A YEAR OF THE POD. Can you believe it, Rats??

We can not BELIEVE that we’ve been doing this for a year and we’re oh so grateful for every single one of you that has joined us so far - whether that be for 1 episode or 105 episodes.

Today to celebrate we are going IN on our ‘Love Is Blind’ Season 9 thoughts - because it wouldn’t be a Mel & Sam pod without a shameless reality TV deep dive! We talk about the political undertones of the season, the representations of masculinity, the good, the bad, the ugly, the glass closet, some of our reunions predictions and so much more.

We also (very importantly) rank our fave chocolates, mourn the canning of Queer Ultimatum and celebrate Lucy’s catering business. It’s all happening!

Love and cheese cubes to you all this Ratfood day, and we will of course see you for another Ratbag on Monday.

Mwa mwa mwa!

Mel & Sam

xoxo

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://youtube.com/@themelandsam?si=jzeN-E_-DcE-DGHS

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well Productions

Produced by Thomas Zahariou

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Trick or TREAT you absolute rat heads!!! Welcome to the first EVER Halloween episode of Ratbag, and by Halloween episode, we mean, the first segment is Halloween based. Hell yeah.

In today’s episode, Sam brings the best of the best costumes that are copyright free, found on the internet and riffed on today for your pleasure. Once going through the selection, Mel and Sam then toss around their own copyright free versions of some classic characters including Aunty Donna, Virginia Gay and many more.

The ‘Bring Bring Bitch!’ hotline gets them talking about their favourite films of all time, and why, and then we take a trip down memory lane and reflect on all the tech items of the early 2000s we miss oh so much!

Love you as always and see you Thursdays for another '‘Ratfood!’

Mel & Sam xx

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://bit.ly/MelAndSamYouTube

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey cutie patooties!!

Welcome to today’s Ratfood where we’re chatting allllllllllllll about the Madagascar penguins most recent successful project (aka the HEIST of the Crown Jewels at The Louvre). Mel has all the details and we are SCREAMING at how it all went down.

We also chat the girlification of RACV on the precipice of Mel finally getting her license (shout out to that dexy), SKIMS new release of the full bush underwear and being full dolphin-mode for surgery and the ins and outs of having a Go Get as a getaway car.

This and lots lots more - have a listen and have a giggle with us! And if you see us sporting any crowns in the next week … no you didn’t.

Love and cheese cubes to you all this Ratfood day, and we will of course see you for another Ratbag on Monday.

Mwa mwa mwa!

Mel & Sam

xoxo

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://youtube.com/@themelandsam?si=jzeN-E_-DcE-DGHS

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well Productions

Produced by Thomas Zahariou

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Study pads out. Phones down. Welcome to your lecture. Today we will be going in deep on the 'Courtney Take Your Break' effect that rose to cultural relevance in musical theatre a few years ago. If this means nothing to you, don't you worry by the end of this episode you will be noticing this moment in every musical you watch.

We then take the time to both share our coming out stories in our 'Bring Bring Bitch!' hotline segment because we realised we have never done it on this pod!! Our 'Kick Ons' is an incredibly impossible palava and then we then have a 'Courtney Take Your Break' riff off for our 'Hit It Toots', where two theatre kids go head to head to have the most impactful ensemble moment.

She's a super fun one (we think!) so enjoy you darlings!!

Love you as always and see you Thursdays for another '‘Ratfood!’

Mel & Sam xx

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://bit.ly/MelAndSamYouTube

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey babies!

Have we mentioned we LOVE YA?! Welcome to today’s Ratfood - she’s an absolute jam packed one with a bit of everything!

Sammy opens up about her Depop era - doxing, Gen Z validation and all - and we then launch in to a very giggly chat about some of our worst marketplace and depop experiences including a horror story involving a lemonade can and a trip to the hospital, an Elsa dress scam and an accidental therapy session.

We then have our second ever ‘Grassrats’ segment (thank you for all the positive feedback on this segment so far - we’re so glad you guys are loving it!)

We have amazing theatre-maker Ollie Ayres and Kaite Head (SKINT Producing) on mic to talk about their incredible Melbourne Fringe show ‘No Seasons’. The work delves in to the feeling of being on the precipice of a choice - in this case, whether or not to have children. Ollie shares his experience of having his eggs retrieved at the young age of 19 before starting testosterone, and now being ten years older, mulling over what this means to him (and to his partner) now.

BUY TICKETS TO ‘NO SEASONS’ HERE: https://www.melbournefringe.com.au/whats-on/events/no-seasons

We hope you’re having a gorgeous week wherever you are, and we will of course see you for another Ratbag on Monday.

Cheese cubes for all!

Love,

Mel & Sam

xoxo

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://youtube.com/@themelandsam?si=jzeN-E_-DcE-DGHS

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well Productions

Produced by Thomas Zahariou

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey rats!!

Welcome to another episode and today we are unpacking something very interesting and NO one is talking about it - the unspoken rule of gift giving, and what is appropriate to gift someone vs what is not!

We then take the time to both share the people that inspire our art, and our lives, thanks to a listener dm for our hotline segment. We thought why not shout out the people who make who we are!! Our 'Kick Ons' has us designing our own reality tv shows and then we then we had to sing our gift giving woes in our 'Hit It Toots!'.

