Pablo Torre Finds Out - Sarah Jessica Parker on the Seductive Power of Sports and the City

Episode Date: June 23, 2026

New York is palpably horny right now. And happy. So we invited the patron saint of sex and this town to chase euphoria, appreciate the romance of the American idea, advise these young Knicks, remember the halcyon days of HBO... and make the case for reading books in the crowd.• Previously on PTFO: Celebrating These Knicks Title Vibes, with Desus Nice• Subscribe to The Athletic Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to Pablo Torre finds out. I am Pablo Torre, and today we're going to find out what this sound is. Well, I think when we all liked Wembe, remember those days? Right after this ad. I realized on the way here, unless I've completely made this up, that we don't really know each other at all. I was going to say, we don't really, we've never met. Correct. We don't know each other, but I, if somebody, which, you know, I told you, I invoke your name all the time. Like, any time I'm in a complicated.

conversation typically about sports, most especially of these last days. I will wield your name, you know. But then I think you don't really, he's not your friend yet. You haven't earned that. I am now going to play hard to get because now I realize that I have the power to give friendship or not in the course of this taping. I should say that at the very beginning of our relationship, of our relationship. I got a voice note. Yeah. And you're a voice note person.

I am. I have never sent voice notes to people. You are the only person. Is that right? We have a voice note-based relationship, and that is a unique dynamic. What do you think of voice notes? If you're Sarah Jessica Parker, you should be using them exactly as you happen. It's my one.

contribution to modernity because I'm not at all conversant with technology. I mean, I use the bare minimum of what a phone can offer. But it's a real point of pride how many people I've taught, not yourself because you would be able to figure out how to send a voice note. But I have taught, like sincerely given a master class, as it were. And it has liberated a lot of people and all types of people. And it's very interesting to hear from those people how it has come to annoy other people in their life. I just know that on Instagram you sent me a voice note and I cursed very loudly and told any number of people that I'm embarrassed to know, admit that I just got a voice note slash memo from Sarah Jessica Parker. Something I really take pride in with PTFO is your

surprise at what any given show is gonna be about. Some days we'll be investigating an endless NBA scandal. Other days will be marking the 10-year anniversary of the assassination of a gorilla by showing you an exclusive, never-before-seen video of that same gorilla, eating its own poop. But today, we're bringing you a person of interest, a patron saint of sorts, whose entry into our cinematic universe here is a surprise to me. Sarah Jessica Parker's collection of Emmys and Golden Globes and all these accolades

does not even begin to describe a five-decade career in public performance, ever since she was a child actor in Hollywood and on Broadway and other such Manhattan sidewalks. You, of course, would know her from her role as a relentlessly fashionable newspaper, columnist named Carrie Bradshaw in Sex of the City, and if you don't know her from that, I guess it is extremely funny that this would be how you're finding out about Sex in the City for the first time. But Sarah Jessica's voiceovers, her narrations on that show, as seen and heard on HBO from the late 90s and into the 2000s. I had a choice. I could run, or I could stand and ask him the question that if I didn't

would haunt me the rest of my life. I thought by the time I got here, I'd know what to say. And? It got to the point where receiving a voice note from that same woman, who, I will note, is happily married to another voiceover Hall of Famer, Matthew Broderick, felt exhilarating to me. And also, to be honest, confusing. You have been so genuinely kind to be from afar as somebody who I did not think would be in the coalition of consumers of this strange show in this studio that we do.

It makes total sense to me. First of all, I want to find out. But I love the kind of work you do, the way I like to receive news and information. And I always have preferred a kind of long form. I like the depth, which is why you just want to really. big prize. Well, it's true because that's the way you approach it and I love it. And then I started seeing you for the first time really joining the news in a much more public-facing way. And then all of a sudden there you were more and more in front of my eyes. So it was really exciting for people like me who admire the kind of work you're doing. You've gotten in on the ground floor before any of these fancy things and prizes. It turns out you were watching me while I was like kind of sleep deprived on Morning Joe and talking about the news and also posting things about sports journalism and the idea that Carrie Fri Friandshaw

would be in our audience. It brought me to this moment where I was like the reason there are many reasons I wanted to have you in studio here today. I mean we'll get to all of them I hope but first and foremost is the fact that you're also a New Yorker in a way that has made me according to whom Well, come on. So what's your take? Do you have to be born in New York to be a New Yorker? Yes. I know everybody wants to claim the city.

