Speaker 1: I have had a cold now for eight days.
Speaker 2: I can't keep it nine days. Whatever it is, it
Speaker 2: will not go away.
Speaker 3: And I keep hearing all.
Speaker 4: These random people giving me advice on how to get
Speaker 4: rid of it. And the one I heard yesterday was
Speaker 4: just doing shots of bourbon with lemon in it, which
Speaker 4: sounds great, and I feel like I'm just going to be.
Speaker 1: With you drunk and then you don't mind having a cold.
Speaker 4: I'm wondering if you guys can give me any advice
Speaker 4: about the random, most random ways you've heard to get
Speaker 4: rid of the common cold, which is just not going away.
Speaker 5: I shan't okay, Well, first of all, do you use
Speaker 5: a netty pot?
Speaker 4: What a nutty pot? I do not use a net
Speaker 4: I feel like I'm put things up my nose.
Speaker 5: And then okay, Well, I would like to say that
Speaker 5: a Nettie pot one is great even if you don't
Speaker 5: have a cold. It helps prevent you possibly from getting sick,
Speaker 5: because nasal visage is getting all, you know, helping keep
Speaker 5: it clear from germs, and when you are sick, it
Speaker 5: will help push things through faster. I really cannot say
Speaker 5: enough wonderful things about a Nettie pot and I would
Speaker 5: highly recomon do it in the show?
Speaker 1: Do we just enter an Nettie Pot commercial? And I
Speaker 1: didn't realize it? It's like it also leads me to
Speaker 1: believe do we have the copy.
Speaker 6: I don't know what the pot Neteethpot.
Speaker 5: You can get it at your local CBS, Walgreens, Nettie
Speaker 5: Meets World.
Speaker 1: I've actually never used the pot, but I know people
Speaker 1: like around me you swore it, but it's I also
Speaker 1: heard it's kind of addictive, though, like one of those
Speaker 1: things like once you clear your nasal passages.
Speaker 5: I don't recommend using it every day. I don't recommend
Speaker 5: using it every day if you're not sick. If you're sick,
Speaker 5: I recommend using it every day if you're not sick,
Speaker 5: a couple times a week, maybe just once a week,
Speaker 5: or maybe you just pick and choose, like before you
Speaker 5: go on a plane, after you come off a plane,
Speaker 5: like places where maybe you're going to be in extra
Speaker 5: jermy environments. I use it in the shower so that
Speaker 5: I don't have to worry about, you know, it dripping
Speaker 5: down my face or feeling like I'm drowning. I can
Speaker 5: just figure out the best most comfortable position to be
Speaker 5: in to use it.
Speaker 6: I really highly recommend that.
Speaker 5: And there is a little bit of truth will to
Speaker 5: the idea of the bourbon that's kind of like a
Speaker 5: hot toddy.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's honey lemon, a little bit of your favorite
Speaker 6: type of alcohol.
Speaker 5: And a cinnamon stick. And it will help one help
Speaker 5: you sleep. It will sue the sore throat, it will
Speaker 5: it will just give you a little bit of extra rest.
Speaker 3: I have no symptoms other than my head.
Speaker 6: Is clogged for I can hear it.
Speaker 2: Just I cannot kick this thing. It is killing me
Speaker 2: at this point.
Speaker 6: I'm so sorry. I also really love Faara Flu.
Speaker 5: If you don't want to do the alcohol version a
Speaker 5: night time I'm fair flu. They make a daytime theiflu.
Speaker 5: I'm also a really big fan of Floonse.
Speaker 2: It really.
Speaker 3: Works on me.
Speaker 4: The the afron is the stuff that's scary, not touch
Speaker 4: and it works so well.
Speaker 2: And then next thing you know.
Speaker 6: That that is addicted.
Speaker 5: I don't recommend. Yeah, I don't reckon. My dad had
Speaker 5: an afron addiction. Couldn't breathe image at one point.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it happens fast too, but it's such a good.
Speaker 5: Product, and then you can't breathe without it. So flose
Speaker 5: doesn't do that. It's non addictive. So you know, Will I,
Speaker 5: I really I think if you started a regiment of
Speaker 5: Nettie pot Flownase a hot body and or a faraflu,
Speaker 5: and you're gonna feel better in a couple of days.
Speaker 2: I'm just going to stick to the bourbon. I think
Speaker 2: that's the way. I'm It seems the easiest way, just
Speaker 2: to start taking.
Speaker 6: Bourbon the least natural.
Speaker 4: Tell you, though, I'll meet you in the middle and
Speaker 4: I will drink bourbon in the shower.
Speaker 2: Okay, so we'll do that.
Speaker 1: Perfect sold, wonderful.
Speaker 6: Welcome to pod meets World. I'm Daniel Fischl.
Speaker 1: I'm right or strong Will Fidel.
Speaker 5: At this point in the podcast, we all know about
Speaker 5: Andy and Danny, the unstoppable nineties duo that took photos
Speaker 5: throughout all of Los Angeles and held up childhood blankies
Speaker 5: that looked like genitals in front of handmade.
Speaker 6: Cars like it was nobody's business.
Speaker 5: But what you don't know is that we had a
Speaker 5: third amigo, someone who was in just as many photos
Speaker 5: and also held just as special of a place in
Speaker 5: my heart and also Will's hart.
Speaker 6: But we'll get to that later.
Speaker 5: Our guest this week is best known as the iconic
Speaker 5: the Dorothy six lemuur On Blossom, the eccentric best Friend,
Speaker 5: nicknamed because it took that amount of beers for her conception.
Speaker 5: She'd also be seen in The Night Story Really it
Speaker 5: was Yes, Wow, isn't that funny? I didn't know that either.
Speaker 5: That's great.
Speaker 6: She'd also be.
Speaker 5: Seen in the nineteen ninety nine sitcom The Parkers and
Speaker 5: heard as Stacy in the classic A Goofy movie. But
Speaker 5: we'll always remember seeing her in real life in that
Speaker 5: red convertible Toyota Selica, where she was the coolest woman
Speaker 5: any of us knew, and there was no way you
Speaker 5: could convince us any different. This week, we are thrilled
Speaker 5: to welcome not only a nineties sitcom legend to pod
Speaker 5: Meets World, but someone from the inner circle of myself,
Speaker 5: Will and writer.
Speaker 6: It's Jenna VANOI.
Speaker 2: Thought I was white, white, Selica.
Speaker 6: Hers was red.
Speaker 5: Let's ask her if hers is white.
Speaker 6: I'm gonna be I'm gonna be.
Speaker 7: Walking abound.
Speaker 5: Tell me was your convertible convertible Selica white or red?
Speaker 7: I'm just curious. At first, I have to ask who
Speaker 7: said what I said red?
Speaker 1: I said white? I don't remember.
Speaker 7: I mean, I'm gonna go with the guy I dated.
Speaker 2: Was correct, thank you.
Speaker 4: My Selica was read. Hers was white. That's one of
Speaker 4: the reasons we bonded at dinner that night.
Speaker 7: Yes, that's correct.
Speaker 6: Wow, believable. I'm really.
Speaker 7: So I'm going to see you. I'm so excited.
Speaker 5: First of all, my whole life, I've wanted a red
Speaker 5: Toyota Selica convertible, and I've attributed it to you my
Speaker 5: entire life. I've said it in panels, I've said it everywhere.
Speaker 1: Well, you were inspired by her, but then it became
Speaker 1: red in your magic. So your version was going to
Speaker 1: be right, that's how you're gonna be. You were gonna
Speaker 1: be like your version.
Speaker 7: Yeah. Yeah, it was like you know the dream that
Speaker 7: took off room.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you were the inspiration and I just wanted the
Speaker 5: cherry red. Wow, it's pretty pretty amazing. So to jump
Speaker 5: into all of this, do you know how many photos
Speaker 5: we took together and related to that? Do you have
Speaker 5: room in your house for a few boxes full of them?
Speaker 7: No, because my mother has already sent me all of
Speaker 7: the ones that she's stockpiled in her attic, and there
Speaker 7: was far more of a packrat than I ever gave
Speaker 7: he credit for. So no, there's no room, no room.
Speaker 7: I will say this. So I have a nine and
Speaker 7: an eleven year old, right, and I was I'm threatening
Speaker 7: this summer to make them sit down, and I actually
Speaker 7: kind of think this is a brilliant idea. I'm very
Speaker 7: excited about it. I'm threatening to make them sit down
Speaker 7: and go through all of like the old Team Beat
Speaker 7: magazines and tear out the pages, and like, I think
Speaker 7: this is a really good summer project. Guys, I'm really.
