Latest / Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond / Why Would I Do That to Jennifer Lopez? | Revisionist History

Transcript

Why Would I Do That to Jennifer Lopez? | Revisionist History · Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond

• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Pushkin.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: In two thousand and one, Tommy Mottola, then the head
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: of Sony Music Entertainment, called murder inks IRV Gotti, who
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: at the time was working with the likes of jay Z,
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: y Ashanti and DMX. Tommy asked Gotti to do a
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: remix of Jennifer Lopez's I'm Real, which became a huge
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: radio hit and led to more remixes with j Lo.
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: In the world of hip hop and crossover pop in
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: the early yachts, IRV Gotti was at the top of
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: his game, and then admittedly he messed up big time.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: In the latest season of revision of History, Malcolm Gladwell
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: is looking at the origins and consequences of mistakes while
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: we make them, the context in which we make them,
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: and what happens after we make them. Here's the story
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: of Gotti's mistake and what it tells us, not about
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: the individual who makes a mistake, but the witnesses who
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: watch it happen, enjoyed the episode, and find more of
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: Revisionist History wherever you get podcasts.
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: This guy calls me like seven in the morning, like
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: Tommy was South.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: In two thousand and one, the head of Sony Music
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: Tommy Mottola called the rap producer IRV Gotti at the
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: time God. He worked with jay Z, Ja Rule, Ashanti
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: DMX in the hip hop world of the early arts.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: He was at the top of his game.
• 1:32
  Speaker 3: He's like, yo, I need you to make a record,
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: And I said what he said, make a record with
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: j Lo and put jaw on it and make it
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: a duet. And I say, yo, I need total creative
• 1:45
  Speaker 3: at TIMMS, I'm doing whatever the fuck I want. Tommy
• 1:48
  Speaker 3: was like, you could do whatever the fuck you want
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: as long as it's a duet with Jo Roul and
• 1:53
  Speaker 3: j Loo.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: Mattola wanted Gotti to do a remix if I'm Real,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: a single off Jlo's second album. The first time around
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: it had been a generic ballad. Matola thought it could
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: be reinvigorated God. He went to work and started to
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: make a demo with Ja Rule and Ashanti.
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: I said, yo, I got the records. I'm Real. Him
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: and his wife Talia come to the crack house, my
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: studio and solo and it's funny because the freight elevator
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: used to always go out, so him and Talia walked
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: up six flights of stairs. He gets upstairs he said,
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: this fucking record better be fucking good. So I played
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: I play real form. Him and his wife go crazy.
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: They're like, oh my god, it was a one listen.
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: They listened and it was like, it's the biggest record.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: So he puts me on a private jet. I fly
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: to La record the record with j Lo. Next thing
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: you know, the record comes out. It's all over the radio.
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: I'm talking about maybe a couple of days after we
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: recorded it, it's all over the radio.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: A few months later, God, he made another remix from
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: Jalo's album Ain't It Funny? The same thing happened.
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: You don't even understand. Those records was colossal, not just
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: in the States, on the planet Earth. I don't give
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: a fuck. If you went to Germany, Australia, Africa, that
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: shit was in heavy rotation. Look, those are the two
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: biggest records, and for me to do, i'mral and instead
• 3:32
  Speaker 3: fuck it and Ain't It Funny? It was like at
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: that point in my life, I was like on top
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: of the world. It was a feeling of invincibility. It
• 3:43
  Speaker 3: was a feeling of I could do whatever the fuck
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: I want to portray who I was at that moment.
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: That's that's who I was. I'm from the hood. I'm
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: making all of this money. I'm producing records for everybody.
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: All of them are working and going number one, and
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: money's raining from the sky. I could do no wrong.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: It was at this point that IRV God he made
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: a mistake. My name is Malcolm Gladwell. You're listening to
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: Revisionist History, my podcast about things overlooked and misunderstood. This
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: is the third episode in our mini series inspired by
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: Michael Linton and Josh Steiner's book From Mistakes to Meaning Will.
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: The authors sit down with a wide range of people
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: and try to make sense of their biggest screw ups.
