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Heather Thomas on The Fall Guy, Activism and The Poster

Melissa Roth: Weirding Way Media.

[Music] [Singing] Amy Englehardt: 80s TV Ladies, So sexy and so pretty. 80s TV Ladies, Steppin’ out into the city. 80s TV Ladies, often treated kind of sh-[wolf whistle]. Working hard for the money in a man’s world. 80s TV Ladies!

Susan Lambert Hatem: Welcome to 80s TV ladies, where we look back in order to leap forward.

Melissa Roth: Welcome to 80s TV Ladies. With your hosts Sharon Johnson and Susan Lambert Hatem

Susan Lambert Hatem: Hello, I'm Susan.

Sharon Johnson: And I'm Sharon. It's interesting how influential posters were in the 80s. Did you have any posters on your wall in the 80s? I don't think I did. We were living in military housing primarily and my mom was always kind of wary of us putting stuff up, if I did have any. And then when I went out on my own, I don't know what I had on my wall. Hadn't really thought about it for a long time.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It was such a thing. Certainly, early on. I remember when my sister and I shared a room, we would often fight over what, like pull out from Teen Beat. We would put up because it would have one young star on one side and another on the other side. And the. One of the bigger fights we had was the Hardy Boys. And Sean Cassidy was on one side and Parker Stevenson was on the other. And I was a total Parker Stevenson over Sean Cassidy. And my sister was a Sean Cassidy. And so we literally flipped it every week. yeah.

Sharon Johnson: I was gonna ask you, how did you resolve this dilemma? For goodness sake. Did you go buy another magazine?

Susan Lambert Hatem: No.

Sharon Johnson: And we didn't get them.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. So. And again, you know, I had single mom and we didn't have a lot of disposable income. We had plenty, you know, for our life. We wouldn't have a team beat every week. It would be picking up a special one because there was a special pullout like the Hardy Boys.

Sharon Johnson: I was thinking maybe use your babysitting money to get another one or something like that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yes, yes, yes, that's true. But yeah, so we compromised on that. And it was half and half. Then, when I got my own room, it was the, Definitely Star Wars was probably a poster, but it wouldn't have been a true movie poster. It would have been again, another sort of pullout from a magazine. And Harrison Ford, I remember. But I would mostly put up pictures. I remember I had this little sort of corner. I didn't put up a lot all over the walls. I had a little corner that were like cutouts from magazines. And that's what I would put up on my walls when I was home, when I went to college. I feel like I started putting up movie posters then because you could get them like every once in a while you could walk up to a movie Theater and be like, hey, do you have any extra posters? And whatever posters they had taken down, if the employees didn't take them, you could get them. And yeah, I never would have thought of that.

Sharon Johnson: But seriously, I, for the life of me could not begin to tell you what, if anything, I had on the wall. There probably were things and my mother would probably remember very clearly because she's much better about that stuff than I am. but I have no idea, but I'm going to have to ask her about it next time.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, and it's so funny because, our walls were pretty bare at home. Like it wasn't the decorating that life has now. Right. I have everything up on the wall. I also used to cut out magazine words. And I had a clipboard and I would make, make a clipboard like every few years of different, inspiring. It was like a little like vision board for my clipboard. The Fall guy as a TV show is not technically an 80s TV ladies show, but our next guest is Most definitely an 80s TV lady and, and an 80s poster lady, Heather Thomas.

Sharon Johnson: Heather Thomas was born in Connecticut and raised in Santa Monica, California. She had an extraordinary influence on popular culture in the 1980s. She's an actress, writer and activist, but may have been most famous in the 1980s for her pink bikini poster, may be the best-selling pinup poster of all time. She appeared in several 80s shows including BJ and the Bear, Love Boat and TJ Hooker, as well as movies and TV miniseries including the man in the Machine.

Susan Lambert Hatem: She also got famous playing stuntwoman Jody Banks on 112 episodes of the Fall Guy. The Fall Guy was an ABC action show created by Glenn Larson, which ran for five seasons from November 4, 1981 to May 2, 1986.

Sharon Johnson: The Fall Guy TV show inspired countless posters, a board game, a, 1984 video game, and of course most recently 2024's the Fall Guy movie starring Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt, and has a.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Cameo by Lee Majors and Heather Thomas. Now Lee Majors, he was one of the biggest television stars because of the $6 million man and the Bionic Woman. So he

00:05:00

Susan Lambert Hatem: was the star of the Fall Guy as stuntman Colt Seavers, who moonlight the side as a bounty hunter using his stunt skills to catch bail skippers. A perfect 80s idea.

Sharon Johnson: It also starred Douglas Barr, who many of you may recall later was on Designing Women, another show we've talked about. He played Lee Major's nephew and sidekick Howie Munson. And Heather Thomas was his associate, assistant and a newbie stuntwoman. Jody Banks. In the first season, Joanne Pflug played Samantha Big Jack Jack as the bail bondswoman who hires them. Then Markie Post came in to play a similar female bond dealer for the rest of the run.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Now, it had lots of movie stunt action, which was kind of cool as a kid that was interested in filmmaking. Heather Thomas left acting after doing a bunch of stuff. She left acting in the late 80s, apparently due to some stalker issues and because she had a family and wanted to focus on that. And she's recently returned to acting, but she's always been a longtime writer, novelist, political activist, organizer and fundraiser.

Sharon Johnson: So we are thrilled to welcome Ms. Heather Thomas to 80s TV. Ladies, hello.

Heather Thomas: How are you?

Sharon Johnson: We're great, and so looking forward to this conversation today.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It's kind of a crazy time, and I'm just wondering what you're doing to find joy these days.

Heather Thomas: well, I've been mainlining grandchildren. A lot of that. I had four school programs, one community theater play and actually two community.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Theater plays because now is the time for children pageants and holiday pageants.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, yeah, I have them from, 12 down to 7.

Sharon Johnson: That sounds fantastic.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Are your family close or are they far?

Heather Thomas: They all live within five minutes away. We have a big family, big happy family.

Sharon Johnson: That's awesome.

Heather Thomas: Three daughters. Two of them have families.

Sharon Johnson: That's wonderful. That's really wonderful.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, that is very delightful. You know, I've been watching some of your interviews, and you clearly love words and storytelling, and I am very curious about where that love of story came from.

