448. Alternative Walk of Fame | Brett Cooper
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Brett Cooper, YouTube phenomenon, but in the prepared manner that many people who are explosively successful are prepared. Brett started acting when she was very young. She was very dedicated to her pursuit of her artistic career. She was aided in that by the efforts of her mother, and so she had that working for her.

By the time she was 10, she had a pretty decent CV on the acting side behind her. She spent a fair bit of time in Hollywood.

expanding her abilities, protected from whatever toxicity that environment might offer by the aforementioned commitment of her mother. And then she got a stellar opportunity, but also had set that up with Daily Wire. She had worked with Dennis Prager and some other conservative organizations, making short-form social media content and learning how to do that, and that's a real skill in and of itself.

and got the opportunity to expand that into something of longer form with Daily Wire. Was hesitant and afraid about that, felt at 19 because that's when the offer came in that perhaps that was beyond her, but took the plunge and has produced, out of whole cloth, a spectacularly successful YouTube channel.

And with about four and a half million subscribers, that's been built up in the short span of a couple of years. And also has a plethora of exciting acting opportunities arrayed in front of her as a consequence of her partnership with The Daily Wire. And so join us for all that. So you've made a big splash in recent years. That's what I've been told. Yeah. Yeah. Why? Why do you think that is? What are you doing that's working?

I think I'm filling a niche that I myself wanted and that I was lacking. Growing up, I didn't have influences online that I felt like spoke to me, that shared my values like a common young person with more traditional values. I did not see that, especially growing up in Hollywood. I was not surrounded by that whatsoever. And so when we created the Common Section, when I came to Daily Wire,

I wanted to reach young people in general, but I specifically wanted to talk to young women. Yeah? And is that fundamentally your audience? No, it's growing. It's becoming more female-oriented, but it's always been more male-dominant. I think that's just because more young men are on YouTube. Yeah, well, that's a big thing to fight against, so to speak. And I think the last time I looked, which is a couple of years ago, like YouTube was 80% male-dominated. So it's hard to not have a majority male audience. But my female audience continues to grow. Yeah.

And when I meet fans in public, when any member of my audience comes up to me, obviously I'm thrilled to meet all of them. And they're always such kind and interesting people. And they always, you know, share interesting stories. But the people that speak to me the most are the young women where I see myself in them. Yeah, and what are they telling you? They thank me for sharing their values on such a public platform. They...

thank me for showing that it does not have to be scary to espouse common sense and traditional values. They say you feel like a big sister that I never had or like a little sister or you give me hope for my daughters. And it's incredibly touching. I was just talking about it while I was getting my makeup done, but I am incredibly blessed and incredibly grateful to have been given the platform. Right. Right. Right. I'm honored. So,

When you grew up in Hollywood, let's talk about that a little bit. I understand that you were emancipated at the age of 15 and pursue acting. Okay, so let's start with that. I don't think we have to go any earlier than that. Now, was that the point at which you moved to Hollywood? No, I moved to Hollywood when I was 10. When you were 10, from where? From Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Oh, yeah? Mm-hmm. Okay, then I guess you have to start. I have to go back a little earlier? Well, I would say so. How was it that you, and I presume your family, decided that it was a good idea to move from Chattanooga, Tennessee to Hollywood? Like, what was behind that? The short of it, and I'll get into the long of it, but the short of it was me. It's, I...

felt like I needed to perform like I needed to breathe. I loved telling stories. I loved being on stage. And... And you had been on stage in Tennessee? Yes, at a community theater. So, the first production that I ever did, and I started in theater, love musical theater, was being a munchkin in my brother's high school production of The Wiz. And they needed a couple of younger siblings to get up on stage, do a little munchkin dance, and be in this high school production. One of my mom's friends...

whose children also went to this private school, said, you know, Brett's six, five, would she like to come and be in this? I was terrified. I was deathly shy. One of my brothers had passed away the year prior, and it had absolutely wrecked my family, just absolutely cracked us open. And I was reeling from that. My family dynamic was completely different, and I just shut down.

and did not want to get on stage, had no interest in doing it. I remember we were doing construction on our house in Chattanooga, and I would hide in like a credenza like that, and I would get in cabinets and hide. I was just like, I don't want to be seen, don't want to be heard. And my mom was noticing that and was making a conscious effort to push me. Go in and speak to somebody in a gas station by yourself. Here's $5, go buy a candy bar. And so when I was just absolutely, I don't want to get on stage, I don't want to do this, she was like, well, no, I think that this is something that you should do if you're afraid of it.

And I got on stage and have never felt that way. And she said that me being on stage, I just came alive. And that's how I felt even at six years old. That was at six? That was at six. Okay, and so what performances did you undertake after that? How did that develop? I did...

I did multiple at that high school. Then I started doing community theater productions. And then I was begging my mom to do more. I was like, let me find other things. Can I do a community theater production here? She was originally from Atlanta and Atlanta was two hours away. Could I go do Annie? Annie is being produced in Georgia. Can we drive out there and I'll audition because I really want to play the little orphan Molly in Annie.

The Atlanta Symphony and Opera, I started doing singing lessons. They were doing La Boheme and had a children's choir. Please let me go audition for this. And so my mom would put me in the car and we would drive two hours and she would sit outside while I would be in rehearsals and dance classes. And I just came alive and there was nothing that I loved more. Why did you like performing? What did it do for you? It gave me an outlet to express things I didn't feel comfortable expressing at all.

What kind of things? I think it was less of a specific emotion, and it was more of I was just able to be completely openly me. I was able to put myself in other people's shoes. It's like that Atticus Finch quote where you get to put on somebody else's shoes and walk a mile. Not walk a mile, the more he says, and feel a mockingbird. It gave me the opportunity to do that, to...

put myself in character circumstances that were completely unlike my own. It was an escape in a lot of ways. Well, it's play. It is. You know what I mean? Kids, like, love to play. Yeah. And even though we don't really, like, let them. Yeah.

anymore. That's why they, I think that's why they play so intensely when they go off to university. I'm sure. And switch roles and transform identities. Sure. Yeah, I think most of it's repressed play. Not most of it. Much of it is repressed play. Yeah, well, you have to play a lot of roles before you find your part. Yeah. Right? And that's what kids are doing. That's what they should be doing between the ages of two and a half and like, well,

That really intense play period lasts probably till around 10. But then there are variants of it in adolescence as well, as people find their way and find their role. And what you were doing was a very structured variant of that. And I think I needed that because so much of it was suppressed at home. I think I was constantly trying to make myself as small as possible to not rock the boat my entire life.

Because of how upset things had become? Yes. And in the aftermath, particularly? Yes, after my brother's death. My parents, their relationship was not great from the beginning, and they stayed together for me. My brothers are all older than me, and so the death in the family just broke that open even more. And I knew from a very young age, I was very self-aware, I knew that they were staying together for me. It was very uncomfortable, and I...

just wanted to cause as few problems as possible. And ironically, that turned into then me traveling around the country doing theater. Causing problems constantly. Yeah, logistical problems. Yeah, right, right. But those are, you know, those are better problems than pointless and horrible problems. Yeah, they were fun problems. They were adventurous. Okay, so you accrued quite a lot of experience by the time you were 10. Yes. All right. And then so you're

your family up and moved to? My mom and I did. Your mom and you did. My parents' relationship, I would say, was already on the fritz, like I said. And I had been working in New York a little bit while I was nine or ten. And I actually don't know if I've ever told this story on a podcast before, but I desperately wanted to play Jane Banks in Mary Poppins. And it was a musical that was on Broadway in the early 2000s, desperately. And

And the show had been running for a couple of years, and I would sit on my mom's big desktop computer, and I would avidly watch YouTube videos of all the girls who were playing Jane Banks, this 12-year-old character. And I learned who their managers were and who their agents were. And there was one guy, and he managed four of the different girls who had played Jane Banks over the course of three years.

I wrote him a letter, a handwritten letter. And I said, my name is Brett Cooper. I love performing. These are all the things I've done. I'm attaching my resume. My biggest dream is to play Jane Banks. And then I painted a photo of me as Jane Banks on Broadway and I mailed it to him. And then I got an email back somehow.

And brought me out to New York, and I auditioned there. And so then I started working more in the big leagues, I would say. And so I started auditioning for Broadway shows, doing workshops at Broadway shows, and... How old were you then? Nine. Nine, okay. So this is still prior to the move. Yes, prior to the move. So this is in New York. So you did all that research when you were, what, eight? Yeah, eight and nine. Hmm.

And I... It was completely self-directed. And I hit my growth spurt very young. And on Broadway, if you are under the age of 18 and you're playing a children's role, if you're playing a 12-year-old, an 8-year-old, a 15-year-old, they want you under a certain height limit so the people in the back of the house can distinguish an adult from a child on stage. And so I think for Jane Banks, this was a role for most of the young roles at that time. It was 4'11".

And I had auditioned for Jane Banks time and time again, the national tour, the Broadway show. Somebody's, you know, a girl is being replaced because, you know, you have like a six month contract. And finally got to one where it seemed like it was going to happen. I was pinned and they said, come back in two months. It's going to be you and a few other girls.

Over that two months, I hit the biggest growth spurt of my life. Came back and I was way too tall. And I remember sitting up there and they literally measure you before you can go in and audition. And I was like, let me shrink myself as much as possible. That's hard. Yeah. And they said, no, we're not going to hire you.

