[00:16] Meg: Welcome to Desperately Seeking the '80s. I am Meg.

[00:19] Jessica: And I am Jessica. And Meg and I have been friends since 1982. We got through middle school and high school together here in New York City where we still live.

[00:28] Meg: And where we podcast about New York City in the '80s. I do ripped from the headlines.

[00:33] Jessica: And I do pop culture.

[00:35] Meg: So it's been a couple of weeks.

[00:37] Jessica: It has been.

[00:38] Meg: I've missed you terribly.

[00:39] Jessica: Well, I sobbed the second you walked in here, so I think I missed you, too.

[00:44] Meg: I know. It's also kind of that time of year, don't you think? With, like, seasons changing and stuff.

[00:49] Jessica: My sobbing is usually in February, so I think that an April hysterical outbreak is less seasonal. I think it's just situational. Yes, little more situational situation.

[01:07] Meg: May I give you some feedback from a couple of our BFFs?

[01:11] Jessica: Feedback is such a loaded word.

[01:14] Meg: Oh, no, this is good. I mean, the first one is interesting.

[01:18] Jessica: Yes, I want feedback. As long as you don't make me cry.

[01:21] Meg: No, you won't cry.

[01:22] Jessica: Okay.

[01:22] Meg: All right. So this is from. Tears of Joy. My dear Michael. Yes.

[01:28] Jessica: Oh, Michael. Okay.

[01:28] Meg: In response to Episode 58: The Ballad of Sexual Dependency + Deep in Vogue. So buckle up. This is a well thought out response.

[01:39] Jessica: I'm even going to sit back in my chair.

[01:41] Meg: All right. In Michael's voice. In my inner circle of radically queer folks, I am often considered a crazy right winger who is not worth even half an ear when we start arguing. But I think I'm pretty good at seeing an issue for what it is and understanding its complexity. Of course, when asked for a solution to a problem, the best I can do is usually say, well, it's complicated, and I respect that radicalism is necessary to push the needle. I know many people who think that cultural appropriation is occurring when someone outside of a minority or suppressed culture adopts something that was born from that minority or suppressed culture. This argument claims that no white person can ever sing a blues song. I am full throated in my disagreement with this definition of cultural appropriation. A white person singing a blues song is at its best, cultural cross pollinization, which is a good thing as art changes and grows, as more and more people get to know it, and is its worst vultureism when someone in the cultural majority makes money off of something because a person from the cultural minority who invented it was being suppressed. Elvis and Johnny Cash, in my estimation, are not guilty of cultural appropriation. They were vultures. They were very clear that they learned how to play guitar and learn rhythm and blues from black people. They never claimed to invent it. They never claimed it as their own. When I argue the evils of cultural appropriation, I use Madonna's Vogue as a clear example. There is and was nothing wrong with her adding voguing to her show, to her album and to her sound, an argument can be made that she thought she was being helpful by bringing a culture that was hidden out into the open with a power that only Madonna would have had at the time. We can argue for days about whether she was being a vulture or a cross pollinator, cool. But I don't think anyone can argue that she is not guilty of cultural appropriation because of the following lyric, "Greta Garbo and Monroe. Dietrich and DiMaggio. Marlon Brando, Jimmy Dean on the cover of a magazine. Grace Kelly, Harlow, Jean, picture of a beauty queen. Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers dance on air. They had style, they had grace, Rita Hayworth gave good face. Lauren, Katherine, Lana too, Betty Davis we love you". By creating a list of white and mostly non queer people, the song's writers create a new origin story of how voguing came into existence. Earlier, it says, "it makes no difference if you're black or white". Well, yes, actually, it does. Madonna had the chance to write and perform a song that used vogueing and ignored its history. I would call that vulturism. Instead, she created a false narrative that voguing was born of white Hollywood stars from the 1940s and 1950s. It's a lie and is necessarily appropriation. This went on too long. But this is why, from my very moderate views on culture, appropriation think it's absolutely necessary to call out Madonna and this song as being baddie, bad, bad, bad. Of course, it's also a BOP and fun to dance.

[05:02] Jessica: Wait, I'm so confused. So is cultural appropriation better or worse than being a vulture? Worse. Okay, so I would say that being I thinkl, Michael, I want to have this conversation with you, but vulture was very confusing because it's very negative.

[05:22] Meg: It's such a negative. But no, he's saying, be a vulture. Eat, know and grow and digest.

[05:30] Jessica: I think bumblebeeism.

[05:32] Meg: Is this is a semantic argument.

[05:35] Jessica: Yes, although I'm really interested now that he has brought it up in what the lyrics are right before she gives the list of everyone who gives good face.

[05:47] Meg: Okay, let's look into that and have a response next week. You guys can do it back and forth. I mean, it's a really good point. I got to say, it never occurred to me that all those people were white.

[05:59] Jessica: What I think is much more important is that and we're going to hearken back to Andre Leon Talley for a second, but I think that that song doesn't make any reference at all to the ballroom culture. It just says you know this is a dance and it's about peacocking in a particular way.

[06:24] Meg: I think that's his point, though.

[06:25] Jessica: I'm not saying no, I didn't get that that's his point. I always think that cultural appropriation is acknowledging where it's from and then saying, but that's wrong, or acknowledging where it's from and saying, but it's also us.

[06:43] Meg: Actually, I think it's what he's saying, which is when you don't even reference where it came from.

[06:49] Jessica: Interesting.

