Let's watch Stutz and talk about the Jonah Hill texts

TRANSCRIPT: Episode 59: Let's watch Stutz and talk about the Jonah Hill texts

August 10

*Music intro starts*

Stephanie Fornasier

that was so arrogant, and like, sorry, Jonah. But you know, you haven't gone through like seven years of training. So fuck off.

Michael Watson

Yeah and superbad wasn't that good!

Stephanie Fornasier

Welcome to Psychocinematic a podcast where we analyse topics in mental illness or disability in popular 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 Psychocinematicpodcast.com. For access to special bonus content episodes, Early Access, stickers and contribute to a regular fundraisers, join our Patreon starting from $3 with per month, you can be the coolest Psychocinematic listener there is.

*Music intro ends*

Stephanie Fornasier 0:00

I'd like to start today by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land that we're recording this podcast on the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation, and pay respects to their elders past, present and future, as well as any First Nations people listening to this podcast today. And welcome back to the podcast, Michael Watson.

Michael Watson 0:19

Hellooooooo. how are you going?

Stephanie Fornasier 0:21

How.. That's a loaded question now. But how are you today?

Michael Watson 0:26

Fine. Not too bad.

Stephanie Fornasier 0:29

We've had a little bit of a hiatus since I last recorded an episode. And I thought I'd bring you on the podcast today because it's gonna take a little while to get back to our normal programming.

Michael Watson 0:42

Fair enough.

Stephanie Fornasier 0:42

Most people will be aware by now there's been a death in the family, which is our beloved Nic Fornasier. How you going throughout this time, Michael?

Michael Watson 0:53

It's difficult. In the in the grief, thick, in the thick of the grief.

Stephanie Fornasier 0:59

Thick of the grief.

Michael Watson 0:59

Are you in the thick of the grief?

Stephanie Fornasier 1:01

Thick of the grief, yeah.

Michael Watson 1:02

feeling it?

Stephanie Fornasier 1:03

Yeah, we've had like, celebrations of his life. One in Brisbane and one coming up in Melbourne. So it's... kind of feels like once that's all done, then it will get thicker in the grief, I recko.

Michael Watson 1:18

Yeah, it is a bit of a weird feeling when you come out the end of the ceremonies,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:23

I guess it gives you something to focus on for a bit and have his, have him around in that way. So when that's over, I'm sort of like life as normal but without Nic, I think it's gonna hit... it's gonna hit me hard, I think yeah,

Michael Watson 1:36

yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:36

Is there anything else you want to share?

Michael Watson 1:38

Nothing to add, but you talk about it as much as you want to.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:42

I think I think there'll be a time where we we talk about our experience of grief on the podcast a little bit more. But I think while we're thick in the thick of it, it's the time is not now

Michael Watson 1:54

Probably. Yeah, fair enough.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:55

Which is a good reason also, that I wanted you to be on the podcast today. Because if I cry suddenly, it's okay. You're my safe person.

Michael Watson 2:04

I'll just make sounds to mask your sobbing. Like, uhh, uh, uh, what's in the news today? And I'll spin my bow tie.

Stephanie Fornasier 2:14

I thought you were gonna be like, do some beatboxing, like *clicks her tongue a few times*

Michael Watson 2:18

Yeah, some ASMR ought to drown out the sound of your tears dropping on the table.

Stephanie Fornasier 2:24

I thought we'd kick off our regular programming with something that was extremely topical a few weeks ago, has kind of died down since but... why not? Let's do it anyway. we finally watched Stutz. Is that how you say it, Stutz? *pronounced with soft U* *then hard U*

Michael Watson 2:41

Stutz, Stutz *with hard U* I would have thought Stutz *hard u* I don't know.

Stephanie Fornasier 2:45

So it's a documentary that Jonah Hill made about his psychiatrist. Last year in 2022. And it's a Netflix film.

Michael Watson 2:55

On hearing that that had happened. I remember when it first came out on Netflix, I had some like semi erect red flags. Just p... poking through my pants.

Stephanie Fornasier 3:07

What were your red flags?

Michael Watson 3:08

Why would you make a documentary about your psychiatrist?

Stephanie Fornasier 3:13

I think anyone who thinks they want that's a good idea.... And he questions that himself. There's something going on there.

Michael Watson 3:20

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 3:21

But I guess the reason why we're focusing on this now is that there's been some leaked texts between Jonah Hill and his then girlfriend, Sarah Brady, which highlighted some real toxic relationship patterns. And given that this film came out last year, and this would be around the time that these texts were sent, it's a really good opportunity to delve into some of the psyche of this film, in the context of these texts, I guess. We don't usually do many documentaries. But this is a documentary that Jonah Hill really wanted to make about therapy and about the process of therapy, given what he has gone through in his life. So he's deciding to display that to the world. And now we're getting a sense of who He really is through those texts and where he's applied that therapy. So you can't not delve into it. It's just perfect for our purposes.

Michael Watson 4:17

Yes.

Stephanie Fornasier 4:18

And I thought it'd be interesting to hear your take from a man's perspective who I respect who I consider a bit of a feminist,

Michael Watson 4:25

thank you. I consider... I'm more than a bit... Am I more than a bit of a feminist?

Stephanie Fornasier 4:29

Well I hope so.

Michael Watson 4:30

Okay. You hope so, But yet to be proven,

Stephanie Fornasier 4:33

Oh you know, anyone who goes, I'm a feminist, like, okay. But also the fact that you're looking into doing psychiatry as well. So yes, I thought you'd be very relevant for this.

Michael Watson 4:47

Well, yeah, I do like therapeutic relationship stuff. And I think that this is an example of probably a not so good one.

Stephanie Fornasier 4:54

A questionable one, Yes, I think there's pros and cons which we'll get to

Michael Watson 4:59

this is actually the first time I've read the incriminating texts.

Stephanie Fornasier 5:03

Oooh this is grat. Okay, let's talk about the texts first. So I guess some context, Sarah Brady dated Jonah Hill between 2021 and 2022. She is a semi professional surfer and a law student. She is 26 years old. And Jody Hill was 39. So she leaked a number of texts. I think it was about end of June and beginning of July that Jonah's sent her when they were dating, to post him demanding that she delete photos of her Instagram of her surfing. So he was already engaging in some controlling behavior of determining what she could and couldn't post on Instagram. And then I'm not going to read out all the texts, but the biggest most incriminating text was him outlining what he called his boundaries for her. So I'll read that text for you. It goes, "if you need surfing with men, boundaryless inappropriate friendships with men, to model to post pictures of yourself in a bathing suit, to post sexual pictures, friendships with women who are in unstable places and from your wild recent past, beyond getting a lunch or coffee or something respectful, I am not the right partner for you. If these things bring you to a place of happiness, I support it. And there'll be no hard feelings. These are my boundaries for a romantic partnership".

So there were more texts that were leaked, which which continue to paint a picture of him kind of weaponizing therapy speak as the news outlets called it and people who made commentary on them. Definitely, his manner seemed very toxic, and emotionally manipulative, and frankly, abusive, because he was also asking her to stop surfing, which is something that he was she was clearly doing before she dated him. And he had actually liked the photos that he was asking her to remove before they started dating. So it's very much that case of I like you because you're, you're wild and you're, you're cool, and you're free. But now I'm dating you, you can't be that anymore.

Michael Watson 7:03

I'm here to tame you. Mmm.

Stephanie Fornasier 7:04

Exactly mmm. So give me your thoughts on that text.

Michael Watson 7:11

I don't like it.

Stephanie Fornasier 7:12

No.

Michael Watson 7:12

And I think the kicker is the last thing where like, it's probably a good thing to be like X, Y, Z, don't do these things. If you want to be with me, I'm putting it up front, if that's what you want to do, bye. that's a good thing. I think that's a good way to manage the relationship, but not when those things are like seek gainful employment. Associate with 50% of the world's population-ship, population. And, you know, imposing restrictions on someone's body and autonomy.

Stephanie Fornasier 7:43

And freedom. Yeah.

Michael Watson 7:44

Yeah. So it's a bit, it's a bit sick. And I do agree that it is trying to weaponize boundaries, which Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 7:53

should we explain, I guess what a boundary is? Yeah.

Michael Watson 7:55

Yes, yeah. Well, I mean, from my personal experience of therapy, as somebody who's a bit of a doormat, boundaries is 99% of what I have ever spoken to a psychologist about.

