Ep 2 - What's it like to be a man?

As a seasoned TV and film actor, Cameron often plays characters with a touch of toxic masculinity. In this episode Sarah asks Cam a series of probing questions about his own take on what it's like to be a man, as well as finding out something about her pal of 35 years which BLOWS HER MIND!

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:14

Welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_03 0:17

Welcome to what camera? Welcome to Midlife Youth Club.

SPEAKER_02 0:23

Midlife Youth Club, you say? Isn't that the name of our podcast?

SPEAKER_03 0:26

That's what we do, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 0:28

What? We're Youth Club in midlife.

SPEAKER_04 0:30

Navigating and negotiating life in the middle.

SPEAKER_02 0:34

Yes. But things we've learnt from being a youth.

SPEAKER_04 0:38

Yes. Yeah, it's good to know episode two. It's flowing really well along.

SPEAKER_02 0:45

Flowing really well. Um do you like my top? Well, we we have already discussed it, and it does look a little bit Ray Winston. Yes, but you look very nice in it.

SPEAKER_04 0:55

Yeah, my sister bought me.

SPEAKER_03 0:56

She buys me the vast majority of my clothing.

SPEAKER_02 0:59

You are your your collars flipping up a little bit. Your flaps are flapping. Right. Is that fair? That's better. Yeah, your flaps were were in full flap. Stop flapping your flaps.

SPEAKER_04 1:12

So mature.

SPEAKER_02 1:13

So oh yeah, we forgot to say who we are. He is Cameron Jack.

SPEAKER_04 1:17

And she is Sarah Simons.

SPEAKER_02 1:21

That's right.

SPEAKER_04 1:21

I thought you were going to jump in.

SPEAKER_02 1:22

No, I wasn't. Okay, so this week, our theme is What's It Like to Be a Man?

SPEAKER_04 1:30

Oh god.

SPEAKER_02 1:31

So I'm gonna be grilling Cameroon Jack.

SPEAKER_05 1:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:36

In a couple of weeks, we'll be we'll we'll be doing what's it like to be a woman. Before we head into the theme, we're gonna discuss our icon of the week. Cameron Jack, who's your icon of the week?

SPEAKER_04 1:47

Few choices, but I'm gonna go for drum roll. Mr. Robbie Williams. Nice icon by his very nature, his energy, his personality. But and forgive me if I get the numbers wrong, he's just surpassed the Beatles for number one albums. Yeah. So I think it's 16 now. Yeah. So 16 albums at number one, just the longevity. Yeah, in the UK.

SPEAKER_02 2:15

And I know this because it was he was he was on the news talking about how he was the best selling, you know, uh musician. In the and he was on about how he how his daughter Teddy went in the UK, in the UK. And I love that she'd put him down like that. Yeah, and I also love that he would tell us that she did.

SPEAKER_04 2:35

Yeah, yeah, that's part of the reason I love him. He's just so open and honest. Yeah, so he is my icon of the week, Mr. Robbie Williams. But it's the longevity and the just the driving energy it's taking creating.

SPEAKER_02 2:49

That I love that he's still a little bit of a loose canon. Yeah, you're still not hundred percent sure that he won't say something awful or overshare or just upset the the Apple cart a little bit in interviews, which I I love.

SPEAKER_04 3:06

Kind of cool, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:08

And at and at that age as well, that you know that he's he's he's a he's a midlife person.

SPEAKER_04 3:13

I get that vibe from Colin Farrell as well. I love Colin Farrell, but he's kind of like there's always that little bit of yeah, anything anything could happen.

SPEAKER_02 3:22

Yeah, I like that. Yeah, yeah. I bet it's a nightmare if you're interviewing them, yeah. Yeah, the anything could happen, or if probably if you're their PR person as well, yeah. But very exciting to watch. Who's my icon of the week? Will you? Will you? Or was it all about you? Was it all about you?

SPEAKER_04 3:42

I would just like to ask you, Cynthia.

SPEAKER_02 3:47

My icon of the week.

SPEAKER_03 3:49

Is it a cow that scratches itself with tools?

SPEAKER_02 3:51

It's not a cow. Okay, it's not any animal, actually.

SPEAKER_03 3:55

Is it?

SPEAKER_02 3:56

It's Nigella Lawson. Oh Nigella, oh, I love her. I do love her. Right from the beginning when, oh god, the first episode, and I've I think it might have been How to Be a Domestic Goddess, uh, her first TV show. The first episode, she looks like she's been dragged through a hedge. Yeah, she's got hardly any makeup on, she's her hair's in a fright wig, she looks like she's only just put, you know, put on the nearest clothes, but she's doing all a normal Nigeliness, all a you know, uh kind of self on purpose sexiness that's a little bit camp. She's a little bit like a drag queen.

SPEAKER_05 4:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:35

And if and by the second episode, it's like somebody's gone, have you seen what this woman looks like? Do you think we should brush her hair and put some makeup on her? Do you think that'd be better? And from the first to the second episode of that very first series, it's like you just see the transformation. Yeah, yeah, you see the transformation. It's properly like somebody's gone and watched it and gone, hang on, did nobody say she, you know, she's really beautiful.

SPEAKER_04 5:00

Food is amazing, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:02

And I like that she's so aware, she's to me, she seems so aware of who she is and what she is, and that you know, she's camp, yeah, and that all of the daft sexiness is just that, it's daft, and it's she's not up herself. I don't think. I don't think Nigella's up herself. I don't. She seems like somebody I would like to be friends with, and I feel like her friendship group is all the girls and the gays.

SPEAKER_03 5:28

All right.

SPEAKER_02 5:29

I think she's a ladies, gayties, ladies person. Oh, is that what you call it? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:33

Will you watch her on the bake off?

SPEAKER_02 5:36

Oh, love the bake-off as well. I don't really watch any many of the cooking competition shows, but I do love a bit of bake-off.

SPEAKER_03 5:43

Will you miss Prue?

