Alex Cooper on flipping "Call Her Daddy" into a media business and entering the creative agency space

Speaker A: Foreign. Welcome to another episode of the Mixed Signals podcast from us here at Semaphore. I'm Max Tawny. I'm the media editor at Semaphore. With me, as always, is our editor in chief, Ben Smith. Ben, viewers of the show, listeners of the show know this is a special episode where not only we're in the same place, obviously, uh, but the backdrop is this beautiful, uh, location. It's really hot. Uh, we're here at Cannes because we're interviewing Alex Cooper in a few minutes.

Speaker B: Yeah, what a gad, right? Like one of the really iconic figures of this era of media. A, you know, huge creator, as they. As they insist on calling themselves and people call them, but who's also built. Trying to build a really big media business.

Speaker A: Yeah, Ben, obviously, we have a lot that we want to get to with Alex. We want to talk about her career trajectory. We want to talk about the biggest moments from her show. Obviously, there's a lot going on, uh, with her and with her business. There have been some articles that have come out recently about, uh, what the state of her media company, Unwell, uh, is leadership changes, that they've been going through some friction. And of course, we just want to get her to talk about what it's like to be a celebrity star interviewer interviewing the biggest guests in the world.

Speaker B: Yeah, I think I have a business question, which really is. I'm a little skeptical of this model of a creator creating a media company around themselves, but with lots of other talent. I think she's unusually ambitious, unusually successful at this, and that's kind of what I want to ask her about.

Speaker A: Well, we have to take a short break, but we'll be back with Alex Cooper, of course, live on stage right after this.

Speaker C: Our friend Josh Spanier, Google's VP of marketing, has a new podcast out called Frontier cmo. It's from Think with Google. And it gets into all the ways marketing is shifting, especially in the AI era, where the old marketing playbooks have become obsolete and, and the whole role of the CMO is being redefined in real time. Josh talks to the people who are actually figuring it out, top CMOs, industry leaders and creators, and gets into the real world challenges and specific strategies they're using to navigate this new era. These are notes from the marketing Frontier. You can find Frontier CMO on any podcast platform or watch it on YouTube.

Speaker A: Amazing. I feel like the last time you were up here, it was actually literally the hottest day in French history. Is it better today? Is it. How do you. I mean, it Feels better.

Speaker D: I feel like they figured out how to get me to not pass out as these little like side breeze fans. And I brought a handheld today, so hopefully I'm making sense by the end of this.

Speaker A: We've got pretty good coverage, I feel like in terms of our fan spread up here, which is great. You got it.

Speaker B: That is our goal here. Nobody pass out. Please, please stay hydrated. Um, thank you for doing this, Alex. You, I think, unlike many people in your position, love Cannes and have been coming here for years. I think it's your fourth year here as creators have moved from like a, uh, confusing fringe to the center. And I'm just curious like how you've seen those changes around how people see you. Like how has your experience here changed?

Speaker D: That's a really good question. I think it's two pronged because on one hand the industry, yes, has changed so significantly. So showing up in the beginning as a creator, I was eager to just make connections and learn from people and if anything, probably be noticed and hopefully make a deal or something. And now obviously having a media company and also having the shift in the landscape where people are looking to, yes, creators, but also our media company unwell to be like, what do we do? Right now the entire industry feels like it's been disrupted. I do feel like we in an amazing way have an upper hand. Not in the sense of, um, were taking over and it's completely shifting, but more in the concept of like, oh, people are actually respecting it in a way that it is now a two way conversation. And it's not just legacy holds the seat forever.

Speaker A: So you have, I mean, we were talking about this extensively backstage. You were telling us about how involved you are in a lot of the uh, partnership that you have with Google and like the creative, uh, involved in that in a way that was kind of shocking to me because I think a lot of people want to get to your level and then essentially so that they don't have to be involved in the advertising and marketing. You know, you've called yourself a marketer at heart. You worked in ad sales. You, I want to read this quote that you gave the Wall Street Journal recently. You said Gen Z has grown up scrolling their feeds, but the reality is they're being bombarded by sometimes tone deaf brands. What did you mean by that?

