Celebrity, conspiracy and a Royal photo scandal (Plus, the most hyped films of 2024)

What's driving the obsession and conspiracy theories over the Royal photo scandal?

Osman, Thomas and Mel explain how the situation unfolding, discuss why it lit a cultural flare, and how it fits into our contemporary understanding of celebrity culture. They discuss their favourite Royal-themed movies, likely Oscar contenders for 2025 and share their pop culture recommendations on Impress Your Friends.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

S1 (00:07):
Hey, I'm Usman Farooqi and this is the drop a
culture show from the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age,
where we dive into the latest in the world of
pop culture and entertainment. I'm here with Thomas Mitchell and
Mel Campbell. How you doing, guys? What's up?

S2 (00:22):
Not too much. Just, you know, good to be back together.
We spent a lot of time together this week. Actually.

S1 (00:27):
We have it's funny looking at you guys on the screen.
We spent quite a bit of time together this week,
which was really nice. And now we're separated again.

S3 (00:34):
It is, but distance makes the heart grow fonder as
they say. So I'm sure next time we're all in
one room we'll enjoy it even more.

S1 (00:40):
Correct. Well, you know, what makes the heart grow fonder
is watching movies in cinemas with with you together for
the very first time ever in our lives and our
professional lives and our personal lives. We all went to
the movies together, uh, to watch something collectively. Uh, it
was Dev Patel's directorial debut, Monkey Man. We're gonna have

(01:01):
a bit more to say that in a couple of weeks,
closer to the release. This is a big, crazy, fun,
wild film, but we'll keep the powder dry. I think
the most interesting thing to say about this is I
got another insight into the world of our man, Thomas Mitchell.
You are like the mayor of these screenings, my friend.
You are kissing babies, shaking hands, wandering around, jumping up

(01:25):
and down the aisles saying hello to people. What is
the go with.

S2 (01:28):
That jumping up and down the aisle?

S3 (01:30):
Walk in. You're like, hey there and you over there. Hello, hello.

S2 (01:33):
Look, I have a lot of friends, so don't blame
me for being a social guy. And I'm a man
of the people. It's good to get out there and
meet the other people that get invited to these things.
And yes, there happen to be lots of people that
I knew from different walks of life is always going.

S3 (01:47):
It is always good going to an event with you,
because I feel like I have quite bad facial recognition,
I think. And if I don't know who someone is
or I'm curious, I just you're like a human Google search.
I can just be like, who is that person? Why
do I know that person? And you are on it?
And then you're probably making your way over there to
chit chat as well, correct?

S2 (02:04):
Yeah. It's good to, you know, it's just like it's
important to know people and to catch up with people.
So yeah, it's basically a mini reunion for me every
time I go to a screening.

S3 (02:12):
That's lovely.

S1 (02:13):
Would you say that was a, uh, like a oversaturation
of your friends at this particular screening, or is that
what it's like for you all the time?

S2 (02:22):
I'm always surrounded by people I know everywhere I go. Uh, no, actually. Well,
I mean, one of the guys, he's like a movie guy,
so that's like what he does, um, on sunrise. So
he's like, basically at every single screening. Shout out to
Jason Jabber Davis, uh, of band in a box fame.
This is.

S1 (02:37):
Today. Oh, like Jabba, like Jabba. Jabba from like to Jabba. Oh,
that's that was Jabba.

S2 (02:42):
That's cool. He actually loves this podcast. He'll be very
excited that we're talking about him.

S3 (02:45):
This is how you get so many friends from doing
shout outs like these. Like, this is the secret.

S1 (02:50):
Do you want to just list every other friend you
spoke to?

S2 (02:53):
So there was, uh, Gary Lou from Boss Hunting, who
I once.

S1 (02:56):
Okay, you don't have to. You don't have to do this.
You don't have to do this.

S3 (02:58):
Um, Osman, I have a question. You know, in the past,
I've spoken a lot about Thomas etiquette at the cinemas.
How did you find him? As. Because you sat directly
next to him as a movie companion. Yeah.

S1 (03:09):
Well, one one of the things that did stand out
to me this time around, and I was going to
ask you about it, and I thought I'd save it
for when we are talking in front of microphones, you
do check your phone a lot. Like, did you have
a home situation? Were you bored in the movies or
is it just the thing you do like a nervous.

S2 (03:24):
I knew this was going to come up because I
felt you catch me a few times. It was a
combination of two things, like I was texting my wife
a lot because she was kind of like, what time
are you coming home? Not she wasn't. She wasn't busting
my balls. But she was like, you know, she was like,
how's it going? What time are you coming home? And
then I was also I was feeling very tired last night,
so I was like kind of checking the time. I even,

(03:44):
I think I googled at one point, monkey man run
time to be like, what are we looking at here? Um,
as we were into, you know, the latter half of
the movie, but yes, I do check my phone often, um,
because I've got lots of friends contacting me who aren't
in the cinema.

S3 (03:56):
And you do know you do know us. Like Thomas
brought us into disrepute at the June screening, right? Looking
at his phone so much. Yeah, I curity guard got
kicked out.

S1 (04:05):
Yeah, this.

S4 (04:05):
Is.

S1 (04:06):
An issue with him. Look. Well, we will talk more
about monkey men and perhaps Thomas's phone etiquette. Uh, down,
down the track. But today on the show, there's there's
only really one thing happening in the world of media, culture,
celebrity at the moment. That is the scandal over the alleged,
I guess we'd say disappearance of Kate Middleton, the the

(04:28):
royal princess, the the future queen. It's not the kind
of topic we just generally have waiting to bit. We
realized this week that it's kind of all we were
talking about. It's all most of the people in our
lives we're talking about, and I think it sort of
says something about the way that like, we consume and
talk about celebrity now, the way things move so fast.

(04:51):
Kate had this long absence from public life that I'll
admit I was not completely across. But then we got
this bizarre proof of life photo accusations that had been
digitally altered and admission that had been digitally altered. That
there is a lot to unpack, I think, here, and
I think. This is not just going to be a
gossip session on on the royals. If that's what you're

(05:12):
worried about, they'll be a little bit of that, maybe.
But generally we're gonna look at this from the perspective
of why an event like this seems to have captured
the imagination of so many people, and whether or not
it's a good thing. Or maybe it speaks to a
kind of hollowness in our in our society and culture
of them. We'll we'll get there. We'll get there before

(05:32):
we get into the big one. We cover the Oscars
on a special episode on Monday. So if you want
to go back and listen to that for some more
in-depth takes, please feel free. But I think it's always
good to talk about these things with a bit more distance.
When the dust has settled, we can sort of look
at the reaction to the reaction, if you like. Uh,
one of the things that has come in since, since

(05:53):
today and Monday, the ratings, so on on sort of
linear broadcast TV in America, the Oscars attracted just under
20 million viewers, which is actually their biggest result in
four years. They're not bad when you consider what a
big proportion of the US population is, how do those
numbers feel to you guys? It's kind of what you expected.

(06:15):
Did you expect it to be bigger with the, you know,
the additional Bobby Oppenheimer factors?

S5 (06:21):
No.

S3 (06:21):
I reckon best results in four years. That's kind of
their best since post-Covid makes sense given the caliber of
the cast. There were so many films stacked with really
big popular figures. Um, multiple ones of these films had
real ensemble cast, so it kind of makes sense to
me that they've probably got a wider audience than usual.
They've got the Barbie heads, the Opie heads, they've kind

(06:42):
of been able to capture quite a big demographic compared
to other years.

S2 (06:46):
Yeah, I think so. I think it makes sense. I'd
be curious to see what happens next year. Like, I
do think that, as you all know, um, it for
me wasn't a great Oscars. And so, you know, the
audience has now like committed to it and watched it.
But like whether or not then next year you get
a hangover from people like, well, I watched the Oscars
for the first time in four years and, and it
was a bit boring. So like, I go back I

(07:06):
don't know. Yeah, but all.

S3 (07:07):
The June heads will be tuning in.

S2 (07:09):
That's true. Of which there are a lot.

S1 (07:11):
I think one of the reasons that like, ratings are
so tricky these days. We talk about this with TV, right?
Most people, even if there's a show like, say, Survivor
or Married at First Sight that broadcasts on television, a
lot of people, particularly younger people, are watching that on
a streaming platform which isn't captured, uh, you know, in,
in the kind of old school rating system. But I

(07:32):
feel similarly with the Oscars, like there might not just
be people streaming it on whatever digital platform it's streaming on,
whatever country they live in, but people can basically watch
the Oscars in real time, on TikTok, on Twitter, on Instagram,
because you just see people cut little videos. The Oscars shares, uh,
speeches and and the musical performances on YouTube as well.

(07:54):
So I feel like that increase, which is the biggest
in foyers but not the biggest overall and certainly not
as big as the heyday, you know, in the olden days,
doesn't actually quite capture how much of a phenomenon this is,
because my guess would be most people who don't work
in the industry, who are under the age of like 35,
wouldn't be anywhere near a TV for the Oscars. They

(08:14):
would just be watching it on social media where it
pops up on their face.

S3 (08:18):
Yeah, I think that's completely right that these figures ignore
the import it has kind of in other forms, or
people would just be consuming the stories about it all.
We know our live blog was very popular. People are
probably reading the live blog but not watching the Oscars
on TV. So I don't think the the viewer numbers
are necessarily, uh, kind of useful tool in the importance
and relevance of the Oscars because, yeah, as as you're saying,

(08:40):
I think people are accessing it and engaging with it
in entirely different ways to in the past.

S2 (08:44):
Yeah, I feel like they used to do a thing
where they would do like, I remember when I was young,
I'm sure they used to do like a they would
cut an episode like a shorter version of it, and
it would run at prime time on like channel nine
or whatever. When we were younger.

S1 (08:54):
They did do that. They did do that. Um, on
seven this year, 830, there was a Oscars, um, sort
of live event. I actually haven't looked at the ratings
for that. Would be interesting to see how that was.
But again, I doubt that that is attracting, you know,
anyone under the age of like 40 or 45.

S3 (09:10):
Yeah, like the ceremony itself. It's kind of, yeah, to
sit and watch three hours of it or even an
hour and a half of it is a lot like
without also some of the red carpet and other bigger
moments that they might have cut out for that broadcast.

S1 (09:21):
The other, the other thing that's happened in the last
couple of days since the awards, Al Pacino, Thomas, your
guy has, I guess, would have been forced to issue
an apology. This this goes back to his announcement of
the Best Picture winner, which is the ultimate category. It's
the finale of the evening.

S6 (09:39):
Ten wonderful films, uh, were nominated. But only one will
take the award for Best Picture. And I have to
go to the envelope for that, and I will. Here
it comes. And may I see Oppenheimer?

UU (10:07):
Yes. Yes. Emma. Thomas. Charles. Gordon.

S1 (10:12):
We talked a bit about how. Kind of fumbled. It
wasn't really clear whether he was announcing Oppenheimer or if
he was about to announce all the Best Picture nominees.
So people were sort of annoyed at him for two reasons. One,
he didn't list all ten nominees, and two, it wasn't
really clear or direct when he announced that Oppenheimer had won.
It now turns out that the producers of the awards

(10:33):
made the decision for him to not announce all ten.
They basically said, well, we unveiled them throughout the course
of the ceremony. Everyone knew who they were. So for
time reasons, we didn't need Pacino to just rattle off
all ten. And maybe they were also worried, given, you know,
his propensity to just go a bit rogue, that things
might have gotten out of hand if he started just
talking about his feelings on anatomy of a fall or whatever.

(10:56):
But Al Pacino has has issued a written apology. He
says there seems to be some controversy about my not
mentioning every film by name last night before announcing the
Best Picture award. I just want to be clear that
it was not my intention to omit them, rather a
choice by the producers not to have them set again
since they were highlighted individually throughout the ceremony. I realize

(11:19):
being nominated is a huge milestone in one's life, and
to not be fully recognized is offensive and hurtful. I mean,
we're at this point where, like Pacino is putting out
PR drafted apologies. It's just feel necessary. I'm interested in
your view, Thomas, on this. As a guy who has
been a staunch Pacino defender, I do love Pacino.

S2 (11:36):
And I think I said the other day, like, you know,
give him a break. He's a new father and probably
very tired. And also he's 200 years old, so he's
also very tired from that. I mean, I think what's
funny is like. Pacino is 83. Uh, Warren Beatty is 86,
but was probably, well, it was over 80 when he
had his slip up. Like, I think maybe the message

(11:58):
for the Oscars is like, let's stop. Really old guys
do the biggest announcement of the night because they're easily confused.

S3 (12:03):
No, I completely disagree. He was the winner from the
Oscars for me, and I am. I'm so saddened to
see such a great man brought to issue this apology.
He did the right thing not naming all the films.
We're just talking about how long it was. We didn't
need them all. And his performance was the one piece
of kind of unscripted gloriousness from the Oscars. It was

(12:25):
the moment we all said the Oscars need more of
a bit of ad libbing. Um, so I really feel
Pacino should not have issued an apology. He did a
good job. He did the best job of the night.

S2 (12:34):
I mean, maybe we're talking a lot today about, like,
the machine that is, you know, Hollywood or when you're
a superstar celeb. Pacino has a memoir coming out later
this year. Is it beyond the realm of possibility that
his team were like, why don't we make ourselves a
moment here? And then shortly after that, we can, you know,
get people talking about Al Pacino again, and then his
memoir comes out and, you know.

S1 (12:53):
I mean, it's a really good point. The, um, PR
statement went out announcing the memo the day after the Oscars,
or maybe even that the later on in that night.
It's called Sonny Boy. It's a story. It's like a
bit weird, I guess. Like that timing is obviously not coincidental.
And it's certainly interesting that he's made a moment of
it to be discussed. So that's worked well for him. Yeah,

(13:14):
that's a good point, Thomas. I wouldn't be surprised if
he just thought, what's something I can do to really
ham it up to make sure people remember me at
the end of this ceremony?

S2 (13:21):
It is funny, but what is the actual process like
of picking who reads the Best Picture winner? Because it's
not like. Is there a is there a method to it?

S1 (13:32):
Well, my understanding is that every year the the Academy
appoints a different producer. You know, it's been big directors
like Steven Soderbergh in the past. This year it was
a Canadian producer called Raj Kapoor. I don't know that
much about them. And I imagine there's some consultation with
with other like heavyweights in the Academy, but it always
does feel a bit random. It's like they all make
sense in the sense that, you know, Warren Beatty is

(13:52):
a big figure that makes sense, but, you know, is
a big figure but doesn't really seem any reason why
it would be him this year and not like last
year or in five years.

S2 (14:00):
Yeah, it's weird, but look, I mean, as as you said,
it was one of the, the more interesting moments, but, uh, yeah,
I still feel like. Yeah, but you know, like, he's
the guy has form, but this wasn't his finest moment
on stage.

S3 (14:13):
Well, look, if it was any hint of what's to
come in the memoir, I will be reading A Sonny
Boy come October, I hope.

S1 (14:19):
I hope they have to, like, reprint the memoir to
include his apology in his flat. That could be. That
could be a fun little addendum. You guys made fun
of me earlier in the week for guessing that, like
Dune Part two would be up for a whole bunch
of Oscar nominations next year because we were literally hours
out of this year's ceremony. So I thought, why not, uh,
take your laughter and sort of double down on this

(14:41):
idea of trying to predict what movies might be Oscar
contenders this time next year. We have no idea. Let's
be honest. Like we have no freaking idea whatsoever. There
were movies that came out like past lives that no
one expected to catch the Oscars. There were movies that
got nominated and won awards, like anatomy of a fall
that weren't even on anyone's release radar this time last year.

(15:04):
So let's be very upfront. This is a fool's errand.
We are not genuinely predicting the victory of these kinds
of movies, but it's an interesting one to have a
look at. And maybe just for people listening who are
just curious to know what big name, big director, big
actor releases are coming up in 2024, that could be
part of the race next year. Is this worth doing?

(15:26):
Do you think this makes sense or are you just indulging, uh, crazy?
I was wanting to talk about some movies. He's excited about. Look, as.

S3 (15:32):
Long as we don't need to revisit Dune, I'm keen
for this discussion. And in one year we will come
back and we'll see how right or wrong we are.

S1 (15:40):
That'd be fun. It'd be fun to play back. Uh,
the the excitement I have in my voice when I
talk about these films. Well, the first one is the
one I'm both very excited about. That could go very well,
or it could be a complete mess. It is a
film called Megalopolis, directed by Francis Ford Coppola from The
Godfather trilogy. Fame and Pocalypse now fame. He's been working

(16:02):
on this movie for a very, very, very long time.
He has basically sold and mortgaged off his winery and
all his assets to make it come true, make it
be brought to life. It stars Adam Driver, Forest Whitaker,
Nathalie Emmanuel, Jon Voight, Laurence Fishburne, Aubrey Plaza, Shia LaBeouf,
Jason Schwartzman, amongst many others. The concept for this movie

(16:24):
is crazy. It's about some architect who builds a new,
crazy futuristic city. That's kind of all we know, but
we know that Coppola has got form and making great
movies also form and making some pretty bad films. This
could be a huge contender. It could be a total total.
Fudge of a film. Do you guys have any any

(16:45):
any early thoughts on Megalopolis?

