The Cut on Tuesdays

Old emails are a fossil record of our lives. What were you doing this time last year, or two years ago, or ten? Even if you don’t keep a diary, you’ve got email... and this week, we're digging through ours. With Allison P. Davis, Mona Chalabi, Maddie Aggeler, Lisa Miller, Andrea Long Chu, and Stella Bugbee.

Meet a stranger, get married, do LSD, follow a band, buy a van, swear off men, go sit on a pyramid.... and other ways to change your life forever. Two women in their seventies look back over decades of committing to big change, and Molly’s husband demonstrates the fathomless mysteries of the people we know best. Plus, a show announcement.

Once upon a time, Carmen Maria Machado met a woman who was beautiful and smart and funny and (amazingly, to Carmen) wanted to be her girlfriend. They got together, and at first, it was everything Carmen had been waiting for... and then things started to change. We spoke to Carmen about her new memoir, In the Dream House, and her search for more women with stories like hers.

Jenny Slate never had stage fright at all... then suddenly, in her late 20s, she did. In this episode the comedian, actress, and author of the new book Little Weirds tells us about feeling like she was losing the thing she most loved. And she shares some of the ways she's learned to deal with her anxiety--from finding a supportive partner, to deciding not to drink, to establishing a morning routine...

When you start a new job, maybe you’ve got a fantasy of the life you want to lead—the new and improved person you want to be. But then you walk in the door, and your fantasy future collides with reality. So: What comes next? In this episode, we talk to Congresswoman Lauren Underwood and Uncanny Valley author Anna Wiener about intense new jobs, and how to embrace the optimism of a fresh start withou...

On August 18, 2012, Cher tweeted: "Whats going on with mycareer." In this episode we ask what's going on with OURcareers—how do we know when it's time for a change, and what does it feel like to actually quit? Esther Perel offers some advice about work, friends, and feelings.

Eva Chen is Instagram's resident queen of fashion... but she's also a life-long Babysitters Club obsessive who just published her third book for kids. She sat down with Stella Bugbee to talk about how she gets it all done, from sanitizing her airplane seats to the sneaky email trick that keeps her sane.

When Alison called a Lyft after a night out with friends, she was looking for a quick ride home. Instead, she was driven across state lines, to a park — and the next morning, she woke up with no memory of what had happened there. Two years later, she's still looking for the truth about that night. On this week's show, Alison tells her story.

Ben Lerner is not known for freestyling. He's known for writing novels (also poems). But as a kid growing up in Topeka, Ben was deep in a world of male anger—anger that found outlets in debate championships, drunken fistfights, and, yes, also white-guy rap battles. And while Ben was growing up, his mom, Harriet Lerner, was navigating a world of anger, too. In this episode, Ben and Harriet talk abou...

This week, we want to know: What does it ACTUALLY feel like to be pregnant? We asked women to tell us what they didn't expect when they were expecting... and we heard about everything from third boobs to extreme horniness to the benefits of being a pregnant war correspondent. With Rukmini Callimachi, Angela Garbes, and many more.

It’s that time of year again—and this week, we’re re-releasing one of the first episodes we ever made. It’s all about what happens when women’s whisper networks become visible... which happened on a bathroom wall at Brown in the 1990s, and in our own inboxes two years ago.

Sperm donation used to be a deep, dark secret. But increasingly it's out in the open, and it's raising brand new questions. Like: When dozens of strangers start popping up on Facebook and saying you're related, how do you even define "family"?  This week, we've got two stories about parents and children figuring it all out.

Rebecca Traister checks her phone first thing in the morning: It's always full of bad news, but that bad news is her job, and she wants to know what she's getting into right away. On today's episode, Traister--the politics writer for the New York Magazine and the Cut--tells us how she gets it all done, from profiling presidential candidates to constantly reminding her four-year-old to "PEE AND BRUS...

An episode all about anxiety—from panicky thought-spirals to demented self-soothing techniques.  Featuring Aparna Nancherla, Jenny Odell, Sarah Wilson, our extremely anxious colleague Ruth Spencer, and many more.

