The Bechdel Cast - To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar with Jeena Bloom

Episode Date: June 17, 2021

Caitlin, Jamie, and special guest Jeena Bloom take a break from their road trip to discuss To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar(This episode contains spoilers)For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast.Follow @jeenabloom on Twitter. While you're there, you should also follow @BechdelCast, @caitlindurante and @jamieloftusHELP Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th 2017 was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearthed 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. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple 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, They're just dreams. Confessions. Join hosts Gabe Gonzalez and Chris Patterson Rosso as they explore queer sex, cruising, relationships, and culture in the new iHeart podcast, Sniffy's Cruising Confessions. Sniffy's Cruising Confessions will broaden minds and help you pursue your true goals. You can listen to Sniffy's Cruising Confessions, sponsored by Gilead, now on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Thursday. 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 Bechdelcast. To Jamie Loftus, thanks for everything, Caitlin Durante. Wow, we really just Mad libsed that one.

Just picture that with like me having written that in Sharpie on a framed photograph of me where I'm looking extremely statuesque. Love an inciting incident that revolves around a framed photograph. It's good. There's actually, i feel like for that it would be either like we would be sitting at the table and it would be either a it would be like an alfred molina headshot which by the way we are recording on his birthday happy birthday alfred to mr alfred um but yeah it would be it would be to jam and Caitlin. Thanks for everything, Alfred Molina. Wow.

That would be a dream come true. If we're already pitching ideas, I think that that's a strong place to start. Welcome to the Bechdel cast, by the way. By the way, it's me, Caitlin Durante from the photograph. It's me, Jamie Loftus. I'm referenced in the photograph with the pictures of Caitlin. Yeah, exactly. This is our show where we examine movies through an intersectional feminist lens using the Bechdel test simply as a jumping off point to initiate a larger conversation about representation and such in film.

Film. Yeah. It's 2021. We added an extra syllable to film. And the Bechdel test, if you don't know, was a media metric created by queer cartoonist Alison Bechdel, sometimes called the Bechdel-Wallace test. There's many different versions of this test. Here's our little spin on it. For our

version of the Bechdel test, there must be two named characters of a marginalized gender who speak to each other about something other than a man for more than two lines of dialogue and guess what the dialogue has to be plot wise meaningful somehow not like right the biggest thing that happens in the movie but not something that is like oh they passed it by accident i'm sick of handing it to movies that pass it by accident god damn it we won't take it anymore yeah brave of us incredibly brave um so today's movie is if you didn't guess by my amazing introduction or by reading the title of the episode yeah is to wong fu thanks for everything julie newmar long time request i think this has been on our list for a couple years since the beginning yeah since the beginning.

Yeah. Since the beginning. And I understand why, because there's a lot to talk about. And to join us in that discussion, we've got an amazing comedian. She's the host of the podcast, Sweet, a lady's guide to bro culture. She's got live tour dates coming up in the fall because we're going to be able to do shows again. It's Gina Bloom. Hey, hi.

Welcome. Thank you for having me on this most auspicious day of Melina. It is a very, very special day. I love an Alfred Melina. So here we are. You've come to the right place. On this very special day uh i love an alfred molina so here we are you've come to the right place on this very special day yes oh what a treat if he i don't i mean i don't know alfred molina he was working in 95 he could have been in this movie you know not high profile enough this is a very high profile movie yeah and yeah higher profile than i thought it was. Apparently there was a little bit of a war

between leading actors trying to get on with this. They really went for it. The people who were considered for the Vita Boheme character is every A-lister from 1995. Half the Wikipedia page. It's wild. From 1995, John Cusack looking like his sister Joan which is a huge upgrade so no idea why he didn't keep that going but there we go Billy Baldwin there's some there's like everyone you would expect and then some wild cards such as Willem Dafoe what James

Spader I was like Jamesames spader yeah yeah john torturo i was like okay we got some character actors in the mix here sure tom cruise was one of them tom cruise robert downey jr um matthew broderick mel gibson boo boo yeah i i feel i feel that broader probably could have brought it although i'm'm not a huge fan. But I do. I do love the idea of an alternate universe Willem Dafoe as as Vida. There is something special about that. It's wild. Yeah, every every working white man at this time auditioned for this part. And Swayze won the day. Yeah. Yeah, Swayze is, I love a Patrick Swayze movie.

And I guess the weird thing about this movie is that I've never seen it until now. And I've seen almost, I think, literally every other Patrick Swayze movie. No way. Wait, so this was your first time seeing the movie? It was my first time watching this yeah and so just to give you some idea about you know my personal like story with this movie is that well i i'm a trans lady and so when you're growing up you know in the south which in the part of florida that i grew up in is the south so you'd be like you didn't grow up in the south

you grew up in florida like no no tampa florida is the south. So people are like, you didn't grow up in the South. You grew up in Florida. Like, no. No, Tampa, Florida is the South. Trust me. And, you know, I heard of the movie. I'd seen the commercials. You know, you watch it back in the day at the VHS tape, and you'd see the commercials and all that. And I'm like, and in my head, I was like, I should watch this. I am a trans person.

I didn't know what the words were, but, like, it was too much for my head to take. And, like, all my little miscreant friends were like that movie uh-uh i'm not gonna watch that that there's gay stuff going on in there and like you know that little like cloistered world it just it just got by me and like i'd always wanted to watch it but you know it was in during that time when i i just couldn't bring myself to it and then by the time I could, there was all kinds of other stuff to watch. So here I am. Wow. I didn't know you hadn't seen it before. Wild.

Finally. Yes. That's why I picked it. I was like, Oh my God, I've never seen this. Let's do this. What was your broad impression of it? I'm so curious. You know, it was a little it was a little um it was a lot of fun uh first of all it's a it's a fun it's a fun silly light film and you know what that's fine like i like i read on like wikipedia page where like a lot of the straight male reviewers are like this is nothing special and like well i mean it is though it's it's queer movie. It's a very gay movie put out by, you know, a studio. So that is, by definition, something special. It was really, it was kind of confusing in 2021.

The movie didn't seem to know the difference between trans women and drag queens. This is true. Yeah. Yeah. So it took place in some weird world where drag queens just went around and dragged 24 hours a day all the time including when they're in bed where they have their wigs on and their makeup still on and they're like about ready to go to bed yes they're in a full face they're they're tucked in they got the tape they got everything going and it's like no there was a very fun um i found a i'd not heard of this youtube channel

before but it's a drag queen movie review channel so i was like oh this is perfect and uh the drag queen who runs the channel uh james man mansfield brings that up right away i'm just like where what planet does this movie take place on some weird drag planet and i had read you know i read a an article about you know i think it's like the 20th anniversary this is from a few years ago and the uh the screenwriter was like um who is out he was a gay man he was like i wanted to make a world where it was like it was like a fantasy world and like it doesn't have to be realistic i just wanted to be fabulous all the time so i kept the drag queens in drag all the

time which is a very white gay man perspective on on transness which for sure you know i you know what it's 1995 i'm gonna i'm gonna have to like just deal with the fact that things are gonna be a little weird for a movie made in 1995. A product of its time. The 1995 is really popping out at multiple places. There's a lot of 95 going on in here. Caitlin, what's your history with this movie? I saw it for the first time in college and I have not watched it since and that was like 15 years ago so I've spent this whole time since then under the impression that this

was a movie about drag queens which to be fair is what the movie thinks the movie is about and then I saw it again a year ago and I was like wait a minute that's not what this movie is about this movie is about three trans women as far as my interpretation goes and uh so yeah I'd only seen it like one time before like in my youth and then again more recently trans women who don't know how to dress for comfort as as a as a trans woman that has been all across the country i can tell you that is not how you dress for the south that is not it's not how you dress for the weather ladies or a road trip like or any of that it's not comfortable you guys yeah they drive clear across the country i was like how oh god so yeah i don't i don't have a, an extensive history with it. But I do find this

movie very fascinating. And I'm excited to dive deeper into it. Jamie, what's your relationship with it? I had never seen this movie all the way through. I think I'd seen bits and pieces of it over the years. I think I think this was I feel like I've given this answer for this show a bajillion times. But I believe there was a heavily edited version of this movie that used to air on TNT that I had seen bits and pieces of. But this was basically my first time seeing it all the way through. And I mean, holy cow, there's so much to talk about. I didn't, this is the smallest thing but i was like oh stockard channing it took me so long to figure out who stockard channing's kind of a

chameleon i feel like she looks so different i recognized lady stockard immediately i i am i i am a stockard fan from way back i ran into her her in 2007 at a Cuckoo Roo restaurant in California. God, you know, RIP Cuckoo Roo. But like there in Burbank, I was standing behind Stockard Channing and I just wanted to gush. But I left her alone. She ordered her chicken and left. But like, yes, I immediately like, oh, that is Stockard Channing. Nice.

