Stylish vs Skinny & Welcome To Sperm Sports

May 4, 2026

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It's all Harry Styles’ fault that the 'taxi cab theory' is everywhere you look. His engagement has everyone debating whether finding 'the one' is a matter of fate, or as Sex And The City’s Miranda Hobbes told us, all about timing? We do not agree.

The Devil Wears Prada 2 is officially massive. So, is it good? Why did it almost make Amelia Lester cry and why do some Americans just not 'get' our Aussie love interest Patrick Brammall?

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Why is there a Sperm Olympics? How is Australia performing in it? And… again, why the hell is there one? Clare Stephens explains spermmaxxing.

Are you super-stylish, or are you just thin? Lena Dunham is heading back to the Met Gala this week, and a new essay from her about the reaction to her past appearances reveal who’s considered cool enough to go.

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AUTO GENERATED TRANSCRIPT:
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Mama Mia. Out loud, It's what women are actually talking about on Monday, May the fourth. I'm Hollywayen right, I'm Clays Stephen, I'm Amelia Lester, and here's what's on our agenda for today. The taxiicab relationship theory gets an update thanks to my close personal friend Harry Styles.

Speaker 2: Plus dispatches from the Worst Dressed list ahead of the met Gala tomorrow, and a lister shares what it was like to be mocked over her fashion choices for a decade.

Speaker 3: And the Devil West product is absolutely everywhere right now, so we unpack why, and we also talk about the fact that Meryl Streep, who must be the most celebrated actress of all time, apparently didn't discover her worth until she was fifty six.

Speaker 1: In case she missed it, though out loud as speaking of knowing your worth, we are pulling on our big girl pants and asking you for a favor.

Speaker 3: You have to know, if you're listening to this, that Holly is so uncomfortable right now to just go with us.

Speaker 1: To still like asking for this. I don't like asking, okay, But there's this thing called the Australian Audio Awards. It's like like the Oscars or the Emmys of the logos, except it's not but for people who speak into microphones like us, right, and we're up for some awards this year and we need your help to win them. So if you love love, love out loud, and we know that lots of out louders do, and you listen all the time, and you think you know what those those women need. They need some public accolades, Yeah, some affirmation.

Speaker 2: Think you think you know what I'd like to see. I'd like to see them dress up in some frocks, you get on a stage and make a speech.

Speaker 1: Yeah, but particularly you class evens, I would like to see you do that. The very pregnantness you will be when this event occurs, very high heel, great, and you're in your flop here you keep telling us, so maybe you'll be really indiscreet and just get up there and say something rude. Yeah, anyway, we digress. Tell the out louders how they can help.

Speaker 2: Okay, So basically these Audio Awards, you go there's a link that will put in the show notes and you can vote for There's two things and sorry, you can vote anyway that you got.

Speaker 1: We're not voting, you know, we've got suggestions.

Speaker 2: In our interests. We like you to vote for best Podcast Producer Ruth to Vine, Mummy are Out Loud, and Best Society and Culture Podcast Mummy.

Speaker 4: Because we are society high society, and we are very we're so cultured.

Speaker 2: And we do. The thing is we pretend to be cool, but we really like awards.

Speaker 4: And I think that's what people think of when they think of you and me. They're just like, we're.

Speaker 1: Too cool for school.

Speaker 2: And meanwhile we're like, we rely on achievement for something. But it would be funny. I think. So the podcast Awards the end of this month, right the twenty eight. I believe I would like to win this award. While Jesse's on Matt lead, I think.

Speaker 1: You want to just wade right into that weird Steven's Sister dynamic. Just get into the weird Twin stuff. Come in and help. I think there's a people's choice too, So anyway, like just vote for us, vote for wherever you get to vote for us, and we would love it. We can't bribe you with anything except our affection. Yeah, yeah, anyway, shall we get on with the friends over to you, Amelia Lester, I'm up.

Speaker 3: Well, it's been hard to escape the Devil Wears prior to of, like, really has it has been everywhere?

Speaker 4: I kind of felt like bullied into going to see it.

Speaker 1: I feel like Merril's chasing us down with that red pitchfork. She's like, literally, go theater on and look.

Speaker 4: It's done really well.

Speaker 3: It's done better than anyone expected at the box office over the weekend. I'm going to tell you what the critics said. They basically liked it, and then I want to know what you thought, Holly Claire. I know you haven't seen it yet. Yeah, the critics praised it. They said it was glamorous, they said it was wishy, They said it was the fun we need right now. They called it a millennial nostalgia bath. I love a millennial nostalgia brath. Look, some did question the whole premise of updating a movie that came out twenty years ago. Someone wrote it's less a follow up than a tribute at the satire apparently didn't bite so hard.

Speaker 4: Holy. What I want to know.

Speaker 3: Is did this movie live up to the marketing height machine for you?

Speaker 1: I don't want to be a debbie down of it. No, I went to see it with my sixteen year old daughter, and that was really interesting because the absolute enormous generation gap there in terms of so this is a magazine. Once upon a time, magazine editors were considered very important and influential. She's like, this was a job everybody wanted. That was a lot of groundwork being laid there with my daughter. And look, I'm not allergic to a nostalgia bath. I like that. I mean I back in the day, I was first in line for the Sex and the City movie like I was.

Speaker 4: And the vibes were similar.

