A Bit Fruity with Matt Bernstein - Is Glinda Good？

00:00:00.000 Hello, hello, and welcome back to A Bit Fruity, the podcast where we, as connoisseurs of queer

00:00:08.140 media, hold space for the lyrics of Defying Gravity. I know you think I just tried to

00:00:14.640 shoehorn that joke in there, but that's literally what we're going to be doing today.

00:00:17.880 today we are talking about wicked and it is just me so brace yourselves and pray that i don't fly

00:00:31.680 off the handle but matt why are you talking about wicked you don't need to this isn't a film

00:00:37.480 podcast i know that's what makes me so nice this is a podcast where we tend to talk about

00:00:44.960 politics, the internet, gay things. And unless you've been living under a rock, you're probably 0.54

00:00:51.080 aware right now that wicked is what is currently occupying the intersection of all three of those

00:00:56.700 things. And as someone in gay media who wants to hold space for that moment, here we are.

00:01:02.500 I talk about politics and wicked is a deeply political story. I talk about gay things and

00:01:08.700 one could argue that Wicked is a deeply gay story. I had no intentions of making an a bit fruity

00:01:14.980 episode about Wicked, but I want to tell you what landed us here today. So I saw Wicked on Thursday

00:01:23.000 night and I saw it with a few friends. And as I was leaving the theater, my literal first reaction

00:01:30.400 to the film was, oh my God, Glinda is Megyn Kelly.

00:01:36.760 Well, Kelly's Court is back in session on the docket today. 0.98

00:01:39.140 Dirty words in disguise for the princess of pop. 0.87

00:01:42.480 Britney Spears pushing the envelope on obscenity,

00:01:45.620 getting rather crass in a crafty way on her new hit recording.

00:01:49.640 Love me, hate me, all of the boys and girls are begging to,

00:01:55.660 and then she says, if you seek Amy.

00:02:00.600 Doesn't make any sense, does it?

00:02:02.580 It's not supposed to.

00:02:03.620 if you say it quickly with no space in between the letters it basically spells out the f word

00:02:10.360 and then me so it's all the girls and boys are begging to the f word and then me now i know you

00:02:19.240 may have some questions about that thesis not trying to jam my thesis down your throat right

00:02:23.860 up front here i promise we will get to it anyway i decided i wanted to make an episode interrogating

00:02:29.480 and investigating the politics of glinda a deeply complex and complicated character as we'll get

00:02:35.880 into so i went and i saw it again this time so i could you know sit in the corner and basically

00:02:41.640 take notes throughout the movie which i did and that was yesterday and i have to say for some

00:02:47.640 reason upon leaving the theater the second time i was absolutely in tears in a way that i was not

00:02:53.680 the first time you know i take ssris and any of my ssri girlies out there are gonna know it makes

00:03:00.320 really hard to cry it's actually like the one thing that i miss the most from before being on

00:03:05.560 ssris now i totally don't regret taking ssris they in many ways save my life but i do miss crying

00:03:13.780 and something about the fascist politics of oz getting in the way of glinda and alphaba's budding 0.99

00:03:21.940 and beautiful and complicated relationship, I was like in tears, like, fuck the wizard, 1.00

00:03:28.620 fuck Madame Morrible, and you know what? Fuck Dorothy too while we're at it, just because. 1.00

00:03:33.860 Hi, get back on track, Matthew. So what I want to talk about today is, yes, the political allegories 0.99

00:03:40.020 in Wicked, but specifically questions around Glinda, who I think is one of the most psychologically

00:03:46.200 complex and conflicting characters in the show. Is she good? Is she wicked? Is she liberal? Is

00:03:52.160 she conservative? Is she gay? Before we get started, if you would like to support this show 0.99

00:03:59.120 or would like more content from me, you can get that on Patreon. The link to the Patreon will be

00:04:05.460 in the episode description. I also do live streams over there, some more in real time commentary type

00:04:11.960 stuff so it's a it's a fun time i think go see for yourself now before we get into the wickedness

00:04:18.100 i would like to lay some groundwork for this episode there is so much wicked lore dating back

00:04:24.660 to the original publication of the 1995 novel by gregory mcguire and then that novel was adapted

00:04:31.400 into a stage production which premiered in 2003 starring of course the original cast kristin

00:04:36.440 Chenoweth as Glinda and Idina Menzel as Elphaba. Which, by the way, love Idina Menzel. Love Idina

00:04:43.160 Menzel. I'm a gay man. I love Idina Menzel. But thinking once again about how intense the allegory

00:04:49.980 of Elphaba being green is to racism, why was Elphaba not always played by a Black woman?

00:04:58.300 Love Idina Menzel. This is not Idina Menzel's shade. This is a casting decision question.

00:05:02.900 Anyway, obviously the reason that we're here today is because the novel that was turned

00:05:07.060 into a stage musical is now being turned into a film musical, with Cynthia Erivo starring

00:05:12.860 as Elphaba and Ariana Grande as Glinda, Jonathan Bailey starring both in my heart and in the

00:05:21.400 film as Fierro.

00:05:22.600 The film that just came out is part one of two.

