The Bechdel Cast - The Truman Show with Brandie Posey

Episode Date: July 30, 2026

Good morning! Caitlin, Jamie, and special guest Brandie Posey discuss The Truman Show (1998). And in case we don't see you, good afternoon, good evening, and good night! Here's the piece we reference, "The Real Truman Show" -- https://idapb.substack.com/p/the-real-truman-show  Follow Brandie on IG at @brandazzle and check out her comedy special Milk Jug and Burn This Records at https://www.youtube.com/@BurnThisRecords See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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The patriarchy's effing vast. Start changing it with the Bechdelcast. Good morning, Jamie, and in case I don't see you, good afternoon. Good evening and good night. And Caitlin, while I have you here, might I suggest some delicious Dunkin' Donuts coffee to go with your podcasting? Duncan Donuts, it really isn't that bad. Who are you talking to, Jamie? It's just me here.

What? What? Wow. Incredible intro. Wow. I think honestly, you know what? That was the usually just one of us wakes up. Today?

Today? We're both here. Honey, all right. Welcome to the Bexel cast, the podcast where we take a look at your favorite movies using an intersectional feminist lens as well as the Bechtel test for jumping off point for discussion. My name is Jamie Loftus. My name is Caitlin Durante. The Bechtel, of course, being a media metric created by our dear friend, Alison Bechtel, friend of the show, best friend in real life, of course, first appearing in her comic collection decks to watch out for, has since been kind of mainstreamified into a media metric. There are many

different versions. The one that we use is do two characters of a marginalized gender have names? Do they speak to each other? And is there conversation about something other than a man? And ideally, it's like a narratively impactful conversation and not just throw away dialogue. Yeah. But what if you live in a simulation? This is, which brings us to today's movie. Another one in our, as we approach our 10-year anniversary, a movie that you would think we would have covered by now, but it just never, the pieces never quite came together. Until now. Exactly.

And today we are talking about 1998's The Truman Show. Yes. Not the true woman show. The true man show. Yeah. Kind of fucked up. It kind of makes you think and we'll get into it. We have an incredible returning guest, so let's get her in here.

We sure do. She's a comedian. She's got a new comedy special out called Milk Job on Burn This Records, which you can watch on YouTube and which you should watch. And you remember her from our episode on 500 Days of Summer. It's Brandy Posey. Welcome back. Hello, hello. Thank you for having me.

This is one of my favorite movies of all times. So I'm really, when I saw you guys had done it yet, I was like, ooh. Ooh, oh, please, please, please. And here you are. Yay! I am so glad. This has been a show that, or a movie we've almost covered several times. It just for some reason, it just hasn't happened.

So I'm so glad that you're here. Yeah. Yeah, what is your history with The True Man show? Okay. So I am a, and I am now an adult, so this has waned a little bit, obviously, because of things over time. But I am a massive Jim Carrey fan from way back. Aesventura 2 was a religious awakening for me in comedy in the theaters as a child. I have not missed the opening day of a Jim Carrey movie since Aes Ventura 2.

Even number 23? Yes, I saw that at the Grove on opening day with about five other people. That includes Mr. Popper's Penguins. I was going to say, what about Mr. Popper's Penguins? You're a real head. Every single Sonic? Every single Sonic. I was on vacation for Sonic 2, and I said, sorry, I'm going to need about three hours to go see Sonic 2.

because the tradition lives on. That's really beautiful. Yeah. It's just a fun thing I've always done because it's like I was really just really drawn. I love, I love him. His 90s run is like pretty unfuck withable.

You know what I mean? You can't touch it. And if you were like a drawn to comedy but also kind of shy person, I think that his just like larger than life persona was this like, you can be that? like I'd consider him like one of my biggest it's funny because my stand-up is nothing like him but he's like one of my biggest

comedy influences of all time and I the one person I think that him and Patrick Stewart I think if I met them I would cry on site so don't ever want to do that never meet your heroes I mean hero but also like he has some weird stuff in his personal life as a human so as we all do so you know that's separate but young Brandy, he meant the world to me, basically.

Yeah. Wow. Yeah. So you saw this, this came out after Ace Fincher or two. So you saw this in theaters? Oh, yeah. June 4th, 1998. It was also the last day that my friend Lindsay lived in Maryland because she was like a Navy brat and then she was moving. And the very last thing we did before she moved to Colorado was go see and Truman Show on opening day. Wow. Oh, that's, what a nice memory. Yeah. Jamie, what about you? What's your relationship with this movie?

I somehow had never seen this movie in spite of the fact that I It's definitely like on description like This is a movie I would love and it is a movie I love Spoiler alert I really wish I had seen this when I was in high school It would blow my mind because it blew my mind and I'm in my 30s So I we've talked about this recently on the show And kind of any time Jim Carrey grows

I was not allowed to watch Jim Carrey movies for the most part when I was growing up Because my mom found him annoying So Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler movies, I still have not really seen most of their 90s classics because my mom found them annoying. And unfortunately, it's a hereditary trait. So I, I've seen more, I think I've seen more serious Jim Carrey movies than for some reason Grinch. We made an exception for Grinch. I don't know why. We showed up for Grinch hard.

Yeah. And we still do. Sure. But yeah, I don't have a strong attachment to him. his his 90s work but I did see Eternal Sunshine in middle school and you know was pissing shitting for the next 20 years about it yeah I mean he's he is yes has a lot of controversy that we probably don't have the bandwidth to get into today but um incredibly versatile actor and this I feel like this was maybe his first step into more serious stuff and

where he started to show that he had range. And I definitely didn't know that Peter Weir had directed this. And like he has a kind of ridiculous track record of helping comedic actors make a dramatic turn. Because he did Robin Williams' dead poets. I just, I really, I mean, this movie is incredible. I feel like it does something. I'm trying to think of a similar movie to this in that it's like, this is an idea everybody has had or at least an intrusive thought everyone's had.

And it's executed perfectly. And like how many times has that happened? It's pretty incredible. And I'm excited to talk about it. Yeah. Also, Laura Linney is so good in this. If only if only she'd been allowed to have a conclusion to her arc. We'll get there.

We'll get there. But I, yeah, this movie's amazing. First timer. Caitlin, what about you? I would count this among my favorite movies. I saw it around the time that it came out. I don't think in theater. but probably within a couple years of it being out.

I eventually bought it on DVD, which I still own. Thank you very much. I've seen it, you know, a few dozen times, I would say. I love a movie where characters are in a like, things aren't what they seem kind of world and that they have to like figure out the truth of what's going on around them. So very late 90s because it's like we get the Matrix the next year. There's a lot of simulation culture is so hot.

It's so hot right now. And then this movie, I would also pair it with Pleasantville as like if you want to do like a double feature. I feel like these two movies pair together really well. But then you've got your other like things aren't what they seem movies such as like Vanilla Sky. They Live. Total Recall. Stepford Wives. You know, the list goes on.

But I love that as a narrative thrust, if you will. so I've always loved this movie I hadn't seen it in quite a few years before re-watching it for prepping for this episode but yeah, it was a joy I was worried like oh no, what if it doesn't hold up as well or you know but honestly

I don't have that many complaints I think it gets more prescient with age honestly I know, yeah this really shaped a lot of my view of the world and how to like question things and kind of just like be looking for up It really like is like a really seminal movie and the DNA of a young granny. Yeah.