Speaker 1: And even though as we know, that run of movies ended up disappointing us bitterly, in that first movie, I remember the excitement of seeing those women on screen again and being in the movie theater and seeing them walk down the street and like the audience was kind of like, yeah, there's a girl, and we're back in that world. And I think the Devil Wears Prada nostalgia is similar in that these were great characters who've entered, you know, our culture in lots of different ways. Miranda Priestley and Andy Sex and Emily Blunt's character Emily is just heaven. So I understand that wanting to jump back into that, but they've had to give it quite a cynical update to reflect where media culture is now, and so it ends up to me feeling like quite a negative, like it's not and to be honest, the Sex and the City movie was a bit like this too. I remember they were grappling at the time of the financial crisis and so they were like, this cushion costs two hundred and fifty dollars, and lots of the critics were like, who are these women and why are they spending that money? And this feels a bit like that, and that we're supposed to all be lolling and laughing along while they're telling us our media has been hollowed out, billionaires run everything.

Speaker 4: I don't know.

Speaker 1: Am I being a bit too cynical? No?

Speaker 4: I think you're right.

Speaker 3: When I went to see it, I went to see it with two friends and they both turned to me at the end and said, are you all right? Because I kind of feel on the verge of tears and didn't Nicki Gammel, Yes.

Speaker 1: I saw a review from Nicki Gammel in The Australian where she said, she cried, And she didn't cry because the plot line was really touching it. She cried because of what it was saying. Yea journalism, which is obviously not everybody's industry and they don't care. But if it is yours, you have this kind of affection for it, and this does not dress that up.

Speaker 5: No.

Speaker 3: And what's interesting is Lauren Weisberger, who wrote who wrote the book, The Devil was Prida a piece for Vogue dot Com on the occasion of this movie coming out about what her life has been like after that book came out. Now, that book was not seen particularly favorably when it came out. People criticize the bad writing. It was kind of seen as a little bit mean, a little bit throwaway, and then that first movie kind of gave the book a bit more of a sheene than it had on first publication. Now, Lauren Weisberger has done great for herself. She apparently announces in this article that she now lives on a boat in a remote part of the Bahamas, which is good for me. Absolutely sounds difficult to get your mail there, but other than that sounds delightful. But her article reminded me that her book was first and foremost about a bad boss. Yes, that's what people loved about it because everyone, practically everyone has been in a work situation where they felt oppressed underappreciated, and everyone could relate to that kind of idea that when you're young, you want to make your mark on the world, but older people kind of are trying to push you down, or that's what it feels like. So everyone knows what it feels like to be young and underappreciated, but the new movie is so far removed from that idea of bad bosses and bad workplaces as it feels alien to.

Speaker 1: It's also funny because the bad Boss, Miranda Priestley, obviously became a cultural hero, so much so that Anna Wintour, who she's famously based on, kind of kept her distance very much from the first movie, but now is entirely in on it. She's appearing in all the promo. There's a lot of partnerships between Vogue and this movie, so she's accepted that. But there are a couple of nods in the movie to how times have changed in that now Miranda Priestley isn't allowed to just throw her coat at people anymore, and she has someone who sits next to on the meetings and says things like you can't say that all the time, as if there has been like a woke update, if you like. And that feels a bit funny, But you're right, it was everybody related to this idea that these people are monsters like glamour.

Speaker 6: Like.

Speaker 1: The idea was that, you know, the Miranda Priestley was kind of a glamorous monster who you got to see a little bit of the humanity of. But by this movie, we're all supposed to be rooting for her, unquestionably.

Speaker 2: Because I think even if that was the kind of premise of the book, in the first movie, you're very much you're looking at Miranda Priestley, but you're also it's obvious that she's an icon and that it's Andy's character arc to kind of fight against that, not that there's something inherently wrong with Miranda. So so I'm interested to see in the second in the second one, whether, yeah, what the stakes are then if there's none of that tension. But as much as you say it was depressing, am I like because I'm going to go see it. I like a film that isn't good.

Speaker 1: I don't know what you mean, but for me it felt and look, I'm not no spoilers here. And you do get lots of fashion montages, you get lots of a fashion show montages. You get you know, they're walking in a different coat every two minutes, there's music, there's celebrities everywhere like this. It delivers all that, okay, but it just for me, it felt kind of a bit empty. And basically the steaks are which billionaire is going to get to own this business? Which was kind of the stakes the first time around two is like will Miranda get to keep a job? And it kind of feels like I don't know if I care about that. But Patrick Brammel, isn't it Remember last Wednesday we were all giddy on the show because he was here and we bumped into him in the offices. He wasn't here to see us, sadly, he was here to be interviewed by the amazing Kate Langbrook for No Filter, and that episode's out today.

Speaker 2: I have purely been absorbed being vibes so far online and I think you guys are pretty spot on with the vibe of people. People I've seen they're like, yeah, yep, fun But Patrick Brammel. I'm obsessed. I'm obsessed with him and Harriet Dyer, who's his wife. They co wrote, co starred in Colin from Accounts, and now he's.

Speaker 4: Maybe one of the funniest TV shows ever.

Speaker 2: Yeah, and now he's in a bloody Hollywood movie with Anne Hathaway. Is he hot? Is he car like? What's the what's the go? Is there? Is there?

Speaker 4: Bare? So I want to.

Speaker 3: Say the outset that I love Patrick Bramore and I think he's so good in this movie. And to me he was a highlight. He was he was just so he gets to play an Australian. So you might remember in the first movie, Andy Sack's love interest is also played by an Australian, Simon Baker, my personal friend has discussed on the show, but he has to put on an American accent, whereas in this one, in recognition of the fact that there are a lot of Australians in New York these days, he gets to play an Australian. So I loved it, But then I started to hear the rumors that his part has really been cut down. People observed that it felt a little underdeveloped, and I.

Speaker 4: Was surprised to read that.

Speaker 3: A lot of the reviews felt there was zero chemistry between him and Anne Hathaway. Oh.