No, I know. Everybody wants to claim our city, but you have to be born in New York. You have to be born in one of the five boroughs to be a New Yorker. The J-Lo standard, if we're being real here for a second. Jennifer Lopez is standard. You are. I am. I'm.

You're Marie Hill born and raised, right? That's right. Yeah. That's right. That's right. Been here for 40 years. I don't believe in blood and soil citizenship when it comes to who gets to be a New Yorker. I would like to hear your opinion on this, actually, because you can have the label, but...

Well, I guess it really depends on how you want to identify a New Yorker. My father was born and raised in Brooklyn. When we were little, before we moved to New York City, we would visit New York. And then we would travel home in our Volkswagen bus. and I would get to Clifton, which was this beautiful little neighborhood in which we lived in Cincinnati, and I would say out loud to anybody

who would listen, or perhaps not just, I can't believe we were just in New York City. Like, I can't believe there was just this distance. So when we moved, we moved to New York City on January 1st of 1977, so that is just shy of 50 years ago. So I think of myself as a New Yorker

because I can't claim Cincinnati because that would be fraudulent to me. I've lived a majority of my life, not just adult, but my life here. And this is not about her definition. But I also feel as if it does speak to the broader conversations we're having it in politics and the political body and social body really is contributions. What are the ways in which we're contributing? And I don't mean like, but look at my contributions. But I mean all of us look at the ways in which we're relating to our city, taking from our city, trying to give to our city, wrapping our arms around

the city, being disappointed in the city, frustrated by the city. So I think you have to experience all those things to know what it means to be a New Yorker because it's not sex in the city, which was a very sort of an alternate universe, decadent kind of look at a city at a particular time, economy, politics, sex. So I feel you have to weather all that to say you're a New Yorker. I always say I wasn't born here. But that too is a point. point of pride. The thing about what New York is, by definition, it's the place that welcomes those who are not from the place. It's specifically, that's the story. Yeah. And I think about this a lot with, again, the larger political discourse, but like the cultural discourse around,

are we an idea or are we something that you need to have this blood and soil to claim? It's such a cool thing that you said this word idea because I had to, I didn't have to, but I was speaking to some students this past weekend. You are a doctor. Dr. Sarah, Jessica. I'm an honorary doctor. At Northwestern University. But in trying to fashion my remarks, I was thinking so much about the idea of New York,

but the idea of our country, that the revolution was formed around an idea, like this crazy, great, transcendent idea of liberties. And to this day, 250 years later, we're still wrestling with those. original notions. So New York is that. I love its promise of that. And it has fallen short for so long. Of course. This idea of coming here with a dream and being able to afford an apartment to be a dancer or an artist or an architect or an engineer or a school teacher or a plumber. Like all of that isn't real anymore. But it doesn't mean that we don't want to make it doable here. There's a whole statue about this, I think.

It has to still mean it even if we're constantly coming up. short of it. Because you've now given all the characteristics of what New York can be like, but you've left out the adjective that I think has been most felt during this last glorious couple of weeks. And I think it's an underrated aspect. The city has been horny. Yeah.

That's so great. I wouldn't have thought of that word, but I would have danced around a bunch of words that if you had to look in the the thesaurus, there would be some van diemogram where they would all overlap. Pharomones are out. The level of agitation in the best way, you can't even shake it. It's not like spinning it off and seeing it. Like, I don't want it to go.

I don't want all of us to drop back down to Earth. We're on a run. Like the New York next, all of us in the city are on a run. I saw, you had a guest on, yes. Well. Jesus, yeah, yeah. He was talking about. Stealing the USS Intrepid at one point.

I mean, the way he articulated, I'm embarrassed to say I was unfamiliar with him prior to watching. Oh, he's a huge fan of yours. He'll be delighted that you're saying this. He is so cool. He is so, he's a poet. Yes. He literally created prose. I've never taken drugs or anything, but that's what it seems to me, like a kind of euphoria that you would chase forever.

