Speaker 1: Hi, Welcome to Desperately Devoted the Ultimate Desperate Housewives rewatch,
Speaker 1: hosted by me, Terry Hatcher, my on screen daughter Andrea Bowen,
Speaker 1: and my real life daughter Emerson Tenny. We are so
Speaker 1: lucky and blessed this week to have the incredible Doug
Speaker 1: Savant here with us telling us.
Speaker 2: To talk about the show and his experience. And thank
Speaker 2: you so much for being here with you.
Speaker 3: I am thrilled to be here and thrilled to be
Speaker 3: back with you ladies, and now with Emerson all grown up.
Speaker 4: It's fantastic.
Speaker 5: It is so amazing. You look amazing. I just every
Speaker 5: time we see somebody from the show, or even when
Speaker 5: we're just watching the episodes now, memories just come flooding back,
Speaker 5: and I don't know, maybe it's it's time, but I
Speaker 5: just find everyone was so brilliant and genius and just
Speaker 5: I just have so much love. It's just I know
Speaker 5: I'm on zoom, but I feel like I'm in the room.
Speaker 5: I want to just grab you by the cheek. It's
Speaker 5: so great to see you, and that's.
Speaker 6: Great to see so welcome.
Speaker 4: It's great to see you.
Speaker 3: It's great to be seen by you and with you
Speaker 3: and be with you, but yeah, I as you've gone back,
Speaker 3: like are what are your feelings?
Speaker 5: It's been really fun because Emerson's basically never seen the
Speaker 5: show before, and we haven't seen it in such a
Speaker 5: long time that, like I said, you know, I find
Speaker 5: myself going, oh my god, I forgot that.
Speaker 7: I forgot that, I forgot that.
Speaker 5: You know. But one of the things that was standing
Speaker 5: out to us very early on, and I know, I'm
Speaker 5: so excited to talk to you about this is you know,
Speaker 5: there was so much obviously hype around the show and
Speaker 5: around the idea of housewives, which mostly focused on the women,
Speaker 5: and when you step away from it for as long
Speaker 5: as we have and we go back, I feel by
Speaker 5: the third episode, the men, I mean, I think I
Speaker 5: came in to discuss our podcast and I was like,
Speaker 5: you guys, aren't the men just like jumping off the
Speaker 5: screen at you?
Speaker 6: Like, I.
Speaker 5: Have so much kind of curiosity and compassion for the
Speaker 5: character development and the individual differences uniqueness between these men.
Speaker 5: And also I have so many questions about what it
Speaker 5: was like to try to play it. But let me
Speaker 5: just start there that in hindsight, I feel like the
Speaker 5: men are landing in a very strong way. Do you
Speaker 5: guys feel that way.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, I's second that it's so exciting and nice
Speaker 2: to have you here because we have been discussing amongst
Speaker 2: the three of us just how strong the husband's point
Speaker 2: of view comes in, starting around episode three particularly, but
Speaker 2: continuing on through the first season.
Speaker 5: I mean, how did you can we just even go
Speaker 5: to like how did you even get the show? Like
Speaker 5: did you know Mark?
Speaker 6: Or how what was?
Speaker 5: Really?
Speaker 6: Go back?
Speaker 3: Okay, really go back? So I went into a no,
Speaker 3: just a standard audition. It was another audition, and the
Speaker 3: first thing that Mark Cherry said to me jumps out
Speaker 3: of his seat and he says, I wrote the first
Speaker 3: thing that your wife was ever in.
Speaker 4: So my.
Speaker 3: Wife, when she, you know, was starting launching her career,
Speaker 3: she was part of a touring company of the Young
Speaker 3: Americans and which Mark was, and so Mark had written
Speaker 3: like this sort of musical thing, and Laura was there
Speaker 3: and so she sang and she did this this thing
Speaker 3: with Mark. So that was That's how Mark introduced himself
Speaker 3: to me.
Speaker 2: Welcome. That's an ingratiating way to meet something.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And then of course I auditioned. It was Charlie McDougal,
Speaker 3: the our pilot director, And the interesting thing about the
Speaker 3: process for me was I was coming into the pilot
Speaker 3: as a guest. I was not a contracted a series regular.
Speaker 3: I was a guest star. So I got the Desperate
Speaker 3: Housewives pilot as a guest and it was the only
Speaker 3: husband that didn't have a serious regular role, and in fact,
Speaker 3: I had to pass on a on a CSI there
Speaker 3: were at the same time, and I thought, I'm gonna
Speaker 3: I'm gonna go with this Desperate Housewives thing, and and
Speaker 3: then magically the show goes, you know. And I thought
Speaker 3: from reading the pilot that it was outstanding that I
Speaker 3: saw something in it, and I hope that we all
Speaker 3: did that, that there was a duality that there was.
Speaker 3: There was seriousness there, but there was this also farcical
Speaker 3: side or a soap side that people could engage with
Speaker 3: it on many levels. And having come from Melrose's place
Speaker 3: many years before, that was something that I noted in
Speaker 3: that audience too. There was people who are in on
Speaker 3: the joke and then people who just wanted to simply
Speaker 3: be in for the soap opera aspects of it. But
Speaker 3: then we got picked up and that's when the real
Speaker 3: drama started. Because the studio called he said, we want
Speaker 3: we want some want to come back as a guest.
Speaker 3: We wanted you to come back as a guest for
Speaker 3: for six episodes the first we were picked up, where
Speaker 3: we picked up for nine or thirteen.
Speaker 6: I forget, I don't really I might have.
Speaker 5: Season.
Speaker 4: Well we didn't get the backward I know that, I know,
Speaker 4: I know that.
Speaker 3: And so they said and we said, okay, well, you
Speaker 3: know great, you know I'm interested in doing the show.
Speaker 3: But they just made it awful. They were we're not
Speaker 3: going to pay him another nickel. We said, well, is
Speaker 3: there would you maybe be willing to offer some contract. No,
Speaker 3: we never do that. Well that's interesting because Nicole at
Speaker 3: Sheridan was a guest star on the pilot, but she
Speaker 3: was up for the contract, and so I ended up.
