Laurel: Daniel, go poop.

Daniel: That's why I can't put the earphones on is 'cause it makes me feel too closed in and I just don't feel like I'm ready to poop. just like how I need to have my shoes tied firmly in order to feel confident. I also need to feel like at any moment I could just take a poop.

Nichole: The leaps of logic that we make. Down here in this, in this podcasting corner in the basement. We recently found out that we absolutely have molds down here. Um, and I'm starting

Laurel: to think what happens if you get rid of it and the podcast isn't good anymore. Oh shit.

Daniel: I thought the cause and effect was the other way and the podcast was causing the mold just with all the garbage that is spewing

Nichole: out of our absolute rot.

Daniel: God, all the wetness.

Nichole: Thank you. No thanks.

Laurel: I thought I had a good story, but I forgot it now. Or maybe it wasn't a good story at all. It's just gone. It's the basement, it's oh, it's the mold

Nichole: is making you forget. It's not perimenopause. After all. It's mold spores. Also, we had the air tested and the guy told me, he was like, do you know what carbon dioxide is?

Nichole: And I was like, yes. It's what you breathe out. He's like, yeah. So you have 1600 parts per million of carbon dioxide down here. , Should be around 900.

Daniel: Yeah.

Nichole: So,

Daniel: so stop exhaling.

Laurel: What is like, are there, , like layer plants? You can get like plants that thrive in an evil layer? Well, oh, layer, layer, layer, layer, layer.

Daniel: Layer. Plants. Layer

Laurel: plants. Layer plants layer, like one syllable layer. Layer, layer,

Daniel: layer,

Laurel: layer, layer. That's like what I call my pal layer for short layer, Hey, layer,

Multiple: because you inhabit him in the dark. You no crawl into the darkness of lair.

Nichole: This feels like the air horn all over again. Like we can't make the air horn noise.

Daniel: This guy, let's call him Lair, the guy who was inspecting the basement Uhhuh. I think he was just really excited to kind of be sy like, I don't know if he's really a scientist, but he was walking around with his like little tricorder thing, you know, Uhhuh, and he's like, this is my chance to ask somebody, have you ever heard of carbon dioxide?

Daniel: The silent killer?

Nichole: Yeah. So he made me open a window.

Daniel: Nice.

Nichole: Down here we have an egress window. It's open now. Okay. Yeah. That's good.

Daniel (2): you know, when Dallia Bell was here

Daniel (2): last night for Star Trek Night Uhhuh, and we were talking about our various kinds of OCD.

Multiple: I told her about how when we first moved in and we had that egress.

Multiple: Window put in. Mm-hmm. For like a few weeks later, I was afraid that we had damaged the foundation and that the house was tilted.

Nichole: Oh. I blocked this out.

Multiple: And so I would walk around, I would close my eyes to see if I just, uncontrollably ran in one direction.

Laurel: Holy God. you were the marble and you were waiting just to see if you started

Multiple: rolling.

Multiple: And then I opened my eyes and then I'm, I'm just against the wall on one side of the room, and that's how I know.

Nichole: I kept telling 'em, I was like, we did get professionals to put this in. I don't think that they would just like punch a hole in the foundation and be like, good enough

Laurel: and like, and that the house would sag because of a window, but not like get, like, it would just sag a little bit and then stop there.

Laurel: Like, listen, like it was

Nichole: frowning.

Laurel: It's like the half of

Nichole: Trump's face. Trump's

Laurel: face. Yeah.

Nichole: Our house would be having a stroke.

Laurel: His foundation is not right? Yeah, that's what it's his foundation is crumbling.

Laurel: Yeah,

Nichole: have you guys ever mooned anybody? Probably. I just feel like it's a lost. Art, it's a lost art. You can't like moon somebody when you're driving. Right. You need a, an accomplice. Yes. '

Multiple: cause of fucking traffic laws these days.

Multiple: It used to be when comedy was legal in America. Oh God.

Nichole: mooning was a thing before

Laurel: it was a thing. And it's no longer a thing because now we're chronically online and it's now fun to moon someone online.

Laurel: You can't moon somebody online. Yeah.

Nichole: I just remember like in middle school, We shared a campus with another school. Oh. For some fucking reason we were in like portables.

Nichole: I went to a weird art school.

Multiple: The art of Moonen.

Nichole: Yeah, it was Art of Mooning 1 0 1, but like I remember some kid got in like huge trouble because he got in a fight with the kids on the other campus and he mooned them. And because this was a school of teachers without teaching Degrees Uhhuh, some of the teachers thought it was fucking hilarious.

Nichole: Yeah. And so they were talking

Laurel: about it in class. Is that what they do in, in teaching college? They just like drill into you that mooning is not funny.

Nichole: I think you have to sign a waiver at the end. I will never laugh a teaching degree at a mooning.

Multiple: By the way, teachers Without Teaching Degrees is my least favorite nonprofit out there.

Multiple: Welcome to Poly Amateur Hour.

Nichole: I'm

Laurel: Nicole, I'm Laurel,

Multiple: I'm Daniel. And you know where else? A lot of like half moons are shown just the upper curve of the ass. Where? On the classic Star Trek series.

Multiple: Star Trek Enterprise.

Multiple: this is the age of low rise . And so it's it is, yeah. All upper ass cleavage.

Multiple: But really, I think Star Trek enterprise is sexy primarily because of. The doctor,

Laurel: Dr. Flox,

Multiple: the great actor and activist john Billingsley plays the ship's doctor of the USS enterprise, NXO one

Laurel: and Dr. Flocks is the first and only, Canonically acknowledged polyamorous. Main cast.

Multiple: Yeah, a character. Character, I think. Yeah. Period.

Laurel: Really? At all.

Multiple: At all.

Laurel: well, there's like side characters that allude to some like Polygeny in episodes.

