A League Of Their Own | 25
Show Notes:
Melissa is back and we are discussing A League of Their Own. When we recorded this, we didn't know that Abbi Jacobson (Broad City) was developing a mini series. Maybe she'll tune in and take our suggestions!
Transcript:
Julia: Hey friends, this is Julia. Your host of pop culture makes me jealous and welcome to this week's episode today, Melissa is back and we're talking a league of their own.
a league of their own. As the first movie I saw where I felt injustices existed within the female empowerment movement in the montage. There's a scene where the ball goes off to the side and we see a group of black people standing watching the. One of the women picks up the ball, Dottie claps, her glove, as if to say right here, throw me the ball.
Instead of the woman throws the ball to Ellen Sue who catches it and shakes her hand from the force of the ball, thus highlighting the All-American girls baseball league excluded black women from the club, but acknowledging that there was no shortage of talented amongst women. The significance of this team didn't affect me as much as a child, but as I got older, it really impacted me.
And I cry every single time. I often think about whether or not the movie could have done more to address this, but then I realized that it was perfect and whether or not the writers realize it, this really highlights the equality and equity issues within feminism. I don't typically make a top five or top 10 list because it's very difficult.
I'm a mood television or movies watcher, which means I have to be in the mood for it in order to sit through it and enjoy it. We're not a. But this movie without fail. If somebody says, Hey, let's watch a league of their own, I will never say no. And now here we go to the show.
Alissa. Welcome back to the show.
Melissa: Hi, thanks.
Julia: So today we're talking about illegal with their own, which is I don't make top five lists ever because that's just too hard, but it was always in my rotation. Like that is a movie. This is a movie that I can quote. This is a movie that I have memorized. It drives my child crazy.
When I have things in there. Just like sort of mouthing along.
Melissa: Oh yeah, no, I'm, I'm just as bad. My kids, it drives my kids. It drives one of my kids crazy. And then my other one finds a lot of entertainment
Julia: out of it because
Melissa: she's just like, how do you
Julia: know so many movies? And I'm like,
Melissa: I don't really know
Julia: this one, this one though, baseball's the only sport that I can sit down and watch. I know a lot of people say things like, oh, baseball, slow. It's not as fun, blah, blah, blah. Um, but both of my grandfathers were really into baseball. And so a lot of like my, um, childhood memories, spending time with them involved, sitting around listening, well, grab the Edward, have the game.
This is before they delayed television. Thank you, Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson for making that happen, he would have the game on the TV, but then he'd listened to the radio commentators because it sinked up perfectly. You can't really do that now, but that's, that's like. The best way to watch baseball, because when you're listening to it on the radio, they have to be more, they're better storytellers because you can't see it.
They have to, they're seeing it for you. Well that,
Melissa: and then they ha they have to keep your interest. Exactly. Like they have to keep you engaged in the game. And especially because baseball actually goes pretty fast. It's really funny when I hear people say that that baseball is like slow or whatever, like things happen so quickly in base.
That it, the commentator misses that and misses telling you that, then you're confused. You're just
Julia: like, wait, what? It's got a hurry up and wait and feel to it. Right? So like when you're waiting for a pitcher to try change out, or if you're waiting for somebody to come up at bad or something happens, there's a lot of pausing.
And I think that people, which is ironic because I do have actual attention issues. So I don't know why baseball's the one I can send through.
Melissa: It's really funny that you, um, that you grew up with baseball like that because I kind of grew up, similarly, my grandmother played on
a
Julia: co-ed team. Do you remember the first time you watched a league of their own?
Yeah, so I was
Melissa: like seven. I was like seven and like, I, I didn't really. There was just a lot of stuff that I didn't understand about it at seven. Right. I understood the concept of it. I didn't understand the feminism. I didn't understand a lot of the nuances. I didn't understand just a lot, just a lot of it.
Right. I also didn't know. Or like maybe I, not that I didn't know. It was just that it wasn't, I wasn't aware that like, there is no like professional girls baseball league that's heard. And I remember asking about it and my grandma was just like,
Julia: yeah,
Melissa: this is.
Julia: You can see watch movie. I don't, I wasn't old enough to see it in theaters because of the rating.
And my parents were very strict about readings, but it used to play on TV quite a bit in the, and so I would watch it on TV and I don't think I watched it fully in its entirety until I was an actual teenager and we got cable and I could actually see, oh, it's playing on TV. I can start from the beginning.
But it was always, it's always one of the ones, if it's on, I'm not turning it off. So, so I was aware of, you know, there weren't women on the teams, there weren't women in the staff, that kind of stuff. So I need to know who is your favorite character? Cause there's a cast. There's a team of nine, which first of all, Tayley Oni.
If, for people who don't know, Tayley Oni is in this movie, she doesn't have a speaking role, but she is a racing bell or whatever the hell they're called. Yep. Yep. But there's like a ton of stars in this movie. And then I'm like, is this person still around acting? Is this person still acting? I'm digressing.
Let's talk about your favorite character. And then I'll tell you mine. It is, it's such a loaded cast. It's
Melissa: such a loaded
Julia: Cassie limit. I, I go back and forth.
Melissa: Okay. So I love Donnie. I identify with Dottie in a lot of ways because I'm the older child, I'm the oldest child. And so like I, and
Julia: I have one sister also really loves, oh my God, Evelyn, Evelyn,
Melissa: Evelyn,
Julia: the kid, the lineup. Sorry, Josephine shouting. So now my dogs like getting to like comforting,
Melissa: who has had to bring her child to work with her. I just,
Julia: yeah,
Melissa: I hate her child. Her parenting is not great. However, my God, that kid, I wanted to flick that kid in the nose. Every time I've
Julia: seen this, we were just like, God, I just, with you, I think I thought it was very like on point with the way parents were in the, during the world war II era, you know, dad's, hands-off, my husband says that I have to take him with me
Melissa: and I shut up.
