You are listening to their Reality Steve podcast with your host Reality Steve. He's got all the latest info and behind the scenes juice on Matt season of The Bachelor and interviewing some of your favorite reality stars. Now, here's a reality, Steve. What's up, everybody? Welcome to podcast number two 17. I'm your host reality, Steve. Thank you all for tuning in. A first time guest this week, Ali Barthwell from Vulture Dotcom is coming on in just a moment.

Not a whole hell of a lot to get to before we get started with Ali, as we know, episode two in the books of The Bachelor. And we end with a quote unquote cliffhanger as Sarah passes out at the rose ceremony on Monday night. And so when episode three starts.

We've got the continuation of that rose ceremony. I don't know how many I didn't do the count of how many roses were left versus how many women were left and all that. My guess is they're going from 24, probably down to 20. I'm guessing four get eliminated. I know Sydney is done. I know Sydney doesn't get a rose and no doesn't get a rose, I think Keila doesn't get one. But again, I don't have the details. And, you know, I wrote this yesterday in my column in one of the questions that I was asked in that, you know, these last couple of seasons, I've been getting just as much information as I have in past seasons.

I just haven't been able to get the confirmation of things and certain details about things. So, yeah, it's different. And I don't have episode by episode breakdowns and the exact episode certain women go home. But, you know, I hear stuff like, oh, so-and-so lasted about five or six episodes or so and so lasted about a month and it's just so hard to the second I put it out there of the exact episode, if it's wrong, you know, one detail about the five women that come in, you know, Britney and Ryan and Michelle and the other two that are I'm blanking on right now, the five that come in after a rose ceremony at the beginning of the season.

I had said they come in after the second rose ceremony. Well, the second rose ceremony was Monday nights, and that continues into next Monday's episode. But they don't come in next week. They so I'm assuming that means they came in in the third episode. So, again, it's like one of these things where getting information, I just haven't been able to get the details that I'm usually getting and that I like to get to make it a little more clearer for you.

But you do knew you did know that five women are coming in. You know, the five women that are coming in and it looks like it happens after rose ceremony number three, not number two.

So I will keep you updated. Again, I'm hearing things I think I might be getting closer to, at least giving you your final four. I've given you three of them. You know, look, I think Berry is the fourth one, but I think I might be able to get closer to the breakdown of who goes home when. So, um, yeah, that's what I'm looking at right now. That's my next thing, hopefully to get to you and kind of take it from there.

But without any further ado, let's get going. Podcast number two. Seventeen. OK, let's bring her on, she recaps The Bachelor for Vulture Dotcom. She's a writer on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver and she's a former director of the Second City.

It is Ali Barthwell. Ali, thank you for joining me first time.

Thank you so much for having me. Great to be here. I want to first off, I want to talk to you about something that has me confused right off the bat. We've never spoken before now, so I want to ask something right off the bat. Can you explain your Twitter and handle of W.T. flank steak? I am.

I like when I did a search when I did a search for you on Twitter of your name, it didn't come up. So I had to do a Google search, which then brought me to your Twitter, which is flagstick. What is it? Yeah.

So I got on Twitter, like at the very beginning in like 2009 or 2008 or 2009 and every other sort of social media thing at that point was like you had a user name that was not your name because it wasn't a thing that you were marketing yourself with. So I just picked something that I thought was kind of funny. So I was playing like, WTF. But what this looks like, I just thought it was silly and fun. I didn't know that, you know, ten years later, it would be like a source where people would contact me and I would get job offers and and things like that.

So but I mean, people seem to be able to find me, so I haven't changed it.

Yeah, I was going to say, I mean, it's it's almost a hassle to change. It's almost like changing your phone number. Once you get a new number, you don't want to be the person that tells everybody in your contact list. Hey, everyone got a new number. It's just I've had the same number for the first cell phone I ever had. I got in college in the mid 90s, and I still have the same number.

I just. Oh, yeah, me too. Who's going to change that stuff?

And the same thing with I mean, unless you're deleted off Twitter or banned or whatever, you need to you need to come up some better or something different. OK, I want to I want to get into your background because the stuff that I have read is pretty fascinating. So just give.

Give the audience a little bit on your background, how you got started, when you got started, when you were going through high school and college, what it is you wanted to do.

Yeah. So all through even middle school in high school, I did a lot of theater. I did speech, team speech and debate slam poetry. I did like The Louder Than a Bomb Chicago slam poetry competition in high school. And the thing that I was always drawn to was the comedies like Whenever they would have the play, you know, the plays each year. I would never audition for the drama because I was like, I'm not a good actress, but audition for the comedies.

And so I really focus on that. And then when I went to college, I was like, I still want to perform, but I don't want to learn lines because I imagine I'll be spending so much time doing my homework. That should also give you a clue as to what kind of child I was like, I'm going to be doing my homework. So I started doing improv a sketch. When I was in college, I was on our college sketch team and then when I graduated, I got a scholarship to the second city in Chicago, the improv and sketch theater that you mentioned.

And so I started doing classes and shows and performing all over the city, you know, and grimy bar where the roads would crawl across the stage in front of you. And that would get a bigger laugh than anything you had been doing that night. Because I just I kept performing. I was a member of the Second City touring company, so I was a touring. Nashville is the national touring company doing sketch and improv around the country. And then from there, I started teaching, I started directing, and then I moved into writing for late night just this summer.

Did you have a goal ultimately maybe when you were younger to to be on SNL, since we know Second City is really a feeder to that show, was that was that a goal in the back of your head or was it a I'm going to just do a second city if it comes around, it certainly be interested in it.