Like the best version. And that drug. is sports. I was a huge Yankee fan. My whole courtship was pretty much based around baseball. And Barbara Cook, the Carlisle and some other cultural stuff. But our honeymoon was going to try to visit every ballpark in the country. Oh, my God.

And we didn't do it. But I was a Yankees fan, you know, Tino Martinez, Chuck Knop, like that whole group, Paul O'Neill. That's my childhood. The 90s is my... Yes, those Yankees radicalized me. Those Yankees. And Matthew was born pretty much and raised a Mets fan.

His father was a Mets fan. So it was complicated first for him to fall in love with the Yankees. But that team was... You couldn't... It was so seductive. So this team felt like somebody took that and multiplied it... By what? Nothing's like this.

Nothing's like this. trying to do the math on this and I keep on coming to the realization that I've never felt this. Deezis, again, the poet said accurately, this is reverse 9-11. Yeah. And I'm like, yeah. Yeah. And the thing that I, that made me think of you is as the pheromones are swirling and as the city feels alive, it has this whole Carrie Bread Shop monologue voice note lingering over all of it. I mean, inadvertently, like, I'm making puns. I'm doing my own version of what this all means to me. And it is this heightened reality. Yeah. It feels like we're watching and starring in the greatest television show and also everyone is horny. Yeah, I've got it.

I mean, this is why the serious and the silly, love you. But the thing that's also really struck me about what's happened is that everything that I look at connects to it. Things that are seemingly completely unrelated makes me think. of not just the five, but the entirety of the team, because those last two games, we were just seeing the entire bench just in and out. I was thinking about them as all of us were doing when they went home after they lost. You know, what was this going to do to them? How are they? How are they this morning? Did they sleep? Did they eat? Can they eat? Some people can't eat when they're upset, but you need food and fuel for that kind of level of physicality.

So they're always on my minds. And in ways that are important and meaningful and in ways that are silly, like I cannot get over their dop kits. I cannot get over their dop kits. And inside there is what? Speedstick, maybe a good luck charm. That is a point of absolute obsession for me because I've also just never seen that. Like they have redefined all of it. I can't believe the way they dress.

I can't believe the serious. and the professionalism, the way they've talked about these games from the very beginning, there's so much about them. But then I was thinking another day also, anytime anybody says something's difficult now, my answer is immediately, well, if they can win in five, I can do this. It's unfreeking believable what happened. It's unbelievable. And the movement and how brutal it is, it's so freaking brutal I didn't know.

somebody who tends to be this ambassador from the world of sports to political news and other people who are not as steeped in it, the thing I always delight in when I think about this team is how many people have in fact been converted. Yeah, it's amazing. I love that sports like New York is a club in which anyone can be a member. You can be a fan. And having likeable, deeply likable people who also happen to have three of the five biggest comeback wins in the history of the finals in the same series, it's the other version of what New York does to people. And you've experienced this as a New Yorker who's been here for so long, who's been very famous in this city for so long, who has lived in the city. Which is a place that lots of other famous people who have stayed.

Exactly. While other people have run away, it's because what New York can do is eat its young. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The spotlight can melt you or like Superman feeling the rays of Earth's sun, it can make you stronger. Yeah, there's a reason people, no matter how many times that song is played, if you can make it here. You know, it's like, but it is the greatest crucible. It asks the most. It gives the least. And then it gives.

But it's so withholding. Yes. And its expectations are so high. And those are only based on what has happened here or what has been achieved here. And I just want to be clear that I have not been watching the Knicks all season. I'm like so many people. And it's all because of my son James Wilkie, who is devoted every single day, every game. He has far too many jerseys, has spent far too much of his own money and likely hours on those jerseys.

And it was impossible to not fall in love. It's like the best date you've ever been on where everything is revealed. and he is the guy. He is the right guy. You do not just bring him home to your mother or your parents or whomever raised you. You're bringing him very quickly to your friend group. You're showing him off. You take him to the wedding the first weekend. You don't think, is it too soon? And if you put it all together again, it might not work. It's one of those crazy lightning in a I think, is it or not? I think that right now we are living through what feels like this cosmic moment in which suddenly everything that's bad about New York has been turned into a romantic, deeply romantic

opportunity to have lots of new people fall in love with it. And so I don't know if you can do this if the pandemic hadn't happened already. There are a few steps that lead us to this. There was a story being told and there were kind of very specific breadcrumbs that had they not happened, we might not have known how much we needed this because we might not have needed each other. The end of June and July can be a really rough period for sports fans with football still a few months away and basketball and hockey ended.

