Eiza Gonzalez
Eiza González (Ash, Baby Driver, 3 Body Problem) is an actor and singer. Eiza joins the Armchair Expert to discuss whether there is human DNA in hotdogs, how she wanted braces because all the cool girls had them, and being a patriotic Mexican. Eiza and Dax talk about her father’s priority always being for her to learn as many languages as possible, why her dad passing away suddenly influenced her to pursue acting full time, and experiencing insecurity when she started working in America. Eiza explains why she rides so hard for those who first gave her a shot, seeing her new “Substance-in-space” horror film Ash in theaters, and how she learned the lesson that really horrific things can give way to the most beautiful, life-changing opportunities.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1 Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert. I'm Dan Shepard and I'm joined by Lily Padman.
Speaker 2 Hi there.
Speaker 1 Today we have Aza Gonzalez-on.
Speaker 2 Yes.
Speaker 1 Aza is an actor.
Speaker 1 She is a singer.
Speaker 1 Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, Baby Driver, Three Body Problem, Ambulance, Bloodshot, and a new movie out that I quite enjoyed. Yeah.
Speaker 1 Very moon-like, as I say in the episode, if anyone remembers that great Sam Rockwell movie
Speaker 2 called Ash. Yeah.
Speaker 1 Yes, Ash.
Speaker 2 Yeah, I just saw something about Ash on maybe Instagram. Some friends had seen it and they were raving about it.
Speaker 1 They were raving, yeah. It's an intense, it's got that, as I think I said in the episode, it's got that kind of substance-y tension.
Speaker 2 Ooh, we love it.
Speaker 1 Oh, it was really good. Really good.
Speaker 1 Please enjoy Aza Gonzalez.
Speaker 1
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Speaker 2 She has bad news.
Speaker 1 amazing. I love bad news.
Speaker 3 I have amazing, life-changing information for you.
Speaker 1
Because of your hot dogs, this is what started it. Okay.
I'm nervous.
Speaker 1 Don't tell me anything negative about hot dogs.
Speaker 3 I fear it. It will be happening.
Speaker 3 Are you traumatized by this? And this was the day that I stopped eating hot dogs.
Speaker 2 This is a good example of how you, if you care about something, you can twist it. Because we'll tell him the fact and then I'll tell you how I twisted it.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 3 Because we were talking about your pictures and your paintings.
Speaker 2 Celebs on sandwiches.
Speaker 3 I said, wow, who would pick a hot dog as their favorite sandwich? Is that a sandwich?
Speaker 2 That's the big question.
Speaker 3 I used to be obsessed with hot dogs. What were your favorites before we were met? I'm not American, so I would just settle for a regular whatever.
Speaker 3 Yeah, I mean, I wish we even had that.
Speaker 1
Would you have a street dog? Because I like the street dog in the middle of the day. I'll have a Mexican.
I'll have anything from the street.
Speaker 3
Street food is like everything for me. So anyway, I was obsessed with hot dogs and I eat them all the time until my brother.
I have a brother who's 12 years older than me and likes to ruin my life.
Speaker 3 He was like, do you know it's proven that every single piece of hot dog has human DNA in it? Like there's human flesh.
Speaker 2 And then she just looked it up.
Speaker 1 On what website? Willows.com.org.
Speaker 3 It's called Hey Siri and Siri is AI.
Speaker 3 Hey Siri, is there human DNA in hot dogs?
Speaker 2 In other words, yes, your hot dogs are going to have a little human DNA on them. This answer is from menshealth.com.
Speaker 1 Oh, well, I don't know about men's health.
Speaker 2 Also, she started in the middle. She said, in other words, what's before that?
Speaker 3 Yeah, what is before that?
Speaker 1 Yeah, why did she edit her own?
Speaker 1 Why would it have to be a drink? She started to explain.
Speaker 2 Oh, my God. She's a bad person.
Speaker 1 Jesus, in summary.
Speaker 3 I think I did have a deep dive when I figured this whole thing out, and it's a scary percentage. Definitely like a 5% of human flesh, which is pretty high.
Speaker 1
Hold on, though, hold on. For a hot dog.
It's all pretty high. We are playing it a little fast and loose with DNA and now human flesh.
Speaker 3 But I'm saying that it started with flesh, and then I kind of unraveled it.
Speaker 1
But if guys operate in the grinding machine, machine, one of their hair strands falls in. That's human DNA.
They grind it good.
Speaker 1
I'm going to claim more of a Jonathan Haidt version, which is like, this is moral dumbfounding. We eat animals.
We draw very arbitrary distinctions between which ones we eat and which ones we don't.
Speaker 1
Culturally, some more than others. So, I mean, I don't know.
Is someone going to get killed so I can eat them? Big ethical issue.
Speaker 3 I guess it is all a mental state.
Speaker 1 For you, though, the notion of having some human...
Speaker 3 It was a done deal for me. Look up.
Speaker 1
It's not really my kink. It's not mine either.
Again, I don't desire to eat a human. It's whether or not I can handle it.
Yes. On the surface, look at Rob, cute wobbly wob.
Speaker 1 And then look at a pig sitting in its shit.
Speaker 3
No disrespect. I'd be more sad to eat a pig than eat him.
I'd be more sad.
Speaker 1 Sad, because you know he's not a good boy. I mean, he looks, I don't know him, but he looks like
Speaker 3 if I had to compare to a little pig who's sitting there just like,
Speaker 1 I guess I'm just saying hygienically, get Rob out of the shower and then the pig's sitting in its shit and it eats shit. And you go, like, well, what would be smarter to eat? You're not wrong.
Speaker 1
You're an alien and you're evaluating what of these animals am I going to eat. One's wallowing in its shit and another guy just hopped out of the shower.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 Yeah, but humans are so gross.
Speaker 1 You think grosser than a pig?
Speaker 2 In our hidden environments, we're disgusting.
Speaker 3
It's true. It's really hard to say.
I do think that sometimes animals can be cleaner than humans. They lick their own booty holes.
Speaker 1 And you think that's clean? That's so clean.
Speaker 3 You ain't cleaning your booty hole as much as the hell I'm not. A cat.
Speaker 1
Isa, 80% of my shower is focused on my anus. Trust me.
And I have a bronze where I spray water after every, and then I left out that I also clean when I do that.
Speaker 3 But are you like a full hand cleaner?
Speaker 1
I'm neurotic. You go like in.
Are we talking wiping or cleansing with water?
Speaker 3 No, well, like in shower. Are you like a full hand cleaner or you're just like a toss of water into it?
Speaker 1
No, you gotta get in there. Listen, there's multiple steps.
So first is I lather a ton of soap and do a full scrub. Then I rinse because I don't want anything gross touching the soap.
Speaker 1
And then I go in hard with the bar of soap. Wait.
And I
Speaker 1 really rub the bar of soap
Speaker 1 on my anus, not in it.
Speaker 2 Wait, first you don't want the soap touching it and then you use the soap directly.
Speaker 1
I use soapy hands to get the first round of whatever off. Then I rinse everything.
So now it's pretty clean. And now I go in with the direct bar of soap.
Speaker 3 Direct bar of soap? Yeah.
Speaker 1
That feels. kind of erotic.
No, I don't know about that.
Speaker 2 Two humans being disgusted.
Speaker 3 Yeah, that feels. Is this a morning shower? That feels aggressive in the morning, just a whole bar.
Speaker 1 You guys are very judgmental of this. I'm wondering, how are you cleaning your butts? I hope not splashing water.
Speaker 2 I'm up in there, too.
Speaker 3
I'm up in there, but I'm not a bar girl. I'm like a liquid soap.
I'm kind of crazy about that.
Speaker 2 I have a bar soap.
Speaker 1 And are you putting it directly on your?
Speaker 2 I normally use hands, also a lather.
Speaker 2 But I do get in there. I am sure that I am in the bag.
Speaker 3
But I think if for girls, that's more normal. When we were little, my mom with her hand, very Mexican of her, would be like in my butt like that.
With girls, it's a bit more normal.
Speaker 3
I feel like guys, by the way, I have showered with men at one point in my life. Right.
And I've seen an array of different routines.
Speaker 1
Do we jump right to Dumel? Because, you know, I'm friends with Dumel. Oh, God.
Did you date Dumel? Did I see this?
Speaker 3 Yes, we dated. Okay.
Speaker 1
I'm so envious of him. What? In this way.
He seems effortlessly masculine. He can't not be masculine.
He just seems to have these huge haunches. I'm like, how much are you working out?
Speaker 1 He's like, I don't know, occasionally. And I'm like, you have that frame, but I could see him in the shower just like walking through and being on his way.
Speaker 2 Hold on. I want to give you, because I was hard on you and I actually want to commend you now because.
Speaker 2 I do appreciate that you as a guy really care about it being clean because I do think a lot of guys don't. And then they just have skid marks and they think, who gives a fuck?
Speaker 2 But really, you should care.
Speaker 1 Yeah, you really should.
Speaker 1 I know
Speaker 3 totally care
Speaker 3 and you should do two rounds and you should use the soap this is across the board not women or men so my mom's an orthodontist former model too right former model yeah so did she learn orthodontia later so it was the other way around so my mom won out of eight brothers and sisters from like a very small town and she was the only one that got out she got a full scholarship in mexico city when she was 18 and then crazy lady she might kill me for saying this but she got pregnant the first time she ever had sex with my brother.
Speaker 3 So she's super young. She was studying to be an orthodontist, and then she had to work because she had to support my brother.
Speaker 1 Because that dad did not stick around.
Speaker 3 No, no, he's not around.
Speaker 3 And so she started modeling simultaneously because a friend of hers was like, I have some extra jobs and then so much more money as a model.
Speaker 3
She had a master's degree and she was an orthodontist for like three months. And then she was like, well, the model life is paying me more.
So she did it for a very long time.
Speaker 1 Did you do your braces?
Speaker 3 See, I never had
Speaker 3 braces. I hate to be that.
Speaker 2 They're literally perfect. They look like veneer.
Speaker 3 That's very sweet. Thank you.
Speaker 1 I'm like, really, when I get in there now, they're incredible.
Speaker 2 They're so white.
Speaker 3 So when I was little, all the cool girls had braces
Speaker 3 in my school. Did that happen here too?
Speaker 2 Retainers. People would go and get a retainers.
Speaker 1
All the cool girls had braces. Cool girls.
Yeah. Yes.
Speaker 2 In middle school, it was a thing.
Speaker 3
All the cool girls had braces and they would change. I remember the band Halloween.
They had, and I was obsessed with it. And I really wanted it.
Speaker 3 And I would torment my dentist, who was not my mother, but they studied together and he was like you don't need them and I begged forever and now I'm like wow I really was clueless about what I was begging for.
Speaker 1 Do you want to cast too?
Speaker 3
I had that from scratch. I've been in the hospital in and out probably past 40 times in my life.
Really? Yeah, I was a very accident prone kid from age negative zero.
Speaker 1 Because you are a risk taker or you're clumsy by nature?
Speaker 3 I think it's a combination of both.
Speaker 1 That's a bad combo if you're a risk taker and you have bad balance.
Speaker 3 I mean, it was an ongoing joke constantly that I'd be standing and fall. My mom was like, you're just standing there.
Speaker 1 Like, how did you feel?
Speaker 2 It's like you're on roller skates, but you're not.
Speaker 3
All the time. I've been very lucky because I've had impact to the face.
You name it, broken nose in six pieces.
Speaker 3 Wow.
Speaker 2 And it still looks like that.
Speaker 1
I fixed it later. Okay.
It was a mess. This is not fair.
Speaker 3
Because I broke it at 11. I went straight into a.
You remember we had coolers outside instead of ACs? And I ran straight into a tube at night playing hide and seek.
Speaker 3
Five pieces concussion. Broke it completely.
Like, I have a Harry Potter scar on my forehead. I love you.
Speaker 1 One-year-old.
Speaker 3 This is a table. This is jumping in the shower.
Speaker 2 Oh, my God.
Speaker 1 If I was your mom
Speaker 2 would be like, I'm putting you in a bubble.
Speaker 3 But to the point of the dentistry of it all,
Speaker 3 if you brush your teeth, you need to brush your tongue.
Speaker 2 Oh, yeah.
Speaker 3 This is the one thing I constantly see that kills me. I'm like, I cannot kiss you now if I've seen that you don't scrape your tongue.
Speaker 1 You don't get a scraper.
Speaker 2 You don't have tongue scrapers.
Speaker 1 You don't have to go to the nuclear option.
Speaker 3 And especially if you're shoving that piece of that part of your face into somebody else into my mouth.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 3 That's the least as a respect to you.
Speaker 1 I agree. I'm going to promote one of my own products right now to you, a movie called Hit and Run.
Speaker 1 Because I directed it, I got to do the thing I always wanted to do, which is in movies, no one ever brushes their tongue. And I brush my tongue specifically to like gag.
Speaker 1
That's when I know I've gotten. Yes, because you're also taking care of your health.
Brain health. Yeah, everything.
So in the movie, I'm brushing my tongue and I gag and...
Speaker 1 almost throw up and there's toothpaste everywhere and that's in the film and i felt like i have the first really authentic teeth brush.
Speaker 3
It's important. You know, the one movie also that I remember very clear in my head when I was young.
And I was like, oh, wow, this is realistic. Bring it on.
Oh, loved.
Speaker 3
The brother and the girl are in the bathroom. And they're brushing their teeth.
And she stays over at...
Speaker 2 Gabrielle Unions?
Speaker 3 No, that's the bad girls, the main girls.
Speaker 2 Kirsten Dunce.
Speaker 3
Yeah, it's Kirsten Dunce. And then they're brushing their teeth with Kirsten Dunce's brother.
And they're going in.
Speaker 3 It's a whole scene of them sort of flirting, brushing their teeth, and she's going into the tongue.
Speaker 1 And they kept it in. I guess it's not novel.
Speaker 1 You did it too.
Speaker 1 She didn't gag though, did she?
Speaker 3 I don't think she did.
Speaker 1 She didn't do it. I don't know.
Speaker 2 We'll have to go back and watch for the fact check.
Speaker 3 Important, cleansing your tongue.
Speaker 1 So your mother has your brother who's 12 years older than you, and she's an orthodontist turned model. When does she meet your dad?
