HALLOWEEN SPECIAL: The Haunting of Hill House

TRANSCRIPT: Episode 65: The Haunting of Hill House, or, problems that could be solved by simply talking? (with Braaains Podcast)

October 31

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Music Break 0:32

Intro starts

Stephanie Fornasier 0:32

You do have to hold space for someone else's trauma and you do have to protect yourself from that without ending up being not empathetic.

Sarah Taylor 0:40

You have to you have to put your gloves on.

Stephanie Fornasier 0:42

You have to put your gloves on Yeah.

Welcome to Psychocinematic a podcast where we analyze depictions of mental illness and disability in popular films and TV. I'm your host Stephanie Fornasier. If you love our podcast and want to give us some support, make sure you're following Psychocinematic podcast on Instagram, Tik Tok and Twitter. And check out our website Psychocinematic podcast.com. For access to special bonus content episodes early access stickers and contribute to our regular fundraisers, join our Patreon. Starting from $3.50 a month you can be the coolest Psychocinematic listener there is.

Music Break 1:22

outro finishes

Stephanie Fornasier 1:23

Please note that this episode contains discussions of suicide and self harm. If this episode brings up anything for you. Lifeline is available on 1311 114 or the suicide callback service on 1 300 6 59 467 But feel free to skip this one if you prefer. So I'd like to start the podcast recording today by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land which I'm on today, which is theWurundjeri people of the Kulin nation and pay respects to elder's past, present and emerging. 

And just a little Australia based note: even though our the majority of our nation voted No for some recognition in the constitution for First Nation peoples, myself and other allies are still very much on the side of First Nations people and acknowledge them as deserving of a voice. So just want to throw that in there. Because last podcast episode, I said let's all vote Yes. But anyway, the all that aside, I'd love to introduce the co hosts we have today from the Braaains podcast, which is Sarah and Heather Taylor, thank you so much for joining me today. How are you both

Heather Taylor 2:31

Oh, great. Thank you for having us. Yes.

Sarah Taylor 2:33

Thank you for having us. I want to just shout out that I'm joining in from Treaty six territory, the home of the Nehiyaw, Cree Dene, Saulteaux and on and on. Anyway, I just want to acknowledge that.

Stephanie Fornasier 2:33

Thank you so much. Would you ladies like to introduce yourself to our podcast listeners? Heather, would you like to start?

Heather Taylor 2:51

Of course, I'd always love to start. *all laugh* I want to say there is again, just like Sarah, there is where I am in Manhattan. So I had to look this up because I normally am in Toronto, but in Manhatten. And so, the ancestral homelands of the Canarsie, Lenape, and the Wappinger people. So just because I'm in New York City right now.

Stephanie Fornasier 3:16

Fabulous.

Heather Taylor 3:16

I am Heather Taylor. I am a writer and a director. I write TV and films and podcasts about complicated family relationships, often through genre lens, which is why I'm so excited about today. I was a story editor on the Hardy Boys. I obviously co host Braaains with my amazing sister Sarah. And it's a podcast about how film and TV portray our brains. And so it's feels like a very much a sister podcast to this podcast, which I'm so excited about. And my second feature is on lives on Netflix. It's called lethal love. I think it's actually in Australia.

Stephanie Fornasier 3:49

Yay oh good we can watch it

Heather Taylor 3:51

Yeah, it's fun. As I was told by the producer, good with a glass of wine, and then I started up but I started out with playwright. I've authored three poetry collections, and I'm a former journalist and ad person, and I was born with a non visible disability, I have ADHD, and I strive to destigmatize mental illness, disabilities and poverty in my work.

Stephanie Fornasier 4:10

Wonderful. Thank you so much. And just like you say, I feel like Braaains and Psychocinematic are two peas in a podcast. So great to have you on. Sarah, would you like to introduce yourself as well?

Sarah Taylor 4:23

Yes, of course. So I am the sister of Heather. As she mentioned, I can officially say I'm Sarah Taylor CCE. I just got my accreditation for editing. So it's very exciting. I am an award winning editor with over 20 years of experience in documentaries, television programs, like all the things you can think of I've cut but I always strive to tell unique stories from unheard voices, which is also what we do with our podcast. So I both host co hosts the podcast brains with Heather and I also post an editing podcast called The editors cut. So all I like to do is talk about brains. I talked about editing and I edit. That is my life. And I'm very pleased to do all I

Stephanie Fornasier 5:00

must be an extremely busy life. Because as someone who's only fully edited Psychocinematic In the last few months, it's a lot of work.

Sarah Taylor 5:08

Yeah

Heather Taylor 5:09

definitely take time. Tell everyone what CCE means. Because yes, no, that is

Stephanie Fornasier 5:13

Yes, please.

Sarah Taylor 5:13

So CC stands for Canadian cinema editors. It's a organization that promotes and supports editing in Canada. So if you look at Ed credits, and you see anybody that has an AC E, there's also an Australian version of it, which also might be AC E. I'm not sure what the letters are in there, but they have definitely have have one. It just tells you that you are an awesome as an editor, highest editor of in the country kind of thing, which feels the same. You could be, but I just got my letters, and it's very exciting. And this is the first time I get to say it out loud. So yay,

Stephanie Fornasier 5:43

congratulations. That's awesome. I want to know, which is the oldest sister?

Heather Taylor 5:47

I'm an older sister Heather. Yeah, I'm the oldest.

Stephanie Fornasier 5:50

I feel like that's relevant to what we talk about.

Heather Taylor 5:54

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 5:58

So when I suggested you guys come on the podcast, we were talking about what we should cover. And you pretty much immediately suggested this piece of media, which is Haunting of Hill House. And I was so stoked, what made you both decide pretty much unanimously to choose this to focus on today?

Sarah Taylor 6:17

I just thought it was a brilliant series, and it scared the bejesus out of me. And I liked how there was more than just like the jumpscares there's more to the story than just being scared. So when we were talking about like, spooky shows to do around Halloween, it just made sense to talk about this.

Heather Taylor 6:32

For me, I'm a huge fan of Mike Flanagan's work, it's kind of the not only the type of horror that I both enjoy, and actually scares me I find like I could watch a slasher film and feel essentially nothing. But if you want emotional depth to characters like he does, and this kind of emotional connection I found sometimes in let's say, hunting of Hill House, I was more scared and upset by some of the emotional moments than I was in some of the scares from the ghosts. But I think it's because he really creates a world not just where you have to beat the bad guy, but you actually have to grapple with whatever metaphor that he's put forward. 

So like haunted houses, ghosts, but yeah, it's really about something internal within the characters. And so I love and how he plays with past and present, he does it in everything. Because this belief that he says this himself, this idea of giving weight to their past trauma on their current selves, because our past does affect our future or present. And I found a quote from him and he said, I really wanted to play with ghosts as an expression of the emotional wounds that we carry, how the past and present can echo each other that moments don't fall like dominoes. They fall like confetti.

Stephanie Fornasier 7:41

I love that. Yeah. For me, I absolutely love his series. But it took me a while to recognize how good they were, because they're so brilliantly made, and so incredible, but they also make me feel awful. Because He does it so well. So like the first time I watched this, I thought it took itself a bit too seriously. And the acting was a little bit over the top and I wasn't as invested in it. But on the second watch of Haunting of Hill House, I was just like this is like the best show ever made. Especially because it was like you're saying it's so much of like a meditation on grief and trauma and how the past and present in intermingle and how you have to grapple with your own demons. 

But also, it's so campy at the same time. It does it in a way that is a little bit ridiculous, which makes it a good setting to explore those things in a way where it makes you feel terrible. But also you can exit out of it a little bit in like this. This isn't reality the like midnight mass. I think I love Midnight Mass the most because it just really affected me the most and like gave me a panic attack at one point. But Haunting of Hill House was close. Yeah, I'm glad that you brought it up, because there's a lot of grief in it. And what's going on in my family at the moment involves a lot of grief. So it's actually really relevant. But yeah, there's so much to explore. There's so much to unpack in the show. So I feel like it's going to be a very rich discussion.

Heather Taylor 9:01

Yeah. And I will say I'll just start at midnight mass was his most personal work. So he said like he's been trying to write midnight mass for years. And it took him becoming sober, to be able to actually write about something that talks about alcoholism. He's like, I could talk about alcoholism, but I couldn't talk about sobriety. And now once being sober, it allowed me to be able to actually talk about this. So he's like, if I if someone asked me to write this in 2014, I wouldn't have been able to write it and do and I had to wait until I had been sober. 

But he actually references Midnight Mass in other films before midnight mass was even made. He has as a novel in Gerald's Game, the Stephen King as Stephen King. Yeah, Midnight Mass. The novel is in that film. Oh, wow. So like he been obsessed with this idea of this since he was he started thinking about this since he was 10 years old and ultra boy when he lived on Governors Island, which is really isolated, small community. So

Stephanie Fornasier 9:54

wow, that's so interesting.

Sarah Taylor 9:56

I want to watch it again. Now that I haven't now that I don't drink because I feel Like I watched Midnight Mass when I was drinking, and I think it would be a different perspective. Yeah. Anyway, that's that's a side note.

Heather Taylor 10:07

That's a different show. But I know like, I know, but like, there's the character that kills someone. Well, yeah, when he's drunk, but that is was his biggest fear. Yeah. And so he put that into play, which is I think a lot of times, I know, I put my biggest fears into stuff. Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 10:22

yeah. Yeah, for sure. And I feel like for me, Midnight Mass was very much about the afterlife and death and, and continuing on, which is one of my thinking about that is one of my biggest anxiety triggers. So exploring that, I'm sure that he's probably got a lot of his own fears wrapped up in that as well. And he was very relatable in that way. But on Haunted Hill House.... *laughter*

I guess the other thing is, he tends to adapt a lot from like famous authors. So Haunting of Hill House was based on the book by Shirley Jackson, which was known as one of the most terrifying ghost stories ever written. And he also did Haunting of Bly Manor, which is based on Turn of the Screw Yes. by Henry James. Yes, it's no James. Yes. And then the latest one, the house of Russia is also based on an Edgar Allan Poe poem. I'm guessing. I haven't read it.

Heather Taylor 11:11

It's a book. Yeah, he's just very poetic. Even we've only just started watching because I wanted to watch Hillhouse versus the Fall of the House of Usher

Stephanie Fornasier 11:19

Same, I haven't started it yet. Because I thought I'd get confused

Heather Taylor 11:22

yeah, he's, in the pilot, you have actually so much of so much of Poe's original language. So I was like, Oh, my goodness, like, it's so cool to hear those words, but in a kind of very contemporary context. So I thought, yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 11:34

yeah. Yeah. So he's very much like adapt things to a point where it's more relatable to right now, but also is much more than the novel. Have you read The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson the book?

Heather Taylor 11:46

No, I haven't actually,

Stephanie Fornasier 11:47

I started listening to the audiobook, but I didn't get through it.

Sarah Taylor 11:50

Good idea ooh

Stephanie Fornasier 11:53

But it seems quite different. There's only really a few of the characters that are present in the TV show, Eleanor, Theodore and Luke, the characters who are in the house, but they aren't related at all. And the Dudley's also there, but other than that, a lot of like, the themes are the same, but the actual plot is quite different. It seems.

Heather Taylor 12:13

Oh, interesting. Well, that's the thing is that he's using this as a jumping off point, right? Yeah, like thematically. But then also, like, great on him for finding IP,

Sarah Taylor 12:23

yeah no kidding

Heather Taylor 12:24

that is, like open, I think it's all public domain. So he's like, I'm gonna take this public domain and talk about stuff I want to talk about, but interconnected with something that is known and then make it even more now. So I'm like, good on you, Mike Flanagan.

Stephanie Fornasier 12:36

good way to do it

Sarah Taylor 12:38

so smart

Stephanie Fornasier 12:46

I'll just briefly discuss the plot, and I'll just make it very open ended because otherwise we'll be here for hours. So in the summer of 1992, Hugh and Olivia Crain and their five children Stephen Shelley, Theo or Theodora, Luke, and Elenor, or Nell, are now moving to Hill House to renovate the mansion in order to sell it and build their own forever home designed by Olivia. However, due to unexpected repairs, they have to stay longer, and they begin to experience increasing paranormal phenomena, resulting in a tragic loss and the family fleeing from the house. 26 years later, the crane siblings and their estranged father reunite after another tragedy strikes, and they are forced to confront how their time in Hill House has affected each of them. 

If you haven't watched Haunting of Hill House, definitely watch it before you listen to this episode. But there's gonna be lots of spoilers, but there's lots to unpack. And I guess one thing that I think it was a review said it's not so much a paranormal story as much as a meditation on the distinct way grief and trauma main the living, as we've sort of alluded to, I looked up some lived experience of the creators, and you both sort of had a lot to say about Mike Flanagan, do you want to share? Do you want to share a little bit more about what you found out?

