Why Hamnet (2026) is the Most Important Movie for Mothers


What if the most important person in history was the one nobody bothered to write down? This week, Blane and Coco dive into the mud and "wet leather" of 1580s England to discuss the film Hamnet. While history remembers William Shakespeare, we’re focusing on Agnes—the intuitive healer, the "cunning woman," and the mother who held the family together while Will chased fame in London.
We navigate the heavy waters of "survivor’s guilt" as we discuss the death of Shakespeare’s only son and how that tragedy was channeled into Hamlet. Coco breaks down the "Witch Wound" and why she’s reclaiming the term "Witch" as a badge of honor for healers. Whether you’re interested in "spicy psychology," Shakespearean conspiracies, or the primal nature of motherhood, this episode is an exorcism of history’s greatest lies.
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Have you ever looked at a piece of history and
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realized the most important person in the room
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was the one nobody bothered to write down? Today,
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we're talking about the film that sounds like
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somebody with a head code or a spelling mistake,
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Hamnet, and not Hamlet. It's Hamnet. Stratford
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-upon -Avon, late 1500s. Not the postcard version,
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the muddy, loud, frankly, it smells like wet
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leather and livestock version. But before you
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think, I'm going highbrow literature here. That's
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not what we're doing. Because it's not about
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the dusty old books. It's about the stuff that
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keeps us up at 3 a .m. Movie Monday, Hamnet Coco,
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Mother's Day, yesterday. Yeah, let's kick it
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off, right? Whole two weeks of mothers. But now
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we're going to do two full weeks of mother -themed
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movies, TV shows. We're going all out for the
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moms. Now, how was Mother's Day for you over
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there, Coco? Mother's Day is always great if
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you... Don't demand what you need out of Mother's
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Day. I have a lot of moms that are online are
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like, I hate Mother's Day. Nobody does anything
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for me. It sucks. And I'm like, how do you not
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just plop yourself down on the couch and say,
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day off. Y 'all are taking care of me today.
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Because that's kind of what I do. Yeah. All right.
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But I do. I'm like, I work hard. Today is my
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day. We went to the zoo. Nancy wanted to go to
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the zoo. I'm like, all right. And there was lots
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of moms at the zoo. The zoo was packed. I started
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thinking about it. I was like, why do so many
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moms want to go to the zoo for Mother's Day?
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And I came up with two answers. One, it's because
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they want to leave their kids there because they're
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feral anyway, and they want to keep them at the
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zoo. That's probably not it. I think the second
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part is maybe it's that primal. Part of being
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a mother. You want to be around. Yeah. Yeah.
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Remember when we did Night Bitch? Yeah. There
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you go. You know, like going back to giving birth
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in a pile of hay or something. Yeah. Digging
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in the dirt, whatever it is. But I think that
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might be, there might be a trigger there. There
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might be something that. women connect to. Cause
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for father's day, I don't think I want to go
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to the zoo, but then again, father's day is a
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month later in June and it's probably going to
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be 120 degrees. So there's a, there's a, yeah,
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I don't know. Yeah. I mean, I think part of it
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is moms want not all moms. Let's be honest. No
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judgment. You want to spend a day. My mom was
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one of those that was like, she said to us yesterday,
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she goes, do you, do you guys even remember what
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we did on mother's day? I didn't see you all
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day. She was like, I wanted you gone. I was in
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my room all day. I didn't want to be bothered.
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I didn't want to be touched. But I think for
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a lot of moms, they're like, I do want a day
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with my family. I want to spend it with my kids.
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I just don't want to take care of anybody. I
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just want a break. So it's nice if we can go
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to the zoo, but I can relax and enjoy the zoo
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for once. That's how I see it. I would be like,
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okay, dads. whoever, you know, it's like you
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plan it, you pack the bags, you pack the car,
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you make sure everybody has their water bottles.
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I'm going to get in the car and wait to be taken
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to the zoo. Yeah. No, I see that too. Yeah. I
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see that. Yeah. Makes sense to me. I love the
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zoo though. Love the zoo. Let's get into, let's
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get into movie Monday though. Hamnet. Wait. One
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that you put on the docket probably wouldn't
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have come across my radar. But then again, it
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would have because it did get nominated for a
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bunch of awards. And, you know, you start watching
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this movie. And for me, it took me a couple of
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times to get through this movie. Got to get to
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the beginning. If you're not in the mood for
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something like this, you're not going to want
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to sit there and watch it. So you've got to kind
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of prep yourself that you're going back to the
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1500s. You're going to go. living this dirty
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just i mean it's wet it's raining all the time
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like i just i felt like i needed a bath watching
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it at home yeah pretty realistic and i mean honestly
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that period of time in that place it probably
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was very stinky nobody hours nobody took baths
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there's a reason there was um the bubonic plague
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yeah it's dirty it was a little dirty Yeah, so
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we're in 1580s Stratford -upon -Avon. You know,
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like I said, it's not your pretty postcard version.
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It's not your beautiful scenery movie. Don't
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get me wrong, it is a beautiful movie, but it's
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not going to make you feel clean. And we've got
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a guy named Will, Glovemaker's son, basically
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the Elizabethan version. of his dad has a small
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business and he's trying to not take it over
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like that's what he's got going on he meets artist
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yeah he meets agnes who history calls anne hathaway
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and labels her a shrew who trapped him into marriage
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that's what history kind of lays her out but
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maggie maggie o 'farrell the writer here says
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uh and i'm with her on this says wait a minute
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Not so fast. What if she was, you know, magic?