S3 (16:47):
I am hoping it's a huge contender, only because he
has put so much of his life into this. Like,
I think he started writing it in the 1980s, and
he's spoken previously before about how he made other films
like Dracula and The Rainmaker to get out of debt
because he needed to fund this film like that. This
film is pretty significant to him, so I'm really excited

(17:09):
to see it. The cast is amazing. Um, I hope
it stacks up and is everything Francis Ford Coppola wanted
to make and is obviously he sees it as the
kind of peak of his directing. So I hope, I
hope it does live up to the hype.

S2 (17:22):
Yeah, it's interesting and like super stacked cast, but we've
spoken a little bit about Adam Driver. Um, he had
such a funny trajectory where he was like the man, uh,
for a while, picking all these really interesting projects and
doing great stuff. And then he's had a bit of
a slide. Um, so it's interesting whether or not this
will be like his comeback and Coppola's kind of like,
you know, Magnum opus or will it be indicative of

(17:44):
the fact that, yeah, he's he's continuing on this weird trajectory,
but I am very excited and obviously we'll see it.
And yeah, you know, we've seen we've seen lots of
these like late stage directors, um, kind of having a
crack at Oscars glory again. So yeah.

S1 (17:55):
Yeah, this megalopolis sort of feels a bit like it
could fall into the Napoleon or Ferrari space, which is
this director at the later stage of his career, and
it just does not work at all. So that's out
sometime in 2024, but the exact release date is unconfirmed.
And speaking of Napoleon, Ridley Scott is back already with
none other than Gladiator. Two sends Russell Crowe, who is

(18:19):
very disappointed, to not be involved. He's made that clear
in a few comments and interviews over the past few months. But, uh,
instead we have Paul Mescal, Denzel Washington, Pedro Pascal starring
this film. It's supposed to be released in November. We
don't have many details on this. We know that it
is not based on the screenplay written by Nick cave

(18:39):
all those years ago. But I mean, look, Ridley Scott,
like Napoleon, didn't land for a lot of people, but
it was still a well-made movie with great action set pieces.
Paul Mescal, people like him, white people really like him. Um,
Denzel Washington, white and non-white people really like him. So this,
this movie, this movie has got something very.

S2 (19:00):
Well wasn't I'm pretty sure Napoleon was Mel's family film
in the last 12 months. So she's like, obviously obsessed.

S3 (19:06):
Look, no I'm not. I like obviously Gladiator is a
fantastic film and I do love it, but I just
I 2023 was the year for big films about men
doing things you're brought out. Yeah, yeah. I don't think
I need Ridley Scott on Gladiator two. Like I just,
I don't think we need it and I don't think
it will land. And I do think I know you're

(19:27):
talking about me liking Napoleon, but I do think if we.
If he's forming Napoleon is carried through to this film.
I'm not super excited about it. Like, I can predict
what it will be like. Lots of gory battle scenes,
some beheadings, lots of kind of big crowds cheering and
then dark, brooding. Paul Mescal not saying much. Probably a

(19:47):
nice female character who is not really being championed, a
nice female character to bring out the softness and to
give a love angle to it. I don't know, I
think I kind of, I want to be wrong and
I want it to be a film that we need,
but I don't know if it is one.

S1 (20:01):
The one that I'm probably the most excited for is
a film called Blitz. It's, uh, directed by Steve McQueen,
who is, I think, one of the underrated directors of
the last few years. To be honest, his film widows
with Viola Davis is one of the best sort of
heist movies around that I don't think was watched enough.
He also released this anthology, Small Axe, a few years ago.

(20:24):
I think in the middle of Covid, it was five
of the best films like this century. He is a awesome,
awesome director, and Blitz is a World War two drama
set in London during the Blitz. It stars, uh, Sasha Ronan. Uh,
release date for this? Also not confirmed, but this is
the one that I'm personally most excited about, and also
the one that I think.

S4 (20:43):
Could.

S1 (20:44):
Like legitimately be a real Oscar contender just because of
the the, the topic, the combination of of McQueen in
that topic and Sasha Ronan, who we know the Academy uh,
enjoys as nominated before. So I think yeah like Gladiator
two these kind of big action ones. There's a chance
if they work they might pull off. But out of

(21:04):
the movies we know that are being released so far
this year, I reckon Blitz is, um, it's got a
strong chance. You guys got any, any vibes on Blitz?

S3 (21:13):
Well, yeah. I mean, I guess my only takeaway is
that if historical films or kind of more recent history
films are back in vogue, thinking of Oppenheimer and World
War II, then? Uh, yeah, this probably has a lot
of Oscar bait written all over it.

S1 (21:28):
The other one that is coming out very soon, April 18th, uh,
challenges Luca Guadagnino's film, uh, delayed because of the strikes
last year, starring Zendaya in a sexy tennis love triangles.
And I actually coming out to Australia in a couple
of weeks for the. I'm here in Sydney. You're excited
about that?

S2 (21:45):
I'm very excited about that. I love tennis and I
love Zendaya and I love Josh O'Connor. Uh, they're coming
out here for the premiere, which is like in late March.
So before the rest of the world gets it, um,
and no doubt that'll be a huge deal. Um, obviously
the whole cast is coming out, and as you said,
I feel like hype has been building for a really
long time. It was one of those films that, like,
the trailer dropped and it was very like risque and

(22:07):
everyone was like sending it around and people were super hyped.
And then obviously the momentum was killed off when it
got delayed. But yeah, I think I'm very keen and
we all love his work.

S3 (22:15):
Yes, I love his work. All the repressed desire, usually
hot weather, the kind of quite vivid coloring. I think
this is going to be probably a standout film of
the year for me.

S2 (22:25):
Best tennis film since Match Point? Yeah.

S1 (22:27):
It's like they love making sexy tennis movies. Tennis?

S2 (22:30):
Yeah, but tennis is pretty sexy.

S3 (22:32):
Yeah, the back and forth, the noises, the you know.

S4 (22:35):
Yeah, yeah.

S1 (22:36):
Mel, you've got a couple of other films you wanted
to shout out that you're excited about. I'm going to
say early that I don't think any of these have
any Oscar buzz whatsoever to weed editions. They're weird additions
to this list. But if you just want to mention
some nice movies that you are excited for, you're more
than okay.

S3 (22:51):
Well, I am excited for you to eat your hat
in next March. Okay, I don't fully agree. I'm furious.
That could have a bit of Oscar buzz about it.
Like people are going to like that industry category.

S2 (23:02):
Okay, so.

S1 (23:03):
I didn't know that we were predicting like what's going
to win best costume?

S2 (23:06):
No. Exactly.

S3 (23:07):
Okay. Cinematography. That's a big category. I reckon mad Max
could get a best film nomination. There you go. Yeah.
So tell.

S1 (23:13):
Us about Fury.

S3 (23:14):
Furious. So this is the fifth prequel in the series? Yeah,
both prequel and sequel. It's about the origin story of Furiosa. Um,
Anya Taylor-Joy, Chris Hemsworth. I mean, I feel like we've
been talking about this for years, and it's been kind
of the release has always been a bit unsure. It
is coming out this year. Are you guys mad Max heads?
Maybe that's why I'm so backing this.

S1 (23:33):
I loved Fury wrath. It was amazing. Um, and I
guess I just I'm not on the Anya Taylor-Joy train
as much as other people. Uh, the early, early trailers
of this one do CGI, and the effects don't look
as good as Fury Road. But I also know that
sometimes trailers are, like a little bit rough, and maybe
I just need to wait to get blown away in

(23:55):
in the cinema, though. I did see the trailer for
this at Imax before watching Dune, and it just didn't
didn't really land for me that much. But I trust
George Miller and I do like the mad Max world,
so I'm I'm coming in with open eyes, I'm ready
to be wet.

S3 (24:08):
And maybe they're just managing expectations. And look, the other
one I had on the list, which I agree, it's
not an Oscar nomination film, but I wanted to just
shout it out because I'm excited to see this one
fall guy, which is the new Ryan Gosling Emily Blunt.
If their chemistry at the Oscars was anything to go by,
I'm like, looking forward to this film. He plays a
stunt man who's filling in for an actor who has

(24:28):
gone missing, and he kind of gets wrapped up in, um,
wrapped up in the mystery. It obviously has quite a
bigger impact here because they close down the Harbour Bridge
for a day, and everyone was kind of upset about it. Um,
so I'm excited to see Sydney again in a film.
And I think Ryan Gosling, funniest actor at the moment,
going on, going around. So, um, yeah, I reckon that
will have a lot of buzz.