Heather Taylor 13:59

Yeah, I think that from what I looked at, growing up, his family relocated a lot because his dad was in the Coast Guard. So they basically moved around all over the place until he was in high school. So to me like plenty of Hell House this family who moves from place to place renovating houses like flipping houses, I'm like, That's so reflective of not really having a home and your family being the only tether is like with each other and the importance that comes with that movement. And then also, like I was reading like an you can see in his stuff. His core themes are domestic abuse, alcoholism, addiction, and then battling mental illness, or dealing with mental illness. I don't like to say battling. Yeah, but that's language from someone else. 

He said directly, The Haunting of Hill House is infused with his experiences with death in his extended family and include specific imagery from his life. And you'll see there's a very natural thing that happens where if you're writing anything that tip toes into a personal place, you find yourself vomiting all sorts of things into it. It happened to me with Hill House in a pretty big way. So I couldn't find you, just most of his work is inspired by his experiences of his life. But I couldn't find him ever talking directly about these things. But with its prevalence and so much of his work, I feel like most of this is deeply personal.

Stephanie Fornasier 15:18

Yeah, I think we could probably determine what's what some of the traumas that he's experienced in his life. And it's interesting, you mentioned domestic abuse, because I feel like in a lot of his media, there's a lot of like coercive control, or query, is this actually a good marriage? Or are there some sort of dynamics that are toxic and things like that inside them? And not just marriage, but also in relationships in general? Um, Sarah, did you have anything to add?

Sarah Taylor 15:45

Just like I listen, I watched a few things where he talked about being like a showrunner and how he like directs things and the use of camera and like, I just found it interesting how there's a mean, I feel like he has a meaning to everything he puts out there. Like it's, there's a purpose for all the things he chooses to do. And I found

Stephanie Fornasier 16:02

very deliberate.

Sarah Taylor 16:03

It's very, he's very deliberate in his way of filmmaking. And I thought, the music like all the choices he makes, and I and it works really well, especially the camera.

Heather Taylor 16:13

He's an editor, you know this Sarah, right?

Sarah Taylor 16:14

I didn't know that. No

Heather Taylor 16:16

he's an editor first. He actually

Sarah Taylor 16:18

See that it makes total sense. Okay. Now I know why

Heather Taylor 16:22

He films by the edit. So he actually edited reality TV, including drag second season of drag race.

Stephanie Fornasier 16:27

Oh, my God really

Sarah Taylor 16:29

I should know this. I should interview him for my other podcast.

Stephanie Fornasier 16:31

Wow. And second season of drag race is were like, like the first seasons kind of a write off. So.. in terms of editing

Sarah Taylor 16:36

when the things... that makes total sense,

Heather Taylor 16:39

yeah he thinks about the edit first

Sarah Taylor 16:40

and how he uses the camera in a way that really motivates the edit. Because a lot often I found like, I was really impressed with watching the series. I'm taking it on an editing side note now, because there wasn't often like there's one scene where there's no real at like visual edits. It's all like one, quote unquote, take. It's not but it is. And so like, it's just so well done on that side of things. And that storytelling is amazing.

Heather Taylor 17:05

Yeah, a lot of it was I talked to a camera guy who actually operated on it, but they hand off camera to people.

Sarah Taylor 17:11

Yeah. I think there was a there was a few cuts. I don't know if I read that few. There's a few secret like you hide the cuts in action. But yeah,

Heather Taylor 17:18

yeah. But there was like them going from the funeral home into the house was actually in studio. So it actually was that, they walked through into the house. And it was and it was actual.

Stephanie Fornasier 17:18

that was one of the best episodes

Sarah Taylor 17:18

I watched the behind the scenes. So cool.

Heather Taylor 17:19

And they had like a, they had a dolly, not a dolly a lift, where they the cameras stepped on, like the camera operator stepped onto the lift, and then it lowered. So it looks like the cameras on a giant crane. But it was on a like a lift they built in and then lowered it to ground and they kept walking.

Sarah Taylor 17:45

And they would I think there was a behind the scenes somewhere that you can see how the operators worked anyway, it was so many really great filmmaking techniques that he displays.

Stephanie Fornasier 17:54

yes, if you do find the behind the scenes, send it to me, so I can pop it in the Episode Notes, because that would be great to see. And it really shows that because I feel like editors don't get as much recognition as like the directors and writers, etc. It just highlights how important editing is to telling the story and how it can be used in such an effective way.

Sarah Taylor 18:14

Especially this genre. Yes.

Stephanie Fornasier 18:16

It's all about the edit.

Sarah Taylor 18:17

Yes

Stephanie Fornasier 18:17

Yeah. Oh, thank you. That's so interesting. I did a little bit of a deep dive into Shirley Jackson, because I find her really fascinating. And I don't know if you've seen the film, Shirley, starring Elizabeth Moss, who plays Shirley Jackson. It's sort of a fictionalized version movie about sort of her later life and where she's, which is true when she was a bit old. I think sort of in her 60s, she had some pretty severe agoraphobia and anxiety and sort of self medicated with alcohol and drugs. And at the time, she wasn't able to write, she had writer's block. And she also had quite a philandering husband, who would just very openly have affairs with students at the University where he taught. 

So yeah, she had a pretty rough time. And there's this movie, which is kind of about that time. It's not a particularly great movie. I was a bit disappointed by it when I finally watched it, but Elisabeth Moss does an amazing job. So you know, if people want to watch it, go ahead. But yeah, it was interesting hearing Shirley Jackson's sort of experience of mental illness herself, which I think, having not read the full original book, but there's definitely some themes of mental illness within that as well. And she explains that she had a very conservative family and parents who weren't particularly nice to her mom really was undermining and demeaning and quite abusive towards her. 

And she was, she described herself as an outsider, she she felt really lonely growing up, she would write about how the only sane people are the ones who are condemned as mad as in her words, and how the whole world is cruel and afraid of people who are different.

Sarah Taylor 19:57

yes

Stephanie Fornasier 19:58

So I think that really shows mine's through in what I know of her novels. The only other piece of work that I've read is the lottery.

Heather Taylor 20:07

Yeah, I read that at school

Stephanie Fornasier 20:08

pretty iconic. Yeah, it was. It's often prescribed just to students to read. I think we just read it during lockdown only had a short, short story book club to get us through.

Heather Taylor 20:18

ooh nice

Sarah Taylor 20:19

that's a good idea

Stephanie Fornasier 20:19

Yeah, it was good. Everyone should read the lottery. It's it's very relevant today. I think I won't spoil it. But I think she's, you know, she's pretty much held up as a very interesting author with a lot to say about society a lot to say about mental illness and about being a woman as well. And being a wife, which is something that she sort of found herself being and not really particularly having a lot of control over that role. This quote was interesting, she said, I wrote of neuroses and fear. And I think all of my books laid end to end would be one long documentation of anxiety.

Sarah Taylor 20:54

I can agree with, well, maybe not all of heer... But with this show, yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 21:01

100% Apparently, she died quite mentally, quite well. She died off in her sleep, of a heart attack. And she was in a pretty good place. And she was in the middle of writing her last novel. So it's, I'm comforted to know that she was not struggling with a lot of mental neuroses that she had but yeah, I just find it really interesting, just based on the content that she wrote about.

Heather Taylor 21:24

Yeah. And that they become so much a part of our world as well. Right.

Stephanie Fornasier 21:29

Yeah. Especially given like this novel Haunting of Hill House was made into a film

Sarah Taylor 21:35

twice.

Stephanie Fornasier 21:36

A couple of films.

Heather Taylor 21:37

Yeah. Twice.

Stephanie Fornasier 21:38

Yeah. Twice. The Haunting in The Haunting of Hill House. Yeah. Like you say her her work is quite timeless.

Sarah Taylor 21:44

Yeah, totally.

Stephanie Fornasier 21:45

So the actors I had a look through at all the different actors and any sort of lived experience that they had. Did you guys manage to have a have a look as well

Heather Taylor 21:55

I looked at your list. I was like, whoa.

Sarah Taylor 21:59

yeah

Heather Taylor 21:59

A lot of stuff going on with them, too. I mean,

Stephanie Fornasier 22:02

yeah, I'll just maybe mention the ones that were there was some information because not everyone, and some of them are quite new actors, although they're all most of them appear in all of Mike Flanagan's works, which is great.

Heather Taylor 22:16

It's really fun.

Sarah Taylor 22:17

It's really good. I even noticed in the new series The mom, right? is it?

Stephanie Fornasier 22:21

Yeah.

Heather Taylor 22:21

Oh, yeah. Tons of them are tons of the characters.

Sarah Taylor 22:23

I love I love that part. Anyway, yes. Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 22:26

I love an ensemble.

Heather Taylor 22:27

I want to say when you see the same crew and the same actors working with a director, you know, they're good, like not like this, not just that they're good at their job. They are good people to work with.

Sarah Taylor 22:37

good humans yeah

Heather Taylor 22:38

yeah, good humans, so

Stephanie Fornasier 22:39

they want to keep working with each other. Yeah, yeah.

Sarah Taylor 22:42

Especially when the crew sticks around. That's like a really good sign.

Heather Taylor 22:45

I think as a just a side note, I love the Newton brothers just a shout out to the composers of all of Mike Flanagan's work, and a few other things too, but I follow them on Twitter. I listened to their stuff whenever I'm writing I like ever every time like chatting, I'm like, right? Listen to your stuff today. And they're like way to go. And I'm like, in love with them. I'm like, I want them to write to be the musicians composers for my horror feature that I want to do soon. So I'm like, if you're listening, Newton brothers just know I'm coming for you.

Sarah Taylor 23:19

Your love listening to them while you're writing your spooky show your scary shows? I think that's cool

Heather Taylor 23:23

Yeah literally Yeah.

Sarah Taylor 23:24

I love that

Heather Taylor 23:25

and not just spooky shows, too.

Sarah Taylor 23:26

oh ok

Heather Taylor 23:26

I was listening to the House of Usher while I was writing a like family drama set in the music industry *laughs*

Stephanie Fornasier 23:33

which has its own horror elements.

Sarah Taylor 23:35

Exctly I think your themes, your themes play through everything. There. There's always something a little scary.

Stephanie Fornasier 23:42

Brilliant. Yeah. But unfortunately I didn't kind of look up the crew because, yeah,

Heather Taylor 23:47

I don't know what they're lived experience is we just love them

Stephanie Fornasier 23:48

exactly I'm sure they don't get interviewed as often as these guys, but just a few things. Carla Gugino as Olivia Crain, the matriarch has had some early trauma in her life. She had a kidney surgery at five years old and led to a near death experience. So yeah, that's all I could find. But I'm sure that has definitely shaped some of her work and she's quite established in. She was in Spy Kids. I just realized that the other day, I'm like oh!

Yeah, She's the mom

Spy kids!

Sarah Taylor 23:57

She's the mom, yeah

Stephanie Fornasier 23:58

Which is funny because she's not actually as old as I thought she was. She just kind of plays that really maternal. Just has that maternal sort of look about her. Timothy Hutton who plays who the older Hugh, sadly, not great news, but there was a sexual assault accusation which he was faced no charge from.

Sarah Taylor 24:37

mmm.

Stephanie Fornasier 24:38

But you know, that doesn't sound great. Anyway, that's that's not relevant to what we're talking about. But I just thought it was worth mentioning.

Sarah Taylor 24:44

yep

Stephanie Fornasier 24:45

Henry Thomas was the younger Hugh Crain and he was the young boy in et which is wild to me. So fantastic actor, but obviously given that he was exposed to fame quite early on, that was a a lot for him and he was very conscious of not wanting to be you know, the child actor that goes off the rails. He has had some alcohol issues in his past, was arrested for drunk driving and also is a quite avid mental health advocate. Yeah, he was lucky in that he wasn't one of the you know, like Corey Haim, on in the news everywhere as being really struggling with fame as he grew up

Sarah Taylor 25:22

I feel like he he went away like he took himself out of Hollywood. And this was this like one of the first things where he was back

Stephanie Fornasier 25:30

I think so yeah

Sarah Taylor 25:30

Cos I remember that being a thing. We're like, oh my god, it's Elliott from ET This is so cool.

Heather Taylor 25:35

And then he proceeded to be in the haunting of Bly Manor. And then now he's in the new one

Stephanie Fornasier 25:40

He's in the House of Usher. Yeah

Sarah Taylor 25:41

every character is completely different. And it's amazing to see him in this new one I was like, holy, like, he is just so talented.