Well, it's like there's been so much written about how this movie came out before Survivor and like before most contemporary reality TV and like surveillance culture, self surveillance culture. It's just like it's ahead of its time by only a couple of years, which is pretty wild. but it had such an impact on me that to this day, I would say at least once a month, I'm like, oh God, I'm probably in the Truman show. I better not jerk off in case anyone's watching.

So it really, really affected me. Luckily, Truman only does funny bits in the bathroom. He never jacks out. He's never taking an explosive shit. This deeply lonely 35-year-old man does not jacks out. off ever. Absolutely not. No, he just makes weird collages. So why don't we take a quick break and then we'll come back for the recap.

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Ed Harris in a beret. I mean, I didn't know, well, I didn't know any of this movie except the premise, but he replaced, what's his name, Mr. Scary. Dennis Hopper? Dennis Hopper? Yeah. Dennis Hopper shot for one day on the Truman show and they were like, get him out of here.

And Ed Harris had like 20 seconds to prepare for this role and just like absolutely knocked it out of the part. I'm pretty sure he got nominated for an Oscar for this. I think he did. Yeah. Yeah. After 20 seconds of preparation, he's amazing. Oh, man.

Yeah. I mean, the Christoph character, I mean, we can get into later, obviously, but the Christoph character is like. so how many of those people have we encountered that are just like in Hollywood I'm making art by exploiting others also that true okay and then I promise we can start talking but that the Truman's house is owned by Matt Gates's family that's another disturbing fact I learned oh I have we just have to live with that for some reason yeah I have a whole tangent about master plan communities that I'll get into.

Oh, yeah. Yes. When you know about master plan communities, of course, that's the way that Matt Gates grew up. And also his last name is literally Gates. But just Truman's house is where Matt Gates grew up. We hate to say it, but it's true. Yeah. Yes.

Wild. Anyway, here's the recap of the Truman show. We open on the Ed Harris character, Christoph. He is talking about Truman Burbank, who is, the star of the Truman show, a television program in which Truman's entire life is recorded

and broadcast 24-7, except Truman has no idea about this. He doesn't know that he is the subject of this show. He doesn't know that he's being filmed by hidden cameras all over his community. He doesn't know that everyone around him is an actor,

including his best friend and his wife. He doesn't know that the town that he lives sea haven is a set and that his whole life is a lie fabricated for the sake of this show, which Christoph is the like creator slash executive producer of. It's a really quick one-off line that could be its own movie entirely, but I was like, what, like Grant and I both stopped and we're like, what the fuck? That hopefully isn't prescient of something that is going to happen.

but where they were like Truman Burbank is the first baby to be adopted by a corporation. And the way that they say the first, as if to imply, although of course now, that is completely normal. Like it's so, oh, I was like, oh, so scary, such a good detail. Yes, indeed. So this is going on with the Truman Show for nearly 30 years ever since Truman was born. So then we meet Truman Burbank, played by Jim Carrey. He's a very cheery guy, but he also seems to be longing for something or someone. He's searching for a woman.

He wants much more than this provincial life. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Yes, he's searching for a woman named either Lauren or maybe Sylvia. We'll find out more about that. He feels very restless where he is. He yearns to leave and go somewhere like Fiji.

But he is intensely afraid of. boats and crossing bodies of water. So he feels stuck on this small island where Sea Haven is. At some point we get a flashback from when Truman was a child where he and his dad went out on a boat during a storm and his father fell overboard and drowned. And that's why Truman is so petrified of water. And when you know this is fake, because you find out in the framing device at the beginning that everything is fake, that sequence of Truman's dad drowning reminds me so much of

the arrested development cutaways. So like, and that's why you always leave a note. Like it's so goofy looking. Doesn't really? And that's why you never go out on a boat in a storm. Right. A tiny dingy with your child in the middle of a storm. Oh, man.

And that scene is wild because then it's also the dad floats away and then a guy in a scuba suit comes up and just gives them like a little oxygen and he's mad that he had to just betray his. adopted son. It's so dark. I interpreted it that he was mad that his character got killed off and he's out of work. Yeah. Well, probably that too.

There's a lot of like interesting stuff with the like how do the actors feel about the, I don't know. I would watch a whole separate movie about the actors. And we meet some of these actors such as the person who plays his wife, Merrill. Although that's her character's name. I forget what like the actor's name. Hannah. Hannah McGill, I think, played by Laura Linney. So it's an actor playing an actor,

playing a character. And she's so good in this that I did not like Laura Linney for probably 15 years because of how much I hated the character of Merrill. She disturbed me to my core in this movie. She's spooky. Yeah, like that you could make, that you could live a life,

a complete fake life with somebody that you said you love. It like really is like, 8th grade Brandy really was like, I can't. That is, that's a possibility it can't even allow to be real. It's so scary. Yeah. Yeah, she's incredible. There's a lot of, we can talk about it a bit, but there was like

some, when I was doing some research, like the actors were given a lot of freedom to write their own backstories. And Laura Linney came up with the, like, some really scary shit for Hannah that like you wouldn't know because I think she's not

in the movie enough, but like, she, she really cooked. She got some, yeah, I need to read more about that. Yeah, that's really cool. So we meet Merrill. We also meet the actor who plays Truman's best friend, and then his character Marlon,

played by Noah Emmerich. And the two of them, Merrill and Marlin, are always plugging products, like kitchen utensils or ice cold bruskeys, because they have to advertise things within the show. And this happens at Truman, and he's always like, okay.

And then Truman starts to notice other strange things, such as what appears to be a large movie set light falls from the sky right next to him. It starts pouring rain on him, but only a tiny little section at first. He sees an unhoused man who he thinks is his father on the street. But then this man is promptly grabbed away and put onto a bus. And so Truman talks to his mom, played by Holland Taylor, again, his fake mom. Love her. About all of this.

And she brushes it off because her role, his wife's role, his best friend's role is not only to advertise things in the show, but also to gaslight Truman and maintain this facade. then we get more insight about the Lauren slash Sylvia person and we flash back to when Truman was, I don't know if he's in high school or college, but a woman named Lauren, played by Natasha McGillohen catches his eye. But clearly Christoph, again, the guy who's the brains behind the Truman show, cast Merrill to be Truman's love interest. So there's this forced meet cute between Truman and Merrill and Lauren isn't supposed to be heavily involved in Truman's life. But he keeps trying to pursue Lauren and asks her out and they sneak off to the beach where she tells him that everyone around him is pretending. Everything is fake. It's a show that everyone is watching. Her name

isn't Lauren. It's actually Sylvia. And then a man pretending to be her father shows up, excuses her behavior as mental illness and then drags her away saying that they're moving to Fiji, which is why Truman is so obsessed with going to Fiji. But every time Truman talks about traveling or wanting to travel, various characters make excuses. They continue to gaslight him. Meanwhile, more strange things are happening. Truman hears a radio broadcast in his car that seems to be narrating his every move. I'm curious what you both think about this, or maybe I just missed something. This does seem like the kind of movie you have to watch like 20 times. I watched it twice, but I was like, maybe this is, maybe real heads will know. What is the reason do you think that things get so sloppy

