There Are No Girls on the Internet - The Twitter-to-Fame Pipeline of the 2010s (w/ Celebrity Memoir Book Club)

Episode Date: July 22, 2025

Remember the 2010s? Ubers were cheap, Obama was president, and you could get legitimately famous just by having a lot of Twitter followers. Claire Parker and Ashley Hamilton, hilarious and insightful hosts of Bridget's favorite podcast Celebrity Memoir Book Club, take us back to the era when viral tweets led to real book deals — and what those memoirs reveal about Internet fame, publishing, and the culture we've created. LISTEN TO CELEBRITY MEMOIR BOOK CLUB: https://www.youtube.com/@celebritymemoirbookclub   If you’re listening on Spotify, you can leave a comment there or email us at [e-mail]!    Follow Bridget and TANGOTI on social media! Many vids each week.   instagram.com/bridgetmarieindc/    tiktok.com/@bridgetmarieindc    youtube.com/@ThereAreNoGirlsOnTheInternet    See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter.

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or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Deanna Maria Riva. And on my new podcast, How Hard Can It Be? I call on my Gen X squad from Ohio to Hollywood as we navigate midlife's most fantastic BS. Unfiltered conversations from night sweats to futas to scheduling sex. Wait, what sex? Is it just me or does every woman my age want to look at Pinterest instead of having sex sometimes? They say we can't polish a turn, but we're sure going to try. So let's get blunt with laughs, tears, or tears of laughter. Listen to how hard can it be with

Tiana Maria Riva on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. It really felt like the cryptocurrency era for comedy writers. There are No Girls on the Internet as a production of IHeart Radio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd, and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet. I spend a lot of time thinking about the Internet, but also a lot of time thinking about celebrity. And I don't think the two are unrelated, because today, being online is just part of being famous. How a celebrity shows up online can tell us just as much about Internet culture as it does about them. And in the early 2010s, the internet rewrote the rules of fame.

A strong online voice, funny, raw, relatable, could turn tweets into real book deals, viral posts into publishing contracts, and internet clout into real cultural capital. It was a moment where being extremely online could genuinely change your life. Today, I'm talking to Claire Parker and Ashley Hamilton, the host of my favorite podcast Celebrity Memoir Book Club, about how that moment shaped modern celebrity and what the memoirs left behind can teach us about internet culture, platform fame, and the stories we choose to tell. So what is it about celebrity memoirs that made you want to dive into them for a living? I'll be honest, is that we didn't have a comedic living.

We were both at the time working day jobs trying to be stand-up comedians. And actually, it's our third podcast. And we kind of figured out that in order to, like, have a niche on the internet, if you haven't done The Bachelor, you can't just be two people talking. And we were like, we want to talk about pop culture. We had also done a Britney Spears podcast and felt really grossed out by like what had happened to her. It was the beginnings of the free Britney era. So nobody really knew what was going on yet if the rumors were true or not.

But we were like, whatever that, whatever is true, we do not want to be part of a group of people who talk about celebrities in a way that drives them to potentially being like fully trapped by their dad in like a mental legal contract. we were like, okay, how do you make fun of a celebrity in their own words? And then Mariah Carey and Jessica Simpson were coming out with memoirs around the same time. We were like, done. They're literally, whenever somebody goes, why is this even your business? They go, well, they sold a test and a book. And this is actually literally my full-time job. So it's everybody's business.

This is an economy of sorts. So I feel like it's easy to sort of discount celebrity books as fluff, meaningless. But something I really learned from listening to the podcast is that even bad celebrity books do tell us something about the world that we live in. What do you think that celebrity memoirs tell us about the time or the culture that they were produced in? I think the pop culture and like celebrity culture in general is dismissed as like just frivolous nonsense, even though it is like one of the more popular topics of conversation

across like all people. And so the way that you can get engaged on society from how they talk about like moments in pop culture, like you can see like this. swing towards, you know, Tradwife, like the diminishing of women's rights, like in the Amber Heard Johnny Depp case. Like, there are so many things that you can watch it happen in the way people talk about women in pop culture

and people in, like, the celebrity sphere. And I think that the books are such an interesting look at all of it because I think it's so interesting to look at the way people present themselves in that space and, like, whether or not they acknowledge the way that, like, they contribute to like the way people look at the world. And I think the way that they like don't mention certain things or the way they think things come up completely normal

is such a fascinating look at our society. And then again, the way that people will like let them get away with it based on how generally likable someone is is so fascinating. I also think when you read these memoirs and get the whole story versus when you're living through it and seeing the headlines, it helps you remember that there is a cohesive story going on. And I mean, in this world of clickbait, hot moments, you have to constantly fight yourself to not just like take the headline and run with it,

but try to understand the larger narrative at play. I feel like the amount of times like a woman has been absolutely demolished by the public because of a bad night out. And then you look at what was happening in her life. And she's like, well, my dad just died and my husband just divorced me. and I was postpartum, and I was being forced to work. And you're like, oh, okay, so she was, like, going through it. Women really going through it memoirs are one of my favorites of the genre.

