I was Quite Happy to be the Villain (Ep 374: Tork Shaw/Kenneth Williams)

Next week would have been the 96th birthday of Kenneth Williams, an incredible British performer who hid queer culture in plain sight on the BBC back in the 1960s. For this week’s episode we’re diving all the way back into the Sewers of Paris archives to one of my very first episodes, a conversation with game designer Tork Shaw. Tork would listen to tapes of Kenneth Williams in the car with this family growing up, and he'd hear something of himself in the bookish, aristocratic, quick-witted gays like Kenneth Williams. Tork didn't quite fit in at school -- everyone around him was sporty and posh -- so he cultivated a caustic wit, modeled on the characters he heard, and despite being a small, unathletic kid, his classmates grew scared of him and he was voted "worst bully" in his class. But by the time he was teenager, he was feeling ready to set that aside. "I didn't want to be mean anymore," he said. "What happens if I let go of everything I've done in the past?"

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. And hey don’t forget to head over to mattbaume.com to subscribe to my cute little newsletter. 

Also take a look at my YouTube channel where I post stories about film and TV history. I just posted a new video about The Golden Girls. And head over to my Patreon to support The Sewers of Paris and watch hours of bonus videos about queer pop culture.

Behind the Scenes with Betty White (Ep 373 - The Golden Girls/Jim Colucci)

My guest this week is Jim Colucci, author of numerous books about the behind-the-scenes stories of the making of classic TV shows. In his work he’s had opportunities to interview greats like Norman Lear, Betty White, and Bea Arthur — but the REALLY good stories are about what happened after the interviews were over.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. And hey don’t forget to head over to mattbaume.com to subscribe to my cute little newsletter. 

Also take a look at my YouTube channel where I post stories about film and TV history. I just posted a new video about The Golden Girls. And head over to my Patreon to support The Sewers of Paris and watch hours of bonus videos about queer pop culture.

Southern Decadence (Ep 372 - The Chronicles of Narnia/Jonathan Alexander)

My guest this week is author Jonathan Alexander, whose new book Dear Queer Self comes out in March 2022 and is a sort of conversation with his younger self, and an attempt to recapture some of younger-him’s wisdom. Though Jonathan of today has been through a lot of eye-opening experiences, from a brief marriage to a woman to a life-changing experience with Hurricane Katrina, he still pauses to listen to that nerdy kid drawing fantasy maps inspired by CS Lewis novels.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. And hey don’t forget to head over to mattbaume.com to subscribe to my cute little newsletter. 

Also take a look at my YouTube channel where I post stories about film and TV history. I just posted a new video about The Golden Girls. And head over to my Patreon to support The Sewers of Paris and watch hours of bonus videos about queer pop culture. 

Cozy vs Kinky (Ep 371 - The Jungle Book/Caudle)

My guest this week grew up alongside eight sisters, in a home so crowded his room was a tiny storage closet. Splitting his time between homeschooling and the family flea market, Caudle had a particularly insulated upbringing — until an adventure to a convention for fellow nerds opened his eyes to a big wide world, and he left home with the help of some new friends.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. And hey don’t forget to head over to mattbaume.com to subscribe to my cute little newsletter. 

Also take a look at my YouTube channel where I post stories about film and TV history. I just posted a new video about The Golden Girls. And head over to my Patreon to support The Sewers of Paris and watch hours of bonus videos about queer pop culture. 

You Can be Sad or You Can be Gay (Ep 370 - Guy Branum)

Fifty-eight years ago this weekend, the musical Hello Dolly opened on Broadway — and this week we’re diving into the Sewers archive for a chat with Guy Branum about why, for him, the show encapsulates all the greatest joyful aspects of being gay.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. And hey don’t forget to head over to mattbaume.com to subscribe to my cute little newsletter. 

Also take a look at my YouTube channel where I post stories about film and TV history. I’ve got a Golden Girls video in the works. And head over to my Patreon to support The Sewers of Paris and watch hours of bonus videos about queer pop culture.