around this point? Because it's so many things in a row. And maybe it's just like a movie that feels like a movie. But I was like, wow, they keep this, they keep this shit up for 30 years. And then in a couple weeks. I'm like, who got fired? Like, it just is like, this show's a mess. They hired a bunch of scabs. I think there's probably some department's unionizing. I do feel like there could have been like a fun

and it seems like there was a lot about this. There's a lot of like deep lore done around the Truman show that doesn't necessarily make it to the screen. But I'm like, I wonder if there is a reason somewhere of like, because there could be a million external interesting in world reasons why all of a sudden things are getting sloppy. That could be a like a union thing. I don't know. I just didn't, I was like, did I miss something? Do they explain why all of a sudden the show is like kind of a disaster? They don't explain it, but I guess my

head canon is that probably a lot of little mishaps have been going on this entire time. It's just that now Truman is starting, like paying attention. Sure. And connecting the dots. That's my guess. Got it. Yeah, I think so too. Yeah. So yeah, Truman hears this radio broadcast that seems to be about him. He almost accidentally walks into what seems like a like backstage craft services area that is disguised as an elevator. Well, and he does that because he breaks his routine. And I think that's probably part of it too, Jamie. Yeah. Because then people are so used to him just doing the routine that when he starts breaking it, I think that's when the fuckups start happening more and more too. Because they're like, whoa, we don't know what to do with this guy that now is

becoming uncontainable. He's going off script. Yeah. Right. And so he's like, what the hell is going on? So he starts doing some kind of like wacky stuff like running out into the street and stopping traffic, basically seeing what he can get away with. But no one seems to pay him any mind, which is also weird. So he's like, okay, something's up. And he goes to Marlon to be like, okay, I think there's a conspiracy happening.

But he thinks it's about his dad that maybe his dad is still alive. Marlin, of course, gaslights him and says, oh, you're cuckoo. Everything is normal. And then one day, Truman follows Merrill to work because he suspects that she's lying about her nurse job at the hospital. And sure enough, the operation that he tries to observe seems sketchy as hell. It's so funny. Just the idea of actors being like, just all go with it.

I'm going to make the primary incision. So this prompts him to try to leave for Fiji. But, oh, no, there aren't any flights. So he gets onto a bus to Chicago that, quote, unquote, breaks down. So he's like, fuck it, I'll just drive somewhere. So he has Merrill get in his car and he starts kind of like erratically driving around. There are all these clearly fabricated obstacles, including, fake traffic and a nuclear power plant leak.

I was like there was a fair amount of stopgaps in place. There's about a half a mile of error space. That was pretty impressive. Yeah. Just like him running through the woods trying to get away from the nuclear power plant to just, it really reminded me of ET being just like captured. Oh, yeah. Totally.

And so he ends up nearly getting arrested and taken. back home. And he's demanding to know what's going on. And again, Merrill is gaslighting him. But she's also freaking out and she's scared for her safety and like talks to camera almost. But then Marlin shows up all of a sudden things kind of calm down. Truman confides in Marlin. And we realize that it's Christoph feeding Marlin lines through an earpiece from like Truman

show control center HQ, yeah. Where Paul Giamatti is there. I kind of forgot he was in this movie. A baby Paul. Oh, my God. He's like a technician of some kind who does different things to like control different cameras

and manipulate the weather and stuff like that. I also like that baby Paul Giamatti. We're fully talking about a 35 year old man probably. We're like, oh, baby Paul. It's like when we talk about baby Holland Taylor, we're like she was 50. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Yes. And then Truman's father shows up, and there's like this big dramatic reunion, but it is clearly to divert Truman's attention away from the actual conspiracy that he's starting to uncover. And Truman and his dad have a very tearful reunion. And also, we are periodically cutting to the people at home who are watching the Truman show. There's a Truman Bar. There's a bar that I found very fun. Of course that would exist.

I love a gimmicky bar. I would absolutely go to that. I would go to Truman Bar. Definitely. Get that merch. Yeah. I've been to more ill-conceived bars than that. Oh, my gosh.

I've been to a Titanic-themed bar. I've been to a Big Lobowski-themed bar. I've been to a Beetlejuice pop-up bar. There's the unlicensed Star Wars bar. Hollywood. Oh yeah. Scum and villainy. There used to be an Austin Powers bar in Glendale. I went to that too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love all these places. This is our culture. I was thinking of watching this. I was like when this show ends, I wonder if there is like a in this world like a version of a Jake Tapper that shows up to try to change the Truman Bar into something else.

Wait, I don't know this reference. The bar rescue guy. Oh, okay. Oh, yeah, yeah. Sorry. No, no, no, no, quite all right. But anyway, so we know we see the different audience members who are diligently watching the program that is the Truman Show, one of whom is Lauren, aka Sylvia, who watches with bated breath. Then we get a kind of like news report slash Harry Shearer is interviewing Christoph about the show. Christoph talks about all the ways that he's had to like manufacture ways to keep Truman on the set that is Sea Haven Island, which is why he killed off Truman's dad by drowning him at sea to sort of induce this phobia of water in Truman. Christoph also discloses that Truman was the result of an unwanted pregnancy and that he was, to your comment earlier, Jamie, the first child to be adopted.

a corporation. And then Sylvia calls in and berates Christoph for being a liar and manipulator and making Truman this prisoner. But Christoph insists that Truman could leave whenever he wants and that the life that Christoph has given him is better than any life Truman could have in the real world. And then we cut back to Truman's life. He seems to have returned to his, you know, normal, cheerful self, despite Merrill having left him so that Christoph can introduce a new love interest for Truman. So basically Laura Lenny's character is written out of the movie from that point on. Yeah, she's going to go off Broadway. I do, I really do wish that we found out what became of that character. Yeah. Laura Linney's really quickly, this is, well,

I'll save a bit of it because we have to talk about like the consent as it is conceived in this world. But Laura Linney is head canon for Hannah because I guess her and Noah Emmerich, they, I mean, they're important in the movie, but they had a lot of downtime. And so they just like wrote these elaborate backstores. They were also living in the homes that they, like most of the actors were living in the homes that their characters lived in. And so for Hannah, she conceived this whole backstory that like, Hannah does the most product placement because she does backdoor deals herself. And she's saving up money so that she can afford to leave the show. That's her whole.

