April 6, 2022 • 35 mins
On this week’s episode, Laverne shares how she stepped into the (tennis) shoes of Anna Delvey’s trainer and life coach, Kacy Duke. Laverne has all kinds of fun stories to tell about how she prepared for the role, like how she had to digitize Kacy’s old fitness workout VHS tapes, and her four hour lunch with Kacy in New York. During that lunch, Kacy told Laverne her entire life story and Laverne found out that they actually have a surprising amount in common, primarily that they are both bad b*****s!! But also that they both have a strong connection to something larger than themselves.
Stacey and Laverne dig into key Kacy-moments from the show and explore Kacy’s relationship with Anna, Rachel, and Neff. Centered around the series, Laverne explores themes of feminism and solidarity among women. She reflects on Kacy’s life and shares how this role has changed her.
To catch up before you listen, make sure you binge Inventing Anna the series on Netflix now.
Please rate, review, subscribe and share Inventing Anna: The Official Podcast with everyone you know.
Follow Laverne Cox @lavernecox and host Stacey Wilson Hunt @galinhollywood on Instagram and Twitter.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Inventing Anna the Official Podcast is a production of Shondaland
Audio in partnership with I Heart Radio. Welcome to Inventing
Anna the Official Podcast, your exclusive look inside the making
of the Shondaland series on Netflix. I'm your host Stacy
Wilson Hunt and Today on the show, I talked trauma, mantros,
(00:22):
and feminism with Emmy winner Laverne Cox, who plays Casey Duke,
Anna's personal trainer. Laverne digs into how she overcame initial
skepticism of her character's unbridled positivity and how Casey Duke
became not only her friend but a continued inspiration. Oh
and she also sings for us. More on that a
bit later. Hi, Laverne, It's so nice to have you
(00:50):
on the podcast. How are you good. It's nice to
be interviewed again. I've been doing the interviewing um a
lot lately. That's the other end. Yes, that's true. Now
you know how hard this job is, right, Yes? I do.
And I'm just generally speaking. How have you seen Inventing
Anna received in your world? It's really created a lot
of buzz, a lot of conversation. What's it felt like
(01:11):
on Urine it's felt magical. If I have to be honest,
I think we would number one on Netflix for two weeks. Yes,
very very much, most viewed show in a week in
Netflix history. That's incredible. I've gotten messages from people I
haven't heard from in years who are watching and loving
the show and loving my character. The best thing has
(01:31):
been Casey's response. She sent me flowers after she saw
the whole series, and this has been so complimentary. She said,
I killed it. One of her friends, apparently of twenty years,
tweeted me saying that they've known Casey for twenty years
and said, I nailed it. And so that has been,
um the most gratifying part of this. I felt a
(01:53):
lot of pressure playing a real life person and a
lot of responsibility to have or be happy to have
her friends and people who love her see Casey in
my portrayal is really the highest compliment. So yeah, everything
else is kind of gravy, but it's just it's beautiful
that people are watching, and I love the discussions that
(02:14):
are coming up around it. People are just having a
lot of fun with it too. There's memes and there's
you know, YouTube channels and think pieces and it's just
it's wonderful. It's absolutely wonderful that this show his started
a cultural conversation or continued one, or is gotten people
thinking and talking in such interesting and diverse ways. It's
(02:35):
very exciting. I agree. And and this show is special
in the sense that there's enough levity where we can
create memes and have fun with it, but then they're
also at the heart of the story or serious conversation starters.
And in terms of how you captured Casey, we had
her on the show. She is really fantastic human being,
and I'd love to know, firstly, tell me your impressions
(02:56):
of her when you first met that pressure that you
felt when you thought, Okay, here's this person. I have
to find a way to embody her, but also leave
room for my own invention on screen. What did you
first think of her when you met? It was interesting
because when I by the time I finally met Casey,
I had watched hours a video of her. What's beautiful
(03:16):
about YouTube is that there's this plethora of information on people.
And she has been a trainer, you know, for thirty years,
and there's workout videos of her on YouTube. I actually, um,
oh my god, what was it called? I forget what
it's called. She to workout video that's only available on VHS,
and I found it on Amazon and ordered it, and
I didn't had to find a VHS player, but I did.
(03:39):
I couldn't, so I got the VHS transfer to digital
so I could watch the workout tape and so and
then she had been interviewed by the Writer's Room, So
there was like, I think an hour long interview that
I got. I watched. I watched tons of video of
Casey before I met her, and so I had ideas.
(04:00):
And then I met her, and she was so so effervescent,
you know, and Elwood says, and um, the first legally
blonde that, like, you know, she couldn't kill someone. People
who work out have endorphins. They don't kill people. I
was thinking that, like, you know, Casey, because she works
that all the time, she has other endorphins, and so
she was just so like energetic and positive and effervescent.
(04:22):
She was like, is actually effervescent? She really is, And
there could be something to that endorphin theory because she's
constantly high on life. Yeah yeah, And I mean she's
working all the time. And I met her in the
lobby of her building, and then just her the way
she related to the door people, and she's just so
kind to everyone. And then you know, we worked out together.
(04:44):
But then it was interesting after we left the workout
and we went we were going to lunch together, and
everyone knew her. They're like, Hi, Casey, We're walking down
the street and she's so friendly, and I'm very like,
I don't talk to strangers, you know, in the street.
I'm very sort of protected and very to leave me alone,
and I'm very boundary. But Casey's just out and just
(05:06):
happy and people know her and people were saying hi,
like everyone, how you doing, And she's like, hey, there
was these relationships with just people like just as she's
just walking to Hala taxi and then the restaurant we
went to, everyone knew were there and it was so lovely.
And so it was just interesting feeling like the effervescence
(05:26):
of this woman who just has this positivity that like
surrounds her and that she's obviously putting on and like
it was it was coming back to her. It's just
interesting watching the positivity come back to her that she's
obviously been putting out and earned. There are many fascinating things.
I mean, I just and then we had a four
hour lunch where we where she told me her life stories.
(05:48):
What did you guys eat at this four hour lunch?
Because she spoke about it too, and I wanted to know,
what are you eating at this lunch? You know, she's
very fitness conscious. I think she had like she had
a salad. I think in some fish. She had like
fish and a salad. I had approached because I'm not
doing fish right now. I think I had like a
steak or something. And then there was there was white wine,
of course, obviously because the people at the restaurant know
(06:12):
she knows the owners. They were very generous and they
kept refilling. I think she needed, you know, some liquid
courage to go where she went. In our conversation, she
was very it was raw. It was very encompassing. Like
we started with her childhood. We started with her love
of dance that you know, turned into her love for fitness.
(06:34):
We talked about her first marriage and moving to Europe
and when we went and we talked about her her mother,
and we talked about there are a lot of things
that feel personal that I just would never feel comfortable sharing.
But she it was very very intimate and very real,
and I'm really grateful for that, because there were moments.
She's been through some things, she's had a life, and
(06:56):
it's effervescent in as positive is she as She's had
a challenging life, and she's been through some things, and
there was so many beautiful moments that she shared. It's
just such an honor. I don't know why I'm getting emotionally,
she says, an honor for someone to um to sit
with you and share so much, well, to trust you
(07:16):
with it too, I think, to trust me with it.
