Latest / Camp Classics / Mommie Dearest (1981) w. Peaches Christ!

Transcript

Mommie Dearest (1981) w. Peaches Christ! · Camp Classics

• 0:00
  Get away from her you bitch. Classic.
• 0:05
  He was in the Amazon cry along when she was researching spiders
• 0:09
  right before she died. No, I.
• 0:13
  Thought you become a prostitute or a dog at it.
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  I used to love doggy chow. I used to love.
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  Doggy chow, too. I know where to find the boys
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  and the booze. I'm Crystal.
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  And I'm bigger and I'm faster and I will always beat you.
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  My name is Baby Lame. Finally, a movie with more
• 0:36
  credible lines than thank you to do it.
• 0:39
  I had, I had my backup. If you did that, I was just
• 0:41
  going to say, why must everything be a contest with
• 0:44
  you? There's literally so many to
• 0:48
  choose. Oh God.
• 0:49
  Welcome to Camp Classics. It's a thoughtful podcast about
• 0:55
  stupid movies. Every two weeks we're here
• 0:58
  discussing, exploring, raiding, some of the peaks and valleys in
• 1:03
  the genre of camp in the search for the campus of Camp Classics.
• 1:08
  Have you been working on that? I really felt like it was like
• 1:11
  different layers. There was like a different, like
• 1:13
  kind of yeah, I felt like you, you maybe been like working with
• 1:16
  acting coach or something. No, it's just ever since I got
• 1:18
  that script in LA, I've just, you know, I'm really leaning
• 1:24
  into my acting error. Well, I've actually been given a
• 1:29
  script as well. Funnily enough, I have actually.
• 1:32
  So you're not is. It a porn.
• 1:35
  I wish, what kind of like porn is it going to be like some like
• 1:39
  weird old man cooking in the corner or something?
• 1:43
  Oh, don't threaten me with a good time.
• 1:45
  But no, it's quite funny. I do feel like I should tell you
• 1:47
  about it because I believe it's going to change, but the script
• 1:51
  I got sent suggested otherwise. It's basically this kind of like
• 1:55
  ghost story about older people coming in life and being
• 2:00
  haunted. I it won't go into it because
• 2:03
  it's like a thing, but essentially there's like an
• 2:06
  older person that's died that was like crossdresser, drag
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  queen, queer, blah blah blah. I read poetry and sonnets.
• 2:16
  And. Basically I read this script and
• 2:18
  and it just mentions this like this old this person coming back
• 2:23
  from the dead and dancing. And he plays the upright bass.
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  But it there was no, there's no like mention that person is like
• 2:29
  a younger version of the said the said character.
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  So it's basically this like old, old man that it's dead.
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  And I was like, oh, so that's, that's the, that's the part that
• 2:40
  that. I'm being considered for.
• 2:43
  Yamaki, Pierbo, Cedar ray for cable window.
• 2:46
  Latin equal. I mean, I still haven't
• 2:47
  confirmed it and I still haven't.
• 2:49
  I don't know if I'm going to get the part and I still don't know
• 2:51
  if that is the thing. But actually it might lead on
• 2:53
  quite nicely to the film we're talking to today.
• 2:56
  And maybe I could take some prosthetic inspiration as a
• 2:59
  little teaser to what we're talking about, Uji.
• 3:03
  I mean, yeah, I don't think you need prosthetics.
• 3:05
  I think just go natural. What's the character that's
• 3:07
  tease your movie? Well, because wouldn't this be
• 3:09
  great if we had like, rival films?
• 3:11
  Roles coming out. I actually did just do a short.
• 3:15
  I did a short film last year. Called Check us out with that.
• 3:21
  Called space daddy and I play an alien daddy who knocks someone
• 3:29
  up with an alien baby. Oh.
• 3:36
  Yeah. Is it?
• 3:38
  Is it out at the moment? I think it's actually going to
• 3:41
  like a Film Festival next month. Can we review it?
• 3:45
  No. Oh my God we are reviewing you
• 3:48
  Bonus episode on the Gatreon. I am going to do a deep dive
• 3:52
  review of space studies. What's it?
• 3:54
  Called the my 3 minutes short. What's it called?
• 3:58
  Space Daddy. Space Daddy, we'll do it as like
• 4:00
  a mini. We'll, we'll rate it.
• 4:02
  Show me to me please. Great.
• 4:05
  I just got really warm thinking about that.
• 4:08
  I I feel very uncomfortable. Oh my God, now that's
• 4:11
  sensational. We'll do it as like a bonus, a
• 4:13
  bonus one on the. Chart.
• 4:15
  I love that. Well, Speaking of the Catreon,
• 4:19
  we have one. It's £4 a month and you get a
• 4:23
  bonus episode every month and access to our growing back
• 4:27
  catalog of camp classics. And just released our episode on
• 4:31
  barbed wire. Don't call me.
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  Baby. Did you see the picture?
• 4:41
  Yes. Yeah.
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  Wait, which picture are we talking about?
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  What picture do you think I'm talking about?
• 4:47
  Of her made over. Send it to me, Rachel.
• 4:50
  Yeah, back in the 90s make up, I was like, Oh my God, she's
• 4:54
  listening to me. Yeah, our impact.
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  The episode isn't even out yet at the time of this recording,
• 4:59
  but somehow she knows. She was listening.
• 5:02
  Listen, I don't know if it made the cut, but I kind of was
• 5:04
  saying stuff that maybe I thought I'd like to see her in
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  make up again. I like, listen, I'm loving the
• 5:09
  new Pammy. I'm loving her, taking acting
• 5:11
  seriously. I'm loving her going against
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  abolishing crappy beauty standards blah blah blah, but
• 5:18
  let's face it, she still looks fucking hot in the 90s.
• 5:20
  Makeup. Yeah, and who doesn't?
• 5:22
  I I like that she can let us have it every now and then as a
• 5:25
  little treat. I'm Julia Child.
• 5:28
  Yeah, it's just to remind you also.
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  Yeah, she. Knows once a year we get a
• 5:31
  little treat. She knows, though.
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  Are you telling me that she hasn't put that makeup on and
• 5:35
  she hasn't gone? Oh, fuck yeah.
• 5:37
  Oh yeah, yeah. Bon appetit.
• 5:43
  I'm also going to spoiler alert, you know, just to entice you to
• 5:46
  listen to that episode. Barbed Wire got what I'm calling
• 5:49
  our Camp Classics perfect score. It's the first movie on Camp
• 5:54
  Classics to get the score because it got 10 Lizas and 1
• 5:58
  Merrill. Oh, that is the perfect score.
• 6:02
  It's the perfect score. Oh my God, I didn't even realize
• 6:05
  that. Yeah, it doesn't get camper than
• 6:07
  that. No, that is the truest because I
• 6:10
  I did when you you sort of came up with the idea of having the
• 6:13
  Merrills, it was just like, well, who fucking cares?
• 6:15
  It's not a podcast about good films, but I guess actually.
• 6:19
  Yeah, we finally got like, the peek.
• 6:22
  Anyway, you can subscribe to the Gatreon over on Patreon or
• 6:26
  directly through your Apple or Spotify feeds.
• 6:29
  All you have to do is click on the locked episode for a free
• 6:31
  trial. And we've got new joiners to the
• 6:33
  Gatreon welcoming in Amanda P and Jimmy, thank you for the
• 6:39
  support. Amanda P sounds like a drag
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  Queen's name. You're right, you're right.
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  I actually shortened it to P because I wanted to protect her
• 6:47
  anonymity. Oh, OK, now you just.
• 6:50
  Now I just turned Amanda P, well, Amanda P on.
• 6:55
  That's what we're all looking for, Bon.
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  Appetit. And that's just a member that's
• 7:01
  now unsubscribed as well. It really sounds like I made-up
• 7:06
  Amanda. P It really does.
• 7:08
  It really does Stop changing. The only reason people are
• 7:11
  signing onto this patriot is so that they can get their name
• 7:14
  read out. And you're bastardizing their
• 7:16
  name as well, Amanda. P You know who you are if you're
• 7:22
  not in a position to subscribe but help.
• 7:24
  Me, I'm poor. Well, go give us a five star
• 7:27
  rating on whatever platform you're listening on.
• 7:29
  And I mean like right now, open your phone.
• 7:32
  Yeah, click the thing, hit five stars.
• 7:35
  It's really easy. It will take you like half a
• 7:38
  second if you do it right now, but if you don't do it right
• 7:40
  now, you're not going to do it. So just so just do it.
• 7:43
  Yeah. Also, if you don't want to give
• 7:44
  it five stars, be honest, you know, I appreciate.
• 7:47
  No, no, no, no. Can we not?
• 7:50
  I don't want. I don't want any.
• 7:51
  I don't want anything other than a 5 star.
• 7:55
  We're not. We're not here for your honesty.
• 7:58
  We're here for your unconditional love and support.
• 8:02
  Otherwise mommy's going to be very upset, dude.
• 8:06
  Fuck with me, fellas. The other thing I wanted to say
• 8:10
  is, you know, we, we launched our, our comments contest.
• 8:14
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 8:16
  So despite me putting it on the podcast and then because we
• 8:21
  hadn't gotten any comments, me messaging my best friends and
• 8:25
  family and saying I need you to put a comment on so we don't
• 8:29
  look sad and pathetic. Yet even that didn't work.
• 8:33
  So we haven't had any new comments since we launched the
• 8:38
  competition. Why can't you give me the
• 8:43
  respect that I'm entitled to? I don't know whether or not I
• 8:47
  should be saying this because it makes us look kind of sad, but
• 8:51
  what I am saying is that you've got another two weeks to win a
• 8:54
  T-shirt, so the field is wide open.
• 8:58
  But I think in keeping with what we're looking for in a camp
• 9:02
  classic, which is under underdog flop vibes, it seems completely
• 9:06
  appropriate. Why can't you treat me?
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  I would be treated by any stranger on the street.
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  Yeah, that's so true. That's so true.
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  Anyway, here we are begging for one review so it can win AT
• 9:23
  shirt. Yeah, that's it.
• 9:24
  We. Actually, we actually have two
• 9:25
  T-shirts to give away, so we need 2 comments.
• 9:28
  Any 2 comments at this point will do.
• 9:31
  Maybe this will start a feeding frenzy and we can actually pick
• 9:33
  up between. Again, I think you're digging A
• 9:36
  deeper hole, and I think this is going to make us look even more
• 9:39
  sad and pathetic. Unfortunately so, yeah.
• 9:42
  There are hundreds of people listening.
• 9:44
  Just leave a review. But now they have power over us.
• 9:50
  Because I am not one of your fans.
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  Oh yeah, we're their little bitches now, aren't we?
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  Yes, we are, Daddy. Yeah, Daddy.
• 10:03
  Well, Speaking of little bitches, I guess we should
• 10:05
  probably bring our guests. In Oh little bitch.
• 10:09
  But wait, wait, wait, before we go any further, Actually, baby,
• 10:12
  what makes the camp classic? Well, the camp classic everyone
• 10:15
  is something that unlocks queer joy.
• 10:17
  We want an ongoing legacy. We want something that is
• 10:20
  stupid, something that informs queer pop culture and is anti
• 10:24
  mainstream, has underdog. Oh God, we want it to be an
• 10:28
  underdog gem, basically. But yes, I'm actually having a
• 10:31
  stroke because we're doing this podcast, so I apologise.
• 10:35
  Cool. Well, that just means more
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  airtime for me and that's, and that's very John Crawford, I
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  feel. Yes, I do as well.
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  I don't even think I'm Christina in this plot.
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  I think I'm fucking Carol Anne the Maid I.
• 10:52
  Have so much to say about Carol Anne, but before we go any
• 10:55
  further, I think we need to bring in our special guest.
• 10:57
  You've heard them on the podcast before.
• 10:59
  And can I just quickly say something?
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  I would like to think that if this person adopted me as their
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  stepmother, they would treat me like Joan Crawford treats
• 11:08
  Christina. I think there would be very
• 11:10
  similar energy. You'd be so lucky you wouldn't
• 11:14
  get the beautiful gowns anyway. It is, of course, drag legend,
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  dear friend and true expert in the world of camp cinema.
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  Peaches, Christ. Woo, thank you.
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  I just. Cheered for myself.
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  That's right. Yeah, here she is.
