Episode 33: “Is That a Dyson?” (w/ Adam Robitel!)

*This week we’re joined by director Adam Robitel (Escape Room, Insidious: The Last Key, The Taking of Deborah Logan) and guest host Joelle Monique to talk the 1986 cult classic WITCHBOARD!   OK, maybe we don’t so much talk about Witchboard as we sit around telling spooky ghost stories for forty minutes, but it’s still a blast! It’s a BOISTEROUS episode, so please forgive Brennan’s failures as a replacement sound engineer.   Plus, in Tea Time we sip on GAME OF THRONES, ALL THAT WE DESTROY, THE HEAD HUNTER, and the revenge of Brennan’s La Llorona Corner![1]*

## **Trivia**

Second episode with friend of the pod Joelle Monique as guest co-host. First episode with Brennan "pawing at the soundboard like a cat" since Ernie's out of town. Michael doesn't like to be asked first for Tea Time because he's always asked first.

Topics brought up during the episode: Jon Berenthal (aka "the guy who plays The Punisher"), Nay's upcoming art show, Joelle on Nerdificent talking about *Endgame*, Joelle's article in Playboy, the voice of Darth Maul (Sam witwer), the voice of Samurai Jack (Phil Lamarr), Brennan's interview on Fright School, Brennan's episode of Fright School discussing *From Beyond*

## **Tea Time**

**Joelle:** *Game of Thrones*; *She-Ra* (Netflix)

**Nay:** *Not That Bad* by Roxanne Gay

**Michael:** *Avengers: Endgame*; *All That We Destroy*

**Adam:** *The Head Hunter*

**Brennan:** Top five hot guys from La Llorona movies

## **Shady Summaries**

**Joelle:** If you want your boyfriend to be able to say the words, "I love you," become possessed by a ghost

**Brennan:** So true. That was his emotional journey

**Joelle:** Yeah!

**Adam:** A fiery damsel in distress uses a talking board to conjure a demon to help her angsty chain smoking latent bisexual boyfriend expel the one man who stands in the way of her heteronormative life and her master plan of progressive entrapment

**Nay:** I was just gonna say that it's super disappointing when the character that looks like a hot dyke, a.k.a Lloyd, was the first to die, 'cause Lloyd looked like a *hot-ass* dyke

**Joelle:** Lloyd had the flavor

**Brennan:** Oh yeah

**Adam:** Zarabeth? The psychic?

**Nay:** *No*, absolutely not

**Michael:** The guy with the glasses

**Nay:** No, Lloyd, the homie with the one dangly earring

**Brennan:** His construction worker friend

**Adam:** Oh yeah

**Joelle:** The *other* bisexual

**Michael:** The guy with the sunglasses that would always do (lisping) this kind of voice

**Adam:** He was hilarious

**Michael:** He was cute!

**Nay:** You know, one of the most attractive things in the world to me is when you glance at someone, and are a little unsure of their gender

**Joelle:** Genderqueer! Yes!!

**Nay:** And you glance again, and you're like (stammers)

**Joelle:** It doesn't even matter

**Michael:** *Hot*

**Adam:** Is that what happened when I walked in?

**Nay:** Yeah

**Adam:** Asking for a friend.

**Nay:** I didn't know I was so transparent about that. But yeah, I was like, "Okay, Lloyd!" But then, damn.

**Adam:** Yeah. Sheetrock death

**Nay:** *Damn*

**Michael:** That sucked

**Nay:** You know, that really surprised me

**Michael:** Same. Same!

**Nay:** I thought the hatchet was maybe gonna fall

**Michael:** That's what I thought, too

**Brennan:** Oh, yeah

**Nay:** And even when they were moving the sheetrock I thought the hatchet was still gonna be *under* the sheetrock

**Michael:** In his neck or something?

**Nay:** Yeah

**Adam:** I definitely paused it and saw the dummy body *under,* like...

**Michael:** And it like, bounced?

**Nay:** Yeah, I was like, that's not Lloyd

**Michael:** I hadn't seen it in a really long time, but Brian was watching it with me and we were both very impressed with like, he kept going, "This doesn't look cheap." Like that was him complimenting the movie. "This movie doesn't look cheap!"

**Brennan:** 'Cause it was, so like, that's kind of a compliment

**Michael:** But it kind of wasn't. They had two million

**Adam:** Yeah, they had a bit of a budget

**Michael:** Two million in Eighty-six? That kind of goes a long way

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Michael:** I don't have a Shady Summary after Adam's perfect one. I just kept thinking the whole movie, "Just kiss, guys."

**Brennan:** Oh yeah

**Joelle:** That was in my notes four times!

**Michael:** "Just kiss a little bit"

**Adam:** I feel like they *have*, like *for sure*

**Nay:** They *definitely* have

**Adam:** Like I feel like they went biblical, like full-on--

**Nay:** Yeah, little frottage

**Michael:** They rubbed their holes together and they didn't speak for a couple of years, yeah

**Adam:** Space dogs

**Joelle:** Isn't that how it's done?

**Nay:** They were in a circle jerk together

**Brennan:** It's bumping together

**Michael:** That's why they have the tension that they have

**Joelle:** Yeah

**Michael:** They used to date

**Nay:** Yeah. They remember watching porn together

**Michael:** Back-to-back

**Adam:** But it's so crazy if you think about it, like the way she-- and then she gets possessed and by the end, she's wearing a man's outfit--

**Michael:** Yeah

**Brennan:** Yeah. Dressed like latter-day Stevie Nicks

**Adam:** Yeah. Yeah. He literally has to kill his latent thing inside of him

**Michael:** Yeah. Through the board

**Adam:** Yeah. There's a lot of wood in this movie

**Michael:** Hopped on his back

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** And that was, y'know, from behind

**Brennan:** The only horror film in history that insists upon pronouncing "ouija" the right way. A ten out of ten masterpiece.

**Joelle:** It was the most obnoxious part of the film!

**Michael:** And they actually made a point of going over that

**Nay and Joelle:** "Wee and ja."

**Brennan:** It's true! I don't see "weejee" anywhere in there, my friends

**Adam:** When we would play with the ouija board after that, I would always correct people, like I was suddenly the authority

**Nay:** Oh my God, were you so annoying?

**Adam:** (prissily) "Guys, I've seen *Witchboard*."

**Michael:** Such a gay little boy thing to do

**Adam:** Right. I know

**Michael:** That's something I would have done as a kid--

**Nay:** Oh, yeah

**Michael:** And looking back, I would be like, "Oh, I was coming out to my friends in high school."

**Nay:** Right. Very on-brand story for your little gay ass

**Adam:** (fey voice) "It means yes and yes!"

## **Pride Float**

**Brennan:** Does this movie get a Pride float? Obviously we haven't talked a lot about the queer subtext of the movie--

**Nay:** (sarcastically) Really? (laughs)

**Brennan:** But, I dunno. What do you think?

**Adam:** What is a Pride float?

**Brennan:** Oh, in terms of like--

**Joelle:** In a Pride parade would you give this its own float?

**Michael:** Does it earn its own float

**Brennan:** Is it an appropriate representation of any sort of homoerotic--

**Michael:** Is there any queer positivity or something to be celebrated?

**Adam:** I think it's anti-gay in a way, right?

**Michael:** Yeah

**Adam:** It's sort of like the, and I'm not saying that's  any conscious choice by the filmmakers--

**Brennan:** Oh, no

**Adam:** We're reading subtext of this

**Michael:** Right. I mean, he literally shoots a ouija board instead of being like, "Die, gay! Die!"

**Adam:** Yeah

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** So, no?

**Nay:** I think Zarabeth gets a party for like, white witches

**Michael:** Oh yeah. She gets a--

**Brennan:** And the landlady--

**Michael:** In Palm Springs, in the desert?

**Adam:** With good hair, yeah

**Nay:** With fringe

**Joelle:** I would like a Pride float that acknowledges queers who are in love with their best friends before they're out to themselves

**Adam:** Oooh

**Joelle:** And so maybe in that way--

**Michael:** Maybe--

**Nay:** Ohhhhh

**Joelle:** Like just the hotel scene?

**Adam:** That hotel scene, yes

**Joelle:** Where he just went, "Shut up! Shut up!"

**Brennan:** *That scene*

**Joelle:** Are you guys gonna admit that you fucked once?!?!? I was so on the edge of my seat!

**Michael:** I wanted him to use his toothbrush

**Adam:** Yeah

**Brennan:** Oh yeah, that would've been cool

**Joelle:** There were so many moments where I was waiting for romantic things to happen and it's just like, (angrily) "No, we're not gonna do it!" I was like, "I want it!"

**Michael:** Uh-huh

**Nay:** Is using someone's toothbrush romantic?

**Michael:** Well, I thought it would have been for them

**Adam:** It's better than a rock

**Brennan:** Let me tell you what, my boyfriend has done it, I hate it

**Michael:** I mean, it's gross

**Nay:** It *is* wild that y'all think--

**Joelle:** I have a theory

**Michael:** Like, "Why didn't you pack anything?"

**Nay:** I mean, it is wild. I don't know why I'll lick your asshole but I won't use your toothbrush?

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Nay:** What is that? I don't know why

**Joelle:** I have a theory, the sharing of anything intimate, I think

**Nay:** I don't think a tooth-- no, you can't use my toothbrush

**Brennan:** Like I don't like sharing drinks with people and I *do* keep that even with people I will then make out with later

**Joelle:** That you're intimate with, yeah

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Joelle:** I have almost zero boundaries, almost nothing bothers me, like what the fuck ever, just do it. Who cares? So I don't-- share a drink, no, none of it, whatever

**Adam:** That is true, the resentment, that deep brooding like, wanting to be something, wanting to do something and in that time, a lot of those friends ended up getting married and there was a *hatred* almost--

**Michael:** Yeah

**Adam:** At like an atomic level of why--

**Michael:** Absolutely

**Joelle:** "I hated my best friend."

**Adam:** Yes, yeah, yes. And it does tap into that, so y'know

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Adam:** Maybe half a float? Maybe?

**Michael:** Yeah, look. It was the Eighties, it was not easy to be out in the Eighties

**Adam:** Ronald Reagan on the wall

**Brennan:** Bleh

**Michael:** Yeah, exactly

**Michael:** Brandon's mullet gets a Pride float

**Joelle:** No. That's *not* gay. That is anti-gay

**Adam:** Yeah. And his pinky ring, and his pinky ring gets a Pride float

**Nay:** *Yo, for real*, *yeah*

**Michael:** And it's just the pinky ring?

**Nay:** Yeah

**Joelle:** Love it

**Michael:** It's a big version of the pinky ring

**Nay:** A big pinky

**Michael:** Yeah

**Adam:** Dot com

**Michael:** His shirt ripped, yeah

## **Quotes**

**Brennan:** I will let you know Michael, you are really a professional, because your sound bar has to be way lower than everybody else's, because your voice is so loud automatically. You're like Idina Menzel basically

**Michael:** Yeah, I have the chops

**Brennan:** You do

**Michael:** Yeah

**Joelle:** That theatre training

**Michael:** (chuckling) Oh yeah

**Joelle:** (singing) Pro-ject!

**Michael:** It's insane. I break glass

**Brennan:** We're also joined by an extremely special guest

**Nay:** For real

**Adam:** Awww!

**Brennan:** You probably know him for playing the role of Butch in *I Was a Teenage Werebear*, but he's also the director of *Escape Room*, *Insidious: The Last Key* and *The Taking of Deborah Logan*, it's Adam Robitel!

**Everyone cheers**

**Adam:** Thanks so much for having me! Yes, I was impaled by a werebear penis. Guilty.

**Brennan:** I *love* that short so much

**Adam:** Oh, good. I'm glad. I'm glad you do

**Michael:** Brennan, while you were out running an errand, we were talking about (Adam's) performance in *2001 Maniacs* as well

**Brennan:** (gasps) *Oh*

**Adam:** Yeah (southern accent) Lester

**Michael:** Mmm-hmm, mmm-hmmm

**Adam:** Yeah, I made love to a sheep

**Brennan:** You *do* seem like a Lester to me

**Adam:** Thank you!

**Michael:** Just a sheep lover?

**Adam:** Just a general pervy kind of vibe coming from me? That's awesome

**Nay:** I have questions about the werewolf dick. Does it, like does hair grow over the complete dick, the balls?

**Michael:** That's a really good question. Is it on the shaft?

**Adam:** I didn't look *too* closely at the lipstick of it all, I tried to avoid the lipstick whenever possible

**Michael:** Is it a hairy shaft?

**Brennan:** It's under twenty minutes, it's not a big commitment to you

**Joelle:** You know there's a dildo somewhere that'll explain this to you

**Nay:** Like a werewolf dildo, seriously

**Joelle:** There's like a dragon dildo and stuff, so you could get the anatomy of animals if that's what you're into

**Nay:** Yes

**Michael:** You're just wondering if it's got a hairy shaft

**Adam:** This definitely went to the gutter real quick

**Nay:** Yeah, I'm just wondering if it's hairy because you know, I'm like, I need to know what's going on and I can't see it, so, just wondering

**Michael:** Just in case?

**Nay:** Yeah

**Joelle:** That's a really good question

**Nay:** Yeah. Just like a visual scan. You know, you ask folks about testing, but just a quick little visual scan I think is appropriate

**Michael:** Yeah, I getcha

**Adam:** True!

**Michael:** Adam asked if it gets blue at all

**Brennan:** Oh, no. Not at all! We'd be really offended if you made a gross joke at all in  this entire podcast

**Adam:** Okay, good. Then I'm not going to be able to speak

**Nay:** I am a good Christian woman, you know what I mean?

**Michael:** (fey voice) Mmm-hmm. Me, too. I wear my hats

**Nay:** I don't make any of that nonsense

**Brennan:** We all have our pearls ready to be clutched

**Joelle:** Clutched

**Michael:** Gays and their hats!

**Joelle:** I will be honest. I have been watching *Game of Thrones*. I have been watching it and rewatching it. That, and *She-Ra*. Getting my queer love on. If you guys aren't watching the new animated series *She-Ra*, [ND] Stevenson created it with (their) partner, it is *gay* *as hell*. Everyone's a lesbian. Just lesbians and then one gay guy in an adorable crop-top

**Michael:** *Oh!*

**Brennan:** Okay!

**Joelle:** It is the *best*! There are Black gay dads this season!

**Nay:** Sold

**Michael:** Where's it airing?

**Joelle:** Netflix. It's on Netflix.

**Michael:** Oh, okay!

**Joelle:** Season two just came out. Show it to your children, let them know... see homosexual Black dads! Oh my God, I'm not gonna cry. You can also go online and see a lot of people give testimonials, Netflix does a lot of "The First Time I Saw Me," there are a lot of Black men talking about, being like, "I needed this as a kid." It's gorgeous, it's beautiful.

