Kaley Cuoco and Chris Messina Talk ‘Based on a True Story’

The powerhouse comedic actors tell Shondaland how they teamed up to realize this darkly humorous send-up of our collective true-crime obsession.

As Kaley Cuoco and Chris Messina pop onto my screen to chat about what it was like to work on Based on a True Story, their brand-new Peacock true-crime dramedy, which premieres on June 8, they are doubled over with laughter. Though they’d never met prior to playing a long-term couple going through a little, let’s say, theoretical estrangement before murder brings them back together, if this interview is any indication, they instantly forged the kind of connection where finishing each other’s sentences came to them really easily.

“We never met. It was very instant. We also kind of … our sense of humor is very, very similar,” Cuoco begins.

“Which is really dumb,” Messina adds.

“Which is just dumb, dumb, dumb, which ruined everyone’s lives on set because we just wouldn’t stop,” Cuoco explains. “But it worked for these characters, and we were able to go off on these tangents and find a lot of little magic moments together that made it into the show.”

A simpatico vibe between the two seems completely feasible, considering both Cuoco (best recognized for her Emmy-nominated turn as drunk but well-meaning Cassie on The Flight Attendant and her 12 years as literal girl-next-door Penny on The Big Bang Theory) and the affable Messina (who has appeared in many, many films, such as Air, and put in five solid years as the handsomely toxic Danny Castellano on The Mindy Project) are the kind of leads who bring an infectious charm to the parts they play.

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When you put the two together as husband and wife in Based on a True Story, you get Ava and Nathan, a couple facing imminent parenthood along with significant financial and existential crises. Their desperation drives them to bond as they attempt to do business with a serial killer in the form of a true-crime podcast, and all kinds of wild high jinks ensue — all of which is heightened by the aforementioned tangents. “At one point, one of our directors came up to me,” Cuoco begins. “We were doing a scene, and she was like, ‘Can you do this a little more straight?,’ and I was like, ‘I don’t know what that means.’ In other words, it was getting so funny and outrageous, I kept getting told to bring it down. We were just being so insane.”

Cuoco first heard about the project as any highly successful, young, hot actor does — it came around. “I heard about the project way before I actually heard about the project, if that makes sense,” she explains. “I knew the script was looming around, but I had nothing to do with it. Then it came back around for me, and I was like, ‘Oh, my God, I heard about this; this is so brilliant.’ I love true crime. I love the tone they’re looking for, and I just thought it was such a funny, funny idea. The writing was brilliant. I obviously wanted to work with these amazing producers, you know, Bateman [as in Jason] and our amazing showrunner, Craig [Rosenberg].”

Part of the appeal of the project for both of them was that it was a chance to work with the other. “When you go into a job and you know you’re going to be truly one-on-one with someone for a long time, you kind of do your due diligence and kind of ask around town and other actor friends if they’ve worked with this person,” Cuoco says. “It was like, every single person I spoke to not only knew Chris but said he was the best human being in the world and that I had to work with him. He had a gleaming reputation. It was just so cool, so I was thrilled to do this with him.”

After joking that he first read the script when he “was a baby,” Messina agrees: “Very similar to her, I knew she was in it, and I was a huge fan of hers. She’s just so talented; I was dying to work with her. And then I read it, and I loved the idea of these two people that were falling apart, and in order to come back together, they go down the strangest, dumbest, darkest path. That was interesting to me. When you do these things, you never know. I did the same thing with Kaley: I asked around about her, as she said for me. And the same thing: glowing, glowing reviews. People just love her,” Messina pauses, “and they were wrong; they were absolutely wrong!” Messina laughs, then course corrects. “You never know what you’re going to get, really. Just friendship or a way of working, and from day one, we were just the best of friends.”

Kaley Cuoco and Chris Messina in Based on a True Story.

NBC / NBC Universal

Cuoco’s character Ava is visibly pregnant throughout the series, and yes, it is her actual pregnancy. She discovered she was pregnant with daughter Matilda (born late March) early on in the process. “I was in town doing some chemistry reads, and I sat the producers down and was like, ‘What if this character was pregnant?’ And Craig was like, ‘Uh,’ and I was like, ‘No, really, you guys should really think about that,’ and I could see all their brains kind of going, ‘Wait, what?!’ They were very cute about it, very sweet, and they wrote it in, and it ended up being a great part of our show, actually. It kind of raised the stakes and the stress. I also love that it didn’t change anything about our scripts. Everything was the same; they were still doing these high-jinks moments, there were still those fantasies, there were still all these things, and it didn’t change the vibe at all, which I thought was really cool.”

