#243 – Two Broadway Musicals, Succession and GOATs doing GOAT $hit!

Spun Today with Tony Ortiz

In this episode I speak about watching two Broadway Musicals: MJ and Back to the Future! I also speak about watching the HBO series, Succession and wrap it up with another addition to our legendary segment “GOATs doing GOAT $hit” where we celebrate the true champions of greatness and highlight the phenomenal achievements of extraordinary individuals.

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Links referenced in this episode:

MJ the Musical: https://newyork.mjthemusical.com/

Michael Jackson - Dangerous Diary MTV 1992 HD: https://youtu.be/OWC5uPK93fE?si=MQpzBldf_k9gqxoO

Back to the Future the Musical: https://www.backtothefuturemusical.com/new-york/

Succession: https://www.hbo.com/succession/season-1

Rebirth of a Bad Boy: Diddy Explains Handing Over Publishing Rights & Reveals His ‘Total Truth’ https://www.msn.com/en-us/music/news/rebirth-of-a-bad-boy-diddy-explains-handing-over-publishing-rights-reveals-his-total-truth/ar-AA1gEX69

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] What up? What up, folks? What's going on? Welcome to the Spun Today podcast, the only podcast that is anchored in writing, but unlimited in scope. I'm your host, Tony Ortiz, and I appreciate you listening. This is episode 243 of the Spun Today podcast. And in this episode, I speak about two Broadway musicals,

which I can't believe I took this long to mention them,

especially for one in particular.

So definitely stay tuned for that. I also speak about

watching the Succession Series.

An HBO series that I was definitely late to, but had the added benefit of being late

in that it allowed me to binge the entire series.

And lastly, I wrap it up with another addition to our legendary segment goats doing goat shit where we celebrate the true champions of greatness and highlight the phenomenal achievements of extraordinary individuals.

Stay tuned for all that good stuff. But first I wanted to tell you [00:01:00] guys about a.

Quick way that you can help support the spun today podcast.

Your support is greatly appreciated.

Not only can it help out financially

to help keep the lights on in good old spun today studios,

but it definitely adds fuel to the motivational fire

that I rely on to continue putting out episodes. And even more importantly, finding time to write.

Nay, making time to write.

So thank you. Thank you. Thank you to each and one of you,

to each and every one of you

that have shown your support to date. And thank in advance to each of you that will show support in the future. Here is one quick way that you can help support the Spun Today podcast. Definitely stay tuned for the outro of the episode where I'll tell you about a bunch of other ways

that you can show your support. But here is one of those ways. And we'll jump right into the episode.

The first musical that I wanted to tell you guys about was

MJ, the [00:02:00] musical.

Here is the official synopsis. He's one of the greatest entertainers of all time. Now, Michael Jackson's unique and unparalleled artistry has finally arrived on Broadway in a brand new musical centered around the making of his 1992 dangerous world tour. And created by Tony award winning director, choreographer, Christopher And two time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage, MJ goes beyond the singular moves and signature sound of the star, offering a rare look at the creative mind and collaborative spirit that catapulted Jackson into legendary status.

I went to check this out with my best friend, Steven. Shout out to Steven's Spun Today alumni, who has been on the pod several times in the past. We thought it would be cool to check out.

You know,

kid touching and molestation and all that,

which has obviously [00:03:00] tarnished

Michael Jackson and how we view him,

all that aside.

And I know in and of itself, it's like a controversial topic where some folks are like, no, they're all 100 percent rumors and nothing like that ever happened. Nothing was ever proven in court. And then the other folks on the other side where say. You know, the rumors have been rumors for decades for a reason.

It's all true. It was even worse. I know the audience is split when it comes to that.

From an artistic body of work perspective, he's obviously, as the little synopsis says there,

one of the most legendary entertainers of all time.

Now from attending and, you know,

watching this musical,

And for someone who likes going to like Broadway plays and musicals and enjoys that

genre of art and acting and singing and stuff like that as a consumer, from that perspective, [00:04:00] we had a great time.

And Michael Jackson in his heyday, I was a kid for that, a little kid, but I obviously know his music and his body of work and I think you'd be hard pressed not to find. Or to find someone that wasn't aware

of any of it,

but I obviously never saw him live or anything like that

going to see this play, though, the way they did it,

you definitely get that experience, albeit at a much smaller scale, but you definitely get the, like, you feel you're watching Michael Jackson. That's how good of a performance, not just the Michael Jackson characters did with it.