Speaker 3: They made it so hateful that I ended up passing
Speaker 3: on the show.
Speaker 6: Oh my god.
Speaker 3: And I said, I said, I'll go out and I'll
Speaker 3: get six guest stars myself of other shows.
Speaker 4: I'm not doing this.
Speaker 3: They never said. They never came to me and said,
Speaker 3: we think you're great. We just don't have any money.
Speaker 3: We don't know if the shows hit yet. We don't
Speaker 3: you know, they didn't play any of that they said,
Speaker 3: we're not paying him another nickel.
Speaker 4: I don't care if we have to reshoot the.
Speaker 3: Thing, And I thought wow, And so I thought, wow,
Speaker 3: you just go right ahead.
Speaker 4: Thanks. Yeah, I know, Terry.
Speaker 5: I'm going to brace interrupt for one second, and I'm
Speaker 5: going to circle back to something our listeners may have
Speaker 5: picked up on. This is why I wore my own wardrobe.
Speaker 8: Probably, yes, we talked about this in the pilot.
Speaker 5: I'm just thinking that all of these things are trickling
Speaker 5: down into some sort of like they were not prepared
Speaker 5: for what it actually took to shoot what they wrote,
Speaker 5: and we.
Speaker 8: Found all these moments where I was like, Mom, isn't
Speaker 8: that your shirt? Like didn't I end up borrowing that?
Speaker 8: I still have that purse today? And she said, yeah,
Speaker 8: they were not prepared to dress five leading women.
Speaker 5: Anyways, I'm so sorry to interrupt, but I just know
Speaker 5: it's crazy to hear how that.
Speaker 6: Yes, so you may not know the also awful, So
Speaker 6: go ahead.
Speaker 4: You may not know.
Speaker 3: The end of the story is Mark Cherry called me
Speaker 3: and said, Doug, is it true that you're not doing it?
Speaker 3: You're not going to do our show? And I said, Mark,
Speaker 3: they made they made it horrible long story short. Mark said, please,
Speaker 3: let's get them out of this. I'll negotiate. I'll negotiate
Speaker 3: with you. We don't have any money. We're you know,
Speaker 3: we we we love you. We thought you were great
Speaker 3: on the pilot. He said, all the nice right things.
Speaker 3: And I said, okay, let's you know, can we just
Speaker 3: make something more like than more than just like Top
Speaker 3: of Show? Like musicians, if they're a really good musician
Speaker 3: and they get a studio gig there or an album
Speaker 3: they'll get, they'll get double scale or something like just
Speaker 3: pay me double scale something, throw me a bone, he goes,
Speaker 3: let me go. They said, oh no, no, we never
Speaker 3: do that. And I said, okay, So I said, okay,
Speaker 3: I tell you what, Mark, I thank you. I appreciate that.
Speaker 3: I want to do the show. I'll come in and
Speaker 3: I'll do the first six. And they had some number
Speaker 3: on the backside too. I said, I'll do it, and
Speaker 3: I'll do it for Top of Show. But you're the
Speaker 3: reason you're saying this is because we don't note the
Speaker 3: show is a hit yet and we don't have the money.
Speaker 3: So if the show is a hit and you go
Speaker 3: a second season, whether you kill tom Off or not
Speaker 3: you don't want me on the show. You need to
Speaker 3: pay me for the second season. Just if the show's
Speaker 3: a hit, I'll go, he said. He said, oh, Mark said,
Speaker 3: I can do that. I will definitely do that. He
Speaker 3: called me back and said, oh, they said, we never
Speaker 3: do that.
Speaker 8: I feel like I hear this all the time from
Speaker 8: his studios.
Speaker 1: We never.
Speaker 3: Mark Cherry then uttered these words to me which made
Speaker 3: me take the job. I give you my word as
Speaker 3: a Christian man, if the season goes, you'll be there.
Speaker 3: And to his eternal credit, he kept his word. He
Speaker 3: Mark Cherry is a fantastic human being who he gave
Speaker 3: me the best eight years of my life, my professional life.
Speaker 3: I adored this experience. I adored this show. I wouldn't
Speaker 3: change it for anything. My trip as you girls were
Speaker 3: like blowing up on every magazine cover in the world,
Speaker 3: and the studio was lavishing lovely you know tokens of
Speaker 3: their affection on you. I was just a guest star
Speaker 3: sitting there, like to know, keeping my fingers. Grassed that Mark.
Speaker 3: Mark kept his word, and he did then more so
Speaker 3: because we had another seven years.
Speaker 2: Yeah after that, it's astonishing. I thought people are going
Speaker 2: to find that your origin story is so fascinating because
Speaker 2: Tom becomes.
Speaker 5: Such a staple of the show.
Speaker 2: The idea that initially you weren't going to be on
Speaker 2: that regularly, you were just kind of coming in occasionally,
Speaker 2: and then the risk that might have you not having
Speaker 2: been on the show for as long as you were
Speaker 2: is just amazing to hear.
Speaker 6: I'm so glad.
Speaker 8: I'm so glad that he kept his word too, because
Speaker 8: I have to say Tom and Lynnett are my favorite
Speaker 8: couple on the show. And I mean, even in all
Speaker 8: of the chaos of all of the kids. And we've
Speaker 8: talked a lot about the baby who comes in and
Speaker 8: out of the first episodes, we don't see for me
Speaker 8: five episodes. But something that we've talked about a lot,
Speaker 8: especially in regards to your performance, is on the page,
Speaker 8: Tom could come across as so oblivious to his wife's
Speaker 8: struggles and he's gone at work, and you know she's
Speaker 8: sort of resentful of him. But you play the character
Speaker 8: in such a way that feels so disarmingly charming and
Speaker 8: present and kind that even when the actual words Tom
Speaker 8: is saying feel like I cannot believe this man is
Speaker 8: saying it, there's something believably charming and endearing about it.