Speaker D: I feel like everyone right now is looking at Gen Z like they're this enigma of like, how do we catch them, like shove them in the corner, try to get them to listen to what we're saying, like how do we reach them? And I believe then a lot of times the brand deals can feel forced and they can feel inauthentic. And I think what has made my company Unwell so unique is that has been in our DNA since day one. Community building, understanding the audience. And so you can kind of suss out when something feels forced and not authentic to that brand or when something feels organic from the very beginning. And I think that consumers nowadays are so quick to call bullshit immediately. Like, you have liter one second before they keep scrolling. And so the way it looks visually, the first word that is used in the second that you are consuming that, um, content, it is so imperative to the success or the detriment of that brand deal you have.

Speaker B: Your colleague Joanne was just showing me, um, the micro drama that you put out that struck me as like, both very, very deeply integrated with Google and then also very much your voice, just as an example of what you were just talking about. Can you talk through that a little bit?

Speaker D: So when we launched Unwell, we did not have a creative agency at Unwell. We had a podcast network, we had a television and film studio. We launched consumer products as one of our first new sectors. Um, we started a charitable foundation. We had live events, but we didn't have a creative agency because that's just not who we were. As we started working with different brands, we started to recognize, wait a second, we keep having this middleman and, and we keep end up doing all of the creative. Because the creative agencies that we were working with didn't understand the audience that the brands coming to us were trying to appeal to better than Unwell itself. And that was the day that we were finally, we're like, why don't we just start a creative agency ourselves? Google was our first partner in that creative agency, which is still mind blowing to say to this day, because it's Google. And you're like, that's a pretty good first partnership. Okay, I'll take it.

Speaker B: Um, and it's good to be Alex Cooper.

Speaker D: It is. Is good to be Alex Cooper sometimes. But I will say what has been so striking about the relationship with Google is they know their products better than anyone and they know where they're going better than anyone. But no one understands women and Millennial and Gen Z women, I believe, as a media company, better than Unwell right now. And so the meeting of our minds really worked together where Google trusted us to launch essentially campaigns for them. Our first campaign that we did get lost for Google, Pixel, came out last year in 2025. And it was one of their biggest advertising, um, campaigns of that year. It did double the impressions they could have ever expected. It's been used in all of their research, um, when they're like, this was a success story. And so I was like, okay, no pressure, we gotta do it again. So when we went back to the drawing board of how can we do another Google Pixel ad that essentially breaks all expectations, we wanted to think of a format that is going to create a conversation that is not expected but still will work with our audience, these Gen Z young women. And a micro drama was a format that immediately came to the drawing table when we came together with the creative. I think that when you think about a micro drama, right now people who are consuming vertical content, I.e. young Gen Z women, right, they want to be able to see high definition, great quality content. But also recognizing that we went to a Google and we're working with a brand. And a lot of times if you launch a campaign, you're thinking of one asset. And we recognize at Unwell, when we had our creative agency working on this, that a microdrama actually allows you to have a long format asset that could be uploaded if you want long form, onto YouTube, for example. And then you can cut that piece of content into 15 to 20 extra individual clips. And so part one, part two, part three. So you essentially have a 15 part campaign that is being rolled out and you're just getting that much more traction, that much more engagement. And so when we presented it to Google, they were like, yes, where do we sign up? This is perfect, let's do it. And it just launched, um, this week and it's been such a success. And the, um, the watching, the engagement and also the people in the conversation it's creating is exactly what you're doing.

Speaker B: You're a person who reads the comments.

Speaker D: Oh, I'm in the comments. I'm in the comments.

Speaker A: Um, it's so interesting to hear you get so incredibly granular, uh, with the details of this. I was struck by that when we were talking about it backstage. Could you ever see, right now, obviously you're doing a lot of the creative for yourself and properties at Unwell. Could you see it expanding beyond that?

Speaker D: Oh my God, no. I got to keep my secret sauce in Unwell. Uh, we got to keep it right where it's supposed to be.

Speaker A: I'm just saying, you're like, I was watching you talk and I was like, I forgot that I'm talking to Alex Cooper, the podcaster. I thought this was like a creative direct you know, agency direct. Well, you are an agency director, obviously.