Speaker 3 I think they meet when my brother's around eight.
Speaker 1 And what did your dad do?
Speaker 3 My dad was a graphic designer.
Speaker 1
Was he from Mexico City? Yeah. I got a side note.
We went for the first time over Christmas, and I cannot believe how much I loved it. It's incredible, right? This fucking city.
Speaker 3 I love to see what's happened with Mexico City because when I moved to the U.S.
Speaker 3 10 years ago, you're saying that everything for us is 10 years ago, even though we've been here for like probably six decades.
Speaker 3 When I moved here, every time I said I was from Mexico, they were like, How's Mexico? Like, I feel like a lot of people were sort of on the fence of going.
Speaker 3 And in the past seven to eight years, it's changed so drastically.
Speaker 3
Every time I say I'm from Mexico, someone says, My God, I love Mexico City. Oh my God, I love San Miguel Allende.
Oh my God, I love Merida.
Speaker 3 The amount of people that have embraced Mexico, everything progresses. And I think that cities get better.
Speaker 3 And I definitely feel like Mexico City, especially after COVID, got much better because so many people traveled to Mexico because it was open in the middle.
Speaker 3
I'm glad that you had an amazing time. I mean, hey, I'm a patriotic Mexican.
Is that a thing? Can you be a patriotic Mexican?
Speaker 1
Yeah, I'm from anywhere. Okay, so you seem on the surface because you went to a couple private schools.
One of them is like an American school. It was pretty privileged.
Speaker 3 I did have, in the sense, a privileged education, but with parents that worked really hard. My school was very expensive.
Speaker 3
It was one of the best when it came to education, but my family wasn't wealthy in comparison to everyone else. You know, Carlos Slim's kids were there.
We didn't have that type of money.
Speaker 3 My mom, you know, was truly the breadwinner of the house. My dad was incredibly talented, but not very successful at businesses.
Speaker 3 And so he was an incredible father figure to me because he spent a lot of physical time with me. And his priority number one for me was education because he didn't get that.
Speaker 3 And so he really wanted me to be like a lawyer or a doctor.
Speaker 1 I hope you've played a lawyer or a doctor. I have.
Speaker 3 I played a scientist and an AMT. So it was helpful.
Speaker 1
So you did it for him. It did.
What was the American school?
Speaker 3 It's interesting. So I went half my life to an American school.
Speaker 1 Does that just mean like international?
Speaker 1 Yes.
Speaker 3 People that flew from America, all their kids were there. Or people that worked for the embassies and stuff like that.
Speaker 3 And then my other half of my education i went to a british school american meant it was full english all day long no spanish so i had geography math chemistry everything in english so i was fully fluent in english since i was a baby i don't even remember learning another language and your parents put in that effort because they just wanted the whole world to be open to you did they specifically see you going to the u.s that was never thought my dad had a fixation with languages so he really was was hyper-focused on me speaking multiple languages.
Speaker 3
And I do. I was his only daughter and his only kid.
My dad really didn't want any artistic sort of influence in my life in the sense of like music.
Speaker 3
And my mom was a naughty one who would take me to dance or singing. And he was like, stop distracting her from 17 different languages.
Oh, wow.
Speaker 1 You went to Italy at 10 for a minute to learn Italian?
Speaker 3
Yeah. So my family lives in Italy.
Your extended family. From my mom's side.
I went to Trento to learn Italian when I was little.
Speaker 1 Have you done a 23andMe?
Speaker 3 I actually have it because I'm paranoid of human DNA, as you can tell.
Speaker 1 Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You don't even want to know about your own human DNA.
Speaker 3 But I should, because I do know that I have a little bit of everything.
Speaker 1 Yeah, what do you think you have? Because, mind you, what I thought I had didn't prove out in the data. Have you done it?
Speaker 2 Yeah, we had to do it, and I'm 100% Indian. Pure.
Speaker 3 That is incredible.
Speaker 2 I'm so pure.
Speaker 3 By the way, that's so funny to me because when I moved to the U.S., when I would ask people, Where are you from? They'd be like, Yeah, yeah, I'm American, Italian, Spanish, with a quarter Cherokee.
Speaker 1 I was like, oh my God, yeah.
Speaker 3 That is, with all due respect, such an American thing.
Speaker 1 Yeah, tell us. You guys don't do that in Mexico.
Speaker 3 I'd be like, I'm from Defe.
Speaker 1 You'd be like, I'm from Rome.
Speaker 3 Like, I've never in my life thought of this.
Speaker 1 So I would be so wrong. I would have thought it would have been even perhaps more
Speaker 1
fetishized there because you have this mestizo population and then this European influence. And there has been some kind of status hierarchy a little bit derived from that.
No?
Speaker 3
Yes and no. We're all sort of in agreement that we all know that there were some sort of mix.
It's settled. We got conquered.
The conquistadors came in, took us.
Speaker 3
We had some Jewish communities coming in from this side, some German on that side. In the best way possible, it's a new country type of mentality.
America is the land of immigrants, right?
Speaker 3
It's the concept of it. So everyone's identify by where they came.
I don't want to talk about other countries specifically, but I feel for Mexico, we were just all like, yo, we're Mexican.
Speaker 3
We didn't really care if we're like more Aztec, more Mayan. Exactly.
We're just proud to be Mexican.
Speaker 2 Yeah, it's the search for identity here that you're right is young country sort of thing, but also it's a college application thing. I think that's when most people start to really do the deep dive.
Speaker 2 So they're like, I'm 0.2% Native American, so I'm diverse enough to get us
Speaker 1 to college.
Speaker 3 What to me started happening when I became an actress in America because they're like, so are we legally able to contractually cast you because you're not Mexican enough?
Speaker 3 I did definitely have an identity crisis when I moved here. It did throw me off for a second because I had never really asked these questions myself.
Speaker 3 I was just always glaringly Mexican in my eyes and it was just fine. And so when I came here, people were like, but you're not a Mexican because you don't speak.
Speaker 1 Right. So if mom had family in Italy, had they moved from Mexico to Italy?
Speaker 3
Married into Italian. That makes sense.
But also my mom's blonde with blue eyes.
Speaker 1 So she might not be Aztec.
Speaker 3 But she is.
Speaker 1 Right.
Speaker 3 That's when like, to me, it's so funny when they're like, but your mom's blonde. I'm like, guys.
Speaker 2 Yeah, that's fine. What are you talking about?
Speaker 1 What are we talking about?
Speaker 3 There's colors in the world in different countries.
Speaker 1 Like, it's okay.
Speaker 3 I have an array of friends who are blonde and fully Mexican. Outside of the fun part of it, it definitely made me really anxious when I moved here because my value was really tied to that.
Speaker 3 And I understand now why I think it is a cultural thing. I don't know if the chicken or the egg of where it started in this place, but people feel a responsibility to justify or explain this descent.
Speaker 3 And I find that quite interesting, psychologically. Annoying? No, because I don't judge the effect of circumstances, but it made me insecure.
Speaker 1 You know what's interesting? This is a bizarre thing to say, but I kind of think it's good, but it does tread on this notion of people pretending they're colorblind, which is also bullshit. But
Speaker 1 I was watching Ash last night.
Speaker 3 You watched Ash?
Speaker 1
Yeah. Oh, my goodness.
Yeah, I loved it. We'll get to it.
Oh, my God. Exciting.
Speaker 3 I haven't talked to anyone that has watched it.
Speaker 1 Oh, yeah. This happens to me more and more frequently now when I'm watching movies.
Speaker 1 If I i hadn't done research on you i just wouldn't have considered your ethnicity in any capacity whatsoever and i wouldn't even guess i wouldn't know it was quite irrelevant also people are much more now mixed just as our population is much more mixed there's tons of people now that i see on camera and i think this is a good thing where it's like if you asked me later what they were i'd be like oh i don't know i have no clue i wasn't even thinking of it that's what it should be but that's exactly how i feel with artistry when i was in mexico I started in soap operas.
Speaker 3
We were all Mexican. When we were playing roles, it wasn't like, oh, this person needs to be from Germany.
If they need a German person, they would hire someone slightly Mexican, slightly white.
Speaker 3
So this sort of thought of where you're from and what you can play never existed in my head. And I worked since I was really young.
I started when I was 13, 14. When I moved here, I was 24.
Speaker 3 So when I got here, I'd be on the first few phone calls with my agents or the first few things that I read, especially when I came here, because it's a night and day since I've moved here.
Speaker 3
The industry has flipped completely. I'd be like, oh, this is so exciting.
And they're like, yeah, they're looking for more of like a Caucasian. By the way, I didn't even know the word Caucasian.
Speaker 3 I didn't even understand what that meant. That's when I come to being super self-conscious.
Speaker 1 What made me limited?
Speaker 3
Yes. My artistry now is limited based on.
the piece of land that I was born.
Speaker 3
And my first play was Greece. I played Rizzo and like the thought in my mind never passed through that I have to be American.
So when I started transitioning to the U.S.
Speaker 3 market, it was really challenging and it made me feel really insecure because I felt like my artistry was limited to playing Latin forever.
Speaker 3 At the time when I was playing Latin, it was really stereotypical. It really deflated my spirit because I went into it wanting to play an astronaut or a scientist.
Speaker 3 And the first few years of my career was really impossible. Even with the blessing that I had thanks to my parents, which was having very fluent English and speaking other languages.
Speaker 3 And I don't say it in an, oh, poor me. To me, it was life-changing the moment that Guy Ritchie let me play English.
Speaker 3 We could argue that there's a million people that could have played it better than me that were English.
Speaker 1 Maybe a hundred thousand. I don't know.
Speaker 1
Not that many. Yeah.
They were like, math ain't mashing here.
Speaker 3
And I grew up watching actors. And I guess in hindsight, white actors, actresses that could play everything.
I mean, I remember my mom and we're watching All the Godfathers.
Speaker 3
And then it sort of sent us to Scarface and we were watching. And I was like, the world that Al Pacino was playing, like Italian, but then Cuban.
And I never thought of it in any kind of way.
Speaker 1 Yeah, he's played Jewish, Italian, Cuban.
Speaker 3 And no one said anything.
Speaker 3 And then somehow I've been in places and roles that if I'm not specific type of Latina, then I'm not even being considered. It's a very complex nuanced conversation, right?
Speaker 3
Because you do want to create opportunity for Native Americans. They don't get enough representation.
And so I'm always sort of torn because I do want people.
Speaker 3 to get opportunities and get more chances, but I don't want Native Americans to just play Native Americans.
Speaker 2 I want them to play anyone it's just taking away the description in the role that this should be a 24 year old white woman maybe it could be anyone it has gotten a ton better it is definitely once that's gone then i think there'll be less of well this person's asian and they should be native like that will go away if the opportunity is there for everybody you got into acting, dancing, painting all at 12, 13 because your dad died in a motorcycle accident.
Speaker 1 Yes. I hate that for many, many reasons.
Speaker 3 I'm sorry. No, it's okay.
Speaker 1
And obviously you guys were very, very close, as you already said. Super close.
And mom wanted to just keep you busy and distracted. Yeah.
Was there space for what you were going through?
Speaker 3
I don't think there was. I just looked up to him with so much admiration.
I was daddy's little girl.
Speaker 1
Good luck, future suitor. Yeah, tell me about it, bro.
Here we are.
Speaker 3 But when you have such an amazing father, truly, I don't say that lightly. It was really, really the toughest moment in my life.
Speaker 3 I just went into complete shock and my mother was really, really suffering. I look back at it and it just feels like a not even real time in my life because it all happened so fast.
Speaker 3 My mom took me to extracurricular classes to distract me and I went into musical theater. And that's where it just clicked.
Speaker 3
I think about it all the time being a young child and I sat my mother down and I said, I need to have a very serious conversation. I was 12.
I was like, we're done. I don't have to continue studying.
Speaker 3 I'm an actress. She was like, what are you talking about? I'm like, I'm dropping out of school.
Speaker 1 You're retiring?
Speaker 3
I'm retiring from school. I'm dropping out and we're full on going into this.
And I don't know what type of crack cocaine was she on that she allowed me to do it because she saw me so happy.
Speaker 2 Well, maybe she also was like, life is short. What's the point?
Speaker 1 Probably.
Speaker 1 How did she take it? My guess is at 12, you would be dealing with your own loss, but then also trying to cheer mom up or regulate mom.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 3
I feel so much empathy for my younger self. Not only that, my career was so jarring because I got thrown into it overnight.
Yeah. And I was so young and I was so not mentally, physically prepared.
Speaker 3 I was a grieving, depressed,
Speaker 3
sobbing, eating compulsively child with raging anxiety. And that.
was really challenging because you sort of get thrown into this child star perfection.
Speaker 1 What What age did you get the first telenovela?
Speaker 3
14. And it was really overnight.
Floricienta? Yeah, it was called, the original was Floricienta, and my remake was called Lola Once Upon a Time, Lola Aracuna Ves.
Speaker 1 And it was a show from Argentina.
Speaker 3
Originally. We shot in Mexico, but it was the biggest show in literally history of children out there.
And so I got the remake, and it was a pretty big deal.
Speaker 3
It was like a national wide search, and they saw thousands of, and I got it. And I was just so naive.
My mom wasn't like a stage mom where she wanted me to be famous.
Speaker 3 And people think that because she was a model, but my mother never wanted me to be in the business.
Speaker 3
She just was letting me be, but she never made me self-conscious about my looks, never made me feel pressured. So I was like a very normal 14-year-old.
I was like a chubby, not polished girl.
Speaker 3
I was not doing my makeup. I was quite ratty.
And I was quite of a tomboy because I grew up with boys because my brother's 13 years older than me.
Speaker 3 The shock was really aggressive because overnight they were like, wow, she's so ugly.
Speaker 3 she's fat she's not talented my dad had been passed for like less than a year a year and a half i was so excited because i loved what i did it was so earnest i loved singing it was the only moment that i felt happy yeah can i ask really quick what was the work schedule of that brutal so studying in set school working 17 hours a day so they don't have the same laws no no no no you're shooting like 15 20 scenes a day because it's soap style right yeah it's a a machine.
Speaker 3
And then I would get on the plane right after I would finish on Friday straight to tour. So I would tour Friday, Saturday, Sunday, get back Monday.
It goes for years.
Speaker 1 So you started reading about yourself on the internet?
