1
00:00:00,240 --> 00:00:02,920
Speaker 1: I was gonna play in high school where it was

2
00:00:02,920 --> 00:00:07,480
Speaker 1: like a murder mystery. UM. And the director of the play,

3
00:00:07,520 --> 00:00:09,800
Speaker 1: in quotes, was was a character in the show, so

4
00:00:09,960 --> 00:00:12,040
Speaker 1: like break the fourth wall, like speaks to the audience.

5
00:00:12,560 --> 00:00:13,960
Speaker 1: It would come out, was like he was trying to

6
00:00:14,000 --> 00:00:17,640
Speaker 1: put this show on, this murder mystery classic. It was.

7
00:00:18,800 --> 00:00:23,239
Speaker 1: It was terrible. It was really bad. It was a

8
00:00:23,280 --> 00:00:27,760
Speaker 1: really bad play. Um. But we had someone get very

9
00:00:27,920 --> 00:00:32,120
Speaker 1: very sick the night of the show, of opening night

10
00:00:32,159 --> 00:00:35,959
Speaker 1: of the show, and um, so we had the director

11
00:00:36,080 --> 00:00:40,120
Speaker 1: character step in and like be like and I'm going

12
00:00:40,159 --> 00:00:41,840
Speaker 1: to have to play this part. So he was able

13
00:00:41,880 --> 00:00:44,000
Speaker 1: to just have his script in front of him because

14
00:00:44,040 --> 00:00:47,239
Speaker 1: that already worked for his character, and he like deliberately

15
00:00:49,000 --> 00:00:52,200
Speaker 1: played it terribly, you know, like like a non actor,

16
00:00:52,280 --> 00:00:54,240
Speaker 1: even though he was a very good actor. Actually, I

17
00:00:54,280 --> 00:00:57,440
Speaker 1: liked how much weight was in that pause between it

18
00:00:57,560 --> 00:01:05,560
Speaker 1: was terrible. I was for a word that more accurately

19
00:01:05,600 --> 00:01:09,679
Speaker 1: described what it was, and there's not. There's I couldn't

20
00:01:09,720 --> 00:01:12,400
Speaker 1: think of a stronger word than just plain old terrible.

21
00:01:12,880 --> 00:01:15,560
Speaker 1: And that was the only terrible play I've ever been.

22
00:01:17,680 --> 00:01:20,000
Speaker 1: The only dinner theater type thing I ever did was

23
00:01:20,080 --> 00:01:25,840
Speaker 1: our one manual tavern and forks, knives and other weapons. Right,

24
00:01:26,120 --> 00:01:28,800
Speaker 1: we had the titties cut off and all that stuff,

25
00:01:28,959 --> 00:01:31,040
Speaker 1: and I was the murderer. Once. You can't just say

26
00:01:31,080 --> 00:01:32,720
Speaker 1: we had the titties cut off and all that stuff.

27
00:01:32,760 --> 00:01:39,160
Speaker 1: Like you've got to tell people about tell them. Cherry,

28
00:01:39,200 --> 00:01:41,480
Speaker 1: who you heard in the show, played a character we

29
00:01:41,560 --> 00:01:44,840
Speaker 1: got murdered and she came out of the kitchen. We

30
00:01:44,840 --> 00:01:47,240
Speaker 1: were performed this in a restaurant and she came out

31
00:01:47,240 --> 00:01:50,400
Speaker 1: of the kitchen with a platter with two like what

32
00:01:50,480 --> 00:01:56,640
Speaker 1: do we make like cake boobies jello? Yeah, and it's like,

33
00:01:56,680 --> 00:01:58,440
Speaker 1: oh no, and then she had like blood all of

34
00:01:58,480 --> 00:02:02,160
Speaker 1: her chest and then she collapsed onto the table with

35
00:02:02,200 --> 00:02:05,640
Speaker 1: the cities and they were let us around it like presented,

36
00:02:06,400 --> 00:02:10,320
Speaker 1: and it was like this killer cut off her boobs,

37
00:02:10,520 --> 00:02:12,800
Speaker 1: put him on a platter, handed her that platter and

38
00:02:12,840 --> 00:02:15,400
Speaker 1: then she stumbled out into the restaurant and died in

39
00:02:15,440 --> 00:02:17,440
Speaker 1: front of everyone. How killed her? Also, I was like,

40
00:02:18,160 --> 00:02:22,280
Speaker 1: it's being cut off murder. Well, definitely a pretty fucked

41
00:02:22,360 --> 00:02:27,360
Speaker 1: up thing, yeah, but still I worked. The funniest death

42
00:02:27,440 --> 00:02:29,560
Speaker 1: was probably Julian's though, when he had the plunger on

43
00:02:29,680 --> 00:02:31,959
Speaker 1: his mouth and it pulled out all his intestines. Yeah,

44
00:02:32,200 --> 00:02:34,880
Speaker 1: that's just like plunger on the face, classic Looney Tune style.

45
00:02:35,080 --> 00:02:37,840
Speaker 1: And he like pulled pull, pull, pull, and then he

46
00:02:37,919 --> 00:02:42,800
Speaker 1: ripped it off. This like we used any hose stuff

47
00:02:42,840 --> 00:02:45,640
Speaker 1: with cotton that was all packed into the plunger, and

48
00:02:45,680 --> 00:02:47,160
Speaker 1: he put a piece of in his teeth, so when

49
00:02:47,160 --> 00:02:50,920
Speaker 1: he pulled the plunger out, it looked like his intestines

50
00:02:51,919 --> 00:02:53,919
Speaker 1: of his mouth. People are eating by the way, wow,

51
00:02:54,800 --> 00:03:01,880
Speaker 1: Like we made it the most bloody, gross, disgusting come

52
00:03:01,960 --> 00:03:05,880
Speaker 1: up with and it was hilarious. Anyway, I'm in a

53
00:03:06,000 --> 00:03:11,160
Speaker 1: show right now if you're in Atlanta at Village Theater.

54
00:03:11,480 --> 00:03:16,840
Speaker 1: It's called Tipsy Tales robin Hood, and we, uh, we

55
00:03:16,919 --> 00:03:18,840
Speaker 1: do a one hour show robin Hood, but one of

56
00:03:18,840 --> 00:03:21,360
Speaker 1: the actors is drunk and we've got to work around

57
00:03:21,440 --> 00:03:22,840
Speaker 1: that and try to get to the end of the

58
00:03:22,840 --> 00:03:25,799
Speaker 1: play as best we can. I can't wait to do this.

59
00:03:25,919 --> 00:03:28,840
Speaker 1: I'm very excited. It's been very funny. I mean, the

60
00:03:28,880 --> 00:03:31,440
Speaker 1: script itself for the robin Hood show is funny. It's

61
00:03:31,480 --> 00:03:33,960
Speaker 1: like a nice little one hour comedy robin Hood play.

62
00:03:34,639 --> 00:03:37,680
Speaker 1: And then it's going to be chaos because we we

63
00:03:37,800 --> 00:03:40,880
Speaker 1: just have to basically go along with whatever the drunk does.

64
00:03:41,400 --> 00:03:44,160
Speaker 1: They've done this show before and like not robin Hood,

65
00:03:44,160 --> 00:03:47,840
Speaker 1: but like they've done other shows, and you know the character,

66
00:03:48,000 --> 00:03:50,520
Speaker 1: the actor will be drunk and they'll just like murder

67
00:03:50,560 --> 00:03:52,000
Speaker 1: a character in the middle of the show, and now

68
00:03:52,040 --> 00:03:54,160
Speaker 1: you just have to that character is dead now and

69
00:03:54,200 --> 00:03:55,720
Speaker 1: you have to get through the rest of the play

70
00:03:56,040 --> 00:03:58,480
Speaker 1: with that character. So at any point they might decide

71
00:03:58,560 --> 00:04:00,480
Speaker 1: robin Hood is the villain and we have to like

72
00:04:00,560 --> 00:04:07,080
Speaker 1: rework the show. Now robin Hood is pretty capitalist. Well

73
00:04:07,160 --> 00:04:09,280
Speaker 1: it should be chaos. So if you're around, come check

74
00:04:09,360 --> 00:04:11,840
Speaker 1: us out the Village Theater. I can't wait to see it.

75
00:04:11,880 --> 00:04:16,960
Speaker 1: I'm so excited. Speaking of theaters, yeah, we have kind

76
00:04:17,000 --> 00:04:22,240
Speaker 1: of a theater person to talk. Performer, performer and true storyteller.

77
00:04:22,800 --> 00:04:27,400
Speaker 1: So one of our listeners, Rachel it's Rachee Vaughan on Instagram,

78
00:04:27,560 --> 00:04:30,240
Speaker 1: had reached out and said, hey, will you please do

79
00:04:30,480 --> 00:04:34,640
Speaker 1: Collette because she is like a bisexual, like cool author,

80
00:04:34,760 --> 00:04:38,680
Speaker 1: feminist author from France. Um, it's like turn of the

81
00:04:38,720 --> 00:04:42,039
Speaker 1: century France, so it's all crazy love affairs and stuff

82
00:04:42,080 --> 00:04:45,240
Speaker 1: going on during that period, and yeah, that sounds right

83
00:04:45,320 --> 00:04:48,359
Speaker 1: up our street. So we started looking into Collette, and

84
00:04:48,400 --> 00:04:50,520
Speaker 1: we realized there's so much going on with her life.

85
00:04:50,680 --> 00:04:53,120
Speaker 1: There's just so she's like in the middle of this

86
00:04:53,200 --> 00:04:58,600
Speaker 1: really interesting period of history, so many opportunities for historical tangents,

87
00:04:58,680 --> 00:05:01,279
Speaker 1: and so much banter, and she had so many ridiculous

88
00:05:01,360 --> 00:05:05,080
Speaker 1: romances throughout her life that we decided to kind of

89
00:05:05,120 --> 00:05:10,080
Speaker 1: split her up into several parts and do our first series. Um. So, yeah,

90
00:05:10,080 --> 00:05:12,320
Speaker 1: we had flirted with like a few series ideas like

91
00:05:12,400 --> 00:05:17,359
Speaker 1: Henry the Eighth or Casanova or Lord Byron um, but

92
00:05:17,440 --> 00:05:20,080
Speaker 1: it kind of feels good to like start with, you know,

93
00:05:20,120 --> 00:05:24,280
Speaker 1: a really complicated woman who had hot encounters with male

94
00:05:24,320 --> 00:05:28,760
Speaker 1: and female alike and was just just can't be shoehorned

95
00:05:28,880 --> 00:05:33,560
Speaker 1: very easily into any label or any box, you know. So, yeah,

96
00:05:33,640 --> 00:05:36,560
Speaker 1: let's learn all about the early years of Collette. In

97
00:05:36,560 --> 00:05:39,560
Speaker 1: our first part. We're gonna talk about her first books,

98
00:05:39,560 --> 00:05:43,520
Speaker 1: her first marriage, her first lesbian love affair, and so

99
00:05:43,640 --> 00:05:48,400
Speaker 1: much more. Yeah, let's go. Hey their French comlution. Well,

100
00:05:48,880 --> 00:05:52,560
Speaker 1: Eli and Diana got some stories to tell. There's no matchmaking,

101
00:05:52,560 --> 00:05:57,120
Speaker 1: a romantic tips. It's just about ridiculous relationship. I love.

102
00:05:57,160 --> 00:05:59,479
Speaker 1: It might be any type of version at all, and

103
00:05:59,560 --> 00:06:03,520
Speaker 1: that's stra comes don't concrete, but if there's just the

104
00:06:03,600 --> 00:06:09,040
Speaker 1: second glance. Ridiculous Rolets, a production of I Heart Radio.

105
00:06:10,560 --> 00:06:15,400
Speaker 1: Sidney Gabrielle Collette was born in eighteen seventy three and

106
00:06:15,440 --> 00:06:19,920
Speaker 1: she lived in sin Xeiville on Puis Say in Burgundy, France,

107
00:06:20,400 --> 00:06:24,680
Speaker 1: like rural, you know, rural France. And her father, Captain Collette,

108
00:06:25,000 --> 00:06:27,159
Speaker 1: was a war hero. He lost his leg in the

109
00:06:27,200 --> 00:06:30,839
Speaker 1: Crimean War, so he was given a tax collector position

110
00:06:30,920 --> 00:06:33,720
Speaker 1: in this village, which left the family well off initially.

111
00:06:34,080 --> 00:06:37,880
Speaker 1: And Collette attended public school from six to twelve, and

112
00:06:38,120 --> 00:06:41,320
Speaker 1: all the boys in the public school only called each

113
00:06:41,360 --> 00:06:43,640
Speaker 1: other by their last names. You know, they'd be like, hey, Banks,

114
00:06:43,760 --> 00:06:47,360
Speaker 1: get over here, right. So Collette was like, okay, well

115
00:06:47,360 --> 00:06:49,680
Speaker 1: then call me Collette just like one of the guys.