Multiple: in a code of honor.

Laurel: Yes. That's specifically what I'm thinking of.

Laurel: We should never mention again, strike it from the record

Daniel (2): computer. So in mere minutes,

Multiple: We're going to have John Billingsley, AKA Dr. Fox on for our segment practical poll. Because he is practically Polly.

Multiple: Well, this is the first time that we've had somebody on who has decidedly not Polly.

Nichole: Yes.

Multiple: But I feel like he has provided maybe more of a service than almost anybody I can think of. To the poly community. The poly trekky community by providing this representation.

Laurel: Yes.

Laurel: , like Dr. Flock's character feels really wholesome in a way. But like isn't,

Daniel (2): It's a way of having no boundaries, but in a way that feels totally respectful. Just open yes to the world. It's this sense of openness.

Laurel: our idea of boundaries in day-to-day life is like a little bit limited. Yeah. yeah, just like socially constructed norms.

Laurel: Yeah. But because F Flox is alien, he gets to live outside mm-hmm. Of those norms, but is a very respectful, kind, curious, playful, morally integrous character.

Daniel: it's like the more empathy that you have, the fewer boundaries you need. Yeah. And a lot of what people call boundaries are actually prejudice. Yeah, yeah,

Laurel: yeah. It's a big misnomer.

Nichole: So, should we roll tape?

Multiple: Oh, I can't wait to roll tape.

Daniel: The moment you wake up before you put on your makeup.

John: Well, I say a little before you

Daniel: some something. Some something.

John: I know it's always funny in the movies, they all know all the words. You know, every, the entire great group breaks into song. It's like in the real world, that's what everybody would be going, well, la, la, la, la,

Multiple: la.

Multiple: this podcast is a little bit of a sometimes rogue musical, and that is usually the way that our musical numbers begin.

John: How did I know that? I

Nichole: just, yeah. It's the energy that Daniel gives off.

John: Yeah, yeah, that is a very tiny cup you are drinking from.

John: Can I just say it's my

Nichole: little espresso cup?

John: Oh, I was going to say it's wow. You're, you're a grownup. You can have a big cup of coffee.

Nichole: Oh my God. Thank you.

Multiple: If Dr. Flock says you're grown, you're grown, you're

Nichole: grown up.

John: I probably, I'm probably over caffeinated for this conversation. I just got back from lunch with two dear pals and I ended up having two lattes, like a slut.

Laurel: Wow.

John: He said, would you like another latte? I said, no, that'd be too much. He said, well, it's complimentary. I said, bring it the fuck on.

Multiple: Complimentary, complimentary. Second latte, I would say there's no such thing as like too much coffee for this pod, but that's 'cause we all start from a deficit of just being eternally incredibly tired.

Multiple: Oh,

John: okay. Well, I'm retired, so I really needn't to have coffee in the afternoon. It's It was free. Somebody could come up to you and say, this is a bag of turds.

John: It's free. And you would go, oh, wow,

Multiple: free. Wow. Yeah. Thank you. Wow. No one's ever. Wow.

John: Don't try that at home , because probably wouldn't work

Multiple: I mean, yeah. We were walking around Star Trek, Las Vegas with that bag of turds. No takers.

John: Well, you know, you had coins coming outta your penis. I mean, that was, uh, gee, I'm

Multiple: distracted by that.

Multiple: And I I had hoped that you would bring this up again.

Nichole (2): I think we need to digress with this

Nichole (2): story.

John: Yeah, you probably do because, your listeners might not know what the fuck I'm talking about.

Multiple: Our listeners never know what the fuck we are talking about. Oh, okay. Is true. Alright, so at Star Trek, Las Vegas,

Multiple: on one certain day I was dressed as a human Dabo wheel it's the space roulette. And, everybody was coming up and playing it. And is it, I'm not getting a little notice there. What is that saying?

John: Don't mention penis on air. Must stop government watching no penis mention on air.

John: Is that what it is?

Laurel: Or getting canceled in real time?

Multiple: our Alexa is just talking back now and starting to censor our behavior. Oh, it's just a matter of time. It's just a matter of time before that

John: asshole is like, you know, controlling the whole fucking mic. Oh yeah.

John: Don't say that. Don't think that, don't speak that.

Nichole: I'm gonna say it. Penis, penis.

John: If we say it loud enough and often enough, it'll draw my wife from the other room.

John: Oh. Oh, I love your wife. Yeah. Penis.

John: Honestly, that's how I, get Laurel to come into the room too.

Laurel: Wow.

John: he's got cats on her lap. Oh yeah. That takes Preston then you can't move. Yeah,

Laurel: yeah,

John: yeah, yeah. Until the cats decide to leave.

John: Sometimes she's been in bed for seven days at a stretch

Multiple: yeah. Yeah.

John: I, I, I interrupted. So you,

John: you are a human roulette wheel.

Multiple: Yes. And you, supplied the best non sequitur that I. Heard the entire convention. Just yelled out. Gold coins are dispensing from his penis. Ladies and gentlemen,

John: well, if you could spin your torso, it only makes sense that something has to pay out somewhere. We were in Vegas for God's sake.

John: Where else would gold coins? I wouldn't want any gold coins coming outta your ass. Yeah, like I like gold coins as much as the next guy, but it's like, nah, I'm fine. You can say

Multiple: this. This is where I think we diverge because I think I would prefer gold coins coming outta my ass than coming out of my penis.

John: You yes, do, yes, but as the consumer, as the person who goes, you're the one who chose to wear the costume, my friend. So you know the sacrifices

Nichole: you have to make. Yeah.

John: This is true. payout would be smaller, I would say. I mean,

Multiple: Aw,

John: we

Multiple: don't know.

John: I, I, it would take a long time for a lot of coins, I would imagine to come.