Was that or was that never? I think for a lot of improvisers and sketch performers, SNL, it feels like it's the only game in town. Like, that's the big thing to do. And also in my family, we're we don't have a lot of creative performer type people saying, like, what I want to do is like SNL was very easy to explain what I was doing. But then that got transformed into Ali is going to be on SNL.

I was like, oh, I never said that. I just tried to explain to you. And so I always looked at I looked at different performers that I liked. And I would say, oh, I want their career because they get to do interesting projects or they get to create things for themselves or they get to play in sort of a wide variety of roles. So for me, it was never I want to do this one thing or this one show or I have to get this thing.

It was like, all right, let me get to the next level and then see what opens up for me and keeping sort of the principles and things that would make me feel satisfied rather than I'm going to go for this one thing, because you don't get that one thing. You don't get it. You're disappointed if you say, I want to do something where I can write for myself. There's a lot of different avenues where you can write for yourself and still feel satisfied.

You know, comedy is such a subjective thing. I mean, two people can watch the same stand up, two people can watch the same improv show. One person think it's hilarious. One person think it's not funny at all. Same goes for me. I'm a huge standup guy. I've been watching standup on Comedy Central and HBO special since I was in middle school. And so I've always been very critical of standup comedy and who I like to. I didn't like and stuff like that.

I've watched SNL since high school. I it's a huge part of my TV watching and I've actually seen improv in person as well. I like going to improv shows and I've been to some really kind of. I want to say not low budget, because. I don't think the budget matters, it's what's on stage, are they funny, are they not are they putting good content together or are they not? And but I think really top improv, instead of maybe going to a stand up show, I would encourage a lot of people to go to an improv show during one night because it's very interactive, at least the ones that I've gone to where they were literally just call out to the audience and you, the audience, participate and give them a topic.

And all of a sudden they're acting out a scene just like, how are they doing that off the top of their head? I mean, it's really good.

Some of it, like I said, it's a little bit sketchy and it's like, OK, this wasn't listen, I was the I taught improv for years.

So when you say bad improv, I know bad improv. I'm very familiar with, you know, white guys that just moved to Chicago from Iowa. And they were the funny one at their high school. Yeah. Trying out trying out improv. But I would say to people when they would look at what we were doing or trying to sort of conceptualize, I said we all played pretend when we were kids. You know, that's just what we're doing.

But, you know, a lot of the times are playing pretend as ourselves or a slightly different version of ourselves.

And when you're a kid and you're playing pretend you're being honest and you're being present. And those are really scary things. Once we become adults and once we move into our jobs or into school environments. So improv is a place where you as a performer, you get to be present, you get to be honest, you get to explore and you really get to play. You know, when we talk about what we do is we're playing we're playing with each other.

We don't call it rehearsals. We have practice because we're just we're just up there playing.

Yeah, it's it's a really fun show to go to if you get to a good one, like you said. I mean, you've heard you've seen some really bad improv.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, when you teach improv, I know that you say it's kind of like you said, you're practicing. And we all like to make believe at some point exactly what is there.

Is there one main or maybe even a couple main things that you teach someone that just says, I want to do improv? What immediately some some rules behind it that you would tell somebody starting out that thinks they want to do it? Kind of what you need to know getting into that business. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, I think those first two things, if you have to be present, you can't be planning what you're going to do because the other person is going to give you something that you didn't expect. And if you're not in the moment, you're not going to be able to hear what they're going to say. You're not going be able to react. You have to be honest. If something shocks you in the scene, like your character can be shocked.

You can be amused by something. If something makes you angry, your character can be angry. You know, you're being emotionally honest, which is something, again, it's like that's hard for people to do. But in terms of like rules, the the main one that we talk about especially can say this is philosophy of. Yes. And anything that my partner is going to give me, I'm going to say yes to I'm going to agree that that's real and that that's the foundation that we're working with.

And then I'm going to add on to it. So it's not anyone's responsibility to build everything. I'm just bringing a brick and then you're going to put down a brick and then I'm going to put another brick on top of that. And eventually we have a house that's much easier than trying to bring a whole house. And then the other thing that I always say to my students is like my responsibility on stage as a performer is to make my other classmates, the other people, my ensemble to make them look good.

So I'm going to honor the things that they're creating. I'm going to listen to them. I'm going to contribute to what they want to build. If they do something that looks really fun, I'm going to do it with them. And if I'm making sure my partner looks good at my partners, making sure that I look good, everybody's going to look good, everybody's going to have fun. So coming in with that spirit of collaboration and listening and support and acceptance really makes the difference.

And people that can bring that, they can do it. And then once you get that down, because that's really scary for people, then we can work on how do we make a joke, how do we make a character, all that different stuff. But it's a lot of listening. It's a lot of support. It's a lot of agreement. You know, you're wanting to avoid conflict and being harsh or mean to the other person. Maybe your character could be that you as the actor isn't so teaching those skills.

So sometimes I joke I'm teaching you how to be a better person because all those things I say to make you a good person and on stage they make you a good performer. Very, very interesting stuff.

I'm fascinated by that. And that's really cool. Take a break. Talk to you about apostrophe prescription skin care company for people that are ready to take their acne seriously. Prescription acne treatment really works, but it is hard to get you have to take time off to work, see doctors that line at the pharmacy for your medications until apostrophe possibly makes it easy to see a board certified dermatologist online and get treated immediately and your medications are delivered to your home.

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That's a post Tiaro dotcom slash Steve and use the code Steve to get your dermatology visit for fifteen dollars off. And we thank Apostrophe for sponsoring this podcast. I want to move on to your vulture column because there are some questions that I have about it, you do a bachelor recap and bachelorette recap the summer for vulture dotcom.

How long have you been doing them and what made you choose to do this show? So I started with Cristol this season, so I think now that maybe six or seven years ago and so I've been at it for a while. That was the first I had never watched The Bachelor before I started doing a recap.

