84: Started My Period in Churchill’s War Room
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Direct from the Broski Nation headquarters in Los Angeles, California, this is the Broski Report with your host, Brittany Broski. Guys, good morning! Don't talk to me until I've had my diarrhea. Don't talk to me until I've had the squirts. What a blessed morning it is, team. Haven't washed my hair in a week.

You couldn't tell though. I'm training my hair. I don't think that's a real thing. I'm just, my hair stinks. You know what I mean? I'm back from London town. I was in London, weren't I? I was in London. I was at the premiere of Mickey 17. Mickey, I so love him. Robert Pattinson. Hello, darling. We had a fucking laugh. Yeah, guys, I was in London.

And I don't really have, hey, did I meet Robert Pattinson and Steven Yeun? Yeah. And am I okay? No, no. But is it just, you know, this is the life, hold on tight. That's how I feel lately. And this is the dream, it's all I need.

I feel like Canada, Montana sometimes. So yeah, I was just in London and I was supposed to only be there for like less than 72 hours for the Mickey 17 premiere. But I ended up extending because one who we all might know in broski nation is in a play. And that's going to be Paul Maskell. And he was going to be in a little production called Streetcar Named Desire. And all my theater bitches, you know about that play. Dude. Yeah, he was. The premiere was on the 13th.

And his play was all that week, but there was a showing on the 15th. And I was like, motherfucker, should we stay? But it was sold out. And then we figured it out. I got tickets. I mean, Stanley went, oh my God. Hold on. Let me go back to Mickey 17. So much fun. So much fun. The movie's fun. It was freezing fucking cold in London because duh.

And, yeah, it was a blast. I think, oh, I wore this crazy fit, okay? One of the best fits me and my stylist have ever cooked up. That fit, it was very, like, menswear is back. Let me sort of put y'all, let me guide y'all's finger to the pulse, okay? Menswear is so back. And it's fun to experiment with, like,

Not only just like the suit and tie sort of thing, but incorporating interesting shapes into the red carpet space. You know what I mean? And I know people kind of do that with the structured gowns or like when they have stuff come up over the bodice and it's, you know, really structured and whatever. That's one thing is like evening wear. But this sort of

cocktail, business casual, fun take on menswear is really, I just, I'm having fun. Me and my stylist, Kat Zapaldos, we have a fucking blast. When we do fittings, we just yell. We're like,

And then what if we did the, yes, yes. It's so much fun. So we stuck around and we saw Streetcar Named Desire. Now, let me sort of reveal my soul for a second. I never actually saw Streetcar Named Desire when I was in high school. It's one of those that's always in rotation for one act plays or for community theater, or it's always, it feels like it's showing on Broadway or whatever. I've never actually seen it. And I actually went into it

not knowing the plot or even the setting or anything, just that it's super famous. When we were in high school for our one-act play, we did Bus Stop, which is by William Inge, and him, Tennessee Williams, who wrote Streetcar Named Desire, and Arthur Miller, who wrote The Crucible and Death of a Salesman, they were all contemporaries of

This is in like the 30s, 40s, 50s. Arthur Miller was famously married to Marilyn Monroe. So that's kind of this time period of post-war America. And there are so many social constructs and social context that people are trying to return back to a normal life. But how can you, you know, in this post-war state?

So, Streetcar Named Desire is set in the 50s, I want to say. Yeah, in the 50s. In New Orleans. And it is... Okay, so, Paul Meskel, right? I thought he was going to be the lead because the way that they marketed it and all this, it's like, and Paul Meskel is brilliant and... Which he was, by the way. This play...

I can't even tell you. I saw it with Stanley, and for the next hour after we saw this play, we went to dinner, and we just could not stop talking. That is a good piece of fucking media, dude.

When we're talking about it, you know, because you can go see a musical or a play or whatever, and you can be like, oh, that's good, and then move on with your day. When it's a piece of art that you have to dissect and be like, oh, well, I thought this. Oh, that's actually the volume. Go back and forth. This is what I interpreted it to mean. And then, you know, you Google it and look it up, and it's like, oh, it actually was. That's what art, that's what's fun about art. So Streetcar Named Desire is about...

To put it short and simple, in my opinion, a woman's descent into madness, honestly. Which, oh my god, could I write a fucking thesis on it? Plays or media that center around that, you know, something like The Bell Jar or anything by Virginia Woolf or anything where it's like, it actually, as best as it can, captures this...

And like, just listen to me. It captures this existing kernel of madness that I think is in every woman. And you only understand if you're a woman that can be activated and it doesn't always show up, but it's there. It's there. It's there. And it's not silly or funny. It's like true unhinged, um,

anger and sadness, it manifests as that form of madness. Am I making sense? I feel like if you've experienced it, you've experienced it. If you haven't, that's fine because the play is compelling even without that innate emotional connotation. So the play is a gradual descent into

into that state where the characters are described and portrayed as so gray. And what I mean by that is in life, especially online, people want to see the world as black or white, good or evil, right or wrong. That is not how the world works. And it's best, it's best you start believing it. You best start believing in ghosts. What is it? Fairy tales, Miss Turner, you're in one.

