August 19, 2021 • 50 mins
This week Jamie talks with Michelle Williams about how books cemented their friendship. They discuss how art can bring people together and how friends can have a lasting impact on your life — even when you don’t see them every day.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
If there's something don't already, I'll get it. I'm a
good friend. Hi everybody, it's Jamie Lee Curtis and you're
listening to the Good Friend Podcast, presented to you by
I Heart Radio. It's a podcast about friendship. We talk
(00:22):
about everything, We cry, we laugh, we think about what
it really means to be a good friend. And I
have conversations with some of my best friends, some people
I've never met, and sort of everything in between. So
I hope by the end of it that you have
(00:45):
a really good sense of what friendship means to me
and the people that I consider friends. And I hope
you can take those same ideas into your own friendship groups,
and I hope you enjoy it. I don't know idea
an alcative. I'm a good friend. Good morning, good day,
(01:08):
wherever we are in the the podcast universe together. My
guest today is my friend Michelle Williams. Thank you for
joining the Good Friend Podcast. You are a good friend.
Oh you always have been. I wouldn't have missed it. Yeah. Well,
it's very sweet of you to do. And I know
(01:30):
you are busy because you have recently given birth to
a beating heart of a child. And um, you're in
the middle of raising your now you know, teenage daughter
and your husband and maybe some work. Um, so I
(01:50):
appreciate it. We were unlikely friends. You know, I don't
know about you. Do you when you work on movies
or a TV show or a play for that matter,
do you really connect in with people? Do you often
find that you make a friend? I find that there's
(02:12):
always one person that you take with you. It's one
of the things that I love so much about what
I do is that it is communal, and it's exciting
because there's so many people with so many stories and
so many lives intersecting. And while I feel while I'm
(02:34):
working close in a certain way to everyone, because you're
all engaged in the same pursuit, I find that you
there's always one person that you take with you, and
that really lasts, and that's us. So let's just for
the uninitiated listener. Wherever you are, however you are listening
(02:59):
in this way that you can listen to things in
so many ways and cars and on trips. My husband
falls asleep to podcasts. Please don't fall asleep to this one.
Listen with a sort of invigorated ear rather than one
asking us to put you to sleep, even though I
have my good sort of FM DJ voice on where
(03:20):
it's like, Hi, it's eleven o'clock at night and we're here,
just you and me and Michelle Williams, and we're gonna
put you to sleep. You know, I'm I'm I'm hoping
that you're listening. But for those who do not know,
Michelle and I met on the movie h two oh,
(03:40):
which was the twentieth anniversary of the movie Halloween, And
do you remember sort of when you knew, like, was
there a defining moment in that experience for you where
we where we both went like, hmm, I'd rather hear
(04:01):
it from you first. I have mine. It makes me
like I feel like I'm free falling through time and
space to imagine how many years ago that was. It
was a long time ago. It was twenty two years
ago at least, or maybe even twenty three because them
I only look at my life based on Halloween years
(04:23):
and we just did the anniversary of Halloween were so
that would be twenty three or twenty four years ago.
It's a long time. Wow. You know, I don't know
if I have like a specific memory on set per
se of like when we locked eyes and minds. But I,
(04:49):
you know, I remember the I've been thinking about doing
this for so ever since you asked me. I'm like,
how long is it gonna take me until I start crying?
I cry when I think of you. Almo like, how
how many minutes are we in? Now? Five minutes? I'm like, So,
I don't have like a specific set memory because it
(05:11):
was twenty five years ago. It was a very humanizing
experience for me. You were the the first person to
ask me questions and wonder what I thought and talk
to me with so much dignity and respect and interest,
and I felt like I sort of became a person
(05:32):
instead of just a sort of blob or or an
idea in somebody else's mind. I became like you put
the Michelle in the Michelle. And it's amazing how close
that that experience feels years later. Yeah, well, you see
each other in a way I don't. I can't identify
what it is that you see. That's that is you know, chemistry,
(05:55):
That literally is some sort of magical experience that occurs
when someone sees you. I remember we we connected because
we talked about books. Yeah, we started talking about literature,
and I mean, I know there are people who talk
about maybe more trivial pursuits and get really jacked up
(06:18):
with each other talking about a lip gloss that they love.
And by the way, I'm not denigrating the friendship connection
over a lip gloss if that's what happened. But with us,
what happened was it was literature and that you were
How old were you then, I mean, I don't even know. Ah,
(06:42):
I mean you were young. You were young. I was
really young. Yeah, we're young, and yet you felt very
formed to me, and you had an artistic formation that
was very clear. Um that you you were talking about
writing screenplays, you were talking about producing screenplays, you were
(07:04):
talking about literature. And for me, what happens with friendship
is you do find these connective tissue moments and that's
what you build your relationship on. And for the uninitiated
um or from our new friends listening, when I after
we had worked together on this movie, UM, I believe
(07:25):
I gave you a book as the rap gift. If
I'm not mistaken, I believe it was a first edition
of something that was important. I'm trying to remember which
book it was. But when I visited you in New
York City. You were a young actress. You had been
doing a play on off Broadway. You've been doing Killer
Joe in an unheeded off Broadway theater, the Barrow Street Theater,
(07:49):
in the dead of winter, in a very tough play
by Tracy Letts, um really tough emotional, physical role. You
had done your TV show and now you were in
this freezing cold theater doing eight shows a week in
this brutal park. Really it's brutal. It's it's you are
(08:11):
brutalized in this part. And I remember visiting you in
New York and when I have and by the way,
I have copied you for all of the listeners. Here's
my like decorating Michelle Williams decorating tip. It was a loft.
Space was big, open space, and the entire room was
(08:32):
lined with stacks of books, so not bookshelves. Imagine stacking
on their side about ten books, and then another ten
and then another ten, so that the entire baseboard of
this apartment we're books. And I remember when we walked
(08:52):
in and I saw that. I have copied that since then,
by the way, thank you. But I I remember how
important literature was to you as it is to me,
and for me, that's the friend that's like the beginning
cementing of that friendship. Because let's be honest, I am
much older than you. At the time, I was married
(09:15):
with one no, I was married to children. Um, I
had been married a long time. I was, you know,
living in Los Angeles, and and you were young and
just at the beginning of your career, and you had
had this experience on this show, which obviously brought you
a lot of attention that I don't think you really wanted.
(09:38):
I mean, the nature of the show was it was successful,
and therefore there was a lot of attention. But the
depth of your interest in art and literature was for
me the great glue. It was just the cementing of
how we knew each other. It still is, it is
(09:58):
still and books under my Christmas tree this year. Yes,
and you have allowed me in and I think that's
the great gift of friendship. When you said you had
already started to cry, I woke up crying because you know,
this isn't trivial to me doing the Good Friend podcast.
(10:23):
I'm not going to ask you what moisturizer you wear.
I don't give a What I know is that you've
let me in and in times in your life and
in times in my life that have been incredibly difficult
to navigate, which is just life. Yeah, it's just life.
(10:45):
It's everybody. There's a phrase, you know, everybody gets their
turn in the barrel. H and we're you know you've
been in the barrel. I've been in the barrel our friend,
other friends have been in the barrel. But the the
trust in each other um is what makes me feel safe,
(11:06):
which is why that's to me. To me, if you
boiled down, like if I say the word to you,
good friend, what is the what is what? What does
that conjure up in you? You know? I think a
lot about this because I think about I think about
the friendships that I value most, and I think about
what are the qualities of those friendships and how can
I be the friend that I value to somebody else?
