99: A GOOPy Cocoon With Jane Marie

Jane Marie, creator and host of The Dream podcast, joins the Night Callers this week to break down the wellness industry. Are all essential oils a scam? What’s up with the influencers who stopped drinking water? Do I need to sell my crystals? Plus the creepy unregulated world of therapy apps, and a long dip in the pool for Ron Howard’s 1985 wellness opus Cocoon! All this and Steve Guttenberg too on an all new Night Call!

FOOTNOTES:

1. Jane Marie's The Dream podcast
2. Jane Marie on Twitter
3. Not that Rick Ross
4. Dry fasting
5. Goop lawsuit
6. Donald Gary Young wikipedia
7. Gary Young/Young Living Behind the Bastards episode
8. "Free birth" article
9. Gold dildo
10. Jezebel on online therapy data-mining
11. Smarterchild
12. Ancestry.com's roots
13. .css-j9qmi7{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:row;-ms-flex-direction:row;flex-direction:row;font-weight:700;margin-bottom:1rem;margin-top:2.8rem;width:100%;-webkit-box-pack:start;-ms-flex-pack:start;-webkit-justify-content:start;justify-content:start;padding-left:5rem;}@media only screen and (max-width: 599px){.css-j9qmi7{padding-left:0;-webkit-box-pack:center;-ms-flex-pack:center;-webkit-justify-content:center;justify-content:center;}}.css-j9qmi7 svg{fill:#27292D;}.css-j9qmi7 .eagfbvw0{-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;color:#27292D;}

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Nightcall, a production of I Heart Radio. It's
eight pm in a swimming pool in St. Petersburg, Florida,
and you're listening to Nightcall. Welcome to Nightcall, a podcast

(00:33):
for your Rose Courts Days and Carnelian Knights. I am
Emily Oshida. I am here in Los Angeles and with me,
as always, are Tess Lynch and Molly Lambert. And this
week we are joined by our special guest, Jane Marie.
She is the creator and host of the Dream Podcast.
The first season we have talked about on the show
talked about multi level marketing schemes and the current second season,

(00:56):
which is about to wrap up, right sweet about the
wellness industry again, we've talked about that. We are obsessed.
We're a big fan. So thank you so much for
joining us today. Welcome, Thanks for having Yeah we uh,
we've been talking about wellness influencers and Goop and all

(01:20):
sorts of stuff like that. UM, but we had a
question about going back to your first season, UM and
the MLMs. We had a night email from a listener
and she writes, I have a lot of family and
friends who have joined MLMs and have also taken dumb supplements.
Despite my protests that these are dumb and expensive. My
sister has poured money into m lms. It always fizzle

(01:41):
out near um our bond some amwe website. My ex
husband would take this liquid supplement Sea Silver religiously, even
when I said there's no proof it worked. Then the
company had to pay four point five million in FDC finds.
And even after that, my X still wouldn't admit that
he was wrong. I don't know how to get over
for only that I was right and they were wrong
and they won't admit it. Any advice on what I

(02:03):
can do. Wow, that well, that's a whole I mean,
this is advice for your whole life. Just like relationships
something to do with UM MLMs, I'd say, you can't
control anybody. Yeah, that's my advice that you'd move on
from that idea, especially because these are I'd compare sort

(02:24):
of mlm s and being really into wellness with like
faith based belief systems. Try changing that for anyone UM
and not saying that you're a messiah of some sort
of just trying a regular person to like d program
someone out of their religion. It's impossible. But the bigger

(02:45):
piece of advice is just like mind your own business. Um,
you did like a little bonus season in between the
first and second season, and I remember you had an
episode that was like about a guy who specifically kind
of he gets people out of but then he was
kind of also talking about how like a lot of
the same techniques apply to getting people out of m

(03:06):
l M s. And it's like you can't be like
you were so stupid to get hoodwinked or whatever. It's tricky.
I mean you have to. By the way, my favorite
cult extractor who's on Dr Phil all the time is
named Rick Ross. Actually he's awesome anyway, Ross right right,
I just read a hurricane Have you checked it out?

(03:27):
His autobiography. I wasn't fascinating large type did really easy
readons didn't get anybody out of a cult. Now, Um,
quite the opposite. Um, Now I think like, yeah, you
have to meet them where they are and be like,
of course, I can see why this is something you

(03:47):
might be into. Let's talk about the ways that it's
made your life smaller or whatever that it's made it,
you know, made stress on your relationships. But in my experience,
like when you're talking about life and which is what
wellness is talking about. Um. That's a pretty good counter
argument from believers, which is like, well, if I don't

(04:08):
do this, I'm going to die. And you're like, so
you're killing me by trying to get me out of
this weird cult. And then you have to just say
drink your silver and see silver. Do people just send
your podcast to family members? I tell them to all
the time. I'm like, hey, listen, my family listened to it.

(04:29):
They still love me. Um. People are smarter than you
give them credit for. I think what you need to
remember about people who are involved in m l m
S or super into wellness, a lot of them are
brilliant geniuses, like legitimately really smart worldly people. So don't
treat them like babies when you want to talk to
them about a disagreement. Treat them like the educated people

(04:51):
that they're claiming to be and say like, look, here's
a different opinion, and if not, if nothing else, they'll
like at least have like something to yell at you
about the next time you guys hang out together. But
people are smart enough to hear criticism and then either
take it or move on. This again seems like great
general advice as well. Yeah, yeah, treat your audience like

(05:12):
they're smart. Um. I wanted to ask you about what
the newest wellness trends that you have seen have been.
You mean, don't drink water? People who don't drink water? Wait,
there was an article is this dry fasting or whatever?
Y fasting? Nothing sounds of work. I learned about it

(05:34):
from an article that was like the wellness influencers who
don't drink water and that's their thing. Okay, First of all,
all of their before photos look like they had a
real good night out the night before, you know what.
Like that that's their their eyes, eyes are puffy or whatever,
and they look tired, or they're retaining water, maybe for
some other health reason. Why is your body retaining water?