But this year, we're pretty lucky because not only is there a World Cup, there is a World Cup in our backyard. And so make sure to check out the Athletic Podcast Network to stay up to date on all things related to the World Cup. You can wake up with the Totally Football Show from L.A., then dive deep into the biggest talking point of the day with the Athletic FC podcast. And you can watch the TIFO podcast fool around

on their daily live streams in the afternoon. All shows are free to watch or listen on your favorite podcast platform. I just have to imagine that as someone who has lived in New York City and managed being famous in New York City and recognizable and the type of person that people want to stop, and they share their...

whole preconceived baggage with you. Yes. Tell me what your strategy is, and I want to see if there are lessons for the Nix in figuring out how do you be famous in this city? I think one of the reasons that we all feel a lot of joy for this team is because we're not worried about them. They don't show any signs of not being fully equipped for this moment. To me, when I hear all of them talk, whether they're being silly or serious, they all have these family ties that are consequential that are a part of this moment with them. So I feel like they're tethered. They're both levitating and tethered at the same time. And that could not, in my opinion, put them in a better

position to reap all the benefits of this. And I sort of feel that this group of men are equipped and capable. And the stuff that will be new, they'll have to figure that out. How do you handle selfies? I know, I'm very bad at cell. I've never taken a selfie in my life. I've never done one, never taken a selfie. I'm very bad at it. I always prefer that we chat. But I always say to somebody, if we have a second to chat for a minute,

I remember you for the rest of my life. And when I run into you again, I'm going to say, how's your aunt doing? You know, how did you do on that test? You know, did you have that trip that you wanted to do? How was your wedding? You know, but I think for them, they're much more conversant in that and that, because they do it and they know how to do it and they can do it quickly and move.

I just feel that they don't need advice from me or from anybody. What they need is our support. And my great hope is that the council they're getting is telling them all come back. Don't leave New York. Please don't leave New York. And that's what I want to ask you. I'm not leaving the studio without getting your thoughts

on all of the contracts because I've been through it with professionals and I've gone down and know how much every single person makes. So I do want to get to that before you kick me out. I think it's doable. I think they can keep this together.

I was worried that we wouldn't be able to keep them that this wouldn't exist next year that we're going to lose some of them. This is what the drug is like, by the way. Suddenly you're worried about what's going to happen in 2028 with Ariel Huckporti.

It's just like, Jesus Christ. It does not end. And that is yet another difference between Broadway and the NBA. Yeah. Is that when you watch a play, you are also thinking about the plays five years from now. Right.

That is a nice distinction. Can you remind us, though, what it was like in 1998 when, look, HBO, I should remind people, when Sex and the City came on the air in 1998, and I was 13 years old. Oh, my goodness. HBO was dude stuff. It was HBO sports.

It was boxing. And so the idea of you becoming this supernova at that moment in the sort of like long chart of what media and television was like. 98, do you look back on that nostalgically? Yeah. Oh, yeah. All of us do. For lots of reasons that are related and unrelated to the experience of the show. And New York was not a city of justice.

It was in one of those kind of halcyon periods of there was a lot of money. and post-Go-Go-80s and some literature that was describing it in really interesting ways, modern contemporary literature. But it was still a city where actors and artists moved. They could share an apartment with two or three people at most. And what populated the streets was more singular than it became. We didn't have tons of big box stores. We had family-owned businesses. You know this well, even if you were 13, you could imagine.

and things look much more like Lexington. You know how Lexington has somehow maintained it's, I love, I worship Lexington. Because I think it's, I don't know what. Like the Avenue, yeah. Yeah, Lexington Avenue, because it's got all, it's a lot of family-run businesses. And New York looked much more like that.