And that was my next question is when and when I when I started, I had made some reference that I didn't watch the show. And my editor was like, don't say that. They'll eat you alive. You can't do that. And so I really sort of had to immerse myself because there's a lot of law and culture and the tropes and things that go along with it. But I got the assignment because I was in this Facebook group of women writers and we were all, you know, you could posting ideas of what you were working on or ask for help from from different people.

It was like half socializing, half networking. And I was posting about Sex and the City and woman said, oh, this is really funny because you turn this into like a listicle or an article for Vulture. So I started doing lists for Volter and I did a lot of them about I did a few about Sex in the City and other sort of comedy TV shows like that. And then that same woman became the editor of the TV recaps. Her name is Evan Boloney.

She's I credit all success to her. And she said, you're funny and you're fast. Do you want to take on doing The Bachelor recap? So that is how I started. I sort of taught myself how to do it. And before the format that I like, then I've evolved with it as I've gotten more familiar with the show now that I'm six or seven years into it. But that's how I got started. Do you have a favorite season that you've watched since Christmas season?

Does anyone stick out to you more than another does? I prefer The Bachelorette and Bachelor in Paradise to The Bachelor. I think, like, if I have to sit down and watch something, Bachelor in Paradise is my favorite, like just to watch. But all those seasons kind of blur together. And then in terms of The Bachelorette, I think my two favorite bachelorette, they're Kaitlyn Bristo and Rachel Lindsay. I thought they were just sort of coming at it really authentically.

And they felt like real people and they were, you know, really it's probably going to stay a thousand if they're really honest and really, like, present in the thing. And they both sort of broke the show. And in an interesting way, with Caitlyn being really open about her, her sexuality and having sex before the fantasy suite, but sort of not allowing herself to be ashamed of that. And then, Rachel, for being the first bachelorette and really breaking down, I think that putting some of the first sort of cracks in that and the white establishment around the show, and I just really admire both of them and thought they're they're also fun and interesting people on it, people that, you know, guys that I really liked.

So I really enjoyed those seasons.

Interesting. Yeah. I mean, those were those were seasons that I think were pretty. The Kaitlynn one was interesting because they started out with the two bachelorette format, something they'd only done once before years ago on The Bachelor. And, you know, they they tried it with Caitlyn. I think we all knew Caitlyn was going to end up being the Bachelorette.

Right. But it was interesting. It was an interesting start. I don't think they will ever do that again. And two women against each other. But, you know, this summer.

Over the summer is when Mat's announcement was made that he was going to be The Bachelor, this franchise was under a ton of heat for basically being, for lack of a better phrase, being too white for 40 seasons. You know, they never had a black bachelor in 24 seasons. They only had one black bachelorette in 16 seasons. That was Rachel. So then Matt is announced, I believe, June 12th. It was five months before filming began.

And then a few weeks later, we hear the rumblings that Taisha was going to take over Claire's season when when you heard all that and in that month, June into July, what was your response? I mean, I was excited that there was a black bachelor, I thought, OK, fine, it's those things of you don't want there to be any more firsts, but it's twenty, twenty, twenty, twenty one. We shouldn't be getting the new first of the first black person who is the first black person that you sort of want us to be in a place where I want to as a society, we need a place where these things are just fully integrated into our society and we can have representation, have authentic representation of people of color.

And it's not a novelty. So, you know, I was kind of worried that they would make the show a novelty around him. And I also think not knowing anything about him made it really hard to engage with that sort of historic first, because I think Rachel had a really great showing on Mixi all season on Kolten Season and Bachelor in Paradise. We knew who both of them were. So you were excited for the representation, but then you're also just excited to see these people that you know and you like.

So finding out that it was Matt, I was like, who is this guy?

Who who is this person? And I don't think ABC did a good enough job in showing the audience who he is and why. Why? Beyond that, he's very tall and had a lot of abs and is friends with Tyler. Why he would make a good leader for the franchise and what women would see in him as a desirable partner. You know, because I talk about a lot in my recaps for The Bachelor, it sort of built into the show that each man has like a fantasy attached to him.

So like with Peter Webber, he was a pilot. And that's like a fantasy, like their sexy pilot costume that you can buy to surprise your girlfriend on Valentine's Day and that he also had this process of being this really sexual guy. Like there's a fantasy built in and even I don't particularly like crystals.

I didn't like a season, but like the strong sexy farmer is a fantasy story so that you're the type of woman that you want a sexy farmer. You may not care which sexy farmer it is or you're like, I want to go live in the country and live on a farm. But with Matt, I don't think they've done a good job sort of communicating what fantasy like what romance story we're in and why he he is this romantic lead. And so I think the start of the season, you're sort of coming at a deficit and I think.

Before the show and in the first episode, we sort of don't know a lot about him, and he is admittedly not someone who's very open and vulnerable and like forthcoming with that kind of information. And so it's been kind of hard to to sort of understand what story we're going to be told about him, if that makes sense.

Well, you don't even have to say we don't know a lot about it. We know nothing about him, really. We do.

We we it's everything that's been presented to us as a viewing audience so far has strictly been surface level stuff, how good he looks, what he does for charity and the fact that he has a white mother. I mean, that's really all we keep hearing is. And then, oh, we also found out he's never been in love. And those that have heard things about him going back even further has he's never been in a serious relationship in his life.

So what is the appeal? Why did you announce this? Why is he the catch that you announced five months in advance, something you've never done in the history of the show before, that early of an announcement of who your lead is going to be? I think it was coupled with with a few things that happened this summer and the fact that he is I mean, look, he was set to be on classes and so we would have seen him if the pandemic didn't hit.