Stephanie Fornasier 25:50

Yeah, which is so great that he's able to now just choose all these roles that have fantastic roles and not be sort of typecast. And he hasn't he looks different enough from being a kid that people aren't gonna be like, Oh, it's just Elliott.

Sarah Taylor 26:03

Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 26:04

it kind of reminds me of the trajectory of, he is short round in Indiana Jones

Sarah Taylor 26:08

Oh yeah, Ke.

Stephanie Fornasier 26:09

Yeah Ke

Sarah Taylor 26:10

Can't remember his last name, but yeah. Oh, Key Yeah. And now he's in Loki.

Stephanie Fornasier 26:13

Ke Huy

Sarah Taylor 26:13

Yes.

Stephanie Fornasier 26:14

Yeah. And thanks to everything everywhere all at once. He's just like, now one of the most established actors after having such a huge break. And it's worked quite well for him

Heather Taylor 26:24

Ke moved, He moved behind the scenes actually, he was

Stephanie Fornasier 26:26

Ke Huy Quan I think

Sarah Taylor 26:27

Yeah, I think that's right. And he was doing, like stunts and stuff.

Heather Taylor 26:30

Fight choreography

Sarah Taylor 26:31

Yeah. fight choreography. That's right. Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 26:32

exactly. So I think that's really interesting. And it also shows his range as well, the fact that all these actors play such different roles in the same series, so that, you know, he's a fantastic actor. And also, it sounds like he had some family trauma as well. They weren't particularly positive about his foray into acting and try to stop him.

mmm

Oliver Jackson Cohen, who plays Luke Crain has a lot to say about mental illness. Because he was in a quite a few films that I've seen, including the Invisible Man,

Heather Taylor 27:03

oh, yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 27:04

Which is a great film. And he's talked about, he's had a lot of articles where he's talked about how toxic masculinity is so awful. And he really wants to play the roles of someone who perpetuates that to show how damaging it can be. Whereas a lot of people tend to avoid those roles, because they don't want it to be seen in that light. But he's very, very much anti domestic abuse, etc. And describes himself as quite sensitive as well, which is very similar to his character. But he also mentioned that he was diagnosed with PTSD a few years ago, and he's had some childhood trauma in his past, which he brought into the role of Luke. So he said that it felt really cathartic to be able to put it all out there and be there and use all this stuff in his past To play that role. So that's pretty fantastic. I thought he was excellent in it.

Heather Taylor 27:52

Mmmm i did too

Stephanie Fornasier 27:53

It felt very authentic. Theo, who's my favorite character, I think. the adult version is played by Kate Siegel, who is married to Mike Flanagan, and has a four year old? Well, that's the last article I read, which is maybe last year and she I think, if you're married to the auter that is Mike Flanagan, how could you not have some you know, influence and also feelings and authenticity in the roles

Heather Taylor 28:17

the only got married in 2016. So it's more, they have a more recent relationship, but that's kind of when they started working together.

Sarah Taylor 28:24

Yeah, I was gonna, when did this come out? 2019?

Stephanie Fornasier 28:26

2018 I think? Yeah

Heather Taylor 28:27

yeah. So in 2016, she was in a feature film that he made

Stephanie Fornasier 28:30

It must be interesting, being married to be such a creative person

Heather Taylor 28:34

And being able to like put some of yourself or some of the things that you know, you want to talk about in there too, I'm sure

Sarah Taylor 28:40

Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 28:40

yeah. And just a side note, the young version of Theo, McKenna Grace has scoliosis, because I also have scoliosis. Scoliosis is a very common but that she is someone who came up with someone who has you know, gone through the treatment for scoliosis and yeah, that's it's hard stuff.

Heather Taylor 28:57

Wow yeah

Stephanie Fornasier 28:57

So I just thought that was interesting.

Sarah Taylor 28:58

She also in the new Ghostbusters

Yep, that's right.

Stephanie Fornasier 29:03

Is She

Sarah Taylor 29:03

Yep, Ghostbusters afterlife. That's the name as I'm wearing my Ghostbusters shirt

Stephanie Fornasier 29:07

Oh cool

Sarah Taylor 29:07

she is so good and so different. Her character is so different.

Stephanie Fornasier 29:10

Yeah, she even looks completely different from from what she does in other films. She's such a very versatile young actress. That's amazing. Lastly, Victoria Pedretti plays Eleanor or Nell and she as is very open about the fact she was diagnosed with ADHD although at the time it was ADD when she was six years old.

Heather Taylor 29:29

mm hmm

Stephanie Fornasier 29:31

She did mention as well she's had an abusive childhood, but didn't go into details and that's completely reasonable. But also felt some she's she's sort of discussed in an interview how she felt about the AD D diagnosis and didn't feel like the labels suited her and didn't enjoy having that label. So yeah, and of course, you know, she was diagnosed quite early on in her life so there was a lot less understanding and yeah, acceptance of that diagnosis at the time I'm sure

Heather Taylor 29:59

I think things are continuing to shift so like anything like it's just like an ever evolving, other people learning how to understand and then allowing yourself to be able to be like, Yes, this is me. And that's okay.

Sarah Taylor 30:12

Exactly. I was just gonna add, so I didn't rewatch the whole series because it was too scary for me to watch at all once again. But when I started watching it, I was like, Oh my gosh, Nell is from the series You and she's

Stephanie Fornasier 30:25

Yeah

Sarah Taylor 30:25

her character in You, is very bad. Like, good bad. She's like, I was like, ohh! so like, there's like, what rewatching it with the character Love from You. And then now, because she seems so like, gentle, and she's helping everybody lift you up. And this lovely person and then she's like, a murderer, i'm like woah! Itwas like in that world of this haunted house, and she's been a ghost. And then she also has this other cha.. anyway, it was really kind of fun to watch it, knowing the other character.

Stephanie Fornasier 30:55

And another example of someone who's just so versatile, shecan play someone who's so manipulative and awful, and someone who's just so going through it and having just trying to be the best person you can be and just struggles.

Sarah Taylor 31:07

exactly

Heather Taylor 31:07

Yeah

Stephanie Fornasier 31:08

it's interesting. As I've just lately, I've noticed a lot of actors come out and say that they've got ADHD. And I feel like, I don't know what you guys might think of this. But I wonder if the film industry attracts a lot of neurodivergent people because of the nature of it, and the busyness and the stimulation? And yeah,

Heather Taylor 31:26

Well, no 100%. It's also like the changeability. You get to move from thing to thing, there's no, you have a different I mean, it's not necessarily the best for you. But when you are working, you have a very strict defined schedule, which is perfect for the ADHD brain, like when I'm in a writers room is actually the time that I'm working the best because I have hours, specific hours. And when I'm on script, I know when specifically when things are due. And I have to like advocate for myself when I'm not in that, because a lot of times working with producers on projects, you're like, Okay, when's the deadline? Like when does it feel right? And like, Oh, honey, don't do that to me.

Sarah Taylor 31:58

Tell me now!

Heather Taylor 31:58

I'be actually said, I will work on this day and night and not sleep. So you need to tell me what's reasonable. They're like, Oh, yeah, three weeks, I'm like, great. Three weeks, it is like, that's fine.

Sarah Taylor 32:08

But I feel like whether you take that structure that you have from a writer's room, and you put it into your day to day when you're not in a writers room, which is what I see you do, which I think is really good.. that maybe not all writers would do that?

Heather Taylor 32:20

Well, it's a little deceiving, because in a way I do like I work every day. But I don't necessarily give myself the breaks that I need.

Sarah Taylor 32:28

Yeah

Heather Taylor 32:28

I allow myself sometimes I hyper focus and work for a 10 hour day, like I had a delivery on the 13th. And I worked until midnight. And I started that day at 9am. And

Sarah Taylor 32:38

So there's nobody telling you to stop because you're not in the writers room.

Heather Taylor 32:41

Yeah.

Sarah Taylor 32:42

Ok

Heather Taylor 32:42

So I'm trying to give myself more like, Okay, I'm going to, I will finish at this time, and I will go make dinner. And I'll do this and go for a walk. But I because I do move from thing to thing, or even place to place. I live in different countries. I need transition periods. I don't give myself sometimes a day off between big projects. Like I'm trying to learn how to do that more. Whereas I know other people, which is difficult, like I was talking to someone the other day they're like, how are you so prolific? and I said, ADHD. I was kind of being cheeky, and they're like, but how like, My child has ADHD, and I can't get them do their homework. I'm like, because it's not interesting. 

I love writing. And I love being in these worlds. And sometimes it's very hard. And I have to trick myself like I have to go to coffee shops, I have to print off something and take it somewhere I have to change the environment, change the medium, like I have to do different things. But it's like, it's something I love. And it's a puzzle. And I'll go back and like, how do I fix this puzzle? How do I make this one page less? Like it's, those a re games?

Stephanie Fornasier 33:39

It's a challenge.

Heather Taylor 33:39

I find it's a challenge. And my brain loves that. Whereas I know people who I've talked to who have ADHD probably inte...ADHD-I They're like, Oh,

Inattentive,

Inattentive, sorry, inattentive. *all laugh* That's the word. They're like, I can do it once. And then I'm, I can't do more like I can't. I have a, I have trouble and I'm like, Oh, but I hyperfocus like. But it damages my body and my bladder and my life and like my relationships. So *laughs*

Sarah Taylor 34:08

it's interesting. You say like the switching the medium and switching places is... I do that too with editing. I don't have ADHD. I wonder if that's part of just a creative thing to like some of that stuff like a creative process. That can be a lot of creatives have

Heather Taylor 34:21

Yeah, it depends on your process. Everyone has a different process. So Stephen King, he doesn't I don't know what Stephen King has, probably something. but

Stephanie Fornasier 34:29

There's definitely something

Sarah Taylor 34:30

there's something there.

Heather Taylor 34:30

I mean, look what he's writing, but he gets to his desk and he has a very defined like I write from this time to this time. Yeah, and that's my time. It's and it's hard like I will put off... I wrote this thing where I knew that act 3 of six at midpoint was going to be really emotionally difficult and I was gonna cry while I wrote it because it was people telling their truth in a very damaging way. And I'm like, I'm leaving that to last because is actually emotionally draining and difficult. And someone was talking to the writer was like, that's some of the most fun. I'm like, nothing is not fun. I'm just saying it's gonna hurt my heart. And I need to give it like its own space. And I won't be able to write anything else unless I give it space.

Sarah Taylor 35:11

And you saying that... I just talked with an editor who cut a really intense series, and there's one scene in it, she cut Dahmer. And it's the victim statement scene. She had to wait to the end because it was so important and so heavy. Anyway, yeah. So like, I just think creativity in general is just so cool. But that's not what we're here to talk about

Stephanie Fornasier 35:29

it's fascinating

Sarah Taylor 35:30

but I think it's fascinating. Yes,

Stephanie Fornasier 35:31

I think that's a really important point, because I feel like there's a lot of misunderstanding around ADHD and that if you can't concentrate on anything, then you have ADHD, or if you know, you're struggling in class, and like, I've been in that position where they're exploring ADHD diagnosis, but they're saying, Oh, but they really like art. But they can't concentrate in math. So if they can do it in, in art, then clearly they have the capability and they don't have ADHD, it's just behavior or whatever. It's like, no, that's not that's not the truth. It's if it's interesting and stimulating, then

Heather Taylor 36:04

yeah, that's exactly

Stephanie Fornasier 36:05

there's the capability. That doesn't mean they dont have ADHD.

Heather Taylor 36:08

I said to this guy, who's the dad, I said, we have a.. different drivers than other people. Like, I remember being at a job where they tried to like motivate with money. I'm not motivated by money in any way. So I'm like, awesome. I want more money. Like, why wouldn't I but

Stephanie Fornasier 36:24

but it's not gonna make you more productive?

Heather Taylor 36:25

No, I'm gonna do the same, but I'm like, it's like interest. And it's novelty, which is, I think, the creative space of jumping from project to project. Yeah. And, you know, I think sometimes especially as a writer, they try to pin you into like, you're only this writer and my agents great cuz he's like, write whatever you want. I'm thematically they're all very similar. But I can write across genres. Because then I'm like, because otherwise my brain would like implode, like, I wouldn't be able to function if I couldn't just do lots of different things, because it's where my brain wants to go. And so I allow it to do that. Because I'm like, No one, no one can no one can put don't put baby in the corner, right? Like it's, I'm, like have oppositional defiance. Like, please. Like, I'm going to you tell me, let's do it. I will. 100%. 

Sarah Taylor 37:12

Yeah, I don't know why I've never thought of this before with, like, obviously, Heather and I are sisters that we talk all the time. We have a podcast together. But her way of working is exactly the way I work and my world. And I'm always jumping between shows and genres and things. And I've never really connected that. Well. I just think it's really interesting that we both do that.

