[00:16] Meg: Welcome to Desperately Seeking the 80s. I am Meg.

[00:18] Jessica: And I'm Jessica. And Meg and I have been friends since 1982. We got through middle school and high school together here in New York City, where we still live

[00:27] Meg: and where we podcast about New York city in the 80s. I do ripped from the headlines lines,

[00:32] Jessica: and I do pop culture.

[00:33] Meg: Jessica.

[00:35] Jessica: Yeah.

[00:36] Meg: On my way here, I was like, oh, what should we talk about at the beginning? And then I had to get out of my cab a little bit early.

[00:45] Jessica: And

[00:46] Meg: you want to know why?

[00:48] Jessica: Is it the marathon?

[00:49] Meg: I was stuck on the other side of the marathon, so I was like, oh, my God. Okay, just let me out here, and I'll just. I'll just walk uptown. So I walked through Yorkville in the thick of the marathon.

[01:05] Jessica: That's. That takes a lot of work.

[01:07] Meg: It was amazing. It's a total street party right now. It's like pub crawl central. People are like, whoa, it's beautiful.

[01:19] Jessica: People need something to celebrate right now.

[01:20] Meg: And it's gorgeous weather out, and it's just a great day for a marathon.

[01:26] Jessica: It is a great day for a marathon. I. I don't like crowds.

[01:30] Meg: It wasn't even that crowded in

[01:32] Jessica: Yorkville. All I was going to say is that that's a crowd that I will tolerate because it's always so joyous, even if you're in the crowd because you're just trying to cross First Avenue.

[01:45] Meg: Which I had to do.

[01:46] Jessica: Yes.

[01:47] Meg: I had to run across, like, Frogger.

[01:49] Jessica: You wait. You wait for the policeman to be like. Or policewoman to be like, okay, go, go, go. And you're like, oh, my God.

[01:57] Meg: So it was wonderful, and it made me very happy to be a New Yorker on this November 1st.

[02:04] Jessica: When you were.

[02:05] Meg: Rabbit.

[02:05] Jessica: Rabbit. Damn you. I was gonna ask,

[02:10] Meg: did it this year I did it. Or this month?

[02:13] Jessica: I said it. Actually, I managed to be the one to say it first this morning. And Will was like,

[02:19] Meg: and it's my birthday month, so that bodes well. And the tarot card that I pulled for November back a year ago was Wheel of Fortune, so that's good. That's a good month. Yeah, yeah. I'm just saying bodes well.

[02:37] Jessica: Look, being associated with you and knowing that's what you got. I'm all in. Yes. Just let it leak over here a little bit

[02:45] Meg: on it.

[02:46] Jessica: I'm in.

[02:47] Meg: Okay, let's get started. I'm excited about my story.

[02:51] Jessica: I'm so delighted that you're excited about your story, by the way. I just have to talk about this because we don't do this a lot. I just love your jumpsuit today,

[03:00] Meg: and here's why I love

[03:01] Jessica: it. So first off, who, who created this?

[03:05] Meg: Maria Cecilia, which is Nanette Lepore's new line? Of

[03:09] Jessica: course. It's one of her new things. Okay, fine.

[03:11] Meg: It's like half my wardrobe now is Maria Cecilia.

[03:13] Jessica: It's a hammered satin. Do you like that? I know that that's a hammered satin and it's an army green, but it's satin, so it really does. It's like, is. And it has like a military flair to it. But it's this gorgeous fabric. It's cut so well. And the drawstrings that you have sort of, you know, at the waist, that kind of trail in the front and the back, just adorable. You are frequently very cute when you walk in here. I like, open the door and I'm like, I'm in jeans on this sweatshirt. Welcome. And you come in because you're out in the world wearing something adorable. This is a notable outfit. Put it into circulation.

[03:56] Meg: And I have to say, every time I go over to Nanette's place, she's also a friend and she's got new stuff coming out. I'm like, but I can't believe I. I am leaving here with another item. Like, there's not enough room in my closet. But what she designs is. Just fits me very well and I love it. I

[04:17] Jessica: signed Annette Lepore when she was still under that brand. So, you know, I. I don't know if I've. If I've said this quite as boldly as I will, but could you take me with you the next time, please?

[04:31] Meg: Absolutely.

[04:31] Jessica: Because, you know, and I promise we won't be matchy matchy. I just, I just.

[04:35] Meg: No, I would love to. It's

[04:36] Jessica: amazing. It's just amazing. It's so cute.

[04:38] Meg: And she has frequent sales and all that kind of stuff. I want to go

[04:42] Jessica: to theater. I

[04:42] Meg: want to

[04:42] Jessica: go with you.

[04:43] Meg: Come, come. And it's. It's a lovely vi. I guess it's a pop up, except it's in her apartment. So.

[04:50] Jessica: Open house.

[04:51] Meg: Open house. Exactly.

[04:52] Jessica: I like it.