And I had like a kind of dynamism that went away. But then in terms of the show, you know, we were very liberated because on the streets, because for the whole first season, we weren't on the air. We were just shooting, just shooting everywhere, doing whatever we needed and wanted to do. And we had a network that had such a healthy ego that it didn't matter that there was no point of reference.

So we were just, these scripts were being written. They really weren't like anything else. There wasn't a point of reference that we could look to for security or for warnings or cautionary tales. You became the template, you became the reference point for all these other shows that came after. And it was a great studio to let that be the case. And most of us didn't have kids yet. We were young or unattached or dating. Like I could shoot 18, 20-hour days for months and months and months and feel nothing, no guilt, like it was where I wanted to be. And it was a really fun and exciting time. And it felt a little bit like a pioneer. You were shot on film, you know, rolling big kids. cameras down the streets, big, like, Kleg likes, like proper movie lights.

Around the city of New York. Around the city, over potholes. One of the great things is always to see one of the almost like the multicolored, like, flyers that are saying, this is shooting right now. And you hope that's sex in the city. I hope it's law and order. I was one of the ones that I know. But it was a great, it was a great time in the city.

And everything I've read about you is that you did not and will not watch sex in the city. I don't watch anything I'm in. Anything. Anything. Why not? No movies, no nothing. That's why I love theater. I think it's just, you know, for me it's not helpful.

You know, when the Spurs were in timeouts, et cetera, there were these three fellows lined up behind them with computers. They're shouting at stuff, shouting to them, and it's clearly about plays and strategy and things like that. My colleague, Cynthia Nixon, is so good at looking at the work and having it be productive and helpful. For me, it will never be. as good as I want it to be ever. It will never achieve what I did in my bedroom learning lines.

Like, I was better in the shower. I was better in the van. And Cynthia can look at the work and say, oh, I want to do that differently tomorrow or, yeah, that was good. Like, she can look at Daley and say they were really good. And that's a healthy relationship with that. But mine has been healthy for me because it's just simply the way I've worked. I did a series 100 years ago called Square Pegs, and I had never really worked on film in this fast pace. I'd done movies as a little girl, and I was invited to watch Dailies,

which I'd never been invited to. And one day, you know, we were in school, so they'd call us from the studio school, and we'd run back to the set, and I'd jump on my mark and say my lines, and then I saw it back, and I was horrified by what I saw. I was like,

you don't you shouldn't be here yet you're not ready and so i think from that day on when i saw that i wasn't happy i was like you're not going to be someone that's going to get something good out of watching yourself so i haven't it's hard to argue when you put it like that if the whole thing is like my performance is better i am happier my quality of life is improved if i'm not stuck in my own head yeah because all you have to do and the same with these athletes you know you see it all the time and I'm sure you're in game three and you see it on stage it's very evident on stage as you can tell when somebody's in their head and you just are desperate to get to a Saturday matinee. Nothing is better than a Saturday matinee and that's what I was thinking in game three.

I was like guys get to the part of the season can you do that? And it's a huge amount to ask because the stakes have never been higher for them and the stakes are never higher when you're in previews and the critics are coming or when the camera's rolling like the stakes are really high. There's a lot of money at stake. There's professional lives that have invested in you and time. All of it feels really important to me. And that's the same for these athletes.

We're asking them to be in the zone constantly. That's what makes this story so amazing about the next is that it was humans that did it. It was humans that overcame, fought against, fought back, came back. Like all of the human stuff with all this chatter about, All the things that technology and digital life is about... This is the context for people. Yes, being refreshed by the triumph of mortality.

And how deeply it cuts and feels and is and satisfies. It brings me to the question of Celebrity Now versus Celebrity in 98. Wow. I think it was George Clooney who said it. I'm lucky that the advent of camera phones happened when I was 43. And of course, the equivalent of tabloid coverage and paparazzi photographs and all of that is... Although, do you feel paparazzi is sort of... I think that the cell phone has basically come for all of it.

Yeah. And I'm wondering, is there nostalgia for you as a New York-based person who has to navigate? What am I doing in public? Who's seeing me? How am I being seen? Yeah, except then you're never out. I'm going to leave the studio. I'm going to go walk up the street because I happen,

I can early vote, and my early voting place is literally up the street from here. And I'll walk there and I'll jump on a train to run some errands on behalf of my daughters. And I don't want to miss out on all those advantages that city life gives you, which is, A, getting to look in someone's eyes and know why they're happy because of the next. Like, you miss all of that if you are cloistered and afraid of, what you might bump into. Right. And that someone might recognize you, and they do.

