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January 26, 2026 12 mins
This week on Pop Culture Weekly with Kyle McMahon, Kyle sits down with Evan Peters and Rebecca Hall to talk all about The Beauty, Ryan Murphy’s stylish, unsettling new series for FX and Hulu that will make you rethink mirrors, skincare ads and society’s obsession with perfection.

The trio dives into what it’s like working inside the Ryan Murphy universe, why The Beauty feels especially relevant in the age of influencer culture and how the show blends glamour, horror, and psychological unease into something you can’t look away from - even when it makes you uncomfortable.

Evan opens up about returning to yet another Ryan Murphy project (yes, he’s basically a resident now), Rebecca talks about her first experience collaborating with Murphy, and both discuss the frighteningly plausible ideas at the center of the series - including beauty as power, control, and commodity. Stylish, provocative, and designed to spark conversation, The Beauty is one of those shows that sticks with you long after the credits roll - and this conversation goes just as deep. The Beauty is streaming now on FX and Hulu.

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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
In this episode of pop Culture Weekly, I talk with
Evan Peters and Rebeccah Hall all about their brand new
Ryan Murphy show, The Beauty. Let's go.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Welcome to pop Culture Weekly with Kyle McMahon from iHeartRadio,
your pop culture news, views, reviews and celebrity interviews on
all the movies, TV music and pop culture u CRABE Weekly.
Here's Kyle McMahon.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
Nitt nana, no, nit nana no. Welcome back to pop
Culture Weekly with Kyle McMahon. I of course am Kyle McMahon,
and this is the show where we celebrate pop culture,
question our life choices, and once again ask the important
question do I really need another Ryan Murphy show in

(00:44):
my life? And that answer is always yes, Even when
I know it's going to emotionally damage me, that answer
is yes. Today it's all about The Beauty, the new
series on FX and Hulu that stars Evan Peters and
Rebecca Hall that is from Ryan Murphy. And The Beauty

(01:07):
is stylish, of course, It's unsettling, of course, and it
makes you feel weird about mirrors in a way you
didn't expect. And yes, I'm talking to both Evan and Rebecca,
so let's be honest. Let's talk about Ryan Murphy for
a minute. He doesn't just make TV shows, right, like,
he creates entire moods. You don't just watch a Ryan

(01:32):
Murphy series. You enter it. You know, American horror story,
American crime story, Nip Tuck, Ratchet which I absolutely loved,
Grotesquery which I absolutely loved, Feud, Glee, I mean, he
screamed Queens. I could go on and on, but like
I said, you really just enter a Ryan Murphy show.

(01:57):
It's like you live in that universe, and it's you
always know that everybody's gorgeous, traumatized and wearing incredible coats,
and they're absolutely hiding a secret that will be revealed
in episode five. His shows are bold, they are messy,
they're addictive, and you know, if you've ever finished a

(02:19):
Ryan Murphy series and thought I need to sit quietly
for a moment, then congratulations, you're doing it right. His
shows just have that I don't know how else to
describe it. So the Beauty takes that signature Ryan Murphy
energy and it kind of points it directly at our
obsession with perfection, with beauty and youth and image and control.

(02:45):
You know, all the things that society tells us are
totally healthy and definitely won't destroy us psychologically. The Beauty
it's not a comfort show, that's for sure. And it's
not like I'm half watching while I'm scrolling on TikTok show.
It's a why do I feel judged by my TV?
Kind of show. It's very sleek, it's very creepy, as

(03:08):
all of his shows are. It's smart. Well, I shouldn't
say all of his shows are creepy. Glee wasn't creepy,
but a lot of his shows are. It's smart. You know,
his shows are often smart, and it's definitely the kind
of series that makes you rethink skincare ads forever. And
at the center of The Beauty is Evan Peters and
Rebecca Hall love them. This is Evan peters first time

(03:31):
on the show and Rebecca Hall's second. Evan is a
man who has played more emotionally intense characters than most
of us have had hot meals. You know him as
Quicksilver in the Fox X Men Universe and now the
MCU the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Of course, he's been in

(03:52):
numerous seasons of American horror Story, including The Og Murder House.
He's been in Monster tron Ares, Mayor of East Town,
Kick Ass, Wanda Vision, and so much more. Love him
and Rebecca Hall, who was on for her creepy movie
The Nighthouse, is one of the most quietly powerful, unsettling

(04:16):
performers I'd say working today, and she could convey like
existential dread and just one look. She's been in The Gift,
The Prestige, The Town, Iron Man Three, Godzilla Verse, Kang
Godzilla Verse, Kang The New Empire, Love love, love her.
So I talk to them both about working inside the

(04:38):
Ryan Murphy universe, why the Beauty feels specially relevant right now, Hello,
influencer culture, and how you prepare for a show that
lives somewhere between glamour and nightmare. So let's jump right
into my interview with Evan Peters and Rebecca Hall. Thank

(05:00):
you both so much for joining me. I really appreciate it.
So oh, thank you very much. I love this share.
So first of all, congrats on the beauty. It really
is awesome. I'm really loving it. You know, I love
Ryan Murphy's work. I love both of your work. I
wonder what what attracted you to this particular project, both

(05:23):
of you have worked with Ryan before. I'm sure I
assumed part of that, uh had something to do with it,
You haven't.

Speaker 3 (05:33):
Really, it's my first time. It was my first time.
I've since done another Ryan Murphew production.

Speaker 1 (05:38):
Oh the the Monster, right Monster?

Speaker 3 (05:40):
I just yeah, but this was my first, my first
experience and entrance into the Ryan Murphy universe.

