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Experience has made me rich / And now they're after me
On this week's episode of Deep Thoughts About Stupid Shit, Emily and Tracie discuss Madonna's 1985 music video Material Girl in front of a live studio audience. As a six-year-old child, Emily did not recognize how Madonna's video was intentionally in conversation with Marilyn Monroe's performance of Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend from 30 years prior. Both women are singing about the importance of financial security, although Monroe's cultural commentary is more of a practical guide for navigating misogyny than rallying cry for feminism and women owning their financial and sexual freedom. What a difference 30 years makes.
Of course, baby Emily was unaware of this pop culture homage within Madonna's video. She was much more concerned by the storytelling intercut within the music video, wherein a rich producer woos Madonna by pretending to be a poor suitor. It bothered the budding financial expert that the producer spent more money trying to look poor than he would have paid for expensive gifts, and it truly annoyed her that Madonna seemed to be taken in by his fakery. Women with her level of financial and sexual agency should be savvier than that!
Ultimately, Emily and Tracie are glad they had Material Girl as an example as little kids. It helped them recognize that boys needed to give them proper credit...or they'd just walk away.
We are living in a material world…and you are a podcast listener!
Note to listeners: We teased Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood for next week, but we’re actually welcoming guest Tanesha Myles to come talk about The Devil Wears Prada instead! We’ll be sharing our deep thoughts about Fred Rogers the following week.
Mentioned in this episode:
https://www.emilyguybirken.com/post/everything-i-know-about-money-i-learned-from-pop-culture
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deep thoughts about stupid sh*t, women, feminism, pop culture, madonna, marilyn monroe, cultural commentary, storytelling, gen x childhood, gen x nostalgia, money, romance, nostalgia, music video, material girl, diamonds are a girls best friend, mtv, psychology, comedy, comedy podcast
This episode was edited by Resonate Recordings.
Our theme music is "Professor Umlaut" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
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We are the sister podcasters Tracie Guy-Decker and Emily Guy Birken, known to our extended family as the Guy Girls.
We're hella smart and completely unashamed of our overthinking prowess. We love 80s and 90s movies and tv, science fiction, comedy, and murder mysteries, good storytelling with lots of dramatic irony, analyzing film tropes with a side of feminism, and examining the pop culture of our Gen X childhood for gender dynamics, psychology, sociology, religious allegory, and whatever else we find.
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Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_00 (00:01):
It's because women who are financially and sexually
dependent can be controlled.
And so Madonna showed me as asix-year-old that I don't have
to accept that.
SPEAKER_01 (00:16):
Have you ever had something you love dismissed
because it's just up culture?
What others might deem stupidshit, you know matters.
You know it's worth talking andthinking about.
And so do we.
So come overthink with us as wedelve into our deep thoughts
about stupid shit.
SPEAKER_00 (00:37):
I'm Emily Guy Birkin, and you're listening to
Deep Thoughts About Stupid Shit.
Because pop culture is stillculture.
And shouldn't you know what's inyour head?
On today's episode, I'll besharing my deep thoughts about
the 1985 music video MaterialGirl by Madonna from her Like a
Virgin album.
With my sister, Tracy GuyDecker, with our live studio
(01:00):
audience, and with you.
Let's dive in.
All right, Trace, I know you'veseen this music video.
We were in the MTV generation,we grew up with it.
But tell me what's in your headabout it.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12):
Yeah, I cheated a little bit because since it's
such a short piece of media, Iwent and rewatched it.
So I have the whole thing in myhead.
But what re-watching ityesterday validated for me was
the dress with the gloves andlots and lots of diamonds and
the sort of army of kind ofinterchangeable men behind her
(01:37):
who were like quite literallylifting her up and carrying her
around.
Those are the things that weresort of in my head about the
video prior to re-watching it.
So having just re-watched it,because it was brief enough that
I could for today, there's abunch of other stuff, but we
will get into that in ourconversation.
(01:59):
But tell me, like, why are wetalking about this music video
today?
What's at stake for you?
SPEAKER_00 (02:05):
I'll link to this in the show notes.
I wrote a blog post severalyears ago talking about the pop
culture money lessons that Itook in as a child.
And I mentioned this music videobecause I remember watching this
and taking in money lessons.
Specifically, there's kind of alove story throughout this music
(02:28):
video because interspersed withthat Madonna wearing the pink
dress, and she's got the coterieof men in tuxedos who are uh
walking around, there is a lovestory of a producer who wants to
impress her, who, the actressplaying the woman in the dress,
and overhears her saying, like,yeah, he thinks he can impress
(02:52):
me by buying me expensivethings.
And so this rich producer throwsaway the expensive gift he's
bought her and instead impressesher with a bouquet of handcut
daisies, and then he gives awhole bunch of money to a farmer
to either buy or borrow his likerun-down old truck.
(03:15):
He impresses her with hispoverty, basically.
And so he seems more authentic.
And I remember as a kid reallygetting hung up on that because
it's like he spent more money tolook poor than he had would have
spent on the diamonds.
(03:37):
And it's successful because atthe end of the video, you see
them kissing and undiagnosedADHD, six-year-old, like really
fixating on that.
Because what she wants is not somuch that she doesn't want a
rich man, it's that she wantssomeone who sees her as a human
being and wants an authenticconnection.
(03:58):
And she still isn't getting itbecause this man is lying to
her.
And I remember that bothering meas a kid.
But also thinking, well, atleast he's listening to her
because he's listening to whatshe doesn't like about these
other suitors.
Uh-and he's trying.
Huh.
Okay.
All right.
So that's part of why I had beenthinking about it.
(04:19):
And I just recently recorded apodcast with a friend of mine
talking about how I spent anunreasonable amount of time
thinking about money in thismusic video as a kid.
And then as I've gotten older, Idid not know that the pink dress
portion of it was an homage toDiamonds Are a Girl's Best
(04:41):
Friend musical interlude from uhGentlemen Prefer Blondes, the
Marilyn Monroe movie.
Because, you know, I was six,but I didn't have the background
for that.
As I got older and realized thatit was the homage, the Diamonds
are a girl's best friend song,which is very much in Material
Girls in conversation with it,reminded me of the kind of
(05:05):
financial advice that we mighthave gotten from our
grandmother.
And that also I found to befascinating.
And the complex relationshipbetween women, beauty, and
money.
So that's also why I thought itwas really an interesting thing
(05:26):
to talk about.
Those are all like part andparcel what's in there.
It's also a banger of a song.
SPEAKER_01 (05:36):
Okay.
Well, I'm sure we have a lot totalk about from this like
five-minute piece of media.
But before we get there, likethere is something of a plot,
which you've given us a bigportion of.
SPEAKER_00 (05:46):
But do you want to do a 30-second the music video
starts with two actors?
One, I he's a carradine, and Idon't remember which carradine.
He plays the rich producer LoveInterest.
And then Robert Wool, who was inBatman, that we just relatively
recently talked about, arewatching a screener of Madonna
(06:09):
in the Merilyn Monroe um, whatwe're about to see.
And the rich producer is sayingshe's going to be a star.
And Robert Wool is just likebeing a yes man.
He just says, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (06:23):
And like he like reverses and he realizes what
the yeah, he disagrees with theproducer.
SPEAKER_00 (06:29):
He immediately agrees with, even if it's the
opposite of what he just said.
Right.
And so the producer says, I wantto meet her.
And Robert Wool is like, when?
And he's like, right now.
Right.
And so you see him going to herher dressing room door with a
gift, a wrapped gift.
And she is on the phone withsomeone saying, Yeah, you just
(06:53):
something along the lines of hejust dropped me off.
He thinks he can impress me bybuying me expensive things.
I mean, it's nice.
I think it's a diamond.
Do you want it?
And so you see the producerthrowing away the gift they had.
Then interspersed, you see themusical interlude that is an
homage to the Marilyn Monroe,Diamond Zara Girl's Best Friend,
(07:16):
where she is dancing with theseabout seven or eight men in
tuxedos, which is just like whatMarilyn Monroe did in Diamond
Zoro Girl's Best Friend.
SPEAKER_01 (07:26):
Yeah, which our studio audience, one of our
members has told us in the chat,the men are in both.
SPEAKER_00 (07:32):
Yes.
And in both, the men are holdinglarge red hearts.
Both the it's not just tuxedos,but they have like a red sash.
A sash, like that diplomaticsort of a sash.
Yeah.
And they're on the same kind ofstairs with a red background,
and they have these largecandelabras as part of it as
well.
(07:53):
In between that, you see thatinterspersed with her getting
out of like really expensivesports car with the rich guy
who's trying to impress her, andthe rich guy throwing his keys
to the rich producer, assuminghe's the valet.
So he's clearly a dick.
And so the producer keeps likeobserving her and trying to
figure out what it is that she'sgoing to like.
(08:16):
And towards the end, you see himfinally show up at her dressing
room with the daisies that arekind of funky, like that.
It's a hand cut of daisies.
And then you see him in front ofthe studio, and it's a broken
(08:36):
down old pickup truck, andthere's an old man in overalls
who looks like a very likecentral casting said, like, we
need someone who looks like afarmer.
Right.
And the producer is likecounting out twenties, like a
whole bunch of twenties, andhanding them over to the farmer.
And then he like ushers Madonnainto the pickup truck and they
(08:59):
drive off.
And then the very last scene isMadonna and the producer
kissing.
You didn't talk at all about thelyrics to the song.
Not yet.
SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
No.
Oh okay.
Are we going to get to that?
SPEAKER_00 (09:10):
Yes.
And that's part of what I wantto talk about for both of them.
And I have like I've the lyricsto both Diamond Zora Girl's Best
Friend and Material Girl.
SPEAKER_01 (09:19):
Okay locked and loaded.
All right, great.
We didn't do postcards beforeyou gave me the synopsis, but so
do you want to sort of tell me,give me the agenda of what we're
going to talk about, and then wecan figure out what to dive into
first?
SPEAKER_00 (09:30):
Sure.
Yeah.
So some of the things I want totalk about, I want to talk about
like the evolution of feminismfrom like 1950s, which is that's
not to say that feminism didn'texist then, but it's prior to it
being the kind of mainstreamthing where I don't like I think
Madonna was perfectly happy tobe a feminist icon, whereas I
(09:51):
don't know that Meryl Monroewould have been comfortable
calling herself that or beingreferred to that way.
But the evolution of feminismfrom between those 30 years.
The idea of money as freedom isanother thing I really want to
talk about.
I want to talk aboutauthenticity and how poverty is
used as a show of authenticityin the uh sort of the frame
story.
(10:11):
In the frame story.
Yeah.
I want to talk about the homageto Marilyn Monroe, what Madonna
was trying to do with thathomage.
I want to talk about the ironyof the lyrics of Material Girl
and also how many people arejust irony deficient.