116
00:06:49,760 --> 00:06:51,880
Speaker 1: You know, you shouldn't call me Sidney gabriel He should

117
00:06:51,880 --> 00:06:54,039
Speaker 1: call me collect just like everybody else. That's kind of

118
00:06:54,040 --> 00:07:08,320
Speaker 1: how she started going by her It's like menonymously monom Okay,

119
00:07:08,480 --> 00:07:14,000
Speaker 1: that's how she's It starts to say, I'm a monomononomon

120
00:07:16,720 --> 00:07:23,440
Speaker 1: that's exactly anyway. That's when she started being known menonymously

121
00:07:23,800 --> 00:07:29,760
Speaker 1: as Collecte collect like Madonna Share or Frank. Frank, Yeah,

122
00:07:29,800 --> 00:07:32,760
Speaker 1: he has no Frank. At some point in her childhood,

123
00:07:32,840 --> 00:07:35,600
Speaker 1: her father was seeking election as a deputee in the

124
00:07:35,640 --> 00:07:39,960
Speaker 1: French National Assembly, and Collette accompanied him to his campaigning

125
00:07:39,960 --> 00:07:42,880
Speaker 1: events and she would get tipsy on mold wine with

126
00:07:42,920 --> 00:07:47,160
Speaker 1: the voters, which such an idea of, like I don't know,

127
00:07:47,240 --> 00:07:48,880
Speaker 1: like an eleven year old kid being like, give me

128
00:07:48,960 --> 00:07:52,320
Speaker 1: some of that juice, like good juice. Yeah. Her mom

129
00:07:52,320 --> 00:07:55,320
Speaker 1: put a stop to that. Eventually she stepped in was like, okay,

130
00:07:55,480 --> 00:07:58,480
Speaker 1: that's enough. How many voters have you won over? Okay,

131
00:07:58,480 --> 00:08:01,880
Speaker 1: that'll be enough, thank you. But by the time that

132
00:08:01,960 --> 00:08:06,520
Speaker 1: Collette was twelve years old, everything changed. Her father had

133
00:08:06,560 --> 00:08:09,120
Speaker 1: made some poor investments and this forced him to sell

134
00:08:09,160 --> 00:08:11,960
Speaker 1: off some of his wife's property. And then, in addition

135
00:08:11,960 --> 00:08:15,200
Speaker 1: to that, Collette's half sister married a doctor, but her

136
00:08:15,240 --> 00:08:18,160
Speaker 1: family didn't have the money to pay off the dowry

137
00:08:18,240 --> 00:08:21,200
Speaker 1: that they'd agreed upon, so the house and all the

138
00:08:21,240 --> 00:08:23,920
Speaker 1: furniture had to be sold to cover it, leaving the

139
00:08:23,920 --> 00:08:27,120
Speaker 1: rest of the family basically in poverty, which kind of

140
00:08:27,160 --> 00:08:29,880
Speaker 1: sucks for the sister to be like, sorry, this is

141
00:08:29,920 --> 00:08:31,520
Speaker 1: what I'm worth. I know the family is going to

142
00:08:31,600 --> 00:08:34,480
Speaker 1: go broke. Paying for me to marry this guy. But

143
00:08:34,480 --> 00:08:36,480
Speaker 1: but also have to be like, it's not like you

144
00:08:37,240 --> 00:08:40,360
Speaker 1: could be confused about the terms of the marriage contract,

145
00:08:40,480 --> 00:08:43,200
Speaker 1: Like why would you agree to pay a price you

146
00:08:43,240 --> 00:08:44,960
Speaker 1: can't you don't have I wonder if it was agreed

147
00:08:45,000 --> 00:08:47,199
Speaker 1: when they still had money and then they lost it

148
00:08:47,280 --> 00:08:51,320
Speaker 1: all over the course of the engagement, right, right, how

149
00:08:51,320 --> 00:08:52,920
Speaker 1: are we going to pay this debt? And you can't

150
00:08:52,920 --> 00:08:56,120
Speaker 1: go and like negotiate, like, hey, what if can we

151
00:08:56,120 --> 00:08:58,800
Speaker 1: lower the You got it? That's why you always set

152
00:08:58,840 --> 00:09:02,559
Speaker 1: your dowry. Less for you, everybody, when you're setting your dowries,

153
00:09:02,679 --> 00:09:05,800
Speaker 1: make it a percentage of your net worth, not a

154
00:09:05,840 --> 00:09:09,600
Speaker 1: hard number. That way, if you lose everything, you know,

155
00:09:09,760 --> 00:09:13,080
Speaker 1: well sorry, here you get of my money. That's two

156
00:09:13,120 --> 00:09:16,640
Speaker 1: bucks and turns out my daughter's worth less than USA. Yeah. Sorry,

157
00:09:16,840 --> 00:09:23,080
Speaker 1: don't carry that energy into your marriage. So everything had

158
00:09:23,120 --> 00:09:26,600
Speaker 1: been sold off, the families left with nothing, and Collette

159
00:09:26,600 --> 00:09:30,120
Speaker 1: wrote in her memoirs quote except for my parents ruin,

160
00:09:30,480 --> 00:09:33,760
Speaker 1: the money gone, the furniture sold by public auction. It

161
00:09:33,840 --> 00:09:36,920
Speaker 1: had been roses all the way. But what would I

162
00:09:36,960 --> 00:09:41,400
Speaker 1: have done with everlasting roses? Well that's an optimistic outlook,

163
00:09:41,720 --> 00:09:44,360
Speaker 1: It's true. I think she was pretty depressed throughout her life,

164
00:09:44,400 --> 00:09:47,680
Speaker 1: but she seemed to try at least. Who wants to

165
00:09:47,720 --> 00:09:51,360
Speaker 1: be happy all the time? Sounds miserable? What would I

166
00:09:51,360 --> 00:09:55,240
Speaker 1: write about? Yeah? Her father frequently corresponded with a friend

167
00:09:55,320 --> 00:09:57,840
Speaker 1: that he had served in the Crimean War with, and

168
00:09:57,880 --> 00:10:01,880
Speaker 1: when Collette was nineteen, this friends son came to visit them.

169
00:10:01,920 --> 00:10:06,200
Speaker 1: His name was Henri Guthier Villars, known to most people

170
00:10:06,320 --> 00:10:10,720
Speaker 1: by his pen name Willie just Willie, another anonymous. So

171
00:10:10,920 --> 00:10:14,600
Speaker 1: Willie is in we say Willie is in puiss And

172
00:10:14,679 --> 00:10:19,920
Speaker 1: if I were twelve, I'd have a joke there, But

173
00:10:19,960 --> 00:10:22,400
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna let it go because I'm a mature

174
00:10:22,520 --> 00:10:28,840
Speaker 1: adult now. Willie was thirteen years older than Colette. He

175
00:10:28,920 --> 00:10:31,400
Speaker 1: was a critic and writer in Paris. He was already

176
00:10:31,440 --> 00:10:34,600
Speaker 1: famous with his quips and ways, his way with words,

177
00:10:34,720 --> 00:10:38,960
Speaker 1: and also as being one of the most notorious libertines

178
00:10:39,120 --> 00:10:44,640
Speaker 1: in Paris. And he wasn't handsome. Joel van Valeen writes

179
00:10:44,720 --> 00:10:48,520
Speaker 1: in his article The Endearing Colette that Willie had quote

180
00:10:48,600 --> 00:10:51,080
Speaker 1: a beak of a nose and a paunch of the stomach,

181
00:10:51,280 --> 00:10:54,920
Speaker 1: but he was cultured and urbane, and most importantly he

182
00:10:55,040 --> 00:10:58,440
Speaker 1: made her laugh I'm telling you, it's like Roger Rabbit.

183
00:10:59,520 --> 00:11:01,319
Speaker 1: You can get a hot lady if you've got a

184
00:11:01,320 --> 00:11:04,880
Speaker 1: good sense. It's true. It's plus he was Collette's ticket

185
00:11:05,040 --> 00:11:08,560
Speaker 1: out of the provinces and rural obscurity, which probably really

186
00:11:08,559 --> 00:11:11,480
Speaker 1: added to his attraction. Like she saw him like she

187
00:11:11,640 --> 00:11:14,000
Speaker 1: was like, this is my train out of here now.

188
00:11:14,080 --> 00:11:17,959
Speaker 1: Willie seemed equally taken with this. You know, this striking

189
00:11:18,080 --> 00:11:20,560
Speaker 1: French beauty, this gorgeous woman, and she had this this

190
00:11:20,679 --> 00:11:24,960
Speaker 1: flowing golden hair and these big magnetic eyes. Her hair

191
00:11:25,120 --> 00:11:29,720
Speaker 1: went all the way down to her ankles. Yes, in fact,

192
00:11:29,800 --> 00:11:35,920
Speaker 1: like just a natural dress. She always wear it. There's

193
00:11:35,920 --> 00:11:38,360
Speaker 1: actually some writer said that she would wear him in

194
00:11:38,440 --> 00:11:43,120
Speaker 1: two braids that would sit coiled like a python in

195
00:11:43,200 --> 00:11:45,480
Speaker 1: the chair next to think. That was one of her

196
00:11:45,480 --> 00:11:49,319
Speaker 1: biographers talked about that. I'm like the heaviness of the

197
00:11:49,360 --> 00:11:53,839
Speaker 1: hair and her neck anyway, I had really long hair

198
00:11:53,880 --> 00:11:56,079
Speaker 1: down to my waist and it was I'm just saying,

199
00:11:56,360 --> 00:11:58,600
Speaker 1: she's got a wheelbarrow. She's always pushing around with her

200
00:11:59,320 --> 00:12:02,360
Speaker 1: hair braids in. I would assume if I saw someone

201
00:12:02,440 --> 00:12:06,320
Speaker 1: with hair coiled up around them that they could control it,

202
00:12:06,360 --> 00:12:11,920
Speaker 1: like it could count to life. And stranglement. If it

203
00:12:12,000 --> 00:12:16,520
Speaker 1: got that long, there's some magic to it. If there's

204
00:12:16,559 --> 00:12:20,880
Speaker 1: some magic to it, there's no limit, there's all magic exactly.

205
00:12:21,320 --> 00:12:28,720
Speaker 1: Fire breathing hair, I would smell like actually fired hair.

206
00:12:28,840 --> 00:12:33,120
Speaker 1: Let's not put this. Van Valen, the journalist, says that

207
00:12:33,160 --> 00:12:36,720
Speaker 1: in a French gossip newspaper, there was an item printed

208
00:12:36,800 --> 00:12:41,760
Speaker 1: warning quote an exquisite blonde whose marvelous hair has made

209
00:12:41,760 --> 00:12:46,440
Speaker 1: her famous to follow Mephistophily's advice and not give away

210
00:12:46,520 --> 00:12:49,720
Speaker 1: on the kisses until she has a ring on her finger.

211
00:12:50,440 --> 00:12:55,440
Speaker 1: La And this article made Willie so mad that he

212
00:12:55,520 --> 00:12:58,959
Speaker 1: fought a duel with the editor and wounded him this

213
00:12:59,040 --> 00:13:02,120
Speaker 1: day like the hell you say now, pink you in

214
00:13:02,160 --> 00:13:06,400
Speaker 1: the arms. But not long after that, in eight three,

215
00:13:06,760 --> 00:13:10,240
Speaker 1: Willie and Colette were married. They moved to live in

216
00:13:10,400 --> 00:13:14,040
Speaker 1: Paris full time, but married life was not all it

217
00:13:14,120 --> 00:13:17,120
Speaker 1: was cracked up to be. Collette said the city of

218
00:13:17,160 --> 00:13:20,000
Speaker 1: Paris filled her with dread, which kind of makes sense

219
00:13:20,000 --> 00:13:22,920
Speaker 1: when you grow up in the country Hansria overload, just

220
00:13:22,960 --> 00:13:26,680
Speaker 1: a lot going on. She called marital sex quote an

221
00:13:26,800 --> 00:13:30,840
Speaker 1: ugly dream, which I don't know what that says about

222
00:13:30,880 --> 00:13:34,680
Speaker 1: Willie and bed or just how how traumatic, your first

223
00:13:34,679 --> 00:13:38,679
Speaker 1: sexual experience can be Um. I don't know exactly what

224
00:13:38,720 --> 00:13:42,920
Speaker 1: she's referring to with that. Also, Willie was a neglectful

225
00:13:43,000 --> 00:13:48,199
Speaker 1: husbands the guy. He worked hard fish and he played harder.

226
00:13:48,840 --> 00:13:51,240
Speaker 1: His whole life was about like the social rounds, so

227
00:13:51,280 --> 00:13:54,160
Speaker 1: he would always be out at the theater and running

228
00:13:54,160 --> 00:13:57,720
Speaker 1: around trying to meet journalistic deadlines and stuff. So he

229
00:13:57,840 --> 00:14:01,559
Speaker 1: just left Colette home alone most of the time, and

230
00:14:01,760 --> 00:14:05,000
Speaker 1: usually she was hiding from people that they owed money to.

231
00:14:05,480 --> 00:14:07,480
Speaker 1: We would come around, you know, knocking on the door,

232
00:14:07,520 --> 00:14:09,280
Speaker 1: and she would just have to like hide behind a

233
00:14:09,360 --> 00:14:12,640
Speaker 1: bureau and pretend not to be home, which is so creepy.

234
00:14:13,760 --> 00:14:19,000
Speaker 1: No one's here, and oh we're absent. Nobody homes, just

235
00:14:19,160 --> 00:14:23,920
Speaker 1: those chickens clock clock. What's a French chicken noise? You know,

236
00:14:24,000 --> 00:14:27,080
Speaker 1: different countries are different now they do, It's true. What

237
00:14:27,200 --> 00:14:31,120
Speaker 1: do the French say for chicken clucks? You know, we're

238
00:14:31,160 --> 00:14:37,880
Speaker 1: like gruise montepul got the translations chicken, chicken, very sophisticated.

239
00:14:39,200 --> 00:14:45,240
Speaker 1: Gru that's a French chicken. Well, I can't find chicken,

240
00:14:45,320 --> 00:14:48,040
Speaker 1: but my quick Google search here found me a French rooster,

241
00:14:48,560 --> 00:14:51,640
Speaker 1: which rears us in America and in English, it says

242
00:14:51,720 --> 00:14:55,280
Speaker 1: cockadoodle do. Of course we all know what a rooster says.

243
00:14:55,680 --> 00:15:01,720
Speaker 1: In French, they say cock rico cock rick, which sounds

244
00:15:01,760 --> 00:15:04,240
Speaker 1: more like a salsa dance to It's about to say

245
00:15:04,280 --> 00:15:06,720
Speaker 1: that sounds like a really cool cabana spot. But I

246
00:15:06,800 --> 00:15:10,160
Speaker 1: can go to leave me down of Coca Rico denies

247
00:15:10,360 --> 00:15:15,400
Speaker 1: some dancing. There's a big breast band plan. It's led

248
00:15:15,440 --> 00:15:20,960
Speaker 1: by a chicken. I would pay good money led by

249
00:15:21,000 --> 00:15:24,440
Speaker 1: a chicken called Coca Rico. Somebody get it together for me.

250
00:15:25,520 --> 00:15:27,880
Speaker 1: I am ready to watch for Diana's birthday. We're gonna

251
00:15:27,880 --> 00:15:29,880
Speaker 1: have to find that. I want to cocoa eat piece

252
00:15:29,960 --> 00:15:35,280
Speaker 1: band led by a giant chicken. It's my one wish,

253
00:15:35,600 --> 00:15:38,200
Speaker 1: all right. So Willie's leaving her home alone. He owes

254
00:15:38,240 --> 00:15:41,720
Speaker 1: money everywhere. It's just like a chaotic situation, right, He's

255
00:15:41,720 --> 00:15:45,240
Speaker 1: always going down to the Coca Rico cash like I'll

256
00:15:45,240 --> 00:15:47,360
Speaker 1: go to the Cocoa Rico. He says, no, no, no,

257
00:15:47,400 --> 00:15:53,800
Speaker 1: it's too dangerous. Sorry, the chickens Rooster's own. Well, it's

258
00:15:53,800 --> 00:16:01,720
Speaker 1: only for cox. But also Willie cheated, like we said,

259
00:16:01,760 --> 00:16:04,560
Speaker 1: he's one of the most notorious libertines in Paris. So'

260
00:16:04,680 --> 00:16:07,680
Speaker 1: not really a surprise to hear this. He had a

261
00:16:07,720 --> 00:16:12,320
Speaker 1: string of mistresses, actresses, waitresses, studio models. He was forever.

262
00:16:12,440 --> 00:16:14,080
Speaker 1: Some of them he had him for years. Some of

263
00:16:14,080 --> 00:16:16,480
Speaker 1: them it would just be a short, little one night

264
00:16:16,560 --> 00:16:20,480
Speaker 1: stand or whatever. And about a year into their marriage,

265
00:16:20,680 --> 00:16:25,400
Speaker 1: Colette received an anonymous letter telling her, hey, you'll be

266
00:16:25,560 --> 00:16:28,080
Speaker 1: very interested. Don't know what is going on in this

267
00:16:28,160 --> 00:16:32,360
Speaker 1: particular Parisian at part a month? How is my how

268
00:16:32,440 --> 00:16:38,120
Speaker 1: is my accent? And Colette took herself to the address

269
00:16:38,160 --> 00:16:43,680
Speaker 1: provided and she found her husband with his mistress, Charlotte Kinsellor,

270
00:16:44,000 --> 00:16:46,160
Speaker 1: who he had actually been with for like several years

271
00:16:46,200 --> 00:16:49,160
Speaker 1: at this point. And again, this is far from his

272
00:16:49,200 --> 00:16:51,440
Speaker 1: only affair, but this is the first one that Colette

273
00:16:51,480 --> 00:16:54,640
Speaker 1: knew about, and somebody wanted her to know, you know that.