And he was a cast member on class season. So he would have been on hers, probably was going to get the Bachelor through that anyway. But the fact that he is best friends with Tyler Cameron certainly played a major role in why this guy is the bachelor, because for everything that you laid out, there is no fantasy there just yet outside of the looks department. And we just we don't know anything about him at all.

Yeah, and they could if they if the show if ABC needed to, they could have given him a get to know Matt special. Yeah. Or take in the first hour of the premiere and have it be. You see Matt with Tyler and you see the quarantine fit talk videos and you see the charity and you hear from these people in his life. Because when you get to a certain point on The Bachelorette or on The Bachelor before you become the lead we get, we get to see you.

We get to see how you function in a romantic relationship. We get to see your friends and your family or understand a bit of your story and where you're coming from. So we're like on board for the journey. But yeah, I don't think the show, the show, I believe they probably said we can check this box and there's nothing else we have to do and assumed that the audience was very like clued in to the bachelor cinematic universe of Tyler and Hannity's tick tock, that Instagram and that we maybe have seen him there.

So they don't need to do any extra work, which they did.

They certainly they certainly didn't. You mentioned you know, you mentioned you were a fan of Rachel Enza. You liked her season. And I'm sure you followed a lot of her work post show.

And she's very she's been very outspoken about the franchise, almost to the point of I'm amazed that she has The Bachelor part of the official bachelor podcast, which she constantly calls them out, and rightfully so. They should be called out for some of the stuff that they've done over the years.

And Rachel, one of the thing that's always stuck with me when Rachel has talked about the show is she has said that this show isn't made for people like myself. I don't see this as a black woman who dates in America before she got with Brian. I wouldn't go to the show to see how dating life is like. This is not how black people date. And I've always been curious because I've had a lot of former contestants on who were black and I had on two black girls, one Rose podcast.

They came on this summer and we talked about this. And I've gotten a lot of different answers. So I'm curious to what yours is in regards to. Why do you watch this show if it wasn't for writing recaps that you have since Christmas season, is this a show that would you would watch for fun? And is there anything that you take out of this show or is it just completely mindless entertainment for you?

I mean, I if you asked me back at Christmas season, do I want to watch it? I would have said no. Like, I probably would have said no. I maybe would have tuned in for Rachel's season because, you know, I'm just rooting for everybody to act so like I want them to win.

But I think, you know, the the show one of the things that I notice when I watch the show is how blatant they trade in the same sort of stereotypes and stories.

And it's really easy for the show to. To bank on the audience being white so that they can treat the black contestants or contestants of color with a really outdated edit, so it's really easy for the show to turn any person, any person of color that has an opinion into this angry, scary person. And you see people that are contestants that are maybe from these small towns and don't seem to have a lot of interaction with people that are very different from them interacting with people of color.

Maybe for the first time, you know, there are people still out there that have never interacted with people of color in a meaningful way in their life, and they're able to take their discomfort and their anxiety and turn it into or there's a problem with this person, you know, that this woman of color is scaring me or this man of color is intimidating me. The show trades that a lot of that. So watching it as a black person, you don't I wouldn't want to participate in that because I don't know what they're going to do to be on the in the edit or how they're going to cut around me, all of that kind of stuff.

And then I think there's there's so much built into the assumption of what a a good family is, what a good home town is. You know, what the the right religion for you to be is really built into so many of the narratives on that show that it would be hard if you deviated from any any of that in any way. And not to say that, you know, people of color don't come from good families or don't come from good hometowns of the wrong religion.

But just anything that isn't a white heterosexual person from a small town that goes to church and their parents are still together is wrong. And if you deviate from that in any way, then you're scary and you're weird and you're something we have to think about, something we have to like, talk about and address, you know, and I think about that. Higgins, when he went on his hometown, he was from Warsaw, Indiana. And I went and looked it up just to be like, all right, what is there anything funny that happened in this town that I can make jokes about?

So I looked it up on Wikipedia and there's a section of the Wikipedia about the Klan that was from there and that it was this hotbed of Islamic State. If I'm dating him, I don't want to go on a hometown visit. You know, if the people they're looking for to promote this sort of wholesome American life, but for a lot of black people, those wholesome American towns are full of danger, are not going to be welcoming. So there's a lot of factors that sort of put up a a higher barrier for people of color to to cross over to be able to.

Even to be on the show and then to be successful on the show, so I don't think it's set up for people of color, particularly black people.

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Well, for the longest time, this show and its higher ups have always thrown out this statement of, well, we haven't really been the most diverse in our casting because we just don't get a lot of black people that apply, which may be true. But the reason black people don't apply is because why would they?

This show isn't right. This isn't this isn't representative of their dating life. So it's a kind of a chicken. And the egg theory, when you think about it with the production and I look, I understand their answer that and look, I guess we technically don't know because we don't see their applications that they go through. And if they have 10000 applications and less than 100 are black people, then, yeah, they probably don't have a lot to choose from.

But again, it goes to well, there's a reason they're not applying. And I don't know if they've ever understood that until maybe recently when they had to. They took a lot of heat this summer. And, you know, the batch diversity campaign started up on Instagram that got over 150000 signatures to it to can we please have a lead on this show after 24 seasons? You know, that's BIPAC, you know, and they finally did. And it was coming.

There was no way after what happened this summer. And then the with the racial injustice and the fact that that campaign started up, I didn't think there was any way that. You know, first of all, the way the announcement was very quickly, they didn't do it like they usually do it with a lot of pomp and circumstance. It was like, oh, by the way, tune in to GMA tomorrow. And then even saying we're going to announce a new bachelor.

