"Birthdays at Barcades" w/ Hayden Johnson

Summary

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StraightioLab – "Birthdays at Barcades" w/ Hayden Johnson

Podcast: StraightioLab
Hosts: George Civeris, Sam Taggart
Guest: Hayden Johnson
Air Date: July 14, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this characteristically witty and sharp episode of StraightioLab, comedians George Civeris and Sam Taggart are joined by LA-based comedian Hayden Johnson to dissect the straight cultural phenomenon of birthday parties at barcades (think Dave & Buster’s and similar nostalgia-laden adult arcade spaces). Together, they explore inclusion, exclusion, and what straight and queer party planning says about cultural defaults and anxieties. The trio branches into broader conversations about discovery, influencer culture, the paradox of inclusivity, gay vs. straight bar politics, "the Miniature Wife" TV show, and the ongoing AI creep into culture.

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Key Discussions and Insights

1. Being "Discovered" in LA vs. NY, and the Death of Gatekeepers

[03:33 – 10:54]

• The episode opens with George and (co-)Sam riffing on the mythical Hollywood "discovery" and how social media has changed everything.
• Quote:

  "There’s no gatekeepers and there’s no quality of any kind. So at any given point, you have been discovered because you’re in control of who gets discovered or not." – George [05:00]

• On the ubiquity and awkwardness of "man on the street" content in NY, and how being passively discovered has transformed into a desperate act of not being discovered.
• Quote:

  "If you are alive and have a phone, you are discovered." – George [05:09]

• Hayden adds, "Getting discovered in New York is so much easier because you guys have those little people running around interviewing people on the street. We don't have that in LA." [07:45]
• The group skewers Instagram and influencer culture, longing for a time when personalities felt authentic versus algorithmic.

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2. Fake Content, Real Loneliness: "The Miniature Wife" and the AI Takeover

[13:40 – 22:19]

• Discussion steers into the increasing artificiality of media, with examples like "The Miniature Wife" (an intentionally absurd fictional TV show).
• The panel lampoons both its premise and how it symbolizes the emptiness and weirdness of current streaming fare—sparked by Substack discourse suggesting even dialogue is AI-generated.
• Quote:

  "If you just have your third eye open, you will notice so many things around us are written by AI...When you look at these ads, you know something is off. All we have left is our human judgment." – Hayden [19:20]

• They riff on the fragility of “human ideas” in a world where actual scripting, dialogue and even emotional appeals are outsourced to AI.
• Memorable moment: Imagining Emmy acceptance speeches by a tiny, CGI "Miniature Wife" [25:28]

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3. What’s in a Party? The Emotional Politics of Queer and Straight Social Planning

[43:45 – 61:10]

• Main Segment: Hayden introduces the week’s deep-dive: the fraught territory of straight birthday parties at barcades/Dave & Buster’s.
• Quote:

  "Me walking into a Dave & Buster’s is the equivalent of me walking into the RNC. It is terrifying." – Hayden [43:58]
  "There are people on the TV saying to get me out of there."

• Sam and George echo the feeling of being asked to perform queerness or “add spice” at straight events, or being used for “diversity” optics.
• The group contrasts the straight "default mode" of assuming inclusion ("Of course you can come! I am not ashamed!") with the often-misaligned reality of safety and comfort for queer friends.
• Quote:

  "It's not about you being ashamed. It's about me feeling safe." – Hayden [61:21]

• The privilege dynamic gets flipped: straight friends get to have their nostalgia undisturbed, while queer friends must brave hostility or be deemed "difficult" for not wanting to attend.

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4. Bar (and Birthday) Politics: Inclusivity vs Authenticity

[46:44 – 55:20]

• The tendency for straight people to host in exclusionary venues vs. queer folks’ acculturated anxiety about making everyone comfortable.
• They debate the merits of mixed venues (e.g., High Tops Los Feliz) that allow space for both communities without anyone feeling like a side act.
• Quote:

  "The longer you stay out, the more bisexual you become." – Guest [50:36]

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5. Tiered Invites & Queer Social Engineering

[56:11 – 66:34]

• The group brainstorms the logistics and ethics of birthday parties with overlapping social circles.
• Should invites be staggered, or split by group? Is it possible to avoid resentment for "3pm" friends vs. "night out" crowd?
• Quote:

  "What’s happening here is interesting because the gay impulse is: what can I best do to accommodate everyone and make sure everyone has a good experience? The straight impulse is to be like, ‘You can come to Dave & Buster’s, bitch.'" – Guest [60:37]

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6. Performative Progressivism and "Diversity" as Accessory

[61:10 – 63:03]

• Discussion about weddings/parties where queer friends are trotted out as proof of enlightenment rather than included authentically.
• Quote:

  “Do you see him? Do you see how one of the bridesmaids is a guy? Bet you didn’t think I was capable of that.” – Guest [61:47]

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7. Closure: Best Practices, Bad Advice, and the Limits of Inclusion

[66:34 – episode end]

• The group accepts the impossibility of pleasing everyone: "Maybe we grow up. I'm not eight years old. Why are you speaking to me in throw pillow language? Like, let's get down to brass tacks—what do I do?" – Guest [58:35]
• Birthday party advice becomes a metaphor for the limits of both radical inclusion and performative diversity.
• Final recommendations: just be honest about group structures and accept some discomfort.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• "There’s no gatekeepers and there’s no quality of any kind. So at any given point, you have been discovered..." – George [05:00]
• “‘Me walking into a Dave & Buster’s is the equivalent of me walking into the RNC. It is terrifying.’” – Hayden [43:57]
• "If you are alive and have a phone, you are discovered." – George [05:09]
• "It's not about you being ashamed. It's about me feeling safe." – Hayden [61:21]
• "The longer you stay out, the more bisexual you become." – Guest [50:36]
• "Do you see him? Do you see how one of the bridesmaids is a guy? Bet you didn’t think I was capable of that." – Guest [61:47]
• "Why are you speaking to me in throw pillow language? Let's get down to brass tacks." – Guest [58:37]

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Timestamps for Highlights

• 03:33 – The myth of “discovery” in LA vs. NY; social media as the new street
• 07:45 – How “man on the street” videos define NY clout
• 13:40 – Instagram as pure advertising/altruism lost
• 19:20 – AI’s subtle takeover of media; the uncanny in “The Miniature Wife”
• 22:01 – Gender, sexuality, and power dynamics in TV
• 43:45 – Hayden’s straight topic: the terror of barcade birthday parties
• 46:44 – Inclusion/exclusion in straight vs queer party planning
• 55:00 – Changing group dynamics in queer social life (Twinks vs Dolls, etc.)
• 56:11 – How to plan an all-inclusive (but fun) birthday
• 60:37 – Gay vs. straight approaches to guest selection and empathy
• 61:47 – Being used as “the diverse friend” in event photos
• 66:34 – The futility of pleasing every guest
• 71:01 on – Shoutouts and pop culture recommendations

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Tone and Language

The tone throughout is irreverently intellectual, self-consciously “meta,” and loaded with dry, sardonic asides. The hosts and guest are persistently self-aware, breaking the fourth wall to acknowledge podcast conventions, queer social anxieties, and the ever-creeping influence of commerce and AI on culture.

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Memorable Moments

• The extended riffing on "The Miniature Wife" as an allegory for fake yet deeply human entertainment.
• Hayden describing the feeling of walking into Dave & Buster’s as “the huge wife” and the group’s riff: “Must be this short to enter. No huge wives.”
• Suggestions for tiered/segmented birthday invites as a form of queer event management.
• Skewering of well-meaning straight friends who lack the self-awareness to see when their "inclusivity" is actually exclusionary or performative.

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Final Segment: Shoutouts

[82:41 – End]

• Shoutouts to Boots Riley’s new movie ("so bold, so colorful, Keke Palmer’s a generational talent"), the Pulitzer Prize board, the podcast BANDSPLAIN ("12 hours deep into the Madonna saga"), and to different local queer-adjacent bars and communities.

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Takeaways

• Birthday parties at barcades serve as a launching-off point for deeper questions about empathy, inclusion, and the sometimes-incompatible psychic needs of straight vs. queer spaces.
• "Inclusivity" done thoughtlessly can feel alienating as exclusion itself.
• AI and commerce have profoundly warped both authenticity and fun, but self aware, long-form conversations like these are a bulwark against the drift.
• Will the group ever solve the "birthday invitation dilemma"? Probably not—but at least they can laugh about it together.

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For new listeners:
If you’ve ever wondered why a straight friend’s party feels awkward, why queer event planning feels fraught, or whether anyone else notices culture sliding into the uncanny valley, this episode’s mix of humor and insight will hit home.
Clippable? Extremely.
Shareable? Even if you’re only a 3pm friend.

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Transcript

[Sam Taggart]

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[George Taveras]

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[Sam Taggart]

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[George Taveras]

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[Sam Taggart]

He's at the edge of the box. He cuts past the non stop group chat trash talk. He clears on goal.

[George Taveras]

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[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

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[George Taveras]

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[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

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[George Taveras]

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[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Soon after I was in their Kohler

[George Taveras]

Wisconsin foundry watching molten iron poured, enamel applied by hand and the beautiful finished pieces ready to ship. Since 1883, Kohler cast iron has been crafted by incredible artisans and seeing it

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

firsthand gave me a whole new appreciation for their craftsmanship.

[George Taveras]

Now I am proud to lend my

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

stamp of approval to my favorite Kohler

[George Taveras]

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[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Shop my curated [e-mail] as the Kohler

[George Taveras]

Cast Iron Ambassador, I say long live cast Iron.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

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[George Taveras]

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[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Just head to CarMax.com for details and get pre qualified today. Want to drive? CarMax. Tour Announcement starts now. This is George. Just a reminder that you can see my dear co host Sam Taggart on tour this summer starting in July in San Francisco, Seattle, Portland, Washington, D.C. philly, Chicago, Pittsburgh and Boston. And hot off the presses, you can also see me, George Severis do a few small shows this August in anticipation for my own tour that's happening later on in the fall. But this August I will be in New York, Louisiana and get this, East Hampton on August 30th. So if you want to see me In New York, Louisiana or East Hampton, tickets are at linktree.com Drew George Severis the link is in my Instagram bio and if you want to see Sam on tour, you can find [e-mail] getthis samtaggart and that link is in his Instagram bio. God, we love symmetry, folks. Well, enjoy the show.

[George Taveras]

Podcast starts now. What is up, everyone around the globe, we are here in Los Angeles, California. We can be discovered at any moment. For the actors, we are not.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm walking around saying, kind of hair on my face, like stuck to my cheeks, yelling, please discover me.

[George Taveras]

You know what?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm undiscovered.

[George Taveras]

You know what you just scolded me for? New York versus la.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But I have to say every before every episode, I take Sam aside, Rocky style. I'm a coach. I'm literally in the wrestler and he is Mickey Rourke. And I'm saying, Sam, don't go New York versus LA mode. Right off the bat you have other moves.

[Sam Taggart]

You can't.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You have so many things in your arsenal. You can't just do New York vs LA.

[George Taveras]

You can't get discovered in LA because you can't walk on the street. Part of being discovered is walking down the street. You need to be walking down the street and have a person say, oh my God, you're a model.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

First of all, you can get discovered in a mall. You can get discovered in a strip mall. You can get discovered at a coffee shop, maybe Maru Coffee in Los Feliz.

[George Taveras]

You get discovered in line, that one hour long line. Yes, at Maru Coffee.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Many people, you know what they do these days, these aspiring models, they come and they wait in lines.

[George Taveras]

That's true. Okay, nevermind, I take it all back.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And also, there's no such thing as being discovered on the street anymore because the proverbial street is actually the feed. So if you just come to la, as long as there's a palm tree in the background, you can prove, you know, you don't have to pay for me to move. I'm already in la. But here I am, here's my face. This is what my cheeks look.

[George Taveras]

There's also no more being discovered because there's no more such thing as.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

There's no gatekeepers, there's no film or tv. There's no gatekeepers and there's no quality of any kind. So at any given point, you have been discovered because you're in control of who gets discovered or not.

