Stupid Comedy Stuff
My name is Emma Kat, and I'm a standup comedian and writer from Austin, TX. Stupid Comedy Stuff is the podcast version of the noise in my noggin. In short, bimonthly episodes, I share my thoughts on comedic subjects ranging from the role of women in standup to my first experience with the catalogue of Pauly Shore. (Watching all the film-age!) If middle-aged ladies with too many opinions are your thing, please subscribe, rate, and review!
Stupid Comedy Stuff
Ice Princess
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After Hayden Panettiere's death on 8/16, I felt inspired to record an episode on the 2005 Disney film Ice Princess. I, too, was a teen figure skater, and I wanted to pay tribute to Michelle Trachtenberg and her co-star Hayden, who tore up the ice on celluloid while setting a new standard for female friendships.
In this episode, I'll briefly recap the movie, tell you some trivia I learned about it, and then share some of my experiences as a teen figure skater.
Sources:
About.com interview with Michelle Trachtenberg:
Campus Circle interview with Michelle Trachtenberg:
https://www.campuscircle.com/review.cfm?r=702
MTV.com interview with Michelle Trachtenberg:
About.com interview with Hayden Panettiere:
People Magazine piece on Hayden's mother's statement:
https://people.com/hayden-panettiere-estranged-mom-speaks-out-after-death-12061596
News article about Zahra Lari:
https://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/04/17/208359
Terry Jinks obituary in Skating Magazine:
https://skatingmagazine.usfigureskating.org/article/Skating_201508-09_25
Spread Eagle Example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxlUk399JqI
Hydro plane/blade Example:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=figure+skating+hydroblade
Magical Rewind "Ice Princess" podcast:
Stupid comedy stock stupid comedy stuff stupid comedy stuff stupid comedy stuff Oh yeah Hello Welcome to Stupid Comedy Stuff I'm Emma Katz I'm your host I'm a writer and stand-up comedian in Austin, Texas, and this is my sporadically updated podcast. I um I'm gonna try to update it more frequently, um, but I I'm not really uh a commitment-ish type of person, so um we'll see how that goes. Today we're gonna be talking about the Disney film, the 2005 Disney film Ice Princess. Now, uh this is not really a comedy, uh, it's really more of a drama, um, but it stars Hayden Panateer and Michelle Trachtenberg. And and given given uh Hayden Paneteer's tragic passing this this uh last week, I felt like it was appropriate to do an episode on this film. And um I do want to mention that I also uh recorded an episode on uh Michelle Tracktenberg's film Euro Trip. This was uh my second podcast episode. So if you want, you can uh go back and listen to that. Um but yeah, today I'm gonna uh pay tribute to these two uh incredible actresses who uh we lost far too soon and uh this this wonderful movie that they left us with. So uh I would be remiss if I didn't mention that I'm recording this podcast today on August 22nd, 2026. And yesterday, August 21st, was Hayden Panateer's 37th birthday. So uh I I just don't I don't really know what to say. I just no one should be gone at 37. Um but um I this this episode I wanted to do I don't you know under the circumstances I I really wanted to talk about this movie because I was also a teen figure skater, just like the the two actresses in the movie. And um I you know this movie came out when I was 20, so uh it's not like I have some nostalgic fondness for it. Uh I don't have like have a childhood attachment to it like some people do. But uh my experience as a teen figure skater was similar in some ways to the two women in the film, but um, but also quite different. And uh so uh in this episode, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna do a plot summary of the movie. I'm gonna share some trivia, and uh then I'm going to compare my experience as a teen skater to each of the lead actresses in the film. And um, then we'll also take a little bit of a dark turn and we'll compare, we'll we'll talk about my mother and compare her to the the two mothers in the movie. So uh if you're ready, let's go. Disney's Ice Princess. Let's do it.
SPEAKER_01For Casey Carlyle, getting A's was easy.
SPEAKER_02Oh, oh come on. Like you didn't get an A? That was the pot. Scary.
SPEAKER_01But fitting in.
SPEAKER_02I don't really go to parties. Sorry.
SPEAKER_01Was nearly impossible.
SPEAKER_02Anyway, that could take a few lessons.
SPEAKER_01Until the moment. A twist of facts.
SPEAKER_02Oh no, it's covered. When you sound like this, I'm not a fight to the house.
SPEAKER_00No way, I just wanted to. We're not making up. You have to want it more than anything else, right? And then you'll let it out.