It just feels very there's nothing very sacred about it,
and I'm just I'm really honored. I'm very honored that
she trusted me and she shared all of that and
I used it in the work. He was invaluable. It
was invaluable that conversation. How much of what you heard
Casey share resonated with you and your experiences? You're someone
(07:36):
I think a lot of us look to for wisdom
and inspiration. You've been very open about your own struggles
and feeling comfortable with yourself now at the stage of
your life. How much of what she shared did you feel, Gosh,
I really understand that a very organic intersection is Casey spirituality.
(07:56):
Casey's understanding that there is an energy that bigger than her.
To you, she talks about the universe, and so that
to me that I feel that, I feel like I'm
in the core of who I am. Casey has done
a lot of work to be in a healed space,
and I've done a lot of work to be in
a healed space. It's done a lot of work to
(08:18):
not be reactive, to find the lesson in something, to
be of service. Casey's life is service, really, it really is.
And so Casey more so than me, I'm trying to
be a little more selfish and a little more because
I've given so much sometimes that I haven't had anything
left for myself. And I think Casey has been there too.
(08:42):
I think that's part of how she ended up in
this situation with Anna, that she gives once she takes
on a client. I don't want to say it looks
like her children, but sort of. You know, she's very
she wants people to win, and she wants to be there,
and she wants to be a service. And I think
she and I both have in common that we've been
(09:03):
in situations where we want to be of service so badly,
and we allow people with not the best of intention
to take advantage of that right, and you do open
yourself up to be sapped a little bit of your
own strength because you're giving, giving, giving, And when she
talked about her approach to training, isn't just about losing
(09:24):
weight or getting fit. She's targeting the whole person, the
holistic experience. It's about mindset, motivation, movement. And the mindset
is you know, how you think about yourself, what is
your relationship to your body? That that changing the reframing,
you know, instead of I hate this about myself, this
is the thing I want to work on, but I
(09:44):
have to love this. And then motivation what gets me
out of out of bed every day to do it?
And then finally the movement. Um, I'm sorry, I like it.
Spent a lot of time with crazy stuff. We're taking
a short break, but please stay too, and hey, thanks
(10:09):
for sticking around. Now back to the interview. It's interesting,
there's a there's a lot of Overlapman, how are you
approach acting how she approaches training. It's not just this
mental exercise, it's a full body investment. So tell me
when you invested your own body and becoming fit for
(10:30):
this part, which you have said you've never had a
role where you had to be physically fit because you're
playing a trainer. How are you using some of her
approach to approach your own fitness, which was probably pretty rigorous.
I'm guessing what was interesting for me about I mean,
it just be really real. I kind of got lucky.
I got um. I haven't talked about this publicly. I
(10:52):
got sick at the end of twenty eighteen and just
ated losing weight. And I just started losing weight, Like
I lost fifteen pounds in a month, and I was
really ill. That's scary. I was tested for everything, and
we figured out what was going on. And I won't
say publicly, but I got really sick and I just
started losing weight. And the weird thing about losing weight
(11:16):
is that, for me and probably for a lot of
women and some men as well, is that like, I'm
sick and I'm losing weight and I don't have no
idea why, and I'm not really doing anything. And I
also was loving losing weight because clothes were fitting better.
And I mean twenty nineteen was the first year I
(11:37):
was able to wear samples to the Emmys. For example,
I was we still had to alter with the samples.
I didn't get that skinny, I mean skinny for me.
But so when I started working on Casey, I was
getting better, but I lost all this weight. And so
when I had trained with Casey, it was really about toning.
So I took some of Casey's exercises. Casey is about
you know, muscle fiber targeting, you know, and toning and
(12:01):
lengthening and elongating, having sine with muscles, you know. I
watched her workout videos obviously trained with her. So I
was going to work out in the gym here and
I was going back and forth. And then when when
I was traveling a lot, I was just it became
easier to just have weights. So I started traveling with
weights in my luggage. I had five in tin pound weights.
That's probably pretty heavy. No, yes, I wasn't carrying like
(12:25):
we have drivers caring the luggage. You know, people at
the airport they're like what do you have in here?
We're like waits, and I'm like um. So I started
traveling with five and tin pound weights, and so I
would do wake up and do a little cardio and
then I really started. I really went in on weights
and like a lot of stomach stuff, a lot of stretching.
(12:46):
I was really obsessed with, like abs, like case these
abs are like insane. So and then but it became
part of the character. I just remember being in Morocco
and like waking up and doing weights, and it just
like it just felt like Casey, Like this is what
Casey would do, you know, like she it felt very
I've never like worked out that much, you know, like
(13:07):
just really like except when I was dancing back in
the day, when I was dancing six hours a day,
but as an adult, I've never consistently woken up and
done weights and at lunch doing weights, and at night
before bed like doing weights. Like it was that kind
of thing. So I think I don't think it was
about It wasn't about how I looked it. Really. I
(13:27):
think it was just about that kind of um because
I with a sports psychologists as well, because there was
a part of me. It's very important for actress not
to judge our characters, so it was a part of
me that was a little bit in judgment of like
Casey's positivity and her effervescence, right her and right, I
was gonna ask you about that. How did you get
over that skepticism? Initially, I remember something Casey said to me.
(13:49):
She did bigness competitions when she was younger, and I
just started to think of her. I mean, she's, you know,
sixty five years sixty six years old now and in
impectable shape. And I was like, oh, she's an elite athlete.
This is a woman who's an elite athlete. Elite athletes
have a different mindset. I found a sports psychologist. I
had a recommendation from my therapist and found the sports psychologist.
(14:09):
We did like three sessions and I really just kind
of wanted to get a sense of like how elite
athletes think and what their process is like. And that
really got me over the hump. I was just like,
this woman is an asks an athlete. You have to
have a mindset that is positive, that is affirming, that
(14:29):
motivates you. There's really no time to like spend too
much time in negativity or cynicism or because I have
I'm kind of cynical. Um, there's no time for that.
Really when you're training, when you have to make physical
goals and right either you you know, stick the landing
or you don't. Either you make the basket or you
whatever the sport is, you know, you hit the ace
(14:51):
or you don't. In tennis, that sports psychology piece really
helped me just like go in and just be like,
this is what it is, without judgment. I love that,
and I also just want to say I'm glad you're better.
Even though it's fun to lose weight, and where smaller
size clothing, health is number one. So and what was
Steve too is that people were like, girl, you're losing weight,
you look sickly, you look snatched online and I was
(15:13):
just like wow, And I didn't say anything at the time,
and it was just really interesting how we celebrate people
being thick and we don't know we just celebrate weight loss,
and we don't know what people are going through when
they're losing weight. I know I think about this a lot,
and I always try to compliment people if I've sense
that they look thinner, I'll say you look very fit
or you look healthy. I really try to stay away
(15:33):
from those quote unquote compliments because they we don't know
what's going on with someone. So thank you for sharing
your story. I'd like to talk about Casey's dynamic with Anna,
which obviously is so complex and transactional in nature we
come to see throughout the show. How much of that
aspect of their relationship do you think blinded Casey to
(15:54):
Anna and her real intentions. Obviously, the you know, the
first deposit, the check cleared, she out of package of
workout sessions. So that cleared, So she was like, okay,
well I got my money, you know, for that first session,
the only money she got. And so there was that piece,
and then she just saw this spoiled girl who she
assumed was an heiress. But she had this great idea.
(16:18):
What Casey said to me is that, you know, I
liked she didn't wanted to be an Instagram model, that
she wanted to build a business, and so let's help
her because it's I mean, the it's the workout piece,
but it's also months at motivation movement, and it's all
connected for Casey. For Casey, it's like, this is my job.
So she's I've been asked to go to Morocco to
train people. It is not unusual for Casey to be
(16:40):
flown places to train folks. She told me this wonderful
story about when um I think it was the year.
I think that didn't Sel Washington won the Oscar for
training day because you know, she trained, didn't sell and
mini movies. They had flown her out to Los Angeles
and put her up at the Sunset Tower. And she
said she had five Oscar nominees that she had didn't
sell Julian or Diane Lane, oh my god, and somebody
(17:03):
else I forget. So they put her up at the
Sunset Tower when she was training people. So this is
her life, you know, her traveling to train clients is
none of this is unusual. So I think for Casey
she wanted to be of service. Once she takes on someone,
she wants the best for you. She like genuinely wants that.
And she really wanted that for Anna. And I think
(17:25):
the moment when um Anna ends up, you know, sleeping
over her apartment that night, she couldn't possibly let her
that girl go. What if she harmed herself. It's very intense,
and like obviously people like Anna manipulate people and play
on their feelings and play on their find their weakness
and Casey's weaknesses that she wants to help people. She
wants to be of service, so right, which can be
(17:48):
a wonderful quality, but it really does open you up
to potential harm. Yeah, but what is beautiful. We see
in this series that Casey was able to set boundaries.
Casey was able to be like, okay, wait, no, yes, okay,
it gets to a point Casey and I had this
in comment too, it can get to a point where
I'm okay, no, we're saying them boundaries here right. There's
(18:10):
this great scene in episode two, which of course we're
jumping back and forth and in the time continuum, and
this is when Casey is telling Nef about setting her
own boundaries when Anna's in prison, and she's saying, you know,
the person who's sitting at Rikers is not the person
we thought we knew, and Adelphi doesn't exist. That person
new Rikers is somebody else, somebody who was pretending to
(18:32):
be an Adelphi. And it seems like for even though
we haven't seen the full trajectory of Casey's story yet,
we sense early on, oh, this woman is kind of
having to teach the younger women to not be so trusting.
Tell me about that interplay between Casey and Nothing. That scene,
it was such a juicy scene for me. That person
sitting and its sale maybe a made of character. It
(18:54):
was just so it was such good writing and I
just remember prepping the scene with a coach and just
having a lot of fun. And we tried it a
lot of different ways, and um, Tom was so amazing
and directing that scene. I love being directed by actors.
He just gave me such fun things to play with
(19:16):
and try. I have I have no idea which take
they use. This is the fun of doing multiple tastes.
It's like not in my hands anymore. It's just like
it's in the director's, in the editor's hands. So it
was just I had fun preparing, I had fun on
set with it. And I think it may have been
Alexis and I think was our first scene together. She's
(19:37):
just so amazing. What an amazingly talented young woman. Oh
what a joy was just doing scenes with her. And
just I love talent. I really, really really love talent.
I love young talent, you know, young talent that is
fresh but cultivated. She has a skill set, it's not
raw talented, is cultivated talent. She also has an amazing
(19:59):
wisdom and grounded nous. Speaking to her, I felt like
I was speaking to a seasoned, you know, thirty professional.
You do feel that when you talked to her behind
the scene and she played I believe she played violin
as a child. I don't know. Yeah, And she's a musician,
and you can really tell she's a full, full fledged artist.
But the discipline of studying anything classically is so useful
(20:22):
that discipline will serve you, and it served her really well.
She was so professional on set, and she apparently has
perfect pitch, which I am so jealous. She said she
had a perfect pitch and I was like, and I
was saying, I know, because I mean I have sometimes
I have decent relative pitch, like I can usually pull
an app out of my out of my um, yeah,
(20:52):
it was an app for the record everyone. I'm like, okay,
I think I haven't eff in my head, so I
say I think an effort her and I was like,
what note is this? It was brilliant. She was like,
it's fluctuating between E and F shot with the vibrato,
and I was like, work, I'm sorry, I'm a world
(21:17):
class neer and like so many ways. Well, you know,
you may become the casey of acting coaching for the
younger generation, so keep working on that. I see this
as the next phase of your career. I'm obsessed with
the with the craft part of it. I'm obsessed with
the process part of it. So um, I'd love to
(21:37):
talk about episode six, the Morocco episode, which is Casey's
episode and her crazy experience on the quote unquote vacation
that turned out to not be a vacation. There's a
great scene when Casey and No are talking in Casey saying, oh,
you'll have a great experience. The universe provides what you're
meant to have and what are you meant to have?
(21:58):
M hm, three pounds off Anna a vacation and do
you think she was enjoying for the first time in
her life? This idea like I'm just going to be
carefree and feel young for a weekend, not be so
tied down with rigor and discipline, and just sort of
have fun. Casey has fun. No, case of my understanding
(22:21):
and you spoke to her, They of my understanding is
a woman who has fun. The case of my understand
is a woman who enjoys life. So this No, this
is a job Morocco, wonderful, La Mommonia, Wow, gorgeous, But
this is a job for her, and she definitely looks
at it as a job, and that's maybe the dissonance
(22:41):
she feels where she's starting to feel, what is my
role here? You know, she's done some work with Anna,
and she's starting to question what is my interaction with
this person? And maybe that's where it starts to unravel
for her. I think too, it's she's just trying to
make the most of it. I think Casey is like,
this is awkward af a lot. Let's just make the
most of it. I'm here. You know. It's like she's peacemakers.
(23:03):
She's like, let's chill and have fun. Um that this
situation couldn't be paid right obviously, right, it became a
bit untenable for her to even fix. Right. Yeah, Okay, everybody,
We'll be right back right after these messages. Hey, Stacy
(23:30):
here again back to the interview, and one of my
other favorite moments for Casey is in the finale episode
nine called Dangerously Close, where Casey confronts Rachel at the
courthouse about the fact that she concealed her involvement in
(23:51):
Anna's ultimate arrest. I feel used by the police, by
the prosecutor, I feel used by are you thinking you're
some kind of victim in all this taking care of you.
I am a victim in all of this. At least
you get to cry into all that money. It's like
you have plenty leftover even after you pay m it's six.
(24:13):
Oh tell me where you think Casey is in that
moment and how hurt she feels. Even though she understands
Anna has done some bad things, she still almost feels
like Rachel has been the bigger person to hurt in
that moment. Right, Anna was a job an, it was
a job when Rachel was betrayed by Anna. Taking advantage
(24:38):
of by Anna, she became a friend to Casey, and
she became this girl that she needed to be there
for and needed to nurture through this deeply traumatizing moment
in her life. And she was lying to me the
(24:59):
whole time she was lying to me about turning in Anna.
She was lying to me about a book deal Like,
it's just who are you? Like, I don't know who
you are, So you've been this like victim to my face,
crying to me distraught. Meanwhile, you're working with the police,
you're turning and your friend you are exciting you know,
(25:23):
six figure deals. Just tell your story. The credit card
companies paid you up. You haven't told me any of this.
Like it's like we're supposed to be friends. I have
extended myself to you and taken your side in this
and brought in one of my clients to try to
do this intervention for you, and you've been lying to me.
(25:47):
It's a betrayal. That's just like it's the end of
the it's all the whole mess of it. I've been
lied to you by and I've been taking a bandobay
and we pay for an airline ticketing our first class.