(11:30):
And I think it's the ability to tell a kind
of you know, to tell the truth, to tell the truth,
and to tell it kindly, but to tell the truth
because your friends have an access to you that no
one else does, you know, and they can see what
you're blind to. They can see. You know, we all
(11:51):
have our own inherent blind spots that we just we
are unable to perceive about ourselves, but our friends can.
And when our friends can see that and then kindly
tell us about it, it is it can be life changing.
And I think that some friendships sort of get stuck
in a rut where you don't where you don't tell
those truths because you're afraid of you know, rightly, so
(12:12):
you don't want to hurt your friends feelings. So the
ability to perceive and tell a kind truth is you know,
what feels like a good friendship to me. Ability to travel,
which I think is what you're talking about that I
feel like we've always had, which is the ability to
travel somewhere interior with each other very quickly and with
(12:35):
total trust. And like you said, for some magical chemical reason,
you and I have always been able to do that
from the very beginning. We could travel inside of each
other quickly, efficiently, tenderly. We would just go to deep
places fast. You know, I don't think we've ever had
(12:59):
a conversation about moisturizer or By the way, again, there
are people that that spend a lot of time and
money on moisturizers. And you know, I appreciate that you
can find that content somewhere on the internet. And I'm
sure there are conversations with people talking about moisturizer and
(13:20):
that's groovy. I'm happy. And by the way, you know,
it's an important aspect of your beauty regime. Look, all
of a sudden, you know, commercials for whatever, nameless moisturizer. Yes,
I also think there's an understanding with us. So I
(13:42):
was thinking about it because we have never lived in
this same city. We only get to visit each other
when we are visiting the other city, the other's city,
And at the same time, there are often requirements and
(14:04):
a lot of push me pull use when you're visiting. So,
for instance, you live on the East Coast, when you
come to the West Coast, it's usually work related. It's
not like you are dragging your entire family out to
the West Coast unless you're a working or be that
you're promoting, or you know, the promotion of movies or
(14:28):
television or awardy worlds which bring people to California often,
and you know, it's hard to carve out time for friends,
and because you have a lot of things going on,
and often when you land in Los Angeles, you're really busy.
(14:52):
And by the way, it's not like I'm really busy.
I really wish I could see you. I'm just so busy.
I know what you're busy is. And I think that
is the key, is you see, I know what you're
busy is. And I'm not talking about busy, the other busy,
the other busy with busy, you're beautiful busy. I'm talking
(15:13):
about understanding. Like when you're here and I don't see you,
there is zero on a scale zero attachment two that
I didn't see you. I only know I'm going to
see you when the stars align. It's just the way
(15:36):
it works. We throw out the net. We say to
each other, I'm coming here or coming there, but only
when the stars aligned, when the window opens, when the
thing gets canceled. Because you can make a priority to
see each other, but if you make it too intense
the time constraint, it feels sort of rushed and like, Hi,
(15:57):
I really love you, I really love you. Just what's
going on with a Oh, I gotta go, And it
doesn't have the same depth of contact. And so my
experience with you is that when we make that space.
When the universe allows the space, when our family life
(16:19):
allows the space, it it happens. And I think that's
a big part of being a good friend is giving
people space m hm, overwhelming expectation and in a way
disappointing colin need. I personally always feel I am um
(16:44):
not satisfying that person's need for the contact. And you've
never with us as far as I can tell, And
even if we had had a conflict over it, I
would talk about it here with you because it would
be open and honest. But my experience with you is
that we hope the universe allows us the time together.
(17:07):
The universe being a combination of our family lives, our
work lives, our spiritual lives, um allowing it, and I
am so much better for those contacts. I'm a good friend.
We'll be right back with more good friend after this
(17:29):
quick break, So stick around, friend, I don't That's the
thing about a podcast is interesting with particularly with people
that you genuinely love, is that the reason I will
(17:51):
never write a book is because I don't want to
betray the confidences, the intimate confidence that I've had with people. Yeah,
for strangers, for the consumption of strangers to what understand
(18:13):
me a little better. So there are things that have
occurred between the two of us that will obviously remain
between the two of us. And we can speak in
a more sort of theoretical level. Because I write books
for children, and I I would like to say I'm
child friendly, wild centric, child friendly. Many of the listeners
(18:37):
would say I'm just immature. I would say that. They
might say it. They might say it. But when you've
been apparent twice and at at very different times, very different,
with very different circumstances, very different I I just I'm
(19:01):
seeing these flashes like I'm having like a near I
don't want to call it in your dad, but I'm
having like a near something friendship flashing in the past
of like moment after moment after a moment of these
really full times and like and there you are and
(19:21):
there you are, and you said that, and I took
it with me and you said that, and I took
it with me. Like it's funny because our lives don't intersect,
like you were saying, because we live in different places.
But when I think about the like major events of
my life, there you are. It's really astounding, which might
also be a virtue of the fact that we because
(19:42):
we don't get to spend you know, idle afternoons together,
that when we are together, it just it goes to
like the the deepest place that we can mutually explore together,
and that we've always been interested in that too, that
we've always wanted to go find that like deep, dark,
(20:07):
sacred secret place together, and that, to me is what
friendship really is about. It is really that level of
trust and compassion because regardless I don't care if this
is a women's friendship show or it doesn't matter, we
(20:29):
are humans, and every human I know, there's not one
that hasn't had very difficult times, and for me it
would be trivial anything more than you. There's never been
a time we have not wept together because we feel safe.
(20:51):
And really what I've wanted I want safety. I want
safety from you with you, and you have graced me
with some safety stuff. And what happens is when someone
(21:11):
gives you that gift of trust, you feel trust worthy.
You You can't say you're trustworthy unless you've been given
a trust, unless you've carried someone's secret, you've carried someone's grief,
(21:34):
you've carried someone's um joy excitement. That's to me, what's
the yummy, delicious, satisfying aspect of a friendship? Our friendship,
you know, tears rolling down my my face, sort of snuffling.
(21:59):
But that's how it feels, and that's how it has
felt with you, UM from the very beginning. UM. I
do want to ask you a couple of questions about
your earlier life, because so many people's friendships get formed
in their early life. Like you grew up in Montana, right,
I grew up in Montana, and then we moved to
(22:20):
San Diego, and then I moved to Los Angeles, and
then I moved to North Carolina. When I got Dawson's Creek, right,
and you were little, we were just a wee girl.
Do you still have those friendships? Do you are there
people that you were you able to go into that
(22:40):
or was it more just sort of what I'd like
to refer it as kids do parallel play? You know,
because I left school when I was so young. I
I stopped attending any kind of traditional school setting when
I was I don't fourteen fifteen or something, so I
(23:03):
don't have early friendships. I was thinking this morning, I
was thinking, are you my oldest friend, and you are
my second oldest friend. My first friend was Mary Beth Peel,
who played Grahams on Dawson's Creek. She was my first
friend and we are still friends. So I didn't really
(23:25):
start to cement relationships until I was sixteen. Is that
how old you were when you made that show? I was, Um,
I was sixteen. Yes, I was sixteen at the front door. Sixteen.
At that point, I had been emancipated and I had
graduated high school so I could work as an adult
(23:48):
and I didn't have to have a set teacher or
a guardian because those things cost extra money and they
can't work you as long hours. So, um, you know,
I was. I was. I was sixteen when I started
that show, and you know, as I just said, like,
not a friend in the world. Um. And and then
I met Mary Beth and she would talk to me
(24:08):
about a place called New York City where people did
plays and read books and saw black and white movies.