It was just the bachelor saying tune in to GMA tomorrow morning and then we find out that morning. Oh, Matt James is our bachelor. But the other thing being that, you know, they had all summer to if they would have done it normally, I was just under the impression like they can there's no way that this show can just roll out a twenty fifth white guy to be their bachelor. They will get crucified after what's happened this summer.

And and there it was. I literally said that I think a week before Matt was officially announced, I didn't know was going to be Matt.

But it's there. And I think if but the other side of that is if you think about the scale and the magnitude of the protests, the demands for justice, the visibility of the Black Lives Matter movement this summer, without that, they would not have ever I don't think they would have ever cast a black bachelor, you know.

So it just takes but again, thinking about like the level of work that everyone had to do to put pressure on ABC. And the production company is so much higher to get a black bachelor cast when to be a white guy and get cast, you just have to, like, make it to the top three and like maybe do some good. But there's no other you know, there's no requirement. But for a black bachelor to get cast, the entire system of our country has to be challenged and thought about and like, you know, so many things upended.

It's just the ask is too high. So are we going to get another black bachelor or does that sort of movement have to happen again? I don't know. I depending on what happens with that, I don't know when we'll see another black bachelor.

Yeah, I mean, I had this talk last week and maybe it was the week before on the podcast. And I think it's something to where we're going to need a few seasons to pass because we've we had Teisha, we had Matt. If our you know, the next bachelorette starts filming in March, we don't know who it is yet. But if the next bachelorette, say, is a white girl from either the season or from a season past, I don't want to immediately jump down the show's throat and say, oh, well, look, they gave us two in a row.

Now we're done. I think we need to see the next, I don't know, five to ten leads. If we get one out of the next ten, then was this just a summer thing in a summer of racial diversity then? Yes, it probably was, but I don't think we can do it just based off who the next one is or even the next one. After that. I think we need a good maybe five to ten more seasons and then see after the back to back of Tatia and Matt, how many in the next ten seasons were BIPAC?

Let's see how it goes then.

And I also wonder if there's going to be a movement to the other side that pops up. I remember when I was in college, we would have like a big concert every spring and it was like a popular recording artists, you know, The Decemberists or it was Ludacris one year. But my freshman and sophomore year, one year it was Lupe Fiasco, and the next year it was Sean Kingston. And I think those two artists is also dating me in terms of my age.

But they were the two artists that I remember when Sean Kingston was announced. All of these people came out of the woodwork. And we're posting on our, like, college message board. And they said it's unfair that we have to rap artists in a row. Not everybody likes rap. And first of all, we were like, Sean Kingston is not a rapper. Like he is a small he's a reggae child. Like this is not what's happening.

But does that sort of like two years in a row? There was a black artist and the response from a lot of people in the community was, why are we doing this? Like, why does it have to be ready to shove it down her throat that hip hop is a genre and we weren't doing that. That wasn't what was happening. But I would be interested to see what who from this season sparks people as getting the bachelorette edit and who might become that next bachelorette?

Or if they cast someone from a different season, like how they picked Claire coming into her season. And sort of the undercurrent will be what we did say. So we did that. Let's go back let's go back to what we really want, what we like kind of feeling and what we think the audience wants, because that's what they've been used to for 40, 41 seasons now.

Yeah, right. It'll be interesting. We just we just don't know. It's still too early. The next bachelorette, you would think would probably come from this season and then the next bachelor most likely, which starts filming in September, is going to come from the cast of. The next bachelorette season, which we don't even know yet, so the next bachelor is probably out there and we haven't even heard of him yet and we haven't seen how he's acted.

We haven't seen how far he's gotten. We haven't developed any sort of connection to him yet. And then you have this summer with paradise, maybe a former contestant shows really well in paradise this summer and America gets behind him and there's some ground swell heading into September. We just don't know. There's too many unknowns. Yeah.

And I think it's going to also be, in my opinion, a bit of a disservice to the guys that were on clarinettist this season. If the next bachelor comes out of whoever The Bachelorette that season is, because I think there was a real shift in the type of guy they looked for, for Claire.

And then that ended up being going to sort of that top three or four for Tatia in that there was more racial diversity. The men were older, they had more life experience. You know, one of the things I'm noticing with Matt is he doesn't seem to have a lot of romantic life experience. And so when he is talking to the women, he's just running through like a Rolodex of approved bachelor phrases in his head. But the guys that were on Claire and Taisha season that were maybe divorced or have gone through some actual life experience and came out the other side with this really amazing perspective and men that seem to be doing a lot of work on themselves.

I think there's a big pool of men there, too. And if they want to cast a man of color, there's a bunch of guys from plantation season and there's a bunch of guys from other seasons that have a bit of an audience, have a bit of a following that people want to see that I think we can we can pick people that would make for good television. And that have something to say about themselves, in addition to who's going to look good with their shirt off?

Well, you know, it's funny you mention I was going to ask you kind of my next question was almost like, so we're two episodes into Matt season, you know, give me your overall view on this guy. But I think you've kind of already said it. Like, he just seems to be a guy who is already well versed in spouting off bachelor cliches that we've heard for twenty five seasons. Like there's nothing there's nothing deep about him that we know yet outside of his conversation that he had maybe the first night with Chris Harrison, which Chris Harrison doesn't need to be the person having that conversation.

But, you know, the fact that he said, I feel like I'm almost stuck, you know, the black community, if I basically without saying it, he said, if I pick a white girl, the black community is gonna get mad at me. And if I play like a black girl, then, well, what what's wrong? You know, what is wrong with that? If he picked a black girl.

So outside of that, I don't there's nothing deep, but we're only two episodes in who knows where it's going to go from here. But your thoughts? Two episodes in outside of him spewing bachelor cliches. Where are you at with Matt?

