Vinson Cunningham accompanies us to a fancy private school where the parents tend to get a little too involved in the yearly fundraiser. Follow Vinson on Instagram here. Get your tickets for the Normal Gossip Live tour here!Subscribe to our newsletter for writing from Rachelle, Se'era, Jae, Alex, and Kelsey, plus blog recommendations and secrets!You can support Normal Gossip directly by buying merch or becoming a Friend or a Friend-of-Friend at supportnormalgossip.com.Our merch shop is run by Dan McQuade. You can also find all kinds of info about us and how to submit gossip on our Komi page: https://normalgossip.komi.io/Episode transcript here. Order Kelsey's book, You Didn’t Hear This From Me, here!Follow the show on Instagram @normalgossip, and if you have gossip, email us at [email protected] or leave us a voicemail at 26-79-GOSSIP.Normal Gossip is hosted by Rachelle Hampton (@heyydnae) and produced by Se'era Spragley Ricks (@seera_sharae) and Jae Towle Vieira (@jaetowlevieira). Alex Sujong Laughlin (@alexlaughs) is our Supervising Producer. Justin Ellis is Defector's projects editor. Show art by Tara Jacoby.Normal Gossip is a proud member of Radiotopia. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
Chapter 1: What is the introduction of Normal Gossip?
If you have been listening to the past few episodes or following us on Instagram at normal gossip, then you know that this September, Sierra and I are bringing normal gossip to nine different cities. We are stopping in New York, Boston, Seattle, Portland, Oregon, Denver, Dallas, Austin, Chicago, and Minneapolis. Tickets went on sale to the public on Friday, May 9th.
So that means that if you are listening right now in this moment and live in any of those cities, you can go buy a ticket immediately at normalgossiplive.com. Every show has exclusive VIP tickets that include a meet and greet with Sierra and I. So I hope you're all workshopping what... Delicious little tidbits of gossip are going to bring us.
I know we're close to four months out, but a little birdie did tell me that Minneapolis, Boston, and Portland are selling particularly fast. So if you live in those cities and have been considering buying a ticket recently, I'd do it soon. That is all the housekeeping for today's show. Now, on to the gossip.
Today, I'm so excited to be joined by one of my absolute favorite writers in the whole wide world, Vincent Cunningham. Vincent is a staff writer at The New Yorker where he's written about theater and television. He's also a co-host of Critics at Large, which is the New Yorker's weekly culture podcast. Last year, he published a gorgeous novel called Great Expectations.
Yes, there's another very famous novel with that title, but let's be real here. Vincent's is better. It's a semi-autobiographical novel about a young Black man working on the historical presidential campaign of a Black senator from Illinois. Yes, I know that sounds familiar. Yes, it is who you think it is. Yes, it is so good.
It came out in paperback, and I truly think everyone should go out and buy it right now. But without further ado, here's the man, the myth, the legend himself, Vincent. Hello.
Hey.
Thank you so much for joining me.
This is my total pleasure. This is the best. To be on a podcast with somebody I already like to talk to.
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Chapter 2: Who is Vinson Cunningham and what is his background?
Joy. I'm so excited to gossip with you. I already know that you're good at gossip because I've heard you gossip before.
Wow. I can't even pretend on this podcast that I don't do that.
Well...
perfect because i have to ask you what's your relationship with gossip and we love honesty and transparency on this podcast well as you just exposed for me sometimes i do in fact gossip i do still feel though that and maybe the reason that i do it when i feel empowered and equipped to do so is that generally i am not a good receiver of gossip i feel like i don't know what it is
maybe I have cop energy, maybe I have church boy energy, whatever it is, people tend not to tell me just weird, lurid secrets, which is, of course, the fuel of all good gossip.
I don't know.
Or it's taken me a while for that to be the condition of my life. I often analogize it to this. You know there's just a big party, and then you learn that there's cocaine in the bathroom? No one has ever told me about the cocaine. I never know that there's drugs. I'm always the one from whom it is hit in plain sight.
Okay. Having been to a party with you, I can pretty confidently say that you don't have cop energy, but I am going to give you a chance to prove your gossip credentials. A little birdie told me you have some gossip for me.
I do. A guy that I sort of knew, like a friend of a friend, which is the perfect person to like hear gossip about. In high school, went to another, a different private school in New York City. And these are schools where you always kind of know other people in your grade, even though they don't go to your school. You go to a party, they're there.
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Chapter 3: What gossip does Vinson share about a private school incident?
He's going out in a blaze of glory. The dean of students accosts him and drags him out of the cafeteria.
Oh, my God.
Now, this is a true story because I knew someone who was on the scene. But as these things occur, the legend grows. Again, as I mentioned, this kid was a very rich guy.
So over the next months and years, this legend lived on in New York City private schools that he paid off a cab driver early that morning, drove it onto the grounds of the school, drove it through the gates onto the middle of the green, crashed into a gate and started his stampede of glory, which ended in this cafeteria.
Oh, my God. Wait, so why did Daniel decide to go on a rampage? Why was he like, fuck this school?
Because he'd gotten away with everything that it was possible to get away with.
Oh, it was just a power trip?
Yeah.
renting a cab for a day just to come into your cafeteria to say fuck all of you i mean i'm gonna be honest that's how i wanted to go out of high school too vincent that was incredible gossip and also you managed to perfectly sync up with the gossip that i'm about to tell you oh my god are you ready yes Today, our friend of a friend is named Ellen, and Ellen is in her mid to late 40s.
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Chapter 4: How do competitive fundraising dynamics play out in private schools?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a good way to live your life. Like, you shouldn't have people who are preying on your downfall in your immediate orbit.
That is 100% true.
Yeah, Hazel and Ellen are both in that second group of people who are energized by having frenemies.
They...