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What if there was some other stuff that goes
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on with Anne Hathaway and Agnes here? So you
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got, all in all, one marriage, three kids, two
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twins named Hamnet and Judith, and one very hungry,
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very patient fleet carrying the Black Plague.
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That's kind of what this movie comes down to.
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Coco, what'd you think about this flick here,
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overall? Well, you know, the gritty, dirty England
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countryside, all that aside, the aesthetic of
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the movie is absolutely right up my alley. In
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fact, I've been doing a lot of marketing and
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branding work for Prism Healing, my business,
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and trying to figure out what does the branding
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look like? What are kind of the aesthetics? And
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this movie came up as a suggestion. You know,
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those who've been listening to you. me and practically
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magic podcast, or, you know, if you follow me
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at all, you know, I love practical magic. Yeah.
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Covered that in the witch movie project, because
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again, that aesthetic, the general vibe of that
00:06:52.120 --> 00:06:56.300
movie is a hundred percent, you know, what I
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try to help people understand what magic really
00:07:00.879 --> 00:07:04.589
looks like. I mean, You can go really magical
00:07:04.589 --> 00:07:06.329
with it. You can go Harry Potter with it. You
00:07:06.329 --> 00:07:08.709
can be like, oh, you know, magic wand sparkles
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come out. There's something transforms into something
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else and blah, blah, blah. Real actual magic,
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quantum physics, spicy psychology, whatever you
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want to call it. More like this movie Hamnet
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than most other ways that Hollywood could portray,
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you know, what it means to be powerful, what
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it means to be a healer. And I think. That is
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my favorite part about this movie is why this
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show that strength. And, you know, there was
00:07:37.560 --> 00:07:40.939
some criticism. I mean, with witch talk being
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a thing, you know, they're like, it probably
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most likely wouldn't have looked like this if
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she had been what they called a cunning woman.
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But there were many men and women in the societies
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of that time and age and before that, that were
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portrayed as. And the etymology of the word witch
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comes from the person who everyone came to for
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healing and help in some way. And I've talked
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about this before. One of the things I culturally
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love about whales in particular is that they
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had less witch trials during this time period.
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You know, King James and the witch trials that
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started at some point after this. We know about
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that history. But whales in particular, they
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did not see their witches. or whatever their
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word for witch is, the Swinrike, the cunning
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women, they did not see them as evil in any way.
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In fact, they saw them as the person you would
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go to if you were having a problem. Like, instead
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of blaming the witches for cursing the land and
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the crops are dying or the cows are dying or
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whatever, you know, might be going on, rather
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than blaming the witches, they would have blamed
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the Fae. And they would have gone to a witch
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to ask for help. And I think Agnes' character
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in this movie perfectly portrays that type of
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person where she had wisdom passed down to her.
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Her and her brother commiserate over like the
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wise words that their mother had spoken to them
00:09:09.929 --> 00:09:13.070
and how they were taught how to use herbs and
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medicines and help women give birth and things
00:09:16.169 --> 00:09:20.149
like that. You see that come out in them and
00:09:20.149 --> 00:09:23.029
then she's teaching it and that's how she nurtures
00:09:23.029 --> 00:09:27.240
her own children. Yeah. She's intuitive. She
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has visions. She trusts her visions. She's not
00:09:30.700 --> 00:09:32.940
somebody who's like, I think I saw something
00:09:32.940 --> 00:09:35.000
in a dream, but I don't know. That's a little
00:09:35.000 --> 00:09:39.299
weird. She's like, no, I saw this. This is what's
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going to happen. I don't know how it's going
00:09:41.200 --> 00:09:43.879
to come about, but I do know that I saw two people
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at my deathbed. Or, you know, she has these premonitions
00:09:48.600 --> 00:09:51.299
and then she just goes with it. And she's confident
00:09:51.299 --> 00:09:54.940
in what she believes. I just love this movie
00:09:54.940 --> 00:09:59.019
for all of that element. I'm a big fan of Shakespeare,
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you know, being a theater person. Yeah. Shakespeare
00:10:02.679 --> 00:10:08.600
did some cool stuff. Oh, yeah. But, I mean, we've
00:10:08.600 --> 00:10:11.019
praised him enough. Do we think maybe, like,
00:10:11.019 --> 00:10:14.200
over the centuries? Exactly. And we can get into
00:10:14.200 --> 00:10:16.539
all the conspiracies about Shakespeare, who he
00:10:16.539 --> 00:10:19.159
was, was it one man, was it a woman, was it multiple
00:10:19.159 --> 00:10:21.039
people? Like, there's all these questions and
00:10:21.039 --> 00:10:24.299
all this stuff. You know, Do you think, do you
00:10:24.299 --> 00:10:26.779
have premonitions? Is premonitions, are those
00:10:26.779 --> 00:10:29.580
common? Or can we just call dreams a premonition?