John: I, I'm fascinated that we're talking when you think about what would be required,, unless they were like tiny little ha pennies.

Laurel: Yeah. Well, you're the doctor here, so Yeah. I,

John: I, I would probably not prescribe, generally speaking, anything larger than a Hany.

Laurel: This is the best

John: interview I've ever had, by the way, because so far, uh, you haven't had to ask a question.

John: I haven't had to answer a question.

Laurel: Well, I'm about to ask a question.

John: Uh, it's not calling. I'm about to

Laurel: ruin it. Christ,

John: lemme just, lemme just say the word

Laurel: penis one more time.

John: Hope springs eternal. Alright, go ahead, ask your question. Well,

Laurel: with all this like wildly fabulous improvisation you do, how much did you get to improvise?

Laurel: On enterprise

Multiple: 0, 0 0.

Laurel: And it could have been so much better if they just let you make a musical of it all. If just once in a while flocks had yelled out. Penis. Penis.

John: I know. Now I will say that there were things that I do feel I sort of inspired. , I was talking to one of the writers, Chris Black, and I was making fun of the fact that everybody on the show was always running around in their blue underpants.

John: And I said, how come I never get to run around in my blue underpants? And he said, maybe de nobie ands don't wear underpants. And I said, that's fine. Bring it on. And so in season three you do see a kind of a Benny Hill episode where I'm walking around the ship 'cause everybody else is in deep sleep. There she is.

John: Hi.

Bonnie: Hello. I like the candyman where you say it three times.

John: It's apparently, it's it's penis, man.

Bonnie: Oh, good lord. Heaven.

John: Good Lord,

Bonnie: you guys. Hi. Hello. I brought a cat with me too.

John: Did you? Aww, there you, you can kind of see walking. Oh yeah, I see a little cat. Oh, hi

Laurel: there.

John: He's boo Booo. He may quite possibly hop up here and join us.

John: Uh, yeah. So in any case, I challenged them to go ahead and put me in the buff and they did. Wow.

Multiple: Now I

John: suggested, and they did not take this I said, when I walk into sick bay, I should turn sharply to the left.

John: And all the way across the room, a flower pot should hit the ground.

John: And they said, we're not gonna do that. You gave me a tongue that extends to my toes. I'm just saying,

Multiple: yeah, I

John: can blow up like a puffer fish. Don't tell me that. I don't have, a long, like an Anaconda, uh, that got my wife's attention. My nickname should have been Dr. Phil Anaconda.

John: Long,

Multiple: I wish, I wish that this was a video format just so we could get , the incredible side eye. It is being provided right now by, well, this isn't

Laurel: video. Oh, no, I didn't realize that. I'm sorry. Yeah, we're not for years.

John: Oh, yeah, yeah. She's very good. She's very good at the hairy eyeball.

Laurel: I love it.

Multiple: So I also had a question, question,,

Daniel (2): Flocks to me was given off hardcore polyamorous vibes long before it was actually revealed that he was polyamorous, like interesting. He's, he's trying to feed people , from his plate.

Daniel (2): Well, I

John: did early on. I asked if I could watch people, , have sex. You did? Yeah.

Multiple: Yeah, yeah.

Multiple: How much did they know and how much did you know about Foxx's polyamory when the show began?

John: Nothing. I didn't know.

John: I didn't know nothing about nothing. , I was a brand new alien species they'd never had any de bulent on. They didn't tell me anything about De Noa.

Bonnie: you didn't know how to say the word nogi.

John: I did too . I that's why they cast me. I was the only one who could fucking pronounce the, that's the reason my wife married me.

John: I'm the only one who could pronounce her last name. Oh, that is true. Which is free drei, like fried and greasy. It's very hard for people to wrap their tongues around that. For some reason, it's always frick, DIY or Fred or Icey or

Bonnie: that 18 foot tongue. You had

John: I wrapped around it. I disclosed the fucking life out it.

John: I know,

Multiple: The ENTs need the really, really long tongues for the, uh, three foot lums. Well, the

John: Anaconda Schlong won't do it. Yeah, that's on T-shirt. No one buys. No, I had no idea. I had no idea. But I, I was polyamorous. I mean, all you really know is that he's joyful and that he's curious and that he isn't bound by human morality.

Bonnie: Did you fir first find out that he was polyamorous? Is that with the Kelly Wayme?

John: No. No,

Bonnie: didn't you tell her that you had a wife.

John: what was interesting to me was I, at one point in that episode, made a gesture as if to say she invaded my personal space that de Nobilis didn't like to be touched.

John: That was hard to square with what I suspected I knew about the De Nobel. And so I had to kind of go back and think about that and kind of figure out that on a planet as crowded as that, where, where space is at a premium, there's a series of courtship rituals and rules that you have to go through before touching is permitted.

John: 'cause casual touching is like, you know, you like never have any, you know, elbow room if everybody was kind of slapping you on the back and kissing you on the cheek.

Multiple: Oh yeah. Just because you're. Uh, slut doesn't mean that you don't have really good consent boundaries, Yeah, exactly.

John: Exactly. But, but I didn't know, I mean, you know, when I first got the gig, I thought, okay, how do I justify the fact we've never seen a bulent before? And I thought, well, there must only be nine deins left. I left the planet because I was bored and there's no one to talk to. And it turns out we're the fuck bunnies of the universe and there are gajillion de bulent.

John: And I had to leave because there was no room for me anymore. I mean, you know, so you, you have to go 180 degrees sometimes from what your conception is to what the writers write.

Bonnie: You got upset when you read, you told me immediately when they had him in an army.

