Rosemary's Baby with Jessica Harper

Jamie Loftus and Caitlin Durante invite special guest Jessica Harper to join their really nice and peaceful coven, whose main objective is to unpack the movie Rosemary's Baby.

(This episode contains spoilers)

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
On the bel cast, the questions asked if movies have
women in them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands,
or do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef invest start
changing it with the beck Del cast. Lay better than

(00:23):
I so like a cat that sounds sick. Hello and
welcome to the back dol cast. La La la that's scary.
That's pretty creepy. Maybe too young. It sounded like a baby.
Oh well, I'll speaking of babies. That's relevant. Hey, good transitioningway.
This is the Bechtel Cast. My aunt Jamie Loftus, my

(00:45):
name is Caitlin Darante, and this is the Becktel cast.
La La la La La La La la La. We're
talking about La La Land. Just kidding out. I'm not
ready to talk about Lalla. I will never be ready
to talk about La La Land. Not today. The movie
we are talking about the is Rosemary's Baby, and we'll
jump into that in in a moment. Before that, we'll
just give you a quick overview what the show is.

(01:07):
We talk about the portrayal and representation and treatment of
women in movies. We use the Bechtel test as a
jumping off point to initiate that larger conversation, and the
Becktel test is, of course, a media metric created by
cartoonist Alison Bechtel that requires that two female identifying characters,

(01:31):
they must have names, they must speak to each other
in the story that they're in, and that conversation cannot
be about men. Right then for us, it's just like
a two line exchange. Let's let's demonstrate it, alrighty, Hey, Caitlin,
Hey Jamie, how did you really feel about the La
la laws that I was serving? I felt that, um,

(01:52):
I have some notes, Okay, Okay, I'm ready to receive um.
I think it just like keep practicing and you'll see improvement. Okay,
that makes sense. Yes, that was a really compelling I
think that's maybe our most compelling. Like there was some
tension because I'm not good at receiving criticism. There was
a lot going on. Sure, it was a very rich conversation.

(02:15):
It was good. It was good at this. Okay, Rosemary's Baby,
we should introduce our our guests before we go any further,
and asked me too. She is an actor. You know
her from many films, including both Suspiria films as well
as My Favorite Year, and she has a new podcast. Um,

(02:35):
it's a ten episode memoir of her childhood called Winnetta.
It is Jessica Harper. Thank you so much for being here,
so much for having me. Of course, we're so happy
to have you. And we're talking about Rosemary's Baby. So

(02:55):
tell us your your history, your relationship with this movie.
I first saw it, I think when it came out,
which was, oh my gosh, this dates me. I was
a fully grown person, and I was trying to remember

(03:16):
yesterday how did I react and my reaction to it now,
of course having rewatched it yesterday, which was so much fun,
But my reaction to it, I believe was so different
to what it was because in sixty eight, prefeminism, you'd
have a very different take on this movie. So, um,

(03:37):
in sixty eight when I first saw it, I was
just simply horrified, and yesterday I was horrified. With a
whole lot of interesting side notes, which I'm sure we'll
get into indeed, But um, it's a fabulous movie. It
is a well crafted, really well crafted, so well written.

(03:59):
The direct is incredible, even though there are some people
who might not like the director anymore. Well, you will
talk about that as well. Pretty some strong cases. Yeah,
my history is I saw it for the first time
in college as a as a young film buff, and
so that was probably around fourteen years ago, and I

(04:23):
think I only saw it that once before revisiting it
for the podcast. But I remember thinking, I remember really
liking it because as far as horror films go, I
not such a huge fan of slashers, but I love
anything that has to do with the occult and like
kind of like satanic stuff. I don't know why I
never revisited it, but yeah, I just I really enjoyed it,

(04:47):
but it was just that one time that I had
seen it. What about You, Jamie, I had not seen
this movie before. It's and it's like one of those
movies that has been you know, recommended to this show
and to me specifically for years. But I think it's
just I think by the time I was aware of
this movie, I was also aware of all the Polanski stuff,

(05:08):
and I kind of avoided it for that reason, which
is like, I mean, it's so it's so weird because
going into this movie, I was almost like, I kind
of hope I don't like it, because then it will
be a lot easier to have the I mean, it's
always easy to have an art artist discussion if you
don't like the art anyways, and you're like, oh, well
it sucks and he and he sucks. Usually he uh sucks,

(05:31):
and so put it all in the trash. But it
was like, I mean, this was like a challenging watch
in a lot of ways because I did there's a
lot about this movie to love it. I had been
avoiding it because I was aware of all of the
allegations before, and so I just I don't know. I mean,
I just try to navigate around. There's a million movies
you can watch anything. But yeah, I enjoyed it, and

(05:55):
I feel and I feel weird. I know, I have
such complicated feelings. Usually, like before we even start the episode,
I have a fairly good idea of like what nipple
rating I'm going to give it, I have no idea,
Like I think it's going to take, like whatever discussion
we have to, we're going to have to We're going
to have to dig really deep because I just I
feel very conflicted and challenged by this movie. And this

(06:18):
is a yeah, and it's aligning, and Jessica, you were
starting to get at it. I think that there's like,
so much context to this movie that's important to how
you interpret it. And it's like, I can't imagine seeing
this movie ten years ago. Like I it's yeah, because
when I talked for the first time, if anyone was
talking about Roman Plansky and his horrific crimes, I wasn't

(06:42):
aware of it. I didn't really know. It was years
later until I started hearing things about that. So what
year was that? That was much much later. I was
just going to say the Sharon Tate murders and all
was here. It's the year after the murders. Okay, so
the big sympathy for Roman hadn't really kicked in yet

(07:02):
when this came out. If you know what I mean,
right right, there was a whole big, poor Roman era,
right right, which when morphed into something entirely new, much lighter. Yeah. Yeah,
Tape murders were in nineteen sixty nine, and then like
his allegations start I think in the late seventies. That

(07:24):
sounds right, and then he is still technically I don't
know what the word is for what he's He can't
come back to this country without getting or arrested because
he admitted that he committed and we'll talk about somewhere.
There's so much okay, so with how much further too,
I'll get through the recap as quickly as possible. Feel

(07:46):
free away in at any point in the recap because
this movie is crazy. It's crazy, and it's long. Um okay.
So we are introduced to a married couple. Rosemary that's me,
a Pharaoh's character, and guy that's John Cassavetti. Jo hot,
so hot, My god, it's upsetting. I mainly learned about

(08:09):
him a bitch. It's like, how long did it? Okay,
we'll get it. How long did it take him to
sell that first baby to the Like twenty seconds? He
was like so fast? Yeah, okay, we're getting ahead of ourselves.
I mainly knew about John Cassavetti's through like film school,
like textbook stuff and and all of his directorial work.

(08:31):
And then I was like, wait, no one told me
he was hot. Unfortunately, he is hot, so hot. Okay.
So they're looking for an apartment together to move into
in New York City. Ever heard of it. They're looking
at this one giant apartment. I don't know how they
end up affording it because he is a struggling actor
and she is a homemaker, Like, who can live in

(08:53):
it's the Dakota, which is overlooking. Yeah, so's this like
enormous apartment icon they can afford it somehow, Even before
they get mixed up with you. There was a little
suspension of disbelief there. Maybe just rent on haunted apartments
is really low. Maybe. So one of the first things

(09:15):
I noticed about this apartment is that there is a
closet that's blocked by a large piece of furniture, and
that will become important later, believe it or not. And
Rosemary notices too. Yes, she's she's so active in the movie.
I was always I was so ready to be like plankey,
she's so yeah. So then a friend of There's Hutch

(09:36):
tells them that this building that they're moving into, called
the Bramford, had a bunch of weird shit happened in it.
There were sisters who cooked and eight children. There was
a guy who practiced witchcraft and who have claimed to
have conjured up the devil there. So they're like, whatever,
we'll move in anyway, happens every time you move somewhere.
It's like there's every every place has its statue, everybody

(09:59):
has some child eaters in it. So they move in
and then Rosemary meets one of her neighbors, Terry, and
one night, poor Terry Terry Y. Yeah, they have this
great spoiler alert Bechtel test passing huge in the laundry room.
Even if it was about doing laundry, let's not forget

(10:23):
that still domestic overte Y Terry. It was I was
in the middle. I was like googling stuff in real
time as I was watching, and I was like in
the middle of looking up Terry and then can you
find out what happens to Terry? And the person that
Rosemary mistakes her for actress and model? Name was it Vicky?

