The Making of the Alix Earle Episode [VIDEO]

Welcome to the first Season four Sunday session with your father. I'm back at it again. My name is Alex Cooper. I hope you guys know that by now, and in case someone's new here, my name's Alex.

I'm 29 years old, I have two dogs and a fiancé and a podcast called Call Her Daddy. Welcome to the Sunday Sessions. I used to call these mini episodes, but then I realized half the time I make them fucking an hour, that's not miniature, Alex.

That's another podcast episode, so I decided we're going to do a little rebrand. So Sunday sessions are basically going to be me and you guys doing some solo episodes, reading questions. I can have experts on when we're going through midlife crisis, mental health crisis, whatever we're going through, and then also a lot of behind the scenes episodes.

I released a one and only behind the scenes episode ever of the Ariana Maddox episode, and you guys ended up loving to see. Like, the process of the making of an episode. So that is what we're doing here today. I just released the season four premiere episode with Alex Earl, and as fun as that episode was, I feel like the behind the scenes of the making of that episode with Alex Earl was even more fun.

It was a fucking rollercoaster ride. And so today, Daddy Gang, we're going to get into it. And I am going to take you through step-by-step the making of the Alex Earl episode.

So let me take you back to the beginning of the first time that I saw Alex Earl. I started following her, and I just remember she made a video of her, basically saying like, Oh my god, Alex Cooper followed me. I didn't know she was a fan of Call her Daddy, until after that she started making more videos, saying like, I'm a huge call her daddy fan I've always been.

And if there's going to be one podcast that I ever go on, it's going to be Call Her Daddy. So from then on, I knew we were going to be meant to podcast together at some point. It was just a matter of when. Whenever I get a highly requested guest, a lot of the times, you guys harass me.

You don't let up on the gas pedal. If I ignore you guys, you ramp it up. I started getting inundated with Please have Alex Earl on the podcast, Please have Alex Earl on the podcast.

But something about it, this is almost like exactly a year ago, something about it. I just knew. This isn't just going to be a podcast with Alex Earl where she comes in the studio and we talk about, like, what's your dating life like? I just knew she's so talented, she's so engaging, and she has such a great career ahead of her. There's definitely going to be something more here than just one Call her Daddy episode.

So I waited on it for a while. Alex and I met about six months ago through someone mutual that we work with, and we went to a brunch. And I remember it was just like an immediate, easy connection. The two of us, we were just like, Oh my God, we're very similar in certain ways, very different in certain ways. But we hit it off immediately and we were like, this is going to be very fun. No matter what we do together, whether we work in business together, we do an episode, it's going to happen.

And fast forward. I signed Alex Earl to the Unwell Network, which is now a network that my fiancé and I just launched under our company Trending. So finally, we decided when you launch Hot Mess happens to be the same time that I am launching season four of Call Her Daddy. And it only felt right to have Alex come on and to finally do what everyone wanted from us. The Call Her Daddy episode that you guys just watched starts in New Jersey. But I'm going to give you a little behind the scenes. That is not actually how this filming process started.

I made the decision that I thought it would be really advantageous for Alex and the content if we started in Miami. Because when we were in New Jersey, I knew that content was going to be really deep and really heavy. And we were going to talk about her childhood and certain trauma that she's been through with her family. And I'm like, I can't just roll up to New Jersey the first day of shooting and be like, speak your truth, hey girl, like, it just wasn't the vibe. So I get on a plane and I fly to Miami for this shoot.

I get there on my birthday, which was a Monday. And we decide that we're all going to kind of do. Like a big kickoff dinner, we all meet up for a dinner at a place called Carbone. I'm sure Daddy Gang, you've heard of the spicy Rigatoni. It's fire, it's incredible.

It's really fucking annoyingly hard to get into, but it makes the food taste even better. So this trip was very chaotic and also special. Because not only are we filming the Call Her Daddy episode for this trip, we're also about to film the Hot Mess first episode. And it was my birthday, so I brought my best friend Lauren to come down and celebrate my birthday with me. And Alex brought her best friend, Kristen. And it was kind of like a very cute dinner. And moment to watch Lauren and Kristen hitting it off and becoming close, me and Alex talking, and I was like, Fuck, we should have saved it for the podcast. Guys, you all ready?

One, two, three.

Happy birthday, happy birthday, happy birthday to you.

Thank you, bye, goodbye, oh my God.