00:05:25.400 Part two is being released in a year, and there are differences between the film adaptation,

00:05:31.200 the stage adaptation and the book but just so we're all on the same page we are going to be

00:05:37.300 centering this conversation and this episode around the movie that just came out and particularly

00:05:43.460 on the story of part one because that's what's in the zeitgeist right now and i think it gives

00:05:49.400 us enough to talk about i have 13 pages of notes so it gave me a lot it gave me enough to think

00:05:54.420 about i want to start off this episode by talking through some of the major plot points in wicked

00:05:59.860 so if you haven't seen the movie yet or have gone 25 years without ever seeing or hearing about the

00:06:07.100 show no shade to you all good but if you are someone who's very concerned with spoilers then

00:06:13.620 maybe wait until you've seen the movie to continue listening to the episode if that's something you

00:06:18.600 care about if you've already seen it or you just want to keep rolling with the episode

00:06:21.400 i am going to explain the basic plot of the first act of wicked right now wicked tells the

00:06:27.340 intertwined backstory of Glinda the Good Witch and Elphaba the Wicked Witch, two characters which

00:06:32.940 we're already familiar with from the 1939 classic film The Wizard of Oz based on the 1900 book by

00:06:39.480 Frank L. Baum. This is a long time ago. This story has existed for a long time. We go into Wicked

00:06:46.860 thinking obviously that Elphaba is the Wicked Witch of the West and that Glinda is the Good

00:06:51.960 witch and wicked serves to complicate that narrative and some would argue flip it entirely

00:06:57.900 wicked opens where the wizard of oz ends with the citizens of oz learning that the wicked witch of

00:07:04.240 the west has just been killed by a little girl you may know her named dorothy dorothy was messy 0.97

00:07:11.720 as fuck glinda visits the people of oz to confirm the news and basically all of oz is throwing a 0.99

00:07:20.440 celebration that the Wicked Witch of the West has been killed. They're burning statues of her, 0.99

00:07:25.560 there's posters everywhere exaggerating her features, and painting her as this sort of

00:07:30.760 monstrous villain who's finally been defeated. During the opening song, No One Mourns the Wicked,

00:07:36.260 Glinda is attempting to celebrate with the rest of the Ozians, who she's just confirmed the news to,

00:07:42.160 but she's clearly pained. And Ariana Grande does a great job of showing that pain in small ways

00:07:49.180 with her face before glinda flees the scene and ozian asks her if the rumors are true that glinda

00:07:55.660 and elphaba were once friends this is such a messy thing also imagine being at a celebration

00:08:02.400 burning down statues of this lady and then being like wait glinda is it true that you were buddy

00:08:09.440 buddy with her glinda initially says yes and then she walks it back immediately she's like well 1.00

00:08:15.500 we didn't know each other. And then she walks that back and says, well, we crossed paths back

00:08:21.880 at school. This basically sets the scene for Glinda to narrate the rest of Wicked, which is

00:08:27.780 the backstory starting from when they were young children of how Glinda and Elphaba came to be in

00:08:33.920 one another's lives. Glinda grew up an upper class spoiled brat, while Elphaba was the daughter of

00:08:40.480 the mayor of Munchkinland, but not biologically, because actually Elphaba's mom had an affair with

00:08:46.420 an unknown traveler. And as such, Elphaba was born green. Elphaba spends her whole childhood

00:08:53.840 shunned and silenced by her father, as well as bullied by the rest of the world at school and

00:08:59.000 anytime she went out in public for being green. This is that very clear racism allegory I was

00:09:04.480 talking about. Anyway, Elphaba and Glinda end up at Shiz together. Shiz is, like, I don't know,

00:09:11.020 the University of Maryland of Oz. Glinda and Elphaba get assigned to dorm together, and

00:09:16.480 initially, they hate each other. Glinda hates Elphaba for the same shallow reasons everybody

00:09:21.640 else does. Elphaba hates Glinda because Glinda represents, you know, everyone who's always been

00:09:27.280 mean to her, and is also a glaring example of societal inequality and blind privilege. 0.99

00:09:33.640 Eventually, Glinda and Elphaba grow to become best friends, maybe even more lesbians. 0.99

00:09:41.720 Just kidding. 0.95

00:09:42.480 I mean, I'm not just kidding, but this is not that video.

00:09:45.660 But it can be, if you want it to be.

00:09:47.260 But they become closer through a series of events in which each of them grow empathetic

00:09:51.740 towards the plight of the other.

00:09:53.420 Elphaba is naturally drawn towards social justice, which makes a lot of sense because

00:09:58.180 she has been for her entire life exposed to inequality and discrimination. Elphaba also,

00:10:04.880 even though she knows it's shallow, laments the fact that she's green and admits to the viewer,

00:10:09.760 but not to the people around her, that she longs to be a normal color. She pities Glinda for being 0.99

00:10:15.300 so shallow and vapid, but also secretly longs for some of the access and power and beauty that 0.99

00:10:21.220 Glinda has always naturally had access to. Glinda, on the other hand, finds personal fulfillment in

00:10:27.000 helping Elphaba achieve beauty and status. This is where the song Popular comes in.

00:10:32.820 Popular. Gonna be popular. Just kidding, you don't follow me for singing? This is, by the way,

00:10:41.600 a large part of why Glinda helps anybody with anything. She's obsessed with good deeds, 0.94

00:10:46.660 but ultimately only insofar as they can advertise her as a good person to others. 0.68

00:10:52.040 She cares less about the good thing that she's doing for someone else, and a lot more about how that will reflect back on her own image.

00:10:59.940 In short, Glinda and Elphaba each have what the other lacks.

00:11:03.860 Glinda has riches and beauty and popularity, but lacks a purpose bigger than herself.

00:11:09.420 Meanwhile, Elphaba has a deeply held sense of purpose, but lacks beauty and popularity.

00:11:14.220 and that divide initially yields loathing, unadulterated loathing between them, but it

00:11:23.260 ultimately allows them to foster empathy for one another and eventually even love. And whether or

00:11:29.300 not that's romantic love is for you to decide. Meanwhile, a fascist project is underway in Oz.

00:11:36.360 One of their professors, Dr. Dillamond, who is a goat, explains to them how animals have long

00:11:42.760 existed in Oz on basically equal footing with humans. Shiz, for example, used to be full of 0.95

00:11:50.160 animal professors and scholars. But as a result of political and economic turmoil, animals like 0.52

00:11:57.060 Dr. Dillamond are being removed from society and stripped of their right to speak by a government

00:12:02.560 that's blaming them for all of the problems in Oz. In other words, they're being scapegoated.