Not because of my talent or anything like that, but you are just too tall. I mean, you cannot be tall. -Sizism, I would say. -Yes, yeah. -You were a victim of sizeism. -I was a victim of sizeism. -You were definitely a victim of sizeism. -At nine years old. -That's right, yeah. And it was heartbreaking, just crushing at nine years old. And one of my best friends at the time got the role of Michael Banks. So he played, he was playing Jane Banks' brother, and it was crushing because I saw him, you know, traveling around the country on the national tour.

And my management team, I ended up signing with the guy who had represented all of those actresses, was with him for 10 plus years, adore him.

He said, "You basically can wait until you turn 18 and then you can play adult roles or you can go to Los Angeles and you can do film and TV." My mom said, "Absolutely not." She was originally born in California. My brothers were all born in California. She said, "I'm not going back. That industry, specifically film and television, is disgusting. I don't want my child in it." And I just begged, begged like this is all I want to do.

I was homeschooled at the time already just for academic reasons. And I basically just laid it out for her. And I said, we have the flexibility. We want to be in Tennessee. You don't really want to be in this marriage, basically. This is all I want to do. And so she said, let's go and try it. And so we went there for three months. And she said, we'll see if you like it. And I loved it. And things started taking off. Signed with an agent out there. And then we would do three months on and then three months off with my father.

And he would drive across the country with us and, you know, get us to the apartment, and then I'd stay there for three months and then go home. And then I think at 14 was when we permanently moved out there. And then I emancipated myself. We meet you and your mother again. Yeah. And so what were you doing in Hollywood between 10 and 14? Auditioning and doing small roles on different TV shows and short films and training. That's the biggest part of being an actor is that you are in...

acting classes four times a week. You are doing singing lessons, you are dancing, you're building your skill set. I remember, you know, I had to do a... I was on a TV show and I had to learn how to fence. So you're in, you know, fencing classes. And in addition to that, I think this is important, I had a lot of things outside of acting

that I think kept me more well-rounded so that my identity did not completely get wrapped up in this industry that is very vapid and it is very based on vanity and selfishness and fame. And I was a horseback rider and I was a ballet dancer for 15 years. I did gymnastics. I played tennis. I was very, very involved in school. I went to an online private school, incredibly, incredibly academic.

And I would say my identity was honestly more wrapped up in my education at that point in my life than it was in acting. And acting was just something that I got to do for fun. And was your mother facilitating all of this? Was she helping you out? Yeah. Right. So you enjoyed your time in Los Angeles between 10 and 14? I loved it.

There's been a lot of rumors about child actors in Hollywood recently. What do you make of all that? It's all true. So what did you escape unscathed? I did. I saw a lot of it. What did you see?

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Go to Shopify.com slash JVP now to grow your business, no matter what stage you're in. That's Shopify.com slash JVP. For example, I worked on a children's TV show on a major network. And one of the writers, after we wrapped on the show, after the show was canceled, had incredibly inappropriate relationships with young women like me who were on the show. Young women in my... How young?

Okay. And to my knowledge, this was not sexual, but it was objectively grooming. It was inappropriate relationships between an adult and minors because Hollywood goes ahead and it blurs the lines between what is appropriate between adults and children because you're working with adults constantly. Right, right. My entire life.

I spent my entire childhood, I spent more time with adults than I did with children. My management team, they were all adults, obviously. Agents, managers, directors, casting directors, producers, wardrobe assistants. You're surrounded by adults constantly. Writers, in this case.

And those lines get really blurred. So if a writer on a TV show that you worked on invites you and one of your co-stars out to lunch to talk about another TV show that he's working on, your parents go, oh, okay, yeah. Well, you've worked with him for two years at this point. Let's take you to lunch. Mm-hmm. And then you're sitting here with this girl who's a year older than you and he starts talking about the lesbian fantasies that he has about you and your friend. Mm-hmm.

Like, that's, nothing happened, but that's the fact that he thought that that was appropriate. The fact that he... Well, that's a testing behavior. Yeah. And then the fact that later we're walking around the restaurant and he puts his hand in my friend's back pocket, who's 15 years old, and I was just, you know, I'd get me out of here. Completely inappropriate. She was, I think... How many of the young people in Hollywood are sold into that, so to speak, by their parents? Now, you characterized your mother as...

someone who was loath to take you on the Hollywood adventure. But there's no shortage of parents. Is it more common among mothers? Probably. The cluster B type mothers who use their children to their own advantage, come hell or high water.

Like Jazz Jennings, for example, swings to mind, right, in the most brutal and horrible possible manner. Right, but you can see a lot of this on social media. You know, parents pimping out their children, transforming them as well, you know, and then proclaiming their moral virtue in consequence of the transformation. You know, my child is very, very deviant, but...

I'm such a wonderful person that I still love them deeply. Right, right. But it was them in the first place that pushed them in that direction in the first place. And then you might say so. Yeah. And I think another example, did you read I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jeanette McCurdy? No, I haven't read it. Fantastic. And that, I mean, that I think is the most incredible example of what

A lot of these other people. Jeanette McCurdy. Jeanette McCurdy. She's Jeanette Carly. Jeanette, you haven't talked to her on your podcast. No, I have not. I believe she talked to Michaela. Ah, okay. It was just an incredible book. I remember sitting, I read it last year when it came out, and I was just, I mean, full, just tears reading it. Because these are the stories of the people that I grew up with. They're the things that I saw but was protected against. My mom was very wary about me being involved in this industry, and she was a shark. She...

set firm boundaries. She was always watching. She was always within eyeshot. Right, right. So you had a guardian. Oh, yes. Right. And the other thing that I think was incredibly important that she did was, again, like I said, I had so many other things going on in my life, so my identity was not wrapped up in this industry. I never connected it to money at all because my money was put in savings accounts. My parents never touched it. My mom never touched it. The state...

takes 15% of whatever a young actor makes and puts it into your Coogan account. So if you are in a situation where your parents are exploiting you, at least by 18, you have some money. Never touched any of that. And never wanted me to connect Hollywood and making money. Because I would see, she saw...

People in my circle, these kids, they would do an episode on a TV show and then their parents would go out and buy six American Girl dolls and they would buy a fancy new car for the family and the parents would take a huge vacation that the kid at eight years old paid for. Right.

And my mom always wanted to ensure that I stuck in this industry because I loved it, because I couldn't live without it, because I loved telling stories. And at least once a month, she would say, are you sure you want to do this? Because if you ever want to stop, we'll stop. I don't care how much money we've invested in your acting classes and your dance classes. If you want to stop, if you want to go home, we'll pack up and move to Tennessee. What made her so sensible? She's just a brilliant woman. She's incredible. She's one of the most resilient people I've ever met. She has been amazing.

to hell and back a million times. Her first husband passed away, her child then passed away. My older brother, in light of my brother's passing, has severe mental illness. He's permanently in a psychiatric facility for schizophrenia. Very, very hard marriage with my father. Very, very hard upbringing where she was often the black sheep. She is very comfortable being non-traditional.

and doing things that would be considered unconventional in whatever circumstance she's in. How did you end up with traditional values then? Because she's very traditional. I realized that as I said that, I contradicted myself. She is willing to be...

unconventional under the given circumstances. So in Hollywood, we're in... So she's daring. She's daring. And the majority of people that we were surrounded by were parents who were pushing their kids into this. She was willing to be the one that says, no, my kid is not doing that. My kid isn't doing this kind of project. My kid is not going out for this project that is run by a producer that we know has a bad track record. She was incredibly involved. Right. Well, so fundamentally, I mean, the case you're laying out

It's always useful to look at situational determinants of unfortunate outcomes, let's say. And, you know, the first thing you said was, well, there are kids working with adults, and so the lines are blurred. And, okay, so that sets the stage. And then you can imagine that within those relationships, there's no shortage of people always whose ability to

obtain intimacy, like in a relationship or sexually is like stunningly compromised, right? And so those people at minimum are going to like, just as a consequence of their inability, are going to be looking

for opportunity and maybe not even that good at distinguishing inappropriate from an inappropriate opportunity. And then there's the ones that are really bent because they're resentful and because they're isolated. They're actually looking for innocence to subvert and destroy. Those are the more people who tilt more in the explicitly narcissistic and sadistic direction. And your circumstance was such that

you had a mother who was watching out for you. And so that, instead of a mother who was complicit and exploiting you. - Who turned a blind eye, yeah. - Now you said you had a girl's spirit when you were how old, nine? - Yeah. - So what, how physically mature were you by the time you were 14?

Relatively. I always looked older for my age. That's another thing that blurs the lines, of course, right? It is. Yeah. And if you're around adults and you learn to act like an adult, you're going to also present yourself in a more mature manner. And if you physically look like one. Yeah, yeah. Well, that's... It makes it very, very complicated.

However, it also, it just shouldn't be complicated. What did you do, do you think, that so often girls, bully victims in general, girls who are subject to exploitation are not very good at subtle signaling. They don't know how to say no. They don't know when to say no. They don't know how to broadcast that.

No. Yeah. Like right from the initial interactions, right? So how do you think you conducted yourself so that, because I know you said your mother was protecting you, but did you conduct yourself so that nothing got going? Yeah. Okay. How? I would say just intrinsically, I'm very self-aware and have been for a long time. And I think that that is...