Speaker 3 Yeah, it was brutal. I went into a heavy depression.
Speaker 1
Because this would have been 2004, 2005. And so you could go online and what was...
MySpace. Oh, MySpace.
There we go.
Speaker 3
I remember it like it was yesterday. So they did this presentation.
They've been waiting to see who the girl was because it was like a really big show.
Speaker 1 It was like the American office. It was like, who's going to be in the American office?
Speaker 3 Exactly. It was the equivalent, I would say, like Hannah, Montana.
Speaker 1 Right, right.
Speaker 3
This major presentation where I like came out on a stage and they put me in these crazy dresses. I looked insane.
And I came out, I didn't really know what I was getting myself into.
Speaker 3 I was just happy to be there. And the next day, my mom was watching the morning news, and these 40-year-olds were sitting there ripping into me.
Speaker 2 God, it's so embarrassing.
Speaker 3 40-year-old men and women being like, wow, she's so ugly.
Speaker 1 She's fat.
Speaker 3 Wow, she's not even talented it was ruthless looking back at it because now we've become so aware of like you can't talk like this not in mexico you're talking about like real third world country type of shit and it was never-ending you never got the looks or the body they were hoping you to get or talent or smart if i'd said something i was the worst if i didn't respond i was conceited you're already so self-conscious as a teenage at 14.
Speaker 3
i went crazy i remember when I was 23 and I got a nose job. And then they were like, look at her.
Now I was insecure.
Speaker 2 Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3
And then I was uglier. And then now I had all this done to myself.
And then they would doctor photos and sell them to sell papers. And we didn't have law of defamation of character in Mexico.
Speaker 3
A president removed it. So you couldn't sue.
So you had to like let it go. You couldn't fight the magazines.
So it haunted me for. So my life was always sort of terrifying.
Speaker 3 I moved here, escaping that. I didn't even want to cross over to America.
Speaker 1 There was an event, too. It's a juicy event, mom.
Speaker 3 It is really funny.
Speaker 1 You were on Lola too. So you had another show later.
Speaker 3
I'm in a Mores Berdados, which is another soap opera. It's like the bodyguard.
I fall in love with the bodyguard. My mom falls in love simultaneously with the bodyguard.
Oh, my God.
Speaker 1 Oh, a love triangle between mother-daughter and a bodyguard.
Speaker 3 Two different bodyguards. Oh, thank God.
Speaker 1 It's like a freaky Friday.
Speaker 1 Yeah, but everyone gets a bodyguard. But it was bodyguards.
Speaker 1 And they're all hot.
Speaker 3 I love very attractive bodyguards.
Speaker 1 But you got a boyfriend. How long were you guys together at that point?
Speaker 3 I try to forget.
Speaker 1 Okay.
Speaker 3 But I think it'd been like two years.
Speaker 1
At 20 years old. So that's 10% of your life.
That's a huge chunk of your life when you think about it that way. And she sees a headline one morning.
Oh, no. Her boyfriend has a sex tape.
Oh, my.
Speaker 1 But mom, she's not in it.
Speaker 3 I'm not in it.
Speaker 1 Was he famous too? Was he an actor? No.
Speaker 3 Oh, my God. This time of my life.
Speaker 1 This is awful.
Speaker 3 My life is really like a soap opera.
Speaker 2
Yeah. It's like life art.
Yeah.
Speaker 3 Like, maybe I should make a movie like the disaster artist.
Speaker 1 Oh, it would be greatest if your boyfriend was your bodyguard at that time.
Speaker 3 I should have just cheated with my bodyguard.
Speaker 3
So he was a owner of restaurants and the nightlife kind of guy. It was really funny because it was not funny for him.
He's going to hate me for this. I'm so sorry.
Speaker 2 Doesn't seem like you need to apologize.
Speaker 1 No, I don't.
Speaker 3
Was there the cover in this magazine and they had like little stars covering his private parts? And it's like he has a sex hit, but it's not me. Oh, boy.
And so I remember he emailed.
Speaker 1 He didn't email you preemptively going, this is coming out. He waited until you found out from the press.
Speaker 3
In Mexico, you don't know. Again, no defamation.
It's the wild, wild west. When people complain about the UK press, I'm like, live in Mexico's press for three months.
Speaker 3
If you survive, I will applaud you. That then makes you like a different type of person.
And so he emailed, this was a really funny story. A lot happens, chaos, drama.
I don't pick up the phone.
Speaker 3 I'm screaming. And so he thinks that the best idea is to send this email where he cc's my brother my mother oh boy his whole family
Speaker 1 me
Speaker 1 you're just in there you're like one of them like and i just okay you know when you open cc and you're just like you're like oh no
Speaker 3 and the title was like let me explain or something
Speaker 3 to not get into detail he's like going back and forth about how this sex tape Wasn't while being with me. The comparison was him in his underwear and sending screenshots of the sex tape to my mom.
Speaker 1 Oh,
Speaker 3 I don't have that tattoo. He's pointing out tattoos.
Speaker 3 And I am just like,
Speaker 1 what are you? So he mounted a defense to your whole family.
Speaker 3 So a whole defense, which maybe if I was in that situation, I would have done the same thing.
Speaker 3 I don't know if I would CC someone's brother with my body naked and photos of before and after and like a selfie of him with his underwear.
Speaker 3
And my brother just sent me a message. He said, what's going on? Why do I have photos photos of this guy naked on my email? And so anyway, I left Mexico.
It was so jarring.
Speaker 1 That's a lot.
Speaker 1 Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert,
Speaker 1 if you dare.
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Speaker 1 Do we believe that it was from an era that you weren't together?
Speaker 1 Did the tattoos prove his
Speaker 3 yes?
Speaker 1 Because this actually happened to me. One of these trashy magazines ran this article about me saying I had hooked up with this girl while I was dating Kristen.
Speaker 1 I did hook up with that girl, but it was way before I met Kristen. And luckily, I have a tattoo in it that I had covered right before I met Kristen.
Speaker 3 So, this is like a sensitive subject to you.
Speaker 1
For me, it really was that. It was a lie.
Thank God the tattoo absolved me of that because Kristen met me and I had already had that one covered. It wasn't a sex tape.
Speaker 1
It was just a picture of her and I together at an event. We were kissing.
We weren't even kissing. I just had my arm around her.
Speaker 2 Yeah, because these magazines, they do make up so much.
Speaker 1
And she lied to them for sure. This woman had sold stories about three other people.
She also banged an AA. I met her in AA.
And
Speaker 1
she was out of money and she's getting high. And this is a fourth story.
That's horrible. She just lied to them.
I guess they believed her.
Speaker 3 Did you send nude photos of you to compare to your wife?
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 1 I got a martin and I sent Tom a picture.
Speaker 1 Well, I didn't want him to think I was a loser. Sure.
Speaker 3
And I've said this story before because it's a Phoenix story. And I always bring this to my dad's death.
You couldn't think of something more tragic than losing a parent.
Speaker 3 And my father would have never let me be an actress.
Speaker 1 You would have had to fight him and have a big separation from him. No, it would never happen.
Speaker 3 I was convinced that his narrative was my narrative. And I say with all the love because he didn't mean it in a mean way, but he wanted the best for his daughter.
Speaker 3 And he thought economy, making money, artistry, modeling, acting, it didn't sound like you had Sal Mahayak.
Speaker 1 That was it.
Speaker 3
And still, by the way, we're not a lot that are from Mexico that crossed over. Yeah.
And so when I did that, I thought amazing, positive things can happen from horrific situations.
Speaker 3
And that's kind of been my life. Thanks to that, I moved here.
I rented a little bedroom, and my mom had the brilliant idea. I'd always wanted to act here, but I never thought it was like a reality.
Speaker 3 I studied in Lee Strasburg, and they educated us that you need an agent, you need a manager, you need a lawyer. And I was like, I have no end to any of this.
Speaker 3
And she said to me, I've heard about this thing. It's called IMDb Pro.
Have you heard of it? I was like, mom, you need a manager and agent.
Speaker 3
She's like, no, no, I heard I can put my email under your profile and then we can get auditions. I was hiding.
I was in depression here after that.
Speaker 3 i was distraught my boyfriend it was a public real big brutal thing i was already the black sheep in the business people loved to like really hate me which was always interesting because i never understood why well i think still this happens here people pick a villain or escape like archetypes and if you're a woman i think at the time the way you see me i come in strong and confident and i think that the confidence was off-putting.
Speaker 3 They liked a woman that they would kind of bully.
Speaker 1 Well, they also want to see young actors just exude gratitude.
Speaker 3 Which I did, but I think I didn't do it in the way because I always felt like I had to defend myself constantly about something that I hadn't done. And that's how I felt here too for many years.
Speaker 3 There was this underlying, I always needed, wanted to be here through a man, or because I was dating someone, disregarding my 10-year career in Mexico, because for people that was irrelevant.
Speaker 3 When I started dating Josh, they would write I was using him. And I've always wanted to talk about this publicly, but I've never found where to do it in a safe space.
Speaker 3 They sort of tied this desperation to me as a Latin woman. Like I was coming and wanting to cross over when I had already had a career.
Speaker 3 And funny enough, they would say that I would call or tip off paparazzis when they forget that 99% of the paparazzis and the kitchens and the ballets, who works at kitchens? Who works the ballets?
Speaker 1 Oh, yeah, yeah, Mexicans.
Speaker 3
Yeah. And I had 10 years of a career in Mexico.
I was huge in Mexico. So every time I'd walk into a restaurant or go somewhere, they would call me.
Speaker 1 They knew. They knew.
Speaker 3 But because people here didn't know who I was, they were like, who is this weird bitch who came out of nowhere?
Speaker 2 She's calling the paparazzi for attention.
Speaker 3 And it was so crazy because it was a combination of I had no value, but at the same time, it was also sort of. said in a way that was incriminating of something that I wasn't doing.
Speaker 3
And it stayed for long. And it was this sort of sense of the experience of being an immigrant.
I wasn't worthy of being here.
Speaker 1 Is it possible you were also inflating how big this narrative was?
Speaker 3 I think that when you're incriminated of something that you're not doing, it always feels that way. Yeah.
Speaker 3 Because I felt really frustrated how to navigate it because I'm a person that would be like, that's completely fucking untrue. So I don't even care.
Speaker 3 But at the same time, I was being guided to like not engage into it because you're feeding it. Maybe it wasn't as big, but I felt injustice, complete character assassination of who I am.
Speaker 3
You're selling someone that I'm not. I hate people that get incriminated for things that they didn't do.
In criminal justice, when people get wrongly convicted, it's I have the same thing.
Speaker 2 It really gets under my skin. When someone's miscalculated or misjudged.
Speaker 3
When they talk about people publicly, it's so triggering for me. It drives me nuts because I've been that person.
To add to your point, I worked really hard. I didn't let that define me.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 And I cried in silence many days to just not let it become who I was because it was really prevalent at the beginning of my career.
Speaker 3 I also was dating and I didn't want to stop my dating life because I was looking looking for love.
Speaker 1
I would have fallen for him in one second. I think I did as well.
For Josh? Yeah.
Speaker 3 He was my crush when I was little.
Speaker 2
You dated your celebrity crush, too. I did.
And it's exciting.
Speaker 3 You're like 23.
Speaker 3
Sorry, I'm not smarter at the time to be like, you know what, I'm above this. No.
It's just to say, like, the interesting of perception versus reality. Yeah.
Speaker 1 So, mom put you on IMDb Pro, and then impossibly, Mary Vernoux calls you in to read for Dust Till Dawn reboot. Mary Vernou, by the way, is another person.
Speaker 3 she's in the same camp as allison jones as allison jones oh i don't know her oh mary vernu has cast the most incredible amazing yeah she's changed my life falling through i mean talk about someone's doing their work they're on amdb to find you without a manager or an agent so random you know who found me was robert rodriguez he was watching tv and he saw me in univision i was on some awards and he saw me speaking english and he said mary finder and so i was in mexico the middle of a bridal shoot.
Speaker 3
I'm wearing a ginormous bride dress. And I had a flip phone that I had bought at the OXO, like a 7-Eleven to have an American number because I was studying in Strasbourg.
So I had a 9-1-7.
Speaker 3
I opened my flip phone. I have a text from Mary Bernoulli.
And I'm like, who's this? She's like, I'm a casting director. I'm like, okay.
She's like, can you tape yourself?
Speaker 3 So I taped myself against the wall with a wedding dress on the bottom. Uh-oh.
Speaker 1 Like, then like a t-shirt on the top.
Speaker 3 And then I flew in the next day. And yeah, he cast me.
Speaker 1
Okay. Now you go to Austin for two years.
Obsessed. Austin's my favorite city in the country.
Speaker 3 I'm going two days.
Speaker 2 South by side.
Speaker 1
I'm going in a few weeks. Where did you live? How was it? How many months were you there to shoot that? Did you go to Barton Springs? Yeah.
Okay. Have you been to the city? I've been to Cedar Point.
Speaker 1 Yes. Did you go to Salt Lake and sit outside on the picnic tables?
Speaker 3
It's my favorite time of my life. It was such an amazing introduction to realistically living in America because I'd been in and out.
I'd been in New York for school.
Speaker 3 and lived in Argentina for a few years after that and then came here.
Speaker 1 Buenos Aires.
Speaker 3 Buenos Aires. Was that a great place?
Speaker 1 You have to go.
Speaker 3
My favorite city in the world. And the hottest people I've ever seen.
I'm going to go to the hole.
Speaker 1
Yeah, I've heard there's a lot of sexy frogs. Sexy, everything.
I also heard you can buy Coke there for like $10. Oh, you wouldn't go.
You should not go. I would have to go.
Speaker 1 You shouldn't have normally.
Speaker 3 Not allowed.
Speaker 3 Yeah, so I moved to Austin and I fell in love with Austin. Keep it weird.
Speaker 1 Did you like rent an apartment or were you staying at a hotel the entire time you shot?
Speaker 3 The whole cast was living in the communal
Speaker 3 apartment complex. So we all lived together.
Speaker 1 It was Milwaukee's place.
Speaker 3
It was Melbourne's place. It was like the ultimate American experience.
I'd never done the dorm thing.
Speaker 1 So it was so exciting.
Speaker 2 I'd be like, that's so fun. Monday.
