Tell Me About Your Father

For the season 4 finale and 2023 Pride episode of Tell Me About Your Father, Matt spoke with comedian, TV and film actor, and Emmy award-winning writer Bryan Safi. As the co-host of three weekly podcasts, "No Autographs Please," "Ask Ronna," and "Attitudes!" formerly known as "Throwing Shade," Bryan is as much a master of comedic improv as he is a shrewd cultural critic, and political commentator. The child of Syrian immigrants on his father’s side, Bryan grew up gay in a deeply conservative household in El Paso, Texas in which his mother suffered from ongoing mental health challenges and his father - who also had a tough father - was extremely difficult to connect with. Listen as Bryan talks about how he eventually extricated himself from his parents’ home, moving first to New York and then Los Angeles where he’s built a successful career, how he now maintains a relationship with his parents despite their political differences, and how and why he’s grateful for some of the things his father taught him. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

Gretchen Cherington, author of the 2020 memoir "Poetic License," discusses her complicated relationship with her late father, Richard Eberhart, a Pulitzer-prize-winning poet and former U.S. poet laureate. Growing up surrounded by literary titans, Gretchen idolized her father but experienced a disturbing shift in their dynamic during her teenage years. She eventually revealed the truth about her father's inappropriate behavior at a public event nearly five decades later, receiving unexpected support from her father's friends and hearing from other women who had similar experiences with him. She also delves into her father's relationship with his own intimidating father, Alpha LaRue Eberhart, a Hormel Foods executive, and the strange embezzlement scandal chronicled in her newest book, "The Butcher, the Embezzler and the Fall Guy: A Family Memoir of Scandal and Greed in the Meat Industry." Throughout the episode, Gretchen explores the effects of abuse and secrecy, the power dynamics that enable abusers, and the lifelong journey of healing. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

In part one of our two-part exegesis on Succession, Erin and Elizabeth parse the incredible storytelling at play on this show, including the emotional and psychological underpinnings of the motivations and machinations of each slime puppy in the Roy pack, and the daddy issues at the root of this razor-sharp comedic satire about an American family by a sensitive British creator, Jesse Armstrong. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

Actor, director, and bestselling author Andrew McCarthy talks to Erin about Walking with Sam, his new memoir about making the 500-mile-long trek across Spain on the Camino de Santiago with his 19-year-old son. This episode is excerpted from their live conversation at the Cuyahoga County Public Library in Cleveland on May 15th. Andrew opens up about reconnecting with his father after a 30-year-estrangement, the ongoing art of talking about sobriety and divorce with his children, and the surprising, sometimes counterintuitive parenting lessons he’s learned along The Way.  --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

A day after Britain crowned its third Charles as King in 1200 years, Matt and Erin spoke with author Komail Aijazuddin about what it was like growing up gay in Lahore, Pakistan with a father who was the honorary consul to the UK, what it was like being taught how to be a British gentleman at a British-style school in Pakistan, and how he once curtsied for the Queen. Komail talks about how the brutal fallout of British imperialism still resonates across the globe and what the future may hold for the British monarchy.  We discuss the pettiness and tone-deafness of the coronation itself, and how the themes of class and race in the UK are mirrored in the US.  It’s the perfect conversation to give you a little rational distance from all the fawning coronation coverage.  --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

Rockstar Melissa Auf der Maur (Hole, The Smashing Pumpkins) joins Erin and Elizabeth to talk about her professionally provocative father, Nick, a legendary journalist, leftist politician and “unofficial mayor” of Montreal for three decades, where he pinched butts and influenced culture until his death at age 54. Twenty-five years later, Melissa regales us with stories about her unconventional coming of age, which saw her joining Hole to tour the world at age 22, Nick's paternal bond with Courtney Love, the education her relationship with her hard-drinking bon vivant dad provided her with navigating "big personalities" later in life, and that time she had it bad for her father's gravedigger and then recorded a smoldering metal song about it with Glenn Danzig. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

Noted radio DJ Nic Harcourt joins Elizabeth to talk about his difficult relationship with his late TV news anchor father, his own struggles with fatherhood, and putting in the work to rebuild his relationships with his kids. Listen as Nic talks about “blowing up” his life and marriage and the subsequent work he has done to be closer to his children, the acceptance and empathy he now has for his father – who came with his own wounds and was, as Nick has since realized, “just this guy” – and his acceptance for “life on life’s terms.” If you’ve ever been a life detonator, or are the child of a parent who reached for the TNT, this episode might be for you.  --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

