154 - DNA Dad

[0] This is exactly right.

[1] Hey, this is exciting.

[2] An all -new season of only murders in the building is coming to Hulu on August 27th.

[3] Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez are back as your favorite podcaster, detectives.

[4] But there's a mystery hanging over everyone.

[5] Who killed Saz?

[6] And were they really after Charles?

[7] Why would someone want to kill Charles?

[8] This season, murder hits close to home.

[9] With a threat against one of their own, the stakes are higher than ever.

[10] Plus, the gang is going to Hollywood to turn their podcast into a major movie.

[11] Amid the glitz and glamour of Los Angeles, more mysteries and twists arise.

[12] Who knows what will happen once the cameras start to roll?

[13] Get ready for the stariest season yet with Merrill Streep, Zach Alfinacus, Eugene Levy, Eva Longoria, Melissa McCarthy, DeVine, Joy Randolph, Molly Shannon, and more.

[14] Only Martyrs in the Building, premieres August 27th, streaming only on Hulu.

[15] Go, goodbye.

[16] Hello.

[17] Hello, I'm welcome.

[18] Happy 2019.

[19] Oh, my God.

[20] We are back for a brand new year.

[21] of a brand new podcast year.

[22] That's three years old.

[23] It's three years old this month?

[24] Is it this month?

[25] This month.

[26] Oh, shit, girl.

[27] Dude, that's so many years to be, in podcasting years, that's what?

[28] Three years.

[29] That's like 104 years.

[30] But it feels like 17 minutes.

[31] It does.

[32] This thing has been like a fucking, it's like stepping on to an elevator and then being like, oh my God, the cable broke.

[33] Yeah, but it's flying upward.

[34] Upward.

[35] Into success land.

[36] Into success.

[37] ceiling and nod downward into you get crushed though no but our stomachs are still in our throats right exact same feeling of panic and fear that's right yeah we're still waiting for it to now go downwards kill us even harder than it would have had we not traveled up or whatever i don't know what's happening i may have chosen the most negative metaphor possible for the best thing that's ever happened to me which explains everything that's my style it's explains everything about us and about this podcast called My Favorite Murder.

[38] Did you know that?

[39] That's Karen Kilgareth.

[40] And that's Georgia Hard Start.

[41] Fresh from 2018.

[42] Fuck that year.

[43] The year's gone.

[44] Goodbye.

[45] Goodbye.

[46] It's a fresh brand new year.

[47] Do you make resolutions?

[48] Yes, I did.

[49] But it's also one, because I realize we talk about so much stuff on this podcast and we are so constantly like vomiting personal shit on this podcast.

[50] And like, when I went to make resolutions, I'm like, no, this is just shit I've been talking about for a long time that, like, I've been declaring.

[51] You know, you know what you've been promising yourself because you say it weekly.

[52] Yes.

[53] Okay.

[54] But I really think that I want to truly start for real.

[55] No, but this time is for real.

[56] 2019 is a brand new year.

[57] It has a nice ring to it.

[58] But I honestly want to start saying yes to things even when I want to say no. Okay.

[59] Maybe the other times were like, you know, just try.

[60] trial periods and you've you've kind of practiced and so and give it a little shot and now it's like room.

[61] Well, for that specific one, it's very easy to say you want to do that.

[62] But when things come up, there's such a resounding no that it's like, well, this isn't, this is purely logic.

[63] It's not my opinion.

[64] I simply cannot do this thing.

[65] Like, what do you mean?

[66] Anything.

[67] What if the correct answer is no?

[68] Right.

[69] What if you shouldn't be doing it?

[70] Well, my problem is I always think the correct The answer is no. Okay.

[71] That's my go -to.

[72] Maybe you're wrong 50 % of the time.

[73] I do, at least.

[74] I think I've proven here that I'm wrong about 78 % of the time.

[75] But it's that weird habit of what I do is pre -write what's going to happen.

[76] And based on what I make up, I don't like those results.

[77] Therefore, I'm going to stay home, B, not try to do something, whatever.

[78] So I just think basically the saying yes, forcing myself into discomfort, therefore progress being made.

[79] is my new plan.

[80] Okay.

[81] For 2019.

[82] Okay.

[83] How about yourself?

[84] I don't really usually make resolutions, but I am reading Daring Greatly again for the 100th time.

[85] Sure.

[86] And so I would like to...

[87] Daring Greatly by Brne Brown, a book recommendation we've made many times on the show.

[88] To be more aware and appreciative in the moment, because I think that we do this thing and she talks about it where anything that's happy and joyous, as we just said, we you add on the and this is what's going to go wrong with it yes so instead it's like well what if we were just like took a minute and we're like to have you know to appreciate it and have gratitude um and having anxiety we're about to start our new tour traveling is really hard for me and scary so to actually take a moment and enjoy it and like you know add it up that's a great plan also because I think it's not just traveling the whole thing is we've been doing things that are incredibly daunting pretending that we do them all the time just so just so we can do them and get them done like I remember the very beginning and you were just like I do not like traveling and like there was some real like we have to do this and we can't do this and that went away very quickly because you just did it so you didn't you didn't stay home and go no I don't do that you just said, I don't want to.

[89] Yeah.

[90] And then kind of like, I need to find a way to make it, make it happen.

[91] You can't say no to shit like that.

[92] No, you can't, girl.

[93] I'm making the international money sign with my fingers right now.

[94] I didn't know that was just for me or if you were doing that.

[95] I kind of was doing just for you.

[96] And then I thought, it's going to read.

[97] Yeah.

[98] You're going to hear that the greed in my fingers as I do that.

[99] But yeah.

[100] So there's, but there's ways to prepare oneself so that traveling is that your anxiety that you know is going to come won't hit you in the face.

[101] and you'll be shocked by it every fucking time, like preparing my stories ahead of time, planning on doing certain things in every city, you know, so I'm trying to do that right now.

[102] It definitely makes it easier, but I know, and I think that's probably the same reason you do it, is when you have a thing that's, that you have to get done that distracts you.

[103] Oh, right.

[104] That's the problem.

[105] Then flying is no longer the problem.

[106] Fear of imminent death is no longer the problem.

[107] Something bad happening when you leave is no longer the problem.

[108] Suddenly the problem is you haven't gotten your homework done.

[109] And you can focus on that entirely and not worry about the things that normally worry you.

[110] So that's bad.

[111] No, I'm saying that you were probably doing that for that reason.

[112] Okay.

[113] Because it feels better to worry about homework than it does that Elvis is going to die while I'm gone.

[114] Exactly.

[115] Yeah, okay.

[116] That makes sense.

[117] Yeah, I'm not afraid of being on a plane at all anymore.

[118] No, we've done it so much.

[119] Yeah.

[120] Yeah, because I used to have a lot of like, it wasn't even fear of flying, but just, that thing of the effort like this isn't going to be worth the pain right or something which is such insane i'm not 82 i don't know it's like i'm just doing an impression of my grandmother all the time i don't know why it's so irritating but i want i did tell you this already and you had the funniest reaction but i think it's a pretty good story that's a little bit symbolic of just the experience that we've been having again no complaints but last I think it was August but I can't remember exactly the month I sprained my ankle pretty bad and I'm sure I talked about in the show I was walking George I was with my friend Don I was pointing something out over my shoulder like it was a commercial rolled my ankle off the side of the sidewalk and then basically looked at Don and said you have to go get George and I have to make it into the house before this thing blows up because I won't be able to walk on it so I like quickly limped back to my house, put my foot up, and then just had a terrible sprain for weeks and weeks.

[121] But of course, our fall tour was coming up.

[122] Yeah.

[123] And I knew I wouldn't be able, all I could think of was you can't walk out on that stage with a weird limp.

[124] Like, like that moment where we go out on stage at the live show is such a big moment for us.

[125] And it's so exciting.

[126] And you don't want to be all like.

[127] You don't want one crutch under your armpit hobbling out.

[128] Tennis ball at the bottom.

[129] Yeah.

[130] Just like, ew, what?

[131] Or I carry you on my back.

[132] And I could make it, you could look cute.

[133] We're like, we're best friends.

[134] And I'm carrying you on my bag.

[135] And it's really that caring.

[136] But how?

[137] How aerodynamically?

[138] How could you do it?

[139] So basically, I put my foot up.

[140] I was just like, this can't, I don't have time for this right now.

[141] And then we went on tour and it was fine.

[142] You fucking, you, I have to say, you were, you hobbled without a complaint through so many airports where I could tell you were in pain.

[143] Yes.

[144] And I could tell you were using that away suitcase for fucking.

[145] Oh.

[146] keeping you up it was my secret walker i will say this here's a free commercial for away suitcases they're not just uh wonderfully convenient suitcases that make it easy for you to overpack they also double as a walker a very hip modern walker they got that side roll thing that's so fucking amazing yes and you just you if you get that away suitcase on the side of your spring yeah you're golden okay so when i went home for christmas on the first day back i was going to pick Nora up from grammar school or school she's in grammar school it was at the grammar school the same one I went to so I'm walking up the back entrance and for some reason and I kind of want to sue the city over this but there are they do this thing on some of the streets in petaluma where the as you go into the ditch area like there's the asphalt of the road and then as it goes kind of toward the sidewalk cement it turns into cobblestone almost like this is what it used to be like, which is so irritating.

[147] It's charming to look at.

[148] Yeah.

[149] Hazardous when you have to look at your phone 24 hours a day.

[150] Another issue that I don't even have time to address.

[151] 2019.

[152] We'll deal with it.

[153] 2021.

[154] We'll get that.

[155] So the grid goes down.

[156] It's going to take care of itself.

[157] That's right.

[158] And take it off the to -do list.

[159] That's right.

[160] So as I'm walking up looking at my phone, there is a mini cobblestone pothole, foot -sized pothole, and I wrench my ankle.

[161] same ankle roll it again freeze don't fall down this time last time i fell all the way down which is very embarrassing to do that oh shit oh shit oh shit yes because i it made the same crack it was equally horrible and i froze like is this going to be the worst and then nothing the wave of pain didn't come and the this didn't come and so i'm like okay so i kind of like very casually uh as i've taught myself to do hobbled up this fucking flight of ten stairs i realized norah's not on the playground she's on the upper sidewalk waiting for me on the other sidewalk oh i have i so i have to walk up there but i'm like waving her down without trying to try not to yell she meets me we go and i say we were supposed to go christmas shopping together and i said i'm gonna i'm gonna i'm gonna you know keep a check on it but i might not be able to go to target today yeah she was like okay and then we by the time we get to you know across town it doesn't still doesn't hurt that bad so I said I'm gonna grab a cart and I'll have my walker and let's get this Christmas shopping done yeah um so that afternoon when my sister comes home and she like we put it up and she's putting ice on it and she's like it's so bumpy and then she goes well you just get a fucking x -ray because once I told her I didn't get an x -ray the first time she lost her mind yeah so she makes me go to petlama Valley hospital.

[162] And it was like 8 o 'clock at night.

[163] And I get an x -ray.

[164] I broke it the first time.

[165] Yeah.

[166] So it was a broken ankle that I was walking on for several months until you're like, well, I'm going to ignore this.

[167] I don't.

[168] It's been a year at least.

[169] It's not several months.

[170] That was like a year ago.

[171] Was that a year ago?

[172] I think so.

[173] Yeah, because I guess it wasn't at the beginning of this fault.

[174] No. God, that's weird.

[175] I can't keep track of time at all.

[176] Well, anyway, when I texted Georgia to tell her she was like what the fuck and I said if I didn't have time to feel it and so I just didn't and she wrote back I want to laugh but I also want to cry because I had just gone to the fucking podiatrist and my toe's been fucked up for like a year and this finally this doctor took me seriously and did an x -ray and my toe it's not an ingrown nail I fucking it's either a broken bone on my my toe or a tumor.

[177] So I chew.

[178] And when I was hobbling last tour for the airport with you and like changing my shoes all the time.

[179] Yeah.

[180] Oh my God.

[181] What are you going to do?

[182] Right.

[183] We didn't.

[184] There was it.

[185] It was not in the in game plan.

[186] No. So we couldn't do it.

[187] No. So we didn't do it.

[188] But now the tour, the new tour is about to start.

[189] Now let's deal with it.

[190] Now let's go get surgery.