(10:48):
It was some anyway, that's actually who plays that character.
Oh that's funny. I forget the name. So this isn't
a good story. But she's like, hey, aren't you like, oh,
thank you super producer Sophie. She's like, aren't you Victoria
Vettry And she's like, no, I'm not. But guess what
Victoria Victory plays that part. There's so many little credited
as a different a different name. But anyway, A fun

(11:08):
fact about that is that I was like when I
saw her in the game, I was like oh, I
recognize her from something. She was a playmate Model of
the Year under a different name, um, the year this
movie came out, which like a lot of playmates would
do back in the day, is like use different names, um.
But she was Angela Dorian, same lady right on wild Okay,

(11:30):
r I p Terry do all kinds of snaky references
and yeah, tell me about it, um. And then so
after they've moved in, Rosemary and Guy here some like
strange chanting coming from next door. And then a short
time later, Terry commits suicide by jumping out of a window.

(11:51):
And she had said, oh, I live with this older couple,
the Cast of Vets, which is confusing because John cast
sa Vettius is in this movie and their name is
the cast of it. Anyway, She's like, yeah, they were
a family to me. They brought me in. And then
she commits suicide. So something is amiss here. And then
they meet this couple Roman, and she commenced, he said,
we don't really know what happened. We don't know. We

(12:12):
never we have her suspicions, though, suicide not being one
of them. And she has this necklace with a charm
on it stace stinky necklace. I love the detail that
the necklace stunk. Yeah, especially when that receptionist at the
end is just like, yeah, everyone in this office smells crazy,

(12:33):
like you're just like So then they meet Roman in
Many cast of It and can I just entergect One thing?
So in this little babble, this jewel that's hanging around
her neck. Inside it is a route called Tannis Root. Yes,
which is very important because later Rosemary holds this thing
up to the mirror and she says, Tannis anyone, which

(12:56):
is one of my favorite lines in the movie. She
she talks to herself a lot in this movie. I
know I'll either her, It's either her Minny and I
mean I'd pick me over many. Who can she trust?
She can't trust anyone, but I mean Ruth Gordon and
she's so great. Yes. So um, they made the Neighbors

(13:17):
and Rosemary and Guy go over to dinner at the
cast of Vettes and Guy is like reluctant at first,
but then they start hanging out with them more and
more and the castavettes are getting a little clingy. Meanwhile,
Guy is like, Rosemary, let's have a baby, and then
she's very excited because she wanted that, and then she's

(13:38):
about apparently, yeah, it seems to be her one the
whole thing. I was like, we don't know a lot
about her. I don't know to be a mother so interesting.
Why is that? Maybe because it was written by men. Yeah,
in nineteen sixty six, by the way, right now, So
the more time they spend with the cast of vettes,

(13:59):
the more weird things are happening. Like guy who is
an actor and who was up for a part gets
it because the other guy who was up for that
part suddenly goes blind. And then many brings over this
dessert which she calls chocolate mouse, which is just moose,
and it makes Rosemary all loozy and she notices this

(14:20):
like chalky undertaste, and then she eats a little bit
but not all of it, but then she passes out anyway,
presumably from having eaten this. And then there's this dreamlike
sequence in which she is surrounded by naked people who
are chanting and that she they're tying her to a bed,
and her husband guy or is there, and the cast

(14:42):
of vettes are there and they're all participating in what
seems like some sort of demonic ritual. They're nude, but
they're also talking to each other. It's like it was
like is this chill or not? Like I know it's
not chill, but they were all just like standing in
the nude, like, hey, is she awake? And then it's
very casual, very chill, and then a demon looking guy

(15:08):
rapes Rosemary. Yes, and then she wakes up. She's covered
in scratches, and then Guy is like, like, I happen
to watch the scene like four or five times. It
is we have to. We will spend a lot of
time in packing this scene, I'm sure. But basically he's like,
I had sex with you last night while you were sleeping.
I didn't want to miss baby night. And she was

(15:30):
like oh and then no problem. Marital rape is legal
in New York. Okay, yeah, so yeah, well we'll spend
a lot of time on packing that um. And then
Rosemary goes to a doctor, doctor Hill, and finds out

(15:51):
that she's pregnant, and then Guy insists on telling the
Castavettes right away. It's like the first thing he does,
and then they recommend it. She see a different obstetrician, Dr.
Sapristein and then she's having a lot of pain with
her pregnancy, she's losing weight. Everyone keeps telling her that
she looks like shit. Everyone keeps telling her she looks

(16:12):
like everybody's look like chalk, you look like death warmed
at one after the next. So it's and and it's
like the one and I'm sure what we'll get to
this too, but like the one choice that she makes
without consulting anybody as her hair cut, and everyone is
so mean to everyone the haircut we have to that's

(16:33):
another unpacking about the haircut, Like what the one? The one,
but it's like the one thing she does without checking
him with anyone, and everyone's like yeah, even her friend,
yeah yeah, yeah yeah. So then Hudge comes back and
he wants to talk to Rosemary, but he does hate
her haircut and he comments on her weight a lot.

(16:54):
Was just to like him, right, But then when she
goes to meet up with him because he feels that
something's wrong with this situation, And when she goes to
meet up with him, she discovers that he has suddenly
fallen into a coma. And then her pains are getting
worse and she wants less and less to do with
the cast of Vets, and she doesn't want to go

(17:16):
to dr Sapristine anymore. She stops drinking the herbal drink
that Minie has been making her and then Guy does
not react well to this. He is furious. And then
at a party that she insists on throwing and insist
on not inviting the cast of ITTs to or the
Sapristines are like anyone, her friends like give her a

(17:40):
regular drink, and then the pain goes away. It's unclear
exactly what causes the pain to go away, you know,
maybe it's witchcraft for not sure, we don't know, but
it goes away because she's threatening like I'm never going
to go to sapristine again. And then suddenly the pain
vanishes and we get a brief scene with her and
her friends, which I was waiting for the whole time,
like where are her friends? She didn't seem to have

(18:02):
any best use anywhere, right, And all of a sudden,
there they are at the party. There they are. I'm like,
what did we learn what their names were? But either way,
there's a good scene. It's like they're immediately responsive to
her pain. They're immediately like, no, this doesn't sound like
what should be happening. They make sure Guy stays out
of the room, and that interaction empowers Rosemary a little

(18:23):
bit to stand up to Guy, who immediately is like,
you're never going to see your friend the end, sorry,
you know, like, and calls them dumb bitches and I'm
at icon guy. He is literally guy, And then we
cut immediately to a few months later, and now she
is gregnant as Hell's thriving and yeah, she's they're making

(18:50):
preparations for the baby. They're making this nursery and everything.
And then her friend Hutch dies and his friend gives
Rosemary a book that Hutch wanted her to have called
All of Them, which is Ye. And then Rosemary has
told that the name is an anagram, and she figures

(19:10):
out that it's not the name of the book, but
it's the name of someone in the book, Stephen Marcato.
And anagrams too, Roman Castavet, why are you criminals got
to keep using that? Criminals should just stop doing anagrams,
just makeup. It's so interesting too, because, as you pointed out,
his last name is very close to Cassavetties, and that's

(19:32):
obviously a thing they thought and laughed about before they
shot the movie, right and then you know which came first,
the name or the anagram. So they go, Okay, the
title is going to be this, so let's see, how
can we wait here? And there's so many name games
in this thing. The Roman, I mean, the bad guy
next door is named Roman, of course, and which can
play into this whole thing about what happened later in

(19:53):
the seventies and how the devil man. And and then
of course, as you said, her husband's name is guy
was totally generic word for dude, right, And she's Rosemary,
like the virgin Mary. Oh my god, it goes on
and on. Rosemary is also an herb. There's a lot
of herbs, herbs, stinky herb. Also, this is a great

(20:17):
time to point out that my name, Caitlin Darante anagrams
to a number of things. You've got Latin d answer
U T I that we've got um cat turd in line,
you've got there's there's a bunch. Well, I'm gonna go
do anagram myself. Fun. It's really fun anyway. So in

(20:40):
the book, she learns that Romans father was a witch
who performs rituals and uses like baby's blood because it's
the most powerful blood. To use. Sure. So Rosemary tells
Guy about all this and then she's like, I never
want to see the cast of Its again. My baby
is in danger. We're gonna move out. Uh. And then