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: One of their interviews was with her of Gotty just
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: before God, he had a stroke and died at the
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: age of fifty four. I listened to the interview and
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: I found his story so moving that I asked Steiner
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: and Linton if I could include it in this series,
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: because in his story, I think is a really important
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: lesson not about the person who makes the mistake, but
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: about the people around the person who makes the mistake.
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: The witnesses.
• 5:04
  Speaker 4: Man I grew up, Oh man, I grew up. Let
• 5:08
  Speaker 4: me describe how I'm the youngest of eight kids.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: This is Gotty talking to Litten and Steiner about his
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: childhood and growing up in Queen's We have no money.
• 5:20
  Speaker 3: We live in the home. I sleep in the attic.
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: They ever slept in the attic of a house in
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: the summertime.
• 5:28
  Speaker 5: There's no refuge. It's a hundred change. Yes, you wake
• 5:31
  Speaker 5: up every every day, you wake up in a puddle
• 5:34
  Speaker 5: of sweat like I had. That was my life. That's
• 5:39
  Speaker 5: it was a lot of love. My family, the most
• 5:41
  Speaker 5: loving family. But we had nothing. So when you talk
• 5:45
  Speaker 5: about the ship, you told me, I'm not I don't
• 5:51
  Speaker 5: give a fuck. Yo, I'm getting money. Oh, I'm gonna
• 5:55
  Speaker 5: I'm gonna get it. I'm gonna work my ass off
• 5:58
  Speaker 5: and get it. I don't give a fuck what comes
• 6:01
  Speaker 5: from it.
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: He was blunt, reckless, ambitious, and hugely talented. His rise
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: in the music world was swim. It was no accident
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: than Buttola called Gotti to work with Jennifer Lopez, then
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: well on her way to becoming one of the biggest
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: celebrities in America, and when the two of them met
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: at Gotti's recording studio, Gotti from Queen's Jailah from the
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: Bronx to click, just so you know what to expect.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: Were giving you the unfiltered gottie.
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: So I had like thirty hood niggas in the studio
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: and in walks Jlo, and she was straight Jenny from
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: the block. She had on some sweat pants and the
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: tank top. And if I tell you, she got in
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: that studio and she had every one of my guys
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: fall in love with her. She worked and talked to everybody,
• 6:57
  Speaker 3: and I was just like, Yo, she's just so dope,
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: you know what I'm saying, because she could have been
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: on some I'm a big star boogie shit, but she
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: was a total opposite, the biggest sex symbol, biggest superstar,
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: got on some sweatpants, her as was looking fucking phenomenal.
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: She worked, She literally worked the whole home. Like when
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: she left, every guy was like, Yo, she's dope.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: I think she liked me.
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: I'm like, yo, dog, she's she worked us, Yeo. She
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: she worked for fuck the rule. But I thought it
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: was so dope of us and me and her specifically, Yo,
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: we hit it off. Benny Medina, her manager, Benny Medina,
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: was like HERV, you're gonna be like the Quincy Jones
• 7:49
  Speaker 3: to her Michael Jackson, she was like, We're not doing
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: nothing musically unless you're involved.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: A year later, Ellen Magazine decided to do a cover
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: story on Jennifer Lopez. It was for their Sex and
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: Body issue June two thousand and two, headline Big Letters.
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: J Loo on fashion, that song and Puffy. Puffy referred
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: to Puffy Combs, the infamous rap impresario who she'd just
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: broken up with, and that song referred to Ain't it funny?
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: Because Gotti's reinterpretation of the song turned it into the
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: story of someone coming out of a very problematic relationship.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: The writer asks her, is that song about Puffy? She says, no,
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: it's not. Then the reporter calls gotty. Jlo says, ain't
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: it funny? Isn't about Puffy? What do you say? And
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Gody says, Oh, it's absolutely about Puffy, and Jlo knows it.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: Here's the exact quote from the l magazine article, which,
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: by the way, is nearly impossible to find now. My
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: producer had to get someone at the New York Public
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: Library to unearth the issue from an off site storage unit.
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: I ain't gonna lie. We was thinking of effing with
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: Puffy because that's what the world wants to hear. And God,
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: he tells the reporter a story about running into Puffy before.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: Ain't it funny came out and playing him the demo?
