Lena Dunham’s Memoir Famesick (with Sierra Teller Ornelas and Brian Bahe)

Summary

Glamorous Trash: A Celebrity Memoir Podcast

Episode: Lena Dunham’s Memoir "Famesick"

Host: Chelsea Devantez (with guest host Sierra Teller Ornelas)
Guests: Sierra Teller Ornelas, Brian Bahe
Date: April 28, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into Lena Dunham's second memoir, Famesick, with guest host (and frequent collaborator) Sierra Teller Ornelas and guest Brian Bahe. The hosts approach the memoir through a mix of recapping, personal connection to the industry, and critical, funny dialogue. The conversation explores Dunham’s tumultuous relationship with fame, a lifelong negotiation with illness, the making of Girls, friendship, romantic relationships (notably with Jack Antonoff), her medical struggles, addiction, and the overall “time capsule” of the early 2010s creative scene.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why Cover Lena Dunham’s "Famesick"?

[03:54] Sierra Teller Ornelas:
Describes what to expect:

“You can expect an early aughts time capsule, harrowing medical tragedies, artistic genius, and the best Bruce Springsteen cameo in history. This memoir, love bombed me.”

• Background: Lena Dunham: writer, director, star of HBO’s Girls, known for raw honesty and controversy.

2. Hosts’ Evolving Relationships to Lena Dunham

[06:47] Brian Bahe:

“I could not ride or die harder for her... at the exact opposite end of the spectrum of when she first came into my life... I was just like, oh, I hate everything she is... and it was just like a blind hate based on just, like, headlines... Reformed hater is sort of what I’m hearing.”

[07:16] Sierra:
Shares a similar trajectory—initially “an avowed hater,” then became an admirer, especially of Dunham’s writing and bravery.

3. Main Themes of "Famesick"

• Fame & Sickness:
  • Fame and chronic illness as “silent killers”—society is unsympathetic to both.
• Obsession with Friendship & Belonging:
  • Dunham’s relationships, both personal and professional, as a throughline.
• Making TV as a Stress Cooker:
  • Honest depiction of behind-the-scenes of TV, the pressures, and responsibilities unique to young creators.

[09:53] Brian:

“...the effect that fame has on the body kind of brought out all of these illnesses in her... if she had never been famous, would she have gotten as sick as she did in a way?”

[12:13] Sierra:
Anecdotes about how extreme stress in TV manifests physically.

4. The Tone-Setting Dedication

[12:27] Sierra:
Reads the book’s dedication—honoring a gallery of tragic stars—and analyzes its bold, unhinged tone as quintessential Lena:

"That’s an unhinged beginning that really just sets the tone. She’s gonna be Lena, the whole book from page one.”

5. Pre-Girls: Creative Beginnings

[18:03] Sierra:
Vivid descriptions of Dunham’s early indie New York days, collaborating with now-famous peers (e.g., Greta Gerwig); “indie sleaze time capsule.”

• Tiny Furniture: Lightning-speed script-to-film-to-SXSW-jury-prize, made with family and friends.
• The reality of privilege: Access via her mother’s network (UTA founder), blessing and curse (“jealousy seeps in”—[21:56]).

6. "Girls" Pilot: From Concept to Set

• The grind: Casting, crew, set building with an eight-week pre-production.
• Vulnerability of performing, directing, and showing her own body (not typical for TV at the time).
• Sex on Screen:
  • Adam Driver’s improvisational intensity in sex scenes led to groundbreaking TV realism.
  • “Deep trust, but also, like, so much vulnerability that, like, ultimate trust is impossible.” —[28:42] Sierra

Memorable Quote:
[31:15] (paraphrased)

“We would trust each other not to abuse the privilege... in the lack of boundaries, there was a safety.”

7. Fame’s Dark Side & Early Fame Internet Culture

• Sudden fame through Girls.
• Media coverage by peers (Gawker, Jezebel) creates an unsettling intimacy in criticism.
  [34:11] Sierra:

“...she's being written about by folks that she used to like see at parties and hang out with... such a mind fuck.”

• Nepo baby discourse; privileges acknowledged but contextualized (“privilege of access to artists”).

8. The Jack Antonoff Relationship

• Whirlwind romance, mutual support; but his success and her declining health created tension.
• Psychic prediction (“He plays the guitar... I see him laughing through a pane of glass”) delightfully fulfilled ([38:24]).
• As her health deteriorates and public hate intensifies, their relationship becomes an emotional lifeline—a double-edged sword for her self-worth.

9. Golden Globes, Vogue, SNL—At the Top, Physically Declining

• Hollywood peak: awards, high society events, and pop culture status.
• Chronic illness (endometriosis, surgeries) intensifies; industry’s lack of support for women’s health.
• Detailed, at times grim, recounting of surgeries, pain, and being underestimated/disbelieved by male doctors.
• Press obligations vs. personal boundaries: “...to say no was like she couldn’t do it. But it was taking so much from her.” ([41:43] Brian)

10. Addiction & Rehab

• Complex overlap between medical, mental health, and substance use—especially with opiates and Klonopin.
• The book’s narrative gets fragmented, mirroring Dunham’s own disorientation ([53:43]).
• Reliable narration? Hosts discuss how all memoirs are, by nature, subjective.
• Rehab: humbling, mortifying as a public figure; befriends a teen who idolizes Jack Antonoff.

11. Unique Memoir Moments: Bruce Springsteen Cameo

[66:12] Sierra:
Lena’s emotionally raw, weird, and oversharing dinner with Bruce Springsteen is a true highlight:

“Reader, sometimes you see two doors in life. One marked normal behavior and one marked psycho stuff. And after a brief pause to really consider what’s best, you choose psycho stuff.”

Bruce: “...you don’t owe it to people to be honest about every little thing. That doesn’t mean you lie. It just means you can have secrets. You only owe it to them to show em how your mind works.” ([68:10])

[69:08] Brian:

“I literally teared up at that part. I was like holy shit. I like need to hear that.”

12. The End: Divorce, Loss, New Beginnings

• Hysterectomy finally brings vindication and new hope.
• Dunham’s marriage (to Louis Felber) is mentioned only briefly—hosts hope for a Part III memoir on her happier years.
• Returns to writing and reconnects with self; learns to value personal relationships over fame.

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Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• On Lena’s artistic approach:

  “She seems to make this huge case of, like, sickness and fame being similar... both sort of these silent killers...”
  —Sierra, [08:31]

• On critical trust and collaboration:

  “We would do what was required to make these scenes surprising, to make them true, to make them sing. We would trust each other not to abuse the privilege.”
  —Dunham, as read/discussed by Sierra, [31:15]

• On the isolation of fame:

  “By the third season, her phone stopped ringing. She stopped getting invited to weddings... The loneliness of that fame.”
  —Sierra, [43:30]

• Bruce Springsteen’s advice:

  “You only owe it to them to show em how your mind works.”
  —Bruce Springsteen to Lena, [68:10]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Hosts’ histories with Lena & initial take: [06:30–09:30]
• Setting up the book’s main arguments: [09:30–13:00]
• Early career & indie NY scene: [18:00–21:00]
• Making "Girls" & the pilot: [24:00–27:30]
• Sex scenes, body image, and shock value: [25:30–28:42]
• Crash course in showbiz privilege: [21:56–23:35]
• The media & internet beating: [33:39–34:41]
• Soap opera of relationships—the Jack era: [36:39–41:43]
• Medical rundown / chronic illness narration: [49:22–54:07]
• Memoir as self-mythology / reliability: [54:09–56:21]
• Rehab journey: [64:00–66:05]
• Bruce Springsteen dinner & advice: [66:12–69:14]
• Discussion of memoir’s legacy and effect: [71:25–73:39]

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Book Dill Test (Wrap-up Segment)

• Was the author vulnerable? – Overwhelming yes: “the mascot for vulnerability.”
• Was it entertaining? – Yes, with rich, sharp prose often “quotable and really punch you in the gut” ([72:45] Brian).
• Did it elevate your life? – Yes: “Time capsule aspect... nostalgia for early creativity and stress... tapped into wonderfully.” ([73:02] Sierra)

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Tone & Style

The episode is lively, confessional, and irreverent—mixing industry insider experience, book club friendly analysis, and genuine admiration for Lena Dunham’s messiness and audacity. Both hosts are candid about their own shifting opinions and their personal reactions to the ups and downs of Dunham’s journey.

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Memorable Moments & Final Thoughts

• The “unhinged” dedication as a harbinger for the book’s maximalism.
• Dissecting the messy intersections of art, illness, and celebrity.
• Dunham’s vulnerability as a superpower and a curse: “She did what the boss said to do... she showed them how her mind worked.” ([70:16] Sierra)
• The Bruce Springsteen cameo as both utterly surreal and deeply moving.
• An empathetic but critical take on the fuzziness between illness and addiction in the memoir’s final third.
• Hope for a future, happier Lena memoir.

[Final thought – Sierra:]

“You do want to protect her. It makes sense she attracted all these people who... wanted to help usher her to places because she really puts it all out there, and I just really admire that.” ([71:25])

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Guest Plugs

• Brian Bahe: Co-host of Sage Based Wisdom podcast with Janice Meeting.
• Sierra Teller Ornelas: Instagram @sierraornelas; encouragement to support and enjoy Indigenous creators and powwow season.

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This summary omits advertisements, intro/outro, and sponsor shout-outs for focus on substantive content.