She owes me for fitness sessions, like I haven't got
any of that money back, right, I'm trying to be
zen about that. I'm trying to be there for this girl,
(26:08):
and she's lying to me, to everybody. It's like it's
just too much. She had Casey had her name taken
off the story. She's like, I want to be associated
with this. This is bad for business, This is bad karma,
this is bad energy. These girls are toxic, all of them.
I went out at this narrative. What do you mean
I don't want to be in your article? What this
(26:29):
ain't mean? I don't want my clients seeing me in
this negative context. I'm out, like I need to distance
myself from this, and then Rachel sucks her back in
and I'm going to court. Can you imagine? No, I'm
taking time out of my life to go from Hudson
Yards all the way down to the courthouse, you know,
(26:50):
with city Hall to support you, to be there for you.
You can't tell me any of this. It's the shock
of it. It's the bet trail of it. It's just
the it's the how dare you of it? She felt
she was made a fool out of and I think
she could have maybe understand Rachel was distraught, and if
Rachel had just had the courtesy to share with this
(27:13):
person who has been a mentor and a friend of her. Hey,
just so you know, this is an opportunity I have.
Don't judge me, but this is what I need for myself.
I think it's the lack of honesty that feels so hurtful,
and it's in that Casey put herself on the line,
like she when she confronts Neff about the Instagram page,
you know, at her job, and you know, making this
case more public and I could go to prison for
(27:35):
fifteen years and you're worried about Becky's fifteen minutes of shame.
Stop calling me Becky. Okay, Karen, we aren't gonna wait
the funk up and realize you're saying, secretary at her
damn strength, she's like going to somebody's job and confronting
them to defend Rachel, to try to protect Rachel. It's
(27:58):
just like it's Embarras saying, it's like really like going
above and beyond to be there for Rachel, and Rachel
is like girl. And what's too bad too, is as
a woman watching this, I felt, gosh, it's unfortunate when
women try to help each other and build each other
up and then they still can't get hurt. Right. So
(28:20):
there's this idea that just because people are women doesn't
mean that we're always going to have each other's back,
that we always have to be watching not for ourselves,
And just because someone's the same gender as you doesn't
mean that there's a built in trust or I think
that's that goes for race. I think that goes to
so many things. But you know, I think the the
actor in me, the empathetic part of me, is that
hurt people hurt people just because then when it's trans
(28:43):
you know, I can love them. I can love them,
but I can set some boundaries and I can love
them from a distance. And I think, you know, we
want solidarity as women, but I think that we also
have to acknowledge that womanhood is confident with that class
shifts our womanhood. There's no one universal, one woman experienced, class, race,
(29:04):
ex assigned of birth, all of these things. So we
can have solidarity around issues and acknowledge our differences. Right, Like,
I'm very pro choice and I've done a lot of
advocacy for reproductive rights. Right, I'm obviously can't get pregnant,
and it's just part of my values, you know. And
(29:25):
I believe that part of being a feminist is, like
people who can get pregnant, women need to have control
over their bodies. And what I think you're talking about
is how sometimes women tear each other down. How right,
how patriarchy sets sets it up so that we are
fighting each other to divide and conquer thing. And I
think when we can understand that divide and conqueror strategies
(29:47):
are tool of patriarchy or tool of domination culture, then
we can be in solidarity. But we have to. We
can only be in solidarity in truth, right, We can
only be in solidarity when we can behold ourselves like countable.
When I have done something that's not the coolest thing
to a friend of mine, male, female, whatever gender, I
(30:08):
have to be accountable. And then final question, how would
you say that playing this character, playing Casey has changed you?
And what have you taken from her that you now
use or you hear maybe mantras that you learned from her,
And how has she affected you? I mean, there's so
many things, there's so many caseyisms. My favorite though. The
(30:29):
past is our teacher, the presenters our creation, and the
future is our inspiration. So in this present moment we
can create whatever we want. Right, so it encourages us
to be present. The past is our teacher. Learn from that.
Learn from the past, but like, don't get too caught
up in it, don't get stuck there, because in this
(30:51):
present moment, in our creation, we can heal, We can
create healing. We can create a new future inspired by
the future, inspired by the and that we're manifesting in
our lives. That is just wisdom, that is really really
good ship, that's a life like and I think too.
(31:12):
Casey is a trailblazer. Casey Duke is a trailblazer in
the fitness business. She was doing this in the eighties,
and there weren't you know, I would think Richard Simmons
and James Jane Fonda, you know, But Casey Duke was
on TV in the eighties too. I know. I actually
feel remiss that I didn't know her name before the story,
like we should know her name absolutely. She had a
workout class that was the most popular New York in
(31:33):
the eighties that madonnad went to. Obviously, workout videos. In
the nineties, she designed the diet Coke kunk Um Lucky
Vanos This he had a two workout videos that Casey
actually devised the workouts for. She's in the workout videos
with him. She's the co founder of Equinox. Equinox. I
did not know that this multimillion dollar company that she
co founded. The first three Equinox gyms in New York City.
(31:55):
Casey Duke open, she hired the staff, she helped design
the space. She did not participate when that company sold
for over a hundred million dollars. These are the things, too,
that I think we should reflect on, you know, thinking
of hidden figures, thinking of like so many women, but
specifically black women who have been trailblazers and are unsung
(32:20):
and have not gotten the financial recognition, have not gotten
the shine that they deserve. It really is my hope
that with this show that people understand that Casey Duke
is not only a bad bit, but she's a legend,
a living legend in the fitness business. She needs her flowers,
she needs her money, she needs all the things. And um,
(32:44):
I took a lot of things away from her story,
her strength, her optimism, her wisdom, but I also took
away the resilience and the perseverance when she's not always
been Duck treated well and treating well. That i e. Money, recognition,
and fame. Not that it's all about fame, right, but
(33:06):
it is about money and it is about recognition. Right.
When you've contributed to something and helped build something and
you don't get to share in the profits of that,
I think that's a problem. This is an American story,
you know, this is many people have experienced. As you're talking,
I'm kind of feeling like a Casey dog. Biopeck is
next up. Maybe you can lobby for that if you
(33:27):
sit down with Casey and she tells you the real
reil of what she's been through it. It was my
hope to to infuse as much of that bio that
like the world doesn't know about, that she's so generously
share with me. I tried to infuse that into every
moment of playing Casey, that this is the woman who
(33:47):
it stands before you, enlightened and resilient and powerful and
strong because she has endured some stuff and she is
better for for it, and that that is the beautiful
thing about playing real people and getting to hear real
(34:08):
people's stories that everybody has mentioned in stuff and how
we how we get over, how we managed to persevere,
is the stuff that we all need to hear. Those
are the stories that we need to hear. That is
so true, and I have to say you both are
role models to everyone listening. So thank you for your
hard work, and thank you to Casey again for sharing
her story with you and thus with us. Casey Do,
(34:32):
Casey Do, Thank you, Casey Duke Well, thank you for
your time lover, and congratulations again that your work is
studdying as usual. Appreciate that now that we've heard from
the actor who plays her. It's time to meet the
Queen of Montrese herself, Casey Duke. Tune in next week.
(34:52):
Don't play it, stay jump and let the net appear. Really,
go for your dreams. Even if you fail, you'll learn
something from that failure. Think big, dream big. And that's
what I really saw an Anna. She was dreaming big.
If you're enjoying this show, subscribe, share with your friends,
rate and leave us a review. All of that good stuff.
