Struggle Meals with David Oyelowo

Actor and Producer David Oyelowo joins Chelsea to talk about mispronouncing Oprah’s name, preparing for a character who suffered through solitary confinement in his new movie NEWBORN, and the kindness of good friends. Then: A sheltered 30-something is ready to date, but doesn’t know the rules. And a new mom prepares to leave her toxic marriage. * Need some advice from Chelsea? Email us at [email protected] mailto:[email protected] * Executive Producer Catherine Law Edited & Engineered by Brad Dickert * * * The views and opinions expressed are solely those of the Podcast author, or individuals participating in the Podcast, and do not represent the opinions of iHeartMedia or its employees. This Podcast should not be used as medical advice, mental health advice, mental health counseling or therapy, or as imparting any health care recommendations at all. Individuals are advised to seek independent medical, counseling advice and/or therapy from a competent health care professional with respect to any medical condition, mental health issues, health inquiry or matter, including matters discussed on this Podcast. Guests and listeners should not rely on matters discussed in the Podcast and shall not act or shall refrain from acting based on information contained in the Podcast without first seeking independent medical advice. See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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  Feeling curious? Maybe a little bold? Just push play. Listen to Sniffy's Cruising Confessions now on the iHeart Radio App or wherever you get your podcasts. Sponsored by Healthy Sexual from Gilead Sciences. Okay, for the High and Mighty Tour, people, we are rocking and rolling. These are the shows we have coming up. Chicago, April 10th, I start Chicago. Then I have Indianapolis on the 11th and then Louisville, Kentucky on April 12th. April 16th is Albuquerque. April 17th is Mesa, Arizona. April 23rd is Kansas City, Missouri. April 24th is St. Louis, Missouri. April 25th is Minneapolis. April 30th, Nashville. May 1st, Charlotte, North Carolina. May 2nd is Durham, North Carolina.

• 2:48Speaker 00

  May 6th in Los Angeles at the Saban Theater for Netflix is a Joke. April 15th, I will be in Saratoga. April 16th, Monterey. April 17th, Modesto. I will be in Portchester on June 4th. June 5th, I will be in Boston, Massachusetts. June 12th, I will be in Portland, Oregon. And June 13th, I will be in Seattle, Washington. June 27th is going to be Hyannis, Massachusetts. August 6th is Red Bank, New Jersey. August 7th, I'm coming home to Montclair, New Jersey. August 15th is Calgary, Alberta, Canada. September 18th, Santa Barbara. September 19th, San Diego. September 25th, I will be at the Beacon in New York City. September 26th, I will be in Philadelphia.

• 3:33Speaker 00

  September 27th, New Haven, Connecticut. October 2nd, Atlanta, Georgia. October 3rd, Baltimore, Maryland. October 4th, Saginaw, Michigan. October 9th, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. October 10th, Toronto, Canada. October 16th, I'm coming to Boise, Idaho. October 17th, Spokane, Washington. November 7th, I will be in San Francisco. And November 13th, Salt Lake City. November 20th, Austin. November 21st, Houston, Texas. November 22nd, Irving, Texas. December 5th, I am adding a second show in Denver. For those of you who couldn't get tickets to the first one. And on December 6th, I will be coming to Vancouver, Canada.

• 4:17Speaker 00

  Okay, those are all my dates for the High and Mighty Tour. Go to ChelseaHandler.com for tickets. Hi Catherine.

• 4:24Speaker 02

  Hi Chelsea, how are you?

• 4:26Speaker 00

  I'm coming to you from my brand new house.

• 4:29Speaker 02

  You know what? Your assistant said that you are loving it. And I was like, she's loving it?

• 4:33Speaker 00

  Who said that? Who said that?

• 4:36Speaker 02

  Karen?

• 4:36Speaker 00

  I am, I am.

• 4:38Speaker 02

  I am so happy about that.

• 4:39Speaker 00

  It's actually very quite, it's quite peaceful considering all of the hullabaloo. I guess maybe I just needed to get out my last vomit bath about it. And, um, but it's really beautiful. I mean, it's very.

• 4:51Speaker 02

  It is gorgeous.

• 4:52Speaker 00

  Serene and beautiful. And I spent the last two days, because I've been on tour, as you know, I spent the last two days sleeping. I slept 13 hours, two nights in a row with the help of a little Xanax and edibles.

• 5:03Speaker 02

  I was gonna say, I texted you at what, 6:40 yesterday? And I was like, she's, I know she's gone. She's not responding.

• 5:09Speaker 00

  I was like, I was like, wait, I was done with my day yesterday at 2:30. And I was like, how long do I have to wait before I take my Xanax? I, I watched the new season of, I watched the new season of Euphoria. I watched three episodes of that.

• 5:23Speaker 02

  Amazing.

• 5:23Speaker 00

  And I was like, wow, this is fucking awesome.

• 5:26Speaker 02

  Good.

• 5:26Speaker 00

  And, uh, yeah, I'm just, I was just having a great time. I'm having a great time recuperating. I love bed. I love bed. Me encanta mi cama. I just can't get enough of it. Like also the feeling when you wake up, like I wake up to pee at around midnight. And I'm like, I look at the clock and I'm like, oh God, this is amazing. I have like six more hours to go.

• 5:51Speaker 02

  That is the best feeling. When you're like, it's not almost dawn. Like I have so much more time.

• 5:56Speaker 00

  No, and I have shows this weekend. There are tickets still available for the Indianapolis show on Saturday. I'm at the Marat Theater. And then on Sunday, I'm in Louisville, Kentucky at the Palace Theater, and there are tickets still available for that too. So Friday, I'm in Chicago at the Chicago Theater. That's sold out, thankfully.

• 6:12Speaker 02

  And I've got people coming to see you in Chicago, you know, my sister-in-law is gonna be there, my, her girlfriends, yeah.

• 6:18Speaker 00

  Oh, fun, yes.

• 6:19Speaker 02

  And they're all here Chelsea fans, so.

• 6:20Speaker 00

  Oh, and I'm also doing an Owls Brew event, people, on Thursday afternoon in Chicago. So look that up for Owls Brew for my vodka lemonade. I'm gonna be in person, in store, in person.

• 6:30Speaker 03

  Chelsea, where are you playing this weekend? Is it the Chicago Theater?

• 6:33Speaker 00

  Chicago Theater, yeah.

• 6:34Speaker 03

  Nice. Do you know that the first time I asked Catherine out was after a show there? I was playing and there was an after-party and I asked her out for the first time there. So it's a really special place to us.

• 6:44Speaker 02

  That's true. It was the I O 25th anniversary that like will go down in infamy. Like every famous person who went through I O or Improv Olympic like came back to the city and like none of the audio worked at this 5,000-seat theater. So people just like left and Brad was playing the show. I was seeing the show and then went to the

• 7:04Speaker 00

  Oh, that's funny. That's funny.

• 7:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 7:07Speaker 00

  Well, I'll be celebrating your love while I'm there, you guys.

• 7:10Speaker 02

  Thank you, Chelsea. Think of us.

• 7:12Speaker 00

  Oh, and also for those of you in Chicago, I'll be at, it's called the Jewel Osko is the liquor store that I will be at for the event from 1:30 to 3:00 PM on April 10.

• 7:23Speaker 03

  They call it the Jewels.

• 7:24Speaker 02

  And I also spend a lot of

• 7:25Speaker 00

  Oh, is that your place, you guys? That's pretty funny.

