Episode 189: "Australian Mars"

Date

October 17, 2014

Guests

Cole Escola

Origin of the episode title

One of Julie's new accents.

Discussed

This week's show featuring a delightful chat with the hilarious COLE ESCOLA! Enjoy as Julie & Cole discuss the tension the two of them got past due to them both being Bossy Bottoms, the different kind of moms represented on commercials these days, the origin of one of Cole's characters, Lorraine, and what she has to do with one of the daughters of an author being interviewed on NPR, and what Patti LuPone said to him while getting out of an elevator one time.

Plus: On The Town and the dread of having to go to a second location whilst you are intoxicated! Twisty the Clown and why he is better than Michael Chiklis! Jay Leno's stupid and obnoxious decision to not have Joan Rivers on The Tonight Show, and why it is based in insanity. Gamergate's humiliating concession that someone who does a webseries is actually, not-sarcastically brave! And why it's fun to do an accent when you are running errands.

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Monologue Transcript

Transcription by Amy Hello everybody. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello. It’s Julie Klausner back for another episode of HWYW.

It’s mid-October, almost Halloween, Hallowed of all weens coming up very soon. I watched a little bit of the Great Pumpkin starring Linus, Lucy and the rest of the Peanuts gang. Lucy is so mean in that show, special. “If you got an invitation to a party Charlie Brown it was probably a mistake. There are two lists of people Charlie Brown, people who are invited to a party and people who are not invited. If you were invited to a party they probably go you on the wrong list.” Fuck you. I don’t like that Lucy has been reinterpreted as some feminist, or anything. She’s just a fucking bitch. She’s a nasty monster. I know I’m not saying anything mind blowing but what as asshole, Lucy from Peanuts. Fuck her. No, she’s bossy and it’s cool to be bossy—I didn't say it wasn't cool to be bossy. It’s not cool to be mean. She’s a mean jerk. I still like Sally. I still think Sally’s cute even as I become more embittered towards cuteness I still have a place in my heart for Sally and jazz. Brubeck—Brubeck is my Coltrane, what can I say?

I only got halfway into the Great Pumpkin this year. There was a part where Linus was monologing about how sincere his Pumpkin Patch was and I thought what am I doing? American horror story is on. I watched the second episode of that. I wasn't crazy about it. There was a little too much Chikles for my taste. I’m not a fan of Michael Chikles. Sorry. I know he’s probably done things that are good. I don’t like his face. He plays the strong man in American Horror story and I’m not buying what he’s selling. He doesn't look strong. He just looks fat. I don’t mean to disparage people of size; I just don’t like his particular type of fat guy face. He looks like the guy at the rest stop or K-mart where you think; ugh you’re the one who’s helping me? This could be hostile so I’ll be overly ingratiating. I’m going to be super friendly so that it’s over with. I’m going to play… have you ever been in a transaction or a retail transactional encounter where you think I’ll play a character. I’ll be a version of myself in this transaction that is a little more cool. “Cool, hey what aisle are the nuts?” “Aisle 4.” “Aisle 4? Cool. Cool. Thanks.” “How’s it going ?” “Pretty good.” Do you know what I say when people ask me how it is going, I say, “So far so good.” But in this particular character if I had to buy something form a Michael Chikles sort, I’d be like, “So far so good.” That’s what I would say.

Have you ever done an accent to jazz up a transaction? “Scuse me.” You could say if you want to sound like you are from some demented, what was that? South African, if you are from South African Mars, “Scuse me,where’s the dealie boppers?” I’m from Australian Mars. Guys I have not had a drop to drink. I don’t mind telling you that I don’t know what my relationship is with alcohol right now but I haven’t said hello to that old friend in a couple of weeks. No I was drunk last week. I got drunk. I had drinks with Charles Graeber who wrote the Good Nurse. We were both like, “Hiccup, do you know people who kill a lot of people.” No we were not laughing about killings. But we drank and I had some drinks. Since then I haven’t imbibed.