Heather Taylor 37:29

I'm going to throw out another like thing of we also come from the world of so we grew up very poor and grew up. Now we grew up with, you know, a very difficult situation. And I joke but not joke that I write like poverty is chasing me.

Sarah Taylor 37:45

Yeah. yeah

Heather Taylor 37:45

And I think that there is the reason why we're doing so many things is not just because this is a creative process. It's like, how do I do as many things as I can, so I don't drown?

Stephanie Fornasier 37:54

Yeah

Sarah Taylor 37:55

and then I'll be drowning in all the things that I have to do.

Heather Taylor 37:57

Well, of course, it's like not useful, but

Sarah Taylor 37:59

it's not useful yeah

Heather Taylor 38:00

carry our trauma with us from that. And we're like, we might I like I have a hard time. Like, my husband's like you have enough things going on. Like I'm gonna go do this pitch thing, why? you literally have no more time. And I was like, but, but I have to be prepared for what's next. And so lots people are like, you're amazing, you have all these things you're doing. And I'm like, it's a compulsion and a love, but it's also a huge, huge fear that drags me down and seeps out of my core when I'm in the, like, a place of, which is, I think very relative to the show that we're talking about, but like it seeps into me in a way that, like sometimes just seeps out of me that idea of like... 

I overshare, but I will overshare about everything like, I guess I'm eating ramen for the next like whatever months, I can't, you know, do this job, or I can't do partly, you know, it's like, no matter how much work you do, it's it's a long game. Yeah. But it's a fear driven economy. So I'm like, how do you not be full of fear when you come from a place where you literally at times didn't eat.

Sarah Taylor 38:55

Always been full of fear? Yeah.

Heather Taylor 38:57

So anyways...

Stephanie Fornasier 38:58

And I guess also, there's modeling as well, perhaps between sisters as well... *sarah laughs* I've completely forgotten already. Heather, we are you the older sister

Sarah Taylor 39:06

i'm the oldest Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 39:06

Yeah, exactly. So you've perhaps modeled to your younger sister. Yeah, this is the process you have, and you can't help it pick it up, Sarah because

Sarah Taylor 39:14

Possibly, yeah.

Heather Taylor 39:15

I had ambition for days. Like I was going to be the youngest author. There was a girl in my grade six classes, really good illustrator. And I was like, well, we're going to make a book together. And she's like, I just like drawing. I don't want to write a book. and i'm like but we must Because we must be the youngest authors and she didn't go for it and it really ruined my future. *all laugh*

Sarah Taylor 39:35

Thanks, girl from grade six

Stephanie Fornasier 39:36

think you're doing very well though, regardless of that horrible young girl *all laugh*

Music Break 39:39

Stephanie Fornasier 39:48

So on that note, let's let's pivot to

Sarah Taylor 39:52

Sorry

Stephanie Fornasier 39:52

No, no, this is so interesting. But I guess the big question that Haunting of Hill House poses is is what's going on mental illness or is it ghosts? Which doesn't have an answer? I feel like the answer at the end is it's probably both or it's neither. But the usual question we asked at this point in the podcast is what is the accuracy of what we see on screen. And this is a fantastical piece. But there are definitely some mental illnesses or processes that we see in the film, which is also I think, we agree is explored through the metaphors, or spirituality. What were your thoughts on? I guess that big questioned in general?

Sarah Taylor 40:33

Yeah, I think there's definitely lots of the ghosts are the things that haunt us but also haunt us on screen. Like, I think that did a good job of I know for myself, because I deal with I have generalized anxiety disorder, there's so many moments when that anxiety felt like it just felt so authentic to how I feel.

Stephanie Fornasier 40:52

yes

Sarah Taylor 40:52

And so I think they portrayed those moments, amazingly like it. It just took me to places that I myabe didn't want to go sometimes, so that I had to hide under the blanket but but those are and that's carried from trauma too sometimes some of the trauma stuff. I think they did a good job. Yeah.

Heather Taylor 41:08

I mean, Flanagan says, A Love Story and a ghost story is similar. But I'd say like every experience and asimilar the idea, he said, when we fall in love with someone, we're birthing a new ghost, something that will follow us for the rest of our lives. But if you actually expand that, and say, every experience we have, is a ghost we carry for the rest of our lives.

Stephanie Fornasier 41:27

yeah.

Heather Taylor 41:28

Because it is.

Sarah Taylor 41:28

Yeah, and I think with anxiety, like, there's so many moments that I'm like, something will like a hold on to in my anxiety brain. And it is like carrying a ghost with me. I'm feeling emotional about that idea. But that's totally what it is. It's like you you have these moments in life that maybe somebody who didn't deal with anxiety would just like it would float away, it would go into the other world right it would cross over, but we hold on to these, or I'll hold on to those feelings or those, those thoughts will take me and it'll it'll sit with me just like the Man in the Hat right? Just follows him.

Stephanie Fornasier 42:03

Yeah.

Heather Taylor 42:04

Yeah. I think it's both because it's like the ghosts are a metaphor. It's grappling they are your internal thing. I like what Steve said. Stephen said, ghosts are guilt ghosts are secrets, ghosts are regrets, our failings. But most times, ghosts are a wish. And I thought that as beautiful.

Stephanie Fornasier 42:21

Yeah, I guess it's different ways of looking at it. Because I'm feel similar to you, Sarah, in that a lot of my Generalized Anxiety Disorder comes out in some of those fears of myself failing, but also things that have happened in the past that put me back there. Like, yeah, like PTSD, or maybe even Complex PTSD, where the ghost is, you know, what could have been, or what I thought was going to happen, that didn't happen, or whatever it might be and coming back to haunt you. And particularly with... its maybe skipping ahead a bit, but with Nell's bent neck lady, the fact that she's constantly haunted through her whole life by this, this woman who ends up being herself. Like that's like, Whoa,

Sarah Taylor 43:10

yeah, that's

Stephanie Fornasier 43:11

that's just like, shit!

Sarah Taylor 43:12

it feels like that still feels so relevant to anxiety, when it's kind of unmanaged, or you don't understand your safety mechanism, your safety behaviors are the things that you do to keep it going is that you are the person that you are causing

Stephanie Fornasier 43:27

you're afraid of, yeah

Sarah Taylor 43:29

you're doing it to yourself. And it's, urgh.

Stephanie Fornasier 43:31

Yeah, and I have pretty severe death anxiety that I've learned strategies to manage. But when it hits, it's like, really hard to shift from. And I feel like that's such a metaphor for it. Because, you know, it's inevitable, we're all gonna die. And being afraid of that is so it feels ridiculous. Because like, what can you do about it? And I feel like that was a really good metaphor for that. And that she could not escape the bent neck lady, because she was the bent neck lady. Oh, it really hits me.

Sarah Taylor 43:58

Yeah, mmhmm.

Heather Taylor 43:59

Yeah, I think there was something that I originally I was thinking a lot about originally thought, well, it's about the inevitability, right of like when you have mental illness, the inevitability in your family sometimes that you'll have it or whatever. But then I started thinking about, is it more about a representation of suicidal ideation, this idea that it's actually even though it ends up being an accident, and her death like that I did she choose, or did she not? And it really feels like she didn't choose. But is it something where it's like, the idea of dying, and the idea of looking at death and thinking about death, but in the way that it's represented, this film is really her death, her actual death because she's thinking about her actual death. And so even though we then go, it's actually her death and she's haunted by herself and like, but she's haunted about the idea of death.

Stephanie Fornasier 44:48

Yep. And the fact that according to everybody, she ends her own life, whether it's a choice or not, she's haunted by it.

Heather Taylor 44:55

Yeah, whether she meant to or she skirting that like the idea of like, is There's something I really want, like, but that obsession, the thinking of death. And like there are people sometimes from what I understand that, that they have the suicidal ideation, but they still let someone know she, like they still let someone know and there is a chance for them to live. And so they are skirting it, but not necessarily... whereas there's other people who don't tell anyone, and then they're found. And so yeah, we know this from our own experience with family, but like, yeah, then you have that question of like, you know, did she mean to die? Or is it more that she was trying to find a way to get relief and find closure, but in doing so ends up dying?

Stephanie Fornasier 45:34

Yeah. Which just that in itself is a metaphor for being suicidal and having that ideation and trying to, and depression in general, and just wanting to feel it to stop?

Heather Taylor 45:47

yeah

Sarah Taylor 45:47

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I think also often, like, I've also have lived with depression in my life, and I have people in my life that have dealt with depression chronically. And there's always this, not for me. But there has been people, I've known that the idea is that I will eventually die by suicide, that is just inevitable. That's just something that's going to happen. And so I don't know if that's what Nel, like, the bent neck lady is showing her like, Well, eventually, this is what's going to happen, and maybe the depressive state is Well, eventually just going to get to that. So how can I just yeah, it's just going to show me that all the time, because that's where I'm going to end up.

Heather Taylor 46:23

Well she goes away, she goes away and then comes back after her husband dies.

Stephanie Fornasier 46:27

Yes, yeah.

Sarah Taylor 46:28

Yeah, cos she It's so yeah, she went back into that depressive state again, right? Which is when there you go, which is when you often have these ideas of suicide, because it's for the pain to stop

Stephanie Fornasier 46:41

To stop. Yeah, I think it's also relevant that she trusted tell everybody and is not believed and not validated in what's happening to her. And I feel like that's it feels quite resonant in maybe it may be a metaphor for society, and that there's, there's not enough resources and support out there for people in these situations where they can actually get the help they need. And mental illness has not given as much gravity and legitimacy as physical illness is, and I'm being very broad, but it's true. You know, if someone just maybe, yeah, this is happening to you. And her husband was probably the closest it came to that. And then he died.

Heather Taylor 47:20

He was literally her technician for her sleep paralysis. No one believed her about her sleep paralysis. And he did, yeah, he was there to help her through it, and no one else was there to help her through it. And then she did try like little things like Steven says, like, you're in your crystals, and you're like, like making fun of her really grasping at straws at anything like what's going to give me relief. And the one thing would be could be maybe this idea of her family actually stop running from their pain and stop reading from and hiding and being cowards. They were being cowards. , in terms of their own. That's really harsh to say, but they didn't want to face what was it was going on...

Stephanie Fornasier 47:56

Right, in different ways. Yeah.

Heather Taylor 47:57

In different ways. And in doing so if they believed her, if they allowed them to say, Yes, this is real, then they would have to admit that what they're dealing with is real too.

Sarah Taylor 48:05

100%.

Stephanie Fornasier 48:05

Exactly.

Heather Taylor 48:06

Which was too difficult.

Stephanie Fornasier 48:07

Which is a lot

Heather Taylor 48:07

This, yeah. So then said, they're like, she's just and she'll be fine. Because she goes through these states, and then everything's fine. Until everything isn't.

Sarah Taylor 48:15

And how often though, does that happen in a family?

Stephanie Fornasier 48:17

Exactly. Yeah.

Sarah Taylor 48:18

It happens all the time. And I like I've been guilty of that in the past with my own family members. Sorry, family. But and I'm sure the same thing has happened for me when I was in like, intense bouts of anxiety, because I think you can, like you can't fix the person. You can't just make it stop. Like you just have to be there. And it's sometimes really hard.

Stephanie Fornasier 48:35

And you have to sit with it in that discomfort

Sarah Taylor 48:36

And you have to sit with it

Stephanie Fornasier 48:36

and that's really difficult

Sarah Taylor 48:39

And if you're unchecked, if you have things that you're dealing with, it's hard to be with someone who's maybe not well, if you're not well, if you're not ready to face that so I can see it's so it's human nature, and a lot of ways sucks. But

Stephanie Fornasier 48:50

I think we see that a lot with Theo. Like when she goes and visits her. And she gets really frustrated with her in the state of her room and says I just wanted to hang with my sister and go to the beach and cry. Like, yeah, the way that she wanted to deal with it was not whatNell was in the state to do.

Heather Taylor 49:07

Right? Like she is so highly empathetic, like literally because

Sarah Taylor 49:10

She can touch it

Heather Taylor 49:09

She touches.

Stephanie Fornasier 49:12

She can't help it.

Heather Taylor 49:13

Yeah. But because she can be so insightful. She's actually emotionally unavailable. That's her protection. So she's like, I'm just gonna like, check out...

Sarah Taylor 49:22

Yeah.

Heather Taylor 49:22

And so she doesn't want Nell to want to talk about it, because then she has to talk about it. So instead, like how...

Stephanie Fornasier 49:28

And that's painful for her.