Thanks once again for chosing our pod!! We love ya!!

See you Thursdays for another '‘Ratfood!’

Mel & Sam xx

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://bit.ly/MelAndSamYouTube

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi bbys!

Welcome to another Ratfood. Today we’re going IN on the Taylor Swift chatsssssssss. We’re unpacking ALL our thoughts on the album on everyone’s lips, what we liked, what we didn’t (spoiler alert!! It was a lot!!) and what we would’ve loved to have seen instead.

Mel also chats briefly about her stint in the hospital - nee naw!! BBL alert!!!

Let us know your thoughts on the album in the comments below.

Lots of love, and big fat cheese cubes to you all.

xx

Mel & Sam

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://youtube.com/@themelandsam?si=jzeN-E_-DcE-DGHS

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well Productions

Produced by Thomas Zahariou

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Buckle up cuties because it's time for another guest ep! If you have been to a mainstage musical in the last few years, odds are you would have seen this star on the stage, whether it be playing the role of Eliza in Hamilton or Catherine Parr in Six, she is a force in this industry and she's joined us today... it's Vidya Makan!

In today's episode Vidya chats all about the process of writing her musical 'The Lucky Country' which is opening for Melbourne Fringe this October and for Melt Festival this November! We also chat navigating Australia's industry as a minority that isn't often represented on stage and how beautiful collaboration can be in the artistic process. Of course it wouldn't be a Ratbag without opening up our hotline for your questions, and then we get Vidya improvising her own spin off Hamilton-adjacent musical in our 'Hit It Toots!'. We are beyond grateful to Vidya for joinung us. Go and follow her / her work - she is brilliant!

We hope you enjoy!

See you on Thursday for another 'Ratfood'.

Love Mel and Sam

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://bit.ly/MelAndSamYouTube

Follow Vidya here: https://www.instagram.com/vidyamakan/?hl=en

Buy tickets to 'The Lucky Country' for Melbourne Fringe here: https://www.melbournefringe.com.au/whats-on/events/the-lucky-country

Buy tickets to 'The Lucky Country' for Melt Festival (Brisbane) here: https://www.melt.org.au/events/the-lucky-country/

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

Buy tickets to our LIVE POD @ Cheerful Earful: https://cheerfulearful.podlifeevents.com/festival/ratbag-with-mel--sam---live-from-cheerful-earful-podcast-festival-4-oct-2025-tickets?clientside_routing=true

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey there you rats!

We soldier on into another week of pretending we aren’t hosting the biggest music-theatre-loser-pod of all time as Mel finally shares the long (one week) awaited story of the agent from hell! This story is absolutely WILD so get ready because what we are about to tell you, you will absolutely lose your minds over.

This then leads into chats about the industry as a whole and just how vulnerable it can be when auditioning / when you put faith in the industry and it lets you down.

We then launch a brand new segment called ‘Grass Rats!’ - aimed at showcasing grassroots projects whether they be theatre, music, film, tv, dance - whatever! We are very passionate about underground work, emerging work etc and thought it would be a perfect segment to throw in every now and again when there’s an artist working on something and we wanna shine a spotlight on them for a sec! Today we are joined by Leigh Lule, writer and actor in the new TikTok series ‘Ceebs’. We chat all about this project and much more, so stick around to the end of the ep for this!

Thanks so much you hunnies and see you next week!

Mel & Sam

LINK TO CEEBS : https://www.tiktok.com/@ceebsseries

LINK TO LIVE POD: https://cheerfulearful.podlifeevents.com/festival/ratbag-with-mel--sam---live-from-cheerful-earful-podcast-festival-4-oct-2025-tickets

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well Productions

Produced by Thomas Zahariou

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey hey dear listener and WELCOME to another 'Ratbag' episode!

Have you ever wanted a deep unpacking of the Instagram Story Fonts? Well you're in luck because today we are doing the very necessary ranking of IG Fonts using Mel's important ranking scale. We then chat in our 'Kick Ons' about the items that would bring us back to life (someone get Mel her potato gems) and our 'Bring Bring Bitch!' hotline is a creative prompt sent in by a listener. We then improvise our creative pitch in our 'Hit It Toots' and the only word that you need to know for this is: The L Word.

She's a super fun one (we think!) so enjoy you darlings!!

Love ya guts and see you Thursdayas aaaalways for another '‘Ratfood!’

Mel & Sam xx

—

You can watch the full video form of this episode on YouTube HERE: https://bit.ly/MelAndSamYouTube

Follow Mel & Sam on Instagram (@themelandsam) to keep up with all things pod, live shows and other nonsense. And remember, our Bring Bring Bitch hotline is always open! You can also send submissions to [email protected]!

Buy tickets to our LIVE POD @ Cheerful Earful: https://cheerfulearful.podlifeevents.com/festival/ratbag-with-mel--sam---live-from-cheerful-earful-podcast-festival-4-oct-2025-tickets?clientside_routing=true

—

Mel & Sam would like to acknowledge that Ratbag is being recorded on Stolen Land.

The original custodians of this land have had a rich history of storytelling for over 65,000 years, and we pay our respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation whose land we are recording Ratbag on.

Treaties were never signed. Sovereignty was never ceded. Always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

—

A Grouse House Podcast

Recorded at Haven't You Done Well

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.