[06:50] Meg: When you say, oh, look at me, I've got this great dance, and you don't, in fact, reference the origin story. boo Madonna. A little bit.

[07:01] Jessica: Boo Boo Madonna.

[07:03] Meg: I have to say I was a little convinced. And you know I love Madonna. Okay.

[07:06] Jessica: As do I.

[07:07] Meg: We have something else from another BFF. Okay, you ready? Okay. This is from Alex Smith in response to Episode 59: The Scarsdale Diet + From Klutz to King. First of all, as it turns out, Alex Smith tried the Scarsdale Diet.

[07:26] Jessica: As did a friend of mine who listened and then came to visit me and told me how she was traumatized by the proliferation of grapefruit and toast in that diet and that her mother put her on it when she was, like, nine.

[07:42] Meg: Oh, Lord. So we have to ask Alex. We're going to see him this week. We have to ask him how the diet went, because now I'm curious. He wrote about it in his blog in 2006

[07:53] Jessica: Did he do it as an experiment?

[07:57] Meg: No, he said in his blog, he's like, I'm about to start this diet. I feel like I might need to lose a little bit of and now there's what's the follow up? We need the follow up from however many years ago. But then he closed by saying, and look, I was absolutely never a fan of Howard Stern. I prefer my comedy a little more nuanced and sophisticated, generally speaking. But I take Howard's idiocy over the brazenly, racist, right wing clap trap of Don Imus every damn time. I agree. And I have to say, after I got that, I was like, oh, yeah, there was something up with Don Imus. And then I looked it up and I was like, holy crap Don Imus is so bad.

[08:40] Jessica: Horrible.

[08:46] Meg: Really, really bad. And I listened to him all the time. He wasn't saying that on the air when I was listening to him on when I was listening on the radio. I promise you he wasn't. But it was clearly a horrible workplace environment. And he did obviously he did like, in later years, he said things I read. The masks slipped a little bit more, but whoa.

[09:11] Jessica: Yeah, really, really quite revolting. So, yes, Alex, we agree with you. Yes.

[09:19] Meg: We should get started. I've got a good one for you. All right.

[09:21] Jessica: Okay. Meg?

[09:34] Meg: Yes.

[09:34] Jessica: You know what I love?

[09:35] Meg: What?

[09:36] Jessica: A round number. Yes. Do you know what round number is very important today?

[09:44] Meg: 60.

[09:45] Jessica: Why? Yes, you're right.

[09:49] Meg: We mind meld sometimes.

[09:50] Jessica: Mind meld. 60th episode. Episode.

[09:55] Meg: And guess what? We have 12,000 downloads. We're so special. As of this week. It's kind of exciting.

[10:01] Jessica: It is extraordinarily exciting. And I feel like it's almost mind blowing that we have done so much. I'm so proud of us. It's a lot, we had a lot of as the old phrase used to be, we have a lot of stick-to-itiveness. So I'm very proud of us and our listeners for continuing to tune in. Thank you.

[10:28] Meg: Engagement question.

[10:30] Jessica: Yes?

[10:31] Meg: Did you ever participate in competitions in high school?

[10:36] Jessica: Actual competitions or the ones in my head?

[10:39] Meg: Actual ones. Like the Shakespeare competition we did.

[10:42] Jessica: Oh, that was a competition. I didn't do that.

[10:44] Meg: I thought you did.

[10:45] Jessica: Was I in it?

[10:46] Meg: Maybe you weren't.

[10:47] Jessica: You know what, Meg? There are a lot of things I don't remember because of what I did to my brain in college. I was always sort of a compete with yourself kind of person. And I was so not interested in playing any sports ever.

[11:07] Meg: Oh, that's true.

[11:10] Jessica: I can't say that I did. Okay. All right. Well, I'm going to learn something, then. Yep.

[11:16] Meg: My sources are The New York times, People magazine, The Daily Beast, New York Magazine. On September 17, 1983, Miss New York, Vanessa Williams, was crowned Miss America. She had won the preliminary swimsuit competition and the preliminary talent competition singing Happy Days Are Here Again. At 20 years old, she was the first African American woman to win the competition. Unlike many of the other women competing for the crown, Vanessa had very little experience in the pageant world. She was scouted for the Miss Syracuse pageant while performing in a play at Syracuse University, she was a sophomore. She signed on when she learned she could win scholarship money. She quickly rose through the ranks and six months later was competing for the national crown. Can you imagine?

[12:13] Jessica: No.

[12:14] Meg: The previous summer, she had made ends meet working as a receptionist and makeup artist for a photographer, Tom Chappell. He had a studio in Mount Kisco that provided aspiring models with portfolio pictures, which is a little bit of a scam. I'll make you famous. Let me take your picture.

[12:33] Jessica: That's like Fame. It is indeed Coco in Fame.

[12:39] Meg: It becomes even more like that.

[12:41] Jessica: Oh, Vanessa.

[12:43] Meg: After Vanessa had been working for him for a month and a half, he asked her if she would model for him nude. He had a concept he wanted to try out using silhouetes.

[12:54] Jessica: Doesn't every male photographer have a concept? How hackneyed is that?

[13:02] Meg: The photos. What other word do you think he used? If he's trying to convince her to do it, they'll be vision, and the photos art. It's going to be artistic.

[13:11] Jessica: Of course it's art.

[13:12] Meg: And they will never leave the studio. Never seen by anybody, ever. So Vanessa was game, and a series of photos were taken, some with another female model. And I'm now going to pass the photos to Jessica so she can see.