(05:56):
Why are you bloated? Maybe? Like look into that and
instead they're just like, oh, I can add this to
my list of eating disorders. Like I don't have to
call it what it really is. I can call it
dry fasting, or I can say I've only drink you know,
but don't even people with eating disorders drink water normally.
This is like the idea of someone being like no water,

(06:17):
it's just a new eating disorder. All of this stuff
isn't eating. Doesn't water good for you? I don't want
to drink that much water. But as soon as you
said dry fasting, I was like, Wow, I'm so thirsty
for water. Maybe it's a great kind of reverse psychology thing.
I just got to get that mad Max Fury road body.
I love water, and also I can't live with was

(06:38):
a water addict. When I was going to labor and
they were like, you can't have water, just ice chips
at this certain point in labor. This is the worst
part of having anxiety when someone says you can't have water.
After I went to the dentist and they were like,
don't drink anything through straw because you might like bite
your tongue off when they give you prepared you for

(07:01):
the novocaine. I just it is scary. Anytime they're like,
don't do a thing, You're like, I have to just
reading the article. But I also love water well at
least like dry fasting doesn't sound like it involves buying anything,
quite the opposite. So it's like Firth, you go on
the Goop website, I'm sure, okay. So we're arguing about

(07:22):
Goop a lot on nightcall there's a pro group flank.
It's actually it's just me test is more on your side.
I'm in the middle. I don't think that Gwyneth is
Joe Rogan, although someone else on Twitter after moll wasn't
you Okay, I don't think I personally find her less
objectionable than Joe. Criminals, Okay, that's fine. I think, Um, well,

(07:51):
that's it. I just took a super long criminal who
sells fake cures for ill illnesses that could kill people
if they don't like what I mean. Well, for one,
she's familiar with like the Yoni eggs and stuff and
starting like that's a light thing. Besides that, it was

(08:13):
saying that it would control hormones, which are something you
should tap into and think about if you're going through
perimenopause or menopause, and it could mean any amount of
I mean, you can have like hormone or flora issues
that have to do with cervical cancer or that have
to do with like other serious illnesses, and claiming that

(08:34):
these things would cure that. Um, there's other things where
it's like, don't take these ten antibiotics. She promotes colloidal silver,
the stuff that turns you blue. Yeah, I didn't know
that silver is that the same thing as sea silvery.
It's it's silver particles suspended in water, and over time

(08:54):
it builds up in your cells and permanently turns your
skin blue and does pretty much nothing else. It's toxic
to your body and does nothing else, Like it used
to be used back in the Again, these are all
like medieval cures or whatever, like, yeah, exactly, you used
to put silver on on wounds. Um, And I guess

(09:16):
I'm not sure of like the action of it, but
like it can prevent bacterial infections but antimicrobial but not
anti virals to drink, yeah, and your pillow com it's
for the four humors. Yeah. So Gwyneth, I mean like, look,
I don't think she's actually like went out and murdered anyone.
But I don't think she's careful enough about the products

(09:37):
that she sells, and I don't think she doesn't due diligence.
And I think she puts ideas out there that's like whatever,
try whatever works for you, and you're like, you know what,
you're talking to cancer patients That to me is the
Joe Rogan thing. And it's not just them, it's a
lot of like cable talk shows, or they'll just be like,
let's have a personnel in selling something obviously bad and

(09:58):
like give them their say, well, you build a giant platform,
and then anything that seems as though it fits with
your brand you kind of welcome in. So I say,
on Shark Tank, they always shut that ship down to
me because my hero on that stuff where he's like,
show me the papers, show me the stuff, and then
he's like, get out of here, you're a fraud. I mean,
be nice. Mark. That's a weird best friend too, because

(10:19):
it helps make the rest of the stuff they do
look more legitimate. It's also like they're selling you like
dumb garbage he needs you don't have that, but they're like,
we will not sell you in your blood yeah, or
something that says like you're never going to get another cold,
or like this will help your dog not get cancer. Anyway,
I am so anti It actually makes me want to
cry as I start talking about her, because first of all,

(10:43):
she has other ways of being famous that she's really
good at. She can just act, and that still also
makes a lot of money. I don't understand she can
do nothing and still have a lot of money. The
idea that you have to like, the idea that she
feels compelled to step in as a basically as a
medical professional, is um. I think, yeah, I think that

(11:06):
there's like a whole side of this that has not
like she's never discussed, but I've just sort of like
put it together through context. And I think that she
has probably gone through some fucked up ship with like
her own healthcare and stuff. I think that people turned
to alternative medicine sometimes, but I think I think specifically
for her, she started group like after she had had

(11:28):
her kids. I talked about this when we had our
big group discussion, and UM, and she thought she was fat.
She described herself as having a but she also like
had severe postpartum depression, and I don't think that she
was probably like getting the help that she needed for that.
And I think, I don't know. I mean, I think
also now we know she had a hard time as
an actress and in the industry, and I think I

(11:51):
can imagine getting like having a genuine existential crisis where
you're like, what if I am called to do the
thing completely different besides just being an actress like everybody likes. UM.
I mean, I have a little bit of sympathy for
her with that, Like I think, so I think, be
that person. Don't sell me anything, you know, don't don't