00:12:07.980 scapegoated scapegoated dr dillamond is a goat scapegoat oh animals in oz are basically a stand 0.51

00:12:22.920 and symbol for oppressed groups in society something which makes wicked so applicable

00:12:28.540 to so many different points in history because at various points in history the plight of the

00:12:32.680 animals in Oz could symbolize the plight of Jews in Nazi Germany, or when thinking about the United

00:12:38.960 States right now, really resembles the scapegoating of, for example, trans kids or undocumented

00:12:45.940 immigrants. People who are essentially being pushed to the margins of society to make people

00:12:50.740 feel better about the fact that they can't afford the price of groceries. Elphaba's life of facing

00:12:56.120 anti-green discrimination has made her privy to identifying with other marginalized groups,

00:13:01.180 and so she takes up the marginalization of animals as her cause.

00:13:05.560 Glinda initially doesn't really understand this

00:13:08.420 because Glinda has a hard time thinking of anyone but herself.

00:13:12.580 Dr. Dillamond eventually gets taken away by the Ozian cops, 0.85

00:13:16.460 who, if I had written the novel, I would have made the cops pigs.

00:13:20.360 Meanwhile, Madame Morrible, who is one of the more notable professors at Shiz, 1.00

00:13:25.780 she teaches magic.

00:13:27.380 She's one of the only people who's basically been nice to Elphaba

00:13:30.280 since the beginning because she was always able to recognize that Elphaba had the natural powers

00:13:35.780 of a sorceress in a way that Glinda and the other students don't. Madame Morrible is training Elphaba

00:13:42.140 in the background to meet the wizard, which Elphaba is super ecstatic about because that's all of their

00:13:48.840 lifelong dreams, and she also hopes that she'll be able to ask the wizard to grant her one biggest

00:13:54.380 wish, which at this point is to be de-greenified. She's also hoping that the wizard will be able to 0.96

00:14:00.580 do something about the plight of the animals, because the wizard in this story is kind of set

00:14:05.380 up as an allegory for, like, God or Jesus. You know, a false prophet who arrived one day, who

00:14:11.700 promised that he could solve everybody's issues and understand the world in a way that nobody

00:14:17.300 else fundamentally could, and of course, he's unable to do any of those things. Eventually,

00:14:22.160 they do get an invitation to meet the wizard, and Elphaba goes and brings Glinda with her.

00:14:27.440 They go, yada yada. Elphaba realizes that the wizard has no power, but also realizes that he's

00:14:33.500 been the mastermind behind the fascist oppression and rounding up of the animals. The wizard,

00:14:38.860 knowing that Elphaba has magic that he does not possess, wants to use her and her magic to aid in

00:14:45.420 his fascist project. He promises Elphaba a place in the castle where she can live and essentially 0.51

00:14:51.740 a spot in his, you know, cabinet and says that if she stays, then Glinda can join them. Elphaba

00:14:57.900 refuses. She starts running away. Glinda chases after her, tells her to stop fighting and just

00:15:03.460 apologize to the wizard. Madame Morrible gets on the Aussie and loudspeakers and declares Elphaba

00:15:09.900 a wicked witch and an enemy of the state. Fuck Madame Morrible. Michelle Yeoh, you are so lucky 1.00

00:15:16.280 that you had such a great performance in Everything Everywhere All at Once because you were so

00:15:20.780 convincingly evil and wicked that I actually almost started disliking you as a person. Queen.

00:15:25.900 Elphaba creates a magic flying brune that she can use to escape on, and she asks Glinda to come with

00:15:31.580 her. Insert defying gravity, which we are about to hold some space for the lyrics of. Elphaba and

00:15:39.360 Glinda at the end of the film share this tender and decisive moment. Elphaba decides that she's

00:15:45.480 gonna flee and you know become an enemy of the state so as to not abandon her morals but glinda 0.99

00:15:51.400 doesn't have it in her to do the same she stays behind and ultimately joins the wizard's fascist

00:15:56.920 project both of them have so much love and respect for each other at this point that they are

00:16:01.800 genuinely devastated to say goodbye and when they wish each other well in this last scene

00:16:06.800 they really mean it and that's the end of the film before we talk about glinda i want to talk

00:16:11.900 a little bit about how Wicked represents fascism. There's the things that are really obvious,

00:16:16.880 right? The scapegoating and othering of the animals, the silencing of dissent, the silencing

00:16:22.360 and dehumanization of anyone who speaks out against the fascist project. But one of the

00:16:27.760 sneakier ways that they employ fascist tactics in Wicked, which I thought was really interesting,

00:16:33.780 is the way that the story leans into associating goodness with physical beauty and wickedness with

00:16:40.700 physical ugliness. You know, it's not a coincidence that Glinda the Good Witch is played by a petite, 1.00

00:16:48.340 conventionally beautiful white lady, and why Elphaba is green. As Elphaba is running away 0.82

00:16:54.780 from Madame Marble and the wizard at the very end of the film, you hear Madame Marble on the 0.80

00:17:00.400 loudspeaker saying, her green skin is but a manifestation of her twisted nature. Later on,

00:17:06.920 but actually at the beginning of the movie when she's already dead.

00:17:10.060 The posters that you see hanging around at the celebration of her death

00:17:13.420 are all exaggerating her physical features like her nose.

00:17:17.440 I found this to be really harrowing because it reminds me a lot,

00:17:21.540 and this is something I've talked about on this podcast before,

00:17:24.080 because it is a very reliable way to dehumanize people, right?

00:17:26.860 Think about how the Jews were depicted as rats and vermin and lice during the Holocaust.