Speaker 3: Did you, Can I first acknowledge I never tire of
Speaker 3: hearing that, And can.
Speaker 5: I just acknowledge how wonderful it is that my daughter
Speaker 5: is such a generous and articulate human.
Speaker 8: Yeah, well, it's true. It's really, I mean, it is true.
Speaker 5: I am true. Yeah, no, and it is. It is
Speaker 5: true that you really added layers that in some sense,
Speaker 5: you know what I mean, just weren't there, you know,
Speaker 5: and and and without that, I think I think Lynette's.
Speaker 7: Ability to do what she needed to do would have.
Speaker 5: Been much harder. I thought some of the choices you
Speaker 5: made were incredibly brave because they were you were committed
Speaker 5: to the cluelessness in a way that must have felt
Speaker 5: very awkward, because I think I said this in one
Speaker 5: of our episodes a couple of weeks ago, I said,
Speaker 5: there is no way Doug treats his wife like that
Speaker 5: like that. You know, I guarantee you, I guarantee you.
Speaker 4: You know that I'm not allowing you what to come
Speaker 4: in for a postmark? Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so, I Terry, I thought, I, you know, you
Speaker 3: were reticent to say that about Tom's either cluelessness or
Speaker 3: I thank you that was You're being kind. But no,
Speaker 3: there was a Tom. What I heard while I was
Speaker 3: on the show. In the first I had women come
Speaker 3: out to me and say, you are playing my husband.
Speaker 3: But because Tom, I believe was a good guy, he
Speaker 3: just didn't know what to do. He was he was like, oh,
Speaker 3: and then would you tell me? Of course, yeah, of
Speaker 3: course I'll do.
Speaker 5: I feel like when I said clueless, I didn't mean idiot.
Speaker 5: I meant more like just unaware. Sure as the second Tom,
Speaker 5: the second Tom became aware, he tried to do something
Speaker 5: about it.
Speaker 6: Oh, I wanted to help. Yeah, he was always absolutely
Speaker 6: and he.
Speaker 3: Came from the place I used to say this and
Speaker 3: this happy wife, happy life. That's and there's many there
Speaker 3: are many, many, many men who lived this way. And yeah,
Speaker 3: so he might not have got it right, you know
Speaker 3: on the first take, you know, like what and then
Speaker 3: but then he would rise to.
Speaker 2: The occasion and you listened, I mean Tom, Tom listened
Speaker 2: to his wife when she would say, hey, I actually
Speaker 2: need something from you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and Lynette, Lynette, come on, let's see. Lenette was hardcore.
Speaker 3: I mean she you know. That's really what I loved
Speaker 3: about the portrayal of this marriage ontellivigionce I thought it
Speaker 3: was really a good portrayal of a not perfect marriage,
Speaker 3: but a really good, strong marriage, and that wall things
Speaker 3: aren't always perfect. They stayed together early or early early,
Speaker 3: they really you know, they really stuck together, and I
Speaker 3: think that they had a good I think it was
Speaker 3: a good representation of marriage in you know, in the media.
Speaker 5: Do you have scenes, I mean, it's long, it's it's
Speaker 5: I would imagine maybe you don't remember, because I know,
Speaker 5: eight seasons is a long time, and I'm finding myself going,
Speaker 5: I don't even remember shooting that, you know, but do
Speaker 5: you have scenes that stick out in your brain that
Speaker 5: were particularly rewarding or challenging.
Speaker 6: Or humiliating you go, yeah.
Speaker 5: Back, and you go, I'm really proud of that. Like
Speaker 5: I would use the example of me getting locked out
Speaker 5: of the house naked and this sort of like physical
Speaker 5: comedy I did involved in that, as I would look
Speaker 5: at that as like a highlight not just my execution,
Speaker 5: but the opportunity itself that Mark wrote for me to even.
Speaker 3: Do that, right, but that really you execute it on
Speaker 3: the highest level. You know, somebody can put it on
Speaker 3: the page, as your daughter knows, but bringing it to
Speaker 3: life and doing it the physical comedy is next level.
Speaker 3: So no that I would say that that is an
Speaker 3: iconic image from the show of what you did there
Speaker 3: Eva mowing the lawn. There are so many just the
Speaker 3: imagery of the show. I think was it season two
Speaker 3: when they did the whole Eden thing with the apples
Speaker 3: and the or was that from them that's in the
Speaker 3: opening credits of this Well, I know, I know it's
Speaker 3: in the opening credits, but didn't somebody came in, like
Speaker 3: a big commercial director and they Oh.
Speaker 5: Yeah, David David Chappelle, David Chappelle, David David not La Chappelle,
Speaker 5: David Chappelle, David Chappellee.
Speaker 4: We're going with that.
Speaker 6: Yes, I was right.
Speaker 5: I think he did something like very high high fashion
Speaker 5: with apples. But so back to like, are there scenes
Speaker 5: that stand out like great?
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, there's okay. You know, I was certainly humiliated
Speaker 3: when I had to wear the song you know, a greet. Yeah,
Speaker 3: that was like something I didn't want to do. I'm
Speaker 3: like in my fortes, I'm like, Mark, nobody wants to
Speaker 3: see this, But that's still out there.
Speaker 4: That that lives on today.
Speaker 2: He gave you his one question word.
Speaker 3: When Curry Graham who's a fantastic actor, played my sort
Speaker 3: of my boss, and I was at the advertising in
Speaker 3: marketing or the advertising agency.
Speaker 4: There was a scene and.
Speaker 3: It got caught, but I had to go bobbing for
Speaker 3: a donut in the toilet bawl.
Speaker 5: Oh my god.
Speaker 3: And also he was throwing do you remember there was
Speaker 3: a scene in a in a boardroom where he's challenging
Speaker 3: me all the time and he was chucking eminem peanut
Speaker 3: eminem's at me and I would have to eat them
Speaker 3: out of the air.
Speaker 4: And we literally shot this. This wasn't c g.