Speaker 1: I didn't feel that necessarily, But what I did fit I knew that his part had been cut. And the reason I knew this is because when we first found out about Patrick Brammle, there lots of pap of him and Anne Hathwayne. She's wearing this particularly incredible sort of bluey purple sequin slithery dress that's just like oh, and she was like spinning around a lamp post and it looked like she was tipsy, and he was holding her back and this kind of stuff. That whole sequence is not in the film, so it obviously has been cut back a lot.

Speaker 3: Boy, I love your forensic knowledge of this so bad.

Speaker 1: I did spy on that. But I think one of the reasons why he plays such a small part because basically he's the love interesting Again, no spoilers about whether or not that works out, But this movie is about girl bosses. Even though girl bosses are out of fashion now, this movie is ultimately about that. It's about Andy's ambition, It's about Miranda's ambition. They sort of talk a lot about how much they love work, and they're the partners are all a bit beta and a bit like not relevant.

Speaker 3: Including by the way, Meryl Streeps, who was played by Kenneth Branner. Yes, and the reviews also commented that that didn't work for them either. So maybe just the writing around these boyfriends and husbands felt hollow because that's not where the interests lay.

Speaker 1: But isn't it funny because we used to critique girlfriend roles, you know in movies. We'd be like, oh, the so and so actress, she just has to play the girlfriend. Not no character development, right, no particular complex characteristics or backstory. They're just the girlfriend. And I feel like this and so maybe this is progress. This is one of those movies where there are just the boyfriend roles.

Speaker 4: So it's just like true sort of.

Speaker 1: Middle aged guy. Well, I don't know whether Patrick Brewmle will qualify as middle age whatever, like nice enough age appropriate guy of name recognition is in this person's life, but we don't really care about them.

Speaker 2: There is one person who is pretty convinced that there was chemistry between Anne Hathaway and Patrick Brammel, and it is Patrick Brammle's wife, Harriet Dyer. She I lulled so hard at this. She has uploaded this Instagram video where the caption is trust No One, and she is filming her TV as her daughter stands in front of it, and Patrick's on a red carpet and he is asked by the interviewer about Anne Hathaway, and he says, playing someone who falls in love with Anne Hathaway. Tough gig, tough gig, and he looks straight at the camera, and then the interviewer says, the world's most beautiful person according to People Magazine and everybody in here, and he says, and me too. Andy rewinds it and plays that again and then switches a camera to her and she's like what, And she's got her glasses on and just sitting at home, and then she interspersed it with all this footage of like when you propose to her their wedding.

Speaker 4: Apparently they got engaged five days after he proposed.

Speaker 2: Yeah, yea, yeah, they got married five days up.

Speaker 3: Yeah.

Speaker 2: It was like, so they've had this beautiful love story in him reading Newborn books and being miscored and hath the way talking about how gorgeous and joyful he is, and it's just so good But a great part that Amelia directed me to is that so ninety nine percent of the comments from Australians absolutely get it. That they're like, yeah, this is funny because like whose husband ends.

Speaker 4: Up in Hollywood?

Speaker 2: Blod faster. But there are a few Americans who are like, oh no, this is this isn't right.

Speaker 5: Yeah.

Speaker 3: No, there's a distinct portion of the comments that are like I don't understand what's happening here, or like check on your husband, or like just completely missing the point. And I have reason to believe, in part from the spelling of said comments that they may be from Americans. There's a suspicious lack of us in words like coloring. And that got me thinking as to why Patrick Bramle, who I thought worked so well in the movie, had evidently been cut down. And I wonder if it's just because he is allowed to play such a quintessentially Australian part in it. He is very laconic, he's very understated, he's got that very kind of irony seeped Australian wit about him, and maybe it just didn't play very well in a movie that's actually not very irony drench.

Speaker 1: That's true. I just have to mention one more thing, because I think Mia would throw something at my head if I didn't. Twenty years have passed between these movies. Twenty years has not passed on these ladies' faces. Yeah, it's just be very clear about that.

Speaker 2: I could have told you that without saying any Yeah.

Speaker 1: That doesn't matter because in lots of ways, I think particularly Emily Brunt Blunt's character she plays, she's obviously still Emily, you know, the former assistant, but she's got a villain arc in this and she is meant to be again, this isn't a spoiler, the hot new girlfriend of a billionaire character. So they're like commenting. The script is commenting on the fact that the tech bros run the world now, and there's kind of a Bezosi character who's had a glow up in her hot new girlfriend, and she would have done all that stuff to her face. Question so perfectly character, you know, in character, and appropriate for the industry, for the vibe and all those things. But it is astounding to think it was twenty years ago. Because Anne Hathaway, Meryl Streep, who is just one of them.

Speaker 2: She seventy, She is incincredible.

Speaker 1: To look at her Jita performance and this is great. You're just like, Wow, my twenty years and your twenty is not the same. Maybe I live in doggy well, Meryl.

Speaker 3: I did want to also say that Meryl had a great moment in her interviews for this She was being interviewed on the American Today Show by Jenna Bush Hager, who was incidentally George W. Bush's daughter, and Jenna was talking to her about the fact that she initially turned down the.

Speaker 4: Role on the Devil Wes product Let's Have a Listen called me up and they made an offer and I said, no, I'm not going to do it. Why because I.

Speaker 1: Wanted to see. I knew it was going to be a hit, and I wanted to see if I doubled my ask. Wow, And they went.

Speaker 4: Right away and said sure, And I thought, I'm fifty six year It took me this long to understand that.

Speaker 1: I could do that, that you can ask for what you want. Yes, and I wanted it. But you know, if they didn't want to do that, I was okay, because I'm old. I'm ready to fifty six.

Speaker 4: I was ready to retire.

Speaker 1: But you know, I love that story. I also love that story because, as she says at the end, there she was fifty six, and she thought, well, I'm winding down, you know, like good years. Her career has been unbelievably amazing in the last twenty years.