Because I had to grow up very quickly in terms of my family, I was just very aware of everything that was going on. You also said you didn't want to cause trouble. Yeah. Unnecessary trouble. Yes, unnecessary trouble. But I don't think that means that I was not willing to stand up for myself because...

In situations that were this severe in terms of my safety, my innocence. Anyway, I think that I was very self-aware. And then it goes back to my mother. Again, when we moved out to Los Angeles, she knew everything. All the rumors about Hollywood, the casting couch. She put me in women's self-defense against sexual assault classes when I was 10. And I did those classes until I... And that was useful? The most incredible thing I've ever done.

- Hmm. - Hands down. I was put in situations, I started out doing group classes, and you learn how to fight against a male opponent that is bigger than you. Because you can do jujitsu, you can do karate, I think that those disciplines are incredible. They often do not translate to real world fighting for women. - Yeah, right. - Specifically.

Women, we hold our strength in different parts of our bodies. When you are dealing with an assault, situational awareness is so important. Your voice is so important. Just being able to scream no. Yeah.

It was incredible. And so, I mean, I was put in situations in these classes where, you know, a man comes up behind you, my instructor comes up behind you, holding a knife to your throat, knowing how to get out of that, holding a gun to your head. So you at least were run through situations. I was run through, but I think...

this writer, I think you said was a writer, slipped his hand into the back pocket of this, of your friend. - Yes. - You said she was a little older than you? - Yeah, she was 16. - Why didn't he do the same thing to you? - He tried to and I moved away. And I said, "That's weird, don't do that." - Okay, did she do that? - No. - Okay, so-- - So that's the perfect example of what you were just saying. - Yeah, well, that's exactly my point. Those are the micro no's that stop things from proceeding. - Yes. - Right, yeah, and so,

And I credit a lot of that to these classes that I did. Because as you said, and as you brought up again, I was unwilling to rock the boat. I was a doormat in my family. And still, that's something that I'm still working through as an adult now. I'm being very, very nervous about that in my immediate family just because of the way that I was raised. Are you an agreeable person? Do you like to please people? I do. Uh-huh. Right, right, right. Well, you can also see the complexity because...

If you're an entertainer and you're on the stage, you're obligated as part of your role to be magnetically attractive, charismatic and all of that and to capitalize on that. And so drawing the line, Marilyn Monroe,

She said she could walk down the street as Norma Rae. Norma Jean. Norma Jean. Norma Jean. Or as Marilyn, right? And if she walked down the street as Norma Jean, no one paid any attention to her. But if she walked down the street as Marilyn Monroe, then she was magnetically attractive. And so those are obviously...

Well, she was a master of that seductress role. She's still iconic because of that, and it's like 70 years later. That's really quite something, and it certainly destroyed her, right? Because that was too much. Well, if you're an actor, an actress, then you have this conundrum because you're rewarded for your attractiveness. You're capitalizing on your attractiveness. You're among adults, but you have to hem that in so that you're not

exploited. Yeah. Right? Well, when exactly are you being exploited and when exactly are you exploiting yourself? It's not like that's obvious. So it's a very good thing that you had your mother along with you. Yeah. The courses too, that's interesting because you were at least placed in frightening situations and you were at least alerted to the fact that those sorts of things existed. How do you think what you learned in the courses translated into changes in your day-to-day behavior? They

They addressed my doormat behavior. They addressed my aggriebleness. Because more than any of the physical fighting that I was doing, and that was fun and it was an energy release that made me feel powerful. Emotionally, I held myself differently. My confidence skyrocketed. Because for the first time in my life, I was given permission to say no. I was given permission to draw a line in the sand. And I think that is what my mom wanted more than anything. I think that obviously she wanted me to be able to defend myself

And as I got older, that's when we started doing more of the date rape simulations. We weren't doing that at 10 years old. What she wanted me to learn, because she had watched me grow up and be very, very shy and refusing to get on stage. And I think that she knew that I had this desperate urge to perform, that I wanted to tell stories she did not want to.

She didn't want that mixed with my doormat behavior to then open the door for exploitation. So women are more empathic, compassionate, agreeable than men on average. And from what you've told me, you tilt more in the agreeable direction. And the problem with being agreeable, one of the problems with being agreeable is that you're...

agreeable people feel the pain of others quite acutely, like literally. So I'm an agreeable person, so if I'm watching you in pain, the same circuits that are mediating your pain are active in me. Now if I'm not so agreeable, that doesn't happen and that makes it easier for... What does that mean? Well, the downside is it makes it easier for me to be selfish because I don't give a damn about my effects on other people. But the upside is I can tell you to go to hell when it's necessary and I don't care what your response is.

I worked with a lot of women in my clinical practice who were like sequentially abused. And one of the things I noticed about them was that, well, first of all, they generally were very badly socialized. And so I had no idea where to draw those initial lines. And that's what continually got them into trouble. But they're also very unwilling to reject and to say no. And the reason for that's obvious. Like,

If you reject someone, if you say no to someone, if you stop their advances, you're definitely going to do something like offend them or hurt their feelings. And so if you're an agreeable person, that's a very difficult thing to do. It's the worst thing you could do. Yeah, yeah, exactly. A disagreeable person will just say, well, no, and I don't care what you think about it or feel about it. Like, screw off. Yeah. Right? And

You need that. You need that, especially if you're attractive, especially if you're charismatic, or especially if people are coming at you for a variety of reasons. There are kind of two main reasons why people go to therapy. Mm-hmm.

One is to deal with negative emotion, let's say depression and anxiety. The other main category is to learn how to stand up for themselves. That's why I went to therapy. Learn to say no. And how are you at that now? I'm much better. How are you at contractual negotiations? Much better. Yeah. How'd you do negotiating with Daily Wire? I think I did pretty well. Did you do great? I think I did pretty well. I've gotten better since then. And it's good to surround yourself with sharks as long as they're not like gnawing on you. Yeah.

But it's been a... Have you had good agents? I've had great agents. That's good. That's good. So you've had people other than your mother that have been on your side? Yeah. Long-term relationships with them? Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's a good deal. I think one thing, and I think we're going to talk about this later, but another thing is my now husband, I think has probably been the most influential in that.

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How long have you known him? Two years. In influential in what way? In encouraging me to stand up for myself. I am very agreeable. And I think that was something that I didn't want to be for a long time. And I think that it was important that I...

learned how to control that because I think that it can be used really beautifully and to your advantage. And I think it makes me a very empathetic person. If you started crying, I would start crying right now. It's great with infants. Yes. But seriously, like it's great with infants. And so, you know, that's the place where agreeableness most appropriately manifests itself. And it's partly because, think about it this way, when you have an infant, especially in the first, let's say, nine months, it's not quite that long, but it's certainly the first six.

you have to agree with everything, right? Every single demand that new creature makes, you are obliged to say yes to, right? And so if you're agreeable and empathic and compassionate, responsive, then that's a perfect match for that relationship. Problem is, is that

The relationship with infants isn't the same as the relationship with, well, certainly not with predatory adults. Right. Those are very different. Yeah. Yeah. Opposite. And so it takes a whole different set of personality skills to be able to manage both levels of relationship. It does. And that had to be developed. So let's talk about, let's move from Hollywood to Hollywood.

to the beginning of the comment section, right? Because is that when the trend... That's when... Yes. Yeah, that's when your life transformed. Yes? Yes. Yes, okay, so tell us that story. It was during COVID, and Hollywood shut down, as the world did. I was in college. I was at UCLA. What were you taking? I was an English literature major. Yeah, how did that go at UCLA? I feel like I... You're in English? You're in the English department? That's so awful. Really, that's so awful. I know. I...

I'd wanted to be- Were you crawling out of your skin? I was, but the good thing is, this was a blessing in disguise. I had a much better experience in a twisted way because of COVID, because I got to go home. And because I was in online classes, I didn't- You were protected from the university. Yes, yes. Oh, God. I know. That's so awesome. But I had a unique experience because I-

Emancipated myself at 15. That's when I graduated high school. Started doing... So you graduated from high school at 15? Yes. Oh, well, congratulations on that. Thank you. And why did you emancipate yourself? I think a lot of people assume that it was all for acting, but it was mainly family. My parents' divorce had gotten pretty messy. I was being used in the middle of it.

Um, inadvertently so. Um, and that was not a position that I wanted to be in and I was making enough money to remove myself from that situation. And I think the most important one was my, um, my brother's schizophrenia had really taken off at that point and it became a physically dangerous situation to be at home.

And there was a lot of turmoil. There were just a lot of outbursts. My mom was splitting her time between California and then flying back to Tennessee to handle the divorce and the division of my parents' estate while simultaneously coming back out to Los Angeles. My brother was homeless at the time, was using drugs. When she was gone, I would be the one to go literally find him on the streets of California, and he would be, you know, passed out, drugged out of his mind.

And that mixed with my parents' divorce. And then also I had a career on top of that. And I was getting offers for jobs. But because I was ultimately under the age of 18, I had to have a legal guardian, you know, within six feet. Eyesight earshot. And my mom could not be there because she was handling this. She was handling too many other things. Did your relationship with your mother maintain itself? Yes. She was in support. And one of them was your father's.

But my father and I have had a very tumultuous relationship for the majority of my life. And so that wasn't like a real breaking point. It was just kind of like a, okay, here we go again. So it was more, I see. So you had practical reasons for this. Very practical. Was it a good decision? It was the best. Yeah.

And it was not contentious. I came to my parents and I said, "This makes logical sense. I have a career." - Yeah. - I am in college. - Oh, you graduated? - Yeah, yeah. - And you're in university, right? - I'm in college, yeah. - So you were ahead of the curve, essentially. - I was ahead of the curve and I'm sitting here in Los Angeles and my mom basically, I mean, she agreed and she said, "If I leave, that means you're gonna have to leave 'cause I can't leave a 15-year-old child here in Los Angeles."

with a drug addict schizophrenic brother on the street. I'm not going to do that. So you'll have to come back to Chattanooga. And I said, I don't want to do that. I don't want to go back to Chattanooga. I don't want to live in the middle of your mess of your divorce. I'm not going to do that again. And I have opportunities. And so we... So there's a time you said no. Yeah. And I said, I'm going to do this. And so we went to court in Chattanooga. My oldest brother helped me. My parents signed off on it. And...

You know, I lived with my mom after that. Like, it was not like I was ever around her, but I got a job at Trader Joe's that I would have a stable income in between acting jobs. And I worked there for five years and just kept that job until I left California. Best job I ever had. What did you do at Trader Joe's? Just, you know, a bad girl, basically. We did. People at Trader Joe's do everything. You stock the shelves. You bring in orders. And you liked that? I loved it. Why? Yeah.

I felt physically useful. I see. So there was immediate reward element to it. Yeah, immediate reward. I loved the appreciation from the customers. And I loved meeting interesting people. Because if you go to Trader Joe's, you're always talking to people. Like the joke with Trader Joe's is that is the cashier flirting with you or not? You go there to have social hour. And I loved that aspect of it. I loved meeting new people. I loved feeling like I had a purpose every single day in a very...

Acting in Hollywood is very... Sporadic. Yes. And you can be working on a series, you know, be a series regular, and then they cancel the show. You have no work or you might not work for... Right, where it's you going like this. Yeah. And I am a very...

I'm pretty habitual and I like knowing exactly. - Everyone is. - Okay, that's good to know. I'm not crazy. - Well, my suspicions are you're probably far less that way than most people. - Yeah. - Well, because you take all sorts of risks. - That's true. - And you were able to tolerate a very dynamic life. It's like people are creatures of habit like you can't possibly imagine and they go crazy way faster than you think if their habits are disrupted. It's really hard on people. We're pack animals.

Right. We like an orderly social environment. We like a high degree of predictability. And we like the same things, at least a fair number of the same things happening on a regular and predictable daily schedule. You know, weekly, monthly, all of that. Otherwise, the threads start to show. Do you think it was because I was experiencing such an extreme high and low? Because you are right. Because I do take risks. I...

have been in very unconventional situations my whole life. - Yeah, yeah, constantly. - So I wonder, I also think it might have been a, again, going back to family,

It was so turbulent, it was so up and down, that I think I just needed some kind of... I had no structure. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to have to formulate a rationale for wanting some habitual predictability. Right? People, they cannot function without that, right? People think of anxiety as something inside their head. That's not right.

You're anxious when everything around you is coming apart. And so the anxiety is a reflection of that. Now, you can find yourself in situations where your physiological state or your psychological state makes you overreact to uncertainty in the environment. But...

Generally, for example, when someone develops major depressive disorder, it's in the aftermath of something truly awful. Yes. Like they just don't fall apart for no reason. Now, having been broken once, they may be more susceptible to being broken again in the future. But it's not exactly a psychological problem. And anxiety is not a psychological problem. It's a navigation problem. And, you know, you had...

complicated and mutable home life, and your career was very complex and multidimensional, the fact that you found a job that had this level of predictability and sameness and found that, what would you say, that offered you a certain degree of security, that requires no explanation whatsoever. - Interesting. - Yeah, yeah. - Well, I loved it. - This is a good thing to know about kids too. Like, you want to routinize your children, right?

They get up at the same time. They eat at the same time. They get read to at night at the same time. Like, they need these little islands of stability. Then they can use those islands of stability as places to explore from. But if they're in chaos all the time, if you put your children in chaos all the time, they will torture you to death. And you deserve it for not setting them up with these predictable daily routines. That's how they...

Those are the islands. It's like at the beginning of time when the earth emerges from the primordial waters. It's these islands of stability. That's what allows people to plant their flag in the ground and to establish themselves. Yeah.

It's a very good thing to know, too, about marriage is that you need routines and rituals. They have to repeat because otherwise you don't know which way is up. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So tell me how you got involved with the Daily Wire. Finally, yeah. We'll make it there. During COVID, I was, I got involved in conservative politics.

media, I would say, in Los Angeles. I lost a lot of friends in UCLA because of my political beliefs. I felt incredibly isolated, not just from friends, but campus life in general. What conservative beliefs? First of all, one of the things I really have observed about the left, and I do not believe that this is true of classic liberals or conservatives, the left, especially the radical types, they will drop you in a moment if you say or do anything that's out of

that ideological sink. And that is not equally true of people on the liberal or the right side. So the lefties, they will cancel and exclude. That's part of the entanglement of the radical left with cluster B psychopathology, with narcissism, with psychopathy, with borderline personality disorder, with antisocial behavior. Like that's all

behavior that's associated with social exclusion. It's very, very aggressive. Like, it's passive-aggressive because it doesn't involve fists, but social exclusion is a very effective form of punishment. And the radicals on the left are masters at using it. So what sort of views were you being... I was not... Alienating yourself with? So the first one was that...

I did not want to vote for Biden in the primaries. It was going to be my first time voting in a presidential election. You were going to vote for Trump? I was. And how old were you? 18. So, like, you were the one 18-year-old female. Yeah. And I walked into... This is my favorite story from college. I walked into a party at one of my best friend's apartments. Big rager happening. And this is after I just had, like, a...

I wouldn't even call it a fight. It was just kind of like a reckoning in my friend group of they realized that I was not on their team. And I had never considered myself Republican. I never considered myself Republican.

I just didn't even think about it. My family... Right, so you weren't political up to that point. No, I was not. My family was always more on the right. My mom studied under Ayn Rand. She was a libertarian. My oldest brother, who was one of the most important people in my life, incredibly, incredibly libertarian, as libertarian as you can get. And my mom raised us...

based on values instead of politics. She didn't talk about politics. She didn't talk about current events, but she talked about personal responsibility. She talked about accountability. One of the greatest things that she taught me, sort of what you touched on when you were talking about anxiety being, you know, the mirror and something that's external is that you can only control your response to the circumstances in your life.

Again, that you are in control. She valued freedom and independence. And then the more political stuff was fiscal responsibility, but we didn't even talk about that in terms of politics. It was just...

We would sort of touch on taxation in my homeschool, civics class. So your mother really helped you with the understanding that you had some choices to make in your life and that you could make them well, and then you emancipated yourself. I sure made my choice, yeah. Independence. And this all really came to a head as COVID was taking off.

- Did you finish your degree at UCLA? - I did. - Oh, congratulations. Good for you. You stuck it out. - I did, I did. - Even though you took online courses. - Mm-hmm. I did. - Were any of your online courses worth taking? - Yeah. - They were? What percentage of them do you think? - Oh gosh. 60%. But I'm a major English litner. Like I loved

English that all throughout high school since the fifth grade I knew that I wanted to be an English major because I just again I love stories I love stories I love understanding the human condition through stories and I wanted this I wanted to study British literature and so I did it I did my final capstone on Barnaby Rudge by Charles Dickens and I've just I mean I was obsessed and so a lot of the classes I

I made it through just because I, number one, I already knew my values. I had a great foundation. I wasn't easily deterred. And I cared more about stories. And I did have a few good professors. Actually, the best and most common sense driven professor I ever had was at Berkeley because I did a business program at Berkeley's grad school. And she was the most right wing person.

At Berkeley? At Berkeley's grad school, at the Haas School of Business. Oh, okay. Well, you might find someone like that hiding in the business school. And she was fantastic. How did your professors respond to your essays and so forth at UCLA? The worst case of this was actually in...

My first semester at UCLA. So just a little bit of context. So, you know, I know we keep getting off of the daily wire thing, but I think you'll find this interesting. You'll find this interesting. I did community college for the first two years. So I didn't go to university for all four. And I think that was also a very important thing. Yeah, right, right, right. I believe that I got a better education. In person at community? Yes. Yeah, I went to community college for the first two years too. And I got the best education of my life at community college. I had a better education there. My professors actually cared about teaching. Yeah. And I had a personal relationship with them. I loved them.

Yeah. Because they were willing... Small classes? Yes. And they wanted to be there because of the students and because they loved the subject, not because they got the notoriety of being at UCLA or because they got the resources for their research or the book that they were writing. Yeah, yeah. And I think that I was much better off for it. I would recommend it to anyone. I saved so much money. I think I got my full bachelor's for under $20,000. Yeah. Because of that, I got to explore so many...

subjects that I would have never gotten to explore at UCLA. Right, and you were still able to concentrate on the literature, actually, literature, right? So I studied that, then came to UCLA. My first semester at UCLA, I had to take one of those intersectional literature classes, which actually, since my leaving UCLA, they have, I believe, adapted their English literature department, where now it is less about the Miltons and the Shakespeare and the Barlettes, and it's more about

Bronte through the lens of feminism. - That's wonderful. - When I was there, you had to do-- - Bronte through the lens of resentful bitterness. - Yes, there you go, that's what I'm looking at. - Yeah, lovely, lovely. - Just makes it even more enjoyable. - Or how we as professors are morally superior to all the great artists of the past. - Exactly. - Right. - That's basically it. But when I was there, you only had to do one of those.