And you just say, hello, and you say I'm running, or you say, I'm on the phone, I'm so sorry. Headphones on. And sometimes I am, sometimes I'm not. Sometimes I'm listening to you. And if you want to live in a city, if you want to be, like, I just love cities. When I travel, everyone's like, go to the beach.

I'm like, no, I want to go to São Paulo. I want to go to the city. I want to go. South Paulo's a crazy skyline. It's. I was there for the World Cup in 2014. As a New Yorker, I was just astonished at how much bigger even their skyline felt. Isn't it incredible?

But it's like a city that's like super vibrant. And so for me, if I remove myself, then I'm like, why am I here? Then I don't get any of it. I take the train everywhere. I take the train out east. I get on the cannonball when I can. You know, you fight for a seat. Like, it's so great.

It is so. great. My daughter had two wheels stolen on her bicycle yesterday. You know, she'd have to chained up two days too many, probably, or four days to... It's okay. This is like a right of passage. Matthew's like, yep, this is what happens,

and now you know what to do, and now you know where to go, and the guy down the street, and then she's like, do I sell the bike for parts? Do I... You know, these are like... You can't do it if you don't give yourself the chance to live it. Like, you can't have it. You can't have it.

You can't have it. have it. And everybody's tuning in all over the world because they know that we're tasting this thing that no one else can taste. Yes, the possibility that anything can happen. Yeah. And that's the upside. It's also the downside. When you're on a subway car, it's like, why is a subway car empty? It's like, oh, someone just took a shit here. Yeah, yeah. Like that also is possible. Yeah, or vomits on you or says something that scares you. But, but, you're not. But, you're not, you. But, you're But also, too, I feel like my kids are really prepared in a lot of ways because they will come home and tell me what they experienced. In one daughter in particular, she's like, why am I always on that car?

Why is it always me like, why am I on that car all the time? But you know, you know what to do? You get out, or you move to the doors. Yes. You go, when I was really young and I first moved to New York and I had to travel alone, I was like 12, I think, really short. didn't weigh anything. And I had to get back up to Dobbs Ferry from Grand Central. And I thought, oh, you know what I'm going to do? Because they were all, the businessmen were all traveling back up on the Metro North too. I'll just go stand by one of them and they won't know, but I'm going to look at

one of them like they're my dad. So if anybody sees me, I'll be looking up with this man, like the way a child looks at a father. You develop all these coping mechanisms when you're in a city. That is a child actor. That is almost definitionally what a child actor's commute would be like. I am protecting myself by pretending that I am their child. But you developed it too. Yeah. You found all these ways to navigate the city, get through, pay the fair, don't pay the fair, use your pass from school on a weekend.

My favorite thing remains, like, just walking through the city. It's fast. And that's the thing of like what's different about this place is that I think there is something too, by the way. I'm curious how you feel about this. Because on some level, of course, there is a greater risk of being stopped

and bothered and selfieed and all that stuff. But there's also, I think, something to the idea, especially before cell phones, where New York also knows when to not freak out. Yeah. So many people on the subway are like, you know.

And that's the coolest thing. The coolest thing is that when people signal, like I... Especially at a crowded train, like on the one, it happens a lot to me on the one at busier times when you're really like, you know, that thing. Like, you're in someone's armpit and then there's another. It's unbelievable. But I love it so much. But that is when a lot of, I'll have a lot of those exchanges where someone's quiet or leans into me and they're like, I see you, I know you, I was raised on you. or, you know, you got me through a tough time

or whatever it is. But I couldn't have those exchanges if I live differently and not saying that it's better. It's just what I like. Yeah, because we're all crammed against each other and it feels like, yes, the coldness. I mean, this is the whole thing

on the spectrum of like the coldness of New York is also, when it's warm, it feels like it's never been warmer. Yeah. It's because you know that New York can be very indoors and also extraordinarily outdoors. You can not know your neighbors that you lived on the same floor with for four years.