Speaker 1
And we'd be like at the pool and we all live together. I'm gel.
I know. It was the best.
Speaker 3 And then we would eat food trucks, go to Franklin's, live in Barton Springs, run every day. And I'm obsessed with Robert.
Speaker 1 He's incredible, right?
Speaker 3
He's like my dad. When I started, he protected me a lot of really horrible me-too things.
He really was like, no one's going to get close to her.
Speaker 1 Also, the parallel, though, between Selma leaving Mexico, having been huge on telenovelas, being terrified she's not going to make it, and then breaking out in a Rodriguez.
Speaker 3 With the same rule.
Speaker 2 He just keeps doing it.
Speaker 1 So you come off of that and then you go into baby driver's really the next big thing in your career.
Speaker 1 It's a humongous success, makes $220 million.
Speaker 1 Edgar Wright.
Speaker 3 I die for Edgar. I just really ride for the people that supported me at the beginning.
Speaker 1 Took gambles on you or fought for you.
Speaker 3
That's like the first first English-speaking movie ever. I was so scared.
I remember walking into that set, and it was like Jamie Foxx and John Hamm, and Kevin Spacey, and Ansel, and John Brenthel.
Speaker 3
And I was the only woman on my first day. Lily James was in the movie, but we never really worked together.
There's no warm-up with heavy hitters. And I was really scared.
Speaker 3
And Edgar was just so kind and let me create. and gave me so much openness.
And I felt so inspired in that room. But I was fucking shitting myself.
I'm not going to lie. I was so nervous.
Speaker 3 I'm very shy. It doesn't look like I am, but I am.
Speaker 1
Yeah, that's an intimidating group to step into. Then Hobbs and Shaw.
This is a Fast and Furious spin-off. This is another enormous movie.
Hobbs and Shaw, we've got The Rock.
Speaker 3 And Jason Statham.
Speaker 1 How long does that movie take to make?
Speaker 3
The movie took a long time to shoot. I was in and out.
I shot in a week.
Speaker 1 David Leach called me.
Speaker 3 He's like, would you come? I was shooting Godzilla versus Kong in Australia.
Speaker 3 And I had a week off between location and location and so they fixed my schedule so i could go and shoot they wrote that role and so they popped me in to be part of the franchise whatever was gonna happen nothing happened david leech i did his first 20 minutes short when i was a ground lean yes and he was still doubling Brad Pitt or somebody huge as a stunt man.
Speaker 1
The best. And then to see Fall Guy, which I think was the best movie of last year.
I just couldn't be happy for that guy.
Speaker 3 And Kelly, his producing partner and his wife, by the way, talking about stunts new to be honored at the Oscars like yesterday. The amount of work, I've done a fair share of stunt work in my career.
Speaker 3 I've had a horrific accident. I broke my collarbones and my ribs on a set, a stunt that went wrong.
Speaker 1 Oh, God.
Speaker 3
These people are like risking their lives. A lot of stunties die in these movies, and we're still not honored.
One of my best friends
Speaker 1 driven over by Tom Sizemore. He was not supposed to drive the car, and he drove the fucking car over to Castro and drug his body.
Speaker 3 It's gnarly, and they don't get enough recognition.
Speaker 1
They do it over and over again. Like Like your story about getting hurt, they have like 30.
That's going to be painful. I was going to say that's literally one out of that's their day-to-day.
Speaker 3 And they recover and they go back into it.
Speaker 1 Right now. It's a mindset.
Speaker 2 Daniel Radcliffe's stunt double was paralyzed during one of the Harry Potter.
Speaker 1 Yes. There's a doc about it.
Speaker 2 He has a memoir or something that's supposed to be amazing.
Speaker 1 Okay, Godzilla versus Kong, another enormous hit. I was looking at Godzilla versus Kong and I was like, I think that one movie would put your lifetime box office above my like 25 movies.
Speaker 1
He's getting one of those fucking movies. That makes sense.
That's half a billion dollars.
Speaker 3 People love those movies.
Speaker 1 It's wild. And then Three Body Problem, you work with David Benioff and Weiss.
Speaker 2 Game of Thrones for people who don't know.
Speaker 1
Yes. Oh, I wanted to mention I care a lot because that's huge.
This is what's weird about movies now. So 56 million households watch this movie.
I care a lot on Netflix.
Speaker 1
And if each household has just bought a $10 ticket, it's bigger than Kong. And it's like a billion-dollar movie if you think about it that way.
Yeah. What's better, do you think?
Speaker 1
I'm now out of it where I would have to worry about whether it's coming out on streaming or in box office. Like there's this pride of having a winning movie.
It's so rare and exciting to be a part of.
Speaker 1 But then. Don't you just want the maximum amount of people to see the thing you do?
Speaker 3
That's how I feel. I mean, I guess some people get paid for those things.
They get back ends. I really haven't had the beauty.
Speaker 1 Right, a $1 gross deal.
Speaker 3
I've never heard of that in my life. I don't know if I will.
And so I just care about the work and people watching the work and the work that I feel proud of.
Speaker 3 And sometimes I'm like hoping that it never gets seen too. Sharp, sharp.
Speaker 1 No, you're like, oh, God.
Speaker 3
So I care a lot was an amazing experience because it was also in the COVID era. Everyone was in their homes watching TV.
So so many people watched it more than probably would have now.
Speaker 3
And I love that movie. Were you shooting it? We shot in Boston.
Okay.
Speaker 1 Your co-star was from New Zealand.
Speaker 3 And I care a lot. It's a rose.
Speaker 3 No, she's English. Yeah.
Speaker 3 She's an English rose, baby.
Speaker 1 I'm so sorry.
Speaker 3 How dare you?
Speaker 1 She's English.
Speaker 2 Gong girl, you're thinking of not the right person. Another Rosamond?
Speaker 1
Yeah, he's got a different friend, Rose. That's Kiwi.
RosemacGiver?
Speaker 1 Oh, that's RosemacGuyver.
Speaker 2 Yeah. Rosamond Pike is gone, girl.
Speaker 1
Gone girl. Dax.
Yes, I love her. My apologies to everybody.
I was picturing David's friend who's a Kiwi.
Speaker 3 She's great too. She is great too.
Speaker 1 I like her too.
Speaker 3 I don't know her, but I like her.
Speaker 1 Okay.
Speaker 3 Rosamond Pike, she's incredible.
Speaker 1 You guys are bros now, right? Bros. She interviewed you for Interview Magazine.
Speaker 3
She's my wife. We're wifing up.
I spend a lot of time with her. She sends me raunchy photos.
I send her raunchy photos.
Speaker 1 Not of yourselves, but of other people.
Speaker 3
No, of us. We play lovers in the movie.
We had a scene originally in that movie where I pegged a man with her.
Speaker 1
Oh, wow. Yeah.
Okay. And what did you use to peg the young or old man?
Speaker 3 Really big black dildo. Okay.
Speaker 1 Not a big one.
Speaker 3
Okay. It was pretty big.
And I could find it.
Speaker 1
Oh, right. Yeah.
What have you had in your purse? No, no.
Speaker 3 So basically, we have this scene, which was incredible. The movie starts with her sort of going on a date with Scoot McNair.
Speaker 3 It's totally scrapped out of the movie, which is a bummer because it was so good.
Speaker 3
Anyway, we would go into the scene where she's sort of saying how much she realized she doesn't like men and she's really into women. And so she's like, but you should try it.
It's fun.
Speaker 3 I'm like, maybe we should try it together.
Speaker 3 And there's a scene where we would go on a date, the three of us, we would go back to the house and you would see from the reflection on a microwave three bodies having a threesome, but I was pegging a man
Speaker 3
with a strap-on. And then we'd come out and then be like, Yeah, it's not really my thing.
And then we'd go back to being full-on lesbians. And so that got scrapped out.
Speaker 3 I don't know if it was too raunchy.
Speaker 1 Maybe just a little too early in the film.
Speaker 3
It would have been a win because it was funny. It was great.
But since then, we just have photos of each other
Speaker 3 just with raunchy things. And so she sent me for my rap gift a ginormous strap-on whoa wonderful does the intimacy coordinator know about all this yeah we would get in trouble
Speaker 1 we would get in trouble no you both consented you're both good about it and then this is me sending her my rap gift oh you're wearing it
Speaker 1 wow
Speaker 1 this is really something this is too personal but in the filming of that where you like maybe i would want to do this to somebody Yeah, did it seem like that?
Speaker 1 I'm not going to lie.
Speaker 3 I don't know if it's my kink.
Speaker 2 Well, we know cannibalism isn't your thing.
Speaker 3 No, definitely not mine.
Speaker 1 This one's more.
Speaker 1 I just imagine there could be a moment where you're like, that doesn't appeal to me at all. Now I've put this thing on.
Speaker 3 I definitely was fascinated by it.
Speaker 1
There's something about your hips hitting someone else's and you are the business end. Yeah.
I can imagine a gal doing that and going like, oh, I get it.
Speaker 3 I see how that is powerful.
Speaker 1 I get.
Speaker 3 the psychology behind it and how that could be yeah a fetish i'm never a no to things i'm always a yes to trying things and discovering yeah
Speaker 3 not done yet Just fictionally.
Speaker 1 But you have the apparatus.
Speaker 3 Also, it sticks on the walls. I have it like on a window.
Speaker 1 But what could be really terrifying to a man is if on his third date with you, he was going to the bathroom and he saw this and he's like, oh, fuck.
Speaker 1 It's happened. She's getting
Speaker 1 it.
Speaker 1 It's happened.
Speaker 3
Because I had it in my house. So one time I did this movie.
Like, it's a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 Six years ago.
Speaker 3 If I was a dude, I wouldn't believe it.
Speaker 2 Let me show you why he see.
Speaker 1 Do you know Rosamund Pike? Not from New York. She's not from New Zealand.
Speaker 1 She's very English.
Speaker 3 Very English. You should have her here.
Speaker 1
You would laugh a lot, by the way. She's awesome.
Awesome. So you did one movie with Guy Richie, and now you've done, I imagine you already shot it.
I've done three.
Speaker 3 So I've done the Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. Then I did a movie called In the Gray that comes out later this year.
Speaker 1 Oh, okay. Okay.
Speaker 3 With Jake, Jyllen Hall, and Henry Cavill. And then I did the third one, which comes out later-ish this year.
Speaker 1 How quickly is he shooting movies?
Speaker 3 Back to back.
Speaker 1 Does he grill on set and you eat the grilled food?
Speaker 3
We went carnivore on Fountain of Youth. Krasinski tried it.
He was successful for a minute. I think he did it.
And then Natalie is vegetarian, so she did not do that.
Speaker 3 It has to be the biggest nightmare for a vegetarian to be surrounded by people that are just eating red meat. Because he was losing weight.
Speaker 3 I was sort of into the whole biohacking of it all, fascinated by it. And so we would grill just steak and steak and steak and more steak with butter every day.
Speaker 1 Oh my God. But how's your heart?
Speaker 3 My cholesterol is good and I have to kind of get tested.
Speaker 1 Almost exclusively red meat. I really like mine's lower than yours.
Speaker 2 Yeah, but that's genetic.
Speaker 1 Yeah, that's genetic. So that's the whole thing.
Speaker 2 So if you're genetically predispositioned, it's probably not the dietary.
Speaker 1 It's not for you, honey.
Speaker 3 But I loved it. So we would grill on set every day.
Speaker 1
Natalie Portman is in the fountain of youth. Yes.
Forget those dudes on the set of Baby Driver. The dream.
Speaker 1
I'm so intimidated if I'm you. Like, if I've got to do the two-hander with Bill Murray, who I idolize, for me, Natalie Portman was the only ingenue I bought in 100%.
Period.
Speaker 3 I became an actress because of Natalie Portman.
Speaker 1 So it was pretty wild.
Speaker 3 I was trying really hard to be cool.
Speaker 1 I was just like, hi.
Speaker 3
So I'm like you. And I like know everything in a creepy, like, probably she could sue me kind of way.
I was so uncool.
Speaker 1 But did you penetrate? Did you eventually?
Speaker 3
Yes. It's easy because she's the nicest person ever.
I couldn't stop staring at her. It's only happened to me twice with her and Marian Cotila when I did a show with her.
Speaker 2 You're like, how do you look like this? Transfixed.
Speaker 1 Totally.
Speaker 3
And And she was so fun to work with. Really challenging physically.
Water tanks for hours, freezing cold in the air of the UK. And we were laughing all the time.
Speaker 3
We would always be like joking about it. She has the best humor.
Krasinski obviously has the best humor. And it was good vibes all day long.
And it was a dream job. And I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 1 Where did you shoot that?
Speaker 3
We shot everywhere. We went to...
Thailand, then we went to Vienna.
Speaker 1 Oh, then we went to Egypt.
Speaker 2 Oh.
Speaker 1 There's like a dream vacation.
Speaker 2 Yeah, but not the water baths.
Speaker 3 That's how you pay for the trip.
Speaker 3 But it's cool, though. Like, how many times can you say, oh, I was in some weird water tank for hours with Natalie?
Speaker 1
You're right. You're right.
I'll take it.
Speaker 3 It was an amazing experience. So we have become quite tight with Guy Richie.
Speaker 1 Okay, so Ash, which I watched last night. What about Mr.
Speaker 2 and Mrs. Smith really quick? You did a little camping.
Speaker 1 I love that.
Speaker 2 I loved that show.
Speaker 1 How good is that show? So how good?
Speaker 3
Hero, the director, did such an amazing job. And yeah, he called Skarsgaard and me.
We had already worked together in Godzilla. He was like, would you guys come and play for like a few days?
Speaker 3
And we want your stereotypical couple of what you would think Mr. and Smith is going to be.
And then turn it on its head. And it was fun.
You think we're going to be in it?
Speaker 1 It was like dead. Yeah.
Speaker 3 Hopefully we'll make it back.
Speaker 1 Maybe it could be a throw now.
Speaker 3 You never know.
Speaker 1 So, Ash.
Speaker 1
I would say it's got two really great parallels. It really reminded me of Moon.
Did you ever watch Moon? Yes, Moon. Oh, my God.
Did you ever see Moon? I don't know Moon.
Speaker 3
You should watch it. That's incredible.
That's a huge reference.