[George Taveras]

If you are alive and have a phone, you are discovered.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's actually, you need to. Being discovered now is the default. And opting out of being discovered is like the choice you make.

[George Taveras]

Well, and this is here, this is what kind of makes me sad about people who are famous and older. Sort of like Madonna. Like, she actually needs to be discovered now.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That is literally so true. And that is why she's doing SpawnCon for. Built the platform for paying for your rent. And you make points.

[George Taveras]

That was really sad to me.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

So basically, if people haven't seen this, Madonna is doing a digital series, I think approximately 17 part digital series. 17 part digital series where she's being interviewed by the CEO of Bilt, who does not respect her enough to memorize the questions and is looking. This is his camera. He's looking over here to read the questions.

[George Taveras]

Completely charmless.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

So, Madonna, what is your craziest trend story in New York?

[George Taveras]

It's such a bummer. And by the way, she's, you know, she used to like storm out of things. Meanwhile, she's being disrespected and she has to sit there and take it.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Are you kidding me? Right before that was filmed, her team took her aside and said, if this Bilt account backfires, we're not releasing Confessions 2. Bildt is fully funding Confessions 2, the album, the tour, and the press tour. And you better sit there in your leotard, completely motionless.

[George Taveras]

And your answer, and to yourself, what

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

is your craziest rent story in New York?

[George Taveras]

Should we bring in our guest?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Of course.

[George Taveras]

Because I feel that she might have some things to add.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

She's kind of the Madonna of the alternative LA based comedy scene, but much younger.

[Sam Taggart]

Thank you. Thank you. Take that, Madonna.

[George Taveras]

Please welcome Hayden Johnson.

[Sam Taggart]

Wow. Okay. And I have two thoughts. First of all, it's just so fucked up to bring Madonna back to a place of. What's your craziest rent story?

[George Taveras]

I know.

[Sam Taggart]

Disrespectful.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And you know what?

[George Taveras]

So disrespectful.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

She keeps saying these things like, and they obviously primed her. They were like, you gotta like be self deprecating, whatever. And so she goes, I used to fuck guys just so I could use their shower. It's like, madonna, don't say that.

[Sam Taggart]

Don't say that, Madonna. It's not true. Don't say that.

[George Taveras]

It might be true, though.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, no, it's definitely true, to be clear. But it's just like we are past that. Madonna shouldn't need to nostalgia bait.

[Sam Taggart]

I agree.

[George Taveras]

She doesn't need to nostalgia bait. And she doesn't need to be like, can you believe my journey? I was poor, now I'm rich. I'm like, I don't care. You're one of the greatest we have

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

in the grand scheme of your life. You were poor for like two seconds.

[Sam Taggart]

She just kind of emerged from like an oak tree.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Kind of like this is how I

[Sam Taggart]

like to think of it. My second thought is getting discovered. Right. Getting discovered in New York is so much easier because you guys have those little people running around interviewing people on the street.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That's a really good point.

[Sam Taggart]

We don't have that in la. Nobody's running up to people going, what's the worst thing your mom said to you? Like that. But you guys have that in.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That's like most of the economy in New York right now. It's that and then it's like matcha brulee, latte build, credit card.

[George Taveras]

The whole thing with the constant interviewing people on the street is I'm like, the street is for walking. The street is famously the catchphrase of New York is I'm walking here. And now they've created this world where you can't even walk on the sidewalk. Yeah. Because it's constantly. Talk shows are being filmed left and right.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, they've gentrified the street. The last remaining place that was not

[George Taveras]

gentrified before for community is now a. It's now a set for upand cominging

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

creators, non union, by the way.

[George Taveras]

Yeah, well, of course people used to

[Sam Taggart]

just sit in Washington Square park and

[George Taveras]

read a book, smoke a joint, and

[Sam Taggart]

now you can't because people are. People are screaming about what their favorite movies are or whatever.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

God forbid you refuse to participate in this non consensual set that is you're literally on the set of like a reality show that is again sponsored by Bilt. If you refuse to participate in it, then the video of you refusing goes viral. And it's like, look at this dumb ass gay guy, you know, like he's so weird. He didn't want to participate in a video.

[George Taveras]

You know how Republicans are like, I'm afraid to go to New York City because I'll be murdered on the street. Yes. It's like I too am afraid to go to New York City because I will be interviewed by someone I don't want to be interviewed by.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

And I am Scared of being that person.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Sometimes these people come up on my feed and I'm like, you don't seem to be having the interviewer, the person doing the man on the street thing. I'm like, were you chosen for this by some sort of, like, you know, it's like mandatory military service, but for doing man on the street videos. Cause you don't seem to be having fun. You don't know what you're talking. There was this one person who asked people what their favorite movies are, and then they say. And he's like, haven't seen that one.

[Sam Taggart]

No, I didn't know. They asked me if I wanted to do this one, and I was like, no.

[George Taveras]

Well, it's like.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

He'll be like, what are. And it's like a gay guy. And he's like, what's your favorite gay movie? And someone will be like, you know, an obvious choice, like Pink Flamingos or, you know, Kung Fu. Yes. And he's like, oh, haven't seen that one. And then the person will be like, yeah, it's like John Waters. Like, oh, I don't know him.

[Sam Taggart]

End of clip, end of clip, end of clip. And a little sound Sting at the end. And it's like, what?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

What are we doing?

[Sam Taggart]

We're getting so far away from interesting content to just two people talking. And they both look crazy enough that you're like, I guess I'll stick around.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's actually unintentional Andy Kaufman level alternative comedy where it's like, how much can we deconstruct human interaction? Where at some point it's just gonna be someone staring into the screen, Marina Abramovich style. But it's like kind of a mediocre gay guy.

[George Taveras]

That's unfortunately a genius idea. I will say that we have weaponized sound, Sting and title card. Like, now you put sound, sting and title card on literally blank space, and you're like, that's my favorite show. There can be nothing else there as long as there's a Sting and a title card.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

We're stripping down the initial thing that everyone's aiming for is what? Like sitcom or talk show? Like, okay, yeah, that has certain parts. We're stripping them down and it's like, what if a talk show was just the man on the street segment? What if it was just, you know, the clip of two people having a conversation and they're stripped down. Stripped. And then at the end, it's going to be like. Like, nature document. It's going to be like, just footage of New York City, which Is a beautiful.

[Sam Taggart]

We need to like.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But then with Accelerate, and it's just a static image of New York City.

[Sam Taggart]

I would prefer if these people just kind of went around with a camera and kind of locked onto someone's conversation from far away. I would rather watch that be dropped into the middle of two random New Yorkers talking. I think that would be beautiful.

[George Taveras]

That would be really nice. It's funny to talk, of course. To critique this world while doing a podcast where our clip will end with a sting and a title card.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But I.

[Sam Taggart]

But this is a whole. This is a whole seven.

[George Taveras]

Well, this is long form.

[Sam Taggart]

This is long form. This is getting people into the long. There is no long form.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

There's no long form.

[George Taveras]

That's true.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Also, do you ever sit, stop and think, what I am doing here is watching only ads? Like, what. What clips are. Is ads for something else.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That you're never gonna go and find.

[Sam Taggart]

Well, I'm finding it's like opening.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

What if you opened a magazine and it was literally just advertisements and you were just sitting. And that's just. You're sitting there like, oh, interesting. Oh, I don't like that one. Oh, and then that's it. That's your whole life.

[George Taveras]

Well, to be fair, when I do feel like magazines fell off because.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Because it was all ads, you literally

[George Taveras]

open a Vogue and you're like, wait, that' not. That's not. That's not. And you're like, when does it get fun? Like, when am I like, ooh, how chic.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, at least the ads in Vogue are chic, though.

[Sam Taggart]

A little. I don't know.

[George Taveras]

I don't know what's chic anymore.

[Sam Taggart]

I got to get rid of my Vogue.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Do you subscribe?

[Sam Taggart]

I. I used to.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I used to. I was like.

[Sam Taggart]

I was like, I. I want to know. I want to.

[George Taveras]

I want to carry.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I want. I literally. I was like, I'm moving to the city. Like, I want to be carried. Well, that's. Yes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That's how I was with the New Yorker, where someone the other day was like, oh, I sent a link and they were like, oh, I don't subscribe. And I was like, I didn't know you could not subscribe to the New Yorker. To me, that was like my birthright. As soon as I move to a major city, I have to get the New Yorker and then have a pile of it that I've never read.

[George Taveras]

I will say back to your thing about Instagram entirely being ads is that it does feel like I open it now. And it's so foreign. No one on there I know anymore. It's just, like, different people trying to start a new show. And I'm like, okay, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. And so it's, like, kind of losing its grip on me because I not feeling that, like, personal connection to it.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But, you know, what's funny is, like, you're saying, okay, it's not what it used to be, but then you think, when did I like it? Like, it's like. It's like, what am I looking for here? When I keep scrolling.

[Sam Taggart]

I do think there was, like, a period of time where people hadn't figured out how to, like, be an influencer yet, but they were making content. And then you were able to look them in the eyes and see a person and genuinely connect to them. And now everybody's kind of imitating somebody who is doing a style that was recommended to them by their marketing person or whatever. And so now it just seems like there's. People have a big personality, but it feels like there's a vacuum. There's nothing behind their eyes. They're just kind of being loud or, like, I don't know, making a big.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, big personality is an interesting phrase. Haven't seen one of those in a while.

[George Taveras]

I feel like maybe not big personality, but big sort of outfit swing.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, big outfit swing.

[George Taveras]

I feel like it's big outfit swing. Some signifiers in hair and makeup that are like, I'm cool. And then it's like, whatever comes after that.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh, the signifiers are everywhere.

[George Taveras]

Oh, the signifiers are signifiers.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It is the matrix, and the signifiers are bullets. And I am trying to avoid all of that. Signifier here, signifier there. Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

And I'm just. I'm uninterested. They're asking questions to someone. Kind of banking on that person being interviewed being really entertaining because then their reactions are just like, yes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Or when they, like, the person says something, and then the interviewer just looks to camera and is like, oh, yeah, the person just said, my favorite color is yellow. Or whatever. Like, oh, cut.

[Sam Taggart]

Turbotax. Sorry.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I love our world.

[George Taveras]

You can say turbotax.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay, okay, okay. Sorry.

[George Taveras]

I don't want to say it a couple times.

[Sam Taggart]

Maybe I don't want to step on.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I would love to be sponsored by TurboTax.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. They're so ethical.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. I don't.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Isn't it crazy that we have to do our own taxes? Hello. If you want to use AI for something.

[Sam Taggart]

Well, okay. Yeah. Clip that, clip that, clip that.

[George Taveras]

Clip that today. I was at my gym, of course. And there's.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm so jealous. You already went.

[George Taveras]

Yeah, the morning does help. It was yesterday. I was in a horrible mood because they were after. That being said, they have a TV in the locker room that plays sort of local news and the big game if it's on. But I was watching local news and there was a commercial, and I was like, this is entirely made of AI I was like, wait, this happened without me knowing where. If you turn on just a normal channel, the commercials are AI Now.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah. So I recently read a substack. Pause for a fact.

[Sam Taggart]

Yay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Wow. Everyone gets the entire staff of iHeartRadio.

[George Taveras]

Wow, that's awesome, George. Was it. Did you pay for it monthly or was it free?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, it was one of the free ones. Yeah, I'm a free subscriber to this particular substance.

[George Taveras]

That's what I thought.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

By this guy Sam. Chris, I believe is his name. But he was. There was usually some controversy where a short story or something won some award. And then it was revealed that it was written by AI Okay. And so then he was making the point. He was like, yes, obviously this is written by AI but guess what? If you just have your third eye open, you will notice so many things around us are written by AI and one of the examples he mentioned was the show the Miniature Wife. And I was like, okay, you're taking this too far. I don't think the Miniature Wife was written by AI and then he started quoting parts of it, like pieces of dialogue, because he watched it. And I'm like, it's written by AI Is it? No human would write this.

[Sam Taggart]

I can't believe that you were so quick to defend the Miniature Wife.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I was like, I don't think Elizabeth Banks would work on an AI Project.