And I just thought like, oh, I'll go there, I'll
go there. But it was a pretty lonely, a lonely
life until then. Honestly, Well, and you're a performer, you're
(24:30):
an actor, you're an artist, you're a writer. None of
that comes from I don't think. I don't think I've
ever met an artist who didn't feel that tremendous amount
of loneliness, that sadness, that yearning. Thank you. I'm looking
(24:56):
up at a tree and oak tree as I was
looking for the word yearning. That's exactly right. It's a
yearning for contact, for creativity, for understanding. I want to
be understood, you know. I'm I've entered a period of
my life now where I am like, if not now, when,
(25:19):
if not me, who I am here? I am going
to die sooner than later? I mean, it's it's if
I wrote a book, which I'm never going to do.
I've already expressed during this podcast. Sooner than later is
(25:40):
the name of the book today. If I'm writing a
book today, it's called sooner than later. And so I
have no time to waste none. And I have been
looking and yearning for that contact with people my whole life,
(26:03):
and it's just rare to find it. There are people
I know who are best friends with the people they
knew in kindergarten all the way through grade school, college
work kids. There I see pictures of these people. Everybody
has arms around each other and they're smiling and laughing
and having the best time. And I'm just not that person.
(26:31):
If you see photographs of me as a baby, and
I'm going to put them up on some website for
I Heart Radio, so don't go looking now. But every
photograph of me, I looks done. Me too, mean too,
I'm always alone and completely forlorn. Yeah, I'm I have
this look on my face as if someone just shouted
(26:55):
from the other room. Jamie and I have this look
of like what what what I'm I'm I am? I
look shocked. And that doesn't mean I didn't have loving
people around me. And I have an older sister, and
(27:18):
although we are very different, you know we you know,
I had an ally, you know, I'm I was lucky
enough to have an ally, a real ally, someone who
who I could go what am I crazy? Like? You know,
so that there's a little feedback there which is so valuable. Um.
(27:40):
But finding a friend, as you said, sort of an
unexpected friend I didn't expect when I showed up that
first day on that movie. There were seven eight, nineteen
years old. I mean, it was just not what I expected,
and it was thrilling. I want to mind you out
(28:03):
Edward Popper. Of course, Oh I know, Oh I know right, No,
I bet that I still have that treatment. Yes, like
old notes and when we used to write things in
my hand. Remember you you got me to get my
first computer. Oh well, the reason is again for the listener.
(28:25):
I know we're having a conversation, but since there are
people listening in so it's a long story. But a
friend of mine named John Boorman made a movie. It
was part of I think the BBC did a bunch
of these individual movies about works of art, and the
(28:50):
idea was that you took up piece of art and
then you wrote a narrative around that piece of art
that painting. And John did the two Nudes bathing photograph photograph.
Excuse me, everybody, the painting where two women are in
a bath and one is looking toward the camera, I
(29:13):
mean towards the painter and one of them is pinching
the nipple of the one sitting next to her, and
John Boorman created an entire wonderful movie about that painting.
And you and I we're looking at a painting by
Edward Hopper, and you said, I'm going to write a movie.
(29:38):
I have an idea in my head about that story
of that painting. Do you remember that whole you had
told me, the story of your friend and so you together.
I don't even think I couldn't credit myself with the idea.
You were like, you should make this world come alive.
Wasn't it the want of the woman coming down the stairs?
(29:58):
Down the stairs? Yeah? The paintings, there's just so much
about isolation. Yeah, yes they are not. Those are not
paintings of a bunch of happy people with their arms
over their shoulders, throwing up the Shaka symbol, you know,
(30:21):
but you know they are people in isolation, in an
internal moment of something. And it's what great art does,
is that it pulls you in, it makes you relate.
And I remember thinking again that you were twenty years
(30:45):
old at this point and you were going to go
write a screenplay like that. The level of your artistic
commitment when we met so again, it was a young
woman who we met on a movie. And I too,
By the way, don't I'm lucky if I walk away
(31:09):
from a job with a real contact. One of my
my friend Rick Frank, who died um He and his
husband both died of AIDS when they were forty and
forty one. But Rick and I connected when we did
(31:29):
this TV show called Anything But Love, and it's so
rare for me. So it was rare for me on
a you know, a horror movie set in the school.
There were a lot of people running around. It was.
There was a lot of pressure on on the movie.
It was a sequel, so there was intense pressure on everybody.
(31:52):
Do you remember they reshot the mask. We got two
weeks of the mask because they didn't like the way
the mask. But I just I'm I was taken by
the depth of feeling that we had so quickly on
that movie. Look and find each other like that though,
(32:13):
Isn't it like I always used to think about it.
It's like having antenna. You know that you're you, haven't
You have these little sensory particles that are sort of
out in front of you, and you're able to identify
others like you. Now. You also have had a very
full life. You've had a full personal life and a
(32:35):
professional life. I got to see you do cabaret. You
like to mix it up, you know, Fossey Verden as
you know, as we spoke, Although I didn't know Gwen.
Gwen was a version of my mother. Gwen was a
version of women like my mother, these professional women in
(33:00):
that time. Gwen was a redhead. My mother was an
auburn head originally, and the like time war head snap
for me with that work was crazy town. Did you
see manc No, Okay, I know what it is that. Yeah,
(33:20):
I mean it's it's but it's from that time and
place and here we are in and it's always challenging
to see other times and places being recreated with the
language and the verbiage and the way words were were
(33:41):
thrown around, and it's more and more challenging to really
feel that their similitude of time and place completely. And
it was exciting for me. But I went on I sorry,
I went on a I went down the MW rabble professionally.
(34:03):
But the point I was trying to make was simply
that you also now are married, and you have raised
or are raising two children, and there are friendships that
you also make with your children. As the conduit, I
have made a lot of friends because of the bravery
(34:24):
of my daughter. Yeah. Um, we had the same Eiggs
BacT thing in England when I went to make the
sequel to a fish called Wanda. And we rented a
little house on Caduggan Square. And the first day, you know,
(34:45):
you were told there's a key to the garden, and
you know, only the people who live on the square
get to go into the garden. And I remember we
arrived and we went into the garden and Annie, you know,
sort of ran off. There were a group of kids.
When she came back, she introduced me to her friend
(35:05):
and I said to her, where do you live? And
she said, sixty nine Cadugan Garden. And I said, oh,
that's so funny. We've just rented the house at sixty
nine a Cadugan Garden. And what happened is they went
(35:26):
home to her house, we went to ours, and our
houses literally faced each other with an eight ft little courtyard,
and Rachel and my daughter, Annie and Susan, her mother,
and I. Okay, Susan and I became a lifelong friend.
(35:50):
Mary Anne, her older sister, became very much the relationship
that you and I had. Marianne, I think was fifth team.
And we were so into Courtney love that it was crazy.
And Annie and Rachel went to the same school and
(36:15):
we created we took a piece of PVC pipe and
extended it across the courtyard, and we had a basket
and we would send things. We lived. We could look
in their window and it was all because Annie brought
these people to me. And that's what happens in friendship.
(36:39):
I think many people listening can relate that the children
bring the parents, and then the parents and the other
parents kind of start to dance with each other a
little and see if the pieces fit. And that can
be a really lovely aspect because, as you said, you
(37:01):
travel so much, and now you have a new baby,
and now you're going to have that whole and a
little boy baby by the way, very but you're going
to have that wonderful experience with the friendships that you
will make as he grows up, as you and your
(37:22):
husband meet other people in the park, and those friendships
that are going to be built. And it's such a joy,
isn't it When you're when you are with your friend
and you are watching your children interact with each other.
