In this episode, Dana Lash delves into the complex discussion surrounding ‘certainty of maleness’ and its implications in today’s cultural climate. She also tackles the intricacies of the Texas Republican political landscape where Ken Paxton challenges Senator John Cornyn, bringing to light the often untold stories of loyalty and strategy in politics. The segment continues to evaluate the role of marital fidelity in elections and how it serves as a reflection of a candidate’s character.
SPEAKER 01 :
The Supreme Court sides with parents and common sense about whether they can protect their kids from indoctrination at school. A House Democrat wants to radically overhaul Congress and the courts, quite a temper tantrum for losing last year. And the numbers don’t lie about how much better Florida is than New York over the past 25 years. I’m Greg Karumbas, inviting you to join Jim Garrity of National Review and me each weekday for the Three Martini Lunch podcast. We’ll give you the good, bad, and crazy news of the day, and hopefully a lot of laughs too. Follow the Three Martini Lunch on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
SPEAKER 05 :
Dana Lash’s Absurd Truth Podcast, sponsored by Kel-Tec.
SPEAKER 04 :
Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of the United States.
SPEAKER 06 :
They’re always hedging, you know, because in the back of our minds, we weren’t raised with the certainty of maleness that, you know, kind of the confidence that young men in their 30s have, which they haven’t earned. They just have it. We don’t start feeling that and owning that until our 50s and 60s at a time when we start to be treated as invisible in society. What is she talking about?
SPEAKER 02 :
Who the hell sits down and is like, I’m going to devote an hour of my life to the Michelle Obama podcast. Everybody’s got a podcast these days. Jiminy Christmas. Welcome back to the show. What is this phrase? What did she say? Sorry. Certainty of maleness. What does that even mean?
SPEAKER 1 :
What does it even mean? I
SPEAKER 02 :
We weren’t raised with the certainty of maleness. Like, what is uncertain about it?
SPEAKER 04 :
I think they mean fatherless homes, maybe?
SPEAKER 02 :
No, that sounds smart.
SPEAKER 04 :
Certainty of maleness would be a father in the home, right?
SPEAKER 02 :
I mean, that’s what you would think, but that’s probably not what they’re talking about because that sounds intelligent. Oh. Who pays her to do this? Who’s like, I want to have somebody who’s actually, like, not even mid-Oprah. sit here and just run about the certainty of maleness. Like, what is the audience for this? Who sits and listens to that? It’s, she just, it’s her delivery. Her words aren’t any different from Kamala Harris’s. It’s just her delivery. Her delivery is better. And so it makes you think for a minute, wait a minute, maybe it’s not word salad. Nope, it is. It’s word salad. It’s like the Southern Baptist preacher speaking technique. You know, by the way, you can’t get mad at me. I was very Southern Baptist where you, you know, you are dramatic and you can say, you know, you deliver things like that. It sounds authoritative and like you really know what you’re talking about and very important. And you could just be reading, you know, Kraft Mac and cheese box. And it’s, you know, sounds like really impressive. I just yeah, I’m pretty sure we were raised. I mean, if you weren’t raised with the certainty of maleness, then you were brainwashed abusively. So if you had no concept of the certainty of maleness, what is that? I don’t even understand what these words mean that she when she strings them together like this. Like, you didn’t know that men existed? Or you did, but you still questioned it? That sounds like a you problem. That’s not a societal problem. That sounds like a you being confused problem. You being raised wrong problem. That’s what it sounds like. I don’t know. Is this her own podcast, or is she a guest on someone else’s?
SPEAKER 05 :
I think it’s hers. It’s hers. Yeah, it’s the IMO. IMO, which means In My Opinion, I think.
SPEAKER 04 :
Right. But also, I’m Michelle Obama. Oh, my gosh. That’s so bad. Oh, good catch, Kate.
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s so bad. Oh, that’s right. Yeah. You know that they thought that they probably focus grouped it then. But we weren’t raised with a certainty of maleness. Yeah, we pretty much were. Why is there all of this questioning over it? I mean, it’s science. Why are there all these questions?
