MAEVE: Hi. I'm Juana's stepdaughter, Maeve (ph). This week on the show, how the U.S. is shifting away from a collective approach to the pandemic. Plus, a chat about the ultimate influencer, Oprah. All right. Let's start the show.
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JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
You're listening to IT'S BEEN A MINUTE from NPR. I'm Juana Summers.
Y'all, we have made it to the weekend. I just picked up a growler of cold brew, and I keep refreshing my weather app because temperatures here might be in the 80s. And while all of that has me really excited and looking forward to the summer, there are also some changes in how we are dealing with the pandemic that I think we've got to talk about.
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SUMMERS: This week, a federal judge struck down the requirement to wear masks on flights, on trains and other forms of public transportation. And that comes as coronavirus cases in the U.S. and worldwide have been ticking upwards in the past couple of weeks. In some ways, this summer feels full of promise, but there are also a lot of lingering questions about the response to the pandemic in this new phase and also who's left out of this conversation.
KATHERINE WU: We know that there are large, large, large swaths of the population that remain vulnerable. I mean, really just watching the CDC's list of people who are at high risk of, you know, suffering extreme outcomes from the virus - that has really ballooned on average in the past couple years.
SUMMERS: Katherine Wu is a staff writer at The Atlantic. She covers science, and she's been writing about all of this, including the ways the pandemic is still a collective problem, even if, here in the U.S., we often don't act like it is.
I am not sure if you've seen this, but there has been this video going around of a pilot on - I believe it's an Alaska Air flight. And he announces over the loudspeaker in the middle of his flight that the mandate is over, and people start cheering.
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UNIDENTIFIED PILOT: Congratulations.
(APPLAUSE, CHEERING)
SUMMERS: And I have to confess that when I was watching this earlier today, I do not know how I would have felt in that situation had I been on that flight. It seemed a little jarring. I am wondering, did the end of these mandates surprise you at all?
WU: Oh, my goodness. I - so I have not watched that video, but I have heard that clip played to death all over the place this week. And the same thought went through my head. What on earth would - I would have done if I had been on that plane?
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: I mean, suffice it to say, my mask would have stayed on.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: But I don't know how I would have reacted emotionally. I think it would have shocked me to be, you know, in person in that situation. But if I take a step back here and, you know, put my reporter hat on and recognize that I am here in my apartment and not on a plane right now...
SUMMERS: (Laughter).
WU: ...You know, I'm definitely sitting here thinking this was not the biggest surprise in the world. I mean, we knew this particular mandate was not here forever. And really, we kept seeing it extended and extended and extended, and the extension intervals were kind of getting shorter and shorter on average. We knew this was not long for this world. But, you know, it was a slightly jarring experience still to have this end so abruptly and in this exact fashion, rather than having it expire, as I think many of our nation's leaders might have expected or intended it to. I think it really does reflect this new attitude that much of America is taking toward the pandemic, that things are, you know, quote, unquote, "safe now."
SUMMERS: And as you point out, that's a big shift from the way that this country has approached the pandemic. It was not always a time where masks were thought of as a thing of the past, where safety was presumed by many of us. What do you attribute that shift to?
WU: I think there is just this huge confluence of factors coming together. And we've - if we sort of dissect the public discourse that's been unfolding over the past - oh, I'd say, I don't know, six months, especially - you know, people are exhausted after two years. I think our nation's leaders have increasingly been saying, you know, messages like your health is in your own hands. This is an increasingly individual pandemic where, you know, your...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: ...Choices sort of reflect what's going on with you. And, like, you can sort of chart your own course, choose your own adventure and just - you do you, sort of thing.
SUMMERS: So what you were describing there sounds like a move away from the more collective approach that we saw here in the U.S. earlier in the pandemic and towards a more individual approach.
