June Diane Raphael and Jessica St. Clair launched their podcast, The Deep Dive, within the midst of the pandemic as a strategy to compensate for the loneliness and disconnect of lockdown.
Every week, the 2 longtime buddies and artistic collaborators focus on their pursuit of pleasure amid a bevy of challenges each relatable (motherhood, growing older) and aspirational (discovering the right poolside apparel for Miami Seaside Satisfaction). Doing the podcast helped carry the actresses out of their very own post-lockdown voids, and their motto — “Let Us Dwell!” — echoes by way of Apple critiques posted by their ever-expanding listening neighborhood.
When the abrupt work stoppage of this summer time’s double strike threatened to set off an analogous existential disaster, they have been prepared with an antidote: They launched the Deep Dive Academy of Significance.
“We began a digital college, and that is without doubt one of the most insane issues I believe I’ve ever stated,” St. Clair says with amusing.
The academy is their tackle a Patreon — bonus content material, for $8.99 a month, tailor-made to their distinctive mix of sincerity and satire. And, true to their a long time of expertise working in movie and tv — Raphael first broke out after co-writing the screenplay of 2009’s Bride Wars with Casey Rose Wilson and spent the previous seven years starring on Netflix’s Grace and Frankie; St. Clair co-created and starred in USA’s Taking part in Home — they’ve infused it with a sure stage of artistry. The academy releases tutorial movies on the whole lot from cat-eye make-up to baking the right tomato tart, presents a “scholar portal” on which to submit coursework, and is overseen by their newly fashioned Headmistress personas, the inspiration for which, says Raphael, involves them from the past. Provides St. Clair: “This began as my child, but it surely was June’s thought to lean additional into the college facet and to create these kind of turn-of-the-century Headmistri characters — like all good marriage, we break up up our duties.”
Components of each the academy and the podcast contact on matters that might be thought-about wellness-adjacent. St. Clair and Raphael are uninhibited in discussing the machinations of contemporary womanhood and life within the public eye, by no means too shy to share a couple of magnificence process or focus on the facility of a great set of highlights. However they’re deliberate of their deal with how ladies can open up their lives, versus proscribing themselves.
“God bless Gwyneth Paltrow and Goop and preserve them effectively, however what I like about what we’re doing is that it’s partly a satire of all these locations that inform you if you happen to simply get or do that one factor, the whole lot will likely be OK,” says Raphael. “The promise of wellness or an excellent type of residing as a girl is completely empty. We’re doing these classes, however we’re utilizing them as a recommitment to one another and our neighborhood.”
They level to the academy’s ebook membership, which launched with former Goop CCO Elise Loehnen’s On Our Finest Conduct: The Seven Lethal Sins and the Worth Girls Pay to Be Good. After studying the chapter on sloth, they requested college students to submit pictures of the mess of their properties, together with a blurb about what they have been doing as a substitute of cleansing. “It was so stunning and therapeutic to learn,” says St. Clair. “It actually modified us and the best way we’re taking a look at our personal messiness. Numerous wellness is mostly a product of capitalism that claims you at all times must be optimizing. It’s good to do issues which might be nearly having fun with your self.”
Right here, the Headmistri discuss what they’ve discovered from their podcast and one another.
You launched the Academy on July 1st, about two months into the WGA strike and 10 days earlier than SAG; how do you’re feeling about that timing?
St. Clair: I really feel like we’re busier than ever.
Raphael: The timing of making the Academy, and now having a strategy to be artistic, to have an outlet throughout all this, to have full management of one thing, has been superb.
St. Clair: We began as such little scrappers in New York, by no means getting paid, and creating our personal content material. There’s one thing about it, when the whole lot is stripped from us, we at all times return to our roots and that makes me actually completely satisfied. As a result of it doesn’t matter what firms resolve to do or not do, we are going to at all times have ourselves — and one another.
It looks as if it’s additionally providing an outlet to different creatives you understand and are buddies with…
St. Clair: That’s what’s actually stunning concerning the Academy, is we have now constructed this neighborhood. And we’re calling on our buddies too. God bless my finest good friend Josh Levine, who is often within the author’s room of fantastic exhibits and now occurs to be free, so he’s modifying each single considered one of our movies. At one level, I did see him put his head down on his desk and say quietly to himself, “Oh, I’m in it for the lengthy haul.”
I do know that you just began getting the thought for all of this earlier than the strikes hit, however has it modified the best way you’re approaching your careers? Like, you’re not essentially ready round for somebody to greenlight one thing.