00:17:32.760 I'll put up some images of those posters on the screen, 0.70

00:17:35.280 but it's really disturbing. And it also reminds me of the way trans people are depicted in media

00:17:41.580 now. Think about the types of queer people that libs of TikTok chooses to put on blast. 0.81

00:17:47.420 They usually can't pass as cis. They oftentimes are hairy or fat. And by the way, I don't think 1.00

00:17:54.860 there's anything wrong with any of that. And I don't think it makes anyone any less deserving

00:17:58.740 of respect. But that clearly is the message of a page like libs of TikTok, is that if you are

00:18:04.760 visually gender non-conforming or fat or hairy that outward failure to conform to traditional 0.80

00:18:12.480 standards of beauty must be a reflection of your inner wickedness just think about all the viral 0.95

00:18:17.780 tweets that you may or may not have seen but they piss me off so i'm happy that i found a place to

00:18:22.160 talk about them these viral tweets comparing current assistant secretary of the department

00:18:27.240 of health rachel levine who's a trans woman who's currently the highest ranking trans person ever to

00:18:32.860 federal government with rfk you know there's all these viral tweets like this one from twitter user

00:18:39.320 normal catholic girl who said department of health 2020 versus 2024 and on the left it's a picture of

00:18:46.880 rachel levine and on the right it's a picture of rfk jr and the idea of holding up rfk jr as the

00:18:54.220 pinnacle of health in any sense is very funny to me but it's rfk jr shirtless looking muscular

00:19:01.160 looking ripped. And the idea here is that Rachel Levine is a worse and less competent person

00:19:08.820 because she, what, is trans? Also, not that it's really my business to speculate, but it's pretty 0.99

00:19:17.440 clear to me that RFK takes some sort of performance enhancing drugs or like HGH or testosterone or

00:19:24.020 something for his muscles to look that way at his age. So the idea that because he looks like that

00:19:29.360 he's inherently healthy or healthier than Rachel Levine is just ridiculous. But what we're

00:19:35.440 describing here more generally is phrenology, which is a pseudoscience that basically takes

00:19:41.600 the shape of someone's skull and uses it to draw conclusions about their character. And you can see

00:19:47.780 how and why that that's been used by fascist movements many times throughout history. It's

00:19:52.700 what happens in Oz and it's what's happening in America. Which, by the way, sometimes like

00:19:58.360 liberals online try to do a sort of woke phrenology where they're like why do all conservative men

00:20:05.380 have a similar face why does charlie kirk have this inherently conservative smile guys don't do

00:20:12.040 that trying to make inferences about someone's character or politics by the way they look

00:20:16.400 it's a real slippery slope and when that same line of thinking gets used against you

00:20:20.760 you're going to realize why it was never good to begin with sorry just a little rant like guys we

00:20:25.920 don't want to do left-wing phrenology. It's, it's, it's not a good look. You know, I do this whole

00:20:33.480 operation myself. I research and film and edit this podcast. I do all the social media stuff.

00:20:40.640 It's all me. It's, it's all me. And I'm not complaining. I love my job. I do. But one does

00:20:47.240 run out of time to do, you know, other things that you need to be a person like cooking. And so I

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00:22:05.800 sponsoring today's episode and let's get back to the show. Okay, we've discussed fascism.

00:22:13.920 Now let's discuss Glinda. Ariana Grande, please come to the stage. I think Glinda is such a rich 0.54

00:22:20.840 text. You know, you could argue that at its core, Wicked completely subverts the idea of the Wicked

00:22:27.780 Witch and the Good Witch, revealing Elphaba to actually be the good one, the hero, if you will,

00:22:33.120 and Glinda to be the real Wicked Witch. And while I certainly agree that Elphaba is good,

00:22:39.020 I think drawing a conclusion on Glinda and her politics and her motivations

00:22:43.900 is actually a little more complicated. Elphaba's politics are somewhat straightforward. She's

00:22:50.200 a leftist and likely a black leftist at that. She's been racially discriminated against her 0.69

00:22:56.080 whole life and practices intersectionality by standing in solidarity with other groups

00:23:01.580 against the institutions that oppress them all. And for doing this, she gets labeled as a treasonous

00:23:06.980 terrorist. Does that sound familiar? Elphaba, it's worth noting, also has a lot less to lose than

00:23:13.960 Glinda. Glinda comes from an upper-class background, and coming into the film, she lives her life in 0.81

00:23:19.980 such a degree of comfort and wealth that she literally cannot understand when something

00:23:25.720 doesn't go her way. That's her origin. Total delusional self-absorption. Like I said, she does

00:23:32.520 have a penchant for helping others, but only when it serves her own image, and not if it requires

00:23:38.200 taking any sort of risk or sacrificing her own comfort. And on top of that, sometimes she

00:23:43.600 misdiagnoses what she's even trying to help. A little bit of a pink savior complex, if you ask 1.00

00:23:48.980 me. Like, when she first gets to Shiz and she sees Elphaba for the first time, she unprompted

00:23:54.480 apologizes to Elphaba for the fact that she's green and says that she'll help Elphaba work

00:23:59.960 through it. To which Elphaba replies, I don't really have to work through it. Mind your fucking

00:24:04.540 business. It's fine. Elphaba's sister, who I've failed to mention up until this point, is also at 1.00

00:24:10.700 shiz and in a wheelchair. Her name is Nessa. Glinda pities Nessa in the most patronizing,

00:24:17.740 ableist way possible by continuing to call her tragically beautiful. Throughout the story though,

00:24:23.360 and through her relationship with Elphaba, I would argue that Glinda becomes a little more aware,

00:24:29.960 a little more observant, a little more caring, dare I say it, a little more woke. And by the

00:24:36.240 end of the film, she's genuinely supportive of Elphaba's decision to take a revolutionary

00:24:41.640 fight from the outside kind of stance, but, you know, not enough to join her. Ultimately,

00:24:48.360 Glinda devotes her life to upholding a system that she knows is corrupt. She knows that the 0.97

00:24:53.620 wizard is full of shit, but she commits to helping him with his fascist project, which involves 1.00

00:24:58.740 dehumanizing minorities and dehumanizing her best friend because what she values most is comfort and 1.00

00:25:04.120 power. So where exactly do Glinda's politics land? And if you want this to be a Glinda roast, 1.00

00:25:12.220 it's not going to be that. But if you want it to be a Glinda celebration, it's also not going to

00:25:17.060 be that. I'm a Glinda skeptic and I'll tell you why. I think if we were to project our current

00:25:23.940 political landscape onto Glinda, she would represent various aspects of conservatism,

