah. But we're good. But there we go.

But yeah. So, yeah, like I said, we've talked about putting this on Instagram and on Facebook so that people have. You can get a bigger audience. Exactly. You know, and that's not just for the art of it. That's not just because, hey, we have an important shit to say. That's because we're hoping that it catches somewhere and we can actually make money at it. And I would love to make money

doing this. Absolutely. What? That'd be great. But like, we're absolutely, we're absolutely falling into it. But like, you know, when I talk about, you know, my, my punch show all the time, but I always say it pays for Christmas every year, right? And that's how I know it's successful. And I don't need it to be any more than that. But if it's less than that, I'm going to start questioning it. Yep. And yet, you know, for the last year, you know, it hasn't done that or for the last two years, it hasn't done that because of COVID. And so I've had to really reevaluate, is this worth doing? And sure enough it is because I'm doing it when it's live. But again, I'm always checking that bottom line. I'm always PT bar numbing it. Yeah. But they go on. They say we compartmentalize our real life experiences in relation to

content like ability, meaning how liked will this be by my followers? What potential does this have to get me more followers? How can this help me gain the attention of brands or corporate cultural publications? This pattern warps our ability and collective power to change the devastating social and psychological effects of perceiving our value solely from the mirror corporations hold up for us. Soley from the mirror corporations hold up for us. How do we remind ourselves that we deserve to archive, to document and to share the nuances of our lives without the suffocation

of profit incentives? Now, I don't know if you see this in your school because you teach it in middle school. But my freshman this last year, we're regularly talking about the amount of followers they have on Instagram and whatever else that is that they use these days. Dismissively and insultingly, they've said, quote, whatever, that's why you only have 300 followers. Yeah, and I'm sitting there going like,

okay, how active are these followers? How engaged are these followers? And I think we could probably pair that down to, oh, this person said they'd follow me and they'd ever pay attention. But let's say that's even 10% of that. You have 30 people who dig shit that you dig. I mean, you and I both play D&D. How easy is it to get a group of five together?

You know, if I get 30 people come to a show, if I pull 30 people to a show, I'm pretty happy because I know other people will have pulled more people to that show too. 300? I fucking love a room full of 300 people who love my shit. Yeah. And they're, you know, well, it's only 300.

Regularly, they're having these conversations, by the way, and they'll praise people who have five digits worth of followers. Like, I heard this quote once. Yeah, but she's got like 25,000 followers, so she's all right. The wizard fucking called it. Their value is pinned to the amount of people who like, who notice them and give them hearts. Wow. Okay. Sorry. to the amount of people who notice them and give them hearts.

Wow. Okay, sorry, the only knowsness of give them hearts is really quite a thing. Oh yeah, when we saw that together, my girlfriend, and I was like, and I even told her, I was like, I have to do a podcast on this. Like yeah, I think. So, local Sacramento comedian Keith Lowell Jensen, So local Sacramento comedian Keith Lowell Jensen and

local Sacramento author Keith Lowell Jensen said quote what Orwell failed to predict is that we'd buy the cameras ourselves and that our biggest fear would be that nobody was watching. Yeah. Very very profound.

Yeah. Yeah. Why wise man. Yep. Wise man. And immediately after receiving his heart, the Tin Woodsman notices that it's ticking. So it's counting up its likes. As if to reinforce the extrinsic nature of the symbol of the badge, the cowardly lion requires everyone to look at what his metal says, too. badge. The cowardly lion requires everyone to look at what his metal says, too. Look, courage ain't it the truth. I have the thing. I don't have to have the thing inside. I have the thing that shows I have the thing. And perhaps most prophetically, Dorothy, the teenage girl, after seeing the commodification of education, the shoving down our throats of the thin blue line, and the insidious nature of social media, she says, oh, I don't think there's anything in that black

bag for me. Well, women make 72 cents on the dollar compared to men. Female police officers comprise only 12% of the national total and social media's impact is measurably earlier in girls than it is in boys, 11 to 13 for girls and 14 to 15 for boys It's a good movie That I'm never gonna be able to watch the same way again Just knowing what Judy girl and went through filming it. I'm like never again, Masada. I don't think I can do it like no. Yeah. Like holy crap. Yeah. Wow. So here's so okay, here's a question.

Sure. On a strictly, I don't know if I want to say spiritual level, but on an strictly satirical level, do you think that the gifts that the wizard gives to the protagonists in 1939, thinking about the framing of how that would have worked for people at the time. Do you think that could have been a satirical statement about external you know showing kind of kind of like hypocrisy you know the the the outward symbol being more important than the than the inner quality. I think in many ways the wizard, maybe because the wizard himself was a charlatan and an admitted one, but as charlatan can very often show us the truth about ourselves that we've forgotten. And in many ways, he's he's basically taking them through the iliad, the odyssey, and the i need.

taking them through the Iliad, the Odyssey, and the Ineed. He's showing them the courage. He's showing them the brains, and he's showing them the heart. Isn't that Achilles Odysseus and Ineus? In many ways, isn't that just an archetypical heart body in mind? Anyways, isn't that just kind of an archetypical heart, body, and mind or heart, you know, you know, the heart and the soul and the mind. Yeah. I mean, so it goes super ego. Yeah, I mean, it could be as simple as that. I mean, you know, you've got your brains, you got your heart, and then you've got your, your will to do good things for people, no matter the consequence, right? That courage, your virtue. Moral courage, virtue.

Yeah, you know, and so I think those things, or those three things are pretty constant things anyway. So, but he is a charlatan, and he, the only person he does actually gives something materially valuable to is Dorothy. He gives her a ride back home, but it just her dog fucks it up. So then, Glinda shows up. So then yeah,

Glinda shows up and she's like, Oh, by the way, you had the secret this whole goddamn time. There's no place like home. Right. No place like home. Yeah. Oh, yeah. No, you could have gone home at any time. You wanted to, but I needed you to, you know, take care of the carry carry carry out the head of my cousin. Finish the genocide because we killed her her sister when you showed when you showed up. Yeah. You know, um, oh my god, Kalinda is the CIA. Oh, so that would make her Alan Foster, Delas, or Alan Delas and the wizard is Dean Foster, Delas.

I like it. Yeah. Yeah. So But yeah, I think no, I don't think that works because the CIA didn't come about until later. Yeah But I don't think it was satirical so much as it was these are props that are easy to see This is a very quick and tidy way to tidy it up The and it is still loyal you've you've read the books. It is still loyal to the book. Oh, yeah. No, it's thematically. They get those things, right? Yeah. And in 1900, you know, a college diploma was a known thing. It was almost talismanic. You know, it made you, it made you of intellectual elite. Exactly. You had a bachelor's degree. Good God.

And L. Frank Baum is married to Maud Gage and Maud had gone to college. And you know, I mean, he's still pulling from the soup, right? So the movie is because it is tied to the book, I think it does have to do those things. So I don't think that it's purposeful satire. Okay. those things. So I don't think that it's purposeful satire. And I don't, and again, look at the shitty, shitty people the directors were. Yeah, well, you know, directors, directors want to screenwriters might be another was a bit second, but yeah, but then they're sticking to the source material. Yeah, such a faithful way. So, yeah so I wish but no, the movie is far too abusive for it to have actually did that on purpose. Yeah, yeah, so anyway, so what what have you gleaned? This is one more aggregate example, because it's multiple examples, but they're all tied up with a nice shitty bow.

It's one big aggregate turd of an example of just how bad the studio system was. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, I mean, I remember hearing stories about, during the silent movie era, early black and white films of people having retinal burns for being on set, beautiful light, and just the condition's sucking nuts. I think it was Lillian Gish. Yeah.

She suffered from frostbite damage on her hand, because she had her hand in freezing water for the entire day. Yeah. Yeah. Just, you know, shitty um shitty awful inhumane conditions And again, Cecil B. Jamel called he wants to know why why he weren't killing any extras What if he's just like sacrificing people to an elder god of

Entertainment or something like yeah, you you know, my best friend in college came up with a fifth chaos god for Warhammer 40K called War Nure. And he came up with, it was back when 40K was kind of the Wild west, you could create your own units and stuff. But like he created a demon unit that was essentially the Tasmanian devil that, you know, world around, randomly around the board, like it would spend. Yeah, Chaos God was a wariner. And, and like, you know, talking about the studio system of like, you know, maybe he actually was on to something.

That was awesome. Um, just the, the, the shit that they did to people and, you know, and, and, you know, we, we recoil now at the stories of, you know, the things that came out during the Me Too movement. Yep. But the thing is, like, well, of course, that shit was happening because this is the system that is the descendant of the studio system, which was so much worse. Yeah, like, I mean, and I don't say that to minimize the shit that women have had to put up within modern Hollywood. But rather to just try to, you know, to say just how literally leethely bad the studio system was. Yeah. And then the studio system gave way to all tours, who pricks in a completely different way. Yeah. You know. And just like, you know,

and the actress who played the Wicked Witch of the West saying, well, you know, I could have sued, but I would have never worked in Hollywood again. It just reminds me of the joke. Yeah, well, yeah. And but it reminds me of the joke about, you know, a pair of stable hands, you know, shoveling out the elephant and closure in the circus. And one of them says, man, why do we keep putting up with this shit? Well, like if we leave, we give up show business. Oh, my God. I don't think you understand the scale of what's going on here. But yeah, I'm not going to be able to watch the Wizard of Oz the same way again.

I'm sorry, because your kids just about the right age. Yeah, well, yeah, he is. And the thing is, I mean, I will be able to sit with him and watch it, but the whole time I'm gonna be looking at Judy Garland going, girl, run. You're right. Right. Oh my God, get the fuck out of there.

Yeah. You know, and I mean, all of those stories are old enough that like individually, like you kind of know them. I remember, I don't remember the stuff about the scarecrow, but I do remember about Buddy Ebsen who's suffering permanent lung scarring. I remember that.

I remember about Judy Garland having a very hard time. The details are worse than I had recalled. Yes. You know, but, you know, and there were all of these horror stories associated with it. But like most of the time you hear about the horror stories separately from each other. Yeah.

And then being confronted with all of them together, like they're happening at the same time. Holy shit. Yeah. You know, um, just yeah, and and, um, the, the last thing, the last thing, is the, the issue with the lighting, having to be so intense because of the technology for tech color. Is an interesting note to me about the way technology advances in a particular way and creates a whole new set of complications and problems.

Yes. And the way that any given technology develops from there is partly going to be determined by the people who have the power to decide what the priorities are in dealing with those problems. Yeah. So like, well, okay, the actor playing this part is wearing literally two lights. It's stitched together. Like, right. Oh my God. Yeah. Which is, as

its own, squick factor just to begin with, but like, you know, we've got them in a pair of line hides and we've stitched up. Right. You know, so we're gonna try to dim the lights when we can, but like, no, for the color process to work, it's gonna have to be 106 on the set all the time. Like, we can't make any lower than that. Right. And that was the selling point.

That was the selling point of the movie. It really was. It was, you know was the shift between Kansas, the Southern, Black, and White, and then we get the Oz and oh my God. And I think that's what bothers me the most about it is that you always have this, well, it's for the art. Yeah.

And we can all share in the art. And it's like, yeah, but it's art built on that much fucking suffering. Yeah. You know, it's, it's, I mean, I did it with the Asa base episode too. Yeah. Like it's there, there is, there is an unwillingness or there's a willingness to sacrifice people's health and comfort and safety and well-being for the sake of art. And I think that that is a problem. And it's and that opens up everyone involved to abuse. Oh yeah. A much more benign version of that is when you don't pay comics and you just tell them, oh, it's a good exposure. Or you don't pay writers and you tell them it's exposure. Yeah, you wouldn't, and any creative when you say, well, you know, this will, this will

provide you with an audience. No fuck you, pay me. Right. Right. No, no, I'm putting in time and effort and work. I deserve. Exactly. Exactly.

For that. You know, and the, the, in that, in that vein, one of the things that I've always taught or always brought up in my World History Club, I seventh grade World History classes, when we get to Japan, we talk about the hay on period. And one of the things that makes the hay on period notable was that an African-American leader named Andre 3000 was actually the shogun. No, no, no, he got them tall. Hey, on. Yeah, well, no, that's actually the, I'm I was trying to, I was trying to come up with a, Oh, he was an Albin Castooler. Yeah, he was, yeah, he got, he got exiled.

Yeah. Um, yeah, so, but what actually did historically happen was the, the, the noble classes of Japan had become almost entirely separated from the commoners who were doing all of the farming and all of the day-to-day work. Right. And they had all of this power because they were landlords and they owned all the property. And the thing is, the hay on era, hay on period, is this incredible literary and artistic

and religious. There's this explosion of art and like the development of no drama. Yeah, the art that they did. Yeah, no fear. Yeah, is absolutely amazing. And the question that you put to the kids is, okay, so the reason this art was kind of possible was because we had an entire class of people who literally did not have to work a day in their lives.

And the question is, is that worth it? You know, right? And, you know, this wasn't a case of like active abuse by those hang on nobles of the people who were doing the working for that art to happen. And the art itself didn't involve, you know, bloodsacrifice, high seas, they'll be to mill. You know, but there was still this concentration of wealth and one group of people who were stuck doing all of the work. And another group of people who were liberated by that to create all of this literature and poetry and everything else. And like,

how, you know, for each student's going to be a different answer, how do you reconcile that? Right. Like, you know, what do we do? Yeah, well, I used to talk about this in my econ class of just like, you know, I beg the question by assuming that capitalism is the norm. But then I have them, you know, kind of work themselves into, well, no, if you can lower cost and blah, blah, blah, blah, and that's the most important thing, because then customers

and they work themselves, they paint themselves into the corner. I said, great, you've just made an argument for why slavery is acceptable. And there's the kids who double down because they know that they're not actually making policy that involves creating slaves and enslaving people. And the kids that double down because they also know that they've been tricked and they don't want to admit it. And then there's the kids who have a conscience and they're just like, what the?

Oh, I was like, yeah, you got done dirty. But you know, it's, yeah, I always, I'm always looking at like, okay, to make this. And I go the other way around too. We watched, we finished watching Miss Marvel, which by the way, is phenomenal. And I know I just dated the show. But we finished watching it.

And what I showed the kids was, we sat just dated the show. But we finished watching it and what I showed the kids was we sat through all the credits and I said, do you realize how many screens of credits we've seen? No, not really. How many? I'm like, I don't know dozens, dozens and on each screen, there's easily 30 or 40 names. I said, think of how many people had a job because somebody created the character of Kamala Khan and it is taken off now. Think of how many jobs that that created, how many, how many, you know, Christmas's that is that's taken care of now. I said, that's what's amazing about creativity is that you can do that. So it's, you know, the other side of that. But now we have far less abusive systems. I say that knowing full well

that I was watching it on the Disney Plus app. And that who knows in 20 years, we'll find out that in fact, there was all kinds of horrible stuff. Like, I mean, we know, we know the business. Yeah, we know the business that Chris Evans had to go through and put himself through. Yeah. Um, and, and stuff like that. So yeah, it's a, it's a good movie, though.

So yeah, classic. Yeah, it is family family, classic family viewing. Uh-huh. Bill Taun. So much of use. So much shitty stuff, which is awful. Would you think about who it was again, who wrote the book? Right.