Heather Thomas: I think as a child I was bored, so I had books and I, mean, television was sort of a. It was sort of more of a communal event because we had a commonality in that we'd watch one of the three stations available, and usually there was one big kid program a month, you know, whether it was on Disney or Wizard of Oz, something like that, you know, or the Charlie Brown Christmas Special. And, so it wasn't so much tv, it was more books. I read a lot as a kid, and I had a big fantasy life, too.

Sharon Johnson: Did you do any writing as a result of your writing?

Susan Lambert Hatem: Sure, sure.

Heather Thomas: Always as a kid, I always did.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And then you ended up going to UCLA Theater and Film school? Yeah, both. I'm curious about that.

Heather Thomas: You couldn't enter as a film major. The film major was primarily in those days, back in the Mesozoic age when I was going to school. it was primarily a graduate program. In my junior year, I applied to the film program because it was Only two years for undergraduates. And then I got in. They let 14 people in. I got into the film school there.

Sharon Johnson: When you went to college, was it always your intent to just study film in theater and writing?

Heather Thomas: Yes, yes, absolutely. Absolutely. I wanted to be part of story and theater. You know, you run into the proscenium walls, you know, it, you can't break the way you can with film. You can't flash cut, you can't, you know, extend past whatever's possible on stage.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's such an interesting point. We spoke with Dorothy Lyman on another episode and she talked about that too. That you can kind of put the camera anywhere.

Heather Thomas: Yeah.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And a lot of the directors that we've talked to, that's been the real appeal of television and film.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, well, there's an intimacy you can't get with theater too, and that you're right there with the character and it's live. So it's just such different mediums. But you can be inside the character in film.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. So I'm curious about what it felt like to break in at that time.

Heather Thomas: Well, you know, you're in theater class, you're in the acting class, or you're, you're studying Chekhov or you're doing, you know, something esoteric, waiting for Godot or something. And then you do 80s tits and ass. You know, “they went that away.” That's what I, you know, I. “Help me, Help me.” It was, you know, it was. You caught on pretty

00:10:00

Heather Thomas: quick what it was about and how you maneuvered and where the power lay, et cetera, et cetera.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I'd love to just sort of talk about some of the shows that you were on, like BJ and the Bear. How was working with the Bear?

Heather Thomas: I didn't work with the monkey much. I ended up working on an episode of Fall Guy with that Clyde monkey from Every which Way But Loose, that Clint Eastwood movie. Yeah, I worked with an orangutan on that and that guy was scary. Like he thought it was funny to grab my boob. And I just kept thinking, he's going to rip it off any minute. But, the chimp I didn't work with.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Okay, well, good, because if they were going to sexually harass you.

Heather Thomas: I worked with Greg Evigan a lot and I adored him.

Sharon Johnson: Was BJ and the Bear the first time you worked with, Glenn Larson?

Heather Thomas: Yeah. And because of that, you know, I got Fall Guy. He called me in for Fall Guy because I ended up doing a two-part episode that was kind of a pilot that didn't get picked up with, Rebecca Reynolds. We did one. It was called Girls on the Hollywood High or something. We were women detectives, and we were researching a case, and I was a straight man, and she was the funny one.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, I would have loved that show. I wish that had gone, too.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, that would have been a good show.

Susan Lambert Hatem: So clearly, you worked like Glenn Larson wanted to work with you and. And find the right thing. So what was it like? We heard he's a little bit crazy.

Heather Thomas: All of them are crazy. You're not going to find a normal one. not in those days. Everybody was nuts. Everybody was nuts, and they still are. Glenn was great. He started out as a boy band singer guy with the four preps. And so everything was breaking. The song, you know, you'd be walking along and someone would start singing, I can't sing for hell. I did not sing, but everybody sang.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's so great. I love that. Glenn Larson is a musical theater guy.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, he's a very musical guy. And so there was a lot of musical stuff. there was a lot of celebrities, and everywhere was limousines and stuff like that. It was funny. It was a funny time, working.

Susan Lambert Hatem: With Lee Majors, coming off of, like, one of the biggest stars in television.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, I get over intimidation really fast. It's just another dude.

Sharon Johnson: What did you think about your character, Jody?

Heather Thomas: my character, for a while there, they said, can you smile more? And I was just thinking, oh, brother, here we go. not them. But the network was worried that I wasn't likable because I didn't smile enough. And then, they put me in a bikini, and it made up for me not smiling enough, I guess.

Sharon Johnson: I’ve been watching some of the fall guy episodes in particular, looking for what I like to call Jody centric episodes. But one of the things I really like about Jody and the way that they wrote her is that she was literally just, you know, one of the guys. I mean, they really weren't trying to, you know, sort of pat her on the head and say, oh, you're just a, girl. Please stand over to the corner while the men take care of things. yes, you could have had more to do and on a regular basis, but when you did have. When there were things to do, they. You had things to do, which was great. I thought.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, A lot of the times I was just a slave, you know, but other times I had would participate in the stunt or I would be part of the stunt team, which is really important, you know, you need your backup people.

Sharon Johnson: Did they let you do a number of your own stunts in the. In the fall guy, or did you have a stunt double?

Heather Thomas: Oh, I had a stunt double, Debbie. But I did the fighting and they hung me from a crane once. I was supposed to be parachuting. They had me spread eagled over the entrance to Fox. It was terrible.

Sharon Johnson: Oh, my goodness.

Heather Thomas: we hung from a helicopter skid once. What else did we do? I didn't do any of the fire and I didn't do. It was mostly this fighting. I would do the stunt fighting.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Did you ever get injured?

Heather Thomas: No. Okay, well, once or twice. There were some, Lee Majors. Almost broke my nose once. There was like a cue. I was here and he was here with our heads, and my head was supposed to pop up, then his, and he went on my cue, so he bumped my nose.

Susan Lambert Hatem: He tried to take you out?

Heather Thomas: Yeah, he said, get her close up quick before it swells. We used to work like that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Was he a fun guy to work with?

Heather Thomas: Yeah, he was funny. He was funny. He was very jaded. And, he'd keep the set closed because he didn't want a lot of looky-loos.  