00:25:30.380 of evangelical Christianity, of liberal centrism, and of white feminism, all of which have circles

00:25:38.120 that overlap at different points. At her absolute worst, and perhaps at her introduction, Glinda

00:25:44.100 could be seen as a conservative hack who cares about nothing and no one but herself and preserving 1.00

00:25:50.160 her wealth and comfort. This is how we're introduced to Glinda, but there are also various 0.99

00:25:55.000 points later in the film where she betrays the fact that there's still a lot of this in her

00:25:59.800 underlying ideology and worldview. Like right before she and Elphaba get on the train to go to

00:26:05.920 Oz, which is about two-thirds of the way through the film, Glinda is complaining to Elphaba about

00:26:11.260 how her boyfriend, Prince Fierro, has been really emotionally removed from the relationship ever

00:26:16.340 since the day that Dr. Dilliman, the goat teacher, was taken away by the police, the

00:26:22.040 Aussie and Gestapo. Fierro was really taken aback by that and hadn't been the same since.

00:26:27.380 And Glinda, recalling this, says, who knew he cared so much about that old goat?

00:26:32.400 Glinda, I think, is also a pretty heavy-handed parody of evangelical Christianity. You know,

00:26:39.240 for most of the film, Glinda is very fixated on the aesthetic of kindness. She's much more

00:26:46.320 concerned with everyone thinking that she's kind, but much less concerned with the material outcome

00:26:52.600 of how she treats other people. Does that sound familiar? Glinda's a very bless your heart type

00:27:00.000 of kind. If you're from the South, you know what I mean. She's very, uh, she's very, I love gay

00:27:09.300 people. I love them enough to tell them that their sin is taking them to hell. 1.00

00:27:15.200 I love homosexuals, if you can believe that. I love them enough to tell them the truth because I know that there is hope for the homosexuals that if they're willing to turn from sin the same as any individual, that they can be ex-homosexuals the same as there can be an ex-murderer, an ex-thief, or ex-anybody. 1.00

00:27:34.500 Ugh, you know it's not an episode of A Bit Fruity unless I invoke a little Anita Bryant. 0.85

00:27:39.720 Glinda's only kind when it's in service of improving her own image, 1.00

00:27:43.440 and she's capable of immense cruelty as long as she believes that she's being kind.

00:27:49.300 In many ways, I think the fact that Glinda ends up being known as the Good Witch

00:27:53.620 is kind of a parody on how we view goodness.

00:27:58.080 You know, if you look the part and you sound the part,

00:28:00.940 the material consequences of your actions don't really matter.

00:28:04.500 Finally, I would like to see Glinda through the lens of liberal centrism and performative 1.00

00:28:12.020 white feminism. Walk with me here. Once Elphaba and Glinda become friends, Elphaba begins drawing 1.00

00:28:18.580 the attention of Glinda's hot boyfriend, Fierro. Jonathan Bailey, by the way, you have never looked

00:28:24.880 better. And I almost bought the heterosexuality. I almost bought it. And then you did Dancing

00:28:31.180 through life and your enthusiasm towards the tap dancing was just a little too high your 0.81

00:28:36.200 homosexuality betrayed you try again anyway fiero starts to become attracted to elphaba's deep

00:28:42.800 investment in social causes a type of passion for something outside of herself that glinda is

00:28:48.460 fundamentally incapable of having but once glinda realizes that fiero is really into this about 0.96

00:28:53.580 elphaba glinda starts glomming onto social justice in the shallowest way possible like at the

00:28:59.380 beginning of the film glinda's actual name from birth is galinda like g-a linda but dr dilliman

00:29:07.200 the goat that got taken away he could never say that correctly because he was a goat and so he'd

00:29:13.500 be like galinda oh my god though goat impression on the a bit fruity pod but so dr dilliman would

00:29:23.920 always call her just Glinda. And so after Dr. Dilliman gets taken away and Glinda wants to

00:29:29.580 virtue signal so that her boyfriend will like her more, she in front of everyone says, I'm changing

00:29:35.160 my name from Galinda to just Glinda in honor of the animal rights cause. Ariana Grande captured

00:29:43.140 the humor of these bits so well, but also this is very Facebook social justice profile picture 0.58

00:29:52.740 frame. It's a very June 2020 Instagram black square. You know Glinda would have been all over

00:29:59.760 Blackout Tuesday. But Glinda also genuinely does support Elphaba in her cause until the moment

00:30:06.980 she's tasked with sacrificing her own comfort or betraying her wealth or reputation or status or 0.99

00:30:14.120 good graces in the eyes of power. Then she turns back. It's giving liberal. It's giving white

00:30:22.900 feminist. So by the end of the film, it's not that Glinda doesn't care. She does, especially 0.89

00:30:28.980 about Elphaba. But she's unwilling to sacrifice her place in the hierarchy of power or put

00:30:35.780 anything on the line in order to stand in those values. Next, I want to talk about what I think

00:30:41.860 is actually the most interesting and illustrative thing that Glinda does, which is her absolutely 0.79

00:30:47.700 soul-rotting pursuit of power. Glinda's ultimate ambition in Wicked, more important to her than 0.97

00:30:54.580 justice for the animals, and ultimately more important to her than her relationship with

00:30:59.520 Elphaba, is achieving status and power within the political establishment of Oz. That and wearing

00:31:06.420 the cundiest false lashes i've ever seen on a witch she wants to live in the palace and work 1.00

00:31:12.800 for the wizard even after it's revealed to her that the wizard is some fraudulent hack pause

00:31:19.580 i know we're keeping this episode and this analysis relegated to the part one movie

00:31:24.040 but i'd like to insert here that yes ultimately in part two she does little spoiler use her power

00:31:32.740 against the wizard and i know some people are going to comment pointing that out but even if

00:31:37.920 we factor that in here we'd have to acknowledge that in the process of eventually coming around

00:31:43.400 to wielding her power against the wizard she does an incredible amount of harm both in the

00:31:48.540 scapegoating of minorities and in fueling the dehumanizing propaganda against her best friend

00:31:54.200 while working on the wizard's behalf so perhaps that's all a nod to the limits of trying to you

00:32:01.860 know, change the system from the inside. But back to this movie. Glinda turns her back on Elphaba

00:32:09.380 in the final hour because she wants a spot in Trump's, I mean the wizard's, cabinet. Trump 0.60

00:32:16.520 announces Glinda as Secretary of Glamour. And ultimately, although she sacrifices the love

00:32:22.560 and friendship of her life for it, she does get it. She's made Glinda the Good Witch. Pause.

