Emmy Rossum

0:00Legally, we can't say drinking Storm makes you smarter and more focused. But with zero sugar, 200 milligrams of caffeine, and immunity support, you're smarter and more focused for drinking Storm. Storm. Good energy in, good energy out. Energy for life. How old were you when you started performing at the opera? Seven. How would you feel if any of your kids... Yeah. Well, Emmy, welcome to One Night Stand. Thank you. We're so thrilled to have you here. Me too. Have you always been a big reader? I resisted reading as a child. Did you? I was a late reader. Me too in a way, yeah. Really? What age? Well, maybe that's not true.

0:35I read a lot like... Can't wait to hear like, I was reading at 18 months. I was very resistant at 12 months. I don't know if I... I basically just stopped as a teenager. You did? Yeah, and then got back into it as an adult. But anyway, carry on. That's so interesting. I don't think I really wanted to read until second or third grade. I think I was the youngest in my class going into... I turned five on the first day of kindergarten. So everyone was somewhere almost 10 or 11 or almost 12 months older than me. And so I think the idea that people were learning to read more rapidly than I was developmentally makes sense now, but certainly felt intimidating at the time.

1:19So I felt an internal resistance to doing things that were hard or that I might not be good at. Virgo reform reformed reforming perfectionist but I really loved reading and writing by the time I was nine ten eleven um loved children's books and and then of course reading is a huge part of my job too reading being analytical um but of course most of what I read is in script or play form and I don't have to explain this now because so many people know what that aesthetically looks like but it's quite white on the page it's quite blank and empty and there's lots of spaces to fill in so so much of my job is filling in the blanks in the big white piece of paper around the dialogue and around the stage direction and so I love to read a book because it fills in so much of the work that I generally have to do to create the kind of edges and the girth of the character.

2:25And so I love to lose myself in a book. And do you look for do you read looking for IP to develop or not? Sure. Yeah. Yes. Always. And also sometimes not. And I really don't like digital reading. There's something about it that doesn't quite stick in my brain. Yeah. I don't mind an audiobook but I prefer the kind of way I can imagine my way into the space of what the character's voice sounds like in my imagination I also like to leave room for happy accidents and mistakes like I was a huge Harry Potter fan and I thought that the female character's name was Hermione I did too you did not I swear to god and I was literally thinking about telling that story just like 20 seconds ago and you first said that i thought it was her my only and then when they adapted it i was like hermione no well i i saw like the trailer for the movie and i remember she's like i'm hermione and i was like oh that does sound so much better i thought i but i for years and i was like first online at barnes and noble like i was ready for the new books i've always really liked fantasy i love house of dragon like i love fantasy tv shows too i don't think i really made any anime maybe but not really like you know wizards and dragons there's still time there's still time yeah but I I have always loved kind of book series and um I've always loved a book too that has kind of a singular POV and a singular voice where I get to spend a couple hundred pages really inhabiting um less plot but um the voice of the person and really understanding how small things in their world can shape them or change them.

4:15I agree. Agents are kind of definitely pushing writers away from that, I think, based on what I taught. The sort of guidance that a lot of my friends who are writers get now from editors and agents is that people like multi-perspective novels. But I'm with you. I like sinking into one person's world and like seeing it. Sure. I think it depends as a producer when you're thinking about developing IP, finding IP and building it out, it is helpful if there are multiple storylines. It makes it bigger. It makes it, it's very helpful if there's a propulsive engine. Reverse engineering that is quite difficult sometimes.

4:54But I think the core of what we come back to isn't necessarily the stickiness of the idea or the plot, but the characters and the way that we see ourselves in them. And certainly when I'm looking for IP to develop, I'm looking for a character that is challenging or an idea, a central question that is challenging something in me that starts to feel challenged or uncomfortable or just scratches some part of my brain that I can't quite put away. Yeah, I love that. I also think the easiest elevator pitch is sometimes the answer. when something is really easy to explain and really sticky and will prompt a conversation yeah that is generally the thing that gets made totally well I think one of the first books that we're going to talk about today has such a great elevator pitch which is Half His Age by Jeanette McCarty yeah which is we had Jeanette on um when she was bringing out the book and it's it's it's so incredible but tell me what you loved about this book I found this book online I have never read her first book, which I know had a lot of heat around it.