**Michael:** Is it live-action or animated?

**Joelle:** Animated

**Michael:** Okay

**Joelle:** But also, Arya Stark did what the fuck she had to do this week, and it was great if you're a *Game of Thrones* fan

**Adam:** All these people bitching about the darkness of it. I *love* that it was so dark. I enjoyed not being able to see what I couldn't see.

**Joelle:** I agree that the dark-- no, I agree with you. If your TV's calibrated right, and you're not streaming it? Mwah. It was so beautiful. But HBO needs to up their streams to the same level as Amazon's streams, so that we can *all* see, because a lot of us, especially those of us who live on the west coast are like, "I know it dropped on the stream at six. I'm trying to live-tweet and enjoy with the fandom so I *have* to stream it," and that stream is not coming in strong guys and it's not my internet, it's definitely...

**Michael:** That's my boyfriend with his job knows all about the calibrations and the--

**Joelle:** Yeah. (indistinct)

**Michael:** What you just said about Amazon streams being better than HBO

**Joelle:** Mmm-hmm

**Michael:** He has been telling me about that for weeks

**Joelle:** It's *really* bad!

**Michael:** Even before that, he's like HBO Go has a horrible--

**Joelle:** It's coming in pixelated, it's spotty quality

**Nay:** Oh, yeah

**Michael:** As a platform, HBO Go, it's bad. Just crazy!

**Joelle:** I'm gonna watch it three times, so I guess it doesn't really matter, but…

**Brennan:** I will say, I did not approve of the kind of elitist tone that Twitter was taking, like, "Oh, you need to buy a better TVs." Like, "Oh, sorry!" Like maybe I can't!

**Joelle:** I also feel like not everyone works in this industry and to expect, you know, my grandmother to know how to calibrate her TV?

**Michael:** Also, a lot of people when they buy a TV, they don't wanna have to work to make their picture look proper

**Joelle:** Right. We're not all cinematographers. Having lived with several cinematographers, the first thing was the TV. "I'm just gonna calibrate it and get it right. Okay, this is our game setting. We're good." Not all of us do that job, sweetie. We don't all know how to do it, so

**Adam:** I was wondering why you were walking around with an F-stop, that's weird

**Joelle:** That's just for my selfies

**Adam:** But you know, the thing is, and some people are saying it's because of the CG of it all, it costs less, it lets you see, but it's a medieval battlefield in the middle of the night, what do you want? A stadium? It was so honest

**Michael:** Well the DP said it was all about natural lighting for him, right?

**Adam:** Yeah!

**Michael:** I didn't see it, so. I'm way way way way way behind

**Nay:** I want to watch *Game of Thrones*, I do

**Joelle:** Yeah

**Nay:** I'm not like one of those people, (mockingly) "Oh, I've never seen it!" And feel, you know, elite for that?

**Brennan:** Empowered?

**Nay:** Yeah. No, I'm just like sometimes, you know, if I hear about just like seasons and seasons of stories about white people, I can't *always* convince myself to do it

**Brennan:** Oh yeah

**Joelle:** True

**Nay:** But I know, I do that with shows all the time! It's not like I've never watched seasons and seasons of shows with white people

**Joelle:** Sometimes you have to

**Nay:** And that's like all you want, and that's like most shows, right?

**Joelle:** That's what's available to us

**Nay:** And I want to...

**Adam:** That's a great title: "Seasons and Seasons of White People"

**Nay:** Who don't season!

**Joelle:** A show...

**Adam:** Oh, we season, we season

**Joelle:** Enter Taylor Swift, stage left

**Nay:** The only season they're doing--

**Michael:** Is mayonnaise?

**Nay:** Is the show's… you know

**Brennan:** I will say, sorry. What?

**Nay:** I don't. Anyway.

**Brennan:** I'm watching this current season with my boyfriend, he's like a huge fan, he's so amped.

**Joelle:** Yes. Love your boyfriend, get it

**Brennan:** Thank you. I have great taste

**Joelle:** You do

**Brennan:** But I've personally only seen the first season and now I'm watching this one with him

**Joelle:** *Noooo!*

**Adam:** *What?*

**Brennan:** No, honestly, it's so working for me

**Adam:** Ha!

**Brennan:** *Because* all the characters that get introduced after season one have been *killed* before season eight, so I'm just on the exact same playing field as everybody else. I feel great about it

**Adam:** Yeah. And they're all coming back together

**Joelle:** But did you know who the dragon woman was?

**Brennan:** Yeah! I've seen *gifs*

**Nay:** I feel that

**Brennan:** I know about the Snow Queen's Ice Dragon. I know *everything*

**Michael:** *Oooooh*

**Joelle:** (amused) "The Snow Queen's Ice Dragon?" I really love your description

**Nay:** Could you sound whiter?

**Joelle:** (indistinct) where it's like your own version of it

**Michasl:** (laughing) Is anyone listening to Nay?

**Nay:** That's why I haven't been sold! The Snow Dragon's Ice Princess? Like, what did you say? I'm like, this is the whitest shit I've ever heard

**Brennan:** That's a joke that I made

**Nay:** Oh, okay

**Brennan:** That's EL James's pen name from when she wrote *Fifty Shades of Grey* as a *Twilight* fanfiction

**Nay:** Oh, gotchu. Okay

**Michael:** Also very white

**Brennan:** But there is a dragon and basically a snow queen, so

**Nay:** Okay, Ice Princess

**Joelle:** And Ice Dragon is amazing, he's really dope. You should--

**Nay:** Is this a person or a dragon?

**Joelle and Brennan:** It's a dragon

**Joelle:** But it was birthed by (X)

**Michael:** (to Nay) Maybe you and I should watch it together

**Nay:** *Maybe*, okay

**Joelle:** Listen, do it. There's some great horror moments, a lot of classic throwbacks to, oh my God. what's the first-- oooh my Dad would kill me… walking skeleton, creepy, it's been in a bunch of movies

**Brennan:** Oh, like *Jason and the Argonauts*?

**Joelle:** Thank you, *yes*!

**Brennan:** You're welcome

**Joelle:** In season three, there's a great *Jason and the Argonauts* moment that's (chef's kiss). It's so beautiful. It's wonderful. You guys would love it

**Nay:** Yeah, I think I can get into it

**Michael:** Yeah

**Brennan:** Yeah. Sure! Season one and eight are great!

**Nay:** I've been reading *Not That Bad* by Roxane Gay

**Joelle:** *Love! So good!*

**Nay:** Yeah. And the point that I walked away with so far was just that a lot of us have really bad things happen to us and we are like, "It's not that bad." Because we know of things that have happened that are worse. We know we're maybe quote-unquote "lucky" for *only* having-- but literally Roxane Gay in this book is like, talking about being a young person gangbanged in the woods, like being gang raped in the woods

**Brennan:** Oh my God,

**Joelle:** Yeah

**Nay:** And how she's like, "Well, you know, I didn't get killed, or no one pulled a gun on me. It's not that bad." And literally, it's fucking bad.

**Michael:** Mmm-hmm!

**Joelle:** Horrible

**Nay:** And just how when we don't acknowledge the pain and hurt and trauma we have experienced, which we all have our reasons for doing that or not doing that, how we-- it's like we elevate ourselves to this place where you're not supposed to think *anything's* that bad that happens to you, and you're just supposed to keep operating and functioning as though things were not that bad. That just really spoke to me, because I think, you know, especially women, I feel like are told, "Get it tog-- you can't be overly emotional," and you have to get it together because you have shit to handle, and I really appreciate thinking about taking time to fully *understand* things that have happened to us. You know, I love therapy.

**Joelle:** Therapy's so good

**Nay:** I think that all of us, no matter what has happened to us could benefit from a good therapist

**Joelle:** Yes

**Michael:** Mmm-hmm

**Nay:** Which of course, there's access issues to that and whatnot, but yeah, just been doing some reading

**Brennan:** That sounds lovely

**Joelle:** Read *all* of Roxane's books

**Nay:** And it's kinda hard, obviously. It's not the easiest reading

**Michael:** She's so great though

**Nay:** (softly) Reading about rape culture though

**Joelle:** And she writes in really short chapters, which makes it really helpful

**Nay:** *Yes!*

**Joelle:** *Hunger* is **amazing**

**Nay:** Yeah

**Joelle:** But if you wanna start light and kind of not drown yourself in heavy emotions, try *Bad Feminist*

**Nay:** Yes. That is good

**Joelle:** It is the absolute shit, it's a collection of short essays about, "I would like to be a good feminist but I'm so fallible and I still like dicks, so it's really hard to be a good feminist when you like penis." She's great. I love Roxanne Gay

**Nay:** She *is* great. She's fucking *hot*

**Joelle:** She's amazing

**Nay:** Can we talk about that? Can someone tell Roxane Gay that I think she's hot?

**Brennan:** She's *on* Twitter

**Nay:** 'Cause she is *not* responding to my DMs

**Brennan:** Oh, okay

**Michael:** (laughs) You slid in, huh?

**Nay:** Okay, I don't always slide in

**Adam:** I mean, that restraining order was just a--

**Nay, Joelle and Adam:** Just a suggestion

**Nay:** But sometimes she looks *so* good and I'm like, "You know what? I just need to tell this person. They're never gonna, you know, read this DM actually," but I'm like, if you do, you'll see--

**Michael:** Get it out of your system?

**Nay:** Like, six replies from the past five years that are like, "You look great though!" Like, whatever they are.

**Joelle:** "That haircut, boo. Working."

**Nay:** Yeah. You know? I'm like, "Going on another flight, huh? Mmmm."

**Joelle:** "Something about me."

**Michael:** (amused) Goddammit. Nay

**Michael:** Saw (*Avengers:*).*Endgame*

**Joelle:** Yeah, you did!

**Michael:** Loved it. Not a huge fan of comic book movies, but it was fun and I cried

**Joelle:** "On your left."

**Michael:** Yeah. And then I actually last night went to the premiere of Chelsea Stardust's *All That We Destroy*, which premieres on Hulu tomorrow, so when this airs it will have premiered six days ago

**Joelle:** It's available to you

**Michael:** It's available to you now, and go watch it. It's fun, it's unnerving, it's creepy. Adam was there

**Joelle:** What's it about?

**Michael:** It's about this mother who's a geneticist and her son is essentially going to become a serial killer, so she keeps cloning one of his victims so he doesn't kill anybody else

**Brennan:** Oh!

**Adam:** Yeah, it's a great therapy session, talk about therapy sessions, yeah

**Joelle:** *Oooh*, so just killing the same person?

**Michael:** He's just killing the same person, who's played by Aurora Perrinau, who's amazing

**Brennan:** *Oooh*

**Adam:** Yeah

**Nay:** I love that!

**Joelle:** *Ohh*, I love Aurora!

**Michael:** Yeah. And Israel Broussard is the son that is killing Aurora over and over again

**Nay:** That's cool

**Michael:** Samantha Mathis plays the mother, Frank Whaley plays I don't wanna say

**Adam:** Yeah, it'll give it away

**Michael:** Yeah

**Joelle:** Here for this

**Michael:** Dora Madison plays a neighbor. Small cast. Chelsea did an amazing job with like, limited locations, limited money, limited time

**Brennan:** That's what makes the best horror

**Michael:** It's great. She's so great, so deft. It's a really good time. And Sean Keller and Jim Agnew wrote it. I know all these people so I'm like fawning over them because they're some of my closest friends

**Nay:** And you're in the movie, right?

**Michael:** And I actually put in an appearance. I walk by the screen at one point.

**Brennan:** *Oooooh!*

**Michael:** I walk onscreen at one point

**Joelle:** Someone screencap it so we can do a *Where's Waldo?* with Michael

**Michael:** And it's Chelsea's feature film debut and I'm just so happy and proud of her

**Brennan:** Congratulations!

**Joelle:** Support female directors!

**Michael:** And I got to meet Mister Robitel last night, actually

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** I mean literally 'cause he sat right behind me

**Nay:** Yeah, I heard you were great movie theater--

**Adam:** Yeah, I'm a cackler, I cackle

**Nay:** *Yes!*

**Adam:** You know, I have to say, I have to mirror your sentiments. I mean, Chelsea was my assistant on *Insidious* and she, you know, she's worked really really hard and I, having worked now with a lot of professional women, you know, the struggle is real, you know? She's had to work her ass off--

**Michael:** Her ass off

**Adam:** Just to get her foot in the door

**Michael:** Yeah

**Adam:** And I've seen her fight, and she just deserves it. She deserves this moment and yeah, the movie's really twisted and gnarly--

**Michael:** And creepy, yeah

**Adam:** And hard to watch in places, but funny too

**Michael:** Yeah

**Adam:** Yeah, and you know, they did a great job

**Michael:** I love her so much. She's gonna be in here in a few, like a month-and-a-half?

**Adam:** Awesome

**Michael:** To do an episode, and also her second movie premieres in four weeks!

**Adam:** I know! Who does that?

**Michael:** She's literally having two movies premiere in the same month

**Adam:** She's literally cloned herself

**Joelle:** That's amazing!

**Nay:** Bad bitch alert!

**Michael:** Right? Queen of Stardust. Her second movie is called *Satanic Panic*, which is Fangoria's first movie back, and it premieres at the Overlook Film Festival at the end of the month

**Nay:** *Wow*

**Brennan:** Oooh

**Joelle:** I'm so excited about this

**Michael:** Yeah, I saw a snippet of (*Satanic*) *Panic* and it's a fucking blast

**Joelle:** Is it set in the Eighties?

**Michael:** No. No

**Joelle:** It's a current movie?

**Michael:** It's a current movie. It's about a pizza delivery girl, who on her last delivery of the night happens to be delivering to a group of Satanists.