Speaker 3: I know.

Speaker 2: And it's also quite inspiring to think you can have that lightning rod moment at fifty six, because I beat myself up thinking, oh goodness, maybe it's too late for me. I should have had it backbone before. Now I've got some time.

Speaker 4: We've got time time to develop it.

Speaker 1: Merril's shown us all that after the break. What Harry Styles can teach us about love? I don't think so what Harry Styles can teach us about taxicabs, which I also have to explain to my daughter what they are as well. God help me. But while we're on a roll of things from another time, A TV show that ended in two thousand and four has provided some of the most enduring relationship theories of several eras. I think there was He's just not that into you, which can also be She's not just not that into you. It's fine, And the other is everywhere in the news this week because of my close personal friend Harry Styles. I think we touched on it last week that Harry and Harry is engaged to Zoe Kravitz. Now, he hasn't said that because he never says anything about his personal life, but sources close to have confirmed.

Speaker 4: Oh good, old sources.

Speaker 1: The woman is wearing a golf ball sized diamond on her finger. It's on. It's definitely on. And this has started a lot of headlines like this one. Harry Styles and Zoe Kravitz are reportedly engaged after less than a year, and fans think this wild theory explains why, and they mean the theory I'm about to explain to you. Harry Styles proposing after eight months is further proof that taxi cab theory is real and none of us are safe. Okay, are you across what taxi cab theory is?

Speaker 2: Yes, I'm across it from Sex and the City. As you say, I believe it was a bit of Miranda Wisdom.

Speaker 1: Oh no, it was Miranda brand I'm about to play it to you. Yeah, Season three, episode eight. This iconic statement the wait.

Speaker 2: Hedge, it's fate.

Speaker 4: It's not fate.

Speaker 5: His light is on, that's all what lights. Men are like cabs. When they're available, their life goes on. They wake up one day and they decide they're ready to settle down, have babies, whatever, and they turn their light on the next woman they pick up them.

Speaker 2: That's the one, Mary.

Speaker 5: It's not fake. It's dumb luck.

Speaker 1: It's not fake, it's dumb luck, so says Miranda Hobbs. Now, obviously none of us, not even me with my close relationship to missus Steals, knows whether or not there's any truth to this in terms of their relationship. But the reason that it's being applied to him is because it has one of the classic characteristics of taxi cab theory, which is that he has had quite a lot of high profile relationships. And when I say high profile again, he's never mentioned any of them ever, but there are photographic evidence.

Speaker 4: Is that right?

Speaker 1: He doesn't talk.

Speaker 2: About his was his most recent one before.

Speaker 1: So he was with Taylor Russell, who's a British actress, for quite a long time. He obviously famously dated Taylor Swift. Yeah, he was with Olivia Wilde for quite a long time. He's dated Kendall Jenna, He's dated Caroline Flack, He's dated a lot of people.

Speaker 3: Can I just interrupt Holly and ask do you think he's going to come to the tailor swift wedding now that he's engaged to no should wedding guests.

Speaker 1: I we really hope so that wedding is going to be the best. The reason why they're applying this theory to him is they're saying that a trademark of a taxi cab the taxi cab theory, And I don't think this is just a men thing. I think this is men and women. Is that you know, you date lots of people and you try them all on and whatever, and the theory is that one of them is right for you. But taxi cab theory says it's not that one of them is right for you, it's that the timing is right for you. And they're saying that's why Zoe and another trademark of it is quick. So you've been dating, dating, dating, dating quite long relationships a year here, two years here, three years there, whatever, But then eight months he has been dating Zoe that we know of, he puts a ring on it. Taxi cab theory thoughts.

Speaker 2: From the outside, he's looking ready to settle down, and so we all then assume that he's gone, Okay, who am I? Who am I next to right now? Who do I happen to be at dinner with?

Speaker 1: Oh?

Speaker 2: I happen to be with Zoe kra which is Bloody Convey, which.

Speaker 1: Is a very good dinner because, as I discussed, absolutely amazing.

Speaker 2: She's incredible. But the way at least this article was constructed was very much that it was about him and his readiness. And the thing I worry about is that do we start thinking if we use this theory, do we start thinking that someone is only with somebody because of timing, that it's interchangeable, it could have been anyone. It's not real, it's not a real life.

Speaker 1: I don't think that's the correct way to view taxi cab theory. I think it's not about you'll do, it's that the timing is right. And the reason they're not applying it to Zoe Kravitz is because she's been married before and she's been engaged before, so it doesn't apply to her in the same way, do you know what I mean? So my theory on this, and the reason why I think it's true not for everybody, like everything isn't for everybody, is that we like to have a romantic narrative that there's one right person for us, and whether we meet them when we're nineteen or fifty nine, we will just know that's the right person for us. That's it. And what taxicab theory says is that's not true. There could be lots of right people for you, but in order for you to to get together and settle down in verted commas, you have to it has to be the right timing. So other examples for this might be Taylor and Travis. Right if they'd have met at twenty two, because at the same age, would we not have any of these beautiful songs that we have for Taylor, Or if they'd have met when they're twenty two, would the timing not have been right for them both to commit in the way that they are now ready to commit. So in my mind, taxicab theory doesn't mean you're settling or it's the wrong person. It just means timing is everything. So the people I dated before I met my guy, if you're a serial monogamist, and many of us are, we like to go, well, none of those people were right, This one's right. But the truth of it is is probably like that one probably would have been fine, but if we weren't ready, I don't.

Speaker 2: Know it's by romantic sensibility.