Speaker 3: I I mean I was, you know, and I I
Speaker 3: don't want to really toot my own home.
Speaker 4: It was kind of I was kind of great at
Speaker 4: It was kind of a big deal.
Speaker 5: Everybody has to have like tricks in there in their
Speaker 5: basket of tricks. That's a good one to have.
Speaker 6: It really is.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I of course I remember all of this
Speaker 3: stuff with with Flick in terms of but I think
Speaker 3: I was most nervous and I don't know how. I
Speaker 3: don't want to mess up your podcast with a spoiler alert.
Speaker 3: So if anybody, oh, that's okay.
Speaker 5: I think when we're we've got we're so happy to
Speaker 5: have guests on. We know we're going to go way
Speaker 5: out of order.
Speaker 3: That's all right, Okay, So way at the end of
Speaker 3: the series, when Tom and Lynnette get back together on
Speaker 3: the street, that was really uh, that was I wanted
Speaker 3: to make sure I didn't screw that up. And I
Speaker 3: will say, you know, after all of these years, I
Speaker 3: don't I have not gone back and watched the show,
Speaker 3: but I it pops up on YouTube, various scenes and
Speaker 3: stuff like that, and I'm I'm vulnerable watch you know,
Speaker 3: and and I'm I'm super proud of what I did.
Speaker 2: I'm like, should be yeah, you should be three fans
Speaker 2: here and a million of more fans out there listening.
Speaker 8: I'm sure.
Speaker 5: Well, I don't know, but yeah, yeah, I was curious,
Speaker 5: like just a little digging a little bit deeper into
Speaker 5: playing Tom, because you know, I think people sometimes don't
Speaker 5: know this with series that sometimes the actors don't know
Speaker 5: where it's going. So so you get a script and
Speaker 5: the most you have is what you've done before in
Speaker 5: another episode, and then what you're looking at now, and
Speaker 5: you're not necessarily privy to where it's going. And sometimes
Speaker 5: character things that they write for you to do, you
Speaker 5: think I wouldn't do that, like based on what happened
Speaker 5: before or I that's not the way I've been playing it,
Speaker 5: Like how do I do you?
Speaker 7: Did you feel?
Speaker 5: And Plus in this show there's so many characters that
Speaker 5: I think a lot of us were creating homework about
Speaker 5: our characters by ourselves because there just wasn't time to,
Speaker 5: you know, have rehearsal and talk about it and figure
Speaker 5: it out.
Speaker 7: So did you do that?
Speaker 5: Did you fill Tom with some of your own stuff
Speaker 5: for like anything's come to you?
Speaker 3: Well that I think it's it's a great question. But
Speaker 3: given my history and I don't know how you because
Speaker 3: Terry yours we've done this a while, I was not
Speaker 3: prepared to come on a show where where any writer
Speaker 3: was going to listen to what I had to say.
Speaker 3: I mean nobody, I mean I don't know why. In
Speaker 3: my experience up to that point, nobody, nobody else wanted
Speaker 3: to listen to me anyway. So I was busy doing
Speaker 3: my damnedest to take what they had written and make
Speaker 3: it somehow work for me. But on this point, this
Speaker 3: was the most generous group of writers that I have
Speaker 3: ever been around.
Speaker 4: They there was not.
Speaker 3: Uh, they did listen when and the only reason, the
Speaker 3: only reason I ever even would would pipe up is
Speaker 3: because Felicity did. And she would say, this just doesn't
Speaker 3: make sense. And I will say, to her credit, she
Speaker 3: was extraordinarily.
Speaker 4: Demanding of the truth.
Speaker 3: And she was demanding, like she didn't phone stuff in
Speaker 3: and she always come in on the set and you know,
Speaker 3: it's too neat in here. We've got all these kids.
Speaker 3: It'd just be a mess and throw cheerios around and
Speaker 3: stuff like this. But really, I mean stuff there wasn't
Speaker 3: even her job. And she'll acknowledge this now. So also
Speaker 3: one of my favorite things is when I would go
Speaker 3: to wear terry, I didn't I'm not a person that
Speaker 3: would show up in the makeup trailer in my normal
Speaker 3: civy clothes. I would always get in my wardrobe first
Speaker 3: and then go I just didn't want to I don't
Speaker 3: like makeup. I didn't want to get No, I always
Speaker 3: get I was getting a wardrobe, then I go to makeup.
Speaker 3: And so when we would come to rehearse, Uh, most
Speaker 3: people are in their city, their city clothes, they're hanging
Speaker 3: out doing something. Then we're rehearsing and you go get
Speaker 3: in your stuff, but I show I always showed up
Speaker 3: in my wardrobe and Felicia more than one occasion was look, Mika,
Speaker 3: are you gonna wear like what and just pull the
Speaker 3: rug out phone and you're like, well they put it
Speaker 3: in the trailer. She goes, oh my god, that's hideous, and.
Speaker 5: Back to why I used my Oh yeah, he keeps
Speaker 5: coming up.
Speaker 2: It just keeps coming up.
Speaker 3: Well they did, Oh my god the first season, Terry,
Speaker 3: you're right if now that you're making me recall, I mean,
Speaker 3: I literally most of my wardrobe is from Target. This
Speaker 3: is before.
Speaker 4: The genius of.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but yeah, I had some really there's some embarrassing
Speaker 3: cast photos of me, like like throwing a football on him,
Speaker 3: Like I look like the worst Sears of Robot model
Speaker 3: that like, yeah, they just couldn't.
Speaker 2: Another time in the last our last podcast that I
Speaker 2: pointed out that I'm wearing inexplicably, I'm wearing flip flops
Speaker 2: in a scene that it's just like why why am
Speaker 2: I not wearing sneakers? Like why am I out in
Speaker 2: the world, not at the beach, not nearpool, Like it's
Speaker 2: very strange. They certainly fliplop around like it couldn't have
Speaker 2: been good for sound, And we determined it. It must
Speaker 2: have just been the budget. Any other options for me?