SPEAKER_02 5:45

Um, I didn't get as involved when Prue was on it. Um I'm thinking of vintage bake-off with Mary and Paul. Mary and Paul.

SPEAKER_04 5:53

Yeah, Paul's still there though, isn't he?

SPEAKER_02 5:55

Yeah, he gets on he tits a bit though. I'm sorry he does.

SPEAKER_04 5:58

Oh blue eyes.

SPEAKER_02 6:00

Yeah, he does it, he gets yeah.

SPEAKER_04 6:02

He loves cats though.

SPEAKER_02 6:04

Does he?

SPEAKER_04 6:04

Mem coons, he's got beautiful cats.

SPEAKER_02 6:07

I don't know what that is.

SPEAKER_04 6:08

It's a beautiful not them bold ones, is it? No, they are look like frozen chickens. Are majestic lion-like cats, big cats, very not domestic cats, but they're very like dogs. Anyway, I digress.

SPEAKER_02 6:22

So you're not So he likes cats, he likes a cat that's like dogs. Why don't he just like dogs? Why don't he cut out the middleman? Why don't he cut out the middle cat and just like dogs? Um see that's even more reason for me to think he's a you know, I'm not a fan of. Sorry, Paul. Sorry, Paul. I'm sure you're very lovely, and I'm very glad that you're involved with animals.

SPEAKER_04 6:41

He's got nice eyes.

SPEAKER_02 6:42

He has got nice eyes, but I still want to be still wanna hit him with a chair.

SPEAKER_04 6:47

And the ladies like him.

SPEAKER_02 6:48

Not this lady.

SPEAKER_04 6:49

Oh, and that gents and ladies was icon of the week.

SPEAKER_02 6:56

Right, so let's hit the theme, let's run headlong into the theme, which is what's it like to be a man? So what I am interested in is the difference between the the kind of gender stereotypes of maleness and masculinity and and how those are seen, how those are like manifested in you as a person, and how how of how many of them are relevant.

SPEAKER_00 7:32

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 7:33

I mean, so when you were a little boy, what do you what from your background, what did you believe that you should be as a man?

SPEAKER_04 7:42

Right, so I I will start by saying I think it's much easier to be a man than it is to be a woman in this world. Yep. I think so. I'm just gonna leave that there. Park it. I don't, you know, leave comments, whatever. But that's just my opinion. So my dad was a shipbuilder, yeah. So was my brother. He's left that business, he's now a personal trainer. So my dad was a shipbuilder, brother was a shipbuilder, all the uncles were proper grafters, tradesmen, sparks, joiners, all that. So I thought as a little boy, to be a proper man, you had to get dirty at work. Because I remember them coming home literally covered in dust and muck, and uh without a word of a lie, I can remember sitting having dinner with them. Joyce used to make us all say mum. Yeah, Joyce the mum. Uh, what's for dinner? Shite and short bread, she used to say. Um, but we didn't eat that, she did make proper food, you just got told off for asking. But I remember, so it was me, Lorna, brother Dave, and my dad. But when my brother and my dad came in, you would notice their teeth and the whites of their eyes because they were so dirty from work, yeah, just a grime. So I thought, well, that's what it is to be a man. I have to, I can't do anything other than go out and graft and get dirty and come home. The interesting thing was my dad's just because of the sort of economy at the time, um, where Scotland was and Missy Statcher closing a lot of the shipyards and stuff, um worked away from home a lot. So he would, for example, I remember working in Holland, I remember him working on the Shetland Islands down in London. So quite for quite a long chunks, my dad would be away, and my mum was in charge. Yeah. And my mum, who I love to bits, has uh she was like a little lioness. She was sort of um scrappy, she was really tough, an amazing woman, but kind of strict is maybe the wrong word, but firm.

SPEAKER_01 9:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 9:56

My dad was like this sensitive soul who would cry at an Andrex advert.

SPEAKER_01 10:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:01

Um so I kind of I think if I if I reflect on it, I'm not quite sure where I was. I was like, so the tough ones are the women, the sensitive ones are the men. But my mum was a cleaner and an auxiliary in the children's hospital in Glasgow. So I saw a lot of it, it was just work, work, you always have to work. But but going back to your point, I just it's a really simplistic view of it and a very young view of it. But I remember thinking, if I want to be a man, I have to work really hard and graft, which is weird considering what I do now is so far removed from what he did. But he was he was just jumping forward a few years when I said to him, I'm gonna go and be an actor, I couldn't have been more supportive.

SPEAKER_02 10:51

That's what I was just gonna ask you. How how did it go down you saying I'm gonna go to London and go to drama school and be an actor?

SPEAKER_04 10:58

When he died, my dad, I did a speech at his funeral, and he was he was it was a complex soul, my dad. He was, you know, really sensitive, um liked her drink, um he was kind, um funny, really quiet sometimes and quite insular. But the whole thing that that um and interestingly, I know we joke about it and I joke about it, and I'm quite self-deprecating about it. My whole acting career is gangsters and drug dealers and murderers and arsonists and really toxic men, um, which I seem to do quite well. Um but when I was little, the love for what I do came from um that's Betty.

SPEAKER_02 11:49

Betty the whippet is too scratchy to get in. She wants to get involved in the conversation and she can't.

SPEAKER_04 11:54

She just agrees with everything I say.

SPEAKER_02 11:56

She does.

SPEAKER_04 11:57

So my dad would maybe be away working in the Shetland Islands uh for four weeks and back for a week, and then my mum would go out uh in the evening on a Friday with her mates. So my dad would get these amazing films, um like Night of the Hunter, which is still my favourite film, all black and white film with Robert Mitchum, uh, horror films, Exorcist we watched, we watched Jaws. So all of the love I have for cinema, screen, acting all comes from my dad.

SPEAKER_01 12:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:29

So I had a couple of jobs where I I worked in an office, which was lovely in the council, great people. Before that, I was stacking shelves and Marks and Spencer's. I was working in a pub and I was like, I don't really know what I'm gonna do. And then I discovered the joy of musical theatre.

