The Bechdel Cast - Reality Bites with Bridget Todd

Episode Date: November 3, 2022

90s friends Jamie, Caitlin, and special guest Bridget Todd make a documentary and chat about Reality Bites. (This episode contains spoilers) For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast Follow @BridgetMarie on Twitter. While you're there, you should also follow @BechdelCast, @caitlindurante, and @jamieloftusHELPSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Oh, look at you giving me therapy, girl. Listen to Basket Case every Tuesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On the Bechdelcast, the questions asked if movies have women in them. Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands, or do they have individualism? The patriarchy's effing vast start changing it with the bechdel cast hey jamie hey caitlin my sharona is playing hey turn it up and let's dance caitlin did you know that my sharona is a song about an underage girl i did not know that like extremely underage like 13 yikes well well welcome to the

bechtel cast that was my that's one of my favorite bubbles to burst not because i mean but that was something i learned while i was making lolita podcast because i was just making a super list of popular songs that are actually about exploiting young women yeah and my sharona is i mean look if you want to pause the podcast and take a gander at the lyrics be my guest but it is uh it is a rough road my my dad that was one of my dad's favorite songs and i was like dad you gotta you gotta take a peep at these lyrics. And he was like, oh, my. Oh, my. Oh, no. Now, look, this is just a sampling of one of the elements of culture that maybe don't age very well. Welcome to the Bexel cast.

My name is Jamie Loftus. And my name is Caitlin Durante. And this is a podcast where basically we take media that you love and point out everything that's wrong with it from an intersectional feminist lens. I think that's a little harsh. We take a look at it from an intersectional feminist lens. We're not a part of the ruin everything culture. We take a look at things. That just happens sometimes as a byproduct of what we do because a lot of things kind of just ruined themselves i guess so is that fair to say anyway um so we use the bechdel test as a jumping off point to initiate a larger conversation and the bechdel test of course is a media metric created by queer

cartoonist allison bechdel sometimes called the bechdel wallWallace test, originally conceived as a just kind of one-off joke in a comic by Alison Bechdel called Dykes to Watch Out For, and has since been kind of repurposed as this media metric. There are many versions of it. The one that we use requires that two people of a marginalized gender who have names must speak to each other and their conversation has to be about something other than a man and ideally it's a narratively meaningful conversation oh yeah oh yeah and today we have a long time request with a much beloved guest so let's get to it we're covering reality bites 1994 directed by one Ben Stiller, written by one Helen Childress? Childress?

Don't know. Sure. Don't know. And we'll never know. And that's on internalized misogyny. Yeah, we know how to pronounce Ben Stiller's name. Makes you think. Okay.

So let's get our wonderful returning guest in here. Indeed. She is the host of the podcast. There Are No Girls on the Internet. She's the host of the new podcast, Internet Hate Machine, on Cool Zone Media. Check it out. And you remember her from our episode on Eve's Bayou. It's Bridget Todd. Oh, I'm so excited to be here.

Thank you for having me. Thank you for bringing us reality bites i'm very excited to excited to discuss us us us this movie um that you have brought us i feel like this movie is very often held up as like this is the gen x movie which as many you you know, and we can bitch all day about Gen X and we will, but I will say it must suck as a generation to be told like, this is you, whether you like it or not. Like, I don't think that millennials really have a movie that is like made, like this is your defining thing.

I think I would resent it on uh i would just resent it automatically so yeah to our gen x listeners um whether you like this movie or or not i think it's just i feel like it's the only generation i know of that is like there's one movie about gen x and it involves one of the most toxic relationships i've ever seen committed to film. You're just like, oh, brother. That said, I'm excited to discuss this movie. There were elements of it I liked very much. So Bridget, to kick us off, what is your history with Reality Bites? Oh, I have a long history with this movie. That's why I suggested it. I loved it when I first saw it. I saw it as a young person. Maybe I saw it in high school. I even had the soundtrack that I bought from The Salvation Army, which the soundtrack slaps.

It's an iconic soundtrack. It really is. Yeah, I loved it. And I also think it was a movie that when I was young in the suburbs, I thought, when I'm an adult, my life's going to be like this. It's going to be cool, creative young people hanging around in a group house, smoking weed out of cans and quibbling with each other. It really presented a life that I found aspirational at the time.

Sure. And it's funny because watching it now, I'm like, thank God that wasn't my life. Yeah, not a great fate, as it turns out yeah Jamie what is your relationship and history with this movie um I don't have much of a history with it I had never seen it before it never really never came across my desk as a youth sure I have worked with one of the producers of this movie before Stacy Schur she's really really awesome so I'm coming in a little bit biased here because I just think that she's like championed so many movies that center women and queer stories and like she's done a lot of really really cool

work but I'd never actually like sat with this movie before and watched it and honestly I was coming in thinking maybe I wouldn't like it very much at all. They're definitely like, I mean, I think that this movie like I didn't know much about the history. I didn't know it was like written by a young woman that is like very much pulling from her own experience, which I think is really cool. And especially in 1994 would have been super rare yeah and then just like I don't know I mean my main issue with this movie which I'm sure we'll be talking about is it's like hyper focus on this shitty relationship that I mean and amongst other things but it felt like there were a lot of things this that this movie was commenting on that even

when characters suck they sucked contextually in a way that felt like there's a lot of satire and a lot of commentary on like why people are making the choices they are. Like no characters go completely uncriticized by the movie, except for like this relationship that I just am like, oh. But I'm very excited to talk about it I feel like there's a lot of um it it resonated more than I was expecting it to for me Caitlin what is your history with Reality Bites I honestly am not sure if I had seen it before because there were parts that were very familiar to me. The Mai Sharona scene in particular, I... That scene is really fun. It is.

But what I remember even more than them dancing to that song was the line where they're like, Avion is naive spelled backwards. I don't know why. The most corny Gen X line ever. Why did I remember that so much? I'm not sure. I think there's a very real possibility that I had only ever seen that scene probably from that movie trivia game, Seen It. Oh my god. And that's just why I remember. Seen It, that's the

millennials true movie. Oh yeah. Oh, you just unlocked a memory for me of how much I love seeing it. And I haven't played it in years. Seeing it kind of rules. Yeah. Oh yeah. That's so much cultural osmosis. Maybe that, maybe I had seen that scene that way too.

Also, this is like Janine Garofalo being, I was like, that's the true harbinger of, of a Gen X classic is like Janine Garofalo in a supporting role. Done. Oh, yeah. We've done it.

That's how you know. Yeah. But yeah, the rest of the movie wasn't super familiar to me. So I think I hadn't actually seen the whole thing. And it was just that scene in the gas station that I saw and then thought I had seen the whole movie. Not really sure so yeah uh not super familiar with this movie but but there's a lot to talk about there is this is not the primary thing to talk about but I didn't know Steve Zahn was in this movie and as a known Zahn head I was like well well well look who we have here. Steve Zahn. I love Steve Zahn so much.

The fact that anyone would say in a movie that no one wants to have sex with Steve Zahn. I'm like, you're going to want to check your notes on that one. I do. I love Steve Zahn. Do you remember when he played the cat in Stuart Little? In Stuart Little? Of course I remember when he played the cat in Stuart Little. Yeah, he played Nathan Lane's best friend, and his only line was,

Snowball, you're my best friend. God, he's so delightful. It's such a delight when he, like no one's ever sad to see Steve Zahn. He's such a delight. Is that your favorite Steve Zahn movie? Stuart Little? Yes.

I'm trying to think of where I first fell in love with Steve Zahn. It would have been, I remember, this is, I don't think where I fell in love with him, but he was in a early Kristen like oh nice mr. he's just always mr. nice he's always mr. nice is mr. nice he he cannot play a villain I've set in White Lotus where he definitely does oh that's I didn't finish that series um I first saw him in the movie joyride what's that yeah it's basically a remake of the movie duel where a scary truck driver terrorizes steve zahn paul walker and lily sobieski and it's pretty cool what else is steve zahn is also in you've got mail i think maybe that's the last time i got thrilled to see him on the show in a movie I otherwise did not like.

It's funny. I'm looking at his IMDb. Reality Bites was only the fourth movie he had ever been in. He was in an episode of All My Children, a TV movie called First Love, Fatal Love, another movie called Rain Without Thunder, an episode of a show called South Beach, and then Reality Bites.