• 7:29Speaker 02

  It's like the Albertsons of Illinois.

• 7:31Speaker 00

  Okay, great. Well, I'm glad I'm glad I'm getting to hit that spot.

• 7:35Speaker 02

  Enjoy.

• 7:35Speaker 00

  You know me and liquor stores. I love it.

• 7:37Speaker 02

  Enjoy.

• 7:39Speaker 02

  Well, I am thrilled for our guest today. He is, I think he's one of our great actors of our time.

• 7:44Speaker 00

  Yeah, he's actually really, yeah, he's, he's definitely one of the great actors of our time and our interview with him was really, I really loved speaking with him.

• 7:55Speaker 00

  And he gave great advice. So I always love when a straight man can do that.

• 7:59Speaker 02

  He gave really great and thoughtful advice, like really great.

• 8:03Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's very nice when people are thoughtful. Our guest today is an actor and an executive producer of the new film, Newborn. Please welcome David Oyelowo O. Hi, David.

• 8:15Speaker 04

  Hello.

• 8:16Speaker 00

  So nice to see you.

• 8:18Speaker 04

  Nice to see you too, again. I don't know if you remember when at the Critics' Choice. I think that's the last time I saw you. Yeah.

• 8:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, backstage. That was right. Yeah. Yeah, that was like two years ago, right?

• 8:29Speaker 04

  That's right. That's right.

• 8:31Speaker 00

  David, happy birthday, first of all.

• 8:33Speaker 04

  Thank you. Thank you. It was yesterday. I had an amazing time.

• 8:37Speaker 00

  What did you do to celebrate?

• 8:39Speaker 04

  So I've been shooting a show in the Canary Islands and I've been there since January. I love my home, I love my kids, I love my wife and I've missed them all terribly. My wife and I actually have a two week rule, we're never apart for more than two weeks. So she's been toing and froing from the Canary Islands, but I haven't seen my kids for a while. So just being here to celebrate with them. And then we had this extraordinary circumstance whereby my eldest son got engaged three days ago.

• 9:11Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 9:11Speaker 04

  And this happened while I was on the plane from Tenerife to LA. My wife sent me a text saying she said yes, she sends me the video. I couldn't download it on the plane, it was infuriating.

• 9:25Speaker 00

  Oh, I know that feeling.

• 9:27Speaker 04

  I know, I know. So the glow of all of that was in the party yesterday. It was, it was a phenomenal time.

• 9:33Speaker 00

  Oh, that's so exciting. Congratulations on all fronts.

• 9:37Speaker 04

  I know, it's really great, I'm very happy.

• 9:39Speaker 00

  And having a family that likes to spend time with their parents also. Congratulations on that.

• 9:45Speaker 04

  I know, yeah, it's, it's actually, something happened with our family. We were always close, but during the pandemic, even though that was such a devastating time for so many people, for us, we, we just kind of coalesced as a family. We just, you know, everyone's going to school and I'm going off doing jobs and my wife and I run a company. And we had this year and a half, two years where we just kind of went together. You know, in this, in this really amazing way that hasn't abated. And so, yeah, we really love each other's company.

• 10:16Speaker 00

  That's so sweet. And you and your wife have been together since you were teenagers?

• 10:21Speaker 04

  Correct, we met when we were seventeen and eighteen, doing youth theatre. And we've been, we've known each other, we worked out for nearly thirty two years now. We've been married for twenty seven.

• 10:35Speaker 00

  Twenty seven years, thirty two years together, four children.

• 10:39Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 10:40Speaker 00

  Nice, this is all nice.

• 10:42Speaker 04

  Yes, yes, yeah, I'm very blessed.

• 10:45Speaker 00

  And she's also a member of Mensa, which I think is worth mentioning.

• 10:49Speaker 04

  Can we just take a moment to

• 10:53Speaker 04

  give my wife some props, my wife some props on that. Yeah, so she, very late diagnosis for ADHD and went in for the testing for it. And the person doing the testing was like, um. By the way, this testing we're doing on you signifies very high IQ. Have you ever tested that side and you went, no? And so incredibly a byproduct of what could be perceived as some kind of deficiency in terms of ADHD is what illustrated that she has this off the charts IQ.

• 11:32Speaker 00

  I love that. First of all, we were just talking, me and my friend were talking two nights ago about getting tested because we couldn't decide which disorder we had, ADD or ADHD. I believe I just have ADD. I don't have the hyperactive part, but he was saying that I do. Anyway, this is a great incentive for everybody listening, since we all have some form of this, because you could find out that you're a member of Mensa.

• 11:54Speaker 04

  Exactly, exactly. Such great bragging rights, by the way.

• 11:57Speaker 00

  That would be a real feather in my cap, quite frankly.

• 12:01Speaker 00

  So, speaking of your wife, she's also a producer on this movie?

• 12:04Speaker 04

  No, she, so we run a production company together. And so our production company produced this. She's not a producer on it, but she is a producer and we've produced stuff together. In fact, this is how much love is in the air, Chelsea. So upstairs, this is my office building, we are preparing for my assistant, who fell in love with our art director on a show that my wife and I produced called Bass Reeves. And I'm officiating their wedding on Saturday.

• 12:34Speaker 00

  Oh, my God, you just spreading love around town like it's nobody's business. Watch out.

• 12:42Speaker 04

  I know, I know. There's not enough of it in the world. So I feel like when you find it, you got to talk about it.

• 12:47Speaker 00

  That's true. We got to double down on all sorts of love and all kindness, especially to strangers, everybody listening. Be kind to strangers. People need love right now.

• 12:56Speaker 04

  I couldn't agree more.

• 12:58Speaker 00

  Let's talk about your movie, which is called Newborn. It's out now in AMC theaters. So this is a story about a man who was in solitary confinement for seven years. And I know you're a method, you're a method guy. Is that accurate?

• 13:12Speaker 04

  Well, it's, I would say, I, whatever the, the, the part requires, I feel like I'm in service of. So, you know, I definitely would not apply what I guess people call the method to, you know, a, a comedy or something that doesn't require that level of, as I say, giving yourself over to something. Sometimes you're playing something that's closer to yourself, sometimes it's very far from yourself. And so, yes, to, to, to your point, in playing Chris Newborn, a guy who had endured seven years of solitary confinement, which is something I simply cannot personally get my head around, given my own very blessed

• 13:52Speaker 04

  circumstances and experience. I read a lot about it, but you know, I read a book called Solitary by a guy called Albert Woodfox, who had endured, believe it or not, over forty years of solitary confinement for something he didn't, a crime he didn't commit. But I also shadowed a guy called Richard Rosario, who was wrongfully convicted of a crime. He served twenty of the twenty-five years he was convicted for, seven of those were in solitary. And in talking to him, I started to get a sense of what the role requires. And so, yes, to, to a certain extent, I, I had to sort of give myself over the, to that in order to come close to telling the truth of that awful situation.

• 14:36Speaker 00

  So what did you learn from these guys? I mean, fill us in. Like, how does someone move on from, I mean, as you can see in the movie, which is really beautiful, and Denzel Washington's daughter is in the movie, who is absolutely fantastic. Incredible. She's gorgeous, a gorgeous actor, and you guys are great together. And as you depict in the movie, you could see, what did you pick up from them in like researching this role that really helped inform you that you were maybe surprised to learn?