You know, it's like two greatest joys in life, these
(37:42):
relationships and to sort of and to have them to
be in them at the same time. In your adult relationships,
and and in your relationships as a parent, and in
the children and their relationships as friends. It's like it's
a great joy and it's when I really miss you
know after this year, strange year, strange strange year. So
(38:06):
I'm the if not now, when, if not me, who
I'm going to die soon, sooner than later. I'm on
the book tour right now. This is the Those are
words to live by. Do you find you have to
let go of people again? I'm not trying to get
you know. Maybe your friends are gonna listen, Maybe my
friends are gonna listen. So be careful hard to do
(38:29):
a good friend podcast because you're gonna talk about friendship
and a lot of the people that you know might
be listening. But I find my experience talking to people
is that there are old ideas and new ideas, and
that a lot of friendships cling to the old idea
(38:51):
of the friendship, and that they don't metamorphous size, they
don't shed the skin of the old idea and move
into a new idea. Um can you relate to that
at all? I can? I have I'll have another motto,
which is rejection is protection. And so when a friendship fades,
(39:12):
I I choose to believe that it's it's in the
best interest of both of our personal growth. And I
have lost a couple of friendships and it's very painful.
But I also I'm quick to let go of things.
My husband always says, the oceans arising, the oceans arising,
(39:34):
and so we're very quick to let go of you know,
so small things really don't bother me. Um, and I
really do believe that, you know, everyone is doing their
version of their best, and so I don't really second
guess people's motivations or choices or you know, everyone makes
sense to themselves. If they don't make sense to me,
(39:55):
that's fine. But I read something that really had i
a profound impact on my life, and it was an
article talking about how sometimes a few times in your life,
it's important to make choices based on who you want
to be, not on who you think you are, and
because if you just make a series of choices based
(40:16):
on who you think you are, you're going to miss
out on a few big growth opportunities because you say
to yourself, well, I'm I'm not the kind of person
who would ever do X, Y and Z, because I'm
the kind of person who does A, B and C.
And you building on this idea of yourself that a
few times in your life you have to break from
(40:38):
and say, I'm not going to be that person anymore.
But you have to make a conscious effort and think
about who you want to become and make a decision
in that direction. Something good friend. We'll be right back
with more good friend after this quick break, now that
(41:05):
we're swapping mottos um. There's a wonderful novel called Special
Topics in Calamity Physics by Mauritia Pestl, And in the
middle of this book it talks about the planning of
our lives. You know, we think this is how life
is supposed to go. You're supposed to do this, then
(41:27):
you're supposed to do this, then you're supposed to get
this job. And in the middle of this book she
says it's not true. She said, life hinges on a
couple of seconds you never see coming, and what you
decide in those seconds determines everything from then on, and
you won't know what you're going to do until you're there.
(41:52):
It's a partner of what you just said, which is
we have to be open. We can't be calcified. Closed people.
We just can't. We can't as artists, we can't as parents,
we can't as partners, and we certainly can't as friends.
(42:16):
And therefore you have to be able to. As you said,
the oceans are rising, it's some have to go. Yeah,
and you know you. I started crying before we started talking.
I was crying this morning thinking about talking to you,
remembering some moments in our lives together, and then you
(42:39):
got me going again just now when you said we're
all trying the best we can. That's so human to me.
That's so at the core of friendship. That's why when
friends put on each other those feelings of like my
(43:02):
feelings are hurt or I don't not getting enough of you,
or I didn't hear from you, and you talk to
them and they're like, oh hi, and that oh hi
really means oh you haven't called me in a month
exactly how are you? And the minute I hear it, yeah,
I realized they don't know me. Yes, because they don't
(43:26):
trust me, don't trust that I am doing my absolute
best in every moment and if that includes them, yes great,
and if it doesn't, it doesn't diminish them. It's not
personal it's not personal, but people take it so darn personally.
(43:50):
And that's I think really the way that we can
now end this conversation, because what it started with and
it will end with, is that that we may not
live in the same place. I may not get to
watch your son become a man, I may not have access,
(44:15):
I may not be in the path of that experience,
but it doesn't mean I can't be your friend and
cheer you on along the way and be there should
you need some support about something, and that I don't
(44:36):
want more from you than I get, and I'm so
happy to have what I have with you because it's
such an integral part of my life, and I love you.
I love you too. I think that we also trust
(44:57):
that even when we aren't there in the same phy
sical space, that we carry ideas of each other and
memories of each other and words from each other and
intentions from each other, that people exist in our minds
and in our hearts and in our daily lives without
seeing them. Like you have had an impact, there is
(45:21):
a shadow of you. Well you your impact is in
my life. Your spirit is in my life. You have
a very strong spirit. I'm sure it's in many people's lives,
Like I can't imagine how many people attribute something to you,
you know, attribute something that they've made, something that they've created,
(45:42):
a way that they've parented, a way that they've been honest,
like you must be everywhere. You taught me how to
sue the baby. You taught me with Matilda. You know,
every time I pat my baby, I'm doing the Jamie well,
but by the way, there is no doing the Jamie
(46:03):
because of course Jamie learned it from somebody else. It's
how the the beautiful connective tissue of people and experiences
and being open to it. And what I will say
to you is that I am better. I am just
better being able to call you my friend. And you
(46:24):
know it's all of a sudden, Carol King and James Taylor,
you know you call out my name, you know wherever
I am will come running. I mean it's that Thank you,
Carol for that, because that's how I feel. And I'm
we the community of strangers listening to this today will
(46:50):
and have taken some of this and will employ it
into their own apply it, employ it. I'm like into
jobs or like employee employee? What what? What can I
ask you? A question. Of course you can't. We've discussed
that you won't publish a book, But would you have
(47:11):
a publish a book of your photographs? You're a nice
girl to ask me that. Um No, here's why. Um,
there's no need. You know, the way you publish a
book of photographs is for charity. So if there was
a universe, that made sense to me to publish volumes
(47:35):
of the book of photographs, but I would give one
hu to Children's Hospital Los Angeles, because the one thing
I must tell you is I you know it's the
other quote, by the way, we all live by all
these effing quotes, So don't hate me people, but you
know it's from the Princess Bride, which is really the
(47:56):
one I live by, which is life is pain highness.
And anyone who says differently is selling something. You know,
I sell a lot. I'm a seller. I'm a really
good seller. And what I don't want to do is
have to sell the artistic parts of me that are me,
(48:20):
that are mine and for me. The concern I have
is that I would have to then go sell it
and turn it into commerce. Now there could be a
world I can't imagine I'll ever pull it off. But
there could be a world where I would make a
book of photographs, but I would connect it to selling
it to benefit something other than me. To the people
(48:45):
who are listening, you would be so lucky to see
the way she sees. So I hope that there is
a universe in which that happens. And that's very kind
of you. I'll do it. I'll do own it a
certain photo, yes, I know, picking up which shall remain
(49:08):
nameless right now. M Here's what I will say as
I'm really this is really the first official podcast recording.
A thank you for being a good friend to all
of our new good friends listening. I hope you find
something in our conversation that helps you connect deeper and
(49:31):
stronger to your good friends, or something in our conversation
that makes you jettison people out of your life. If
all of a sudden you're like, yeah, that's an old
idea of friendship, I'm out, and then um and anywhere
in the middle, And for all of you, you would
(49:53):
all be very lucky to have a friend like Michelle.
So thank you, God, bless you everybody. I love you, Michelle,
and kiss that baby for showing me the way Jamie,
I love you. I love you too. Go kiss your
baby and husband and everyone, stay safe and God bless you. Thanks.
(50:23):
Good Friend is produced by Dylan Fagin and is a
production of I Heart Radio. Our theme song, good Friend
is written, produced, and performed by Emily King. Agative I'm
(50:45):
a good friend. Don't already from a good Friend. For
more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the I heart
Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
If there's something don't already, I'll get it. I'm a
good friend. Hi everybody, it's Jamie Lee Curtis and you're
listening to the Good Friend Podcast, presented to you by
I Heart Radio. It's a podcast about friendship. We talk
(00:22):
about everything, We cry, we laugh, we think about what
it really means to be a good friend. And I
have conversations with some of my best friends, some people
I've never met, and sort of everything in between. So
I hope by the end of it that you have
(00:45):
a really good sense of what friendship means to me
and the people that I consider friends. And I hope
you can take those same ideas into your own friendship groups,
and I hope you enjoy it. I don't know idea
an alcative. I'm a good friend. Good morning, good day,
(01:08):
wherever we are in the the podcast universe together. My
guest today is my friend Michelle Williams. Thank you for
joining the Good Friend Podcast. You are a good friend.
Oh you always have been. I wouldn't have missed it. Yeah. Well,
it's very sweet of you to do. And I know
(01:30):
you are busy because you have recently given birth to
a beating heart of a child. And um, you're in
the middle of raising your now you know, teenage daughter
and your husband and maybe some work. Um, so I
(01:50):
appreciate it. We were unlikely friends. You know, I don't
know about you. Do you when you work on movies
or a TV show or a play for that matter,
do you really connect in with people? Do you often
find that you make a friend? I find that there's
(02:12):
always one person that you take with you. It's one
of the things that I love so much about what
I do is that it is communal, and it's exciting
because there's so many people with so many stories and
so many lives intersecting. And while I feel while I'm
(02:34):
working close in a certain way to everyone, because you're
all engaged in the same pursuit, I find that you
there's always one person that you take with you, and
that really lasts, and that's us. So let's just for
the uninitiated listener. Wherever you are, however you are listening
(02:59):
in this way that you can listen to things in
so many ways and cars and on trips. My husband
falls asleep to podcasts. Please don't fall asleep to this one.
Listen with a sort of invigorated ear rather than one
asking us to put you to sleep, even though I
have my good sort of FM DJ voice on where
(03:20):
it's like, Hi, it's eleven o'clock at night and we're here,
just you and me and Michelle Williams, and we're gonna
put you to sleep. You know, I'm I'm I'm hoping
that you're listening. But for those who do not know,
Michelle and I met on the movie h two oh,
(03:40):
which was the twentieth anniversary of the movie Halloween, And
do you remember sort of when you knew, like, was
there a defining moment in that experience for you where
we where we both went like, hmm, I'd rather hear
(04:01):
it from you first. I have mine. It makes me
like I feel like I'm free falling through time and
space to imagine how many years ago that was. It
was a long time ago. It was twenty two years
ago at least, or maybe even twenty three because them
I only look at my life based on Halloween years
(04:23):
and we just did the anniversary of Halloween were so
that would be twenty three or twenty four years ago.
It's a long time. Wow. You know, I don't know
if I have like a specific memory on set per
se of like when we locked eyes and minds. But I,
(04:49):
you know, I remember the I've been thinking about doing
this for so ever since you asked me. I'm like,
how long is it gonna take me until I start crying?
I cry when I think of you. Almo like, how
how many minutes are we in? Now? Five minutes? I'm like, So,
I don't have like a specific set memory because it
(05:11):
was twenty five years ago. It was a very humanizing
experience for me. You were the the first person to
ask me questions and wonder what I thought and talk
to me with so much dignity and respect and interest,
and I felt like I sort of became a person
(05:32):
instead of just a sort of blob or or an
idea in somebody else's mind. I became like you put
the Michelle in the Michelle. And it's amazing how close
that that experience feels years later. Yeah, well, you see
each other in a way I don't. I can't identify
what it is that you see. That's that is you know, chemistry,
(05:55):
That literally is some sort of magical experience that occurs
when someone sees you. I remember we we connected because
we talked about books. Yeah, we started talking about literature,
and I mean, I know there are people who talk
about maybe more trivial pursuits and get really jacked up
(06:18):
with each other talking about a lip gloss that they love.
And by the way, I'm not denigrating the friendship connection
over a lip gloss if that's what happened. But with us,
what happened was it was literature and that you were
How old were you then, I mean, I don't even know. Ah,
(06:42):
I mean you were young. You were young. I was
really young. Yeah, we're young, and yet you felt very
formed to me, and you had an artistic formation that
was very clear. Um that you you were talking about
writing screenplays, you were talking about producing screenplays, you were
(07:04):
talking about literature. And for me, what happens with friendship
is you do find these connective tissue moments and that's
what you build your relationship on. And for the uninitiated
um or from our new friends listening, when I after
we had worked together on this movie, UM, I believe
(07:25):
I gave you a book as the rap gift. If
I'm not mistaken, I believe it was a first edition
of something that was important. I'm trying to remember which
book it was. But when I visited you in New
York City. You were a young actress. You had been
doing a play on off Broadway. You've been doing Killer
Joe in an unheeded off Broadway theater, the Barrow Street Theater,
(07:49):
in the dead of winter, in a very tough play
by Tracy Letts, um really tough emotional, physical role. You
had done your TV show and now you were in
this freezing cold theater doing eight shows a week in
this brutal park. Really it's brutal. It's it's you are
(08:11):
brutalized in this part. And I remember visiting you in
New York and when I have and by the way,
I have copied you for all of the listeners. Here's
my like decorating Michelle Williams decorating tip. It was a loft.
Space was big, open space, and the entire room was
(08:32):
lined with stacks of books, so not bookshelves. Imagine stacking
on their side about ten books, and then another ten
and then another ten, so that the entire baseboard of
this apartment we're books. And I remember when we walked
(08:52):
in and I saw that. I have copied that since then,
by the way, thank you. But I I remember how
important literature was to you as it is to me,
and for me, that's the friend that's like the beginning
cementing of that friendship. Because let's be honest, I am
much older than you. At the time, I was married
(09:15):
with one no, I was married to children. Um, I
had been married a long time. I was, you know,
living in Los Angeles, and and you were young and
just at the beginning of your career, and you had
had this experience on this show, which obviously brought you
a lot of attention that I don't think you really wanted.
(09:38):
I mean, the nature of the show was it was successful,
and therefore there was a lot of attention. But the
depth of your interest in art and literature was for
me the great glue. It was just the cementing of
how we knew each other. It still is, it is
(09:58):
still and books under my Christmas tree this year. Yes,
and you have allowed me in and I think that's
the great gift of friendship. When you said you had
already started to cry, I woke up crying because you know,
this isn't trivial to me doing the Good Friend podcast.
(10:23):
I'm not going to ask you what moisturizer you wear.
I don't give a What I know is that you've
let me in and in times in your life and
in times in my life that have been incredibly difficult
to navigate, which is just life. Yeah, it's just life.
(10:45):
It's everybody. There's a phrase, you know, everybody gets their
turn in the barrel. H and we're you know you've
been in the barrel. I've been in the barrel our friend,
other friends have been in the barrel. But the the
trust in each other um is what makes me feel safe,
(11:06):
which is why that's to me. To me, if you
boiled down, like if I say the word to you,
good friend, what is the what is what? What does
that conjure up in you? You know? I think a
lot about this because I think about I think about
the friendships that I value most, and I think about
what are the qualities of those friendships and how can
I be the friend that I value to somebody else?
(11:30):
And I think it's the ability to tell a kind
of you know, to tell the truth, to tell the truth,
and to tell it kindly, but to tell the truth
because your friends have an access to you that no
one else does, you know, and they can see what
you're blind to. They can see. You know, we all
(11:51):
have our own inherent blind spots that we just we
are unable to perceive about ourselves, but our friends can.