That was his early Steve Zahn. This was his break, his big break. I read that because the casting process for I mean, the production of this movie is just like wild in general. Yeah. But I read that Ethan Hawke had just like done a play with Steve Zahn and was like, he's cool. Bring him on yeah and then steve zahn being mr nice um was really enthusiastic about playing a queer character who is like who comes out of the closet and is loved and accepted for it because he's mr nice so the only movie i've ever seen him being not nice in is um a perfect

getaway he's like i don't want to spoil it but it's got uh i think mila jovovich maybe uh and he's very much the villain like not just like the villain like in white lotus where it's like oh he's rich and has a lot of privilege like a villain villain oh like a bad guy good for him he's got range i also remembering he's mr nice in i don't know if anyone else was a babysitter and saw the diary of a wimpy kid movie series but he's he's mr dad in that one and yeah sure he makes some mistakes but at the end of the day he's mr nice well shall we move on from steve's on the zonisense the beginning of the zonisense is in this movie this is a feminist movie podcast which you wouldn't have guessed from that conversation our five minute tirade about steve

zahn about how he's nice yeah let's uh recap the movie shall we let's do it okay so we open on lelaina that's winona rider she's giving a speech at her college graduation which effectively sets up the theme of the movie which is like hey there are all these problems in the world but what do we do about them i don't know right then i like how every generation will especially now that like we're no longer the youngest generation and we're growing crustier with each passing day i do think it's like funny how that this is the question of literally every generation but everyone is like but it was my idea we're kind of the first people to have this problem and it's like wow damn getting old is punishing it was not our idea nope it was and we are also fumbling it so amazing yeah okay so then we see video footage because lelena is making a documentary about her friends her friends are troy dyer

that's ethan hawke hi his character's despicable um his character's horrible yeah yeah vicky that's janine graffalo and sammy steve's on of the zonacents hi there's i just i'm gonna be annoying today um there was i i was thinking of just like other very gen xe movies and things in general. And I was thinking about Rent, which I feel like also goes in this category very much. Also features, I think, a visibly terrible documentary about someone's friends. It was a very 90s thing to do, to think that you were,

I mean, I guess it's like how millennials and Gen Z use social media to be like, get ready with me. And it's like, God god everyone's so fucking boring and we all have the same instincts exactly yeah and i think that to document our lives and make them public i do think that winona rider's fake documentary in reality bites seems more interesting than anthony rapp's fake documentary in Rent. That's my professional opinion. No question. I mean, his documentary is just videoing his...

I mean, Lelaina is asking them questions about what's it like to be worried about AIDS? What's it like to do this? She's asking them their perspective. The documentary... I haven't seen Rent in a long time, so excuse me if I'm misremembering, but if I recall correctly, he's just like got a camera in his friend's faces and they're just living their lives.

Yeah, he's trying to do a more like, I'm just like, who's getting releases for these things? Logistically, like who is getting releases for this? Yeah, he was just bringing his camera to like support groups in a way that you're like, this is illegal. Right. Mark. Loathing this person's anonymity or whatever. Right.

Yeah. Sheesh. Anyways. Here's they both probably would suck. But I think Winona's is more interesting. And it seems like at least everyone is willingly participating. That is true. Most of the time.

Here's my hot and potentially terrible take is that the tv network in your face version of winona's footage i think is like not that bad totally agree i'm so i was i was gonna totally say the same thing i thank you honestly i don't i truly so i'm sure we'll get to this and i'm maybe i'm jumping the gun but the scene when they show it i was like it just seems like the bumper or the teaser like you don't even what was so bad about it like i truly don't get it okay my as i was watching that i was like how different is this from the trailer to reality bites it's pretty similar it's very similar but that's like i feel like that's kind of like one of the bizarro, like, I mean,

I know the word irony is used really heavily in this movie, but that's like kind of the weird irony of this movie is like, it's a movie about selling out, but like you would have had to have sold out in order for it to be made. It's a studio movie. Right. I don't know, Jamie, define irony. I, you can't, it's undefinable i literally i was as

she was fumbling with that i was like oh i would have uh i would not have been able to do that i would have fucked it up i also think that what uh ethan hawke's character's definition is like also not quite the right definition of irony was this before or after the alanis morissette song that's a great question. This exchange was, I was like, could no one in this generation correctly define that word? We don't know. Anyway, okay. So Lelaina is making this documentary about her friends.

We see footage of them talking, they're goofing around, they're speaking on their lives and their future plans and they all seem kind of aimless and they they're not really sure what to do or how to proceed then we cut to lelena having dinner with her parents her dad gives her a gas card which he says he'll pay the bill on for a year he also gives her his old bmw there's some debate about whether or not she should take the bmw because she mentioned being more morally opposed to bmws in her graduation speech but ultimately she takes the car yeah and loaded loaded the privilege these kids have um i know yeah so then lelena uh we see her at her job as a i think production

assistant on a morning talk show for frazier's dad yes oh my god right second only the two times i gasped no three times i gasped first steve zahn reveal second frazier's dad reveal third she chooses ethan hawke reveal just just just but frazier's dad absolutely killing in this movie and his character is a mean old jerk we learn just like in frazier except in frazier it's complicated i mean he's a big old softy he's like a softy that we love but he does run for like like an extreme like he doesn't even vote for like an extremist candidate and might have some not so great political positions I would not because I think isn't he like a former cop like in for you're you're like I don't want to know how this guy votes, but I do love the just the character setup of I love my fancy sons.

My fancy lad son. I love my weird fancy sons. Well, someone's got to. A little aside. I only I watched Frasier for the first time in the pandemic. And my partner loves the show. And I was like, oh, isn't it about a gruff guy who has two sons who are British for some reason and he was like no they're not British they're just fancy

I always for whatever reason I just assumed they were British I would say that Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce do sort of affect a like movie-like transatlantic accent for their roles it's not for sure they don't sound like they're from seattle they sound like rose dewitt picator from titanic yes they sound yeah they sound like they're from a place that never existed but i mean look the fraser reboot god damn if i'm not gonna watch it they shut down one of my favorite local bars to film which is weird that's like a thing that's happening a fraser reboot oh yeah i don't know about this there's gonna be a fraser reboot and they shut down this bar near me called the

thirsty crow which is like a fun but like grimy little bar i was like what what is Frasier going to do there? Get killed? Like, I don't know. Okay. So we see Lelaina at her job. Then she gets into a minor car accident with this guy named Michael, played by Ben Stiller. And they meet via this car accident. And they kind of hit it off. And he asks her for a date. Meanwhile, Troy slash Ethan Hawke has been fired from his newsstand job for eating a Snickers bar. So he has to move into Lelaina and Vicky's apartment and he crashes on the couch for

a while. We also learn more about the dynamic between Troy and Lelaina, which is a bit contentious. It's a bit will they or won't they? The friends are hanging out. We see more documentary footage. Lelena and Vicky and Sammy dance to My Sharona in the convenience store. Troy is like, I'm too cool to dance. You're like, shut up.

I hate him. Can't stand Troy. Can't stand. I'm discovering that a lot of 90s Ethan Hawke characters are really deplorable because Before Sunrise is one of my favorite movies. But I went back and rewatched that recently. I was like, oh, my God, his character is awful in that movie. He gets a little more mature in Before Sunset. I still haven't seen it.

I mean, it's like there's i i'm it's it's so confusing i wish i could was anyone able to find like because i read that this script was written like 70 times so it sounds like there was like studio notes on notes on notes on notes um so i'm just like because it seems like the final script goes all the way up to like yeah fuck this guy but then at the last second it's like nah he's great he's great and you gotta marry him and i was like that has to be a studio notes like i cannot conceive of a world because it's like the movie goes all the like she does the she does the right thing she bails yeah anyways we'll get there yeah so then lelena goes on her date with michael aka ben stiller they make out which troy sees and he gets upset about this and he

picks a fight with lelena and she's like if you have a problem just say it and he's like i love you and it seems like he's being sincere but turns out he's just being an asshole even though it is clear that he is in love with her but he won't admit it he is so annoying can i can i ask a question there because that's something in re-watching this movie i was sort of like what is this and i and i know people are complicated and i've certainly been there sure what is the vibe of like being in love with each other it's also implied that they've hooked up drunkenly at least once in the past at least once what like why are they so against admitting it talking about it communicating about it like i understand that in in this in the universe of the film it's supposed to be like they can't admit it you know they don't want to ruin the friendship why not like