Before ending our chat, I have to ask both Cuoco and Messina about the craziest thing they’ve done to pay the bills:

KALEY CUOCO: This, right here.

CHRIS MESSINA: This is it; you’re looking at it.

KC: This is as desperate as it gets.

CM: This is as downtrodden as it’s been.

KC: Downtrodden! [Laughs.] Were you in the middle of a bet to say that today?

CM: Yeah! I said I’m going to get downtrodden. I don’t know what it means.

KC: [Laughs.]

CM: Nothing like this, thank God! I don’t know.

KC: I don’t know.

I get the signal all entertainment journalists must abide by in interviews like this, to “please wrap” so the actors can move on to the next set of similar questions. I smile and wish them both well on their day, adding it might be interesting to see how a baby might fit in to Ava and Nathan’s edgy doings should there be a second season. They emphatically agree, politely wish me well back, and I leave the call, completely confident they’re still laughing.

5 Astrological Aspects in 2022 You Need to Know About

Astrological experts weigh in on how a few major celestial events could impact our vibe for the rest of this year.

Given the current state of the world, we could all use a little insight into what's to come, yes? So, to peek into what 2022 has in store for us, we consulted with a handful of esteemed astrologers for the scoop on five celestial events with the biggest potential for an impact on our personal business. These days, knowledge is certainly power.

Jupiter’s dance between Pisces and Aries

The good-fortune planet entered Pisces late last year on December 28, setting off a back-and-forth foray between Pisces and Aries that will last all year. Jupiter will remain in Pisces until May 10 and then take a spin through Aries from May 10 to October 27, only to then return to Pisces from October 28 to December 20. Jupiter then takes one more trip through Aries until May 16, 2023.

Chani Nicholas, the developer of the ever-popular CHANI astrology app and author of You Were Born for This, says Jupiter, the party planet of expansion, should lend some “wet and wild goodness” to all of 2022. “Because Jupiter is bestowed with the label of the fairy godmother of the cosmos, it has returned to Pisces (its home) and therefore is able to bring its overflowing chalices to the party,” she explains. “Here, Jupiter is well resourced to ply us with abundance and some much-needed ease.”

Nicholas says Jupiter’s dip in and out of Pisces throughout the year — it only circles through a sign once every 12 years — is “at its best, about more than accumulation or advancement. It’s about trust. About faith. About refilling our cups and the wisdom that finds you when you limber yourself up to give, receive, and believe.”

When Jupiter moves on to Aries on May 10, it “exchanges its wet suit for biker chaps and a flamethrower,” Nicholas describes. “In Aries, Jupiter is bold, brash, brave, and unapologetic. It barrels helmet-first into every endeavor, reminding us that even the most well-established people on the world stage are making it up as they go along. The spirit of Jupiter in Aries is intrepid, enterprising, and entrepreneurial, bringing a flush of fire to the Aries corner of your chart. Just make sure that you’re taking time to calculate those risks or at least educate yourself on potential consequences. Jupiter in Aries isn’t known for its prudence, but with practice, that’s exactly what you can bring to the equation.”

North Node in Taurus, South Node in Scorpio

January 18, 2022, through July 18, 2023

In astrology, the North Node — a node being the point in the sky where the Sun and Moon cross paths — represents the collective vibe or energy we’re moving toward, and the South Node represents the area of our lives that requires a releasing or letting go. Astrologer Colin Bedell of Queer Cosmos says the last time the North Node shifted to Taurus and the South Node shifted to Scorpio was in 2004 — it only happens once every 18 years. What does this mean? “We’re all looking to get grounded while the ground is moving,” explains Bedell of the Taurean influence. “If we could look back to the last time, it was post 9/11, and a lot of people were on edge, just like we are now. We’re all in this hypervigilant space in prolonged uncertainty.” He says the North Node in Taurus is a great time to clarify your values and determine which behaviors support how you live according to those values.

