Hacking The Afterlife podcast

• Hacking the Afterlife with Jennifer Shaffer, Kobe Bryant, John Candy, John Hughes, Luana Anders

  I happen to catch the "I like me" documentary about #JohnCandy on Netflix, directed by Colin Hanks.  It's a wonderful trip down memory lane.  In my case, I studied at Second City in Chicago (took classes for a semester) before I moved to LA.  I joined a group of improv actors in the Harvey Lembeck workshop, but was an avid fan of SCTV during my years at Boston University and beyond. Charles Grodin and I had that in common - he loved Johnny LaRue (John Candy) and all the other characters, and late in life, Chuck would make DVD copies of his favorite bits and send them to his pals. I have a dozen or so.  As a film director I got to meet a bunch of people... and in this interview with John - you'll hear that I don't say the last name of the actors that I'm referring to, because it's more fun if Jennifer gets them accurately. And she does (once I let her know who we're talking to.) I had just watched the documentary, so the people in it are #SteveMartin (who needs to lighten up on the sobriety), #MartyShort (get your heart checked), Dave Thomas, Andrea Martin (who never changes),  Joe Flaherty, #EugeneLevy (the skeptical one) #CatherineOHara (the dreamer he's visited) Harold Ramis... #BillMurray, #DanAykroyd, #JohnBelushi, #TomHanks... I remembered to mention his lovely wife Rosemary and his two children, both whom are very touching in the doc.  (Sorry I didn't mention his brother in case he views this.)  I asked these questions without Jennifer knowing who I was talking about (except she saw Tom Hanks and saw Bill Murray when I said their first names.  That happens.   So this is an extreme yet excellent example of what we've been doing for  every week for over ten years.  See the film HACKING THE AFTERLIFE on Gaia or Amazon prime for examples.  Jennifer doesn't know anything about the doc about John's life, doesn't know anything about John Candy's life - and I made some errors, like giving Harold Ramis credit for directing Stripes which he cowrote (Ivan Reitman directed it) Harold directed him in Caddyshack, National Lampoon's Vacation.  (A movie that John Hughes told me in person he hated the film but clearly he like John in the film).  As noted, I went to high school with John Hughes, and he was pals with my brother, and super close friends with his wife - who was close to both John and Nancy.   My brother was also pals with Bill Murray in high school, and although I didn't say it in the podcast, I'll say it here - Bill Murray gave me - a brother of his high school pal - free tickets to the dress rehearsal at SNL for years.  I mean - for years -I took friends, including Luana Anders to the show.  And once, had the chutzpa to wait to see him after the show, give him a bottle of wine, and introduce him to Luana...  It was funny because he really didn't know me - I was just there to thank him for leaving tickets for "Elvis Martini" for all those years, and I think he was miffed I'd stuck around to thank him. Little did he know that the Luana he met - the very same Luana - is the moderator of our podcast from the flipside. If I was going to point to one show that demonstrates the ability of Jennifer talking to people offstage - it's this one. She works with members of the FBI, NYPD, LAPD on missing person cases, works pro bono a third of her practice, has been doing this for a long time, and indeed, they're making a show about her on Fox as we speak. I've written 13 books about the flipside, I do offer guided meditations, and Jennifer does these "wine and spirits" evenings in Manhattan beach that anyone can attend and isn't expensive, or they can book her directly. She works with members of Steve Jobs and Kobe Bryant's families - and they've given her permission to say so. So sit back, watch her talk to John Candy about all his pals onstage and off, mock Tom Hanks, tease Steve Martin, make fun of Bill Murray's golf game - all of it is not coming from me or Jennifer. I don't know how else to say it - have been filming people talking to their loved ones for over 15 years via hypnotherapy, guided meditation or mediums like Jennifer.  The story never changes. They aren't gone; they just aren't here.  Enjoy. 