[05:02] Meg: My engagement question, I would like for you to give me an example of a time in the 80s when you made a plan to meet somewhere and then the person isn't there who you're supposed to meet. So did you get your wires crossed or did something happen to them or what should you do now? Should you go home? Should you go to the second location? Like something like that, where it's just like, what the fuck you know what I'm talking about?

[05:29] Jessica: Yes, absolutely.

[05:30] Meg: Because no phones.

[05:31] Jessica: Right. I'm trying to think of it being 80s specific. I think very late 80s. So we were already in college. I had a friend, a college friend who was. I mean, I'm a late person. He took it to new levels. So we had to have an agreement. 15 minutes and I leave.

[05:51] Meg: Okay,

[05:52] Jessica: so. So

[05:53] Meg: you did have a plan. It was

[05:54] Jessica: a plan. It was. I will wait for 15 minutes and if you have been so out of your gourd that for whatever reason you can't make it, no harm, no foul, but I'm leaving.

[06:04] Meg: Yeah. So then that. A little

[06:06] Jessica: harm and a little foul, but I.

[06:08] Meg: Right. So was that a way to avoid wasted time? Obviously. But also the anxiety. It's the

[06:12] Jessica: anxiety. It's. I don't want to sit around on a street and frequently, you know, these are evening plans.

[06:16] Meg: Yes.

[06:17] Jessica: So I don't want to stand around on a street

[06:19] Meg: like a dodo head.

[06:21] Jessica: Like a who. And. And you know, potentially be in. In peril of some kind.

[06:28] Meg: And that.

[06:29] Jessica: And also if it's winter, it's fucking cold. Like

[06:32] Meg: the anxiety that. That flips from annoyance to. To fear. What if something actually happened? Or wait, maybe I got the whole thing wrong and it was supposed to be tomorrow night. Like that kind of thing that goes in your brain while you're standing there for probably more than 15 minutes is very stressful. And it's a level of stress we just don't have anymore.

[06:57] Jessica: Correct. The other. I just thought of another scenario, which is if you're going to a club, there will be a line. I'll meet. Oh, no, forget even a club. Movies. Going to the movies. There's going to be a line. I'll meet you on the line. And then the line starts moving and you're. And you've got the other person's ticket.

[07:17] Meg: Yeah. And you're

[07:18] Jessica: like, what the shit? What

[07:19] Meg: do we do?

[07:20] Jessica: And then you've got to talk to the usher and be like, I'm sorry, can I just stay at the front? Because the super ticket.

[07:28] Meg: So

[07:29] Jessica: that was super annoying. So that's. That's. And

[07:32] Meg: who knows? Maybe they are in the line. They're just way back there. And they didn't.

[07:35] Jessica: No, no, they. I mean, I would hope that they would know, like, walk. Oh, Johnny

[07:40] Meg: would

[07:40] Jessica: occur to me,

[07:41] Meg: walk

[07:41] Jessica: the line. Maybe that's what that was about.

[07:43] Meg: But that's the thing. I. That would be the anxiety that I have. Like, oh, did they miss me? Should I go look in the line? Maybe we're still in the same line. I mean, all of that.

[07:51] Jessica: Well, yes. And there was a completely reasonable request at the time to say to the person in front or in back of you, I have to go see if my stupid friend is at the back of the line, would you hold my spot?

[08:05] Meg: Which is a huge ask in New York City.

[08:09] Jessica: I feel like people, like, they'll roll. They would roll their eyes, but they would be like, like. Because who hasn't been in that position?

[08:15] Meg: Right. But what if you come back with like five people?

[08:19] Jessica: Well, then you should be booted out. Right. And. And

[08:22] Meg: line. Line etiquette. Okay. Thank you. It's a good setup for my story. My source is New York Magazine. At 8am on Saturday, September 6, 1980, David Cohen asked his wife Denise, what she planned to do that day. David was a neurosurgeon at Brooklyn Veterans Hospital and had to do his rounds that morning. But then he wanted to go into Manhattan to test drive a saab.

[08:51] Jessica: Hmm. How very 80s.

[08:53] Meg: I thought so too. Denise, or Denny, that was her nickname, had a bad cold. And while she usually went into her Manhattan law firm on Saturday mornings, she thought maybe she'd take it easy this weekend.

[09:07] Jessica: This is quite a power couple.

[09:09] Meg: Rest up. Finish Sophie's Choice.

[09:12] Jessica: Ooh, very nice.

[09:14] Meg: The book.

[09:15] Jessica: I. I figured it wasn't the video.

[09:18] Meg: Then she joined David and check out that sob. She'd wait for his call so they could coordinate. After David was finished at the hospital, he called home. No answer. He headed to a sporting goods store in Brooklyn Heights and tried calling again twice from payphones. Right?

[09:37] Jessica: Yeah. Yeah.