Taurus is the bull, and thus, like a bull, we should consider basking in the simpler pleasures our five senses bring, says Celeste Brooks of Astrology by Celeste. “It’s a good time to let go of keeping up the Joneses and find new ways of valuing ourselves without acquiring the stuff that causes us to deplete the Earth of its resources.” She adds that, with the concurrent South Node in Scorpio — which rules control, covert ops, and secrets but is also cathartic and insightful — we might see a lot of news about money and wealth, as well as the unearthing of secrets about corruption.

CSA Images//Getty Images

Venus’ meaningful meetups with Mars

In Capricorn, February 16; In Aquarius, March 6

When a planet goes retrograde, all actions it governs slow down. If you’re wondering why this year started off at a snail’s pace with a strong urge for us to hibernate (hello, omicron), it’s because Venus, the planet of love and human connection, went retrograde from Aquarius to Capricorn on December 28 until January 29. “Venus rules the clarity of values in relationships and our relational intelligence,” explains Bedell. “If anyone wonders why they didn’t gain the usual momentum in the beginning of the year, Capricorn is the sign of dot your i’s [and] cross your t’s, so January wasn’t the month to begin anything.”

Now that Venus is direct, she has a hot date planned (aka a conjunction) with Mars in Capricorn on Feb 16 and in Aquarius on March 6. “Venus is how we draw in things we desire; it rules self-esteem, money, love, and relationships,” explains Brooks. “Mars is focused on how we get what we want. Mars is a lot more primal — it’s the fighting and fornication planet. When you bring them together, it can be quite beautiful. Aquarius is a sign of our hopes and dreams; it’s like the bigger vision, with higher-level, forward-thinking wisdom. People might feel a connection to some of their deeper desires, and some instinctual understanding of how to move forward to get what they want. People have been so focused on others these past two years, they might find some footing with themselves again.”

Jupiter cozies up with Neptune

April 12

While in the spiritual sign of Pisces, Jupiter, the planet of expansion, will have, according to Nicholas, “one doozy” of a meet-cute with Neptune, the watery planet of dreaming and escapism that also rules Pisces. This hasn’t happened since the 1850s. “It’s going to be especially potent for artistic endeavors, forays into fantasy, and anything that inspires a mystic or divine love,” Nicholas explains. However, as Jupiter can overdo anything, and Neptune represents escapism, it’s an influence to be a little wary of. “Beware the delusional pipe dreams that seem too good to be true,” Nicholas says.

Big picture: This meetup might inspire us to feel a little more altruistic. “We’re going to consider the possibility of another way of living that’s more soulful and spiritual,” says Bedell. “Is there a different meaning-making lens that can help us think about ‘who am I? Who am I meant to be with? What is my meaning?’ We’ll investigate identity, relationships, business, and money from a more soulful lens. Not to be corny, but it’s about love. Isn’t it funny that love is considered anti-intellectual?”

Mercury retrogrades

May 10 through June 3; September 9 through October 2; December 29

If you’re into astrology at all, you’re well aware that when Mercury goes backward, your best-laid plans, communications, itineraries, and anything involving forward movement seems to go backward as well. When this happens, Bedell says, it gives us the opportunity to process whatever we’ve learned about our lives while Mercury was direct. He says it’s the perfect time to “re”: rethink, review, renegotiate, recharge, and rest.

When Mercury goes retrograde from Gemini through Taurus in May, Bedell says it might inspire us to rethink how we use words (ruled by Gemini) and consider “embodiment,” or how what we say is what we do (Taurus). When Mercury retrogrades from Libra to Virgo in September, we might find ourselves rethinking about where we fall into the either/or state (the cerebral pro/con cycle of Libra) and reconsider how our habits are serving us (the Virgo influence).

Overall, the astrology of 2022 holds many promising vibes. Between February 4 and April 29, all planets will be direct — a full-steam-ahead vibe, says Brooks. She says one snag that might wrinkle the fabric is a final square-off between Saturn (the planet of restriction) and Uranus (the planet of the unexpected) from late August through mid-November. Though it’s more of a close call than a direct hit astrologically, the three times these two met up in 2021 coincided with the emergence of new Covid variants. “It could reflect on the midterm elections in the U.S.,” Brooks mentions. Indeed, we’ll soon see what’s actually written in the stars.

