This is so nice.
Yeah.
It feels good, right?
Yeah.
Power at a desk.
Just ladies running The Daily Show.
DESI LYDIC: That's it.
I'm very into this.
[applause, cheering]
All female guests this week.
- I love it. - That's what we got.
Yeah. It's great to see you.
Welcome to the show. - Thank you so much.
Thanks for having me.
Hi, everybody.
You've been busy on many things, but one of them
is your very popular podcast, "Drama Queens"--
Yes.
--which is basically a rewatch podcast
of "One Tree Hill," right? - Yeah.
DESI LYDIC: Yeah.
Yeah, we realized that the nine
years of that show that we made were sort of a blur.
And people at these lovely events
always ask us, oh, you remember when?
And we were like, no, we don't.
I'm so sorry.
I don't remember.
And our sort of COVID project was launching this podcast,
and it's actually been really special to relive it.
And every so often, we're all just sitting on Zoom sobbing.
And we're like, we get it.
It's really good.
This is super emotional.
DESI LYDIC: Very therapeutic, I would imagine.
Yeah.
Because when you started that show, you were really young.
You were like 20 years old, right?
I had just turned 21.
Hilarie Burton and I actually-- our birthdays
are one week apart.
DESI LYDIC: Aw.
We had both just shredded our fake IDs.
I'm so sorry, mom.
And we were like, we can get into bars now.
We are so grown up.
Turns out, at 21, you are still absolutely a child.
And it's really weird to look back and see, like--
Well, yeah, there are so many documentaries that have come
out recently about women entering
the entertainment industry at that time,
in the early 2000s--
Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Pamela Anderson-- and hearing
their side of the story.
What was that like going into the industry that young?
Uh, you know that famous adage,
it was the best of times and the worst of times?
DESI LYDIC: Yeah.
It was that.
You know, it's so special to go and do what you love
and to get to do art for a living,
and we worked for a total pig, and that was awful.
And so it was very confusing.
I mean, I'm like-- women are laughing.
I'm like, you know what I'm talking about--
Oh, yeah.
--where you're like, I love my job, but I
also really hate it here. Ugh.
[laughs] What?
No, I don't know any pigs at this job!
I love this job! - We love this job.
I love it so much!
This is different.
- This is different. - Yeah.
This truly is different.
It is, and you know when it is.
I worked on this amazing show in Toronto
last year that was different.
And when I look at sort of what's on my resume,
almost everything has been amazing.
It just sucks when the things that you've done the longest
have been sort of toxic and awful.
DESI LYDIC: Yeah.
Yeah.
But how amazing that you talk about it with your castmates,
because having those conversations--
and I want to believe that things are different now.
Women still struggle with these things.
But by you talking about it, it makes
other women not feel alone.
That's been the really special part of it.
And when people ask women, like, why
are you so obsessed with this?
It's like, why were you never paying attention?
Why, when we were all crying for help,
did you go, like, it's not that bad, you're lucky?
That's weird. But--
[laughter]
But you know, I think for us, it's been really--
the unexpected side effect of this podcast job
is that it's been really healing,
and it's been really empowering.
And what's been really beautiful is
the sort of connections that we've been making
with listeners, with other women in our industry,
with women who were directing on our show back then,
who listened to an episode, reach out, and say,
that was totally going on.
I heard that, or I was told this.
It's been really affirming.
And so I don't really care who's mad about it.
We're here to-- DESI LYDIC: Good.
--heal.
DESI LYDIC: That's right.
And we are very much reclaiming our territory.
DESI LYDIC: Good.
It feels nice.
So much of what you do is you do so much activism.
You are extremely vocal about issues
that you care about-- gun reform, voting rights,
women's reproductive health.
You were just honored yesterday--
Yeah.
--by the National Institution of Reproductive
Health for your work.
How does that feel?
Congratulations.
It was wild.
It was so wild, and they gave me this,
like, big, gorgeous, heavy award.
And I was like, wonderful, I can leave here and feel very
special and also have a weapon, just in case,
because that is being a woman in the world.
You know, I was like, I don't have to carry my keys today.
I got this.
Jokes aside though, it was very special.
And I think having a platform is a privilege.
And I don't expect anybody to do what I do or believe
what I believe necessarily, but I do think for me, knowing
that this is a megaphone means that
what I've been privileged enough to have access to--
study education, the words of women like Gloria Steinem
and Brittany Packnett Cunningham
and my friends who run the media,
or, like, I get to listen to incredible leaders
and to amplify those voices and to talk about equity,
whether it's in reproductive justice or justice
for women of color or Black maternal mortality
rates or gun reform, because gun
violence touches all of us.
That's my work and in the same way
that we as women need men to talk about sexual violence
because, like, it can't just be us.
We're like, please help us.
Talk to each other, my god.
Like, it's--
[applause, cheering]
It's the same way that I feel about, as women, when we look
at the diversity within our gender group
and then we look outward at how we
need to stand up for our trans friends and folks.
Like, all of the beautiful Black women
I see in this audience, like, racial justice among--
in feminism can't be your job.
Like, that's our job.
Women who look like us are the problem.
- Yes, exactly. - So--
[applause, cheering]
--for me, what has been a privilege
and an awakening and hard and inspiring
has been getting really fired up about an injustice
and then starting to pull the thread and going, oh, my god,
it's all connected.
It's systemic everywhere.
We have work to do.
But I do think we can do it together.
Organizations like the NRIH are doing incredible work.
They're proactive for us and our freedoms and our rights.
And it's those sorts of groups and, obviously,
this group, because y'all are fabulous,
that I want to hang out with.
Yeah.
You-- you're about to start a play in London--
Yes.
--called 2:22, A Ghost Story.
Did I get that right? - Yeah.
2:22, A Ghost Story.
Are you excited to go work in a country where they have access
to health care for women? - Health care?
Yeah, wow.
DESI LYDIC: That might be nice.
I realized it was a really big deal when I had to apply
for my work visa, and they were like,
have you ever tried to sneak into the United Kingdom
to access health care?
And I was like, oh, yeah, we have to do that, I guess.
That's weird.
DESI LYDIC: Yeah, it's coming to that.
No, but while I'm doing this job, can I go to the doctor?
That would be so cool.
Yeah.
Tell us what the play is about.
It's a supernatural story, right?
It involves ghosts?
It is.
So I don't want to give it away,
but the thing we all loved about Friends
was watching a group of people in an apartment hang
out, right?
So imagine it's four instead of six friends,
and when their dinner party gets, like, a little bit lit,
people start up a conversation, essentially, of who does
and doesn't believe in ghosts, and suddenly we're
talking about belief and faith and upbringing and education
and what's bigger than us.
And it's very spicy.
DESI LYDIC: Oh, that's fun.
Yeah.
DESI LYDIC: I love a good ghost story.
Did you research for this role?
Did you just go visit the Senate?
You know, I should have.
Yeah.
That'd be a good place to start.
Yeah, I should have.
Is this the first time you're doing theater?
- It is. - Aw.
The West End will be my stage debut, unless you count
Our Town in the eighth grade. Same, same?
DESI LYDIC: Oh, right. Same, same.
- Yeah. - Same, same.
You're going to be brilliant. - Thank you.
You're going to be brilliant.
I can't wait to see you in this.
I'm really excited and completely terrified.
And then I have these moments where I'm like, OK,
we're doing eight shows a week in front of people.
What if someone has a bad day?
I'm like, what--
I don't know.
And then it was actually one of my girlfriends
from the podcast, Hilarie, said, dude,
when you do a TV show, you're on set
for like 14 to 17 hours a day.
This will literally be the least amount of hours
you've ever worked in a week.
And I went, oh, yeah, OK.
Oh, right.
Maybe I can read more books or something.
- You have a lot of downtime. - Yeah.
- It'll be great. - It's gonna be great.
Plus, you're great with an audience.
This is-- - Oh, they're lovely.
Yeah.
[applause]
You once said that you weren't interested in working
in politics.
Back in 2013, you said this.
But you said, ask me in 10 years.
- Yeah. - So what's up?
What do you think?
Well, it's so interesting.
So many people for the last number of years
have said to me, like, please run.
And then Nancy Pelosi--
what a weird thing I'm about to say to you.
Nancy Pelosi said to me one day, like, it'll all be
better when you're president.
And I went, I bet you say that to all the girls,
but thank you so much.
AUDIENCE: Woo!
DESI LYDIC: That is an endorsement, that right there.
It was so deeply flattering.
And then I went, like, well, I guess if we're electing people
from TV, anyone who knows anything
about public policy or public health or education
or, like, women would be cool.
DESI LYDIC: Right, who can string a sentence together.
Yeah, you know?
Articulate humans who like other people instead of wish
ill upon their lives would be nice.
But I think as I've learned so much over the last 10 years,
I don't know what it's going to look like.
I don't know where I'm supposed to go yet because I want
to do what is the most useful.
And I think a lot of people, whether they want
to run for office or run a company,
do it because they want to center themselves
in the experience.
If I could be most useful serving in elected
office, great.
If I can be most useful raising money for incredible C4
candidates across the country and making sure
we flip State Houses so we're not thrown back
to the Dark Ages, into it.
Like, literally just tell me how to help, and I'm down,
you know?
I so appreciate, we so appreciate,
all the work that you do.
And I really appreciate you coming on too.
You are a delight. - Thank you.
Oh, my god.
Sophia Bush, everybody!