BACK ISSUE
In Our Triple Threat Era
Multi-hyphenates raise your hands? Now put them down because we know you can't be talented in everything you think you are. In this episode, Josh and special guest Ashley C. Ford are talking about their favorite multihyphenates, what makes them great, whether or not they're underrated, and what it means to be good at everything, or maybe not.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION
Back Issue Intro: Beyonce? You look like Luther Vandross. Ho, but make it fashion. I don't get no sleep because of y'all. It's Britney, bitch. We were rooting for you, Tiffany. We were all rooting for you. But I ain’t one to gossip… Who said that?
Josh Gwynn: Welcome to Back Issue, a weekly podcast that revisits formative moments in pop culture that we still think about. Today, we're talking about the folks that do it all. The singers/actors/fashion icons/business owners/whoever else decided that being famous for one thing isn't enough. We're going to talk through the careers of three of our favorite multi-hyphenated celebrities, and appreciate their ability to do it all. Our co-host today is a multi-hyphy in her own right. She's a bestselling author, a fantastic podcast host, and a world-class Michael McDonald impersonator. Ashley C. Ford. How you doing, Ashley?
Ashley C. Ford: Hello, Josh, I'm fantastic. I'm so excited to be here. Just to give you some idea about how multi-hyphenate I am. I was in the band in high school, I was in theater in high school. I'm starting to see how those things actually just go together, maybe don't make me a multi-hyphenate.
Josh Gwynn: It still counts, it still counts. Let's be real, the word "multi-hyphenate" can mean so many different things. Does it mean singing? Does it mean acting? Or business? Does it mean grabbing an EGOT? I think it's subjective, Ashley, and one of the special things that can happen when you're watching a multi-hyphy is when they get that role where it's built in a lab for them to show off all of their talents at once. Like think of a Barbara Streisand in Funny Girl moment.
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
CLIP: (Funny Girl Singing).
Josh Gwynn: It's like, wow, this was created in a lab for her.
Ashley C. Ford: Absolutely.
Josh Gwynn: In my perfect world, every multi-hyphy would get a moment like this one. No Kelly Clarkson. Where they get to show off everything that they're good at the same time.
Ashley C. Ford: I agree.
Josh Gwynn: Now, it's almost time for us to take a deep dive into the career of our first multi-hyphy, but first, it is Back Issue, got to set the mood. We're going to start with some multi-hyphy themed trivia.
Ashley C. Ford: Oh, okay.
Josh Gwynn: Ashley, are you ready?
Ashley C. Ford: I'm ready.
Josh Gwynn: You're going to be given a quote from a movie, a lyric from a song, or an interesting fact. Try to match it with the associated multi-hyphy.
Ashley C. Ford: Oh, man. All right. I believe in myself.
Josh Gwynn: This is multiple choice. Which multi-hyphy sang the lyrics, "We're part of the same place. We're part of the same time. We both share the same blood, and we both have the same mind." Bonus points if you know the song and/or movie. A, Jennifer Hudson, B, Vanessa Williams, C, Beyonce, D, Lady Gaga.
Ashley C. Ford: Baby, that's Jennifer Hudson from Dreamgirls. Okay? Okay?
Josh Gwynn: Know the song?
Ashley C. Ford: And I'm Telling You I'm Not Going, yes.
CLIP: (Dream Girls Singing).
Ashley C. Ford: Sing, Effie! Okay. Josh, I have a trivia question for you.
Josh Gwynn: Okay, let's do it.
Ashley C. Ford: This multi-hyphy first got into comedy by telling jokes at an open mic night because his then girlfriend dared him to. Was it A, Kevin Hart, B, Ben Stiller, C, Marlon Wayans, or D, Jamie Foxx?
Josh Gwynn: Okay, so I don't think Ben Stiller has ever done standup. I don't think that story sounds traumatic enough to be Kevin Hart's origin story.
Ashley C. Ford: Wow. And fair.