00:32:29.180 i want to talk about megan kelly megan kelly is a conservative news commentator and former fox 0.91

00:32:36.300 news host she was a frequent flyer on fox from 2004 the 2004 yeah 2004 to 2017 in 2015 during

00:32:48.860 the republican presidential primary debate on fox news which megan kelly hosted she asked donald

00:32:55.460 Trump if a man of his temperament was fit to be president.

00:32:59.620 Mr. Trump, one of the things people love about you is you speak your mind and you don't use

00:33:04.980 a politician's filter. However, that is not without its downsides, in particular when it

00:33:10.100 comes to women. You've called women you don't like fat pigs, dogs, slobs, and disgusting animals. 1.00

00:33:18.340 Your Twitter account- Only Rosie O'Donnell. 0.99

00:33:20.660 no it wasn't for the record it was well beyond rosey o'donnell yes i'm sure your twitter account

00:33:29.160 has several disparaging comments about women's looks you once told a contestant on celebrity

00:33:34.740 apprentice it would be a pretty picture to see her on her knees does that sound to you like the

00:33:39.860 temperament of a man we should elect as president i think the big problem this country has is being 0.86

00:33:46.100 politically correct. This was the first time that he ran for president. This was like 16 lives ago.

00:33:53.620 The next day, in an interview with Don Lemon, Trump made wildly memorable and misogynistic

00:33:59.860 comments about Megyn Kelly, including an insinuation that she was on her period while

00:34:04.900 she was moderating the debate, and that's why she put even the slightest amount of pressure on Trump. 0.93

00:34:10.120 She gets out and she starts asking me all sorts of ridiculous questions. And, 0.96

00:34:14.580 You know, you could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever. 1.00

00:34:20.900 This led to a long media row between Megyn Kelly and Donald Trump. 0.99

00:34:26.160 And there was, by the way, some conservative media backlash to it at the time.

00:34:30.980 Like, there were other conservative pundits who were like, Donald Trump, that was out of line. 1.00

00:34:35.480 You can't say shit like that. 0.99

00:34:37.000 But you know, that was many moons ago, back when some people in conservative media had fucking spines and were willing to criticize him. 0.99

00:34:43.960 A year later, in 2016, amid a lawsuit against the head of Fox News, Roger Ailes, alleging that he had been sexually abusing female employees at Fox for years, it was revealed that Megyn Kelly internally came forward as a victim of his harassment.

00:35:00.120 This whole ordeal was fictionalized, by the way, in the movie Bombshell, where Megyn Kelly is perfectly played by Charlize Theron, and you should pause this podcast and go watch that movie. It is so good. And that movie's from 2019, and it makes the rest of Megyn Kelly's career arc even more pathetic and sad to watch.

00:35:19.560 That lady went through so much misogyny, sexual harassment, so much bullshit while she was at Fox News, and the fact that she landed where she is today is just, well, give me a second. 1.00

00:35:33.700 Shortly after the 2016 Roger Ailes harassment suit was the 2016 Republican National Convention, where Megyn Kelly wore a, you know, strappy black dress. 0.98

00:35:44.840 first of all, she looked so good. And I hate saying anything nice about Megyn Kelly, but she

00:35:49.000 looked fabulous. And for this strappy black dress, she was absolutely lambasted by conservative media

00:35:55.460 pundits. And so amidst the falling dominoes of anti-Megyn Kelly misogyny, she was briefly

00:36:02.900 portrayed by popular media as this sort of feminist figure. And for one brief and fleeting moment,

00:36:10.460 she took up the cause. She left Fox in 2017 when her contract expired and had a two-year stint

00:36:18.120 hosting a daytime talk show on NBC where she briefly ditched the conservative news commentary

00:36:23.820 for something honestly a lot more mellow. Also, this is really random and something I have never

00:36:29.800 spoken about, but my aunt went on this briefly existing Megyn Kelly talk show.

00:36:35.580 so you're probably wondering who my aunt is

00:36:40.820 my aunt was in a cult

00:36:44.440 what my aunt was raised in the cult the moonies her name is lisa cone she wrote a book about it

00:36:52.120 uh i talked to her all the time i love her so much uh shout out lisa but when my aunt was

00:36:58.900 promoting the book that she published you know i guess six or seven years ago she did a daytime

00:37:05.200 talk show sit down interview with megan kelly who as far as i'm aware was really nice at the time

00:37:10.280 i'll link my aunt's book about uh growing up in and then escaping a cult in the episode description

00:37:16.420 i suppose didn't didn't think i was going to talk about that one today but is i suppose a small

00:37:21.800 world megan kelly's little daytime talk show stint ended in october 2018 when she did a segment 0.91

00:37:29.720 defending blackface and discussing how back in her day you could wear blackface in a halloween

00:37:36.580 costume and it was okay before the wokes came along what is racist because because truly you 0.70

00:37:43.180 do get in trouble if you are a white person who puts on blackface on halloween or a black person 0.65

00:37:47.560 who puts on whiteface for halloween like back when i was a kid that was okay as long as you 0.92

00:37:52.340 were dressing up as like a character there was a controversy on the real housewives of new york 1.00

00:37:55.660 with Luann as she dresses Diana Ross and she made her skin look darker than it really is. 0.97

00:38:01.080 And people said that that was racist. And I don't know. I felt like, who doesn't love Diana Ross?