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  That's. Also very Joan.
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  Crawford yes, exactly. Oh God, I I, I should have had a
• 11:37
  quote ready to go, but I I guess it would just be don't fuck with
• 11:40
  me, ladies. It's not my first time on a
• 11:44
  podcast, no. Well, I just really appreciate
• 11:49
  that you're doing this because last time we we got you on the
• 11:52
  podcast, we got you to talk about Megan Fox and what some
• 11:56
  service sexy. Confident.
• 12:00
  Yes. It's it's quite incredible that
• 12:02
  we've got you back. I've tackled 2 of the greatest
• 12:06
  camp classics of all time. I thought it was really
• 12:10
  important that we got you back to talk about something that we
• 12:13
  knew you'd actually be familiar with.
• 12:15
  I did have fun with the other one.
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  I mean, it was it was a fun, you know, experience.
• 12:19
  But of course, this is this is the tried and true.
• 12:23
  This is one of the the mothers of all you know, not just
• 12:27
  modern, but any queer camp cinema, if you know, I feel like
• 12:30
  it's part of the holy triumphant, if you will.
• 12:34
  Yeah, you said that before on Subservience.
• 12:35
  What was your? What were your 3?
• 12:37
  Valley of the Dolls and You're a Moon.
• 12:40
  Child. And you're a.
• 12:42
  Bitch, it starts with Valley of the Dolls as far as like a queer
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  reckoning with a movie that came out that the world did not
• 12:49
  understand, yet queer people understood it.
• 12:53
  And then it happened again with Mommy Dearest.
• 12:55
  Don't fuck with me, fellas. And it happened again with
• 13:00
  Showgirls, different places. And those three, I think are
• 13:05
  like just that those pure examples of unintentional, you
• 13:09
  know, that sort of Sontag version of camp where it's
• 13:11
  unintentionally funny. And queer people obviously
• 13:16
  embraced these films immediately and understood them in a way
• 13:19
  that that the mainstream did not.
• 13:21
  If it's alright with you pictures, I would like to maybe
• 13:23
  add a slightly different shape to this camp equation.
• 13:26
  A square I think we should add. Basic Instinct to.
• 13:30
  Risk addiction, yeah, no arguments, no arguments there.
• 13:36
  I in fact, I remember very specifically the people that saw
• 13:41
  that film and and told me immediately go see this it you
• 13:46
  must, which I think is probably what it was like when, you know,
• 13:50
  Mommy dearest came out. You know, I think there was
• 13:52
  probably this, these queer people who were telling their
• 13:55
  friends like, do not miss it, you know?
• 13:58
  I mean, I've just got a vision in my head of one of your drag
• 14:02
  parody shows of you being driven in a car, wanking off some
• 14:06
  footballer hottie and then, like, driving off as the opening
• 14:09
  scene. I don't think there's an
• 14:11
  audience for it, but I would pay to see that show.
• 14:13
  P She's just saying so, yeah. I mean.
• 14:16
  We're here to talk about a different classic, though, much
• 14:19
  as I'd love to talk about Basic Instinct 2 All day Peaches.
• 14:22
  What is your history with this movie?
• 14:24
  What's your history with Mommy Dearest?
• 14:27
  Well, I was in college when I first saw it, and it was part of
• 14:31
  kind of a mentorship in a sense. There was a, an older gay male
• 14:37
  professor who was studying queer human development and sociology.
• 14:42
  And he ended, he was the, what do you call it, the faculty
• 14:46
  advisor for our student activist group, you know, the queer group
• 14:50
  on campus. And, and I remember him one time
• 14:54
  talking about something that I just didn't understand.
• 14:57
  And it was like as basic as like people loving Judy Garland,
• 15:01
  where I was just like, I don't get it.
• 15:02
  I don't get it. I was like, I love the Wizard of
• 15:05
  Oz. It's like one of the best movies
• 15:06
  ever made, but I don't get the Judy Garland thing.
• 15:08
  And he said, OK, well, here's the movies you have to watch.
• 15:11
  And while you're at it, you need to understand the love for Betty
• 15:14
  Davis, You need to understand the love for Joe Crawford.
• 15:17
  And you need to understand things like Mommy Dearest and
• 15:21
  Faye Dunaway. And he basically gave me a list
• 15:24
  of things to see. And I did watch.
• 15:27
  I, I did watch things like Mildred Pierce, which I think
• 15:30
  was really good for me ahead of Mommy Dearest.
• 15:33
  So I actually knew more about Joe Crawford.
• 15:35
  A lot of people, I think a lot of American young people,
• 15:39
  especially if, if you're not, you know, a boomer, you might
• 15:45
  know Joan Crawford most from this movie from mommy dearest,
• 15:50
  right? So for me, it was kind of a, a,
• 15:52
  a, a thing where I had heard of mommy dearest.
• 15:54
  I knew what the phrase meant. I, I, I kind of knew what the
• 15:58
  movie was about. But after seeing things like
• 16:01
  Mildred Pierce and of course whatever happened to Baby Jane
• 16:04
  and understanding what a fantastic Hollywood superstar
• 16:07
  she was, and then just see Mommy Dearest and kind of understand
• 16:10
  it better from a camp sort of lens, I just became obsessed.
• 16:15
  I mean, I just thought it was amazing, you know, it was
• 16:17
  something that I just fell in love with.
• 16:19
  And then of course, when I was doing Midnight Mass a few years
• 16:23
  later and we started screening Mommy Dearest for a live
• 16:27
  audience, you know, at midnight in San Francisco, it became one
• 16:31
  of our signature shows. And I screened it.
• 16:34
  I mean, I screened it a lot. Eventually I created a show
• 16:38
  called Mommy Queerest. And, and then that play, which,
• 16:44
  which was presented before screenings of the movie, ended
• 16:48
  up evolving to the point where we just sometimes we just do the
• 16:50
  play. So I've had a long love affair
• 16:53
  with this film. How many times do you think
• 16:56
  you've seen it? Oh, God, a lot.
• 16:59
  I mean, it's hard for me because I feel like as a as a as an
• 17:04
  aging drag queen who has written a ton of shows and produced
• 17:09
  many, many, many events celebrating movies.
• 17:12
  It it's funny, there are some I really do know backwards and
• 17:16
  forwards. I would say that mommy dearest
• 17:18
  is almost one of those. But yeah, I, I think I've
• 17:25
  probably seen it, I don't know, maybe 40 times.
• 17:28
  Like, realistically, you know? Your poor brain, it explains a
• 17:32
  lot. No, but my brain is.
• 17:33
  My brain is not, is not. The problem is I don't retain
• 17:38
  information. And I feel like my brain is like
• 17:42
  a hard drive that's been overloaded.
• 17:44
  And so my brain will, will, will absorb new things.
• 17:48
  You know, like this week I'm learning a song because I'm
• 17:50
  doing a punk concert tomorrow night.
• 17:52
  So I've been focusing on memorizing lyrics to a couple
• 17:54
  songs. And I believe that in order for
• 17:57
  me to do that, my brain has pushed other things out.
• 18:01
  And I've, you know, I've lost things.
• 18:04
  Yeah. I'm exactly the same, but it
• 18:05
  just means you get to learn things again and it's then they
• 18:08
  delight you, they delight you all over again.
• 18:11
  That's that's exactly right. That's a good way to look at it,
• 18:13
  yeah. I feel like I learned so much
• 18:16
  researching for this podcast and then as soon as we're on to the
• 18:19
  next movie, I forget everything about the last movie so I could
• 18:22
  do it all again and be like, oh. Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.
• 18:26
  And that's the joy of something like Mommy Dearest because,
• 18:29
  well, one, it's long, it's it's melodramatic.
• 18:32
  It's it's it's a kind of an epic Hollywood movie in many ways.
• 18:36
  And so you get to watch it with these repeat viewings and
• 18:41
  honestly, the first few it it it's so monstrous and big that
• 18:45
  you're focused on the the largeness of it.
• 18:48
  But then as you continue to watch it, there's so much about
• 18:51
  it that is truly amazing. You know, the, the set design,
• 18:57
  the, the performances that are of the secondary actors.
• 19:00
  You know, you know, it, it's, it's, yes, it's Faye Dunaway's
• 19:05
  train ride for sure. But the whole, all the trains
• 19:10
  on, on this, you know, journey are quite fabulous.
• 19:14
  And so I, I love, I love when you watch something that you
• 19:16
  think you, you know so well and then you pick up some new thing
• 19:20
  or you see something you hadn't seen before.
• 19:22
  I totally agree with that about this film.
• 19:24
  It is like pick your own adventure because you can
• 19:26
  literally be like, right, What's happening to Christopher
• 19:29
  Crawford throughout this movie and every time he comes on and
• 19:32
  that little mute that's not doing anything, that little fuck
• 19:35
  up. It's still an interesting
• 19:36
  storyline. So yeah, I like, I like kind of
• 19:39
  because I again, I feel like I've seen it a lot of times.
• 19:41
  I've not seen it as many times as you, but now I get to the
• 19:43
  point where I'm like, oh, who's that?
• 19:46
  I like Sassy Barbara, the journalist, all of that kind of
• 19:49
  stuff. So yeah, there's it's very,
• 19:51
  there's a lot to take in for sure.
• 19:53
  Yeah, can I admit something? I realized on Sunday when I was
• 19:58
  watching it again for this episode that I've never seen the
• 20:00
  whole thing. Amazing.
• 20:03
  I thought you were going to say you've never seen it.
• 20:06
  I've never seen. It the last the last half hour I
• 20:08
  had never seen. You wait, so you'd never seen
• 20:11
  her get choked like you Never, No.
• 20:13
  No, no, no, sorry. I've I've seen that.
• 20:14
  I'd basically, I think from like New York onwards I was like,
• 20:18
  this is new information. Interesting.
• 20:21
  It's completely wild. Yeah.
• 20:22
  I must have seen the first half like 5 to 10 times.
• 20:26
  I don't know how this has happened.
• 20:27
  Yeah, like I knew the first half very well, but there you go.
• 20:31
  OK, I'm opening up a vacancy for a new Co host of our Queer Camp
• 20:36
  movie podcast because clearly this bitch doesn't know anything
• 20:39
  about queer cinema. Or we need to have an
• 20:42
  intervention or something like how much do you, how many drinks
• 20:45
  do you have a night? Not enough.
• 20:50
  You see, I think I'm the opposite.
• 20:51
  I think I'm the one drinking, boozing and repeating the scenes
• 20:54
  on Right Play. I fixed you another one baby.
• 21:00
  Freshen your drink. I fixed all my uncles drinks
• 21:04
  this way. OK, well here's a bit of reviews
• 21:07
  and contexts for everyone who, like me, isn't as familiar with
• 21:10
  this movie as they should be. We're of course covering Mommy
• 21:13
  Dearest from 1981, and it's directed by Frank Perry about
• 21:19
  Joan Crawford, based on the book of the same title by Christina
• 21:23
  Crawford. Boo.
• 21:25
  Sorry, I just want to get into it.
• 21:28
  I love I love just hating on her.
• 21:30
  So much hate fest. This movie isn't it?
• 21:33
  It is, it is. So this movie was released as a
• 21:36
  serious movie. It was Oscar bait, but it wasn't
• 21:39
  received that way. It was immediately panned and
• 21:42
  the studio pivoted, marketing it instead as a Cap movie with a
• 21:47
  new tagline reading. Meet the biggest mother of them
• 21:50
  all. Variety said about.
• 21:53
  I love this quote. Variety said about Dunaway's
• 21:55
  performance. Dunaway does not chew scenery.
• 21:58
  Dunaway starts. Dunaway starts neatly at each
• 22:02
  corner of the set, in every scene, and swallows it whole,
• 22:06
  costars and all. Amazing.
• 22:09
  It's such a good quote. Whoever wrote that was like yeah
• 22:12
  fuck I'm on fire. It was nominated for 9 Razzies
• 22:19
  at the second ever Razzie Awards, so it was still taking
• 22:22
  place in the Founders living room at this point and it won
• 22:25
  five, including worst Screenplay, Worst supporting
• 22:28
  Actor, We're Supporting Actress, Worst Picture and Worst Actress
• 22:33
  for Faye Dunaway. Swept the boards then.