That made me think of the time…it’s been like a year and a half since the time when I got out of a 4 1/2 -5 year relationship. It was a really hard time for me. I remember reading the Podmass reviews at the time, the AV Club reviews this show sometimes, we are fortunate, we’re very fortunate. I thank god every day how fortunate we are to be reviewed by the AV Club. Sometimes we’re the best, sometimes we’re the rest but at least we’re mentioned and we appreciate that. I remember at the time Podmass was like, “Julie has got to stop drinking.” Or, “I’m annoyed that Julie’s drinking so much.” I’m doing the best I can Podmass! Maybe it was a comment like, “I used to like the show but ever since Julie drinks through the monologues, I’m not interested.” Do you know what? The show is free. I hope somebody you love leaves you someday. That’s what I commented because I love commenting. I never talk to you guys about how much I love commenting on websites. It’s a guilty a pleasure. I start an anonymous account and then I just comment up a storm all the livelong day. It’s such an escape. I mean talk about being someone you’re not. There’s nothing I like starting up a commenter account and then just going to town interacting with people, insulting people, saying things about the person who wrote the ting I am commenting on. Making friends, sharing opinions, being heard, and being seen. I reluctantly discovered what Gamergate was, speaking of commenter so and sos and people that need to be seen and heard and have used the internet as a means of completely distorting that very natural desire. I learned that people that play video games are threatening the lives of other people that criticize the video games. That’s something I learned this week. Boy oh boy what would Clive Barnes say…the role of criticism…the Gamergate, which I don’t know that much about, but I follow her on twitter. I've never seen her web show-the feminist frequency person, I respect her immensely. That I actually have to call someone who makes a web series brave and I’m not being sarcastic is really depressing. The fact that she hasn’t gone anywhere even though people are threatening her life is ugh! She’s a tough bitch. God bless. I guess she pointed out that women in video games are hookers and target and people were like, “We are going to fucking kill you for saying that.” Guys, what a world. What a world.

Like I said, I resent knowing this. There was stuff about how gamers themselves feel marginalized, that’s the whole thing. No one ever said …the notion of feeling marginalized as opposed to being marginalized is not new. The narrative that people applied to Columbine, that they were nerds, or outcasts, or losers, that they weren’t popular is something that we apply in order to understand the notion that two pretty entitled reasonably popular white kids from a reasonably affluent community who when looked at by someone who assumes that they are healthy and functional would think, why would they do that? That’s kind of the point. You don’t need to be marginalized to feel marginalized. You don’t have to be not privileged in order to feel like you are a victim. Boy between the men’s rights activists and the Gamers on the side death threat to this poor woman who is just saying things that are pretty obvious. If anything if I were a gamer I would like, no shit. Thanks for womensplaining. Now pardon me while I get back to this game where I see how man grenades I can stuff inside of a prostitutes’ vaginal opening, madam. What a horrible world. What a terrible, terrible world.

Tonight I went to go see On the Town. I’ll say Jackie Hoffman was in it and Jackie Hoffman was fabulous. I’d watch Jackie Hoffman be fabulous and I’d be fortunate to see Jackie Hoffman be fabulous with greater frequency than I already do. She’s just a delight. She steals the show. At the beginning of On the Town, I went to the premier with Jodi Lennon that was nice and exciting and fun. They had us sing the Star Spangled Banner before the show started. That never happened to me before. The flag is on the scrim. The lights go down. Everybody stood up. We sang the song. We clapped at ourselves then the show began sailors and so forth. I guess what I am saying is the Gamergate has ruined America. No that’s not what I am getting at. You know what, here’s my peace offering, I’ll take it over ISIS.