274
00:16:54,800 --> 00:16:56,000
Speaker 1: I don't know if it was meant to be a

275
00:16:56,120 --> 00:16:58,320
Speaker 1: kind thing, like your husband's running around on you, or

276
00:16:58,320 --> 00:17:01,360
Speaker 1: if it was like, hey, you're being you know, like

277
00:17:01,480 --> 00:17:03,880
Speaker 1: kind of a shitty thing. Was it like I feel

278
00:17:03,880 --> 00:17:09,880
Speaker 1: badly cut out magazine letters? Oh, speculation station. It's one

279
00:17:09,880 --> 00:17:13,960
Speaker 1: of his other mistresses who found out about this girl.

280
00:17:14,400 --> 00:17:17,400
Speaker 1: I was like, fine, I'm gonna tell your wife on you.

281
00:17:17,680 --> 00:17:20,800
Speaker 1: I like that you're cheating on me with somebody else,

282
00:17:21,640 --> 00:17:24,000
Speaker 1: that you're cheating on your wife with You're supposed to

283
00:17:24,000 --> 00:17:27,680
Speaker 1: be cheating on your wife with me. Well, I'm gonna

284
00:17:27,720 --> 00:17:32,840
Speaker 1: go tell Collette about this. That's definitely what happens anyway.

285
00:17:33,040 --> 00:17:35,400
Speaker 1: One of his other mistresses tipped off the lead about

286
00:17:35,440 --> 00:17:40,800
Speaker 1: his other mistresses. That's definitely what happens there. Anyway, history made. Now,

287
00:17:40,920 --> 00:17:44,840
Speaker 1: don't let your lard imagination get away with you, because

288
00:17:44,880 --> 00:17:47,480
Speaker 1: I didn't. I thought they were like in the middle

289
00:17:47,520 --> 00:17:50,479
Speaker 1: of some crazy sex actors when she when Colette walks in,

290
00:17:50,840 --> 00:17:54,119
Speaker 1: Like so Colette walks in and it's like, mon dieu,

291
00:17:55,200 --> 00:18:03,280
Speaker 1: what are you doing? And we assumed that, um, but

292
00:18:03,359 --> 00:18:07,640
Speaker 1: it wasn't. They actually were just going through Charlotte's household

293
00:18:07,640 --> 00:18:12,200
Speaker 1: accounts and honestly, listen, like this might have been more

294
00:18:12,280 --> 00:18:15,200
Speaker 1: galling and walking in on some sex stuff, because again,

295
00:18:15,920 --> 00:18:18,600
Speaker 1: Collette has spent a year hiding from creditors and then

296
00:18:18,640 --> 00:18:21,000
Speaker 1: she has to walk in and watch this guy financially

297
00:18:21,000 --> 00:18:24,199
Speaker 1: support another woman. Goodness, so she might have been like,

298
00:18:24,280 --> 00:18:26,520
Speaker 1: I'd rather caught you with your dick insider than this

299
00:18:27,320 --> 00:18:33,359
Speaker 1: right now? Check what's this? Wow? Maybe another speculation station? Uh,

300
00:18:33,520 --> 00:18:35,679
Speaker 1: maybe he wasn't helping her with her finances, maybe he

301
00:18:35,720 --> 00:18:39,520
Speaker 1: was trying to scam some money, where he's like, oh, yes,

302
00:18:39,640 --> 00:18:43,399
Speaker 1: some you should probably I've got an account that that

303
00:18:43,440 --> 00:18:45,320
Speaker 1: could keep some of this in that does a better

304
00:18:45,400 --> 00:18:47,359
Speaker 1: interest rates, So why don't you just give it to me.

305
00:18:48,040 --> 00:18:51,359
Speaker 1: It reminds me of my when my cousin came to

306
00:18:51,400 --> 00:18:55,040
Speaker 1: look at all my Magic the Gathering cards in middle

307
00:18:55,080 --> 00:18:57,679
Speaker 1: school because I my mom bought me a yard sale

308
00:18:57,680 --> 00:19:02,240
Speaker 1: box like five magic Gathering cards and I never played before.

309
00:19:02,520 --> 00:19:05,240
Speaker 1: My cousin definitely had, so I was like, hey, you know,

310
00:19:05,320 --> 00:19:08,080
Speaker 1: are these worth anything? And he comes through. He literally

311
00:19:08,080 --> 00:19:09,840
Speaker 1: sits down my deck and he starts going through it,

312
00:19:09,840 --> 00:19:11,679
Speaker 1: and I was just too naive at the time to

313
00:19:11,720 --> 00:19:14,119
Speaker 1: know what he was doing. As he sets cards aside,

314
00:19:14,160 --> 00:19:16,960
Speaker 1: and it's like, you don't want this, you don't want this,

315
00:19:16,960 --> 00:19:19,600
Speaker 1: This one's no good, this one's no good. Here, you

316
00:19:19,640 --> 00:19:22,040
Speaker 1: should keep these. Maybe you can sell that one, and

317
00:19:22,080 --> 00:19:25,080
Speaker 1: he walks away with a stack of his own, And

318
00:19:25,119 --> 00:19:28,840
Speaker 1: in hindsight, I'm like, he definitely probably took all the valuable.

319
00:19:29,840 --> 00:19:31,239
Speaker 1: You should have been like, well, if I don't want him,

320
00:19:31,240 --> 00:19:34,640
Speaker 1: why do you want him? Yeah? Well, well, I actually play.

321
00:19:34,680 --> 00:19:36,159
Speaker 1: So these are good for my deck, but they're not

322
00:19:36,160 --> 00:19:41,680
Speaker 1: worth anything, you know kind of thing? Sure, sure, well,

323
00:19:41,720 --> 00:19:44,000
Speaker 1: whatever he was doing with Charlotte, whether he's trying to

324
00:19:44,040 --> 00:19:48,800
Speaker 1: scam her money or give her money. According to Victoria Best,

325
00:19:48,920 --> 00:19:52,199
Speaker 1: a former lecturer on French literature at Cambridge University, she

326
00:19:52,240 --> 00:19:55,280
Speaker 1: writes a blog called lit Love, and she goes real

327
00:19:55,359 --> 00:19:58,320
Speaker 1: into Collet. It's really interesting. Definitely check her out. Can

328
00:19:58,359 --> 00:20:01,439
Speaker 1: I pause for Victoria Best? Here? For second? Her blocks

329
00:20:01,480 --> 00:20:05,320
Speaker 1: called love? Why isn't it called best lit our best Love?

330
00:20:05,640 --> 00:20:07,240
Speaker 1: You got the last name like best, you better be

331
00:20:07,359 --> 00:20:09,439
Speaker 1: using its? True? I don't think about not a lot

332
00:20:09,480 --> 00:20:11,760
Speaker 1: of us are gifted with the last name like best.

333
00:20:13,000 --> 00:20:16,080
Speaker 1: Use it, use it for them for those of us

334
00:20:16,080 --> 00:20:18,920
Speaker 1: who can't. That's true. We should write her a letter

335
00:20:19,280 --> 00:20:23,240
Speaker 1: like love. Your blog just cited it in our podcast episode.

336
00:20:23,359 --> 00:20:30,320
Speaker 1: And also want to ask, what then is Robert here? No? Victoria?

337
00:20:30,440 --> 00:20:33,479
Speaker 1: You do you? Okay girl? She does great work? Please

338
00:20:33,480 --> 00:20:36,920
Speaker 1: continue well. She wrote that when Collette walks in on

339
00:20:37,040 --> 00:20:39,520
Speaker 1: Charlotte and Willie, Charlotte was like ready to fire, she

340
00:20:39,640 --> 00:20:43,359
Speaker 1: grabbed a pair of scissors would defend herself, which tells

341
00:20:43,400 --> 00:20:46,000
Speaker 1: me something about maybe Charlotte's life. In the past couple

342
00:20:46,040 --> 00:20:50,040
Speaker 1: of years, people keep sending anonymous letters about Willie being

343
00:20:50,080 --> 00:20:53,560
Speaker 1: in my apartment. I gotta be ready. She's always got

344
00:20:53,560 --> 00:20:58,320
Speaker 1: a pair of scissors with hands reach. She was gonna

345
00:20:58,440 --> 00:21:02,800
Speaker 1: stab Collette. She's like, there's always man, my boyfriend's wives

346
00:21:02,800 --> 00:21:08,560
Speaker 1: are always showing up here China start some ship. But

347
00:21:08,680 --> 00:21:12,200
Speaker 1: Collette played it really cool. And this is like a

348
00:21:12,200 --> 00:21:14,600
Speaker 1: common thing for Collette. She seems to be very like

349
00:21:15,119 --> 00:21:19,240
Speaker 1: interested in maintaining in maintaining her cool in the face

350
00:21:19,400 --> 00:21:22,800
Speaker 1: of public humiliation. So when all her family's stuff went

351
00:21:22,880 --> 00:21:25,600
Speaker 1: up for auction, even as a kid, she was acting like, Oh,

352
00:21:25,640 --> 00:21:28,719
Speaker 1: that ain't no thing. Everything's fine. I don't care well

353
00:21:28,760 --> 00:21:31,160
Speaker 1: what I want with all these roses? Exactly what would

354
00:21:31,160 --> 00:21:35,080
Speaker 1: I do with everlasting roses? Um? So in this situation,

355
00:21:35,160 --> 00:21:37,560
Speaker 1: she also just played it cool. She said, I'm here

356
00:21:37,600 --> 00:21:40,520
Speaker 1: to get you, Willie. Let's go um here to get

357
00:21:40,600 --> 00:21:45,520
Speaker 1: dear Willie out of that and let's go. So, yeah,

358
00:21:45,520 --> 00:21:47,680
Speaker 1: she just played it cool. She got Willie, she left,

359
00:21:47,920 --> 00:21:51,680
Speaker 1: and actually she and Charlotte became friends eventually, like once

360
00:21:51,720 --> 00:21:54,200
Speaker 1: she had kind of I guess decided there's and Willie

361
00:21:54,240 --> 00:21:56,919
Speaker 1: is incorrigible. There's nothing to be done. She sort of

362
00:21:57,000 --> 00:21:59,560
Speaker 1: was like, fine, why am I mad at Charlotte? She's

363
00:21:59,600 --> 00:22:01,719
Speaker 1: making her way in this world. I'm at at Willie

364
00:22:01,800 --> 00:22:04,879
Speaker 1: and so you and I are cool. But the pain

365
00:22:05,119 --> 00:22:09,120
Speaker 1: of discovery didn't slow Willie down, not for a second.

366
00:22:09,520 --> 00:22:12,320
Speaker 1: There's another time. While Colette was sitting down to have

367
00:22:12,359 --> 00:22:16,040
Speaker 1: her portrait painted with the artist Jacques amure Blanche, she

368
00:22:16,359 --> 00:22:19,879
Speaker 1: watched Willie get dropped off at their place by a woman,

369
00:22:20,600 --> 00:22:24,119
Speaker 1: and as he stepped away, they exchanged like a loving goodbye,

370
00:22:24,560 --> 00:22:26,960
Speaker 1: you know, kiss kiss, So glad we could spend some

371
00:22:27,000 --> 00:22:30,840
Speaker 1: time together, little booty grab, I'll see you later, sugar

372
00:22:30,960 --> 00:22:39,119
Speaker 1: sugar cakes, cake, hey, the French sugar cake. But since

373
00:22:39,160 --> 00:22:43,280
Speaker 1: he wasn't inside the room to see Colette see him,

374
00:22:43,400 --> 00:22:45,920
Speaker 1: she actually let her emotions get the best of her.

375
00:22:46,200 --> 00:22:48,400
Speaker 1: As we said, she usually keeps it cool, but this

376
00:22:48,440 --> 00:22:52,520
Speaker 1: time she really broke down. The painter would later write quote,

377
00:22:52,920 --> 00:22:56,840
Speaker 1: she had real convulsions, hysterical crying fits. One had to

378
00:22:56,920 --> 00:22:59,240
Speaker 1: lay her on a sofa and bathe her temples with

379
00:22:59,280 --> 00:23:04,280
Speaker 1: cologne because she believed herself abandoned forever. That's such an

380
00:23:04,280 --> 00:23:08,040
Speaker 1: old school like rub cologne on my temples. I'm having

381
00:23:08,040 --> 00:23:11,840
Speaker 1: a fit, you know, don't work anymore. Can you imagine

382
00:23:11,880 --> 00:23:13,840
Speaker 1: like you're having a panic attack and I just come

383
00:23:13,880 --> 00:23:17,119
Speaker 1: up and spray acts in your eyes Like this is

384
00:23:17,160 --> 00:23:23,000
Speaker 1: the worst, so much worse. Um. But yeah, I think

385
00:23:23,000 --> 00:23:25,840
Speaker 1: this is important to note because Colette's is so well

386
00:23:25,880 --> 00:23:28,120
Speaker 1: known for having like an open marriage and just being

387
00:23:28,160 --> 00:23:30,080
Speaker 1: kind of out and about in the world. But early

388
00:23:30,119 --> 00:23:33,359
Speaker 1: on that was not really her her jam and she

389
00:23:33,480 --> 00:23:36,000
Speaker 1: really took it to heart that she was being she

390
00:23:36,119 --> 00:23:39,919
Speaker 1: used being run around on. And not long after this,

391
00:23:40,320 --> 00:23:43,159
Speaker 1: Colette got pretty sick. She chalked it up to this

392
00:23:43,280 --> 00:23:47,560
Speaker 1: nervous breakdown, but one of her biographers, Judith Thurman, argues

393
00:23:47,600 --> 00:23:50,840
Speaker 1: in her book Secrets of the Flesh, A Life of Colette,

394
00:23:51,400 --> 00:23:55,720
Speaker 1: that Collett's symptoms indicate not only about serious depression, but

395
00:23:55,800 --> 00:23:59,680
Speaker 1: that her husband Willie had likely given her a severe

396
00:23:59,760 --> 00:24:04,840
Speaker 1: k of gonarrhea. Willie, look, if you're going to be

397
00:24:04,920 --> 00:24:08,439
Speaker 1: running around, first of all, have a conversation about it,

398
00:24:08,480 --> 00:24:10,800
Speaker 1: you know, come to an agreement with your partner. You

399
00:24:10,840 --> 00:24:14,080
Speaker 1: can at least talk about it. And secondly, actually probably

400
00:24:14,119 --> 00:24:19,560
Speaker 1: primarily played safe friends. I know, it's nineteenth century France.