SPEAKER 04 :
Also, how are they so certain they’re against toxic masculinity or masculinity in general if they can’t also admit there is and be certain of masculinity?
SPEAKER 02 :
I don’t believe in toxic masculinity, but I absolutely believe in toxic femininity. It’s the third and fourth wave matriarchal society. I mean, I’m going to tell you, gents, nobody dislikes them bitches more than, you know, the chicks who are not that. OK, like nobody dislikes them more. Our friends over at Kel-Tec, Kel-Tec makes some some very good stuff. And you guys are very familiar with Kel-Tec, the PR 57. As you guys know, this it’s a very interesting brand. This is the rotary barrel pistol chambered in 5.7. It’s 40% lighter than any other 5.7 that’s on the market. And it’s inspired by real world data and defensive needs. So super affordable $399 MSRP. But you also have a unique top loading design. It replaces traditional magazines with stripper clips for slimmer carry profile 20 plus one capacity low recoil for ease of use. It’s really great everyday carry, quickest and easiest field strip available as well. It’s the new Kel-Tec PR57 rotary barrel pistol chambered in 5.7, lighter than any other on the market, and you can find it at Kel-TecWeapons.com. Innovation Performance Kel-Tec, K-E-L-T-E-C-Weapons.com. Tell them Dana sent you.
SPEAKER 08 :
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SPEAKER 02 :
Everybody heard the Texas story, right? Oh, boy. So in Texas, you got John Cornyn, who’s a senator. Not a lot of people like John Cornyn because he’s been there for a long time. And typically when you tend to be in a place for a long time, when you tend to be there for as long as he’s been there, you kind of don’t His record is kind of haunting him a little bit. A little bit. A lot of bit. A lot of people think he’s a rhino. Some people think he’s ineffective. Some people think he’s an effective rhino. I mean, he’s got baggage, right? So it doesn’t help. But he’s been running… I mean, I don’t even know how long. He’s been in office for forever. He’s been running unopposed, essentially, in the Senate for some time. Well, until now. So you have the Attorney General of… the state of Texas, Ken Paxton, who has filed to run in the primary to challenge Cornyn. And he’s been so far, he’s put up a good challenge. The White House hasn’t waited in yet in it. And Cornyn was meeting with POTUS apparently earlier this week, according to Punchbowl News. Paxton’s already tight with POTUS. Because remember, Ken Paxton was up there in New York when Trump was going through that New York witch hunt, which was a really stupid trial, by the way. That was the dumbest case ever. I can’t even believe it was prosecuted. But here we are. It’s New York. And he was up there. Remember, he was in the background like he was a part of like the hype squad that went out there. And all of this, you know, yes, I’m sure he believed in the rule of law and that it was being subverted in that case. But I also think that he was looking out for, well, I’m going to be running against John Cornyn at some point. So I want to make sure that I get that coveted Trump endorsement. So he’s challenged John Cornyn. And it’s already been I mean, it’s barely started and it’s already so nasty. Well, then yesterday it got nastier. In days of our Texas Republican politics, this could I mean, you’re talking about a senator who could be working with all of you. So his wife, Ken Paxton’s wife, Angela Paxton, by the way, did they ever respond to you? I mean, it’s been a day. They’re not going to I’m not going to grill him. I mean, I like what Paxton’s done, but I’m not an idiot. You know, I like what he’s done, but I know that there’s a lot of people talking about a lot of issues with him. Anyway, his wife came out and said that basically, according to all the documents that had been reviewed and publicly reported on that, he committed adultery. I don’t know if he committed adultery again past the 2018 affair that he had. And he came out and talked about it in the press, and I guess they got over it, and their marriage continued. But she filed for divorce yesterday, and that was cited in the documents that were made public. She’s accusing him of infidelity. So I don’t know if it’s based on that 2018 affair or if it’s something new. That’s one thing that wasn’t made clear, but… It’s already, you can imagine how that’s fitting into a nasty Republican primary. So here’s the question. And I don’t mean, I’m not trying to diminish anything. I just want to get right to the point of the issue. Does it matter? Nobody wants to talk about this on the Republican side of things. Does it matter? Does marital infidelity matter in elections? Is it meaning do you think it’s an effective weapon? Is it is it effective when it’s weaponized against someone?