6:08And I was intrigued by the intensity of the character's journey. So I bought the book. I'm usually buying books. I'm usually finding books at my local library, actually, or my local bookstore. but this one I happened to find online. I think I read a review of it or some comments about it. I'm always interested also in other creatives. Obviously, Jeanette is an actress and a director and now a writer. I'm very interested in people who find their way into their voice in other ways. And so I couldn't put this book down. I think I read it in about a day. I loved that the central figure Waldo is this 17-year-old girl who's living in Anchorage, Alaska, which Alaska has a special place in my heart because I vacationed for a month there when I was seven with my mom.

7:10Oh, wow. We're just like backpacking around and catching our own dinner and trying to evade bears, actually. and Alaska is in itself very kind of isolated and remote place and kind of a beautiful wilderness in many ways which actually reminds me a lot of this lead character who is so lonely and isolated and her dad seemingly MIA her mom is more interested in kind of how her own dating successes might be able to save them rather than being a mom. And inside the character is insecure and scared and lonely and a ball of desire and yearning to create and to connect. And it starts in a very familiar way with her English teacher taking an interest in her talent initially which kind of sets her on fire and then she becomes totally obsessed with him and pursues a romantic and sexual relationship with him Mr.

8:16Corgi who's 40 and married and I suppose I was really taken by the way that someone believing in you creatively can change your life it becomes very complicated for the two of them but I was really taken by the way that the character seems confused as to whether she actually wants this or just wants to be wanted. Yeah. Which is very relatable when you're 17. And so lonely. Yeah, exactly. And confused. Yeah. And looking for sort of, well, she's looking for a way out, isn't she? And I think she thinks maybe he's it. and then I loved the ending because I and one of the questions I asked Jeanette was like you know how do you think her life goes after and she's like I do not believe this is a tragedy that will define her and about you know this relationship with her teacher and I think this end scene of how she leaves it does feel kind of like she's realized she's her own way out in a way and she's sort of like backing herself can't rely on her mom yeah she can't and so she's like it felt inspiring to me yeah i yeah because she doesn't get on the plane to hawaii right yeah i mean it's weird because she gets what she wants yeah she gets him she wins him yeah and then the more time she actually spends with him the more she becomes kind of disgusted by the things that she thought were so interesting about him totally and i was also kind of wondering if he who is kind of like a failed creative himself was also kind of like can never quite get his book off the ground some people he seems quite stalled and almost like in this misguided attempt to think well maybe this could do something to my creativity it's like leeching onto her disgusting yeah like a host body yeah it's really shocking yeah um and the bit where they're there at the hotel together it's like so disturbing i know i know um and i just thought it was so well written i know and it really felt like that messy 17 year old i don't know what i want so i'm gonna put on a lot of eyeliner and order some cheap clothes that make me look hot and i'm gonna figure my life out and you're like no totally i know and she writes the like the mundane character of suburbia and like I think so well and like they're like dingy hotel they're like the apartments that she's the the richer friend who's like taking pity on her I don't know I just think it's all so well crafted yeah and she's so desirous of stuff in her life to fill the void when he's not texting her back she's like shopping online and those kind of impulses that satisfy our kind of yearning and our loneliness that fill that moment for us feel so tragically familiar was there anyone early in your career who you felt really saw your creativity or talent and in a way that helped you or hindered you in any way hey it's christy from lululemon i'm here at the office and we just dropped some really fun new summer colors in the flow y styles if you're like me you've loved the flow y tank and bra for years and as of this year it also comes in a dress and a crop tank these are made in our buttery soft nulu fabric and my favorite part is the built-in bra it makes it super easy to wear for yoga or honestly as an everyday basic you can find flow y styles in store or online at lululemon.com

12:00both I'm sure yeah yeah and sometimes it's people that I mean I had a lot of coaches early on that were rigorous and hard on me and that definitely helped shape my internal engine but also I believe now that there can be a lot there's a lot of fun to be had and that in taking things less seriously there is room for surprise and freedom and that I think the best moments in scenes or the ones that I experience the most joy in are the ones where surprising things happen, where there is a lack of control. Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting. I think when I think about younger sort of like mentors early in my career or people who helped me when I was at school or something, I think the thing that it took me a while to realize is that you can like take the affirmation from it and you can take this sort of like supportiveness, but you don't have to follow the path that they have suggested you follow with that talent that they've said you have like I think when I was younger I was definitely pushed to like oh you're a bright kid and you know you could make money so you're going to be a lawyer right or you're going to be a banker and that idea that it was like oh I can choose what I want to do I don't have to like follow the path that someone has like decided is the right one for um your talents or whatever certainly and I think part of growing up is finding your own way exactly about things is and trying lots of different things.