S2 (24:48):
Yeah, I agree, I'm very excited for that. Um, and yeah,
seeing Ryan Gosling on the bridge will be good, but
I actually have one that I think is going to
be really good. And we'll also be maybe like a
potential Oscars boater. Uh, this will shock you, but it's
being made by A24. Uh, and it is Civil War.
So the new Alex Garland film coming out April 26th. Um,
basically it's kind of like, you know, set just in

(25:11):
the near future. And the US has fallen into a
state of civil war. It's very much like cherry picked
from recent history to create this kind of, like, very
meta film. Uh, obviously, I don't know if you guys
know this, but there's a US presidential election this year,
and so like, oh, when's.

S1 (25:23):
It, when's it on?

S2 (25:24):
Uh, late November. Is that right? Did I get it right?

S1 (25:27):
They're always innovators. Yeah.

S2 (25:28):
You're right. Uh, but no, like, I feel like it's
coming at a at a really interesting time. Um, it's
got a great cast. Kirsten Dunst, Jesse Plemons, Nick Offerman,
and Cailee Spaeny. The thing I think is really interesting
is I have had this feeling for a long time
that we're, like, soon to enter the real era of
Jesse Plemons. Like, he is such a great actor. He
picked such interesting roles. Like, I know it's not exactly
he's like a new find. And he has previously been

(25:51):
nominated for an Academy Award in 2022 for Best Supporting Actor.
But I just have this feeling that, you know, it
could be a bit of a a bit of a
bolter for the Oscars next year. And I feel like
Plemons is like perhaps going to be the next generation's
Pacino or De Niro. He's got that kind of range.
So yeah, I reckon, um, Civil War could be a
big deal this year.

S1 (26:07):
Yeah, it's a really good shot. The trailer is really
fascinating and and it has that sort of haunting thing
of being like, well, basically everything they're talking about I
feel like is ripped from the headlines, but they're projecting
it forward in a pretty dark way. So I'm really
excited for that film.

S2 (26:21):
But also that's the other thing, like the Oscars love
that that maybe they'll both get nominated. They can go together.
Like it's all like kind of written in the stars.
And then there was one other I wanted to mention
and that's Back to Black. Uh, so that's a biopic
about Amy Winehouse. We've seen Amy's kind of like tragic
story on screen a few times in docs and stuff,
but this is a proper, um, you know, biopic. Marisa
Abella is playing Amy Winehouse and it's being directed by

(26:43):
Sam Taylor-Johnson. This really could go one of two ways.
It could be like, you know, this is one of
those great, like, stories, like a kind of Freddie Mercury
type thing. Or it could be a weird knock off. Um,
I will personally watch it because I loved Amy Winehouse,
but yeah, remains to be seen if it'll be any good.
That hit screens May 10th.

S1 (27:02):
I mean, getting the director of 50 Shades of Grey
to do this is such a curveball choice. But I
love I mean, I loved Amy Winehouse. I'm very interested
to see this story brought to the big screen. So again, I'll,
you know, withhold expectations. But I think you'll you're totally
right that this could this could just be a mess.

S2 (27:21):
And then I guess the only other obvious one is
Bad Boys for um, which is June 14th. Yeah, I know,
I know, you will say that.

S1 (27:29):
I definitely see it. I definitely this is not this
was not supposed to be a list of movies that
I'm excited to watch in the movies. It was supposed
to be a list of movies that could win Oscars.
You guys weren't totally wrong. Uh, I mean, Thomas stayed
on brief a bit more for good. Gosh.

S3 (27:42):
Yeah, yeah, I clearly missed the break. But, you know,
I bet we'll be talking about the fall guy soon.

S1 (27:47):
Um, and. Yeah, fall Guy and fearless, both filmed in
New South Wales, which is, which is cool and exciting
and a bit of a a fun renaissance for Australian
film production. So excited for all of those. All right,

(28:07):
let's let's move on to the big topic of today's episode,
the royal shenanigans underway. I was, I'll admit, and you
can make fun of me if you want. I was, like,
pretty oblivious to this furore around Princess Kate Middleton's disappearance,
until this frenzy around the allegedly altered photo started sparking

(28:28):
100 conspiracy theories, became the only thing I saw on
my social feeds, and was inundated at work with conversations
about it, people asking me what I thought was going on.
So I realized I had to pay a bit of
attention to this one. I thought the way we could
structure this is maybe we'll talk about the photo situation itself,
which is kind of captured everyone's imagination, and then explain

(28:51):
a bit of how we got here. So on March 10th,
it's just a few days ago, a family portrait of
Kate and her three children was posted to the Prince
and Princess of Wales Instagram account. It's normal stuff. That's
what people do on Instagram, the caption thanked the public
for their support and wish them a happy Mother's Day

(29:11):
because in the UK, Mother's Day is in March. The
photo credit. It had that cute little, you know, camera
Icon that people use when they're like crediting a photographer. Uh,
was signed the Prince of Wales 2024, so presumably that's
the family. William's taken this photo and they've uploaded it
to Instagram. All great. Normal royal family stuff. Then the

(29:33):
British media starts rolling out that photo, because it was
one of the first that they'd seen of Kate in
a couple of months. Then very quickly. And this is
something that happens in media, not that often, but when
it does, you stand up and pay attention. The AP,
the the newswire service, issued a kill notice, which is

(29:55):
such a dramatic term journalists love using extremely dramatic terms,
though perhaps in this instance it was literal as well as, uh,
they said that they said that this photo had been
digitally altered, had been manipulated at its source. They couldn't
trust its authenticity. So they said that it should no
longer be distributed. They were like basically pulling it back

(30:16):
from publication. And all of a sudden things went crazy,
because this is a photo of the royal family that
major news networks which previously ran with it are now
saying should not be out there. It is fake. That
is when people started pointing out that there were a
lot of weird things with this family portrait. There were
glitches on the slave of, uh, her daughter Charlotte. Uh,

(30:38):
Charlotte's cardigan looked like it had been manipulated. All these
different little things that I'm sure that we can explain.
But this is where I wanted to pause for a second.
Because while some of this is a bit wacky, it
becomes weirder when you understand the context to this. And
I need one of you guys to help me out here. Like,
how did just one photo of Kate become such a
big issue?

S3 (30:58):
I am ready to step up to the plate. This
actually reminds me of succession. Like when we used to
have the fun fact music. Like the kind of I'm okay. Well,
I think this dates back to Cast your Mind back
to December 25th, Christmas Day. You were probably having Turkey. Um,
Thomas and Trent, um, Catherine's last public appearance. She was
out and about, um, walking with the rest of the

(31:18):
family to greet the public as she does so. That
was December 25th. That's the last time we've kind of
seen Kate do a royal duty. Then on December 28th,
I know everyone's a bit curious. They see a royal
motorcade go past heading towards a hospital in in London.
It's noted. But, um, you know, not not too much
detail about it. January 17th Royal family comes out and

(31:41):
they say Catherine's in a hospital. She's had abdominal surgery
the day before. They've said it's been successful. She won't
be returning to public duties until after Easter March 31st.

S2 (31:52):
It's a long break.

S3 (31:53):
That is a long break. But have you ever had
abdominal surgery? No.

S2 (31:56):
Like I thought, it sounds like an appropriate break, but
that's a long time. Like it must be a big surgery.

S3 (32:00):
Yeah, yeah. Doctor, doctor. Mitchell. Um, so then, uh, so. Okay,
we know Catherine. Everyone's been curious. About what abdominal surgery
is like. Well, what specifically was going on? They didn't
give any more details. We know that, um, will went
to go visit Catherine a few times. Then around January 20th,
late January, some kind of reports come out in Spain

(32:22):
that Catherine's condition was worse than reported, that she was
hospitalized on December 28th, and that was what the motorcade
was about. Then more reports kind of come out from
this one journalist in Spain saying she was in a
medically induced coma. Um, royal family fights back about this.
They announce that she's released from hospital. She's recovering in Windsor.
They deny those reports, which is quite rare for the

(32:44):
royal family to do, but they do come out and
deny it. Um, and then essentially, really, we haven't seen
or heard much from her until the photo saga which
you outlined. We know she left Windsor to go and
spend the school holidays with the children. Um, but other
than that, she's not really been seen or heard of.
So I guess the groundwork was laid for all of

(33:05):
this to explode when this photo was. Released and people
started to think it had been manipulated.

S1 (33:10):
And what you guys like much plugged into this, like,
I don't I don't think we've talked about the Royals
heaps on, on this podcast or in our personal lives,
but was this something that you were like clocking in
people in your lives, maybe you were talking about and
speculating on?

S2 (33:24):
Well, yeah, funnily enough, like I personally wasn't plugged into it, but, um,
I guess this is how the flow of information works.
My wife is from the country or her family's from
the country, and, you know, her grandparents and country people generally.
I think it's safe to say love the royal family.
And so she my wife two weeks ago received a
call from her grandmother who was like, this probably happens

(33:45):
to you guys to like, when your grandparents know you
work in the media, they think you just like have
all the information to every news story. So her grandma
was like, hey, I'm really curious about where Catherine is.
Can you, like, use your sources to find out? My
wife works for, like a website that doesn't cover royals. Um,
but anyway, she was obviously can't say no to your grandparents,
so she was like, absolutely got it. Luckily, one of

(34:07):
our friends actually is a royal reporter and has just
moved to the UK. Um, to take up a posting
over there. So she called her and basically was like,
what's happening with Catherine? And that was for me the
first time. I was like, oh yeah, this is like, really?
People are really. I knew that vaguely something was happening
with her and that she had had surgery, but that
was the first time I got clued in to like, wow,
people are now worried beyond the point of like, it
being a funny joke about what's going on with her. Uh,

(34:29):
and I believe that, you know, our friend who's the
royal reporter was like, oh, yeah, the essentially the Intel
she had was at the surgery, um, was a much
bigger deal than the Palace had let people into. And,
you know, the recovery was taking much longer. That was
all information she kind of shared.

S3 (34:43):
Yeah, I mean, I hadn't really I kind of knew
she went into surgery and people were questioning, what does
abdominal surgery mean? What's happened? But I thought the conspiracy
theories about Kate dying or being replaced or getting divorced
or any of that, I kind of thought that was
an extreme fringe kind of discussion, and it's only really
kind of entered into the mainstream. Not that those theories

(35:05):
are really getting much airplay, but more kind of the
questioning about the Palace's handling of this and what actually
is going on. It was only with those photos that
that really came to my attention. Yeah.

S1 (35:15):
So I think that is probably a good point in
which to talk about what happened next, because this really
set all the conspiracy. Theories ballistic. So Monday night things
get really weird after people have been speculating about what's
happened to this photo. It's been killed by AP and
other news organizations. Catherine on Twitter, or at least someone purporting.

S4 (35:38):
To.

S1 (35:39):
Says, like many amateur photographers, I do occasionally experiment with editing.
I wanted to express my apologies for any confusion. The
family photograph we shared yesterday caused. I hope everyone celebrating
had a very happy Mother's Day signed C. This is crazy.
I'm sorry. Like, like, I totally understand why people who

(36:02):
like your your grandmother in law Thomas, or just other
people casually following along and like, it's a bit weird,
but maybe the surgery is just gone on a little
bit longer than it needed to, and we don't know
what it is. And we'll put a pin in the
whole surgery speculation conversation, because I think that's something to
talk about kind of on its own. But regardless of
like what had and hadn't happened behind the scenes, putting

(36:23):
out a photo that was obviously digitally altered as an
example of trying to show to the world that she's
all okay having that photo be withdrawn by the media,
and then admitting that you digitally altered the photo while
you've been recuperating from this illness, this idea that Catherine
was like the evening before Mother's Day, hanging around on
Photoshop to edit her daughter's cardigan, doesn't. None of this

(36:48):
makes any sense to me, and I think maybe there's
two halves to this conversation. One is like the mechanics
of what actually went on. And then the other half,
which we alluded to at the start of the episode,
is why we can't stop talking about it. And what
it might say about the way that we fixate on
things in kind of modern society right now. But what
were your immediate reactions to seeing that tweet, to seeing

(37:09):
this level of confusion around this photo?

S3 (37:12):
It was two things. It was the C sign off
that threw me. I was like, she doesn't present as
a C girl. Like just signing off with the casual C.

S1 (37:20):
I honestly, when I saw the C, I was like,
who is this? Because I, I guess this is how
little that I like full of roles of day to day.
I'm like, She's Kate. But then I'm like, now she's Catherine. Like,
now we have to call it Catherine, that's the thing.

S3 (37:31):
Or just see, is that what we are? Comfortable? Yeah. Yeah.
So that really struck me. But then I was also
struck by the royal family famously tries not to engage
with rumors in a direct way like that, like they're
obviously backgrounding journos and have deep ties in the media,
but very rarely are they so directly addressing gossip. Which
kind of did make me question about what is going

(37:52):
on in that PR department and how did this happen
in terms of the actual photo editing, I think people
were losing their minds a bit over a photo being edited.
Like people edit photos all the time. I'm sure every
photo they've ever shared has been edited. Not hugely, but
they're definitely touching up photos. Like, there's no doubt in
my mind that when they release a royal family, they're
getting out shadows, they're smoothing backgrounds, they're playing up certain colors.

(38:15):
The editing never bothered me and like, yes, it was
bad editing and they probably need to, you know, address
the person or photographer who did that was really new
to Photoshop.

S4 (38:23):
Yeah, right.

S3 (38:24):
But like, I think the response to the photo editing
itself is kind of insane. People are so quick to
read something bad into what I think is a pretty
normal practice for media.

S2 (38:34):
Yeah, but it wouldn't be an issue if she'd been
like at a hospital last week cutting a ribbon. It's
it's all compounded that because no one knows where she is.
And so it's like, oh, this is even weirder now.
Like the context is important. I thought it was very funny. Like, agreed,
the C sign off just was like an added mystery
they didn't need. It reminded me of like, Pretty Little Liars.
Don't know if you guys ever watched that show, but like,
all the letters came from a.

S1 (38:53):
Um, great show. Back to a great.

S2 (38:56):
Yes, it was, it was a great, terrible show. But yeah,
it was very odd and, um, definitely didn't do anything to, like,
hose down the rumors that perhaps she's, like, in a
basement somewhere with David Miscavige, his wife, um, waiting to
be released sometime in the future. It's all just very strange.
And it does make you then, like, I guess almost
for a lot of people, no doubt this is a

(39:17):
reluctant thing that they know about. Um, and and yet
it is fascinating now because for me, my immediate thing
is like, okay, why can't she just then if she's
going to be obviously she's quite good at Photoshop or
she's learning and she's using Instagram, why not jump on
like stories and be like, hey everybody, what's up? Um, like,
Will's just cooking and like, what are the kids names? Charlotte. And, like,

(39:38):
George and, um, whatever the other one's name is, they're
all just playing around, but, like, we're all good, and, like,
here I am, and I'm definitely alive. Like, it's just
all getting, like, outrageous now.

S3 (39:47):
Yeah, like C would do that. C would just jump
on the live story.

S2 (39:51):
Hey, loads of you guys have been asking me like
where I am, just go full influencer.

S1 (39:54):
I agree with a bit of what you're saying though.
Like some of the stuff on social media is both
hilarious and ridiculous. People are like, I know what they've done.
They've taken the portrait photo of Kate from Vogue, and
they've angled it differently and use that to construct her.
And everyone's like, you figured it out. I'm like, that
to me, seems ridiculous. Her face is her face, right?
Of course, it looks similar to a photo she took

(40:17):
like a year ago or whatever. Like it's her face.
That's that's it's not going to change drastically. And people
who are used to posing for photos have a similar
pose that they strike. So it'd be ridiculous to be like, well,
it doesn't fit in. It's the same person, but at
the same time, I don't think it's weird to stop
and dwell on it for a second, because what? So

(40:38):
what in your in your sort of chain of events
that you think is totally normal? After months of this
weird absence, they feel the pressure to post a photo.
They choose to do it on Mother's Day. William, according
to the credit caption on Instagram, takes the photo. And
then what? Like airdrops it to Kate? Who then opens
up her photo manipulator app. Touches up like the positions

(41:02):
of the bodies and then sends it out. Is that normal?
That's not normal.

S3 (41:07):
Okay, my question to you, I would question the weirdness
of the absence. They have said that she won't be
back to duties until March 31st. We know she went
into hospital in kind of early January. We know she
came out late January. They've always said she won't be
back to work till March 31st. So I don't actually
know if the absence is that weird, right. If if

(41:28):
this other if this Spanish journalist and those reports hadn't
come out to kind of throw a doubt on the absence,
wouldn't you just be like, she's had some serious surgery,
I don't know, I know people have had hip replacements
and it takes them that long to get back out
and about. Like, isn't that if you have major invasive surgery? Yeah,
you're probably going to be out for a few weeks.
And they've said she's had major surgery and what is

(41:49):
she out for a few weeks. But in saying that,
I don't want to be like a killjoy because I
love when the internet gets on these things. But I
wouldn't take it much further than the internet. Just having
a really fun time, like the internet, is a place
where people get behind these kind of moments. And I
do see you think you see a lot of creativity
and joyfulness on the internet on these kind of occasions.

(42:10):
And the New York magazine had a really good quote
where they were like, when we hear hooves, it's more
interesting to think it's zebras than horses. And I think
that kind of sums it up like it's just an
internet culture moment. I think that we're all getting excited about.
We're all having a lot of fun with. It's got
everything we need from internet conspiracy theory. So I understand,
and I celebrate the internet for doing its thing at

(42:32):
the same time as I'm like, guys, I've said she's
been she'll be away. She's still away. Like, what's they
release a photo that someone is badly edited, but that
doesn't mean she's dead.

S2 (42:42):
Sounds like something that someone would say.

S1 (42:45):
Yeah, yeah. Nice try Charles. Like what? What are you talking. No,
I think yeah. Okay. Well, let's talk about the let's
talk about the internet side of things. I'm not letting
you off the hook that easily. I think there's more
royal stuff here to unpack, but I think I think
you're right. Like, kind of half the reason or more.
We've ended up at this point is because this is
how things work now. Right. And I think one thing

(43:05):
crystallize it for me. I saw someone share a tweet
from another account that was doing like micro-level analysis of
the shadows on all these other photos. And that person
happened to be a Taylor Swift Stan account. And this
person shared and said, oh man, the Swifties have figured
this out like the Royals are totally cooked. And obviously
this acknowledgement that Taylor Swift fans have been for like

(43:29):
nearly 20 years now, trained to find Easter eggs and
codes and all these little things on everything that a
celebrity in this case Taylor releases to piece together the
the puzzle and figure out what's really going on. And
even at the Oscars this week, you just see the
way that we consume an event now isn't just by
watching it on TV, or just not even just by

(43:49):
watching clips. It's by looking at everyone's Instagram account. Who
was there, everyone's TikTok account who was outside trying to
see what people are wearing, who they're talking to. There's
a clip of Marty Scorsese is talking to Lily Gladstone,
and someone said, well, if you look at the way
he's gesticulating his hands, it looks like he's counting all
the times he's been nominated and has lost other people.

(44:12):
Saying that, Emma Stone whispered, he's such a prick. When
Jimmy Kimmel made fun of it. Like, this is the
way in, in a in a media culture where we
are saturated by, by content, by photos, by videos, and
audiences have been trained or just have nothing else to
do other than harmlessly, most of the time, hyper analyzing
these things that then gets transferred to this situation where

(44:38):
because I guess of like the history of secrecy around
the royals, the history of conspiracy, and honestly, the history like,
particularly around Princess Diana of accusations of nefarious behavior, I
think the collision of those two things has made this
such a crazy thing. So that's kind of why I
agree with half of you. Half of you.

S4 (44:57):
I don't know.

S1 (44:57):
I half agree, that's why I half agree with you,
because it is a sort of harmless internet thing. But
what if all this training that internet pop culture sleuths
have been doing on things like the Oscars, on things
like Taylor Swift, is now stumbling onto a very real
issue for the royals?

S5 (45:17):
Well, the issue.

S3 (45:18):
I think it's stumbling onto is probably how they handle PR.
I think this is a big lesson for a legacy
institution about how to handle new media. But you tell me, Oz,
what do you think they are stumbling onto?

S2 (45:33):
I've just been waiting to bring up this Reddit thread
I was on about Prince Louis hand formation last night.

S4 (45:39):
Yeah.

S1 (45:40):
It is weird.

S4 (45:40):
What is this symbol that. Yeah, it's obviously.

S2 (45:42):
Some kind of subliminal cry for help where he's like,
it's like some kind of some kind of thing from
outer space where he's like, this whole family is fucking mental.
Please get me out of here. And on the thread
I was on, uh, everyone was like, posting pictures of
themselves trying to do it. No one could do it
because obviously it's not real and everything is.

S4 (45:59):
Ly.

S1 (46:00):
So to answer your question, Mel, like to go to
go back to your point this. We don't know what
Kate's illness is. And a lot of me, most of
me feels really uncomfortable speculating on it. Like there are
theories around like what abdominal surgery could be and why
it would take out of action for a long time.
I don't really want to get into that, if I'm

(46:22):
honest with you, like I. And it's not because I
don't think the Royals are worth interrogating. It's what we're doing.
But the ins and outs of a particular kind of surgery,
I don't think matter that much other than to say
that's what it could be. It could be complications from
a more complicated surgery than we've been let in on.
And she's just been out of action for a bit.
And so this photo thing is like a harmless accident

(46:42):
that speaks to naivety around the media than anything else.
But I think what overshadows all of that is this
is an institution with both a long term and very
recent history of media manipulation and character assassination, right? Like
we have seen and read the way that the Palace
handled things like Princess Diana to protect Charles. We have

(47:06):
seen most recently in the last few years, the Harry
and Meghan stuff. This is a big they call it
The Firm. It's this big, powerful institution that goes after
people that it doesn't like and uses every resource at
its disposal to protect people that it does like, and
the lack of any detail, even though I don't need
to know the the kind of whole rap sheet for

(47:29):
what happened in hospital or whatever, the fact that in
this situation there has been such little detail and the
little media engagement that has been has been so hamfisted
that being the photo thing, I think raises a lot
of questions. I think it's really hard to write this
off as a bunch of just accidental, you know, one
consequence after another. It just feels too murky given the

(47:53):
history of this family.

S3 (47:54):
Yeah, I understand what you're saying and like, but again, realistically,
I think this is probably more about how they've handled
it then. You know, something that particularly bad that's going on? Like,
I mean, if something bad is going on, it's probably
related to her health. And then you've said you don't
want the ins and outs of the health, but you
want more. I guess it's a balance between like what

(48:17):
you tell the public and what you don't tell the public.
Because if something bad has happened with her health and
they don't want to announce it publicly for whatever reason,
then I guess that's acceptable. But this is the fallout
from that.

S1 (48:27):
No, I think I think what I'm saying more is
I don't want to speculate on what could have happened.
But I also think that the royal family, like with
a serving politician or whatever, they're going through something. There's
an obligation on the public, particularly the public, who like
they rule over and who we, you know, whose taxes
they benefit from or whatever. There's an obligation from them
to tell us what's going. You don't get to have

(48:48):
both ways. You don't get to benefit from being part
of this institution and never have to work a normal
job and live in a palace and whatever, and then say,
but we're not going to tell you anything that's going
on other than these weird photo issues and recalls. That's,
I guess, my perspective.

S4 (49:01):
Yeah. Didn't we get.

S2 (49:02):
The when Charles went into hospital, it was like, he's
got a massive prostate. Prostate is all fucked up. And
then they were like, yeah, also he's got cancer.

S3 (49:09):
I do I, I think as I.

S4 (49:12):
Was.

S1 (49:14):
That is that was.

S4 (49:14):
Word for what the statement I believe that that guy got.

S2 (49:17):
Fired. Who wrote that one. That was he was an intern.

S4 (49:19):
I do think he's.

S1 (49:20):
Now he's now the guy.

S4 (49:21):
Doing the Photoshops and I.

S3 (49:24):
Yeah. I mean, obviously how the King Charles health issue
was handled was very different. And I.

S2 (49:29):
Wish they had lied about.

S4 (49:30):
That. Yeah, I.

S3 (49:31):
Know that was too much detail. And the Cancer Council
websites have spoken about how they've had huge increase in
visitors to their site since that announcement. So it's obviously
serving a public education agenda as well. But to Oz's point,
I do think it's a bit simplistic to say, like,
I think the right to privacy is very important and
we should be careful about who we declare doesn't have it.

(49:53):
Because I do think when you take it away from
some people, you open it up to be taken away
from the rest of us. And we're in a generation
and an era where privacy is not valued and it's
not important, and we all give it away all the time.
And we've got a generation that just doesn't care about it.
And I Thomas was laughing at me. He shares too much, obviously.

S2 (50:11):
Yeah. And you are so private. Yeah.

S3 (50:14):
But I do think, like, you know, just I think
the right to privacy is enshrined, right? It's like a
human right as well as the law. So like, I
don't think we should stand up and be like, we
have the right to know everything about you because you're
part of an institution. Yes, I take your point. I
take your point that they serve the people. And, you know,
this is an institution that protects them. They do owe
us something. But I guess I do worry about just

(50:37):
saying she should go into all the details about the health,
when for me, I'm kind of comfortable with sitting with
the fact that she had probably major surgery and isn't, well, like,
I don't really need to know what it is. I
hope hope she gets better, but I don't know if
we are owed and should feel that we are owed
more than that. And I think people need to be
careful about being like public figures, even if they are
taxpayer funded. Sponsored, um, need to tell us more about themselves. Like,

(51:03):
I think that's a slippery slope and it worries me.