Why Art Can Offer Us Catharsis and Healing

Artists like Adele and Taylor Swift channeled their pain into their work for us all to relate to. Here’s how making and enjoying art can also help heal us.

Adele's latest, long-awaited album, 30, is far more than just another gorgeous piece of work from the songstress. It’s referred to as her “divorce album” because she admittedly used her talent to express her feelings and heal from her separation from Simon Konecki, with whom she has a son, Angelo. When it was released in November 2021, 30 resonated so deeply with the zeitgeist that tweets galore validated how, yet again, Adele was able to reduce an audience to emotional rubble via her music.

Likewise, when Taylor Swift released her re-do of the break-up record Red (Taylor’s Version) last month, she not only invalidated an earlier version of the album that profited famed music manager/executive Scooter Braun — who managed Kanye West during his feud with Swift and came to own all of Swift’s masters — but rerecording her music and marketing it to her (very) loyal audience afforded Swift the opportunity to take back her power and heal the injustice. In its early weeks, Red sold over 600,000 units, staggering for a rerelease, and found listeners floored by Swift’s emotive, honest lyricism, on full display in tracks like the 10-minute version of breakup song “All too Well.”

Since the Lascaux cave paintings, artists have used their preferred artistic media to work through interpersonal issues and find catharsis and healing through the process. “As mammals, we are inherently social, and we rely on information from each other to survive and enhance our ability to make sense of the world,” says Girija Kaimal, Associate Professor in the PhD program in Creative Arts Therapies at the Drexel University College of Nursing and Health Professions in Philadelphia. “In order to do that, we have to keep communicating with each other and express ourselves.”

Kaimal says the expression of pain through art is a way of seeking connection and validation while externalizing complicated feelings. “We take some of the sting, and incomprehensibility and pain, and convert these intense emotions into a container outside of ourselves so it can be shared with others,” she says. “We invite empathy and compassion — all the things you need when you're struggling. A big part of what any kind of artistic expression does is, when you've had a life experience that makes you feel really alone and isolated, the art sort of pulls you back and reminds you that you're not the first person to have been through it. It might not replace the feeling of loss, but it may bring you comfort from those who respond to the work.”

Expressing pain through art is a way of seeking connection and validation while externalizing complicated feelings.

Marina Parahina / EyeEm//Getty Images

Another benefit of channeling your emotions into your creativity is what you can learn about yourself in the process. “The upset or the stress we put into art serves as sort of a mirror, telling us about some aspect of our experience that we haven't addressed or is probably still a trigger — something we haven’t figured out,” Kaimal says.

The process of using art to work through challenging emotional issues is reflected in Kaimal’s thoughts about Adaptive Response Theory (ART), a framework for the practice of art therapy. She theorizes that creative endeavors allow our brains to use the information to make predictions about what we might do next. “Art-making — or any creative-expressive activity — helps us to concretize and externalize an idea we have imagined in our minds,” Kaimal says. “When we do this frequently, we keep practicing our ability to imagine the future and feel a sense of control over our ability to make things happen.” In other words, we may not be able to control the outcome of our situation, but we can control how what we make inspired by those emotions comes out, and that, in turn, empowers us with a sense of agency we didn’t otherwise have.

Along with gaining a sense of control over emotions, we can make art to gain a feeling of catharsis, or an aha moment in the processing of our emotions, which offers us some clarity and distance from the situation. Rod Thomas, known musically as Bright Light, Bright Light, says channeling difficult or trying emotional states into his music has helped him find balance while bringing him to a more positive and healthy place. “I used my last album, Fun City, as a way to express troubles facing the LGBTQ+ community as well as celebrating some of our love and achievements,” says Thomas. “Rather than screaming into a void, I was able to make a record that focused on what is happening, what I want to happen, and how history repeats for both better and worse. I found that making the album infinitely helped my mental health during those months and years, turning deep negatives into eventual positives. I guess it's the ability of music to flip a switch! Creating something out of despair adds a tiny silver lining to darkness, and creating something that others can be involved in helps relieve loneliness, so music is in many ways a savior for me.”