[13:32] Jessica: Can I be the judge of the artistic concept? Shut up. No, you have to be kidding me. You have got to be kidding me.

[13:47] Meg: Do you want to help our listeners out here?

[13:50] Jessica: Hold on. Hold the phone. Literally, I'm holding the phone. Hang on just a second. I mean, really, you have to let.

[14:00] Meg: Them know what you're looking. You're zooming in.

[14:07] Jessica: I'm just I was shocked because I've never seen these photos. I've known about them for decades. I've seen them. Thank you. So what do you want me to describe what I'm looking at? Sure. Vanessa Williams is on a stool, but she's on her knees on the stool, but then sort of doing a back bend. So up on her knees, not sitting back on her heels. So she's up on her knees doing this big back bend. And the other young woman in the photo is on her knees in front of the stool holding Vanessa by the buttocks. Were you shot in the buttocks? She's holding her and very clearly has her tongue out and in Vanessa's crotch.

[15:07] Meg: And they are both entirely nude.

[15:09] Jessica: And I'm so sorry. I was so heart. There's so much going on. They're both completely naked. And the next photo is another I mean, these aren't even simulating. The the next one, the other girl is straddling Vanessa, who is lying on the floor, and she's sort of poking the other girl's nipple. And then they're back to oral sex in the next one with the girl. The other girl with her tongue extended.

[15:44] Meg: Right.

[15:45] Jessica: And then the last one no, not the second to last one is bizarrely. A cheerleading photo.

[15:51] Meg: That's the one I love.

[15:53] Jessica: With Vanessa just smiling at the camera in this incredibly acrobatic cheerleading leap.

[16:02] Meg: Naked.

[16:03] Jessica: Naked. And then the last one is a very classic soft core pose of these two young women naked front to front, with their heads slightly bowed and their hands circled around each other's waists, right above their butts. I am shocked.

[16:30] Meg: Okay, well, to give it a little bit of context well, first of all, I'll just ask you, are they artistic?

[16:34] Jessica: No. I mean, they are porn.

[16:38] Meg: Yeah, like '80s, '70s, right now, they're porn.

[16:44] Jessica: I mean, any time of day, any year you choose. They are too explicit to pretend that they are anything else.

[16:54] Meg: Right. Now, just to give it a little bit of context, Vanessa has said, actually, we didn't do anything. Everything was simulated. FYI.

[17:05] Jessica: That's fine.

[17:06] Meg: Yeah. I mean, just so that you know, he didn't actually take photos of them engaging. They didn't have sex. That's what she said. I'm just telling you.

[17:15] Jessica: I say to her, what I would to a very difficult client. I hear what you're saying, and I fully understand where you're coming from.

[17:27] Meg: Okay.

[17:28] Jessica: But you're wrong. Okay, go ahead.

[17:31] Meg: Vanessa had grown up in a respectable middle class home in Westchester county. Her parents were both music teachers. She was the only black child in her class for most of middle school and high school. Her parents were very protective of her, which may have contributed to her period of rebellion in her late teens, when she smoked pot, had sex with her boyfriend, and took artistic nudes. Not coincidentally, the Miss America pageant was created in 1921 in the wake of women getting the vote. I'm going to read you the lyrics of the anthem of the Miss America pageant.

[18:12] Jessica: We don't like that you're voting. We want to objectify you again. Is that the entire song?

[18:21] Meg: Well, that's the subtext, yes.

[18:23] Jessica: Well, I figured it might be.

[18:25] Meg: There she is, Miss America. There she is your ideal. The dreams of a million girls who are more than pretty may come true in Atlantic City. Oh she may turn out to be the queen of femininity. There she is, Miss America. There she is, your ideal. With so many beauties she took the town by storm, with her all American face and form and there she is walking on air. She is fairest of the fair she is, there she is Miss America.

[18:57] Jessica: And she doesn't read a book because we don't like it. The rules. Okay.

[19:05] Meg: Women competing must be between 18 and 28. That's today, too. At the time that Vanessa Williams competed, contestants could not be married or have been married or be cohabitating. They could not have been pregnant and could not have a child. The notorious rule seven, which stated that contestants must be in good health and of the white race. What? Had been abandoned by 1970.

[19:38] Jessica: Clearly everything about rule seven is wrong. I just want to ask because of the white race is so obviously what it's about? Of good health? Does that mean you don't have VD? Does it mean you're not pregnant? Does it mean they've already covered the pregnancy thing? I don't know. What does that mean?

[20:00] Meg: I think it basically means you have to look good in a swimsuit.

[20:03] Jessica: Oh, I felt like you can't have syphilis. 23 skidoo. No syphilis for you. Okay.

[20:13] Meg: Sorry.

[20:13] Jessica: Go ahead.

[20:15] Meg: But that rule seven was still on the books when Bess Myerson competed. That's a callback to Episode 42: Messy Bessy + Rocks "True fairy". It was a huge deal when Vanessa Williams won. On the one hand, she seemed like a shoe in. She was so strikingly beautiful and incredibly talented and looked fantastic in a swimsuit. She also seemed super chill and confident, unlike the many contestants whose lifelong dream was to be on that stage and who understood what was in fact at stake. So no one was shocked when she won, except Vanessa. Quote, "It's a jolt. I guess I still haven't been able to realize it yet. It's interesting to know I'm making history." She'd been planning to study theater in London for her junior year, but instead was booked to travel across the country, making appearances as the reigning Miss America. I watched that Miss America pageant. I was babysitting that night for Taylor Harris, my cousin, and I watched it, and I was like, that is actually one of the most beautiful people I've ever seen in my life. And then she won. And I was like, Duh. All right. She won $25,000 in scholarship money. Because that's the other thing about Miss America. You can't win cash. They're not going to give you money. It has to be scholarship, it has to be fake money. It has to be know, oh, we'll give you a prize, because women aren't supposed to have money, money.