Speaker 3: I think I sort of agree with both of you a little bit, and agree with both of you a little bit because I think what the taxicab theory misses is it makes it very one sided, now, whether that side is a man or a woman. I take your point, Holly that even though sex and city talks about men are like cabs, we could equally apply to women. But a relationship is about a dynamic between two people. And what I think this theory overstates is that it's just about one person picking another person. And I don't think that's how relationships work. I don't think a relationship works or like ends in marriage. And I'm using air quotes here for anyone listening, just because one person decided, Yes, this is the person I'm going to make it work. It's about two people meeting and deciding together. And that's what's different about when you get in a cab. It's not about a mutual decision.

Speaker 4: It's about one person deciding.

Speaker 1: I agree. But the way that I've always thought of taxi cab theories, you both have to have your lights on, do you know what I mean, like, you have to both have your lights on for the timing to work. If one of you has the light on and the other one doesn't, it's not going to work. You both have to have your lights on.

Speaker 3: I feel like that was what was really You know, we've been talking on this show about what happens over twenty years, and I think that that line from Sex and the City, they weren't talking about both people having their lights on. I think back then we had an idea of relationships which was that men in heteronormative heterosexual relationships men picked women. Yes, I think, and you're trying to update it, which is good.

Speaker 6: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Although I think I always that was always my understanding of that quote, because I think in later in the show, Carrie's talking about my lights not on, his lights not on, Like I always sort of understand it to mean it's all about timing. And I genuinely do believe that a great deal of whether or not a relationship will work or not is about time.

Speaker 2: I think you only have to watch one to eight seasons I've Married at First Sight to see that it is not oh that much about time, because you've got two people who's lights could not be more on who are matched by very clever, non manipulative psychologist and they go in and you can have your light on as bright as it can possibly be, and it still doesn't vibe.

Speaker 1: I don't buy that because I don't think their lights are on for that at all.

Speaker 2: Oh holy just because they're getting Instagram followers. I am not looking for real love. But the other thing is, I don't know. I think you hear so many stories of people who may be met at a time that wasn't on paper a particularly good time.

Speaker 4: Oh that's a good point to people.

Speaker 2: To meet, and it's still and it still happens.

Speaker 3: Yeah.

Speaker 1: But I think, like any theory, it doesn't apply to everybody. One person's going to meet. Some people are going to football in love of their childhood sweetheart stay with them forever, right. But in the dating world, in the world where you are trying people on, if you are serial and anogamizing, I think that's where this comes in, because sometimes your lights on even when it shouldn't be. Like if you heard of the getaway car theory of like you find a relationship to get you out of the relationship you're in, so you could be married and one person's light is on and the other one doesn't know. Like I think the point of it is that for a lot of people, the one true love theory isn't necessarily it. It's more like, is this the right moment? Clooney and a mile? Very good, very good advertising for that.

Speaker 2: No, hard because I'm also like A miles A mile.

Speaker 3: Zoey, like, I don't know for a proving any extraordinarily Well, no, but I don't like that theory right because I bet that.

Speaker 1: I mean, of course a mile is extraordinary, and of course so is extraordinary. But that theory buys into the idea that everybody who didn't get picked there was something wrong with that and we're waiting for like. So my point about A mile and George is he was married when he was young, but through all his big rise he was single, and he was known as the most eligible bachelor in Hollywood. And I think that he made a bet with Nicole Kidman comes to mind, I will never get married again?

Speaker 3: Is that during that period, as people may remember, I had a long phone conversation with him. She went for about an hour in a work context, and I guess he's light his life just wasn't.

Speaker 2: Why.

Speaker 1: But the thing is is that of course these women are amazing, because of course they are. But if you believe that it just takes the right woman, then that's like a model of exceptionalism that I'm not that into. Was more likely getting to a point in his life where it's like, I don't want.

Speaker 3: To be a six I don't want the pot belly pig as my life, and.

Speaker 1: Then he meets an extraordinary woman, and he would have met other extraordinary women in Amma would have met a million extraordinary men who wanted to tie her down like she's a catch and a half in a million ways, intellect, beauty, human rights, like savior. She's incredible, but her light probably was not.

Speaker 3: I feel like you just out sexist argument to know. I thought the taxi like theory was sexist, which turns out I was carrying.

Speaker 2: Around the sexes I think. I think that there are I think the taxi light theory does make us feel better about ourselves, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's true, because because I think it's really convenient to be like, oh, that man like George Clooney. The reason he didn't end up with all those women was because of timing, not because he wasn't compatible, it wasn't right whatever, Whereas I think I lean towards Amal and George were always destined?

Speaker 4: Is that do I?

Speaker 1: Did we just say the word destined?

Speaker 2: I think romantic you.

Speaker 4: Are because you met the love of your life quite young.

Speaker 2: Yes, I think maybe I'm trying to justify my own choices, which is.

Speaker 1: And maybe I'm trying to just always because I don't. I don't buy the theory necessarily that everybody before was wrong and it was the right fit.

Speaker 4: Oh, you haven't met my ex boyfriend, fair cool.

Speaker 1: I'd love to know what we think about the taxi light theory, and also if there's an update, because I've heard a couple like some people say it's musical chairs, who are you with when the music stops? Some people say it's coughing season. EMM has said that, like there's times of years, seasons in your life where you're just like, Okay, let's do it.

Speaker 2: I need someone.

Speaker 1: But I was wondering because my daughter wouldn't even know about taxis and lights on.

Speaker 4: No, no, we need to fit into this.

Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, it's like the ubers available and empty.

Speaker 6: The.

Speaker 1: Waiting time on this No, I can't ten minutes too long. Tell us out louder.

Speaker 2: We're really in an era of maxing, which we've touched on on this podcast. Not me personally. I'm not maxing anything.

Speaker 1: I'm just everything is maxim but everything.

Speaker 4: Other people very optimi everything.