For instance, the tech book everyone was talking about this year, Careless People, is basically a woman going through some stuff, memoir. Even if you haven't read Careless People, the memoir by Sarah Wyn Williams, former Director of Public Policy at Facebook, you've probably seen the headlines. And, wow, were they scandalous? stories about Facebook's Cheryl Sandberg,

buying her female staff lingerie, and even sharing beds with them on work trips. But those viral moments, as wild as they are, overshadowed stories that were much more disturbing, like Wynne Williams' first-hand account of Facebook's complicity in global harm, including the company's admitted role in the genocide of the Rohingya people in Myanmar.

We just read the Facebook book, Careless People, that memoir. It's less celebrity, but more like, Facebook is a celebrity. Mark Zuckerberg is a celebrity. But it's so interesting, even the way memoirs are covered, where the headline will be, I think the headline with that Careless People article is like,

Cheryl Sandberg bought lingerie for her assistant. And listen, not great, but when you read the book, what Facebook was doing and is doing was so much more horrific, she describes essentially watching over the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar 10 years ago as it was being incited by Facebook posts that she couldn't get anyone on the inside of Facebook to take down. That they kept saying,

this isn't hate speech, this isn't hate speech. Well, like, literally 10,000 people were being slaughtered in the street. And she was like, we need to take this down to prevent more deaths than she couldn't get it done.

And the idea that, like, I'm sorry, it's bad to buy your assistant laundry. It's worse to incite genocide. And the fact that the media coverage of that book seems to be so sexy, fun, scandalous. I think that that's, like, how a lot of media is.

And even if there are, I think there are journalists doing good work, but what goes viral, what comes to you, you have to seek out the whole story. And this is like a good, maybe lighter way to remember that lesson. That's such a good example. And I'm in the middle of that book myself. Oh, my gosh, sorry. No spoiler alert. There's a genocide at the end. I know about that. But, you know, I am intrigued by the fact that it's a memoir, right? Like, it could have easily been a like Kara Swisher style kind of hard-hitting, non-fiction. book. But the fact that it's a memoir, it really is about like how it felt from her perspective. And I think it just comes at it in such an interesting and different angle of like, this is what you remember from this experience of being at Facebook and all the ways that fucked you up. And not necessarily like, here's the hard hitting facts of like what went on. It really allows

you to really, I don't know, see her perspective and live in that experience a lot more. Another thing that I think is so like why I like the memoir genre so much is because of that. because I think there are so many things that like as a society, especially with the constant onslaught of news, I feel like we see this a lot with reality TV and celebrity in general, the way that people like believe in such a control. Do you know what I mean? Like they're like everyone, like this is how I would have reacted into this thing now that I'm reading the full picture.

So like that's how you should have reacted to it. And I think reading someone's thought process as it was happening instead of just the facts, like allows you to be like, oh, they're a person. with humanity, not a sim reacting with, like, control. Do you know what I mean? Absolutely, yeah. And it's easy to, I do think that there's something about our culture where that's easy to forget, where when someone is talking about an experience, it's so easy to say, like, well, this is what

I would have done. Or this, the way that she responded doesn't make sense because of X, Y, Z. Like, it just gives us such a look into what they were actually feeling and experiencing. Yeah, I think right now we're in this weird era of everyone thinks there's this PR, overlord that's like pulling the strings. I mean, even we had a journalist said to us, like, well, it's very clear that you're promoted and sponsored by Diet Coke because you have Diet Coke because you have Diet Coke's in the videos. Do you make a lot? Like, I was laughing as a journalist suggested this and we were just like, no, we just record for like three straight hours. So sometimes

we need caffeine and that's as deep as that is. We just sincerely are drinking Diet Coke's like most people on earth. Very famous to have a beverage when you're sitting at a table chatting. People really, the Taylor Swiftification and like the conspiracy theories, I think we're in this era right now of feeling like everybody's tricking you and everything's advertising and everything is a long time. I think it also falls in with the therapy speak and the way everything can be diagnosed. Everything has like nothing is ambiguous. Everything has a cause and effect. Like, I don't, like, Huda crashing out on Love Island is because she's an abuser. And you're like, I don't know.

I just think she's a single mom who's tired. She might be, like, sleep deprived in a very stressful, fishbow situation. The way that if I were in her shoes, I would immediately crash out, immediately, like, lose my shit. And it's like, yeah, maybe she's just in a weird situation for the first time. And she's having a big reaction to that. It doesn't necessarily mean, like, there's. some dark underbelly of a muse happening. Deeply manipulative language.