[George Taveras]

Well, I mean, the premise of the Miniature Wife, I'm saying this is the most original concept I've heard in decades.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. There's a wife that she's tiny.

[George Taveras]

There's a wife that she's tiny.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I actually was really. I was really defending the Miniature Wife because when it came out and people were like, this is a 30 Rock joke. I'm like, it's self aware, dumbass. They don't think they're making the Godfather, but the Miniature Godfather, like, they know it's funny that the wife is miniature. Do you think they don't know that it's funny that the wife is miniature? I'm glad you're the dumb one.

[George Taveras]

We have the same reaction when people react to Like a title being funny. I'm like, it's give it a chance. Give it a chance.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Or it's like that other. There was that trailer for that movie where it's like, there's one night a year you can have sex. Do you know about this? Oh, it's like a rom com. And the premise is they live in a dystopian society.

[George Taveras]

Dua Lipa's husband is in it.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Dua Lipa's husband is in it. Callum Turner and some other girl. The girl from a complete unknown. And people were like, okay, so I guess it's funny that they live in a fascist theocracy. It's like, maybe. Have you seen the Producers?

[Sam Taggart]

I think what was making me laugh about the Miniature Wife is it was like, okay, we've done so many. To me, I saw it and I was like, okay, we've done so many shows about, like, a straight couple that now it's like, what can we give them to kind of make them interesting? Oh, I know. We'll make the wife tiny. And that's kind of where we're at.

[George Taveras]

I love a big swing. Like, I saw the Miniature Wife, and I said, okay, how did we get here? I'm like, I'm gonna want to see this pilot.

[Sam Taggart]

Well, of course I want to know how she got tiny. That is really big. I just want to know.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

In this substack, the guy hadn't fact checked, so he kept calling the show the Littlest Wife. And he was making this, like, really, like, passionate argument against AI and he was like, and in the Littlest Wife, she says this. And I'm like, well, it is the Miniature Wife.

[George Taveras]

He said, this was written by a human. Notice my mistakes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, exactly.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. That's beautiful.

[George Taveras]

That is interesting. Can he prove that the Miniature Wife is AI or is just.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Here's the thing. He can't prove it, but I'm kind of like, I actually like that he's not trying to prove it, because he's like, my human eye. What he's basically saying is, believe in your human capability of judging what is human. When you look at something like you're looking at these ads, you know, something is off. Like, what we have. All we have left is our human judgment. And if we just, like, accept that this is the new normal, then we will also start thinking like AI and then there's no going back.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I think that's why. I mean, you would hope that that's why the Miniature Wife would be kind of a truly human concoction, because you Would hope that maybe AI wouldn't come up with a wife. Tiny man.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And in the miniature wife. And I do think the idea to make the wife miniature was a human idea. I think it's just the dialogue that was written by AI.

[Sam Taggart]

They're putting out a statement. The idea to make. Of course, the idea to make the wife miniature was all human, 100% conceived by people.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But I kind of. I also do think that is the argument that pro AI people are making where they're like, well, the ideas are human, but you don't want a human to write. You know, the cold open. Like, it's like.

[Sam Taggart]

It's.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's like, AI is a tool.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

People love to say that.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

That's kind of how it keeps going, where people are like, oh, don't. You shouldn't be using AI for this. And then they're like, hey, we came up with the idea of what the movie was going to be, and then AI made it. That's the human part. Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, the human part is the idea and the execution part. Like, the workers can be replaced. So it's sort of like the manager can be human, the workers should be robots.

[Sam Taggart]

We can get an idea from a person, and then the robot can write that idea. But that's not a big deal.

[George Taveras]

Yeah, you can come up with a prompt. Yeah, wife miniature.

[Sam Taggart]

Hey, hey. People came up with the prompts. People came up with wife miniature.

[George Taveras]

Write a show about a wife who's miniature.

[Sam Taggart]

Now, was it. Now, was it the AI's idea to put the miniature wife on a little train set? Yeah, but we knew that the wife was going to be tiny.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

They're interviewing the writer on, like, inside the Writer's Studio, and he's like, when I was coming up with a prompt, I was going back and forth between, what if a wife is miniature? And what if a miniature is a wife? And they came back with such different things for each one. And my job as a writer is to choose which one made the more sense.

[Sam Taggart]

And, you know, the first execs I went to, they were like, what if the wife was huge? And I was like, you don't get it. You don't get it. You're trying to take my idea and change it.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Although this is interesting. What if the wife was huge?

[Sam Taggart]

What if the wife was huge?

[George Taveras]

Like, that actually could have been a more interesting story.

[Sam Taggart]

Well, I think that it is not a coincidence that Trump is president. We're making the wife small.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That's very true.

[Sam Taggart]

I think.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I think, you know, but they made Sydney Sweeney.

[Sam Taggart]

Big.

[George Taveras]

Okay, well, that was different.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Was that a dream? I haven't seen the show.

[George Taveras]

That was fetish content.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That was fetish content. Whereas the miniature wave, of course, could never be fetish content.

[George Taveras]

Well, that's true.

[Sam Taggart]

That's interesting.

[George Taveras]

That's true. Maybe because the wife. Sydney Sweeney's not a wife yet. Wife.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, she got married in the show that I've seen.

[George Taveras]

Well, she leaves him sort of.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh, okay. Well, I guess again, never seen the show. There's so many clips of the show, I have no idea what it's about.

[Sam Taggart]

She's been.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Every show is like Sydney Sweeney saying the R word. And then it's like, so is this about high school? Yeah.

[George Taveras]

No. Season three of Euphoria was one of the worst things I've ever had to see. That being said, Sam Levinson. I do, Stan. I am the idol's number one fan.

[Sam Taggart]

But you just stand behind anyone with your name. Any Sam. True.

[George Taveras]

Any Sam.

[Sam Taggart]

Any Sam. You're on their side.

[George Taveras]

No. You're like. Like, at least someone's dreaming.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Wait, what are you referring to Sam Levinson?

[George Taveras]

Oh, he's like, at least he's having fun out there.

[Sam Taggart]

I do think he took some big swings making this last one.

[George Taveras]

And the only issue. The big issue with the last one is that it was just so. Boy, the whole thing was. I'm like, ugh.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

Let me guess. Yeah. Shooting, drugs.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. Prostitution, fighting. And it's like, what happened? Not high school.

[George Taveras]

Whatever happened in high school.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

What happened to knitting macrame? Right. That's my examples of things that are women related.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. You're here watching Euphoria season three, and you're going, why do women all have to do onlyfans Now? Whatever happened to women doing macros?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Whatever happened to staying in the home?

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. Knitting.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Knitting.

[Sam Taggart]

Hello.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Making a nice roast.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. Well, I think I haven't seen the miniature wife. Of course.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But at least imagine if you had you suddenly come out as having seen the miniature wife.

[Sam Taggart]

I would walk out, you know, Can

[George Taveras]

I tell you, I did start it.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, oh, my. You are insane.

[George Taveras]

I hit play on the miniature wife because I was like, I've got to know more.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, I will say, but I didn't.

[George Taveras]

I fell asleep during.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I don't want to dox him, but someone we know that is sort of in the industry. Okay.

[George Taveras]

Who dox him?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Pausing to be. Yeah, Everyone is in the industry looking

[Sam Taggart]

at me, which I think is really interesting, as he finds John Cole Bush.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

This is someone we know that writes about the entertainment industry. Is what I was trying to say. So he has access to, like, Nielsen proprietary tools that you have to pay for whatever. And at one point, he was over at my apartment, and he was, like, looking up the Nielsen streaming rating, so it's like the top 10 most popular shows on Nielsen. And he was like, what do you think is number one? And I was like, of course. One of the Taylor Sheridan shows. Like, I don't know, some sitcom I've never heard of, Whatever it was. The Miniature Wife. Meanwhile, I thought it was a flop because in my community, no one has seen the Miniature Wife. But it turns out all across America, they have Miniature Wife fever.

[George Taveras]

But that's not. I think they're, like, canceling it already.

[Sam Taggart]

Oh, okay.

[George Taveras]

So it can't be.

[Sam Taggart]

I think there is something about hooking people, because here we are, despite all our talk about how it's flopping, here we are devoting 30 plus minutes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And today's episode is brought to you by the Miniature Wife.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. Which is canceled, we believe.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Which is canceled. But the first season is still up. For your considerations, go to all the arts and watch best miniature performance, Elizabeth Banks.

[Sam Taggart]

You know what I would love is if the Miniature Wife won an Emmy. And then she had to accept the, like. She did kind of like an old school. You know, when they used to have, like, the, like, Shrek would accept that. Yeah, yeah.

[George Taveras]

Except in character.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And then her, like, climbing up the Emmy, being like, you guys.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. That's really gutsful. We used to have whimsy.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I know.

[Sam Taggart]

It's crazy.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, they did put Baby Yoda on the red carpet.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay, that's good. Yeah.

[George Taveras]

You know what else? You know what else? I saw the Mandalorian movie.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, yeah, but. That I expected you to see. Well, you were so excited about it.

[George Taveras]

Well, because I needed to see Baby Yoda and Babu Frank, you taught me

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

that Baby Yoda's real name is Grogu. Grogu, Right.

[George Taveras]

Which.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And he's not actually Baby Yoda. He's a different person. Yeah.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Didn't know.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. There can be lots of them.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, I didn't. I guess I didn't realize that Yoda is a species.

[George Taveras]

Species.

[Sam Taggart]

You thought he was kind of a man who ended up looking like that.

[George Taveras]

You thought he was a miniature woman.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I thought he was like a God figure. And that's what he looks like.

[Sam Taggart]

He was kind of in the swamp long enough that he got.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yes, exactly.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I thought it was just like a guy.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. That's interesting.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. Pretty boring film if you Ask me.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh, really?

[George Taveras]

Yeah. Well, you got Jeremy Allen White plays baby Jabba the Hutt and it's one of the worst. What? Wait, Jeremy Allen White plays baby Jabba the Hut?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Is it a voice performance? Is it animated? Is he in prosthetics?

[George Taveras]

He is giving a vocal performance.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, yeah, I don't think that's who you want for a vocal performance.

[Sam Taggart]

And again, we should put him in prosthetics and he should be in that

[George Taveras]

thing and talk about AI writing the whole thing is. I just wish my dad was a better guy. I'm not like my dad. Every line.

[Sam Taggart]

That's what Baby Jabba the Hut.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Because he and the dad is Jabba the Hutt. Imagine you have daddy issues. It's Jabba the Hutt.

[George Taveras]

It was so stupid. It was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Huh.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. I already kind of feel for baby Jabba the Hutt, if I can be so honest.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

So the whole point of this movie is like, what if they were all babies?

[George Taveras]

Star wars babies.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, it's kind of like with a My Little Pony where they're all baby ponies.

[George Taveras]

Well, Jabba the Hutt's son is at, you know, a teen or even twenties potentially, but I don't know.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

So it's like euphoria

[George Taveras]

kinda.

[Sam Taggart]

He's like smoking weed.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah. They're like doing heroin.

[George Taveras]

He lives in a fighting ring.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh, what the fuck are you talking about?

[Sam Taggart]

I like that you're improving this fly. That's really fun.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Should we do our first segment?

[George Taveras]

Let's do our first segment.

[Sam Taggart]

Hi, Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Are you looking for a beach read this summer? May I suggest your big wireless bill? It's got suspense, mystery, a slightly flat emotional arc, and a shocking twist where you realize you've been overpaying the entire time. Fortunately, though, Mint's story is better. Every plan, $15 a month, even unlimited.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That's it.

[Sam Taggart]

Happy ending, zero tears.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Give it a [e-mail] Switch upfront payment

[George Taveras]

of $45 for three months, $90 for

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

six months, or $180 for a 12 month plan.

[George Taveras]

Required $15 per month equivalent taxes and fees. Extra initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Me slow.