(21:01):
she goes to Dr Sapristein and tells him about all
of this, and he tells her that Roman is ill
and then he doesn't have long to live and she's like, okay,
well maybe this will solve my problems. Uh if they
he just dies and is out of the picture. So
Guy and Rosemary see the cast of vets off because
they're going to be traveling to all these different places

(21:22):
because he's a world traveler. And then Guy throws out
the book that Hutch gave Rosemary. Um, So she goes
and gets more books about witchcraft and sort of confirms
suspicion that she had that the coven was responsible for
the other actor being blinded. She basically hacks pre computers

(21:42):
which is going to a bookstore just doing some research.
Major hacking scene, definitely. So she realizes things are really
a muck here and she packs up her things and
she goes see Dr Sapristein again, but then she realizes
that he's on in on it. Too because of this
thing herb. He's got the Tannis to Tannis anyone feminist icon,

(22:06):
the receptionist. He's just like, you smell bad, just like
my boss, Like it doesn't say that when you're walking.
I was like, well, maybe a little unprofessional, but helpful
to the plot. So she runs out and she goes
back to Dr Hill and tells him everything, like she
thinks the guy has promised the coven her baby in

(22:28):
exchange for his success as an actor. And then it
seems like Dr Hill is going to help, but instead
he calls guy and Dr Sapristein and then they come
and get her. She's hysterical, right, yeah. They take her
back home and then she tries to get away, but
it doesn't work. She goes into labor and then Sapristeine
gives her sedative and she passes out. She wakes up,

(22:50):
the baby has been born. She's like, where's my baby.
They're like, the baby died, sorry, and she knows that
they're lying, but you can hear a baby in the
other room. I was like, do you guys not have
a second location to go to? Not a full proof plan?
And then guys are like, you have the pre part
of the Crazies got so yeah. She hears the baby crying,

(23:14):
and then she remembers that closet that the big piece
of furniture was in front of. She's like, let me there,
you go. She goes into it and she realizes that
there is a door behind this, like I guess partition
kind of thing. And she goes into this creepy apartment

(23:34):
and the coven is there, including Guy and the cast
of vets and a satanic bassinet. It's all black. That
must have been fun for the art director Richard Silbert,
by the way, incredible. And then there's a baby in
the cradle. She looks into it and we see her

(23:58):
horrified reaction and she's like, what have you done to
its eyes? And then Roman is who is not dead,
by the way, and who is not traveling, and he's
like he has his father's eyes. Satan is the father,
not Guy. Satan chose you because you're the cutest woman
in New York. That's not everyone that people should say

(24:22):
that on dinner day. Satan chose you. You're the most
Jovan girl in Los Angeles, apparently the most clueless too.
And then guys like the guy at the end is
very I mean, I guess if we're going like a
reverse Nativity deal. He liked. Joseph is pretty thrilled to

(24:46):
be cooked by a higher power. Yeah, he's like, yeah,
it's not my baby. He just didn't care nearly enough,
not hardly at all. Yeah, just take a take a
close guy. We can make more babies. Love to Beverly Hills.
Have babies there, Oh yeah. And then they're chanting hell

(25:08):
Satan and then Roman is like, hey, Rosemary, why don't
you be a mother to this baby. At first she's like,
oh no, but then she's like okay, and that is
the end of the movie. Yes, don't, don't, don't don't.

(25:30):
Let's take a quick break and then we'll come right
back to discuss and we are back. I mean, where
to begin. I don't know. There's there's so we've we've
all three of this have established that we enjoy the
movie and admire the crafty and we just just say

(25:52):
one thing. The music Christoph Komada, I'm sure I'm pronouncing
that totally wrong. The music, the score is incredible, and
I guess going into the behind the scenes lore surrounding
this movie, he died a pretty brutal death less than
a year after this movie came out, the composer, there's

(26:16):
a lot of like strange stuff. What's one of those
one of those? Well, yeah, I mean so this is,
you know, a highly regarded prestige horror, psychological thriller. Like
in two thousand fourteen, it was selected for preservation in
the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress. It's
still shown in theaters. Like, trying to reboot it with

(26:38):
ZOEI Saldana didn't work out. Also, should we just tackle
the art versus artists right at the top and then
we can talk about the characters, because I feel like
if we don't talk about it now, it will just
haunt the rest of the conversation. In terms of Roman Plansky,
the director of this film and the writer of the film, Yes,

(26:59):
he wrote and directed it, and it was adapted from
a novel written by our eleven who will get to
I don't. I don't know anything about him, so I'm
interested to learn about that. So Roman Polanski, he had
a troubled past. You know, he was a Holocaust survivor.

(27:20):
His parents were taken in raids during the Holocaust. A
year after this movie comes out the Manson family brittlely
murders his wife, Sharon Tate and some of his friends.
And yes, definitely went through some ship, but it is
no excuse for what he did, which is he statutory
raped a lot of underage girls and he admitted it

(27:43):
at least convicted in eight I believe, of statutory rape. Yeah,
seventy eight he was arrested and charged with drugging and
raping a thirteen year old girl. Uh. And then a
short time later he fled to Paris after learning the
judge planned to imprison him other than just give him
some other lesser punishment. But um so, he's been a

(28:05):
fugitive for about forty years, several decades, and in that
time he has one another Oscar. Is that correct? If
he won for the pianisto um so, that's fun. Um. Also,
since that time, several other women have come forward saying
that he raped them while they were underage. So good lord.

(28:29):
He's also been celebrated in the recent years in Europe
as well. I mean, he doesn't stop getting awards. No,
he doesn't stop working. I mean it seems like he's
very infrequently stopped working at all. Um he Yeah, he
did win an Academy Award in two thousand and two

(28:50):
UM for the pianist. Like he has continued to work,
he just can't come back to the United States. And
it wasn't until last year that, like post me too,
that he was finally room moved from the Academy. UM.
But that's not even to say that that's a permanent thing.
It's like, yeah, yeah, as as so many people who

(29:11):
perpetrate stuff like this get is just a brief time out.
I mean, that's the fact that the worst thing that
has happened as a result of all of this is
that he couldn't be in the Academy forty years after
being convicted and confessing a crime like that is just absurd.
La la la. Yeah. His punishment is basically that he

(29:38):
still gets to keep working and living in Europe and
he lives in Paris. It's it's just it's yeah, it's
like one of the more upsetting examples in an industry
that is, you know, littered with them. Can I also
read a quote of his that I found, Oh sure,
I wonder if it's the same way. Yeah, he is
speaking to Clive James this in four he says, women

(30:01):
these days where a virtual armor, tights, panties, blue jeans,
belt as though they were afraid of constant aggression. There
must be something psychological at the bottom of it. I've
got another quote from him from when he's seventy nine.
He said, the pill has changed greatly the women of
our times. It masculinizes her, it chases away the romance

(30:23):
from our lives. And then he says, um trying to
level genders as quote idiotic. It's crazy that he made
this movie if that is how he feels. Yeah, this
is code of ethics, because I mean, I think there
are a few different reads of this movie, but largely
this is a story about a woman who's been emotionally,

(30:46):
psychologically and sexually abused and who is trying to regain
agency over her body and her pregnancy in her life. Right,
she doesn't do it successfully, but also again having as
I said, being the person in the road here was
the ground up in sixties six she was, and it
really was. I'm not pre feminist entirely. Obviously feminists lived

(31:08):
long before that, but but before it became you know,
before say Miss magazine was published, which was my aha moment.
Oh yeah, I remember the day I read the first
issue of Miss magazine, and I'm sitting in the steps
outside my apartment I reading it, and I got so angry.

(31:28):
I went into a fury, and I've never stopped the
fury anyway. It was but sixty six it was still like,
as I said, I saw the movie, and that woman
looked like people I actually kind of knew, like she
had no ambition, no career, no employment, no interest in
any such thing. And by the way, as we pointed out, no,

(31:51):
not like besties. I mean, she didn't even She had
nothing except this craving to have a baby, which sets
you up for her willingness to ex up this poor
little devil baby. But it works for the story. But
it's just you know, again, looking at it now versus
looking at sixty Oh, that reminds me of my friend Heather.