I'm like, I don't, she's... She's not Jack's Taylor. Listen, why can't she have a crash out, but Taylor Swift gets to write the tortured poets department? You know what I mean? Who's allowed in our society to crash out over a situation ship? I'd like to review.

Yes. The way people can, like, pin it on these, like, very specific trigger words. It, like, really strips the humanity out of everything. And so, like, getting the full story all the time is nice. I like knowing what happened. Let's take a quick break.

Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guide, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Jim Gaffigan to Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel

help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. There's that worst singer in the group. The worst? Yeah. Me. Is there anything to the idea that because you're from Harvard, you only got in because your parents made a huge donation.

The yard birds, right? That's the name. The Harvard Yardt. They're open. Do you have a name suggestion? We're open. Since you guys are middle-aged. One erection.

Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. me. I need some jokes to make me seem funny. Run a business and not thinking about podcasting, think again. More Americans listen to podcasts than ads supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora. And as the number one podcaster, IHeart's twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only IHeart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio.

Think podcasting can help your business. Think IHeart. Streaming, radio, and podcasting. Call 844-844-I-Hart to get started. That's 844-8-4-I-Hart. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast, Point Game is about defying the odds. Like LeBron heading into the playoffs without Luca and Austin Reed.

And finding ways to win no matter what. He's the smartest player to ever play the game. His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows. Without Luca and Austin Reeves, I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid.

He has to guard Julius Randall. And then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis on offense. And when IT's friends stop by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too. Steve Nash would get that thing. That man, hell get the flying. He running up the court, licking his fingers why he got the bar. Like, you go through a training camp with that, Isaiah. You figure it out real quick.

Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can have opinions. You can have like a strong stance. And then there's your body having its own program. I'm Dr. Maya Shunker, a cognitive scientist and hosts of the podcast, a slight change of plans, a show about who we are and who we become. life makes other plans. We share stories and scientific insights to help us all better navigate

these periods of turbulence and transformation. There is one finding that is consistent, and that is that our resilience rests on our relationships. I wish that I hadn't resisted for so long the need to change. We have to be willing to live with a kind of uncertainty that none of us Listen to a slight change of plans on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. At our back. Remember the 2010s? Uber's were cheap, Barack Obama was president.

In a lot of ways, it was a simpler, happier time, and the internet was really different, too. Back then, 20,000 followers at a viral tweet could get you a book deal, and being internet funny was a viable career plan. Things feel very different today. But I'm still so fascinated by that era and the cultural scaffolding it left us with. So the reason I reached out to both of you was I was listening to your episode on Kelly Oxford's book. Everything is perfect when you're a liar, published in 2013. If you don't know who Kelly Oxford is, she's a writer who was one of the first people who really got famous and blew up on the early days of Twitter for her snarky, relatable tweets.

And celebrities loved her on Twitter. She used that attention on Twitter to parlay that into a book deal for this book. It became a New York Times bestseller, and she parlayed that into a real Hollywood writing career. And I was kind of stunned by that trajectory and how commonplace it was back in the early days of social media and how that trajectory seems basically impossible today in 2025. And the way that you all described, this time and culture that I almost would have forgotten about, the 2010s. You got a mustache on your finger. Yes, you've got a mustache on your finger. Katie Perry is like the height of culture.

you know, who's the girl from new girl? Zoe Dashnell is like what every kind of quirky girl wants to be. Tina Faye is the funniest woman on the planet. Chrissy Tegan would tweet something and then there would be a hundred headlines like Chrissy Tegan claps back on the haters on Twitter on BuzzFeed, you know? Oh my God, BuzzFeed. What do you all remember about this time online? I guess I remember lists, obviously.

Chrissy Tegan's 12 best clapbacks. Oh my God. Like, Rihanna's 12 best reactions. I'm thinking about we also read Ina Kendrick's book that came out around that era, which was based on her successful Twitter. And it's so funny to go back. Like, what took a successful Twitter back then was like 35,000 followers. And it's like, now that's scratching the surface.