And it changed after I left. I think I got there at the perfect time. And so my first semester, I did that class and it was race, religion, sexuality, and Asian American literature. And it was the one intersectional class available that semester. And I just thought, let me just get it out of the way. And my final paper, I don't remember what the book was, but it was the story of a man who had immigrated here, possibly from Taiwan, I believe.

And told his story of assimilating into American culture the struggle of being an immigrant. Alleged racism, he was also gay and was dealing with that. And what my professor, her conclusion from this novel was that he had faced racism and that was the, he had endured racism and that was why he had all of these mental health struggles and the character was incredibly flawed. You know, incredibly depressed, was just a terrible human being. Yeah.

And the thing that she did not bring up or did not touch was that he was sexually assaulted halfway through the book. And that's when all the behavior started. So my...

take on it was I argued that it was not necessarily racism. I said, I'm sure that he experienced some, you know, immigrating to America in the 70s. However, all of this behavior started after he was sexually assaulted. And then he became depressed. He was mentally ill. Where could you possibly go in the world that would be less racist than California in the 1970s? Yeah, right. Oh, my God. And so that was my argument. And I

And we had to give her our thesis statement prior to writing the essay and signed off on it. She said, sounds so interesting. We had to go around the class, read it out loud. People would give notes on it. That's really interesting. When I got my paper back, I think I got a D and I had never, that was the first time that I had not gotten to sound so pompous. I had never gotten anything other than an A on a paper before. I was a 4.0 student. I had gotten a, you know,

A B in my entry-level statistics class my first year of community college. Other than that, straight A's. I was crushed. Absolutely crushed. And in the margins, she had written, I fundamentally disagree with your thesis. And then all of her notes were, she had a couple about the way that I had structured it, but they were that your take on this novel is fundamentally wrong. Mm-hmm.

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you know, two years of my life. And after that, I was able to skate by. I did not do any more of those intersectional classes. My schedule, I would give, I would

make myself wake up, I lived off campus, I'd make myself wake up at 5:00 a.m. to beat the traffic to take a 8:00 a.m. class all the way across town. - Another conservative failure. - Yeah, get up. - Waking up in the morning. - To avoid doing classes like that. So I would only do Milton from this year to this year. I would only do Dickens. It was very, very author-focused. And that was intentional. - So you took a very proactive strategy. - Very. - And so that's why. - Yeah, okay, got it. - And because of that, I loved it. - Right. - I truly did. - Well, look, one of the ways

that it's one of the things you have to do to be successful at university is to take an active role. - I completely agree. - Finding the professors and finding the courses. You have to search them out. And once you have a good professor, you need to stick with them, but you have to discover them. You have to explore. - And job opportunities on top of that. I think one thing that I've been just witnessing as I saw some friends that are graduating from college

Is that they are not being set up for career success whatsoever. There's no push for internships. There's no push for work. And that friend group where I got hit in the head. I don't think I finished that story, but I was hit in the head with a communist manifesto at a party. Oh, yeah. Hit in the head, like literally? Yeah. When I walked into this party, you know, that was after my I'm not going to vote for Biden popped in the head.

choked at my face. Many people have been hit in the head by the Communist Manifesto. I'm proud of it. Yeah. Where was I going with this? Oh, but in that friend group, I was the only one who had a job. Not just a Trader Joe's job. They did not have internships. In their junior year, like their third quarter internship,

Junior year, they got their first internship. I had had an internship every single semester. I was working. I took that proactive stance. And colleges do not encourage it. Parents aren't encouraging it. And so kids are going into this four-year environment thinking, you know, I'm going to go and, you know, $80,000 into debt.

I mean, you talk about it on Twitter all the time and on your show that, you know, then you're popped out into the world, you're in debt, you have a meaningless degree, and you have no job opportunities because of your experience. Yeah, none. And my generation is entering the workforce later than any other generation ever has before. It's just shocking. So, yes, you do. If you are going to go to college, and I still am...

A lover of the liberal arts. I still do love university. I love that I went. I love the things that I learned. I love the essays that I wrote. I'm such a nerd. I, you know, I had my transcript up on the wall because I was so proud of it in high school. Like, I just, I truly love it. But you have to be incredibly proactive. It's not something that you can just passively skate through if you want to, you know, suck the marrow out of it.

All right, so let's talk about your current projects. Let's start with the podcast. How did that set itself up? I was doing social media for a couple of different political organizations, Young Americans for Liberty, PragerU in Los Angeles, which is where I really found community in the midst of COVID and BLM and losing a lot of friends at UCLA, and Foundation for Economic Education. How did you run across Prager's group?

They have an incredible student group called Prager Force. - And at UCLA? - No, just based- - Just generally. - Yes. - I see. - And it's a online group and they have a Facebook group and they have webinars that you can join. And I was, I think if you would ask me a year prior, I would have been like, "I don't need that. I don't want to go join like a Zoom call with a bunch of, you know, like-minded individuals or whatever." 'Cause I didn't think I needed it, but I was so alienated. The world was shut down. I was living in California. There was nothing I could do.

I felt so alone, and I was becoming more and more political by the day, becoming much more aware of the world around me, current events. My values were transforming into something that was very tangible around me. And I joined PragerForce. I got to know other young people around the country, around the world that had similar values, and I got to know the people at PragerU. They knew that I was an actor. They're also based in Los Angeles, and they invited me into their offices, and said, would you like to make videos for us? I was like, yeah.

Yes, I have nothing else to do. Hollywood is shut down. I'm bored out of my mind. I want to do something that's meaningful.

And then I jumped from that to writing. I did some economic journalism at Foundation for Economic Education and did social media for them as well. Jumped to Young Americans for Liberty, running their TikTok and Instagram accounts. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And so I had a growing—I wouldn't say big because it's nowhere compared to where I am now, but I had a growing Instagram presence just through TikToks and Reels, all short form. And then—

I woke up one day and saw a DM from Daily Wire. And they said, hey, we've been loving your content on Instagram. Would you want to? And that was what year? That was 2021. 2021. Okay. So it's three years ago now. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So you got a DM from who? It was a producer at Daily Wire. I see. And she was like the social media video producer. And she had been tasked with.

with finding a couple of people that were doing well on social media, young people. And because they, a member of their team who worked on the YouTube channels, he had the idea that we needed a YouTube show. And he was, these were all people that were around my age. And it was very, very cool. And I think a lot of people

Look at my show and people that have critiqued me before, and they imagine, you know, Jeremy Boring sitting in his glass office being like, I need to get the youth. So, like, I knew what it was all this was, like, I'm going to create something for the young people. It was all people my age. They were sitting in the Daily Wire offices saying, we need content for us. We want something that we will watch, that we relate to, that is based on YouTube, that's based on the internet. And so...

They tasked this video producer with finding some people that were already out in the world doing that. So I got a DM and they said, would you be interested in launching a show with us? Well, they say, you know, it takes 10 years to become an overnight success. And you certainly put in your 10 years and you said you'd accumulated all the social media experience and you'd said yes to a lot of things. You said yes to Prager, you said yes to Young Americans for Liberty, etc. And funnily, I almost said no to Daily Wire.

I was too scared because it felt like the big leagues. Like I had looked at Daily Wire. I had applied for, I had applied to be Candice's assistant. This was all during...

my graduating year, like that spring. I had applied to be Candice's assistant. I had applied to be a producer on Ben's show. I had applied for some social media role. I just... And then you got a bigger offer. I got a bigger offer. And I got no interviews for any of those roles. And granted, I was not really qualified for any of them. And I could have... So what scared you about the Daily Wire offer?

it felt huge. I felt like I wasn't ready. Well, you probably weren't. No, and that's the good thing. You just jump in head first. Yeah, well, that's the thing. When you make a status transition, if it's a major transition, you can't be ready when it first happens. This is partly why faith is necessary in life, Faye. Because when you make a major transition, first of all, you don't know what you're in for. You have no idea. Like maybe it'll work and maybe it won't, but the evidence isn't there.

And then the next thing is, well, you don't necessarily know that you can do it. Why? Well, you haven't done it. It's a new thing. Well, so how else can you move forward in a situation like that except in faith? And you said your mother helped you with this, but that you had faith.

already learned that you could take tasks upon yourself and grow into them, right? And so you said even though you had done a lot of that, that the Daily Wire offer intimidated you. What was the offer exactly? Was it to start your own YouTube channel? Yes, it was to start the show. Okay, and how was that outlined? Like a number of times a week, like the full-fledged YouTube show? It was not even... So I turned it down even before any of that. I obviously didn't fully turn it down, but...

I didn't even want to send in an audition tape at first because they wanted me. They knew that I had done short form videos and they said, could you, here's a couple of things that are going on in the world right now. Could you do a longer form reaction to this and just, you know, talk off the top of your head, give your tips on culture. Yes. And I got so scared and I didn't even want to send in a tape. And I think that it was because I was out of practice taking risks for 10 years in Hollywood.

I would audition four to five times a week. I was told no 99% of the time. And you have to be okay with that. I would take huge risks. I moved across the country writing a letter to a manager. That's why kids have to be allowed to fail. That's why they have to lose in competitions. They have to learn. I lost a lot. Well, the thing is, you skipped over something there. And you said, when you went to all these auditions, you've been successful, but your success rate was like 1%.