401
00:24:19,840 --> 00:24:24,919
Speaker 1: I was about, well, just try It's nine or something.

402
00:24:25,320 --> 00:24:28,879
Speaker 1: And Willie's like a wife, gotta do, gotta take what

403
00:24:29,000 --> 00:24:31,960
Speaker 1: she gets, So that means I get to cheat on

404
00:24:32,000 --> 00:24:34,399
Speaker 1: whoever I want and I get to bring home a

405
00:24:34,560 --> 00:24:36,440
Speaker 1: STD and give it to you. That's the risk you

406
00:24:36,560 --> 00:24:39,120
Speaker 1: run when you marry a guy. You take what you get,

407
00:24:39,160 --> 00:24:43,280
Speaker 1: and what you get is gonarrhea s t DS. So

408
00:24:43,440 --> 00:24:49,200
Speaker 1: Willie sucks like Willie Boo anti Willie podcast, ridiculous romance.

409
00:24:50,480 --> 00:24:53,480
Speaker 1: But in a minute, he is going to do the

410
00:24:53,520 --> 00:24:57,160
Speaker 1: best thing ever for Collette, and that is make her

411
00:24:57,480 --> 00:25:06,040
Speaker 1: a writer. And let's find out how right after this break, Okay,

412
00:25:06,240 --> 00:25:13,560
Speaker 1: welcome back, my petite co co Rico's so collect you know,

413
00:25:13,640 --> 00:25:15,920
Speaker 1: got sick with gnoia. She was sick for a little while.

414
00:25:15,960 --> 00:25:17,720
Speaker 1: Her mother came to live with them to like nurse

415
00:25:17,760 --> 00:25:19,880
Speaker 1: her back to health. And then Willie was feeling bad,

416
00:25:19,960 --> 00:25:22,439
Speaker 1: probably for giving her goneria, so he took her on

417
00:25:22,480 --> 00:25:25,159
Speaker 1: a little trip to Brittany, France, and that seemed to

418
00:25:25,240 --> 00:25:27,600
Speaker 1: kind of repair their relationship, at least for a minute.

419
00:25:27,680 --> 00:25:30,920
Speaker 1: You know, they had better communication skills after that. Now,

420
00:25:30,960 --> 00:25:35,080
Speaker 1: as we said before, Willie well known music critic and

421
00:25:35,119 --> 00:25:38,080
Speaker 1: writer in Paris, but actually he was more of a

422
00:25:38,119 --> 00:25:41,880
Speaker 1: con man than he was a writer what Willie Willie guy,

423
00:25:41,960 --> 00:25:43,800
Speaker 1: And he was real proud of it too. He loved

424
00:25:43,800 --> 00:25:46,919
Speaker 1: telling people how he never did a day's work. He

425
00:25:47,040 --> 00:25:49,520
Speaker 1: just paid other people to do some work. Some sources

426
00:25:49,520 --> 00:25:52,399
Speaker 1: to say he never wrote a word himself. Some sources

427
00:25:52,400 --> 00:25:55,119
Speaker 1: to say he did some writing, but mostly not a

428
00:25:55,880 --> 00:26:02,200
Speaker 1: real um. John Grisham totally right, hate, I don't speculations station.

429
00:26:02,560 --> 00:26:04,960
Speaker 1: John Grisham doesn't write is on stuff? Does he? I don't.

430
00:26:05,119 --> 00:26:07,919
Speaker 1: It's a lot of books. How could he? How could he?

431
00:26:08,160 --> 00:26:10,800
Speaker 1: And like Tom Clancy, like any of those grocery store

432
00:26:10,840 --> 00:26:12,960
Speaker 1: novels where they come out with a new book every month,

433
00:26:13,000 --> 00:26:14,879
Speaker 1: I feel like you've got to have some ghostwriter. They

434
00:26:14,960 --> 00:26:17,800
Speaker 1: probably wrote some at first, and then somebody came and

435
00:26:17,840 --> 00:26:19,280
Speaker 1: I was like, all right, you guys can all copy

436
00:26:19,320 --> 00:26:22,639
Speaker 1: this style. I hear movie composers do this a lot um,

437
00:26:22,680 --> 00:26:27,680
Speaker 1: the big ones, especially uh. In fact, I read recently

438
00:26:27,800 --> 00:26:31,680
Speaker 1: that not Michael Giaquino, who's amazing, but some of the

439
00:26:31,720 --> 00:26:37,480
Speaker 1: bigger ones will farm out there compositions to other composers

440
00:26:37,520 --> 00:26:40,679
Speaker 1: and then not necessarily maybe give them the credit they deserve.

441
00:26:42,600 --> 00:26:44,960
Speaker 1: So yeah, just a thing just popped into my head.

442
00:26:45,320 --> 00:26:49,400
Speaker 1: I read recently well, much like that, Willie had himself

443
00:26:49,440 --> 00:26:53,320
Speaker 1: a stable of ghost writers collect called it his factory.

444
00:26:54,000 --> 00:26:57,600
Speaker 1: So he had composers writing music criticism, and then he

445
00:26:57,640 --> 00:27:03,600
Speaker 1: had authors writing articles and novels, whatever, sonnets, sometimes whatever

446
00:27:03,600 --> 00:27:06,320
Speaker 1: they felt like writing, or whatever he thought they should write,

447
00:27:06,600 --> 00:27:12,680
Speaker 1: whatever you thought would sell. He's like, right this recipes, recipes, Yeah,

448
00:27:12,760 --> 00:27:17,320
Speaker 1: I think pieces. He's like, get me some discourse right away.

449
00:27:18,160 --> 00:27:20,960
Speaker 1: And sometimes like he would conceive the plot and like

450
00:27:21,040 --> 00:27:24,600
Speaker 1: hand over an outline and they would actually write the book. Um.

451
00:27:24,720 --> 00:27:26,439
Speaker 1: Most of the time, though, it seems like he just

452
00:27:26,640 --> 00:27:29,480
Speaker 1: edited whatever they came up with and then slapped his

453
00:27:29,560 --> 00:27:33,280
Speaker 1: name on it and sold it. And because that, you know,

454
00:27:33,400 --> 00:27:37,640
Speaker 1: Willie was like a marketing genius. He was an incessant

455
00:27:37,640 --> 00:27:41,959
Speaker 1: self promoter. He had a huge network in the literary world,

456
00:27:42,280 --> 00:27:44,919
Speaker 1: so he could really make a book sell. That is

457
00:27:44,960 --> 00:27:46,760
Speaker 1: the truth about him. He could market the ship out

458
00:27:46,760 --> 00:27:49,200
Speaker 1: of something. So a lot of even acclaimed authors would

459
00:27:49,200 --> 00:27:51,880
Speaker 1: take a turn in the factory if they were hard

460
00:27:51,960 --> 00:27:54,800
Speaker 1: up for cash, because they knew they would get paid

461
00:27:54,840 --> 00:27:58,239
Speaker 1: well because the book would sell. Um. So Stephen King

462
00:27:58,320 --> 00:28:01,760
Speaker 1: comes by is like things are tight, mhm, what you

463
00:28:01,760 --> 00:28:06,119
Speaker 1: got for me? I mean basically, and Meanwhile, that meant Willie,

464
00:28:06,119 --> 00:28:09,040
Speaker 1: of course, could publish as many as fifty books a month,

465
00:28:10,119 --> 00:28:12,399
Speaker 1: which is a rate that no single author could keep

466
00:28:12,480 --> 00:28:14,840
Speaker 1: up with on their own. So he's kid raaking royalties

467
00:28:15,040 --> 00:28:20,080
Speaker 1: except Stephen King, except for Seing. So Collette even did

468
00:28:20,119 --> 00:28:23,040
Speaker 1: some work in the factory herself, although she saw herself

469
00:28:23,080 --> 00:28:25,280
Speaker 1: as more of like an actress and a singer than

470
00:28:25,320 --> 00:28:29,400
Speaker 1: a writer. But one day Willie was a little hard

471
00:28:29,480 --> 00:28:32,120
Speaker 1: up for money and he didn't have any ghostwriters around

472
00:28:32,119 --> 00:28:35,160
Speaker 1: that he'd lean on, so he turned to his wife

473
00:28:35,160 --> 00:28:37,800
Speaker 1: for a new book. He suggested that she writes something

474
00:28:37,840 --> 00:28:40,840
Speaker 1: about her school days. But hey, you know what, Colette,

475
00:28:41,200 --> 00:28:43,840
Speaker 1: why don't you throw a little lesbian action in there?

476
00:28:44,360 --> 00:28:48,200
Speaker 1: Might help me sell the book, Oh Willie, it's like

477
00:28:48,240 --> 00:28:52,760
Speaker 1: sex sells. So Collette put pen to paper, and indeed

478
00:28:52,800 --> 00:28:56,280
Speaker 1: she wrote a six hundred page manuscript in the form

479
00:28:56,320 --> 00:28:59,840
Speaker 1: of a diary, and it was called Claudine in School,

480
00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:03,360
Speaker 1: and it was about a fifteen year old protagonist who's

481
00:29:03,840 --> 00:29:07,320
Speaker 1: a bit of a hoyden. Uh. This is a Diana

482
00:29:07,360 --> 00:29:10,560
Speaker 1: word where let's take a literary lesson for today. I'm

483
00:29:10,560 --> 00:29:13,880
Speaker 1: sorry I did not know this word hoyden. Hoyden. I mean,

484
00:29:13,880 --> 00:29:15,960
Speaker 1: I don't know the actual definition, but I think it

485
00:29:16,000 --> 00:29:18,560
Speaker 1: means like a girl who's a bit of a tomboy.

486
00:29:18,880 --> 00:29:21,840
Speaker 1: You know, she'll she'll run around in the dirt. She's

487
00:29:21,920 --> 00:29:25,440
Speaker 1: very opinionated and kind of bold and brassy, and she'll

488
00:29:25,480 --> 00:29:29,000
Speaker 1: talk back. The definition I'm seeing is a boisterous girl.

489
00:29:29,480 --> 00:29:32,320
Speaker 1: And the example sentence they give just to clarify for

490
00:29:32,360 --> 00:29:36,320
Speaker 1: you is I've warned you before you young Hoyden. That

491
00:29:36,520 --> 00:29:39,920
Speaker 1: is not helpful. Helpful, That is not a helpful sentence.

492
00:29:39,960 --> 00:29:46,680
Speaker 1: Thanks Oxford Languages. Anyway, Claudine is a bit of a Hoyden.

493
00:29:47,400 --> 00:29:51,080
Speaker 1: She's got a quick wit, she's curious, she's bold, she's

494
00:29:51,080 --> 00:29:54,560
Speaker 1: got this independent spirit, and she has a love affair

495
00:29:55,040 --> 00:29:59,080
Speaker 1: with her female teacher. And I'll say she was only fifteen,

496
00:29:59,240 --> 00:30:01,480
Speaker 1: so there's no se x and it's not a graphic.

497
00:30:02,160 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 1: It was like kissing and cuddling. Thank you. Was a

498
00:30:05,560 --> 00:30:11,880
Speaker 1: little worried about that either way. Inappropes, but but it sells.

499
00:30:11,960 --> 00:30:16,200
Speaker 1: I guess Willie barely even flipped through this six page

500
00:30:16,240 --> 00:30:19,840
Speaker 1: manuscript before he just threw it into a drawer in disappointment,

501
00:30:19,920 --> 00:30:22,360
Speaker 1: slammed it shut. No way am I have publishing? This

502
00:30:22,440 --> 00:30:25,320
Speaker 1: will not see the light of day piece of mered.

503
00:30:26,800 --> 00:30:30,120
Speaker 1: But a little while later he dug it back up,

504
00:30:30,600 --> 00:30:34,480
Speaker 1: reread it, and according to Collette, he called himself a

505
00:30:34,800 --> 00:30:40,800
Speaker 1: stupid ass. Oh Willie, what was I thinking? This is brilliant?

506
00:30:42,560 --> 00:30:46,720
Speaker 1: So stupid? So he put his hat on. He ran

507
00:30:46,760 --> 00:30:49,920
Speaker 1: out to the publishers with all the notebooks in hand, said, quick,

508
00:30:50,480 --> 00:30:55,720
Speaker 1: have the next. Um, I don't know ulysses and like,

509
00:30:55,840 --> 00:31:00,280
Speaker 1: I hope not. We like something people can read, sait,

510
00:31:00,600 --> 00:31:07,960
Speaker 1: I have the next? I have the next Da Vinci Code.

511
00:31:08,160 --> 00:31:11,640
Speaker 1: Everyone is going to be talking about this one like

512
00:31:11,680 --> 00:31:14,600
Speaker 1: I was the next Tom Clancy. No, will get it

513
00:31:14,600 --> 00:31:18,360
Speaker 1: in here, and he gives the publishers. They put it

514
00:31:18,400 --> 00:31:21,880
Speaker 1: together in the year nineteen hundred, under Willie's name, of course,

515
00:31:22,560 --> 00:31:27,280
Speaker 1: and this became an instant bestseller, selling forty copies in

516
00:31:27,440 --> 00:31:32,080
Speaker 1: just two months. Was the next da Vinci Code? It

517
00:31:32,160 --> 00:31:34,800
Speaker 1: really was? It really was, and soon to be made

518
00:31:34,800 --> 00:31:38,720
Speaker 1: into a movie with Tom Hanks, Yes, Tom Hanks, Claudine.

519
00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:42,360
Speaker 1: He'll play the teacher. He'll play the teacher and do

520
00:31:42,480 --> 00:31:47,920
Speaker 1: a ridiculous French accent, and they'll get obviously probably l

521
00:31:48,000 --> 00:31:51,920
Speaker 1: Fanning to play Claudine and see it. She could play fifteen,

522
00:31:52,000 --> 00:31:55,320
Speaker 1: maybe a little old for it, but she could playft

523
00:31:55,600 --> 00:31:59,840
Speaker 1: like sexy stuff. You'd want someone older. She's she's been

524
00:32:00,200 --> 00:32:04,120
Speaker 1: back five or six years in the Yeah, and I'm

525
00:32:04,160 --> 00:32:06,840
Speaker 1: saying she could play a high schooler just as easily

526
00:32:07,080 --> 00:32:09,520
Speaker 1: as Tom Hanks could play a female high school teacher.

527
00:32:10,160 --> 00:32:16,720
Speaker 1: Very true. This movie is very interesting. Directed by the

528
00:32:16,800 --> 00:32:23,640
Speaker 1: Duffer brothers. What is going to happen to? Cladie can't wait? Well?

529
00:32:23,680 --> 00:32:26,560
Speaker 1: This kicked off like a new era for Collette. She

530
00:32:26,640 --> 00:32:30,320
Speaker 1: had found her voice, she loved writing, and her literary

531
00:32:30,360 --> 00:32:33,960
Speaker 1: career was launched. Because even though it was only Willie's

532
00:32:34,040 --> 00:32:37,320
Speaker 1: name on the manuscript, it didn't really take that long

533
00:32:37,440 --> 00:32:41,000
Speaker 1: for too Pi to figure out who the real author was.