Heather Taylor 49:29

Yeah, how about I drink instead?

Sarah Taylor 49:31

Or have sex, yeah.

Heather Taylor 49:31

And how about I, I'm going to just destroy myself, but I'm going to make sure that no children get hurt anymore. Like she's helping other people but never herself.

Stephanie Fornasier 49:40

She's directing that empathy to others who need it because that's easier to do. Yeah. And then trying to numb her own experiences and how it affects her.

Heather Taylor 49:49

Yeah, yeah.

Sarah Taylor 49:51

Can we talk about sleep paralysis. Can we talk about that now?

Stephanie Fornasier 49:53

Yes, lets talk about it

Sarah Taylor 49:54

It's intense, and I can I have had sleep paralysis a few times. And one time when i was visiting Heather in London, and it does feel like there's something coming for you is terrifying. And it comes about when you're stressed or your sleep schedule is wonky, or whatever it might be, but a very cool thing to use as something in a film series like this, because it is very, it is almost supernatural. And if you want to you have that experience, or paranormal or whatever you want to say,

Heather Taylor 50:21

Yeah, that's like explainable, but not when you're in...

Sarah Taylor 50:24

Not when it is happening. Because like, you're no, you're like laying there and you can't move and you hear this loud sound. And like, you can see, but you can't see and you can see your arm and you're moving it, but it's not moving like it is intense, until you understand what did I think it was with Heather, I'd experienced it probably three or four times. And then I was with Heather and I said this thing happened, like what is going on? Because I hadn't really talked about it. And then because you're really great at research, you started looking up the the things I was telling you, and you were able to we were you know, I was able to learn what it was. And we had an explained explanation. 

So the next time it happened, because it's happened, especially when I had my daughter, it happened a few times, again, disruption of sleep and all the things. I was like, Oh, this is happening. Just wait a few seconds. And I was able to like talk myself while I'm in the state out of it until my arm would move, right? But if I didn't have that, that research component, and Heather telling me like, Oh, this is a thing. You're not like, you're not losing your mind, which is what I thought was happening. Yeah, yeah. So like her husband supporting her through that, and then having that be gone. And yeah, it's hard.

Stephanie Fornasier 51:25

Yeah. Hard to watch. I know, just a little bit about the history of sleep paralysis, and that there was those sorts of experiences in the past of ghosts or spirits or demons, which would when you look back, that was actually sleep paralysis that was happening? Because it makes sense because you're, you're not fully awake. You're still sleeping, you can still be dreaming, but you your body's in that you're asleep state so your muscles can't move. Yeah, it's super terrifying. I've only experienced it a few times. But I had a friend who I lived with who had night terrors,

Sarah Taylor 51:57

urgh

Stephanie Fornasier 51:57

poor thing. It was awful. And yeah, I feel like that was conveyed fairly well in that, like, the strategies that he was talking through seem pretty, like legitimate and helpful. And also just the fact that you know while she was with him. They weren't really happening. But then they came up every now and then which suggests, you know, she's going through a stressful time. And then when he does pass away, they're amped up again, I think, yeah.

Heather Taylor 52:21

Especially as I'm sorry, but Nell and Luke got the really, bad end of the deal

Sarah Taylor 52:26

they did

Stephanie Fornasier 52:26

I know

Heather Taylor 52:26

because not only were completely terrorized by ghosts, they also were of a family that were all emotionally unavailable. They were abandoned, they literally, Luke was almost murdered by his own mother. And like, it's very bad. Like, they and then like, Nel loses her husband. She's abandoned. She's unprotected by her family. Her twin brother's like ruined by addiction. And she's essentially helping him because she has no one else to turn to to help her. She's internalizing all of her pain. Of course, she's having paralysis and, and thoughts of death.

Sarah Taylor 53:04

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 53:04

Yeah.

Heather Taylor 53:05

Like she is like, no one will listen to her.

Stephanie Fornasier 53:08

Her oldest siblings is sort of like treating her like a burden, as they do with Luke as well. And something they just have to deal with, which is just does not help.

Heather Taylor 53:17

Yeah. And also, if you really think about it, Steven, both Steven and Shirley, became their parents. Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 53:25

Exactly. they support them financially. And

Heather Taylor 53:29

So like, they were being parented Luke never had to grow up. He didn't learn coping mechanisms. Like it just they were left adrift with the only parental figures were too emotionally unavailable children. Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 53:40

Yeah, who are going through their trauma and processing of what had happened,

Heather Taylor 53:45

And then Theo's off doing whatever, because she's the middle child, and there's like peace. Like I'm out. And then you there's this weird economy of children taking care of children, and another and an emotionally unavailable father who realizes eventually that he really screwed up.

Stephanie Fornasier 53:59

Yeah, yeah. And it's interesting everyone's memories of, of what happened and how they cope with it and their memories of the mother as well, and how that they've come to those places of coping like for Stephen, he remembers the nurturing maternal woman that she was before all of these traumas happen, so he's just like, it was mental illness. Dad didn't deal with it. Fuck you all.

Sarah Taylor 54:22

We all have it...

Stephanie Fornasier 54:22

No one will talk about mental illness in this family, but he doesn't do it in a way of understanding. It's just like, yeah, mental illness is terrible. And we you know, I don't want to have kids I don't want my kids have mental illness because it's this horrible, and that's why he finds it all so frustrating, and he can he just identifies this like Luke and Nell as like people who are unable to help themselves.

Heather Taylor 54:42

Yeah.

Sarah Taylor 54:42

But yet he makes all this money off of I don't know how much money he made, but he's like, writes ghost stories of his the trauma and makes it to work for him.

Stephanie Fornasier 54:51

He manipulates it to serve himself.

Heather Taylor 54:54

He's a fixer, right. His dad's a fixer. He's a fixer and I get this as someone who is also a fixer.

Stephanie Fornasier 54:57

He was the fixer as the older child.

Sarah Taylor 54:59

Exactly

Heather Taylor 54:59

Exactly, as oldest fixer here...

Sarah Taylor 55:02

Yes...

Heather Taylor 55:03

Recovering fixer...

Sarah Taylor 55:04

Yes, yes, one more time... *steph laughs*

Heather Taylor 55:07

And the anger it would bring inside of me to not be able to fix things to be the repetitiveness of like, anxiety that dealing with other people's anxiety and being like, but just then don't do that anymore, or leave that person or make a different choice because like, You are making me into an insane person. And then when you're like, I don't, that's what I felt like, I

Sarah Taylor 55:31

I know! I know

Heather Taylor 55:31

I'm not saying it lightly. I was just like, oh my god, I'm, I'm so angry. And I realized this because I felt powerless. And the fixing comes with control and control means, that you're safe. Now I'm gonna cry. And so with Steve, I see someone who has controlled his life to a point where he's alone,

Sarah Taylor 55:50

yep.

Heather Taylor 55:51

And lonely, and who is basically terrified that he, like if he lets go of control that he too will like... I talk about a lot like I always waited for a long time for the other shoe to drop. When am I going to have agoraphobia? When will I not be able to leave my house when will I have anxiety, like when we'll have these things? I know, it's inevitable. And I'm scared. I don't have those things. But it was that fear that I carried with me. And I feel like the same thing where he's like, he creates this state of control and anger and dismissiveness, because he has, that's the only thing he can tether himself to.

Stephanie Fornasier 56:25

Yeah. And I think it keeps him contained

Heather Taylor 56:27

yeah and keeps him contained. And this like idea that will if I can lean on something rational, yes, that it means that's the only thing that's real, and it's doing so has completely severed his emotions from his rational brain. And he's no doesn't think in any emotional way. It's all through the guise of like the rational brain. And we are human. So we need both sides, we have to make decisions with both things. And in doing so you saw in the show how he actually isolated himself from everything and everyone because of his skepticism because of his inability to be emotionally connected to anyone.

Stephanie Fornasier 57:02

I think you see that through the earliest scene where he's at the house investigating some possible paranormal activity. And the way he deals with it is just so matter of fact, and dismissive of her and she's like, so you're saying that what I saw wasn't what I saw, it feels like it's his job to rationalize everything. That's his purpose.

Heather Taylor 57:23

That's why I love how the episode is called Steve sees a ghost. And it's the first time he sees a ghost, and it's of his sister, who he basically like, let down because he's gonna carry that

Speaker 4 57:32

he's abandoned

Heather Taylor 57:33

who he's abandoned, and he's gonna carry that with him.

Stephanie Fornasier 57:35

And I think throughout the whole film is him trying to not succumb to his fear that he experiences mental illness himself. So seeing that really rattled him, and you can see him like, during the two storms episode, where they're in the funeral home, he's constantly saying, Get Get it together, get together, like don't slip into what he sees everybody else going into that he cannot have for himself

Heather Taylor 57:58

At end of the show, when you have the scene that you will never have, where the you can talk to the person who died and apologize and essentially wipe away the sins and the guilt that you will be carrying the ghosts that you will carry of your sibling. by saying like, Oh, I'm sorry that I didn't pick up the phone, I'm sorry. And then Steven says, I'm sorry, I never listened. And I think that's a big thing of like fixers, the thing that I've learned personally, is that you have to ask the question, do you want to fix this? Or do you want me to listen?

Stephanie Fornasier 58:29

Yeah.

Heather Taylor 58:29

And then once you have that answer, then that's what you need to do. And all he needed to do is listen, and he could not be open enough to listen.

Stephanie Fornasier 58:37

Yeah, definitely. I want to talk more about that scene

Sarah Taylor 58:40

Yeah. That's a good one.

Stephanie Fornasier 58:42

But just on the topic of Steven, I guess, moving to Shirley as well, I feel like she's also someone who tries to control to cope. But in a very different way from Steven, like, she's a lot more nurturing, but her sort of way of controlling is, i dunno... it's more making sure her house is in order.

Heather Taylor 59:01

She's a perfectionist.

Stephanie Fornasier 59:02

Yeah, she's a total perfectionist, like the funeral home scene, everything being exactly right, and having the right flowers and all of that sort of stuff. Not quite as pathological but still, like, I feel like she's probably the most together of all of them. Maybe, but not really.

Sarah Taylor 59:16

It feels like that. But she's just

Stephanie Fornasier 59:18

Yeah, exactly. She presents that face.

Heather Taylor 59:21

Right? But she's just not haunted by the dead. She's haunted by the living with her own guilt on her like she so she has a different haunting and like she basically is she wants to be nothing like her parents. So of course is exactly like her parents. Like that idea of like keeping secrets and burning anger and like keeping everything under wraps. Like it's cool. I'm perfect. And so that means I'm completely inflexible. So that's not ideal. *Sarah laughs*

Stephanie Fornasier 59:48

I forgot about her haunting being the person she has a brief affair with as well. And I wonder if her biggest fear is not being perfect as having made a big mistake in her marriage. And being found out is actually fallible and perhaps not such a good person that she thinks she is.

Heather Taylor 1:00:05

Yeah, you know what could have helped them all just maybe communication. Just straight up talking. Yeah, that's it, just talking

Sarah Taylor 1:00:10

Just a little bit talking and a little bit of listening.

Heather Taylor 1:00:12

Just gonna throw that out there.

Sarah Taylor 1:00:13

That's all we needed.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:00:14

Same with Hugh, like he I find that storyline quite hard that he, after it occurs, he's obviously not convicted of having anything to do with his wife's death as far as we see. And he sort of packs the kids off to live with their aunt. And he's, you know, AWOL.

Sarah Taylor 1:00:30

Disappears. Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:00:31

Why? Why don't you want to support your kids through what they've just experienced?

Sarah Taylor 1:00:37

Well, because he can, because yeah, man in the 90s, who can just... Yeah, right, could just go away, who could take the kids to the Auntie's and say, I can't do this right now. I'm walking away.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:00:47

I'm noping out of this. Yeah. And if he had been less typical dad, and yeah, even asked for help himself, I guess he could have actually given them some support that would have helped them through their trauma, where they were instead abandoned,

Sarah Taylor 1:01:03

And added more trauma.

Heather Taylor 1:01:04

Basically, he was like, I'm gonna check out emotionally and I'm going to totally focus my attention to the memory of my wife, who we actually physically see. So we know he's being haunted by the memory of his wife. And he'd rather be prioritizing the memory of someone dead than his own children, which really checks out

Sarah Taylor 1:01:21

Because it's safer, it's easier. I don't know. Yeah. Like it feels

Stephanie Fornasier 1:01:24

It's less complex. Yeah. Because it's less difficult.

Heather Taylor 1:01:26

Or it's like, you're living staying in the pain instead of dealing with it...

Sarah Taylor 1:01:30

Dealing and healing.

