Abomination w/ Michael Boatman

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Hi, Hi, Hi, Welcome to That's Messed Up, an SVU podcast.

I'm Kara Klank and I'm Liza Traeger. This is a podcast where we talk SVU, true crime and talk to celebrities.

So thrilling and up top, we catch up. We catch up.

Yes, we're as always were in the time machine. So we will be just returning from a glorious whirlwind tour of the Northeast. Thank you to everybody who came out. We loved seeing all of you.

Well, So, a few weeks ago, I was talking about two different things that I thought was one thing. Yeah, so I was talking about a crime in Japan, and I said that the documentary The Serpent was about it.

The Serpent's about something else.

Oh okay, it's about a man killing tourists.

So shit, So it's something different.

And I don't know why my brain put them together into one one thing.

So I just wanted to.

Shit smarter any which way you sliceaid. I'm sure that's what happened. Yeah, So well, I want to hear from you because you went to go see the movie that's swooping the Nation M Threegan, uh, Megan, And I thought it was gonna be I told you this, but I thought it was going to be like I thought it was a rated R Chucky, like there would be like a little doll spilling blood everywhere. But I think it was just more like a campy, fun horror movie because it's PG thirteen.

Yeah, but Chucky also is not scary like it is.

When you're a kid and he fucking murders people with like blood and knives like it's all raided.

There's blood and knives, well a machete in this one.

Oh really, is there a lot of blood?

There's an okay amount of blood, I mean whatever, whatever amount of blood's allowed for a PG thirteen, But it's yeah, bloodless, you know what I mean.

Right, there's ripped off body parts.

I saw and I saw a marketing thing they did on Instagram where they just had like fifteen girls dressed as Megan dancing on the deck of the Empire State Building and doing her weird like like googly dance that she does well.

You know what I learned, Megan is girls. It was an actress. They filmed that with real girls wearing masks. Yeah, there are real dances. So yesterday a few friends were showing me just like the making of and it's.

They're real girls.

That's why it's like so fucking cool. On top of it, it's like Nazgi. I just love that they didn't take themselves too seriously.

It's silly. It's funny.

Everyone is so pretentious, like I feel, you know, they're like Babylon.

We don't care, we don't I don't need Babylon.

I didn't even know Babylon was a thing until I got to the movies and saw posters. But that's supposed to be the big thing. No one cares. We want little robots.

That's well.

I bombed at the box office, but it might do well. It gets nominated for stuff. It's three hours long. You know what I think everyone, I'm just gonna say it as everyone is a little bit tired about movies about the magic of Hollywood, like the Fableman. Yeah, and that's always the ones that win. The ones that win are always like jerk Off Circle jerk picks about the magic of cinema and it's like, okay, we all like movies. Whatever. I don't know that's the problem. Give them, give them

And I just love Alison Williams finding this like horror, no emotion, niche for herself in her life.

Like I'm just really proud of her.

Have I said on your podcast before that I wow a babysit for her.

Yes, but you could say it again.

It's huge. Okay, No, I haven't seen her in years, but my friends at MTV interviewer on a red carpet for like get Out or something, and they were like, oh, we work with your old babysitter, Charc like, and she goes she was there when it all started because I used to do I used to do Disney sing along songs with her. We used to like sing and like

I loved those Disney singalongs because like the little Mickey Mouse would bounce.

Towards I loved those totally. We would do it in class. I just like her and her NEPO baby like comment was perfect.

Like she's what did she say? She just goes, yeah, it's not that big of a deal. You could just admit it and know that you had a leg up. But still, you know, do good work and nothing matters and eventually people won't care.

Yeah, like the most basic great thing.

Because Jamie Lee Curtis had a quote like that too, and then she came out with a wild one like they like she was like, we deserve the right to exist, and it's like okay, Like they're just their worlds are too small. I just feel like Kate Moss's sister being like it had nothing to do with me being Kate Moss's sister.

It's like, are you out of your mind?

Like I just I don't.

Brook Smith, our former guest the Woman in the Well from Silence to the Lambs, one of the best Nappo babies able to talk about it, admits it doesn't care, like what's so bad? What's so bad? I don't get it. Your mom's Zuma Thurman. Just say it help getting a Quentin Tarantino audition.

Yes, she's like my mom being Uma Thurman had nothing to do with me being cast in that movie, and it's like, what what are you talking about?

She's a muse.

I don't know, but right, Alison Williams is amazing and Brian Jordan Alvarez is in Meghan Me I'm three again.

I can't even say it like you and Ronnie Chang. So that was like fun too to see some familiar faces.

I don't know.

I loved it.

I love I don't know are personally. Does he do stand up? No?

I think we might be just internet friends.

But yeah, and I think he's like a sketchy character guy, right, Yeah, sketchy sketch comedy.

Yeah, he does like front facing really funny characters like I following, Like I'm in a Southern waitress on your first day of work and it's her like training you, but she's like, You're not supposed to do this, but I always do.

Yeah.

One of the best undercover bosses is retro fitness.

Have you ever seen that? No, there's like a.

Woman ah Jack Jacqueline, and she is so disrespectful. She legit like tells client like customers at the gym, like go fuck yourself, and like the boss like the owners trying to and she goes, I don't give a shit. I just told you what to do, Just do it. And then she obviously gets fired. In the end, she's wearing a diamond cross, just swearing at the TV like soapiss it's the best go find undercover boss with our

I checked out the winners. I looked at a couple of speeches. I saw Jennifer Coolidge is like hilarious, like very touching speech to Mike White, and then I just this morning saw a red carpet with her where they were like, are there any part roles that you want to play next? And she goes, I've always wanted to play a dolphin. It's oh, what are you talking about?

She's so funny.

And I love when Mike White one he went, well, you all passed on this, so this makes it even better and he was like oh to the actors, he goes, you all passed and don't pretend you didn't. You all passed and it makes this moment even sweeter. Something like that. I only watch it. I just you know, I don't have Twitter anymore, but I'll go look at the trending topics.

Sometimes I'm super early. I feel like a word season doesn't usually get going into like feb And it's like January, like ten No Golden Globes. Always January, okay, always January, super February. I did also like that Ryan Murphy let MJ. Rodriguez take a moment as the first transactress to ever win last year she won in the non televised and so he like let her get up and like, you know, take a bow and that was really sweet. Yeah, and so I saw a couple of clips, but I didn't

Well, I think once you see how the sausage is made, it's like not as cool either. Like I grew up with my family, awards shows were everything my dad.

I mean, my dad would let us get.

Pizza and we would watch and then we'd get the magazines of all the best dress during the week, like right, we loved it. But now you know, it's like a pr circuit, Like it's just the Golden Globe started because the press.

Celebrities were talking to the press. Did you tell me this? I know you told me this, you told I'm the pot or no, no, I don't think so the Golden Globes is just like the foreign press and no one talked to the press, and they're like, well, no one loves awards more than celebrities, so they created this award show just to get interview exclusives with celebrities.

Yeah, it's like all kind of based on stuff.

But what I really want to talk about someone who didn't watch the whole thing, just Twitter, Internet, some BuzzFeed clips Gerrod Carmichael, it's like you haven't seen anything about it.

Just the Shelley thing.

He I don't get it, Like I don't get why he did it.

It wasn't funny and it was basically like I just hate people that are like, well, I didn't even try, so it doesn't even matter. I just hate cynicism. I hate people that don't try. And it's like you can make points and be funny, like it was Ricky Gervais's scathingness with not a joke insight.

But the mention of Shelley miscaviage. Did that bother you? Because I thought that was kind of like, oh, damn, at least somebody's talking about it.

Oh, it didn't bother me. It was just towards them. And it was right before like Tom Cruise people came. I'm just saying, people were like talking, like people.

Weren't listening to him.

He had to spend most of the time going, why do I have to keep telling you guys to shut up? Shut up, stop talking because people stopped listening to him because he.

Was just not caring at all, like playing it like anti comedy.

Well it was anti comedy, and he wanted to make points of like this is racist as fuck.

I hate this, I hate all of this. Hollywood is bullshit.

I don't give a shit about any of you, like very and so people were just talking and the Shelley bar everyone just went like, oh, I know, I loved that, but it just I don't get him. I don't get it. I never have gotten it. I don't get it.

Yeah, yeah, when I meet him, he's nice, but like, oh, he's so lovely to me. The first time I met him, He's like, when you come to LA, I'll help you get on shows. And then he did, he like emailed people for me to get on shows, like he's always been so nice. But yeah, I haven't talked to him in a while, and I don't I haven't seen a lot of the new stuff, like the specials and the whatever.