Like, the quicker you realize that the world is not so simple, I'm not going to say the easier, but you have a wider palette of colors to paint the world with. Do you know what I mean? So this play, from the beginning to the end, there is not one character where you're like, oh, well, she was my favorite. She's right.

or he did nothing wrong, or whatever. That is such an interesting, especially in this age of bullshit Marvel movies and all that. I love Marvel, okay? Iron Man 2, one of my favorite movies of all time. But those stories are based on this concrete evidence and understanding that here is a hero. This is a hero. And there's no hero in Streetcar Named Desire. To give you a short summary of the play...

There is a sister dynamic, okay? There's a sister named Blanche and a sister named Stella. Stella is married to Stanley. Stanley is Paul Meskel. Stella and Stanley live in New Orleans. They have their happy little life. They're married. It's very lustful, okay? They're always fucking and they're always with his friends and it's a very domestic life. Well, Blanche, Blanche Dubois, she's the sort of unhinged sister, just could never really figure out

What she was going to do is kind of a spinster, you know, never was married, is a little bit too old now, like in her late 30s maybe, to get married. She's not a fresh spring chicken anymore. And in this time period, beauty is currency, you know, and being a young, untouched woman, that's a form of currency, the highest form of currency. You know, you talk about the ceiling, the glass ceiling, there's...

There's not much room to grow as a woman in this time period. So you either become a secretary, become a nurse, or get married. There is no form of protection or independence for a woman like Blanche DuBois. And she knows it. And she is very vain because, of course she is. It's how you move through the world in that time period. So she's kind of down on her luck. You come to find out all these things about her, the ways that she...

has made money, maybe not so glamorous ways. The reputation she had in the town that she left. She used to be a teacher who made some less than impressive decisions when it came to her students.

And she got kicked out of town. And you come to find that out. But the way that she presents herself is this very, you know, she shows up with a suitcase full of diamonds and furs. And, oh, I could never do that. Haven't you got a cigarette? Haven't you got this? Oh, my. You know, very almost entitled where she is living outside of her means, but not really. It's this double think of,

She's fully aware of the realistic state of her situation. She's been kicked out of her town. She has no place to live. She has no money. She's defaulted on loans. She's in debt. And so she's running to her sister's house for help. Well, her sister, you know, welcomes her with open arms. And, oh, Stanley, you know, my husband, this is my sister Blanche. You know, it's so exciting. We can have a sleepover. Well, as you can expect, she overstays her welcome eventually. Stanley starts getting pissed the fuck off.

And all these characters have shades to them. Stella is a victim of domestic abuse. Stanley is a perpetrator of domestic abuse. But they both ignore the reality of we're letting this happen. Blanche, as an outsider, comes in and sees that. And she's like, what the fuck, Stella? Leave him. She's like, I can't fucking leave him. And guess what? She's pregnant. So all this stuff is happening. Blanche...

is being a squatter, essentially. Stanley is just a toxic, hyper-masculine male. And Stella, I think, is the real victim in the whole story because she just loves her husband and he's not a good man. And does that make her an ignorant woman or does that make her a victim of her situation? Because in Blanche's mind, it's like, well, leave, just leave.

And Stella's like, I fucking can't. So just shut the fuck up. I don't want to talk about this anymore. Like that's the situation. Oh, the dialogue is so good. So this is the reality we find ourselves in. Well, things happen. You know, the web begins to become spun. And towards the end, Stanley plays puppet master and he gets Blanche taken away by doctors.

And it was the most harrowing scene, and it was done so well. And Paul Meskel is so scary in this play. And that is such an impressive feat to distance yourself from how you're known publicly, to fully embody this character. He was doing an American accent. All of them did American accents in the play. I don't think any of them were American. And

I could not take my eyes off of him. But let me tell you something else. Patsy Farren played Blanche Dubois in this version that we saw. When I tell you, she tore. She carried that fucking play. Paul Meskel, you're great. She's the best, right? I was blown away. Me and Stanley could not sing her praises more. We were like...

I was fully just enraptured by her performance. And she had this sort of manic way of speaking where she was, you know, and she would get way ahead of herself and talk really fast. And then she would try to distract you from what she just said because it was kind of incriminating. And she would go over here and, oh, and if you could get me a Coke with lemon and ice, I'd really appreciate it. It was amazing. And what we also found out is she's in Mickey 17. She's

movie that we just went to the premiere. And she plays a sort of supporting character who's British and is kind of the crux of the whole movie, not to spoil anything, but she, her character is very important. Yeah. Stanley was like, she looks familiar. She looks like the girl from Mickey's 17. I was like, no. And then we looked at the name and I was like, oh my God, it is. She was brilliant in this play. I cannot even tell you.

And throughout the play, towards the end, I'm not spoiling anything. This play has been published for almost 100 years. She gets taken away by, you know, psychiatrists, by doctors, at the request of Stanley. Stanley, Paul Meskel's character, orchestrates this whole thing where he's had enough. He recognizes fully the reality of the situation, that Blanche is taking advantage of them, and

He finds out all this tea on her. You know, you got kicked out of your school for sleeping with a student. You turned into a prostitute to make your way until that didn't work out. You got kicked out of town, this, that, and the other. I know about you, Blanche. I know about you.