Speaker 1: You're going to make them Yeah, you're gonna consolidate.
Speaker 7: I like that, Yes, because my mother gave me all
Speaker 7: these boxes of magazines and I was like.
Speaker 6: What am I gonna do with all this? I have
Speaker 6: all of mine too.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's great. Just to take your pictures out, you
Speaker 4: can call it between Beat.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: My god.
Speaker 2: Yep, I'll show myself out. That's fine.
Speaker 1: I'm officially done for the day.
Speaker 7: Let me just say that some things never change, all right.
Speaker 1: Do you guys have any memory of meeting Jenna or Jenna?
Speaker 1: Do you remember meeting us? Because for me, you just
Speaker 1: appeared fully formed as the most experienced, coolest, nicest like
Speaker 1: when we showed up on boy Metsorre that was like,
Speaker 1: who can we trust that knows what's happening in this
Speaker 1: whole crazy experience And it was like Jenna and you
Speaker 1: were just like.
Speaker 7: The rock for all of us and what worked the
Speaker 7: world was I totally balanced and good.
Speaker 1: Like I don't know, you were the folest person ever.
Speaker 1: I think you will list you were sixteen or seventeen.
Speaker 1: You had been on a hit sitcom that was like
Speaker 1: ahead of us, like two or three seasons in so
Speaker 1: when we started, I just know that we all looked
Speaker 1: to you. It was like, how can we be more
Speaker 1: like Jenna? And like you were just always around. You
Speaker 1: were so kind, You were so nice for the parents.
Speaker 1: You like had your own apartment maybe already or just
Speaker 1: your own car. So you were just like everything we
Speaker 1: wanted to be. And was like how do we who
Speaker 1: do we trust? Right? I mean, don't you guys remember
Speaker 1: feeling this way? And I don't remember meeting you. I
Speaker 1: just you were just like this fairy that entered our
Speaker 1: life and like I knew I needed you in my life.
Speaker 1: And I remember everything about meeting Jenna, all.
Speaker 7: The confidence that.
Speaker 1: Of course I remember meeting Jenna.
Speaker 2: I remember where we were. I remember the first night we.
Speaker 6: Met, of course, because tell us the story?
Speaker 1: Well we do you want to tell it?
Speaker 2: Or should I tell it?
Speaker 1: You're the guest, you should tell it?
Speaker 7: I kind of would like to defer to you for
Speaker 7: a moment.
Speaker 4: Well, So Jenna was writing an article for was it
Speaker 4: a teen magazine?
Speaker 7: Yeah? I think it was teen be?
Speaker 1: Was it teen Beat?
Speaker 2: Okay?
Speaker 3: And so was it Scott Appel?
Speaker 4: Somebody put us together through a publicist, put us together
Speaker 4: so you could interview me.
Speaker 7: I feel like there was probably underlying matchmaking things happening
Speaker 7: that No, probably, but that's besides.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: And so we went to an Italian restaurant in Burbank
Speaker 4: and we both ordered salads because both of us were
Speaker 4: too embarrassed to eat in front of each other, and
Speaker 4: neither of us I think took a bite the entire
Speaker 4: night we sat there.
Speaker 7: Wow, likely because we were talking too much, but maybe
Speaker 7: also because we were nervous about eating in front of
Speaker 7: each other, yet.
Speaker 4: In front of each other, and we were. We instantly
Speaker 4: found out we had all these things in common.
Speaker 2: We were from Connecticut.
Speaker 4: We both drove Toyota Celica's and we kept she was
Speaker 4: recording it, and she kept stopping the tape and then
Speaker 4: going back and being like, oh my god, we just
Speaker 4: found out another thing that we had in common.
Speaker 3: It was just one thing after another, and we just kind.
Speaker 2: Of started dating after that.
Speaker 3: We were just kind of together after that night.
Speaker 1: Yeah, wow, how long did you guys?
Speaker 4: Date?
Speaker 3: For?
Speaker 2: Four months? Six months?
Speaker 1: Okay?
Speaker 7: Right, I mean at sixteen. I feel like it was
Speaker 7: a pretty link.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was.
Speaker 7: She broke up with me in a parking lot in Connecticut.
Speaker 7: But that's like a story for another time.
Speaker 6: That story.
Speaker 5: Forget the story, tell that story, Jenna Gough.
Speaker 7: Fine, it's fine. I'm not scarred from it or anything
Speaker 7: I did ironically, So here know, there actually was a
Speaker 7: very precious thing, which was that it was the first
Speaker 7: Valentine's Day. This fun, fun little secrets that I don't
Speaker 7: think anybody knows first Valentine's Day that either of us
Speaker 7: had ever had a significant other. Yeah, which, ye, a
Speaker 7: significant other you can have at sixteen. And and he
Speaker 7: gave he was he was so sweet and gave me
Speaker 7: his favorite Whaler's sweatshirt.
Speaker 6: Not the jersey, the sweatshirt.
Speaker 7: Big you guys. That was like, so yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 7: can't believe we're like in this in minute what four address?
Speaker 7: This is like record? So yeah, what Siri is talking
Speaker 7: to me now, She's like, here's what I found. God
Speaker 7: knows what She's.
Speaker 1: Got sweatshirt wh.
Speaker 7: Yeah, so Whaler's sweatshirt, which I actually located I think
Speaker 7: about two years ago and was like, holy crap, SI
Speaker 7: left this and I took a picture of it because
Speaker 7: I was going to try and send it to you,
Speaker 7: and I don't I don't know if I like found
Speaker 7: you online and send it to you or not, Like
Speaker 7: I was going to try and find you on social
Speaker 7: media and like send it, but I think, yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Don't have any social media.
Speaker 6: Correct.
Speaker 5: Do you take a picture of it before you donated
Speaker 5: it or do you still have it? You know?
Speaker 7: I actually don't know the answer to that because I
Speaker 7: was getting out of a storage unit and I'm not
Speaker 7: going to say I had this what shirt and a
Speaker 7: storage unit? But you did break up with me in
Speaker 7: a parking lot, so storage unit.
Speaker 1: I mean, I do feel like we at least you
Speaker 1: kept it at all.
Speaker 6: I do know what I mean.
Speaker 5: Come on, we know how you met, so now I
Speaker 5: think it's only appropriate we know how it ended.
Speaker 7: But correct, correct, correct, but no hard feelings. I mean,
Speaker 7: you know, forty years.
Speaker 4: Later we saw each other. After that, it wasn't what
Speaker 4: I mean, Jenna was around for a while.
Speaker 1: At least, you were just the You were the most experienced,
Speaker 1: like actor.
Speaker 7: So bad experienced actor okay, yeah, just like make sure
Speaker 7: we add actor to like the very yeah's.
Speaker 6: You were a fast girl.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, you were just the one who knew
Speaker 1: the ropes of like being on a sitcom and how
Speaker 1: to manage like the teen magazines and like where to go.
Speaker 1: Like I don't know, like, did you go to ed
Speaker 1: de Bevik's with us? I feel like that seems sounds
Speaker 1: about right.
Speaker 7: Like that's highly likely. Y.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I feel like that you were just in and
Speaker 1: that you were in the scene in a way that like,
Speaker 1: you know, we didn't we just looked up to you.
Speaker 1: I just remember looking up to you and you were
Speaker 1: so cool and fun and we just liked each other.
Speaker 1: And I just remember like thinking, yeah, it's so funny
Speaker 1: to look back and be like, yeah, you were actually
Speaker 1: probably only sixteen and probably had no clue what you
Speaker 1: were doing either.
Speaker 7: But do you feel like that how people who are
Speaker 7: only a couple of years older than you seem so
Speaker 7: much older at the time. Yeah, I'm like in my
Speaker 7: brain and of course I still feel this, and I'm like, oh,
Speaker 7: you're twenty seven, We're the same age. It's totally fine. Yeah,
Speaker 7: Like you know, at that time, I feel like I
Speaker 7: looked at you as being my peer and being the
Speaker 7: same age as me. Meanwhile, I was obviously a couple
Speaker 7: of years older than you, and that pines in age
Speaker 7: was just that gap was so huge. What I think,
Speaker 7: what I remember most for you, writer is the cruise
Speaker 7: that we all yes, which was so and so insane
Speaker 7: looking back.
Speaker 4: But for you, hell it was it was Yeah, ocean
Speaker 4: hell is what we've called that.
Speaker 1: No, well, okay, oh wait, but you were there old
Speaker 1: on we you were in the first year, right, or
Speaker 1: were you there when Danielle went? I think you were
Speaker 1: there the first year.