**Nay:** We love pizza, okay?

**Adam:** So she lives in Covina? Exciting

**Nay:** Amazing

**Michael:** So yeah, that premieres in like, four weeks

**Nay:** Okay

**Michael:** But *All That We Destroy*, give it a shot, it's on Hulu

**Nay:** Definitely gonna watch it this weekend

**Adam:** I'm always watching stuff when I'm developing movies, so I do a lot of research stuff, which almost feels like work, so then I discovered this movie last night that Bloody Disgusting had talked about called *The Head Hunter*, which was made for like, thirty thousand dollars. It sort of takes the *Game of Thrones* milieu, like this weird medieval knight who's living in the middle of the woods and there are these monsters out there, but it was incredibly well rendered. The guy's name is, I think it's--

**Michael:** (sotto voce) Twenty-five thousand

**Adam:** Yeah, yeah. Directed by Jordan Downey. I just hit him up on Facebook to tell him congratulations

**Michael:** Oh, that's nice of you

**Adam:** Yeah, and it was also just really amazing visual storytelling and you can get it on iTunes and yeah, just a fucked up dude who's hunting the heads of these monsters and--

**Michael:** That's really cool

**Adam:** He's avenging his daughter's death and yeah, just really solid storytelling. So hopefully it leads to more stuff for the filmmakers

**Michael:** And you saw it on Netflix?

**Adam:** It was on iTunes

**Brennan:** That sounds so awesome

**Joelle:** Is it like *Bone Tomahawk*? Although I know *Head Hunter*'s...

**Adam:** It's not kind of graphic, but just really great use of prosthetics and it's just, you know, what you *don't* see a lot of the times.

**Michael:** Fucking loved (*Bone Tomahawk*). Loved it

**Adam:** It's mostly just him in that shack in the middle of the woods, but yeah. If you like that kind of gritty, you know…

**Joelle:** I do, very much

**Adam:** It was very cool

**Michael:** Cool!

**Joelle:** *Bone Tomahawk* has the best final death of *any* movie

**Michael**: *Bone Tomahawk* is an awesome movie.

**Joelle:** Fuck, it's so good

**Michael:** It's really great

**Adam:** Craig Zahler's, he's just such a unique voice and his writing is so amazing

**Joelle:** And he's this dynamo who started off as like a baker who just was writing on the side. Mind blowing!

**Adam:** I know

**Nay:** *Yesss*

**Adam:** He wrote a script called *Big Stone Grid* that Michael Mann was attached to for a while

**Michael:** That's cool. I wanna know more about his baking

**Nay:** Right

**Joelle:** Whoa

**Adam:** I know

**Michael:** Bread? Treats? Do you know what he bakes?

**Joelle:** I'm not sure. I think he was working at a cupcake place

**Michael:** Okay

**Joelle:** We gotta invite him but also be like, "Bring us some cupcakes!"

**Brennan:** Yeah! Horror people are everywhere

**Nay:** Michael was just wantin' to know if he makes dong bread

**Michael:** Dong? (laughing)

**Nay:** I already know. Michael's like, "Does he make those long loaves of bread, long bread"

**Brennan:** Okay

**Adam:** (fey, haughty voice) "Frrrrruitcake! Lots of fruitcake!"

**Michael:** What did we watch when I had a dong of bread?

**Nay:** *Heavenly Creatures*

**Michael:** Uh-huh

**Brennan:** I mean, perfect

**Joelle:** Oh yeah! I remember penis bread!

**Michael:** (to Joelle) That was your episode

**Nay:** I remember 'cause it was the only time we've all watched the movie together before recording

**Joelle:** I'm real glad you guys did that

**Nay:** Yeah.

**Michael:** It was fun

**Nay:** It was iconic for sure

**Adam:** Was the bread… cut?

**(Everyone laughs)**

**Nay:** Eventually

**Michael:** It was. I made it

**Brennan:** They had a bris

**Adam:** They had a bris!

**Michael:** (laughing) I circumcised it!

**Brennan:** I have a request of you Michael. Can I request my theme music one last time?

**Michael:** One last time?

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Michael:** Oh, okay. Um. (sings the rhythm of "My Sharona") La Llorona! There's my Idina Menzel

**Joelle:** Amazing! The talent!

**Brennan:** This is the revenge of Brennan's La Llorona Corner. I don't have a La Llorona movie to talk about, but I didn't want to leave my Llorona marathon hanging…

**Michael:** You gonna give a ranking?

**Brennan:** Not a ranking of those movies specifically, because I did write a top five Llorona movies for AlternateEnding.com, check it out

**Joelle:** *Heeeey!*

**Michael:** Okay

**Brennan:** But I wanted to share with you all the top five hottest *guys* in the La Llorona movies.

**Joelle:** This is the kind of list we *need*!

**Michael:** Is Daddy gonna be at number one?

**Brennan:** Okay, spoiler alert: Yes

**Michael:** Okay

**(Joelle and Nay laugh)**

**Michael:** So Adam, if you're not in the know, Brennan for like the last thirteen weeks has talked about a La Llorona film during Tea Time--

**Adam:** Okay. I didn't realize there's that many

**Michael:** And it led up to the new movie

**Adam:** Wow, okay

**Michael:** So this is a bonus

**Brennan:** So, I guess spoiler alert for number one. It is Adría Collado he was the guy from *Kilometer 31*

**Michael:** Mmmmm

**Joelle:** Oooh, Jesus!

**Brennan:** I have pictures to share

**Michael:** I was gonna say, do I get visuals?

**Joelle:** Yeah, you guys I'm gonna give a visual, audio visual. So he's got like a salt-and-pepper beard, he's got the *best* cheekbones and then--

**Adam:** Lupine, I'd describe it as lupine

**Joelle:** Yes

**Michael:** He's got a butt to die for

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Nay:** (softly) Oh Lord

**Brennan:** I'm gonna share all these pictures on my Twitter also @itsrainingbrens

**Nay:** (sings to the tune of "It's Raining Men") It's raining Brens! Hallelujah!

**Michael:** (to Nay) I love when you sing!

**Brennan:** What a good voice!

**Nay:** Awww

**Michael:** She does!

**Nay:** It's so strange that I can't hear tonight

**Brennan:** I know. I'm so sorry

**Nay:** No. You don't have to be sorry

**Brennan:** Well...

**Nay:** I feel like MJ Bassett, okay?

**Adam:** You sound good

**Nay:** I'm not putting the headphones on!

**Brennan:** No, she was bold, she was like--

**Nay:** Oh, yeah

**Brennan:** She was like, "I know where my voice is going and I'm good."

**Nay:** I am so grateful to meet bold women...

**Brennan:** Oh yeah

**Nay:** Who remind me to ask for things I never would have thought to ask for

**Joelle:** *Yes*

**Michael:** We talked about that last week! Asking for what you want

**Nay:** Ugh. Yes. Shoot your shot.

**Brennan:** Where I want to start is at the bottom now. So, number five is the *only* white dude on the list 'cause I was running out of hot guys so I had to include one. I'm sorry. His name's Tom Parker, he's from the movie *J-ok'el*, which is the one with Dee Wallace

**Michael:** Oh, okay

**Brennan:** He's just got kind of a like, ruggedness to him--

**Nay:** Oh. Hello!

**Brennan:** That I appreciated

**Michael:** Yeah, he's cute!

**Joelle:** He's kind of like a lumberjack turned principal. I like it

**Adam:** Lumberjack, yeah

**Michael:** He looks like six guys that live on my street in West Hollywood

**Joelle:** His eyes look so angry, which is definitely a turn-on

**Nay:** He's got a hot neck

**Michael:** Wait, can I see his neck?

**Nay:** Yeah, look at his neck

**Brennan:** Here!

**Michael:** He *does* have a hot neck!

**Nay:** He has a hot neck.

**Joelle:** I don't know what that means

**Nay:** Do you remember on *The Lure* episode where we talked about where your fish slit would be?

**Michael:** Didn't I say in-between my boobies?

**Nay:** You said your chest, yeah. But we also talked about in the neck and I feel like his neck would look great with a fish slit

**Joelle:** Okay

**Michael:** He does have a good neck

**Nay:** He's got a hot neck

**Brennan:** (to Joelle) You're peeking! You're peeking!

**Joelle:** I'm peeking! I'm getting very excited

**Brennan:** Number four is the ensemble of *The Wailer*

**Michael:** The *ensemble*?

**Joelle:** The *entire cast*?

**Brennan:** No, it's the *Cabin in the Woods* slasher movie starring La Llorona. All the dudes are shirtless in this movie

**Michael:** Yes!

**Joelle:** Oh yes!

**Michael:** Like *The Covenant*

**Brennan:** I have a really low-rez pic I took of my TV on my phone

**Joelle:** I really like this though

**Adam:** (groans in mock frustration)

**Michael:** Adam is like, looking around, "Where's your phone?"

**Nay:** You know, I am just constantly amazed at how men can spend, like, supposedly straight men--

**Joelle:** Yeah

**Nay:** Can spend time with a bunch of other supposedly straight men, shirts *off*, like they're doing the most homoerotic stuff

**Michael:** Absolutely

**Nay:** I think that every time I watch like, DP porn, I'm like, "You say you're not gay? You're literally rubbing your homie's dick through someone else's vagina--"

**Michael:** But such a thin layer of skin

**Nay:** "Y'all's balls slapping together? Oh, you're not gay. Sure." That's the hottest part of the porn to me is how gay that is, you know? I'm like, y'all are crazy. Like this shit is gay. Watch a music video and there's like a hundred guys with their shirts off and I'm like, "Okay."

**Michael:** Like around a pool?

**Nay:** "We're not gay."

**Joelle:** It's like watching a basketball game that's just very homoerotic

**Nay:** *Yes! Yes!*

**Joelle:** It's just like, "Oh, all these shirts are off and we were just running around and our shorts were falling and oh my!" It's lovely.