Does your heart long to wander? To discover the deep secrets of coral reefs, explore the wonders of the California coast, and island hop from the Galapagos to Madagascar. Feed your wild heart.

Travel the world right here in San Francisco at the California Academy of Sciences. Get tickets at calacademy.org. See penguin feedings, puppet shows, and other live programs daily at the Academy.

Does your heart long to wander? To discover the deep secrets of coral reefs, explore the wonders of the California coast, and island hop from the Galapagos to Madagascar. Feed your wild heart. Travel the world right here in San Francisco at the California Academy of Sciences. Get tickets at calacademy.org. Uncover the ocean's deep secrets in the Twilight Zone exhibit.

So get the fuck out of my house. I'm not going to be this halfway house for you because you are making decisions that are putting you in this situation. So get the fuck out and figure it out. And so towards the end, this is what I'm talking about, where no one's right. Okay, Stanley's a woman beater. And now he's kicking out this woman who's down on her luck. And is it her fault? Yeah, kind of. She made some decisions that were shit.

But Blanche, in her reality, she has nowhere else to go. So of course you go to your sister. That's your family. She has no other surviving family. She has no children, no husband. She's late 30s, unmarried. There's no, and she is a self-sabotager. And you feel bad for her because she did it to herself. And she doesn't want to live like that.

You know, she thinks that she's Miss Asta. Miss Asta was a rich socialite who's on the Titanic, okay? Think like Rockefeller, Carnegie, that sort of, you know, Miss Asta. She thinks she's that, and she's not. And she knows it, but she won't admit it. But Stanley sees that, okay? Oh, their dynamic is fucking great! And the dynamic between sisters...

Oh, my God. It was just, I could not tear my eyes away. I cried. There were some funny parts. Patsy Farren is just, oh, my God. I have chills thinking about it. So, towards the end of the play, she gets taken away, and they actually take her through the audience. So, the spotlight comes on the little walkway, whatever. And I literally, I wish there had been a camera on me and Stanley, my friend Stanley in the audience, because we were like,

It was so, wow. So, cannot recommend it enough. They're taking it to New York. If you have the means, but I know this is so obviously like, duh, but if you are on the East Coast in the next two months, try to make your way to go see this play. It was fantastic. We were blown away. And it deals with, you know, the residual effects of trauma.

and how we construct our own realities to best make that trauma livable. And it deals with themes like domestic abuse and the reality of life as a woman in that time period, and maybe even the time period that we live in today. It was just amazing. I cannot, well, cannot sing its praises enough. Also, while we were in London...

We went to, this is totally unrelated. We went to Churchill's War Rooms, which I don't mean to turn this into a history lesson, but it's about to be a history lesson. So lock the fuck in because we're doing, once again, Professor Broski's World War II segment. Okay. World War II history segment. I've been to the war rooms before, and I've also been to the Imperial War Museum.

And the UK is a very, very interesting country to do a museum like that. Obviously, as a sentient adult, you become aware that each country has their own retelling of what transpired from 1900 to 1945.

And that just becomes very apparent when you walk through a museum like this. And I think that the war rooms, if you ever get a chance to go, please go. If you are interested in history at all like that, especially political figures in history. Churchill was not a good man, to put it very elementary. He...

you know, was born to be a politician, there was never going to be anything else he was going to do other than like be a politician. And I think that this museum, to its credit, does a good job of not trying to like embalm him in hero fluid. You know what I mean? They didn't try to make a hero out of Churchill. I think that they accurately portrayed how destitute the situation was before. And this is, look, okay, I'm American. Let me say it.

Before America kind of swooped in and the Allies really won the war. The situation was bleak in the UK. And when you go on any tour through the United Kingdom, when you go to any museum, any whatever, you would be in the minority to find a building or a family or a company that was not affected by the Blitzkrieg.

In London specifically and around London, the German air raid, the continuous German air raid on London during World War II destroyed buildings, destroyed cathedrals, destroyed monuments, destroyed structures that had been there since. I mean, London, that island has been destroyed.

fundamental in human history since... I mean, we went into some buildings that had been there since 1099. 1099. Roman ruins in London. I mean, one of the oldest cities in the world, okay? Destroyed by the Blitzkrieg. And...

I think that when you look at it like that, and the Imperial War Museum, if you ever get a chance to go, does an incredible job of reimagining what life would have been like as a British citizen during that time period. I'm talking war rations. I'm talking air raids, consistent air raids, the different types of planes to see overhead and how to recognize if one is German and one is, you know, a friendly bird.

Not only that, but the reality of you're going to be inside for a while. And even inside, you're not safe. And they have this reimagined living room of the average British family in the 1930s, 1940s. And some of it has some real memorabilia from that time.

And it's just harrowing. I mean, you can read about history in a book. You can watch a documentary. You can watch an interview by someone who was, you know, a World War II veteran or whatever.