John: Oh yeah, that was, and fortunately it didn't affect , any behavioral choices, but there was an episode in one of the, seasons, and, and I tell the story about how back when I served in the de Noian infantry and yeah, there was a part of me went the de Nobel in infantry. I, I just can't see that. It's weird, you know, when you're a human writer. As all the writers are you, you don't even realize sometimes that there are certain preconceived notions about structures and systems and ways of being in the world that you have so taken on as a given that you can't transcend them yourself.

John: Yeah. Even when you are dealing with an alien species. That was a moment when I kind of wanted to say, ah, I think they did that shit.

Multiple: I think they solved their conflicts like bonobo chimps. Right. They just fucked it out. Yeah,

John: yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Why, why create a species that seems to have, such interesting structures and not say, then everything should be looked at with a, an eye towards upsetting the apple cart of our expectations.

John: Don't put 'em in the fucking infantry. It's like back when I wore a tie and I went to the De Noian office place, and I, I carried my de noian briefcase. It's like there weren't a lot of moments like that. In fairness, though, I mean, really there, there were very few, and I, the, my memory is the first episode in which I genuinely actually went, oh.

John: Oh, interesting. In terms of the polyamory was the episode of Night in Sick Bay. Mm-hmm.

Multiple: That was

John: the episode where I had the most cause to talk about my, planet.

John: They didn't spell out that the guys got it on with the other husbands as much as with the wives,

John: all I could try and do was like, lift an eyebrow.

Multiple: Yeah.

John: , probably one gets it on more often with one's wives than with one's wives, husbands, and with those husbands other wives.

John: But there is some set of rituals, courtship rituals, attitudes and possibilities that allows for more openness

John: Like Charlie Sheen, that's who I, I thought I was like, it was like two and a half men. I was the Charlie Sheen character.

Bonnie: Sure. Yeah, yeah.

Laurel: that is what I took away from watching Enterprise. But sometimes it's also hard to tell , like what is John Billingsley conveying in this character that I'm picking up on?

Laurel: And what am I just adding to it? Because I want to pick up on it.

John: And after the fact, I mean, you know, it's convenient for me to say, oh, well that was my intention. But the reality is, is that I'm always staggered I think I'm reading into the actor's behavior that the intention is X and then reading an interview later on and finding out you were 180 degrees off.

Laurel: Yes. Yeah. Of what

Multiple: Now the episode that gets most into your polyamory is, of course, the, the one where feal shows up , your wife. yes,

Bonnie: yes. His wife, who played my

Bonnie: daughter in a movie,

John: yes. My

John: wife. Really my own personal, real life wife, who unfortunately, 'cause it's not on video, you can, you can't see standing behind me.

John: Beautifully attire. Mm-hmm. In a cocktail dress pearl.

Multiple: All right. When I get nervous, I forget everyone's name except for John Billings. Liz. Mrs. Billingsley, um,

John: or Bonita, free dei. She goes

Multiple: by Bonnie. Bonnie. and I knew this at one point.

Multiple: Can you say her last name? Fredi.

John: Oh, look at you. You can marry HER two. And Bus is a polyamorous relationship Born. It's a very low bar. If you can pronounce her last name, you're in, uh,

Nichole: Fredi. Fredi. Fredi.

John: She's actually wearing overalls. Uh, I I lied about the, the, you lied

Laurel: about the cocktail dress.

Laurel: They're

John: super cute. I did. But they're her, best overalls

Bonnie: um, Melinda, Paige Hamilton, who played Fe Yeah. Is a lovely actor. She's very talented.

Multiple: And we really liked her in, , mad Men too.

John: Yes. Yeah. I highly recommend a movie that's hard to find called Sleeping Dogs Lie. In which, , Melinda Page Hamilton plays my wife's daughter. She was a little disturbed that not only did she not get cast as my wife, but the woman who played her daughter was cast as my wife.

John: 'cause even in a television show that might celebrate polyamory, there's still ageism.

Laurel: Yep. Yeah. Yep. No

John: fat middle aged guy still has a hot young wife. It's like, I, I think I have a hot young wife. Don't get me wrong,

Bonnie: it's all okay. I was not particularly bothered. I just thought it was pretty funny.

John: are you leaving Bunny?

Bonnie: I'm, I'm gonna hover back here. I don't wanna interview.

John: Okay. But if you're gonna hover back there, we can't hear you when you enter J. Okay. Well then what's the point of hovering

Multiple: Bonnie, when you have something to say, run toward the camera. Yeah.

John: Or

Laurel: you could sit in the chair and join in. Yeah. Yeah.

Laurel: Just join us please.

Multiple: she knows that it doesn't, , automatically make her part of her quee if she joins the interview. Right?

John: Uh, I'm not part of Fucking

Multiple: Quee

John: don't make me, I'm not a, I'm a, I'm all for polyamory, but, uh, one life is plenty.

John: yes, yes, yes, yes. They cannot see this. But let it, that my wife brought down a sign that we have hanging in our front hallway that says Bigamy is having one wife.

John: Too many so is monogamy. I did not procure this sign. My wife gave this to me for a holiday treat. Uh, and it made it onto the wall. These do not, this does not reflect my sentiment. I'm a very, very happily married man. I, I love my wife dearly. And I'm not just saying that because I suspect she's still in listening.

Daniel: So once you got to that episode

Daniel: did you do any research or did you do any, I mean, not, my wife

John: wouldn't, my wife wouldn't let me do any research. i'll tell you that, that was my favorite scene. I think in the end of all the scenes in Enterprise.

Daniel (2): I asked about the research 'cause there's like, there's scenes in that episode, which feel so absolutely emotionally authentic. Mm-hmm. When you and, uh, feal and, um, Melinda.

Multiple: When, when Mel and I are like, gossiping about your metamours, metamours are like the partners of your partners and you're like, oh there was something so, intimate and natural about it. I just wondered if you didn't, , talk to anybody who was like in that kind of situation, did you, develop some head cannon, like about how to emotionally like approach. That.