SPEAKER 04 :
The answer to that question is yes, it is effective when weaponized. It is effective when weaponized, but I don’t think it matters very much. Now, there is an argument to be made that, hey, if he’s going to do this to his wife, he might do this to the state of Texas or the country or whatever. I don’t buy into that necessarily so much. So I don’t look at this. as something that may automatically kills his chances to become senator, but I think it is an effective weaponization.
SPEAKER 02 :
I don’t know if it is an effective weaponization. I’ve seen it happen. I don’t know if it’s mattered since Bill Clinton. Well, I take that back. No, I don’t take it back. It hasn’t mattered since Bill Clinton. And you can bring up John Edwards, but John Edwards, if you remember, didn’t get in trouble because he had an affair. John Edwards got in trouble because of how badly he tried to cover it up. When John Edwards screwed around on his wife with that Ryle Hunter, he paid his campaign surrogate to pretend that he was the one having the affair. And then when she had the love child, He basically had, he paid this guy off just to claim that baby as his own. And I mean, that guy was married and had to deal with that in his own marriage. And they, he was using campaign contributions to cover it. And then there was that rich heiress, Bonnie, Bunny Mellon, whose money he was taking to pay for all of it. So he got in trouble for campaign fraud, like all kinds of fraudulent spending and all of this. That’s why he got in trouble. And the coverup is usually always worse than the crime for, for the most part in instances like this and so they weren’t mad at him because he had an affair they got mad at him because he was using bunny melon’s money to pay off people in his campaign to pretend that they were the ones having the affair and that his love child was actually theirs if you remember they got caught on that cctv footage at a hotel that somebody sold to the national inquire national inquire actually got to report some journalism and nobody else would touch the story and they reported on it and that’s how it went gangbusters And then he hit it and they were trying to say, well, National Enquirer reported on it. So it’s trash. Yeah, that’s guilt by association. That doesn’t really work. So it came out and then he went to court and and then his wife was sick. She had cancer. His wife had cancer terminal. Oh, my gosh. It was just a diet that all of that, all of that contributed. But that being said, if it had just been an affair, I think he would still have been Democrats golden boy. He was going to be the one that they had before Barack Obama. Barack Obama was not the next one after Clinton. It was John Edwards. They wanted John Edwards. He was the VP pick for Kerry. They wanted him. He was the golden boy. And they thought that they could, you know, they thought they really had it made, but it turned out, you know, they didn’t. So, I don’t know, because it didn’t really, a lot of people talked about it with Trump, the first term, but I think the thing that made it difficult in talking because i agree with you and i’ve said before i’m like well if you can’t you know i i you know is it’s a judge of it’s a judge of character and that if they can’t stay true to their wives can they stay true to the voter however again i think that’s not the way to look at it you got to look at the currency of this Everybody has a currency. Some people want public adoration. Some people want power. And if that currency is being served, they will be faithful to that currency. They will be faithful to whatever gets that currency more so maybe than they would ever be within the bonds of marriage. And that’s one thing that you can always count on and predict with certain politicians. So I think that’s in some cases makes it different with POTUS. For his first term, it seemed like everything was already resolved. And I think that’s what made it harder to stick. Like he was on good terms with his first wife, on good terms with his second wife. They all seemed to be reconciled to how everything went down and they were fine and everybody was getting along. None of his kids were Hunter Biden. Nobody was on drugs and running out and partying. You didn’t see any bleary-eyed photos of any Trump’s kids pouring out of the club at two in the morning, hopping into a car all drunk as skunks. You didn’t see any of that. And I think that… kind of i think that tempered any criticism this is is what’s different though this is what’s different so i um with i i just think that uh i don’t know i just think it’s just weird it’s just the whole thing i i with paxton there’s a lot of rumors And there are a lot of rumors. There’s a lot of different stuff that I’ve heard over the years. I don’t know. I’ve never put stock in any of it. I don’t pay attention to any of it. I just know that there’s a lot of whispering and all of that. Whether or not that hurts him, I think, depends upon the negatives that John Cornyn has. And also, how badly do they want to get rid of John Cornyn? And how does this play out? I think some of this is going to be predicated upon the nastiness of their dissolvement of their marriage. So if it gets nasty between them is that, that could potentially overshadow his Senate bid. And then that, yeah.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah. I agree with that 100%.
SPEAKER 02 :
So I don’t know. That’s, that’s just kind of like the big thing with it. I, I, I’m not going to like report on it breathlessly. Like it’s TMZ and, However, I also think that for people who bring up questions as about fidelity and they say that that may be a mark against a candidate for them. I don’t think that you can get mad at those people for saying that either. I mean, you’re going to be like you’re going to pretend to be family first or you’re going to be family first. You’re going to pretend to be principals first or not. I think it’s just – I think it exposes people as grifters when they get mad at other individuals that they claim are on their side for espousing observations that everybody held 10 years ago that everyone kind of agreed on. And they think, yeah, it might be – that’s a market against somebody’s character. Believe me, I get being Machiavelli probably better than most of these people do. However, what I don’t like are people getting attacked because they say, well, yes, you shouldn’t be cheating on your wife or yes, you should keep it within the bonds of marriage, whatever. And I see that happening all over social media. If that’s not something that you use as a standard of value, then that’s fine for you. But don’t look down or attack somebody else that’s done probably more than you have for the conservative cause because they disagree. If you’ve noticed dry skin or changing texture that comes with time, you’re not alone, and that’s exactly what OneSkin is here to help with. Healthy skin starts at the cellular level. Taking care of your skin isn’t just about looks. OneSkin’s topical supplements make it easy for you to do something practical for your skincare. They’re designed by a team of women scientists, and they use the proprietary OS01 peptide to target the root cause of aging, which is cellular sin sense, also known as zombie cells. These cells slow down collagen and hydration, making your skin weaker. OneSkin’s OS01 peptide is clinically proven to reduce wrinkles, boost hydration, and help strengthen thinning skin. Plus, they have over 4,000 five-star reviews for their face, body, sun, and travel products. Visit OneSkin.co now and enter promo code DANASHOW to get started today with 15% off. That’s OneSkin.co promo code DANASHOW for 15% off. After your purchase, they’ll ask you where you heard about them. Support your show and tell them we sent you.
SPEAKER 04 :
And now, all of the news you would probably miss. It’s time for Dana’s Quick Five.
SPEAKER 02 :
All right, so… There was, let’s see, two people facing… Oh, no, I’m not doing that one. Oh, we’re not doing any of those. I don’t like those. Now, there’s a billboard in Cleveland that are drawing a lot of criticism because they say, I buy… It says, I buy crack houses and your house is trash. People are… Literally, that’s what it says. Is your house trash? And then it’s like a guy in glasses. And so it’s drawing some criticism. One of the billboards reads, yes, I buy crack houses. People are upset over it. There’s a lot of backlash from community members and city officials. One particular sign has been taken down, but all the others have remained in place. Local real estate investors say the signs go too far. Somebody goes, what was your point? I didn’t understand. Well, the point was that they want to buy your crack house. That’s the point. The guy wants to purchase your house of crack. Or if your house is trash, he would like to buy your trash house. I mean, I think that’s kind of the point, right? It seems pretty direct. Isn’t that the whole point of why they’re upset?
SPEAKER 04 :
It’s a crack house and a trashy house.