**Brennan:** It's really special

**Joelle:** Yeah. And I like it

**Brennan:** And that's why I wanted to give it a shout-out

**Nay:** Oh my God I'm fucking your list up. Okay, go ahead

**Brennan:** No no no, it's fine! Look, commentary is welcome. My number three is from the 2004 movie *Las Lloronas*, it's the one that was like a melodrama. That one's probably at the top of my list

**Michael:** Oh, okay

**Brennan:** That one was *really* fun. But this is a Mexican actor who's *still around*, he's been doing stuff. He's not someone you might necessarily have heard of in America out there, or Norway

**Nay:** Yeah. Carmine, heeey!

**Brennan:** Yeah, hi Carmine! But his name is Miguel Rodarte and he has an interesting brooding look that I really like

**Joelle:** *Oh*! Yes

**Michael:** This is so fun. This is a lot of fun

**Brennan:** Sorry, I have to stretch across the table to show Adam

**Michael:** Ooooh, girl

**Nay:** Oh, wow. Is that person gay?

**Brennan:** As far as I know, no?

**Nay:** With the fauxhawk...

**Joelle:** He gives off a queer vibe. The scarves, there was definitely some under eyeliner to make his eyes pop

**Michael:** He's fluid

**Brennan:** Oh yeah, he definitely had some eyeliner in that picture, it was great

**Joelle:** I'm here for it

**Nay:** Oh yeah. That's so hot. Bad Bunny? Those nails? Y'all know who Bad Bunny is?

**Michael:** Uh-uh

**Nay:** Have you seen that artist? You gotta look at them nails on Instagram

**Michael:** Okay

**Brennan:** Well, I guess this is the last one

**Michael:** We're still gonna look at number one again. Yeah.

**Brennan:** Fine. But this number two is kind of a cheat, because it's a *sequel* to the animated film, which is *La Leyenda de La Llorona*

**Michael:** It's a live-action sequel or he's a voice actor?

**Brennan:** No. He's a voice actor

**Michael:** Got it

**Joelle:** Love it

**Brennan:** But he's *incredibly hot*

**Michael:** Wow. So you like sought him out based on his voice

**Brennan:** I actually saw him in a movie called *Amor de mis Amores*

**Michael:** Okay

**Brennan:** Which is…

**Nay:** Oh yeah. Yeah

**Brennan:** Oh, you've seen it?

**Nay:** Yeah, I've seen that

**Brennan:** Oh! It's fine. It's like a fun rom-com movie, but I was like, "Who is this guy?"

**Michael:** I wanna see the picture

**Brennan:** No, it's coming, it's coming. And I found out that he was in a sequel to (*La Leyenda de*) *La Llorona*, it's *Leyenda del Charro Negro*, he's like this spooky ghost cowboy guy

**Michael:** Okay

**Brennan:** And his name is Erick Elias, and Jesus Christ

**Joelle:** *Oh my God*! You guys, he's like a ten!

**Nay:** Wow

**Joelle:** He is beautiful. He could be in a boyband

**Adam:** *Oh!*

**Michael:** *Whoa!*

**Joelle:** He is steamy! How did this not make number one?

**Michael:** I like Daddy, *but*

**Joelle:** I need to see number one again, because now I'm confused

**Michael:** Yeah. The son should be number one

**Brennan:** Yeah. I had to put Daddy in at number one because we've spent so much time together

**Michael:** True. (chuckling) "So much time together"

**Brennan:** The reason Eric is lower is because he's *not* in a La Llorona movie, I just needed to share him with the world

**Michael:** Can you send me his name?

**Brennan:** I can do that. Yeah

**Joelle:** We're gonna add it to the bank! What's up?

**Nay:** Yeah, that person's hot

**Brennan:** Yes he is

**Michael:** I wish Google knew by now that I just want to see them shirtless

**Nay:** *Yo*

**Michael:** I'm so sick of having to type "shirtless"

**Brennan:** You're so sick of having to delete the word "feet"?

**Michael:** "Naked"?

**Nay:** Yo

**Brennan:** I hope I sent it to the right Michael

**Michael:** You did. I got it.

**(Some chattering from everyone about how hot Erick Elias is and who he resembles)**

**Michael:** So Adam, this is our show

**Joelle:** We have been cursed!

**Brennan:** Well, (today's movie is) from 1986 or 1987, depending on who you ask

**Michael:** Yeah, they all say something different on the apps

**Brennan:** I have no idea. It's something

**Michael:** Google says Eighty-six

**Brennan:** Well, it's called *Witchboard* and the answer is this board, we're here to talk about it today

**Adam:** Nice segueway

**Brennan:** Thank you. I don't have a trailer. I pulled a lot of clips, but I don't know how to plug 'em in, so we're just not gonna play 'em

**Nay:** I mean, you had to pull a Witchboard of your own

**Joelle:** Yeah, you did

**Michael:** To get us going tonight? Yeah

**Brennan:** Yeah, I had to do some sacrifices

**Michael:** We appreciate it. We appreciate everyone sticking around

**Adam:** Yeah, kudos for the technical skills there

**Joelle:** You pulled it out

**Michael:** Just be a lot of screaming, that's the trailer

**Brennan:** *Witchboard*, real easy summary: Tawny Kitaen, she has two homosexuals who are in love with her--

**Nay:** Yes. Ideal

**Brennan:** One is her live-in construction worker boyfriend, the other is his childhood best friend. The childhood best friend's very spooky goofy

**Joelle:** (amused) "Spooky goofy"!

**Brennan:** He has a ouija board and you know, they play the thing. She starts to get possessed by this ghost demon thing

**Adam:** Malfator

**Brennan:** (deep voice) Malfator. And they have to figure out who and why and how to stop it

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** The end

**Nay:** *Yo*. David was a little shit

**Joelle:** Mmm-hmm

**Michael:** Little fucker. Kids suck!

**Brennan:** Back to your point about Lloyd, Nay. *Everyone* in this movie is soft butch, and this is exactly the spectrum I wanna live in

**Nay:** True, true. I also wanna say again that it might have sounded weird that i said; people should not be looking at people and trying to figure out their gender. Of course, we do that a lot 'cause as human beings and the way that we categorize things with our brains, but I just, I dunno. Something about what I said made me feel strange. and I don't know what it was, so I just wanted to name it

**Brennan:** Okay

**Joelle:** Gender's a spectrum and we're not trying to guess what's in your pants

**Nay:** Right. Exactly

**Joelle:** But sometimes I am trying to guess how you are presenting *to me*

**Nay:** *Yes*

**Joelle:** And when you fall in the middle of that, and you're like, "I don't really give a fuck, I'm just whatever," that turns me on

**Nay:** Yes

**Joelle:** "I'm just wavering in the middle."

**Nay:** Okay, well thank you. No, we're not guessing people's genitals out here, 'cause we don't care

**Joelle:** I don't care. It don't matter to me

**Brennan:** America's favorite talk show!

**Michael:** I'm surprised that hasn't been a game show in America, on like, PAX

**Nay:** It has. I mean, have you watched *Maury*? I remember as a kid watching so many episodes where they're like, "Guess: This person is presenting as a woman…"

**Michael:** Oh my God, you're totally right!

**Nay:** "Guess if it's a man or a woman."

**Joelle:** Oh, God

**Nay:** And, sometimes when I think of the person that I am--

**Michael:** (disgusted) Fucking *Maury*

**Nay:** Right. For many reasons

**Joelle:** (laughing) That's such a personal….

**Nay:** I mean, when I think about how many very, *very* transphobic things I've done in my life

**Brennan:** That's a tough road to walk down

**Joelle:** But necessary

**Nay:** I know. But thinking about watching that show as a kid and like, cackling

**Michael:** Also you were a kid

**Nay:** No, I know, I know for sure. But I think it's a lesson to remember, that we all have things to learn

**Michael:** And never forget those kind of things because it helps us become better, yeah

**Nay:** And never forget, because if I think about the person I would like to be, and it's nowhere near the person who watched *Maury* and was cracking up at you know, people's gender, but it's just, I dunno. I think it's good to remember--

**Michael:** Totally

**Nay:** At one point you can do something that's not fucked up at all, and not even that long later just be like, "*Woooow*."

**Adam:** There's been a sea change in education though, too

**Nay:** Yeah

**Adam:** I remember my sister and I, both gay, and I--

**Michael:** Oh!

**Joelle:** Lucky!

**Nay:** So cute!

**Michael:** Good job, mom and dad, you know?

**Adam:** And she was, she embraced it, she was a butch little kid, you know?

**Nay:** Where's she at? Oh my God, where is *she*? (chortles)

**Joelle:** Bring your sister next time!

**Adam:** But the thing was, when we were growing up, she didn't wanna wear dresses, and I would always be like, "You could be so pretty! Wear lipstick!" And it just, you know, we have that one picture of her in that communion dress and she looked so naked and vulnerable--

**Michael:** Uncomfortable

**Nay:** Yeah

**Adam:** She did not feel comfortable. And it took a long time and education to understand that's not the way she identifies, and, y'know

**Nay:** But she's pretty in a flannel, too

**Brennan:** Look, all of life is a journey to understanding people's lives and stories

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** And your own

**Brennan:** Oh, absolutely! But you're not always there at first, and we've all done some bad things. But, I mean, learning is the only way we can move on from that and making sure it doesn't happen again

**Nay:** True

**Joelle:** Unlike anybody in this movie, who learned literally nothing at all

**Michael:** I was just gonna segueway to Tawny Kitaen's hair

**Adam:** Tawny Kitaen, girl

**Nay:** Oh, let's talk about it!

**Michael:** That's a character

**Nay:** *Yeah!*

**Adam:** It was a timezone, I think

**Michael:** Yeah, like literally its own fucking zip code?

**Nay:** Oh my God yeah, I would give it the key to the city

**Michael:** The moment she got on screen, I was like, "Is she wearing a *fucking* helmet?"

**Joelle:** (indistinct) this half-done bun

**Michael:**

**Nay:** I would love that helmet

**Adam:** She's definitely sexy, though

**Michael:** She really is

**Nay:** *And that dress*!

**Michael:** I haven't seen this movie probably since college, so about twenty years? And I was instantly struck by how *everyone* was at an eleven right away

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** (gruff straight dude voice) "*And Brandon, the entire movie he talks like this!*" (normal voice) And I'm  like, dude, unclench the butt, chill out

**Joelle:** We have to talk about the opening scene!

**Michael:** Yeah, I mean the opening scene alone is amazing

**Nay:** Yeah

**Joelle:** Alone!

**Michael:** We get right into it

**Joelle:** The opening scene you're like, "This is so aggressive! And I don't know why anyone is so angry *so* early at a party."

**Michael:** With each other!

**Joelle:** Confused me

**Nay:** "Because we're playing a group game! That's why!"

**Michael:** I don't know if it was a dynamic I couldn't get...

**Joelle:** I don't think I've ever seen someone get that much anger out

**Michael:** And we start *right away*, like we get into the story immediately

**Joelle:** Yeah, that is so true

**Nay:** 'Cause Jim's a fucking dick

**Michael:** But *is* Jim a dick?

**Nay:** So, at the end, you know, there is a revival--

**Joelle:** I thought Brandon was an asshole

**Michael:** I thought Brandon was being a dick to him, and I was like, "Why is she not sticking up for her boyfriend?"

**Joelle:** I thought the exact same thing! Like, "This is my house! First of all, you come in here, you're all laid up on him?" I have old school Black heteronormative ideas about who you should be touching. It's really dumb, I'm trying to get over it. But she's laying on top of Brandon talking to Jim--

**Brennan:** True! I thought (Brandon) was her boyfriend

**Joelle:** You know, what's going on?

**Michael:** I thought that, too

**Nay:** Yeah, that's true. I definitely thought that too, because when she went and sat by Brandon, I was like, "Oooh, little power move Brandon." I'm like, "Oh. Wait. Okay. I don't know."

**Michael:** I was just like, "She's dating a gay guy."

**Joelle:** I thought the guys on the couch were a couple!

**Michael:** Yeah!

**Nay:** I did too!

**Michael:** Yeah

**Nay:** He's like sitting--

**Michael:** I was like, "Oh! Brandon and Ben Bauer with the glasses…"

**Joelle:** Yes!

**Nay:** Yes! Shout-out to Ben Baur! Listen to that episode!

**Joelle:** They looked like a couple

**Adam:** He looked like a Barbie doll, he was like a Ken doll with the rings and all the….

**Joelle:** God

**Michael:** So Adam, I have a question for you

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** Does this movie hold any significance to you?

**Adam:** Yeah, it does! I told you earlier, full disclosure it scared the shit out of me as a kid

**Michael:** Yeah

**Adam:** But I was raised on insane stories of a talking board that possessed my grandmother's house for seven years in the early Seventies

**Michael:** *Ohhhh, yes*

**Nay:** Ohhh my God

**Adam:** My grandmother's, she was very progressive, she's passed now, but she was very progressive and you know, smart and spiritual and stuff, but there was a period of time in the early Seventies where they don't talk about that time. And uh, yeah, she would play with my father, they lived in a little house in the middle of the woods in New Hampshire

**Nay:** Oh my God

**Michael:** Huh

**Adam:** It progressively got stronger, the entity materialized itself physically, one time there were twenty people in the room and they said, her collie dog had just died so they said, "Where's Sheba?" And the planchette spelled out, "fireplace." All of the logs fell into the perfect shape of a collie dog burning in the fire

**Michael:** *What?!?*

**Adam:** Yeah. My grandfather wouldn't step foot in her house anymore because he was a total cynic and he said he asked that thing, "What's my best buddy's name in the war?" It spelled out, "P-h-i-s-h," phish. He had never told anybody, his face went white, he never went back to my grandmother's house, so it's shit like that

**Michael:** Holy shit!

**Adam:** Yeah, yeah. And towards the end, it had seven biblical things it was demanding them to do, like kill babies, crush skulls--

**Michael:** I am blown away right now

**Joelle:** Did they burn the house down??

**Michael:** "Crush skulls"

**Adam:** Well they ended up having a woman from the Catholic church come and bless it in tongues

**Michael:** Was it Lorraine Warren?

**Adam:** It wouldn't burn

**Joelle:** The house wouldn't burn?

**Adam:** The board wouldn't burn

**Michael:** What was the other five? Kill babies, crush skulls…

**Adam:** Join Amway. No, I don't remember all of them

**Michael:** Vote Ford?

**Adam:** (chuckles) Yeah. Pay your taxes. No, I don't quite remember, it just--

**Nay:** *That's wild*

**Michael:** That *is wild!*

**Adam:** Yeah

**Joelle:** So what was done with the board in the end?

**Michael:** Fuck this movie

**Adam:** They ended up burning it. She blessed it with oils and burned it

**Michael:** They did eventually burn it?

**Adam:** Yeah

**Brennan:** They shot it and the devil (indistinct)

**Adam:** She called Lorraine Warren, my grandmother called--

**Joelle:** *What*

**Michael:** She did not!

**Nay:** *Shut the fuck up*!

**Adam:** They didn't come, but my grandmother spoke to her on a radio show and Lorraine Warren said you're fucking with, oh she didn't say "fucking", she said "fudging"

**Nay:** *Yes*, grandma!

**Joelle:** Lorraine is in it!

**Adam:** She said you're dialing the wrong tune right now and you need to get away from that board immediately, so

**Michael:** *Whoa*

**Adam:** Those are the stories I was raised on

**Joelle:** That's amazing!

**Michael:** And this obviously played a part in your career, right?

**Adam:** Yeah. Hell yeah

**Michael:** When are we gonna see your movie on this?

**Adam:** You know, my grandmother was a lot of the inspiration for Deborah Logan, actually

**Michael:** No kidding

**Nay:** *Oh my God*

**Adam:** She had a switchboard answering service, and a lot of the character work that went into that character was...

**Michael:** I wanna watch it again tonight

**Nay:** Oh, *I'm going to*

**Adam:** Sans the whole snake-eating jaw distending thing of it, yeah. My grandmother didn't do that

**Nay:** (*The Taking of Deborah Logan*) is one of my absolute favorite movies of all time

**Adam:** Oh, wow! Thank you!

**Nay:** Yeah

**Adam:** That's awesome. Thank you

**Nay:** Yeah, like me *and* Jesse, my partner, her whole family roasts her about this movie 'cause she'll be like, "Do you wanna watch it again?" And they're like, "*Again?!?!* I can't. That movie's so scary I can't watch it again." And we're like, "Yep. Start it up!"