What do you say when someone close to you has lost everything? Colin Campbell, author of FINDING THE WORDS: Working Through Profound Loss With Hope And Purpose talks with Erin about losing his two teenage children, Ruby and Hart, who were killed by a drunk driver in a car crash in 2019, leaving him and his wife Gail grappling with their own identities as parents. Colin shares how we can show up for each other in times of acute tragedy and avoid the platitudes we tend to lean on when we don’t know what to say, finding laughter and embracing joy again through creative work and ritual, and what his kids taught him about the meaning of life.  --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

This week, we're highlighting Elizabeth's May 2021 interview with the writer and cultural critic Rebecca Carroll, whose memoir "Surviving the White Gaze" details a childhood with white adoptive parents that left her feeling disconnected from her identity as a Black woman. This episode features a new intro, in which Elizabeth reads from some of Carroll's February 2023 essay on her life since the book came out. In short, her parents have threatened to sue her and she's got Dinesh D'Souza haunting her Twitter replies. Despite this, Rebecca continues to bravely talk about her experience as a transracial adoptee, the ways that white people still get to dictate what a family looks like, and the family of choice she's created as an adult. You can read Rebecca's update here: https://wearethemeteor.com/still-surviving-the-white-gaze/ Original episode description: In her new memoir, Surviving the White Gaze, author and cultural critic Rebecca Carroll describes with heroic honesty and compassion, an upbringing seated in an adoptive family whose whiteness prevents them from facing their failings, in a country unwilling to do the same. Listen as Rebecca talks to Elizabeth about navigating overt and covert racism, her difficulty connecting with both her birth and adoptive fathers, and marrying a man who would celebrate and support their son’s Blackness, always. Just a note: This episode includes a discussion of sexual abuse and eating disorders. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

Richard Lawson, Vanity Fair's chief critic and co-host of its awards podcast Little Gold Men,  joins us for our annual Oscars episode to discuss father themes in this year's nominated films. From the chest-beating patriarchs of Avatar 2 to the unhappily married backdrop dads of Everything Everywhere All At Once to the leering father-daughter Lifetime body horror of The Whale, we're cheering and jeering Hollywood's best attempts at capturing "dad stuff." We also get into the sexual predation and abusive careerism of a female protagonist in Tar, the drama of male friendship in The Banshees of Inisherin, the daddy longing of Marilyn, and the lineage-poisoning effects of PTSD in All Quiet on the Western Front. Then it's on to Richard's official winner predictions (crib them if you want to sweep your Oscars pool) and tips for approaching Cate Blanchette at a party without fully disassociating and being sucked into a nearby air vent. We're Petra's father and we urge you to hit play. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

Presidential historian Alexis Coe, author of the New York Times bestseller “You Never Forget Your First: A Biography of George Washington,” joins Elizabeth for a special Presidents’ Day edition of Tell Me About Your Father to discuss what we get right and wrong about the legacy of America’s first dad. Alexis is the first female historian to write a biography of Washington in over a century, and her work dares to roll its eyes at the male biographers, or  “Thigh Men of Dad History,” as she calls them, who have preceded her. These Thigh Men have exclusively told Washington’s story in 1,000-page tomes read by dads everywhere, spending hundreds of pages focused on Washington's masculinity, rhapsodizing over his bulging quadriceps and his battlefield accomplishments. Coe, however, brings Washington into fuller focus as a fatherless boy left to fend for his family at 10, a devoted "helicopter" stepfather, and a charismatic leader who was reluctant to be president. Listen as Coe tells us about Washington's early life and marriage, the “trial and error” approach he brought to the office, and the lingering untruth that he freed his slaves upon his death, a fact historians at Mount Vernon wringing their hands over. today  --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

How do you connect with a father who is so emotionally stoic that the only thing you can really talk to him about is the weather? On this episode, Matt talks with George Azar, author of the forthcoming My Gay Church Days: Memoir of a Closeted Evangelical Pastor Who Eventually Had Enough, about how diving head first into political and religious conservatism was one way to connect with his dad. He even became a pastor in the process.  And it worked, too.  But then, when he came to terms with his own sexuality, everything had to change. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