Cause he's too busy. What
Julia: reading the one ad. So I just need to do it and shut up about it. So can I, and then Tommy says like, can you, what bring them and you know, bring him on whatever. And I'm just like, that's. So
Melissa: that's such
Julia: a world war II era. Situation like that would not have, well, I mean, it might happen.
Melissa: I actually like so, but let's go into that though. Cause that what happened now and that's something that has to happen now, often women often have to bring their children
Julia: to work. Yeah. So,
Melissa: and like we said before,
Julia: I met in the sense of like the husband being like, I'm not fucking, I'm lazy as shit doing nothing literally.
And now, and you, you still, even though you were the one working, earning money, you, you still have to take the child. I'm not bothered with him. That's what I meant. Okay. Yeah.
Melissa: Yeah, for sure. Because he would definitely get chastised at this point
Julia: in time. Yeah. Like fucking step up and help with your kid.
Your wife's working. You're not, don't be that guy like, sir. Excuse me. Yeah.
Melissa: So I think that, I think that my favorites are, uh, are Dottie in an Evelyn. I really love those stickers. I really want to
Julia: Evelyn, every time like Rosie O'Donnell does something, she's like, she reminds me of my husband. Oh
Melissa: my God. I just love Rosie, Donald and general as an act like just as an actor, I love her as an
Julia: actor like you, I related to Dottie in the early, in my earlier years.
Cause she's so naturally talented at baseball will softball prior to them coming over and she's tall and beautiful and elegant and just very has this great demeanor. Not that I'm saying I'm those things. But in previous episodes, I have mentioned that there is a level of protection that I have because I've always been like the prettiest one in the room.
So there's certain types of racism that I don't have to deal with. And, and so the way that everyone sort of fawns over Dottie, I have that experience in my life so I can relate to her in that way. And then sort of, she dials it back a lot. You know, she's always saying things like, oh no bill. And I want to have kids.
We want to have kids, you know, I, I don't, I'm just, this is just a job for me kind of shit. But you know, that's not true for her. She's just trying not to lean into all the things that people are putting on her or really what she wants because of the era. And then as I got older and my life took all the turns, it took, I'm like this last time.
So I watched it last weekend. This last time I was like, fuck, I feel kid's pain so bad. I feel like I've outgrown the city I live in. I feel stifled by so many things. I feel like my current job while I definitely earned it, my resume and my portfolio prove that I can do this job and I have done this job well.
And so there's all these little things that kit just feels so like, Everybody loves ADI and nobody's paying attention to me and she's not being a brat about it. She's just feeling left out. Like when she says to Dottie haven't you ever heard how mom and dad introduce us? Here's our Dottie or here's our daughter Dottie.
Here's our other daughter, Dottie sister. And, and I, even though I've not like really introduced to me, but her desire to like get out. And then at the end of the movie, when she gets this opportunity to stay in play again and she takes it, you know, daddy's not going to discredit her for that because she sees that her sister struggles at home and she's not going to hold her back, but she had no other option, no other way to help her other than getting her on, on the train.
Melissa: So long story short.
Julia: So like, for me,
Melissa: when I'm watching, when I'm watching kit and Dottie's interaction, I want to validate, I validate what she's saying. Right. Like I hear those things. I've experienced that type of issue, like similar issues with me and my sister because of our age difference and because of how, um,
Julia: just how we've been treated in the past.
Okay. What is the difference with you and your sister?
Melissa: Me and my sister are six years apart. Um,
Julia: My sister and I are five years apart with a league of their own. I think penny Marshall captures that generation so well because it's showing like, but then kit, isn't allowed to explore anything because she hit, he's not
Melissa: wrong,
Julia: not wrong.
Right. And daddy's the hurdle. So she's just going to go that direction. But no, one's going to say daddy's not the hurdle cause no one's, um, evolved enough to do that. Yes.
Melissa: Yes, exactly. And that's just. It makes me sad to, just to just to see that type of relationship just played out it, like, it just hits me in my heart because I remember when me and my sister had those issues.
And like, I remember I, like, I get treated differently because my dad is a different
Julia: person. The movie is more than iconic if we're going to really go there. Um, so I actually read a book recently called the bells of baseball and it literally just talks about the, it was the historical chronical association.
It was the Chronicle realization of the all American girls baseball league. And it was, it was, it was okay in terms of like the way it was written, however, it was very informative. And so, I didn't know. So you know how the movie it's, um, Gary Marshall and he's, you know, Mr. Harvey, Harvey butters. So the original all American girls baseball.
Was created by Philip K Wrigley, who is a Chicago Cubs owner, Wrigley field is named after him. And he also, you know, Wrigley gum, double the flavor. Um, and so he actually established the, I mean, in, in, in the movie, it's, it's not, he, they're not off in the movie. He starts the, he establishes the league because the men are at baseball and there's, you know, all these things that he wants to have like this past time and, and bring joy to, to the community.
But he also like doesn't want baseball to die, but he actually established it as a softball league first. Okay. Every season, they modified a little differently because they were still sort of learning how to do this. Um, and so Rockford peaches, was it 100%, a real team, which I knew, but I didn't know. You know?
And so, and so was racing. Racing was an actual team in there. Um, but it was what was interesting to me when in reading this book is that most of the players that they recruited were between the ages of late, you know, like 15 to 20. Oh, I thought they were young. So when I'm watching this whole, my whole life, I'm watching a league of their own sort of my whole life.
I mean, I was a child when it came out, but still, um, I always assumed that Dottie was maybe like 20, 22 and kit was maybe like a handful of years younger than her. So reading this, I was like, oh, that's completely realistic. Now, knowing, knowing what I know after reading this book like that, that tracks that they would be so young and because, and a lot of them came from farms and I was like, oh, I love that penny Marshall.