(12:13):
give health advice. You're not a doctor. Don't go on
doctor oz. We all know. I feel like that's the
thing too. It's like when when Goops started, to my mind,
it was more about like what are the fancy hotels about,
like this fantasy rich person life of Like what are
these like the most expensive, nicest like accessories that are
every month or yeah. But it was like I sort

(12:35):
of understood it as like you read it as this
lifestyle porn of like what's it like to be a
person who's just like so wealthy all they do is
go on vacation and buy stuff and not have to
buy any of the stuff to feel that. But at
a certain point it definitely became more about like health
and wellness in tune with general trends around that, uh

(12:58):
that are sort of like pseudo feminist, which is what
I find offensive about it. Also, it's also one of
the big defenses people say, well, it's okay that she's
you know, selling fraudulent stuff or making fraudulent health website.
She's getting young girls to look at their vaginas, and
it's like you can have one without the other. I'm

(13:20):
so sorry, but you can still be super famous one
with Paldrow and get young girls to look at their vagina.
It was just like culture goes to high school health classes. Yeah,
Like my question is do you how aware do you
think that she is? She's fully aware, but I mean, like,
do you think that she has conviction that she's right?

(13:42):
What was that last lawsuit that you were posting about. UM?
The most recent one, um Well Truth and Advertising found
that she violated her order to stop making false health
claims and they found like fifty new ones on the
website in the in the last few months. UM. Last
year was the Jade settlement out of court um and

(14:02):
where they they did this kind of like fuck you
response where they ended up posting these like kind of
short health articles with like a bibliography that's like five
pages longer than the article itself to be like see
all of the evidence. But then they're still selling stuff
in their shop. UM and anyway, they violated their agreed
upon out of court settlement court order to stop making

(14:24):
unsubstantiated fault health claims, and UM, I just think like,
I'm sorry that got me off track. What was the
question before that? I mean I was just curious about
like because you're saying it's like she can if so
this is something that comes up also with the people
who own mlmah. I feel like I don't know anyone

(14:46):
like these people for a reason. They're not my friends.
They're not my friends. My family members are their victims.
But I've met, I've brushed up against I think similar
personality types to these sorts of folks, and it always
feels wrong and like you need to get out of
the room as fast as you can. I don't know

(15:07):
what that is. I don't know if that's the if
that's an answer to your question, But I don't know
what she's thinking because I'm always curious, Like like as
you said, I mean, I don't have in my inner
circle anybody who like is actually hawking MLMs. But friends
and acquaintances have tried to sell me MLMs mostly like
the young living kind of stuff, and it's hard for

(15:28):
me to even tell it a certain yes, yeah, it's
young living the essential oils. Can you explain that for
listeners who might not know you can get young living oils?
Is a Christian essential oils company who's founder, um Gary Young,
killed his baby in a water birth where he left
her underwater for an hour in his unlicensed wellness clinic

(15:51):
in Spokane, Washington in the early eighties, and then went
to jail. And then uh took off from Spokane, moved
to southern Califor when you started a vitamin company, then
moved to Tijuana to start a cancer clinic where he
analyzed people's blood in the from samples they sent him
in the mail, and then he would tell them what
kind of cancer they had and then either cure them

(16:12):
remotely or charge them ten thousand dollars to come to
his clinic and be fully cured of their cancer. He's
like the craziest villain. I actually feel like he may
have been covered on behind the bastards, which if he was,
I think he was. Yeah, I'll link it. I didn't
know that. I thought you meant like maybe he poisoned
him with essential oil. But also there's a huge overlap,

(16:35):
and we've talked about this on the show before, and
I know that it probably comes up a lot for
you as well, But as a mom, you're targeted, and
Emily brought it up in terms of like the postpartum
depression and when you're particularly vulnerable to that kind of stuff.
But there was just today an article I think NBC
News about the free birth thing. I don't know if
you saw that, but it's like a horrible it's just

(16:56):
a horrible and it and it you know, in terms
of talking about like making false medical claims and kind
of tying it in with like the idea of well,
if you know, why not try it? If it's like
because a woman was going on Facebook as she knew
her baby was dying because her duel and midwives were like,
don't go to the hospital, don't go to the hospital,
and she was like asking like these Facebook groups and

(17:19):
her and everyone was like just feel you feel it.
Your body is just doing And also she was a
month overdue with any obstetrition. Would never let someone do.
But I mean, it's when you talk about the dangers
of of you know, goop and stuff like that, it
is true that the way that this kind of leads
into like how women and mothers in particular are targeted,

(17:40):
and then the danger that that brings with it is
I want to say, also there's like a different sector
of this that involves like rich white women scams that
are like more on the group side. And then there's
also people that I'm like, I understand like why people
seek out alternative medicine. Like the whole medical system is
definitely like super were screwed up, super screwed up, super racist,

(18:02):
not organized around women's kneed, especially like women of color.
You know, like when people yeah, again, it's like it's
not like a failing of somebody that they don't find
American medicine to be like fully satisfying. And I think
that there's a there's a definite, like legitimate reason to
look elsewhere. I think, Um, I wish that Gwyneth palt

(18:22):
would sit down and in front of me and I
could shake her and be like, this isn't about beauty
and youthfulness and being skinny and being pretty and having
nice skin. Think for like two extra seconds about what
you're actually telling people these products can do, and think
about who might be buying them and who you might
be hurting. Yeah, I just thought no one could afford them.

(18:44):
You'd be surprised. I went to the Group Store and
the Brentwood country Mark when there was like a pop
up of it they're just like out of curiosity, and
I was like, there's an audience for this stuff. It's
like a solid gold BUILDO want to know about the dildol.
Dildos also doesn't say does it say like it does anything?