• 22:36
  Swept the board. Yeah, like a real early strong
• 22:39
  start. Like showgirls.
• 22:42
  Like showgirls. Exactly it.
• 22:43
  It must have held the record for most Razzies for a long time,
• 22:45
  but it's since been dethroned. The The film has 50% on Rotten
• 22:51
  Tomatoes, which really surprised me and can only be because it's
• 22:56
  been reclaimed so much as a camp classic.
• 22:59
  But the critical consensus on Rotten Tomatoes is this Mommy
• 23:03
  Dearest certainly doesn't lack for conviction, and neither does
• 23:06
  Faye Dunaway's legendary performance as a wire wielding
• 23:09
  monster. Unfortunately, the movie is too
• 23:12
  campy and undisciplined to transcend guilty pleasure.
• 23:17
  Well, we're going to get into all of that.
• 23:19
  Well, then I'm going to do this plot kind of fast.
• 23:22
  And then I thought we could just all please.
• 23:24
  Because it is an entire career of a woman with a huge life,
• 23:28
  it's going to take hours to go through that plot.
• 23:31
  Yeah, so and then I thought afterwards we could just talk
• 23:34
  about our the scenes that are important to to us and go a bit
• 23:38
  deeper into certain scenes. So we've got Joan Crawford,
• 23:41
  dedicated and career driven actress.
• 23:43
  MGM Despite having achieved success in her career, she longs
• 23:46
  to have a child, but she's unable to conceive and has
• 23:49
  suffered a series of miscarriages.
• 23:51
  Joan applies to adopt A child but is denied due to the fact
• 23:54
  that she's a single woman. With the help of her love
• 23:57
  interest Greg Savitt, Joan adopts a blonde haired baby girl
• 24:01
  and names her Christina, and then she adopts a blonde haired
• 24:04
  boy, naming him Christopher. Joan sometimes lavishes
• 24:08
  Christina with attention and luxury, such as an extravagant
• 24:11
  birthday party, but also enforces A strict code of
• 24:14
  discipline. And when Christina begins to
• 24:16
  rebel against her mother's demands, confrontations ensue.
• 24:21
  I mean, that's putting it mildly.
• 24:22
  What's a bit of child abuse between your friends?
• 24:25
  Yeah, Joan sends Christina to a boarding school and then we've
• 24:30
  got a big gap of time and we've got teenage Christina who has
• 24:33
  developed an interest in acting. I'm acting.
• 24:38
  Joan reveals to Christina that she's struggling financially
• 24:40
  after losing her contract at Warner Brothers, and Christina
• 24:44
  realizes her mother is a drunk. Sometime later, Joan has met and
• 24:48
  married Alfred Steele, president of Pepsi Cola, and moves to New
• 24:51
  York City. Steele is a genial, easygoing
• 24:55
  man, and Christina and he and Christina get along.
• 24:58
  But then he dies of a heart attack and Joan remains with
• 25:00
  Pepsi. Christina begins acting in
• 25:04
  Manhattan, eventually landing a leading role in a soap opera,
• 25:08
  and Joan and adult Christina maintain a polite yet tense
• 25:11
  relationship as they lead their separate lives.
• 25:14
  Though tensions still exist between the two, Christina
• 25:16
  believes that they have put the past behind them and that in her
• 25:18
  way, her mother does love her. Years later, when Joan dies of a
• 25:23
  heart attack in 1977, Christina and Christopher attend the
• 25:26
  reading of her will and learn that Joan has disinherited them
• 25:29
  both. Christopher states that their
• 25:31
  mother always has the last word, but Christina asks, does she,
• 25:36
  and after a melodramatic pause, repeats the question, conceiving
• 25:40
  her autobiography. Oh God, such a good moment.
• 25:44
  Such an incredible moment. And yeah.
• 25:47
  And yeah, it's, it's a reverse. Does she?
• 25:50
  Because she still looks shit in that terrible wig.
• 25:52
  So I'm like, imagine it feels like Joan Crawford has directed
• 25:55
  the ending of that film because she's managed to make sure that
• 25:57
  Christina Darling looks absolutely fucking terrible.
• 26:02
  Yeah, OK. Well, I think we should start at
• 26:05
  the beginning of this movie, which is Jones morning routine.
• 26:10
  I mean sensational. You don't see Jones face for the
• 26:13
  1st 5 minutes of the movie and you just see her getting ready
• 26:15
  for her day. And it's basically that
• 26:17
  influencer who went viral with the 3:00 AM wake up and the ice
• 26:20
  bath. It's like it's all done.
• 26:22
  It's really really, really fab. I love it.
• 26:25
  She's like scrubbing herself to shit.
• 26:28
  It's so cool. I mean, it's it's it's like in
• 26:30
  death becomes her when she's wearing the strappy head harness
• 26:33
  as well. It's like modern influencers
• 26:36
  just saw Mommy dearest and death becomes her and we're like, let
• 26:40
  me get in on that. Yeah, I mean, it seems like cold
• 26:44
  plunges are are all the rage, right?
• 26:46
  Like everyone's talking about a cold plunge and it's like,
• 26:49
  hello, Joan Crawford was doing a morning cold plunge on her face
• 26:54
  every day. You know, that sometimes these
• 26:56
  old, old Hollywood beauty secrets are are repackaged and
• 27:02
  quote UN quote, reinvented, but really they're not.
• 27:05
  It's been around for a long time.
• 27:06
  Yeah. I love, I love her morning
• 27:08
  routine. I love the opulence of the the
• 27:10
  opening of the movie with the the music is so beautiful and
• 27:14
  the credits are so, you know, luxurious and, you know, she
• 27:18
  lives in this beautiful mansion. I mean, the Hollywood glamour of
• 27:22
  it all is very well presented in the film, you know?
• 27:26
  I agree. I agree.
• 27:27
  She her shower has three heads. Yeah.
• 27:32
  That shower shot of her, you know, with standing center frame
• 27:37
  with the three, three, you know, sprays of water kind of hitting
• 27:41
  her and her throwing her head back and getting all wet.
• 27:44
  I mean it's just perfect. It's.
• 27:45
  So she's a sensual woman, isn't she?
• 27:49
  I'd love it. I'd love that on my wall,
• 27:51
  actually, that photo of that, it's so great.
• 27:54
  We did an ad for Mommy Queers a long time ago where we we took
• 27:57
  the video, but we superimposed my face over her actual like
• 28:01
  nude body. Like with me, you know, making
• 28:05
  the faces. It was just so ridiculous.
• 28:07
  Now you're talking, yeah. So good.
• 28:12
  What do we think about Faye Dunaway as Joan?
• 28:15
  Like obviously that face reveal, it's supposed to be a big
• 28:18
  moment. It's 5 minutes in before you see
• 28:20
  her face and it's like Faye Dunaway is Joan Crawford.
• 28:24
  It's very that moment and it the camera spends so much time on
• 28:27
  her face. Like Drink It In, you are
• 28:30
  watching Faye Dunaway as Joan Crawford.
• 28:34
  Let's go. It's so camp.
• 28:36
  It's so. Camp, it's fabulous.
• 28:37
  I mean it's it's it's camp in the best way like it's, it's,
• 28:41
  it's just it's over the top and she twirls around in that chair
• 28:46
  and it's almost like she's directly looking at the
• 28:48
  audience, you know, and in this intense way.
• 28:50
  And I mean, it is obviously a interpretation of Joan Crawford,
• 28:57
  right? By way of of Faye Dunaway.
• 29:00
  That being said though, her look is so spot on that if someone
• 29:06
  who's promoted both this movie and other movies that actually
• 29:11
  starred Joan Crawford, you'd be surprised at how many people in
• 29:15
  the press and elsewhere have incorrectly used photos of Faye
• 29:22
  when talking about Joan. You know, like some of the
• 29:25
  makeup and the hair is so spot on that people who should know
• 29:29
  better actually get it mixed up, you know, historically.
• 29:33
  So, I mean, it is camp, but it is believable enough.
• 29:36
  The recreation of that massage is pretty spot on.
• 29:42
  Well, I would just like to interject it because I, I don't
• 29:44
  know if either of you have read Carol Ann's Diaries, The Mummy
• 29:49
  Dearest Diaries, which is the worst book ever, might I add.
• 29:55
  So yeah, they actually actress that played Carol Ann, Ruth and
• 29:58
  Alder. Yeah, yeah.
• 29:59
  Have you met her Peaches? I have.
• 30:01
  Yes, Yeah. What?
• 30:02
  Yeah. Is is she really?
• 30:04
  She's like the book seems that she's just milking the like the
• 30:07
  slightest information of working with her.
• 30:09
  Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.
• 30:11
  I think that she realized smartly that people desperately
• 30:17
  wanted a family on the wall. T yes, they wanted someone who
• 30:22
  was there, someone who was in the room.
• 30:24
  And I totally get that. I mean, that's exactly how I am
• 30:26
  with like, you know, my friend Patrick Bristow, who was Marty
• 30:30
  in Showgirls. Like, what was going on?
• 30:34
  How did it work? What was the dynamic?
• 30:37
  What was, you know, what was for Hovind saying to Elizabeth,
• 30:40
  Right. So I think Ratronia, Britannia,
• 30:43
  Rutania, Rutania, I don't know, I think.
• 30:46
  That you say Britannia, I say Britannia.
• 30:48
  If she was fat, I would say Rutandia, but she's not that
• 30:53
  fat. She is, you know, I think both
• 30:59
  capitalizing on having been there, but also delivering what
• 31:04
  a certain group of us want. Right.
• 31:06
  Which is? Yeah, exactly.
• 31:09
  But I literally like the the the juice was it's like, oh, fate
• 31:12
  took ages to be kind of like set and lit and you know.
• 31:16
  It's not right. It's not as scandalous as we
• 31:19
  might, you know, have thought, right?
• 31:22
  But in terms of the look, I there was something that she
• 31:25
  mentioned that I thought was fascinating because apparently
• 31:28
  in this movie they used, they brought one of Jones wig
• 31:32
  designers out of retirement to come and work on the hair and
• 31:36
  they used some of the original wigs from some of her previous
• 31:39
  pictures. But then apparently Faye Dunaway
• 31:43
  saw Goldie Hawn on in the film Bird on a Wire and was like who
• 31:48
  is doing Goldie's hair? I need to have that person.
• 31:51
  And apparently sucked Joan. Crawford.
• 31:55
  And I was like, I, I whoever's doing Goldie's like little
• 31:58
  shaggy blonde thing, that's who's doing Joan.
• 32:01
  So I just love that straight away, that eightiesness, that
• 32:05
  the star power of Faye Dunaway is not stopping herself from
• 32:08
  looking shit hot so. I mean, it's going to be it's
• 32:11
  going to be a running theme throughout this episode, isn't
• 32:13
  it? The Faye Dunaway versus the Joan
• 32:15
  Crawford and like the blending of the two.
• 32:18
  It's so fascinating because you're right, like sometimes the
• 32:21
  look is so spot on. And like I think even that
• 32:24
  opening shot, you're like, wow, this is so good.
• 32:26
  And you look at side by sides of them and you're like, these
• 32:28
  people look so similar. And then there's a couple of
• 32:31
  scenes in it. You're like, I think I'm in
• 32:32
  1984. Yes, for sure, for sure.
• 32:36
  And I think, I think with the the mommy dearest, you know,
• 32:42
  the, the, the over the topness, the, the sort of insanity of it.
• 32:47
  It's an interesting thing to think about now because when
• 32:52
  that movie came out, Faye Dunaway was the big movie star,
• 32:56
  right? Like she was massive.
• 32:58
  Bonnie and Clyde was like such a huge, you know, film in
• 33:05
  Chinatown and, and, and, you know, she was a movie star.
• 33:10
  And then you look at her portrayal of what she and the
• 33:13
  director, obviously, and the writers thought Joan was like.
• 33:18
  Now all these decades later, knowing what we know about Faye
• 33:23
  that we did not know and audiences did not know then,
• 33:26
  which is that she can be quite hysterical on set.
• 33:29
  She can be very demanding. She can be abusive.
• 33:31
  I forget what the story about her throwing the food at the the
• 33:34
  person and calling him gay boy, you know, you know.
• 33:37
  Yeah, she's been. I would love.
• 33:39
  That if they'd done away for something, I mean could be gay,
• 33:41
  boy, I would literally be rolling on the floor.