Speaker 6: She was there with me.
Speaker 1: She was oh did you do both years?
Speaker 3: Then?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 7: Okay, I didn't know there were two years.
Speaker 1: I went two years.
Speaker 6: I went two years.
Speaker 7: Too, Wow, you went two years. Yeah, there might have
Speaker 7: been reasons why they didn't invite me back. It's I
Speaker 7: think you.
Speaker 5: I think you did do the second year because good,
Speaker 5: that's so you weren't invited the first year, but you
Speaker 5: got a invited to the second year.
Speaker 7: Okay, fair well, that sounds better.
Speaker 5: So will mentioned already you're from Connecticut. How did you
Speaker 5: decide to become an actor? And what did your parents
Speaker 5: think of you wanting to do this?
Speaker 7: Other than that I was nuts. You know, acting is
Speaker 7: not It's not in my family at all. My mom
Speaker 7: is from a small town Wisconsin. My dad is from Fairfield, Connecticut,
Speaker 7: very you know, fairly small town. And when I was
Speaker 7: about three years old, there was a Jordash Jean's commercial
Speaker 7: and all these girls were doing ballet and I loved
Speaker 7: to dance, and I took dance classes at the time,
Speaker 7: essentially because my parents didn't know what to do with
Speaker 7: me because I had so much energy, which now as
Speaker 7: a mom to a firecracker of a nine year old,
Speaker 7: I'm like, oh, goat feeling my poor parents. But so
Speaker 7: I think, you know, I saw this commercial and I
Speaker 7: was like, oh, all these girls are dancing, and I
Speaker 7: don't know what goes through one's mind prior to understanding
Speaker 7: that there are actually people on display on the television,
Speaker 7: that it's not robots, that it's not I don't I mean,
Speaker 7: I don't know what you think prior to that, but
Speaker 7: for me, that was my first indication that there were
Speaker 7: actually humans that were doing these roles and they were dancing,
Speaker 7: and these were kids like me, and it made sense
Speaker 7: to me, and I was like, oh, well, that's what
Speaker 7: I want to do. So I started telling my parents
Speaker 7: and they were like, oh, that's so cute. You know,
Speaker 7: you're gonna fight fires one day, dance and dad where
Speaker 7: Georde Ash Jean's the next. And I was like, hmmm, no,
Speaker 7: it's that We're done. Here we go and scene. So yeah,
Speaker 7: they started, they didn't know what to do. They ignored
Speaker 7: it for a while. And then this woman my dad
Speaker 7: was a longtime server at a really beautiful water fall
Speaker 7: front restaurant in Connecticut that served he served, you know,
Speaker 7: people like Paul Newman and were the stewart for many
Speaker 7: many years and it was just like this classic traditional
Speaker 7: restaurant and the bartender there. Ironically, or maybe not so ironically,
Speaker 7: when my dad told her that I wanted to be
Speaker 7: an actress, said to him, Oh, that's funny. I just
Speaker 7: started taking my son to New York for auditions. I'm
Speaker 7: I'm a manager. Now I've become a manager. My dad
Speaker 7: was like, I don't really know what that means, but cool,
Speaker 7: and she said, well, I'd love to meet her. And
Speaker 7: I went to her house and she was like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 7: we're going to do this. And so she started taking
Speaker 7: me to New York for auditions and still plenty of
Speaker 7: money along the way. My dye, oh no, because it
Speaker 7: was one of those situations where, you know, my parents
Speaker 7: were so green and yeah, I know them. They're both
Speaker 7: from small towns and they they had no idea and
Speaker 7: which really, in the long run, as much as it
Speaker 7: sucks to say this, like it's kind of a beautiful thing.
Speaker 7: My parents didn't know any better and that they were
Speaker 7: amateurs in the whole thing. You know, we learned together,
Speaker 7: we grew together in the business to understand it better
Speaker 7: and and well not be taking taken advantage of quite
Speaker 7: so much. But but yeah, So this woman took me
Speaker 7: to New York on the train for auditions for years,
Speaker 7: and then at some point when we realized sort of
Speaker 7: more of what was going on, my parents started taking
Speaker 7: me in instead.
Speaker 6: So what was the first job you booked?
Speaker 7: It was a It was a Jello Pudding Pops commercial
Speaker 7: with Bill Cosby.
Speaker 3: Now I remember this.
Speaker 2: We talked.
Speaker 7: Yes, I was an extra. One of the girls licked
Speaker 7: a jello pudding pop after she was told not to
Speaker 7: lick it and got her tongue stuck a Lah Christmas
Speaker 7: in the Christmas Story. Yeah, and it was, but it
Speaker 7: was quite. It was quite the memorable day.
Speaker 6: Tell us more, I.
Speaker 7: You know, other than her getting her tongues, Like, that's
Speaker 7: really the bulk of my memories. Henrible because of that.
Speaker 3: So how old were you when you did the commercial?
Speaker 7: Six years old?
Speaker 2: Six? Okay, so yeah you were you were in the
Speaker 2: young group. Yeah, you're in the young group for us.
Speaker 7: So me, Joey, Melissa Hart, Sarah Geller, Natasha Leone, these
Speaker 7: are Alison Porter, like, these are all people that I
Speaker 7: was in New York with and yeah, grew up with and.
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, so you knew Joey before Blossom.
Speaker 7: So I didn't know Joey, but we were both auditioning
Speaker 7: in New York at the same time. I mostly knew
Speaker 7: the girls because we would end up at the same auditions. Yeah.
Speaker 4: When did you then get or hear about Blossom for
Speaker 4: your first time?
Speaker 2: Was it a thing?
Speaker 4: Were you auditioned in New York and they flew you
Speaker 4: out to l A or were you already in Los Angeles?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I auditioned a new Yeah.
Speaker 1: You guys were the cool New York kids. We were,
Speaker 1: and we'll both yeah, it was another thing we had
Speaker 1: in common.
Speaker 3: We had, we had a lot in common when we met.
Speaker 4: It.
Speaker 1: Always there's always this. The network test came down to
Speaker 1: two people from LA and one New Yorker always and
Speaker 1: then New Yorker always got it.
Speaker 7: It sucked for us, but not true because I went
Speaker 7: to network for Roseanne with Sarah Gilbert and she got it.
Speaker 4: We always saw the l A people as the ones
Speaker 4: that were actually getting.
Speaker 1: The But when they flew you out from New York
Speaker 1: and they put you up in a hotel, you felt
Speaker 1: so much cooler. You can give you that extra bit
Speaker 1: of confidence, like they're flying me out, I.
Speaker 7: Mean that's probably fair. Yeah, Like I'm not taking the
Speaker 7: train to the audition today, I'm flying it. Like that's
Speaker 7: pretty high tech.
Speaker 4: And staying at the Universal Sheridan is always there's always
Speaker 4: it was.
Speaker 7: Always that Howard Johnson's, which may not Howard Johnson's anymore
Speaker 7: on like Vineland or Joe's.
Speaker 1: Oh my I with my manager all the time, with
Speaker 1: Bruce and I at that Howard Johnson's. Yes, oh, I
Speaker 1: remember the taste of the instant coffee that you would
Speaker 1: get in your room.
Speaker 7: Yeah, for me, it was there. It was like an
Speaker 7: attached restaurant at the time, you know, going back a
Speaker 7: little bit far, and they had these like fried clams
Speaker 7: and clam chowder. And of course it was not like
Speaker 7: an East Coast clam chowder at no, I mean not
Speaker 7: even close. But it was like the only thing even
Speaker 7: close to home that I could find, and I was
Speaker 7: latching onto it like yes.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, I can't let one thing pass rider. How
Speaker 4: old were you when you were drinking the instant coffee
Speaker 4: in the hotel.
Speaker 1: Room, Probably starting at eleven. I was like super sweet.
Speaker 4: It would like it would be like it was like
Speaker 4: wait a minute, you're now tell as a kid you're
Speaker 4: drinking the coffee.
Speaker 6: I started drinking coffee at twelve.
Speaker 7: I started drinking coffee at six years old on my
Speaker 7: way to New York for three am, because we would
Speaker 7: have to we would leave from Fairfield train station. There
Speaker 7: was a Dunkin Donuts at the train station, and I
Speaker 7: would have to be in by six am or whatever,
Speaker 7: so we'd have to leave my house at six or
Speaker 7: at three rather to get there by six, and so
Speaker 7: my dad would get me half coffee, half cream. I
Speaker 7: tributed all of my Napoleon Napoleonic stature. I have my
Speaker 7: coffee obsession, my father getting me dunkin donuts.
Speaker 6: And now I say the same thing.