Right. Well, that's a lot of failure. And most occupations are like that. Most, like a job search is like that. Yes. Right. If you do a comprehensive job search, the probability that you'll get rejected for any given position is like above 90%. Yeah. And so if you're not accustomed to that, well, what are you going to do? Exactly. You think the world is against you when the situation is actually that

moving forward productively is rather unlikely and the default answer is generally no. Most jobs that are advertised, for example, don't even exist. They have an internal candidate. You're not going to get that job. It's posted for like technical reasons. So they're going to say no to you. It has nothing to do with you. It has to do with base rate of rejection. Yes. Right. The base rate of rejection in the world is very, very high, but it's not 100%.

Right. So you keep on plugging away and you have to be resilient enough to do that. Okay. So how did you change your mind? My mom yelled at me. Oh, good. Yeah, she did. And she said, you were being an idiot. And she said, I don't care if you don't get this. I don't care if you don't actually take the job later on, but you are shooting yourself in the foot. This opportunity does, you know, it's a once in a lifetime opportunity. And she said, you've been trying to get in with the Daily Wire. I'd already seen what Jeremy was talking about

with what he wanted to do with creating a parallel to Hollywood. All of it. I was completely bought in. I watched Matt and Michael constantly. They had just brought on Candace. I was just like, these are my people. And I felt like I could learn a lot from them. But then when this opportunity came around that was so big, I went, oh, no, no, no, no. I didn't teach you to ask for it. Yeah. And she yelled at me. And I did it. And it all took place. And I also think what you were saying about humans needing...

routine and habit for my entire life like we've already outlined it's been up and down tumultuous for the first time at this point in my life I had normalcy and structure and my mom had just bought a farm and I was living five minutes away from her I was working as a waitress at a really nice restaurant and I was doing these social media jobs I had gotten into law school I withdrew from law school because I decided I'm there's no reason for me to be a liar I should not be a

I was going to, I was wanting to plant down roots where I was. Where were you living? I was in Boise, Idaho. This is a whole, we don't need to spend that part of that, but yes. And I thought this is where I just want to be. I want to find a nice guy. I want to get married. I want to work in marketing. I want to be near my mom. And I had bought two horses that were on her farm. I just want to live. This is just normal and it's safe. And I think for the first time it was just so comfortable.

And I didn't want to ruin that. And she said, this is not the time to be afraid. This is not the time to be risk averse. This is what you've been working for for 10 years. And you get to be... You know, it's very common. I see this. I saw this a lot when I was working with people. Mm-hmm.

People say no to what they want. Yeah. Right. And they do that in micro ways, right? And then they do it now and then in major ways. And then the opportunities dry up. They do. And they think, why are there no opportunities coming my way? It's like, you have to say, you have to be prepared for a lot of failure and you have to say yes enthusiastically whenever an opportunity makes itself present. And then they multiply. But boy, it's...

It's partly, too, because people actually, they don't have faith that it's okay if good things happen to them. Right? They don't feel that they're worthy of it. And so, you know, and sometimes that's understandable. It's not surprising that you were nervous about having to move from making short-form content. Was it scripted to short-form content? No. Okay, so at least you had that. I still had that. And it was a physical move across the country. It was leaving my mother, who had been my rock for...

through this entire career, obviously my entire childhood, moving across the country within two weeks. Right. To, as I say. To Nashville. To Nashville. Yeah, yeah. And again, just working the big leagues. Like I, I mean, I walked in and just, you know, Matt Walsh walks by and I'm like, you know, this is somebody who I've looked up to. It was incredibly intimidating. I'm so, I'm so glad that I did. When I think about it too much, it just makes me want to cry because interestingly, and I was talking about this on a live stream,

At my wedding just a couple of weeks ago, one of my bridesmaids gave a speech and she's been my friend for 11 years or so. We were 15, we were at Disneyland. And she remembers a specific conversation where I said, there's three things that I want in my life. I want to be married. I want to have a farm and I want to be successful at whatever I'm doing. I want to have a successful career. And at that time, I thought that it was going to be, you know, a producer, Reese Witherspoon-esque running some kind of production company like that. And so she stood up at our rehearsal dinner and she said,

You have just bought a farm. I just bought, you know, 60 acres or something like that. And I, um, and you're now getting married tomorrow to an incredible man and you are successful. Mm-hmm.

And I think about if I had not taken that risk, I might have, I might have had the farm. My mom had a farm a few minutes away. It wouldn't have been mine. It would have taken a long time to do that. I might've married a really nice guy, but it would not have been Alex who I adore. I just think he worshiped the grounds he walks on, but he's incredible. And I would not have this career now that is so perfectly harmonious with everything that I

loved about Hollywood, I loved telling stories, I loved being on camera, I loved reaching people through media, while also being true to myself and not compromising my values

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Yes. So your channel grew like mad. Crazy. Yeah, yeah. We had a million subscribers in five months. Right. And you're up to about 4.3, something like that now on YouTube. In two years. Right, right, right. So obviously you could do it. Right, right. So that's, well, so that's extremely interesting. And I will say, and it wasn't, I think that we found an important

niche. But I also do believe, as you said, I did put in the time. Yeah, yeah. I had 10 years. And so I think it's a combination of that. And I will often discredit that. Preparation and opportunity. They have to meld. And then you have to strike when the iron is hot. I mean, timing is crucial. And you had this opportunity and you did take it. What are you doing

why is what you're doing working? And why did it start working so quickly? What do you think? Like, you're very upbeat. You're very enthusiastic. So you've got the charisma that goes along with that. Why don't you characterize a typical show? And why don't you walk me through why you think it works? I think it works because, like you said, I do approach things with a positive attitude. I think a lot of content online right now is incredibly...

especially things that are, you know, I don't want to just say political, but also cultural, cultural commentary. It's very angry. It's very intense. And with my personality, I think I have been able, and my sense of humor and my levity and the fact that I, you know, I take myself and my work very seriously, but, you know, I can laugh at anything. I think that if you're not laughing about something, you're crying about it. So you might as well find humor. And I think that humor is an incredibly important way to reach people.

I think that is something that my show does really, really well. And it's the kind of show that I would want to watch. And kind of like I said at the beginning when we sat down, this is something I did not have. I knew that this needed to exist. Because I would look around and I, like I said, like, you know, I watched your YouTube videos. I would watch Michael. I would watch Ben debate. You know, I have, you know, his...

his line about, you know, in that debate, I don't remember where it was, might've been UC Santa Barbara or something where, you know, that kid said, well, how do you know the girls can't be in Boy Scouts? He's like, it's in the name. Like I watched all of those debates. I was constantly consuming that. I didn't see myself represented. And it's weird for me to say that because I will often critique Hollywood always saying you need to be represented, you need to be represented. But in this case, I do believe that it was important because I did not see

Well, that means you occupied that. Look, there's two ways of looking at that. You can whine and complain about the victimization, or you can see that that's a market opportunity because the niche has been filled. Yeah. Right. Well, the social media landscape is pretty new. It's not surprising that all the niches aren't filled. Yeah.

And so you filled, and this is why I compared you a bit to Candice earlier, is that you filled a relatively rare niche, which is young, female, conservative commentators, right? Who are entertaining, right? And engaging. Well, you know, that's a lot of combinations of

That's a lot of rare traits combined. And I also think on more on the right, whether you're a libertarian or conservative or classical liberal, the women that I saw were either. And this is not talking down to any of them whatsoever. It just wasn't me. I either saw, you know, the Trump intern type girls in their pencil skirts, the D.C., you know, politicos. Right. Or I saw.

you know, the hunters and the... Yeah, well, you're a creative conservative. Those are very rare creatures. I saw, like, the outdoorsy hunters, and I think that they're amazing, but that wasn't, like, I was in a very weird box where I just felt like I'm a normal girl. And why do I not have anybody to watch that's sharing my values that has a take on things that I can relate to that I feel like I'm, like, I'm not crazy for the things that I believe? And so I think that is one of the primary reasons why it just

took off immediately because young people... Well, you hit the target. I did, yeah. There was a gap there. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I think, you know, again, the humor and my personality, and I really, I care about it, and I care about my audience a lot. I genuinely care about them. I genuinely want to create good content for them. When I meet them in person... Yeah, that's really important. It is. And I...

because I see myself in them. And I still do. I don't look at them as like, oh, you were me a few years ago. Like I am creating things that if I wasn't doing this, I would want to be watching. And I would want somebody to care about me. How's the daily wire being to work with in that regard? Incredible. Yeah, I've had the same experience. Yeah, there's two things they do for me. The first is they leave me the hell alone. Well, the thing is, if you hire someone who's on a journey, let's say a creative journey,

and you box them in, then that's the end of them. I struggled with this continually at the university as it degenerated because I loved my job. I loved doing research. I loved being a professor. I very much enjoyed being a clinician, but I wanted to be left alone so I could do it at minimum. At minimum, just don't get in my way when I'm doing the job you hired me to do. That's the minimum requirement. There's another requirement too, which is,

Well, how about I bring you a creative idea and you jump on board? And one of the things that's really characterized my relationship with The Daily Wire is that they've said yes to preposterous projects and like right away and backed them. They did that with the Exodus seminar I did, which is very high risk. It's a very high risk project.

We did a gospel seminar on a Western civilization project. These were complex projects. They whipped them up very quickly. They did that well? Very quickly. It was stunning. And not only did they green light them almost immediately, and then we went ahead with them right away, but they also edited them extremely professionally, produced them extremely professionally, and did that all rapidly too, and enthusiastically. So we're in a fortunate position with that company because we're in a growth phase of that enterprise.

And as far as I can tell, not only do they put their money where their mouth is, but the people there are...

Fully and enthusiastically and non-resentfully and efficiently on board. And so that's very helpful. Even when they don't completely understand it, they're on board. I mean, just from the beginning, I sat in a meeting with Jeremy and Caleb and the whole team, and we pitched comment section. And we had produced a pilot, and the marketing team and the social media team was developing it. They brought me in. I could have been fired at any moment. If they had not greenlit the show, my job would have been axed. I had nothing else to do.

Not my show would have been next. I would have been next. Sat in this meeting with Jeremy. We played the pilot and he got through it. We watched all three, you know, looking back on it. It's terrible, terrible pilot. But he looked over at me. He was silent in his normal Jeremy way, contemplating things and looked at me and he said, I don't understand this show, but I know other people will.

And I think, you know, he was willing to take that risk on me. I would, when they hired me, I was 19 years old. Right. Yeah. I just graduated college. It's no wonder you were nervous. You should be nervous. Yes. I was 19. They were giving me, you know, all, I wouldn't say they were giving me a platform. They were helping me with a platform, but we were starting with zero. They gave me resources, an incredible team. Yeah. Um,

And they took a chance. Yeah, definitely. And even when Jeremy watched it, he said, this show's not for me. Like, I don't get the memes. I don't understand the TikToks that you're talking about, the lingo you're using. But I know it's important because I know that this doesn't exist. Yeah, he has enough confidence to allow people to generate autonomous projects. Yeah, yeah. Which is also the hallmark of a confident and creative manager. And also something that makes that group unique.

a pleasure to work with, like a genuine pleasure to work with. Let's talk about your other projects as well. - Yeah. We're circling back into Hollywood four years later, which is funny. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you have "Mr. Bertram." - Yes. - "The Pendragon Cycle," and "Snow White and the Evil Queen," right? - Yes. - So is that a good order to discuss them in? - They are, yes. - So let's start with "Mr. Bertram." - "Mr. Bertram" is coming out very soon. - And what is that? - "Mr. Bertram" is an animated comedy

Here's a look at the trailer for Mr. Burcham. When I was a kid, men were men. Now everyone's wrapped up in feelings. Real men stuff feelings down with red meat, cigarettes, and violence. You and the geriatric Girl Scouts will be passed out in an hour. Burcham. Burcham. Mr. Burcham. Burcham. Burcham. Richard Burcham. Let the record show I'm a dick. Watch Mr. Burcham, an all-new animated series from Daily Wire+.

Now streaming. It is inspired by a character that Adam Carolla has been doing on his radio show for years. He's a... Is this a series, a TV series? It's a series, yes. It is, you know, he is a curmudgeon-y shop teacher that is, like, woodshop teacher in schools who is...

incredibly traditional, incredibly, you know, everything he does is tangible. It is about as traditional as you can get working with, you know, tools and wood. And he's watching as the world just changes around him, as things get more technologically advanced, as the world gets more progressive, as the school is trying to push him out. Yeah. Saying your job is not as important. And so it follows his...

And what role do you play? I play his daughter. I see. Yes. And what's the character of his daughter? She's incredibly—she actually reminds me a lot of myself. She's incredibly precocious, very smart, very close with her father. And who's the target market for it? I think the target market is people that have felt abandoned by comedy.

who watch, you know, animated TV shows, who... Adult? Is it an adult series? Yes, yes, it's an adult series. Yes, yes, that's important. Okay. And who are wanting comedy that is truthful, that is not afraid to pull punches, that I think that The Common Man will relate to. It has some satire. I wouldn't say that it is satire, but it has many satirical elements to it. The writing is...

They brought me on and I didn't really know what to expect. And I had done voiceover a lot, had not done it in a few years. And that's always interesting because it, you know, I, we recorded this whole series. I play a very significant role in it.

I have not met Adam yet. I have not, you know, Megyn Kelly plays my mother in it. Oh, yeah. I have never met Megyn yet. I'm meeting her next week for the first time. But you record all of this completely remote. She's quite the powerful force. She is. Yeah. Yeah, and she's done extremely well on her own. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, two thumbs up for her. Yes, yeah, we brought her in for that. Yeah.

But you record it all remote. And so I only got to see bits and pieces of it. I knew that the scripts were fantastic. And then I started to sort of see the animations. When does it launch? It launches this month. Oh, it does? Yeah. Okay. And that's on the Daily Wire. Yes, that'll be on Daily Wire. Okay, let's talk about the Pendragon cycle. Yes. That's a huge enterprise for Daily Wire. They poured a tremendous amount of resources into it. It's the biggest swing we've ever taken.

Yeah, yeah. That Jeremy has ever taken. So walk through it. I talked to Jeremy a bit about it on my podcast, but let's hear it from your perspective. So the Pendragon Cycle, and I'm sure Jeremy told you this, it is his favorite book series. Yeah. From the beginning. I mean, he has wanted to create this TV show for 30 plus years. This is something he's thought about, dreamed about, has physically written scripts for. And it was finally the time when we had the resources. It was a cultural moment. He was able to step away from

to direct a majority of it. He was the showrunner. He produced it. He wrote a significant portion of it. This truly is his, I mean, I can't speak for him, but in speaking with him while we were there and seeing him work, this is probably the most important thing that he's ever done. And we went to Hungary. I was there for five months. He was there for

Seven months and I was the were you recording your podcast during that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, so we I was the only daily wire host that is in the show What role did you play? I play Merlin's wife so it is an authorium legacy tale of and and it follows the rise of Christianity through the lens of an Arthur like Not speaking right not legacy And so I play Merlin's wife

And she is... Is she a good wife? She's a very good wife. She's a good character. She is, yes. She's a very, very fun character to play. She has a really beautiful balance of being incredibly strong, but also being very feminine and very empathetic and very sympathetic to Merlin's very unique experiences.

And it was just a very, very fun character to play. And I saw a lot of myself in her. I got to do stunts that I've never done before. Sounds like a wild time. It was amazing. It was fantastic. It was very, very hard work. Yeah, I bet. How long did you do it for? Five months. Five months. Right. And how many hours were...

- Oh, gosh. - You know, for the final series. Any idea what's going to come out of it? - I have no idea yet. - Okay. And I know that they'll probably, like, they'll have a first edit and then they'll cut it down and that kind of stuff. - Have you seen any of the edits? - I haven't yet. Jeremy's protecting me. And when is it supposed to be, when is that supposed to launch? - I'm not sure yet. - Okay. Yeah. They're in full post-production now. I think that there is already a first round of edits that is finished. And now we have so much VFX that is going to go into this, so many VFX.

There's just a lot of post-production that has to be done. But the very cool thing is, even though we are using some VFX, we did 90% of everything that you will see on the screen practically. We physically did it all. There was a... The series starts with an incredible sequence with Spanish bull leapers. And they were physically jumping over these bulls. One of my best friends who played the lead in Pendragon, Rose Reed,

She was in the arena with these bulls. She trained for months to be able to look like one of these bull leapers. She was having to navigate around the bulls. I was on horseback with a spear, jumping over streams, you know, chasing a boar. We were physically fighting. If there was an explosion that you see on screen, we felt the fire. There's a scene where I'm, you know, running through, putting out a fire. I was basically covered in...

Fire protection, which is like a goop that you put on so that you can't be set on fire, running through fire as people were being fully set on fire. It was absolutely incredible. There was, I mean, they did not hold back. Good thing you said yes to the daily wearer. No kidding. And it's also, it's very special because it's very full circle because I get to go back and do

what I love more than anything, which is tell stories. But I get to do it with people who I love and trust, who are not exploiting me as a child actor, who share my values and are genuinely creating content for the betterment of other people. Right. Well, that's a good deal. It is. I would read scripts that would be sent in Hollywood and I would look at it. I would say, I don't want to watch this. Like, these are terrible characters. They're sharing terrible messages and

I don't even want to be a vessel through which this gets out to the public. Right, right. And I knew that at the end. And you didn't have that feeling with the Pendragon cycle at all? No, it's an incredible story. I haven't had that feeling with anything that I've done with Daily Wire. I think Mr. Burcham is incredible. I can stand behind that completely. The Pendragon cycle is a perfect mix of something that is meaningful in terms of its values and what it promotes and the values of the characters that you will fall in love with.

while also being something that is beautiful and that people objectively can enjoy. You're not going to sit down and say, oh, I'm watching a Christian TV show. You're going to enjoy it because it actually is very good. But you can know that the people who made it, the hours that were put in, I mean, Jeremy barely slept for seven months. But I've also never seen him happier because this was... His dream. Yeah, I gained...

massive respect for him watching this take place. And he did it masterfully. And so you can feel good watching that. And it's incredible being an actor in that environment and being a vessel because you really are a vessel. You go there, you stand...