That works. That works for me. Wow. I love the just the image of stalker channing ordering her chicken and leaving it's just so beautiful it was it was it was my it was my wong fu julie newmar moment you know stalker channing is she's up there she's up there with like jodie foster as far as like my my white lady um mentors they don't know they are but they are beautiful but

yeah in terms especially in terms of like the production history of this movie i was very much in the dark so it was it was really interesting to learn i mean first of all just like watching the movie all the way through there's so much and then learning about the production there's also so much so i'm yeah i'm stoked to talk about it should i recap it and we'll go from there yes yeah let's party okay so tonally this movie is very light and rompy but i do want to do a quick trigger warning at the top because there is sexual assault that happens um okay so we meet vita boem Bohem, that's Patrick Swayze, and Noxzema Jackson, that's Wesley Snipes. They are drag queens, according to the movie, competing in a drag

queen of the year pageant in New York City. Ever heard of it? Also there is Chi Chi Rodriguez played by John Leguizamo. RuPaul is there as Miss Rachel Tensions. Okay. Let's discuss RuPaul. Let's just get through the RuPaul part because RuPaul enters

in a Confederate flag dress, first of all. Yes. I was like, wow, RuPaul is literally just like stopping by before going back to like the fracking fields. Like what is just there was a lot. And I know that there's I read that there were a number of iconic, I guess, 90s era New York drag queens in in that scene as well and i don't have the background but who boy rupaul oh yeah in the rebel flag dress i mean the figure was good it was nice to see rue as as a youngin but like that that dress that was not good but it also it also it signified like it alerted you to the fact

that there's a lot of like racist humor in this movie and you're gonna be hearing a lot of it oh my gosh yeah well it didn't even connect for me on my first re-watch of the movie it wasn't until i was re-watching it a second time to prep for this episode that i remembered that rupaul's drag name in this movie is rachel tensions and i was like oh that's why that doesn't explain the outfit the confederate flag dress but that that beat isn't really stepped on so you just so it's just rupaul in in a confederate flag dress and you're like huh and like knowing that it was all written by a white guy you're just like what no yeah you know just a reminder that rupaul fracks it's just never a fact that gets old for me rupaul fracks in a in a in a confederate flag dress this is what i'm canon as is only a the only appropriate outfit to frack in oh yikes um so Rachel Tensions

is there to announce the winner of this competition uh the prize for which is a trip to Hollywood California and it's a tie between Noxzema Jackson and Vida Bohem. And Chi-Chi is devastated that she didn't win. So Vida takes pity on her and invites her along on the trip to Hollywood. And while they're at a bar trying to figure out the logistics of how this trip with the three of them will work, in which we get a cameo from Robinin williams who i guess had a

big hand in making this movie happen too yeah that was interesting yeah yay always happy to see him yeah and like he had wanted to play the lead but he felt that it was he was physically inappropriate which is the correct response robin and then got steven spielberg's involvement in getting the movie made so it's surprisingly star-studded this production yeah i didn't i i did not know i realized that this was an amblin joint when when i was going into it and reading there reading the history of like how that happened there was like a great piece in the advocate that was kind of this oral history of the at the time the one out producer at amblin really pushed for this movie yeah yeah and it's just it's an interesting um it's an interesting story i just didn't

really i was like steven spielberg all right sure he really was absolutely everywhere in the 90s. He owned 95. Yes, absolutely. So while they're at this restaurant, Vida notices a framed picture behind her and written on it says, To Wong Fu, thanks for everything. Julie Newmar. So Vida steals the photo to take with them on the trip as sort of like a good luck charm.

So they leave for their trip in an old Cadillac convertible. They stop in Vita's hometown. We find out that she is estranged from her rich family. And they also live in a castle. They live in a castle. They live in an absolute castle. Yes. Somewhere in Pennsylvania. Yes. Then they talk about what it means to be a drag queen. And they say that Chi Chi isn't a full-fledged queen yet. She's still just a princess. And that there are these four undefined steps that she has to take before she's a full drag queen. Complicating that, though, is before they refer to chichi as a

princess they refer to her as a boy in a dress which is complicated because on the one hand chichi is very obviously a trans woman but on the other hand the film doesn't acknowledge that so it's it's a it's a muddled message to say the least right There's a monologue from Noxzema in this scene that we will unpack in a little bit because, oh wow, is it outdated. I think I know the one you're talking about, yes.

I had to watch it three or four times and be like, okay, what? Is it? As a trans lady that's experienced 1995, I can tell's that's about what 1995 was like so yeah we're just gonna yeah i'm just gonna have to deal with it i'm gonna deal with the past yeah um so then a little while later they pull off for the night and they have to be like careful about where they stay because they know about this very real possibility that

people will be cruel and intolerant toward them. But then they go to this, they find this hotel where the concierge mistakes them for members of a women's basketball team. So they're like, woohoo. And then they set off again. They drive for a while. They get lost. It's dark. It's late. They're in the middle of nowhere. And then they get pulled over. And Sheriff Dullard has stopped them and asks Vita to step out of the vehicle. He then assaults her. She fights back and knocks him out. And they think he might be dead.

I really wish he had just died. Wouldn't it have been a treat? That would have been a treat. The film would have been without conflict, but that's okay. Didn't need this guy at all. Could have found another way. Right. I don't know why I was so shocked when he turned out to not be dead, but it was deeply disappointing. Yeah.

I also, I'm like, I love that they just leave him for dead. They just frantically flee the scene. They make a quick stop, but then the car won't start back up again. So they hitch a ride and end up getting stuck in this small town for a few days while their car gets fixed. A local woman, Carol Ann, that's Stockard Channing, offers them a room in her house and they have to just hang out for these few days while the park comes in to fix their car. So Vida, Noxy, and Chi-Chi make the best of it they befriend the local ladies give them makeovers help them plan this upcoming strawberry social some of the local men are harassing everybody so yeah but the movie is like but it's a but it's a joke you're like yeah the random gang of toughs was undeveloped, to say the least.

Yeah. There's a random gang of small town toughs that just annoy people for some reason. And also seem like they are about to assault Chi-Chi in one scene. Yeah. And then, don't worry, Vita and Noxy teach them some manners yeah they get they get scolded one time they get straightened out then they learn their lesson right right there's a lot of that going on in this town a lot of uh being reprimanded one time a lot of lessons learned here yeah uh including so uh caroline has an abusive husband who they run out of town also chichi has been flirting with this man bobby ray um but a young woman named bobby lee

is in love with him so vita noxi and chichi help bobby lee pair off with bobby ray isn't bobby ray one of the dazed and confused guys am i like yeah he is i'm pretty sure he is okay okay because i was like he's familiar well they're twin brothers so he's either the dazed and confused guy or he's that guy's brother but they're twins but yes that is true you know? I don't even want to solve the mystery. I'm just gonna live with the mystery. Let the mystery be. Yes. Carol Ann's abusive husband, Virgil, runs into Sheriff Dullard, who presumably tells Dullard about Vita, Noxy and Chi-Chi, because then Dullard shows up to the town demanding to know where they are. But then the whole town, like, shows up to protect them and sends Dullard on his way. Kind of like Spartacus style, the way it happens. Oh, yeah. Yes, very much so. Yes. like spartacus style the way it happens oh yeah yes very much so yes a very spartacus ending absolutely

so vita noxi and chichi are very touched that the town stood up for them everyone celebrates at the strawberry social carol ann wishes them a farewell vita gives her the photo of Julie Newmar. And then they leave. And then the movie ends with the Drag Queen of America contest in Hollywood, California. Ever heard of it? And Julie Newmar crowns the winner, who is Chi-Chi. And that is the movie. So let's take a quick break and then we'll come right back to discuss

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. 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. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. I've been thinking about you.

I want you back in my life. It's too late for that. 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. One session, 24 hours. BPM 110, 120. She's terrified. Should we wake her up? Absolutely not. What was that? You didn't figure it out? I think I need to hear you say it. That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. This machine is approved and everything?

You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago. We're not hurting people. 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, I fell too seen. Dragged.

I'm NK, and this is Basket Case. So I basically had what back in the day they would call a nervous breakdown. I was crying and I was inconsolable. It was just very big, sudden swaps of different meds. What is wrong with me? Oh, look at you giving me therapy, girl. Finally, a show for the mentally ill girlies. On Basket Case, I talk to people about what happens

when what we call mental health is shaped by the conditions of the mentally ill girlies. On Basket Case, I talk to people about what happens when what we call mental health is shaped by the conditions of the world we live in. Because if you haven't noticed, we are experiencing some kind of conditions that are pretty hard to live with. But if you struggle to cope, the society that created the conditions in the first place will tell you there's something wrong with you.