On the Town is fine. It’s not my favorite musical. I liked it a lot. I remember seeing it in college with Lea Delaria who played Hilde the cab driver who was so horny for that man. She was like fuck me. Lea Delaria everybody. She’s fabulous. Buy can that bitch sing. Then tonight I didn’t enjoy it as much. I may have outgrown that show. Maybe Pippin has ruined everything for me. Maybe it’s got to be Pippin. If you don’t know, the plot of On the Town is three sailors who are on shore leave for 24 hours enjoy New York City and meet ladies that two of them fuck and one doesn’t. There’s a dream ballet and then at the end they go back on the boat. By the end of the first act the three sailors are already at a club. One of them doesn’t have his lady yet but the other two have their ladies. You know that he’s going to hook up with his lady in the second act. You also realize you are going into intermission, when we come back from intermission the only thing that could happen is that they are going to go to more clubs. Sure enough when we came back from intermission it was like watching sailors go clubbing, that’s the whole second act of On The Town. Let’s go to Cabana La Cha Cha. Let’s go the the Harem Scarem Belly Dancing. I was thinking while I was watching that there’s nothing I hate more when you’re drunk when someone want to go to a second location or god forbid a third. Or what I hate more than that, this actually happened. Someone says, “My roommate is coming,” then she calls and they give you a land line on a tray because that’s how classy it was back in the day. She says, “You’re at the wrong place. Ok you’re heading over.” That’s the worst. Someone says “I’m leaving now, “and you are already halfway through your experience at least. Now that I hear that you are not here I am ¾ of my way through this experience and I just want to leave. The idea of waiting for you is painful. Have another…No, no, no, no, no no. Once you’re doing that you are crossing the line from spending time to killing time and I just can’t abide it. I have no…I acknowledge that this is an issue of my reframing and I just have to trick myself into thinking I am having fun and I am not being patient. I think we all know which of the things I am doing.

There were also celebrities in the audience of On The Town. It was the premier party thing. I didn’t go to the party. I came home to talk to you. Here’s who was in the audience. Celebrity Brooke Shields. Celebrity Joanna Gleason, Celebrity Padma Lakshmi who was two or three rows ahead of us. She got up right before intermission in the middle of the last number before intermission and she stood up and walked…everybody noticed and looked at her. Really Padma? You couldn’t have waited three more minutes? While I was going downstairs to use the facilities I was walking downstairs and she was coming up the stairs she open-mouthed yawned. Padma, put a lid on it.

Who else was there? A 91 year old veteran who got a shout out at the top of the second act by one of the actors who was in character as a nightclub emcee. He said, “Ladies and Gentleman here tonight we have a birthday. He fought in the Second World War. He’s 91 years old.” I thought oh sit this is a real person. He came into the audience a lot, more than I would have liked for my taste. Here’s how I like my third wall broken—by cats, by people dressed up as cats, in Cats the musical prowling through the audience in a cat-like way. That’s how I like actors entering the space theatrically.

I wanted to mention that I read something that Jay Leno said about why he hadn’t had Joan Rivers on The Tonight Show when he hosted the show and it had to do with him believing in his heart that Johnny Carson wouldn’t have wanted it that way, and this just made Jay Leno an even bigger twat than I acknowledged him to be before. The notion that Jay Leno said he did it because it’s what Johnny would have wanted is not only shitty to the living. It’s logically egregious because Johnny Carson didn’t want Jay Leno to have the Tonight Show. He wanted David Lettermen to have The Tonight Show. If you’re not into having anything on the Tonight Show that Johnny wouldn’t have wanted why don’t you get a job as a car mechanic? You loser. What a shitty thing. I was unnecessarily shitty to a living legend that had already been hurt unnecessarily by my deceased predecessor who never really cared for me. What an asshole. Although I will be watching his special on CNBC show about antique cars. Great job, great job Jay Leno, way to land on your feet, on your Sears shoes, your denim-ed shoes.

I mentioned earlier I don’t care for Michael Chikles in American Horror Story but I do like that Twisty the Clown. I learned recently that Twisty is played by John Carroll Lynch who is our friend Emily Altman’s stepfather. When she told me that I lost my mind because how frequently do you get texts from your friends that say, ”You know my stepfather is Twisty the Clown?” Not very frequently. I met John Carroll Lynch. He came to the office of the place where I worked when Emily Altman and I wrote for a TV show on MTV a couple of years ago. John Carroll Lynch said, “Nice to meet you.” He made a couple of jokes. He was terrific. I learned recently that he also played Norman Fargo. So there’s Twisty, Bette and Dot, dual Paulson’s I call them. One of them sang Fiona Apple’s criminal this week which means I have to take that out of my cabaret act. So basically Sarah Paulson has ruined that. Lady Gaga is doing bang bang and tweeting Cher constantly which is embarrassing. Come on Lady Gaga. Don’t tweet Cher. Don’t you have …can’t you go through that 15 year old diva boy in Nevada? You know about this kid right, Brendan? I love this kid. I wanted to adopt him but now I just want him to mentor me. What do they call him? Diva Kid? Diva Hero? I adore him. He makes the Actually Kid look like a big hunk of shit. So the Twisty the Clown business came up because Emily Altman wanted to know who Murder Clown was. I had tweeted something about Murder clown. There’s a clown in a town in California who has an instagram. He shows up and is creepy. They call him Murder Clown even though there’s no proof that murder clown has actually murdered anyone. In fact since I started following him on Instagram one of the captions of his—he just takes photos of himself, they’re not selfies though. I think he has a colleague who photographs him doing his thing. One of the captions said, “I have not murdered anyone.” All right, cool. Good to know. People are saying maybe it’s an ad. It’s probably an ad. These ad people nowadays boy are they clever.