00:38:06.000 She wants to look like Diana Ross for one day. I don't know how like that got racist on Halloween. 0.97

00:38:11.860 Megan, girl, you make it so hard to defend you. So after being canceled by the blue haired woke

00:38:20.540 left for being racist, she returned to the cozy arms of conservative news media, launching a now

00:38:28.980 very popular Sirius XM podcast, The Megyn Kelly Show, where she, as of this morning, is on air

00:38:36.200 defending Trump's Secretary of Defense pick, Pete Hegseth, from his own sexual assault allegations.

00:38:43.000 This allegation should not tank his nomination. It's not fair to cost him a position like this

00:38:50.060 based on an unsubstantiated accusation.

00:38:53.500 It doesn't become more substantiated

00:38:55.160 because it wound up in a police report,

00:38:57.420 maybe slightly more because she's at least taking the risk 0.80

00:38:59.920 of potentially perjuring herself

00:39:03.320 when she goes down this lane, but not much. 1.00

00:39:06.800 Here's the thing, fuck Megyn Kelly, 0.99

00:39:09.940 but also I can't help but feel like she's lost 1.00

00:39:13.860 a bit of her soul in all of this, right?

00:39:17.100 I mean, while Trump was campaigning this time around

00:39:19.600 for president, Megyn Kelly spoke at one of his events and was on stage hugging him. Hugging the

00:39:25.900 man who, because she criticized him once, made a joke on air about blood coming out of her vagina. 0.98

00:39:33.380 I don't really, at the end of the day, have much sympathy for Megyn Kelly because I really think 0.99

00:39:39.920 she's made her bed. And not only that, but the rhetoric that she spews and the platform that

00:39:45.620 she's built to spew it hurts so many people. I mean, the stuff that Megyn Kelly has been saying

00:39:51.220 about trans people is just reprehensible. But if I dig deep in my soul, which for just this moment

00:39:57.180 I'm willing to do, and look for some Megyn Kelly sympathy, just as I try to do with the other people

00:40:02.460 I talk about on this podcast, like Riley Gaines, I see people who have found everything they wanted

00:40:09.940 in terms of power and success and money and fame.

00:40:15.320 And yeah, they got it. 1.00

00:40:16.980 Megyn Kelly got it.

00:40:18.420 But at what cost to her integrity

00:40:21.020 and her truth and her soul? 0.99

00:40:24.120 Megyn Kelly has to go to bed at night

00:40:26.020 knowing that speaking honestly 1.00

00:40:27.920 about the horrific misogynistic abuse,

00:40:31.860 both physical and verbal,

00:40:33.360 that she has received

00:40:34.160 from all of these conservative men around her

00:40:36.340 stands in the way of her professional ambition

00:40:39.420 and having the career that she wants.

00:40:42.240 And so the question is, is it worth it?

00:40:45.260 And maybe for her it is, but it's not without a cost.

00:40:49.780 I would like to give a quick shout out

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00:42:42.100 And now, let's get back to it.

00:42:45.820 I want to switch gears. 0.84

00:42:47.360 I want to switch gears to Caitlyn Jenner.

00:42:50.760 Ariana, I am so sorry.

00:42:52.400 Caitlyn Jenner, a rich and famous former decathlete, that means I think 10, sports, good for her, and partially responsible for the spawn of the Kar-Jenner dynasty, publicly came out as transgender in 2015 with a cover of the Vanity Fair magazine where she's posed like a pinup girl.

00:43:11.780 It's a beautiful cover shot by Annie Leibovitz.

00:43:15.100 And personal side note, I remember the day that this magazine cover came out.

00:43:19.860 I was in high school.

00:43:21.100 I first saw it when I was sitting in art class with my other gay friends.

00:43:24.240 And we were so excited.

00:43:26.840 Caitlin was at the time, and honestly, probably still the most famous person to have ever come

00:43:32.980 out as transgender. 0.98

00:43:34.080 And we were fucking stoked. 0.98

00:43:36.000 But after an exceptionally brief stint of solidarity with other trans people, 0.97

00:43:41.780 Caitlyn ultimately took up the cause of being an extraordinarily wealthy white woman,

00:43:47.020 campaigning for Republicans, and even briefly running a campaign for the Republican governor 0.98

00:43:52.680 of California in 2021. Caitlyn Jenner for governor. Like, what the fuck timeline do we live in?

00:44:00.320 As you may have heard, don't know if you've heard, the Republican Party took a sharp right turn into 0.99

00:44:07.280 the politics of the anti-trans culture war over the last few years. And while that has happened,

00:44:13.340 Caitlyn Jenner has not wavered. She spent the last three years groveling in submission at the feet

00:44:19.380 of a party that not only hates her, but does not see her as a woman. And by the way, isn't afraid

00:44:25.980 to tell her that whenever they have the opportunity to. Right after Trump won the election a few weeks

00:44:30.940 ago, Caitlyn Jenner got brunch with Donald Trump, his granddaughter, and Elon Musk, a brunch from

00:44:38.000 which Caitlyn posted a photo to her Twitter account where there were thousands of replies

00:44:43.140 from Republicans calling her a man. And so like Megyn Kelly did with women, Caitlyn Jenner betrayed

00:44:51.680 her trans community in pursuit of power. And she's gotten what she wanted, right? She has a literal 1.00

00:44:57.840 seat at the table with some of the most powerful people in the world, but at what cost? And I can't

00:45:05.420 help but feel similarly about Glinda, minus, you know, the vehicular manslaughter. A lot of people,

00:45:12.660 in my opinion, rightfully, criticize Glinda's decision to align with power over her morals or

00:45:19.100 over her best friend. But something that I want to acknowledge, something that I want to throw in the

00:45:23.500 mix, is isn't Glinda ultimately punished too? In Defying Gravity, Glinda and Elphaba sing to each

00:45:31.180 other, I hope you're happy now that you're choosing this. I really hope you get it and you don't live

00:45:36.360 to regret it. And this is what I was thinking as I left the theater crying last night. You know,

00:45:40.840 ultimately, which of them lives to get it and which of them lives to regret it? The superficial

00:45:46.120 answer is easy. Glinda is made the good witch and is beloved by Oz. Elphaba is punished and shunned

00:45:54.260 and relegated to the outskirts of society and dehumanized for the rest of her life. But despite

00:45:59.320 all of this, Elphaba gets to hang on to her morals. She retains her moral compass. She never

00:46:05.400 wavers from her own belief system. She, of course, doesn't have the microphone to honestly

00:46:10.440 communicate those morals to the rest of Oz, but to herself, to her inner self, she never has to lie.