Hercules as a Twink (Ep 369 - Roo/Disney movies)

My guest this week is one of the busiest people I’ve ever interviewed. Roo George Warren is an educator, an ecologist, a singer, an activist, a performance artist, and that’s not even half of the jobs you might find him doing on any particular day. Roo was raised with a healthy respect for skepticism and rebellion, and after venturing away from the town where he grew up, he found his calling close to him — now focusing on issues like food sovereignty and language revitalization for the Catawba Nation.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. And hey don’t forget to head over to mattbaume.com to subscribe to my cute little newsletter — this week I shared a bunch of my favorite Betty White performances.

Also take a look at my YouTube channel where I post stories about film and TV history. I’ve got a Golden Girls video in the works. And head over to my Patreon to support The Sewers of Paris and watch hours of bonus videos about queer pop culture. I just posted a roundup on Patreon of the most downloaded episodes of Sewers in 2021, along with my most watched YouTube videos.

I Just Lied (Ep 368 - Andy/Revolutionary Girl Utena)

My guest this week has been a lot of different people — Andy Casadonte grew up a meek kid in Maryland, came out of the closet when he went to school in New York to study illustration, and then had to watch his step when his first job out of college required him to move to Tennessee to work on the religious show Veggie Tales. For a while, he found solace in the fandom of queer anime. And when he was finally able to escape Tennessee, it was to a city and a job where queerness could be celebrated.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. First a reminder to check out my YouTube channel where I post stories about pop culture history. And head over to my Patreon to watch hours of bonus videos. I just posted a roundup on Patreon of the most downloaded episodes of Sewers in 2021, along with my most watched YouTube videos.

Also check out my cute little newsletter where I share sneak peeks at what I’m working on at mattbaume.com.

Big thanks to everyone who supports the Sewers of Paris at Patreon.com/mattbaume. And to everyone who’s left a review on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen.

That Really Felt Like Christmas Magic (Ep 367 - Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer/Jonathan)

I hope you’re having a delightful holiday time, full of seasonal entertainment and sweaters and good cheer. For this week’s episode, we’re heading into the archives to hear my 2016 interview with Jonathan, who grew up in a deeply religious family and always found himself swept up in the pageantry of the season. These days, he's distanced himself from the faith, but unexpectedly Christmas has become spiritual for him in a far more personal way.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. First a reminder to check out my YouTube channel where I post videos about queer pop culture. And head over to my Patreon to watch hours of bonus videos featuring stories of TV and film history.

Check out my cute little newsletter where I share sneak peeks at what I’m working on at mattbaume.com.

Big thanks to everyone who supports the Sewers of Paris at Patreon.com/mattbaume. And to everyone who’s left a review on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen.

A Boy in the Country (Ep 366 - The Wizard of Oz/Tyler Dwiggins)

My guest this week is playwright Tyler Dwiggins, who grew up in an isolated, rural Indiana farm town where there wasn’t much in the way of arts — especially if someone else needed to use the school’s combination auditorium/cafeteria. That’s why today he produces the kind of stuff he was looking for back then, starting with a series of queer-inclusive plays for high schools.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. First a reminder to check out my YouTube channel where I post videos about queer pop culture. And head over to my Patreon to watch hours of bonus videos featuring stories of TV and film history.

Check out my cute little newsletter where I share sneak peeks at what I’m working on at mattbaume.com.

Big thanks to everyone who supports the Sewers of Paris at Patreon.com/mattbaume. And to everyone who’s left a review on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen.

I'm Not Gay, I'm Just a Dance Major (Ep 365 - The Boys in the Band/Raymond Miller)

Twenty-one years ago this week, the show Queer as Folk made its American debut, and this week we’re diving into the Sewers archive to revisit one of the very first episodes of the podcast — my 2015 interview with Toronto performer Raymond Miller. If you were a teenager in Toronto in 2002, you saw him every afternoon hosting a local after-school TV show. He's also appeared on stage in Mamma Mia, blink on Queer as Folk, and with the Canadian Opera Company. Back when he was a TV show host, management told him he needed to get rid of his lisp. And if he couldn't on his own, they told him, they had a solution to straighten him out: hockey.

We’ll have that conversation in a minute. First a reminder to check out my YouTube channel where I post videos about queer pop culture. And head over to my Patreon to watch hours of bonus videos featuring stories of TV and film history.

Check out my cute little newsletter where I share sneak peeks at what I’m working on at mattbaume.com.

Big thanks to everyone who supports the Sewers of Paris at Patreon.com/mattbaume. And to everyone who’s left a review on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen.