← Glamorous Trash: A Celebrity Memoir Podcast
Glamorous Trash: A Celebrity Memoir Podcast
Spencer Pratt’s memoir The Guy You Loved to Hate (with Erin Bagwell)
01:30:44
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- [00:06]
A
Welcome to Glamorous Trash. This is a podcast that book clubs, viral articles, celebrity memoirs, and trashy discourse to elevate your life. I'm your host, Chelsea Divachez. I'm a TV writer, comedian, filmmaker, author, and sometimes I'm in stuff too. And today we are macro dosing the guy you love to hate. Confessions of a reality TV villain. The men's more of one. Spencer Pratt. Now, perhaps you rem Spencer as a villain in the early 2000s MTV reality show called the Hills, where he appeared alongside now wife Heidi Montag. You know them both as Spidey. Brutal couples name Spidey. And he's gone on to appear on other reality shows like I'm a Celebrity, Get Me out of Here, Celebrity Big Brother, Wife Swap. I'm sure something else is coming. Spencer made headlines last year after he and Heidi lost their house in the Palisades fire. Fire. And he became a staunch critic of Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. And then in early January of this year, Spencer announced that he's running for mayor of Los Angeles. And that's when the book came out. Now, before we dive in, I can see that we have a slew of new listeners. So for anyone who is brand new to this podcast, we play a game called Dringo. It's a combination of Bingo and take a drink, where every time we hit one of the usually very sad tropes in a memoir, like getting a husband, juror, or a periphery female character who we need to check on, I will call Dringo and we take a drink. Sometimes it's good stuff, like a psychic moment. The number one Dringo of all memoirs ever is a celebrity list their exact weight. Second to that is a cameo from war criminal Henry Kissinger. That's podcast lore. I know, it's unbelievable. It's true. Mick Jagger, Prince, or Warren Beatty are a close second. Now, we've been recording since the pandemic, and I mean literally. The first episodes were Instagram Lives, where I invited friends to Instagram live with me about books. And I did it all from a bathtub, which was a horrible idea, but I love to read books in the bath. So that's how it started. Which is all to say, there are so many episodes, if you start at the beginning. I especially went on a very emotional journey on this podcast. The first books I shared were these female celebrity memoirs that had really shaped my life and deeply impacted me. I love this genre of book. This is my favorite genre. I don't think it's Stupid and trashy. I love celebrity memoirs. I'm also in this business, so I kind of always have this, I guess, bias towards, like, learning about their lives. Like, how did you do it? How do you survive in the arts? Like, all these things. So I went through a deeply, deeply emotional journey, journey on this podcast as these books, sort of deconstructing them one by one honestly kind of tore me apart and put me back together in. In the best way. And it led to me writing my own memoir, which came out last year. And then since then, I've really. I feel so emotionally spent that I've really pulled back on the emotions as of late. Not even by choice, but it's just the place I'm in right now. If I was going to recommend one throwback episode to start with, I would actually say Roseanne. It's not what you are expecting. And once someone DM'd me that they actually got a speeding ticket while listening to our Roseanne episode, because that's how wild it is now. If you like the podcast, join the Patreon or Apple subscriptions where we do at least one juicy memoir a month behind the paywall. Which also means there's five years. Is there five years? Yeah, I think more than five years of bonus books just waiting for you. And now gird your loins. Because while this podcast likes to center female stories, every now and then, we make a men's more exception. And today is that day. Let's dive in. Spencer, there were so many times where you were just really a douche canoe on that show, and you just seemed to amp it up, amp it up, amp it up.
- [04:03]
B
Was there ever a time when you got home and you'd go, I just.
- [04:06]
A
Can'T believe I just did that, or I just said that. Or were you aware of how you were coming across at the time? Oh, I was well aware you were, yeah. And if anything, I probably should have been a bigger douche canoe, you know? Really? Yeah. I mean, look at, you know, the show ended and Jersey Shore is still airing, still a success. And I always wanted to be part of a franchise and a team like the Jersey Shore cast. So I think the rest of the cast should have all tried to bend bigger douche canoes. My guest today is Aaron Bagwell. You might remember Aaron as the guest on our episode about Madison Beer's memoir. Aaron just teamed up with another cookie, Rhiannon Hauk, to host the new podcast, the Hidden History of Magic. It's about the extraordinary, mystical, and true stories they skipped over in History class. You will hear a little preview at the end of our episode. Now, Aaron, you called dibs on this book literally 30 minutes after it was announced, I think nine months ago. Is it because Spencer is super woo woo and into crystals, or does your connection go further than that?
- [05:10]
B
I definitely am a Hills fan and I. I've been following Spencer since, like, his hummingbird TikTok days. But there's some. Just something that grabbed me about it, and my God, am I glad that I signed up for this book. It is such a wild ride. I'm so excited to talk about it. I've been gabbing about it to everybody. They're like, shut up about Spencer Pratt. I had a dinner party last week and I was like, showing people, like, my notes in the book, and I'm like, you'll never believe this memoir. It's so good. It's so fun. So thanks for having me.
- [05:37]
A
Oh, my gosh. Well, thanks for doing it. And also you being like, I have to cover this is also what guaranteed it would come on this podcast. Because I am shook to say that I loved reading this book. And I mean, I'm almost devastated by it.
- [05:51]
B
I think Men's war of the Year. I'm writing a little something myself. And I was like, do I have to go back to my edit? Do I need to dig deeper? Because Spencer Pratt's voice in this, his tone is so strong. I mean, I was quite inspired.
- [06:06]
A
Yes. That is a great way of saying it. It's not like it's like the most deep book you've ever read. It is that for a celebrity memoir, the tone and voice is off the hook. The clarity, the storytelling. And what I want to do right now is give a trophy out to his ghostwriter, Carolyn Ryder.
- [06:23]
B
Hell yeah.
- [06:23]
A
He also, thank God, gave her lots of credit in the back of the book, but I think she should have front cover credit. This is a phenomenal ghostwriter job. Like, I constantly was like, who is this ghostwriter? Who's this ghostwriter? I looked her up just a little bit, and from what I found, I think she is one of us. The way she described the scripts she writes and things like that, I was like, oh, I would love to read something like that. And so I really think that in her hands, he has a great book in the way where, like, I think if she was the ghostwriter for some other people, they could have funneled their horribleness into a, like, sarcastic take. Accountability still tell a good story, but, like, really captured that millennial voice. Cause it sounds like him if it didn't sound like him, it wouldn't have been fun.
- [07:09]
B
I say yes. Obviously, the ghostwriter did an exceptional job, really took the bear stories, and, like, gave us a theme. The whole villain arc is fun to listen to, fun to read, fun to get his perspective on. But I also have to give Spencer credit because so many celebrity memoirs want to tell the stories they want to tell, and Spencer really, like, shares his wounds, shares his despicable behavior, shares stories that I would never tell my children. You know, he really lays it all out there, and I think what's fun about it is because he's, like, a little bit on a darker journey, especially through all, like, the weird Hills gun thing. We'll get to it all. It makes his redemption towards the end very sweet, and you feel very connected to his growth. Like, we get to see the arc of it, which I think is satisfying as a reader.
- [08:01]
A
He has a huge arc, but I'm wary of it because, again, I can really see the beautiful work of the ghostwriter in this book. Like, I. I really don't think this book would have delivered in someone else's hands. And while he has a huge arc for him, he's still done so many horrible things that it's like. I don't know, like, how much growth is there? Or did you just kind of get to a normal level? And he comes off really, really well in the book, but is his book. And so I'm really trying to hold all the other stuff I know about him as we talk about this, because I did not watch the Hills.
- [08:37]
B
Yeah.
- [08:37]
A
And at one point in the book, you can tell, he.
- [08:40]
B
He.
- [08:41]
A
If he had just been a reality TV producer, he would be one of the richest, most successful of them alive.
- [08:48]
B
And could have been.
- [08:49]
A
Could have been. And that. And he is like, I make bad decisions, and that's why I'm not. And that. And I love that part of it. But when he gave his assessment of the Hills, he's like, I turned this thing on. It's wildly popular. It's slow, it's boring. Nothing happens, but they look beautiful. And he gives this whole rundown of it, and I was like, that's how I feel. I've never been able to watch. I know people love the Hills. It's never content. I've taken in all to say that I'm worried that I am giving him more of a pass than he deserves because I'm loving the book but can't hold that hate from the Hills equally in my hand, you know?
- [09:23]
B
Yeah. I mean, Listen, I watched the Hills and Laguna beach, and it was really. I mean, he talks about in the book that it was really a carryover from the O.C. you know, like, my friends were obsessed with O.C. we had watch parties. Like, we were very dedicated to it. It was very formative television. And then for Laguna beach and the Hills, it was really kind of this fantasy. You got to watch play out of these beautiful young women who were working for Vogue. And it just was very in the way Housewives is. It was very aspirational to see these young women think about their careers, think about their love life, live together, you know, have Chinese on. Like, it was a very joyful, kind of easy, breezy show.
- [10:02]
A
That's nice.
- [10:03]
B
And I will say the thing I remember most about Spencer is the scene where Heidi leaves with the U Haul and moves in with him. I remember crying because I knew it was Heidi and Elsie were breaking up. Like, their friendship was over. And so we do hold this space where he played the monster and the villain, and he was portrayed as, like, a playboy, a brat, spoiled, entitled. You know, he talks about having, like, a double cell phone. But to know that it all was just for the show, like, gives me grace for him in that character. And also, when you're in your 20s, your early 20s, like, what the hell? You know what you're doing? I don't. You know, so that also the age of it all, I feel like, adds softness to it.