[21:56] Jessica: Yeah, right.

[21:58] Meg: They might use it for something that we haven't told them they're allowed to use it for. Vanessa wasn't prepared for the adolation from people who thought they'd never live to see a black Miss America. She also didn't expect the death threats.

[22:15] Jessica: No.

[22:16] Meg: Racists.

[22:17] Jessica: Oh, really?

[22:20] Meg: And her blackness was dissected. Was her light skin black enough?

[22:25] Jessica: Was she black enough? Were her blue eyes, those eyes of a black person, et cetera? I remember that.

[22:31] Meg: All of this was a lot to take on as a 20 year old and then.

[22:38] Jessica: Could you imagine your daughter doing this?

[22:39] Meg: Well, exactly. I have a 20 year old. No, but I can absolutely imagine her being bamboozled by all of this happening to her.

[22:50] Jessica: No, I guess that's what I mean. It's like, could you imagine if Alice was in this situation, that she would just be like, what? No. Yeah, I'm out.

[22:59] Meg: And then Bob Guccione showed up on the scene. Good old Tom Chappell, who had promised never to share the arty nude pics he took of Vanessa, had approached Hugh Hefner at Playboy, but Hugh turned him down. Playboy claimed that they weren't interested in publishing the photos without Williams consent. They also were not interested in lesbian material. Hugh Hefner doesn't like ladies to interact with each other. He just wants them to interact on him. I just watched this documentary. It's really dark. Bob Guccione of Penthouse magazine, on the other hand, loved everything about these pics. When the Miss America organization found out that Penthouse would be publishing the photos, it gave Vanessa Williams 72 hours to resign. Some urged her to fight for the crown. Others thought she had disgraced all black women. William Safire was especially appalled that she hadn't told the Miss America organization about the embarrassing photos, putting it in jeopardy. That institution, William Safire, I mean, who asked you? Fuck off. In the end, Vanessa resigned seven weeks before the end of her reign. The September 1984 issue of Penthouse, which is now a felony to own because of its photos of an underage, Traci Lords, which is a whole other story we have to tell.

[24:29] Jessica: She's in that magazine.

[24:31] Meg: She's in that magazine.

[24:33] Jessica: Oh my God.

[24:35] Meg: So now it's actually illegal to own that magazine. It was its most successful issue ever and netted Guccione a $14 million profit. After the scandal, everyone expected Vanessa Williams to fade away. She was the subject of public shaming and bullying. The Philadelphia Inquirer said "her career and reputation tanked overnight. She went from being America's sweetheart to a national disgrace."

[25:01] Jessica: Can you imagine how liberating it would be to no longer be America's sweetheart.

[25:06] Meg: Well it was such a brief period of her time and she never really wanted to be one in the first place. Joan Rivers couldn't tell enough scathing jokes about her. Actually, it was very traumatic. Apparently, her mother was just devastated. She comes from I mean, these people are music teachers. I mean, they were not prepared for this either. She wanted to perform in plays but couldn't get auditions. Then in 1988, she came out with an album, The Right Stuff, and it was well received. I was spending the summer that it came out. Isn't it so weird that I remember this? I was in a record store in Cambridge because I was spending the summer in Boston, and I saw an album cover. I was like, I think that's Vanessa Williams, for crying out loud. She's singing now. And I kind of rolled my eyes. But you know what? Lots of people bought it, and it was good. She followed it up with The Comfort Zone featuring Saved the Best for Last, her iconic song.

[26:07] Jessica: Oh, my God.

[26:08] Meg: In 1991.

[26:11] Jessica: That one?

[26:12] Meg: Yeah.

[26:12] Jessica: Wow.

[26:13] Meg: And she was off and running. I saw her in Kiss of the Spider Woman on Broadway in 1994.

[26:20] Jessica: Really?

[26:21] Meg: Yes. This is just ten years later. She'd replaced Chita Rivera. She sang Colors of the Wind for the Disney movie Pocahontas. And of course, most people know her as Wilhelmina Slater in the TV comedy Ugly Betty. On September 13, 2015, she served as head judge for Miss America 2016 and sang Oh How The Years Go By. After she sang, the Miss America CEO, Sam Haskell, who since has had his own problems, but that's another story. They all have, apparently. But he publicly apologized to Vanessa. Quote, "I have been a close friend of this beautiful and talented lady for 32 years. You have lived your life in grace and dignity, and never was it more evident than during the events of 1984 when you resigned. Though none of us currently on the organization were involved then, on behalf of today's organization, I want to apologize to you and to your mother, Miss Helen Williams. I want to apologize for anything that was said or done that made you feel any less the Miss America you are and the Miss America you always will be." About her remarkable comeback, Vanessa said, quote, "You can't give up. You always have to remember what you're made of and not let circumstances get in the way. They might delay your progress for a moment, but you always have to remember who you are, and that will give you the eyes on the prize."

[27:55] Jessica: Brava. I'm still stuck on the photos, sorry.