[George Taveras]

When network is busy, see terms. Guess who's back in the house. The old gays return for season two of Silver Lining, their hit podcast from Iheart's Ruby Studio in partnership with Veeve Healthcare. Just wait until you hear what hosts Robert, Mick, Bill and Jesse have in store this time around. They strut back down memory lane, navigating life, love, loss and everything that shaped them along the way. And as usual, someone just might break into a song. From leather bars to bathhouses, dance floors to drag brunch, nothing stays off limits. These are the kind of insights that can only come from experience. So listen to your elders, honey, and discover the silver linings you can take with you all Sass, zero Filter and decades of perspective from four friends proving that queer joy only gets better with age on the podcast that Never Gets Old. Listen to Silver Linings available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The official language of football is trash

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

talk, late night group chats, memes and unbelievable highlights clips.

[George Taveras]

That's why Boost Mobile brings you our new Global connection plan, the first plan ever made for WhatsApp. Get unlimited data, talk and text, international roaming and calls to over 100 countries for just $40 a month.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Forty dollar price includes five dollar a

[George Taveras]

month autopay discount after 40 gigabytes of

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

premium high speed data speeds will be lowered.

[George Taveras]

Coverage not available everywhere. Visit Store or BoostMobile.com for details.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Awkward time to ask this, but. Hey, did you download the trail map?

[George Taveras]

Yeah, no, I don't need to.

[Sam Taggart]

I I don't understand.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You're trusting your signal out here?

[Sam Taggart]

I'm trusting T Mobile.

[George Taveras]

They have the best network and if

[Sam Taggart]

we end up in bumtots nowhere, well we've got T satellite for backup.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Whoa, I don't trust my carrier that much.

[George Taveras]

We'll just use your phone as a flashlight. With America's best network and T Satellite, we're keeping you connected in places you never thought possible.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And if you switch today you get

[George Taveras]

free phones for zero down and only 25 bucks a month per line for four lines. Find out more@t mobile.com or visit your local store.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Best Mobile Network based on analysis by Ooklib speed test intelligence data to H 2025 with 24 monthly bill credits and 4 eligible port ins on essentials for well qualified customers with auto pay taxes fees and 35 connection charge per line credits and imbalance too if you pay off earlier, cancel contact US Finance Agreement example 299.99 Moto Edge 5G required T Satellite available with compatible device in most outdoor areas in the US where you can see the sky included with experience beyond or $10 a month aud news monthly cancel anytime visit t mobile.com. Hayden I'm like so happy you're here.

[George Taveras]

Me too. This is like such a good like a comedian and like, we love our

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

non comedian guests, obviously, but then we come in so stressed and we're like

[George Taveras]

suddenly so stiff and weird.

[Sam Taggart]

And I do want to say something about this because I've noticed, I've noticed podcasts are kind of moving into this trend of like having people who are like, like popular or like famous on and.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh, to be clear, we're not looking for popular or famous.

[George Taveras]

But go ahead. The people we're nervous around are obscure.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, no, they're obscure. And by the way, fewer people listen. Go ahead.

[George Taveras]

Yeah, and.

[Sam Taggart]

And I'm. And I'm kind of. I like, will get like 15 minutes into an episode of something and I'll be like, okay, well, this is like, this feels like painful. Like, this doesn't feel like they're friends.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, completely.

[Sam Taggart]

We've just met, but I. I know you.

[George Taveras]

We've known each other.

[Sam Taggart]

We've known each other. Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But spiritually we've known each other.

[Sam Taggart]

Spiritually, we've known each other forever because we've. We all kind of the blood and the spirit kind of flows through us of the alternative gay comedy community.

[George Taveras]

Yes, of course.

[Sam Taggart]

And I'm pulling you back. You guys are trying to get into that. I'm pulling your back.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Absolutely not. I don't know where I would go.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, it's. Every time we have a non comedian on, I'm like, suddenly I'm like, should we change the entire structure of the show and have it be like a deep interview about their childhood trauma and

[George Taveras]

I'll be fun for like 10 minutes and then I'll start to disassociate and be like, what am I doing here? Be like, this is the last thing I'm good at.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And then you guys are throwing the ads more and more.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, more and more. We just did an ad for Febreze.

[Sam Taggart]

Oh, wait, I've heard. And can I say I was listening to kind of a fucked up history podcast and you two pop on talking about Febreze. Your guys ad is everywhere.

[George Taveras]

I didn't know we'd gone globally.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I actually think our Febreze ad is really good.

[Sam Taggart]

I think so too.

[George Taveras]

I haven't heard it yet.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, it's really good. I heard it.

[Sam Taggart]

I thought about Febreze. I was like, am I. Wait, sorry, I don't want to.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, please.

[Sam Taggart]

But I'll say I wasn't thinking about Febreze.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And now you're thinking about it constantly.

[Sam Taggart]

And now I'm thinking about like, oh, I wish my home kind of smelled like.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, wait till you Hear about their pride campaign.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Our first segment is called Straight Shooters. And in this segment we gauge your familiarity with and complicity in straight culture by asking you a series of rapid fire questions where you have to choose this thing or this other thing. And the one rule is you can't ask any follow up questions about how the game works. Just choose.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Trusting your gut or strutting your stuff.

[Sam Taggart]

Strutting your stuff.

[George Taveras]

Chipotle mayo or Everybody say ao Chipotle Mayo.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

The Curious case of Benjamin Button or the bicurious phase of Lindsay Lohan.

[Sam Taggart]

The vicarious phase of Lindsay Lohan.

[George Taveras]

La Isla Bonita or can I see your Fita?

[Sam Taggart]

Can I see your fita, please?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You are going so postmodern with it. Coming from an erotic massage or. She's coming. It's Michelle Visage

[Sam Taggart]

coming from an erotic massage.

[George Taveras]

A pitch perfect performance or a rich affect that's gorgeous.

[Sam Taggart]

A pitch perfect performance.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Frame mogging. Clavicular or brainstorming. Nothing in particular.

[Sam Taggart]

Brainstorming Nothing in particular.

[George Taveras]

And I feel like I've maybe done this one before, but it came to me again and I'm having to respect that. So Gucci, Gucci, Louie Louie. Fendi. Fendi, Prada or supercalifragilistic xp?

[Sam Taggart]

Supercalifragilistic Expel. Wow.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I think what you're thinking. I once did one that was supercalifragilistic Expialidocious or Super Call me Friday. Let's just expedite the process, which to this day is maybe the best straight year.

[George Taveras]

Right.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And that's actually how, you know, AI could never. Because sometimes I will. I don't do this anymore. But in the past, sometimes I would. If I was really struggling with coming up with them, I would go to rhymezone.com and like, try to rhyme something and it could never come up with super Call me Friday. Let's just. Let's just expedite the process, like. And that's how you know that only a human mind.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

When they have the right cadence.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And I do want to say that I wouldn't say that most of those rhymed.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, no.

[Sam Taggart]

That's the thing.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah. And they would not have been as funny if they did rhyme.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

[George Taveras]

And so we rate our guests on a scale of 0 to 1000 dubs.

[Sam Taggart]

Great. Great, great.

[George Taveras]

And that was a really amazing performance.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You're. I'm going to be completely honest with you. This isn't no fault of your own. But we've recently been giving a lot of high scores and we're, like, due for a low one.

[Sam Taggart]

And I'm.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm trying to not give it to you because you don't deserve a low one.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, but when was the last time you guys have a trans person on this podcast?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

We have trans people on this podcast all the time.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay, Just check in before you.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Before you pick, to be clear. In fact, we have had. Get ready for this.

[Sam Taggart]

Are you ready for this?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Are you ready for this? Are you ready for this fact? I have a crazy fact for you.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

We have had three trans Pulitzer Prize winners on this podcast. What do you have to say to that? And where's your Pulitzer Prize?

[Sam Taggart]

Give me the low score. Give me the low score. Then give me the low score.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I had that realization the other day when I was stoned.

[George Taveras]

That's right. George smokes weed.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, that's.

[George Taveras]

But she thought he was. Fucking smoke a sweet.

[Sam Taggart]

Interview Pulitzer Prize winners. That's really cool.

[George Taveras]

Well, I'm going to be insane and say 1,000 doves.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, it's 1,000 doves.

[Sam Taggart]

Ah, yay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I should write a book. Look at that Pulitzer.

[George Taveras]

I think we need to encourage you to get that Pulitzer.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I think it can happen for you.

[George Taveras]

Is Pulitzer only book.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, of course. Think about the ones we've had interview. No, no. Each of our guests has won for a different category.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay. If you guys can name them, maybe I can figure out which one I can.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Okay, so Cole Escola, one for theater, Tori Peters won for fiction, and Andrea Longshu won for criticism. So those are out. But you could still win for poetry.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You could win for, like, something more journalistic. Like, if you want to do photojournalism, maybe we'll send you to Botswana and you can go on a sort of nature photography type thing.

[Sam Taggart]

What if I kind of take like, one picture of, like, Trump where he kind of like, looks sort of editorial photography?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, you could definitely cover New York magazine. He's like, in shadow.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes, yes. And there's kind of like a strange kind of background. And, you know, he's. He's kind of. He looks. His shadow has become like an old tree or whatever.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm hearing the Pulitzer committee, like, start getting the engraving machine roll, you know, sort of like starting so that it can start engraving.

[George Taveras]

It takes a couple of years.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It takes a couple years to warm up.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. I'll say that your other tests kind of took the ones that seem more like kind of fun and up my alley. Yeah, I'll work on poetry.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You could do, like, book length nonfiction. Like, if you want to write a memoir?

[Sam Taggart]

Okay. Oh, I should.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That's kind of a classic thing that a queer creator can do is write a memoir.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And people do really like it.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

People do love it.

[George Taveras]

People love it.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. It's like. It's like. It's like six chapters of my coming out story that was like an hour long.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah. And it ends with. And then I did Stradio Lab.

[Sam Taggart]

And then I did Stradio Lab.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

And then I. I looked around and said, I'm home. I'm home. I say that twice. Yeah. Oh, my God.

[George Taveras]

You turn the page, it says it again.

[Sam Taggart]

I'm home.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, that's good.

[George Taveras]

That'd be really moving.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, I've always said that. Well, I actually did not invent saying this, but another gig I did, and then I've been kind of claiming it as my own. But Rich Joyak once said that bell hooks legacy is less talented people trying to sound like her. Do you know what I mean? It's like people trying to have that cadence of like, love is when a feather touches another person, but you are the chicken.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes. Yeah. I've been noticing this, especially with some, I think, more popular queer people, where I think they are kind of getting on stage and saying something that reads as pretty insightful, but it's like, this is maybe insightful to my cousin that, like, only met, like, one gay person in their life.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, and guess what? The cousin community is way bigger than the community you're a part of.

[Sam Taggart]

I know, I know.

[George Taveras]

It's so tough.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

We're living in a world of cousins,

[George Taveras]

and they're buying this country up.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

They are buying tickets to arena shows of people telling them, you know, that love is the answer. The answer.

[Sam Taggart]

And it just. It seems profound. And they present themselves as profound. But I think they might actually be, like, maybe a little dumb.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Completely. Or maybe a lot.

[Sam Taggart]

Maybe a lot. Maybe a lot. Hot take, potentially. Yeah. And I want to say that it is. Every day I get more and more upset that the two biggest trans comedians are. And jvn, the two ones who are doing arenas.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, JVN is so iconic.

[George Taveras]

I'm trying to.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

In a weird way, like, clips of JVN stand up are like, talk about, like the miniature wife level human genius. There was one clip where they're like. They're like, I used to do meth, now I clean the kitchen counter. Like, it's just like, that's the. And then jingle, no, no, no, no, no, no. See me on tour.