- [10:47]
A
I really like hearing that point of view on the Hills. And especially because it was, like, one of the first. You know, it was way before we had all of the reality shows we do now. And, like, going back and watching Girls Next Door, which I did watch, is weirdly such a pleasant show. Like, nothing happens. And so, yeah, you're right. Hit in that moment because it has been so popular. We're going to debate on this because. And I want to debate, and I'm really going to try and hold the line because I actually. I don't know that it was all for show. He still hates Lauren Conrad in this book, and for all the evidence he gives, I am like, you have it wrong. Like, and we'll get into it. But when she's moving in with him, I am like, no, this actually was wrong and it actually did happen. And their friendship actually did break up. And he does play a role in that. Obviously, it will get into the details of how much was for show and how much wasn't. But some of it still remains in him where he's like, lauren sucks. Okay? We're going to take a quick break right now and we'll be right back. LA goes through so many weather changes so frequently. Sometimes it's raining, sometimes it's sunny and my skin reacts every single time. So I have been taking Ritual's Hysera skin supplement which is a clinically proven way to support skin hydration with science backed benefits like reducing wrinkles and improving skin smoothness. Now I love that. Hysara is a certified B corp, which means they are committed to doing good in the world and good with their product, which always makes me feel better both as a person and with the product I am using. And Hysera led to a 2.9 increase in facial skin smoothness within 90 days as compared to a placebo. Hysera is also rigorously tested and validated by a third party for allergens, microbes and heavy materials and is Clean Label Project certified so you can trust what you are putting in your body. Start Hysera to support your glow without compromising on clean science. For a limited time, save 40% on your first month at ritual.com glamorous that's ritual.com glamorous for 40% off your first month. All right, so I run around a lot. I do a lot. I'm kind of a night owl that has to wake up early so I have the darkest circles under my eyes always. I have started putting castor oil underneath my eyes and sleeping with it every night and then on my eyelids. I have been using Thrive Cosmetics Brilliant eye brightener, which is my favorite. It's just shimmery enough. It's like an eyeshadow highlighter stick made to brighten and open your eyes. And this combo is really guys, I got to say, I think, I think it's crushing it. It looks radiant. I apply it to the inner corner of my eyes to look rested and effortless. But then I also just cover the lid. It just kind of gives your eyes an extra pop. The smallest things you do can have a big impact. And when you buy from Thrive Cosmetics, every purchase goes to a cause. The cause in cosmetics that they support, including domestic violence, which is a topic that is extremely close to my heart and my life. And I love that when I am making a small purchase, I know that it's still going to help a larger purpose. Thrive Cosmetics has given over 150 million in product and cash donations to save 600 giving partners. And each purchase directly fuels real impact. So it is beauty with a purpose. Amplify your everyday. Go to thrive cosmetics.com glamorous for an exclusive offer of 20% off your first order. That's Thrive Cosmetics. C A U S e m e t-I c s.com glamorous okay, welcome back. Let's continue the conversation.
- [14:34]
B
I also understand, though, that here I go defending Spencer. Lauren Conrad is the Gwyneth Paltrow, like, of mtv. She really was protected. She was the princess. It felt like anything that she said goes. And knowing that Spencer grew up, you know, with your Kate Hudson's and your Jack Blacks and was kind of not on the wrong side of the track specifically, but like, not living in a billion dollar mansion and it feels like he always had a little bit of a chip on his shoulder of being the second guy. And so I think Lauren just really triggers all of, like, his childhood emotional wounds about not being the number one golden star. And I don't know if that could ever be healed. But you are right that Heidi did choose him in the end and that their friendship, all those things were real. And because of Spencer. Yes, period. And that sex tape, the whole thing. Yeah.
- [15:26]
A
Which we're going to get into all of that. Okay, so first off, he has a note to the reader. Obviously it's dedicated to Heidi. Then there's a note to the reader. This is the note. If, following the publication of this book, anything happens to me. Heart attack in quotes, suicide, slip in the shower, breaks go out, fall on my head, choke on deli meat, dot, dot, all caps, know that it was murder, and yes, please seek revenge. Love, Spencer Pratt. My note was, oh, no, it's gonna be funny. Damn. Great note to the reader. Great, funny note to the reader. Especially for an early 2000s villain, you're just like, oh, it's funny, it's cheeky, it's. And on the joke, that's when I knew, like, oh, the book's gonna be good. And he gets into the prologue, and here are two paragraphs that jump out. So basically, he's going through the remains of their house that are basically all ashes after the fire we experienced here in la truly only a year and a couple weeks ago. So even though I don't relate to Spencer Pratt, just talking about these fires are pretty hard. And he said I was searching for anything I could salvage from my crystal collection. The chunk of moldavite that turns my meditations into time travel. That first piece of Sugilite, sure, that healed the pain of my wife, Heidi. None survived. All reduced to the same gray dust. The truth is, I'd already burned my life down years before this Wildfire torched relationships for storylines, nuked my reputation for ratings, set my soul ablaze, and called it entertainment. Back then I called it success. So I think it was. Yeah, you already know he's gonna take accountability for dancing with the devil. Pretty much, yeah.
- [17:09]
B
I mean, it's fun to, like, go through each kind of era of his experience and kind of dissect, like, what's real, what's not.
- [17:17]
A
Oh, yeah. He basically grows up in Los Angeles, goes to Crossroads, which is. There's, like, two extremely privileged high schools in Los Angeles. I mean, there's many, but the top two, I think one of them is Crossroads, and his dad is a dentist. And so they are the poor family of the richest part of Los Angeles. And something distilled. For me, it's a theory I'm going to present to you because I had this thought, which is God, that's why he's so evil. To be the poorest person of the 1%. Then I immediately thought of 10 other people I knew or knew of who were the poor person of the most privileged people you've ever met. And they're all monsters. I think this combination makes you maybe the biggest monster. It's like the people who are feeling yourself. Is that you? No.
- [18:11]
B
I mean, I. I grew up on army bases, mostly.
- [18:14]
A
Okay, so this is not you talking about.
- [18:18]
B
But then when we lived off of base, we would go. My mom is very Catholic. We would always go to Catholic schools and be, like, the, like, you know, lower middle of, like, rich kids who lived in huge mansions.
- [18:30]
A
Yeah, and listen, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about, like, did you go to the number one Catholic rich school in your entire city? No, I'm talking about making it to, like, oh, I am here with a bunch of famous people, and the only thing I have is that my dad's a dentist. Wa. Wa. Poor me. And it's like, you. You have the best life. And I think it creates this, like, putrid entitlement that, again, would have made him a really successful reality TV producer, because he also talks about his personality trait as a kid, and this really made me laugh. He said my first full sentence was, that's mine. Straight to property rights. And basically, as a little kid, he would just walk around, and anything he wanted, he would point at and say, that's mine. And so he really was this person, like, from birth, and he was like, I love detention. My parents said I was the best. They said I deserved everything and I got everything I wanted.
- [19:25]
B
I mean, not only that There's a story in his childhood where essentially he, like, throws a big party or does something or gets in trouble. And his dad calls the voicemail and screams at him. And he takes the voicemail tape and he records it 11 times, holds onto the tape so that he can blackmail his father every time he gets in trouble. Like, if I were in this situation parentally, I would demolish all the tapes and then shame my child for ever thinking they could pull one on me, right? But Spencer's father, he says every time, a glint of pride in my dad's eyes. Game recognize game. Chip off the old block. His approval wasn't for my being good or well behaved. It was for my being clever, strategic, effective. That tape became my first masterclass in power. Not the kind you're born with, but the kind you create. And I feel like that thread is exactly what you're saying. Not only is he kind of edging in that space, but then he's given praise for kind of lighting it all on fire, which is absolutely insane.
- [20:27]
A
Yeah, I completely agree. And, yeah, I think it was a great way of saying, like, my parents raised a little bitch, but in a very compelling way where you're like, oh, this is the truth of it. Like, they really did reward that behavior because he has the seeds of entrepreneur, CEO, villain. So young in that, like many great villains, he's a failed artist. They're like, I want to be a filmmaker. I don't have the talent. I know I'll become evil. And so he wanted to be an artist, and he's like, oh, I want to make a film. I want to do this, I want to do that. And like, has just left high school and is like, I know. And he writes this. My crossroads buddy, Max Winkler, son of Henry Winkler, AKA the Fonz, had a photo shrine to his ex, Mary Kate Olsen, in his bedroom from when they had dated. Young love documented in European hotels, Hollywood parties, stolen moments. This, I realized, was a wasted resource. He goes over to their house and he says, hey, Mr. Winkler, I called out Spencer. How's college treating you? Okay, great. So he's in college. Great. Just picking up some stuff from Max's room. That's nice. You boys stick together. Max needs really good friends right now because he's going through the breakup. Spencer goes upstairs, steals all the photos, finds the number in Us Weekly for the photo editor calls him. He says, hi, this is Spencer Pratt of Pratt Daddy Productions. Devastated he had that name so early. And he said, I have photos you might be interested in. He then Introduced him to another pap who's then like, give me the photos. Here's $50,000. He has $50,000 and he goes and shoots a horrible, terrible film in Brazil with a girl he is sleeping with.
- [22:10]
B
I was gagged. I can't believe he had the audacity to tell this story. And not only tell it, but tell it so beautifully. Like, I love the visual of the fawn sitting like on the stoop just being like, hey, how's it going, Spence? Grab a, grab a sandwich. Oh my God. This one.
- [22:28]
A
Blackmail my son and his teenage. His 18 year old girlfriend at the time, I'm sure. Well, ex girlfriend.
- [22:34]
B
Yeah.
- [22:34]
A
I think it was one. Spencer knows how to sell. So he's like, I have a secret. This will get me headlines when the book shows out. Good for him.
- [22:41]
B
He could. He's around all these rich people. Get an investor, get somebody to write you a check for 50k. It doesn't like, get this. Yeah. It's so bananas that he was like, this is how I'll do it. By exploiting my friend and their relationship. That's so. That's wild.
- [22:58]
A
It's callous, it's manipulative. It's again rewarded early. This is the person who has the chip on their block. My dad's only a dentist. You're a billionaire. Like, I'm mad at you. I'm going to exploit you. Because this is when the press was like, it was probably just right after or right when they were having a countdown to those girls turning 18. Just disgusting. No, it really is. It's like it's 2004. So I'm pretty sure that's the year where men are like as soon as they're 18. I know, like I can look at nude photos of them also.
- [23:27]
B
50,000 is a crazy amount of money for photos. Like the money he talks about in this book. It seems like wild. I mean, I don't know what like paparazzi photos are going for these days, but there's no way that anybody could get that much now. Unless they were like, you know, the Duchess of Schmuckers.
- [23:44]
A
I think you definitely could. For the. Right. The Duchess of Smuckers. I think you still get that money for the right photo. However, one, I think, I hesitate to say this, but I think one good thing social media has brought about is that it did lessen the value of paparazzi photos. Yeah.