Matt talks fathers with two queer Asian food professionals: cookbook author and graphic designer Frankie Gaw (author of "First Generation") and Yuhe Su, the talented chef behind the professional home kitchen Daddy's Got Chopsticks, about the ways in which they maintain a connection with their fathers through recipes from their respective childhoods. They talk about the importance of scallion pancakes, Olive Garden,  pig’s blood, masculinity, coming out, and the symbolic power of Antoni from Queer Eye. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

We’re using this sleepy week between Christmas and New Year’s to honor and shun a cavalcade of celebrity fathers and men,  from dicks to dictators and zeroes to heroes. Listen as the glamor unfolds with appearances by Meghan Markle, King Charles III, and Don Draper, as we recognize and alienate Daddy Awards veteran offenders including Alec Baldwin, Woody Allen, Ted Cruz, and the Supreme Court, as well as new low achievers, including Elon Musk, Johnny Depp,  horses, and lions. We also honor Beto O’Rourke’s righteous anger, the best plastic surgery of the year, fish dads who do the work, and give out our annual award for holistic hotness to the dads and men who put their asses into it in 2022. Thanks for spending this year with Tell Me About Your Father. We love you and will return in January with new episodes. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

AJ Daulerio, writer, and creator of the excellent recovery newsletter The Small Bow, returns to Tell Me About Your Father for a second time to discuss our recent episode on Shia LaBeouf. That episode, which also focused on Shia's fellow recently canceled peer Armie Hammer, examined Hollywood's need to quickly forgive famous men who have done bad things. (Shia was sued by ex-girlfriend FKA Twigs in 2020 for sexual battery, assault and infliction of emotional distress. Their trial is slated for April 2023.) AJ was especially interested in coming on to discuss our take on a two-hour interview Shia gave to fellow actor John Bernthal for his "Real Ones" podcast, wherein he manically talks about being a recovering addict, liar and abuser, all while balancing new roles as a husband and father. AJ, who also became a husband and father very soon into his sobriety nearly 7 years ago, could relate to some of the cringier aspects of Shia's obsession with what Shia calls "e-masculine" behavior, a hyper-awareness of the “defects of character” (to use recovery speak) that have always been synonymous with men behaving badly. But AJ also thinks it's rare and significant that Shia is making an effort to get to know himself and the roots of his anger and self-loathing. AJ tells us how he's continuing to change as a person since his own public trial (the most important First Amendment case of the internet age in 2016) and why it's his tendency to want to help other men who are undergoing a similar public shame. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

Effervescent, thoughtful king and GayVN award-nominated porn star Cody Seiya joins us on the latest edition of our current events talk show, DADDY ISSUES. In the first half of the episode, Cody describes how art and anime offered solace from his difficult relationship with his late father and his upbringing as a Chinese American Jew in the Reagan-esque hell of Orange Country, California. He also discusses his plans to become a father, and how father themes show up in his own art. Then it’s on to the news in the second half, where we cover the Club Q tragedy in Colorado Springs and Iran at the World Cup, as well as the brutal paternal legacy of Britney Spears, Tiffany Trump’s farty wedding, Elon Musk’s pitiful relationship with his daughter, and Yuletide empress Mariah Carey’s tribute to her late dad. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

In this episode, Erin and Elizabeth talk with Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Kathryn Schulz, staff writer at The New Yorker and author of the new bestselling memoir Lost & Found - in paperback 11/22 - which has been longlisted for The National Book Award and the Andrew Carnegie Medal, and has been called a best book of the year by NPR and the New York Times. Lost & Found grew out of “Losing Streak,” a New Yorker piece that was anthologized in The Best American Essays about the paradox of loss—from keys, to memories, to dads; and the joy of finding something—from language, to love. Between love and loss, we find that the "and" of life matters too. Kathryn tells us about her larger-than-life father Isaac, an attorney and Renaissance man who came to the US as a child and Jewish refugee, spoke at least 5 languages fluently, taught, philosophized, mentored, and generally spread the love to his family and all who knew him, and died in 2016. In a wide-ranging conversation, Kathryn talks about the boredom of grief and the beauty of sorrow, her future wife's first meeting with her dad so soon after their own accidental love story, and what surprises her about the intersection of the scientific and the spiritual. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