Transcript

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[Chelsea Devontez]

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[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

Welcome to Glamorous Trash. This is a podcast that recaps female celebrity memoirs and other glamorous trash to elevate your life. I am your usual host, Chelsea devontez. You know me but y'.

[Chelsea Devontez]

All.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

Today, Today, Today, Today. Okay, so we have put together a schedule this month that did not include Lena Dunham's memoir Fame Sick. And I was flipping flooded with messages and DMS and Patreon chats requesting Fame Sick by Lena Dunham. And here's the truth.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I am y'.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

All. I am struggling to keep up with the pace of this podcast sometimes because you know, it's not my full time job and so when my other work in TV and film, there's a lot going on, I can't fit in an extra unplanned book. Way back when when this podcast first went independent, I actually only did two episodes a month, two book episodes a month because I was head writing Jon Stewart's show at the time and I just couldn't. And the podcast, you know, the Patreon members have always been there. We held strong for a year and then after that we bumped back up and now we put out five to six episodes a month and we always have a bonus episode and bonus zooms and book clubs for people on the Patreon. And so. So when I looked at putting an extra episode on, I said, I can't, I can't. But I don't want to let y' all down. And so here's what I have decided to do. I am bringing on a guest host. I thought to myself, who would I want to hear a recap of this book from? And in my phone was my dear friend Sierra chatting away about this book already. And I said, I have a mission for you. And you know Sierra because she's been on this podcast a ton. We talked about some MAGA viral articles together. Oh, one of my favorite episode, Maria Bamford's memoir was starring Sierra. And so she's on this podcast a lot. We debate about everything. We're almost always sending voice notes back and forth, heatedly arguing with each other in something that is a deep love language of mine. Like, other people hear me and Sierra talking and they're like, are you gals okay? And we turn to them and we're like, we're having the time of our lives. And so Ciara, she's gonna be your host this episode. I'm so excited. And Ciara, tell me, what can we expect from this episode about Lena's memoir?

[Chelsea Devontez]

Oh, my gosh. This episode you can expect an early aughts time capsule, harrowing medical tragedies, artistic genius, and the best Bruce Springsteen cameo in history. This memoir, love bombed me. What up? This is Ciara Taylor Arnelas. I'm a TV comedy writer, a fairly good mom, a fellow cookie, and a proud member of the Navajo nation. I am Edgewater clan, born for the Mexican cl. You know Lena Dunham from writing, directing, and starring in the critically acclaimed HBO series Girls, or from her newsletter, Lenny Letter, or perhaps from being a punching bag for the conservative Internet, which might just be the Internet now. More recently, she co created the series Too Much with her husband, Louis Felber. The show starred Megan Stalter on Netflix. Before we bring on our guest, your trigger warnings for this episode include medical abuse, substance use, ptsd, and death of a loved one. Okay, let's dive in. I have been dating someone who treats my heart like it's monkey meat. It's a bummer, but people do outgrow each other. Will you still have sex with me? When it's appropriate, sure.

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[Chelsea Devontez]

You could be a little more supportive. You are so self involved. You were always like this. This is why you have no friends from preschool. I have a lot of friends from preschool. I'm just not speaking to them right now. My guest today is Brian Bahi. Brian is an indigenous gay comedian and writer whose credits include Ghosts and the Great North. He was named a comedian you should and will know in 2023 by Vulture. And recently he co starred in a pilot made by me and some of our friends that NBC was dumb and didn't pick up. He co hosts the wonderful advice podcast Sage based Wisdom with my first wife, Janice, meeting where they offer sacred indigenous wisdom to callers. Brian, say hello.

[Brian Bahi]

Yate. Hello. If you're unfamiliar, that's hello in Navajo.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yes. Which Brian is. Even though he refuses to claim he is.

[Brian Bahi]

I claim it every day, all day.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Secret Navajo. No. Thank you so much for joining. I'm so glad to be guest hosting,

[Brian Bahi]

Honored to be here, honored to share this space with you, and even more honored because when you asked me to be a guest, you referred to me as the native Lena Dunham, which I am going to get tattooed on me.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I was like, who is our native Lena Dunham? I feel like you're very open. You're. This is going to sound bad. You're a little gross, but you're, like, proudly shameless in the best way. You're very fashionable. You lived in New York. You're very funny. You're a great writer.

[Brian Bahi]

I mean, as gross as I am, I do admit to being gross. I feel like I could. I do hold back a little bit, and I would love to go. I feel like she holds nothing back.

[Chelsea Devontez]

She holds nothing back, and I would

[Brian Bahi]

love to get to that a thousand percent.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Well, that's kind of leading me to my first question here. Before we start and get into her book, Fame Sick, A Memoir, I did want to ask you because I feel like she's such a polarizing character that, like, just for context, for the audience, where do you stand on the Lena Dunham spectrum? Like, what is your thoughts on her as a concept? Where do you stand?

[Brian Bahi]

I could not ride or die harder for her, which is the. At the exact opposite end of the spectrum of when she first came into my life, which was like, season one of Girls. I had just heard about her. I did not watch the show until, I think after it ended.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Okay.

[Brian Bahi]

But so, like, this whole time I was just like, oh, I hate everything that she is, that she stands for, that she represents. And it was just like a blind hate based on just, like, headlines that I may have read about. Her.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So reformed hater is sort of what I'm hearing. Perfect. Okay. That I too, I will admit I started out in television around the same time that she did, but was older and was not a juggernaut. And so watching that show initially, I was, like, just so blind with jealousy that I just could not stand her. I was an avowed hater for the first couple years. And she also. Girls made a Navajo joke that I didn't appreciate. And I, like, lost my mind on Twitter, which was so stupid.

[Brian Bahi]

But do you remember it?

[Chelsea Devontez]

Marnie's boyfriend dated this, like, cupidol looking influencer girl. She was super boho. And Marnie called her that little Navajo. And I was like, who the fuck are you? And I got so mad. Like, so. And right. It is. It is still like, that's why. But also, I didn't need much to get mad. So it's sort of a situation where it feels a little unfair there even now. So I was like, totally wrote her off, but then years later did a rewatch and I was like, oh, this show is brilliant. She's brilliant. And went back and read a lot of her stuff. And she wrote this essay for the Criterion Collection for the Big Chill. And I remember it was like, I thought about that essay for days. And I just. I love her writing and I think she's so talented and I think she's incredibly brave is like a word we're not allowed to use anymore. But I do think the way that she puts herself out there is really admirable and kind of stunning to watch sometimes. I am a huge fan currently, so

[Brian Bahi]

we're kind of had similar trajectories.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. I'm gonna just start with, like, my overall thoughts on the book. The book is really long. There's no way I feel like I could talk about one or two of these elements for hours. So we're not gonna be able to cover everything. Just forewarned. But definitely buy the book. Definitely enjoy it. It's got so many amazing moments. And I think, to me, my overall thoughts were that, like, she seems to make this huge case of, like, sickness and fame being similar, that they're both sort of these like, silent killers that people ultimately don't want to hear about or have much sympathy for. And she thinks maybe they definitely should. And then also there seems to be this through line of, like, friendship, like an obsession with friendship and belonging that she will play out with various characters in the book. Some are romantic, professional, familial, platonic. Some are with very famous people. And I think I was more drawn to those elements of the book than the former. But even in that, I think her stories of fame and of her ailments were fascinating. And then lastly, I feel like this was just a great, like, VIP tour of what making TV and trying to express yourself in this business can feel like. I find in a lot of memoirs, people are either great writers and like, nothing really that interesting has happened to them, or they've had these fascinating lives, but they don't have the writing chops to kind of match. And she's one of those kind of singular people where she has both. And I just, I loved kind of seeing how she processed this part of her life. But what were your overall thoughts?

[Brian Bahi]

I think the fame sick part of it was really interesting because I thought she was, yeah. Trying to make this comparison that they are similar. But then I was as like, it kept going and as she like, kept getting like, more sick throughout, I was like, is the connection a little bit that, like, the effect that fame has on the body kind of brought out all of these, like, illnesses in her? Like, if she had never been famous, would she have gotten as sick as she did in a way?

[Chelsea Devontez]

What do you think? I'm so curious.

[Brian Bahi]

I think no, I think literally, I think what you put yourself through mentally comes out physically. So if you're kind of like going through a lot of mental stress, mental everything. I think the body does have a way of like, expressing that as well.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I agree with that for sure. Like, I was thinking about, because both, you know, Brian and I are TV writers and I had a show called Rutherford Falls, and it was like we were making it during COVID and at the time it was like the first Native American sitcom in history. And during COVID it was so scary and we didn't know what was going to happen. And it was also like a lot of other drama going, going on. And there was like a two month period where I woke up and threw up every morning and it was just like, all right, first I throw up and then I take a shower, I get ready and go to work. And then like. And it was just like, that's what I do. And then finally I calmed down and the stress of work had calmed down and I just one day didn't. And even like one of the very nice co workers was like, did you throw up today? I go, I didn't. And he was like, good for you. Like, it wasn't seen as, like, weird because a lot of folks that I'd Worked with, had said, like, oh, my first show, I didn't sleep. Everyone has those stories of the stress. And like, obviously we're always supposed to say, like, we're not coal miners or whatever. But there is like a crazy. And she talks about it in the book of, like, when you're making a show, you're acutely aware of, like, there being 90 to 150 people who are able to pay their rent and pay their mortgage and their kids school tuition because you have this show. And it's like, if you're not able to produce or perform, you feel like you're letting them down. And I thought that was, like, fascinating. I will say, though, I do think I feel like if she worked at Best Buy or at Whole Foods or here, she would have these ailments. Like she had endometriosis. I think TV made it happen probably faster because she was 23, 22 when this whole process started. And like, I cannot imagine going through what she went through at that age and trying to make sense of it all while your body is like, going through all these crazy things.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah. I think she also just, like, as a person, feels a lot of things in a very intense way. And so I do think that, like, the way she experiences sickness too, she experiences it harder than I think some people might.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I agree. Okay, so let's get into the book. And I'm not gonna read all the names in her dedication, but this is her dedication and it gave me pause. I don't know if it gave you pause, but okay, so she says for Jean Seberg, Jean Harlow, Marilyn Monroe, Jane Mansfield, Amy Winehouse, Janis Joplin, Chris Farley, Brittany Murphy, Lisa Left Eye Lopez, Maria Schneider, Sharon Tate, Eve Babbitts, Keith Ledger, Whitney Houston, Robin Williams, Caroline Flack, Dana Plato, Gilda Radner, Gia Kahn, Jonathan Brandes, Louise Brooks, and anyone else who was too fame sick to be cured. And at first I was like, whoa. But then I was like, but your book is called Fame Sick. And those people all had very different ailments and ultimate demises and histories. I know you're not saying you're them. I'm not trying to, like, call her out on the first page of the book, but it is just like, for me, the kindest version of it is like, that's an unhinged beginning that really just sets the tone. She's gonna be Lena, the whole book from page one. We're not gonna get like a version. Big swing, big swings, big ideas. And you just kind of have to either get on the Roller coaster. But you can't act like you didn't know. Like, page one. This is what the book is, basically. There's just so many names that I'm like. To try to make sense of it, but in her knowing way, she's like, and this is what it is. And I'm just like, what?

[Brian Bahi]

I like a little bit. Get it. I like. I feel like she's basically, what are we doing? This is why I will ride or go with Lean Dunham forever. Because she's like, she knows that, like, it's. Hollywood is fucked up.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yes. But that's like celebrity.

[Brian Bahi]

Celebrity is crazy.

[Chelsea Devontez]

You're. You sound like you're like at the Chateau Marmont with a coffee being like, right, Lena? Like, right girl? Anyway, whatever. I just was like, that's a lot. That's a lot. It's like a. It's a big idea at the beginning. So the first part of the book deals with sort of her life pre girls. This is her second memoir. So she had already written a book called not that Kind of Girl, which dealt with a lot with her childhood and things like that. So this sort of starts kind of post Oberlin College. And I loved this section. I noticed that all of the chapters are named after girls episodes. So chapter one is I Get Ideas. She talks about the early years of making short films and getting into these film festivals and meeting sort of all these kind of indie darlings. She talks about befriending Josh and Benny Safdie. They rented this office space, 365 Broadway where they all had office space and they're all trying to make films in New York at the time. She rents this tiny little 150 square foot studio that she shares with a bunch of other women, one of whom is Greta Gerwig.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

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[Chelsea Devontez]

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[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

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[Chelsea Devontez]

I don't know, I just loved this whole section. She talked about how making things and helping them with their films and them helping them with her films reminded her mother of like Soho in the 1970s when someone fascinating was always doing something fascinating and all you had to do was get out of bed to find it. And like it's like that time when you're just creative and you're trying to do stuff and I don't know what did you think of this, like, section?

[Brian Bahi]

I also love that part too. It was very much like one of those, like, when you hear about how, like, the French writers or whatever and like, the 1700s would all gather. It's just like how, like, different groups of creative people somehow find each other and just, like, feed off each other. And like, that's kind of just becomes your cohort in a way, which is really cool. What I found interesting about this part was that, like, I'm sure it is out there, but there was something about when I remember, like, being in college and, like, hearing how this was starting, like this, like, period up to girls. Like, for me, I was like, oh, is this something I could do? Because it kind of like, laid out the steps in a way that I feel like I have never seen before. Like, suddenly somebody had a job in Hollywood, but you didn't really know, like, how they got there. And so reading this part was so cool and reminded me of, oh, yeah, I. Maybe this is something that I could do.

[Chelsea Devontez]

No, it was like an indie sleaze time capsule. Like, the way she describes how all the men dress like grandpas. And I was a film programmer at the National Museum of the American Indian. And we programmed, like, a bunch of films, programmed some, like, momelcore films. And I had, like, an internship with Barry Jenkins. And so, like, there was some kind of cross pollination here in a way that, like, it just reminded you of the time. I don't know. It feels weird to be nostalgic for something that doesn't feel like it was so far away. But I agree, it was an exciting time where people would take money from editing DVD extras and, like, make a feature in a summer. And then suddenly they were making movies. And it was just such, like, a beautiful kind of optimistic time. And she really. Her writing just, like, really captures, I feel like, that moment. And so it's in that sort of creative soup that she writes her first feature, Tiny Furniture. She writes it in, like, a few days, she said, which is just incredible. It's based in part on these journals by her mother, Lori Simmons, who's a very famous artist and photographer in New York at the time and still is. And her mother raises from, like, her clients and people that she knows, like, $20,000. They make this movie. Her sibling stars in the film as well as her mother. And it wins. It wins the, like, jury prize at south by Southwest, which is just like, if you don't know, like, a whirlwind experience to be writing something in three days, making it in a couple weeks and then suddenly you're like the toast of south by Southwest. When it was like, I feel like not at its height, but it was sort of like the new Sundance at that time.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah. If you were into like film and like indie stuff, south by Southwest was kind of like the pinnacle in a way.

[Chelsea Devontez]

So I was just like. I felt like I was like being whisked through this portion of just kind of like it's the sort of biopic, like rise to stardom. Like when you're watching like Ray or Elvis or something, you're just like, oh

[Brian Bahi]

my God, it's what everybody dreams of. Who's ever made anything. You're like, well, this is going to obviously what's going to happen. I'm going to get, you know, become an industry darling overnight.

[Chelsea Devontez]

The town is littered with like terrible short films and the way too long features that should have been short films. And like she made this thing that was so personal and so herself. And so then she takes a Southwest flight home and she starts getting all these emails from managers and talent agents and agencies asking to meet with her and she like doesn't know what to do and she's sort of freaking out and. And so she goes, my mom, whether in ramshackle real estate or at a seemingly picked over sample sale, has always sensed an opportunity and her instincts kicked in. She knew enough to know something was happening. And unlike so many momagers, she wasn't the right person to guide me. But that is a Dringo, guys. So whenever a memoir mentions a momager, we have to take a drink. So technically that is a mention. But she says that her mother Lori, only had one contact in Hollywood and she called him. And at this point in the book, I'm like, you've got me, Lena. I love you. I'm rooting for you. This is amazing. But then she says he was an agent who had founded uta, which if

[Brian Bahi]

you don't know, crazy.

[Chelsea Devontez]

United Talent Agency is like, it's my. I'm. I'm a client. It's one of the biggest agencies in. In. It's one of the top three. It's crazy. And I just wrote, what the fuck? Like you. I like rooting for you. But then it's like, God, you're. It's the jealousy just seeps in. But not. It's not her fault. It's just like, how are you to know everyone has that one person. They could probably call or someone has an uncle who knows someone, but usually that person is like a PA or like, right, like worked in Hollywood 20 years ago and is giving you advice. She met the guy who stood, started one of the biggest agencies in history.

[Brian Bahi]

And then she goes on to list. It's like, David Chase, like all of these people who have made everything right.

[Chelsea Devontez]

She's not sure if she should sign with him, should I meet with other people? And he's like, you ever heard of Dick Wolf, David Chase, you're in good hands. And I'm like, oh, it's the thing you like literally ask Santa Claus for in your head, like all the time. And she got it. So she goes on the couch and water bottle tour, which, if you don't know, is when you go to la, your agent will set you up with a bunch of general meetings with like a random executives and people who own production companies. And you just sort of meet and talk about your life and see if you guys vibe and maybe you guys come up with projects. It very rarely turns into anything. Oftentimes, you know, you're lucky if one or two of those meetings become anything three years down the road. But she meets with hbo, and this is where I feel like the milk rises to the top. She does get this credit because she knew exactly what she wanted to make. And when she was asked, she was ready. So there is luck, but there is also the idea of like, you're ready for what's being thrown at you.

[Brian Bahi]

Totally.

[Chelsea Devontez]

So they ask her in this meeting, what would you like to make? And she says, Sex in the City was about being a woman in New York, already established and looking for love. But what about the phase before when you don't even know enough to know what you're looking for? The New York I know isn't glamorous. We graduated during recession. We're the first generation that can't reasonably expect more than our parents had. We all grew up on Ritalin and AOL Instant Messenger. We're having sex fueled by the availability of porn. And we're feminists who don't know how to live our politics. I want to see my friends on tv. The room was quiet for a moment. Can you write us a page about that? She asked. And here's the other thing. So many times you're asked in those meetings to write pages and you just don't do it. I've like, definitely been asked to write something and I'm like, seven months later, I send it. And they're like, we don't even know who you are anymore. She went home that night and wrote it.

[Brian Bahi]

That is. That is A game, huge game changer. I'm always, like, playing it too cool. Sometimes I'm like.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Or like, who would want to hear what I have to? And she, like, did her homework and turned it in. And they immediately were like, we're giving you a blind script deal. Which, again, is incredible. So the next few chapters are about the making of Girls. Again, we're gonna getting so granular. I know we're not gonna have time to get through everything, but I do think that this is such a great depiction of the stress. Brian and I recently made a pilot, and it is just like a harrowing experience. And I got to make it well into my career. I mean, the best thing about being that young is you just don't know what you don't know. Luckily, she had been placed with Jenny Connor, who was a very established television writer at the time, as well as Judd Apatow, who had with Jenny previously. And they both were able to guide her. But she had, like, eight weeks to find a cast, a crew to build sets. I mean, it was like, very little time. Obviously, I feel like if you're listening to this episode, you know about Girls, so I'm not going to walk you through, like, who started it and who got cast. Everybody knows. But I do think it was fascinating getting sort of like a bird's eye view of what it took for her to make the pilot feeling so sort of, I think, like, kind of scared to share her story and then really diving into the collaboration. Like, this seems to be like one of the first moments where this sort of obsession with belonging and sort of mixing friendship with a professional job setting starts to happen in a real way. Did you have any thoughts on the Girls pilot sequence or anything in this area?

[Brian Bahi]

I did think it was really interesting the way she talks about, like, the first sex scene with Adam.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yes.

[Brian Bahi]

And how it just like the whole experience of having to do a sex scene in front of people and having her body on such big display, even though that is something she did right for the character, knowing that she would have to play that. But it is a different thing to have to go through it. The way she talks about the process she went through mentally, for some reason, I'm like, her going through that kind of fueled how sex was portrayed in Girls a little bit. Cause it is always just like the sex in Girls sometimes was difficult for me to watch because I was like, this is crazy. Like, I know nothing about, like, female anatomy and just, like, how they are during sex. So I think that was just like. So it Was shocking to me.

[Chelsea Devontez]

That's so funny. I was a little older than her, and I remember watching tiny furniture where everyone's like, that ending. That ending. And she gets in a. Like an industrial drum outside by this guy who's kind of a loser. And I was like, yeah, that's just what sex it. Like, I was the opposite. Like, I'd had so many bad boyfriends that I was like, why are people so shocked by. I was really. I was shocked that people were shocked because I was like, that's just what being in your late 20s and the late 2000s was like. Like, I didn't realize it was, like, prolific until later on watching it again. Being like, oh, right, that was of a time. And we didn't see, like, natural bodies and, like, people who weren't looked like, you know, CW models. It really did break people's brains. But I remember being like, I've also had some bad dates because, like, I didn't know that that was, like, weird. Which is a little bit of an overshare.

[Brian Bahi]

But I think, no, I think that's so important because, like, for me, this is. As a gay dude, I'm like, oh, women have sex and beds. I don't know if that's just like, my weird Catholic upbringing or what the fuck. Obviously, I'm not well either. But, like, for some reason, that was just like what I thought straight sex was.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yes, well, I also think too, like, prior to Girls, it was Sex and the City, which was very graphic but also kind of wacky. Like, Samantha would be like, screaming and having like, an opera scream while it cross dissolved to Miranda, like, buying shoes or whatever. And so this was like, kind of the first time you saw that. Sort of like indigridy. And I think she talks about it in the book about casting Adam Driver.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

Okay, we're going to take a quick break right now and we'll be right back.

[Chelsea Devontez]

We gather here tonight to bring women back to their rightful place.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

The Testaments, a new Hulu original series from the executive producers of the Handmaid's Tale.

[Chelsea Devontez]

It's easier to accept a story than believe that the people around you are monsters.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

The battle isn't over.

[Chelsea Devontez]

There comes a time when you have to take action, when you have to choose your own destiny.

[Brian Bahi]

Never quite as it seems.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

Watch the new Hulu original series, the Testaments, streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney for bundle subscribers. Terms apply. Okay, welcome back. Let's continue the conversation.

[Chelsea Devontez]

And that he was this, like, very, very serious actor and that she had sort of Seen herself as almost kind of lazy in her process and that he sort of elevated her and in his sort of being present kind of lifted her up. But that it was also the dynamic that sounded so crazy to me was I'm the director and writer and showrunner, and you're an actor, and I'm an actor, but, like, then you're sort of kind of dehumanizing me, for lack of a better word, on screen, because that's what the role calls for. And I wrote it. But you're sort of going off book. And she talks in the book about the actual book, about having, like, a sense of trust, that after this first sex scene that they did, she had sort of tried to block it. And in the book, she says, if Adam had been lackluster in rehearsal, now he was focused, as if the sex scene were a mission that had to be completed with as much vigor as basic training as in his audition. When in character, Adam was a man possessed. He would often shout filthy improvisations, seemingly unbidden. The same was true here. As my careful blocking went out the window and he hurled me this way and that. It felt so real. Part of me was afraid that when I turned around, I would find I was suddenly in a full penetration 1970s porno. But after a few mime thrusts, I called cut. I mean, this is so different now. Now there's intimacy coordinators, and everything is sort of preordained before you even get on set. And there's all these conversations about what you're. Your comfort levels are. But this was before all of that. And they're making something that's really real and also a comedy. And so she tries to block it. They call action. He just sort of does his own thing. She goes with it. And then when it's over, she's like, what did we just do? And everyone starts laughing and applauding. And she was like, oh, I guess this is good. And she was like, I nodded at Adam. This was after the sex scene. I nodded at Adam. He nodded back. It was in that moment that we made a silent agreement. We would do what was required to make these scenes surprising, to make them true, to make them sing. We would trust each other not to abuse the privilege. And it was a rare situation where in the lack of boundaries, there was a safety. He trusted me to write scenes that weren't gratuitous, had something to say. I trusted him to try things, knowing that certain lines wouldn't be crossed and others would be. But for the sake of the work and I thought that was like, such an interesting way of describing this, like, relationship where there was, like a deep trust, but also, like, so much vulnerability that, like, ultimate trust is impossible. That she wanted to be a boss, but also a collaborator. And then there was also sort of like an off screen, off camera flirtation with each other. Lena Dunham, that they, you know, almost hooked up. And right at the last minute, she sort of put the stop on it. Which just sounds like just once again, like, boundaries blurring. It seems like brother and sister and then also kind of like dating and work wifey. There was just a lot going on in that sequence. It's a great depiction of someone trying to figure it out and also just someone who had never done it before. She talked in the book about how it kind of hit her. Like, you said that she would have to be in these scenes and she would actually have to act. And they're on set for the first time and she goes, I was so ecstatic when three bells rang. A fire alarm. I thought relieved. I had been quite literally saved by the bell. And then it was quickly explained to her that, no, like, when you start shooting, they ring the bell so everyone knows it's, like, time to start. I was on set for, like, Jana's first professional scene. I've been on set with, like, Casey Wilson and all these folks who, like, it was like their first job in television. And it is like this thing that is so distinct. And I hope people know, like, when she's describing this, like, this is a lot of people's first experience. And I think that's a good thing. You know what I mean? Like, I feel like she gets vilified for being so green, but there's so many people where, like, your first job is your first job always, you know, and you're always trying to kind of swim upstream to figure it out.

[Brian Bahi]

I will say that moment for me was the. I think it was the camera test for your pilot. And I remember just, like, standing there and looking out and just seeing just a bunch of people just watching you, but you just have to, like, stand there and just take it all in and. And you're like, whoa, this is like,

[Chelsea Devontez]

this is real business. Yeah, Yeah. I remember reading some book Barry Levinson wrote, the guy who did, like, diner, and he was saying, like, once the big trucks show up, that's when, you know, like, oh, somebody wrote a check to make this. And, like, we're. And I always get freaked out when the big trucks show up. I'm like, okay, we're Actually, actually making a TV show. So the rest of the chapters are about making girls. She does talk about. As sort of things ramp up, she starts to experience a real sense of disassociation and really I think, have it on like sort of her first sickness. She starts sort of a combination of wild stress leading to sort of injuries. The first one, I believe is like colitis where her stomach has just doubled over and she can't handle what's happening. And then she starts to sort of disassociate and sort of tune out. And in opposition of that, she reaches out to her doctors. She has suffered for many years from obsessive compulsive disorder. And her psychotherapist suggests Klonopin, which is a drug that she had taken previously in order to help with disassociation. And so this is sort of the beginning of the book of the salad days of Girls and enjoying the experience of collaboration and making the show, but also this sort of like deep fear and deep anxiety and then sort of trying to combat the urge to disassociate.

[Brian Bahi]

And this is also season one era is when she's like first thrust into like a spotlight type of thing. There was just a lot of like press around. 23 year old indie darling gets pilot, gets picked up by hbo and suddenly everybody on the Internet in a way knows who she is and suddenly has an opinion about her. And like, you know, blogging is kind of like a popular form of journalism or something at the time. She really experiences like the fame aspect of fame.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I guess the fame aspect is crazy because it's also like she was talking about how like Gawker and Jezebel and all these places, a lot of those writers were people she knew in New York. So like she's being written about by folks that she used to like see at parties and hang out with. And that has to have just been such a mind fuck. And then there's a whole conversation, of course about like the concept of like the Nepo baby, that everyone had access to parents who had some sort of notoriety, which I think she really tries to downplay. I still think there's an element of. You can never underestimate the sort of privilege of having access to artists and writers, even if they weren't necessarily like Hollywood people. Because my mom is also an artist and I grew up at like gallery openings and I grew up in like a lot of those worlds in the native art world. My husband always tells me, because a lot of her clients and collectors are like millionaires and Billionaires. He was like, you know how to handle rich people in a way that I, growing up in, like. Like, suburban Virginia, just did it, you know? And I do think, even if she doesn't see her privilege in that, and she's like, I'm not an uppo baby. Like, there is an element of that, of just, like, you have access to, like, a certain echelon of people, whether they're just highly educated, that I do think is, like, fascinating. She turns in the PIL. 24 hours later, they call her to tell her that her pilot's been picked up to Ceres. And even, like, Judd Apatow, who was, like, wildly successful, is like, it'll never be this smooth again. Which, like, what he dealt with with freaks and geeks and all that stuff. He was just like, it'll never be this good again. And he's correct. So then it's during this moment, the height of Girls. We're deep into the seasons. She's starting to take the Klonopin. She's still trying to write. She's sort of not in and out of the writer's room, but she's definitely, like, starting to have to take breaks, but she's also having to film and not wanting to feel like she's failing the show. And she meets Jack Antonoff. So Chapter six. I love you, baby. She's starting to do a lot of press. So she meets this girl who is a fashion designer. It turns out to be Jack Antonoff's sister, Rachel. And as she's talking to her about, like, her life, and she's super chatty. She's like, oh, you should meet my brother Jack. And at this point in the book, she has dated some real pieces of work. You know, the guy that. He's called Lip in the book, who is the character that Adam is based on, just sounds like a. A sadist who's just also boring. I can't tell you how many freaking losers that got away with one in the 2000s. I'm sure they're still here now, but it just was like, pre, like, looks maxing. But it was during the, like era of the, like, the, like. What do they call those guys? They were, like, dating gurus. And it was like, keep talking. The pickup artists.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Chelsea Devontez]

There was, like, Maxim magazine where there was all these guy magazines. These are kind of wannabe GQ magazines that would, like, tell you how to pick up a girl or how to make out. I remember one time, like, like, I was making out with a guy, and he was Using moves. And I was like, did you get this from Maxim? And he was so embarrassed because clearly he was, like, using a tutorial on me. It just was an ugly, ugly time.

[Brian Bahi]

It feels almost like reality dating shows were, like, kind of at their peak, and it was kind of like a lot. A lot of women competing for one man. And I think that kind of like, gave men the idea that, like, I should have 24 women vying for my attention at all times. And I need to figure out how to do that.

[Chelsea Devontez]

It just truly was. I mean, it's like when we say time capsule, it is truly. It was like the worst of times. And it was the beginning of, like, certain Internet cultures that it was almost like a rental car we hadn't figured out how to use yet or monetize. And so it was so feral and it was so mean. And I feel like she was sort of a lightning rod for so much of that. And so I was so glad at this point in the book, she meets, like, a nice guy. She meets someone who's, like, very kind to her and very sweet to her and really just giving her, like, a whirlwind kind of rom com moment in the book. And she talks about, this is our second Dringo. I think this might be the only one I have in the book here. But we have the mention of a psychic. She says after she has a date with Jack, it goes really well. She's really into him. He tours a lot. So throughout the book, he's sort of gone for large swaths of time, or they're sort of like meeting at the entrance of a tour bus. But she says, months earlier, my mother had sent me to see a psychic who lived in a tiny tenement apartment on Prince Street. She was the real deal, said my mother. And she asks the psychic, will I ever find love? I asked. Before I could even consider what I wanted to know. I was embarrassed by how quickly it erupted. The need and the hope. She closed her eyes. He's coming, she said. He plays the guitar. I see his hands and I see him laughing through a pane of glass. As we know, Jack Antonoff was in the band Fun. He's also a huge music producer, so he's always holding a guitar. And there's a moment where they're having dinner and she has to pay the bills. Chelsea wanted me to make sure to explain this, that apparently Jack Antonoff had forgotten his wallet and he was about to go on tour and he felt super embarrassed. And she was like, oh, I don't mind. Paying. And so she has to go to this ATM to get. To get some money. So she goes to this ATM and she looks out through the window, and he started being, like, silly. And she says, and then through the pain, just like the small medium had promised, he threw his head back and laughed. And I was like, oh, I want this for you.

[Brian Bahi]

It's so crazy and beautiful. I'm so happy she got to experience that.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I am, too. And it's also too, like, I definitely dated men where it's like, you're not the one, but you. You kept me from bad people and taught me, like, to have, like, a. A type of standard that you don't go below anymore, you know? And, like, yeah, he buys her gifts and he asks her questions. He's sort of starting to become famous. Like, they hear a song on the radio while she's on Girls, and they're sort of both. Their trajectory is both going up at the same time. They both have ocd. They're both sort of obsessed with, like, medical issues, and they really seem to kind of, like, meet on a lot of different levels. The flip side of that is as things sort of get ugly on the Internet, as she explains in the book, there's a real feeling of, like, her using him as this sort of defense that she is a worthy human being. And, like, those moments made me so sad that she sort of says, well, the Internet hates me, and they think I'm ugly and that I can't walk in high heels. But the fact that this good man who dated Scarlett Johansson wants me proves that I'm good and proves that I'm worthy. And I think that, as, you know, her health issues sort of start to get worse. She sort of falls into that more. But that early sort of just kind of young love is such a sweet moment. And I wonder if her show changed as she was falling more in love. Like, I'm trying to think on, like, the actual seasons they were together, if the show got sweeter.

[Brian Bahi]

I think it definitely was more just her having actual relationships in the show. So I'm sure that was part of it, rather than just like, Sex and the City. I feel like a lot of, like, hookups. Fucking. Fucking.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yeah.

[Brian Bahi]

Well, I guess there's big.

[Chelsea Devontez]

But, like, I do think, yeah, like, eventually they all kind of. Yeah, she did sort of have more, like, domesticated relationships, and so did the other characters did as well. So she says now at 26, I was heading into season three of Girls, we should mention. There's just. There's so much in the book, we're gonna skip over a lot of the details on like, the production of Girls, her writing of her first memoir. Just a lot of stuff that I feel like has been heavily covered. But what I really wanna talk about is the fact that she wins a Golden Globe for Best Actress. They're critical darlings. It's a hu. It's not a juggernaut hit in the sense of like, everyone and your mom is watching it, but it is a cultural touchstone. She mentioned specifically LA and New York, like the elite folks who are writing about tv, like, absolutely love the show. And I think you can't also argue that, like, the longevity of the show, like, it's having a huge renaissance. People are doing huge rewatches even now. But at the time she was getting invited to the Met Gala, she was getting invited to like all these. She's getting invited to host snl. It's just like a huge, huge part of her life is not just the making of the show, but the promotion of the show. And that seems to also be sort of draining her and her health.

[Brian Bahi]

She talks about the press tour for season one a lot and how it required so much of her. And she felt like she couldn't say no to anything because that was part of making the show, she felt. And so to say no was like she couldn't do it. But it was like taking so much from her. I kind of really like her dad, how her dad is kind of like, fuck, why are you doing this? Don't do it. But you know, she's like, this is what I have to do.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I know I went back and forth with the parents in the book because there are moments where I was like, oh, that's a good mom and dad. And then there are moments where they're literally like dictating emails for her to write to hbo. And I'm like, well, she is a grown woman. There are like moments where they like kind of scoop her up and take care of her and it's like so sweet. And then there are moments where I'm like, what is happening here in terms of their relationship? But I agree, her dad is not her biggest fan necessarily because her parents seem like art snobs, but they're both very much like in her corner. So she says yes. Now at 26, I was heading into season three. I had a boyfriend, an apartment, and a full time adult job. So she really is feeling like kind of in her power. The trajectory at this point seemed to move exclusively upward. And she says, she mentions this Thing about making television and sort of getting more well known that it's this very anxious experience. But she says my obsession with mortality had always defined it. I spent a lot of time wondering why we try when we're all just going the way of the dinosaurs. There was something tidy about visible success that had at least the temporary effect of eliminating these questions. People remembered the dinosaurs and they would remember me. And it's like this idea of, like, wanting to belong. And as long as things were going well, she was like, I'm good, you know, which, as someone, I, I, I have been diagnosed with ocd. Like, that is such a big thing of, like, obsessing over your goodness versus your, your badness. And just like, this idea of, like, getting to feel free of those worries for a little bit, but that the, like, stress it takes to get that is just too much. It's like. And she also talks about how, like, it's also, though, during this time that she starts to lose her actual friends. That season one of Girls, it's like just this kind of crazy moonshot second. It's like, oh, let's celebrate this. And then by the third season, her phone stopped ringing. She stopped getting invited to weddings and to parties, and people stopped including her in, in, in email threads and things like that. And, and just the, the loneliness of, of that fame.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah, just to go back to that quote, I also wrote that quote down. I, I was doing audiobook version, but I did, like, go back and like, write that quote verbatim. Cause I was like, she ate with that, you know, And I, I took that as more like she was experiencing so much, like, negative effects of how the success of the show and what the show required of her, both making it and then also promoting it, and how that was just taking so much for her. But in her head, the payoff is that there's a little bit of remembrance or it's doing something that could be the aliens will find or something at

[Chelsea Devontez]

some point, a thousand percent. It's proof that I was here. It's like that immortality. And I will say too, like, as someone who had to promote a show that was not nearly as popular as this show, she talks in the book about how, like, no one's gonna give you sympathy for being famous, but there is, like, a taxing thing about people talking to you and asking you questions over and over and you saying the same thing. And also, I remember, like, the first year of Rutherford, we had, like, this press tour, but everyone only wanted to talk about diversity, and they didn't wanna talk about anything else. And it was like, oh, this is how people. You get a real window into how people see you, how they think you should be presented. And also, like, you kind of can't mess with City Hall. Like, you kind of have to just roll with it and keep sort of fighting it on a certain level. And again, she was 23, 24 when this was happening. I can't imagine she talks a lot about her first interview, like ordering an ice cream sundae and then finding out that, like, everything you do is stuff that they can report on and make you look bad. And so unlike other folks who I feel like could sort of enjoy the fame or the press with a little bit of separation. It's like her face on the poster. Even as someone who's just a writer, it's not your actual face on that poster that people get to judge and make horrible comments about. Like, it is emotionally and physically draining. I just. I can't even imagine. But it is during this time she says that the three JS were taking care of her. So that's Jemima McKirk, who played Jessa, who was her childhood best friend, Jack, her boyfriend, and Jenny Connor, that they're sort of kind of ushering her and showing her sort of her way through this. And yes, it's during this time that she's invited to do all these high profile things. But this is like the plight of a comedy writer is. I feel like this is how you know she will always be. Comedy versus drama is that the worst things happen to her during the best times. She's asked to be on the COVID of Vogue, which at the time is like, the height of fashion. It's like Bezos had nothing to do with it yet it's the coolest thing ever. And it's also, I think her publicist is, like, in tears being like, comedy women now never get to do this. I felt that so deeply that, like, we never get to be on the COVID of Vogue, but she also gets shingles. So she has, like, crazy, crazy sores and things on her face while she's asking to be on the COVID of

[Brian Bahi]

Vogue, which is photographing, which is.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Which to me, it's just insane. But it's also like, that would have been a Sex and the City episode where it's like, Charlotte gets to be in Vogue and gets in the Tygo or whatever. Like, it just so dumb. But she does it. They like, slap makeup on her and they're like, the makeup artist will wear gloves and they do it. I Do think it's very funny that Adam Driver, who throughout the whole book is like, I'm a serious actor. I do plays. I don't want to watch myself on screen. I don't want to like all these things and like, I'm throwing chairs. But then they're like, will you be in Vogue? He's like, yes. Then he, like fully agreed to do the Vogue shoot with her. I thought was pretty funny. I'm like, all right. You might also kind of like the fame too.

[Brian Bahi]

Was this the part where she mentioned she's like, well, maybe in that moment I saw that, like, it reminded me of like when I watched him in a cologne ad many years later that like, maybe he did want to be wanted or something like that.

[Chelsea Devontez]

It's so good because it's a little shade to him, Mr. Serious Actor, that like, yeah, you kind of also liked it a little bit.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah.

[Chelsea Devontez]

And then she goes from Vogue into hosting snl, which sounds like its own specific kind of hell, I can't even imagine. Meanwhile, the whole time too, like, there are no sample sizes that fit her. She's constantly having to, like, make it work on the day when she's filming all these things. And then you have the Internet, like, judging her, being like, we'll give any amount of money for untouched photos of Vogue. And it's just.

[Brian Bahi]

That's so crazy.

[Chelsea Devontez]

It's so crazy and so mean spirited and so unnecessary. It was the normal sized woman who wanted to show herself having sex with hot guys on tv and people just like, lost their minds. It was such a time, like, ugh. I think, like, this is where, in my opinion, it's right before a lot of the health problems to starts. It's sort of the salad days of girls. It's sort of the best version of what it's gonna be for her in terms of her fame. And it's also kind of like her at her height. Like, she has this boyfriend that loves her. They're living together, They've bought this apartment. It's kind of a weird apartment that's not totally them. And she's sort of kind of really enjoying her life as much as she possibly can at this moment. And then she says, I had my first endometriosis surgery in the fall of 2014, knee deep in scandal. I almost felt relieved that I would soon be forced to pause and have the blessed vacation of anesthesia. So she suffers from endometriosis, which, if you don't know, is a chronic, often painful disease where tissue similar to the uterine Lining grows outside of the uterus, causing inflammation, scar tissue, and infertility. Brian, you're Catholic. We're gonna talk a lot about women's body parts in this section. So just buckle up, get ready. My Catholic friend.

[Brian Bahi]

Former Catholic.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Former Catholic. I'm not Catholic, but I was raised by a Catholic who thought, like, Madonna was bad. So I feel you. I'm right there with you. But no. So, again, there's so much detail about her surgeries and her health problems. I feel like we're kind of getting back into the book. Gonna talk about that as a section. But it is throughout her health problems, and I am not a doctor, so I'm gonna try to talk about this as cogently as I can. But she talks a lot about. She has surgeries to remove lesions during. I think it's like, the last season of Girls. She says it's sort of cursed. She shatters her elbow. She's getting on these drugs to lower her estrogen, which is supposed to help. Post surgery, she starts to have these surgeries that these male doctors are telling her it's gonna get fixed, it's gonna get fixed, and it just never does. She does a talk at the endometriosis ball, which. I'm a comedy writer, so I'm sorry for laughing.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah. Hottest ticket in town.

[Chelsea Devontez]

But she is introduced to a doctor who's a specialist who wants to help her, and she just seems to be getting. As anyone who's had, like, chronic issues, like, a lot of information from a lot of different people. And I will say, too, there's such a ton. I don't want to act like I understand it. There is an element, though, of not the unreliable narrator in terms of her not telling the truth as to what's happening to her. But there is a lot of. This section ends with her going into rehab. And I feel like, as someone who has family who has suffered from drug addiction, this is the portion of the book where I was like, oh, man, it took her seven years to write this. She's clearly been so thoughtful about how she processed the events. I do wonder. There's, like, your version, my version, and the truth. And, like, I do wonder sometimes I'm like, what happened? Because this is when loved ones start to pull away. This is when her parents sort of have to take over. She has to use a walker. She continues to suffer from pain. She's starting to take more of, like, a cocktail of drugs to combat different side effects that are all sort of competing for her attention. This is during the final Season of Girls. There's a lot of ER visits, which I was shocked to hear, which is, you know, it's for emergencies, which she was having lots of emergencies. It's also addict behavior. I know a lot of addicts that would, like, frequent the emergency room in order to get like. And I'm not making any. I'm not making any judgment calls. I'm not. But, like, there's a portion of this book where, like, I would imagine if I suffered from a chronic disease, my triggers would be, like, supporting her as someone who has been at the other end of dealing with folks's drug addiction. My other triggers went up, but I was like, wait, what's going on here? And I was like, trying to make sense of it and ask questions in a way that, like, made me uncomfortable. Like, I didn't want to question a woman, believe women, you know what I mean? Like, I don't want to, like, question someone's health. But there was an element of like, this is when she starts calling in sick to work a lot. This is when she has to sort of step away from her next television project called Camping that she did with Jenny Connor. And then it's like, suddenly I'm in rehab. And also, too, she admits, like, taking more Klonopin and that her memory wasn't as good for certain moments of this. And this is when and Jack starts to be making albums in other rooms with pop stars that she doesn't name. Okay, coming back in to say that while Lena doesn't name her in the book specifically, we know from the timeline that this is allegedly about Lorde Jack co wrote and co produced her album melodrama in 2017. Both Lord and Jack denied dating rumors, but there was a lot of Internet chatter about it. There was this Twitter user named Buzzkillory that made this, like, super long PowerPoint about it. And I guess I forgot to mention in the book, Lena writes that she reached out to her, she DMed her. And this PowerPoint creator immediately asked if Lena wanted to go on her podcast. And she did not, but just wanted to add that context. And so this to me was like, clearly when her life got the messiest. And it felt like the most. Not unreliable narrator, but it definitely felt like a little bit like, huh. That was the only part where I'm

[Brian Bahi]

like, so interesting because I'm glad you brought that up, because it was during this part that I was like, a little bit losing track of what was happening. I felt like I would be like, like, she's in the hospital. She's like, doing something. It's not going well, and then it's like a different hospital visit. And it was like. It was all just kind of, like, so quick and put together in, like, a way that was hard to follow, that I was like, huh, what's this? Feels like a lot.

[Chelsea Devontez]

This feels like a lot. I don't envy the experience of having to go back and revisit it and also having to track it, especially if you had been on a lot of drugs while it was happening, for sure. But it was kind of this thing of, like, at what part does the health narrative kind of transition into the attic narrative? And it felt like in this version, there wasn't really a clear line, which is how this stuff works, and it's messy, you know?

[Brian Bahi]

I have a question for you.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yes.

[Brian Bahi]

Do you think all memoirs have there's a little bit of, like, you're kind of trying to tell your version of the story to make that, like, the version. In a way, you're, like, a little bit twisting what you feel is the truth in order to come out as, like, less of a bad person?