• 33:44
  Right. I mean, and, and so she's
• 33:45
  notorious now and what I think is interesting, especially now
• 33:48
  that she's actually actually talking about it.
• 33:51
  And you know, I, I, I'm assuming you've both seen the HBO
• 33:55
  documentary Fey, you have, right?
• 33:58
  You haven't. Seen it?
• 33:59
  No, no, you fucking. Cunts, how dare you do an
• 34:05
  episode like this. No, it it it.
• 34:07
  You should watch it because I think one, it's very touching.
• 34:13
  It's it's a portrayal of her looking back on her life.
• 34:16
  She talks about mommy dearest and she very much owns her
• 34:19
  bipolar diagnosis. And yeah, and, and, and talks
• 34:24
  about it in a way that is really kind of heartbreaking and honest
• 34:28
  and revelatory. And her son is in it.
• 34:30
  And when he talks especially about this period of her life,
• 34:32
  it's, it's rough, right? Like, like, you know, she's
• 34:36
  she's had to really kind of realized that some of the stuff
• 34:41
  and some of the behavior was connected to a mental illness
• 34:44
  that she wasn't aware of. Right.
• 34:48
  So it's an interesting thing looking back on mommy dearest
• 34:51
  now, because you go, huh. I wonder, like how much of that
• 34:55
  portrayal of Joan Crawford is, is Faye or is it Joan?
• 35:00
  You know, like there's, I think there's some some, and there's
• 35:03
  probably overlap between the two of them, you know?
• 35:07
  Yeah, that's fascinating to me that I didn't realize that she'd
• 35:12
  been diagnosed bipolar. And it actually takes a bit of
• 35:15
  the joy out of the movie for me because I I really just enjoyed.
• 35:19
  Oh no, you can still. You can still have joy.
• 35:21
  Right. But do you know what I mean?
• 35:23
  Like I one of the things I love about it is how much of a first
• 35:27
  rate bitch Faye Dunaway seems. And it's just fun.
• 35:30
  It's just fun to kind of watch movie stars be that.
• 35:34
  I mean, you don't want to be in their crosshairs and you don't
• 35:36
  want to be on a set with them. But like, I love picturing
• 35:39
  someone being that big of a Diva.
• 35:41
  That's too bad that it was from such a dark place.
• 35:43
  But The thing is though, it's like, obviously there's been so
• 35:45
  much talk about the the monster vacation of Faye Dunaway's
• 35:49
  portrayal, but it is such an intensely performed role.
• 35:54
  She's the she beyond commits to it.
• 35:56
  And it's just like I've read people comparing, it's like
• 36:00
  Kabuki theatre, all of these kind of different styles of
• 36:02
  acting in it. I mean, it is such an exhausting
• 36:05
  performance. There's you can't say that she
• 36:08
  didn't give everything to her portrayal of the role.
• 36:10
  It's sensational. I think it's brilliant.
• 36:13
  I think she in the movie, it's fantastic.
• 36:15
  Yeah. And, you know, and and I guess
• 36:17
  what I meant about when you see the documentary, it's not so
• 36:20
  much of her what she brings to the performance of Mommy Garris,
• 36:23
  that was her interpretation of what she believed.
• 36:26
  You know, Joan Crawford could have been like.
• 36:29
  I actually think that she was finding connective tissue.
• 36:31
  You know, actors pull from their own experiences to play other
• 36:35
  people, right? And I think what's, you know,
• 36:40
  what's more in line with the sort of bipolar diagnosis is the
• 36:43
  sort of erratic, abusive, you know, the stories that we hear,
• 36:47
  you know, behind the scenes, which I think actually got worse
• 36:51
  after Mommy dearest. So like Ratania's book is, you
• 36:54
  know, it has some tea, but it's not that outrageous.
• 36:57
  It's not that shocking. In fact, a lot of the actors on
• 36:59
  the set of that movie, especially the child actor, I
• 37:02
  forget her name, but she Diana Scarwood.
• 37:04
  No, that's the older one. But the, the, the younger act,
• 37:08
  Christina, you know, talks about how wonderful she remembers Joan
• 37:11
  being and, and, and you know what I mean?
• 37:14
  I love to see what she grabbed me with the scissors.
• 37:16
  She says that it was really, really intense.
• 37:19
  But like, she was, you know, like Joan was.
• 37:21
  I mean, sorry, Joan. See, here I go.
• 37:24
  Faye was, you know, concerned and wanted to do it right.
• 37:26
  And no doubt Faye Dunaway was a fucking pro.
• 37:31
  You can't turn in that performance and have it be that
• 37:34
  legendary without it being a pro.
• 37:37
  And I think it was John Waters who very keenly observed that if
• 37:42
  the script had been different, we very well could be looking at
• 37:46
  the exact same performance with a different script winning her
• 37:51
  an Oscar, right? Like, like, but the script
• 37:54
  demanded that she scream for an axe.
• 37:58
  You know, the script demanded these things that we, but if you
• 38:01
  look at her actual execution, it's amazing.
• 38:05
  She's doing what what the script wants her to do.
• 38:09
  Totally. Yeah, I love.
• 38:11
  I love as well as reading. Apparently Betty Davis really
• 38:14
  hated Faye Dunaway as well. And I just think that's such a
• 38:18
  gorgeous connection. I'm like, how perfect as well.
• 38:21
  It's like. Yes, and Joan Crawford
• 38:22
  apparently said before she died that she really loved Faye
• 38:25
  Dunaway and thought she was a star and one of the only women
• 38:28
  doing Hollywood right anymore. So there you go.
• 38:31
  Yeah, yeah. Imagine that as a cosign.
• 38:33
  Yes, please. Yeah.
• 38:38
  Like the other thing, like the other things that I've heard is
• 38:40
  that Faye did, it comes from a method school and so you never
• 38:45
  hear about someone doing method And then the people on set are
• 38:48
  like, and she was a joy to be around.
• 38:51
  It's always like it makes people insane.
• 38:53
  It makes people insane. But you do get some really cool
• 38:56
  stuff out of it. She apparently it was like
• 38:59
  holding her jaw in such a way, which is part of what gave her
• 39:02
  the Joan look. But it was like so painful for
• 39:05
  her that she was in like, agony the entire shoot because of this
• 39:09
  like weird way she was holding her jaw.
• 39:12
  Yeah, she committed. Yeah, for sure.
• 39:15
  No, she's, she's extraordinary. I mean, the movie is really
• 39:19
  quite good in many ways. But there is that point in the
• 39:26
  script where, you know, it just it goes a step further and then
• 39:30
  and then another step and then another step, you know?
• 39:33
  Yeah. Should we talk about that the
• 39:37
  haircut scene a bit? Yeah.
• 39:38
  Oh, God, the hair, the haircut on that girl throughout the
• 39:41
  film, though, the wiggery of it all is, I mean, it was Faye
• 39:48
  Dunaway signing off on her hair because that little ringlet
• 39:51
  blondes, that is out of a bag that is from a costume shop.
• 39:55
  It is whacked on her head. It is.
• 39:58
  It is one of the stars of this film.
• 40:00
  If we're looking at stripping all of this, like, oh, what a
• 40:03
  great film, you know? Brilliant fade, blah blah blah.
• 40:06
  If we're looking at just a camp, I can't.
• 40:10
  Yeah, it's it's Christina's wigs throughout this film, I believe.
• 40:14
  I really do. I know Wig, I feel that already.
• 40:18
  I love how much you can see. So Joan Crawford finds
• 40:24
  Christina, like, acting out on awards acceptance speech, and
• 40:27
  she's furious about it. She feels like she's being
• 40:29
  mocked by her daughter. So she's like, she goes to cut
• 40:32
  off all her hair, but you can see the little girl holding the
• 40:35
  wig desperately in place because the wig is slipping off as Faye
• 40:39
  Dunaway is like hacking at. It which which is why my my
• 40:44
  parody stage show was so true to the movie, you know, because I I
• 40:48
  would take those scissors and start going at Hecklina, you
• 40:51
  know, the way we did. It was like, you know, I was,
• 40:54
  you know, I walked in and Hecklina was sitting in the
• 40:56
  mirror and she was combing her hair and she was saying things
• 40:59
  like I'm so fierce. I'm friends with Elvira, don't
• 41:03
  you know, Hey everybody, I'm so fierce.
• 41:07
  That's fly out of my pussy. I'm, you know, whatever, you
• 41:11
  know, And then I and then I go and she turns around a mommy and
• 41:16
  I what do you think you're doing?
• 41:18
  You know, that whole thing. And then I get the scissors and
• 41:21
  I start cutting her hair. Well, we had, I wore a giant
• 41:24
  black robe. So in our very expensive special
• 41:27
  effect, I swoop the black robe up into the air while Heklina
• 41:31
  bends over in the vanity and swaps her, you know, Kitty wig
• 41:35
  out with like this really chopped up like shitty, shitty
• 41:39
  little blonde piece of trash wig.
• 41:42
  And then I drop the Cape and I turn around and she reveals to
• 41:45
  the audience, you know, that I butchered her hair.
• 41:48
  And it's like, perfect, because the audience just screams and
• 41:51
  cheers. But my favorite line, maybe one
• 41:54
  of my favorite lines in the whole show is Hecklena saying,
• 41:57
  you know exactly what Christina says, where she goes, oh, mommy,
• 42:00
  mommy, I can't go to school now. I look terrible, you know?
• 42:05
  And I say, I know you do. And now your wig does too.
• 42:16
  Anyway, were you were you finding yourself going method?
• 42:18
  Were you going method in it as well?
• 42:20
  Because it sounds like the perfect roles every night on
• 42:22
  stage to be like, oh, this is where we can really fucking go
• 42:25
  in on each other. Yeah, because I mean, the way
• 42:27
  that my parody show was written was we're doing, you know,
• 42:32
  obviously it's mommy queerest. And, you know, we love my, my
• 42:36
  whole thing is like, how do I channel these things really for
• 42:40
  a queer audience? I mean, you don't have to be
• 42:42
  literally homosexual, but these shows that I do are for a niche
• 42:46
  audience who love these things and want to see them celebrated
• 42:48
  in this really camp, ridiculous, queer way.
• 42:51
  So the concept is that Peaches is an aging drag star who adopts
• 42:57
  a drag daughter, you know, to inject celebrity into her life.
• 43:01
  And as we did this show for 20 years, and I was adopting drag
• 43:05
  children like Jinx Monsoon and Bob the Drag Queen, Heklina
• 43:08
  would be like, wow, pretty true to life, don't you think?
• 43:13
  Your star was fading and you had to spice things up by getting a
• 43:17
  new drag daughter. You know, So it is sort of weird
• 43:21
  because we do play ourselves. But the concept was that Heklina
• 43:25
  showed up, said that her name was Hektina.
• 43:28
  And me being an idiot, didn't realize that it was Heklina
• 43:32
  dressed up as a little child, which, you know, is her.
• 43:35
  And she's in the house to try to take me down and destroy me from
• 43:39
  the inside, which of course leads to US playing ourselves
• 43:44
  right. And so it was super fun.
• 43:46
  I, I mean, I got to, I got to beat up Heklina every single
• 43:49
  night, of course. Perfect.
• 43:51
  You know I. Mean the way our show ends is
• 43:53
  she murders me at the you know, I, I get killed at the end, you
• 43:56
  know, but you know, but until I get killed, I get to abuse her
• 44:00
  for two hours. Well, 90 minutes, you know.
• 44:05
  What do we think about Christina?
• 44:07
  But let's talk about little girl Christina, maybe.
• 44:10
  I think she's amazing. I mean, she's amazing.
• 44:13
  I think, I think it's hard to imagine because, you know, the
• 44:16
  movie. So it's, it's like for me, it's
• 44:19
  like the Wizard of Oz or something where it's like, I
• 44:21
  just don't, I can't imagine someone else doing it, you know,
• 44:25
  So when, when that little girl, you know, that has the line
• 44:28
  where she says Jesus Christ, you know, Oh my God, it's just so
• 44:32
  great right in the, the, the, the, the look on her face at
• 44:36
  dinner time. I also like that she was, it
• 44:39
  wasn't just some sort of like victim.
• 44:41
  I liked, I liked that she kind of sass back sometimes or stand
• 44:45
  up for herself, you know. And I thought the girl played it
• 44:47
  well, like it felt like a realistic child in a way.
• 44:52
  Like they're, yeah, they're kind of back and forth between them
• 44:54
  is so consistent from the get go because we're not.
• 44:58
  When I do screenings of it, I divide the audience into teams
• 45:01
  and I get the masks and you either Team Christina or Team
• 45:04
  Joan and it's great because it's literally like you can score
• 45:08
  like who's winning and it's like the back and it and then she's
• 45:11
  down the middle. Because it's like everything's a
• 45:13
  competition now. Yeah, she's a sassy little
• 45:16
  bitch, isn't she? Yeah.
• 45:18
  So who, who wins when you screen it?
• 45:20
  Who gets more? Well, point it all depends on
• 45:23
  how the audience go with it, but it's like, you know, the there
• 45:26
  are equal moments throughout the film as well.
• 45:28
  And then but also there's then the joy of like booing the the
• 45:32
  dirt community. You know, there's a lot of hate.
• 45:34
  It's a hate alone. But I, I think, I think the
• 45:37
  actress that plays both Christina's are brilliant.
• 45:41
  I do. Too, Yeah.
• 45:42
  Yeah. My my favorite bit with young
• 45:44
  Christina is the scene where she's making drinks for so great
• 45:49
  boyfriend and she's just the look on her face.
• 45:52
  You can read so much into it, but it's like there's like a bit
• 45:56
  of evil. There's a bit of like kind of
• 45:59
  sexy, menacing something going on.
• 46:01
  It's like really, really weird. It's a really weird scene, but
• 46:04
  it's like, I think it's my campus moment with her.
• 46:07
  I think all my uncles drinks this way.
• 46:10
  I got to say, I find some of the abuse scenes kind of hard to
• 46:14
  watch because I think that they just.
• 46:16
  I know, I know. They're pure joy.
• 46:20
  What's wrong with you, Crystal? What happened to you baby?
• 46:24
  Eye rolling so hard. Baby literally is masturbating
• 46:29
  during those scenes harder? Look, I'm gonna, I'm gonna read
• 46:36
  you this quote from Guy Lodge in the Guardian, who kind of echoes
• 46:40
  what I feel. Something.
• 46:41
  What the fuck do they know? OK, I think it's an interesting
• 46:43
  comment. No, no.
• 46:44
  But that's not baby. Let's not suppress this
• 46:48
  sensitive amongst us. Each time I've seen Mommy
• 46:54
  Dearest, it's most violent scenes startle me anew.
• 46:57
  I find the harsh physical vigor of Dunaway's performance,
• 46:59
  combined with the piercing, uncontrolled sounding pitch of
• 47:02
  young actor Mara Habel screams profoundly uncomfortable to
• 47:05
  watch and hear. Can I be alone in this
• 47:07
  discomfort? Or have audiences over the years
• 47:09
  collectively decided to override the film's gaze, making a joke
• 47:12
  of these scenes so as to make them easier to endure?
• 47:15
  So I have a thought on this and a couple things to say because I
• 47:20
  actually think that there is a profoundly disturbing element to
• 47:27
  this film. Clearly is a film about abuse.
• 47:31
  And specifically we're watching a we're not really used to
• 47:36
  seeing a young child actor be, you know, assaulted the way that
• 47:40
  we see them assaulted in this movie.
• 47:42
  And I think in that way, queer audiences in, in, in, in a way
• 47:49
  that we do as queer people now. Now, bear with me because I'm
• 47:52
  going to get a little bit deep. People outside of the queer
• 47:56
  community were often horrified when they'd come to early Tranny
• 47:59
  Shack before there was an AIDS cocktail, and they would hear
• 48:03
  Hecklina and Timmy Spence up on stage talking about how many T
• 48:07
  cells they had left and cackling and and making fun of AIDS.
• 48:13
  OK, I believe that part of our coping with horror in our lives,
• 48:20
  whether it be AIDS or child abuse or gay bashing or
• 48:24
  homophobia or racism or all sorts of things, there has been
• 48:28
  a, a, a, an underground embracing of wicked humor
• 48:33
  amongst our community of laughing at what shall not be
• 48:36
  laughed at as a survival mechanism.
• 48:39
  And I think when audiences saw this movie, I think it was
• 48:42
  disturbing and that the queer response to it being disturbing
• 48:45
  was it's only a movie. Look how ridiculous this is.
• 48:49
  It's a movie. Now, that being said, is it
• 48:52
  disturbing when you forget that it's a movie, when you forget
• 48:55
  it's Faye Dunaway when you picture them as mother and
• 48:57
  daughter? Absolutely.
• 48:59
  And I one time screened the movie in Switzerland of all
• 49:03
  places, where I was asked to program a series of movies for a
• 49:07
  Film Festival. That was it was when All About
• 49:09
  Evil, my film was new and they said we'd love you to scream.
• 49:12
  Five nights of movies that inspired All About Evil.
• 49:15
  So I screamed Faster. Pussycat.
• 49:16
  Kill, kill. I screamed.
• 49:18
  Female Trouble. I screamed.
• 49:20
  I forget what. All but one of the movies was
• 49:22
  Mommy Dearest, because a lot of the films I was choosing were
• 49:25
  about grandiose egos and larger than life women on screen and,
• 49:30
  and being wicked and being, you know, driven by narcissism.
• 49:36
  And all those movies got a great response, except for Mommy
• 49:42
  Dearest, the audience. It was an underground Film
• 49:45
  Festival, so the audience wasn't as queer as we might have
• 49:48
  thought, right? And that audience hadn't been in
• 49:51
  break, hadn't been exposed to the idea that this film was
• 49:55
  camp. So imagine watching this film
• 50:00
  having just seen Female Trouble or Faster Pussycat Kill Kill,
• 50:03
  because Peaches, Christ wants you to come and see this amazing
• 50:06
  cult movie. And they took it at face value
• 50:09
  and they were baffled and upset with me.
• 50:12
  Like, like, why did you show this to us?
• 50:15
  Why would you think this is good?
• 50:17
  You know, and that really clued me into like, Oh yeah, this
• 50:21
  movie is it's different for different people depending on,
• 50:26
  you know, the the way you're looking at it.
• 50:27
  So. Yeah.
• 50:28
  And the way you watch it, like the the context you watch it in,
• 50:32
  you know, is it in a fun, raucous, joyous atmosphere or,
• 50:36
  you know, is it by yourself on a Sunday night on the couch?
• 50:39
  Yeah, though that makes such a big difference.
• 50:42
  I think for me personally, it is like, as we said, I agree that
• 50:47
  this film with Faye Dunaway made with a different script,
• 50:51
  potentially a different director.
• 50:52
  And I think you'd be talking at a very, very different outcome
• 50:56
  and masterpiece and an Oscar worthy film.
• 50:59
  And I think because there are so many elements about this film
• 51:01
  that aren't that it just allows me to kind of enter this portal
• 51:06
  of like a ridiculous, overblown world.
• 51:09
  And as I said, like I see the the role of Christina from the
• 51:13
  get go. We know it's her story.
• 51:15
  We know it's her book. I see her as this like equal
• 51:18
  character that is like fighting her.
• 51:20
  I think it's like this, you know, that that that theme that
• 51:24
  continues between mother and daughter, that sort of cliche
• 51:26
  trope that they're always going to battle to the end.
• 51:29
  I just think it's fucking joyous.
• 51:30
  And I think I literally don't. I can view it with such like,
• 51:34
  just the kind of a fun gaze. I don't connect.
• 51:37
  But that's not saying, like, I'm sure if Gillian Moore was
• 51:39
  playing this role, I'd be crying.
• 51:41
  I'd be like, deeply. Yeah.
• 51:43
  I just. Yeah, I totally hear you.
• 51:46
  I think, I think thinking about it as like a reclamation of
• 51:50
  abuse that a lot of gay people experience themselves or even
• 51:53
  just like being a disappointment to their parents, that really
• 51:58
  helps me kind of contextualize it.
• 52:00
  I think that's really interesting.
• 52:01
  What if it's just fun? What if it's not that deep
• 52:03
  though? I know, but I.
• 52:06
  No, I just think from my perspective but it.
• 52:08
  Is. Yeah, but your.
• 52:09
  But your perspective is, baby you, me, a lot of our friends,
• 52:15
  we have wicked senses of humor and we think things are fun that
• 52:20
  the mainstream may not. And that's probably
• 52:24
  intrinsically connected to our queerness.
• 52:26
  Probably. That would be my argument, you
• 52:28
  know. Totally.
• 52:29
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's not the first
• 52:32
  inappropriate thing I think I've ever.
• 52:33
  No, I mean, look at you look at. You I also I also really like
• 52:38
  that perspective. I think it's really I think it's
• 52:40
  super valid. It's just I did watching it
• 52:44
  prepping for this. Those scenes did make me feel a
• 52:46
  bit like this is kind of hard to watch and it's they are supposed
• 52:49
  with watching with watching Faye Dunaway like over act so hard.
• 52:53
  You're kind of like laughing at her and then also like feeling
• 52:55
  this weird way for the kid. I don't know.
• 52:57
  I found that kind of a weird juxtaposition.
• 53:00
  But that said, like when Christina is older and they have
• 53:03
  that choke out and the slap off, I am so on board for it because
• 53:08
  it just, it feels, it feels like it goes fully into the farce at
• 53:11
  that point for me, because I guess a child isn't involved.
• 53:13
  And, and I guess because I know that that child, one of the
• 53:16
  things that bothered me researching this episode was
• 53:19
  like, that child actually got stabbed by those scissors and
• 53:22
  they had to stop doing takes because she was covered in red
• 53:24
  bruises from Faye Dunaway actually squeezing the shit out
• 53:28
  of her. And it's like, I know, I know
• 53:30
  I'm being sensitive, but at the same time it's like, Oh, that's
• 53:33
  kind of it's hard to know that. Whereas when they're older, it
• 53:37
  just looks so silly and, and I'm like, well, they're, they're on
• 53:41
  equal footing here. Like she can give it as good as
• 53:43
  she's taking. It's absolutely fine.
• 53:45
  And the choking is just so silly.
• 53:46
  And I'm like here for that fight.
• 53:47
  It's it's funny. I find it is that's.
• 53:50
  Showbiz. That's showbiz, though.
• 53:52
  If you want the role, you've got to.
• 53:53
  You've got to take the punches. You must.
• 53:55
  Be choked out by Faye Dunaway, Judy.
• 53:57
  Garland in Bloody Wizard of Oz. Like the thing she went through
• 54:01
  that poor witch in the Wizard of Oz with her lead poisoning.
• 54:05
  Yeah, it's showbiz, babe. Yeah.
• 54:08
  Oh my God. Yeah.
• 54:09
  It's one of those things where as you're talking about it, I
• 54:12
  completely agree with you, Crystal.
• 54:15
  I agree with you that the stuff with the comet and the wire
• 54:20
  hanger, especially the child screeching is, is rough.
• 54:27
  I think that if that had not led to the the choke out stuff, I
• 54:33
  don't know and the bring me the axe and some of the other really
• 54:38
  over the top camp stuff. I don't know that the the wire
• 54:41
  hanger scene is the big camp moment that everyone thinks it
• 54:45
  is. It's actually a big moment
• 54:48
  that's really impactful and really over the top and really
• 54:52
  disturbing. But because of all the other
• 54:55
  stuff that's so kind of joyously over the top and kind of almost
• 54:59
  fun. Bring me the axe, you know, and
• 55:03
  being choked out on the coffee table while the, you know,
• 55:06
  Harper's Bazaar reporters in the other room.
• 55:09
  And Barbara, please, you know I'm not And yeah, I'm not one of
• 55:12
  your fans, right? Like, it's so fabulously camp
• 55:16
  that it's almost like we took. That's how we we deal with the
• 55:20
  wire hanger scene and maybe why the wire hanger scene became
• 55:25
  known as the big, big camp moment.
• 55:27
  I actually think it's the the hardest moment in the film to
• 55:30
  watch. And in fact, almost to the point
• 55:33
  where, like in Showgirls, there's a rape scene towards the
• 55:36
  end of the film that I actually just don't.
• 55:38
  I never have gotten on board with it.
• 55:40
  I've never been able to watch it and find any semblance of fun.