00:10:30.100 --> 00:10:32.100
I mean, sometimes they are a dream. Some people,
00:10:32.159 --> 00:10:36.799
that's how they receive their downloads, if you
00:10:36.799 --> 00:10:39.279
will. I text you over the weekend. I had a dream
00:10:39.279 --> 00:10:41.279
about me and you. Oh, yeah, we haven't talked
00:10:41.279 --> 00:10:44.259
about that. No. I was going to ask you, what
00:10:44.259 --> 00:10:48.120
was that about? I have no clue. So you had a
00:10:48.120 --> 00:10:50.539
dream. Tell us about this. Let me text. Let me
00:10:50.539 --> 00:10:53.779
read the text that I sent you here because. I
00:10:53.779 --> 00:10:55.740
was a little busy hanging out at prom with your
00:10:55.740 --> 00:10:57.919
wife. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I was texting
00:10:57.919 --> 00:11:00.379
you while you were out at prom with my wife.
00:11:00.799 --> 00:11:04.340
Yeah. Yeah. But I had a dream. And here it is.
00:11:04.399 --> 00:11:07.279
I said I had a dream that me and you talked about
00:11:07.279 --> 00:11:11.600
back rooms. Like super vivid to the point I actually
00:11:11.600 --> 00:11:15.279
had to look up our recordings and see. I went.
00:11:15.299 --> 00:11:17.460
I did. I got up. It was like middle of the night.
00:11:17.519 --> 00:11:19.559
I went up. I was like, did we talk about this
00:11:19.559 --> 00:11:23.139
or not? We actually were filming this in the
00:11:23.139 --> 00:11:24.679
back rooms. Now, I don't know if you're familiar
00:11:24.679 --> 00:11:27.179
with the back rooms yet, but you will be soon.
00:11:27.659 --> 00:11:29.980
Yeah. Let's just leave it at that. All right.
00:11:30.000 --> 00:11:32.480
Let's leave it at that. The back rooms are coming.
00:11:33.259 --> 00:11:35.759
There's an A24 movie coming called Back Rooms
00:11:35.759 --> 00:11:40.919
also. Oh. May 29th. And back rooms are a different
00:11:40.919 --> 00:11:43.940
genre. It's a new genre. I don't want to take
00:11:43.940 --> 00:11:46.289
away from Hamnet, though. Back to that movie.
00:11:46.389 --> 00:11:49.929
A dream? Yeah. Okay, so I do think information
00:11:49.929 --> 00:11:51.889
comes through dreams. And I think that if you're
00:11:51.889 --> 00:11:56.009
really good at deciphering, this dream felt like
00:11:56.009 --> 00:11:58.549
it meant something. There was a message behind
00:11:58.549 --> 00:12:00.850
it. Sometimes you can even feel that the dream
00:12:00.850 --> 00:12:03.809
didn't come from you. And I don't know how to
00:12:03.809 --> 00:12:06.309
explain that any other way. Just that I know
00:12:06.309 --> 00:12:11.159
that dream wasn't me. Wasn't my subconscious.
00:12:11.460 --> 00:12:14.440
It was like a download from the collective consciousness
00:12:14.440 --> 00:12:17.820
or something. Is that channeling? Is that what
00:12:17.820 --> 00:12:20.220
channeling is? Is that different? What is this?
00:12:20.759 --> 00:12:23.559
I mean, there might be some people wiser than
00:12:23.559 --> 00:12:27.379
me and in a different way that would say it's
00:12:27.379 --> 00:12:29.340
different or that there's different. I don't
00:12:29.340 --> 00:12:31.559
think so. I think that the channels in which
00:12:31.559 --> 00:12:34.720
something comes from the ether, the collective
00:12:34.720 --> 00:12:36.139
consciousness, whatever you want to call it,
00:12:36.159 --> 00:12:40.110
the universe, it's coming. In just different
00:12:40.110 --> 00:12:43.250
ways. I think people can feel it in their body.
00:12:43.389 --> 00:12:47.250
They can hear it through their clear audience.
00:12:47.669 --> 00:12:49.789
You know, there's different gifts that we receive
00:12:49.789 --> 00:12:52.490
information. But I think it's about developing
00:12:52.490 --> 00:12:54.690
those gifts and being more into it, allowing
00:12:54.690 --> 00:12:57.009
yourself to be trusting your intuition. Like,
00:12:57.070 --> 00:13:00.769
I feel this in my gut. I feel that this is, you
00:13:00.769 --> 00:13:02.590
know, I'm being led to this or I'm being told
00:13:02.590 --> 00:13:05.840
this or however it comes to you. And I think
00:13:05.840 --> 00:13:07.440
it can come to people a lot of different ways.
