1997: Buffy, Destiny's Child, and My Best Friend's Wedding

This week we're looking at all the culture that popped from: 1997. From Spice Girls to the Jenny Jones Show, from Vegas Vacation to Destiny's Child, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer to My Best Friend's Wedding, we've got it all. Plus, our unmitigated gall from the week and so much more.

Fuzzy Memories is the podcast that celebrates the good, the rad and the fugly of the 80s and 90s. Three latchkey kids who made it out alive break down everything from Madonna and Masters of the Universe to Twin Peaks and Titanic. Join us to celebrate the hits, the misses and the misfits of the weirdest decades.

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Episode Transcript

(00:42):
So. Hey, guys.
Hey.
Hey. Hey.
How we feeling?
I'm feeling good.
Excellent.
I'm all right.
Okay. I'm feeling stuffed up,I'm gonna tell you that. Well, weird
allergies happening now.
I mean, my eyes are on fire.Oh. But.
Okay.
Yeah, other than that. Butthat's normal for me. I always.
We're just bypassing normalpains and aches and all the stuff.

(01:02):
Yeah. Okay. So should we talkabout gall? Speaking of aches and
pains and all the things.
Not me first.
Not you first. Did you forget?You're gone? Okay, well, I. Can I.
It'll be a surprise for all ofus, including you.

(01:26):
Oh, my God.
Okay. Did you remember it yet?No. No.
I have to. Not when Iconcentrate too hard on it, it won't.
Oh, God.
I've read.
That's so embarrassing.
Okay, well, I can go first,then. Okay. So my golf sort of has
to do with allergies andstuff, but it's the pressure to go
out and play because. Becauseit is getting to be nice weather

(01:47):
now. And I'm gonna go out on alimb and say, this is no surprise
to anyone, but I was an indoorkid, and I spent many a summer vacation
reading. Just books inside,looking outside. Don't want to go
out there. But my parentswould always say, you know, go out,
go play. Go do your thing. AndI'm like, I don't even.
What.
What is playing? Like, how do.How does one play? What am I supposed

(02:10):
to do outside besides just sitand get hot and be miserable and
have bugs? And I'm gonna tellyou, nothing has changed. I feel
the exact same way about theoutside. And that. The gall. The
gall then, is that their voiceis still in my head. Anytime the
weather turns, I start feelinglike, oh, man, I should go outside.
I should go outside and play.And I don't know what. What that

(02:32):
is.
It is funny that there's thisundue pressure you're feeling like,
I gotta go toss a Frisbee around.
Yes. Or even just, you know, Ihave a nice patio. I have a catio.
And I'm like, I should. Ishould go out there and do something,
but I have no idea what to do.And immediately, if I go out there
and I'm reading a book, I'muncomfortable. I hate it. So I stay

(02:56):
inside, and then I feelguilty. So this time of year, I can
just kiss my ass. I don't knowwho I'm trying to impress at this
point, but someone in my brainkeeps telling me to go outside and
play. And I say, fuck You. Soin conclusion, I will stay inside.
And that is. Yeah, Yeah.
I remember as a kid, like,being at my grandmother's house during
the day. Like, she sort ofbabysat us. And I remember by the

(03:19):
afternoon, she'd be like, youshould go outside and do something.
Cause I'd spend all morningwatching the Price is Right and game
shows. And then you havelunch. And then I'd watch Days of
Our Lives because the Salemstrangler was on, and I want to know
who. They were gonna kill us.
Oh, my God, of course.
And it was always like, gooutside. And it's like, yeah. Why?
I've been inside all day. I'vebeen doing all right.
Yeah.

(03:39):
I was very lucky to have allgrandmas that were inside people,
so they would never, like, gooutside. They're like, do you want
another Fig Newton while wewatch the next program? And I'm like,
yes, I do. I sure do.
And this is how much I hatedit, like, both of my grandmas that
I hung out the most withhardcore smokers. And I would have
much rather stayed inside andingested all of that and just lived

(04:01):
in that haze than go outside.It's dumb out there.
Well, nothing's really changedsince we were kids as far as outside
goes. So if anything's necessarily.
If anything's changed, it'shotter and there's more bugs and
more things that can kill us.So, no. I say, no, I'm gonna stay
inside and play.
What would the world be if wewere all outside people?

(04:22):
It'd be miserable. And also,if you go on a dating app, everyone
talks about, I'm an outsideperson. I love the water. I love
the lake. Well, no, thank you.
That's all lies. That's. Who'sputting. Who loves it that much.
That. That's like, animportant piece of information.
Almost every heterosexual manin the world, apparently, that is
on. Yeah, I know. Once you getinto the girls, which, of course,

(04:43):
I'm bi. So I look at both thegirls. They are more realists. They
talk about things that areactually important and things that
are of interest. The guys mostare just trash. And they're showing
pictures of dead fish and deadanimals, talk about how much they
love to go out on boats. Noneof this. None of this is making me

(05:04):
horny. None of.
So it sounds like you're goingto murder me off a boat.
Exactly. Exactly. If I gooutside, I could get murdered.
Yeah.
If I stay inside, I could diefrom falling down the stairs, but
at least I won't be murdered.
At least it's of my own will.
Yes.
I mean, or my own klutziness,however you want to look at it. But
I didn't get taken out on aboat and thrown over.
I didn't get tricked intogoing outside and playing.

(05:28):
So you're not up for ourannual Jarts tournament?
Can we do it in my attic?
You can stay on the porch andjust throw your jarts on the porch.
There you go.
I could do that. Yeah, sure.Yeah. Did you remember yours?
I did.
Okay.
Mine is actually. It's theunmitigated gall of programming.

(05:51):
Oh, let me explain.
Okay, Let me explain.
I think we got it done.
Understood.
Understood. Okay. Mike and Ilook forward to Friday night. That
we get a couple new murdershows in Dateline and 20 20. Both
air on Friday night. Andthat's no matter what else we have
going on on Friday night.That's like our wind down time. Once

(06:13):
we get into bed, we watch alittle bit of the murder, and then
it takes us a few nightsbecause we invariably fall asleep.
So my unmitigated call is, whothe fuck isn't communicating between
Dateline and 2020? Becausethis has happened now more than once.
I'm leaning towards five timeswhere the story is the exact same
in both episodes. And it was one.

(06:35):
Well, they're covering thesame murder.
Exactly.
And not from different anglesor anything.
Sure. But like, you know thestory, so it's like, very. A lot
less interesting. And it wasone that we had already seen before
on like a 48 hours, so wealready knew the story. So we go
to the first one. Boom. We'relike, oh, we know this guy. And then
we're like, okay, well, we'lljust watch the 20 20. We go. And

(06:57):
I'm like, are you kidding me?How on the same night are you doing
the same program? Are youcompeting head to head for something?
Like, why is this happening?And I just think a simple email back
and forth would solve allthese problems for me. Mike's theory
is that there's a mole at Dateline.
Oh.
And that they're feeding thestories to 2020 so they can go head
to head and see who did it better.

(07:18):
Interesting.
But I was like, that's a lotof people. That would be, I mean,
I would assume a productioncalendar. There's some similarities.
And when you're interviewingpeople and cutting things together,
and I'm like, yeah.
Like when you're out in thefield, like, talking to people, like,
somebody would mention, like,by the way, Dateline was here, like
yesterday afternoon.
Yeah, yeah. Like not that long ago.
Right.
So it's just a disappointment.And it's happened a few. If it was.

(07:40):
It was a one off. At first Ithought, wow, that's weird. Like
how it was almost like a cool. Anomaly.
Anomaly. Anomaly. You got it.You got it.
Anomaly in Paris.
That. But then what happenedagain, and then again, and now again.
I don't like it.

(08:01):
You can't be the only oneupset because, you know, there's
a lot of people that liketheir murders. They do.
And a lot of people watch allthree of those programs, and I'm
not. I. I've lost all shame inadmitting that. So I don't feel bad
about it. And I want somethingdifferent on both programs. I'm sorry.
I want. I sound like my grand.I want my programs. Right.
I want my stories.

(08:22):
Yeah. I want to come and do me right.
All right, Heath, what's yourunmitigated go.
I was actually. I was gonna.My unmitigated gall was gonna be
these motherfucking birds.
Oh, okay.
Because there's birds in thetree outside my bedroom. They're
loud. But I think. I thinkafter additional reflection, I think
it's gonna be prom. Oh, notprom in general because, like, my

(08:47):
niece is going to prom thisweek, so, I mean, she's looking forward
to it. I think. I livedowntown and the whole. And Aaron,
you know, had to experiencethis, the whole thing before prom
where the whole family goes toa new location to take a bunch of
photos.
Which was never a thing forus. Right? Like, I mean, maybe like

(09:09):
one at the house, right?
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, maybe some people did,but it wasn't as well trod territory
as it is now, right?
Yeah, but yeah, like every.The last. Yesterday was like the
third Saturday in a row where.Just downtown at late afternoon on
a Saturday, early evening.It's just the streets are just clogged
with people's parents tryingto get prom photos.