Speaker 5: Yeah, well, it's I think you know, she's obviously an
Speaker 5: amazing actress. I don't know how you had you worked
Speaker 5: with her before. I hadn't either, And I have this memory,
Speaker 5: it's really one of my most clear on the pilot,
Speaker 5: and I remember it was I had. It was the
Speaker 5: deference that I had.
Speaker 7: It was it was I was just like, it's really.
Speaker 5: Nice to meet you, and I just want to make
Speaker 5: sure that you know whatever I do is supporting the
Speaker 5: choice that you want to make, because I know that
Speaker 5: you're a really accomplished, great actress, and I just want
Speaker 5: to make sure I'm setting you to be what you
Speaker 5: want to do.
Speaker 6: You know that she made me that way.
Speaker 3: She is a Yeah, she is a super strong presence.
Speaker 3: I think, Terry, when I felt that most was when
Speaker 3: I'm in a scene with Felicity and her husband, Bill Macy,
Speaker 3: from whom Macy comes to watch and he's behind the monitor.
Speaker 4: I'm like, no, go right now, you know no?
Speaker 3: And so yeah, but Bill, Bill, in his to his credit,
Speaker 3: he was always very gracious, a great liar.
Speaker 4: He's a great He's a great liar. He always he
Speaker 4: was very supportive of me.
Speaker 3: But yeah, one of the other things about Felicity that
Speaker 3: needs to be that is sort of interesting and why
Speaker 3: as we were talking before we got started with Emerson,
Speaker 3: why I'm glad you're no one's you know, you're not
Speaker 3: pursuing a career in acting. One of the things they
Speaker 3: did during the nego while I was in limbo and
Speaker 3: I said, no, I'm not going to do the show,
Speaker 3: or Mark was trying to negotiate for me, was they
Speaker 3: They certainly, and I don't know if they did this
Speaker 3: with you Terry to check in about Jamie or anything,
Speaker 3: but they went to they went to Felicity and said, you.
Speaker 4: Know, do you you like the savant guys? He is
Speaker 4: he okay with you? You know? And she was like, yeah,
Speaker 4: he's great. You know.
Speaker 3: She was just like, yes, I had And this is
Speaker 3: the tenuous you know, Cliff precipice that actors live on.
Speaker 3: Had Felicity said, I don't know, you know, or I
Speaker 3: didn't you know, she didn't like the way I smelled her,
Speaker 3: the way I kissed her that on that opening scene,
Speaker 3: you know, No, I mean any number of things it
Speaker 3: could have it could have spelled, could have taken away
Speaker 3: that opportunity from me.
Speaker 4: So I am, I.
Speaker 5: Don't remember having.
Speaker 6: Anywhere anybody else kind of powered.
Speaker 2: And she's like, if so Andrea would have never.
Speaker 6: I don't that's not true.
Speaker 5: If So Andrew would have been in every episode from
Speaker 5: the quire eight seasons, if I had had that kind
Speaker 5: of power.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so, Terry, I don't know that Felicity.
Speaker 3: They didn't come to her and say, you know, there
Speaker 3: wasn't nice to sit down, Hey, we want to discuss
Speaker 3: she they checked in, They checked in before before there
Speaker 3: before they're going to go another you know, another yard
Speaker 3: down the road with me. They were checking in and
Speaker 3: had she had she you know, any burn or saddle
Speaker 3: about me.
Speaker 4: I want to be here. I want to know when.
Speaker 5: Well, I'm glad that she didn't because, as Emerson said,
Speaker 5: I think you guys were just an iconic television married couple,
Speaker 5: so so truthful and complicated and willing to be ugly
Speaker 5: and and and and as you said, the show rode
Speaker 5: this incredibly truthful but also satirical comedic lines, just like
Speaker 5: walking a tightrope, and when it was at its best,
Speaker 5: you guys really just shined. So it's like such a
Speaker 5: joy to reflect on. And I want to Yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 5: go ahead.
Speaker 3: In that you know clearly you yours and Jamie's dynamic
Speaker 3: was popping and everybody, you know, people wanted they were starving,
Speaker 3: and we had we couldn't allow them to have that relationship, right,
Speaker 3: That's why they had Andrew Jackson Nicholet. But then you had,
Speaker 3: you had Jamie, you had, you had a number of
Speaker 3: guys over the year.
Speaker 6: I'm probably I'm not forgotten.
Speaker 4: What's that that's gonna be ritual?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 4: God, of course.
Speaker 3: So in the ordination of things, I'm just gonna say
Speaker 3: Jamie's on a different level, right because he is a friend.
Speaker 3: I know if I come in here a bad mouth
Speaker 3: and it just looked bad. Uh So so who was
Speaker 3: who did you then next, like really spark with her?
Speaker 3: That you you you thought there was really some great
Speaker 3: you loved working with them?
Speaker 5: Oh this is really this is just difficult because I
Speaker 5: feel like it's a complicated answer. Plus we haven't gotten
Speaker 5: to those episodes yet, so that makes it hard. But
Speaker 5: I will admit something that I think it will be
Speaker 5: interesting to discover if my recollection it matches when we
Speaker 5: start watching it.
Speaker 7: But I used to feel that after we got.
Speaker 5: Through season one and a lot of people said this,
Speaker 5: that Susan became annoying and did some things that just
Speaker 5: seemed very out of character. And I talked to one
Speaker 5: of the writers years and years later, and he admitted
Speaker 5: to me that they really wrote themselves into a corner
Speaker 5: with Susan and Mike, because once you let a character
Speaker 5: find the love of their life, you have nothing to
Speaker 5: do but break them up and put them back together,
Speaker 5: and break them up and put them back together, and
Speaker 5: break them up and put them back together. They never
Speaker 5: were willing to add Susan and Mike as another version
Speaker 5: of a married couple. So you had, you know, Brie
Speaker 5: and Rex and their particular struggle, and you had Tom
Speaker 5: and Lynette and their particular struggle, and Gabby and Carlos
Speaker 5: and their particular struggle. And they were never willing to
Speaker 5: let Susan and Mike get invested in a marriage and
Speaker 5: see what the problems were. And so they just started
Speaker 5: arbitrarily making up what he admitted to me were not
Speaker 5: particularly grounded or earned reasons to split them up and
Speaker 5: put them back together, and split them up and put
Speaker 5: them back together. So, to answer your question, there was
Speaker 5: a part of me that just always felt like why
Speaker 5: are we doing this storyline?