534
00:32:41,760 --> 00:32:47,719
Speaker 1: I spread, surely, I imagine Collette dropped them. She might

535
00:32:47,760 --> 00:32:51,480
Speaker 1: have whisper whisper Actually I wrote that, and then boom,

536
00:32:51,760 --> 00:32:55,040
Speaker 1: gossip spreads in Paris like like revolutions. That just goes

537
00:32:55,120 --> 00:32:57,880
Speaker 1: so fast. But I mean, he's well known for having ghostwriters,

538
00:32:57,880 --> 00:32:59,600
Speaker 1: so they probably were always trying to be like who

539
00:32:59,640 --> 00:33:04,719
Speaker 1: actually yeah, um so yeah. At this point they're frequenting

540
00:33:04,800 --> 00:33:08,360
Speaker 1: like literary salons. Kind of a glamorous couple going around,

541
00:33:08,360 --> 00:33:11,320
Speaker 1: not rich, but you know, people wanted them on their

542
00:33:11,360 --> 00:33:14,800
Speaker 1: guest list and stuff, and she is like hanging out

543
00:33:14,840 --> 00:33:18,760
Speaker 1: with as yet unknown legends like Marcel Proust. What you know,

544
00:33:19,040 --> 00:33:22,239
Speaker 1: Paris was just enchanted with her country manners and her

545
00:33:22,360 --> 00:33:27,160
Speaker 1: childlike spontaneity. During a blizzard, for example, she once made

546
00:33:27,320 --> 00:33:31,040
Speaker 1: sorbet out of jam and the snow that had collected

547
00:33:31,120 --> 00:33:36,160
Speaker 1: on the windows. And so Paris was probably like, oh,

548
00:33:36,320 --> 00:33:39,960
Speaker 1: she took his strawberry jam and snow and she made

549
00:33:40,040 --> 00:33:47,280
Speaker 1: ice cream all so cottage cool shut. It's kind of

550
00:33:47,280 --> 00:33:51,800
Speaker 1: making me think of the snoopy um right where you

551
00:33:51,800 --> 00:33:55,680
Speaker 1: would literally what we did, We put snow in them.

552
00:33:55,720 --> 00:33:58,920
Speaker 1: I guess that's not the thing people did ices, weren't

553
00:33:58,920 --> 00:34:02,120
Speaker 1: they like snow cone That's what I'm gonnes. Yeah, we

554
00:34:02,240 --> 00:34:04,720
Speaker 1: just made them with actual snow. Well, the one time

555
00:34:04,760 --> 00:34:07,040
Speaker 1: we had snow in Georgia enough snow to do that. Yes,

556
00:34:07,680 --> 00:34:10,120
Speaker 1: I know, I'm thinking about snow in Georgia, and I'm

557
00:34:10,160 --> 00:34:12,200
Speaker 1: just like, you can't scoop up snow in Georgia without

558
00:34:12,480 --> 00:34:14,759
Speaker 1: other stuff coming with it, because it's not deep enough.

559
00:34:15,280 --> 00:34:18,720
Speaker 1: You don't get that clean middle layer. No, And well,

560
00:34:18,960 --> 00:34:20,880
Speaker 1: as a kid, I think it was like during the

561
00:34:20,960 --> 00:34:24,680
Speaker 1: ninety three blizzard or something. So snow to actually do

562
00:34:24,800 --> 00:34:27,480
Speaker 1: something like that, but I feel like, yeah, most of

563
00:34:27,480 --> 00:34:29,760
Speaker 1: the time, snow in Georgia is not you don't want to.

564
00:34:30,880 --> 00:34:37,320
Speaker 1: We moved to Georgia and people were still constantly talking

565
00:34:37,360 --> 00:34:40,920
Speaker 1: about the Blizzard of ninety three. It was like it,

566
00:34:41,400 --> 00:34:43,480
Speaker 1: you know, because I had moved from upstate New York

567
00:34:43,520 --> 00:34:45,960
Speaker 1: in a valley where we regularly got like eighteen inches

568
00:34:45,960 --> 00:34:48,600
Speaker 1: of snow, and people were like, oh, well, we had

569
00:34:48,640 --> 00:34:53,759
Speaker 1: the Blizzard of it was six inches deep and I

570
00:34:53,840 --> 00:34:59,520
Speaker 1: was like, oh my god, I lost a scarf that day. However,

571
00:34:59,560 --> 00:35:03,000
Speaker 1: did you say, well, the next year there was no snow,

572
00:35:03,040 --> 00:35:05,880
Speaker 1: so I didn't need it. I had bought it and

573
00:35:05,960 --> 00:35:11,479
Speaker 1: lost it for that blizzard. Collette also around this time,

574
00:35:11,600 --> 00:35:16,239
Speaker 1: cut off her famous floor length golden tresses, and she

575
00:35:16,440 --> 00:35:19,560
Speaker 1: kicked off the fashion for short hairstyles for women that

576
00:35:19,600 --> 00:35:23,920
Speaker 1: would stay trendy into the nineteen twenties. So who amongst

577
00:35:24,040 --> 00:35:26,400
Speaker 1: us has kicked off a fashion trend that lasted almost

578
00:35:26,400 --> 00:35:28,920
Speaker 1: twenty years. It's been it's been a while since I've

579
00:35:28,960 --> 00:35:32,840
Speaker 1: done it. I can't wait for you to do it again. Yeah.

580
00:35:32,920 --> 00:35:37,960
Speaker 1: I was actually responsible for the midriff and rings. Yeah,

581
00:35:38,040 --> 00:35:41,439
Speaker 1: that was me, what about belly chains? Remember those? Oh yeah, yeah,

582
00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:43,919
Speaker 1: Well I started with it with with just a ring,

583
00:35:44,040 --> 00:35:46,239
Speaker 1: but then I like clipped my wallet chain to it

584
00:35:46,480 --> 00:35:50,319
Speaker 1: because I also started wallet chains, and people just kind

585
00:35:50,320 --> 00:35:54,239
Speaker 1: of cut out the moment chains as like, nobody's going

586
00:35:54,280 --> 00:35:56,600
Speaker 1: to take my wallet if it's chained to my belly button.

587
00:35:57,160 --> 00:35:59,759
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a fair point, or they'll rip out

588
00:35:59,760 --> 00:36:03,839
Speaker 1: your Come on, I wasn't going to say it, think

589
00:36:05,360 --> 00:36:12,080
Speaker 1: I was going to leave it there. I blame myself,

590
00:36:13,880 --> 00:36:17,560
Speaker 1: your fault. If you started it, that's your fault. And

591
00:36:17,680 --> 00:36:21,439
Speaker 1: Willie wanted more Claudine because of course it's selling so well,

592
00:36:21,560 --> 00:36:25,240
Speaker 1: and he's like, let's get more of this rambunctious lady,

593
00:36:25,400 --> 00:36:28,399
Speaker 1: and so she got to writing it, and she has

594
00:36:28,520 --> 00:36:32,520
Speaker 1: famously claimed that Willie would lock her in her room

595
00:36:32,719 --> 00:36:36,080
Speaker 1: for hours at a time until she had pushed sufficient

596
00:36:36,120 --> 00:36:38,880
Speaker 1: amount of pages under the door jam each day, and

597
00:36:38,880 --> 00:36:41,600
Speaker 1: then had to let her out rump still skin like

598
00:36:41,719 --> 00:36:44,440
Speaker 1: you got you better spin this straw into go by,

599
00:36:44,480 --> 00:36:46,440
Speaker 1: which I mean, take this blank paper and make it

600
00:36:46,480 --> 00:36:52,000
Speaker 1: porn and then I'll che not too much point because

601
00:36:52,000 --> 00:36:58,279
Speaker 1: that limits the market. Um. But actually her the biographer

602
00:36:58,400 --> 00:37:01,360
Speaker 1: that we cited earlier Judith Therm and she's kind of

603
00:37:01,440 --> 00:37:03,879
Speaker 1: is like, you know, Collette liked a good story, and

604
00:37:04,000 --> 00:37:06,080
Speaker 1: so that means she was not always a hundred percent

605
00:37:06,280 --> 00:37:09,800
Speaker 1: honest about everything that she's talking about. And there is

606
00:37:09,880 --> 00:37:11,960
Speaker 1: some evidence that when they were in the country together,

607
00:37:12,280 --> 00:37:15,200
Speaker 1: Collette just had a lot of trouble concentrating. So she

608
00:37:15,239 --> 00:37:18,600
Speaker 1: would walk their dog and sometimes also her cat in

609
00:37:18,640 --> 00:37:21,680
Speaker 1: the morning and then ask him lock me in my

610
00:37:21,800 --> 00:37:23,719
Speaker 1: room for four hours so I can get to work,

611
00:37:23,800 --> 00:37:26,640
Speaker 1: like as a focus technique, I guess, So we don't.

612
00:37:26,840 --> 00:37:28,719
Speaker 1: I don't know for sure if he actually was like

613
00:37:28,760 --> 00:37:31,600
Speaker 1: this cruel dude who would lock her in a room,

614
00:37:31,760 --> 00:37:34,520
Speaker 1: or if she was like, I just need to concentrate. Um,

615
00:37:34,880 --> 00:37:36,279
Speaker 1: you know, I'm in the country where I like to

616
00:37:36,360 --> 00:37:39,000
Speaker 1: run around, and so I need you to make me

617
00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:42,000
Speaker 1: sit and work for four straight hours. So that's a

618
00:37:42,040 --> 00:37:44,400
Speaker 1: good idea. I might start asking you to lock me

619
00:37:44,520 --> 00:37:47,000
Speaker 1: up so I can finish my work and then and

620
00:37:47,040 --> 00:37:50,040
Speaker 1: then I will definitely tell everyone she locks me in

621
00:37:50,120 --> 00:37:55,160
Speaker 1: my room until I'm finished working. She's problematic. I mean,

622
00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:58,400
Speaker 1: I think it's a good point that sometimes Mary, because

623
00:37:58,440 --> 00:38:00,000
Speaker 1: you do ask me, they'll be like, do not let

624
00:38:00,040 --> 00:38:02,320
Speaker 1: me have this I don't want one of these cookies.

625
00:38:02,640 --> 00:38:05,440
Speaker 1: Don't let me eat this after this hour or make

626
00:38:05,520 --> 00:38:08,200
Speaker 1: me get up at this time. And you know, that's

627
00:38:08,280 --> 00:38:10,080
Speaker 1: that is a thing that you lean on your partner

628
00:38:10,120 --> 00:38:12,839
Speaker 1: sometimes and you're not great at it. No, I'm bad.

629
00:38:13,480 --> 00:38:16,280
Speaker 1: I'm bad at it. But but I think that Collette

630
00:38:16,320 --> 00:38:18,600
Speaker 1: had maybe like picked up a little bit of marketing

631
00:38:18,640 --> 00:38:21,560
Speaker 1: genius from Willie, and she was sort of like, this

632
00:38:21,600 --> 00:38:24,560
Speaker 1: is this is going to make people want to, you know,

633
00:38:24,920 --> 00:38:26,560
Speaker 1: you know, more about me, and they're going to care

634
00:38:26,600 --> 00:38:28,600
Speaker 1: more about what I'm doing if they think there's this

635
00:38:28,680 --> 00:38:31,680
Speaker 1: crazy brute locking me in my room every day and

636
00:38:31,760 --> 00:38:34,120
Speaker 1: forcing me to write with bread and water or something.

637
00:38:34,800 --> 00:38:36,239
Speaker 1: So I think, you know, it was almost like a

638
00:38:36,239 --> 00:38:39,160
Speaker 1: branding thing, like, oh, it's just a way to get

639
00:38:39,160 --> 00:38:42,040
Speaker 1: interest up about about the book. I don't want people

640
00:38:42,080 --> 00:38:43,919
Speaker 1: to know what a hid and I am. I want

641
00:38:43,920 --> 00:38:46,200
Speaker 1: them to think I'm just an innocent princess locked in

642
00:38:46,200 --> 00:38:49,200
Speaker 1: a tower. She certainly thought it would get people gossiping

643
00:38:49,200 --> 00:38:52,799
Speaker 1: about Claudine, the second installment of Claudine, and it did.

644
00:38:53,000 --> 00:38:56,239
Speaker 1: She ended up writing him a book a year. There

645
00:38:56,320 --> 00:39:00,080
Speaker 1: was Claudine at School, of course, and then Claudine on

646
00:39:00,239 --> 00:39:07,279
Speaker 1: Berry and then Claudine married and Claudine and Annie, and

647
00:39:07,320 --> 00:39:09,279
Speaker 1: then there was also two other books about like a

648
00:39:09,320 --> 00:39:13,480
Speaker 1: spinoff character, and this is all by five. Willie comes in.

649
00:39:13,560 --> 00:39:17,719
Speaker 1: He's like, I got one word for you, merchandizing. We

650
00:39:17,760 --> 00:39:22,800
Speaker 1: want action figures, lunch boxes. It's just like early Disney McDonald's.

651
00:39:23,840 --> 00:39:25,839
Speaker 1: How else can I make money off this property? Yes,

652
00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:31,440
Speaker 1: you'll get the free toy with every happy meal. What

653
00:39:31,560 --> 00:39:36,320
Speaker 1: is it? Whatever French joke insert here, you get it?

654
00:39:36,800 --> 00:39:40,360
Speaker 1: So but but no, really, he started making Claudine postcards,

655
00:39:40,600 --> 00:39:45,840
Speaker 1: Claudine cigarettes, Claudine perfumes, lotions, ice cream. There's like a

656
00:39:46,000 --> 00:39:50,920
Speaker 1: like a Ben and Jerry's flavor Claude Claudine praline or

657
00:39:53,120 --> 00:39:56,680
Speaker 1: Claudine and Annie's pretzels. Would that be a good one?

658
00:39:56,960 --> 00:39:59,359
Speaker 1: I would like a little sweet and salty. That's good.