Josh Gwynn: I'm not wrong! Did I lie?
Ashley C. Ford: No, you didn't lie. I'm going to have to give you that one.
Josh Gwynn: Jamie Foxx?
Ashley C. Ford: It is Jamie Foxx!
Josh Gwynn: Woo!
Ashley C. Ford: Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.
Josh Gwynn: Okay, so now it's time to talk about our first celebrity, who just so happens to be Jamie Foxx.
Ashley C. Ford: It's almost like you planned it this way.
Josh Gwynn: He's a comedian, he's a movie star, he has the voice of an angel. We'll get into all these things, but first, Ashley, what does Jamie Foxx represent to you as a multi-hyphy?
Ashley C. Ford: To me, Jamie Foxx is the epitome of the quietly confident multi-hyphy. Everything that he can do, it feels, to me, like it just sprang up one day, that he casually let it drop into some role he was playing, or he suddenly was going to be in a movie that everybody was like, "Jamie Foxx was going to be in what?" And then he showed up and showed out harder than everybody else.
Josh Gwynn: I absolutely love Jamie Foxx. He's one of the most talented people on the entire planet. To truly understand how he got to where he is now, we're going to go through his career. We'll start with his comedy and his TV shows, move to his music, and land on a few of his movie roles. But first, this is Back Issue, so let's go back. (Singing). That's me going back. Jamie Foxx had been playing the piano since he was five years old in Texas. He studied musical performing arts composition at the United States International University. In 1989, he started doing standup comedy because he was dared by his girlfriend to get on stage, as you said.
Ashley C. Ford: As we know.
Josh Gwynn: So, he changed his name from his government, Eric Marlon Bishop.
Ashley C. Ford: Sound like one of my uncles.
Josh Gwynn: To Jamie Foxx. Okay? Jamie Foxx does sound like a stage name though.
Ashley C. Ford: It sure does.
Josh Gwynn: I miss the days of stage names. I think that's so cool.
Ashley C. Ford: Me too!
Josh Gwynn: Do you think it works like drag names? Do you think that he's like, "I'm of the school of Redd Foxx." That's where he got Foxx from?
Ashley C. Ford: I think that is where he got Foxx from, but also that would be amazing, and I wish more comedians would identify themselves by the houses they affiliate themselves with.
Josh Gwynn: I love this. After he won the Bay Area Black Comedy Competition, he landed an audition for In Living Color, which broke him into the world of TV comedy. So things were on the up and up for Jamie Foxx as a comedian. And in 1994, the same year that he left In Living Color, bam, he releases his first album. It's called Peep This.
CLIP: (Jamie Foxx Singing).
Ashley C. Ford: Not Peep This.
Josh Gwynn: It was a huge flop, but, to be fair, it's hard to cross over from one industry to another. People just really wanted him to stick to being funny. Anyway, let's talk about the music. Let's talk about the music.
Ashley C. Ford: Let's get into that.
Josh Gwynn: When I think of Jamie Foxx and I think of music, I think of the uncle from the '90s that's singing at the funeral, and you're like, "Who picked this song? Why are you singing I'll Make Love to You..."
Ashley C. Ford: At the funeral!
Josh Gwynn: "... at the funeral?"
Ashley C. Ford: Not in the church house.
Josh Gwynn: Because his lyrics are a little bit dirty. There's this clip of Emma Stone and Jamie Foxx on The Graham Norton Show, and Graham Norton starts reading his lyrics.
CLIP: Lights out like a power outage. (Singing). Lights out like a power outage. Oh!
Josh Gwynn: Jamie then starts singing them and Jamie's voice is so beautiful. So he's singing them, and you can tell, halfway through, Emma Stone's like, "Uh, hold up. That's nasty."
CLIP: (Jamie Foxx Singing). Yeah, but why were there puddles in the bed? Yeah, wait. Is she an old lady? What is it? Oh!
