Jono, Ben & Megan - The Podcast - Jeff Bezos' $500m foam party: We’re Live from New York with the Latest

Episode Date: June 26, 2025

This week we dive into the lavish, sweltering and wicked. First up: Jeff Bezos makes headlines with his $500 million yacht party ahead of his wedding in Venice. Meanwhile, Florida is turning up the heat - literally. A brutal heatwave has temperatures soaring to a record-breaking 103 103°F. Wicked fans rejoice! Cynthia Erivo is dropping new details about the upcoming movie, and it’s pure magic.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The John O'Bannon Megan podcast, thanks to HelloFresh, your home advantage for delicious midweek dinners everyone will love. Every week we like to catch up with our entertainment reporter, our New York correspondent, Nicole Ryan. Nicole, how are you? You know, I'm okay because I am currently inside. I don't know if you've heard, but there is a heat wave here and I feel like I'm currently sitting on the equator. So what are we talking? You're in New York city right now. We can see you on zoom. You're wearing a summer summer type of tie where, you know, yeah.

And so what are we talking? You got the whole Fahrenheit Celsius thing. What are we talking Fahrenheit? And we'll try and work it out. You guys are going to have to figure it out for me because I don't know how to do it. Look at Megan is getting it already on the computer. So today it was in the 90s tomorrow it's supposed to reach a hundred and three. A hundred and three Fahrenheit. 39 degrees! Whoa! Far out! And I don't know I don't know if in the time that we've become friends

you've got this about me but I don't do well in the heat. I am hot when it's not hot. I grew up like in upstate New York where there was blizzards all the time in snow and my dad had the air conditioning on then. So in this weather, I wanna die. I actually want to die. Okay. Cause I remember like going to New York

and going down into the subways and this wasn't in summertime or anything, but just the heat wave that you feel going underground and that's just a normal day. What is it like now? It must be sweltering. It's really, really bad. And I think when I fell asleep, unless I had one too many drinks this weekend, that my husband said that there was a state of emergency that they were bringing.

Because you think about people who are in lower income housing and might not have hair conditioning or people who are homeless. this is very dangerous to be outside. Like they sent the kids to school today because somehow we're not done yet. And they did nothing because they were just like, we want you kids to stay in the air. They watched movies. They watched movies in school today because it's so hot. So you need to come to New Zealand. Middle of summer, we would get around 80 Fahrenheit on a good day.

That's about as hot as it really gets on average. Yeah, that's lovely. But yeah, that's not what it is. And listen, I mean, I love the warm weather. I love summertime. But this is like, I mean, what is this? Yeah, this is not livable. It's not sustainable.

Well, now we're talking to Jeff Bezos, obviously a very wealthy individual, Amazon founder as well. Now he's getting married at the moment and as you would expect, it's probably not a, you know, bring some booze and pay your own way sort of thing. It's pretty lavish. Could you imagine just being a fly in the wall at that wedding?

Oh my god, I don't think I'd have anything to wear. Have you seen, so apparently there's like three themed parties before the actual wedding. So one of them happened at the weekend. It was like a foam party. Have you seen, I'm pretty sure it's him and yeah, dressed up in their togs. There's something very gross, gross about foam parties. They do do them on yachts. Like I feel like them like down in like in New York city, they'll do them sometimes like at like a club, like at a rave maybe.

Yeah. But like it also is super childish and gross. Like, I mean, it's like, it's like, I don't know. It feels like you're, it's already gross and you're like swapping like sweat a little bit when you're like dancing and getting all crazy. Like I don't need, I don't want, I'm not bathing with you. I don't, I don't like it. Taki.

It was the word that came to mind for me. I was like, Oh, that's tacky. You're in beautiful Venus and you're having a phone party. I was like, it. Taki. It was the word that came to mind for me. I was like, oh, that's tacky. You're in beautiful Venice and you're having a phone party? I was like, oh, come on. For a Jeff Bezos, that's like any old day, right? He probably wants to do things he wouldn't normally do. He can fly anywhere, yacht anywhere.

So Venice is probably like, oh, I've been here like 15 million times. And a pajama party as well where everyone had to bring pajamas. So I was like, well,, and a pajama party as well, where everyone had to bring, bring pajamas. So they, I was like, wow, is this a child's party? You guys watch below deck. Yes. Yeah.

Every day. There's a Kiwi guy going on. Is there? Yeah. Uh, there's, there's many versions of the show around the world, right? Uh, yeah. Well, I feel like often when I've watched here, they'll have like somebody charters a yacht and they're like, one night we wanna have

this kind of party. And often they'll say, we wanna have a pajama party and they turn it into that and it's kind of a theme. Again, kind of childish, a little bit tacky, but I guess I prefer that over the foam, right? Yeah. But I don't know, also I don't know if I need to see like people that are rich like that in their PJs,

like in footy zip footy pajamas like. Jono, Ben and Megan. The podcast. The Hats. We like to catch up with Nicole. She hosts a radio show in New York, goes right around the country. She's our entertainment reporter.

Last year Megan Wicket was probably one of the biggest movies in the world right now. This song. Huge and of course it was only part one of the two part. They split it into two so we've got another one coming out. Yeah and Nicole joins us right now. We want to talk Wicked at the start. You're always having amazing stars in the studio Nicole. Well actually there was something else you did that was pretty impressive recently. You had one of the stars Wicked on your radio show.

Oh my gosh. And you know what was so crazy. All I cared about was her nails. She sat down. We started the interview. If you have seen the Wicked movie, Cynthia Erivo. Yeah. Yes. And she was an absolute doll. I thought she was going to be a little bit like obviously you saw her during press with Ariana Grande when Wicked was first coming out and she seemed like she was great, very engaged. But I don't know. She's like a Broadway girl, like an OG Broadway girl. So I thought maybe she'd be a was great, very engaged, but I don't know. She's like a Broadway girl, like an OG Broadway girl. So I thought maybe she'd be a little quiet, a little bit more reserved. Cause we're kind of like, like you guys, like cookie pop in the morning.

And she rose to the occasion and she was so lovely and so cool. And she like played along with us. And I was like, I want you to be my friend again, probably not going to happen. Well, the, the, the second part of the wicked movie is going to be massive at the end of this year, right? Did she give you an A&T? So November 25th, I think around then is when we can expect the second part. And the trailer, there's a little bit of Dorothy in there as well, which is quite exciting to tie the whole thing together.

She said they just rapped all of the second soundtrack. And what's cool is, I don't know if you heard this, but you probably have that they all have like original songs in the second part, which is very cool. So Ariana has an original song. Cynthia has an original song. They worked that in, which will be kind of cool for them to to make that happen. Yeah, she was just lovely. That makes a lot of sense because I love the first movie, saw the stage show on Broadway Wicked when I was there, but the movie, which is just half of the story was longer than the full stage production of the, in Broadway.

That somehow managed to, that makes sense now they've got new songs they're adding to the second part. Yeah. Yeah. It was, it was really cool. And also we were kind of like, you're in New York right now. Cause obviously she's been like flying all over the place cause she was promoting her album at the time.

Um, and you know what she was doing after she left, like she was going to finish all her press, then she was promoting her album at the time. And you know what she was doing after she left? Like she was gonna finish all her press, then she was gonna go back to her hotel and then she was going to a Broadway show by herself. I was like, what? She was like, yeah, I love seeing Broadway by myself. I was like, nobody's gonna bother you. She said there's a certain like vibe,

like a certain like etiquette people know, like they're respectful. When you go to Broadway in New York City and if you see like a Broadway star, you kind of like, you respect them. And she went all by herself. It's not like you wouldn't know who that was. Yeah.

Well, especially Broadway crowd. That's incredible. Just quickly before we let you go, Nicole, are we giving away a prize at the moment for people to go experience Florida? Five nights, thanks to the movie, How to Train Your Dragon. Florida, you must've been there many times. Now all my family's down there, my uncles, my aunts, my cousins, my grandparents, they're all from Florida,

so I've been down there. They march to the beat of their own drum, is all I have to say. The weather's lovely, but they're almost like their own little country, Florida. And one thing you'd need to do if you went to Florida, these people, what would one thing you'd recommend? Oh, I think it's cool to go to Miami and go down to Collins just like, just

because it's, it's like iconic. You see it in a lot of movies. There's all these amazing restaurants and it look, you'll be down, you'll be there. And you'd be like, Oh my God, I feel like I'm on a movie set. Collins Avenue is very, very cool. If you go down to Miami. What about watching a rocket takeoff? That's what I would like to do.

Oh yes. I don't believe that's something I've ever done, but I mean, Hey, still got that bucket list going. They've got amazing air and space museum there. Yeah. Yeah. The whole thing. Yeah. Cape Canaveral and stuff. No, I wasn't joking. You laughed. I'm like a real space nerd. I'd love to watch a rocket take off. Oh, I forgot about that. I forgot that you're like that. I love, yeah. Space. I'd go by myself. That's fine. That's fine guys. That's fine. One last thing. They're very, very slow in Florida.

Like don't go into like a restaurant or like a Dunkin' Donuts or anything and expect anybody to move with any gusto. So it's like it happens in warm places. Everyone's in their own time. I guess it's a relaxed vibe, right? Yeah. It's like island time, but Florida's not an island. So speed it up, buddy. I can imagine for someone from New York like yourself, you're like, come on, we just got to get going.

Oh, it's a nightmare. My husband almost like punched someone in the face last time we were there. He was like, will you just pour my coffee? Nicole, we love catching up with you. We really appreciate you joining us every week and talking entertainment and a whole lot more. We'll catch up with you next week. All right.

Have a good one, guys.