(09:29):
Are they trying to get it likeon the bridge right across from.
There are some there. TheWorld Food Prize is not super far
from where we live. And theyhave a really nice garden that looks,
you know, looks good all thetime. Looks especially good in the
springtime. And so there'slots of people there. And that's
fine. Take your pictures. Getout of the fucking streets. Because
like yesterday we drove bythat and there were three different

(09:49):
adult men just in the middleof the street, not paying attention
to what's going on, trying toget photos and just looking. And
it's like last week I wasdriving by It. And these people stopped
in the street because they sawsomeone else they knew who was taking
pictures of their kids andwere waving, hey, how are you?
And it's like the suburbs, right?

(10:10):
Just, if you want to talk tothem, great. Find a place to park
your car and get out and gotalk to them.
It's actually the. It's theworst. Like, as someone who's now
on my third child goingthrough prom, I've been to a lot
of. I've been to the SculptureGarden. I've been to Waterworks.
I've been to some randomparks, and every single one. Yeah,
it's the same. Why? Why,though? But also, why. Why are we

(10:31):
doing this? We already got thepictures and the dresses. I mean,
at some point, I have allthese pictures on my camera wall,
and what am I going to do withall your prom pictures? Someday when
you're older and you'remarried to someone else, like, you
know what I mean?
Hey, remember when you dated this?
Yeah.
I was going to say. I waslike, that's outdated. No, was good.

(10:51):
Yeah.
I mean, except for my oldestchild, who did marry the person.
Yeah. Yeah. But she's not askank or a child.
She's the only, like, person,you know not to say anything about
Evan or whatever. But. Yeah,it's a. It's a weird thing. And they
coordinate, and they're like,we gotta go here. Then the worst
is when they say, we're gonnago to multiple places. No, you get

(11:12):
one extra location. In myopinion. Opinion. You don't get to
go to multiple locations.
And do you find it's mostlythe parents driving this, not the
kids?
I think it's. I. I don't liketo gender things, but I think it's
mostly the females.
The. The girls getting.
They want a second location.They want some better shots. They
want something different.
Yeah.
And I know there. There arehotels downtown like, that have signs

(11:34):
in the lobby that say, youcan't take prom pictures here. Because
it had gotten to be so bad.There were so many people in there,
and just. It was causingproblems for the guests. And so now
they're just like, Nah.
I remember, like, before prom,my parent or my mom, like, trying
to take pictures of us in our house.
Yeah.
And even that, I was like, Ihate every single thing about this.

(11:57):
I just take the picture andlet us go.
I'm gonna tell you somethingthat you would hate so much.
Okay.
It would have completelyprevented you from going to prom.
Okay.
Because I went to a smallCatholic high school for some reason.
There's a tradition calledpromenade where after you get with
your date, you literally haveto line up in the gym. And they say,
the two people that are goingprom together, you walk out on the

(12:18):
stage, you have to walk downlike a carpet to, like, all the parents
are in the gym.
What?
And there's like a picturetaken at the end of the thing. And
then.
But what about. What if youdecide to go to prom with, like,
just your friends or.
Yeah, you don't walk inpromenade, then.
Oh, no, that seems not likethe right thing to do, right?
Correct.
Yeah. I mean, all of thatseems, like, not the right thing

(12:39):
to do. Like, why are weputting this much pressure on teenage
relationships? Who.
They didn't do it when I wasin high school, but they do now at
my old high school where all.Every parents, they go take the pictures,
but they all show up at highschool and watch people get out of
the car and walk in. And I'malways just like, do you not have
anything else to do? Like justyour kids out of the house, like,

(13:02):
you know, go out to dinner?
Just, you know, I have a freenight. Like, I want to go do something.
I want to go eat. Yeah. Idon't. This is too much time.
Oh, it makes me sick justthinking about it all.
But I will say good luck toall of the servers out there. Wait
on kids going to prom who'llget, like a Sprite and some French

(13:22):
fries and then leave a 10 cent tip.
Well, yeah, that's some goodcall. Okay, so recap from our last
episode. I'm first gonna goout on a limb and say it was a killer
episode. We talked about a lotof things, a lot of good things.
I talked about behind theMusic. VH1.

(13:42):
Love it.
I talked about the McCoy septuplets.
Wild.
Yeah.
And curry.
Yeah. That was not the mainthrust of the story. In my mind.
It was the seven babies comingout of one lady. But, yeah, like
a fucking clown car. I thinkhe said at one point.
Saw a clip online the otherday of Joan Rivers, like, back a

(14:05):
long time ago when she wasguest hosting the Tonight show and
she was talking to somebody inthe audience, she's like, oh, what's
your name? And the woman'slike, you know, Carol. And she's
like, oh, you know, tell meabout yourself. And she's like, oh,
I have six kids. Chuck Rivers.So quick. Was like, did you have
them in litter or one by onelitter? And she just. It was so fast.

(14:25):
The way she set it back wasvery funny.
Yeah, gross. Also gross wasFen Phen the. It was. This was the
year when this was the yearcame out. And then whoops, later
on. Holes in your heart. Sothat was a bummer.
Whoops.
Whoops.
Sorry about that.
Erin, you introduced us tofootball Jail at Philadelphia Eagles

(14:48):
football court.
It tracks, doesn't it?
Yes. You talked about theVersace murder.
When you said football court,I was gonna be like, no, it's a field,
but I'm in court of law. It'sa basketball court.
I just don't know my sports.And you also talked about Tamagotchi

(15:10):
pet pets.
Yeah.
Which I didn't know wasbasically just murdering the electronic
pets. It was very weird. Okay.Heath, you brought us two volcano
movies with just some reallydelightful plot points. In those
movies, Volcano and Dante's Peak.
They could have benefited like2020 and Dateline by some communication.

(15:32):
They were coming out of thesame ground.
You also talked about somefailed must see TV shows.
Oh, yeah, there's a lot of them.
There's a lot of them. There'sa lot of ones in that. Oh, my gosh.
And then you talked about thedual versions of How Do I Live.
Oh, yeah.
Again, a 14 year old singingabout how do I Live, how do I live?

(15:55):
More feeling, Leanne.
Really feel it, teenager.
We're gonna do another takeand act like you've lost something
really important.
My husband's father used totell this story about when he would.
He was at a talent show orsomething like that. And when my
husband was in high school andthere was like an 11 year old singing
Save the Best for Last and hejust thought it was very funny that

(16:18):
like a fifth grader is singingthat song and it's like, well, you
know, hopefully you got somestuff ahead of you, ma'am.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
If you're already there.
Yikes. That just feels like aworld weary viewpoint of singing
that. That feels likesomething you would do.
Yes.
Yeah, yeah.
It sure does.
Since you were middle aged inhigh school. Yeah.

(16:40):
Were you ever in a talent show?
No.
That felt like an importantfollow up question.
I think we used to have to doskits for like homecoming. Like each
class would have to do a skitand so I was in one or two of those.
Did you ever play anyinstruments or anything?
I played the trumpet.
So did I. Nice. Yeah. Well, Iremember absolutely nothing. Do you
remember anything?
It took me years to figure outthe tongue thing where you had to

(17:02):
put the tongue like battalionbehind your top teeth. Like, I didn't
like. It took me a Long timeto figure that out.
Tongue action.
Yeah. And I played. I playeduntil I was a sophomore in high school.
And the only reason I did isbecause we were going to Disney World
to march.
Oh, nice.
And we had known that a coupleyears ahead of time, and had we not
been doing that, I wouldprobably not have played in high
school.
Way to use the system. I likethat. Yeah.

(17:24):
This is just a side note. Thefifth graders in Norwalk have to
do this wax museum projectevery year where they have to, like,
they get to pick a figure thatthey think is important, and then
they put a whole trifoldpresentation. Then they have to dress
up like that figure, and youget to go around and hear their little
presentation. So Mason pickedLouis Armstrong because he felt like
he was the most influentialtrumpet player.

(17:46):
Okay.
My son took it to anotherdegree and said, comes home and says,
I got to add a special sectionto my trifold. And, you know, I said,
what? What do you mean? And hesaid, well, I asked the teacher if
we could do fun facts, and wecould add a section of fun facts.
And I said, oh, what's yourfun fact? Louis Armstrong went to
jail when he was 11. Cause heshot a gun. And I was like, that's

(18:06):
what you put on yourpresentation? He's like, yeah. She
was kind of surprised, too.But then she said, anyone else could
put fun facts, too?
It's very fun.
I did. That is fun. That's afun fact.
Fun fact. Yeah. And came outwith it so fast.
We were like, okay, Your sonis a treasure. He's an absolute treasure.

(18:31):
He's he. And then not 20minutes later, said, do I have a
suit? No. What?
I have suit. Like, you've justbeen hiding a suit?
Yeah. Like, oh, yeah, I do.
Yeah, of course. So I'll gofirst for 1997. And this was the
year that Buffy the VampireSlayer premiered. And I got to admit,

(18:52):
I did not watch it when itfirst came out. It was only a few
years later when I moved toChicago and I became friends with
a super fan named Amy. And wewatched Buffy every week.
She's looking like your alterego. Just, like. Did you have a mental
split?
She's real. Okay. I could texther right now just to show you.