(32:12):
Now you look at it and go, I don't know
anybody like that. This is the sane and you know,
he takes the book away from her and he's he's
just so dominating and she's yes, sir, yes, sir yes,
or to her husband. There's a scene where he wakes
her up and he's like, it's nine o'clock. He doesn't say,
make me breakfast, but that's what's applies. Yeah, She's like

(32:33):
go eat out and he's like like hell I will,
so like, yeah, she is just like this very traditional
like homemaker housewife type and women who want to be mothers,
women who are homemakers. There is absolutely nothing wrong with
that if that is the life they choose. The fact
that she has given no other characteristics or interests or

(32:55):
it's just hires. It's treated as a given and that's yeah.
And she doesn't even have any hobbies. So in a way,
she's kind of i mean really kind of one dimensional, right,
you know, you'd think there would be some something. Everything
we see her do is is very domestic. I mean
she's preparing the nursery, she's like redecorating the house and
stuff like that. And again those things, those activities are

(33:17):
all fine to do. But the fact that we don't
see her and it's frustrating because I think that, like
the story at so many times indicates that she is
very smart and very capable because she, you know, sees
through this huge ruse and she like I'm listed out
all the different times that she clocks things and notices

(33:39):
things that other people don't and then follows up on
it later and tries to get more information. It seems
like with this character that the big hurdle for her
is that she wants to figure out what's going on,
but she wants to do it in a way that's
polite and doesn't hurt anyone's feelings. And so at the time,
I was just like Rosemary. Now like where after she
figures out right away it when she's given the chocolate

(34:01):
moose by Many and she's like, this tastes wrong, like
something is You're they're not poisoning me correctly, and you know,
guy starts to gaslight her immediately. It's like it's always
something like you gotta just eat it whatever, And she
goes back the next morning after she is raped and
knows that, but she goes back to Many and brings

(34:23):
back the dishes and it's like, thank you, I really
liked it. It It was really good. And it's like she's
part of what really like broke my heart about her
character is that she always knows that something is wrong,
and she's always aware of her own pain but is
allowing herself to be talked out of it because she
doesn't want to hurt other people. Or because she's like
doubting her own because because women are conditioned to be

(34:46):
accommodating and polite and and all that. And I mean,
we can't ignore the cultural and historical time that this
comes out in this movie. That's that it's set in.
I mean, it's set in sixty into sixty six, and
you know, second wave feminism was kind of jeering up

(35:06):
starting Yeah, yeah, as you said, Jessica, like, she's not
unlike a lot of women of this time. So we
me watching it now, I found myself very frustrated by
her just constant accommodation of people, and even when she
senses that people are doing wrong by her, she's still like, well,

(35:29):
I don't want to offend any Constantly everybody is doing
things wrong, at the minimum annoying her and at the
maximum raping her. Yeah, but then we also see, I
don't know, there are so many parts of this movie
that even when I was frustrated with Rosemary, I felt like,
in most cases, the story explains to you why this
is her reaction, Because the times that she does say something,

(35:52):
her situation gets worse almost right away. Where Like when
she does assert herself and she's like, I'm throwing this party.
Guess what, I have friends, they're coming over, Scary people
are invited. Um and like you know, makes that happen.
And then when she speaks up for herself right after
the consequences, she's cut off from access to her friends

(36:15):
and it's like, I don't know, they're like seeing her
try to accomplish something and then be immediately set two
steps backwards by like the oppositional forces, like I don't
I worked for me story wise, and it made me
really sad. Yeah. And then another example that is when
she's saying that she's no longer going to see Dr.

(36:36):
Sapristein anymore, the like this pain that she's been having
for months now is not going away, like something is wrong,
and she's saying, I'm not going to drink the herbal
drink Mick flurry. It's like vanilla milkshake. I kind of like,
I was like, damn drinking. And then the husband is

(36:56):
so mean not getting a second opinion. I mean, it's
so she will. We see her stand up for herself
different times, and then she's shot down, and then in
the next scene we see her drinking the drink again.
So it kind of makes for reasons that I don't
think the narrative quite needs in like changing her mind,
and it might have to do with all of this

(37:20):
emotional and psychological abuse that she is undergoing by everyone
around her. I remember when I first learned about just
the concept of gas lighting, and like first hearing that
term and learning what it was, I remember thinking to myself, Oh,
like what Rosemary's husband does to her in that movie,
like that connection because I was like, oh, that is

(37:43):
exactly what gaslighting is. That was like kind of my
frame of reference for that. But like, like we already
kind of touched on. There's so many times where he
is just like textbook abuse of behavior in terms of
you know, gaslighting her, Like no, that chocolate mouse doesn't
have chalky undertaste, just eat it and like so much.

(38:06):
But it's also you see that so much in modern
movies too. I mean the movie doesn't look like a
dated movie unfortunately, really, you know, you see I think
it was the was it The Shape of Water with
Octovia Spencer Just that just popped in my mind about
her abuse of the relationships for example, you do see
these all the time. Unfortunately, still the submissive woman on

(38:29):
the abusive husband the chocolate the chocolate mouse scene while
we're on it. Yeah, that that was a scene that
felt like pretty true to the marital rape scene just
blew my mind on a number of people. But the
moose scene, it was like a little bit different of
you can sort of see the like mechanics of what
he's doing, but I also sort of understood why. It's like,

(38:53):
I don't want to have this conflict with this person
I have to be with no matter what, because that's
how she viewed her life, and like, what is what
are my options? What is it easier to do? I
don't know. I mean, I've been in relationships like that
where you're picking your battles kind of exactly where you're like,
finally the fucking moose like and that's sort of what
she ends up saying because he finds, I think, in

(39:15):
the space of that scene three different ways to blame
it on her, where he's like, nothing's good enough for you.
Why are you being mean? She worked on that all day,
You're being rude, and like, you know, like and she
pushes back a couple of times. It's not like immediately
she folds. She's like, it's gross, it tastes weird. I

(39:35):
think the Ruth Gordon is weird fair um. But then
eventually when he starts to raise his voice, she is
like final fucking eat it, which is like stuff, I
I know that I have done. It's I recognize that
in my parents marriage. Like that scene hit for me
especially because it felt normal in in a weird way.

(39:56):
Well yeah, exactly. I mean in the movie, of course,
he has an agenda behind this, which says he wants
to provide the world with this devil baby and because
it helps his career, he'll become a movie start tomorrow,
and so he's invested in her reading the Damn Moose.
But in real life, these things happen all the time,
and the man has no other agenda except to keep

(40:18):
his wife submissive. Of course, so it's just an act
of random violence abuse. And so that's why it seems
it's the scene seems normal in the movie. It's, as
I say, it's a whole other story. But but nonetheless
it's a sad reflection of all kinds of things that
happen like that all the time. And it's like as
a viewer, it's almost like easier and like more easy

(40:41):
to understand that someone would do that to you because
they're working for the devil exactly other than that is
just what they think is okay to treat Somewhere in fact,
you almost I mean, as a movie watcher, you go, oh, well,
I see he's doing that because he wants so you know,
it's not at least you say, I see he's got
a motivation rather than just random misogyny. You know, well,

(41:06):
I couldn't help but think that. Like in the scene
where they first go to dinner at the cast of
Vets Roman is like complimenting guys, I'm oh, you did
all this great hand gesture and you're working this play
was so and it's just like, oh, he got complimented
one time, and now he's going to sell his baby

(41:26):
to the devil. He literally goes and she goes into
the kitchen with many for a minute, and literally by
the time they come back two minutes later, this decision
has been Yeah, okay, sure, bastard, you lazy bastard. My
people will get to your people. We'll take care of this.
I mean, I know, it's just like it also makes

(41:48):
you kind of want like this is an indication that
this guy had a serious character of law to say
the lazy wouldn't she have picked up on us at
some point in their marriage? Kept thinking that it takes
her so long to figure and again, I mean, but
their relationships seems to change pretty abruptly in the movie too,
Like they're in the first couple of scenes, they seemed

(42:10):
to be generally getting along. She's like, like, she even
seems it's it almost seems like she's like, let's make
love even yeah, Like she she's like, I want to funk.
He's like okay, Like it's it started to seem like, oh,
maybe this is a I did not know anything about
this movie. It's like they're kind of a nice couple, right, well,

(42:30):
seems that way at first. Then he turns in yeah,
but see, like why why did it take this long
for them for her to figure out? Especially with the
doctor Sapperstein thing, it takes her so long to realize
that he's on it because he's also doing like classic
like abuse of things, isolating her from her friend, Like
she's like, don't talk to your friends about their pregnancy,
don't read books. He literally don't read books, don't talk