13:45I had a full goth phase when I was like about 14 years old. Oh, yeah. I love that. Very like Wednesday Addams summer. And I think it only lasted a summer. But I was very into it and very committed to that being my identity forever. That didn't last. But yeah, I think it is important to find yourself. And sometimes the ways in which our teachers initially believe in us as the next generation of what they created is is inspiring and energizing and ultimately sometimes um limiting of our full capabilities exactly yeah i think that's exactly it and you sort of have to especially if you're a people pleaser or you like like to be given the pat on the shoulder and say good job i found i love that exactly exactly exactly so that idea of being like you're not going to be happy with what I'm deciding now but I feel like it's the right thing for me is I think something hard yeah totally you really just have to do it I'm proud of us I know we made it we made it and then one of the other things that I sort of like loved about this book is that you know and I think she speaks about this explicitly she sort of wanted to resist any kind of moral framework that felt too rigid um and too sort of binary or like the terms of the equation were like sort of set out at the beginning and we're just going to follow that course are you drawn to art like that that has that sort of flexibility because it reminded me a little bit when I was watching the first few episodes of furious and you're sort of I I love the way that in those first few episodes you're you're like oh well how much do I dislike this serial killer she's killing these bad men and then the stuff with the daughter in episode two and you're a bit like okay I'm getting uncomfortable now I don't know it's that sort of moral ambiguity is always so interesting to me but I'm curious what your take is on that I think those are the most interesting characters um in my life I would like to think I'm a moral person um at least I try to be I think we all do try to be the best versions of ourselves even when we come up short but I think yeah the juiciest characters and certainly the two female leads here are kind of two sides of the same coin.

16:04I think both women have been victims of violence. Both are looking for justice and you could argue one's looking for vengeance in kind of unorthodox ways. Both are very underestimated by society and And therefore have to and are able to work outside the normal lines of morality in the gray area. And so I think that you see that it's funny reading the scripts. I was like, am I really identifying with this serial killer right now? Am I like hoping she kills all these people? Yeah. And really, I think that that is also kudos to Lola Pettigrew's performance, which is so embodied and so brave and so raw and charming and vulnerable that we can connect with a killer in that way and want to get to the bottom of what happened to them and why they're picking these people to kill.

17:09And similarly with Alice, somebody who my character who's working at the FBI newly and was a detective at the NYPD who left because of a toxic and ultimately abusive relationship she found herself in with another officer. I think you see that she is, you know, head down, very focused at work, very, very internally driven, obsessive about her work. And also that there are problems that she's ignoring about getting justice of what's happened to her personally that's starting to affect her in every way. We see that she's kind of unable to shower. people say that she smells which is kind of a funny thing for a character that you're watching because you can't experience that as the viewer so we have to kind of explain it to you in a lot of different ways um and something that's quite shameful to smell in society and i thought that that was so brave that liz merriweather our incredible writer are is giving these women these kind of unforgivable traits yes um and i find that quite um quite delicious yeah and then humanizing them as well in a way that makes you sort of understand their motivations in a way and empathize with their motivations yeah and ultimately be challenged by them I mean for me reading the the first episode we know that Alice has some trauma in her past just by her vibe and her way of going about the world and how kind of closed off she is and because we're told that and we see also that she's swiping and calling these guys over to her house to fight her yes seemingly under the guise to have sex but then she really just wants to fight and we see that that is a confusing turn on for her somebody who has had abuse in her past yeah and so when you read that in a script you know you read it and you're terrified of playing the scene what are we saying what does it mean and the more that I thought about it and my own fear of the scene the more you have to run towards the fire I think ultimately because I think that for Alice that kind of fear and desire and history and connection in the relationship she had are kind of all interwoven together with a sense of intensity and violence and also for a lot of people in high performing high stress jobs where vulnerability is not um an asset not only is it not an asset but it could be um dangerous yeah in your job you're so kind of cut off from any softness or connection to yourself in order to perform in order to go out into the street in order to find a killer yeah um that i think she really needs that level of intensity to feel anything totally yeah because she's had to the only way you can get through it is by numbing some of the other parts yeah yeah it's brilliant I mean I was fascinated and I yeah the so on the sort of edge of my seat and watching it and yeah that's sort of you sort of want to unpick the threads on both sides it's fascinating yeah I thought that way when I was reading it as well juicy um well next I thought we could talk about we are too many a memoir uh kind of by Hannah Pittard tell me what you love about this book I found Hannah's first book.