Heather Taylor 1:01:30

Because he'll again, like everyone is like, we're just gonna just deny everything. Like he's denying that his children are hurting, like, he's denying that he needs to be responsible Yeah. So everyone's in denial. And everyone won't talk to anybody. And then they only talk to someone when someone dies.

Sarah Taylor 1:01:46

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:01:47

The only time they come together

Sarah Taylor 1:01:48

Which again, is like so indicative to many a family, right?

Stephanie Fornasier 1:01:52

Yes, yeah.

Sarah Taylor 1:01:53

It's a good family show! *laughs*

Music Break 1:01:54

Stephanie Fornasier 1:02:02

Let's go to grief, because there's so much to say, the fact that when they come together at nails episode at the funeral home, the dynamics between them and the arguments is just so it's just so bang on because when a family member dies, you think this is a time to come together and support each other. But it's often the opposite of what happens. And when my brother passed away, the first month was difficult, not just because we were all grieving, but there was a lot of tension. And everyone was on their own sort of grief experiences and waves, which we continue to be in. And it meant that tensions were high. So a comment could be made, and that would just be completely interpreted the wrong way. And then we'd end up fighting didn't happen a lot. 

But there was a few moments where it was like, my sister had to be the one. She's the youngest, but she's the most rational. And she's got ADHD. So I don't know if that's related. But she was just like, Guys, we're supposed to be supporting each other. Can you stop like it, nothing matters. Now, our brother's dead. So stop fighting. It's really hard to remind yourself of that fact. Because you're stuck in your head, you're going through your own feelings, and you don't have as much control over your filter, and you're more vulnerable. So I felt like those ups and downs during that episode, were very relatable.

Sarah Taylor 1:03:28

Yes.

Heather Taylor 1:03:28

Yeah. And I think like how people deal with grief and how we have to, in our society, we did an episode on grief, with this belief that in 12 months, everyone's fine. And this is 26 years later...

Sarah Taylor 1:03:39

Nobody is fine.

Heather Taylor 1:03:39

None of them are fine, because grief inevitably changes you for the rest of your life. And this idea that if you do not allow yourself to grieve in the way of like community, and then understanding that your life will be changed and not expecting it to just go back to the way it was, because there is no back to the way it was and that like your life moving forward, you will carry that with you. Doesn't mean you have to always be sad, but instead they just locked everything. Yeah, all of them are like lock, lock, lock, lock, lock. We're not going to talk about mom. Like no one talked about her like zero talking about. 

Stephanie Fornasier 1:04:11

It felt like any person that really brought her up was really Hugh in the fact that he was talking to her constantly. And then Stephens saying, mom died because she was crazy. And yeah, we're all Yeah.

Heather Taylor 1:04:22

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:04:23

And I think it's also very indicative, like for me, like there's before and after. So like, you know, that event of this person dying is like colors, everything. And when you think of how long they actually spent in Hill House, it wasn't a significant chunk of time. But it's a very before and after, because of what actually occurred there and has colored the rest of their lives.

Sarah Taylor 1:04:44

And I feel like being in Hill House, all of the things that led up because if we go on the idea that maybe mom was dealing with mental illness that led to death by suicide, it was evolving and getting worse to that whole time they're in that house. So that whole piece period of time can feel like a million years when you're dealing with someone who's progressively getting sicker. Yeah. And then there's that endpoint and then you want to erase all of that, but you can't because it does feel like a lifetime. Those moments of that that whatever you call that,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:05:14

Trauma.

Sarah Taylor 1:05:15

Yeah, the trauma, there you go, that trauma...

Heather Taylor 1:05:18

And I think that idea of like the red room I've been thinking about this a lot of times. is that it is actually coping mechanisms and how people are trying to ignore through a coping mechanism what is the reality? So yes, they say like, the house is digesting...

Sarah Taylor 1:05:36

The stomach.

Heather Taylor 1:05:36

It's the stomach of the house and it puts on faces, so we could be still in quiet while it digested, but if you look at it's like Theo's dad's studio, and dances, what she loved to do, it was a reading room for mom, it was a game room for Steven a family room for surely because she desperately just wanted family toy room was for Nel and then a treehouse for Luke. They were their places of sanctuary, but it wasn't real sanctuary. It was them coping with someone important in their life, basically, like going through something major, like I know, as I was, I would cope by reading. That was my escape, like I escaped the world. And I just read all the time. And I can so I identify with those things as coping mechanisms for like, the world is too hard right now. I'm going to just go and hide, and this is what they're doing.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:06:22

Do you think they were interpreting that is not a good thing to have that escape or have that coping strategy?

Sarah Taylor 1:06:28

I think did it go too far, though. I think it was probably good at first, it helped at the beginning because they were using that to not deal, right. But when you're when you're young, that's what they did to feel better. But eventually, you have to actually work on the trauma that's making you need to go hide or, or go to that safety

Stephanie Fornasier 1:06:44

You actually have to look at the room.

Sarah Taylor 1:06:45

Find out how can I be safe? Not in this space? But in all the spaces?

Stephanie Fornasier 1:06:49

Yeah, right. 

Heather Taylor 1:06:49

We talk a lot about that, right? Just in general coping mechanisms, how we, the things we've learned to get through childhood, we have to undo as adults.

Sarah Taylor 1:06:57

All that's all I'm doing right now in therapy is like, what are my safety behaviours because of anxiety, and that some of that's learned, maybe in a way, some of it is just the nature of anxiety, but understanding the things I'm learning like everybody does this, whatever I do... Well know that's actually a safety behavior to get me through the anxiety I'm feeling as opposed to being like, Oh, I'm feeling this anxiety. It'll eventually pass. I don't have to now research for eight hours on the toe that hurts or whatever that might mean. Right? Like, that's such a basic example. But so yeah, like, I think at first, it feels like it's helping, but it doesn't help forever.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:07:30

No.

Heather Taylor 1:07:30

Yeah, it starts to eat you from the inside because you're not dealing with so literally like the idea of it being a stomach that you're coping mechanisms that are hiding your pain is the thing that ends up eating you

Sarah Taylor 1:07:42

Ooh!

Stephanie Fornasier 1:07:42

Oof! *both laugh* but it makes sense.

Heather Taylor 1:07:42

It totally makes sense, like I don't, I looked up lots of things like what do other people think of the Red Room, no one talked about that. And I was like, oh, but this is just it's keeping you complacent in the face of horror, right? It's like your coping mechanism when you when you can't deal with how bad the world is being and then Hughthey say, never found the red room because the whole house was his red room.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:08:02

Yeahhhhh...

Sarah Taylor 1:08:02

Mmmmmm...

Heather Taylor 1:08:02

Because he was just trying to fix it always like the mold the mold, like I fix it, I gotta fix it. I gotta fix it. Imagine if he allowed to, if he let go and admitted that he can't fix everything? What if he had felt secure enough with his family to be able to talk about how he has feeling and how this is maybe beyond them? And maybe it's better for them to move on that better than to like, get help or better to like deal with it was happening, like seeing his wife unravel? And instead focusing on this rot without seeing that the rot is happening in his family.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:08:33

Yeah, and where does the rot come from? Like, what is the the actual issue at hand that needs to be unveiled?

Heather Taylor 1:08:40

Right.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:08:40

And the fact that they thought that the red room was the heart of the house until Nel actually says no, it's the stomach. So that's, I guess that's really indicative of when we think the coping strategy is actually helpful and wholesome, and there's no malice so there's nothing bad that can come from it, but then realizing that it's actually avoiding whatwe need to actually deal with

Sarah Taylor 1:08:59

And I think that's those realisations. I don't know, because I just for me just recently, where I'm like, oh, yeah, it would feel a lot better not to continue thinking about the thing that you know, like...

Stephanie Fornasier 1:09:07

Yeah...

Sarah Taylor 1:09:08

Oh, that makes sense. But when you're in it, you just it consumes you, which again, stomach. It's consuming you! argh!

Heather Taylor 1:09:14

Yeah. I feel for Olivia, I feel for her because I think she was literally emotionally exhausted. She had cabin fever.

Sarah Taylor 1:09:23

She had migraines.

Heather Taylor 1:09:24

Migraines, anxiety, she's dealing with these children in a house it's falling apart. She is essentially the sole caregiver of these children and she's over-protective.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:09:33

And she's trying to design this home as well.

Sarah Taylor 1:09:35

Yeah she's trying to do work.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:09:35

For them to live in.

Heather Taylor 1:09:38

Yeah. So she's like leading all this and doing all these things and dealing with like, a lot of mental health and physical illnesses. And they're like, Oh, she's schizophrenic I'm like, How about she was like doing all the things and how about...

Stephanie Fornasier 1:09:52

Yeah, she's being a woman in this day and age.

Sarah Taylor 1:09:53

Yeah. being a woman, period.

Heather Taylor 1:09:56

Yeah I know.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:09:57

The patriarchy...

Heather Taylor 1:09:58

And her overprotectiveness being pushed over the edge by this ghost. Yeah. And you know, Olivia, but I don't know, it's interesting. Like, sometimes people, this happens where you have you take on so much. And then you have a breakdown. And why does that mean she's schizophrenic? Could it just mean she had a breakdown because she was trying to protect everyone? And couldn't. Because it happens a lot.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:10:21

And it feels like the ghost Poppy saw that in her and manipulated that into, yeah. Which, you know, could be a metaphor for psychosis and how that can take over when you're at your, particularly people who do have schizophrenia, when there's a buildup of stress and anxiety can lead to a psychotic episode. And the behavior that comes from that is not intentional, whether you can interpret it that way. And that, you know, it led to her to becoming homicidal. 

But I think I completely agree, particularly the fact that we see her being so nurturing to the kids in so many episodes, and also the fact that she really relates to her kids in such a way, like when Theo talks about how she can feel things, and she says, Yeah, my grandmother was sensitive like that. And so am I, and gives her a strategy to help deal with it. Like she's such a good mom in so many of those moments. And I think, given everything that's happened, I don't think he can explain it all the way by Oh, she was just mentally ill.

Heather Taylor 1:11:19

Yeah, those circumstances she was in were dire.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:11:22

Yeah.

Heather Taylor 1:11:22

Were dire. Because also they're like, if we don't do this...

Sarah Taylor 1:11:25

Like the pressure on that...

Heather Taylor 1:11:26

You lose everything. And that happens when you have that exceeding pressure. And you see, though that with people who, sadly, you know, because she did die by suicide in this show, you see that with people who are, get burnout. And they'll like, especially like in finance, jobs and things like that, and they will just walk up to their apartment and walk off the balcony, because they're like, I can't, this is too much.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:11:49

I can't do it anymore. Yeah.

Heather Taylor 1:11:50

Yeah. And it's not because that they were had anything beforehand that would indicate that they had some difficulty with mental health, it was that they burned themselves out. And so is this actually a case of burnout, and that she, I know, she then becomes homicidal, but it's like, in a way, that idea of like, oh, without me, you'll not be cared for. And it's better for us to die together, which you see that happen a lot of times either happened with women and like their children, it was like, well, if Without me, you be lost. And so we'll die together versus me leaving you,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:12:23

And in the show, she thinks that she has to kill her kids in order to save them from the atrocities that are occurring. 

Sarah Taylor 1:12:31

So all in all, she was a really good mom. *laughs* She just loved her kid.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:12:38

I'm interested, though, because it's like, you know, at the end, it's like Hugh and her being together. Like it feels like, I'm just trying to sort of interpret how you know, Nell comes home, and she wants Nell to come home, like the ghost of Olivia. And then Hugh sacrifices himself so that all the other kids can go, and he gives himself to the house. And obviously, this is the house, not necessarily Ilya herself who are consuming all these people. But it also feels like at the end of the day, nails there, but it's sort of the relationship between Hugh that is sustained?

Sarah Taylor 1:13:10

Saves... Yeah. I'm not sure about that either.

Heather Taylor 1:13:16

But maybe it's that he finally like, he finally saw Oh, like I screwed up so badly that this is this maybe for the first time I'm going to step up and help my children.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:13:28

Yeah, that's true.

Heather Taylor 1:13:29

But it's almost like he's doing that. But he's benefiting because he gets to be with his wife again. Like is he really losing anything? Not that he has to lose, like I don't know? Like, is he doing the right thing? I guess his his, some of his kids are, are able to move on and like show us that they all seem to be doing well and functioning after everything's done,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:13:48

supposedly.

Heather Taylor 1:13:48

But like, Was it hard for him to choose that? I don't know if that would be hard for him to choose. Great. I get to hang out with my wife.

Music Break 1:13:54

Stephanie Fornasier 1:14:00

On the topic of Theo, can we talk a little bit about her portrayal as a psychologist

Sarah Taylor 1:14:05

I feel like you need to to say Steph because you are trained

Stephanie Fornasier 1:14:08

Can I talk about It?