And then you could be out on the street, again, celebrating a championship in a way that suddenly makes you feel closer than you've ever felt to a person before. I have to tell you, I put up a little free library. Oh, yeah. My daughter loves to stop at any given little free library. You're not near me, though, right? No, but now that we know that there are free books. But a lot of times I don't have to replenish it because the whole neighborhood does.

It's unbelievable. And bookstore down the street came like the day. that I put it up and came and dropped them out and said, can we leave all of our extra books here? I was like, sometimes I'll see someone and I'll say, I'm about to bring more books out. Don't go. I've got some really good books and I'll bring them out. And then people talk to me. And people have met through my little library. They've gone on dates. They've made best friends. A dog walker told me a story of meeting somebody that now they have drinks together. And I'm like, oh, that just happened because you were walking down the street and then you started

talking because we weren't in our cars. Getting from A to B, we had to step aside, move around during the snow all this winter. I couldn't believe the amount of exchanges that were happening. But it was like so cool to have to see a grumpy person, you know, mad about the sidewalk and then catch their eye and do a thing. And then they get a little smile from them. And then you see them Tuesday and you're like, it's us again. Yes.

It's us again. Now we know each other. So in Sexing the City, of course, you are playing a character inspired by a columnist from the New York Observer. Candice Bushnell. And there's that part of it. But your love of books as well in terms of just like the written word, it takes me to one of my favorite sports photographs. And I maybe think you know what I'm referring to, but it's March of 2015. and you have brought one of your books to the Ranger game. Yeah, I think that was a book about a ballet dancer. That book is written by a great writer, a woman.

Maggie Shipston. Yes, Maggie Shipstead, who's gone on to great acclaim and included in consideration for some of the most important literary awards, like literally in the world. And this was a story about a ballet dancer. And I was at that game. That was a hockey game. It was a Rangers game with my son and maybe one other person.

And that's the young Hanks fellow. Yes, that is Chet Hayes slash Hanks. Okay. Noted Jamaican. Yeah. Oh, that's right. Yes, that's right. I thought, that seemed like the perfect place to read.

Do you not think so? Your feet are up and you are loving this book. You are ear-to-ear grinning. I might be laughing at something my son said. It's very possible. But I was happy. Like, to me, that's the perfect combination. Because you're going to take the book to read on

subway to get to the place. And there are slow innings in baseball. There are things where nothing happens. And it's not like you can't look up. Well, the reality of what you are doing is you have. But this is the defense I have of the subway take. Books should be allowed at sporting events is that you're going to be on your phone. Yeah. So the idea that you're engaging with, I have a book here that I'm going to web out in the action on the ice. is slow when there's a timeout or something. Or halftime. Yeah. I think the question is, are you performing reading or are you actually reading? No, I'm really reading, yeah. And in fact, I have a book right here. I was reading while you were still working someplace else.

And your love of books, it's a funny place to bring a sports show back around because one of the people that I reached out to who I happen to know in the small little world that is our planet it is Maggie Shippstead, who agreed to leave for you this voice note. Hey, Pablo, it's Maggie Shippstead. I am so happy to hear you talking to Sarah Jessica Parker, and please thank her from me for providing one of the all-time, most serendipitous and delightful book moments I've had in my career. I remember you were waking up that morning in 2015,

and having a text from a friend with a link to the photos saying, Have you seen this? I had not, you know, and I kind of built and built over the day. I kept getting Google alerts from websites out otherwise never be on like Us Weekly and Fox Sports. And I mean, part of the charm is that she's reading my book and exactly the way you dream of someone reading your book. Like she's laughing in one photo and in another she's kind of saucer-eyed, like hopefully with suspense. Authors call it seeing your book in the wild and this was just the ultimate a sighting of books in the wild and an iconic moment for people like myself who maybe read at sporting events sometimes. And what I couldn't have anticipated was that it would just live on and on,

like probably two or three times a year, a sort of clickbaity social media account will repost one of the photos, especially after big sports events. So people are kind of like, can you believe that Sarah Jessica Parker was reading at the 2024 NBA finals or Super Bowl or something and people send it to me saying, oh my God, have you seen this? And I always sort of say like, yep, it's, it's 11 years old at this point. So anyway, have a great conversation and all the best to both of you. I love her. She really has an incredible career. She has written three books. I've read all of them since then. Her books have been massively successful, critically, but also in terms of the kind of attention they've received.