00:15:00

Heather Thomas: That way we were all very comfortable.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Mm

Heather Thomas: You know how sometimes they bring people on set?

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: Doug Barr lived in the same building as Bette Davis at the time. She wanted to bring her grandson and Lee said no.

Sharon Johnson: Oh, did he really? Oh, my.

Heather Thomas: Doug had to answer to Betty.

Sharon Johnson: Poor guy.

Heather Thomas: I thought that was funny.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That is funny. And how was it working with Doug where you guys were kind of,

Heather Thomas: Doug was like my brother. I love Doug. I still talk to Doug all the time. I talk to Lee every now and then, but I talked to Doug a lot.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, it felt like you guys were in a similar place, Right. You had come up through some of the same stuff, and now you were on this show that was a hit show. And, so it felt like it was the acting version of the characters in the show in some ways. But I was wondering if you worked much with Jo Ann Pflug or Markie Post.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, I worked with both of them. I miss Markie. Poor Markie. Yeah, Markie was great. Jo Ann was great. I like everybody.

Susan Lambert Hatem: But I was thinking of the episode Hell on Wheels where you are a roller derby woman and you did the slide into the split.

Heather Thomas: Oh, yeah. I did all that stunt because I was really good on skates. And then I went and I learned how to do roller derby, which is pretty easy if you can skate because I lived in Marina Del Rey Peninsula, and we went everywhere on roller skates. It was at Linda Ronstadt Roller Rink Time. I trained one afternoon with LA Thunderbirds, and they taught me how to. You know when you're jamming and you're getting somebody behind you? They're holding onto your shorts so you can't knock them down, but they make it look like, So you're faking, like you're falling backwards and stuff, but you're actually hanging onto their shorts.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Oh, my God.

Heather Thomas: And Ralphie Valladares. He showed how to break my back on the rail. He picked me up and went like this, and I go, It was fun.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That sounds terrifying.

Heather Thomas: But a roller derby is really fun. But I didn't do roller derby after that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Thought maybe you'd pick it up as a hobby, you know?

Heather Thomas: No, the show won't let you. The show was really strict in what I could do in my spare time.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Oh, really? They said, you can't do this and you can't do that.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. They were like, you're going roller skating. What if you break an ankle? You know?

Susan Lambert Hatem: Oh, all right. Well, did you have other, like, favorite stunts or things you got to do because of the show?

Heather Thomas: Like, I love doing the horse stuff because movie horses are a riot. Like, when you play polo, it's like having a Ferrari. Well, a movie horse is like a machine. The truck with the camera on it goes. Your horse goes. So you could be, like, not even holding the reins, and the horse would go perfectly anywhere it needed to be.

Sharon Johnson: That's so interesting. wow.

Heather Thomas: It makes you look like a great rider. Now, I did a movie in Australia where I had to write English, and they actually needed me to ride in that one. And, they trained me with these crazy Australian stuntmen that every single one of them thought they were the man from Snowy River. So they would take. They would take you with no saddle and make you gallop downhill and the forest, you know, avoiding trees.

Sharon Johnson: It was crazy.

Heather Thomas: But it was one way to teach you. It's like throwing the kid in the water to teach him how to swim.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's amazing. Again, the 80s felt like, oh, we're going to be very careful with our stars. sometimes.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. Sometimes they were. Sometimes they weren't.

Sharon Johnson: A few minutes ago, you mentioned a stunt performer named Debbie. By any chance, was that Debbie Evans Levitt? Different Debbie.

Heather Thomas: No, I'm trying to remember her last name. So long ago.

Sharon Johnson: I only asked because she. Debbie Evans Levitt, was a guest on our show. She was fantastic. So, anyway, just Just. That might be a happy coincidence.

Heather Thomas: Mm. Mm. No, I'm trying to remember her name. I feel like a horrible person.

Sharon Johnson: No, like you said, it was. It was a while ago.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It was a while ago.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: I gotta look her up on my phone. 40 years ago.

Susan Lambert Hatem: We should organize our phone by decade.

Heather Thomas: Now I'm like, yeah, that would be great.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I met her around, 85.

Heather Thomas: I'm doing this with no glasses.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's an impressive stunt indeed.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, I'm going to find it. Wait, I'm going to tell you her last name, because I'm really. Who was.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I know. I was trying to Google it. Here's the problem. Because it's AI. They were telling me that Jody Banks was your stunt woman.

Heather Thomas: I know. This is horrible. They just keep telling me it's me.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Welcome to the future.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. And then there's something

00:20:00

Heather Thomas: about my net worth, which is frightening, so. Ah.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Ah. The dumbest timeline.

Sharon Johnson: Hold on a second. I think I have it.

Heather Thomas: AI Only has what they program into it.

Sharon Johnson: I think I have it. Debbie Porter.

Heather Thomas: Yes, Porter. You in the Frigidaire. Debbie Porter. Oh, my God. Yeah, he was great. You get all the flames and falling. I've got two dogs now. They want to get out of my office first. They were crying to get in.

Sharon Johnson: Okay, we need to take a break, and we'll be right back with the rest of our fantastic conversation with the amazing Heather Thomas. And we're back with more Heather Thomas.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Any, favorite directors that you worked with on the Fall Guy or Beyond? I saw that Ted Lang directed a couple.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. Ted was great. I remember when Reagan got elected that day, and we all went, oh, heaven help us. But it's nothing like now. We thought it was bad then. Yeah, Bruce Bilson was great. Man, you're, like, killing me here.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I'm sorry.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. 40 years I'm supposed to remember these people. I love Bruce Bilson. And then his son ended up being a, professor at USC film school. For my daughter, my youngest. Oh, yeah.

Sharon Johnson: For you, what makes for a good director? What did you like? What did you want from a director?

Heather Thomas: Well, on, Fall Guy, the director was basically Lee Majors, said, I want to go home at 5. You know, that's what made a good director for him to get it all done. For me, a good director was someone that gave direction.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: You know, I knew my character, and he'd say, a good director would be okay. I'm probably gonna need to cut to you at this point. You know, sometimes when they explain what they're gonna do, with the film. That helps for me.

Susan Lambert Hatem: The poster. Right. was it before the show or during the show?

Heather Thomas: No, it was during the show.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It was during the show.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. I had, Rogers and Cowan publicist, and they said, okay, the show's a hit. You got to do a poster. And I went, what? You know, they were booking me to do all these photo shoots and go to these events, and then they said, you're doing a poster? And I did it. And, it sold really big.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It's one of the top. Maybe the top. I mean, it's hard to tell now.

Heather Thomas: It's the highest selling in the world. I outsold Farrah.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. and were you sitting around going, okay, I'm good. I got. I just passed Heather Locklear. Now I gotta head for Farrah. Like, I didn't.

Heather Thomas: I didn't need to pass Heather Locklear. She didn't even come till, like, later. I wasn't even thinking about her at that point. I was just happy because I was going, I can buy a house. You know, that was what I was doing. I was thrilled.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, it was the time. And people still love those. Like, those are still, you know, for, sale. Do you still get any money?

Heather Thomas: I'm vintage now. You know, they never give you the money. After a certain amount of time, all these people, they license me these phony companies and they sell my likeness. You know, they sell the rights to have a picture of me somewhere.

Sharon Johnson: That's got to be frustrating.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, yeah.

Heather Thomas: But if you go after these guys, it's like, whack a mole, another one's gonna pop up. I remember being, you know, in the 90s, they were taking pictures with giant life size cutouts. You know, boardwalks and things like that. You take a picture with a giant life size Eddie Murphy and a giant life size Heather Thomas. One time, I think I was on a date with my husband in New Orleans, and as a joke, he stole the heather cut out. And the guy was. And he gave it to our limo driver who was running away with it. And the guy is chasing him down the street going, bring Heather back. Really funny. And my husband goes, no copyright infringement. But we had to give it back at the end of the day if we wanted to go. Unless we wanted to take them to court. You know, I didn't.

Sharon Johnson: Still sounds like a fun moment.

Heather Thomas: But they, No, I was everything but a toilet seat cover and an ashtray. It probably was an ashtray. I. I saw. I found myself on a lighter in Mexico. I was, a peachy Notebook. I was a puzzle. I was a lot of notebook covers for kids. And then I was a lot of, I was a pillow.

Susan Lambert Hatem: All right.

Heather Thomas: Sounds scary.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. Do you start to separate yourself from the image?

Heather Thomas: Well, it's work. It's.

00:25:00

Heather Thomas: It's, ah, my learning, you know, it's work. And that's how I looked at my body even then, you know, like, oh, this is my living. This is what needs to be healthy. This is what needs to be, you know, exercised and starved.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And, it was. It's tough. It was tough in the 80s to be on television as a woman.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. Because you were naked half the time. They didn't have, you know, all the special effects that could soften. You couldn't have an ounce of cellulite or anything. You had to be.

Susan Lambert Hatem: You had to be screen perfect.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. You couldn't fix it.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And so, I mean, did you feel that pressure? Did you feel like, oh, my God, I have to do this, or did it, you know, you seem like you were athletic.

Heather Thomas: It was part of the gig, you know, it wasn't like, oh, my God, I can't, eat, ice cream. I didn't care. I was happy to make the money. I was grateful every day. I was making more money than I ever made in my life. I was happy. I was a kid.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. And so what did it mean to be that? Recognized that young, like, I assume you went out and people were like, oh, my God.

Heather Thomas: You were, like, objectified to a certain amount, but that was what you were selling. So I wasn't. Oh, they don't think of me as a person. I never did any of that stuff. I was pretty. I was pretty tough in those days. I was. That's what I'm selling. That's what I do. And. And, yeah, they talk about you like you're a thing, but you really didn't. It didn't, like, hurt my feelings. It was. I, kind of knew the gig.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And so can we talk about a couple of your movies?

Heather Thomas: Sure. Which ones they were speaking of. Knew the gig.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I think I kind of have to talk about Zapped!, if we can, because it's such a. It's one of the quintessential 80s movies where it's basically, you know, teen sex comedy. Borderline sexual harassment.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, it was very much sexual harassment. I, did that before Fall Guy. I remember I did that. And again, I didn't think anything of it. They tried to get me topless, and my contract said. And so they used a body double, but they Have a disclaimer at the end.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Was it fun to do or was it just, this is a job?

Heather Thomas: It was fun until they tried to get me topless. They said, we're gonna get a girl with ugliest tits in town. I said, fine, as long as my head's not on them. And they did morph a picture of me with somebody else's boobs. But there's a big disclaimer at the end of the movie that it's not my tits.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I mean, I'm glad you got that, you know, because.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, and I did a People magazine about it. I did a, kind of publicity about it, you know, to keep the network happy that it wasn't my boobs.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, because the network cared for the show.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. You know, they want. They don't want you doing something trampy.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And you did a lot of press and appearances. I revisited a David Letterman appearance you made.

Heather Thomas: Oh, that was fun.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That was fun.

Heather Thomas: So much fun. That was fun. And, Bobby Morton, I hung out with his producer, and we were laughing because we had this book. I don't know how we got a hold of it. I think it was Bobby's. It was about the Gabor sisters, and we were all talking about Gabor lore. And, like, the new Gabors were the Kardashians. They married well. They had all these gowns and all these things they sold. And they were like a sister act in Vegas for a while. And they had a mom that just kept making money, and she owned, like, three blocks in downtown Manhattan. They were just funny. They would just, you know, marry and divorce and marry and divorce, and.

Susan Lambert Hatem: So they were the Kardashians.

Heather Thomas: Like the Kardashians. Yeah, they were just like the Kardashians. They got the sister plastic surgery the minute she hit New York.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Oh, my gosh.

Sharon Johnson: So what was David Letterman like as a, talk show host?

Heather Thomas: Lovely and normal. They're all lovely and normal.

Sharon Johnson: Well, that's great.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, I thought that you were. You showed a lot of, funk. And you made for a very interesting guest because of your wordsmithness. I think David Letterman asked about your poster and why you did it, and you said it was an actualization of a misdirected need for acceptance. And you kind of threw him with that answer.

Heather Thomas: Well, why not? That's kind of what it is. And it was, you know, you could say that's what it is. It was basically, furthering my cue quality.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. I mean, I think you were messing with him, but the way you did it, I think also threw him.