I think it was like 11 in the morning because we are anxious, so we're about to shoot. But like, we're doing things kind of in a reverse order. So we're just going to take a shot. Because we need to really feel like, we're, you know, loose and it's like the middle of the day.

Yeah, just something to like, take the edge off.

Alex had never podcasted in her life. I think people underestimate how different TikTok is from podcasting. And Alex. We were just laughing because at first Alex kept being like, words are not coming out of my mouth, hitting her head, being like, hello. And then she picked it up in literally five minutes.

And I was like, Alex, I have sat with people for hours. She literally is a natural and it was so cool to see knowing she's about to start her own podcast. Hello, oh wow.

But you've listened to me so you can expect it. And I remember saying to everyone I literally was sucking a pee, pee. And I'm not going to lie. I had a really great experience with this setting. Because I came up and I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I was like, Oh my God, it's still on.

Everything's on.

So, of course, one thing just had to go wrong. That first night, when we were filming before the Get Ready with Me section, we're like, Okay, we've been filming, let's get our shit together. And I realized that I left my Duffel bag that had my makeup, my going out outfit, my passport.

Because I was after this trip, leaving to go out of the country with Matt to look at a wedding location. I just fucking lost my bag and I left it completely in a fucking Uber. I have no outfit, I have no makeup. It was a fucking disaster.

These are the things you don't see in the episodes. Oh my god, okay, I'm going to go die bye.

But then when you call, they give it back.

I know you'll get it back.

The trunk closed. Okay, I had in this bag because it was my carry on bag, and I always think my bag is going to get lost. Every designer bag I ever owned, all my nice shoes.

I had my wallet, my passport, my birth certificate.

Because I was moving, I was like, I'm a big girl, I'm not living at my house anymore. And this was this past year. I had all of this stuff my whole life, I wouldn't have existed.

My birth certificate was in there. Every single bit of Alice Earl was in this bag. And it was dumped on the side of the highway. And I called the police station, they were like, it's on the side of the highway.

We know exactly where it is, I go to there and it's not there. And someone contacted me a few hours later because their dad brought this bag home and was like, I found this on the side of the road.

I don't know. And the daughter was like, that's Alice Earl's bag because they opened it and saw my ID, so I almost wouldn't have existed.

Oh, wait.

Let's go, let's get ready.

And now Alex and I, at this point, had had like two cocktails. We're feeling good. And I'm like, it's truth or drink. you either answer the truth, Alex, or you drink instead, and I'm like, in to my seventh question.

I'm like, Wow, this girl's like so open, like, I love Alex, she's really giving me all the answers we all need. And I remember at one point, Alex is like, Oh fuck, I forgot. I can use the option to drink instead of telling the fucking truth.

Alex was answering every single question as if I was like interviewing her, like, what's your body count? and finally, when I asked her the body count question? She's like, I'm going to actually use the I'm going to plead the fifth and actually take a fucking sip of my drink. It was very funny though, and cute to see her, like she was so down and willing.

I feel like that's what makes for some of the best episodes. Then we go out to this nightclub and I had so much fun, I can't even put it into words, I had too much fun.

I will I look back at this video footage and I can't express to you guys. When I meet the Daddy gang in person, it is like I become, I almost become like possessed.

Something clicks in me when I see you guys out drinking, having fun and partying, and I'm like, we are one. I just went really hard because it's just important to me when I meet you guys that we have the time of our lives. We raged to the point where I almost smashed my entire fucking mouth onto the table. Thank you to the security guard for carrying my limp body out of the air.

I think it was probably one of the craziest nights that I have ever had in terms of, like, meeting Daddy Gang and meeting Alex Earle's fans. It was like, Whoa, this feels like a cult and I like it. I actually saw comments from some people being like, you're like, getting old now? like, it's just cringe that you're partying.

I feel like I want to be a grandmother in the corner, shooting shots of vodka and having the time of my life until it all ends. And I just like, feel bad when people say that, I'm like, Oh God, like you're one of those. That's like, when you hit 30, you have to take your life seriously. And you can't go out. And you can't have good sex, you have to have normal missionary, and you're not allowed to drink anymore, and you're not allowed to wear anything but turtleneck and overalls.

I don't think so. OK, pussy out till I'm fucking dead. Tequila shots up my asshole and like, let's fucking ramp it up even more. When I turn 30, it's only going to get fucking weirder. Damn like that just sucks that people like you have like an age range that you have to, like, stop having fun.