But just the entire cast and the world that they built and created around it.

And from a storytelling perspective, it was interesting how they did it. Because it is this very, and I guess, makes sense. In terms of it being like a deliberate conscious [00:05:00] move to do it this way. So you don't have to bring in a lot of like the things we know about Michael now. The allegations and court cases and...

Drug abuse and, and stuff like that. So they didn't have to bring too much of that into the story because again, from a storytelling perspective, it's a very myopic focused view of

his time around

his 1992 dangerous world tour, which is his biggest tour ever. One of the biggest tours ever.

And it was chronicling, the buildup to that,

all the practice sessions.

And how he was as an artist

getting ready for that performance.

And in the play, there

is an MTV crew that was given access to chronicle this whole thing to do a,

a piece on, you know, this very much anticipated world tour,

which was based on true events that MTV [00:06:00] piece. Actually exists and I'll link to it in the episode notes for you guys to check out.

So we got to see this interesting view of. That MTV camera crew. Trying to put together their creative vision of this documentary. While also getting close enough. Access to Michael Jackson to see his inner workings and stuff like that and picking up on.

Certain things like.

The beginnings of his drug addictions, which we know now ultimately led to his death in that he had a private doctor giving him shots or like IVs of

trim butyral or something like that. I forget the exact medication name of what he ultimately died of, but it's

supposed to be a strong ass, sleep aid. And so much so that he was getting that shit [00:07:00] injected on a nightly basis just to be able to try to get some sleep.

And ultimately that's what he died of. And the doctor that was prescribing him the medication wanted him to go to jail for a few years and losing his medical license, I believe. But in the play, it shows him getting drugs from his manager or other folks like that were part of the stage team. I think it was his manager.

And you get some insight into the all too common story of,

you know, people in positions of power, whether it's in our music, politics, whatever, just having a circle of yes men and women around them that do what they want and don't really check them.

And we saw that through the lens of, again, the beginnings of his drug addiction. And we also saw that same

dynamic playing out with his financial team and how he wanted to pay for [00:08:00] this over the top

concert and do like never before happened things like him being shot out of not a cannon, but something that shoots, shoots him out and onto the stage and him running out of money. And then Pushing his accountant and his financial team to mortgage Neverland Ranch, where he lived just to continue funding this artistic vision that he had, even though all the

financial folks around him, lawyers, accountants, financial advisors

warned him against it, he still ultimately got his way, i. e. via these yes men.

So that was definitely interesting to see. They also showed.

A direct correlation between his

abusive childhood with how Joseph Jackson, the father was always depicted as, you know, being super, super hard stage dad, forcing them to practice [00:09:00] all the kids when they were the Jackson five for hours and hours on end, no breaks, didn't really have a childhood. You know, they had fame when they were young.

So they didn't have a, you know, especially Michael being the youngest. Of them, of the Jackson 5, or second youngest, I believe. But never really having a childhood, or traditional childhood.

They showed correlations of that, instilled hard work ethic.

And they kind of papered over the, physical abuse in the play. With how hard Michael Jackson was on his crew and the choreographers and everything. And the dance team around him and how they were all exhausted and he would force them to to work hours on end just like his dad did to him and kind of showing that

traumatic shift, trauma shift of, you know, him being the recipient of that and then dishing it out as he got older in the same exact way [00:10:00] and then seeing himself as, you know, becoming his father in that sense.

But the play did a great job in also showing different.

Stages within Michael Jackson's life,

they showed him as a child, you know, as a flashback scene, because the entire thing again takes place around

him working up to this dangerous world tour and being interviewed by the MTV crew

and them filming and interviewing him in between rehearsals, etc. But while they were interviewing him, he would flash back and tell stories of childhood, of his mother and his father, Jackson 5, transitioning, going solo. And you got to see different actors, which did a phenomenal job of playing Michael Jackson.

Now we did go on an off day, I think it was like a Tuesday or Wednesday. So every cast member, including Michael Jackson, wasn't necessarily the best.

Number ones, if you will. I believe the young Michael [00:11:00] was, but I don't believe the middle Michael that they showed as well as the older Michael Jackson that's being interviewed. I think he was also the understudy,

but I mean, these are all top tier phenomenal actors, right? All did an amazing job. And we got to hear all the hits, all Michael Jackson's hits, all Jackson five hits.

