ICYMI - How Zola Went From Twitter Thread to Major Movie
ICYMI
Slate Podcasts
3.9 • 800 Ratings
🗓️ 7 July 2021
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Zola, a new movie based on the infamous Twitter thread by Aziah “Zola” Wells King, follows a part-time stripper who goes on a weekend trip to Florida with a new friend to make money, and how things quickly escalated until their friendship fell apart. On today’s episode, Rachelle and Madison talk to Tony-nominated playwright and screenwriter Jeremy O. Harris about how he and director Janicza Bravo translated the 148-tweet saga into a feature-length film, the scene that almost made members of the crew quit, and why he considers Zola’s tale to be akin to Homer’s epic poetry.
Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Derek John.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You want to hear a story about how me and this bitch here fell out? |
| 0:07.6 | It's kind of long, but it's full of suspense. |
| 0:13.3 | Hi, I'm Madison Malone Kircher. |
| 0:15.3 | And I'm Rachel Hampton, and you're listening to I see why am I. |
| 0:18.9 | In case you missed it. |
| 0:20.3 | Slate's podcast about internet culture. |
| 0:22.9 | Rachel, I have to just come clean at the top here. |
| 0:25.4 | I was fully unplugged and in the woods for this long weekend. |
| 0:28.8 | And it was a goddamn delight. |
| 0:31.8 | But I don't really know what happened online. |
| 0:33.6 | Madison, I feel like we have to talk about the fact that you keep just disappearing into the woods. |
| 0:38.5 | And A, never taking me, and B, completely ignoring your responsibility to be online. |
| 0:44.6 | Two times. It's happened twice. |
| 0:46.6 | That's more times than I've done it in the past, however many months the show's been going on. |
| 0:52.7 | Well, you didn't miss much. |
| 0:54.5 | And I say that as somebody who was also trying not to be online this weekend because it was a long weekend. |
| 0:59.5 | And sometimes you just have to unplug. |
| 1:02.4 | Yeah, Rachel, sometimes you do. |
| 1:05.3 | Okay, I'm not leaving the vicinity of New York City. |
| 1:09.5 | I'm back now. |
| 1:10.3 | You're back now, |
| 1:11.2 | and we've both been greeted |
... |
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