• 55:44
  The rest of the movie, which is filled with misogynistic tropes
• 55:48
  and horrible ideas and terrible, you know, bullshit, you know,
• 55:52
  all the worst of male writers and directors is fun.
• 55:56
  It's really, really fun. But that scene, that rape scene
• 55:59
  is just too brutal. It's too real.
• 56:01
  And I think that the wire hanger scene is just on this side of
• 56:07
  camp, if you know what I mean. Like, I feel like it.
• 56:10
  I totally get what you're saying, Crystal.
• 56:12
  Yeah, yeah, the the showgirl scene occurred to me too when I
• 56:15
  was thinking about this. Yeah.
• 56:17
  And it that's obviously much more extreme, but yeah, there is
• 56:20
  something in that where you're like, oh, can I, can I, can I
• 56:24
  get on board with this part? The one thing that I honestly
• 56:27
  might have made a difference is if they didn't have the Jesus
• 56:30
  Christ moment. It's almost like at the end of
• 56:33
  the scene she's saying to you, don't worry, I'm an adult.
• 56:37
  I have a sense of humor about this.
• 56:38
  I know how to take. I mean, it's so bizarre how they
• 56:41
  make her almost not a victim at the very end.
• 56:44
  I mean, she's a victim, but like, they give her this very
• 56:47
  adult response to it all. You know, Jesus, which is camp,
• 56:54
  which is funny 'cause like, I don't think that's how a kid
• 56:56
  would react after being beaten in the middle of the night, you
• 57:00
  know? Yeah, Jesus.
• 57:01
  Although maybe, maybe, maybe you grow up.
• 57:03
  I mean, I don't know what your mother's were like, but my
• 57:06
  mother hates this movie because my mother, she's not gonna like
• 57:13
  it if she ever hears that I talked about this.
• 57:17
  She is a really wonderfully supportive mom, but growing up,
• 57:22
  I think that she had some Joan tendencies where because her
• 57:26
  childhood was so chaotic. She's the adult child of a of a
• 57:31
  crazy alcoholic family. She was abused as a girl.
• 57:34
  She was, you know, she was a runaway when she was like 16
• 57:37
  years old, not because she was thrown out of the house, you
• 57:39
  know, like horrible, horrible childhood.
• 57:42
  So my mother was like determined to give her three kids a perfect
• 57:46
  childhood. And what that meant was we
• 57:50
  walked on eggs in that house, you know, a speck of dirt could
• 57:54
  land you in trouble. You know, there'd be raging
• 57:58
  over, you know, the the smallest thing.
• 58:00
  So I, it wasn't beat the way that Christina was, but there
• 58:05
  was, I did grow up with, you know, some, some fear of, you
• 58:09
  know, messing up the house or, you know, pissing my mother off
• 58:13
  at Christmas time, you know, So I think in some ways watching
• 58:17
  Mommy Dearest, it's also kind of cathartic, you know, and I think
• 58:21
  as queer people, we know that we have a special relationship to
• 58:24
  horror movies as well. You know, I was obsessed with,
• 58:27
  you know, horror and it's, you know, definitely connected to,
• 58:31
  like, being teased and bullied at school and coming home and,
• 58:34
  like, cathartically wishing I could, you know, blow the prom
• 58:37
  up with telekinetic powers, you know?
• 58:40
  I guess also like if this movie weren't based on a true story,
• 58:44
  that would probably also make it a little bit easier because then
• 58:48
  I'd be like, this is a farcical horror movie.
• 58:50
  But it is farcical because the woman who wrote it has got like,
• 58:55
  I don't know. I just think she's, I think
• 58:58
  she's got a problem with her mom.
• 59:00
  I think there's been a lot of spinning, a lot of pettiness
• 59:03
  that seeps through this story and then has been twisted even
• 59:06
  more. I'm not, I'm not viewing this as
• 59:08
  a factual story at all. I'm seeing this as someone who
• 59:12
  didn't get any inheritance and is, you know, there were loads
• 59:15
  of articles sort of pulling apart how certain aspects of
• 59:19
  that weren't true, like the the two daughters that were also
• 59:23
  adopted that don't feature in the film had a great
• 59:27
  relationship with Joan. So I think there's, I don't
• 59:29
  know, I, I take it all with a pinch of salt personally, and
• 59:32
  that's why I think I can devour it in all of its.
• 59:35
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. That makes a lot of sense.
• 59:43
  Hit children is what I'm saying. One thing.
• 59:47
  Joan worked hard, she came from nowhere and those disrespectful
• 59:51
  children. One thing I I noticed that they
• 59:57
  changed from the book to the movie is that Christina says
• 1:00:01
  that Joan killed her last husband and in the movie he just
• 1:00:07
  dies. From 1 scene to the next, he's
• 1:00:09
  dead. Well, that's that's yeah, that's
• 1:00:14
  probably. What do they call that?
• 1:00:18
  I don't know, Like you, you don't want to get into territory
• 1:00:20
  where you're. What do they call that when you
• 1:00:24
  say something really horrible about another person that might
• 1:00:27
  not be true defamatory, right. Yeah.
• 1:00:29
  Like you. You're.
• 1:00:30
  Yeah. I mean, hello.
• 1:00:32
  You're the queen of being defamed.
• 1:00:34
  The. Queen of Defamation.
• 1:00:36
  Yeah, you're, you know, supposedly you got that out.
• 1:00:45
  I'll sue. I'm going to, I'm going to sue
• 1:00:48
  you, Peaches. Christ, you came on my podcast.
• 1:00:54
  No, but I think that, yeah, I I actually agree a lot with what
• 1:00:58
  baby is saying because when anyone is at that level of fame
• 1:01:06
  and they, you know, do something that is at all, I don't know,
• 1:01:14
  it's hard to know to what degree these things happened.
• 1:01:18
  And, you know, I was spanked as a kid.
• 1:01:21
  You know, I was told I couldn't leave the table without
• 1:01:25
  finishing my meal or, you know, I mean, a lot.
• 1:01:28
  There are a lot of things in the movie that kind of I'm like,
• 1:01:30
  yeah, I mean, I I, but I'm not going to write a book about how
• 1:01:32
  horrible my mom was, right? Like, so it's hard to know
• 1:01:35
  because we weren't there, right? So, but I mean, if there are
• 1:01:39
  other siblings saying it really wasn't that bad or this is an
• 1:01:43
  exaggeration, then you have to take all that, you know, into
• 1:01:46
  the picture. But you don't want to be the
• 1:01:48
  person who, what's the word, doesn't believe the victim too.
• 1:01:52
  You know, it's like kind of like, well, I don't know, I
• 1:01:54
  wasn't there. But it is fascinating.
• 1:01:57
  And I think I feel like Faye Dunaway's performance and Joan
• 1:02:01
  Crawford in general, they they inevitably and obviously still
• 1:02:09
  are both, you know, being perceived through this lens that
• 1:02:16
  views women differently than men.
• 1:02:19
  And, you know, I feel like, you know, we're we're forgetting
• 1:02:22
  that in order for Joan to survive in this industry, a
• 1:02:26
  little bit of it's in the movie. I think few did a much better
• 1:02:31
  job of just going to say that of really showing like what it took
• 1:02:35
  how hard you had to fight to be a strong woman in this studio
• 1:02:40
  system with these pigs, You know, these men who were
• 1:02:44
  horrible. We know they were horrible.
• 1:02:46
  I mean, think about Harvey Weinstein in the 90s and early
• 1:02:49
  aughts. Imagine what these douchebags
• 1:02:52
  were getting away with in the 30s, forties, fifties, 60s, when
• 1:02:55
  she was, you know, a star in the system.
• 1:02:58
  So I just feel like she too, is a tremendous survivor and and
• 1:03:03
  and such a strong, strong woman. And I feel like I wish, I wish
• 1:03:09
  that the movie reflected a little more of that just as far
• 1:03:13
  as, you know, Joan Crawford herself.
• 1:03:15
  But also, I think when, when Faye was was being ripped to
• 1:03:18
  shreds, and I and I defend Elizabeth Berkley in the same
• 1:03:21
  way, when Faye's career was just being, you know, chewed up.
• 1:03:27
  It was like, wait a second, some man wrote this movie.
• 1:03:32
  Some man directed this movie. You know, this woman had a
• 1:03:36
  director, Faye Dunaway. It's not like she was just told
• 1:03:39
  to go do whatever she wanted, you know.
• 1:03:42
  So I think that there's these things where when men turn in,
• 1:03:45
  these really can't be over the top performances.
• 1:03:48
  And I always talk about, you know, Al Pacino and Scarface.
• 1:03:52
  It is a ludicrous, insane performance that it is not.
• 1:03:58
  There's no reality where someone behaves that way.
• 1:04:01
  But we love it. We applaud it.
• 1:04:03
  Jack Nicholson in any movie, Oh my God, look how great Jack
• 1:04:06
  Nicholson is, you know, and he is chewing up the scenery and
• 1:04:10
  everything he's ever been in. You know, Anthony Hopkins in
• 1:04:13
  Silence of the Lambs, you know, gets an Oscar and it is
• 1:04:16
  ridiculous, but we love it. We love those performances when
• 1:04:20
  they're turned in by men. But women who have the audacity
• 1:04:23
  to perform big like that, you know, we, we kind of, we blame
• 1:04:28
  them for, you know, being too much.
• 1:04:31
  Totally. And women can.
• 1:04:34
  Men can have a flop, men can have a failure of a movie and
• 1:04:37
  their career is just fine. Yeah, as soon as a woman has 1
• 1:04:41
  Elizabeth Berkeley, they Dunaway like the list goes on and on and
• 1:04:45
  on. It's like Oh well, their career
• 1:04:47
  is over. They no point in booking them
• 1:04:49
  anymore. They're done.
• 1:04:50
  And we know that men were sabotaging these women's
• 1:04:54
  careers. You know, and I bring up Harvey
• 1:04:57
  Weinstein again because that's how recent it's been.
• 1:05:00
  Oh, Mira Sorvino, you won't suck my Dick.
• 1:05:03
  I will destroy your career. I will make you disappear.
• 1:05:05
  And he did. You know, this is the culture
• 1:05:09
  that these people are performing in.
• 1:05:11
  And I feel like we don't look at it and not for talk about it
• 1:05:14
  enough. I do think that feud did a
• 1:05:16
  better job, but I still think it was probably 100 times worse
• 1:05:20
  than we've even ever seen it. You know, and the fact that Faye
• 1:05:23
  and Betty, they're the ones who pulled off Baby Jane, they made
• 1:05:27
  it happen. You know, they just deserve so
• 1:05:30
  much more credit, the two of them.
• 1:05:32
  I even question whether or not they they actually didn't like
• 1:05:35
  each other. You know, I actually, there's
• 1:05:38
  been some articles I've read where behind the scenes they may
• 1:05:43
  have orchestrated their public feud because they knew it would
• 1:05:47
  keep them in the press. They knew it would keep the
• 1:05:49
  public interested in them and they could agree on it.
• 1:05:52
  Because by the time they were publicly feuding, they were
• 1:05:55
  smart, they were savvy, they had a movie to promote.
• 1:05:58
  They knew what sold tickets. You know, they, they had a, so I
• 1:06:03
  actually kind of go, wouldn't that be funny if they had the
• 1:06:05
  last laugh, if they were the ones, you know, manipulating
• 1:06:09
  everyone into believing there was this diva feud between them
• 1:06:12
  when there really wasn't, you know?
• 1:06:14
  It'd be so fab. Yeah.
• 1:06:16
  But yeah, you see that in like later interviews with them on
• 1:06:18
  chat shows and they're, you know, they're they're kind of
• 1:06:21
  they're doing digs and they're laughing about it, about each
• 1:06:24
  other. They know what, they know what
• 1:06:26
  they need to say to get a reaction.
• 1:06:29
  Yes. But also, who doesn't love that?
• 1:06:31
  You know, you had like, you know, Madonna, how many
• 1:06:34
  different feuds has she had with like, people over the years?
• 1:06:37
  And you know. Ian, Elton John just made-up.
• 1:06:40
  I don't know. There you.
• 1:06:41
  Go yeah, now that is a fucking diva.
• 1:06:46
  Elton John, I think, terrifies me the most out of all of them.