00:13:07.600 --> 00:13:10.980
I don't think there's anybody more gifted than
00:13:10.980 --> 00:13:14.700
anyone else. I think there's people who develop
00:13:14.700 --> 00:13:17.639
the gifts, who develop the skills, and who lean
00:13:17.639 --> 00:13:19.539
into it. I think there are others who are like,
00:13:19.639 --> 00:13:21.879
I don't know anything about that. Woo -woo is
00:13:21.879 --> 00:13:24.840
weird to me. And they're not interested in developing
00:13:24.840 --> 00:13:27.679
those gifts. You mentioned the universe playing
00:13:27.679 --> 00:13:30.500
a part in this. And I think it did because you
00:13:30.500 --> 00:13:32.899
got all this stuff going on. And the real gut
00:13:32.899 --> 00:13:37.139
punch is... Tell me this doesn't feel like a
00:13:37.139 --> 00:13:41.179
modern thriller slash drama. You know, you get
00:13:41.179 --> 00:13:44.399
the plague creeping through England and it's
00:13:44.399 --> 00:13:48.519
not an if, it's a when. You got Hamnet, the boy,
00:13:48.639 --> 00:13:52.759
and his twin, Judith, sister, getting sick. They
00:13:52.759 --> 00:13:55.679
try to trick death. You ever try to bargain with
00:13:55.679 --> 00:13:59.299
the universe? take me not them that's what this
00:13:59.299 --> 00:14:02.519
11 year old kid does it's what him does and here
00:14:02.519 --> 00:14:06.220
we go the universe being the cold -hearted bitch
00:14:06.220 --> 00:14:10.500
that it can be says deal yeah and that's what
00:14:10.500 --> 00:14:13.019
happens so think about what happens after this
00:14:13.019 --> 00:14:15.879
is there survivor's guilt that kicks in living
00:14:15.879 --> 00:14:18.639
in that house you know does judith feel like
00:14:18.639 --> 00:14:21.639
she's only half of a set that's left because
00:14:21.639 --> 00:14:24.669
she lost this What happened in that scene? That
00:14:24.669 --> 00:14:26.769
scene's incredible, by the way. It's about halfway
00:14:26.769 --> 00:14:31.389
in the movie when they try to trick Death and,
00:14:31.529 --> 00:14:35.049
yeah, Death takes Hamnet. There's an X -Files
00:14:35.049 --> 00:14:39.649
episode about that. There is, right? It's occurring
00:14:39.649 --> 00:14:43.370
to me just now. I'm like, you see Death coming
00:14:43.370 --> 00:14:47.470
for you and you turn your head. Scully is going
00:14:47.470 --> 00:14:50.850
to live forever because she turned her eyes away
00:14:50.850 --> 00:14:55.919
from Death. This is a powerful story because
00:14:55.919 --> 00:14:59.879
it doesn't just give us the snapshot of the Shakespeare
00:14:59.879 --> 00:15:02.519
family and what happened to them. It's about
00:15:02.519 --> 00:15:06.519
this trauma and grief that shatters and ripples
00:15:06.519 --> 00:15:10.600
through, you know, generations. I truly believe,
00:15:10.799 --> 00:15:14.179
and, you know, some people talk about this in
00:15:14.179 --> 00:15:16.200
the witch community of, like, the witch wound.
00:15:16.320 --> 00:15:18.600
Things that happened in that period of time.
00:15:19.279 --> 00:15:24.019
This was pre... witch hunt, witch trial time.
00:15:24.259 --> 00:15:27.440
But it was still like, you know, Christianity
00:15:27.440 --> 00:15:29.779
being what it was at that time, it was creeping
00:15:29.779 --> 00:15:34.059
in, right? Like, no, King Henry VIII was also
00:15:34.059 --> 00:15:38.000
suspicious of witchcraft and would accuse and
00:15:38.000 --> 00:15:42.159
behead those that he felt were using malicious
00:15:42.159 --> 00:15:45.139
witchcraft against him. So it was creeping in
00:15:45.139 --> 00:15:46.740
as something that people were starting to fear.
00:15:47.440 --> 00:15:52.539
You know, this... plague i mean so many people
00:15:52.539 --> 00:15:55.639
losing family members how can that not ripple
00:15:55.639 --> 00:15:57.519
through the generations afterwards of people
00:15:57.519 --> 00:16:02.139
losing children and you know holding their own
00:16:02.139 --> 00:16:04.120
child in their arms while they died i mean it's
00:16:04.120 --> 00:16:09.779
just oh the heaviness and tragedy of it so powerful
00:16:09.779 --> 00:16:14.139
yeah that agnes shares and william as well i
00:16:14.139 --> 00:16:17.440
mean that they share in this he's kind of a little
00:16:17.440 --> 00:16:19.200
bit removed because he's living in london you
00:16:19.200 --> 00:16:22.250
know writing plays and doing that removed from
00:16:22.250 --> 00:16:24.429
his family. And we know that, but there's this
00:16:24.429 --> 00:16:26.250
connection with them. There's this connection.
00:16:26.250 --> 00:16:29.409
And that that scene at the end where they share
00:16:29.409 --> 00:16:31.429
in that grief, where she realizes he wrote this
00:16:31.429 --> 00:16:35.169
play Hamlet in honor of their son. And she's
00:16:35.169 --> 00:16:38.070
on the edge of the stage reaching out for him.
00:16:38.110 --> 00:16:41.909
Oh my gosh. I get chills all over my body. How
00:16:41.909 --> 00:16:44.669
can you not? It's hard, but let's, let's talk
00:16:44.669 --> 00:16:47.049
about will. And you said it like he's living
00:16:47.049 --> 00:16:50.159
in London. He's becoming the bard. Yeah, he's
00:16:50.159 --> 00:16:53.740
the original himself. He's the original. I'm
00:16:53.740 --> 00:16:56.600
doing this for the family dad who was never actually
00:16:56.600 --> 00:17:00.980
with the family. You know, how many of us have
00:17:00.980 --> 00:17:03.919
used the hustle or the career as a shield from
00:17:03.919 --> 00:17:07.500
keeping from dealing with heavy stuff at home?
00:17:07.819 --> 00:17:10.380
He's writing. Think about this. Think about this.