why is communicating openly about how you feel such a villain in the universe of this film? I feel like my assumption was, like, they're 22 and extremely emotionally immature. Like, that was sort of my. And, like, especially Troy. Like, I mean, we'll talk about Lelaina in all the ways where, like, she's very messy in a lot of regards. Especially with, like, her own privilege. And, like, she's just, especially with like her own privilege. And like, she's just like bad at navigating it. But like Troy,

especially, I feel like he's like, I don't know. Like I'm trying, I was watching this movie. I was thinking all this bad advice. My mom has given me a different points in my life, but where she's like,

well, sometimes like people run away because they know that they can't handle a relationship even if they care about you and i was like yeah like i can sort of see that in troy of like he knows he's a piece of shit to some extent and like even if you love someone and you know you're a piece of shit but it's then but then he's also so unwilling to work on himself that you're just like right i don't know I don't know what do you guys think well I would have definitely had the hots for Ethan Hawke's character when I was in my early 20s no question I would have let him fuck up my life fuck up my credit crash on my couch no question in my mind I would have gotten sucked

up in that Troy tornado happily I would have been in love with Steve Zahn and then he would have gotten sucked up in that Troy tornado happily. I would have been in love with Steve Zahn and then he would have come out to me and then I would have been like, I'm happy for you. And then I would have cried for weeks. And then we would have been friends forever. But yeah, I mean, I don't get the whole, oh, we love each other, but we refuse to admit it thing. I mean, I do. But for me, at least if I like someone romantically, I go out of my way to tell them. See, I will I will be quiet about it forever. So I do understand

like where he's coming from. But also but but I feel like that gets conflated with like, and so he's allowed to be an asshole and neg everything she says. It's like, well, it's one thing to not express your romantic feelings to someone, but that doesn't automatically translate to like, and you get to be an evil villain because you can't. But I feel like that's where a lot of the masculine issues that Troy has. Yeah, that's where a lot of them live. The film really like validates his antisocial dick behavior. And it's supposed to be like, well, he's an artist. He's where a lot of them live. The film really like validates his antisocial dick behavior. And it's supposed to be like, well, he's an artist. He's tortured. He's emotionally unavailable.

And we're supposed to not find that problematic as the viewer. We're supposed to like empathize for him being in that state as opposed to be like, well, you're an adult and you are responsible for communicating the way that you feel. And if you can't, we're not all supposed to find it charming or whatever. Right. And it's like there are moments where Lainey like does explicitly say that where she's just like, oh, you're a fucking artist. Then like, where's the art at? Like, what are you doing?

What? You don't do shit. Like she calls him out on his shit. But then like that. But then she just ends up with him anyways. And I don't, ugh. It is a tricky movie. Because sometimes you're like, you know,

there's a lot of criticisms I would have of these characters. And I'm like, yeah, I probably did something like that when I was 22. I probably did something emotionally volatile and weird. But it's tricky. Mm-hmm. There's this through line in the movie or this kind of like subplot where vicky we learn that she has a lot of casual sex and then she becomes worried that she is hiv positive because a friend of hers tested positive for hiv so we see her going to get tested we then see a scene where lelaina's boss aka mr frazier's dad

is an asshole to her so she retaliates by humiliating him on air which gets her fired so now she's worried about money she's worried about paying rent troy consoles her and in so doing he surprise kisses her and she's like no it'll ruin our friendship and also i'm dating michael dude troy's ability to make anything and everything about himself is um infuriating staggering yeah yeah meanwhile lelena shows michael her documentary and he is like a VP of programming for this TV network similar to MTV called In Your Face and he thinks this documentary would be great programming for the network but Lelena isn't sure about that. We also see Troy after having been rejected by Lelena he's being pretty distant then we see Lelena trying to get a new job in television, but she can't get hired for anything.

She then considers a hot dog job. Shout out to Jamie's hot dogs. David Spade hot dog cameo? Hello. And I also like that she can't hack it in the world of hot dogs. Right. That I found to be good hot dog representation of like not just anyone can work in hot dogs, which is true. It's true.

And on the other end, I appreciate that there's a through line with Lainey that she is a smart and creative young woman who is constantly thwarted by being bad at math. Don't we know that yeah i was like i know this i know this struggle i know this pain bad at math bad at money numbers in general are not her strong suit like no way either let's be real could either of you two add two numbers like that in your head like he's he throws her like 316 plus 29 like you couldn't add that in your head quickly without a piece of paper right right right and she also like i i do like how i mean like when on a rider's the best like i love this character like just buckles under like one millis thing of pressure at any time they're're like, define a word. She's like, and like explode. And then he's like, what's two plus two?

And she's like, I don't know. That is my favorite line of the whole movie when she can't add the numbers that she's guessing and David Spade is like, it's not an auction. And then that that scene, I mean, it is a well-written movie. Like the line that it ends

on where he's like look i've been at this job for six months for a reason that's honestly the funniest scene in the movie hot dog hot dog the scene that precedes that we'll talk about but there's some really fucked up ableist language and ideology that's happening there yes Yes. Okay. So Lelena, she's struggling to get a new job. She's bumming around for a while. Then she calls a psychic hotline and racks up a huge phone bill. So now she has to figure out how to pay it off and get her life back on track. So she basically starts running a scam where she pays for people's gas with her dad's gas card, but makes the customers give her

cash so she's collecting the cash knowing that her dad will pay off the gas card and that's how she like earns enough money to pay for this phone bill she she taps in and out of her privilege it's wild it's wild yeah so then michael tells lalaina that his network wants to buy her documentary and make it a series um and she's very excited about that because she's like this will solve my money problems and then michael and troy argue because troy is being an asshole and he's like you don't know what lalaina needs and michael's like i know what she needs in a way that you never will and you're like oh my god put your dicks away and stop trying to measure them uh and then and then the fact that they go back for round two before the end of the movie i'm like you guys this is such a bad look

she shouldn't pick i was really hoping she would do the thing where she is like wait a second I'm 22 I picked nobody I picked myself right right yeah yeah sex in the city finale style I mean I I do I in the universe of this film I always wonder is Michael such a bad guy like what did he do that was other than with the movie like what did he do that was so wrong? I have the same thoughts. I don't hate Michael. I think it's very interesting that the movie seems to want

I mean I feel like we're supposed to dislike Michael because he works for a corporation. Yeah he's like a yuppie sellout. Yeah he's a yuppie sellout. But the messaging of this movie is so muddled where it's like,

it's okay if some people are sellouts, but it's not okay if other people are. Again, I just like, it makes me want to read earlier drafts of this movie because I found Michael to be a pretty sympathetic character. And I liked that the movie went out of its way to characterize him as like a guy that had dreams but was bad at math. And like he's like, I don't know. It's so weird because you put yourself in Gen X brain and we, you know, we all work for fucking iHeartRadio.

We don't have a leg to stand on when it comes to like being yuppie fucking sellouts. Here we are. Not even a little bit. I take my I am. am i am i have a price people have met it you know what can i say right like and and it's like a very 22 year old mentality and i don't even mean that in a negative way i think like young people being vehemently anti-capitalist is always a net good thing but but to put all of the evils of capitalism onto like one ben stiller who's the only person in the movie or the only man in the movie who seems to

a be willing to apologize for when he fucks up yeah and be like accept laneey's decisions and like seems to like genuinely respect and love her yeah I I felt like a sellout for kind of being like is he that bad but like is he the same I don't know are we are we old by saying is he that bad but I don't think he's that bad he is sweet to her Troy treats her like shit like there's a notable difference in the way that like those two guys treat her and i also feel like he is you know he like wants to siphon off corporate money to get her art out into the world which again you would think is exactly what's happening by reality bites being made and by producers championing this young writer and like so there's all these like interesting parallels that i'm like i don't hate michael i understand people's criticisms of him like ideologically but like he seems like a

pretty nice guy i don't know yeah i would let him take me to the aquarium restaurant i'm just saying watching this when i was in high school when i first watched it I was like oh he's such a yuppie fuck Troy is clearly the right match for her watching it recently in my 30s I was like that Michael seems like a nice guy probably got a 401k taking her to dinner stable

guy like I literally was like dude I don't know I was like at this point you can't be emotionally abusive and make me pay your rent like pick a fucking lane man and like anyways he really i think he really has troy's number in that scene where he's trying when they have their second confrontation like you're like the jester like holding a skull like it comes out terribly but i think that he really is the only

person in the movie who really sees troy for who he actually is which is just somebody who wants to make crass jokes while really offering not a lot himself exact yeah and i also was like would i ultimately date a guy fumbling that hard to make a hamlet reference? Yes, of course I would. Where he's like, in the clown and the skull and he's alone. You're like, yeah, man. Yeah. Okay. We're all, I guess we're all on team Michael.