Sarah Taylor 1:14:08

You tell us what you think

Heather Taylor 1:14:10

you have to talk about this, please tell us about the psycholllooogyyy.

Sarah Taylor 1:14:12

what is right. And what is wrong.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:14:15

I think she was great. And I love also that she's like queer and that's just like who she is. And it's funny that a couple of her siblings didn't notice but like everyone else did, and that she's got like a life outside of being a psychologist too. And it feels balanced because she's still a very good psychologist from what it seems like. And also she's a great psychologist, but also has her own issues, which is very accurate.

Heather Taylor 1:14:40

Yes.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:14:40

And I love that her experiences of trauma actually led I feel, to her, well it did, choosing that as a field which is also extremely accurate.

Sarah Taylor 1:14:49

totally

Heather Taylor 1:14:49

Yeah

Stephanie Fornasier 1:14:49

I think if you interviewed any psychologists, they'd be like, Yeah, cuz I had some shit happen when I was a kid. And that made me look into this. Yeah, I thought the therapy it was pretty good. In terms of what most depictions of therapy are, I think it was pretty good, particularly with kids, because I have worked with kids with trauma backgrounds as well, and the use of like play. And you know, how sessions usually go seem pretty accurate. And then having that sort of chat with the parents afterwards? And not sort of divulging what exactly happened in the sessions, but just asking some questions, and my only concern was that she didn't clean the toys afterwards, which I had to do every session.

Sarah Taylor 1:15:24

I like, I liked that you made note of that and if you're doing it, you would like, that would clock, like that's a job I need to

Stephanie Fornasier 1:15:32

Yeah I was just like, But there's germs everywhere *all laugh*

Sarah Taylor 1:15:34

Especially in our world right now.

Heather Taylor 1:15:36

Exactly.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:15:37

Exactly. And I guess, you know, the one inaccuracy is that you wouldn't just do a drop in to a family's house. But of course, you know, usually psychologists don't have special powers where they can actually feel what's happened to a person.

Sarah Taylor 1:15:51

*laughs* I can, can you imagine if your therapists could do that though

Heather Taylor 1:15:52

Wow

Stephanie Fornasier 1:15:53

it would make things so much easier

Heather Taylor 1:15:56

I'd say it'd be harder, because they'd be very traumatized.

Sarah Taylor 1:15:59

Yes, I guess.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:16:00

Oh, it'd be so hard. Yeah

Sarah Taylor 1:16:02

That would be hard for the therapist, I didn't think about that. I just thought about my selfishly how beneficial it would be *laughs*

Stephanie Fornasier 1:16:08

but it's a good metaphor for how vicarious trauma can occur as a as a mental health professional, and that you do have to protect yourself, because you do end up hearing lots of really traumatic things and have to hold space for someone else's trauma. And you do have to protect yourself from that. without ending up being not empathetic.

Heather Taylor 1:16:25

You have to put, you have to put your gloves on.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:16:27

You have to put your gloves on. Yeah.

Heather Taylor 1:16:30

See, I was saying, I was pointing at Sarah,

Sarah Taylor 1:16:31

yes

Heather Taylor 1:16:31

which no one can see on a podcast, but editing, documentary filmmaking can, you know, I've done that too, where it's like talking to people, I was interviewing people who had survived Hurricane Sandy in really traumatic situations, talk to people who are in the field. And you're listening to these stories again, and again, and you it normalizes for you, but it's not something that is actually traumatic

Sarah Taylor 1:16:55

I've done a lot of work with residential school survivors. And watching that footage, there's moments even Heather's pointed out where I'm like, feeling a certain way. And then it'll be like, Well, what have you been working on lately? I was like, Oh, of course, I'm feeling a certain way. Because I've been dealing with telling somebody's story that is traumatic

Stephanie Fornasier 1:17:15

Yeah

Sarah Taylor 1:17:16

I'm trying not to share the parts that could traumatize the audience. But it does in turn affect me

Stephanie Fornasier 1:17:22

Yeah. Even if you try, it's hard to avoid that. And you're not necessarily aware of how it's affecting you. Yeah. And it was sadly quite accurate in a very brief way. But like the fact that when she discovers the clients abuse, and she reports some child services, although they acted very quickly, I don't think that's accurate.

Sarah Taylor 1:17:41

*Sarah laughs*

Stephanie Fornasier 1:17:41

She says she's just back in the system. Sorry, is this a win? And that's so true. Like, the sad part is this little girl who's now not having her foster father abuse her, she's likely to experience abuse in some other ways, and not have her trauma dealt with appropriately because she needs to be protected. Unfortunately, that system is really flawed.

Sarah Taylor 1:18:00

Yes.

Heather Taylor 1:18:01

Yeah, exactly. Like what is the place that is beneficial, like I worked in a program where there's a kid who had was being abused, and they took him out of the abusive home and and he went to live with his grandparents who are alcoholics. But it was a better situation for him than it was at the home where the stepfather was beating him. And so they're like, it's not ideal, but it's better.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:18:21

Yeah.

Heather Taylor 1:18:21

And so that's still so difficult.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:18:24

It's sadly the reality.

Heather Taylor 1:18:25

Yes, very much so. And I love

Stephanie Fornasier 1:18:27

the quote that she says that it's very much about how we deal with traumas, particularly as young kids, she buried it so deep that she made up a monster to compartmentalize it, she needed help and no one was listening. I guess the context being that she's like the smiley man came. And what she was actually focusing on once the I was able to get them in position that she would have been in is the, you know, looked like a smiley face in the roof while she was being abused. So that's how she's created this monster to cope with the abuse. Just that line was just so perfect of how, especially with horror, as well as we make up monsters to deal with difficult situations

Sarah Taylor 1:19:00

because horror heals.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:19:04

*laughs* I, we also was saying that like having sensitive skills and being ultra, ultra empathetic, and I sort of thought, Is that sort of a code for Neurodivergence?

Sarah Taylor 1:19:13

Yeah

Stephanie Fornasier 1:19:13

but also complex PTSD, as well

Heather Taylor 1:19:17

I lead to complex PTSD. Yeah,

Sarah Taylor 1:19:19

I think that's yeah, you have to be very aware of hyper vigilance feelings around you to make sure you're safe, hyper vigilant.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:19:26

And sometimes that can look similar in neurodivergence as well. And often there's a crossover.

Sarah Taylor 1:19:31

Both and

Heather Taylor 1:19:32

yes, exactly. And or

Sarah Taylor 1:19:33

And or

Stephanie Fornasier 1:19:33

and or

Heather Taylor 1:19:33

and or.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:19:34

Yep, definitely. So just to finish up all the neuroses of the family. Let's talk a little bit about the substance use from Luke, because that's a huge plotline as well and his stint in rehab. What did you guys think about how that was portrayed?

Heather Taylor 1:19:49

I mean I feel like he was like, like, A, he he's from a family of like, what's crazy to talk about the hereditary illness because Theo also abuses alcohol, not drugs.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:19:58

A bit more functionally its seems

Sarah Taylor 1:20:00

uh yeah

Heather Taylor 1:20:00

Yeah, I guess that's functional but but man, this poor kid, his family skeptical of everything he says they don't believe anything, right? I said this earlier, he was tormented by ghosts. He was followed by one. And then he was almost murdered

Sarah Taylor 1:20:17

by his mom

Heather Taylor 1:20:17

by his mother lost everybody. And he was completely isolated in a place where something like substance abuse could be a good place to go to try to help him deal with this idea that he's has nothing is alone and completely unbelievable. Yeah, I'm like, Yeah, I that tracks like, how do I escape this

Sarah Taylor 1:20:35

It makes sense that he got to that place

Heather Taylor 1:20:36

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:20:36

And even things like they didn't believe that Abigail was real. They thought he was in his imagination. She was a real person. Like just basic things. They just completely

Sarah Taylor 1:20:45

everything he said

Stephanie Fornasier 1:20:45

invalidated everything. Yeah, it sounds like there was a theme of wanting to be brave and constantly telling him he wasn't a brave person.

Sarah Taylor 1:20:52

And he was being so brave

Heather Taylor 1:20:53

Yeah he was probably the bravest, because he actually was trying to like, deal with it all the time.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:20:58

Yeah, with no support or help.

Heather Taylor 1:20:59

Yeah, it's kind of like in those families where we know this from people that we know. I know that you have a person who's like, hey, there was abuse in our family. And then everyone's like, No, you don't know what you're talking about, youre a black sheep now, we don't want to talk to you don't come to any parties. Don't be part of this, like, Hey, we're allowed to be here as a family

Sarah Taylor 1:21:16

Everything happy.

Heather Taylor 1:21:16

And chat as a family. But as as long as we don't talk about anything bad. And he's like, Hey, that shit happened. Everyone's like, shut up. go! We don't want to we don't want anything to do with you. Because you're actually telling the truth, go away. And he's like, I guess I will be alone here and I will try to do some drugs.

Sarah Taylor 1:21:30

Yeah, try to feel better.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:21:33

And he's still being haunted so much by what has happened. And like with the bowler hat tall man, like...

Heather Taylor 1:21:38

Floating man is scary!

Sarah Taylor 1:21:39

He's so scary.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:21:39

Oh, yeah, absolutely terrifying. them saying it doesn't exist. Like it doesn't make everything go away. It

Sarah Taylor 1:21:46

Makes it makes it more extreme, makes it worse. Yeah...

Heather Taylor 1:21:49

He's a few literally a few steps away from him.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:21:52

His entire life.

Sarah Taylor 1:21:53

And you even just like pause and think about I was just like, I have to walk down a dark hallway when I leave this room. I'm not looking forward to that. Because I like you just the feeling of somebody a few steps behind you for your whole life.

Heather Taylor 1:22:05

Well, what a great metaphor for complex PTSD 100% That you always feel like you're being watcedh, and they're hyper vigilant.

Sarah Taylor 1:22:13

Yeah, you have to keep looking around. What's next?

Heather Taylor 1:22:16

Yeah, you'd keep yourself safe and like and him the way he kept himself safe was to do drugs.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:22:22

And the fact that he struggled so much to get sober, because it makes the trauma more real. And it's harder to escape something when you're things are clear, and things are sharper, because you're not dulling that pain anymore.

Heather Taylor 1:22:39

Also, you don't the thing that we did something talking about addiction, and one of the big things is having support mechanism in place. he had no support mechanism,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:22:47

No, he had no one to go to.

Heather Taylor 1:22:49

Yeah. And when he went to Nell she helped facilitate his drug use.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:22:52

Yes. Because also she was not in a place to be able to, she was in her most vulnerable state as well.

Heather Taylor 1:22:59

Exactly. So they became codependent on each other. because they that's how

Sarah Taylor 1:23:03

That's all they knew, too. Right. As twins, I think.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:23:05

Yeah.

Sarah Taylor 1:23:06

Them being the littles.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:23:07

Yeah, yes. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I didn't love how in the rehab facility. And I don't know how accurate this is in rehab, maybe it is, which I have a problem with. When he leaves to go and seek out his friend who had escaped rehab, his support worker, whoever it was said, if you leave you give up your bed, you did it to yourselves, which I thought was just a really horrible message.

Sarah Taylor 1:23:30

I think that can that can be accurate for these facilities that are voluntary. There is only so many and there are only so many beds, like I think that that's probably.. It's shitty. I don't think it shouldn't be like that. And we need facilities for people who don't have the means to pay for this private rehab space. Like I was listening to your episode about A star is born and and how beautiful the rehab facility is like, if you have money you have the means you have you'll have a bed.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:24:01

Yeah.

Sarah Taylor 1:24:02

But you have to pay for it. Anyway, that's the system is just its broken

Heather Taylor 1:24:04

If you have the money in the means and you go to jail, your experience is pretty awesome. Yeah, heard of, you know what I mean? Like, anything, everything is better when exactly yeah. Which is not...

Stephanie Fornasier 1:24:14

That wasn't the case for Luke.

Heather Taylor 1:24:22

Yeah, no.

Music Break 1:24:22

Stephanie Fornasier 1:24:22

We have to wrap up soon. Let's talk about some of the I guess the helpful messages and the harmful messages. And I guess we'll touch on some of those stereotypes as we talk about it. I guess firstly, how did you find this show helpful for you personally,

Sarah Taylor 1:24:35

I have a quick feeling I thought for a film a first series that was like a horror show. That was scary and spooky. Like very scary. to have it feel like everybody was lived happily ever after. Like actually made me feel good. Like I felt like a happy ending. So like in a small little bite size thing. I was happy with how it made me feel good and how it ended. Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:24:58

yeah,

Heather Taylor 1:24:59

Yeah, like that the stuff that Nell like really closes out with like, but the idea that there's no without, I'm not gone, I'm scattered into so many pieces sprinkled on your life like new snow. I love that, like we talked about confetti, but it was brought into this too. It's like that idea that yeah that you are always... You were loved, I was loved and you were loved. And the rest is confetti, like as in like, the rest is fine. It doesn't matter, like love is all that matters. 