On today’s special Halloween episode of Tell Me About Your Father, Matt sits down for a real psychic reading with medium Victoria Laurie who reaches into the primordial ether to get in touch with his deceased father, Ross. Featuring unedited excerpts from the session, the episode is a moving, funny, and unexpectedly pragmatic conversation between Victoria, Matt, and what purport to be the spirits of his father and late maternal grandmother. Matt and Victoria touch on the survival of consciousness after death, what the other side might be like, and, in particular, what insights his father - who died suddenly in 1982, at 35, while running in a marathon - has to impart to his eldest son.  Then, in the second half of the episode, following the session, Erin and Matt talk with Victoria, who is also the co-host of the Psychic Eye Mysteries True Crime Podcast and New York Times Bestselling author of the Psychic Eye Mysteries novel series, about what it’s like to be a psychic who can commune with the dead, how anyone can learn to connect with deceased relatives, and how being a medium impacts her understanding of life and death. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

On this special double episode of Tell Me About Your Father, hosts Erin and Elizabeth take a graphic look at familial curses, generational trauma and the rules of inheritance as they relate to addiction, abuse, and American men in power. We're looking at two actors in the news right now—satiric “actual cannibal,” Shia LaBeouf, and actual alleged cannibal, Armie Hammer—both facing multiple credible accusations of sexual assault and battery, abuse, and violent behavior. Neither has been charged with crimes (this year), though a civil suit bought by Shia's ex-girlfriend, musician FKA Twigs, is upcoming. LaBeouf recently discussed the allegations at length, and much more, on an episode of actor Jon Bernthal's Real Ones podcast. Meanwhile, a new documentary series on Discovery+ called House of Hammer exposes the dark and disturbing side of Armie's family going back four generations. Both Shia and Armie are currently attempting to rehabilitate their lives and careers, which include well-placed comeback ascension narratives since their alleged crimes were revealed just 1.5 years ago. Both men are fathers themselves at age 36. Shia grew up on food stamps; Armie comes from incredible wealth. Erin and Elizabeth look at how the nature vs, nurture debate plays out when it comes to grown men who abused their power and followed similar paths of chaos as the fathers they hold in conflicting esteem. Why is it different for Hollywood men behaving badly in public than it is for women, whose careers tend to fall apart over their addictions, even as they fall victim to the crimes perpetrated by men who so often get pass after pass?  Why do we as a society have a tendency to race to forgive men/fathers their trespasses, even as they continue to trespass against us? Note: This episode is long. And upsetting. Trigger warnings for discussion and descriptions of sexual assault are included throughout to allow listeners to skip ahead. Additional time codes are below: PART 1 / Shia LaBeouf  0:00-3:00 Intro 3:00-25:19 Shia LaBeouf's childhood and history of arrests, plagiarization, and abuse allegations from FKA Twigs  25:19-31:51 Don't Worry, Darlin'  31:51-57:59 Revelations from Shia's Real Ones interview  57:59-1:05  Shia's newfound devotion to Catholicism, new movie, and whether true rehabilitation is possible in Hollywood  PART 2 / Armie Hammmer  1:05-1:11:22  Intro  1:11:22-1:27:00 Armie's career, January 2021 "downfall," and abuse allegations  1:27:00-1:52:45 The Hammer family tree and revelations from House of Hammer  1:52:45-2:10:38 Jeffrey Dahmer vs. Armie Hammer, Robert Downey Jr.'s outreach, and Hammer's ex-wife Elizabeth Chambers is the opposite of Camille Cosby 2:10:38-2:12:35 What our own dads have in common with serial killers besides their astrological signs 2:12:35-2:20:35 In summation!    --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support

In a gold-plated return to the airwaves, our current events show “Daddy Issues” is back from its summer hiatus with a special super-sized catch-up edition of all the celebrity dadly dysfunction we must discuss as we enter into pumpkin season. Matt explains the British monarchy in the wake of mummy HM Queen Elizabeth’s death, and the saga of Britain’s new divorced dad, now known to his sons, William and Harry, as King Charles III. Erin unpacks the British cultural obsession with the body language cues of the senior royals as they try to keep their emotions inside like so many tampons, and Elizabeth presents new and myriad ways in which the Musk Men still stink. She also takes a sobering look at Jonathan’s Depp-ression, Alec Baldwin’s Instagram Live with Woody Allen that failed worse than Hilaria’s birth control, and the whole gang discusses Armie Hammer’s sojourn into the Caymen Islands hospitality industry and Robert Downey Jr.-guided recovery, as well as new dad Shia LaBoeuf’s too-soon appearance on Jon Bernthal’s podcast “Real Ones.”  --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tell-me-about-your-father/support