[27:59] Meg: Because when I first wrote all this out and everything, I was going to tell you, oh, I was nude in a play in grad school. And was that arty? And then I looked at the photos, and I was like, oh, that was very different. Very different from what I did in that play.

[28:16] Jessica: I didn't know that you were nude in a play in grad school.

[28:19] Meg: It didn't even cross. And it was videotaped. There is a videotape of me, although I will say that the playwright said he put his hand in front of the camera. And when he told me that afterwards, he was like, when you were on stage, I just put the hand in front of the camera. I was like, well, thank you. But now I'm like, but why? But my point is, it didn't even occur to me. I was like, what? Some videotape or whatever. But actually there would have been a videotape of me butt naked, wet, because I was coming out of a bathtub. I mean, who needs that stuff hanging around?

[29:00] Jessica: I'm so impressed that you did that.

[29:03] Meg: Thank you. Well, anyway.

[29:08] Jessica: You're like, I was younger. Hey. No, I'm kidding.

[29:10] Meg: Truth, though. But anyway, the point is, it never even crossed my mind that it would be something that I would regret, because know, I don't know. I didn't know that I was going to run for Miss America and win and become America's sweetheart. You know what I mean?

[29:28] Jessica: Wait, did I skip a group? Did that happen?

[29:31] Meg: You know what I'm trying to say. There might have been things that happened in my life where I would regret that if it were circulating, and it never even crossed my mind at the time.

[29:40] Jessica: Well, Vanessa Williams, for people of our generation, I think, is definitely a symbol, you know, as we said at the beginning of this podcast, stick-to-itiveness. She did not give up. And she is something that is really.

[30:01] Meg: You know what's also interesting to me? You're still thinking about that picture?

[30:07] Jessica: I can't help it. It's so explicit. All these years, I was like, oh, it's just a glamour shot. I was just not prepared for what you handed to me.

[30:20] Meg: She definitely had a rebellious period.

[30:23] Jessica: She said that I'm going to explore some new directions.

[30:28] Meg: She wrote a book with her mother, actually, and she talks about why she agreed to do it. And it all seems to be kind of like, sure, whatever. I'm in for an adventure.

[30:41] Jessica: You must be clear. I am not judging anything that she did. It's just visually a bit of a surprise. But if she wanted to intentionally pose for Bob Guccione, then go for it.

[30:58] Meg: Oh yeah, no no no. And Bob Guccione gross. Well, yes, but also Hugh Hefner gross.

[31:03] Jessica: Just a different shade of gross.

[31:07] Meg: Different brand of gross. It's also interesting, the whole Miss America pageant thing, because it is a contest. They wanted so badly to bring it into modern times and just kept flaming out time after time because well, I don't know. That's an interesting question.

[31:25] Jessica: Wasn't there a year where there were some radical feminists who were in it and started protesting in the middle of one of the bits of the competition?

[31:39] Meg: Yeah, no, it's always, like, had protests. Itself, though. It keeps trying to be relevant. There's no more swimsuit, for example, right? Guess who never watches Miss America anymore?

[31:54] Jessica: Americans.

[31:55] Meg: You got it. But it's interesting because it's not like we don't have competition shows. We've got So You Think You Can Dance. We've got American Idol. We've got Drag Race, for crying out, mean, but nobody has any patience for Miss America.

[32:13] Jessica: Well, I think it's also that. I mean, think about it. If you've got Drag Race on one hand and Miss America on the other, Miss America is as boring as boring can be. There's no drama. There's nothing. It's like, hi, I'm in a bathing suit. Now,, I'm not even in a bathing suit. I'm in a pants suit. Look at me. It's so boring. The only things that were great that I recall because I'm a sick ticket, is when they would have the talent competition that it would be some young woman in a pale blue, like a powder blue evening gown with feathers on it, playing an accordion, and you're just like, yes, this is weird. I want to see. And in fact, isn't there that great monologue from Designing Women when Dixie Carter is defending her sister? Her sister who plays Delta Burke. Yes. And she's know. And Suzanne Sugarbaker threw that baton so high. That was the night the lights went out in Georgia. Oh, my god, I'm so glad you remember. Yeah I mean, like but the fact that that was parodied basically on one of the campiest shows ever to be on television, ever, I think, says quite a bit. Yeah that was that show just got better and better and weirder and weirder. And actually, one of my favorite lines that show was, remember Anthony, the not gay helper? And he had been in prison, and part of the plot line was that they were, know, we accept everybody here at Sugarbaker's in Atlanta, Georgia. And so Anthony, not acknowledged as gay, black man who had been in prison. He would talk about whatever he was talking about in his life. He would preface it with during my unfortunate incarceration. That is the funniest thing ever, I don't know why, but it was so camp. Everything about it was, oh, it was so great. I remember how they had Bernice, the drunk old lady who was like, Oh, what's happening, Anthony? And then would try to manhandle some young man and sexually harass him. You don't remember this? It was Alice, the famous and miraculous Alice Ghostley, who played Bernice. Please look it up. I will, because I will post about it. I mean, she was a legendary actress who, in her older years had this high camp role and ah, chef kiss. Well done. Okay.

[35:21] Meg: Yes.

[35:22] Jessica: I feel that I have not done justice to a whole swath of high school culture in New York during the '80s. Okay. We've done a lot of coverage of Dorian's and its ilk, like, where we would go drinking and what the partying was. But, you know, Meg, let's get real shall we? Uh oh. Not everyone went out.

[35:47] Meg: Oh, that's totally true.