Doesn't feel like a great place to be but what's the alternative? But here we are. Yeah. Apparently it's 1994. She has to end up with a guy by the end of the movie right there's no alternative so these are the choices yeah okay so speaking of selling out lelena sees what the in her face network did to her documentary footage which basically makes a mockery of her and her friends so So she's furious and she storms out.

Back home, she and Troy talk. And he's like, I do love you for real this time. And then they smooch and then they frick. But then the next morning, Troy is very distant and he bails. And Lelena goes to his show that night i think where michael shows up and apologizes to lelena for the whole network mishap he's like let's go to new york and we'll show the network the the series the way that you want it to be but then troy pops up and he's like i panicked this morning and yeah i know i'm an asshole but I'm the only real thing you have

oh my god that speech a legendary a legendarily bad and she well this is like what what drives me up a wall about this movie is she reacts appropriately she's like go fuck yourself because he literally is like yeah I'm gonna treat Yeah, I'm going to disappear out of nowhere. Yeah, I don't play by anyone's rules and I don't respect you. God. But I love you, you bitch. And I was like, dude, oh my God. Can you imagine if a man said that to you all defiantly, expecting you to marry him because of that speech or something or run away with him?

The audacity of straight men, let me tell you. Oh my God, it never ends. I was a pretty exceptionally bad decision maker at 22, but even I wouldn't have gone for that bullshit. He's literally telling on himself in a way that it's like almost doing her a favor. Because then you're like, okay, you're telling me who you are.

Now I can walk away. There has to be a version of this movie where she walks away like I would hope so what the hell do you think it's like one of those situations like I think was it pretty in pink or 16 candles where there's two apparently two versions where she chooses the one guy and then she chooses the other like audiences didn't like it like do you think there's a cut of the script somewhere where she doesn't choose him I think it's pretty in pink I'm guessing if there were 70 drafts the coin couldn't have flipped in his favor and all 70 right I don't know you would think right yeah anyway point is that this love triangle slash like competition between Troy and Michael

for Lelaina's affection it's's like reaching its peak here. Then Troy leaves town. We find out it's because his father passed away, but he doesn't really tell Lelaina that he's leaving. And so she's looking for him. She's thinking about him. She's moping around. And then Sammy's like, oh no, Troy went to Chicago. So she's about to like go after him. But before she can, Troy shows up at her doorstep and he's like, I love you. And I wish I had behaved differently the morning after we smooched and fricked. And then they smooch again. And then we flash forward in time. They are together.

It seems like they live together. And then the movie ends with Lelaina's dad calling and being like why is there a 900 bill on my gas card yeah the end can i say something about that yes the scene where okay they they smooch and they frick he wakes up feels weird bails okay then laney is like where is he there's like a montage where it's like that sad u2 song is playing and it's like have you seen him like she's like a montage where it's like that sad U2 song is playing. And it's like, have you seen him? Like, she's like going to all his old haunts and like finding his laundry. And then Steve Zahn is like, oh, his dad is sick. He's in Chicago.

Ever heard of a fucking phone? Like, I guess I feel like. I mean, he does call her, but then he's like, I can't. Oh, that's right. I hate it. I hate it. It's like, I guess I just feel like in the universe of the film, him not being able to physically express himself verbally, even just to be like, yo, my dad is really sick.

I'm going to be gone for a couple of days. Talk to you then. I know things are weird. When he shows up unexpectedly at her door, we're supposed to be like, wow, this is so heavy. And in reality, it's like he just skipped town for a legitimate reason, but couldn't even leave her a voicemail letting her know. Like and why? I guess I feel like why is it treated as deep in the movie or like like a weighty emotional choice?

All he had like he couldn't leave a message. Right. And then him showing back up is like, oh, my gosh, it's so romantic that he just showed up on her doorstep and professed his love after he's been an asshole to her for the entire movie which is like it's so it's such an abrupt way to end it because it's like if there was a draft of the script produced where the fact like it's it's referenced twice early in the movie that troy is dealing with a terminally ill parent and like the I can't imagine thankfully I can't imagine the existential stress that comes with that especially when you're so young like that is a real thing that I'm sure I mean like causes people to act out and like you know like that grieving process is a real thing but like there's

no emphasis put on it and it's made to seem like well because the horrible thing happens that excuses how poorly he's treated people this entire movie when it's like there's I don't know like I we've talked about this a bunch on the show but there's like such a dearth of like movies that address grief in a, in a thoughtful way. And it's like, there is an opportunity to like explore it with Troy's character, but like, it just doesn't really go there.

Cause it's like, you obviously like feel for him. He's lost a parent, but it doesn't mean that he hasn't been treating Lainey like shit seemingly before his dad was even sick. Like, it seems that he hasn't been treating laney like shit seemingly before his dad was even sick like it seems like he's just been an at like he's an asshole going through something horrible yeah that's an interesting thing to explore but you can't just like forgive the behavior i don't know he does nothing to redeem himself that's exactly it we we as the

audience never see him like what is the thing that we don't see him grappling with any of that, like, coming to realize, you know, I have treated her badly, and I have, like, not treated her the way that I wanted to treat her,

and, you know, I've learned from my behavior. You don't, you don't see any of that, you know, where you just are meant to be like, oh,

his dad passed away, that was some sort of emotional block or weight lifted, and now he's going to show up at her door, door and she's gonna be thrilled to have him like I think if the movie had shown us a little bit or like built like built that out a little bit more I would be more willing to accept it also sign out Jamie how many beverages do you have because I'vepsi cold out I'm impressed look we've got we've got three we've got three on rotation right now

pretty cool are any of them diet cokes because you know who loves a diet coke oh you fucking know Jamie's got a diet coke I was like wow quirky white girl drinks too many big gulps someone has my fucking number like

ridiculous by the way we need to take a quick break and then Like, wow, quirky white girl drinks too many big gulps. Someone has my fucking number. Like, ridiculous. By the way, we need to take a quick break and then we will come right back. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017 was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture

of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it's Teddy Mellencamp. And Tamara Judge, better known as the Twats. Yep, you heard that right. We're the hosts of Two Teas in a Pod.

For all the housewife lovers out there, every week we break down every episode and give you our opinions. We cover it all. OC, Jersey, Beverly Hills, New York City, Dubai. As we always say, you're only as good as last week's episode. Plus, we're talking to all your favorite Bravo celebrities and not just housewives. We're putting your favorite people in the twat seat and getting the juicy stories everybody wants to know. So join us as we stir the pot and get ourselves into some trouble.

Okay, maybe a lot of trouble. It's not really trouble when it's truthful. Let's just say we can be a little twatty. Listen to Two Teas in a Pod on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Sure, totally normal humans. Embark on a journey across the stars, discovering the wonders of the universe one episode at a time. We'll talk about life, love, laughter, and why you should never argue with your co-pilot. Especially when she's always right.

Right, and if we hit turbulence, just blame it on Mercury retrograde. Or Emily's questionable space piloting skills. Hey, join us on In Our Own World for cosmic conversations, stellar laughs, and super corny dad jokes. Listen to In Our Own World as a part of the My Cultura podcast network

available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And don't worry, we promise to avoid any black holes. Most of the time. And we're back, and we're're so hydrated and we're doing great i would say that most actually that the the things i'm drinking are not contributing to hydration um by the time this episode comes out i will have already said something about it

but i've been working at um a haunted hayride and so i just I forgot I had all all of my last night's hayride beverages and so I've just kind of been draining them throughout the morning and afternoon beautiful so we we've we started talking about the Lelaina slash Troy slash Michael love triangle what else needs to be said about that yeah let's let's kind of tackle that so I this kind of gets into my curiosity about like how this movie was written and and made okay so a lot of this revolves around the writer Helen Childress or Childress I'm truly not totally sure but there's a there is a piece that came out a couple years ago from Atlantic writer Soraya Roberts,

whose work I really like, but about sort of the legacy of this movie and how it's remembered. Because I guess when this movie came out, it was not popular with its target audience, which I feel like is a very Gen X thing of like, fuck you, don't make a corporate movie about me you know so like whatever I get it but how Helen Childress has like kind of

been left out of the narrative even like it just feels like a very Hollywood-y story where studios were like okay Gen X like they're now viable consumers or whatever by the early 90s and we want to have a like generation defining studio movie because there had been a couple of indie movies that had done well there was a um a Richard Linklater movie that I'd never seen that but like they were like okay there's an audience for. Let's do a studio version of it. So they bring in this young writer, like Helen Childress is Lainey in a lot of ways, which she's very much admitted to. And so she's like being given $500 a week

to write this movie. Lainey makes $400 a week. She's pulling from her own experiences and her own friends. But by 2019, she wasn't even invited to the 25 year reunion of this movie. Like it got swallowed whole by Hollywood. And like,