I just feel like, I like, obviously awards are stupid, but they mean a lot to people, Like a lot of people work decades, like Mike Whites and Tears, like things mean a lot to people, like it takes a lot of work to be able to be there, and like.

And nobody wants you to be too cool at anything, like that's it. Yeah, don't be at a don't be like speaking at an insurance conference and be like I'm too cool to be here, Like then, don't be speaking like I mean, don't be too cool. And then I went on Twitter for anyone to be like he would you guys, you know, and all the people that did like him were like, the jokes are supposed to.

Be not funny. You just don't get it.

And it's like, I actually do get it and anti I don't like anti comedy people. Andy Kaufman. I've never seen a piece of it. I don't give a shit, Like it's not for me, but I don't know. I'm gonna watch the full. I'm gonna watch more and more just to like make sure.

Yeah, you're making me want to watch it now. Yeah, I want to.

Check it out.

We should watch it together because I want to see if I still think what I'm thinking while seeing all of it. But it was just like that's why I hated the Kathy Hilton putting lipgloss on. I don't like anyone taking away from people like doing things that really do matter, and I don't.

I think it's cool to care and that's that.

But he got paid half a million, and I can't believe they let him do it, Like I really, did he have writers?

I wonder, like I'm sure did they know what he was doing? Like maybe not? Because I heard that he likes to rewrite a lot of things, Like I think he likes to have his own hand on the steering wheel, you know what I mean? Like I don't he maybe had writers, but I think he had final say on everything that he said. For judging from what I've known about what I've heard about him.

I just feel like you can be a badass and say all the fuck's up shit and still be funny, like the I just don't get why you want to not be funny. But he also was first comedy special he had. He brought notes up and doesn't care.

He doesn't care, and it's just like so rewarded in every way, and I don't I don't know.

It's just something I don't understand at all.

Well, it's kind of like I have a friend in comedy who, like, he books a million commercials. He books so many commercials, and he goes into the attitude at every commercial like I don't give a fuck if I get this, and he gets it all the time. It's like it is rewarded in this business. Like they'll be like will you shave? And he'll be like nope, and

I don't know.

I'm curious how everyone felt about it or if he had fun at the parties, Like I wonder.

If he had fun. It's just like I it's just confusing to me.

But if he really pulled one on them, I guess that's a cool prank getting paid a lot. And then the Golden Globes switeted like that was amazing, thank you for your incredible work. And then all the comments are like, what, like are you talking about?

I love how you're just signing into like member sign in. Yeah, you're just like logging on too, no sign in Twitter, just checking out the free public Twitter feed.

Yeah, I just do it for like White Lotus.

I did it.

I loved seeing the White Lotus.

It's the only place where people are having conversations about stuff still. Unfortunately, because I didn't even know the Golden Globes were happening, I was on the phone with our friend and I saw something. I go, wait the Golden Globes today. It was I saw like people that we both follow, like Meg's Stalter. So I saw her on the red carpet and was like, oh, that's today, Like I truly didn't know.

Well, I thought it was because of Twitter, but I guess not. I thought it was because I don't have Twitter. I'm out of the loop. But you're you have it and you're out of the Oh. No, I was totally out. Was totally out.

Well, you know, I go on my own Twitter for like a little bit sometimes in the morning, and then I go on the that's messed up Twitter, which is all just like releasey fanfic and like rammed shit. You know.

No, I also didn't know it's on a Monday, like that felt weird or Tuesday whenever. What I thought it was a Sunday thing. I thought, yeah, Sunday I usually is. You're right, I was obbious about that.

I don't know.

Well, I have an episode of my podcast that you know I've been telling you about NonStop called The Town, which is like an industry podcast about Hollywood, which I think non industry and industry people both listen to. But there is an episode waiting on my phone that's like, why are we losing award shows? Like why are people just so totally dropping award shows. So I'm interested to listen to what.

He Oh, I'll do theories, and then once you listen, you can like te tell me the truth.

Well, I think the Internet ruined everything.

Yeah, because you could just see the best speeches, you could see who won. You don't have to watch. There's no surprise, there's no excitement. Also, people aren't going to the movies. We also are all watching such different things exactly. Everything's very yeah except White Lotus.

I think that really after the Nation, but and I love that Jeremy Allen White one.

I didn't watch The Bear yet, but I do like him.

Yeah, and I really loved everything everywhere all at once. So I'm happy Michelle Yo is getting like all the props that she's getting for that movie. I feel like she's gonna win the Oscar too. Well the Guy one too Oh yeah he did too.

Yeah.

Yeah, and I guess see I I googled him. I guess he was like he acted in the eighties as a kid.

Yeah, he's from Goonies or no, it's another big eighties.

It's Goonies, Goonies and Harrison Ford Indiana Jones.

Yeah, and then he like dropped off forever, and he's so have you seen it not yet?

Because I see it in the movies and it's on Delta flights, but usually Delta's for fun, Like, I don't know. When I'm in the air, I don't want to watch this incredible film, you.

Know what I mean? And you and it's not the kind of movie where you want to like doze off for a few minutes and then pick it back up, like yeah, you got to really focus on it.

So I have a flight where I'm in first class lay down and it's in the afternoon. I'm flying from like one to nine pm, Like it's chill, So maybe that's where I'll finally watch it with like my meal.

Oh yeah, that'll be chill. That will be nice to like cozy up and watch a movie. I am number five on the list for an upgrade tomorrow and there are nine seats for tonight and I'm excited. Okay, I don't know if it's going to happen, but I was like looking this morning, it was like ooh la la, okay, let's get started with our episode today. We don't really have a ton of tour dates coming up because we

And watch the Instagram. Yeah, I'll do like a YouTube thing. Subscribe, No, subscribe to any subscribe and yeah, oh but give us some give us some nice reviews and some stars if it feels good. The Taylor Swift camp fans really made it, did a debt. They made a and it bothers me.

But you know what, somebody told me. Somebody told me that, like, it's just the number of reviews that you get, Like, even if they're bad, it's still that they told you a number of reviews. No, I feel like it was Hannah or somebody. So they were like, yes, your bad reviews are good.

Yeah.

So it's like, fuck you all the people that give us one star reviews, jokes on you. All Right, let's get started. So we are doing Abomination season five, episode eight, taking it back to two thousand and three, and we open on a lady in a crossing guard vest and she's corralling a bunch of children across the street and she's like talking to them in kid talk. She's like, let's stop, look and listen when we cross the street.

Whatever.

But then as the kids go under.

Her breast as much of a trope as like jogging through the park. I feel like there's been a crossing guard with young children in like ten episodes.

Yeah, that is a thing.

It's always like we're gonna be safe, and then it's like a dead body or a van snatches a child, like this does happen. Yeah, maybe we could be crossing guards. Maybe that's where we're going off, begging for casting. Maybe we would make great crossing guards that are kind of fighting.

Wow, this is my corner, you know, this is the street I walk the kids on. And then you're like, I've been here for ten years. Okay, yeah that could be us. But this lady's like all nice with the kids, and then under her breath goes, I hope a cab doesn't splatter you all over midtown, you little brats. And it's so funny to me. She hates her job and she sees something and I can't tell. She like works for the school and as a crossing guard, just wearing

Why can't they mind their business?

Yeah? I just don't get it. Well, I definitely think when people are gay bashing, I think what these people think they're doing is helping people get over like a gambling addiction. Like it's the same thing as gambling or drinking too much, like listen, you just have to avoid like this. That's that's what I get the idea that ReGenesis is trying to do. So bd Wong says it's controversial, and fucking Stabler is like, okay, so if someone thinks being gay is a sin, not saying I do, what's

Not even like, oh, this guy is so familiar looking to me the sun and I don't know from where I know him, Like he's in one episode of Six Feet Under.

I'm like, is that it?

Like I'm looking at all his credits and I'm like, none of these are connected to me, But this man's face is it just from SVU?

Like Lisa, when I tell you I wrote the exact same thing I wrote. This is Jonathan Tucker. He looks familiar. I thought i'd seen him in more, but I think I only know him from Hannibal, the TV show. He was in Hannibal, which I watched. That must be where I recognized him from. He was also in Parenthood. Did you watch that? I did watch Parenthood. I just saw that he was in ten episodes.

So I'm trying to but I don't remember Bob Little Christina Bambert former.

Oh he was running for mayor. Okay, yeah, so we both know him from like one show. But I thought i'd seen him in like a lot of stuff, but I haven't. He's also Injustified and American Gods and yeah, that's this guy. He's in Echoes with Daniel Soon Jada. Oh, excuse me, we need to watch that now.

