0:00

They love the ones where I do accent work. Hello

0:19

and welcome to yet

0:21

another episode of Kill James

0:24

Bond. My name

0:26

is Devon. And

0:28

I, tragically

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alone, I'm heartbroken.

0:33

My friend and

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my friend and co-conspirator November has sadly

0:41

gone away to get consensually kicked the

0:43

shit out of or be an essay

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hell one or the other. It's 50 50 pretty

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much. But I

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am still here with dear friend

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of the show one on one inside

0:54

the actors studio with Abigail Thorne,

0:56

star of stage and screen. My love.

0:59

Welcome. Hi, it's so nice

1:01

to be here. We do like the kind of

1:03

masters, masters acting, but it's master's podcasting. It's like

1:05

Devon and Abby. It's a double dragon

1:07

episode. Double dragon. But really it's the

1:09

three of us listening because you're here too.

1:13

That's right. Silently watching. You're a

1:15

key part of this. You're

1:17

the podcast cook listener. We're

1:19

both podcasting and we're having fun, but

1:22

you can't take part. You just have

1:24

to listen. And

1:26

what are we talking about today, Abigail? I believe it

1:28

was your pick. It was. It was.

1:31

So we decided for Pride Month to choose to be

1:33

gay, to choose to embrace a

1:35

homosexual ideology. And so I chose a

1:37

film that is a classic,

1:40

but it's something I was only introduced to very

1:42

recently by the wonderful Valentina V, who's

1:44

the director of Dragon's Ex-Girlfriend. And

1:47

she showed me this 1996 film

1:49

called The Birdcage, which stars Robin

1:51

Williams and Nathan Lane

1:55

based on a French play, which is... I

1:57

really fucking enjoy this film. It's such fun.

2:00

with this. It's in some ways like

2:02

maybe a little dated and perhaps even

2:04

a little nostalgic in the way that

2:06

it depicts a kind of queerness that

2:09

is maybe like passing

2:11

into history now.

2:13

I mean, there's still gay people

2:15

obviously but like... Yeah, because this

2:17

is based around two owners

2:20

of a drag club in South Beach.

2:22

Hmm, Florida, yeah. This

2:24

made me very nostalgic for a certain

2:27

tier of like British drag, right? Yeah,

2:29

yeah. Because it used to be time

2:31

being like a good couple of years

2:33

ago, you could just have like drag

2:35

queens as personalities that would be on

2:37

things like they'd be on like Jonathan

2:39

Ross. They'd just like they'd come and

2:41

hang out on things. You

2:43

had like Day Medner, you had Lily

2:45

Savage. Yeah. And we've sort of lost

2:47

that. Like drag race is more popular

2:49

but it feels like the whole drag

2:52

has been siloed off to just that.

2:54

Yeah, yeah. In a way it's kind

2:56

of... It's gone more mainstream but has

2:58

gone to the place that like mainstream

3:01

quote unquote queer representation goes where it's like, as you say,

3:03

it's like it's in its own little pen. Yes. It's like

3:05

own its own pen over to the side of the entertainment

3:08

industry and like it all goes in there and now if

3:10

you say, oh, it's drag, people go like drag race and

3:12

sometimes you have to go, no,

3:14

not like that. You're not a town like drag

3:16

race, no. No, actually. There is actually a fascinating

3:18

line later on that we get to about the

3:20

kind of like gay or trans thing. Anyway, we

3:23

open up, we get like a performance of We Are

3:26

Family, this queer nightclub in

3:28

Miami called The Birdcage, which

3:30

is run by Robin Williams. It's on the beach.

3:32

So it's like very, we got rolling over the

3:34

ocean. It's a wonderful opening shot. Fantastic. And the

3:37

headline act we see on the sign outside is

3:40

Starina. So Robin

3:42

Williams is like on the club floor. He's like

3:44

making sure the patrons happy. Somebody mentions that the

3:46

Kennedys are in the club and he's like, oh

3:48

cool. So it's like really popular. Yeah. And there's

3:50

these, I think six people on the stage who

3:53

are performing. There is a moment that's

3:55

a shame though. Yes. They're all like dressed as

3:57

women and then they perform We Are Family and then

3:59

they run on. off stage to do a quick change. Yes.

4:02

We're shown the quick change. Yeah.

4:04

In full view of the camera, one of the mic strips

4:06

off the clothes and in particular shows us that there's like

4:08

a massive bulge. Yes. So we get

4:10

this like assertion of there being a presentation and

4:13

there being what the movie would have you believe

4:15

is like the truth of these people's bodies. I

4:17

think what the movie is trying to tell us

4:19

is that these people are men, even though that

4:22

may in fact, real life not be accurate. Yes.

4:24

So yeah, that's the one thing that's one of

4:26

the things in this moment. Ah, man, right? It's

4:28

one of those things. It's a real shame. Yeah,

4:31

it is. Starina is not

4:33

coming down because she's experiencing mental

4:35

health. It's fine. It's

4:37

reasonable. She's supposed to be on stage in four

4:39

to five minutes, but she is in bed under

4:42

the covers going, I'm hideous. I'm a monster. She

4:44

is. She is. And she's being attended to

4:47

by Hank Azaria. Hank

4:49

Azaria in the booty

4:51

shorts. Hank Azaria in this film

4:54

is so good. Big

4:56

performance in this film is amazing, but Hank

4:59

Azaria is this like very

5:01

OTT, like lisping gay man.

5:05

Yeah. Who is very funny

5:07

and very charming because they're trying to help

5:09

Starina put the stockings on and everything else.

5:11

It's called Agadore. Agadore, yeah.

5:15

When the covers come down, we

5:18

see that Starina is Nathan Lane.

5:20

Nathan Lane. None other. Beautiful. Who

5:23

is also Robin Williams's partner. And

5:26

Robin Williams is very upset that

5:28

Nathan Lane is late to stage

5:31

and he actually does kick down

5:33

the bathroom door as they're hiding

5:35

in there. And they're also a

5:38

couple and Nathan's like performance in

5:40

this is fucking incredible as this

5:42

like histrionic, like so over

5:45

the top. It's so good. Startled

5:47

by everything. Just like my old

5:49

French teacher, genuinely like phenomenal. There's

5:51

so many times where you hear

5:53

him in the distance. It's

5:56

sort of like a way to establish that he's in the

5:58

scene. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's

6:00

fantastic. And Nathan said, you don't care about

6:02

me anymore. They're having this like couples bicker.

6:04

You don't care about me anymore. You don't

6:06

love me anymore. It's like, come on, you're

6:08

on stage in like, like five minutes. And

6:11

so Nathan Lane says, Oh, I

6:13

have to do everything you say because

6:15

you're a man and I'm a woman.

6:17

And probably discuss, you're not a woman.

6:19

It's because it's so

6:21

wonderful. Yeah. And it's like

6:23

not entirely clear. Like he

6:26

is, I don't think Nathan Lane's meant to be trans in

6:28

it. I think the characters like he him. Yes, I

6:30

believe so. I think it's just like a very effeminate

6:32

gay man. Like I still know gay people

6:35

who do this who will call each other.

6:37

She yes. This like very,

6:39

very effeminate thing. Yeah.

6:41

This is one of those things where

6:43

this is of a time where drag

6:46

and being transgender, these sort of ideas

6:48

hadn't fully separated in the way that they

6:50

are nowadays. Like there's a lot of overlap

6:52

here. You're right. Yeah. I just went to

6:54

take a drink of my tea and realized

6:56

I forgot to put the tea bag in.

6:58

So this is just hot water and milk.

7:00

Oh, it can't be good. That's disgusting. But

7:05

this is of an era. So the language may not

7:07

be a fail of how you understand queerness at the

7:09

moment, but this is something that we'll come across a

7:11

lot. Yeah, definitely. I think

7:13

in Killjoy response pride season, Nathan Lane

7:16

is experiencing what I guess we would

7:18

now call twink death. Yes. Because like,

7:20

Oh, I was beautiful once. But now

7:23

look at me. Look at what you

7:25

turned me into. Now I'm this short,

7:27

fat, hideous, ugly thing. And probably because

7:29

I made you short. They

7:34

have such good chemistry. Like as a couple,

7:36

you really, really do believe it. Yeah. It's

7:38

a yeah. Like eventually he's

7:41

like fine. Fine. I'll send

7:43

out someone else to do the piece

7:45

and like immediately obviously what?

7:47

Obviously I'll do it. My public need

7:49

me. Like, yeah, it's like they've come

7:51

to see starina and starina will not

7:53

disappoint them. And we also see that

7:56

the hankers area is giving him piran

7:58

tablets, like tablets. I must have a

8:00

Perrin tablet like and then Robin's like, what the fuck are you

8:02

giving him? Like what's Perrin's like? It's Aspirin with the

8:04

A and the S scraped off. Yeah don't

8:07

worry. He's like you're genius, you're genius. It's

8:09

part of the fucking like theater. Yeah right.

8:11

It's getting into character but like there's

8:13

a little accusation that is thrown out

8:15

by Nathan Lane's character who I guess

8:17

we should probably name at a certain

8:20

point. Albert. Albert we're talking. Robin Williams

8:22

is Armand, Nathan Lane is Albert, Hank

8:24

Zaria is Agadore, there's a lot of A's

8:26

to take stock off. But he's

8:28

going, well I know that you're like trying

8:30

to get away from me to

8:32

meet someone because you've got wine in the fridge and

8:35

it's white wine and I don't drink white wine and

8:37

neither do you. And Robin's like

8:39

no no no of course not I would never never

8:41

do anything like this. And

8:43

we're sort of left to stick with

8:45

that for a minute. But we see

8:47

the transformation Starina on stage.

8:51

Fantastic. Like if you've ever seen a

8:53

proper drag show just wonderful.

8:56

Comedy just yeah just really

8:59

good. And she starts her first

9:01

number and Robin Williams does in

9:03

fact sneak away. He does. He sneaks upstairs

9:05

to the apartment finds Hank Zaria dancing in

9:08

a wig and a bra and

9:10

talks to him in a very sort of

9:12

nasty way. Yes. Robin Williams is kind

9:15

of an asshole. I have

9:17

a lot of complaints about the way Robin

9:19

Williams treats his friends and loved ones in

9:21

this movie. Yeah he's a fucking twat in

9:23

this because Hank Zaria says when are you gonna let

9:25

me audition for you? And Robin Williams goes when you have

9:27

talent. And

9:29

like there's a certain degree of like cattiness okay

9:31

fair enough. But then it's not really catchy he

9:33

plays it quite like brutally. Yeah. And then he

9:35

says well you know you should let me audition

9:38

for you like oh let me audition or I'm

9:40

gonna tell Nathan Lane that you're like meeting somebody

9:42

when he's on the stage. And he goes I

9:44

have two words for you green card. He threatens

9:46

him with deportation. Yeah. It's a nasty man.

9:48

Yeah he is he's kind of he's a

9:50

fucking ticket in this film. All right

9:52

I'm gonna have to stop you there. That is

9:54

quite enough of that. If you want to hear

9:57

the rest of this you're gonna have to head

9:59

on over to our Patreon. Patreon. patreon.com slash killjamesbond

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Beautiful.