John: No, you really don't. I mean, It is sort of to your earlier point, an audience reads a lot in, the bottom line is when you get a script, you know that this is an action that is fundamentally about two people who love each other and haven't seen each other for a while are, are reconnecting.

John: You don't have to go out and kill somebody to understand what it's like to kill somebody.

John: Yeah. You have to understand what it's like to hate somebody. and that's easy.

John: I do it 12 times a day. I think actors, particularly younger actors, kind of overcomplicate their thinking, you know? Mm-hmm. A little bit. It's like, I don't need to know what I had for breakfast to play the scene.

John: 'Cause the scene is rooted in action, intention, and objective, and how you commit to pursuing your objective based on the fullness of your emotional connection to what you want.

John: Mm-hmm. Which is just an imaginative act.

Multiple: So you just uncorked the love.

John: Exactly. Exactly. I, you don't need to, you don't need a PhD to know what it's like to kind of love somebody, you know? It's like,

John: Hey, oh my God, it's so good to fucking see you.

Daniel: And,

Daniel: and I, I, I've heard in real life that when you see somebody.

Daniel: You, John Billingsley, you haven't seen in a while. You do smell their neck.

John: that was my idea.

John: I'll say that was my idea. I did think that, on a planet where, touch has its rules that one of the things they may have done was say, well, what about using smell as sort of a gateway drug?

John: when you're really intimate with somebody, then you get into a higher level of smell, so that if we had been left to our own devices, there'd be like 10, 20, 50 minutes of good smelling before the touch took place.

Nichole: I really resonate as a polyamorous person with the level of curiosity that Dr. Flocks has. Mm-hmm. And I think that's what I latched onto, is like, as a polyamorous person, one of the ways that I explore my curiosity is like finding out about people.

Nichole: Right? Mm-hmm. I really just love connecting with people, i'm like, that's why that feels poly to me,

John: curiosity should be at the heart of every actor's.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

John: Exploration. I mean, it doesn't matter who the character is, if the character is a depraved fucking lunatic.

John: I'm curious to find out what it is going to be like to pull this man's tongue out of his mouth and cut it in half with a pair of scissors. I'm

John: curious.

Nichole: Curious.

John: It's always curiosity.

John: I think, you know, one of the things you're always trying to find, you're looking for joy, curiosity, and humor.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

John: In any script,

Nichole: those things came across in those scenes. Yeah.

John: that those scenes are easy because the scenes are so palpably about joy. Curiosity, yes.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

John: Yeah. The hard thing is when you get scenes that don't seem to allow you to dig those elements out, that's the challenge.

John: Mm-hmm. Is can you bring joy, curiosity, and humor to scenes where they don't seem to be present on the page. As an actor, if you can find that as a wellspring, it's gonna give you something to play that's deeper.

Daniel: that element of curiosity that you think is like the heart of a good performance

Daniel: I think it's also what probably makes for great relationships, i think that's why I am able to sustain a level of intense love with people that I've been with for a really long time, is because we sustain that curiosity is 'cause we're always coming to the situation with a curiosity about the other person,

John: curiosity, sense of humor, which, you know, to my mind it sort of amounts to the same thing.

John: Your sense of humor is a sense of playfulness. And when you play, you're playing because you're curious, you know? I mean, what is our play? We play games as kids. It's cops and robbers, it's detective, it's whatever. What's gonna happen next. Why we like stories. Play is fun, is love is curiosity.

John: They all. You know, to my mind, uh, are kind of different facets of the same jewel,

Multiple: How much other Star Trek have you consumed?

John: Zip

John: That's not entirely true. That's not entirely true. I, I was born in 1960, so when I was six years old, the original series came on and I remember vaguely watching it as a child.

John: And I think I watched a lot of the reruns of the original show. Mm-hmm. But I was bopping around doing theater. I ran a theater company. I was pretty busy during a lot of years. I didn't watch any television for years and years and years.

John: So when I got Enterprise, fortunately I have a very good friend who's a Star Trek guy, and I said, I need like a crash course. What the fuck is a, who's a whatchamacallit?

John: , I don't watch a ton of television. I really, I like, I, I shouldn't even be an actor.

John: I like to read.

Daniel: For those of you at home, we are talking to John.

Daniel: He is sitting in a room that looks like it's constructed of books. Like a book. Igloo. Like

John: Yes. That's one room, unfortunately in a house. So that is pretty much all the rooms are like this. I got a very, I've got a very patient wife I could read, uh, every minute of every hour of every day for the rest of my life.

John: And I would not scratch the surface of the surface of the books I have, which wouldn't scratch the surface of the surface of the surface of the surface, of the books that exist in the world that are worth reading. I'm stunned as I walk through the world when I go into houses and there aren't any books, I think, well, but, but

Nichole: wasn't that, I think it was John Waters that said, if you go home with somebody and they don't have any books, don't fuck them.

John: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I went out on a date with some gal years ago and, you know, I was like, I've been in a play together and I liked her and I thought she seemed fun and smart, and we went out and, uh, I can't remember.

John: I, I picked her up and I think early on, like in the first five minutes we had some conversation, she said something to the effect of, I know you'll like to read. I, I don't like that. You don't approve of it or it said, no, no, no. I just don't do that. I just don't. So I dunno if we have much in common. I said, well, I don't think so either.

John: Should I turn the car around? Oh my God. Or should we just fucking go through with it? And so we kind of went through with it, but it was, it was as clear a like line of demarcation. But I thought it was really interesting that she's the one who put it up. Yeah. I didn't say to her, you read.

John: I never thought meeting would stop me from having sex. I, I never thought that it would be an actual obstacle to, I mean, if you would've thought about it for a minute, I, I still would pick reading.