I'm like, Ugh, I don't want to hang out with you. I had fun and I don't actually get to go out that often and I don't get to party that much. I feel like my whole life is work and so I was like it was nice to be able to combine work and partying. And Alex Earl is a pretty good fucking time to let your guard down and get fucked up with. But that morning debrief of Alex and I, that was not a joke.

I had full glass in my foot, I ended up going to the hospital, but it was actually for an ear infection. There was a lot of things going on with me that trip, the beach scene. I'm not going to lie in between takes, and I wonder if we have it on film. We kept being like, this literally looks like we're shooting a fucking scene from the Bachelor.

Like, it was so romantic, we ended up going to the Frat Boys House, which you guys saw. It's so crazy when you see things on TikTok. I had no idea the house is big.

They had a pool in the backyard going to Boston University, it was like parkas and big boots, and there wasn't even a fucking campus. I'm like, it can't even relate to the concept of having a fucking pool when you're in college. It was really cool to see where she was when she got famous in that house and her Get Ready with Me station, that was super fun.

I love what you've done with the place.

Although there will be a solitaire app on their fucking phone, and it's really a vault with all of your nudes. After we finished filming, it was a Thursday for Call Her Daddy, and then we started filming Alex's first episode of Hot Mess. So this week, quite literally, I was dying, laughing multiple times with Alex, where I was like.

We're gonna get sick of each other at some point. We were together for a straight week, from 8 a.m to basically, I mean, we slept together one night, not like that. We're waking up at 8 a.m, we're filming till the sun is going down. Every fucking day. We filmed Hot Mess, her first episode, and it's so fucking good.

It's so weird to think about a pilot. I look back at the call, her daddy pilot sex me. So I know it's real. So many years ago recording that, and I'm so excited for her. Because launching something that's yours and that you're so proud of.

It's exciting, Alex just called me because while I'm recording this hot mess is dropping tomorrow, I'm recording this on a Wednesday. And she just facetimed me being like, How are we doing? Talk to me, and I'm like, it's gonna be great, you're gonna fucking kill it. And it's fun to see her just so invested in the product and that's something I have to say about.

Alex is this girl fucking works her ass off, she has a crazy work ethic. I didn't know until I got to Miami, and I kept being like, we can take a break. And she's like, No, what's up, what's the next shot?

I'm like, Okay, bitch. I just love to see how seamless her content is online, but she works really fucking hard to make sure that she's giving the world's content. 24 fucking 7 and entertaining all of us. I know I'm entertained. The pilot is always like a brain fog moment where you're like, what do we put in here? what do we not put in here?

So I'm really proud of her and it's so fucking good and I can't wait for everyone to watch it. It's out now, so go watch it.

Then we left Miami and we headed to New Jersey, Alex's hometown, where we went to her dad's home. And it was a lot. Meeting her siblings was incredible, her siblings are the cutest, cutest. Like play clips of Thomas over and over. If you need to just feel good and just be like, Thomas, you're literally like this little ray of sunshine. I'd be like, I'm Thomas, like the cutest kid ever.

Penelope and Isabel, her little half siblings. They're literally precious humans. So much energy. It was so fun to meet them and thanking their like family so much for, like, letting me come into their home. And to film to get an idea of, like, what Alex Earl's life is like.

Please.

Yes, I would love that you can give me a little tour.

Can I meet Percy? because I feel like, where is he? He's right on the couch, Alex and Percy.

He's right there, he's right here.

Is Alex your girlfriend?

Oh, really.

Oh, oh.

Thomas is like.

She's like, okay.

Yeah, she graduated college, she graduated college, right?

But.

She's nice, she's pretty, she's kind.

And I think that's why I said, like, we waited to go to New Jersey last. Like, there's a place and a time to ask someone these questions. And obviously, when I'm in the studio with someone, I'm going in a linear way. That, like, we know where the trauma sits, or like, when we're going to get to that point. And even when I'm doing interviews in the studio, sometimes I will come up with a bunch of more questions. Because I can feel the person's like, not ready to go there yet.

I wanted to build rapport with her, I wanted her to feel like she wasn't talking to a random stranger. She had made a comment to me, like so many people try to, like, get me to do interviews and ask me about this. And like, I knew, call her daddy was the place that I actually wanted to talk about. This, which I take with like, great responsibility. Like wanting to make sure you're not pushing someone too hard to the point where you're just like being invasive and rude. But also trying to get them to push themselves to talk about things.