- [24:01]
B
Because people just post their own stuff.
- [24:02]
A
Yeah. And as someone who sadly still reads Us Weekly, most of their photos are reposting celebs Instagram photos, and I sadly.
- [24:09]
B
Watch all of your reels about your posts reading Us Weekly and vote on what outfits you're wearing.
- [24:14]
A
So it's, It's. It was kind of nice. Where it's like, I do think the paparazzi business shouldn't be thriving the way it was in the early aughts. And so I hope that it's gone down a bit, but, yeah, that's an incredible amount of money. What an asshole. Absolutely a monster. And is off to his big start in Hollywood. So then the movie does terribly. He shows it to his friend Brody Jenner, who's like, I think you made a snuff film, because it looks like a real murder film versus, like an actual artistic film. He easily is like, yeah, you're right. Let me throw that away. And listen, maybe I'm projecting. I am truly in the final stages of post on my feature film. And to make a film is just. It's like an act of creative war. You truly feel like you're surviving it sometimes. And so it's hard for me to imagine that he would ruin a good friend's Life to give 50,000 to shoot his first film, then find out it was bad. And it's not devastating, you know, like, how is this not the true villain origin story moment?
- [25:15]
B
But Chelsea, you said before that Spencer is not a good filmmaker potentially.
- [25:21]
A
But I'm saying this is when he finds out this is the moment.
- [25:24]
B
But is it, though?
- [25:25]
A
It is because he made an entire film for $50,000.
- [25:29]
B
Right.
- [25:30]
A
Shows it to no one after he realizes it's bad. This is the moment you realize, I'm not gonna be an artist. I'm not gonna be at the Oscars. I'm gonna have to be something. Something else in a different lane. I think that's a devastating moment to have in life that I don't think he spent enough time on.
- [25:47]
B
I read it differently, and I like your take. And I think he breezes by even though he's very truthful in the book. And I wish, you know, we would get a little deeper. There's part of me that knows he has that producer brain that was like, oh, I saw it through Brody's lens and was like, oh, shit. Like, this isn't the direction. So there's part of me that's giving him credit for seeing that. It just wasn't quite the thing.
- [26:13]
A
Yeah. Okay. I really like that read on it. That maybe it wasn't devastating because his true talent is producing, which I do believe.
- [26:19]
B
Yeah. The other thing is, then he later produces Brody's little teaser for the Princess of Malibu. And he can hit the teaser and he can hit.
- [26:25]
A
He, like, yeah.
- [26:26]
B
And he knew where to put the camera. He knew where to follow them around. He knew the, you know, the energy to bring to it. And I think it seems like he has vision. He just maybe whatever that film was, like, didn't hit the mark.
- [26:38]
A
Yeah. Okay. Interesting. Yeah. I mean, listen, having vision for a narrative film so wildly different than what comes next, which is he's hanging out his best friend Brody Jenner's house, and they had been like enemies in high school, fighting over the same girl, but then realized she was playing them both, and they came together and got one over on her. And, I mean, it plays just like a terrible.
- [26:59]
B
That was a dark story, too.
- [27:01]
A
Terrible high school movie. Yeah. Brutal. Where it's like, oh, this is funny and fun, but at the center of it is like, these two losers ruining a woman's life.
- [27:08]
B
So woman we need to check on.
- [27:10]
A
Woman we need to check on. Oh, my God. Brody Jenner and Spencer Pratt, first high school girlfriend. Okay, we're going to take a quick break right now, and we'll be right back. It has been five months with my Quince Ultra Stretch Ponch super wide leg pants. Happy anniversary to us, I guess. No, it's been five months with my favorite pants. And they haven't pilled or fallen apart. When I wash them, they're still my favorite. They were less than 50 bucks each. I now have three pairs, one in every color. So when my new foster fail dog happened to eat a hole in my bedding comforter, I turned to Quince to replace it. So don't worry, she's getting dog training. And then as for the comforter, I was like, okay, Quince makes good pants. Let's see if they can make a good bedding set. So I ordered their bamboo duvet cover, and I love it. I absolutely love it. It just feels really clean and luxurious while sitting still being really soft and smooth. Big fan. And here's the thing. I used my own glamorous trash code to buy this bedding. So thank you, Quince and I love them. Quince works directly with safe, ethical factories. And all the products are super high quality and built to last. So I love it. Refresh your wardrobe or your bedding with quince. Go to quince.com glamorous for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Quince Q-U-I-N C E.com glamorous to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com glamorous okay, welcome back. Let's continue the conversation. So Brody is the guy that Spencer wishes he was. He is so rich. He has a literal train that takes you from his house down to the pool. And I also thought he wrote this wonderfully, which is that Brody Jenner is the son of Caitlyn Jenner and does talk about like in the past in a very respectful way of what that relationship was like. And so I also like the shade.
- [29:26]
B
That when he talks about Caitlyn before that says that their personality had the on screen charisma of drywall.
- [29:34]
A
And that Caitlyn Jenner wanted to be on camera. And Spencer was like, you're bad. And everyone on the network was like, you're the worst. Get off camera. Which is hilarious and true. Okay, so he sees Brody and he's like, I'm going to make a reality show about your life with your stepdad David Foster, which David Foster, huge hit song, maker of so many songs, a lot of Whitney and Celine Dion songs. Notorious, Absolute asshole. He is also the husband currently to who's that American Idol girl. Our producer Christina came in to say. Catherine McPhee. Yeah, Catherine McPhee. She's married to him. I think she's like 90 years younger than him. They of course have an infant. He has many children and in his documentary some of them are like, he never spoke to me, hahaha. But he's successful. So this is Brody Jenner's stepdad and he's like, I'm gonna film a reality show around you. Both does the teaser and the teaser is so good. And he's so intertwined with LA rich kid shit. This made me sick. This is some true Hollywood Nepo syndrome shit right here. Okay, here's what he writes. Because I was 20 with zero credits, David recruited a grown up to help me. So David Foster, who comes up terribly in the show, recruits help Brandt Penvetic, a Canadian producer who David had done some pilots with, trying to sell his own shows. Brandt took one look at the footage and got it immediately. His stroke of genius was cutting the whole thing to the final countdown and titling it Battle in Malibu. An epic father, stepsons cage match. Brandt wanted to shop at the Standard way, but I went straight to my old childhood buddy, David Chernin. His dad was Peter Chernin, president and COO of News Corporation, which owned Fox. I handed Dave a DVD of the sizzle reel. Would love your thoughts. I Said all casual Sunday night. My phone rang. Spencer, it's Peter. Peter who? Churnin. He said, you have a meeting at nine tomorrow with Gail. Who's Gail? Gail Berman. She runs Fox Television. She knows the deal. So I work in Hollywood and I know these names so intimately that to pass it to the sun and have a meeting at 9am on a Monday with Gayle, I was like, holy shit.
- [31:45]
B
I don't work in Hollywood. But this story also made me faint and then throw up when we find out later how much he makes. Yes.
- [31:51]
A
So immediately he's like, it's mine. You're not shopping it around. Give it to me. Which, yeah, good. He nepo kid his way in there. Nepo adult him right back. Whatever. They're like, here's 4.5 million. Spencer is like, you need to make me co creator. And they're like, no, you've never worked in television before. You don't get that deal. So then he calls Peter direct again. He's like two years into college, so. So maybe he's 20. And Peter, adult Peter, one of the most successful adults in LA is talking to 20 year old Spencer Pratt. And Spencer says, I'm not signing the deal because they're not giving Brody and me executive producer credit. And it's not fair. This is our show, our idea. He responds, I'll look into it. Don't call me again.
- [32:35]
B
Click.
- [32:36]
A
And then he gets executive producer credit. Unheard of. And then he basically starts shooting the show. And do you want to tell the listeners how much he got in the end? The deal was $3.7 million and went to Brandt's production company. And how much did Spencer get?
- [32:53]
B
He got 90,000.
- [32:56]
A
$90,000 for a sizzle? For a sizzle. And he was never paid anything else. He knew to get the executive producer credit, but somehow didn't know to get ongoing payments. And he wrote this, which if you're in the industry, is an incredible lesson.
- [33:12]
B
I didn't catch that.
- [33:13]
A
Yeah, because he also, absolute idiot, takes $90,000, spends it entirely on a car.
- [33:18]
B
Well, that makes perfect sense. Chelsea. Oh, sure, that part I got. If you've got money, spend it, spend it.
- [33:24]
A
I mean, spend all of it immediately. He said, if this were today, I'd keep the ip, hire a production company for a flat fee and eat the back end. But I was young, dumb and high on my own walkie talkie. That's where the book is. Like, very funny to me. I had a lot to learn. Plus what I didn't know, what nobody told me Was that crossing from behind the camera to in front of it was career suicide back then, before Kim K. Proved you could do both. There was an unwritten law in Hollywood. Once you become the talent, you're trapped there forever. And in reality tv, that's Hollywood speak for circus freak. You're not Timothee Chalamet. You're a dancing monkey. I did not know this. Repeat, I did not know this. I hadn't been warned. And basically, the producer there is like, Spencer. You get in the sizzle with Brody because the two of you is gonna be funny. And Spencer's like, yeah, okay, I'm still a producer, whatever. And then obviously loses all of his cred. And I think what Spencer's talking about of, like, can you be the on camera talent and the producer, like, that was not a thing back then.
- [34:18]
B
I mean, Barbra Streisand was starring and directing and things. I mean, it can be done, certainly.
- [34:22]
A
Yeah, no, absolutely. You're absolutely correct. You're absolutely correct.
- [34:25]
B
I feel like Spencer Pratt was in, like, new territory. You know, reality TV wasn't. I mean, we didn't even have the Kardashians to think about that as, like, our starting point. So really, it was interesting. His ideas around branding and identity, I mean, these were all just kind of floating ethers that haven't taken hold yet.
- [34:44]
A
Exactly. Yes. And that is one of the wildest things in the book, which is that he could have been a successful producer, and he could have been the producer and the talent, but he turned it down. And I am going to read a story where Kris Jenner calls him. Kris Jenner's voice purred through the speaker. Spencer, honey, I want to do what you boys did with princes, but with my family up in Calabasas. What do you think? Want to team up? Make TV magic? A reality show in the Valley?