(42:52):
to your friends. You're like no, yeah, like it you're
a doctor. What are you saying, And she well that
that's like a transition into like the whole like one
of the big themes of this movie. And it's like,
it's weirdly now looking into knowing what we know about
how Roman Polanski used women, and then if you look
into Ira Levin's work, where he was not the monster

(43:16):
that Roman Polanski is, but his work sort of had
a general theme that he He also wrote The Stepford
Wives was his other major work of he was really
good at writing villains that were normal men, and that
was what makes the story scary, is that it's like
the devil you know, basically, but you know, also makes

(43:39):
a lot of women and his narratives pretty submissive and
not I wouldn't say he is a feminist, but he
wrote some interesting stories about women. So it's weird. I
guess all that to say, I don't know how much
of these themes are done intentionally and how like Ira
Levin said about this book that it's about atheism and

(43:59):
the people who see feminism in it are just seeing
what they want to see. He's interesting. He's like, it's
about how how people go too hard with Christianity and
then they're like, but don't you think any director makes
a movie without necessarily realizing what things people are going
to see in it, Because I mean, I can't imagine that,

(44:21):
you know, everybody has notions about a movie they've seen
that the director knew knew they would, you know. I
just I don't think that the way art works. I
think you know that stuff inadvertently affects people. They find
things that well, really that's what you saw, okay, And
now that seems to be like some of the main
takeaways that people have from this movie watching it now

(44:42):
is like one of the bigger themes of just like
ignoring and minimalizing um women's physical pain, which happens throughout
this entire movie. I mean it feeds into the gas
lighting thing as well. But there's that moment where me
and Pharaoh is standing outside and New York and she's like,
pain begun, I will have no more of the as

(45:02):
like she is she like that was in a side Yeah,
that between Dr Sabristeine and Guy, they're constantly like she
is saying, I'm in pain, this hurts. Something's not right.
And then people who obviously couldn't possibly understand what a
pregnancy feels like are saying, no, it'll go away in

(45:26):
a day or so, you know, ad nauseum, don't read books,
don't talk to your friends. And that is like such
a proven, I mean exaggerated version of like how women
are treated and by doctors. There's been studies. I have
a study here from a book called Doing Harm, The
Truth about how bad medicine and lazy science leave women dismissed, misdiagnosed,

(45:48):
and sick. Um. It's a researcher named Maya Douson Barry
says that quote, the tendency to not believe women's reports
of their symptoms is definitely connected to these larger, broader,
could true stereotypes about women as emotional and irrational and
hysterical in the colloquial sense of the word. Women are
stereotyped as more ready to seek care. So basically like,

(46:10):
women are more likely to point out their own pain
and therefore it is more likely to be dismissed by
makes perfect profession um, which I'm sure was even more
so in the nine and the sixties. Yeah, I mean again,
you know, having seen it back then, I don't remember
having any thoughts about any of these things when I

(46:31):
saw it I mean maybe a slight annoyance and how
dominated she was because I was kind of a rebel
at that time. But it was the sixties after all, right,
But yeah, just totally different now perspective now because of
all this stuff, you know, and the eight million studies
that have been done since then, and all the advances
of feminism and everything else and all the and all

(46:52):
the the meat too. Yeah. I mean an example of
that that we see in the movie is the scene
where she goes to Dr Hill after or she's discovered
that like Dr Sapristein is in on this coven. That's
another heart that that is like a heartbreaking on par
for me with the you weren't raped by the devil,
you were marritally raped, okay scene and the gas lighting

(47:15):
scene with the chocolate moose, because it's just like they're
like shades of real life in that. Yeah, it felt
very authentic. Yeah, it's and it's and it sucks. The whoever,
I don't know, let me find the name of the
actor who played Dr Hill, but I thought it was
very well. Charles Groden, my man Grows. I thought he

(47:37):
gave a great performance because you know, in that scene,
me and Pharaoh is laying out all this research she's done.
It does sound a little bit out there. I would
be worried about her if if someone just came in
cold and was like, I'm pregnant with the devil. Everything
is sucked up. But you can tell she means it
so much and it's something is wrong and she needs

(47:59):
someone to leave her, which she tells him. She's like,
no one is listening to me. And he says what
any woman who desperately needs to be believed is. He says, Okay,
let's do something about this. Like that's like and she's
got them, and she's so relieved the relief it's like
palpable can feel it, and and then he leaves and

(48:24):
it sucks like this just so many versions of this
happen all the time of like you want to keep
someone calm and then you call their abusers to come
and pick them up, like that happens constantly, and it's
just so But there did you I maybe I was
like reading too much into it, but I really liked

(48:45):
the shot where Dr sabristein and Guy enter the room
and Dr Hill is in the back of that shot
and you can almost see that he knows he's doing
the wrong thing, or he'd like, there's this look of
dare I say doubt too that the name um, there's
like a look he has a I don't know if
Charles Grodin's got a weird resting face. But I was like,

(49:08):
I felt, I was like, this motherfucker knows he did
the wrong thing. But and this I think is against
something that's like real life sometimes the way that men
interact with each other. They would rather sell out a
woman than seem weird to other men totally, because if
Dr Hill is the one person who's like, I do

(49:30):
believe that all this freaky devil ship is happening and
aligns himself with her, I think that he is afraid
of doing that and would rather sell her down the
river and literally, you know, force her to birth the
devil than be think go out of his comfort zone
socially right. And for a split sec and I was like, oh,

(49:50):
is the implication that he's also in on the coven thing?
But I don't think that's it at all, and I
think it much just I know, I think it's just
that like he sees this woman, even as the medical
doctor that he is, he sees a woman who appears
to be hysterical and who he perceives to be like, oh, well,
she's pregnant, so and like pregnant women be hormonal. That

(50:12):
she is like out of her mind and needs to
be put back in the care of the men who
are actually abusing her, because men can be trusted and
women can't be trusted with their feelings basically. So yeah,
that was I mean, it was a very effective horror
moment in the movie when when Sta Christine and Guy

(50:34):
come back into the room. But it hurts my heart
to be like, like, Dr Hill, I thought you were
a good guy, like right, I mean, and it's like
he oh, it's so devastating, to the point where it
almost took me a second to get back into the
action after that, because that is such a gut punch,
and then she immediately has to like literally go on
the run to get away and it doesn't work right,

(50:57):
and it makes me so sad. Oh gosh, we got
to take another quick break, so let's process her feelings
a little bit and then we'll come right back and
we're back. Can I just say, Also, Anthea Silbert, the
wife of Richard Silbert, the designer. She did the clothes,

(51:20):
and can we talk about her clothes for a minute.
The little I mean they were all literally dresses like
you would see on a three year old small child.
While those are the lace collars and then the little jumpers.
Nothing was fitted. Her body was completely you know, like
those little lampshade dresses. But literally, think about it, there
were children's clothes. It's just so even when she's pregnant,

(51:42):
she looks like a little girl, a little girl. It's
very strange. Yeah, I mean the art direction in the
costuming this movie is also cool, and I mean the
movie looks incredible. Yeah. I mean that's like an attempt
to infantilize her and make her seem virginal, so almost
like equating her to the virgin Mary. But also the

(52:03):
little you know again, it just it just you can't
help but have parallel. Yeah. Absolutely. The haircut that Rosemary
gets makes her be the baldest woman in charge, except
she's not really in charge of anything, including her own life.
It's aspirational. I think spiritually it makes sense. She gets
the haircut, She's like, I'm in charge now, and everyone's like, no,

(52:26):
we hate it bad. And it affects her negatively. She
wasn't ready for the haircut. That haircut should have aligned
with her becoming more in charge of her life. I
mean a different version. Yeah, It's just it's so it's
so frustrating to watch every like, everything she tries in
good faith that in a movie that we're kinder to

(52:46):
its protagonist would result in something. The last thing you
wanted to say about the just like the minimizing pain
is of course, the only people she talks to who
believe her are other women, yes, who are then immediately
removed from her life. I think she tries to call
one right before she is forced into going into labor,

(53:08):
but they take her seriously immediately they believe her. They're like, well,
let's let's get this fixed. And then they are also ostracizing,
removed from her life, and then we never see them again,
and they can. I just say, Also, that scene in
the phone booth is incredible when she's she's trying desperately,
she's trying to reach her friend A and the doctor

(53:28):
B and she's in a phone booth and it's degrees
and people are coming in and it's just like and
the camera holds on. I lost track of how long
it was. The camera held one position and it went
on for like eight minutes. There's no cuts, no cuts,
and she was and she was sweating, and and it