One issue on the bleacher scene, Alex gets to a point where she is. We're coming back from crying, and she goes to tell the story of what happened in her childhood. And I'm not kidding you, there's a train track right next to her old high school. Just starts going, beep, literally I'm seeing a tear come down.

She's like, So, then I remember.

We picked the worst place.

And then on top of that, there was a runner. You know who you are? I'm sure you looked for yourself in the episode, buddy, and we cut you out. There was a man in a sweatsuit. He thought it would be a good idea to run the bleachers that day.

Okay, and we had to put an edit effect over the side of the bleachers for almost the entire interview. Because there was something so not cool about you watching Alex being like, So, my trauma, I remember in second grade. And it's fucking Johnny in the back in his sweatsuit, being like another mile, like you couldn't take it seriously. Trying to, like, deflect and make sure she has something to do and play with. Like, were you ever torn, like, with how to handle the situation?

And so we had to put like a fake fade thing. You don't need to know about it, but it's an edit thing that you can put over and like, mask it. And it was the biggest mind fuck to the entire time be like, Oh my god, you can see his leg cover it.

Like, we were tracking this suit, man, oh, I fucking hate suit men. And the issue was as we're sitting there editing this, there were moments where the tracking device didn't fully work. And so it looked like there was a fucking ghost and I was like, you guys, if we upload this footage and we don't carefully watch every second? The thing that's going to trend about this fucking episode is people being like there was a ghost. That came near the bleachers when Alex was telling her family trauma story.

Like, no one would have been able to take it seriously, or no one would have been able to focus. So that was an edit that took way fucking, that literally took almost two full fucking days to mask that fucking shit and post edit. But we figured it was worth it. Because, you know what, I didn't want, you guys focusing on Johnny and how you guys would have been like, Okay, that's his fifth lap, that's his sixth lap.

Oh yeah, he's on his 10th lap. Like, we didn't need that, we were focused on what Alex was saying, so that was a fucking disaster. If I have learned anything from podcasting, it's really therapeutic.

And I had a cute moment with Alex off camera of just saying, like, I'm excited for you, for your podcast. Cause it's going to force you in a kind of good but uncomfortable way to actually have conversations about things. Not even. I don't even mean on camera the amount of conversations I've had to have with my family. Because something sparked a conversation through my podcast. Or distant cousins or family members.

Like, it's a really, I know this is like it's to entertain all of you. But personally, I'm excited for Alex because I can tell that she's just beginning to try to like, work through shit that she's been through. And I know I'm biased, but I don't think there's anything better than having a podcast. Because on and off camera, you just have to constantly be looking inward and thinking about things and thinking about yourself. And and thinking about, like, how did that emotionally affect me? Cause I need to go talk about it on the podcast? And so it's almost like you're like forcing yourself to go deeper than maybe you would if you weren't talking into a fucking camera every fucking week and having to be like, what's new and original happening in my life?

Oh, I just had a fight with my mom, or I just was going through something with a family member like, you get deep. And I'm just excited for her, cause I can tell she's at that point in her twenties where it's like. Romantic relationships become affected if you don't start to work on shit and you start to question things about yourself.

And it's kind of a fun crossroads. And I'm just excited for her because clearly she's going to share a lot of this on Hot Mess with the World. And I'm just happy to watch her do it and be a part of it in any way that I can help her. So I can't thank you guys enough for watching the episode, and I can't also thank you guys enough because we really switch it up here.

And I know sometimes we've gone from just audio podcast to video podcast, to vlog podcast to docu style episodes, sometimes like, we're swerving. And I truly feel like I have the coolest job in the world and I can't thank you guys enough for supporting me. Of being like, we liked this format, we didn't like this format, yes, I like that.

You're creatively trying different things, Alex like. It invigorates me to feel like every week I can put out something that I was feeling creative and creatively inspired by. And you guys are going to support it. Even if you do slide in and be like, Okay, none of that again, but like, good try, like, hate that format, but never again. But it seems like you guys really liked this format of the Alex Real episode. And so all I can say is next week, a.k.a. This upcoming week, there is another vlog style movie, ish style pod, coming your way.

And I can not wait for you to see who the guest is because I am in love. I love her so much and I cannot wait for you guys to get a full episode with this person. So get ready daddy gang, I will see you fuckers on Wednesday. Goodbye.