And you mold yourself to the character. And you lose a lot of yourself in doing that if you hate the project and if you hate the character you're playing. But if you're able to love the character, if you're able to love the production and the story you're telling, it makes it so much more meaningful and you feel like you're actually part of something that can impact audiences, can impact the culture in a really important way. So let's talk about, let's close with Snow White and the Evil Queen. So you were picked to play Snow White? Yes. Yeah. Once upon

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So we announced it when we announced Bentkey, which is our children's division. Yeah.

And I think a lot of people assume that we had already filmed the movie when we released the trailer. It was very backwards. We did not do that. We were maybe a week into filming "Pen Dragon" and I get a text from Jeremy who just goes, "Where are you?" I'm like, "I'm at my apartment." And he says, "I need you to meet me at the Parisi. Can you be here in five minutes?" And that was maybe an eight minute walk. I was like, "Yes." If Jeremy asks anything, you say, "Yes, I'll be there." Sprinted out of the apartment. I get to the lobby of the Parisi, I sit down.

And he says, we want to do something that could be, it might be impossible. And this was at the time that every, it was during the SAG strike, but everything was going viral about Disney Snow White.

- Everything Disney. - Everything Disney. - Perversion of the social order and the demolition of the narrative. - Yep. - What? - The destruction of values. - Of the traditional narrative. - Yes. - Let's just rewrite this. - Be great every time. - Oh yeah, yeah, we'll improve it. - Yeah. - Yeah, these ancient stories. - With their not-so-secret gay agenda. - Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

And so that was in the middle of all of this happening, and I had obviously been following it. I had done episodes about it. No, the gay agenda is a mask. It's just a destructive agenda. It is. It's just a demolition agenda with, oh, we're pro-inclusion. That's the mask. That's the mask. That's so that if you attack it, you sound like a bigot.

Yeah, then you can't. It's their wall. No, we're just bringing in the marginalized. It's like, yeah, wait till you invite the real monsters out from underneath the rocks. You and you are bringing in the marginalized. We're starting to see that happen already. Oh, yeah. The maps. Oh, no, there's worse monsters than them, right? No, no, no. No matter how bad...

There's no limit to what people are capable of doing. As you see one extreme emerge, you can be absolutely 100 percent sure that that

new margin has a multiplicity of more extreme margins on its fringe. And there's no end to that. Well, the end is that everything collapses. That's how this has happened historically. So, okay, so Snow White, where are you with this project? We are in pre-production. You went to see Jeremy. Oh, yeah. So I went to see Jeremy and this was as everything with Snow White was happening and people were

very upset about the way that Disney was rolling out this project. The way that they were-- - Oh, they picked such a fun actress, too. - It was, and you know, you've now heard me speak for I don't know how many hours we've been talking, but about my love of literature and stories, and I grew up reading classic literature, I grew up reading the traditional stories, I grew up reading Grimm's.

And I love the stories underneath these fairy tales. And so as somebody who is more traditional and has a love and appreciation for stories, it's very, it's sad to watch these stories be completely destructed for that agenda. And so I had been watching this and commenting on it. And so Jeremy brings me in and says... Luckily, they fail. They do. Right, because they're dull and preachy and obvious and...

transgressive in the casual manner, not in the creative manner. Right. Yeah, Jeremy said we want to do the impossible and we want to do our own Snow White.

and we want to do it in line with the values with which it was written. We want to honor the story, and we want you to play Snow White. And Jeremy had been watching me work. No audition. No audition. Well, I think my audition had been the first month of Pendragon. I understand your audition. Yes.

But he hadn't even really seen me act before that. He had watched my TV shows and that kind of thing, but he really saw me during Pendragon. Uh-huh, right, right. And so this was about a month into Pendragon or so. And he said, I'm going to keep you updated. We're working on a script. And at that time, I think he had a very ambitious goal because that's when Snow White was still going to be released right around this time.

He was like, let's try to film it during Pendragon. And I was like, okay, well, we'll see how this goes. That did not happen. And I'm very glad that it didn't because I think we will do the story justice. Yes. With the right amount of time in the prep. And we got back from, no, actually I'm skipping over the story of how we created the trailer, but Jeremy started working on music and he had this idea for the trailer and

knew that we were going to be announcing the rollout of Benkei and the, you know, the hundred episodes of children's content that we had on the platform. He wanted Snow White and the Evil Queen to be the first feature film that we do on Benkei. And so I got a call probably at four o'clock in the afternoon and he said, I want you to fly to Trento, Italy tomorrow, because that's where we had been filming

Pendragon that week. We jumped back and forth between Italy and Hungary. I want you to get on a plane and you're going to fly out and we have a costume that's being worked on for you. They're going to finish it in the next six hours on the plane with you. And you're going to fly out to Trento, drive, you're flying to Milan, drive four hours up to Trentino, wake up the next morning, you're going to come up onto a mountain, another hour of drive, and then stand in this forest and sing. And Jeremy was sending me, gosh, I still have the recordings on my phone.

One day I'll leak them to the public. But it's Jeremy on his, on a piano app on his phone. And it's what you hear in the trailer. Oh, no.

And he's singing it. He has an amazing voice and he's an incredibly musician. And so he sent me the lyrics, he sent me the song and he said, can you have this ready by tomorrow? I said, sure. And this man, he, I've never had to sing this high before. And I'm a soprano, but I'm not that soprano. I texted him back and said, Jeremy, this is not gonna, you know, I sound like Tweety Bird. And so we went back and forth and he sent me one in the lower octave.

I said, "This is much better." And he was all nervous. He was going, "This sounds really low." Meanwhile, I'm thinking, "This is still really high." So I get up to Italy. We record it. We record it in the middle of shooting "Pen Dragon." So in the middle of a scene,

Some of my other Pendragon cast is six feet away. And at this point, they don't even know we're doing so much because it has not been announced to anyone. Jeremy said, do not tell your mom. Do not tell Alex. Do not tell anybody. We have like three people who know that this is happening. Nobody can know. So I'm sitting here in this princess dress thinking this is really not the wardrobe that everybody else is wearing. They're going to know. I'm like huddled up, literally hidden.

The rest of the cast is over doing something else. Jeremy says, hey, we're going to film a little commercial for a daily wire thing that we have to do. Gets the crew to turn around, points the cameras on me, and we film this teaser. And then I fly back to Budapest and I keep going on comment section and keep going on Pendragon. And then I wait to hear what we're going to do with it. And then it launches with Benkei.

With a Benkei rollout, it's a huge success. And then I keep, I just sit and I wait. I'm like, all right, Jeremy, when are we going to film this? Got back to Nashville. We wrapped Pendragon. It was a raging success. I truly think people are going to love the series. And then we've now rolled into pre-production for Snow White and the Evil Queen. So I'm in voice lessons, you know, three to four times a week. I was classically trained as a singer when I was young, but I moved more into singing.

pop when I was older and have not sung seriously in many years. And so I'm retraining that muscle. I'm in dance classes every week. It's a musical. We're super excited about it. And that's what I can tell you. And there's a lot of people that I see comments every single day and they're like, what can you tell us about X, Y, and Z? It's all coming soon. We'll be able to share more soon, but it is

an incredible adventure and it's just always a joy and an honor to collaborate with Jeremy specifically. I mean, he's incredibly creative. He takes incredible risks. I think I've learned even more about risk-taking by working for him and working with him. That was one thing that I felt

incredibly comfortable with and excited about when I came to Nashville and I came to Daily Wire was I could not have asked for better mentors than the people that I'm surrounded with. And again, I told you, I got this job when I was 19 and I walk into a room and I was, you know, with

Jeremy Boring and Dallas Sonia who was one of the you know greatest producers to come out of Hollywood in recent years has just an incredible story Michael Knowles Matt Walsh Ben, you know can I mean just you I mean just the fact that I remember meeting you when we were about to announce That you were joining daily wire and you were doing a photo shoot I was in my studio and I think you would ask and I meet the YouTube girl and I about just like fell out of my chair and

But I just could not have asked for a better group of people. And, you know, they encourage me. I grow every single day, not just in my career, but I learn from all of you, you know, emotionally and spiritually and in my personal life. And that's just an incredible, incredible gift. Typical Hollywood story.

All right. Well, look, that's a good place to stop this part of the discussion. I think what we'll do for everyone watching and listening, I think what we'll do on the Daily Wire side is talk about women. Sounds great. Yep. Because we haven't done that. And marriage, because you're newly married. And the...

Well, the conception of women in the modern world as it is and perhaps how it might be if it was tilted in, let's say, a more conservative direction and what attraction there might be in that and what obstacles there are in the way of communicating that to young women. So that's what we'll do for half an hour on the Daily Wire side. If you who are watching and listening want to continue to join us, that also enables you to throw some support the Daily Wire way, which...

Well, if you're happy with the state of the world, then there's not much point in doing that. But if you think that things are a little unstable and that some additional voices on the side of something approximating tradition and reason might be useful, well, you know, they're fighting a pretty good—they're putting up a pretty good scrap. And so—

And so also to all of you who are watching and listening, thank you very much for your time and attention. It's always much appreciated and hopefully never taken for granted. And to the film crew here in Scottsdale, Arizona, which is where I am today with Brett. And Brett, thank you very much for coming in today to do this. It's a pleasure to talk to you. You're a very entertaining character and congratulations on having enough daring to, uh,

To play the fool. Thank you. Yeah, no kidding. Well, seriously. Yeah. You know, it takes a lot of daring to throw yourself over the edge. It's true. Yeah, yeah. Happy to be here. Yep. All right, everyone.

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