SPEAKER 02 :
A trashy crack house. Rarely are the crack houses bougie. You know, I’m just saying like I I don’t even understand what what what is this is the sign. And then these investors are like, I don’t what is the point? I don’t understand. Well, he wants to buy your trashy house in cash. That’s what I get out of it. Yeah. Do you know that your suitcase is 58 times dirtier than a public toilet seat? What? I believe it. Who else wipes their suitcase down every time before and after you go through security? And then when you get home? Just me? Yeah, it’s 58 times dirtier, according to a new study. And the wheels, obviously, are the dirtiest. So, ew. Like, they found, like, staff, a bunch of stuff I can’t say, and grody stuff on these things. Ugh. Don’t lick your wheels. Don’t lick your suitcase wheels.
SPEAKER 04 :
Nobody does that. But I think about it now.
SPEAKER 02 :
I bet some people do.
SPEAKER 04 :
I’ve wheeled my suitcase into the bathroom before. So imagine rolling around on the bathroom floor that whole time.
SPEAKER 02 :
I don’t take my suitcase back into my room when I get back from traveling until I wipe the wheels down. Really? I always have the little wipes on me. Always. But I don’t take it into my house. I can’t say that for everybody else in my family. But I don’t take it. I am that person. I’m going to start doing that now. I know. No, this makes me so sick. This is a travel and leisure story. So let’s see. They’re going to bed. They’re going to ban lead ammunition for hunting and shooting in England, Scotland and Wales. Yeah, they are. It’s restrictions on shots and toxic metals. What do you think the lead comes from? It comes from space. Where does the lead come from? It comes from the planet that you’re on. How is it all, if it’s in the planet, how is it all of a sudden toxic? You know what? Lead’s toxic if you get shot with it. So just don’t do that. We got a lot more on the way. Do you like the Outsiders? I mean, there’s some like really cool stuff that’s happening on a friend, Danny Boy O’Connor. He’s doing some really big things in Tulsa. He joins us about his new book next. Stick with us. Welcome back to the program. Dana Lash with you. We’re at the bottom of this third hour. And I got to tell you, so you guys know Simple Minds, one of my favorite groups ever. And New Gold Dream is one of my absolute favorite songs of all time. And I played this like bumper music at some point and I got a message on Instagram and I my jaw hit the floor because it’s Danny Boy O’Connor who messaged me on Instagram. And it was like one of those things where I mean, this guy’s like a legend and he was a part of like a legendary like musical moment like or era in the United States. I’m like, oh, my gosh. And then he and then not only does he also love that song. But then you realize that he loves a particular author that made a major impact on you when you were growing up and a story that like resonated through the generations. And I’m talking about S.E. Hinton and the Outsiders, which that literally created an entire genre in publishing. There was no YA anything before Hinton came out with her with her books. She had fought i mean boom boom she was a teenager when she wrote this book and she had a bestseller she was like famous out of the gate very few authors get to enjoy that not just the notoriety but knowing that there is such widespread appreciation for their work as she did well then i was reading more about it and i saw that danny boy o’connor really was so invested in the story like most people get memorabilia you know they’ll get like a signed copy of the book maybe if they’re lucky, they might get a copy of the actual screenplay. He got the house. He literally went, he was in Tulsa, bought the outsider’s house, the actual craftsman home where they filmed it. So I think I can safely say without any debate, that nobody is a bigger fan of the outsiders than Danny Boy O’Connor. And I doubt that there’s a bigger film fan anywhere than Danny Boy O’Connor, who joins us now via video. My good friend, Danny, God love you. It’s so good to see you.