(19:19):
She has two cell phones.
You'll hear the ping in theother. See? Anyway, we'll just leave
that for listeners to puzzleover and see if that's real or not.
So, anyway, Buffy the VampireSlayer debuted in March 1997, followed
Buffy, who's a high schoolstudent, who also happens to be the

(19:40):
Slayer. The one girl in allthe world chosen to fight back the
vampires, the demons, the. Allthe bad. All the bad stuff. The monsters.
But she also just wants to goto prom. She wants to get her picture
taken at the hotels indowntown Des Moines.
Yeah.
And maybe not die in theprocess. So this was created by Joss

(20:00):
Whedon, and he had originallycreated a movie in 1992, Buffy the
Vampire Slayer, with ChristySwanson, Luke Perry, Paul Rubens.
Oh, that's right. Yeah, PaulRubens. And it was very sort of campy.
It was fun. Like, I reallyenjoyed it when it came out, but
apparently it was not whatJoss had envisioned when he created
it. He wanted it to be alittle darker. It just wasn't quite

(20:22):
his tone that he looked for.
Okay.
So he decided to make it intoa show and made it a little bit,
you know, like I said, darker,a little bit deeper. More horror
and drama together, but lotsof comedy at the same time. And so
the first season, you know, itkind of took a little bit to get
going. But then by season two,three, four, like, it was a critical

(20:43):
hit. It was never a big, verypopular hit. It became a cult classic
later on. Never got, like,Emmy recognition or anything like
that because, you know, no oneloves the sci fi. After five seasons
on the wb, the WB was suddenlylike, no, no more. So they moved
to upn, which was a huge dealat the time, because UPN was new
and UPN became cw.

(21:05):
Oh, okay. Because I was like,I do not remember UPN at all.
Cw, yeah, WB came one network. Cw.
Okay.
But, yeah, this was the timewhen the WB was doing lots of, like,
Dawson's Creek, the VampireSlayer, like a bunch of teen shows
like that. Some. Oh, and bythe way, when they moved over to
UPN, because apparently no oneknew where UPN was, and they were

(21:27):
like, we can get away withanything. Got dark. It got real dark
in season six and Stevens,season seven. But some types of storylines,
okay, Buffy is a vampireslayer, but she falls in love with
a vampire named Angel. And thefirst time they have sex, Angel.
See, angel has a soul, so he'sa good vampire. Oh, the first time
they have sex, she sucks thatsoul right out of him and he becomes

(21:50):
a bad.
Pardon me.
Another great storyline wasthere's supposed to only be one slayer
in the world, right? But Buffydied for a few minutes. So another
slayer got activated, and thatwas Faith Eliza Doucheku. And she
was kind of a bad slayer. Soit was Slayer, get slayer.

(22:12):
Oh, no, it's awesome.
Yeah.
Just a real quick backtrack.
Yeah.
Just died for a few minutes.
Yep.
Okay.
Yeah. And then she came backto life.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
Like, with medicalintervention or just, like.
Someone gave her cpr.
Oh.
Unfortunately, it was not herboyfriend, angel, because he has
no breath. So it had to be herbest friend who actually had a crush

(22:33):
on her, Xander. So he got tomake out with her and bring her back
to life. Yeah.
Xander, that's not a makeup.
Yeah, no, it seems like therewas no consent.
Nope. No consent at all. Also,Willow was the nerdy sidekick for
a while, but then she went onto become a power lesbian and a witch.
Oh, wow. Good for her.
And it was a big, big dealwhen they had a kiss on. On screen.

(22:56):
But, of course, it was one ofthe trailblazers of the kill your
gays trope, where poor, poorTara got killed off and then Willow
went real bad. So. Excellentshow. Loved the show. Like I said,
I only got into it a fewseasons in, but as soon as I started
watching it, I got obsessed.So I would go home. It was airing

(23:19):
on, like, TNT or TBS orsomething like that. So I would record
all the old episodes on vhs,come home, watch a couple episodes
at night, catch up. It wasgreat. For a while, I was a real
big Joss Whedon fan. Thenguess what? He turned out to be a
creep.
Oh, no.
Yeah.
So in 2021, CharismaCarpenter, who played Cordelia, accused

(23:40):
him of abusive and toxicbehavior on Buffy and the spin off
angel, including body shamingher during her pregnancy and retaliating
against her. One of the otherstars, Michelle Trachtenberg, who
recently died, said a rule wasput in place that Weeden was not
allowed to be alone with her.Sarah Michelle Geller, who is the
star, she's said kind of vaguethings. She's never really gone on

(24:03):
record and said that he's acreep, but you can kind of infer
from there.
Well, stand up better. SarahMichelle Geller.
Yeah. Yeah. He also, at onepoint got jealous, apparently, of
the guy that played Spike, whowas another vampire who eventually
got a soul. They had a really.Buffy and Spike had a very interesting,
sometimes violentrelationship. It was hot, as though.

(24:24):
So at one point, Spike wasbecoming a fan favorite, and apparently
Joss Whedon, like, threw himup against the wall. Said, you're
not gonna be the big star youthink you are. Like, he was. It was
so random, this weird story,but it sounds kind of right. Anyway,
the show was. It was shot on abudget. You can tell A lot of it.
The beginning, the first fewepisodes, especially, like, some

(24:45):
of the cg, real bad. It feelslike it's puppet stuff happening.
Like it's real.
It's real bad.
Puppet stuff is hot.
But we didn't care like it.And it got better over time. And
the story lines just. It gotinto all sorts of. Ultimately, it
was a metaphor, right, oflike, you know, going through teen

(25:07):
years and everything and theninto college and then, you know,
she faces death all the time.But at one point her mom died and
it was this whole.
Yeah, yeah.
Just a fantastic show. Too badit was led by a creep. But pretty
much everything we're learningthat has been good in our lives has
been led by creeps. So there's that.
Now I have that TLC creep songin my head. Thanks.

(25:28):
Yeah. Just creeping on the download.
Oh, good. Do all the parts.
Oh, you're up.
All right, I'm up. In 1997,Special Group broke through on the
music scene, and we've gottena lot of things from it, let me just
tell you. And that group isDestiny's Child. Oh. It's an American

(25:53):
musical girl group whose finallineup comprised Beyonce Knowles,
Kelly Rowland, and MichelleWilliams. And when I tell you that
I was obsessed with Destiny'sChild, it was next level.
Oh, okay.
I knew all the B side songs. Iknew everything. Loved them so much.
So much. They actually begantheir musical career as girls. Time.

(26:18):
Time spelled with a y. Formedin 1990 in Houston. Yeah, I don't
know.
I don't get it.
I don't either.
All right, maybe because maybethere's a Y in Beyonce. I don't know.
Oh, it was already a nod.Well, there's a wine. Kelly Rowland,
too, but not Michelle Williams.
Well, I mean, but she wasn'tthere at the beginning either.

(26:40):
True, true. Yeah. So maybethat is why they did the. Why.
You're listening to science, everybody.
Okay.
Yeah. We're using clues andfacts and evidence to figure things
out.
Yeah.
Our own 2020 episode. Reallydrill down here.
You know what? I'll go aheadand make that my goal before we record

(27:01):
again. To find out why theychose Time. Okay. After years of
limited success, the originalquartet comprising Knowles, Roland
Latavia Roberson and LatoyaLuckett, were signed in 1997 to Columbia
Records as Destiny's Child.And they were launched into mainstream
recognition following therelease of the song no, no, no. Their

(27:22):
best selling second album, theWritings on the Wall, which was also
my favorite, contained thenumber one singles Bills, Bills,
Bills, Bills. I'm Trying tosay this really like, enunciated
because otherwise I will startsinging. Oh, say my name, say my
name, say my name if no one is.
Around you say baby, I love you.

(27:45):
Alongside successful singlessuch as Bugaboo, also a great jam.
What I love about Bugaboo,though, is the references in the
lyrics are, you know, youknow, when it came out. Because it's
talking about like cutting aol.
Yes.
Yeah, it is. Yeah, it's avery. Yeah, it really places talking
about getting.
Pages and your beeper andstuff like that.

(28:05):
Yeah, I like that, though.When you can pinpoint when a thing.
Was made, it felt right. Andalso Jumpin, Jumpin, which was another
classic that came from that.And one of my favorite connections,
which obviously I didn't knowat the time. This is Pre Housewives
of Atlanta. But Candi Burris,who is one of the original members
of Real Housewives of Atlanta,someone that I did like to watch

(28:26):
on that show, famously cowrote Bills, Bills, Bills and Bugaboo.
And she's kind of been aprolific record producer and co writer
and things like that. Butdespite critical and commercial success,
the group was plagued byinternal conflict.
What?
Yeah. Shocking.
This is brand new information.
Shocking. And legal turmoil.Roberson and Luckett attempted to

(28:49):
split from the group'smanager, Matthew Knowles, citing
favoritism of Knowles andRoland. And so that's eventually
how we ended up with the threeof them, although.
Because latoya, the two thatleft, and then Michelle Williams
and another one came in andthen that fourth one only lasted
a few months and then she leftand they decided to be a trio. And

(29:11):
I think it's because Beyonce'sfavorite number is four. So she just
wanted there to be fourpeople. Like, you know.
Yeah. And I just want all thelisteners to understand that I took
this on because I loveDestiny's Child, but I know that
my love of Destiny's Childdoes probably not reach Heath's love
of Beyonce. Noah. So to beclear, I love. I mean, I like Beyonce.