Nothing has sent a chill down my spine quite like being in this reimagined little living room with the tiny little radio and the reimagined war rations and the family photos and the sound of the sirens. And they have completely reconstructed it. And you sit there. I can't even put into words how just horrifying doesn't begin to cover it. And, uh,

I'm not localizing this to just a British struggle. War, in any case, is brutal. It's inhumane. It is unthinkable. This is just, I think, a more... It was the most tangible thing that I've ever been immersed in, if that makes sense. So you sit in this little fake living room and they do all the raids and all the drills and all the propaganda videos and...

cut back on the bread that you're eating. And if you can, you know, buy a war bond, buy it and all these things. It's just that history is not far away. And this is unrelated, but very related at the same time. When you think about segregation and things like the Civil Rights Act, all of these things are not ancient history. This was in our grandparents' lifetime.

So when you go to museums like this, don't think that this is too far off. And I don't say that to scare you, but it's, you know, you need to be acquainted with these things because we are living through unprecedented time after unprecedented time. And it's just important to be aware of what we're living through right now and the real risks that having a leader, the fucking sitting leader of the free world like Donald Trump,

what life under his regime could turn into. Okay, anyway, they went to the war rooms, and I think that this museum is very well done. And it's a museum, but it's also the actual place where Churchill and his cabinet, quote-unquote,

met. And it was literally, a bunker isn't even an accurate description. This was just the basement of some government building. It was not safe. It was not reinforced. The attempt they did at reinforcing it with this slab of concrete, that wasn't going to keep them safe. It is a miracle that this place was not bombed and everyone in it died.

And from this little bunker, people lived there, they slept there, they had fake sun lamps because they spent so long underground.

They had one, and this was like a super secret, whoa. They had a direct phone line for Winston Churchill to speak to the American president in the 40s, and they would discuss plans, and they would have these meetings in these rooms that were probably 15 by 15 feet, and they would cram 20, 30 people in there, all of these desks, and every single morning update everyone on things.

The location of German troops, the location of British troops, you know, the evacuation of Dunkirk, all these things. This was... It was real. And that sounds so stupid to say because, of course, it was real. But when you are standing in the room where these briefings were giving, I can't... It's like you have to really focus to make it connect in your brain. Like, I...

I am here. I have the privilege of standing here and witnessing this. And they have it all behind glass in the map room. It's called the map room. And it's kind of at the heart of the basement of this building where there's maps on every wall from everywhere from all of Europe to granular London to Japan, Korea, all of these places where you can see all the little pinpricks in it where they would move the

the little pins and update positioning. And there's a big desk in the middle with all these telephones on top and they wouldn't ring. They would light up different colors because obviously it's the ringing would be loud. And it's just, it's unreal because it's all just how they left it on what? August 16th, 1945. Like the day the war was over, everyone left and it's left just like that.

There's still pencils on the table. There's, you know, all the equipment, the telephones and the bedding and the newspapers. It's just, it's amazing. It's amazing. And I think they opened up the war rooms to public, like you could tour it finally in the 80s. And you can, you have to pay for a ticket inside and all that money goes to keeping it up and restoring it and

All that. It's just, it's so neat to open things like that up to, you know, the general populace. Someone like me. I'm not British. And it's psychotic to think I can go in there and just be like, whoa, this might happen. Because that history is all of our history. And that sounds so fucking corny, but it's true. And...

The Imperial War Museum explores World War I and World War II, and that's harrowing as well because World War I, I mean, not to go back into what I used to talk about all the time, but that was my hyper fixation for a second because the sheer magnitude of destruction that that war brought on mankind is...

I mean, there have been horrible wars in human history, but World War I, that was the turn of we're using biological warfare, we're using tanks, we are using technology to assist in the killing of human beings in a way that we've never seen before. You know, muskets, bayonets, sure, that's technology too. But this was the beginning of, you know, something that has turned into...

nuclear warfare. And it's scary to look back on that time and think they didn't even know what they were introducing into warfare. So all that to say, anyway, if you're ever in the UK, check out the war rooms because it's psychotic. And I have a little magnet on my fridge that says, eat less bread.

And I think it's silly because it's like, oh, you like Kate Moss. Oh, like Kate Moss, like a model, like Tony Brandt. But really, it's in relation to the war rations. And there's another one that I have in my office that says self-indulgence at this time is aiding the enemy.

It's just, you know, when you see propaganda as something that is an art piece and is funny and someone had to sit down and be like, okay, how do we tell them to not eat that much? How do we tell them not eat that much because war rations cost money and we don't have money? It was very educational. This museum, both of those museums do a really great job of honoring the dead and

honoring the effort, the war effort by everyone. There are different sections for women, for POC soldiers, for the young underage soldiers that conscripted to, for the sake of my country and for God glory and country. No, what is it? King and country. I mean, these kids were as young as 14 conscripting lying about their age to go join up. And it's like, so-

Very, very educational. Very relevant. Not in a scary way, but also kind of in a scary way. And while I was down in the war rooms, of course, I did actually start my period. So raise your hand if you've started your menstrual cycle in Churchill's war rooms. Just me? Just me, I guess. Okay, let's talk about the fun stuff now. Please help me show this one for my sock doc.