Speaker 8: Like?
Speaker 5: Why are we doing this storyline? And I think the
Speaker 5: audience felt that somewhat, And I, as you said, you're
Speaker 5: not you don't tell the writer what to do. I
Speaker 5: don't either, I, you know, would get it and certainly
Speaker 5: try to do the best with what I could manage
Speaker 5: out of what the story was there. But in regards
Speaker 5: to the loving relationship, yeah, and picking other boyfriends, I
Speaker 5: mean that's going to be an interesting thing as we
Speaker 5: start to watch these episodes, because I'm sure at like
Speaker 5: Gail is coming to mind. I'm sure like as and
Speaker 5: and of course Richard Bergie. You know, the heart wants
Speaker 5: what the heart wants. You can't not hear that, So
Speaker 5: it'll be interesting to see that. But yeah, that's kind
Speaker 5: of my reflection on where Susan's love life. You know,
Speaker 5: I never really got the opportunity that I think Tom
Speaker 5: and Yes, Susan.
Speaker 4: It's really well, really well said.
Speaker 8: I'm so rooting for Susan and Mike every time they're
Speaker 8: on screen together, and the chemistry is so real and obviously,
Speaker 8: you know, I grew up knowing James and is the
Speaker 8: best and you guys are so great together that I
Speaker 8: can imagine spoiler alert for me to see you not
Speaker 8: always stay together.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have a question for you. So something we've
Speaker 2: noticed is that, And one of the reasons why we
Speaker 2: were so excited to do this podcast is that we've
Speaker 2: had people, you know, coming up to us and letting
Speaker 2: us know that they're experiencing the show for the first time.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of people who are rewatching it and
Speaker 2: who are watching it for six seventh, eighth time, which
Speaker 2: is incredible, but there's also a huge amount of people
Speaker 2: out there who are watching it for the first time,
Speaker 2: and you know, they get really excited to come over
Speaker 2: and share that with you. So have you noticed that
Speaker 2: out in the world.
Speaker 3: I have, But even though I don't, I'm going to
Speaker 3: admit something I don't want to admit. There's seems to
Speaker 3: be a ground swell of like Tom Scavo haters.
Speaker 4: Terry.
Speaker 3: Is that So you just got through saying you know
Speaker 3: that you've got some audience reaction like, oh god, Susan
Speaker 3: is kind of either whatever, I forget what choice?
Speaker 4: Okay, that's Jesus.
Speaker 3: So you know, I was living in my own like
Speaker 3: you know, castle where I was like, you know, Tom's
Speaker 3: a great guy. Tom's a great guy, but no, there's
Speaker 3: there's a whole My children have let me know that
Speaker 3: there's a community of haters out there.
Speaker 4: And I was out at a.
Speaker 3: Press event for something and a kid came up to
Speaker 3: me and he said, uh, you're Tom's cobo And I said, well,
Speaker 3: not exactly, but yes and uh and.
Speaker 4: He said, would you do it this TikTok with me?
Speaker 3: I've got these followers And I go, sure, I don't know,
Speaker 3: I'm there for Presidente.
Speaker 4: I'm like, oh.
Speaker 3: So he holds up his camera and he starts going yeah.
Speaker 3: He starts going off on bat like I've got Tom
Speaker 3: Scobbo here.
Speaker 4: He did this?
Speaker 3: He was he and I was like what and he
Speaker 3: said and so we got to me and I just
Speaker 3: said what I thought Tom was handsome and charmie. I
Speaker 3: didn't know. So he sort of threw me under the bus,
Speaker 3: but I just rolled with. I mean, I don't nothing
Speaker 3: I could do about it. Literally, I know nothing about that.
Speaker 3: But within a day it had a million and a
Speaker 3: half people viewing it and shanning. So there seems to
Speaker 3: be some people out there who and I don't know
Speaker 3: if there's been a paradigm shift by the way with
Speaker 3: all this all of this masculinity that's out there now,
Speaker 3: all this toxic maxiculinity that's out there now, Like, is
Speaker 3: somehow Tom like because he was a little hapless and
Speaker 3: not particularly strongly directed that like, is he no longer
Speaker 3: is he not longer seen as a as a good
Speaker 3: character or I don't.
Speaker 5: Know, you know, I think we need to tee this
Speaker 5: up to Emerson.
Speaker 8: Yes, let me jump in and speak for the entire
Speaker 8: younger general person in their late twenties. I it's interesting
Speaker 8: hearing you say that, because I am watching it, and I,
Speaker 8: like I said, I actually really like Tom and Lynette,
Speaker 8: and I think maybe there's some hate around Lynette having
Speaker 8: given up her career to be a stay at home
Speaker 8: mom and then Tom being the character who sort of
Speaker 8: carries that career forward, even though it seems and again
Speaker 8: I'm watching it for the first time, but seems like
Speaker 8: maybe Lynette was better at the job, and so it's like, oh, well,
Speaker 8: why is this man, Like why are we ascribing to
Speaker 8: these traditional heteronormative ideas about the man's the one who
Speaker 8: goes and works when Tom maybe should be the one saying, hey,
Speaker 8: let me take a back seat because you're so good
Speaker 8: at your job. That would be my instinct in terms
Speaker 8: of the toxic masculinity. But I don't think. I don't
Speaker 8: want Tom to become toxically masculine.
Speaker 4: Yeah no, no, no, no, I don't. I didn't want him
Speaker 4: to be to be hond.