(35:13):
And if you haven't finished Shondo Lan's Inventing Anna on Netflix,
please go do that. We really don't want to spoil
it for you. Inventing Anna the Official Podcast is executive
produced by Sandy Bailey, Lauren Hohman, Tyler Klang, and Gabrielle Collins.
Our producer and editor is Nicholas Harder, and the show
is produced and hosted by me Stacy Wilson Hunt. Inventing
(35:41):
Anna the Official Podcast is a production of shondoland Audio
in partnership with I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from
shondo land Audio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple podcast,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Inventing Anna the Official Podcast is a production of Shondaland
Audio in partnership with I Heart Radio. Welcome to Inventing
Anna the Official Podcast, your exclusive look inside the making
of the Shondaland series on Netflix. I'm your host Stacy
Wilson Hunt and Today on the show, I talked trauma, mantros,
(00:22):
and feminism with Emmy winner Laverne Cox, who plays Casey Duke,
Anna's personal trainer. Laverne digs into how she overcame initial
skepticism of her character's unbridled positivity and how Casey Duke
became not only her friend but a continued inspiration. Oh
and she also sings for us. More on that a
bit later. Hi, Laverne, It's so nice to have you
(00:50):
on the podcast. How are you good. It's nice to
be interviewed again. I've been doing the interviewing um a
lot lately. That's the other end. Yes, that's true. Now
you know how hard this job is, right, Yes? I do.
And I'm just generally speaking. How have you seen Inventing
Anna received in your world? It's really created a lot
of buzz, a lot of conversation. What's it felt like
(01:11):
on Urine it's felt magical. If I have to be honest,
I think we would number one on Netflix for two weeks. Yes,
very very much, most viewed show in a week in
Netflix history. That's incredible. I've gotten messages from people I
haven't heard from in years who are watching and loving
the show and loving my character. The best thing has
(01:31):
been Casey's response. She sent me flowers after she saw
the whole series, and this has been so complimentary. She said,
I killed it. One of her friends, apparently of twenty years,
tweeted me saying that they've known Casey for twenty years
and said, I nailed it. And so that has been,
um the most gratifying part of this. I felt a
(01:53):
lot of pressure playing a real life person and a
lot of responsibility to have or be happy to have
her friends and people who love her see Casey in
my portrayal is really the highest compliment. So yeah, everything
else is kind of gravy, but it's just it's beautiful
that people are watching, and I love the discussions that
(02:14):
are coming up around it. People are just having a
lot of fun with it too. There's memes and there's
you know, YouTube channels and think pieces and it's just
it's wonderful. It's absolutely wonderful that this show his started
a cultural conversation or continued one, or is gotten people
thinking and talking in such interesting and diverse ways. It's
(02:35):
very exciting. I agree. And and this show is special
in the sense that there's enough levity where we can
create memes and have fun with it, but then they're
also at the heart of the story or serious conversation starters.
And in terms of how you captured Casey, we had
her on the show. She is really fantastic human being,
and I'd love to know, firstly, tell me your impressions
(02:56):
of her when you first met that pressure that you
felt when you thought, Okay, here's this person. I have
to find a way to embody her, but also leave
room for my own invention on screen. What did you
first think of her when you met? It was interesting
because when I by the time I finally met Casey,
I had watched hours a video of her. What's beautiful
(03:16):
about YouTube is that there's this plethora of information on people.
And she has been a trainer, you know, for thirty years,
and there's workout videos of her on YouTube. I actually, um,
oh my god, what was it called? I forget what
it's called. She to workout video that's only available on VHS,
and I found it on Amazon and ordered it, and
I didn't had to find a VHS player, but I did.
(03:39):
I couldn't, so I got the VHS transfer to digital
so I could watch the workout tape and so and
then she had been interviewed by the Writer's Room, So
there was like, I think an hour long interview that
I got. I watched. I watched tons of video of
Casey before I met her, and so I had ideas.
(04:00):
And then I met her, and she was so so effervescent,
you know, and Elwood says, and um, the first legally
blonde that, like, you know, she couldn't kill someone. People
who work out have endorphins. They don't kill people. I
was thinking that, like, you know, Casey, because she works
that all the time, she has other endorphins, and so
she was just so like energetic and positive and effervescent.
(04:22):
She was like, is actually effervescent? She really is, And
there could be something to that endorphin theory because she's
constantly high on life. Yeah yeah, And I mean she's
working all the time. And I met her in the
lobby of her building, and then just her the way
she related to the door people, and she's just so
kind to everyone. And then you know, we worked out together.
(04:44):
But then it was interesting after we left the workout
and we went we were going to lunch together, and
everyone knew her. They're like, Hi, Casey, We're walking down
the street and she's so friendly, and I'm very like,
I don't talk to strangers, you know, in the street.
I'm very sort of protected and very to leave me alone,
and I'm very boundary. But Casey's just out and just
(05:06):
happy and people know her and people were saying hi,
like everyone, how you doing, And she's like, hey, there
was these relationships with just people like just as she's
just walking to Hala taxi and then the restaurant we
went to, everyone knew were there and it was so lovely.
And so it was just interesting feeling like the effervescence
(05:26):
of this woman who just has this positivity that like
surrounds her and that she's obviously putting on and like
it was it was coming back to her. It's just
interesting watching the positivity come back to her that she's
obviously been putting out and earned. There are many fascinating things.
I mean, I just and then we had a four
hour lunch where we where she told me her life stories.
(05:48):
What did you guys eat at this four hour lunch?
Because she spoke about it too, and I wanted to know,
what are you eating at this lunch? You know, she's
very fitness conscious. I think she had like she had
a salad. I think in some fish. She had like
fish and a salad. I had approached because I'm not
doing fish right now. I think I had like a
steak or something. And then there was there was white wine,
of course, obviously because the people at the restaurant know
(06:12):
she knows the owners. They were very generous and they
kept refilling. I think she needed, you know, some liquid
courage to go where she went. In our conversation, she
was very it was raw. It was very encompassing. Like
we started with her childhood. We started with her love
of dance that you know, turned into her love for fitness.
(06:34):
We talked about her first marriage and moving to Europe
and when we went and we talked about her her mother,
and we talked about there are a lot of things
that feel personal that I just would never feel comfortable sharing.
But she it was very very intimate and very real,
and I'm really grateful for that, because there were moments.
She's been through some things, she's had a life, and
(06:56):
it's effervescent in as positive is she as She's had
a challenging life, and she's been through some things, and
there was so many beautiful moments that she shared. It's
just such an honor. I don't know why I'm getting emotionally,
she says, an honor for someone to um to sit
with you and share so much, well, to trust you
(07:16):
with it too, I think, to trust me with it.
It just feels very there's nothing very sacred about it,
and I'm just I'm really honored. I'm very honored that
she trusted me and she shared all of that and
I used it in the work. He was invaluable. It
was invaluable that conversation. How much of what you heard
Casey share resonated with you and your experiences? You're someone
(07:36):
I think a lot of us look to for wisdom
and inspiration. You've been very open about your own struggles
and feeling comfortable with yourself now at the stage of
your life. How much of what she shared did you feel, Gosh,
I really understand that a very organic intersection is Casey spirituality.
(07:56):
Casey's understanding that there is an energy that bigger than her.