Speaker 4 (05:49):
A veteran and now I'm a veteran.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
I'm not a veteran.

Speaker 5 (05:51):
You'll never leave.

Speaker 1 (05:58):
And Rebecca, was that something that attracted to you, you know,
doing a Ryan Murphy project?

Speaker 4 (06:04):
Yeah, No, I know, I've yeah, I've always wanted to
work with him, but I've always been an admirer and
thought that everything that he don't he just has such
an instinct for the zeitgeist and for what's going on,
and he seems to tap into something that we're all
talking or thinking about and somehow make it subversive and
exciting and fun and just entertaining and the thing that
you want to watch, and that, of course an actor

(06:27):
wants to be a part of that.

Speaker 3 (06:29):
So I was very excited when he pitched it to
me because it sounded like all of those things and
it you know, he also pointed out that it was
going to shoot in New York and Paris and Venison, Rome,
and I was like, well that doesn't sound too terrible.

Speaker 1 (06:45):
No, no, And how about for you, Evan? By my count,
you're at like forty seven Ryan.

Speaker 5 (06:52):
Murphy projects somewhere.

Speaker 1 (06:55):
What what brought you to this one?

Speaker 5 (07:00):
I really liked the comic book series uh that he
sent along with the first script, and it's a very
uh it was international. It was going to be shooting
in all these very exciting locations, and it was an
opportunity to do some fun action sequences and have a

(07:21):
romantic storyline with with Rebecca Hall, which is very exciting.
And so yeah, it was there was a lot that
was going to be different, and Ryan's always throwing something
different at me to do, which is very It's it's
really a dream come true. So so yeah, I jumped
at it.

Speaker 1 (07:39):
And for you, you both play you know these agents
that are investigating this uh, this being you know this
kind of uh I want to say almost not zempic ish,
but you know this thing that yeah ozempic adjacent. Do

(08:00):
you see could you see it? You know in our world?
Could you see that kind of happening in our world?

Speaker 4 (08:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (08:11):
I mean it feels very far fetched, but also it's
not that far fetched.

Speaker 1 (08:14):
I mean, you know, right now.

Speaker 3 (08:16):
If you've got enough money, you can you can you
can permanently look thirty five pretty much. So you know,
it's like, yeah, I don't know that we're that far
away from these things getting more and more distilled into
until you get to one shot makes you hot, but
maybe not the side effects, right, I mean there's always
side effects. There is always a crash, there is always
an inevitable cost.

Speaker 5 (08:38):
That's true. Pers it's yeah, yeah, metaphorical explosion. Yeah yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
Next question, so I would have to ask, you know,
you both are in Hollywood. There is you know, Hollywood
often leads kind of the rest of us in new
treatments and that sort of thing. Is that something you know?

(09:07):
I was thinking about this as I was watching. If
I didn't know the side effects, you know, would I maybe,
you know, try to try to do this?

Speaker 2 (09:17):
You know?

Speaker 1 (09:18):
Is that something that kind of ever crossed your mind
taking the side effects part of it out? You know?

Speaker 3 (09:25):
I think that obviously, like we're act it's like how
we look as part of our job. I mean, it's
sort of you know, it dictates how much time you're
in the makeup chair in the morning, how hard it
is to light your face. You're thinking about it, You're
thinking about how you look it on a on a
daily basis, and it's naive to pretend that you know
I'm not. I also like to think that that acting

(09:45):
is about looking all types of ways according to what
the project is. And sometimes you want to look actually
the opposite of of of good for the sake.

Speaker 4 (09:56):
Of truth, and that's meaningful.

Speaker 3 (09:59):
So I think I suppose what I'm trying to say
is like, on a broader sense, of course, beauty is
a is a commodity. There's power in beauty, but it's
also something that is I guess created by I sort
of agreed upon social reality. At any given time, you
look through time, what was the standard of beauty, and

(10:22):
it varies enormously. So I think, you know, it is
something that's external and is imposed from outside. And so
if you're giving a lot of money to people who
are going to make those decisions for you, I think
that's kind of frightening because those people want to keep
making money, and frankly, feeling inadequate is more profitable than

(10:42):
feeling satisfied. That was a long answer.

Speaker 5 (10:44):
It was a great answer.

Speaker 1 (10:45):
That was an amazing answer.

Speaker 5 (10:51):
No, No, that was great.

Speaker 1 (10:55):
Thank you both. Say that again. I love that. That
really was profound and it's and it's so so true.
Thank you both so much. I can't wait for everybody
to see The Beauty. It really is a great show.
Thank you guys, Thank you, thank you. I have a
great day, you too, Thank you Evan Peters and Rebecca Hall.

(11:19):
I'm telling you, The Beauty is one of those shows
that stick with you in the best and worst possible ways.
It's extremely stylish, as all as Ryan's as all of
Ryan's shows are. It's provocative, it's unsettling, and I'm telling
you it's absolutely going to start conversations. The Beauty is
on FX and Hulu right now, and yes, you're gonna

(11:41):
watch it before someone on the internet ruins it for you.
That's it for this episode. I'm Kyle McMahon. This has
been pop Culture Weekly, sleep Tight and maybe don't stare
too long in the mirror tonight. I love you, I'll
see you next episode.

Speaker 2 (11:55):
We thank you for listening to pop Culture Weekly. Here
all the latest and Cultureweekly dot com.

Speaker 1 (12:06):
The Bedy, The Bedy the bedy Ryan murphy universe, the Beudy,
the bedy, the bedy of Ryan Murphy's universe,
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