Speaker D: No, I appreciate that. I will say that back in the beginning days of how I got started is Call Her Daddy, my podcast. And I really do attribute a lot of the success to, yes, the authenticity in the conversation. It was polarizing and it was the right moment in podcasting. But I do believe it also was the marketing and the amount that went into the strategy behind the voice and the building of the community and the cut downs and the language that was used. And so I think that's always been a part of me. But now to get to expand and have co founded Unwell with my husband and to get to work with some of the most creative people I've ever worked with, and hiring such incredible people, it's genuinely my biggest passion is to get to sit with a group of people every day and be like, how are we going to break the Internet this week? How are we going to get people to engage? How are we going to get people to talk? And so I can't imagine myself ever not being in those rooms in that circular table, being like, what's on the docket this week?

Speaker B: It's a universe that favors talent, where it's fun to be an individual journalist. It's great to be a creator, and everybody wants to be that. And being an executive, uh, these days is a bit of a step down in a way, or at least some of some more. Some nights. I think that, you know, Ben says

Speaker A: this as an executive himself, having made

Speaker B: this particular choice myself. Do you feel like there's a trade off there? Like it's a. It's a pretty nice life to be a creator these days. And there's a lot of headaches that come with running a company. And I'm just curious, like, if you could talk a little about that trade off, that choice.

Speaker D: I mean, I will say that I feel like I've never just been a host or a creator. I think that my main goal when I studied film and television at Boston University was to one day be a film director. So, like being a host of a podcast, I was like, oh, this ended up working out like, wow, there's a lot of money in this and there's a lot of fandom in this. This is fun. But I think that I have always approached it almost like I look at Alex Cooper, the host, as I'm producing her. So I've always had this weird separation within myself where I've always edited my podcast, I've always been marketing it. I've always been Doing the back end, which I completely recognize that there is a lot of talent in a beautiful way who gets to show up and sit in the seat and read the cards. And it hasn't been in the pre or post edit or process or prep.

Speaker B: I again wrote this.

Speaker D: Who wrote your question?

Speaker B: I can't even read them.

Speaker C: I wrote them.

Speaker A: I did.

Speaker D: But, um, so I. There you go. I transcribed, um, so I think in a sense, from the inception, I've never just been a creator. Um, if anything, I probably feel the most confident behind the camera. And so I think when I was able to start this media company, it actually felt the most authentic to who I am because getting my hands dirty and actually getting into the weeds, of course, it's a, A lot more work, I will say, than just being a host. But I was an athlete. I love competition. I love getting my hands dirty.

Speaker A: Well, you know, one of the things that goes along, obviously with, uh, managing a company is you do kind of have to unfortunately become hr, obviously. There was this Vanity Fair article that came out. You addressed it yesterday at the Wall Street Journal house. We're not going to get into the specifics of the article, but I am kind of curious, like, is there anything that you think that you want to change about the company?

Speaker D: I think there's so much growth and change always when you have a startup. Like, I always think about when I've met with other people who have had startups. You kind of talk about when your startup begins. It feels like you're literally flying the plane and you are putting the pieces together as you're flying the plane. Because again, certain divisions didn't exist when we started Unwell. Ideas can come about and then you need to go hire the division of that new sector that you're building out. And so I think change, yes, comes more with growth. I think the industry is changing so drastically that my goal is to keep my business moving as fast as the industry, which is going to require extreme leadership. Um, I believe that this past year I'm really proud. We have really honed in on the leaders at our company now being able to delegate to them and believe in them to basically own their individual divisions. When we first started unwell, there was about 10 plus people. And we're like, all right, how are we doing this? Let's roll up our sleeves now. I feel like we are actualizing it to the degree that each division has a full built out strateg structure. So that's exciting.

Speaker A: No, it's funny because I was actually thinking about, I'M a day one employee at Semaphore. We're about four years old as a media company and I think about, you know, when we started out, we were working out of essentially an apartment with uh, one bathroom. We had a shower, you know. Yeah, we had a shower in the bathroom, which Ben, I think. I don't know if you showered in there or not. There's. I heard maybe you did at one, but it's just. But it is true that we are now a very, that we are a very different company and we have kind of grown a lot and obviously there are growing pains that go along with.

Speaker D: But uh, even like you just said, like, that's the beauty of it, right? To see the growth and the trajectory of where it started. And my husband and I, him having a film and television background making YA movies for 20 plus years and then me having the podcast background and us looking at each other being like, look at the landscape of what is happening right now. We have the opportunity to create something greater together with our storytelling abilities than being individuals and creating a media company together. We saw as, yes, it's going to be a lot of work, but the end result will actually be more gratifying than us as individuals in our own sectors.

Speaker B: One of the, I think crazy things about the media business that our friends in marketing have to deal with slightly less is how much you operate in public. And there's like, across media and TV and news, there's like a large commentariat that analyzes your every business move, your end, your every HR thing. And I'm curious, like, how do you. And I think you are like top of that. There are people on TikTok making flow charts all the time about your business. How do you think about that? Do you consume it? Do you learn from it? Do you block it out?

Speaker D: I think I do a little bit of both. I think that again, having the recognition that I'm in a very unique position, that a lot of business owners are not hosts and public figures and talent and also. So there's a lot of nuance that goes into my position and I recognize that. And so I also, um, I met Oprah yesterday and I was like, you're the blueprint. Like she, she did such an incredible job of building out her business in the capacity of, yes, being facing, but also being behind the scenes building something out. I think you kind of have to trust your gut. There's always going to be road bumps. But at the end of the day, I believe that what we are doing is so unique. And even coming to Cannes, I've never felt more inundated with people wanting to work with us. And so we have something really special. It's just about being really specific about who we work with and what we listen to and all the noise and how we take that, learn from it, grow from it. Uh, yeah.

Speaker A: Wait, we have to go back. You met Oprah yesterday. What did you guys. What did she talk to you about? We have to hear about that.

Speaker D: Well, I texted my mom. My mom's freaking out. She's like, what do you mean, you met Oprah? I'm like, I'll tell you when I get back to the States, Mom. She's like, what are you talking about?

Speaker B: Finally impressed.

Speaker D: Casual. Um, I interviewed Gayle King the other week, and the episode went so viral. And, um, we started chatting about Gayle, because obviously they're BFFs. And, um, no, I just said to Oprah that, like, as a woman in this industry, I recognize just how difficult it is. And she has been someone I've always looked up to as this extremely strong individual who has had a path forward that she has had her eye on since day one. And she's been resilient. And I think as a woman, it's important to have a woman to look up to. And so I just. I gave her all the flowers I possibly could.

Speaker B: You're 31, and I think at the beginning of, you know, potentially very, very long career, like Oprah, how do you think about that? You could be easily doing this for 50 more years.

Speaker D: Yeah. Oh, my God, I hope I am. I think that when you genuinely love something, and I always say, like, I'm so fortunate to have my, you know, passion become my purpose in life. I don't think this is something that happened to me, and I have a lot of empathy for when someone blew up on TikTok, and they're like, oh, my God. I was in college, and I didn't even know this was going to happen. And I didn't know if I wanted to go into this industry. Like, that just wasn't the case for me. I have been the young woman in my basement since day one, making content, stealing my dad's camera, trying to make content and movies and directing and producing. So I think this is, like, in my blood of who I am. My father was a sports television producer. My mom's a psychologist. I feel like I was able to take the beauty of them both and merge it together for my career. So I just don't see a world where I could Ever not be doing this because it genuinely fuels me every single day.

Speaker A: I was surprised to hear earlier that, you know, you said that you were, you know, in the comments you read stuff. I feel like, uh, you know, whenever I, uh, watch, you know, look at clips of myself or whatever that are circulating around there, I'm like, oh my God, wait. I do not want to hear what anybody has to say about me. I guess how do you kind of keep strong mental health while you're in the comments section? Uh, that can be difficult. I can imagine.

Speaker D: I don't know. I think I just have had. When you share a locker room with 20 plus women in college and you have an older brother and you. There's a lot of things that went into my life where I think you have to take everything with a grain of salt. I have very thick skin. I also am very confident in who I am. And I know as a woman that can be sometimes off putting, but I'm never going to change that. And so I think, yes, there's always going to be commentary, but I've always said a view is a view. Whether it's a hate view or a like view, you can't differentiate. A view is a view. If people are talking, they're talking and we're making money.

Speaker B: We'll be right back with more from Alex Cooper. We have to take a quick break.

Speaker C: We spent 2025 talking to people who channeled the excitement and belief in AI, uh, in media and marketing. A lot of that conversation in 2026 will be about the hard work of building with those tools. Think with Google is here to bridge the gap between inspiration and implementation. This isn't fluff. It's a rigorous look at the mechanics of growth to help CMOs solve the hard problems, like navigating complex consumer journeys, Improving value through better measurement. Make this the year you turn potential into performance. Visit thinkwithgoogle.com.

Speaker B: So many people are watching. Call Her Daddy. At this point, what share of unwell is Call her Daddy? And how do you think about that evolving?

Speaker D: Well, what's really exciting is when we started unwell, obviously Call Her Daddy was a huge part of it. And today I can say what's very exciting is of course Call her Daddy is a very big part of unwell, but that is not 100% contributing in any capacity to our revenue. Um, the creative agency this year was going toe to toe with Call Her Daddy in revenue, which was mind blowing to me. Um, our network has been. We have over 100 million followers across all platforms. And so the goal is not to just be in the Alex Cooper business. And I think this year that was actualized where I don't have to show up to an Unwell event anymore. It actually can be 100% based in the community we've built, in the brand that we've built. The recognition is there without my name on it, which was really fulfilling because at the end of the day, yes, I love being a part of it, but I do think in order to sustain a media company, you cannot just have someone be the face of it. And God forbid that person doesn't want to do it anymore or they fall back, then it all dissipates and disappears. Um, so the goal has been to actualize all the other sectors of our business and we've been able to do that successfully.

Speaker B: There are a lot of competing talent led networks that are really struggling to do that exact thing. Like that's kind of the story of that part of the industry right now. Super successful talent and then not bringing in, then the revenue, certainly not more than half other things. How do you think about that? How do you figure that out?

Speaker D: Uh, something I think that's very fascinating and understandably right now is I think there's such an oversaturation of creators in the industry. And so creators, I think, understandably, I think, are trying to survive. And they're like, how can I go to the next level? And I think a lot of creators are like, maybe I should start a media company. And the issue is, I think, and the biggest misconception about that is a, uh, creator who has a large audience has a creator business. And that is so impressive in itself. But to actually create a successful media company, the audience needs to have loyalty to the platform, to the brand, or to the community. And that is what we have built with Unwell. I kind of equate it to similar back in the MTV days where they were a cultural touchstone. When you thought of mtv, you thought of a bunch of different things, right? And so with Unwell, we now have film and television shows that are in the zeitgeist. We launched Love Overboard with Hulu and it had this huge moment where I wasn't even in it. It was just such a, in the culture. And that is our, um, that's our main, I think, objective. When we have live events, we have thousands of women show up to events in Miami, in Chicago, and again, I don't need to be there. The people are showing up for the community and they have loyalty to the community. And the feeling that Unwell presents them. So whether you're consuming our consumer products, you're at our live events, you're consuming our television shows, our film, our podcast network, that feeling is a cultural integration that I think that, understandably, creators are having a hard time not just doing on their own because it takes a lot of work.

Speaker B: So don't start a media company unless you really know what you're getting into.

Speaker D: Well, and also, I couldn't do this alone. Like, I think there's a. Understandably a misconception, because I am, um, the face of Unwell. I am not even close to only the person who is doing all of this. I have a cmo, I have the president of the company. We have my husband, who literally has brought this to fruition with his film and television background. We have people from Meta who work at a company, people who have come from Google, who have come from Netflix, who have come from Hulu, all these incredible places, Disney. And so we have real adults sitting and dictating each division. That that is how we move this thing forward. It's not just Alex Cooper with a dream being like, let's throw a live event. It's like, this is actual real work that takes place.

Speaker A: So you are now, uh, as famous, or if not more famous than many of the guests, uh, who come on your show. I'm kind of curious, how do you navigate maybe friends, even celebrity friends who may want to come on the show, but you may think, like, uh, this may not be the right fit, or this may not do super well.

Speaker D: I think the good thing is, and I really, um, am so proud of staying true to what I wanted to build with Call Her Daddy is, yes, it is a safe space for women to come on and talk, but there is a little bit of an expectation when you come on Call Her Daddy, ladies and gentlemen, okay? It's not just to come on and talk about fluff and promote your. Your brand or your new project, which I always have them do if they want to do that. We're trying to break the Internet. We're trying to cause conversation. And so, in a funny way, I do think that there's a lot of people actually that come that are like, well, wait, I want this to be noisy. Like, I want to tell a good story. And I'm like, okay, let's tell your good story. Like, what have you got? Like, who cheated on you? Like, what went down? Like, what was the divorce like? And so I think Call Her Daddy. There's an expectation there that you gotta bring it. I have had literal celebrity people say, I'm not ready for Call her daddy yet because I'm not ready to tell the story yet. Uh, and so I think that is a really good, um, just caliber to have of a show.