(29:35):
Don't get me wrong. I listen.Yeah, I'm all in for Cowboy Carter.
But I.
My first love was reallyDestiny's Child was all that.
I just without Destiny'sChild, we wouldn't have the Beyonce
we have.
Right, Exactly. But dang, theywere a good group. And it just felt
right. It felt very like girlanthem. Like women, Anthony sometimes.
Even though it was just aboutcheating boyfriends most of the time.

(29:59):
But when they did, likeindependent women for Charlie's Angels,
that was pretty cool.
Yeah, exactly. Even Bills, Iwas like yeah. You're not paying
any of my bills.
You're what, 15?
Yeah. Like, you're not doinganything. What are you talking about?
I loved it.
How did you feel when theyreunited at the Super Bowl?

(30:21):
Could watch it over and overand over again. All right. I'd love
a reunion tour. I wouldabsolutely fly somewhere to see that.
Do you think that they wouldstay together long enough for a reunion?
To her? No.
I think they get along justfine. I just don't think Beyonce
wants to be in a group anymore.
No, no. And I don't even knowif it. If, like, her abilities would
allow her to be in a groupanymore. You know what I mean? Like,

(30:43):
she's such a performer, andshe's come into that so much. Like,
I don't know how, like, evenher stage awareness or anything would
be appropriate for two otherpeople. And I think that would be
very clear, and they would beprobably her pulling most people,
not necessarily. Like, I wantto see Destiny's Child. It would
be like. And honestly, Idon't. That's a good. Almost a philosophical

(31:04):
question, because can you eversee Destiny's Child again? Because
with her being at the level ofsuccess she is, it's never just going
to be the three of them againperforming, where they all kind of
blend as a group. Like, it'salways going to be Beyonce and these
two other women.
It's like Diana Ross and theSupremes. The Supremes. And then
suddenly, Diana Ross becomes ahuge thing. And. Yeah. Yeah.
You're not going to be. Youknow, it's not going to be the same.
So.

(31:24):
Yeah.
But, man, I had a love forDestiny's Child just grew and grew.
I remember in college that Iwas going somewhere. It wasn't with
my roommate. It was with myroommate, but it was a couple. Two
other people on the floor.This is like, my freshman year of
college, and this song cameon, and myself and one other person

(31:44):
in the car knew it, and I waslike, you. We will be friends. Yeah.
Because I was like, how do youknow? Mm.
And you became friends.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. We moved in.Yeah. We lived together all through
college.
Okay.
Yeah.
You have an ability to spotthat, because you and I at a writing
retreat, you looked at me whensomething real weird was going on,
and we both apparently had alook on our face, and you're like,

(32:06):
you. Yeah.
I was like, she gets it.
Yeah.
I'm gonna gravitate to thatone. Also, she had a really cool
leather jacket on. You did?
I did. Oh.
It's like That's a dope jacket.
Okay.
The first night, I don't thinkyou were wearing it when that incident
that we're talking abouthappened, but you were night before.
And I was like, okay.
Oh, I think I know whatjacket. It was a dope jacket.
It was a dope jacket. Yeah, itwas awesome.

(32:28):
Did you have it?
Yeah, I think it's in mycloset. Yeah.
Yeah, it's a good one.
I remember in. I think it was2000, when Destiny's Child played
the Cattle Congress inWaterloo because they had booked
it before the Writings on theWall kind of blew up.
Blew up? Yeah.
Cause, I mean, for anyone thatdoesn't know, the Cattle Congress
is basically a small versionof, like, state fairgrounds and,

(32:50):
like, the place where they hadconcerts, they had a dirt floor,
and you would just put, like,folding chairs on.
Please tell me you went.
No, I tried to. I tried to wintickets off the radio. I called the
radio several times. Like, Iwould have it, like, on as I was
at work all day, and I'm,like, not working. I'm just listening
to the radio. So I'd, like,call him, you know? Yeah, I did once.
I remember calling it, and Iwas like, oh, did I win the Beyonce,

(33:12):
or did I win the Disney Childtickets? And I'm like, we haven't
done the thing yet, man. Like,I thought I had heard it, and I didn't.
And I didn't hear it, and I.It was. Yeah, the guy, like, stop
it.
Cheater.
Right? Yeah. Yeah.
Did you have. I did. I cover.I was really only focused on Destiny's
Child, not Beyonce. But no.

(33:32):
Yeah, I thought it was great.
Okay.
Yeah.
I could just tell his posturechanged a little when I started talking
about.
Well, I thought you were goingto talk about what I was going to
talk about. It's not the samegroup of people. So.
So what's yours?
Yeah, I was thinking about theSpice Girls.
Oh, also.
Yeah, that's also really good.
1997 was a huge year for theSpice Girls, but we've got to kind

(33:56):
of back up a little bit tosort of get all the history of these
five ladies. In the early1990s, someone named Bob Herbert
and his son Chris Herbertdecided Herbert. Yeah.
That's what I named all myfictional people. I drew Herbert.
I always drew a fictional guy,and I called him Herbert. Wow.
You refer to him as Herb for short.

(34:17):
Nope. Herb. Herb. Missed opportunity.
They decided. I feel like thisis weird the way people do this.
Like, they decided they wantto, like, make a musical group. Like,
they do this with boy bands alot. And I just think it's strange
that, like, people who are notmusically talented and just maybe
know somebody in the musicindustry just decide, oh, we're gonna

(34:39):
make a bunch of money off someone.
Else'S talent, and then shovea bunch of people together that probably
aren't meant to be in a bandor a group or. Yeah, yeah.
So, yeah, they decided theywanted to make a girl group as sort
of a counterpart to all theboy bands that were sort of. I mean,
at this point, they were kindof on their way out. This was before
the second wave of later inthe 90s, but they wanted to create

(35:00):
a group of five very differentwomen who would each appeal to a
different audience. InFebruary of 1994, they put an ad
in the newspaper encouragingsingers to come in and audition for
the group. And 400ish womenshowed up. So they had a big response.
Was this just in London, orwas it like, okay, yeah.
After several rounds ofauditions, the group as we know it
had mostly been assembled. Oneof the singers from the original

(35:23):
lineup of the Spice Girls wasreplaced by Emma Button, Baby Spice
for what the Herberts thoughtwas a lack of commitment to the group
by the woman who wasdismissed. And this is probably just
somebody who was just like, what?
Yeah, yeah.
What are we doing here?
Yeah. What? Wait, what?
Yeah.
Okay, so the Herbert's movedall five women into a house so they

(35:44):
could get to know each other.
Oh, God.
Practice song. Like, yeah.This is different than just like.
This is like, if you apply. Itfeels like if you apply for a job,
and they're like, yeah, youknow, we'd like to hire you, by the
way. This is where you live now.
Oh, my God.
You live here with your co workers.
Yeah.
And because they want a break,they're just like, yeah, sure, whatever.
Yeah.
So, yeah, they wanted. Theywanted them to live together so they

(36:05):
could practice songs andrecord demos and work on choreography
and all that stuff. Andbasically, you know, they'd be around
it. They'd be doing that allthe time because they lived in this
house, and that's just. Thatwas their day. The original name
of the group was Torch, butdecided to change it to Spice after
they wrote a song called Sugarand Spice. So it was just Spice for

(36:25):
a while.
What listeners can't tell isAaron and I both have very skeptical,
like, confused faces on. Whichaccounts for the silence. That doesn't
translate. Yeah. Audio podcast.
My mind's a little blownbecause why do we go backwards and
add girls? Spice is betterHonestly, or even Torch is better
than.
Well, they had. What I readwas as they sort of were getting

(36:49):
more attention, like, peoplein the industry would just call them
the Spice Girls. So that wasjust sort of added on and they were
like, okay. And there wasalready a rapper that went by that
name. So they.
Okay, that makes sense. I cansee that happening. Yeah.
So by late 1994, the group wasstarting to get pretty antsy because
they still didn't have anofficial contract with the Herberts.

(37:10):
They didn't have a recorddeal. So after a successful performance
at a showcase where there arelots of music industry professionals,
the Herberts decided that theybetter get the group to sign a contract
while they still had theirchance. Because, I mean, it went
really well, Right? Not forthe Herberts, for the Spice Girls.
This is so. Okay. I hadn'trealized the Herberts weren't really

(37:31):
connected at all to the music.So they just randomly brought a bunch
of girls and put them in ahouse and, like, make music for us.
And then had no, like, place.
I mean, there was obviouslysecret cameras in there.
I have to believe they're justmasturbating like crazy to those
cameras.
Yes. So you said the quiet part.

(37:53):
So the Herbert's give them acontract. They want him to sign it.
All five refused, based onlegal advice from Victoria Adams,
who was later VictoriaBeckham. Her dad was like, do not
sign this. This is not a good contract.
Oh, so he was. He was tryingto take advantage of them.
Yeah. So the group decides toleave the Herbert's, and when they

(38:15):
did, they snuck into therecording studio and stole all their
master recordings that they'dalready finished. And so through
contacts they made at theshowcase, they found new songwriters,
they found new producers andmanagement to work with. And so while
working with these new people,that's when they wrote and recorded

(38:35):
Wannabe and Two Become One andsay youy'll Be There, like some of
their biggest songs. Right. Soat this point, there's lots of buzz
around the group and severalrecord labels decide they want to
sign them. And they sign withVirgin Records. And again, like I
said we talked about before,they changed their name from Spice
to the Spice Girls. This iswhen they did that. Okay, so it's

(38:57):
still 1996 when they releasedthat first song, Wannabe, in the
United Kingdom, and that wasfollowed by say youy'll Be There
and Two Become One. All threesongs were huge hits in Britain.
A magazine named Top of thePops, which is a TV show I've heard
of in Britain, but They haveapparently at one point, had a magazine.
They wrote an article aboutthe group and gave each one, each

(39:19):
woman in the group, anickname. And that's where they did
that. Yes, that's where SportySpice and Scary Spice and Ginger
Spice and Baby Spice and PoshSpice. That's where they kind of
all came from.
I kind of hate that.
I do, too, because poor Scary Spice.
I know. Yeah. They looked ather and they're like, well, the black
girl has to be right.
That was always weird. It'slike, why, like, the rest of them
are complimentary names. Scaryand. Yeah, it felt weird.

(39:42):
Maybe Baby. That's kind of a.Baby Spice is kind of a rough one,
too, but.
So in January of 1997, that'swhen they released Wannabe in the
United States. It wasinteresting because basically that
first album had come out anddone all sorts of business in the
United Kingdom and Europe, andthen they kind of started over with
the same stuff in the UnitedStates. So, yeah, Wannabe went on

(40:05):
to be a number one song forlike a month. It was the number one
song in the Billboard Hot 100,say youy'll Be There and 2 Become
1 were both released in theUnited States the months that followed.
And their album Spice was thebest selling album of the year in
the United States for 1997.
Wow.
It's a big, big hit. So laterthat year, they released the follow
up album, Spice World and thelead single, Spice up youp Life.

(40:27):
And those were hits, but theyjust wasn't at this point, as you
probably both recall. We wereall a little bit like, it's been
a lot of Spice Girl.
Yeah.
Kind of a constant thing forthe whole year.
We were full up on Spice Girl. Yeah.
Because they were really,really pushing them, too.
They were everywhere and theyfelt a little one dimensional. Like
it felt like kind of the samesong all the time. Just.

(40:47):
Well.
And I think at least I wasjust like, this isn't like feminism,
this is like weird girl power.Like, I just didn't like.
Yeah, you have one called Baby.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I tried to hate it. I ended upknowing all the words, but I. I tried
to hate it.
Yeah, it was a valiant effort.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I imagine by the end of1997, they've been singing the same
four or five songs, like,constantly for two years. They probably,

(41:09):
you know, they just madeanother album out of necessity just
to.
Have something else to say, truly.
Yeah. So the following year,in 98, Spice World was released,
which was a movie that, youknow, it's a film.
It's a movie.
Yeah, it's a movie.
It has Alan Cumming.
Yeah. Yeah, I forgot aboutthat. Yeah, he's in it. Yeah. And

(41:31):
then there was also a tour in1998, and it was during that tour
that Ginger Spice quit thegroup. Some say she would quit because
she wasn't getting along withScary Spice, with Mel B. But the
official reason was exhaustionand disillusionment.
Oh.
I was gonna say exhaustionusually is, you know, some sort of
alcohol or drug thing, but,like, disillusionment. That's interesting.

(41:54):
Yeah.
That feels a little straightforward.
Yeah. So it might be real.
Yeah. Also, I like thinkingthat I could use that.
Yeah.
I will not be attending due to disillusionment.
That's why I'm consideringbreaking up with the United States.
Yeah.
Yes.
Yes.
Can we list that on our asylumforms? Like, can we get asylum because

(42:14):
we're disillusioned?
I can't.
I just can't.
I just can't.
So, yeah. The group releasedanother album in 2000 called Forever,
and then they went on hiatus,which. I don't know. Is that funny?
Is that ironic? I'm not sure.In the years since, they've gone
on a couple of reunion toursand performed at the closing ceremonies
at the Olympics in 2012. Oneof those reunion tours, it's called

(42:38):
the Return of the Spice Girls,was announced in 2007. So this is,
you know, 10 years after kindof their heyday. And the tickets
for the first date in Londonsold out in 38 seconds. So they added
16 more shows for London, andthey all sold out in less than a
minute.
Oh, my God.
16 more shows sold out in lessthan a minute. That is insane.

(43:00):
So, yeah, they were. You know,they're still a pretty big deal,
and they've talked aboutreuniting on and off over the years.
But Victoria Beckham hasalways sort of been to hold out because
she says she's too busy withher fashion line. I think she maybe
just doesn't need the money. Imean, her husband.
She's solid.
She's good.
Yeah.
And, I mean, I don't know if Iwas sleeping with David Beckham.

(43:21):
I'm not sure I'd be like,yeah, I'll leave for a few months
to go out on tour with people.I think I'd be good at home. No,
it reminds me of. You saw thatclip online where she was being interviewed
about something and she wastalking about how her humble beginnings
and stuff like that. And he'soff camera not participating in this
in Any way, shape or form.Like, he's in a separate room, he
can just hear her. And he'slike, humble beginnings. Like, what

(43:43):
are you talking about? Itkeeps pressing her on. She's like,
we had humble beginnings. Andshe's like, what car did your father
drive? She was hesitantlyacknowledged that he drove a Rolls
Royce.
Oh.
And she referred to her humble beginnings.
I like that he called her onher shit, though.
I do too. I like that a lot.
Rules Royce. Jesus. That'sRichie Rich.

(44:04):
Yeah, that's next level.That's not even just like, yeah,
I mean, I was fine. I waslike, no, we had money.
Well, good, good time travel.
That was a good time travel.
How did you feel about SpiceGirls when they were out?
I remember when the songWannabe came out. I remember it was
sort of at the end of like,everything was sort of grunge for
about four years. There wasn'ta lot of pop music going on. And

(44:25):
so this kind of like turningthe corner because then after this,
you know, and then a coupleyears later, there was Britney Spears
and there was the Baxter Boys.And the Baxter Boys, I think, were
actually later that same year.And it just sort of the kind of pendulum
went back the other way to more.
Maybe that's why I didn't likeit too, because I was fine with all
the grudge and the. And therock. It was like, we. We're good

(44:47):
right here.
Let's stay right here.
We don't need to move. Yep.All right, so my next one, I took
a gamble and did true crime.So we'll see if I.
How dare you?
Did you do true crime? Okay,good. All right.
Just making sure.
All right. This is the JennyJones show murder trial.
Oh, yeah, this is a good one.
Which I had completelyforgotten until I looked this up.

(45:10):
So this whole cluster of athing started in 1995, a little bit
before this, when a 24 yearold man named Jonathan Schmitz was
invited to appear on the JennyJones Show. And if you don't remember
the Jenny Jones show, this wasvery similar to like Sally Jesse
Raphael, Ricky Lake, this wasall like, even Donahue a little bit.

(45:32):
Oh, yeah, maybe later MauryPovich. It was, you know, sort of
the gotcha television. And younever knew what you would be. You
know, it could be good or badkind of gotcha television.
I remember they had an episodecalled you're too good looking to
be gay. And they just hadpeople on that were just attractive
and happened to be gay. Andlike, everyone in the audience was
like, you're too good lookingto be gay. Like, like that. That

(45:53):
the level of show that's whatwe're talking about, should have
been you're.
Too good looking to bestraight. Because usually it, usually
it's the gay guys that are beautiful.
Yeah, exactly.
Lord.
And it was always my brainwith all the crushes I had on guys.
And it always had, you know,the, the, the banners at the bottom

(46:13):
where it was somethingridiculous. And it was probably like
Scott's too handsome to be gayor something like that. Yeah. So
anyway, this was a segment onthe Jenny Jones show called Same
Sex Secret Crushes Revealed.
Playing with Fire, Jenny Jones.
Jonathan Schmitz was told thatsomeone had a crush on him, but he
didn't know the title of thissegment. He didn't know who had the

(46:35):
crush on him. I imagine heassumed it was a lady.
And they did that a lot in thetalk shows of the mid-90s where they
would bring people on and nottell them why so they could get the
reaction.
Which, you know, I would thinkafter a while, anyone in the 90s
would have learned, maybedon't accept the invite from whatever
show this is, but, you know,nope, gotta have your fame. So on

(46:57):
the show, on the show,Jonathan found out that his admirer
was a male acquaintance, ScottAmadour, a 32 year old friend and
neighbor. So Jonathan, when hefound out, he sort of laughed awkwardly
and said, oh no, you know, I'mheterosexual. And the taping ended
without incident. And thenthree days later, Jonathan bought

(47:20):
a shotgun, went to Scott'shouse and shot him twice in the chest,
killing him.
Wait, wait a minute. The guythat had the crush killed Scott or
Scott?
No, no, the guy that, that wascrushed upon. Yes, he.
Okay, that's what I thought. Igot confused for a second.
Okay, Scott was the one withthe crush.
Yes, yes.
Poor Scott. Just crushing on astraight guy. Didn't know this. Yeah.

(47:41):
So Jonathan, the killer, heconfessed to the murder and he claimed
he was humiliated andemotionally disturbed by the surprise
on tv. And his defense wasabout gay panic.
Oof.
That he felt confused andashamed after being on national television
and having a dude say that hewas into him. That's enough for murder.

(48:04):
I mean, in my experience, gaypanic is what, Like I go into a barbershop
and I've got to butch it up.Like that's gay panic. It's not someone's
says I like you on tv. Likethat's not gay pain.
No, no. So anyway, Jonathanwas convicted of second degree murder
and he was sentenced to 25 to50 years in prison. But that conviction

(48:26):
was later overturned and hewas retried and convicted again in
1999. He ultimately served 22years, but he was overturned because
they were like, it makessense. It was gay and it was panic.
So, you know, anyone would doit kind of thing.
So he's just out on thestreets now?
Yeah.
Oh God.
Yeah. Probably panicking atevery, you know, he's.
Gonna get mad at us becausewe're talking about.

(48:47):
Yep. He's gonna hear this andhe's gonna have some more gay panic.
So everybody watch the outbecause this guy is unhinged. So
the. But what's interesting isthat beyond the, the trial itself
and the murder, it became alegal and ethical scandal for the
Jenny Jones Show.
Yeah.
And daytime TV as a whole.Like, like we said, all these shows

(49:07):
are doing this, this sort ofgotcha television. And the episode
itself never aired, but clipswere shown in court and on the news,
which made it feel like it wastelevised. So everybody was seeing
this.
Well, I was gonna say, likewhen you said he did it three days
later, like they couldn't havepossibly recorded the show and edited
it together and aired it inthat amount of time. So this was

(49:28):
all. I mean, I guess he was infront of a studio audience, so he
maybe felt whatever he feltbecause of them. But it's not like
millions of people had seen this.
Yeah, maybe. I mean, he, maybehe was closeted himself and he was,
you know, freaking the fuckout because, oh God, someone's gonna
think I'm gay now. Because agay person likes me. Someone's gonna
think I'm gay. How dare they?So Scott's family, the guy that was

(49:51):
killed, they sued the show forwrongful death, claiming that the
producers created ahumiliating and unsafe environment
by. By ambushing guests forshock value. Which. Yep, that's what
they did in the 90s.
Yeah.
But in 1999, a Michigan juryawarded the family $25 million. Unfortunately,
that verdict was overturned byan Appeals court in 2002. So, you

(50:14):
know, I think this, maybe someother things too. It led to a lot
of scrutiny of these daytimetalk shows, you know, like, like
I said, Jerry Springer, Maury,Ricky Lake. And it became a sort
of case study for mediaethics. You know, like, what responsibility
do producers have for the wellbeing of their guests? Although it's
interesting now when we thinkabout reality television and how
much producers are behind thescenes machining, you know, all of

(50:38):
these things. Like, is thatethical discussion just cute now
and quaint? Like, I I don'tknow. But, like. Yeah. And it's often
cited in discussions aroundthe gay panic defense, which some
states have outlawed orlimited. I imagine it's going to
become national law now.
Yeah.
That. You know, if you. If youknow someone gay likes you, you can

(51:00):
murder them.
That's fair. Go for it. Yep,yep, yep, yep.
What a world. Worlds. Iremember you told us that you went
to see a movie once with afriend, and he made you have a gay
chair between you two. So thatfeels like gay panic.
That does feel like. Yeah,your gay might rub off on me.
Exactly. At least he didn'thave a gun. And at least he wasn't,
you know, just ready to shootanyone that might think he's gay.

(51:23):
And even. I mean, I know now,and even then, I. I think I probably
knew. That's like, nobodycoming in this theater. It' that's
not. When they. When you seetwo men sitting within, you know,
two feet of each other,nobody's like, they fucking. Like,
nobody's thinking there's handjobs happening right now.
Look at those seats.

(51:43):
Nobody just, like, sees otherpeople. Whether it's two men or a
man and a woman or anything.Be like they're doing it, you know,
like, that's just not what I was.
Just trying to think of. Like,when you go on a movie here and I
see people together, unlessthey're doing something really odd,
I don't even pay attention.There's no thought of my part. They're
like, oh, those must be acouple. Couple. Those are two brothers.
Yeah.
Like, I. There's nothing thatever occurs. Why would that happen?

(52:03):
It's only if you're havingsome dickish behavior. Am I paying
attention to you?
Yeah, I notice or something.Yeah. Or if a random guy sits next
to Amy and makes comments. Ialways notice that.
But that's reprehensible.
Reprehensible. What a nut.Okay, I'm gonna. I did a movie. We

(52:25):
just switched spots.
Oh, my goodness. Yes. This isvery weird, me doing true crime.
And the only reason that I'mdoing this is because I want to be
clear that in 1997, I did notsee this movie.
Oh.
I have now since seen thismovie quite a bit, solely because
of my husband, because myhusband's favorite Christmas movie

(52:45):
is Chevy Chase's ChristmasVacation. Okay. Which means that
a lot of times when they showthat movie around Christmas, they
do, like, a marathon of allthe movies. And he is more than happy
to leave that on the TV. Whichbrings us to 1997 and Vegas vacation.
Oh, wow. This is cinema. It'sits finest.
It is. There are so many plotproblems, holes, weird behavior.

(53:10):
I don't even know how they gotthis done and said yes and sent it,
but I'm assuming it did. Well,I don't. So Clark Griswold finally
gets that bonus that he'sworried about in Christmas vacation.
This is how we tie it together.
Okay.
How we tie it together.
Yep.
The loosest of ties. And hesays, guess what? We're all gonna
go on vacation. And they'relike, okay, great. Where are we going?

(53:31):
And he's like, vegas, becauseyour mom and I are gonna renew our
vows. Oh, okay. So a couplethings, huh?
Yeah.
One, two. Family vacation inVegas feels like an oxymoron. Like.
Yeah. What are you.
I enjoy Vegas. I actually do.Mike and I have been. I have no desire
to take anyone else in myfamily with us when we go to Vegas.

(53:54):
Like, it's not like a. Afamily friendly. Like, I want to,
you know, walk around. Audreyand Eddie are still, for some reason,
teenagers.
Yeah. They have not aged 4, 3.Casting or something.
Yeah, yeah, we lose. We lostsome good actors and replaced them
with subpar. And Audrey'swhole personality changes in this
movie. She's like a very,like, timid, sort of tame, like,

(54:17):
wilting, like, flower.Whereas, you know, when we started.
No, it was way better. Yeah.Anyway, so first, of course, we have
to bring in cousin Eddie. Sothey visit him on the way to Vegas,
and he happens to live on aformer hydrogen bomb test site.
Oh, that explains a lot.
Yeah. And Eddie's like, yeah,I'm down for Vegas. I can meet you
there. Whatever. We get theidea that Eddie could pop in at any

(54:39):
time. So the next thing thatwe know is that they're going to
take a tour of the Hoover Dam.They've arrived in Vegas. We're looking
for things to do. They tourthe Hoover Dam, and right away, Clark
gets up to hijinx and getstrapped in the Hoover Dam and causes
a leak that he tries to fixwith bubblegum gum. And when it continues
to leak, he instead scales abunch of scaffolding to escape and

(55:01):
just keeps the ordeal tohimself. Never tells anyone that
he was separated from thegroup or caused a leak or anything,
which to me, actually seemslike the most unbelievable part of
the movie, because this guy,in every other aspect, character
and actor, I believe, wouldnever not brag about that. That he
scaled the Hoover tension.Yeah. That makes no sense to me.

(55:22):
But okay. Okay, so we havethat little scene which is super
fun. The next evening, a dressfor Ellen and tickets for the family
arrive. And the tickets are toa Wayne Newton concert. So they go,
and they soon find out thatWayne himself sent the tickets and
the dress because he has acrush on Ellen, since he sings to
her, tries to bring her up onstage. Okay, we just move on from

(55:43):
that. We don't talk about it.We move on from it. So the next day,
they all agree to have analone day. And In a tight 24 hours,
Clark develops the worstgambling problem in the history of
gambling problems. Okay, he isdown a lot of money. Within hours,
he's reading books at thebuffet. He doesn't know what he's
doing, but it's. We get thesense that it's bad. Rusty, on the

(56:05):
other hand, becomes asuccessful high roller after securing
a fake ID with the name Nick Papagiorgio.
Is this Ethan Embry is the kid.
Audrey starts to hang out withsome exotic dancers led by her cousin.
And this is where I mentioned,like, she's this shrinking flower

(56:26):
that's just surprised by allthis behavior. And the Juliet Lewis
version was so much more likeedgy and starkey and would have been
so much more fun in Vegas.Like, I understand why as an actor,
she didn't want to do this. Iget it. And probably she was too
old at that point to pass offas a teenager, but man, we really,
we should have at least kepther vibe and her attitude because
what came out was like subpar.But in the meantime, Wayne Newton

(56:50):
and Ellen's relationshipprogresses terrifically. Yeah. Just
moving right away.
How would we describe WayneNewton? Like, he was waxy. Like,
I keep thinking of RobertGoulet and Will Ferrell's Robert
Goulet. And it's kind of asimilar vibe, right?
Similar vibe. Yeah, yeah,yeah. And you know, I think for someone
who was a star like in, youknow, with Vegas fame, like, to do

(57:15):
the movie was a littlestrange, but yet I could almost see,
like he maybe wasn't totallyin on the joke. Like he kind of,
I don't know, it's like, ooh,I'm gonna expect to.
Romance Beverly D'Onofrio orwhatever. Yeah, D'Angelo, D'Onofrio.
Same thing, you know.
So in the meantime, Clarkgambles away the family's $22,600

(57:39):
family bank account. I don'tknow why it's a family bank account
or why they all know what's inthere exactly.
But shouldn't Beverly havejust cut him off? Be like chatty
Chase is A dick. We gottasupervise him at all times.
Idiots. She is furious and sheand the kids both storm out and leave.
And Audrey, seeing no otheroption, secures a job as a go go
dancer with her new exoticfriends. Because I guess she's also

(58:02):
a dum dum and just couldn'treturn home. She thought her old
man, she was a child of the streets.
In this tight 24 hours.
Tight 24 hours. Rusty, on theother hand, wins four cars. Four
different cars. So which issort of begs the question why we
weren't ever discussing thathe had four cars or money this whole

(58:24):
time. Because Eddie steps inand gives Clark some money that he
had buried in his front yard.Yeah. And Clark loses it and then
decides that all he reallywants is his family. So he's just
going to leave and go find hisfamily. Which is great timing for
Eddie because I took yourmoney, lost it, and then had had
an epiphany and said, nope,actually, family is the only thing

(58:44):
that matters. So for somereason, they all come together and
they agree to play one lasttwo dollar game of keno. And the
only other guy, no lessonshave been learned. No lessons?
No.
The only other guy in the kenoplace is an elderly man that they're
kind of annoyed with. But thenthey end up talking to. They lose,
he wins a bunch of money, theold or gentleman promptly dies. So

(59:10):
they're standing there,personnel comes in to take him away,
and you see the ticket flutterto the ground. The winning ticket.
And of course, Clark puts hisfoot out, steps on it, and brings
it to himself just under shoe.Never says anything. So now they
have all this money and theyget their vows renewed, they pay
Eddie back the five grand, andthey all hightail it back to home

(59:31):
in Rusty's four cars.Everybody gets to drive a different
car home.
Based on my experiencewatching Ocean's Eleven, I feel like
security in Las Vegas isdifferent than the way they're portraying
it. Well, it's tighter. I feellike somebody's gonna check Nick
Papagiorgio's soch before theygive him four cars.
I agree, because the four carswere just in the parking lot. But

(59:52):
again, my takeaway from thestory is one, I think you need to
spend some more timeparenting. Audrey panicked so much
and became a go to dancer thatquick. Like, she's not set up for
any of Life's subst downs. 2.Rusty, we were down to our last $2
and you were letting us playkeno and you had four cars sitting
in the parking lot like.

(01:00:12):
Yeah, like he's not. So he'snot putting it together. He's missing
something up here.
Yeah, we could have sold. Imean, lot of problems with that.
But they see no problems atthe end. They all drive a separate
car home. It's a piece ofcinema. I don't know. I don't know.
The first time I watched it,like, there's some nostalgia in the

(01:00:34):
Christmas vacation one. Likethere's some funny scenes. It is
what it is. It's supposed tobe that. Like it's somewhat campy.
There's some funny lines,like. But this one just felt so slap
hazardly thrown together andit feels like a money grab.
Like somebody was just like,people have goodwill towards the
Christmas vacation.
Yes.
Let's see if we can squeezesome more money out of people.

(01:00:56):
Yes, absolutely. And that'swhy I think it always gets coupled.
Like you see it a lot atChristmas time because that's when
they play all of them. Likethe European vacation, the original
Chevy Chase vacation,Christmas vacation and then Vegas
vacation. Yeah, it's over. AndI think they knew that after this
one, like we've run out of.
They made another one that's Ithink Eddie's Island Vacation that's

(01:01:18):
just got EDDIE CHASE, BeverlyD'Angelo, I don't think are anything.
I didn't know that.
It's like Eddie Goes to Hawaiior something like that.
Oh, I don't know if Eddie cancarry a whole movie.
Yeah. In no world do I want towatch him for an hour and a half.
No, no. He's funny. Like theonly movie that I really enjoy him
in is Christmas Vacationbecause it's a little less sad otherwise.

(01:01:39):
His roles are always like, ohmy God, it's so alarming. But wow.
So if you're not doinganything tonight.
I'm not gonna watch that.
Don't watch Vegas Vacation.
Just keep doing nothing.Here's a different movie from 1997.
Oh, good.
Oh, hopefully better.
Well, probably, I thinkprobably. Well, it's called My Best

(01:02:02):
Friend's Wedding.
Oh, this is.
Fuck. I love this movie. Istill have the soundtrack to this
movie on cd. Oh, God.
Oh, man.
It stars Julia Roberts asJules Potter, a woman who's about
to make a long series of verybad choices. Max, Jules and her best

(01:02:23):
friend Michael, who's playedby Dermot Mulroney, a very lovely
Dermot Mulroney. They'veagreed that if they are both single
when they turn 28.
Once I became an adult andturned 28, I'm like, what the fuck
is that about 28.
Yeah.
Yeah. That's an insanely youngage to be like, we're just throwing

(01:02:43):
this towel in here. I'll marrywhoever's around. I just need to
get married. Anyhow, as luckwould have it, it's three weeks before
Jules 28th birthday. AndMichael gives her a call and lets
her know that he's engaged tobe married in just four days.
Which, again, is like,turnaround wedding.
Yeah.
If you're.
That's your best friend, Ifeel like.

(01:03:04):
You know, you would know.
Right, Right. So the womanMichael is set to marry, her name
is Kenny Wallace, and she'splayed by young Cameron Diaz. That
character is only 20 years old.
Yeah.
Which again, is. But not theage to get married, I don't think.
No.
And, like, she's leavingcollege. And again, I didn't really

(01:03:25):
register all of this untillater. I was like, what are we watching?
Yeah, it's rough. Yeah, man, Iloved it.
Her dad owns the Chicago WhiteSox, so.
Yeah, that's true.
She's got that going for her.
Yeah.
So now Jules has decided thatshe's in love with Michael and sets
out to sabotage the wedding.First, she tries to humiliate Kimmy
at a karaoke bar. And thatdoesn't work. Cause Kimmy's just

(01:03:46):
too damn perky for her owngood. I just don't think humiliation
is something that sort ofregisters with her. Then she tries
to get Kimmy to convince herdad to offer Michael a job, knowing
that that would piss Michaeloff. But that doesn't work either
the first time she tries. Soshe's not really making any progress.
So Jules calls her other bestfriend, noted homosexual George Downs.

(01:04:07):
Noted homosexual.
She asked George to come toChicago and help her ruin this wedding.
And it's Rupert Everett.
Yes, it's true.
Who is also beautiful. Oh, God.
So Jules. To try to makeMichael jealous, Jules tells him
that she's engaged to George.So again, this is sort of like, but
you guys are best friends.Like, wouldn't you?

(01:04:28):
And he was also like, no, he'stoo good looking to be gay.
I've seen the Jenny Jones Show.
At some point, doesn't he say,I really thought he was gay? And
she's like, he does that. Youknow, it's a joke. Like, oh, this
is so 1997.
Yeah.
So against his betterjudgment, George kind of plays along
with a little charade. Andthen also leads the whole wedding

(01:04:49):
party in a rousing renditionof I say a Little Prayer in a crowded
restaurant. And somehow,nobody, except for Michael detects
that he is a noted homosexual.
Yeah.
Nobody's like.
It's like.
Oh, man.
So the day before the wedding,Jules hacks the email account because

(01:05:12):
that's the level we're at now.She hacks the email account of Kimmy's
dad and writes an email toMichael's boss asking him to fire
Michael so Kimmy's dad canhire him. And I don't think that's
how these things work.
No, like that doesn't. Thatdoesn't track.
It's also not something you doto someone you love.

(01:05:32):
Yep, yep. This is getting real dark.
Yeah.
So, yeah, I mean, I don'tknow, like I get phishing emails,
you know about.
Yes.
Owing somebody money for tollsthat are more believable than that.
A lot of tolls. Ones.
Lot of tolls. Ones.
Yep. So Jules doesn't send theemail. She kind of has second thought.

(01:05:52):
She just ends up saving it tothe drafts folder because, you know,
why would you not just leavethat there for this man to discover
at some point?
Uh huh.
Of course, Kimmy's dad ends upsending the email unknowingly. So
Michael gets a call from hisboss. Michael's pissed and argues
with Kimmy. They call for thewedding. So mission accomplished.
Apparently.
I guess really Jules is notbeing a good friend.

(01:06:13):
No.
She doesn't really understand French.
No.
The only issue is that neitherMichael nor Kimmy told anyone that
they had called off thewedding. So wedding day arrives and
the preparations are happeningas if there was no argument, as if,
you know, everything's justgoing according to plan. Jules decides
that Michael's wedding day isthe best day to finally confess her
love to him.
Jesus.

(01:06:34):
And she kisses him and Kimmysees us and she gets pissed and she
drives away. Right. This isall in Chicago, Amy. You've lived
in Chicago. It's real easy tohave a three car chase in Chicago
on a Sunday afternoon.
Yep.
So Jules finally catches up toMichael at Union Station, which is
near downtown Chicago. Sheconfesses everything and for some
reason he forgives her. Yeah,I don't think I would do that right

(01:06:56):
away. At least I think. Ithink I'd have to.
No, that's too psycho. That istoo psycho to come from.
That's when you start thinkinglike, oh, wow, okay, my friend has
changed and we gotta reevaluate.
This is what's wrong withsociety right now is that we are
not okay. Calling outpsychobee. We're like, well, they
were having a bad day. Gaypanic, whatever. No, that's insane.

(01:07:18):
And we are no longer Friends.
Yeah, like that's.
How do you come back fromthat? Honestly, Truly, and I mean
well.
Okay, we'll circle back tothat. So Jules goes looking for Kimmy
and obviously finds her in abathroom at Comiskey park where the
White Sox play. And becausesuper easy, right? Because again,
in Chicago, the laws of spaceand time, at least on this day, just
don't exist. They're real easyto get from downtown to the south

(01:07:40):
side, lickety split, go in.And I'm sure there's only one ladies.
Room in all of Chemistry parkjust to find her. Yeah, no problem.
Joe's and Kimmy kind of haveit out while a crowd of ladies waiting
to take a piss kind of allwatch it go down. Kimmy forgives
her, and then they both headout for the wedding. And again, I
don't think I would haveforgiven her that quickly. Especially

(01:08:01):
if you're Kimmy, because thisis all you know of this woman. You've
known her.
You've known her four days andyou're like, this bitch is Satan.
Yes, she has been. She's beenbad and mean and dishonest with you
the entire time, like, andstealing her man. Right. But with
Michael, they at least had ahistory before this episode of bad
choices, so.
But she's good looking, soall's forgiven.

(01:08:22):
That's true. Yeah.
I did have some troublefinding the details about it on the
Internet, but I remember along time ago, I read an article
about this movie and they werediscussing how they had to add in
the scene in the women'srestroom with those two fighting
because test audiences hadwatched it and they were just like,
the Jules character needs to.Someone needs to call her out on
her bullshit. Because thatwasn't in the original. It was. It

(01:08:44):
was her. She confessed toMichael, Michael forgave her, and
then they went to the weddingand that was it.
That was actually smart that.I mean, focus groups don't usually
help movies, I don't think.But yeah, that one situation where
they did.
Yeah. And you can kind of tellif you watch that scene, like, it's
pretty obvious that JuliaRoberts and Cameron Dierzer weren't
wigs because, like, it hadbeen months since they filmed and

(01:09:04):
they had different hairstyles.So it was. Yeah, but it was. I mean,
it was smart for them to addthat in because it would.
Have been very much.
Yeah, very. For sure.
And I also just. I mean, Iguess want to point out that for
young people, want. Listeningto this. If you're 28, you're not
married. You're fine.
Yeah. You're so fine. Yeah.
Okay. Actually, yeah.
You don't need to make anyplans about, oh, my God, if I'm single

(01:09:25):
at any age, I'm just gonna marry.
My random marriage pack ingeneral. Not a good idea.
Not a good idea.
Yeah. Don't. It's notnecessary to kind of compare where
you are in your life path towhere someone else is.
Nope. This was also kind of agamble to make Julia Roberts less
than just beautifully likable.
It's true.
Yeah. Because she was it atthe time. So to even have her play

(01:09:48):
some gray areas was prettyrisky, I bet.
And they didn't. I'm sure shehad representation and management
stuff. They were just like,no, just keep making movies, like,
and just be, you know,America's sweetheart, because you're
making a lot of money doingthat, and so am I then.
But this was. Was this a hit?
Yeah.
Yeah, it was.
Yeah. I remember I loved it atthe time.
I did, too. Yeah.
It was a. It was a big hitmovie, and I think it made, like,

(01:10:10):
$100 million. And I rememberat the time, though, it didn't make
as much money as, like, someother Julia Roberts movies did, because,
again, she was not idealthrough this whole thing.
Sure.
Her character wasn't anyway,but I was. I think it was Wikipedia
or something. When I wasreading about this, when I was getting
ready, they were just like,oh, the huge hit. One of the biggest
hits of the whole year. And,like, it was this glowing thing.
I'm like, who wrote this? DidRert ever write this? Like, did people,

(01:10:34):
like, is that what she's doingnow? Like, who.
Who got hold of this?
Uhhuh.
I mean. And, you know, forbetter or worse, this was a bit of
gay representation that wedidn't have at the time, so. And
at the end, it was a lovelyscene where, you know, like, she
didn't win her goal. She gotto keep one friend at least.
Yeah.

(01:10:54):
Even though. Yeah, he maybeshould have looked at their friendship
too. Be like, girl, you psycho.
But that's interesting. Youlike to look at it from, like, the
timeline perspective, too.Cause, like, two days before, George
had left Chicago, and thenJules is at the wedding reception,
sitting by herself, talking tohim on the phone, and then he shows
up and dances with her. Andthat's kind of how it ends. I'm like,

(01:11:15):
this motherfucker flew back toChicago from New York.
Yeah.
And it was almost. I doremember it was almost presented
as like, oh, they're gonnahave the romance. Like, Suddenly
he's gon not gay anymore.
Yeah, I do remember thatfeeling too. Yeah, you're right.
The scene we don't have isthem on a plane to their honeymoon

(01:11:36):
being like, so we're notfriends, honey. Like, we're done.
Like, I mean, we made it nicefor the day.
We can't trust Jules.
We're good on that.
Good stuff.
Good. Yeah.
That is a good one.
That if you are bored tonightis worth.
Worth a watch. Yeah, itactually. I haven't seen that in
a long time. I bet there wouldbe a lot of like, oh, God kind of

(01:11:57):
moments.
I was rewatching that, tryingto think of like, you know, when
Barbie and Oppenheimer are outand it was like people were seeing
those back to back.
Yeah.
Like if Vegas vacation at thesame time. What that would be called
My Best Friend's Vegas.
Oh, boy. I mean, ifBarbenheimer worked, this could work.
Yeah.
Who knows?
Who knows?

(01:12:29):
Fuzzy Memories is a broads andbooks production. It's hosted by
Heath Smith, Aaron Johnstonand Amy Lee Lillard. Big thanks to
our supporters on Patreon,especially those at the make me famous
level, including HaleyScarpino, Nick Thornton, Daniela
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(01:12:50):
our Patreon for bonuses andnew stuff. And be sure to follow
us at Fuzzy Memories pod onInstagram for clips and highlights.
See you next time. I'd justlike to point out the pings that
were probably recorded herewere from your husband and they sent

(01:13:13):
us a picture that we need todescribe for our listeners.
So I haven't seen this pictureyet either.
Will you take a stab atdescribing that, Eric?
I don't.
This is from a gala that youattended with your husband.
Is all right. This is a. Iwant you to imagine that Heath has

(01:13:39):
a somewhat confused. Confusedslash worried look on his face.
Skepticism.
Skepticism, yes. Yep. Asthere's a large eagle that looks
like it could be ready toattack. But that's just sort of on
a nice backboard of.
This is at an event center, bythe way. This is not outdoors.
No, this is wild. There's twosort of off placed eggs that could

(01:14:01):
make for a better joke if youhad lined up better with them.
I should have knelt down. Theywere my breath.
Oh, I was gonna go bald gigantic.
That would have worked too.And then on the third one is sort
of over and there's a tinystuffed bald eagle popping out of
that one.
Here you can take a lookbecause you haven't seen yourself
in this.
Yeah, yeah. The eagle I guessthe eagle itself behind me is what's

(01:14:24):
made of bubble wrap, I thinkthe rest of it. Yeah. There's some
bubble wrap in the nest area,but a lot of it looks like it's just
sticks.
Should we make this pictureyour new picture on our website?
I don't know. I mean, I've gotJesus on me.
I know. I like you and jc. Ilike that a lot.
Your facial expression makesthat photo.
Yeah, this is good. We'll askMichael if we can share that on social

(01:14:44):
so that people can see it, seewhat we're talking about.
And Heath as well. We'll ask permission.
I guess I should say ask thephotographer, but not the subject.
We don't ask for consent here.We don't do it.
He's like, I have a newunmitigated call.