And it will call you a basket case. Listen to Basket Case every Tuesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. Where do we want to start here? Where should we begin? Yeah. Well, as we touched on already already this movie does not really understand no it doesn't purposely purposely does not understand because i mean it took place it's 1995 it's not 1962 like they knew they just chose to do it this way like they knew that drag queens and trans women are not the same thing but they they're like no we're gonna do it this way. Like they knew that drag queens and trans women are not the same thing, but they, they're like, no, we're gonna do it this way. Yeah. I have to imagine it was a, an attempt to maybe appeal to a more widespread audience to leave it intentionally vague.

Yeah, I well, I think it's Yeah, that I think it's just the visuals because you know, they're going for this idea, you know, with the stunt casting that we're going to cast these like alpha male action guys as drag queens. So we can never not show them in drag. Otherwise, they're just gay men. And that's not that's not high concept enough for 1995. right like they like they really wanted to like just drive home the visual so they could you know pump the uh you know the trailer full of like funny music so i'm sure that's what they were thinking yeah and that's just that's just the reality of the film the trailer is so bizarre i don't know if either of you have seen it but it's yes wesley snipes yeah and then you like see him see footage of him in action movies he's done in other movies yes you see him in like passenger 57 beating people up yeah it goes it shows wesley snipe clips it says he's been a killer and a commando and then it cuts to like patrick swayze clips it

says he's been a heartthrob and a hero they don't introduce john leguizamo at all and then they just cut to the and then the actual trailer starts. It's very bizarre. And then it's something like in their most physically challenging role yet. And then it like cuts to them in drag. And you're like, okay, if you insist. 1995.

It was 1995. It was 95, yes. We're going to say that 5,000 times in this episode. It's going to be the title of the episode. It was 1995. It was 1995. It was 95. Yes. We're going to say that 5,000 times in this episode. It's going to be the title of the episode. It was 1995. Just deal with it. So yeah, another distinction that we should make is that while drag queens have traditionally been thought of as cis gay men who do drag, of course, there are lots of trans and non-binary and gender queer people who are also drag performers the two are not mutually exclusive yes but again this movie the mission of the film was that these were drag performers not trans women although you watch the movie like these are trans women and then if you read john lug was on those interviews he's like no i played this as a trans woman like this is this is not a

drag queen that i'm that i'm performing as right so he got it he got it and he said like if this movie were to be remade today they should cast a latina trans woman yes absolutely to play that part so yes we in our 2021 lens understand this we get it we get it we're smart just your episode lee reminder we are smart well you're smart and we in the year is 2021 yes i honestly i mean i was surprised because there was so much or not so much, but there was a fair amount written about this movie at its 20 year anniversary. And I was surprised to not see like the writer of the movie pressed a little more on this. I wasn't able to find any examples of also Douglas Carter Bean. Very fancy name. Don't know anything about his background, uh douglas carter bean is a funny

name and he it's it says on his wikipedia page he often writes works with sophisticated drawing room humor so he's he's just a fancy uh person a fancy man he's a fancy lad we get it douglas carter bean uh but no one no one seems to have ever really pressed him on this. And it's his only film project. He's otherwise worked almost exclusively on stage. I just thought it was like kind of, I was honestly just expecting him to have commented on it at some point. And he never has. Yeah, I have a quote from him where he says, quote,

My inspiration for the script came from watching the religious right videotape the gay agenda there's a scene where they show drag queens going through a town and the narrator is warning viewers that these people will take over your town and i thought well that would be fun unquote so yeah you know and i read that too and that that is a that is a funny funny uh it's a funny inspiration yeah i don't get me wrong yes we we we have we have well established that this film has an incorrect depiction of trans women but on the other hand it is kind of funny that the movie simply is that it's just drag queens taking over a town and that that in itself is a funny idea which it generally accomplishes in my opinion like i have to kind of turn off my my sensors my 2021 sensors a little

bit but like i think just going with the flow sometimes i i get on the movie's wavelength because of that i mean to enjoy a movie we often must turn off absolutely those lenses those goggles take off the bechdel cast goggles etc because there are elements to this movie that are like really just like road movie romp stuff is going on there's yeah it is like at its heart a road trip movie and there's a party at the end and i know caitlin you're generally anti prom wedding party at the end but i'm like there's a party at the end and everyone's wearing red you know what i didn't mind it i mean i don't mind a general party at the end of a movie i just specifically don't like proms and weddings because of the

connotations they generally carry. But I liked the Strawberry Festival. The Strawberry Festival. You're like, yeah, sure. This is probably the only thing that happens at this place all year. What's funny is that where I grew up in Florida had a Strawberry Festival. Really? Yes. Yes. I grew up near Plant City, Florida, which is where the Strawberry Festival in Florida is. And it was never this fabulous. Never. They never coordinated colors. They never did any of that.

This was a way better Strawberry Festival. There was never a red and wild theme? Never. No. Never a theme, period. It was just carnies. That was it. That was the theme.

Every townwide party should start with running the sheriff out of town i think that that really sets the vibe in a fun way yes i agree yeah this movie it it was fun like despite the many many many many problems it was it was good natured and like being good natured scores a decent amount of points with me because a lot of trans movies, and I'm going to call this a trans movie, even though it doesn't call itself that. Sure.

A lot of trans movies don't have joy. Like a lot of movies about trans characters, they're miserable. The women, the men, whatever, they generally are just miserable. I was up for a role. I turned it down because it was basically a trans woman a drag performer trans woman it was kind of the same thing where the writer didn't really understand the difference and it was basically this this person just gets beat up for 20 minutes and then just gives up on their dreams and it's like

and they're like i could see you in this role i I get, you can? Like, I hope not, because I'm a happy person. Jesus Christ. Yeah. And I mean, like you mentioned, Gina, this coming out from, like, this movie came out as a, like, a major studio release. It had huge bankable stars in it. It opened as the number one movie for, the first two weeks of its of it being released so a lot of people saw it and also let's not forget that this movie came out like at the height of the aids epidemic in the u.s so for this to be such a major movie that is just such a like fun campy romp yeah not without its problems but a romp nonetheless

and that it wasn't you know tragedy porn the way that so many right trans movies are that's something i i was so inspired by this movie that i ordered susanontag's On Camp essay off of Amazon, but I was not inspired enough to actually read it. So I almost movie almost so close to see that I feel like it is like it's a middle of the road, you know? Yeah, I'll spend $4. But will I follow through? I don't know. I'll get to that. I'll get to that Sante, I guess, someday. But it did inspire me to reacquaint myself with the theory of camp. It's something that I've been, I live it. I have a campy life. So yeah, I felt inspired enough to do that.

So it's fun. Yeah. And now Susan will just be waiting for you yes we'll do brunch later i'm busy yeah the the context of this movie is very i i get we're just gonna keep saying like the context of this movie is so specific that like understanding the exact circumstance that this movie was produced and released into was at least it it didn't solve the problems but it at least kind of contextualized them a little bit where like you were both just saying that the fact that

this is a movie that is fundamentally like created on joy it's fun it's money it's a comedy at its core at the height of the AIDS epidemic like was was uh it seemed and that seemed like it was a big motivating factor in making the movie where there's this piece on the advocate by Mitch Cohn who used to work at Amblin and then later became a teacher his life story is interesting we'll we'll link it in the episode but essentially he was the only out employee at Amblin for a long time and really advocated for this movie to get made particularly because of wanting to see a movie that had just had joy in it at all yeah and another thing I thought was kind of interesting about it so the the director of this movie, I did not, I have not heard of this person before, but

apparently she also directed a Bridget Jones, Beban Kidron. Am I saying that right? I think so. Yeah. Beban Kidron. I think that's right. With all due respect to Beban Kidron, if I'm getting it wrong. But what I thought was interesting was there was like this movie seemed very easy to cast

where it sounds like wesley snipes and john leguizamo were in right away the part was written specifically for chichi rodriguez was written specifically for john leguizamo which again it's like i wish that john leguizamo and douglas carter bean could have like talked about it it was like if john leguizamo was playing a trans woman and Douglas Carter Bean was like, I'm Douglas Carter Beaning. He's Douglas Carter Beaning over here. Whatever. But I thought it was interesting

that it was, I guess, very hard to find a director for this movie. Much harder than it was to find stars where they asked a number of male directors and according to Mitch Cohn every male director passed because of course they did of course they went

to 15 male directors and they're like get the broad I guess get the Bridget Jones girl okay here we go bring in Beban you know it's like for what I'm like okay you know Beban did it know it's like I for what I'm like okay you know Beban Beban did it uh and

