Podcrushed – Tembi Locke (September 30, 2025)

Main Theme / Purpose

In this heartfelt and deeply engaging episode, the Podcrushed team—Penn Badgley, Nava Kavelin, and Sophie Ansari—welcome acclaimed writer, actor, and creative force Tembi Locke. The conversation charts Tembi’s journey from a turbulent, creatively formative adolescence through the highs and lows of adulthood: acting, grief, profound family bonds, memoir writing, and the reinvention that comes with "re-nesting" after a child's departure. Along the way, it explores creativity, the impact of rituals, and spiritual connection—rooted in her latest audiobook, Someday Now.

Episode Structure & Key Discussion Points

1. Early Change, Identity, and Sisterhood

[04:03–08:37]

• Middle School Upheaval:
  Tembi shares memories of shuttling between four different schools during her pre-teen years, alongside her father’s remarriage and shifting homes in Houston.

  • “12, my dad remarried. I was changing schools, so I went to three different middle schools.” (Tembi Locke, 04:28)
  • “There’s just a lot of change... trying to hold on to something, you know, as like, identity is forming.” (Tembi Locke, 04:54)

• Code-Switching & Emergence:
  She recalls experiencing social code-switching and experimenting with identities—from preppy to punky.

• Power of Books and Theater:
  Books and performance provided constancy and comfort.

  • “Books were the things where I was like, oh, other people have had, like, really interesting stories. And that's when I was really into theater.” (Tembi Locke, 05:54)

• Sister Attica—the “Ride or Die”:
  Through these constant changes, Tembi’s close bond with her sister Attica blossomed, forged through shared experience and creative play.

  • “She really became each other’s kind of ride or die. Because we were the only constant in each other’s day to day.” (Tembi Locke, 07:05)

2. Creative Roots & Importance of Boredom

[08:37–13:49]

• Family as Nurturers:
  Parents put Tembi and Attica in whatever creative afterschool programs were available.

  • Grandmother, a teacher, was especially influential, giving them structured freedom and access to art:
    • “[She] would let us do things... give us guardrails, but also free rein.” (Tembi Locke, 09:25)

• Art as Outlet:
  When Tembi acted out as a teenager, her grandmother’s solution was to let her buy art supplies, channeling emotion into creativity.

• Value of Boredom:
  Nava and Tembi discuss the necessity of boredom for creativity—a contrast with today’s constant digital stimulation.

  • “Learning to be with oneself without stimuli... All of those things are saying your experience is real and... worth documenting.” (Tembi Locke, 12:11)

• Seeds of Memoir:
  Early fascination with detail, journaling, and scrapbooking laid the foundation for her later memoir-writing:

  • “As a memoirist, all of that raw material... then become[s] the raw material that we shape and craft into narrative that’s... universal.” (Tembi Locke, 14:52)

3. Classic Podcrushed Middle School Questions

[15:17–19:44]

• First Crush & Heartbreak:

  • First crush in kindergarten—“A little boy taught me how to tie my shoes, and I thought he could come home with me.”
  • In middle school: many crushes from afar, locker reassignments for proximity.
  • “My first, like, real, though formal boyfriend relationship... was in the eighth grade... But then I went to a different school, so it all, you know, went away.”
  • “Thinking we were going steady in air quotes, only to find out that he was taking someone else to the dance.” (Tembi Locke, 17:43)

• Cringe Memories:

  • Meticulous, color-coordinated outfits: “I basically walked out of the house looking like color blocks... everything was just matchy and strange.” (Tembi Locke, 18:24)
  • Infamous school photo with matching pink eyeshadow to coordinate the outfit.

4. Crafting a Creative Career & Navigating Loss

[23:49–28:45]

• Acting Origins:

  • Grew up as a performer, began with soap operas in NYC, later moved to LA.
  • Journeyman actor: “You show up... work enough to pay the rent... That was kind of what a journeyman actor [does].” (Tembi Locke, 24:20)

• Pivot to Writing & Memoir:

  • Caring for her ill husband, Saro, paused acting career; sought creative expression through writing.
  • Writing not intended as a career—began as processing grief and complexity.
  • Encouraged by Attica: “You have a story in you. You need to write it, and if you don’t write it, I’m not gonna speak to you.” (Tembi Locke, 27:20)

• Transformation of Pain into Story:

  • Loss emboldened her: “Once you've had the hardest thing happen, you kind of... don't give fucks.” (Tembi Locke, 27:43)
  • Assembled writing, acting skills, and raw experience into her memoir From Scratch.

5. From Memoir to Netflix: What It’s Like

[28:45–31:52]

• Surreality of Adaptation:

  • “Seven lifetimes trying to explain what this experience has been like... so surreal, so all encompassing.” (Tembi Locke, 28:45)
  • Watching Zoe Saldana—inspired by her own life—filming scenes both bizarre and moving.

• Communal Healing:

  • Receiving global audience responses:
    • “Here were all these people... saying things like, I want to call my mom... I wanna be a better husband...” (Tembi Locke, 29:53)
  • Felt deep gratitude and spiritual connection to Saro.

6. Spirit, Ritual, and the Pulse of Sicily

[31:52–40:11]

• Co-writing With Spirit:

  • Writing was dialogic and spiritual—a “collaboration” with her late husband, Saro.
    • “Often, I started my writing process by actually writing to him... or I’d make some of his favorite food.” (Tembi Locke, 33:07)
    • Infused food and ritual into creative practice.