Eve L. Ewing has spent years living in Chicago, working in Chicago, and thinking about Chicago--she knows the place. Then she found an 800-page document that changed the way she saw her hometown. On this week's show, Eve explains what happened in Chicago in the summer of 1919.

Featuring: Brittany Luse, Zoe Haylock, Aminatou Sow, Glory Edim, Kaitlyn Greenidge, Angela TK, and Ashley C. Ford.

Elizabeth Warren has spent most of her career as a teacher. Before she faced off with a stage full of opponents for the Democratic nomination, she was facing off with a roomful of rowdy 5th graders intent on cutting each other's hair. So what would it mean to have a teacher-in-chief? On this week's episode, Rebecca Traister pays Warren a visit to talk about her life in the classroom (and drink tea ...

How can you fight back against online abuse? Writers Clementine Ford and Ijeoma Oluo tell us about a few go-to tools, like screenshots, mass-blocking, and the mute button. But what if you don't live your life online — and you’re dealing with a troll who seems to know everything about you? That's what happened to Francesca.

Tiffany Caban’s outsider campaign for Queens district attorney could come down to just 16 votes. But Rebecca Traister says this race was thrilling long before it came down to an election night dead heat. 

Brittany Packnett is an activist who rose to prominence after she became a leader of the protests in Ferguson back in 2014. Since then, she’s worked with leaders on the federal and state level on ending police brutality, and was appointed to President Obama’s task force on 21st century policing. Brittany talks with Stella Bugbee about how she gets it all done, including how she decompresses from de...

Alison Roman is a cookbook author, New York Times and Bon Appetit columnist, and she’s also the brain behind The Cookies and The Stew, those chocolate chip cookies and chickpea stew that you’ve likely seen in your Instagram feed. This week, Alison sat down with Stella Bugbee to talk about how she gets it all done, including how she develops her recipes, deals with online critics, and embraces her i...

When Hannah was a kid, everyone knew she was dying. All over town, donation cans showed a picture of her: a sweet little girl with cancer who needed help. But it turned out that Hannah's story wasn't so simple—in fact, she still doesn't understand everything that happened to her as a kid, and all the lies she was told. In this episode, Hannah gets a chance to talk to someone who can help her figure...

Taffy Brodesser-Akner is perhaps best known for her profiles of celebrities like Gwyneth Paltrow, Tonya Harding, and Jonathan Franzen — turning her subjects into characters through the irresistible drama of being famous. Now, she's turned to fiction, and has just published her first novel, Fleishman Is In Trouble, about the painful dissolution of a marriage. Taffy talks about her long-standing fasc...

What is life really like inside an immigrant detention facility? In this episode, we talk to Karla, who came from Honduras to the United States as part of the much-discussed migrant caravan. When she walked over the US border six months ago, she thought she’d be reunited with her kids in South Carolina. Instead, she spent months in a terrible limbo. And when Karla's family is finally reunited, she ...

Filmmaker Sandi Tan told the Cut that her next project would be an adaptation of Elif Batuman's novel The Idiot — it's a book about a hapless college freshman. So we brought Elif and Sandi into the studio to talk. Sandi pumped Elif for autobiographical details, Elif told us her big revelation of 2018, and they agreed that people who lose touch with their past selves — however idiotic — are the wors...

Cynthia Nixon joins us this week as we consider the past and future of abortion. What does it look like to end a pregnancy when the law stands in your way? Wendy Zukerman from Science Vs tells us about a group of women in the 60s who developed their own safe abortion kit. And we hear from a Dutch doctor who’s made it her mission to distribute abortion pills in countries without access... which has ...

The spring thaw is here... or is it? The Cut staff tries to figure out what it means to be horny in 2019. (The answer involves asking Adam Driver to run you over with a bus.)

When you see "Mom" in your missed calls, do you start to sweat? Does a voicemail that starts "Hi, sweetie, it's me, so sorry to bother you..." make you twitch? You're not alone. Whether you have a great relationship with your mom or a predominantly shouting-based one, calls between moms and their kids are complicated. And on this episode, we hear from friends, colleagues, and listeners about how th...

Cynthia Rowley is a fashion designer, author, and successful businesswoman, despite not having a background in business. Stella Bugbee talks with Cynthia about balancing work and life, hustling Andy Warhol at the start of her career, taking risks in fashion and business, and much more.

This week, we listen in on a conversation between Dr. Alexandra Sacks, host of the new podcast Motherhood Sessions, and Anne. Anne never wanted to be a mom. For years, her family, friends, and husband all told her, "When the baby comes, you'll change your mind" — but the change never came. Anne's now the mother of a toddler, and she's still struggling with lingering doubts about motherhood.

Topeka Sam and Holly Harris are two women on opposite sides of the political spectrum who’ve worked together to pass criminal justice reform. They both played a part in passing the First Step Act, which reduced mandatory minimums, made it easier for families to visit loved ones, and allowed people who’ve been incarcerated to leave jail early for good behavior. Stella, Topeka and Holly discussed how...

Nicole Cliffe and Daniel Mallory Ortberg met in the Hairpin comments section and quickly became long-distance friendship soulmates--they went on to start the website The Toast together. This week, they tell us about everything that's happened since they first bonded over Rebecca, answering questions like: How does a friendship change when one of you transitions? What about when one of you finds God...

Tamara Mellon is a fashion designer, businesswoman, and magazine editor. In the 90s, she founded the luxury shoe brand Jimmy Choo, which she walked away from back in 2011. We talked with Tamara about starting her professional life over again in her forties, her path to sobriety, how she's come to peace with fractious family relationships, and much more.

Author Curtis Sittenfeld talks about what it means to sell out -- from short stories on Chipotle cups to brand-written tweets. And she reads her short story "Creative Differences," about the making of a viral ad campaign.

Yasmeen Hassan is the Global Executive Director for Equality Now, an international non-profit that has successfully pushed governments around the world to pass laws protecting women from sexual exploitation and harmful cultural practices like genital mutilation. Stella and Yasmeen discussed how to get it done as a single mom, the importance of face to face communication, and growing up in Pakistan....

Marriage: Why do we bother? Our theory is that it all comes down to a good story--so this week, we've got two couples with really good stories. First, she's Deaf and he's hearing. Second, a couple who met while he was serving 25 years in prison.

On this week’s show, Stacey Abrams tells us how she wound up $200,000 in debt, and Abigail Disney explains why no one should have a private jet. We're talking about the financial baggage we inherit from our parents—whether that means a trust fund, a mountain of medical bills, or a compulsive attraction to two-for-one deals.

In 2014, Nora McInerny miscarried a child, lost her dad to cancer and her husband to a brain tumor, all within weeks of each other. Since then, she's written three books - her latest, No Happy Endings, was just released - and started a podcast called "Terrible, Thanks for Asking." Stella talked with Nora about how she got it done while her life was in turmoil, and how she gets it done now, as she b...

This week, we return to the dawn of sexual knowledge--a time when the first stirrings of horniness were paired with a total lack of useful information. Featuring AIM, purity rings, a nail polish bottle, Song of Solomon, and The Neverending Story.

Our "How I Get It Done" series is back! For this episode, we sat down with Rukmini Callimachi, award winning journalist and host of the podcast Caliphate. She's been reporting on Islamic extremism for over a decade, and her reporting has brought her to some of the most dangerous places in the world. Stella Bugbee talked with Rukmini about how she balances the risks of her job with her ambition, her...

We talked with Sally Rooney, author of Conversations With Friends and Normal People, about why she writes, how she’s smuggled socialism into page turners, the best way to keep her readers hooked, and much more.

Natasha Lyonne, Greta Lee, Padma Lakshmi, Aidy Bryant, and Hope Solo tell us how they tackle rejection, imposter syndrome, new job stress, and get it all done.

This week, we’ve got a story that gets at the power of brain drugs in a way we hadn’t heard before. It comes from our friends at the Nod, and it’s about brain drugs but also about racial trauma

This week, we take a look at ambition: the internal force that wakes you up at 2:30 am full of ideas, that makes you want to do more than you thought you could, or than anyone else said you can.

A cartoon, a genius, a man who hated sweatpants... Making sense of one of the greatest fashion designers of all time, with Vanessa Grigoriadis, Carl Swanson, and Cathy Horyn.