(53:49):
was literally like her life in that phone booth. She's
trapped in this small space, nobody's responding to her on
the phone or otherwise. And and then at the very
end of the scene, this man appears outside the phone
with his back to her. So there's always it was
like a living hill literally in her brain in that

(54:09):
it was. It was an incredible scene. It's a very
effective horror movie. Yeah, and the a Farrow like her
performances like insanely good. Yeah, it really is. Yeah, Um,
we got to talk about the rape scene. We do
something that the rape scene. Um, so there's okay. So,

(54:32):
I mean I think that maybe maybe they in to
talk about that scene is to talk about the scene
that comes immediately after, because the way it is stylized
is I mean, it's it sucks that we see raping
movie so frequently. I don't think that it's especially like
worth discussing. Um there is. I mean, there's a bunch
of nude Satanists there. She gets raped by satan. She

(54:56):
does call out one at one point, this isn't a dream,
this is really happening, right, And then we cut to
the next morning. Yeah, I think the next day is
I found that far more disturbing, even though I mean,
obviously the previous scene is very disturbing, but it's disturbing
in a way that's kind of unfamiliar because it's there's
a room full of nude Satanists also in that scene,

(55:19):
so much fantasy that you can kind of you and
and the just the horror and uneas we feel during
that scene is like, that's the intention of that scene.
But then the next scene, Jamie, as you said, is
disturbing for a different reason, is because so I have
the dialogue exchange, Oh, I have it written, now, who
do you want to be? I don't want to be Guy,

(55:41):
but I don't want you to be Guy. Um, nobody
wants I'll be guys. So that we So the next morning, Um,
she wakes up next to Guy. She's kind of disoriented,
she's remembering what's happened to her in real time, and
she realizes that she has these like pretty severe scratches
on your body. Yes, so Guy says, kind of gesturing

(56:04):
to his fingernails, don't you know, I already filed them down.
I didn't want to miss baby night. And the first
and the Rosemary says while I was out, and then
and then he's in the other room and he says,
and it was kind of fun in a necrophile sort
of way, and just like any any sympathy. And in

(56:25):
the previous scene, um where you see Rosemary being in
and out and in and out, and then it cuts
to the devil raping her, he's not acting that way.
He's saying, we'll have sex another day, It's okay to
go to sleep, and and so that, I mean, I
didn't know what happened immediately after, and I was like, oh,
that's something, you know. But then the next morning it's

(56:49):
a total one eight. He was like, yeah, yeah, of
course I merritily raped you. It's still legal in this
in most states when this movie comes out. And then
Rosemary says, I dreamed someone was raping me. I don't
know someone inhuman. Then he says thanks a lot, like
he's already over it, and he's and she's calling him.

(57:10):
She says nothing, and then he tries to touch her.
She pulls away and he's like I didn't want to
miss the night, and she says, we could have done
it this morning or tonight. Last night wasn't the only
split second, and then he wraps the scene up by saying,
I was a little bit loaded myself, you know. So
he he admits that he merritally raped his wife, even

(57:34):
though he said in the previous scene, go to bed,
it's fine. And then where the story gets really complicated
is that he didn't maritally rape his wife. He brought
her to the devil so that she could get raped
by the devil. But the fact that all the fantasy
should aside the fact that this scene plays out the
way it does and it's realistic, it's just insane to watch.

(57:56):
Where he's like, yeah, of course I did that. It
was fun. Then she also acts like it's kind of
no big deal. She's she's visibly upset by it, but
she just kind of has to accept it because, yeah,
as you said, like marital rape wasn't even considered rape.
It was like, oh, you're married to a man. He
can have sex with you whenever he wants, including while

(58:17):
you were sleeping and not able to give consent. Yeah,
she that seemed to go right by or Actually I
thought that was kind of alarming, to say the least,
and to see her like she pulls away a little
bit and but still is Oh, it's just a very
but that was very much with the culture too, as
you say, like, man, you know, whenever you want, you
just take it. You know, would anybody have thought that

(58:39):
the devil raping this childlike virginal young woman would sort
of have this creepy mirror effect as to you know,
Rouman Polanski's activity. I mean, it just has a whole other,
whole other level of creepy. Yeah. Absolutely, yeah, God this
And I'm like I understand after watching it, I'm like,

(59:01):
I understand why I avoided it for so Yeah. And
then I mean, I'm not a mother, so I can't
speak to mothering instincts. But I'm just curious if there's
anyone out there whose mothering instincts are so strong that
when you learn that your baby is the devil, do

(59:21):
you still like, yep, I want to be the mother
to this devil baby? Is that? Well? I can a thing.
I have been a mother. I mean, I am a
mother ahead still am did you quit? I got fired?
My daughters fired me. They turned to wedding um, and

(59:41):
I have to say it's it is an overpowering Okay,
it really is. Neither my daughters are a devil, although
sometimes I wonder. But so I can't really speak to
that exactly. I mean, it's not a real thing, but
you know, and I can a sort of bought it
because I know what that's that feeling is like when

(01:00:04):
your baby first shows up. It's the most incredible thing,
unless you're a person who doesn't like babies. But and
also because we've been set up through the movie where
she has no other interests or no other nothing else
she's passionate about except that, so she's all her juice
is going towards being maternal, so you can sort of see, well,

(01:00:25):
he's mine, and maybe I better. She's rocking the cradle
too hard, she says to the woman, don't rock that
cradle so hard any consort of I don't know. I
thought it was an interesting ending where it doesn't it
would be so it would be super lame if the
movie outright said and now she's going to be a
mother to the devil baby. But the fact that she

(01:00:48):
it like does line up with her character that she
would consider it and then also I don't know. I
was like in a hotel room in Indianapolis, just like
staring at the ceiling, like what would I have done?
But if you think about like no one asks to
be born, right and this baby is in a predicament,
it seems like, you know, this baby could really use
some good influence. I mean, there is that great maternal

(01:01:12):
rush right when I'm born. And she said, so, she's
good doing this towards her infant. The thing that across
my mind was like, but what happens when he's a teenager? Yeah,
and he's gonna and he starts like starting wars and
whatever all that ship the Devil does. Then what is
she going to think Jee's adoption might have been a
better option. This could go very We need to talk

(01:01:35):
about Kevin later exactly. I guess my mind went to
one of our very first discussions on our on our
very first episode was the kill Bill discussion, where like
she learns that she's pregnant, and I think the implication
is just that every woman has such a strong mothering
instinct that no matter what her circumstances are in life,

(01:01:58):
she's gonna like drop up everything to be a mother
that was more darring to me in that movie because
we knew that she had she had her The whole
movie was about her other interests with Rosemary. I mean,
I think it's a flaw. I don't even know if
it's a flaw, but it's we don't know anything about
her other than she is a sweet little lady from

(01:02:19):
like Ohio. So it's like implied that she is naive.
She doesn't have a large support network in New York,
and she wants to have a baby, and that's sort
of all we know. That really does make your skin
call a little bit, doesn't know when somebody says everybody
is such a strong mothering it because they don't. Actually
I don't have one whatsoever. I mean, like you might

(01:02:41):
have a baby popped out. But it's something I sometimes
I think people don't know where they do or they don't.
But they said definitely a lot of people don't write.
And that's always been a thing that's been pinned on
women that it's like a falsehood, definitely, and that's never
asked of just like no one has ever what about
the about like strong Let's make that movie also with

(01:03:07):
Sharon Stone. Um, is there anything else that anyone wants
to talk about before we finish. So the villains of
this movie are we I mean, we have male and
female villains basically all the all the Satanists are. And
it's also worth saying culturally that this is like base

(01:03:28):
level satanic panic, which will only increase going into the
seventies and eighties and nineties even And a lot of
that has to do with what happens to round Plansky's
wife the next year, because the man's and family is
so steeped in that. Yeah, it's just a whole fucking
like this. This movie weirdly foreshadows. And also there were

(01:03:49):
a lot of I forget what, there was like a
list of in the late sixties. It was like The
Omen came out. There was a lot of like evil
baby movies. The Bad Seed came out in the fifties,
which it was a movie that's to scared the ship
out of me. So it's like taking place with that.
But many, for all of her satanic shortcomings, is a

(01:04:11):
fun character, really fun to watch. Every time she's on screen,
You're like, fuck, it's Ruth Gordon. She's got charisma, she's
got look at that head scarf, look at that blouse
like she's got blue eyeshadow on. She's really going for it.
And I think that that just is like something that
we come across a lot, where Mini's character has nine