“When you can channel emotion into a piece of work, it draws in others and they get what you are going through. It brings us back to a feeling of not being alone.”

Another benefit of channeling your anger, sadness, misery, or frustration into your art is the ability to lower stress — and if you’re coming out of a stressful situation, that’s a good thing. In one small study, Kaimal and a group of researchers measured the cortisol levels — cortisol being the hormone that helps the body respond to stress — of 39 healthy adults while creating art, and found the process significantly lowered cortisol levels regardless of ability.

As far as those of us who viscerally weep along when listening to Taylor, Adele, or Bright Light, Bright Light, Kaimal says we can pick up on the depth of emotion that goes into a piece of art, which helps us to further connect with it. “It's almost like a magnet,” she explains, “because when you can channel emotion into a piece of work, it draws in others and they get what you are going through. It brings us back to a feeling of not being alone.”

Some theorize that art brings on a visceral emotional response because mirror neurons are pinging around our brains; we reflexively reflect back whatever emotional landscape we’re subjected to. Though Kaimal describes mirror neurons as an overused concept, she says they work as a “primitive mechanism” that incite a reflexive, unconscious mirroring of behaviors.

“The purpose of our brain is to keep us alive from moment to moment. Mirror neurons evolved as a way to attune ourselves to our surroundings and each other from that evolutionary need to be really quickly responsive, which means that it's not connected to our sort of motor systems — it activates and fires almost instinctively,” she explains.

Using this theory, without being conscious of it, we sense the deepest of feelings in the music we listen to, the art we observe, the films we watch, and the writing we read and reflexively feel those feelings ourselves. And, in the end, that can be an incredibly healing experience. “What happens when we cry is we release endorphins along with our tears,” Kaimal says. “Endorphins are the body's natural painkiller, so crying actually reduces the feeling of pain. It's really important for us to allow ourselves these emotions. All emotions are transient anyway.”

Rax King’s ‘Tacky’ Is About Getting Real

King’s debut essay collection is a testament to how pop culture shapes how we see ourselves.

The cover of Rax King’s debut essay tome, Tacky: Love Letters to the Worst Culture We Have to Offer, foreshadows the vibe: Against a stark black backdrop, a shapely plastic brunette drink-marker doll wearing a wry smirk balances an olive on her high-kicking heel while basking inside an empty martini glass. Enter the confines of its pages, and you’ll find King deftly defending her “tacky” pop-culture predilections — which, rooted in her coming of age in the early 2000s, run the gamut from Creed to Cheesecake Factory — and the sexual milestones she ties to them with a wink and a clink.

In an early chapter, she writes: “Being tacky was the opposite of being right. To be proudly tacky, your aperture for all the too-much feelings — angst, desire, joy — must be all the way open.” Thus, this book is King’s opportunity to wrestle with the residual mess of “too-much” feelings. To dive deeper into all of it, we got on the horn with King to discuss the process of writing Tacky, her various inspirations, and how it feels to be judged for what you’re into.

VIVIAN MANNING-SCHAFFEL: Did you always want to be a writer? Were you “birthed” this way?

RAX KING: [Laughs] I definitely was birthed this way. I did always want to be a writer. During recess, I would go outside with my little notebooks and would write my little stories and poems. I hardly talked to anyone because I was antisocial. I’ve learned to talk to people and act like a human being, but I definitely still have that side of myself where, in any given situation, I’m thinking I just want to be at home writing.

VMS: As a writer, there’s always a part of yourself that lurks outside of your body as the observer.

RK: Yeah, exactly. I’m always thinking up my little quips about things that are actually happening. It’s kind of a bad habit, actually. I should try and be more present, but I don’t think I can at this point.

VMS: It’s a blessing and a curse — at least you’re monetizing it! So, who did you read who made you a writer?

RK: When I was in college, I discovered the essays of Lisa Carver and became obsessed. I think she really never got her due. She was one of those writers who in the late ’90s and early aughts was always poised to become a star, but circumstances always seemed to intervene. It’s really a shame. I’ve been saying her name in every interview because her work was really, really important and formative for me. Anybody who reads my book and enjoys it should absolutely read everything she’s ever written.

VMS: Early in writing the book, did you know that you were going to write about your nascent sexual awakening and how we judge one another through music, for example, or were you like, “I’m going to write about Creed and just see what comes out”?