Speaker 5: I'm horizontally challenged because of the coffee at twelve.
Speaker 7: As fun sized, blind sized size.
Speaker 4: At eleven years old, the coffee would have ruined the
Speaker 4: taste of my cigarettes.
Speaker 5: Okay, so will you tell us a little bit about
Speaker 5: what we'll ask the blah how did Blossom come around?
Speaker 7: So I auditioned in New York the same day that
Speaker 7: I auditioned for Blossom. And this is like the most
Speaker 7: probably one of the weirdest stories for me, because I'm
Speaker 7: not really a believer of ghosts or things of that
Speaker 7: supernatural things of that nature, just not very much. A
Speaker 7: I like logic. I really love logic. I really embrace logic,
Speaker 7: and so things like that kind of tend to elude me. However,
Speaker 7: on this particular day, I was auditioning for three different things.
Speaker 7: One was a show called Lenny, one was a show
Speaker 7: called Blossom, and one was some sort of miniseries or
Speaker 7: commercial or something. And I got on the train with
Speaker 7: my mom and we sat in the back and this
Speaker 7: man was sitting in the row in front of us,
Speaker 7: and he turned around and he started talking to me,
Speaker 7: because in those days, a grown up can talk to
Speaker 7: a child and it's not terrifying now. And this man
Speaker 7: was like, you know, what are you going to New
Speaker 7: York for? And I said, Oh, I'm an actress. I'm
Speaker 7: going to some auditions. And he goes tell me about them.
Speaker 7: And normally I would not have done that, right, I
Speaker 7: would have felt very uncomfortable and not done this. For
Speaker 7: some reason, I felt very comfortable, and I said, I'm
Speaker 7: going on an audition for this show, this show or
Speaker 7: this mini series, this show and this commercial or whatever.
Speaker 7: He was like, Blossom that one. You're gonna get that?
Speaker 7: Get ready?
Speaker 1: Wow geez?
Speaker 7: And I was like okay, thanks.
Speaker 4: Well.
Speaker 7: At the next stop, we looked and he was gone,
Speaker 7: like he had gotten up and left. We hadn't noticed
Speaker 7: he had totally disappeared. And I was like, Mommy, what
Speaker 7: would happen if, like I did get this show and
Speaker 7: it filmed in California? And she goes, oh, we'll cross
Speaker 7: that bridge when we get to it, and I was like,
Speaker 7: I think we're at it. He just said I'm getting it,
Speaker 7: and lo and behold I go. And I auditioned for
Speaker 7: the show, and then I also auditioned for the show
Speaker 7: called Lenny. So Lenny and Blossom were both created by
Speaker 7: Don Rio, amazing, just phenomenal writer. Both were with Thomas shows.
Speaker 7: One was NBC, one was CBS. And when I was
Speaker 7: flown to California to test for Blossom, I was also
Speaker 7: flown to California to test for Lenny.
Speaker 1: They were vying for you. Yeah, and that's always the
Speaker 1: best way to be in hollywod.
Speaker 7: Let's I mean, yeah, I'm not not complaining at all
Speaker 7: and uh and so, but Blossom was first, and before
Speaker 7: we went to network, they brought Miam and I together
Speaker 7: at the Sunset Gower lot and we went up to
Speaker 7: this room and I'll never forget this, Like I can
Speaker 7: remember what she was wearing. I remember what I was wearing.
Speaker 7: Of course they told me to bring I had worn
Speaker 7: this like crazy wide brimmed purple hat to the audition
Speaker 7: and when I got the callback, they were like, tell
Speaker 7: her to wear the hat, and so network work, they
Speaker 7: were like, tell her to wear the hat again. So
Speaker 7: it became part of my character. You were the character, right,
Speaker 7: and being a New Yorker or being you know, being
Speaker 7: from the East Coast, just being an East Coast girl.
Speaker 7: Like I talked, I talked quickly. It's you know, south
Speaker 7: now for seventeen years, so probably sounds I'm like very
Speaker 7: bipolar in my in my chair or in my language.
Speaker 7: But but back then I was very much sounded East
Speaker 7: Coast and uh and I think that the fast talking yeah,
Speaker 7: derived from that. And uh so, yeah, So they brought
Speaker 7: me up and I talked to Maam and we did
Speaker 7: the scene together, and then we went into Network together.
Speaker 7: She had already gotten the role. They brought me in
Speaker 7: with her because they knew that they wanted me and
Speaker 7: and they wanted to make sure that that was what happened.
Speaker 7: Joey was also there, so you know, they had us
Speaker 7: and they told us talk about crazy because this would
Speaker 7: not happen now. We walked out of the room. They
Speaker 7: told us to hang on for a second. They told
Speaker 7: us we got it outside of the room. She was
Speaker 7: at Network when it happened.
Speaker 1: My hold on a second. But Mie was the show, right,
Speaker 1: she was already cast, like the show was being built
Speaker 1: her out but you and Joey both got the art
Speaker 1: at the same time in the chemistry test. Amazing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I saw the show.
Speaker 1: They were like, here's the show.
Speaker 4: Yeah, mine had done Beaches already, right, I mean, that's
Speaker 4: where she's.
Speaker 7: Why they created And then she had also done a
Speaker 7: show called Malloy, a very short lived show called Malloy
Speaker 7: after Beaches with Jennifer Aniston. And so they knew that
Speaker 7: she could. I feel like they knew that she could
Speaker 7: carry a sitcom. Dawn for she could carry a sitcom.
Speaker 7: And now in retrospect, of course, we all know that it's.
Speaker 1: Quite interesting that that used to be the Like, I
Speaker 1: don't know do they still do that where they like
Speaker 1: see a kid actor and then go give that kid
Speaker 1: a show and build an entire Like that was how
Speaker 1: our show got created, that was how Wowson got created.
Speaker 1: There was the Gabby what's her name show that wast
Speaker 1: her own show. Like if you were a kid actor
Speaker 1: and you had like a breakout role in a movie,
Speaker 1: you would just get a sitcom the next year they
Speaker 1: would build a whole. I don't know if they'd do
Speaker 1: that anymore.
Speaker 5: That's so, Yeah, Disney Channel doesn't mean that and Nickelodeon,
Speaker 5: even that girl Leyley was you know, so it's not
Speaker 5: necessarily having a role in a movie. But maybe you
Speaker 5: have a song, or you're a big social media talent
Speaker 5: their you know, influencer type thing. If you're a personality,
Speaker 5: a big personality as a kid, they might try to
Speaker 5: build a show around you. I mean, Miam was such
Speaker 5: a force at such a young age. What were your
Speaker 5: first impressions of her?
Speaker 7: I think really the same impressions that I have now.
Speaker 7: I just know her a hell of a lot better.
Speaker 7: And she's brilliant. I don't think anybody meets Miami and thinks,
Speaker 7: you know, yeah, yeah, she's okay, she's so smart, like
Speaker 7: that's it. You know, that just doesn't happen. She's She's
Speaker 7: a phenomenal woman. And I will say that we are
Speaker 7: a lot closer now than we were back then. You know,
Speaker 7: it was a little bit odd with us growing up
Speaker 7: together because she and Joey and I were so on
Speaker 7: such fart ends of the spectrum when it came to
Speaker 7: our likes and dislikes, and you know, she likes Elivius
Speaker 7: Costello and Joey and I were singing harmonizing to boys
Speaker 7: to men like it was very desperate scene. But but
Speaker 7: she's just like, but she's always been so cool because
Speaker 7: she's never been afraid to be her, very just unapologetically
Speaker 7: her and I and that's something that I've you know, writer,
Speaker 7: you talk about you talked earlier about like looking up
Speaker 7: to me and being experienced, Like I looked at Miam
Speaker 7: like that. And although she had never done a show before,
Speaker 7: and you know, Joey and I had both spent years
Speaker 7: already in the industry prior to being on Blossom. You know,
Speaker 7: he did give me a break and all of that,
Speaker 7: and I, you know, and I'd done tons of guest
Speaker 7: spots and mini series and movies and whatever else like,
Speaker 7: but myam to me somehow was just this this like
Speaker 7: essence of knowledge and and like, you know, just there's
Speaker 7: she's just a fount of knowledge and and she's all
Speaker 7: has been super professional, which I will say to all
Speaker 7: of our credit is something that and I imagine this
Speaker 7: was the same on your show too, But all of
Speaker 7: us really really put a lot of stock in being
Speaker 7: professional at all times. Yes, you know, I look at
Speaker 7: shows that are on now and I think, you know,
Speaker 7: it's a very different it's a very different scene, and
Speaker 7: you do have sort of, like you said, Danielle, the
Speaker 7: the those who sort of are involved because they've gained
Speaker 7: notoriety through some other avenue like social media, which doesn't
Speaker 7: necessarily prepare them for the type of work ethic that
Speaker 7: happens on a set like.