And when our friends can see that and then kindly
tell us about it, it is it can be life changing.
And I think that some friendships sort of get stuck
in a rut where you don't where you don't tell
those truths because you're afraid of you know, rightly, so
(12:12):
you don't want to hurt your friends feelings. So the
ability to perceive and tell a kind truth is you know,
what feels like a good friendship to me. Ability to travel,
which I think is what you're talking about that I
feel like we've always had, which is the ability to
travel somewhere interior with each other very quickly and with
(12:35):
total trust. And like you said, for some magical chemical reason,
you and I have always been able to do that
from the very beginning. We could travel inside of each
other quickly, efficiently, tenderly. We would just go to deep
places fast. You know, I don't think we've ever had
(12:59):
a conversation about moisturizer or By the way, again, there
are people that that spend a lot of time and
money on moisturizers. And you know, I appreciate that you
can find that content somewhere on the internet. And I'm
sure there are conversations with people talking about moisturizer and
(13:20):
that's groovy. I'm happy. And by the way, you know,
it's an important aspect of your beauty regime. Look, all
of a sudden, you know, commercials for whatever, nameless moisturizer. Yes,
I also think there's an understanding with us. So I
(13:42):
was thinking about it because we have never lived in
this same city. We only get to visit each other
when we are visiting the other city, the other's city,
And at the same time, there are often requirements and
(14:04):
a lot of push me pull use when you're visiting. So,
for instance, you live on the East Coast, when you
come to the West Coast, it's usually work related. It's
not like you are dragging your entire family out to
the West Coast unless you're a working or be that
you're promoting, or you know, the promotion of movies or
(14:28):
television or awardy worlds which bring people to California often,
and you know, it's hard to carve out time for friends,
and because you have a lot of things going on,
and often when you land in Los Angeles, you're really busy.
(14:52):
And by the way, it's not like I'm really busy.
I really wish I could see you. I'm just so busy.
I know what you're busy is. And I think that
is the key, is you see, I know what you're
busy is. And I'm not talking about busy, the other busy,
the other busy with busy, you're beautiful busy. I'm talking
(15:13):
about understanding. Like when you're here and I don't see you,
there is zero on a scale zero attachment two that
I didn't see you. I only know I'm going to
see you when the stars align. It's just the way
(15:36):
it works. We throw out the net. We say to
each other, I'm coming here or coming there, but only
when the stars aligned, when the window opens, when the
thing gets canceled. Because you can make a priority to
see each other, but if you make it too intense
the time constraint, it feels sort of rushed and like, Hi,
(15:57):
I really love you, I really love you. Just what's
going on with a Oh, I gotta go, And it
doesn't have the same depth of contact. And so my
experience with you is that when we make that space.
When the universe allows the space, when our family life
(16:19):
allows the space, it it happens. And I think that's
a big part of being a good friend is giving
people space m hm, overwhelming expectation and in a way
disappointing colin need. I personally always feel I am um
(16:44):
not satisfying that person's need for the contact. And you've
never with us as far as I can tell, And
even if we had had a conflict over it, I
would talk about it here with you because it would
be open and honest. But my experience with you is
that we hope the universe allows us the time together.
(17:07):
The universe being a combination of our family lives, our
work lives, our spiritual lives, um allowing it, and I
am so much better for those contacts. I'm a good friend.
We'll be right back with more good friend after this
(17:29):
quick break, So stick around, friend, I don't That's the
thing about a podcast is interesting with particularly with people
that you genuinely love, is that the reason I will
(17:51):
never write a book is because I don't want to
betray the confidences, the intimate confidence that I've had with people. Yeah,
for strangers, for the consumption of strangers to what understand
(18:13):
me a little better. So there are things that have
occurred between the two of us that will obviously remain
between the two of us. And we can speak in
a more sort of theoretical level. Because I write books
for children, and I I would like to say I'm
child friendly, wild centric, child friendly. Many of the listeners
(18:37):
would say I'm just immature. I would say that. They
might say it. They might say it. But when you've
been apparent twice and at at very different times, very different,
with very different circumstances, very different I I just I'm
(19:01):
seeing these flashes like I'm having like a near I
don't want to call it in your dad, but I'm
having like a near something friendship flashing in the past
of like moment after moment after a moment of these
really full times and like and there you are and
(19:21):
there you are, and you said that, and I took
it with me and you said that, and I took
it with me. Like it's funny because our lives don't intersect,
like you were saying, because we live in different places.
But when I think about the like major events of
my life, there you are. It's really astounding, which might
also be a virtue of the fact that we because
(19:42):
we don't get to spend you know, idle afternoons together,
that when we are together, it just it goes to
like the the deepest place that we can mutually explore together,
and that we've always been interested in that too, that
we've always wanted to go find that like deep, dark,
(20:07):
sacred secret place together, and that, to me is what
friendship really is about. It is really that level of
trust and compassion because regardless I don't care if this
is a women's friendship show or it doesn't matter, we
(20:29):
are humans, and every human I know, there's not one
that hasn't had very difficult times, and for me it
would be trivial anything more than you. There's never been
a time we have not wept together because we feel safe.
(20:51):
And really what I've wanted I want safety. I want
safety from you with you, and you have graced me
with some safety stuff. And what happens is when someone
(21:11):
gives you that gift of trust, you feel trust worthy.
You You can't say you're trustworthy unless you've been given
a trust, unless you've carried someone's secret, you've carried someone's grief,
(21:34):
you've carried someone's um joy excitement. That's to me, what's
the yummy, delicious, satisfying aspect of a friendship? Our friendship,
you know, tears rolling down my my face, sort of snuffling.
(21:59):
But that's how it feels, and that's how it has
felt with you, UM from the very beginning. UM. I
do want to ask you a couple of questions about
your earlier life, because so many people's friendships get formed
in their early life. Like you grew up in Montana, right,
I grew up in Montana, and then we moved to
(22:20):
San Diego, and then I moved to Los Angeles, and
then I moved to North Carolina. When I got Dawson's Creek, right,
and you were little, we were just a wee girl.
Do you still have those friendships? Do you are there
people that you were you able to go into that
(22:40):
or was it more just sort of what I'd like
to refer it as kids do parallel play? You know,
because I left school when I was so young. I
I stopped attending any kind of traditional school setting when
I was I don't fourteen fifteen or something, so I
(23:03):
don't have early friendships. I was thinking this morning, I
was thinking, are you my oldest friend, and you are
my second oldest friend. My first friend was Mary Beth Peel,
who played Grahams on Dawson's Creek. She was my first
friend and we are still friends. So I didn't really
(23:25):
start to cement relationships until I was sixteen. Is that
how old you were when you made that show? I was, Um,
I was sixteen. Yes, I was sixteen at the front door. Sixteen.
At that point, I had been emancipated and I had
graduated high school so I could work as an adult
(23:48):
and I didn't have to have a set teacher or
a guardian because those things cost extra money and they
can't work you as long hours. So, um, you know,
I was. I was. I was sixteen when I started
that show, and you know, as I just said, like,
not a friend in the world. Um. And and then
I met Mary Beth and she would talk to me
(24:08):
about a place called New York City where people did
plays and read books and saw black and white movies.