It's been thrilling. Great Circle, Astonish Me, Seeing Arrangements. I just love the idea that you bringing a book to a sporting event has also inspired book clubs potentially to want to read. Well, I think when we all liked Wembe, remember those days? Yeah. The early days. But he has a book group on the Spurs. So I was like, he's got a book group.

He's a reader. He's always got a book with him. But that couldn't eclipse. Even a book club couldn't eclipse the action, the decisions on the court. Gosh, man, oh, man. It has occurred to me as I was revisiting as the younger brother to an older sister. And a person grew up in the 90s. It occurred to me that like insects in the city, sports does come up.

Various times. You dated at one point a New York Yankee. Yeah. Yeah. I think I throw up in his mouth. Yeah. Yeah. And that's just from memory, not from seeing it.

No, I think that's right. I think that's right. Of course, Miranda, the aforementioned Cynthia Nixon, Steve, just an all-time. Massive sports. iconic basketball fan. Right. He had the half-court shot.

That whole episode. Miranda was also sleeping at one point with her neighbor, who was the next team doctor. Oh, that's right. Right. I forgot that. The cheerleader subplot when she was jealous. Wait, is he flirting in the cheerleader? And then no, in fact.

I feel like, see, I never remember the plot as well as everybody else because I haven't seen them. Rand also separately dated a guy in L.A. who refused to take his next hat off. Is that right? Yeah, played by a friend of the show Sam Cedar, which is just funny. Oh, wow. That's Sam Cedar. Wow. Sameder. Majority Report Sam Cedar.

Yeah, majority report. Sam Cedar. Wow. Air America, Sam Cedar. Yes, that's right. That's right. He was also on your show, which is, again, in the way. in the way that I hope that everybody who goes through Hollywood at some point is a bit character.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Definitely. And then, of course, the iconic and I think self-explanatory plot of the guy who wouldn't have sex with Samantha unless the Nix won. Right. And then Carrie has a line which has been sent to me. Excuse me, but why is that on and who is Marcus?

Marcus Camby nix forward. Now that Ewing's been injured, he really needs to pull it out. And when did we start? caring about basketball? Don is obsessed. I don't get laid unless the Knicks win. And can I just say, they and I have been on a very long losing streak. Well, that's awful. No kidding. The Knicks are the only ones that are we getting screwed right now. Come on, you f***ards. Why are you staying with him? Because the sex, I can remember, it was unbelievable. Yes! Yes! I gotta go. Go, go. Have sex. Go. Yeah, I'm glad that they were worked into the script

so we don't look like complete, you know, bandwagon jumpers. I was going to say, if nothing else, what you are responsible for, what this show is responsible for, is the horniness that I have previously described. It is a coaching tree, a lineage, an heirloom, a tradition that you can trace. A chalice presented to us by the patron saint of sex and this city.

And the city. Wow. It's amazing that you put it all together. You wrapped that in an unbelievable bow that I was not expecting, though I should have, knowing what I know about you. Mostly really enjoying the fact that we have now become friends. Yeah, man. So it's official? I was going to say, it was teeth at the beginning.

We paid it off at the end. My friend, Sarah Jessica. Oh, my gosh. It is a delight to be at the table. with someone whose voice has traveled from my puberty to my cell phone and now to real life, the best version. Thank you, Bobel. Such a big admirer, as you know, and I'll keep repeating it, and I'll keep leaving

you messages, and I'll keep waiting to hear what you're going to share and what you've been working on. And it's always a surprise because that's the secret sauce of great investigative journalism is we don't know what people are working on. We know the stories of the day. and then some extraordinary story unfolds in front of us, and I live for it. I dare say, and this is a bit of a tease to end this episode,

I dare say that we may have a role for you in an upcoming episode. I dare say I've heard that rumor. Source is closest situation. Source is not revealed. Throw me in the clinker. I'm not revealing my source. This has been Pablo Torre finds out. media production.

And I'll talk to you next time.