Speaker 3: We had absolutely what was the set of Blossom?
Speaker 7: Like you know what it was? It was really awesome,
Speaker 7: Like we had a lot of inside jokes and we
Speaker 7: had like Miam and I used to it we laugh
Speaker 7: now because we used to have these like little codes
Speaker 7: that we would send each other about boys. Will I'm
Speaker 7: sure your name.
Speaker 6: Was in there where Oh it had to be, I'm sure.
Speaker 7: Actually, let me say so, you met her for the
Speaker 7: first time not that long ago, like a couple of
Speaker 7: weeks ago, and she she sent me a text and
Speaker 7: she was like guess what and she the picture of
Speaker 7: you guys together, and I was like, no way, that
Speaker 7: was my first boyfriend. She goes, dude, I know that's
Speaker 7: my point.
Speaker 4: Well, that's what I wanted to ask you, because she
Speaker 4: said to me she were we were talking and she said,
Speaker 4: why did you never come to the set?
Speaker 1: I wondered that too, because I never.
Speaker 6: I still I don't think I didn't.
Speaker 4: I you never because and I answered truthfully and this,
Speaker 4: and I'd like to know I'd like you to answer this,
Speaker 4: because I was never invited you. Even when we were dating,
Speaker 4: you never invited me to the set of Blossom. Maam
Speaker 4: said it was because you thought she would she would
Speaker 4: try to steal me. And she was joking, of course
Speaker 4: as she was saying that, but she said, why didn't
Speaker 4: you come? And it's when I realized you had never
Speaker 4: once invited me to come to the set.
Speaker 1: A boy, Yeah, she was always I remember, yea.
Speaker 7: All the time. It more likely was because I was
Speaker 7: worried about what the hell Joey would say?
Speaker 2: Oh really, probably that makes sense, you know.
Speaker 7: Yeah, we've always had very much like this brother sister
Speaker 7: relationship where like and never he's kind of like the
Speaker 7: wild card for me, where I don't I don't noways no,
Speaker 7: it's gonna come out with that, and I probably just
Speaker 7: like I probably wanted keep it private and not feel
Speaker 7: everybody was.
Speaker 1: In on it, you know, so you weren't embarrassed by me?
Speaker 7: Oh, for the love of God, No, no, now I
Speaker 7: don't know.
Speaker 1: But yeah, well, now, well everybody is. I want to
Speaker 1: have the Joey conversation. I want to hear what that
Speaker 1: was like, because when you started the show, he was
Speaker 1: obviously already working as a child actor, but he became
Speaker 1: like the Joe Lawrence we know because of Blossom, Right,
Speaker 1: So what was that progression like as his character became,
Speaker 1: you know, this phenomenon, and as he became this public
Speaker 1: figure and then a musician, like what happened there?
Speaker 4: Well?
Speaker 8: As his hair grew, I feel like so did his popularity, Yes,
Speaker 8: and so did his He go, I don't know, I'm
Speaker 8: just guessing.
Speaker 7: I love me some, Joey, I say not. My point
Speaker 7: in all of this is that when we started the show,
Speaker 7: he yeah, I think you know, he'd done a lot
Speaker 7: of shows before. He, by far of all of us,
Speaker 7: had the most experienced. Sure, For as much as I
Speaker 7: had on my resume, it did not it could not
Speaker 7: compete with Joey having been on a series before and
Speaker 7: really understanding that.
Speaker 3: Day to day he worked NonStop from the time he
Speaker 3: was five years old. I mean, he was the consummate.
Speaker 1: It wasn't even a child actor. He was just an
Speaker 1: actor we'd been working for ever.
Speaker 7: And well and well deserved.
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely so talented, so talented.
Speaker 7: And so I think, you know, the the interesting thing
Speaker 7: was to watch what happened as we grew enough into
Speaker 7: our our bodies, ourselves that the audience, like all the
Speaker 7: girls would start throwing. I mean they would. We would
Speaker 7: come out for intros before the.
Speaker 6: Show, you know, they'd cast intros.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, and people would like girls would throw underwear
Speaker 7: and I'm like, I don't know if they packed them
Speaker 7: and they're personal wearing them first, I don't want to know,
Speaker 7: but they're the underwear were flung well well aimed. Might
Speaker 7: I add flung had a teenager and you know, and
Speaker 7: we were like we were like twelve, thirteen, fourteen, and
Speaker 7: it was just that's what's so crazy is we started
Speaker 7: to show when so I was twelve and I'm trying
Speaker 7: to think, so that would make I guess Joey thirteen
Speaker 7: and I am fourteen, because I think I want to
Speaker 7: say we were like a couple of years off from
Speaker 7: each other, and uh yeah, so we just we we
Speaker 7: literally went from being kids to being teenagers and him
Speaker 7: being this teenage heart throb almost overnight, and they would
Speaker 7: fling underwear, the condoms were thrown.
Speaker 6: Oh my gosh, this bizarre, Like I.
Speaker 7: Don't even know if I knew what condoms were when
Speaker 7: they were That's how like early on it was. And yeah,
Speaker 7: it was just bizarre. But also this kind of brilliant
Speaker 7: phenomenon that happened where it was like the making of
Speaker 7: an idol of a.
Speaker 4: Teenage Yeah, you really got to see them from the
Speaker 4: inside of the making of a teen idol, like going
Speaker 4: back television wise, you're talking David Cassidy, Scott Bao. I mean,
Speaker 4: this is like a generational teen icon. Was Joey Lawrence
Speaker 4: in the late eighties early nineties. I mean, he was
Speaker 4: that peak of talent and of popularity. It was.
Speaker 2: It was amazing, and so why should he not do.
Speaker 7: A music video where he wraps and rides around like
Speaker 7: a you know, a jokal gym thing like that's a
Speaker 7: great naturally, that's the.
Speaker 9: Next he throws the football to himself. He throws the
Speaker 9: football and then catches the same football. It's very impressive,
Speaker 9: very impressive.
Speaker 7: I feel like you've spent more time watching it than.
Speaker 4: I My stepdaughter from the time she was a little kid.
Speaker 4: Nothing of love can't fix for your baby has been
Speaker 4: her jam. So it's yeah, I mean, but again just
Speaker 4: very impressive to both be the quarterback and the wide
Speaker 4: receiver at the same time.
Speaker 7: Totally, totally, and I feel like at the next Super
Speaker 7: Bowl we should really like him. Make sure some people
Speaker 7: know about that, because that's how it brilliant is.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: So Blossom was a mid season replacement that ended up
Speaker 5: going one hundred and fourteen episodes.
Speaker 6: When did you know it was a hit? And were
Speaker 6: you recognized all the time?
Speaker 7: So you know something that I don't, which is it
Speaker 7: was one hundred and fourteen episodes. For some reason in
Speaker 7: my head, I was thinking it was like one hundred
Speaker 7: and twenty two or twenty three. But I also confusing
Speaker 7: it with the Parkers right now.
Speaker 6: Which okay, it's highly possible.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it, I don't know when we knew. I can
Speaker 7: tell you that the you know, we did the pilot,
Speaker 7: it did not get picked up. I had gone so
Speaker 7: when going back a little bit, when I went to LA,
Speaker 7: when they flew med to LA from New York, and
Speaker 7: I went to Network for Blossom, and they told me
Speaker 7: right then and there, they told Joliana that we'd gotten it.
Speaker 7: I then did not go to Network for Lenny, which
Speaker 7: was immediately following like an hour or two later because
Speaker 7: I already had a show, so I had to skip it. Well,
Speaker 7: when Blossom didn't get picked up, Don Rio called me
Speaker 7: and said, hey, would you like to be on Lenny instead?
Speaker 7: And I was like, well sure, I yeah, not an idiot. Yeah,
Speaker 7: So I went and did Lenny. We did the pilot.
Speaker 7: That show was already picked up, so I was on CBS.
Speaker 7: CBS had no idea, They didn't They didn't know that
Speaker 7: I was the same girl from Blossom, which is super weird,
Speaker 7: but we'll go with it. I had like curly hair
Speaker 7: on one show and straight hair on another, and apparently
Speaker 7: it was terribly deceiving.
Speaker 6: Yeah you had Clark Clinton, Clark Clark Kent classes.