00:17:10.519 --> 00:17:15.539
He is writing fucking comedies while his son
00:17:15.539 --> 00:17:20.240
is being buried. Is he a genius? yeah is he a
00:17:20.240 --> 00:17:23.180
deadbeat maybe a little bit you know i think
00:17:23.180 --> 00:17:25.980
so but it's the tension we all feel for sure
00:17:25.980 --> 00:17:28.880
i mean yeah i mean this is where you go back
00:17:28.880 --> 00:17:31.460
to the conversation we've had before about uh
00:17:31.460 --> 00:17:35.359
about mothers and fathers who are artists or
00:17:35.359 --> 00:17:39.960
passionate dreamers ambitious people life in
00:17:39.960 --> 00:17:42.259
in what's portrayed in this movie and book is
00:17:42.259 --> 00:17:45.819
that he didn't want to be a simple you know glove
00:17:45.819 --> 00:17:47.880
maker or tradesman or anything like that. He
00:17:47.880 --> 00:17:49.940
had these ambitions and dreams, right? He had
00:17:49.940 --> 00:17:52.640
these stories to tell. He wanted to be on the
00:17:52.640 --> 00:17:55.259
stage or behind the scenes of the stage, writing
00:17:55.259 --> 00:17:58.140
the words that he wrote. And you see all this
00:17:58.140 --> 00:18:00.819
like passion and I have to be in London. I have
00:18:00.819 --> 00:18:04.160
to be there. And she's like, I can't be there,
00:18:04.240 --> 00:18:06.819
but I know you have to be there and I will support
00:18:06.819 --> 00:18:08.839
you. Right. So she's going to stay home, raise
00:18:08.839 --> 00:18:11.720
the kids out in the countryside. She's going
00:18:11.720 --> 00:18:14.680
to sacrifice having her husband there and available.
00:18:15.669 --> 00:18:17.910
but knowing that this is what he's got to do.
00:18:18.670 --> 00:18:21.029
How many times have we seen a story like that?
00:18:21.130 --> 00:18:23.369
And I'm glad it focuses on her in this movie
00:18:23.369 --> 00:18:26.130
because, again, we're going back to Mother's
00:18:26.130 --> 00:18:29.849
Day themed, but she made the sacrifices to make
00:18:29.849 --> 00:18:34.029
the family work. And so he, you know, even in
00:18:34.029 --> 00:18:36.009
losing his son, but not just in losing his son,
00:18:36.029 --> 00:18:41.250
in day -to -day parenting life, he gets to kind
00:18:41.250 --> 00:18:43.670
of avoid it, right? He gets to see London writing.
00:18:45.590 --> 00:18:49.650
He talked about channeling. He can channel and
00:18:49.650 --> 00:18:53.630
transmute that grief energy and probably a lot
00:18:53.630 --> 00:18:57.869
of guilt. Yep. Of not being there, not being
00:18:57.869 --> 00:19:01.269
with his kids and not being there for his son's
00:19:01.269 --> 00:19:04.369
last moments. All these things channels it into
00:19:04.369 --> 00:19:08.690
the art. Yeah. Hamlet. Right. And I think that's
00:19:08.690 --> 00:19:11.410
it. I think that's a tension that we all feel,
00:19:11.589 --> 00:19:14.789
you know, trying to build a legacy. while the
00:19:14.789 --> 00:19:18.650
foundation is cracking under our own feet. He's
00:19:18.650 --> 00:19:22.430
trying to leave a mark. People trying to leave
00:19:22.430 --> 00:19:25.450
a mark, you don't need to try so hard sometimes.
00:19:26.329 --> 00:19:29.730
Yeah. There's no real winning at it, or there's
00:19:29.730 --> 00:19:32.650
no real right or wrong way to do it. No. I mean,
00:19:32.670 --> 00:19:34.930
you can give a lot of criticism to somebody like
00:19:34.930 --> 00:19:36.289
William Shakespeare and be like, you abandoned
00:19:36.289 --> 00:19:40.089
your family to go be a big star in London. But
00:19:40.089 --> 00:19:44.000
then also, he's Shakespeare. Exactly. And that's
00:19:44.000 --> 00:19:48.220
where I'm going to go, because he's got art,
00:19:48.279 --> 00:19:50.940
and it's basically an exorcism, if you think
00:19:50.940 --> 00:19:53.099
about it. I mean, four years later, he writes
00:19:53.099 --> 00:19:57.559
Hamlet, not Hamnet, after his son Hamlet. People
00:19:57.559 --> 00:20:00.619
think it's about the Prince of Denmark. I think
00:20:00.619 --> 00:20:03.019
it's a seance. You know, imagine being Agnes.
00:20:03.160 --> 00:20:06.019
You lost your son. Your husband has been gone
00:20:06.019 --> 00:20:09.359
for years. And then you hear he's written a play
00:20:09.359 --> 00:20:13.710
called... Exactly the name of your dead kids.
00:20:14.329 --> 00:20:18.650
Yeah. You're not going to just cast that as to
00:20:18.650 --> 00:20:20.289
the side. You're going to go to the theater.
00:20:20.690 --> 00:20:23.450
You go see your husband on a stage playing the
00:20:23.450 --> 00:20:27.289
ghost. The father is the ghost. And the son Hamlet
00:20:27.289 --> 00:20:29.690
is the one left behind. He literally swapped
00:20:29.690 --> 00:20:33.089
their fates on stage so he could talk to his
00:20:33.089 --> 00:20:37.630
son one more time. That's beautiful, right? I
00:20:37.630 --> 00:20:40.230
don't think I've ever seen Shakespeare performed.
