WE CAN'T PRINT THIS
anthony hudson
Episode 4: The Ham Flute Turned Purple
Writer and performer Anthony Hudson slash drag clown Carla Rossi on collaboration, the art of the drag queen, and the importance of moderating your appetite.
From the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, Siletz, Anthony is an artist and writer also known as the drag clown Carla Rossi. Together they host and program Queer Horror at the Hollywood. Anthony also cohosts the queer feminist horror podcast Gaylords of Darkness, and cowrote and costars in the upcoming Gloop, coming soon to a stage near you.
Anthony Hudson: 0:00:00
This is why if you ever need an excuse to get away with anything in a show, just set up the fact that you are two grifter clowns who are on an insane amount of mushrooms and then you can get away with anything.
Fiona McCann: 0:00:17
Welcome to We Can print this.
Eden Dawn:
It's a podcast telling the story you don't know. Behind the store you do know.
Fiona McCann:
And you should know
Eden Dawn:
And you should know.
Fiona McCann:
And you will definitely know because after this podcast, you will go ahead and read that story. I'm Fiona McCann.
Eden Dawn: 0:00:35
And I am Eden Dawn. Every week, we interview a writer of some kind or another about the stories behind their stories, and we have a lot of fun doing it.
Fiona McCann:
We do. And especially this week because we have the funnest, inimitable, Anthony Hudson, in the studio, Anthony from the Confederated tribes of Grande Ronde Siletz is an artist and a writer also known as the glorious and very beloved to us drag clown Carla Rossi. Together, they host and program Queer Horror at the Hollywood Theatre, which is I think the only LGBTQ horror film and performance series in the whole entire country of the United States of America. So that's a pretty big deal, but Anthony also cohosts the queer feminist horror podcast. Gaylords of Darkness.
Eden Dawn:
Gaylords of darkness.
Fiona McCann:
Oh, that was good.
Eden Dawn:
Thank you.
Fiona McCann:
Together with writer, Stacey Ponder, and is currently adopting their award winning show looking for Tyler Lilly into a book and co wrote and co stars and this is the best bet. I save the best to last, in the upcoming hotly anticipated Gloop, which opens at Pika in Portland later this year.
Eden Dawn:
And we talk a lot about Gloop, which is based on who you think it's based.
Fiona McCann:
Mhmm. You know already.
Eden Dawn:
You know already. And we talk a lot about collaboration. And also, we should mention we love Carla who does so much good work in Portland and really around the country touring internationally with their shows And I should say that we talk about Anthony and Carla interchangeably both names for the same person and also we believe strongly drag queens make your life better.
Eden Dawn: 0:02:13
So listen up, Tennessee, Texas, Arkansas, everybody else who is on this ridiculous witch hunt, drag queens make your life better, and in fact, can I quickly list for you some things that drag queens have done that make my life better? One. Poison Waters taught me how to hide my drink before I go on stage to make sure no one could ever put anything into it. Two, taught me how to do a cut crease on my eye shadow. Three, taught me it's okay to be loud and big and funny and to wear whatever I want. I will say that drag queens have made my life better every step of the way, and I was thrilled to have Carla come here today.
Fiona McCann:
Well, Poison Waters taught me that I can be very easily upstaged.
Eden Dawn: 0:03:01
That's the other thing. It is a humbling experience to go on stage with the drag queen.
We were like, I think I'm funny. I think I'm good. No.
Fiona McCann:
I thought my hair was big. No. No. No. It's not big.
Fiona McCann: 0:03:09
I I hotly agree. I don't know if it's a hot agreement. I agree. Oh, hotly. It's hot. It's sparkling. It is full of glitter and joy.
Fiona McCann: 0:03:19
And I also wanna point out that and part of the reason that Karla joined us is because we really also strongly support the drag queens artists and they're part of this community, and we're so lucky to have them. And you all are gonna realize that when you go and see poop. Yeah. Yes.
Eden Dawn: And I love that Gloop is about Carla collaborating with a drag bestie, pepper, pepper. Hi, bestie. Hi, bestie. And, you know, collaborating like finding your person that you wanna make creative stuff with is so fulfilling and I happen to know that as I look longingly into your deep blue eyes.
Fiona McCann:
She's looking into my eyes and I'm like, it me. It me.
Eden Dawn:
Well, I missed you because you went to Egypt for two weeks and you left me behind and I'm sad, and I'm so happy you're back.
Fiona McCann:
Yeah! Because as I think Carla would testify in terms of Pepper, but I will testify in terms of Eden, Eden makes me make better work. Mhmm. And she makes it a hell of a lot more fun. Yeah.
Eden Dawn:
You do the same for me.
Fiona McCann:
So I strongly encourage people who find the artistic life to be a little solitary and don't like that—some people do good for you. We see you. We appreciate you. We respect your introversion, but that is not all of us.
Eden Dawn:
And it is good for us because we have collaborated professionally for some time. And obviously, this is a kabillion dollar podcast now. Kabillion dollars but we did collaborate together on a magazine package one time and we won a national award. At the basically the Oscars version for magazines. They gave us they gave us a whole ass award for us working together.
Fiona McCann:
And that's when we dropped the mic.
Eden Dawn:
That's when we dropped the mic. And we peaced out and we were, like, we're done. And we don't get on to make a kabillion dollar podcast. Yeah.
Fiona McCann: 0:05:13
So here we are. Testament to the beauty that comes from collaboration, the joy, the effervescent the glitter, the sequins,
Eden Dawn:
find somebody that you wanna do cool work with that lifts you up, makes you feel better, that you wanna get excited about every day, but that also understands the importance of spreadsheets, responsibilities, and hitting their deadlines. And if you can have both of those things, What a magic relationship? You are stuck with me in your life forever.
Fiona McCann:
Yeah. But you know what, Eden? If I ever got stuck on a light fixture, Yours is the name I'd be calling out.
Eden Dawn:
That's good. I thought you were gonna say, you know what? Eden, I'm moving. And I'm not telling you where.
Fiona McCann:
No. Egypt. No. If my dress ever sniped? You'd be the name I'd call out, and I know you'd come get me. I would come get you.
Eden Dawn:
So with that, with that, let's, as they say, stop. Collaborate. And listen.
Eden Dawn: 0:06:18
Anthony and I were raised in the same county in Oregon, and we made it out.
Anthony Hudson:
We're the survivors. We're the the stragglers that were able to crawl out from the primordial slime of the place that showed up being named.
Eden Dawn:
Which is just a a hard place if you are people like us who were seeking a level of fabulousness. That didn't exist there then. Maybe it does now. I don't know.
Anthony Hudson:
There was a coffee shop.
Eden Dawn:
There was the one coffee shop. One. God, I love that one coffee shop. And which was near the one record store. The one record store kind of across the street. Oh, great. Mhmm.
Fiona McCann:
At a record store,
Eden Dawn:
This is where she always out irishes me because I got a little I'm like, I'm Irish enough to have the plight of my people, but Fiona's always like, hold on. There we go.
Fiona McCann:
You were lucky. We didn't have coffee stores and record shops where I grew up. Well, that sounds fun. Glad you made it out all the way here. Thank you.
Fiona McCann0:07:23
Anthony, today, we are gonna talk a little bit about some of the story behind where this show grew from. Right? And I'm trying to remember where we started because there were so many bananas, anecdotes that I recall, I know there was vomit. Do we get to that straightaway?
Anthony Hudson:
This is, like, these are of words on my tombstone. I know there was vomit. Where do we begin?
Edem Dawn:
What an interesting word cloud we've begun for the day. Which show are we talking about first of all? So this is Gloop. Right? We're working on Gloop.
Anthony Hudson:
This is how GLP came to be. Okay.
Eden Dawn: 0:08:03
And the one liner for about Gloop?
Anthony Hudson:
The one liner about GLP is it's it's psychedelic assisted satire. From Portland's premier avant garde drag duo, Carla Rossi and Pepper Pepper. Oh, snapdragon Pepper. Pepper. Basically, we're doing, like, a white woman's wellness workshop. It's very much a goop inspired show. Mhmm. But where we are facilitating so much. It's it's seriously, like, it's so fun to do, but it is exhausting because we have to essentially pretend that we have microdosed instead of microdosed like we're supposed to teach in the workshop we've macro dosed, and now we're going to lead you on a workshop of how to better yourselves, while we don't know what the hell is happening. So it's just like a bonkers psychedelic drag gauntlet from hell.
Fiona McCann:
A hundred percent relatable.
Eden Dawn:
Yeah. Yeah. We've all been there.
Anthony Hudson:
Absolutely. You know, you're high as hell and your your legs turn into chickens and good times.
Fiona McCann:
And next thing you know you're hosting a Gloop. Who can say? these things happen.
Fiona McCann: 0:09:00
So this is about sort of the origin story of that show. Right? Yeah. And that began when you were on tour separately with something else. Is that right?
Anthony Hudson:
So Queer Horror at the Hollywood, like, we have a touring version of that show.
Anthony Hudson: 0:09:13
And Pepper and I took it on the road. It was our first time back on the road, like, since the pandemic hit. So this was in November of twenty twenty one. And then, you know, we did what everybody does, which was we we went and we visited the Winchester Mystery House and then learned about how you know their
Eden Dawn:
I love that place.
Anthony Hudson:
It's amazing.
Anthony Hudson: 0:09:29
It turns out that there weren't ghosts. It turns out she was actually just like really yet maybe lesbian architect and philanthropist.
Eden Dawn: And did she have, like, her whole eavesdrop room? Yeah. That was amazing. I was like, man, I love gossip. I want a whole Eavesdrop room. Right. Who
Anthony Hudson: Everyone needs an eavesdrop room.
Fiona McCann:
This is our eavesdrop room.
Eden Dawn:
Do you know what the do you know what the Winchester mystery house is, Fiona?
Fiona McCann:
No but I was pretending that I did.
Eden Dawn:
I had a feeling.
Anthony Hudson:
It was good nodding.
Eden Dawn:
Let me be This is my -- Totally. -- cultural attache moment.
0:09:58
So the Winchester mystery houses like, old farmhouse out outside of San Jose. Yeah. Correct? And essentially, it's the woman whose husband invented the Winchester Rifle. And they became so wildly inconceivably wealthy. They were the Bezos of their era. That they built this farmhouse and the story goes that after he died, she broke, mentally broke because of the weight of the world and the ghosts that were on her of all the people that were murdered by the gu,n and that she kept building to appease her sadness?
Anthony: Yeah. And, like, keep the ghosts from from reaching her right because there was it the house was like, she just building or building and children and building.
Fiona McCann:
Wait this. I have a friend who wrote a song about this. It's all coming back to me.
Fiona McCann: 0:10:48
When this airs in Ireland, Paul Noonan's song, missus Winchester, was about this woman.
Eden Dawn:
Oh, see. There we go. So this house has famously like a staircases that lead to nowhere, and there's just these things that don't make sense because she just kept building. But part of it was that she would have like seances and things and there was a whole area she built where the acoustics led her to perfectly be able to eavesdrop over her staff.
Anthony Hudson:
Yeah. And she would throw these massive lavish parties and then just, like, try to get the dirt on everybody.
Anthony Hudson: 0:11:15
So I'm, like, obviously, covert lesbian architect brilliant queen -- Mhmm. -- not maybe afraid of ghosts.
Fiona McCann:
But That was that was her cover story, which is the cover story. Fair cover story. Aware. It flew. Everyone was like, yeah. Clearly, it must be that.
Eden Dawn:
Also, how many times throughout history have we been like, oh, lesbian, maybe she's just afraid of ghosts or a witch.
Anthony Hudson:
Exactly. That's like a thing. We always just say no. She's just crazy. We never confront the reality. She's a brilliant queen in architect. So so we did that.
Anthony Hudson: 0:11:43
We went and we had, like, this transformative journey through the Winchester Mystery house just screaming about how she was a lesbian and the rest of the tour did not enjoy any of that. And then we went to go see
Fiona McCann:
Lucky tour goers,. That's what I say.
Anthony Hudson:
Yeah. That's what I told them as we were forcibly removed. And then we were, you know, we since we had driven down, we decided to, like, luxuriate our way up the California coast instead of just heading straight home wish
Fiona McCann:
I wish everyone could see your luxurious hand movements.
Anthony Hudson:
This is the international hand symbol of luxurious.
Eden Dawn:
I can't wait till you do Redwoods.
Anthony Hudson:
That one's too hard for TV.
Anthony Hudson: 0:12:19
So we we decide to stop in this town called Fort Bragg, California, where my friend Pepper has two other friends that had just started an art studio. And they said, oh, yeah. You could come crash with us at our little art studio. So we think, okay, great. So we go. We drive to Fort Bragg, California. We meet up with them. And the art studio that they are yet open that they have just, like, signed the lease on that we're staying in is literally a recently decommissioned curves gym of what? Yeah. Like, where the ladies go to work out. Right? Mhmm.
Anthony Hudson0:12:52
And it was it was fascinating just this vast empty space you know, tables for, like, art stuff everywhere, but all unused
Fiona McCann:
The ghosts in that space..
Eden Dawn:
That space has ghosts. All of us who are, like, been given our calorie counters -- Yes. -- just internalized sexism. Absolutely.
Anthony Hudson:
All coming to light like she wanders the halls at night with a a a whole thing
Eden Dawn:
Diet Coke?
Anthony Hudson:
Yeah. DiCoke in a healthy choice. Those awful chocolate cookies from, like, ten ninety three.
Fiona McCann:
Oh, why is it gonna be their art studio? That's incredible.
Anthony Hudson: Yeah. Which has just made it all the better. What's like, you know, rich with history, curves gym.
Anthony Hudson: 0:13:29
So so they put us in this little like studio we're saying in what is formerly the curves gem office, but for some reason there's a giant tree in there. Just like -- Okay. -- stationed in there. So we're sleeping in this room. It's like subzero that night.
Fiona McCann:
Wait, there’s a tree inside the building. Women are supposed to climb that. Yeah. That's the wrong one. Like, if You can make it onto the third brunch without breaking it. You. When it's achievement unlocked, is that what's going on with the tree?
Anthony Hudson:
Yeah. Exactly. It's what they could afford in place of the rock a call. And so they just said, have had it, sister. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah.
Fiona McCann:
This was a this place is storeid. Oh, story.
Anthony Hudson:
That's it. And no offense to our wonderful friends, to Cynthia, who made this happen.
Anthony Hudson: 0:14:19
I I love that she took a curves gem and she saw, you know, the venture capitalist and her said, I am going to create an art studio for the people of Fort Bragg, California. Like, thank god. Thank god. Art Scene Studio. Is their name. And so we were staying in this little, like, weird tree room.
0:14:36
We're sleeping on an air mattress because Pepper had an air mattress because road trip -- Mhmm. -- and
Fiona McCann:
Gotta love Pepper. Thank you so much. Here's the air mattress that I've bought. What doesn't she have? It's man profit. She has the Mary Poppins bag.
Anthony Hudson: No. No. She has a hair mattress. She has a a bag of dildos. She had, like, everything. Keeps just the essentials. Absolutely. It actually always makes going through TSA with her really fun too. Because she always always gets singled out by the TSA and then they pull out, like, the giant machine gun dildo, though. Machine didn't like all this stuff. Yeah. They just see these random shapes. Yeah. I'm talking to the scanner. Yeah. Like, what? Yeah. Dildos and air mattresses. Fine. Only half of them are our props, but the other was just belong to her,r.
Anthony Hudson: 0:15:18
So So we're working on it. We're we're we're we're hanging out, staying with their friends, and they say, okay. Well, how about, you know, would you be interested in helping do a soft opening? For our art scene studio. And we're like, no. We we we were very tired. We just wanna relax. And then they said, well, Are you sure? And we think like, okay. They're letting us stay here in the room with the tree. We get to hang out with the ghosts with the Healthy Choice cookies. Like, we should we should be, you know, we should give back
Fiona McCann:
You have to honor that.
Anthony Hudson:
How can we give back?
Eden Dawn:
Is this one night?
Anthony Hudson:
Yeah. This happens all in one night.
Eden Dawn:
Okay. Okay. That's a lot.
Anthony Hudson: 0:15:56
So what I had not paid attention to before that night before the show because we figured we're just gonna figure out what we're gonna do for the show in that morning. We're like, you know, we can we have a lot of different numbers we've done. We can just throw these all together.
Fiona McCann:
Pull something out of the bag. Exactly. Yeah. Go for Mary Poppins.
Anthony Hudson:
Exactly. So when Pepper and I had first got there. Okay. We were still waiting for the friends to meet up with us. So this is important backstory. We were waiting for the friends to meet up with us. And we had just grabbed a bunch of food that, like, we had pulled out of the car that had been traveling with us during the drive. Okay.
Anthony HUdson: 0:16:34
Among these things, there were, like, you know, this little prosciutto flutes. I call them ham flutes.
Fiona McCann:
With the cheese inside or -- Mhmm. -- yes. Mhmm. Oh I know them well? Eden does not know them at all.
Eden Dawn:
No. Sorry. But vegetarian blind spot. Well, this is why I am a . . ham ffute. It's not what I was What are you gonna do to those? Ham flute means something else -- Sure. -- and I world.
Anthony Hudson:
Ham flute there is a very specific thing reserved for that terminal. Yeah. But I like to call it a ham flute.
Anthony Hudson: 0:17:02
So we're hanging out and we're like very hungry. We're still waiting for our friends to show up and we're gonna be silly to plan the gig. And I just think, you know what? How bad could it be? It's only been in the car for, like, thirteen hours. No, baby. It was so angry. Oh, no. I was so hungry and granted I had never experienced, like, the horrors of what happens when you eat food that's been sitting out too long before. Yeah. Because, like, I mean, I grew up in BEEP again. Like, what? Oh, I I kind of almost revealed where we're from ish.
Eden Dawn:
We’ll air horn it!
Anthony Hudson:
Thank you. Thank you.
0:17:35
Our friends, like, in in small town growing up life, you know, you have sleepovers. The mom makes, like, you know, all the food, and then it just sits out all night and you just eat it all night because you're a teenager and, like, you don't get, like, foodborne illness at that point in time.
Fiona McCann:
You eat it off the floor. Yeah.
Eden Dawn:
Especially pizza. Pizza. You get it at nighttime. You have to sleep over or in the morning you look at what's in the box you need it. Of course. We all done it. Yeah.
Fiona McCann: 0:17:58
But what You were about to eat was, like, specifically, the ingredients of pizza basically. S
Anthony Hudson:
cheese and a meaty thing. And a meaty thing? A ham flute.
Eden Dawn:
Yeah, but was there sun involved? If there’s sun involved, I feel like that changes it.
Eden Dawn: 0:18:11
Well, science. Yeah. It's what we call Eden Science, where I just don't have the facts to back it up, but I have the feelings. I'm doing my own research.
Anthony Hudson:
I love this. There's a very a crack team of scientists working on the on these ideas.
0:18:28
I just like, I'm so hungry. I'm so hungry. And I just I greet you and I grab it because I was like, these are good and I just put the thing in my mouth. I start eating the thing.
0:18:41
I don't look at the thing. I don't think about what I'm doing.
Fiona McCann:
How does it taste? Can I ask?
Anthony Hudson:
It tasted a little gamey. A little gamey. A little cagey. But there was still the cheese to kinda cancel it out. Because, you know, cheese if you leave it alone. It's kinda sharper. Mhmm. So maybe that kinda distracted me. From the thing. But then I said, I don't know this tastes kinda funny.
0:18:59
So Pepper reaches over and pulls one out and looks at it and then shows it to me and goes, Carla Look. It was purple? The ham, the ham flute had turned purple?
Fiona McCann:
That's not right. No. It's not right.
Eden Dawn:
And I just think in no instances of whatever you think a handflute is, whatever you think a handflute is, if it's purple. It's not a good idea. Perfect.
Anthony Hudson:
It's never a good color. I'm very upset. So I I I just think, oh, well, that was kinda gross, and then pepper takes a bite. That's very small bite, and it goes, Oh, no. We chuck them in the trash, and then we think nothing of it. We go to a giant Italian dinner with our friends. Just loaded some stuff on that..
0:19:40
So after the purple ham and now a couple oysters, this is, like, This is a layering nightmare.
Eden Dawn:
It's not good. I I have a lot of anxiety right now.
Anthony Hudson:
The lesbian doctor urgent care was she she she didn't understand either how this happened, but she was very wonderful. So I have jumped ahead.
0:20:01
So I'm slurpin oysters, which I I don't do ever, but I do to impress Pepper. I don't know why. I we don't feel to impress each other. I'm not fancy.
Fiona MCCann:
Let's not do that ever again.
Eden Dawn:
So this could be an after school special moment right now, where we just let everybody know. If they're really your friend, You can say no to the oysters. You can say no to the oyster. And if they don't like you anymore, they were never your friend to begin with.
Anthony Hudson:
Thank you because imagine that the alternative option where you're Helen Hunt throwing yourself out of the window, like, high on bad oysters and ham flutes. Yeah. No one needs that. It could be the same. I'm let me be the statistic to warn you.
Fiona McCann: 0:20:40
So So we've the layer of the purple ham flutes, and then we have a layer of oysters. Yeah. K. And now you're queasy out there?
Eden Dawn:
You're back at the curved space.
Anthony Hudson:
Plenty of alcohol, back at the curved space. I'm like, okay. Let's let's quickly, like, bust out this show.
Anthony Hudson: 0:20:56
So we sit down and we're like, okay. Here's a bunch of different drag numbers we have. Here's a bunch of different things. I've got this costume. We've got this wig. We already have an air mattress. Let's use the air mattress. So we figure out, okay, well, pepper. What number do you have that can that can play? Long as it takes to inflate the air mattress, then we discover, you know, pepper has one of the tracks from the four seasons by Vivaldi. Mhmm. I've been calling it a track. Because that's not how that was
Eden: The hot tracks vivaldi dropped?
Anthony Hudson:
The hot tracks Vivaldi drops? Have you heard it? It's called the ham flutes across America. So We go to bed.
0:21:30
And then at, like, three in the morning, I I just kind of like an eye pops open. I'm like, oh, wait. It just starts to I it just starts to increase. It starts to increase. It turns into like the scene from Alien. Where, you know, they're just casually sitting around eating lunch. Yeah. And then all of a sudden, the thing just explodes out of a stomach. Yes. I am just violently ill. Just, like, heaving. So I'm like fully convinced I'm going to die. And I was calling for Pepper who who sits up is not a morning person and this is now four in the morning. I've been dealing with by myself for an hour. I scream for Pepper as as much as I can.
0:22:07
Pepper immediately begins to think like because this is also a year into the pandemic. And so we don't know.
Fiona McCann:
Oh No.
Anthony Hudson:
Is this COVID? Is we just toured and did a show for the first time ever in two years? Like, we we don't know what is happening. Do we all have COVID? But do we all have COVID?
Eden Dawn:
Do We need an old priest and a young priest. I must know.
Anthony Hudson: 0:22:28
A beam of light comes down. Yeah. And on top of it, like, it's two degrees in this room. There's a space heater that isn't working. We're on an air mattress that's like cold and deflating. There is a tree in the room.
0:22:43
And the ghosts of the curves The ghosts of the curves gym ladies.
Fiona McCann:
You know what? I think they'd be good in the pinch, though. I'm just saying I think they I think they would have held your hair back.
Eden Dawn:
I felt like they were over you judging.
Anthony Hudson:
That's why they didn't come to help. That's why. Mhmm. It's like this whole back and forth.
0:23:01
Pepper ends up, like, just spending, like, literally a best friend spends like an hour massaging my abdomen. Just like trying to help me. Yeah. It's such an angel.
Fiona McCann:
That's honestly kudos to pepper.
Anthony Hudson:
I wouldn't do that. And then I sleep like maybe another six hours and and everything is fine. I wait up and everything is great. And I'm like, this is wonderful. This is wonderful. So then we think, okay, let's take that food poisoning and let's put that in the show. So we have to explain, why are we here doing
Fiona McCann:
I'm covering my eyes.
Anthony Hudson:
Why are we here doing a a seminar? Because we decided, okay, we're gonna play this this like, this best of show. We're gonna pitch this as like a new show where we're leading a seminar. And Pepper and I I was really obsessed with the Vow, the Nexium TV show, documentary. Yes. So we start bring bringing in stuff from the Vow and start bringing in, like, some self help stuff.
Anthony Hudson: 0:23:53
Pepper grew up in, like, not, like, not Sedona, but pepper grew up in, like, Northern California, like, New Age kind of culture. And, you know, I was I was, like, the weird kid that loves, like, you know, the the crappy witch books that you would find at the other bookstore across from the coffee shop by the record shop. I know. Yeah. So so like, I I I had this background of being really into, like, teenage paganism and be like, I'm a druid mom because I watched Mists of Avalon. And so we figured out, like,
Eden Dawn:
It's the craft. We can't undrestate what the craft did to us all. Faruza Balk put on that that means Come on. We are the weirdos, mister. We are the weirdos. We carried with our life.
Anthony Hudson:
And these are my gifts, my ham flutes.
Anthony Hudson: 0:24:34
So we we we incorporate all of this into the show. We are these two gifters who are just off the bus and we're gonna lead you through a seminar on how to attain your true your your ultimate best self in your true self. Only we're too high and now we're about to get violently ill. And we we we thought, okay. So why are why are our characters here? And this is in the show today still is why are the characters here? Like, they just wander into the space and then just start doing the thing without even noticing the audience. And so we thought, okay. So they're on a tour bus headed to Sedona and, like, land of the Gwyneths. They head to Sedona, and then they feed their bus driver a ham flute. And then he gets violently ill. So the show opens with us discovering him dead. And so it it it writes itself. It writes it writes itself.
Fiona McCann:
This shit writes itself.
Anthony Hudson: 0:25:25
The audience didn't know that half of was, I mean, legitimate. Like, we are grifters, and we are obsessed with New Age. And I I am actively dying.
Eden Dawn:
How did the audience react? Tell us about the first reaction to Gloop.
Anthony Hudson:
Oh, they loved it. Yeah. They absolutely loved it. They loved it.
Anthony Hudson: 0:25:40
And that's what I think that's how what kept me moving through the pain. And through like, you know, adrenaline is a hell of a drug. Oh, yeah.
Eden Dawn: I mean, we're a show people. So it's like It's just do it as soon as you guys Sometimes I feel like a trained monkey. We're, like, I'm tired. I'm this. And, you know, they push you out on stage to do something, and you just start tap dancing, baby. Where's my line? Where's my line?
Anthony Hudson:
Where's my camera? So this is just like such a a me thing that I just I thought it was totally normal fine. And then I would be fine. And then a week later, then that's when I was like, Jason, I, that's my partner. I was like, I think I'm dying.
Anthony Hudson: 0:26:18
I go into urgent care, I meet, like, the greatest lesbian doctor of all time who literally is, like, she's like, will we think it's your kidneys or we think it's your liver? We don't know which. And then she does runs me through every test, puts me in this terrifying MRI machine, and she goes, it's none of those things. What have you been eating? And then I explained to her.
Fiona McCann:
Then the litany starts. What have I not been eating? That’s really the question.
Anthony Hudson:
Well, besides the sushi burrito and the ham foods and the beef. Did I mention the oysters? You said the oysters? The milkshake and the profuse amount of alcohol and edibles that I on top of that. Besides all of that, I've just been eating normally.
Anthony Hudson:
0:26:56
So she slapped me and then she gave me, like, a GI numbing solution that was, like, still weird.
Eden Dawn:
Oh, I've had it. The lidocaine cocktail. Oh, yeah. But the lidocaine cocktail is disgusting, but I love to. Yeah. Phil's good.
Anthony Hudson: 0:27:08
t numbs you from your teeth all the way down.
Eden Dawn:
It's the first time you've become very aware of where your esophagus is. Yeah. And then isn't. Yeah. And then you're like,
Anthony Hudson:
Yes, sir. Yeah. I think I just saw my root chakra. It's so weird.
Fiona McCann: 0:27:28
Mrs Winchester. would go in for this.
Anthony Hudson:
I'm sure she would. She built a special room for that too. Room for that. Is so it was it was it was wild. It was wild. And then it finally resolved itself.
0:27:37
And then after that, I became a vegetarian, and now I feel, you know, healthy and ethically superior. So I love my life.
Eden Dawn:
I mean, welcome to my boat. Yeah. You know, I've been on it for a long time.
Anthony Hudson:
It's why we do it, right, is to be better than other people.
Eden Dawn:
But I wanna go back to Gloop. Because -- It's the process. -- I do wanna know because you go right here to now you've been touring around with it.
0:28:00
And what is it? What does it say about our world that a that just two white women as grips. Everyone's like, oh, yeah. I know who that is. Mhmm. Which is now I'm afraid people just look at Fiona, and I like that.
Anthony Hudson:
Listen. I'm half white, so I can claim it.
0:28:21
And as a as a drag former. I think like Pepper and I always just like love to go off this grifter model in any show we do, and this is like the one that really took because it's like your drag queens. We feel like grifters in the art world. Right? Like, it took long enough to convince people that we were artists that now now that people actually do look at us as artists. It's like weird. And and we just feel like imposter syndrome and con artists. So just embrace it.
0:28:45
So in the in the process of, like, writing the show to answer your question, basically, like, it started out with, like, okay, let's just have a rough score of, like, this is what needs to happen. At some point, you need to get on this airbag and inflate it. And then at some point, I need to throw this bag of Cheetos everywhere. And then it it has since turned into like we have incorporated a real script now. And so every time we do the show, like, when we did it at Portland Center stage, it was entirely improvised, which was so fun because it was a two hour show. And my my assistant actually came up to me and said, and they had not worked on the show, and they came up to me and said, oh my god, that was so great. And you and Pepper, like, just nailed that script. Like, you you your lines back and forth, it was incredible. It was like, there was no script. And so I thought that was a wonderful compliment.
0:29:28
Since then, we have begun scripting parts of the show. So there's still, like, sections that we have to we know, like, we don't know what exactly happens in it like the ending. We still don't know what the hell the ending for the show is. We know we need to tie the audience back into it. We need to have a part where we'd sell to them. What is the sale and what is the ask? But up up till that point, you know, the rest of it has just kind of been determined through either scripting or just figuring it out as we go. And every time we do it, the show continues to change and transform.
0:29:59
And so, like, this last time when we when we did the show, I packed some chicken leg tights because my partner sent me a picture on Instagram. I thought they were funny. And I said, this is the one Chinese product I will order off of Instagram.
Fiona McCann:
Wait. What's a chicken leg tight.
Anthony Hudson:
they're they're black. And then on the front, in the middle, in the center, there's a really thin long like orange chicken leg. So when you put them on, it looks like you are wearing a, you are a void with chicken legs in the middle.
Fiona McCann:
Yeah. I did not I mean, I don't know what I was imagining.
Eden Dawn: Instagram is not targeting you correctly. That's what we learned right now.
FIona McCann:
It’s all coveralls.
Eden Dawn:
She just gets Wildfang ads and buys them all. So we're good to go.
Anthony Hudson:
But the chicken, you know, but the chicken leg sucks. I kinda want honestly, you have to get them. I've since discovered because in the show, like, the show gets really messy, and so I had to I destroyed my last pair, and so I was able to easily find a million tiny retailers that make them. So I highly recommend chicken leg tights.
Eden Dawn: 0:30:59
So is there sometimes where you'll have like a ratatat in the in a show and then you walk away and you're like, that was really good. Like, oh, you write this bit down and try to replicate it. Absolutely. So I like the idea of there being like an outline with chunks that might have a script for, like, seconds? Yes. Like, here's seconds of a script and then just, like, a big void and then maybe a few others. Know where you have to get to. Yes.
Anthony Hudson: 0:31:21
We tell and then, like, it's fun with the tech people being like, okay, listen. We have a strict I know. Here's the first twenty minutes. After that, we're gonna need you to watch. We're gonna almost kiss three times. And then on the third time, that's when you have to hit the audio cue and then watching their brains explode as they try to navigate this as we
Fiona McCann:
When are those three times? We can’t tell you.
Anthony Hudson: 0:31:40
At it, when we when we include a fifteen minute sequence of just us laughing hysterically at each other, like, sometimes the tech person might just go ahead and just hit the queue because they wanna the show along and sometimes that's actually very kind of them to do. But it it's it's so fun like this this process of discovering the show as we go, like every single place that we do it. So the chicken leg tights, I just threw them on, and then the audience could not stop laughing. I realized that I don't even have to lip sync when I'm wearing chicken leg tights. I just have to do a little chicken dance.
Eden Dawn:
Oh, my this is a slippery slope into prop comedy.
Anthony Hudson:
I am Carrot Tops. You are. This is how it happens. Peppers, Mary has the Mary Poppins bag, and I have the Carrot TOp. . . And this is just becoming my gig now. I I mean
Eden Dawn:
You're gonna have a Las Vegas residency before you know it. Yeah. So my now.
Anthony Hudson:
Thank you so much.
Eden Dawn:
You're welcome.
Anthony Hudson: 0:32:28
I'll join in the likes of of Rita Rudner and all Erica Jane. All the greats.
Eden Dawn:
Get yourself a Paula Poundstone blazer. Oh, ASAP. You would look great in that actually. She don't.
Anthony Hudson:
She's my all time queen. I love Paula Poundstone so so much. Iconic. I I absolutely my whole life's goal is to replicate all of those blazers and
Eden Dawn:
did I read Rita Rudner’s book when I was twelve? Yes. I did. What does that say about me?
Fiona MCCann: I mean, it sounds funny. Yeah. Can I tell you? Oh,
Eden Dawn: I might still have a copy. I'll look. I'll see if I still have my copy. Please, my great rest of life. I'll tag you.
Fiona McCann: 0:33:08
Well, but so is there do you envisage a time when you'll be like, that show is now all scripted? Because we we nail down every little bit? Or will it never get to that? Because it has to have some looseness in
Anthony Hudson:
I think it's always going to change. Like, you know, even with this this most recent tour, like, this is the closest to a full script that we ever had where literally there there are pages and pages and pages of written dialogue that we have learned and that we rehearse and that we, you know, interact in front of an audience. But even still, like, those little thing those little discoveries that happen, then we think, okay. Now we need to add in this part of the show. Now we need to add this part. So the whole idea with it, even when we when we first talked about it after the initial performance, the night of a million food poisonings, we we thought, like, this could be a thing that we could do in the whole ideas. It's a dare. It's a game. And each time it's gonna be different.
0:33:57
And I just think as a performer, like like theater, you know, I'm obsessed with this idea of, like, why is theater live? If it's so rehearsed and
Fiona McCann:
Or static. Yeah. Yeah.
Anthony Hudson:
Where it's, like, you know, you go and or you you sit through, like, a tech rehearsal for a show, and it's, like, that's the time everyone wants to die. Mhmm. Because it's like, okay. Stop. Reset. We're gonna check the lights and, like, everything is cue to cue to cue to cue to cue to cue. Mhmm.
0:34:22
And so I just like, as a live performer and particularly, like, for Pepperoni as huge queens that really love to connect with an audience, like, you want to find those moments and let them have and on their own versus, like
Fiona McCann:
Ann feel how the energy is Yeah. Oh, you know, this is an audience that's gonna make me go this way. Yeah.
Eden Dawn:
Yeah. I do love that moment in performance art where it feels like you're in on it. As an audience member, we were like, I feel like they just did that for me. And now we as it have formed a unit together. Yes. You know, you feel like I'm part of the team now, and that is such a special thing that you don't have as much as I love film and stuff. It's it's a very different feeling. Yeah. They're like, this is which it was just for me.
Anthony Hudson:
But I love, like, I love film. Obviously. And like but that's the thing is, like, film is also super manipulative. It's like, this is so choreographed, so rehearsed. We need this music to come in, and we need the people when she says the line and the music spikes, people are gonna feel a feeling. Mhmm. And we could do that in theater or we can let it organically try to happen. So I I just love that aspect of Gloop is that it's a roller coaster obstacle course that we put ourselves through and we get to just kind of have these moments of discovery that continue to evolve.
Eden Dawn: 0:35:31
The double dare of Performance Art. Yeah. Absolutely. I'm learning of slime. Yeah..
Fiona McCann:
I mean, it sounds amazing and also a little bit exhausting, honestly, because you have to, like, write the work every like, every single time. Yeah. Are you ever, like, my god. Why didn't we just write it all down? Then I could just, like, go ahead and perform, and that would be that.
Anthony Hudson:
Yeah. Absolutely. There's so many times. I mean, that was that was, like, why we sat down and actually created the full script for the last version that we did was we we just we're so tired. Yeah. And we needed we need it would be so much easier to just, like, get the lines in our bodies and worry about that versus, like, inventing it on the on the in the moment. Yeah.
Eden Dawn:
But the power of the curves
Anthony Hudson:
But, like, as a kid, you know, I was I was the one that, like, my mom would turn on the stove and get something and then it would turn bright orange, and then I'm the kid that, like, just looks at it and wants to put my hand on it.
0:36:20
Yeah. And enticing. It's just it's it's the ham flute. I want I'm gonna I knew that's been sitting out for thirteen hours, but I'm gonna eat. It's just don't put anything of bold or saturated color near me with like any question of time duration because all this is a challenge.
Eden Dawn:
What a specific thing? We'll have to put that in your rider now. Yeah. Thank you.
Fiona McCann: 0:36:38
I have a question for you. There was an incident you told me about involving, I think, a light fixture. A light fixture. A light fixture. A light fixture
Anthony Hudson:
Oh, I can't tell that story. So please Oh, you can. So okay. So every time we do the show, something insane happens.
0:36:54
So last time we did the show or not the last time, but last time we did this in Portland at Portland Center stage, there's this part where Pepper is supposed to have this giant entrance, like, we have we have had this huge fight just like we had in real life. We have this huge fight.
Eden Dawn:
About post its. Post its and mustard.
Anthony Hudson;
We have this huge fight and then pepper storms off now, I'm crying. You are my only friend and then I I try to sell people a product and then I storm off. And then there's just silence. And pepper is supposed to enter. Just silence.
Fiona McCann:
Okay. Where's tPepper gone? Dove into the bag, never to be seen again. Just flew off.
Anthony Hudson:
And the tech crew just knows, like, Okay.
0:37:28
Don't start the track until she appears at the top of the set. No no appearance. And then I'm like I'm like where is she? I'm on the other side of the stage. Like, Where the hell is she? And then I just hear, Carla. The audience is like, what's up? I thought they were fighting. Carline I'm I look at the I come back out. I look at her and say, hold on one minute. I run backstage.
Anthony Hudson: 0:37:56
Pepper is wearing Pepper has a crochet dress that she wears in the show when she appears in, like, her act two look. And so she's supposed to appear singing Roses Turn from gypsy, the the Patty LaPone version, the ultimate version. Right? So Pepper does not do that because she in her knitted crocheted red basically, she's wearing, like, a fishing net. And caught caught caught caught on a lighting fixture backstage. And she didn't know how to get off of it without breaking the lighting fixture. So I literally had to Breaking the crochet. Breaking the crochet. Which is worse. So I had to go and, like, finally try to pick this thing off, which it had, like, knotted itself around the light fixture.
0:38:34
Okay. And I'll shake hope you're in the Yes. Yes. Oh, I am ready to go. Portland half lesbian ready to go. Hello. I've got it all happening. And then the audience is just sitting there. Like, what the hell are they doing? Right. So there we go. Why are they gone?
0:38:47
But once again, This is why if you ever need an excuse to get away with anything in a show, just set up the fact that you are two Grifter clowns who are on an insane amount of mushrooms and then You can get away with anything. So any mistakes we make.
Eden Dawn:
That is a great note. That is a great note. Thank you for coming on our podcast where we are two grifter clowns who are so high that we cannot be held accountable for anything. It does feel freeing. It's very freeing. I think it's nice to feel
Fiona McCann:
I think just disappear get kinda like fiction. It'd be fine.
Eden Dawn:
Alright. This is my serious wrap up. I don't know why always your friend gets so serious at the end so that everyone knows how to handle.
Anthony Hudson: 0:39:28
That was very Paul, silence.
Eden Dawn:
Alright. Bring back my girls. Thank you.
Fiona McCann: Well done.
Eden Dawn:
Was that a casual was that a casual segue? Did I do it? Thank you to Anthony and Carla for joining us. You can read more about all of their upcoming shenanigans at thecarlarossi.com follow Anthony on Instagram at The Carla Rossi, and that's it from We Can’t print This for today, see more info about our episodes and we can't print this , follow us on socials. And if you feel like supporting us who are just a couple of grifter, independent gals, you can find us over on Patreon. We can't print this as well. And thank you to our producer Miranda Schafer and to Dave Dipper for our music.
Fiona McCann: 0:40:22
This podcast was recorded at The Writer's Block in Portland, and the biggest of thanks to our third work wife, Rachel Ritchie, for her little tennis outfit.
Eden Dawn:
She looks so cute today. That was a good outfit.
Fiona McCann: If you are a writer with a great behind the story story, write to us at Wecamp print this at gmail dot com because we love email. We love email. Thank you so much,
Anthony, for coming in. That was a hoot. That was a hoo. Thanks for having me in all of my diseases. All of my diseases. I didn't have all of my diseases. Why diseases are our disease? And everybody just unity.
Eden Dawn:
Watch it with your ham flutes. Be careful with your ham flutes out there. Just throw it out. Throw out a hand clip. Throw an old, a purple one, particularly. Dear god. Dear god.
Fiona McCann:
You must be starvin’ now Anthony, are you? You haven’t eaten in a full hour.
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