You're so good. Cause you totally recruited farm girls and totally had it parallel the real story as much as you could. And for the beginning of the movie and I just love you for it.
Melissa: And it was well done. They like, the research was very obviously there, which
Julia: I always appreciate in any, in any
Melissa: sport movie, like please do your research.
Please do your damn research, make up some cockamamie story about a team by stop, please
Julia: stop. Even down to the uniforms. I mean the pictures, but those were the exact uniforms they were in real life too. And I thought that was really cool. How they paid homage to in that way. What was your favorite scene in the movie?
Okay, so we were just talking about it via Josh. Just got it. I was just like, okay. I'm so excited about that.
Melissa: So my favorite scene in the movie is after Dottie tells Tom Hanks to take her out, to take kids out of the game. Okay. And Dottie throws the big temper tantrum. And Tom Hanks or kit, sorry, kit throws the big temper tantrum and sacrifice with Rosa Donald, and just all of it happens.
And then he grabs her and throws her in the shower. I love that scene. I suppose I would understand if people didn't like that scene because of just, you know, he just grabs her and throws her in the shower and, you know, it seems like a very like toxic male abusive big, right. I, I didn't take that in that way.
Um, especially because I was a coach at one point in time and that's a super realistic scene and that's how he would have treated any other ballplayer, male, female, doesn't matter. Like you are starting a fight within your team. You know, we're handling this now I'm going to throw your ass in the shower.
And I just loved, I loved everything about it. Um, and how he just, I feel like at that moment he was. Full on their coach. He was handling his team and that, and I feel like that was such a pivotal point in the movie that that's yeah, for sure.
Julia: One of my favorites, one of my favorite ones I have to actually, when they go to the son's house, do all the dancing and then, you know, Dottie's like, Hey, we're going to get in trouble.
Like we got to get out of here. Did Marla come? And they're like, she came on stage singing and then just the musicians are just crying because she's so bad. And it's just like, it's such a great scene, but that whole bit is such a great scene because the dancing is amazing and just the vibe just feels so good.
Um, so I love that scene. And then the other scene that I really love and I, and it gets me every time is the scene where. Somebody's the ball it's like after it's like during the montage, but, and the ball rolls away and there's some people, there's some black folks standing off to the side and then woman picks up the ball.
And daddy's like right here, right here. And she's like, I got this and throws it to the, um, former miss America or whatever she was. And like, then she's like shaking her handout. Cause it was so hard and I love, and I just, again, penny Marshall, you're a genius and I hope that you're making amazing movies and heaven because we sure as shit miss you.
It was such a powerful way to demonstrate without having a pedestal or soap box or any sort of like speech, because sometimes that shit gets on my nerves and isn't realistic historically to show that there is a subsect of women. Who were not allowed to be involved. So like everyone's Americana during world war II.
Right? But in this moment, here's this group of women who isn't short on talent, but they weren't allowed to be involved. And when I did the math, after reading the book, I was like, shit. Like, and I've always felt that could have been my grandma. My grandma didn't play baseball, but the connection is like, it was her husband that watched baseball with me when I was a child.
My grandma was that age. This is 1943. My grandma would have been 18 years old, 18, 17, whatever. She would have been age appropriate to have been recruited. Had she, you know, had the opportunity to be so then it, when I did the math, like 20 years ago, it really. Like that scene really became impactful for me because it was like, that's, it's no longer, that's my people.
It's now that's my granny. That's my granny being left out. And
Melissa: you know that like, if we were in that era, if we were in that time era, we totally wouldn't have been able to play either. And that's just hurtful another one of my favorite scenes. Like this is my only, like the only other ones that I really wanted to
Julia: talk about,
Melissa: um, was surely, surely seen when they find out that she's illiterate and she can't figure out if she's on the list and she's just standing there and she can't tell, like, you can't tell people, you can't tell people that you are illiterate, right.
It becomes, at some point in time, it becomes something that you no longer can tell
Julia: people. Yeah. Um, it's not socially
Melissa: acceptable and they start.
Julia: Yeah, I think, I think in that era though, during the world war II era, the greatest generation of our time, it was, it was more common to be illiterate than not most of my, my relatives in that era did not pass, did not go beyond eighth grade or they were lucky that they went through grade.
But I think to your point, what was great about that scene and learning that they really did heavily recruit from far, you know, farming community. So typical in a farming community, you know, the schools, the school year is structured to accommodate crop season. You know, we don't go to school September to may just because we want to, and it's fun.
It's because shit's starting to grow and you have to pick it and you have to do stuff for it. So you can't be in school, pulling the kids out to do that. When, when the coach in that scene was like, are you on the list or. Right. Oh, I'm sorry. You're on the cut list. Get you out, leave the field and let's let him
Melissa: know to him.
He wouldn't even think that any of them were illiterate because he is a man and it would not be socially acceptable for one of, for anyone, any man to be illiterate, especially to have a job as a coach. Right. And so to him, he didn't even think that any of these girls might not have the knowledge to be able to read their name on a damn list.
And it took another, another female to stand up and be like, oh honey, you can't read. It's okay. Like it's not.
Julia: And that actress and that actress plays how and sister on mad about you, the one who comes up and says, can you read honey, Shirley Baker? You're one of us European beach, come on
Melissa: over. I just love that.
And what I read when I saw that scene this morning, it just like it, that one
Julia: really made me cry. Um, because
Melissa: like, I, I like, I
Julia: like history. I like,
Melissa: I like a lot of Renaissance history and stuff, and that's just something that's so consistent in patriarchy is keeping women so on educated. That we just
Julia: can't succeed either.
You know, my, we, we suspect that my grandfather probably didn't breed, you know, he only ever had, he only ever worked on a railroad and you know, really manual jobs. And I remember when we'd give him birthday cards, he'd open it, hand it to granny and she'd read it for him. You know, I never he'd sit in front of the paper, but I don't know if that was for show or if he was actually reading.
I don't know when, when they had cable. I think, I don't know. I think she put the channels on for after cable started doing a guide channel. Cause they didn't always have a guide channel, but when people started having a guide channel, I think she'd either he had memorized what channels and what time everything was on or she would put it on for him.
Yeah. He was born in 1916. So he would've been an appropriate age for that arrow to sure.
Melissa: For sure. Yeah. But just, um, Whenever I see that anywhere in any time era movie, when I see the width, the withholding of education, the withholding of literacy is just,
Julia: oh, that,
Melissa: that hurts me. That
Julia: reading us freedom. Do you have a favorite quote from the movie?
Cause you know, the most famous quote is there's no crying in baseball and I like, I want to ask these people half the time. Do you even know where that came from?
Melissa: I love the no crying in baseball. I first of all, I don't know why that's like the, why that's the most quoted one. I don't really,
Julia: are you crying?
Are you crying, crying, crying in baseball?
Melissa: You know what? You know what my favorite quote is? It's right after that scene where she gets thrown out. Yeah. When he calls and when he calls the empire empire that he looks like a penis with a hat on. First of all, that's hilarious. That's funny. I love that you're out of here. Right. And I love it's. It's just, um, I just like that little, what they all say, they're just like, Get them out.
That's where you go back to where
Julia: you belong the right clapping. And
Melissa: that's my feet. Those are my favorite clothes. And it was like, you have to go back to where you belong, being rude, get the fuck
Julia: outta here. So my quote also includes Jimmy. Dougan played by Tom Hanks when the kids come up to him and they're like collecting stuff for salvage, for the cause.
Cause it's, everybody's rationing and they're like my baseball and he's like, he signs it and the kid reads it, avoid the clap, Jimmy Dougan and then those are running away. He's like, that's good advice.
I'm like, I don't get it. And then when you get it, you know, and then freshman year comes and I have to take a sex health class and I'm like, oh shit, that line, well, not in class. Do I realize that that lion's funny, but then, you know, the next time I see the movie and I'm like, oh my gosh, that's so funny. I want to know what you love about the movie.
Cause you keep coming back to it. I keep coming back to it. Like I said, it's going to be in my rotation probably until I die. So
Melissa: we were talking earlier and like, we both love, you know, we both love sports movies. So I think that's like just that in general. And I know that's such like a generalized thing to say, but like I just love sports movies and because I love sports movies, that's partially why I like it.
It did a good portrayal of a time in sports
Julia: history. You know, that.
Melissa: Well known. Isn't talked about very much, unless you watch a league of their own, like there's
Julia: not really. And unveiling Cooperstown in 1988. I thought that was interesting because, you know, at the end of the movie, they were like, oh, they're all gathering to be unveiled in Cooperstown.
And I think it's 1992 that the movie was released, but in 19, 19 88 is when they did the unveiling in Cooperstown, which I thought was really cool.
Melissa: Yeah. And so, like, I just think that it's, like I said, it's just not a very super talked about point of time in sports history. Um, and
Julia: I, it's a funny movie.
It's so funny. Everything about like, it has me rolling
Melissa: in so many different ways. Like Rosie O'Donnell is hilarious. Yeah. Just hilarious. Madonna is hilarious. Madonna is hilarious when she's having surely read the porn in the back. Oh my God. I was just like, oh my God. I didn't realize that's what that was.
Julia: Yeah. That's um, the blonde gal that you love that you said earlier, I forget her name, Shirley. Um, may what is she reading? Who cares? She's reading. That's all that matters. Mind your business
Melissa: and it gets better. It gets better. Look it here. And then she reads it for her. Like,
Julia: oh my God. It was
Melissa: I, so yeah, I like, um, I like, I like watching the friendship.
I like watching the team between like, it's so different watching a female team and the female team dynamic versus a male team dynamic is so different. It's such a different psychology. It's so different to watch a man. In this time, era coaching, a female team, very many of in general, in any sport there weren't very many female teams and shit like.
Julia: Yeah. Um, so yeah, I just, I love everything about that. They, I want to, one of the things for me, I mean, obviously I'm a penny Marshall, like competitive Marshall year, amazing couple times already today, but she has a way of being a storyteller. That's a timeless. So even though it's a very specific time period in our nation's history, there are still themes that are relevant today that work and, and, and haven't really moved much, which I think is really smart and forward thinking.
And I don't know if she was intentionally being forward-thinking about it. And so you have like that sister dynamic between Dottie and kit like that sister tension, as long as sisters exist on the planet, it's always going to be. Present and, um, you know, Jimmy Dugan's character, he's an alcoholic, he's got issues.
You know, there's always going to be people who can relate and identify with him, Dottie choosing her husband over her career, or, you know, kind of doing all this back and forth stuff. That's a universal theme still in 2021. And I think. That just because this movie takes place in 1943, it's still so relevant today and it's beautifully done.
And like you say, it's, well-written, the comedy is gold because there it's smart humor and not bathroom humor. And so smart humor lives way longer than bathroom humor does. It's just so beautiful. So as I'm rewatching this movie, and as I'm watching, reading this book, the bells of baseball and, you know, I'm learning so much in 1883, August of 1883, the young ladies baseball club was developed, but that didn't last very long.
In 1922, Lizzie Murphy played in an exhibition game with American league and new England. All-stars against the Boston red Sox. And it's the first time a woman has ever played in a major league baseball. In history, she retired at 41 and is known as the queen of baseball, which I thought was funny because daddy's nickname in the movie is the queen of diamonds, Vassar Smith, and Wellesley all had female baseball teams.
Vassar's was established in 1880s, 1866. Smith was 1879 and Wellesley was 18 97, 18 67. The Dolly Varden formed in Philly. It was an, an all African-American women's team becoming the first professional baseball club. Wouldn't it be so cool to do a limited series or like a very like a three cause. So there's 12 years of American baseball league for girls, um, do a four series show and it encompasses each season.
Each season encompasses three seasons. At the end of the league. And it goes through all the development because, you know, at first they didn't have the women throw overhand. They still had them do underhand. And then Wrigley was like, wow, we got to try and make it feel more like baseball, baseball. And so he made changes every season to make it feel more like baseball, baseball.
And so by like the third or fourth season, the polished clubs that we see in a league of their own really were my understanding from reading this book. We're really more like. Season three and four of their, of their existence. Oh,
Melissa: okay. That makes a lot more sense.
Julia: So it'd be really, really cool. If somebody could pick, I have fuck.
All right. It, pick it up and develop it and really get into the nitty gritty because there were so many, like it's not a very long book. It was only 112 pages. And then he goes into highlighting the different famous women of that era for those teams. But it would just be really interesting to get into the nitty gritty of the culture of the time, you know, baseball, how it's evolving for women and just how it was able to survive for 12 seasons.
Like I would be, I would watch the shit out of that kind of show, especially if it was as well done as penny Marshall did illegally. Right. That would be really fun, but here's my caveat. So, you know, my favorite scene is, like I said, it's the one with the black ladies, like throwing the ball and everyone's like, oh my God, my hand hurts.
I, I struggle. When movies that encompass like black history have these big grandiose speeches, because there's got to, you have more than words, demonstrate things through imagery, because it's not exactly historically accurate. We all didn't stand up and give a speech to make it better because, you know, there's the sad little component of our history where it's like, that's going to get you lynched.
So you're going to stay quiet. And that's why it's so important and so impactful that the people who did stand up and fight, like, that's why it's so meaningful because they were the only ones, right? Like we're leading the brigade to stand up and fight. They weren't, it wasn't just. Having been the only brown person in the room.
I'm not giving speeches if I'm outnumbered. And I don't know that there's an ally in here because that's, that's a, that's a suicide mission and I'm not, I do, I have the energy for that today. And so I struggle with Hollywood when they do stuff
Melissa: like that. I totally agree with you and identify with what you just said of like, if I'm in a group of white people, like I'm not going to get the speech, not going to do that.
Even if I know that I have an ally, even if I do, I'm probably not going to, I'm not going to, because I'm just going to get argued with somehow in some way I will. And then I have to have an ally there. I have to have an ally there to be comfortable. No, I don't have to have an ally there to be comfortable.
I have to have an ally there to speak up for me and to provide validation as a white person, to the rest of the white people, because they will not take what I say with validation, but they will take what I'd say from another person that looks like that. And that will be
Julia: valid. But in addition to that, there's retaliation.
So if I'm the only one in the room that says, Hey, that joke's not funny. And here's why. Then there's going to be retaliation and it's going to be subtle, passive aggressive comments. So it's not just, and that's why I have a hurdle with this type of showmanship and movies. Because once you have this grandiose speech that doesn't stop this shit from happening, it has a ripple effect.
So now I've stood up and had a speech about something and now I'm getting treated like shit. Well, I'm getting, I'm getting passive aggressive comments. I'm getting people saying things to me and now I'm working and now I'm in an environment that's not comfortable anymore. And I don't really want to be a part of, and I'm dreading.
So like Hollywood recognize and understand that because there's an backlash to that. And I'm not saying we shouldn't have people stand up and say, The truth and help people understand and do these speeches. I'm just saying it doesn't stop there. And that's why the imagery of that scene in a league of their own is so powerful because it's showing without a speech without saying anything.
And it's perfectly fits within the context of the film, because the movie is all about loads of female themes in the, in the film. But what's obviously missing is black representation. And that's because it's the 1940s. Right? And so penny Marshall, can't bring somebody in to give a speech about how, why aren't there black people on the All-American girls baseball league, because it's 1943.
She can show this isn't. This is a component of this. Narrative that wasn't allowed to exist. So we're still gonna acknowledge that there was no short of talent in the black community to be a
Melissa: part of this, for sure. And like, I will even go so far as to say that, like at some point, like sometimes when I see a speech like that, like in my head, I'm like, I wish that we could say something like that.
I wish that we could speak up like that and, and do that. And then like,
Julia: and not have the retaliation and not have
Melissa: the retaliation and not have the negative side effects that come with that. Right. And like I've told, so my, one of my best friends is, is very white. She's me and her. She's my best friend. And I've told her before, if I, if I were honest with all of us, with our whole group of friends, about things that I was really offended by or things that like made me kind of uncomfortable or topics that we've talked about, I wouldn't have friends anymore.
And so. That just kind of comes with the package of sometimes I feel like it just kind of comes with the package of like having to sit in my uncomfortability to be able to retain certain friendships, or at least it felt like that for a long time. And like, it doesn't feel like that anymore because I've gotten rid of friends that make me feel that way.
And now I'm able to have these conversations. Like I told Steph that and she was like, I had no fucking idea. I had no idea. I thought that because you were joking with us and because like you were laughing with us and being part of the conversation, I thought that it was, I thought that everything was okay.
Julia: Right. We all understand Rosie the Riveter, get out of the kitchen, do your part for America. But that concept didn't start in world war two, that concept started in world war II. And there was a very small percentage of women after world war one who were like, fuck that shit. I'm still going to keep doing what I'm doing.
You know, post-war he was like, I don't to go back. Um, I'm actually reading a book serious about a woman who served in world war one, and then it's fiction. It's a historical fiction. And then historical fiction I do too when it's researched well. Um, and then she goes, and then she kind of creates her own business and you know, all these things.
So, and, and, and then world war II hits, and it's a really big push of like girl power. Get out there, do your part. You're doing the job we need you because the men are fighting, yada yada, yada, yada, yada. Right? So the tone is very much girl power in the movie, but it's also very, and we kind of touched on this already with the scene.
One of my favorite scenes, it's, it's we know it's very specifically white. So when we talk about, you know, the differences, when it comes to being mixed, you know, when you're, when you're black and white mix or mixed with white, there's this level of what I'm learning from this online community. I found, you know, there's this level of like, it's, it's not as.
Stark when something is all white, because you have a side of your family, that's all white. So, so with you, I'm wonder watching a league of their own. Like, was that super, was that a thing? Cause you know, we're all at rock representation, blah, blah, blah. Right? Because like, for me, I'm seeing a league of their own and I'm not thinking anything as a child, I'm not thinking, oh, this is a white woman's movie movie.
And then when I start to get older and start to put the pieces together, like this is 100% a white person's movie, but I love it. And I'm okay with it. And I'm here for it. Cause penny Marshall doesn't D you know, she doesn't leave out the black girls, but you know, it's not about them, um, kind of stuff. So if, if that made any sense, yeah.
Melissa: I've always had a little bit of white in me. Okay. But I never, I've never identified as white because I'm not white. Right. Because the one drop rule, if you're one drop of anything. You cannot be white.
Julia: I mean, yes. And you know, my, technically my mom's Italian, but you know, there's still a level of, she's like a white, she's like a white Italian.
So there's a, there's a level there that even though we had the Italian culture influence our lives, she's still walking through the world as a very pale woman.
Melissa: Right. And so for, for me, like I grew up in this, like my grandpa's from Tennessee, he was from Tennessee. Like he was super Southern. He had a super thick accent, like,
Julia: oh, so, okay.
So just, I was coming into this conversation under the impression that you didn't have any white lineage at all. I do. So I didn't know that. Yeah.
Melissa: Okay. I need to tell you about this because it's real interesting. So I came from this weird dynamic because my grandfather brought my, my grandfather met my grandmother in the Korean war.
That was.
Julia: Pretty common, pretty
Melissa: common. It's very common. He would just always tell me about our role about our family's role, my white family's role in civil rights movement and
Julia: how we need to keep that going
Melissa: to continue happening. Right. And it was really important for him, for me to understand that my, my great uncle or great, great uncle or something like that, uh, was the judge for the assassination of Martin Luther king, Jr.
Okay. And so he just perpetuated that for my whole life of you. Don't have, you don't have, uh, you might not look the same. You might not be white, but you have that in you, you have that part of that's that's in you and you have. An ally just in your soul. And so you, you have to keep this, that type of thing going.
You have to continue that type of research. You have, we have to continue being on the side of everyone and making sure that everyone does have the same type of rights and that they're not treated differently in that and all of these things. And so, uh, I feel very fortunate that that's, that I had that experience and that I had that type of upbringing, um, cause it could have been very different.
And I think that it would have been, it could have been harmful in a way to feel. To feel like I want to be white or feel like I want to assimilate into a white culture because I feel othered.
Julia: So when I say that, man, when I make that statement, it's because when you have like a white family and then the minority family, you're going back and forth between the two, the way the families function are very different.
So because you're constantly othered, it's like, and you, you, it's not lost on you that your white relatives have it easier in life for certain things. So when, and I, I can't speak for everyone. In the mixed community, but online, when, when these sort of like, there was a tick tock challenge where it was like, put your finger down situation if ever these things.
And one of the things was, if you ever wanted to be white, put your finger down and the girls did, and you know, they're lighter skinned, black women. And so the comment section just exploded on them about like, I don't, I never wanted to be white, that kind of narrative. And it was like, okay, but when you have the duality of having to go from white culture to black culture regularly in your life is a thing because you recognize and notice.
They've got it a little bit easier, right? Ted I've said this multiple times, and I will say this until the day I die. There are certain levels of racism that I was protected from because I was always the prettiest one in the room. How having said that there are still things that my cousins are able to navigate in the world differently.
It's not like I never felt like it was a harmful or damaging to myself. But I can. Um, but it's, it's, it's frustrating because you see it's, it's like, it's like taking the red pill man in, in the matrix, you see, you're seeing both sides and you're part of what you're part of both sides, but you're not allowed to be fully both sides.
And that's, that's the point that I'm trying to make. It's just a little
Melissa: different because like, I would see how my, my Mexican family members were treated. Right. I would see how my Asian family members that, that present much more Asian looking than me, how they were treated. And I always felt in a weird place because sometimes I would get treatment like that.
But sometimes I wouldn't just because people won't know what I am, but I didn't have, but I didn't have what you, which was seeing like the other side, which was, I didn't have a lot of white family members. I only had my white grandfather. And so I just didn't have that. In particular, but I had it kind of with all, I had a weird variation of it with the rest of them, because sometimes I would be like, I wish I was like, maybe I wish that I was Mexican enough or Mexico, more Mexican presenting or like that I spoke Spanish or things like that.
Sometimes I would wish that like, I was more Korean and that I was fully Korean because, you know, just things like that. I would definitely feel that way about my different cultures. And so I totally understand where you're coming from with that. It wasn't ever, because they were, they were treated by. We all got all my folders, get treated
Julia: like shit.
I think too, as I got older, it was like, man being monoracial must be nice. At least they'd know what to do with me. At least it would be flipping consistent, man. So part of the reason why I would like to see a series like a four season series is because I'd like to see that exploration of, um, black stories and, you know, were there women who wanted to come and audition audition?
Were there women who wanted to come in and try out who were in the black community? Like were there, can you tell us their background? Um,
Melissa: yeah, it was basically an audition.
Julia: I
Melissa: mean, that was, oh my God. I love the scene when they, when they
Julia: reveal. The dresses
Melissa: and, oh my God. And then the prep school and all
of,
Julia: oh my God.
It was so great. Yeah. Well, and, you know, charm school for, for women, wasn't that uncommon, you know, Barry Gordy did that for his girl groups and, and the guys too, um, with the Motown era. Cause you know, he wanted a very specific look for his town. So he put all of them through, through school as well before going out on tour and doing performances.
And so that's very, very much that era. Um, But that's, you know, I would love to see there's so many ways that you can angle by doing a four season breakdown of the 12 seasons in which this institution existed. There's so many different ways you can explore it in so many different storytelling techniques that could happen, that I would love to see somebody try and that would require a diverse writers room to make it happen.
So that way could have the different angles coming in to, to tell this bigger, more robust story. Cause I think a league of their own just scratches the surface. Yeah. Yeah. I think so too. In the movie cause it's 1943, there's all kinds of fucking sexism left and right. But it's a necessary tool to highlight because that's the 1943.
We have television and movies to show that this is how women were treated. It's not just Benny Marshall's imagination.
Melissa: Nope. It was a real thing.
Julia: There's a point where the gals are like running to catch the train and Jon Lovitz character. To look out the window, but there's a woman sitting in a chair there and she's like, sir, your knee.
And he's like, you'll like that no way. He doesn't like it. No, she doesn't like it. Like how dare you take agency of her space? Like no. Or
Melissa: when Mrs. Cuthbert, uh, Mrs. Cuthbert.
Julia: I don't remember. Yeah, the chaperone.
Melissa: Okay. Uh, when she wait, when she's going to wake him up and he's like passed out on
Julia: and he kisses her so forcefully,
Melissa: like he grabs her
Julia: and he even, he says, what is it, baby?
And then pulls her in.
Melissa: And then he has the audacity. He's
Julia: the one that's yeah, he was totally offended. She's just sitting in the corner of the, of the third row of seats. Just like, terrified about what just happened. And also she had just
Melissa: gotten. Thrown in her face and the bus driver, like he literally picked up a handful of dirt and threw it in her face.
And then she gets actually assaulted on
Julia: the bus, perfectly normal behavior for 1943. Oh my God. It's so terrible. Yeah. So I know we talked about it earlier, but pitch the TV show Fox 40. So for those of you listening Fox 40, not Fox 40, that's my local, but the network Fox had, um, their entertainment side listeners had developed a TV show called pitch.
It had Mark Paul Gossler in it. It had, um, Kelly husband whose name I'm forgetting. And then there was a gout. And the premise of the show was that this woman, young woman is the very first woman to be drafted as a pitcher in the major league baseball for the San Diego Padres. So, first of all, yes. 'cause I love, I love going to Petco park, so, and by just loving in San Diego.
So thank you for picking them, but she's a woman of color. She's a black woman, so it's not just a woman, it's a black woman. So it feels very much like thank you because we can't talk, you know, we haven't explored that for, in a league of their own. It's not explored and there's not really any female centric baseball movies.
Since then I won. I wa I was so upset when they canceled it, because I thought it was a little rough, but I thought there was a lot of potential of what they could do and where they could go. So it was really disappointed to see that it got canceled. Okay. I have everything in that first season. Sorry. One more thought everything in its first season is a little rough, everything, any good?
Anything
Melissa: has a rough first
Julia: season, especially for network television, because you don't have the same type of, you have a different structure that you're following under because you have different rules. You're playing by like. Does not have the same, like it's a subscription base, so it's a little different anyway, but continue.
So let's talk about,
Melissa: but, so I, I thought it was a little rough here and there. The format was a little bit like the actual editing of it was a little bit, um, a little bit choppy, but I kinda liked it because it, I don't know. I just liked it. I liked the whole fucking thing. Honestly. I loved the shit out of every single part of it.
I loved every character. I loved her. I loved the coach. I loved the one, the one guy that she ends up befriending that ends up sleeping with her, uh, with her agent. I love her agent. Oh my God. I love her so much. She gives me so much boss, babe vibes that I just love her so much.
Julia: So I appreciated that. Mark Paul Gossler his character is still older.
Ballplayer. He's had a couple injuries. He still has star power, but he doesn't have the same star power he did maybe 10 years ago. And so, so I loved that dynamic between like her and, and him. I loved the way that they did flashbacks. So we got an understanding of her. She's not just a complicated character to be complicated.
She really does have some trauma she's working through and baseball is her outlet, but also could be her meal ticket at the same time. And, and I think, I think that their storytelling technique was good. It just, they needed more time to get into the groove of what they were trying to do.
Melissa: I feel like they didn't even give it a chance.
Really. They cut it halfway through the fucking season. Like they cut it at a pivotal moment in the season, in the actual story for like, Why would you cut it there? I just didn't, I didn't
Julia: understand that that's network TV. If the numbers aren't there and they don't, they don't count, uh, re DVR numbers. So like 4 million people could be DBR in it.
But if like 200,000 people are watching it live, it's still going to get cut. Which stupid. I don't understand why I don't. Tina Fey talked about it on an episode. Was it, she talked about it somewhere. I don't know if it was in her book or in an interview, but she talked about that specific thing because 30 rock was having a hard time there for a minute.
When she brought that up, it just kind of blew my mind because I was like, we, this isn't this isn't life before a VCR. We have lives. I can't Oracle, or I can't stay up till fucking 10 o'clock at night to watch your hour long show. Let me record it and watch it on
Melissa: Saturday. Right? Like that should still, the watch should still count the view of the, of the content should still count for something.
Right. I would
Julia: love to talk to somebody in the business about that and like specifically in that part of the business of the numbers. Cause that I think would be an interesting for me. I don't even know if anybody else would care, but I'm just so curious about, I think that
Melissa: there've been so many shows that have been cut short and like, but pitch, I, I don't know, it had so much potential.
It had so much represent. It had just a lot of representation just in the fact that she was a black female
Julia: pitcher who
Melissa: was going into the major leagues and, and they, they portrayed that.
Julia: This is what it could look like. This is what it
Melissa: could look like. Like look at her fan base, look at her fucking fan base.
And then it also, I love that it went cause I watched it. I watched it a couple of times
Julia: actually. Um,
Melissa: and I loved, uh, how they portrayed the pressure of having that fan base. And like the thing is we should, we should really identify, or we should acknowledge that because it's been so long without this representation.
Right. That now whenever we get even just a drop of it, even just a little bit of it, just one person in there representing they're going to have so much fucking pressure through on them that we're basically setting them up to fail. Like, and that's, that is what happens with the lack of representation.
Julia: And there's, there's, it's in, how do I put this? It's creating the support, right? So Jackie Robinson talked a lot about how there was a lot of pressure to be the first black ballplayer in the major league baseball. And a lot of the advice he was given over the years was just like, you can't respond, you can't act aggressively.
You can't do these things, but that's not support. That's not, that's not helping them navigate. That's telling him, you need to box yourself up so you can survive. So we can, you know, make this thing happen. And I think that when one of the things that pitch could have done is explore that for her. You know, it it's color is not an issue anymore in baseball, but now it's it's gender.
So what kind of support is lacking and we see that she doesn't have any support, but that could have been an area in which that they explored more in the sense of. Here's the support base. Like when she's, she can, I'm trying to remember now, cause it's been a minute since I've seen it, you know, there's a lot of like locker room situations.
Like what do we do with her in the locker room and, and stuff like that. And so that could have been developed more cause it is really, it is really an interesting conversation to have, especially because I think at the same time, there was a lot of conversations going on nationally about, you know, states and their use of bathrooms for the trans community.
There could have been an opportunity to discuss. Not necessarily specifically for the trans community, but just like navigating a locker room. Like, are we going to build her, her own locker room? Like, what are we going to do here? Kind of stuff that they could have explored deeper. And there's so much more of that, that that could have been explored throughout this seasons.
Cause you know, they go off to the Caribbean to play winter ball. A lot of these guys do, or some of them go to Japan to play in the off season. So there's, there was just so much room for growth that like you say, it got stunted. It was like, oh, I don't know if it was numbers driven. It was probably numbers driven.
It's Fox.
Melissa: I would S I, I don't even know. I don't even know why it was canceled. I just know that they canceled it quite literally, quite literally like at a pivotal
Julia: time. Yeah. The
Melissa: last episode. Like I remember, I remember when I watched it because I watched it on Hulu and I didn't, I had been watching it live.
Right. And then I, because I was a doula, like I would miss episodes here and there and like, I just fell off. Right. And then a few years later I saw that it was on Hulu and I was just like, oh, they have it on Hulu. I had no idea that it had gotten canceled. I had no idea anything of this nature. I just knew that it was on Hulu.
So I started watching it and I got to, I think it's episode eight or episode seven. It's some brand amass number two, episode seven. And then it's done. What do you mean it's done, but it can't be done. There's literally more story. There's a part two to this episode, they ended it on a part, one episode.
It's bullshit.
Julia: Right? Like you can't leave us hanging like
Melissa: that. I'm still so offended. I'm offended. I'm offended by Fox in general, most of the time, but like real.
Julia: Yeah. If there were to be some sort of female led centric baseball situation, would you want to see it modern era or would you want to see it, like in the way that they did bridge written colorblind casting?
Just kind of, so gender blind, I don't know if that's a thing, but you know, gender, not an issue. There's a major league baseball TV show that has all, you know, all representation or would you rather see an expansion of diving deep in the history of the, all the all American girls baseball?
Melissa: I dunno. I think that they're both.
I think that they're both two, like really separate things, right? Because like, if we were to, if you were to do a colorblind casting of like a historic piece, right, then it wouldn't be historically accurate. And I really hate things that aren't historically accurate. I, I can, I can vibe with Britain because like we talk about, on that episode, it's going into a theory, right?
Like that she could have been maybe parked whack. Right. So what would that look like in like, to me, it's like an alternate reality I have. Right. And so I think that if, if I were to see, I, I would want it to be modern if we were going to do colorblind casting. Yup. I want it right now. I want to see it 20, 21, 20 19, like somewhere around the two thousands.
Um, and see it that way kind of like the way that pitch was portrayed now, I, but that being said, I would love to see a history, just a cool history of female
Julia: baseball.
Melissa: That would just be so
Julia: fascinating to. Be a lot of fun. And I know like there's an episode of Ken burns is baseball. That's do they touch on it?
I don't know, but whatever Lupin, Ken burns research team, because his 10 part series of baseball is hail of fucking good. Right. It's funny, but still, you know, it could be, it could be really, it'd be really interesting. I think it could be really interesting and really impactful for, um, a lot of people, I would love to see something like pitch exist again, because there's just, like I said, there's so much to explore and the world has changed so much since 2016 already that there would just be so many.
Avenues related to baseball that we could do, um, and see represented. And it was just as much fun. Baseball's the same game every time, but you never, it's different. It's different outcomes every time. And that's what I love about it. Scott, all of this, like ceremony to it. Oh my God. In the office when Dwight's like talking about he talking about nostalgia or whatever, I forget specifically what episode, but he's like, you know something about like, I can, I can do to soldiers.
Nostalgia's great. Look at baseball. They've, you know, sports boring or stupid or something like that. And they've made a whole market out of nostalgia. You're not wrong, Dwight.
Melissa: You're not, you are not wrong.
Julia: Not even a little bit. Thank you for coming back on the show. I had it. I love being here. I'm so glad.
And, and, and I'm sure we'll have you on again and I appreciate your time today. Yeah,
Melissa: no problem. All right,
Julia: I'll see you next time. Okay. Bye. Bye.
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