[George Taveras]

Guess who's back in the house. The old gays return for season two of Silver Linings, their hit podcast from iHeart's Ruby Studio in partnership with Veeve Healthcare. Just wait until you hear what hosts Robert, Mick, Bill and Jesse have in store. This time around, they strut back down memory lane, navigating life, love, loss and everything that shaped them along the way. And as usual, someone just might break into a song. From leather bars to bath houses, dance floors to drag brunch, nothing stays off limits. These are the kind of insights that can only come from experience. So listen to your elders, honey, and discover the silver linings you can take with you all Sass, zero filter and decades of perspective from four friends proving that queer joy only gets better with age on the podcast that never gets old. Listen to Silver Linings, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The official language of football is trash talk, late night group chats, memes and unbelievable highlight clips. That's why Boost Mobile brings you our new new Global Connection Plan, the first plan ever made for WhatsApp. Get unlimited data, talk and text, international roaming and calls to over 100 countries for just $40 a month. $40 price includes $5 a month autopay

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

discount after 40 gigabytes of premium high speed data.

[George Taveras]

Speeds will be lowered. Coverage not available everywhere. Visit store or boost mobile.com for details.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Awkward time to ask this, but. Hey, did you download the trail map?

[George Taveras]

Yeah, no, I don't need to.

[Sam Taggart]

I I don't understand.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You're trusting your signal out here.

[Sam Taggart]

I'm trusting T Mobile.

[George Taveras]

They have the best network and if

[Sam Taggart]

we end up in bumtots nowhere, well, we've got T satellite for backup. Whoa.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I don't trust my carrier that much.

[George Taveras]

We'll just use your phone as a flashlight. With America's best network and T Satellite, we're keeping you connected in places you never thought possible.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And if you switch today, you get

[George Taveras]

free phones for zero down and only 25 bucks a month per line for four lines. Find out more@t mobile.com or visit your local store.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Best Mobile Network Based on analysis by Ooklib speed test intelligence data to age 2025 with 24 monthly bill credits and 4 eligible port ins on essentials for well qualified customers with auto pay taxes, fees and 35 connection charge per line credits and imbalance due if you pay off earlier. Cancel Contact Us Finance Agreement example 299.99 Moto Edge 5G required T Satellite available with compatible device in most outdoor areas in the US where you can see the sky included with experience beyond or 10, $10 a month. Audible News Monthly. Cancel anytime.

[George Taveras]

Visit t mobile.com hey, everyone, it's Cal Penn, host of Earsay, the Audible and iHeart Audiobook Club. This week on the podcast, I'm sitting down with Wil Wheaton, who played Gordie Lachance in Stand by Me 40 years ago and now narrates Stephen King's the Body, the novella that inspired it all. We talk about what it's like to return to a story that shaped his life, channeling his memories of River Phoenix in the recording booth, and why the friendships you have at 12 might be the most important ones you'll ever have. I know Gordie Lachance. I am Gordy Lachance.

[Sam Taggart]

Like, I mean, even when I was

[George Taveras]

a little kid, I was Gordy Lachance when I didn't know it. Listen to Earsay, the Audible and iHeart Audiobook Club on the iHeartradio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Let's get into the topic. Hayden, what is your straight topic today?

[Sam Taggart]

Okay, my straight topic is straight birthday parties, specifically, but not limited to birthdays at Barcades.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Whoa.

[Sam Taggart]

Because here's where I'm coming at this, please. There is a Dave and Buster's in Los Angeles. People are, I don't know if you've had this experience yet. My straight friends often are like, oh, I know what I'll do for my birthday. Everyone can come out to Dave and Buster's. I am not welcome at Dave and Buster's. Me walking into a Dave and Buster's is the equivalent of me walking into the rnc. It is terrifying. There are people on the TV saying to get me out of there.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's like you're walking into one of those jubilee videos. That's like one trans person.

[George Taveras]

Yes.

[Sam Taggart]

50 conservatives David Busters. It is like. And they are. They are mad at me. They are mad at me for being in there. They're like, why would you come here? I'm trying to have a beer while my kid screams at the basketball thing where they shoot the basketballs. Yeah, it feels like. And it just. I guess really the broad part of straight culture here is that I feel like my straight friends and it's okay. But do not take into consideration, like, maybe what might be a really terrifying place for somebody that's not maybe, like a CIS woman to the miniature wife. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's not the miniature wife. The miniature wife could walk into a Dave and Buster's and everyone would go Crazy.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

They cheer.

[Sam Taggart]

But I'm the huge wife.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I mean, the most obvious.

[Sam Taggart]

But, honey, I'm the huge wife, and they don't want to see me in there.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You rsvp I'm gonna have to RSVP no, because I am the huge W wife. The Dave and Buster's website is like, no huge wives, no flip flops.

[Sam Taggart]

I walk into Dave and Buster's and there's, like, a height request for how tall a woman can be before they go in there. And I'm not. I'm not passing the test.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Okay, so just sort of spitballing here. My most obvious interpretation of what you're saying is that, like, Dave and Buster's is nostalgia for people who, like, had a good time in high school.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's like, for them, they think of a Dave and Buster's, and they're like, remember when everything was better? And then for you, you think about it and you're like, remember when I, like, aided my life?

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Remember when that kid, like, slammed me into a wall in the laser tag arena because they knew I was the f. Slur. Yeah. And you. And you guys have said that. I can't say on this podcast, you

[George Taveras]

specifically, it's just not right.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Cis women can.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

Must be this short. Just say faggot.

[Sam Taggart]

Here we go.

[George Taveras]

Here we go, diva. I. It is funny when, like, straight people don't know when they're being exclusionary, like, because there is such a thing. But they're like, well, no, I'm being normal. And you're like, no.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It reminds me of when straight people try to do. Try to effortlessly include gay people in wedding activities of being like, yeah, there's, like, you know, my bridesmaids, and there's one of them is a gay guy. Or, like. Or even worse, the gay guy, since he's a guy, he can go on the groom's side, and they just think, like, it'll work itself out. And it's like, like, I'm dying.

[Sam Taggart]

This is not going to work itself out. And I want you to have your little thing. Of course, I'm not asking you to not do your birthday there. But what I'm asking for is it's always these big life events. And I feel like by abstaining, I'm saying, I don't care about you as a friend, or, I don't care that it's your birthday. I don't care that you're getting married. I don't care that your short film's coming out.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But that one often Is true.

[Sam Taggart]

But it's like, I do care, but you are asking me to go into an actively hostile environment.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. It's like, you know, I'm not having my birthday party at the Eagle because I know it would exclude people.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes, yes.

[George Taveras]

Because I'm like, this is just for me. You can go to Dave and Buster's with your squad whenever you want.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes.

[George Taveras]

I don't have a party there.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I will say you not to call you out. You, like, would have your birthday party at the Eagle and then be weirded out if someone did.

[George Taveras]

George. I have never done that. One time in all of my years.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I've never done that. We were in D.C. and Sam's sister, who has, like three kids, came to our show. And then afterwards we were like, we're all gonna go to a bar. And then we're like, where should we go? And then Sam was like, maybe some were gay. Do you remember this?

[George Taveras]

Of course I remember this, George, because it was my night too, and this was my show and I wanted to go where I wanted to go. And that's okay.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes. Yes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

This is his sister Mom's night out. She hasn't. She has three kids at home. She hasn't been out in like four months. He's like, should we go to a gay bar?

[George Taveras]

George? I did a show and it was my night too, and I was visiting D.C. and I had unbelievable.

[Sam Taggart]

And I do think there is, like, I think there are. I've been saying, you know, Nicole Paige Brooks says fag bar. And I really like Fagbar. I think Fagbar is one of our best. I think there's like, fag bars where you can bring like, I did my birthday at High Tops List feels very tasteful.

[George Taveras]

Very tasteful.

[Sam Taggart]

Thank you. High tops list feel is during the day because I'm like, I have a lot of straight friends. I also want to be in like

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

a gay space, but it's also a sports bar.

[Sam Taggart]

It's also a sports bar.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

So it's intersectional.

[George Taveras]

Everyone's welcome.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Everyone.

[Sam Taggart]

Everyone kind of gets what they. What they want. And I think that that that space is important where it's either a straight leaning gay bar or a gay, straight people, come on in bar.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

Not to say that that's High tops list feel is, but that is the experience I've had there most of the time.

[George Taveras]

I mean, that space is like. It does feel like a straight bar. But then you're like, actually, you are allowed to be gay here.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. That's how I like. I'm Doing kind of like gay makeout at my birthday. But also there are very straight heterosexual writers who I work with there. But it's okay that I'm doing what I'm doing.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

High tops. Los Feliz is like, what if Disneyland kind of tried to make a gay bar in Los Feliz?

[George Taveras]

Yeah. It's an interesting space.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You sort of keep thinking, Daisy is gonna come out and sign autograph,

[Sam Taggart]

A little baseball outfit.

[George Taveras]

I will say it's one of those places that I do go to. And I can feel like my health bar running out. I'm like, I only have so long here, and then I have to go somewhere where I can really queen out.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And I remember one time I did a birthday and the after I was like, anyone who stays late will go to Akbar. And I like Akbar. And hopefully most of the straight people will have left. And the ones that are left behind kind of have an aura of bisexuality. So it's not a big.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Longer you stay out, the more bisexual you become.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, the more bisexual everyone becomes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Literally.

[George Taveras]

It's true.

[Sam Taggart]

And I think the people who, like, are kind of like, I've been. More people have been coming out recently. Have you noticed this?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh, it's constant.

[Sam Taggart]

It's crazy. When I find out that people weren't gay or I. It's shocking to me. This is just.

[George Taveras]

Wait, wait, you're saying people are like, gay people are coming out as bi or straight people are coming out as bi?

[Sam Taggart]

No, sorry. I, like, I've been finding out that, like, people that I would have assumed have been gay their whole lives, like, came out in the last. Last, like, year or two. Like, I meet a lesbian and I'm like, well, this is, you know, this is the number one lesbian in the world. This is the head of the lesbian community. And then they're like, I came out last year. And that's really shocking to me.

[George Taveras]

That's kind of freaky.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. I don't know if this is happening to you guys at all.

[George Taveras]

This. Here I go again. I feel like it's more common in LA thing. It's more common in LA because I think you can get away with being like, all dating here is bad. Maybe I'm just, like, bad at dating thing. And then suddenly you're like, well, LA

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

is a very lesbian city.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I see that. And New York is a very gay gay guy.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Because. And obviously there are so many iconic lesbians in New York. You know, Fran Leibowitz, end of list. But, you know, New York, it's always like, the theme of New York is we have to save Ginger as the last remaining lesbian bar.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. There's always a GoFundMe.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

There's always a Go, A lesbian are open with a GoFundMe to keep it going. They're like, we're opening. We have money for two weeks. And then after that, we're switching to the GoFundMe model.

[Sam Taggart]

We gotta protect the lesbian bars. I like being able to go there.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

They're the best.

[Sam Taggart]

They're nice. And yeah, sometimes the. I mean, there are a few gay bars that I even feel like are really that fun at this point. I know. You know, it's like they're kind of getting more like, Kathy Hilton is now running WeHo or whatever.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, WeHo is like.

[Sam Taggart]

Like, WeHo's grand marshal for the Pride Parade is Kathy Hilton. Oh. Which is, to me, crazy.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But don't you think that WeHo's always. It's like how Lisa Vanderpump used to run WeHo. Like, it's always some woman like that running WeHo.

[Sam Taggart]

And I think it's just becoming more and more like. I don't know. It's getting scarier over there.

[George Taveras]

WeHo's. Whenever I've been over there, I'm sort of like, what year is it?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, it's completely alienating.

[George Taveras]

I'm like, what culture are you consuming? It's really freaky.

[Sam Taggart]

They're trying to, like, trap themselves in 2015 or something, and it's not working. And it's like the cracks are.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, completely. It's, like going to Amish country, but for them, they haven't gotten streaming yet. So they're, like, watching live. They're, like, watching Will and Grace.

[George Taveras]

Like, you think wearing, like, little red athletic shorts is hot? Like, we don't do that anymore.

[Sam Taggart]

We don't do that anymore.

[George Taveras]

It's not 2003.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No. We're doing really long Carhartt.

[George Taveras]

Of course.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Shorts.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah. Gay guys.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But then a belly shirt.