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I went to Penhaligon's. Let me tell you something about this.

Michelle Visage, you will always be famous. Michelle Visage, I love you. Michelle Visage talks about pinhaligans on TikTok all the time. I was like, what the fuck is that? It's a perfume house. It's a British perfume house that was started way long ago and then had to shut down. And then some Italian designer or businessman came in and revived it because there was this one super famous fragrance that Churchill used to wear and all these, you know, it was a very high society fragrance.

And they revived it, and someone took over as creative director, and now there's a full storyline, and there's a narrative to this perfume house, which I love. Hey, duh. I love shit like that. And it is so fucking British, and it's so fun. So...

There's this whole storyline behind Penhaligon's and all the names of the fragrances and how they release them and, you know, what their bestsellers are and all this. So it's based around this sort of murder mystery of a man and his estranged wife and his mistress. And then all these characters get introduced and each fragrance is named after one of them. It kind of gives...

What's that game? Clue. Like Mr. Mustard, Colonel Mustard, all that shit. Like it's very reminiscent of that, but all the characters are so fucking British. Well...

I go in and this was another, I was like, fuck. I went in and I always, when I go to Britain, I like to say, I like to ask the people working there, how old is this building? Because you never know. You never know how old the structure that you're standing in could be. And she was like, well, the original structure is surely the 1600s, but this one rebuilt after the war, destroyed in the bombings. And I was like, fucking course it's destroyed in the bombings. Everything was destroyed in the bombings. It sucks. It sucks.

And so I was like, how old is this building? She was like, well, they rebuilt it after the war, but Penhaligon's has been around since... Let me see. Penhaligon's is a symbol of English artistic perfumery. The brand, originally founded as a barbershop in 1870, immediately made people interested, attracting the curiosity of the English nobility, and in particular, that of the crown. So it's been around for a super long time. Anyway, so we go in...

And I'm like, let me smell Halfeti. Halfeti is their most successful bestseller. And Halfeti is a city in Turkey, if I'm not mistaken. Turkey, yes. That was going to be humiliating if that was wrong. Halfeti is in Turkey. And of course, everything relates back to imperialism. And Halfeti is this really beautiful... It's like there's notes of coffee in it. There's...

It's very woody. Here are the accords. Woody, aromatic, warm, spicy. I'm into that. I'm into that. And here's another thing. Okay, this is kind of separate, but warm florals, I'm trying to get into. Fuck me, dude. Warm floral. I want to smell like a hotel lobby. I don't want to smell like a model. Does that make sense?

And I don't even think, like, models don't even wear, like, models wear some weird-ass shit. So, I don't know. Like, when you go into Sephora and all those fragrances, it's like warm floral, light floral, clean floral. I don't give a fuck about floral! I like woody. Woody, oud, musk, all that. That's my shit, okay? Halfetti, it is a mature fragrance, I would say, but it's so good.

Here are the top notes. Cypress leaf, saffron, cardamom, artemisia, bergamot, grapefruit. Heart notes are Bulgarian rose, nutmeg, jasmine. I don't like rose. You know, here's another thing. There are some perfumers or some fragrance TikTok people where I'm like, I don't know if I can trust your opinion because we don't have the same taste. If you are a person who loves florals,

I don't really trust your opinion. If you love sugary sweet, if you like anything from Kayali, we're not on the same page. Kayali is like,

teenager Victoria's Secret sweet. I'm not into that. If you're into that, slay. Go do your thing. If you love Parfums de Marly, all those rose perfumes or those sickly sweet, whatever. Parfums de Marly isn't sickly sweet. Those are more, you know, mature, beautiful, sugary fragrances sometimes. But there's depth to those. Kayali, it's just sugar. And if you're into that, slay. And, you know, if you want to layer it with something deeper, slay. Not for me.

Michelle Visage, her taste, we're on the same page, where if you're going to do a gourmand, it has to be a very interesting gourmand. And so that's, I would describe Halfetti as that. Base notes are agarwood, leather, cedar, sandalwood, amber, tonka bean, vanilla, musk. Yeah! Launched in 2015. This one is, it's just a classic. Like, Halfetti is a good one for every day, I would say. It's definitely a nighttime fragrance, but any gourmand is. And

In my opinion, the gourmand of all gourmands, this is my opinion, is Angel Share by Killian. That motherfucker, you want to go out clubbing, you want to go to a nice dinner, you're on a date, you want to do this, you want to do that. If it's at night and you're feeling sexy, you do Angel Share. It'll last for seven years. One spray lasts seven years. And if you spray it on your clothes, even longer. And that one to me is like, there's not a richer...

more interesting, lustful gourmand. It just is. Halfetti is delicious, so I got a little one of it. I got this other one by Penhaligon's called Dandy. And let me show you this motherfucking bottle, girl. It's from the... It's based on the 1920s, right? Like, Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald type of core, right?