You couldn't get a coffee for 35,000 Twitter followers. But I think we were in this era of like Obama era America where the VC companies were funding all of our lives. I hear people talk about that a lot, like the class pass Uber seamless. Everything was relatively, like all these new apps made things efficient and affordable. And we weren't really aware of the hell that was coming. Airbnb was new. It felt like America might be going in a good direction. Oewe, where we about to be slapped in the face by that. But I think there was this idea that it was okay to be ironic. I think there was a height of irony at that point because people felt that things were going good. So it was okay to be like tweet.

and ironic and like this kind of like toothless snarkiness where it was very watered down Larry David. Do you know what I mean? It was like it was like the Christian girl version of a Jewish man comedy. Yes. I also feel I wonder if there is something to be said about the way that it was like the rise of social media crossed with still the dominance of mainstream media. Like so I was clear saying like you didn't actually have to have that many followers. but like people were on social media kind of making a name for themselves

but those names were defined by mainstream media picking who was the main ones. Do you know what I mean? Like people would get Twitter followers but if you were looking for new people to follow on Twitter you'd go to BuzzFeed and be like, well who did they pick as like the eight funniest people on Twitter? And like they,

the mainstream media was still deciding who within social media was like the top choices and like the funniest people in the world and those accounts then became TV shows. Yeah. Yeah. like there was a real currency there because, as you all see in that episode, you could have 20,000 followers and get retweeted by Lena Dunham or Pat and Oswald, and then you might

have an editor or somebody in your DMs, and that could translate to an actual paid writing gig or like a staff position on a late night show. Yeah, I really feel like the cryptocurrency era for comedy writers and that like the bubbles that were bursting, you know what I mean, like the amount of attention and overall deals that were inked for people that had quite literally only come up with 1,400 characters of comedy. Like, when you think, you know, you had 10 hit tweets. That was truly 10 sentences. And people were like, could you do a full-length film?

And it's like, maybe. But this would not let you know in any direction, really. I mean, I knew someone who was like this 19-year-old Twitter prodigy who was viewed as like the next it girl of L.A. And I like don't even want to say her name because it fell off so hard. Like, I think she's like a wedding photographer now. Oh, and then the other thing is that it was in an era of the internet where like, you still only knew what people were telling you about themselves.

One thing about that era of Twitter, it looked like people just got randomly chosen by the algorithmic gods to go from internet funny to published author. Joke accounts with one running bit became book deals with titles like, shit my dad says. Take Charlie McDowell. In the 2010s, he was just a writer in L.A., getting increasingly annoyed by his loud upstairs neighbors.

Instead of just leaving a note, he started tweeting about it from a new account, Dear Girls Above Me, and it blew up. Time magazine ranked at one of the top 140 Twitter accounts of 2012. That led to a book deal, and that success helped launch his career as a film director. A real Twitter-to-Hollywood Cinderella story, right? Well, not exactly, because what you didn't see on Twitter was how deeply connected Charlie already was to Hollywood. So watching on the outside, it probably was.

felt like anybody could have made it big online. It definitely helps if your stepdad is Ted Danson. Naturally, Ashley, who is also a comedian, has thoughts about that. There was still like a nepo baby of it all. There was still some shit where I'm like some people were heavily connected. Like Charlie McDowell of dear girls above me. Like Ashley's like low key, you know those people that you're like, I talk about this person way more than a lot of people talk about this person.

Like he doesn't come up a lot, but compared to how often other people are bringing him up, This is Ashley's truly her Roman empire. This is my Roman empire because I think at the time, I remember people finding it as like an organic account. I remember this account and like being told about how funny this random guy who lives underneath these two girls is. And now you read it and you're like, oh my God, this is so sexist. And also he is like his parents are actors,

but like they're both successful and you would recognize them from things. And now he's married to Lily Collins. And you're like, oh my God, his Twitter didn't become a book because he's funny. Dude, we were living in such a liberal ideal. I like, it was just thinking about, do you know what I mean? I feel like I'm thinking about like race relations and Clirty Rock and the way that it was so, there was such an idea of like, well, we, we beat it. We beat racism in this country. And then also with the beauty scene or something about Beyonce's, I woke up like this.

I remember there was like this feminist photo shoot at my college where you could show up with makeup if you, like, however you feel best. And that would be your I woke up like this. It was pre-body positivity, but at a time where the most beautiful, skinniest woman you've ever seen would kind of tossle her hair and be like, I don't even care. And we took that. We were just like, yeah, she's so quirky. She wears sweatpants. It reminds me of what you say about the Kelly Oxford book that, like, the funniest thing

a woman could be is, like, obsessed with sandwiches and bacon, but also thin. Yes. It was this idea of, like, we were opening the confines of what it meant. to be a woman and be funny. But with that, but you still better play the part. Do you know what I mean? And Jennifer Lawrence, the belching.

Oh, God. Jennifer Lawrence, I mean, I would, she hasn't written a memoir, but I would love for you all to do a deep dive under her because, I mean, it was like, we have a word for it now,

pick me, but I do think that you had to be in this, walk this very specific line as like a funny, quirky woman in the public eye. I would argue that this entire era came crashing down. when Jennifer Lawrence fell for the second time.