Ashley C. Ford: Wait a minute, Wait a minute. Can you say that?
Josh Gwynn: I personally love his music. Remember the song, Blame It, from the album Intuition?
CLIP: (Jamie Foxx Singing).
Josh Gwynn: I remember a very vivid Halloween of 2008 in Santa Barbara. This kid fell down, and this other kid down the street just yelled, "(Singing)!" And it was the funniest thing I'd ever experienced.
Ashley C. Ford: I do like his music. I've never owned a Jamie Foxx album, I'll say that. I wouldn't say that I have, necessarily, a bunch of Jamie Foxx on my playlist, but I think of Jamie Foxx music as something that's fun, and if somebody cut it on, I'm not mad at it. And I've always liked him as a singer. I've liked him even from when I was little, watching him doing comedy specials, where he would sing sometimes during the comedy specials, and I knew I loved him singing then. I knew I loved hearing him sing on The Jamie Foxx Show.
Josh Gwynn: Oh my God. Remember The Jamie Foxx Show?
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
Josh Gwynn: For those of you who don't know, The Jamie Foxx Show was a sitcom in the '90s, where Jamie Foxx played a struggling musician trying to make it in LA, and he lives in a hotel that's ran by his aunt and his uncle. And one of my favorite Jamie Foxx moments of all time in that show is a scene where he gets into a jingle off with one of his coworkers, and they start singing about the magic of plain white rice.
CLIP: (Singing). Woo! (Jamie Foxx Singing).
Josh Gwynn: And it's not only that I like his voice, but it's also that you want talented people to win. So I'm like, you know what? I hope you get your win.
Ashley C. Ford: I hope you win.
Josh Gwynn: I hope you win because you deserve, you know what I mean?
Ashley C. Ford: With all the people out there being given a shot who are obviously not talented at all, it's lovely to see somebody be given a shot when they have the talent and the chops to at least give us something fun. That's all I ask for, fun.
Josh Gwynn: And when you think about the way that his music has influenced his movie choices, he got the Oscar for Ray, where he's playing a singer, right?
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
Josh Gwynn: It was like what I was talking about earlier with Barbara Streisand, he was able to showcase his abilities, not only as an actor, but as a musician, as an impressionist.
Ashley C. Ford: I would say I appreciate him, probably, as an actor even more than as a musician. I know not everybody loves the movie, but I certainly loved him in Django Unchained.
Josh Gwynn: Really?
Ashley C. Ford: They gave him the opportunity to do that leading man, playing an original character, and I loved that for him. I think he deserves that.
Josh Gwynn: Yeah, me too. All right, Ashley, let's do another multi-hyphy trivia question. What do you have in store for me?
Ashley C. Ford: I would like you to match these lyrics to the multi-hyphy rapper.
Josh Gwynn: Ready to hear it.
Ashley C. Ford: "I rule in favor of the unit with a flavor. We make moves this major, this style coming like a pager." Bonus points if you can name the song.
Josh Gwynn: Okay.
Ashley C. Ford: Is it by A, Nicki Minaj?
Josh Gwynn: I know who it is, just because of the lyrics, but I don't know what song this is.
Ashley C. Ford: B, Queen Latifah, C, Will Smith, or D, Donald Glover?
Josh Gwynn: It's Queen Latifah. And I know that from context clues, I feel like I'm taking the SAT. She talked about being in charge of Flavor Unit. That's Queen Latifah.
Ashley C. Ford: Yes, but what's the song?
Josh Gwynn: What song is that? Monie in the Middle?
Ashley C. Ford: It ain't. It's Court's in Session!
Josh Gwynn: Oh!
CLIP: (Queen Latifah Rapping).
Josh Gwynn: All right, that was fun. Now I'm ready to deep dive into another career, let's do it. So, our next celebrity is none other than Miss 'keep a check' Keke Palmer.
CLIP: And now that I'm here, I can tell you exactly who I am. Baby, I'm Keke Palmer.
Ashley C. Ford: Ah, we love her!
Josh Gwynn: I love Keke Palmer.
Ashley C. Ford: My Virgo queen.
Josh Gwynn: I've loved Keke Palmer since I was little. Keke Palmer's a one of a kind talent, and she has been for so long. She's like this weird mixture between child star and Jennifer Lewis.
Ashley C. Ford: It's like Rudy and Judy.
Josh Gwynn: Or even Raven.
Ashley C. Ford: Or even Raven! Yes.
Josh Gwynn: Her career has been so personality driven.
Ashley C. Ford: It has been.
Josh Gwynn: Which is so fun to watch.
Ashley C. Ford: Yes, because she has a delightful personality.
Josh Gwynn: Also, she's just at an age range where her references are current. She's able to come up with memes off the top of her head. She doesn't know who Dick Cheney is.
CLIP: I hate to say it, I hope I don't sound ridiculous, I don't know who this man is. He could be walking down the street, I wouldn't know a thing. Sorry to this man.
Josh Gwynn: And the gag is also her impression of Angela Bassett.
Ashley C. Ford: That she got to do in front of her.
CLIP: You're a liar, and you're a cheat. And I don't want you, I don't want you, I don't want you no more. I don't want you, I don't want you no more. Yes!
Josh Gwynn: She's the best. It's very much like she's the kid whose auntie was like, "Show them that little dance." And she's like, "Okay."
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
Josh Gwynn: She starts in Barbershop 2: Back in Business, 2004. She has a small role where she plays Queen Latifah's niece, right?
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
Josh Gwynn: And then she has this breakout role in Akeelah and the Bee. You know you've made it in the Black community when they refuse to call you by anything other than the role that you had.
Ashley C. Ford: And not even the last name of the character, they call you Akeelah and the Bee.
CLIP: Akeelah. What's wrong?
CLIP: I don't want to do the Bee no more.
CLIP: You don't want to do the Bee? Why not?
CLIP: Dr. Larrabee don't want to coach me no more. Georgia don't want to hang out with me, and all these people are expecting me to win, and it's just too hard, Mama. I want it all to stop.
CLIP: Baby, you were-
CLIP: Please! Please.
CLIP: All right, all right.
Josh Gwynn: And it's really ironic that in Akeelah and the Bee, her mom, Angela Bassett, the one who does the thing, was so well known for this biopic, in which she looks nothing like the person she's portraying, because then Keke goes and does the same thing in CrazySexyCool: The TLC Story, because she plays Chilli, but she doesn't look anything like Rozonda.
Ashley C. Ford: At all. And played her to a T.
Josh Gwynn: Down.
CLIP: Pebbles? Rozonda.
CLIP: I know who you are.
CLIP: Well, do you know I can sing too?
CLIP: Oh, really?
CLIP: Rozonda, we're not-
CLIP: (Singing).
Josh Gwynn: She had her own talk show called Just Keke. It was like Teen Summit, kind of.
Ashley C. Ford: Yes, I loved it.
Josh Gwynn: She had Michael Ealy on there, and Brandy, and they got to sing The Boy is Mine. She is really good at talk shows, because she went on Good Morning America with Michael Strahan and Sara Haines in 2019. She's a guest, right? She is literally so charismatic, that they were like, "You want to host? You want to work here?"
Ashley C. Ford: They told her to put her application in before she left. That is wild.
Josh Gwynn: Can you start on Monday? I was so excited when I heard that she was going to be in Nope.
Ashley C. Ford: Me too. And I loved her in it immediately.
Josh Gwynn: Me too.
Ashley C. Ford: The way she just trots out on set, and starts talking to the people about being around the horse, working with the horse, what it was going to be like to work with them, telling the Black history of the farm or whatever, her special relationship with her brother? I thought she was phenomenal. I believed her. I believed her the whole time.
CLIP: Did you know that the very first assembly of photographs in sequential order to create a motion picture was a two-second clip of a Black man on horse? Yes it was. Yes it was. Look it up. Now I know you guys know Eadweard Muybridge, the grandfather of motion pictures, who took the pictures that created that clip, but does anybody know the name of the Black jockey that rode the horse?
Josh Gwynn: I just remember thinking finally, she's getting a role that is seen as more of a straight role, less of a kid's role, and that's from working with another multi-hyphy, Jordan Peele, right?
Ashley C. Ford: Yes!
Josh Gwynn: Jordan Peele said, quote, "Keke developed this relationship, especially with the Black community, as being a member of our family, and being the hardest working member of the family. I think the world is catching up with how capable she is. I've been doing this for a little bit now, and I haven't met another like her."
Ashley C. Ford: Because there is no one else like her.
Josh Gwynn: Period. But still, Keke Palmer struggled when she tried to cross over from acting to music. Listen to what she said in this interview with DJ Suss One.
CLIP: My success in acting came so quickly and so fast. And so when I was younger, and people didn't feel that same way about my music, it always hit my ego. I started letting it get me down.
Josh Gwynn: There's also the StyleCaster article where she talks about how record labels early on exploited her for her already in place fan base, since she's been acting since she was in the womb. They didn't actually want to promote her music, they just wanted her fans.
Ashley C. Ford: Ooh.
Josh Gwynn: Anyway, she still won, because she made her own record label called Big Boss Records. And Ashley, I want to get your opinion on one of the tracks that she made. What would you rate this song that Keke Palmer released for the show Star's soundtrack? It's called Bossy.
Ashley C. Ford: Play that.
CLIP: Fuck it up! (Keke Palmer Rapping).
Ashley C. Ford: What the hell!
CLIP: (Keke Palmer Rapping).
Ashley C. Ford: Oh! Oh my God! I'm even more in love. The heat on that sucker! My shoulders came alive!
Josh Gwynn: Imagine being able to do that, but also play the first Black Cinderella on Broadway.
CLIP: (Keke Palmer Singing).
Ashley C. Ford: And kill that too.
Josh Gwynn: Right.
Ashley C. Ford: She's so phenomenal. She's such an amazing performer. We barely deserve her, if we deserve her at all.
Josh Gwynn: All right, Ashley, let's do one more multi-hyphy trivia question. On top of his career as a celebrity, this multi-hyphy also plays the piano, the guitar, and the violin, and he practices transcendental meditation. Is it A, John Legend, B, Hugh Jackman, C, Andrew Garfield, or D, Idris Elba?
Ashley C. Ford: C. Who is it?
Josh Gwynn: Hugh Jackman.
Ashley C. Ford: Really?
Josh Gwynn: It actually kind of makes sense.
Ford: I didn't know none of that stuff. Oh my gosh. You know what? I'm going to keep it hundo p right now, I definitely was thinking Hugh Grant. That is my fault. I said, "Hugh Grant can do what?"
Josh Gwynn: Wait, what? Oh my God.
Ashley C. Ford: I'm like, he didn't do none of that shit in Notting Hill. So, I don't know.
Josh Gwynn: Okay.
Ashley C. Ford: But to be fair, I'm pretty sure I had the only answer that was a white person.
Josh Gwynn: Oh my God.
Ashley C. Ford: That's not my fault.
Josh Gwynn: Fair, fair. Yeah. We got to look at that.
***MID-ROLL AD BREAK***
Josh Gwynn: Ashley, we've talked about Jamie Foxx and his hilarious singing ass. We've talked about Keke Palmer and her ability to keep a check through any recession. I want to bring up one more multi-hyphy for you. And she's kind of like... I know when people think of multi-hyphies, they think of Bette Midler and Cher and stuff, but she's kind of like my OG.
Ashley C. Ford: Who is this?
Josh Gwynn: Vanessa Williams.
Ashley C. Ford: Oh, my gosh!
Josh Gwynn: I saved the best for last, girl.
Ashley C. Ford: (Singing).
Josh Gwynn: (Singing).
Ashley C. Ford: She does everything, from film to TV to music to fashion. She's the queen of adult contemporary.
Josh Gwynn: Ugh. We can't talk about adult contemporary until we talk about adult past. Let's think about how she got her start. She's crowned Miss America in 1984. She's the first Black woman to win, ever. Then these nudes start leaking and she's forced to resign, and the media starts dragging her like crazy. Some people think that all of this publicity helped her career, but according to Vanessa, she lost $2 million in brand deals and sponsorships.
Ashley C. Ford: Oh!
Josh Gwynn: I'd be pissed. This is just an awful situation, and had it been anyone that didn't have, maybe, her talent, they just would've walked away and just got a job at the mall, like… too much.
Ashley C. Ford: Or just been somebody's extremely gorgeous wife, and live a very high class, lovely life. And as amazing and talented as Vanessa Williams is, it took three years for her to be offered a role that she was actually interested in taking. A year later, in 1988, she released her first studio album, The Right Stuff. You remember that?
CLIP: (Vanessa Williams Singing).
Ashley C. Ford: She's not the best mover in the world. You can't do everything. Some of the albums that came out when we were younger, of course, The Right Stuff, which was her debut album in 1988. Save The Best For Last, Running Back To You, that's your song on The Comfort Zone.
Josh Gwynn: Ugh, that's my jam.
CLIP: (Vanessa Williams Singing).
Ashley C. Ford: That's the one you love. Save the Best For Last was nominated for Song of the Year that year. So she is a Grammy-nominated queen, okay? Credentials. Silver & Gold in 2004, and The Real Thing in 2009.
Josh Gwynn: She's also a film actress. She stars in one of the biggest Black classics of all time, 1997, Soul Food. When's the last time you saw Soul Food?
Ashley C. Ford: Okay, so the last time I saw Soul Food was when I was trying to show my husband the movie Soul Food. And for those of y'all who don't know, my husband is white, which I don't apologize for, I just explain that we were in our twenties and we got together during the Obama year. I tried to show him Soul Food and he couldn't make it. Too much was happening in the movie, it was really dysregulating for him, how these people were suffering. And then at a certain point he went, "Man, they didn't..." He was like, "This happened, this happened. They took Big Mama's leg, the next thing you know somebody's going to die!" And I just stayed quiet. And then he realized that Big Mama was going to die, and he was just like, "Turn it off. I can't do this."
Josh Gwynn: So quick refresher. So Soul Food is the story of a Black American family that lives in Chicago. There's three sisters; Bird, Teri, and the other one that Vivica Fox plays. Teri is the one that's played by Vanessa Williams. She's the responsible one, she's a lawyer, she wears ascots, and everyone, always, is coming to her for money because everyone else is broke. I remember being little and thinking that she was the villain because she's the mean one. She's holding the purse strings, she's acting like Scrooge, she doesn't want to have no fun. But then I forgot, the cousin has sex with her husband.
Ashley C. Ford: Sure did.
Josh Gwynn: Which leads to one of the best scenes in Black cinema, which is Vanessa Williams saying...
CLIP: Fuck the family! I let the family into my house, you know what? The family fucked my husband.
Josh Gwynn: Her picking up a knife and chasing her husband out into the middle of the party where everybody can see.
CLIP: Can we talk about this?
CLIP: Can we talk about what? Fuck you!
CLIP: Teri! Teri! Whoa, whoa, whoa! Teri!
Josh Gwynn: Cinema.
Ashley C. Ford: Should have stuck him.
Josh Gwynn: Another movie that comes out around the same time, three years later in 2000, is called A Diva's Christmas Carol.
Ashley C. Ford: Let's take a moment, okay?
Josh Gwynn: We have to.
Ashley C. Ford: Let's take a moment to sit with A Diva's Christmas Carol. My favorite holiday film.
CLIP: You know, you don't actually have to dump that toxic waste down my throat to make it look like it's snowing in here. Perhaps they didn't teach you that at the Academy de la Minimum Wage! [foreign language]. Bitch.
Ashley C. Ford: She is this really beautiful, wonderful, celebrated diva who goes around the world touring, but she is not good to her staff, she is not good to her fans, and all she cares about, baby, is that money, until some ghosts come to visit her.
Josh Gwynn: Oh my God. And also she was in a group in the '80s, and one of the girls from her girl group dies, and it's Chilli from TLC.
Ashley C. Ford: Yes, it is.
Josh Gwynn: They have this song, probably like my favorite fake song from a movie, and it's called Heartquake.
CLIP: (Singing).
Ashley C. Ford: Heartquake! It's such a good song. So, six years after that, she comes back to the diva role, and we love her as Wilhelmina Slater in Ugly Betty, our ice queen with a heart of not exactly gold, but she's got a heart! It looks like she's having fun.
Josh Gwynn: It's the way she can control an entire room with the raise of one eyebrow for me.
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
Josh Gwynn: And her career, it's still going. She was on a Broadway show last year. It's called POTUS, she played the First Lady. She's picking up roles on a bunch of different TV shows, and generally just killing the game, and I would expect nothing less.
CLIP: Learn, learn, learn, learn, learn something from this. Learn, learn something from this. Learn, learn, learn, learn something from this. Learn something from this.
Josh Gwynn: Now we're at the part of the show where we take a page from the patron saint of this episode, every episode, who also happens to be a multi-hyphenate of her own, Tyra Banks. And ask the question, did you...
CLIP: Learn something from this!
Ashley C. Ford: I did.
Josh Gwynn: You did?
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
Josh Gwynn: What'd you learn?
Ashley C. Ford: I definitely learned that Hugh Jackman is not Hugh Grant.
Josh Gwynn: To be determined. I ain't never seen them in the same room at the same time.
Ashley C. Ford: Now, hold on now.
Josh Gwynn: I have a question for you, and I think that it'll help us kind of synthesize the episode.
Ashley C. Ford: What's your question?
Josh Gwynn: At the beginning of this episode, we talked about the perfect multi-hyphy role, the role that feels like it was created in a lab just for them. Do you think that these three multi-hyphenates that we talked about today have had that role? And if not, what is our dream role for them? Let's go one by one.
Ashley C. Ford: Okay.
Josh Gwynn: Jamie Foxx.
Ashley C. Ford: Jamie Foxx, I'm going to say no. Not until he gets the opportunity to perform in something that he also had a hand in creating from a production standpoint.
Josh Gwynn: Oh, okay. See, I was like, I remember watching Dreamgirls, and, ugh, him as Curtis?
CLIP: (Dream Girls Singing).
Josh Gwynn: I remember thinking in that moment like, "Wow, he looks great, he's singing, he's acting."
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
Josh Gwynn: More of this. More of this.
Ashley C. Ford: More of this.
Josh Gwynn: It was so good. He didn't get a chance to be as funny as he's able to be, but I like this idea of him being a part of creating it. What about Keke Palmer?
Ashley C. Ford: Keke... Keke just needs some more time. That's it.
Josh Gwynn: I think so.
Ashley C. Ford: I think she's just still cooking. I think everything she does now is great, but I think we haven't even scratched the surface of what she's capable of.
Josh Gwynn: I love what Jordan Peele said about her as being like Black America's little sister that's like super talented and always has a job.
Ashley C. Ford: Yes.
Josh Gwynn: For those that didn't grow up with Keke Palmer as their little sister, I think Nope was the moment where they were like, "Oh, she's talented."
Ashley C. Ford: Yes, I agree.
Josh Gwynn: What about Vanessa Williams?
Ashley C. Ford: Vanessa Williams, I also think that she's going to get a role, at some point, that... I think it's going to be something that is meaty for her as an actress, but allows her to display her singing voice. And I think that if we get the chance to see her in that kind of role, especially as an older woman, that it's going to blow us away.
Josh Gwynn: Would Vanessa Williams not play the best Disney villain?
Ashley C. Ford: Yeah. Yeah. It wouldn't even be close.
Josh Gwynn: Oh my God, she would be so good!
Ashley C. Ford: She would.
Josh Gwynn: No one would be the same. She'd be so good. But one other thing that came up for me is I just think we should all appreciate how hard it is to pull off a successful multi-hyphy career.
Ashley C. Ford: For sure.
Josh Gwynn: When you look at all these celebrities who try to do it, and just get laughed at, it makes it even more impressive that these three were able to pull it off. Especially when you realize that even people as successful and talented as Jamie Foxx and Keke Palmer and Vanessa Williams were all met with resistance when they tried to cross over from one industry to another.
Ashley C. Ford: Do you think that maybe part of the reason why people don't have the respect or regard for the multi-hyphenate the way they should is because being a multi-hyphenate, in and of itself, indicates a kind of ambition?
Josh Gwynn: Yes.
Ashley C. Ford: And people don't necessarily want to see your ambition?
Josh Gwynn: Especially from women, especially from queer people, especially from Black people. Okay.
Ashley C. Ford: Okay. You said it!
Josh Gwynn: There's this clip from this world renowned philosopher, her name is Nicki Minaj, and she was talking, it was in the middle of her feud with Lil' Kim. She was like, everyone loves you until they see you as a threat.
CLIP: When you don't make moves and when you don't climb up the ladder, everybody loves you, because you're not competition.
Josh Gwynn: And that's real. That is so real.
Ashley C. Ford: That is real.
Josh Gwynn: And when you think about it, when a multi-hyphy happens to be Black and a woman, it really just means more access to power, which is more of a threat to the status quo.
Ashley C. Ford: Hoo!
Josh Gwynn: Right?
Ashley C. Ford: Absolutely! I actually think it's really patriarchal to confine people to one thing and say, "Oh, if you do multiple things, it diminishes your ability to do this main thing, or to do it well." I don't think that's true. I think just because you're super talented at something, and you got to the top quickly, doesn't mean you can't be just as good, or better, than someone who dedicated their whole career to it.
Josh Gwynn: I agree.
Ashley C. Ford: We're good at different things. We run at different paces. At some point, we're just going to have to accept it. I'm everything, baby.
Josh Gwynn: I'm every woman, bitch. Chaka Khan.
Ashley C. Ford: Chaka Khan!
ENDING CREDITS: Back Issue is a production of Pineapple Street Studios. I'm the host, and senior producer, Josh Gwynn. Back Issue was created by myself and Tracy Clayton. What's up, girl? Our producers are Janelle Anderson, Xandra Ellin, and Ari Saperstein. Our editors are Leila Day and Emmanuel Hapsis. Our managing producer is Bria Mariette, our executive producer is Leila Day, and our intern is Noah Camuso.
Today's episode was produced by Noah Camuso, and edited by Leila Day. Our sound engineers include Sharon Bardales, Davy Sumner, Jason Richards, Jade Brooks, Marina Paiz, Pedro Alvira, and Raj Makhija. Art designed by Cadence13, and original music by Raj Makhija and Don Will. Executive producers for Pineapple Street Studios are Jenna Weiss-Berman and Max Linsky.
I'm on Twitter and Instagram, @RegardingJosh. You can follow the show on Instagram @backissuepodcast, and you can use the hashtag #BackIssuePodcast on Twitter if you're an agent for chaos, because we really shouldn't be on that website. You can subscribe to the podcast wherever free podcasts are sold; leave a review, it really does help. I will see you next week. Outtie 3000.