To you, she talks about the universe, and so that
to me that I feel that, I feel like I'm
in the core of who I am. Casey has done
a lot of work to be in a healed space,
and I've done a lot of work to be in
a healed space. It's done a lot of work to
(08:18):
not be reactive, to find the lesson in something, to
be of service. Casey's life is service, really, it really is.
And so Casey more so than me, I'm trying to
be a little more selfish and a little more because
I've given so much sometimes that I haven't had anything
left for myself. And I think Casey has been there too.
(08:42):
I think that's part of how she ended up in
this situation with Anna, that she gives once she takes
on a client. I don't want to say it looks
like her children, but sort of. You know, she's very
she wants people to win, and she wants to be there,
and she wants to be a service. And I think
she and I both have in common that we've been
(09:03):
in situations where we want to be of service so badly,
and we allow people with not the best of intention
to take advantage of that right, and you do open
yourself up to be sapped a little bit of your
own strength because you're giving, giving, giving, And when she
talked about her approach to training, isn't just about losing
(09:24):
weight or getting fit. She's targeting the whole person, the
holistic experience. It's about mindset, motivation, movement. And the mindset
is you know, how you think about yourself, what is
your relationship to your body? That that changing the reframing,
you know, instead of I hate this about myself, this
is the thing I want to work on, but I
(09:44):
have to love this. And then motivation what gets me
out of out of bed every day to do it?
And then finally the movement. Um, I'm sorry, I like it.
Spent a lot of time with crazy stuff. We're taking
a short break, but please stay too, and hey, thanks
(10:09):
for sticking around. Now back to the interview. It's interesting,
there's a there's a lot of Overlapman, how are you
approach acting how she approaches training. It's not just this
mental exercise, it's a full body investment. So tell me
when you invested your own body and becoming fit for
(10:30):
this part, which you have said you've never had a
role where you had to be physically fit because you're
playing a trainer. How are you using some of her
approach to approach your own fitness, which was probably pretty rigorous.
I'm guessing what was interesting for me about I mean,
it just be really real. I kind of got lucky.
I got um. I haven't talked about this publicly. I
(10:52):
got sick at the end of twenty eighteen and just
ated losing weight. And I just started losing weight, Like
I lost fifteen pounds in a month, and I was
really ill. That's scary. I was tested for everything, and
we figured out what was going on. And I won't
say publicly, but I got really sick and I just
started losing weight. And the weird thing about losing weight
(11:16):
is that, for me and probably for a lot of
women and some men as well, is that like, I'm
sick and I'm losing weight and I don't have no
idea why, and I'm not really doing anything. And I
also was loving losing weight because clothes were fitting better.
And I mean twenty nineteen was the first year I
(11:37):
was able to wear samples to the Emmys. For example,
I was we still had to alter with the samples.
I didn't get that skinny, I mean skinny for me.
But so when I started working on Casey, I was
getting better, but I lost all this weight. And so
when I had trained with Casey, it was really about toning.
So I took some of Casey's exercises. Casey is about
you know, muscle fiber targeting, you know, and toning and
(12:01):
lengthening and elongating, having sine with muscles, you know. I
watched her workout videos obviously trained with her. So I
was going to work out in the gym here and
I was going back and forth. And then when when
I was traveling a lot, I was just it became
easier to just have weights. So I started traveling with
weights in my luggage. I had five in tin pound weights.
That's probably pretty heavy. No, yes, I wasn't carrying like
(12:25):
we have drivers caring the luggage. You know, people at
the airport they're like what do you have in here?
We're like waits, and I'm like um. So I started
traveling with five and tin pound weights, and so I
would do wake up and do a little cardio and
then I really started. I really went in on weights
and like a lot of stomach stuff, a lot of stretching.
(12:46):
I was really obsessed with, like abs, like case these
abs are like insane. So and then but it became
part of the character. I just remember being in Morocco
and like waking up and doing weights, and it just
like it just felt like Casey, Like this is what
Casey would do, you know, like she it felt very
I've never like worked out that much, you know, like
(13:07):
just really like except when I was dancing back in
the day, when I was dancing six hours a day,
but as an adult, I've never consistently woken up and
done weights and at lunch doing weights, and at night
before bed like doing weights. Like it was that kind
of thing. So I think I don't think it was
about It wasn't about how I looked it. Really. I
(13:27):
think it was just about that kind of um because
I with a sports psychologists as well, because there was
a part of me. It's very important for actress not
to judge our characters, so it was a part of
me that was a little bit in judgment of like
Casey's positivity and her effervescence, right her and right, I
was gonna ask you about that. How did you get
over that skepticism? Initially, I remember something Casey said to me.
(13:49):
She did bigness competitions when she was younger, and I
just started to think of her. I mean, she's, you know,
sixty five years sixty six years old now and in
impectable shape. And I was like, oh, she's an elite athlete.
This is a woman who's an elite athlete. Elite athletes
have a different mindset. I found a sports psychologist. I
had a recommendation from my therapist and found the sports psychologist.
(14:09):
We did like three sessions and I really just kind
of wanted to get a sense of like how elite
athletes think and what their process is like. And that
really got me over the hump. I was just like,
this woman is an asks an athlete. You have to
have a mindset that is positive, that is affirming, that
(14:29):
motivates you. There's really no time to like spend too
much time in negativity or cynicism or because I have
I'm kind of cynical. Um, there's no time for that.
Really when you're training, when you have to make physical
goals and right either you you know, stick the landing
or you don't. Either you make the basket or you
whatever the sport is, you know, you hit the ace
(14:51):
or you don't. In tennis, that sports psychology piece really
helped me just like go in and just be like,
this is what it is, without judgment. I love that,
and I also just want to say I'm glad you're better.
Even though it's fun to lose weight, and where smaller
size clothing, health is number one. So and what was
Steve too is that people were like, girl, you're losing weight,
you look sickly, you look snatched online and I was
(15:13):
just like wow, And I didn't say anything at the time,
and it was just really interesting how we celebrate people
being thick and we don't know we just celebrate weight loss,
and we don't know what people are going through when
they're losing weight. I know I think about this a lot,
and I always try to compliment people if I've sense
that they look thinner, I'll say you look very fit
or you look healthy. I really try to stay away
(15:33):
from those quote unquote compliments because they we don't know
what's going on with someone. So thank you for sharing
your story. I'd like to talk about Casey's dynamic with Anna,
which obviously is so complex and transactional in nature we
come to see throughout the show. How much of that
aspect of their relationship do you think blinded Casey to
(15:54):
Anna and her real intentions. Obviously, the you know, the
first deposit, the check cleared, she out of package of
workout sessions. So that cleared, So she was like, okay,
well I got my money, you know, for that first session,
the only money she got. And so there was that piece,
and then she just saw this spoiled girl who she
assumed was an heiress. But she had this great idea.
(16:18):
What Casey said to me is that, you know, I
liked she didn't wanted to be an Instagram model, that
she wanted to build a business, and so let's help
her because it's I mean, the it's the workout piece,
but it's also months at motivation movement, and it's all
connected for Casey. For Casey, it's like, this is my job.
So she's I've been asked to go to Morocco to
train people. It is not unusual for Casey to be
(16:40):
flown places to train folks. She told me this wonderful
story about when um I think it was the year.