[35:48] Jessica: Not everyone was going drinking. No, I don't want to paint a picture that everyone lived in Dublin House

[35:54] Meg: Absolutely not.

[35:55] Jessica: No, but there was a place where everybody knew your name, but they knew it with a Greek accent. For those of us who did not go drinking all the time, New York in the '80s had the coffee shop. Now, let us not confuse, I was thinking about this, and I was like, what am I going to talk about? What am I going to talk about? And I was like, how did I spend most of my weekend evenings? I was like, with my friends at Gracie Mews Diner, drinking endless cups of coffee, eating french fries, and you know, just being an idiot.

[36:36] Meg: Or like Jackson Hole. I'm thinking of, like, Gracie Mews is closer to you. Jackson Hole is closer to me.

[36:42] Jessica: Yes, exactly. And there are other iconic coffee shops like the Viand Coffee Shop.

[36:48] Meg: And there are two of those, or at least two, because I remember I was trying to meet somebody at one of them, and I got confused and went to the other one. Viands are fantastic.

[36:57] Jessica: The best.

[36:57] Meg: Are they still there?

[36:58] Jessica: There's one on Madison between 61st and 62nd, and it is magnificent. It is as much of a hole in the like, it's really narrow. Marvelous. And there's also 3 Guys Restaurant. There was one on Madison and one on 96th. One on Madison. And Nell's. Yes. That just closed. That just closed. Well, the 3 Guys on Madison & 96th just closed, and they're disappearing, and.

[37:28] Meg: They're disappearing and they are so good. God, the BLT's

[37:29] Jessica: And the thing is that people now refer to those establishments as diners. You know people who didn't grow up here may not know the difference between the New York diner and the New York coffee shop. They looked different, and they did different things. And so I wanted to have a little conversation about nerd nightlife. Okay. Highschool nerd nightlife in the 80's and its demise at the hands of Starbucks. Do you know the difference between a diner and a coffee shop?

[38:11] Meg: I can't think offhand, because the places that I'm thinking of, I could definitely order food.

[38:18] Jessica: Well, they're all food.

[38:19] Meg: Okay.

[38:20] Jessica: So I did a little bit of a deep dive. Am I giving any sources? Of course not.

[38:27] Meg: That is fine. We trust you.

[38:29] Jessica: Well, a lot of people don't, because I've learned that what you've been hiding from me is that there are a lot of people who write in, including some of my best friends who write in, going Jess, not so much.

[38:45] Meg: That's not true. They're adding to the discourse.

[38:48] Jessica: Well, that's a very nice way of putting it. Yes. I get fact checked a lot.

[38:53] Meg: This is true.

[38:54] Jessica: So I'm just saying, if you don't believe me, look it up yourself. That's the salty mood I'm in today. Remember that episode when I went on a rant? I just kind of lost it.

[39:07] Meg: I can't. Which one? I don't remember. There have been 60.

[39:09] Jessica: This might be one of them. What was that?

[39:11] Meg: There have been 60 episodes.

[39:13] Jessica: Well, that's entirely, well, I don't go crazy on all I went really insane on one. Here's how on brand this is for me. I'm doing a callback to myself and I don't remember it. How about that? That's fact check. That's a really special moment of Hi, I'm Jessica, and I've gone off the deep end. So difference between a coffee shop and a diner in classic New York. A diner.

[39:44] Meg: I know.

[39:45] Jessica: Okay. Oh, my God, I'm so excited. And you're raising your hand, which gives me a professorial air. I love it.

[39:51] Jessica: Yes, I'm calling on you.

[39:53] Meg: A diner has a counter. As did coffee shops. All right. Yeah. No, I think I meant to say coffee shop has a counter. Yes.

[40:02] Jessica: As do diners.

[40:04] Meg: Damn it.

[40:07] Jessica: So the difference is this. C minus. Coffee shops were usually breakfast and lunch and diners were either 24 hour or through dinner. I can't call it dinner service, but into the evening. And coffee shops were sort of more like either the downtown cafes, like Caffe Dante of the Village ilk, or they were sort of like tea rooms. Like in London, the ladies would go have their tea and their sandwiches at an inexpensive tea place. It's the equivalent.

[40:50] Meg: Like Eat. Okay, so that's a little more upscale than a diner.

[40:54] Jessica: Well, not necessarily, because when I grew up on eight.

[41:00] Meg: We should say that Eat is a place where you can have food.

[41:03] Jessica: Yes. It's on Lexington in the upper sixty's. Seventy's? Lower seventy's, yes. Anyway, whatever the case may be, there was a place across the street from where I grew up called Mr. Chips. And Mr. Chips was filled with the ladies of the neighborhood with their children having lunch. The people who would have breakfast there. It was less frequent. And that might be like people who worked in the area for whatever reason, but it was you know Gladys and Myrtle are going for a ham sandwich. Where do they go? Okay. And a diner is burger and fries and all of that kind of thing. Right. And so one of my favorite coffee shop stories of all time, which really encapsulates not just my mom and her dear friend Barbara, but women of their ilk at the time. So they were sitting Barbara. Did I tell the story about Barbara and the fur coat?

[42:12] Meg: I only remember one fur coat story, and I don't think Barbara was there.

[42:16] Jessica: It was, I thought you knew better, is?

[42:18] Meg: No.