And then there's some like pretty diabolical stuff that we'll get into when we talk about consent. But anyways, yeah, she had a whole, she thought more about Hannah than maybe the script of the movie did. But it's a fascinating character because it's like, They, what, theoretically, she and Noah Emmerich's character, Lewis, right? Like, Marlon. Marlon. Marlon. They've been on the show since they were children. So it's like, what is, you know, I know that the movie would sort of have you feel that they're villains, but it's like, I find them like sympathetic to some extent too because it's like they, it's unclear to me how much they signed up for this, you know? This is all they know. Yeah, definitely. I mean, Marlon is, I mean, they were best friends when they were, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're. seven, right? Those when they met and became best friends. And it's like, so you're a child actor,

honestly, who's only ever known this. Like, right. I didn't even think about that. And he answers to Ed Harris like God as well. Like, of course he does. It's all he knows. So I don't know. I think I, I, especially in the second watch, I'm like, I think Noah Emmerich especially, just because he gets worse green time is doing something so like nuance that I didn't pick up on in the first time. But you're like, yeah, of course, this is all this guy knows. Like he's doing something horrible, but also, you see the picture of that little kid and you're like, what's he supposed to do? Yeah, I know. Product of his environment. Yeah. Okay, so, Truman seems back to normal and it appears as though he no longer suspects anything unusual is

happening. Just kidding, we discover that he has staged a scene in his basement to make it look like he's sleeping but really it's like just a lumpy blanket and like a tape recorder it's a classic honk shoe machine i'm like i'm like i love it tristov come on how'd you miss him recording himself snoring for hours they did this for 30 years pal come on yeah the man has no privacy you know everything he's doing but it's pa i guess it's paul giamati's fault that's right like canada they're like paul giamati wasn't wasn't paying attention was sleep on the job or whatever. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, so anyway, Truman escapes through a hole that he dug in his yard. So Christoph cuts the transmission of the Truman show, while the principal cast and extras look for Truman around the set. But no one can find him. And then Christoph realizes that no one's looking for him on the sea, which is where Truman turns out to be. He's facing his fear of the water and leaving the island on, a sailboat. So Christoph orders a violent thunderstorm to try to stop Truman, who falls overboard.

It seems like maybe he dies. But Truman lives. And his boat then crashes into a wall. It's like the edge of the set. That shot. Oh, my God. Oh. Woo! Yeah. So he finds a door and he's about to go through it. But then Christoph, who sounds like the voice of God, like coming from above, starts talking to Truman and trying to convince him to stay. But Truman's like, bye, he does his famous, good morning, and in case I don't see you, good afternoon, good evening, and good night. And then he exits through the door. And so Truman is free.

The audience watching at home is thrilled for him. Sylvia runs out to presumably reunite with him. and Christoff is like, oh, fuck, oh, crap. But, and I love the last line. It's so good. Like the what else is on. Yeah. It's so good.

It's so good. It reminds me a lot of, have you all seen Cable Guy? No. Actually, that's one of the ones that happened seen. Ooh. I mean, it's great. It's, it's kind of like, I think they're honestly a very good pairing together because the cable guy also is about media consumption and is incredibly critical of it.

And the ending of that is a little bit more hopeful, actually, because they end up cutting the power and then they don't have that moment, which is nice. But not to ruin cable. And that doesn't at all. But I think that they're really great companion pieces to me. Okay. Good to know. I do. I mean, the two Jim Carrey movies of this era that I genuinely think I would like it but haven't seen are cable guy and liar, liar, based on the description.

They seem interesting. Lyer, liar, I think I've said this before on the show, but that was a big one of my childhood. Yes. Lyer Lire Lire was huge for me. Yeah. Anyway, so that's the movie. Let's take another quick break and we'll come back to discuss. Love horror movies, but also working on yourself.

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Hey, Portlandia fans. Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here. You know us or rather you know them. Tony and Candice, Nina and Lance, Spike and yes, the chicken. We've played a lot of iconic characters over the year. but today we're showing up as ourselves to tell you about Podlandia, AEO rewatch, our brand new podcast. Each week, we'll revisit an episode of Portlandia from the very beginning,

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To Bill Burr. I don't think I've ever met somebody so exactly out of their mind as I am. And now, we even have more great guests coming up, including the great John Tuturo. It's called happiness, Delivering Happiness. Mariano Rivera. Big it. Oh my God. And many, many more. Open your free high, hard radio app. Search delivering happiness with Nick Totoro. And listen now. And we're back. We're back. Yeah, where to start.

Brandy, what's jumping out to you? I mean, they're just, I, rewatching it, I was like, I'm going to actually write down some quotes that really are jumping out at me for the, and, and looking at it through a 2026 lens that had been a few years since I'd really watched it. And thinking about our relationship with entertainment now and the Jamie who said self surveillance, but also like the way that we have all made ourselves these little like content kingpins in a certain way. Like Laura Lidney early on the movie says that when they're interviewing at the top, she says there's no difference between a private life or a public life to me. And she's like proud of like this is just I make my art is my content all day long 24 seven. And, and

And she calls it a blessed life. And I struggle with like how much of myself to put online all day long all the time. So just like I think that me, that's also a part of her character that unnerves me to a degree, you know, that the leaning into it of all. I remember there was like a moment during COVID very early on where I got onto Instagram and there were like 30 lives across the top of my stories. And I was like, oh, so many people are. just live broadcasting anything right now. And I remember being like, I want nothing to do with that whatsoever. And I think that this movie makes me think about that a lot. Totally. Yeah, absolutely. I thought the other line from that beginning that stuck out to me was Marlins' line of

like, it's all real. It's just controlled. And like how that feels like connected to that same conversation of like, yeah, since the Truman show has come out, like shortly after the a show comes out, you have the big wave of American reality television, which is all tied in with union issues, not wanting to pay writers. And so it's like, what's cheap, exploitative TV we can make? And unfortunately, it did create some real hitters. I can't argue with Survivor conceptually. It's a great idea. Yeah. But quite evil. But like, so the, like, the, like, the Ed Harris type producers, they still exist in like the Andy Coens of the world, but now it's like we've sort of cut out the Ed Harris middleman. Like we do that for ourselves now. And like we dilute ourselves into being a

main character and our condition to feel frustrated when we, when that's unsuccessful or like, I don't know. Yeah. This movie is like endlessly relevant in a way that like it's not the movie's off, but it sucks. It sucks to be like, true, like, it, it forecasts so much. And also, it just, like, gets worse and worse. Right. I mean, because there's so many conversations that we could start to have from this movie. There's the obvious conversation about how, quote, unquote, reality TV is not actually reality. All these things are, all the dramas manufactured, all the situations are manufactured. there's a conversation about how about product placement and about how so much media is just there to sell products or fill the space between commercials or whatever. Well, and I think there's also like a a yearning in society to see something real too.

And you have to believe where does that come from on us as people? It's wanting to escape to see something real because we. feel so beat down by our everyday lives. Like, what is actual authenticity? Yeah. And people are so hungry for it. And, you know, they, Tristaud's character says at the end, you were real. It's what made you so good to watch.

And it's just, people just are like, we, I want to see authenticity. I don't think I can live it myself or I don't, I'm not on that level, but I'm yearning for something. Yeah. Even the idea of like the, obviously, like, product placement existed before the Truman Joe, but like so much of what, like, they're all, Christoph is also selling something larger. Like, he's selling this regressive view of America that didn't exist.

And like, he lives in actual 1998. They live in like 195 and not even real 195, like television, 1955. So he's also like selling all of, he's selling an idea of like this American lifestyle. On the second viewing, I was like, oh yeah, this movie also was, far ahead even though it's like the phrasing wasn't there but like the whole world has this parissocial relationship with Truman yeah that he has I mean it's like obviously extreme because he is not even aware that it exists but but that like speaking to yeah what you're just saying brandy about like there is this like desire to see yourself where I do believe that even though like whatever

people at the Truman Bar like we would go to the Truman Bar even though by doing that you're in something pretty dark. Right. But I do believe that that normal people are rooting for him and care about him, even though in doing so, they're complicit in something really sinister. Yeah. Right. Everyone who is watching the show is complicit to some degree in the exploitation of Truman.