SPEAKER_02 12:45

I'm sorry, you can hear her yipping. She keeps yipping.

SPEAKER_04 12:47

She's a yipper.

SPEAKER_02 12:48

Betty the whippet. Yeah, Betty the Yippet. Um she's gorgeous if we let her in here, she'll just come and shout at us to stroke her. And if we stop stroking for one second, she'll come just punch.

SPEAKER_04 13:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:00

She gets a bit punchy, does better.

SPEAKER_04 13:02

Yeah, she does that, doesn't she?

SPEAKER_02 13:04

She does. She gets a bit punchy, does better? Stop it! And uh, yeah, so we're hoping that she'll just at some point she'll back off. Who knows? Maybe she won't. Maybe this is just all the way through. She's punching the door now. She's gonna run, she's gonna run at it with a shoulder in a sec, isn't she, and try and knock it down like police.

SPEAKER_04 13:25

Liam Neeson.

SPEAKER_02 13:26

Liam Neeson. So um did your idea of masculinity change? If you're thinking that being a man involves going out and uh drinking, drinking, shagging, shagging, yeah, lots of uh fighting. Did you believe that that when you were a teenager, that's what yeah?

SPEAKER_04 13:46

Yeah, I uh with all due respect to, and I'm generalising here, it's a kind of working class, glassweging thing. You know, you kind of you've got to be tough. If you're not tough, you don't belong. If you can't fight, you don't belong. If you can't drink.

SPEAKER_02 14:01

It was fighting, you had to you had to be able to fight.

SPEAKER_04 14:03

It was street cred, it gave you street cred being able there was two things.

SPEAKER_02 14:06

Would you get in fights?

SPEAKER_04 14:08

Occasionally, yeah. You can't imagine it, can you? No, but two things gave you street cred, uh, which is probably true of a lot of cities. One is being able to fight, yeah, and the second one's been able to play football. And I wasn't very good at either. So I discovered tap dancing. So so I I um it is the third option.

SPEAKER_02 14:33

Yeah, and if you tap dance football, tap dance.

SPEAKER_04 14:36

If you tap dance through the streets of Glasgow, nobody will say anything to me.

SPEAKER_02 14:41

In fact, they encourage it, don't they? They encourage it.

SPEAKER_04 14:44

So I discovered sort of early secondary school that I could sing and I was I did a couple of musicals, and I remember thinking, I quite enjoy this, but I'm not sure I'm not sure how it's gonna go down that I want to be creative and artistic for a living. So I kind of stopped and did all the other things the football, the occasional fighting, the drinking. And was that because you thought I thought it was a bit effeminate and I probably imposed a lot of that on myself, but I definitely heard it.

SPEAKER_02 15:21

Um So if you're thinking it was effeminate from that at that point, did you think feminine was less? Because if you at that point, if you're thinking I can't do this because it's it has female connotations to it, was that because you uh thought that you couldn't be more feminine? Yeah, but she because she'd get your head kicked in.

SPEAKER_04 15:51

Probably not my head kicked in, but slagged like you know, all the usual I don't want to say them bullied a bit and a bit sort of like the old cliche of ponsing about on a stage. It was said to me, actually on reflection now at my age at 54, I look back and I think Christ, and I always have had. I've been I'm 34 years in now since we started drama school. I wouldn't have lasted as long as I have without the tremendous that's like a sponsorship deal, the tremendous support I've had from my mum, my dad, my brother, my sister, all of my mates. Um but I was worried about how it would go down at the time because I just thought it's just not what blokes do.

SPEAKER_02 16:39

And you were the first one out of your family to do something that wasn't like in a traditional kind of gender round.

SPEAKER_04 16:45

100%. When I told them, I took them out for dinner, my mum and dad's, um and I'd I'd have been having kind of like I was got I'd gone a bit wild, I'd got nicked, I'd had to go to court. Did you? Yeah, yeah. Did you? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:04

What did you get nicked for? Oh god. Can you tell me?

SPEAKER_04 17:08

It's nothing darkly sinister, it's just a bit of uh breach of the peace, bit of fighting.

SPEAKER_02 17:15

Bits of fighting, bit of uh yeah, just being on the Have you spent a night in the cells?

SPEAKER_04 17:19

Yeah, yeah. Just being an arsehole, really, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:22

Did you not know that?

unknown 17:24

No!

SPEAKER_04 17:24

Yeah, and I remember thinking, what a dick, what an arsehole move. My mum and dad were really upset about it, but I do remember also having a thought of well, I belong now, because I've been nicked as well. And I've done my little bit of jail time one night, and so I felt I felt like I'd earned my stripes, but it didn't sit right with me. I was like, this is I've let a lot of people down. Fast forward a couple of years, I was in the office job, I liked it, people were great, but I was like, this I have to find something that I can do. I'd gone round and won a lot of karaoke competitions. Yeah, I won Tellys, I won my brother's honeymoon, I won cash. Yeah, and I was going around Glasgow kind of picking up prizes, and a couple of people went, You should try and do shows. So I went and did a bit of armdram. I was like, this is good. There were lots of girls. And then somebody said you should maybe try and go to drama school. I only knew about one in Glasgow, but I wanted to kind of go away.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 18:33

Somebody in my musical theatre group was like, uh my armdram group was like, Oh, you should try for Mount View. So I went, did the audition, got offered a place the same day, and then got a scholarship. When I had the conversation with Joyce and Billy Joyce and Billy, mum and dad. Yeah, mum and dad. My mum particularly was like, that's gonna be hard. It was something along the lines of she's brilliant now, but don't be so bloody daft. You know, it's a nice wee hobby, but I couldn't have done it without them. They were they were brilliant. So as I'm navigating, going into a very different world, I think what emboldens you and makes you feel strong, male or female, is that you know people have got your back.