00:20:41.099 --> 00:20:43.460
so well than that scene right there i mean yeah
00:20:43.460 --> 00:20:46.380
because there was all this new information behind
00:20:46.380 --> 00:20:49.559
it that just made you your stomach and your heart
00:20:49.559 --> 00:20:52.160
drop and this is the thing about shakespeare
00:20:52.160 --> 00:20:55.640
because a lot of people can have their thoughts
00:20:55.640 --> 00:20:58.960
about it yeah it'd be really boring it can be
00:20:58.960 --> 00:21:02.079
really awful to sit through trust me i know i
00:21:02.079 --> 00:21:04.599
was in theater for many years sometimes it can
00:21:04.599 --> 00:21:09.400
just be like oh yeah but when it's performed
00:21:10.289 --> 00:21:15.450
really well. It is fantastic. We have the Cedar
00:21:15.450 --> 00:21:18.170
City, the Shakespeare Festival here in Utah every
00:21:18.170 --> 00:21:21.450
year, and sometimes those performances are just
00:21:21.450 --> 00:21:24.450
above and beyond. Just absolutely amazing. I
00:21:24.450 --> 00:21:27.190
gotta point out, I love the one scene there when
00:21:27.190 --> 00:21:29.630
they're on the stage in the middle -ish of the
00:21:29.630 --> 00:21:33.670
movie, and he's got two of the actors, two of
00:21:33.670 --> 00:21:36.609
the players, and they're doing the lines back
00:21:36.609 --> 00:21:38.890
and forth, and he keeps saying, again, again.
00:21:39.750 --> 00:21:43.109
Again. And finally, he says, you're just basically
00:21:43.109 --> 00:21:45.549
I'm paraphrasing. He says, you're just saying
00:21:45.549 --> 00:21:49.250
these words. Yeah. Like and I felt that I'm like,
00:21:49.329 --> 00:21:51.130
yeah, you're right. You've got to feel this.
00:21:51.230 --> 00:21:54.309
You can't just be reciting because that's where
00:21:54.309 --> 00:21:56.369
you fall into what you're talking about. And
00:21:56.369 --> 00:21:59.329
it's boring as hell. I'd rather watch paint dry
00:21:59.329 --> 00:22:03.150
or grass grow. You know, like language. I mean,
00:22:03.150 --> 00:22:06.210
gosh, just just to think about how he came up
00:22:06.210 --> 00:22:09.279
with. basically making poetry out of everyday
00:22:09.279 --> 00:22:12.259
conversation. And it's just incredible, really.
00:22:12.559 --> 00:22:16.059
After watching this movie, we watched the Leonardo
00:22:16.059 --> 00:22:19.539
DiCaprio, Romeo and Juliet. And I made my 11
00:22:19.539 --> 00:22:20.819
-year -old watch it with me. And I was like,
00:22:20.920 --> 00:22:27.440
you need to know how incredible these words actually
00:22:27.440 --> 00:22:30.559
are. And that movie is one really great way to
00:22:30.559 --> 00:22:33.319
see how that comes to play. What an incredible
00:22:33.319 --> 00:22:35.619
movie. What an incredible soundtrack for that
00:22:35.619 --> 00:22:40.849
movie as well. Oh, I know. Yeah. 90s. Yeah. We
00:22:40.849 --> 00:22:42.309
can get into more about William Shakespeare,
00:22:42.349 --> 00:22:46.170
but back to Agnes, the mother, and this incredible
00:22:46.170 --> 00:22:51.049
portrayal of somebody who just, if this is how
00:22:51.049 --> 00:22:54.970
she really was, she deserves all this spotlight
00:22:54.970 --> 00:22:59.730
on her in this movie to show. The wisdom that
00:22:59.730 --> 00:23:03.349
she had, the connection to nature, the nurturing
00:23:03.349 --> 00:23:05.950
mothering that she was giving her children, everything
00:23:05.950 --> 00:23:12.329
about her just, it felt like home to me. Or what
00:23:12.329 --> 00:23:15.670
I wanted. Yeah. You know, what I wanted to feel.
00:23:15.849 --> 00:23:18.950
And I wanted to be more like her as a mother
00:23:18.950 --> 00:23:21.809
in this movie. I want my kids to gather around
00:23:21.809 --> 00:23:26.289
so I can show them how to smell. the time and
00:23:26.289 --> 00:23:28.849
Rosemary in the garden and what it's for. And,
00:23:28.869 --> 00:23:31.150
you know, these medicines that grow from nature
00:23:31.150 --> 00:23:34.829
and the way she, when she was getting ready to
00:23:34.829 --> 00:23:37.890
give birth to her first child and she had to
00:23:37.890 --> 00:23:42.349
be in the woods, she had to be, that was so incredible.
00:23:42.470 --> 00:23:44.730
Back to that, like primal, you know, urge to
00:23:44.730 --> 00:23:47.490
be in nature and be around animals. We were talking
00:23:47.490 --> 00:23:49.670
about going to the zoo for Mother's Day. I'm
00:23:49.670 --> 00:23:53.960
like that. Makes sense to me. When they tried
00:23:53.960 --> 00:23:56.279
to keep her from it in her second birth and they
00:23:56.279 --> 00:23:57.880
were like, no, you can't go out there. It's literally
00:23:57.880 --> 00:23:59.619
flooding out there. You can't go to the woods.