I I didn't know I just didn't know who had directed this movie at all and then also that the the piece references a lot of how and I wasn't exactly clear on whether this was true or not but when the movie came out there were a lot of kind of you know light accusations that it was ripping off Priscilla queen of the desert even though it sounds like they may have been in production at the same time and priscilla just came out first but they were definitely compared a lot yeah they came out really close and i think it was just one of those like convergent things but priscilla queen of the desert was a huge hit that got oscar nominations and got critical respect that to wong fu didn't get so i think that was just an

unfortunate bit of timing on their part but it happens yeah we should cover priscilla on the show at some point it's on our list you absolutely should another except i believe it's been a while since i've seen priscilla but i believe that is an actual trans woman played by taryn stamp in in that one so there is an example of a trans woman in the drag community way back in 94 95 so they they did they did understand that that could happen back then they just chose to ignore it right because the character in within like in the movie is identified as a trans woman yes and is living as a trans woman and she wears like regular lady clothes when she's not performing she just dresses normally she doesn't she doesn't pull a pull a vita and just you know go around in full face and and bustier to the gas station the gas station would appreciate that but that's that's a lot of work it's a gas station

a lot of work yeah yeah yeah it was definitely in production by the time priscilla queen of the desert came out so it wasn't like a ripoff in that way but yeah most people were like this is just like an american ripoff of priscilla cashing in also choreography by kenny ortega wait really yeah but then it made me think like what even scenes are choreographed besides like the drag shows so i mean maybe he just choreographed those drag shows at the very beginning and end i wonder yeah I think that would be it. That's all the choreography that I can recall. I love a Kenny moment.

Wow. Shout out Kenny Ortega. Again. The king of Disney Channel original movies himself. Yes. Let's take a quick break and then we will be right back.

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I felt too seen. Dragged. I'm NK, and this is Basket Case. So I basically had what back in the day they would call a nervous breakdown. I was crying, and I was inconsolable. It was just very big, sudden swaps of different meds. What is wrong with me? Oh, look at you giving me therapy, girl. Finally, a show for the mentally ill girlies.

On Basket Case, I talk to people about what happens when what we call mental health is shaped by the conditions of the world we live in. Because if you haven't noticed, we are experiencing some kind of conditions that are pretty hard to live with. But if you struggle to cope, the society that created the conditions in the first place will tell you there's something wrong with you. And it will call you a basket case.

Listen to Basket Case every Tuesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. We're back. Do we want to unpack that Noxzema monologue? Yeah, I think it's relevant. I think it's relevant to understand the time. Now, we can avoid certain terms that they were using just know that they they use them they use some outdated terms yeah and most importantly so noxema does this whole you're talking about the one where noxema is telling you the different types of gay man you could be yeah just yeah

basically yeah so here's what noxema says yeah, I'll refrain from some of the very outdated language that gets used. But according to Noxzema, quote, when a straight man puts on a dress and gets a little operation, he is a, insert, similar but different. A lot of problems with that statement, but yes. Yes, lots, lots to unpack there. Beyond just the technical terminology, yes. And then when a gay man has too much fashion sense for one gender, he is a drag queen. Yes. So these are the three ways in which, according to this character, someone might wear a dress.

Yeah. That hasn't historically been a person that would wear a dress. Absolutely. Right. Right. That's what they're saying. That's what Noxzema is saying. And Noxzema is like and yeah it and Noxzema is like

explaining this to Chi Chi for reasons just for conflict reasons they're just designed not to get along like that's just that's basically you're like Sid Field you know gotta have characters in conflict

but Hollywood movies are all about characters arguing with each other so they just invented arguments for them to have and yeah it you know what though that for 1995 that that is even a little outdated um to say the least but like but like that's that's what people would talk like. That's what people who didn't understand would talk like. And I remember, as a closeted trans woman on the internet back then, trans girl, I guess, you know, underage, whatever. But like back then, you didn't know about pronouns, you didn't know that, you know, throwing the word sex into into the subjunctive of a term gives it context that you don't really want to put in there and that's what people thought like and probably to them and back in the day they were just high-fiving each other like look out look at how smart we are like we we got this covered like this we're educating the audience here and that's the kind of thing that i said at the top of the episode i avoided watching this movie because I didn't want to come to terms with

certain things about myself because it was too scary at the time. And that's exactly what that's speaking to. Cause like, that's what I thought is exactly what I thought at that time, that you're either one of these three things and there's no other place for you. And none of those sound like me. None of those sound like very attractive options,

except for being a drag queen, which is a fun fucking job that i actually tried and failed at so because i just i i do not have too much fashion sense i have barely enough so you know that stuff that's why i wanted to talk about this because that was like i didn't get triggered by that scene you know i'm an adult I've been on this planet for a long time. Lots of other things have happened to me. But that reminded me of how I thought back then and how a lot of trans women thought back then that I would talk to on the were just getting their kicks off and like there was there was no place for us unless we had surgery but then even then you're still a he according to this monologue right yeah yeah this monologue misgenders trans women multiple times in one sentence multiple times yes absolutely it does and, like you said, on the assumption that if you're trans, you have to have surgery. You have to have surgery. Absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah. Which we know better than that now, but we kind of don't. In 2021, if I were to get arrested as a trans woman who has not had gender confirmation surgery, has not had bottom surgery, I would go to male prison and I would die absolutely within minutes. And that's a reality. It's not my reality, but that's a reality that a lot of trans women face. They go into male jails. They get shoved into these unsafe spaces because of their surgical status. And so, you know, you're still, to this day, you're still being reinforced that you have to have surgery. And maybe I will, maybe I won't.

It's not a huge priority for me right now. I'm having a good life right now, but maybe I'll decide that's what I want later. But I don't want to feel unsafe. I don't want to have some cop in a mall in Tennessee give me a genital check because of whatever stupid law they come up with out there because of that. So that stuff is still happening. And that's the reality that we live in. Even then, even the community, even our community had that position. And a lot of us still do. I still to this day, and I don mean to like take over the show here but i still to this day will run into

gay men that will conflate my sexuality with my gender with my presentation i i have a lot of jokes about about gender i was at a stand-up show at a gay bar and i was telling this joke i tell about straight men straight men are bad at sex blah blah blah you know stuff that we all know hey like this gay guy starts heckling me he's like but if you're having sex with him he's not straight yeah he is i guarantee you he is i know from personal experience this man is straight as a fucking board maybe some of them aren't so i've had sex with body men too they're fucking fun but you know that has nothing to do with that so that's still that that attitude is still out there yeah this guy should have known he he was

a little older but he was not so old that he didn't he couldn't have been inundated with this information over the past however many years so this this scene is is i think key to the critique of the film it's a bad scene it's cringy absolutely and it's something i don't i didn't really enjoy but like as a as a document of this film and the environment that it came from is absolutely key that we discuss it yeah yeah it's again it's it's like something that i wish that the writer had been pressed on at at any time because yeah you're totally right gina where it's you know douglas carter bean chose to write this story so if he's choosing to write this story that you have to do your due diligence and talk to people and you know he also had to have been well aware that he was one of the

only writers who was writing a mainstream story like this and how yeah like spreading misinformation and half-assing anything like there is a higher risk to doing that because no one else is talking about it to a mainstream audience it's just it's really frustrating and and very of its time but just like it's it's it's so frustrating that like this scene i don't even know what to say like they're the the mental gymnastics you have to do to even get through that um it was hard to watch absolutely yeah yeah very hard to watch i i audibly gasped at it. And I don't normally do that. But I did there. And it did take me out of the film for a minute. Yes, I agree. Should we have pressed the writers? Should someone have pressed the writer? Absolutely. But as is typically

the case, those marginalized people who are perhaps the least marginalized he's still white and male often are the ones that are the first you know on the scene and have an imperfect perspective on it so there you go yeah and then for that monologue to end with the noxemic character and also i think I read a lot of articles about this movie that interpret that monologue in the way that Noxzema says, like, when a gay man has too much fashion sense for one gender, he's a drag queen. And then that's I read a lot of articles that that people interpreted. OK, so like Noxzema is saying that's the category that we fall into. Yeah. Even though i'm like did you watch the rest of the movie but um the and then the way the sentence and or like the way the monologue ends is noxzema saying to chichi like you're not a drag queen you're a boy in a dress