**Adam:** Well, you know, thank you for saying that. For us it was always, you know, if you take the genre stuff out, the movie's interesting, and for us, having Ann Ramsay's character Sara be so-- to feel that her mother rejected her, didn't accept her for her sexuality and that being the thing

**Nay:** Yeah

**Adam:** But ultimately she was trying to protect her. That's such great interesting drama, without the Alzheimer's, without the possession stuff

**Nay:** Oh yeah

**Michael:** We should have Jesse on

**Nay:** We definitely have to do an episode

**Michael:** And we should have Jesse on

**Nay:** Oh good lord. She would slay. You would die

**Michael:** Yeah?

**Nay:** *Yesss*

**Michael:** *Deborah Logan*'s on our list. For sure

**Adam:** That's really kind of you. Thank you. Really proud of it

**Nay:** I'm not even that kind, so it's just a good movie

**Michael:** So, your dad witnessed some of this stuff, then?

**Adam:** Oh yeah yeah yeah. My grandmother had, she was, I would say, you know, clairvoyant or something. She would be out raking her leaves, she lived out in the middle of nowhere--

**Michael:** In New Hampshire?

**Adam:** In New Hampshire, and another story, my cousin who's like a vice president of the Mellon Corp., you know, very button-down conservative guy and he went into the house and said, "Dee, Dee, there's some guy sitting in Hank's front window!" And she's like, "Calm down, calm down."

**Michael:** (laughing) It was just an accident

**Adam:** And she was like, you know, "Calm down." And she went, (with a New England accent) "Here." (regular voice) She gave him pictures like, (New England accent) "Is that him?"

**Michael:** He's doing that voice

**Nay:** Yeah, that voice is New England, yes!

**Adam:** And she's like, (New England accent) "Turn it over," (normal voice) and it was a memorial card

**Nay:** *Yikes!*

**Adam:** She was like, (New England accent) "Oh, that's just Phil. He likes to sit in that window."

**Michael:** In her house?

**Adam:** He was in the neighbor's house

**Michael:** Neighbor's house

**Adam:** He had died like five years earlier and she used to always see him in the window, and we used to think she was batshit crazy until my cousin saw him and validated it.

**Michael:** And your dad, too, right?

**Adam:** Yeah… then seeing the power of scaring people so she would hold court and tell ghost stories

**Brennan:** Oh no!

**Nay:** She bad, *yesss*!

**Michael:** Bad bitch!

**Adam:** And you know, when her friend Marie died, you know, she said they would speak quite lucidly about what it was going to be like to die. And she said Marie, life long Catholic schoolgirl friends, "Marie, will you come to me when you pass? I wanna know if you're all right." "I will if I can. I'm gonna be busy," is what she said. And then the night, a week after she died, middle of the night, my grandmother woke up, there was no moon, it was a very dark night, and this old defunct television was glowing a beautiful blue light emanating from the TV. And she got up, she had polio so she couldn't walk, she gets up on her stool, and only finally when she verbally acknowledged, "That's you, Marie, isn't it," did the light wane. So she was totally convinced

**Michael:** *Wow*, that's fascinating

**Adam:** But at the end, when she was getting a bad heart and stuff, she was like, "I don't know." She was like, "Adam, when I rested on that table, all I saw was nothing but black," you know? And I was like, "Fuck. Don't turn into the Hammond girl. Come on!"

**Joelle:** *Oh, no!*

**Nay:** She was-- yo, she liked scaring you for real (laughing)

**Adam:** Yeah (laughs)

**Nay:** Like, "*Damn*, Grandma!"

**Adam:** There was nothing but black

**Nay:** *Wow*

**Michael:** The black was for a surprise party they were gonna throw for her. The light was gonna flick on, as soon as she-- oh my God

**Joelle:** So have you ever experienced any paranormal or supernatural?

**Adam:** I haven't!

**Joelle:** Damn!

**Adam:** I did, and I've done all these movies and stuff, but I've honestly; we did a ghost hunting show, we went to that, what was it, that hotel in San Diego where--

**Joelle:** *Yes!*

**Adam:** You know, I went to the Queen Mary, I did all that stuff. I haven't had my own experience yet

**Joelle:** Oooh, Queen Mary

**Nay:** Damn

**Joelle:** I am convinced that the big attractions freak the spirits out

**Adam:** Right

**Joelle:** Like, "We're not here to be attractions for you." I've had *one* encounter--

**Michael:** *Ohh!*

**Joelle:** The second house I lived in was built in the Seventies, and the lady who built it with her husband left messages underneath all of the drawers

**Adam:** Wow

**Joelle:** So you'd pull out the drawers to clean them and be like, "Oh my God, there's a handwritten message."

**Nay:** She'd be like, "Good thing you're cleaning this drawer like I told you to."

**Adam:** That's creepy

**Joelle:** And they're mostly love letters to the house. Like it was really beautiful, like, "This is when we built this part.."

**Adam:** Awwww

**Joelle:** "And this is what was in our hearts." It was really gorgeous. And it wasn't even like-- I think when I tell this to people they're like, "It must be an old lady in the house." No. It's a little boy, and he's about seven, and it creeps me the fuck out because he would show up always in a blue shirt and these bright red pants, and not doing anything. Sometimes running around a table, sometimes just sitting and watching TV. And I kind of kept it to myself until one day, I screamed because I saw him and it just freaked me out a little bit. I was like, "What happened?" "It's the craziest thing, but I swear to God, I see a little boy here." She's like, "In the red shirt?" I was like, "Noooooo!!!"

**Brennan:** (gasps)

**Adam:** Ohhh!

**Michael:** Oh, that's creepy

**Joelle:** He didn't want anything, I think he was just happy to--

**Adam:** Did you do any research?

**Joelle:** We couldn't find anything else about the couple that owned the house. So all we have are her weird messages and little ghost boy

**Adam:** Wow

**Joelle:** I have no idea what he would….

**Michael:** I think I have one that was totally someone fucking with me. So I was living in Sherman Oaks at the time in my apartment and I was asleep. I was having a dream that I was asleep, like laying in my bed…

**Nay:** Right

**Brennan:** Oh God. Oh God

**Michael:** Sleeping

**Nay:** Already scary

**Michael:** Someone walks in my room--

**Adam:** Wait, say this again. You had a dream that you *were* asleep, so you could see yourself, like sleep paralysis?

**Michael:** I was sleeping, but I could see myself

**Adam:** Sleep paralysis. Okay. Dissociative state

**Michael:** So, someone walked in my room, and I couldn't turn, sleep paralysis. And I was like, "Who the fuck is that?" He disappeared, he like went down, and then I look over and he's face-to-face with me

**Brennan:** (gasps)

**Joelle:** Nooo!!!

**Michael:** Like kneeling and next to my bed, I see this face. So in my dream I wake up, like actually really wake up. And when I wake up, the face is there.

**Adam:** Noo!!!

**Michael:** And then, my fucking closet door, at the exact same time--

**Joelle:** No no!

**Michael:** Fell off its hinge and smashed my fuckin' television

**Brennan:** What?

**Adam:** And that's when you leave the apartment

**Joelle:** Oh my God, what are the spirits trying to tell you?

**Michael:** I screamed at the top of my lungs, and my roommate, I was living with my friend Erin at the time, you just hear her, she goes, "Um. Are you okay??"

**Brennan:** Oh my God!

**Michael:** I was like, "No! I don't know what just happened!"

**Brennan:** I think that was--

**Michael:** For the longest time, hearing you guys speak for the longest time I just thought it was a huge coincidence, but now I really do feel that someone visited me and he was just fuckin' with me

**Adam:** *Jesus*

**Brennan:** No, the spirits were telling you you watch too many sitcom reruns

**Michael:** They're like, "Stop watching *Married...With Children."*

**Nay:** Yes

**Joelle:** "Watch something better than this! Or watch whatever you watch, bitch!"

**Nay:** They're like, "I don't wanna hear about Marcy D'arcy *another* time."

**Michael:** It's like, "And then her haircut in season seven..."

**Adam:** I did a shit-ton of research in parapsychology In my day. It's really interesting. They used to have, you know, Princeton, Duke, they had all these massive universities that were doing these studies but they could never find *legit* verifiable empirical proof. That being said, there was tens of thousands of anecdotal data, and one of the really interesting things is this thing called a "crisis apparition", which happens a lot. For example, a woman will wake up and see her husband freezing at the end of her bed and then she'll call the army brig and realize he has pneumonia

**Brennan:** Oh, yeah

**Adam:** And he's projected himself to her and she somehow received it. And there was a case in London where this couple kept seeing this woman fucking vacuuming their flat, and it was terrifying, you know, it was a spectral vision of this woman. They  thought she was dead, they did research, the woman was still alive and in a coma like twenty kilometers away in Leeds was projecting herself to this place that she liked. It was her home and her sanctuary.

**Nay:** *Wow*. First of all, can you actually come vacuum?

**Adam:** "Somebody come vacuum! Is that a Dyson? Bitch, you missed a spot!"

**Nay:** That is *sick!* You're gay

**Joelle:** That is so wild

**Joelle:** Everyone in my family has been visited at least once by somebody who died, which I think is--

**Michael:** Oh my God

**Joelle:** And they're very, like your family Nay, religious, and so to admit that for them is really hard

**Nay:** That is major. My family would never, yeah

**Adam:** Yeah. See, I haven't, Aunt Dee hasn't visited me yet. That's the thing. Where are you, I want, y'know?

**Joelle:** It's so wild, because they got them the *day after*, you know? Like my mother's father died when she was in college, he died in a plane crash, so super unsaid. And it wasn't even her dad who came back, it was his brother. He was like, "Your dad's with me, so you don't have to worry. I've got him." And then she woke up to the phone ringing to learn that her father had passed. Like, wild. My Dad did it when he was like, four, and it was his grandfather, and he was just, "You don't even have to worry, I'll be back. We'll see each other soon." Poof, gone. *Wild*

**Adam:** See to me, that would give me unshakeable faith. If I had an experience like that--

**Nay:** Yeah

**Adam:** The precognition of that is powerful

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm.

**Adam:** But I haven't had that

**Michael:** It'll come

**Joelle:** I haven't had it either

**Nay:** I don't believe in anything, It is so hard for me to put my faith in *anything*. Literally the internet can be like, "Garlic is anti-microbial!" And I'll be like, "Is it?" It's really a problem. I need to bring it up in therapy, but like, I'm an atheist. I really, I just don't believe in much of anything

**Adam:** I'm with you

**Brennan:** Yeah, me too

**Adam:** I'm agnostic

**Nay:** Okay. You know, I teeter. The point is, when I first moved to L.A., I moved into this place that was fondly called "the Queer Mansion".

**Michael:** Ooh, girl!

**Nay:** There was nine to ten of us living in this house in K-town

**Brennan:** Oooh

**Nay:** A *huge* house

**Michael:** Kind of like in *Witchboard*

**Nay:** And I was young, so it was awesome and I don't think I could do it again, but I was young and thought it was the most amazing

**Michael:** Of course!

**Nay:** Anyway, roommates had started to be like, "You know, I think there's a ghost in this house." And I was like, "All right." But also didn't *not* believe my roommate, you know?

**Joelle:** Well, *sure*!

**Adam:** What was the reasoning?

**Joelle:** "You're experiencing *something*."

**Nay:** I'm like, "I would believe you any other time." So, one night my phone rings. It's like one in the morning. I'm like, this bitch is down the hall, you're being annoying. So I don't answer.

**[Everyone else laughs]**

**Nay:** Right? 'Cause I'm like, we used to fuck with each other, we're all young and annoying and so we're like, "Haaa," you know. And it rings again and I'm like all right, well, I guess I should answer. And Marina is like, "Renee, come into my room right now." And so I go down the hall, and my roommate is *terrified*. She's pale. She's like, "The ghost in that just tried to open my door." She described it as like, a pencil etching, like not really firm lines, but just kind of dark and kind of etched out, like the Babadook drawing, like etched out pulling her door open

**Michael:** Queer

**Nay:** And I'm like, I know that whatever happened, you one hundred thousand percent believe this

**Adam:** Believe it, yeah

**Nay:** So it was scary, and I-- but it got *crazier*. There are so many of us, you didn't ever really know who was home when necessarily. And one of our favorite things about living together was hearing each other laugh in other rooms. It would make us laugh, right? Like if you heard me laugh in the other room, you would crack up, yeah?