00:23:59.740 --> 00:24:03.960
And she's like, I have to be in the woods. I
00:24:03.960 --> 00:24:08.500
just felt that everywhere. Yeah. You do like
00:24:08.500 --> 00:24:14.640
the woods. I do. I loved the imagery. And you
00:24:14.640 --> 00:24:16.279
kind of got a feel for that. Like you talked
00:24:16.279 --> 00:24:19.339
about like the dirty feeling. I wonder if it
00:24:19.339 --> 00:24:21.079
was a conscious choice. It probably was. Obviously,
00:24:21.079 --> 00:24:23.019
everything with movie making was a conscious
00:24:23.019 --> 00:24:26.119
choice. But, you know, more in the house or in
00:24:26.119 --> 00:24:28.940
civilization, it felt dirty. But you notice how
00:24:28.940 --> 00:24:30.400
different it felt when they went out into the
00:24:30.400 --> 00:24:33.680
woods? It was green. It was clean. It was, even
00:24:33.680 --> 00:24:36.079
if it was raining and wet, it was somewhere I
00:24:36.079 --> 00:24:39.460
still wanted to be. Yes, I did notice. Had to
00:24:39.460 --> 00:24:42.200
be conscious. There's no way in hell I would
00:24:42.200 --> 00:24:44.160
ever want to be in the streets anywhere near
00:24:44.160 --> 00:24:48.779
Stratford -upon -Avon. No way. Yeah. What do
00:24:48.779 --> 00:24:50.720
they call them? The chamber pots? Yeah. Yeah.
00:24:51.079 --> 00:24:53.720
No way. It was just like chamber pots being dumped
00:24:53.720 --> 00:24:56.519
out the window into the streets. Yeah. No, no,
00:24:56.559 --> 00:24:58.680
no. Thank you. You know who I just thought about
00:24:58.680 --> 00:25:02.920
was great at performing Shakespeare? Will Friedle
00:25:02.920 --> 00:25:05.599
in Boy Meets World. Remember the episode that
00:25:05.599 --> 00:25:08.539
he. Yeah. Everybody out of the water. And that's
00:25:08.539 --> 00:25:11.059
real. I mean, sure, he's doing it great on the
00:25:11.059 --> 00:25:15.099
show, but he actually performed it. really really
00:25:15.099 --> 00:25:17.519
well i there's there's probably tons of people
00:25:17.519 --> 00:25:20.500
that can perform shakespeare shakespeare really
00:25:20.500 --> 00:25:24.720
well uh but there are a lot more who can perform
00:25:24.720 --> 00:25:29.279
it way way too bad and yeah there can be some
00:25:29.279 --> 00:25:32.440
stiff performances for sure and i have um you
00:25:32.440 --> 00:25:34.660
know we talked about this before on the on the
00:25:34.660 --> 00:25:38.500
podcast but uh i have judged high school drama
00:25:38.500 --> 00:25:40.880
for many years and sometimes you get assigned
00:25:40.880 --> 00:25:44.390
classic scenes And I'm not going to lie. I'm
00:25:44.390 --> 00:25:49.210
a little bit like, okay. Yeah. All right. We're
00:25:49.210 --> 00:25:50.309
going to be listening to a lot of Shakespeare
00:25:50.309 --> 00:25:54.950
today or whatever, you know, sit down. But honestly,
00:25:55.130 --> 00:25:57.769
sometimes it is a little bit like, all right,
00:25:57.869 --> 00:26:00.130
there's some work to be done here. But sometimes
00:26:00.130 --> 00:26:02.450
it's incredible. Sometimes those kids, even high
00:26:02.450 --> 00:26:06.109
school kids, can just pull it together and perform
00:26:06.109 --> 00:26:09.980
like nothing else. And I'm like. Fantastic job.
00:26:10.099 --> 00:26:13.299
Way to go for kind of getting it, like getting
00:26:13.299 --> 00:26:17.160
Shakespeare and portraying it in a way that we
00:26:17.160 --> 00:26:21.660
can understand. And I did see my favorite Shakespeare
00:26:21.660 --> 00:26:24.180
play, Midsummer Night's Dream, at the Globe Theatre
00:26:24.180 --> 00:26:28.539
in London when I was there in 1923. Check that
00:26:28.539 --> 00:26:31.339
off my bucket list. Nice. Did it smell awful?
00:26:31.519 --> 00:26:33.779
Did they still throw the chamber pots in the
00:26:33.779 --> 00:26:35.789
street? What was it going on there? No, it's
00:26:35.789 --> 00:26:37.829
great. It's clean. It's wonderful. They serve
00:26:37.829 --> 00:26:41.450
food. I actually had a seat under the awning,
00:26:41.589 --> 00:26:43.930
but you know, it's, it's built like the old globe
00:26:43.930 --> 00:26:46.289
theater. So the middle is totally exposed to
00:26:46.289 --> 00:26:48.490
the elements and it was raining that day. Oh,
00:26:48.630 --> 00:26:50.769
it felt bad for the people who are standing by
00:26:50.769 --> 00:26:53.049
the stage. Just like you see in the movie Hamnet
00:26:53.049 --> 00:26:55.650
at the end, she, she's right there in the front
00:26:55.650 --> 00:26:58.349
of the stage. People really do stand in the center.
00:26:58.410 --> 00:27:00.690
Like there's no, there's no seats there. Yeah.
