Taylor Swift’s Eras tour hits movie theatres

This is an audio transcript of the FT Weekend podcast episode: ‘Taylor Swift’s Eras tour hits movie theatres’

Lilah Raptopoulos
Welcome to FT Weekend. I am your host, Lilah Raptopoulos. Today we are changing up the format to do something a little bit different because a film that shook the world came out recently. We’re doing a roundtable about Taylor Swift. That means I should probably do this again. Hi. Welcome. I’m Lilah Raptopoulos. I am a nightmare dressed as a daydream. I am thrilled to be here in the New York studio with Anna Nicolaou, our US media correspondent. She is the breeze in my hair on the weekend.

Anna Nicolaou
I truly couldn’t be happier to be here.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Also with us from London is Jo Ellison, editor of HTSI and deputy editor of FT Weekend, who is also, crucially, the James Dean daydream look in my eye. I don’t know. Hi, Jo. How are you doing?

Jo Ellison
Very well, thank you.

Lilah Raptopoulos
So all three of us went to movie theatres recently for the opening weekend of Eras. That is the film version of Taylor Swift’s sold out Eras tour. The film is a cut-down version of Taylor Swift’s US tour. It was filmed during her stop in LA over three nights. And over the course of the weekend, it has become the highest grossing concert film of all time just in one weekend. Anna, it was right under Barbie. Is that right?

Anna Nicolaou
Yeah.

Jo Ellison
No, really?

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. So basically, for the price of a movie ticket, as a movie-goer, you get to be at the concert, have the best seat in the house, see everything that’s going on. And that’s great, because the tour was famously exorbitant. Jo, maybe you can explain the movie itself. What, how was the show organised?

Jo Ellison
So it’s, like, it’s effectively a ticket to the show, no frills, no backstage, no conversation, no monologue. It’s pretty much a kind of like breakdown, abridged version of what exactly what you would see in the stadium, except that you are watching it in, like, on the front seat, in high definition, swooping round with the drones, and getting this kind of like incredible access, all-areas sort of view of the show, which is a two-hour, 48-minute, I think version of her Eras tour, which is a condensed version of her ten studio albums that she’s released, bridging 17 years of Taylor, the life of Taylor Swift.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yes. Anna, what did we miss?

Anna Nicolaou
Nothing. That was perfect. I mean, though, I guess the one out of the Taylor camp was this is the way for people who couldn’t afford to go to the show to experience it, and they want it to be an event. So it’s only showing Thursday through Sunday.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Right. Can we talk about the experience seeing it, Anna? How would you describe your experience in the theatre?

Anna Nicolaou
Yeah. I had an amazing . . . I mean, so the context is I’ve been a Taylor Swift fan since 2006, so I’m coming into this with like, I’m almost a bit of a jaded, I would say, by, like, just her sheer level of popularity this year has been insane. But it kind of brought the magic back a bit for me. Like being there, I don’t know, to set the scene like it was a Sunday afternoon. I was a bit hungover. I wasn’t really in the mood to sit through like a three-hour movie. But no, it was. It was like as soon as the film began, I was just happier. Yeah, it was amazing. What did you think?

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, well, I was in a similar situation. It was the day after my birthday, and it was, and I was tired, but we were together. It was you and me and my seven-year-old niece, Athena, came, and some of my best friends, my boyfriend. And I didn’t really realise until a little ways in that, like, this was a thing that we were gonna be standing and dancing.

Anna Nicolaou
No, I wasn’t. I don’t think I expected any of that, to be honest. Yeah, I was fully prepared to just, like, sit there. I mean, we were kind of getting bullied into dancing. There was pressure coming from people in the audience.

Jo Ellison
I’m gonna cut in here because I was on Swiss Cottage Odeon, which is on the Finchley Road in north-west London, and there was zero dancing.

Lilah Raptopoulos
No dancing?