**Michael:** Absolutely

**Brennan:** Podcast listeners across the world know this experience with you

**Nay:** Yes, yes. And so, you know, we would hear like, Serifel laugh. So one day in particular, we had a roommate named Serifel and we heard him laugh and we all started laughing 'coz it was so cute. And then a few minutes later, not a few, twenty minutes later, he walks in the front door from work--

**Joelle:** Nope! Nope!

**Brennan:** Ahh! Ahhh!

**Nay:** And we were like, "*What?*"

**Adam:** (chuckles) How old was the house?

**Nay:** Um, you know, at least like a hundred years. It was an older home, and we looked it up and someone had died in it, like a man. And so it happened with two other roommates. At different times we heard them laugh and we were like, "Oh, that's so cute, Sean's laughing!" And then that person would get home

**Adam:** Okay

**Nay:** And we'd be like, "Were you outside on the phone?"

**Adam:** Sounds like a trickster ghost

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** (amused) "Trickster ghost"

**Nay:** And it like, mocked our joy

**[Everyone else laughs]**

**Nay:** And I'm saying this--

**Adam:** The Joy Mocker

**Nay:** The Joy Mocker

**Adam:** James Wan

**Nay:** I'm saying this as someone, who literally, I would tell anyone at any point, I do not believe in ghosts. But these things *did* happen--

**Michael:** (laughing softly) "Mocker of joy"

**Nay:** And it was so undeniable, and it did. We were like, "Do we have a homophobic…?" Because everyone in the house was gay--

**Michael:** *Ohhhhhh!*

**Nay:** And we were like, "Do we have a homophobic ghost in the house who like…?"

**Joelle:** Nay's going to make this movie!

**Nay:** Right?

**Michael:** *Mocked Our Laughter*? Or *Mock Our Joy*

**Nay:** It was truly--

**Adam:** *The Joy Mocker*

**Nay:** *The Joy Mocker*

**Michael:** *The Joy Mocker*

**Adam:** By Dean Koontz

**Nay:** It truly was creepy, and I was like, at the time, I definitely wasn't as faithless as I am now, you know, because I was closer to being a religious person

**Michael:** Your old life?

**Brennan:** Uh-huh

**Nay:** But I couldn't explain it and I had roommates who didn't believe in anything and who weren't scared and roommates who believed very much and was like, "I'm having dreams about this ghost now at night," or, "I saw it in my room," or you know, one night it sounded like-- we lived in a *home*, not an apartment building, so if you hear someone moving, it's someone in the home. And I think as someone who grew up not in a house, a single-family unit, when I hear a noise, I assume it's another apartment building or something

**Brennan:** Oh yeah

**Nay:** So I remember having to get used to hearing a noise and being like, "Oh, that *is* someone in the house. Because this is a single house."

**Michael:** Mmm-hmm

**Nay:** I dunno if that sounds ridiculous, but when I'm laying in Serafin's room, one of the people the ghost mocked, I'm like, "Who is one of the people going up and down the stairs right now?" 'Cause literally stomping up and down the stairs. And he was like, "I dunno. I'm tryin' to sleep." And I was *so mad* 'cause I was up, terrified, and I was trying to wake this fool up. I was like, "I need to know!" But no one's on the stairs.

**Adam:** The thing is, if you're raised religious and then you step away from that, you overcorrect a little bit, you know?

**Nay:** Oh, that's me. I'm like, "Fuck you! Burn it down!"

**Adam:** I interviewed Ed Warren, and like you said, he was *so adamant*, he was telling me about, what were they? Something ghosts? Shadow ghosts! And they were like, they can kill you, they can maim you. And he was so fucking convincing, like all I know is whatever he was saying, he believed it one hundred percent on an atomic level, and that was creepy to me, you know?

**Nay:** Yeah, absolutely

**Brennan:** Nay, you just unlocked a memory for me

**Nay:** Ooooh! Coool!

**Adam:** Oh my God, it's like *Inception*!

**Brennan:** Okay. So, when I was a kid, whenever I'd go to sleep at night, I would *see things*? So, I don't know if you know this word, but they're these things called "phosphenes" they're the lights that you see when you close your eyes

**Nay:** Yes. Yes.

**Michael:** Mmm-hmm

**Nay:** I used to trip out on that shit

**Joelle:** Hell yeah!

**Nay:** I'd be like, "Whoa!"

**Brennan:** But it was-- that's the most comparable way I can describe it. There were these things that were like colorful Etch-a-sketch drawings of goblins and witches and things just *floating* around in the air around my bed, and I could see them with my eyes open or my eyes closed

**Adam:** You're tapped in. As a kid, I saw shit; I used to see these little people dancing across the top of my cabinet...

**Nay:** Mmmkay

**Adam:** They were like fucking trolls

**Nay:** (laughing) Oh, hell no!

**Brennan:** But it was every night for a couple months

**Michael:** I used to see shit like that too, as a kid

**Joelle:** Oh, wow

**Brennan:** It always freaked me out

**Michael:** You are seeing *something*

**Adam:** You're just more open

**Joelle:** How did you get over it? Did you just stop? Do you remember?

**Brennan:** It just kind of went away eventually and I kind of repressed and forgot about it

**Joelle:** I used to see a nine-foot tall Frankenstein in my closet when I would go to sleep

**Brennan:** Oh my God!

**Adam:** I usually pay extra for that

**Michael:** I used to see a man standing--

**Nay:** Right. "*How* tall? Mmm-hmm."

**Adam:** "Oooh, Frank."

**Joelle:** He's just standing in the closet

**Michael:** "Everything matched."

**Adam:** (fey voice) "Take off those tic tacs when you're…"

**Joelle:** One night it just really freaked me out, so I just this bloodcurdling scream that my parents are like, "What the fuck is happening?!" And they came in and were like, "We could just leave your light on." I was like, "All right. No shadow lights." Kids are wild

**Michael:** I always used to see a man at the end of my bed

**Joelle:** Yeah

**Adam:** That's very common

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Adam:** Sleep paralysi

**Brennan:** When that happens to me now, I'm like, "Oh, that makes sense."

**Nay:** My cousin showed me *Ghost* when I was little and that shit fucked me up

**Michael:** Demi Moore?

**Nay:** Yes

**Adam:** When the ghosts come out of the…?

**Nay:** I thought there was little black shadow demons *everywhere*

**Adam:** Oh yeah

**Michael:** And pottery

**Nay:** I was so scared of demons as a kid. I was so scared of Satan, hell and demons, I thought that was just like--

**Adam:** When I was bad, my mother would write on *soap* on as the Devil--

**Brennan:** (gasps) Cool!

**Adam:** Saying, "You're getting closer to me every day."

**Brennan, Joelle and Michael:** Oh my God!

**Nay:** *Excuse me?!?!*

**Joelle:** What a creative goddamn--

**Adam:** Yeah, I would open the fuckin' bathroom door with dread and it would be scary writing

**Brennan:** (gasps)

**Nay:** *Mom!*

**Michael:** Did you know it was her?

**Adam:** No. I thought it was, I really thought it was the Devil for at least three years

**Nay: *Yo!!!***
**Michael:** Every time I look to my right, I see fucking Jason Blum's fake head

**Michael:** Every time I look to my right, I see fucking Jason Blum's fake head

**Brennan:** I'm gonna go close that, actually

**Nay:** I know. It actually really freaks me out

**Michael:** It's like, "Jesus fuck!"

**Joelle:** Staring unblinkingly

**Michael:** I know it's a man, but *God!*

**Joelle:** I imagine you got a reprieve afterwards, though

**Adam:** I was good for awhile

**Joelle:** Right?

**Adam:** I was definitely good for a while, yeah yeah yeah

**Nay:** I would do all kinds of fucked up shit

**Michael:** Evil genius mother

**Joelle:** As a person who needs to sleep, I can't even imagine

**Adam:** Think about Catholic ideology. It's so binary, it's like you're either with them or you're with the Devil

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Michael:** And it's all so grisly

**Adam:** It's so much fear. Like I remember the basement in fucking church and it would just be like these effigies of Christ with blood everywhere--

**Joelle:** Blood everywhere, yeah

**Adam:** And the nuns looked like witches

**Nay:** Hot. Nuns that look like witches? Hot.

**Joelle:** I really disturbed my parents around nine. I got really into devices of torture and they're like, "What the fuck?"

**Nay:** Yo, that would freak--

**Joelle:** Well, yeah. I bought like a ton of books on mummification and like, the Romans and I would be like, over dinner, be describing like, "And in the Iron Bull they basically cook you alive. There's nothing in there…"

**Michael:** Oh, that's right. The Iron Bull, I remember learning about that

**Joelle:** "So what's really happening is that you're getting welts on your skin and you can't escape because it's *all* metal," and they'd be like, "Uh-huh, that's really, *wow*. Fascinating."

**Michael:** Catholicism, I grew up Catholic and it's just--

**Adam:** Torture porn

**Michael:** It's just pure fear. They instill fear in you from the moment you start

**Joelle:** I grew up Catholic and it's not only that, it's punishment, right?

**Michael:** Yes

**Joelle:** It's both hand-in-hand

**Nay:** The fear of punishment, yeah

**Michael:** A equals B

**Joelle:** And I really don't think I could comprehend or deal with it, and I just turned it into, "Well, what's the worst thing humans do to each other? If I just explore every avenue of that, then I won't have to be afraid, because I'll know what's coming." I got *really really* into this

**Nay:** You were just doing your young BDSM research

**Joelle:** I know what I'm into, *yes!*

**Brennan:** Yeah, put a metal spike up your nose and twirl it around

**Nay:** (indistinct) Yeah

**Joelle:** *Yes!*

**Adam:** I remember, just anecdotally, I was a lifeguard one year and this girl, her parents were mathematicians and I remember reading it was like *The Celestine Prophecy*--

**Joelle:** *Yeah!*

**Nay:** *Yes!*

**Adam:** Which is this book about the power of trees and stuff, and I believed that and I was like, "You don't understand, each tree has its own spirit." And then she said, quite literally, "I don't believe in God." And I was like, so shocked. And then what happened for me was I discovered Carl Sagan and I started reading just about how we're just this cosmic accident--

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** Or just things

**Adam:** And that in and of itself is just profound in a way

**Michael:** It is!

**Adam:** It's almost more profound. But yeah, the vacuum of not having "I wanna believe when I get some, if I get sick, that there's gonna be some other thing," but yeah, it's trippy, you know? And it's no wonder as you get older, you know, my Grandmother's funeral and her mass, all these eighty-year-old women in the front row, just lapping up that story of Isaac, and I'm just like, "*Wow*. This shit still sells to that crowd."

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm!

**Michael:** Lu-cra-tive

**Nay:** It is so deeply ingrained in every single part of those folks' lives

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** Like I was telling my roommate earlier today how my family, or lots of people, like my family think that if you do something wrong, that something catastrophic happens. And I think I've told you all a million times how--

**Michael:** *Yes*. How you thought you killed Princess Diana?

**Nay:** I thought I killed Princess Diana from watching *Loveline*

**Joelle:** We made the Twin Towers drop! Same thing!

**Nay:** Yeah

**Adam:** Oh my God! That's some serious power you're wielding there

**Joelle:** We had been really bad the day before, me and my little brother

**Michael:** Holy shit!

**Nay:** My cousin was like, "Oh, Grandma has cancer 'cause I had premarital sex!" Like that kind of thing?

**Adam:** *Wow*. That's a lot of weight

**Joelle:** Guilt

**Adam:** Yeah

**Nay:** And it reminds me, I meant to bring this up in Tea Time, something that I *was* watching, I watched that flat earther documentary on Netflix

**Michael:** *Ohh*

**Adam:** *Ooof*

**Joelle:** (laughing) The flag!

**Nay:** And listening to those folks talk reminded me of honestly--

**Adam:** Horrifying

**Michael:** Is that the convention one? Where they go to the convention?

**Nay:** Yes.

**Michael:** Okay, I watched that. Nuts

**Nay:** And it reminds me, I mean, of listening to a lot of religious folks, like straight-up talk

**Adam:** Yeah

**Nay:** *But*, there was someone on there who was like… okay, he was like a doctor of psychology at UCLA, a professor there, and he was talking about how, "Actually, I could probably talk to every single one of you and unearth one of your beliefs that is just as far-out as this…"

**Joelle:** *Whoa*

**Nay:** And I thought about it, and I was like, "Oh you're so right."

**Joelle:** Probably

**Adam:** Well give me an example, though. Magical thinking?

**Nay:** You know for instance, some old wives tale that you believe and you haven't even teased out--

**Adam:** Right

**Nay:** You've always just kind of thought that it was true

**Adam:** Right

**Nay:** But is actually just so spectacularly false that you're like, "Oh, wow!" And so, it humanized a bit, but some of the experiments these people were doing trying to see if the earth was flat or round

**Michael:** I think there's a lot of it--

**Nay:** Anyway, they're absolutely right, when you grow up in a *supremely* religious environment and you overcorrect

**Adam:** Yeah

**Nay:** I'm wondering if I'll ever come back towards the middle? And just sort of *relax* a little bit? Because sometimes I think, "*Oh,* if I hadn't grown up *as* religious as I did, would I still go to church now?"