SPEAKER_01Just thank you about the ice can you.
SPEAKER_04So, first let me say before I begin the plot summary, if you're watching on YouTube, uh, yes, I do have a massive sunburn on my nose and my face, which is ironic. We're talking about a an ice skating movie. I spent the day at the beach. Uh so yeah. Um, and then secondly, I want to say um there is a much, much better recap of this film, a very comprehensive, very funny, very detailed one over on the Magical Rewind Rewind podcast. Uh, that one's hosted by Will Friedel and Sabrina Bryan. And uh you should definitely check that out. It's a really excellent episode. I'm gonna link to it here in the show notes. So that said, here is a summary of Disney's 2005 Ice Princess. This movie is about Casey Carlisle, a brainy science geek played by Michelle Trachtenberg. She's a high school senior who lives on a huge farmhouse in Connecticut with her mom, Joan. And Joan is played by Joan Cusack. I have to say, it always tickles me when the actor's name is the same as the character. Now, uh, Joan is a college professor and a single mom, we think, because Casey's dad never gets mentioned. If he's anything like my dad, he might just be sitting on the toilet the entire movie, but who knows? So uh Casey, at her mom's urging, is trying to get into Harvard, but she needs to get a figure uh physics scholarship, and uh she has to do a personal project to get it. So she decides to do a project on figure skating because Casey, as much as she loves physics, really loves ice skating, and lucky for her, there's a pond in her backyard that she gets to skate on every winter. Much to her mom's chagrin, because her mom, Joan, really hates ice skating, which we'll get more into a little bit later. My cat just jumped up behind me. That's what that belt was. Anyway, Casey goes to a local ice rink to film some skaters for her research. And I gotta tell you, as a veteran of many ice rinks, filming people at while they're skating is a big no-no. I'll just tell you as a quick aside, I absent-mindedly took a video with my phone at a skating rink while I was visiting my mom a couple years ago because I was just like, you know, like dur, you know, this will be a cool Instagram boomerang video. And like almost immediately that skater's coach was like over on the bleachers, like, yeah, put that phone down. Who are you? Like, you know, you'd think like a crackhead just like stumbled into or barge into Taylor Swift's dressing room. Yeah. So, like me, Casey gets busted, and uh, she's busted by none other than Kim Cottrell from Sex in the City. Yeah, in this movie, she's removed the sultry Samantha Jones voice, and she's playing Tina Harwood, a retired former figure skater who now owns a rink and coaches her daughter Jennifer, who goes to high school with Casey. That's Jennifer with a G, which is cool. Like, how often do you see that? And Jennifer is played by the intractable Hayden Penance here. Hello, this is Emma Kat with a corrections corner. I'm stealing this idea from the great podcaster Matt Bernstein, whose podcast a little bit fruity, I really enjoy. So I used the term intractable incorrectly here. I think someone's gonna have to revoke my English degree because I I don't know why. I really thought when I said uh hate impenance here is intractable, in my mind I thought it meant like um like exalted or um like you know unique, like top of their game. But I don't know. I just had this funny feeling, so I Googled it after, and that is not at all what it means. It means stubborn and willful. And um, so I'm making a correction because um, you know, nothing I have read about this this wonderful woman uh in any obituary or remembrance uh indicates that she was intractable. Uh, you know, not like I would expect to read in a um God, I don't know, a Kim Kardashian obituary. Sorry, Kim, I don't know if there's probably a more intractable example I could use, but I am sorry. I did not mean to call Hayden the late, great Hayden Peneteer intractable. She is magnanimous and wonderful. And in my own defense, I um heard Jon Stewart uh say on the weekly show podcast not long ago that he recently learned what erstwhile means. And uh, as we all know, he's the smartest man alive. So okay, I I feel a little bit better. All right, back to the show. And what I really love about this movie is that her character initially is kind of set up like a Regina George type. Uh, you know, she seems like the most popular girl in school. Um, and uh early on there are instances of her dismiss or kind of like belittling or dismissing Casey and uh kind of just generally acting like a mean girl in her direction. Um, like for example, she hands an invitation to Casey for a party at her house and then says, Oh, can you please give this to someone else? Um so, however, uh Jennifer has the most fascinating arc in the whole movie, in my opinion. And I cannot wait to unpack that a little bit more later. So, um, but first, back to Casey and her dreams. So she meets Tina and tells her that she's working on a physics project and wants to observe the skaters and their moves. And uh this all eventually leads to Casey taking classes at the rink and starting with the snowplow Sam class, which is a real class. Like I've taken it, they really call it Snowplow Sam. And uh that's the most basic one. It's uh the first one that anyone has to take. Uh, that's where they teach you to stop properly, to fall properly, move forwards, move backwards. And in this movie, they even get styrofoam butt pads. That's a luxury I never had. Me and my bruised baby booty would have definitely loved that. Um, and Casey is really good. I mean, she's fantastically good. She progresses very quickly. By the time her class has its first recital, she gets a solo. And uh the thing is, uh, to pay for her skating habit, she's also working at the ice rink concession stand so that she can get the money for like the lessons, the ice time, and all those expensive bells and whistles that come along with ice skating. So it's just at the rink, basically 24-7. And she's doing all this while hiding her blossoming hobby from her mother, uh, who tells her at one point during the movie, you know, if I just saw you in one of those little skating outfits, I'd cry. You know, it's like, okay, Joan, we get it. You've got a flair for the dramatic. Like, I don't get she really hates skating in this movie. Like, did her husband cheat on her with Christi Yamaguchi? Like, I don't, I don't know. It's it's a little bit much, it's kind of weird, but yeah, she I don't know why she hates skating so much. Um, so uh meanwhile, Casey's moving up in levels and she's outranking her peers, but she's also helping Jen and Jen's friends Tiffany and Nikki improve their skating by applying physics principles. Now, uh Nikki refers to herself as the quote jumping shrimp, and she says that her mom quote copyrighted it. Although I'm sure that she meant to say she trademarked it because you cannot copyright a brand name. Uh, that's a trademark, Nikki. Like I did not work at a legal document company for three years not to know that. Also, I am five foot one, so I guess you can call me the insufferable shrimp. So uh Casey and Jen are getting closer. Uh Jen invites Casey to hang out for real this time. Uh Jen is uh impressed with Casey. And uh they so see this is this is the great thing about Jen. Like, you know, they they kind of position her as a mean girl, but she she changes, like it's just so good. Um but they go to this party where Jen encourages Casey to mingle and maybe even hook up. Um but the thing about Jen is that her mom has her on a strict training schedule and diet, and uh she envies Casey because she can sleep in and eat cheese. Uh, but Casey is jealous that Jen gets to skate whenever she wants, and she can't because her mom thinks that skating is like a form of sex work. Uh so Casey is this subplot is stupid, but uh Casey is also kind of dating Jen's brother, uh, who does the Zamboni at the ice rink. His name is Teddy. Um, although as I like this a lot better, as many have pointed out on social media, this movie has like a very strong lesbian undercurrent to it. Like, once I saw that, I I just cannot unsee it now. I mean, yeah, like Jen and Casey. Okay, yes. Anyway, as competitors, Jen and Casey are neck and neck at the big regional competition. They end up ranking fourth and fifth, and both of them are beaten by Zoe Block, the bad girl skater of the movie, who you can tell is bad because she has a nose ring and she skates in fishnets. Uh, she also wears the ugliest denim two-piece outfit that I have ever seen, but that is neither here nor there. So uh Zoe makes a rude comment about Casey's old skates, and Tina buys Casey brand new ones on the spot. Now, this may seem like a wonderful act of kindness, and Casey certainly takes it that way. Um, however, it's actually an act of sabotage because any seasoned skater knows that you can never skate on brand new skates. I mean, not in competition. Um, so skate so Casey skates horribly and she gets these oozing blisters on her feet. Zoe Block sees her injuries and she tells her, uh, you know, hey, this is typical Tina. It's just like in Sarajevo. And so Casey ends up thinking that the entire Harwood family set her up. Casey calls her mom to pick her up, and she ostensibly quits skating. She didn't make it to the next level, uh, which would be sectionals, and uh only the top four advance, she got fifth. Now Jen, however, is furious with her mom for cruelly harming Casey, and she drops out, which means Casey gets fourth. Jen and her mom have this big confrontation, and and Jen quits skating. I don't know, we don't know how long she's been doing it, but she quits. Uh, when Casey finds this out, she literally walks out of a Harvard interview because she's on her way to pursue her dream. She eventually seeks out Tina and asks her to explain what happened in Sarajevo. Tina sighs dramatically and says that she went to the Olympics, but was disqualified after she collided with another skater during warm-up accidentally, of course. Casey then asks her to be her coach, and Tina reluctantly agrees. While training for sectionals, she admits that she and her mom have barely spoken in months. At Sectionals, Casey falls during a triple Sao cow, but then skates beautifully when she sees