WU: It's hard to say that the U.S. ever really had a fully collectivist approach. But, you know, certainly it's a huge spectrum, right? I think there was more unified thinking earlier in the pandemic when we were all in this together, when risk more or less felt closer to, I guess, even across different sectors of the population. If we think back to 2020, no one was vaccinated. Most people hadn't been infected at that point.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: And I think everyone was feeling like, oh, this crisis is fresh. Let's all agree on the terms we need to set here and come together and try and beat this back. Now, two years in, it's like, oh, a lot of you have had the opportunity to do all these things to protect yourselves. And if you've followed the instructions, let's sort of exempt you from the rest of this. You know, you did the thing. Go back to your lives because you followed instructions.
And I think that's where things get a little tricky. Individualism isn't super compatible with the best forms of public health. But it seems to be what's most palatable in a country like the U.S., where people want to feel like if I did the thing, you know, and that affects me, that should be what matters most.
SUMMERS: When I hear you talk about it that way, it makes me think a lot about who in this moment gets to move ahead and who feels like they are left behind. And I know just in my own life, I've had a lot of very frustrated conversations with parent friends who have young kids who can't get vaccinated. My family has a caretaker for a person who's immunocompromised, for whom - who is vaccinated, but for whom COVID would be quite dangerous and could possibly result in a huge setback for them. And I know that there has been kind of this promise that we're all going to move forward together, but it does seem like there is some kind of parsing out. Everybody's kind of getting spread out on this big field, right?
WU: Yeah. No, it's a great way to frame it. And, you know, just to sort of, I think, dig into that analogy a little bit more, I think public health - when it's operating best, it acknowledges that people sort of start this race toward a finish line, you know, on very different footing. Some people are going to be naturally faster than others. Some people are going to have better gear than others. Some people are going to need to, you know, stay behind and make sure that their elderly relatives or their kids are moving at the same pace, you know? They can't just charge ahead on their own.
And where public health operates best is noting that there are going to be people, you know, kind of at the back of the crowd and making sure that they are supported - that they are given the most water, the most resources, that they're being taken care of to an even greater degree than the people at the very front who may not necessarily need, you know, the most degree of intervention. That is, you know, the goal of a collectivist approach - making sure that everyone, at some point, crosses the finish line and that the finish line crossing is, I guess, as equitable as possible. If not everyone is starting off on the same footing, how can we even that out? How can we make the ground smoother to travel for everyone involved?
Having an individualistic approach is kind of the opposite of that. It's great. We have some people crossing the finish line. Look how fast they're doing it. That's where our focus should be. And let's turn the cameras off as soon as we get the first 10 people across, do the award ceremony and just wash our hands of this. That's certainly an extreme portrayal, but I worry that that has been more the direction that the approach in the U.S. has been trending rather than the other, where people left behind are paid more attention to.
SUMMERS: One thing that has sort of surprised me is the fact that particularly if you talk about the millions of kids under the age of 5 who are ineligible to be vaccinated, I feel like we kind of just aren't talking about them as much anymore, unless you are a parent, unless it's impacting your home. When I watch the news or read headlines, I feel like I rarely hear about them. Is that a fair characterization? Do you hear more about that?
WU: I think that is fair. And it's interesting to think about. I mean, I guess I'll move backward in time again. You know, when the adult vaccines were coming out, we were, again, sort of unified in crisis and everyone could not wait for those first vaccines to get here. People were so excited to line up. Now it just feels like such a different world, with the messaging from up top saying things are OK now, things are chill now, you know, the worst is behind us. There just feels like there is less urgency. And I think that's further amplified by the fact that, you know, we're sort of numb to this waiting for vaccines for kids under 5. It's been so long. We know this is the last group. And the messaging has unfortunately been for so many months, oh, these kids are not at high risk. These kids are not at high risk. It's totally fine. You know, the idea was, crudely and unfortunately, these kids need the vaccines the least, so they're going to get them the last.
But really, I think that is an oversimplification. We know that kids of any age can suffer severe outcomes from COVID. We know that they can get long COVID. We know that any amount of sickness or infection can spread the virus through the community...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: ...Or keep kids out of school. And we also know that kids under 2 can't even, you know, mask most of the time. It's not recommended for them. It's too hard for them to mask in a lot of situations. And so they have been especially vulnerable.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: And so it's unfortunate that I think these conversations have fallen to the wayside.
SUMMERS: You know, I have to say, on a personal level, these last two years have felt pretty exhausting, just trying to navigate how to keep myself and my family safe, how to do my job under these circumstances. And I say that as someone who has had the privilege of largely working from home, who doesn't have young kids who are not old enough to be vaccinated yet.
But I have to imagine for someone like you - you were doing all of those things, but you're also trying to help people make sense of what is going on right now in a really unprecedented situation. And I just want to ask how you're - how are you handling all of that?
WU: (Laughter) Well, thank you for asking that question. Gosh, I don't know (laughter). I feel - like you, I feel a lot of luck. And I'm very happy that I have, you know, really supportive colleagues. I love my job, as difficult as it is sometimes. But it is really tough.
And I think one thing that I am constantly thinking about is, you know, how can we sort of clarify the message, not just for ourselves, but the people around us? Truly, I think, multiple times a week, I have a family member ask me something like, well, when are you going to feel comfortable acting like, you know, the pandemic is over? - or when are you going to feel comfortable doing X, Y and Z more social thing? - or when are you going to stop wearing a mask? I think it's so easy to feel really down in the dumps about everything and get locked into this dichotomy of, well, if we don't loosen up now, does that just mean we do these pandemic behaviors forever?
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: That's, of course, not reasonable. And that's absolutely not what I want. Like, I am exhausted (laughter). I am tired of this, too.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: And something that I try to tell myself and the people around me is, like, you know, I'm trying to get comfortable with not having the answers to everything. You know, we never will have that. But things can get better. And trying to put a positive spin - like masks aren't restrictions or shackles. They are tools that can empower me to go out into the world, to travel, to go to the grocery store, to meet up with people indoors, or that, you know, the more we make tools like masks, treatments, tests, booster shots, first vaccines available to everyone in an equitable way, the more...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
WU: ...Comfortable we can all feel moving forward and, you know, shedding some of the sort of daily, more cumbersome interventions.
SUMMERS: Katherine Wu is a staff writer at The Atlantic covering science. Thank you so much for being with us. And I hope you stay healthy.
WU: Thank you. It was a pleasure being here.
SUMMERS: Coming up, Oprah is an institution. We talk to the hosts of a new podcast that is exploring the ways that she shaped culture over the past five decades.
(SOUNDBITE OF FLEVANS' "FLICKER")
SUMMERS: I have to start this conversation with a confession. I did not grow up in an Oprah household.
LEAH WRIGHT RIGUEUR: Gasp. I gasp.
(LAUGHTER)
RIGUEUR: The horror.
SUMMERS: I know.
KELLIE CARTER JACKSON: I just clutched my pearls.
(LAUGHTER)
SUMMERS: Kellie Carter Jackson and Leah Wright Rigueur are best friends, historians, and they are the hosts of a new podcast called "Oprahdemics." They define that as the study of the queen of talk herself. Kellie and Leah, along with the guests on their show, apply a critical lens to the ways that Oprah shaped culture and became the original influencer. All right, y'all. Class is in session.
It's hard growing up as a Black girl in the '90s to not have the sense of awareness of the largeness of Oprah's influence, especially because I was a Black girl growing up who wanted to be a reporter. Yeah. It was a huge thing looming large. I'm sure there's some college admissions essay written about it somewhere...
(LAUGHTER)
SUMMERS: ...Back in the files. I want to start by asking each of you, do you remember what your sort of first impression or introduction to Oprah was?
JACKSON: You know, we get asked this a lot, and it's so bad...
RIGUEUR: Yeah.
JACKSON: ...Because we don't know.
(LAUGHTER)
SUMMERS: You don't know?
RIGUEUR: Well, we know that Oprah is ubiquitous, and that's...
JACKSON: Yes.
RIGUEUR: ...Part of the problem, right?
JACKSON: Yes. I mean, when she comes on, I was a child, probably 3 or 4 years...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
JACKSON: ...Old, but she was always on in my house. And there were very few times where I was not paying attention to what Oprah was doing (laughter).
RIGUEUR: Right. And so, you know, my experience is similar to Kellie's, which is that I grew up in a household where "Oprah" was on all the time. My family members had "Oprah" on all the time. We knew, at least on the East Coast, that 4 p.m. was "Oprah" time.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
RIGUEUR: And I can't remember a time when I didn't know about Oprah. And a part of that is, you know, that I was, again, very young when "The Oprah Winfrey Show" premiered. But I just want to point out, Juana, that I think your point about even not - you know, not being an avid watcher of "Oprah" but still knowing who she was, I think is an indication of how pivotal and how influential she was in the culture. So there was a way that...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
RIGUEUR: ...You could grow up and not watch the show but still know very much who Oprah Winfrey was. She's just that omnipresent. She's everywhere.
JACKSON: Yeah.
SUMMERS: When I think about her show in particular, it - as I look back at it now as an adult, it's just so clear that she reinvented what daytime talk TV looked like and sounded...
RIGUEUR: Yes.
SUMMERS: ...Like. And you get into this some in your show. What made what Oprah did on that show so different, especially in the early days?
JACKSON: For those who don't remember, talk shows were everything, and there were so many of them. So you had your Sally Jessy Raphael and your Phil Donahue and your Jerry Springer and Jenny Jones and Ricki Lake. There's - I mean, I can go on and on (laughter). There's so many different talk shows. Oprah is doing something so different in that she's constantly pivoting with the culture and changing and evolving and sort of...
RIGUEUR: Yes.
JACKSON: ...Meeting the audience where...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
JACKSON: ...They're at. And so that, to me, is why she has stayed around so long, is that she's been so agile at sort of expecting the next thing that's coming. Where everyone else gets sort of stuck in the tabloid rut, Oprah gets out of that and really becomes something that people don't feel ashamed to say they watch, you know? (Laughter) Like...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
RIGUEUR: Yeah.
JACKSON: ...If you watch "Jerry Springer," it's kind of like, oh, you watch "Jerry Springer"? But...
(LAUGHTER)
JACKSON: ...If you...
RIGUEUR: Right.
JACKSON: ...Watched "Oprah," you know, there was almost a sense of classiness to that.
RIGUEUR: Yeah. And I would also add, you know, that the aesthetics and the phenotype of having a Black woman, a visibly Black woman, in the daytime talk show space in 1986 was actually really important. So we knew that - you know, we know that Oprah had her own show in Chicago preceding this. But then to go national - right now, we do have a lot of talk show hosts who are Black women, Black men, right? It's not uncommon. In 1986, it was uncommon. And she really paves the way for that. But then, also the way that she handles a number of different topics - she is the first to jump into any number of themes, including during the kind of more tabloidy era, right? She's talking about race in really explosive and innovative ways.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
RIGUEUR: Even when she makes her (laughter) - you know, her shift into a very different kind of Oprah and she evolves into a different kind of host, she's still catapulting herself into areas that other talk shows are not doing, like veganism. And so she really lays the groundwork for the kind of daytime talk - the kind of daytime talk show host that we are now accustomed to. She does that.
SUMMERS: You mentioned the episode about veganism. And in your show's first season, that's one of the episodes you focus on. And you talk about what we're going to shorthand here as Oprah's vegan challenge, when she and her staff at Harpo Studios went vegan for a full week. Why did you want to start there with your show?
JACKSON: You know, it was so - OK, this has been the hardest thing to decide because (laughter) there are...
RIGUEUR: (Laughter).
JACKSON: ...Forty-five hundred episodes. So...
RIGUEUR: Forty-five hundred.
SUMMERS: Wow.
JACKSON: ...Where to start was, like, so hard. But I think that most people were introduced or understand Oprah through some sort of, like, health avenue and that when we think about Weight Watchers or when we think about her chronic dieting, when we think about the wagon of fat, which is probably...
SUMMERS: Yes.
JACKSON: ...One of her most iconic episodes, we understand Oprah through this lens of weight and eating and food. And so the vegan episode really, I would say, puts veganism on the map. And we use the episode not just to talk about veganism, but also to talk about how Oprah really sets the conversation for a lot of things that become trendy, like kale and quinoa...
(LAUGHTER)
JACKSON: ...You know? - stuff that we completely take for granted now. She's...
RIGUEUR: Right.
JACKSON: ...Curating that conversation.
SUMMERS: Kellie, you mention the ubiquitous wagon of fat episode and I feel like we have to, like, let people know what that was because I...
JACKSON: (Laughter).
RIGUEUR: (Laughter).
SUMMERS: ...Went back and watched some of that.
RIGUEUR: Oh, my gosh.
SUMMERS: And I kind of - I didn't kind of. I cringed a lot. It made me...
RIGUEUR: Oh.
SUMMERS: ...Really uncomfortable to watch. And I know that some of my - other than the professional side of it, some of my earliest memories of Oprah were being a teenager who struggled with their weight, and she talked openly about her weight. She faced some really ugly criticism about...
RIGUEUR: Yeah.
SUMMERS: ...Her size and...
JACKSON: Yeah.
SUMMERS: ...Her weight. Talk to us about that part of Oprah and the culture.
JACKSON: Man, she wheels out on a red Radio Flyer wagon, you know, dozens of pounds of fat.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE OPRAH WINFREY SHOW")
OPRAH WINFREY: I have lost, as of this morning, as of this morning, 67 pounds since July 7. This is what 67 pounds of fat looks like.
JACKSON: When I look back on it, it's sort of grievous when you think about how degrading she was to herself.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE OPRAH WINFREY SHOW")
WINFREY: Is this gross or what?
(LAUGHTER)
JACKSON: She basically put herself on a liquid-only diet. I mean, she looks scarily thin.
RIGUEUR: Yeah. I should also say, you know, Oprah talks about how she regrets that wagon of fat...
JACKSON: Yes.
RIGUEUR: ...Episode. She's like, oh, my God. I regret it so much. But, you know, one of the things that makes Oprah so appealing and why she's so successful is that she is constantly vulnerable about things that other Americans feel vulnerable about. She opens herself up in a way. And of course we know that it's - you know, it's calculated. It's crafted. But she does open herself up in a way that is deeply appealing to so many people. So when Oprah talks about struggling with weight and going back and forth and back and forth, most people heard that and said, I can identify with that. So, you know, like, when we see those magazines that love to do, like, celebrities, they're just like us, right?
JACKSON: (Laughter).
RIGUEUR: They go to the grocery store. They struggle with their weight. I mean, Oprah really perfects that because she says, I am human. And look; I'm just like you. These are the things that I struggle with. And if I can do it, you can do it, too. And that's part of what makes her, you know, I think, so popular but also in a way that exceeds normal celebrity.
SUMMERS: I want to now ask you about a completely different type of episode of Oprah's show that came out in the 1990s when Oprah takes the show on the road to LA in the wake of the acquittal of the four police officers who beat Rodney King. I was so interested in how you talked about, on your show, the idea that Oprah was a convener of these uncomfortable conversations where perhaps some things were said that maybe shouldn't have been said.
RIGUEUR: Oh, oh, oh, oh.
SUMMERS: Yeah.
RIGUEUR: Chaos.
JACKSON: This...
RIGUEUR: Anarchy.
JACKSON: Explosive. This episode that we talk about with Elizabeth Hinton - you know, when Rodney King was beaten and kicked and this video went viral - we didn't have a word for viral then, but that's what - well, that's what happened. It was all over the news, international news. And about a year later, when the four officers who were accused of beating him were acquitted, LA really turns upside down with...
SUMMERS: Yeah.
JACKSON: ...Violence. And what Oprah does is she moves her show to LA to have these race talks, these conversations about how do we make sense of the anger and the rage and the looting and the grief and what some people saw as justifiable? And so her audience represents this spectrum of political and social ideas about what is OK, what is not OK. And people are duking it out.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE OPRAH WINFREY SHOW")
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: ....The defense attorney got to choose.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: You are wrong. What do you mean? That did not give them the cause to beat him. They would've killed him.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: I'm not condoning their behavior. I'm condoning the verdict. The verdict was right.
JACKSON: It gets ugly, but it's great for TV. It's great...
RIGUEUR: It's ratings week. It's also ratings week when this happens.
SUMMERS: Oh, gosh. Oh, gosh.
(LAUGHTER)
RIGUEUR: You know, this show in that moment actually is really formative for a lot of people who watch it and are like, I'm thinking about questions of race. I'm thinking about questions of rage, of inequality. And so to see that all on display as Oprah is running back and forth to audience members, touching different people in the audiences, you know, allowing people from varying political perspectives and opinions to speak their peace. I mean, that is something that was formative to many of us who witnessed that growing up and watched that growing up.
SUMMERS: Yeah. So the last episode of the show aired in 2011, and while it is the highest-rated talk show in history, we know that Oprah is so much more than just the show that she put on the air. She is a mogul. She is a billionaire. She is, like, the original influencer. And...
JACKSON: She's an actress...
(LAUGHTER)
RIGUEUR: Yes.
SUMMERS: She literally does everything.
JACKSON: Yes.
SUMMERS: In the most recent episode of the show, you talk about something that I'm really interested about, which is one of the many ways in which Oprah has also spread her wealth and her influence. And I wonder if you can talk a little bit about the mark that she's leaving on American culture and what that tells us about her.
JACKSON: I cannot think of anyone else - and we're historians, right? So we know the past. I can't think of anyone else in history that has touched so many areas of the culture in terms of literature, in terms of her book club, in terms of putting on authors in this major way. She's a kingmaker. She is, you know, I think largely in part responsible for Barack Obama's rise. There's no one else that has - no man or woman, Black or white - that has that kind of influence and power. It absolutely cannot be underestimated.
RIGUEUR: She's an - so she's an institution. And I'm not even going to put the, you know, the qualifier of cultural or social or political or economic on there, because she's all of the above. This is a woman, a Black woman, who has dominated multiple spaces and arenas for over five decades - right? - '80s, '90s, 2000s, 2010s, right on through the present day. And I say that in a way that doesn't absolve her of, say, you know, constructive criticism or feedback or anything like that, but instead as recognition of, you know, the institution of Oprah Winfrey and the Oprah Winfrey brand.
SUMMERS: All right, y'all. Leah Wright Rigueur and Kellie Carter Jackson are the hosts of the "Oprahdemics" podcast. Thank you all so much for talking with us.
JACKSON: Yes, my pleasure.
RIGUEUR: Thank you. This has been so great.
SUMMERS: Y'all, I have a question. Will you stick around and play a game with me?
JACKSON: Oh, sure.
RIGUEUR: Absolutely. Of course.
SUMMERS: All right, listeners, that is coming up next.
(SOUNDBITE OF FLEVANS' "FLICKER")
SUMMERS: All right. We are all going to play a game, and it is called...
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE REAL HOUSEWIVES OF ATLANTA")
KANDI BURRUSS: Who had been saying that?
PORSHA WILLIAMS: Who said that?
KENYA MOORE: Who said that?
SUMMERS: ...Who Said That? And I haven't played this for a long time, so I am really excited. Have you guys played this before?
RIGUEUR: Oh, gosh. Oh, gosh.
JACKSON: I have not. And I'm hoping I will not fail miserably.
RIGUEUR: I know. It's been a long week. It's been a long week.
(LAUGHTER)
SUMMERS: All right. Here are the rules. I'm going to share a quote that you may have heard in the news this week, and you're going to guess who said it or what it's about. There are no buzzers. You can just yell out the answer. And there are no prizes, just some bragging rights. But this is still a competition for champions.
RIGUEUR: Oh, gosh. OK.
JACKSON: I'm ready. I'm ready.
SUMMERS: All right. We're ready?
RIGUEUR: Let's go. Let's go.
SUMMERS: All right. So for this first quote, you can tell me what it's about. "While rumors of the blank's return have been swirling for months, it has not been publicly confirmed until now. From petitions to memorials to merch, the Taco Bell cult has rightfully been all but silent about its menu hiatus." What's it about?
RIGUEUR: Oh, it's definitely about the thing from Taco Bell. Oh, my gosh. It was all over the news. Oh? My gosh.
JACKSON: A menu item at Taco Bell?
SUMMERS: It's a popular menu item.
JACKSON: The Chalupa?
(SOUNDBITE OF BUZZER)
RIGUEUR: No, it's the crunchy thing with the pizza. It's like a - the Mexican pizza.
JACKSON: Oh, the tostada?
RIGUEUR: Mexican pizza.
(SOUNDBITE OF VICTORY TUNE)
SUMMERS: Mexican pizza - that is correct.
JACKSON: I'm not ashamed to say that I was an avid Taco Bell patron during graduate school.
RIGUEUR: I love the Mexican Pizza.
SUMMERS: So this is a quote from a press release about the return of Taco Bell's Mexican pizza...
RIGUEUR: That's hilarious.
SUMMERS: This news was first teased when Doja Cat played a snippet of a jingle for the Mexican pizza on her TikTok.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
DOJA CAT: (Singing) I got beans. I need meat. I need a shell with the sauce and cheese. Give you hell if you cross me - we 'bout to throw hands if you want to try me. This ain't easy...
SUMMERS: And earlier this week, Taco Bell confirmed that this menu item is returning next month. Thank goodness. The Mexican pizza is one of several items they took off the menu in 2020...
RIGUEUR: Yes.
SUMMERS: ...Because of the pandemic. At that time, they said that there were less staff in kitchens and more demand at drive-thrus among the reasons for simplifying their menu. And I am just personally very excited about this.
JACKSON: It's hilarious.
SUMMERS: And I know a lot of other people on our staff are, too.
RIGUEUR: It's good. It's good. I'm all about it.
JACKSON: Oh, man. Man.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
DOJA CAT: (Singing) Mexican pizza is the pizza, yeah.
SUMMERS: Y'all, who got that point?
RIGUEUR: I think I...
JACKSON: I think Leah got that point. Yeah.
RIGUEUR: Oh, damn.
SUMMERS: All right, Leah. All right. Y'all ready for the next one?
RIGUEUR: Yeah, yeah.
SUMMERS: All right. Here is the quote, and I'm looking for the person who said it. "Here's the thing - if I'd thought something was good enough, I would've done it. If I'd read something that I thought was "Notting Hill" level of writing or "My Best Friend's Wedding" level of madcap fun, I would do it."
JACKSON: Oh, oh, oh. Julia Roberts?
(SOUNDBITE OF VICTORY TUNE)
SUMMERS: Ding, ding, ding. You got it.
(LAUGHTER)
RIGUEUR: Oh, that's a good one.
JACKSON: It was something about she hasn't been in a rom-com in, like, 20 years or something (laughter) like that.
RIGUEUR: Oh, OK.
SUMMERS: Yeah, that's right. This was in an interview with The New York Times Magazine. She was explaining why she has not done a rom-com for a really long time until "Ticket To Paradise," which is going to be released later this year. She pretty basically said, you know, they just don't make them like they used to anymore.
JACKSON: Oh.
RIGUEUR: Gosh.
SUMMERS: What do y'all think about that? Are you rom-com fans?
JACKSON: I am (laughter).
RIGUEUR: I am not. I am not.
JACKSON: I love a good, formulaic boy meets girl, then conflict, then they break up...
RIGUEUR: Ugh.
JACKSON: Then they meet. Then they get back together. I'm all about it.
RIGUEUR: Ugh. I mean, you have to drag me kicking and screaming to rom-coms, which - I'm the outlier. I'm definitely - everybody else I know loves rom-coms. I do not. I do not.
JACKSON: (Laughter).
SUMMERS: All right. So it sounds like Kellie got that one.
JACKSON: I - yeah, I got Julia Roberts (laughter).
RIGUEUR: Oh, Kellie definitely got that one. Kellie definitely got that one.
JACKSON: (Laughter).
RIGUEUR: Look at this. It's so cultured. Kellie gets Julia Roberts, and I get Taco Bell Mexican pizza?
JACKSON: (Laughter).
RIGUEUR: Shame, for shame.
SUMMERS: Yeah, we like a mix here at IT'S BEEN A MINUTE.
JACKSON: What is this saying about us (laughter)?
SUMMERS: We like a good mix.
RIGUEUR: For shame (laughter).
SUMMERS: All right, y'all - tiebreaker. Here is the final quote. Tell me what this is all about. "Two out of 3 of our kids can't read. And when our oldest read it while I was making it, I just told her it was a funny quote from a movie, and she never asked about it again."
RIGUEUR: Oh.
JACKSON: Oh, man, I need a hint (laughter).
RIGUEUR: Yeah, can we get a hint?
SUMMERS: This is about a sign that everyone online was talking about this week. And I believe it was hanging over a bed.
JACKSON: Hanging...
RIGUEUR: A sign.
JACKSON: ...Over a bed?
RIGUEUR: I've never seen this one. I feel like we need - I think we need more.
JACKSON: (Laughter) A sign hanging over a bed? Who puts a sign over their bed?
SUMMERS: I don't have a sign over my bed. That's for sure.
(LAUGHTER)
SUMMERS: All right. I'm going to give this one to you. This quote is from a woman named Lauren Hegenbarth in an interview with MEL Magazine. Photos of the home she put up for sale in rural Wisconsin went viral this week, and the sign hanging over the bed reads, welcome to poundtown.
RIGUEUR: Oh.
JACKSON: (Laughter).
SUMMERS: Hegenbarth was inspired...
RIGUEUR: Oh.
SUMMERS: ...To make the sign after seeing one on Facebook. And she said, I wanted...
RIGUEUR: Oh, my God.
SUMMERS: ...To make it look like just another cheesy decor sign. And then once you read it, bam - raunchy and hilarious.
JACKSON: (Laughter).
RIGUEUR: Oh.
SUMMERS: Friends and family have been cracking up over the sign. And as for those kids, the one who is old enough to read apparently has absolutely no idea what that means.
JACKSON: (Laughter).
RIGUEUR: Oh, my God. Until they show up at school and, like, my mom...
JACKSON: (Laughter).
RIGUEUR: Oh, my gosh.
JACKSON: Oh, my gosh. That is hilarious (laughter).
RIGUEUR: That is hilarious. That is definitely crazy Zillow mansions or whatever they call it.
JACKSON: (Laughter) I know.
SUMMERS: Y'all, we have a tie this week. Thank you so much for playing with me.
JACKSON: Yes.
RIGUEUR: Thank you. Thank you so much. This has been so fun.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
JACKSON: Thank you.
SUMMERS: Leah Wright Rigueur and Kellie Carter Jackson are the hosts of the podcast "Oprahdemics," and it is available wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you both for joining me.
RIGUEUR: Thank you (laughter).
JACKSON: Thanks so much.
SUMMERS: All right, y'all. This week's episode was produced by Anjuli Sastry Krbechek, Andrea Gutierrez, Liam McBain, Chloee Weiner, Aja Drain, and Janet Woojeong Lee. Our editor is Tamar Charney. Our director of programming is Yolanda Sangweni. And our big boss is NPR's senior VP of programming, Anya Grundmann. So until next time, be good to yourselves and to each other. I'm Juana Summers. We'll talk again soon.
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