WHO’S PLAYING GLENNON ON TV? Meet her today.
February 8, 2022
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. So-
Abby Wambach:
So, I would like an apology from my wife right quick.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. We’re going to start We Can Do Hard Things by apologizing. I am sorry, Abby, for not handling the technical difficulty that we just had with the grace that you have become accustomed to in moments of crisis for me.
Abby Wambach:
Got it.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay.
Abby Wambach:
Thank you. I feel better.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. Everything’s fine. Welcome to We Can Do Hard Things. Bless you for having missed the last minutes where the tech went wrong and my life was over, but my life is back. And I’m glad because there’s no way I could be more excited for the next hour, which in my defense is why I wanted everything to go perfect, which is why I was so upset before. Okay. You understand?
Abby Wambach:
Here we go.
Glennon Doyle:
So what we’re about to do, dear listener of We Can Do Hard Things is we are about to share with you-
Abby Wambach:
Top secret.
Glennon Doyle:
This top secret magical information, which is that as you know, We Can Do Hard Things listeners, Untamed is being made into a TV show. This is not the bigness. Exciting, but not the bigness. But I, in my little sweaty heart have known the person that I needed, the universe.
Abby Wambach:
The only person.
Glennon Doyle:
The only person that I needed the universe to provide, to play me in the Untamed show that I have always known in my little sweaty heart. One shot, one shot for this human.
Abby Wambach:
We’re going to start [inaudible 00:01:57].
Glennon Doyle:
They say to me, “Give me your list. What is your list?” I say, “Here is my list.” They say, “Your list has one person on it.” I say, “I realize this might be difficult for us.”
Abby Wambach:
This is not a good definition of list.
Glennon Doyle:
We’ve only got one shot. Do not-
Abby Wambach:
Miss your chance.
Glennon Doyle:
… miss your chance. Sarah Paulson-
Abby Wambach:
Opportunity comes-
Glennon Doyle:
Once in a lifetime. Sarah Paulson comes once in a freaking lifetime.
Abby Wambach:
That is actually right.
Glennon Doyle:
And tragically, I was not the only one who knew this. The whole universe knew this. So that’s why she’s going to be tricky. So first of all, hello, Sarah Paulson. I love you forever.
Sarah Paulson:
That was quite an introduction. Quite an introduction. Hi, Glennon.
Glennon Doyle:
Hi.
Sarah Paulson:
Hi, Abby. Hi, Amanda.
Amanda Doyle:
Hi.
Sarah Paulson:
I’m starstruck about Amanda. Is that weird?
Glennon Doyle:
I know, isn’t she striking?
Sarah Paulson:
I just feel starstruck because I’ve seen her a lot, but this is our first real, aside from Share The Mic Now when I was… You were there a lot, but this is really our first eye contact.
Amanda Doyle:
I know, I know. It’s like looking at the sun looking at you, Sarah Paulson.
Sarah Paulson:
My God.
Abby Wambach:
And are you in the closet? Are you in a closet, Sarah Paulson? We’re just going to call you Sarah Paulson the whole time.
Sarah Paulson:
Okay. I’m in my closet. I’m in a closet in my home. Not the only closet, but this one is the one I chose. There’s this one. It’s got sweaters and I thought I needed soft things. How do I sound? Am I too close to the mic?
Glennon Doyle:
Maybe a smidge.
Sarah Paulson:
I like your honesty.
Glennon Doyle:
But I don’t care. Because like I said before, you were perfect and everything you do is perfect forever. So what I want to say to you, Sarah, and what I want to introduce the world to is how we came to each other. Because for a very long time, we had a sad relationship where I was the only one who knew how close we were. And honestly, I felt like it was a little lopsided and non reciprocal, but the team of people from Bad Robot, Jesse Nelson, and this team that was making this show knew that Sarah Paulson was the north star of this. So at one point they said, “We’re going to have to ask her to do it, if you’re going to continue to be certain about it. And I said, “Is there any other way?” So they recommended that I write you a letter, because they didn’t want me to speak to you in person yet. Because they wanted us to have a shot.
Amanda Doyle:
Which is wise because Sarah might right now be reconsidering this whole situation.
Sarah Paulson:
She is not, she’s never been more excited about anything truly ever, ever. That’s the truth, you can see as evidence by what I think is about to happen now, if it’s happening now, is it happening now?
Glennon Doyle:
Let’s do it. So I’m going to read the email that I sent to you-
Sarah Paulson:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). And I reading the one I send back?
Glennon Doyle:
Would you like to?
Sarah Paulson:
I don’t like acting on the spot. I would like to hear your interpretation.
Glennon Doyle:
Exactly. Okay.
Sarah Paulson:
So I think that that would be kind of great.
Glennon Doyle:
So I’m going to be Sarah Paulson.
Abby Wambach:
This will be so funny.
Glennon Doyle:
In a minute. Okay. So this is what I wrote to you. “Dear Sarah, everything is hard right now. I like to just start with that just as a level setter in all the things I said. The way I love the world when things are hard is to keep creating beautiful, true, hopeful things. And the way I love myself is to co-create those things with beautiful, true, hopeful people. To that end, I have forever worshiped you as an actor. I understand that this is not a unique experience as the entire world worships you as an actor. I will tell you this. I never imagined, I dare to ask you to play me. I thought you were too elegant, sophisticated, cool. I am many things, but cool is not one of them. I am warm, toasty, sweaty even. Then you showed up at our first Share The Mic Now call. You were goofy. You were real and present and so open-hearted and vulnerable, a little sweaty even. And you took the action seriously. You were careful. You cared about the women involved.”
Glennon Doyle:
“After Share The Mic ended, I began watching every interview you’ve ever done and reading every article ever written about you. Sarah, Untamed is on the surface, a sexy, funny, modern classic love story between two women. Underneath it is a story about women breaking free from conditioning and tribalism to save ourselves each other in the planet. The reason the book is selling at astronomic levels is that this is what’s needed in this exact moment. We need a woman to lead us out of the matrix of patriarchal, capitalistic white supremacy. But we need her to do it a little clumsily and sweaty, and simply by trying to live her own fucking life. Now I ask you, who the hell else can play this role but you? You are already this role, your lifelong resistance to labels and commitment to creating a life and love of your own, your activism and love for others, your twinkly eyes. Are you aware that every few words you say your eyes twinkle? I am obsessed with eye twinkles because they are proof that a woman is up to something.”