S1 (51:05):
What do you think about the fact that even if
that is a a fine principle, that when there's an
information vacuum and when people are doing their pop culture
kind of sleuthing on this and creating conspiracy theories, and
even if some of them seem obviously ludicrous, but they
are getting traction, they could be easily killed, like Thomas suggested.

(51:27):
Hey guys, I'm c just going live on Instagram here.
Like they could be dealt with by the release of
more information or photos or videos. The absence of that,
does that not create some sort of harm or does?
Is it not corrosive in some way to just. Let
the the sort of field be flooded with random TikTokers,
Instagrammers or whatever. Or do you think that this one

(51:49):
is ultimately like a bit of harmless fun? Who really
cares what people post or what sort of Reddit threads
get traction?

S3 (51:56):
No, I mean, I, I think that I'd love to
see C come out and do that, but I also
think that people's release of information shouldn't be based on
what TikTok is, an Instagram as they're doing. Like how
bad a how bad a precedent is that to set
that just because the public I mean, is it any
different to cancel culture but directed in a different way
just because the online masses want something? Well, we now
need to give it to them to counteract what what's

(52:19):
going to happen. Like that's kind of bullying, right? Like
I do take your point that, you know, the PR
has not been handled well on this, but I don't
necessarily think they should cave just because that's what the
people want. Like that's not a good precedent either. Otherwise,
like imagine the information we could get out of people
if we started these kind of campaigns.

S4 (52:35):
I mean.

S1 (52:36):
It is it is this is the other side to it.
It is often how the media operates, right? Aside from
social media like a lot of how we get information
from people and a lot of people don't necessarily like this,
and there are some outlets that do this way more
than others. But it is sometimes in the celebrity space
about hounding someone day in, day out until you find
out whether that divorce rumor is true, whether they are

(52:56):
having a kid, whether they are experiencing substance abuse issues
or whatever like that is being part and parcel of
this world for so long. And I guess it seems
like what you're saying is like, that wasn't good then.
And just because it's shifting to social media now doesn't
necessarily make it better.

S3 (53:13):
Yeah, I mean, I think so, and I think this
is obviously quite a real, very real issue in the
UK as well with the phone hacking scandal and Princess Diana, like,
I do see it all as part of the same
illness in society to an extent.

S2 (53:25):
How much did we'll pay you to say all that
as well?

S4 (53:27):
Out of curiosity.

S3 (53:27):
I'm getting a jump at the Royals. Guys.

S4 (53:30):
Little George.

S1 (53:31):
I guess the the interesting thing for this is like
where it goes next. And I think without more information, honestly,
without like a live video where she's holding the newspaper
of the day and like responding to people like a
streamer or something like that. Like unless she jumps on
a twitch and is like playing Fortnite and responding to
people in real time, I don't think these rumors are

(53:52):
going to go away. Uh, do you guys just see
that they'll be more of this stuff? Are you going
to continue to follow it and read these things, or
do you think it's reached like a bit of the
fact that, like, old people on podcasts are talking about
it like us? It's like, ah, it's not cool anymore,
so let's all move on.

S2 (54:09):
She'll probably do like a sit down with Oprah at
Tyler Perry's house in, like, Calabasas. Um, and then that
will be her big comeback. No, it's true. Like, I
think what Mel said as you saw off in the case, um, begrudgingly,
was actually very smart and wise. But I do think that, like, the,
the context and history of the family makes this particular

(54:29):
situation very different, particularly, as you said, like their history with,
you know, the female members of the family, especially marrying
into the family. So like, I really do understand, I
don't I personally don't care. I'm sure she's fine and
just I don't know, maybe she's like got, you know,
Photoshop for dummies open right this very second. But like,
I do understand that now, especially with all these like
additional things happening, why people are like, okay, this was

(54:52):
like funny at first, but now it's a little bit
like what's going on here? This is pretty weird. And
perhaps it is worth the royal family like just addressing
it in a way that like kills the story dead.
So you don't have people continuing to speculate. And yeah,
it might set a dangerous precedent, but it's not really
going to happen to then everyone else. But like the
Royals are perhaps one of the few institutions that deserve

(55:13):
that kind of treatment.

S3 (55:14):
I think. I think it's been so badly PR handled
up to now, but if I was like the crisis
comms cord in at this moment, I think you've got
to I think this story will die out on its own.
The internet has like a goldfish mind. It will be
on to the next thing.

S1 (55:27):
Yeah, something, something else will happen.

S3 (55:28):
Like Taylor Swift will get engaged and this will it
will die out in a second. So if I was
crisis comms coming on now, I'd say C has to
be above this. And the only way to keep her
above this is to keep her out of it. And
the only way to keep her out of it is
not to address it. When they go low, we go high.
On Michelle Obama, I would say C says nothing. C
turns up on March 31st, when she was due to

(55:49):
come back to work in perfect shape with a big
smile on her face. And oh yes, I'm feeling much better. Yeah. Um,
and so finishing.

S2 (55:55):
In the corner.

S4 (55:56):
Hello everybody.

S3 (55:58):
She's like, put up a photo of herself, like, all, like,
glammed up with Photoshop. Um, yeah. And then I think
it moves on and everyone. And it never gets more
oxygen by being addressed. The royals like to see themselves
as away from the muck, for better or for worse.

S2 (56:14):
One thing I would love to say though, like, wouldn't
you just love to be a fly on the wall
at Harry and Meghan's house listening to the chat on
this like, oh god.

S4 (56:22):
Yeah, Meghan's like offering them advice, I.

S1 (56:24):
Reckon. I reckon you're probably right Mil. I think they've
probably counting down until the release of the Tortured Poets.

S4 (56:29):
Department like April.

S1 (56:31):
19th, and they're like, please, can we change the narrative?
My last, my very last question is, and I think
I know the answer because of the things that you
said in this conversation. Mel, do you believe that the.
The royal family had no role in the death of
Princess Diana.

S4 (56:49):
Wow.

S3 (56:50):
And I was gunning for a job there. Do you?
I mean, role is a broad.

S1 (56:55):
Don't ask me the question. I'm asking.

S4 (56:57):
You the whole.

S3 (56:58):
Question. Term like kind of responsibility and morality is where
do you define it? Like it's a very extensive term.
Did they have a role? Yes. Obviously they had a role.
But the level of that role, who's to say I'll
be taking no further questions.

S1 (57:15):
Well, to make this conversation loop back towards pop culture,
I thought it'd be fun to talk about some of
our favourite films about the Royal family. Uh, one of
mine is about Diana. It's a 2021 Spencer by Pablo Larrain,
starring Kristen Stewart. Uh, the films about Diana's crisis, she
has during the Christmas of 1991, when she's thinking about

(57:38):
divorcing Charles and leaving the family. It's a really smart
and interesting film. Kristen Stewart gives an awesome performance, and
it's almost shot like a horror, which I think captures,
I guess, a perspective that Diana would have been going
through at that time. Maybe that's why I have the
feelings that I do about this situation, because I watched
that movie not that long ago, and that's thinking about

(57:59):
Kate in a similar situation. You know, maybe she's in
a in a get out kind of frame or something
like that, but it's a really, really, really well-made film.
The other one I wanted to shout out, uh, this
is Yomi Thomas. Yorgos Lanthimos is the favourite from 2018
Olivia Colman, Emma Stone, Rachel Wise just super fun, uh,
co-written by Australia's own Tony McNamara. Surprisingly, a lot of

(58:20):
people I've talked to about this movie haven't seen it,
but could not give it a stronger rec. I think
it's very fun and it's very sexy.

S3 (58:26):
Both of those are fantastic films, and I think the, um,
Spencer is like, highly underrated as well.

S4 (58:31):
Yeah. Sam, I loved that. Yeah.

S3 (58:33):
Didn't get the attention or the kind of acclaim it deserved.

S4 (58:35):
Mel, why.

S1 (58:36):
Don't you share your recommendations?

S3 (58:38):
Well, maybe this goes to why I think more positively
of CS experience. Mine is Maria Antoinette, Sofia Coppola's film
Kirsten Dunst, isn't it? We've already had a mention on
this pod today. Um, from 2006. I don't know, I'm
a real Coppola head. I love everything she's done. I
love I know some people.

S4 (58:55):
That's so surprising, isn't it?

S3 (58:57):
I know, I know, some people don't like this film
and her style, but I think it's fun. Over the top. Silly.

S1 (59:04):
I like Sofia Coppola and I like us a lot,
and I liked this film. But I think the worst
thing about this film is the whole like, let's reclaim
like the narrative of the woman who was actually the
victim here when we're talking about Marie Antoinette. And it's
interesting you compare that to your attitude to this situation,
because I can see how if you're adopting the Pablo
Larrain perspective, you're like, well, these people are all crooks

(59:25):
trying to murder everyone. And if you're adopting the Sofia
Coppola Marie Antoinette perspective, you're like, well, you're just trying
to have a good time. And other people are ruing
their lives. And can we just, like, listen to some
indie rock and chill out?

