Intimacy Coordinator

It’s time for another Background Check! This week, Brooks Wheelan was on Intimacy Coordinator, so we wanted to replay the classic Bad Date story he told to Joel and fellow guests Ali Kolbert and Jared Goldstein. The original description for his story was: “Brooks can overlook the scabies, but can the scabies overlook Brooks?” and that’s still all you need to know. Enjoy revisiting this Bad (question mark?) D...

Joel puts comedy couple Brooks Wheelan and Katherine Blanford on the couch for live couples therapy, starting with the eggs Brooks ate, the all-caps text Katherine sent about it, and why laughing at that text was not the move.

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Danielle Perez was on Intimacy Coordinator this week, so it’s time for another Background Check! Join us as we revisit two hilarious and harrowing tales that Danielle told Joel and fellow guests Bonnie McFarlane and James Tom back in the Bad Dates era! First off, this man is simply too close and his lips have not been deemed ADA accessible, and in the second story her date goes full Shark Week. Catch up with Danielle’s ...

Joel Kim Booster convenes a panel of (at least) double minorities — Danielle Perez, Solomon Georgio, and Tien Tran — to dig into how intersectional identities shape who we date, who we marry, and who keeps asking us to role-play. The panel trades the backhanded compliments they took as wins, sheepishly admits to dating white people, and unpacks the bedroom requests that went too far, from a breaking-and-entering fantasy...

Joel Kim Booster assembles three of the world's most famous liars — Bob the Drag Queen, Meatball, and Rheeqrheeq Chainey — to settle what's fair game to fib about in sex and dating. Then Bob hands over her phone, and the panel puts her Grindr profile on trial: photo by photo, verdict by verdict — is Bob catfishing America? Plus: the smoothest bad-date escapes), the official wiggle room for height and weight, and w...

We're kicking off a new series of bonus episodes where we revisit classic tales from our guests' past appearances, it's Background Check! Daniel Webb was on Intimacy Coordinator this week, so we wanted to replay his Bad Dates segment from 2024, alongside Joel, Zoë Chao, and Olivia DeLaurentis. In this clip, Daniel tells two stories, one about what it looks like when you randomly hook up with a guy who might have just won No Nut Nov...

Joel gathers three Austin-scene comics to dig into what dating (and drinking) in that city actually looks like — from bisexual bar culture and older closeted guys in the 2000s, to accidentally hooking up with conservative dates once you can't read the room anymore. Vanessa tells the story of playing hard-to-get, and Martha explains her theory on why "nice guy energy" always throws her radar off. We get into small-town-big-cit...

Joel sits down with the co-hosts of the parenting podcast Good Enough. They discuss what new turn-on has emerged in their partners since becoming parents, and it goes places. The group spirals into a full circumcision debate ("uncut energy," designer dicks, and whether Gen Alpha will be the first mostly-intact generation), then each names the four things they'd actually get out on the street for — billionaires, no war, and sc...

Joel Kim Booster brings together three guests he’s almost scared to put in the same room — writer/actor Yassir Lester, writer-director Chelsea Devantez, and Drag Race All Star Season 2 Winner, Alaska Thunderfuck — to dig into how online identity messes with real-life relationships. The icebreaker is pulled straight from Chelsea’s movie Basic: name the person you hate-scroll most. The grou...

Joel is joined by Johnny Pemberton (Fallout, Superstore, Mermaid) and Beth Stelling (Girl Daddy) to dig into one of dating's messiest questions: can you actually stay friends with an ex? The trio trade stories on staying in touch with old flames, meeting a partner's exes, why proximity to your ex's new life changes everything, and how a well-timed voice (or a phone call from inside the house) can save a relationship.   

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Two of comedy’s most fearless clowns join Joel to talk vulnerability and silliness, on stage, and in the bedroom. Beware: cringey dating stories ahead.

Send in your own listener questions by emailing us at intimacycoordinatorpod@gmail.com or leave us a voicemail at ‪(213) 379-9851‬‪.

Subscribe to SmartLess Media on YouTube for full episodes, and follow @intimacycoordinatorshow on Instagram and TikTok for clips.

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This week, Joel is joined by comedians Dylan Adler and Liza Treyger, plus reality dating star Harry Jowsey, fresh off his run on Netflix’s Let’s Marry Harry. They dig into what it’s actually like to date multiple people at once—how to do it without hurting anyone, and the strange etiquette of a house full of women all trying to get ready for dates on the same schedule. Harry shares stories from filming, incl...

This week, Joel and guests—Langston Kerman, Roz Hernandez, and Jenny Zigrino—come in hot with the topic of first loves, and messy but real feelings they come with. They get into hooking up on the road—from offering to fly someone out just to get ghosted, to surprise homemade lube—the cities that want them the most, Big Girl Wednesday, and the many shades of polyamory.
 

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Comedian Steph Tolev and musician-comedian Jefferson McDonald join Joel just four days after getting engaged — and they're still mid-argument when they sit down. To help sort out what's really going on, Peter Antoniou (AGT Season 16 semifinalist, Pretty Psychic Tour) comes in to read the room, call out old patterns, and dig into what makes this relationship different from all the others. They dive into coffee runs, angry dads...

Joel Kim Booster opens with a theory about Gen Z’s relationship to porn and doesn’t let up from there. Margaret Cho, Zach Noe Towers, and Gregg Araki join him to talk sexual muses, the etiquette of dating someone with the wrong politics, and a real conversation Joel had at a party about reverse racial dating discrimination. Along the way: Margaret’s Percy Jackson era, Zach’s queer-Asian solidarity bit, and G...

Joel sits down with an all-bisexual panel — Trayvon Free, Ian Fidance, and Kat Bird — to dig into the stereotypes that follow bisexual people around (too greedy, secretly gay, just experimenting), the specific stigma bisexual men face versus bisexual women, and what it felt like to come out on their own timelines. The conversation covers dating across the gender spectrum, getting fetishized, getting razzed by other comi...

This week Joel Kim Booster gets his two Las Culturistas sisters on the mic to talk about the pop culture you share with someone new. Joel makes it comfortable for Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers to get honest about the shows, movies, and games that double as relationship litmus tests — Fire Island as a first-date screener, decade-long TV trade, and the eternal Mad Men blind spot.

Produced by Brian Baldinger and Anne Harris. Associ...

Joel Kim Booster is joined by comedians Usama Siddiquee (Funny AF with Kevin Hart runner-up, Usama Bin Laughing), Rachel Wolfson (Jackass, Rachel Interrupted), and Felicia Folkes (Funny AF with Kevin Hart top-ten finalist) to unpack how their families shaped — and warped — their approach to sex, love, and dating. They swap the worst relationship advice their parents ever gave them (location-sharing paranoia, "never let ...

Joel Kim Booster, Symone, Adam Shankman, and Guy Branum get into their types — and the harder problem of being someone else's. Guy explains why being attracted to him counts as a kink. Symone breaks down getting collected like Infinity Stones by men who only date Drag Race winners. Adam, talks about the gap between how he feels at work and how he feels everywhere else. Plus the katanas on every Chicago hookup's wall, Guy's li...