Speaker A: Wait, who's on the list of people who you want to have who think that they're not ready for it?

Speaker D: Oh, I can't. I can't spill their tea.

Speaker A: But just, you'll put some pressure on them.

Speaker D: There's definitely a list of women that have DM'd me being like, I'm coming, just give me a couple of years. And I'm like, I'll be here.

Speaker A: You know, it just reminds me that, like, obviously the show is about sex. And sometimes you do notice listening to it, that there are people who come on the show and they are ready to kind of jump into some experience like that. Um, I guess, yeah. How do you, how do you kind of navigate that? Like, maybe you want to take it in a certain direction. And people are like, let me tell you about this insane sex story that I have.

Speaker D: Well, the good thing is, is that I do think that is still a belief that people have. I don't think in the past, last even few episodes. If you go look like the conversation's not about sex anymore. The conversation is about liberating women. And sex is a part of every single one of our day to day lives. So, yes, back in the day we would get more graphic, but to be honest, like Cardi B coming on Call Her Daddy, she was like, let me tell you about these lyrics, okay? Let me tell you what WAP actually means. And I'm like, okay, I'm listening, Cardi. And then you have on Olivia Wilde, who is actually talking about her new movie where she's talking about intimacy in a marriage and how impactful that is within two people and communication about intimacy. So sex is so salacious to say and it always gets a good headline, but we're really just talking about women and our experiences in our day to day lives. And sex happens to be a part of that conversation. And for some reason, it's really hard for people to think about it as just an everyday thing. Um, because we're women and obviously we get shamed for that.

Speaker B: You've, um, been talking a lot on the show about your pregnancy. You've also come to Cannes Pregnant, which is very brave.

Speaker D: It is brave.

Speaker B: It's tough. Yeah. How do you think motherhood is going to change the show?

Speaker D: I'm really excited. I think that my entire career has been based off of, um, genuinely leaning into the moments that I am experiencing in life, whether I'm in my 20s, living in my first apartment in the Lower east side, waking up with a rat on my bed and having a man in my bed and being like, this is. This is living like this is New York City, baby to then now stepping into motherhood. I think what has built the community that I've built is women know that I'm gonna just be really honest about my experiences. And even prior to me getting pregnant, I've had women stop me on the street and just say, I cannot wait for you to have a baby one day, because I know you'll be so honest about, yes, all the great things about it, but also the really hard elements about being a woman and having a child and also being a working woman. And so I think it's just gonna unlock another part of me that allows me to connect with more women. Of course, it's not gonna become Call Her Mommy. It's not gonna just be a mommy podcast, but I will be able to now connect with women in a different way that I wasn't able to before.

Speaker B: How do you think about. I think for a lot of media startups, there's a question of, are you connected to the generation that you're growing up with? I guess kind of Gen Z and young millennials who are living through, living life along with you, or are you sort of permanent and eternal when you're 40, when you're 50, you're still going to have that young audience. Like, are you connected to this cohort so deeply that you age up with them? And how do you think about that?

Speaker D: I think it's a little mix of both. I think, yes, Gen Z and Millennial right now is like the young generation, and Gen Alpha is obviously coming up. So I think the beauty of Unwell and our company is signing and working with other creators who appeal to different audiences. Like, when we think about our movies or our podcast network or whatever it be, it's like, who is going to fill the fashion space? Who is going to fill the mental health space? Who is going to take the comedy space? Who is going to take the talk space? With regard to Call Her Daddy, are there other shows like Call Her Daddy? I think I'm looking at it more as a business plan of, um, yes, I can continue to age up. I would love to, obviously, continue to speak always to younger generations, because I have found on Call Her Daddy, when I sit down and I speak to Michelle Obama, I'm like, I am Just trying to listen to anything you have for us with your wisdom and your life experience. Because I feel the older I meet of a woman, the more secure she is in her body, in herself, in who she is. And when I was in my young 20s, I really didn't feel that way. So, yes, those little life lessons. I hope I can always connect with the younger generation. But then from the business side of things, we're gonna sign younger creators, and they should be speaking to Jan Alpha because they're in high school and they're the ones that are living that lifestyle right now. And so there's no competition. It's, like, more the merrier.