20:25Oh, no. This is Hannah's first book. I found Hannah's more recent book at my library. Right when you walk in, they have a wall with the librarian's picks every month. And this one, for whatever reason, the cover caught my eye because it's bright blue and it just had text on it that said, I think the title is, If You Love It, Let It Kill You. And so I read this book and I generally will give a book the first five pages to see if I really like the voice. and then I'll either read the whole thing or I won't ever read it again. And this book got me immediately. I loved her voice so much I blew through the book right away.

21:01And then I wanted to go back and read the first book, which is We Are Too Many, a memoir kind of. I love this book because it kind of reads like a play. It's quite sparse in its scenes. And it's set up as a series of conversations between really the core three people are a version of Hannah, the author herself, a version of her former husband, and a version of her former best friend. And her marriage, which ended because of the affair between her former husband and her former best friend. And it's told nonlinearly. So you're kind of dropping into different versions of conversations, both remembered and imagined, and also getting to know a little bit about her family, a little bit about how she views herself and her body, and how her relationship between her husband and her best friend might have helped negatively shape her own self-opinion over the last decade.

22:04Yes. And they're all also creatives and writers as well. So their voices are kind of bright and very distinct. And I thought this book was laugh out loud funny, moving, very vulnerable. I like the absurdity of life. And I definitely got it from this book. Yeah. One of the things I think she talks about this in the introduction is the challenge of like, who gets to own a memory and who like, and I think one of the parts I wrote down, she's she asked the question, is there a legitimate way to own a recollection, which I think is such a fraught concept. And I think has always been a fraught concept, like through history, but especially in in our current climate, where anyone can document everything and put it online and say something online.

23:02And I wonder how you reckon with that as someone who's like a public figure and who people like offer recollections or stories about and whether like how you sort of connect with your own truth and whether that ever feels difficult. Because I think she does such a good job of just sort of saying this is my version and sort of owning that and standing behind it. But I was curious. I don't think it's much different if you're a public figure than if you're not. Yeah. Because I imagine anybody's memories of that time, you know, Spencer Monshine pushed me off the, you know, playground swings and, you know, preschool is he probably has a different memory.

23:45I remember it that he said, you know, he said, what do you want to be when you grow up? This is my first boyfriend when I was three. And I said a doctor. And he said, girls can't be doctors, only nurses. And I was like, and then he pushed me off the bench. And I didn't break up with him. This is the beginning of my love life. No, but I think there are so many sides to every story. And I think that, I mean, what is time? Yeah. What is memory? Like, what is it? It's so funny because it's not unlike you wonder sometimes if you really have that memory of that birthday party or it's only because you've seen that picture in your family scrapbook of that moment.

24:34Like, do I really remember being in Alaska or is it just because that vacation was so well documented and the other ones in Florida weren't? Yeah. Yeah. Do I really remember? And also the amount of times you tell a story. Yeah. it becomes less something that you're remembering and more like a narrative that you're telling and something that you get better and better at telling. Yeah. Which is actually more like a performance of a story and less like a memory. Totally. And no less real in terms of the interaction of I just told you that story about Spencer and we had a real moment about it, but it was probably just as real as when I actually got pushed off the bench.

25:14You know what I mean? Totally. It's also like memories can be shared or they can be grown. I don't know. I think. Nebulous. Yeah. And also so much of what we do as actors, or at least my process is cannibalizing my own memories and also learning new things and reading things about other people, reading stories about other people, meeting with other people and learning about their life experiences. and then attaching those to myself as like memories by proxy so that they become a kind of adjacent part of myself so that I can have them to tell the story so I don't know who owns a memory yeah no one really I guess the moment in time in which it happened I'm not sure and it's funny when I recently had a like doctor's appointment that my mom came to me with and afterwards we were talking to my dad and she was like well she said this and I was like no she didn't she was like yeah she did she said that's like well we have a completely different recollection of this conversation two hours ago yeah and it's it's funny the way you hear different things and has that always been your process to try and like draw on memories and like for example when you did phantom or something like that quite young were you drawing on own experiences or different experiences well with that specifically the character is haunted by who she thinks is her dead father.