659
00:39:59,560 --> 00:40:02,399
Speaker 1: I'm to that um. And then he would also make

660
00:40:02,760 --> 00:40:06,040
Speaker 1: Claudine candy and even dulls, so action figures was not

661
00:40:06,120 --> 00:40:10,719
Speaker 1: far off. They have the first novel adapted for the stage,

662
00:40:10,800 --> 00:40:14,439
Speaker 1: with an actress named Polaire cast as the titular role,

663
00:40:15,120 --> 00:40:17,240
Speaker 1: and Willie would go out and about with both women,

664
00:40:17,239 --> 00:40:21,120
Speaker 1: both Colette and Polaire, on his arms and he would

665
00:40:21,200 --> 00:40:24,240
Speaker 1: hint that there was a lesbian relationship behind closed doors

666
00:40:24,280 --> 00:40:27,760
Speaker 1: between the two of them. Our old friend Victoria Best

667
00:40:27,840 --> 00:40:32,640
Speaker 1: writes on Litlove quote, Willie knew that personality mattered, and

668
00:40:32,760 --> 00:40:35,920
Speaker 1: that selling the people behind the stories appealed to a

669
00:40:36,040 --> 00:40:39,680
Speaker 1: voyeuristic desire in the audience to see the real versions

670
00:40:39,719 --> 00:40:42,799
Speaker 1: of the characters they read about. There was, after all,

671
00:40:43,040 --> 00:40:46,279
Speaker 1: plenty of truth in this. Colette was ransacking her life

672
00:40:46,280 --> 00:40:49,600
Speaker 1: with Willie for the plot, transposing their marriage into print

673
00:40:49,680 --> 00:40:54,239
Speaker 1: almost as fast as she lived it. So's it's like,

674
00:40:54,320 --> 00:40:57,080
Speaker 1: how you know, we want to see all the Avengers

675
00:40:57,120 --> 00:40:59,640
Speaker 1: actors hanging out as if they really are going to

676
00:40:59,760 --> 00:41:01,760
Speaker 1: say of the world when we need them to. Yeah,

677
00:41:02,600 --> 00:41:04,960
Speaker 1: that quote really made me think, like, what would Willie

678
00:41:04,960 --> 00:41:08,400
Speaker 1: have done with social media? Can you imagine the fake

679
00:41:09,640 --> 00:41:12,279
Speaker 1: ship that he would be having celebrities put on their

680
00:41:12,320 --> 00:41:15,080
Speaker 1: social media accounts. It would just be he would have

681
00:41:15,120 --> 00:41:17,239
Speaker 1: just done well as all in his hand. He would

682
00:41:17,280 --> 00:41:19,279
Speaker 1: probably be a huge piece of ship, just like he

683
00:41:19,400 --> 00:41:22,080
Speaker 1: was then, but like he would have done well, very

684
00:41:22,120 --> 00:41:26,279
Speaker 1: successful and in terms of Collette writing her married life

685
00:41:26,280 --> 00:41:30,279
Speaker 1: into the novels, most notably at least for this podcast,

686
00:41:30,920 --> 00:41:35,520
Speaker 1: Collette wrote about Claudine living in a threesome, and we're

687
00:41:35,520 --> 00:41:39,640
Speaker 1: going to find out more about that right after this

688
00:41:45,160 --> 00:41:49,200
Speaker 1: and welcome back to the show. So yeah, Claudine's fictional

689
00:41:49,320 --> 00:41:53,480
Speaker 1: threesome was actually extremely true to life, and it will

690
00:41:53,520 --> 00:42:00,920
Speaker 1: bring us to this episode side piece, What could happen?

691
00:42:02,360 --> 00:42:07,640
Speaker 1: Collette met the Parisian born American socialite Georgie Raoul Duval,

692
00:42:08,239 --> 00:42:11,640
Speaker 1: the wife of a wealthy French mining engineer, at a

693
00:42:11,719 --> 00:42:15,040
Speaker 1: friend's house in March nineteen o one, and seems like

694
00:42:15,080 --> 00:42:20,040
Speaker 1: it was lust at first sight. Georgie was hot. Georgie

695
00:42:20,120 --> 00:42:22,040
Speaker 1: was lying, hey girl, and she was like, hey girl,

696
00:42:22,880 --> 00:42:26,480
Speaker 1: look a wealthy French mining engineer is you know he's

697
00:42:26,520 --> 00:42:28,719
Speaker 1: going to marry a ten He's going to marry ten right?

698
00:42:28,800 --> 00:42:34,400
Speaker 1: And also he's busy exact feeling lonely. Yeah, Georgie's board,

699
00:42:34,800 --> 00:42:39,239
Speaker 1: Georgie's flying solo. She wants some anonymous and read all

700
00:42:39,280 --> 00:42:42,560
Speaker 1: these Claudine bucks and it's like, true, this girl knows

701
00:42:42,600 --> 00:42:46,480
Speaker 1: what's up. This girl knows how to push buttons specifically,

702
00:42:47,160 --> 00:42:52,600
Speaker 1: but one button we all know what matters. Now. This

703
00:42:52,680 --> 00:42:57,760
Speaker 1: is Collette's first known homosexual affair. Um, but it isn't

704
00:42:57,800 --> 00:43:03,840
Speaker 1: just Collette's side piece, because unbeknownst to Collette, Georgie also

705
00:43:04,000 --> 00:43:08,160
Speaker 1: began having an affair with Willie oh Man, and Willie

706
00:43:08,239 --> 00:43:10,840
Speaker 1: also had no idea that Georgie was sleeping with Collette.

707
00:43:11,760 --> 00:43:14,520
Speaker 1: Playing the field, Georgie was like, I wonder head long,

708
00:43:14,560 --> 00:43:17,400
Speaker 1: I can keep this up for real? Well, it wasn't

709
00:43:17,440 --> 00:43:20,000
Speaker 1: that long before husband and wife figured out that they

710
00:43:20,040 --> 00:43:22,759
Speaker 1: were sleeping with the same person. And I just want

711
00:43:22,800 --> 00:43:25,960
Speaker 1: to know how how like did they meet each other

712
00:43:26,000 --> 00:43:29,160
Speaker 1: coming and going or did one of them let it

713
00:43:29,200 --> 00:43:30,920
Speaker 1: slip in bed one night? Like they were like, oh,

714
00:43:30,960 --> 00:43:32,680
Speaker 1: Georgie and he was like, wait a minute, how do

715
00:43:32,719 --> 00:43:35,240
Speaker 1: you know, Georgie, How do you know I've been sleeping

716
00:43:35,280 --> 00:43:37,400
Speaker 1: with her? How do you know, Georgie, I've been sleeping

717
00:43:38,920 --> 00:43:40,879
Speaker 1: I wonder if Georgie would like play them against each

718
00:43:40,880 --> 00:43:45,040
Speaker 1: other and be like, so, Collette, tell me what does

719
00:43:45,080 --> 00:43:47,640
Speaker 1: your husband like in bed? You know what, what really

720
00:43:47,640 --> 00:43:50,360
Speaker 1: turns him on? I'm just curious, you know, and vice versa.

721
00:43:51,080 --> 00:43:53,120
Speaker 1: And of course Willie is like, I don't know what

722
00:43:53,200 --> 00:43:56,280
Speaker 1: turns Colette on in bed, but why would pay attention

723
00:43:56,320 --> 00:43:58,120
Speaker 1: to that? You have to turn a woman on in bed?

724
00:44:01,239 --> 00:44:03,480
Speaker 1: I mean maybe Willie was like dynamite in the sack

725
00:44:03,640 --> 00:44:06,719
Speaker 1: as it's possible he got he got around enough that

726
00:44:06,760 --> 00:44:09,439
Speaker 1: he should have. If practice makes perfect, you would think,

727
00:44:09,640 --> 00:44:11,560
Speaker 1: I tell you, you hear about some of these guys

728
00:44:11,600 --> 00:44:15,000
Speaker 1: and they're like having hundreds of affairs with actresses and

729
00:44:15,080 --> 00:44:18,440
Speaker 1: singers and models and stuff. And I'm like, I guess

730
00:44:18,440 --> 00:44:20,520
Speaker 1: you just have to. I guess you. Really, it's just

731
00:44:20,640 --> 00:44:25,000
Speaker 1: confidently put yourself out there because it sounds exhausting to me.

732
00:44:25,200 --> 00:44:27,600
Speaker 1: It really does. I don't know Collette. Apparently as a

733
00:44:27,640 --> 00:44:30,280
Speaker 1: journalist later on in her life, she would write articles,

734
00:44:30,400 --> 00:44:34,520
Speaker 1: including about fake orgasms, and I wonder she was like,

735
00:44:35,080 --> 00:44:39,280
Speaker 1: let me talk to some of these women, who are

736
00:44:39,360 --> 00:44:43,560
Speaker 1: you really enjoying yourself? Or maybe because she had lesbian

737
00:44:43,600 --> 00:44:46,120
Speaker 1: love affairs, she would be with women, married women who

738
00:44:46,160 --> 00:44:47,520
Speaker 1: would be like, wow, I didn't know it could be

739
00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:50,000
Speaker 1: like that. What are you doing in bed with your man?

740
00:44:50,560 --> 00:44:52,600
Speaker 1: I thought, I just thought you were supposed to scream.

741
00:44:53,120 --> 00:44:55,920
Speaker 1: I wasn't compelled to. It just seemed like the right

742
00:44:55,960 --> 00:44:59,439
Speaker 1: thing to do. I love that parton Emily where she's

743
00:44:59,480 --> 00:45:02,120
Speaker 1: listening for orgasms in Paris and they're all different. Do

744
00:45:02,160 --> 00:45:05,239
Speaker 1: you remember that moaning? And one one of the ladies

745
00:45:05,360 --> 00:45:11,280
Speaker 1: is just like it's like the most quiet. So however,

746
00:45:11,320 --> 00:45:13,359
Speaker 1: they figured it out. They figured it out one day

747
00:45:13,400 --> 00:45:15,839
Speaker 1: that they were both sleeping with the same woman, and

748
00:45:16,000 --> 00:45:20,280
Speaker 1: in true Parisian fashion, especially for that time, they decided

749
00:45:20,320 --> 00:45:24,319
Speaker 1: to share her. Um. There's a police report from May

750
00:45:24,360 --> 00:45:28,720
Speaker 1: first one that really spells it out. It says, quote,

751
00:45:29,000 --> 00:45:33,040
Speaker 1: we learned that the novelist Gautier Villars has chosen the

752
00:45:33,080 --> 00:45:36,719
Speaker 1: afternoon of twenty nine April a small apartment on the

753
00:45:36,760 --> 00:45:40,360
Speaker 1: fourth floor of a discreet house in Pasquier Street, with

754
00:45:40,520 --> 00:45:45,719
Speaker 1: the aim of meeting to lesbians, his legitimate wife and

755
00:45:45,800 --> 00:45:49,840
Speaker 1: a lady aged about thirty. The meeting of the novelist

756
00:45:49,880 --> 00:45:53,000
Speaker 1: and the two ladies in question took place from three

757
00:45:53,040 --> 00:45:57,640
Speaker 1: to six o'clock in the evening. Arriving first, the two

758
00:45:57,760 --> 00:46:01,680
Speaker 1: ladies were left alone for an hour, but Mr Gautier

759
00:46:01,800 --> 00:46:05,239
Speaker 1: Villars had come to join them, so they continued with

760
00:46:05,360 --> 00:46:10,320
Speaker 1: him the game. First, okay, a couple of questions. First,

761
00:46:10,480 --> 00:46:16,680
Speaker 1: love this afternoon delight? Second? First, what police report? Why

762
00:46:16,719 --> 00:46:18,839
Speaker 1: were you there? We had nothing else to do today,

763
00:46:18,840 --> 00:46:22,319
Speaker 1: so we decided the snoop on a local threesome. My

764
00:46:22,440 --> 00:46:24,600
Speaker 1: question was like it sounds were like a gossip column,

765
00:46:24,640 --> 00:46:27,319
Speaker 1: and the police report, So who were they being really

766
00:46:27,360 --> 00:46:31,319
Speaker 1: loud and the neighbors called the police. Are just like

767
00:46:31,360 --> 00:46:33,200
Speaker 1: they just did a lot of gossip columns back then,

768
00:46:33,719 --> 00:46:38,880
Speaker 1: or maybe because homosexuality was legalized in France after the

769
00:46:38,920 --> 00:46:42,600
Speaker 1: French Revolution, but you know, people would still call the

770
00:46:42,600 --> 00:46:44,960
Speaker 1: cops sometimes. So I wonder if the two ladies showing up,

771
00:46:45,000 --> 00:46:47,680
Speaker 1: people are like, oh, these two bitches are dooming something,

772
00:46:48,080 --> 00:46:49,840
Speaker 1: and then the police showed up and they're like, oh, no,

773
00:46:49,920 --> 00:46:52,319
Speaker 1: there was a man there. He showed up late, but

774
00:46:52,360 --> 00:46:57,520
Speaker 1: he was there. That's all good. Two women together talking,

775
00:46:57,600 --> 00:47:00,760
Speaker 1: having a conversation without a man present, and even discussing

776
00:47:00,760 --> 00:47:05,440
Speaker 1: a man zip. I'll have no Beckadel tests passing in

777
00:47:05,640 --> 00:47:10,400
Speaker 1: my town. I also love they continued with him the game,

778
00:47:13,320 --> 00:47:15,400
Speaker 1: the game of doing it in a game, job playing.

779
00:47:15,920 --> 00:47:18,800
Speaker 1: I don't know, but I want to play. It depends

780
00:47:19,080 --> 00:47:25,400
Speaker 1: for me. It depends only well. Of course. Collette frequently

781
00:47:25,520 --> 00:47:28,920
Speaker 1: acknowledged that she suffered from jealousy. She called it quote

782
00:47:29,320 --> 00:47:33,319
Speaker 1: the only suffering we endure without ever becoming used to it.

783
00:47:35,440 --> 00:47:39,000
Speaker 1: I would say that that's true of like hitting your

784
00:47:39,000 --> 00:47:42,239
Speaker 1: funny bone. You know, you never get used to that.

785
00:47:42,320 --> 00:47:44,479
Speaker 1: I could hit my funny bone thirty times a day,

786
00:47:44,840 --> 00:47:47,520
Speaker 1: and I would hate it just as much tomorrow. That's

787
00:47:47,520 --> 00:47:50,640
Speaker 1: so true. It does hurt in a very special way.

788
00:47:50,920 --> 00:47:58,360
Speaker 1: So checkmate, Collette, check poetry. But anyway, she managed to

789
00:47:58,360 --> 00:48:00,520
Speaker 1: put her jealousy aside for a while, at least to

790
00:48:00,560 --> 00:48:04,080
Speaker 1: carry on this Manashati was Georgie and Willie, and this

791
00:48:04,200 --> 00:48:06,840
Speaker 1: went all through the spring. But in the summer of

792
00:48:06,920 --> 00:48:11,239
Speaker 1: nineteen o one, Willie and Collette realized that Georgie made

793
00:48:11,320 --> 00:48:13,799
Speaker 1: something of a habit of summoning each one of them

794
00:48:14,040 --> 00:48:17,239
Speaker 1: an hour apart from each other, and they didn't take

795
00:48:17,280 --> 00:48:19,640
Speaker 1: kindly to that. They're like, wait a second, we had

796
00:48:19,680 --> 00:48:22,520
Speaker 1: something worked out here, and you're all deliberately separating us.

797
00:48:22,600 --> 00:48:27,360
Speaker 1: Plus I would also wonder whose seconds getting sloppy seconds?

798
00:48:27,440 --> 00:48:30,440
Speaker 1: Maybe it's switched sometimes depending on her mood. See that

799
00:48:30,480 --> 00:48:32,920
Speaker 1: would be more fair. Well. Also, it's like, listen, if

800
00:48:32,960 --> 00:48:36,440
Speaker 1: you're in a polyamorous relationship, there's certain rules, and if

801
00:48:36,440 --> 00:48:39,920
Speaker 1: the couple's like, hey, we only meet together, it's not

802
00:48:40,000 --> 00:48:42,920
Speaker 1: cool for you to then meet with one of them

803
00:48:42,920 --> 00:48:47,400
Speaker 1: outside of outside of your threesome, right, although it's also

804
00:48:47,800 --> 00:48:51,160
Speaker 1: not cool of the couple they both met with her individually.