John: I mean, I, I one knows, you know,

Multiple: this is just, this is just me gushing again.

Multiple: Your performance as this playful, open, curious person? The character is not only unique, but the performance I feel like is unique in all of Star Trek. Yes. I don't think that there is anybody who brings that much vibes to, to any other show. Uh, and so, uh, squirm in the discomfort of that compliment,

John: I can, I'm old enough to take a compliment.

John: I can take an insult, I can take a compliment, either one if you wanna try me now and yeah, I can insult me. See if either one phased bit one way or the other,

Nichole: I don't think constitutionally we could do that. Yeah. I think

John: kill

Nichole: us inside

John: I digress. I digress a lot.

Laurel: We all do. We all do. You're

Multiple: in good company, so.

Multiple: We can't be the only people, the only weird, freaky polyamorous people that have ever come up to you and said, oh God no. This means, oh good, this means so much. I would, Hey, Bonnie, would you bring my

John: fan down? No, it is certainly not, it's actually, it has been one of the great, uh, joys of my life to have gotten the chance to play this guy. '. Oddly enough, one of the perversities of being somebody who can find a way to be a joyful serial killer or a, curious child molester is a yuga cast to serial killers and child molesters all the fucking time.

John: Mm-hmm. So this is one of the few opportunities in my life. I had to play a guy who was like me. You know, not the polyamorous part, but certainly the part that is sort of like, you know, Mary. And so I take a lot of joy in the fact that this is the part that a lot of people associate me with. It feels truer to me than anything else on some level that I've ever done .

John: And consequently, I have been very, very happy to meet all sh a shitload of people. Mm-hmm. In the cameras community. And Bonnie's gonna bring me this fan. I was hoping that the timing would work out better 'cause this is when it should be in my hand, which she's. Got bigger fish to fry. There she is. I, uh, was on a Star Trek cruise with, uh, Wilson Cruise. And he was being introduced as a gay icon and, uh, wow. Hell yes. That's

Laurel: amazing. So,

John: uh, I said a gay icon. Fuck, uh, Dr. Foxx was polyamorous. I, I mean, how come I ain't a gay icon?

John: And a bunch of people on the ship said, you are a gay icon and we're gonna make you a fan. So what I'm holding

Multiple: up,

John: which you cannot see, is this gorgeous fan, which is one of the things that I would save if there was a fire. In fact, when there were fires in LA it was, one of the things I put in the car is a fan that has a picture of Dr.

John: Flocks and it says John Billingsley gay icon. And my wife, a fan made her a shirt. you also probably can't quite see it.

Laurel: That is okay. This is very meta

John: A fan in Vegas. Gave my wife a t-shirt with a picture of me appearing in front of the fans, carrying that fan with the, the picture, uh, says, proudly married to a gay icon. So, um, so good.

Multiple: Oh, that's amazing.

John: Unfortunately, being a gay icon doesn't pay. I, I didn't, not like I'm getting checks in the mail or anything, but, um, you know, I mean, my wife and I both, you know, my dad was gay, Bonnie's brother's gay.

John: Uh, we both grew up in the theater. You know, more than half of our friends are gay. My best friend is gay. I've officiated a gay weddings. I would cheerfully, you know, push the button that would lower the boom on every one of these sons of bitches who was anti LGBTQ plus I'm gonna get serious for one second.

John: Yeah, yeah.

Laurel: Because

John: horrible political assassination yesterday and, uh, heinous violence is heinous. What bugs me is I hear people talking about, well, we must speak out against political violence, but the propagators of political violence. Are the people who basically are demonizing and, , castigating people for their, their beliefs and for the way they choose to live their lives.

John: Uh, the person who died yesterday committed acts of political violence, and it, it doesn't mean that he should have been treated violently himself, but it is nonetheless a reality that we cannot pretend that political violence isn't, it isn't just a politician gets shot. Political violence is violence done to people by politicians.

John: And there's far too much of fucking that going on right now. We all know. So anyway, I decre.

Multiple: Yeah, it's just the man who was , killed yesterday, , actually said gay people should be stoned to death.

John: Yes, he did. Yeah, absolutely he did.

John: Absolutely. And He caused people who were. , Gay to lose their jobs and to be brutalized, , and detoxed and, , horribly abused by, his followers and he was proud of it. So, and again, it is not to condone, it is one of the reasons we are in this pickle we're in, because it is a slippery mother fucking slope.

John: Once we accept the fact that violence is an acceptable behavior, be it verbal, be it, be it physical, we, we, we are doomed. And I, I just think it's ironic that the, a person who propagated violence died violently and somehow the idea that he would become an American hero, or that the flags get lowered to half-mast, or he's declared, you know, I'm sorry, that's just, that is itself a politically violent action.

John: Yeah.

Multiple: Yes. Amen.

John: Anyway, back to good humor. There are two times, there's good humor, John, and then there's like, know, really furious John that lives in the world.

Nichole: But I do, I I do appreciate you sharing that. And , I do wanna say that, , a couple years ago at, , SDLV, we got to see you lead a panel on Star Trek activism.

Nichole: , We've seen the passion behind, your activism and. I think there is a lot of crossover between, this fandom of Star Trek and activism and, you know, moving toward a better and brighter future.

Nichole: And I just wanted to thank you for being a part of that.

John: Oh, thanks. I appreciate that. No, I mean, that is one of the things that has been a, an interesting, uh, journey for me that even though I'm not as conversant with the individual episodes, I certainly have become deeply conversant with the ethos, what Roddenberry's vision really means.

John: A world in which we can put aside our trinary differences and agree that we were all in it together and fighting for our common goods and our common humanity is the most important thing we can do.