that her mom is in the audience. Joan finally pulled through. Casey finishes with the silver. She and her mom, along with her coach Tina, walk off toward the rink exit, arguing about how many college classes Casey will take and which companies will sponsor her. Trivia time. Some interesting stuff that I found out about this movie. So Hayden Paneteer has a song on the soundtrack called I Fly. It's a pretty cool song. Rachel McAdams was almost cast as Casey, which I think is kind of funny since I felt like they were trying to make Hayden's character like a little mini Regina at first. And Mean Girls came out the year before uh Ice Princess did. But I'm very glad, yeah, no shade to Rachel McAdams, but you know, I'm very glad that Michelle Trackenberg was ultimately cast because yeah, I I don't think uh anyone out there would disagree, but uh you know, this this is her movie. I mean, you know, she owns every every inch of the screen. Um you know, this this movie made her into a Disney princess. And speaking of her, she really learned how to skate for this movie. Um, of course, you know, she did have a stunt double doing the bigger moves, uh, but she trained for eight months. Uh, and then she also trained five hours a day while she was filming the movie, uh, just so she could skate. Um if you've ever skated before, it's fucking hard. Uh, but she said before this movie she'd only skated a few times, you know, just like as a kid, like at a birthday party or something. And um like the one of the moves she does in the movie is called a spread eagle, uh, which is uh a difficult trick that none of her stunt doubles were able to do. You have to have a specific body shape to be able to do it, and she learned to do it uh so that her character could do it in the movie. I never was able to do a spread eagle. Uh it's it's hard to describe, you should just look it up on YouTube. But she nailed it. And uh get this. Michelle Trachtenberg and Joan Cusack were both born on October 11th. Or Libras, just like me. And Hayden Paneteer and Kim Cottrell were both born on August 21st, which was yesterday. So both moms and daughter, you know, both actresses playing mother and daughter in the movie had the same birthday as each other, just different years. Uh Kim Cottrell's character, Tina Harwood, is loosely based on Tanya Harding, which is a little on the nose, if you ask me. Tina Harwood, Tanya Harding, you know, controversial former figure skater. Like, yeah, yeah, okay. Um, and uh there are some real figure skaters in this movie. The actors Kirsten Nelson and Jocelyn Leigh, they play Nikki, the jumping shrimp, and Tiffany. Uh, they're they were real-life competitive figure skaters, they're both now retired. And then, of course, Michelle Kwan and Brian Boitano play the announcers in the film. Finally, I think this is really cool, but this is one of the coolest things I've ever heard of. Um, there was a young, young woman, uh a tween girl in the United Arab Emirates. Her name was Zahara Lari, and she saw this movie when she was about 12 years old, and it made her fall in love with figure skating. And she became a competitive figure skater, uh, and she went on. To become the first ever figure skater to compete wearing a hijab. So, how about that? I mean, that's there you go. That's the legacy of Ice Princess. Very cool. Alright, now I want to talk about my experience as a teen figure skater. And I'm gonna compare it to the experiences that both the lead actresses have in the movie. So the characters Jen and Casey. So I guess I'll start with Jen uh since we just lost Hayden this week. So um now uh in the movie it's really unclear if if Jen ever had any passion for skating, or if it's something that her mom, Tina, just pressured her into. Uh, you know, it could be that as a little kid she knew that her mom was a champion figure skater and was like, oh yeah, I want to do that too. Um, or you know, it could be just that she was never a stranger, but she was the daughter of a, you know, uh kind of probably let's face it, kind of narcissistic uh figure skater um who had lost a lot of glory and you saw probably a good chance to like the second opportunity to live through her kid a little bit. So um, you know, but they don't they don't clarify that in the movie, so so we don't know. But uh by the time Jen is uh by the time the movie uh catches up with the character Jen, uh she is done with figure skating. Uh she she really doesn't like it. Uh it is taking up a lot of her time, it is preventing her from having a you know normal teenage life. And that is very relatable to me, uh, but for a very different reason from her. Um so Jen is is very she's a very good figure skater. Uh she's you know competing, she's getting up at 5:30 a.m. to to practice. Uh, you know, Tina, her mom has her on a diet as well. Uh, so you know, she isn't gonna be able to gain any weight. Um now, uh, as I said, I was a teen figure skater as well, but I was terrible. I was absolutely terrible. I was definitely not like I was let's just put this this way. I was I was not going to regionals, you know, like that was not happening. Um but I I wasn't there because I wanted to be. I was