• 15:06Speaker 04

  So many things. I mean, there are so many things that we don't know that we should know. One of them being that there are eighty thousand people in solitary confinement today in America. Men, women and children. So it is widespread as a practice. You know, in talking to Richard and in studying up on this, after thirteen days, studies have shown you're never the same again. There is a psychic break that happens that you will you will just never fully recover from because it's twenty three hours a day, every day. Fluorescent lights are on all the time. Almost everyone in those wings are dealing with mental illness.

• 15:49Speaker 04

  So they're screaming and, you know, it's just sensory overload with complete isolation. So let alone seven years of that. And what I learnt from Richard, specifically outside of generally what happens to people, is that our connection to humanity is literally what defines us as human. So it is the ultimate form of dehumanization to not have connection with other human beings. And the only thing that kept him remotely sane was knowing his wife and two kids were out there. They loved him and that was the only thing that gave him any kind of modicum of hope.

• 16:33Speaker 04

  If you don't have something to tether yourself to, it is it is being alive but dead, so to speak. And, you know, he has now been free for ten years. He's still dealing with, of course, the effects of it, but he attributes his ability to still function as a human being to the love that he knew was out there for him from his family.

• 16:58Speaker 00

  Yeah. Was it hard for you to get out of that character after filming such a demanding kind of mentally anguish-filled movie?

• 17:06Speaker 04

  It was very intense for me because on the first day of shooting, unfortunately, my dad, who had been dealing with a stage four colon cancer, passed away on the morning of our first day of shooting. And so weirdly, even though that was definitely not what you would want, it instantaneously put me in this place of intense retrospection, intense focus, just to get through it, combined with, you know, the great scripts that Nate Parker

• 17:45Speaker 04

  had written and was directing. But honestly, it was about trying to be in service of Richard and others who I had spoken to who had dealt with this. I felt a real burden of responsibility. And so, you know, we just did everything we could to tell the truth. I mean, the good thing is I'm a father, I am a husband, I have brothers, and Chris Newborn has a brother in this film, which is also a key relationship for him. So I could identify with all of those things. Obviously, the gap in my knowledge was the extreme nature of dealing with solitary confinement.

• 18:24Speaker 00

  Yeah. And I mean, it is a, it makes you really think about why that's necessary in a prison system. Like, putting someone in a room alone without fluorescent lighting is bad. Like, why add all of these things that turn a person crazier than they are? It makes, it's just, everything is so backwards. Speaking of your father, I'm really sorry to hear that. I know that I read that your father passed away on the first day of shooting. Your father had some, I know a lot of people have trouble pronouncing your last name, or yellowo? Or yellowo? Got it. Wow. That was impressive.

• 18:56Speaker 04

  You've literally disproved.

• 18:59Speaker 00

  I know. I got it. That means anybody could get it.

• 19:03Speaker 04

  Yes, exactly. Moving on.

• 19:05Speaker 00

  Your dad, but your dad had problem pronouncing Oprah's name. He couldn't get that right.

• 19:10Speaker 04

  Literally. It's so hypocritical. He would get so upset about the mispronunciation of our name. And then he would always call it opera. Opera Winifred. Opera, but then he met her and like to her face, opera. I was like, oh my lord.

• 19:30Speaker 00

  Well, you can just attribute that to a Nigerian accent, can't you?

• 19:34Speaker 04

  I guess so, but you know, like literally one of the most famous people on the planet. Let's be clear that he had heard it enough to know that it is not opera. So it slightly discounts his annoyance at our name being mispronounced.

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• 22:29Speaker 00

  I know that Yopra is like a very close friend to you and you kind of used her as a gut check at different times in your career. Can you talk about that?

• 22:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, we have a very special relationship. I met her doing a film called The Butler, which Lee Daniels directed and we played mother and son in that film. And that dynamic just never quite changed. Something truly beautiful happened even before we started shooting. We were at a party at Lee Daniels' house. We shot it in New Orleans and he had rented a house and we were having this party and I was sort of stood in the corner. I was a younger actor then, still fairly new to Hollywood. My wife and I had moved here from the UK. And in all honesty, I felt quite a bit of isolation. There were other.

• 23:21Speaker 04

  To be perfectly frank, there were other black actors who I I felt there was resistance to me. There was this sort of, um, I don't know, this Brit coming over here, taking our jobs, kind of vibe that I was getting. And I I had gone into this role that was a significant one. And in all honesty, I was kind of trepidatious about, is this gonna continue to exacerbate this feeling of isolation I have from a community that I really wanna be a part of and all that kind of stuff. So slightly stood in the corner and Oprah noticed this, came over to me and and said, are you okay? I said, yeah, you know, I'm just just dealing with

• 24:01Speaker 04

  a little bit of anxiety about these things. And of course, she famously has the ability to to get the truth of your soul out of you instantaneously. And so I started talking to her about this. And then she was just so open and honest about having had the same syndrome coming up as a as a black journalist in the South and at that time, feeling the same thing from other black women, to be perfectly frank. And that feeling of isolation, both from her own community, but also from an industry that told her she was too fat, she was too ugly, she was too black to to, you know, be anything in that world. And

• 24:44Speaker 04

  then she happened to meet Sidney Poitier, who expressed also having the same thing, having come over from the Caribbean and was starting to forge a had back in the day, forged a path in Hollywood and feeling the same sense of isolation. You know, people are threatened by success, especially when you're from a marginalized community and you feel like the pie that you want a slice of is very small. And so there's this sort of crabs in a barrel thing that can happen. And he had said to her, Sidney Poitier, this is, I know exactly what you're dealing with, and I'm going to walk you through it. And he became her mentor. And this was like the first major interaction I had had with Oprah.

• 25:28Speaker 04

  And she said, what he did for me, I'm going to do for you. And that was, I don't know, 15 years ago now. And she is, that has just never abated.

• 25:39Speaker 00

  Wow, that's amazing. That's a really beautiful story. Thank you for sharing that.

• 25:43Speaker 04

  Yeah, thank you.

• 25:44Speaker 00

  Have there been times in your career where you've gone to her at other times for advice when you're thinking about choosing projects or just navigating Hollywood after that?

• 25:55Speaker 04

  All the time, all the time, because one of the things she said to me is basically, she didn't say it like this, but, but she basically was saying, "You're only allowed to make new mistakes, not old ones. I'll tell you the old ones. I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll guide you through the potholes that I stepped in so that you don't have to," basically, which is as extraordinary as an offering as you can make to someone, as I think is possible. And so, yeah, whether it's financial literacy, which I had, I was very low in because my parents spent every day sort of scrabbling to put the pennies together. And, you know, they were amazing parents, but really bad business people, you know, just constantly on the precipice

• 26:40Speaker 04

  of bankruptcy and bailiffs at the door and, you know, just, just never could find enough financial oxygen to not be stressed by finances. And so, you know, I just, that was the only example I had. So I associated being a father, being a husband, being a working man with that. And, you know, one of the things she taught me is do everything you can to get out of debt as quickly as you can. Focus on that fastidiously, because the difference between wealthy people and people who are not is that they have somehow managed to get to the point whereby they can look down on their issues and have the space to strategize.

• 27:25Speaker 04

  When you are down on the ground, scrabbling to make ends meet, that's when you just inevitably make financial mistakes. You're caught in the rat race. You're caught in all of the things that keep you in financial debt. So do everything. And obviously, it's not an easy thing to do. But if she, she said she was just very conscious early on, "How do I get out of debt?" And I took her at her word and practiced it. And by golly, she was right.