[42:18] Jessica: Okay. I have two Barbara stories that I have to tell today. Okay, so quickly, before I tell you about the coffee shop, I need to set the scene. So New York women and this no longer applies. So this is New York women. Really. I think our mother's age was the last generation of this. Frequently they were all ready to go with a college degree or whatever, but then were expected not to work. So we had all of these you know it was like the women of I know we're not supposed to talk about Woody Allen, but too bad, like Hannah and Her Sisters type folk. Anyway, so Barbara lived on East End Avenue, very nice building, and it was the early 80s. And she went out in the cold dressed as one does. And she was wearing a hat and a fur coat and boots and whatever. And this woman came up to her and Barbara was waiting for the light to change. So she was standing on the corner and this woman came up to her and was like excuse me, but I'm really surprised. And Barbara's just sort of looking at her quizzically, I'm really really surprised and kind of amazed. Now Barbara's like am I having an aneurysm? Like what is going on here? And this woman just keeps going like I must have been mistaken. And then it gets to I thought better of you, I thought you knew better. And then it becomes evident that this is about the fur coat. So this is back in the earliest days of throwing paint on people. So she says she finally ends her monologue of insanity as the light is changing and says to her I thought you knew better than to wear fur. And Barbara very calmly turns to her and says you thought wrong and crosses the street.

[44:17] Meg: Oh, Barbara.

[44:19] Jessica: And so let's now cut to life in the coffee shop. So here's typical afternoon, you've got it filled with women who either have kids in high school so they're like thank God it's 3:00, I can have my sandwich and talk to my friend. Or mothers who have picked up their little kids.

[44:38] Meg: Got it

[44:39] Jessica: And they're like yes, you can have fries so I don't kill you. And you would have a malt. Like a chocolate malt was still a thing or a chocolate egg cream or whatever. And so there are kids swarming around and like and a little child wanders over to my mother's booth with Barbara. So they were sitting there and this little child wanders over to their table and is staring at my mother and Barbara and they're trying to have a conversation and they keep looking over at this child whose eyes barely clear the table. Like you know Kilroy was here, like just little eyes over it. And the kid does not leave and they keep pausing and looking over. And finally my mother turns to the child and says get lost. This is the '70s, early '80s. This is, this is what life really was in New York. Like there was none of this like oh my God, I'm a helicopter parent and everyone has to be nice to the children. Oh, my child is lying on the floor. That's perfectly fine. No, shut up, sit in your seat, have your chocolate milkshake and piss off. That was basically it. So, coffee shop versus diner. Now diner was teenagers like us.

[46:15] Meg: Burgers.

[46:16] Jessica: Yes. And like with Jackson Hole we would go in the morning before class and get our egg sandwiches.

[46:24] Meg: I would go, as would Kathy to Double Duck

[46:26] Jessica: Which became more upscale.

[46:33] Meg: But Double Duck was just it was a little sliver of a bagel place. I don't know what else you could get there. You couldn't sit down.

[46:42] Jessica: No, you could not sit down. But it was like a deli. It was a deli.

[46:48] Meg: Like a deli. But it was not wider than 5ft.

[46:54] Jessica: Right. Mostly counter. Meaning like where you would order, like from a deli counter.

[47:00] Meg: Yeah. It was all counter. Yes.

[47:02] Jessica: So the other thing about diners now we're going to go back to the '80s. Diners are where we would hang out. And I have a couple of diner late night diner stories. So here are two of them. So Gracie Mews actually started as a coffee shop and morphed into a diner. Yes. And I'm fully of the belief, and I know that Alex Smith is listening right now and doing research as I'm speaking. So I fully expect there to be a correction any moment. But I think that a lot of these coffee shops either went out of business or morphed into diners as the proliferation of Starbucks. And not surprising, right? Came into the city. So anyway. And Ale and I would go frequently to Gracie Mews. And there was another coffee shop right across the street from Chapin. We still don't know how to pronounce it. Le L-E P-A-N like Nancy T ike Thomas, O. So we were like, Le Panto. What is this? And the girls from Chapin called it Panos. So I don't know the origin of this. I mean, it has to be Greek trying to be fancy. I don't know. So we would go there frequently. And as we got older, they all started to have bars. So now back to drinking. Back to high school drinking. So if you were not going to parties, if you were not trying to get into a bar, how would you drink? And what would you drink as a teenager when you had finally had so much coffee that you were vibrating? What did you do? Well, number one, you smoked. We all smoked.

[48:54] Meg: We did.

[48:55] Jessica: And I look back on it now, and I'm going to be honest with you. It was fun.

[49:00] Meg: Yeah.

[49:01] Jessica: And I don't recommend that anyone ever do it.

[49:04] Meg: No, because once you start, it's really hard to stop.

[49:09] Jessica: Yes, it will kill you and will.

[49:11] Meg: Kill make you just they're all other kinds. But we were it makes your stuff smell.

[49:15] Jessica: Yeah, but we looked cool, right?

[49:19] Meg: I miss it horribly.

[49:22] Jessica: Every now and then, if I've been out at night and I wind up behind someone who's smoking, it's like, oh, yeah, it's like Madeline. I'm like, nightlife. Blow in my face. Nightlife. We then would start ordering at the diners because we could also smoke in the diner. You smoked in the diner? Exactly. Yes. Thank you for bringing that back together. So we would smoke and drink in the diner, but hilariously, the diners specialized in having things like midori or schnapps, like other out. And you're like, why? So I guess I'm having a melon ball in a diner. Okay, smoking, having a melon ball. All right. At about that same time, MTV was starting to get its programming to be beyond just videos. And remember, they had comedy and weird game shows and stuff. So I was in Gracie Mews with Ale late one night. And of course, if we were smoking or drinking, but it was only the smoking, I would go home and my mother would be like, God damn it. And I was like, how do you smell it over your smoke in this apartment? How can you tell the difference? And I'm smoking your brand so that you can't smell it on me. What is happening? So we were sitting there, and there was a bunch of boys, but they were not really boys. They were like 10 to 15 years older than us.