Heather Thomas: Well, you know, everybody was so analyzing in those days that there must be a psychological issue if you do something like that.

Sharon Johnson: You know, these days it seems on talk shows that it's almost scripted what they're going to talk to the host about. Was that the case when you were on David, on Letterman's show?

Heather Thomas: No.

00:30:00

Heather Thomas: They always ask you questions so he can know what you're doing. You know, the guy's got to do what, 50 people a week and you know, so. So they're gonna pre interview you to find out if you're interesting enough to be on the show, number one. And number two, what you have going on. Yeah. So they can get a clip of it, you know.

Sharon Johnson: Sure.

Heather Thomas: I was, I was in a really bad movie when I did Letterman. I was laughing so hard about it. I was still shooting it.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I think it was Psycho.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, it was so bad.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And you, you were like.

Heather Thomas: No, I was, I was shooting like a really, I was shooting something in Montreal at the time. I was like four movies ahead of that. But Cyclone was my divorce movie.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's what you say on the show. And I was like, this is insane. Like, talk shows were so much more fun in the 80s because people just said things.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, you said what really was. It was my divorce movie. I came back from Sri Lanka making this other move, a German miniseries. I went over there and that way I could get a divorce and hide. There's no place better to hide than the jungle in Sri Lanka. And, still. So, I came back and my soon to be ex-husband had contested some of my money. And so it was frozen. So I said, I need money. And my friend Mark said, well, why don't you do one of the crappy movies across the hall? They're always making movies. I walked over there, I told them my price and they, they met it and I, was in their crappy movie.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's amazing.

Heather Thomas: It was. I took so much of their money out of the budget that they use the craft service guy for my stuntman, doing the motorcycle stuff. Like there's a couple of times when there's like hairy knuckles revving the.

Sharon Johnson: That's awesome.

Heather Thomas: They even took my bra and put it on the guy. Stuffed was so low budget.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It was low budget, but they had Heather Thomas.

Sharon Johnson: That's right.

Heather Thomas: And Martin Landau was in it. There was like, hey, you had to get the card to get the insurance. You had to have so much money every year.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, for sure, for sure. And so who did like. I'm also curious about. I watched some of the Ford, the Man in the Machine. TV movie or TV series? it was like a miniseries. You're great. It's something you don't get to do as much the period and all that stuff.

Heather Thomas: I know, that was fun.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. I'm curious about working with Cliff Robertson, what that was like.

Heather Thomas: And Hope, Hope Lange was a scream. She was a scream. She's one of the funniest people I ever met, rest her soul. I loved her. Cliff Robertson. He would help me with my acting. He was good. He was good. He would tell me he was a little bossy, but I respect that in old guys they like to do that.

Heather Thomas: He was a good actor. Damn, he was a good actor. It was cold as cold AF there. I mean it was so cold. I was in Montreal in the countryside and I thought I knew cold, but I didn't know cold until I was out there. It was like we were shooting in like 27 below. The guys from Quebec were not friendly. The Montreal people were not that friendly. They were just busy trying to survive. And like the grips, all you saw were two little red eyes and a scarf. And yet they were pulling cable with their bare hands.  

And I remember I had this one scene where I had to. I'm in a riding habit, I'm leading a horse and talking with Cliff. And Cliff kept blowing the shot because he was scared the horse was going to eat his toupee or something. the costumer didn't think. He gave me real riding boots that were my size and all I could wear with them was like a nylon sock. And so my feet were walking through slush. and the director said, well, just raise your hand if you go numb and we'll get you to the hospital or something. And I remember at the end of the shot I said, I can't feel my feet anymore. And so they took me and they plunged my feet into ice water. And I remember screaming, they put them in ice water to warm them up because when you have frostbite you can't put them in hot water. And I didn't lose any toes. I got to keep them.

Susan Lambert Hatem: See, There you go, the 80s. We won't let you do anything fun, but God forbid on set we're gonna take off your toes.

Heather Thomas: We might kill you, but we don't mean to.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I want to talk about your mom a little bit, if that's okay.

Heather Thomas: My mom is fabulous.

Susan Lambert Hatem: She sounds fabulous. Her name was Gladdy Ryder. What A name she sounds like.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, Gladdy Lou Ryder

00:35:00

Heather Thomas: she was a riot.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Is that love of words and. Or just that sort of, I don't know, interesting layer? What do you. What do you think she gave you?

Heather Thomas: I think what she gave me was, a sense of not conforming more. Don't be what people expect. She, was enthusiastic. If she wanted something, some way, she figured out how to get it. Very determined when it came to her students, she wouldn't give up on any of them. She was a special ed teacher for 36 years. And she would do things, like, on her own dime, her own time. She would teach parents at night what their rights were as far as their children's rights were as student in the state of California, and what they could ask for for their student, and what. How to tell if the teachers were teaching them correctly. And I would have given up the ghost after two days in her classroom. But she just handled it all.  

She could multitask. Each kid was different and had different needs. And she said, your job is to do this thing. You need to stop chewing that. She let kids chew gum. And there were the kids that had emotional disabilities, and there were kids that had physical disabilities, and there were kids that had perceptual disabilities, and they were all different. And she would handle it all at once. She was amazing. Wow. Wow. And, she'd have, like, 36 kids in her class or 40 kids sometimes, because at one point, the conventional thinking in California was, let's make mega schools with mega classrooms. And then nobody got any attention.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. And what do you think you gave to your daughters?

Heather Thomas: To my daughters? Discipline. as far as being kind to everybody, treating everybody with deep respect, and reading a room. I know I'm good at teaching my kids that. That you have wealth or privilege. Comes responsibility to give back. That's very important to me. my children also know how to set limits and not blow it, go overboard. They know they're loved. They got that from me.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's great. I mean, we're, you know, we're fascinated by sort of that mother daughter stuff, which comes up in some of the shows.