I think that didn't Sel Washington won the Oscar for
training day because you know, she trained, didn't sell and
mini movies. They had flown her out to Los Angeles
and put her up at the Sunset Tower. And she
said she had five Oscar nominees that she had didn't
sell Julian or Diane Lane, oh my god, and somebody
(17:03):
else I forget. So they put her up at the
Sunset Tower when she was training people. So this is
her life, you know, her traveling to train clients is
none of this is unusual. So I think for Casey
she wanted to be of service. Once she takes on someone,
she wants the best for you. She like genuinely wants that.
And she really wanted that for Anna. And I think
(17:25):
the moment when um Anna ends up, you know, sleeping
over her apartment that night, she couldn't possibly let her
that girl go. What if she harmed herself. It's very intense,
and like obviously people like Anna manipulate people and play
on their feelings and play on their find their weakness
and Casey's weaknesses that she wants to help people. She
wants to be of service, so right, which can be
(17:48):
a wonderful quality, but it really does open you up
to potential harm. Yeah, but what is beautiful. We see
in this series that Casey was able to set boundaries.
Casey was able to be like, okay, wait, no, yes, okay,
it gets to a point Casey and I had this
in comment too, it can get to a point where
I'm okay, no, we're saying them boundaries here right. There's
(18:10):
this great scene in episode two, which of course we're
jumping back and forth and in the time continuum, and
this is when Casey is telling Nef about setting her
own boundaries when Anna's in prison, and she's saying, you know,
the person who's sitting at Rikers is not the person
we thought we knew, and Adelphi doesn't exist. That person
new Rikers is somebody else, somebody who was pretending to
(18:32):
be an Adelphi. And it seems like for even though
we haven't seen the full trajectory of Casey's story yet,
we sense early on, oh, this woman is kind of
having to teach the younger women to not be so trusting.
Tell me about that interplay between Casey and Nothing. That scene,
it was such a juicy scene for me. That person
sitting and its sale maybe a made of character. It
(18:54):
was just so it was such good writing and I
just remember prepping the scene with a coach and just
having a lot of fun. And we tried it a
lot of different ways, and um, Tom was so amazing
and directing that scene. I love being directed by actors.
He just gave me such fun things to play with
(19:16):
and try. I have I have no idea which take
they use. This is the fun of doing multiple tastes.
It's like not in my hands anymore. It's just like
it's in the director's, in the editor's hands. So it
was just I had fun preparing, I had fun on
set with it. And I think it may have been
Alexis and I think was our first scene together. She's
(19:37):
just so amazing. What an amazingly talented young woman. Oh
what a joy was just doing scenes with her. And
just I love talent. I really, really really love talent.
I love young talent, you know, young talent that is
fresh but cultivated. She has a skill set, it's not
raw talented, is cultivated talent. She also has an amazing
(19:59):
wisdom and grounded nous. Speaking to her, I felt like
I was speaking to a seasoned, you know, thirty professional.
You do feel that when you talked to her behind
the scene and she played I believe she played violin
as a child. I don't know. Yeah, And she's a musician,
and you can really tell she's a full, full fledged artist.
But the discipline of studying anything classically is so useful
(20:22):
that discipline will serve you, and it served her really well.
She was so professional on set, and she apparently has
perfect pitch, which I am so jealous. She said she
had a perfect pitch and I was like, and I
was saying, I know, because I mean I have sometimes
I have decent relative pitch, like I can usually pull
an app out of my out of my um, yeah,
(20:52):
it was an app for the record everyone. I'm like, okay,
I think I haven't eff in my head, so I
say I think an effort her and I was like,
what note is this? It was brilliant. She was like,
it's fluctuating between E and F shot with the vibrato,
and I was like, work, I'm sorry, I'm a world
(21:17):
class neer and like so many ways. Well, you know,
you may become the casey of acting coaching for the
younger generation, so keep working on that. I see this
as the next phase of your career. I'm obsessed with
the with the craft part of it. I'm obsessed with
the process part of it. So um, I'd love to
(21:37):
talk about episode six, the Morocco episode, which is Casey's
episode and her crazy experience on the quote unquote vacation
that turned out to not be a vacation. There's a
great scene when Casey and No are talking in Casey saying, oh,
you'll have a great experience. The universe provides what you're
meant to have and what are you meant to have?
(21:58):
M hm, three pounds off Anna a vacation and do
you think she was enjoying for the first time in
her life? This idea like I'm just going to be
carefree and feel young for a weekend, not be so
tied down with rigor and discipline, and just sort of
have fun. Casey has fun. No, case of my understanding
(22:21):
and you spoke to her, They of my understanding is
a woman who has fun. The case of my understand
is a woman who enjoys life. So this No, this
is a job Morocco, wonderful, La Mommonia, Wow, gorgeous, But
this is a job for her, and she definitely looks
at it as a job, and that's maybe the dissonance
(22:41):
she feels where she's starting to feel, what is my
role here? You know, she's done some work with Anna,
and she's starting to question what is my interaction with
this person? And maybe that's where it starts to unravel
for her. I think too, it's she's just trying to
make the most of it. I think Casey is like,
this is awkward af a lot. Let's just make the
most of it. I'm here. You know. It's like she's peacemakers.
(23:03):
She's like, let's chill and have fun. Um that this
situation couldn't be paid right obviously, right, it became a
bit untenable for her to even fix. Right. Yeah, Okay, everybody,
We'll be right back right after these messages. Hey, Stacy
(23:30):
here again back to the interview, and one of my
other favorite moments for Casey is in the finale episode
nine called Dangerously Close, where Casey confronts Rachel at the
courthouse about the fact that she concealed her involvement in
(23:51):
Anna's ultimate arrest. I feel used by the police, by
the prosecutor, I feel used by are you thinking you're
some kind of victim in all this taking care of you.
I am a victim in all of this. At least
you get to cry into all that money. It's like
you have plenty leftover even after you pay m it's six.
(24:13):
Oh tell me where you think Casey is in that
moment and how hurt she feels. Even though she understands
Anna has done some bad things, she still almost feels
like Rachel has been the bigger person to hurt in
that moment. Right, Anna was a job an, it was
a job when Rachel was betrayed by Anna. Taking advantage
(24:38):
of by Anna, she became a friend to Casey, and
she became this girl that she needed to be there
for and needed to nurture through this deeply traumatizing moment
in her life. And she was lying to me the
(24:59):
whole time she was lying to me about turning in Anna.
She was lying to me about a book deal Like,
it's just who are you? Like, I don't know who
you are, So you've been this like victim to my face,
crying to me distraught. Meanwhile, you're working with the police,
you're turning and your friend you are exciting you know,
(25:23):
six figure deals. Just tell your story. The credit card
companies paid you up. You haven't told me any of this.
Like it's like we're supposed to be friends. I have
extended myself to you and taken your side in this
and brought in one of my clients to try to
do this intervention for you, and you've been lying to me.
(25:47):
It's a betrayal. That's just like it's the end of
the it's all the whole mess of it. I've been
lied to you by and I've been taking a bandobay
and we pay for an airline ticketing our first class.
She owes me for fitness sessions, like I haven't got
any of that money back, right, I'm trying to be
zen about that. I'm trying to be there for this girl,
(26:08):
and she's lying to me, to everybody. It's like it's
just too much. She had Casey had her name taken
off the story. She's like, I want to be associated
with this. This is bad for business, This is bad karma,
this is bad energy. These girls are toxic, all of them.
I went out at this narrative. What do you mean
I don't want to be in your article? What this
(26:29):
ain't mean? I don't want my clients seeing me in
this negative context. I'm out, like I need to distance
myself from this, and then Rachel sucks her back in
and I'm going to court. Can you imagine? No, I'm
taking time out of my life to go from Hudson
Yards all the way down to the courthouse, you know,
(26:50):
with city Hall to support you, to be there for you.