[Sam Taggart]

The good gay guys are looking like workers. Now are looking like slutty little workers.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

So they are. It's complicated because it's like, first they looked like, fully workers. You are right. And then they were like, wait, we have to walk it back a little bit. So now it's worker pants, but then, like, limited to belly shirt on top.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I like that. That's really good. I like that. I like that. I like that. I went to the Eagle in LA with one of my partners this last weekend, and, like, my. It's like a. A very Femme person. Like kind of trans femme person. And there was. I had a moment of being like, wow, we're the only two femme people in this entire room. And it is like such a. It's so. And I loved it. I was like, I want to be in spaces like this all the time, but they, of course, don't want me there.

[George Taveras]

Do you what? I feel like the LA Eagles celebrates that.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I wonder sometimes. I'm trying to think how it is in LA in New York. I'm trying to phrase this the right way. I'm trying to phrase this the right way. I would say there is an increasing solidarity, specifically between gay guys and trans girls, almost exclusionary of other parts of the community.

[George Taveras]

I think that's true.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's very like. I think Twinks vs. Dolls was very instrumental in making this happen. I think obviously club culture, gay guys and trans girls are overrepresented compared to like lesbians and like bisexual married women.

[George Taveras]

Let's get them.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You know what I mean?

[Sam Taggart]

Let's get them.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Let's get them. And so I find, like, I'm often in a quote unquote mixed group that is those two communities hanging out together.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And I don't know if we have the language yet to describe what that is.

[George Taveras]

Yeah, that's your politics. Would you say that?

[Sam Taggart]

That's what I mean.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah. Like, literally, like. Cause it's also you. It's complicated. It's almost like we had to all lose each other to find each other again. Like, we had to be like, go on different journeys, go on different journeys and then find each other again.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. But there is, like, there's always going to be that thing of, like, I was a gay boy and all these people were gay boys. And as. As long as you guys don't go, well, you can only become a gay man after that. Like, then we can all kind of connect on this.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And I think that's what it is.

[Sam Taggart]

It's a shared experience. Yes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I think it's like recogniz shared experience without being problematic about it.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes, definitely. Definitely. Now it gets really quiet.

[George Taveras]

That was, first of all, very profound.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Thank you two.

[George Taveras]

I want to take it into a less profound direction. Perfect. So here's what I'm struggling with that I need you guys to help me with.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[George Taveras]

Is like, what am I supposed to do for my birthday these days?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Thank you for bringing it back to birthdays.

[George Taveras]

Because the thing, as we get older, I feel that like my friend group, and maybe it's cause of moving and everyone is so disparate. Like, I'm like, I have the comedy people. I have the comedy people from my past. I have the comedy people from my present. I have gay guys I've met in the last year. I have queer friends from comedy. And none of them know each other. And I'm sort of like, do I pick one?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

So I'm stuck.

[Sam Taggart]

I tried to do everyone this past time. I was kind of like, okay, everyone on my close, come out. Maybe we can make it work. And it did kind of work. I do think probably the best thing to do is dancing, because what is the universal language?

[George Taveras]

That's true. We can all speak it.

[Sam Taggart]

Of course. It is dance. It's music and dance. But I don't know, it is getting hard to do birthdays.

[George Taveras]

I think I wanna have a pool party.

[Sam Taggart]

Pool party's really good too.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah. Pool party.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. But then it's like, so, like random comedians going to be hanging out with like the hottest gay guys on earth. That's not going to go right.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I don't think they will even speak to each other. I think there will be different groups.

[George Taveras]

They're not going to get mad at each other.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Think about your wedding.

[George Taveras]

That was tasteful.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, no, I'm not saying. Excuse me. What are you arguing? You're like. You're like.

[Sam Taggart]

I want it both to be an orgy and a networking event. I'm just saying might be difficult.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Okay, okay, okay, I see. You don't want it to be tasteful.

[George Taveras]

I don't want it to be tasteful. I want to be like. I want it to be like a fun day, like, where I'm like, yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

Then I think it becomes dark room. Well, yeah, I think you had a dark room. Well, it's like, how allowed are we? Because we're in community with so many people as comedians, how allowed are we to extract the people that are fun out of that group?

[George Taveras]

Well, that's the big question.

[Sam Taggart]

And leave behind the people that are. Are kind of annoying because I will say this to people and everyone will be like, just invite. Just invite the ones you want. It's your birthday.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

They love to know.

[Sam Taggart]

We know.

[George Taveras]

That goes horribly.

[Sam Taggart]

That goes horribly.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I get in trouble when you ask people for advice and they give you something like that. It's like, can you fucking be serious? I trusted you to have this conversation. You know that what you're saying is bullshit.

[Sam Taggart]

Maybe we grow up. I'm not eight years old.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, why are you speaking to me in like throw pillow language? Like, let's get down to brass tacks. What do I do?

[George Taveras]

Well, yeah, they'll be like, just invite who you want. It's like, well, this is why everyone hates you.

[Sam Taggart]

Not invited. Yeah, I don't. I don't know how to. How to pull those people out.

[George Taveras]

And like, almost what I want to do is like, from the hours of 12 to 4 is comedy time.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay.

[George Taveras]

And then 4 to 8 is like. Like, I'm kind of wanting you to.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And then the burlesque performer comes.

[Sam Taggart]

This is actually. You've maybe stumbled upon something incredible, which is to do two separate invites, one from four to seven for comedy people. One from seven to 11. That is gay guys. And. And people might stay, but they will all think that it is from the same invitation.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, nobody will say, yeah, because they will just think gay guys are naturally late and more night out.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, exactly. And then to your. They're gonna go, well, of course. This faggot's showing us.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And then to your point about people becoming more bisexual as time goes by, it's perfect. Because then the people in the first tier maybe don't discover their bisexuality, you know, by 7pm yes. Suddenly they're staying for 7 to 11.

[Sam Taggart]

They're having their first gig.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

By the end of the night, they're doing poppers.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. Wow, that's.

[George Taveras]

That's actually. Could work.

[Sam Taggart]

I'm, like, not doing a bit anymore. Like, I'm not. I'm no longer on the podcast. I'm talking to you. You, Sam. I think that's a good idea.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Someone listens to this episode and then gets the invite for 3pm they're like, what the fuck?

[George Taveras]

You think I'm just a comedian?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Learning that you're.

[Sam Taggart]

That you're a 3:00pm is like, yeah, I would love if you did like a. Like kind of a six to eight. That's like. That's like you're on the verge. Because I think I'm cusp. I know that I'm. I know that I'm not.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm cusp too.

[Sam Taggart]

I know. I know that I'm not hot gay guy late in the night, but I'm also a comedian, but I think I can stick around.

[George Taveras]

Yeah, you can be in both.

[Sam Taggart]

It will be fun. It will be fun. Fun.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Okay, so to. To bring it to gay versus Straight. What's happening here is interesting because the gay impulse is what can I best do to accommodate everyone and make sure everyone has a good experience? And it's like the. Like, you are basically paralyzed with choice because you don't want one person to feel left out. Whereas, as you're saying, the straight impulse is to be like, you can come to Dave and Buster's. Bitch.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

And they're.

[George Taveras]

Oh, totally.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You know, like, they are not thinking. They're just sort of like. Like, basically it's a lack of empathy because they're thinking, I like Dave and Buster's I in person, and it's my turn. And it's my turn.

[Sam Taggart]

And there's almost a kind of woke liberal energy to it where they're like, well, of course you can come to Dave and Busters. You're my trans friend. But I'm not ashamed to be seen with you in Dave and Buster.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's like, it's not about you being ashamed. It's about me feeling safe.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. Yeah. It's like, hey, you being proud to be with me is yes. Besides, no.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Because for them, you are, like, adding diversity.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And I'm one of the few people. I'm one of the few people.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And I would say this also goes back to the wedding thing of, like, straight people are actually really proud that they're like, look at the photo. See her?

[Sam Taggart]

Yes.

[George Taveras]

Right, right, right.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Do you see him? Do you see how one of the bridesmaids is a guy? Bet you didn't think I was capable of that.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. This is this one. And he was crazy. You were completely quiet. Yeah. Yeah. You didn't say a thing.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

One of my favorite tropes is when God bless them, but women who have only one gay friend oversell how crazy funny it is. And it's like, some guy that works. Some guy that works at Merck Pharmaceuticals. It's like, oh, my God, Phil is always saying the craziest stuff.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And he's just like, where are you guys going for your honeymoon? And they're like, you're nuts. You're nuts.

[George Taveras]

I had this insane experience once where I was, like, invited to a part of the wedding. Like, they were like, the ceremony's really small. The reception's really small.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But, like, you were at the 3pm

[George Taveras]

literally, they were like, come dance. Like, come. And it was like, in New York. I was living in New York. I was like, of course we'll pop in. How fun.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

And then, like, I didn't realize the moment I walked in the door, I was hired help. Like, I. Not paid, of course, but it was like, dance.

[Sam Taggart]

Like.

[George Taveras]

And I was like, oh, I'm getting a drink. And she was like, why aren't you dancing? Why aren't you dancing? And there was like. And she was Even like, why don't you go request a song? Go request a song from the dj. I'm like, it's your wedding. I would never do that. She's like, be crazy. Be gay.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

And I was like, what the fuck? It was scary.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. You're kind of. It is like you're bringing a. You're bringing your little kind of energy to it in hopes that that will make it more fun and cool. But that is not our responsibility. We just want to. We actually just. Here's the truest thing. We just want to show up for our friends. We just want to be nice and

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

maybe not get hate crimed in the process.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's all I'm looking for. It's like, if you do your. If you're gonna have your birthday at a brewery, let's check who's like, let's check the vibe of the brewery, maybe.

[George Taveras]

And I know it's so. Sometimes it's even just the word brewery.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, no. I get chills.

[George Taveras]

It's like a straight person, it's like how they feel a warmth. They feel like comfort. And then I hear the word brewery and I'm just like. It's like, oh, I can do it. I can do it. It's like, I don't wanna be like that, but I can't. Not. Not.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And I. Again, like, I want them to do what they want to do. I just want to be absolved of not going. Really?

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah. You have a doctor's note. It's like, my patient is lgbtq. Yes.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

She can't attend this party.

[Sam Taggart]

I wanted. It's like, I never RSVP no. I just ignore it, But I want to RSVP no. You know, little comments for safety reasons. Lgbtq. Good reason.

[George Taveras]

Good reason.

[Sam Taggart]

That's.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Wait. I'm having the craziest memory that is. Is literally related to your idea of. Or your idea. Your joint idea of three to seven.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay, so I'm getting my bullets, right?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

At my wedding, we had a ceremony and dinner and then an after party where more people were invited because it was like a bigger bar and it was like dancing. Whatever. The people that were invited to the ceremony were not told there would be an after party. Like, there was no extra invite because you were like, they'll hear about it through word of. Like, we'll all say at the end, like, we're all going to the bar after. Right. But then the people that were invited only to the after party, of course, did get an email that's like, hey, come celebrate with us at Julius. Here's what happened. Straight people from the main event heard that all these gay guys had been invited to an after party and became offended. They were like, oh, so are we not invited to the gay guy dance party? We're like, you're safe for work friends, and we're only ceremony and dinner, and we're not invited to the after party. And I. And I was like, no, I promise that's not what the thinking was. The thinking was, like, we would all walk over together. You guys don't need to get a separate email about it. But then, like, people I think to this day were like, I don't think that's true.

[George Taveras]

That's interesting.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But.

[Sam Taggart]

And I want to say you are allowed to do that.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You wouldn't be promised. I wasn't doing that. I do agree. But it's like, I can fully see

[George Taveras]

being offended, like, because it's like, huh, well, yeah, I can come. But I didn't get the email because

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

to me, it was more chic to be like, secret, secret. There's an after party. It feels less planned, and it's fun because then the people that did get the separate invite are already there. So then everyone walks over together. Suddenly it's a bunch of gay guys.

[Sam Taggart]

And what is the energy of the. Of the straight people who are like. Cause that's really specific being like, you

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

know what I think it is?

[Sam Taggart]

Why can't I come to the gay guy after party?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It was actually straight people that are cool and would be hanging out with the gay guys. And I think they had this moment of being like, I thought I was cool. Like, I thought I was gay guy adjacent enough for this. But George thinks I'm not.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, I've worked my whole life.