26:39I didn't have a father growing up. So the yearning for something missing was certainly kind of adjacent to a sadness that I had inside and a yearning that I had inside. But I also went and had an experience at the Spiritualist Society, a kind of seance that I went to to kind of see what that was like and had an experience there that was um interesting and surprising and certainly um helped uh give me a concrete memory of something as I was going into shooting that oh wow that's amazing so you were like you were you were 16 when you cast and 17 when you filmed yeah that's I mean that's very young and brave to be doing those things I was like let's go to a seance literally I was like getting drunk in the park I'm sure I was doing that like but you know when I wasn't shooting but but I think for me I always wanted I've always believed in homework I've always believed in assigning myself homework and that's always been what made me feel most prepared to go into a job so that when I I need to know enough so that I can suspend my own disbelief.

27:58I need to have enough lived experience or have met enough people who have had the lived experience. Like I clearly wasn't going to become an FBI agent in order to do this show. But I did train with former and current FBI agents and former and current NYPD detectives so that I could really understand what it was like on a cellular level. Yeah. Is the beef real between the FBI and NYPD? No comment. No comment. I love it. I love them both. Yeah. I love them both. No sides have been taken. Yeah, I love it. No, it's because I love that dynamic in it as well, because it is fascinating the way those organizations work together or against each other.

28:45Yeah, I also think that the female experience in both places is not dissimilar. I mean, women are not as many in law enforcement and certainly have a very different experience there in the boys club. So I think getting to also understand that from the inside and firsthand and also, you know, Liz Merriweather worked with a lot of agents and detectives. And we also had FBI and NYPD on set with us as advisors. so it's really helpful to in moments when you were wondering if there was an opportunity for a moment to have more nuance or depth to have that person there or to have that person you were able to call to kind of help underpin the reality of the moment for you I love the moment where you take the scissors and drop them into the bag that Marshall's holding because I'm like that's sort of all the vibes are going off um it was so good like I could stab you but I guess I'll put them in the bag put it in the evidence bag exactly um one of the things that I found myself wrestling with listen and I with with um Hannah's book is the sort of I couldn't decide whether I hated Trish or Patrick more they're like husband or the best friend and on some level I think I resented the best friend more and then I was like is that some like she was also always awful always she was always awful awful like awful the whole way through that one moment where she says to her, like years before she even marries Patrick, she says something like, you know, how would you describe your body or something?

30:23And Hannah says, like, tidy. And Trish mishears her and goes, tiny? This episode is supported by FX's The Shards, a seductive drama from executive producer Ryan Murphy. Set in 1980s Los Angeles, the series follows a group of glamorous, deeply entangled high school seniors drawn into a life of wealth, beauty, parties, and excess. At its center is Brett, whose reality begins to unravel when the arrival of a new student coincides with a series of mysterious murders. FX's The Shards premieres August 5th on FX and Hulu. I had to, like, I almost threw the book across the room. Yeah. Also, the way in which she always makes herself the central figure of her romantic relationships and seemingly tries to be so kind and like put herself in the middle it's not unlike a dynamic on the real housewives of rhode island this year one character was accused of trying to mediate and help things and really was really thought to be perceived as i don't have a side in this i promise thought to be more of an instigator than she was a mediator and so i think trish is a little bit of that dynamic that has been alleged and accused are you ever a house Wives person?

31:41I like to do my research and I recently did a film in Rhode Island and had to have a Rhode Island accent and energy and so part of my research was watching a lot of the Real Housewives of Rhode Island which I would love to say didn't become an obsession but I made it all the way through both reunions. Oh good for you. Thank you so much. I love that. I've never got into Housewives but I feel like I should at some point. It definitely would balance out the intellectualism i need to do i feel like it's part of the american experience i've just got to do it while i live i'll just i'll shoot you some clips you can enjoy great yeah give me the highlight reel um but no i felt i found myself right arranging at her and then i was like oh am i expecting more of women which i think i tend to like because with him i was like of course he's an asshole but um yeah i did find myself well she's diabolical yeah she literally calls her and is like i've met someone like i'm so in love i think i really do want to have babies with this person and then you find out she's talking about her best friend's husband yeah that's psychotic yeah no totally and she's like but i thought you'd be happy for me and you're like girl what yeah it's total crazy you should try and adapt this one it's it's a good one it would be a good one yeah because that would be such a yeah interesting because i mean imagine trying to do the moral two sides with trish i'd be like you know trying to it is being adapted oh it is it is being adapted It is.

33:04Okay. That's interesting. It is being adapted. Interesting. Would you? I am not in it yet. Yet. I am not in it yet. Yet. I love it. But I would be. Yeah. No, it's amazing. And it's so well done. And it is a sort of. Wait, did you say I would be Trish? No, no, no. I said like, I think you'd be brilliant. They're both great parts. They're both great parts. But also I think Trish would be so interesting because to the point of like even with the serial killer in Furious and with Lola's trying to make you empathize with her. How the fuck do you make someone empathize with Trish? I think the women who create the most chaos are sometimes the most insecure or damaged.