Stephanie Fornasier 8:09

I've also spoken a lot about boundaries, not in the context of being in a relationship with you

Michael Watson 8:15

You're talking about my boundaries!

Stephanie Fornasier 8:17

I'm imposing my boundaries on to you. So what would you say isn't a is a boundary? How would you describe a boundary?

Michael Watson 8:24

I don't know how to succinctly it's just like, you need to know your values, and what you need to be safe in a relationship or workplace or whatever. And when those things are threatened, you need to be able to say to the other party, hi, you've done this, I don't let people do that. Please don't do that.

Stephanie Fornasier 8:47

I think that I guess that's a way to describe your needs and your values. But boundaries are really not something you can put, tell someone else to do. They're controlling your own behaviors, you can't impose a boundary or on to change someone else's behavior, it's for you to change your behavior. So

Michael Watson 9:09

I've spent 1000s of dollars on this, and I've got it wrong.

Stephanie Fornasier 9:12

Don't worry, it's taken me a while to get to that as well. For an example, I've came up with come up with a couple of examples. One would be like if you're in a relationship, and to keep yourself feeling safe and protected in that relationship, you might not feel comfortable, say giving a partner key to your apartment until you've been dating for a certain period of time, like six months or a year. So you your behavior in that would be giving that key to your partner so that they can come and go whenever they please or whatever. So it's your action your controlling, not theirs. Which would, I guess would be an overt boundary. So like, your partner might be like, Hey, can I just cut a key? And you might be like, No, I'm not comfortable with that yet. So that's your boundary that you're asserting there. So they're asking you if you can do that, and you're saying no, I'm not comfortable. An example of maybe a covert or maybe a little bit less explicit boundary, or like a soft boundary would be, say you had a family member, or a friend that you enjoy spending time with, but they had a lot of needs, emotional needs, so they left you quite exhausted at the end of time that you spent with them. This is not a person in real life, I just need to make that very clear. This family member or friend does not exist in my life

Michael Watson 10:30

Any similarities to any person, living or dead, it's purely coincidencal.

Stephanie Fornasier 10:32

Purely coincidence, coincidental. So if any of my friends or family members are going, is that me, it's not you. Okay? So after you spend time with them, your energy is really depleted. So you might decide to set yourself some boundaries around this person that you only spend time with them. When it's only a short period of time, or you're doing something as a buffer, like seeing a movie. Or you make sure you catch up with them in advance, rather than just last minute, because you might not have the spoons or the energy to hang out with them. If you're sick or like just mentally depleted, and they asked to catch up, you would say no to that request, to protect your own energy. So that would be imposing some boundaries, you're not necessarily telling that person that this is my boundary, you're just putting some, I guess, rules for yourself around spending time with that person that they don't necessarily have to be aware of which continues your relationship with that person, but also protects your own energy, I guess, at that time, because some, you know, sometimes you need to sort of compromise some things in that, like your own values of of having, being a supportive friend, but also your value of supporting your own mental health needs, for example. Does that make sense?

Michael Watson 11:45

Yeah, it's like how I ghosted my dad. *Steph laughs*

Stephanie Fornasier 11:49

In that context, what do you think Jonah is implying boundaries are in this text exchange?

Michael Watson 11:57

Well, I guess if you conceive of boundaries as something that affects your behavior, that's not at all what he's doing. I mean, I guess in a sense, if she was to violate those boundaries, his behavior would be to end the relationship.

Stephanie Fornasier 12:10

Yeah.

Michael Watson 12:11

So in that sense, it is a boundary, but the boundary can't be dictating how another person behaves.

Stephanie Fornasier 12:19

No. Particularly when, like, you can't anyway, but particularly when she was behaving that way, before they started dating, and he accepted that behavior before they started dating.

Michael Watson 12:30

And none of the behavior is wrong... or hurting anybody.

Stephanie Fornasier 12:32

It's not even behavior. No. Exactly. It's really just controlling. Weirdly, Vogue had a really good description of articulating boundaries

Michael Watson 12:41

Vogue is good shit,. What do you mean, weirdly, Vogue?

Stephanie Fornasier 12:43

I dunno I just I don't think of Vogue as like feminist tomes. So they say for me, articulating boundaries means accurately identifying people places or things that test your moral truth, personal safety or emotional well being, in order to make the decision to either challenge the overstep or remove yourself from the situation entirely. They're not a way to stop your partner surfing with men or modeling. They're not a device to contain another person's actions to control them. And it's a really good article to read, because it really goes through how it's a bit of a Softboi quote, unquote, technique of being like, they'll argue your autonomy away. They say with like logic and emotional upfront, so it looks like they're being really emotionally available and mature. But they're just using open speak to actually control you with that image of being emotionally mature. I think we know some people across the years who have been like that *laughs*

Michael Watson 13:41

Is it unique to men?

Stephanie Fornasier 13:43

No of course not. But I think there's a bit of a trend, or maybe it's not a trend, maybe it's always been there of toxic masculinity being sort of slipped in under the cover of being a feminist voice of like, Oh, I'm in touch with my emotions, and I can I want to talk about my emotions. But then, when you actually look at what they're requesting, from that, it's just the same toxic masculinity thats always been there.

Michael Watson 14:08

I guess we live in a patriarchy that's malignant and always finding new techniques to

Stephanie Fornasier 14:15

New weapons. Yeah.

Michael Watson 14:16

Mm mm. Interesting.

Stephanie Fornasier 14:18

After that text, she continued to leak some more texts, as well, once they broke up. I'm not sure about the timeline, to be honest. But it seems like he kept Sarah as a friend for five or six months, but they had sexts and things like that

Michael Watson 14:33

Sex!?

Stephanie Fornasier 14:34

Sexts.

Michael Watson 14:35

Oh sexts, sexts.

Stephanie Fornasier 14:39

Sexy texts! No sex-t-s. Sixy tixts. And a month or so after one of them last second. He had a new girlfriend and they were photographed and magazines thought it was there. And not long after that she got pregnant and Jonah's now a dad, has a baby. Did you know that?

Michael Watson 14:55

I didn't.

Stephanie Fornasier 14:56

It was a very short period of time between those two relationships or at least between connection with Sarah and this new relationship. So she, she sort of disclosed that he kept her as an emotional.. close emotional confidant after the breakup. So she says sexting sex-t-ing me on July 13, visiting her at our apartment in our hometown early August, and then waited a week till after she moved to Hawaii for law school to send him a text being like, by the way, I'm in a new relationship. And she has leaked all the texts that they sent between that which I won't go through, but it continues that line of therapeutic weaponization, he gaslights her so much. She feels quite hurt and used for that emotional Reliance as well as the sext-ing before he moves on to a new girlfriend. And he just denies all of that. And then when she sends him screenshots of like, well, this is the last time we had a sexy text. He accuses her of like attacking him and hurting him by screenshotting. And then she went on to leak all of these texts to the public. So you know.. *laugh* it's very much painting himself as the victim, and just being nothing but kind to her this whole time and just being a friend, and just really questioning the reality and making her question herself. And men are very good at doing this. Not all, not all men hashtag but was this is this is a common theme in relationships. I've dated someone like this. And you know, doesn't mean that women can't do it as well. But it was really interesting how she shared this with everyone and so many people like, yes, this has happened to me, and I questioned it. And I wondered if I was in the wrong, but now I can see that, Yeah, this is abusive and manipulative. So it's been huge, and doesn't make Jonah look very good at all.

Michael Watson 16:48

Has Jonah responded to all of this,

Stephanie Fornasier 16:50

I can't see any formal response from Jonah Hill, which is probably what his PR team are suggesting he does. Who knows?

Michael Watson 16:58

Seems like the best approach well, in terms of avoiding.

Stephanie Fornasier 17:03

And this is why we're what I want to talk about Stutz because he's just had a very successful documentary, where he explains his years of therapy with one of the best psychiatrists in the world. And, you know, spent an hour and a half of screen time, showing everyone all these wonderful therapeutic techniques that has helped him so much. And then these texts have come out showing that, oh, he's got some fucking issues, mate. So what could you say? Like, I guess what he could do is apologize and say, I'm going to be better because like, you just showed us how you're better. You know what I mean?

Michael Watson 17:43

Yeah. Yeah And how does it reflect on poor Stutz?

Stephanie Fornasier 17:47

Well, should we go through Stutz?