(01:04:32):
thousand times of personality that Rosemary does, which is I
don't know. It's almost like in high school musical. If
you listen to our matron of them in high school Musical,
it's like how Gabriella is the main character, but she's
kind of boring. And then Sharpey, the female villain, has
all this personality and we're supposed to hate her, and

(01:04:52):
it's like, but she's more fun to watch. It's just
another thing. And then when you get to fucking Louie
Louie laur Laura Linney, it wasn't the character there, Laura Louise,
Laura Louise. She's in one scene and she's just she's
She's in a bunch of scenes. I want to spin
off with her. I want to spin off with her,

(01:05:13):
and she's just yelling. She's also got a wild blast.
I'm like Mini and Laura Louise. Okay, a sitcom with
two older female satanists who are best friends. I love
that it's someone by it it's like Laverne and Shirley,

(01:05:35):
but like they're saying, Well, that's another thing I wanted
to say about this movie, which is that a lot
of movies and a lot of media about which is
have a very specific way of depicting which is, and
it's usually that they are evil and bad and praying
upon innocence. But these days, anyone who identifies as a
which is just you know, charging their crystals and not

(01:05:58):
doing harm to anybody. Same thing with Satanism. The way
Satanism is depicted in this movie and many movies is like, hey,
let's get together and help someone rape a woman and
steal her baby and stuff like that. And obviously anyone
who's doing anything like that is horrible. But modern Satanism

(01:06:19):
is nothing like that. I don't know if if you
or our listeners are familiar with like modern Satanism. But
the members of the Satanic Temple are cool. They are
very like progressive. They're very like pro reproductive rights, they're
very pro science, they're very pro like separation of church

(01:06:42):
and state. Their agenda is is very progressive as far
as I can tell, I guess we should, yeah, we
should make clear that when we are goofing on Satanism
in this movie. It's the version of Satanism that is
projected in this and throughout the Satanic panic. Yes, yes, yes, yes,
shout out to all our Sataness and I mean, and

(01:07:03):
it's like it's so fit interesting because it's like it's
always the not always, but in some cases, like the
subcultures that just have a negative stigma attached to it
because of media like this, that end up being like
very lovely progressive people. I would also lump in Juggalos
to that. Juggalos are if you look at their platform.

(01:07:23):
We gotta get some Jugglers in office. They're so progressive,
they're so they preach love, they march on Washington, They're
out there doing the work, they are gathering. They're also
really good hack shout all our Juggalo listeners. Yeah. The
main thing here is that the way that like Witchcraft

(01:07:43):
and Satanism is portrayed in this movie and different other
movies around this era is not reflective of like modern
Witchcraft and modern uh Satanism and stuff like that. So
worth noting. Oh we did get around to the artist
art thing. Oh yeah, we never concluded that maybe just
too long a discussion there. I mean, this, this is

(01:08:07):
one of the harder cases I've ever en. I don't know,
I doesn't get harder than this. Yeah, well, how does
everyone feel? I mean, I'm fine with not seeing this
movie again, or really any movies that we know have
been made by the autours who are criminals. There's so

(01:08:31):
much other stuff out there that isn't made by sex
criminals that I am happy to watch instead. But it
is tricky because this is a well crafted movie, and
I like, I hate to admit this, but I like
another of Polanski's movies. It's called The Ninth Gate. It
is not a good movie, but I still like it.

(01:08:53):
But like, I'm like, I can't watch this anymore. Yeah,
it's weird. It's it feels like it's it's such an
individual decision, and it's like the sort of thing where
I think when the me Too movement was first happening,
I was very I think, along with like a lot
of people are very quick to just be like nope,
done by see garbage bad. And I still feel that

(01:09:18):
way fundamentally, But it's like, now that we are having
these conversations more, it's like, Okay, it's not as black
and white as that, especially when it's like, you know,
you can't be upset with a friend of yours if
you have a friend who loves Rosemary's Baby and is
not quite ready to part with it, Like that's that's
a thing that that means, that's like what when are

(01:09:39):
I mean, there's millions of people out there who aren't
going to want to part with Michael Jackson's music, you know,
Like so I still don't know. I think what my
hope is is that we come to a point in
just the entertainment that's available to us that so much
good stuff has been made by talented people who are

(01:10:03):
not predators and sex criminals, that we can just just
enjoy that and kind of forget about the stuff is
made by the bad people. But also, but there was
also a lot, for example, to look at this movie now,
it gives us, just on this discussion, it gives us

(01:10:24):
an interesting perspective on not just you know, the movie
itself and how it's craft and how women in it
look different than they would have when it came out,
but also on the issue we're talking about about on
Roman Polanski and his behavior, and it makes you go,
you know, I mean, it can be productive in a
way if you can use it to better better understand

(01:10:46):
your own feelings about about the whole thing, about all
kinds of things. Yeah. I mean it's like I wish
all Sex Predators works were so like, absolutely unquestionably bad art. Yeah,
that it would be a much easier discussion, but it is.
I mean, it's like a lot of people are processing
how they feel. Um, I think, I mean, the only
thing I think that we can all agree on is

(01:11:10):
the fact that Roman Polansky got convicted of this crime
and continued to work for forty years is absolutely unexactly
that's horrible. That's horrible. I mean, while other people are like,
I think, you know, two people have said he did
this or he did that and their lives are completely over,
which is yeah, like you just don't get it. Just

(01:11:32):
doesn't make sense that he is thriving in Paris and
a lovely fuck him. It's definitely like an individual journey. Listeners,
we encourage you to continue to explore your feelings about
stuff like this, talk to your friends about it. It feels,
I don't know, it's uncomfortable to talk about, but it's

(01:11:52):
even having talks like this is feels helpful. To process.
I had one more I don't know this movie because
this was the fifty at anniversary of this movie last year. Um,
there was a lot of media around it. And there's
a female horror director, UM named Karen Kusama my favorite
movie she's directed as Jennifer's Body Love. But she's she's,

(01:12:15):
you know, one of the only prominent female horror directors.
And so she was asked about this movie and UM
she I'll just read what she said. She said, what
one thing to add here is that Roman Polanski has
made one of the greatest feminist parables of cinema. And
yet we have to struggle with Polanski the man and
the things he did, the crimes he committed. But that,
to me is the enduring possibility of art, that it

(01:12:37):
can stand apart from its maker. And I believe we
have to judge Rosemary's Baby on its own merit. I
don't necessarily agree with that statement, but the fact that
that comes from a very progressive female horror director I
thought was interesting, so worth mentioning. Well, it's just about
one fift so we got to wrap up. I don't
go see Dr Sapristin. Oh No, before you know, we

(01:13:01):
can fanis anyone does this movie pass the Bechdel test?
It does? Um? Can I just say all they did
whenever more than one woman in the scene, Let's talk
about recipes and saying getting a second opinion, That's all
I'm saying. Yeah, there wasn't really any substance exchange, not really, no, no,

(01:13:21):
but that's pretty par for the course. For all the
conversations that we see. You got to put in my
clothing stuff in a fabric, laundry, babies recipes, yeah, yeah,
And in almost every scene there was an additional conversation
about what does your husband do so yes, or your

(01:13:41):
husband is very hot. That was one thing where like
Rosemary repeated her husband's resume to like four or five.
I'm like, I don't know, loser and shot to kill
an apatross. That's not what she was like, he's in this,
in this and yeah, things aren't going great right now,
but they will be going good soon. And I was like,
oh god, that seems exhausting. Um, just I'm like, I

(01:14:02):
don't walk around just being like my boyfriend is not
sure about his life direction Like that sounds exhausting. Well,
there are plenty of exchanges between Rosemary and Mini Rosemary
and Terry Laura Louise that the brassy queen of the Devil.
Um it passes the Devil's Nanny. The Devil's aren't, but

(01:14:27):
she in most scenes with women it passes at least once,
but the kind of exchanges are very domestic. Also, question,
does the movie pass the back to test if Mia
Pharaoh talks to herself because I won't feel pain ever again?
Pain begone? Feminist test heard it here first. Um, so

(01:14:48):
let's rate the movie on our nipple scale. It's zero
to five nipples based on its portrayal of women. Um,
I just don't know. I think I'm going to give
it like just right down the middle, like a two
point five because or is like, on one hand, this
is like a movie whose journey we see is a
woman who's dealing with all this abuse and who is