805
00:48:51,520 --> 00:48:54,160
Speaker 1: If that was the rule, so everybody was breaking it.

806
00:48:54,200 --> 00:48:56,560
Speaker 1: So I'm not entirely sure what was bothering them here.

807
00:48:56,920 --> 00:48:58,800
Speaker 1: Maybe it was just the hour apart they're like, we

808
00:48:58,840 --> 00:49:00,960
Speaker 1: could use a little more time than that. I don't know,

809
00:49:01,000 --> 00:49:03,520
Speaker 1: but they got mad at her. I think got real

810
00:49:03,560 --> 00:49:05,879
Speaker 1: mad about it. Whatever bothered. Then they did not take

811
00:49:05,960 --> 00:49:08,080
Speaker 1: kindly to it, and they broke it off with Georgie,

812
00:49:08,440 --> 00:49:12,600
Speaker 1: and then they took revenge in literary form. It's also

813
00:49:12,680 --> 00:49:16,040
Speaker 1: pretty pretty messed up to be like, we're gonna go

814
00:49:16,120 --> 00:49:19,479
Speaker 1: make what do they call it. It's like revenge porn

815
00:49:19,600 --> 00:49:23,480
Speaker 1: or something kind where it's like, oh, this girl broke

816
00:49:23,560 --> 00:49:26,480
Speaker 1: up with me, so now I'm gonna publish all the

817
00:49:26,480 --> 00:49:30,320
Speaker 1: all the sexty stuff we used to do pretty twisted.

818
00:49:30,800 --> 00:49:34,560
Speaker 1: But Collett wrote the book Claudine Married, and in that book,

819
00:49:34,600 --> 00:49:38,040
Speaker 1: the character that Claudine has her lesbian affair with is

820
00:49:38,080 --> 00:49:42,360
Speaker 1: so obviously a caricature of Georgie that Georgie tried to

821
00:49:42,440 --> 00:49:44,719
Speaker 1: keep the book from being published. She feared there was

822
00:49:44,760 --> 00:49:48,680
Speaker 1: going to be this scandal. But Willie, he's savvy, he

823
00:49:48,760 --> 00:49:52,400
Speaker 1: got it published anyway, and Georgie cut all ties with

824
00:49:52,440 --> 00:49:55,279
Speaker 1: both of them, sus it I'm done. I'm done. With

825
00:49:55,320 --> 00:49:59,280
Speaker 1: both of you. How dare you now, I I question,

826
00:49:59,640 --> 00:50:04,480
Speaker 1: I don't uh if took revenge is like a scholarly

827
00:50:04,600 --> 00:50:08,120
Speaker 1: viewpoints rather than their own viewpoint, because she was already

828
00:50:08,200 --> 00:50:10,600
Speaker 1: right writing about her own life. So a lot of

829
00:50:10,719 --> 00:50:14,640
Speaker 1: characters and all the books are very thinly veiled caricatures

830
00:50:14,640 --> 00:50:16,759
Speaker 1: of people in their life, and this was kind of

831
00:50:16,760 --> 00:50:19,879
Speaker 1: a common thing I think in a lot of literature.

832
00:50:20,080 --> 00:50:22,160
Speaker 1: We talked about a little bit during the Oscar Wild

833
00:50:22,200 --> 00:50:25,719
Speaker 1: episode that sometimes they would be writing books about each other,

834
00:50:26,200 --> 00:50:28,239
Speaker 1: and it was, you know, you change the name, but

835
00:50:28,320 --> 00:50:31,440
Speaker 1: everyone knew that Lord is actually that guy in the circle,

836
00:50:31,520 --> 00:50:33,759
Speaker 1: at least well in the circle. Yeah, and now we

837
00:50:33,800 --> 00:50:37,239
Speaker 1: don't know necessarily who they're talking about it, but but

838
00:50:37,320 --> 00:50:39,440
Speaker 1: at the time they certainly knew, and they would often

839
00:50:39,480 --> 00:50:41,839
Speaker 1: be real mad about how they got portrayed by one another,

840
00:50:42,080 --> 00:50:44,319
Speaker 1: because for all I know, Stephen King is out there like, man,

841
00:50:44,360 --> 00:50:47,759
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make Dean Coots the villain and nobody's gonna know,

842
00:50:47,800 --> 00:50:50,400
Speaker 1: but I'm gonna know. Dean's gonna know. Dean's reading it

843
00:50:50,520 --> 00:50:54,200
Speaker 1: like that best. Well, I'll show him in my next one.

844
00:50:54,480 --> 00:51:02,239
Speaker 1: I'm scared of him, though he can summon clowns um, well, yes,

845
00:51:02,400 --> 00:51:05,040
Speaker 1: it might not be that cruel. But but in either case,

846
00:51:05,120 --> 00:51:07,440
Speaker 1: you know, Georgie went to them and was like, hey,

847
00:51:07,680 --> 00:51:11,440
Speaker 1: this is really obviously me. Can you change that or

848
00:51:11,840 --> 00:51:14,759
Speaker 1: stop this book from going out? And they were like no,

849
00:51:14,920 --> 00:51:19,880
Speaker 1: we're mad at you. So there was some there was

850
00:51:19,960 --> 00:51:23,600
Speaker 1: some animosity to it. I think so if if she

851
00:51:23,680 --> 00:51:26,480
Speaker 1: actually tried before it was done to get it changed

852
00:51:26,640 --> 00:51:28,600
Speaker 1: or something, then yeah, I think that there might have

853
00:51:28,640 --> 00:51:30,560
Speaker 1: been a little bit like, sorry, that's what we do.

854
00:51:30,640 --> 00:51:32,920
Speaker 1: So I should have should have known it before you fucked.

855
00:51:32,920 --> 00:51:39,080
Speaker 1: A famous literary couple definitely talked thought about that. It's

856
00:51:39,080 --> 00:51:41,440
Speaker 1: like dating Taylor Swift and then being like, what she

857
00:51:41,480 --> 00:51:45,759
Speaker 1: wrote a song about me? Come here? How could I

858
00:51:45,800 --> 00:51:51,240
Speaker 1: have known? So? Writing wise, things are going great. Everyone

859
00:51:51,280 --> 00:51:55,560
Speaker 1: loves Claudine, they're in literary salons. Life is good. But

860
00:51:55,920 --> 00:52:00,840
Speaker 1: marriage wise, everything sucked. Victoria Best rights that as Willie

861
00:52:00,880 --> 00:52:04,919
Speaker 1: got older, quote, his libido flagged and he needed ever

862
00:52:05,080 --> 00:52:09,400
Speaker 1: more perverse scenarios to revive it. The steady stream of

863
00:52:09,480 --> 00:52:12,680
Speaker 1: schoolgirl Claudina likes that were drawn to him by his

864
00:52:12,760 --> 00:52:17,799
Speaker 1: celebrity proved useful for this particular task. Very gross, and

865
00:52:17,880 --> 00:52:21,960
Speaker 1: Collette wrote about it saying, quote, hanging on him, cooing

866
00:52:22,080 --> 00:52:26,399
Speaker 1: to him. They write, darling, you'll marry me when she dies. Yes,

867
00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:31,360
Speaker 1: you'd better believe it. He's marrying them already, one after another.

868
00:52:31,880 --> 00:52:36,720
Speaker 1: He could cull, but he prefers to collect. Damn. Collette

869
00:52:36,760 --> 00:52:39,319
Speaker 1: is a cutting ass bitch when she wants to be

870
00:52:39,320 --> 00:52:43,600
Speaker 1: issued like these dumb bitches. But as Best says, she

871
00:52:43,640 --> 00:52:47,600
Speaker 1: did not write about quote how Willie required her to

872
00:52:47,680 --> 00:52:53,080
Speaker 1: warm them up socially and sometimes sexually before he received them. WHOA.

873
00:52:54,800 --> 00:52:58,280
Speaker 1: So this is a really interesting point here because Collette,

874
00:52:58,640 --> 00:53:01,160
Speaker 1: like we said, she starts her married life seeming to

875
00:53:01,200 --> 00:53:04,600
Speaker 1: be pretty monogamous, like she doesn't want him running around

876
00:53:04,600 --> 00:53:08,240
Speaker 1: on her um. But then she kind of gets maybe

877
00:53:08,239 --> 00:53:10,560
Speaker 1: swept up into the Parisian life, or she sort of

878
00:53:10,600 --> 00:53:14,400
Speaker 1: becomes resigned to this is how it is, and gets

879
00:53:14,400 --> 00:53:16,799
Speaker 1: into the open marriage thing. And of course she she

880
00:53:16,920 --> 00:53:19,759
Speaker 1: must have had some same sex desire already or else

881
00:53:19,760 --> 00:53:23,000
Speaker 1: she wouldn't have been interested. Um. But I wonder how

882
00:53:23,080 --> 00:53:25,360
Speaker 1: much Willie was like, go ahead and try it, you know,

883
00:53:25,440 --> 00:53:27,680
Speaker 1: kind of coerced her a little bit into some things

884
00:53:27,760 --> 00:53:30,279
Speaker 1: that she didn't really want to do or yeah, or

885
00:53:30,480 --> 00:53:32,200
Speaker 1: or introduced her I mean, a lot of people are

886
00:53:32,320 --> 00:53:35,840
Speaker 1: very feel very monogamous until they are presented with someone

887
00:53:35,880 --> 00:53:38,600
Speaker 1: says like, well, you know what about this lifestyle and

888
00:53:38,640 --> 00:53:42,359
Speaker 1: they maybe even tepidly check it out, and then they're like,

889
00:53:42,360 --> 00:53:46,279
Speaker 1: oh shit, this is awesome. You know. So, I mean,

890
00:53:46,280 --> 00:53:49,799
Speaker 1: it's true you have to try it before you know. Um. So, yeah.

891
00:53:49,840 --> 00:53:53,160
Speaker 1: I wonder how willing she was to sexually warm up

892
00:53:53,200 --> 00:53:57,160
Speaker 1: someone for him, or if that was like, Okay, great,

893
00:53:58,000 --> 00:54:01,640
Speaker 1: that sounds great. I love that. Right. However she felt

894
00:54:01,840 --> 00:54:04,880
Speaker 1: about the whole situation, you know, of their marriage. She

895
00:54:05,040 --> 00:54:09,000
Speaker 1: was definitely getting sick to death of Willie himself. She

896
00:54:09,080 --> 00:54:11,719
Speaker 1: loved their bohemian life, we think. I mean, she said

897
00:54:11,760 --> 00:54:15,080
Speaker 1: she had all these illustrious friends, She had scandalous friends.

898
00:54:15,800 --> 00:54:18,319
Speaker 1: One time collect jumped naked out of a cake at

899
00:54:18,360 --> 00:54:20,759
Speaker 1: a party. I gotta wonder if that's the first time

900
00:54:20,760 --> 00:54:23,640
Speaker 1: someone did that. Life goal, life goal, life goal. You

901
00:54:23,640 --> 00:54:25,160
Speaker 1: think she was the first one to do. No, it

902
00:54:25,200 --> 00:54:28,120
Speaker 1: must have happened before. It might have. It's just such

903
00:54:28,160 --> 00:54:30,759
Speaker 1: a trope. Yeah that. I don't know if she was like,

904
00:54:30,840 --> 00:54:33,480
Speaker 1: I'm doing that because that's what like crazy ladies do,

905
00:54:33,760 --> 00:54:35,359
Speaker 1: or she's like, you know what, I'm gonna do something

906
00:54:35,440 --> 00:54:38,920
Speaker 1: real crazy and it became like a thing popularized it.

907
00:54:39,080 --> 00:54:41,000
Speaker 1: But yeah, that's I'm like, she's such a trends that.

908
00:54:41,960 --> 00:54:46,640
Speaker 1: I just think of Adam's family values. Lurch was that

909
00:54:46,840 --> 00:54:48,919
Speaker 1: was she in the cake when you baked it? That's

910
00:54:49,000 --> 00:54:59,720
Speaker 1: poor girl, poor girl, raw, Julia as come as Adams

911
00:54:59,760 --> 00:55:04,520
Speaker 1: is one of the finest performances of our age, I agree, absolutely,

912
00:55:04,640 --> 00:55:07,000
Speaker 1: he will always be my Gomez. I'm totally fine to

913
00:55:07,040 --> 00:55:09,760
Speaker 1: see new gomezes in the lifetime, but he will always

914
00:55:09,760 --> 00:55:12,280
Speaker 1: be my Gomez. And then it didn't hurt that Angelic

915
00:55:12,320 --> 00:55:15,960
Speaker 1: at Houston, also one of the great performances, will also

916
00:55:16,000 --> 00:55:21,680
Speaker 1: always be my Morticia. So good anyway, cakes just jumping

917
00:55:21,719 --> 00:55:25,640
Speaker 1: out of a cake. Collette also loved writing, but she

918
00:55:25,760 --> 00:55:28,920
Speaker 1: was bored. In an article for The Guardian, Aida at

919
00:55:28,960 --> 00:55:33,160
Speaker 1: Amerium writes, quote, Collette always knew that the shock of

920
00:55:33,200 --> 00:55:36,600
Speaker 1: marriage contained something greater than her own experience of a

921
00:55:36,640 --> 00:55:42,440
Speaker 1: specific man. It ended any sense of independent sovereignty. That's

922
00:55:42,440 --> 00:55:44,400
Speaker 1: apparently was like a theme in some of her books

923
00:55:44,560 --> 00:55:46,640
Speaker 1: was this sense. And it wasn't just women that had it.

924
00:55:46,719 --> 00:55:48,759
Speaker 1: Some of her male characters would get it too, where

925
00:55:48,880 --> 00:55:51,080
Speaker 1: once they're married, they're like happy to be married, but

926
00:55:51,120 --> 00:55:53,600
Speaker 1: then they also realized like, oh, I'm not in charge

927
00:55:53,600 --> 00:55:55,480
Speaker 1: of my own life anymore. I have the other person

928
00:55:55,520 --> 00:55:58,359
Speaker 1: who had to consult with all the time, and how

929
00:55:58,400 --> 00:56:02,280
Speaker 1: constraining that can feel and eating Um, I guess, especially

930
00:56:02,360 --> 00:56:05,239
Speaker 1: depending on who you're married to and how much they

931
00:56:05,239 --> 00:56:07,520
Speaker 1: can strain your life. But um, but I thought that

932
00:56:07,600 --> 00:56:09,920
Speaker 1: was an interesting thing where she's like really realizing that

933
00:56:10,040 --> 00:56:13,880
Speaker 1: marriage as a partnership isn't just like we're together, working

934
00:56:13,920 --> 00:56:17,359
Speaker 1: together and making life together. It's like, you're also kind

935
00:56:17,360 --> 00:56:23,200
Speaker 1: of limiting my personal freedom. And then her nineteen ten

936
00:56:23,280 --> 00:56:27,640
Speaker 1: novel The Vagabond collect wrote that marriage, even to someone

937
00:56:27,719 --> 00:56:35,160
Speaker 1: kind and true, is quote a long drawn out, voluptuous nous, suspended, fanned, renewed,

938
00:56:35,719 --> 00:56:39,319
Speaker 1: the winged fall, the swooning, in which one's strength is

939
00:56:39,360 --> 00:56:44,080
Speaker 1: renewed by its own death. Damn, that's exactly what I

940
00:56:44,120 --> 00:56:50,160
Speaker 1: was going to write in your anniversary card this year.