I think everyone, that moment, the moment she hit the ground again, everyone said, this is enough. Well, can I actually say something that I think is very, with the picnic era that I think is true is because I feel like there was this like liberal idealism of like we're all equal and Hillary Clinton, right? Like she's something. She's something to write home about. But I think there was this idea that women could be more honest and real.

But when you think about who was. picking, it was still the mainstream media. And so Twitter gave us this illusion of getting to know people in a more sincere, honest way. But at the end of the day, you had to be on the Stephen Colbert show. Like, you had to be picked by the man that owns NBC. Whereas today, I do think there is, there are fewer gatekeepers in terms of like you can create an online community. Obviously, it's a long way to go. But I do think right now there are non-mainstream ways to like make a living. I'd say me and Ashley do one of them with like Patreon and stuff. And I think, with direct support from followers and stuff

that does allow you to carve out a piece of the internet, whereas back then the internet was a tool to launch into the very traditional forms of media. Yeah. And I almost wonder if some of the books that you talk about kind of reveal the fallacy of what, you know, not everybody who can make a funny quip on Twitter in 140 characters should be expanding upon that

and I would 140 page memoir. And when you read some of these memoirs, they just seem so dated and they just don't feel substantive. And I wonder if that reveals the fallacy of like, oh, if you are funny on Twitter, that needs to be connected to a kind of mainstream success, which is publishing a comedy memoir. Well, I think what happens is when you're funny for Twitter, you learn to write a very certain style. It's like you're being funny for King of Queens. You know what I mean?

And then what happens is everybody's fitting into this one mold of how to be funny in these quippy little ways. And they don't realize how dated it is. It's funny to think of a personality type or a comedy style as like very dated. But you read it back now and it's so millennial cringe. And they're all writing like that. They're all like, I don't want to wait for in line for cops. Like, lotis. La.

I don't know. And like another thing that I think is so interesting what you were just saying about the way that like it's still being chosen by the president of NBC is that a lot of the people who came out of this era are still very attractive. mostly white people. Even the ones that are strictly writers, Kelly Oxford never really like made a play for being in front of the camera, but she is still a very attractive white woman. The girl that I know was like a very cute white woman.

Like most of these people were still just very exactly what was already getting picked, but like maybe sometimes a girl this time. Like Anna Kendrick blowing up on Twitter, you're like, yeah, I don't know, she's Anna K, she's already a famous actress. Fucking Charlie McDowell. Has she said on this podcast, who Charlie McDowell's parents are, the mom is Mary Steenberg, who is, she's the woman in all the Will Ferrell movies.

You know, the hot mom? Yes. Oh, my God. And then the dad is Malcolm McDowell. Okay. So, too, like, wasn't just, didn't just fall into, you know, writing a book and publishing a book because they were good on Twitter. It would be helpful to know how deeply. connected this person is and how that was connected to their rise. Yeah. And then by the way,

Mary Steenberg right now is married to Ted Danson and they have been for like 30 years. Ashley, what is it about this person that you, that like, you can't, you can't sort of can't get over. Like, why are you, how did their hoax get in you? I feel like, okay, so my mom was on Twitter a lot and I feel like Kelly Oxford and Charlie McDowell were two of her favorite Twitter accounts. And she, like, this was when I was living in L.A. and like starting comedy. And so I knew some people in the Twitter, like some people who were big on Twitter and you'd meet them and be like, holy shit, that person's like Twitter famous. And I never met him, but I remember being so specifically like, whatever he's doing is working and I have to figure that out. And then I like kind of forgot about

him. But he really like imprinted on me in like 2014. And then when we did the Lily Collins book a couple years ago and I like googled her and she's recently married to Charlie McDowell. I was like, why does that name ring a bell? And when I realized who it was and who his parents were, I feel like I went insane. So I also want to say his Twitter at the time was like dear girls upstairs, right? Was that what it was called? Dear girl above me. Dear girls above me and the promise of the Twitter account because there used to be all these real these Twitter accounts that had like one shtick. Shit my dad says. Shit my dad says things white people like coffee. MPR. That was like a book at Urban Outfitters

You could buy I mean that was the book But his was essentially just making fun Of these two fictional girls Who quote unquote lived above him That were obviously just like two white Pre-Instagram models Instagram models

And when you look back It was just like a mean-spirited thing Like making fun up It's very much like you're inventing someone online To be mad about Like he just made up these two girls And then called them stupid every day And it is like when you look back

Like fuck you Try being funny I feel like I remember it as such a cultural tubstone. And then when we remembered it via the Lily Collins memoir, and I went back and I looked at the archive of tweets, I was like, wait, these girls never existed. You barely even existed. You were just like the son of actors.

Like this is crazy that this was such an important, like, aspiration. And I guess watching it unfold, you know, that era on Twitter, it kind of gave the impression that anybody could amass 20,000 followers and luck into this kind of real career success for publishing a book. But then when you actually dig into it, it's like, well, probably not anybody. It probably did take more than, you know, the followers and the quips or whatever. Yeah. Yes, exactly.

There was like a real, I think Ashley was fun of him. This is before people actually found out who you really were. More after a quick break. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor Me with Robert Smygel and friends, me and hilarious guests from Jim Gaffigan to Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel,

help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. The worst singer in the group? The worst? Yeah. Me. Is there anything to the idea that because you're from Harvard, you only got in because your parents made a huge donation. To the group.

The yard birds, right? That's the name. The Harvard yard, but they're open. Do you have a name suggestion? We're open. Since you guys are middle aged, one erection. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Humor me.

I need some jokes to make me seem funny. Run a business and not thinking about podcasting, think again. More Americans listen to podcasting. then ads supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora. And as the number one podcaster, IHearts twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only IHeart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio. Think podcasting can help your business.

Think IHeart. Streaming, radio, and podcasting. Call 844-844-I-Hart to get started. That's 844-8-4-I-Hart. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast Point Game is a about defying the odds.

Like LeBron heading into the playoffs without Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what. He's the smartest player to ever play the game. His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows. Without Luca and Austin Reeves, I got to manipulate the game.

We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid. He has to guard Julius Randall. then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis on offense. And when IT's friends stop by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too.

Steve Nass would get that thing. That man, hell get the flying. He run up the court, licking his fingers, why he got the ball. Like, after you go through a training camp with that, Isaiah, you figure it out real quick. Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. have opinions. You can have like a strong stance. And then there's your body having its own program. I'm Dr. Maya Shunker, a cognitive scientist and host of the podcast, a slight change of plans,

a show about who we are and who we become when life makes other plans. We share stories and scientific insights to help us all better navigate these periods of turbulence and transformation. There is one finding that is consistent, and that is that our resilience rests on our relationships. I wish that I hadn't resisted for so long the need to change. We have to be willing to live with a kind of uncertainty that none of us likes. Listen to a slight change of plans on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Let's get right back into it. I've listened to a lot of Celebrity Memoir Book Club, like almost every episode.

So I've heard Ashley and Claire break down hundreds of celebrity memoirs. And let's be real, some of them do not age well. There are books that read less like life stories and more like a string of casual racism dressed up as insight. The kind of stuff that screams of an era and not in a good way. So memoirs, especially of this era, what do you think separates the ones that just sound so, dated from the ones that like have staying power or like don't really seem as dated or that you can really connect with even reading them years later. I mean, I think it has to be like a sincere story you want to tell because I mean, human stories have been true since the dawn of time.

Like you read the Odyssey and you can connect to it because it's like there've only been so many human experiences and emotions and I can tap into that. Good example is like I you saw the picture of Dorian Gray on Broadway so I reread it. there was so much in it that I was like, oh my God, this is about like influencers. And so I think that then you take these books that came from like Twitter virality specifically, which in the time had a very specific like tone of snarkiness. Like Claire said, it was just like dripping in snark. And then you take this like pseudo vulnerability that's actually just snarkiness and turn that

into a book, like there is nothing that's going to stick. I also think it really has to do with how vulnerable you'll be because that Twitter virality from 2014 specifically was very much lighthearted punching down. I wouldn't say anybody was being out and out cruel, but there is this as like these girls above me are dumb. Chrissy Teagan's calling some poor teen mama slut. Like there is a lot of punching down happening where you got to just be like, what? I'm just saying it.

And something that happens is top, like that kind of humor gets dated because who is. society is allowed to be the butt of a joke changes. And I think a good example is Tina Faye. When you look back at like how she deals with like racial jokes in 30 Rock, the joke she makes like with Tracy Morgan versus Jenna Maroney being like, what's harder, black man, white woman, those are done, I feel like with an awareness. Whereas Asian people are like just straight up a punchline. Like whether or not you find her jokes funny, like you could be like, oh, but like there's

clearly, shoot, the joke is racism. whereas, like, the Asian jokes are racist. You know what I mean? Here's Tina Faye on Jimmy Fallon's late night show back in 2014. Little one, two and a half, didn't talk for a long time. And now finally is talking a lot and big long sentences. Cute. So cute and great.

And she has a very specific way of talking. I realize she kind of sounds like a prostitute in like a Vietnam movie. She was like, no, you know, give me cookie. I'm going with you. Then 10 years later, it turns like, you're not allowed to be racist to Asian people openly anymore. And her book looks insane. Yeah. In Kelly Oxford's memoir, she describes seeing someone on the street and specifically notes that person is Chinese.

And it's clearly sort of meant to be the joke. Because as you say in the episode about the book, this is when the funniest thing a person could be was an ethnicity. It really is. Yeah. Just naming races is like a really funny thing to do. And it's just dating. And I think so and that's all because those stories aren't really vulnerable honest stories. They're like naming races.

Yeah. You're trying to be funny. And being vulnerable lasts forever and being funny. It's crazy how quickly that becomes outdated. Especially edgy humor. You know, the only thing that's still funny is falling down. Jennifer Lawrence was actually exactly right. She was right to fall down.

She was wrong to fart on that sacred rock. Well, as we moved away from like the 2010s Twitter millennial culture, how do you see that impacting the next generation or the current generation of celebrity memoirs that are going to be coming out? It'll be interesting because I think things already move so much faster that I wonder how much of this is like being turned into a book before it's time. Like I wonder what's going, you know what I mean? because like Twitter was writing and writing to a book deal feels like a trajectory where it's like TikTok to a book. I think some people are doing it. But like even there,

they know there needs to be a very specific angle that isn't necessarily like. Because even TikTok, we've seen the exact same, what do you call it? Like life cycle of Twitter where like first people are just doing these like snarky little characters and then people actually like within months, they'll be like that TikTok trend from a couple months ago was actually really fucked up. You know what I mean? And so there's a lot more, it's like faster turnaround with what is like the tone. I was going to say, I think right now

there's a, anybody who has any followers online can get mired in scandal or can get canceled can get like, you know what I mean? Like there's so many more people in the public eye because the public eye is all of us now. Like there's no more gatekeeping of the tabloids. It's like anyone that you follow you're interested in. And I think a lot more people will want to set the record straight. a lot more people feel like they have a lot more things to go back and be like, by the way, you were all dead wrong about me.

Because like now it's just 35 people commenting something. But you're like, I have to set the record straight on this. And so I think a lot more people are going to feel compelled to be like, I have to tell you what was really going on once the dust settles. Yeah. But I think it's going to be a lot more about like explaining after the dust settles and less about turning the current stick into a book. And I think that'll be interesting.

So I have a couple of rapid fire questions for you. first of all, worst celebrity memoir that you've ever read. I mean, in what way? Like the most boring, the most delusional, the most fucked up? I would say the one that most did not need to be a book. The most like, why did you write this?

Well, you know, it's funny. I would say we were talking about like the new kind of memoir, which is no longer the Twitter funny memoir, but the Let Me Explain Myself memoir was Hilaria Baldwin's we just read. And it is like eight chapters directly speaking to the Daily Mail and you're like, I don't even know what you're talking about,

she's like explaining herself up against situations that don't even make sense. And you're like, none of the thing is explained. There's no overarching narrative. There's no like, I was born here and then this is how I got to where I'm at now. It's still like, and here's something someone said about me. And here's why it can't possibly be true.

But like, not even here's something someone said about me. She'll like, she'll, like, because people say, like, she was faking her accent, instead of saying people said I was faking my accent and that's not true, she'll go, And do you know something about accents and like that's how it starts? And you're like, wait, what? Okay, it's so funny that you mentioned this because she's sort of my Roman Empire.

I don't think I've ever told this in public before, but everybody who knows me has heard this in real life. This is an exclusive. So I have met her. I met her before the fallout. I was working, I don't want to give too many details, but I was working on behind the scenes on a podcast and she was one of the guests. I, this was one of those jobs I had that felt very tenuous. So I was like, I need to show up on my A game every single day. So the host, understandably, was really particular about pronunciations of names.

So when we had a guest, I would listen to audio of the person saying their own name, write it out phonetically to give to the host so that she felt confident in saying this name. Okay, we kind of need to hire you. Well, I mean, this is the time where I was like putting way too much, like, really over preparing for like, it's just a celebrity podcast. Like, you really probably didn't need to take it that far. So I listened to footage of her saying her own name. Granted, this footage was from several years earlier,

kind of before she blew up and got super famous. But the way that my name is pronounced today is the way my name is going to be pronounced in 10 years, so I figured this is fine. She said her name, Hilaria, clearly an offshoot of the name Hillary. That is how she says it. When I give this information to the host, the host is like, Hilaria Baldwin, welcome.

And she says, no, it's Elaria. Elaria. And the host is like, she's cool. about it. But then after the fact, she's like, you know, I felt like an asshole that I mispronounced her, a person of color's name kind of wasn't great. And I was like, oh, shit. So I kind of took a little bit of a reaming out at my job because of this. Then cut to when the whole thing unfolds. And I was just thinking, this woman really lied. She lied to me. And she lied in a way that jeopardized my job. She's European. She's not, she's lying about being European.

