Trashy Divorces

Ready for some royalty? No, not that kind – this week we feature the Trashy Divorces of music royalty! Alicia details the First Couple of Country Music, George Jones and Tammy Wynette. Their relationship covered a lot of territory, from a heroic table flip to a double-barreled shotgun, and every other country music trope you can think of. Then Stacie takes us back to Memphis for the story of The King, Elvis Presley, and his (sorta) child bride, Priscilla.

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To celebrate Mother’s Day, we decided to cover the Mother of Trashy Divorces – Elizabeth Taylor! And to cover Elizabeth Taylor, we asked our friend Erica Kelley of the Southern Fried True Crime podcast to join us! Elizabeth Taylor was complex: a child star, a hard-drinking beauty, a foul-mouthed sophisticate, a one-take actor, an Oscar winner, a widow, a mother, an activist, and a many-time divorcee. Elizabeth Taylor was singular. Come meet her with us, or get to know her again.

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This week, Stacie shares a listener suggestion: Barnaby Joyce, former Deputy Prime Minister of Australia and, apparently, a trash man on the make. After a career as a family values champion, a 2018 sex scandal known as #barnababy brought a swift end to his 24-year-long marriage and a firm estrangement from his four daughters.

After the break, Alicia has a story she’s been waiting her whole life to tell: Martha Mitchell, wife of Nixon-era Attorney General John Mitchell, and the flawed Cassandra of the Watergate scandal, and, in the memorable words of one listener, “that resourceful little drunk-dialer.”

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Alicia explains the multifaceted life and times of former Hollywood executive turned writer warrior for justice Dominick Dunne to Stacie. Stacie shares the unimaginably complicated and (yet somehow) inspiring love of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera.

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This week, we look at very different relationships. Stacie shares the sordid tale of the nearly six-decade-long marriage of New York real estate developer Harry Macklowe and his wife Linda, who recently completed their trashy divorce at the tender ages of 80+. Then, Alicia has all the tea on the three trashy divorces – and deeply sad personal story – of Marilyn Monroe, a timeless icon who married and divorced the likes of Joe DiMaggio and Arthur Miller.

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Join us for an exploration of the failed romances that shaped - but certainly didn't break - two pioneering women writers. First, Alicia brings us an enduring mystery from the life of the mother of the genre, Agatha Christie. On Friday, December 3, 1926, the 36-year-old author disappeared without a trace, only be found 11 days later safe and sound in a hotel in Harrogate. What happened during this period has been a point of speculation for nearly a century, and Alicia thinks she's got all the tea for this one.

Then, Stacie brings us closer to current events with the unfortunate tale of the celebrated marriage of writers Nora Ephron and Carl Bernstein. When they wed in 1976, they were considered a power couple. Bernstein had recently been half of the dynamic duo who took down a president, and Ephron was a columnist for Esquire magazine who was reinventing the form for women. They were the life of party in DC and New York, until Bernstein fell for the wife of a foreign ambassador. From this catastrophe, Ephron rebuilt herself and her career, and found lasting greatness.

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This week, pull on something mustard yellow and get your glitter scarves out of the closet: we're taking a trip to the 1970s!

First up, Stacie has the trashy situation that rock superstars Fleetwood Mac found themselves in circa 1977, when the whole band was a roiling mess of heartbreak, infidelity, illicit attraction, and power-pop prowess.

In the second block, Alicia has the heartwrenching story of the marriage of Carly Simon and James Taylor. Though they had two children and spent years together, James's drug addiction eventually made the marriage untenable.

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And we're back! In case you aren't familiar with the subjects of our season two opener, Donald Trump is the son of a real estate millionaire based in Queens, New York. He got into the family business as a young man and made a bit of a name for himself, ultimately becoming a reality TV star. Along the way, he had five children, three weddings, and a couple of trashy divorces. We're not ruling out a third divorce for him, either.

His story is trashy, but it's even trashier when you dive into the life of his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr. Don Jr. had a startlingly tragic adolescence and has gone on to live deep in the shadow of his father - and somehow decided that the senior Trump's life choices were something to emulate. We don't get it either.

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Yes, it’s our week off, but we wanted to share some of the Trashy Tidbits that we put up on Patreon, as well as reveal Stacie’s hard-hitting No-Strology rebuttal to Alicia’s astrological framework. And wouldn’t you know it? No-Strology works pretty well as weird science too. We also update you on some Royals action, Rudy shouting, and preview a trashy octogenarian NYC divorce. See you back next Sunday, March 31, for Season 2!

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For our season one finale – we’re taking one week off and will return March 31 – we wanted to play a little, so we’re telling some stories that might not normally fit into a theme this week. First, Alicia brings us the story of the King and Queen of the Jazz Age, writer F. Scott Fitzgerald and his wife Zelda. Though they never actually divorced, the story is a great illustration of the reality that some marriages don’t work, and a lot of people would be better off ending a marriage rather than staying in it.

Stacie follows that up with the story of a Manhattan address that ties together a bunch of Trashy Divorces threads. Its owners have included a previous Trashy Divorces subject, a divorcing couple we’re likely to cover in the future, and a slightly mysterious real estate magnate who will likely reappear.

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