• 1:06:50
  Yeah, I guess it's a funny thing to think about.
• 1:06:52
  Like Faye Dunaway as mommy dearest is such a persona of of
• 1:06:58
  a star run mad and and who do you think you know of living
• 1:07:03
  stars today? Is the most mommy dearest out
• 1:07:06
  there? Is it Elton John?
• 1:07:08
  Oh God, that's. A great question.
• 1:07:11
  Who's like secretly? Who's beloved but secretly like?
• 1:07:15
  I mean, I'm a little terrified of Patti Lupone, but she doesn't
• 1:07:18
  really like, she doesn't really hide it, you know, she'll like,
• 1:07:21
  yeah, no agreement you if you're on your phone or whatever.
• 1:07:23
  So yeah, yeah, it's not like a secret.
• 1:07:26
  Yeah, like who's actually beating people up behind the the
• 1:07:30
  scenes? Like do you think Gaga's hitting
• 1:07:31
  her assistant? No, I don't think so.
• 1:07:34
  She doesn't come off that way to me at least.
• 1:07:37
  I mean, RuPaul, sure, I'm just kidding.
• 1:07:43
  I totally just wanted to see what your reactions were.
• 1:07:46
  It was just like quiet silence. And that kind of says it all.
• 1:07:52
  Doesn't it? It says nothing.
• 1:07:54
  Actually, there's absolutely nothing.
• 1:07:56
  I. Think you'll find we said
• 1:07:58
  nothing? I didn't even say you should.
• 1:08:02
  I didn't. I didn't.
• 1:08:03
  I didn't even say nothing with a face.
• 1:08:06
  I just. I know you went, you went full
• 1:08:09
  on blank, girl. I've never seen you go so blank.
• 1:08:16
  Moving on, moving on. I I see, I've, I've struck, I've
• 1:08:23
  struck a nerve. You silent or were you silenced?
• 1:08:29
  What are, what are the like objective problems with this
• 1:08:31
  movie and what would have made it better or worse or like, I
• 1:08:35
  don't know. Let's talk about.
• 1:08:36
  Let's talk about it. What do you want to do?
• 1:08:38
  Yeah, that's what I was going to say is it depends on what you
• 1:08:40
  what you want, because for me it's kind of perfect because,
• 1:08:43
  you know, because I've gotten to celebrate it so much over the
• 1:08:46
  years and have so much fun with it and it's created so much
• 1:08:49
  source for celebration. And, and I'm sure baby feels the
• 1:08:52
  same way because we get, I mean, when you really get to see
• 1:08:56
  audiences joy, you know, as strange as it sounds in this
• 1:09:00
  movie about child abuse, you get to see this sort of joy that
• 1:09:04
  comes with these over the top camp performances in this, this
• 1:09:07
  big movie that, you know, that, that the, the, the mainstream
• 1:09:10
  feels like when so, so wrong, you know, and, and ran amok.
• 1:09:15
  Whereas I would say, Oh no, it's kind of perfect.
• 1:09:18
  I mean, honestly, my, my, my, my biggest criticisms would be
• 1:09:22
  because it's so wonderfully over the top.
• 1:09:25
  I, if I could go in and just chop out some of the, the boring
• 1:09:29
  bits here and there. You know, it does feel a little
• 1:09:31
  long in places, you know what I mean?
• 1:09:33
  Where it's like, I would just want to tighten it up so it's a
• 1:09:35
  little more midnight movie friendly.
• 1:09:37
  It's kind of long for a midnight movie, but but in general I
• 1:09:40
  don't think I would want to change much.
• 1:09:43
  Yeah, it's kind of doesn't work to talk about it in the in the
• 1:09:46
  way we normally talk about movies, right?
• 1:09:48
  Because it's just, it's become so much bigger than itself.
• 1:09:52
  It's so meta. Yeah, I think as well, though,
• 1:09:54
  it's like there are very few films that you can watch on mass
• 1:09:58
  and they can really kind of, as you said, Peaches bring out so
• 1:10:02
  many emotions and such like, reactions.
• 1:10:04
  Like there were big, big belly laughs in this film.
• 1:10:08
  There were big moments of like, redemption for like, you know,
• 1:10:11
  Christina getting revenge on her evil mother.
• 1:10:14
  But then you've got they keep on kind of, you know, right at the
• 1:10:17
  end with Joan getting, you know, you know, I'm not giving them an
• 1:10:21
  inheritance. There's all of this stuff
• 1:10:23
  there's and I think it is like terrifying.
• 1:10:25
  It is like you're watching a horror film.
• 1:10:27
  But yeah, like big jokes, big drama.
• 1:10:30
  You do feel for her. I think near the end it actually
• 1:10:32
  does a really good job of kind of calming down Joan as you see
• 1:10:36
  them getting older and you you kind of have the scenes where
• 1:10:40
  they're doing the the laundry downstairs and she's kind of
• 1:10:44
  talking to Christina about how she doesn't have any money.
• 1:10:46
  They feel like real scenes when she goes to Christina's
• 1:10:49
  apartment and she's like, fuck, I remember what this used to be
• 1:10:52
  like. You do kind of get more of a
• 1:10:54
  sense of a relationship from them.
• 1:10:56
  And I think that's an interesting.
• 1:10:57
  It does kind of calm down. But then obviously the pettiness
• 1:11:01
  creeps back in when Jones like taking her role on the soap
• 1:11:04
  opera and stuff, which I've tried to see if there was a clip
• 1:11:06
  of that anywhere, but it doesn't exist, does it?
• 1:11:08
  But. I've tried to find one too.
• 1:11:10
  So amazing that that even happened is just, I mean, we
• 1:11:14
  know that we know that that happened.
• 1:11:16
  It's not like you can say, oh, the movie's being ridiculous.
• 1:11:19
  Oh, no, that fucking happened. You know, and it's it's like no
• 1:11:25
  matter what you can argue about whether, you know, Joan was was
• 1:11:28
  this far overboard or not. It's like, yeah, but she did
• 1:11:32
  take her daughter's role on that soap opera and she did not leave
• 1:11:38
  her anything in the will. I mean, there are things that we
• 1:11:40
  know are factually correct, you know, and and I agree with you,
• 1:11:44
  baby, that like even though the movie sort of that there is this
• 1:11:47
  sort of more tempered tone at the end, you still all the way
• 1:11:55
  through get another great line of dialogue.
• 1:12:00
  So like, just when you're like, oh, it's getting a little, this
• 1:12:04
  is a little dull. You're like that don't fuck with
• 1:12:06
  me line is coming around the corner and the boys in the booze
• 1:12:10
  line is on the heels of that. You know, there's always
• 1:12:13
  something that's gonna like, oh, yeah, here we go.
• 1:12:16
  And, you know, and that that, you know, does she moment at the
• 1:12:20
  end is so great. In fact, if you'll, if you'll
• 1:12:23
  allow me, I'll let you know what we did because of course, I
• 1:12:26
  can't talk about this movie without talking about Mommy
• 1:12:28
  Queeras, which is of course the stage show that I did for all
• 1:12:31
  those years. And as you know, you know, I was
• 1:12:35
  in London when I found Hecklina. Dad was what we were rehearsing
• 1:12:40
  mommy queerest. We were supposed to do it at the
• 1:12:42
  Soho Theater and we were literally rehearsing it.
• 1:12:45
  And I, so this is kind of dark, but I, I feel like I, your
• 1:12:50
  listeners will understand. So, you know, we're doing mommy
• 1:12:52
  queerest, We're rehearsing. And at the point at the time
• 1:12:55
  that, you know, I was rehearsing in London, I had, you know,
• 1:12:58
  hecklina and I were together, though, you know, all the time.
• 1:13:00
  I often didn't know if she was relapsing.
• 1:13:03
  You know, Heckledo was an alcoholic and a drug addict,
• 1:13:05
  too, was sober most of the time I knew her.
• 1:13:07
  But, you know, when she would relapse, I often didn't know it.
• 1:13:11
  And so this was one of those examples where during
• 1:13:13
  rehearsals, I was like, why is she acting so crazy?
• 1:13:17
  You know, and we're doing the show and we're doing this scene
• 1:13:20
  at the end that we do over and over and over again to get the
• 1:13:24
  timing right because it's the comedy of the timing.
• 1:13:27
  And in San Francisco, it's Lady Bear who plays Mamacita, and and
• 1:13:32
  England was George Bourgeois who was playing Mamacita.
• 1:13:36
  And at the very, very end, the way it's written in my script is
• 1:13:40
  Heklina stands up at the reading of the will.
• 1:13:42
  After I say I've left her nothing.
• 1:13:46
  And she says, you know, there's Mamacita says, I suppose she had
• 1:13:51
  the last laugh. And then, you know, Heklina
• 1:13:53
  says, does she? And then she walks up, you know,
• 1:13:56
  towards the the front of the audience, prepared to say does
• 1:13:59
  she a second time, which the audience is all prepared for,
• 1:14:02
  you know, because I know that she says it twice in the movie.
• 1:14:04
  So she says, does she? And then the script Mamacita
• 1:14:07
  goes, well, yeah, she's dead. So that's the last laugh, right?
• 1:14:11
  She's not. And then Hecklina goes, she
• 1:14:14
  breaks character and goes like, look, George, I'm trying to do a
• 1:14:17
  thing here. Just, yeah, hold on.
• 1:14:19
  He goes back, sits down, and she's like, does she?
• 1:14:22
  And then she stands up again. And then George Bourgeois is
• 1:14:24
  like, well, yeah, she's dead, you know?
• 1:14:27
  And it goes back and forth, back and forth like that till
• 1:14:29
  finally, like, Hecklina just goes like, fuck off, Mamacita.
• 1:14:33
  And like, that's how the show ends.
• 1:14:35
  She never gets to say it. So I was walking around London
• 1:14:41
  that week in a daze and all I could hear was Hecklina saying,
• 1:14:46
  does she? Because I would say, well, I
• 1:14:48
  suppose she had the last laugh. Like I was a lunatic.
• 1:14:52
  If ever there's a movie made about this part of my life that
• 1:14:55
  was in my head over and over and over again.
• 1:14:59
  So I mean, not to bring everyone in this really dark place, but I
• 1:15:02
  actually think it's funny, like and and it's.
• 1:15:07
  Amazing. Yeah, it's, it's surreal, right?
• 1:15:09
  And remember, I'm in Soho where we were staying and there were
• 1:15:14
  huge posters of us, like, like, like, so I would walk around the
• 1:15:18
  corner and there'd be like a giant poster of me and Haklina
• 1:15:22
  and those mommy dear, you know, it was very surreal.
• 1:15:24
  It's like the movie was like coming to life all around me.
• 1:15:26
  You know, that is so my alcoholic, drug addict friend,
• 1:15:30
  you know, acting crazy. Like it was very surreal.
• 1:15:33
  It was very bizarre. She had the last laugh.
• 1:15:36
  Exactly. Exactly.
• 1:15:38
  Yeah. And she left me there to deal
• 1:15:41
  with all that shit. But yeah, it's such a surreal
• 1:15:44
  connection to this movie, isn't it?
• 1:15:46
  Like how it's how it's affected you?
• 1:15:48
  Like, as you said, from like, before you kind of made this
• 1:15:52
  your career and it was kind of taught to you and you learn to
• 1:15:56
  love it. And then it's built to become
• 1:15:58
  part of your career. And then it took you to all of
• 1:16:00
  these. And then.
• 1:16:01
  Yeah. And then it's got this like,
• 1:16:03
  fucking otherworldly connection. Yeah.
• 1:16:06
  You know, Faye Dunaway said she was, she was haunted by Joan
• 1:16:09
  Crawford. I feel like it's actually you.
• 1:16:12
  Yes, exactly. Mounted by all of them.
• 1:16:15
  You know, I, I, I think what's funny is in that documentary,
• 1:16:18
  Faye, they have a picture of me and Heklina in the film when
• 1:16:21
  she's talking about all the mommy dearest response and the,
• 1:16:25
  you know, all this, they cut away to me and Heklina in the,
• 1:16:29
  the birthday costumes. So I was really flattered that.
• 1:16:33
  And I guess I must have maybe I signed something saying like, I
• 1:16:36
  don't remember. Yeah.
• 1:16:40
  But I of course, I was so excited when people told me that
• 1:16:42
  we had made it into the movie. Yeah.