Speaker 3: I just didn't know if there's a new generation of
Speaker 3: guys like you, we don't do that work, take charge
Speaker 3: kind of guys and we you know, and then it
Speaker 3: made the character less attractive to some people.
Speaker 8: Or maybe and I'm I'm I'm afraid of them. I'm
Speaker 8: afraid if that's a new generation.
Speaker 2: But I think this is this kind of ties into
Speaker 2: you know what we're Another reason why we're so enjoying
Speaker 2: this experience is because we do we re examine the
Speaker 2: show now and see what kind of holds up or
Speaker 2: what what new interpretations have come from watching it now.
Speaker 2: And I didn't I was not aware that there's a
Speaker 2: Tom Anti Tom Sco movement.
Speaker 4: Out there, bastards.
Speaker 3: So I would like to ask the both of you,
Speaker 3: as the younger general and you're about to you're gonna
Speaker 3: have a have a baby.
Speaker 2: And I got to look up what generations?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, So I've got a dog, I've
Speaker 3: got I'm a grandparent, I've got two grandchildren, I've got
Speaker 3: brilliant Both of my adult daughters are professionals, very successful
Speaker 3: in their own right. But she's my daughter, is dealing
Speaker 3: you know, she's a mom now too, and so what
Speaker 3: would what is the argument that would have been made?
Speaker 3: I don't know, you know how, I thought the show
Speaker 3: did a very good job. And sorry for being all
Speaker 3: over the place with dealing with the fact that Felicity
Speaker 3: probably she was better at her job and she was
Speaker 3: a professional that she was struggling with, but that need
Speaker 3: to want the desire to also be a mom, but
Speaker 3: to have a career and trying to navigate that. And
Speaker 3: I thought the show did a My recollection is that
Speaker 3: they did a pretty good job.
Speaker 4: Is that not the case?
Speaker 3: And doesn't this conundrum still exist for this generation as
Speaker 3: you go forward? I don't know, because you know, the
Speaker 3: women are still having the babies, and that you know
Speaker 3: how it you know how we can navigate it differently,
Speaker 3: And what would you propose?
Speaker 8: Oh, that's such an interesting question. I mean, obviously, Andrea,
Speaker 8: you're the one about to have a child. I have
Speaker 8: said a few times watching you know, growing up from
Speaker 8: the time I was seven until I was sixteen with
Speaker 8: the show being on. Watching my mom go to work
Speaker 8: and be such a badass, professional working woman and a
Speaker 8: really present mom with me oh always kind of made
Speaker 8: me feel like, you know, I know, I want to
Speaker 8: be a mom myself one day, and I never really
Speaker 8: imagined a world in which that meant giving up my career.
Speaker 8: Although I did see you, mom when I was first born,
Speaker 8: take a moment in time between you know, Lois and
Speaker 8: Clark and and you did other things. You did cabaret,
Speaker 8: you did spy kids.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was on Wolshre. Yeah I did. I was like, Wow,
Speaker 3: she singing and all that. That's the way to go.
Speaker 5: Thank you. That was crazy show, I mean, amazing experience.
Speaker 5: Feels like it happened to somebody else, you know. I
Speaker 5: just to So I was raised my mom, uh went
Speaker 5: back to work when I was six weeks old, and
Speaker 5: I was basically raised by a babysitter and had like
Speaker 5: not the greatest childhood in the world. So when it
Speaker 5: came time that I wanted to have a child your
Speaker 5: dad and I wanted to have a you, I made
Speaker 5: sure like I was like, I'm not working, you know,
Speaker 5: and I just built, like, we just made it so
Speaker 5: that our finances and everything were in a place where
Speaker 5: I knew that I was gonna want to not go
Speaker 5: back to work because I had to, And that was
Speaker 5: based on how I was raised and I didn't want
Speaker 5: that experience.
Speaker 4: Lewis and Clark done.
Speaker 5: By that time, I got pregnant that yes, she did
Speaker 5: end it, she did. Emerson ended it. Yeah, I got
Speaker 5: pregnant and I had a like a high risk pregnancy
Speaker 5: that actually ended up going perfectly well, but in the
Speaker 5: anticipation of it, it was considered high risk. And they
Speaker 5: told the studio Warner Brothers that I have to be
Speaker 5: on bed rest probably by like August, and that was
Speaker 5: enough to make the studio cancel it because they just
Speaker 5: they didn't, you know, what were they going to do
Speaker 5: if Lois couldn't come to work for five mins, months
Speaker 5: or whatever. And so yeah, that was kind of the
Speaker 5: end of it. And then and then I took about
Speaker 5: almost two years off. I mean I think I did,
Speaker 5: like you said, little part here, a little part there
Speaker 5: that were a couple of weeks or whatever. But and
Speaker 5: then the first thing I really did was cabaret. But
Speaker 5: I was on the road and I was still breastfeeding,
Speaker 5: and you came with me to every city and it
Speaker 5: was I breastfed every day care.
Speaker 4: That wasn't just an LA show.
Speaker 5: No, I did seven months. I did LA Chicago, Boston
Speaker 5: and DC.
Speaker 6: God, yeah, bless amazing.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that was a lot. I one of the biggest
Speaker 5: regrets I have in my life because I don't have
Speaker 5: many and I don't really believe in it. But they
Speaker 5: did ask me to go to Broadway after seven months
Speaker 5: in DC and I passed because I was.
Speaker 4: Just burned done.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and that's one of those things that I go, Okay,
Speaker 5: that maybe that was a mistake, Like I would love
Speaker 5: to have that Broadway bucket list item to check off,
Speaker 5: and I have not had that opportunity since. So anyways,
Speaker 5: enough about me.
Speaker 2: No, it's so interesting, and just to kind of wrap
Speaker 2: this this part up, I do think it's still an
Speaker 2: incredibly topical dynamic in relationships today, particularly heteronormative ones or
Speaker 2: you know, heterosexual relationships, that the mom to be is
Speaker 2: having to play mental gymnastics approaching motherhood, deciding what that
Speaker 2: means and how to do it all and do it
Speaker 2: all well. And I'm really enjoying rewatching Desperate Housewives and
Speaker 2: relating to these women and Lynette storyline that I, of
Speaker 2: course didn't relate to the first time around. At this
Speaker 2: point in my life about to be a mother and
Speaker 2: I'm learning from these characters and it's really it's really fun.