- [35:16]
B
I asked.
- [35:16]
A
And he thinks to himself, the Valley sucks. It was anti Malibu. And he wrote, who the hell would want to watch that? Spoiler alert. Everyone. Literally everyone. For 20 seasons and counting. I ended the call with Chris Brody and I burst into laughter. Yeah, we're going to have to pass on this one. And then he said it was the worst mistake of my life and the worst thing I've ever done.
- [35:40]
B
Incredible. An amazing story.
- [35:43]
A
An amazing story. And there's going to be several more times where Spencer admits to making the worst decision you could possibly make. He's. It's almost like he's addicted to, like, getting close and then choosing the absolute worst thing ever.
- [35:56]
B
He self sabotages on so Many occasions, yeah. It's really, really fascinating to the point where, like, people are like, no, this is your thing that you wanted. And he goes, nah. Like, it's very. I mean, it should be studied.
- [36:11]
A
I totally agree. There's times where I'm like, actually, he's not talented. He just takes 100 shots on goal, gets one of every 100 and makes money. And you're like, oh, wow. Because the amount of times he chooses incorrectly, I'm like, were you ahead of your time in a Mastermind or were you like, you actually can't see straight?
- [36:29]
B
But I think sometimes cannot see straight. And we'll get to it later. But after all the Hill stuff goes, he gets offered a deal and he doesn't take it. And they have no money, they have no job, they're dying to get on camera. And he sabotages a deal. Same with Heidi's record. Later, when it first starts getting played, he calls radio stations, tells them not to play. Like, it's very odd.
- [36:49]
A
Yeah, exactly what you're saying. It should be studied. Like, part of me is like, oh, you're self sabotage. I think this is just like playing the slots of his life. And like, sometimes it's good and sometimes it's bad. And like, there's no logic to it because this cannot be explained. To get us through a couple moments, Dringo psychic moment. His mom's friend is a psychic. The Hills is on tv. She points at Heidi and says, you're gonna marry that girl. So incredible psychic moment in the book. Then he's like, the Hills sucks. This is such a stupid show. But talks about how beautiful it looks and drops an amazing fact, which is that the DP of the Hills who made them look so amazing on camera was the cinematographer, Rachel Morrison, who later shot Black Panther and became the first woman nominated for an Oscar in cinematography. That's incredible. And she created that look on the show.
- [37:41]
B
Yeah. And she also was the first one to put reality TV on tripods and like really set up shots and really frame it. Because before it was more of like that Blair Witch, like running around free camera. And it felt like really loose and a little chaotic. And he credits her with like framing everything, having it set up, having it feel stable, which you can only do.
- [38:02]
A
When it is a fully scripted, but otherwise.
- [38:06]
B
Yes, true, true. And also, I think, took a lot of inspiration from the OC as well, obviously.
- [38:11]
A
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And so cool to learn about her. Some of the reality of this is that Brody Jenner really was dating Kristen Cavallari. Who was Lauren Conrad's actual nemesis. And Spencer starts doing the math, watching the show, and he's like, we should get on it and we should be the boyfriends. And you dating Kristen and her hating Lauren. It's her perfect way on the show. This is going to be gold. That then gets us into him joining the Hills. And I think what kills me is that he and Brody had simultaneously taken a TV show to MTV that was, I'm going to say, genius. This is the part where I'm like, wait, this is a genius show. It was, I think it's 2006, something early where he was going to capitalize on his stupid TMZ scam, paparazzi skills and set up encounters with Brody Jenner and famous women like Cameron Diaz, where, like, they would just stalk where she was shopping at. And when she walked out, Brody would just walk next to her for a second. Someone would pap it and get in the headlines, like Brody Jenner and Cameron Diaz dating. And that they would do this over like, eight episodes and get him dating a famous woman. That would have really made the headlines in the moment. And then the TV show would come out and reveal that it was all staged, was all fake. They would have filmed every way they'd pulled this prank and pulled back the curtain on paparazzi, tmz, Perez Hilton culture. I think that would have been mind blowing. I think it would have changed some of the direction of reality TV and, like, got us more into a meta space earlier. And when they go to pick up this genius show, Spencer says, no, why don't you put it out in six months after we're famous on the Hills. We're gonna do the Hills first, and then the show never happens. What did you think of that?
- [40:02]
B
Now I'm starting to think maybe your theory is the correct theory, that it's like we're just shooting and seeing what happens. Because there's no way for him to know that his rise on the Hills was gonna be so monumental or that they were gonna become these core central characters. Unless he truly felt that him and Heidi were endgame and that he was always gonna be around her and that their thing was TV able.
- [40:25]
A
I don't think he knew yet because he wasn't that far in enough with Heidi. Do you know what I mean? Like, by the time he gets on the Hills, he's actually in real life having to win her back from fucking it up with her off camera. So he didn't know.
- [40:38]
B
Right? Which is. Which makes it odd that he would be like, let's go on the hills.
- [40:43]
A
Exactly, Exactly. So that's where I'm like, either you're just shooting in the wind or something even darker. Which is. It's giving low self esteem. It's giving dad talk. It's giving. Attaching myself to these women will be the best thing that's ever happened to me. Let's go leech off of their success instead of doing our own thing. Because being the boys hooking on to these women's rides will go better for me, it's more guaranteed. I know it's dark. I don't know if it's true. I'm just saying that's kind of what was coming up.
- [41:10]
B
So, yeah, the other thing.
- [41:12]
A
Here's the other thing. I loved reading this book. I mean, I probably read this in one sitting. I loved it.
- [41:17]
B
Yeah.
- [41:17]
A
I have notes in here going, oh, no, why do I love this love story with Heidi? I'm loving this love story. And I have to remember something that I always say, Erin. So I'm really conflicted, which is that when the main number one quality we know about someone's personality is that they love their wife, that is the red flag of all red flags. Wife guys are red flags. Because I should know multiple things about you. I should be like, oh, you're really skilled in this. You are this. You are this. You are this. And, wow, they really respect their wife. But when one of their main personality traits is, I love my wife, it's always a red flag. And I don't know how, but in this book, I bought it. But I know better than that.
- [41:57]
B
Agree. And I have to. I have to stand with Spencer on this one because when they go through their whole thing, blah, blah, blah. And we'll get into other details. When the wreckage of their careers come to where they're kind of at rock bottom. Let's just say Heidi's career perseveres and his does not. And so he becomes this very supportive character in her life. And I kind of like that. He's like, well, if I can't be the star, then I'm going to be the hype person for my partner. And I'm going to use, you know, my TikTok and my promo to really shine a light. And I feel like his.
- [42:32]
A
I think that's how he stays the star. He says, I know I can still be a star if I become a wife guy. And also if he's a producer, he's producing his wife. He is. And this is why I hated how much I loved the book. He is a husband juror. We're reading the memoir of a husband juror. Which is why it was wild to be like, oh, I really, Chelsea, I.
- [42:53]
B
Can'T accept that because I'm on his side.
- [43:00]
A
Aaron, you're a Spencer Pratt defender. No, listen, let's debate through it, because is he not a husband your wife guy? This is the book of a husband juror.
- [43:10]
B
Maybe he can be the.
- [43:12]
A
The one. I won't allow it. All right, well, let's keep moving through it. So he is, like, he meets Heidi one night, and, like, they go back to the pool. They take the train down to Brody's pool. He's like, just. This girl from Colorado has swept me off my feet. And one night at a club, she's like, oh, my God. Spencer's obsessed with me. Her friends come up to him. Is it Lauren? It's before. They're not on camera yet. And they come up to him and they're like, I heard you're obsessed with Heidi. And he writes, I had such a low ego. I wanted to be a man. Like, it made me so. I was so in pain that she knew I was head over heels for her, that I was an and danced with six different girls that night. She literally changes her phone number and is, like, dropped out.
- [43:52]
B
I mean, that's queen behavior.
- [43:53]
A
Well, it would be if it wasn't for what happens next.
- [43:56]
B
But that's what makes me also be like, heidi doesn't fuck around. So if she was like, heidi fuck around?
- [44:03]
A
Heidi's married to him.
- [44:05]
B
No, I know, but I feel like she held a boundary, and then he respected that boundary, and they figured it out. Am I wrong? Yeah.
- [44:13]
A
No, I think you're right. I think I'm. Tell me if this feels familiar, but I feel like I've said seen this in real life and on reality TV shows where women are like, you don't talk to me like that. And, like, that is not okay. And I draw a boundary, and you're like, sick. Nice. And then they just, like, say that every time it happens.
- [44:28]
B
Yeah, but changing your whole phone, that's, like, a lot of work.
- [44:31]
A
That was fucking cool as hell. But then he's then like, I've got to get her back, and this does make me, again believe, like, oh, maybe he does really think she's a soulmate and acted like a dick, but I don't know.
- [44:42]
B
So I didn't love this story then that where he goes and he meets Audrina. She. He knows she's filming with the hills and like, let me crash. I'll be like a drama maker. And it'll throw Heidi off her game, which I love. When he tells the story, it doesn't throw Heidi off. She can offer a quick line, like, right at her little podium while she enters them into the party. But that part felt icky. I didn't like that. Of, like, that's how he's sneaking back in, is through the show. So he can be, like, this little brat like that.
- [45:08]
A
So that he can be on camera. Yeah. Again, it's giving dad talk. It's pathetic. And what does she do that night, Aaron? She takes. Takes him back. So this is where we can't be like, queen. Because she was like, oh, and then you scammed your way onto my TV show. I knew it was love. So he wins her back, and he's like, brody, you date Lauren, I'll date Heidi, and we're gonna be the famous boyfriends. And I ruined our other TV show idea, and I truly love Heidi, and I just, like, want to be with her forever. Brody then fakes his chemistry with Lauren. Apparently, like, they never had it, were never into each other, but because her nemesis was his ex girlfriend, it made for great tv. And soon they are on every episode.
- [45:48]
B
I did love that the reason that they're on every episode is because Spencer refused to sign a release form. Like, he would show up, be on camera, cause a bunch of drama, and then they would be, like, chasing him around, sign a release, and he's like, you show me a contract. Like, at least he is learning he learned that lesson.