• 1:16:45
  So it, it has been an incredibly strange and wonderful journey.
• 1:16:50
  And at one point, Jinx, she saw mommy queerest and she was
• 1:16:54
  obsessed with it. And she was like, I want I want
• 1:16:57
  to be an aversion of this. And I was kind of like, you
• 1:17:00
  know, this show is written for Hecklida and me and we've done
• 1:17:03
  it for all these years. I couldn't imagine doing another
• 1:17:06
  version of mommy dearest. I feel like I've done mine.
• 1:17:08
  But you should you know, we we talked about maybe her doing
• 1:17:11
  another version, maybe she and Dayla or something.
• 1:17:14
  So when, when I got back to San Francisco and it was probably,
• 1:17:17
  you know, last year at some point, you know, when time had
• 1:17:20
  passed, it was really nice to to have the LGBT Historical Society
• 1:17:25
  here, who has the Peaches Christ Archive and the Heckling Archive
• 1:17:28
  where they store a lot of our stuff for historical purposes,
• 1:17:32
  which is so surreal to say. But I donated all of our
• 1:17:35
  costumes. So like our birthday girl
• 1:17:38
  dresses. All of our different looks from
• 1:17:41
  the show now can be seen at the GLBT Historical Archive in San
• 1:17:46
  Francisco. Yeah, it's nice.
• 1:17:48
  I loved it. And they were so excited to to
• 1:17:51
  have it. And those dresses, those
• 1:17:52
  birthday girl dresses we had and we wore for over 20 years.
• 1:17:57
  And what I was showing the historians was the back panels
• 1:18:00
  that had been added over the years.
• 1:18:05
  You know, I was like, here's the first set of panels that were
• 1:18:07
  inserted. Here's It was like both she and
• 1:18:10
  I must have been growing the same amount at the same time,
• 1:18:13
  you know? But that's what I find so fun
• 1:18:16
  sort of interesting about like the relationship between like
• 1:18:19
  when films become a cult film because ones that are like lucky
• 1:18:22
  enough to be that enduring and last that long, it they become
• 1:18:26
  bigger than the film. And it's like, you know, there's
• 1:18:29
  a reason why all of this stuff that you've had from the show is
• 1:18:32
  being archived and is being put into like museums and stuff.
• 1:18:36
  It's because you have been part of that legacy of making the
• 1:18:38
  film last longer. Do you know what I mean?
• 1:18:40
  It's like passing it on to new audiences and it's, I just find
• 1:18:43
  that so fascinating that it's like it's now you're part of
• 1:18:47
  that history as well because you've been one of the factors
• 1:18:50
  of sort of exposing it to bigger audiences and taking it on.
• 1:18:53
  It's pretty fucking amazing. I mean, it's, it's surreal to me
• 1:18:56
  because it just feels like we were, you know, we were just
• 1:19:01
  kind of carrying a torch. The one that I would actually
• 1:19:04
  take the most credit for would probably be showgirls, because
• 1:19:07
  we were screaming it when nobody else was and nobody wanted to do
• 1:19:10
  it. But when I, when I started doing
• 1:19:12
  Mommy Dearest, I was not the first drag queen to do it.
• 1:19:15
  And I love that I'm part of this lineage of queer people who
• 1:19:20
  celebrated this thing. Well, that's a really tick to
• 1:19:22
  box for me. Ongoing Legacy, which is on our
• 1:19:25
  fucking checklist. I mean proven.
• 1:19:27
  Yeah, I think I knew and you were the right person to do this
• 1:19:31
  episode, but I had I hadn't realized the extent to which
• 1:19:35
  that was true. It's like, it's really cool to
• 1:19:37
  hear your stories about it. Thank you for.
• 1:19:40
  Thank you for the like the personal ones too.
• 1:19:41
  It's just amazing. Yeah, to be honest, I was a bit
• 1:19:43
  eye rolling about doing this one on the podcast just because it
• 1:19:46
  is what it says it is like. Well, we've never done it on my
• 1:19:49
  podcast. OK.
• 1:19:51
  Yeah, it's tough, right? Like on one way It is the mother
• 1:19:54
  of all Cap movies. I mean, truly.
• 1:19:57
  So part of me is intimidated because there's so much to say.
• 1:20:01
  There's so much to say. And then another part of me is
• 1:20:04
  kind of like, what more needs to be said?
• 1:20:06
  Do you know what I mean? Like, and, and I do feel equally
• 1:20:10
  tugged. So actually coming on your show
• 1:20:12
  has been lovely because, you know, I get to get satiated for
• 1:20:16
  a little while. Yeah.
• 1:20:18
  There is so much to say. I mean, we could talk about it
• 1:20:20
  for another 3 hours, you know? Oh God, totally.
• 1:20:23
  I think. I think we will need to do
• 1:20:24
  another part. I think we will need to break
• 1:20:26
  down this a bit more. I think this has been like a
• 1:20:28
  great intro and sort of as, as Crystal said, sort of your
• 1:20:33
  experience of it is so deep and it's so like nuanced.
• 1:20:36
  It's really interesting to explore that.
• 1:20:37
  But yeah, like we need to talk about Bloody Caroline's
• 1:20:40
  prosthetics at the end with I. Know, I know.
• 1:20:44
  I'm just about to say that I'm like.
• 1:20:45
  Have the important issues. I've got lists.
• 1:20:49
  I know. Shy of.
• 1:20:50
  Abuse. Who cares?
• 1:20:51
  I want to talk about prosthetics and how she can't move her face.
• 1:20:57
  I was about to ask you all like what you what your campus moment
• 1:21:01
  was, but I was going to use it as a vehicle to talk about
• 1:21:04
  Caroline's prosthetics. So should we talk about
• 1:21:07
  Caroline's prosthetics just really quickly?
• 1:21:09
  Yeah. Did you, I mean, you know that
• 1:21:12
  Faye got the actress who played her to cut.
• 1:21:15
  She made her keep going back to the makeup trailer to make her
• 1:21:18
  uglier because they did not want someone pretty on screen with
• 1:21:22
  her, which I love that already. But then the fact that Carol Ann
• 1:21:26
  just gets older and older and older throughout the movie and
• 1:21:30
  Faye Dunaway, nothing changes. She's in that coffin looking the
• 1:21:36
  the exact same as she did with the movie star.
• 1:21:40
  It's so amazing. Listen, Kris Jenner.
• 1:21:44
  Yeah. Yeah, Madonna, Demi Moore, all
• 1:21:48
  of these women, all of these women are going to be exactly
• 1:21:51
  the same when they're 30-40 years old and the help are gonna
• 1:21:57
  be old. Yeah.
• 1:21:59
  Touché touché. I mean there helps not doing an
• 1:22:01
  ice bath in their face every morning.
• 1:22:05
  That's that's the thing I loved about that book.
• 1:22:07
  I'll go into it very quickly, but it really talks.
• 1:22:10
  And, you know, bless her and I appreciate her getting her coins
• 1:22:12
  and spreading her story. But it really reeks of someone
• 1:22:15
  that just hasn't had much of A acting career.
• 1:22:18
  Because it's just like, you know, the director said that the
• 1:22:21
  the work I did on that scene was really sensational, but you
• 1:22:24
  know, they had to cut it because Faye saw it.
• 1:22:26
  And it's like, baby, the film is already really long.
• 1:22:29
  Like, and there's also this other section where she talks
• 1:22:32
  about how evil Faye Dunaway took ages to be filmed in her coffin
• 1:22:37
  because it just took so long to get the lighting right.
• 1:22:40
  And it just went they went over schedule and it was only
• 1:22:43
  featured for a couple of seconds, which meant, but her
• 1:22:47
  scene, the reaction scene was cut and never got to be shot.
• 1:22:51
  It's like I like that was going to change the bloody outcome.
• 1:22:53
  How could you convey emotion wearing that much bloody
• 1:22:56
  prosthetic? But again, I love that that like
• 1:23:00
  the kind of levels of pettiness under running through this
• 1:23:04
  entire production. The costume designer apparently
• 1:23:07
  hated Faye Dunaway and like said like oh sure you can come into
• 1:23:11
  her dressing room, just Chuck a rib eye, state to this, distract
• 1:23:15
  her, all of that. The underbelly of this film is
• 1:23:18
  toxic and I'm here for it. I mean how can a movie be so
• 1:23:23
  meta that it's based on a like traumatic tell all and then the
• 1:23:26
  filming of it inspires another traumatic tell all?
• 1:23:29
  It's just. And, and I was actually invited
• 1:23:32
  last year to do have you heard of there's a new book about the
• 1:23:37
  making of Mommy dearest that came out last year.
• 1:23:43
  It's called with love, Mommy dearest, the making of an
• 1:23:46
  unintentional camp classic. OK, it's actually really good.
• 1:23:50
  It's a little more. It's good because it's an
• 1:23:52
  outside. It's this queen who did a bunch
• 1:23:54
  of research and then wrote a book based on a lot of testimony
• 1:23:58
  from a lot of different people. I think you would enjoy it
• 1:24:01
  because I think it gives you that sort of like, well, this
• 1:24:04
  person said this and this person said this, and you're kind of
• 1:24:07
  left to sort of figure out like, you know, what might be true.
• 1:24:10
  Which is, which is what the feud was based on, wasn't it?
• 1:24:13
  It was based on the Divine Feud book.
• 1:24:14
  And again, that's the sensational book because you're
• 1:24:17
  getting so many different accounts of both of them.
• 1:24:19
  Joan and Betty. Oh, I'd have to check that out.
• 1:24:22
  Yeah, I think it's to. Watch Spades documentary as
• 1:24:24
  well. Yes, this is your homework.
• 1:24:27
  Has Britannia Alda done a documentary?
• 1:24:30
  I don't think so. You bitch.
• 1:24:34
  Listen, if she ever came to London, I would be the first
• 1:24:37
  person to want to do a screening with her.
• 1:24:39
  I'd like I stand her. Not after she hears this
• 1:24:42
  episode. I know, really.
• 1:24:45
  We better we better rate this movie so Merrill's.
• 1:24:49
  Bon appetit. Quality of the movie?
• 1:24:52
  How many Merrills are we giving it out of 10?
• 1:24:56
  I would say 7 or 8 me. It's pretty gorgeous, isn't it?
• 1:25:01
  Gorgeous. Yeah, it's strongly Yeah.
• 1:25:06
  I think the plot's a fucking mess.
• 1:25:08
  It's a knife. Yeah, through.
• 1:25:12
  I think I'm gonna I'm gonna give it a 5 Merrill's.
• 1:25:17
  OK, I'm gonna give it 7. Ground breaking and then Liza's.
• 1:25:25
  I wonder what it's going to get. It has to be a 10, it has to be
• 1:25:31
  a 10. And I'll fight anyone that that
• 1:25:33
  says it's not a 10, right? Are we fighting so?
• 1:25:35
  What's the Liza qualification? Oh, sorry.
• 1:25:38
  Liza's is the camp factor of the movie.
• 1:25:41
  How camp is the movie? Yeah, yeah.
• 1:25:43
  I mean, it's the, it's the mother.
• 1:25:45
  Yeah, it's, it is the, it's, it's like you want to understand
• 1:25:49
  camp? Watch this.
• 1:25:50
  Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:25:55
  I've got nothing else to add. You're correct, but that does
• 1:26:01
  not mean I support child abuse. No, but it does mean that child
• 1:26:06
  abuse is camp. So there we go, Jesus.
• 1:26:08
  Christ. He says, thank you so much for
• 1:26:11
  being here. Thank you.
• 1:26:12
  Thank you. Thank you for having me.
• 1:26:14
  It's been really, really great. Can't wait to have you back
• 1:26:17
  soon. Really appreciate you.
• 1:26:18
  All right. Thank you.
• 1:26:20
  Bye all. Bye.
• 1:26:21
  Thank you. And we'll be back in two more
• 1:26:24
  weeks with another Camp classic away from her.
• 1:26:27
  You bitch. Classic.
• 1:26:31
  He was in the Amazon with my mom when she was researching spiders
• 1:26:35
  right before she died. No.
• 1:26:39
  I thought you can't prostitute go and go again I.
• 1:26:45
  Used to love doggy chow. I used to.
• 1:26:48
  Love doggy chow too?