**Adam:** Right

**Nay:** Would it be something I don't vehemently hate? Like, I dunno! And we'll never know this

**Brennan:** Well, there's usually a slingshot with things like that

**Nay:** Yeah

**Brennan:** Like I talked about last week, a much smaller thing, but with *Halloween III*, like it got so much hate that people slingshotted into loving it way too much

**Nay:** Yeah

**Brennan:** And that happens in a lot of ways. I think that happens in a lot of different smaller ways, when people come out--

**Nay:** Oh, yeah

**Brennan:** They slingshot way too far into like, I'm gonna be, "Just Jack!" for two years and some people are and those people are beautiful

**Nay:** Yeah. Right

**Brennan:** But people just lean in so hard into things that they think they need to be or that kind of thing, and then they find who they are. And sometimes that is who they are. Like I said, great thing

**Nay:** I'm a leaner-inner. I lean in

**Michael:** You go hard?

**Nay:** I tend to lean-in for sure

**Michael:** I leaned in hard when I came out, when I moved out here?

**Brennan:** Oh yeah, of course!

**Nay:** Oh my God

**Michael:** Oh yeah. How do you find your zone, and yeah

**Brennan:** And some people that comes out as like, a bathhouse phase maybe. And again--

**Michael:** Perfectly fine

**Brennan:** Bathhouses aren't always a phase. People go to them and they're great for those people

**Nay:** I mean, we should have some for women, y'know?

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Nay:** Yeah

**Brennan:** I wish they had a lot of things for women

**Joelle:** A boys' cabin is the worst. They're like, "No ladies allowed!" "We're all dykes! Let us in!" "No." You go in, it's stupid

**Brennan:** Yeah, no, I think that happens with a lot of different things. It's just such severe repression you just *bounce* right as far as possible

**Nay:** Yeah. I'm like, head-to-toe rainbow and glitter honey, like comin' atcha--

**Brennan:** Hell yeah

**Nay:** One hundred percent

**Michael:** I quit drinking four and a half years ago, or four years ago--

**Adam:** Congratulations

**Michael:** I don't even know how long it's been at this point, but, thank you

**Adam:** That's awesome

**Michael:** *I* didn't do A.A., and I still don't, because my Dad was so into A.A. and was so about it--

**Nay:** That's why it's not for you

**Michael:** And would push A.A., like even before, when I still drank and didn't have a problem, per se? That when I finally quit drinking, I was so dead set against doing it via A.A., because of the way he pushed it to me. Not pushed it to me, but talked about it

**Adam:** It's underlying spirituality too, because it's about a Higher Power, you know, some people have issues

**Michael:** *That*, and it was the only way he would say stuff like, "It's the only way you could get sober…"

**Adam:** "Is to find God."

**Michael:** Yeah. And not to knock anybody that does it. My boyfriend of four years has been sober for about seven now, and he does A.A. and that works for him

**Nay:** Okay boo

**Michael:** But I pushed really hard back against doing the program. Granted it's worked for me the way I've done it, but it's just another example

**Brennan:** Yeah! And again, all of these examples are not things that we condemn

**Nay:** Right, right

**Brennan:** They're not behaviors or activities that we condemn

**Nay:** Right

**Michael:** Exactly! Everybody's different. That's the way I look at it. Whatever works for you, works for you

**Nay:** It's just, sometimes you hit the gas--

**Brennan:** Yeah

**Nay:** And you're off!

**Brennan:** So, *Witchboard*

**Joelle:** I was gonna say, I find this conversation really interesting because it does all stem back to *Witchboard* and again, that opening scene which I think--

**[Brennan and Michael laugh]**

**Brennan:** We're three minutes in to *Witchboard*!

**Joelle:** I can't get over this scene! First, why do we choose to start the movie this way? And how does it project forward? Because we start off with a conversation about "Does God exist?" right?

**Brennan:** Oh, yeah!

**Joelle:** And through this time-- I watched this scene four times trying to figure out how does this play into the rest of the movie? Because we talk a lot about spirituality and evil, but never really back to this opening conversation of like, "Does God exist and is he here?" And no one ever turns to God for a moment despite the fact that we end up in a church on a wedding! Am I missing something?!?!

**Adam:** I just think that the idea of supernatural entities exist, ergo God must exist in a way, maybe?

**Michael:** Right

**Adam:** You know, "If there's dark, there's light," so maybe that's what I took from it, was that

**Joelle:** 'Cause Eighty-six we're in the height of "Satanic Panic". I'm trying to get into the minds of people watching and creating it, yeah

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** What I took from it is that they got married like, immediately after everything stopped, because they were still cleaning the house

**Joelle:** They didn't even clean the apartment

**Brennan:** Oh, yeah!

**Joelle:** Yeah, no, they went straight on into the wedding

**Nay:** *Yo*

**Michael:** He had a neck brace on. I love that.  I was like, "Wait. Bitch couldn't wait until he had no neck brace on?"

**Joelle:** "We have to be sanctified by God immediately. This is terrible."

**Michael:** Mrs. Moses is like sweeping the--

**Brennan:** Also, speaking of characters I loved, I *loved her*

**Michael:** Mrs. Moses?

**Brennan:** Yeah, the landlady

**Michael:** I love that she had a lapdog or a lap cat?

**Joelle:** Oh, I loved that too!

**Adam:** (as Mrs. Moses) "What's goin' on?!" Like four Pall Mall cigarettes

**Michael:** (as Mrs. Moses) "There's something wrong with Linda!"

**Adam:** (as Mrs. Moses) "I love that!"

**Michael:** Did she have a dog or a cat? What was that on her lap?

**Nay:** What was-- you just asked that. Was a lapdog or a lap cat?

**Adam:** I don't know

**Michael:** Yeah

**Nay:** I dunno

**Michael:** But I love that the first visual get of her was--

**Nay:** Little nightgown?

**Brennan:** And tea

**Adam:** I loved Zarabeth

**Nay:** "My tea," okay?

**Joelle:** That's what Tinker says. I was so confused

**Nay:** Zarabeth, I was like, "This annoying witchy dyke. "

**Adam:** (as Zarabeth) "A little more psychic humor."

**Michael:** I know

**Adam:** Oh, I loved her though

**Nay:** You know what the thing is? I really hate nonsense. And like, when she kept--

**Adam:** She was like, (as Zarabeth) "Spiriently trained!"

**Michael:** Method!

**Nay:** Which, you know, "Nothing like a little psychic humor," fuck you

**Brennan:** Oh yeah

**Nay:** I don't understand people who say things--

**Michael:** Especially if you have that power

**Nay:** You're *not* trying to get a point across with what you're saying? Maybe that's why I was confused, 'cause--

**Michael:** And also, "You're the expert here. Don't joke about it."

**Brennan:** Yeah, people in positions of authority who use that position to make jokes? Are kind of sickening to me

**Nay:** Yes

**Brennan:** Like when cops are like, "Oh, you know you're getting a ticket for that. Just kidding!" It's like, "You shouldn't abuse that authority position."

**Michael:** "Well also, I just shit my pants, Mister Cop." I love that he said that her head looks like a rainbow, 'cause it did

**Adam:** I love that she just happens to have the book with Malfator in it, like in her apartment. She's like (as Zarabeth) "I"ll do the research! A little Nancy Drew bit."

**Michael:** Yeah

**Brennan:** Her *Rocky* montage of opening the book was glorious

**Nay:** *Yes*

**Adam:** Oh, I know. It's like ten seconds

**Michael:** She died, like a lot quicker than I thought she was going to

**Joelle:** Yes

**Adam:** By the way, her death--

**Michael:** Pretty great

**Adam:** There's a pretty good homage to that in *The Conjuring 2,* when what's-her-name gets impaled on the window

**Brennan:** (gasps) Oh yeah!

**[Everyone but Adam]** *Ohhhhhhh!*

**Adam:** I'm just sayin'!

**Nay:** *Conjuring* universe!

**Michael:** I also love they never apparently cleaned up from the party in the opening scene because there was all those beer cans there

**Adam:** Right

**Nay:** That was irking me. You ain't wrong

**Michael:** That pissed me off

**Brennan:** I thought that was how he had to summon the spirits, was by making a pyramid of beer cans or something

**Nay:** I was like, "Are you in college?"

**Joelle:** (Tawny Kitaen)'s in college, right?

**Michael:** She's in law school?

**Joelle:** So she's in graduate school

**Nay:** Yeah, and I'm like, "Are you an undergrad living in a frat house?"

**Brennan:** Is she a med student? No, he was a med student, right?

**Joelle:** (indistinct)

**Michael:** Well, Brandon is in law school, right? They said in the beginning he was in law school?

**Joelle:** Brandon and Lydia were in law school

**Brennan:** The answer is

**Adam:** He was med or pre-med, but--

**Michael:** But also like knew the spirit world

**Nay:** *Whew!*

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** Had a mullet

**Adam:** And also a member of the Village People

**Michael:** Yes. And gay

**Adam:** Yeah

**Adam:** It legitimately did scare me. I mean, the idea of a talking board because you could go out to a Toys "R" Us as a kid and buy one of these things

**Michael:** Yeah, you could get it

**Adam:** But again, it goes back to this cognitive kind of dissonance like we *so* wanna believe, you know, that we can make contact and yeah, that vulnerable time right after you lose somebody. And there's a town in upper state New York, the name'll come to me, but it's ten thousand psychics, and all they do is readings. And people go all over-- Lily Dale. There's a town in upper state New York called Lily Dale

**Michael:** Ten thousand psychics?

**Adam:** There's literally ten thousand psychics *in* the town and people come and they do readings and stuff

**Brennan:** How would you pick?

**Adam:** There's a great documentary on Netflix about that. How would you pick? I don't know

**Michael:** There is a doc, huh?

**Adam:** Yeah, there is a doc. But what I get from it is what these, the grieved people who are being manipulated by very smart actors essentially, and getting paid for it. It's egregious

**Joelle:** I want to go there

**Michael:** There's a really good *Unsolved Mysteries* about a mom and daughter duo that would prey on people who just had family members die, and gritted like hundreds of thousands of dollars from people

**Nay:** *Yo*. I had a psychic try to scam me a few years ago. I was driving and crying on my way to work, as one does.

[**Everyone else laughs]**

**Michael:** Goddamn, Nay

**Nay:** To be transparent, I was like full-blown manic episode going on, like crying on the way to work. And this car, this woman in the car next to me is like, "Pull over!" And I *did*?

**Joelle:** Yikes!

**Brennan:** You were open

**Michael:** You were in a moment

**Nay:** I don't even, I don't talk to strangers. I don't-- I cannot tell you and that's how I know I was manic. I don't know why I did it. And I also think I was at a low point in my life, so once I realized all that could have gone pretty bad from pulling over when someone told you to pull over, I didn't even care?

**Brennan:** Oooh

**Michael:** Oooh, yeah. You were there?

**Nay:** Yeah. I was like, "I don't actually care what could happen."

**Joelle:** Mmm-hmm

**Nay:** Anyway. She saw me crying, right? She was like, "I can tell. You just give so much to everyone else and no one takes care of you." And you could probably tell any woman crying that they give too much--

**Adam:** Right. You're an empath.

**Joelle:** Yes. Yes!

**Nay:** And I'm like, (pretending to cry) "You're right!" (regular voice) Because she was

**Michael:** (as Nay, pretending to cry) "Here's money!"

**Nay:** No, literally she's like, "I just wanna give you a reading. I feel *so* connected to you. I had to tell you to pull over, I want to give you a reading."

**Adam:** Wow!

**Nay:** "You know, normally it's like twenty-five hundred dollars--"

**Brennan:** (gasps)

**Nay:** "But how much money do you have?"

**Brennan and Joelle:** *Ohhhhhh!*

**Nay:** I was like, "Well, I'm crying on my way to work, so obviously I'm rich." I think I literally had like thirty dollars for the next two weeks until payday or something and I was like, "I don't have any money." And she was like, "I could do it for like, a hundred?"

**Brennan:** (gasps)

**Nay:** I was like, from twenty-five hundred to a hundred? I'm like, you must see a crying woman--

**Michael:** Discount for a drive-through?

**Nay:** Okay? I'm like, "Did you see me driving this beat-up Honda Fit or nah? You didn't ask the woman crying in her Range Rover to pull over. You asked *me* to pull over. I know you see the gas cap hanging off 'cause I ain't shit." Yeah

**Michael:** "By the way, can you push me to work?"

**Nay:** Okay? "Can you do something useful for me?" But I was thinking about how as someone who was in a manic episode, if I had been someone who had believed--

**Adam and Michael:** Mmmm

**Adam:** Ripe fruit, yeah

**Nay:** She could have *really* got me

**Michael:** She would have really gotten you, yeah

**Nay:** If I had any money, she really would have gotten me, because the thing is, she had all these very generic things to say, but they all hit home as generic things do sometimes

**Joelle:** Yeah

**Adam:** (as a psychic) "I'm feeling sadness."

**Nay:** Yeah. Right!

**Michael:** (as a psychic) "Someone has died."

**Nay:** Yeah. You know?

**Adam:** So you've never had like a--

**Nay:** She's like, "You're very close to your mom." And I'm like, (softly) "I guess so?"

**Joelle:** "I guess you could say that. She is my mother."

**Adam:** "She birthed me."

**Joelle:** "We are close genetically."

**Nay:** But I've never gone to a psychic

**Adam:** Right

**Nay:** And like, part of me is curious, but honestly it feels scarier to believe

**Brennan:** Yeah, I don't wanna know!

**Michael:** Yeah, me either

**Nay:** I'm like, I actually don't wanna know

**Joelle:** I *love* going to psychics. Y'all are nuts! So much fun! Listen. I've never been to a psychic's storefront. I go to like psychics' houses

**Brennan:** Like in the park?

**Joelle:** No no no! Like their legitimate homes, like they're usually very small, like one or two bedrooms, cozy. A lot of single ladies. They're like, "Give me a piece of jewelry you've worn for a very long time, and we're just gonna do a reading." And you give 'em like, eighty to a hundred bucks and they spend two hours talking to you. You don't even necessarily need to believe that what they're saying is true, or that there's a pretty good chance the nature of what-- I don't need to believe that what they're saying is going to happen, I'm just going there because it's maybe the closest I can get to a religion. I grew up like, my Dad's Southern Baptist and my Mom's Catholic and so *lots of rules and God*. But when you go to a psychic, it's like, anything is possible! And she's usually super sweet and nice

**Adam:** Are they, do you feel like they're accurate?

**Joelle:** No

**[Everyone else laughs]**

**Joelle:** Not even a little bit! Not even a little bit! But when you do it--

**Michael:** I love that you're looking up

**Joelle:** I'm thinking about it. I'm like, "Do I?" I take really detailed notes when they're doing it

**Nay:** Of course

**Joelle:** We're trying to figure it out, like, "Is it gonna happen?"

**Nay:** Shocking

**Adam:** So you haven't gone back to one of them more than once

**Joelle:** No. I haven't. No, it's always a different psychic. But it's great! I have my own deck of tarot cards. I don't know if I believe. Sometimes I'm feeling like, "I need to know what's going on in my life!" Or, "Man, I have questions about this thing." You can just pull the cards and again, that level of vagueness allows you to--

**Adam:** Interpret, yeah

**Joelle:** Kind of project and think and feel and figure out how do I really feel about this?

**Adam:** Yeah

**Joelle:** Sometimes it depresses you because all the cards are bad and you're like, "Shit! Is my life going to hell? Probably." But yeah, I like that literally anything is possible with this and if you don't like it, you can just put the cards together and flip again

**Brennan:** Is it like a The Secret visualization kind of thing where it's kind of like your fate then it kind of makes it feel positive?

**Joelle:** I feel that of all religion, though?

**Brennan:** Mmmm

**Joelle:** I feel like all aspects of these are stemmed from that

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Joelle:** If you are putting in your good vibes or bad vibes or whatever, you're most likely to get that outcome from it. In the same way that I don't believe that success is a matter of-- like we were talking about earlier, like so much of your success is based off of luck, right? So if you just don't give up and try to have the most positive outlook on things, eventually you'll reach your goal or something close to it. It's just a matter of time and--

**Adam:** Yeah, luck and time, talent, preparation, all that stuff, yeah

**Joelle:** And even talent, the more you're doing something the better you're getting at it

**Adam:** Yeah

**Joelle:** And so it's really just time and trying to have a positive outlook so you don't wanna hate the fact that you have to keep coming back to this thing over and over again

**Adam:** Right

**Joelle:** Ava DuVernay talks a lot about finding the way to love the work

**Adam:** Yeah

**Joelle:** Yeah. She's like, "If you're not enjoying your rewriting process, you're never gonna get through your script. But you're gonna have to do a lot of rewrites and take a lot of notes." And so, I think especially over the last three years, that's really been my goal is just, "Can I find my way into loving the work?" And it has been a lot. I'm a lot broker, but it's a lot better

**Nay:** Oh, that damn capitalism

**Joelle:** It's a bitch

**Adam:** Yeah

**Nay:** You know, something resonated with me, because ugh, God, I hate to say this, because I feel like lesbians are not supposed to say this

**Joelle:** Uh-oh!

**Nay:** And I fear that I will never get a date ever again once I say this

**Joelle:** Give her a chance, ladies

**Nay:** But, I don't believe in astrology

**Adam:** What?!?

**Joelle:** But do you know how all of your positions?

**Nay:** Yes. I do

**Joelle:** Okay. Well, again, that's all that really matters

**Nay:** Yes I do. But what I will say for astrology is that it's thought-provoking

**Joelle:** Yes

**Nay:** And I feel like it has helped me describe my personality by reading--

**Adam:** So you think that your sign is--

**Nay:** I don't think that my sign is close to--

**Adam:** What's your sign?

**Nay:** But if I say it, then people will be like, "Pffft, no wonder you don't believe in astrology."

**Joelle:** Wait, give me your top three. Give me your sun, your moon and your Rising

**Nay:** Cancer sun

**Joelle:** Yes

**Nay:** Aries moon

**Joelle:** Love it

**Nay:** Leo rising

**Joelle:** Oh my gosh! There's so much fire in you

**Michael:** True

**Adam:** Okay, for laypeople, what's your main sign?

**Nay:** Cancer

**Adam:** Cancer. So what is that?

**Nay:** You're like super emotional and nurturing

**Adam:** Okay

**Nay:** And sometimes as someone who is *very emotional*

**Michael:** And nurturing

**Nay:** And nurturing. But… I think when I started to not believe in astrology is when everyone was roasting my sign all the time

**Brennan:** Ahh!

**Joelle:** Well…. (laughs)

**Nay:** And I would be like, "Yeah, I have mood swings. Not because I'm a Cancer, but because I have a mood disorder. I'm *bipolar*. That's what that's from."

**Joelle:** Let's go, babe

**Nay:** "I don't know what to tell you, okay?"

**Michael:** "Not my sign!"

**Nay:** It's not because I was born in July.

**[Everyone else laughs]**

**Nay:** But it *is* because I was born into trauma. I don't really know what else to tell you

**Joelle:** This is amazing!

**Nay:** But thought-provoking and--

**Adam:** (to Nay) Do you do stand-up at all?

**Nay:** No

**Adam:** Are you an actor?

**Nay:** No

**Adam:** You should

**Nay:** No

**Michael:** She should, right?

**Nay:** No

**Adam:** You're very funny. You're very funny

**Nay:** Oh my God! Oh my God! *Taking of Deborah Logan* person, do not tell me I'm funny, that I'm funny

**[Everyone else laughs]**

**Adam:** But you are! Do you do solo performance? Do you write?

**Joelle:** A little bit

**Nay:** Oh my God, this man making me blush

**Adam:** Do you write?

**Nay:** Yes

**Adam:** Yeah. Good

**Nay:** Yes. I do

**Michael:** Isn't she the best?

**Nay:** Oh *my God*! I am gonna die

**Joelle:** Accept these compliments in this room

**Adam:** No, you have a monologist, you're like a raconteur, you're very gifted

**Nay:** Thank you. Oh my God

**Michael:** Adam can come back any time

**Nay:** You can come in any where you want!

**Adam:** You paid me twenty bucks to say that, but…

**Michael:** Shhhhh!

**Brennan:** Wow

**Nay:** My face is on fire, okay

**Brennan:** It's beautiful

**Nay:** Oh my God!

**Brennan:** All your signs are full of fire, so it just makes sense

**Nay:** Oh, right

**Joelle:** It's just what's happening

**Brennan:** I think the thing to bring up (about *Witchboard*) that's the most subtextual here is progressive entrapment

**Nay:** Oh yeah!

**Brennan:** It's not just when you're stuck in a conversation with a Bernie Bro

**[Everyone else laughs and claps]**

**Brennan:** Thank you

**Michael:** So true

**Brennan:** No, I mean, it can be seen as you know, an addiction metaphor, it's like she can't resist using the ouija board--

**Joelle:** Emotional manipulation

**Michael:** Yeah

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Brennan:** Emotional manipulation of someone *taking over* her spirit, and literally entering her

**Joelle:** Like being pregnant

**Nay:** Yeah

**Brennan:** Did any of you have a reaction to that while watching the movie?

**Nay:** I had a reaction to them ascribing what she's doing to well, "You're either pregnant or possessed." Like it's got to be a thing

**Brennan:** Oh yeah

**Nay:** I mean, I love when she would burst into the curse words and pop off

**Brennan:** Oh yeah

**Nay:** 'Cause I thought Jim was so annoying. I know y'all are like, "Jim's cute!" And I'm like, "He's fucking annoying." And when she told him to fuck off or go fuck himself, I was living.

**Michael:** I loved when she told him to go fuck himself. I was dying when she, I have it written down here, when she's like, "How many times have I told you not to sneak up on me like that?!?!" I wrote down, "Bitch, you said that once!"

**Adam:** (as Tawny) "*Goddammit,* Jim!"

**Nay:** *Yo.*

**Joelle:** Right?

**Nay:** You know how I feel about that. I think I've expressed that many times

**Adam:** Okay, but did the Malfator-- the couple of stings get you? The one really scared me. I mean, come on

**Michael:** You know, at least the knife

**Adam:** Did you jump once? The knife?

**Michael:** I jumped once

**Nay:** Yes.

**Michael:** I did once, really high, the knife flying off the counter--

**Joelle:** Me too!

**Michael:** And the hitting the ground and then the ketchup?

**Nay:** And the ketchup?

**Michael:** That would have got me

**Adam:** That was cool

**Joelle:** Of all the ways to start messing with people, the most mundane--

**Michael:** Yeah, that was cool!

**Joelle:** As someone who's dropped a lot of knives before, it's the most mundane kitchen accident

**Michael:** Unexpected though. I didn't expect it at all

**Joelle:** Yeah. It didn't hurt her, it didn't strike her, and then the blood symbolism, "What are you doing to me? What's happening?"

**Michael:** The thing that I love though, it was so well done--

**Adam:** Yeah

**Michael:** That watching her flail around, I was like, she's just standing there making movements--

**Nay:** I noticed that too, yeah

**Michael:** And they're shooting it from her chest up, because they just didn't have what they needed to show her being flung around. It's like how did the same dude get this jumpscare to work, but he can't get Tawny--

**Joelle:** To flail?

**Michael:** Miss Dancing Machine herself, to throw herself around the room, right?

**Adam:** It's not a perfect science, you get what you're gonna get. Some of them work better than others, you know? You only have so many days. I mean--

**Michael:** And then I was like, "Why do we have to see her vagina? Why do we have to see her body?"

**Joelle:** Yeah, the nude scene was like classic Eighties nude scene of like--

**Michael:** Super out of nowhere, right?

**Joelle:** "We definitely don't need it, but here's Tawny naked!" Like, fifteen seconds--

**Michael:** I mean she's gorgeous

**Adam:** She's beautiful, yeah

**Joelle:** It was the Eighties. Like, grab a hot chick and get her naked on set. It'll he fine.

**Michael:** She was doing videos right around then, right? Music videos? That was what she was most known for, right?

**Joelle:** Yeah

**Adam:** Yeah, she was workin' it. Yeah

**Michael:** I love her on *Seinfeld*

**Brennan:** Of course you do

**Michael:** She did an episode of *Seinfeld*

**Brennan:** I will say if you want really detailed and awesome analysis of *Witchboard*, you should check out--

**Michael:** A book??

**Brennan:** I was gonna read a passage, but not anymore. It's *Men, Women and Chainsaws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film* by Carol J. Clover

**Michael:** Oh, cool

**Brennan:** She is famous for inventing the term, "the final girl". But she talks about possession films in the second chapter of the book, which is called, "Opening Up," it's in the terms of how women are treated as *vessels* to be entered or filled up and it's a really interesting chapter that compares *The Exorcist* (1973) and *Witchboard* as the two kind of primary texts of the chapter

**Michael:** Oh wow, really?

**Brennan:** She talks about the, you know, how Tawny Kitaen is treated, she talks about the homosexual subtext between the two of them and in terms of how gender can be applied to that in terms of theory. It's *really* interesting and I really recommend it

**Brennan:** That's the end of this show

**Nay:** That was amazing

**Michael:** This was great. I know we didn't talk about the movie a lot, folks, but I hope you enjoyed it, because I was enjoying the *hell* out of it

**Brennan:** It was a blast!

**Nay:** I was supposed to leave early--

**Michael:** You were

**Nay:** And couldn't

**Adam:** We were gonna stage your death

**Nay:** Yeah, we were gonna stage my death

**Michael:** (amused) We were gonna kill Nay off?

**Joelle:** I'm glad you stayed, though

**Nay:** I would've missed those compliments

**Joelle:** They're recorded

**Adam:** I would have texted you later. "You're so funny! You should act!"

**Adam:** (to Brennan) (The hosts of Fright School) are expecting you to do all the tech set up

**Brennan:** Oh, I have it at home, Adam

**Michael:** Well, I hope you guys talk about the movie as much as we did tonight

**Brennan:** I'm sure--

**Adam:** I do wanna say, I love *Witchboard*, it's like a cult classic

**Nay:** Oh yeah

**Michael:** It's great! It's super fun

**Adam:** And so yeah, that's why I suggested it, even though we're talking flippantly about some of it

**Michael:** I hope you're not upset we kind of strayed, but as soon as you--

**Adam:** Oh no no no

**Michael:** Started talking about your grandmother, I didn't give a shit about the movie

**Nay:** Oh yeah. You can't tell a story like that, yeah

**Michael:** You brought so much to the episode, Adam, I'm so happy

**Nay:** Yeah. Thank you so much

**Adam:** Thank you, guys

## **Previous Episode**

Episode 32: “OBGYN Satan Worshiper” (w/ Kara Vallow!)

## **Next Episode**

Episode 34: “I Love Trash” (w/ Sam Wineman!)