(01:15:10):
trying to you know, she has agency and she's trying
to reclaim her agency even further. But I think this
story would be a lot more powerful and authentic and
probably maybe would have ended differently, or or the story
would have been unfolded a little differently if it had
been you know, written and directed by women, especially a

(01:15:31):
mother who knows what a pregnancy is like, and not
a man who is a known rapist. I think I
might be wrong about this nipple writing, but I don't
really know. I still just don't know how to really
process this movie. So I'm just gonna do the two
point five and, which is still an f when you

(01:15:51):
think about it. But but yeah, I wish there was
just a slightly different version of this movie in which
she's maybe more triumphant at the end, or we know
more about her character. I don't feel empowered by this movie.
I see the read that it is. It could be
a feminist text, but looking at it through the lens of,

(01:16:14):
you know, our culture in two thousand nineteen, like I'm
I don't really see that so much. I wish the
way this story had played out was that she catches
on to all this Devil Covens stuff, sooner she does
her research, she figures everything out, she gets away, she

(01:16:36):
has an abortion, and then she just lives the rest
of her life away from all the scary people. So
that would be lovely. So at two point five and,
I'll give two of my nipples to Mia Pharaoh, whose
husband at the time, Frank Sinatra, left her during the
shoot of this movie because he's like, you're still working. Well,

(01:17:00):
then that's not what I wanted and I'm going to
divorce you. Well, he wanted her to be in a
movie with him, and then she bailed on the movie.
And then the movies came out the same day and
Rosemary's Baby did like five times the amount of business.
So that's the triumphant. That's a marriage killer. Yeah. Anyway,
so um too to Mia Pharaoh, and I'll give my
half nipple to the black cat that you see at

(01:17:22):
the very end for a split second in the coven
um and cats also have eight nipples as cat facts
with Caitlin anyway too and half nipple as the end. Jessica,
you're you're rating, Oh gosh, I'm I'm torn about my nipples.
Sounds very uncomfortable because I know Rick does, doesn't it?

(01:17:44):
Because again, I mean when you said, like the horror
director considers this a feminist movie, in a way, you
have to look at Rosemary. You could look at Rosemary
as getting exactly what she wants ultimately, which is a baby,
and um, this is the Devil's baby. But you're not
going to take this baby away from Hofs but yeah,

(01:18:05):
herby she got what she wanted in a way. It's
just I'm so uncomfortable about how she's treated. I mean
it's because you know, I'm from that generation. Um my parents,
you know, the greatest generation grew up and you know,
we're I mean we're married and had children the fifties,
and I watched the dynamics between them and they were

(01:18:26):
you know, there's the echoes of that just made me
so uncomfortable. On the other hand, I do think the
movie is beautifully crafted. It's incredibly written, it's so well acted.
It looks gorgeous, and she's terrific, you know. So there's that,
So there's great artistry. There's just so much to make
you uncomfortable. And I'm a little ambivalent about the feminist

(01:18:47):
thing too, Like, really, I don't know if that's really
what I would call a feminist outcome. So I don't
know what is that? What would that translate in terms
of nipples? Like what do you think two and a hat.
Maybe I'm with you, Maybe it's doing it. I mean,
I give a big nipple to to the scene on
the phone booth was just create like Hitchcock kind of Jamie.

(01:19:13):
What about you. Um, I'm going to go with two
and a half as well, Uh say, complicated choice. I
I don't think it's weird. I don't think we come
across stories like this very often. Where I disagree with
Karen Casama. I don't think that this is like a
feminist film, but I do think it's an effectively told

(01:19:34):
story about a woman. Uh. That made me feel a lot. Yeah,
it's it's an effectively told story about a woman where
for all of the failings of Rosemary's character writing wise,
where we don't know anything really about her family, we
don't really know anything about if she has interested, she

(01:19:54):
go to school, how did she guide me? Like? There
there's so many things we don't know about her that
we do know about guy. But for the things we
do know about her, she does seem pretty smart, getting
through like a mire of gas lighting from everyone around
you and still being able to do research. She's constantly

(01:20:17):
seeking out allies who can help her out unfortunately most
of the world. And I think the scene that upset
me most is the scene with Dr Hill at the end. Yeah, Like,
I think you see that she does everything she possibly
can to gain agency over herself, her life, and her body.
The reason I don't think it's the feminist film is
because she's not really successful in doing that. So I

(01:20:41):
don't know. The way this movie rolls out is just
like it's I'm still I feel like I'm still processing it.
It's so I've never seen a movie be this cruel
to its protagonists but also make it clear to you
that the protagonist has done everything she could poss a
bleed do to try to save herself and it does

(01:21:02):
not work. It's just like it's usually if you see
a movie that's cruel to its female protagonists, it's like
the protagonist is so severely underdeveloped that they seem stupid
and like completely unable to help themselves. But it's like
Rosemary is intelligent, she's observant, she's doing everything she possibly can,
and the movie does not give her an inch. It's

(01:21:24):
just wild, which I mean, I think. I think it
just has a lot to do with the era and
the cultural context when this movie came out and takes
place and stuff, and for for all of its problematic
history that goes along and all the baggers that comes
with this movie, it does feel worth mentioning that it
is like movies like this that allow It's like I

(01:21:51):
famously said before we started recording Rosemary's Baby walked so
that Baba Duke could run. And there's a lot of
less troubling, more endings. You were just talking about movies
made in the past couple of years alone with Boba Duke.
And then you've also got hereditary um that explore to

(01:22:14):
varying degrees of success, but like explore a woman's psyche
and have that be a part of where the horror
comes from. So this movie, while very flauded, think it
was at least it's influence all good stuff to happen. Yeah,
but it seems like just like very surface level read

(01:22:35):
it seems like in spite of her trying to and
like intelligently trying to save her own life at every turn,
it ended up the way that they want it, and
that is I didn't feel uplifted or she does not
come out the victor in this story. And and it's
like that's a difficult thing to watch that I don't think.
We see a lot that is true to life in

(01:22:58):
a lot of ways. Um, not necessarily what I want
to see reflected in media, but you know, like someone
who does everything and the oppositional forces are too much
and it just doesn't happen. Um, this movie fucked me up.
I'll just go two and a half just because I
love my friends and I want to be like them. Um,

(01:23:22):
two and a half I'll give I'm going to give
one to what's her name again, Louie Louis. I don't
give what to Laura Louise because I was like, what
is going on with you over here? Which, by the way,
Roman cast Avent is like, oh she and many are
too old to take care of babies like those those

(01:23:47):
broads will fuck them up, like you're just like just
but yeah, but like I know, but guy is to
just Satanists in general shouldn't be raising children. I think
we can agree. Um yeah, I'll give one to Louis Louis,
one to Terry r I p wish I knew you better,
and then I'll give a happy to Ruth Gordon because

(01:24:09):
my god, what a fucking performance and she was turning
a look in every fucking scene. Yeah, Jessica, thank you
so much for being here. This has been such a delight.
Thank you so much for having me. This is so far. Yes, Um,
is there anything you would like to plug talk about
your podcast. I want to just once again plug my
new podcast. It's called Winnetta. That's spelled w I n

(01:24:32):
n E t k A, and um, it's about my
childhood growing up there, which of course took place during
partly during the era that this movie covers and has
all the all the ups and downs represented in that movie, um,
except for the double part. Anyway, you can find it
wherever you find your podcast and it's a memoir and

(01:24:54):
then go on Instagram to Jessica Harperama or go to
Winna Pa podcast on Instagram or Twitter. I'm on Facebook
to Jessica Harper. Awesome, I mean great, Yes, follow her
in all the places and listen to Thanks guys, thank
you so much for coming so you have to see
or just a quick note, Jessica did have to leave

(01:25:20):
a little bit before we were done recording the episodes.
If there are sections of the episode it was like,
are you just talking over a legend. No, she just
simply was not here for those night here and we
love her so much. Yeah, she was amazing. Yeah. So
if there are large chunks where Jessica is not talking,
we recorded those after she had to leave, and then

(01:25:42):
edit them into the episode. So with that, let's plug
our little plug doubles. You can follow us online on Twitter, Instagram,
Facebook at Bechtel cast Um. You can sign up for
our Patreon ak Matreon Yeah to bonus episodes among five
bucks a month, and then you get the backlog so

(01:26:02):
you really get like thirty episodes um. And then check
out our Tea Public store, get some merch at t
public dot com, slash the macdeal cast, and as always,
we love you so much, thanks for listening. Yeah by