The other thing from this week that is very disturbing is that Michael Keaton is everywhere. It’sIvery frustrating that I am not fucking him. I have had a crush on Michael Keaton since I was what 12? When did Batman come out 1990? What is that expression? I’ve been in the tank for him and now he’s everywhere because of Birdmen. He looks incredible. I saw him on CBS Sunday Morning. He lives on a ranch. It’s like walking around with one of those clitoral hood rings. I’m excited all the time. It’s a little frustrating. It’s also like the world has caught on that your imaginary husband is great. Yeah, that’s why I imaginary married him!

Finally the other depressing thing is that Zach Galifianakis lost weight. I’m conflicted in saying I prefer chubby Zach Galifianakis because I don’t feel like it’s my place to comment on somebody else’s weight. If he’s happy that way then great. By the way I do know that I comment on other people’s weight so that’s not a universal thing I stand by as if I am never hypocritical. I don’t know, but when I saw that he lost weight I didn’t want to tweet that I liked him better before because how is that my business? What if he lost it because he was concerned about his health? How is it my place to weigh in on? But between you and me I happened to have liked him better with a little weight on. He looked special. Now he looks like a good looking guy and longish hair on a skinny guy—he looks a little like Bradley Cooper, am I wrong? Like I said, I don’t want to snark. Zach Galifianakis is beautiful at any weight. I don’t know. It’s not my place to feel how I feel.

There are some people who have sent in…Thank God. Last week I put in a desperate plea for you to send me photos of your dogs dressed in costumes directly inspired by this podcast. I have two winners this week that I want to announce. I will send you T—shirt. There are two people that sent in some pretty incredible costumes. The first winner of this week’s dog Halloween costume comes from Kaitlin Bower who writes, “I wanted to enter your dog Halloween costume contest but my dog is back in Pittsburgh. My suggestion that my mother dress Bailey who is half Basset and finds the sound of your voice soothing as a member of the Manson family was met with abject horror. So I thought all was lost, but I found these pictures of her, so here’s our submission--Hide-y my favorite HWYW character. Fuck the AV Club for saying anything about her… We don’t want to say Fuck the AV Club here at HWYW, they do a good job.

Hide-y does appreciate this amazing picture of Kaitlin Bower’s dog hiding behind a chest of drawers. Fabulous job. Great job, your dog dressing up as Hide-y is absolutely marvelous. You win a free T-shirt. Then the other outstanding costume from this week comes from Maura Hammie. Your submission is a picture of your beautiful golden retriever, Nelson dressed up as guest David Rees who hosts Going Deep with David Rees. This is a costume that features a Golden Retriever with a tote bag around his neck and attached to the tote bag is an ice tray and there’s ice in it. Maura writes, “We could not get him to pose with a donut. “ Fair enough. Why would a dog want to pose with a donut? A dog would only want to eat a donut. Thank you so much Maura. You also win a T-shirt. Will write to you and get your size . I also want to thank runners up Joe Portenar who dressed her dog like Hedwig. There’s a fabulous wig on this dog, and then Theresa B sent me a photo of her dog Penny dressed up as Jimmy Jazz, Theresa this is so good that I am giving you a runner up award which is also a free T-shirt. I will write to you and give you a shirt. If you are listening and want a shirt for god sake just buy one. They’re available anyone can buy one. Just go to Howwasyourweek.com you dingus. That’s my Steve Brule. We have so much fun. Every day is Halloween when you are weird.

We have one interview with one guest because one is all we need…