and when you look at it through the context of these are trans women and then for another character who for all intents and purposes is a trans woman to say that to another trans woman yeah i mean as a trans woman i can tell you trans women are awful to each other sometimes so that happens not always we're usually quite nice to each other but sometimes we're terrible the the thing that i took away from that scene other than what we've been talking about is that there's really not any motivation for it and so you kind of have to fall back on what the movie gives you like what is exactly noxema's problem with chichi and like they don't give you a whole lot other than the fact that she's young and that there's this weird racial undercurrent to things that she says so like you just you get the kind of

impression that noxious kind of a racist which is which is the motivation behind that scene for her to talk like that it's yeah it's it's not good it's it's like i just don't trust that douglas carter bean really knows what he's talking about on a lot of levels here and yeah i don't think he does i think you're correct on that jamie i think he does i i think that i think this is what happened this is what douglas carter being in my estimation is what he did he he he talked to some drag queens and he probably listened in on some drag queens talking to each other and you know you're both comedians you know how people get when they're around each other and like sometimes especially back then the humor can

get kind of rough and tumble and i have no doubt that in 1995 drag queens of different races were throwing racist jokes at each other but it came across kind of ugly in this movie like it was it wasn't it just felt racist just felt like they're being racist and that's probably what he's missing he's missing like there's supposedly some context here right and just don't put it in there if you just don't do it you know don't if you can't do it right and there really is no right way to do it. I mean, some things you just don't need to put in a PG-13 comedy. Right. A bunch of racist jokes, probably qualifies as that. Yeah, leave them out.

It just felt like Noxy was being racist toward Chi-Chi just because she was being racist. That's because she was racist. She kept saying racist stuff to her throughout the entire movie up until that point it just it made the character unlikable yeah for that bit now wesley's doing a great job being the likable person but that scene was yeah it's brutal and and vita says racist shit constantly too like they're yeah yeah and it kind of for Vita it Vita's character for me is so she's just hard for me because there's so much like I guess I'm interested in what everybody thinks because it was there were so many times where I was like I wasn't sure if I was supposed to be on Vita's side or not where it seemed like either Noxzema or Chi-Chi were making a very like valid point to her and she'd be like no we have to do this and I'm like

no Vita like listen to your friends and then plot wise she would end up being right like and yeah that happens a few different times like where at one point with the cop where Vita's trying to decide you know should we stay should we leave and Noxem is kind of like no we have to get the fuck out of here like this is a real and present danger and Vita's like oh okay but it's like Vita's whole core quality being that she you know perceives herself to be very pure of heart and and wants to kind of be this fairy godmother to the world and that happens again with Carol Ann it's just i don't know vita was was tough to crack for me i think i i think that we should discuss the relationship

between vita and and stockard tanya's character then because that that formed a big component to this film because it really that's where it really bites off more than it can chew among many other times this is this this plot line is where it bites off way more than it can chew yeah and it's part of a larger issue that i have with this movie in that it's about three queer characters who end up focusing all of their energy on helping straight people. Oh, yeah. And this is like a trope that is commonly seen in like rom-coms and other genres. This is also a trope in my actual life.

So it's totally a thing. I am. I, yes. Unfortunately, this is a thing. This is a thing that happens. I am constantly called, I, yes. Unfortunately, this is a thing. This is a thing that happens. I am, I am constantly called in as character witness to some straight person's woke-itude. That is not fair to you. No, it is not.

So we see this a lot where usually the situation is that there will be a straight protagonist in a movie who has a gay best friend. And the only thing the queer best friend characters they are your like three core characters and they are still doing nothing but helping yeah straight people who are like the secondary characters right there's still the queer advisory board yes yeah right to the point where at the end they're like removed from the action and they're on a balcony they're not even at the party they're like removed from the action and they're on a balcony they're not even at the party they're right they're levitating above the head to hide yeah yeah i just i i think the the subplot with the the stalker channing character stalker channing's character is that that's carolanda her name carol and yeah so her character is is she's running the house that the queens are staying at. And she's in an abusive relationship with her husband.

He physically abuses her. And it's pretty upfront about it. Like it's not, like he's openly abusive and unrepentant about it. Makes no attempt to even hide it or anything else. And everyone just kind of, that's what he does. That's what he does. That's how it is and like vita's purpose in the film at that point becomes you know enabling this enabling carol ann to to move on with her life and get this bad man out of

it and again the movie is buying up way more than it can chew at this point like it's it's totally inconsistent and it you end up just not doing the subplot justice grad you have you know really charming actors stockard channing patrick sloisy great performers great charming performers they do a lot to sell this stuff and i think hollywood movies especially they are reliant on on the charisma of charisma of their stars just to sort of paper over the crap that they have written for them. Right. Because similar to how after one little lesson in manners and etiquette, Noxzema is able to cure a whole group of bullies who are prone to sexual assault. Moxema cures the sexual assaulting bullies.

And then she makes a mute woman talk. There's a lot of translating magic going on in this thing. Which, the way disability is treated as a gag, like as a joke with that character is obviously not acceptable it's so it's it's i mean so much about the tone of this movie is bizarre but where where it is very much biting off more than it can chew is like well if we want this to be a comedy why why do we keep introducing these beats into the story where exactly everything is so upsetting why have your inciting incident some sexual assault when they could have just had the car breakdown like doc hollywood does the same plot line cars from pixar does the same plot line but they don't they're not

they're not motivated by this extra character especially because he's not really posing any threat to them except for the very end of the movie and then that is very easily resolved right yeah they immediately just form a wall and like that's it and run him back out of town as quick as he came yeah it's the cop the cop storyline is is also just so frustrating because it's like taking a very very real issue of i mean on multiple levels on how police treat trans women on how police treat people of color where he uses like racial slurs back to back right out there yes that's the hard racial slurs not not even euphemisms he's going he's going straight for them yeah and and and then assaults vita and like these things all happen back to back to back and then this character just

becomes a cartoon as the movie goes on and it's again it's one of those things where it's like well douglas carter being like this is a very real issue that if you want to keep the movie this light then don't introduce that plot point because it's serious they could have excised Chris Penn's cop character and not have had any problem whatsoever they could have every beat could have been preserved

without that piece not that person there but that's again that's Hollywood stuff they're like that's an exact question that execs asked where's the danger where's the conflict where's the danger that's what they they expect especially when you have queer people like queer people in america well they have to be in peril otherwise it's not being authentic this is one thing i read in the contemporaneous reviews is that people were critical of the film, not being dark. Like you can't have queer characters and without having the,

you know, run through the muck because then it's not authentic. And like, that's how straight people view queer life. And it's not that, I mean, it is that don't get me wrong. I,

I have an absolute, you know, I have an absolute heart attack once a week, just dealing with the straight world. And I, I have a very sheltered life. I an absolute you know i have an absolute heart attack once a week uh just dealing with the straight world and i i have a very sheltered life i do you know i'm i'm in a safe city and like i'm i'm a i'm a white person so i i as far as a trans woman goes i'm pretty sheltered but like i still have to deal with stressful situations sure i just i just wish that i just wish the film were just better about

it or just didn't put him in there like if you're gonna have this light-hearted romp where everything's fabulous just be that it's totally fine yeah at the very least and this is like minuscule and surface level i was like at least this is like one of the few movies from this era that isn't afraid to show a cop character being a bad person and a racist and misogynist, etc. But like, again, this movie is not equipped to handle like so much, so much, all of that. So, yeah, just get it out of there but as far as the the subplot with carol ann and vita you know basically empowering her to leave her husband and there's this weird beat at the end where the abusive husband looks at her and it looks like they're going to get back together they give like this weird wondering about that look at each other and then he just

sort of walks away and it's like i don't think you get it i don't think you get this get this at all douglas carter bean right i was like was that her being like now go on and get or was that her being like maybe yeah we're gonna figure this out like yeah the most the generous, because it's open to interpretation. The most generous interpretation that I'm willing to give it is that she was, she was adopting this power pose to be like, look at what you missed out on. You could have had this empowered woman. And he begrudgingly gives her the respect of, you know, not being an asshole and walking away. Yeah.

That is the most generous interpretation that i can give to the scene but it is open to many other interpretations yes yes yeah and and gina i think you're saying this earlier but like the scenes where he is being physically and verbally abusive to her are very intense and pretty explicit in the way that they're presented and it's just i don't know we we just gotta talk to douglas carter bean about all of this because because it's just like okay the if you want this to be a fun romp but it would just be so jarring where sometimes something very upsetting would happen and then the music would be like and you're just like, hold on.

I think in Douglas Carter Bean's defense, he has a fun name to say. So I'm sure that's why we keep saying it. He wasn't the composer. He wasn't the editor. That's true. That's on you, Rachel. The whole thing. The whole thing.