Glennon Doyle:
“Dear God, give me a woman who is up to something and Sarah, your constant ability to sway between the dark and the light, the way you stay joyful while rushing towards the hard stuff, the pain of the world. I like how you use your life and talent and fire and power, Ms. Paulson. I really want you to play me. I want to make something together that the entire world can claim as a moment of hope and beauty, and a map of the way forward. I want to make something that the queer community can claim as our own celebration and proof of what we’ve always known. That the best life lies just beyond where they told us to stay. We would have so much fun. We would have so much fun. Love, Glennon.”
Abby Wambach:
Oh my God.
Sarah Paulson:
One of the great emails of all time, I think, personally.
Abby Wambach:
She really got you.
Glennon Doyle:
I send it and then I sweat. But I think only two days later, quick I get back this email,
Abby Wambach:
Quick turnaround.
Glennon Doyle:
It just says this: “Okay, let me be frank. I have never gotten an email that made me sweat and cry, and sweat and laugh, and sweat and cry and sweat, welst, that’s right, welst making my hands shake a little. Also, did I mention the sweating? Glennon, Glennon, Glennon? I, I, I truly don’t even know what to say or where to begin. Okay. Here’s what I know. I revere you top to toe.”
Abby Wambach:
I love that line.
Glennon Doyle:
“I cannot believe that you want me to play you? I feel, I feel I have so many feelings, always with the 1 million feelings. Is this email making you rethink things? I’m sorry. I will stop shouting now. All caps, all caps, line break. We take a breath. I would be so honored. I would be so blessed. I would be so scared. I would feel so incapable. I would do it anyway. I’m sure I’m not supposed to tell you all of these things that I’m feeling, but I don’t know how else to do, well, life really. Your letter made me feel like I could fly more soon. Sweaty, Paulson.”
Amanda Doyle:
I think that’s a pretty good email too, I have to say.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s so good.
Sarah Paulson:
Mostly just because it is just me represented as clearly as I possibly can represent myself. There’s not a single hyperbolic, even though on the face of it, I can imagine someone going, “This is not. Who could possibly?” But that’s just me.
Glennon Doyle:
It is.
Sarah Paulson:
In a nutshell, in little words, letters put together that form words.
Glennon Doyle:
It is. So Sarah, at the point that this email reached you, you could play anybody in the whole world, right? You are, sister, can you read her just actual bio real quick?
Sarah Paulson:
Oh God.
Amanda Doyle:
It would be a damn honor. It would take the hour. So I’m just going to condense it. But as you know, Sarah Paulson is the first person to that’s ever in the whole wide world, win all five major TV awards in one year sweeping the Emmy, Golden Globe, SAG, Critics Choice and Television Critics Association Awards for her portrayal of Marsha Clark in FX’s People versus O.J. Simpson. She starred in The Run, which was the most watched original film on Hulu. She stars mesmerizing, ratchet-
Abby Wambach:
Ratchet.
Amanda Doyle:
Ratchet. Eerily transcendent as Linda Tripp in Impeachment, both of which she also executive produces as well as, as complex as they come in the Academy Award-Winning film, 12 years a Slave. She is a Sagittarius sun. She’s afraid of flying, she loves watching The Real Housewives. And most importantly, she and Holland Taylor are mothers to two absolutely perfect rescue pups, Winnie and Louise.
Sarah Paulson:
Wow. That got all the good stuff. That’s all the good stuff.
Amanda Doyle:
Good job, Sarah Paulson.
Sarah Paulson:
So funny when you hear it, sort of, spelled out like that, it’s like, all those things I have told myself about, maybe it’s not going well, or maybe I haven’t done it. And then I go, “Wait a minute. You’re talking about me? That’s wild. That is wild. Wild.”
Glennon Doyle:
I wish every listener of We Can Do Hard Things, when they wake up in the morning could just get a bio read.
Amanda Doyle:
Yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
Somebody read them a bio before they get out of bed. Everybody’s done a lot of good.
Sarah Paulson:
And it’s so hard to remember when you’re the thick of your day and you just go, wait a minute, everything feels so hard. And then you’re like, but wait, I’ve done some hard things.
Glennon Doyle:
Yes, that’s right. So why then you’re in…at this point you can do any role, why Untamed? Why did you say yes to this role?
Sarah Paulson:
Oh my God. Okay. Well, I think I told you this a little bit, that I was convinced it would be a different actress and I don’t know if I’m supposed, but I-
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. Yes. Yes.
Sarah Paulson:
I thought it would for sure be Reese Witherspoon, I thought, for sure. I was following the whole launch of the book and Abby, getting you on speaker phone with Reese and the book being chosen for… I just thought, it’s going to be Reese. It’s going to be Reese. It’s going to be Reese. And of course, why should it be Reese? Reese is incredible. And then I thought, well, that’ll never be me. And then, I thought it would be Kristen Bell. Then I thought it would be a lot of, sort of, I don’t know, very charming littler. I’m a little taller than you. I don’t know how, maybe I’ll play the part on my knees. I’m not quite sure what we’ll do, but knees and shoes on me.
Sarah Paulson:
So I just thought, I don’t know, I just thought it would never be me, but I dreamt about it being me. And I would watch you read passages of the book, every place I could possibly watch you read passages of the book. And I kept thinking, I don’t know. Sometimes there are these, and I know you’ll know what I’m talking about, these things that are impossible to describe, but this sort of feeling I felt in my body that it should be me. Just thought it should be me. And I didn’t even know it was going to be made into a television program for people to watch. But I just thought if they make this, when they make this, it should be me. It won’t be me, but it should be me.
Sarah Paulson:
And I think the reason I want to do it is because I’m terrified of failing, which is a barometer I often use for the things that I know I must do. So I didn’t know it was going to come to me, but I thought it should be me, and I didn’t know why, and I couldn’t explain why, but just something up about it. I almost sometimes get a, this is going to make it sound like I think I’m some kind of psychic friends network person, but I’m not. But I had this shaky feeling when I would. See you read it and I would watch you and Abby, and I would see interviews with you and sister. And I just thought something is… I just would get a little shaky. I didn’t know why. And then when I got your email, that’s why even though the email seems a little over the top, my response.