I mean, I don't know, like whatever. I can't make a character judgment on Ben Stiller based on this, but it seems like this is more remembered as like Ben Stiller's first directed movie and not like Helen Childress's experiences committed to film she also has not gotten a script produced since which feels relevant I just wanted to share a quick quote from her from 2019 also to tie it back to the love triangle, that was Ben Stiller's suggestion and idea. Helen Childress's early versions of the script gave fuller pictures of

all, I guess, four main characters' lives. So there was more Steve Zahn, there was more Janine Garofalo. But Ben Stiller was like, let's keep it focused on the relationship, which is what we all have hated the most. Interestingly, the notes from the male director. But yeah, she said Helen Childress said in 2019, quote, I have worked consistently and constantly for 29 years. They estimated she's written 40 screenplays since Reality Bites. She says of the handful she wrote on spec'd half were sold or optioned most of them feature female protagonists in all sincerity i think that

was a problem um which is i mean 1994 to 2019 is a stretch we've well covered and so that is definitely a thing so yeah and and to be clear she, she went for like two decades or slightly more without like any writing credits. So if you look at her IMDB, she does have some writing credits from like, I think 2016 and beyond, I think for mostly television, but yeah,

she made this movie that ended up being this like cult classic. Like people still ride for this movie but ben stiller hasn't had trouble directing more movies right and yeah she's not given the credit where credit is due for like telling her own story and for example like the i'm also pulling this from that atlantic piece but um the iconic my sharona dancing at the Gas Station scene is like one of the producers of this movie, Michael Schamberg, credited that scene to Ben Stiller entirely. He's like, yeah, that was Ben Stiller's idea. But Helen Childress was like, um, hello, I wrote that into the screenplay. In the script. So how, in what way was it his idea? It wasn't. It was just this male producer failing to give the screenwriter, Helen, her due credit for writing that scene into the movie.

And then when that was pointed out, this guy, Schamberg, was like, oops. Yeah, I guess she does. And then he says something like, so she deserves credit for guiding Ben's direction. Oh, my God. And then he says, I think the reason that I mistakenly gave Ben all the credit was that he was determined to give this feature film, his feature film directorial debut, a strong visual style. So the guy can't even like. But like, what does that have to do with like it's again bare minimum shit like oh he directed the script like that's that's his job she wrote the scene like it's her yeah oh so yeah it's just

all of this is very indicative of the way that women in hollywood are often erased from the narrative forgotten about ignored not given due credit, all of that stuff. All that to say, also, this movie's produced by Danny DeVito. Just wanted to throw that out there. Danny. I don't have any more information than that.

But to bring it back to the love triangle, focusing on the love triangle was very much a Ben Stiller note. And it's the thing that bothered us the most. In that Atlantic piece they do talk a little bit about Michael but in a way that I thought was interesting where like that character it seems like went through a lot of different drafts and Ben Stiller wasn't originally supposed to play the character and then eventually he's like oh I can pull from my

own experience as you know like not even to insult it but like you know, like, not even to insult him, but like, you know, as like, a working sellout, basically, to, you know, kind of flesh out this character. And like, I feel like I can relate with some of these moral dilemmas. And I guess that he and Helen Childress would improvise as the two characters to like, figure out what that relationship was, which I thought was kind of a fun way to write. I'm sure that that's part of the reason why Michael does come out as a more sympathetic character than if he was just written as like, this is the guy you don't want to end up with. This is Mr.

Business. This is Mr. Evil. Right. I'm seeing not to bring up Titanic again, but what choice do I have? I mean, I think it would have been, yeah,

kind of an easier or like maybe a lazier choice to have like the Ben Stiller character be like Cal Hockley. And then you have your like Ethan Hawke being more of the Jack Dawson who is artsy and poor and who isn't some cog in the capitalist machine. Like the boyfriend at the beginning of every Lifetime movie, where this uptight woman is dating a guy who only cares about his job, and she needs to date someone who is free and wants to save this Christmas tree farm or whatever. She needs to move back home and start a Christmas tree farm

and go to church more while you're at it. That's a more respectable outcome for a woman. Yeah. But yeah, just to put, I guess, a button on the love triangle thing. It feels like such a trope-y choice to have a woman be in this like hetero love triangle where she has to pick one or the other. And the option of like not picking one of them isn't presented.

And then ultimately she picks the worst option of the two guys. Because again, both aren't great options. But at least Michael is nice to her. And Troy, again, Troy is such an asshole. And it just like kind of sends this message that so many movies and so much media has delivered to audience which is that oh yeah a man can treat a woman like

shit uh and he doesn't have to apologize for it and she will still pick him for reasons unclear yeah I personally blame the studio executives for that. I feel comfortable blaming the studio executives for perpetuating that. Cause that just feels like very nineties Hollywood studio notes in general, because it sounds like Helen Child just wanted to take it in a totally different direction that would have allowed you to explore these side characters who I think are like really interesting. And there's a lot like the you do get a fair amount with Lelaina and um and Vicky and their friendship but like I just like I wanted

to see more of that because there's so I was trying to think of other friendships that it's like it's a loving supportive friendship that is constantly challenged by like class issues which is like something i you don't really see in movies very often i was like i'm you know i want to see the version of this movie that's more focused on that i want to see the version of this movie where you know our only openly queer character gets uh more than like mentioning three quarters through the movie by the way i'm coming out. I mean, great, but you know, you just don't get a lot. Where's, where's my Zahn?

Yeah. And I think the point that you make about fleshing out those, those side characters more, I think is so apt, especially with somebody like Vicky, because, you know, they allude to the fact that Vicky is obsessed with like seventies pop culture. And so if she's, you know, just graduated from college, that's probably her childhood. So are we supposed to, like, what's going on there that she is someone who is a, you know, sexual libertine, but is perhaps obsessed with the, you know, idyllic childhood of her youth?

Like, I feel like there's a draft of the movie that flushes that out. But in the version that we see, we're left to connect these dots that are not really connected for us in ways that I think just don't really work. Right. It's confusing. Yeah. It's like I would love to know why she's so fixated on this. And Bridget, you're probably right that it's just like a childhood nostalgia thing. But we just don't even get I didn't even think that. Yeah, that thread is

never really connected yeah and then that i mean i guess one thing i did like is that like much like us and and i probably every generation ever because we're never as special as we think we are um i did like how these characters are constantly trying to like contextualize their own experience using pop culture where even when Vicky's talking about her stress about waiting for to find out if she is HIV positive or negative which I thought was I mean I wasn't expecting that to be tackled within this movie and I thought it was pretty tastefully and thoughtfully done. But the way that she explains her anxiety is like imagining herself as a character on Milrow's Place. Right.

But like the way that it's presented isn't condescending. It doesn't make her seem silly or like unintelligent. It's like, oh, yeah, that's like not only are you worried about potentially being very sick like also it I feel like that in that like simple exchange she is describing how she thinks the world will perceive her if the results come back a certain way because pop culture trains you how to see the world in so many ways and right like moments like that I was like that is awesome you never get stuff like that that's interesting I have mixed feelings about the way the movie handles HIV and AIDS um the movie seems to be quite obsessed with it number one there are several

references and like sometimes kind of like offhand jokes made about it that or like characters will make an offhand comment or joke about HIV and AIDS. And then the kind of main conflict that the Vicky characters is dealing with is that she is worried that she might be positive for HIV. And so she goes to get tested. And this is based on her having, you know, multiple sexual partners, she has a little book like a sex diary it seems where she like writes down the names and the dates of the people she had sex with she doesn't always remember their names I used to do that based on this movie like because I saw this movie when I was a virgin and when I started having sex I was like oh you're supposed to keep a diary. I don't do it anymore. But in my early days of being sexual, I love it. It could be a helpful tool, I feel like. But anyway, you never know. So she gets tested. She's waiting on the results. Prior to her getting the results, she,

you know, expresses a lot of concern about, you know, yeah, the way she might be perceived or what her life might be like if she is HIV positive. I just felt that, okay, for this to be an issue that a hetero cis woman is dealing with when HIV and AIDS is something that largely affected the queer community. It just feels like a weird erasure of that. And obviously I'm not saying that hetero people cannot become HIV positive and have AIDS, but it's an issue that was famously not handled well because it disproportionately affected the queer community. And, you know, like Reagan and other administrations and institutions didn't give a shit about the queer community. So it was just like very mishandled.