Speaker 2: Before we let you go, we would love to hear
Speaker 2: about what you are up to currently, what you are working.
Speaker 3: On, what you Oh, I did a little television movie
Speaker 3: on the Lifetime network or the Lifetime app or my life.
Speaker 5: I know all about you do. Yeah, yeah, you can
Speaker 5: watch you can watch your movies on demand on Lifetime.
Speaker 7: And so this is called the child Bride.
Speaker 3: This it is thank you Terry for seing. It is
Speaker 3: called the Child I was a child bride. It is
Speaker 3: the Courtney Stodden story. And I don't know you do Okay, Okay,
Speaker 3: I don't great. I'm gonna I'll try my best to
Speaker 3: make it tight in nine. In twenty eleven, actor Doug Hutchison,
Speaker 3: who had played the sadistic guard in the movie The
Speaker 3: Green Mile, married sixteen year old Courtney Stodden married a
Speaker 3: sixteen year old in Vegas with the blessing of her parents.
Speaker 3: Blessing maybe going too far, but they signed her away
Speaker 3: and they went on to have a very sort of
Speaker 3: exposed paparazzi marriage. She was a child, She was sixteen
Speaker 3: years old, and she looked a lot older, let's say,
Speaker 3: and she was sort of sexualized at a young age
Speaker 3: and were what I would think, forgive me, I'm going
Speaker 3: to just show my cards. I think inappropriate stuff for
Speaker 3: children of that age. But and she sort of the
Speaker 3: media ran with a story that and attributed adult values
Speaker 3: to this child and attacked her like that she was
Speaker 3: an adult who had had you know that her cerebral
Speaker 3: culture critics had been fully closed, and she was making
Speaker 3: all of these decisions with informed consent, and she wasn't
Speaker 3: she In the most tragic sort of act of parenting,
Speaker 3: these parents signed their daughter away to this guy, and
Speaker 3: they were married and had and then the relationship goes bad.
Speaker 3: So this is it's uh, it's kind of like if
Speaker 3: I don't know, if you remember the the Bob Fosse
Speaker 3: will go to Fosse again Bob Fosse movie Star eighty.
Speaker 3: There's elements of that in in in their relationship, but
Speaker 3: it was a highly toxic and dysfunctional and unhealthy relationship,
Speaker 3: and Courtney stopt into her credit now is fighting back,
Speaker 3: changing the narrative. We're seeing it from her side. There
Speaker 3: were other celebrities, you know, she was photographed all over
Speaker 3: and Doug Hutchison was sort of pimping her out at
Speaker 3: these to the paparazzi. They would go to different places.
Speaker 3: Whe're going to be here so she could be seen
Speaker 3: and shot with this specific product. That's how they were
Speaker 3: making money. Hollywood had turned his back, their backs on Doug.
Speaker 3: He was a pariah by this time, and.
Speaker 5: That must have been a really complicated, difficult role for you.
Speaker 3: Well, it was, It really was, because, as fate would
Speaker 3: have it, Doug Hutchison was someone that I had friends
Speaker 3: who had worked with. I knew of him. We had
Speaker 3: auditioned back in the day. I'm sure John and other
Speaker 3: actors of my age.
Speaker 4: No new dog.
Speaker 3: He was a very talent. I want to give him
Speaker 3: his props. He was a talented actor and a or.
Speaker 3: He had a terrible psychopathology that let him down a
Speaker 3: very dark road and he it's it's pedophilia, just there's
Speaker 3: no other way to say it. But the interesting things
Speaker 3: about playing him were changing myself physically. He's he's got
Speaker 3: dark hair, you know, we dyed the hair and cut
Speaker 3: into my head. We needed to receive my hairline because
Speaker 3: I have such a great hairline normally. But we we
Speaker 3: did all that, and then he spoke in a sort
Speaker 3: of a very specific way. He's you know, he talked
Speaker 3: only out on one side of his mouth, and he
Speaker 3: was like very sort of had a tone that's like,
Speaker 3: you know, like I never I would never, I would
Speaker 3: never hurt you, you know.
Speaker 4: Like I love you. It's very very soft and the boom.
Speaker 5: So that's so interesting, you know, I do find that
Speaker 5: Lifetime it gives you some compelling characters to explore us
Speaker 5: an actor.
Speaker 3: Well, I was, I was, I was all in. You know,
Speaker 3: he's a guy you can see online. You know, people
Speaker 3: the audience can go to YouTube on I can't just
Speaker 3: play like the television version of him, like they're gonna go,
Speaker 3: that's Tom Scavo, Like, you know, like that's so stupid.
Speaker 3: So I had to try and get as physically close
Speaker 3: to that character. And that's really why I became an
Speaker 3: actor to begin with. I was interested in transformation and
Speaker 3: then you know, here I am just like, you know.
Speaker 5: That's fantastic Lifetime app video on demand videos on it.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I'm excited.
Speaker 7: It's so great to see you.
Speaker 4: It's great to see everybody.
Speaker 3: You guys look like a million bucks and and uh,
Speaker 3: you're doing the lord's work here keeping our show.
Speaker 5: You know, we get to see your son periodically, he
Speaker 5: pops in.
Speaker 4: You know, my guy, that's my guy.
Speaker 2: It's so great and it's like seeing and looks exactly.
Speaker 7: There's no doubt about that.
Speaker 3: I'm immensely proud of my son. So yeah, I'd take
Speaker 3: all that. I take the compliment.
Speaker 5: Thank you, well, thank you everyone for joining us for
Speaker 5: this fabulous bonus episode with deg savont I. We're so lucky,
Speaker 5: and uh, we're going to keep putting it out there
Speaker 5: because we are desperately devoted to you