Glennon Doyle:
We don’t do over the top, we delete it.
Sarah Paulson:
This is just really what I felt and I couldn’t believe that it was happening. I couldn’t believe it, but it terrifies me. It terrifies me because you belong to people, is what I feel. There are people who kind of claim you and need you, and all that you represent to feel brave enough, I think, to take steps, to make just little movement, even internalized movements, anything. I think you really are a north star for a lot of people. And I feel that is an enormous responsibility, that people will have attachments to the you, that is the you for them. And I will, of course, try to do that. But it also has to be sort of filtered through the you that is you, that I see, because that is the ultimate thing too, is that you’re going to sort of give this over. Not that you won’t be around for all of it. And tell me when I’m doing it wrong, which it’ll happen.
Glennon Doyle::
No, because I won’t know. No, I won’t.
Sarah Paulson:
You will. You’ll be like, “That doesn’t that doesn’t feel like me.” I sometimes think about, will I do a voice? Will I try to do your voice? Will I not try to do your voice? All these things that I’m already thinking about. And there’s so many things we still don’t know yet. So, I just don’t want to mess up what… But I do believe that sometimes that is, for me anyway, incredible motivator for a lock down deep dive to sort of block out the fear component and just focus on… the only way for me to deal with the fear is to focus on the act of the doing and learning everything I can. So the fear is mostly why I want to do it. And also, you are the greatest person who ever lived.
Sarah Paulson:
Oh.
Abby Wambach:
I agree. And I think it’s so fascinating that, to be such a high performer-
Sarah Paulson:
The greatest person who ever lived you.
Amanda Doyle:
You are.
Glennon Doyle:
There’s only one greater one. And that’s Sarah Paulson.
Sarah Paulson:
I don’t think so. Might be Abby.
Glennon Doyle:
[Crosstalk 00:17:13] You and also sister.Abby Wambach:
That’s a weird thing. I just said, “Honey, you are the greatest person and my wife just, “Sarah Paulson, you actually, are the other one.”
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right. What do you do? When you said right now, you’re trying to figure out, again, I’m dripping with sweat right now.
Sarah Paulson:
I’m sweating too. I’m sweating too.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. This is a sweaty one. Can you talk about what do you do? You’re trying to figure out how to play someone? Freaking Linda Tripp.
Abby Wambach:
You got your eyebrows back. I see.
Sarah Paulson:
They grew in.
Glennon Doyle:
You got eyebrows back.
Amanda Doyle:
Good job.
Sarah Paulson:
They grew in.
Abby Wambach:
Congratulations.
Sarah Paulson:
Thank you, because it really was a very painful time for me. Can you imagine if you just took your eyebrows off your face, what you might feel about that? It doesn’t seem it’s this sort of silly attachment to have to ones eyebrows, but really think about taking them off your face. All of a sudden the distance between, and also, I have a bit of a high forehead. So if you take the eyebrows away, the distance between the top of the eyelid and the top of the head is too big, it’s too big. So it’s hard and it was hard for me to feel… You’re playing a character at work, 16, 18 hours a day. Great, nothing I could want to do more. It was heaven on earth to me, but then you come home and you still have nothing on your face that used to be there. So it’s like, you’re still Linda Tripp at home, but you’re you. It’s really unpleasant. That was the most unpleasant part of it, was I had no eyebrows on my face.
Abby Wambach:
How is Holland, how did Holland deal with this?
Sarah Paulson:
This is one of those moments where it was very clear to me that this person loves me because she always was so… She said, “I think you look beautiful. All I can do is see your beautiful features.” I’m not going to say what she says to me because it will sound self-aggrandizing and I’m not in the market of that. It’s uncomfortable for me. But she made me feel… I had to gain weight for it, my body changed, my eyebrows were gone. I had these hideous nails that I lived with for, no offense to all the people who love an acrylic nail, it’s not my jam. I don’t love it. They were square nineties French tip. And it was almost a year of this and I couldn’t take them off. So I would come home hairless, with the body I didn’t recognize, with hands that weren’t my… It just was a trying time.
Sarah Paulson:
And this is the part that is a little deranged is that I kind of get off on it. I’m like, look at me. I’m allowing my body to be taken over by another person. And I’m that committed. And then, there are other moments where I’m like, “What was I thinking? This was a horrible mistake. And for what?” So embody this other person to then let, I don’t know. It’s a really weird thing to choose to do with your life. It’s like-
Abby Wambach:
How are you going to transform to be like Glennon?
Glennon Doyle:
Well, because you do transform. That’s the thing about you. There are so many people who you’re like, that’s that person playing someone, but that’s not what the experience is. Watching you act is freaking weird. It’s like-
Abby Wambach:
I’m like.
Glennon Doyle:
… an actual transformation.
Abby Wambach:
I hate her. I hate her. She’s my friend. Why do I hate her? She’s my friend. And I hate her.
Glennon Doyle:
Or she’s just brilliant getting you to see the whole full humanity of a human being because she doesn’t play a character. She plays a human being every time, all the prism of it. So what the hell and how, and WTF?
Sarah Paulson:
What the hell in and WTF?
Glennon Doyle:
How do you do that? How are you prepared to play me?
Sarah Paulson:
Can I ask you a question to maybe answer the question?
Glennon Doyle:
Absolutely.
Sarah Paulson:
I could know more explain to you how I do it or what it is. I can tell you all the, I will work with a movement person and you move in ways I don’t think you know, but you’re going to become aware of them.
Amanda Doyle:
You can say that again. She doesn’t have any idea.
Sarah Paulson:
You’re going to become aware of the way you walk and the way-
Abby Wambach:
I can help. It’s beautiful. It’s not bad. You’re making a face like it’s bad. It’s just the way you are.
Sarah Paulson:
It’s the way you are. It’s the Glennon-isms, there’ll be things. I will watch more video of you than you’ve ever watched of yourself. I remember having a conversation once with someone who was married to a person on Saturday Night Live. And she told me that the only way that he did what he did was he would pick one, all you have to do is pick one undeniable physical communication of a person, something that everybody notices right away. And whether you notice you notice it or not, maybe not even the thing, but it’s the way they move their hair or what they do with their hands.
Sarah Paulson:
And it will sell it. If they’ve got all the right things on in the costume and stuff. So was a version of that. I remember with Linda Tripp, the woman I worked with whose name is Julia Crockett, who you will come to know, and she’s an incredible person. I’m not a singer. I apologize for that moment.
Abby Wambacg:
Neither is Glennon, so we’re good.
Sarah Paulson:
We got a couple of good, I hope we have a singing moment in the show where I can try to do that, but she watch so much tape of Linda and there were some things Linda did that if I did them, you would turn the television. She had a blinking thing that was very intense. And I thought, well, I can’t do, I can’t do that blinking thing. You will be so distracting. So there’ll probably be things about your physical self that I won’t do, because maybe it would be a lot.
Glennon Doyle:
Like the voice?
Sarah Paulson:
Maybe? Are you going to do this, I have to say good morning, everybody. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning, everybody. Good morning. Hi. Good morning. I don’t know. This is just my initial hit on it. That that is like, not with any work on it at all. So it will be better than that, but it’ll be a thing you’ll decide. You’ll go, I can’t, that feels too. I don’t know. I don’t know how any of it will happen. I just know that it will. I’m trying to embrace this new thing in 2022 for myself, which I have never, never dipped my toe into, which is a allowing myself to be confident that I can do what I have spent 20 years of my life doing.
Glennon Doyle:
Oh God.
Sarah Paulson:
I have spent an enormous amount of time fertilizing this part of my being that thinks that in order to do my job well, I have to be disparaging about my own abilities. I have to not bring self reverence. I’m not allowed to sort of acknowledge that. And it’s like, we all, I think collectively, I know that I’ve been guilty of this. A confident woman freaks me the F out. I get so freaked and it’s because I don’t operate that way that I allow myself to decide that it’s somehow negative, that a woman would think that they’re good at what they did a human being would allow. But I think men get such a sort of broader, there’s so much latitude for them to embrace their greatness. Whereas I think as women it’s really hard for us to do confidently. And some of that is from the, the dangerous things that happens, the interplay between women about not wanting that from other women and feeling so threatened by it. And so I am trying so hard to acknowledge that I have spent over 20 years doing what I do.
Sarah Paulson:
And there were times when I didn’t know that I knew more unless, but I have to acknowledge that my current age, that I know how to do it. It doesn’t mean that I’ll always do it well, because I do believe in that thing of the Marsha Clark thing was, I was the right person to play that part. And it was a magic alchemy and synergistic thing across the board. And there are other things that I’ve done since then that I will do in the future that will either have that or won’t, and some of it we can’t control, but I can acknowledge that. I know I will. I will do my absolute best and that will be good enough.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right. That is right. What do you think are, when you think about playing this role, are there things that you see for yourself? Now I know you’re going to point. so I’m going to stop. Do you know when you were at my house and we were chatting on your-
Sarah Paulson:
Are you sitting on your hands?
Glennon Doyle:
I was so yes, I get self I’m like, oh wait, am I doing a thing that she’s going to notice and start doing? Okay. My question is, if I remembered how to breathe or move, what I would say is, are there things that you find are similar about us and are different? What thing about me or the me from Untamed or the me that you watch in videos feels like something that you’re tapping into because they’re similar. And what do you feel like is a huge difference between us?
Sarah Paulson:
I think there are more alignments in our essential being, I think. I really do feel this, which is why when I would think that it was going to be Kristen bell, I would get so upset. Cause in the, I don’t know if she’s the same, that I’m the same, like Glennon inside. I’m like Glennon inside, Kristen Bell is great. She’s the greatest ever. Did you see that sloth video on Ellen? There’s no way better, greater ever, but it’s really how I feel. And I don’t know why, except for the things that I do know about why, but in terms of the differences.
Sarah Paulson:
You are braver than I am, I think, I think you are. I understand why you’re making that face, but I do think you are. I do know why you’re making the face, but I do think you are. Because, let me say this. Here’s why. You, I hide behind character. Myself gets revealed in the roles that I’m playing, right? And if, if people are paying attention, they might notice some connective tissue that’s in each character that they might be able to connect to something about me. You are you, out in the world as you, you are not hidden. You are not hiding. I ultimately, as a performer, inherently am hiding a little bit and revealing at the the same time. So I think there is a, there is an inherent bravery in just revealing oneself, the way you do.
Glennon Doyle:
Where do you feel like you’re not hiding? In what parts of your life do you feel like you are the most seen and held, and where you’re not performing and you’re just the coziest and the most… Where do you feel you’re belonging?
Sarah Paulson:
With Holland, most significantly, for sure. I’ve never slept the way I sleep when I’m next to Holland that I just… it was the most significant indicator to me beyond the other sort of more overt, obvious things. It was like, the peace I feel. And I’m not a peaceful person, internally. I am a kind of chaotic, anxious, overthinking person. And Holland has some of that too, but she’s a much more practical, logical, optimistic person than I am, generally. But there is something about, we sleep holding hands. This is a real thing that we do. And it’s not even something we started doing or tried to do. It’s just how we sleep. And that is, I just feel most peaceful with her, for sure.
Sarah Paulson:
And I have pockets of that in my relationships with some of my closest friends in the world. Amanda Pete have been known to literally wet our pants while being together from laughing so hard from an actual pee.
Glennon Doyle:
Same, same with me and Sister.
Sarah Paulson:
We had to pull over once on the road and she was wearing a kind of sweatpants where there was a bloom of water. All of a sudden I was like, oh my God, you peed. But I couldn’t speak. And there’s a sound that I make and that she makes when she’s laughing so hard. That is so funny that even just thinking about it really makes me… It’s just unacceptable.