SPEAKER_02 19:19

So when you went to London, when you went to Mountview um uh doing musical theatre, and you were meeting the lots of different kinds of people that you perhaps had hadn't met, been in that sort of environment before. How did that make how did that impact your thoughts of what it meant to be a man?

SPEAKER_04 19:40

I remember like I was excited, I had a lot of trepidation about entering this new environment, feeling very kind of disorientated by the the just a vast array of different people that I'd never encountered before. And I was the sort of person I don't care so much now, but I wanted everybody to like me, so I was like, Well, how do I be a how do I be friends as a man, still retain my masculinity, but be mates with everybody, yeah and the answers just to be yourself. Um I've got such an eclectic group of mates now, but at the time I was like, Well, I couldn't possibly get on with somebody who's openly gay because I don't know anyone like that, and I actually navigated it much better than I thought I would.

SPEAKER_02 20:29

Yeah, because I remember you being pals with everybody, everybody, yeah, there were a lot of the homosexuals.

SPEAKER_04 20:35

There were a few.

SPEAKER_02 20:36

There were a few homosexuals at drama school doing musical theatre.

SPEAKER_04 20:41

I love people, I just I always have my little one Alba, I can see that in her. She's got this real curiosity about the world and she just loves. I know your Mickey, your other half, loves loves people, didn't he? Yeah, he does. He does. Um, and I'm like that.

SPEAKER_02 20:57

So go jumping into your career, when did you first realise that you might be being a little bit typecast as rent a thug?

SPEAKER_04 21:06

So rent a thug was the Twitter name that my agent, my old agent, suggested. When we were at college, I'm not the tallest, I'm 5'7, so I'm not in any way, shape, or form ever gonna really be a leading man. I remember thinking I don't quite know where I fit.

SPEAKER_01 21:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 21:25

Um not awful looking, but also not classically handsome, quite short. And I was like, I don't really know where I'm headed. And then in 1994, I saw train spotting on stage.

SPEAKER_01 21:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 21:40

Just after I read the book, and then I heard that there was a theatrical production of it. Said to my agent, I've got to I've got to be in this. Um and I want to play Begby, who's the most toxic character in there, right? So it ended up name drop coming. So Gerard Butler, the movie star. Played Renton, yeah, and I was Big B. Jerry's a brilliant bloke, six three, six, six, two, six three, incredibly handsome. And so then we I thought, well, I'm not gonna get the part because I'm not scary enough. Yeah, and he actually said that's what got me the part was I was like a little terrier, right? And I was really comfortable with it, sort of at ease with playing that kind of part, and I enjoyed it, it was fun. I just found it fun, and as an actor it was really challenging, so I kind of enjoyed it, and it just went on from there and it hasn't stopped.

SPEAKER_02 22:36

What point did you sort of lean into that? You know, you're getting cast as these toxic men. When did you go actually? Yeah, I'm gonna totally lean in and and and be that look like that. Not that you are that at all, but you be that.

SPEAKER_04 22:51

I'm not like that as well. No, no, I know. So in episode one, I mentioned doing the Regents Park job with the director by Brian Cox of Acting, not science. Yes, and I mentioned beautiful John Chalice who played Boise and Only Fools and Horses. Yeah, and John said to me very early, I was only a few weeks out of drama school, and he said, What did he say about typecasting at drama school? And I said, Oh, they tell us it's it's best avoided, you know. Um, and he said, It's the best thing that can happen to you. Really? Yeah, he said if you're a strong flavour, you will keep working. Yeah, and that is exactly what happened.

SPEAKER_02 23:27

So I've never interested.

SPEAKER_04 23:29

But I've never really fought against it. I just it's so as you know, it's so tough to get work. I just think I'd rather work in one realm than not work at all.

SPEAKER_02 23:40

And is that when you st after that conversation, after those thoughts, is then when you started changing your physicality?

SPEAKER_04 23:48

Yeah, I had decided I wanted to have a a more definite look, a stronger look. Then I started getting tattooed as well, which uh which again enhances that strong flavour. And I learned bizarrely as well. Obviously, I mentioned Begby earlier. Begby was loud and brash and leery, but as the career went on, the quieter I was and the more still I was, the more menacing I was, right? Which is an important, obviously, an important thing for the screen. As long as you can separate toxic masculinity and a in a real person and a character, then you're on safe ground.

SPEAKER_02 24:30

If people think you can play that because of your appearance, how has that impacted your real life if people make assumptions?

SPEAKER_04 24:39

I've noticed sometimes when I've been in companies, acting companies, theatre and TV, there's like a because of the way I look and the way I talk, I do get occasionally, not often, but occasionally, there's a kind of I can sense a kind of snobbery about it, like a almost not that I don't belong, but I have a lesser voice, a lot of kind of casual racism about Scottish people being drunk and violent and angry.

SPEAKER_02 25:06

In real life, you looking like you might be a you know a tough guy. Have you sensed that people have found you intimidating?

SPEAKER_04 25:15

Maybe maybe when they clap eyes on me, but as soon as I start talking to people, my my kind of the bouncy sort of tigger aspect of me is the complete antithesis of how I look. So I've not I've not had too many problems with it. I did I did when I was younger, I think because I'm so open as a bloke and so kind of curious and interested in people. I always was confident enough to navigate it. I never ever felt like I had to be defensive about who I was, yeah. But there were definitely moments in in comments where people wanted to make me feel like less because of the way I looked. I don't think people were intimidated by me, like I said, because as soon as they saw what I was like as a person, the look became kind of secondary, yeah. And the other thing is that in our game people are very open-minded, aren't they? Yeah, yeah, as a as a rule, not everyone.

SPEAKER_02 26:15

How has your view of masculinity and what it means to be a man, how has that changed since you've become a parent? And you're you're a parent to a you're done to a little girl, yeah, and she's six now.

SPEAKER_04 26:32

She's six, yeah. You become very aware of the dangers and just how difficult it is for a kid to navigate the world now, not maybe not so much at that age, but a worry about her you know growing up, what she's gonna encounter, obviously.