[Chelsea Devontez]

Absolutely. I mean, I feel like you can tell the people who've had therapy and are kind of processing these things that have happened to them. And then I think there are some memoirs where they are, like, litigating and making an argument for, like, why they're right. It's like a. It's like, an interesting thing, watching folks be like, well, obviously, I was gonna sleep with this man, because I did, or whatever. And you were like, wait, what? It was interesting reading Ione Skye memoir where, like, she makes some really messy decisions, and there were parts of it where you're like, oh, you're just trying to make this okay. But I also think, like, there are folks who are genuinely. And Ione sky is the same, trying to process something that had happened to them. My therapist, I was telling her about, like, something that my mom did, and I was like, and she doesn't even remember it. And she was like, yeah. She was like, the way the human brain works is when something happens to you, it means more to you. So that's why, like, sometimes my mom would apologize for things, and I'm like, I have no memory of what you're talking about because it didn't matter to me. But if it deeply mattered to me, like, she has no memory of that because it didn't matter to her. And so I think ultimately, a memoir is a collection of your memories, and you're gonna write the stuff that matters. The most to you. And you're probably just, in a human way, gonna be unaware of the things that may have mattered to other people. So in the book, she says, my boyfriend didn't do this, or my co worker didn't do this. But I. All I could think of is what would their memoir say? Like, what would they be saying? What was their version of it? It is the part of the book that she seems the most under an influence. And I'm like, some of the arguments for some of the fame, sick stuff. Some of the arguments for how she was treated by the industry, some of that stuff, I'm like, okay, I'm taking a lot of that with a little bit of a grain of salt only because if this is an addiction, your frame is gonna be very specific. In my mind.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah, it felt like it was just too many bad things listed for it to. It didn't feel real. In a way, it didn't feel real.

[Chelsea Devontez]

But also, if it's happening to you, that is the list. You know what I mean? You're not gonna make the list of like the days we didn't get to shoot camping. You're gonna be like, I fucking had this cyst explode. You know, it's like. So it makes sense to me why it is this way. But it also gives me, like, a curiosity that like, other parts of the book just didn't. And not to make light of any of her medical situations. Cause there's a point in the book where she has to take a break, she has to step away, and it becomes an insurance issue, which if you don't know, like, you know, all shows are insured, but it's just awful. I don't want to get too much into the details of it, but she has to go to a doctor that's connected to the productions insurance to. To validate her decision to step away medically. And she gets an exam where the doctor does not listen to her and is completely, in my opinion, commits medical abuse and he causes the system to burst that she's trying to get surgery from this specialist to fix. It's a horrific crossroads between her professional life, her having to deal with these medical issues, and also being sort of really failed by the medical industry. And then there was a reader that reached out to her and got word to her that she may have this thing. It's a genetic collagen disorder called Ehlers Danlos syndrome. And again, too much to go over in one podcast. But she literally, while she's dealing with all of these crazy issues with her Endometriosis. And her loved ones are sort of still holding on, that she gonna get better. She's so afraid to get diagnosed with this new thing because she's like, I can't bring this new diagnosis, even though I definitely have this thing to my loved ones. And it just. It's so awful.

[Brian Bahi]

What's crazy about that letter is the person. It was like one of her friends went on a few hinge dates with this person and was like, can you pass this letter on to Lena? But also, they referenced a lot of just, like, her physical ailments that she wrote about in her first memoir. And that based on that, she. They, like, kind of diagnosed her.

[Chelsea Devontez]

That's crazy. So it all kind of culminates in this moment. And she says, I was convinced that the uterus I'd been given was defective. Their goal had been to preserve my fertility. These doctors. And so she goes, I took all the medications, I felt the side effects, and I had the surgeries, and I had some more of them. And I paused and unpaused, life started and unstarted, fucking hoped and unhoped things would change. Until one day in November, after I'd run out of healthy things to try during my autumn of health health, my mother and I marched right into Lenox Hill emergency room and announced I wasn't leaving until they took my uterus. No, really, take her. And she had written an article in the New York Times about this when she was talking about her endometriosis. And so I. I'd heard the story previously, but she. And I've had friends who also have wanted to have hysterectomies who are just refused in the medical industry. She says, like I. I said before, their goal had been to preserve my fertility. That was what they had considered their primary job. And there's so many doctors who refuse to give women under 30 a hysterectomy because they believe, like, eventually you're going to want. There's a lot of fear of being sued. But she basically refuses to leave the hospital. She stays there for 15 days, has to get approval with, like, a therapist note, and to see another doctor and gets approval to actually have it removed. And it's just. It's such a crazy, harrowing moment in the book. And you're just like, so with her. And you're so sick for her. Like, you're sick that she has to keep doing this and having to keep advocating for herself. And the whole time it's like. Like a. Like a mystery where she's like, I know something's. It's like a horror movie. She's like, I know something's wrong.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah.

[Chelsea Devontez]

And no one will believe her. And she's like, I know. I know my body.

[Brian Bahi]

It's truly my greatest fear. Anytime I go to the doctor, I'm

[Chelsea Devontez]

like a th percent.

[Brian Bahi]

Just let them know what's going on, because I. If they don't know, I'm so worried.

[Chelsea Devontez]

No, a thousand percent. And you want to trust the person who's saying they can fix it, you know? So she gets her uterus removed, and she says, my uterus was worse than anyone had imagined. It was the Chinatown Chanel purse of nightmares, full of blood. Both subtle and glaring flaws. In addition to endometrial disease. An odd hump like protrusion and a septum running down the middle, in effect creating two uteruses one behind the other. I had had retroperitoneal bleeding, AKA my period running in reverse so that my stomach was full of menstrual blood. My ovary had settled on the sacral muscles on my back, which was affecting my gait, hence the need for a walker this past summer. Oh, my God. And so. So she was right about everything. The doctor has to admit that she's correct. Everyone has to kind of just say, like, you were right. This was the right thing to do. We never should have kept treating something that should have unfortunately been removed. And then, of course, at this point, Jack Antonoff shows up two hours late. He was stuck on a tour bus and was asking if they could hold the surgery. Her dad is, like, pissed at him and is like, yeah, surgery is like a train, not a tour bus. You either make it or you don't. And this is where we sort of get the idea that this is the sort of beginning of the end for. For her relationship and her sort of working relationship with Jenny Connor, but also her actual romantic relationship with Jack Antonoff. When she goes to heal, they don't take her home with her boyfriend. She stays home with her parents. And so we sort of kind of enter the sort of last third of the book. So she's finished the last season of Girls. She's sort of on the outs with her boyfriend. And the thing that's hard, too, is because of all the drugs and things she's taking, she's, like, not having a lot of sex. She's not feeling very sexual. I feel like so much of that relationship seemed so impacted by her ailments in a way that, like, wasn't necessarily unfair, but, like, it does a Lot of explaining as to why there was a lot of conflict. I didn't seem like, yeah, two people who didn't like each other. It seemed very much like it was situational.

[Brian Bahi]

Okay, so I wrote this quote down. I feel like this is around the part, I forget where this happens exactly, but I wrote this quote down. I think she's talking with her dad or like it comes off like a part where she's talking with her dad. But she was like. But I've always been possessed with a dense imagination that feels as if I was born with generations of tipsy, provocative women inside me. For some reason that informed the illness part as well, because I feel like she has so much to say and has so much to like, wants to do creatively and give and like have stuff like experience and pass through her. And then like the output is that. And in a way I think what comes with that, like that kind of intense, kind of just like feeling and creativity and output is this like also body intense. I don't know how to describe it, but it just like it somehow makes sense that like the other half of like to experience a lot is to also just like have your body, put your body through a lot. And for some reason that like made me, I was like, she, I don't know, that made a lot of sense to me.

[Chelsea Devontez]

This is reminded me of something I highlighted from the introduction where she says I'm here because of an almost unrelenting drive towards self expression which manifests as workaholism and single minded obsession that actually runs counters to a skilled manipulation of fame. It feels like she just started running and she just never stopped. And she obviously like exhausted her body, but it was coming from this place of wanting to create and wanting to experience so she could keep creating. And I do think there's something really like wild and free about that that I think is really cool.

[Brian Bahi]

Absolutely.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yeah. So as she is feeling better now, I feel like there's now doctors sort of trying to make sense of everything that has happened to her. She has an experience where someone sort of goes through all of the drugs she's been taking to sort of combat about various side effects and things. And they explained to her like, you're on way too much Klonopin and you're taking way too many opiates. And it sort of explained to her that she's addicted to opiates which. And that she can't just go cold turkey because she needs to be taken off of them slowly. And so she enters a rehab and this is happening while she is in making her second show with Janet Connor called Camping. I watched every episode of Camping. I don't know if you ever saw it, but it was an experience. I won't get into it, but it was, you know, know, those were the chapters that gave me so much anxiety. And I don't know if that's my own workaholism or if that's just like where she was just taking like weeks off of work and, and trying to write by herself and trying to like sort of participate but was unable to. And it was like that was one of the parts that made my neck sweat. So she enters rehab. Things are getting very kind of even more rocky with Jack Antonoff. Oh, oh. But in between that, we should talk about Nick. So she has her hysterectomy. She's starting to fight with Jack Antonoff. He leaves to go on tour and she cheats on him. According to her, she's reunited with this guy Nick, who she's known since they were 8 years old, so her like 6th grade boyfriend. And she ends up having sex. No judgments, but way too early based on the surgery. Like you're supposed to heal for many weeks and just scary. The way she described it, it was terrifying to me. I was, but I was, wasn't like judging her. I was worried. I was like, you just got back.

[Brian Bahi]

No judgment at all.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Hashtag, no judgments live out loud. But it was like I was so worried for her. Nick, it's pretty clear to me, was an addict who might have also been homeless. She clearly was like kind of drawn towards someone who was like a full bowl of chaos and sort of to get away from him and to get away from a lot of things. She enters rehab to get off Klonopin. I think she's a little skeptical about her need for this. But she enters and I cannot imagine being Lena Dunham famous. Like she talks about how like someone outs her for being there. It's very embarrassing. She tries to like befriend the people who are there. There's like a teen girl who she ends up befriending Galen, I think is her name, who is like literally listening to a song produced by Jack Antonoff while they're in rehab. It just seems. And Galen is this wonderful like kind of Bling Ring type teen who's also in rehab and sort of befriends her and as sort of like her confidant during that time. And it's just, it's. Please enjoy the chapter. I don't have much to say about the rehab of it all, but it does seem like, thankfully, she's able to really embrace the program and has stayed sober, which I think is really beautiful. Yeah.