[191] Let's get some surgeries.

[192] Let's have a surgery tour.

[193] Let's have a surgery.

[194] Who can get the most surgeries.

[195] Oh, my God.

[196] Without anyone noticing that you got surgery.

[197] Yeah, you can't.

[198] I mean, you could do it on your face, but you have to get very high end.

[199] So subtle.

[200] The highest event.

[201] That's right.

[202] Very high end.

[203] Speaking of our tour, it starts on, I'm excited.

[204] It starts on the 10th in San Diego.

[205] I'm not that excited.

[206] Great.

[207] Most of the shows are sold out.

[208] But listen, Honolulu.

[209] Honolulu?

[210] Hawaii?

[211] They're doing Hawaii time on this show.

[212] Yeah.

[213] They're being as chill.

[214] as Hawaiians are.

[215] It's February 8th, I believe.

[216] And like, it's, we're going to need some seat warmers in there, some sea fillers.

[217] Go there.

[218] Or if you maybe live in a cold climate.

[219] Yeah.

[220] And you're independently wealthy and you want to go to Honolulu for our show.

[221] Yeah.

[222] Come on over.

[223] Take a, take a weekend.

[224] Pretend it's, it's for Valentine's Day.

[225] I don't know.

[226] Sure.

[227] Rent a jet.

[228] Yeah, yeah.

[229] Pick us up on the way.

[230] Come on.

[231] And we'll see you there.

[232] And let's party Hawaiian style.

[233] That's right.

[234] Well, another exciting thing about it being January of 2019 is very soon a whole new wave of podcasts are going to roll out on the exactly right podcast network, which we're very, there's some of them that we cannot wait to tell you about.

[235] We've been teasing it for a long time.

[236] It's taken a while, but we're finally going to roll them out and you're going to be very happy.

[237] It's been annoying not being able to tell you guys this like fucking slate of podcasts that we've been.

[238] not or I wouldn't say working on because we've done nothing I mean we've done a lot of work to make them alive but we're not the podcasters of them yeah so you know what I mean but still we have all that we have that hometown pride that's right and we just think you're going to be excited lots of these podcasts were specifically either chosen or developed with the the audience that listens to this podcast in mind so it's very it's very exciting to us and we think you're going to be really excited.

[239] So keep whatever, we'll tell you all about it.

[240] Follow on exactly right.

[241] Network, something on Instagram.

[242] Yeah, and Twitter.

[243] It's all there.

[244] Twitter.

[245] Lots of, lots of, lots of.

[246] And then, of course, in the meanwhile, please listen to this podcast will kill you.

[247] The Purrcast, the fall line.

[248] And of course, there's going to be a brand new episode of Do You Need a Ride, me and Stephen and Chris Fairbanks, just recorded it with the great Dave Holmes.

[249] Dave Holmes.

[250] Love him.

[251] Comes out Monday.

[252] Oh, yeah, we did it on New Year's Eve Day.

[253] Nice.

[254] Yeah, yeah.

[255] Dave Holmes is so sweet.

[256] He's the greatest.

[257] I tried listening to this podcast, We'll Kill You, it was about diphtheria, you know, while I'm falling asleep at night.

[258] It was a bad idea.

[259] Did you know you get tumors and your throat from it?

[260] No. It was one of those ones where I'm like, well, I can't listen to this while I'm falling asleep because I don't want to miss anything, but also I'm terrified and you're touching your throat.

[261] Are you okay?

[262] Who knows?

[263] I can't, I don't know.

[264] Clearly, I'm not in touch with my body.

[265] just check in to see if there's anything but wait diphtheria does it do people still get it i don't know you have to listen to this podcast we'll kill you why don't i listen to this podcast will kill you on my way home yeah um anything else um i don't think so not that i well i guess we'll just bring it up as we think of it yeah um who the fuck goes first stephen the last live show because we did the mfm or Origins last week.

[266] Yeah, that's right.

[267] If you want to listen, if you haven't listened to last week's episode, Origins, it's Steven fucking made a beautiful episode.

[268] Editing so many, find, like, combing through old episodes to find the origins of a bunch of our stupid quotes.

[269] And he put them all together, did a great job.

[270] I mean, it took a long time mostly because I just was listening back.

[271] I'm like, oh, wait, I'm supposed to be working.

[272] Nice one.

[273] It was like a your Christmas gift to us where we didn't have to record an episode, another episode at the end of December.

[274] It was wonderful.

[275] It was really fun.

[276] Thank you.

[277] Yeah, it's really fun.

[278] Great job.

[279] So at the, so before Origins.

[280] Oh, is Glasgow and, um, you did the, um, Bible John.

[281] Yes.

[282] Then you would go first.

[283] Oh, okay.

[284] Yeah.

[285] Or it's new 2019.

[286] Are you start a new system, like, point flipping.

[287] Rochambeau.

[288] Okay.

[289] I'm a big fan of Rosambeau.

[290] Are you really?

[291] Would you say you're good at it?

[292] I think I'm good at it.

[293] Which is so stupid.

[294] I know that's ridiculous.

[295] And I was about to say it and then you asked it.

[296] And I was like, don't say it.

[297] I think I'm good at Rochambeau.

[298] I could see it in your eyes.

[299] You were like, should we do this?

[300] My eyes got bright.

[301] Is that fair?

[302] What if I'm really good?

[303] I'm going to lose immediately.

[304] So it's one, two, three, hit.

[305] Yeah.

[306] One, two, three.

[307] Shit, you just won.

[308] I won it.

[309] So now Georgia doesn't get to believe she's good at Rochambeau anymore.

[310] I don't.

[311] But wait, does that mean you go first or I go first or you get a pick?

[312] We didn't decide what winning event.

[313] What does winning mean?

[314] What do you want?

[315] I, you know, I, you know, I have.

[316] assume winning means you go second but that's because I'm from the world of stand -up comedy where the headliner is last got it but that doesn't apply to us no that's fine and it's not the same um do you have an end do you have an ender a good ender i'm staring at steven like you're gonna help me i mean i feel like it's it's it's you get to pick because it means either you get to go first or you get to pick you know yeah like it's you get to pick which one you want to do i like going first sometimes okay but it depends on if you have a story that you think is going to be a good ender.

[317] I don't, I have to say, we haven't done this in so long in this way that I kind of feel, I absolutely don't know what day it is.

[318] I'll say this right now.

[319] I mean, obviously, it's Wednesday because that's when we record, but conceptually, I've been asking what day it is for like two weeks.

[320] No, I thought it was Tuesday for three days.

[321] I'm in so in weird vacation mode because we haven't had one in so long that we just literally and legitimately took two weeks off and did nothing and, like, didn't do anything.

[322] It was so weird.

[323] It was, yeah, suddenly I could feel my bones.

[324] Yeah.

[325] It was not pleasant.

[326] Oh, because they're broken.

[327] Right.

[328] Hey, this is exciting.

[329] An all -new season of only murders in the building is coming to Hulu on August 27th.

[330] Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez are back as your favorite podcaster, detectives.

[331] But there's a mystery hanging over everyone.

[332] Who killed Saz?

[333] Were they really after Charles?

[334] Why would someone want to kill Charles?

[335] This season, murder hits close to home.

[336] With a threat against one of their own, the stakes are higher than ever.

[337] Plus, the gang is going to Hollywood to turn their podcast into a major movie.

[338] Amid the glitz and glamour of Los Angeles, more mysteries and twists arise.

[339] Who knows what will happen once the cameras start to roll?

[340] Get ready for the stariest season yet with Merrill Streep, Zach Alfenakis, Eugene Levy, Eva Longoria, Melissa McCarthy, Davey, Joy Randolph, Molly Shannon, and more.

[341] Only Martyrs in the Building, premieres August 27th, streaming only on Hulu.

[342] Goodbye.

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[344] Absolutely.

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[363] Goodbye.

[364] Okay.

[365] Then you know what?

[366] I'll go first if it's my pick.

[367] Okay.

[368] And just let's dive right back in.

[369] Okay.

[370] Because also I really like this story, but I don't know if it's an ender.

[371] I don't know what it is.

[372] I think I got it.

[373] But I will tell you this.

[374] The reason that I picked it, is because it's in my little file on my computer that's murders that I haven't done yet.

[375] Yeah.

[376] And it's one of the only ones that had any information on the page whatsoever because I've run out of those completely.

[377] Right.

[378] You're like, great.

[379] It started for me. Yeah.

[380] I barely had like a backlog to begin with.

[381] Yeah.

[382] So this was one of my only ones.

[383] And then the whole reason I loved it is because there was this quote that I had pulled from another story and was like, remember to do this one and remember to use this quote.

[384] You know I lost that quote.

[385] Do you ever do that in the, when you're cutting and pasting from one document to another?

[386] Yeah.

[387] If you cut from one document and then you delete something else before you paste.

[388] No, it's gone?

[389] Yeah.

[390] I didn't know that.

[391] Like if you basically take the place of the cut and paste.

[392] Yeah.

[393] On one.

[394] Got it.

[395] Am I wrong about the Stephen?

[396] I don't.

[397] I mean, it might be whatever you're like, I don't fucking know.

[398] I think, yeah, if it's highlighted, definitely.

[399] If it's highlighted, you copy it and then you delete it.

[400] It won't.

[401] Whatever.

[402] It doesn't, yeah.

[403] I just wanted to see if we could get super boring before I started, just to, like, have a nice abasement.

[404] Great.

[405] It can only go up from here.

[406] I'm just saying, I wish, I would say this was an under, if I had this quote, that would have been, like, the shiny tiara on top of this princess story.

[407] What's the quote?

[408] Well, it doesn't matter now.

[409] Okay.

[410] And I don't, I truly don't have it.

[411] And now I can't find it.

[412] I couldn't find it, which is very odd.

[413] Then it's like, where did I get it?

[414] Did it ever even exist?

[415] Yeah.

[416] What the?

[417] Was it just a quote that you wished someone would say?

[418] Or did, is there a rare chance that I actually read a physical book and then copied the quote out of a book?

[419] That's impossible.

[420] No. I don't do research that.

[421] You can't even read.

[422] I can barely touch books because of my ankle.

[423] Okay.

[424] But the, uh, so I'm going to do for you right now and Stephen in 2019, the murder of Thelma Todd.

[425] Okay.

[426] Hollywood actress of the 20s and 30s.

[427] You know her from the many Marks Brothers films that she appeared in, if at all.

[428] They called her the ice cream blonde and she, in less than 10 years, made over 120 movies and short comedic shorts.

[429] Jesus.

[430] Cometic shorts.

[431] All with a broken ankle.

[432] So I got the majority of the information about this murder.

[433] from the website deranged L .A. Crimes.

[434] And this is the same website where it's a website written by someone named Joan Renner.

[435] And that's where I got the whole story for our L .A. live show, two live shows ago, when I did the story of Aggie Underwood, who was the first city desk editor and this basically very famous female true crime reporter in L .A. in the 40s when no one else, no other women were doing it.

[436] And she did it.

[437] and she is said to be the one who coined the Black Dahlia nickname.

[438] Right.

[439] She was, and supposedly the first on the scene reporter -wise.

[440] Crazy.

[441] So Joan Runner has a website deranged L .A. Crimes, but there's a whole part that's about Aggie Underwood.

[442] She's like an expert in Aggie Underwood.

[443] So a lot of the information is from there and also from, I got it from there.

[444] So apparently Lonnie Anderson starred in a 1991 film called White Hot, The Mysterious Death of Thelma Todd.

[445] And when that, I think it's a made -for -TV movie, but everyone only ever called it movie on the internet, so I'm not sure.

[446] And it costs like $50 on Amazon.

[447] Like, it's hard to get.

[448] Yeah, I thought I was going to watch it really fast and then have a fun, like, then Lonnie Anderson said this.

[449] And it's like, you can't get it.

[450] You have to be like a devotee.

[451] But in 1991, a writer named Frank Sinello wrote an article.

[452] in the Chicago Tribune that was basically it was all about Thelma Todd's mysterious death because this Lonnie Anderson made for TV movie was about to come out so he basically was like it's still a mystery but there are some theories and he kind of like reignited the whole idea of it so let's do this great Thelma Dodd was born July 29th 1906 in Lawrence Massachusetts to an abusive distant alcoholic that's right an Irish father named John Todd, who was an upholsterer and a corrupt local politician.

[453] Great job.

[454] I don't know if he really was both of those things, but he was said to be one thing and then the other thing and different websites.

[455] So I like to think he started as a lowly uppulsterer.

[456] Right.

[457] And he rose up to being a corrupt policy.

[458] But you know, like even back then, it was probably such a small town.

[459] I was like, great, you're mayor.

[460] You know what I mean?

[461] Like, it wasn't like a big fucking deal.

[462] Like it was a big political fucking.

[463] That's right.

[464] They're like, you recovered our couch so beautiful.

[465] You're the mayor.

[466] Thank you.

[467] Remember that time we had a whole conversation about how upholsters are always creeps?

[468] Yeah.

[469] I think it was it was because Angelo Bono who was one of the hillside stranglers, he was an upholsterer.

[470] Because they're just half in fumes, glue, fabric glue.

[471] And they got a lot of like hooky, a lot of instruments are hook shaped.

[472] And yes.

[473] Anything else?

[474] No. Go ahead.

[475] What?

[476] There was nothing.

[477] Okay.

[478] So Thelma Todd graduates high school.

[479] She actually enrolls in college.

[480] She wants to be a teacher.

[481] So she enrolls at a school called the Lowell Normal School.

[482] Where the mascot is.

[483] A normal person.

[484] Just the most normal person.

[485] Just someone as normal.

[486] This guy, he's like a beige person.

[487] He's got his buttons all the way to the top.

[488] He's just normal.

[489] He likes pot roast.

[490] He likes potatoes.

[491] Go normal people.

[492] Missionary sex.

[493] And that's it.

[494] That's all he's into.

[495] Okay.

[496] So that is now the University of Massachusetts at Lowell.

[497] But at the time, it was called the Lowell Normal School for all those people in Massachusetts.

[498] Am I pronouncing Lowell wrong?

[499] No, it sounds right.

[500] It's not a Worcester situation, is it?

[501] I don't think so.

[502] Okay.

[503] Why am I asking you?

[504] Why am I being so competent in my answer?

[505] That's a good question.

[506] No, there was a stand -Bow.

[507] Francisco named called Lowell.

[508] So that's why I'm pronouncing it that way.

[509] So maybe in Massachusetts it called something else.

[510] But listen, we're going with the San Francisco pronunciation.

[511] Got to do it.

[512] NorCal, West Coast.

[513] Zian.

[514] Okay.

[515] So unfortunately, Thelma wants to be a teacher because her name's Thelma.

[516] So yes, that's a natural.

[517] But her mother, Alice, is real pushy and it's like you need to enter beauty contests.

[518] Well, it turns out her mother was right because in 1925, Thelma wins the title of Miss Massachusetts.

[519] And she actually goes on to compete in the Miss America pageant that year, or later on.

[520] She doesn't win, but she does catch the eye of Hollywood talent scouts, and she ends up getting a contract at Paramount.

[521] Damn.

[522] Yeah.

[523] So now she's in the mid -20s, mid -to -late -20s Hollywood studio system.

[524] Hell yeah.

[525] Which I'm sure was good, but from what I understand, pre -code Hollywood, there's a lot of Phenemines.

[526] Sure.

[527] There was a lot of drinking and there's a lot of just, you know, this, orgy type things.

[528] It's casting couch stuff.

[529] Yeah.

[530] Actors are cattle.

[531] This is where all this.

[532] Okay, never mind.

[533] I take back my positive note.

[534] No, we can be positive about it.

[535] No, I hate it.

[536] No, come on.

[537] Don't let your love of acting be killed by the early studio system.

[538] I'm just saying there's a reason that things are, there's a reason we ended up in the fucking meat.

[539] situation that we're in right now.

[540] And it's because this has been a long road of overt oppression.

[541] Oh, right.

[542] Phelma Todd starts out in silent films, but because of her beautiful speaking voice.

[543] And I say beautiful, but it just was like she had an okay voice.

[544] Yeah, she could speak like a normal human.

[545] Yes, exactly.

[546] She didn't have the, um, like a normal human, like the person from her.

[547] That guy.

[548] She could speak just like him.

[549] She was thinking of the school mascot, all those football games where the beige guy cheered just came out.

[550] I was like, Gray, I really hope you guys win.

[551] Look, I'm really supportive of this team.

[552] Yeah, and she was like, hey, I'm a silent movie star.

[553] Look at me. Everyone's like, God, this is normal.

[554] Yeah, I love it.

[555] I love her.

[556] She makes a transition to talkies, and in less than 10 years, as I said, she appears in over 120 movies and comedic shorts.

[557] Now, comedic shorts were like this thing, and it's, if you ever go to black and white, like, remember the old silent movie theater?

[558] back in the day there used to be comedic short so like Buster Keaton and Laurel and Hardy and all those guys they would put out these little short movies that were like you know wasn't an hour it was like 12 minutes long or whatever she was in a ton of those and in 1931 producer Howl Roach teams her up he gets this idea that he wants to have like a female Laurel and Hardy he thinks that would be great and then all the bros in the 30s were like you're ruining my childhood women aren't funny and this is again say women aren't funny say hey say hey say women and then they all do like a four -part harmony sweet caroline so how roach teams thomas todd up was a very famous actress zazu pits who is very actually you look a lot like her she has these big brown eyes she's very kind of dramatic looking and she looks like she was an amazing silent film actress because she was very expressive So the two of them, it's like the blonde and I, the picture I saw of Zazu Pitch, she was a brunette, could have changed in the, like later in her career.

[559] But they do a bunch of shorts, you know those famous comedy shorts they start in, like hot dogs.

[560] It's basically like original YouTube where it's like, we just need to make funny content.

[561] Fall down a couple times, break your necklace, you know, and then drive a car.

[562] It'll be hilarious, your women.

[563] one of their shorts was called Let's do something Great I love it Let's go with it Let's do something Publish it on YouTube now So good Okay so then when Zazu Pitts Leaves Howo Roaches Like production company Over a contract dispute Thelma Todd is then paired up With an actress named Patsy Kelly And they make a ton more Now while she is under Howo Roach's tutelage I've never said that word before He creates something called this you might enjoy it's called the potato claws oh dear um he just he believed that thelma had a weight problem oh great and so he um stipulated that he put in her contract the potato clause if she gained more than five pounds she'd be fired jesus so of course thelma's mother was there to the rescue giving her diet pills okay uh which she of course became addicted to and this is and she also was a huge drinker and this is now when this turns into the karen kogogar of store although I was never missed Massachusetts.

[564] Clothes, if I try.

[565] Run her up.

[566] I couldn't get that baton to light on fire.

[567] Okay.

[568] She plays opposite Buster Keaton, but eventually what she gets famous for is being the blonde in all the Marks Brothers movies that all the brothers are into, including horse feathers and monkey business, some of their most famous movies.

[569] If you haven't watched a Marks Brother movie, you absolutely should.

[570] They're super hilarious.

[571] They genuinely are great comedy.

[572] And Chico Marx is truly one of my favorite performers.

[573] He plays the piano, but then he does jokes while he's playing the piano.

[574] He does piano playing jokes.

[575] Like, you have to see it, but it's like one of my favorite things.

[576] Okay.

[577] He's amazing.

[578] So in 1931, she stars opposite Chester Morris, your favorite actor in a pre -code crime drama called Corsair, and the director of that movie was a man named Roland West, who then Thelma began to have an on again, off again affair with.

[579] He was a married band.

[580] Uh -oh.

[581] In 1932, she marries a self -proclaimed producer and, uh, you gotta hate a self -proclaimed producer.

[582] I mean, here's the thing about Hollywood.

[583] It was founded by people in the mafia and creeps.

[584] it just was they were self -proclaimed everything they were so they were just proclaiming all over town i know art i know how to make a movie proclaim until you make it is what they used to they used to say that was the old saying that was the poster that the chico marks had above his bed so these guys they ran the movie business like it was any other business like it was running liquor or prostitution or anything it was kind of the same thing where if you were in a movie you could shut up and you'd take your money and you would get as much as they gave you the end totally and here take these pills you know come to the party yeah and potato claws always hanging over your head the potato clause still exists today oh you say it's unspoken we have it at my favorite murder but it's that if you don't gain five pounds you're fired that's um I actually inducted the potato clause uh late 2016 and it was I'm going to gain five pounds every day until I break both of my ankles.

[585] Okay, so...

[586] We weigh Stephen every time he comes over here.

[587] All right, I'm done.

[588] Stephen is a wreck.

[589] Steven, get on a scale.

[590] 1932, Thelma marries this man. His name's Pat, I think it's Decheco, but it's spelled D -I -C -C -C -O.

[591] De -C -C -C -O -D -C -C -E -C -C -E -C -E -C -O?

[592] No, it's not that.

[593] It's de C -C -C -C -S -O.

[594] Desceo.

[595] C -So was named after him.

[596] Deceeo and desist.

[597] So he had mob ties.

[598] They had a very bad marriage.

[599] They both drank a ton.

[600] They would get into huge drunken brawls.

[601] One of which resulted in a broken nose for Pat.

[602] And another ended in an emergency appendectomy for Thelma.

[603] Holy shit.

[604] So they threw down.

[605] Oh.

[606] Oh, my God.

[607] Married for two years.

[608] In 1934, they get divorced.

[609] And right after that, Selma stops drinking.

[610] She's like, I'm already on diet pills.

[611] Yeah, yeah.

[612] And I believe me when I say, it's actually the best combination in the world.

[613] Because when you're on diet pills, you can drink like nine beers and not feel anything.

[614] Like, that's when it just starts cutting the edge off the diet pills.

[615] Oh, yeah.

[616] And I bet you in the 30s diet pills were way more intense.

[617] They were insane.

[618] What were they made of?

[619] Like, who the fucking asbestos and pink?

[620] gasoline, ethyl gasoline, ethanol, ethanol, and paint chips, and asbestos.

[621] And you chewed it on up and you liked it.

[622] And you said, pretty, pretty, pretty.

[623] You lost all the pound.

[624] So in 1934, she decides she's going to open her own, basically restaurant club.

[625] And it's called Thelma Todd's Sidewalk Cafe.

[626] And it's in that building.

[627] I know.

[628] I drive by it all the time.

[629] Not all the time.

[630] I'm never on PCH.

[631] But every time I drive by it, I think that's the Thelma Todd's, place.

[632] Yes, it's the building, I believe, is still standing.

[633] It is between Santa Monica and Malibu on PCH.

[634] It's gorgeous.

[635] It's the best location, um, right, right on the ocean.

[636] And, uh, it was, our deco looking building.

[637] It's really cool.

[638] It's very cool.

[639] You notice it because it's really like, it's an old -timey, cool structure.

[640] I think it's like a, like a car mechanic now or something.

[641] Is it really?

[642] I have no idea.

[643] It's weird that they didn't make it like a, it's so Los Angeles.

[644] They that they're just like, oh, yeah, that can be whatever you want.

[645] We're not going to make it any kind of a landmark or preserve it.

[646] Yeah.

[647] Have it be like a Pizza Hut Taco Bell drive -thru.

[648] That's what we like the most.

[649] Let's desecrate this place.

[650] But quickly.

[651] So at the time, Thelma Tog's Sidewalk Cafe was the Spago of the 30s.

[652] It was frequented by celebrities, politicians, and mobsters, all the people who partied.

[653] And the menu offered gin fizz for 35 cents, which is what my parents used to have at every holiday, like Christmas morning, Easter morning.

[654] They were gin -fiz.

[655] Just gin and fizz?

[656] It's gin.

[657] It's an egg.

[658] Oh, God.

[659] Egg white?

[660] Egg white.

[661] Oh, man, I don't know.

[662] I don't think they'll use yokes.

[663] I hope not.

[664] It's my mom just drinks a whole egg.

[665] And then she eats a live gold fish.

[666] And then she swallows a tire iron.

[667] She gets into the penis book.

[668] And then it's a fish that she pulls out as like fish skeleton.

[669] And now she's in the Guinness Book of World Records for it.

[670] What a great woman.

[671] Gin fizz, all I know is there's egg whites, as you say, gin and lemonade.

[672] Minamade lemonade.

[673] It always has to be from a can of Minutemate lemonade.

[674] Yeah, of a, like, defrosted can of, holy shit.

[675] That was always on the counter when it was a holiday at the go -guards.

[676] I'll take four.

[677] Well, if you took four at Thelma Tad Sidewalk Cafe, it would only cost you $35.

[678] cents each.

[679] Right.

[680] Isn't that the best?

[681] Yes.

[682] I couldn't do, I couldn't multiply that.

[683] I know, it takes me a minute.

[684] It's over a dollar.

[685] Yeah.

[686] I know that for five.

[687] We don't need to know.

[688] It doesn't matter.

[689] It's a $1 .40.

[690] There was also the Thelmatad knockout, which was $1.

[691] Oh.

[692] So that was like triple a gin fizz.

[693] There was the Thelma Todd milk punch, which had a gin base.

[694] I wonder if they made all their own like bathtub gin and then just served it.

[695] And the Thelma Todd Ricky instead of a lime Ricky, which was $0 .45.

[696] And that last one was listed as a hot weather suggestion.

[697] Great.

[698] Thank you, yes.

[699] Yeah.

[700] Just wait for winter when you have that gin fit.

[701] Yeah, don't eat, drink egg whites during the fucking summer.

[702] That sounds disgusting.

[703] Okay, so here's what's crazy.

[704] She opens Thelma Tog Sidewalk Cafe with director and her on again, off again, lover Roland West, and his wife, actress Jewel Carmen.

[705] She's like, great, let's do this.

[706] Jewel is like, I love restaurants, I love ideas.

[707] I love my husband.

[708] God, I love this guy so much that I want to go into business with his girlfriend, actress.

[709] So, weirder still, the three of them move into the duplex that's above the cafe.

[710] Now, this, that line of information I got from one website, but then I saw on the Joan Renner's website, there was actually a hand -drawn map of the location.

[711] And basically, in the foreground right by the ocean, is the building where Thelma, Todd's side of what cafe is and at the top of that building there's an apartment there's an apartment that Thelma Todd lived in but then in the street above basically so it was like a house built into the hill so it had a view of the ocean and overlooked the building where the cafe was that's where Roland West lived with his wife but it was like up this it was basically up the main house it was the main house up 300 stairs from PCH you would have to walk up them and then walk up the road.

[712] Okay.

[713] So they, but basically they all live together, whether it was in that apartment above the cafe or in Roland's house.

[714] Yikes.

[715] Yeah.

[716] Apparently, Jule is fine.

[717] The wife is fine that Roland is having an affair with Thelma Todd.

[718] But Roland is not happy because Thelma, now that they all live together and have this business together, he sees the constant influx of her other lovers that are on again when he's off again and it pisses him off.

[719] He doesn't like that.

[720] it because they're all roommates, which is a mistake.

[721] Which she isn't something you should do.

[722] No. If you're having an affair with a married man, go ahead and don't move in with him.

[723] Yeah, just as generalized advice.

[724] Okay.

[725] And one of those lovers is the mobster lucky Luciano.

[726] Mm. Now, this guy, have you ever seen a picture of him?

[727] I've seen the guy who played him in Boardwalk Empire.

[728] Ooh.

[729] And holy shit.

[730] Holy shit.

[731] Smoke stack.

[732] Smoke stack.

[733] Smoke.

[734] People these days say smoke show.

[735] Smoke show.

[736] That's the trendy thing to say, but I'm starting to smoke stack.

[737] I knew it was something.

[738] He is a, he is the smoke stack of a nuclear fission reactor.

[739] Apps a fucking Tivli.

[740] Let me see a photo of him.

[741] And what's the actor's name who played him?

[742] I'll never know because he's a character actor, but he's a, look at the real lucky Luciano.

[743] He looks a little scarier than that.

[744] the actor.

[745] He has a, he has a lazy eye and scars on his face like a panther scratched him.

[746] He's been punched in the face so many times.

[747] You know it.

[748] There's no cartilage left in his nose.

[749] And he himself is a smoke show.

[750] I will say, yeah.

[751] If this guy was like, hey, I want to talk to you at this bar.

[752] Yeah.

[753] I'd be like, well, absa fucking lootly.

[754] What would you like to speak about, sir?

[755] Tell me anything with your broken jaw.

[756] I'm listening.

[757] Your vaguely threatening face.

[758] just consistently talk about like a resting bitch face yeah he is resting i'm gonna shoot you in the back of the head when you think we're just out for a stroll totally they resting face that's the thing will you look up this um the actor that played lucky luciano and boardwalk empire because i do remember when his part would come on there was also there was him and there was mire lansky and they were both hot totally well myer lansky's that amazing actor that it's on uh yes was a simple man a serious man A serious man. He's amazing.

[759] I love him.

[760] Okay.

[761] The actor is Vincent Piazza.

[762] He played Lucky Luciano.

[763] Hi.

[764] He's so cute.

[765] He's the cute.

[766] Well, see, in that picture, he, of course, all actors take pictures wearing some weird European scarf.

[767] And that's how you know that they're not the character they played in the period piece.

[768] That's the only way you know.

[769] Because that guy is Lucky Luciano is so scary and his hair is so perfectly like finger wave.

[770] Yeah.

[771] And he's like all in that three piece suit.

[772] and he's just like you can tell his like new york italian accent and shit yeah and he's like calmly killing people and calling for people to be killed and thelma todd is like absa fucking luteley what remember this let me see god damn it he did that so good oh he's so cute yeah you guys watch boardwalk empire it's a really good show if you haven't seen boardwalk empire i think it's on some of the streaming HBO or not just streaming um please watch so thelma todd sees him and she's like absolutely So she sees him the non -acting version of him, the scar -faced version.

[773] He's, by the way, when she meets him, he was the first head of the Genovese crime family, which is a pretty fucking big deal.

[774] When I went on to Lucky Luciano's Wikipedia page just to kind of get a general sense, because I thought he was like an L .A. mobster that was just kind of like opening clubs here and stuff.

[775] No, no, no, no. he was like he was huge and everywhere it couldn't figure out what city he originated in he was a smokestack he was the top brass he was fucking a killer among killers so she meets him at the coconut grove we're all great things happened in the 30s yeah which i believe i could be wrong stephen you might want to he's stephen's writing in his notebook right now he's you're writing takeout lucky luciano's day i just says lose five pounds over and over over um i think coconut grove is what the comedy story is now because you heard there's always the stories about how the comedy store on um sunset boulevard is haunted and it's because i believe so stephen's going to correct me it used to be the caguna grove and they used to take people in the basement and kill them constantly and there are amazing ghost stories from people who have worked at the comedy store guys who have left the main room closing up the club at night and they go back in to like because they hear a noise and all of the chairs are piled up into one tall pile in the center of the room.

[776] Why is the scariest thing stacked furniture in the world?

[777] Like fast stacked furniture.

[778] And yeah.

[779] Because then you know something happened.

[780] And those were people who told those stories on like television.

[781] Yeah, yeah.

[782] Those story shows where they were like, Yep, this is, I'm, you're like, this guy's not a bullshitter.

[783] No, telling the truth.

[784] He, he said it was like, so scary.

[785] So I think, Stephen, am I wrong?

[786] I think, well, yeah, it says here because it was demolished in 2005.

[787] I guess that was, it used to be, or it was turned into the ambassador hotel.

[788] Oh.

[789] But it doesn't say anything about the comedy store.

[790] So where was Coconut Grove?

[791] This was in, it was on 3 ,300 Wilshire.

[792] Oh, nowhere near it.

[793] And everyone knows, yeah.

[794] And everyone knows the ambassador hotel never had anything.

[795] any problems and was everything went well there.

[796] Everything was great at the ambassador until no major assassinations.

[797] Never took place there.

[798] So everything is fine.

[799] I guess there's lots of bad vibes in L .A. It's really what the...

[800] I mean, that's really L .A. That's just moral of this story.

[801] One bad vibe.

[802] Okay.

[803] So, you see now why this is not a closer.

[804] Okay, so she meets Lucky Luciano.

[805] They're at the Coconut Grove.

[806] He offers her a glass of champagne.

[807] she says no thanks because she stopped drinking when she divorced asshole he when she refuses him grabs her and pours a bottle of Dom Parignon down her throat oh my god and then they fall in love no yeah because Thelma Todd had a real problem with dating abusive men you know probably like starting from her father the relationship she had with her father distant abuse of alcoholic men was kind of her thing and also it was so common back then yeah it was just a thing i think a lot of women just expected to happen right you were a man handled you were treated like a thing um so she but also how scary to date a mobster those people are that's scary totally and she's like i'm in it because she was all speeded out and he also got her better diet pills oh he immediately got her hooked on stronger and fed mean and was like we're doing this but the sad part is he may have been using her because what he wanted Although she was the most beautiful and successful woman in Hollywood at the time.

[808] She really was huge.

[809] She was like the biggest star.

[810] But he wanted to open a casino above Thelma Tog Sidewalk Cafe in the empty third floor of that building.

[811] And that was his plan.

[812] So what he wanted to do was because she already had the celebrities and all the people going there, he wants to open a casino on the third floor.

[813] Then the movie studio executives would go up there, lose their money, owe him money, and then he would slowly take over the studio system.

[814] That was lucky Luciano's plan.

[815] Holy shit.

[816] And that's what he wanted to do.

[817] But Thelma Todd basically said, no, you're not, she didn't want to have any of that involved in her restaurant and that wasn't happening.

[818] Now I'm seating you all the little things that were going on in Thelma Todd's life.

[819] All nefarious and...

[820] Yeah.

[821] Right.

[822] Lots of bad.

[823] Good, fun, great comedy stuff, hot dogs.

[824] but then also lots of, lots of creepy stuff.

[825] So on the night of Saturday, December 14th, 1935, she gets invited to a party that Ida Lipino, who at the time was 16 years old, her father, who was a British actor, he was throwing her 16th birthday party or a party for her.

[826] I assumed it was her birthday at the Trocadero, which is another famous club.

[827] Maybe that's what the comedy store was.

[828] He was actually talking.

[829] I've just talked to my phone.

[830] It was zeros and it was a mafia -controlled nightclub.

[831] Ceros.

[832] Yeah.

[833] There's an article in Daily Bruin about the history.

[834] Okay.

[835] Read it.

[836] Thanks, Stephen.

[837] Okay.

[838] So they go to Turgadero for Ida Lupino's birthday.

[839] Now, if you don't know anything about Ida Lupino, at the time she was only 16, she went on to become a really big star in the 40s, I think more in the 50s.

[840] And then she became a director.

[841] She was one of the first big female director.

[842] directors in Hollywood.

[843] And it's only ever mentioned on like that a go on the Google art thing once a year when it's like, you know, the date of her death or whatever.

[844] But if you're interested in anything like that, look up Ida Lupino, because she was a big deal.

[845] And she should be more famous.

[846] Okay.

[847] So Ernie Peters is one of Thelma Todd's, um, uh, usual limo drivers.

[848] And so he picked her up her and her mother going to this party.

[849] And when they get into the car, Thelma gets chased out of the house by Roland West, who is yelling, you'd be back by 2 a .m. And she gets into the limo and turns around and says, I'll be home at 205.

[850] And then they peel out, is how I like to imagine it.

[851] So they go to this party.

[852] Ernie ends up driving Thelma's mother, Alice, home around 8 o 'clock.

[853] Thelma stays.

[854] While she's still there at the party, her ex -husband, Pat de Chichio.

[855] shows up with a young actress.

[856] He was not invited to this party.

[857] So they immediately get into a fight.

[858] She's like, you're trying to embarrass me. You're trying to humiliate me. It's a big blow up.

[859] And then she just stays there.

[860] Obviously, she wasn't that embarrassed because she stayed until 2 .30 in the morning.

[861] She sits down at Sid Grauman's table, the man who opened the Chinese theater.

[862] And it was one of the first big Hollywood guys.

[863] I don't know anything about him.

[864] I'm just trying to lie through this part.

[865] She sits down at his table and says, will you call Roland and tell him I'll be home I'm leaving now I'll be home in a half an hour I pictured as he was sitting at one of those tables and had a phone yeah yeah like on the side little side table yeah with the phone which in 1935 would be like having your own satellite yeah real big deal Sid Grumman so when she finally leaves and gets it back into the limo it's 3 a .m. Yikes.

[866] Ernie the limo driver says that Thelma was unusually quiet on the ride home which is really saying something when she was on a ton of diet pills yeah God you want to talk so much on those and smoke when he drops her off at 3 .30 he offers to walk her up the 63 step flight of stairs that goes up to the house above but she does something she never does because he normally does do that especially if she's been out drinking she says no and that's Ernie Peters is the last person to see Selma Todd alive so on Monday morning this is this is late Saturday night early Sunday morning on Monday morning on Monday morning morning.

[867] Thelma's made of four years.

[868] Her name is May Whitehead.

[869] She drives her own car down to the garage to get Thelma's Brown Lincoln convertible and bring that down to the hill, down the hill to the cafe where Thelma usually is at the time so that she can use her car down there.

[870] And that was the setup that they always did on Monday mornings.

[871] And she later tells the police that the doors to the garage were closed, but they were unlocked.

[872] And inside, she finds Thelma Todd slumped over in the driver's seat of her car.

[873] The engine's running almost out of gas.

[874] So May runs down to the cafe.

[875] She tells the manager of the cafe to call Roland West.

[876] And then the police are called when Thelma's mother is told of her daughter's death, she screams, my daughter was murdered.

[877] That's the first thing she says.

[878] Thelma Todd was 29 years old at the time of her death.

[879] So the second the story breaks that she died, her death has treated with total suspicion and murder is immediately in the headlines.

[880] There's no proof of it and there kind of will never be, but it's just immediately introduced by the press and by people like Aggie Underwood, the true crime, people who are just like, this is a woman who's in the prime of her career.

[881] She is young.

[882] She's still gorgeous.

[883] She's now getting full -length movies, and she, you know, like she's really coming into her own.

[884] Her restaurant is huge.

[885] She's, why would she kill herself?

[886] It makes no sense that she would kill herself.

[887] But law enforcement theorized that what actually happened was she came home drunk from that party.

[888] She found herself locked out of the house like Roland West said he would do.

[889] And they're at the beach, so anywhere else in Los Angeles, it would be unlikely.

[890] But out on the coast, it would be pretty cold at 3 .30 in the morning.

[891] December right so she went in they theorized she went into the garage to get warm and because she was drunk um she turned her car on to use the heater and she um uh died of carbon monoxide carbon monoxide poison poison oh my eyes were scanning the page so quickly so a coroner's inquest into thelmatog's death is held on december 18th 1935 the autopsy surgeon ap wagner testifies there are quote no marks of violence anywhere upon or within the body and that there was only a superficial contusion on her lower lip so they say that her from one of her front teeth was chipped and that there was blood on her lip from what from hitting the they say from passing out and hitting her mouth on the steering wheel so the jury rules that the death appears to be accidental but recommends further investigation to be made into the case by proper authorities But now other people claim, and a lot of journalists theorize that her nose was broken.

[892] So she didn't just fall, like pass out into the steering wheel.

[893] Her nose was broken, and some say they saw bruising around her neck that indicated strangulation.

[894] There were also rumors that she had two broken ribs.

[895] Wow.

[896] She had also had peas and carrots in her stomach.

[897] They did not serve peas and carrots at the trocadero.

[898] So then there were theories.

[899] that she went when she went up and found that she was locked out of the house, she ended up going somewhere else and eating and hanging out with somebody.

[900] But that's all theory.

[901] Was there alcohol in her system?

[902] She had a 0 .13 blood alcohol level.

[903] So that's drunk, but it's not like crazy sloppy drunk.

[904] It's like drunk, but you can get yourself, they say that you would know that you were about to gas yourself.

[905] If you were that drunk and you wanted to turn on the heater, you'd be like, I'm just going to have to be cold in this garage.

[906] Yeah.

[907] But who knows?

[908] Who knows?

[909] I mean, it couldn't even cross her mind that people die that way, you know?

[910] It could have been that.

[911] It could have been that if she was also on all that speed that she didn't have all her faculties and she just was kind of like, fuck it, I'm going to do this for one second.

[912] Yeah.

[913] I fell asleep.

[914] Yeah.

[915] Who knows?

[916] A grand jury probe subsequently found that there was no evidence of murder.

[917] And the case was closed by the Homicide Bureau which listed the death as, accidental with possible suicidal tendencies.

[918] The investigators were never able to find any motive for suicide or a suicide note.

[919] And all her friends and family were like, it's impossible that she would want to commit suicide because, of course, of her career, of her restaurant.

[920] Like, everything was going great for her.

[921] Yeah.

[922] But then why would she be so quiet in the car?

[923] Maybe she was just like, fuck this shit.

[924] Well, she could have been drunk.

[925] She could have had been because of that fight with her ex.

[926] and maybe being embarrassed from that.

[927] It could have been, she could have also met somebody at that party that she then planned to go see after and was going home to get her car to go meet someone.

[928] That's why she was like, you don't need to walk me upstairs because she wasn't going upstairs.

[929] No, she was like going to meet somebody.

[930] I mean, who knows?

[931] So here's the even weirder part.

[932] Then a bunch, when police start looking into it, a bunch of people come forward claiming that they saw or talk to Thelma Todd on Sunday, December 15th.

[933] What?

[934] Yes.

[935] So one of the people who claimed this was a woman named Martha Ford.

[936] She's the wife of actor Wallace Ford, and she was hosting a party on Sunday during the day.

[937] And she claims that Thelma called her, and when she first got on the phone, she thought it was someone named Velma.

[938] She didn't know who she was talking to.

[939] And then she realized it was Thelma, and she's, Thelma asked if it would be okay if she evening clothes from the night before to her party that day.

[940] And when Martha said, sure, I don't care, she claims that Thelma then told her she was bringing a surprise guest and said, quote, she said, Martha said, she said, quote, you just wait until I walk in, you'll fall dead.

[941] So somebody's in the mix.

[942] If this is to be believed and it wasn't an imposter, there was somebody in the mix that, because you could also be quiet in a car.

[943] after being in a club because you ran into someone awesome and hot that you were like, oh my God, I'm going to go meet this guy.

[944] And you're stoked about it.

[945] I was like some famous actor or something that you're like up with.

[946] And also famous enough, there's the tragedy train.

[947] Can you hear it?

[948] Chew -choo -choo -choo -choo.

[949] Thinking about that, if she herself is one of the most famous actresses, who could she have been talking about that she was like, you're going to die when you see who aren't bringing to your party.

[950] George Clooney.

[951] It's clones from the early days.

[952] Pre -E -R.

[953] Clooney.

[954] Okay.

[955] So, yeah, Mrs. Ford assured investigators it was not an imposter.

[956] She was positive.

[957] She spoke to Thelma Todd.

[958] Then later in court, I don't know if it's in court is accurate.

[959] I think I just wrote that.

[960] But later on, Jewel Carmen, who's Roland West's wife, she testified that she saw Thelmato at the intersection of Hollywood and Vine on Sunday morning with a handsome, handsome stranger in the passenger seat of her car.

[961] But according to the coroner's estimated time of death, Thelma was already dead in the garage at her own, at Jules' house when she claims to have seen her in Hollywood, which if you know anything about Los Angeles, is very far away from Pacific Palisades where all of this was taking place.

[962] And like if she needed to, like, Her seeing her is suspicious because she's, like, putting her somewhere else to avoid the suspicion.

[963] Yep, exactly.

[964] Or any connection of her, her family, the house.

[965] Yeah, no, she was alive when I saw her last and not near here.

[966] Yeah.

[967] She was having a great time at Hollywood and Vine where that Starbucks is.

[968] With a hot stranger, yeah, at the old -timey Starbucks.

[969] With that old Starbucks that just had the one barista.

[970] He did it all.

[971] So Thelma Todd's funeral is held on December 19th.

[972] it's like three days later open casket thousands of fans show up her to view the body they there's there's a really weird pictures you can see there's tons of pictures of all this stuff because this was also back and i talked about this a little bit with the agnes underwood thing um this was back when the press would show up with the cops at crime scenes so like in all of this stuff there's pictures of everything you can see pictures of thelma todd in her car in the garage you can see it all Oh, my God.

[973] Yeah, it's nuts.

[974] So there is a picture of her in her coffin at the viewing, and her coffin is surrounded by roses.

[975] They're piled up everywhere behind her and on it.

[976] It's really weird.

[977] Also, the coffin is tipped up a little bit so you can see her thumb.

[978] It's open casket.

[979] You can see her from far away.

[980] That's so creepy.

[981] It's so creepy.

[982] And it's, yeah.

[983] Of course, her two ex -friends and co -stars, Patsy Kelly and Zazu Pitts, were devastated and it said that Patsy Kelly was so upset she had to be kept under a doctor's care because she had just gone shopping with Elma Todd like days before so it's and she wasn't even 30 yeah I mean it's it's horrible so now we talk about some of the suspects so obviously the ex -husband is the first suspect because it's one of the last people who saw her alive public fight infamous like wife beater this guy Pat de Chico whatever's name is went on to marry Gloria Vanderbilt.

[984] Oh, my God.

[985] He used to call her Fatso or some, he had some horrible nickname for a woman who is in no way.

[986] Like, he's a fucking pig.

[987] And he used to beat the shit out of her as well.

[988] So he, and he had mob ties, you know, if Thelma Tad embarrassed him at that huge party that he was not invited to with all these famous people, he could have just been enraged and gotten drunk himself, went back, knew she was.

[989] when she was going home and like met her on the staircase and then basically set up the body to make it look like it was an accidental death.

[990] And later on, in 1937, Pat Tachico was said to have been involved in an altercation with comedian Ted Healy that led to his death.

[991] So he's no stranger to beating the shit out of people until they die.

[992] Yeah.

[993] So he's up there.

[994] Of course, lucky Luciano's up there because of his whole plan of putting the casino above the Elmott Sidewalk Cafe that she said no to.

[995] And he clearly would not in any way.

[996] I mean, he was, he was like the head of a huge crime family.

[997] No one says no to this guy.

[998] So it could have been knocking her off to get her out of the way so that they can go in and actually make that plan that's obviously like a plan to take over.

[999] show business.

[1000] And it said that a few hours after Thelma's body was found, he was on a plane out of L .A. And he left town.

[1001] But the most likely, oh, also Thelma's mother, Alice, was said to have been bragging about two friends that she was going to build a mansion for herself.

[1002] And Alice was the only person in Thelma Todd's will.

[1003] So she was going to get all the money.

[1004] No way.

[1005] her mom knocked her off.

[1006] Well, you never know.

[1007] But then there's Roland West.

[1008] So Roland West admitted that he did lock the door on Thelma Todd that night and locked her out of the house.

[1009] And he had done it before to her.

[1010] But he claimed when he was like on the official record, he claimed he was only joking when he ran out and said, you be back by 2 a .m. It's one of those hilarious threatening jokes.

[1011] Yeah.

[1012] But nobody believed he was joking because he, he was constantly enraged so apparently his career wasn't doing that well she wasn't that interested in him in him anymore she he was having to witness her her other lovers and all the dates that she went on and the fun parties that she went to so at the very least there are theories that he intentionally locked her out that led to her death accidental death by a carbon monoxide poisoning um he found her then tried to like basically make it look like that's what happened and that like it had nothing to do with him, which is then why his wife, Jules, said that that she saw trying to cover for her husband.

[1013] Yeah.

[1014] Exactly.

[1015] And he basically knew what he did led to her death, so he was just trying to break the chain.

[1016] But there are also theories that she came home late, they got into a fight, he strangled her to death, which is, you know, connects those supposed bruises that she had on her neck and a broken nose and the, you know, like basically her general being, battered um that he had finally had it and that he then placed her in the garage and made it look like she either killed herself or um basically just uh he could have done it so she she passed out and then put her in there and so she still would have died from it right when you know yeah maybe you're saying there's a third third theory no no no he he strangles her till she passed and he doesn't actually kill her she just does something to make her pass out puts her in the car, turns the engine on, and then she dies from that.

[1017] So the coroner's like, this is what she died from, but she was placed in there.

[1018] Yes, and it's all kind of convenient, but it works out perfectly for him, because then he has the restaurant, right?

[1019] He has everything.

[1020] He maybe even has, like, deals with Lucky Lucianic.

[1021] Maybe he wants the casino in that place.

[1022] Well, it did turn into a casino after that, right?

[1023] I don't think so.

[1024] I don't know.

[1025] I don't think so.

[1026] I think, yeah, just went straight to Jiffy Loob.

[1027] straight into the jiffy loom that's there today and if you bring a coupon they will honor it there are unsubstantiated rumors that Roland West admitted on his deathbed to Chester Morris, your favorite actor and his good friend that he was more involved with Thelma's death than he had initially admitted to police but of course those are unsubstantiated by Chester Morris himself who everyone knows is a fucking lie he lies everywhere Thelma Todd's last movie she started with Laurel and Hardy.

[1028] It was a comedy called the Bohemian Girl.

[1029] And she died after she had finished it.

[1030] But producer Hal Roach reshot almost every scene, deleted all of her dialogue and limited her appearance to one musical number.

[1031] And the quote that I pulled that I was so excited to even tell this whole thing on.

[1032] It basically, when the press asked her on the day that Thelma Todd Sidewalk Cafe opened, the press asked her why she would open a restaurant.

[1033] And she basically gives this bad us answer.

[1034] God bless anyone that can find it.

[1035] But she basically said she's setting up a safety net for herself because she wants to be able.

[1036] So in the future, when she's not pretty enough and when she gains too much weight, she can just go and transition right into this business and never worry about it again, the way that her friends and the people around her were so caught up in looking beautiful, staying young and all the like traps and dangers.

[1037] Do you have it?

[1038] Fucking Stephen.

[1039] Oh, my God.

[1040] Here it is.

[1041] This is it, Stephen, amazing.

[1042] How come I couldn't find this fucking website?

[1043] I realized long ago that it is only a case of a few years for an actress before she gradually and sometimes almost imperceptibly loses popularity and younger one start to take her place.

[1044] Look at some of the one -time famous stars of a few years ago, whoever hears of them now.

[1045] Most of them are unhappy and rather bewildered.

[1046] It's pretty hard to have your lifelong career.

[1047] at an end.

[1048] So I decided long ago that I wasn't going to be one of them.

[1049] The years are not going to bother me as they do so many of my colleagues.

[1050] Rinkles won't worry me. Neither will increasing weight because as long as I can use my head, it won't matter how I look.

[1051] Thelma Todd and Karen fucking Kilgara.

[1052] That's right.

[1053] Thank you so much for finding that.

[1054] God bless you.

[1055] Amazing.

[1056] Wow.

[1057] We should open a restaurant.

[1058] You want to?

[1059] Because everyone knows podcasting.

[1060] As soon as as you start to age and gain weight, they kick you right out of there.

[1061] So the opposite.

[1062] God bless you all.

[1063] The podcasting mafia.

[1064] You know how they are.

[1065] And that is the story of the mysterious death of 30s actress Thelma Todd.

[1066] Great job.

[1067] Thank you.

[1068] Really excellent.

[1069] Here we go.

[1070] I don't know how to start.

[1071] All right.

[1072] This is called the footpath murders, but it's got like historical significance that I don't want to tell you about yet.

[1073] Okay.

[1074] And I got a lot of information from a good article in The Guardian by Ian Cobain and elsewhere.

[1075] Okay, here we go.

[1076] November 21st, 1983 in Narborough, which I definitely had to look up and make sure I said it right, a quiet village located in Leicestershire, another fucking hard one that I was not sure I was going to get, right?

[1077] Is that spelled out phonetically?

[1078] I spelled it out.

[1079] Lester, sure.

[1080] Lester, sure.

[1081] And NARboro, I read out like NAR, like GN -A -R, like NARly.

[1082] Don't know why.

[1083] Narlie Borough.

[1084] That's right.

[1085] Okay.

[1086] So NARBrow is about 100 miles from London.

[1087] It's like a small little village.

[1088] It's not super small, but it definitely feels like a little village.

[1089] And so November of 21st, 1983, 15 -year -old Linda Mann takes a shortcut on her way home from babysitting instead of taking her normal route.

[1090] So it's a small village community where crime is.

[1091] almost unheard of.

[1092] So when Linda hadn't arrived home by that night, people started to worry and freak out.

[1093] Her family calls the police to report her missing.

[1094] The next morning on a deserted footpath known locally as Black Pad, Linda Mann is found dead with her clothing scattered around her.

[1095] She'd been strangled with her own scarf and the autopsy shows that she had been killed pretty quickly and had been raped post -mortem.

[1096] Yeah, awful.

[1097] It takes her little shortcut down to some fucking, like, you know, know as you do when you're 15 in a little village yeah like in a little yeah yeah so probably wasn't even that secluded you know it was just a shortcut that everyone took right so using the forensic science techniques available at the time police uh find that the person they they take a human sample from linda's body and they say it's a person with type a blood and an enzyme profile that matched only 10 % of males in England.

[1098] And the quiet village town is terrified.

[1099] The residents are in a frenzy freaking out, wanting to catch this killer of a high school girl.

[1100] But there's no leads or evidence in the cases not closed, but it's left open and kind of goes cold.

[1101] For three years, time goes by.

[1102] The town starts to kind of somewhat go back to normal.

[1103] And then on July 31st, 1986, and a Thursday afternoon, another 15 -year -old high school girl from the same fucking high school called, named Don Ashworth.

[1104] She leaves a friend's house in the village and begins her trek home only a few minutes walk away.

[1105] Dawn, she was only 12 at the time of Linda's murder, so maybe she didn't hear, you know, the warnings, maybe she just didn't think of it.

[1106] Yeah.

[1107] She chose to take a shortcut along an overgrown footpath, locally known as 10 -pound lane.

[1108] And then she vanishes and her family becomes worried again.

[1109] They put out a search for her.

[1110] They can't find her until two days later when Dawn's body is found in the corner of a nearby field close to the 10 -pound lane that she had taken.

[1111] She's covered in twigs and branches and the pathologists established that she had put up a fucking crazy fight.

[1112] So she hadn't been killed right away like Linda had.

[1113] she, and then had been raped and strangled.

[1114] So the field where Dawn was found in was just three fields away, which is like a hundred yards from where Linda's body had been found three years earlier.

[1115] Plus, the locations were between a cemetery and a psychiatric hospital.

[1116] Oh, no. So everyone's losing their shit.

[1117] Like, did a fucking psychiatric patient get out and, you know, kill these people, right?

[1118] These poor girls.

[1119] Did someone rise from the dead and killed them?

[1120] In the cemetery.

[1121] That's right.

[1122] So it's like Just cordoned it off as the creepiest area of your village And don't have anybody walk over there Never ever I mean it's so creepy And so they're like well these these are probably related And so seaman samples taken from Don's body show That it's the same person who had killed Linda three years earlier Detectives believe that the killer's a local man Someone who knew the area and possibly even knew Linda For some reason A week into their investigation into Don's murder Police get a break when witnesses come forward saying that they had seen a young man in the vicinity of 10 -pound lane on the day of Don's murder.

[1123] And that man is tracked down.

[1124] And it turns out to be a 17 -year -old named Richard Buckland.

[1125] So Richard Buckland is a kitchen worker at the psychiatric hospital.

[1126] All right.

[1127] Yeah.

[1128] Let's see.

[1129] Who likes to volunteer at the cemetery?

[1130] That's right.

[1131] He's a kitchen worker at the cemetery, too.

[1132] He has a reputation around the village for liking to scare girls as they walk home.

[1133] And after 15 hours of questioning, Richard, who had learning difficulties, kind of a slow dude, I believe, he confesses to Don Ashworth's murder, but he adamantly denies having anything to do with Linda's murder.

[1134] He's like, I didn't do that one, but I did do this one.

[1135] And of course, they're saying he had information that only the killer could have, which we all know now is not, you know, doesn't mean anything if you've been interrogated for 15 hours.

[1136] Right.

[1137] But the police are 100 % certain that the person who killed one killed the other.

[1138] It's impossible that he just killed one of them.

[1139] Right.

[1140] And they are convinced he's lying.

[1141] So he's charged on August 10th with Dawn's murder.

[1142] And okay, meanwhile, across town.

[1143] This dude, Alec Jeffreys, let's talk about him.

[1144] Ten miles away from where the girls had been murdered at the University of Leicestershire, who of course, their mascot, of course.

[1145] Oh, the fighting walnuts.

[1146] Right.

[1147] You know walnuts.

[1148] How they like to fight each other in England.

[1149] Clonk into each other all the time.

[1150] Very common.

[1151] Fight, fight, fight, fight.

[1152] Oh, it's so loud.

[1153] Yeah.

[1154] Walnuts everywhere.

[1155] Clack.

[1156] Clack.

[1157] Okay, so at the University of, what did I call it, Lesterhire.

[1158] So he, this dude, Alec Jeffries, is a genetic researcher.

[1159] And he had recently made an unexpected but insane fucking discovery during a failed experiment, he was studying the way inherited illnesses passed through families and kind of studying, like, so he could do paternity tests and that sort of thing.

[1160] He had extracted DNA cells and attached it to a photographic film, which he had then left in a photographic developing tank.

[1161] And once he extracted that, the film showed a sequence of bars.

[1162] And Jeffries realized that every individual whose cell had been used in the experiment could be identified with great precision.

[1163] he was a fucking first person to do DNA testing to realize that DNA like a fingerprint everyone has their own it's it's specific if you're from a family you can tell what people are families and all this shit holy shit this fucking alec Jeffries dude whoa he's the originator so after published so he's like this is incredible he I'm sure he had a lot of fucking co -workers and buddies who it's not just him etc he's not alone I don't want to give him all the credit however he published he after publishing an academic paper on his discovery.

[1164] He uses his new thingal testing to solve paternity cases and all other kinds of like cases like that.

[1165] But he's also like, well, I wonder if this could be used to apprehend criminals as well.

[1166] So, but he when he had fucking talked about that possibility at like a conference, the fucking audience laughed at him.

[1167] Of course they did.

[1168] That's what always goes.

[1169] They're like that's not going to happen, bro.

[1170] Yeah.

[1171] How would you know?

[1172] Yeah.

[1173] Dumbies.

[1174] Looks like you're wrong.

[1175] in your face from what 80 years ahead yeah look at your dumb face um but lestercher police thought or like i guess they were kind of forward thinking because they were like let's have this guy fucking help us prove that this richard buckland is the murderer okay of both of them so they contact jeffreys he agrees to test bucklin's blood and semen on the girls uh the girls bodies so but when he takes a film from the developing bank, he could see immediately that the girls had indeed been raped and killed by the, or raped by the same person.

[1176] But it, that, that man was not Richard Buckland in either fucking case.

[1177] Oh, shit.

[1178] Yeah.

[1179] Okay.

[1180] So the police are totally astonished.

[1181] I wrote, there's probably a ton of hubbubbery around.

[1182] Hubbubbery.

[1183] Whoa.

[1184] And it's England.

[1185] So it's very British bubbery.

[1186] Yeah.

[1187] Kind of curly mustache bububbubbery.

[1188] They have Jeffrey's repeat the test two more times and it's definitely not him.

[1189] The senior investigating officer says at the time, one minute we got the guy and the next we've got jack shit.

[1190] And that's where that phrase was invented.

[1191] Right, but in a British accent, which is so much better.

[1192] Do they say jack shit over there?

[1193] That's so funny.

[1194] Yeah, I kind of, I bet because it's like, it's kind of a cute phrase instead of just like, you know, like jack shit's cuter than bullshit.

[1195] Maybe.

[1196] And, yeah, Yeah, sure.

[1197] After more than three months in custody, Buckland, clearly innocent now, is set free.

[1198] And the police are back to square one with their hunt for this fucking highly dangerous double killer of teenage girls.

[1199] Yeah.

[1200] So they fucking throw their balls to the wall and they're like, let's just do everything we can.

[1201] How about this?

[1202] It's an unprecedented move.

[1203] They send out a letter to all the local men between the ages of 17 and 34 asking them to give a voluntary DNA.

[1204] sample.

[1205] A what kind?

[1206] Voluntary.

[1207] What did I say?

[1208] Voluntary.

[1209] What is voluntary?

[1210] I thought there was some, you're teaching me all this new blood sample stuff.

[1211] Voluntary DNA.

[1212] It comes directly from your nipple.

[1213] It's when you squeeze her nipple really hard.

[1214] That's voluntary.

[1215] And then the juice that comes out.

[1216] After a while, Alec was like, I don't think this test is worth it.

[1217] I've invented a ton of great tests here.

[1218] Every time I go on stage to tell people about this even though it works better than anything else.

[1219] They laugh at me. I'm sick of it.

[1220] I want voluntary testing to be required.

[1221] That's right.

[1222] On everyone.

[1223] And then the nipple clamps come out.

[1224] That's right.

[1225] And everyone's like, I don't like this.

[1226] Gross.

[1227] I don't care how many crimes it solves.

[1228] Okay.

[1229] So they ask all these dudes to give voluntary DNA samples.

[1230] It becomes the world's first mass screening for DNA.

[1231] Wow.

[1232] Yeah.

[1233] By the end of that month, around a thousand men had volunteered to give samples.

[1234] And of course, the police are like, we're going to flush out the people who fucking won't give samples.

[1235] because obviously those people are guilty of something.

[1236] Yes.

[1237] And at the time, the forensic science laboratories or laboratories, because burn as they like to say, Aluminium.

[1238] They can't even keep up because they're like testing so many people.

[1239] And of course the media at the time and a lot of people were talking about how like this is a violation of your, what's it called?

[1240] Your DNA rights.

[1241] Yeah, and like personal rights, all this bullshit.

[1242] But the fucking townspeople over in Leicestershire, like fuck you they're so hardcore into catching this killer that they don't give a shit good and basically like hound all their friends the male friends into making sure that they go get tested like everyone's on it and also i just would urge people who believe that it's a it's it's somehow a violation of your rights like it doesn't make sense because the cops can get you in lots of different ways yeah this whole DNA thing like it's such a weird paranoid um theory of like then they have you, as if this apocalyptic future where everyone's going to get controlled by cops with their DNA or whatever, where it's just like, it's bad now.

[1243] But it's to catch murderers and rapists.

[1244] Yeah, right now.

[1245] And they have a thing, I think there's a thing now.

[1246] It's not really, this isn't really used anymore, this mass screening.

[1247] But when they do do it, they have to then destroy all the evidence or the DNA of people who weren't the suspect.

[1248] Right.

[1249] They can't keep it, you know, to be like, well, maybe later we'll have a crime that this guy will commit.

[1250] Yeah.

[1251] That's sort of thing.

[1252] They can't.

[1253] They can't.

[1254] Oftentimes, police departments can't solve the crimes that they're there.

[1255] They're not like holding a bit, one, whatever.

[1256] Why am I arguing this?

[1257] Because you're mad about it.

[1258] I'm not.

[1259] Because Karen is all about personal rights.

[1260] I hate personal rights.

[1261] And she argues against them any chance she gets.

[1262] Blah -b -de -blah.

[1263] Okay, after eight months, 5 ,500 men had given blood samples.

[1264] Only one person had refused, but I don't think it's him.

[1265] It wasn't him.

[1266] Okay.

[1267] It was, and I promise.

[1268] Okay.

[1269] But there's no match with the killers, samples, and the police are still at a fucking loss.

[1270] And they're, like, even though they tested, can you imagine 5 ,500 fucking people that you're testing and they're not, you're just not finding him.

[1271] Yeah, after, like, 2 ,500, you're like, it's probably going to be this next guy because we're like, we've done so many.

[1272] So many.

[1273] But, I mean, super props to the Lestercher Police Department who were just, like, by any means necessary.

[1274] Yeah.

[1275] And forward thinking, because I feel like so many people were like, DNA.

[1276] I mean, it took, like, until the O .J. Simpson trial for anyone to even know what it was, but they were like, let's use this immediately.

[1277] Yes.

[1278] Which is pretty insane.

[1279] Okay.

[1280] Then, in August of 1987, here we are.

[1281] Yes.

[1282] More than a year after the murder of dawn, some workmates from a local bakery are having some pints at a pub.

[1283] I wrote all of that.

[1284] Here we're having drinks at a bar.

[1285] They're having pints at a pub.

[1286] And they're workmates at a pub.

[1287] And they're workmates, not co -workers.

[1288] That's right.

[1289] I'm in England.

[1290] When one of them, this dude named Kelly, he starts drunkenly bragging.

[1291] He has a big mouth, starts drunkenly bragging to his coworkers.

[1292] And that how he had been paid 200 pounds by one of their coworkers to impersonate him and give bloods in his place.

[1293] Oh, no. Good old Kelly.

[1294] You can't keep his fucking mouth shut.

[1295] Kelly, braggy, brag, brag, brag.

[1296] God bless you and then at the same time.

[1297] Yeah.

[1298] Oh, you're the worst.

[1299] You're the worst.

[1300] One pint and he won't shut his fucking mouth.

[1301] Zip it mouth.

[1302] You have to pick better than Kelly when you're going to get somebody that's going to have a big, dark secret.

[1303] That's right.

[1304] Buy, by Kelly a bag of chips, whatever, and he'll talk.

[1305] Kelly explains drunkenly to his friends that the coworker that they all knew had asked for this favor.

[1306] Kelly said that he told him that he had already taken, this guy had already taken the test for someone else who had a conviction for indecent exposure when he was younger.

[1307] So now Kelly needed to take it for him.

[1308] It wasn't, you know what I mean?

[1309] It's not, it wasn't his fault.

[1310] He's caught up in this insane.

[1311] It's a circle.

[1312] DNA fraud link.

[1313] Exactly.

[1314] That's right.

[1315] So the co -so this coworker had doctored his passport, like cut out his little picture and put in the picture of Kelly's stupid face.

[1316] And then driven him to the test center and waited outside while Kelly gave his blood sample in his place.

[1317] It worked out.

[1318] Like a carpool mom just waited out there.

[1319] Uh -huh.

[1320] And run right back outside.

[1321] don't dilly -dally Kelly when you're in there don't get talking about football right that's don't be like that soccer yes exactly luckily there's a fucking nosy woman at the bar yeah girl who fucking overhears all of this yes and is like wait a fucking minute this is insane and tells the police about it yes she does yeah she does Kelly is promptly arrested by the end of the day this fucking co -worker is also in custody.

[1322] Who's a co -worker?

[1323] Twenty -five -year -old Colin Pitchfork.

[1324] No. That's his name.

[1325] Okay.

[1326] He is married to a social worker who, of course, had no fucking clue.

[1327] They have two young sons together.

[1328] He had worked at Hampshire's bakery for over a decade.

[1329] And here's what it said in one of the articles, despite his habit of constantly hitting on female employees, according to his boss, he was a good worker and had a special talent for artistic cake decorations.

[1330] I mean, so don't fire him.

[1331] Yeah, soon, hopefully, hopefully in the next five years, people will begin to integrate the idea that hitting on women.

[1332] Constantly, using your word, constantly.

[1333] Constantly at work, it shows sign of that you're not a good guy.

[1334] Yeah, maybe there's an impulse control issue.

[1335] Maybe there's other boundaries.

[1336] Just, you're a creep.

[1337] Just creep, the creep issue.

[1338] Yeah.

[1339] he but also you know he had a previous conviction for indecent exposure he was the indecent exposure that he was claiming exactly be covering for um he was picked up and after reading him his rights the detective asked why dawson ashworth and colin pitchfork shrugged and replied opportunity she was there and i was there he's just a fucking monster yeah then he gave a detailed So he believed in DNA evidence too, so he wasn't even going to try to fucking say it wasn't him.

[1340] Right.

[1341] He gives detailed, a detailed confession to both murders and two other sexual assaults that he had done.

[1342] Wow.

[1343] He told police that when he raped and killed Linda, man, our first victim, his car had been parked nearby and his baby son had been asleep in the back of it.

[1344] Holy shit.

[1345] That's right.

[1346] And the night after, and the night of Don's killing that night, he returned home to his, uh, He returned to his home in the village of Little Thorpe and baked a cake.

[1347] Yeah.

[1348] It's insane.

[1349] Immediately, I'm thinking of Paul Hollywood in the Great American, the Great British Baking Show.

[1350] Have you watched it?

[1351] Yeah.

[1352] I think we've talked about it.

[1353] I'm so obsessed with it.

[1354] Yeah.

[1355] It's great.

[1356] Well, actually, it comes in a play.

[1357] I'm just saying, how was his sponge that night?

[1358] Was it affected by his terrible, terrible crime?

[1359] against humanity or was he able to get a nice bake Jesus I don't know he's so creepy he does look like a normal dude kind of too except there's one his mugshot his eyeballs his like his like pupils look like they're just floating in his eyes you what's how dead they are they're like they're just like it's just like someone was like here's what a human eye is supposed to look like and like how you know when you put an egg a raw egg in water and it floats they just look so dead that they're just oh yeah doesn't he yes he has a what i believe the japanese called supuku where your iris doesn't touch your bottom right and i think like they're bobbing in there yes and it's there there are floaters and it means i believe it's japanese uh culture or whatever that you're evil if you have eyes like that well i might have done that before so i don't want to go that far do mine no they do not you promise yeah they they fill up your whole eye okay great yeah he just looks like who does it look like he looks like a young al bundy but british and dead eyed yes doesn't he well the eyes are wrong yeah they're they're wrong and there's weird space there's too much space on yeah it doesn't it look like an alien and was like here's what human eyes are like here let's try this try these also now just as i scroll of course i scroll down and then there's just a bunch of other old black and white mugshots that are equally horrifying, like creepy.

[1360] I have a good sleep tonight.

[1361] Okay, so he also, pitchwork also admits to exposing himself to over a thousand women's, from, women's, from his early teens onward.

[1362] Jesus.

[1363] Like he was a fucking sexual predator.

[1364] Wow.

[1365] He progressed to sexual assault and then murder.

[1366] He pleads guilty to the murder of 15 year old Linda Mann and Don Ashworth's rape and murder.

[1367] sentenced to life imprisonment becoming the first criminal to be convicted of murder based on DNA evidence wow that's the fucking first case you know how everyone's always like googling that here it is this is it i wanted to throw down your paper like there you go motherfucker i was going to say that as as the as the um introduction to this but then i was like let's save it for good good call you know what i mean good call for storytelling i'm a storyteller it's my job somehow i don't know how that happened either and you're welcome it's weird okay but alex jeffreys our fucking good friend the DNA dad yeah um he becomes known as the father of genetic fingerprinting and in 1994 he's fucking knighted for his services yeah he is to science and technology in a psychiatric report about colin pitchfork he said to have personality disorder of psychopathic type accompanied by serious psychosexual pathology which we're all like, yeah.

[1368] And it's warned that Colin Pitchhork, quote, will obviously continue to get that all thing out.

[1369] Do not cut that out.

[1370] I'm begging you.

[1371] Please.

[1372] I am 100 % not drunk.

[1373] I just want to go ahead and say.

[1374] I mean, maybe I shouldn't say that because it makes it worse.

[1375] I feel like I'm just rusty.

[1376] It's been so long since we've done this.

[1377] It's been forever.

[1378] It's been forever.

[1379] No, no, no, this is good.

[1380] It's like that first show when we go back on tour after months off.

[1381] And we're all just like, what are we doing?

[1382] How do we say things?

[1383] Okay.

[1384] Can't wait to see you, San Diego.

[1385] It's going to be great.

[1386] Oh, no. Someone warns that the psychiatrist warns that he will, quote, obviously continue to be an extremely dangerous individual while the psychopathology continues.

[1387] Like, don't let him out, essentially is what they're saying.

[1388] Yes.

[1389] So he's sentenced to life imprisonment, as I said.

[1390] But what that really means is that he has a minimum of 30 years.

[1391] Right.

[1392] Because it never fucking means life in prison, which everyone at the time is probably like, yay, we can go home now and everything will be fine.

[1393] Right.

[1394] That 30 years is reduced to 28 years in 2009 for, quote, exceptional progress while in prison.

[1395] Right.

[1396] He hasn't exposed himself to anybody in prison.

[1397] So he must be fine.

[1398] He's doing great.

[1399] Let's take two of those years off.

[1400] Doing great, murderer.

[1401] In prison, he is said to have been.

[1402] well -behaved, has gotten a degree, and has become a specialist in the transcription of printed music into Braille.

[1403] So he's like kind of becomes this artistic -y guy.

[1404] Okay.

[1405] Who gives a shit?

[1406] In April of 2016, so 30 years, time is so funny and that it fucking goes by.

[1407] Yeah, it does.

[1408] So what's 30 years, 30 years ago is now.

[1409] Is now.

[1410] You can get out.

[1411] So in April 2016, he, appears before the parole board, they recommended that he be, that he not be released, but that he be moved to an open prison.

[1412] So, what the fuck's an open prison?

[1413] An open prison is like basically what we would call minimum security, but also, you can't leave during the day and go to the movies, can you?

[1414] You absolutely can.

[1415] And guess who does?

[1416] Colin Pitchfork?

[1417] That's right.

[1418] He's 58 years old now.

[1419] He's changed his name to Thorpe.

[1420] So he gets to have to have.

[1421] anonymity.

[1422] That is a good call.

[1423] I'm sorry.

[1424] Yeah.

[1425] Pitchfork is just like, you're going straight to like the canned ham devil is.

[1426] Yeah, but then he gets, you know, it's not fair because he gets to have anonymity.

[1427] Yes, that's right.

[1428] Yes.

[1429] Um, so he is living in an open prison in Gloucestershire, Gloucestershire.

[1430] Didn't look that one up.

[1431] Gloucestershire.

[1432] Gloucestershire.

[1433] I believe that, mine's a guess.

[1434] I think you're right.

[1435] Okay.

[1436] And he's been allowed alone on the streets for up to six hours at a time before being taken back to prison.

[1437] He's been photographed and you can fucking see the photograph.

[1438] He looks like a 60 -year -old, not that old, like a young, because he's been indoors for so long, dad, he looks like not someone you should be afraid of.

[1439] He's been photographed on a shopping trip in Bristol City Center browsing Bakeoff books.

[1440] Okay.

[1441] Which is your favorite show.

[1442] Is the Great British Bake -O?

[1443] I think that they have, yeah.

[1444] Yeah.

[1445] Because remember he was a baker too.

[1446] Yes, that's right.

[1447] He must love that show.

[1448] Yeah.

[1449] And eating, he was eating a pulled pork roll.

[1450] He's having a great old day acting like someone who hasn't killed two teenage girls brutally.

[1451] Right.

[1452] And exposed himself to thousands.

[1453] Right.

[1454] He now has the right to unsupervised overnight stays in the community.

[1455] And they're doing this in a way to prepare him to get out soon.

[1456] Right.

[1457] So like he can go look for jobs.

[1458] He can prep, like, find a place to live.

[1459] They're like prepping for him to fucking leave.

[1460] okay in a may this last may of 2018 in a parole hearing was a parole hearing was due to take place but was canceled after a review of the case paperwork by the parole board the parole board probably read the fucking file and we're like oh jesus i don't want him near my teenage daughters yeah well and also because that that first time he got somebody to give blood in his right you can't act like this isn't somebody who is like not a mastermind murderer totally who knows that if i'm good in prison I'll be let out someday.

[1461] Yes.

[1462] When I'm young enough to continue killing.

[1463] It's not like he's a feeble 90 -something -year -old man. No, you're exactly right.

[1464] He's a legit psychopath who's like, raring to go.

[1465] Yeah.

[1466] Don't, I mean, I feel like people who, who have admitted to being fucking psychopathic murderers and, and violent ones at that, who have good, have a completely perfect record should be, like, feared more than the ones who keep fucking up in prison.

[1467] It's like, you're so good at controlling your crazy.

[1468] that you can do it for fucking 30 years and make people believe you.

[1469] I just feel like people shouldn't get out until like you're saying, they're feeble essentially and that they can't do anything.

[1470] Right.

[1471] Why would you release a double murderer in like essentially the prime of his life?

[1472] Totally.

[1473] Yeah.

[1474] And let him change his name so he can be anonymous.

[1475] Meanwhile, of course, the families of Linda and Don are fucking up in arms.

[1476] pissed off about this.

[1477] Yes.

[1478] And they're, of course, doing all kinds of crazy petitions and everything.

[1479] Linda's mother, Kath Eastwood, she's fucking pissed off and is fighting Colin pitchfork being released.

[1480] She's pissed off because, like, the parole board wouldn't even let the victim's families speak to talk about what a piece of shit he is.

[1481] They just, like, let him go on fucking day trips.

[1482] Right.

[1483] They are fighting him being released or allowed back into the general public.

[1484] She said, Kath Eastwood said, you can say he is a well, be a well -behaved prisoner, but don't ever forget that he is a well -behaved double -child killer.

[1485] Yes.

[1486] Which, Kath, yes.

[1487] She and other family members of Linda and Dawn are working on petitions to fight pitchfork ever being released, but he does have another parole hearing coming up soon in the future.

[1488] So the one that got canceled was because the parole board was like, no, we're not considering this.

[1489] Yeah, because I think that the public.

[1490] There's been such an uproar.

[1491] Right.

[1492] Good.

[1493] So there's a huge uproar about it.

[1494] And so it's been postponed, but it's going to.

[1495] to happen again.

[1496] Right.

[1497] But yeah.

[1498] That is the footpath murders, aka the first criminal to be convicted of murder based on DNA evidence ever.

[1499] Amazing.

[1500] Yeah.

[1501] Wow.

[1502] Crazy.

[1503] So crazy.

[1504] We'll post a photo of him now so we can all keep an eye out.

[1505] Yeah.

[1506] Watch out, England.

[1507] Yeah.

[1508] Oh, that's, yeah, that's awful.

[1509] I know.

[1510] So creepy.

[1511] I feel like there's all those, like, we have now truth in sentencing laws, meaning a life sentence is a fucking life sentence.

[1512] But I don't think it, I don't think it's proactive.

[1513] Retroactive?

[1514] Thank you.

[1515] Backwards active?

[1516] That way.

[1517] Yes.

[1518] Right.

[1519] Back there.

[1520] Yeah.

[1521] So whatever you got sentenced to when you were sentenced, doesn't change.

[1522] It's just for people now, which is stupid.

[1523] And could not be true.

[1524] I'm just saying that.

[1525] No, I get it.

[1526] I mean, it's just that you just don't hear, and maybe it's just because it's not as big of a, deal, but it's like there's people who get arrested for dealing pot and they stay in jail for 10 years.

[1527] Yeah.

[1528] Like all of these things, it's just, and we have to say this last, they just did sign in some huge legal reform bill that's like a big deal.

[1529] It was actually bipartisan, which is unbelievable that anything bipartisan is happening in this country right now.

[1530] But like legal reform is definitely on the docket for a lot of people these days.

[1531] Thank God.

[1532] Yeah.

[1533] And that's just one of the things that has to be looked at.

[1534] It's like there are people who are incarcerated for years and years who have like victimless crimes.

[1535] Yeah.

[1536] And those people should be getting paroled and be put into these like release programs.

[1537] Or drug programs instead of prison time at all.

[1538] All that stuff.

[1539] And then then there'll be plenty of room for double like for serial killers, for double murderers, for people who plan who don't see human life as valuable as their own and who do things for pleasure that should absolutely not be happening.

[1540] Whose psychiatrist says he will do this again if he's let out.

[1541] Of course he will do it again.

[1542] We've all learned that at this point.

[1543] Everyone can sing along to that song.

[1544] And you know, even if he's a fucking upstanding citizen now, you don't like, well, those two girls, Linda and fucking Don, don't get chances to be upstanding citizens.

[1545] Don't get to go fucking do British bake -off.

[1546] But the other thing that they never talk about is he's not an upstanding citizen.

[1547] He's an upstanding prisoner, which means that he's not shiving people left, right, and center.

[1548] That doesn't mean he's a good person.

[1549] He's getting along to go along to get along.

[1550] He's making it work so he can get out.

[1551] He's doing what needs to get done.

[1552] Like you said, he's more devious.

[1553] It's scarier.

[1554] He's a psychopath.

[1555] He wants to murder people.

[1556] Yeah.

[1557] It's the potato clause.

[1558] but with murder let's act like murder is as bad as gaining weight let's do that let's culturally let's try to like just get that going a little bit yeah we'll stop fat shaming and we'll have said murder shame yes fat shaming body shaming can be finally put to an end by all of us yeah and let's get some murder shaming go let's try that instead let's go on Instagram and shave murderers and comment on murderers Instagrams instead of on people who you look a little murdery in this picture have you been murdering yeah have you been murdering too much people um cool all right fucking hooray it's fucking hooray time do you have one i do do you do you want to go first or you want me to do is this now the fucking hooray challenge let's hit them at the same time ready you can go first okay all right well my okay so okay okay okay I don't know why I to preface it with this.

[1559] But ever since we lost our house when I was 16 years old at the bank, I've lived in apartments and rented and just kind of had that, you know, nomadic apartment -y lifestyle and thought I always fucking would for the rest of my life and never even dreamed of anything else because it was impossible.

[1560] Right.

[1561] This podcast in so many ways has changed our fucking life.

[1562] And that includes the fact that just a couple weeks ago, we closed escrow.

[1563] Vince and I on a house and we're going to be homeowners for the first time and it's this gorgeous little bungalow that the first two times it was the first house we saw and after we looked around I started crying because I realized that I could have it you know yeah and the second time I went there a cry too it reminds me in my grandma's house which was like kind of my my safe haven in between all these things happening she died a few years ago but I just I can't believe it.

[1564] I can't believe it.

[1565] I'm, it just doesn't feel real and I love it so much and I'm so happy and so thanks for helping me with that.

[1566] Everyone.

[1567] Well, on behalf of everyone else, we say you're welcome.

[1568] You deserve it.

[1569] And yeah, it's so, it's so exciting.

[1570] It's really crazy.

[1571] It's really, it just keeps the same events.

[1572] We bought a house.

[1573] I mean, the bank owns it for the time being, but we bought a house.

[1574] We have a house.

[1575] We have a house.

[1576] We have a home yeah yeah that's very cool really cool and so there'll be a pod basement instead of a pod pod loft i ain't going into that basement first of all there's not supposed to be basements in california so something very strange has happened in that home absolutely we have to have a wigi board say out let's do it like on the first night that you move okay oh that's so awesome yeah thank you okay what's yours yeah um well i guess mine i my friend ryan sickler just started a brand new podcast called The Honeydew.

[1577] And his first episode came out.

[1578] Um, his co -host is Josh Adam Myers.

[1579] He's another comic who's really funny.

[1580] And so, uh, Ryan's old podcast is the crab feast.

[1581] And Ryan Sickler and Jay Larson hosted the crab feast for years.

[1582] It's a great podcast.

[1583] There's tons of hilarious people on it.

[1584] And I met those guys and did that podcast.

[1585] So anyway, Ryan Sickler started the Honeydew podcast.

[1586] There's one episode out.

[1587] And it basically, he named it that because that's the most the least popular fruit of anybody like that's the fruit everybody leaves on their plate at restaurants and that he basically is like it's a podcast about coming on and talking about what how you are honey do melon in your life and basically telling like sad stories or stories of rejection or loss or disappointment or whatever and basically laughing about it because that's kind of all you can do and he starts with his own story and And I'm telling you, it is a fucking unbelievable.

[1588] Like, I had no idea that's what his life was like growing up.

[1589] It was awful.

[1590] And it's unbelievable because he's one of the best guys.

[1591] Like, it's just unbelievable.

[1592] So, if you're into that kind of comedy or you, like, Ryan's done, he's got an album out.

[1593] He's done a bunch of stuff.

[1594] But if you're a fan or you're looking for a new podcast with like a completely different flavor, I recommend it because it's really enjoyable.

[1595] And it's really good storytelling, but it's also very poignant at the same time.

[1596] It kind of blew my mind a little bit.

[1597] That sounds good.

[1598] I am going to listen to it.

[1599] I like fucked up stories.

[1600] Yeah, it's just fucked up.

[1601] It's pretty fucked up.

[1602] All right.

[1603] Well, that's that then.

[1604] Thanks for listening.

[1605] And happy 2019.

[1606] Let's fucking get through this year together.

[1607] Yeah.

[1608] As a family.

[1609] And so much to come in 2019.

[1610] The ball is rolling.

[1611] Let's have fun.

[1612] Yeah, let's do it.

[1613] And let's stay sexy.

[1614] And don't get murdered.

[1615] Bye.

[1616] Elvis, want cookie?