Our French people She's no better than a French person That's like the one The defense I always have of her fake accent Is that I'm like I don't know white people do British accents all the time Spain is also like a colonial empire So like they're not like I don't know I feel like it's racist the way of white people are always like

Like you just there are people of I'm like it's not that same thing Um however for her to get you in trouble is psychotic for her to like in the way she insists upon it I'm like I mean it's just not true like you're heard her say hilarious video footage of her saying hilarious you're going to change your name based on the vibes that's no you don't you don't get to just like you need to just go with whatever people are saying if you've made it up if you've made it up yourself that day is there a celebrity memoir that surprised you the most like you thought it was going to be one kind of read and it turned out to be mother. Minka Kelly is always, I feel like one of our go-toes with that where we're always just like, I don't know, Laila Garrity from Friday Night Lights, what the fuck is she talking about? And then you're like, oh, the most heartfelt story about like self-discovery. Amazing. Yeah, I would say for me, it's Tori Spelling, because I never really gave Tori Spelling much thought, but then hearing you all really dive into the minutia of how she shows up in the world is fascinating. And now I'm like, she's actually a very fascinating person. She needs to be.

studied in a lab. She does. It really does go to show money is and everything because what if your dad was Aaron's spelling and you came out? Like, it's weird to watch someone and be like, how do you have a worse life than me? Yeah. How could that much cashmere be bad for you?

That's a good way to put it. Here's our two memoirs that we would like if they let in case Katie Holmes and Nicholas Cage are listeners of yours. We should, I mean, if they are, please reach out. We'd love to have you on the show. No pressure, but we'd like you guys to write memoirs. That's our dream memoir. Ooh, Katie Holmes would be so good.

Do you know, is she still in a relationship with Jamie Fox? No, I think they broke up. Yeah. That was before Emilio Bellato, right? I think so. She was making out with that restaurateur a couple years ago. My friend is actually, can I say something? Please.

My friend is about to start working on a film that she's like, she wrote, directed, and is starring in. So I guess that little Surrey cruises off to college and Katie's making her comeback. Yes. Maybe she'll use this as the time to write a book. Yeah. And then you all can talk about it. Maybe she'll be a guest on your show. Who knows?

Yeah, maybe. Maybe she'll tell us how to fucking tailor a cardigan because she knows it and I don't. There's an example of a woman with a lot of cashmere who's happy. So I guess I can go either way. Where can folks listen to the podcast? Check out the show you all we're doing, follow you, all that good stuff. We are on YouTube, Celebrity Memoir Book Club, Spotify, Apple Podcast. Amazon.

Well, memoir practice. No, it's true. It's true. We are on YouTube. I just love that. We've never been YouTube forward before, and I love this new change. I'm changing. I'm evolving. I'm trying to expand the brand. I feel like YouTube is really where you've got to be these days. Oh, that's what they keep telling us. Same. This has been such a delight. Like, you have no idea. This is like made my month.

My partner came down and was like, you're going to talk to your favorite podcasters. Are you excited? And I was like, yes, I'm very excited, but very nervous. So thank you for doing this. I really, really appreciate it. And thank you for making the show. It just, like, has given me so much, so many hours of delight. It got me through the pandemic.

Truly, like, one of my favorite podcasts around. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Thank you for having us. This was so fun. Yeah, this was so fun. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech or just want to say hi? You can reach us at hello at tangoati.com.

You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangoody.com. There are no girls on the internet was created by me, Bridget Todd. It's a production of IHeart Radio and unbossed creative. Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer. Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If you want to help us grow, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts.

For more podcasts from IHeartRadio, check out the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite, unhumor me with Robert Smyl and friends. me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an acapella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, it's Edwin Castro, also known as Castro 1021. And I'm conky. friend and business manager. And we've got a new show called The 1021 Podcast. I'm taking you behind the scenes on how I became one of Twitch's most popular streamers. We also love sports. And with the World Cup right around the corner, we'll be breaking down the biggest storylines ahead of the big tournament here in the USA.

Listen to the 1021 podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi everyone, I'm Cheryl Stray, author of Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things. I'm excited to share that I have a new podcast called Mind Over Mountain. In each episode, I interview athletes, adventurers, and adrenaline seekers to discuss the inner landscapes that informed and inspired their extraordinary feats. So we too can better understand how to face our own seemingly insurmountable challenges. Listen to Mind Over Mountain every Thursday on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

American soccer is about to explode. The World Cup is coming. Ramos sending on to Ernie Stewart the chip. I'm Tab Ramos. I'm Tom Boeh. On our podcast, Inside American Soccer, you'll get the real storylines, the biggest decisions,

and the truth about the U.S. national team. It wouldn't be a huge surprise if our team ends up in the quarterfinals or potentially a great run into the semifinals. Listen, Inside American Soccer with Tom Bogan, Sabramos on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcast. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.