You can't tell me any of this. It's the shock
of it. It's the bet trail of it. It's just
the it's the how dare you of it? She felt
she was made a fool out of and I think
she could have maybe understand Rachel was distraught, and if
Rachel had just had the courtesy to share with this
(27:13):
person who has been a mentor and a friend of her. Hey,
just so you know, this is an opportunity I have.
Don't judge me, but this is what I need for myself.
I think it's the lack of honesty that feels so hurtful,
and it's in that Casey put herself on the line,
like she when she confronts Neff about the Instagram page,
you know, at her job, and you know, making this
case more public and I could go to prison for
(27:35):
fifteen years and you're worried about Becky's fifteen minutes of shame.
Stop calling me Becky. Okay, Karen, we aren't gonna wait
the funk up and realize you're saying, secretary at her
damn strength, she's like going to somebody's job and confronting
them to defend Rachel, to try to protect Rachel. It's
(27:58):
just like it's Embarras saying, it's like really like going
above and beyond to be there for Rachel, and Rachel
is like girl. And what's too bad too, is as
a woman watching this, I felt, gosh, it's unfortunate when
women try to help each other and build each other
up and then they still can't get hurt. Right. So
(28:20):
there's this idea that just because people are women doesn't
mean that we're always going to have each other's back,
that we always have to be watching not for ourselves,
And just because someone's the same gender as you doesn't
mean that there's a built in trust or I think
that's that goes for race. I think that goes to
so many things. But you know, I think the the
actor in me, the empathetic part of me, is that
hurt people hurt people just because then when it's trans
(28:43):
you know, I can love them. I can love them,
but I can set some boundaries and I can love
them from a distance. And I think, you know, we
want solidarity as women, but I think that we also
have to acknowledge that womanhood is confident with that class
shifts our womanhood. There's no one universal, one woman experienced, class, race,
(29:04):
ex assigned of birth, all of these things. So we
can have solidarity around issues and acknowledge our differences. Right, Like,
I'm very pro choice and I've done a lot of
advocacy for reproductive rights. Right, I'm obviously can't get pregnant,
and it's just part of my values, you know. And
(29:25):
I believe that part of being a feminist is, like
people who can get pregnant, women need to have control
over their bodies. And what I think you're talking about
is how sometimes women tear each other down. How right,
how patriarchy sets sets it up so that we are
fighting each other to divide and conquer thing. And I
think when we can understand that divide and conqueror strategies
(29:47):
are tool of patriarchy or tool of domination culture, then
we can be in solidarity. But we have to. We
can only be in solidarity in truth, right, We can
only be in solidarity when we can behold ourselves like countable.
When I have done something that's not the coolest thing
to a friend of mine, male, female, whatever gender, I
(30:08):
have to be accountable. And then final question, how would
you say that playing this character, playing Casey has changed you?
And what have you taken from her that you now
use or you hear maybe mantras that you learned from her,
And how has she affected you? I mean, there's so
many things, there's so many caseyisms. My favorite though. The
(30:29):
past is our teacher, the presenters our creation, and the
future is our inspiration. So in this present moment we
can create whatever we want. Right, so it encourages us
to be present. The past is our teacher. Learn from that.
Learn from the past, but like, don't get too caught
up in it, don't get stuck there, because in this
(30:51):
present moment, in our creation, we can heal, We can
create healing. We can create a new future inspired by
the future, inspired by the and that we're manifesting in
our lives. That is just wisdom, that is really really
good ship, that's a life like and I think too.
(31:12):
Casey is a trailblazer. Casey Duke is a trailblazer in
the fitness business. She was doing this in the eighties,
and there weren't you know, I would think Richard Simmons
and James Jane Fonda, you know, But Casey Duke was
on TV in the eighties too. I know. I actually
feel remiss that I didn't know her name before the story,
like we should know her name absolutely. She had a
workout class that was the most popular New York in
(31:33):
the eighties that madonnad went to. Obviously, workout videos. In
the nineties, she designed the diet Coke kunk Um Lucky
Vanos This he had a two workout videos that Casey
actually devised the workouts for. She's in the workout videos
with him. She's the co founder of Equinox. Equinox. I
did not know that this multimillion dollar company that she
co founded. The first three Equinox gyms in New York City.
(31:55):
Casey Duke open, she hired the staff, she helped design
the space. She did not participate when that company sold
for over a hundred million dollars. These are the things, too,
that I think we should reflect on, you know, thinking
of hidden figures, thinking of like so many women, but
specifically black women who have been trailblazers and are unsung
(32:20):
and have not gotten the financial recognition, have not gotten
the shine that they deserve. It really is my hope
that with this show that people understand that Casey Duke
is not only a bad bit, but she's a legend,
a living legend in the fitness business. She needs her flowers,
she needs her money, she needs all the things. And um,
(32:44):
I took a lot of things away from her story,
her strength, her optimism, her wisdom, but I also took
away the resilience and the perseverance when she's not always
been Duck treated well and treating well. That i e. Money, recognition,
and fame. Not that it's all about fame, right, but
(33:06):
it is about money and it is about recognition. Right.
When you've contributed to something and helped build something and
you don't get to share in the profits of that,
I think that's a problem. This is an American story,
you know, this is many people have experienced. As you're talking,
I'm kind of feeling like a Casey dog. Biopeck is
next up. Maybe you can lobby for that if you
(33:27):
sit down with Casey and she tells you the real
reil of what she's been through it. It was my
hope to to infuse as much of that bio that
like the world doesn't know about, that she's so generously
share with me. I tried to infuse that into every
moment of playing Casey, that this is the woman who
(33:47):
it stands before you, enlightened and resilient and powerful and
strong because she has endured some stuff and she is
better for for it, and that that is the beautiful
thing about playing real people and getting to hear real
(34:08):
people's stories that everybody has mentioned in stuff and how
we how we get over, how we managed to persevere,
is the stuff that we all need to hear. Those
are the stories that we need to hear. That is
so true, and I have to say you both are
role models to everyone listening. So thank you for your
hard work, and thank you to Casey again for sharing
her story with you and thus with us. Casey Do,
(34:32):
Casey Do, Thank you, Casey Duke Well, thank you for
your time lover, and congratulations again that your work is
studdying as usual. Appreciate that now that we've heard from
the actor who plays her. It's time to meet the
Queen of Montrese herself, Casey Duke. Tune in next week.
(34:52):
Don't play it, stay jump and let the net appear. Really,
go for your dreams. Even if you fail, you'll learn
something from that failure. Think big, dream big. And that's
what I really saw an Anna. She was dreaming big.
If you're enjoying this show, subscribe, share with your friends,
rate and leave us a review. All of that good stuff.
(35:13):
And if you haven't finished Shondo Lan's Inventing Anna on Netflix,
please go do that. We really don't want to spoil
it for you. Inventing Anna the Official Podcast is executive
produced by Sandy Bailey, Lauren Hohman, Tyler Klang, and Gabrielle Collins.
Our producer and editor is Nicholas Harder, and the show
is produced and hosted by me Stacy Wilson Hunt. Inventing
(35:41):
Anna the Official Podcast is a production of shondoland Audio
in partnership with I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from
shondo land Audio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple podcast,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
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