33:42Yeah, totally. And so even though we are so firmly rooted with Hannah's character, our whole, I mean, and Trish is the antagonist. Yeah. I certainly think that there's, you know, it's interesting, like, what's a memory? Yeah. I think it would be interesting to see it from, you know, and you do at moments get to see it from Trish and Patrick's perspective. Yeah. It's brilliant. I really enjoyed reading that one. Yeah. Well, next I thought we could talk about Blood Test, a comedy by Charles Baxter. Yes. Tell me what you love about this book. I found this book at my local bookstore. I love to go to the local bookstore.

34:18It's actually just right on the corner, the corner bookstore, quite literally called the corner bookstore. And ask them, I'll usually say I'm looking for a book that makes me feel this way. or I'm looking for a character that does something like this. And this was a book that the bookseller hadn't read, but someone else had read it and he had heard it was quite good. I think I said I'm looking for something really funny, but kind of dark and I like grounded absurdity. I think that was the prompt. He crushed it. He crushed it. I love the title too. And I love the fact that there's this mouse in a glass jar.

34:59And this, I think, is a really, this is one of those books that I think is the really easy 15 second elevator pitch, which is basically our lead character is a guy who is an insurance salesman. he his wife has left him for a kind of more macho carpenter guy and left him to take care of his two teen kids and he this guy doesn't have main character energy he's not gonna do anything unpredictable he's mr reliable he is just gonna live his life and nobody is ever gonna know about him. And one day he goes in for a routine checkup and is offered an add-on to his blood test. There's a new company, kind of a med tech company that is offering kind of a fate predictor.

35:54Let's figure out who you really are. And so he takes this blood test, even though he knows they couldn't possibly find anything interesting about him because he just is not that interesting of a guy. and in fact they call him and say not only are you very interesting but we're very concerned about you because you're actually going to be a violent criminal probably a murderer and so it kind of like really calls into question his identity who he thinks he is what he thinks he's capable of right after getting this blood test he goes to get shears pruning shears for his garden at his local hardware store and as he's checking out he's so kind of annoyed at having gotten this inaccurate diagnosis that he thinks you know what like if I'm such a criminal like I guess I'll just steal something and I'm sure I'll immediately get caught and then I'm not a criminal and he like slips something into his pocket and walks out of the store in addition to the shears that he does pay for and he gets away with it and so it kind of starts to kind of mess with his concept of himself, but also challenge the limitations he's accepted about his life.

37:08And the funniest moment comes kind of at the, maybe the midpoint of the book, when the new husband of his ex-wife has made a homophobic comment towards his son. and he's gonna show up at this guy's house and really set him straight and in the middle of this argument which ends up to be the ex the the new husband kind of like puffing out his chest and peacocking a bit and calling him a bunch of names too the new husband slips on a literal banana peel and falls down the stairs and ends up in a coma which has nothing to do with what our main character has done, he thinks. Yeah. But does he remember it correctly?

37:54And then he, in fact, gets a call from the genetics company saying, see, it's already happening. And so he's not sure if this is a scam or a fraud or if they're somehow going to profit off this. They then ultimately send him a loaded gun for his protection and then ultimately try to sell him a lawyer at half off, which he will eventually need. And it's kind of a wild, absurd, but grounded story about this guy who wonders if maybe he is capable of more, maybe even murder. Yeah. And I think in this day and age when we are as a society increasingly turning to tech companies to advise us, to help us, to guide us, to guide our decision making.

38:50I think we really have to think about free will. Yeah. And if this is more helpful or more harmful. yeah would you take a test like that if one existed I know I don't I don't think I would I don't know I don't think I want to know like if someone's like do you want to know the moment you're gonna like probably not probably not I don't think it's helpful probably not helpful I do think it's it's so interesting that theme of like I mean I think it's a theme running through a lot of these books of like nature versus nurture and the way that our environment shapes us and it really made me think of shameless which I think because that is such a theme right like the you know the environment that you know Fiona and the family come up in is so shapes who they are but also the world is already telling them that that's who they're all they're going to be and that sort of tension between the two things of like and and the difficulty of breaking out of a cycle that society has told you is predictive of where you're going to end up it's really really hard and that's why I think I wouldn't take because I think once you once you believe something about yourself or believe that a future is inevitable for you I especially if it's a bad one like because I think manifestation disposes the other thing which would be wonderful if you could manifest something brilliant but I don't know I just think it's I don't know it's hard I wondered with shameless whether you guys talked about that like nature versus nurture thing while you were making it or like how you thought about that we talked a lot about characters who were in a kind of economically depressed environment but who were not depressed yeah um who had each other who had loyalty who had family who had and kind of the comedy that can come from the absurdity of what it takes sometimes to survive um especially as all these kids were kind of raising themselves and she was the de facto mom.

40:43And also the family was not comfortable in their struggle but very familiar with struggle. So as gentrification was kind of pressing into their neighborhood and Fiona ultimately does kind of go into real estate and start to fix up these buildings and kind of start to become part of the problem in their minds, I think we are seeing kind of how the world is changing and how she's kind of trying to change with it and how so many of them are not. Yeah, it's hard. Have you done like a rewatch? Do you ever rewatch your old shows or would you not? I haven't, although the algorithms do serve clips. And I've noticed that there are younger and younger people who know the show just from clips.

41:29There's like a whole clip group. We were researching for this episode. Sophie who helps me with research was like, these clips were posted in the last few weeks and they have two three hundred thousand likes and it's all just like clips from the show yeah so there are some very much younger people who wouldn't have even you know been watching the show when it was on who know it from oh that meme or that clip yeah but even really have a sense of the dynamics between the characters from clips so people are clearly consuming entertainment in different kind of more vertical shorter ways yeah um obviously um but i think it's interesting how it's kind of found a new life that way as well yeah it's amazing really and it's i'll always be into long form horizontal but um i do i do think it is really cool and it's really cool because i bet a lot of them will go and then search out that show eventually and it and it's such a testament to the power of that that it's longevity not just the amount of seasons that it ran but that it still captures attention in that way and I think that is because it deals with such a like primal bunch of themes in a way yeah I think there's also not a lot of families on tv that look like that yeah and that are living hand to mouth that way and that are living with real alcoholism in that way who are also you're able to laugh with and cry with yeah and the characters are also sexually liberated and free and you're able to get very close to the characters because of the intensity and vulnerability that comes with so much so many of those scenes and those character arcs so I think that they're for a lot of people who grew up in big messy chaotic households that may have had substance problems um or just emotional chaos um or poverty i think that there are very few shows that that resonate in that way totally um yeah that you know have joy in them too yeah talking of memory is it weird when you see a clip because you'll be like oh i remember that day it was like 2014 and i was tired because i'd been or Or would you just be like, oh my gosh, I forgot that episode or something?

43:46Totally a lot of forgot that episode because I made 110. Yeah. Or like don't ever remember learning that line, which I must have drilled 50 times before I got there at least. I think, yeah, but really loving the dynamics and watching the dynamics and remembering just the tenderness and the fun that we had. Yeah. Oh, I love that. Yeah. That's so nice. Are you guys still in touch? like oh that's so nice I love that that's I mean those are my favorite those shows where you can feel that they're still like makes you feel like they're alive somehow yeah but um but yeah with um with uh Charles's book as well I mean it's sort of the the whole like put our like desire to sort of understand more about our future I think is so interesting and I when I first moved to America in 2020 it was it was popping off in the same way in the UK astrology was but it was so big here and I remember when I first started working for bustle I've been at vanity fair before that and on my in my first week someone was like so let's do your chart and I discovered I was like a triple libra and like everyone wanted to sort of understand and I you know it's sort of fascinating how much we crave to like know more about our true selves than what we tell our when ultimately we get to decide right but I'm sort of curious are you an astrology person you mentioned being a earlier but i'm an astrology person only so much as i know a little bit about it and some of it definitely hits yeah totally like i'm a virgo married to another virgo oh how does that work we're both very organized we're on a tight ship there's a lot of labels in the house the brother p touch labeler is used often yeah i love and sam and i just reorganized our kitchen drawers this this Sunday morning we spent about two hours making sure that all the pots were with the pots and the pans are with the pans and the little you know the thing that slices the apple slicer well it now has a nice little label by it that says apple oh so you know where that one goes I love that you guys are so organized it's probably too much no I think it's sweet do the kids are you like they love it they love peeling the labels putting the labels on that's very sweet and it's fine if things get moved around too yeah we'll relabel it in a couple of years flexibility as my therapist says we have to um but yeah no it's it's it is interesting that desire for knowing more about ourselves i i there is just like a balance to it all i guess yeah you don't want to feel too oppressed some of it must be right somehow with astrology yeah i don't know i don't really know about the rising this or the moon that but I'm open to learning more.