[09:38] Meg: Still no answer. Annoyed, David went to check out the car alone and didn't get home until late afternoon. David and Denny lived in a beautifully restored brownstone at 49 S. Portland Ave. In Fort Greene. I have a friend who lives on that very block and he frequently has gatherings there. If I may describe the brownstones, they are extra wide, extra deep. The gardens are huge. The ceilings are to the hemisphere. They're just really, really big. They're oversized. Much bigger than Upper east side brownstones. And even bigger than Upper west side brownstones that tend to be even bigger than east side brownstones.

[10:33] Jessica: Okay, big house,

[10:34] Meg: big house. Now it's this gorgeous tree lined street. It's changed in the last few decades, but we're back in 1980. David and Denny married in their early 20s and had lived in the neighborhood for 11 years. They were trailblazers, young, affluent and white, moving into a mostly black neighborhood that had hit hard times in the 60s. So they're just the beginning of the gentrification that would happen to Fort Greene. They'd raised their three kids there and were very active members of the community. They had a bunch of neighborhood friends and were regulars at the local mom and pop shops.

[11:20] Jessica: So these were people who had already raised children. Like, these were college people?

[11:24] Meg: Yeah, yeah. So now they're in their 40s. Okay. When David got home Saturday afternoon, Denny wasn't there. So he's seen the car, he's done his rounds, he went to Paragon Sports or whatever in Brooklyn Heights, and he comes back to Fort Greene, and she's still not there. The door wasn't double locked, and the lights downstairs were on. There were breakfast dishes in the sink. The bed was unmade. Her favorite gold ring she wore every day. It was a gift from her best friend, and she wore it every, every day. Everywhere was on the mantel. Her clothes from the night before were draped over a chair. The washer had been started, but the wet clothes had not been transferred to the dryer. It was just all very, very bizarre. Denny was organized and meticulous and just never would have left for the day with all these tasks undone. Their three kids were out of town. Their eldest, Deborah, was at Vassar. And they had two teens, Stephen, 16, and Trilby, 13. And they were in Florida with their grandparents. Denny's parents scheduled to return the next day. School started on Monday. David was flummoxed. And earlier in the summer, there had been another mystery. Someone had broken into their home. And the whole family got in on trying to figure out who did it and how. They ended up finding some of their stolen antiques at a pawn shop and figured out a neighborhood punk named Shorty was the culprit.

[13:11] Jessica: Oh, dear.

[13:12] Meg: It was like a family project to figure out what had happened. And they solved the mystery. But then when Shorty was arrested, Denny got really, really upset, sobbing over the sight of this kid in handcuffs. David was a little worried that Denny had been depressed lately. She hated her job, and she needed a change. She bemoaned the fact that she'd become a lawyer and not an artist.

[13:42] Jessica: Oh, girl.

[13:45] Meg: But she was 41, and they had plenty of money, and she had time to change direction. Denny would go through periods when she was terrified of being homeless. But then other times, she wanted to get a pied? Terre to have time for herself, away from the family. There's a lot going on there.

[14:04] Jessica: I actually have a lot to say about what she's going. This is fascinating.

[14:10] Meg: Okay. So early in the Evening, Saturday. David is getting annoyed at Denny's absence and also figured, okay, fine, maybe she's mad at me, and she stormed out. But she would have at least left an angry note, like, where's the angry note? You know? He went around the corner to pick up some cheese at the cheese cellar and ran into Angela, one of Denny's good friends. Angela didn't like what David told her about not hearing from Denny all day. Something wasn't right. Many of the brownstones on South Portland had been purchased and renovated by enterprising yuppies, but some were still boarded up or used as rooming houses for transient people. Sex workers and people clearly addicted to drugs and alcohol were very much a part of the fabric of the neighborhood. Now, at 6am the next morning. So we're Sunday now. David's hiking buddies showed up for their scheduled outing. And David opens the door and. And mentioned that Denny was missing.

[15:14] Jessica: Wait, so wait, wait, wait. So she's missing overnight and he has not contacted the police?

[15:19] Meg: No, he's not.

[15:20] Jessica: Hmm.

[15:22] Meg: His two hiking buddies are shocked. They're like, dude, okay, obviously we're not going hiking today. And that prompted David to begin to search in earnest. His two friends walked up and down the block, knocking on doors. David started calling everyone in Denny's address book. Finally, at 11am Sunday, they all three went to the 88th Precinct. And Detective Richard Armstrong was there and met them. Guess what? Detective Richard Armstrong wasn't too concerned.

[16:00] Jessica: Oh, well, why would he be? They never are.

[16:02] Meg: But he did think David was holding something back. The thing that struck him most was that she left the washer running. I don't know. For some reason, the detectives like the washer was running weird. But according to the detective, Denny wasn't high risk, you know, so I'm sure he'll be fine. And she hadn't even been missing for 24 hours. Denny's parents felt differently. David called them in Florida and asked them to hold on to the kids until the situation resolved itself. Denny's mom lost her on the phone and felt in her heart that Denny must be dead. And after Denny's friend Angela had called every hospital to check for Jane does, she also became convinced that Denny had never left her neighborhood. Angela got David to pick out a recent photo and asked what he thought Denny would be wearing. David, remember, he's a neurosurgeon. He was confident. She was wearing a blue T shirt with a Matisse torso of a nude woman and the silhouette of a tree cut off shorts. And Dr. Scholl's sandals. Those were the three items that were missing, he was sure. Angela walked up and down the street asking everyone she encountered if they'd seen Denny. And the answer was yes.

[17:32] Jessica: She

[17:33] Meg: had been spotted. An elderly man who lived at the 34 South Portland rooming house had seen her carrying some tools and directing a man with a ladder. And she was wearing the exact outfit David had described. Turns out Denny sometimes collected rents and supervised repairs for the landlord of the rooming house, Haig Boghossian. Now Angela, her good friend, was very confused at this. The. The rooming house was in horrible shape and most of the people hanging out in front were scary. What on earth was Denny doing here? But it was true. She had been seen there by a few residents. So Angela was just

[18:20] Jessica: like habitual thing that Denny was like working for this?

[18:24] Meg: Yes. And Angela had no idea. She had no idea. She was like, okay. David checked their joint checking account at the nearby Citibank cash machine. The only way you could check your bank account on a weekend. And the balance was unchanged. So she must be close by now. What about this Hague Boghossian guy? In 1975, Denny started doing small legal services for Boghossian, a gruff, self made millionaire who owned 26 buildings in Fort Greene and carried a 9 millimeter pistol to collect rent. But Haig spent a lot of time on his yacht in Florida and Denny started helping out with more of the day to day needs of his properties because he was just never in town. And by 1978, she was basically his manager. It seemed like a crazy mismatch. The properties were horribly run down and their residents were on the fringe of society and Denny didn't need the job. But she also wasn't scared of it. And the residents all knew her well. Three weeks earlier, in late August, Francine Holland, who lived at 34 South Portland, had run across the street begging for Denny's help. Her boyfriend, Francine's boyfriend, Grant Minor, had just got out of jail and was threatening her, cutting the electrical cords in her apartment.

[19:55] Jessica: Can I ask a question?

[19:56] Meg: Yes.

[19:58] Jessica: So David did not know that she had this job?

[20:00] Meg: I think he did.

[20:01] Jessica: Oh, okay.

[20:03] Meg: But didn't think it was

[20:05] Jessica: relevant

[20:06] Meg: to the situation. I.

[20:09] Jessica: Bizarre. Okay.

[20:10] Meg: But you have to admit, like David's a little disconnected from a lot of things

[20:16] Jessica: out of it. Like there's something not clicking with him.

[20:20] Meg: So this woman runs across the street and goes, please help me, Denny. And Denny called the 88th Precinct and reported him. So the 88th Precinct also knows Denny because she just a few weeks ago had reported this incident on behalf of Francine. And Denny asked that he be removed from the apartment. And she was allowed to request that because she was working for the landlord. And in the meantime, while she was doing all this, Francine hid in the brownstone because she was scared of this guy.

[20:58] Jessica: Denny's brownstone?

[20:59] Meg: Yeah.

[20:59] Jessica: Okay.

[21:00] Meg: The arresting officer picked up Grant Minor and drove him over to Denny's home.

[21:06] Jessica: Oh, God damn it.

[21:08] Meg: Insisting she sign a complaint while Grant was in the back of the patrol car.

[21:15] Jessica: Okay. Signed a death warrant. Well done, cop.

[21:19] Meg: Grant, who had only spent four of the last 15 years out of jail because of violent offenses, was released and back at the rooming house the next night. All right, now we're back in September. On Monday morning, 48 hours since Denny's disappearance, David filed a missing person's report. Detective Armstrong still wasn't too worried and didn't think to search the rooming houses, even though Denny had been spotted there. Saturday morning, David went to work at the hospital. And Denny and David's tenant, they had a guy who was living in the basement apartment. Michael. He stayed by the phones just in case someone called with news. Michael was a psychic.

[22:09] Jessica: Okay, now. Now I know why you chose this story. Okay? If I had. If I could prick up my ears, I would.

[22:19] Meg: He conducted a number of seances on Monday with some of Denny's closest friends and said he could see Denny in a brownstone with the numbers 3, 4, 1. And he could also see her in a blue car driving by the sea. Denny's law firm and her good friends pulled strings in the mayor's office and called the papers. Finally, the police in the friggin ADA were forced to take the situation seriously because of all the outside pressure. And they finally did a house to house search. And Denny was discovered with her blue T shirt pushed up to her neck. She was strangled and mutilated in the furnace room of 34 South Portland. At 10am Saturday morning, Danny had gone to the rooming house to collect rent. Grant Minor opened the door of Francine's apartment. He would go on to tell three different convoluted stories that I'm not even going to tell you because it was all such bull and they all contradicted each other. But finally he did confess to her murder and he was sentenced to 25 years to life. And Denny was cremated and her family scattered her ashes in the sea

[23:55] Jessica: by

[23:56] Meg: Rockaway Beach.

[23:58] Jessica: Wait. So he said, numbers 3, 4, 1. Where's the one? So it didn't have to be all three, but these were numbers that were. Okay. I don't. I'm not putting him on trial. I'm just like, come on, you were so close. It makes me weary. I don't know how to explain it, but it's like, you know, we're back to Durst. Like, no one gives a shit. The police don't give a shit until the friends are like, are you insane?

[24:26] Meg: Isn't it crazy? It's the same in every case. And these are different stories and different people and coming from different reporters. But one thing does seem to be very clear. Police are just not going to take a missing woman seriously. They're just. For some reason, they're. They all just figured they'd come back. None of them came back. That's just not a thing.

[24:49] Jessica: No, I think that it's. They're expendable. Whether or not it was internalized,

[24:53] Meg: even. Even a wealthy woman is expendable

[24:56] Jessica: because. Yeah, because she's high maintenance. She came here already complaining about something. She's a complainer. It's like. What's her name? Adrienne Shelley.

[25:06] Meg: Remember

[25:07] Jessica: when she was

[25:08] Meg: awful? Awful,

[25:09] Jessica: right. And it was because she was complaining about the noise. She complained to the. And you know.

[25:14] Meg: Well, that's not why he killed her.

[25:15] Jessica: No, no, he killed her. Cause he was a fucking psychotic. But.

[25:17] Meg: And he was a sexual. It was a sexual attack.

[25:19] Jessica: Yes, but I'm just saying if you don't stay in your lane and keep your mouth shut, you are now opening the door to a very bad scene. So. Wait

[25:28] Meg: a

[25:28] Jessica: minute. See,

[25:28] Meg: but this more interesting than that, I think, is as you picked up on this husband is. Just. Doesn't seem very responsive. And if you can imagine, her whole life, she's only 41. My God, she's so, so young. And she

[25:47] Jessica: feels.

[25:47] Meg: I

[25:48] Jessica: mean, she feels cutoffs from the neighborhood and Dr. Scholz, which,

[25:52] Meg: by the

[25:52] Jessica: way, I had to tell you,

[25:54] Meg: I

[25:54] Jessica: heard Dr. Scholz and I was like, she's a goner. Cause she can't run in that.

[25:57] Meg: You can't run.

[25:58] Jessica: You cannot run in

[25:59] Meg: Dr.

[25:59] Jessica: Scholz. Mm, mm,

[26:00] Meg: mm, mm.

[26:01] Jessica: Uh, so.

[26:02] Meg: But yeah, that at 41, she feels washed up and disappointed in her very short life. It's like, oh, you've got so much ahead of you. Go get em. Danny.

[26:15] Jessica: When you gave that piece of information, I was like, wait a minute. I was kind of like, she wants a pied a terre.

[26:21] Meg: But she's also scared. She's scared of being homeless. So she's got some anxiety.

[26:27] Jessica: That was the thing I was going to

[26:28] Meg: Talk

[26:28] Jessica: about. So I don't. I think I may have spoken to you about this or we talked about this. Not on the podcast, but this idea of very successful women being frightened that they will be homeless is a thing. And like, I, of course, I've told you this forever, that I'm convinced that I'm going to die at a cardboard box in Port Authority, because why not? I ran into our mutual friend's mom, who I respect enormously. She was the head of huge division of a publishing house. And we were just chatting, and somehow it came up and she said, oh, Jessica, don't you know that every woman is afraid of that? Every single successful woman is afraid it's all going to be taken away. Everybody. She's like, I know women with millions and millions and millions of dollars, they think they're going to die on the street. And so there's something about this story about, like, she thinks she's gonna be homeless, but then she wants a pied a terre. And

[27:33] Meg: then

[27:33] Jessica: she doesn't want to be around her family. And then she.

[27:36] Meg: And she doesn't want to be at the law firm. That's for sure. She

[27:38] Jessica: doesn't want to be at the law firm.

[27:40] Meg: And she takes this weird job,

[27:42] Jessica: right? And I, I. When it all added up to me, I was thinking, like, what's the profile of this woman? Which I know is really relevant to the story, but that's what catches my imagination, is like, who is this person and what's she going through at this exact moment in her life? And it's 1980, so it's really the 70s still. And I'm thinking she went to law school when that was not prevalent for women. Not as prevalent for women. She's at a huge law firm, hard to do as a woman. So she is tired. She has been fighting, you know, like, she. And they're like, I.

[28:22] Meg: She just found out she wasn't going to be made partner.

[28:24] Jessica: Okay. Hello. Yes. And I was thinking, like, she doesn't know what she wants, but she clearly knows she doesn't want what she has. Like, everything is wrong. And so taking that cuckoo job actually starts to make sense. Cause she's like, how far outside of what I know can I go and can I learn about something else and maybe be useful in some other way? Because she was willing to be. You know, she knows Francine. She's friendly with Francine, who's a fringy person,

[29:03] Meg: and she was upset about that.

[29:05] Jessica: About the boy.

[29:06] Meg: The boy

[29:07] Jessica: she clearly. Like, you're talking about gentrification. She's clearly, like, really wanting to be part of this community and has taken risks that maybe if she wasn't so fed up, you know, she had something going on where it was, you know, it just wasn't so hard that maybe she wouldn't have taken that very particular risk

[29:31] Meg: in this article that was written in 1980. So we have to take that into account, too. That is definitely the slant of the article, is how could she have put herself in such a dangerous position and why was she, you know, living life on the edge like that? I think it's more interesting for me to talk about why she was interested in doing something that was against the grain of what she had been doing.

[30:02] Jessica: I think it's.

[30:03] Meg: Rather than the risk level of it.

[30:06] Jessica: But I. I believe that certainly I agree with you a thousand percent about the against the grain. And I think that for a lot of people, you know, the risk, as corny as it sounds, the risk is part of what makes it real. I'm really doing something. I'm really making a difference. I'm really immersing myself. It's not pretend, it's not play. Like, these are really fucked up people and I'm going to encounter them, I'm going to engage. And I think that maybe she had been so privileged, you know, and thinking that she could do anything because she had. She had done so many things that were not necessarily easy or the norm for women. She probably was in law school in the 60s. Right. Maybe she was just like, of course I can do this too. I just want to live. I want to live a different. I want to see things from a different perspective.

[31:02] Meg: And she also is in a position of. Not authority, exactly, but the fact that Francine came running to her for help, that she is the person who, when somebody has something wrong in the rooming house, she's the one who will go and talk to Haig, the absent landlord, to try and get it fixed, all of that kind of thing. I mean, she was not a figure of authority, but a figure. What do you call that? Like somebody who people turn to.

[31:31] Jessica: Yeah, she was safety. I don't know. She was the manager. It's disheartening that so many of these stories are just like. And the police. Well,

[31:40] Meg: right,

[31:41] Jessica: not a problem.

[31:42] Meg: And then couple that with the police disinterest and her husband's like, fugue state. I mean, what is happening where he's just like, I don't know if I should be angry or bored.

[31:57] Jessica: Well, maybe. Maybe

[31:58] Meg: I'll sleep on it.

[31:59] Jessica: Well, I mean, also maybe her whole thing about, like, I want a piano terre. Like, maybe their marriage was actually pretty shitty. And it's not in the article that he would be like, she would possibly, you know, take a dinner

[32:11] Meg: because the kids were coming back,

[32:13] Jessica: oh,

[32:14] Meg: the next day because they started school on Monday. It flitted through his mind. Well, she's not the happiest person in the world, but she would have left an angry note, and she would have gone to fucking Angela's. Which Angela realized immediately. Angela was like, what do you mean? Over at the Cheese Cellar. Angela was like, you haven't seen your wife for 12 hours. What? What

[32:37] Jessica: is wrong with what. What. Was there any significance to the fact that she left her ring?

[32:43] Meg: My guess was that she always took it off, probably to do laundry, but she didn't put it back on to go do the errands. I think she was called out of the house. I think maybe Francine called her out. I think something happened that it was like, oh, my God. I'll be right over. I'll be right. She got a phone call. That's what I think. From the rooming house. She went over to deal with it. I mean, this whole thing of, like, going to collect rent at Francine's and he opens the door. I don't think that's actually that. To me, that doesn't make sense based on, like, the fact that she had a really bad cold. She was gonna stay in bed. There were breakfast dishes in the sink. She hadn't started her day. She rushed out to the point where she didn't even double lock.

[33:26] Jessica: Do you think that Francine lured her at the boyfriends?

[33:30] Meg: I really hope not. That would be.

[33:34] Jessica: The

[33:35] Meg: dark

[33:35] Jessica: fantasy that I have now is that he was gonna or was beating the shit out of Francine and was like, if you don't call her, I'm gonna kill you.

[33:45] Meg: Oh,

[33:46] Jessica: like you are gonna call her right now. But that's just my darkness. I mean, obviously. What do I know?

[33:52] Meg: That would track.

[33:53] Jessica: It would track again. I've learned so much from you, Meg, with these stories. Now, this is how I think. Great.

[34:01] Meg: Well done. Thank you. Sleuthen.

[34:03] Jessica: You're my good T. I have an engagement question for you.

[34:17] Meg: Okay.

[34:18] Jessica: Do you like Alfred Hitchcock films?

[34:20] Meg: Yes.

[34:22] Jessica: What are your top three?

[34:24] Meg: Rear Window.

[34:24] Jessica: Yes.

[34:25] Meg: Psycho. And I was gonna say the Birds, but I don't know if that's actually one of my favorites. Rear Window. Psycho. Oh, High Anxiety, but that's not it. It's. What's it called? Vertigo. Yeah.

[34:39] Jessica: I love that you're like Mel Brooks. I feel like my work is done here. We can go. Well, Betty Gordon also really liked Vertigo. And I'm going to tell you a little bit about a film and the women behind it. And I'm inviting you, either this is a two parter, either to do a watch party with me for this film, or I'll watch it and talk about it next week, depending on your time. But Betty Gordon, filmmaker, really well respected. She wound up doing a lot of other films and worked on, I believe stuff with Jonathan Demme, like, wound up as her career went on, being a big deal. But she wound up in, I believe it's 1983. A film of hers called Variety was released. And Variety is the story of a young woman who has to take a job at a porno theater in Times Square.

[35:43] Meg: I know of this movie and I have not seen it.

[35:46] Jessica: Oh, my God. Okay, so she has to take this job and she winds up, you know, having many encounters with the people who go there. And she starts participating in it in some ways. And then she becomes obsessed with a guy who goes to the Variety theater and she thinks that he's a mobster and she starts following him. Betty Gordon, basically, she wrote a story. It's the same story close to Vertigo, but she's reversed the roles.

[36:20] Meg: Very interesting. It also, I mean, I can't help thinking of like all those other sort of early 80s movies like Desperately Seeking Susan and who's that Girl is like the mysterious person that somebody is chasing through the streets of New York.

[36:36] Jessica: I mean, how about Dressed to Kill?

[36:38] Meg: Yeah,

[36:38] Jessica: you know, like all of those, you know, like there's something out there

[36:42] Meg: and that the city is definitely a character in these films,

[36:46] Jessica: 100%. And we talk about the city and about Times Square and, you know, the cleaning up of that area and what was there before. So this film, you know, was filmed there. It was a very low budget. And so it's another opportunity to see the New York that we've been talking about. Mercifully, at 13, we were not hanging out there. I said, that's a good thing. She was really interested in voyeurism and that everything in that industry is as we talk about it now, and it's such a prevalent term, but the male gaze. And so the other interesting thing is not just that the roles are reversed, meaning who's doing the chasing, but this main character is the voyeur. Everything is through her eyes and how she sees the men and the women, but the men. So that was very interesting. But she needed someone to write the screenplay and. Because she wrote the story, but she needed someone who was gonna be pretty authentic to get involved. And who did she choose? She chose Kathy Acker.

[38:00] Meg: Oh,

[38:01] Jessica: who you know about.

[38:02] Meg: Yes,

[38:02] Jessica: tell me what you know about Kathy Acker.

[38:04] Meg: I'll just say a friend of mine was close with her before her untimely death.

[38:09] Jessica: Really?

[38:09] Meg: Yeah.

[38:10] Jessica: Very interesting. So Kathy Acker has a very interesting background. New Yorker, came from a very wealthy Jewish family. Sutton Place, where she lived. There was a lot of trauma going on in that household. There was a lot of no good nish git. And she wound up being very interested in exploring the dark undercurrent of New York. And she got very heavily into the punk scene. And one of the things that she also did was she got very involved in the Times Square sex trade. And so she was a prostitute at one point. She was a stripper dancer. But she was also a well regarded writer and eventually also filmmaker. As you know, she went to the Lenox School, which no longer exists. I mentioned that she was part of the punk scene. And I just have a list of people who we've talked about on this podcast who surrounded her and were her. Were her people. So you'll understand a little more about why I got so excited about her. William S. Burroughs, Marguerite Duras, Alain Robe Grier, Jean Genet, Sherrie Levine. She was in the midst. She brought the verite to the film. I saw this, that this was a thing that even happened. I had never heard of it, had no idea that this film exists. And I saw a clip from it. It is Taxi Driver for Women. Just the way it's shot. And the cinematographer was a very big deal. All of that information we will have. But it is considered one of the most subversive films of its time. It was panned, absolutely panned when it came out, and then became a cult classic. And now it's seen as one of the most hardcore feminist statements on film of the 80s. So I don't know, it just seems so weird. Like it's all of these people who became famous in this really dark, angry, feminist movie that was so out out there with the message that critics couldn't handle it. That intrigued me.

[40:28] Meg: Have you heard about these old movie theaters that are closing? Old? I mean, my goodness, they've been there since the 60s and the 70s. So I guess they're old. It's not like, you know, they're the Ziegfeld or something, but lots of movie theaters are closing in the city.

[40:45] Jessica: I am not Even remotely surprised. I mean, we've. I think we've talked about it on this podcast that the only reason that Paris survived is because Netflix bought it. And Netflix bought it so they could premiere their movies there so they could be Oscar contenders.

[41:01] Meg: Yeah, I guess I am a little surprised because I feel like moviegoing has become, like, doing things in person has become such a huge deal in the city, and movies are so hot right now. It's not like it's a dying art form.

[41:19] Jessica: Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think that people have gotten. I mean, there are two things that strike me. The first is that, you know, what are the movies that are making the most money? Right. It's all of the Marvel blockbustery.

[41:32] Meg: I don't know. There have been some outliers lately.

[41:34] Jessica: There have been some very popular films. I'm talking about what's raking in the money because there's also all the licensing and all of the stuff around it. And people have gotten so accustomed to being fine with watching even the Marvel universe on an iPad that I think there's a whole generation of people who have been raised on being not only a TV screen, a small screen.

[41:58] Meg: I don't know if that's the case right now. I think it's something else. I think it's not that movies are not popular and that they're not making money. I think it's more about real estate.

[42:10] Jessica: Well, no, I'm not saying I don't think they're popular. I think. I mean, I saw the invite. Did you see that as well? Oh, my God. Watch it. You will love it. No, there are definitely really great films that are not ridiculous. Children's movies that are. That are coming out. Why do you think it's the real estate?

[42:29] Meg: Well, at least at Kips Bay, NYU Langone is buying the building. And so, so long movie theater. Which has nothing to do with whether movies are popular or not.

[42:41] Jessica: Langone is taking.

[42:42] Meg: Mm.

[42:43] Jessica: Huh. Interesting. Well, it's a. It's a shonda. It's a shame. It's terrible.

[42:50] Meg: There's been a huge neighborhood outcry. Murray Hill is pissed off.

[42:56] Jessica: Is that an AMC theater?

[42:58] Meg: Yeah. They're like, take your health care somewhere to another part of town. We don't want any more health care in Murray Hill. We have enough.

[43:05] Jessica: That's part of the horror, isn't it? That it's like the healthcare industry, which does not actually care for our health, is now taking our movies away.

[43:14] Meg: Exactly. No, they're taken to the streets. It's a Big deal. But then there's that other theater on the Upper west side. Theater. It's called Cinema 1, 2, 3.

[43:25] Jessica: Oh, the. The Lincoln Center. You

[43:28] Meg: had to

[43:28] Jessica: go downstairs. Those are gone.

[43:29] Meg: Yeah,

[43:30] Jessica: yeah.

[43:30] Meg: Very sad.

[43:31] Jessica: I made a little pact with our friend Ale that we would try to see in a theater, a movie each week.

[43:38] Meg: Wow, that's a huge.

[43:40] Jessica: Well, it's a goal.

[43:41] Meg: Goal.

[43:42] Jessica: It's like book club, like, good

[43:43] Meg: every week.

[43:45] Jessica: Well, we'll see what happens. I'm not saying it's. Thank you. But we went to see the invite on the 86th, you know, and third theater, and just the experience was so great. But I was looking for. There's some new movie that. Oh, I was looking for where Wicker is playing. And I went on Fandango, and it's like there were three theaters. So to your point, I was wondering why there were so few. And you've now answered the question.

[44:15] Meg: And you can see everything. You have to go to Staten island to see it. It's sold out everywhere.

[44:22] Jessica: Staten island. It's like a really. That's

[44:25] Meg: far away.

[44:26] Jessica: Staten, the island of stat. That's

[44:29] Meg: the only place to go. The point is, people want to see movies in the theater. Let us do it, please. Well,

[44:36] Jessica: maybe there will be a wonderful resurgence of independent theaters. That would be really cool.

[44:41] Meg: Very cool. I have a friend who works at the Nighthawk

[44:43] Jessica: Fun.

[44:44] Meg: Can't say he enjoys his job, but it sounds like a really cool place to see a movie. Well,

[44:49] Jessica: also that, you know, if it's not one of these chain theaters, you know, the movie programming can get much better, right?

[44:58] Meg: Yeah, Theoretically, yes.

[45:00] Jessica: Well, I don't know. Anyway,

[45:01] Meg: seeing a movie. We're going to see

[45:04] Jessica: Variety. Our watch party.

[45:06] Meg: Awesome.

[45:07] Jessica: Feminist rage. Feminist rage. This is a tenuous link. Most definitely, because I haven't watched the movie yet, but. But I'm thinking that there may be a tie in that. Denny had to make, for her own private reasons,

[45:37] Meg: a

[45:37] Jessica: giant change in her life. She made a choice to do something that was on the edge of acceptability. In fact, maybe even not acceptable at all. And this main character in this film goes from being a mainstream person to this instant fringe and potential danger.

[45:56] Meg: It'd be interesting, too, to talk about the Kathy Ackerness of it.

[46:00] Jessica: Oh, God, yes, Absolutely.

[46:03] Meg: Because that sounds like that's in her story as well.

[46:05] Jessica: Her story is completely bananas. But I didn't want to get into it until we've seen the movie, because even though Betty Gordon came up with the story, it feels like Kathy Acker. Like, it's partly her story. So. Yeah, very provocative.

[46:22] Meg: Cool. Looking forward, right?

[46:23] Jessica: Bye, Sam.