(10:32):
And I want to talk about womenowning their sexuality and women
owning their financial freedomare equally terrifying to the
status quo.
I want to talk about how womenwere involved in making this
music video, even though thesong itself was written by men.
That Madonna did not pen thelyrics or write this song.
(10:52):
Yeah.
But the music video was directedby Mary Lambert, and Madonna was
very much involved in thecreation of this music video.
And she was excited to recordthis song.
So I want to talk about that.
And then I want to talk aboutBaby Emily and her literalism.
(11:13):
This was an importantinformative piece of media for
Baby Emily.
All right.
Where do we start?
I want to start because youmentioned I hadn't talked about
the lyrics.
I want to start with the lyrics.
And that kind of for me is theevolution of feminism.
Okay.
So in the song from GentlemenPrefer Blondes is Diamonds Are a
Girl's Best Friend.
(11:34):
And what Marilyn Monroe sings,she says, a kiss may be grand,
but it won't pay the rental onyour humble flat or help you at
the automat.
Men grow cold as girls grow old,and we all lose our charms in
the end.
But square cut or pear-shaped,these rocks don't lose their
shape.
Diamonds are a girl's bestfriend.
There's a quite a few thingswhere it's then that those
(11:57):
louses go back to their spouses.
Diamonds are a girl's bestfriend.
Well time rolls on and youth isgone, and you can't straighten
up when you bend.
But stiff back or stiff knees,you stand straight at Tiffany's
diamonds, and I don't meanrhinestones, but diamonds are a
girl's best friend.
She actually says I don't meanrhinestones.
Oh yes.
unknown (12:17):
Huh.
SPEAKER_00 (12:18):
And there is something about this that
reminds me of our grandmaRuthie.
Now, I mean, she used to say alittle powder or a little paint
makes a woman what she ain't.
And there's something about thelike stiff back or stiff knees.
You stand straight at Tiffany's.
Just it sounds like the kind ofthing that our grandmother would
have said.
And in 1953, which is when thissong came out, our grandmother
(12:40):
was 42 or thereabout, somewherearound there.
She was of that era.
I know as a young woman, as ateenager, the lyrics of this
song would have made me cringe.
Because the idea that MarilynMonroe, who was so unbelievably
(13:01):
gorgeous, had such sex appealthat she would trade that for
material goods, seemedanti-feminist.
Except looking at those lyrics,it is extremely practical.
SPEAKER_01 (13:20):
I feel like maybe Ruthie said to me, I'm I'm
having a hard time coming upwith a very specific time.
But as you say, like, I do feellike she said, like, always have
a little of your own money.
Oh, yes, she did.
She did.
And that's what that means.
That's what Diamonds are girlsfresh friends means.
Like, is like make sure you haveyour own money.
SPEAKER_00 (13:42):
And this is specifically saying, get it from
the men that you are seeing.
And like she louses go back totheir spouses by saying, like,
you're having affairs with men.
I know that's the part thatmaybe you can crawl.
Yeah.
But there, and this is somethingthat we've talked about about
(14:04):
like the price of being a womanand like the cost of being
female in public.
This is the world we live in.
Men are going to pay attentionto me because this is how I
look.
If that's going to be the case,I'm getting paid for it.
And I don't remember which ofour grandmothers it was, if it
was Ruthie or Beta, but one ofthem was always like, always
(14:25):
have a$20 bill with you so youcan get a cab where you need to
go.
SPEAKER_01 (14:28):
Oh yeah.
I think that was better.
Like the emergency 20 we weresupposed to keep in the glove
box.
Or in our wallet or whatever.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:36):
Or in our bra.
SPEAKER_01 (14:37):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (14:38):
Uh that yeah.
Yeah.
I would not have described thatkind of advice as feminist when
I was 17 or even 25.
But I can recognize it as suchnow, where it's like this is
women taking care of women withpractical advice.
I think that I can look back onDiamond Zara's girl's best
(15:01):
friend and recognize thestrength and the feminism within
it within a misogynistic world.
And so that's something thathadn't occurred to me.
Now, obviously hadn't occurredto me when I first saw the video
(15:21):
because I didn't know Diamond'sOrgirl's best friend.
But once I knew of it.
SPEAKER_01 (15:25):
Right, right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
A member of the studio audienceis saying that she remembers her
grandmother showing her how shehid money in her bra.
Grandma did.
SPEAKER_00 (15:34):
The other thing our grandmother did was she always
told us, and she always usedthis terminology.
She says, if you're going onvacation or if you need to hide
money somewhere, put it in yourco-text box under the first or
second pad because the peoplewho are going to be stealing
from you are men and they don'twant to touch your co-text box.
SPEAKER_01 (15:51):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:52):
And again, very practical diamonds are a girl's
best friend kind of advice.
SPEAKER_01 (15:56):
Which leads me to something that you said that,
like, let's maybe with thiscould we could segue.
You talked about money asfreedom.
And I think that's what all ofthese grandmotherly advice
things that we're talking aboutthat resonate is the freedom.
It's not just freedom like fromour grandmother's advice, but
safety.
So you want to get into that andwhat how that shows up in this
(16:20):
video?
SPEAKER_00 (16:20):
Yes.
So those are the lyrics fromDiamonds or Girl's Best Friend.
Now, for the lyrics fromMaterial Girl, what the lyrics
start off with some boys kissme, some boys hug me, I think
they're okay.
If they don't give me propercredit, I just walk away.
There's a nice little pun inthere with proper credit.
Right.
But she's making it clear like,I don't need these boys.
(16:42):
In 30 years, we've gone from I'mgoing to use these men for the
money they can give me, to ifthey're not going to give me
proper credit, I'm walking awayfrom them.
I don't need them because I havemy own money.
And then the second stanza orsecond lines are they can beg
(17:04):
and they can plead, but theycan't see the light.
Because the boy with a cold hardcash is always Mr.
Wright.
So that kind of gets back intoDiamonds or a Girl's Best
Friend, where like, look, ifthese boys aren't going to
appreciate me for me, then I'mgoing to go for the one who's
going to shower me with gifts.
(17:25):
Because if I'm not going to beappreciated anyway, I might as
well get as much as I can out ofthis because I can get my own
money.
And she also has, you know, someboys romance, some boys slow
dance.
That's all right with me.
If they can't raise my interest,then I have to let them be.
Again, another nice financialfun.
(17:46):
And so the material girl has thefreedom that the girl who for
whom Timens were the best frienddidn't.
Because she can walk away fromthese boys.
She doesn't have to squirrelthis away for when she's too
old.
Yeah.
That's something that I think isI'm really glad I had that, even
(18:09):
if I didn't really necessarilytake it in as a kid.
But Madonna didn't care aboutany of these men.
Right.
Marilyn Monroe doesn't either.
She's doing the same thing.
Like the choreography is verysimilar.
Right.
SPEAKER_01 (18:26):
But Madonna is definitely freer.
Well, the lyrics in particular,like the louses who go back to
their spouses, like one gets theimpression that like Madonna's
not spending time with louses,right?
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (18:39):
Yes.
Yeah.
She walks away from Louses.
Like she does not want to be theother woman.
SPEAKER_01 (18:44):
She's not, she's like, she's not gonna try and
get diamonds from the marriedman that she's sleeping with
because she's not gonna botherwith him.
Yeah.
Which the Monroe character,like, we get the impression,
like she takes what she can get.
SPEAKER_00 (18:59):
I'm like Because she knows that this is a cruel world
and she needs to set thingsaside for her future.
SPEAKER_01 (19:04):
And there's an expiration date on her beauty,
which is her primary asset.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Interesting.
Okay.
Where do you want to go next?
I feel like there's a coupledifferent directions we could go
from here.
SPEAKER_00 (19:15):
So I want to talk about like irony and how people
are irony deficient.
SPEAKER_01 (19:19):
Okay.
This mini-film, right?
Like she's saying the guy withthe cold whore cache is always
Mr.
Wright in the lyrics of thesong.
But the music video, theopposite is true.
So let's talk about irony inthis piece.
SPEAKER_00 (19:37):
Yeah.
So remember when this came out?
This was 1985, middle of the1980s, Reaganomics, Greed is
good.
Greed is good.
1980s.
Yuppies were ostentatiouslyshowing off their wealth.
Yep.
And so what Madonna has said wasshe loved the song because she
(20:04):
is not material.
She's not someone who caresabout material things.
She does care about ambition andher career.
And so what she took from thesong was like, we are living in
a material world.
So she's surrounded by peoplewho care about material things,
but she doesn't want a man whois only interested in material
(20:28):
things, but she does want toconnect with someone who cares
about his career or isrespectful of how much she cares
about her career.
And so the fact that she'ssinging that I am a material
girl is ironic and is likelightly skewering the world that
they're living in, that this isa material world.
(20:49):
And people just missed it.
No, you finish, especially.
Well, especially considering howshe set up the story of the
video.
The video, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (20:58):
Yeah.
I think it's interesting.
I never thought of it this way.
Cause I always heard it's amaterial world and I'm a
material girl, meaning like theworld cares about material
things and so do I.
But some of the conversationsthat we've been having about
women as commodities that wewere talking about before the
audience got here, it's amaterial world and I'm a piece
(21:20):
of material.
That's yeah.
Wow.
I never read it that way.
Okay.
Interesting.
All right.
Did people, I don't remember wewere children.
Did people give Madonna a hardtime about this?
SPEAKER_00 (21:34):
So it's not so much that they gave her a hard time,
but she has been referred to asthe material girl ever since
then.
Uh-huh.
And that bothers her.
Like she has talked about I willbe 90 years old and people will
still call me the material girl.
And that's not who I am.
Now, this was one of her likefirst big hits.
Yeah.
(21:55):
But this song and Like a Virginoff her Like a Virgin album, and
that that She wrote.
And both of them are supposed tobe ironic.
Mm-hmm.
And like just over people'sheads.
And she's like, how can you belike a virgin?
It's a yes-no binary.
Even though it is a construct,but it's a construct we made to
(22:18):
be a yes-no binary.
And that lack of irony, I didn'tcome up with irony deficient.
Friend of the show, ScottKennamore, who you remember was
on, his first book was The Zenof a Zombie, which is a comedy
self-help book where how you'resupposed to achieve
self-actualization by being morelike a zombie.
(22:41):
More like a zombie.
And it says right on the coverthat it's humor.
But he has gotten letters fromreaders saying, like, this
hasn't helped.
People who think it's actualself-help.
And he's, I think he's the onewho's like, people really are
irony deficient.
That's funny.
So there are people who just arenot capable of recognizing
(23:05):
something as being ironic orskewing or sarcastic.
SPEAKER_01 (23:10):
I mean, let's talk about baby Emily then, because
maybe it is actually aneurodivergent thing that makes
it difficult to not take thingsliterally.
SPEAKER_00 (23:20):
So baby Emily taking things literally.