I was there because my mom wanted me to be. Um and I I wasn't getting up at 5 30 a.m. to go to practice. Um, you know, I wasn't like sacrificing my all my time, all my money, all my my time for it. Uh it was just it was just kind of like this um this sort of like this problematic thing in my life because it was just very embarrassing. And uh it was this thing that I had to do that I didn't want to do. And you know, I guess I'm I kind of I have a little sympathy for Joan, you know. I had to like squeeze myself into like the little outfits, and that was uncomfortable. And and you know, again, I was very bad at it. Like I'm I'm very klutzy, I'm a very, very clumsy person. I'm finding new ways to injure myself all the time. Like it it really surprises me, like what I can injure myself on, you know, like like a Q-tip, uh, an eraser, you know, just you name it. I can I can probably hurt myself on it. Um, so yeah, like ice skating is not the right sport for you if you are, you know, just like a a colossal oaf, um, and which I am. So um, but uh, but anytime I would try to quit. See, here's the thing, like Jen's mom, Tina, although she herself is a former figure skater, she's the type of person that, you know, she's similar to my mom insofar as like, you know, like the pressuring to be there, but also like um, you know, she's like who my mom would have wanted to be, because you know, my mom was was no champion figure skater. But uh when Jen quits uh skating, like her, it's kind of it's kind of amazing. Like, you know, this is maybe one of the more unrealistic parts of the movie, how like quickly uh um Tina just capitulates to her daughter's request. But you know, I guess maybe that says how much she really actually like cares for her daughter, and you know, maybe is is actually more of a good mother than than a um a ruthless uh figure skater um or ruthless competitive athlete. So uh, but yeah, she she does more or less accept Jen's decision without any kind of like complaint or fight, um, which is interesting because like I you know you get the impression that like Jen has been skating for forever, like you know, probably since she was a little kid. I'll bet she like put on skates the instant she was out of the womb, you know, um, in that family. And um so but yeah, uh Tina does pretty quickly say, like, yeah, you that's okay, you know. Um, but yeah, I uh Jen tells Casey at one point, like, you know, you're so lucky, like you have a real life, and and that's so relatable to me. Because like, as when I was in high school, like I would have loved to, you know, just like been going to parties or like like having a boyfriend, you know, like the things that Jen wants to have. Uh, but I didn't feel like those things were accessible to me uh because of skating, um, but not because I was so good and it was, you know, I it took up so much of my time, but because I was so bad and and also because I was like pressured to stay in it. And it was just it was just weird and embarrassing. Like it just infantilizing, I guess, is is maybe a good word for it. Um, but uh yeah, so it like it just wasn't it just didn't make me feel like very equal to my peers or like like very, you know, like I could really like talk about like my hobbies or like my personal life because you know, I like at one time I I tried out for the school play. Uh I really wanted to be part of that, but um, I couldn't, you know, end up making the rehearsals. I I got into the course, but I couldn't make the rehearsals because of because of my my skating time. Um, and it was uh it was just like this big obstacle in my life. And and um like my mom just made it very difficult because uh my my mom really really loves skating. She my talk about ice princess. Like my mom is an ice princess, uh, you know, she's the ice queen. Um, but we'll we'll touch on that a little bit. But uh yeah, and the last thing I want to say about Jen and me uh is that her issues with food make me really sad in the movie. You know, she she goes up to the concession stand and tells Casey to give her a an iceberg lettuce salad with garbanzo beans and a lemon wedge, which there's that that's absolutely not an item you can get at a an ice ring concession stand. But also, like that's so relatable to me. I mean, you know, anyone who knows me knows that I had a like I struggled with an eating disorder when I was younger. Uh I've you know I've written about it and uh I will continue to do so, uh, which you can read about if you subscribe to my Substack, Clemency and the Claims Adjuster. You can subscribe for free or for the low, low price of just eight dollars a month. But anyway, um so I um you know there's part of me that wants to be like, oh, you know, the well that was that was 2005, that was you know back in during diet culture, but uh, but but no, no, are we in like the middle of the the Ozambic pandemic? I mean, are teenagers still doing this? Probably. I I I I don't yeah, I don't have kids, but I would I wouldn't be surprised. So um, so yeah, I I I can relate to Jen in a lot of ways. I mean I wasn't like a cute popular blonde girl, you know, but um, but yeah, I I really wanted skating out of my life, and um, you know, I'm I'm glad in the movie she was able to find a way to 86 it, to 86 the the figure eight. Now I want to talk about my experience and compare it to Casey's experience in the movie. I also worked at the ice rink concession stand. That was my first ever job after school when I was a kid. I think I started when I was 14. Yeah, I was super young. I was making minimum wage. I used to walk there after school because it was like a couple blocks from high school. And uh fortunately, they did not make me wear a stupid hat like uh they make Casey do in the movie. Um, you know, as I said, we definitely did not serve iceberg lettuce and chickpea salad, like Jen orders. I do uh I remember mostly scraping lots of cheese off the inside of a microwave. Um, but I do have a funny concession stand story. I uh I got a friend of mine a job there, and um, the rank that we worked at was right next to the community center, like the city community center, and they sometimes hosted AA meetings there. So uh this one time when my friend was working, this drunk lady came into the ice rink and uh she was looking for the AA meeting. So like she went up to the concession stand and uh she first she tried to order pancakes and uh then she tried to order a lasagna. That didn't work, which like it's it's funny, but now that I'm thinking about it, like wow, they were letting like 14-year-olds work at a place where like drunks could potentially wander into. Man, like anyone probably at any point could have like walked in there with a gun and been like, you know, give us all that cash. And now we just went from Disney to Scorsese. Okay, but um a big point of contention that you know people have about this movie is that uh Casey gets way too good too quickly and and it doesn't really make sense. Um, and you know, that that is valid, you know, it's a valid criticism. Uh and I will say, like in the magical rewind podcast episode, they talk about how like the timeline in the movie is a little unclear. So, you know, it's we don't really know like how like long she's been training, or and certainly it seems like she probably spent like quite some time on the pond, you know, for part of her life probably. But let me say this uh it's not impossible to get great at skating, uh, even as an adult. Uh, because uh when I was younger, and when I was a teen skater, I knew a man whose name was Terry Jinx. And uh he was a member of the same skating club that I was when I was a teen. Uh now he was a lot older than me. He started ice skating when he was 42 years old, and he got so good that he started competing nationally in a very short period of time. He was this huge star at our local rink, and um his signature move was the hydroplane. Now, that's like this red eagle, it's it's as hard to describe as it is to do. So I would just you know recommend you you pull it up on YouTube, see if you know you can see someone doing it. Um, and he would do the hydroplane while juggling juggling a couple of balls. Like it's it was just so amazing to see. Um, Terry passed away in 2015. Uh he had cancer, and he was just such a wonderful person. He was like just such a positive, you know, like incredible part of my childhood. And um, and you know, I feel like there's that's when you know people say, oh, you know, she gets too good too quickly, it's it doesn't make sense. Well, you know, I I literally knew somebody who was much older than Michelle Trachtenberg who who got very good. Um, and I feel like even she herself is the proof of that. Uh, you know, she didn't skate before this movie, but learned how to, and and even did some of her own stunts. So, um, so yeah, I I really don't feel like that's the most unrealistic part of this movie. I I personally I feel like uh Tina immediately accepting her daughter's decision to no longer skate is more unrealistic. So uh something else I can relate to about Casey's experience is uh being the oldest in the skating group. I was always the oldest person. Like I be because here, like I said, you know, I was terrible at ice skating, but because my mom wouldn't let me quit, I kept getting put in the same group with kids who were like 10 years younger than me. So it's when you look at pictures of me from the ice show, it's kind of hilarious because like I am always the tallest one. And in my whole life, I am never, ever, ever the tallest one because I am barely five feet tall. I'm five foot one. You know, I'm the insufferable shrimp, remember? So it's it's funny, like it's the only time I'm ever the tallest one. But like, you know, again, I just cannot stress how bad I was at skating. I mean, Michelle Trachtenberg could have skated circles around me, guarantee you. Uh, my mom also was a college professor, just like Joan in the movie. And as I'm sure you've um, you know, perhaps picked up on, she had some strong ideas about what my life should look like. Uh, you know, as much as Joan doesn't want her daughter to skate, mine really wanted me to. So it's kind of a weird inverse um, you know, thing. But now, uh, yeah, I want to talk about the two moms and my mom a little bit more here. So my mom is more Joan Crawford than Joan Cusack.
SPEAKER_03No! Hang on.
SPEAKER_04Although it is funny when Joan in the movie yells at Casey, you know, maybe if I'd gone to college at your age, we wouldn't be living like this. Like what? Their house has a pond on the property. That is similar to my mom. Um, she was always dramatic about money. Like, you know how there are those people that say, Oh, well, we grew up poor, but our parents never let us know it. Uh, yeah, my parents are the complete opposite of that. Like, we were not really that bad off, but uh my mom has always liked to act as though we were just one paycheck away from living in a van down by the river. Uh and my mom loves figure skating as much as Joan Carlisle hates it. But you know, my parents wouldn't let like I said, my parents wouldn't let me quit it, but they tried to like get me to do it on the cheap, uh like the cheap, untalented version of it. So um, you know, so like I I that's just why, you know, one, I wasn't talented, two, I hated it, and and three, like they never put in like the effort or the money to to make me do it. So, you know, I just just had to like mandatory three days a week ice time and also mandatory embarrassing ice show performances with little kids and and little outfits. So uh that was that was my whole high school career right there in a nutshell. Um, when I I finally got to stop figure skating when I turned 18 and graduated, uh, but my mom only stopped figure skating when her arthritis got too bad. And she just turned 80 this year, and I don't think she skated in the three years, perhaps. So um during the years that I was in the skating club at my mom's insistence, you know, when I'm I was there, uh, she was always in the adult number, and uh, she often had her own solo too. And that's not because you know she was good, uh, it's just because she was like a big part of the skating club. Eventually, uh, I think like in 2021 or so, my mom became the president of the skating club, and she got to preside over all the drama. Yeah. So it's it's like she she she finally became the Regina George of the Sating Club, which or the Tina Harwood, maybe. I don't know. I don't know which which uh metaphor is more appropriate here. Uh one thing that really made me hate skating when I was younger is that my mom thought it was funny when I would fall. Uh like we would sometimes watch videos of uh like my performances or like competitions. And like I remember this one time um I was doing a spiral, which is when you're you're like moving forward and you you have like one leg back up in the air. And um, I remember my mom, like I I went falling forward, I like my toe pack caught in the ice and just you know, whoosh, yeah, flying forward right onto my face. And I remember my mom like kind of like laughing at it, like, you know, whoops, there she goes, you know. And um I don't know, my mom just kind of thinks it's misfortune is generally sort of funny. She's one of those people that sort of laughs when like people tell her, or you know, when she finds out that like yeah, I don't know, you get it, you get it. Um but uh she um when I was in high school, when I graduated high school, she made a uh uh a photo album for me, and there's a whole section dedicated to my skating career. Now um I had one solo ever in the ice show, and it was it was barely a solo at that. It was like a feature solo. I think they finally felt so bad for me, they just like gave me a solo, or maybe someone owed my mom a favor. I don't know. But uh, so there's a picture of me uh like skating in my doing my solo, and um the caption that my mom wrote under it says Emma's 1.5 minutes of fame, her first and only solo to Sweet Dreams by Annie Lennox. How appropriate. Okay, well so yeah, I guess her saying like my 1.5 minutes of fame. I it makes me feel like she thought that that was the best I would ever do. Like I I peaked my junior year of high school doing like a a one-minute cut of of that song, doing like some some skating moves to it and managing not to like fall on my ass or on my face. Uh plus like she has and only solo in m-dashes, so like you can really feel like the palpable disappointment. Like that's that's it, that's all you got. Uh the last thing I want to say about that is uh here's what I'm disappointed by. I I wish that I had not skated to Sweet Dreams by Annie Lennox, but sweet dreams by Marilyn Manson. That would have been a lot cooler. All right, I want to wrap up here. Uh so in conclusion, well, first of all, you know, thank you for going on this journey with me. Um, you know, again, I'm I'm learning how to podcast, and and you know, this has been a sad week. Um, but I will say I don't skate anymore. But when I first met my husband, uh one of our first dates, uh, we did go to an ice rink together here in Austin. And uh that was actually his first time skating. Uh he's a Texas boy, so so that it was fun. We only fell one time, so we were pretty proud of ourselves. And uh I really like the idea of Jen and Casey having a secret romance. I mean, you