John: I mean, that's, that's a pretty interesting and powerful message to have survived for all these years. Mm-hmm. Down through all these iterations. And I think it's because it resonates with so many people

John: obviously not everybody, there are some people for whom it's just a space show, but I think for the bulk of people who are Star Trek fans, they buy into what this vision is about, which is deeply humanistic and, and anti-religious and anti doctrinaire and, you know, rooted in empiricism and love.

John: You know, and, and three cheers for that shit.

Multiple: Oh yeah. Yes. And, and to bring it back around to polyamory. There's no way that Gene Roddenberry was not at least a swinger.

John: Oh, oh yeah. I won't, I won't tittle tattle because that would be unfair. But there's tattle to be td

Laurel: Oh my god.

Multiple: Thank you, John. Thank you so much, so much. This.

Multiple: Yeah. I really appreciate it. Everything that we could have dreamt of and more. someday we may reach out to you again if and when. Flocks returns,

John: , From your mouth to God's ears. Well, they better not be fucking waiting too much longer. I ain't getting any younger.

John: The pain in the ass to put that rubber head on. I have the windows closing fast is Oh, yeah,

Laurel: I bet

John: this is, this is what will make the yellow press. This is invariably what happens. I say something flip about you. Now John Billingsley says he'd never go back to play. Dr. Flo, why didn't I call earlier?

John: I'll ru I'll ru the day.

Multiple: oh my God, I got so flushed at one point. I needed to take off my jacket. I was just having like a, a flocks induced hot flash.

Laurel: Yeah. I definitely had a little bit of a like starry-eyed freeze response. Oh, I got full body

Nichole: chills at one point, I think when we were talking about activism and, and the ethos of Star Trek.

Nichole: Yes. Like that really, it just really, it got me.

Multiple: And I'm so glad that pretty much the most pointedly political discussion that we have ever had on this podcast was brought to us by a man who plays a fictional space doctor.

Laurel: So true.

Nichole: So good. Oh man. Well, okay, so trying to come down off the high of that,

Multiple: Oh, are you gonna just dunk us in the cold plunge now?

Nichole: I mean, it feels like a total 180 Monogamy, are you okay?

Multiple: monogamy, are you Okay? Is the segment where we look at examples of toxic monogamy that we come across in our, uh, daily internet lives?

Multiple: I feel like

Laurel: we should get Reddit to sponsor this segment.

Nichole: Yeah. We went a looking, and again, we went to the am i overreacting subreddit. Define this gem. Ooh. Can't wait. All right, you guys ready? Ready. Am I overreacting because my wife maintains a daily conversation with a previous coworker of the opposite sex?

Laurel: Yes. Yeah. I'm gonna stop you right

Nichole: there.

Laurel: Yes.

Nichole: Context leading into the specific situation. My wife and I have one elementary age child and in the past year or two, there have been points where we've drifted apart under pressure of parenting a young child while caring for elderly parents and working full time.

Nichole: At times I was with friends more than my wife. Liked for the weekly bowling, playing video games online and drinking while playing, said video games, her version of Drift was probably getting big into watching hockey.

Nichole: An old hobby. She revived. She went to like 15 NHL games last season.

Multiple: What if this just takes a turn where it's like he's super jealous of hockey.

Nichole: Oh, just wait. Reading mostly smut, quote unquote playing phone games and just generally spending a lot of time on her phone, texting with friends and coworkers.

Nichole: She's found a better balance and we've committed to rekindling our own closeness the one lingering thing that I'm struggling with, which is impacted by the harm done to our trust by the aforementioned stuff, her what? Her spending, having hobbies. Her having hobbies. Basically texting too much with her coworkers, she has a male coworker who she worked with for a few years.

Nichole: They were always close and friendly in a way that she defined as brother, sister in the office. They prank each other, talk about hockey, whatever.

Nichole: She's like 10 plus years older than him. And while I don't know him, I get the sense that he's pretty straight laced Christian.

Nichole: Married with two kids, not like some young hot guy hunting for cougars, LOL. They used to just talk in person in the office when their office schedules would overlap, and then he got a new job and they continued talking,

Nichole: I had no sense of how often they were talking and just knew that they mainly talked about hockey.

Multiple: Okay. I'm, I'm imagining it being like a super erotic conversation about hockey where everything like takes on double meaning, it's like, do you ever wanna go into the penalty box?

Laurel: wanna puck? Did you see the way. That guy punched that other guy and slammed him up against the glass on the side.

Nichole: That's what I think of when I think of hockey. Yeah. Like how violent it gets. Yeah. Yeah. At one point she originally got seasoned tickets last year. She had mentioned that he , could be an option of someone to go with to the game if other friends weren't available. And it struck me as kind of odd and inappropriate.

Nichole: I said as much and she just dropped the idea, even though she thought I was overreacting. As the hockey season went on, she was pretty deeply into the sport.

Laurel: Is this problem with this other, this other guy or with hockey? Yeah, like it's insane how much he mentions

Nichole: hockey. whether that meant being at games, watching games.

Nichole: Reading about hockey smut, hockey love stories sometimes, and also just like news about hockey.

Multiple: What, what, what nudes about hockey? No, no, no. We're N Oh,

Laurel: Daniel's jealousy nude.

Multiple: I'm just imagining like a guy on the skates, on the fucker, on the rink,

Laurel: like he's got the skates and the stick and the helmet. But nothing else. Nothing else. Like they did a Nudie calendar to raise money for a local charity. Yeah. And it's called Hot and Cold

Nichole: and every other pitch that's like, there's shrinkage 'cause it's cold.

Multiple: There's like a fluffer with a space heater that comes up and stands.

Nichole: Okay. I don't know what smut hockey love stories are, but apparently this woman found them and told her husband about them.

Multiple: I mean, I used to have a copy of the, , best smut hockey Erotica Oh yeah. Of 1998. Smut Hockey Weekly.

Nichole: Oh my God.

