About this episode

Tom Junod discusses masculinity, his relationship with his father, and personal reflections in this intense conversation.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.com Tom is a journalist and author. A former staff writer at GQ and Esquire, the film A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood was based on his Esquire article on Fred Rogers. He’s currently a senior writer at ESPN, and his new memoir is called In the Days of My Youth I Was Told What It Means to Be a Man . It was an intense conversation — about dads, sex, Catholicism, and growing older. For two clips of the episode — on being your dad’s wingman as a kid, and the dark secrets that Catholic families often carry — head to our YouTube page . Other topics: his dad’s serious injury at Normandy; emulating leading men in Hollywood; selling women’s handbags; his extreme vanity and obsession with scents; “the first metrosexual”; women flocking to him; making Tom complicit in his countless affairs; how men benefitted from the early Sexual Revolution more than women; Vatican II; Tom’s close relationship with his Catholic mom; Tom fearing his dad; the friends who worshipped him like a celebrity; hiding his Brooklyn accent; hiding extreme porn and dildos in his briefcase that Tom found; sadomasochism and bondage…

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