SPEAKER_02 26:51

That's kind of regardless of gender. How how you as a dad, how has that affected your your view of masculinity? What what do you think it means to be a dad?

SPEAKER_04 27:04

It's a I can I can only I'm probably not gonna articulate it very well, but I feel like I've got a really important job now. I whereas before I was just kind of focused on myself, and a mum does an amazing job, and all our aunts and our grands uh are are amazing. I just kind of try and stay in my own line with her.

SPEAKER_02 27:26

What does that mean, stay in your own line with her?

SPEAKER_04 27:29

I want to make her feel really safe in the world, yeah. Um so just I and and look, most parents do it naturally, right? When Alba was born, I was 47, so I was like, whoa whoa, I've just been you know doing my own thing and playing all these crazy you know so I I just have this very strong sense of her masculine role model has to be a positive one and not a negative one, and I think I think I might be looking at really really simple terms. I think being a dad to a girl, you have a really important job, and you the obviously there's the protection aspect, but I want her to feel like she can have a voice in the world, yeah, and I want her to feel like she can always come to me, and I don't want her to feel like I'm closed off because I think probably a lot of kids growing up when I was around probably couldn't have open, honest conversations with her parents. It was just like crack on, get on with it, you know.

SPEAKER_02 28:35

But also, you know, we hadn't really discovered that mental health existed, did we? When we were if you depression, if you were a young person and had depression or anxiety, yeah, you're a bit fed up. You're a bit fed up, and normally you have to get outside and have a walk.

SPEAKER_04 28:50

Oh, she's a bit stressed.

SPEAKER_02 28:51

Yeah, go and have a walk, you'll be alright.

SPEAKER_04 28:53

Yeah, yeah. Or have a drink.

SPEAKER_02 28:55

Yeah, have a drink.

SPEAKER_04 28:56

Oh, she I I don't overthink it. All I know is whatever it is I've had to navigate, I need her to see me as a positive role model. Yeah, and I guess mums feel at that. The toxic masculinity thing's really interesting because that particular phrase has become really common, particularly the last two, three years, with Andrew T and Adolescence and all that.

SPEAKER_02 29:20

Yeah, the adolescence series on on Netflix, it it really brought it into you know everyday conversation, didn't it? And and the impact that those uh influencers or or kind of changes in society that is now seeming to really kind of element society to champion that you know outdated, misogynistic, um, toxic version of what it is to be a man and not just toxic at women, toxic to the men themselves. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:55

Um, they're toxic to everyone.

SPEAKER_02 29:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:58

I I don't I mean this is a really simplistic viewpoint, but my fear is that across the boards, maybe not even focusing on toxic masculinity, it's just that there are not enough positive role models anymore, or the negative voices are too loud now. Yeah, they get too much of a play.

SPEAKER_02 30:23

Yeah, I think that's probably that's what I think. It's not that there aren't enough uh positive male role models, it's just that the noise of them is drowned out by this, you know, incessant sort of shouting and yeah, boring awfulness.

SPEAKER_04 30:40

But at what point did we let them start shouting like that?

unknown 30:44

I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 30:45

I I don't know if it was you know you know, I'm thinking about why the reason that somebody like Andrew Tate was, I don't know if he still is so popular. Is it because of is it because of the things he says, or is it because he's such a clear articulation of that sort of person? He's like he's like a baddie, he's like a pantomime baddie, he has these things, and so it's kind of quite easy not to get behind, but at least quite easy to understand what he is.

SPEAKER_04 31:18

He's a pantomime baddie with very nice clothes and cars and a big, huge house and lots of properties and lots of money.

SPEAKER_02 31:28

But for me, all of that kind of goes in the whole that's that's the you know the cartoon that he is.

SPEAKER_04 31:34

Yeah, my point is I think do boys aspire to the having the things, yeah. And think, well, if he's behaving like that and he has those things, I can get away with behaving like that as well, and I can have those things.

SPEAKER_02 31:50

I don't know if it's that or if it's just that he shouts the loudest, that there might be another um person who comes through and you know, or another group of people who because when you get somebody like Andrew Tate and you see how how successful he is as a result of that sort of communication and that sort of online content, you know, they grow like mushrooms, all the people around him seeing that he's successful, then so they copy that so they can get the the spoils of it sort of thing. If there was a different sort of role model who was very, very positive, or a different kind of breed of role model who shouted as loud and who was as definite in their identity, would that be just as popular? And is it the toxicity that's adding to the popularness, or is it the populess, the popularity, words and that, or is it is it the how definite the caricature is and like how loud he is?

SPEAKER_03 32:57

There's a lot in there.

SPEAKER_02 32:58

Oh I know she's gone deep, she's gone ever so deep, hasn't she?

SPEAKER_03 33:01

She's gone proper, Michael Parkinson.

SPEAKER_02 33:03

Oh, she's gone ever so Michael. I I don't know if it's just because he shouts the loudest, and he you know, and he's like a cartoon.

SPEAKER_04 33:10

There's got to be more to it than that, though, ain't there?

SPEAKER_02 33:13

Yeah, there's gotta be something. I hope I hope I'm right, but I suspect I'm not. I suspect there's some sort of deep-seated thing to do with, you know, the way that Trump getting in kind of played to some people's kind of darkest fears. Yeah. And that some of the things he said, some of the things he's got away with um so publicly has showed other people that you can get away with that shit. Yeah. And you can still be one of the most powerful things.

SPEAKER_04 33:44

I think what Trump proves is you you s there's a man that says what he feels in a certain moment and then has to backtrack and backtrack and backtrack and he flips and he changes, and that just that just shows how weak he is, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_02 34:00

Yeah, but if he can say whatever the fuck he wants, yeah, there's been sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, there's been everything for there's all of them.

SPEAKER_04 34:12

There's just a massive platform for these people frightening.

SPEAKER_02 34:15

Yeah. Um and it's is that sort of slip towards well it's it's far right wing, isn't it? It isn't just right wing being a Tory, being a conservative, being a Republican, it's like beyond that.