Heather Thomas: I'm very eccentric as a mother. I would do weird things. Yeah, like what? Oh, we do solstice dinner, where we wear crowns, different types of hats that we have made, and we have. You have to offer something to the group, something that you created, whether it's a painting, or a song or a story or something you discovered. You have to offer something that night. And then we all tell fortunes. I'm that Kind of a mom. I'm a weird mom. My youngest daughter on her birthday, every morning my husband and I would be wearing big rubber masks to wake her up. You know, we're a little bit weird as a family. I would put like soap in the mold of dolls hands on their soap in the morning. Or I'm weird and eccentric, but I think that keeps it interesting. And we have good traditions. You want to have traditions. When I came on the scene, my husband and his ex-wife were fighting and the kids were caught in the middle and I came in and cut that out. That's good.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I'm, a step-parent and a parent and I love when everyone prioritizes the kids.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, you got to. And you can't take anything personally when you're a step parent. You're going to be the outlet for their, the stuff they can't tell the other parents. They're going to put some anger on you, some resentment on you. And my biggest thing was never criticize either parent because that's like telling a kid half of you is wrong. They can't separate themselves at an early age and it puts pressure on them to, you know, either have to defend their parent or they feel they're betraying their parent. It's just weird. So I just didn't personalize anything and just was along for the ride and wanted to be just loving and accepting.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That is amazing. And it's so interesting. Where did that come from? Is that from your mom? Is that from your own family?

Heather Thomas: No, My parents didn't divorce till I was like 18, 20, 19 maybe 18 or

00:40:00

Heather Thomas: 19. They didn't divorce until then. I just saw what was going on and figured out the most healthy way that I was going to exist in the relationship, that I was going to be there. I didn't want to be one more thing on these kids. and then the other thing was we needed to set some consistency. My husband tends to be a giant walking. Yes. And it's not healthy for kids. They need boundaries. And I was the mean mom that would say, you gotta know you're not going to this person's house unless the parents are home because it's disrespectful or, you know, stuff like that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. I remember when I started dating my now husband and his kids were very little and I was like, ugh, I don't know about this, this. And I was looking for the book on how to be a, step parent or how to manage blended families. And at the time, this was now 20 years ago, there wasn't a lot out there. There's a little more now, and there's podcasts all over the place. But it was an interesting sort of like, okay, I'm stepping into a world that exists.

Sharon Johnson: Right.

Susan Lambert Hatem: So how do I build a place and guidelines, but also honor what's existing?

Heather Thomas: Yeah, because you have to honor what's existing. But if what's existing is really unhealthy, you have to say, well, what am I going to bring to this that makes it healthy so I don't go crazy and they don't get hurt?

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, yeah. It's, interesting to navigate modern relationships.

Heather Thomas: Yeah.

Susan Lambert Hatem: speaking of modern relationships, can we talk a little bit about your activism? What sparked for you? I mean, you've been very politically active and very interested in the world and how it works for a long time. When did that start?

Heather Thomas: I've always been that, though. ever since they said, you can't climb the tree, the boys can. I was probably a feminist first, and I have a great love of nature. I also could see where the environment is everything. It's the air you breathe. It's like everybody thinks the environment's out there. It's right there, here. So I was very interested in conserving nature, you know, from seeing the discrepancies between the sexes. I gravitated to civil rights things. I think I did my first march in high school with Dolores Huerta. I was there. I don't think Cesar was there, but it was for, UFW farmworkers.

Sharon Johnson: Was that the kind of thing your parents were doing that? Your parents?

Heather Thomas: Yeah, my parents were really into Bobby Kennedy. They were there in the night he got shot.

Sharon Johnson: Oh, my goodness.

Heather Thomas: They were Democrats. I come from a big Democrat family.

Susan Lambert Hatem: So LA Cafe is what I was reading about. It was called Regime Change Cafe. How did that start?

Heather Thomas: I got together with some guys that were progressive, but also embedded in the Democratic Party, but more the progressive wing. And what I was seeing happening in Hollywood, because, you know, I got thrown into this kind of trophy wife donor class thing when I married Skip.  

I blame monotheism. Everybody kept, like, gravitating to the one big thing that election. You know, there would be one guy who would say, I have GPSs, and we're going to track, you know, voters that way, and we're going to, you know, make sure everybody votes. And there would be one guy, and I'd say, well, what about all the grassroots or locally, blah, blah, blah, blah. But they would always want to do it from a big national level. I saw that happening, and we kept losing. And I started saying, well, let's identify local issues and what's going on. But it takes a million different. There are a million different paths up the mountain that you have to get there.  

So I started working with putting baby grassroots groups, these effective grassroots groups together with foundations and, funds and seasoned activists. So we started doing this kind of linking salon where, you know, young groups would present what they were about, and people would come and advise them. You know, it was kind of just m. Like getting them connected to people. And sometimes they'd say, well, you should probably roll into this group and be part of them and not be your own thing. Or some of them would say, this is great. I'm going to fund you. We'll get you some money for this effort. And we had everybody present. Everybody came through. Move On first came in through there. we got critical early funding for CREW.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Nice.

Heather Thomas: Which was a really funny story at that time. Gail Zappa was still alive. It was at a time when that. Who was that guy? Tom Delay was, you know, doing all this cheesy stuff. And they had no ethics in Congress, probably how they're going to have it now. And, nobody. Everybody was faking like they were conservative. There were like, tumbleweeds blowing through Henry Waxman and Barbara Boxer's office. And everybody was faking like they were these big conservatives. And. And, they could not get enough money to challenge the ethics. And they were all former federal prosecutors. They knew where everybody was breaking the law, but they couldn't get any traction. And the Democrats were too scared to get on board with them. They needed critical early funding. And Gail goes, oh, I know where I can get him a million dollars. And I said, really? Where? He said, Larry Flint. I went, really? And I said, okay, okay. And she goes, have Melanie Sloan. We're going to have a lunch. So we had lunch at the, Four Seasons. And I don't think I told Melanie until he rolled in like, Jabba the Hut in his wheelchair. She, like, freaked out, and I'm just holding her dress down on her chair, like, take the money, Take the money. Take the money, honey. And because of that, they were able to bring up all this stuff that culminated in that Foster guy who was molesting the pages. And the Republicans knew. And then Nancy Pelosi was able to say, culture of corruption. But none of that was started by the Democratic Party. That was started by crew. But it was critical early funding. And because of that, Nancy Pelosi became the speaker. So there's all these funny little ways to get up the mountain. I love that critical early funding by Larry Flint. Like he was sick of them. He was sick of them hounding Bill Clinton about a blowjob. So, so he, he was looking to discredit other people, you know, to say they're just as bad. Who are they to point fingers? You know, I can dig it.