And it really did feel like a Michael Jackson concert experience

as a narrative choice. Again, it does seem to me to have been a deliberate choice to

tell this story from a specific

point in time. And in doing so not have to, or I guess they had the ability to paper over

all the negatives that we know of Michael, like the drug abuse and

child molestation allegations, so on and so forth.

So you definitely lose something historically. From that perspective, but as a piece of [00:12:00] entertainment,

we do wind up enjoying a shitload of music

and just how they put the musical together. It was definitely an entertaining watch. And I definitely recommend it. MJ the musical, check it out

back to the future. The musical,

if you guys know anything about me, I am a huge,

Back to the Future fan. I've spoken about the movie multiple times. I've highlighted how the screenplay for Back to the Future 1 is considered a perfect screenplay and I think it's taught in theater classes. It's my personal favorite trilogy of any genre, any movies, all time.

And I've also said, controversial to some, that

it's one of the rare occasions where the sequel, Back to the Future 2. is even better

than the first movie. And I know that's blasphemous for some folks to hear. And even I myself go back and forth [00:13:00] between that thought from time to time. But just from the creativity of it alone to delve back into the first movie through the second movie and find ways to tie

into the first movie, And make things that already existed within the first movie, make them that way because of the actions of the second movie, which was filmed and created. I think it was something like five years later.

It's just fucking amazing from, from that standpoint. And I'm such a fan that my debut novel fractal Available now, SpunToday. com forward slash books, so you can find all the links of all the different places where you can find it.

Back to the Future is an inspiration for

that story. It is a time travel tale, as I like to say.

Furthermore, I dedicated that book to my first [00:14:00] born Aiden, and

the quote, the very first quote after the dedication section of the book, is a quote. From back to the future, part one

from George McFly to Marty McFly,

stating, if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish absolutely anything

in him speaking to writing his first novel. So there's a complete tie in on multiple levels there. I fucking love it.

I literally have a life size replica of the hoverboard immediately to my left right now. That said, I signed up, or, like, I follow all the different Back to the Future fan pages, official, unofficial. And I saw months before that they were developing the musical.

I also subscribed to a bunch of different newsletters having to do with Back to the Future and the DMC newsletter, even from the DeLorean Motor Company. And

I signed up to be alerted when the pre sales went on, [00:15:00] and I bought these tickets months in advance, I think something like seven months in advance. That's how much I was anticipating going.

So I copped the tickets and my wife and I, shout out to Zoila, sponsored alum,

went to go see it and had an amazing time.

Being such a fan holding, I'm both holding the musical to a very high bar. I don't want them to fuck it up while at the same time being completely biased

and knowing that I'll find a way to love it some way or another.

So holding my love for the story. And the history of the film aside,

as much as is humanly possible and attempting to be objective,

I personally thought they knocked it out the park. Now they clearly didn't have, I'm not sure if Back to the Future, if it's old enough, I think it came out in 89, where the story itself is public domain or if they actually got

the rights to [00:16:00] retell the story in this format. Because I don't believe that

Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale were involved with the musical. I could be wrong, but I don't believe they were. And

I wonder if certain choices that they made throughout the musical had to do with not having the full rights, or if they had to do with just trying to retell the story on the stage.

Because although it was still very, very, very true to the original Back to the Future 1 film, which was another thing that I was curious about if they were going to try to encapsulate all three films within the musical, but it wasn't. It was just a retelling of the first one.

But everything is not, you know, word for word, verbatim, although it does have a lot of the same key scenes. But then... Certain other key, certain other key scenes. For example,

the famous skateboard [00:17:00] scene

in front of the diner, when Biff and his crew chase Marty and wind up crashing into the manure truck

and Marty's getting around the skateboard, they didn't redo that scene,

but in its place, they kind of extend the scene of the lunchroom where. Marty first confronts Biff,

you know, where they both kind of grab each other and make fists and they're about to punch each other, but then Strickland shows up and breaks it up, essentially.

And Biff tells him, why don't you make like a tree and, and get out of here. They elongated that scene instead and made that the chase scene and made it so that Biff was chasing Marty throughout the lunchroom. He was jumping over tables and hitting him with lunch trays and running through the school.

And they had an original musical number there. So they took certain liberties that way. I guess it was easier to do [00:18:00] it that way. If it wasn't a licensing issue or concern, it was easier, it must have been easier to put that together versus the actual skateboard scene and having multiple cars and etc.

But it was something that I was curious about.

It was kind of interactive in that, you know, like they had the enchantment on the the sea dance and during it

when Marvin Barry and the Starlighters are playing Earth Angel there were in the actual theater there was Bubbles, there was a bubble machine or something. There was bubbles going all throughout so we were in the first few rows and you know, we could swat the bubbles and that kind of built the atmosphere around around the whole thing And of course he did the Johnny B.

Good scene in terms of the cast, all phenomenal. The gentleman who plays doc killed it.

Oh, and that was another thing also, they did not do the, you know, terrorist Libyan terrorist [00:19:00] shooting scene,

which I guess to make it more PG they made it that doc was using the plutonium for the 1. 21 gigawatt reaction that he needs. Within the flux capacitor to make the time travel possible, but that he was using an old

radiation suit, which wasn't completely insulated. And that's how he wound up dying initially versus getting shot by the terrorists. But yeah, the gentleman who played doc amazing,

super funny, steals the show. The guy who plays Marty's spot on, did a great job. But the person who played

Crispin Glover's character of George McFly dead on balls accurate to quote Marissa Tomei fucking amazing spot on like they could reshoot back to the future drop this gentleman in place of [00:20:00] Kristen Crispin Glover who legend has it was like an absolute asshole on set and that's why he wasn't in part two or three, but.

Drop him into that role and you wouldn't tell the difference. He was amazing. Fucking awesome.

The guy who played Biff was really good. Really looked the part.

Which brings me to the number one star of the show. The DeLorean.

They did it so ill that it looked like an actual real DeLorean that was up there. I guess they just, you know, it's just like the outsides or whatever, but it really looked like an actual replica real DeLorean.

And it's obviously the moment that all the fans are anticipating the most, you know, when they first see the DeLorean,

which they did the big reveal and like the same same way at Twin Pines mall, [00:21:00] which then becomes Lone Pines mall at the end when Marty runs over. Old Man Peabody's

Pine Tree.

Symbolizing how the littlest change in the past could affect have a ripple effect on the future. But they did an amazing job with the car itself and then with the actual time travel sequence. So the theater, the decor of it, can't also, this is how it also immersed the, the crowd aside from the bubbles thing from, from earlier.

The decor. The balconies on the sides, on the left, on the left and the right, they were also part of the decor. Like there weren't

people sitting in the seats there.

Instead, they had this metal

widgets and circuitry spanning all of the balconies. And during the time travel sequence, like when Marty accidentally goes back to 1955, all those start lighting up in different [00:22:00] colors and it's reminiscent of the flux capacitor and the lights around the actual DeLorean, which they also show

and really immerse you and bring you into it in that way.

And then at the end, which was even more amazing because they could have just done that again. They

with like a crane or something, something you couldn't see, but some sort of lift, they lift up the DeLorean. For the scene where, you know, the clock tower scene when he's going back to the future. They lift up the DeLorean and push it forward into the crowd. So it's hovering above us almost.

Like above, the first couple rows. Not completely, but just enough for it to be off of the stage.

Can you imagine the fucking lawsuit that thing would have fallen or something? But obviously it was secure and it was just so ill the way they did it. And I couldn't have been happier with Back to the Future the musical. I definitely, definitely highly recommend.[00:23:00] If I have the chance to see it again, I definitely will.

Tickets should be a lot more reasonable now.

That's the only

issue I had with it. Although I was willing to pay, so whatever. But apparently it's not doing well, or as well as anticipated. And the. Ticket prices. I checked the day of for my same seat and it Was like 40 percent less in terms of the actual pricing

But that aside it was an amazing experience.

I Loved every bit of it. If you're back to the future fan as I am you will too Back to the future the musical Check it out

HBO's original series succession Is a series that ran from 2018 to 2023. Like I mentioned in the intro, I didn't start watching the series until 2023. Literally while the final season was, was airing. [00:24:00] So,

that came with the benefit of being able to binge it and see it all the way through.

But in terms of sharing some of my personal takeaways and tidbits here. It's it shows a bit out of the zeitgeist.

And some references might be dated, but we'll share them nonetheless for posterity.

Here is the official synopsis. The Roy family is known for controlling the biggest media and entertainment company in the world. However, their world changes when their father steps down from the company.

And as we like to do here on the Spun Today podcast, I wanted to shout out each and every one of the writers,

starting with the show's creator, Jesse Armstrong.

Followed by Jamie Carragher,

Susan Soon Hee Stanton, Alice Birch, Miriam Batty,

She a Batty, she knows she a 10.

Georgia Pritchett, Tony Roche, Nathan Elston, Callie Hirshaway, [00:25:00] John Brown, Will Tracy, Lucy Preble, Jonathan Glaser, Ted Cohen, Anna Jordan, Mary Laws, and Will Arbery. Shout out to each and every one of the writers on Succession who put together an amazing show.

And I particularly want to shout out the, the writers

in this particular series, because they took what

is the embodiment of quote unquote evil rich people,

you know, just like the vile

borderline sociopathic

Narcissistic archetype of, you know, the greedy, quote, unquote, greedy, rich people.

And they made us, the viewers,

through the strong characters that they created, that the writers created,

and that the actors, which were phenomenal, and I'll speak to it in a minute, brought to life.

They made us, as the audience, connect [00:26:00] with those characters, and in some cases, in a lot of cases, actually root for them to win.

Which, if you take a step back and look at the ruthlessness with how they

navigate the world with little to no care of who or how

they affected others.

When you look at it objectively through that lens, it's like, fuck these people.

But since they're developed so richly as characters, and it's such a character driven show in my opinion.

we still connect with them and root for them on a human level. And that I think is a testament again to just amazing writing. So shout out again to the writers there.

Now the cast absolutely killed it. Kieran Culkin is one of my favorite characters. He plays Roman Roy, the youngest of the four children.

Brian Cox is the matriarch, the Rupert Murdoch like character

who [00:27:00] created this Conglomerate multi billion dollar company.

He's just amazing.

Tom Wombs Gans played by Matthew McFadden. Such a cool character. Very selfish. It turns out as, as all of them have traits of selfishness, but he was in it for himself from the jump and. He plays possum throughout, so much so that he's married to Shiv Roy, the daughter, played by Sarah Snook, also does a great job,

but she's like a, you know, princess, always gets what she wants, kinda has the quote unquote trophy husband, cheats on him,

and he just takes it all, and his character is such that you hate him at first, so. because he's such a pushover and you're like yo stand up for yourself you fucking pussy

then you wind up rooting for [00:28:00] him then you wind up finding out that either he's been running a game the entire time or he just got caught up in it and began running a game somewhere along the line and became fed up great characters both in real life British I believe it's

a good job with the American accents there Same as Logan Logan Roy's character, Brian Cox.

And by British, that's just my dumb American interpretation of their accent. You know, it could be Australian, Zealand, or who knows.

Conroy, the eldest half brother played by Alan Ruck. Shout out to Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Really cool character. Shout out to the Conheads out there. Jeremy Strong. Not the eldest, but the eldest of the full siblings of the three, you know, Kieran Culkin's character, Sarah Snook's character, and himself, Kendall Roy.

He was the heir to the throne, if you will. And in the very [00:29:00] first episode, which sets the stage for the entire series,

the first half of the episode is him going through

The process of getting ready to take over the company because the father had announced his retirement. He was gonna step down Kendall Roy is gonna take over and in that very first episode the father winds up Literally fucking him over and saying nah, I changed my mind. He's like, wait, what my You changed your mind.

I'm supposed to take over next week. He was like now let's give it a couple more years I decided to stay on He was like, but we announced it to the world and the, you know, it's a publicly traded company and the stock and this and that and blah blah blah. He was like, yeah, that's all bullshit. Don't worry about it.

And you have this tension within the family always throughout the entire series of the son trying to take over from the father, the father trying to maintain control, the father getting sick, the other siblings trying to vie for control,

sometimes being on the same page with each other, most of the time not, and just like this complete [00:30:00] dysfunction.

And it was such an interesting, family dynamic

that really keeps you hooked. I also thought it was particularly interesting the way that the show was shot. And I got this from some of the, not behind the scenes, but the extras of the show where they, you know, interview different characters and they also have a podcast, et cetera. So I don't remember if it's from one of the extras or from the actual podcast, but

one of the directors, I think the main one Mark Millard. Maybe it was Jesse Armstrong, the creator of the show, but they were breaking down how they shot in a way where they zoom in to the actual characters for emotional exclamation points. So they called it. And you notice that throughout the entire series where they'll, you know, they'll shoot a scene and then.

For the character reaction, they'll zoom in to the character's face, which is pretty interesting. And he also mentioned that on set, they [00:31:00] always kept live cameras around so that the art, the actors themselves, they didn't know when they were being shot or not. So it forced them essentially to stay in character.

And he likened it to filming theater, similar to when you go see a play. How all the characters, as long as they're on stage, they're in character, you know, that whether they're the main focus of a scene or not, or a background character, they're always doing something. They're always on, if you will,

then I'm going to jump to in season two, episode 10, I jetted down here. There was a dope line that Logan Roy said again, the matriarch of the family played by Brian Cox,

and he was speaking to money and wealth and how most things don't exist. Or companies rather. And he said that the Ford motor company hardly exists. He said that it's just a time saving expression for a collection of financial [00:32:00] interests. Again, all the Ford motor company was to this psychopath was

just a time saving expression for a collection of financial interests. I thought that was such an interesting way, such a financially motivated lens to view the world through.

And I just love the way that was phrased. All the four Ford Motor Company is, is just a time saving expression for a collection of financial interests. Jesus.

There's a lot of double crossing in the show the siblings with each other, the father to the, to the kids, the kids to the father.

There's a point in the season two finale where you think Kendall is going to rise to the occasion and, you know, be the

heir to the throne that the father, [00:33:00] you know, wants him to be, that is grooming him to be. But he winds up double crossing his father again,

as he did multiple times throughout the series.

And I thought it was interesting that he had a lot of ups and downs, you know, he had addiction issues in the show. They reference all the time that he had a stint in rehab.

And just from a mindset perspective, he was always

either completely out of it and crying and in the dumps or completely manic and on the fucking ball.

He reminded me a lot of Kanye. And or the public version of Kanye that we've been seeing in. You know, recent news and media cycles and all the drama around the Kardashians and all that shit and his manic episodes. That's what he was reminiscent of to me.

I loved the relationship between two main characters, both outsiders of the family in their own right,

which was Tom Wamskantz, which I [00:34:00] mentioned earlier, which was the husband of the daughter, Shiv Roy. His relationship with Greg Hirsch, played by Nicholas Braun, which is a second cousin, extended cousin to the family that they barely know, but that works his way into the fold and

Tom brings him under his wing kind of because he sees himself in, in Greg in some ways, you know, being an outsider of the family, but also because he wants to have someone to have power over.

And he finally found someone lower than him on the totem pole, if you will, within this family structure.

And they just have a back and forth, funny, quippy, really interesting dynamic throughout the entire series.

And I'll wrap it up with a, a line of dialogue from Alan Ruck's character, Connor Roy, when it spoiler alert, this happened in season four, episode seven. But Connor, who

decides to run for president, out of all things, of the [00:35:00] United States, and Kieran Culkin's character, Roman Roy, hilariously tells him, don't you think you should try

for something smaller first? You know, maybe like running a CVS or something? But Connor gets himself in a position where... essentially his actual, you know, the two rivals for, for president, the Democrat and the Republican running, they're neck and neck, like razor sharp, you know,

49 percent to 49 percent margins. And Connor is

polling at like 1 percent or something like that. It's something, something sick that pretty much put him in a position to make a deal with one of the other guys where he would drop out of the race and His supporters would vote for that person, and that person would essentially become the, the president.

And he's trying to see what he can get, you know, what position he could get from the person that would ultimately win. And one of them offers him to be the diplomat of Alman, which is a [00:36:00] country that I had never heard of.

And he tells him that it's an interesting thought. He'll, he'll definitely mull it over. And that Oman is

the poor man's Saudi Arabia and the rich man's Yemen.

And again, I just thought what an interesting way to view the world and view things. But yeah, yo succession dope show. I definitely recommend you guys check it out if you're into that type of thing. It's supposed to be loosely based on Rupert Murdoch and you know, Fox news, that type of

billion dollar conglomerate company and the tension and dynamics. Within his children, for example Rupert Murdoch, I think I've spoken about here on the past. One of them is like liberal, liberal leaning, which is kind of like Shiv's character in succession. And the other one is very conservative.

Then they're both vying for succession of Fox, for example. So this show is loosely based on that, or at the very least, it's like one of those are imitates life imitates art type of things. [00:37:00] But that is my little recap and review on Succession, streaming now on HBO Max. Check it out. Goat

doing goat shit.