Speaker 7: Yeah, exactly. And then Lenny got halfway through the season
Speaker 7: and Blossom got picked up as a mid season replacement.
Speaker 7: With this revamp of UH, Ted was being the single
Speaker 7: dad as opposed to parents. We had, you know, originally
Speaker 7: a mom and a dad, so it's Ted Wass as
Speaker 7: a single parent. But they wanted to keep all the kids.
Speaker 7: So at that point, you know, Don Rio told NBC, well,
Speaker 7: you know, I've got Jenna on this other show, and
Speaker 7: they were like, what are you talking about. He was like, well,
Speaker 7: we're gonna have to recast six because Jenna is on
Speaker 7: my other show on CBS. And they were like, you're kidding.
Speaker 7: Oh okay, so they recast the role. Halfway through the
Speaker 7: first week, Don calls me in my schoolroom and says, so, listen,
Speaker 7: how do you feel about doing two shows at once?
Speaker 1: Yes? Wow, you're such a badass school sudro over it.
Speaker 7: I was like, I'm in.
Speaker 1: I get off the phone.
Speaker 7: My tutor, my tutor, God bless her, who I'm still
Speaker 7: friends with. I don't know if she remembers this or not.
Speaker 7: I gotta ask her. But Sandy was like, so, uh,
Speaker 7: Don doesn't really call you in your school in the
Speaker 7: school much like what's going on. I was like, oh,
Speaker 7: I'm gonna do both shows. She was like, and when
Speaker 7: are we gonna do school? I was like, I'll figure it.
Speaker 1: Out, school right Networks.
Speaker 7: So I did both shows and we did. We filmed
Speaker 7: one on Tuesdays and one on Fridays for half a
Speaker 7: secon and I went back and forth and I did
Speaker 7: both shows. And then at the end of the first year,
Speaker 7: Lenny had been on CBS up against Murphy Brown, like
Speaker 7: with Murphy Brown, but it was during the goal War,
Speaker 7: and it just I mean, we got preempted so many times.
Speaker 7: There was way that show could live.
Speaker 3: What was Lenny very briefly, who was who was on
Speaker 3: Lenny based on.
Speaker 7: This comedian Lenny Clark? Awesome, awesome, A lot of work.
Speaker 1: Since actually yeah, Lenny Clark, Yeah, Lenny.
Speaker 7: And and then Lee Garlington, phenomenal actress played his wife.
Speaker 7: There were great, great cast members, I mean just great.
Speaker 7: It took place in Boston. He's this Boston comic and
Speaker 7: it was like kind of the sort of the initiation
Speaker 7: of of comics having television shows.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's like the Boston guy too.
Speaker 2: It's Lenny Clark. Yeah, he's Boston.
Speaker 7: Yeah, he is Boston through and through. Yes. So yeah,
Speaker 7: So I did that for half a season and then
Speaker 7: it got canceled because of being prempted so many times.
Speaker 7: I just couldn't get the numbers up because of that
Speaker 7: and and that. But Blossom, but Blossom went and uh
Speaker 7: and so then they finally, you know, then they because
Speaker 7: at first I had to be a guest star on
Speaker 7: Blossom because I was irregular around money. So for like
Speaker 7: the first half a season of the first year of Blossom,
Speaker 7: I was a guest star I think until they could
Speaker 7: could technically legally make you make me a regular. But yeah,
Speaker 7: so we did. We did that and and yeah it
Speaker 7: was just like this crazy, crazy situation that I can't
Speaker 7: imagine happening now, and I yeah, it kind of blows
Speaker 7: my mind.
Speaker 1: And six became such an identifiable character? Was it always
Speaker 1: I mean you talked about like wearing the hat at
Speaker 1: the network and stuff, But was it always written like
Speaker 1: as this very identifiable, fast talking, quirky or was that
Speaker 1: kind of did that evolve with you in concert with
Speaker 1: the writing creating the character?
Speaker 7: This is called Jena driving too much coffee as a kid?
Speaker 2: True start?
Speaker 7: Wait did I answer the full question that you asked
Speaker 7: me before? I'm trying to think. I feel like there
Speaker 7: there was a tube parter and my the second part.
Speaker 6: Of it was did you get recognized all the time?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 7: Well, like when did we know that the show was?
Speaker 6: Like did we did you know it was a hit?
Speaker 6: And did you get recognized all the time?
Speaker 7: I feel like so when the show got picked up
Speaker 7: as a mid season replacement for a couple of years,
Speaker 7: I don't feel like the first year or so it
Speaker 7: was sort of just even keeled. And then I want
Speaker 7: to say something weird happened with like Warren Littlefield was
Speaker 7: president of NBC at the time, and I think, if
Speaker 7: I recall correctly, and I hope I'm not misquoting all
Speaker 7: of this, it's obviously been a His daughter was like
Speaker 7: obsessed with the show when he was going to cancel it,
Speaker 7: and she was like, oh my god, please please don't
Speaker 7: do that. Like I think we almost single handedly can
Speaker 7: can thank Warren Littlefield's daughter for the show being being
Speaker 7: given that that chance UH to continue. And then it
Speaker 7: really really took off. And I will say that the moment.
Speaker 7: There were like two moments where I was like, oh
Speaker 7: my god, I think actually, like maybe people watched this
Speaker 7: show and it's a thing. The first was I went
Speaker 7: to a Boys to Men concert.
Speaker 6: Shocker and I can't wait to talk to you about
Speaker 6: music go on and.
Speaker 7: And mc hammer was also in concert with them. And
Speaker 7: I was in like Peoria, Illinois doing some sort of
Speaker 7: like signing or something, and you know, and people started climbing.
Speaker 7: I was in like a little box thing and people
Speaker 7: started climbing it to get autographs and they had to
Speaker 7: carry me. They had actually had and I was like
Speaker 7: geezh okay, like this might this might mean people watch
Speaker 7: the show. The second one was that they parodied us
Speaker 7: on Saturday and Saturday Night.
Speaker 1: It definitely that's it, that's it for us, like.
Speaker 7: Like mal Shannon and that was Yeah, I don't know,
Speaker 7: maybe it wasn't Molly Shannon. I'm trying to remember who
Speaker 7: was in there, but like Mike Myers, definitely Mike Joey.
Speaker 1: Joey, Yeah, I remember saying yeah, but you.
Speaker 4: I mean, Blossom is also one of those shows, and
Speaker 4: it might be right at the tail end of it, frankly,
Speaker 4: but where the opening title sequence was hugely important to
Speaker 4: the show. Yeah, I mean these were you know, back
Speaker 4: in the days of Family Ties Cosby Show, the opening
Speaker 4: title sequence was really important.
Speaker 3: It started to go away.
Speaker 4: Seinfeld got rid of it essentially entirely, Boymans World even
Speaker 4: got rid of it entirely. But that I remember distinctly
Speaker 4: people singing the home humming along with the song, seeing
Speaker 4: you all come out and dancing. I mean, it really
Speaker 4: was its own character at that time in television where
Speaker 4: that opening title sequences were important. I mean it really
Speaker 4: it mattered what your opening title sequence was, and Blossom
Speaker 4: was one of the last ones that was really had
Speaker 4: that signature.
Speaker 7: I don't know if I've ever realized that. You know,
Speaker 7: the original song was Bobby Brown's Don't Worry I'm blanky prerogative.
Speaker 1: It was a real hy pregative that was like.
Speaker 7: The initial theme song. And then I don't know what happened.
Speaker 7: I'm sure it was a like a rights issue and
Speaker 7: they couldn't it wasn't sustainable, but uh yeah, and then
Speaker 7: it became you know, I think it's doctor John is
Speaker 7: who sings my opinionation, and then that became like the
Speaker 7: the thing, so weird.
Speaker 5: So music is a huge part of your life and
Speaker 5: was always a passion of yours.
Speaker 6: Where did that come from? And tell us what it's
Speaker 6: meant to you over your life?
Speaker 7: I mean, music was always I think my dad sings
Speaker 7: my you know, I mean my dad sings, but it's like,
Speaker 7: you know, church choir. And I grew up listening only
Speaker 7: to classical music, and I think my mom listened to
Speaker 7: John Denver. That was about the extent of my music knowledge.
Speaker 10: Like my mom didn't doesn't like Elvis at all, didn't
Speaker 10: like the Beatles, so like I had to teach myself
Speaker 10: music and which now this has become a big thing
Speaker 10: in my household, Like when I'm cooking dinner, I put
Speaker 10: on music from different genres and different eras for my
Speaker 10: girls because I really I'm like, okay, who's sing this?
Speaker 7: Come on?
Speaker 1: You know, like my daughter.
