SHOW NOTES: S02E01, "IN THE GAME"
Welcome back, listeners! We missed you! Time to kick off season two.
Our special guest this week is Amy Spalding. Amy is the author of several young adult novels, including Kissing Ted Callahan (and Other Guys) and the bestselling The Summer of Jordi Perez (and the Best Burger in Los Angeles), which appeared on Best of the Year lists for NPR, Kirkus Reviews, the Boston Globe, Cosmopolitan, and Autostraddle. She lives in Los Angeles, and we're so excited to have her on the show.
First, a correction: We refer to Jill Soloway, who is a writer and producer on this show, as "she" in this episode. Soloway's pronouns are actually they/them.
The first person we see in this episode is Alexandra Holden, who plays Becky and whom you may know from Drop Dead Gorgeous, an iconic dark comedy from 1999 about pageant queens. Please enjoy this gif of her character, Mary Johanson. If you haven't seen the movie, we highly recommend it.
Amy talks about how she was Freddy Rodriguez's handler at the premiere of Dreamer: Inspired by a True Story, the Dakota Fanning horse movie from 2005. Here's a sample paragraph from Roger Ebert's three-star review of the film:
"They say girls discover horses right before they discover boys. Whether that represents progress is a question every parent of a teenager must sometimes ponder, but certainly any girl (and a lot of boys) in the target age group are going to make Dreamer one of their favorite films."
(While we appreciate the somewhat cursory nod to debunking gender stereotypes, we have doubts about the quality of this movie. We're sure Freddy was great, though.)
We tried to find picture of the Lava Lounge on La Brea, where Brody suggested Becky's ashes be scattered, but unfortunately, they closed their doors in 2007. In an Thrillist article about LA bars they missed the most, they say of the Lava Lounge, "Who doesn't love cheesy underlit tiki decor?" (We surely do.)
Brenda "cleans" her apartment to the strains of PJ Harvey's "One Time Too Many" in this episode. If you'd like to hear the whole song, you can listen here. (Note that a bunch of people have written "Six Feet Under" in the comments.)
And finally, Jenna mentions that Brody's original song about baby rabbits in a field reminds her of "5000 Candles in the Wind," the song Andy Dwyer sings at Li'l Sebastian's funeral on Parks and Recreation. You can watch that scene here.
Farewell, Becky. We'll miss you almost as much as we miss our favorite tiny horse.