SPEAKER 03 :
So good to see you and get to talk to you. It’s been a long time coming, and I definitely remember reaching out to you. You have a fantastic choice in bumper music. I said I think the only one who comes close was the late, great Art Bell, who had a very eclectic taste in music. Some of it I didn’t think I would like, but you hear it long enough and you’d learn to love it. But you and me, I feel like if somebody found my iPod, they would probably return it to you because we like a lot of the same stuff. And for a dude who grew up doing hip hop all his life, people have survived that I’m like into New Wave or, you know, The Cult or Sisters of Mercy or all of the stuff that I like. That’s really what I listen to full time and have done since day one. But yeah, that’s so good to meet you. And I love your show. And yeah.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, thank you. I’m a big fan of yours as well. And the fact that I just had my musical taste affirmed, I’m like going to forever keep that. It’s going to be my epitaph. I want to talk to you about your efforts in Tulsa because I also love The Outsiders. And I think I read this thing about it where it was talking about how libraries and teachers really helped maintain the popularity of that book through multiple generations. And that’s how I first read it in school. And it was… a non-condescending way of talking about the differences between people and a search for inclusion. And it was, and I think it was so non-condescending because it was written by a teenager. And I think this book has impacted everybody in some way, but you most significantly, because when you were in Tulsa, I read that you had somebody that was taking you around to look at where they were filming the outsiders and you saw this house and you ended up buying this house.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, so some of that is correct. I went on tour and we played Tulsa in 2009. We played the famous Canes Ballroom. We had never played as House of Pain, my original group, but we played it as another group called La Coconostra, which was an amalgamation of House of Pain and a couple other groups. And it was that tour that I ended up stumbling upon Tulsa. And then I realized, oh, my God, this is where they filmed The Outsider. So I went looking for locations. Never in a million years did I think I’d buy the house. But for the next five years, God had a funny plan. And I kept making my way to Tulsa somehow. And at year five, after the fifth year of coming here, I realized that if somebody doesn’t step up and do something, this house might get torn down.
SPEAKER 02 :
And it was going to.
SPEAKER 03 :
went and found the owner. It was really hard to find her. She was living in Florida. She inherited the house and she had tenants that were eight months behind in rent. And so we told her we would be interested in hearing her offer. And when I first found it in 2009, they were asking $42,000 for the house. I ended up, I’ll cut to the chase. I ended up paying $15,000 for the house. Wow. Jaw drop. Couldn’t believe I was the new owner of the outsider’s house. But when I got here to Tulsa and… saw what I actually bought, I realized it was a fair deal. But that’s where my life story changes because When you’re six foot six and an alpha male, for me, it was hard to ask for help. But when I got here, I had to really admit that I didn’t know what I was doing. And I’m not the guy who’s like, I’m not the contractor guy or not to build you things. I’m a creative director, but I’m not like in that area. And I asked for help. And I tell you what, Dana, the people of Tulsa put me on high, surrounded me. They cut the lawn. They fixed the roof. They painted the whatever. They were so amazing.
SPEAKER 02 :
Just invested in it.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah. Yeah. And and I decided, you know what, I’m never going home. And home was Los Angeles, California for the last 48 years. And after six months of working on this project, I said, I’m moving to Tulsa and I’ve been here for eight years. I love everything about it. The people here are great. And yeah. There’s so much opportunity here. Not only what, you know, there’s rich music and film history here, but there’s a budding film industry growing on here right now. And Leon Russell’s also from here. So there’s a church studios right down the street from our museum that has also been restored into an incredible museum. And it’s a handful of things that are going on right now. When I first got here in 2009, you couldn’t say all of the things that I can name off that are that are popping right now in Tulsa. But right now, Tulsa is on fire in the best possible way. And it’s I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.
SPEAKER 02 :
And you’re helping to put it on the map. I want to tell everybody about Danny’s new book, The Oral History of the Outsider, Staying Gold, how S.E. Hinton’s novel and Francis Ford Coppola’s movie became cult classics and launched today’s Hollywood icons to superstardom because there were I mean, it was an amazing I know it was done like on a shoestring budget. Because I know when Coppola was making this movie, he was, you know, he was coming out. He already had The Godfather success. This was coming out in 83. But he was able to put together this amazing, like a dream cast of who you would want to play in this. The Brat Pack. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
Emilio Estevez, Tom Cruise, Matt Dillon, C. Thomas Howell, Ralph Macchio, Diane Lane, Leif Garrett. I mean, everybody guys went on, you know, and took the 80s over by storm. So, yeah, it’s an incredible cast, but nothing beats the author and incredible director to Coppola. I’m a huge.
SPEAKER 02 :
He’s one of my favorites. I mean, goodness.
SPEAKER 03 :
But. I told Susie Hinton when I first met her, I said, there’s there’s nobody has had me more in fear to meet the person. And I’ve met everybody growing up in Hollywood that you could meet. I said, Susie, I almost canceled on our date because I was I just didn’t think I’d had it in me to do it. And she said, well, but we hit it off straight away. She’s a fantastic woman. She wrote the book when she was 15 and a half.
SPEAKER 02 :
And she donated to this museum, too. Not to interrupt you, but she didn’t. Yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
She’s the number one supporter financially and just of giving us the blessing. But her story is really what hit home for me because, you know, she wrote that book at 15 and a half. She failed English D plus in creative writing that year. The book has never been out of print in over 42 years. It sells every year. There’s a new crop of outsiders fans. The reason it becomes a movie is because the librarian noticed a tipping point with her students. She said, Danny, the girls would read anything I give them, but the boys, nuh-uh. And she said, I gave them this book, and they devoured it. So she said, I’m going to have 100 of them write to Francis Ford Coppola, of all people, and ask him to look at this book and perhaps turn it into a movie.
SPEAKER 02 :
I love that story.
SPEAKER 03 :
I said, why would you do that? I said, he was the godfather one and two in Apocalypse Now at that time. She goes, yeah, but he did such a masterful job staying true to the black stallion that I thought he’d be a shoo-in. And so there’s so many… Courses of miracles that had to happen for this book to turn into a movie, the movie to turn into a museum, and now the museum to turn into a Broadway musical, which just took four Tony Awards and is sweeping the nation. It’s going to kick off here in October at the Tulsa PAC. I love that.
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s amazing.
SPEAKER 03 :
It just keeps growing and growing and growing.
SPEAKER 02 :
I love this story with Coppola. He said that when he got, I read an interview where he said that he got this big thick packet and all these kids had their signatures. And he said, I looked at every signature and you could tell they were all individual, like these little signatures. And he was like, I had to read it after that. I had to.
SPEAKER 03 :
He got on a flight. They sent it to the wrong address in New York. And then his assistant brought it back to LA and he was getting on another flight to go to New York. And he said, there was nothing to read on the plane. So I dug in that packet and I started finding all these letters. By the time I got off that flight, I knew we had to make this movie. So.
SPEAKER 02 :
And he did and he fought to make it happen in Tulsa. And I know I don’t want to give all the mysteries away of the museum, but I know that there was a mystery involving the director’s chair because you have Coppola’s director’s chair. It’s at I know you have tons of stuff at the house, but you have that chair. It went missing for a while.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, yeah, it was stolen on the set of Rumblefish, which is also an S.E. Hinton book. And Coppola also did that movie.
SPEAKER 02 :
Came out the same year.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, two weeks later, after wrapping The Outsiders, he went right into Rumblefish, also filmed in Tulsa. And I guess… Somebody experiencing homelessness at that time decided they needed a chair. And Coppola, everybody broke character to go save his chair. And he said, guys, we’re here to make a movie. If he wants the chair, let him have it. So a wonderful man named Gary Johnson, a retired Tulsa PD guy, found the chair two weeks later behind a liquor store. A guy was living there and he was playing games on the train tracks. They thought he was trying to kill himself. So he was there to evict him. He said, you grab your chair. Wait. Where’d you get that chair? And he’s like, that’s not my chair. You want that chair? So he said, Danny, I had that in my man cave for 34 years until you got to town. He said, that was going to Valhalla with me. But since you’re doing this incredible work, we want to donate it to you. And so that began my journey. And then I started to build an incredible collection. there’s nothing that comes close to our collection of not only her books, movie memorabilia from wardrobe to cars in the movie. And now I collect all of her work, and the dream is to do an S.E. Hinton Museum.