Speaker 7: Exactly. And my daughter has taken to wearing Cyndy Lopper
Speaker 7: gloves to school on a daily base mat her outfit.
Speaker 7: So I' mean it's fine, It's all good. I don't
Speaker 7: know that school's thrilled with me about it, but I'm
Speaker 7: but I'm thrilled.
Speaker 6: I love happy.
Speaker 7: Yeah, we're channeling the eighties over here. But yeah. So
Speaker 7: I kind of like taught myself music and it was
Speaker 7: always super important to me. I wrote from the time
Speaker 7: I was very very little. That was always an outlet
Speaker 7: for me in some former fashion, and I think it
Speaker 7: started out with music and poetry and things of that nature.
Speaker 7: And now I write, you know, film scripts, and I
Speaker 7: write for a lifestyle publication in Nashville and all that
Speaker 7: kind of stuff. So I've been I've always written, just
Speaker 7: in different in different capacities. But because my parents didn't
Speaker 7: really raise me to know a broad musical horizon, I
Speaker 7: was very excited being on Blossom because we had crazy
Speaker 7: cool music guests, everybody from BB King to you know,
Speaker 7: little Richard See and See Music Factory. Like the list
Speaker 7: just goes on and on and on. I mean, it
Speaker 7: was a phenomenal, phenomenal, eye opening musical experience, I think
Speaker 7: to be on the show because Don Rio is such
Speaker 7: a music fan that he invited as many people as
Speaker 7: he could that he loved and respected to the show.
Speaker 7: And you know, and we all had really vast and
Speaker 7: varied musical Mayam was very much the like violent Femmes
Speaker 7: and Elvis Costello and and and you know again, Joey
Speaker 7: was very and Joey was the boys to men and
Speaker 7: and and you know, and all of that, and so
Speaker 7: it was kind of a cool exposure.
Speaker 6: That's so great.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you've mentioned your daughters a couple of times. Now
Speaker 5: you have two daughters, and you've been able to write
Speaker 5: about your experience with the situation Mammady books. What would
Speaker 5: you say is the most important lesson you've learned in
Speaker 5: Mother Grace?
Speaker 7: Just Grace capital g R A c E. My kids
Speaker 7: are amazing. My older daughter is Gray, she's eleven. Uh.
Speaker 7: And then my younger daughter, Marlowe.
Speaker 1: Is nine, and you know her name is Gray.
Speaker 2: Her name is gret.
Speaker 7: I was like, wow, no, no, I mean they make
Speaker 7: me go gray by wearing the ball. Now they're and
Speaker 7: they're amazing, They're they're so awesome, Like it's just it's
Speaker 7: really cool to parenting is really cool. Like adulting sucks ass,
Speaker 7: but parenting is really cool. And I think some they're
Speaker 7: you know, they're so Yeah. Gray's in middle school and
Speaker 7: she's my introspective, avid reader. She's kind of me at
Speaker 7: her age. She very much wants to people please, and
Speaker 7: she's like she wants everybody to know she's trying her best,
Speaker 7: and she's kicking butt in school and she's like in
Speaker 7: the gifted program and she's you know, I mean, she's
Speaker 7: freaking brilliant and she's super intuitive. If she understands things
Speaker 7: that it's just not even right. It's not fair and
Speaker 7: not right because because there are just conversations we shouldn't have,
Speaker 7: but we do and they're awesome. And I pour myself
Speaker 7: a bourbon and we sit down and we chat. But
Speaker 7: and then Marlowe is like my little spitfirefirecracker. She's kind
Speaker 7: of me once I realized that I had a voice,
Speaker 7: And I'm super impressed that she at nine years old
Speaker 7: already knows that she has one's Wow, it's pretty pretty cool.
Speaker 5: So if your girls came to you and said they
Speaker 5: wanted to get into acting, what do you think you
Speaker 5: would say?
Speaker 7: Well, they have, which is crazy. I think this is
Speaker 7: probably the first interview I've done since I haven't done
Speaker 7: one in a while where question has been asked, and
Speaker 7: like in the past, you know, I was always like, wow,
Speaker 7: if they're really serious about it, obviously you know this.
Speaker 7: This industry comes with its pitfalls, and it's I mean,
Speaker 7: there were so many highs and lows on a daily
Speaker 7: basis really with this industry. And but having experienced as
Speaker 7: much as we all have, particularly during a time when
Speaker 7: I think that we understand work ethic and and sort
Speaker 7: of like the sort of old school industry the way
Speaker 7: that we do, which I have a lot of appreciation
Speaker 7: for old school industry, I feel like I could coach
Speaker 7: them through it in a way that would you know,
Speaker 7: my parents were so green, they just didn't know about
Speaker 7: any of it, And having the background that we have
Speaker 7: makes it a little bit easier. At the same time,
Speaker 7: having the background makes me sit back and go, you
Speaker 7: better really want it, kid. Yeah, So yeah, I you know,
Speaker 7: they just need to really want. I want to know
Speaker 7: it's coming from them. It's not a hey, you did it,
Speaker 7: so I'm curious about it being this is awesome. You
Speaker 7: should be curious about everything. Please be curious, be curious
Speaker 7: about it all. But to actually pursue this industry, I
Speaker 7: need to know that you want it for you. This
Speaker 7: is your passion, not your passion because it was my
Speaker 7: passion or is my passion. Yeah, and you know, both
Speaker 7: of my kids have expressed high, high level interest in it,
Speaker 7: but they're both really young and I so I also
Speaker 7: understand that we live in a world where social media
Speaker 7: has produced very you know, people with a lot of
Speaker 7: notoriety that haven't necessarily used talent to get there. That's like,
Speaker 7: you know, I'm just trying to be fair about this
Speaker 7: whole thing. Like social media isn't a necessarily always based
Speaker 7: on talent. Now that's not to say it isn't based
Speaker 7: on business savvy, totally different thing. But to actually be
Speaker 7: an actress, like I want to know that you have
Speaker 7: talent and want.
Speaker 4: This is like what you actually has to be about
Speaker 4: the art or expression, yeah, not not personal desire to
Speaker 4: do it.
Speaker 7: Yourself too, right, not that like Taylor Swift is famous,
Speaker 7: ergo I should be famous, right, Like, this is not
Speaker 7: you know, that's not what I'm working. I'm not going
Speaker 7: to work with that. So so I'm really I'm careful.
Speaker 7: I'm mindful about thoughtful all about their about their pursuits,
Speaker 7: because I just want to make sure it really truly
Speaker 7: is coming from the right place and coming from their
Speaker 7: art and and and nothing else.
Speaker 6: Have they watched Blossom? Do they know how cool you were?
Speaker 7: And are? Well? I don't know about cool, because I'm
Speaker 7: pretty sure if you ask both of my children they'd
Speaker 7: be like, oh, have you seen our mind dance? I'm
Speaker 7: I want to say they've seen an episode of Blossom.
Speaker 7: I believe I showed them an episode of Blossom a
Speaker 7: couple of years ago because they were what they were
Speaker 7: asking about it, and I wanted them, you know, I'm
Speaker 7: proud of it, like I am really proud of it,
Speaker 7: and I want them to have context. At the same time,
Speaker 7: I don't want them to feel any sense of weird
Speaker 7: entitlement by that, or like confusion that somehow I don't know,
Speaker 7: that's just not really a part of our lives at
Speaker 7: this particular juncture, you know, And I want them to
Speaker 7: feel my sense of pride and understand my work ethic
Speaker 7: without thinking that it's cool that I.
Speaker 2: Was on the show.
Speaker 1: Right, right, do you still get recognized?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. How long have you been in You're in Nashville, right,
Speaker 1: how long have you been there?
Speaker 7: Here's what's crazy. So come April, I'll be here seventeen years. Wow,
Speaker 7: And I was early and I was in La seventeen years.
Speaker 7: So this bizarre thing for me is is hitting this
Speaker 7: moment where I'm like, oh, wow, I've actually been in
Speaker 7: both places.
Speaker 6: Just as long.
Speaker 7: Yeah, for an equal amnt of time.
Speaker 6: So cool, so weird.
Speaker 5: So looking back now almost thirty five years, so's awesome, debuted,
Speaker 5: I hear nothing. What I know looking at young Jenna's
Speaker 5: work dating young Wilfredell at the time. Yeah, how do
Speaker 5: you feel about young Jenna and what message would you
Speaker 5: like to give to her today?