Raphael: Having what is actually a subscription service for our personal content material, and having full management over it with out having to reply to anyone and with the ability to preserve the revenue — that’s empowering. My solidarity with my unions has by no means felt stronger as a result of I’ve seen what it’s love to do one thing completely by yourself, with none networks supplying you with permission or taking the majority of the cash. That’s made it a extremely great mission to work on.
Inform me slightly bit extra about what the preliminary imaginative and prescient was.
St. Clair: What we actually needed to do, versus being like right here’s our content material we’re performing for you, we needed to broaden the Deep Dive expertise, which is that we’re all buddies and studying how you can get extra pleasure out of life collectively. We have already got our dwell experiences, that are equally insane, like our Pickleball tournaments. June handles these, and there’ll be extra of that to come back.
Raphael: The factor I like a lot about having based an Institute of Increased Schooling — and clearly our accreditation is pending — is that ladies particularly can get slowed down in, am I allowed to do that? Am I allowed to name myself this or that? So in fact it’s hilarious that we’ve based a faculty however it is usually deeply soul-satisfying. It’s weirdly therapeutic. Sure, it’s a bit, sure it’s tremendous humorous, however in its personal subversive method I really feel excellent about taking over house on this method.
From left: Raphael, St. Clair and podcaster Wynter Mitchell Rohrbaugh at a BlogHer well being and wellness occasion in 2022.
Kevin Winter/Getty Photographs
So being a headmistress comes naturally?
St. Clair: It’s a straightforward position for June to fill. The scholars have been initially actually afraid of June, which is sensible as a result of I’m typically just like the Daddy serving ice cream for dinner. In our good friend group, which additionally contains Casey [Rose Wilson] and Danielle [Schneider] of Bitch Sesh, June tells us what to do. We’ve got strict gown codes for occasions. She advised me at one level my hair was too lengthy. Now she’s gone again on that, however I’m the one one within the group who can put on my hair this lengthy. Folks would say, that’s unusual, why would you let your good friend inform you what to do? However folks truly wish to be advised what to do, it makes them really feel secure amongst chaos and uncertainty.
Raphael: I’ll say, and I’m completely satisfied to place this in print, that in our good friend group Kulap Vilaysak is usually the Dick Cheney to my George W. Bush. Numerous the edicts are coming down from her, however I’m the one that claims them out loud. So I take lots of warmth for that. However as Jess is aware of, I’m an enormous softie, and I believe the kind of gameplay of eager to be advised what to do, being terrified of being on tutorial probation, is basically enjoyable. It’s an improv sport we’ve been taking part in with our college students, but it surely’s additionally fairly actual. Everyone seems to be taking part in alongside.
I simply did a dwell present for my different podcast How Did This Get Made — I didn’t even inform you this, Jessica — and we have now a query and reply portion and a girl raised her hand and stated, this query is for Headmistress Raphael. Like sure, we might have accomplished a Patreon, one thing that’s simply further content material and that’s nice as a result of I subscribe to lots of these and I believe it’s great for the hosts and artists to have additional cash of their wallets. However I’m actually happy with this as a result of we have now discovered a brand new framework for bonus content material that’s rather more interactive.
St. Clair: I don’t assume you’re gonna discover these items on Goop. And you understand, I’m by no means gonna dry brush. That’s simply not obtainable to me. However I cherished studying everybody’s responses to the ebook membership immediate about what they have been doing as a substitute of cleansing: ‘I sat exterior and drank a martini, I performed with my son, I scrolled by way of TikTok.’
It seems like your mission is extra to broaden folks’s lives than to shut them in…
Raphael: Sure, and that’s very highly effective to me. Life is messy. Life is sudden. There’s fucking wildfires that wipe out an island. There are such a lot of causes for deep disappointment and there’s no quantity of lotions to place in your face to get across the deep grief that’s obtainable to us always. However studying from one another, in no matter methods we have now to supply, is why we began doing The Deep Dive. That was the second we discovered ourselves in and we wanted the connection.
To return to the dialogue of capitalism, and acknowledge that we do dwell in a capitalist society — do you assume you would be charging extra for the Academy? It’s best to see what Goop costs for issues.
Raphael: I imply, pay attention. I don’t doubt it. We do wish to develop. We would like our listeners and our college students to inform their buddies concerning the podcast and the Academy. However we would like it to be accessible. We didn’t wish to value out individuals who couldn’t afford the month-to-month tuition. We even have monetary support obtainable. We really feel actually good about what we’re charging, as a result of it’s what is sensible for us to have the ability to commit our time to it, but in addition it seems like nearly all of our listeners can afford it.
St. Clair: Fully. However I’ll offer you this: We’ve got to pay for our eyelash extensions on the finish of the day. That’s necessary.
This story first appeared within the Aug. 23 problem of LeslyNewsMagazine journal. Click on right here to subscribe.