- [46:05]
A
Yes, yes, Such a good point. And he also has learned how to tip off the paparazzi. So he's, like, staged little shoots for himself. He's, like, getting his ass on that show. To which I say, I wish you would put this much into your other idea with Brody, but okay, whatever.
- [46:22]
B
Ashton Kutcher took it and ran with that little prank show he did in that era. Truly.
- [46:27]
A
Truly. And so he also was talking about things at this point where he's like, I've gotten on the show after I crashed the party with Audrina, we then faked that I had a date with both of them. Like, that was fake. Me using the roses twice was Audrina's idea, and it was funny, and I only wanted to be with Heidi. And we all just kind of knew that we were here to just make a good TV show, and that's the type of stuff we were like, wow, that was so fucking fake. Also, how would you ever love this guy? Ever. When that's his intro on the show. And kind of crazy that they all agreed to this from the jump. He's sort of presenting it like, I don't know, we wanted to make fun tv and, like, I make a good asshole. So, like, it was fine. Did you buy it?
- [47:07]
B
I did, but I also respected and appreciated when he starts to tell us that the boundary starts to slip and that he's not really sure where he begins and the TV villain ends. And I think that's really fascinating. And I think about that a lot with the Vanderpump Rules kids. And like. Like how when you get paid to be a mess, it, like, it must distort your personality of what you think is, you know, appropriate, of what you think is good behavior. I mean, it's such a weird psychological game that in his mind, he's like, yeah, I'm being this villain. But then after a while, it's like, is he Question mark?
- [47:48]
A
Yeah, it's the exact configuration of I am getting praise for being wicked with his dad and the recording. It's the worst things I do. The more money, fame, attention, and time on the show I get. And you're right, the boundary really starts to slip. He talks about how Lisa Kudrow comes up to him and Heidi at a party off camera. And in front of him is like, girl, you need to run away. You gotta get away from him. And he's like, it's so funny. Like, how does she not realize it's scripted? However, can you imagine? It's 2007, 8, whatever. Lisa Kudrow comes up and is like, your boyfriend ain't fucking shit. I would walk away. I would be like, listen, Lisa Kudrow said we gotta split up. And Heidi's like, it's fine. I'll stay with him.
- [48:34]
B
But they are living in a different reality, though. Like, they're living together six months before the famous U haul scene takes place. Like, it is so staged. So there is probably part of her brain that's like, well, we're doing this for the cameras. This isn't our real relationship.
- [48:49]
A
That's a good point.
- [48:50]
B
And at one point, I mean, she's living with his parents. I mean, to move in with somebody in their parents to become part of, like, the family in that way, that's, like, very intense.
- [48:59]
A
While pretending they have their own apartment that production films them in, like, that's nutso. You're so right. And when they eventually get married, which is like, I don't know, a year from what we're talking about that's when I realized she's 22. And I was like, oh, wild mama this. You were 22 for all of this? Yeah. Like, your brain. Your brain is play. D'oh. So at this point in time, they're like, well. And Spencer's already like, they're not married or anything. And he's like, we need a backup. We need a backup. If the Hills doesn't go well, Heidi's gonna become a pop star. And Heidi sings for David Foster. And supposedly David Foster is like, you're a star, kid. And I find that impossible to believe. This is the man who produced Celine Dion's highest note she ever hit in a song. And then turned around and did it with. No, did it with Whitney Houston first. And then use that to get Celine Dion to do the. Like, You're telling me he listened to the song I've heard from Heidi and was like, that's the best shit I've ever heard.
- [50:19]
B
It's creative storytelling.
- [50:21]
A
All right, well, then production gets them an apartment on Kirsten in Hollywood, which is the exact street that Yasser and I lived on when I first moved to la. Wow. I'm sure they were further north in the rich part. At least I hope they were, because if they were on cursing where I was, they really were in a weird place. And then we get to this scripted car moment. So this is when I really felt for him, where he is on board with the storyline of a. Heidi's moving in with me, the guy everyone hates and doesn't want her to live with, and it's gonna split up her and Lauren's friendship. So he's in on that. That's real. That actually is happening. Like, Heidi had already moved in with them, and it was her last moment being besties and roommates with Lauren. But what he says is that the famous scene in the car where she ends up saying, I don't know if I'm ready yet, and he says, sweet, get out of my car. That was the 12th take they did where producers pushed him over and over again to be ruder, be meaner, and he's just trying to deliver it and go home. And then again, he's like, where is the line between what's just for TV and, like, what is who you're making me?
- [51:27]
B
I thought all of these were really sad. And the other thing that I want to make space for, too, is, like, I also didn't appreciate having Spencer's sister be part of the show, learning about the backstory of her struggles with mental health and Substance abuse and then having her kind of stringed along by the producers was really disgusting. And the most insane story. And that car scene is heartbreaking for sure. Is like a producer kind of at the start of the Jersey Shore of it all. Snooki gets punched at a bar, and then the producer of Laguna beach offers for Spencer to hit his sister and, like, thinks that's, like, a great viral moment for the story. And it's like, wow. So, yes, these kids are kind of being blinded and they're getting wealthy and they're getting famous, but, like, to what end is very intense and who's in control of them.
- [52:27]
A
And I feel like this is already calling forward to Tyra Banks documentary, which we are going to cover on this podcast of, like, when you are the producer and in charge, but then you're coming up with these crazy ideas and, like, who's doing what. And I think making a gray area between everyone. That's how everyone gets away with it, right? Of just, like, sharing blame. So you can think, oh, well, everyone thinks it's okay to be doing this. That I should, like, hit Stephanie. And he does horrible things. Thank God he doesn't do that. But horrible moments happen with Stephanie. And then again, I didn't watch the Hills, so I'd kind of forgotten about this. And I. There is a redemption arc written for this in the book that I am not on board with, which is that Lauren calls Heidi, her best friend and is crying because her ex boyfriend is threatening to put out a sex tape he has of them and ruin her life. And Lauren was like, the good girl. So, like, this isn't Kim Kardashian. Like, maybe I was behind it.
- [53:18]
B
This is Gwyneth Paltrow.
- [53:19]
A
Yes, this is Gwyneth Paltrow. Spencer in the book says he overhears this conversation happening in the bathroom. Heidi comes out and he's like, what's going on? She's like, I don't want to talk about it. He who has become best friends with Perez Hilton and TMZ guys, is like, oh, I gotta leak this sex tape. This is gonna be amazing. Now, this is kind of wild because what are you getting from this? Like, where is your $50,000 for doing this? There's nothing here for you. You're really just ruining her life. Or you're thinking like a producer of the show of getting a Hills headline. And while you're doing that, you're not getting paid for that. So also, you're going to ruin her friendship. Cause she did tell it to her. And Then she's gonna remain with you.
- [54:02]
B
Can I ask a question about this?
- [54:04]
A
Yeah.
- [54:05]
B
And we know that Spencer takes, you know, liberties and in his storytelling. Do you think that Heidi told him and that he's covering up for her in this retelling of. Oh, I just overheard it. And she had nothing to do with it.
- [54:20]
A
Highly, highly possible. Because I do think they sound extremely codependent, sadly sounds like it's working for them. I feel like that can't be true. But it sounds like that in the book. And I absolutely think there's a moment where she's like passing stuff on and then he goes and leaks it and ruins her life. Yeah, absolutely. And he is saying that Heidi didn't know and like we're not gonna know. But here's what I have to say. It doesn't matter whether Heidi knew or not because he did do this to her best friend and she said stayed with him. So whether she told him directly or whatever, it doesn't matter. She stays with him after this and. And he tries to make a redemption of like, no, she never knew. It's like, it doesn't matter.
- [55:03]
B
This is the real.
- [55:04]
A
You wanted to do that to your partner's best friend.
- [55:07]
B
Yeah, this is the real breaking scene.
- [55:09]
A
Really? Yeah. And then the reason he said he didn't tell Heidi he leaked it is cuz she was going in for her first plastic surgery of like boobs and nose and didn't want to stress a girl out. And this too crazy for me. You were in a relationship with a 21 year old that's supposedly healthy and she's going in to get massive body plastic surgery only to be followed by like many more surgeries. Like what's going on?
- [55:39]
B
I do feel like they are yes men for each other. So it feels like he's kind of ride or die for whatever adventure she goes on too. You know, it's like they co sign each other stuff in that way.
- [55:52]
A
It was just the saddest. Like, well, of course I couldn't tell her I was about to leak her best friend's secret that she had made a sex tape once because she was about to get a boob job. You're like, okay. Only in the Spencer Pratt.
- [56:03]
B
That's almost even darker. If she didn't know and maybe she didn't and she was totally blindsided. I mean that would have broken me.
- [56:10]
A
But then the other sort of detail and again, I wasn't watching at the time. So leave a comment publicly so other people can get your thoughts. If you have a Different thought on this, but. But it also seems like he makes a meal out of Lauren really did have a sex tape with that guy. Versus Spencer, lied and made it up. And that's what makes him a villain, is that he just made it up to ruin her life. Versus he leaked something very real, to which I say, doesn't fucking matter. And there is no redemption to this being real or not real. This is revenge porn. And, like, how fucking dare you? Whether it was real or not, and putting it in the book being like, no, she really had made it. It's like, I don't care. He really tries to make Lauren the villain in later. He's going to say the only time Lauren called to be friends with Heidi again is when we were faking our divorce, which just shows she only cares about herself. And I'm like, no, she hates you. She hates you. And when your best friend gets with a guy who you think is toxic, completely changes her life, gets a million surgeries, and he backstabs you, you don't want to talk to her again until he's gone.
- [57:12]
B
Chelsea, this is the second time you brought up the surgeries. And in the book, we know that Heidi is a little bit bamboozled when she goes in for two things and the surgeon says, and this, this, this, this little. Little. Little minor. Minor. Minor was the word Spencer used. And then she comes out looking like a totally different person. I mean, that is heart wrenching.
- [57:33]
A
In the book, he says, she loved that she was getting 10 free surgeries. We didn't realize that 10 surgeries would be hard. And she ends up loving her looks.
- [57:43]
B
Well, I think that feels a little Delulu to me of like, well, now this is my face, so I better fucking like it. Like, I tell everybody, I. Yeah, like, what are you gonna say? Oh, my God, I hate my face. Like, the part where I can see.