(19:11):
It does? I don't know. Let's look it up. I'm
sure it cannot be anti microbial. It's a very soft metal.
While you look like that up, Jane, We're going to
take a quick break and when we come back, we're
going to talk about um gold dildos and old people
and peoples. We're back. Um. So it turns out the

(19:47):
gold dildo is not a Goop product. It's just sold
on group. But it's called and it costs. There's a
couple of different versions. I think like lives matters size,
Like is there like a gold plated version if you're
like on a budget? I bet. I mean if I
were the manufacturers, I would do it doesn't say like

(20:09):
it attracts cosmic vibrations of the universe. No, it has
a bulbous end to stimulate your G spot or something
like that. I should hope. So I'm make sure the
only person buying it is someone who wants Okay, now
this person is so gross. We don't like this person,
but like, it's a dude who wants to use it

(20:30):
as like a paperweight on their desks. Oh my god,
you know that guy? Yeah, kind of funny joke. Yeah,
we have some other scary health news. Um that came
out in an article in Jezebel. Um. A new report
found that on demand therapy app Better Help, as well

(20:50):
as some other therapy apps, have been sharing sensitive and
personal information with third party apps. Yeah it's great, isn't it, um,
I will from the article. Facebook, for instance, is alerted
every time a person opens the app, essentially signaling to
the social media company how often we were going to
a session and when we booked our appointments. To confirm
Facebook's retention of this information, we downloaded personal data from

(21:13):
Facebook and identified the associated records from Better Help. During
a session with a therapist, we found that metadata from
every message, though not its contents, was also sent to
the social media company, meaning that Facebook knew what time
of day we were going to therapy, are approximate location,
and how long we were chatting on the app. M See,
this is another one of these things like that, Because

(21:34):
there's a few of these, right there's like talk space.
U is talk Space? Did they have the I think
talk space was mentioned I want to use something creepy guys. Sure,
But after I sent you this article, I got asked
for it in my Instagram and yes, do you Siri? No,
but I was she typed it, you googled it. I

(21:56):
may have googled the word suicide at some time recently
that started serving me ads for therapy and I thought
that was really funny. It was when were you talking
last night? Yeah, okay, um, not no worries everybody. We
were talking about something different. Um. But but I was like,
that's so weird that it's like, hey, feeling bad, I'm
a computer. Well. I think also that I think that

(22:19):
these apps really the way that they sell themselves, because
I've heard I've heard podcast ads for talk Space and
stuff like this, um, is that they take advantage of
the very very true fact. Again, this is like all
the wellness industry things that it is so fucking hard
to get a therapist. It takes forever, it's expensive. Uh,

(22:41):
it's usually not covered or the coverage is like very
like a morphous like somebody can say they're covered by
one thing on their website, and they're not when you
actually ask them, um, And I think that that's like
a genuine frustration, and like people talk about like I
think that there's more of a conversation about mental health
now than there has been in the past, and everybody
like people destigmatizing therapy and like encouraging people to go

(23:03):
to therapy. But it's so hard to go to therapy
even if you couldn't afford it um, which a lot
of people can't. And I think it's like very it's
very insidious that like these apps are taking advantage of
that to like sell like and the cost is just
your personal in for bucks an hour, right, So they
got to make up the difference somewhere because they're real therapists.
On the other end of the line, there are they. Yeah,

(23:25):
there are people who maybe somewhere remost not just a
smarter child. Well, the other thing is, so the information
is you're assigned a number, so it's your name is
not being revealed until the FBI asked, but it's also
being shared. Your data is being shared with an analytics
and research company called Mixed Panel, which um Jezebel's report

(23:47):
kind of suggests might be the basis for a chunk
of the book Uncanny Valley as like you know, her
kind of lamenting having worked for a surveillance company. Um,
but they received information and that had been made anonymous. However,
they had more information this analytics firm, so they knew, um,
how old we were, whether we considered ourselves spiritual or religious,

(24:10):
financial status, sexual orientation. This is also very similar to
a practice run by a super famous cult who signed
we can see out the window here, but we don't
have to name in case because we've already talked enough
about them. We're in Hollywood, California, Hollywood. Um. But it's
like a blackmail. It could be used that way. You're

(24:33):
telling it sensitive information you might not want people to know,
and then you're trusting it to not use that against you.
You know, when I fall asleep to Twilight Zone every night,
like nothing feels like far off from what they were imagining.
I know, Chwilot sounds a little optimistic, the most depressive, honestly,

(24:56):
do you guys? Follow William Gibson on Twitter? He wrote
all follow the great cyberpunk books and he's always like,
holy fuck, what's happening? Where You're just like, oh, come
on Yeah, the guy to the Dystopian Future is like, yeah, yeah,
I think like it's interesting to really consider the dangers

(25:17):
of this because it's it's not always obvious, it's not
always what you think could be the worst case scenario.
I mean, I think like in the article they kind
of point out that a combination of financial status and desperation,
you can paint a picture of a potential consumer who
could really easily be trapped in misled into doing horrible things.