• Sicily as Sanctuary:

  • Place vibrates with natural, spiritual energy: “You have all the natural elements coalescing on a volcanic rock... It is vibrating at a certain kind of energy.” (Tembi Locke, 34:54)
  • Spirituality grounded in nature, not organized religion.

• Creativity and The Divine:

  • Discusses faith, creativity as extensions of the “divine light” in all people.
    • “There is a divine light within all of us. That is really the guiding principle of how I move through the world...” (Tembi Locke, 39:11)

7. Innovations in Memoir: The Audio Experience

[45:51–48:26]

• Unique Approach to Someday Now:

  • Written for audio—meant to be “intimately told as a story.”
  • Blends soundscapes of Sicily (voices, sea, Vespas) with personal narrative.
    • “When you listen to this audiobook... it transports the listener to Sicily. Whether you’ve been there or not, the place comes alive the way it comes alive for me.” (Tembi Locke, 46:49)

• Double Memoir:

  • Both a story of personal/family transformation and a sonic snapshot of place in a moment in time.

8. Parallels: Middle Age and Middle School

[48:01–51:43]

• Middle Age as a New Adolescence:

  • “Middle age brought the same emotional awkwardness I had felt in middle school, just with bills and a stiff back.” (cited by Sophie; 48:01)
  • Hormone swings, uncertainty, questions of identity and possibility.

• Re-nesting Instead of Empty Nesting:

  • Rejects the “empty” narrative: “Let’s just call that the old way. And the new way is... a beautiful, positive, ripe time.” (Tembi Locke, 51:12)
  • Emphasizes opportunity, joy, and reimagining life after children leave home.

9. Grief, Ritual, and Blended Families

[53:34–59:45]

• Grief as Part of Transitions:

  • Leaving home can reactivate old loss; new chapters require processing both joy and sorrow.
  • “Many things can be true.” (Tembi Locke, 54:00)

• Creating New Rituals:

  • Value of new traditions and small rituals (sending postcards on trips), especially for healing and connection.
    • “Ritual gave us anchors... made us agents in the thing we wanted to create.” (Tembi Locke, 56:30)
  • Nava shares how rituals with her father have been pivotal after her mom’s passing.

• Blended Family Dynamics:

  • On her husband Robert joining her family:
    • Importance of consistency for children who have experienced loss.
    • “I'm not policing... I just want to be a point of presence. That's his words, a point of presence in your life.” (Tembi Locke, 60:16)
    • Importance of taking time, listening, and professional support when needed.

10. Advice to 12-Year-Old Tembi

[62:24–63:31]

• “You’re gonna have so much fun. You will have fun. And just don't forget that. Don't forget that. In the face of everything else, don't forget that.” (Tembi Locke, 62:37)
• On the importance of holding on to the “smooth flowing water of joy” from childhood.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Code-Switching for Survival:
  “I also remember a lot of, like, code switching. I don’t even mean that in the cultural sense. I just mean, like, school to school, or mom's house to dad's house... one day I’m gonna be preppy. The next day I’m gonna be punky. The next day I’m gonna be like... I was just really in an emergence and kind of at sea.” (Tembi Locke, 04:54)

• The Power of Boredom:
  “Learning to be with oneself without stimuli... giving someone a paintbrush and a canvas or a pen and paper, all of those things are saying your experience is real and it’s... worth documenting.” (Tembi Locke, 12:11)

• Heartbreak Classic:
  “Thinking we were going steady in air quotes, only to find out that he was taking someone else to the dance.” (Tembi Locke, 17:43)

• On Midlife’s Possibility:
  “I refused. I rebuked defining my life by a negative or an absence or something that was limiting. And I really wanted to do the reframe and call it re-nesting, not empty nesting.” (Tembi Locke, 52:09)

• On Ritual and Loss:
  “Ritual gave us anchors. It gave us things that we could count, and it made us agents in the thing that we wanted to create.” (Tembi Locke, 56:30)

• Advice to Her Younger Self:
  “You’re gonna have so much fun... Don’t forget that.” (Tembi Locke, 62:37)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 04:28 — Tembi on turbulence of age 12
• 07:05 — Sisterhood as survival
• 09:25 — Grandmother’s creative, structured freedom
• 12:11 — On boredom and creativity
• 14:52 — Lifelong detail-keeping → memoir
• 17:43 — First heartbreak story
• 18:24 — The infamous matchy-matchy school photo
• 24:20 — Journeyman actor explained
• 27:20 — Attica challenges her to write
• 29:53 — Deep resonance from global Netflix audience
• 33:07 — Co-writing memoir through ritual/cooking
• 34:54 — Sicily’s spiritual pull and elemental energy
• 39:11 — “There is a divine light within all of us.”
• 46:49 — Unique audio memoir format, “record the island”
• 48:01 — “Middle age brought the same emotional awkwardness I had felt in middle school, just with bills and a stiff back.”
• 51:12 — Re-nesting, not “empty nesting”
• 56:30 — The healing power of ritual for herself and her daughter
• 60:16 — Robert as “a point of presence” in blended family
• 62:37 — The fun is coming: advice to her younger self

Tone & Atmosphere

The conversation is honest, warm, and full of humor—while tackling complex emotional terrain: adolescence, grief, reinvention, family, and spiritual connection. Tembi’s storytelling is vivid and intimate, making her journey feel both unique and universally resonant. The Podcrushed hosts encourage vulnerability and reflection, infusing the episode with that distinct blend of relatability and depth that characterizes their show.

For listeners seeking wisdom on surviving change, crafting narrative from chaos, or finding meaning in midlife and beyond, this episode is a beacon—a testament to resilience, creativity, humor, and love in all its forms.