Even Kidron, the whole thing. There's probably a lot of people that just missed the boat on it. But yeah. Yeah, there's a lot of dissonance. So when we say Douglas Carter Bean, we're really meeting the executive creative team. But it's a much more fun thing to say Douglas Carter Bean. We could say Douglas Carter Bean and company. Yes, company and company.

At all. The grand Douglas Carter bean. Yeah. In conclusion, this movie is trying to tackle a lot of things that it's not equipped to tackle. There's also, and then there's like another confusing component, at least to the cop character where he's hurling these racist slurs. And that's part of what lets us know that he is a bad person. Right. And then the movie turns around and has Vita and Noxzema hurl racist slurs

and very racially charged comments to Chi-Chi. And that's just how the ladies relate to each other, question mark. Yeah, that's exactly. I would be remiss not to at least address Chi Chi Rodriguez as a character. So again, watching this movie, I remember watching the trailers back when I was a kid and seeing Chi Chi and being like, you know what? I could be her. I'm not fabulous in that way, but we were very physically similar. Same size, same basic complexion.

And I saw myself in that character. And that's the reason why I didn't watch it because I didn't want to see myself in this character. I picked up that Chi Chi was a trans woman watching it back then because she, more than any of the other characters, she, she was moved and was addressed and talked.

And even though she was very like loud and out there, she was, she was very much, she was much more natural in presentation than, than the other two women were like, she, she was allowed to have a little bit of a romance, even though she had to sacrifice it again.

That's a whole other thing. Yeah. Again, again, again again we're sacrificing stuff for the straights to be happy right we're sacrificing our happiness there is an argument that that vita makes where or maybe it's noxy that makes this where it's like you know that boy thinks you're hot but wait till you finds out that he's not you're not what he expects that is true i mean there there's definitely a safety issue and that's why i am very upfront when i date anyone about what i have going on but like the chichi character i really have to applaud leguizamo's performance in this and like and yes and yes it's true he's absolutely correct this should be this should have been a trans woman it should would be a trans woman now if they were to make a remake or a musical adaptation like they're planning but he really imbued the character with a naturalism and with like just uh an inherent sort of interior

femininity that the that the maybe the part didn't really call for but i picked up on you know back then and i was afraid of it and i you know if had seen that, if I'd been more brave, maybe I would have picked a different path in life. I don't know. Maybe not. But I just wish in some world that she was able to get the boy. Yeah. That storyline. Let's talk about that because it's so disappointing to me.

Yeah. Yeah. Another moment where I was just like, Vida. Yeah. Like why? Vida, Vida, Vida. Come on. so disappointing to me yeah yeah another moment where i was just like vida yeah why are you doing this let let the girl be happy with the girl and the and the and the cute country boy be happy together right yeah especially because this this movie it sounds like it it is like presenting itself as this like amazing like romp where it's like i feel like the tone of the movie lends itself to chichi getting the boy the tone would absolutely would have supported that and also that boy is way older than bobby lee that was that was not an

appropriate relationship bobby lee and the bobbies get together in the end after chichi lets the boy bobby down and like they did like no girl but i was also i was like she's a teenager question mark but then i looked her up and she's only i think four or five years younger than john leguizamo that actress yeah i it was it was confusing. It was confusingly presented. I thought she was supposed to be like 15. Yeah, she's characterized as being quite young. Yes. And they did nothing to clarify that. Yeah, right. So that was icky. And then yeah, we have this story where even though Bobby Ray has known Chi Chi for all of 12 hours, he's spray painted a Coca-Cola sign to say, like, I love you, Chi Chi. I mean, the tone kind of, again, the tone supported that.

It just, the tone demanded that they get together. And then when they didn't that felt like a narrative betrayal that felt wrong yeah yeah because their story up until that point is very sweet and pure and it's you know once they arrive in the town you know it's each of the queens kind of go on this like side quest where for Vida she is with Carol Ann and then uh Noxzema is with Clara and then there's a whole thing going on there that was kind of fun and but with Chi Chi it's like Chi Chi has the best storyline she yeah you know meets Bobby Ray it's very cute they're like falling in love in this very movie-like way it It could have been the notebook for trans women,

is what I'm saying. And it wasn't. Missed opportunity. Huge missed opportunity. It really sucked. I was very frustrated that that happened. And that there is that conversation where all three ladies are in their shared room.

And I just, Vida is so frustrating to me where I mean Vita and Noxzema are being very cruel to Chi Chi in this scene they're characterizing her as being selfish for wanting to be with Bobby Ray which is like ridiculous and it's like well what what entitles Bobby Lee like what entitles yeah just because she's a cis girl like that's i guess that's it yeah it reminds me it reminds me of some like it hot which is like from the 50s and in the end so jack lemon is jack lemon and the other character they're in they're in drag to basically hide out from the mob and jack lemon's character is is being courted by this guy and then in the end like the very ending scene he's like you know i'm actually a man like

he wasn't trans or anything he's like i'm a man i'm hiding out and that guy they that was courting him the whole times as well you know nobody's perfect and that's the last line in the film is nobody's perfect and like implying that still watch you, Jacqueline. Like they did that in the fifties. Yeah. They were okay with that. Marilyn Monroe movie, the biggest movie that year had that ending. Yeah.

And this movie four decades later, couldn't even fathom. Yes. The idea of a trans woman and Bobby Ray. Yes. They couldn't, they couldn't do a nobody's perfect in 1995 they did it in 1956 though or whatever whenever that movie came out right god with that context it's like three times more infuriating and it's uh that that scene where chichi is understandably upset that vita and noxema are just completely ruling out this romance for her and she says another thing that you're just like as a 2021 audience member you're like yeah

chichi is totally right where she is giving vita shit and saying i'm sick and tired of this freak white lady telling a black and latin lady which way is up down and under and just you know kind of calling vita out for thinking that she knows what's best for everyone and that her like code of morality is the universe's code of morality but then the plot acts as if vita was right and so it's like that's another yeah narrative example where it was like well does the movie just think that vita is right about goddamn everything i just yeah i yeah i i think it does i think i think the movie was just allowing that like pushback like acknowledging hey all this is also a point but also vita's correct because vita is vita's the mother of the cast so she has to be the correct one because

she's the mother that's what archetypally that's what they were thinking I I love doing podcasts like this I love doing my own podcast that is very similar to this but like I always end up like kind of hating after after we're done talking about it did I enjoy this did i have fun watching this didn't i laugh most of the time uh i've i've had so many former favorite movies of mine be like oh fuck i can't like i was i was literally enjoying this movie two days ago we fucked up with our career choices and it's especially concerning for the movie to make it seem like Vita is right about discouraging Chi Chi from pursuing this relationship when Vita is saying stuff like you're being devious you're lying to this boy because Chi Chi has not disclosed her situation whether that be her like trans status if there

was an arc to that if there was an arc to vita being shitty and coming to realize later on that she was being shitty that it would that'd be a different story characters are allowed to be shitty or tonally if we're just a movie where people are just shitty to each other if we're just glenn gary glenn ross for trans women that would have been that would have been a totally different thing i would watch that glenn gary glenn ross can suck my butt wow wow strong word that's a strong response i know what i'm choosing for my birthday we're doing glenn gary glenn ross truly the most boring movie i've ever had the displeasure of watching anyway but yeah i mean so tonally we should if they're gonna do that then we should have seen some some like come around moment where via's like yeah i was wrong but of course the movie

doesn't think that she was wrong that's the problem the movie thinks she's right yeah movie thinks that trans women shouldn't be with straight boys. These straight boys should be with straight girls and, you know, never the twain shall meet. And that apparently queer people shouldn't be with anybody? Well, you know, for three centered drag queens, if we're trusting the film in its internal logic,

these are drag queens. These are the least sexual drag Queens I've ever seen. I've been around a lot of drag Queens and they, there's some dirty ladies. Like I said, I, I attempted to do drag in Florida, bad choice,

by the way, Florida, not the place to do drag it for no other reason than humidity. Of course. Uncomfortable, very uncomfortable. But like I, you know, I know i you know i had a drag mom and i i had like i had two drag moms i had an evil drag mom and i had a good drag mom

and like the the evil drag mom was on crystal meth and was like this total disaster but taught me all the shortcuts and the good drag mom was very much very much like vita almost the same person but taught me like this kind of like backward like republican version of drag but they're also you know very horny ladies both of them and that doesn't necessarily not every drag queen not every gay person not every clear person is horny but like there was no sex whatsoever with these any of them they were just fabulous and they mostly talked about their outfits and you know and and this and the capitalist struggle and like they and i get it it's pg-13 it's a cis

film but like man it's like they had room for racial slurs and no one could be horny like right yes exactly they had room for racial slurs no one can be a horny take out the racism put in the horny yeah yeah that storyline just really bummed me out yeah yeah the the last vita character assassination that i have to do is in that same scene and this is kind of where the where it becomes clear that's like oh the movie is just is is going with vita's view on things kind of in in this just very clear way of like the movie thinks vita is is the correct person where they are hearing carolyn be abused by her husband um which again yeah why why horrible yeah why is this happening in a romp uh and again i think noxema brings up like a pretty nuanced

point there where vita's like well we have to go help her and noxema says there are times when you help people and then there are times that if you help people you end up being killed so then you don't help people which is like a pretty you know yeah i feel like in 1995 logic it's like well you have to help everyone at all times but like if you if you consider the context that Noxzema is saying that in, where, again, it's like a potential safety issue that it's like, well, you know, I understand what she's saying. Yeah, she's got a point. She's absolutely has a point. But the movie, of course, doesn't reinforce that there is no actual there.