Yeah, I mean, I think one of the biggest things that's sort of my struggle with him is I just don't think he's very charismatic. And when I see him with the different women, he seems to just sort of be the same with each of them. So it's hard to even in the first two episodes, you can kind of get a sense of like, oh, he he's The Bachelor is really attracted to this woman, even if she doesn't end up being the one that he picks, but he's really attracted with her or he has a very fun, flirty relationship with this woman over here.

But for Fermat, it's just sort of all the same with everybody. And I think it might be nervousness. It might be that maybe he didn't get the media training that he needed before he went on the season. But I think there's sort of a lack of he is in the game like a lack of experience.

We know he we know he's never been in a serious relationship. He's admitted he's never been loved before. So how does a guy who's twenty eight now, twenty nine, I believe, who's never been in love, how do we expect him to just be this Rico Suave on dates. I think he's still learning how to date women it seems like.

Right. And so it's it's hard to watch because I'm just sitting here going, these women are going to eat him alive. You know, if you're coming into a situation where you have to manage a lot of people's feelings, manage a lot of people's expectations, you have to perform your affection and love and feelings for people.

If you're not skilled at that sort of like high level social and emotional management, that's the kind of person that is going to get taken in by B.S. and it's going to get taken in by people maybe lying to him or misleading him. And I think we're already sort of starting to see it with Victoria. Like anybody with like a bullshit detector is going to look at him, look at Victoria and be like, no, thank you. What are you telling me?

But Matt seems very concerned and like, why would it why would a woman lie on the television program, you know? So it's like I'm like, sweetie, no.

Yeah, he seems like yeah. He's like, you know, he gets to the big city and he gets marks and then ask them for directions like we get out of here.

Well, that's that was my next topic of conversation was was Queen Victoria. It's funny because you have this background in improv and acting. And I've been asked literally fifty times since last Monday's premiere, is she a producer plant? Is she an actress that's being paid to act this way on the show? And I'm just like. Well, no, because they're not going to they don't pay the contestants, why would they go out of the way to pay her?

Of all people? They don't need to. She's she's completely unself aware of her surroundings and how she comes across to people. That's that's clear as day to me at least. She's very insecure and she's just projecting it on everybody else. It's we've seen this type of character on the show before. What we're seeing out of Victoria is nothing new.

Yeah. And I think they don't need to hire an actor because they can the producers can manipulate and suggest until they get what they want and get what they need. And so they found they may be found in Victoria, someone that they can really amp up and get her going for what she might she might not, you know, sit Marylynn down and be like, I'm going to walk away. But she probably has been that person in the friend group that everybody had to have a meeting about and be like, guys, we can't keep inviting Victoria.

Every time we go somewhere, she gets kicked out or she gets in a fight with the bouncer like that. That person exists. And I think what is frustrating in watching it is, one, it's so transparent to the audience of what she's doing. She's just trying to start a fight so she can get Matt to comfort her or, you know, believe her side of the story or someone annoys her.

She can't call the manager so she can get Matt to get that person out of there. But then the other part is sort of like the bigger metanarrative is on the season where we have the black bachelor basically sit down and say, I'm going to pick a white woman and you guys can't be mad at me. And then Victoria, crafting the story that everyone pretty much agrees is not true about a woman of color and calling her manipulative and toxic and angry and reacting as if she's angry, really angry or scary, like when Victoria is talking to her and going to Matt and Matt buying it, because it's just a very familiar narrative.

But I think a lot of people in the audience and maybe there's an audience now that's watching because it's the black bachelor party or maybe getting more viewers of color who just want to watch and support and now having to sit through a really problematic and bogus narrative that Matt maybe isn't sophisticated enough dating wise to see through. And there's this added racial element that the show is very comfortable to play up, not to mention Victoria's claims against Marilyn.

Our very again, generalizations surface level, you're toxic in your manipulative, that's great, you might think that about her, but can you give us an example of what she did that made her toxic and manipulative? Because we didn't see it. It wasn't shown to us. Now, again, you know, people that are going to defend Victoria are going to say there's stuff that you're not seeing. Well, how can I comment on something that I'm not seeing?

I'm going to comment on how this woman acts on television from what they've showed us. And she's acting like Pepsi's ass.

She's and and two people are allowed to not get along like that happens. Of course, we've all had people in our lives that we have to be around, that we maybe don't get along with. But you either you either learn to get along with that person or you just say, all right, I'm just not going to be with you. And I can say as a black woman, I've definitely had coworkers, classmates, friends of friends that I maybe didn't get along with or I wasn't super welcoming or open to.

And then the next thing that I know, I'm being told that I'm angry, I'm scary. I remember really distinctly I had a guy friend tell me that I made him feel stupid because I asked him very politely to stop. We were running an improvisation and a very politely to stop criticizing the people that were auditioning to their face. And he yelled at me and said that I made him feel stupid for, like, trying to look out for somebody else.

So I definitely have been on the other I've been to Maryland where you're not doing anything. You just existing or trying your best to get along with someone that's really hard to get along with or you maybe wouldn't be friends with in another situation. But that gets turned around on you very easily, that you're angry, you're scary, you are toxic. You're bad for the environment because it's really easy to project all those things onto a person of color if that's not someone you're used to being around.

And as far as we have seen, Marilyn at no point raised her voice, started acting crazy in any way, toxic in any way. Everything that Marilyn has showed us from her end has been like. Help me understand why you're upset.

You know, almost coming at too nicely and even being like, well, I'm going to apologize because that might shut you down. Yeah, and I can move on with my day. I'm going to say that.

And it just has no Victoria's decided in her mind because she's probably a person where you either she loves you or she hates you, you know, or you're you're a supporter or you're a hater. There's no in-between like, she's very seems very rigid in how she moves through the world.

So once she decided that you don't get along with Marilyn, she doesn't get along with Marilyn and everybody else can kick rocks.