(25:38):
Like it's you initially think like, oh, my privacy, but
you know, it's really what it's saying about trends and
about like groups that I think is is scared and
the Gwyneth Paltrow at that company to make themselves feel
like a good person could say, well, we're using the
analytics to target ads for people who may not have
access to original conventional therapy to make themselves. That's what's

(26:02):
dangerous about like so much Silicon Valley stuff as being
like okay, well we have no social infrastructure anymore in anywhere,
and like so they thank you, yeah that the book
that it creates like gaps in the market that can
then be monetized. When it's like, no, what it needs
to be is like free and available to everybody. I
just think like between this all the ancestry um and

(26:26):
the what's the other I just want to say I
call that on Molly Sleazy Friends with Create a Long Worth.
In the first episode, we both went on the record
saying we would never give our to the Yeah, yeah,
I I mean I know somebody who is doing the
ancestry stuff right now, and it's such an It's again,

(26:48):
these are like very emotional vulnerabilities to take advantage of
with people, because people who like you know, in this
case of this person was adopted and doesn't have any
idea like with and like that's a very big existential
human questions, super sympathetic, super understandable, and that you know,
you're kind of blinded to the like the idea of like,

(27:09):
oh my information might be sold is sort of feels
abstracted compared to the idea of like, well I could
figure out who I am, though, like I guess who
runs ancestory dot com. The Mormon's yeah, really yeah, Well
that's bad they're not They're they're got some racism going

(27:32):
on in there. Because I saw there was like a
really scary campaign because I feel like it's like they've
maxed out all the people who would use twenty three
in me, and it's like even if you don't use it,
like somebody and your family might use it, and then
you're a part of the part of the chain. Yeah.
Um it came up in that movie, that Netflix movie
Horse Girl. Oh it's so good. Molly Shannon's character is

(27:55):
like talking about her results from twenty three and me,
although it's got another name that's really funny, play on
twenty three and me, and she's like, so, I'm nineties
seven percent irishcent this, and then she's like, and one
percent West African, I'm African. That is also that's just

(28:15):
what people do when they get these results, you know,
it's like the first well, it's like it's all like
white people who want to see if there's like something
some interesting kind of non white person hidden in there.
But I've also seen like this is the thing that
really freaking out recently was like they are bad at
tracing the lineage of people who were trafficked over as

(28:39):
slaves exactly, and then they were marketing like, hey, we
figured it out now like black people come us twenty
three and me. We figured out slavery and I figured
out without users. Don't I don't even just the idea
that they were like marketing it specifically to a black audience,
being like, come get your DNA tested. It just seems
so evil and scary. But don't they also am I

(29:03):
making this up? But don't they also kind of market
it in a wellness capacity of lots of health information.
I mean, the thing that's really hard. Everyone just be
normal and stop being dicks. It's just like, this is
the whole thing in the tech industry, but it, obviously
I don't think has come into the wellness industry quite yet.
But the idea of like, if something makes money but

(29:25):
it's evil, don't do it. But what if it I'm
just playing Devil's advocate. What if it? No, I shouldn't
even because I was just thinking. So I had to
be tested for the BRACA gene the v r c
A gene um and it was crazy expectative. I'm negative,
which is great, um, thank you for asking. But there

(29:46):
are things like that where I wondered with twenty three
and me I was like, obviously, I'm not really excited
to give over any kind of d N A M
to a weird organization, but they test for I mean,
that's the thing. It's not any nine bucks. Well that's
the thing too, is it's like if you're coming into
the health care sector, that's horrible. But you guys know that.

(30:06):
I'm like a big fan of heal, which is the
doctor house called thing, and that is to have doctors
who make house call. I I know. But it's again,
I mean, it's like there's with twenty three and me.
You see how that can that does like exploit a
real need, you know, I mean, you're you're risking a
huge thing. These blood tests that I'm sure they're collecting
your DNA info as well and probably selling it to

(30:29):
or someone. But there's all these new tests that are
like spit tests or whatever for food intolerance and what's
your perfect item and get the ads and you know
they're taking your DNA probably right like read the fine print.
I'm sure there's like some money besides what they're going
to sell you back, like they're selling off something. But
what if you do if you decide to be like

(30:51):
a blood don't or you do be the match or
something like that, like I am, and I'm like I
need to trust you. I need to trust you be
the match and but it's still it's like just the
idea of how this is now emerging as a market,
and you just swab yourself and send it away and
you're like, okay, I guess that's that. Also, if you
swap yourself, can they then replicate you in a lap?

(31:11):
They should? Definitely, that would be it. I'd be happy
to give them idea. There needs to be more of
me I could. I would stay out of the sun
trade faces. It would be fantastic and have a backup face. Right,
never a bad idea. I keep one in my personal time.

(31:33):
If you could twin yourself, would you? You just both
said yes, kind of well, I would take the body
cart from my twin to me harvest have like a
whole discreet me, make sure the clone doesn't take over
and start harvesting you. Right, that's well again, it's risk

(31:55):
and reward, Polly, that's with all things. Um. We got
a night text, actually a night email. We got both
about something slightly less high stakes. Then making a tumble
of yourself with your d n A. It's better than
you than someone else, right, I'm interested to see what
Jamie Rey says about this um okay uh. This is

(32:17):
from Evan in Portland, and he is wondering if you
all think that a Stop is the yuppie, urban professional
version of Living Oils Pick your alternative health scam. The
faux medical packaging and cultish dedication of its users just
creeps me out, although I'll admit the medical claims they
make aren't quite as ridiculous. But tell me this doesn't
read just like a multi level marketing scam. And then

(32:42):
there's a review of a silence facial hydrator. Was this
from Esquire? Is that right? Did it? Was it an advertorial?
It read at least the opener read like an advertorial.
Blow your mind's right here. Beauty sections of magazines are
all really just I know, but it was this one.

(33:03):
I it seemed like an interview, but it was so
advertorially in the intro party. I was like, Wow, they
didn't have to disclose this. Um, what do you think
of ASoP? I mean, it's not an MLM because you're
allowed to sell it in stores. They have their own. However,
it's owned by Natura. I don't I So I found

(33:25):
um on an anti MLM Reddit board, just that board
I'm quoting just found out one of my favorite skincare
brands is owned by Natura, and I'm so disappointed. ASoP
is a very high end brand of bath and beauty
products and I've been a long time customer. Yesterday, after
making a purchase, I decided to research the company in

(33:45):
the hopes of picking up a part time gig in
the retail store near me, only to find out that
it was purchased by the MLM Natura or Natura, which
also now owns the Body Shop. To my knowledge, a
stop does not have an MLM component at this time,
but I'm still hopping mad. Oh this is fascinating. I
didn't know that. Of course, the body Shop got Bob

(34:05):
also bought Avon, which was already and m yeah, um,
this is interesting. See, I like when ASoP started to
become a thing. I was just like kind of marveling
at the idea of like every generation gets its body Shop,
and I didn't realize I didn't mean into it that
it was like the same thing. Natura is a multi

(34:28):
level marketing company that promotes its image as an eco friendly,
sustainable company. The company also uses ordinary women rather than
supermodels and advertisements They don't want to pay for anything.
Maybe like we're a wholesome brand, so the Natura brand

(34:48):
itself is an MLM as well as Avon. I'm assuming
stop buying everybody ASoP has a list for you. The
number of companies that I think are turning into amos
right now, but I don't. I don't want to. Yeah,
if you see a makeup or beauty brand that is
starting a campaign that sounds a little bit like a

(35:11):
street team or representatives or you know, a brand ambassador
for example, beware, I want to say that that's all
super fuzzy now too, though, because of influencers, like everybody
becomes a de facto. I think that's a step before
it becomes an amount. I will say also that like,

(35:34):
what is so sad about MLM culture that also like
group is definitely taking advantage of, is that it is like, hey,
like women like feel powerless and want to feel like
you have like more control about just everything. It's like
it is explaining something that's like you can be like
the head executive at your own company, which is what

(35:56):
all evil geniuses do, right. They look like in the
healthcare realm, in in business and whatever you look for
a vulnerable population. You sell them a bullshit story for
way more money than you should, and you tell them
it's they're getting a great deal on this thing. I mean,
we all got suckered by, like the housing and mortgage

(36:19):
industry doing the exact same thing. Vulnerable population. Everyone wants
a house, Okay, you can do it. I'm going to
give you this incredible deal and then I'm gonna abscond
with the money and run away, never get in trouble.
And that's just what scammers do. Scammers gonna scam, you know,
they have to scam capitalist Yeah, yeah, I mean yeah.

(36:39):
And it's worse for sure. It's like, there's not I
don't think there's a way to get rid of those
bad guys other than to beware and be less trusting,
be less trusting about everybody and trade economy guys. Burning man,
somebody's still going to stuff something full of like telcom
powder and tell you it's you know, flower or whatever

(37:01):
for forty pellets. Exactly, I mean exactly. Well, we're going
to take another break, and when we come back, we're
going to talk about the greatest wellness industry movie ever made.
We'll be back soon. Welcome back, to night Call. So

(37:32):
this week we watched Cocoon, film by Ron Howard. This
was the suggestion of Jane Mayes. No I thought it would.
I don't even remember how we got to Cocoon. I
think it's for Spooky Love February. It may What is
spooky love about it? Yeah, the aliens come and help.

(37:52):
Maybe we were talking about it for next month, which
is spring break March. It has a bunch of elements,
It has Florida, it has a juvenating pool. It does
all spring break well. Yeah, but it's like a little while,
it's like a spa. It also makes you feel young.
It makes the really horny love the alien lady yet

(38:12):
and like always apprising naked, the naked Lady Raquel Welsh's daughter. Yeah,
it's a good transition from Speakla February into springa. Okay, well,
I love this movie, um, and I was pleased to
watch it no matter. The reason I've never seen it,
I think is also I was like, let's do that
because I love seeing big classic movies I've never seen.

(38:34):
I love this movie, Cocoon. I really love Cocoon. I
didn't know that I would still love it as much
as I did when I was like seven years old,
but I did, I really did. I know a lot
of people who liked it from childhood. And that's so
interesting to me because I think I've watched it maybe
when I was like a tween or something, and I
thought it was the most boring thing in the world.
And every time I've watched it since then, I'm like,

(38:56):
more and more into it, get closer. Yeah, I didn't
remember what it was about. Like, okay, here's my memories
of Cocoon before I revisited. Well, I didn't get to
watch the first one again. I watched half of them.
You have seen it. I have seen it, and I
couldn't remember what the plot was. And I was sitting
with my partner and we're like, what was cocoon? Cocoon

(39:19):
was Wilford Brimley, that's for sure years old. What was
an old age makeup? Everybody else was twenty years older. Oh,
he was an old age makeup. The liver spots and
he dyed his hair. Okay, yeah, but he didn't have
to do that. But Wilfred Brimley. Um, there were people
in the room when I was talking about this who
had no idea who he was. So just let's remind

(39:41):
people about diabetes, asked a Quaker oats commercial. Did your
daughter not know who Wilford? She wasn't one of them.
It was an adult. He also made several campaigns because
he didn't want to ban cockfighting or something like that.
He had like a bunch of really weird political opinions
that he's very be allowed to fight each other, especially

(40:05):
if they're gold plated. And then I remembered Guttenberg was
in it, and I was like, remember when Gutenberg was
the thing that was weird? But anyway, I knew there
was like I completely walked out the alien part. I
was like, I knew there was cocoons, and then I
had something to do with stopping time or reversing time
and being young again. And it was based around a

(40:27):
retirement community. That's what I remember. Going into the sequel
did not refresh anything anymore. So talk about the first one, Well, okay,
the first one was incredibly hard to find, it was
not on streaming, and then we just came up with
a potential conspiracy about why right now thought a conspiracy