And then you've got some people, and I'm thinking of the bathtub guy specifically. I'm just like, does he ever leave his bathtub? But like, it seems like a little. lot of these audience members are kind of like living vicariously through Truman and yeah there's like the conversation around like celebrity worship but Truman doesn't even know he's a celebrity because there's this whole issue with lack of informed consent and that's another conversation and just all of these all these things it's it's wild how much this movie like bites off without ever feeling like super didactic or boring.

It's kind of a miracle that it's like really funny and fun to watch. And yeah, I guess like that does sort of just tumble right into the consent conversation where obviously Truman never consents to any of this. He's, you know, living in a simulation. And I think it's probably for the best that the movie doesn't get too into certain issues of consent because it gets that gets very scary. I mean, in Laura Linney's backstory, and this is, again, I'm like, yeah, I'm glad they didn't include this, but that they, I mean, that she was like, well, of course these two characters

have sex and she gets a raise every time he has sex with her. And like she created this really fucked up backstory for how her, I mean, her actor knowingly operates and that she has a marriage outside of this and that she's to some extent, I mean, assaulting Truman and some extent is being trafficked. Like, yeah. If you think about it too hard, it gets so scary. Everyone's being exploited. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and they're trying for a baby too, right? Like, Christoph wants the first orner conception, number one, and like, which is just a horrific phrase. And then it's also like, so now you've done the trauma to a new baby that you're probably also going to raise and it will never know. And then are you actually it's, you are its mother

biologically. Do you consider that your child? You, I know. Or is that just your character's child? Like it's all such a mind fuck. There was another, yeah, the thing I'm pulling from here with the actors making up their characters who are also actors backstory was a, I found, it's, It's like basically lost media, but someone ripped it from it aired on Nick at Night. It was called like True TV. And it was just like BTS, but in character BTS that aired on Nick at night once. But you get a lot of insight into how the actors were thinking at the time and like doing all these thought experiments where Holland Taylor does this interview in character where she's like,

yeah, we're like the most famous actors on TV, but we're also prisoners here. And so I have $40 million. And I own all these properties. I've never been there. But I hear it's amazing. And like, to the degree they've consented to be there seems to be different. You would think that Hall and Taylor was old enough to consent to be there. But Noah Emerick was sort of put there.

Yeah, as a kid. Yeah. I don't know. It's all, it's all so interesting. Well, and y'all should have to wonder, like, how it's pitched to them too, right? It's like his mom was probably what, like she was probably in her mid to late 30s. like when like well this role of a lifetime because they don't they never really knew exactly what this was going to be at a certain point anyway right they kept expanding yeah what if it wasn't a hit

yeah what if it wasn't and so there's probably some insane contract that she had no one because she's an actress she doesn't know what she necessarily signed away completely at that point and she's an aging actress in hollywood it was like oh this role of a lifetime why wouldn't you know it's just the the the levels of people just trying to work within a system um just really really I also, I had never actually noticed it until this time because I had not watched it in a long time, but when they show the shot of the dome itself, it's over the entire city of Burbank into like North Hollywood, because it's like right behind the Hollywood side. And I was like, the idea that they just like bought everybody out of that part of the valley and just flooded it. It really was making me think of like the Dodger Stadium of it all. Totally, totally. You know, just like the displacement of so many families for the. the creation of this like real life. Which I kept thinking on this watch.

I'm like, what is the budget for this show and how could it possibly be sustainable? Because there's a whole ecosystem that you have to pay for. There's all these actors, you know, principal cast and extras who presumably live there full time that you have to like pay for their labor. And I know this is not the biggest issue with this show. but I'm just like, how is this show actually sustainable, but Christoph insists that it is. So I'm just like, all right.

Who knows? Well, and if you're scaling with the kid, right? It's like when you're young, your world is very small, you know, and you're kind of just taken around. So it's like it can maybe didn't start that way overnight, but they kind of have built it as he kind of grew over time too. Right. Yeah.

Well, and then there's like Christoph himself who, again, I like, I like that he's kept vague enough that you can sort of guess your way around. Like, how does this man come to play God? And like the, I forget how much of this is included and how much of it is in this weird Nick and Night thing I watched. But that like Christoph had built his career on exploiting people and that like he had won an Oscar for a documentary on unhoused people that involved surveilling them against their will. And like from that came this idea to like to what if I could do a completely controlled surveillance experiment and broadcast that and call it art and elect myself the god of this person's life.

I just, I don't know. I think like Ed Harris makes so many interesting choices where it is like on paper so nuts that he tries to kill Truman. He's like, Pogamadi, kill him, kill him now. And then 20 seconds later, he's like, Moran, I guess he lived, but I guess I have to give him this God speech. But you can feel that it like really does meet. Like he's just so deep.

He's in his freaky simulation. And you see that in the scene where he's like touching Truman's huge face. We were like, this man is very, very sick. Yeah. I don't know with what. But it's so, I don't know. It's like I fully believe that he would kill Truman. And I fully believe that he was devastated that Truman was like,

electing out of this horrible thing. Well, I think it's what it's like an abuser gets high on their own supply a lot of the time too where it's like I did try to kill you, but now I've let you live. Look how benevolent I am. Like I, it's such a retaining of extreme power in that circumstance because he's like,

you can always leave whenever he wants, like it's, but you know that's not it. You've created things in his mind that make that impossible. Right. For a long, until it's not. I mean, it's also, yeah, it's like, I'm sure someone's written this essay of like how freaky and biblical that final sequence is where he's like, I have to kill my son to prove a point to everyone. Yeah.

And it's like a version of the Bible where Jesus gets off the cross and is like, I'm out of here. If I don't see you, good morning, good evening, and good night. Yeah. Well, I also forgot. I also forgot that Christoph is answering to, like, network executives to who are like, you got to pull the plug. We can't have someone die on national television and, like, Christoph tries to justify it. But I forgot that that was a component of it. Yeah.

Like, he is, he, he is playing God, but he actually doesn't have the final word, which feels like a good. He still answers to a higher god. Yeah. There's so many like levels of complicity that you see play out. Okay. And then this is where we get to like where I have some like, it's an incredible movie. I do wish that we saw more anyone other than white guys struggling with these degrees of complicity. I think that like we see it with Hannah, but then she kind of disappears from the movie.

I think that the character we really get to see a full. arc of like navigating this world is Sylvia slash I forget what a real world name is but like Sylvia is her real world name. Oh wait. Lauren was the character. Lauren's her fake name. Yeah. She's the only woman in the story who you get to really see out her story because you do get to see so many micro levels of complicity where like we were just saying like the buck doesn't even stop with Christoph. We see these like nameless masses watching the Truman show and being complicit in they're watching and being a fan.

We see like Sylvia elect out. We see Paul Giamatti be like, I don't want to kill him. All right. I guess I have to because it's my job. Like there's so many micro levels. But the movie does seem still primarily interested in like the micro levels that exist for white men at every level of society. Right.