46:29I mean, I think also I once talked to my therapist about this when a friend recommended I see a psychic and I was like, Oh, do we do we think this is any good? And she was really pro it because she said that she'd seen many clients who found a kind of hope from seeing speaking to someone like a psychic or like, I guess someone more spiritual, because it gave them belief without like nuts and bolts, I think in the sense of how therapy, I think can often get very bogged down in like okay how am I thinking about this specific problem or this specific relationship and she was like and she said to me she was like for those few weeks after you came back from seeing the psychic she was like you were lighter and which I thought was really interesting because it doesn't matter if any of it's true or real if it has that effect on you and it means that you move through the world like that for however long and I was like it kind of works then by that extent so i thought it was interesting i've never seen one a psychic no it's interesting i mean it's it's i can give you the names of some if you're curious because i have a friend who's very clued in with all of that stuff there are animal psychics as well i've heard about yeah it's interesting i mean they never give you sort of information like look out for july 7th next year like i need that that's the kind of information coming up wait where's my july 7th warning no i mean i suppose it makes sense to me in theory because if the history if time is like forever yeah and extending both ways then now and my mom or my grandma are on top of each other yeah right so basically if it's like in the line of forever what happened now and what happens a month from now is basically happening concurrently I suppose in some way maybe to them to their perception I'm not sure that's interesting yeah who knows um well last I thought we could talk about the velveteen rabbit tell me about your love of this book well don't at me because it's a children's book no judgment I find it really moving and meaningful um it's a good comfort book for me whenever I want to I've kind of forgotten who I am or need to remember or want a good cry or want to feel connected in some way I mean I I love this book I love the way it's written I love the way it's illustrated I love I love how I have a stuffed animal that I grew up with Huggy, who was given to me the day that I was born, who I still sleep with and travel with.

49:05He's like a polar bear about yay big. And we called him Huggy, I think, because I hugged him from the drop. But now it's kind of got a double meaning because all of the fur on his stomach, like from here to here, it's all gone. And he's kind of grayish and has been restuffed and has various colors of kind of, you know, sewing thread that I've kind of doctored him up. I've never actually been brave enough to send him away to one of those places that properly doctor them both because i'm scared that he'll get lost in the mail which i'm sure he would not but also because i'm not sure i want to restore him no to his former glory that's the love that that's the love in the book yeah and i like the idea that i mean the story is quite it's quite dark yeah it is it's a very very dark fever you're right the boy gets the scarlet fever and then they're like burn all burn all the belongings and you know the velveteen rabbit who has been jealous of all of the other embodied real rabbits that he's seen and wondered why he was not able to kind of move like that he gets thrown on basically the funeral pyre yeah and is about to be burned and he he's crying he knows that i mean he's having very adult thoughts like i will never see this boy again i I won't be alive anymore.

50:24I won't be experiencing things in my body in the way that I have. And he cries a real tear. And then suddenly, in whatever your interpretation of this, becomes real. And this idea that it's only when we are really loved do we become real. And in any case, my therapist a couple years ago said, I really need you when you're feeling not great about yourself, down on yourself physically to read this book because everyone deserves love even if they have you know wrinkles and you know furry spots worn off or that's a great recommendation and I was like are you recommending me a children's book and he said yes um do you read as in do you read to does it calm you is that something is that a book's often a tool for you in that way when yeah in the way that sitting in a dark movie theater can make you momentarily forget you even have a body totally that sometimes when I'm reading I am so involved in the story that I forget I even exist yeah and I find that um escape really um amazing yeah do you read a lot to your kids Yes, I do.

51:40That's so lovely. I can't get them to do the whole Velveteen Rabbit, though. I think it's dark. How old are they? Three and five. Yeah, so they'll get there. Not there yet. We're still on Frog and Toad and lots of other fun series. And then do they do all the Julia Donaldson, like, Ruffalo, all those British ones? No. They're so good. They're the best. Like, they have Zog. We do a lot of Little Miss and Little Mister series, which are also British. Yeah. Yeah. They're so fun. They're really funny. Do you sing to them as well? Yeah. Aww. Yeah. And sometimes I try to leave my work at my work, but sometimes if I'm working on a new accent or something, I'll they'll ask me to, you know, they'll hear me kind of messing around with it.