Like one of the sunniest individuals in American literature. Yes. Like, yes. I'm going to write a book so good for children that we're going to abuse a child to an orderly grade to make it a movie that's so good for children. Well, what's your reading? I'm reading the memoirs of Ulysses S Grant. Oh, cool. I think I've mentioned on a previous episode, but I'm continuing to read them, because there's a lot there.

And it's really remarkable how he wrote them while dying from throat cancer because to read at least where I am in the book right now, to read his prose, you wouldn't think there was anything going on. He is a remarkably good writer. He was a remarkably good writer for somebody who historically has a reputation as being kind of a middling intellect and plotter is a term that's been used. His voice is vital and direct. And yeah, my admiration for him as a figure in American history only continues to grow as I read his accounts of these things. And it's not because he's painting himself as this great hero. It's because one of the things that I find admirable is the amount

of work he goes to to give credit to all of the other officers, whether his superiors or his subordinates the other officers, whether his superiors or his subordinates, that he worked with and who were part of all of these exploits. He is at pains to point out where other people did good. And he does not aerogate glory to himself. He's not writing this as a way to burnish his reputation. He's writing this as a way to tell the story. And hopefully bring in the money to support his family after he dies. You know, but it's not like if McClellan were to write something like this, it would be recrimination on all the people who caused this downfall. And it would be, you know, I was right, and you know, I saved the lives of thousands of union soldiers. Never mind the fact that you could

have ended the fucking war in nine months. You chicken shit bastard. You know, I mean, it just, it would have been a completely different book if it had been a McClellan talking about his experiences, just because they're personalities. And, and so I'm very, again, I just, I continue to admire US grants the more I read of his, of his work. So how about you, now that I've opined about Civil War generals. Oh, Lordy. You know, I've depressed people enough, I think, with the things that we covered today

as well as the... A book and a fuller show that was in 1939. Yeah. So I mean, there's a lot of really wonderful histories of the studio system. And many of them are actually written by historians, which is nice, but I'm not going to direct anybody to them. I think actually what I'm going to say is go and watch the Wizard of Oz. the Wizard of Oz, like check it out, actually watch it and see what pokes through in terms of what we've covered here today, especially. Yeah. But yeah, and then of course recognize what it was built upon.

But I say go watch that. And listen to her singing. Her voice is wonderful and it's remarkably deep for someone so little. Yeah. And like I said, she had a four octave range, which is insane. So yeah, I would say go watch that. Okay. Yeah. Well, cool. Where can people find you on social media? On social media, I can be found at Mr. underscore play lock on the tiki talks. I can be found at eH play lock on Twitter. Um, off top of my head, I believe I'm eH play lock on Instagram as well. And we can be found at Geek History of Time on Twitter. And at Geek History of Time.com on the internet. Obviously, if you're listening to us right here, you've already found the podcast.

And we're on Spotify, not Spotify, I'm sorry, the literature and the iPod app for Apple and Android. I think we're in the Android store too. Okay, sure. Should somebody let us know? Okay. And so that's where you can find us collectively. If they, if you need to correct something, you know,

let us know through one of those channels. And if since you're listening, please take a moment to go into whatever app you're using for podcasts, subscribe. Give us the five stars that you know Damien has earned with the research he did for this and the emotional damage he inflicted on himself by, you know, learning all of these dark truths. And yeah, where can you be found to individually, sir? You know, the best place to find me is on September 9th. This should probably release right around

the week before that, or perhaps today. September 9th, I will be at Luna's sling and puns Luna's slinging puns with my crew, capital punishment, starring the all new member, Justine Lopez. She is joining us, Daniel Homburger has moved on to great things, and we wish him well out in Hawaii. So Justine Lopez has stepped in, and she is going to bring a whole new game to it. So please come out and check us out. Capitol punishment to bring proof of vaccination. I recommend a mask, but bring 10 bucks and get some

food and have a really wonderful time catching our puns. So that's where I'm going to tell people to go for today. All right, sounds good. Cool. Well, for aek History of Time, I'm Damien Harmony. And I'm Ed Blaylock, and until next time, keep rolling 20s.