[Sam Taggart]

I read all the books.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I've read all the books. I have so many gay friends. I'm not like the girl who has only one gay friend named Phil who works at Merck Pharmaceuticals. And still it's not enough. Like, no matter what I do.

[George Taveras]

Oh, wow, that's interesting.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. But I do. I mean, I do just. It would suck to find out that you're the three to seven friend. Yeah. Even now, like, I as, you know, as a woman, of course I am going, oh, wow, I hope I don't miss out on the gay guy party. But it is valid to not include me in the gay guy party.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Well, it's also, of course, you know, protect me from what I want. Because then you go to the gay party and it's like, get me out of here often.

[Sam Taggart]

Well, yeah, the only time I think that is when I show up to a gay guy party and I go, oh, the politics in this room are way different than I was anticipating.

[George Taveras]

Well, gay Garry party. We use the term as sort of a monolith, but it can really vary in tone and style.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah, I agree. There is really fun dancing. It's like, oh, I know these songs. This is great. And then there is like, oh, these people are scary.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm fearing fully on Ghost. And their eyes are darting from corner to corner.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And I walk by, they grab both my shoulders, they go, girl, your hair. And suddenly I'm in a conversation with somebody that sells real estate. I think we figured it out.

[George Taveras]

That was really good.

[Sam Taggart]

I think it's in chunks. I think that's really good.

[George Taveras]

I think this episode's really clippable. I think it's super shareable.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I think, no, the miniature wife stuff is really gonna kill you.

[George Taveras]

That was awesome.

[Sam Taggart]

And then he hits your wife stuff.

[George Taveras]

I think we hit, like, so many deep things, so many surface level things.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And, I mean, I do think the question remains, with this tiered system that you guys have come up with, like, people will be offended.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. What if it's like, choose your own adventure. What if it's like, you can only come for one? Well, these are the options.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh, you send the options, and then you opt in.

[George Taveras]

It's like, do you want chicken or something?

[Sam Taggart]

Fish.

[George Taveras]

It's like, do you want to come for the early part that's sort of more wholesome and normal, and you can

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

have different RCPs for each one.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I do. Yeah. I do think there is something to, like, you really have to make sure that the groups don't overlap so that they don't communicate completely.

[George Taveras]

There's an hour window between them where it's empty.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

Just to clear everyone out. Or you do it at different places, different locations.

[George Taveras]

That can be smart.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

What's happening now with, like, overcomplicating? This is, like, what happens when. When people try to solve, like, a political issue, and it's like, there's one obvious conservative side to one obvious progressive side. And then suddenly you're dealing with some sort of very complicated public private partnership where there's, like, sponsors involved. It's, like, super technocratic, and, like, everyone's yelling at one another, and someone is accusing someone of being a YIMBY versus a nimby. And it's, like, the most complicated policy proposal ever. It's like the compromise that pleases no one. And it's like, we did it.

[George Taveras]

It was like that. What was that Kamala thing? That became a meme that was like free college after two years.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, yeah. Pell Grants for. Were in college for exactly nine months while pregnant.

[George Taveras]

I. But this is like, I literally don't have birthdays anymore because I'm like, I struggle with this every year because you remember how I used to solve this problem is I would invite people the day before and just. And then it would. Which was.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, just be like, I'm so crazy. I'm so last minute.

[George Taveras]

And.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And then.

[George Taveras]

Which, by the way, is a nightmare because my birthday is on, like a holiday weekend.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, that's always bad. That's never good. My birthday has fallen on the Super Bowl a lot, and that's. That's going to happen beginning of February, so. And I'm not telling you the year.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, no, no. I just genuinely. I had a moment where I was like, I have literally no idea what season the Super Bowl.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, sorry, I forgot. But that is a thing where it's like, okay, well, that does feel like a hate crime if you guys are kind of like, choosing super bowl over.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It does. But then it probably makes your. It so easy for you because it's so selective.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I am kind of. I'm laying.

[George Taveras]

Matthew's birthday was on super bowl, too.

[Sam Taggart]

And maybe there's something to that that is interesting. Are you February 8th? 6th. Wow.

[George Taveras]

Wow.

[Sam Taggart]

You do know when the super bowl is.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Why not? Well, again, it is my husband's birthday, as Sam pointed out.

[George Taveras]

Guess who's back in the house? The old gays return for season two of Silver Linings, their hit podcast from iHeart's Ruby Studio in partnership with Veeve Healthcare Care. Just wait until you hear what hosts Robert, Mick, Bill, and Jesse have in store. This time around, they strut back down memory lane, navigating life, love, loss, and everything that shaped them along the way. And as usual, someone just might break into a song. From leather bars to bath houses, dance floors to drag brunch, nothing stays off limits. These are the kind of insights that can only come from experience. So listen to your elders, honey, and discover the silver linings you can take with you. With you all sass, zero filter, and decades of perspective from four friends proving that queer joy only gets better with age. On the podcast that never gets old. Listen to Silver Linings, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The official language of football is trash talk.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Late night group chats, memes and unbelievable highlight clips.

[George Taveras]

That's why Boost Mobile brings you our new Global connection plan. The first plan ever made for WhatsApp. Get unlimited data, talk and text, international roaming and calls to over 100 countries for just $40 a month.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Forty dollar price includes $5 a month

[George Taveras]

auto pay discount after 40 gigabytes of

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

premium high speed data.

[George Taveras]

Speeds will be lowered. Coverage not available everywhere. Visit Store or BoostMobile.com for details.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Awkward time to ask this, but. Hey, did you download the trail map?

[George Taveras]

Yeah, no, I don't need to.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I. I don't understand. You're trusting your signal out here.

[Sam Taggart]

I'm trusting T Mobile.

[George Taveras]

They have the best network and if

[Sam Taggart]

we end up in bum tots nowhere, well, we've got T Satellite for backup. Whoa.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I don't trust my carrier that much.

[George Taveras]

We'll just use your phone as a flashlight. With America's best network and T Satellite, we're keeping you connected in places you never thought possible.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And if you switch today, you get

[George Taveras]

free phones for zero down and only 25 bucks a month per liter line for four lines. Find out more@t mobile.com or visit your local store.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Best Mobile Network Based on analysis by Ooklib speed test intelligence data 2H 2025 with 24 monthly bill credits and 4 eligible port ins on essentials for well qualified customers with auto pay taxes, fees and 35 connection charge per line credits and imbalance due if you pay off earlier. Cancel Contact Us Finance Agreement example 299.99 Moto Edge 5G required T Satellite available with compatible device in most outdoor areas in the US where you can see the sky included with experience beyond your $10 a month. However, News Monthly cancel anytime.

[George Taveras]

Visit t mobile.com hey everyone, it's Cal Penn, host of Ear, say The Audible and iHeart Audiobook Club. This week on the podcast I'm sitting down with Lily Chu, the author of the Audible original romantic comedy Just Kiss Already. It's a story about a forensic anthropologist who secretly writes mystery novels, an actress who adapts his book into a film film and what happens when a meme and a media tour collide with a slow burn romance. It's performed by Simu Liu and Philippa sue, and it is an absolute blast.

[Sam Taggart]

When you actually hear the performance, you

[George Taveras]

realize that other people are taking your

[Sam Taggart]

words and what you thought was kind

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

of a straightforward sentence like the cat in the corner is black.

[Sam Taggart]

In my head it's the cat in the corner.

[George Taveras]

Corner is black.

[Sam Taggart]

Not the dog, not the gerbil, but

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Someone else might say it. The cat in the corner is black.

[George Taveras]

That's always fascinating to me how they just bring in all these different nuances and really make it fun and interesting and distinctive. Listen to Earsay, the Audible and iHeart Audiobook Club on the iHeartradio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Should we do our final segment? Oh, my God, is it time, like, basically, right?

[Sam Taggart]

Yes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Do you have anything else you want to say?

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Or, like, promote, even?

[Sam Taggart]

Okay, there we go. Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Or any message to the LGBTQ youth

[George Taveras]

show ideas you're trying to get off the.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah. Do you want to pitch us anything?

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the huge wife.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

All right. The huge wife that's already been greenlit and canceled.

[Sam Taggart]

She's kind of got, like.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Who would play her? Gosh, careful.

[Sam Taggart]

I don't know. All I've kind of got in my head is that she's sort of like Clifford the Big Red dogging it, where it's like she's got a huge kind of house outside the main one.

[George Taveras]

That's nice.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Is she raising normal sized kids?

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I think so. And she's kind of like a time for me to take you to school. And she kind of picks them up and then takes a couple steps and puts them down.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Okay, that's good.

[Sam Taggart]

So I want to plug the huge wife. I'm on tour. My tour. Piss Queen. Get a bunch of cities.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Wait, your tour is called Piss Queen?

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That's really good.

[Sam Taggart]

Thank you.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You know, one of the few things that makes me laugh is this clip of Melania Trump trying to say peace on Earth, but actually saying piss on Earth because of her accent.

[Sam Taggart]

Piss on Earth is really good.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Not to be xenophobic, but it is funny.

[Sam Taggart]

You guys know the, uh. Do not come.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Do not come.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm gonna come. I love that. And that was a really good Trump, by the way. You could clip that.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Clip that, Clip that.

[Sam Taggart]

That's my. That's my. And I'd like to plug that. That's my third flag.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I need him to stop to be less funny so that we could, like. I know. It's the most hack thing ever to be like, Trump is actually the funniest guy.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But if only we could, like, do a very specific kind of brain damage to him. Him that causes him to just not be funny. Like say the same things but not funny, then I think we could get past this whole thing.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. I mean, I think just why not skip? Why not do full brain damage? But I. Yeah, I totally agree.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I was just sort of going with a harm reduction model.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. Yeah. That's interesting. I don't really feel that way about the president, Donald Trump, but I think

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

we have to be respectful.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You guys have.

[George Taveras]

He is our president.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm a humanist.

[George Taveras]

He is. Is our president.

[Sam Taggart]

Fabrize told you guys, you can't speak Trump.

[George Taveras]

Febreze had a lot of rules.

[Sam Taggart]

I see.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Fabrize wants to advertise. They're like, just don't say anything bad about Trump.

[Sam Taggart]

Seriously.

[George Taveras]

If you have to see his brain image, it's partial.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. And it's the Gulf of America, the Gulf of Febreze. Whatever happened with that, that kind of fell off. That didn't stick.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You know, if there's one thing liberals are obsessed with, its names and terms for things like, tell them that something, that a symbol or a word is changing, and they're like, we're hitting the streets. Show them footage of war. They're like, I can't really hold space for that right now.

[Sam Taggart]

I would love to get into that, but Chapel Row and just kind of ignored a kid for an hour, and I kind of have to put on

[George Taveras]

and I need to buy a gun.

[Sam Taggart]

No, it's literally a gun for that reason.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's so amazing.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, people are so amazing.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I think so. Yeah. I think that's really where we're landing.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Our country is so beautiful, so phenomenal.

[George Taveras]

It's really amazing what we can all do when we put our heads together.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I was like, you know, Karamo Brown, shout out.

[George Taveras]

Let's start there.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Wow. I can't believe we made it through

[Sam Taggart]

this whole thing without talking about Karamo's AI AI therapy.

[George Taveras]

Oh, God.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You know, Is defending himself against a variety of accusations, including sexual harassment, by the way, if you read the People article. But one of the. One of the things is that people kept saying, he got facework. And he said, no, I didn't get facework. And now he's explaining himself and he's like, actually, I got buccal fat removal. And then something went wrong, so I had to get a different surgery to fix my whatever. And then people I know are commenting under the, like, People magazine, Instagram being like, so he did get facework. It's. It's like, shut up.

[George Taveras]

Well, the people that we know that actually are still active on social media in the comments is really scary to me.

[Sam Taggart]

That is wild. I also just think, like, it kind of is bad for people. Shouldn't be crazy when people get work done, but also just own it when you get work done. Well, yes, I got this thing done. Hiding it. I know. Hiding it feels so much more sinister to me. You're like, everybody can. I don't know, she stays. I guess I'm just such a high and good person that all my Bugle fat went away.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

But I will say, and just to play devil's advocate, okay, you know, any sort of body modification comes from a desire to look a different way by definition. Right? So that's like if you're karma brown. There was an insecurity that needed to be addressed. So it is asking a lot for someone to be like and now have a sense of humor about it.

[Sam Taggart]

You know, I'm not even saying a sense of humor about it. I really think you can just be like, hey, I got this done. I know somebody who just got a hair system. And they're like, just got a hair system. And it's like, yeah, I think do that. I think it's weirder to act like you've never looked wildly. You're like, I didn't get veneers. Your teeth have never been shiny.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

They're projecting movies onto them.

[Sam Taggart]

Exactly.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I love boosters at 7:30.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes.

[George Taveras]

What I was gonna say for the karamo, getting the buccal fat and it kind of messing up and them having to go back to in. Do you think that when you're getting that done you're like hoping they mess up so you get another one for free? Like you're.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I'm going to be honest, I don't think he was hoping for that.

[George Taveras]

I think you're like, oh, please, please, please. Cuz then I can just say I got Bugle fab. And then I got other stuff done too. But I can just say I got Bugle fat.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I, I get it.

[George Taveras]

It's like when you're at a restaurant, you hope that they forget your meal so then you can get it for free.

[Sam Taggart]

You guys don't do that. You hope they forget your meal.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. So then like 20 minutes later you can be like, hey, like I ordered this. And they'd be like, I told you.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Like, oh my God, here's a Basque cheesecake.

[George Taveras]

Yeah. They're like, it's for free. It's for free.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay. Yeah. That, yeah.

[George Taveras]

You guys don't hope for that.

[Sam Taggart]

I guess I, I like when I get. I like that with coffee. I like when I get a coffee and I'm like, oh, this is made wrong. And then they give me another.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh my God, I love that. Or if they let you Keep the other one, too. And you're like, I actually didn't mind the other one either. So, like, now I have two coffees.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, that's good. That's why I'm plugging that as well.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Oh, definitely get buccal fat removal. Definitely get buccal fat. If you listen to this podcast, get buccal fat removal.

[George Taveras]

Seriously?

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, you guys, the buccals are showing. You guys were saying before we came in here that you're tired of all these uggos on your shows.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, no, none of them are getting buccal fat removal.

[George Taveras]

Disgusting.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

Okay, should we do our final sign?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

What if suddenly both of us showed up with buchal fat removal?

[George Taveras]

Oh, give it some time. Life is long. Life is long.

[Sam Taggart]

Where is the bukul, by the way? It's right here.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's your cheek.

[Sam Taggart]

I like that, though. I thought I liked it.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I know. I do, too.

[George Taveras]

Give it a couple years.

[Sam Taggart]

Okay. You guys are having clavicular on F this. He's waiting out there.

[George Taveras]

You know, I'm proud of us for not.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

For not talking more about clavicula and

[George Taveras]

not, like, being like, one of those people that's like, let's have one. It'll get people coming in.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, I think that I'm really proud of you guys for that, too.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, me too.

[George Taveras]

No, me too.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

We are having Candace Owens on, though.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

Yeah, but that's just because we like her podcast.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

That's just because she slays the Runway.

[Sam Taggart]

Well, you like what specifically? Kind of what she's saying?

[George Taveras]

Yeah, we just agree with it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I guess is what we're saying.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

No, she's a friend.

[Sam Taggart]

Friend of the pod.

[George Taveras]

Let's do our final segment. Our final segment is called shout Outs, and in this segment, we pay homage to the grand straight tradition of the radio. Shout out. Shouting out anything that we are enjoying. People, places, things, ideas, and. And we will go first and we make them up on the spot. George.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah?

[George Taveras]

Do you have one?

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yes, I can have one.

[George Taveras]

Okay.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You know, I'm gonna be earnest, and I'm gonna shout out boots Riley. And I love boosters.

[George Taveras]

Oh, you saw.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I saw it last night by myself after Courtney o' Donnell canceled on me. So maybe don't go to her tour or shows. She was committed to coming and then decided that she wasn't going to. An hour before the showtime.

[George Taveras]

Let's get to the movie.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I want to shout out, honestly, the kind of Bay Area vibe of the movie. I think it's so hilarious that tuniards did the music, but she kind of ate down. It was so good and I just am like, like finally someone with an imagination in this town. It was things I had never seen before. I'm not saying it all added up to, you know, exactly like, you know, more than the sum of its parts, but I was so impressed throughout. It was so colorful, it was so bold. All the actors were so good. Keke Palmer's like a generational talent. It's.

[Sam Taggart]

It's incredible.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's so. It's just so good. And it's a miracle that it got made and it actually, you know, I go back and forth with my Bay Area past because I, I did live there for six years, but it made me proud to have to of my barrier heritage, AKA I went to college there and stayed there for two years afterwards. And I just got a huge shout out to Oakland, San Francisco and kind of that whole area, Wine country and Appa Sonoma and shout out to Boots Riley.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah, we gotta support that one. It's really good.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's really good.

[George Taveras]

What's up freaks, losers, perverts around the globe. I would like to give a shout out to. I guess this is weird to do when we're having the host of it on in a day or two, but I want to give a shout out to the podcast band Splain and The Madonna saga, 12 hour saga that I am four hours deep into. You know, you start listening to a podcast, you say, okay, what am I really gonna learn about Madonna? I pretty much have heard it all, folks. And then I'm listening. I'm saying, I didn't know that. Well, I certainly didn't know that. Well, what the hell, I didn't know that. It's making me appreciate her on such a deep level. I already loved her and now I am so, so in that it feels completely insane. I think even as someone who loves her, I underestimated her. And I think about her, you know, recent past and I say, well, through this lens, it's completely different. I can see it all very differently and with much more appreciation. And so I want to say, I feel so free is still good. I am still supporting. I feel so free. And I think if you're not supporting I feel so free this summer, then you are. You are not coming to the pool party. So stream Bansplaim Stream I feel so free. Stream Madonna. XOXO Sam Woo Wow.

[Sam Taggart]

I want to give a shout out to the Pulitzer board, the people behind the prestigious Pulitzer Prize of the same name. I just think I love the work they're doing over there and if they ever want to get coffee or whatever, I'd love to kind of chat about. About what I'm working on. Also, honestly, the podcast. Cool people who did cool stuff. It's like a podcast about direct action and mutual aid. And it's the podcast that I keep listening to and hearing your guys Febreze commercial.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's good that Febreze is supporting mutual aid.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. So love that second in Boots Riley and I love boosters. That was really fun. You know, all the effects were like practical.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

It's so cool. The stop motion stuff.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And the miniature car chase.

[Sam Taggart]

Yes. People, we don't like. We don't stuff like that anymore.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I can't believe that it exists. Like, it makes me so. It warms my heart.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. It made me really, really happy.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And I also. It's like how fun the Demi Moore is doing it. Random ass. Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

I love, I also like, love when I see like a celebrity that I kind of thought was maybe a little like doing an anti capitalist.

[George Taveras]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

Like, I don't.

[George Taveras]

Does bring into question sometimes how aware actors are of what they're doing.

[Sam Taggart]

I think that's a really good question. And I, and I don't. I don't want to. I don't want to, you know, super get into it with any of them. But I like seeing it happen. I like seeing some of our greatest celebrities. I agree.

[George Taveras]

No, it's fun.

[Sam Taggart]

And I think it's.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

You don't have to be in the bag for Boots Riley's exact politics to understand the ethos of the movie. Like, I think to me more is like, got it. So it's like punk rock.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[George Taveras]

Which is what's amazing about her is you can be pro AI and pro punk rock.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I just want to say that's something you've been saying. I understand that she misspoke. If you listen to the rest of. If you watch the rest of that clip, then she goes on to say like, what will never be replaced is human's capacity for art. It's like, okay. So she's working it out on the spot.

[George Taveras]

People are having their cake and eating it too. They're saying stuff like that. And then they're saying a really useful tool. It's like, quit having your cake and eating it too.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Don't you think Will Poulter also gives a really good gay guy performance with the green hair.

[Sam Taggart]

Oh my God.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

So good.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

And you can tell he like has been waiting his whole life for whatever reason to Give that performance. He's like, I'm gonna be kind of

[Sam Taggart]

a crazy gay guy.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah.

[Sam Taggart]

And I like to imagine that, like, yeah, like Boots Riley. Like, nobody was giving him like, a note on, like, make it like that gay. Yeah. But they're still like, kind of taking that into I.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Really. Something I have always wanted is for Boo Charlie to do, like, a gay project because, you know, obviously Bay Area birth of, you know, gay activism, blah, blah. I think he has a lot of gay people around him and I think the aesthetic is so, like, bright, colorful, gay.

[Sam Taggart]

The aesthetic is very queer.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Yeah, it's very like Almodovar, like, bright colors, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, how fun would it be if he made, like a gay, whatever, anti capitalist satire about pride.

[Sam Taggart]

I want to see Boots Riley stop that train. Yes, exactly. I want to see what that would have looked like.

[George Taveras]

Plus, his name is Boots.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

I know his name is Boots, honey.

[George Taveras]

It writes itself.

[Sam Taggart]

That's good. That's good.

[George Taveras]

Well, see Hayden on tour, period. And this was so fun.

[Sam Taggart]

Yeah. Thank you guys for having me.

[George Taveras]

Of course. Bye.

[Sam Taggart]

Bye.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Podcast ends now.

[George Taveras]

Stradio Lab is production by Will Ferrell's Big Money Players and iHeartRadio podcasts created

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

and hosted by Sam Taggart and George

[George Taveras]

Taveras, Executive produced by Becca Ramos.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Produced by Casey Donahue, edited and mixed by Lawrence Stumpf Social video done by Hot Dog Sandwich.

[George Taveras]

He's dribbling the ball with everything on the line. He's driving down the pitch. He's facing price hikes and cuts past him.

[Sam Taggart]

Carrier contracts, tries to block him.

[George Taveras]

Oh, he leaves him in the dust.

[Sam Taggart]

He's at the edge of the box. He cuts past the non stop group chat, trash talk. He clears on goal. He shoots

[George Taveras]

unlimited data for $25 a month. Forever.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Visit your local Boost Mobile store today to get unlimited data with a price that never changes. Boost mobile after 30gb, customers may experience lower speeds.

[George Taveras]

Customers will pay 25amonth as long as they remain active on the Boost $25 Unlimited plan. Hey, everyone, it's Cal Penn. I'm inviting you to join the best sounding book club you've ever heard with my podcast, Hearsay, The Audible and iHeart Audiobook Book Club. Every episode, I nerd out with amazing guests and dive into the best new audiobooks available on Audible. It's the book club for your ears. Listen to Earsay, the Audible and iHeart audiobook club on the iHeartradio app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Maintenance fee, overdraft fee, minimum balance fee, maximum balance fee Banking fees are just a part of modern life. Or are they?

[George Taveras]

They're not at Ally Bank At Ally

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

bank, there are no tricks, no hidden fine print or jumping through hoops for better rates. They just want to help you save automatically while you spend with spending accounts and savings tools with great rates. No tricks, no hidden fees. Banking built for life today. Learn [e-mail] Ally bank member FDA Honestly,

[George Taveras]

Honestly, Honestly, no one wants to think about hiv, but there are things that

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

everyone can do to help prevent it.

[George Taveras]

Things like prep. PREP stands for Pre Exposure Prophylaxis, and

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

it means routinely taking prescription medicine before

[George Taveras]

you're exposed to HIV to help reduce your chances of getting it.

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

Prep can be about 99% effective when taken as prescribed. It doesn't protect against other STIs, though,

[George Taveras]

so be sure to use condoms and

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

other healthy sex practices.

[George Taveras]

Ask a healthcare provider about all your

[Guest/Co-host (possibly Hayden Johnson or another recurring guest)]

prevention Options and visit findoutaboutprep.com to learn more. Sponsored by Gilead this is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.