It really came and went like you would think a Netflix show would be more in the No, do you think it was in other people's You should watch and it's trending and it's just not in ours, Like we're Daniel Soon Jada fans.

I know you got to know by my Google search that I'm looking up on I'm on Daniel Sujatta's IMDb Paige Weekly. But anyway, they find out that yes, the father pays for a department so close to where the body was dumped, and that there were over fifty calls between Ian the son, and James Reed the night, including the night of the death. So they're like, so, doctor

I know it's like a myth, but I do feel it's sometimes true. But why is it offensive? Like, I know people are offended by that kind of thinking, but in my head of like, you know, doth protest too much?

Yes, the lady doth protests too much?

Yeah, it's like my whole thing is, if like you're living or truth in your best life, why like you would understand why, like if you were in like and a loving thing, you would want that for everybody. So I just assume people that are so hateful of others are jealous because they don't get to live their true life. But obviously some people are just hateful fucks. I was just wondering why it's offensive. Yeah, I know, I'm reading.

I was reading an article about it really quickly, but then I just got stuck on something else, so I don't I don't think I finished it because I wanted to know too, I would. I wanted to know if that was true. So I looked it up and it's and I found out that it was a myth. But every Republican Bossian that is against gays is always found tapping on a bathroom stall, yeag sex workers. They're always caught,

Because it makes it seem like everyone in the closet is hateful in a killer and that's not Yeah, like I'm sure there's times people in a closet that you know aren't hateful. Yeah, it's it's complicated, But to think it's a full myth, I think is.

Like also not true. It happens well I think it's to say that most of them are repressed. I mean, it was is the myth. There obviously exists homophobes who are who are homosexual.

Obviously no one's seen American Beauty.

That's one of my favorite movies.

I know Kevin Spacey has turned out to be kind of a criminal, but that movie really does it for me.

That really that movie was a big one for me back in the day. But anyway, Live is like, be honest with us, and he's like, I'm not gay and I didn't kill him. And Stabler is like helping some old lady out of the building and Lives like, okay, they why don't you just give us a DNA sample And he's like nope and walks away and they don't have cause to compel a swab, and it's like, fuck this old lady. Stabler was really grabbing the door so that he could go in and do some snooping and

Yeah, bring it?

And I want everyone to go back and watch it on Hulu, like right now, it's made me laugh so much. I listened to it six times. And so now this man is sawing open the wall. Ian comes home with his dad Roger in tow and they're demanding a warrant. They slap it in his face and he's like, I'm

How can I forget? Yeah, how can I find get?

A full phone phone conversation in the courtroom.

But also a kind of a brag.

At our Sacramento show, we met a sonographer, yes, and she told us that stenographers are hot and cool, and she doesn't like being portrayed as an old idiot with old technology.

Yeah, they don't use the like doop doup thing anymore, where like your hands just move along. I think they use different shit.

There's a shorthand and you get to create your own shorthand. We learned, and she was hot, and she brought her daughter, so shout out it's our stenographer friend.

Yes, stenographer from Sacramento. Anyway, this man was funny to me. And he's been in five episodes of SVU and three episodes of Regular Law and Order, always just as like a court clerk, and I love the idea that the show's just like bouncing back and forth, like we just need a guy to like read out a court number. So he's like doc at seven three four case of Ian Tate or whatever. And then holy shit. His lawyer is Daphne Zuniga. She's from Spaceballs and Melrose Place. Obviously

So we don't get Postslater going.

What about One Tree Hill? Yeah, she this is her only episode of SVU. She's not like a recurring lawyer though I don't know why. She's pretty fun and Ian Tate pleads not guilty, and Casey asks for remand since he's a violent homophobe and his lawyer claims he was defending himself after being sexually assaulted by James Reid, and this is the first time Casey's heard of this assault excuse at all, and she's like and Emma's like, well, you're an SVU ada and you should know that victims

And just while that, there's a group of people that are like, that's not It's like, mind your fucking business, these fucking losers.

I just yeah and so yeah. So he's like, basically, the ADA says, you got to prove this guy is gay, so that the gay panic defense goes bye bye. And the tricky par is not playing the politics of it. They want to make this about straight versus gay. You need to make it about murder. So now we're at a diner and the gang is chatting over food and it looks I literally fat rewound it six times. It looks like Live is eating a pile of tuna on

This is his first episode.

This is his first appearance, and he has defended some classic wild people on the show, like the mushroom guy from Wet, the twin Sessed con artists from Bombshell Like. He's been all over the place. He's in family, He's the one about the brother I slept with my sister, So a lot of good ones. Also interesting thing about Dave Sever the Wikipedia. The fandom Wikipedia says that his full name is Mary and Dave Sever, But I wonder what episode it is where we find out that his

Yeah, but I know if your first name is silly, you always go with the middle name.

The people are sure that I know a lot of guys. So funny to me, he's a very secondary character on the show that he has a secret first name. That's funny to me. Like it's not like we find out that Olivia's first name is really like Priscilla, you know.

Like I've I always have loved him because he he's funny. He's he's like always got a funny line. He's sassy and confident and fun Yeah, he's even though he's only been only but like in seven episodes, he's really made an impact, like I assumed he was in twenty plus episode because he is so memorable as that.

Well.

This actor's name is Michael Boatman. He's a longtime, very successful actor. His resume includes Spin City, Rless and The Good Fight. So maybe you've not seen him in twenty episodes of s View, but he's been in hundreds of episodes of televisions. Absolutely, he's out there, he's rich, he's out there. So he immediately teases Casey about the bike and is like, how environmentally conscious? It's funny, and then he introduces himself, but Casey passes on the handshake and

This, if it stops the wrinkles from forming, you know, like Beckham, smile.

Keep your face completely, bi. No. One time this woman. I worked at this store in my town, very fancy shop, and the woman who owned it was like this very older woman with Connecticut lockjaw, helmet, hair set hair, very like, just that vibe. And she one time came in and said something to my friend that my friend and I say to each other all the time, and she goes, little sweetheart, tell your mother I left the pills in the garage, and like, that's our favorite thing. I've known

This is an interesting I forgot who I was with talking about it, but like I would love some sort of reunion of all the girls that knowingly went with their gay best friends to prom and homecoming and all the dances. Yeah, I don't know who I was talking to her about what, but it does seem like.

Something special.

It seems like a special little club to be special bond.

Yeah.

So so yeah, they're like, did you ever tell anyone like Ian's dad that he was gay? And she's like, Ian would have killed me, Like, no, I didn't do that, And then from behind them we hear we see Sandy's sassy mom leaning on the doorframe going I told him, and I love her already, And she's like, well, like.

For a second, you, for a second, you weren't scared that she was bad. I told him what like for a second when she goes, I told him, you didn't even for a second think that maybe she was like a bad Christian, like a lunatic too. That was like, just so you know your son is gay or right?

Away. She was God, I didn't get that vibe. I thought she was no.

I was scared for a moment, and then I like relax. I was like, Okay, this is one of our friends. Like, but I was actually nervous.

For a second. She like reminds me of one of my aunts. Like she's just like funny to me, like my aunt Grace. I feel like she reminds me of you met her like and she's just like listen. He was such a sweet boy. He was like my second child. I could see was suffering, and I thought Rogers should know. I told him and Roger's senior or I told them that. During their senior year, I called him and I said, Roger, you should talk to Ian. He's very depressed. I said, Roger,

And hopefully once his dad goes to jail, he can take all his dad's money to live in a nice place. Fucking yeah, squeeze that asshole for all these worth Yeah.

And I hope that also that guy going to jail just kind of like puts all that research just like out the window, Like no one's going to publish a guy who's in jail for killing his son's boyfriend.

I mean, people learn that today on Twitter. It's trending. You know, Fauci created, uh created coronavirus all over again, and people are like, the studies show it.

It's like you can find a study to do anything you want.

You quit Twitter? Are you still on there? Seeing what's going on? I only go on for White Lotus, got it? So you don't have to sign up. I just learned.

So I just like I right after I watch an episode of White Lotus, I just google White Lotus Twitter trending and then I just go through all the White Lotus tweets. I just want to see all the theories. I want to see what I missed. I want to see insight there are you know.

I love the memes, I.

Love the fun you know, I love community.

Yeah all right, well I'll take you through, you know some info after this break?

Can't wave.

Welcome back everybody.

So this is mostly about Fred Phelps in the Westboro Baptist Church. But I just wanted to cover who I think the seagull guy was based on a little bit.