In the fight over later abortions, the political rhetoric is miles away from the lived reality. This week, we tell one woman’s story.

How are we feeling about weed? On this week's show, we talk to Ben Sinclair and Katja Blichfeld of HBO's High Maintenance, Jia Tolentino, Aminatou Sow, Allison P. Davis, Nazanin Rafsanjani, Alex Blumberg, and many more.

When Lisa Miller's editor came to her with this story idea, she didn't want anything to do with it. But then she started poking around... and wound up spending the next year reporting what she found. On this week's show, the link between menopause and late-onset schizophrenia.

"Likeable" has always been a loaded word when it comes to women in politics--it sounds a lot like barely-veiled sexism. But what if everything's changing? How does a politician make voters like her in 2019?

Two different eras of sexual tumult, two very different blockbuster stories about sex. This week, we discuss books and boning.

Sarah Koenig is the host and co-creator of Serial, the show that made podcasts a cultural phenomenon. After three seasons of exhaustive reporting, we wanted to ask her: how does she get it done? We sat down with Sarah to talk about how she balances work demands and supporting her family, her work wife, how she got over her fear of flying; and much more.

It's the perfect time of year for apologies. Instead of thinking about everything you're going to do right in the future, what about everything you did wrong in the past? We asked our listeners what they were sorry for... and they had A LOT to say.

Samin Nosrat, Angela Dimayuga, and Carla Lalli Music do their best to help Madeleine Aggeler--the Cut's semi-competent food columnist--throw a dinner party for her friends.

In this installment of our "How I Get It Done" series, Stella Bugbee talks with writer and actress Jill Kargman. 

A caravan of migrants from Honduras reached the U.S. border a few weeks ago. Now, thousands are living in a camp in Tijuana, waiting to find out whether they'll be allowed in the country. We visited the camp to talk to women about what life is like in limbo -- caught between countries, separated from their families, with no idea what comes next.

In this installment of our "How I Get It Done" series, Stella Bugbee talks with artist Amy Sherald. 

A few weeks back, on Twitter, some doctors started posting photos of the bloody aftermath of gun violence: the things they see at work every day, not just when a shooting makes the news. 

For the first in our "How I Get It Done" series, Stella Bugbee talks with Good Morning America host Robin Roberts. 

This week, an investigation: what's going on with pubic hair these days? From basic maintenance to celebrity grooming trends, we look at the mysterious and messy experience of dealing with your pubes.

This week, stories about motherhood, and the bullshit that comes your way: a woman whose marriage crumbled during her second pregnancy, and Stella Bugbee talks with Anna Sale, the host of Death Sex and Money, about managing anxiety, maternity leave, and professional ambitions while pregnant.

This week we’re talking about the Neapolitan novels, by Elena Ferrante. An adaptation of the first book in that series, My Brilliant Friend, is coming to HBO later this month... and we’re using that as an excuse to revisit Ferrante's world. With Ruth Spencer, Ann Goldstein, Samhita Chakraborty, Aminatou Sow, Danielle Oteri, and Dayna Tortorici.

It's election day. There are a record 257 women are running for Congress, and on this week’s show, we're focusing on one of them: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Just under 16,000 people voted for her back in June, but in the months since then, she's become an international star. In this episode, a look at the reasons everybody is paying attention.

The violence of the last week has clearly shown how hateful rhetoric can translate to real-world violence. So, what do we know about the conditions that allow hate to take hold? In this episode, Cut writer Anna Silman examines the path to right-wing extremism taken by her high school classmate, Faith Goldy.

The Shitty Media Men list, an anonymously sourced Google spreadsheet, was online for less than 24 hours last fall -- but we're still feeling its effects. On this week's show, we talk about what it's like to watch a whisper network in real time, and the recent lawsuit that has the list back in the news. Plus, we take a look at another anonymous list... one that appeared on a bathroom wall at Brown U...

On our first episode, we’re talking about power: from the inadequacy of empowerment, to what it feels like to be powerful (and powerless); and how to change who actually has power.

The Cut on Tuesdays brings you women’s voices on culture, style, sex, politics, and people: It’s everything The Cut can’t stop talking about.