- [57:56]
A
The idea of being bamboozled by it all is that she is so young. She's very young. She's got a husbander. And they're both like, 10 free plastic surgeries to every part of her body. Sick. And they sold it to Us Weekly.
- [58:10]
B
When we think about this, like, in the scope of the Housewives, I like this comparison. It's like when you look at a housewife, you know, you're looking at a face that's not a normal face. You know what I'm saying? Like, we've got lips, we've got fillers. We're so conditioned to looking at a face that looks of a certain scope. Now Heidi is in her early 20s, one of the first reality TV stars. It's almost like she had everything condensed into, like, those five seasons of what housewives experience their whole careers. So I do have sympathy of her. Like, like, oh, I hate the way this looks on tv. Like, people get, you know, a little manic about how they appear if they have to be, like, so front facing.
- [58:52]
A
Then after the surgeries is when she goes and poses for Playboy. She's bamboozled by our culture that tells young women what exactly? That you have to look like Hugh Hefner's sick fantasy in order to be a successful woman.
- [59:05]
B
Rotten hail.
- [59:06]
A
Yeah. So it's like, okay. So then Lauren's really mad at them. She has the power. And Spencer's like, we know we're gonna get kicked off the show. And so we go to my really good is the paparazzi I sold those Mary Kate photos to a long time ago. We say, what do we do? And he goes, that's easy. Get married. And the three of them fly to elope so that they can stay relevant and stay on the show.
- [59:27]
B
Also not bad advice. Sure.
- [59:29]
A
He's really good at selling. He's like, I got a pile of shit here. I learned how to sell it and I'm going to keep selling dog.
- [59:36]
B
Yeah.
- [59:37]
A
And they have the wedding. Then the Hills rescripts it, and they're like, why is Lauren at our staged wedding? You know, and like, all of that, that's fake. He's talking about how, like, they even had to re elope for the Hills when they had already eloped. All those types of things. And then they go on the show, I'm a celebrity. Get me out of here.
- [59:59]
B
That chapter made me sick. And before we get there, I just want to say one thing because I'd love your take on it. When they're at the church. So the Hills makes them reshoot the elopement. Reshoot, like, the big church thing. Her family is there, his family's there. Like, they're having a real wedding now, not the whole paparazzi, blah, blah, blah. Spencer asks Heidi, would you cancel the wedding for a million dollars? And she's like, absolutely not. We're getting married. And he's like, huh, okay. It feels to me like he kind of sells us this idea that he's very much in love with her and it doesn't really matter. And they're very Bonnie and Clyde. But then in that moment, to, like, look outside of it again from that producer's perspective is so intense.
- [60:43]
A
So intense. And again, she is 22. He's four or five years older than her. In a world where you move out from living with your best friend into the arms of the man who becomes your music manager and sounds like he does every single thing for them, manages the money, all of that, still with him to this day, you never have your twenties. You are immediately getting plastic surgeries and all these other things, it's from that perspective is heartbreaking. Yeah. Like, this is so bad. Even though what you read in the book and what I believed in the book and had to really take a walk and be like, this cannot be. It is that they're in love. Like, you root for them in this book.
- [61:21]
B
I do. And. But I also see it all as a problem also. I think both things. Can I read one thing about Spencer's identities? He goes, the old Spencer still existed, but he was sharing space with someone else now. Someone who turned weddings into magazine exclusives. Someone whose day job was being a villain for hire. Someone so good at his job, he wasn't sure if he could even clock out.
- [61:45]
A
Yeah. And he talks about how in the final season of the Hills, they look like absolute psychopaths. And he's like, that wasn't wrong. We really were losing our minds from the fame, from the money. He talks, they're so young. He's like, oh, well, we're always just gonna get tons of checks if we just do fake stuff. Stuff.
- [62:01]
B
I will also say, and this is a mother's intuition coming in here, that he was on a lot of drugs, that we're talking, like, a lot of stuff. Especially, you know, when they get that weird mansion and they've got all their guns and they're kind of slowly deteriorating into the hills. I feel like for his kids, he's like, we're not gonna, you know, spell it out, but it feels very cocaine induced this era.
- [62:23]
A
Yeah.
- [62:24]
B
Yeah.
- [62:24]
A
And you know what? He does talk about a specific drug. So let's get to it. First I off with I'm a celebrity. Get me out of here. We have so much to cover. So what I'm gonna say is that they went on the show because Heidi had a dry shampoo line and they got special permission for her to bring her dry shampoo. And she was like, I know, I'll just use it a lot in the jungle and I'll launch Heidi's dry shampoo line. And then the first day they get there, one of the other castmates rips all the labels off. The crew is like, calm down, Spencer. They're giving him Xanax. He's giving him weed. He's clearly freaking out. He's been lied to. He thought they were gonna, like, have a bed and then come and, like, do fake camping. And he said it really changed the way people saw reality tv. And that, like, there were headlines that they were actually tortured and they truly felt like they were tortured. And also, Spencer lost his mind on camera.
- [63:09]
B
I mean, this whole chapter made me so sick. Mostly because of the scene where he talks about having to, like, go into that little bunker with the rats and the spiders and the snakes. Like, I felt so physically ill that he was like, my relationship to being famous is being just tortured by critters. Like, I could not believe it, and it was so awful. And I can't believe they stayed.
- [63:33]
A
And he writes that he finally gets a hold of a phone, somehow gets on the phone with Harvey Levin of tmz, who says, this is a ratings hit. Get back on that show. And he writes, the only reason we walked back on is because Harvey Levin said the ratings were amazing. It's like, okay, well then you're still walking back. Like, I can't, I, I, we can't co sign all this big.
- [63:52]
B
I mean, I'm so deathly afraid of snakes. I would just. The whole. I couldn't even read that chap. I was like, skim, skip, skim, skim, skim, because it was so gross.
- [64:00]
A
Well, and then Heidi tries to eat a bunch of bugs in order to, like, get them, like, a bed to sleep in that night and ends up in the hospital and truly nearly dying. So, all right. I then wrote, oh, no, it's rock bottom shit. So this is. Now she's doing Playboy. He's, like, showing up to premieres, holding her Playboy cover up like it's a wrestlers pro championship belt. Being like, yeah, my girlfriend. Like, it's just, it's all so ick. They then are feeling afraid for their safety from fans, from other people. And both of them are like, let's get a bunch of fucking guns. Let's also start believing in God. Then he said, around this time, I developed what you might call an expensive hobby. And he dropped $75,000 on his first crystal. Then he's like, anne, Heidi's gonna get a bunch more plastic surgery. That's exactly. He gets a crystal, and the next day she gets all that surgery we were just talking about. And then he writes that. So they're, like, going crazy at their house. They have a bunch of security guards.
- [64:57]
B
He's doing jiu jitsu, lots of Cocaine in the margins.
- [65:01]
A
Yeah, exactly. And then he's like, what really helped me was Kundalini yoga. And writes about, like, how that really helped him. Does not write about how that's actually a scam and it's a fake yoga made up by a con artist, which makes me think he does not know. I don't think he realizes that he was following a fake yoga practice, you know?
- [65:23]
B
Do you?
- [65:23]
A
What? How'd you read that? Because I was like, oh, he don't know.
- [65:26]
B
I mean, there was a lot in the spiritual chapter. I mean, he talks about crystals, he talks about aliens, he talks about the Nag Mahadi text, which I was. Which I enjoyed reading about, but let's get it.
- [65:38]
A
So I thought about you a lot in this section. Aaron, let's get into the. The wildest part of this section. I'm going to read it. So he's reading that text you're talking about, and he says some passages, at least the way I interpreted them, were meant to be recited underwater. Something about the symbolic rebirth, the cleansing, the connection to primordial consciousness. So me being me, I'd often find myself at the bottom of our bathtub, holding the ancient text above my head to keep it dry, chanting and broken Coptic, like I was trying to unlock the cheat codes to reality. One particular night, I'd been in that tub for what felt like hours, completely absorbed in these ancient words. The next thing I knew, I was in our bed and Heidi was shaking me awake. Spencer, what are you doing? She said, a panic in her voice. According to her, she'd been sound asleep when I presumedly had gotten out of the bath to lay down next to her. She woke up and swears she saw me floating, like, levitating about a foot off the bed, rising like a hot air balloon, gripping her hands like I was trying to take her somewhere. We're leaving, I mumbled, rising up, still halfway in whatever state I'd been in. Yeah, you read that, right? Levitating.
- [66:48]
B
Chelsea, you're not gonna like my take on this.
- [66:50]
A
I know I'm not.
- [66:51]
B
Okay, so for context, I'm an intuitive medium. I think that Spencer verges a little conspiracy theory in his spiritual beliefs. And so what I wanna say on this is that the reason that spirituality can be so dangerous is because you find it when you're like, really in emotionally low places. When you really are at the bottom and you're digging around and you're like, how can my humanity be it? I can't exist in this skin anymore, in this world. It's Too overwhelming. And so people find their spiritual beliefs, their belief in something higher, you know, and so I empathize with that piece of it. And also, I think if you are reading, you know, the text of Mary Magdalene and you're learning how to breathe and you're learning how to listen to your body and you're being still and you're kind of in that state where you're open to anything, you might be able to levitate.
- [67:45]
A
And here's what I hope you will grant me and everyone listening, which is that I really. I don't know how to explain it. I have an intense respect for what you're saying, and I really want anyone's spirituality to be protected and held and. And cherished. And I am a fucking hater. I am a hater because grew up New Age, and I grew up around a lot of scam artists who I fully believed until my brain was more formed and I was able to turn around. So I'm just the number one hater. I'm the number one hater. And.
- [68:18]
B
But I think, you know, not to plug my own podcast, the Hidden History of Magic. But really, it's. I feel like there's such a thick veil over spirituality, and I wish we were just more honest about how accessible, how easy, you know, I do think, you know, if you're. You're focused on something, you can get a result.