00:27:00.750 --> 00:27:06.900
So for two hours, the play that that's how important
00:27:06.900 --> 00:27:11.140
it is to get the entertainment of the day. So
00:27:11.140 --> 00:27:13.660
what's, what's your final thoughts here on him?
00:27:13.720 --> 00:27:20.460
I know, I know. Just remember that witches portrayed
00:27:20.460 --> 00:27:24.180
in this movie is the absolute epitome of what
00:27:24.180 --> 00:27:27.819
I consider to be the witch. Okay. Just have had
00:27:27.819 --> 00:27:31.119
such a negative bias, witchcraft, anything like
00:27:31.119 --> 00:27:35.599
that. for so many centuries now that it is really
00:27:35.599 --> 00:27:38.700
time to look at this movie. Even if it's not
00:27:38.700 --> 00:27:41.500
as accurate as people, it wouldn't have been
00:27:41.500 --> 00:27:43.180
like that in that time. She would have been more
00:27:43.180 --> 00:27:45.799
of a Christian woman. Okay, fine. Because there
00:27:45.799 --> 00:27:48.319
are plenty of Christian witches. Doesn't matter.
00:27:48.740 --> 00:27:52.440
The point is, these are the people in your community
00:27:52.440 --> 00:27:56.160
that you would go to for help, for advice, for
00:27:56.160 --> 00:27:59.220
healing. So when I call myself a witch in the
00:27:59.220 --> 00:28:02.589
community, I... wear that as a badge of honor
00:28:02.589 --> 00:28:05.890
and if i call someone a witch or if i say hey
00:28:05.890 --> 00:28:09.509
that's witchcraft that you just did it's an honorable
00:28:09.509 --> 00:28:13.130
thing i'm talking about and i want that to be
00:28:13.130 --> 00:28:16.089
changed eventually i want movies like this to
00:28:16.089 --> 00:28:19.609
show that that is a real thing there is nothing
00:28:19.609 --> 00:28:22.690
magical or fictional about that in movies like
00:28:22.690 --> 00:28:26.650
this this is what we are engaging with and i've
00:28:26.650 --> 00:28:30.519
had some recent I don't know, pushback on using
00:28:30.519 --> 00:28:32.200
words like witch and witchcraft where people
00:28:32.200 --> 00:28:35.440
are like, well, you know, some people really
00:28:35.440 --> 00:28:37.299
don't like that word. And I'm like, too bad.
00:28:37.740 --> 00:28:40.220
Because guess what? You're doing witchcraft and
00:28:40.220 --> 00:28:42.819
you're doing witchcraft and you're doing, everybody's
00:28:42.819 --> 00:28:45.819
doing witchcraft, guys. How many of you are lighting
00:28:45.819 --> 00:28:49.519
candles and making wishes? Please, come on. It's
00:28:49.519 --> 00:28:51.740
witchcraft. So that's my soapbox for the day.
00:28:51.779 --> 00:28:54.759
I loved this movie. Oh, you're going to get some
00:28:54.759 --> 00:28:57.220
people coming at you for that. We're all practicing
00:28:57.220 --> 00:28:59.519
witchcraft. I guarantee they're going to be coming
00:28:59.519 --> 00:29:04.119
out of the woodwork. All these witchcrafts, all
00:29:04.119 --> 00:29:06.960
of the rituals and rites, all of the, you know,
00:29:06.960 --> 00:29:09.940
you can pull something else if you want, but
00:29:09.940 --> 00:29:11.920
it's still witchcraft. You heard it right here.
00:29:11.980 --> 00:29:13.980
When you put that birthday candle on your cake
00:29:13.980 --> 00:29:15.920
and you blow it out, that's witchcraft, folks.
00:29:16.079 --> 00:29:20.039
Yes. We're going to get a lot of people heated.
00:29:20.480 --> 00:29:23.700
I loved Hamnet. Go check it out. It's on Peacock.
00:29:24.359 --> 00:29:27.660
Peacock put that out. I'll watch it again. It's
00:29:27.660 --> 00:29:29.240
one of those. They'll probably start showing
00:29:29.240 --> 00:29:31.740
this one in schools. Maybe. I don't know. You
00:29:31.740 --> 00:29:35.799
have to be, you know, it'll be controversial
00:29:35.799 --> 00:29:39.579
if they do. But once again, what books in schools
00:29:39.579 --> 00:29:42.299
aren't already controversial these days that
00:29:42.299 --> 00:29:45.359
they're already teaching. So I loved it. I thought
00:29:45.359 --> 00:29:48.519
it was great. Go watch Hamnet. And for the freaks
00:29:48.519 --> 00:29:52.599
out there, you know. When have you had to bury
00:29:52.599 --> 00:29:57.519
something to make something bigger, to make something
00:29:57.519 --> 00:29:59.420
great? When did you have to let something go?
00:29:59.960 --> 00:30:02.599
Yeah. When did you take a loss and turn it into
00:30:02.599 --> 00:30:05.799
art? Maybe not to a level of Shakespeare making
00:30:05.799 --> 00:30:11.700
Hamlet, but where's your Hamlet? Freaks out there.
00:30:11.720 --> 00:30:13.460
This is Parallel Frequencies. I am just playing.
00:30:13.640 --> 00:30:16.319
She is Coco. You are the freaks. We will see
00:30:16.319 --> 00:30:16.960
you on the other side.
