Speaker A: So you've been doing the show now several years, many years, uh, you know, and you've had, you know, obviously, some of the biggest guests in the world. What's an interview or an episode that really stands out? What would you say is the best one?

Speaker D: Not to bring her up again, but Michelle Obama. Um, I remember when I was about to interview her, and I have a pretty specific approach. When I go into interviewing someone for Call Her Daddy, there's a couple different ways, whether it's going to be a comedy episode, whether we're going to start from their life and go from childhood to really understand them as a human being. Um, but with Michelle, I remember I worked with my team so long on this interview, and then one day, I completely ripped up every single piece of paper. And I said, no, this is not the interview that I want to conduct. I want to use this opportunity to. With one of the most insightful women of our time. And I want to understand, as a woman with one of the largest audience for women, how are we doing this? How are we moving forward? How are we being empowered? How are we changing the future? How are we changing the next generation? How are we showing up for the next generation? And when I sat down with her, I just had bullet points, which I don't usually do, and I just had themes. And thematically, I just sat with Michelle and have never been more present and just tried so hard to soak up all of the wisdom that she had for me. And it was one of the most exhilarating moments of my life. Afterwards, she was like, oh, girl, you brought it. And I was like, michelle, I have been studying for, like, I felt like I was back in college. I really took that one to heart. Um, and it was like a passion project of mine.

Speaker A: Were there any, uh, big interviews that you did that you thought were a disappointment?

Speaker D: I wouldn't say a disappointment. I Think the biggest moments for me with Call Her Daddy is if someone shows up and is really nervous. And I can feel that, and I work really hard to get them comfortable. There's also, uh, the reality of time. And we can only sit for, what, two hours before we're both like, all right, like, we've tried it. So I think if someone's really nervous and the expectation of coming on Call Her Daddy is so big and so grand, I have felt that pressure for them. And I think that there's moments where you're like, we need a part two. We need a part two. You're gonna come back. Because afterwards, I've had guests say to me, I was so nervous. Oh, my God, I kind of just blacked out. What did I say? And I'm like, it's okay. I understand.

Speaker B: That's how Max and I feel at the moment. A final question about this event, about Cannes. There's a. Obviously, there's a Cannes Film Festival. We were talking about this backstage. The Cannes Lion Ad Festival, which always has a little bit of an inferiority complex chip on its shoulder. Marketing versus film. What do you think about the sort of question of where culture is shaped these days? Because you might as well. Matt Bell, and he wrote a very kind of a great, kind of sneering piece from the film industry perspective about that's the real event. And this is some kind of, you know, sweaty business conference. But here you are creators. Obviously, you know, the film industry, which you're very close to, also kind of tends to look down on creators. Where do you think that balance is at the moment?

Speaker D: I mean, I think it says a lot, because we could have. I could have gone, you know, with my husband to that festival, but we're here. I think there is so much that has changed in this industry. And I think when you think about legacy media, you think about, um, all of these divisions were separate, right? Like I think about in business, it was like, okay, so you had the studios that were making the content, and then you had the networks that were then platforming the content, and then you had the advertisers who were hopefully financing the content. And everything has changed. And I think Unwell is a perfect example of that disruption. We do all of that. We have the distribution because we have 100 million women engaging with us across our platforms. We have the studio back end from our film and television production back end, and we are able to completely finance with brands or self finance. Um, and so you look at how we've kind of merged everything together. And I think legacy media, as much as it can be flashy and it's comfortable and everyone looks at it and it's familiar, I just don't think that's what people are engaging with at this time anymore. And so I think it would be a disservice to think because it's been around for so long, that's where the eyeballs are. That's just not the truth. You see right now, uh, movies are being uploaded to YouTube that are getting more views than anything that's in theaters. And so to try to say that that's not where the future is anymore, you're just going to get left behind.

Speaker A: Well, Alex, that feels like a great place for us to leave it. Thank you so much. Congratulations on the baby and all of your success. Thank you to you guys also. It's hot out here. Fantastic.

Speaker D: Thank you. Thank you guys. Thank you so much. We did it.

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Speaker A: Okay, Ben just got off stage with Alex Cooper. Really interesting interview. A bit of a high wire act. Of course we have to, you know, ask of course about the Vanity Fair thing but you know, we booked the interview really wanting to know about her business. It's an ad conference. What did you think was the most interesting thing that she said up there?