I thought the character in thepink dress did care about
diamonds and things and money.
And I knew that she was acharacter that the actress
playing her, like Madonnaplaying the character in the
pink dress, was a differentperson.
And then I spent way too muchtime thinking about the fact
(23:41):
that the producer, the richproducer, was trying to win her
and doing exactly what everyoneelse was doing, just in a much
more like a more manipulativeway.
Yeah.
And that bothered me.
Yeah.
Cause it's bothersome.
Yeah.
And like thinking, like, well,at least he's listening to her.
Like that was how I could kindof make it okay in my head was
(24:03):
like, okay, he's listening towhat she wants, but he's still
not talking to her.
SPEAKER_01 (24:07):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (24:08):
But my thinking was like, she's saying, like, these
men are trying to impress me bybuying me things.
And I'm like, well, he'sspending all this money.
He's still trying to impress herby buying her things.
He's just trying to impress herby buying her things to make him
look poor.
SPEAKER_01 (24:23):
And that doesn't sound like you were too literal.
Sounds like you got it.
Unless I'm being too literalright now.
No, no.
SPEAKER_00 (24:28):
I it's to me, it sounds like you got the video.
I couldn't tell, and I stilldon't know if that's what
Madonna and Mary Lambert, thedirector, were going for, or if
they actually wanted it to be ahappy ending.
Oh God, I hope not.
I have no idea.
He's rewarded.
They're kissing at the end.
SPEAKER_01 (24:49):
Yeah.
But we saw from the beginningwhen he was like, I need to meet
her now.
That was gross.
But it was in 1985.
SPEAKER_00 (24:59):
That's normal.
Ew.
SPEAKER_02 (25:02):
I I don't see another work for it.
Oh God.
I don't know that Madonna andMary Lambert didn't mean for it
to be a happy ending.
Because Baby Emily was right.
That's gross.
SPEAKER_00 (25:12):
Okay.
All right.
I truly have never could I couldnever figure out what I was
supposed to take away from that.
SPEAKER_01 (25:20):
That's gross.
In re-watching it yesterday, Iwas like, come on, Madonna.
Don't fall for this shit.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm not sure the baby only tookit too literally.
Like, I don't I think that wasgross.
I mean, I think the piece aboutlike the character in the pink
(25:40):
dress, like that maybe, becausethat may be like too literal,
but especially now when you seeit in conversation with the
Marilyn Monroe.
Right.
But let's talk about MarilynMonroe a little bit.
Like you talked about sort ofthe evolution of feminism, but
one of the things you named inthe things you wanted to talk
about was the homage.
(26:01):
So like, let's talk about what,like they wrote and recorded
this music, this song, right?
That Madonna didn't write, butshe was like, Yeah, this is
ironic and I dig it.
And they recorded a song.
And then they were like, let'sdo Diamonds or a Girl's Best
Friend.
What did that do?
(26:22):
Like, can we sort of talk aboutwhat pulling Marilyn Monroe into
the room does in 1980, whateveryear it was?
SPEAKER_00 (26:30):
And like well, that was very intentional on
Madonna's part.
That was her inspiration.
An inspiration.
And something I read talkedabout how Madonna wanted and
welcomed being compared toMarilyn Monroe, but she also
wanted to create a little bit ofdistance because she didn't want
(26:53):
the same kind of sense of beinga commodity that happened to
Marilyn Monroe.
So she wanted to control her ownnarrative in a way that Marilyn
Monroe was not able to.
I was telling Tracy before wehit record, some of the things
that are famous about MarilynMonroe.
Her photos were in the veryfirst issue of Playboy.
(27:16):
That was not her choice.
Those were photos that weretaken before she became famous
when she was trying to make itas an actress.
And, you know, it's the sort ofthing that is very common.
She needed money.
She needed money.
And Hefner got hold of thosephotos and without her consent,
published them.
Hefner was obsessed with her.
They never met.
(27:37):
And Hefner, so she is Monroe isburied in a mausoleum, one of
those kind of like walls.
Column column.
Yeah.
And Hefner purchased the sitedirectly above her so that he
could be buried directly aboveMarilyn Monroe.
So this poor woman, even indeath, cannot escape this man.
SPEAKER_01 (27:59):
Yeah, that's gross.
SPEAKER_00 (28:01):
Who she never met and who made his fortune on her
body.
SPEAKER_01 (28:05):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (28:06):
Yeah, diamonds are a girl's best friend.
Because how else are you goingto get away from that kind of
entitlement?
You know, other than financialfreedom.
SPEAKER_01 (28:17):
That's really interesting, too.
What the insight that I hadearlier, and knowing sort of
Madonna the distance that shewanted to sort of have more
control, but sort of recognizingby putting on the sort of
Marilyn costume and thensinging, I'm a material girl.
Mm-hmm.
(28:37):
Mm-hmm.
Right.
Monroe was in fact a commoditythat many people besides herself
made money off of.
And so Madonna sort of, I don'tknow, naming that and channeling
it in this way that was, I don'tknow if I can call it defiant or
(28:59):
not, but trying to push back onit at least.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (29:04):
It was defiant in that she's defining herself
rather than being defined thatway.
She's also making it clear Ihave my own resources.
I do not have to rely on men forthese resources.
Mm-hmm.
You know, that's within thelyrics of this song.
SPEAKER_01 (29:24):
But then the thing that baby Emily saw, like, she
kind of undercuts it by havingher persona be deceived by this
man.
SPEAKER_04 (29:35):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (29:36):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (29:38):
I don't know what to do with that.
SPEAKER_00 (29:39):
Yeah.
Which always left a sour tastein my mouth, even which is
interesting because I love lovestories.
And even as a six-year-old, Iwanted them to get together and
kiss.
I always wanted them to gettogether and kiss, whoever they
were.
But that always was just like itwas false, false pretenses.
Yeah.
And like we never see him talkto her.
We never see that he likesanything about her other than
(30:02):
that she's pretty.
Yeah.
And talented.
Yeah.
One other thing about babyEmily, though, is before I knew
the term dress for the job youwant, I wanted a big, uh, long
pink dress with the glovesbecause I want seven men in
tuxedos to carry me around.
That is the job I want.
SPEAKER_02 (30:24):
Amen, sister.
Amen.
That's hilarious.
Okay.
Speaking of the evolution offeminism.
SPEAKER_01 (30:41):
Oh man.
All right.
I feel like we've talked aboutmost of the things that you said
you wanted to get into.
SPEAKER_00 (30:47):
Where do you want to go next?
How terrifying it is, womenowning sexuality and owning
financial freedom.
So this is terrifying that is tothe status quo.
That's the sort of thing wherelike I don't if I try to tell my
kids about how much pearlclutching there was about
Madonna, even with this videoand with like Virgin, I don't
(31:10):
think they'd get it.
And I don't remember it thatwell because I was very young
when this came out.
But we are still seeing echoesof that to this day.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (31:27):
Women couldn't have credit cards in their own name
until the 70s.
Like in 1983.
SPEAKER_00 (31:33):
It wasn't that It wasn't until 1987 or 88 that a
woman couldn't take out abusiness loan in her own name
without a male cosigner.
SPEAKER_01 (31:43):
Oh my God.
So after this video was made.
SPEAKER_00 (31:46):
After this video was made.
Our mom was a business owner,but she had financing for I
mean, she she from family.
Grandma was her cosigner.
Well, no, she had money fromlike she didn't need a business
owner.
SPEAKER_01 (32:01):
She didn't need a loan because she'd she'd uh got
me because she had got thatinheritance from her
grandmother.
SPEAKER_00 (32:07):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (32:08):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (32:10):
Right.
Man.
So she would not have been ableto start her business if she
hadn't had that inheritance.
Or she wouldn't imagine dad toco-sign or something.
Yeah.
That's obscene.
Well, and that's why so ourgrandmother on our father's side
owned a Dunkin' Donuts donutfranchise with our father.
(32:31):
With dad.
He was the male key he had toco-sign.
When this video came out, MaryLambert, who uh was the
director, could not have gottena business on her own.
SPEAKER_01 (32:44):
Yeah.
I'm trying to like wrap my mindaround why it is so terrifying.
And like it's those things arethings that men do.
Financial freedom and autonomyover sexuality are things that
not just like men do, but likethey're supposed to do.
(33:07):
Like not the weird ones, likethe ones we admire, that's what
they do.
Right?
The ones we're meant to likehold as role models, that's what
they do.
So is the fear because women whowould do those things are like
men?
I'm putting parentheses around,I mean quotation marks around
(33:31):
the word like, like, is itbecause they're crossing the
binary and doing male things?
Like it's just I'm I'mdumbfounded.
SPEAKER_00 (33:41):
So it's because women who are financially and
sexually dependent can becontrolled.
Yes.
And so Madonna showed me as asix-year-old that I don't have
to accept that.
SPEAKER_01 (33:59):
Yeah.
I mean, Madonna was a path, shewas a in the vanguard on both
counts, right?
Mm-hmm.
In both counts, she was in thevanguard of both financial and a
sexual autonomy because she wassuch a successful pop star, but
also part of the way she didthat was through her.
(34:19):
Thank you, Trailblazer.
One of our studio audiences justgave me that word in the chat.
Trail, she was a trailblazer.
She was a role model in terms ofthat.
Like whatever, even when she wasan actress, like whatever she
was cast in, she was still doingthis sort of sexual autonomy as
well.
And then she's making money asan actress.
SPEAKER_00 (34:43):
Like part of it is she's making money by owning her
sexuality.
Yeah.
Which also was something thatsecond wave feminism that we
were raised with, which kind ofwas like, no, no, no, no.
That's that's dirty.
That's dirty.
Like you don't use your beautyor your sexuality in the realm
(35:05):
of finance.
SPEAKER_01 (35:06):
Well, more than that, I feel like second wave
sex second wave feminism likedidn't want us to acknowledge we
had bodies.
Except insofar, like we maybe wecould talk about the fact that
like medical tests and stuffalways use men as normal.
But like beyond that, like weweren't meant to talk about our
bodies as sexual creatures insecond wave feminism.
(35:31):
Like that was dirty.
Like second wave feminism stillwas not sex positive.
It still was not sex workerpositive.
Like there was a lot of thatthat was still kind of
pearl-clutchy to use yourearlier word.
SPEAKER_00 (35:46):
Yeah.
And being raised by MTV andseeing Madonna unapologetically
embrace her own sexuality andher own ambition and her own
financial ambition wasrevolutionary in ways that I
didn't appreciate because I wasa kid.
(36:08):
But it makes me very glad that Iwas part of the MTV generation.
SPEAKER_01 (36:11):
Yeah, we talked about that a little bit in our
Dick Tracy episode since she wasin that film.
We talked a bit about herinfluence on the culture in that
sense.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (36:21):
Yeah.
So it's one thing I I mentionedand haven't really talked about.
So talked about poverty asauthenticity.
That's what they use as likekind of a metaphor for here.
And something specific aboutMadonna herself.
I remember when she got to beabout 32, her art reflected her
(36:42):
fears of dying because hermother was 32 when she died.
And I remember talking aboutthat with our dad.
I bring that up because I feellike there is authenticity in
Madonna's music, even inMaterial Girl, which she didn't
write, because she brought theauthenticity to the music video,
which she did have a part in.
(37:03):
And there was authenticity inher fears when she got to the
age that her mother was when shedied, which is to, I mean, so
understandable and real.
You hear about that with allkinds of people.
Like our dad was sure he wouldhe would never wake up on his
43rd birthday because his daddied when he was 42.
Exactly.
That poverty is authenticitymanipulation in this video has
(37:26):
this particular sour notebecause I imagine this was at
the very beginning of her likeascendance into superstardom.
Right.
But becoming a celebrity makesit so much harder to have any
kind of authentic connectionwith someone.
Right.
In the same way that wealthmakes it harder to have an
authentic connection withsomeone.
(37:47):
Right.
Which is what the video isabout.
It's about like the wealthmaking it difficult to have an
authentic connection.
They use poverty as a stand-inand like he's manipulating it to
seem authentic.
That also just for me as aperson, looking at Madonna as a
person makes me sad because it'slike, I'm sure she's fine.
(38:08):
You know, like I'm sure thiswoman is fine.
Yeah, she's laughing all the waythe bank, crying all the way the
bank.
But also just like thedifficulty of finding that
authenticity in this video thatlittle baby Emily, who craves
authenticity, that's part of whyI found it icky.
Is because, like, you know, mynon-diagnosed neurodivergent ass
(38:29):
was going like, but it's notreal.
Because I crave authenticity,because that's how my brain
works.
I can't handle it.
It wasn't real.
SPEAKER_01 (38:37):
Yeah.
And I actually I'm having a darksort of thought about that based
on the sort of how terrifying itis.
It is terrifying for our cultureto have a woman to have either
financial security, likefinancial independence, or
having it not controlled, hersexuality, right?
Having her sexuality be unownedor owned only by herself.
(39:00):
Our culture finds both of thosethings terrifying.
Terrifying this woman in thisvideo has both.
And so we see through the video,she's like the shrew.
She's tamed by this producer.
And now her sexuality is ownedby him.
SPEAKER_04 (39:17):
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_01 (39:18):
And that makes it acceptable that she has freedom
in those two realms because nowshe no longer has the freedom in
the sexuality realm.
Yeah.
And we know he's rich.
So he also like is richer thanshe is.
Yeah.
And like, oh my God.
I wonder if there was, I don'tknow, like someone higher up in
(39:43):
the studio going, like, no, havethem end up together.
No, no, no.
Don't don't have her realize,like, have them like end up
together.
SPEAKER_00 (39:50):
When she gets in the truck, she looks sort of bored.
She looks sort of bored and shelike puts her finger up to her
face, like, huh, what is this?
Right.
As a kid, was always just like,oh, she she doesn't really like
this.
She's on to him.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (40:05):
She knows it's not real.
Yeah.
If you cut that final kiss,kiss, which is like the moo the
music's over.
It's like the last like fiveseconds of the video.
In fact, when you watch it onYouTube, it starts to show you
the next, you know, the nextvideo over top of it.
SPEAKER_00 (40:23):
On MTV, it also because you remember how MTV
used to do it would show you thecredits or whatever it was in
the bottom left-hand corner.
And then like depending on howit was, sometimes it would cut
like the last little bit off tomore quickly get to the next
video.
So you didn't always see it backin 1985 when you watched it.
SPEAKER_01 (40:42):
I'm gonna hope.
That's the story I'm tellingmyself.
Is that there was a dudesomewhere in the studio in the
bigger picture production?
Robert Lake.
Yeah.
There was like a dude somewherein like, I don't know, MTV or
MGM or whoever the heck made itthat paid for it to get made
(41:03):
that was like, no, we need onefinal scene of them kissing.
Because if it ended with justher getting in the truck with
her finger on her face, like I'dbe like, Yeah, she's on to him.
She's just Marilyn Monroe.
SPEAKER_02 (41:14):
Yeah.
Like getting what she can out ofhim.
Yeah.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (41:19):
We're getting close to the end, but we still have a
few more minutes.
One of our studio audiencemembers says the dude, whoever
he was, is probably in theEpstein files.
Yeah, probably.
Although he might be too old.
Okay.
So I think we have a couple moreminutes.
Was there one more thing?
Oh, yes, you wanted to talkabout the women involved in
making this music video, whichis really interesting since I
(41:40):
just was talking about the likeunseen dudes whose hands I can I
can see their handiwork eventhough I don't know their names.
SPEAKER_00 (41:48):
So I just wanted to talk about the fact that so we
usually talk about movies onthis podcast.
And this is the second timewe've talked about a music
video.
Yes.
But Thriller is a much longervideo than this.
And the vast majority of moviesare directed by men.
It's a boys' club.
I was delighted, because I hadno idea.
(42:09):
I never looked it up.
I was delighted to see that thedirector was a woman, Mary
Lambert.
And I was delighted to see thatMadonna had a great deal of
influence on what the videolooked like, what was going on
in the video.
Like the story was part of hertoo.
So Mary Lambert did a lot ofmusic videos.
She has also directed movies aswell, mostly in horror.
(42:33):
And to me, that seems aboutright for a woman director from
the 1980s, in that that's aboutwhat would be open to her
because music videos is a lowerbarrier to entry in the same way
that commercials would be, butmusic videos gives you more
creative control thancommercials would.
(42:54):
And then you could work withpeople like Madonna who would be
welcoming to a woman director.
And then horror is the moviegenre that is like the most
reviled and like people areleast interested in.
It's like least likely to beOscar Bait, that sort of thing.
And so it's going to be easiestto find projects that you can
direct.
And so I think that that is alsoindicative of why this piece of
(43:22):
media stuck with me so much.
Like, even though the songitself was written by men, the
influence of women from MarilynMonroe all the way through to
Madonna and Mary Lambertresonated with me as a little
girl who had heard from hergrandmothers, like, have some
(43:42):
money of your own.
Yeah, always have your own moneyand the$20.
unknown (43:45):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (43:46):
$20 for cab fare, no matter what.
SPEAKER_04 (43:48):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_01 (43:49):
Anything else before I reflect back to you what we
talked about, which is a lot?
SPEAKER_00 (43:55):
I feel like Madonna has been a punchline.
Since that period of time, likethere has never been a time
where she wasn't a punchline,even when she was at the height
of her fame in stardom, for thevery reasons why she's amazing,
like because she owns hersexuality, she owns her
(44:16):
ambition, she owns her hermoney.
And even in things like there'sa joke about Madonna and 30
Rock, which was a TV show that Iloved, which I like thinking
back on it and like, ew, gross.
But the thing is, she'sphenomenally talented.
And not just in her art, notjust in music, not just in
(44:40):
dance, not just in acting, notjust in uh she's also a
phenomenally talentedbusinesswoman.
I would argue that's actuallyher greatest talent.
SPEAKER_01 (44:47):
I don't think she's a great singer.
Like, especially like listeningto this song again.
I was like, she's not that Imean, it's a catchy song, but
like she's not a great vocaltalent.
But she's a fantastic performer.
Yes.
Yes.
And she's a fantasticentertainer.
And she's a businesswoman.
(45:09):
She's a savvy businesswoman.
Yes.
Let me see if I can reflect backwhat we talked about.
You had a lot to say about thisfive-minute video.
We were kind of all over theplace.
But I'm actually gonna startwith young Emily, who I actually
don't think took this thing tooliterally, but learned that she
(45:31):
needs to dress in a pink gownwith opera gloves to dress for
the job that she wants becauseshe wants seven or eight men to
carry her around.
SPEAKER_02 (45:42):
In tuxedos.
Men in tuxedos, yeah.
I don't think that's too much toask.
SPEAKER_01 (45:58):
You put this video, you didn't put it in
conversation with MarilynMonroe.
It was in conversation withMarilyn Monroe, but you brought
that conversation to ourconversation.
And through that, you talkedabout sort of the evolution of
feminism, the difference betweendiamonds are a girl's best
friend because youth and beautyhave an expiration date, and I'm
(46:19):
a material girl, I'm gonna getthe money, and I don't need
these men because I have my own.
The 30 years between them, likewhere we have come as a culture,
that we could have Monroe saythe first, which was, I'm sure,
at least a little provocative tosay looses go back to their
spouses.
And then 30 years later, to haveMadonna put on a Maryland
(46:41):
costume and say, only boys thatgive me proper credit.
If they don't give me propercredit, I just walk away.
We spent some time there.
We talked, speaking of that, thedistance between those, we did
spend some time talking aboutthe homage to Marilyn Monroe and
sort of recognizing in adifferent read of the chorus,
(47:03):
which I had never had before, wehad this conversation, like
recognizing that saying I'm amaterial girl, I'd always
interpreted that to mean like Iwant material things.
But when we put it inconversation with Marilyn Monroe
and with the ways in which HughHefner commoditized Marilyn
Monroe and she couldn't get awayfrom him even in death, perhaps
(47:26):
that line, I'm a material girl,actually is acknowledging the
fact that women, if they are inthe public spotlight and
sometimes even not, arecommodities that men feel
entitled to buy and sell, whichthis video sort of leans into
with the producer who wants tosee her now and then figures out
(47:48):
how to manipulate his way intoher head, if not her heart.
Yeah.
There is, you talked about theirony in this video that Madonna
intended and the fact that touse, we believe Scott Kenamore's
phrase, so many people in thisworld are irony deficient and
(48:11):
didn't get the irony that sheintended, though she did not
write this piece of music.
Madonna is terrifying becausenot only is she financially
independent, has financialfreedom, she owns her sexuality
as well.
And either of those things ontheir own is terrifying to the
status quo.
So both of them together isabsolutely terrifying, which we
(48:35):
are wondering now.
Maybe that's why the icky finalscene of this video exists where
the manipulation works and theproducer ends up smooching
Madonna.
Let me see.
We also talked a bit aboutpoverty as authenticity in this
(48:58):
video.
It was sort of a shorthand forauthenticity because the money
from the lyrics of the song areinauthentic.
And then in the sort of framestory, we hear Madonna on the
phone saying, like, yeah, Ithink it's real diamonds.
I mean, I guess that's nice, doyou want it?
Like this sort of likeinauthentic to the sort of
(49:21):
expensive gifts that she'sgetting, and the tension in this
brief piece of media where it'sshorthand for authenticity, but
it's inauthentically deliveredby this particular character,
which is more nuanced andinteresting than I think we
often give credit for musicvideos.
(49:41):
You also talked about beingdelighted that women were
involved in the making of thismusic video, not just Madonna
herself, but also Mary Lambert,who was directing music videos
and horror films, maybe becausethat was all that was available
to her as a female director inthe 1980s.
I speculated there were probablysome dudes who were interfering
(50:06):
in the making of this musicvideo because of that final ick
scene.
Did I forget anything?
Uh no, no, I don't think so.
Okay.
So next time, I believe I amgoing to bring you my deep
thoughts about Mr.
Rogers.
Ooh, I can't wait.
All right, we'll talk to youthen.
(50:27):
See you then.
This show is a labor of love,but that doesn't make it free to
produce.
If you enjoy it even half asmuch as we do, please consider
helping to keep us overthinking.
You can support us at ourPatreon.
There's a link in the shownotes.
Or leave a positive review soothers can find us.
(50:47):
And of course, share the showwith your people.
Thanks for listening.
Our theme music is ProfessorUmlaut by Kevin McLeod from
Incompitech.com.
Find full music credits in theshow notes.
Thank you to Resonate Recordingsfor editing today's episode.
Until next time, remember popculture is still culture.
(51:10):
And shouldn't you know what's inyour head?
It's because women who are financially and sexually
dependent can be controlled.
And so Madonna showed me as asix-year-old that I don't have
to accept that.
SPEAKER_01 (00:16):
Have you ever had something you love dismissed
because it's just up culture?
What others might deem stupidshit, you know matters.
You know it's worth talking andthinking about.
And so do we.
So come overthink with us as wedelve into our deep thoughts
about stupid shit.
SPEAKER_00 (00:37):
I'm Emily Guy Birkin, and you're listening to
Deep Thoughts About Stupid Shit.
Because pop culture is stillculture.
And shouldn't you know what's inyour head?
On today's episode, I'll besharing my deep thoughts about
the 1985 music video MaterialGirl by Madonna from her Like a
Virgin album.
With my sister, Tracy GuyDecker, with our live studio
(01:00):
audience, and with you.
Let's dive in.
All right, Trace, I know you'veseen this music video.
We were in the MTV generation,we grew up with it.
But tell me what's in your headabout it.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12):
Yeah, I cheated a little bit because since it's
such a short piece of media, Iwent and rewatched it.
So I have the whole thing in myhead.
But what re-watching ityesterday validated for me was
the dress with the gloves andlots and lots of diamonds and
the sort of army of kind ofinterchangeable men behind her
(01:37):
who were like quite literallylifting her up and carrying her
around.
Those are the things that weresort of in my head about the
video prior to re-watching it.
So having just re-watched it,because it was brief enough that
I could for today, there's abunch of other stuff, but we
will get into that in ourconversation.
(01:59):
But tell me, like, why are wetalking about this music video
today?
What's at stake for you?
SPEAKER_00 (02:05):
I'll link to this in the show notes.
I wrote a blog post severalyears ago talking about the pop
culture money lessons that Itook in as a child.
And I mentioned this music videobecause I remember watching this
and taking in money lessons.
Specifically, there's kind of alove story throughout this music
(02:28):
video because interspersed withthat Madonna wearing the pink
dress, and she's got the coterieof men in tuxedos who are uh
walking around, there is a lovestory of a producer who wants to
impress her, who, the actressplaying the woman in the dress,
and overhears her saying, like,yeah, he thinks he can impress
(02:52):
me by buying me expensivethings.
And so this rich producer throwsaway the expensive gift he's
bought her and instead impressesher with a bouquet of handcut
daisies, and then he gives awhole bunch of money to a farmer
to either buy or borrow his likerun-down old truck.
(03:15):
He impresses her with hispoverty, basically.
And so he seems more authentic.
And I remember as a kid reallygetting hung up on that because
it's like he spent more money tolook poor than he had would have
spent on the diamonds.
(03:37):
And it's successful because atthe end of the video, you see
them kissing and undiagnosedADHD, six-year-old, like really
fixating on that.
Because what she wants is not somuch that she doesn't want a
rich man, it's that she wantssomeone who sees her as a human
being and wants an authenticconnection.
(03:58):
And she still isn't getting itbecause this man is lying to
her.
And I remember that bothering meas a kid.
But also thinking, well, atleast he's listening to her
because he's listening to whatshe doesn't like about these
other suitors.
Uh-and he's trying.
Huh.
Okay.
All right.
So that's part of why I had beenthinking about it.
(04:19):
And I just recently recorded apodcast with a friend of mine
talking about how I spent anunreasonable amount of time
thinking about money in thismusic video as a kid.
And then as I've gotten older, Idid not know that the pink dress
portion of it was an homage toDiamonds Are a Girl's Best
(04:41):
Friend musical interlude from uhGentlemen Prefer Blondes, the
Marilyn Monroe movie.
Because, you know, I was six,but I didn't have the background
for that.
As I got older and realized thatit was the homage, the Diamonds
are a girl's best friend song,which is very much in Material
Girls in conversation with it,reminded me of the kind of
(05:05):
financial advice that we mighthave gotten from our
grandmother.
And that also I found to befascinating.
And the complex relationshipbetween women, beauty, and
money.
So that's also why I thought itwas really an interesting thing
(05:26):
to talk about.
Those are all like part andparcel what's in there.
It's also a banger of a song.
SPEAKER_01 (05:36):
Okay.
Well, I'm sure we have a lot totalk about from this like
five-minute piece of media.
But before we get there, likethere is something of a plot,
which you've given us a bigportion of.
SPEAKER_00 (05:46):
But do you want to do a 30-second the music video
starts with two actors?
One, I he's a carradine, and Idon't remember which carradine.
He plays the rich producer LoveInterest.
And then Robert Wool, who was inBatman, that we just relatively
recently talked about, arewatching a screener of Madonna
(06:09):
in the Merilyn Monroe um, whatwe're about to see.
And the rich producer is sayingshe's going to be a star.
And Robert Wool is just likebeing a yes man.
He just says, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (06:23):
And like he like reverses and he realizes what
the yeah, he disagrees with theproducer.
SPEAKER_00 (06:29):
He immediately agrees with, even if it's the
opposite of what he just said.
Right.
And so the producer says, I wantto meet her.
And Robert Wool is like, when?
And he's like, right now.
Right.
And so you see him going to herher dressing room door with a
gift, a wrapped gift.
And she is on the phone withsomeone saying, Yeah, you just
(06:53):
something along the lines of hejust dropped me off.
He thinks he can impress me bybuying me expensive things.
I mean, it's nice.
I think it's a diamond.
Do you want it?
And so you see the producerthrowing away the gift they had.
Then interspersed, you see themusical interlude that is an
homage to the Marilyn Monroe,Diamond Zara Girl's Best Friend,
(07:16):
where she is dancing with theseabout seven or eight men in
tuxedos, which is just like whatMarilyn Monroe did in Diamond
Zoro Girl's Best Friend.
SPEAKER_01 (07:26):
Yeah, which our studio audience, one of our
members has told us in the chat,the men are in both.
SPEAKER_00 (07:32):
Yes.
And in both, the men are holdinglarge red hearts.
Both the it's not just tuxedos,but they have like a red sash.
A sash, like that diplomaticsort of a sash.
Yeah.
And they're on the same kind ofstairs with a red background,
and they have these largecandelabras as part of it as
well.
(07:53):
In between that, you see thatinterspersed with her getting
out of like really expensivesports car with the rich guy
who's trying to impress her, andthe rich guy throwing his keys
to the rich producer, assuminghe's the valet.
So he's clearly a dick.
And so the producer keeps likeobserving her and trying to
figure out what it is that she'sgoing to like.
(08:16):
And towards the end, you see himfinally show up at her dressing
room with the daisies that arekind of funky, like that.
It's a hand cut of daisies.
And then you see him in front ofthe studio, and it's a broken
(08:36):
down old pickup truck, andthere's an old man in overalls
who looks like a very likecentral casting said, like, we
need someone who looks like afarmer.
Right.
And the producer is likecounting out twenties, like a
whole bunch of twenties, andhanding them over to the farmer.
And then he like ushers Madonnainto the pickup truck and they
(08:59):
drive off.
And then the very last scene isMadonna and the producer
kissing.
You didn't talk at all about thelyrics to the song.
Not yet.
SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
No.
Oh okay.
Are we going to get to that?
SPEAKER_00 (09:10):
Yes.
And that's part of what I wantto talk about for both of them.
And I have like I've the lyricsto both Diamond Zora Girl's Best
Friend and Material Girl.
SPEAKER_01 (09:19):
Okay locked and loaded.
All right, great.
We didn't do postcards beforeyou gave me the synopsis, but so
do you want to sort of tell me,give me the agenda of what we're
going to talk about, and then wecan figure out what to dive into
first?
SPEAKER_00 (09:30):
Sure.
Yeah.
So some of the things I want totalk about, I want to talk about
like the evolution of feminismfrom like 1950s, which is that's
not to say that feminism didn'texist then, but it's prior to it
being the kind of mainstreamthing where I don't like I think
Madonna was perfectly happy tobe a feminist icon, whereas I
(09:51):
don't know that Meryl Monroewould have been comfortable
calling herself that or beingreferred to that way.
But the evolution of feminismfrom between those 30 years.
The idea of money as freedom isanother thing I really want to
talk about.
I want to talk aboutauthenticity and how poverty is
used as a show of authenticityin the uh sort of the frame
story.
(10:11):
In the frame story.
Yeah.
I want to talk about the homageto Marilyn Monroe, what Madonna
was trying to do with thathomage.
I want to talk about the ironyof the lyrics of Material Girl
and also how many people arejust irony deficient.
(10:32):
And I want to talk about womenowning their sexuality and women
owning their financial freedomare equally terrifying to the
status quo.
I want to talk about how womenwere involved in making this
music video, even though thesong itself was written by men.
That Madonna did not pen thelyrics or write this song.
(10:52):
Yeah.
But the music video was directedby Mary Lambert, and Madonna was
very much involved in thecreation of this music video.
And she was excited to recordthis song.
So I want to talk about that.
And then I want to talk aboutBaby Emily and her literalism.
(11:13):
This was an importantinformative piece of media for
Baby Emily.
All right.
Where do we start?
I want to start because youmentioned I hadn't talked about
the lyrics.
I want to start with the lyrics.
And that kind of for me is theevolution of feminism.
Okay.
So in the song from GentlemenPrefer Blondes is Diamonds Are a
Girl's Best Friend.
(11:34):
And what Marilyn Monroe sings,she says, a kiss may be grand,
but it won't pay the rental onyour humble flat or help you at
the automat.
Men grow cold as girls grow old,and we all lose our charms in
the end.
But square cut or pear-shaped,these rocks don't lose their
shape.
Diamonds are a girl's bestfriend.
There's a quite a few thingswhere it's then that those
(11:57):
louses go back to their spouses.
Diamonds are a girl's bestfriend.
Well time rolls on and youth isgone, and you can't straighten
up when you bend.
But stiff back or stiff knees,you stand straight at Tiffany's
diamonds, and I don't meanrhinestones, but diamonds are a
girl's best friend.
She actually says I don't meanrhinestones.
Oh yes.
unknown (12:17):
Huh.
SPEAKER_00 (12:18):
And there is something about this that
reminds me of our grandmaRuthie.
Now, I mean, she used to say alittle powder or a little paint
makes a woman what she ain't.
And there's something about thelike stiff back or stiff knees.
You stand straight at Tiffany's.
Just it sounds like the kind ofthing that our grandmother would
have said.
And in 1953, which is when thissong came out, our grandmother
(12:40):
was 42 or thereabout, somewherearound there.
She was of that era.
I know as a young woman, as ateenager, the lyrics of this
song would have made me cringe.
Because the idea that MarilynMonroe, who was so unbelievably
(13:01):
gorgeous, had such sex appealthat she would trade that for
material goods, seemedanti-feminist.
Except looking at those lyrics,it is extremely practical.
SPEAKER_01 (13:20):
I feel like maybe Ruthie said to me, I'm I'm
having a hard time coming upwith a very specific time.
But as you say, like, I do feellike she said, like, always have
a little of your own money.
Oh, yes, she did.
She did.
And that's what that means.
That's what Diamonds are girlsfresh friends means.
Like, is like make sure you haveyour own money.
SPEAKER_00 (13:42):
And this is specifically saying, get it from
the men that you are seeing.
And like she louses go back totheir spouses by saying, like,
you're having affairs with men.
I know that's the part thatmaybe you can crawl.
Yeah.
But there, and this is somethingthat we've talked about about
(14:04):
like the price of being a womanand like the cost of being
female in public.
This is the world we live in.
Men are going to pay attentionto me because this is how I
look.
If that's going to be the case,I'm getting paid for it.
And I don't remember which ofour grandmothers it was, if it
was Ruthie or Beta, but one ofthem was always like, always
(14:25):
have a$20 bill with you so youcan get a cab where you need to
go.
SPEAKER_01 (14:28):
Oh yeah.
I think that was better.
Like the emergency 20 we weresupposed to keep in the glove
box.
Or in our wallet or whatever.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:36):
Or in our bra.
SPEAKER_01 (14:37):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (14:38):
Uh that yeah.
Yeah.
I would not have described thatkind of advice as feminist when
I was 17 or even 25.
But I can recognize it as suchnow, where it's like this is
women taking care of women withpractical advice.
I think that I can look back onDiamond Zara's girl's best
(15:01):
friend and recognize thestrength and the feminism within
it within a misogynistic world.
And so that's something thathadn't occurred to me.
Now, obviously hadn't occurredto me when I first saw the video
(15:21):
because I didn't know Diamond'sOrgirl's best friend.
But once I knew of it.
SPEAKER_01 (15:25):
Right, right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
A member of the studio audienceis saying that she remembers her
grandmother showing her how shehid money in her bra.
Grandma did.
SPEAKER_00 (15:34):
The other thing our grandmother did was she always
told us, and she always usedthis terminology.
She says, if you're going onvacation or if you need to hide
money somewhere, put it in yourco-text box under the first or
second pad because the peoplewho are going to be stealing
from you are men and they don'twant to touch your co-text box.
SPEAKER_01 (15:51):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:52):
And again, very practical diamonds are a girl's
best friend kind of advice.
SPEAKER_01 (15:56):
Which leads me to something that you said that,
like, let's maybe with thiscould we could segue.
You talked about money asfreedom.
And I think that's what all ofthese grandmotherly advice
things that we're talking aboutthat resonate is the freedom.
It's not just freedom like fromour grandmother's advice, but
safety.
So you want to get into that andwhat how that shows up in this
(16:20):
video?
SPEAKER_00 (16:20):
Yes.
So those are the lyrics fromDiamonds or Girl's Best Friend.
Now, for the lyrics fromMaterial Girl, what the lyrics
start off with some boys kissme, some boys hug me, I think
they're okay.
If they don't give me propercredit, I just walk away.
There's a nice little pun inthere with proper credit.
Right.
But she's making it clear like,I don't need these boys.
(16:42):
In 30 years, we've gone from I'mgoing to use these men for the
money they can give me, to ifthey're not going to give me
proper credit, I'm walking awayfrom them.
I don't need them because I havemy own money.
And then the second stanza orsecond lines are they can beg
(17:04):
and they can plead, but theycan't see the light.
Because the boy with a cold hardcash is always Mr.
Wright.
So that kind of gets back intoDiamonds or a Girl's Best
Friend, where like, look, ifthese boys aren't going to
appreciate me for me, then I'mgoing to go for the one who's
going to shower me with gifts.
(17:25):
Because if I'm not going to beappreciated anyway, I might as
well get as much as I can out ofthis because I can get my own
money.
And she also has, you know, someboys romance, some boys slow
dance.
That's all right with me.
If they can't raise my interest,then I have to let them be.
Again, another nice financialfun.
(17:46):
And so the material girl has thefreedom that the girl who for
whom Timens were the best frienddidn't.
Because she can walk away fromthese boys.
She doesn't have to squirrelthis away for when she's too
old.
Yeah.
That's something that I think isI'm really glad I had that, even
(18:09):
if I didn't really necessarilytake it in as a kid.
But Madonna didn't care aboutany of these men.
Right.
Marilyn Monroe doesn't either.
She's doing the same thing.
Like the choreography is verysimilar.
Right.
SPEAKER_01 (18:26):
But Madonna is definitely freer.
Well, the lyrics in particular,like the louses who go back to
their spouses, like one gets theimpression that like Madonna's
not spending time with louses,right?
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (18:39):
Yes.
Yeah.
She walks away from Louses.
Like she does not want to be theother woman.
SPEAKER_01 (18:44):
She's not, she's like, she's not gonna try and
get diamonds from the marriedman that she's sleeping with
because she's not gonna botherwith him.
Yeah.
Which the Monroe character,like, we get the impression,
like she takes what she can get.
SPEAKER_00 (18:59):
I'm like Because she knows that this is a cruel world
and she needs to set thingsaside for her future.
SPEAKER_01 (19:04):
And there's an expiration date on her beauty,
which is her primary asset.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Interesting.
Okay.
Where do you want to go next?
I feel like there's a coupledifferent directions we could go
from here.
SPEAKER_00 (19:15):
So I want to talk about like irony and how people
are irony deficient.
SPEAKER_01 (19:19):
Okay.
This mini-film, right?
Like she's saying the guy withthe cold whore cache is always
Mr.
Wright in the lyrics of thesong.
But the music video, theopposite is true.
So let's talk about irony inthis piece.
SPEAKER_00 (19:37):
Yeah.
So remember when this came out?
This was 1985, middle of the1980s, Reaganomics, Greed is
good.
Greed is good.
1980s.
Yuppies were ostentatiouslyshowing off their wealth.
Yep.
And so what Madonna has said wasshe loved the song because she
(20:04):
is not material.
She's not someone who caresabout material things.
She does care about ambition andher career.
And so what she took from thesong was like, we are living in
a material world.
So she's surrounded by peoplewho care about material things,
but she doesn't want a man whois only interested in material
(20:28):
things, but she does want toconnect with someone who cares
about his career or isrespectful of how much she cares
about her career.
And so the fact that she'ssinging that I am a material
girl is ironic and is likelightly skewering the world that
they're living in, that this isa material world.
(20:49):
And people just missed it.
No, you finish, especially.
Well, especially considering howshe set up the story of the
video.
The video, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (20:58):
Yeah.
I think it's interesting.
I never thought of it this way.
Cause I always heard it's amaterial world and I'm a
material girl, meaning like theworld cares about material
things and so do I.
But some of the conversationsthat we've been having about
women as commodities that wewere talking about before the
audience got here, it's amaterial world and I'm a piece
(21:20):
of material.
That's yeah.
Wow.
I never read it that way.
Okay.
Interesting.
All right.
Did people, I don't remember wewere children.
Did people give Madonna a hardtime about this?
SPEAKER_00 (21:34):
So it's not so much that they gave her a hard time,
but she has been referred to asthe material girl ever since
then.
Uh-huh.
And that bothers her.
Like she has talked about I willbe 90 years old and people will
still call me the material girl.
And that's not who I am.
Now, this was one of her likefirst big hits.
Yeah.
(21:55):
But this song and Like a Virginoff her Like a Virgin album, and
that that She wrote.
And both of them are supposed tobe ironic.
Mm-hmm.
And like just over people'sheads.
And she's like, how can you belike a virgin?
It's a yes-no binary.
Even though it is a construct,but it's a construct we made to
(22:18):
be a yes-no binary.
And that lack of irony, I didn'tcome up with irony deficient.
Friend of the show, ScottKennamore, who you remember was
on, his first book was The Zenof a Zombie, which is a comedy
self-help book where how you'resupposed to achieve
self-actualization by being morelike a zombie.
(22:41):
More like a zombie.
And it says right on the coverthat it's humor.
But he has gotten letters fromreaders saying, like, this
hasn't helped.
People who think it's actualself-help.
And he's, I think he's the onewho's like, people really are
irony deficient.
That's funny.
So there are people who just arenot capable of recognizing
(23:05):
something as being ironic orskewing or sarcastic.
SPEAKER_01 (23:10):
I mean, let's talk about baby Emily then, because
maybe it is actually aneurodivergent thing that makes
it difficult to not take thingsliterally.
SPEAKER_00 (23:20):
So baby Emily taking things literally.
I thought the character in thepink dress did care about
diamonds and things and money.
And I knew that she was acharacter that the actress
playing her, like Madonnaplaying the character in the
pink dress, was a differentperson.
And then I spent way too muchtime thinking about the fact
(23:41):
that the producer, the richproducer, was trying to win her
and doing exactly what everyoneelse was doing, just in a much
more like a more manipulativeway.
Yeah.
And that bothered me.
Yeah.
Cause it's bothersome.
Yeah.
And like thinking, like, well,at least he's listening to her.
Like that was how I could kindof make it okay in my head was
(24:03):
like, okay, he's listening towhat she wants, but he's still
not talking to her.
SPEAKER_01 (24:07):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (24:08):
But my thinking was like, she's saying, like, these
men are trying to impress me bybuying me things.
And I'm like, well, he'sspending all this money.
He's still trying to impress herby buying her things.
He's just trying to impress herby buying her things to make him
look poor.
SPEAKER_01 (24:23):
And that doesn't sound like you were too literal.
Sounds like you got it.
Unless I'm being too literalright now.
No, no.
SPEAKER_00 (24:28):
I it's to me, it sounds like you got the video.
I couldn't tell, and I stilldon't know if that's what
Madonna and Mary Lambert, thedirector, were going for, or if
they actually wanted it to be ahappy ending.
Oh God, I hope not.
I have no idea.
He's rewarded.
They're kissing at the end.
SPEAKER_01 (24:49):
Yeah.
But we saw from the beginningwhen he was like, I need to meet
her now.
That was gross.
But it was in 1985.
SPEAKER_00 (24:59):
That's normal.
Ew.
SPEAKER_02 (25:02):
I I don't see another work for it.
Oh God.
I don't know that Madonna andMary Lambert didn't mean for it
to be a happy ending.
Because Baby Emily was right.
That's gross.
SPEAKER_00 (25:12):
Okay.
All right.
I truly have never could I couldnever figure out what I was
supposed to take away from that.
SPEAKER_01 (25:20):
That's gross.
In re-watching it yesterday, Iwas like, come on, Madonna.
Don't fall for this shit.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm not sure the baby only tookit too literally.
Like, I don't I think that wasgross.
I mean, I think the piece aboutlike the character in the pink
(25:40):
dress, like that maybe, becausethat may be like too literal,
but especially now when you seeit in conversation with the
Marilyn Monroe.
Right.
But let's talk about MarilynMonroe a little bit.
Like you talked about sort ofthe evolution of feminism, but
one of the things you named inthe things you wanted to talk
about was the homage.
(26:01):
So like, let's talk about what,like they wrote and recorded
this music, this song, right?
That Madonna didn't write, butshe was like, Yeah, this is
ironic and I dig it.
And they recorded a song.
And then they were like, let'sdo Diamonds or a Girl's Best
Friend.
What did that do?
(26:22):
Like, can we sort of talk aboutwhat pulling Marilyn Monroe into
the room does in 1980, whateveryear it was?
SPEAKER_00 (26:30):
And like well, that was very intentional on
Madonna's part.
That was her inspiration.
An inspiration.
And something I read talkedabout how Madonna wanted and
welcomed being compared toMarilyn Monroe, but she also
wanted to create a little bit ofdistance because she didn't want
(26:53):
the same kind of sense of beinga commodity that happened to
Marilyn Monroe.
So she wanted to control her ownnarrative in a way that Marilyn
Monroe was not able to.
I was telling Tracy before wehit record, some of the things
that are famous about MarilynMonroe.
Her photos were in the veryfirst issue of Playboy.
(27:16):
That was not her choice.
Those were photos that weretaken before she became famous
when she was trying to make itas an actress.
And, you know, it's the sort ofthing that is very common.
She needed money.
She needed money.
And Hefner got hold of thosephotos and without her consent,
published them.
Hefner was obsessed with her.
They never met.
(27:37):
And Hefner, so she is Monroe isburied in a mausoleum, one of
those kind of like walls.
Column column.
Yeah.
And Hefner purchased the sitedirectly above her so that he
could be buried directly aboveMarilyn Monroe.
So this poor woman, even indeath, cannot escape this man.
SPEAKER_01 (27:59):
Yeah, that's gross.
SPEAKER_00 (28:01):
Who she never met and who made his fortune on her
body.
SPEAKER_01 (28:05):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (28:06):
Yeah, diamonds are a girl's best friend.
Because how else are you goingto get away from that kind of
entitlement?
You know, other than financialfreedom.
SPEAKER_01 (28:17):
That's really interesting, too.
What the insight that I hadearlier, and knowing sort of
Madonna the distance that shewanted to sort of have more
control, but sort of recognizingby putting on the sort of
Marilyn costume and thensinging, I'm a material girl.
Mm-hmm.
(28:37):
Mm-hmm.
Right.
Monroe was in fact a commoditythat many people besides herself
made money off of.
And so Madonna sort of, I don'tknow, naming that and channeling
it in this way that was, I don'tknow if I can call it defiant or
(28:59):
not, but trying to push back onit at least.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (29:04):
It was defiant in that she's defining herself
rather than being defined thatway.
She's also making it clear Ihave my own resources.
I do not have to rely on men forthese resources.
Mm-hmm.
You know, that's within thelyrics of this song.
SPEAKER_01 (29:24):
But then the thing that baby Emily saw, like, she
kind of undercuts it by havingher persona be deceived by this
man.
SPEAKER_04 (29:35):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (29:36):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (29:38):
I don't know what to do with that.
SPEAKER_00 (29:39):
Yeah.
Which always left a sour tastein my mouth, even which is
interesting because I love lovestories.
And even as a six-year-old, Iwanted them to get together and
kiss.
I always wanted them to gettogether and kiss, whoever they
were.
But that always was just like itwas false, false pretenses.
Yeah.
And like we never see him talkto her.
We never see that he likesanything about her other than
(30:02):
that she's pretty.
Yeah.
And talented.
Yeah.
One other thing about babyEmily, though, is before I knew
the term dress for the job youwant, I wanted a big, uh, long
pink dress with the glovesbecause I want seven men in
tuxedos to carry me around.
That is the job I want.
SPEAKER_02 (30:24):
Amen, sister.
Amen.
That's hilarious.
Okay.
Speaking of the evolution offeminism.
SPEAKER_01 (30:41):
Oh man.
All right.
I feel like we've talked aboutmost of the things that you said
you wanted to get into.
SPEAKER_00 (30:47):
Where do you want to go next?
How terrifying it is, womenowning sexuality and owning
financial freedom.
So this is terrifying that is tothe status quo.
That's the sort of thing wherelike I don't if I try to tell my
kids about how much pearlclutching there was about
Madonna, even with this videoand with like Virgin, I don't
(31:10):
think they'd get it.
And I don't remember it thatwell because I was very young
when this came out.
But we are still seeing echoesof that to this day.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (31:27):
Women couldn't have credit cards in their own name
until the 70s.
Like in 1983.
SPEAKER_00 (31:33):
It wasn't that It wasn't until 1987 or 88 that a
woman couldn't take out abusiness loan in her own name
without a male cosigner.
SPEAKER_01 (31:43):
Oh my God.
So after this video was made.
SPEAKER_00 (31:46):
After this video was made.
Our mom was a business owner,but she had financing for I
mean, she she from family.
Grandma was her cosigner.
Well, no, she had money fromlike she didn't need a business
owner.
SPEAKER_01 (32:01):
She didn't need a loan because she'd she'd uh got
me because she had got thatinheritance from her
grandmother.
SPEAKER_00 (32:07):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (32:08):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (32:10):
Right.
Man.
So she would not have been ableto start her business if she
hadn't had that inheritance.
Or she wouldn't imagine dad toco-sign or something.
Yeah.
That's obscene.
Well, and that's why so ourgrandmother on our father's side
owned a Dunkin' Donuts donutfranchise with our father.
(32:31):
With dad.
He was the male key he had toco-sign.
When this video came out, MaryLambert, who uh was the
director, could not have gottena business on her own.
SPEAKER_01 (32:44):
Yeah.
I'm trying to like wrap my mindaround why it is so terrifying.
And like it's those things arethings that men do.
Financial freedom and autonomyover sexuality are things that
not just like men do, but likethey're supposed to do.
(33:07):
Like not the weird ones, likethe ones we admire, that's what
they do.
Right?
The ones we're meant to likehold as role models, that's what
they do.
So is the fear because women whowould do those things are like
men?
I'm putting parentheses around,I mean quotation marks around
(33:31):
the word like, like, is itbecause they're crossing the
binary and doing male things?
Like it's just I'm I'mdumbfounded.
SPEAKER_00 (33:41):
So it's because women who are financially and
sexually dependent can becontrolled.
Yes.
And so Madonna showed me as asix-year-old that I don't have
to accept that.
SPEAKER_01 (33:59):
Yeah.
I mean, Madonna was a path, shewas a in the vanguard on both
counts, right?
Mm-hmm.
In both counts, she was in thevanguard of both financial and a
sexual autonomy because she wassuch a successful pop star, but
also part of the way she didthat was through her.
(34:19):
Thank you, Trailblazer.
One of our studio audiences justgave me that word in the chat.
Trail, she was a trailblazer.
She was a role model in terms ofthat.
Like whatever, even when she wasan actress, like whatever she
was cast in, she was still doingthis sort of sexual autonomy as
well.
And then she's making money asan actress.
SPEAKER_00 (34:43):
Like part of it is she's making money by owning her
sexuality.
Yeah.
Which also was something thatsecond wave feminism that we
were raised with, which kind ofwas like, no, no, no, no.
That's that's dirty.
That's dirty.
Like you don't use your beautyor your sexuality in the realm
(35:05):
of finance.
SPEAKER_01 (35:06):
Well, more than that, I feel like second wave
sex second wave feminism likedidn't want us to acknowledge we
had bodies.
Except insofar, like we maybe wecould talk about the fact that
like medical tests and stuffalways use men as normal.
But like beyond that, like weweren't meant to talk about our
bodies as sexual creatures insecond wave feminism.
(35:31):
Like that was dirty.
Like second wave feminism stillwas not sex positive.
It still was not sex workerpositive.
Like there was a lot of thatthat was still kind of
pearl-clutchy to use yourearlier word.
SPEAKER_00 (35:46):
Yeah.
And being raised by MTV andseeing Madonna unapologetically
embrace her own sexuality andher own ambition and her own
financial ambition wasrevolutionary in ways that I
didn't appreciate because I wasa kid.
(36:08):
But it makes me very glad that Iwas part of the MTV generation.
SPEAKER_01 (36:11):
Yeah, we talked about that a little bit in our
Dick Tracy episode since she wasin that film.
We talked a bit about herinfluence on the culture in that
sense.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (36:21):
Yeah.
So it's one thing I I mentionedand haven't really talked about.
So talked about poverty asauthenticity.
That's what they use as likekind of a metaphor for here.
And something specific aboutMadonna herself.
I remember when she got to beabout 32, her art reflected her
(36:42):
fears of dying because hermother was 32 when she died.
And I remember talking aboutthat with our dad.
I bring that up because I feellike there is authenticity in
Madonna's music, even inMaterial Girl, which she didn't
write, because she brought theauthenticity to the music video,
which she did have a part in.
(37:03):
And there was authenticity inher fears when she got to the
age that her mother was when shedied, which is to, I mean, so
understandable and real.
You hear about that with allkinds of people.
Like our dad was sure he wouldhe would never wake up on his
43rd birthday because his daddied when he was 42.
Exactly.
That poverty is authenticitymanipulation in this video has
(37:26):
this particular sour notebecause I imagine this was at
the very beginning of her likeascendance into superstardom.
Right.
But becoming a celebrity makesit so much harder to have any
kind of authentic connectionwith someone.
Right.
In the same way that wealthmakes it harder to have an
authentic connection withsomeone.
(37:47):
Right.
Which is what the video isabout.
It's about like the wealthmaking it difficult to have an
authentic connection.
They use poverty as a stand-inand like he's manipulating it to
seem authentic.
That also just for me as aperson, looking at Madonna as a
person makes me sad because it'slike, I'm sure she's fine.
(38:08):
You know, like I'm sure thiswoman is fine.
Yeah, she's laughing all the waythe bank, crying all the way the
bank.
But also just like thedifficulty of finding that
authenticity in this video thatlittle baby Emily, who craves
authenticity, that's part of whyI found it icky.
Is because, like, you know, mynon-diagnosed neurodivergent ass
(38:29):
was going like, but it's notreal.
Because I crave authenticity,because that's how my brain
works.
I can't handle it.
It wasn't real.
SPEAKER_01 (38:37):
Yeah.
And I actually I'm having a darksort of thought about that based
on the sort of how terrifying itis.
It is terrifying for our cultureto have a woman to have either
financial security, likefinancial independence, or
having it not controlled, hersexuality, right?
Having her sexuality be unownedor owned only by herself.
(39:00):
Our culture finds both of thosethings terrifying.
Terrifying this woman in thisvideo has both.
And so we see through the video,she's like the shrew.
She's tamed by this producer.
And now her sexuality is ownedby him.
SPEAKER_04 (39:17):
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_01 (39:18):
And that makes it acceptable that she has freedom
in those two realms because nowshe no longer has the freedom in
the sexuality realm.
Yeah.
And we know he's rich.
So he also like is richer thanshe is.
Yeah.
And like, oh my God.
I wonder if there was, I don'tknow, like someone higher up in
(39:43):
the studio going, like, no, havethem end up together.
No, no, no.
Don't don't have her realize,like, have them like end up
together.
SPEAKER_00 (39:50):
When she gets in the truck, she looks sort of bored.
She looks sort of bored and shelike puts her finger up to her
face, like, huh, what is this?
Right.
As a kid, was always just like,oh, she she doesn't really like
this.
She's on to him.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (40:05):
She knows it's not real.
Yeah.
If you cut that final kiss,kiss, which is like the moo the
music's over.
It's like the last like fiveseconds of the video.
In fact, when you watch it onYouTube, it starts to show you
the next, you know, the nextvideo over top of it.
SPEAKER_00 (40:23):
On MTV, it also because you remember how MTV
used to do it would show you thecredits or whatever it was in
the bottom left-hand corner.
And then like depending on howit was, sometimes it would cut
like the last little bit off tomore quickly get to the next
video.
So you didn't always see it backin 1985 when you watched it.
SPEAKER_01 (40:42):
I'm gonna hope.
That's the story I'm tellingmyself.
Is that there was a dudesomewhere in the studio in the
bigger picture production?
Robert Lake.
Yeah.
There was like a dude somewherein like, I don't know, MTV or
MGM or whoever the heck made itthat paid for it to get made
(41:03):
that was like, no, we need onefinal scene of them kissing.
Because if it ended with justher getting in the truck with
her finger on her face, like I'dbe like, Yeah, she's on to him.
She's just Marilyn Monroe.
SPEAKER_02 (41:14):
Yeah.
Like getting what she can out ofhim.
Yeah.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (41:19):
We're getting close to the end, but we still have a
few more minutes.
One of our studio audiencemembers says the dude, whoever
he was, is probably in theEpstein files.
Yeah, probably.
Although he might be too old.
Okay.
So I think we have a couple moreminutes.
Was there one more thing?
Oh, yes, you wanted to talkabout the women involved in
making this music video, whichis really interesting since I
(41:40):
just was talking about the likeunseen dudes whose hands I can I
can see their handiwork eventhough I don't know their names.
SPEAKER_00 (41:48):
So I just wanted to talk about the fact that so we
usually talk about movies onthis podcast.
And this is the second timewe've talked about a music
video.
Yes.
But Thriller is a much longervideo than this.
And the vast majority of moviesare directed by men.
It's a boys' club.
I was delighted, because I hadno idea.
(42:09):
I never looked it up.
I was delighted to see that thedirector was a woman, Mary
Lambert.
And I was delighted to see thatMadonna had a great deal of
influence on what the videolooked like, what was going on
in the video.
Like the story was part of hertoo.
So Mary Lambert did a lot ofmusic videos.
She has also directed movies aswell, mostly in horror.
(42:33):
And to me, that seems aboutright for a woman director from
the 1980s, in that that's aboutwhat would be open to her
because music videos is a lowerbarrier to entry in the same way
that commercials would be, butmusic videos gives you more
creative control thancommercials would.
(42:54):
And then you could work withpeople like Madonna who would be
welcoming to a woman director.
And then horror is the moviegenre that is like the most
reviled and like people areleast interested in.
It's like least likely to beOscar Bait, that sort of thing.
And so it's going to be easiestto find projects that you can
direct.
And so I think that that is alsoindicative of why this piece of
(43:22):
media stuck with me so much.
Like, even though the songitself was written by men, the
influence of women from MarilynMonroe all the way through to
Madonna and Mary Lambertresonated with me as a little
girl who had heard from hergrandmothers, like, have some
(43:42):
money of your own.
Yeah, always have your own moneyand the$20.
unknown (43:45):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (43:46):
$20 for cab fare, no matter what.
SPEAKER_04 (43:48):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_01 (43:49):
Anything else before I reflect back to you what we
talked about, which is a lot?
SPEAKER_00 (43:55):
I feel like Madonna has been a punchline.
Since that period of time, likethere has never been a time
where she wasn't a punchline,even when she was at the height
of her fame in stardom, for thevery reasons why she's amazing,
like because she owns hersexuality, she owns her
(44:16):
ambition, she owns her hermoney.
And even in things like there'sa joke about Madonna and 30
Rock, which was a TV show that Iloved, which I like thinking
back on it and like, ew, gross.
But the thing is, she'sphenomenally talented.
And not just in her art, notjust in music, not just in
(44:40):
dance, not just in acting, notjust in uh she's also a
phenomenally talentedbusinesswoman.
I would argue that's actuallyher greatest talent.
SPEAKER_01 (44:47):
I don't think she's a great singer.
Like, especially like listeningto this song again.
I was like, she's not that Imean, it's a catchy song, but
like she's not a great vocaltalent.
But she's a fantastic performer.
Yes.
Yes.
And she's a fantasticentertainer.
And she's a businesswoman.
(45:09):
She's a savvy businesswoman.
Yes.
Let me see if I can reflect backwhat we talked about.
You had a lot to say about thisfive-minute video.
We were kind of all over theplace.
But I'm actually gonna startwith young Emily, who I actually
don't think took this thing tooliterally, but learned that she
(45:31):
needs to dress in a pink gownwith opera gloves to dress for
the job that she wants becauseshe wants seven or eight men to
carry her around.
SPEAKER_02 (45:42):
In tuxedos.
Men in tuxedos, yeah.
I don't think that's too much toask.
SPEAKER_01 (45:58):
You put this video, you didn't put it in
conversation with MarilynMonroe.
It was in conversation withMarilyn Monroe, but you brought
that conversation to ourconversation.
And through that, you talkedabout sort of the evolution of
feminism, the difference betweendiamonds are a girl's best
friend because youth and beautyhave an expiration date, and I'm
(46:19):
a material girl, I'm gonna getthe money, and I don't need
these men because I have my own.
The 30 years between them, likewhere we have come as a culture,
that we could have Monroe saythe first, which was, I'm sure,
at least a little provocative tosay looses go back to their
spouses.
And then 30 years later, to haveMadonna put on a Maryland
(46:41):
costume and say, only boys thatgive me proper credit.
If they don't give me propercredit, I just walk away.
We spent some time there.
We talked, speaking of that, thedistance between those, we did
spend some time talking aboutthe homage to Marilyn Monroe and
sort of recognizing in adifferent read of the chorus,
(47:03):
which I had never had before, wehad this conversation, like
recognizing that saying I'm amaterial girl, I'd always
interpreted that to mean like Iwant material things.
But when we put it inconversation with Marilyn Monroe
and with the ways in which HughHefner commoditized Marilyn
Monroe and she couldn't get awayfrom him even in death, perhaps
(47:26):
that line, I'm a material girl,actually is acknowledging the
fact that women, if they are inthe public spotlight and
sometimes even not, arecommodities that men feel
entitled to buy and sell, whichthis video sort of leans into
with the producer who wants tosee her now and then figures out
(47:48):
how to manipulate his way intoher head, if not her heart.
Yeah.
There is, you talked about theirony in this video that Madonna
intended and the fact that touse, we believe Scott Kenamore's
phrase, so many people in thisworld are irony deficient and
(48:11):
didn't get the irony that sheintended, though she did not
write this piece of music.
Madonna is terrifying becausenot only is she financially
independent, has financialfreedom, she owns her sexuality
as well.
And either of those things ontheir own is terrifying to the
status quo.
So both of them together isabsolutely terrifying, which we
(48:35):
are wondering now.
Maybe that's why the icky finalscene of this video exists where
the manipulation works and theproducer ends up smooching
Madonna.
Let me see.
We also talked a bit aboutpoverty as authenticity in this
(48:58):
video.
It was sort of a shorthand forauthenticity because the money
from the lyrics of the song areinauthentic.
And then in the sort of framestory, we hear Madonna on the
phone saying, like, yeah, Ithink it's real diamonds.
I mean, I guess that's nice, doyou want it?
Like this sort of likeinauthentic to the sort of
(49:21):
expensive gifts that she'sgetting, and the tension in this
brief piece of media where it'sshorthand for authenticity, but
it's inauthentically deliveredby this particular character,
which is more nuanced andinteresting than I think we
often give credit for musicvideos.
(49:41):
You also talked about beingdelighted that women were
involved in the making of thismusic video, not just Madonna
herself, but also Mary Lambert,who was directing music videos
and horror films, maybe becausethat was all that was available
to her as a female director inthe 1980s.
I speculated there were probablysome dudes who were interfering
(50:06):
in the making of this musicvideo because of that final ick
scene.
Did I forget anything?
Uh no, no, I don't think so.
Okay.
So next time, I believe I amgoing to bring you my deep
thoughts about Mr.
Rogers.
Ooh, I can't wait.
All right, we'll talk to youthen.
(50:27):
See you then.
This show is a labor of love,but that doesn't make it free to
produce.
If you enjoy it even half asmuch as we do, please consider
helping to keep us overthinking.
You can support us at ourPatreon.
There's a link in the shownotes.
Or leave a positive review soothers can find us.
(50:47):
And of course, share the showwith your people.
Thanks for listening.
Our theme music is ProfessorUmlaut by Kevin McLeod from
Incompitech.com.
Find full music credits in theshow notes.
Thank you to Resonate Recordingsfor editing today's episode.
Until next time, remember popculture is still culture.
(51:10):
And shouldn't you know what's inyour head?
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