The podcast company which represents Meghan Markle has announced a new, rather familiar sounding series. Lemonada will be launching “Fail Better”, hosted by actor David Duchovny. “The podcast will see Duchovny sitting down with guests to explore the topic of failure in all its forms, from the professional to the personal, and the ways in which failure, shame, and falling short shaped his and all our lives,” according to a press release. Confirmed guests so far include Ben Stiller and Bette Midler.
One person who’s seeing double? Elizabeth Day. The British author is in the twentieth season of her podcast, “How to Fail”, where “every week, a new guest explores what their failures taught them about how to succeed better.”
Sure, imitation is the highest form of flattery, but that didn’t stop Day’s feisty response: “Might invite David Duchovny on @howtofailpod to discuss his failure to be original,” she wrote on X.
Duchovny, who has starred in Californication, the X-files and Twin Peaks, might dispute this. “I’ve been a connoisseur of failure for a long time, obsessed with the mistakes we make or the fear of making,” he says.
In 2018, he told the New York Times “if I was going to get a tattoo on my ass,” it would be Samuel Beckett’s line, “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.”
This is not the first time a podcast hosted by posh British female writers has inspired copycats across the pond. Dolly Alderton and Pandora Sykes hosted The High Low until 2020, where they discussed everything from highbrow current affairs to lowbrow pop culture.
In 2022, model Emily Ratajkowski announced her new podcast, “High Low with EmRata” where she promised to speak about “everything from politics, philosophy, and feminism to sex, TikTok and relationships.” What are the chances!