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: He says, you know the four Seasons on Dohaney in La.
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: I pull up and Puffs out there with his security
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: and I say, Puff, come listen to the new record
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: I did with your old bitch. So boom, he gets
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: in the car. So I'm blasting the record and when
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: it gets to the second verse, he jumps out of
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: the car, screaming, gotty, you bastard, this is the second verse. Listen,
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: you never had.
• 9:41
  Speaker 4: This, well, you should have never played the game.
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: To play now and that you can lay.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: He calls Jelo's ex boyfriend into his car and says,
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: come listen to the new record I just did with
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: your old bitch in a very public way. God, he
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: was essentially saying Jennifer Lopez wasn't being honest. He called
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: her credibility and question.
• 10:10
  Speaker 3: When I read it in that magazine, j Lo quote,
• 10:17
  Speaker 3: those records are not about Puff, daddy end quote. It was.
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: It's the worst mistake I've ever made in my life,
• 10:27
  Speaker 3: because I say that to say, because j Lo Benny Medina,
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: they was friends. They loved me, They love me like
• 10:36
  Speaker 3: I was a writer for them and I would do
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: things for them that probably no one else could do,
• 10:42
  Speaker 3: and I would get done for them, and she was
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: my friend. Like why the fuck would I say that?
• 10:53
  Speaker 3: Why the fuck would I say that?
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: But God, he didn't stop there. He kept going right.
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: So I went on to say other damaging things, like
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: how would she know? She didn't write the records. We
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: made records and wrote the records. She just did what
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: we said, so she don't know who the fuck we
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: was talking about. And yeah, we was talking about Diddy.
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: And then I said some more damage and shit, I
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: was like, guys like me, we didn't listen to Jake,
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: We don't listen to Jalo's music. I made guys like
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: me listening to j Loo's music. I said, before then
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: we just hit the mute button and looked at her ass. Yeah. God.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: He reflected on this with Michael Linton and Josh Steiner
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: when they spoke Wow.
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: And you could pull all this up in the l
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: magazine is there. Those are vivid quotes. Those are like
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: supreme asshole quotes that wasn't warranted. And when I look back,
• 11:58
  Speaker 3: I was like, what did you do to your friend? Yeah? So,
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: needless to say, needless to say, ruined my relationship with
• 12:10
  Speaker 3: j Lo. I apologized, I sent to Candy and flowers
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: and apologized a million times, and I was high, that's
• 12:21
  Speaker 3: no excuse, you know what I'm saying. I apologize by
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: us and she accepted my apology, but it forever damaged
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: your relationship, right. You know, superstars like j Loo, they
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: have a small circle of people who they could trust.
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: And I think I was in there for a second
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: and I totally ruined it. Right, So I'm an asshole.
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: Well you were in that moment. I'm totally in the
• 12:52
  Speaker 3: wrong and I'm a complete idiot. Make sure you say
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: that that I said that I'm a complete idiot. She
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: didn't warrant that, she didn't warrant nothing that I said.
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: She was my friend, And why would I do that
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: with the biggest thought and most beautifulst person. Why how
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: do I do that with Jala.
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: One of the themes we've tried to explore in this series
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: is that mistakes have roots. They aren't random events. They
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: come from somewhere, They arise out of a context, but
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: the context often isn't obvious, not to those around the
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: mistake maker, and often not even to the mistake maker themselves.
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: In Gody's case, the context was a telephone call had
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: been on just before the reporter called. It was with
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: a prominent music industry executive. God. He asked that the
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: man's name not be used, so we're gonna bleep out
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: every mention of his name. All you need to know
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: is that the executive is white, and God he was black.
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: The two of them had an argument. One of Gody's
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: artists had played a part in a hit song and
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: was in the music video, but had been left out
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: of the radio version, and God he was unhappy about it.
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: So I was like, Yo, you're killing my artists. You
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: got him on the video, but on radio he's not there.
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: It's and then like mixed signals, Why are you hurting me?
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Their argument got heated. The executive said it wasn't his fault,
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: the decision was someone else's at his label, a black man.
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: He was like, I told that fat nigga not to
• 14:42
  Speaker 3: not to put this out. But when he said the
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: N word, Oh, that's when I went crazy.
• 14:49
  Speaker 6: Wow.
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: I said, what the fuck you say? I said, you
• 14:52
  Speaker 3: just call Cory Roone and nigga. I said, when this,
• 14:57
  Speaker 3: when this nigga see you, I'm gonna fuck you up.
• 15:00
  Speaker 3: I said, how about that? And he was like, and
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: we argue him, but he said he used the N
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: word on some racist shit. He said, I told us
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: fat nigga not to put the record out or put
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: him on it. Yeah, but when he said nigga, I went,
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: that's that's that's the anger. Yep. I'm not a volatile person.
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: I'm not a pop off. I would describe myself as
• 15:29
  Speaker 3: a cool guy, level headed. But it's something about when
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: a white person like uses the word nigga to me.
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: Mm hm oh, I'm ready to kill because it's like
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: you start thinking of all of the fucked up shit
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: that black people have been through when you got the
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: audacity to say nigga in front of me. Oh, I'm
• 15:54
  Speaker 3: gonna show you a nigga, now you know what I'm saying.
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: Like I used to always say, like when people would
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: ask me how how would you be able? How did
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: how would you think you would be able to operate
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: in those times of racism? And I always answer, I
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: would die. You know what? I'm saying because I couldn't
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: take the racism that would have been bestowed upon me.
• 16:21
  Speaker 3: I would have killed me a couple of white people
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: and they would have hung me and killed me, and
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: my life would be over. I couldn't take them doing
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: something to my mother or you know, hanging my father,
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: and I'm living life. Nah, you're gonna have to kill
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: me too. So these are the thoughts that's in my mind. Yeah,
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: have you experienced that before where you had white people
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: say things with you. A lot of my white friends
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: to say, Yo, that's my nigga. But I'm not mad
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: at that.
• 16:51
  Speaker 4: Yeah, use it when they say that's my nigga, it's
• 16:55
  Speaker 4: in IgG a.
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: He said, Yo, I told that fat nigga, that's n
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: I G G e R. It's a big, big difference.
• 17:05
  Speaker 3: Like I couldn't I couldn't believe that he just used
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: the N word to me. That's what made me so volatile.
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: And it was so weird. It was like as soon
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: as I hung up with the phone rang with L
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: it wasn't like a five minute it wasn't even like
• 17:23
  Speaker 3: a five minute cool off period. No hung up, man, Yo,
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: this is old magazine. Yeah, what the fuck? Y'all want.
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: I didn't like saying hello a little different?
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: Can I ask, So, what do you think it was
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: that made you You think you were just gonna lash
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: out at anybody who showed up in that moment?
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: Uh yeah, within that five minutes, Yeah, it was going
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: to get the exact thing vibe what the fuck you want? Yeah,
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: it just what happened. It was the old magazine, not
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: one of my boys. Yeah, so I said what the
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: fuck you want? And he was like, oh, oh, I see.
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: Like as soon as he heard that response, he immediately
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: cut to the chase. He said, oh, oh, I'll just
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: get right to it.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: Uh.
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: You know, Jlo said that the records, I'm really made
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: it funny and not about puff daddy ex boyfriend, and
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: I was like, what that bitch is lying?
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: This was Serve Gotty's mistake. It changed his life. There
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: was a version of the next twenty years where he
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: could have been a creative partner with one of the
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: biggest stars in the world. He had ideas from movies, collaborations.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Jaelo was at once in a lifetime opportunity. That's why
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: this was a mistake. It had consequences, but there was
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: a point in Gotty's interview with Steiner and Linton that
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: I couldn't get out of my mind.
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: Listen, how quickly did you realize that you'd made a mistake.
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: I didn't realize quickly. I was so angry and mad
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: when I got off the phone with that magazine. I
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: thought nothing of it. It hit me when they sent
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: me like the transcripts of what they was gonna plant.
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: How long after that was that? A couple a week
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: or so? I would say, A right, And when you
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: did you realize it right away? Yeah? I was like,
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: don't print that. They was like it's too but they
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: was like it's too late. Yeah. They loved it. They
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: loved it, and they said it was too late, and
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: I was trying to get them not to print it,
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: but they wasn't. They like, hey, buddy, you said it.
• 19:57
  Speaker 7: Yeah, did you get me try to did you get
• 19:59
  Speaker 7: me help to try to get them not to do it,
• 20:01
  Speaker 7: or did you just.
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: Let it go? Let it go? I gave it my effort,
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: but after my effort, I just let it.
• 20:09
  Speaker 8: Oh.
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: He realized he'd made a mistake that, in his anger
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: at one person, he had said something he didn't mean
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: to another, and when he tried to prevent his mistake
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: from having consequences, from turning into a serious mistake. He
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: was told, hey, buddy, you said it, it's too late.
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: After Linton and Steiner's book came out, I interviewed them
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: on stage at the ninety second Street Why in New York,
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: and I brought up their chapter on gaudy. So who's
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: the villain of the story.
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: Not every story has to have a villain.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: No, but tell me who the villain of the stories?
• 20:45
  Speaker 7: So don't Michael, don't fall for this like this is okay,
• 20:48
  Speaker 7: this look at this is why he's so good.
• 20:50
  Speaker 6: But don't fall for his trap.
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: Like okay, you can say not everyone.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: I got to keep the conversation going. I would argue
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: it was the executive who used the N word, Josh,
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: here's a villain of the story.
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: Here's what I think that guy acted terribly. There is
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: no villain in the story.
• 21:03
  Speaker 7: And I think an important piece of what we tried
• 21:07
  Speaker 7: to describe is that there isn't always a villain, There
• 21:11
  Speaker 7: isn't always some outside danger, there isn't always some consequence
• 21:15
  Speaker 7: that has been derived from a villain. That these things
• 21:19
  Speaker 7: are deep rooted in ourselves and we're not villainous, and
• 21:23
  Speaker 7: so that aspect of our personality doesn't make us bad.
• 21:25
  Speaker 7: This isn't a morality test. This is an opportunity to
• 21:29
  Speaker 7: explore oneself and come to terms and acceptance of the
• 21:33
  Speaker 7: fact that we're flawed, and the way to get hopefully
• 21:36
  Speaker 7: healthier and better is to talk about it.
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: Who do you think the villain?
• 21:38
  Speaker 8: Is?
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: A man who has a very close relationship to the
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: biggest rock star in the world, a relationship that has
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: resulted in extraordinary commercial success. Is called by a reporter
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: and has asked a question about that relationship, and in
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: the course of answering that question, the man says, Oh,
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: she's a liar. Who's the villain in the story? Do
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: you think it's erv Now it's the reporter, But the
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: reporter doesn't No, no, no no. This is a crucial, crucial point, Michael.
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: Think this is because it's about when mistakes are made
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: and they are as deeply rooted as you suggest they are,
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: they're not what's you're The whole argument of the book
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: is a mistake can come out in the spur of
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: the moment, but it's not something that's coming out of
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: the spur of the moment. It's something that has roots.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: And what does that require of those who are observe
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: and are part of the process in which the mistake
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: is played out. It requires some degree of grace and
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: forgiveness and understanding. So the reporter, here's some IRV God,
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: IRV God. He say something that is completely out of place. Right,
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: it makes the reason the reason that story. So that
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: story what you didn't what is important? Detail is here
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: is it goes. It's all across the country. It's like
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: it's huge. That's why it blows up so much. Everyone
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: seizes on this. Her longtime collaborator called j Lo a liar. Right,
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: if you are the reporter in that instance, and someone
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: says something they shouldn't say, your obligation is to say,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: why did you say that? And if they can't give
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: you a satisfactory answer, your obligation is not to use it.
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, it's not to use it. You're not You shouldn't.
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: You can't make someone The reporter turned that from a
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: nothing into a destruction of someone's career because they had
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: not the slightest concern for his well being or his reputation,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: and they if they had an ounce of self understanding
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: or of general understanding. They would have understood that he
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: didn't mean to say that. They should at the very
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: least have said, did you mean to say that? Right,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: that's your responsibility, and the reporter fail in that fundamental
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: Why do people hate the press Because because in an
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: interview like this, where we could talk for three hours
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: and you say one thing out of place because you
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: have to be irritated about something else, and the reporter
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: runs with that one thing that's about practice. Why is
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: this person getting a pass that's terror? Sorry, I'm really
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: upset about this. I was upset about this because you
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: can't do this if you're a journalist. The whole profession
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: works on an implied contract. Somebody grants you the gift
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: of their time and attention and thoughts. They make themselves vulnerable,
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: and in return you pledged to respect that vulnerability. You're
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: not a stenographer. You've entered, for the duration of the
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: interview into an intimate relationship, and intimate relationships have rules.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: But then I went home after that interview at the y,
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: after I had called the reporter a villain and a
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: disgrace to our profession, and I realized I don't even
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: know who this person is, and then I thought to myself, Oops,
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: now I've made a mistake. So I decided to track
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: the reporter down. That's after the break. What do you
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: remember about that interview?
• 25:18
  Speaker 8: It's funny you're asking this something that no one's ever
• 25:22
  Speaker 8: asked me, because I remember that interview quite well.
• 25:25
  Speaker 6: For a few reasons.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: This is Carter Harris, he wrote yel profile. He's now
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: a screenwriter teaches at NYU, and one of the reasons
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: this article he wrote twenty five years ago, sticks out
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: is the reaction a God, particularly from Jlo and her
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: manager Benny Medina.
• 25:43
  Speaker 8: I actually remember being in a car with Benny Medina
• 25:45
  Speaker 8: in Los Angeles, and I can't remember why we were
• 25:48
  Speaker 8: in a car, but he was telling me how disappointed
• 25:54
  Speaker 8: Jlo was, and he was because it seemed like a
• 25:57
  Speaker 8: negative interview.
• 25:57
  Speaker 6: I wasn't negative at all from my perspective.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: At some point, his profile of Jlo completely disappeared from
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: the internet, and he always wondered if Jlo and her
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: manager had something to do with it. Was God upset
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: during the call, Yes, he was. Harris remembers he seemed
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: like he was in a state. He mentioned something about
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: having just gotten off the phone with someone he thought
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: Harris was a fashion writer, and God, he seemed relieved
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: to learn that Harris had been an editor at The Source,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: the magazine that was the bible of rap at the time.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: They talked about Puffy Combs and I'm real, I ate
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: it funny. And then God, he said that bit about
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: Jlo not telling the truth when you heard it when
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: you were reviewing him and decided to use what you
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: were using, did you did you think that you might
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: be jeopardizing his relationship with Jaeloh?
• 26:50
  Speaker 8: No, And maybe that was naive of me, But what
• 26:54
  Speaker 8: I thought was in the moment was Wow, that was honest.
• 27:00
  Speaker 6: She might be a little bit.
• 27:03
  Speaker 8: Irked vexed by one or two of the quotes, but
• 27:11
  Speaker 8: I never imagined that it would.
• 27:14
  Speaker 6: Be such a big deal for her or for him.
• 27:17
  Speaker 6: I mean, I thought she'd be vexed.
• 27:20
  Speaker 8: I mean, when you say, you know, I gave her
• 27:23
  Speaker 8: more hood credibility, that's gonna be like, come on, dude.
• 27:27
  Speaker 8: Or when you say it was really about Diddy and
• 27:31
  Speaker 8: basically you're accusing her of not being honest, you know,
• 27:36
  Speaker 8: yeah that I totally understand why she was vexed. And
• 27:40
  Speaker 8: I even at the time, I was like, oh, she
• 27:41
  Speaker 8: might be a little ticked off about this, but I
• 27:45
  Speaker 8: figured they'd air it out, either publicly or privately, that
• 27:49
  Speaker 8: she'd be like, come on, he overstepped on this one.
• 27:51
  Speaker 8: And then maybe he comes back and says, yeah, all right,
• 27:54
  Speaker 8: I was on Molly what she was willing to say
• 27:55
  Speaker 8: back then?
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: Is it weird to hear someone say twenty five years
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: later the biggest mistake they made in their life was
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: something they said to you in an interview.
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: Oh.
• 28:07
  Speaker 6: Absolutely made me feel very strange.
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: When I heard that. I was. I was, I was.
• 28:17
  Speaker 8: I was very surprised and very I was a little
• 28:20
  Speaker 8: disturbed too, because that when I heard that then I
• 28:23
  Speaker 8: did have feelings.
• 28:24
  Speaker 6: Then I was like, oh shit, what did I do wrong?
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: You know?
• 28:27
  Speaker 6: It was like, what was I responsible for this? Somehow?
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: Did he run the quotes by Gody and tell him
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: that it was too late? You said it? No, that
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: would have been the fact checker. That's the way things
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: worked in the magazine world of those years.
• 28:41
  Speaker 8: If he had called me and said, I was in
• 28:43
  Speaker 8: a state, can you take those quotes out? Yeah, I
• 28:46
  Speaker 8: probably would have worked with him on that. But I
• 28:49
  Speaker 8: never got that call. Nobody ever asked me about those quotes, so,
• 28:52
  Speaker 8: you know, what can I what can I really do?
• 28:55
  Speaker 8: But yeah, I certainly felt weird about it.
• 28:58
  Speaker 3: I mean, you know, I.
• 29:02
  Speaker 8: Don't take any any joy in being, you know, a
• 29:06
  Speaker 8: part of anyone's biggest regret.
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: Carter was frank and thoughtful. I liked him. He was
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: talking about a decision he made many years ago when
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: he was much younger, and he said that he wouldn't
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: necessarily do the same thing today. I understand that you
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: have to make a certain number of mistakes to understand
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: what a mistake is.
• 29:31
  Speaker 8: It's really interesting because if I had been in the
• 29:35
  Speaker 8: gym and somebody had told me this story and I
• 29:39
  Speaker 8: was not the reporter and I was not Gotti, I
• 29:43
  Speaker 8: probably would have had the exact same response. I'm pretty
• 29:46
  Speaker 8: sure I would have been, like what they said, what
• 29:49
  Speaker 8: they messed with Gotti? Like and they screwed up a
• 29:52
  Speaker 8: relationship with Jalo and Gotti. You know, this is bullshit.
• 29:55
  Speaker 8: This is like the media. You know they do this,
• 29:57
  Speaker 8: especially l and these corporate magazines and you know all that.
• 30:01
  Speaker 8: So I'm not surprised to hear that that was your response.
• 30:05
  Speaker 8: That probably would have been my response. But to the
• 30:13
  Speaker 8: larger point. I think we all do this in our
• 30:19
  Speaker 8: own way, in lots of different contexts. We jump to conclusions,
• 30:24
  Speaker 8: mistaken conclusions, and I certainly do in my life. And
• 30:29
  Speaker 8: if I've learned anything it's that I have to check
• 30:33
  Speaker 8: myself sometimes and say, wait a minute, I'm human like
• 30:36
  Speaker 8: everybody else, I'm jumping to a conclusion. I should go
• 30:40
  Speaker 8: look and see if there's more to this story. Doesn't
• 30:43
  Speaker 8: necessarily mean my conclusion that I wanted to jump to
• 30:46
  Speaker 8: is wrong, could be right, could be worse than I
• 30:48
  Speaker 8: thought it was. But I do think that that's the
• 30:53
  Speaker 8: thing to take from this is like, hey, everybody, each
• 30:56
  Speaker 8: of us can check ourselves. You know, we all have
• 31:00
  Speaker 8: the ability to check ourselves and say, hey, maybe I
• 31:03
  Speaker 8: should look into this a little bit more.
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: We can all check ourselves a little bit more. On that,
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: I have to agree. Revisious History is produced by Nina
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: Bird Lawrence, Lucy Sullivan, and Ben Adatt Haffrey. Our editor
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: is Karen Schakerji. Fact checking by Angelie Mercado. Our executive
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: producer Jacob Smith. Engineering by Nina Bird Lawrence, original music
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: by Luis Quira, Sound design and mastering by Marcelo Diela.
• 31:36
  Speaker 3: Vera.
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: I'm Malcolm Gladwell, coming up on the next episode in
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: our Mistakes series.
• 31:49
  Speaker 6: This was madness and yeah and it was just jaw
• 31:54
  Speaker 6: on the floor. I just never experienced anything like that
• 31:58
  Speaker 6: and I didn't see it coming