Jo Ellison
Zero dancing and zero singing. So it was a very British . . . I also would say that I think, I mean, I did not go in there hangover and I did not go in there in a sort of dismissive way whatsoever. I went in there with my eyes fully open to the magic that was about to go, and I was so overwhelmed with how much I was excited and sort of I was just overwhelmed by it that I just absolutely started bawling, like, I could not stop crying for the first 20 minutes. And I don’t even know what it was about. I looked around at my daughter and she too was in floods of tears. I think Fearless just took us right over the edge.

Lilah Raptopoulos
It’s so funny. What do you think it was? What do you think made you feel emotional?

Jo Ellison
I think it’d been a really crappy week. The news cycle’s miserable. And I just felt so much positive energy and happiness and just this kind of, like, there’s no wrong in this. It just felt good.

Lilah Raptopoulos
I’d love to talk a little bit about the concert film as a film like how it worked as an actual movie. Anna, you saw it in concert too. What did you think of it as a movie?

Anna Nicolaou
I thought it worked way better than I expected it to. So I remember beforehand hearing the bit about, oh, they want it to feel like the concert. And I was like, yeah, sure. But no, it really did feel like you were, by the end we were clapping earnestly for the dancers as they were like taking their bows as though they could see us. Like, I fully just, yeah, I agree. I didn’t think it was gonna work that way.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. You know, the one thing I, even though I enjoyed it, I felt, I sort of had to let myself go and accept the cheesy aspect of it was like there were a lot of things that felt really built for a stadium tour and built to be seen from far away that looked kind of silly close up.

Jo Ellison
You’re a fair weather Swiftie. You’ve automatically discounted yourself from . . . 

Lilah Raptopoulos
I know, I know. I know, I know, I know.

Anna Nicolaou
No, I agree! Like, every time I would, it would, every time the screen would go to, like, one of the fans that was like just 10 out of 10 shrieking at any moment during the movie, it was funny. Like, it’s just like funny to see people having that reaction, even if you’re having it yourself, too.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. The other one that I just kind of, I couldn’t really let myself fully in because it seemed so silly, was she was in here kind of witchy, Evermore era.

Jo Ellison
The Kate Bush phase.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. Yeah. Around 2020. Yeah.

Jo Ellison
That was the cabin.

Lilah Raptopoulos
I didn’t mind. She was wearing sort of at one stage she was wearing a, really like a witch’s cape. Yeah, that was great.

Anna Nicolaou
Does it follow, like, a coven seance sequence?

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, exactly.

Jo Ellison
With a moss covered piano, which was stunning.

Lilah Raptopoulos
That’s it, Jo. Honestly, she sat down at the piano. It had been totally covered in fake moss. It looked like this, like, woodland chia pet. It looked like we were seeing it too close up. I didn’t. I couldn’t.

Anna Nicolaou
Oh, I loved it!

Jo Ellison
I loved it!

Anna Nicolaou
I think of it kind of as a Broadway show in a sense. Like, she’s putting on a full performance, which I really like.

Jo Ellison
She was doing narrative there, that was her narrative moment. So we had to go with her on her voyage into this kind of, you know, characterisation that she was inhabiting for the purposes of writing the album. And I was there with her.

Anna Nicolaou
Yeah. Sorry, Lilah, you’re wrong.

Jo Ellison
Because why not? And also you don’t want to see a concert that looks sophisticated and chic. It’s a pop concert. It’s supposed to be kitsch. Like, the whole point is that it’s, like, extra. And you know, and she’s never been like a dancer. I think that’s the other beauty of Taylor. She’s so tall and gangly that actually, you know, she’s, like, not kind of naturally kind of particularly fluid in her movements. So it’s always looked a bit jangly. And I think that’s also kind of part of why I love her.

Anna Nicolaou
Yeah. She’s always giving theatre kid.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. So let’s talk about the material of the show itself and what she’s doing. The idea was that she was taking a tour through all of her eras. This, like, you know, the naive young country ones, her princess ones, her break-up ones, her sexy ones, her like, I’m in love ones, her I’m a cat lady ones, her I don’t care I’m a weird witch ones. And I saw it as sort of asking us to celebrate them with her and in turn sort of asking us to look back at our own eras and let her eras remind us of our own. Would you agree?

Anna Nicolaou
Yeah, definitely. I think like for the, her, like, bread and butter core fan base that’s been around forever, it’s like you grew up with her. And so I think that’s part of why it gets so, for me at least, like it’s so emotional, so quickly. It’s like you’re going through these phases in your life too where, like, she goes to Fearless and she’s like, let’s go back to high school. And then you go to Red. And I remember, like, the coffee shop I was in when Red came out. And it’s just, like, too much fun. Like, she, like, taps into that expertly.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. Can I ask what, for both of you, what your favourite era was and whether that seems different from the era that you’re in.

Anna Nicolaou
Sure. Yeah. I mean, my, I have two. My favourites are Evermore and Reputation. I think I made that clear.

Jo Ellison
That is a very controversial choice. But yes.

Anna Nicolaou
I think I’m permanently in my Reputation era. Like, we were talking about this, like, I’m kind of like, like me or hate me, I don’t care. Like, that’s my vibe generally. I just think the Reputation songs translate better to a big stage because they’re kind of, like, intense.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah.

Anna Nicolaou
What about you?

Jo Ellison
I kept building, and every time a new era came up, I was like, yeah, I think this might be my favourite. I think this might be my new favourite era. I really got stuck on 1989. I have to say, I do think that is, like, almost perfect, perfect album. I quite, I do like Folklore. I personally don’t see them as my own eras at all, but I guess my daughter is kind of, you know, the lifespan of her career and she was obsessed with Taylor Swift as soon as she could like breathe. So I think I obviously have that kind of maternal sort of sadness about seeing a little girl change into a woman, blah, blah, blah. But I don’t really think that was where I was going with this. I was very much just enjoying her being, like on top of her game.

Anna Nicolaou
You know, I’m with you. Every era would be like, oh my God, this is my favourite. Lilah really came alive during Red. Like, something was happening with you when Red came off.

Lilah Raptopoulos
I did come alive during Red and I was diagnosed as a quote, Red girl.

Anna Nicolaou
Yeah, you fully are.

[‘WE ARE NEVER EVER GETTING BACK TOGETHER’ BY TAYLOR SWIFT PLAYING]

Jo Ellison
Red is beautiful. I interviewed Taylor Swift years ago in 2014 for Red, and it was a huge moment for her. And I always felt a bit sad because she was clearly under the grip of a kind of horrible eating disorder. And there was a lot going on in her personal life and she was very haunted. And I just, I always find that moment quite sort of a kind of sad one. So I’m always happy to see her get through Red and then on to the next and sort of get bigger and better.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Jo, I’m sorry you spoke to Taylor Swift! Shall we go into that? What happened?

Jo Ellison
So I interviewed her for Vogue cover in 2014, and it was her first UK Vogue cover. And they kind of courted me. Like, they courted Vogue because they wanted to place it, which is kind of ludicrous when you think about it, like 10 years later. And she was incredibly, it was just one of those things. I think this is why people love her, as was certainly why I’ll always love her is that we met in a restaurant and she was like, OK, now we’re gonna go to my house. And then we went to her house for like two hours and played with her cat. And we sat on the, like, floor on a balcony outside her Tribeca apartment. And we kind of like talked about poetry. And it was just, the whole thing was just like I was at a girls’ slumber party. And that was my, and it was, like, amazing. And the day after she sent me flowers and a quote from Zelda Fitzgerald, I remember. I mean, it was like it was we were deep. It was a major moment.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Did having met her — and Anna, you’ve been at an event with her — do those experiences affect how you see her show, like, how you see her as a public figure?

Anna Nicolaou
I think that it’s all kind of the same thing, right? Like, it’s, I think Jo kind of hit on it. It’s like, we all feel like she’s our friend. Even if you’ve never met her or even been in, like, anywhere near her, like, I think that’s what she cultivates. Like, with Beyoncé, I feel like, I think she’s so amazing, but I can’t even imagine, like, sitting down to lunch with her.

Jo Ellison
Well, I have done that also and she’s definitely not your friend.

Anna Nicolaou
So Jo should just, we just need a deep dive on that as well. But yeah, I think part of it is, like, you feel like she’s your friend that you know really well and, like, has been through similar things as you.

Jo Ellison
I think for me the big, I don’t know, whatever it is, what you call it, the big thing about Taylor is her kind of inherent loneliness. Like, there’s something about her that is like she’s the eternal singleton. I mean, she may or may not be dating whoever she is, but, like, for the time being, she’s like, the equivalent of Jennifer Aniston is also, she’s got that kind of a magical allure of being the most super powerful, brilliant, kind of like all consuming, financially bombastic kind of characters in our cultural world. And yet she still can’t find a man. So there’s that whole kind of other subnarrative that I think taps very deeply into why we all identify with that, right?

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, I mean, it’s true. Like, I think Red partially woke me up because the song’s like, we are never, ever, ever, ever, ever getting back together. I mean, who else does that? Kelly Clarkson. But she’s no Taylor Swift. Like, you know, she gives you these, like, things that you kind of need as your life goes along and as you sort of mature.

Anna Nicolaou
She’s like an avatar for the sad girls.

Jo Ellison
Sad girl and the angry girl and the slightly mental, like, you know, the sort of psycho, overanalytical, like, all the things that we despise in ourselves. She allows, kind of let her freak flag fly. And I think that’s why you’re like, oh, my God, yes. You know what I mean?

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, yeah. Anna, can you tell us a little bit about, like, you know, you’ve been covering the business of Taylor Swift for a long time, about like the actual power. You know, I’m sitting here, like, wondering how I got wrapped up in this phenomenon. I feel like I was watching it from afar over the summer, and now I am, you know asking about why her football player boyfriend like wears such bad outfits and, like, just care. I just care. Yeah. Why?

Anna Nicolaou
Yeah. I mean, so I’m a reporter. I write about the music industry. I don’t. There’s. She’s really, truly in my era. No pun intended. The only artist that has a business story consistently and has been since I’ve been doing this, like, six years ago. But I think, I kind of like, I try to avoid hyping her because I like her so much. So I keep asking these, like, dudes who’ve been in this industry forever, like, has this ever happened? Is this really that crazy? And they’re like, yes, it really is that crazy. Everyone kind of relates it to either the Beatles or Elvis in terms of just like the sheer phenomenon of it. In the past two years, she’s gone from pretty big pop star to like, yeah, Elvis or the Beatles. No one seems to really know why. Like, even if you look at like comparing to like Folklore vs now, her streaming numbers, her sales numbers, even likes on Instagram, it’s like five to 10 times higher than it was in 2020, which is sort of insane. So I think in a way it’s just like all building on itself and then the tour being so big, it’s just morphed into something else, really, in the past year.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. I have to ask both of you, I feel a little like, this feels like she’s gotten so big that it’s like, in a way, it feels dangerous to me, like something feels unsustainable about it, especially for somebody who’s built this fame off of like a folksy kind of like I’m just a normal friend of yours persona. Like, as you watch her, sort of. So she partners with, I mean, who knows, this probably won’t last, but she partners with a football player and suddenly her sort of visibility, you know, doubles and she goes on these tours and then the movie comes out and then she’s gonna go to Europe. And yesterday, I went on TikTok and a dentist was investigating photos of her to see if she had gotten new veneers. And it was like, Taylor I think has new veneers. And it just felt a little scary. And I’m wondering, like, is this a bubble? Is it gonna pop? Is she gonna, like, blow up? You know, is she gonna fall? Like, what do you guys think?

Anna Nicolaou
I think it definitely feels unsustainable. I almost think that she’s now reached such a level of fame that it doesn’t even matter. Like even if like a scandal happened or there was some, like, backlash, like, it’s kind of like she still does, I almost feel like she’s too big to fail at this point.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. What do you think, Jo?

Jo Ellison
I think it would be really interesting if she did get married. I think if she does end up being happily ensconced in a beautiful relationship, I think that would be quite a challenge, because I think that’s always the problem for anybody, like settling down when the high ends. You know, how do you kind of build a career out of that ongoing? So unless she’s going to move into a whole other kind of Madonna Ray of Light era, which is entirely possible as well, because let’s face it, Madonna’s done pretty well at kind of keeping a career going, there is that for her. But yeah, I think it’s, I really think it’s like where the artistic journey is going. And I think she is, you know, she’s always kind of delivered on that. And it’s the minute she doesn’t and I think a happy song about being in a beautiful relationship and making babies is maybe gonna be a struggle for her fans.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, that’s interesting.

Jo Ellison
Or not. Or maybe they’ll be thrilled for her.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, maybe we need it. Maybe we’ll all be moms.

Anna Nicolaou
I feel confident she’s going to find angst about motherhood.

Jo Ellison
Oh my God. No. Not the mother’s era.

Anna Nicolaou
Great. Like, on her divorce album . . . 

Jo Ellison
I mean, that was written. Surely, she’s got that ready. Like, ready to go.

Lilah Raptopoulos
I guess thank you both so much. I guess my last question is sort of like, do you have any other thoughts about what all of this says about us?

Anna Nicolaou
My God. I think broadly, I think we’re all just like seeking some, like, happiness and fun. I think a lot of the, like, the concert business is booming like crazy right now. I think a lot of it is that. Just like the past five years have been so brutal in so many ways and people are just like, ready to, like, enjoy something.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah. Jo, what do you think?

Jo Ellison
I mean, I think there’s, I think we’ve, there’s always been women in whom we’ve invested a huge amount of like our hopes and dreams. I think there’s you know, she’s not the first. There was Madonna. She’s currently touring. That concert seems pretty awesome as well. And I’m sure there are a lot of people crying their way through that because it’s also a backlist. Beyoncé is another. Kate Bush. I mean, I would love Taylor to do a Kate Bush. I’d love her to, like, drop an absolutely awesome album and then vanish for, like, 15 years, 20 years, I think. And she’s heading that way. I mean, she’s got the velvet cape, she’s got the cabin. She’s, like, well in the mindset. I think there’s a real space for her now to do, as you say, whatever she likes. And what does it say about us? I think, you know, we need more female role models in the world.

Lilah Raptopoulos
Yeah, I know. I was thinking when I was watching, I was just thinking like, you know, even though I’m wrapped up in this, even though I sort of have become this hyper fan overnight, but what sort of pulled me into this is really just that, like, I liked going with my friends and my niece and having, it’s so cheesy, but like having a fun time, just like being a girl.

Anna Nicolaou
I have a video of you from Sunday and you’re like, I’m so happy.

Lilah Raptopoulos
I was at a 10. Yeah, and I agree with you, Jo. It would be nice to have more of it. OK, Jo and Anna, this was an absolute pleasure, delight and joy. Thank you both so much for being on the show.

Anna Nicolaou
Thank you, Lilah.

Jo Ellison
Thank you for having me.

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Lilah Raptopoulos
That’s the show this week. Thank you for listening to FT Weekend, The Life and Arts podcast from the Financial Times. We have some links that Anna and Jo have written about Taylor Swift in the show notes. The links will get you past the paywall as well as a link to the best offers available to a subscription to the FT. Those offers are at FT.com/weekendpodcast. Make sure to use that link. If you want to say hi, we love hearing from you. You can email us at FTWeekendpodcast@ft.com. The show is on X, formerly known as Twitter, @FTWeekendPod. And I am always on Instagram chatting with you @LilahRap. I am Lilah Raptopoulos and here’s my talented team. Katya Kumkova is our senior producer. Lulu Smyth is our producer. Our sound engineers are Breen Turner and Sam Giovinco. With original music by Metaphor Music. Topher Forhecz is our executive producer and our global head of audio is Cheryl Brumley. Have a lovely weekend and we’ll find each other again next week.

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