They're never in any actual danger. Everything is easily solved yeah but yeah no i had that was really weird because like yeah noxie's right unfortunately noxie's right you do want to help but not in that way like you know spirit her away later on when when the coast is clear you know there's a lot of things you could do that aren't you busting down a door and beating the shit out of this guy and you know putting yourself in danger with the log you know again tone of the film allowed allowed for this to play out in the most in the most flattering way that it could sure this is a fantasy movie it It absolutely is. It's like hard fantasy.

It unintentionally kept reaffirming the white lady's perspective as the correct one. Or maybe intentionally it did. I don't know. But it didn't seem to entertain much room for argument. That's the other thing too with Vida is that

she's the only character that we have any backstory on and she's like the white character because they like they drive through Vita's hometown we find that she's we find out she's estranged from her family that she you know gave up her family's wealth because they didn't accept her and then we don't get any like to be fair they don't do anything with that backstory really but you do find it out yeah you totally just drive on like that's where i used to live oh okay cool moving on well we're on a schedule so yeah that's it's like especially weird then to include that since it doesn't even pay off but it doesn't come back yeah you can't

help but notice that the other two characters don't get any kind of backstory like that no not really you do at the very least you get a sense of what noxema wants to do she's like i'm gonna go sorry there's a million sirens but she like she's like i'm gonna go to hollywood and i'm gonna be discovered and i'm gonna be in the pictures and yeah she's like a huge film buff and right and she she has an arc a bear arc but an arc where she's like hollywood's gonna have to deal with me so she has a little bit of something but no history absolutely not right yeah i did enjoy that scene with her and clara the yeah the the woman that she gets to speak for the first time since i think that the reason she didn't speak for a long time was because her husband left her it was some yeah something like that

husband related affliction that that has got to be some sort of like anti-bectal cast anti-bectal test a man leaves and the woman can no longer speak at all. It's like Ariel the mermaid style. Just like her voice is in a seashell somewhere. We don't really know. He took the voice with him. Packed it up. Oh, God.

With his ties. Clunky as hell. But I liked that scene between the two of them. I liked that scene. Wesley Sn of them. I liked that scene. Wesley Snipes is very good. They're all very good in this movie. Wesley Snipes is, it made me wish he had stuck to more comedies. He's so funny in this movie.

Yeah. Also, he got totally snubbed because Patrick Swayze and John Leguizamo both got Golden Globe nominations for their roles in this movie. Yes. But Wesley Snipes did not. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, know there you go that's good old i mean that's the globes for one that's the globes yeah we 2021 we finally canceled them i mean it was like it took us long enough but like well like yeah that's a there's a lot of cool little scenes in this film that's a great scene

that's it that character actress she's fantastic senior little scenes in this film. That's a great scene. That's it. That character actress, she's fantastic. She knows a million things. Wesley Snipes is so good in that scene. So good in this movie in general, that that's the stuff I enjoy is the stuff that's not the plot. It's just them hanging out. And I think,

I think that's what most people enjoy. Like no, like no one really is like when they talk about the positive aspects of this film, they're not like, well, you know, they really, that third like no one really is like when they talk about the positive aspects of this film they're not like well you know they really that third act turnaround was really awesome like they it's just the people being people which is what most movies are it's just the people being people yeah it's the queer characters fixing the lives of these straight people and um giving them makeovers yeah i was talking to a friend of mine straight woman and she's dating this guy older man in in las vegas and she went to spend the

week with him and they were staying at his friend's place for a couple of days and basically his friends were like we don't understand transgender. Explain it to us, white straight lady. And then she was telling me all about how she explained it to them and they were fighting with her and then she got it. And then she's looking at me like, do I get a cookie or something like that? And I'm like, basically she's like, what would you have done? Well, if I were in that situation is what i said i would have left because i i don't want to do that i don't want i don't want to educate the straights that is not your burden to bear it's not my burden and you know if a if a room full of trump supporters is asking me to explain transgender to them that's a trap

I'm I am leaving that room yeah in Vegas no less in Vegas no less where there's desert everywhere yes yeah leave the room break up with the guy whose friends are those people Yes. Go away. That happens again. Don't do that. Just go away. Yeah. Does anyone have anything else they'd like to talk about? but what it was to me is a movie about three trans women that are friends with each other. And even though they say a lot of weird racist shit that isn't necessary or, or, or at all desired, they were friends and they were nice and they had fun.

And that is a quality in queer cinema that we don't see enough of, especially in the limited experience of trans movies. You know, when I was picking films to discuss with with y'all i i wanted to discuss something trans related because that's my experience and i think it's important that people with experience talk about their experiences but i also didn't want to pick like a downer yeah and like that's that's a tough one Like I want to talk about queer joy. I want to talk about trans joy. Like that's where, that's where I'm coming from.

I'm a comedian. I like, I like fun. And so this was what I had to work with. And as that, as fill in the correct terminology in your own head, when they say drag queen, just say trans woman in your head, Just make the edit in your own mind, and it'll be a little better. And just ignore, go make some tea during those couple of scenes that we talked about.

Otherwise, it's a fun little romp. It's a fun romp. And yeah, for anyone who, especially like when this movie was coming out, when there were so little other options for queer representation in cinema, especially like when this movie was coming out, when there were so little other options for queer representation in cinema, especially queer joy. So for anyone who saw themselves represented,

who saw themselves in those characters, that means a lot. That's, we don't want to take that away from anyone. What we do want to take away from someone is, what's the writer's name again we do want to take away from someone is what's the writer's name again we want to take away uh mr bean we want to take the pen from douglas carter bean and company uh no with all i it's a fun name to say it's really fun to say with all due respect to douglas carter bean uh your name's fun to say, we're taking your pen. Yeah.

Yeah. What I hope, and watching this movie, for all of its faults, it is such a fun romp and there is so much joy and it is just like fun to watch these ladies be friends and navigate conflict in a very dated way. But they're navigating conflict in their friendship. And I hope that this is the sort of movie that, you know, just paves the way for more movies like it that you don't need to, you know, plow through the dissonance.

And that there will be more movies that are just like trans ladies on a road trip, like having fun. Like that sounds wonderful. Like, let's get that. One thing I did like about this film, and from 1995 is especially refreshing, is that there were no coming out discussions. There were no like, when did you know you were different type discussions? Which is basically what so many of queer representation was it was you were either talking about coming out or you were dealing with some terrible disease and or social affliction

yeah like there there was other textures to their life which was very very refreshing for me to see something from that time that did that for sure yeah and i like that chichi wins at the end i mean that's that's her consolation prize for for you know losing the boy she gets she gets the she gets the crown instead of the boy she has to sacrifice her love for you know to become royalty yes exactly that's that's her head wig in the angry inch moment she's she's she sacrifices for success oh that's another movie we have to cover the last day okay sorry this is like i promised the last thing i had to say but like bobby ray again it's just like a character logic thing but like he just pivots so quickly where like he, he's like, I'm in love with Chi Chi.

Chi Chi's the love of my life. And then she's like, not now. And then he's like, I'm going to get married to, I was like, do you just, what is, what's going on in your head, Bobby Ray? Walk me through this. He just loves the woman who is closest to him. He loves love. He loves love. He's in love with love.

Whoever is geographically closest to him in that moment, that's who he loves. By the end, I was like, he's not good enough for you, Chi Chi. This man has... No. Yeah. No, he really wasn't. But they could have made that into some kind of character quirk. They could have played with that.