S4 (59:37):
I mean, I don't.

S3 (59:37):
Think that's really the perspective I adopted on this. I
think it was quite nuanced, nuanced and okay.

S2 (59:42):
You were in your head with this film.

S4 (59:43):
Came out. So let's. Yeah, it.

S3 (59:45):
Has shaped me. Um, yeah. Great. Great royal film.

S1 (59:49):
Thomas, I just saw what you put in the.

S7 (59:51):
Document is.

S1 (59:52):
I'm laughing out.

S4 (59:52):
Loud. I think it's a.

S2 (59:54):
Fucking crime that neither of you picked this movie. And
I guarantee our loyal listeners, including all the Thomas heads
out there, um, shout out to you guys. The tens
of you out there. Uh, I was thinking, why has
no one mentioned The Princess Diaries? Easily the greatest royal
film of all time, uh, released in 2001. Uh, I mean,
what more can I say about this film? This was

(01:00:16):
what gave us Anne Hathaway. Was that a good thing?
Remains to be seen. But, like, this is a legendary film.
It was like part of that era when these films
still made a lot of money. It made $165 million
at the box office, which is, uh, like.

S3 (01:00:28):
More than June.

S4 (01:00:29):
Yes.

S2 (01:00:30):
It's crazy. Uh, and basically, you know, we all know
the story. Anne Hathaway plays Mia, a 15 year old
who discovers that she's actually the princess of a small
European state. And then she has to kind of go
on this journey to to kind of claim her spot
on the throne. Uh, the Princess Diaries has become one
of those weird films that's like, weirdly, a part of
pop culture now. Um, and yeah, I think it was
just such a fun movie and led to The Princess Diaries, too,

(01:00:52):
which also made a shitload of money. And then I
think they were going to make The Princess Diaries three,
and then Anne Hathaway was like, oh no, I'm actually
in good stuff now.

S4 (01:00:58):
Did you read.

S3 (01:00:58):
The books too?

S2 (01:00:59):
I did not know.

S4 (01:01:00):
Still time.

S1 (01:01:01):
I did. I did read the book. Shout out to
my friend Renee in high school, who would lend me
her copies of the books after she was done with them.
I wasn't laughing at you mentioning this film, Thomas. I
think it is genuinely like a great film, a very
fun film. More that I thought you were going to
read out the Wikipedia summary that you'd copied and pasted,
which just reads hilarious. So I'm glad you didn't do
that was just more of a.

S2 (01:01:20):
Problem for me because I haven't watched it since 2023.

S3 (01:01:24):
That can be fun to watch with. Archie, your royal baby.

S4 (01:01:26):
Yes. Correct.

S2 (01:01:27):
Oh yeah, that's right actually.

S1 (01:01:29):
And look, if that's not enough recommendations for you, we
do still have our regular Impress Your Friends segment where
we share something that we loved watching, reading, listening to,
or consuming in the past.

S8 (01:01:41):
Wake.

S1 (01:01:42):
Mel, why don't you go first?

S3 (01:01:43):
Okay. Mine is. I know I've had a few books
and I've received feedback from my colleagues here. Um, I've
gone with the TV show this week. Now, if you
watch the NFL because of Taylor and you had no
idea what was going on, or just because you wanted
to watch the NFL for the first time, there's a
new documentary on Apple TV, The Dynasty New England Patriots,
which is a really great introduction to the NFL over

(01:02:06):
the past decade or so. It does focus on the
New England Patriots, which is the team of Tom Brady.
Very good. Um, who is famously the best quarterback of
all time, has won more Super Bowls than anyone else
in NFL history. It kind of focuses on the franchise
since he's been there. It's a bit strangely paced, but
it is really good because it looks at how Tom

(01:02:27):
Brady kind of came in as a replacement quarterback. He
was a really late draft pick. How he then dominated
that team. It covers some of the scandals of the
team as well. There was a big cheating, um, for
all that broke out. So it's really like interesting. Look
at the state of America through the lens of this team. Um,
it kind of one of the real interesting things is

(01:02:47):
the kind of role the team played post 911 and the,
the treatment of American sport during that time. Anyway, it's
one of those really interesting sports documentaries that pretends it's
about sport, but is about the world generally as well. So, um,
any good one? Uh, snapshots of Giselle. She doesn't speak,
he's dead. Speaks, and his sister speaks, and he speaks
as well. And they're actually really they're quite forthright about him. Like,

(01:03:09):
it's quite a good insight. I mean, we all know
he's the kind of maniac in a way, like super competitive,
but they do give lots of fun anecdotes of how
he's shown that over the years. You can watch it
on Apple TV.

S1 (01:03:19):
I'm cheating. I got two, but they're pretty quick ones.
Charlie has released her first single from her upcoming album, brat,
which is out on Monday. Singles called Von Dutch. And yes,
it is an obvious throwback to the classic fashion brand
that we all loved. Thomas Von Dutch Guy.

S2 (01:03:36):
I was like, fucking dripped out in Von Dutch. And
to make things even worse, uh, in the year 2000 year,
the Sydney Olympics, uh, my family went to Thailand and
so I bought all knock off von Dutch came home.
I was like, so flammable, so itchy, but just dripping
in Von Dutch. I look like Nicole Richie at Sydney Airport.

S1 (01:03:54):
That's really funny. Look, this this track reminds me of
the sounds of that era as well as a lot
of late 2000 kind of Ministry of Sound club banger vibes.
It's really fun. I've mentioned Charlie a couple of times
on this, but I'm really excited for this album. But
if you want a fun Friday night track, give that
one a spin and a little bit of a play
here from people I've recommended Curb Your Enthusiasm final season,

(01:04:16):
which is on binge right now before, but it is
just getting better and better. It is building up to
something extraordinary. There's a lot of theories and guessing. I
know that, Mel, you're involved in this as well, that
we're going to get a repeat of the infamous Seinfeld
season finale. Larry David, who was a writer on that show,
co-created this. The show with Jerry, uh, has been putting

(01:04:37):
a lot of clues in this season as to what
he's building up to. Please jump on this. This is
a very, very, very, very, very funny and good show.

S3 (01:04:46):
Yeah, it is. And I envy people who haven't seen
any curb who get to go and watch all of
the seasons all over again, because it truly is a
kind of one of a kind show.

S1 (01:04:54):
It's a great gift. Uh, and Thomas, last but not least.

S2 (01:04:58):
Uh, yes, surprising one for me this week. I'm actually recommending, uh,
I guess, like a new columnist, a series of essays. Uh, basically,
Jay Caspian Kane is a writer with The New Yorker.
You may know his byline from The New York Times.
He also has worked on the very successful podcast This
American Life. He has started a new, uh, weekly column
for The New Yorker called faultlines. I sent it to

(01:05:18):
you both on the weekend, his first article, because I
thought it was really interesting and really well written. It's
called Arguing Ourselves to Death. And basically he kind of
talks about, um, well, he's started off by talking about
his love of surfing, but really it becomes this, you know,
discussion about the ideology of the internet and how, you know,
we all talk so much. I mean, as we have
done today on this podcast about the good and the
bad and the reality of the internet, and he talks

(01:05:40):
in a really interesting and intelligent way about how it's
maybe not about whether or not the internet has helped
us or harmed us. It's just, you know, it exists
now and we have to learn to live around it.
But he's a great writer and the column is amazing.
And if you're going to check out any weekly column, obviously,
besides mine on Sundays in the Sun-Herald, then yeah, I
would highly recommend this. It's called Fault Lines. The author
is Jay Caspian King. Um. Highly recommend. You can find

(01:06:03):
it in the New Yorker. And yeah, you won't be disappointed.

S1 (01:06:05):
Yeah, really great column was very, uh, happy that you
recommend it. It was an awesome thing to read and
I'm hooked in for the rest of them. So thank you.
Great Rex team. Great conversations. Sad to not be in
the room with you physically, but hopefully we'll get to
go to more movies in the future. And I can
continue to make fun of Thomas's weird cinema habits.

S2 (01:06:22):
Yeah, but also we can just take a photo of
the three of us and the manipulated so it looks
like we're in the same room.

S1 (01:06:29):
Uh, very, very, very funny. Uh, take care guys. Great
to chat. Bye bye. This episode of The Drop was
produced by Qi Wang. If you enjoyed listening to today's
episode of The Drop, make sure to follow us on
your favorite podcast app. Leave us a review or better yet,
share it with a friend! I'm Usman Farooqui. See you

(01:06:50):
next week!