Speaker 2: Yes, so looks maxing, sleep maxing, fun maxing, which sounds gross. But here's one I hadn't heard of until this weekend. Sperm maxing. I like it because it's not something I can personally participate in. I feel excused from sperm maxing.

Speaker 1: What how does?

Speaker 6: What?

Speaker 4: How do you?

Speaker 1: Maxis swem? I'm not I don't need to know. I'm just curious.

Speaker 2: Headline in Sydney Morning heralds red iced testicles and abandoned underwear. This is the world of sperm maxing. And it begins by telling us about a lovely man named Mick and his partner Holly, and oh there you go, Holly, I'm in. So they were discussing their plans to have a family, and Holly was and Holly was saying she had fears about her fertility, and Mick said, you leave that to me, love, And so what he did was he stopped wearing underwear because most underwear is made of polyester, and that's apparently and a crime disruptor. Come on, and lowers testosterone.

Speaker 1: I believe many babies have been born to polyester wearing people.

Speaker 2: And then he would ice spark at least once a week, not that shrunk, No, no, no, Heat's the bad thing. Because then another guy called Tom was explaining that he goes in the sauna, but don't worry because he takes an ice pack with him.

Speaker 1: And puts it on this necessary that would be a very confusing sensory experience.

Speaker 2: Because apparently excessive heat is damaging to sperm. So apparently there is some evidence about heat and sperm. But the rest of this is complete. You won't believe it, but it's complete bullshit. But Brian Johnson, who's that tech entrepreneur who's obsessed with longevity, claims to have the one who has his sons.

Speaker 1: Yes, the one who has his son's blood injected into He's done so many and measure time erections. He doesn't need food after eleven am.

Speaker 4: Like that guy.

Speaker 1: He's living a long but very boring life.

Speaker 2: Yeah, well, he claims to have sperm quality to rival a twenty year old. He's got no basis that claim, but that's what he says, which brings me to the Sperm Racing World Cup. Are we aware of the Sperm Racing World Cup?

Speaker 1: Totally?

Speaker 2: I discovered this and it is the funnest thing I've discovered as of late. It's founded by tech entrepreneurs.

Speaker 1: They have too much money, too much money that they should come to my We did frog racing, peak racing, like good.

Speaker 2: Sperm race should be doing some sperm racing. It's a race that's going to be held in San Francisco next month.

Speaker 4: I think what they're saying is that their cab light is on.

Speaker 2: Yeah, I'll show you with my literal sperm. And it's one hundred and twenty eight men, each representing a different country, and they submit semen samples which then compete in a microscopic race for a one hundred thousand dollars prize. Now here's the ad for it, because I know you guys are interested.

Speaker 6: The Sperm Racing World Cup one hundred and twenty eight countries, one hundred thousand dollars grand rights, the highest stakes competition elequancy. We are searching for the healthiest man alive. This race will immortalized a nation to your country is watching, the world is ready.

Speaker 3: I don't want to know what images are currently playing.

Speaker 2: It's sperm racing.

Speaker 1: This brings a whole new meaning to the term wanking. Frustrating one hundred thousand dollars price.

Speaker 2: Yeah, but I as much as trust the tech bros To make a literal tournament out of sperm racing, which I have to say I'd love to attend. I mean, how do you make it exciting? I don't know. This is interesting in the sense that fertility has traditionally been in something that women have seen as their soul responsibility and burdens. And it's nice that men are starting to recognize that. You won't believe it, but fifty percent of fertility is down to the man.

Speaker 4: This feels like Elon Musky to me. It feels musky.

Speaker 3: Yeah, and I imagine, yeah, and.

Speaker 4: You got the That was the joke I needed.

Speaker 2: And obviously the problem is that not every fertility issue is has a cause or like it's it's not your fault.

Speaker 3: I'm sorry you're trying to what's problematic about the spermilm?

Speaker 4: So I think we get a crash and it's.

Speaker 2: Literally not a race. Do you reckon?

Speaker 3: You can do a little bit of a race. Are you familiar with the facts of life? It is literally a race.

Speaker 2: But do you reckon? You can tell when a man has very fast spur?

Speaker 4: Oh my god. Oh interesting.

Speaker 1: But do you think he's putting it on his dating profile like one this it would definitely be on that.

Speaker 3: It's going to immortalize his nation. Yeah, for Australia, I need an update on this.

Speaker 2: When it happens, we'll have to keep everybody updated on the tournament and Australia's participation. We need to find who's representing Australia. Oh my god, sorry, I've got another contact.

Speaker 4: So clear, like you asked, you posed a question to the group. Can you tell first sperm?

Speaker 2: Yeah, something tells me like you kind of know who would have fast sperm. But I don't think it's necessarily a good thing.

Speaker 4: No, it's not always.

Speaker 2: No, I think it's it's aggressive and it's like congrats Elon musk. But like you're releasing a lot of sperm and you're not like hanging out with that sperm very much?

Speaker 1: Are you may not taking the sperm to soccer again.

Speaker 2: No, you're not taking a sperm to sport on the weekend, and I think that's very sad. Oh my god, after the break, we get you across everything you need to know about the Met Gala before tomorrow. Tomorrow on the evening of the first Monday of May, which is always confusing. But America exists in a different time to us.

Speaker 1: There are one day behind us.

Speaker 2: They're one day behind us, and I always have to google time in New York. As is tradition, four hundred and fifty very glamorous guests are going to start arriving at the Met Gala. The dress code for this year is Fashion is Art and the theme is Costume Art and I don't understand the difference between dress code and a theme.

Speaker 1: And also always yeah, the Met Gala is about a costume institute in an eye museum.

Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, I'm glad I'm not the only one who was feeling like because I was like, I think it's just me not understanding fashion. But no, it's weird. So guests are invited to explore their relationship to fashion as an embodied art form. That might mean that there are references to literal art, literal paintings, literal kind of art, moments like whether it's the Renaissance or whatever. But it's the Met Gala, so I think everybody just goes bat it crazy and we don't really understand the tide of the theme. Most of her time, Anna Wintur is still the chair despite having handed the rains reluctantly.

Speaker 1: Streep is still the chair.

Speaker 4: Yes she is.

Speaker 2: And she's enlisted Beyonce, Nicole Kidman and Venus Williams to serve as their evening's.

Speaker 1: Co chair, so they have to go.

Speaker 2: Yes they do. Holly, there's a little bit of gossip about Anna Wintour and whether we can expect to see Harry and Meghan at the met Gala.

Speaker 1: You see, the thing is about the Met Gala, and we'll get to this in a minute too, but whether this is is particularly fraught with who will accept an int because of the involvement of one aforementioned Jeff Bezos and his wife Lauren Sanchez Bezos, because they are bankrolling it. So in the past, big companies bankrolled it. I think Apple's bankrolled it before, TikTok's bankrolled it before. Now it's Lauren and Jeff, and some people are like, I don't think we want to be part of that, So we're not going.

Speaker 3: And there have been protests. People have been putting bottles of urine or a liquid that appears to be urine, scattering them around the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the lead up to the gala to protest the fact that the alleged fact that Amazon warehouse workers are not provided with toilet breaks.

Speaker 1: Wow, that's a protest. And for the last few years they have been to kind of eat the rich vibe boiling away about the met gala for good reason, but this year it's overt, right, So I reckon that Harry and Meghan might use that as the excuse for why they weren't invited. You I didn't want to go any who wants to go and hang out with Jeff and Lauren. Those people are bad, evil, naughty. But actually it's that Anna wouldn't invite them, And why would Anna not invite them? So the word on the street is that Anna because it used to be Anna. Winter's relationship with celebrities evolved a lot over the years, and if you watch The Devil We was Proud of Too, you'll know that was a matter of survival. There was a time when she was like Kim Kardashian, I don't think so she's not vogue, and then she literally is exceptionally vogue these days. But she apparently doesn't like Harry and Meghan because she's a royalist, a staunch royalist. She's a dame after all. This might be overregged a bit, but she's a royalist, so she doesn't approve of what happened there and the way that Harry treated the late queen allegedly, and also that Meghan chose to do her first ever Vogue cover with Edward Ennafel in Britain and Anna was not happy about that and sees her as a bit.

Speaker 2: So I wonder if eventually they'll be considered.

Speaker 1: I think Anna's backtracked on enough things and in fact, you know, but as I say, I think that Harry and Megs, if they're not there, which I don't think they will be, well, could definitely use a social justice excuse. But there are a lot of very famous people who are going to be there, of course, including as you've said, the afore mentioned Nicole. Lena Dunham's going, which I find amazing because I've just read a memoir and she talks about the Metgala and not glowing terms, but she was on one of the committees as well. I think we've got Sabrina Carpenter, We've got Zoe Kravitz, so we might get Harry. We've got a lot of very famous people who are going. But this year, more than ever, it's kind of political.

Speaker 3: There's a bit of a tipping point being reached about it. Amy O'Dell, who writes a fashion subject called The back Row, wrote last week a piece that I've seen a lot being quoted and circulated which basically argues that the met Gala is in danger of becoming uncool.

Speaker 4: And the whole point of the met.

Speaker 3: Gala was that it was cool, right, It was like the ultimate and fashion. And the problem is that by allowing the Bezoses to bankroll the whole thing and a winter, risks turning the whole thing into this very craven exercise that no one will want to be a part of. So it's interesting. I'm going to be watching the Red Cup very carefully this year to see if it does feel like the star wattage has been slightly dimmed.

Speaker 2: Yeah, and if the people who make it cool because Ndaya is not going Zendaya makes things cool.

Speaker 4: She does.

Speaker 2: So what I found interesting in all the kind of stuff I've seen about the Met Gala coming up, there was a great piece on Lena Dunham's substack called and her subtacks called good Thing Going, and she wrote a piece called Dispatches from the Worst Dressed List, and I clicked straight away because having been a huge fan of girls, having been a huge fan of her, I remember years and years and years of seeing her constantly mocked for her fashion choices, and I remember wanting to scream at my computer and be like, it's not the fashion, you're talking about her body, And I was so frustrated. And she has now kind of processed that. And as you say, Holly, she's going to be at the Metgala, which is a bit of a surprise. But she writes at the beginning that she's in the process of getting ready for the Met Gala, which she loves to watch but tends to wobble through. And she talks about some of the things that were written about her and how it destroyed her relationship to fashion, and she had loved it when she was little, she had found it really really fun, but it got confusing. She writes when dressing became a bit more of a public affair. Basically, she quotes a bit that Joan Rivers said about her, where she said, it's okay stay fat, but don't say it's okay that other girls can look like this. Try to look better, and Lena Dunham Wrights, I was trying. We just have a different definition of what better meant. And do you guys remember those years? Oh yeah, her just being made fun of.