Michael Watson 17:49

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 17:50

So we're gonna we're gonna talk about the plot of Stutz. You know, it's a documentary but you know, a rough plot. One of the things from it, what do we learn from it and what sort of reviews or criticism Stutz got do you want to read the plot for me, Michael which I got off Wikipedia?

Michael Watson 18:05

Yeah. Thank you Wikipedia

Stephanie Fornasier 18:08

Thank you Wiki.

Michael Watson 18:09

Phil Stutz (hard u).. Stuhtz (soft u) Stuzzy... is one of the world's leading psychiatrists. He's helped countless patients over 40 years including world class creatives and business leaders, and among them many therapy skeptics, directed by friend and patient, red flag Jonah Hill, the film explores Stutz his life and walks the viewer through his signature visualization exercises, known as the tools that would have been a good name for this movie. As Hill sits down with Stutz for an unorthodox session that flips the typical doctor patient dynamic. They bring the tools to life in a humorous, vulnerable and ultimately therapeutic experience. Featuring candid discussion of both Stutz and Hills personal mental health journeys, alongside the lighthearted banter of two friends from different generations. The film beautifully frames the tools and the journey towards mental health in a manner that's accessible to anybody whether or not they're actively seeking help.

Thank you very much for that, Mikey boy. When we sat down and watched, I was like, Michael, we're gonna watch Stutz and it's going to be completely unrelated to anything that's going on in our life right now.

Where was the trigger warning for dual brother death?

Stephanie Fornasier 19:21

Literally the thing that has happened in our life? And you know, that's on us for not looking, on me for not googling it.

Michael Watson 19:30

It's quite funny, though.

Stephanie Fornasier 19:31

So because Indiewire sort of describes it is Jonah Hill, finding a workaround to make a movie about his brother's death without making a movie about his brother's death, which is Stutz. so for the purposes of today, let's not focus on the brother's death. Apart from that it was there and it made us very sad.

Michael Watson 19:55

Yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah. The the the The depths of both stutters and hills brothers are kind of, you know, very much at the forefront of the film. I would question though, whether he is... I mean, maybe subconsciously, he's trying to find a workaround to make a movie about his brother. But the very explicitly stated aim of Jonah is to share, I think these are almost directly his words, to share Stutz's teachings with others, and to honor Stutz

Stephanie Fornasier 20:28

and to like, celebrate this man that he respects so much. Yeah, that's what he or maybe it maybe the, we're sort of analyzing Jonah in this way. But that's, you know, what he says that he sets out to do

Michael Watson 20:42

well, nobody else is analyzing Jonah.

Stephanie Fornasier 20:46

I've never seen.

Michael Watson 20:46

Sorry forgive me... Stutz is good.

Stephanie Fornasier 20:49

So I sort of wrote down some of the therapeutic concepts that Strutz uses. And I think a lot of people found this documentary really, really useful. And the way Jonah talks about, you know, you use these really unique concepts that are very specific. And I just want everyone to know what they are. But I just really need to say, and they're part of a book that Strutz published with a co author in 2013, called the tools. But when you actually look at what the tools are, they're not new. They're not groundbreaking. Very similar concepts to Gestalt therapy, narrative therapy, a lot of them very Jungian, some schema therapy concepts in there. And a lot of Acceptance and Commitment Training stuff in there, or mindfulness sort of concepts.

Michael Watson 21:40

Yeah. And Hill kind of goes, you know, I've been to therapists before, and all they do is listen to you and ask how that makes you feel. And they never tell you to do anything, but you tell me what to do.

Stephanie Fornasier 21:55

And that's, "that's unique. And that's different". And it's not.

Michael Watson 21:58

It's not. It's not

Stephanie Fornasier 21:59

it's just a different way of doing therapy, that there are lots of directive psychology psychologists or therapists out there that do it that way, but not everyone does. And it's generally not what you're necessarily suggested you do when you when you train to be a therapist, for lots of good reasons. But yeah, he very, is very dismissive of usual therapists, which I find annoying.

Michael Watson 22:23

Yeah, it's a little bit narcissistic. I found, even though he's likable, and you know, I like the approach for mild to moderate high prevalence conditions.

Stephanie Fornasier 22:38

Emphasis on mild to moderate. Yeah.

Michael Watson 22:41

Like, yeah, he talked himself up in a way that didn't really match how revolutionary what he's actually saying is like, he's a bit of a Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 22:51

Yes. And it comes across as a lot of softboi types that I've come across, who will go, I read this book, and it's just blown my mind and just teaching me new, like you've got to learn it. And it's like, a little bit culty and a little bit flavour of the month

Michael Watson 23:07

It's got a.. It's got that like new agey-ness to it. But it's also just bread and butter..

Stephanie Fornasier 23:13

regurgitated

Michael Watson 23:14

thought feeling behaviour triad, like..

Stephanie Fornasier 23:16

exactly. I wanted to go through a few of the tools if that's okay.

Michael Watson 23:20

Yeah, there seems there are a lot.

Stephanie Fornasier 23:22

There are a lot but like they've all got fancy words and names, but they're not fancy. Yeah. So for example, the first one he says is lifeforce, which, you know, he divides into physical body, others and yourself. And it is literally just Maslow's pyramid of human needs, which we all learn about not just in psychology just in life. But he says things like if you take care of the physical part of your your being that will increase your well being by 85%. And this amazing article, I'll link that really goes through their critiques of Stutz's approach, in the film says like, where did he get that from?

Michael Watson 24:01

Well, yeah, I don't, I read a Conversation article that we'll link that said it's like not that outrageous a claim. But to say that,

Stephanie Fornasier 24:13

I mean, yeah, your diet and exercise if you improve those, you do get better in some ways.

Michael Watson 24:16

Of course! And you can go to a GP for that advice. Yeah. And not pay for a celebrity psychiatrist. Yeah. But it's interesting, though, because, you know, say Stutz his objective is to get you to 100% improvement in well being 85% of that is diet, exercise and sleep. So he's not... He's not doing that much.

Stephanie Fornasier 24:39

You're paying, you're paying a lot of money for 15%. Yeah, but also no one gets to 100%. No, that's not achievable. And how do you even measure that? You can't. But I just want to say that that is not unique. Obviously, a psych psychotherapist psychologist isn't there to help you achieve physical well being you would go to a GP for that you might go to a dietitian or any kind of medical professional specializing in that field. But I will always in intake and most counselors, therapists, anyone in that field would ask all those questions about their well being in your intake session looking at, you know, how's the alcohol intake drug intake coffee? How much sleep are they getting, how much exercise they're getting you, you do that, you do that to develop a picture of that person's life and then go, okay, so, you know, it's also in line with your values, you want to get more exercise in, okay let's work on that. And that is part of it. That is very much part of, you know, if you're a good therapist, you would focus on that stuff. It's not unique to Stutz. So the other thing that he talks about is part x, which he uses a fancy word for. The term x is going to become out of fashion, though, because Elon Musk has turned twitter into X now so we don't wanna

Yeah it would be better as Part Meta... or Part Uber...

Wrrr. which he calls like, the pot that blocks one's progress, which is just resistance. Yeah, everyone has that resistance part of themselves? Or, you know, difficulty transitioning? Yeah, that's not a new concept either.

Michael Watson 26:15

So but define resistance, it's just resistance to improvement and change?

Stephanie Fornasier 26:19

To change. resistance to change. Yeah, there's a whole therapy modality that's all about that, which is motivational interviewing,

Michael Watson 26:25

rolling with the resistance.

Stephanie Fornasier 26:26

rolling with the resistance.

Michael Watson 26:28

yeah cool

Stephanie Fornasier 26:28

So that, you know, part x, there's so much work that's been put into that that Stutz didn't create.

Michael Watson 26:34

Yeah, and I think we'll see this theme coming through is that motivational interviewing is very specifically about tricking people into doing what you want them to do like quitting smoking. Yeah. and Things. Yeah. Whereas stutters approach is

Stephanie Fornasier 26:48

telling youto stop.. or do it yeah

Michael Watson 26:51

telling you what to do. . Yeah. So he very much has really just cherry picked a lot of concepts from a lot of this stuff.

Stephanie Fornasier 26:58

which a lot of therapists do

Michael Watson 26:58

Well, yeah, there's nothing wrong with it. And it's, it's probably a good thing. Like, you don't want to be married to one particular thing.

Stephanie Fornasier 27:06

No, because it doesn't work for everyone

Michael Watson 27:07

everything has strengths, its strengths and weaknesses.