(40:48):
it is that it is a Fox movie, and the
distribution rights for a lot of Fox movies are kind
of frozen in time right now because they got up
by Disney. It's a lambo. I assumed it would have
been on Disney Plus, but I'd be Okay, which is
also Disney anyway. It was also checked out from all

(41:10):
of the local libraries, which was crazy because I was like,
they always someone who has to It was so it
was so weird to be like this movie is hard
to find, because yeah, it's like any Blockbuster would have
like eight copies of Cocoon. You found it at the
Cult Video Star, and my question is what were they
doing with a copy. I was surprised they had it
that it was in the sci fi section because it

(41:32):
is a science fantasy movie like eighties movies. So Cocoon
is about a group of retirees at a retirement home
in St. Petersburg, Florida. Looks chill would retire, Oh my god.
They like to sneak into a pool a nearby abandoned state,

(41:53):
and then some mysterious visitors come and set up shop
in this state they rented out, and they also rent
a boat from Steve Guttenberg for a mysterious mission, and
they start storing these things that are like these Barnarcley
pods in the pool, and when the old people swim
in the pool, they are miraculously rejuvenated and able to fuck.

(42:15):
And this is like so I don't know when viagara
was like introduced, but I like that this was just
a movie but basically being like, what if aliens came
and they gave us viagara? They no, they were spry
and they cured it cured there. One of the guys
had cancer in it and he was like magically in

(42:38):
remission after swimming in the pool. So I'm saying this
is a wellness industry and they are a part of
the movie where they were like, damn, we should have
done this sooner. Well, it didn't have the effects of
the water. Only only took place once the aliens came
and started storing the pods, and so they've been swimming
into the pool. But I mean younger people like being like,
we should get the young people in here. Why will

(42:59):
you st petersburg Berg, I mean if you have to
pause time, like, wouldn't you want to do it? He doesn't,
He doesn't want to. He gets in the pool. He
gets in the pool, and they has and they what
does she They share each other in the female younger

(43:21):
female love interest is yeah, Tanny will Choose's daughter. It's
one of the aliens, but it's t a h n E.
Listener Christina said, is this the movie where Talia Shire
rips off a rubber face to show like a pure
beam of light? And I was like, yes, but it's
Tanny Well is Talia Shire in the signal? She just

(43:45):
looks like Talia Shire. She has a Talia Shire looked.
Christina had never seen Cocoon because that scene freak out Well.
My husband, I was like, oh, I love this movie
as a kid and made me cry. He was like,
I was scarred forever because there's a scene where Steve
Guttenberg is like kind of like being a peeping tom
on the alien and she's undressing and then she takes

(44:08):
off her skin like terminator and but the worst, the
worst part is when the skin like drops to the floor.
It's not even bad and she's keeling it off. It's
that it's like it looks like a car. Then she's
an alien and she like comes to the door to
be like that you scary. That's a scary Do not

(44:31):
like that they are, especially when they're like playing bridge
because they hang out too. That's what all Peeping Tom's deserve.
Someone peeled their skin suit off. That also reminded me
of species and what's their point? What's their point? The aliens?
What's there? What are they there? And they're coming back.
They used to live on Earth in ancient times, long ago,
long ago. They set up their camp and Atlantis and

(44:54):
then that went pear shaped, and so they had to
DeCamp and go to another planet. But they left a
ground crew. Yeah, they left some like, yeah, some kind
of watchman there in Atlantis, which apparently is off the
coast of St. Petersburg, Florida. And um, and so they
had they came back to just retrieve their comrades who

(45:14):
had been left. And the comrades are in the pod
and they look kind of look like they look like
they look like they've been doing a dry fast. That's
the base of the dry fast. They're like they are
like people, um and and they're not doing that great.
So they were just stopping off for a second to
pick up some fronds. Yeah, because they rented the place
that it was like twenty seven days. They rent the

(45:36):
boat for twenty seven days, They rent the estate for
seven it is. Yeah, it's it's it's wonderful and what
we had to do it with Jane on because but
it's also I have to say it is strange romantic
because so these so there are couples. Um it is
let's see Don Amici is art. His partner is Gwen
Verdon of all people. Hello, then Will for Brimley, his

(46:01):
wife is Maureen Stapleton. We have Hume Crownin and Jessica
Tandy in real life. Um, and then we have heard
a Where and Jack Guilford. Who are the couple rows?
Jack Gilford sounds like Tigger from the Cartoons Front. He

(46:21):
has just like a very cartoony voice, sounds like a
like I don't know Mary cartoony in this movie. But
as are they? Yeah, everyone is lovely. Everybody's a real
sweetie in this movie. We also have a lot of
overlap actor overlap with some night call movies that we've covered.
Because Maureen Stapleton was in Reds and heard Aware was

(46:42):
in Species, I did not know who was she. I
don't know. I saw, I was like, I don't remember.
But now I'm going to go in and do a
podcast without looking it up. That is what I did.
What I learned about this movie is that it was
based on a novel and that it was originally supposed
us to be directed by Robert Samakis, which makes total

(47:04):
sense because it is super weird for a Ron Howard Movieum,
but apparently Zemeckis had just come off a couple of
flops and so they replaced him with Ron Howard. He'd
get around to his yeah, and then he had something
within it and so he got to make back to
the future is um. So the reason I turned the
equal off got very It got very There's this thing

(47:27):
in sci fi. I love ziy is my favorite genre,
but I think there's this thing that happens in a
lot of sci fi where everyone around knows that the
unbelievable thing happened, and then a slightly adjacent or like
something else unbelievable happens, and then everything goes back to
normal in their brains, like that can't be right, Like