Nichole: At some point I became aware that a regular part of those conversations with friends included this old coworker. I was frustrated because I felt like she was taking an unreasonable amount of time away from like real life with her hobby, but also felt extra jealous and frustrated to know that there were times when my son and I wanted or needed to be present and she was texting a guy, I don't know, while sitting across the room from us , even if the texts were just about hockey.

Nichole: Nice. Oh God. So fast forward, we worked out a lot of stuff and through it all, she's maintained contact with this guy , this male friend was texting her every single day, like for months, even if it was just a single text.

Nichole: He legit never went a single day without sending her something, and he would typically engage in conversation for as long as she did. It was weird to me, and I told her that it was something that made me uncomfortable. I wouldn't as a man, especially a married man, feel comfortable texting someone else's wife daily, regardless of the content slash context, I felt like we haven't been on a steady enough ground in our relationship long enough to have some third party person in the mix as hockey season approaches again.

Nichole: Oh my God. Oh God. Oh God. Okay. I'm just concerned that when the season starts again, we're going to be faced with me feeling like she's too obsessed and she's going to think that I'm being controlling and unfair and feeling this way.

Nichole: Ultimately, though, I felt fair in being uncomfortable with her ongoing conversations with this guy, so I ended up asking her to stop texting him or just say even like, Hey, I'm trying to be more present at home, so I'm probably going to be on my phone less or something.

Nichole: They have been texting less maybe every couple of or few days, sometimes longer, gaps in between. How the fuck do you know?

Laurel: Yeah. That's weird

Multiple: Now. Now he's probably monitoring her phone he's like, okay, well. They texted today, but at least they didn't talk about fucking hockey Jesus.

Nichole: But I know she feels like I'm being controlling and unfair and feels

Nichole: it's a completely harmless, platonic relationship that she should be able to maintain if it doesn't disrupt us as a family, She specifically said she's okay not talking to him as much because hockey hasn't started yet,

Nichole: but wanted to know how I was going to feel about them texting more once hockey starts again in a month. And that alone upset me all over again. So what do you say? Am I overreacting?

Laurel: I, I love that the wife is like, so. Earnestly interested in hockey that she's just like, Fine, I don't need to talk to him, but like hockey season's coming around and I'm gonna need to have my hockey conversations.

Laurel: Like to me, to me that screams like, yeah, this is like my fishing buddy.

Daniel: Yeah.

Laurel: Like nothing more. I really just wanna talk hockey with somebody and you're not the person 'cause you're not interested in hockey.

Multiple: this. Something that we actually talk about being like really powerful and important about polyamory all the time, right? Yeah. Is that I can go on a date with somebody and talk about fucking cars.

Laurel: Yeah,

Multiple: right. And you know, uh, Nicole, you can talk about spreadsheets.

Nichole: I can take multitudes.

Nichole: I also like email signatures.

Multiple: Laurel, you can go to Burning Man. Good

Nichole: luck. Have fun.

Nichole: I'm scrolling through the 29 comments on here. Yeah. And they're all basically like, your wife is cheating on you. Like blah, blah, blah, whatever. Oh my gosh. Serious. No one has asked what is hockey love smut like? Because that is my biggest question.

Multiple: Now, stewards also, if you yourselves, are inspired to write a short piece of hockey love smut.

Multiple: A little flash fiction,

Laurel: you know. Ooh, please send us your hockey love. Smut.

Nichole: Fanfic. We will absolutely read it. We'll, and we'll, we'll put a soundtrack behind it. We'll have different character.

Nichole: We will, we will do this. Yeah. We'll make it a radio play.

Multiple: Ooh, yes. Is this. Worse or better as an example of toxic monogamy that he really seems to be jealous of hockey. Like as, as a concept, as a, yeah,

Multiple: like to me, that's almost more fucked up when you are actually jealous of somebody's interest.

Laurel: Yeah. Oh, a

Nichole: thousand

Laurel: percent.

Laurel: like there's not that many games in a season. She went to like 15, 15 nights out of a year. Yeah. Serious. Went and did her own thing yeah, I can't,

Nichole: it's really hard to not see this as manipulative, controlling behavior. Manipulative, because he brings , their son into it. Yes. Saying like, she's not being present with our kid. Yeah. And I'm like, dude, you are writing to Reddit right now? Yes. Like you are taking the time to write a tome, which is why I skipped a bunch of parts.

Nichole: Our,

Multiple: our kid has just taken up hockey just so he can get some of his mother's attention.

Multiple: Okay. Juan, do you think this family is Canadian, and that's why this doesn't make sense to us and that to our Canadian listeners who are listening, they're like, oh yeah, okay. Yeah. Like, no, because then he would be obsessed with hockey too. Yeah, that's right. Maybe it's a, A cross border.

Laurel: Yeah. Maybe she's Canadian. He just doesn't understand her canadianness. I bet they live in like Niagara. She lives on the Canadian side. Yeah, he lives on the New York

Nichole: side. Their house straddles the porter, and they have to go through customs every time they wanna get to the kitchen.

Multiple: So, so maybe this is finally what is going to get our Canadian listeners to write in We did a read alert a long time ago asking our growing Canadian listenership to, write us about what polyamory was like in Saskatchewan.

Laurel: And you never did. You never, you never did.

Laurel: You never did. You never did. Do it now.

Multiple: Tell us whether this dude is overreacting.

Laurel: Yeah. We can only do this with a Canadian perspective. So the jury's out. This is a cliffhanger episode. Jury's out until Canada gets back to us.

Daniel: Oh my God.

Laurel: We're not gonna do another

Multiple: fucking episode of Poly Amateur

Laurel: Hour until Canada responds.

Laurel: What? Father Hockey. Hullabaloo

Nichole: hockey. My cheeks hurt.