Both have two kids who are the exact same age, which means they've been battling it out in the same PTA meetings for, like, nearly two decades now. And where Ellen is a champagne socialist, Hazel is an espresso martini capitalist. Oh, shit. She's not always wearing a power suit, but, like, spiritually she is, you know? I understand. She runs a very, very successful boutique PR agency called
So an invite to her Christmas party usually means brushing elbows with like a Hilton or a Getty.
Fair enough. So we're talking Eileen Fisher instead of whatever else I described. Or like even above, like we might be talking about like two seasons ago, Dior, etc.
Yes.
Yes. I understand.
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Chapter 5: What challenges does Ellen face during the eighth-grade fundraiser?
Like, things got ugly. Mm-hmm. Our girl Ellen may or may not have sabotaged another classroom's bake sale by spreading a rumor that the baked goods weren't nut or gluten-free. Holy shit. Had that bake sale been organized by Ellen's frenemy, Hazel, who could say? Uh-huh. Ellen has buried that version of herself. It has been four years since then. A whole presidential administration.
Ellen is taking CBD now. Ellen has a meditation app. Ellen is not going to get too involved this year. How are you feeling so far?
Ellen needs to take up a sport immediately.
Get into rugby, girl.
I mean, yes, suppression, first of all, never works. And also, too much of her competitive energy is making its way into the lives of her children. She has to take up tennis.
Well, for the first couple of weeks of the school year, everything goes pretty fine. Like, Ellen's oldest daughter is having a great time at her internship, and she hasn't asked for a skirt suit or a copy of Lean In yet. Okay. So, so far, so good. Good. Thank God. And for a hot minute, it seems like the annual eighth grade fundraiser might even be pretty tame this year.
So like I said, there are three eighth grade classes at Briarwood. From here on out, we're going to be referring to these classes as classes A, B, and C. So Ellen's daughter is in class A. Hazel's youngest son is in Class B, and there's no one we care about in Class C. So fundraising starts off relatively chill. At first, there are like bake sales and craft fairs and things of that nature.
And these are all mostly engineered by the children themselves. But things start going off the rails when the silent auction rolls around. Now, Briarwood parents are the kind of people that could very easily donate, like, dinner on a private yacht or a magnum of champagne or whatever rich people have. I don't really know, but they could donate a lot of shit.
So to stop things from getting too crazy, the biggest rule for the silent auction is that nothing can be auctioned off that the kids did not obtain themselves.
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Chapter 6: What items are up for auction and how do they reflect school dynamics?
But then Ellen kind of pauses because she's always just a little bit suspicious when it comes to literally anything that Hazel does. So Ellen's like, what kind of items are we talking about? And her daughter's like, mom, I know you hate Hazel, but she's kind of incredible at her job. People gave her so much shit.
Like someone donated a wheel of cheese imported from Italy, like right from the border of Parmigiano and Reggiano. Ha ha ha!
got that reggiano she went she went got that rich oh man that's crazy and then a former chef of carbone is offering up a private pasta making class and someone else donated this ugly broom that cost six hundred dollars how would you respond to this ellen you have already messed up if your daughter ever has the occasion to say to you
I know you hate X, and yet they are great at their job. You should just lay down and call for the Lord to take you. That is, it's over for you. Does she suspect yet that the daughter is talking about the eighth grade fundraiser? Does she suspect?
Well, Ellen's like, I may hate Hazel, And also think that Hazel's affinity for Tory Burch is a little tacky. But as a feminist, I will not tear this woman down in front of my daughter. So Ellen tells her daughter, I don't hate Hazel. But. Our girl Ellen does have her antenna up. Ellen is suspicious.
And she only gets more suspicious the next day when one of her Briarwood parent friends tells her that apparently Class B had received some incredible new donations for the silent auction that everyone's being really tight-lipped about. Oh, God. What do you do with this information?
She has two options and two options only.
Ooh. What are the two options?
So it's either 100%... Ignore. Forget you heard it. And from then on, tell the daughter, for fundraiser-related reasons, I can't know about anything that you tell me. Like, totally forget. Renounce. Or establish a new Gmail address and send an anonymous tip to the authorities. There is no other way. If she tries a third path, she's going to get burned.
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Chapter 7: How does Ellen's attitude change throughout the fundraiser?
Ellen is filled with joy every time she sees these skeletons. It is better than she has been dreaming of all these years. Every five-year-old in a mile radius becomes obsessed with this co-op. But even better, Ellen's 12-foot-tall skeletons had caught the attention of the coolest person on Ellen's block. Patricia. Huge news.
Our Dowager Queen, Kelsey McKinney, wrote a New York Times bestselling book of beautiful essays about gossip. It's called You Didn't Hear This From Me, mostly true notes on gossip. And I am obsessed. It's about how we use gossip to learn about ourselves. It's about Britney Spears and Weston Caleb and Gilgamesh and Picasso. It's so fun.
Thank you.
Patricia is like old, old money rich. Like, it's giving Gilded Age. It's giving down Abby. What this means is that Patricia doesn't give a single fuck what anyone thinks of her. She has been married and divorced three times. And now that her two sons are off at college, people in the neighborhood have seen her on dates with a series of really hot, mostly younger guys.
She's notoriously terrible at parallel parking, despite being a lifelong New Yorker and will often ask one of her neighbors to come park her car. There are rumors that she grows pot on her roof.
Patricia!
Ellen's obsessed with her.
As anyone would have to be.
And Ellen has heard from her neighbors who are also obsessed with Patricia that Patricia's been cited standing and admiring the 12-foot-tall skeletons at least twice in the past week. Amazing. Ellen has run into Patricia in front of the 12 foot tall skeletons herself, but it's only a matter of time. How would you strike up a conversation with your glamorous divorcee stoner neighbor?
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