The branding is enough to make you want to buy it. Like, I went and I said, yeah, I guess I have to get that. Oh, look at her. She's beautiful. And it's got this little bow ties. This is a crazy fragrance. This is not a womanly fragrance. If you're going to gender fragrance, okay, I wouldn't, I don't think that fragrance has a gender, but...

I say that with an asterisk, right? Because I'm not going to ignore the way that they market these fragrances, the way that they gender notes in a fragrance. Dandy is very masculine, and it's so interesting. The top note is whiskey. Whiskey, sandalwood, and something else. Cedarwood? Bergamot and raspberry. Raspberry. Yeah, bergamot, raspberry, whiskey, cedarwood.

This one, it's just really interesting. And there's some note in it that I just, I keep coming back to it because I've never smelled anything like it. And maybe it's the whiskey. I don't know. This is one I'm trying to figure it out, okay? I smelled it. I was addicted to it. But I was like, how do you wear it? How do you wear it? It's too weird to wear by itself. This is one I'm going to wear at home. Okay.

I'm going to wear it at home so that none of my friends are like, what the fuck are you wearing? Because I like it. I like it. And I think if you put like a sweet lotion under it and then this on top, maybe it'd be interesting. I need to work with it. Let me spend some time with her and interview her. And I'll get back to you on that. Dandy's very interesting. And the last one I got, because I went crazy. I was like, they don't have Penhaligon's in the States. They have one in Soho in New York.

And they used to sell it at Saks Fifth Avenue and Nordstrom and all this, but they pulled it off the shelves. I don't know why, because this would make a killing in the States. This is a niche fragrance house that is British, that is interesting. It has an identity. And fragrance people, they're really missing a market here. So they have one store in Soho. They need to open one in like, you know,

Chicago, Los Angeles, Austin, I would say. This is the other one I got. Now, all of these bottles have animal heads on them. They're supposed to be like, you know, in a rich English country estate, all of the maybe taxidermy you'd see on the wall or like off to the mint and go on a hunt. Oh, yes, the hunt in Africa. Like very that, you know what I mean?

All of the bottles in this line have either like a ram's head, a cat, a dragon, a bull. And so this one, of course, after she told me the story of it, I was like, this one is named The Blazing Mr. Sam. And in the storyline of Penhaligon's, he's the fucking American. I can't help it.

An American abroad with all the cocky confidence you might expect. Hot and cold spices mingle over dry patchouli and creamy cedar in his eau de parfum. No one can quite resist Sam's charms. Yeehaw. I mean, come on. I smelled it. I was like, this is good. Then she told me the story. I said, fuck. Okay. This fragrance is everything I want in a perfume, as me personally. Patchouli has to be done in a...

certain way for me to like it. Patchouli by itself smells like a fucking campfire, which I don't hate, but patchouli needs to be paired with something else. I feel the same way about Palo Santo. I love Palo Santo, but I need it to be paired with something else to wear it because it's one thing to smell it as like, you know, an aromatic or like a candle or whatever. Ooh, it smells good in here, but on the skin, on my skin, my acidic fucking talkies, red 40 skin, it's going to be different.

So this one is really, really nice. I got her and I'm trying to figure out what to pair it with. And I'll get back to you guys on that. Okay.

What did I also get? Oh, I also picked up Tom Ford recently. I have a problem, actually. I need to look in the mirror. I picked up Oud Wood by Tom Ford. I'm addicted to it. This is a cologne. It is purely a cologne. And the bottle's small, and it's really fucking expensive, and it doesn't last that long. Okay, I'm pissed off, but I got it at Duty Free at the airport. They duped me into it.

And it smells beautiful. I love the smell. I just wish these fragrances would last longer. And I've done all the fucking tricks. Okay, make sure your skin is moisturized. Dab, don't rub. You know, don't spray it only on your neck. It'll wash you away. Spray it on your pulse points. I do all that shit. But if the fragrance, Jo Malone fragrances are gone in 20 minutes. If the fragrance is not potent, it will not last. That's why Killian is so impressive is because that shit lasts forever. Yeah.

Okay, so don't come at me and tell me I'm doing it wrong because I'm not. Anyway, pick this up too. Love her. Okay, let's move on from fragrance. I just wanted to give you all that update that I went to Penhaligon's, had a fucking blast. Very excited to start experimenting with some of those. Let's talk books for a second. We're in the rotation, okay? We've talked about World War II, fragrance, and now we have to talk about books. That's what this podcast has turned into. Okay.

Other than when I go on a rant about what? Christ? Christ on the cross? Sometimes that. So we're not doing that segment today. We're not doing the Christ segment right now. Right now we're doing books. Right now we're doing fairy smut. My good friend, Drew F. Wallow, had told me to read Quicksilver. Okay? Quicksilver is fairy smut. Okay? Are you mad at me? Do you guys hate me because I want to talk about the fairies fucking each other?

It's been a while. I've been doing Orwell. I've been doing Ray Bradbury. It's time to read. Very smart. We got to go back to our roots, team. Finish Quicksilver. Very long. Very good. Here's what... Okay, where do I even start? Quicksilver is...

The classic, you know, human finds herself in the Fae world, the Fae realm, and there's a war. There's always a fucking war. And they need this special human's help winning the war because we haven't seen someone like you in the realm in 1800 years. Yeah.

OK, and we just ignore that she's 24 and her boyfriend's 1,800 years old. You just sort of ignore that because it's fine because he's sexy. OK, have you thought about that? He's he's sexy and he's got a big penis and she's 24. No, you don't think about that. I think about that.

And so, of course, she's got some special fucking gift that they need her help, whatever. The plot, I was hooked from start to finish. Here's what I will say, and I don't want to spoil it, but one of the characters is very, very selfish.

And while it lends itself to the plot, you know, why characters make decisions that they do, how it affects their interpersonal relationship, all that, you know, whatever. It was giving me a little bit Iron Flame, but not too much. Not too much. There wasn't this miscommunication trope or I'm ignoring you trope. It was just one of the characters is like...

I've made my decision and you cannot convince me otherwise. Just let me do this. I'm doing this because I love you. And then the other character is like, fuck you, selfish prick. Okay, that's kind of one element of this book. And I was texting Drew and I was like, girl, if he did that to me, I would have said, fuck you, and gone back to the human realm. You know what I mean? Like, I'm not standing for bullshit. Anyway,

I didn't spoil it, okay? This book is really, really good. I really enjoyed it. It was a lot of fun. And the sequel comes out in November, I think. I'm set. I'm going to read the sequel. It was fun. It was fun. But I will say at the end of the book, probably the last 50 pages, the author introduces a crazy plot line that, you know, I wish she had expanded on it a bit more a bit earlier in the book.

You're introduced to a character that changes the course of these characters' lives forever. That it's like, I wish I knew more about who this fucking dude is.

And I hope that at the top of book two, there's a recap because a lot happened in the last, the final pages of the book where I'm like, I'm going to need to be reminded of this because I'm not going to reread it. I'm going to need to be reminded and maybe a map would be nice. If we're doing notes right now, I would like a map of the realm and of the territories and of the river and the castle and the whatever. You know what I mean? That was Quicksilver. I give a 7.9, 8 out of 10. Really enjoyed it.

Now I'm reading One Dark Window. It's good so far. It's good so far. I think it's YA. I think it's young adult, which doesn't bother me. Half a Soul, that Regency fairy tale book I read, was so good. I loved it. What made it so lovely is that it was a standalone. You know, she's written other Regency fairy tales with different characters in the same universe. But yeah, it was short, sweet, and to the point, and...

I was like, oh, I'm going to miss these characters. Like it was that sort of book. And it was YA. It wasn't like, and then his cock went in. It wasn't that. Which is good because know your audience, know the setting. You know, like we're talking Regency magic fairies. You know, it's Regency era. I shall take my leave. I can only hope to apologize, my lady, that if they were like, and then his cock went in my... Okay, fine.

Okay, I guess. Okay, his fairy cock went in my...

Whatever. Can we go back to having tea, afternoon tea with his parents? Anyway. This episode is sponsored by Shopify. When you think about businesses that are selling through the roof or having a viral moment, sure, you think about a great product, a cool brand, and brilliant marketing. But an often overlooked secret is actually the businesses behind the business making selling, and for shoppers, buying, simple.

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Businesses that sell more sell on Shopify. Upgrade your business today. Sign up for your $1 per month trial period at shopify.com slash broski, all lowercase. Go to shopify.com slash broski to upgrade your selling today. Shopify.com slash broski. Reading One Dark Window. It's tea so far. It's very...

Well, for lack of a better word, dark. It's dark. It's, you know, this mist has enveloped the land and it's evil. It is all consuming. You know, it's a matter of time before the town is enveloped in this darkness and the weight rests on this one character's shoulders who...

Again, she has this power that no one else knows about and she hates it about herself. And she thinks that she is, she's different and she's damaged when in reality, she's the one that'll save us all. Isn't that fucking true? Because we all have that inside of us. We all have a power that if we even knew our power, we could save all of us because we are nothing as one. We are everything together.

So it's kind of that. I'm like 20% done. It's good so far. Next, I'm reading... Oh, I'm going to read this Viking. This Viking smut with Drew. We're going to book club. Also...

When I get like, okay, that's enough fairy smart for the night, I switch over to Sherlock Holmes. I'm tandem reading Sherlock Holmes and One Dark Window. And then when I get tired of all that, I go back to my Anthony Bourdain book. And then when I get tired of that, when I need a nonfiction, I do George Orwell's Why I Write. And that's a tiny little, I mean, it's probably 80 pages, but...

There are books like that where I really take my time with it because I'm underlining, I'm highlighting, I'm taking notes, I'm annotating. Even if it's an 80-page book, I'm not blasting through it. I love Orwell and I want to spend time with these precious words that he's left us with. And he was a realist. He was a pragmatist, pragmatist, pragmatist.

where he fully saw the world around him for what it was. And he goes into detail about, I think I talked about this a few episodes ago, where

He has a theory on why authors write. Is it selfish? Is it for artistic purposes? Is it for political purposes? And his, he realized after his time in the war and after, you know, the 1930s, how could he write anything that was not directly related back to the political sphere? Everything in this life is political. Your existence is political. And

He fully wove that in to everything he wrote. And the way that he describes it in this little book is like, I can't help it. There's nothing else I really want to write about. And any artistic impulses he might have, he used those in tandem with the political writing that he did. So, yeah.

Yeah, you know, I don't want to rush through a book like that. It's not just like reading someone's memoir. It's reading the reasoning why they did what they did. And for me, what really interests me is the reason why they made their art in that way. Oh, there's nothing more interesting.

Like, you can read Animal Farm, you can read 1984, and sure, 1984 is a ripoff of this and whatever. Maybe Animal Farm is his only original piece of writing, original in the sense of the idea is completely his, and it's not a reimagination of something else he read. And maybe that's a lie. Maybe that's not true. But as I know it right now, Animal Farm was the first of its kind to be in a commercially successful way

an allegory to revolution, the Russian revolution, and to the effects of fascism in real time. To put it in a way and terms that the average person can understand. Because fascism, the rise of fascism, and when you're in a fascist nation, looking around and thinking, how the fuck did we get here? He details it pretty perfectly and pretty precisely in Animal Farm.

And there's a reason it's still around and studied today. And to get inside the mind, what a blessing he left us with to get inside the mind of the person who wrote Animal Farm and his worldview, his perspective, his lived experience, and how he interpreted those and converted them into words. And not just words, but into artful prose.

that is digestible. That's hard. It's hard. And in this book, he says something like, and you know, first world problem. He said, there is nothing

than being an author. I wouldn't wish this on anyone else, but I have to do it. He said some dramatic bullshit like that. I was like, okay, well, and then I was like, I kind of get it. I kind of get it because what he managed to do is hard and he did it well. And I know, you know, any piece of art, any piece of literature deserves criticism and he's not insulated from criticism and there were things wrong with him. Of course, all these things are true, right?

And at the same time, every artist is unique in the sense that only they could have written what they wrote. And I'm really a fan of his works. So I read that when I'm done with... When I can't do anymore, he put his cock in my... Okay. When I need a break from that, I go back to why I write. But anyway, I got this book recently too called Monsters. And it's about...

Can we, in the black and white world we live in, separate the art from the artist? It's the age-old question. Is art made by a horrible person, is good art, great art made by a horrible person, ethically good to consume? Is it okay to like art by a shitty person?

And I don't have an answer. Let me read this book and get back to you on that. I think the answer is going to be, eh, who's to say? But this book is highly recommended. I've seen it on TikTok and people were talking about it. And I actually bought it in London. We went into this cute little bookstore. It's called the London Review Bookshop. And we went in and they don't call it nonfiction in the UK. I don't know what they call it. Because I was looking, I was like, where's the fucking nonfiction section? It doesn't exist.

I think it was just downstairs in this little bookshop and it was like in the psychology area or something like that or like current affairs. I don't know. Anyway, very excited to read that because I don't have an answer. I don't know and I struggle with it. And I'm sure a lot of fangirls do as well where when someone's art has impacted you in a way that has completely changed the cellular makeup of your mind and

and of who you are, and in a good way, you know, in a positive way, in a identifiable way, what do you do if that person DMs a minor? What do you do if that person turns out to be racist or sexist or gross? What do you do? And I don't have an answer. And it sucks. And you don't want to be a defender of that person. I would never defend those actions.

But here we have this piece of music or a book or a movie or a play that is just mind-blowingly good. What do you do? So I'll get back to you guys on that ethical question next time. Next time when we do ethics with Brittany Broski, we talk about the death penalty and about fucking the book Monsters. How about that?

Okay, guys, I think that'll do it for me this episode. Here are my two songs of the week. First one, High Fashion by Addison Rae. Thank you. Thank you, Addison Rae. And when this album comes out, I'm sat. And when the tour is announced, I'm sat. Second one, Too Far Gone by Ty Myers. It's a country song. Okay. Who cares? I love country music. I don't give a shit. I don't give a fuck. Okay, that's my spiel.

If y'all want merch, go to broski.shop. That's all I have to say. Please go watch Royal Court. We have a new episode with Coleman Domingo, who I love. Love Coleman Domingo. Go watch Royal Court. Subscribe to this channel. Guys, we're almost at one milli. We're almost at one billion subs. We're almost at 100 billion subscribers on this channel. Please be the 101st billion.

That will do it for me. I will see you guys next week. Be good and just okay. And also okay. Oh, one more thing. I'm seeing Swan Lake in New York. I'm seeing Swan Lake because I'm still, I love ballet. I love ballet.

And I do ballet stretches every morning and it makes me feel good. So here's my challenge and homework for you. Do one thing that makes you feel good today. And that doesn't mean eat like shit or indulge in an addiction. Do one thing that is good for you. Sit outside, read a book, call your mom. If that's not good for you, don't do it. Okay? If calling your mother is not good for you, don't do it. Do something else. Okay, love you guys. Bye.

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