Was Charles W.

Socarides Socrates. Yeah, who cares? We hate this guy? You know, I don't know how to pronounce someone that sex, so Charles, it's definitely based on this guy. He Charles was a psycho biatrist and psychoanalysts who publicly, for a long ass time, even after it was considered scientifically like unacceptable to do so, that homosexuality was a condition amenable to treatment and conversion therapy.

It's very good. My mom's partner went there, So why how is this quack a teacher there? That's a great question.

Because there was like a smart guy from my high school who went there too, and I just always thought it was good, ranked well in New York City. And then it's like they have this guy who truly thinks being gay is a disease, Like, it just doesn't make sense to me. Yeah, maybe he had ten here is that how it works? Like, I just I don't get it. Could be who knows. But he believes that being gay is a Eurotic adaptation that in men stems from absent

So and I guess this was he wasn't religious.

I don't think so it's not like, well, the Bible says this, But I just like that his first three marriages to women ended in divorce, and he had a fourth wife, Like, yeah, why is being straight so good?

Like you can't keep a wife? I don't understand.

Yeah, no, this guy seems like a piece of shit. Yeah, piece of shit. Okay, So we're gonna move on. So I just thought I would do a little blurb on this guy. I don't if you wanted to know more information, go read a book.

It's not my job. But we're moving on to the Westboro Baptist Church. I feel like you guys all know about him. So Fred Phelps truly nobody wanted to be around this man. Like he died in March of twenty fourteen, and all the articles were like he's dead, good riddance, Like, as one of the articles wrote, he has very few admirable achievements.

And then one of them was like he was a colossal jerk. He's dead, like no one was.

No one liked this man, as Squire ended an article about him after his death that said, only the good die young. Fred Phelps was a very old man, so very hated individual.

But he didn't mind. He really didn't mind.

And he had a quote in My Enemy with the Witch's Tall Eagle where he said, if I had nobody mad at me, what right would I have to claim that I was preaching the gospel? And his whole thing was like people were mad at Jesus too, so they should be mad at me. Yeah, that's kind of his vibe. So he everyone hated him, and he kind of thrived off being hated. He was born November thirteenth, nineteen twenty nine,

Like, yes, you do, No, Actually, like I know about him very passively, so I'm interested for you to tell me more. But I read a really interesting article about one of his granddaughters who used to be part of his thing and then has fully left, and it was just an interesting thing about her disentangling herself from this like horrible, bigoted organization.

Yeah, yeah, we'll definitely touch on that granddaughter, Megan.

I watched a really cool interview with her, So he was I tried.

There was one documentary, but you had to order a DVD.

I was streaming.

I was like, I'm not ordering a DVD, and then the other doc was like you had to download BBC Player, and I'm like, you know what, I guess I'm back to reading. So, like I said, he was a deeply disagreeable personality. He liked to pick fights with neighbors. He had a thirst for notoriety, and he knew how to get it. His first little taste of fame was in nineteen fifty one when Time magazine profiled his street preaching

Yeah, I don't know. Don't even get him started on fingering. Oh my god, you're going straight to hell.

But he was just obsessed with human sexuality and controlling it for truly six decades. And so I'm doing what you're not supposed to do. But like, what was this man hiding? Like what are you hiding, sir? So up in everyone's business. I feel like he's like fucking sheep or something, or like eating shit in a dominatrix office while while evangel I can't even say the word evangelizing. And I went to an evangelical college to say that while evangelizing whatever. And you know, one of the worst

That's not a college.

He got kicked out, John Muir univers College, Prairie Bible Institute, and Arizona Bible Institute, where he was finally able to get a degree.

So that's his education.

And so most of the family, they live on the family compound and.

They all kind of.

Practiced law so and before that, like all thirties, so he had thirteen kids, and all thirteen kids had to sell candy door to door in the seventies and the proceeds were the main income source for the family.

So he straight I hate when I see this.

He's straight up as like running up subway basketball kids selling em and m's business to support his family.

Yeah, it really hurts my soul when I see children having to sell things with like parents glaring at them from the distance, like it's just not a good way to live, and I feel really bad. So these kids had to go door to door selling candy. But I personally, for just my basketball team, I loved the briefcase of chocolate bars I got to sell.

It was like receis sick. It was like a fun ass box.

Sometimes we would sell airheads in a ziploc bag, but when I got that little chocolate briefcase, I did really enjoy it.

I always sold magazine subscriptions in wrapping paper.

My parents wouldn't see anything. Like my parents wouldn't let me participate in things like that.

It was called the Great Paper Chase and which when it was MAGA, when it was magazine subscriptions. I probably talked about this on the podcast. But my mom's a pediatrician with two offices, so she would just buy a ton of subscriptions for magazines at her office. And I would always win the limo ride to McDonald's. I want to take a limo ride to McDonald's, but like twenty of us would win the limo ride to McDonald's. There were like twenty of us in the limo. Was like

No, but it is weird that.

It was like they encourage children to just knock on doors and sell wrapping paper, like even after kids were put on milk cartons.

Yeah, I did that. I knocked on doors in my neighborhood. Yeah, I was like, do you want any wrapping paper? And then like, we don't even have it on us. They're buying it all out of a catalog. Yeah, oh yeah, you're not like carrying bins. Yeah, we're like, we'll be back to deliver it when it comes in. It's the weirdest thing.

So, yeah, the kids were just out there working like Cara Clank and people from their town hated them as well, but if they needed to win a case, they would still go to them for cases.

And that was who said that.

Religious writer Bill Sherman after visiting the town and family, and he told that to NPR. So eleven of his thirteen children have law degrees. Yeah, and they have this law firm and they actually did a lot of civil rights cases and stuff like that. But so, yeah, everyone in the town is disgusted hates them, but if they have to go to court, they go to this family.

But is it like civil rights, Like I have the civil right to not make a cake for a gay couple because I don't believe in it.

Like no, like they truly represented black people when.

They had issues.

Oh wow, Yeah, money's money, I think to them, and they're latigious.

They're very litigious.

We'll get more into like what drives them, but they're just like very litigious, that's all I have to say. Like they they outside of the selling candy. Like, the way this church makes money is suing towns that won't let them protest and winning.

Like they know the laws so well.

They're kind of geniuses in the law and litigation, and so they kind of sue people constantly and win.

They're terrorized. They're like terrorists.

So yeah, like I said, so, the family law practice pays for the bills for all their travels across the country, and they also make money suing the communities that stop them from demonstrating. And the children of the Phelps family are raised in the church's beliefs and their upbringing offers very few changes or like chance, very few chances to integrate into mainstream society. They have no friends, Like everyone

And then like Megan, the granddaughter that ended up.

Escaping, like there, she was quoted saying, like outside of all this fucked up shit that they made him do, like they did homework together and events and they cooked together, and like there, it was weird for her because they did good parental or grandfathery things. But then also were

Why Democratic, Well, he hates everyone.

He like, he hates Ronald Reagan, he hates Republican like the he hates everyone. It's not Wow, it's not based on Republican Democrat, right wing, left wing.

Anyone outside the church is going to hell like he does.

Right, But if anybody's going to vote for somebody like that, it's it's Republicans more likely.

Oh no, you're totally right, am.

I read somewhere the only two people that he liked were Fidel Castro and Saddam Hussein.

Oh my god, and that once? Is this just like a megalomaniac with like probably some serious issue. I mean, that's like, well, he was born in nineteen twenty nine, isn't that like the depression. Yeah, so he grew up starving maybe like he didn't get the nourishment he needed for his brain cells to form. Like who fucking knows.

So we're going now like that's kind of the background on him. And now for the Westboro Baptist Church. So the website is still active and it's God Hates f Words dot com. Like that's the website. You're you are not Westborough Baptist Church. And what happens when you go to it? Oh, I went to it. I'll yeah, I'll you know, I can. I can tell you right now. It's on their website.

It's kicking. They're up to.

Date, like they have up to date of all the latest sermons, some of which are like days ago from when we're recording. Like they are uploading YouTube, like they are uploading videos and sermons to this day. And they have public a public preaching schedule. So if you're free in February, they'll be at the T Mobile Center in Kansas picketing the juds Bruce Springsteen and Disney on ice.

So if that's what you'd like to be doing. So, Westborough's a.

Kansas based church that the Southern Law Poverty Center describes as a family based cult and arguably the most obnoxious and rabid hate group in America. And even so, they are socially conservative Christian like right vibes.

They are not patriots.

They're on the compound as an upside down American flag.

They've stomped on the flag.

So yeah, they hate everyone, not just liberals, like they went after Ronald Reagan. They don't give a fuck, they really don't. They believe that God is unforgiving, a vengeful God poised to destroy a nation of sinners. He began his anti gay demonstrations around nineteen ninety one after one of his grandsons was propositioned at Topeka Gauge Park. But like that sounds gay as fuck. Of course there's some propositioning happening. I don't know, like Gauge, I don't know.

That one of the most horrific crimes in the nation.

I would say they started protesting at the funerals of public figures. Children I'm like killed in bus accidents, soldiers killed in war. One time, they were planning on protesting at a nine year old's funeral of Christina Green, and she was one of the victims. Do you remember the shooting in Tucson. It was outside of a supermarket where six people died. Another thirteen were wounded, including US Congresswoman Gabrielle Gifford's. So they wanted to go protest at this

That was so horrific. And now it's like.

That was just somebody just walked into a schoolhouse and killed a bunch of kids. I don't remember this Amish kids. Yeah, my god, but they.

Did the same thing, like they didn't pick it for one hour of airtime on a talk show. Shirley Phelps Roper, she's actually the daughter and she's in charge of the cult today. She was on Hannity and Colmes on Fox News on October third, two thousand and six, and she said they did deserve to die about the Amish girls. Thank you Fox News for giving her a platform. Yeah,

How fuck what the fuck? They've always just been twisted? Mm hm.

You would have someone on talking about how these like young girls desert to die.

It's like sick to me, it's really sick.

So yeah.

And then after all of that, the dozens of like dozens of states and for the federal government passed laws to create buffer areas near the sites of funerals, so they kind of like help legislation to leave people alone.

It was just to like.

Create a storm.

The Southern Poverty Law Center states that the church claims to have picketed more than forty thousand times since they started in June nineteen ninety one. Other reports had like fifty three thousand. But this is just like off of their word and they're truly unhinged. Reportedly, they picketed a local restaurant in Topeka, Kansas every day for three years because its owner knowingly and Lloyd a lesbian.

It's so fucked up.

In twenty eleven, Shirley Philips Roper, the churches spokeswoman, said to NPR that the members want to punish Americans for tolerating homosexuality. They pick at funerals to make people angry, to reject God and be condemned to hell. So they're like twisted, like they don't want to save people like what we're used to Christians doing. She continues in quotes, We're supposed to blind their eyes, stop up their ears, and harden their hearts so they cannot see, hear, or

Was said was, oh, look, two wars died in one week.

So like that's how she was raised, Like that's the language, and that's how she learned about life. And yeah, like they just knew nothing else, but like that's how everything was talked about.

They were celebrating that people were in hell.

Yeah, and Megan was asked one time on Reality Check with John Avlon, extremist beat on CNN, if there was ever any questioning in the house or discussions if this was the best way to go about life, and she

They don't pretend. Yeah, they're just like I'll pray for you, like, but they don't, you know, wish you damnation Like these people seem to celebrate in people's internal damnation. Yeah.

And they had a huge win in March of twenty eleven in the Supreme Court, where the First Amendment protected their right to hold antigay.

Protests outside the military funerals.

So even with all the funerals they were protesting and the attention that they received, and this like huge victory in the Supreme Court. You would think this is like a giant enterprise. But the church only had one hundred members. There were only one hundred members of this church because they're too extreme. They're too extreme to be big, I know. And and it's all from the family of one man. Like it's mostly all family members or distant families, so

She said.

They were also careful to never ever use their personal beliefs, like all the signs said God hates and you know, it was all about God's standards and his standards of living and had nothing to do with them.

So it wasn't like we hate it, We're just like God hates this.

She was appointed to running the Westboro Twitter account and that's when she began questioning the church's hateful teaching. So that was in two thousand and nine, and so then people started asking questions and digging into her theology via Twitter. This is like an actual good thing that happened with Twitter,

She actually met her now husband on.

Twitter and he was one of the people tweeting with her to help like change her opinions. And she said she was like really shocked because.

I can't believe Twitter changed somebody's opinion. I know, Like I can't believe it happened.

I know, and like it was just cool because she said obviously, like there was so much like fuck you, fuck you.

Yeah, she was.

Really shocked because but she was used to that because it's us versus the world. And then what shocked her was like the empathy she received from people and people actually questioning her and being kind and like and her.

Husband was one of those guys.

So she left the church in twenty twelve with her sister Grace, and they flee to South Dakota. You know, like, girl, there's a lot of better states to go to. I'm being so mean to these states in.

This Yeah, you did say something mean about Arizona before, and I do want to say that when we were at Tempe, Arizona doing a live show, you really enjoyed the hotel there.

I remember, I always have a good time in Arizona.

I do a joke about this, but like republic Republicans who can't afford a boat is embarrassing to me, like to be landlocked Republicans and they're all swingers. I don't know, Like I just do funny jokes about Arizona. It's fine, yeah, yeah, yeah. But South Dakota truly like no comics go, check schedules, no comics go, and no musicians, no one.

They don't have anything out.

I don't even know if they have an art museum outside of the Mount Rushmore, which is like a disgusting thing, you know, like if you have fun things to do in South Dakota, let me know.

My sister went with, you know once.

So the next month, like after her and her sister Grace left, was the Sandy Hook massacre and Westboro announced it would protest the memorials, and she said she remembers feeling relief like not having to be there, and then she felt distressed over the amount of time she had

And like.

The Biela movement and just like being someone that felt like, why wasn't I taught this in school? And then a friend of mine tweeted, like you knew you were being taught the truth and you didn't go look for it, And I just remember being like, yeah, I guess I never searched for the truth, and I never educated myself more on like civil rights and black history in America and like not knowing these things.

So sometimes we can blame school systems or what.

We're given, or the media or anything, but we have to remember, like if you're not looking for the truth or trying to expand your mind, that you can be stuck in some regressive, bad things and to just like always be on the lookout to change your mind.

Yeah, and that's bad.

So hopefully, I mean they were a group with a lot of notoriety, So hopefully you guys learned something new or learned deeper shit about these people.

But if not, I hope you hate South Dakota. I don't know what to tell you. Ah, And we have gad she got out. I really did like that article talking to her, like it was like there's possibilities. Sometimes you just think some of these people are beyond hope and like there is possibility of like getting them out.

So yeah, it's just like hurts my heart knowing like her mom and aunts and these people that raised her are just like fuck her bye, You're dead to me now. And there's interviews with the mom there's like them like prota and she like they just don't give a fuck about the people that leave.

Yeah. All right, Well we've got a great interview that's going to cleanse this palette perfectly, So don't go anywhere, Okay. Our guest today is an actor who's been a fixture on your TV for over thirty years. You know him for his roles in Spin City. R Less China Beach and The Good Fight But Today and many other episodes of SVU, you know him as the snappy defense attorney Dave. Sever guys, enjoy our conversation that we enjoyed so much with the amazing Michael Bowtman.

Congrats on such an amazing career.

Oh, thank you so much, thank you.

I feel like you've killed it or what you know.

That's a great question. I have to say. I'm one of those people that surprise surprise. I'm an actor. I'm a little neurotic. I'm a little not paranoid necessarily, but I'm definitely always sort of looking for the next, you know, the next hill to climb, if you will.

You know.

So every once in a while when someone comes up to me and says, as this is what happened to me just last night. I watched your show all the way from kindergarten to and this is an adult person talking to me, and she was talking about China Beach, which was a show I was on at the very beginning of my career in nineteen eighty eight. And this is like an industry professional person who's an adult with kids, and I was just like, wow, really, I still feel

You know, I mean, so, wait, where do people recognize you the most from when they approach you?

Oh?

You know what.

As time goes on, it changes. Of course, when China Beach was on, it was that. When SPA, when Spin City was on, it was that a lot. That was the biggest one for a long time because I had a larger audience and it was on for six seasons. But then I was also on a show called Arlists at the same time, and so, but that was a more specific audience.

It was guys, how did you do that?

At the same time, I.

Had an unbelievable agent, Bob Gersh, thank you very much, who just sort of juggled it in a way that made it kind of and he was really smart because what happened was they actually shot it two separate times of the year. So spin City shot from the fall and to the spring, and then Arlest shot over the summer months. So that was because initially they were they weren't sure they would be able to make it work.

And you're like, oh, well, that makes sense.

So it's just a really great piece of agenting work and good fortune on my part.

Wait, but for China Beach that did you meet Neil Bear? And did that have anything to do with SVU?

No? You know what's crazy?

And all I want to say, maybe I think I might have spoken to Neil once in all of these years, like on the phone, Like maybe at the very beginning when I started SVU back in Oh god, you know.

You started around three.

That well that makes sense.

Yeah, And I feel like maybe he maybe he sent a message or I I just remember some distant conversation with him. And then every time I was on the show, I'd go, where's Neil Bear? Where's Neil Bear?

Never?

And I never I haven't laid eyes on the guys.

Crazy.

It's crazy, it really is. I'm like you know, I got this great job. I love this. I just started up again on the new the new old Law and Order. Yeah, you know, playing the same character. And it's you know, it's like, thank you Neil Bear. You know, I've never been able to speak to him. Every episode I watch, I go it's the straight craziest thing in.

Our podcast a couple of times. And maybe if he comes back on, we'll be like, Michael Bowman wants to talk to you.

Please get us, get us together.

And you know what, both those shows, well, all of those shows, all of the Dick Wolf shows, there's such a sort of a big They're just all part of such a huge machine. It's sort of hard to just like pin down one moving part of it just because you happen to be on the set, you know what I mean.

There's so much going on so well.

So if it wasn't through Neil bhar how did your Dick Wolf journey begin? How did you start in the Dick Wolf universe?

So I got a call, Wow, that's such a great question. I did I did? I think it was Law and Order first. So spin City ended in two thousand, Arlest ended in two thousand and one, so around that time. Actually, while we were still while Spin City was still happening, they started this convention on SVU where they wanted sort of a recurring stable of defense attorneys. So Barry Bostwick I think, was the first of us on spin City

You know that that you can sort.

Of become I mean, yeah, a recurring character, but over I mean literally now almost decades.

Yeah, you know, I think I think he's so memorable too. You were really funny, You're the funniest defensive Maybe Susie Esmond too, But like, as far as all the attorneys, you really have all the fun You're like kind of sassy.

Like I've never been called sassy, and really I love it.

I kind of love it.

I wrote.

I wrote funny, sassy, honest, self aware, and flirty.

That's what I wrote about David.

You know what, now that I think about it, that all of those have sort of been called for.

It's kind of crazy.

I have defended or prosecuted at one point or another, some actors and actresses that have gone on.

I think I represented Zoe Saldana.

Yeah, not her her dad, but yeah, did you know she would be in billionaire franchise movies?

Of course not. You know, it's like, you know, pretty girl young I think she was.

I don't know how old she was, or in her early twenties maybe, And then I, oh, god, who was the Paula Paula?

Well, that's who you are really flirting with, Paula Patten and wet.

And you know what, I never Wow, you're good.

I never ever saw that episode, and I always wondered if that if that impression came off, because you know, it didn't call for it necessarily in the script. But I'm the kind of actor where you know, if if you give me a little, if you give me a leash, I'll take it.

I'll run with you.

Yeah, you should watch that one because it's a silly episode like Bensony. It's mushrooms on accident and gets high like it's a silly one.

Oh my gosh, yeah, okay, I have to see it. I always wonder and.

Like Paula Patten is very beautiful and it feels like you're not the only man in the episode that is flirting. Oh you know, like pretty much every man that encounters her is like hello.

But that's hilarious.

But in that episode. We actually just cover that episode at one of our live shows that we do, and you have such a funny moment because the actor Dave Crumholtz fires you like you're not in that episode for too too long, because he fires you really quickly, and then you walk out and you go big mistake, and it's like a very pretty woman moment. It's like big mistake, huge, and we love it.

Oh that's funny.

So I literally for our live show. For our live show recently, I literally just took a picture of your face and I super imposed it on Julia Roberts from that scene and pretty woman. Yeah, and I wish I could show it to you right now, but I just don't have any right.

Wait, how is it that? How do you do a live show this way? This is hilarious, but we have power points?

But yeah, we do a power point. So I was like, we were joking about how you had this pretty woman moment, and so I took a photo of your face and I put it on jewel and I don't know how to do photoshop at all, So it's like a very crude square picture of your head just splatter on her. You know, that's.

Hilarious, A pretty woman moment? Oh my god?

How is Oh?

Yeah, go ahead. I was just gonna be like, how's Barry boss Wick?

Love that man, love that man?

Emailed or texted with him, I don't know, back in the summer, just hey, how's it going? And you know he's in La now. He went back to LA with his family and he's he's he's very Bostwick here. You know, the one of the craziest moments of another crazy moment of just synchronicity and weirdness that didn't necessarily happen because of SVU, but It was all while we were both had you know, by now we're sort of both back and forth in a little bit.

I think maybe i'd done it once or twice and Bostwick had done it once. At one point we were where were we We were on a lunch break or something, if I recall, and it was around Halloween. Now we all had a green room on the set of Spin City. We were all, you know, we and most of us ate together.

Mike Fox would come in sometimes and we'd all play ping pong or whatever. Just shoot the shoot the crab, Connie Britton, you know, Jennifer Esposito, just everybody who was on.

I don't know if you know this, but Jennifer Esposito ends up. She ends up with iced tea in Sbu. There they get married, Yeah, they get there, they don't get married. They have a wedding, and then they don't get married. Yeah kidding.

I never saw that. I have to look that up. Oh my god.

But the surreal Bostwick moment. Bosswick would come by. Barry has a scathing sense of humor. I mean he he can just cut you down.

With a look. I mean, he's an enormous, handsome man. He's six foot four, you know, he walks in.

He's one of the only men other than maybe George Clooney or is that I've seen who You walk down the street with Barry Boswick and the women all and some men just sort of they swoon. I mean, he's this impressive guy, so completely completely Coincidentally, we're at lunch one day. Bostwick's nowhere to be seen. He's up being doing Barry Bostwick stuff, being a legend, me, Alan Ruck,

You know, it's so fun, so much fun. Well, we start watching this thing and then something unbelievable happens. The time warp number comes up, we get up, and then Barry Bostwick gets up and we're doing the time warp Brad and watching Brad on the screen. And at that point, I literally thought the universe was going to like swirl down some kind of a drain and we were going to pop into a whole other universe. And it was one of the most surreal, crazy moments of my career.

Know, Yeah, that is so funny.

I think when you work with shows, you work on shows like that, that that. I think it's also a function of being a New York actor.

You work with you know.

The group of people I work with on SVU, you know, it's unbelievable.

You know, everybody wants to be on these shows.

Yeah. So then this was your first episode Abomination, and I know it was like a long time ago and you've done so much, but like, do you have memories of doing this very first episode? Like, you know, you show up on the scene, you immediately start sassing Novak and then you have like you have a you kind of you have a lot of court time in this.

Like, who was the who was I defending?

You were defending the father of the guy who this father saw his son having sex with a man and thought that the man was raping him, so he killed him. The legend.

Wow, wow, that that blows my mind. Yeah I didn't. I didn't actually remember that, but I do remember now as you as you're saying, it's standing there, and it's another one of those moments, Oh my god, it's George Siegel. What am I doing here?

Who?

Yeah, I'm a little goofy kid from Chicago who read you grew up reading comic books, and now I'm here, you.

Know, with George Siegel. And yeah, he couldn't have been sweeter, couldn't have been funnier and more gracious, you know. And it was one of those moments where and I'd experienced this a little on China Beach at that point. Oh no, no, no, Spin City, I'm getting my entire career mixed up. Of course, we you know, had big stars, and but he was. He's an actor. For me. There are wonderful movie stars and television stars, and there are really great actors, you know,

I will forget my own line sometimes in scenes with people. With Christine Baranski on the show I was recently on it. There's been times where I've just been like, boatman, it's your line. Oh, you're so good.

She I would be so distracted. She's just like in my top Like, I love her so much. I don't know how I could focus.

Yeah, well, I'm gonna shift it into a full different thing. I don't know if you know this, but you're in two incest episodes. Yeah, you were in Families and Bombshell. The one was like Twins. It was Rose McGowan and the Hawkeye from Sons of Anarchy.

Oh.

Another one was like a young Man and Jane Seymour was in it. But I was just wondering when you read those episodes or you like, what like, do you remember reading for the first time some of the more kind of wild episodes of SVU and Yeah, I was just wondering if you read them, if you're ever like.

Geez I am, I'm a writer as well.

I love I write horror.

I write sort of dark science fiction, so I'm a horror guy.

I love horror.

But I like monsters, I like frank I like Dracula, I like vampires, serial my.

Husband all this stuff that you like, sexual sadists.

It's it's it was a little too real, you know, for me at that time, and I frankly remember thinking, Oh, that show's never gonna last. Oh no way. Society is not ready to know that people do that stuff. I mean, And now, of course here we are in season eleven hundred or whatever, twenty four.

Yeah.

No, that's so funny because my husband is like you, he's a horror person, and he when he like over watches me see Ansvu, He's like, this is more horrific than anything I watch. He's like, how do you watch this? And I'm like, I don't know. How do you watch like a chainsaw guy kill a bunch of people? I don't know, Like, but you know, it's like, we have different versions of horror.

I guess all of us. It's definitely true.

And in those instances, you know that kind of horror is ridiculous a guy with a chainsaw, or it's a vampire or you know what I mean, there's some part of you that knows. And in my case, for instance, zombies. I love any of the Night of the Living Dead stuff, all of that stuff. This show, though, I literally remember, even before being on the show, watching the first few episodes and just being like, I can't believe this is

We but you touched on something that I actually wanted to talk about about, like the difference between being a guest star and being.

A regular on a show.

Have you had any like guest star horror stories or from that, have you learned how to treat guest stars differently than maybe you would have and kind of whatever you want to talk about that subject.

Uh, you know what, It's interesting there is a strange cast system. As you know, every I've been so fortunate every show that I've been a regular on, everybody's been great, and it's extended to it's sort of goodwill or now I guess they would call it sort of paying it forward.

Wow. You guys were so nice to me. You guys couldn't have been sweeter. I felt you made me feel comfortable.

That hearing that always makes me feel great because it's how, yeah, it's how I would want to be treated. And the folks on SPU were always Chris Maloney immediately, because I was a little I was a little afraid of him

Well that's good because we hear Maloney can be a little stand offish, so I think maybe he liked you from stuff he'd seen you in, so you got the good treatment. Well, I was going to ask you before because you were talking about like being on these all these different sets for law and Order and stuff, but like you hadn't really been on you hadn't been on it for a while, and then now you're back on original recipe The Rebooths season twenty two. How does it

Had been so long that I was surprised they wanted me to come back as the same character. I thought, maybe, oh, maybe it's a chance to kind of No. When I got there, they had I think it had been nine years or maybe more between my last appearance and this recent.

He'sn't eleven is wet and bombshell. So yeah, ten years.

Oh my god. They had all my old suits, which was hilarious, and they really.

Hope you haven't gained any weight at all.

Well yeah, unfortunately, Well some of them listen.

I'm one of those people who my weight goes up and down depending on my mood. Yeah, and so, but now I couldn't fit anything. So I did a very extensive fitting, which is always encouraging for an actor because you go, oh, okay, maybe they'll have me back.

Also, styles have changed in ten years. I can't just throw you back in those old suits come up.

Oh absolutely as great as great and timeless as this show is and the Mothership, and yeah, you look at some of those old episodes, you know, Chris Chris Note in those suits, You're like, oh, wow, wow, that lapel is really and I'm not even a fashion guy, but yeah, yeah, yeah, it actually can get a little uncomfortable, like what is Wow, those are bad suits, I mean bad timing wise.

Right, I'm sure they were top quality at the time for sure.

Sure. Yeah, they do have good costume people. So I mean they just had you on season whatever it is, twenty two of Long Order, the reboot. I mean that that means to me that the SVU door is always open. They can have you back any day.

Yeah, and I'm ready for it. There I am, baby, I am. I love it.

And your character was never mean to the victims, because that's why like Barry Bosswick, you know, he's on the edge of likability.

Unfortunately, Oliver Gates is.

Not always that mind and some like bully these victims and you're got yeah, like the do you think, yeah Oliver Gates, Right, yeah, he's not one of he's not the worst, like he's.

Got high I mean, I think people pay money for for Dave sever but people pay like huge bucks for Oliver Gates, and so he has like, yeah, he's unscrupulous, you know, he'll he'll just go after whoever.

Do you watch a lot of stuff you're in.

No, not not typically, not that I I'm really critical of myself, but not in a bad way. I just go, ah, you could have done that better. All that worked out pretty well. I mean, so typically I don't watch if anyone's around when people are, you know, because it's you know, it's a different experience. I mean, I'm watching it for tips of how to do something better, you know what i mean, and they're watching it sort of like like I was with Barry Bostwick.

It's very Bostwick and that's very Bostwick at the same time.

Yeah, so yeah, I mean, but like I said, I haven't seen a lot of things, and even even my last show, The Good Fight, I just I didn't.

It's not that, you know what it is. I'm also I I'm obsessed by YouTube.

YouTube. YouTube blows. YouTube is Mankind's greatest invention. If I'm looking at a screen these days, I'm looking look at something on YouTube. I'm learning how to do something. And you know I'm a UFO person. I must Yes, I got.

In UFO footage. That's where it is.

Get that beautiful flying saucer footage.

So no, I just today this morning, one of my kids, you're a dad. One of my kids locked the door to the bathroom and then shut it. So and I didn't know how to open it. And I youtubed a solution. Within two seconds, I had it back open. So something was really helpful.

It really is, it really is.

So I guess I say all that to say I don't watch a lot of scripted content. Uh, and I'm going to say something weird. Does anyone ever tell you that you you look like Sarah Steele?

I wrote that on one of the questions I go, I get told I look like Sarah Steele?

What do you feel since you.

Were wait, who is that?

She was the little girl in uh spanglish? But she was in the Good Fight.

Yeah, she's a fantastic, fantastical Google you could be fan.

Of her because she was an episod of girls and.

To like this girl.

Yeah, when when when you guys first popped on remember at the beginning of this in this meeting, when and I just heard your voices when you popped on. At first I thought I was being punked. I was like, Sarah, really, but yeah, you guys you you you you might have You're like a secret twin out there.

Yeah.

Yeah, I love her that when someone said that, because sometimes when people say you look clicks or whatever, you never know what's going to come out of their mouth. And when I heard that, I go love that. I'll take that, thank you very much.

I've had as actually from SVU. Someone came up to me once and said, hey, you're the lawyer on SVU and I said, one of them Tuba get in June. You're right, No, no, uh, hey you're the lawyer from SVU. Yeah, I'm one of them for sure. Hoody from Hoody in the Blowfish, I love your music, man, I swear to god.

People are wild. They think Hoody was in a.

S v you God, Hey, you know, I don't know what to tell you. I've had people.

I've had people come up to me and request a song. Come on, say just a little, one little, just a snatch of song for my daughter. Dude, I'm not I'm.

Not that so funny, Oh my god.

And that they have appeared on svu huh and.

If it was the guy from Hoody and the Blowfish, like, why would you want to sing to you right now?

Of course?

Are you? Are you back in New York still? Do you still? Do you work out of New York?

Oh? Yeah, yeah I live here. I live in New York. I love it.

Yeah, guys, I would come back anytime. This has been so much fun.

Yeah no, I feel like we had like twenty thousand more questions to ask you, but because yourself so many stories, No, this was incredible.

Yeah, anytime.

Look, you know I love doing I love I love the show, and I love doing this.

So I'm thank you for inviting me.

Yeah.

Cool to see someone so talented and great just like work for so long and enjoy their work.

So thank you so much for doing it. If you will have you back on with Diane, we'll do like a fireside chat all of us.

Why. I would love that. I would love that. I love that woman.

We will definitely tell Center your regards. Oh yeah, do you want to plug anything coming up? Or I don't know if that movie is like still under wraps, but do you have anything now that people should check out?

I you know what I've got I've got a short story that I just that was just sold to it and I'm trying to sort of plug my writing work a lot these days because people are reading, but they're reading online. It's sort of Yeah, there's an anthology of short stories called Dominion Stories from the African Diaspora and it's science fiction, fantasy and horror stories from from African American and African and Afro Caribbean actors all over the world.

Oh cool, we'll put a link to it in our show notes.

Also awesome, thank you very much.

Yeah, my cousin writes a lot of shorts and horror shorts and stuff, and like, I know how hard that is, like getting that stuff published.

I'm actually on my way to work on one now because I got invited to join another anthology of end of the World story.

So you know, zombie's here Armageddon baby. Oh yeah, what a guy. He did that from a library. His power went out. I would have still was like, gotta do this podcast. We both would have canceled. I would have been like, I don't know what to tell you. My powers out, and he was like, I'll be at the public library talking about SVU. What a great guy. But I mean that's why he's had such an amazing career.

I think he shows up. I don't think, you know. I think he shows up. He works hard, and he cares, you know, the opposite of Gerad.

Yes, he shows up and he shows out. I mean his sassy confrontations with Casey Novak on her bike. I'll never forget it.

Yeah, I just am obsessed with him. I'd like to be invited to Thanksgiving at the Boatman House.

They really would. I think that's what I'd like to do.

Lots of kids running around, That's not.

Why, but I think it would be a good time.

Well, this episode, obviously is It sucks that it's so old, and I feel like a lot of it still holds up today, with like people that still you know, Yeah, what is the rule? Gave funerals and stuff like that, what's the rule?

Like it takes two generations to change anything or something?

Yeah, I don't even know.

I might have fully made that up, but it's wild that things are the same. I mean, same with the Nazi episodes in the early seasons, like we're true. No, we've digressed as a society. You like, I don't, I don't know what happened. We've truly went backwards. It used to be like chill, like now people like we might have talked about this, but now people get so mad at any black show and it's like no one would

Yeah, Like there used to just be shows and.

Everything, and now they're like fuck Abbot elementary or.

What yeah, or Blackish Blackish black people. It got under people's skin, you know, or insecure, Like it's like oh great, all of that. It's like it's gone backwards and people are just so angry at nothing and are so regressive and like, I don't know, I don't get it. I really don't.

Yeah. I feel so sad for the main character Ian in this movie. I mean in this episode that you just like are struggling with your own identity and then your father has made it his life's work to prove that like you're a like you're an abomination and that you need to be like fixed.

You know, and that the dead knute But thenk got he got one on his dad, like fuck his dad. Yeah, wait, abominating? Why is the abominable snowman? Is that because of abomination or those are just two separate words.

I think abominable means Yeah, I don't know why that is in reference to a snowman.

Yeah, I don't know.

Casey is looking at Casey? Are you looking it up? But back to Globes Talk and another thing. And it's one of the top podcasts too, But like, I will never watch Yellowstone.

What it's one of the top TV shows. You said podcasts?

Well, yeah, though the podcast of the rewatch is number one. It's the number one show in the nation. Yeah, everyone's obsessed, Like the recap show is number one on all the charts imber speaking.

Sorry my bad, No, that's crazy. I didn't know there was a Yellowstone podcast. What the fuck you know there is? There's a Yellowstone universe, yeah, like they're doing prequels and all this stuff. Oh yeah, because I I think an original Yellowstone takes place like now in Montana. I might be wrong, am I right? Casey? Do you know anyway? I think it just takes place like now in Montana, and then some of the spinoffs are like, Okay, this is twenty years earlier with the same family or whatever.

I will not watch it.

You're not wikipediaing, you're not finding out.

There's like one girl I really follow on Instagram and she just got really into it and she's like, oh my, and I'm like, maybe I'll have that, like, but I don't. It feels so like something my parents would watch and that I would never watch. Yeah, I'm happy for Kevin Costner. I've always been a fan Our family Message in a Bottle. I remember watching that in the theater.

Have you ever watched the movie with Kevin Kostner and Dane Cook called Mister Brooks. It's one of the worst movies I've ever seen in my entire life. Watched it and was Virginia and Jared's parents' basement, and we were both like, this movie is so bad because it was when people were like, yeah, Dane Cook's a movie star and you're like, I don't know, like and it does not.

No, they really pushed him. He couldn't do movies. He got a couple and it didn't work. Your hair looks cute like that? Oh, thanks around.

I never do that. It was my jam when I was like a kid, I would always tell my babysitters, can you put my hair some hair up, some hair down?

It's cute.

My babysitters brushed my hair too, so cute.

Yeah.

Yeah, I brushed Rosie's hair every morning and it's a nightmare.

Well, but she has curly hair.

Do you You're not supposed to brush curly hair without it, like, unless it's wet.

Yeah, I wet it with like Leavin conditioner.

Is it the bottles with an octopus on it? Is it like a no body wash?

That's her body, that's her, that's her bubble, that's Osky shampoo. But no, Rosie, I got special curly hair shampoo. I'm starting or early. I'm like, you get different shampoo from Oscar like even though he's got curly hair too. But it's not quite the problem that rehearses yet. So they have kid curls yeah, and there's not a haircut in sight. By the way, she's not interested in a haircut at all.

I watched a viral video of a dad taking his little son who had long hair, in for a haircut and then surprised the mom with the haircut, and the mom was like happy to see the kid. But I was like, that's like fucked up. I thought it was fucked up.

Why to cut your kid's hair like the first haircut? Oh, without the mom? Yeah, that is weird. That is really weird.

I just the Internet's ruined everything, Like I don't believe anything anymore. Like I watched a horrific video where the dad is on speakerphone talking to a kid, screaming at the kid, and the mom is just videotaping it, and it's the dad being pissed because the mom filed for child support, and the dad's telling the kid, well, then I'm picking you up anymore.

Fuck that.

Talk to your mom.

If I'm paying child support, You're never gonna see me again, never again. I'm never picking you up. You're not coming here. She wants money, then that's what you get, and like screaming at this kid. The kid got on the internet, right, the kid is hysterically crying. I mean it's blurred to face and the mom is just taping it. Maybe it's for court, she's taping it. Yeah, why are you putting it online? Like yeah, what? But also that dad has

Yeah, oh well, I'll definitely be taking my children for their first haircup, but I'm gonna leave Oscars for a long time. Jared's against having him have long hair, and I'm like, why is he against it? I don't know. He's like, I don't know if I really want him to like go super long, and I go, we're not cutting his hair until he's at least three, so get on board.

Like yeah, it's cute and.

He has like curly hair already, and I just can't wait to see what happens if it turns into like a big puffball, Like I can't wait to see it.

He might have a jo fro.

Yeah, I'm excited. And it's blonde. How weird, how weird. It's gonna look crazy.

I'm really excited. Okay, we can't keep talking about this. I did get really sad with the child supports stuff, but.

Well, this actually kind of goes into our what would sister pow go right into it?

My big thing.

I just want to say, like, yeah, I don't have kids if you don't.

Want to take care of them, Like, don't.

I don't know how that's such a hard concept for people, Like just don't do it. I don't, it's so easy not to do it. I don't understand why you would ever do.

That if you didn't want to do it, right, that kid is fucked forever. What a sad sad I would never let that see the light of day on the internet if I had to get it for court or something. I get that, but like, yeah, that would not see the light of day. Like you think it's a punishment to pay for your kid to do what is happening?

I don't know.

Yeah, get your kid to eat. It's not even for your kid to like do activity, it's like for your kid to eat and have clothes. Anyway, this week's what was Sister peg Dow? Yeah, this is the week are what was Sister peg Dow? Which you know is our weekly segment where we point you to an article, organization, maybe another podcast episode, something to help you, you know, kind of inform what we talked about on today's episode.

It's a mountains.

Oh okay, okay, so I wasn't totally crazy.

And then abominable is the adjective version of abomination.

Wow, but how.

I guess it's abominable because it's so huge that it's like, again, it's not the same size as a normal snowman. You know, it's abominable, Like, oh, abomination means huge. No, abomination means you're like against the norm or you're you're out of the norm.

Oh yeah, you know he lives in a cave. Yeah yeah.

Abominable is like causing moral revulsion. Yeah, it's like causing discuss, causing discuss. It's not necessarily size, but it's like causing fear and unpleasant Wow.

Okay, see first time speaking on the pod.

So that's why he's abominable because he causes revulsion because he's so huge with his big snowman claws and everything. Yeah.

But in the movie Monsters, Inc.

He's cute, you know, So I forgot that he's supposed to be a bad guy. Like all of my references, he's a cutie. He's a cutie trying to chill out.

I remember it from like a clay Nation stop motion Christmas thing.

Yeah, but he also wasn't that evil in that right? Like he has a big part.

Yeah, probably so does the Grinch, you know, everybody in the end.

Next week obviously another episode will Never Stop. Real Fake News, Season eighteen, Episode seventeen, Join us and and you know peacock Hulu.

That's it.

I don't know the six internationals. We're obsessed with all of you. We're so lucky we get to do this. And I hope your January has been going good and you haven't put too much pressure on yourselves.

Yeah, because you know what, we've decided that February is the new January. So if this month sucked, fucking throw it away, because February is where we start over. See you next week.

That's Messed Up as an Exactly Right production.

If you have compliments you'd like to give us or episodes you'd like us to cover, shoot us an email it That's Messed uppod at gmail dot com.

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As always, please see our show notes for sources and more information. Thank you so much to our producer Casey O Brah and to our mixer John Bradley and our guest booker Patrick Cottner, and to Henry Kaperski for our theme song, and Carly Geen Andrews for our artwork. Thank you to our executive producers Georgia Hardstar, Karen Kilgarriff, Daniel Kramer, and everybody at Exactly Right Media. Dun Dun