[50:52] Meg: Okay, I thought you were about to say that they were 10 or 15 years old.

[50:56] Jessica: And I was that would have been hardcore. A ten year old is like, light me up. Pour that melon ball. I need a stiff drink. So they are 20 year olds after after geography class. So they're like 25, something like that. And they're making so much noise and such a ruckus, and then they start throwing things at us. What? But not mean, like, flirty. And I was like and there was no way in my mind that they were actually flirting with us because we were not trying to look like anything, which meant that we looked like we were nine. So we eventually talked to these guys, and we're like, oh, hi. And it's brief. And they go away. Cut to 15 years ago. Ten years ago, right after I got divorced, I was on a dating app, and I matched with the first of several celebrities that I have matched with over the years. And this one says, hello. I write back. Remember me from Gracie Mews? No. Yes. It was Colin Quinn. What? Yes. Yes. And he was like, oh, my God. I don't remember you. But I remember Gracie Mews. And I was like, yes, because that's where you would go if you couldn't handle going to a bar and you wanted to talk to your friends. It was indeed Colin Quinn of I think it was Remote Control. Was that the show he was on?

[52:28] Meg: I don't know. That is wild.

[52:29] Jessica: But he has since gone on, actually, he's sort of become like a legit actor, and he had, like a Broadway show. He had some, like, History of the World with Colin Quinn or something like that.

[52:42] Meg: Oh, gosh, I have to look it up. But yeah, I think he did something at the Roundabout downstairs.

[52:47] Jessica: Yes. The other diner experience which I think really says more about what was really going on in diners in the '80s was, do you remember the Empire Diner? So now we're going on a little journey. Absolutely. Gracie, so Pandos was on East End Avenue and, like, 83rd. Gracie Mews was 81st and First. And Jackson Hole was Madison and 93rd.

[53:21] Meg: 93rd or 91st.

[53:23] Jessica: And the Empire Diner was way on the West Side in the 20s. It was in Chelsea, and it was.

[53:30] Meg: You and I have had lunch there before.

[53:33] Jessica: Again, things I don't remember because of what I did in college. When did we have lunch there?

[53:40] Meg: It was right after you got divorced and we hadn't spoken in a while or whatever, and we got together and we had lunch at Empire Diner.

[53:48] Jessica: Oh, I must have had a wonderful time.

[53:52] Meg: And you caught me up on all the drama.

[53:54] Jessica: Oh, yes, marriage. Yes, I do remember this now. Yes, I do. So I went there in 1988 with a certain friend of ours. It was the first place I did drugs, a more substantive nature. I took ecstasy at the Empire Diner.

[54:18] Meg: Fascinating. At the table.

[54:20] Jessica: Outside. At the table, because oh, my.

[54:22] Meg: God, you've told me this story.

[54:24] Jessica: Yes, of course. There's the conversation about is it hitting you? No. Are you feeling anything? No, I'm not feeling anything. And then suddenly I feel like I'm starting to have a heart attack. And I ask, is this normal? Yes. Yes, of course it's normal. My friend gets up and goes to the bathroom. When he comes back, I am literally running my face up and down the tiles on the outside of the Empire Diner. It's so smooth. When I'm a grown up, I want my entire apartment to be covered in these tiles, because this friend of mine was also tripping at this point. He thinks this is a fine idea. Many years later, when we were laughing and reminiscing about this, my friend says, you know why I went to the bathroom? And I said, Because you had to pee. He said, oh, nay, nay, nay. He said, I had only done this once before, and I didn't know if it was normal to be having heart palpitations. I was, too. I thought I was going to die. And I didn't want to tell you that it wasn't normal because the last thing I'd see on this planet is you reaching over to kill me by strangling me. And I was like, fair point. Okay. And then, of course, please reference one of our earlier episodes. You'll have to tell me which one it is. It's a callback to the nightclubs of Chelsea. And off we went. I think we went to Nell's, actually, not to be confused with the coffee shop, but we went to Nell's that night. So that's a diner, not a coffee shop. Got it. Tiles. So I think what's sort of absurd is I've now given you what I set out to say this was nerd town and no one was partying, and this is how we would just hang out and have coffee. And you ended with, apparently, my entire memory is faulty, and we got up to shenanigans no matter where we were. But coffee shop culture, diner culture and its demise, that's a thing. And I invite our friend Alex to please weigh in on his favorite coffee shop.

[56:55] Meg: As usual, you have our tie in.

[56:57] Jessica: I nailed it during the break. So we started out with acting up, being a little naughty, but in fact, we have both brought up celebrities in their youth.

[57:09] Meg: Yeah, it's very young. Like a 20 year old celebrity.

[57:13] Jessica: Yeah, they're both starting out in their illustrious careers.

[57:17] Meg: You talked about Colin Quinn.

[57:18] Jessica: Colin Quinn and Vanessa Williams. Now, the next level is to see if their paths have ever met across.

[57:25] Meg: Six degrees of whatever.

[57:28] Jessica: Six degrees of randomness. Yes. So, anyway, tie in.