Speaker 1: But also because as I said, I've just read the book, or nearly at the end, it's very clear that she's got like she went through years where she was conventionally skinny, and if you correlate this in the book, that coincides with time when she was really struggling with her health and her addiction issues and with mental health and all those things. Since she'd be super skinny and people would celebrate her for that. She made the cover of Vogue famously once in one of those eras, and then there were other times where she was encouraged. There's a part at the beginning about girls where she was told put more weight on the fact that your body looks the way it does is the thing that makes this show Edgy get bigger. So like her body has obviously been objectified to send different messages at different times about all kinds of things. But it's also clear in her book that she does love clothes and style and fashion and that her mind did does and so it was part of her world. But that's not the case for everybody. Right, If you go to the Met Gala, especially these days, you're generally paid to be there by a brand. They will dress you, they will style you, they will do your duels, they will do your put you up at the hotel, and you'll do all these things and it will cost them millions. But I was reading about how it's seen as the best possible advertise, which is be interesting. If the coolness factor wears off, as you're talking about Amelia, that is the best marketing spender brand can have. Because apparently the media impact of the Metgala is bigger than the Super Bowl in terms of how Father's pictures travel, how much coverage it gets, the fact it's televised, it will be on every news side, it will be on every social media feed forever. That not only the brands who are actively involved, like Vogue and whichever are actually sponsoring it will be the ones who cover it, so it is seen as money well spent, and the event itself costs about six million to put on.

Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's obviously at a level that few of us can relate to the met Gala, But that Lena Dunham piece gave me a lot of feelings.

Speaker 4: I loved it.

Speaker 3: I read it as a companion piece to the love Story discourse. This whole idea of Carolyn Bessett Kennedy, who was lauded for her fashion sense.

Speaker 4: People ask the question, is this fashion or is she just thin?

Speaker 3: And this was kind of the flip side to that argument, which is can I not be fashionable if I am not thin? And I loved the fact that she asked that question. This really hit home to me because I have never felt like someone who knows how to dress. I am surrounded by very stylish people, and I grew up with like friends. And I interrupt, Please don't I think of myself as I feel like I've struggled with what to wear my whole life. And I do enjoy clothes. But it's interesting that when I was at my skinniest and probably at a pretty unhealthy relationship with my body. I was lauded much more for my clothes and for my supposed style than at other points in my life. And I love that Lena's teasing out that connection. And just recently I saw some comments online that said that I don't dress very well, and it hurt my feelings because I was like, I try, and I do try with my clothes, and I meant to not try. I mean, as as Miranda Priestley reminds us in The Devil wes Prata, we all have to get dressed in the morning, so you may as well put some thought into it. But I do wonder how much of what we perceive of as stylish is actually connected to bodies.

Speaker 1: Oh so much of it is. And I mean this last night literally, I was packing for the week because I always come up to Sydney on a Monday morning. I usually stay for a couple of nights, so I've got to think on Sunday when I'm in my most harried, like what am I wearing? Obviously we're on camera, but and I was in my huffing around in my bedroom, going I hate all my clothes. I hate all my clothes, and my kids could hear me, and obviously because I am aware, you know, feminist mother, I do not huff around my bedroom going I hate my body, nothing fits me. But the code is I hate all my clothes. I've got nothing to wear, and my son it's like, what do you mean, why have you even got those clothes if you hate them? You know, But there is no question that these things are so connected, and that fashion world, particularly the high fashion world, they say we like to imagine that they've made a lot of progress on that in the ten years. But I don't think in Anna Wintour's world that progress.

Speaker 4: I'm just not talking about it as much. I think that's what it is.

Speaker 2: I remember it still sticks with me.

Speaker 3: Now.

Speaker 2: Remember when Kim Kardashian went on a red carpet wearing a It was kind of like a high neck dress. There's a lot of fabric, and she was very, very pregnant.

Speaker 1: I was working gossip mags and I'm not proud of this at all, but everybody says she looked like a couch. I think we printed that. I think we took the piss out of that overtly, and she was trying very hard to be high.

Speaker 2: Fashion exactly and I think about that all the time. As a pregnant person. I'm like, I the idea of being mocked and being so embarrassed because you're like, I didn't choose for my body to grow, Like, like it just grows in the direction and grows when you're pregnant, and it can grow in weird direction. And to be totally honest, this this move now, and I'm sure people have the total opposite perspective to me, But the move now of people having really cool maternity, you know, people make it look really really cool and sexy, having a bump like the Sienna Millers of the world with their like little top that will open and it looks really sexy. I'm like, God, you can't even be pregnant and be able to give up for just a few months.

Speaker 1: No, we're not allowed hot at all times. Okay, I just need to ask, right, Because as we said, this mat Gala has got this political weight to it. I feel like for the last few years it has, and there's been a sort of oh but it's fun and we all need the distraction. Are we going to be looking at that red carpet tomorrow? Because I know I will, Yeah, I will. I will I will.

Speaker 3: Yeah, I will too, And I think that why I will be looking is because fashion is fun. It should be fun, it should be something that we enjoy looking at. And I love how Lena ties up her piece because it's not a hopeless piece.

Speaker 4: She ultimately concludes.

Speaker 3: By saying, what I realize now is I was making choices that maybe made people feel uncomfortable, whether it was because I was wearing clothes that that type of body should not have been wearing, for instance, or she was wearing clothes that weren't regarded as as exactly mattering me. She talks about how she spoke to a very well known fashion critic about this sort of debate recently, and the fashion critics said to her, you just have a point of view that's called taste. And I love the idea that just because you're wearing something that might not be universally regarded as flattering or fashionable, you can still have a point of view about it. And I guess that's ideally what these kind of red carpet events are meant to showcase is a unique point of view.

Speaker 4: So yeah, I'll be watching.

Speaker 1: We will rope in our absolute fashion expert May who used to love the met Gala. As she said, people take more risks there than they do when they're you know, at the Oscars or whatever, because it is the whole point of it is to be quite bad shit. So we will be doing a met Gala wrap up for subscribers tomorrow afternoon, and I'm sure that Maya will have many thoughts. That's all we've got time for this Monday. I hope everybody's week starts well. We will be back in your ears tomorrow for subscribers, and the three of us will be here on Wednesday. Thank you to our team. We'll see you then, Bye bye.

Speaker 2: Mummy acknowledges the traditional owners of the land on which we have recorded this podcast.

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