And I just thought like, oh, I'll go there, I'll
go there. But it was a pretty lonely, a lonely
life until then. Honestly, Well, and you're a performer, you're
(24:30):
an actor, you're an artist, you're a writer. None of
that comes from I don't think. I don't think I've
ever met an artist who didn't feel that tremendous amount
of loneliness, that sadness, that yearning. Thank you. I'm looking
(24:56):
up at a tree and oak tree as I was
looking for the word yearning. That's exactly right. It's a
yearning for contact, for creativity, for understanding. I want to
be understood, you know. I'm I've entered a period of
my life now where I am like, if not now, when,
(25:19):
if not me, who I am here? I am going
to die sooner than later? I mean, it's it's if
I wrote a book, which I'm never going to do.
I've already expressed during this podcast. Sooner than later is
(25:40):
the name of the book today. If I'm writing a
book today, it's called sooner than later. And so I
have no time to waste none. And I have been
looking and yearning for that contact with people my whole life,
(26:03):
and it's just rare to find it. There are people
I know who are best friends with the people they
knew in kindergarten all the way through grade school, college
work kids. There I see pictures of these people. Everybody
has arms around each other and they're smiling and laughing
and having the best time. And I'm just not that person.
(26:31):
If you see photographs of me as a baby, and
I'm going to put them up on some website for
I Heart Radio, so don't go looking now. But every
photograph of me, I looks done. Me too, mean too,
I'm always alone and completely forlorn. Yeah, I'm I have
this look on my face as if someone just shouted
(26:55):
from the other room. Jamie and I have this look
of like what what what I'm I'm I am? I
look shocked. And that doesn't mean I didn't have loving
people around me. And I have an older sister, and
(27:18):
although we are very different, you know we you know,
I had an ally, you know, I'm I was lucky
enough to have an ally, a real ally, someone who
who I could go what am I crazy? Like? You know,
so that there's a little feedback there which is so valuable. Um.
(27:40):
But finding a friend, as you said, sort of an
unexpected friend I didn't expect when I showed up that
first day on that movie. There were seven eight, nineteen
years old. I mean, it was just not what I expected,
and it was thrilling. I want to mind you out
(28:03):
Edward Popper. Of course, Oh I know, Oh I know right, No,
I bet that I still have that treatment. Yes, like
old notes and when we used to write things in
my hand. Remember you you got me to get my
first computer. Oh well, the reason is again for the listener.
(28:25):
I know we're having a conversation, but since there are
people listening in so it's a long story. But a
friend of mine named John Boorman made a movie. It
was part of I think the BBC did a bunch
of these individual movies about works of art, and the
(28:50):
idea was that you took up piece of art and
then you wrote a narrative around that piece of art
that painting. And John did the two Nudes bathing photograph photograph.
Excuse me, everybody, the painting where two women are in
a bath and one is looking toward the camera, I
(29:13):
mean towards the painter and one of them is pinching
the nipple of the one sitting next to her, and
John Boorman created an entire wonderful movie about that painting.
And you and I we're looking at a painting by
Edward Hopper, and you said, I'm going to write a movie.
(29:38):
I have an idea in my head about that story
of that painting. Do you remember that whole you had
told me, the story of your friend and so you together.
I don't even think I couldn't credit myself with the idea.
You were like, you should make this world come alive.
Wasn't it the want of the woman coming down the stairs?
(29:58):
Down the stairs? Yeah? The paintings, there's just so much
about isolation. Yeah, yes they are not. Those are not
paintings of a bunch of happy people with their arms
over their shoulders, throwing up the Shaka symbol, you know,
(30:21):
but you know they are people in isolation, in an
internal moment of something. And it's what great art does,
is that it pulls you in, it makes you relate.
And I remember thinking again that you were twenty years
(30:45):
old at this point and you were going to go
write a screenplay like that. The level of your artistic
commitment when we met so again, it was a young
woman who we met on a movie. And I too,
By the way, don't I'm lucky if I walk away
(31:09):
from a job with a real contact. One of my
my friend Rick Frank, who died um He and his
husband both died of AIDS when they were forty and
forty one. But Rick and I connected when we did
(31:29):
this TV show called Anything But Love, and it's so
rare for me. So it was rare for me on
a you know, a horror movie set in the school.
There were a lot of people running around. It was.
There was a lot of pressure on on the movie.
It was a sequel, so there was intense pressure on everybody.
(31:52):
Do you remember they reshot the mask. We got two
weeks of the mask because they didn't like the way
the mask. But I just I'm I was taken by
the depth of feeling that we had so quickly on
that movie. Look and find each other like that though,
(32:13):
Isn't it like I always used to think about it.
It's like having antenna. You know that you're you, haven't
You have these little sensory particles that are sort of
out in front of you, and you're able to identify
others like you. Now. You also have had a very
full life. You've had a full personal life and a
(32:35):
professional life. I got to see you do cabaret. You
like to mix it up, you know, Fossey Verden as
you know, as we spoke, Although I didn't know Gwen.
Gwen was a version of my mother. Gwen was a
version of women like my mother, these professional women in
(33:00):
that time. Gwen was a redhead. My mother was an
auburn head originally, and the like time war head snap
for me with that work was crazy town. Did you
see manc No, Okay, I know what it is that. Yeah,
(33:20):
I mean it's it's but it's from that time and
place and here we are in and it's always challenging
to see other times and places being recreated with the
language and the verbiage and the way words were were
(33:41):
thrown around, and it's more and more challenging to really
feel that their similitude of time and place completely. And
it was exciting for me. But I went on I sorry,
I went on a I went down the MW rabble professionally.
(34:03):
But the point I was trying to make was simply
that you also now are married, and you have raised
or are raising two children, and there are friendships that
you also make with your children. As the conduit, I
have made a lot of friends because of the bravery
(34:24):
of my daughter. Yeah. Um, we had the same Eiggs
BacT thing in England when I went to make the
sequel to a fish called Wanda. And we rented a
little house on Caduggan Square. And the first day, you know,
(34:45):
you were told there's a key to the garden, and
you know, only the people who live on the square
get to go into the garden. And I remember we
arrived and we went into the garden and Annie, you know,
sort of ran off. There were a group of kids.
When she came back, she introduced me to her friend
(35:05):
and I said to her, where do you live? And
she said, sixty nine Cadugan Garden. And I said, oh,
that's so funny. We've just rented the house at sixty
nine a Cadugan Garden. And what happened is they went
(35:26):
home to her house, we went to ours, and our
houses literally faced each other with an eight ft little courtyard,
and Rachel and my daughter, Annie and Susan, her mother,
and I. Okay, Susan and I became a lifelong friend.
(35:50):
Mary Anne, her older sister, became very much the relationship
that you and I had. Marianne, I think was fifth team.
And we were so into Courtney love that it was crazy.
And Annie and Rachel went to the same school and
(36:15):
we created we took a piece of PVC pipe and
extended it across the courtyard, and we had a basket
and we would send things. We lived. We could look
in their window and it was all because Annie brought
these people to me. And that's what happens in friendship.
(36:39):
I think many people listening can relate that the children
bring the parents, and then the parents and the other
parents kind of start to dance with each other a
little and see if the pieces fit. And that can
be a really lovely aspect because, as you said, you
(37:01):
travel so much, and now you have a new baby,
and now you're going to have that whole and a
little boy baby by the way, very but you're going
to have that wonderful experience with the friendships that you
will make as he grows up, as you and your
(37:22):
husband meet other people in the park, and those friendships
that are going to be built. And it's such a joy,
isn't it When you're when you are with your friend
and you are watching your children interact with each other.