Sarah Paulson:
It’s like, I can’t explain and it’s so horrible. And We’ve almost gotten into car accidents. It’s bad, it’s bad and great and delightful. And when she laughs sometimes she goes, “De de de.” Like something happened to have her teeth and her, she got really big teeth. You could play the piano on Amanda’s teeth. And just last night it was her birthday yesterday. And we were talking on the phone and she laughed. And she did that. It’s almost sounds like a machine gun, which there’s nothing worse than a machine gun, but it’s like when it’s coming out of her teeth, it’s only funny. Anyway, that was a tangent I went on. But there is a lot of peace I have with a person who can wet their pants laughing.
Glennon Doyle:
Yes.
Sarah Paulson:
And my sister as well, we have my sister and I have a very, we’re so close in age. And we have a laughing thing too, that’s unnatural. Very natural to us, but I think people are like, “Okay, nobody, nobody thinks it’s funny, reel it in.
Glennon Doyle:
Yes, we get it. My sister and I learned very young that in uncomfortable situations, we would start at laughing with each other. So this is when we were seven and 10. So Sarah, we had this thing when my dad would be yelling at us, we figured out if you put your arm over your face like you’re scratching your back. You can cover your face. You can be laughing. We would just be standing next to each other, covering our faces. And to this day, the laughing, Abby told me, I said asked her one time. When is she most jealous? Because I’m kind of a jealous person. So-
Sarah Paulson:
Me too. Jealous. Me too. Jealous really too. Holland, not jealous. Doesn’t get jealous.
Glennon Doyle:
No?
Sarah Paulson:
No.
Glennon Doyle:
Abby doesn’t really get jealous either. And I told her, I said, “When are you you ever jealous?” And she said, “The only time I’m really jealous is when you’re laughing so hard at your sister. Because she can make you laugh like no other.”
Abby Wambach:
More than anybody.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. Speaking of Abby.
Sarah Paulson:
Yeah, Abby.
Glennon Doyle:
You know we haven’t-
Sarah Paulson:
I know.
Glennon Doyle:
We haven’t cast Abby because it feels so huge and important. What are you hoping for in that casting, in that chemistry, in that? What are we going to do?
Sarah Paulson:
Don’t you think Abby kind of has to weigh in very heavily about who that person is?
Glennon Doyle:
That’s what I meant to say. Abby, what do you say? I’m just saying the reason why is that I wonder if it should be for Abby what it was for you, with me.
Abby Wambach:
That’s interesting.
Sarah Paulson:
Honestly, when I think about it, my brain goes to like, “Where is she? I don’t know. Is it, who, I don’t know.”
Abby Wambach:
That’s the thing is-
Sarah Paulson:
That’s the thing, it’s got to be-
Abby Wambach:
We’ve talked about it and it’s very weird to have to actually have this conversation about who’s going to play me in a television. It’s a very weird conversation to have, so I have to like, sorry-
Amanda Doyle:
All right, fine. I’ll do it, Abby. I’ll do it. God.
Abby Wambach:
But-
Glennon Doyle:
Wait, Sarah, you should know that Lizzy, one of my best friends, Liz Gilbert tried out for the role over the phone. So she was sending these pictures of her hair in a Mohawk, and then trying to look like Abby. And then, she sent me pictures. She said, “Well, I know Sarah’s great, but have you seen this?” And she sent a picture of herself in a cardigan with two glasses on her head trying out for the role of me.
Sarah Paulson:
I don’t want to-
Glennon Doyle:
Liz Gilbert-
Sarah Paulson:
I can’t compete with Elizabeth Gilbert for the part of Glennon Doyle. I kind of feel like if you have to pass the Baton, I would understand. I would understand. I don’t know who it should be.
Abby Wambach:
I don’t know either. And I kind of feel like should just be a new person.
Glennon Doyle:
I do too.
Sarah Paulson:
I was thinking about that too, because here’s why, let me say why. Even in the book and I can just, it’s very cinematic. Even in the book it is, it’s cinematic this moment of you seeing Abby for the first time and the idea of not having an attachment to an actor, the audiences have any particular feeling about, but the idea that it’s about Glennon’s experience a.k.a me or Elizabeth Gilbert, I’m sure there’s others. I’m sure all the people will comment below about who they would rather see. And that will be a great day for me.
Amanda Doyle:
And they will not.
Sarah Paulson:
So in advance I say, thank you and f you. No, some people might.
Glennon Doyle:
No, they won’t. I’ll have a block party. I will have a block party that day and I will block block, block, block, block, block.
Sarah Paulson:
Okay, great. I’ve never liked a block party more, but the idea that it is your experience of seeing this person, what happens to you when you see her? Is easier to do when it’s a person that nobody has any… Should just be some girl out there, woman out there who’s a star and she just don’t know it yet.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right.
Sarah Paulson:
But we do.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right. I think that’s a-
Sarah Paulson:
Open casting call for Abby.
Abby Wambach:
Yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
Do you know know what’s interesting is that that is what Sarah McCarron, who is going to be the showrunner and you and I had a meeting with her.
Sarah Paulson:
Sure did.
Glennon Doyle:
During that meeting, Sarah Paulson, I don’t even know if you know what you were doing with that meeting. But when Sarah McCarron started talking, we were needing somebody who understood. Who was the same as us on the inside and who understood all of the layers of what this show needed to mean to the world and she started talking fire out of her mouth, okay? The fire we needed. And Sarah, you started, you were like in the feet, you were rocking back and forth. I was like, “Okay.” So, you were rocking back and forth in your chair the whole time she was talking. And I was like, “Okay. So I guess we’re not having a poker face during this one. I guess we’re going to-“
Sarah Paulson:
I’m not great at that. That’s not my strong suit.
Glennon Doyle:
You were so excited. And I was so excited. She’s amazing. She’s just amazing.
Sarah Paulson:
Have you guys been watching Station 11?
Glennon Doyle:
Yes.
Sarah Paulson:
You know you’re about this because I’m obsessed by it. And there was one episode in particular and written by Sarah McLaren and I was like, (singing).
Glennon Doyle:
And we’ve been meeting every day to… We’ve just been talking about all of what the show needs to mean. I’m bringing her up because she said those words to me that you just said.
Sarah Paulson:
She did?