RK: It was closer to the former. I pretty much never know where something is going when I sit down with it. As silly as it is, those nascent sexual feelings are really inseparable for me from the experience of falling in love with their music, and the two were so completely intertwined that I can’t think about the one without the other anymore. Of course, there’s a bunch of defensiveness built in because, as it turns out, the vast majority of people that I interact with think that Creed is terrible. So, I’m always beating back that instinct to agree. I just wanted to take away that option from myself and be like, okay, this was something that was really important to you, and you have to treat that with respect and care.

With my essays, there’s this sense that this is about Guy Fieri, but it’s also about my ex-husband, and the two subjects don’t really seem to have much in common with each other. I think the reason that so many of these essays are shaped that way is I would sit down thinking, “Okay, I’m going to write about such-and-such piece of pop culture important to me,” and in doing that I end up excavating all these memories I associate with them. That’s pretty much what all of these essays look like, an excavation of memory alongside some light pop-culture analysis.

VMS: In that first chapter, you ask why Lou Reed’s pain is more valid than [Creed lead singer] Scott Stapp’s pain, but that thought really underlines how subjective taste is.

RK: I came up with groups of friends for whom taste was very important. I kept finding myself at odds. I wanted to wear the things that weren’t the prescribed things. I wanted to listen to music that I had to hide, to an extent. So, I guess probably a lot of that old defensiveness does come out in these essays. But, yeah, I think the point is that taste is subjective, and this judgmental attitude about it is often really juvenile — posing as a matter of intellectual bona fides when really it’s just this desire to claim the things that one likes and say, “This is the right stuff, and the things you like are the wrong things, and in this way, I know more than you,” if that makes sense.

VMS: Who gets to decide, right? This has been happening forever. A predilection toward highbrow culture can trickle down to socioeconomics. I don’t know if it’s generational, but did you have shame thrown at you for digging what was considered lowbrow?

RK: Oh, yeah, completely. I grew up in D.C., which has a very staunch punk rock, DIY tradition and scene. I went to this private high school where I clearly had, by far, the least money of anyone that I was associated with. I was like their little scholarship kid. So, it did end up feeling like when I was trying to defend my taste. I was also trying to defend all this stuff staring into my background that I thought my friends must have been disapproving of if they also disapproved of my taste. I’m sure none of that disapproval was ever that consciously about class on their part.

VMS: It isn’t. That’s why it’s insidious.

RK: And that’s why it hurts so much. You can’t really say to somebody you feel you’re close friends with like, “Hey, by the way, the way that you talk to me is super fucked up” — that’s such a hard conversation to have as an insecure teenager. You end up just bottling stuff up and learning what sorts of things you’re supposed to like and the dances you’re supposed to do for people’s approval, and you do them. You learn to do them really well. Or you learn to do them ironically.

VMS: You’re pretending to be yourself when you’re actually being yourself.

RK: There were so many layers of, like, transference, discomfort, and shame. I am now 30 years old and don’t have the time or inclination to wear so many layers of performance. Every time I try and talk about something I like, you either like it, and you agree with me, or you don’t, and you don’t. Either way, it’s fine by me at this point.

VMS: You have a podcast called Low Culture Boil. Is it empowering to draw the line between high- and lowbrow for yourself?

RK: It feels really good, on my podcast, to take a step back. We’re always doing something similar to what I’m doing in my book, which is trying to make cases for things that we love, not because those things don’t have anything wrong with them, but because we just don’t think they’re responsible for the ills of our culture and s--t like that. So, yeah, I try to take the critical eye to the prescriptions that are made for us, culturally speaking, and to the ways that people use taste to designate who’s in the “in” group and who’s in the “out.” It’s TV, and it’s movies, and it’s not that deep.

VMS: What you like has nothing to do with how smart you are. I watched an interview with you in which you said that you made a name for yourself on Twitter. How does Twitter feed you as a writer, or do you feed it? How does it work for you?

RK: Poorly! I hate Twitter so goddamn much, and yet I can’t stay away. A big part of my relationship with Twitter right now is compulsory. From where most people sit, it’s not a big deal whether you’re on Twitter or not — if it makes you unhappy, just leave. It’s probably true I could leave Twitter right now and just try and make this new book work on its own, but that’s making things so much harder for my life and is so much more anxiety-inducing. The function of Twitter for me right now is a) promote my book — whether people are clicking my links and buying my book based on my constant promotion of it, I don’t know, but it feels like I’m doing something important for myself, and b) it makes me feel like I’m in control of my own career, and this way if my book doesn’t sell, then at least it’s my fault for not doing Twitter correctly. I feel that if right now I wasn’t on Twitter, I wouldn’t be able to say that — it would feel very much like someone else’s fault that my book wasn’t doing well. So, I feel like being on Twitter feels a lot like taking matters into my own hands, even though there’s really no way for me to do that. All of this stuff is outside of my control completely.

Every time I try and talk about something I like, you either like it, and you agree with me, or you don’t, and you don’t. Either way, it’s fine by me at this point.

VMS: That’s so high stakes! To me, Twitter can feel like pissing in the wind.

RK: You know how when you’re trying to quit drinking, people always say that it’s easier to just quit full stop than it is to try and drink a tiny bit once in a while and control it that way? I have this addictive relationship with Twitter. It’s like being in a casino without windows, and it’s just smoky and dark all the time.

VMS: You get that dopamine hit every time you get a couple in a row, and you win 10 bucks.

RK: Right! Then I feel good for nine seconds, and that’s nine seconds that I would have just felt normal. God! The cost-benefit analysis of Twitter use is so f--ked.

VMS: Your chapter about Sex and the City discusses how you discovered your natural power over men and then veers into your own sexual experiences. Did you intend to use Tacky as a way to write about them?

RK: I found myself thinking the way we talk about people who have a lot of sex — especially women who have a lot of sex — really closely mirrors the way that we talk about people, especially women, who we think have bad or gaudy taste. It’s this judgment that feels like it could be coming from a place of jealousy or from a place of pity. Either way, it’s a judgment that you, the object of the judgment, are offended by and annoyed by because it doesn’t really have much to do with the facts of your own life and the facts of your own taste, or sexuality. So, I kept finding myself returning to that when I was writing these essays that lean pretty heavily on sex, the idea that someone’s sex life can be offensive somehow — even when it doesn’t involve you. Either way, the answer to me is who cares? It’s not something that we should feel the need to opine about, and yet we often do. So much of the criticism industry isn’t even talking about work a lot of the time; it’s talking about the person way too often for my taste.

VMS: This becomes challenging when your work is about your experiences as a person because they’re inextricably linked, and it’s harder to pull the two apart. I’m curious to learn if writing about things that are so highly personal and giving them to the world was cathartic for you in any way.

RK: I finished the book just before Covid — there really wasn’t so much catharsis to be had because the events happened so long ago. That’s a big part of what allows me to speak about them with humor and self-deprecation. There’s an essay in there about an affair that I had with a married man — that happened more recently relative to when I was writing this book. It was the last essay I wrote. Any time a reviewer mentions that essay, I do cringe and get a little squirmy because those events are still pretty close. It’s a little harder to divorce the events as they appear in my book from criticism of the events as they happened in my life. That has been something to grapple with.

VMS: Bat Out of Hell was a great way to conclude because it’s such an unabashedly theatrical, who-gives-a-f--k album that went balls-to-the-wall. You use that opportunity to talk about the eventual intellectual distance we put between ourselves and taste. That said, isn’t Tacky an exploration of authenticity, which underlines the whole concept of taste and the life decisions that we make in relation to what influences us?

RK: I would like it to be. I think that it’s my own small contribution to a theory of authenticity. It’s very much a product of my own corner of the world and my own experience, as limited as it is. If it’s going to be any one thing, that’s what I want it to be.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

In Defense of a Low-Key NYE at Home

Why one writer chooses a quiet night in over a raucous night of parties.

I have no plans for New Year’s Eve this year, just like last year, when virtually none of us did. Some years ago, there was a five-year run when my husband and I would go see these friends of ours who threw the kind of bangin’ New Year’s Eve party you just had to dress up for, complete with punch, great food, and the warmth of true friendship. But life takes you through changes — those friends moved away, and so did we. In the present, Omicron has begun its spread, even among the vaxxed. Some nearby friends we’ve celebrated with in New Year’s past may not be up for it this year. A raucous end-of-year party, then, seems unlikely. But never say never: If I get a tempting (and safe-feeling) invite, we’ll see. But as of now, I’ve decided to embrace reinventing New Year’s Eve and make it about celebrating myself (and my family) instead — just like last year, when we were just grateful to be able to ring it in.

Years ago, if I didn’t have a New Year’s plan by now, I’d be deeply bummed. Having spent my 20s as a party girl in Boston and New York, a fabulous New Year’s Eve celebration was my finely honed ritual. I’d gather my chosen family, and we’d go to town in every possible way. Somehow, I’d developed an odd superstition: If I didn’t wear the right thing, in the right place, with the right vibe and the right people, it would mirror the vibe of the year I was about to bring in. So, a chill night at home meant being doomed to a year of boredom — a tedious, torturous 12-month sentence I just couldn’t bear.

Irrational, I know. Some of us cling to a ridiculous ritual or two simply because they make us feel better. But this concept loomed large in my subconscious. A mental-health expert, had I made time to see one back then, might’ve said I was spending so much time and money rushing around town in search of whimsy and entertainment to avoid facing how unhappy I was in my career. Instead of taking a step back to hear myself think and figure things out, I did my best to drown out this innermost truth with a vast array of raunchy guitars, shimmering synths, and pounding beats.

A chill night at home meant being doomed to a year of boredom — a tedious, torturous 12-month sentence I just couldn’t bear.

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That is, until New Year’s Eve 1998, when I was really sick with the flu. My FOMO finally flipped me off. A fever of 103° depleted me from any desire to put on festive clothing and spackle on makeup. Instead of bidding the year good riddance by bouncing from one party to the next with my people, my gray-faced, sweaty, sickly self could barely scrape up the verve to drag my body to the bathroom 10 feet away from my bed.

Canceling my plans consumed me with disappointment. It broke my heart to bail, but I could barely speak. There was just no way. All the air in my tires hissed out. So, I took to my bed, and something told me to lean into the restful ritual of it all — not that I had a choice. I think I watched Sex and the City, and eventually Dick Clark made 1998 a memory while I rang in 1999 with my mother on the landline and one of my best friends on my cell.

After sweating it out that night, I woke up feeling tons better. By the end of the day, I almost felt up to going outside. But instead of pushing myself, I took a shower, swapped sweats and sheets, ordered delivery, and got right back into bed. I realized I didn’t mind being alone with my cat and my remote. I also realized that the best way to celebrate anything was to make yourself happy. If that meant missing out on all the hot brunch gossip and the hair-of-the-dog cocktail hour that typically anchored my New Year’s Day, so be it.

The best way to celebrate anything is to make yourself happy.

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Looking back, there’s no doubt in my mind I got sick because I was burnt to a crisp. I was running on fumes. That year was a sh--ty one, complete with a sh--ty breakup and sh--ty professional roadblocks. I took the time I needed to properly get over the guy, but didn’t take the time I needed to get over myself. Though I’d slowed down a little after 30, I still worked hard and played a little harder than I really had the energy for. Had I not rallied so hard to go out and see people the night before that New Year’s Eve and the night before that (and maybe even the night before that) when my body sent signals of distress, I might’ve been able to head that flu off at the pass. But karma, or Mother Nature, or who/what have you, decided to bench me from the seemingly endless schedule of distractions I’d scheduled for myself.

It’s been decades since then. I’m older and wiser now. I’ve come to understand that, sometimes, you have to do the benching yourself. The reward? Now I know, definitively, that where I am is the place I’m meant to be.

So, if your plans fall through for whatever reason or you just aren’t feeling like jumping through your usual New Year’s Eve hoops this year, there’s nothing wrong with leaning into those feelings and claiming it as a self-care celebratory holiday. Whether that constitutes chugging wine out of a box while watching the ball drop in sweats, cooking up a couture meal of your choosing, sitting in your tub for a full hour or more, or indulging in every relaxation ritual you lament never having the time to do, a New Year’s Eve spent on your own terms is a prime moment to reconnect with yourself. Because, if the essence of my suspicion still holds true, you’ll be ringing in the new year with your best friend.