You know, it's like two greatest joys in life, these
(37:42):
relationships and to sort of and to have them to
be in them at the same time. In your adult relationships,
and and in your relationships as a parent, and in
the children and their relationships as friends. It's like it's
a great joy and it's when I really miss you
know after this year, strange year, strange strange year. So
(38:06):
I'm the if not now, when, if not me, who
I'm going to die soon, sooner than later. I'm on
the book tour right now. This is the Those are
words to live by. Do you find you have to
let go of people again? I'm not trying to get
you know. Maybe your friends are gonna listen, Maybe my
friends are gonna listen. So be careful hard to do
(38:29):
a good friend podcast because you're gonna talk about friendship
and a lot of the people that you know might
be listening. But I find my experience talking to people
is that there are old ideas and new ideas, and
that a lot of friendships cling to the old idea
(38:51):
of the friendship, and that they don't metamorphous size, they
don't shed the skin of the old idea and move
into a new idea. Um can you relate to that
at all? I can? I have I'll have another motto,
which is rejection is protection. And so when a friendship fades,
(39:12):
I I choose to believe that it's it's in the
best interest of both of our personal growth. And I
have lost a couple of friendships and it's very painful.
But I also I'm quick to let go of things.
My husband always says, the oceans arising, the oceans arising,
(39:34):
and so we're very quick to let go of you know,
so small things really don't bother me. Um, and I
really do believe that, you know, everyone is doing their
version of their best, and so I don't really second
guess people's motivations or choices or you know, everyone makes
sense to themselves. If they don't make sense to me,
(39:55):
that's fine. But I read something that really had i
a profound impact on my life, and it was an
article talking about how sometimes a few times in your life,
it's important to make choices based on who you want
to be, not on who you think you are, and
because if you just make a series of choices based
(40:16):
on who you think you are, you're going to miss
out on a few big growth opportunities because you say
to yourself, well, I'm I'm not the kind of person
who would ever do X, Y and Z, because I'm
the kind of person who does A, B and C.
And you building on this idea of yourself that a
few times in your life you have to break from
(40:38):
and say, I'm not going to be that person anymore.
But you have to make a conscious effort and think
about who you want to become and make a decision
in that direction. Something good friend. We'll be right back
with more good friend after this quick break, now that
(41:05):
we're swapping mottos um. There's a wonderful novel called Special
Topics in Calamity Physics by Mauritia Pestl, And in the
middle of this book it talks about the planning of
our lives. You know, we think this is how life
is supposed to go. You're supposed to do this, then
(41:27):
you're supposed to do this, then you're supposed to get
this job. And in the middle of this book she
says it's not true. She said, life hinges on a
couple of seconds you never see coming, and what you
decide in those seconds determines everything from then on, and
you won't know what you're going to do until you're there.
(41:52):
It's a partner of what you just said, which is
we have to be open. We can't be calcified. Closed people.
We just can't. We can't as artists, we can't as parents,
we can't as partners, and we certainly can't as friends.
(42:16):
And therefore you have to be able to. As you said,
the oceans are rising, it's some have to go. Yeah,
and you know you. I started crying before we started talking.
I was crying this morning thinking about talking to you,
remembering some moments in our lives together, and then you
(42:39):
got me going again just now when you said we're
all trying the best we can. That's so human to me.
That's so at the core of friendship. That's why when
friends put on each other those feelings of like my
(43:02):
feelings are hurt or I don't not getting enough of you,
or I didn't hear from you, and you talk to
them and they're like, oh hi, and that oh hi
really means oh you haven't called me in a month
exactly how are you? And the minute I hear it, yeah,
I realized they don't know me. Yes, because they don't
(43:26):
trust me, don't trust that I am doing my absolute
best in every moment and if that includes them, yes great,
and if it doesn't, it doesn't diminish them. It's not
personal it's not personal, but people take it so darn personally.
(43:50):
And that's I think really the way that we can
now end this conversation, because what it started with and
it will end with, is that that we may not
live in the same place. I may not get to
watch your son become a man, I may not have access,
(44:15):
I may not be in the path of that experience,
but it doesn't mean I can't be your friend and
cheer you on along the way and be there should
you need some support about something, and that I don't
(44:36):
want more from you than I get, and I'm so
happy to have what I have with you because it's
such an integral part of my life, and I love you.
I love you too. I think that we also trust
(44:57):
that even when we aren't there in the same phy
sical space, that we carry ideas of each other and
memories of each other and words from each other and
intentions from each other, that people exist in our minds
and in our hearts and in our daily lives without
seeing them. Like you have had an impact, there is
(45:21):
a shadow of you. Well you your impact is in
my life. Your spirit is in my life. You have
a very strong spirit. I'm sure it's in many people's lives,
Like I can't imagine how many people attribute something to you,
you know, attribute something that they've made, something that they've created,
(45:42):
a way that they've parented, a way that they've been honest,
like you must be everywhere. You taught me how to
sue the baby. You taught me with Matilda. You know,
every time I pat my baby, I'm doing the Jamie well,
but by the way, there is no doing the Jamie
(46:03):
because of course Jamie learned it from somebody else. It's
how the the beautiful connective tissue of people and experiences
and being open to it. And what I will say
to you is that I am better. I am just
better being able to call you my friend. And you
(46:24):
know it's all of a sudden, Carol King and James Taylor,
you know you call out my name, you know wherever
I am will come running. I mean it's that Thank you,
Carol for that, because that's how I feel. And I'm
we the community of strangers listening to this today will
(46:50):
and have taken some of this and will employ it
into their own apply it, employ it. I'm like into
jobs or like employee employee? What what? What can I
ask you? A question. Of course you can't. We've discussed
that you won't publish a book, But would you have
(47:11):
a publish a book of your photographs? You're a nice
girl to ask me that. Um No, here's why. Um,
there's no need. You know, the way you publish a
book of photographs is for charity. So if there was
a universe, that made sense to me to publish volumes
(47:35):
of the book of photographs, but I would give one
hu to Children's Hospital Los Angeles, because the one thing
I must tell you is I you know it's the
other quote, by the way, we all live by all
these effing quotes, So don't hate me people, but you
know it's from the Princess Bride, which is really the
(47:56):
one I live by, which is life is pain highness.
And anyone who says differently is selling something. You know,
I sell a lot. I'm a seller. I'm a really
good seller. And what I don't want to do is
have to sell the artistic parts of me that are me,
(48:20):
that are mine and for me. The concern I have
is that I would have to then go sell it
and turn it into commerce. Now there could be a
world I can't imagine I'll ever pull it off. But
there could be a world where I would make a
book of photographs, but I would connect it to selling
it to benefit something other than me. To the people
(48:45):
who are listening, you would be so lucky to see
the way she sees. So I hope that there is
a universe in which that happens. And that's very kind
of you. I'll do it. I'll do own it a
certain photo, yes, I know, picking up which shall remain
(49:08):
nameless right now. M Here's what I will say as
I'm really this is really the first official podcast recording.
A thank you for being a good friend to all
of our new good friends listening. I hope you find
something in our conversation that helps you connect deeper and
(49:31):
stronger to your good friends, or something in our conversation
that makes you jettison people out of your life. If
all of a sudden you're like, yeah, that's an old
idea of friendship, I'm out, and then um and anywhere
in the middle, And for all of you, you would
(49:53):
all be very lucky to have a friend like Michelle.
So thank you, God, bless you everybody. I love you, Michelle,
and kiss that baby for showing me the way Jamie,
I love you. I love you too. Go kiss your
baby and husband and everyone, stay safe and God bless you. Thanks.
(50:23):
Good Friend is produced by Dylan Fagin and is a
production of I Heart Radio. Our theme song, good Friend
is written, produced, and performed by Emily King. Agative I'm
(50:45):
a good friend. Don't already from a good Friend. For
more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the I heart
Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Nikki Glaser Podcast
Every week comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced, and brutally honest look into current pop-culture and her own personal life.