Glennon Doyle:
Yes. She said, “I feel like everyone needs to have the reaction when they’re watching, Their own reaction like you had. We want everybody to go, “Holy shit. Who’s that? Holy shit what is that? Holy shit.” So-
Sarah Paulson:
What is that-
Glennon Doyle:
There she is.
Sarah Paulson:
… she is. Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Glennon Doyle:
So that’s interesting. I can’t wait for you to… Just this, Sarah’s amazing.
Sarah Paulson:
We knew it. We knew it.
Glennon Doyle:
We knew it.
Sarah Paulson:
Didn’t we?
Glennon Doyle:
We knew it. She got on the call, started talking. We were like, “There she is.”
Sarah Paulson:
We were like, “There she is.”
Glennon Doyle:
What is that?
Sarah Paulson:
What is-
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right.
Sarah Paulson:
There she is. So and-
Amanda Doyle:
I have a question. Your whole theater background informs everything that you do. And I heard you say that text is queen. Your text derived for your process and I heard you say that you dig in there until you find out what is at stake in every story, what’s truly at stake. And then you let that, your person, you become emerge from what’s at stake. What is at stake in this story, in the story of Untamed.
Sarah Paulson:
Life, everything, everything, I think. Oh my God. Sometimes when I get asked a question where there’s 15 answers to it, I almost see a paint wheel that you get when you look at colors of paint and if you spin it really fast, there’s a million colors on there, but they actually go white. When you spin it really fast, it’s like, I see nothing all of a sudden. The reason I said that about stakes when it comes to acting is because I believe in every person’s life, everything is at stake all the time. And I think sometimes people, when you’re acting, there’s a lot of throwing it away things and this casualization of things and making things less important sometimes is a style of acting.
Sarah Paulson:
And it’s just never been my style because I always think anything anyone is pursuing in life matters more to them than anything in the world, whether it be finding shelter for their child or making a choice to leave a bad situation for a better one or what they want to put in their coffee. Sometimes things like that are vitally important. And in terms of what is at stake and Untamed to me, it’s about survival and freedom, and stepping into one’s power and owning one’s choices and being able to breathe. I think the book is too huge in terms of its importance and its value to even put… And almost also because of the way it’s written. Each piece of it, each individual, I don’t even know, what do you call them, Glennon? Are they chapters? They’re not even, are they chapters?
Glennon Doyle:
They’re not.
Sarah Paulson:
They’re not. So it’s like each-
Abby Wambach:
Story.
Sarah Paulson:
Story vignette. I don’t even know how to categorize it, which is what’s so incredible about the book is that it’s totally original too. It’s just never been, which is what’s so exciting about what I imagine will be the thing about what, you and Sarah will… That is so important I think, to it feeling like the book is to have it not be a sort of traditional way of telling a story.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right.
Sarah Paulson:
Because it isn’t a traditional story. You are not a traditional person. And yet in its lack of traditionality, is that a word?
Amanda Doyle:
I like it. I like it.
Sarah Paulson:
I don’t know. I went with it. It becomes completely universal. It’s like in its uniqueness, it is the story of every woman, every person really. But it’s hard for me to put into a kind of categorical stakes because I think each little part of the book, each one has a different velocity to it. And sometimes they’re still, and sometimes they’re full of fire and sometimes they’re quiet and I don’t know. It’s just so like a person, it’s so faceted, like a person. It’s so amazing to me.
Glennon Doyle:
What do you feel like is, when you think about your life and your relationship to all people and to the queer community, because it was very important to me. I was just really grateful that you, what I would’ve called before now queer, that you were queer. Thanks for that, by the way.
Sarah Paulson:
You’re welcome. I did it for you.
Glennon Doyle:
I needed that to be true.
Sarah Paulson:
I did it so I would be right for this part.
Glennon Doyle:
Thank you. Thank you.
Sarah Paulson:
You’re welcome.
Glennon Doyle:
Because that was actually really, really important to me. And I read this that you said in the New York Times a long time ago, I read this, probably when I was obsessing about you. And it’s funny that you just think that you were sitting there in your bed thinking I should play this part. And it was coming from nowhere. It was coming from me across the country, praying in my bed to God that she would tap you and make you really feel like you needed to play this. But you said, “If my life choices had to be predicated based on what was expected of me from a community on either side, that’s going to make me feel really straight jacketed. And I don’t want to feel that. What I can say absolutely is that I am in love and that person happens to be Holland Taylor.” This is an ongoing life conversation between me and Abby. Do you identify as anything?
Sarah Paulson:
I identify as a human being in love. That’s how I identify. I sometimes, and this is a more complicated… I reject and resist that which is sort of insisted upon me by any person. It makes me crazy.
Glennon Doyle:
Me too.
Sarah Paulson:
And it’s not because I don’t want to belong or I don’t feel part of the community as it is. I want to be the president of my life the governor, the mayor of my town. And I don’t want to be… and I think sometimes it is a bit of a pushback that is just a… because I feel, I don’t know, I don’t want to have to answer to anyone. I want to answer to me. And I want to answer to those people in my life and I want to live honestly and make honest choices for me. And I don’t want to worry about disappoint. I’m already at war with my own disappointment in myself, I already am having to fight that battle with me and I’m quite a worthy adversary. So I just can’t have the other noise, it’s too much for me. So it’s not because I don’t feel part of it. It’s just, I don’t like a label in any which way. And certainly not put on me by anyone other than me. So does that make sense? Does that sound like-
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah.
Sarah Paulson:
I don’t want it to feel like it’s a rejection of something to choose that idea or that belief system for me works for me. And I don’t mean it to be a rejection of something else and I no problem if somebody else wants to label me in one particular way or the other, I suppose, but it’s not how I, don’t know and this will be the most inflaming thing a person could ever say, but I don’t know what the future holds. I just don’t want to worry about letting anyone else down. I want to be the only person that I’m worried about doing that with, except for the people that are in my immediate circle, who I depend on for my brain health and my heart health.
Glennon Doyle:
I get that deeply. It’s kind of religion in that way.
Sarah Paulson:
Yeah.
Abby Wambach:
Well, every inclusion is an exclusion.
Sarah Paulson:
Exclusion, that’s right.
Glennon Doyle:
Right.