Yeah. Again, since it had been a few years since I've watched this, I sort of forgot how. present Sylvia is, because she's sort of the only character that is objecting to the exploitation that's happening with this show. She's cool. She's so interesting. I like her too. And I couldn't remember, like, once she gets, you know, booted off the show when she tries

to expose to Truman, what's actually happening, I was like, okay, do we see her again? And if so, how frequently and what is she doing? I kind of forgot that she makes that phone call to. Christoph, I remembered her as just sort of like watching and hoping that Truman would reach his liberation kind of thing. Well, she's got some free Truman signs behind her and stuff too, which leads me to think there's at least some level of a movement. Yeah. I hope so. Yeah.

I would be curious if that was like deleted scenes stuff because, yeah, she, it seems like that has been her like, I mean, whatever. Truman's been through a lot. He's got a lot to reckon with. But, you know, to find out that your crush has since dedicated her life to liberating you from the sicko government experiment, like good self-esteem boost to be like, not only didn't she forget you, she's professionally obsessed with you, dude. But I really liked that even though we don't, I kind of like that we don't see them reunite. It's just implied that they do. And it's one of the few, like, whatever, the looming sort of like love. the story, but also like they, it's just like they represent something to each other that is really

significant. And I was moved by it. I thought it was so beautiful. Well, and it's like them, us not seeing that means that Truman had that moment to himself too, you know. That's so true. Oh, I didn't think about that. Yeah. That's a private thing that he got. Shit. It's beautiful. I know, but that like makes me emotional to think of that. Yeah. That's really nice. yeah i found their dynamics so moving and beautiful where they just like they they are childhood sweethearts in one way but it's also just like they represent like liberation to each other and like yeah that's so cool like yeah getting yeah what the hell no i know but i mean well it's like it's the the the the yearning for freedom and then like pursuing it at all costs and him like getting over

his fears and being like i know this isn't right i'm going to push against this like entertainment fascism that he's surrounded by honestly i mean it is like a full mechanism just to keep his free will completely beat down yeah and it's like it's powerful and that like him being drawn to sylvia Lauren at the time like that that she also like symbolizes to him the one off script choice he like confidently made and was like punching for it's just like oh it's so good yeah so I mean I the the I guess I mean Holland Taylor also I don't think as strong of a presence as she could or should have been because also it's like you have Holland Taylor let's give her more to do so we do have like three women in

the and then there's also a woman who works with Paul Giumani and Ed Harris but she mostly just responds to things she doesn't really do very much one of the few people of color in the movie I don't even know if we learn her name. Yeah. Like, so we, I would say we basically have three women characters. And, yeah, I would say, like, Sylvia, they stick the landing with and that that story is, like, fully realized and beautiful. I do wish that Hannah wasn't disappeared from the plot in the way that she's a special. Merrill.

Yeah. I was thinking about that, too, but then I was like, well, they write his dad back in. and then as soon as he's presumably a fixture in Truman's life again, he's not, like the dad character is gone too. So I don't even know if it's like necessarily a gendered thing. No, no, I don't think it's a gendered thing. I think it just sticks out because there's so few women of importance in the script. Definitely.

Well, and it's interesting too. It's like thinking about that from Hannah's the actor's perspective too, though. I mean, I would have liked more outside of the dome because I think, the second you're like it's unprofessional my line's been crossed I'm out yeah like you would be gone I mean yeah I would love to see deleted scenes of these I always wish we got so much more of the world because it's like I would love to know so much yeah so much more of that I love that you find like some of the backstory stuff because maybe she does does she have enough money now did she make enough money like does she get to go do QVC for a living right I'm sure she'll you know

land on her feet, but it's just like it is, I mean, it's comparatively a small thing and I feel like Laura Linney makes so much of the time she spends on screen where I feel like the two images that I most strongly associate with this movie

are Jim Carrey at the wall at the end and Laura Linney's smiling and holding up the like malt. The slicer, dice or the malt. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Any of her product placement shots are like the other big thing and so it's like, but yeah, This movie has so much going for it that it's like hard to, hard to stay mad.

It's also tight, too. It's like they really like, it's so. I forgot how quickly that light falls at the very beginning where I was like, oh, we got inciting incident in like four minutes in or something like that. It's so quick. You're like, oh, wow, we're off to the races. I've got a fill up glass score. There's just everything is happening. Yeah, I love it.

Yeah. Well, something that I kind of forgot about the Merrill character slash. sort of the production design of the whole movie is that it's embodying this like 1950s white suburban ideal where like Merrill is dressed like a suburban housewife. She's Donna Reed. Yeah, Donna Reed had a part-time job. Right. And then I was thinking about like the whole production design of the entire movie because

I don't know how aware I even was that it is emulating. this 1950s aesthetic. I think it was like a detail that I mostly overlooked when I watched it as a younger person. But this time I was like really, I really latched on to it. And then I was also thinking about Sea Haven Island as one of the characters. Yeah. And then I learned that the majority of the movie was filmed in a place called Seaside, Florida, which is, as we mentioned earlier, a master plan.

community, which for anyone who's not familiar with that, it's a part of the new urbanism design movement that promotes walkable neighborhoods and seeks to eliminate urban sprawl, which sounds great in theory. But then I was like, wait a minute, where have I heard this term? But they're all racist. Exactly. I was like, where have I heard this term master plan community before? And then I remembered a place that I learned about many years ago called Celebration Florida. Do either of you know about this place? Yeah, the Disney company town. Yes. And so even though the Truman show is not filmed at Celebration, I feel like there are like interesting parallels between Sea Haven Island and Celebration because there are these like corporate built communities that are incredibly

white, incredibly lacking in racial and economic diversity as well. There's also places like Fordlandia, which was, I believe, in Brazil. I mean, companies in the mid-century were doing this were like Disney. I feel like celebrations the most famous, but yeah, Fordlandia, sorry, I'm pulling it up. It was owned by Ford in, it was a company town that was built in the middle of the Amazon rainforest. And, all right. So that

Dole, the Dole Company, which could be a dole whole other thing, they had company towns in, I believe, Hawaii. Like, there's all sorts of shit. Well, a lot of these, like, billionaires now are trying to make these, like, crypto towns in South America, too. That's something. They're currently trying to build these little libertarian havens that run off of, you know, microcoins and stuff. And even like smaller, quote unquote, planned, like any gated community is like building on that idea. And it felt like there's a lot of like, I guess like movies, I associate it with movies from the 70s and 90s as like having strong criticisms of these kinds of communities. But also, I mean, it's not a good movie.

But don't worry, darling is like kind of doing something similar in like this simulated American ideal. But like I also thought of Edward Cisorhands. in like the way that a neighborhood is false and presented in a very specific way. And then like, you know, Stepford Wives and Pleasantville. Yeah, like all the stuff. Yeah. I always have to remind myself that seaside is not Clearwater, Florida. In my head that I know this is not the Scientologist town, but in my head they are the same thing.