SPEAKER_04 34:29

Well, I d I think I think there'll be a reform government and I think Nigel will be Prime Minister. I do. I'm genuine.

SPEAKER_02 34:41

I think it goes back to what I was saying before about identity. If in the UK the two main parties, if they don't have a strong enough identity They don't, then and if someone else comes along and says this is exactly who we are, like I was saying about Andrew Tate, who says this is exactly who I am and there's no kind of hiding any of it, whether um it's positive or negative, it just makes it easier to get behind because people know who they are.

SPEAKER_04 35:10

Yeah, no, I agree with that.

SPEAKER_02 35:11

And it's and it's easier to unite people by things that they hate. So there could be like 50 things the very right wing party talking about like reform are doing badly, but one thing and people get behind that because that's the one thing that they're into. Yeah, you know, so they might not listen to all the other things that they're fucking up or all the other things that are terrible, and I I do feel like it's a reverse for a left-wing party, whether that's whether that's in America or whether it's the Democrats or whether it's over here in Labour.

SPEAKER_04 35:41

I think the difficult thing for somebody like me is where I come from and how what I saw growing up and how I was raised. The industry I work in, I try and be as liberal and open-minded as possible. But there's a bit of me that's like you hurt a hair on my daughter's head that I'm going to fucking jail.

SPEAKER_01 35:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 35:58

That's and I don't consider that as controversial as it probably is. I don't consider that to be toxic masculinity. That's me trying to do what's really And I also think that's just being a parent. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:10

You know, because I remember somebody asking me if if I if I was capable of killing somebody. I was like, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 36:16

We all are.

SPEAKER_02 36:17

Yeah, if somebody had if somebody and before I had my son, I wouldn't have been sure. But since I had my son, it was like absolutely if somebody if somebody hurt him, no question, I am completely capable of of killing somebody. Yeah. You know. Oh, he's oh we've got very dark out there. Very, very dark. Yeah, we could both kill. Yeah, but like you say though, I think But I don't know if that's that's masculinity or if it's just being a parent.

SPEAKER_04 36:45

Just being a parent, I think. I don't know, like toxic masculinity, as I say, it's become a kind of buzz phrase, it's uh it's a common thing that people talk about.

SPEAKER_02 36:54

Um it's almost parodying what we used to think of as masculine. So what you were saying about um fighting, that you fighting that being a a masculine thing to prove how male you are.

SPEAKER_00 37:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:12

You know, something that's objectively not good.

SPEAKER_00 37:16

No.

SPEAKER_02 37:17

To sh to prove that you're a proper man. And I think that's to do with it proving that you are a real man by exhibiting these real negative toxic traits, which aren't to really to do with being a man, they're just to do with being angry and a bully sometimes. And maybe it's to do with power. Maybe it's to do with misuse of power, patriarchal sort of power.

SPEAKER_04 37:45

Is it harder to be a woman now or a girl growing up that that that that we're here now, that it's like this? Has it always been difficult or is it worse now?

SPEAKER_02 37:56

I think it's I think it's different. I think it's the same level of difficulty.

SPEAKER_04 38:03

Maybe more visible.

SPEAKER_02 38:04

But yeah, more visible, but uh but that again being more visible has its positives and negatives. You know, there could be all sorts of shit going on when I was a teenager and when I was in my twenties that we just accepted as well. That's you know, yeah, that's what happens, you know, and a lot of the me too stuff and the you know the the all of Times Up movement and all that kind of thing explored that, um, and all the shit that we just accepted as being oh well, you know, somebody slapping you on the bottom, and if you if you turned around and if you had a go at them, they'd be like, What? It was meant to be a compliment if you were like you talked about again.

SPEAKER_04 38:41

Sorry to jump in, but you talked about me too. Um when those movements came along, I just remember thinking these are positive things, yeah. But I found a lot of people were t terrified that certain other people were having a voice now. So people that I knew were like very detrimental and and derogatory about those movements, which yeah, yeah, quite a few people I knew were like men and women, um yeah, absolutely, yeah. Wow, yeah, it was like the order has changed. I can't deal with the order changing, I don't want to be involved anymore if it's if this is how it's gonna be.

SPEAKER_02 39:31

For me, me the Me Too movement was about accountability. Yes, you know, if you have behaved in a way in a in a way that is illegal or borderline illegal, yeah, then you know you can be held should be held accountable. Yes. Whether it happened yesterday or whether it happened 50 years ago.

SPEAKER_00 39:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:52

And it's you know, and I know it was different times than that, but still if something was illegal, then I think it's right that they're held accountable.

SPEAKER_00 40:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:02

Tough shit, you shouldn't have done it.

SPEAKER_04 40:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:04

You know.

SPEAKER_04 40:05

I agree.

SPEAKER_02 40:06

And we all things that ooh, you think, ooh fuck, it was the nineties or the eighties or whatever. But there's a limit, isn't there? Yeah. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. Do you think the fact that we're all talking about this toxic masculinity, the fact that we're naming it, the fact that we're kind of railing against it talking about it. Do you think that that it's gonna change? Well that by naming it, by you know, holding a mirror up to it, that it might have a to become more positive.

SPEAKER_04 40:39

No. I think I think I think the lunatics are taking over the asylum. Yeah. I I do and I don't say that with any joy. I'm worried about where we're headed. Like, there's so much going on in the world, and it's just it seems to be like the world's being run by uh toxically masculine men making really bad decisions and not thinking about the effect they're having. It's all about power in the moment, yeah, and that's why I don't have a good feeling about it.

SPEAKER_02 41:18

I I mean optimistically, I wonder if because it's something that's now seen and recognised and talked about that there'll then be a a reaction against that and we'll go to a more um equal society or a more equal sort of leadership around the world or a more gentle sort of leadership. But you also think that you know, has this level of toxicity and this like level of patriarchal negativity been normalised to such a such an extent because some of these men have been in power for quite a long time now that it's gonna be too hard to push back to that's that's you put it you've summed it up perfectly.

SPEAKER_04 42:06

I think for a lot of people, with respect, they'll be out there going, Well, there's nothing I can do about it. So we've just got to stay in it, and that's the worst thing we can do. We have to kind of rail against it, whatever way that is, whether that's you know, going on marches or going to protests or writing columns or just having discussions, those things are really important now. Yeah, stay vigilant, and you do, yeah, and you do worry. I wonder what the future looks like for a little one. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:41

We've we've not ended on a bright note, no, we've not. We've not, but we all have the power to be the change, yes.

SPEAKER_04 42:48

Betty Whippet.

SPEAKER_02 42:49

Betty Whippet, she's down there, we should have just let her in earlier.

SPEAKER_04 42:54

And if you look at people like Zach Polansky, who's the Green Party leader, he's doing some amazing things. Yeah, the numbers are up, he's out talking to people. There are positive, positive role models out there uh for us to focus on.

SPEAKER_02 43:10

It's just hard with the noise, yeah, and wherever you get your news, noise, and that's kind of like the the overriding thing, innit? That we've when we've talked about the toxic masculinity and about the like negative power dynamics or the very, very masculine power dynamics that are happening at the moment, that it's the noise, yeah, and almost the showmanship.

SPEAKER_04 43:33

I think I think also as a working class bloke, there's a little bit of your head that goes, I shouldn't have an opinion on this because I'm not smart enough. I've always had to fight against that a little bit to go, actually, my voice is valid, yeah, and I want my voice to be heard, yeah, but there's so much noise. Yeah. My fear is that the sensible, articulate, intelligent, fair, kind. Voices are going to be drowned out by the angry, toxic, shouty, right-wing fucking Arsaws. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:12

What I like to think, and I and you know, this might be my blind, naive optimism, but these this toxic masculinity thing and these loud you know angry men it's a tiny I'd like to think it's a tiny, tiny proportion of men, and most men are kind and lovely and helpful and interested and interesting, you know. And uh the only reason we're talking about uh these this masculinity is because this this little group shout loud, you know, and it absolutely is not representative of all men by any means.

SPEAKER_04 44:54

But the men that you're talking about, the good men, the kind men, they're just not visible enough. Kindness is key.

SPEAKER_02 45:04

Yeah. And let's let's move on to our segment, our final segment. Our segment is rabbit hole of the week.

SPEAKER_04 45:13

Oh doing the rabbit hole.

SPEAKER_02 45:14

Doing the rabbit- Oh no, I went Scottish for a second.

SPEAKER_04 45:18

Oh no, and I don't think I went down the rabbit hole.

SPEAKER_02 45:21

Did you? That sounds much better than down the rabbit hole. Yeah, no, I went doing yeah, right. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 45:26

So Did you go dun?

SPEAKER_02 45:28

Oh, I did.

SPEAKER_04 45:29

Right. Tell me what you went doing.

SPEAKER_02 45:32

This is the rabbit hole I was your rabbit. I got lost in down this week. It was Liza Minelli impersonators, mainly ones that are men.

SPEAKER_03 45:43

Not the answer I thought you were going to. I love Liza Minelli.

SPEAKER_02 45:47

I love their absolutely unapologetic Sherbi's pizzazz.

SPEAKER_04 45:50

I met her.

SPEAKER_00 45:52

Hold on, hold on, I didn't know this. You met her.

SPEAKER_04 45:56

I just remembered. I met her. She came, I was in We Will Rock Q. Yeah. Original cast back in the early noughties. 2002, I think we opened. And the lovely thing about that job was was just con a constant stream of like really nice, important people. Like, as I said earlier, I think I've saying to you, Robert De Niro co-produced it, so he'd be there. Obviously, Queen were there, Ben Elton wrote it. So you were kind of surrounded by icons. David Boey came, Tina Thompson.

SPEAKER_02 46:29

Liza Minelli. Take us to Liza Mellon.

SPEAKER_04 46:30

Emma Thompson came, I'll take you to Liza Minelli. So we just got told one night by the company manager a couple of people want to come backstage and meet you all. And in comes Liza with And you had a big role in that, didn't you? Yeah, at that point I didn't. I was I started off ensemble under study, right? Ended up with a bigger part, but not at that point. Um and she comes full of life with David.

SPEAKER_02 46:57

What shit with a snoggin'.

SPEAKER_04 47:00

No, he was just very peripheral. Yeah. And I remember I was standing close to him. Was he like a bridesmaid? He was like a bridesmaid's a bridesmaid, not a bride. But I remember standing close to him and thinking that.

SPEAKER_02 47:13

Did you smell her? Did you smell it? Did she smell nice?

SPEAKER_04 47:16

She smelled nice, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:17

Oh, what did she smell like?

SPEAKER_04 47:18

Flower, just flowery lady. Um and but I remember looking at David's head and thinking, You look like somebody's painted your hair on. There was a wee sort of fluffed strands of hair, but it looks like somebody had sprayed it with black spray paint.

SPEAKER_02 47:38

What was she wearing? Were the sequins?

SPEAKER_04 47:40

Uh no, she had on, if I remember correctly, she'd on a red sort of pull.

SPEAKER_02 47:44

Red, of course, she had red pull on it. Did she have her legs out? Was she high kicking?

SPEAKER_04 47:49

She had black, I can't like black boots. She just looked sassy, she looked glammy. But she had this.

SPEAKER_02 47:58

Did she light up the room?

SPEAKER_04 48:00

She lit the whole, and not the room, the theatre, the whole fucking stage. She had this a life force, this force of nature energy, and we were just like, she's incredible. And he was kind of just in the slipstream of it, just standing around. And she was so kind of open and wanted to meet everybody. She was lovely.

SPEAKER_02 48:21

Oh, I can't believe you've it was I don't know anybody who's met Liza Minelli.

SPEAKER_04 48:26

Yeah, very briefly.

SPEAKER_02 48:28

I can't believe I didn't know this before now. You forgot that you met Liza Minelli. Oh, that takes my degrees of separation much nearer to Liza. We're practically best friends now, we and Liza.

SPEAKER_04 48:42

Yeah, it was a weird job. You met so many people.

SPEAKER_02 48:44

But me rabb rabbit hole-wise, it is Liza impersonators.

SPEAKER_04 48:48

But a lot of drag.

SPEAKER_02 48:50

A lot of drag, a lot of drag, and they're just there's a lot of brilliant ones. There's a and there's actually there's a lady who I've been watching a lot who's been impersonating Liza, and her and she has a double act with somebody who impersonates Liber Archie.

SPEAKER_04 49:05

I thought you were going to say who impersonates David Guest.

SPEAKER_03 49:08

Is that the husband's name?

SPEAKER_02 49:09

No, no, no, no. Liber Archie. Oh, right, okay. Yeah, so it's Libera Archie and Liza, they do some brilliant stuff, but I'm absolutely besotted. Liberachi.

SPEAKER_04 49:18

So two really quiet people just being very, very Liberace and Liza.

SPEAKER_02 49:23

If you don't know who Libera Archi is, Google him. Brilliant. He was brilliant. Very understated. Yeah. But you could you couldn't pick him out in a crowd. And do you know for a long time I thought he was called Lee Barace? I didn't know it was Liberace L-I-B. Lee Liberaci made it. Liberace. Yeah, more or less. Liberace. He didn't have an apostrophe, um, exclamation mark after he's but he should have.

SPEAKER_04 49:47

Yeah. He should have. My god, he should have. There's a brilliant film where Michael Douglas plays on. Seeing it at Matt Damons and love interest. It's brilliant.

SPEAKER_02 49:54

So that's my um rabbit hole of the week, which is actually being hijacked by you having met real life Liza, which I can't even believe. Never mind, George. You've met Liza.

SPEAKER_04 50:05

Mine's quite similar.

SPEAKER_02 50:07

Go on then.

SPEAKER_04 50:07

So my rabbit hole of the week in probably the last two or three weeks is the football transfer window.

SPEAKER_02 50:14

Don't understand what that means. Right, so and you'll have to tell me in theatre too.

SPEAKER_04 50:18

There are two. So I'm a big football fan, Glasgow Rangers and the Scotland national team. Um, so basically, in the summer and in the winter, yeah, for about sort of four weeks each spell. Forgive me for not being completely accurate. Teams have a window to sign players from other clubs and bring new players in the city.

SPEAKER_02 50:40

Do you mean a time window? They're not just walking past like a like a McDonald's.

SPEAKER_04 50:44

You'll do! No, it's like a time window, yeah. Thanks for correcting me on that. So within there's a four-week period.

SPEAKER_02 50:52

I'd prefer it if they did.

SPEAKER_04 50:54

There's a four-week period where your club gets rid of some of the dead wood and brings in new blood. Yeah. And it's fascinating. The January transfer window, because I know you're really interested, it's harder to sign good players in January than it is in the summer. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 51:10

So right because of the cost.

SPEAKER_04 51:14

There's just less good players around, yeah, and Scotland's freezing. There's just less good players available in the winter than there are in the summer. It's to do with deals and contracts. But it's a really exciting time if you're a football fan because you're looking at new blood coming into your club that makes sense.

SPEAKER_02 51:29

So the transfer window is like swap shop at that time.

SPEAKER_04 51:32

Yeah. So some of it's buy players in, some of it's uh swap players, which is slightly more unusual, and often you'll borrow players till the end of the season. But as a football fan, it's it's proper exciting.

SPEAKER_02 51:45

So it's when you're getting the gang together.

SPEAKER_04 51:47

Yeah, but also getting rid of some of the old gang and getting new gang in. Cooler gang.

SPEAKER_05 51:52

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_04 51:53

Cool. And the gang. So better players hopefully coming in. Yeah. My club's been struggling this year. We've got a new manager in, he's turning things around. We've got three new players in at the moment, three or four gone out, and we're just looking at so it's it's just football madness.

SPEAKER_02 52:11

Well, it's not as good as your Liza's story, but thanks.

SPEAKER_04 52:14

No. So would you rather talk about the transfer window or Liza?

SPEAKER_02 52:21

I might have given the game away. I might have let the cat out of the bag.

SPEAKER_04 52:24

There could have been two rabbit holes more different than those two.

SPEAKER_02 52:28

Transfer window and Liza impersonators. Do you think she likes football? Liza. Well, she'd be enthusiastic because she's an enthusiast.

SPEAKER_04 52:36

How old is she now?

SPEAKER_02 52:37

170.

SPEAKER_04 52:38

Right, okay. She was 150 when I met her.

SPEAKER_02 52:41

Do you know I had tickets to see her? Me and my friend, a homosexual, had tickets to see her. And um anyone I know? Yeah, Nick. Nick. Right, okay.

SPEAKER_04 52:49

And we are he's an icon.

SPEAKER_02 52:51

He is an icon. And we got and we we got second row when she was in Sheffield. We went to go and see her. We could have, you know, we were hoping we might be able to touch her hem of a garment.

SPEAKER_04 53:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 53:02

Um and then she cancelled.

SPEAKER_04 53:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 53:06

I was few.

SPEAKER_04 53:07

I don't think she keeps in the best health, does she?

SPEAKER_02 53:09

No, and as we say, she is 700. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 53:12

Legend.

SPEAKER_02 53:13

Oh, legend. Liza and and Dolly, obviously. But Dolly's for another time. We'll save Dolly for another time. Right, thank you. We have been Sarah Simons and Cameron Jack.

SPEAKER_04 53:25

And this has been the Midlife Youth Club episode two. De in France.

SPEAKER_02 53:33

Oh, he's very bilingual. Thanks for listening. Thanks for listening. Thanks for watching. Talk to you soon. Bye.

SPEAKER_03 53:46

Bye.