Yeah. And I think I mean, it's pretty clear by the promos that this isn't the last we've seen of Victoria. She's certainly not going to be someone that wins or even gets to the end, but she's going to be the early season girl that everybody talks about that because you watched the show last night.

Oh, that Victoria girl is great.

I mean, that's all anyone's talking about today is Victoria, because there wasn't I mean, Bree's date sure went great. Sarah's date, you know, again, it's this issue of. The show just loving the trauma stories from people's back from from their back stories that they are just begging for them to tell the audience or tell the lead and the lead kind of acting like, you know, look, I wrote it today, either Matt was told by a producer, look, she's got some issues with her dad.

See if you can get out of her or.

Yeah, he specifically knows that her dad has ALS and he just wants to ask her. So she will say it on screen. Either way. I just it's that trope is getting old on the show to use your trauma to, you know, sharing your trauma means you're now vulnerable. And if you didn't share it, I guess it means you're not vulnerable and you're not willing to open up, which is just a joke.

Yeah. And I said it in my recaps last season and then also this season. But this idea of vulnerability is becoming transactional. And, you know, you thought to kind of dangle it over guys of like, well, you haven't opened up and I really need to know that or we're not going to be able to go any further. And you see Matt repeating, I want I want to be vulnerable. I want you to be vulnerable so that forces your hand, not just because I think in the past that has been contestants coming on with a story and trying really hard to get that story told.

But I think now we're seeing the lead put pressure on people to be vulnerable and to open up without building the trust required for vulnerability and intimacy. I remember I'm I'm dating someone and we're in a very, very serious. But when we first started dating, it took me a few weeks to tell him that I went to therapy regularly because I didn't know how he would react, because that's not something that you are open about in certain situations. But we had to build trust to be able to tell each other, here's the thing that I do for my mental health.

Here's what's going on with me mentally. Here's what's going on with my family that, you know, you have to build up intimacy to be able to talk about them. And vulnerability isn't a substitute for intimacy. It's a way to it's a way to build intimacy. And it's a reward when intimacy is built, even though like using the word reward. But I think the show is trying to appear more involved than it is and in touch with people being more comfortable talking about being in therapy, talking about their trauma.

But now it's become transactional, that it's like points that you get. And if you build up enough vulnerability points, you win, you get a kiss or all these different things.

Yeah, no, it's just it's getting old. I don't I hate the way they're doing it. I mean, you know, you mentioned Tatia last season. The one thing that I really that really bothered me about, about the whole thing with with Ben was the fact that she kept saying that he won't open up enough and that here's a guy who admitted to a 15 year eating disorder on national television and then admitted to trying to commit suicide twice in the last three years.

Like I'd say, that's opening up, especially on a television show.

He didn't even need to tell you that. I mean, at least on camera.

And someone you know, if you are familiar, I grew up with both of my parents are doctors. They both work in mental health professions. My mom works in addiction, my dad's psychiatrist. So, you know, we talk about these things a lot, but hearing that someone has an eating disorder and then that they felt they were moved to a suicide attempt, that the person that opening up and control is probably part of their mental health issues. You know, like that's a person that you maybe shouldn't push to do anything they don't want to do without them feeling comfortable because they have a they've shown you clearly.

Here's what I do. If I don't feel in control or I feel threatened or scared or vulnerable and not that you shouldn't push someone but be aware of like, I can't open this up and then walk away or I can't ask you to be vulnerable without then taking care of whatever the feelings might be a result of that. And then you end the show.

It's not it's not built into the show in any way for that to happen, because when you're taped over your death over and then you talk about the quote unquote reward for opening up and gaining these vulnerability points, when Ben did open up and tell her his feelings for her, what happened? She kept him after sending him home. His whole thing was, I'm going to come back and tell her I loved her because I missed that opportunity. And that's clearly why she sent me home.

And then he did come back and tells her that and she keeps him. So it's like she there was a reward factor there. And that just adds.

And I also I also have to say, if you think about the things that she did that twice, where someone came back and said that they loved her and she kept them, she did that with Bennett. So. I wonder if there's something in the way that we tell women, if a guy says he loves you, you have to let him stay.

If he's if he's if he's hurt your feelings or he's not who you want, but he says he loves you, you have to let him stay. And you hear from Teisha, she's the she was the person in her marriage that maybe tried to make it work or identified in her own behavior of like I tried really hard to make it work when it maybe wasn't working, that that is a pattern that used to be on the lookout as the lead of like, I can't just take everyone that says they love me.

I have to be able to make this hard decision.

Well, this is this is certainly going to be an interesting season and how it plays out. We there's still a lot that has to happen, a lot to uncover. I this has been a great conversation with you. And I kind of I want to end it on this that I that I saw on your Instagram because I'm now an even bigger fan. You posted in November of twenty nineteen, I think it was with your boyfriend.

You were at Survivor series, so we were how now the other thing about this that I that I like and now knowing your background with Second City is I don't know, are you a huge wrestling girl, you're big into the WWE or was it something?

I've gotten into it because so my brothers were both into it when we were kids. And then I've gotten into it more and my boyfriend has been able to sort of explain things and put it in and references that match things that I'm into. And he was oh, he was so smart. He made he had me watch total divas. Yeah. Because I love trashy reality. So he's like, get to know them and then we'll watch them on the run and smackdown.

I was like, oh you are smart but no I'm this is the storyline and storytelling aspect of it is the thing that's really interesting to me. And I sort of I joke and say that it's soap operas for men. Yeah. Because they can't, they can't cry so they punch. Yeah.