Stephanie Fornasier 27:10

Exactly. And it's good to be holistic and flexible with your client. So Stutz may well have done that. But it sounds like he's marketing or these things, that he's paired together as a unique set of tools.

Michael Watson 27:23

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 27:23

Which people do all the time. That's fine. The other The next one is the shadow. I'm curious as to what you thought about this, the shadow is the inner part of ourselves that holds the negative embarrassing aspects about us. the aspects that we want to hide from the world, and Stutz got Jonah to carry in like a cardboard shadow Jonah, which was essentially just him when he was a fatter younger version of himself that he was embarrassed about? What were your thoughts on that?

Michael Watson 27:51

I mean, it makes sense. Everybody hates themself to some extent. And self hate is presumably based on an unrealistically negative perception of some part about you. And if you're going to progress in the world, then you're kind of going to be behaving in a way that you think is kind of antithetical to that, that hated image of yourself. Yeah. So you know, it's true. Yeah. To an extent, it's true,

Stephanie Fornasier 28:20

I was curious about how Jonah used that concept. And I feel like maybe he could have done better with it. Because, you know, the fact that it was his younger, fatter self, he still seemed so embarrassed, and it was very, very about you about what he looks like, was about his looks and his physicality. And he, you know, felt really, you know, his feelings were related around that. And, you know, I just thought there could have been more around you know, why does it matter how big you were, like, Isn't it about how you feel inside and try and love that part of yourself as well. And he just seemed to have a lot of body image issues still, and not wanting to see that part of him. And you know, if I was to think about my shadow, it would be the the inner bitch and yeah and the inner person who gets too frustrated and angry, and doesn't listen or something like that. It's not really about what I look like. I just thought that was interesting the way it was conceptualized.

Michael Watson 29:16

I mean, you know, obviously now, if Jonah Hill made Stutz now he bring out a two by four printout of the texts.

Stephanie Fornasier 29:24

Or would he be like, that's fine? They're lifeforce.

Michael Watson 29:33

No, but you know, I, a lot of the doco was him coming to terms with issues with body image. Yeah. And I thought it made sense that that was who he would. That that was his shadow. It is quite superficial. I see what you're saying.

Stephanie Fornasier 29:50

I just feel like... Yeah that's what I.. That's how I viewed I thought it was just a bit too like 2d.

Michael Watson 29:54

Yeah, yeah. I agree. And but like, I think that this film despite giving off The appearance of being a, you know, 100% candid confessional piece. I think he does very much keep you at arm's length. the entire time.

Stephanie Fornasier 30:09

Yes, yes, completely agree.

Michael Watson 30:11

And I think it's very easy. And, you know, disclaimer, this applies to everything that we say today. I don't want to say to Jonah Hill, well, maybe that isn't your shadow, because you know, I have no right to say that. I don't know him.

Stephanie Fornasier 30:25

Yeah exactly thats' fine

Michael Watson 30:25

But also, I do kind of think it's like, there's gotta be more to it than that,

Stephanie Fornasier 30:30

surely. Yeah. And of course

Michael Watson 30:31

And there's lots of things missing from the film that make you wonder, like, there's something else going on

Stephanie Fornasier 30:37

What else is going on there? And you know, it was recorded, it was filmed over two years. So there was obviously a lot that ended up on the cutting room floor that we didn't see. So we're only seeing what they've provided to us. Yeah. Which is fair, because it's essentially therapy on screen. But yeah, I just thought the shadow wasn't fleshed out enough. But again, not not a new concept at all.

Michael Watson 31:01

Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 31:01

There's also the snapshot, which again, is nothing new. It's like the realm of illusions, or the perfect world imagined by a client. That's very Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.

Michael Watson 31:11

I wrote this down. Yeah. So part x is what makes the snapshot, which is like, the perfect world that somebody strives for, but that's never going to be possible. Yeah. And that's what cripples you in the moment. Or hamstrings you in the moment, because you're never gonna get there. So why try? Yeah,

Stephanie Fornasier 31:32

yeah. And I think

Michael Watson 31:33

that that's, this is an established thing, is it?

Stephanie Fornasier 31:36

well yeah I think in terms of ACT, it would be sort of that resistance to just being in the moment, and you know, striving for something that you'll never achieve striving for happiness, the happiness trap, hello, that's a book about ACT!

Michael Watson 31:51

by Russ Tamblyn.

Stephanie Fornasier 31:53

By Russ! No! Russ Tamblyn!? Russ Harris. you know, the more you strive for that snapshot, the more unhappy you'll be. And you'll be caught up with the shoulds and the musts, rather than just being, experiencing the now. So yeah, very similar

Michael Watson 32:10

yeah

Stephanie Fornasier 32:11

which is similar to the next concept, which is the maze, which is essentially when you're stuck in the maze, and you keep going over and over a problem and going through like a mouse in a maze that never gets to the end, which is essentially what rumination is. So when you keep talking over and over a problem, and not actually getting to any solution, or you can't let go of something that is very much defusion getting stuck, which is an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy thing.

Michael Watson 32:38

I mean, again, it all resonates with me as true, you know, like, you don't want to be ruminating on things that happened in the past, and demanding some kind of different outcome or revenge or something that's never ever going to happen. And you know, that's something that I do. So it's nice to see some of these things discussed, even if they're new.

Stephanie Fornasier 32:38

I think what concerns the author of the article that I read about it, and also I agree with is that struts is like, this is what this is, and this is the word we give for this. And this is unique to how I conceptualize this, no one else knows this sort of thing. Like, yeah, so many people have been given, you know, this concept. So obviously, it's accessible through this film, but it also makes it like secret and special one that's like everyone, there's no secret here. We can all learn these techniques.

Michael Watson 33:29

But that's why stutz is a celebrity psychiatrist

Stephanie Fornasier 33:32

Exactly. he's got to have a reason to charge so much.

Michael Watson 33:36

Yeah. I mean, I'm skeptical of anybody who becomes this type of psychiatrist who writes books and devises something with all these gimmicks, and whatever. So yeah, the fact that it he marketed as something exclusive and new. It's all just marketing. And it justifies the price tag, which I'm certain is hefty, exorbitant?

Stephanie Fornasier 34:01

Hefty. Yes. but take money out of celebrities, i don't care

Michael Watson 34:05

I'd like to know how much it costs.

Stephanie Fornasier 34:06

But I guess if you're watching this film, and saying, Oh, wow, this really resonates I really want to learn all these techniques, but I'm not going to be able to go to Stutz, are damn it's like, well, if you just go to your, you know, friendly neighborhood psychologist that can probably do all this stuff with you. So, you know, it could send a message that this is an exclusive time to get good therapy. You need someone like Stutz when that's not the case. Have you found out?

Michael Watson 34:34

in 2011 he was charging up to $400 an hour. US it's pretty expensive. It's very expensive. And that's in 2011. Yeah, so

Stephanie Fornasier 34:46

10 years later. Spensive spenny. So the next concept is active love, which is essentially just compassion for anyone even if you don't like them, which you know, it's very Buddhist calm. except but it's also involved in act as well, including self compassion, act being acceptance, Commitment Therapy, radical acceptance, which is like extracting the valuable element out of any negative context, which is essentially just positive reframing, which is a cognitive behavior therapy technique.

Michael Watson 35:17

I mean, yeah, it's just like, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. Or, you know, Silver Linings

Stephanie Fornasier 35:27

Sticks and stones may break my bones. But yeah, the grateful flow, which is listing and creating things that you're grateful for, which, like it's been, was popularized by Kikki K. And grateful journals. Like, it's obviously not very new. Yeah, loss processing, which was the last sort of thing they went through, which is he kind of lost me with that visualization scenario with suns.

Michael Watson 35:48

So it's like a visualization of letting go of something that you're too attached to, then something happens and you fall into the sun, and become a part of a universe that's made up of infinite suns, which is called the sun world. What. But the aim is not to have anything that you're so attached to that losing it would mean, you die like,

Stephanie Fornasier 36:13

well, that's essentially existential psychology.

Michael Watson 36:15

Yeah, it's just Buddhism. It's just Yeah. Non attachment. Yeah. Because, you know, the Buddhism is desire is the root of all suffering. Yeah. Suffering. I'm a sucker for this young Buddhist chip. People. I like, realization, it makes no sense. But I like it.

Stephanie Fornasier 36:36

I just got a bit confused. A lot. Yeah. Again, not new. Yes. Yeah. So we've gone through the tools, essentially, it's a very less structured version of psychotherapy. Like, this article talks about how that, you know, this chair next to each other, which is just very common. therapy can be done in very flexible ways. That doesn't make it new. It's quite frequent and long term, which always raises red flags for me, if you have to go to your psychologist, like, it sounds like they, there are once a week and maybe more than once a week, which is a very psychodynamic kind of therapy, where you see your psychologist a lot more, which is very fucking expensive. No one can afford that. Obviously, Jonah Hill can, but also having that long term, like, how long have they seen each other for like, 10 years?

Michael Watson 37:26

Well, he says that they've been seeing each other for five years, five years. Filming for two. So

Stephanie Fornasier 37:32

So seeing Yes. Yeah, so seeing a psychologist that regularly and for that long, like, to me what you want from therapy for your therapist is that they don't need you anymore. Because you've you fix them? No, you're not going to fix them. But you know, they've developed their own strategies. They're they're able to regulate themselves independently, which is the tools you want to give them to be able to do, which is the whole purpose of the tools that struts provides. So it's a big red flag that they're still seeing each other after years and years quite frequently. And that suggests to me codependence, which isn't great. It's not good.

Michael Watson 38:12

I think we'll talk about codependence Okay. is are we going to talk about it now or later?

Stephanie Fornasier 38:18

We actually we talked about that next. Yeah. Is that okay? Yeah. Another difference in the delivery of this therapy is that Stutz is so proactive, as we were saying, like giving them actionable advice as early as their first session. And it can be seen as a little bit like cultish like, life coach you like just do this? Come on, do it. Yeah. And oh, it worked. Wow. And I'm curious, like sort of thing. And I think there's benefits in that in as you develop rapport, giving them a little bit of working on a little thing that see some change, or some some positive outcome to sort of help your client test the waters and say that, you know, they feel comfortable with you. That makes sense. But it sounds like that's all this approach is that proactive sort of thing. Yeah. And lastly, in terms of the way he delivers his therapy, the cards, I think visuals are great. I used to use them in therapy all the time. They can be really powerful to deliver a concept and they can be more accessible than talking at a client about something and helps them take something home and reflect on it. However, there's some criticism that it inserts the therapist in that person's life in terms of their style and their visuals. And it could be more empowering for the client to do their own drawings, which is true. That's that would be a better way to do it. What are your thoughts on the visuals?

Michael Watson 39:35

Yeah, you know, I've seen lots of therapists work with drawing and I think it's a really good I think it's a good thing to do. I don't know. I mean, the stutters thing is that he has a brand and a product. And part of that is the cards. So inserting himself into the person's life. Well, that's kind of money objective. Yeah. But I don't think it's necessarily such a bad thing. My psychologist does drawings on telehealth, and then they're gone forever. And maybe I'd like to have

Stephanie Fornasier 40:06

that maybe you should take a photo of that.

Michael Watson 40:09

I just don't want him inserting himself into my life.

MUSIC BREAK

Stephanie Fornasier 40:18

So let's talk about the therapeutic relationship, because there's a lot to talk. Thank you. And you've been chomping at the bit. Here we go. So they're very close, they tell each other that they love them. Tell me all your thoughts.

Michael Watson 40:29

Yeah. I don't know where to start, because I have a lot of thoughts about this. And I think that their relationship is really inappropriate. And I think from the get go, the fact that Jonah wants to make a film that A is meant to be seen by as many people as possible, and B is to honor his therapist, I just think that's bizarre,

Stephanie Fornasier 40:54

it suggests that there's already been lots of compromise of that therapeutic relationship. It's clear that Jonah knows a lot about Stutz that most people don't know about their therapists, personal life, personal life, yeah, I don't see huge problem with sharing a little bit of your life with your client, I've shared little bits from my own life before, which is helpful to gain rapport with your client and make them feel like you've been through stuff to like, you're not just some plant that's come out of uni. Yeah. And also, you're human, and you, you know, you can empathize with their experiences. But there's a limit, there should be a limit. And, you know, you've got to, you've got to put some boundaries in how much you share with your client as a therapist, because you don't want that client to feel responsible for your feelings. And to feel like they have to hold your experiences and your feelings, because then that's the therapeutic relationship compromised. And that doesn't give your client the safety and the secure space, to be able to share whatever they need to with you. Because if they feel like they have to look after your feelings, they're not going to be as vulnerable with you. Yeah. Which is the real danger in sharing too much about your left.

Michael Watson 42:07

And do you think that Jonah is do you think they've crossed that boundary?

Stephanie Fornasier

100%

Michael Watson

Because they have, because later in the film, we start talking about Stutz's upbringing, what his mum was like, that his dad, his brother died, how he coped with that, how he got into medicine, I think talking about and doing drugs and things. And it's, it's just stuff that a patient shouldn't know, or elicit from their therapist,

Stephanie Fornasier 42:40

not within the therapeutic relationship, which they're in, obviously, you know, if you've finished up with a psychologist, and you want to, you want to stalk them, go for it, but find out about their life. You know, obviously, in this age, you're going to accidentally come across people that you might have done therapy with. I'm not saying I haven't stopped clients, I'm not allowed to do that. No, no. But within the walls of therapy, you should never feel like you have to put your feelings aside as a client to hold your therapists feelings, you pay them too much for that. And it's much harder for a client to make lasting change. And, you know, to feel safe with a therapist and registered sort of become vulnerable enough to then learn how to sort of make it make changes in their lives or in their thought patterns, etc. In order to eventually not need your therapist anymore. But if you're if there's a to and fro where you're being the therapist at the same time, then it's really hard to make change, I think, yeah. And Jonah, definitely they swap roles during the becomes a therapist with Stutz and asks him the questions and moves with his resistance and stuff like that. And that's like, A, that's dangerous for Jonah being a client and be Jonah's not a therapist. So that's actually quite dangerous for Stutz as well. If Jonah just kind of fucks up with his psyche.

Michael Watson 44:03

Well, Jonah coaches him through reaching out to a loss, you know, and I'm, again, off again, partner. Yeah. And encourages him to pursue that.

Stephanie Fornasier 44:14

Yeah. What is Jonah's authority and professional basis for that?

Michael Watson 44:19

I mean, it's fine, like a friend or family member can do to can suggest that to you, but it's just concerning to me that the relationship is such that that is on the table,

Stephanie Fornasier 44:32

and that's what Jonah is seeing it as Is he also being a therapist? Yeah, situation, helping each other therapy facing each other.

Michael Watson 44:40

And, you know, like I said earlier, I don't, I don't want to delve too much into Jonah's personality. But I also get a whiff of narcissism for him because like anything wants to be seen as giving stood a breakthrough. Yeah, talking about that relationship. And you know, he's not just like You know, stood to Jonah, like, strips makes me feel better. Well, I'm gonna make everyone feel better with this movie exactly like and it starts to raise this question for me in a psychodynamic sort of sense. So for background, they bring Jonah's mum onto the center. Yeah, she's she's been, you know, she knows what Jonah has been saying about her in session and things. And she kind of says, you know, it's, it's good for me to hear these things. And Jonah talks a lot about how her views on weight, shape some of the negative aspects of him, he offers her some critique. When she starts to offer some critique back, he changes the subject with a joke as far back

Stephanie Fornasier 45:48

as far as we're aware, because it's all very heavily edited. And it's very brief, which makes me think that it was a lot longer than what we saw.

Michael Watson 45:55

But the question that popped into my mind is, what is Jonah's dad? About? Like, where's Jonah's.. And I have no idea what the story is. But what is the story of Jonah's dad? Why isn't he there? Why is Jonah forming this inappropriately strong attachment to an older man?

Stephanie Fornasier 46:13

Daddy issue?

Michael Watson 46:14

I mean,

Stephanie Fornasier 46:16

I don't know. It's a dismissive, but it is

Michael Watson 46:18

super dismissive. And it's almost certainly not true. But stood should be able to recognize that that attachment is too strong. Yeah. And and I think once you get a whiff of that, yeah, you know, you need to step back. Yeah. If not refer on.

Stephanie Fornasier 46:34

Yeah, it's like we've said it in the Sopranos.

Michael Watson 46:38

Yes. Yes. Melfi.

Stephanie Fornasier 46:42

Dr Melfi, like her boundaries. were so strong compared to this real psychiatrist's. Yeah. Yeah, you're absolutely right. Because I felt like, even though they weren't saying anything to attack you like, you know, it could have been a lot worse. And I think Jonah's mom really handled it. Well. It just it felt very, not triangular, like it felt unbalanced, the power in the room, and it felt like she could feel very confronted by stoats and Jonah who have this weird pseudo relationship going on. And then sort of pointing at her and then him saying you wanted to bang her as a joke? Like, that was really inappropriate. Yeah, like, it's nice to show.

Michael Watson 47:24

It's funny to watch in movies. Like, you know, I thought their little jig swearing at each other and don't dump your shit on me and stuff. Like, I thought that was fun.

Stephanie Fornasier 47:35

I don't mind swearing. I'm a therapist that swears and it often breaks a lot of the tension and makes someone feel a lot more comfortable.

Michael Watson 47:43

Yeah. And, you know, I'd be willing to give Stutz the benefit of the doubt and say that he's recognized what Joan is like, and uses that as a tool to continue their report. Yeah. But, I mean, is it ever appropriate to get, say, somebody's mum, or somebody that they've had difficulty with in their life into a session?

Stephanie Fornasier 48:05

Yes, it can be useful. But I think there needs to be a balance in the room that wasn't there.

Michael Watson 48:11

yeah, like, hey, we made this joke about you

Stephanie Fornasier 48:14

there needs to be a purpose and a reason like there needs in it can't just relate, let's just see what happens for the film. Which also, you know, treads the line of, were we watching therapy in the film? Or were we just watching a documentary? Because, you know, was this part of his therapy? Every session that we saw filmed? Was Jonah being charged for them?

Michael Watson 48:36

next question, next question, you know, and then

Stephanie Fornasier 48:39

that blurs the boundaries of ethical-ness of this whole thing.

Michael Watson 48:44

I mean, I want to ask, and I think this is a really important question. And actually, it's not it's a really straightforward question. Now that I'm saying it out loud. Is it ever appropriate to enter into some sort of commercial venture with a client

Stephanie Fornasier

you're not supposed to?

Michael Watson

And of course your fucking if this happened in Australia, you know, AHPRA would be investigating Stutz

Stephanie Fornasier 49:07

Well, what about Stutz's other clients who see him every day and then then go watch this movie? Or they just say don't watch the movie? Because, you know, it might compromise how you feel about the therapy we've been doing? There's no thought of the impact of other clients that strict has. Yeah. Which is why we don't go and broadcast our therapy sessions to the world. Yeah.

Michael Watson 49:34

I feel really weird watching my psychologists talk to somebody else. I but I think it's maybe just part of my I think I think I'm just being weird.

Stephanie Fornasier 49:44

No, I don't think you're being weird at all.

Michael Watson 49:46

But that's my report.

Stephanie Fornasier 49:50

But that's the whole point. And what we know about what leads to good outcomes is it's the unique therapeutic relationship you have with your your therapist. that helps you to feel better off for symptoms to improve or make making life changes that are positive.

Michael Watson 50:08

I mean, I think that's something is secret. Yeah. And I think that's something that can be said in Stutz's favor is that I remember hearing probably you told me that if the trust is the foundation of the therapeutic relationship, and an even if somebody's practicing Reiki or something that's, you know, the opposite of evidence based, if you trust and have a good therapeutic relationship with the clinician, you will get some improvements. So yeah, so you know, we can critique the theory. The tools are

Stephanie Fornasier 50:40

the tools are good. They're just not new. Yeah, yeah. But you're right, yeah, we can critique the tools and the modality, but it's the relationship that matters, which is clearly there.

Michael Watson 50:49

And you know, if Jonah is getting the benefit of just his unique relationship with students, then broadcasting that to the masses isn't going to help them because they don't have that relationship unless they're forming like a parasocial type of attachment to

Stephanie Fornasier 51:06

which is very common. Yeah, yeah. Um, but yeah, there's someone who's already in a therapeutic relationship with shorts could feel very uncomfortable about this.

Michael Watson 51:14

And rightly so. Yeah. Yeah. Agreed.

Stephanie Fornasier 51:17

But having said that, the concept of the documentary, I'm not mad about it. If somebody is encouraged to go get therapy from this documentary, that's great. If they're a fan of Jonah Hill, again, if he can do it, so can I That's brilliant.

Michael Watson 51:30

Yeah. If this misogynist can do it. Yeah, for sure. And I found some of the discussion. I was like, Yeah, you know, this is good. This is good stuff. And I thought about it for a while. And it reaffirms some things that I hadn't thought about in a bit. And I was like, That's good stuff , you know? Yeah,I found it helpful

Stephanie Fornasier 51:48

Yeah. But it wasn't any more helpful than reading a book or actually seeing a psychologist. Yeah. It didn't break any new ground for me.

Michael Watson

Of course. Of course not. You're an expert.

Stephanie Fornasier

Nah I'm not. But what did you think about when he broke the fourth wall? It's like, 20 minutes into it. Yeah. This is a stupid idea. I'm wearing a wig. So it looks like it's the same day. But it's we've been doing this over two years and what's going on? I didn't like it.

Michael Watson 52:16

I liked it from a documentary perspective. You know, like, it reminded me of the rehearsal. Yeah. But the resume, it was

Stephanie Fornasier 52:24

the rehearsal. And Nathan Fielder was referenced a lot when describing that bit.

Michael Watson 52:29

Yeah. All like, Who's that guy who did the lockdown in his apartment called?

Stephanie Fornasier

Bo Burnham?

Stephanie Fornasier

Yeah, it reminded me a bit of that, like, almost like an auto fiction type thing. And I actually, I thought it was quite cool. But the thing that I didn't like, the thing that I found bizarre kind of ties into that, going into business with your client. It just seemed weird to me that halfway through, I mean, yeah, the ethics of it is fucked, because join us like, Oh, we're gonna do this great thing. It's not working out how I imagined it. I'm starting to feel really anxious about it. My this thing, this big thing I'm doing for my career. But I can't talk to my therapist about it, because the therapist is in on it. That's so bad.

Stephanie Fornasier 53:19

Thats the problem! And there's a point where Stutz is, you know, my life doesn't depend on this, but yours does. And funnily enough, though, part from that bit, I didn't feel like Jonah was being exploited by Stutz. I felt like it was the other way around. Because Jonah was kind of the one in control. He was the director. He was making it the way he wanted to. And every time he struggles, like, let's talk about your brother's like, now, it's about you. Eventually, they got there. Yeah.

Michael Watson 53:42

But,

Stephanie Fornasier 53:44

you know, there is a chance, judging by the American Psychological Association guidelines about your relationships. That concern is if you enter into multiple relationships, that it could be exploitative, for the client. But I'm also, you know, I sort of interpreted the film as being exploitative for students, because he wasn't really in control of what ends up being portrayed. Yeah. Given that, you know, he pushed Jonah a lot throughout it. It could have been exploitative for Jonah Hill. Yeah. But I don't really care abou Jonah Hill.

Michael Watson 54:19

Yeah, for sure. I mean, I guess it's exploited. If if he charges 400 bucks an hour, it's almost like bootleg in its service. You know,

Stephanie Fornasier 54:29

he's got a lot of money if he did charge him, he could retire. That's funny, too. He's quite, like he's 72. So I wonder if it was like, Well, I'm going to retire soon anyway. So let's do it.

Michael Watson 54:43

But he's, he's written books. He's obviously somebody who wants to either, you know, a nice way of thinking about it is that he wants to share his strategies. Yeah. The other one is that he wants to sell it. And I guess, you know, he's, he's obviously been famous for a long time. You know, just a quick Google Till I get a New Yorker article from 2011, I didn't know who he was until this came out. But I don't know what I'm trying to say.

Stephanie Fornasier 55:09

That's fine. I'm not listening

Music Break

Stephanie Fornasier

was there anything else that you didn't like about it that we haven't touched on?

Michael Watson 55:25

I think that it leaves out a discussion of severe mental illness.

Stephanie Fornasier 55:29

Yes. And there's no diagnosis mentioned at all. Yeah, yeah.

Michael Watson 55:33

Yeah. Which kind of makes me you know, it kind of strengthens the case that this is just a life coach. Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 55:42

Particularly the fact that he says, you know, you know, he says, Our, trust me, you'll feel better soon. It's on me, like a guarantee you'll feel 100% Better. Yeah, that is that he says that, or I didn't like that at all. Yeah. Because you can't, you cannot guarantee that someone feels better, particularly if they have a severe mental illness, there's a very, very good chance they won't feel better no matter how well they implement whatever you've provided them. Because that's how brains work sometimes. Yeah. It was really narcissistic of him to say that,

Michael Watson 56:16

yeah, it's dangerous territory. You shouldn't, you shouldn't make that claim. But, you know, I think he has a unique patient population. Yeah, are very wealthy, high achieving people. And probably Jonah's the sickest person he's come across, you know, like, he's not saying people who are so depressed that they are incontinent in bed, or anybody with any kind of psychosis or anything like that, because, you know, he's got his method. He knows. He knows how to work with the mild to moderate anxiety depressions. Yeah. Which is fine.

Stephanie Fornasier 56:55

Yeah, that's totally fine. But he does. Don't have the exact quote. But he does say that. Depression happens when you're not using your lifeforce or working towards your life goal, like you're being lazy and not you don't have a direction, which is really problematic thing to say.

Michael Watson 57:13

i It kind of disregards the clinico pathological entity that is depression. Psychiatry. Yeah. Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 57:26

Is there anything we'd liked about it? You know,

Michael Watson 57:28

I think that normalizing therapy and showing people what it can look like and casting it in a positive light, getting somebody like Jonah Hill, who, you know, he's really just in my experience, known for Superbad. don't really associate him as you know, a mental health advocate.

Stephanie Fornasier 57:53

I think that he has been quite open about, you know, he doesn't want to do tours, for films because of how it affects his anxiety. That's been a common thing that he's shared, which is a reason why he's engaged with Stutz. Sure, sure. Yeah. And he was in manic maniac, which is, yeah, related

Michael Watson 58:12

to that show. And I liked the the fourth wall stuff, just from a formal perspective, I thought that was interesting. And call that doesn't help anybody with mental illness.

Stephanie Fornasier 58:24

Yeah, no. Well, maybe it does. Who knows?

Michael Watson 58:28

What to do? Is there anything you liked

Stephanie Fornasier 58:29

just Just what you've already said? Like, if it makes therapy potentially more interesting to people who might have poo pooed it before? I feel like this, this documentary is not made for people who are engaged in therapy or are therapists, because, you know, it's sort of like showing the magic behind the therapy, if you know what I mean

Michael Watson 58:52

Yeah, the magician

Stephanie Fornasier 58:55

revealed behind behind the curtain. Yeah. So there was no groundbreaking stuff for me, but there could have been father people, and that's good. Yeah. However, I am concerned that people will think I need a Stutz in my life. Yeah.

Michael Watson 59:10

And they don't necessarily need a Stutz when they get to when they see their every day. Medicare, like bulk builds. Yeah, it's not the same.

Stephanie Fornasier 59:20

Yeah. They want someone to say, Hey, don't dump your shit on me. Shut the fuck up and do what I say. But that's not actually a bad thing that they're saying that yeah, in fact, that can be seen as a little bit abusive.

Michael Watson 59:33

i And but another thing that I liked about it was, even though these are things that you've criticized him for, he's obviously whether intentionally or not, he has a breadth of knowledge about different therapy modalities. And he's picked the things that he likes and that he potentially has seen worked and package them all up into this one thing. And he obviously gets results with his very selective To the high achieving patient population. And I think you're right. We don't know.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:00:06

We don't know. He's been seeing Jonah Hill for maybe seven years. Still. And yeah, let's get to that. But before we do, I just want to share how Stutz was received by the population. Psychology Today said that it was a great example of a trend in the therapy world towards more reciprocal vulnerability and transparency in therapy. And they believe that the therapist and client express love and admiration seemingly without compromising ethics or the integrity of the therapeutic alliance, which I would strongly disagree with. But, you know, all right.

Michael Watson 1:00:44

Sounds like it was written by AI.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:00:45

Maybe it was, oh, but Rotten Tomatoes gave it 100% approval rating, but it was only based on 20 reviews, right? And it's 76 out of 100 On Metacritic. And yeah, a lot of reviews were really positive about it. However, some of my like, friends in therapy were like, No, I didn't like it. It was wonky. So yeah, I agree. And I trust their opinion, more than this

Michael Watson 1:01:10

it's pretentious.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:01:11

It's really pretentious. But you know, Indiewire is like, this was more for Jonah than it was for us, which I totally agree with.

Michael Watson 1:01:20

He doesn't give enough of himself for you to think otherwise.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:01:23

Exactly. Yeah, I think and he was in charge of what? What comes out of it. So he, to me, he comes off as a real wanker. But, you know, he might think he comes off as like a really emotionally literate amazing guy. And you know,

Michael Watson 1:01:39

and that's what he wants Sarah, his ex to, to think

Stephanie Fornasier 1:01:44

And the fact that, you know, he becomes the therapist and Stutz is like I've taught you well, that was so arrogant, and like, sorry, Jonah. But you know, you haven't gone through like seven years of training. So fuck off.

Michael Watson 1:01:56

Yeah and superbad wasn't that good! I mean, on that note, another harmful thing is the fact that when you go to therapy, sometimes you're unpacking a paving all these, you're very so vulnerable, so vulnerable. And it's really, really hard work at times. You don't you don't get that sense here. Anyone working very hard. They don't like like I said, Jonah's keeping you at a distance. He's not zooming in.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:02:25

There's moments where I think the vulnerability shines through a little bit.

Michael Watson 1:02:28

But it's, I mean, it's, he's, he's the director. Yeah. You know, he's in charge of what you see. And I wouldn't want somebody to come out and be like, I'm gonna go to therapy. I'm gonna be in charge, and then be like, Oh, wait, this is hard. It's actually really hard. I can. Yeah. So it's probably it's a fairly unrealistic look at therapy. Yeah. After I saw

Stephanie Fornasier 1:02:49

and, you know, he admits like we've been doing filming this over two years. So it looks like it's happened in one day. That's clearly not what therapy looks like. Yeah, yeah.

Michael Watson 1:02:58

Yeah. Late, at least he acknowledged.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:03:00

And theres a lot of silence in therapy therapy, which you need to get comfortable with as a therapist, which is hard. And as a client,

Michael Watson 1:03:08

No, when your therapist is being quiet, that's when you need to just say more words.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:03:13

Whatever you feel, whatever, lamp, bed...

Music Break

Stephanie Fornasier

All right, let's talk about the context of all of this within Jonah's texts. Yes. So I want to preface this with two positive reviews that I think is very interesting. Now that we've seen these texts. The Psychology Today said that both men had distinct familiar messages about being men that left them insecure about dating, and those revelations invited candidate immersion and empowered action, and we find out that struts reached out to a love interest on Jonah's suggestion, the person reviewing from Psychology Today was like well done, these men for their renewed hope and confidence in each other, etc. was like, oh, and then Indiewire was saying that less about relationships but Stutz didn't need to talk about Jonah Hills grief strips the movie to convince us that Jonah found a way to make himself vulnerable. And while the director might be wrong to assume that his film is an effective vessel for the psychiatrist specific tools, it's hard to imagine a better advertisement for the overall effect they had on Jonah. And I think we now know, if we if we want to take Jonah Hill's texts as an indication of how well therapy is going for Jonah, then it sounds like it hasn't gone as well as we wanted to think from the film

Michael Watson 1:04:41

Yeah, it's hard to say though, because they never really talk about relationships,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:04:47

only in the context of family relationships and the mum, the mum, which there's some unresolved stuff there. Yeah. And Stutzs and his like, struggle to actually They have a relationship.

Michael Watson 1:05:01

Yeah, yeah. So we don't know if Jonah has this long standing insecurity, or we've been relationships, I guess, you know, we can, we can,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:05:13

based on what we've seen in this film, you're right, I just feel like given the toing and froing that we see in the film around vulnerability, and the control Jonah had over what, what they talked about and that sort of power struggle, there's a power struggle occurring in them, between students and Jonah. And that sort of friendly vibe, and then knowing from those texts that it sounds like Jonah has taken some of the concepts and therapy and weaponize them rather than use them to his own personal growth benefit tells me that that sort of friendly pseudo therapy, client change roles, vibe, actually hasn't been a helpful modality. Because he hasn't done the work to me, he hasn't done the work, he hasn't become vulnerable enough in therapy, in order to see the flaws in himself and see what he needs to do to better himself changes unhelpful thought patterns and beliefs and and be able to give himself that self compassion and resolve some of those body hating or whatever it is that's going on for him so that he can be a better person to others. And it doesn't seem like he's done that work. If for him normal behavior is controlling another woman's behavior and calling that a boundary. If he thinks that's normal, then he hasn't done the therapeutic work in order to better himself.

Michael Watson 1:06:31

Yeah. But there's no evidence to me that they talk about that because Stutzs's whole thing is, you know, effectively, its individual, even though it talks about connection with others and compassion for others. It

Stephanie Fornasier 1:06:49

really surely didn't see each other for seven years. Surely, they've talked about it

Michael Watson 1:06:53

Jonah could be that much of an

Stephanie Fornasier 1:06:57

Which, again, we're supposed to believe from this documentary that Stutz does amazing work. And these tools have been brilliant. And look how great Jonah is. Yeah, but he's not. But like, So what the fuck have they been doing for seven years. But I just feel like we see that struts had a gap in understanding relationships with women, it seems that he was straight. But it wasn't clear to me but they were talking about women in the context of Stutz. And it's something that should student experience of having a healthy relationship with a woman. And in a therapeutic relationship, what you experienced personally, as a therapist should not impact how you provide therapy to your client. But because they didn't have a normal therapeutic relationship, it may have impact impacted the therapy that struts gave Jonah, because he had that gap in understanding about healthy relationships. So you couldn't pass that on to Jonah. So maybe you slapped him over. So

Michael Watson 1:07:54

you're saying like on the available evidence of what we saw in the film, and what Jonah has allegedly said via screenshots. So it's probably true, since , that there's a chance that Stutzs shortcoming in relationships have been transmitted to Jonah's

Stephanie Fornasier 1:08:13

impacted jonah, or at least, you know, Jonah might have talked to Stutz about his interactions with Sara or other people. And Stutz hasn't pointed out the toxicities within Yeah, perhaps or how that behavior is not, you know, healthy because we don't want to he doesn't really talk much about boundaries. And

Michael Watson 1:08:33

well, that's, that's what I'm trying to say that like, and you know, that. Yeah, he doesn't talk about boundaries. So for us to say that Jonah is weaponizing therapy talk, isn't we? I mean, yes, that's what he's doing. But we can't say that it's his fault, because we haven't seen

Stephanie Fornasier 1:08:51

No but it also this whole film is very boundary lacking. And Jonah seems to be in charge of what happens. So.

Michael Watson 1:09:01

But I think Stutz is therapy is not really going to address boundaries, or how to appropriately treat people because one thing that he says is that moving forward is the ultimate objective in everything. Yes. So do you. He says, Do you want to be right? Or do you want to create something and he talks about, you know, he's sort of Cco-opted Maslow's hierarchy, where you know, you want your body to be working, then you want to be socializing, to make yourself feel better. And then you want to focus on yourself at the top of the pyramid. People are seen as tools to make you feel better. Yeah, yeah. socialize with them to feel better, and you practice compassion towards them to make you feel better. Yeah. So you know, I think you could make a reasonable case, to say that Stutz is very individually focused therapy has made Jonah think, well, this is my girlfriend. She's doing things I don't want her to do. I'm going to tell her to stop. There's nothing wrong with that.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:10:18

No, I'm just using my life force and moving forward. And that's my direction. Yeah, yeah. Which I guess maybe is a shortcoming of structures modality that it's not systems based family based. It's not a couples counseling. There's no relationship element to it, of how to how to navigate multiple needs in a family system.

Michael Watson 1:10:41

Yeah, absolutely. But you know, the saying that all out loud, I think probably it is a gap in Stutz's thing. But also, I think, I do think that Jonah's probably a bit dysfunctional and narcissistic get baseline. Yeah.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:10:57

And I think in this type of therapy, like, the way I feel like maybe it's been weaponized, is that focus on self, for someone who's already thinking a lot about self, it's just made him more just enabling Yeah, super enabling, but it not might not necessarily need to be that way. It's almost like the really arrogant narcissistic person taking therapy. We've seen this happen, taking therapy that's really designed for people who've been through really traumatic domestic violent relationships, and taking on those strategies to therefore not feel responsible for anybody's feelings. When that's an inappropriate use of those tools. What they need are probably the opposite sort of tools off acknowledging their own behavior and consequences of those behaviors and having being accountable for those behaviors. And words, or whatever it might be. Yeah, it's almost like a mismatch.

Michael Watson 1:11:47

I so agree. Jonah who listens to this

Stephanie Fornasier

you should listen to this and also like

Michael Watson

Jonah, call me

Stephanie Fornasier 1:11:52

I believe in compassion, I have compassion for you. Don't be a can't stop being a tool, use your tools less foolishly. But yeah, like another therapist who saw those needs in Jonah and practicing a different approach might have been more useful for Jonah, or perhaps Jonah wouldn't have been willing to consider how he conducts himself in a relationship might be an issue.

Michael Watson 1:12:18

So you know, therapists can only treat what the patient offers them. Exactly. And what maybe things have changed now that this has gone public,

Stephanie Fornasier 1:12:25

but maybe not being able to be as vulnerable as it could have been, has inhibited that. I agree, Big question. Do you think Sarah Brady should have leaked these texts? Or was that bad? Should she have not leaked the texts? I have my own answer, but what do you think

Michael Watson 1:12:42

I can see your answer written in all caps on the notes? It's tricky. It's complex. You know, I think that personal correspondence is pretty sacred. And you should be careful about sharing it around the place. But I think that it's right that people in power, and I count Jonah Hill as somebody in power, should be held accountable for their actions. I'm not 100% certain how much leaking tax actually leads to proper justice for things like this, like I think maybe veers a little bit into sort of cruel and unusual, I think, maybe, but I think people should be held accountable for the bad things that they do. And I think he unequivocally did a bad thing. And it sounds like it sounds like they she wasn't getting anywhere with him. But he didn't he didn't commit a crime. He's just fucked.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:13:44

But that's, I think one of the big reasons why my answer is yes, she should have is that we give men a pass for not committing crimes. It's unlikely. But you don't have to have been legal to be someone who should be called out on their behavior, making someone controlling what they do, and making them quit their career, because you don't feel comfortable about it is a very big red flag for somebody. And I think what she did by calling out that behavior was making so many women and men feel very seen. Yeah, and non binary people, and feel very validated and what they have experienced and also reinforce that, because we got so gaslit so often, whenever this happens to us as the inferior agenda, so that we think we think they're right to stop us from doing what we want or for controlling our behavior, and that stays with you and that impacts how you deal with other relationships and how you feel about yourself. So it has been really enlightening for her to share these texts for someone who particularly as purported to be very emotionally mature and a therapist So I think it was so so important to share to the world a really important message that you can be in therapy for seven years and you can feel very smug about it and you can have this beautiful relationship with your with your therapist, and you can want to share it with others how important these tools were for you and how useful they were for you. You can go through all that but that is not enough. If you aren't going to do the work and recognize your force and try and build on or personally grow then you might as well throw your money out then time away because you can't just sit there and listen to words and go okay, yeah, that makes me better. It's hard work you have to do the hard work and you have to be vulnerable and you have to acknowledge your flaws and sit with them and turn it into

Michael Watson 1:15:48

the available evidence to me says that he did not

Stephanie Fornasier 1:15:53

but you can you can see the best therapist in the world you can go to the best therapists will you pay them all the money in the world they cannot help you if you don't help yourself as well. You can even make a movie about but you can still be a piece of shit

Michael Watson 1:16:09

that's true that's it that the whole thing I think that's the core of it.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:16:14

Fuck yeah yeah, we did it. Did we solve the Stutz conundrum?

Michael Watson

We did

Stephanie Fornasier

did we solve the jonah Hill problem. The Jonah Hill.

Michael Watson 1:16:26

This is the Jonah Hill we're going to die on Hey, all right.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:16:32

So Michael, the last question I asked all my guests is there anything you'd like to us to plug how can people reach you on social media? The answer is they can't

Michael Watson 1:16:45

you can try and find me on Messenger

Stephanie Fornasier 1:16:49

they can't even find you on mesenger

Michael Watson 1:16:51

I have an outlook. thanks everybody likes subscribe smash that X button.

Stephanie Fornasier 1:16:59

Jonah get more therapy

Michael Watson

Jonah call me!!!

*Outro music*

Stephanie Fornasier

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