[Brian Bahi]

So shout out to rehab.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Shout out to rehab Shout out to rehab Shout out to the 12 steps. Shout out to being sick and tired of being sick and tired. So then this is sort of. There's so much of the book to go through, but she ends up breaking up with Jack Antonoff. She goes to England to do industry. And this is my favorite part of the book. So I'm gonna end on this for the most part. There's one more thing I wanna say, but she ends up in England, where she later will go on to, like, call Jack Antonoff and have a sort of reunion on the phone and set herself on fire in a way that she has to go to a burn unit and her dad has to come back and get her. Spoiler alert. It's wild. But before that happens, she's kind of a good time gal in England. She's hanging out with her mom's glamorous friend. She is taking Lena to a party in London that has people attending like Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, Martin Scorsese, Al Pacino, Harvey Keitel. And to her surprise, Bruce Spreenstein shows up. And she had met him years ago with his wife when she was still with Jack. Jack is from New Jersey. He's a huge fan of Bruce Spreenstein. He's sort of embarrassed and doesn't wanna approach him. But Lena takes him over and she's like, this guy's doing so much for New Jersey. He's doing the Shadow of the City festival. She, like, introduces him and she's really hyping him up the way like a good girlfriend does. And apparently he had gotten much closer to Bruce Spreestein. And she was like, I just wasn't there to see it. And it's just like a sad moment. So she's sitting across from him at dinner, and after an awkward perusal of menus, Bruce looked up at me with eyes so clear I knew he saw my secret garden and said, since we last saw each other, Jack has become very special to me. Reader. Sometimes you see two doors in life. One marked normal behavior and one marked psycho stuff. And after a brief pause to really consider what's best, you choose psycho stuff. And that's what I did. That's what I have so often done. From my mouth came a font of verbal diarrhea that sounded something like this. I'm glad he's special to you because he promised to love me forever and that's not how it turned out. And I may not have been perfect, but I would have tried. And now he shames me for just existing. And I'm going to write a memoir one day. And I don't know how not to just call it. I hate you, Jack. You broke me, Jack. It's like, it's so.

[Brian Bahi]

I love that she chose the chaos row and that's why she is who she is.

[Chelsea Devontez]

She literally took like a rock and roll godfather and turned him into like the Michael Showalter in the post it Sex and the City episode. Like she literally put him in a Sex and the City episode. And so then he. She's like, Bruce could have gone off on me. She totally admits it. She's just like, he could have been like, get your shit together girl. This is not the ladies room. But she goes instead, he looked at me with the gentlest eyes, eyes that crinkled with all the charm that our nation's creative father should exude, and said, well Lisa, this is the hard stuff. These are the questions artists must ask ourselves. And none of us had that answer about how to best express our hurt through art. But when I was writing my memoir, I told myself this again and again. First off, if it's boring, stop writing it. He laughed self effacingly. And second, you don't owe it to people to be honest about every little thing. That doesn't mean you lie. It just means you can have secrets. You only owe it to them to show em how your mind works. And I was just like shout out to that part.

[Brian Bahi]

I like literally teared up at that part. I was like holy shit. I like need to hear that.

[Chelsea Devontez]

That he could have chose violence and he didn't and chose to be like basically Kim Cattrall in a Sex of the City episode and give her like sage like advice was so beautiful to me. And this is only gonna happen to Lena Dunham. This is only gonna happen to her. And like it just made me think so highly of both of them. He goes on to say, it's very hard to write about people we've loved. And then he looked at me as if his eye contact was a hallway and I was walking deeper into. And sometimes we forget that in the moment those relationships should have taken as much work as our real jobs. And it's a little shade from Bruce Springsteen of like backing up his bestie, Jack Anton. It's just so messy and sexy and wonderful and like I don't know. I just loved it. I loved that, like, they were in a Sex and City episode and that he. But he also was, like, so thoughtful enough to give her this gift. And when I look at this book as a whole, I do feel like she did it. She did what the boss said to do. Like, she kept her secrets, but she also, like, she showed them how her mind worked. Like, this whole book is, like. I feel like I walked around in the mind of Lena Dunham, and I really loved that for her.

[Brian Bahi]

You're actually so right about that. That's kind of crazy.

[Chelsea Devontez]

No, it's beautiful. Like, the whole thing is beautiful. And, like, I think I'll end by saying that, you know, she goes on to meet what's odd to me in the book. I don't think it's bad, but she goes in these very deep, detailed descriptions of people's outfits, of people's faces and of people's apartments. She, like, has these, like, long, detailed descriptions. When she talks about her wedding and meeting her husband, there's none of that. She really focuses granularly on, like, the bad parts and the exciting parts. And then when she goes to the happy parts, it's like, she hasn't really tackled that yet. And my only hope is that, like, in 15 years, we're gonna get that. We're gonna get the married Lena, the British Lena. And so I'm hoping that's why it was so short. But it does end with her getting married and sort of starting to write again and starting to sort of really find herself. She says this great line where she's like, I'm no longer invited to them at gala, but I've been invited to weddings. And, like, it just really made me, like. I don't know, I feel like this sort of big sister y weird feeling for her of just wanting. You do want to protect her. It makes sense why she attracted all these people who kind of wanted to help usher her to places because, like, she really puts it all out there, and I just really admire that.

[Brian Bahi]

I think a lot of people wanted to see her fail. They wanted to see her go down in flames. And her kind of, like, disappearing a little bit before too much, I think, was, like, they got a little bit of what they wanted in a way. But I think her with that show and then her with the memoir and, like, the presstorfer memoir, I think, is a little bit of, like, fuck you to them. And it's so cool to see that she is, like, writing again and, like, doing all of this, like, Cool stuff again. I totally.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yeah. I don't think she's, like, by any stretch a perfect person or would claim to be, but I think she seems happier. And I think that definitely makes me happy. Like, I think that's just a beautiful thing. Okay, so we end the podcast by doing the book Dill Test, which was established by Chelsea Devonta's Institute of Reading. She asked these three questions. So, Brian Ryan, was the author vulnerable in the sharing of their truth? Yes, I think so.

[Brian Bahi]

I think the most vulnerable you could be.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I think the most vulnerable she could be.

[Brian Bahi]

Yes, I think. And I think she is one of the most vulnerable people in television.

[Chelsea Devontez]

She's like the mascot for. For vulnerability. Yes, agreed. Was it entertaining?

[Brian Bahi]

Absolutely.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I would say yes, for the most part, yes. And then three. Did reading it elevate your life? If so, explain how I think.

[Brian Bahi]

Yes. Well, first of all, I think. Think a lot of memoirs are ghostwritten. But I think what sets her this apart is that she has such good prose and, like, there are a lot of lines that just, like, are so good and, like, standalone and quotable and, like, really punch you in the gut sometimes. That's what you're. You're getting when you get something that's written by her.

[Chelsea Devontez]

I agree. I think it was really. Yeah. Even if this had been, like, not even if this had been fiction, it would have been a great novel, you know, And I think it's so hard to do that with your own life. And I also think, again, and just a shout out that, like, the time capsule aspect of. She did a great job of capturing so many things that, like, I forgot to feel, you know, like that nostalgia for your youth or that early creativity or just the stress of failing people in a work setting, on a TV writing setting, like, all of it. I felt like she just really tapped into in a really wonderful way, whether you knew that world or whether you don't.

[Brian Bahi]

Yeah.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Yeah, shout out to her. So would you like to plug anything? Brian Bahy?

[Brian Bahi]

If you're listening to this podcast, you should listen to the podcast I co host with our mutual friend Janice Schmeeding. It's called Sage Based Wisdom.

[Chelsea Devontez]

It is so funny. You guys are so, so funny on that podcast. And I've been on it a couple times, and I absolutely adore it. I have nothing else to plug except, I guess, like, my Instagram, Sierra Ornalis. I post a bunch of dumb stuff on there all the time.

[Brian Bahi]

I'm ryanbahi on Instagram and just, like,

[Chelsea Devontez]

buy and watch stuff. Native people are making indigenous people powwow season's coming up. Buy some stuff but also just like enjoy. Enjoy the stuff we make. Thank you, Brian for doing this.

[Brian Bahi]

Thank you so much for having me.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

A big thank you to our senior managing producer, Christina Lopez, our executive producer Jordan Moncada, our sound engineer Marcus Hamm, and our amazing associate producer, Dominique Banyas. I also want to give a huge thank you to our incredible partners over at Thrive Cosmetics and Quince. We will link those incredible brands in the show notes, so go check them out. Everything is always linked in the show notes on Apple. There's also transcripts and if you ever have questions, go to the Patreon Chat Lounge and I will see you there.

[Brian Bahi]

When I found out I was going to be a parent, I immediately felt a lot of anxiety and worry. So I went on to BetterHelp to try to look for a therapist to help me with that.

[Chelsea Devontez]

My relationship with my family and with my boyfriend and with myself were suffering. I really needed help.

[Podcast Host Chelsea Devontez]

I was ruminating a lot.

[Chelsea Devontez]

Really getting those thoughts out to a therapist and getting feedback was just life changing. Discover what BetterHelp online therapy can do for you. Visit betterhelp.com today.