Speaker B: I mean to me, like just her broad story, which is how into marketing she is, how into the business of that was shocking is honestly, uh, it's totally fascinating. So different from so many other people we talked to on the show who are like, I am a purist, I make the work and if people like it or not, whatever. And then on the other hand of that, you know, we, it's the creator economy and the creator world is such a huge part of media. So important. And yet often it's really hard to interview creators because they just want to talk about their own experiences and don't really have a sense of the landscape.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And she is just like bizarrely on both sides of the coin as both the, both talent and management and managing herself. And I think it's Actually kind of hard to do that and not become totally insane. But she seems to basically manage it.

Speaker A: Yeah. It's so interesting, uh, that she started her job as a person in literal ad sales. I guarantee you there's some ad salespeople out there being like, I could be the next. That could be me up there on the stage, you know, talking about, you know, uh, hanging out with Oprah and then flipping and talking about, you know, the creative on our new ad campaign. Uh, it was totally remarkable.

Speaker B: Yeah. And the other thing that she got to at the end because I thought, you know, Matt Bellamy, our friend, took a real, took a, you know, took the kind of film industry shot at like the lesser advertising con. But what she was getting at was if you as the producer, as the talent can kind of go around these giant streamers, uh, and studios who, you know, to her seem like basically gatekeepers taking a very high percentage of their revenue, creative product, it's a much better business.

Speaker A: She also didn't come up that way either. Right. Like she started at barstool sports, which is like, you know, not necessarily even, uh, as a part of new media isn't, wasn't necessarily ever like the sexiest, uh, you know, place in the world. It was, you know, it's scrappy. It is, uh, you know, kind of, of countercultural in some ways. Uh, and I imagine that informs her experience.

Speaker B: Right. But just like the core, I think, like goal in the media business is to like get closer to the reven, to get closer to the money in some sense and like you have these big legacy institutions that from her perspective are just in between her and the people spending money. And it'll be interesting to see how far it goes. But I think what the kind of like trajectory right now of that those creator businesses is, is to take a higher share of the revenue. To not let Netflix come in and say, hey, we'll buy this from you for a nice fee. Keep the back end, keep, keep everything. And I think there's a real struggle going on right now in the industry between, between them over basically the revenue split.

Speaker A: Obviously she's had an unbelievable amount of success. She's one of the most, uh, you know, one of the biggest podcasters, uh, in and of herself. Uh, but do you think that unwell, uh, is, is it a good business? Do you think that that'll continue to survive? Did you buy what she said up there or do you think, think it might go the way of a Westbrook or like, you know, some of these other celebrity driven businesses that have production studios and whatnot that have struggled in recent years.

Speaker B: You know, I'm, like, fundamentally skeptical of that business model, I think, and the basic internal challenge. She has a very smart new CEO. Joanne, I was talking to before, like, and asking about this, but the basic problem is, like, you are superstar Max Tani, and if I spend an hour trying to sell your thing, I'll make $50 million. You know, I can make an additional million dollars. And then you have a small podcast that you brought on board. If I spend an hour trying to sell that, I'll make $10,000. And so the incentive of the business is just always to juice the star. And there's a tendency to then wind up starving. The smaller stuff. The smaller stuff will never become. Call her daddy. I actually was sort of persuaded by her, though, I think, like, to a degree that I hadn't quite realized. She's totally aware of that pitfall of that trajectory and trying to build something real. There is obviously a real community. I think the live events are actually a pretty interesting metric. I mean, I haven't seen. Have not been attending unwell live events. If she's got people showing up for live events that she's not at, that's a great sign.

Speaker A: Absolutely. Well, Ben, that was a really, really interesting interview. I'm so glad we got to do it.

Speaker B: Yeah. Thanks, Max.

Speaker A: Well, that is it for us this week. Thank you so much for listening to another episode of the Mixed Signals podcast. Our producer is Josh Billenson. This is Ben Smith. Our editor is Manny Fadal. Special thanks, too. Let me see if I can remember him off the top of my head. Rachel Oppenheim, Daniel Haft, Garrett Wiley, Jules Zern, Tori Kaur. I think that's it. I nailed it, right? I've done the credits.

Speaker B: We should thank Azia from the Google

Speaker A: team, and of course, Azia from Google, who has dealt with a million things and handled it incredibly well and has been super fun. Thanks again. Listen to another episode of Mixed Signals, uh, next week.