And I want to create a drop for, specific to this segment of the podcast because it is a recurring one. And I have some things that I've been tinkering with and working on. But speaking it aloud to see if I can hold myself to task because I've been meaning to do that, , forever. I just haven't gotten around to it, but the goats doing goat shit segment is a segment where I like to celebrate the true champions of greatness and highlight the phenomenal achievements of extraordinary individuals, especially when they do things that they do not have to do.

And in this episode's

edition of goats doing goat shit, I'd like to welcome

none other Then Sean P. Diddy Combs to the list.

Now, for the longest time,

and still, [00:38:00] Puffy is known as being a ruthless businessman, if you will. Someone who

hustled and busted his ass and built and created bad boy entertainment,

which has brought us countless acts and

music that we all love to this day.

And many, many artists,

but one thing that he did in building his empire from the ground up was recreate the, what some may say myself included, archaic,

traditional,

let's call them music artist deals, where the label that signs an artist winds up owning their publishing their masters, essentially making the lion's share of the money that is to be made from the art created by the actual artist. And the artist is often times in doing this type of bad business

left fending for scraps.

And music artists, [00:39:00] historically, this has happened to across different genres since the beginning of time.

Some but few and far between have had more savvy, you know, teams and lawyers and sound financial advice around them

and just the foresight of ownership. of your creation, being able to reap the benefits of it in perpetuity versus, you know, taking a bigger bag up front, but then never being able to profit from it down the line.

So that's definitely been the biggest knock, in my opinion, on, on Puffy over the years in this respect. As of September of 2023, it became public that

Puffy was returning his publishing rights. Which, by the way, he did not legally have to do.

Returning the publishing rights to the artists and songwriters

that helped him build Bad Boy Entertainment.

Folks like Ma$e, which was the most vocal, [00:40:00] and actually recently dropped, and by recently I mean within the last year or two, diss tracks and

did a lot of interviews and references to all of this, which are actually pretty good.

Faith, The Locks, which is another vocal components of, you know, Puffy's business practices, 112, and the estate of Biggie, the Notorious B. I. G. They are all getting, or have gotten, their publishing back because the paperwork and agreements have all been signed and are actually finalized. And according to Puffy, in an interview that he gave to Billboard.

He had a lot of offers back in like 2021 when, you know, like folks like Justin Timberlake and Shakira and a lot of folks were selling their, their publishing, their, their catalogs for like a hundred million dollars, $300 million, et cetera. He got an offer, an alleged nine figure [00:41:00] offer. To purchase his catalog, which included all the publishing that he owned, owned legally from all these artists.

And that's when he supposedly decided to not sell and

give the publishing back to the respective artists.

It just took a lot of time between then and now to actually execute the

legal documentation, etc.

But I thought that was a dope move. It wasn't something that he had to legally do. Did Puffy make, over the decades, a shitload of money off everybody's catalog? Yes, of course he did. Was he legally correct to do so? Yes, he was. Whether it was ethical or moral or not, and hypocritical in some sense,

those are all valid criticisms in my opinion, but he wasn't technically or legally... it wasn't something he had to do. So I definitely applaud him for doing [00:42:00] so. I'm always of the mentality of just own your shit and be of the mindset that if someone, a publishing company, a label, if you're in music, a publishing company, if you're in, you know, writing or creating different types of art, a platform, et cetera, if they're coming to you with a bag, To purchase outright, whatever it is that you created big bag, small bag, whatever.

They would also pay you for just licensing it. It'll be a smaller bag,

but in my opinion, and I'm not the fucking Messiah here, but in my opinion, if you're offering me a big bag to just own my shit outright, it's because you from a financial standpoint, believe that you're going to make that money back and more over time. So it would also be a sound business move from your perspective to license [00:43:00] it for a smaller bag for a shorter period of time, because you will also make your money back within that shorter period of time.

And then some, and in that type of scenario, you keep your shit then afterwards, license it out to someone else, make money off of it yourself, maintain the ownership. So you could do whatever it is that you want with it in the future. Turn your book into a movie, turn it into a TV series after that, do both at the same time, turn it into a fucking VR

spectacle that hasn't even been created yet, but will exist in 10, 15 years. And since you have the ownership of your IP, you could do that instead of handing it over for a bit bigger bag now, and then the company that purchased it from you. Maintains that ability moving forward. So

again, with that said, I'd like to welcome Sean P. Diddy Combs officially onto the Spuntoday goats doing goat shit list.

[00:44:00] And that folks was episode 243 of the Spuntoday podcast.

Thank each and every one of you very much for listening. I really, really appreciate it.

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