Speaker 1 And that's someone's kid director, that David Bowie's kid or something? Is that what it is? Oh, wow. Duncan Jones.
Speaker 2 But is Duncan Jones?
Speaker 1 Is Duncan Jones the child of David Bowie? Yes. But does not share the Bowie last
Speaker 2
Wanted to separate. It's kind of like Nick Cage.
Nope.
Speaker 2 Anderson Cooper.
Speaker 1 Right. Do you know Nicholas Cage is really Coppola?
Speaker 2 Oh, really? He's in the Coppola family.
Speaker 1 He wanted to make it on his own, so he gave himself Cage.
Speaker 3 You blew my mind.
Speaker 2 And do you know about Anderson Cooper? He's a Vanderbilt. The journalist
Speaker 1
is Gloria Vanderbilt. Oh, my God.
And also, Emilio Estevez not using Sheen.
Speaker 2 You're right. That was a good movie.
Speaker 1
Sheen, Martin Sheen. Oh, Martin Sheen.
Charlie Sheen, Martin Sheen, Amelia Westevez, they're a family, but look at this.
Speaker 2 People need their own path. What?
Speaker 1 We're really giving you a picture.
Speaker 3 So maybe this is a moment to tell you that I've changed my last name.
Speaker 1 Yes. Can you imagine that was that? Barbara Zan?
Speaker 1 Yeah, Barbara Sheen.
Speaker 1
Yes, I couldn't be more like her. And then, of course, Alien.
Yes, Alien. Is obvious.
So who made this?
Speaker 3
Flying Lotus is an artist. So he's a musical prodigy.
He's incredible. He's a producer.
Okay. And I was a humongous fan of his music.
Speaker 3
And I had seen this insane, crazy movie called Kuso that he did before this. There's really not a plot.
It's just a crazy, brutal, gory,
Speaker 3 insane movie. It feels like you're watching back in the day, late-night MTV.
Speaker 1 Just weird.
Speaker 3 And I was obsessed with him. And the script came across my table, and
Speaker 3
I was really yearning for something that was in the horror space, bizarre and creepy. And I like a psychological thriller.
This felt really in the vein. And he showed me his visuals.
Speaker 3 I mean, we made that movie for no money. It's very impressive.
Speaker 1
Okay, so it's set in the future. You are a group of earthlings that is trying to explore and find another planet that would be habitable.
And you touch down on this planet in this pod.
Speaker 1
And when we meet you, you have amnesia. You don't know what the fuck's gone on.
Your head is damaged, and everyone on the crew is dead. And we're kind of piecing together mento style
Speaker 1 what happened.
Speaker 3 Feels like psychosis. It's a discombobulating movie.
Speaker 1
Yeah, you're dealing with like amnesia, but also kind of madness. Like we're not quite sure.
Is this person insane or not? Wow. We don't know why everyone's dead.
Speaker 2 Creepy and good.
Speaker 1 And then we have Aaron Paul pops in, and he ostensibly is trying to figure out what happened as well. But in classic movie like these, we don't know who's friend and who's foe.
Speaker 2 Twisties? Yeah.
Speaker 1
Lots of twisties, but visually, really, really original. And it had a tension and a chaos that substance.
Oh, that kind of unsettling.
Speaker 3 That's how I describe you're doing a perfect job.
Speaker 1 I've described substance in space. Yeah, substance in space.
Speaker 3
Because because when we got this movie, it was a wild card. Everyone was like, Are you sure you want to do this? And I was like, Yeah, it's insane.
I don't even know what's going to turn out to be.
Speaker 3 Cause it's like when you think you know, you don't know, and it gets crazier and it gets crazier.
Speaker 1 Well, a lot of them, you go like, it's either going to be incredible or it's going to suck. And that's fun.
Speaker 3
I'm willing to take the risk. This is fun.
I can see his vision because he had like a very strong point of view. And I trust people that have strong points of view when it comes to creative.
Speaker 3 In my experience, Edgar Wright, Guy Ritchie, Bob Simek, it's like like work with people that have points of views. You're in it.
Speaker 3 And when the substance sort of took a life of its own, I was like, oh, I'm glad people are open to crazy films. And it is slightly camp, but also uncomfortable and weird and dark and brutal.
Speaker 3
It goes from psychological thriller to really gory, really bloody and back and forth. It's dark.
It's a crazy movie.
Speaker 1
And it has this element of oxygen, which is always fun. So like you're watching and you're kind of holding your breath a lot of the time.
Is she going to run out of oxygen?
Speaker 1 I think this is a very like Angelina Jolie role.
Speaker 3 Oh, really?
Speaker 1 Yeah. If this movie was made in 97, I think Angelina Jolie would do this.
Speaker 3 She was quite a risk-taker, I think, with her choices.
Speaker 1
I think she had similar, the bad word would be hang-ups. She had a similar fear of only being hot.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 Yeah, needing to prove herself. Yeah.
Speaker 1 And I think she did a lot of things that were unflattering intentionally to break out of that. And so this very much mirrored, I think, that experience.
Speaker 3 Ah, that makes me happy to hear that you felt that way.
Speaker 1
But I'm going to really applaud you as an actor. You have almost no lines in this movie.
Most of the movie is you processing flashbacks. You have to react to all this stuff that you're not seeing.
Speaker 1
You're in a scene by yourself. You sit at a desk and they go, okay, cameras.
And now you got to take us through these flashbacks.
Speaker 1 You have to take us through the anxiety and the tension of trying to figure out how the fuck you are, where you are at. Anything we're going to learn from you, we just have to see.
Speaker 1 And you did an incredible job. I was quite blown away.
Speaker 3
Thank you. That means a lot because you just nailed it in the head why I picked this role.
I've always craved, I guess, coming from soap operas and I talk a lot too, as you can tell.
Speaker 2 We love talkers.
Speaker 3 Yeah, I'm a heavy talker and I fill space,
Speaker 3 my anxiety with speaking.
Speaker 3 I've always, I think, secretly wanted to experience what that was like to be able to feel comfortable in that space because i don't think that people see me as a type of actress ever because the roles that have flashed into the sidegeist have been quite the dynamic ones and i personally like these performances way more and so i really enjoyed it and i was really scared and i had come off of a run of doing like three body problem was one of the most challenging jobs i ever had because while everyone was sort of rooted on factual things, I had to be creating this anxiety building moments with like nothing in the show.
Speaker 3 I'm watching numbers coming and I'm becoming suicidal and I'm going through a really hard time where I'm seeing this boat get sliced completely that I never saw.
Speaker 3 So a lot of my performance came to childlike imagination. That's a scary
Speaker 3 place to be as an actor, as you know.
Speaker 1
You came from lunch. You have a real life.
You walked over. You can't even connect with another actor in the scene.
Speaker 3 You're likely on imagination and then gauging how much is too much, how little is too little, what is over the top, what is not over the top, you're not giving enough. You don't have a real gauge.
Speaker 3
When you're in a scene, you're bouncing off of each other. Here, you're just like free falling.
I had done that back to back. I went from that to three-body problem.
And that was scary.
Speaker 3
Some people can call it a success. Some people will be like, I don't love it.
But at least I felt really proud. Have you seen three-body problem?
Speaker 3
So there's an episode in three-body problem. Something really major happens.
It's like the red wedding on Game of Thrones. Like it's like a crazy episode.
Thousands of people get killed.
Speaker 3 And we're seeing it sort of unravel in front of our eyes, but we're seeing it on screens, but nothing was happening.
Speaker 3 So you're just seeing this ginormous sort of tragic moment happening, but we're seeing nothing. And we have no idea what the effects are going to look like, how severe, how not severe.
Speaker 3
You really rely on your director. And if you're lucky, you have an amazing director.
If you're unlucky, you don't have an amazing director.
Speaker 1 You're just scared for three months.
Speaker 3 For a three-body problem, I was scared for two years.
Speaker 3 Two years of like bracing because my whole performance on that show, I'm the only one that is relying on nothing because I'm talking to myself. I'm looking at things.
Speaker 1 Ooh, talking to yourself so hard on camera, like a mirror scene where you got to look in the mirror. You're like, oh my God, I can't see you.
Speaker 1 I think it looking at myself, but I've never spoken to myself.
Speaker 3 Never, not once.
Speaker 2 Yeah, but some people do if they're not well.
Speaker 1
Okay. I've seen it.
We're having like a conversation with a second party that's in the mirror.
Speaker 3 Hopefully, that's not me. And hopefully, I'm never there.
Speaker 2 Yeah, let's hope I'm a knock.
Speaker 3
Pretending that you can do it is terrifying. But yeah, so anyway, it's challenging.
And I appreciate you.
Speaker 3 We have many many scenes where lights up she is leaking tears processing this thing yeah i was like god bless to kind of build an arc is where it becomes scary that's where i find hard in the psychological thriller type of like discombobulating films because stay mom three body problem you have to build an arc yeah you have to be your craziest at the end of the second act but you don't know because especially on ash flying lotus was sort of like i can move scenes around and i was like wait wait what do you mean it's not a super linear story no but actually it's the most fun because then I would play every scene differently.
Speaker 3
And then he had like an array of things to pick from. So, that's kind of the dream.
I can be quite type A.
Speaker 3 And I used to have gotten better at it because I came from a school of there's certain directors that want a very specific type of performance. And I had worked in a row with a lot of those directors.
Speaker 3 So, it was very healing for me to go into plays where, like, just go for it. And I was like,
Speaker 1 What do you mean? Yeah.
Speaker 3
They're like, go for it. And that felt scary for me for a while.
And so it was great. And so we played a lot of different things.
Speaker 1 Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert.
Speaker 1 If you dare.
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And it kind of makes you realize you're never really done, are you?
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Speaker 1 I'm sure that movie made you better.
Speaker 2 Yeah, good challenge.
Speaker 3 I hope so.
Speaker 1 That was a big exercise. That was like heavyweight, heavy reps.
Speaker 3 I'm really scared of this movie.
Speaker 1
You did such a good job. Thank you.
I hadn't seen many of these movies.
Speaker 3 So I know you're going to be watching I Care a Lot now for sure.
Speaker 1 You really sold it. But wait, didn't you cut the pegging scene? Yeah, boring.
Speaker 1 Now I don't need to see it.
Speaker 3 There's little heavy makeouts here and there, but no pegging.
Speaker 1 Where do people see it? It comes out March 21st and movies.
Speaker 3 It's wide release. Why I'm also really scared.
Speaker 1 Awesome.
Speaker 3 We need a lot of love. Please go watch it.
Speaker 2
Go to the movies. The movies are fun.
I miss the movies.
Speaker 3
And it's a horror movie. I love going to the movie theaters for a horror movie.
Exactly.
Speaker 2
Or like Substance, as you said, was such a good movie to see in the movie theater. I loved it.
Because everyone's into it and laughing and kind of screaming.
Speaker 2 And it's that communal thing we just don't get anymore. Exactly.
Speaker 3 Wait, did you work with Josh now that I think of it?
Speaker 1
Yeah, we did a movie called When in Rome. You don't need to see it.
Kristen's the lead, Josh is her love interest.
Speaker 1 I'm one of three suitors trying to get Kristen.
Speaker 2 This is from a long time ago.
Speaker 1
Oh, yeah. This was within the first three months of us dating.
18 years ago, we made this movie.
Speaker 3 Wait, so you were dating before you did the movie?
Speaker 1
Yes, which is a wonderful story because Disney did not want to hire us. We've been dating for three months.
They're like, we're not hiring a three-month boyfriend and girlfriend.
Speaker 1 Then they break up in three weeks.
Speaker 3 And then they'll be like, by the way, that's very smart, right?
Speaker 1 One of my best friends, Andrew Panay, Yorgo, was the producer. And I was like, George, I promise you, no matter what, I will not break up with her.
Speaker 3 At least while I'm filming the movie.
Speaker 1
Yes. We barely made it.
We were living together. It was a disaster for us living together three months in and shooting a movie.
Speaker 2 Because they were in Italy.
Speaker 1 Only for a week. Mostly it was this dark apartment in New York where we were living in.
Speaker 2 Oh, you just weren't here, so you had to live together.
Speaker 1 Yes, yes. We were shooting in New York and then in Italy.
Speaker 3 So you said, let's just jump in and straight up live together while making a movie. That sounds insane.
Speaker 1 I'm like so frugal well let's combine our living thing and then we'll pocket the thing we get home and the relationship is in a state of total disrepair we decide to go to a couples therapist her therapist had three months well now we've shot a movie so now we're four or five months yeah i'm out we took a motorcycle trip home to michigan it was a disaster i left like i hope i never see this person again as long as i live i'm sure she felt the same way We get home, we go to couples therapy, and I say to the therapist, I go, you know, I made this promise to not break up with her during the movie because of my friend, but now we're back in real life and I don't know that we're going to make it.
Speaker 1
And he goes, well, it's really interesting. You're saying you're back in real life.
Cause actually
Speaker 1
that was real life. You commit, we're not breaking up.
And I was like, oh, oh my God.
Speaker 1
That sounds so stupid, but I honestly was like, oh, wow, that is it. You go, no, no, under no circumstance.
So we must figure out how to make this work because we're not breaking up.
Speaker 1 So weirdly, it was was kind of a breakthrough.
Speaker 3 And how many years are we in now?
Speaker 1 18th year. Wow.
Speaker 3 Frozen is my favorite movie of all time.
Speaker 1 Well, good news, you'll have three and four coming your way.
Speaker 3 I don't think any adult that has no children has watched Frozen as much as I have.
Speaker 2 That's the first time I've heard that.
Speaker 1 It'd be like musical theater and singing.
Speaker 3 I would go on dates with guys and I'd have my Spotify shuffle.
Speaker 1 And your strap on in the backseat. Yeah, in the backseat.
Speaker 3 And then all of a sudden was like, do you want to build a snowman?
Speaker 1 And I'm singing.
Speaker 3
that, like, this is so weird. Yeah.
You can totally tell I had no childhood and I was like a child star who got completely ripped away from having a childhood. So now I'm living it.
Speaker 3
Did you love Wicked too? I went to the movie theaters. I watched it 17 times.
I cried. I was blown away by it.
Speaker 1 Yeah, the one line got me to well up. It's right before, what's the last song they sing? Is there on the break?
Speaker 1
Define gravity. Define gravity.
It's like a stanza before that.
Speaker 3 If everywhere.
Speaker 1
Together we're unlimited. They got you.
I was like, oh fuck, yes, you are, girls. Yeah.
Did you ever get to the girl? Did you guys girls last night? No.
Speaker 2 Oh, my God.
Speaker 1 Did they rip it up?
Speaker 2
Ariana came out and sang a song from The Wizard of Oz. She sang Somewhere Over the Rainbow.
Yeah. And then Cynthia came out and sang a song from The Wiz.
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 3 And then it's like sang together.
Speaker 2 Sang together that definitely wasn't together.
Speaker 1
We're unlimited. It gave me chills.
Just repeating it gave me chills.
Speaker 2 Also, what it was saying, because The Wiz is an African-American Wizard of Oz, and it's bringing these together.
Speaker 3
It was exactly powerful. And it makes me really happy for John Chu.
Random John Chu was the first person to actually cast me in a movie. Really?
Speaker 1 Oh, really?
Speaker 3 He did a movie that was not successful at all, and we always laugh about it called Gem and the Holograms.
Speaker 1
Oh, yeah, yeah. Ryan Hanson was in that.
Yes, yes, Ryan.
Speaker 1 Are you guys friends with Ryan?
Speaker 3 I love Ryan.
Speaker 1 He's somebody that's best.
Speaker 3 He's hilarious.
Speaker 2
Yes. Yeah, he is.
is.
Speaker 1 He's the most charismatic man in America.
Speaker 3 The most charismatic man in ever.
Speaker 1 Backflips.
Speaker 2 Yes. And will.
Speaker 1
And any chance. And will.
With a little provocation.
Speaker 3
And he cast me as the misfits, which was the bad girls. And we had a little tiny scene.
I remember it was Kesha, me.
Speaker 3 And we had two lines at the end of the gem in the Hollywoods because supposedly we're going to do another one. Never happened.
Speaker 3
But it was my first role actually before Baby Driver. Now that I think of it.
Wow. And we've been friends ever since.
John Chewiner.
Speaker 1 He is.
Speaker 1 All right. Well, this was so fun.
Speaker 1 Thank you, guys.
Speaker 1
Really great job on Ash. Everyone, watch Ash.
Go to the movie theater. It's scary,
Speaker 1 and you'll have that communal experience where you're screaming and maybe throwing up a little bit.
Speaker 3 Oh, you grab your titties out of fear. Oh, you grab your titties.
Speaker 1 You're like, oh, that's a good idea.
Speaker 3
That's a good sign. Thank you so much for having me.
I'm such a fan of the podcast.
Speaker 1 I'm really happy to be here. We're so happy.
Speaker 3 I hope people don't think that I'm insane.
Speaker 1 I'm not insane.
Speaker 1
No one thinks that. No one thinks that.
It's time to let all that go. Anxiety goes.
It's all behind us. All right.
Adore you. Thank you.
Speaker 3 Thank you guys. Bye.
Speaker 1
He is an arm care expert, but he makes mistakes all the time. They got Monica's here.
She's got to let him have the facts.
Speaker 2 Yeah, no, her all-time, her, like, my Matt and Ben
Speaker 1 is
Speaker 2 Mr. Tumness.
Speaker 1 Who?
Speaker 2 What's his name? James McIlvoy.
Speaker 1 Oh, Grey Pick.
Speaker 2 I know, but
Speaker 2 she picked him while he was Mr. Tumness.
Speaker 1 He's Mr. Tumness.
Speaker 2 In like Lion Witch in the Wardrobe. So
Speaker 2 he's like a centaur or something.
Speaker 1 And
Speaker 2 we were seeing in the movie theater and she was like, is he hot? And I was like, no.
Speaker 1 Wow.
Speaker 2 And he's turned out to be quite hot.
Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's so charismatic.
Speaker 2 I guess. I've never met him.
Speaker 1 What did that just make me think? Oh,
Speaker 1
I renamed Whiskey, and I feel like it's such a good name for him. What is it? First of all, conjure him in your head.
Okay. A little Mogwai rat.
And then he eats his name. Right.
Three legs.
Speaker 1 We decided he's tiny Trump.
Speaker 2 Oh, my God.
Speaker 1 So his new name is Trimp.
Speaker 1
I love it. Picture his face and picture Trimp.
That's exactly. This is my dog, Trimp.
Ew. Yeah, yeah.
It's really accurate in a gross way. Trimp.
Speaker 2 Because it's kind of like shrimp, which he's shrimpy. Yeah.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 1
And then what's the rat from Charlotte's Web? Templeton. Oh.
So his name is
Speaker 1 Trimp Templeton something. I've forgotten his last name, but now he's got a whole new three name.
Speaker 2 I like that. He really looks like a Trimp.
Speaker 2 Who do you think is the perfect name to
Speaker 2 face and body? Like name-to-person match.
Speaker 1 Red Pitt.
Speaker 1 Really? I guess just those words
Speaker 1 symbolize now hotness.
Speaker 2 Yeah, but I don't know. That's like chicken or the egg.
Speaker 1 Sure.
Speaker 2 I mean more like.
Speaker 1 Oh, that reminds me.
Speaker 1 As I alerted you
Speaker 1 on my bus trip home from Nashville, I was watching all kinds of stuff. Mostly shit I can just listen to.
Speaker 1 Great rec if you're just driving and you want to listen. Turning point, that 10.
Speaker 1
It's on Netflix. It's 10 episodes.
But really the history of the arms, nuclear arms race and all the twists and turns. I wrote down stuff in my notes that i want to bring up thank god
Speaker 1 you're gonna like it no you're gonna like one part okay great but anyways i gave love island temptation island a choice i've never done that i couldn't do it and i'll blame it on driving and needing to look at probably hot co-eds i assume that's the whole point it's very visual and i'm the most alarming thing is happening to me which is like hot co-eds are starting to do less and less for me that's great i mean is it i mean mean, it's like on a self-actualized spectrum.
Speaker 1 It's good. That's a bummer to miss.
Speaker 1
I understand. Something that has been a source of like titillation and enjoyment my whole life.
It's just one less thing I enjoy.
Speaker 2
Okay, I have a question. Answer honestly.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 Is it that just like overall, the titillation in seeing like women on screen or what? Yeah, we'll see.
Speaker 1 Even ripped dudes. You know how I like ripped dudes as well.
Speaker 2 Okay, so it's all going downhill or is it just the age has changed?
Speaker 1 Yeah,
Speaker 1 how do I know? But everyone's pretty young on the show. What I think is happening is there's some sliding ratio in my head that used to be at 13.
Speaker 1 Looks was at 20. Like my body was just responding to what you see.
Speaker 2 Of course.
Speaker 1 And then I just feel like personality always ratcheted up and then looks priority went down.
Speaker 1 And I think that was at a really nice, even keel for a long time. Long enough that I could at least look at a hot person with a repugnant personality and think that'd be tolerable for 40 minutes.
Speaker 2 Oh, I see. Okay.
Speaker 1 I can't even enjoy now.
Speaker 2 I'm turning into a woman. That's what I was literally just about to say.
Speaker 1 I feel like finally starting to understand. What's happening is you're becoming, you're
Speaker 2 the feminine side is coming out. Finally.
Speaker 1 I must be in Mizagoth. Terry menopause.
Speaker 1 Menopause.
Speaker 2 Yeah. Yeah, but that's how it feels.
Speaker 1 They introduce themselves, right? It's like, you know, the premise. There's like 10 couples or eight couples.
Speaker 2 They come in as a couple.
Speaker 1 It's the weakest premise imaginable, which is like, we want to make sure we can take our relationship to the next level. So we're going to see, we're going to really tempt each other.
Speaker 1 It's like, that's not what people looking to take their relationship to the next level do.
Speaker 1
Conventionally. Conventionally.
But anyway, so it's like you're sitting down. It's this weird mix of jealousy and then bravado of that they don't care.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 And then the temptresses and tempters come out. If that's the male of temp.
Speaker 2 Oh, they bring in new people.
Speaker 1 They break up the couples and the girls live in one house, the boys live in another house, and then they send in temptresses.
Speaker 1
And so, like, all these women come out and they're in, and they're in bathing suits. This whole thing is really fascinating.
Cause what is the line?
Speaker 1 Like, if you set it up, yeah, these are very vague lines.
Speaker 2 You mean like sex worker?
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 1 Like, you're hiring hot people to tempt other people, and then hopefully they'll hook up.
Speaker 1 it's very it's very blurry and do I mean I guess the temptresses
Speaker 2 Want to date it's not right the whole thing
Speaker 1 for being hot They're not
Speaker 1 It's not like they were like I need to find love and I'm looking for someone already in a committed relationship that's claiming they want to go
Speaker 1 So
Speaker 1 and you know, they're like these aren't real names.
Speaker 1 All right, I'm just making them it's like I'm Tiara and I put all the back up front like all these weird sayings and then they show their butt and stuff.
Speaker 1 They put all the back up front.
Speaker 2 That means they have a huge vagina.
Speaker 1 Well, no,
Speaker 1
I'm not mixing metaphors. I'm just saying words.
Anyways,
Speaker 1
they say these things. You know, this guy's like, I'm a chef, and I'm going to cook you hot.
You know, like all these, they got a one-line.
Speaker 1 Yeah. And I'm just like,
Speaker 1 you know, every time they say one of those things.
Speaker 2 Well, cores is so cringy. It's a bummer.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 1
It's a bummer. People, yeah, like you're already hot.
Yeah. And then have to say something hot on top of it.
Speaker 1
But I'm saying all this thing. I know 10 years ago, I would have, I would have maybe don't look right through most of that stuff.
Although the one I always loved was with Ryan Devlin. What was that?
Speaker 1 Are you the one?
Speaker 2 Yeah, we loved that.
Speaker 1 Because they really did want to fall in love.
Speaker 1
And be on TV. Yeah.
And be on TV. Yeah.
Yeah. But they were like, they thought they people were like bawling and stuff.
That's a bachelor. Yes.
Yeah.
Speaker 1
But like, here's hot models that are going to tempt you. Right.
I just don't know how I feel about it.
Speaker 1 Anyways, I gave that a shot and then I didn't.
Speaker 1
I didn't make it. Why did I bring that up? Just to tell you.
Oh, because we were talking about names.
Speaker 2 Yeah, names. And whose names? Whose name matches? Yeah.
Speaker 1 And did you, why did I think of.
Speaker 2 We talked about Brad Pipping hot.
Speaker 1 Yeah, hot.
Speaker 2
And that's it. That's how we got there.
Yeah, I mean, look,
Speaker 1 I used to be able to name like 10 actor, female actors that I was like
Speaker 1
coveted. Yeah.
And we're down to a couple. Really? Yeah.
Speaker 2 I mean, I'm saying really in like it's, I'm dying. No, no, really, like, I would assume that you don't have any anymore.
Speaker 1 Oh, like,
Speaker 1 like, why would I have a nenny? Like, when would there be a day where you go like, Brad, it's not hot.
Speaker 2
No, it's not that. It's just things do change.
Like, even for me, you know, today an article came out in GQ
Speaker 2 about my boyfriend, one of my original boyfriends, Ben.
Speaker 1 Ben. Okay.
Speaker 2 And, you know, my friend said, you have to read this article about Ben. And I was like, it's a must read.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 2 And actually, she said, I know you're more of a Mac girl, but you have to read this. And then I got like old defensive, right? I was like, it's not one or the other.
Speaker 1 They're the same. Yeah.
Speaker 2 But I know.
Speaker 2 at some point in my life, the idea that there was like new info about Ben or that he would have participated in thing and i and i i would have been i would have been so excited i would have read it immediately i would have canceled all my plans yes yes of course and i was like oh i gotta read that like it like felt like
Speaker 1 similar
Speaker 2 i loved it oh you did yeah it was it's really good what makes it so good he's very open in it oh like to what degree um
Speaker 2 well i also give a lot of credit to the interviewer he's not going for low-hanging fruit.
Speaker 1 Right. Like every interviewer.
Speaker 2 Exactly. And so in
Speaker 2 doing that, Ben says a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1
Right, because he's not on the defense. Exactly.
Exactly.
Speaker 2 And I mean, he's just
Speaker 2 a lot of things. He talks about,
Speaker 1 I mean,
Speaker 2 I mean, there's nothing like majorly juicy, but he does talk about
Speaker 2 his
Speaker 2 relationship with Jen.
Speaker 2
Lopez. And he's basically like, yeah, everyone wants like a juicy headline.
He's like, it's just,
Speaker 2
it'd be so boring if you knew the details. It's just a relationship.
It's just like she has things, I have things, and it ultimately doesn't work.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 2 He's very like reflective of this thing about him that like people love to watch him spill coffee on the street.
Speaker 2 And he said, I could have been more strategic.
Speaker 2
I should be more strategic. I shouldn't like go out and get the mail or go out in crappy clothes.
I know people are going to do a thing, but I just don't get, I don't give a fuck.
Speaker 1 Okay. And I liked that.
Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah. And then, and he said, when he looks back, I'm so grateful I'm not him.
Speaker 2 I know.
Speaker 1 I am so grateful.
Speaker 2 It's so unfair.
Speaker 1
Every now and then I see photos of me from out in front of my house. I'm like, oh, they sit there.
You know, that's. They sit there.
Speaker 1 That's a bummer, but it's not like if I go to the store, there's ever.
Speaker 2 And that people are waiting for you to do something very silly. Yes.
Speaker 1 And by the way, just make it through an entire walk to Starbucks from your car without looking goofy at one point.
Speaker 2 Exactly. Exactly.
Speaker 2 And
Speaker 2 he talks about his kids because he has this production company with Mad, and the reason they started that is so he could be at home. He can be with the kids when they get off the bus.
Speaker 2
And he missed a lot of chunks. He said he missed a lot of chunks and he regrets that and he doesn't like that.
And
Speaker 2
yeah, it was great. It was great.
I loved it. But also, I'll to say, like,
Speaker 1 your interest had waned a bit.
Speaker 2 Just my perimenopause is kicking in.
Speaker 1
Same. Yeah.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 It makes sense because I'm Indian.
Speaker 1 I'm a pediatrophy or something to stick out.
Speaker 2 I'm Indian and you're white, so we would be hitting it around the same time.