Abby Wambach:
I remember when actually Chase came out to us, I remember saying, “And if one day in the future you change your mind, great. We are good with you, whoever you want to bring home, whoever you want to be. We are good. It’s not about us. It’s about you. You make you happy.”
Sarah Paulson:
What did he say when you said that? Was he relieved or did he expect that you would say that? I wonder.
Abby Wambach:
I think he was just really overwhelmed with having just come out. So I don’t know if he actually heard me, I’ll circle background in a couple years.
Glennon Doyle:
You know what’s so funny is that that was our reaction. And that was the same thing that a person who is very different, a mother who, like your mom was like, “This isn’t necessarily real. You can change your mind.” And that was on one side and we were on the other side going, “You can change your mind.” But we meant it in the most fluid progressive way. But it was the same thing as saying-
Abby Wambach:
Well, no, my mom didn’t say you could change your mind. She just said, “No, you’re not.” I was like, “Well, no, I am.”
Amanda Doyle:
She was like-
Abby Wambach:
“No, you’re not.”
Amanda Doyle:
She’s like, “I’ll just wait here until you change your mind.”
Abby Wambach:
Whatever, this is not about me. I think it’s so beautiful because I think it’s really important that you just have to, every single person gets to be and do as they please, I believe. And that is true, truly what I think being a queer person in the… It’s just like, you do you.
Glennon Doyle:
We shouldn’t have to belong to people in order to be seen and respected and celebrated. That belonging and checking all the boxes shouldn’t be a requirement to be seen and allowed in the world.
Abby Wambach:
Except you, you belong to me.
Glennon Doyle:
Except for you. Yes, yes.
Sarah Paulson:
Glennon, your hair has gotten really long.
Glennon Doyle:
Do you know what happened, Sarah Paulson?
Sarah Paulson:
What? Tell me.
Glennon Doyle:
Is that my wife for Christmas got me this fancy thing that is a blow dryer that blow dries in magical ways from some weird company. And because my entire life-
Sarah Paulson:
Is it a Dyson?
Glennon Doyle:
It’s a Dyson.
Sarah Paulson:
I have that.
Glennon Doyle:
This is not a commercial for Dyson.
Sarah Paulson:
Sorry, but it worked. It’s a great blow dryer.
Glennon Doyle:
It is.
Sarah Paulson:
I have it too.
Glennon Doyle:
And Abby looked at me today and I was actually using it, which is weird. And she was like, “What’s happening with all of these waves?” And I was like, “Life is such shit right now.” I swear to God, Sarah, I don’t understand what’s happening. The pandemic-
Abby Wambach:
The 2022’s been a doozy.
Sarah Paulson:
It’s already just-
Glennon Doyle:
It’s just already a total f-ing shit show. And I don’t remember who I am or how to be human. And I’m just fucking blow drying my hair, Sarah.
Sarah Paulson:
I blew dry. I blew dry, I blew mine dry. What is it? Blew dry?
Amanda Doyle:
It’s a tough one.
Glennon Doyle:
I blewed it dry.
Sarah Paulson:
I bloated it dry.
Amanda Doyle:
I blowed dried it.
Sarah Paulson:
You done blow dried.
Glennon Doyle:
Blow dried it.
Sarah Paulson:
I blow dried it. Wait, I blowed to dried it.
Glennon Doyle:
We blowed it dry.
Sarah Paulson:
I blow, I blowed it dry. I blew it dry. I blew it dry. I blew it out. I had a blow dry. I bloated. No, it’s not bloated. It’s definitely not that, that shows you how, but I did this.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s so good. You have a curl.
Sarah Paulson:
But see my hair’s curl, I have a curly weird hair.
Glennon Doyle:
Same.
Sarah Paulson:
Same another place where we are aligned. But I do think about sometimes the joy I’m going to have with your hair in this show. Early days, long, long, long town hair.
Glennon Doyle:
You can get real housewife extensions. I know you like Real Housewives. So-
Sarah Paulson:
I do like them and it’s only because I want to play them all. Really, that’s the thing.
Glennon Doyle:
Right? Exactly.
Sarah Paulson:
I look at them and I’m like, “Explain to me what you’re doing. I’m trying to understand what you’re doing.” And I’m fascinated, maybe I’m just tricking myself into thinking I’m doing something when really it’s just a way of creating some negative space in the brain where I usually have none.
Glennon Doyle:
That might be it. So you’re calling-
Sarah Paulson:
It’s like a lot of, so I’m calling it research, but really it’s just like this, like a test pattern. That’s the extent of my sing. I blewed it dry guys. I blew, I blewed. I blewed the front of my hair dry.
Amanda Doyle:
You blew it dry.
Sarah Paulson:
Well, I blow it dry.
Glennon Doyle:
For your sake, I do hope you get to do… I hope they put in the scene when I first went out for Carry on Warrior and I went on the today show, and I was watching a lot of Real Housewives back then, Sarah Paulson. And they told me I was a mom and I didn’t go anywhere really, but the bus stop and a few other places, and they told me to get TV ready. Okay. So if you’re going to tell me to get TV ready, and the only thing I’m watching is the Housewives, what I need you to do is Google, at some point, my first Today Show. I had extensions down to my waist.
Glennon Doyle:
I had a skin tight dress on with chicken cutlet plastic things in my boob so that my boobs would look bigger. I had eyelashes that were mile and a half long. I had Botox in my forehead and my topic was how we should show up as we are, vulnerably transparently as ourselves in the world, okay? And nobody knew what to do with me because, obviously, so at one point they discussed, you had this viral essay about don’t carpe diem, which has to do with knowing that being a young mom is hard and time going by fast. So you know how they put the ticker at the bottom with this?
Sarah Paulson:
Yes.
Glennon Doyle:
It will be like Nobel prize winner or whatever. Mine said, “Mother who understands that time goes by fast and is okay with it.”
Sarah Paulson:
That was why I was on TV.
Glennon Doyle:
And is okay with it.
Sarah Paulson:
My question is, do you have a date so that I… Because I’m sure that you’ve been on the Today’s Show a lot. What year was it?
Glennon Doyle:
I’m going to send it to you.
Sarah Paulson:
Please send it.
Glennon Doyle:
I will. It’s too much to be real. It’s too much.