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• Hacking the Afterlife with Jennifer Shaffer, Luana Anders, Julia Morgan, John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix

  Another mindbending podcast.  Jennifer was up in Berkeley last weekend, ran into a concert pianist prodigy (Evan Le) and filmed a little of him playing the piano (which we included in the podcast with his mother's permission.) While Jennifer was visiting this building, she became aware of the architect of the building, and asked questions about her.  Julia Morgan was the first woman architect to graduate from Berkeley and the room Jennifer was in was designed by her. She's famous for designing many buildings - including the Hearst Castle and Marion Davies' home in Santa Monica - and 700 buildings in California.  I knew the building because I had been in it - but didn't know who designed it.  So we invited the architect to come and chat with us.  And she talked about her path and journey - and what it was like for her on the flipside. My father was an architect, and in our conversations with him, he's told us that he hangs out with famous architects from over the years, or is learning from them - and when asked if that was her experience she said "No, I'm hanging out with musicians." When asked to specify she named Jimi Hendrix - who often shows up in our podcasts.  He talked about the "frequency of a building" - which is like math or music - the same thing that he delved in, and she said "his role as a musician was to shift consciousness." Since it was John Lennon's birthday yesterday, and since our first conversation with John included a memory of his playing with Jimi in the afterlife - we invited him to come and make some observations. Indeed, I did stay at Julian's place in Eze, and was awoken by the sound of John saying "Who the f*ck are you?" The sound of a voice startled me - I'd only been sleeping a couple of hours after jamming with Julian in Monte Carlo - and it took me a few seconds to recognize the voice. I didn't mention it to Julian at the time - because it was too weird, and I had zero context for it.  But I do have context for it now.   So Happy Birthday John, and thanks for the lovely thoughts about Paul (and Ringo) who have carried on the Beatles tradition, and how everyone on the flipside gets to participate in those concerts. It's mind bending to consider - oh and one other thing, when asked "how long does it feel like for you to be on the flipside?" and he replied "two minutes."   We once asked Prince a similar question, and his reply was "a comma" - meaning that previous event to the one I was referencing felt like a comma in a sentence to him. So consider that for a moment when thinking about one's loved ones offstage. They don't have the same connection we do to time... but they can converse with us all the same. Enjoy.  

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• Hacking the Afterlife with Jennifer Shaffer Redux episode Robert Towne, Luana Anders, Charles Grodin, Napoleon

  While Jennifer is on a parent student weekend, am replaying one of our more popular episodes... over 4500 folks have seen it - it is second part of an interview with Robert Towne, the screenwriter, on the flipside (my old boss) and a discussion of Napoleon and a visit with Charles Grodin and Luana Anders. Here's the original liner notes from a year ago in August of 2024...    First; Jennifer's got another one of her Uncorked events in Manhattan Beach - tickets are available, for sixty bucks one gets a glass of wine, two hours with her and others who all get spoken to. The events are fun and easy to attend. UncorkedWineShops.com https://uncorkedwineshops.com/medium-monday-tickets/ For ticket info: JenniferShaffer.com  This is a continuation of our conversation with Robert Towne, my old boss who left the stage last week.  Jennifer mentions how she was walking on the beach the other day and Robert (and his dog Hira) appeared walking next to her... Jennifer did a number of sessions with Robert and so she's used to communicating with him. In this episode, I'm continuing with my list of questions to ask him about - people that we spoke with before, people offstage and if he has messages for people onstage. In this case, Robert was doing a rewrite or polish for a script about Napoleon (I don't know if it was his own, or it was for someone else, like Ridley Scott as Robert wrote "Days of Thunder" for his brother Tony. Comes to mind - when his brother Tony passed, we were doing this research, and Robert asked me about his passing, so we did a session asking Tony what happened.  It's in the book BACKSTAGE PASS TO THE FLIPSIDE. Either way - I want to point something out. We accessed Napoleon and his friend Betsy Balcombe in a previous session - it might be in print instead of in the podcast list - that would be in BACKSTAGE PASS TO THE FLIPSIDE 1, 2 or 3 - and in that instance, she identified herself as Napoleon's friend, and when asked whether he died of natural causes or was "poisoned" we heard her say it was poison. (or not from natural causes). In this episode, I ask Robert if he's had a chance to ask Napoleon about the accuracy of that, and the answer is the word "wife." For those paying attention, that could be the wife of Napoleon (who was having an affair back in Paris, had two children with that fellow and married him) that could be the wife of Balcombe, but his family left St. Helena before Napoleon died, it could be "Fanny" the wife of one of his lieutenants he made a pass at, and nearly jumped off a ship at the thought of being stuck on St. Helena with him - or it could have been any number of wives on the island, as apparently, he'd have flings with quite a few. Wild and crazy guy. But in reading the A. Robert's autobiography of him, it's clear that he died of stomach cancer. The doctors did an autopsy, it's the same disease his father died of - and it's clear to me that is what he died of. "It was a miracle he didn't die from it earlier." In terms of this kind of research, asking questions and getting answers, because I've been doing this for 8 years weekly, I have to allow that it's possible I was asking the wrong question, it's possible that Napoleon was trying to steer the conversation to another topic (like "It was my wife Josephine that caused me to have agita which turned into stomach cancer") or it could be that the word "wife" meant something else altogether.  It's important to note this - because I'm asking leading questions and I could be leading the medium into an area where they are trying to answer my questions based on what they're getting from the flipside. (I've seen people do this, and likely I have done it before as well.) Jennifer says what she hears, senses, or visualizes.  Why he answered "wife" is subject to more questions - because I could revisit the conversation and point out that it was cancer that took his life, so what's he pointing to a wife or his wife, or someone else's wife? Either way - this is one of those things that make people say "well it's all subject to conjecture" so therefore it's pointless to ask questions. But clearly Robert was able to express who Rudy the Rank was, and Charles Grodin is able to express his opinions about the movie we were watching. Either way - we do this work to encourage people to explore on their own - to ask questions, to gauge the answers, to ask more questions and see what one can learn.  If one doesn't want to they don't have to - but clearly if one does want to communicate, they can. Just research the answers (as I've done here.) Hope this helps.

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• Hacking the Afterlife with Jennifer Shaffer, Luana, Henry Jaglom, Orson, Peter, Sally, Dennis, Carl

  This is an unusual version of the podcast. An old friend passed, someone I've known for 40 years, someone who was friends with our moderator Luana Anders on the Flipside, and by his own estimate was friends with 80% of our class on the flipside. Henry Jaglom was a Hollywood icon, known by everyone, knew everyone, used to hold the most attended New Year's Eve parties where I got to meet the cast of the Sopranos, met Ang Lee, Oscar winning actors, directors - Peter Bogdanovich, would run into my friend Carl Weathers and Sally Kellerman and her husband Jonathan Krane. It was always fun - and Orson was a born raconteur. He also didn't believe in the afterlife at all. He was adamant about it - and if the topic came up, would squint at me, wrinkle his brow, shake his head - just the way Luana's pal BJ Merholz does when the topic comes up. All I can say is Harry Dean Stanton was the King of Skeptics - and when we spoke to him on a number of occasions (and he proved beyond a shadow of doubt he still existed by giving me private health messages to friends of his at his memorial - who were flabbergasted to hear what Harry had to tell them as only he could have known those intimate details from the Afterlife.. Harry told us to tell people to "believe in the possibility of an afterlife so they don't waste another minute of their lives arguing about it like I did." As noted in the podcast, Jennifer was able to squeeze me in today when I told her a friend had passed, without telling her anything about it, and his friends had already reached out to me to ask some questions. So sincere best wishes to his family, to his kids, to his exwives, to all those who loved him and think this is an unusual way to pay our respects.   Yes, I know that Orson Welles was upset that he caught Henry secretly taping him - I heard it from Orson's secretary at a party at Henry's house. She whispered to me that Orson felt so betrayed, "He never left his home again." I didn't have to tell Jennifer who I was asking about - she could see them.  And to be clear - Jennifer is not a movie fan, she spends much of her day on criminal cases helping out various law enforcement agencies pro bono - I've interviewed some of those agents or detectives. She is interpreting what she gets - like when I asked her on BJ Merholz behalf - "who introduced him to Henry?"  I thought it might be their mutual pal Jack Nicholson - but Jennifer got that it was a woman - and wasn't Luana (even though that makes sense) but really couldn't pin down who it was.  Why?  Who cares? She was aware of Bert Schneider without knowing who he was (or how his first name is spelled) and how he "left the planet too early."  (How could she know?)  Or that Dennis was Dennis Hopper, or that Orson was Orson Welles - she knew nothing, zero, zippo about Henry Jaglom and most people who knew Henry didn't know that much about him anyways.  Finally it wasn't until I was listening to the podcast when I realize why Carl Weathers and Sally Kellerman were teasing him about "being in our class."  I realized that they were referring to the fact that he was adamant about life going on - and I suspect those who knew this about Henry will continue to believe that is the case - but in doing this work with Jennifer EVERY WEEK for the past ten years, I can report we've had many skeptics, curmudgeons show up to talk to us about how surprised, gob smacked, shocked they were to realize that life goes on. Life goes on. Get over it. Thanks for tuning in.

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• Hacking the Afterlife with Jennifer Shaffer, Luana, Robert Redford, Kobe, Robert Towne, Amelia

  This is another milestone.  We only had a half hour, so I began by asking a specific question. The video that I posted, that Jennifer had not seen - was of footage of Saipan in 1944.  I asked Amelia if this footage featured the Electra?  She said it did but the "wrong date." (She says year, but Jennifer later said that meant date to her). The video was 3/4's correct.   Because the footage shows three planes in a hangar on Saipan - two Japanese Zeros and another plane covered by camouflage.  Amelia confirms that this was her Electra - which they found "the next day."  And is part of the book SHE WAS NEVER LOST: THE AMELIA EARHART SAGA.  Read it to give this comment context. Then we invited Robert Redford to speak to us.  It happens sometimes where I feel like "someone is bugging me" and two days ago that happened. So I asked him all the questions that I could muster about his family and friends. I know the family asked for privacy and apologies for asking him for messages for them - but we've been doing this weekly for ten years now. I've learned that even if a person doesn't believe that we're speaking to their loved one, eventually they come to realize it's accurate. Jennifer revealed she did a reading with Jean Smart, the Emmy winner of "Hacks" - and while not revealing anything they talked about, described the process of their getting together. And then throughout the podcast, she had other things come to mind - working on Robert's daughter's fiancee's case in Colorado - something she hadn't thought about in ten years, but came to her the night before he passed. Jennifer has been working with members of Kobe's family (they've allowed her to say that) - and other folks.  The point isn't about celebrity - it's about the fact that Jennifer has the ability to just say whatever comes to mind. I asked Robert how it was he was aware of our class, and Kobe showed Jennifer that it was his introduction that made him show up. We've interviewed a number of his pals, Sidney Pollack's daughter wrote to me that everything we reported was accurate about her, about him turning his chair around and packing his cigarettes while he answered questions. Sidney confirmed a latter he'd written to my pal Phillip Noyce before he passed.  We've been doing this for awhile. So I dove into the interview. He had messages for his pals, I asked for them by first names, but anyone could figure out who he's referring to.   So Jane Fonda, Barbra Streisand, Dustin Hoffman, Bob Woodward, Meryl Streep, Rod Lurie - he has a comment for all of you.  It doesn't matter if one believes it's him speaking to them or not - eventually we'll realize the process.   Jennifer can be reaches at JenniferShaffer.com, I can be reached at RichardMartini.com He gives some sage advice about politics, and lowering the political temperature. 

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