But no, that was just bad writing. That was just, oh, straight people people now they're being straight together that's what that's so many things get like too easily resolved or inexplicably resolved or things will go on a weird trajectory that doesn't make any sense yeah you know so goes the romp so goes the romp yes there you go uh so let's talk about the bechdel test as it applies to this movie if we are operating on these three women being trans women then yes the movie passes all the time it passes the bechdel test handily because the characters are so neutered they have no real sexuality except for chichi a little tiny bit she's basically like she's basically like this 1950s like peyton place type ingenue at that point right so she's she has she has romantic

interest but no sexual interest but the Noxie and and Vita have have no sexuality whatsoever just about so yes it passes the Bechdel test there's probably some other test that it doesn't pass we don't know what that test is. There are definite tests. It does not pass. Oh, actually, I do want to shout out the May test, which was created by trans actor and filmmaker Kylie May. And the May test examines trans representation on screen. We will link to some information about that. It's definitely worth checking out. I also want to shout out a few lines of dialogue from the movie that I enjoy. This one is from Carol Ann Tuvita says, I think it's really important for a woman to have lady friends. Yeah. Wow.

Nice. Yeah. Are you including in these lines the last bit of dialogue between the two of them? That weird exchange where she's like, I don't think of you as a man or as a woman. Or as a woman. I think of you as an angel. And then Vito's response with, I think that's healthy. That's healthy. Vito's response blew my mind i you know what though i actually kind of enjoyed that response because as a trans woman i have had plenty of straight women tell me straight cis women tell

me that they think of me as an angel or as you know some sort of superhuman or whatever like i've had i've had plenty of like women confess that i'm some sort of like thing a deity beyond humanity some yeah some sort of like walking goddess among us and like i'm far from that but it's better than it's better than hate so so when vita says i think that healthy, that's kind of my response. It's like, well, it's better than hate. I think that's healthy. I think that's something in any way. That's what I took away from it.

That was the one moment from Vita's perspective. I'm like, yeah, girl, I get it. Take the W. Take the W and just walk away i like i liked swasey's delivery of that line too yeah it's just fun and then earlier in the movie carol ann also says and this doesn't technically pass because she mentions men as a concept but she's like i think we should get rid of all men but i feel like that does pass the bechdel test um because but then also she's like but we can keep mel gibson oh yeah yeah yeah it's like oh 1995 maybe but then she says he's not allowed to think or speak

and i was like that's better okay as an improvement. If Mel Gibson has to be alive, I too do not want him to think or speak. He should not think or speak. Mel Gibson is allowed, but only as an automaton. That is it. Yeah. And then we've got our nipple scale,

our scale of zero to five nipples in which we rate the movie based on how it fares looking at it through an intersectional feminist lens so it is as we've discussed very much a product of its time understandings of gender identity gender expression sexuality were things that most people in 1995 did not have a very nuanced understanding of yeah including everyone who made this movie absolutely unintentional unintentional good stuff yeah so you know it's not going to fare great because of that it's not going to um fare great because of all the casual racism that many of the characters display including two of which who we are supposed to be rooting for you know it's it's got of a lot of problems of the time but then but then you have again like queer representation misguided though it may be

in a huge movie with huge stars that a lot of people saw that it does you know celebrate queer joy which was very rare for that time especially but even so i feel like i can only give it like two nipples because 1995 yeah bringing it back around to the because 1995 thing i will give one i'll give one to chichi I'll give one to Chi Chi. I'll give one to the conversation between Noxzema and, what was the character's name? Clara. Clara, yes. Who they talk about movies and like old Hollywood stars. I really liked that scene. That's very sweet.

And I learned things. I was like, I always love when a movie sneakily teaches me something. Right. Yeah. What a great scene. Yeah, totally. I agree. the movie sneakily teaches me something right yeah the great what a great scene yeah totally agree that scene noxeme is like oh my one of my favorite actors was i forget the name of the woman but she's like she she's a black woman but she never yeah dorothy dandridge yeah yeah she never

she never played the help and she was in all these amazing roles but then she you know the the white hollywood machine like chewed her up and spit her out um brb gotta go be racist to chichi and it's like what are you talking about noxema and the way that scene ends too where it's like i don't know i i love old hollywood stuff and when clara ends it by being like let's do lena horn next and it was like oh this seems so fun yeah that was a that was a cool little scene scenes where the people are being people are great I would I would have to rate a slightly higher on the nipple scale only because of its relative um as a queer person we're so used to being forgiving of our texts understanding the flawed as they may be, because they are so rare, we have to

kind of, like, we have to love them, even though they are imperfect. We have to love them anyway because they are ours and we have so few. Totally fair. So I'm going to give it three nipples based on that and really

highly disappointed in the casual racism and that's probably the thing that makes me detract from it the most as well as it's incredibly poor depiction of domestic violence because those are those are completely unnecessary those are generally unnecessary anyway but they're completely unnecessary to the to the film and the film just leaves them be basically so an imperfect vessel of queer joy yes i'm gonna give it three nipples hell yeah that's how i feel awesome jamie what about you uh i guess i guess i'll split the diff and uh i'll i'll do a two and a half here i i i don't think that I have anything to say that we haven't said already, but the casual racism in particular was really frustrating and unnecessary. And the fact that they were able to justify certain things,

like certain instances of violence being there, but then they wouldn't allow their three queer main characters to have love lives is just so dare i say 1995 uh yes there there are a lot of elements that watching this in in 2021 are frustrating but i also you know want to hold space for and respect for the fact that this movie was made and was a success and that it was pushed for at a time where movies like this were not pushed for in the mainstream and this is a fucking steven spielberg movie like and and knowing more about the context that this movie was released in you know doesn't fix things doesn't make the most glaring issues that this movie has better but it did help me understand and and you know at least give

makes me hope hope for romps like this that are not burdened with the same issues that this movie is burdened with because they tried i will uh it seems like they tried okay two and a half and I'll give one to Chi Chi I'll give oh Naomi Campbell is in this movie for a second yeah yeah I guess I'll give one to her

and I will put the last half in the trunk of the car and see if anyone finds it later. Great. Just a really quick assign my nipples. I'd forgotten about this part. Oh, quite all right. Critical. Chi Chi gets a nipple

obviously. I will say Noxy and that's and the lady in the talking about old movies and Dorothy Andridge gets a nipple. And I'm gonna say that the the final nipple goes to the two wong fu scene which we completely the the very opening scene where not very opening but the opening scene where she's stealing the picture off the wall

and they're being kind of racist toward each other yes absolutely but that scene that bit where vita steals the picture i'm giving a nipple to. Because it's the only transgressive thing Vita does in the entire film. True. She is such a saint everywhere else in this movie. But she steals the Tu Wong Fu picture, steals the Julie Newmar picture because it speaks to her. And then she gives it away to stop stalker, Channing, as she starts her new life. So to Vita stealing the Julie Newmar, the inciting incident, the titular Julie Newmar Wong Fu picture, I give my final nipple to.

Love it. Beautiful. And Gina, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for having me. What a treat. Come back anytime. Thank you.

Sorry we ruined the movie. No, it's okay. Okay, but now that I've been on the show and I've spoken for trans representation, should you have me back on, I'm going to talk about something not trans. Because I have more than that to me. I am

a big fan of the Fast and Furious franchise. Right, yes, yes franchise right so among many other things so we can go on and on about all kinds of stuff the next time come back on for f9 is that the one that's f9 yes f9 and they bring the asian dude back from the dead for a second time so there you go very excited i have only seen the first two and then hobbs and shaw so i need to catch up on my fasts and the furious that's just a for instance there's a there's a whole there's a whole 120 years of cinema out there yeah that i i would love to talk about anytime. So whenever you guys want to have me back, we'll open it up.

We'd be delighted. Love it. And then where can people follow you online and check out your stuff, check out your upcoming tour dates? So all my socials are at Gina Bloom, J E E N A B L O O M. That's mostly Twitter and Instagram. You can find me in the fall of September. I'll be touring the Southern U.S.,

Asheville, Atlanta, New Orleans. More dates to come. I'll get that up there. And also New York City, because I am originally a New York lady, so I'll be returning there. So it'll be both the South and New York in the fall. And the new season of my podcast,

which Jamie and Caitlin have already been on, and we had a delightful time, will also be premiering in the fall as well. I talk about movies and other stuff, but it's all about trans lady making fun of bro stuff. So if you enjoy me talking about this,

you can find me on my show talking about bruce willis movies and please do please check it out and you can check us out on instagram and twitter at bechtel cast we've got our patreon aka matreon it's five dollars a month it's two bonus episodes each month plus access to the whole back catalog and it's at patreon.com slash bechtel cast and you can grab some merch if you're so inclined at tpublic.com slash the bechtel cast that's where all the stuff is. Incredible. And with that, to Gina Bloom, thanks for everything. The back to Caitlin and Jamie.

Oh, you guys. That was heartwarming. Thank you. No, thank you for everything. For everything. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017

was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unnerves 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,

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