• 27:52Speaker 00

  You guys moved over from the UK. How do you, why? Why did you move over from the UK?

• 27:58Speaker 04

  A myriad of reasons, the primary one being when I was coming up, you know, I I mentioned Sidney Poitier, obviously earlier, you know, that was my hero, Denzel Washington was my hero, but we literally had no equivalence of those in the UK with me growing up. There were, there were no black actors I could look at and go, that's my North Star. You know, I truly believe you cannot be what you cannot see. And I didn't see anything I could aspire to. And it's also why my parents were very resistant to the idea of me being in the arts, being an actor, because I think for them is like, you know, there's no evidence to us that the hard work we're putting in as immigrants here in the UK is

• 28:42Speaker 04

  good, that's going to be a better life for you. And so even though I defied my parents and I went to drama school and I did all the things, that continued to be the case. And so I got a few roles that got me a bit of notoriety. I did The Last King of Scotland with Forest Whitaker. I did a film of As You Like Here with Kenneth Branagh. I had done a show called, it was called Spooks in the UK, it's called MI5 here. There were things that sort of popped a little bit in the States, so it just gave me just enough juice to turn up here and people had seen things I had done. And then I I just, even though it hadn't happened yet, I knew my career was going to plateau. I I I came up with actors like

• 29:27Speaker 04

  Tom Hardy and Benedict Cumberbatch and James McAvoy, and those were my peers. We were all doing theatre in the UK, we were all working together. But we love period dramas in the UK, and that tends to be the thing that will launch an actor into the American consciousness. So whether it be Atonement for James McAvoy, or it's Pride and Prejudice for Matthew McFadyen, or Imitation Game for Benedict Cumberbatch, I just, I just knew that wouldn't happen for me unless I planted myself somewhere else. And so we started the process of moving and we did move in 2007. So we've lived here for 19 years now. And it it proved to be true within about

• 30:13Speaker 04

  Two months of landing in L A, this script called Selma landed on my doormat. The film didn't get made for another seven years after that, but at least it validated the fact that, oh, this is the kind of thing that I just knew wouldn't happen in the U K and was possible here.

• 30:32Speaker 00

  Yeah. So the transition from the U K to America, things started to open up for you career-wise, and that was your main motivation for moving over here. How was it culturally for you to come over here from the U K?

• 30:44Speaker 04

  Oh, my goodness. The tricky thing, and the thing that no one really warns you about, moving from England, an English-speaking country, obviously, to America, another English-speaking country, is the sheer amount of cultural differences. Like, my wife and I never had credit cards in the U K. We couldn't do anything without a credit card when we moved here. It was just like, uh, what's your credit score? What's your credit, credit, credit, credit, credit? You know, we had never said that word as often as we did when we first moved here in our seven. And so that was something that we were like, we're barely human beings without credit, you know, and things like that. And so bank accounts and all that kind of stuff.

• 31:28Speaker 04

  The schooling system was so different for our kids. You know, our kids were five and two when we moved. And, you know, my wife actually chose to homeschool our kids and ended up doing it for five years because our kids just couldn't adjust to the American schooling system. And, you know, there were so, and the thing about it is the cultural differences are so slight and small, but huge because they are literally the thing that derail you from your child going to school, you being able to open a bank account, you being able to drive, you know? So that was, that took us a minute to adjust to. But there are extraordinary things about moving to this country.

• 32:13Speaker 04

  You know, literally in the U K, the attitude is can don't as opposed to can do. And so that was life-giving. You know, I love warm weather, and I had lived pretty much all of my life, most of my life, in the U K and never made peace with it. And suddenly, here we were, living in L A, and every day it felt like summer, which it basically was at that time. The weather's actually changed in L A, by the way. These rains we had that are so intense and then the heat, which is like unbearable. You know, it was a bit more, you know, even before. But that's a, that's a whole other thing.

• 32:54Speaker 04

  But the, the really tricky thing was we moved in oh seven and then we had the economic crash of oh eight and the writer's strike of oh eight. And oh my gosh, I, I think if we had made the move after oh eight, well, I don't think we would have made the move.

• 33:10Speaker 00

  Right.

• 33:11Speaker 04

  Right. It was so tough. My wife, we, uh, we had two kids and, and she was pregnant with our third and I didn't work for 14 months. And that was rough.

• 33:22Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 33:23Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 33:24Speaker 00

  Yeah. How did you guys get by? Like, how does that work?

• 33:27Speaker 04

  Good question. It didn't. It was like, you know, we were, we were in this headspace of did we make the right choice? Like what are we, it's just, but the, the good thing I guess is that it was everyone. Everyone was in the middle of this crash. Everyone in the industry was dealing with that circumstance. It was affecting not just America, but the UK as well because of how interlinked those industries are. And yeah, you know, we basically ran out of money. I remember being stood next to the kitchen counter with my wife and we were down to three dollars in my wallet. Like literally three dollars.

• 34:10Speaker 04

  And the reason I remember is I gave her two dollars and I held on to one and I went, this is us. You know, we couldn't go to an ATM because that would have just barked at us because there was nothing in there. But I will say, I remember us sort of sitting up in bed full of all the anxiety, but then just having this feeling of, well, at least we have each other, you know?

• 34:32Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah.

• 34:34Speaker 04

  And, and, and I, I sort of felt rich again because not everyone even has that. And I'm going to tell you a story I don't think I've told. Anyone under these kind of circumstances? Also, what happened? Do you know the actress Kate Mara by any chance?

• 34:50Speaker 00

  Of course, yeah.

• 34:51Speaker 04

  So Kate Mara was at the time dating a wonderful actor called Charlie Cox, who now plays Daredevil on the TV show. And they had become really good friends of ours. And we were in the middle of this time where we just had no money. And we invited them over for lunch. And we clearly had given them the most hellaciously basic of meals, because it's all we could afford.

• 35:21Speaker 00

  Seriously? I was just about to say, what are you doing inviting people for lunch?

• 35:24Speaker 04

  What were we thinking? I think we were sort of trying to pretend that our circumstances weren't our circumstances. But the next day, without us having expressed anything of our financial situation, they turned up at the door with a $400 Trader Joe's voucher. And just handed it to my wife and I and said, just, just, just something we wanted to do for you guys. And I could, I could cry thinking about it now. Because it was just, it was, we ran to Trader Joe's after we got that voucher. And that's how, how bad it was. And at the time, I had done a film with George Lucas.

• 36:09Speaker 04

  And like a film called Red Tails that he had produced and was in stock in post for a long time. I was, I was on the precipice of what I thought was the Hollywood dream. And then this crash happened. And, and it was just like such a weird confluence of things. We were in LA, in Hollywood. I'd just done this film with, with Cuba Gooding Jr. and Terrence Howard. And George Lucas was producing it. And, and my wife is pregnant with us. And it was just like, what is happening? But, you know, between falling even deeper in love with my wife, because it's all we had, and then having friends like that who showed up like that, you kind of go, oh, I think, I think we're gonna be okay. And, and, and we weren't.

• 36:54Speaker 00

  That must have been some lunch that you prepared them, by the way.

• 36:56Speaker 04

  I know. How bad was that?

• 36:59Speaker 00

  Took them over the next day with a $400 gift certificate. They must have been like, listen, we don't know what's going on with you people, but that is not it.

• 37:10Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 37:11Speaker 04

  I know, how bad. I can't even begin to. I think he may have just been like pasta with butter or something like.

• 37:18Speaker 00

  That's a really sweet story, though. I want to ask you one more question about, I know that John Lewis, our former congressman, who is now deceased, but one of the all time heroes of our country, was on the set one day for Selma when you were playing MLK Jr. So can you talk to us about that? What was that experience like? Have you ever seen the video of him dancing? Do you know?

• 37:41Speaker 04

  I have.

• 37:42Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 37:43Speaker 04

  I have.

• 37:44Speaker 00

  I watched that video like once a month, whenever I need to be up.

• 37:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah. If you, if you want a dose of joy, you just watch that, you know?

• 37:52Speaker 00

  What is the song? He's, he's dancing to, uh, what song is it?

• 37:55Speaker 02

  Happy?

• 37:56Speaker 04

  Oh, yes.

• 37:57Speaker 00

  Pharrell, Pharrell, right?

• 37:58Speaker 04

  Yes, that's right. That's right.

• 38:00Speaker 00

  And he's got, he has got some serious fucking moves.

• 38:05Speaker 04

  Oh, my gosh.

• 38:06Speaker 00

  Yeah, tell us what it was like meeting him and having him on set, watching you do that.

• 38:11Speaker 04

  Surreal, completely surreal. And yes, yes, Catherine, terrifying. Because, look, you know, in playing Dr. King, I had, I had interviewed Andrew Young, I had interviewed his kids, Dr. King's kids, I had interviewed several of these giants of the movement. I hadn't yet met John Lewis. And John Lewis was featured heavily in our film and was being played by Stefan James. Of course, he's a busy guy. I couldn't get to him in my build up to playing the role. And I, as you had alluded to, Chelsea, I, I stayed in character. I just felt that's what I

• 38:54Speaker 04

  had to do for that role. We were shooting in Atlanta. We were often surrounded by people who had heard him speak, who had worked with him, who had been in his orbit. I'm obviously an English walking around with this accent, just felt like not the way to elicit confidence or to sort of stay in the pocket, so to speak. So, you know, I was pretty much in that zone all the time. And then I got a knock on my trailer door.

• 39:22Speaker 04

  And an A D said, um, just to give you a heads up, John Lewis is visiting set today and would like to say hello. And I, I just felt all the blood kind of just leave my body.

• 39:35Speaker 04

  What, what did that person just say? And then they had literally warned me about a minute and a half before he was at the door. And so I was so in the zone of just staying as Dr. King. I greeted him as the character. And within a few minutes of our conversation, he just leaned into me and said, Dr. King, it is so good to see you again. And I, I, I, I could see that he wasn't just being cute. He went somewhere as he was looking me in the eye.

• 40:16Speaker 04

  And I just thought, how, how many layers can playing this role continue to afford me? It was just so incredible. But what went on to happen is that day I was supposed to be giving a speech to 400 people in a church. And he decided to stay for me giving the speech. And I just thought, okay, great to meet you. Thank you for being here. That's a layer of pressure I just don't know that I want. And you will never believe what happened. So I don't know if you know this, Chelsea and Catherine, when, when you're shooting,

• 40:58Speaker 04

  if because of the generators and all the electrics used for making a movie, the minute there's a hint of a thunderstorm, you have to shut everything down, just in case lightning or, or thunder hits the, the generator. And literally Ava DuVernay, who directed the film, went, okay, everyone going for a take, roll sound.

• 41:21Speaker 04

  Everything went dark. Literally, and I'm not exaggerating. I like have photographs of this thing. Everything went dark and this thunderstorm just suddenly was over the church. We were, we were gonna be shooting in. And by the time the storm had passed, he had had to leave. And I just was like, there is a God and he loves me.

• 41:46Speaker 00

  You willed that thunderstorm to happen. You're like, get the fuck out of here before I have to shoot this scene.

• 41:53Speaker 04

  Leave, exactly. No disrespect, but this doesn't help me.

• 41:57Speaker 00

  Get out of here.

• 42:00Speaker 00

  Oh, he's such a legend. He is such a legend, John Lewis, just the most awesome energy. So just the coolest. Okay, we're gonna take a break. We'll be right back with David Oyelowo.

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• 45:16Speaker 00

  And we're back. We are getting into the advice portion of the show, David. So I want to know, you can give me a good or bad, if there's any, yet maybe bad, since you've already shared some good advice that you've gotten from Oprah and others. Can you remember some of the worst advice that you've ever gotten?

• 45:34Speaker 04

  My dad gave me terrible advice over the two things that I value most in my life. My dad was my hero, my absolute hero. And he endured quite a bit of racism in the UK when he first moved there in the 60s and 70s. So when I met Jess, who is white, and who went on to be my wife, and I went to him and talked about the fact that I think, I think this is the person I want to marry, he was so against it. And I didn't think then it was to do with, you know, all of the trauma of what he had faced from other white people.

• 46:16Speaker 04

  But his advice was, David, one day she's going to wake up and realize you are black. I was like, okay, um, thank you for that. I think she's aware. And that doesn't help me one bit. What on earth are you talking about? And he just was like, they are, they betray us. They leave us. They hurt us. That's what they're predisposed to do. And that was his reality. And I had to defy him on that. That was his advice. And he also didn't get married till he was 40, didn't have me till he was 42. And, and I can understand it now that I'm

• 47:01Speaker 04

  a father myself, but I, Jess and I got engaged when she was 19 and I was 21. And he was just like, are you out of your mind that she's white and she's 19? And

• 47:16Speaker 04

  You know, that was advice which I can now understand, having dealt with my own interaction with racism, my own interaction with now being a father who has children who are similar to the age I was. But at the time, I was in complete defiance of that. And then, you know, and then me telling him I wanted to be an actor. You know, the first thing he said, why do you want to go and be a jester? You want to go and be a jester? I was like, okay, okay. That's what you think of actors, like, yeah, they are jesters. Promiscuous jesters.

• 47:54Speaker 04

  It's like, okay, I'm not listening to you on that either, Daddy.

• 47:58Speaker 00

  Did you ever share what he said with Jess, with your wife?

• 48:02Speaker 04

  I didn't have to because he would say it to her face. I mean, it was so upsetting. Like, he met her, I introduced him to her. I said, do you know how many girls are calling David all the time? Eh? You think, you think, you think, I was like, Daddy. He said, and what do you eat? Salad? Is salad the only thing you're eating? Salad, salad, salad. Why? You need to put some, some weight. Where's, where's the meat? There's no meat. And I was like, I'm stood right there. I'm like, Daddy, please stop. But that, that, that was my parents. They would just say whatever was on their mind all the time.

• 48:40Speaker 00

  That's pretty cute. Maybe not cute at the time, but after the fact.

• 48:44Speaker 04

  The, the, the other thing, so he completely fell in love with Jess, with time, and then ended up living with us. And, you know, with time, my wife did become more voluptuous. And she would come in, she would come into the room. Oh, yes, this is wonderful. Mm hmm, yes. Hey. I'm like, Daddy, I'm stood right here. That is highly inappropriate. Ah, it's true now. Look at this, wonderful. I was like, goodness me.

• 49:14Speaker 00

  Oh, that's good stuff. I like it. Okay, we have some callers and we have some, we give advice, David, on this podcast.

• 49:23Speaker 04

  Okay, I'm ready.

• 49:24Speaker 00

  You're ready. Let's go, Catherine. What do you got?

• 49:26Speaker 02

  All right. Well, we're gonna start with a caller. So we're like jumping into the deep end.

• 49:30Speaker 00

  Okay, great.

• 49:31Speaker 02

  And David, I know you've given dating advice. It seems like it was successful to your children. So, you know, we're gonna jump into some dating advice. So.

• 49:38Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 49:39Speaker 02

  Nishat says, Dear Chelsea, my family immigrated to the US almost 40 years ago from a predominantly Muslim country. I was born here a few years later. Overall, I'd describe my family as being quite liberal and progressive. With time, they've adjusted comfortably into American society. That being said, I'd still describe our upbringing as being more sheltered than our peers. We were allowed to have friends and grew up consuming American pop culture and media, but school was typically first priority and dating wasn't allowed. I don't want to label my mom and dad as helicopter parents, but I'd say they had a tendency to be more overprotective than necessary. Due to their hesitation and expectations, I feel like I missed out on optimizing fun and exploration during my formative years. These reflections have now been having an impact on my views about dating and relationships.

• 50:24Speaker 02

  The irony is that my family would love for me to find a great partner to share my life with, but my insecurities about my inexperience are getting in the way, and I feel like my upbringing is somewhat to blame. I'm embarrassed to admit that I've never dated or been in a relationship before. Now, at 34, I feel anxious, frustrated, and scared about navigating this world. I've been on and off a few apps over the past few years, but they simply make me feel bored and disposable, and I find the infinite number of choices overwhelming. There were a few flirtations that I bailed on and never connected with in person, including one guy I matched with three times over the course of four years. I finally struck up the courage to send a message, but alas, he never responded. I've been harboring a crush ever since. I know everyone's complaining about the state of dating in this modern age, but I genuinely feel unfit to tread these waters.

• 51:10Speaker 02

  How am I supposed to start playing the game when I barely understand the rules? Sincerely, Nishat.

• 51:15Speaker 00

  Hi, thank you for calling in. This is our special guest, David Oyelowo.

• 51:20Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 51:20Speaker 00

  Oh, dating, dating is difficult. It doesn't matter if you've been doing it for 20 years, or if you're just, I would say it's great that you haven't been exposed to too many men.

• 51:31Speaker 00

  I would say check in your box. That's a bonus.

• 51:34Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 51:35Speaker 00

  And your desire, A, is also great. Like, the fact that you're interested and that you've taken steps to make something happen is also positive. Do you have a therapist that you talk to?

• 51:46Speaker 01

  Um, no, I do not. I, I've considered it, but I haven't really taken the step in that direction. No.

• 51:52Speaker 00

  I think it's important to have a therapist. I think especially at your age, especially with everything that you're describing. I mean, it doesn't matter where you're from or what your life experience is. We all need therapists. We all need sounding board, and we all need to unpack our childhoods in some way. And there's all this, you know, trauma that some of us don't even know about. And whether it's like huge traumas, or like little micro traumas.

• 52:14Speaker 01

  Little teen traumas.

• 52:14Speaker 00

  Throughout your life, it's very important to talk to somebody about what shaped you and how you've come into this world to become the woman that you are. And also to just kind of help guide you along. Like, I think as, as long as you're taking little steps in the direction of where you want to go, then that's a positive thing that you're doing. Being on the dating apps is fine. I know it's frustrating, believe me. Like, I hear it all the time. I'm a woman, I get it.

• 52:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:39Speaker 00

  But there are great men out there. There are. There's just, there's a lot of idiots out there, so it kind of makes it look worse than it is. But you have to just be focused, I think, on your intention, which is to be in a loving, happy relationship, I'm assuming.

• 52:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, definitely. It's, I mean, I'm hoping that everybody on the apps has the same intention, but unfortunately, it's, it's the Wild West. So you just never really know. Who's looking for something serious, who's looking for something casual and who's just kind of there for fun.

• 53:10Speaker 00

  Absolutely. And that's also, but like you can't control what somebody, you, all you can do is be as direct as possible. And like, you know, that's one of the things I just kind of started something on my Instagram. It was kind of in jest, but it turned into this whole dating thing of setting people up. Cause I was like, where are all the men out here? I know so many incredible women and they're, where are the men? So I think there's just like, we're in a time in our culture where it's just like, men aren't working as hard to try to meet women, or they've forgotten how to connect with women. But there's definitely like, you know, I think, I think for you as a woman to be intentional, to be, to be upfront, to say, I'm not looking for something casual. I'm looking actually to get to know somebody and, you know, to see with, without any pressure on it.

• 53:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's a good way to take the pressure off.

• 53:56Speaker 00

  Get into the art of practicing communicating that way and get into the practice of trying to go on dates, you know, use those apps and, and, and use those dates, like do nice, innocent, daytime coffee meetup.

• 54:09Speaker 01

  I'm open to those things. Absolutely. Not happening as often as I would have preferred.

• 54:16Speaker 00

  Right.

• 54:16Speaker 02

  Do you have a good group of girlfriends, Nishat?

• 54:19Speaker 01

  Um, do I have a good, that's, that's.

• 54:24Speaker 02

  Or a couple, one or two?

• 54:25Speaker 01

  I have a couple. I, I don't like saying it, but I feel like the older I've gotten, the smaller that group has also gotten and people kind of get preoccupied with, you know, their own changes in their lives. They have new priorities. And so we just don't really get to keep in touch the same way we used to.

• 54:42Speaker 02

  Totally.

• 54:43Speaker 01

  It's pretty limited to like texting or phone calls, but I do have one or two people I still keep in touch with from school and from college. Yeah.

• 54:49Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. I feel like right now what you need is a cheerleader and whether that's like reaching out to girlfriends and getting back in touch with them on a regular basis or a therapist, like someone who can walk through this with you and be cheering you on. Cause it's not just one step, right? It's like multiple steps and getting to know someone. And then maybe if things get more serious, it's really important to have somebody in your corner cheering you on.

• 55:12Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I, Try to also learn from their experiences because they've also kind of gone, you know, through the whole process. I've heard horror stories. And so I think that's kind of pushed me away from wanting to engage in the experience. But you can only learn to swim if you get in the water. That's what I keep telling myself. So, you know, it might take a while, but I'm trying to stick through it to see what's, what's the outcome.

• 55:39Speaker 02

  Yeah. And you don't have to feel embarrassed. Like I have multiple friends who were in their thirties before they really started dating and they're happily settled now. My one friend, I say like, I'm so glad you didn't make us meet a ton of people. It was like the first person she met, that was her person and they're very happy now. So it can definitely happen.

• 55:58Speaker 00

  But also I just would say, would say like, don't give up. And if somebody doesn't respond to you or whatever, that's not your problem. Every no is closer to the yes that you're going to find. Do you know what I mean? So get rid of, who cares about that guy if he didn't respond? Great. Who's next? Let's, and get into that practice of going on really casual, innocent, like coffee dates, just to get into the rhythm of it. So that it doesn't feel like such a big deal anytime you do it, that you're not giving yourself away. It's just kind of like, oh, this is what I do now a couple of times a week or once a week or whatever you want to set up. But constantly making efforts in the direction you want to go, which is to be in a relationship. And I think it's wonderful that you have like accepted that. A lot of people don't even want to say that, you know, they're like, no, I don't want, it's too scary out there.

• 56:43Speaker 00

  Like it's good that, what, what, what part of the country do you live in?

• 56:47Speaker 01

  So I'm in New York City. Yeah. I live just outside of the city in the suburbs. Yeah.

• 56:51Speaker 00

  And then I also think with summer coming up and spring coming up, there's so many things you could sign up for. So many like activities that are outdoors in New York City where you can meet people that are going to be geared for people who are trying to meet people. You know what I mean? If you look up like, you know, dating activities in New York City, they'll be like, oh, singles, like women and men, men meeting women. Like they have all that stuff available. So you're in the best city in the world to do that, to make that happen.

• 57:16Speaker 01

  I keep being told that, but I think another issue is I'm, I'm a terrible flirt. I'm terrible at them like zero.

• 57:25Speaker 01

  Don't know how I would even navigate that kind of a scenario. I look forward to those kinds of exchanges, but because I, I haven't had any experience, I wonder how.

• 57:34Speaker 04

  How would I even perform? And how would it feel like, you know? So it's, it's like constantly like big, big butterflies in my stomach.

• 57:41Speaker 00

  Yeah, well, I really, really encourage you to get a therapist and really have somebody in your corner that you can really bounce this stuff off of because she's going to help you. I'm saying a woman because you should get a woman. And she's gonna, she's gonna help you navigate this. And I think it's great that you want to put yourself out there and that is a big step.

• 58:01Speaker 04

  Thank you, thank you, I appreciate that.

• 58:03Speaker 02

  David, do you have thoughts?

• 58:05Speaker 04

  Yeah, I do. You know, I, I, everything I'm hearing, which I, I agree with is, is how can you be active rather than reactive in a sense? And also intentional, you know? In terms of your upbringing, some of what I expressed on here today is my own parents' perceptions that were being transposed onto me. And I could either reject them because I recognize that that's their experience and not mine, or I could internalize them and then be pulled into someone else's prejudices, preconceptions, fears, doubts.

• 58:47Speaker 04

  And before you know it, you have this sort of generational cycle that is a downward spiral on the basis of information that may not actually even be true anymore. That may have been your experience coming over to this country in the sixties or seventies or whatever, but the world has changed. I'm a different person. I have different beliefs, values, aspirations, desires. And so I think to actively recognize that you may still be living or reacting to your parents' estimations of what your life should be and who you are is, is one thing. And then to Chelsea's point about therapy, you know, what are the things that you can intentionally do on the basis of the revelation you've had about yourself?

• 59:32Speaker 04

  And then the putting of yourself out there in a sense, which is terrifying for everyone, of course. What I would also say is to get rid of any shame tied to the fact that you're in your thirties and You are you and your experience is specific, you know. Because of of how I was raised and my own belief system from a faith standpoint, I was a virgin when I got married. And I got teased mercilessly for that. But it was my truth and it has proved to be something that is wonderful for me. And there were times where when I was being teased or or mocked for it, that I could have been drawn into someone else's perception of what I should have been doing.

• 1:00:16Speaker 04

  And to be honest, for me, that I I just know that wasn't the path I wanted and and the path that was gonna lead to my own specific brand of happiness. And so I agree with with Chelsea. I have a lot of friends in their thirties and forties who have dated a lot and are left with real scars. That that mean that

• 1:00:38Speaker 04

  almost the idea of them finding a partner is is harder because it's that now they're bringing so much baggage to those relationships. And again, not to say that that isn't something that you can also still find love through. But please don't think that you are now somehow damaged goods because of your age or your parental thing or or even being shy. You know, there's gonna be someone out there, that's the very thing about you that they love. Easier said than done, but what are the intentional things you can do? What what is a a team sport or a social situation that you can put yourself in that isn't necessarily tied to dating?

• 1:01:21Speaker 04

  But it's gonna help with your confidence so that you're going into situations whereby, you know, you've just dealt with some of your social anxiety that isn't in a setting that is about dating, which is just like way too many uh uh anxiety. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, so what is that thing, you know, is it a is it a board game thing? Is it a book club? Is it a whatever? You know, get outside of your comfort zone and then get rid of the shame. You know, dispel, you you know, the projections of your parents. And then, yeah, and then just keep on, keep on getting getting on out there. I was just saying to these guys, I'm literally officiating the wedding of my assistant on Saturday. She's she's in her forties, her husband to be is in his forties.

• 1:02:05Speaker 04

  They met on set, uh he was our art director and I I just saw the most beautiful appless. Cute convergence, which is now leading to these two guys in their 40s getting married at my house on Saturday.

• 1:02:21Speaker 01

  I love that it's Atlas.

• 1:02:23Speaker 04

  Yes, yes, it can still happen. It can still happen.

• 1:02:27Speaker 00

  Right. And also just letting people know, you know, that are in your life and in your work life, that you're interested in meeting someone. It's good to keep putting that message out there and letting people, you never know where you're going to be introduced to somebody.

• 1:02:41Speaker 01

  Yep, true, true. Yes, I'm going to try to stay open to those things.

• 1:02:45Speaker 00

  Okay, great. I can't wait for your first boyfriend. Let us know.

• 1:02:51Speaker 02

  Will you follow up with us, Nishat?

• 1:02:52Speaker 01

  Absolutely, definitely. I'll follow up with you guys. Thank you so much.

• 1:02:56Speaker 02

  All right.

• 1:02:57Speaker 04

  Nice to meet you.

• 1:02:58Speaker 00

  Nice to meet you.

• 1:02:59Speaker 01

  Likewise. Thank you. Bye.

• 1:03:02Speaker 02

  That was such great advice.

• 1:03:03Speaker 00

  I know. That was great advice, David. I loved everything you said. Now we have you on record giving dating advice. This is awesome.

• 1:03:11Speaker 04

  Happily, happily.

• 1:03:13Speaker 02

  So Evelyn says, Dear Chelsea, I'm writing because I can't seem to make the move to leave a situation that isn't good for me. I've been with my current partner for three years and I think about leaving almost every day. An overview, he cheated one year into our relationship with an ex and also slept with his son's mother when we were broken up due to the aforementioned cheating and lied until it was clear he couldn't lie anymore. I thought I could forgive and move on, but I think about it often and obviously don't feel like I can trust him. He has a terrible relationship with his son's mother, calls her names, argues and fights with her often. Crazy that they slept together, huh? We don't have anything in common. Our conversations are pointless and he has a short fuse. He's

• 1:03:55Speaker 02

  also a great provider. He loves our daughter and great with kids. I'm close with his family, so he has a good side, too. That's where I get wrapped up in guilt, but I know that I deserve better. Oh, and he proposed on a trip recently, so guilt is at a max. Even writing this, I'm like, girl, obviously you need to leave. The problem is, I'm a mom to our 15 month old daughter. I don't work, so I'm apprehensive to leave. I'm scared he'll be awful to me like he is with his son's mom. I just don't know where to start, or how to leave, or if I should. Do I leave and bite the bullet, put my daughter in daycare? I have a lot of anxiety about leaving her in daycare. And start to rebuild? I know what you're going to say, and my gut is saying the same. But I feel like I'm stuck in quicksand. Please help, I look up to you so much. I dream of one day being able to make moves within my own life that are aligned with my beliefs the way you do.

• 1:04:40Speaker 02

  Thank you, Evelyn.

• 1:04:41Speaker 00

  Hi, Evelyn.

• 1:04:42Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 1:04:44Speaker 00

  Hi, this is our special guest, David. He's here today.

• 1:04:47Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 1:04:47Speaker 04

  Hi, hello.

• 1:04:48Speaker 00

  Hi, I'm really sorry about how, what you're going through. I can feel the pain in your letter. I understand that you're in a really difficult spot. But I think you obviously know the answer to your question, because you do. And you have a knowing, we all have a knowing within us, whether you're a man, or a woman, or anything in between. We all have an instinct and a gut. And the longer you put off listening to that gut, it just feel like the higher of a price you're going to pay. Do you have any family? Do you have anyone you can go to if you were to move out, or to leave, that can help you?

• 1:05:22Speaker 01

  I think I would, yeah. Like, I think I could make it work.

• 1:05:27Speaker 00

  Okay, well, that's, that's something. So like, I think you, also, something to know is like, the people in your life that love you, they already know what the situation is. And they're going to be very, more helpful than you know. When you reach out and ask for help, people really want to help you that really love you. They, they do. So I think it's a time for you to think about who those people are in your life, and ask for help. You're not going to need it forever, but you're going to need it for the transition. And you really have to take care of yourself. And I also just want to say, like, this is about, not just you, this is about the health and happiness of your child. So sometimes when we can't defend ourselves, like the way that we would for a child, a

• 1:06:09Speaker 00

  daughter, a sister, a mother, you have to think of, this is her future. So you're doing the most loving thing for the future of her, and the future that you have together. There's a whole world out there where you're going to feel loved and cherished, and, and not in this situation. But it's going to take a couple, it's going to take some big moves on your part.

• 1:06:30Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:06:31Speaker 02

  David, can you speak to, I know you've talked about listening to your knowing, and can you speak a little bit to that and how you experience that?

• 1:06:41Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean firstly, Evelyn, I can see the pain in your eyes. I can see the conflict. I can see that what you're going through is very difficult and just not easy in any way. And as Chelsea has already alluded to, it's your child is part of a component. So, you know, I don't want to be glib in relation to that. This is tough stuff. Again, I think you know the answer to your own question, but I think it's worth giving it context, which is that you have tried and tested this person, and they are not to be trusted. And so you've already done the thing that is where love emanates from.

• 1:07:25Speaker 04

  I personally believe love is sacrifice. And that sacrifice sometimes manifests in, let me meet this person where they're at. Let me, let me give them the benefit of the doubt. And if they have consistently not met that level of generosity and sacrifice to what they may be able to offer, then at some point, the ability to trust them has, has gone. And that's you having done your part. If it was gossip or hearsay and you didn't know it for a fact, then we would be here saying, well, have the conversation, you know,

• 1:08:10Speaker 04

  have couples therapy or whatever. But it feels like that Rubicon has been crossed over, so to speak. And so it's about self-love. It's about how are you going to now love yourself and your child through to the other side of this? Because I've, I've personally witnessed people recently, a friend of mine who

• 1:08:34Speaker 04

  Stayed and everyone around them are just like, you just know this is not going to be good. It's only going to continue to deteriorate. You're only putting off the inevitable because there's something that is broken, whether it's in the relationship or the individual. And it sounds to me that this person, there is a brokenness in them. That means that they are constantly looking for, whether it's self-esteem, affirmation, whatever it is that you are not providing them and cannot provide them.

• 1:09:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:10Speaker 04

  And that is something that you must not beat yourself over because I'm sure you have feelings of insecurity, feelings of shame, feelings of why wasn't I enough? Well, you will be enough for someone, but you will only get to that someone once you have cleared this slate. And so, you know, my hope for you is that you do make this step that you know you need to make and that the sooner you make it, the sooner you will get through what will be a period of mourning, a period of pain, a period of maybe even some doubt, but you will come out the other side into something better because hopefully you'll take the experience of that. You'll know what the red flags are. There'll be more self-love for yourself because you've made an act and a step that is based on loving

• 1:09:55Speaker 04

  yourself over your insecurity that makes you stay in a bad situation. And that hopefully will be what will inform your next choices and your next relationship.

• 1:10:04Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:10:05Speaker 02

  Yeah. And Evelyn, I just want to encourage you, like, this is big scary stuff. These are huge changes that you would be making in your life and in your daughter's life. But you are brave enough for this. You, you are brave. Even just taking these first steps of like, is this the right choice, reaching out? That is brave. And I believe that you're brave enough to handle this.

• 1:10:27Speaker 01

  Thank you. And I think my biggest fear is like losing time with her because right now I'm a hundred percent of the time with her. And if I made this move, it would be Working all the time and then fifty fifty split and then I think I go back and forth in my mind, is it better for me to hang on now to be with her all the time? Or is that just me being selfish?

• 1:10:54Speaker 00

  I think the time that you're going to gain more time with her by making a healthier decision for both of you in the future. Like this, this period that you're about to enter, maybe you won't be spending as much time with her as you want, but in the long run, it will pay off. Like you're going to get the quality of time is going to be better than the quality of time you have now, because now you're kind of shielding, protecting her in a sense, and you're in this state, but your happiness is going to permeate her life and your peace of mind is going to have a huge impact on your daughter. So we want you to be happy and healthy for the sake of your daughter also, not just for the sake of you, that is hugely important, but it's both of you that you're thinking about.

• 1:11:38Speaker 00

  So like, yes, like this is all gonna be, it will be the right decision down the road. It'll, it won't feel like it when you're going through these difficult things, but you do have the strength and you do have the courage to do it. And you're gonna get, your relationship with her is gonna show it in spades when you're in a different situation.

• 1:11:59Speaker 00

  So please keep us posted about what, what happens, okay? Let us know.

• 1:12:04Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:12:05Speaker 00

  Okay. All right. Take care. Thank you for calling.

• 1:12:08Speaker 04

  Bless you.

• 1:12:08Speaker 01

  Okay, thank you.

• 1:12:10Speaker 04

  Bye.

• 1:12:13Speaker 01

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• 1:14:52Speaker 00

  Wow, that was pretty serious. Okay. Well, I thank you for your time today, David. You were so wonderful. I look at, listen to you talk all day long.

• 1:15:00Speaker 04

  Oh, thank you. Well, likewise, I love this conversation. I've listened to your podcast. What I love, love, love about it is the combination of lightness, but also how

• 1:15:13Speaker 04

  You just go straight for the guts of something and, and you know, people you've talked to people who, you know, like you are funny people, people who you have this perception of who they are, but whether it's therapy or relationships or religion or sex or, you know, addiction or it's just, I just love that you get into the guts of it. So this is, I feel honored to have been there, been on the show.

• 1:15:38Speaker 00

  Uh, thank you so much. Thank you. And I can't wait to come over to your house for lunch.

• 1:15:42Speaker 04

  Great.

• 1:15:45Speaker 00

  David's newest movie is called Newborn and it is out and playing in AMC theaters right now. So go see it. I watched it. It's fucking great. And David, I will see you soon.

• 1:15:59Speaker 04

  Yeah. See you on Thursday at my house.

• 1:16:02Speaker 00

  I'll be there. Bye bye.

• 1:16:04Speaker 04

  Bye. Thank you so much. Bless you.

• 1:16:06Speaker 02

  If you want advice from Chelsea, write into Dear Chelsea Podcast at gmail.com. Dear Chelsea is a production of iHeart Media. Follow Chelsea on all socials at Chelsea Handler and find Catherine on TikTok at Flash Kadabra. Dear Chelsea is edited and engineered by Brandon Dickert, executive producer Catherine Law. Find full video episodes and mini-sodes now on Netflix and get tickets to see Chelsea live at ChelseaHandler.com.

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