And I think what's hopeful, why it's hopeful is finally all of them have finally talked. And they finally have to let go of those coping mechanisms that aren't working anymore, like the isolation and the loss of his isolation and that those roadblocks they put in place. And so finally, they're like, Oh, we can move forward without that. But it took this loss to do it

Stephanie Fornasier 1:25:48

I love that. Yeah, I remember watching it the first time and thinking it was a bit silly. But then that was before things happened in my life that made it more relatable. But just that speech, were siblings and how they're all apologize. And then she's like, it wouldn't have mattered. It was just kind of what I needed at that moment, too. Because a lot of what my family has been experiencing is what if, you know, what if, you know what if this had happened, or that had happened, also just that understanding that she's not gone, it's just a different sort of state of being, and she'll always be there in their lives. 

And I think that's really something that I'm holding on to at the moment in that just because someone's died doesn't mean they're not in your life anymore. That was just incredible. I guess that also that that theme of like family is a home you can never leave, like, in a more forboding way *laugh* like the house like could never leave. But it's also like your you'll always belong here.

Heather Taylor 1:26:46

Yeah, yeah, that idea of the fixer or not, you can't fix everything, it just is, this is just is. And to be able to understand that. And by being able to accept that this just is allows you to let so much more in

Sarah Taylor 1:27:01

Yes,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:27:02

I think that's a huge message and the entire show like, it's not about ignoring, whether it's mental illness or hauntings, it's not about blaming it. It's not about like accusing people of being this way, or that way or, or seeing it as something that's unnatural. It's just accepting it for what it is and making space for it.

Heather Taylor 1:27:21

I love that idea. Like thinking back again to that if we take the idea of every love story as a ghost story, and make it to every moment of our lives, it becomes a ghost and the people that are in it, populate your world with many ghosts of them, that you carry with you.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:27:38

That's so good. Because it's like someone might have touched your life in one way, and then someone else in completely different ways. So those ghosts can be very different to each person as well, even though they're the same person.

Heather Taylor 1:27:48

Yeah. And they're not always bad. Sometimes they're a wish,

Sarah Taylor 1:27:51

Mike Flanagan, good job.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:27:52

I love that. And before we wrap up any harmful messages?

Sarah Taylor 1:27:56

Well, always the woman that has to be the person...

Stephanie Fornasier 1:28:01

The crazy one...

Sarah Taylor 1:28:02

Like, Come on. That's frustrating.

Heather Taylor 1:28:07

I will say like that ending the happy ending that no one have after suicide where everyone gets to talk out their feelings and be like, Oh my god, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. And then get resolution from the person who died. I'm like, Well, that's nice. But that's not real.

Sarah Taylor 1:28:19

It's not real. Yeah. But as we spoke, like, is that a buffer? Yeah, communicate watching something like this. Maybe it'll make you want to communicate? I don't know.

Heather Taylor 1:28:27

Maybe it's not harmful, but it's...

Sarah Taylor 1:28:29

To have those conversations before. Is it harmful? Is it just unrealistic? Maybe that's what it...

Stephanie Fornasier 1:28:33

Yeah. I guess it could potentially glamorise and make enticing the idea of suicide to anyone who feels that way, particularly young minds. But...

Heather Taylor 1:28:43

Maybe, yeah.

Sarah Taylor 1:28:43

But they're not going to are you thinking of coming back as a ghost to say the things that you didn't get to say? I don't know. Yeah.

Heather Taylor 1:28:48

I dunno.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:28:48

No, no. But also, I think it could be quite comforting for anyone who has lost someone to be able to have that conversation in their heads or, you know, write a letter or you know, be able to share those feelings to the ghosts. Yeah.

Sarah Taylor 1:29:02

So maybe you can have those resolutions, but you do it. And it does. Yeah. So anyway, yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:29:07

Yeah,

Heather Taylor 1:29:08

I think that we had in here, which I put to that like, that Nell was the Bent Neck Lady and that I thought about it for a long time as being the inevitability of mental illness, and the cyclical nature of it, that it comes that you carry it with you. But then when I shifted my thing, so then I'm like, well, that's harmful, that this idea that you can never escape it.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:29:26

You can't escape it. Yeah.

Heather Taylor 1:29:27

But then if I went once I shifted my thinking when I started thinking about it and was like, oh, it's if it is more about her feelings of death and her own death and suicidal ideation, that changes what it is so it isn't harmful. It is the reality of what she's dealing with with her depression. It turns it into something that I'm like, It's not inevitable. It's more that that's her looking back almost at the moments where she felt closest to death versus it being like, Yeah, you were you were going to end up this way.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:29:59

And I feel like her monologue at the end, just kind of like now I understand. the comfort in knowing that time isn't linear. And like, everything's confetti and the love is sort of what remains. I feel like that's her sort of coming to terms with the fact that being afraid of death, your whole life isn't necessarily the way to be, I guess.

Heather Taylor 1:30:18

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 0:00

A monologue at the end is kind of like, Now I understand, yes, the comfort in knowing that time isn't linear. And like, everything's confetti and the love is sort of what remains. I feel like that's her sort of coming to terms with the fact that being afraid of death, your whole life isn't necessarily the way to be.

Heather Taylor 0:17

I guess. Yeah.

Sarah Taylor 0:18

The other harmful thing is Stephen deciding that he's going to just not have kids because he doesn't want them to have a mental illness.

Stephanie Fornasier 0:25

Yeah, that's very ableist

Sarah Taylor 0:27

I have a mental illness. I'm fine. And I'm living a great life. But I know that's something people do a lot.

Stephanie Fornasier 0:32

It's that sense that mental illness is a death sentence.

Sarah Taylor 0:35

Exactly. it's ableist.

Heather Taylor 0:35

I know that I've thought about it myself. I mean, there's many reasons I don't have children. I think part of it was definitely like, I raised my family. So I'm like, I did it. Guys. I raised people in my life. So it felt like I was taking

Stephanie Fornasier 0:48

You already have your babies.

Heather Taylor 0:50

Yes. They're all grown. And I just, I'm so proud of them. *laughs*

Sarah Taylor 0:57

Good god.

Heather Taylor 0:58

But I think there is something in.. I understood where he was coming from. And I feel like there are people and it's not because I think anything is wrong with me or anyone who has mental illness. But there is something of like, is this the path that I want someone else to have to take? Yeah. And if I want to give my love, why does it have to be someone that I have biologically? Why can't I take care of someone who needs love, who may not be someone is born from me?

Sarah Taylor 1:25

I don't think that that's what he's looking at, though. like he

Heather Taylor 1:28

No he doesn't want to have children. Like she wants to have children from him with his sperm And he's like, no.pe Right? So he doesn't want to procreate because he's scared of everything else families facing, because that's the ghost of his mom. And it's hard because it's complex. And it's like, I love all the people in my life. Do I want someone who struggles to leave the house now? And I don't, it's like, it's complex.

Sarah Taylor 1:53

It's totally complex.

Heather Taylor 1:53

Because like, I would love the person regardless. But that's like, yeah,

Sarah Taylor 1:57

Remind me, she's pregnant, right? Or that that's the dream. I'm trying remember the end.

Stephanie Fornasier 2:00

So I believe in the end, she's pregnant. So as we're to believe that he maybe got a reverse vasectomy...

Sarah Taylor 2:05

Which he could do, yeah...

Stephanie Fornasier 2:06

So he changes his mind.

Sarah Taylor 2:08

So he healed, maybe realised that if we have the right tools in life, that it can be okay.

Heather Taylor 2:13

Yeah, and it will be okay. But also like, yeah, I can understand, but why someone would...

Stephanie Fornasier 2:18

That would be something you would question, yeah.

Heather Taylor 2:20

That you question or think about or, like, you know, it's, it happens a lot, a lot a lot a lot.

Sarah Taylor 2:23

I think that happens a lot in disability, you know, all the things, people talk about it a lot. And I just, it's hard, but it happens with with people who, and especially over things of poverty or things like where it becomes like, can we bring children into this world and climate change? Like, it's not just mental illness...

Stephanie Fornasier 2:40

The way the world is...

Sarah Taylor 2:41

Like, do I want to bring my child into this environment? And this environment could be like, lots of different things they might be able to, it could be a haunted house, it could be a haunted house, or mental illness. Could I be able to take care of a child in even though I feel like in a good place with mental health, but would I be in a good place with mental health with a child? Who knows? Like, there's all these questions that I think we asked ourselves, and I think it's okay, like, I don't know, I don't condemn him.

Heather Taylor 3:05

It's okay to make those decisions. I think you're right. It's okay to make those decisions for what works for you.

Stephanie Fornasier 3:08

It's what's right for you. Yeah, parenting is fucking hard. The hardest thing in the world if you ask me, so it's completely reasonable to have those fears and worries

Heather Taylor 3:20

Yeah, and I think that's just was a way of like him trying to, again it was him closing everything off and control. Yeah, nothing will be bad no one will be hurt if I because I'm controlling it. So it was more about

Sarah Taylor 3:32

Because I'm...

Heather Taylor 3:33

Other people too. Like I don't want anyone to be hurt. 

Sarah Taylor 3:35

Yeah, maybe it wasn't so harmful, maybe you've changed my mind.

Stephanie Fornasier 3:37

But what I think is good about it is there are a few tropes and a few potentially harmful things but they all sign it kind of get resolved mostly at the end like they will get subverted in some way in that Steven makes that decision, dad ends up saving the day at the end the deadbeat quote unquote drug addict ends up being sober, all of those things in a nice nice tidy little bow which is probably not accurate but good enough

Sarah Taylor 4:02

Wrap it up in a present

Heather Taylor 4:04

are they all dead in this is just a dream? I mean

Stephanie Fornasier 4:07

that's fine too.

Heather Taylor 4:11

I'll take happy yeah

Sarah Taylor 4:12

I'll take the happy ending

Stephanie Fornasier 4:13

it we could probably talk for another hour let's be honest, but I will let you both go before we finish up Could you please let us know anything that's coming up in the pipeline that you'd like to plug and also give us your details so people can follow you and your podcast

Sarah Taylor 4:28

I have a couple features that are getting theatre release I don't know if it's ever going to make it to Australia or not but if you're around and you hear the film Hey Victor or the Lebanese Burger Mafia please go watch them

Stephanie Fornasier 4:37

Fantastic. I'll find out if it's coming to Australia

Sarah Taylor 4:41

You can find us at brains AAA podcast on all socials

Heather Taylor 4:44

BRAAINS podcast

Sarah Taylor 4:49

And my, This is Sarah personally you can find me for my editing SarahTaylorEditor on Instagram. That's the best place

Heather Taylor 4:54

And I'm HeatherATaylor everywhere that you can be on social media.

Stephanie Fornasier 5:00

*laughs* Fantastic. Well, thank you so much for talking to me about Haunting of Hill House. I hope everyone gets a lot out of our chat because I feel like we didn't even touch on so many other things. But I felt like it was the rich discussion we were hoping to have. So thank you so much. And please go and listen to brains especially the three part episode for mental health awareness month just a brilliant mini series and yeah, I'm also I'm haven't listened to your latest episode on Midsommar yet, but because I've been prepping for this, but I'm so excited to listen to it because Midsommar's an amazing film.

Heather Taylor 5:32

It's really good. It's about cults and we also have one coming up about ghosts. Yes. So if you're feeling in the Halloweeny mood, please listen to those. And then of course, Steph was on the three part series, her episode is doing the best.

Stephanie Fornasier 5:44

Oh! Amazing

Sarah Taylor 5:45

It's really good yeah.

Heather Taylor 5:45

So it is, like people love it.

Sarah Taylor 5:48

Top numbers top numbers!

Heather Taylor 5:48

It was people want to listen and hear because a lot of people have questions about disclosure. And so I think it's such a fabulous episode. And so we're so grateful again that you joined us and were the best person to talk about it. So really appreciate it.

Stephanie Fornasier 6:02

Thank you is such an honour to be on and yeah, a great chat

Music Break 6:04

outro finishes

Stephanie Fornasier 6:10

this podcast is not designed to be therapeutic prescriptive will constitute a formal diagnosis for any listener. For a longer version of this disclaimer, please check the Episode notes on your podcast app.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai