Television, perhaps more than movies, has a way of etching its stars in stone. And few actors seem to be able to break the mold more than once. Which is what makes Penn Badgley’s career—first on Gossip Girl then You—special.

We sit this week around the fifth and final season of You (6:36) to unpack its shocking series finale [spoiler] (9:00) and the political climate in which the show is coming to a close (12:00). Then, Penn opens up about the solitude of his west coast upbringing (16:00), his years as a child actor (20:00), and his beloved portrayal of Dan Humphrey on Gossip Girl (29:00).

On the back-half, Badgley’s transformative trip to South America in 2012 (35:00), his spiritual journey into the Bahá'í Faith (40:00), and how these experiences led him to his partner, Domino (45:00). To close, he describes the intense physical experience of filming the You finale [spoiler] (49:00), what the ‘fantasy of Joe Goldberg’ reveals about masculinity today (53:00), and a fitting Dave Eggers passage from the prologue of The Executioner’s Song (1:02:00).

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This episode was recorded at Spotify Studios.

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Before Viola Davis (How To Get Away with Murder) became an EGOT-winning actor, she was an observer. Her work takes the human experience and transmutes it, offering a mirror and a window into ourselves.

Today, we sit to unpack her recent, liberating projects in The Woman King (4:20) and G20 (4:50), the formative years she spent growing up in Rhode Island (10:00), and how she captured those familial memories in her 2022 memoir Finding Me (15:00). Then, we talk about Viola’s start as a performer (20:00), what she learned attending Juilliard (30:00), and the quagmire she faced as a Black actor emerging on Broadway and in Hollywood post-graduation (35:00).

On the back-half, Davis reflects on a scene from August Wilson’s play Seven Guitars (45:00), her singular experience acting alongside Meryl Streep in Doubt (48:00), and the ways her life transformed during Shonda Rhymes’ How to Get Away with Murder and Steve McQueen’s Widows (53:00). To close, Viola shares her views on legacy (1:02:30) and how she finds her way back home, each and every day (1:05:00).

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An outspoken advocate for working families, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) has made a career out of taking on Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and the Beltway. And while she may be tired of Washington, she’s not too tired to make it better.

At the top, we discuss the constitutional crisis (5:00) surrounding the deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia (9:00), this administration’s attack on public education (12:00), and the GOP’s fealty to Donald Trump (13:25). Then, we dive into Senator Warren’s proposed bill to limit the power of special government employees like Elon Musk (25:48), her fight for campaign finance reform (28:05), and the values her Oklahoma upbringing instilled in her (35:43).

On the back-half, Senator Warren reflects on her early work in bankruptcy law (39:47), why she’s devoted her career to fighting for the middle class (45:45), the challenges she’s faced in the past decade in office (1:00:19), and what she sees for the future of the Democratic party (1:05:30).

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This episode was recorded at Spotify Studios.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.