- [68:37]
A
However, this is a space that criminals and psychopaths love to infiltrate. And it is a space where you can go and get help for your needs without having to have health insurance, which means so much wrong can happen to you because it's a completely unregulated industry. Which is not to say that all regulated medical industries are great. There's so much improvement to be made. But this 1 is starting at 000 regulations, 0 agreed upon skill sets or trainings for someone to come into your life and be a guru. And there are so many times you can sit with someone who takes control of your life who should not be allowed into your brain. What I liked about this is that in his book, he's like, yes, I'm levitating. But also he was like, I think I was following a fake guru who kept spraying me with LSD spray every day. So maybe it was that he was like. And I did not realize that Hugo was fake until he was like, maybe I should be your Hollywood manager and read your contracts for negative energy. And he's like, oh, my God. Oh my God, you're a scam artist. And he said, looking back that period was obviously one of the most intensely ungrounded times in my life. Some people took advantage of us. We learned how predators operate in spiritual spaces, targeting people at their most vulnerable moments. But it was also like one of the most expansive times I've ever experienced. Okay. One day they wake up and Spencer's like, hey, remember how we spent $2 million on your pop star record? It came out because I think I programmed it to come out online and forgot about it. It. Did you believe that? That they just forgot?
- [70:05]
B
No, absolutely not. Never in a million years. They spent millions of dollars on this thing. And she worked with all these amazing producers and they're so obsessed with their own marketing. So what happened there? What was the story?
- [70:15]
A
Yeah, he's clearly obsessive and super into learning, as we heard from the bathtub scene. The only thing I'll give it is that, like, if there's like so many guns and crystals and levitating an LSD spray around, then maybe. But otherwise, this is not a man who forgets something like that. $2 million, he said. Down the drain, he said. 672 people bought the album in the first week. Total, total.
- [70:40]
B
Tough, tough stats.
- [70:41]
A
I loved him dropping that. I loved him dropping that. So then we get into weird places where they have they. I mean, they've clearly lost their minds because listen to this. I shouldn't have been too surprised when on August 22, the day before we bolted for Costa Rica, Heidi and I saw a massive white orc orb floating over our house in Malibu. Smooth, silent, glowing, moving fast. Out of nowhere, two F18s came screaming after it. All of nature froze. Birds stopped mid song. Even the ocean seemed to hold its breath. It wasn't just us who saw it. Vader, our security guard, freaked so hard he walked straight into a sliding glass door and dropped drivers on the pch, pulled over, climbed out of their cars, staring up at the like the world was about to end. Independence Day had come to life. My tinfoil hat firmly on as always, I couldn't help but wonder if there was a reason. And Heidi said, spencer, we got to get out of here. And he's like, you're right. Let me get us a private jet. We're going to Costa Rica. So they have a full ass house in malibu that is $75,000 a month in rent. They are no longer on the show. They've lost $2 million on her record. And he said, we moved into the Four Seasons. I stopped wearing shoes to stay grounded into Earth's frequency. And we Got room service. Service three times a day minimum, sometimes four, including grilled salmon for Rainbow, which is one of their many dogs.
- [72:01]
B
I mean, this is really their rock bottom of, like, maybe we can run away from our problems and, you know, have a vacation and just, you know, regroup. But again, I'm seeing, like, the drugs, drugs, drug. Like, they're not operating from, like, a place of, you know, stability. It feels.
- [72:16]
A
That's well said because he also has loaded his backpack full of real gold because his dad told him, you know, gold's gonna be the only currency when the earth breaks apart. And so he's walking around with a backpack full of gold, and this is his racism, thinking he can hand it to someone in Costa Rica and they'll give him a mansion. And when he finds out that, like, no, they won't. And also houses are way more expensive than he has gold in his backpack, they're finally like, okay, let's go home. And how to get home. He books a private IT jet and then almost gets arrested flying with all of his guns because he doesn't know why he couldn't leave the country with guns.
- [72:54]
B
Yeah, I mean, this was a real. I think, you know, and the story continues where they go home. They finally get to go home and their whole house is destroyed, raided trash.
- [73:04]
A
To the point where by their own security guard.
- [73:06]
B
Yeah, I mean, this is really. This is our rock bottom. This is our dark night of the soul. Like, they don't know what way is up or down. They end up moving in with Spencer's parents again and kind of restarting and rebuilding. And I have to say, this felt like a psychotic break. And I was very relieved that they were privileged enough to have a safe space to be like, let's go home. Let's start over.
- [73:27]
A
I think it hit differently for me. For me, it was giving Donald Trump's story of walking with Ivanka and pointing at a homeless man and saying, see that man right there? He's richer than me because I'm $100 million in debt. And her being like, ah, wow. Like, that's what it's giving to me of, like, rich. This is rich people shit. Like, what do you mean you don't have enough money for a house in Costa Rica and you can't pay the rent at home? You're flying on a private jet home.
- [73:54]
B
Yes, money mismanagement, a billion trillion percent. But this is someone who's, like, so high they don't know what's up or down. And these two are just like little puppies. Following each other around again. Spencer's like, shooting in the dark, like, hey, this didn't land. Let's do this. And it's like, then they do and then this does it. So it's just like we're ping ponging.
- [74:14]
A
And to his credit, he's like, everyone's getting sick of us. Us being villains isn't gonna make a check anymore. We've sold this and nothing else from our life. So there's like, nothing to fall back on. But yeah, I think the most gracious read you can give it is yours. Which is to say maybe they're on lots of drugs, because that's certainly not said in the book. That would be at least something believable.
- [74:37]
B
I mean, think they're sitting in that. In that big old house, surrounded by guns, surrounded by gold, surrounded by bodyguards. I mean, it's a dark vision.
- [74:47]
A
I think fame and ego are the drugs here. I hope you're right. And like, there is some something also creating how you could mentally live in this and be buying. I mean, when you are buying 20 guns and 20 crystals on the same day. This is a math equation that shouldn't be happening.
- [75:05]
B
And God, I wish I could have seen that house.
- [75:07]
A
Aaron, your dream house. The way he talks. I said, ugh, Aaron should manage the Spencer Pratt Museum. So, okay, then part. We're at part three of the book, and I'm gonna say 13 years passes in about 20 pages. And he's like, I know I wanna go finish my degree. I dropped out to make a movie in a reality TV show. I'm gonna go back to usc. I think this was fully to try and get a reality show. It didn't work. And really, again, as part of their love story, he says, Heidi attended every single class with me and helped me take notes. And I say, demonic, psychotic, did you have to pay double? And why does your wife have all that time? She doesn't want to go to school. What are we doing? Taking couples class together?
- [75:51]
B
Okay. I'm embarrassed to say what I thought of this part.
- [75:55]
A
You loved it.
- [75:56]
B
I loved it. It made me cry when he was like, he. He says, I left here chasing fame. Now I was coming back, trying to recover what pieces of myself remains, dish myself back up again. I just. I felt maybe I was. Maybe I'm bamboozled. But I kind of love that he was like, let me go back to school. Like, let me get my head and. But I like that.
- [76:18]
A
Why does Heidi have to come to every class, babysit him to make.
- [76:22]
B
Because Heidi was the star Heidi was the star this whole period where they're in Costa Rica, she's doing her album, she's showing the Playboys. Nothing about Spencer. And so what Heidi does, is she.
- [76:33]
A
A star or is he exploiting her as that's neither.
- [76:37]
B
What Heidi then does is when Spencer says, hey, I want to go back and get my degree, she's like, let me get him some stability. Let me be here as to hold it down. Did she go to every class? There's no possible way.
- [76:50]
A
He said she did. He said she did. He said, just like my perfect Heidi. She was there taking notes with me, doing every exam, studying together. Listen, give the ghostwriter a trophy because let me tell you this. They get to the part where he's like, heidi wants to have a child. And I realize that I'm not ready because I don't know how to tell that kid that what daddy does for a living is like, be a dog villain, and I have shame. And I'm like, oh, I'm loving this. Right? And he has to work through that in order to have a child. Then they have a child, and they name him Gunner, which, on a fully separate episode we recorded last year about baby names. Tracy Thomas and I discussed how giant of a red flag it is when you name your child, literally, Gunner for guns. Gunner. And the next child's middle name is Stone. They're looking around their house. They're going, we got guns. We got stones. Gunner Stone.
- [77:44]
B
I don't know what to say about Gunner. That's tough.
- [77:46]
A
Yeah, that's tough. That is a certified, like. Like, you vote Republican name it. Also, the article we were talking about, it was defining baby names by what political party you voted for. So it was like the most popular liberal names, the most popular Republican names for children. Obviously, it's not an exact science, but Gunner was at the top. And listen, if you're out there, your name's Gunner. You're a progressive. Say what's up in the comments. Like, let's learn about who you are. But this is a red flag, okay? So during this era, he also every single day plays Taylor Swift's song look what you made me do. And he. I think he's fully on Snapchat for this. And he gets a huge following and a huge comeback, and he starts selling crystals this way. And again, I fully love it. And I step back and say, a grown man liking Taylor Swift being this cool to people is also sad for us as a culture. We would never give a woman flowers for doing this every day. But Spencer Pratt, like, loves Taylor Swift, and now he's a God. I mean, he is feeding his hummingbirds every day on Snapchat. He's showing off his crystals. He's managing an MMA fighter. Like, and then. Yeah, and then he's playing this Taylor song every morning. And people are watching it happen online to the point where Taylor invites him and Heidi backstage and takes a picture with him. And this sort of, he feels, changes people's perception of him. Like, Taylor being nice to him when he's Spencer Pratt and he gets super popular off of this moment in life. And producers come to him and they say, hey, let's give you and Heidi your own TV show. Crystal Daddy, hummingbird time. A lot of guns. Whatever's up here, let's do it. And Spencer says, I'll do you one better. Let's revamp the Hills. Idiot. And he says it. This is the worst decision. The Hills has something on his ego.
- [79:37]
B
I think your theory is right, though, that he's ping ponging. Does he have adhd? Do we have it documented?
- [79:43]
A
I think it's. I'm gonna say, actually, I think it's confidence. And he's a.
- [79:48]
B
Do you think it's a lack of confidence or overconfidence?
- [79:50]
A
I think it's a lack of confidence because it's a lack of confidence that when Heidi's song is blowing up because he is terribly doing the rap verse on it because of his ego, he has them pull the song rather than capitalize on it. And he's like, that was a bad move. And he admits it's his ego. I think it is easier to believe a comeback from the Hills will do better than it is to believe that just you and your wife aren't. And it's a lesson he always learns a little bit too late that, like, you are enough.
- [80:16]
B
Amen.
- [80:16]
A
Well, the show comes back, everyone hates it, and no one watches it. And he sets up in it. He was like. And then that made a headline. I'm like, it did. Like, it's just all nothing. And Kristen and Lauren don't even come back. I guess if you watch the Hills revamp and you loved it sound off in the comments. But I'm. It was a pretty big flop, I thought.
- [80:31]
B
Never watched it. I hate to say.
- [80:33]
A
Okay, see that from someone who used to watch it every week and cry.
- [80:37]
B
I don't know where it missed it, like. But I will say, when I gave birth to my first daughter, I went into, like a. A pit of despair so deep that I didn't watch any Media for like two years. So, okay, wow.
- [80:47]
A
I'm so sorry, Aaron, but there's a.
- [80:49]
B
Period of pop culture where my brain is like, what happened?
- [80:51]
A
That to be said, that show went away. And he very smartly is always comparing it to Jersey Shore and they revamped it very successfully. And he's like, that could be us. That could be us. And it's just not. And Jersey Shore again set up for constant chaos. And everyone is a Spencer Pratt on that show. Whereas the Hills was like a lot softer, sweeter, real people trying to, like, watch their backs. And that's why the show fails the second time. He's like, everyone would like, do stuff off camera and they wouldn't like, throw a fit like I would. And so the show failed. So we then get to the end of the book and he's like, oh, my God, it's going to be the 15th anniversary of when they dropped Heidi's album without realizing they were releasing Heidi's album.
- [81:32]
B
Well, we should also say that it becomes a big pop hit in China.
- [81:35]
A
Yes, yes, that's right. Her song blows up in China and they're like, oh, my God, are we back? And they're starting to get money and then they realize, like, wait a minute, we are coming up on the 15 year anniversary on January 11, 2025. So we went full throttle, being like, if it's blowing up in China, maybe we can revamp this album again. And they chased down a huge producer who costs a lot of money, and they're like, on January 11th, we're going big and we're coming back. And he said, which is exactly when the universe took out a flamethrower, looked directly at us and said, watch this. This the morning of January 7, four days before the album release, I woke up exhausted. And that's the day of the fires. And I want to say the energy he had in this chapter is the energy that everyone I know in LA and the energy I had on this exact day in January because we had gone through these brutal strikes where everyone here could not work. And then when they came back up, up, everything was being slashed and cut and things were frozen. It was in the fourth quarter and, like, nothing could be bought. And there was this saying all over town, which is, survive until 2025. And the entertainment economy is a huge backbone of LA. So the whole city felt it when it was struggling so badly. It's like, then less people go to restaurants, less events happen, like, less money flows through the whole city. And we all said, survive until 2020. 5. And everyone was coming into January being like, like, okay, we're gonna turn a new leaf. We're gonna like, get this city back. We're gonna make art again. When this happened, and I personally, nothing happened to where we lived. Like, nothing happened to our house. And I still found reading about this extremely hard. Things happen to people. I love people lost homes. And Spencer stays to document the burning of his home. And is there when he's watching, like, like, why is there no water in the reservoir? Like, they can't drop water. Or like, why did it take two hours for like a helicopter to come here? And this is what parlays into him realizing how broken the city's infrastructure is. Because for a city that takes so much tax money to not have fire hydrants full and not have done city planning of resources better, he is now furious. He's tracking all of it. And this is how he ends up deciding he's going to run for mayor. Which again, twofold, which is like, yes, you're correct. And secondly, it's giving guy who's been fucked over by the system for the first time in his life when he's 40.
- [84:01]
B
Yeah, I mean, I would like to say for the record that, you know, I don't think we support him, you know, running for any office. However, I really am inspired by his chutzpah to share his story and tell his truth and to really, you know, rally for the people of his neighborhood and. And you know, I think there's other ways that celebrities can really shine their light and add their support and find the appropriate candidates to do the work. I wish, maybe this is just a wish, you know, being a politician should be a job of service. And I think I want.
- [84:37]
A
Yes.
- [84:38]
B
And I think he's viewing it as something else.
- [84:41]
A
I think that's really well said, Aaron. I wish he would take all this support, take all this celebrity and shine a light on a candidate who we can get behind. I think him running for a mayor is obviously a huge mistake. Need any more TV stars thinking they know best. But I like also you. I don't need a one issue mayor of Los Angeles whose issue is just about his own home and the people in his neighborhood. But there are so many neighborhoods in Los Angeles that need different type of help. We have a huge unhoused crisis. There's so many issues in Los Angeles. I do not need a single issue. Why wasn't my house taking care of Mayer, who is Spencer Pratt now? He ends his first chapter in the book being like, so here I am I've lost my house. I've gained 60 pounds from stress. And he says, I'm sitting here at 6am Writing the last page of a book I never thought anyone would want to read about a life I never thought would add up to anything except scandal and spectacle. Turns out there was a story here after all. Not the one narrated about me, not the one I expected. Just the messy, complicated, sometimes beautiful truth of what it costs to become yourself. Da da da da da. Is that a Hollywood ending? Probably not. And I'm good with that. They usually save those for the hero anyway. Beautiful. I love an ending about a villain that's sad. Like, usually the memoir is like, and then I did it and we're all okay. And his is like, worse than I've ever been.
- [86:05]
B
Oh, I didn't read it like that at all.
- [86:08]
A
I did.
- [86:09]
B
You skipped over one. One piece before, which talks about, like, his relationship to, like, love and home. Like, being different than headlines.
- [86:16]
A
The emotional growth.
- [86:17]
B
Yeah, yeah. So that's what I was saying, that he's not like a Hollywood success, but he's found the things in his family and his home and his passion. That's how I read it.
- [86:25]
A
I read it that way too. I think what I'm loving is that Hida doesn't even talk about being mayor in this book. It doesn't end on and now I'm back as villain mayor. It ends on like, I had to learn what really matters. Being a villain really causes cost me. And all these things I wanted. Looks, fame, and money I no longer have. But, like, I have my wife and children. And also, like, I would have appreciated this emotional growth arc more if he had discussed how, like, post Sandy Hook, they were Alex Jones stands. They've toyed with Maga merch. They've propagated conspiracy theories like a new world order. And again, like, their house is filled with guns. Like they don't believe in gun regulation. And also, you know, he's really going against the Democrats of the city, you know, for things they have done wrong. But also, is he secretly pushing or is he not so secretly pushing his Republican agenda as that's how they voted in the past? I really ended the book liking him a bunch. I really felt like I learned a bunch about him. I felt like he grew so much, but then I had to walk away and remember later that there were like, so many things he did not address. So I don't know. We'll be curious to hear everyone's thoughts.
- [87:32]
B
Thoughts.
- [87:33]
A
Let's do the book Dull Test first question, was the author vulnerable in the sharing of their truth? Yeah, absolutely. And on the minsmore scale, hell yeah. I would say, like, he did better than lots of people. Second question, was it entertaining to read?
- [87:45]
B
I read it in two days. I was like, I breathed bajillion. I mean, he had me at the Mary Kate story on page 40, and I just breezed from there.
- [87:52]
A
This was a millennial bomb. I loved it. And I never watched the Hills. I loved it. Final question, did reading this book elevate your life in any way?
- [88:00]
B
I think it did, because as I alluded, I'm writing a little something that's memoir esque, and I. I really think he got his tone so strong, and I really, I. I truly am reflecting within my own craft. Like, can I really nail my tone? So I think it did. Yeah.
- [88:17]
A
I love that. I love that answer. Aaron, to be extremely honest, I'm gonna say no. But I loved the book. Does that make sense? Like, I really walked away being like. Or maybe I had the thought of. No. You know what? It did in this way where sometimes I really bully myself of, like, I should just, like, spend time on social content because that's important and. Or I should do this right?
- [88:35]
B
And.
- [88:36]
A
And I do do all those things. But reading this book also really distilled that you've gotta be a certain kind of person and personality to truly succeed in this evil math equation of Hollywood. And I don't even mean social media. I also mean, like, in this industry, in this whatever. Like, there's a lot of success in this book that comes out of villainous behavior. And there. It's just never going to be me. I'm. I would. I'm never going to be able to even, like, fake it the way Spencer did. And I just think, like, letting some of those ideas go because they don't lead somewhere good. And if you have to, like, dance with the devil to get your deed done, then, like, it's not a dance I want to take. Okay, well, we are going to end this podcast by thanking Aaron, but also playing a piece of her new podcast, the Hidden History of Magic, where you learn. Learn true stories like memoirs. On this episode, it's a historical podcast of the sort of, like, witchery and wooness that existed in all of these historical things that we just didn't know about.
- [89:33]
B
Yay. Thank you for having me.
- [89:35]
A
Is there anything more misunderstood in history than magic? Here's what your history classes conveniently skipped. The world was not built by logic and reason alone. It was built by something much more ancient.
- [89:50]
B
The Hidden History of Magic tells the true stories of the astrologer in the White House. The intuitive who sat alongside gilded Age tycoons and the black ops government agencies that have used mediums to talk to aliens since the 30s.
- [90:05]
A
These moments often get covered up, sidelined or buried because they prove something. Magic is not fringe. It's used every day.
- [90:15]
B
Because while we've been trained to trust everything but our own intuition, the people in power never stop consulting the stars. They know something we've been taught to forget. Magic is real, and we have access to it.
- [90:29]
A
I'm Rhiannon Hauk.
- [90:31]
B
And I'm Erin Bagwell.
- [90:32]
A
We are psychics, witches, mothers and storytellers ready to break down history's best kept secret secrets.
- [90:40]
B
Welcome to the Hidden History of Magic.
- [90:48]
A
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, Jaron Padre. I also want to give a huge thank you to our incredible partners over at Thrive Cosmetics and Everyplate. We will link to those brands in the show notes.
- [91:05]
B
Notes.
- [91:05]
A
Go check them out. Everything else we discussed is also linked in the show notes. And if you have questions, thoughts, comments, go to the Patreon sign up. There's a free tier. You can join, leave a comment, chat with your fellow cookies. We will keep the book club continuing over there.