Speaker 1
Because I'm white. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 And I'm 12 years.
Speaker 1 You're 12 years old.
Speaker 2 Exactly. Exactly.
Speaker 1 Can I tell you the thing that really interested me about Turning Point? Yeah. Oh, wait.
Speaker 2
Can we do one more thing? Yes, of course. This is still sort of on subject.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 Hotness. So So I say that, right?
Speaker 1 Well, you were shocked that I have two still.
Speaker 2 Oh, yeah. Who are they?
Speaker 1 I probably have more.
Speaker 1 You know, it was
Speaker 1
reinvigorated. I went and saw Black Bag.
I was just about to bring it up. You saw it? Yes.
Oh, my God. You know what's great? I went solely because I saw Fastbender was in it.
Speaker 1 I had like an afternoon off, and I went. I didn't know anything about it.
Speaker 2 Yep, me either.
Speaker 1
I enjoyed it so much. Me too.
The score was so good. And I was angry at myself when I saw the the titles.
Like, oh, Soderberg directed it. Of course.
Speaker 1 And that's, of course, that's his signature kind of music and the style. I almost wanted to re-watch it again.
Speaker 2 Oh, you didn't know to the end it was him? Yes. Oh, that's why I saw it.
Speaker 1
I was like, it was almost a blessing because I was trying to figure out the tone of it quite a bit. If I knew it was Soderbergh, I knew it would be a lot more out of sight.
Playful. Yeah.
Speaker 1 And I was more like, oh, this is hardcore British espionage shit.
Speaker 1 But I loved it. But I was reminded how much I love Alicia Vickander.
Speaker 2 I didn't even realize it was her.
Speaker 1 When he's interviewing her and she's passing the polygraph and they're talking about her anal sphincter.
Speaker 2 I didn't even realize it was her, the whole movie. I completely just said that.
Speaker 1 Am I right on that,
Speaker 1 Rob? I'm looking. I don't know.
Speaker 1 That would be really embarrassing if I have the wrong movie.
Speaker 2 I mean, she looks like her now in retrospect.
Speaker 1 Did you like that actor?
Speaker 2 Yeah, she was great. But I.
Speaker 1 Fastbender? Who's your,
Speaker 2 it's crazy that you said it because what I was about to say is, you know, we're saying this lusty thing, but I saw a black bag and I thought it was so sexy.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 2 And he's so sexy in it.
Speaker 1 Which is interesting because he's so reserved.
Speaker 2 But it's like
Speaker 1 controlled.
Speaker 1 His level of control is hot, right?
Speaker 2 He loves her so much.
Speaker 1 He's just fucking he'll just betray his country for her.
Speaker 1 And she's so beautiful in it. Kate, Bland, Chad.
Speaker 2
Yes. And also, like, I'm really upset because her outfits are so cute in it.
And then I just want all all the outfits okay
Speaker 1 really bad okay yeah anyway I think that was her yeah
Speaker 1 I think we could probably I think well you're in front of a computer I she's not listed on the IMDb you just go to cast black bag well she's not listed there but it's not her the AI it's not her Marissa no way yep Marissa Abuela wait what does that not look like her it does look like her
Speaker 1 couple this girl is Marissa Abuela
Speaker 2 she's she was great oh my god oh great you can add her million yeah but you can add her to your list now although she's 28 oh that's a little dicey wow man i'm embarrassed this is actually why you're liking young people less because i do think whether you are conscious of it or not you know that you wouldn't really want to make that decision.
Speaker 1 Oh, I couldn't date any of these people. Is that not an abundant like? No, no, no.
Speaker 2 It is clear, but I think, think, I think when you're like watching Temptation Island and it's like,
Speaker 2
God, it's just like not doing it for me. I think it's because there's a subconscious streak now going through.
Like, as you've said before, there has to be some reality to your fantasy.
Speaker 1 Well, okay, well, let's back up for one second and just go like, societally, it's disgusting. To have, to be when you're 50 years old and you're dating a 25-year-old, I'm not here to judge.
Speaker 1 But I'm just saying, societally,
Speaker 1 it's embarrassing.
Speaker 1 If you're out at a fucking dinner with all your friends, your peers and they all have wives as peers, as I do,
Speaker 1 and you've brought a 20-year-old,
Speaker 1
that's fucking embarrassing. Yeah.
I'm not saying people shouldn't do it, or I'm just saying I would be embarrassed
Speaker 1 to be at a dinner with all 50-year-olds and I've brought my 20-year-old girlfriend. Yeah.
Speaker 2 So I think that's what's happening.
Speaker 1 Genetically, evolutionarily, no.
Speaker 1 There's no reason a man would ever stop seeing fertile women as attractive. That's just, that's, it would be my culture on top of it.
Speaker 2 Yeah, but your culture's a
Speaker 2 obviously we have also evolved out status. Like, status now doesn't just necessarily mean having as many kids as, like, you're done having kids, right? Yes.
Speaker 1 Like,
Speaker 2 physically, you are done having kids.
Speaker 1
Unless I got a reversal of my vasectomy. Right.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 So, so you have also told me.
Speaker 1 But my genetics doesn't know I got a vasectomy. I don't know.
Speaker 1 No, it doesn't. It can't take info in.
Speaker 2 But the whole point, the reason that we have those genetics is still for status. It's for spreading as your seed
Speaker 2 as wide as you can.
Speaker 1
Yeah, it's just to spread your seed. So genetically, I too am supposed to spread my seed.
That's the pole
Speaker 2 inside.
Speaker 1 Yeah. And then on top of my biology is culture that's affecting a bunch of my behaviors.
Speaker 2 Yeah.
Speaker 1 All I'm pointing out is that there is no
Speaker 1 mother nature rule that I would not be attracted to someone that's real.
Speaker 2 No, I'm not saying there's a mother nature rule, but I'm, but it's, it's still, culture's still subconscious. Culture's huge.
Speaker 1 Yes, it's totally subconscious.
Speaker 2 That's what I was saying. It's like, subconsciously, there is something in you that's like, that's not a reality anymore.
Speaker 1 Yeah. Well, I go to
Speaker 1 mine's very complicated. I go to, I can't talk to, what would I talk to this person about? How would I spend hours with this person? Yeah.
Speaker 1 I'm going to be talking about, you you know, the time Prince was dead in 1983. We all thought.
Speaker 2 You did talk about that recently. Yeah.
Speaker 1 I also continue to because that's what I grew up with. Anyways, man, but I see, I see folks my age just out
Speaker 1
doing it. I guess, I guess I, I don't know.
I want to say I applaud them, but I'm just like, I,
Speaker 1
we just have different levels. I guess it's, I guess it's a signal of confidence.
Seems like a signal of insecurity.
Speaker 2 Yours? When I see 50 plus year old actors with 20 year old actresses, it's either insecurity and they need this like
Speaker 2 woman to raise their status because they're beautiful.
Speaker 1 They want a reflection of themselves.
Speaker 2
Exactly. If this person likes me, then you guys should all like me.
Yeah. Right.
Which I can relate to that.
Speaker 1
In some cases, not all. In some cases, I think it could be.
evidence of a lack of emotional maturity from the male, which is like they've never gone past what relationships are in your 20s. Yeah.
Speaker 1 They don't want to.
Speaker 2 Yeah.
Speaker 1
And they want someone that also wants a three-year ordeal. Yeah.
And nothing more because that's the phase they're in.
Speaker 2
Yeah. They they don't want it to be that serious.
The older you get,
Speaker 2 most women want something a little more serious.
Speaker 2 So there's that.
Speaker 1 And I would imagine the percentage of three-year relationships in your 20s that turn into lifetime versus three-year relationships in your 30s that turn into lifetime.
Speaker 1 I think that's a dramatic difference. Probably, yes.
Speaker 2
I'm guessing. I would guess too.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 Anywho.
Speaker 1 Well, that was.
Speaker 1 Do you want to add any guys to your list? I know a lot of them. Idris Elba.
Speaker 1
The guy from. That's a random one to say.
The guy from Heist,
Speaker 1 Matt Ben,
Speaker 1 Sean Penn.
Speaker 2 Oh, see, this is why it's so
Speaker 1 funny.
Speaker 2 I know I'm sort of an outlier, like, or
Speaker 2 I've always liked older men.
Speaker 2 which is so opposite from
Speaker 1 men, you know?
Speaker 2 And I still do. I know from my female peers and friends that I, on the scale,
Speaker 2 are much more attracted to older men than
Speaker 2 they are.
Speaker 1 Do you have an explanation for that? Yeah. It's a maturity thing.
Speaker 2 No, I think because I spent
Speaker 2 so much of my young life feeling like I had to protect everyone in the family,
Speaker 2
I like the idea of not having to do that. Right.
And having a protector. Relax.
So in my head, the protector has to be older.
Speaker 1
Patriarchal a little bit. Yes.
Oh, okay. Interesting.
Because I was going to harken a guess
Speaker 1 that there's also some part of you,
Speaker 1 an insecure part.
Speaker 2 Sure, I'll dive a little bit.
Speaker 1
That says older men value personality more. Ooh.
Uh-oh. No.
Speaker 1 And young men are just looking for like whatever Instagram model to inflate their own status.
Speaker 2
No, because this is even when I was really young. Yeah, right.
Like when I was really young.
Speaker 2 Yeah, I didn't like I wasn't like, I mean, I guess I did like Leonardo DiCaprio and Titanic. I liked him, but I really liked David Boreanes.
Speaker 1 Okay.
Speaker 1 Wow. I don't know who that is, man.
Speaker 2
Angelon Buffy. Oh, okay.
And he was older, way older than me at the time.
Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 So I was still even then attracted to like an older thing.
Speaker 1 This is where it does get tricky. It's like, I trust you
Speaker 1 and your desires.
Speaker 2 Yeah.
Speaker 1 So if you want to date a 62-year-old man. Yeah.
Speaker 2 Well, we've talked about this. You don't want me to.
Speaker 1 I don't want you to. Yeah.
Speaker 1 But it's interesting that.
Speaker 1 Now, I have two conflicting ideas in my head, which is like, yeah, you should be able to be with a 62-year-old man.
Speaker 1 And then kind of the inverse of that is like, i have to be able to not be judgmental of the 62 year old man that's with you right but you are
Speaker 1 and i get it yeah although there is a threshold but i bet it's kind of just because i'm 50. so to me a threshold is around 35.
Speaker 1 yeah god that's so sad but true like right i don't mind a 50 year old dating a 35 year old No, me either. Yeah.
Speaker 2 I don't mind a 60 year old dating a 35 year old. I know we are a little
Speaker 2 different on this on this page.
Speaker 3 Ted. And again,
Speaker 1 I don't give a fuck. I just have questions.
Speaker 2 Well, I don't have that many questions. It's like if the 60-year-old is finally at the point in his life where he is ready to have some fun and travel,
Speaker 2 settle down. I mean, there is something about feeling
Speaker 2 being with a young person that makes you feel youthful and energized and not like your age. But also, I think a 60-year-old, some of these six-year-old men who are
Speaker 2 hot,
Speaker 2 like
Speaker 2
have had all these women coming in and out of their life. They liked that.
And now they're like, oh, no, like I do wish I had someone to watch TV with. I don't.
Speaker 2 I guess I got to go to the people who do. And those are 35-year-olds.
Speaker 1 Who like to watch TV? Yeah.
Speaker 2 I love to watch TV. I watched all of adolescents this weekend.
Speaker 1 Great.
Speaker 2 Great show.
Speaker 1 Great show.
Speaker 2 Really intense,
Speaker 2 beautifully done,
Speaker 2
impressive. Holy shit.
That boy. New.
Brand new.
Speaker 1 Brand new. Talk about,
Speaker 1 for people who haven't seen it, we have mentioned it before, but all of it is in very long takes. I don't know if they bridged some together or not.
Speaker 2 It might have, but it's
Speaker 1 sold as a one. They apparently didn't.
Speaker 2 So for people who don't know, although I do think we said it, but just in case, it's the story of a boy who's accused of murdering a year old boy who's accused of murdering a girl that age yes and um it's four episodes they're hour-longs they're wonders um and it's really heartbreaking it's intense
Speaker 2 but like intense in the
Speaker 2 reality of life
Speaker 1 stay tuned for more armchair expert
Speaker 1 if you dare
Speaker 1 we're supported by skims You know what, Monica? I have to talk to you about these Skims pajamas they sent us.
Speaker 2 Yes, I was literally just thinking about how much I love mine. I think I've worn them every night since we got them.
Speaker 1 Oh, yeah, I barely was able to get out of mine to come in today. So I've always been that guy who just sleeps in whatever, random t-shirt, you know, old shorts.
Speaker 1
These skims jammies, first of all, they're in the pattern I love. They're in the checkered red and black.
Yes. And then the fabric is just snuggling me all night long.
Speaker 2
It's such a good product. And also for the women's ones, the one I have is so cute.
I like after my shower, my routine, to get into a cute pair of pajamas.
Speaker 2 And I feel like my sleep is improved when I'm wearing cutes.
Speaker 1 Eventize it.
Speaker 2 You eventize it. That's right.
Speaker 1 And honestly, I feel more put together wearing matching pajamas instead of my usual mismatch situation.
Speaker 2
The timing couldn't be better either because it's holiday season. And honestly, these would make incredible gifts.
They have options for women, men, kids, and even pets. That's so cute.
Speaker 2 Who doesn't want to feel this comfortable sleeping?
Speaker 1
Shop the best pajamas at skims.com. After you place your order, be sure to let them know we sent you.
Select podcast in the survey, and be sure to select our show in the drop-down menu that follows.
Speaker 1 And if you're looking for the perfect gifts for everyone on your list, the skims holiday shop is now open at skims.com.
Speaker 1
I certainly don't want to redebate this. I did want to just point out post-R debate about men and women that we had recently.
Okay.
Speaker 1 And in reading comments, I noticed there's a total lack of compassion for young men
Speaker 1 and particularly young white men.
Speaker 1 Totally get it. It's so well-grounded.
Speaker 1
White men have been in power. They've had all the power and all the opportunity.
So I'm asking you to feel bad for the group who's had all the power and all the opportunity and held all the wealth.
Speaker 1 But what occurred to me, and I think it's a distinction people need to make in their mind: the 12-year-old wasn't a CEO of a company.
Speaker 1
He was not the patriarchy. He did not have the power.
I agree. I think we graft on the sins of previous generations under these young boys who are like 10 years old.
They just arrived.
Speaker 1 They don't have any status or power or control. And you got to make the distinction in your head if you hope to have any compassion for this group, that is by all metrics struggling.
Speaker 2 I think anyone who's really thinking about it does recognize.
Speaker 1 And for 30 and above, go ahead and keep feeling that way. I don't mind that you think, oh, poor white men that are 30 and above.
Speaker 2 Right. But I think most people who
Speaker 2 know what's going on do have compassion. And even if you don't have compassion,
Speaker 2
you have to have some fear and some level of like, this is a huge problem that has to, we have to look at it. It's a tinderbox.
It is, it is.
Speaker 2 But I guess what's like the show depicts in, I think, a great way is the outside influence on a lot of these boys.
Speaker 2 It gets into incel culture, which it was funny because I was like, I don't know so much about that. Like, I don't know barely anything.
Speaker 2 They were, they're explaining a lot of stuff that I was like, oh my God.
Speaker 1 My understanding of incel was like, it's a very fringe part of the internet where these guys who are like, I'm never going to have sex. And then they hate women.
Speaker 1
And then I saw this clip that went around, which is incredible. It was one of the very popular vlogging incel guys saying it was gay to have sex with women.
I mean, that's all fucking twisted. Yeah.
Speaker 1 But.
Speaker 1 I didn't realize it was like super common knowledge among young people, or at least in England, if this shows to be believed.
Speaker 2
Yeah. And there's a whole culture around it.
There's emojis that mean things.
Speaker 2 And it's a whole, and there's this like 80-20 rule where 80% of the women, it's part of like what incels say, which is, I think, true.
Speaker 1 On social media, or rather, on dating maps, yeah.
Speaker 2 Yeah, that 80% of women are interested in 20% of men. But then they take it to this level that's so because of that, we have to hurt them.
Speaker 2
I just think it's like the least thought-out fucking thing in the world to be like, so the answer to that is like hurt them and kill them. That means that 0% of you, but that doesn't have to be.
Like,
Speaker 2 the reason is because a woman will be with a man who's not like that like the it's like it's dragging all these boys in to increase the chance that that will happen well they're yeah they have to figure out what the 20 on dating apps are doing and replicate it right again because the college uh graduation rates are dropping and if you got to be a college grad to get that 20%.
Speaker 1 I mean, hopefully that'll just incentivize these dudes to go to college. They got to figure out what are the things
Speaker 1 and go get those things so they can get those mates. Also, I would hope women will start dating laterally.
Speaker 1 If that's the real dynamic on planet Earth, is that 80% of women are getting plowed by the same 20% of dudes? Like, that's not advantageous to them either.
Speaker 1 It's not good for women to all be fighting over 20% of the population.
Speaker 2
Well, I think what's really happening is that women go dormant and they don't. Yeah, they're like, I don't need that.
Yeah.
Speaker 2
And the unfortunate reality is that's more and more true. Yeah.
Yeah. And I don't, I mean, I'm not saying that's good, but it is more true that like you can.
Speaker 1 Well, yeah, you can be an independent
Speaker 2 and live like a happy, good life. That's the,
Speaker 2 but I would say most women.
Speaker 1 I don't think boys are as capable of I agree.
Speaker 2 And so I think most women
Speaker 1 would prefer to be in a partnership, a good partnership,
Speaker 2 than be alone. But also, I think what's starting to happen, obviously, I can fully
Speaker 2 attest to this.
Speaker 2
We're also not going to be in a partnership that isn't equal, like that isn't good. Uh-huh.
It's preferred to be single.
Speaker 1
I would say both are going to suffer. Yeah.
I think people should do what they've always done and form partnerships and that are healthy though. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 You know, like that's the whole thing. I don't want anyone to be in a bad relationship, but I want everyone to have a partner and
Speaker 1 feel fulfilled and have children and keep the population.
Speaker 1 Yeah.
Speaker 2
I agree. I agree.
I just think it's getting,
Speaker 2
it's, it's getting harder. Like, it just is.
It's for everyone.
Speaker 1 I just think way more people are losing now than ever have.
Speaker 2 Yeah. But even.
Speaker 1 Because these 20% of dudes,
Speaker 1 you think any of them are settling down? If they have access to 80% of all women,
Speaker 1
that's fucked for them. It's not good for them.
Yeah.
Speaker 1
It's certainly not good for the 80% of boys that are left out. Right.
It's not good for the 80% of women trying to go after 20% of men.
Speaker 1 I guess the only people that are maybe thriving are the 20 of women who are with the, I don't know, I don't fucking know.
Speaker 2 It seems, it seems, I don't know, but we also like, there's also the reality at play here, even though we're saying we're saying this 80/20 rule, but there is a real truth.
Speaker 2 We've talked about it on here all the time. I see it everywhere that men are not that attracted to
Speaker 2 highly independent, accomplished women. Most men.
Speaker 2 They're threatened by it and it's uncomfortable.
Speaker 1 I think they're all attracted to it. I think they don't know how to handle it when they get it.
Speaker 2 I also think a part of it is like
Speaker 2 for many men, and I don't know, I think they think there's something masculine about it.
Speaker 1
Oh. Like that they.
Or maybe for some, yeah.
Speaker 2 There's like a role reversal they don't like. They don't like the idea that they're like.
Speaker 2 Exactly. So that's not attractive.
Speaker 2 I mean, I just, there's so many women I know that are single and like beautiful and thriving and real catches yeah yeah and they cannot and they are dating like they are out there they are dating and it is not working it's not good i guess what's interesting to think of is i have two daughters that will date and what what do i want for them well yeah
Speaker 2 i also think knowing you you definitely want them to be with an equal partner.
Speaker 1 Oh, yeah.
Speaker 2 Yeah. They deserve that.
Speaker 1 Yeah. I want them to be with an ambitious go-getter protector
Speaker 1 who's confident
Speaker 1
and will let them shine. Yeah.
And if they don't, I'll fucking break their necks.
Speaker 2
So right there is the reason that's 20% of men. That's the whole thing.
Like the expectation you have for your daughters is the expectation at this point that most
Speaker 2 Not most, but a lot of women have for themselves.
Speaker 1 If one of my daughters dated a dude who wasn't ambitious,
Speaker 1
who wanted to keep a really clean house and be a super involved dad. And was nice and I wouldn't be like, you shouldn't be with that guy.
He's not a man.
Speaker 2
I think a lot of women would be fine with that if they had their own thing going on. This is where we get into some weird sort of tricky dynamics.
We had people write indistinct about this a lot.
Speaker 2 And there'd be like some tricky dynamics then because they'd come home.
Speaker 2 And like in a reverse traditional situation, if it was a wife at home, a woman at home, home, they would be required to like keep up the house and do the grocery shopping and do this and do this.
Speaker 2 But a lot of men now, maybe this will change. And I actually think that's going to be the answer, right?
Speaker 1 Is all these anyone who grew up is watching a dad do that right now? They're on like they're on third base.
Speaker 2
Exactly, exactly. And there's no shame around it, or like, I'm not a man.
And I think, but a lot of a certain generation of men, I think
Speaker 2 my generation may be the last one, right? Where it's like
Speaker 2 they don't want to run a house. Right.
Speaker 2 So, and that feels emasculating and things like that. So, this is where the whole like not being within ambition,
Speaker 2 not being within ambitious women, it just is tricky. Yeah.
Speaker 1 Now, let me ask you this. This is a dangerous one, but
Speaker 1 do you think we can bump up against the limits of our biology at some point? Like, society evolves, culture evolves. Yeah.
Speaker 1 But I do wonder at like what point do you bump up against just how much culture can override biology?
Speaker 2 I actually think culture can override it quite a bit over a long period of time. I don't think it's fast, but I think.
Speaker 1 But I think if you plotted you and I in this spectrum, I think we have different like inflection points of where that would be, I think.
Speaker 2 Yeah, probably. Even where this all started, where
Speaker 2 I think the culture has seeped in enough for like you to be,
Speaker 2 you would be embarrassed to do something that
Speaker 2
we weren't meant to do. Yes.
That
Speaker 2 that's an indicator enough for me that like over time,
Speaker 2
things do change and then modeling changes. So, like, what your kids have seen is going to be different than their kids.
You know, it's just, it's overall going to shift.
Speaker 1
We're highly flexible and adaptable. So, maybe it'll work.
That's true. Also, we could see it fall off a cliff and go, oh.
Speaker 2 We'll be dead by then. I think it's all right.
Speaker 2
Okay, a couple facts. Just a couple.
Hot dog DNA.
Speaker 1 Ah, tell me.
Speaker 2 Yeah, hot dog DNA. I've asked a lot of people this question that me and you had about would you rather eat someone's hair, eat their skin, or eat their
Speaker 2
butt, no, eat their skin, hair, saliva. Saliva, exactly.
Well, the whole thing is...
Speaker 2 No, not all hot dogs contain human DNA, but a 2015 study by Clear Labs found human DNA in 2% of the hot dog and sausage samples they tested, with two-thirds of those samples being vegetarian.
Speaker 2 I mean, it's really not that much.
Speaker 2 But then it just, it just made us ask the question, what would you rather have of those three? And I've been asking a lot of people.
Speaker 1 Oh, what's the consensus?
Speaker 2 Everyone's all over the place.
Speaker 1
Skin, saliva, and hair. Those are the options.
We think that's what's getting into the hot dogs.
Speaker 1 I say saliva.
Speaker 2 Yeah, you said saliva. You'd most likely, you'd most rather have saliva.
Speaker 1
You don't have to chew that. You're not going to feel that in your mouth.
Right. It's best to not even know you had the DNA go through.
Speaker 2
Yeah. And I get, and like, I think a lot of people said saliva.
You say hair. I do.
And that is controversial. No one's agreed with me.
Speaker 1
What if it's a pubic hair? No. No.
Okay. Nope.
So human.
Speaker 2 It's going to be a head hair.
Speaker 1 Okay.
Speaker 1 Which is probably dirtier than pubic hair.
Speaker 2
No, no, I don't think so. I don't know.
I, oh my God.
Speaker 1 Not an ass hair. Or arm hair? Mon's pubis hair arm's fine or arm arm
Speaker 2 arm hair is fine yeah i prefer that over head hair yeah me too thinner yeah tiny much thinner but the reason i say that i think it's out of self-defense it's because my hair is all over the place and i think it's true that if you know me you've eaten my hair yeah like to know me means you've eaten my hair unquestionably yeah yeah undoubtedly so i don't want to be gross so I guess I'm kind of like, I'm lobbying that hair eating is fine.
Speaker 1 What are people saying? They're saying slip and no?
Speaker 2 Yeah, a lot of people say someone said skin, which was shocking to me. That's the worst.
Speaker 1 Well, I think I would say skin. No.
Speaker 1 When you're talking skin in a hot dog, it's going to be like flakes.
Speaker 2 No, we're talking. Okay, this week is a little bit more.
Speaker 1 It's like a finger.
Speaker 2 Yeah. No, not the whole finger.
Speaker 1 Well, yeah, that's gross. A chunk of the skin.
Speaker 1 He does make a good point that a tiny chunk of skin, again, would feel like the texture of the hot dog and you largely wouldn't know yeah you wouldn't know i gotta put hair last because you go oh and then you're trying to get coming yeah i know i know
Speaker 2 i know nobody likes that but the reason is we've all done it what if it's like three feet of hair and i'm like
Speaker 2
well this is the other thing often your hair is three feet long no two and a half It's really long. Yeah.
The other thing is if there is a hair in my food, which again has always happens a lot. Yeah.
Speaker 2
I am always like, it's probably mine. I immediately say to myself, it's probably mine.
And then I don't look at the color and I don't think about it.
Speaker 1 And I don't have that luxury. Why? Because if I start pulling a hair that's longer than three inches out of my mouth, it's not mine.
Speaker 2 Well, it's not mine if it's this.
Speaker 1 Plus, it's my cardpoid hair, which can get up to nine, 12 inches.
Speaker 2 Could be yours.
Speaker 2
Yeah, look, I do think I'm in a rare group about hair. I can acknowledge that.
That's cool.
Speaker 1 We are punk rock.
Speaker 2 Okay, now the toothbrushing scene and bring it on.
Speaker 2 I'm just going play that.
Speaker 1 Okay.
Speaker 2 Okay, she's brushing her teeth.
Speaker 2 He's putting the paste on. Colgate, I think.
Speaker 2 Now he's brushing.
Speaker 2 They're like, it's kind of like neat cutie.
Speaker 2 Still going.
Speaker 1 Do we know why they're sharing a bathroom right now? No, I forget.
Speaker 2 Okay, he spit.
Speaker 3 Still brushing.
Speaker 1 Do you have any more volume you can give him?
Speaker 2 He spit again. Oh, wow.
Speaker 1 Okay. They're spitting and rebrushing.
Speaker 2
Now, I don't do this. I do it once.
Okay, spit, spit.
Speaker 2 They're also not. They don't have to take our lack.
Speaker 1 Oh, I don't know. That's dropshipped.
Speaker 1 Spit, spit.
Speaker 1 So it's kind of an aggressive back and forth. It's more of like a tit-for-tat, like a war.
Speaker 2 Anywho, well, that's that.
Speaker 1
Oh, well, thank you for those facts. You're welcome.
All right. I love you.
Love you.
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Speaker 4 Hey there, Armchairies.
Speaker 1 Guess what? It's Mel Robbins.
Speaker 4 I'm popping in here taking out my own ad. Holy cow, Dax, Monica, and I, I don't want this conversation to end and I'm so glad you're here with us.
Speaker 4
And the other thing, I can't believe, Dax loves the Let Them Theory. He can't stop talking about it.
I hope you're loving listening as much as I love having you here.
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Speaker 1 The Let Them Theory audiobook.
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Speaker 4
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I riff. I cry.
You're going to love it because it's going to feel like I'm right there next to you.
Speaker 4 We're in this together as we learn to stop controlling other people.
Speaker 4 So thanks again for listening to this episode of Armchair Expert and check out the audiobook version of the Let Them Theory, read by yours truly. Available now on Audible.
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