(47:48):
The Stiles, where it's like, we know aliens exist, but
killer bees no crazy. So it started out with that
and just kept doing that in the beginning of the movie,
where I was like, I think they all got rejuvenated
and died in a shipwreck. No, they got taken by aliens,
but they're back. That can't be. There's a lot of

(48:10):
incredulity at a thing that he fully established in the
first I don't think Equel did they. So they come back,
they come back, Okay, they just come back. How long
after the first movie is the sequel supposed to take place?
Not that long because the little Boy is still the
little Boy and Steve Stenberg still little is the little
boy from the never Ending Story. That's why he's so Bastian. Yeah,

(48:37):
Bastian thread the other day about how to get out
of quicksand and everybody was like, why didn't the words
for the horse? And you can't reason with a horse.
They're like, it's actually easier to get out of the sand.
Let us to believe there's also a lot less quicksand

(48:58):
the new quicksand like there's no way to get out
of lava. Uh. Yeah, I that makes so much sense
that this was meant to be a as a megas. Yeah,
it also, like I I did, I didn't know that
it was had a score by James Horner. James Horner, Yeah,
but it's so obviously has a score by James Horner.

(49:18):
It's very Titanic and one song by the guy who
did Flash Dance that's like a really good song when
they go to the to that song, very silly song
of Cocoon Forever Young. Oh yeah, they made a music
video that came out around the same time. They made
a music video with all the scenes from I missed

(49:43):
those videos or it's just clips from the movie. It's wonderful.
So yeah, I didn't know that I was I've never
seen Cocoon before. I had no emotional attachment to it. Um.
I started just like enjoying it the whole time, definitely
thinking about how I would love to live in that
retirement community now. And then when they were on the
boat at the end and the ship comes to take

(50:05):
them space, I just like burst into two and was
very surprised. I love how game everybody is to go
to space in this That's like, that's what I mean
when everybody in this movie is like a big sweedie,
like they're also just like super open minded, like, yeah,
let's go live with some aliens. It seems cool. This
movie is the senior big chill. I like that. Well

(50:28):
you started off. Molly turned it on and texted us
it's it's the shining and I was like, I can't
wait to talk about what does that mean? Just there
were just a lot of scenes of like old ballrooms
and uh, because all their hangouts are just these kind
of like still hanging on places like big band balls.

(50:52):
Just feels like in the eighties that would probably be
the kind because that's like what they were doing when
they were adults, and you know, because they just like
so separate from the rest of the world, right, I mean,
I think that one of the great things about this
like this film is genuinely unusual in a lot of ways.
But I just think like it is one of those
things where you start watching it and you are just

(51:14):
our motto, genuinely unusual. But like I mean, for like
a big for like a studio film that was widely
released and was a hit by all counts. Yeah, eighty
five point three million, that's on a seventeen point five. Yeah,
it was a really popular movie. And like, but there's
something like when you're just dropped down into a quartet

(51:36):
of seniors and like just asked to go with it,
it's very unusual. It's one of those things where you're like, oh,
I never see a story about these sorts of people
without making fun of them or the joke being that's right.
And I read an article by the author of the
book that Cocoon was based on. It was like a
sci fi novel. Um. He is now in his eighties,

(51:57):
and he wrote a piece for the A RP Magazine
about what it's like to actually be the age of
the characters, because he wrote the book when he was
in his sporties, and he was like, old people are
much less like sedentary than I imagine them to be
in the first place. He was like, now that I'm
in my eighties, like I've never stopped doing anything, And
the idea that like I thought older people would like

(52:18):
have stopped doing their you know, following their passions or
wanting to have sex, is like a thing I made
up that isn't true popular culture. I loved that. Well,
it's also like I do feel like old people are
really like either villainized in movies or sort of like
a joke. Yeah, well, if it's the center of the story,

(52:41):
it's kind of like the same thing with like that phobia,
or you know, if you have a character that isn't
tiny or whatever, then that's the joke of the whole
movie or this movie takes on like the fear of
aging in this like very beautiful and spiritual way that
I was very affected by at the end, where you're right,
what if people didn't die they could go to space

(53:04):
suggests like it suggests an afterlife, like a real afterlife
the way, well, it's just like a real afterlife, like
I mean, basically it looks like a rapture at the end.
I also had a cynical moment of like, what if
the aliens are just going to do tests on them? Now?
It's it is possible. I mean, yeah, Whitley Striper did

(53:26):
not write this book, didn't go there yet. Well, we
have to let Jane Marie go. Thank you so much
for joining us today. This is amazing, really fun all
the time. We absolutely will. Where can people find you online?
So I'm at see Jane Marie. It's see Jane like
Cee Jane run see Jane Marie on Twitter and Instagram

(53:47):
and my company is called Little Everywhere and you can
find all of our shows. They're like The Dream. Um yeah, holler, yeah,
everybody check out The Dream. It's great. It's so good.
I've mentioned on the podcast before that, I was getting
my cavity fills. I was listening to the first episode
of the Second Torture. That was great. I felt very

(54:09):
lucky and be sure to buy our supplements which definitely work.
I put them in your vagina. We are also going
to be embarking on a new theme for the month
of March. It's spring Break March, and we would love
your night call or night email about your spring break stories,

(54:30):
good or bad. Um. You can give us an email
at Night Call podcast at gmail dot com or it's
a night Call at one to four oh four six night.
Thank you so much for listening tonight Call this week.
You can subscribe to us on iTunes, leave us a
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(54:51):
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(55:16):
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