know, there are so many like furtive glances and suggestive moments between them. Uh, you know, Jen warms up to Casey very quickly. I mean, you know, they could have put these two up as rivals, and but you know, instead, like, like Jen gives, like, she literally quits just so that Casey can move forward in the the competition. Um, Jen ostensibly has a boyfriend, but like, you know, we barely see him, we barely hear about him, and you know, I like it's I I really hate like the subplot of Casey's romance with Jen's brother. It's it's so boring, and and he's such a he's such a like uh a herb. I don't know. But yeah, I love that. Um now I I want to say that while I was reading about this movie, I was, you know, reading some interviews with um with Michelle Trackenberg and uh and she apparently uh apparently worked twenty hours a day to film parts of this movie. And I r when I read that I just you know, I I I said to myself, well, you know, how can something like that possibly be legal? Um you know, how did the screen actors guild allow a young person to work for 20 hours a day? I you know not ever once did I spend 20 hours on the ice or even, you know, in the the corporate job that I hated, uh did I um ever put 20 hours in behind the clock. Uh that's that's a level of barbar I don't know. I I I want to say barbaric cruelty. I just why did someone have to work 20 hours a day so that we could have an entertainment product? I mean, I I guess you know, I'm glad this movie exists. I like it. Um, you know, I it's a great movie. I I you know I'm I really like it. I'm very glad it inspired uh Zahara Lari to, you know, become a competitive skater. Uh but and you know, who knows how many other people, but it just at at that cost, like you know, could this movie have been made uh for eight hours a day? Probably not on the budget Disney wanted, I guess. Um yeah, I I just yeah, I I I can't believe that she worked 20 hours a day to to make this movie and slept for what, two and then got right back on the ice and managed not to break her neck and now she's dead and she died at 39. Um so yeah, I don't know. I was it worth it, I don't know. I don't know. I mean it's yeah, it's it's a good movie, it's but I don't know. Um I think uh you know this I I wanted this to be a funnier episode, it but how could it be really when you know it's it's about when we're talking about a movie that that has uh the loss of two young stars to two who who died so young and and so pointlessly. Uh and of course, you know, I'm also here talking about like my own my own T, you know, my my drama with my my mama drama, which is always like a hot topic for me. Um you know, I I saw that Hayden's Hayden Penateer's mom made that statement after her death. And I haven't read Hayden's memoir yet. I will eventually. It's I won't right away. I I find reading the memoirs of recently deceased people uh pretty triggering. So um I probably will maybe in like maybe next year. But um, but yeah, I I feel like, you know, I can definitely sympathize with um, you know, probably what she must have been going through in terms of her relationship with her mother. And I'll, you know, I guess all I I'm not really sure how to wrap up here. I just uh I just want to say that um that these two women are missed immensely and they brought so much to, you know, not just not just the world of cinema, but um, but millennials, millennial culture. I mean, you know, I I think they they were like very positive role models and and they were like just smart, beautiful, strong women, and and that they came together to make this movie that was not about like female rivalry or or you know like the male gaze, but it was about about like you know sisterhood or maybe even lesbianism, I don't know, but but it was about like coming together and and you know supporting each other and and and rooting for each other and and just getting the life that you want and like and going after your dreams, whatever they are, like even if they're crazy and unrealistic, you know, even if even if they seem unattainable, and and so you know that what a wonderful gift that they left us with. Um But they should still be here. Like they shouldn't have had like no one should have had to work 20 hours a day to to make this happen. Um I read that Hayden Paneteer was a big supporter of animal rights, and uh so I made a donation to our local shelter here in her memory. And if you have the means to do so, I encourage you to also do that. And uh I thank you so much for listening. Uh, if you want to watch Ice Princess, you can catch it on Disney Plus. It is it's a good movie, those uh the cast is fantastic. And thank you for tuning in to Stupid Comedy Stuff. I will be back with a new episode as soon as I gather the time, energy, and um and ambition to record one. So hopefully that will be soon. But in the meantime, you can like, subscribe, rate, review, comment, all of that fantastic plethora of goodies. And um, yeah, rest in peace, Michelle and Hayden. Thanks, guys.