No, unless it's back in the day. When I was working in radio, a former radio partner of mine said wrestling is soap opera for rednecks. That's what he described it as. And it's it's definitely a soap opera. And over the years, like, if you think back 20 or 30 years, you think more about the wrasslin part of it, the actual wrestlers themselves and what Hulk Hogan did or whatever nowadays. And you've watched probably raw and Smackdown enough.

Now you see a lot of a three hour roar or a two hour smackdown, a lot of it. In fact, most of it. And I know there's websites that dedicate the time to this is more about your mike work rather than wrestling matches. And Mike work all stems from a lot of these wrestlers. In fact, all of them have to take improv classes before you get called up to the main roster and stuff like that.

They are taught how to speak because they are on live TV every week. These shows are not taped in advance. You're watching three hours of Raw live on Monday night, assuming, you know, you live on the East Coast and Central Time. You're watching it as it's happening. Same with Smackdown on Friday nights. And that's kind of the fascinating part when you talk about the storylines. I knew you'd be into that because this is what it is. This is it's storytelling.

It's not about the punches in the chair, shots to somebody's back or whatever. That's just kind of the silliness of it. People are into wrestling because of the stories and the characters, which is something your background is kind of right up your alley.

Yeah. And I joke when I talk to guys and my guy friends that are maybe hesitant to watch The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. I go, it's wrestling the the man is the belt, the bachelor is the belt. And they're all fighting for the belt. And there's there's there's heels and there's faces on The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. There's factions and there's storylines and there's you know, there's so many now I'm going to get a little highfalutin, but there's so many like theater traditions that rely on recognizable tropes and characters and storylines.

And you're just watching them be customized for the audience or the location. So, you know, Commedia Dell'arte and Kabuki and and some of the original improv troops where all of these sort of they had a template and then they just put in the name of the king, you know, and we're going to play the same scene. But when we go to this town, we're going to do it about this king. And and wrestling is the same way that some of the runs that people make for championships, they follow one of a couple patterns, you know, and the run up to who wins the heart of The Bachelor and The Bachelorette.

It follows one of a couple patterns. So we're just we're just humans that like watching stories and like watching characters. But more importantly, we like watching things that we recognize. And we like, oh, they said the thing when they're supposed to say the thing and they said they said that thing and then they said it again, like, we love that stuff. So, yeah, I sort of use use one to talk about the other and use another to talk about the other.

But I mean, it also is beneficial because we can go to Survivor series that was for his 30th birthday. So I always kind of have a birthday gift or a Christmas gift picked out or some tickets or a shirt or something like that.

Yeah, no, that was. And it's and it's crazy because I mean, I've been watching wrestling since I was in sixth grade and covid has obviously changed things. It's a different show now. And for nine months these guys are performing in front. No crowds. And anybody that's not familiar with WWE doesn't understand how much the crowd shapes which direction characters go.

Your whole job is to feed off the crowd, whether you're in the ring doing a promo or whether you're in the ring conducting a match. You're constantly looking for the gratification or the negative reaction from crowd to build on what you're doing. And for ten months now, these guys haven't had it. And it's been really, really interesting. You can tell who's risen to the top and who's gotten better on the mic and in telling a story versus those that haven't.

Yeah, and I think it's interesting to look at also at the WWE, which is like I always joke, my book is going to be about racial stereotypes in the WWE, in The Bachelor whenever I get around to writing a book, but looking at like the tropes and the stereotypes that wrestling relies on and, you know, seeing a character, it's like they're not working this way. But it's the fact of black guys sort of put gold chains on them and make them do like raps or whatever.

So looking at that also and there's no there's no system of reaction now. There's no way to know what's working, what's not. So they're just really throwing stuff against the wall. And you're right, the people that are able to succeed on able the characters that are able to be themselves and feel authentic and natural. So that's interesting to watch and it'll be fun to see what what things stay when crowds return and what and same with The Bachelor. Like, what about the format that we're looking at now of them being on one resort and, you know.

Limited travel, whatever, what part of that stays, what part of that goes because I think on plantation season that resulted in a lot of deep conversations and plantation sort of knowing very quickly, oh, no, this is what I want because I didn't have to do a lot of the other bullshit. And it'll be interesting to see if that happens with Matt, if Matt is able to sort of push through the awkwardness and dive deep for sure.

Great conversation, Ali. I really appreciate you coming on. This was a lot of fun. I'm so glad you're Toby fan. Yeah, thanks for having me.

We will we will definitely be reading your recaps there on Volcom. I go up every Tuesday after the show airs on Monday.

And obviously you said you worked for your writer for last week tonight with John Oliver. Very familiar with that. You guys have won quite a few Emmys world. They have won. You just started, right?

Yes. I haven't I haven't won any yet. And despite what my mom thinks, I'm not grandfathered into an Emmy. She's already started telling all her friends that I'm about to be grandfathered into an Emmy. But we come back with new episodes in February. OK, nice.

We'll be looking for that as well. Ali, thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me. You got it. Thanks so much to Ali for that great conversation, first time we ever had her on, I guarantee she's going to be on again at some point because her insight and her knowledge of this franchise had no idea she had started back on Christl season. But great to hear from her.

I really loved her insight on this show and. The lack of diversity and why she watches stuff like that. That was great. Thank you, Ali, so much for coming on. And again, thank you all for listening. I appreciate it.

Two hundred and seventeen episodes in the books and we're going to keep going. So thank you all for listening. Please rate subscribe and review and Apple podcasts. Very much appreciated rated five stars. Hopefully leave a comment positive, that'll be great, um, but always if you can, subscribing is probably the easiest thing to do because then you don't have to check. If I have loaded it, it'll be up every Thursday. And just go straight into your podcast.

There you go. So thank you all again for listening. Thank you to Ali. We will be back next week with yet another episode. So until then, I'll talk to you later.