Speaker 7: Oh gosh, it's I mean, it's kind of the same
Speaker 7: message that I give myself and my kids now about
Speaker 7: about having grace. I think you know, I knew exactly
Speaker 7: what I was getting into at that time, in the
Speaker 7: sense that it was my passion. I wanted so badly
Speaker 7: to continue working. I was the one who begged my
Speaker 7: parents to be an actress. I you know, wasn't their idea,
Speaker 7: it was mine, and I continued to have one passion
Speaker 7: for it. I still do. You know, being in Nashville
Speaker 7: doesn't change the fact that I absolutely love being on camera.
Speaker 7: I love memorizing lines. I love writing scripts, I love
Speaker 7: reading scripts. I love sitting with the cast at the
Speaker 7: first read.
Speaker 2: I love.
Speaker 7: I love all of it. I love all of it,
Speaker 7: every every last.
Speaker 2: Bit of it.
Speaker 7: But I think the biggest thing for me would just be,
Speaker 7: you know, we all go through our own evolution with
Speaker 7: self awareness, and I had a really hard time, I think.
Speaker 7: I you know, we were on shows during a time
Speaker 7: when someone like Tracy Gold was getting called fat, yeah,
Speaker 7: and it was drastically affecting her view of herself, and
Speaker 7: it caused her to in a big way and caused
Speaker 7: her to have an eating disorder, you know. And I
Speaker 7: think we probably, all, in our own ways, Carrie with us,
Speaker 7: certain elements of that time of feeling like really we
Speaker 7: could like you know, now everybody's far more careful about
Speaker 7: what they joke about. To be fair, you know, everybody's
Speaker 7: really aware of mental health, particularly following COVID. You know,
Speaker 7: and we were on shows during a time where they
Speaker 7: made a lot of fun of things because they they could,
Speaker 7: and it wasn't nobody was saying, hey, maybe that's maybe
Speaker 7: that's harming this person in the long run.
Speaker 1: So I don't know.
Speaker 7: I'd like to think that what I would tell myself
Speaker 7: is to just sort of take it with a grain
Speaker 7: of salt. And I probably wouldn't believe it if I
Speaker 7: heard it. I probably heard it from somebody then and
Speaker 7: didn't you know, as we all have to go through
Speaker 7: our own experiences with it. And I'm very much a
Speaker 7: visual person, so I'm not shocked that I had to
Speaker 7: be hands on in all of it to really appreciate that.
Speaker 7: But I'd like to think that having self awareness and
Speaker 7: evolving and adulting, man, I feel like it has helped me,
Speaker 7: has helped me outgrow some of those some of those
Speaker 7: difficulties with self confidence, you know, which is also again
Speaker 7: why I go back to it's so interesting to hear
Speaker 7: you say writer that I've seemed so so confident, because
Speaker 7: I felt so far from confident during that time. And ironically,
Speaker 7: I want to say that because I did my MS
Speaker 7: podcast at one point and I want to say she
Speaker 7: said something similar to me, and like, I just there
Speaker 7: is nothing that I never ever felt confident. I still
Speaker 7: wake up in the morning and drink my cup of
Speaker 7: coffee and I'm like, do I feel confident today?
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 7: We'll see how it goes, Like you know, so, it's
Speaker 7: so interesting to hear other people's perspectives relatively kind of
Speaker 7: shining a shining a light on your own opinions on it.
Speaker 5: But well, Jenna, you were one of the coolest people
Speaker 5: we knew back then, and you're still one of the
Speaker 5: coolest people we know today. And we are honored that
Speaker 5: you spend your time with us this morning. It's so
Speaker 5: good to reconnect with you. Please let us know the
Speaker 5: next time you're in La we would absolutely love to
Speaker 5: do that dinner.
Speaker 7: Still existed, which I'm assuming it doesn't.
Speaker 1: There's one well ren Selica's.
Speaker 4: Restaurant and look at each other while not eating salad,
Speaker 4: and Jenna and I will record it on a tape
Speaker 4: recorder for teen b and I'll bring my mom, who
Speaker 4: will take a photo shoot for us.
Speaker 2: Love it.
Speaker 7: I think we've got it. We've hit the nail on
Speaker 7: the head here.
Speaker 4: We've got to find that tape Jenna, We've got to
Speaker 4: find that tape of the original first date.
Speaker 7: Oh my god, I wonder if I probably turned it
Speaker 7: into team Beat. It's either you know, burned somewhere, or
Speaker 7: it's in like some scary archive in some mic.
Speaker 2: It's on microfish somewhere.
Speaker 7: I mean, thank you so much.
Speaker 5: This was Awesomeank you so good to see you, big, big,
Speaker 5: big hug. Can't wait to give it to you in person.
Speaker 5: You jugs same here, all right, bye bye. It's so
Speaker 5: interesting how many women we speak to who all have
Speaker 5: you know, the same the same stories. And it's not
Speaker 5: just women. Of course, men in the industry also have
Speaker 5: their own, you know, feelings of insecurity and whatever. But really,
Speaker 5: you know, almost every woman we talk to has some
Speaker 5: story about feeling not beautiful or you know, worried about
Speaker 5: whether or not they were overweight. And you know, they're
Speaker 5: always the people that were like, wait, what like are
Speaker 5: It's just you know, you aren't a good judge of yourself.
Speaker 1: We are, certainly in terms of the looks, but even
Speaker 1: even in terms of like it's so funny that she
Speaker 1: didn't even think of herself as like put together.
Speaker 6: Or are confident when like she was the all the most.
Speaker 1: Confident, funny like knew everything about like I just you know,
Speaker 1: and yeah, it's you know, it just goes to show
Speaker 1: that like no matter what stage you're in, whether you're
Speaker 1: a teenager acting on a TV show or a forty
Speaker 1: four year old sad dad, to get out of your
Speaker 1: own way, like don't worry about it, like just be
Speaker 1: just be focused on you know, your goals and the
Speaker 1: thing you want to be and be in the print
Speaker 1: and just just worry about that. Like if you if
Speaker 1: you worry too much about who you are, what you
Speaker 1: look like, what you sound like, or what people's perception
Speaker 1: of you, it's it's never good. Like it doesn't it
Speaker 1: doesn't help any like because you actually will never know,
Speaker 1: you know, like you could be going through the worst
Speaker 1: time I said than done.
Speaker 4: Though everybody says to themselves like I'm not going to
Speaker 4: care and people think about me, I'm not going to
Speaker 4: care how I look, and it's almost impossible to do.
Speaker 2: Everybody seems to care about all that stuff all the time.
Speaker 4: And so it's the older you're getting older, I'm getting
Speaker 4: I'm trying to let that stuff go, but it's hard.
Speaker 4: It's yeah, you know, it's different now, than it was
Speaker 4: when I was fifteen sixteen, but it's still always there.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Well, when you're that age too, it's really hard
Speaker 5: for you to understand that you're actually not the center
Speaker 5: of the universe.
Speaker 6: Right, Fundamentally, you're supposed to.
Speaker 5: Think you're the center of the universe at that time,
Speaker 5: and yet trying to tell yourself no one else is
Speaker 5: thinking this as much as you are.
Speaker 6: Is impossible that Well, if you're on.
Speaker 1: A TV show, you actually are kind of the center.
Speaker 6: You're the center of that.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's it's so weird, right, Like when you're
Speaker 1: an adolescent and you still do think the world revolves
Speaker 1: around like we're social life, and then like your friends,
Speaker 1: the people you work with are also being recognized everywhere
Speaker 1: you go. It's a weird thing. Like it's a very
Speaker 1: it's distorting. It was always a distorting mirror.
Speaker 5: Well, thank you for joining us for this episode of
Speaker 5: Pod Meets World. As always, you can follow us on
Speaker 5: Instagram pod Meets World Show. You can send us your
Speaker 5: emails pod meets World Show at gmail dot com, and
Speaker 5: we have merch.
Speaker 1: Jenna Selica is White March.
Speaker 6: I can't believe you were right about all that. I'm
Speaker 6: never wrong. How did this happen?
Speaker 3: Writer?
Speaker 6: Send us out?
Speaker 1: We love you all, pod dismissed. Pod Meets World is
Speaker 1: an iHeart podcast producer and hosted by Danielle Fischel, Wilfordell
Speaker 1: and Writers. Executive producers Jensen Karp and Amy Sugarman. Executive
Speaker 1: in charge of production, Danielle Romo, producer and editor, Tara Subasch, producer,
Speaker 1: Mattie Moore, engineer and Boy Meets World superman Easton Allen.
Speaker 1: Our theme song is by Kyle Morton of Typhoon. Follow
Speaker 1: us on Instagram at podmets World Show, or email us
Speaker 1: at Podmeats Worldshow at gmail dot com