941
00:56:48,480 --> 00:56:53,560
Speaker 1: But have to find another way to say that you

942
00:56:53,600 --> 00:56:56,759
Speaker 1: can strain my personal freedom. Look, you say it every

943
00:56:56,800 --> 00:57:00,319
Speaker 1: day with your eyes. I'm so glad that to just

944
00:57:00,400 --> 00:57:07,919
Speaker 1: getting well, it's just the magic is still alive. Well,

945
00:57:07,960 --> 00:57:10,640
Speaker 1: so Collet started thinking about other things and other ways

946
00:57:10,680 --> 00:57:14,000
Speaker 1: to be creative, And we mentioned earlier she had always

947
00:57:14,000 --> 00:57:16,800
Speaker 1: thought of herself as an actress, so she decided to

948
00:57:16,840 --> 00:57:21,320
Speaker 1: take lessons in mime from the celebrity pantomime George Wogg.

949
00:57:22,120 --> 00:57:24,840
Speaker 1: And let's remember this is nineteen hundreds, so mime is

950
00:57:24,880 --> 00:57:29,960
Speaker 1: like a really big acting technique. And Willie was super

951
00:57:30,000 --> 00:57:34,680
Speaker 1: supportive of this career path, so supportive in fact, that

952
00:57:34,760 --> 00:57:37,240
Speaker 1: he urged her to go on tour with Wogg's company,

953
00:57:37,280 --> 00:57:39,080
Speaker 1: which is something that would kind of take her out

954
00:57:39,080 --> 00:57:42,919
Speaker 1: of his company a long time. Oh, have all these

955
00:57:42,960 --> 00:57:45,600
Speaker 1: school girls trying to sleep with me? Yes, why don't

956
00:57:45,600 --> 00:57:47,480
Speaker 1: you go out of town for a few months and

957
00:57:47,640 --> 00:57:54,720
Speaker 1: take your long drawn out voluptuousness with you. So yeah,

958
00:57:54,720 --> 00:57:57,440
Speaker 1: she realized that he wanted out to She wrote, quote,

959
00:57:57,760 --> 00:58:00,680
Speaker 1: while I was dreaming of escape, someone side me had

960
00:58:00,720 --> 00:58:05,880
Speaker 1: been dreaming of conveniently showing me the door. It's like

961
00:58:05,880 --> 00:58:07,800
Speaker 1: with just if one of us had just said something

962
00:58:07,880 --> 00:58:10,840
Speaker 1: sooner earlier. It's like my first girlfriend and I went

963
00:58:10,880 --> 00:58:12,880
Speaker 1: to see a movie and I won't say which one

964
00:58:12,920 --> 00:58:16,640
Speaker 1: because it's controversial that I hate it um and we

965
00:58:16,760 --> 00:58:21,480
Speaker 1: both were sitting there, apparently both hating it, but we

966
00:58:21,600 --> 00:58:24,240
Speaker 1: both thought the other person was loving it, and I

967
00:58:24,480 --> 00:58:29,920
Speaker 1: after a certain scene went audibly during the movie and

968
00:58:30,000 --> 00:58:32,120
Speaker 1: after the movie, I was like, you couldn't tell that

969
00:58:32,160 --> 00:58:34,560
Speaker 1: I was miserable, and she was like, no, I thought

970
00:58:34,560 --> 00:58:38,000
Speaker 1: that you saw that scene and went wow. I was like, no,

971
00:58:38,480 --> 00:58:41,000
Speaker 1: it was the opposite. Now is that not a good

972
00:58:41,080 --> 00:58:44,800
Speaker 1: lesson on how you things can be communicated and received

973
00:58:45,080 --> 00:58:50,080
Speaker 1: very differently as But what movie was it? Now? You

974
00:58:50,120 --> 00:58:55,960
Speaker 1: have to tell me which one it is? Okay, fair enough.

975
00:58:56,280 --> 00:58:58,520
Speaker 1: I would like to see it again. Um, I haven't

976
00:58:58,560 --> 00:59:03,760
Speaker 1: seen it since then. I was like sixteen, and I

977
00:59:03,840 --> 00:59:07,080
Speaker 1: was very bored, and I wanted to love it, and

978
00:59:07,120 --> 00:59:09,440
Speaker 1: I love everyone in it, and I love that style

979
00:59:09,480 --> 00:59:13,840
Speaker 1: of movie. I would watch it again. I can't sit

980
00:59:13,840 --> 00:59:16,360
Speaker 1: here and say it was a bad movie because everybody

981
00:59:16,400 --> 00:59:18,960
Speaker 1: loves it so and I canna be like I'm right

982
00:59:19,040 --> 00:59:24,320
Speaker 1: and everyone else is wrong. But it's um me personally,

983
00:59:24,760 --> 00:59:26,800
Speaker 1: I was bothered by it. I would watch it again.

984
00:59:27,360 --> 00:59:31,520
Speaker 1: So anyway, in nineteen o six, Colette and Willie separated officially,

985
00:59:32,120 --> 00:59:35,440
Speaker 1: and Colette left to pursue her life on the stage

986
00:59:35,480 --> 00:59:41,400
Speaker 1: with George Wogg's company, and a lot happens during her

987
00:59:41,600 --> 00:59:45,200
Speaker 1: basically her single life. So we will find out more

988
00:59:45,240 --> 00:59:48,760
Speaker 1: about that, including her affair with Napoleon the Third's gender

989
00:59:48,800 --> 00:59:53,920
Speaker 1: bending knees in part two of our Colette series. This

990
00:59:53,960 --> 00:59:57,400
Speaker 1: will bring us to the end of this part. Wait,

991
00:59:57,440 --> 01:00:00,960
Speaker 1: you dropped Napoleon the Third in there, and I am ready?

992
01:00:01,120 --> 01:00:07,360
Speaker 1: Can we just keep going? I'm so ready? That's crazy.

993
01:00:07,760 --> 01:00:11,320
Speaker 1: Only the third of course, the bastard who sent Max

994
01:00:11,400 --> 01:00:16,640
Speaker 1: and Carlotta to Mexico's. He's a popular character in Ridiculous Romance.

995
01:00:16,680 --> 01:00:21,960
Speaker 1: It's turning out. Yeah, I can't wait, especially when she's single.

996
01:00:22,040 --> 01:00:25,720
Speaker 1: That's when she has a lot of her really ridiculous romances. Um,

997
01:00:25,760 --> 01:00:28,880
Speaker 1: it's so fun. I cannot wait because we're gonna talk

998
01:00:28,920 --> 01:00:32,680
Speaker 1: about like gay subculture in Paris and all these codes

999
01:00:32,720 --> 01:00:35,480
Speaker 1: and stuff. Anyway, I'm very excited about this series. Also,

1000
01:00:35,560 --> 01:00:39,440
Speaker 1: I think it's wacky that, um, she went from like

1001
01:00:39,520 --> 01:00:44,959
Speaker 1: a like a ghostwriting novelist and libertine to a mime,

1002
01:00:45,560 --> 01:00:48,480
Speaker 1: like a touring mime. Like what a shift. This is

1003
01:00:48,480 --> 01:00:51,440
Speaker 1: awesome that that wouldn't happen today. I mean, it wouldn't

1004
01:00:51,440 --> 01:00:54,160
Speaker 1: be like Suzanne Collins being like, well, I finished the

1005
01:00:54,200 --> 01:00:58,680
Speaker 1: Hunger Games books. Now I'll be a touring mime. Can

1006
01:00:58,680 --> 01:01:02,040
Speaker 1: you imagine? And changing it up. I would go see it.

1007
01:01:02,200 --> 01:01:06,560
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know what she looks like, but

1008
01:01:06,680 --> 01:01:09,240
Speaker 1: she has a really expressive face. She could do it. Yeah,

1009
01:01:09,320 --> 01:01:14,320
Speaker 1: you just need some makeup and a striped shirt, reality,

1010
01:01:14,400 --> 01:01:16,840
Speaker 1: physicality and knows a lot of minds that don't wear

1011
01:01:16,960 --> 01:01:20,160
Speaker 1: striped shirts and berets, but they all George Wog was

1012
01:01:20,200 --> 01:01:22,960
Speaker 1: one of them. He was not into that kyle of mining.

1013
01:01:23,960 --> 01:01:27,520
Speaker 1: He felt that actually mime gave you more opportunities to

1014
01:01:27,600 --> 01:01:31,440
Speaker 1: show emotion and expression words do, which is often true.

1015
01:01:31,720 --> 01:01:34,000
Speaker 1: We talked about that in the Oscar Kokoshka episode. He

1016
01:01:34,040 --> 01:01:38,000
Speaker 1: wrote that play that was largely wordless and about how

1017
01:01:38,120 --> 01:01:41,600
Speaker 1: you know, there was a theme in the in Austria

1018
01:01:41,640 --> 01:01:46,200
Speaker 1: at the time that you know, language wasn't enough and

1019
01:01:46,240 --> 01:01:48,600
Speaker 1: it was actually limiting. So yeah, I could see that.

1020
01:01:48,800 --> 01:01:50,280
Speaker 1: I could see that. That That makes sense to me. I mean,

1021
01:01:50,400 --> 01:01:55,360
Speaker 1: especially if you're going around internationally. Great, now you don't

1022
01:01:55,360 --> 01:01:57,560
Speaker 1: have to worry about not language or they don't do

1023
01:01:57,680 --> 01:02:00,720
Speaker 1: your language so they're missing nuance. You're like, there is

1024
01:02:00,720 --> 01:02:02,640
Speaker 1: no language, so it's all good. You might say, a

1025
01:02:02,760 --> 01:02:06,840
Speaker 1: smile is the same in every language. Wow, thank you

1026
01:02:06,920 --> 01:02:10,720
Speaker 1: McDonald's coke or whoever did that. Yeah, that sounds like coked,

1027
01:02:12,240 --> 01:02:14,600
Speaker 1: but we will. Yeah, we'll get into mime in all

1028
01:02:14,600 --> 01:02:17,320
Speaker 1: that culture. I'm sure in the next part she's going

1029
01:02:17,360 --> 01:02:19,400
Speaker 1: to expose her she's gonna have the first nip slip.

1030
01:02:19,920 --> 01:02:21,680
Speaker 1: She's gonna have, well not the first nip slip, but

1031
01:02:21,720 --> 01:02:27,880
Speaker 1: she's gonna have a big nip first. She's she's just

1032
01:02:27,920 --> 01:02:33,360
Speaker 1: gonna have a scandaloust Janet Jackson style nip slip, among

1033
01:02:33,400 --> 01:02:36,040
Speaker 1: other things. Yeah, and we're going to be bringing you

1034
01:02:36,640 --> 01:02:39,800
Speaker 1: collect episodes from the next couple of Wednesdays. That's how

1035
01:02:39,800 --> 01:02:41,720
Speaker 1: we're going to do this. We'll we'll break it up

1036
01:02:41,760 --> 01:02:44,520
Speaker 1: in between with other episodes on Friday's, so just make

1037
01:02:44,520 --> 01:02:47,200
Speaker 1: sure you can find the next part of this next Wednesday.

1038
01:02:47,200 --> 01:02:50,120
Speaker 1: We're very excited about this series, like so into it.

1039
01:02:50,200 --> 01:02:53,080
Speaker 1: So thanks again to Rachel for this rabbit hole because

1040
01:02:53,080 --> 01:02:55,080
Speaker 1: it was awesome and of course it's turn of the

1041
01:02:55,080 --> 01:03:00,160
Speaker 1: century Paris, which is an amazing place to be research purposes. Um,

1042
01:03:00,200 --> 01:03:02,920
Speaker 1: so appreciate that. Absolutely probably be shouting you out a

1043
01:03:02,960 --> 01:03:05,360
Speaker 1: couple of times during the two So thanks a lot.

1044
01:03:05,640 --> 01:03:07,800
Speaker 1: Oh Man, I was going to research a French couple

1045
01:03:07,840 --> 01:03:10,640
Speaker 1: for this Friday's episode, so I guess we'll get out

1046
01:03:10,640 --> 01:03:13,360
Speaker 1: of France. We'll break it up, get out of France

1047
01:03:13,360 --> 01:03:16,600
Speaker 1: for a little while. But yeah, I hope you'll enjoy this.

1048
01:03:16,600 --> 01:03:18,320
Speaker 1: I hope you're looking forward to the part too as

1049
01:03:18,400 --> 01:03:21,200
Speaker 1: much as I am. Now. Uh, and we'll we'll bring

1050
01:03:21,240 --> 01:03:23,280
Speaker 1: that to you next week. Yeah, we'll write in and

1051
01:03:23,320 --> 01:03:26,120
Speaker 1: tell us what you think about Collette. So far, you've

1052
01:03:26,160 --> 01:03:28,520
Speaker 1: read Claudine, I'd love to know if it's worth checking

1053
01:03:28,520 --> 01:03:30,960
Speaker 1: out because I'm kind of interested. I haven't read any

1054
01:03:31,120 --> 01:03:33,960
Speaker 1: Collette myself. Yeah, Um, I've heard of her, but this

1055
01:03:34,040 --> 01:03:35,920
Speaker 1: is the most I've ever learned about her myself, So

1056
01:03:35,960 --> 01:03:37,880
Speaker 1: I'm really into it and I would love to find

1057
01:03:37,880 --> 01:03:39,840
Speaker 1: out if there were still worth reading. I guess yeah,

1058
01:03:40,000 --> 01:03:42,920
Speaker 1: so many years definitely, Um, but yeah, reach out on email.

1059
01:03:43,160 --> 01:03:46,400
Speaker 1: We're ridic Romance at gmail dot com, or find us

1060
01:03:46,440 --> 01:03:49,120
Speaker 1: on Twitter and Instagram. I'm at Oh great, it's Eli,

1061
01:03:49,320 --> 01:03:51,640
Speaker 1: I'm at Dianamite Boom, and you can find the show

1062
01:03:51,720 --> 01:03:55,480
Speaker 1: at ridic Romance. About those platforms, don't forget to drop

1063
01:03:55,520 --> 01:03:58,800
Speaker 1: us a review in Apple Podcasts and Spotify. We love those.

1064
01:03:58,920 --> 01:04:01,000
Speaker 1: They really help us out as well. Help keep the

1065
01:04:01,040 --> 01:04:04,120
Speaker 1: show going. And we will catch you all with another

1066
01:04:04,120 --> 01:04:08,280
Speaker 1: episode later this week. So long, friends, it is time

1067
01:04:08,320 --> 01:04:12,400
Speaker 1: to go. Thanks for listening to our show. Tell your

1068
01:04:12,520 --> 01:04:16,200
Speaker 1: friends neighbor's uncle Sandance to listen to a show. Ridiculous

1069
01:04:16,240 --> 01:04:16,880
Speaker 1: from Dance