00:46:18.500 She lost everything, but she kept her soul. Glinda, on the other hand, is forced to abandon 0.92

00:46:24.180 not only her relationship to Elphaba, but the truth of the fact that she ever had a relationship

00:46:30.560 with Elphaba, because that truth is not viable to power. You know, at the beginning of the episode,

00:46:36.220 I talked about the beginning of the movie, which the first song is No One Mourns the Wicked,

00:46:41.680 where Glinda is sort of forcing herself to take part in the celebration of the death of her best

00:46:47.600 friend. But there's a real painful look in her face. And when asked whether or not she was ever

00:46:54.220 friends with Elphaba, she lies. And you can tell, again, by the great acting of Ariana Grande,

00:47:00.520 that that lie is really kind of eating her from the inside. The relationship that Glinda had

00:47:06.080 with Elphaba, whether friendly or romantic, who knows, it's up to you, my little gay listener,

00:47:13.380 was arguably the most meaningful relationship Glinda ever had, or at least that we know about.

00:47:18.700 And so the only way for her to hold on to power and status and reputation and fame

00:47:22.800 is to lie about this fundamental part of herself in a way that I feel really parallels the

00:47:28.600 situations of Caitlyn Jenner or Megyn Kelly. People who, to be clear, I have a lot of disdain

00:47:34.600 for for the harm that they cause on others, but for whom, on a psychological level, I think it's

00:47:39.640 interesting to look for the places where I can find sympathy for them. Like, in the end, I think

00:47:45.120 Elphaba and Glinda are both punished. Elphaba's punishment is more obvious, but one could argue

00:47:51.960 that Glinda's punishment rots her deeper to the core. And so lastly, is Glinda the real Wicked

00:47:59.180 Witch? After I watched the movie for the first time, and I decided I wanted to make a podcast

00:48:03.720 about it. My original title for this episode was Glinda is sort of a fascist. A little harsh,

00:48:11.360 a little clickbaity. I know, I know. But after watching it the second time, I realized that

00:48:17.380 writing her off as a spineless, self-absorbed, unforgivable right-wing narcissist might be

00:48:24.260 feeding into the very thing that Wicked is warning against, which is, I think, an oversimplification

00:48:29.800 of who is Wicked and why. The truth, well, you know, my truth, is that I think throughout the

00:48:36.540 story of Wicked, even if just in the part one movie which we're focusing on today, Glinda

00:48:41.660 reveals herself to be capable of genuine good. She does have a rare moment of selflessness when

00:48:47.940 she takes up friendship with Elphaba, knowing that the rest of Shiz would judge her for it. 0.93

00:48:52.500 She's a conflicted and contradictory person, like I said at the top of the episode. But by the end,

00:48:57.840 she clearly has a lot of love for Elphaba. And I also think she has good intentions. And,

00:49:04.180 and those good intentions aren't enough. Because without commitment to principles and a belief

00:49:11.380 system that prioritizes people over power, and ultimately, you know, her prioritization of 1.00

00:49:17.440 comfort over change, she is susceptible to being corrupted by power and becoming a tool of the 1.00

00:49:24.600 fascist project, which is what happens. And that, to me, cuts to one of the core questions Wicked

00:49:30.760 asks us, which is what makes someone wicked? How does wickedness happen? I think that Glinda can

00:49:36.680 ultimately represent the banality of evil, or in this case, the banality of wickedness.

00:49:42.620 The banality of evil is a theory coined by philosopher Hannah Arendt, who, in examining

00:49:48.960 why the Holocaust was able to happen, observed that many people's unwillingness to question

00:49:53.620 systems of power or even think for themselves is what ultimately allowed these systems to act in 0.77

00:49:59.380 the most evil way possible. So basically, I don't think Glinda is wicked, but she's not quite

00:50:05.600 anti-wicked either. And everyone, including her, pays the price. Well, folks, how did I do? How

00:50:14.260 did I do? You know what? I was afraid to do an episode by myself. I've gotten used to like the

00:50:19.860 podcastiness of like, okay, it's always going to be me and someone else. We rally back and forth,

00:50:24.520 da-da-da-da-da. And when I talked about doing this episode on Patreon, people correctly pointed out

00:50:29.260 like, you can basically pluck any gay person off the street in New York City and they will have 0.97

00:50:33.840 this conversation with you. But I was like, let me challenge myself. Let me see if I can do an 0.85

00:50:38.960 episode myself. So here we are. I hope you liked it. I hope it was coherent. I am a little bit

00:50:45.180 nervous of entering this like fictional film slash book slash musical analysis space as someone who

00:50:51.540 doesn't typically do that kind of thing. But I got to be honest, this was fun for me. This was a fun

00:50:56.860 little thought exercise. I thought the movie was absolutely fabulous. I thought everyone in it did

00:51:01.860 an amazing job. You know, Cynthia Erivo, Jesus Christ, my goodness. I hope you enjoyed this

00:51:07.840 episode. If you did, feel free to share it with like, I feel like everyone's having these

00:51:12.940 conversations right now anyone who's seen the movie so share it in the family group chat i don't

00:51:17.960 know send it to megan kelly who gives a fuck i love you so much thanks for being here and until 0.98

00:51:25.840 next time stay wicked oh god that was so fucking corny jesus christ stay fruity 1.00

00:51:35.260 goodbye i love homosexuals 1.00

A Bit Fruity with Matt Bernstein - November 28, 2024

Is Glinda Good？

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