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s amazing. And I think that’s definitely deserving. I don’t know anybody that has so many hits at that young, like right out of the gate, was writing bestsellers. You did. We’re talking to our awesome friend, Danny Boy O’Connor, and the Oral History of the Outsiders, his new book, The Early Orders You Can Do Right Now, Barnes & Noble, 25% off today’s last day. You were so faithful to the restoration of this house. I was reading about how detailed you were getting. Like you were even you were like looking at the like, for the lack of a better word, like screen grabs, trying to get the tint of the wallpaper correctly, like marks on appliances. Like you were so faithful to this. What inspired that?
SPEAKER 03 :
Probably my OCD. You know what? I knew that I was such a fan and I knew that there were a lot of fans like me and I knew that if it didn’t pass a test, you know, it was not going to. The last thing I wanted kids to come out and go, that’s not how it looked. So I was obsessed with it. It took three and a half years. I remember the first interview I did, they said, how long do you think it’ll be? This is up and running. I said, give me three, three and a half months, you know, three and a half years later. And, you know, $250,000 worth of stuff, not to count the gifts in kind. We cut the ribbon. But if you were to give me another three years, that’s how much of a perfectionist, because I wanted this thing to be as equally like it has to represent S.C. Hinton. It’s not about, you know, as much as it’s about her legacy and how this book has reached children. And you said it, you nailed it. It’s about the right side of the tracks and the wrong side of the tracks, proverbially. what she says is we saw the same sunset although our worlds were two you know completely different places we saw the same sunset for me that’s finding a mutual thing that we both can like whether you’re left right black white doesn’t matter we both look up see a beautiful creation the sunset that god made even by default if we both like it it brings us one step closer and so that’s what we do at that place and uh i will end by telling you that uh we did have close to six thousand school students tour the museum the last semester that just passed before they went into summer. And that was an unexpected consequence of building this museum. I built this museum for me and your husband to look at switchblades and Matt Dillon’s leather jackets and stuff like that. But it’s really a museum driven by the kids. And the educational component that we’re trying to build out is why we’re doing a gala coming up in October on the 12th on the heels of this musical that’s going to come to town.
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s amazing. I want to share with everybody before I let you go talk with Danny Boy O’Connor, this quote that I read from you, which I thought was so incredibly profound. And it kind of hit me the same way as like the message of the outsiders and the way that you approached restoring this house into this museum. You said, I think as a nation or as a people in the past, we’ve looked at pop culture as being disposable. And now the things that were once disposable to us become more important than, say, like a Monet. And you said, I’ve been to Amsterdam. I’ve seen Rembrandt. It’s a brilliant painting, but I don’t relate to that in any way. There’s no part of my DNA in that. And The Outsiders is like a rite of passage. I love this because I think – You’re good.
SPEAKER 03 :
You dug that one out. That’s good.
SPEAKER 02 :
That is –
SPEAKER 03 :
such a great deal i mean i mean fonzie raised me and and and jachi and joni and and and you know sha na na was the the guys i wanted to look like because they looked like the guys in brooklyn where i grew up originally before i came to california everybody i knew was like a sha na na type character so when i saw the outsiders i thought well listen i don’t have much but if i had a band of brothers that would surround me and me surround them and just look out for each other that this life would be doable and so it sure has been but uh I don’t believe that I would have had the success that I’ve had here in Tulsa if this house wasn’t Los Angeles or New York. It’s just people here are cut from a different cloth and I’m never leaving.
SPEAKER 02 :
Amen to that. Danny Boy O’Connor, the book, you got to get it now, The Oral History of the Outsider, Stain Gold. And you can do that pre-order right now. uh barnes and noble and it comes out this fall and of course the musical we’ll make sure we remind everybody about the gala uh i’m gonna get down there and visit it because i love the book i’ve been to tulsa we got affiliates in tulsa i gotta get down there and i gotta go visit i gotta go look at the switchblades and i gotta go look at this director’s chair and the jacket and the car and everything else danny boy o’connor god bless you my friend and icon in so many different ways and you’re just keeping on going appreciate you thank you my friend stay gold that’s right
SPEAKER 05 :
Thanks for tuning in to today’s edition of Dana Lash’s Absurd Truth Podcast. If you haven’t already, make sure to hit that subscribe button on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