Sarah Paulson:
But I’m excited about it. I’m excited about also how I can find a chamber that I can step into that will just reduce my height by-
Glennon Doyle:
I know, isn’t that interesting?
Sarah Paulson:
It’s just like, I wish I could just-
Glennon Doyle:
We’ll do, Sarah. We’ll just make every other person that’s around you, four inches taller.
Sarah Paulson:
Listen, they do things like this. We don’t want to give away all the secrets, but they could make a countertop much higher looking so that I’m actually not that much higher than the countertop compared to the, and then the person. You can do all kinds, there’s all kinds of short, short movie stars that have been towering over women for years.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right.
Sarah Paulson:
By the help of lifts and boxes, and apple boxes and camera angles. So we can make you look-
Glennon Doyle:
How tall are you?
Sarah Paulson:
What?
Glennon Doyle:
How tall are you? I know, I’ve already Googled. You’re 5’6, right? Or 7?
Sarah Paulson:
No, I’m 5’6 and three quarters.
Glennon Doyle:
5’7?
Sarah Paulson:
But I’ve not really 5’7 because things have already started to… It’s like 2020. It was really hard. So I think I’m 5’4 and a half now.
Glennon Doyle:
Right? Exactly.
Sarah Paulson:
Probably. How tall are you? Are you 5’2?
Glennon Doyle:
I’m 5’3. No. Yes I am, I just went to the doctor’s appoint… Tell them.
Abby Wambach:
It said 5’3.
Amanda Doyle:
Look at her Ms. Switzerland over here..
Abby Wambach:
It said-
Amanda Doyle:
It said 5’3. The form that Glennon reported her height. It said 5’3.
Sarah Paulson:
How tall is she, Amanda? How tall is she?
Amanda Doyle:
She is 5’2 and three quarters.
Glennon Doyle:
What is a quarter? My God, I can’t believe we’ve gone through all this for one little quarter of an inch.
Amanda Doyle:
I’m just reporting. She said she’s 5’6 and three quarters, and you’re not taking her three quarters. You’re rounding yourself.
Abby Wambach:
Nobody will know. Nobody knows how tall people are in television.
Sarah Paulson:
I just think, remember our Abby is, she just has to be taller than I.
Glennon Doyle:
Open casting, but you have to be seven and a half feet.
Sarah Paulson:
You just have to be tall or we won’t even see you.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s fair.
Sarah Paulson:
We won’t even see you, we won’t meet. We don’t want to see your reading. We’re sure you’re great. But no.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right. So it’ll help us narrow it down, honestly.
Amanda Doyle:
I just think, and what I mean by that is 5’9, 5’10 is fine because I’ll be in some flats, I guess.
Sarah Paulson:
That’s right.
Abby Wambach:
That’s right.
Glennon Doyle:
Unless it’s the Today Show, and then you’re going to wear stilettos.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay. We need to let sweet Sarah Paulson go right now. But I-
Amanda Doyle:
I hate when Sarah Paulson go.
Glennon Doyle:
We’re going to have all these beautiful conversations, because we’re going to make such beautiful, wonderful things together this year. And I’m just-
Sarah Paulson:
I know. I need us to start.
Glennon Doyle:
Don’t worry. We’ve been starting, Sarah Paulson, every day. Sarah McCarron and I have been writing and working every single day. And if you understood the fire and beauty that is going on, Sarah, Abby walked into the room into a zoom the other day?
Abby Wambach:
I thought she was in a proper fight with somebody like that. Somebody was attacking. I walk in and I was like, “What’s going on?” And she’s just discussing feminist theory with Sarah McCarronThey’re just discussing-
Glennon Doyle:
So good.
Abby Wambach:
… the theory of it all. And she’s like, “Don’t tell me.” And I was like, “Is everything okay?” She’s like, “No, we’re just talking.”
Glennon Doyle:
I’m yelling at them.
Sarah Paulson:
Right, right.
Glennon Doyle:
Not her. Them.
Sarah Paulson:
So the greatest news about this is that, there she is. We found the right person.
Glennon Doyle:
We did.
Sarah Paulson:
That’s so incredible.
Abby Wambach:
And she is great.
Glennon Doyle:
It’s a passion.
Abby Wambach:
I’ve actually spent a few hours with her.
Sarah Paulson:
She’s great.
Abby Wambach:
And she’s very, very, very smart. She’s way smarter than me.
Glennon Doyle:
And so is Ben and Jesse’s gotten us to this point. I think she understands the book better than I do. So that was a bonus.
Sarah Paulson:
You were like, that is what I meant.
Glennon Doyle:
Exactly what I meant with that sentence. It’s just, no one else has brought it up.
Sarah Paulson:
No one knew it including me, but thank you. Oh my God. I love you.
Glennon Doyle:
I’m so glad you exist. And I’m so incredibly grateful that you said yes to this. And I just love you so much. I love who you are in the world. And I just think this is going to be the beginning of many beautiful things to come.
Sarah Paulson:
I hope and pray that that is exactly right. And I know it is. I just don’t want to let you down. I’m working on it though.
Glennon Doyle:
Never.
Sarah Paulson:
Working on my-
Glennon Doyle:
It’s done.
Sarah Paulson:
… my confidence about being able to do this. Going to be great.
Glennon Doyle:
Aren’t we all?
Abby Wambach:
You’re going to be great and I will be the best fucking cheerleader in the whole wide world.
Sarah Paulson:
Cheers.
Glennon Doyle:
Correct. I know that to be [crosstalk 00:55:12].
Abby Wambach:
You’re going to do great and Holland and I will sit on the sidelines and just marvel.
Glennon Doyle:
And they’ll talk about how beautiful we are even without eyebrows.
Amanda Doyle:
We love you.
Sarah Paulson:
Man, I love you. I love you both. I love you all.
Amanda Doyle:
Thank you for doing so many hard things.
Sarah Paulson:
Thank you for having me.
Amanda Doyle:
Goodbye.
Abby Wambach:
You’re the absolute best.
Amanda Doyle:
Bye, Sarah Paulson.
Glennon Doyle:
You’re the absolute best. I love you.
Abby Wambach:
We love you.