The Scientologist town, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's like the same thing to me too. Or it's like a religion that runs a city. A cult town, yeah. A cult town, cult town. cult towns or company towns also damn yeah damn well then I was thinking about how sea haven island is again a very white community white middle class community even though everyone who is there is cast to be there like they're very deliberately placed there so theoretically anybody could be cast and yet the vast majority of the quote unquote inhabitants of sea haven are

white people. And I was like, okay, well, is that an intentional creative choice? Meaning, like, is this, is Christoph's idea of this perfect world that he has built for Truman? Is that him making that choice for it to be a nearly entirely white community? Or is it that this is a Hollywood production in 1998, where most movies had majority white casts? I would guess. I mean, yeah, probably a little bit of column A, a little bit of column B. Yeah. I feel like this, I mean, especially because this movie also takes place in real world 1998, because all the relevant characters in 1998 are also white,

it does still feel like racism of the time as well. Yeah, I think it's, yeah, I definitely think it's the 1998 of it all, but I do think it also like plays into and wittingly into like the pyramid scheme that is white supremacy, right? where you are trying to build this like perfect world where everything is, you know, this amazing reality that everyone's watching. It's like, which fits into the entertainment fascism of it all. You know, it's like, oh, this is the ideal that we're all working towards if you live in a, you know, white Christian nation. Yeah. I found a piece on the substack of Ida Bradford that examines how the Truman Show, like Truman Show at the television program where,

again, Truman lives, lives in this fake, highly controlled world and is like, quote, unquote, protected from the quote unquote sick world outside, how that can be seen as a metaphor for whiteness and for how so many white people insulate themselves on individual levels and then also like on systemic levels, they insulate themselves from learning about the impacts of racism and capitalism. colonialism and I thought it was a really interesting piece. I'll share a few quotes from it here. In the movie, Truman must give all he has, including his willingness to live, to uncover the truth. He is only able to reach the boundaries of the large city-sized dome that has contained his entire life after choosing to continue the process of liberation, even if it costs him everything he knows, including his very existence. He would rather die than continue to live knowing that his life is nothing more than puppetry. This is the cost of liberation. This is the reality that white folks, white adjacent, and those with internalized white supremacy need to come

to terms with. They can at any point turn back and live the privilege, protected life that hundreds of years of global colonization and racial capitalism have afforded them. They can, and most do choose white supremacy, even the liberals who are disgusted by the idea and set themselves as ideologically against it. These very people give in to the luxuries and comforts of having their perceptions undisturbed and unchallenged. Unquote, the peace keeps going,

and I think the whole thing is worth reading. We can link it in the description. But it's, yeah, it's like making the argument that this movie can be seen as a metaphor of that and that Truman's liberation is like allegorical to like people unlearning white supremacy and kind of liberating themselves from that. Perhaps even taking the whatever color. Is it the red,

taking the red pill? Even though they took that from us, but anyways, but that's what it originally meant. Yeah, exactly. It's like, taking it back. We're taking the red pill back.

But like enlightenment and willingness to engage. That's like, that's, I want to read that piece. Yeah. Because it does. Definitely. It feels very, I've been thinking about this, I've been doing a lot of research for a different project right now about the history of AA,

which is a very white-dominated group to this day for many reasons. But one of them is that there is a sort of explicit rule in the group of quote-unquote not discussing politics. And how that is like such a privileged white thing to say because it limits anyone marginalized in the group from discussing how their marginalization and discrimination has informed their drinking. And there are all of these testimonies of people of color in AA bringing up how people being racist toward them has been a factor in their relationship with drinking and had that conversation completely shut down because, quote unquote, we don't discuss politics here. And like I feel like that energy is all over, all over like the Truman simulation. And I would assume it's because Christoph is sort of not even recreating the world of his childhood, which would have been the 50s-ish.

But he's reconstructing the entertainment of his childhood to try to resell the propaganda he was given for a new generation. which still happens all the time. But it's like if we created a simulation where Jim Carrey lived in Spice World and said this was how 1995 was, guys, we swear. But yeah, just like the refusal to present the world as it is, but insisting that this is the world, which is like that whole opening sequence of all of the actors being like, this is basically real.

We basically are okay with this. It's so dark. Yeah. Well, and it's like you also, what's the, what's the, oh man, I'm not going to get the quote right. I'm horrible quoting stuff. But the, in World War II where they talk about Nazis and they're like, it wasn't the soldiers that were like always the issue. It was like my neighbors that were also complicit in everything. It's the complete complicity of the removal of freedom from this person. And everyone just, it's going along with it because it's benefiting them. Yeah. And there are, there are, I mean, Truman's neighbors are a black family in this world, but we only get to see them say good morning. Like, I don't know. This movie is so tight that it's like there's a million small interactions that could be. It's entirely its own movie. But I would be interested in more.

Well, I was like, I would be interested in just more simulation stories that don't center around white protagonists. Because that, I mean, I think we've at this point gotten, there's a few around. white women like step for wives don't worry darling there's certainly two very famous ones back to back about white men Truman show and the matrix well I mean Keanu is mixed but oh sorry that's true yeah um sorry white passing then yeah but you know I think that there there is a dearth of at least that I know of if listeners know of simulation stories that don't revolve around white or white passing characters drop them in the chat I just love a simulation I don't like horror movies, but is the second Jordan Peel movie?

Oh, us? I guess the... Doppelgangers? Is that kind of that? I never saw it because I'm scared, but... Not quite. Not quite. I don't know. I guess I wouldn't know how to describe what happens in us.

Yeah. Okay. I was thinking, I do want to see it again because, yeah, I don't know how to describe what happens. It's not quite that, but it's not that really. It's not not that. I don't know what it is. It feels like a theme that I'd like to see Jordan Peel explore, though.

I think I would do it. Yeah. Yes. Oh, the Amnad Shamalan. The Village. Get Out is, yeah. Get Out does have simulation elements to it. Kind of.

Like, there's definitely like a world that's not what it seems. Right. It's very small, but. Right. I don't know. Let's, well, we'll keep pondering it. Yeah, we should do a simulation theme on the Matrion or something. That would be interesting.

Let's do it. Does anyone have anything else they'd like to talk about? I'm just trying to, I'm looking through all my notes of stuff. I think just the, you know what's interesting is the, Jimmy mentioned like the self-surveillance culture that we have going on now. I would really like to watch this movie with like some Gen Zs, some older alphas to be like, what do you think? Because you all have each other's locations, like flop cameras are such a big discussion happening now.

Like, does this, like, horrify you to your core in the same kind of way? Because now a lot of these younger people have been raised in their much more comfortable to surveillance from a young age in a similar way, you know? So I just want to know if this hits as hard, if you've been more raised in it. More acclimated to it. Yeah. I mean, I know so many people love to share locations. And I'm always kind of horrified at the idea of it.

I only do it if I'm going on a date and I think I might be murdered. But then I. Yeah. But that's kind of it. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, that's fair. Yeah, that's fair. Well, there's not only the self-surveillance component to it, but there's also just regular-ass surveillance.

Yeah. Surveillance. To share a little anecdote. I recently got back from a trip overseas, and I have global entry brag. And I, like, was walking through the global entry line to, like, whatever, pass through customs and blah, blah, blah. normally there would be a camera that like unfortunately scans all your biometrics and your face and all that stuff and then it like lets you go on through there wasn't even that there wasn't even a camera so i don't even know what had scanned me but i'm walking through and a guy was just like you're good to go katelyn and i'm like how do you know it with me how do you know that i'm here like it was so freaky and i think it just speaks to the level of of surveillance and again with all the biometric data that's being collected and we're never going to be able to like have any privacy like classic police surveillance and like how all surveillance

technology is inherently racist because of the data sets that they're trained on and they're transphobic because of the data sets that they're trained on it's just like it's endless and then yeah like we have ring cameras and surveil each other and there has to be a generational difference, like, there too. Because I personally, I do not want to know where my fiance is at. I'm like, if you're going to cheat on me, do it normal style. Like it's none of my business. It's none of my business. And it's, first of it's, it's creepy to me. And it's also like feels like I don't trust someone. Like, I think for you, like what you're talking about, Caitlin makes total sense because that's safety and temporary. But then at some point, it's like, if, I don't know, if I need to like put an app. tag on a boyfriend, then I'd probably not a boyfriend.

Then you shouldn't be with that person. Yeah. Right. But it's like a societal urging of the breaking down of trust between us, right? You know, it's like they they don't want us to have that instinct to just trust somebody. Yeah. You know. Bleak. I just, man, yeah, there's so many conversations with.

I also, I'll just one more thing. I just, I always love to think about Truman getting out seeing Sylvia and then some lawyer comes and gets him all his residuals and he gets to do whatever the hell he wants for the rest of it he gets to travel the whole world because he's got my space tom money now oh my gosh and all he wants is to travel and explore he wants to see fiji oh i mean i yeah i want him to see the world and go off the grid yes absolutely yeah the only person that's allowed to be an off grid prepper truly is true and And the person who's really earned it, yeah. Yeah.

Well, it doesn't pass the bechal test. Look, we have to say it. It doesn't. It just doesn't. The only scene where women are interacting is the Merrill character and Truman's mom. And they're talking about Truman. They're talking about Truman, which I'm willing to be generous and say that's by design. That these characters wouldn't have personal relationships with each other because they're coworkers and

their relationship would be incidental to the focus of the show, blah, blah, blah. But I still think that there's far more room for not white guys in this story than exist, which just feels product of 1998. Yeah, definitely. But what about the most important metric in the world, the Bechtelcast Nipple Scale? Our scale where we rate the movie, zero to five nipples based on examining it through an intersectional feminist lens. this is a tricky one because it's not necessarily like promoting any ideas of intersectional feminism,

but it is examining all of these things that we've talked about as far as exploitation in media, living in a society, product placement and like, you know, promoting rampant consumption and consumerism, selling this idea of a like white hetero status quo utopia, et cetera, et cetera. And I think the movie has a lot to say about that. So honestly, I think I'm going to give it like three nipples. And they're going to queer icons, the two old women who watch the Truman show together at home on the couch and they're always like snuggling with each other. It's cute.

I love them. That's cute. I love this movie and I'm going to give it two nipples. Just mainly because it's just like having, it has a lot of interesting societal commentary, but is mostly still relegated to how society shapes and affects this specific white guy. And I do think that that is intentional for all of these reasons. But I'm more, I guess,

thinking about the characters that we meet outside of people who aren't, the 1998 characters. meet. I still feel like there, that is an opportunity to show a more diverse array of characters to show you the world that Truman is not able to participate in. Right. That said, it's pretty close to a perfect movie and I love it very much and it's a part of my family now. Yay. Yay. Yay. I'm going to give it two nipples, one to Laura Linney and one to, oh my gosh, I don't think I've seen her in anything else. Natasha McElhoun. Shout out to her. Brandy, how about you?

Um, I'll give it, I'll give it three as well. Um, I think for similar reasons. I'll give, I'll give it a little bit more just because I think that it is also like, I don't know, showing that the way that like a straight white guy can also become a victim of these sign of things. I think maybe hopefully that helps that story break through to some people that might need that. Because it is like, you know, ultimately like even the system that in theory is like benefiting you, you will ultimately become a victim of it if you step up. outside of it. It's still a prison. Mm-hmm. It's still a prison. And I'm going to give them, I'm going to get all through to Jim Carrey. I'm so proud of him.

I'm just so proud of him. Your close personal friend. My close personal friend, I'm just, I'm just so proud of him. He was, he dropped out of high school in ninth grade and was like, houses with his family for years in Canada. And like, I just, I'm just always so proud of him.

He's a problematic fave for life. He always will be. Fair. We all get at least one. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming back and having this discussion with us. Come back anytime. Yeah, absolutely.

Tell us what you want to plug and where to, where to, if people want to watch your life 24-7. Oh, yeah. Please come surveil me on Instagram at Brandozzle on Instagram. I'm on TikTok at Brandazil is here. I barely use it. But if you follow me, maybe I feel compelled to. My new comedy special is called Milk Job. It is available everywhere that you listen to audio,

but also it is available in video at YouTube.com slash at sign burn this records, which is a record label that I started a few years ago to try to create a more artist-friendly space in the comedy industry because it's getting bad and worse all the time. And I'm just trying to create an equitable space to try to help out people around the country that I've meet that are like pillars of in their own local comedy scenes are keeping like an independent alternative to the current mainstream BS afloat. That's awesome. Basically, yeah, it's like I'm a punk rock kid through and through and I'm trying to

like bring that epos to more and more to comedy. And like it's important that there is a healthy working class middle class in comedy. And yeah, if you want to come and listen to some comics you might not have heard of. but are very funny and are very funny and are very good people. These are the metrics by which I am trying to build a label. And I'm really proud of it. And the comedy, the YouTube page is almost monetized. And what would mean a lot to me is if you could subscribe,

but then also definitely watch the special. And then if you want to throw it on a few more times on mute, I wouldn't be mad at you. I'm about 1,000 hours from being fully monetized. And that would mean a lot. So it's in sight. We're very close. And you guys could get me there.

And that would mean a lot to me and a lot of good people. Amazing. Bectalcast hive unite. And we'll have the link in the description as well. Yes. Absolutely. Leave a comment. Let me know how many nipples you would give Truman Show on milk job.

I would love that. Yeah. Please. Please do. And with that, good night. In case we don't see you. Good afternoon. Good afternoon.

Good evening. Good night. Bye. Bye. The Bechtelcast is a production of IHeart Media, hosted and produced by me, Jamie Loftus. And me, Caitlin Durante. The podcast is also produced by Sophie Lichtenen. And edited by Caitlin Durante.

Ever heard of them? That's me. And our logo and merch and all of our artwork, in fact, are designed by Jamie Loftus, ever heard of her? Oh, my God. And our theme song, by the way, was composed by Mike Kaplan. With vocals by Catherine Voskrasinski. iconic and a special thanks to the one and only Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about the podcast, please visit Linktree slash Bechtelcast.

Hey, Portlandia fans. Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here. The Dream of the 90s is alive in podcast form. We're launching Podlandia A.O. Rewatch, our brand new podcast where we revisit every episode of Portlandia together, breaking down sketches, going deep on our iconic characters, and pulling back the curtain on how it all got made. And we'll also be joined by the people who helped bring it all to life. Guestr,

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