Basically every administration. Right. So for a straight character to have a storyline where she's concerned about this, it just felt kind of maybe indicative of that erasure. But I was like, well, what's the alternative to have the one queer character in the movie be concerned about that I wouldn't want that either I mean I think that that then you could really easily skew into tragedy porn and my understanding is that um Helen Childress is not a queer writer and so it's like would it have been her place I I also was not sure. I mean, I wasn't surprised that this movie had a preoccupation with the AIDS

epidemic because it was started being written in 1990. Like, it makes total sense to me that this would be something that these characters would realistically be talking and thinking about. But, I mean, yeah, I wasn't quite sure

where to place it. I thought it was like interesting that they tackled the subject at all. I think it would have been a really easy issue that this group of friends would have been thinking about to erase from a major studio movie. I don't know. Yeah, I guess it's like with this specific writer in this specific movie yeah I mean I wouldn't have preferred it if the Steve Zahn character was if his whole storyline was defined by that right but then I guess that that's also the thing with having only one queer character in your movie like it's yeah I don't know it it didn't bother me that much but also I I'm completely open to that story point not being yeah yeah curious what if any listeners have any insight on that um can we talk about the Steve

Zahn character Sammy let's talk about Zahn baby that's gonna be a new segment on the show where you belong and then talk about the steve's on intersections okay so it didn't even register with me that he is a queer character for a while which yeah does a few things it signals to me that he is just allowed to be a queer character without that being like the first or defining thing you know about him. So his queerness is normalized in the story and in the world that he occupies. I also didn't notice any stereotypes of gay men being used with his character. But also, he's kind of barely in the movie. Yeah, he's the only character of the friend group that we see that we never see with a romantic or sexual partner except there's maybe like one quick little scene where Sammy's

in a diner with a guy named Lance yeah he's a he and he does introduce him as his boyfriend oh okay I missed that okay but that's such a quick throwaway moment and clearly because I missed that part I missed it too so the fact that he like he's just not allowed to have any kind of like romantic subplot the way that other characters that's kind of like the focus of the movie right I did really like the scene where you see him and Vicky kind of like doing this bit where they're rehearsing him coming out to his family um it's cute and then where they're rehearsing him coming out to his family. It's cute. And then you see the aftermath of him coming out to his family.

And they did not receive the information well. They don't seem to be supportive. And you see how that affects him. You see him talking about, you know, the reasons that he has chosen to be celibate. That he, you know, hadn't been honest with himself about who he is and you just like you see a lot of his kind of him expressing his inner struggles in a way that a lot of movies especially from that era never bothered to do or just like never handled well so I thought that was it's queer representation in a movie

at a time where there was very little on-screen queer representation. And when it was there, it was usually really grossly mishandled. This representation isn't necessarily the best. Again, his character is kind of the four friends, like he has the least screen time and i think it's it helen childress did indicate that she wrote many versions of this script right

wasn't the case so again it's like a studio issue of like well sure we can have an openly gay character but not too much where and this also feels like an era where I mean even going back to Rent of like queer characters are or like the movie Philadelphia which I've never seen but I know what happens in it we're like okay we could have gay characters on screen but only if the worst possible thing happens to them and so it's like we're not interested at this point in pop culture of like just exploring a queer person's day-to-day life in the way that this movie seems to be interested in but then the studio doesn't let you go all the way of just like letting a gay man be a person right like and steve's on such a sweetie where oh he's his like first line where he's like such a he's just like, I don't know, I want a career.

Oh, Mr. Nice, Mr. Nice. Yeah. Let's take another break and then we will be right back. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16, 2017, was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state.

And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it's Teddy Mellencamp and Tamara Judge, better known as the Twats. Yep, you heard that right. We're the hosts of Two Teas in a Pod.

For all the housewife lovers out there, every week we break down every episode and give you our opinions. We cover it all. OC, Jersey, Beverly Hills, New York City, Dubai. As we always say, you're only as good as last week's episode. Plus, we're talking to all your favorite bravo-lebrities and not just housewives. We're putting your favorite people in the twat seat and getting the juicy stories everybody wants to know. So join us as we stir the pot and get ourselves into some trouble. Okay, maybe a lot of trouble. It's not really trouble when it's truthful.

Let's just say we can be a little twatty. Listen to Two Teas in a Pod on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Right. In our own world, we're two space cadets. And totally normal humans. Sure, totally normal humans. Embark on a journey across the stars, discovering the wonders of the universe one episode at a time. We'll talk about life, love, laughter, and why you should never argue with your co-pilot. Especially when she's always right. Right. And if we hit turbulence, just blame it on mercury retrograde or emily's questionable

space piloting skills hey join us on in our own world for cosmic conversations stellar laughs and super corny dad jokes listen to in our own world as a part of the my cultura podcast network available on the iheart radio app apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts and don't worry we promise to avoid any black holes most of the time and we're back i wanted to go back a little bit to the uh so this is a very white middle to upper middle class uh i think maybe spans because the middle class existed when this movie came out which is kind of like confusing to navigate. Right.

I think that I mean, obviously, they're all young white people who have done some college. And it seems like Ethan Hawke didn't finish college, not because it was financially struggling, but like because it was like a that was his ideological preference. So it wasn't like he had to drop out because he couldn't afford it right so as far as class goes i think it's like interesting and telling that this is like hailed as the gen x movie even if gen x audiences didn't like it at the time and it's still so centered on the white middle to upper middle class experience oh. There's a lot of like social issues that get brought up in the movie that the characters talk about. Like so many movies ignore societal ills that are affecting,

you know, people across the globe, but they're talking about like the energy crisis and the environment. They're talking about class and wages and workers rights. They talk about world hunger, like these things get brought up. And the movie is largely about a young woman who's like, optimistic, and she wants to make a difference in the world. And she wants to try to help fix some of these societal ills. But then she ultimately like doesn't really do anything. And she just like, kind of marinates in her

privilege and makes a documentary about her friends. Which is what happens in Rent. Also, she acts like working retail after college is like the worst thing. Like everybody fucking works retail after college. It is not that like she makes it seem like it's the worst thing in the world. Okay. So I had so many feelings about that plot point. And that was another thing where it's like that to me was like what was really interesting about like the tension between Vicky and Lelena is like something that does genuinely suck about Lelena is she like wants to have her like cool burnout friends. But she always there is an element to her character where she always has to view herself as a little bit above them which is complicated because like there are things she says them like you're being an

asshole i know you're technically correct where especially troy troy is not paying rent he refuses to look for work like he's just being he is like actively mooching off of her and then negging her all the time which is like go fuck yourself situation's of her and then negging her all the time, which is like, go fuck yourself. Situation's very different with Vicky. I feel like it's telling that the only two people who live in this four person apartment are the two women. Um, I don't think that Sammy has a job for most of the movie.

Yeah. Also, I don't think he lives. Does he live there? I think he lives somewhere else, but I don't know if he lives somewhere else. Cause at one point he comes in and um winona rider's like what are you even doing here you don't live here yeah but she says that to troy too and he does that's

and they they call it the maxi pad which leads me to believe that it's a house where only women live yeah i don't know i might be reading too much into that no I like that but like with Vicky I mean like she I don't know like there is kind of this I wish that we could have explored it more because it's like Lelaina is you know trying to like live life on her own terms while being well actively denying her own privilege but you know capitalizing on her own privilege when it suits her where Vicky it seems like she's from the lower middle class baby it seems like she doesn't have a safety net in the way that Lelaina does and she's working at the gap she becomes a manager she's like taking pride in her work in a way that

I thought was like really cool like she was just like oh you know that sort of shy like I feel like a corporate sellout but I'm also like i've never taken pride in my work before and like that's a cool feeling and i that was like a cool element to that character and then lelaina thinking she's a little too good for it and and like openly expressing that to vicky and vicky being like well fuck you you elitist prick there's like a couple different times in the movie where someone calls another character out and you're like, yeah, good for you.

And then it's just kind of dropped. And then we cut to the next scene and everyone's getting along again. Yeah. With that gap thing in particular, when Lelana thinks that she's high and mighty, she's like, I'm not going to work at the gap, for Christ's sake.

But then when she's at her low moment, when she's on the couch, chain smoking, racking up money to the psychic hotline, she's like, oh, you think you're hot shit because you work at the Gap. Like, it's interesting how for her the Gap is like beneath her. But then also she feels like it's being lorded over her later. Right. Oh, Lelaina. So, yeah, I wish that Vicky, we just got a little more vicky context but i do like the peaks you have into her life of like i thought it was sweet that her parents uh love each other but

she's very grossed out by their relationship i'm like oh good for you vicky good for you your parents love each other oh i didn't read that that way at all i read it is that they don't like each other and they like the romance is completely dead we shit with the door open see i think because that's how dead the romance is i think shitting i think that you can have romance and shit with the door open i agree the two are not mutually exclusive but i think that's a very naive take on vicky's part it's like well i think maybe they're they're in super love because you if you can see someone take a shit and still be like i love you like let's smooch and frick yeah um so i uh mentioned this but so as lelena is like trying to sort out her money troubles and trying to get another job after she kind of like puts down working at the gap she

then goes to her mom for a loan and her mom suggests well why don't you work at a fast food restaurant this is the scene where the r word is just casually thrown around by multiple characters yeah several characters yeah and not just in this scene other it gets it gets said other times. And Lelena dismisses a job at a fast food restaurant, citing a very ableist reason. I do appreciate that the movie kind of makes a point to show that a job at a fast food restaurant is harder and takes more skills than Lelena. Right, she genuinely can't hack it. She cannot. She cannot add 45 and 85 together quickly or whatever the numbers were because the movie does have little moments of commentary like that like kind of class commentary and i

think it has a lot of good moments yeah in terms of yeah there's a scene that seems to be satirizing networks like mtv and the entertainment of that era where lalaney's watching a show and I forget what it's called but it's this woman she's like the host of this show it's like a fashion show fashion oh it's meant to be house of style did y'all watch that oh no I don't know oh my god MTV I might be older than y'all but it's it's clearly meant to be MTV's house of style Cindy Crawford got her start on that show like it was like no way it was I it was fact check that but i think so it was like in the 90s it was mtv's fashion and it was always kind of like edgy hip-hop fashion but yeah it was their fashion show okay so what happens in this like you know this like kind of spoof

version of that on the in your face network is it's this woman she's the host of this show and she's like today we're in i think they're in compton and she's like we're in compton and you can buy this this uh bandana it's got red for crips and blue for bloods or i i don't even know if i have the colors right and she's like and it's only 75 dollars yeah and it's made by donna karen famously a bougie white woman i actually love that comment it's like the movie does try to do some 90s commentary of like that was the vibe of the 90s like corporations and white rich people co-opting like black folks and like latino folks and like like working class like fashion and like making it a thousand dollars and then selling it back to people.

Right. Right. Exactly. Yeah. I thought that like especially for some reason, like the TV stuff, especially I thought was really, really effective with the I mean, even with the Frazier's dad show, where it was very clearly like parodying a lot of daytime TV, where it was like, you know, exploitative thing and tragic thing where you know he he's like today we have this amazing child and and someone with alzheimer's disease and you're just like it's that is clear like what they're trying to do and then i i also thought it was like interesting the how winona rider is like duped by a TV psychic and like that that was just a little montage of like predatory TV scams of the 1990s because it was like TV college TV psychics and

like just little ways that the culture of this time preyed on desperation and loneliness which is like there's a different generational reboot of how to prey on desperation and loneliness, which is like there's a different generational reboot of how to prey on desperation and loneliness. And I thought it was like kind of a fun comment on it. Oh, the TV psychic scene has my favorite line of the movie where when her roommate is coming to talk to her about the phone bill over the phone, the TV psychic is like, Lainey, I sense that you're in great danger.

Danger is coming. And then Jeanine Garofalo is like, we have a $400 phone bill. What the fuck? It's from this 900 number. And then you just see Winona Ryder very slowly hanging up the phone. That was funny.

That's comedy. I thought it was good. Yeah. Part of the reason that the ending to this movie bums me out so much is i feel like there's so many like strong threads of like ways this movie could have gone characters they could have expanded on more topics they could have taken a little further because it's like with troy and laney like they're both shitty in their ways troy is by far worse and i would hope that

if laney had done what i wanted her to do at the end and just like got her shit together and figured out who she was as a person and worked a retail job and wasn't a total snob, I'm sure that these would be issues that hopefully would course correct later in her life. Troy may be permanently broken, but like how Troy's central, like it feels like what they're trying to ask with that character.

I don't know. Let me know what you think. Because I was like, it seems like Troy is trying to do the thing where he's like saying something valid, but his methods are shitty and like don't make any difference for anything. Where it's like he wants to exist outside of capitalism. He resents capitalism. He resents that you are expected, you know, certain things are expected of you to exist in a society and be considered someone worthy of respect.

A valid question and like fair, but like he sucks and like he's useless and he's mean. And then in the end, he's kind of like rewarded by getting everything he ever wanted so and why i mean because he's a white guy who had a safety net the whole time that's why yeah and like at one point it's like a throwaway thing but i think that lelena's dad set up a cushy job interview for Troy that he didn't go to.

And I think he didn't go to it because he was like hanging out with her. I think that like his, her dad definitely is like, I set up a job interview and he couldn't even bother to show up. Right. And so you're right that it's, it's as someone who is a former like slacker, I knew a lot of like slacker types that were anti-capitalist.

It's really easy to be that way when you have a safety net when people are looking out for you and someone can make a call and get you a job and I think Troy is very good at presenting his his rejection of all that stuff ideologically on the outside but not so good at acknowledging what he actually has access to which is not nothing right yeah and it's like Troy's life I mean his life would become so much more difficult if Laney and Vicky weren't constantly doing what he's yelling at them for all the time which is working so that they all have a place to live which Troy is not contributing to and is in fact actively hostile to them for like working so that he has somewhere to yell at them at like

it's just it's so messy and it's like the movie seems to know that but then the ending it's it's wild it's wild I also find it fascinating and maybe this is some irony that the movie loves to talk about but like the the like paradox of this being a movie about characters who are like oh my god selling out is like the worst thing you can do and like it might be tempting but ultimately you're a loser if you sell out but then this was also a studio movie and ben stiller said something like it's a strange thing because it was a studio movie about the ideas of commodification and dissent or whatever.

And the idea that it was a universal movie, meaning like the movie studio universal, a universal movie that was really sort of independent minded was something that we struggled with. So it's like the same studio that released Jurassic Park the year before is also releasing reality bites and clearly made a bunch of script changes and like all the had all these studio notes and it's probably the reason that Lelaney ends up with Troy at the end because

that's kind of like the more like right gritty romantic choice for her to make which I mean I was glad that at least like the major players in this who worked on this movie all seem aware of that because it's like at some point it is just truly like what are you going to do like what the like because all of the you know like they're all of the resources are in the hands of big studios like right what the fuck are you gonna do and it's I don't know it has have either of you ever seen SLC punk I have not no I have I've seen it many times do you like it um I liked it when I was in high school I re-watched it maybe two years ago I actually thinking about it I like not to kind of spoil the ending I don't know if

y'all have like a philosophy I was I wanted to talk about the ending to SLC Punk, because I think I like it better. Yeah, the ending is great, because it's like, oh, this whole time, all of that ideology was BS, and you sold out in the end. And turns out, you just, like, were a poser like everybody else. And that's fine. It's called growing up the end. Like, I kind of love that. Yeah, like, so, oh, I, the only time I've seen SLC Punk, I was on Molly. Nice.

But I really loved it. But but the ending, in spite of me being high out of my mind, the ending really stuck with me as one of the more like, you know, it doesn't feel good to watch, but it is an honest depiction of like and also it's a Matthew Willard joint Caitlin oh I I'm familiar I just have yet to see it and and unlike Reality Bites it's a true indie movie it made like two dollars and it like premiered at Sundance and but but yeah like the the way I I was sort of wondering if Reality Bites would take that sort of option where it's like, you know, it seems inevitable that this group, at least, you know, two or three out of the four are going to end up selling out in the way that adults are forced to under capitalism more often than not. But I was wondering how self-aware it's like it didn't do it in a very self-aware because even in the like the closing line of the movie, Lainey is like it's acknowledging that Lainey has used her privilege to get to where she's at with Troy because it's her dad on the phone.

Who, you know, like all for boomer criticism of like, look at this, you know, how they open the movie with like your revolution. You know, you traded your revolution for shoulder pads. Fair, fair criticism but it's like our characters are well on their way to doing the same fucking thing by the end of the movie but it's not quite willing to like go there and admit it in a way that slc punk was like yeah lillard's a suit now he's uh he he just got the law school he went to law school He went to play Shaggy. He's a corporate stooge. I mean... Lillard's taking that Scooby money.

Can't even blame... And it's funny, like, we're, like... Okay, so if in the universe of the film, nobody, only certain people are allowed to sell out, if the clock spins five years later, like, are we to believe that Troy is still underemployed and like blowing off job interviews and sort of intentionally getting fired?

And Lelaina is like, certainly they would have, like you would have to get a job at some point. Like that's life. And so- Life is unsustainable otherwise. Yeah. Right. It's like, he's not gonna,

if there's one person who's not gonna single-handedly dismantle American capitalism, it troy from reality bites like he's gotta have to do something at some point and i feel like such a like a mom saying that where i'm like get your life together young man but you know what i bet he does direct action he starts a podcast oh you know he starts a podcast and we're a part of the problem yeah you think troy from reality bites wouldn't be fucking podcasting in 2022 oh he's got he's probably got two podcasts he has oh you know who he is i know exactly who he is he is like the leftist podcaster who is all like oh like class solidarity but makes three300,000 a year via Patreon. But you would never know it because he talks about like class warfare every

week in the podcast. That's who he would be. Never volunteered a week in his life. Yeah. Absolutely. No, no. Oh,

look, wow. We're all a bunch of fucking sellouts. We're a feminist podcast on the I heart radio network. At the end of the day, it's like, well, shit. Well, fuck. We're the end podcast on the iHeartRadio network. At the end of the day, it's like, well, shit. Well, fuck. We're the end of SLC punk.

Okay. Yeah. Does anyone have anything else they want to talk about? That's everything I had. I think that might have been it. Yeah. Same. Does this movie pass the Bechdel test?

It does. Yeah. We've got some conversations. We've got some conversations. We've got some various combinations. It's a lot of Lelaney and Vicky, I think is most of the Bechdel test

passing convos. But what about that nipple scale? The famous, flawless nipple scale where we rate the movie on a scale of 0 to 5 nipples based on examining the movie through an intersectional feminist lens i feel like it's maybe like a two or a two and a

half just one of those kind of split down the middle ones or maybe it's less than that let me talk through this um i appreciate that this is a movie like written by a woman writing about her own experiences. It's coming from a pretty privileged place because at least the characters, it's like, yeah, they're broke. But they're broke in the way that white college graduates from supportive middle class families working entry level jobs are broke. Broke, not poor. Right. So it just feels gross to make a movie where things like money and labor and socioeconomic class are major themes of the movie, but the movie only features educated middle class

white people. I do not like that the movie is predicated on which of these two guys is she going to choose because she has to pick one because hetero romance must prevail. And then she picks the guy who has been actively cruel to her throughout the entire movie. I hate that for her. There are some things I do like. There's some interesting satire. There is a queer character whose queerness is normalized within the story, even though that character gets the least amount of screen time in this version of the story, at least. But it's, you know, queer representation that was, I would say, generally more positive than you would tend to find in this era.

And yeah, as I think I like trailed off, but it's a woman writing this screenplay about her life, about her experiences and her relationships. It seems like it got studio notes to death, almost 70 different drafts kind of thing. But I don't know. It's just, have I come to any conclusion no i'm gonna give it two nipples uh i'll give one to winona rider because i do love winona and i'll give the other nipple to screenwriter helen chaldress who again has been kind of like left out of the conversation about this movie and like isn't given credit where credit is due

yeah so there you have it uh i'm gonna go two and a half on this one maybe maybe i'm tempted to do three but i i the the the centering of the relationship is just like so frustrating that i guess i'm gonna do two and a half. Again, yes, like this is yet another, you know, quote unquote, generation defining movie that solely focuses on, you know, middle class cis white people. I do appreciate that there is some different class backgrounds and discussion of class.

I feel like most movies like this, just like, or most, you know, coming of age movies, class exists in a complete and total void. So at least that's not the case. This movie asks a lot of interesting questions. I think that, you know, the answers are really complicated because we also, like our generation is not going to have the answers and, you know, Gen Z, best of luck. But, and then there's no more generations uh so ultimately yeah i think that this movie asks a lot of interesting questions it challenged me in some ways it frustrated me and others yeah and uh it made me want to re-watch slc punk um but i do appreciate that this movie um is you know written by a woman who has lived out a similar experience um i think that

her career sense is very indicative of how disposable um women creatives can be in hollywood especially during this era i'm glad that there has been some motion um against that since it doesn't seem to be something that happens quite as much and that there are a lot of women in high positions in this production you have a woman editor you have a woman writer you have a woman producer but yeah i i don't know it this this honestly this movie was like challenging yeah for for me and uh you know being an adult sellout is fucking embarrassing and it's also um unfortunately kind of a part of being an American and it I guess that's all I have to say about it you know yeah so I'll go two and a half and

I'm giving them all the Helen cuz nice it's ridiculous that justice for Helen have been stillers getting credit for shit she did. Yeah. Yeah. Bridget. Yeah, I'm going. First of all, I love that we're just explicitly identifying as adult sellouts. And this feminist adult sellout is going two and a half nipples. And I completely agree. Mostly for Helen Childress. Like, justice for her. I had no idea about the ways that she was sort of written out of her own experience.

And that just sucks that this is a movie about her life that is so accredited to Ben Stiller, a man, that she just gets written out of it. Like, I was Googling pictures. It was difficult to even find pictures of her with the cast. And, like, this was her story. So most of those nipples are going to her. Also, Janine Garofalo.

I have a soft spot for a Janine Garofalo supporting, casting. Yeah. And this movie, I once loved it as a youth. Watching it as an adult, I agree it's challenging. But yeah, I like a movie that makes an attempt to show queerness in the 90s in a way that it's not so traumatic and steve zahn doesn't die or something like i i think for the time i'm gonna go two and a half fair yeah bridget thank you so much for joining us yes thank you for returning come back anytime oh it's always a blast anytime y'all

y'all about to get sick of me impossible can. Can't happen. Won't happen. Tell us all about your new show on Cool Zone. Oh, yeah. So Internet Hate Machine is an exploration of kind of an unpleasant topic, which is the online harassment of women, specifically black women, but women of color in general, and how I believe that is connected to our current sort of political and social hellscape, I guess I'll say. And so, yeah, it's it's yeah, but I swear it's not dark. It's not as dark as it sounds.

But yeah, it's an exploration of the ways that all of these things online, the way that black women have been treated, have gotten us to a place where those same tactics and those same ills impact all of us and really make it hard for us to have a functioning democracy. So if that sounds like something that you're interested in exploring, please check it out. The new season or the first season drops October 26th.

Nice. Oh, so excited. Thank you. Thank you so much for coming back. We'll be plugging the hell out of the show. And anything else you want to plug as far as your social media handles? Yeah, you can follow me on Instagram at Bridget Marie in D.C. or on Twitter at Bridget Marie.

And I have my own long-running podcast. Long-running two years podcast on iHeartRadio. In podcast world? Oh, I'm proudly claiming that's a long time. Two years. That's a long time. Yeah. Called There Are No Girls on the Internet.

Please check it out. Yay. Amazing. And you can follow us on Twitter and Instagram at Bechtelcast. You can subscribe to our Patreon at patreon.com slash Bechtelcast. It is $5 a month and it gets you two bonus episodes every month, plus the entire back catalog of bonus episodes. You can also get our merch at tpublic.com

slash the Bechdel cast. This is such a funny way to end the episode after Reality Bites. Where we're like, in conclusion, capitalism. Buy our stuff. In conclusion, give us $5 a month. Thank you. And support us on Hellscape social media platforms

that are actively ruining the world. You know, or we can just go fuck ourselves, whatever you want. On that note, let's go watch Fraser's dad's TV show. Honestly, I would watch it if I had pneumonia. Yeah, let's do it. Okay, bye.

Bye. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearths the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you

get your podcasts. Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. What was that? That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. Can Kay trust her sister, or is history repeating itself? There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI. Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore.

The story of one strange and violent summer, this season on the new podcast, Rip Current. Hear episodes of Rip Current early and completely ad-free and receive exclusive bonus content by subscribing to iHeartTrue Crime Plus, only on Apple Podcasts.