Sharon Johnson: That strategy kind of worked for a while too, because there were a number of Republicans who, whose misdeeds were brought to light and they were sent on their way.

Heather Thomas: But there's always more Republicans. They're much more. They're completely audacious.

Heather Thomas: We, we are so timid as Democrats.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah, I agree, I agree.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, yeah, often comes from a place of reason, thoughtfulness.

Heather Thomas: It comes from being thoughtful and kind and having, empathy.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Now, did you help Fair Fight in the early days?

Heather Thomas: A million people helped Fair Fight. Yeah, I got what money I could for Stacy. I also created don't get Purged for her. a little too late because Kemp really purged a lot of people off the voter rolls.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I'm from Georgia, so I was following, Follow Georgia Politics.

Heather Thomas: I'm convinced she won that year. I still am. yeah. You know, Karen Goro Wardo, I bet she knew they didn't even have line of custody of the voting machines, you know, or the voter rolls. But there were so many people that were turned away from the polls that year.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, absolutely. And then even, I mean, even this last election was very scary. There were like 67 bomb threats called into polling places.

Heather Thomas: Something went down. You know, I can go the conspiracy theory way and say, how come Elon pulled all of a sudden 13 satellites went down and the bullet votes and go the way of that. But I think the main problem was that we have ignored being in media and we ignored the fact that media was owned by people that wanted Trump.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. We're in a really weird, tough time.

Heather Thomas: It's gonna get worse. Yes, it's gonna get a lot worse before it gets better. Woohoo. Yeah, we can do it. And we're gonna have to handle it. We will.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: But yeah, it's gonna get worse. And the sad thing is people are gonna get hurt.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: And people are gonna, there's gonna be all sorts of people hurt. And it's just, you think, who are these guys? They think I'm, yeah, I'm gonna own the libs. And then they find out they're going to have to pay for their parents the rest of their lives. Because the social safety net is gone or this is gone and there's. There's going to be hell to pay. We'll see. I think these guys are

00:50:00

Heather Thomas: just gonna rape the money. Yeah, they're gonna rape the money. They're gonna rape the countryside. They're gonna give away our natural resources.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: They're gonna sell the farm. It's all the new world order of the Tech Bros. Yeah. I mean, if you read any of the Curtis Yarvin stuff that Peter Thiel ascribes to, it's. It's a crazy town.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: It's like These nouveau riche 13-year-olds all got together and decided to design a world where they're all little kings, you know? It's hysterical.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Are you staying on Twitter or are you going to Blue Sky or.

Heather Thomas: I'm on both. I'm on both. I haven't done social media for three days and people are like in my DMs going, are you dead? Are you alive? It's so funny. Usually I'm on there a lot.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. But it's kind of good to have that. I did that after the election and it was good. It was good.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. I stayed after the election because I wanted to give people hope and let them know I'm still here. I'm fighting to the last breath comes out of me. And don't concede in advance. Nope. And, don't you know all that on tyranny advice? I'm into it, but I had a lot of grandkids stuff the past couple of days, so I haven't been able to say, oh, Kimberly Guilfoyle should be an ambassador.

Susan Lambert Hatem: You know, it's insane. It's insane. Well, I'm glad you that you're having the grandkid thing now. Also, I'm curious about your fly fishing and how you got into that.

Heather Thomas: Oh, fly fishing. I love it. My husband would have dumped me if I couldn't fish. That's his thing. Skip Brittenham is one of the best fly fishermen in the world. He has records all over the country, all over the continents. He even fished for our nation. He was on two world champion teams. But you didn't know we had a world champion.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I did not.

Sharon Johnson: No idea. Had no idea.

Heather Thomas: I mean, a world. There is a world fishing contest. fly fishing. And he was on the US team twice.

Susan Lambert Hatem: How do they rate it? What are you trying to do?

Heather Thomas: They divide an area. like they've gone to Italy. I'm like, where's the big fly fishing in Italy. And do they have enough to divide into beats so that everybody can compete fairly? No, but they do it anyway. You know, they've done Argentina, and I think they're. They fish all over the world. Just depends on which country is up that year. I was in a, fishing contest. I'm one of the few women that was on a winning team in the Jackson Hole. One fly, which is really, really fun.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: You get one fly in the morning. You pick your fly in the morning. If you lose your fly, you're out. So you only get the points you score with that fly.

Sharon Johnson: Oh, congratulations. That's awesome.

Heather Thomas: Yeah.

Sharon Johnson: What is it about fly fishing that, that you, that you find so appealing?

Heather Thomas: You can't think about anything else but fly fishing? When you're fishing, you have to think about the, you have to think about the entomology. You have to think about the water. You have to think the hydraulics of it. You have to think about the weather. You have to think about what the moonlight was the night before, what the cloud cover is that day. You have to read, what the fish are taking and match it. And I fish barbless. So that gives you less than a second to catch your fish. It's not bait, you know, it's a fly, so they're not going to swallow it. You fish with a worm, you're going to get the fish no matter what, and you're probably going to kill the fish I catch and release.

Susan Lambert Hatem: You have the fly, and it's just if the fish grabs it, how did.

Heather Thomas: Yeah.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Okay. And so it doesn't hook them.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, it hooks itself. But you're getting their lip just that you have just barely a second to get it.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Okay, that sounds harder, but kinder.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, they don't really feel the same way. We feel pain. They just know they're going forward or backward and they're not feeling that thing the same way.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Now, have you ever gone fly fishing with Henry Winkler?

Heather Thomas: My husband taught Henry. I think he first took Henry Winkler fly fishing or one of the first times. And Henry's been on the same river. We've all been, on a fishing trip and he's been in a boat on the same river. I have rode a canoe with Henry Winkler in it. Henry and I have been in a canoe, but I have never been fly fishing with him side by side. We used to own a fly fishing ranch in West Yellowstone called the Fire Hole. And he came up to visit and, everybody went fly fishing, but I don't

00:55:00

Heather Thomas: think I fished side by side with him.

Sharon Johnson: What about your daughters or your grandkids? Do any of them. Are any of them interested in fly fishing?

Heather Thomas: They don't even get no. They don't care. My oldest daughter is really good and she'd be like, dad, there's a fish on my line. Again. They don't like it. It's not their thing. It's not their thing.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, I really now want to show with you and Henry Winkler fly fishing and solving political problems. Can you make that happen?

Sharon Johnson: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: Political problems. Yeah. We need to get rid of money in politics, and I don't know how that's going to happen.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah, we'll figure it out. I would go a long way to fixing a lot of things.

Heather Thomas: Yeah.

Susan Lambert Hatem: How can people find you or support causes that you support?

Heather Thomas: They can always donate to. Don't get purged. There's a donation button on there. Or they can they go to don'tgetpurged.org we had millions of people through that site this year checking their, status. There's a million things I support give to the Rape Foundation. I think right now the most important thing is we support our local newspapers, we support local journalists, we support libraries, librarians, teachers, we support institutions. Support your local, I would do all environmentalists because the environment's going to be. There's going to be no regulations and probably no way to even test legally by the time they get through with this. So I would invest in those life straws and invest in water filters and stuff and air filters.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Wow.

Heather Thomas: All right.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, how do you keep hope?

Heather Thomas: There's always hope. Nothing's impossible. There's always hope. And I don't think people are going to take it. I. I don't think people are aware what they voted for. It was a worldwide throwing out a. Of the incumbencies because of inflation. I think that's what it mainly was this election and eggs were high. And they don't really consider that democracy is going to be at stake. They didn't think that someone in another state having a problem with abortion, if abortion was legal in their state, they didn't care. Nobody m thinks about that stuff until it affects them.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah. It's hard to tell that story effectively.

Heather Thomas: Yeah. And there was also this big sense worldwide. It was, a kind of a zeitgeist where people believed that other people were coming to their country and getting stuff they shouldn't have, and they resented it even if they were living fairly well. It wasn't like we were living in poverty and someone else was, you Know, the the propaganda would be the migrants are in five-star hotels. That was a crock of s** you know, but that's what people believe because we do not have the media.

Heather Thomas: And it was a backlash for me too, which went too far.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And I think we still haven't shown that we can successfully elect a female president.

Heather Thomas: No. And we won't even nominate one for a couple of cycles now, which is stupid. It is stupid.

Sharon Johnson: But you know, sadly, I've, I've thought for a long time that, that the, the first female president will be a Republican. Because Republicans.

Heather Thomas: Yeah, but Republican women are contemptible.

Sharon Johnson: I'm not,

Susan Lambert Hatem: You're just saying that's the way.

Sharon Johnson: I don't know.

Heather Thomas: I have met, very few Republican women I respect, frankly.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, I think it will happen. I was hoping it would happen in my lifetime. I'm not as sure, but that's.

Heather Thomas: I'm not so sure either. But I'll be happy if we keep democracy in my lifetime.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah, me too. Let's start there.

Heather Thomas: At least. Let's start with that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: We'll start from there.

Heather Thomas: And you know, nothing's impossible. It could be. For all we know, there might be another woman nominated and elected. But right now we have to see where the men were. Like, oh, we're losing our white privilege. As long as we're on this grievance thing. And the. Someone's taking stuff. Someone having something is taking it away from me, you know? I thought that was going to come with overpopulation. And we're here and it came. We thought about that in the 80s. We thought about stuff like that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: Overpopulation. And with global warming, whole populations are going to have to migrate with that. And so it won't just be war as an impetus for moving around, it'll be worse. yeah, yeah.

Sharon Johnson: Basic survival.

Heather Thomas: Anyway, I'm not sure, I'm not

01:00:00

Heather Thomas: sure from that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Listen, it has been so great to talk to you.

Heather Thomas: It's been great talking.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It's been awesome to have you on the show and you're an amazing 80s TV lady and so I'm really glad.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah, we really appreciate your time and your willingness to share with us, and eventually with our listeners. Really, really admire what you're doing, what you've done in your career and also what you've done politically.

Heather Thomas: It's an interesting conversation.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah, absolutely.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It has been. And I really appreciate, your activism a lot.

Heather Thomas: Thank you.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And your sense of hope and giving people hope.

Heather Thomas: I do have a sense of hope.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Heather Thomas: Nothing's impossible.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, me, too. I think it's our job.

Heather Thomas: Absolutely.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I think it's our job. If you have any privilege, it's your job to have hope.

Heather Thomas: That's right.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah, that's a good point.

Heather Thomas: It's our job.

Susan Lambert Hatem: All right.

Heather Thomas: Thank you.

Sharon Johnson: Have a great afternoon.

Heather Thomas: Have a good day.

Sharon Johnson: You too. For our audiography today, you can find Heather Thomas on Twitter at Heather Thomas.

Susan Lambert Hatem: She is also on, blue sky@heatherthomasaf.bsky. social.

Sharon Johnson: And if you haven't already seen it, you can find the Fall Guy movie on Peacock TV for free. If you're a subscriber, it can also be rented or bought on Amazon Prime Video, YouTube, Fandango, and Flix Fling.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Flix Thing. How fun.

Sharon Johnson: Flicks. Fling Flicks.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Fling. And the Fall Guy TV show is streaming on Amazon Prime Video. You can also purchase it at YouTube, Apple TV. You can also go to dontgetpurged.org to make sure that you are not taken off the voter rolls. And for the organization crew that Heather Thomas mentioned in the show, which is actually the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, you can go check them out@citizensforeethics.org they're a great organization.

Sharon Johnson: So we come to the end of what I think is another fantastic episode, and we hope that 80s TV ladies continues to bring you joy and laughter and lots of fabulous new and old shows to watch, all of which will lead us forward toward being amazing ladies of the 21st century, which I think Heather Thomas is.

Sharon Johnson: I agree.

[Music] [Singing] Amy Englehardt: 80s TV Ladies, So sexy and so pretty. 80s TV Ladies, Steppin’ out into the city. 80s TV Ladies, often treated kind of sh-[wolf whistle]. Working hard for the money in a man’s world. 80s TV Ladies!

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