FROM RAIN TO SUNSHINE, JOEL KIM BOOSTER IS ALWAYS UP FOR THE PARTY
AS HE GEARS UP FOR ANOTHER BIG YEAR, THE ACTOR PRIORITIZES QUALITY TIME WITH HIS PEOPLE
look like the fractals I’d just seen from behind closed eyes? And was that the throaty rumble of passing cars synchronizing with the nearly imperceptible vibrations in my solar plexus?
Some of those feelings could be a kind of immediate-postexperience placebo effect, but a full week later I still saw things — large and small — that remind me of that midsession moment when I looked the universe right in the all-seeing eye and saw it wink at me. I see it in the hummingbirds flitting past my window, hear it in the gurgle of my emptying dishwasher and feel it in the vibration of the cellphone in my pocket.
So, yeah, the ride was well worth the ticket price for me. And here are several reasons why it might be worth it for you too.
1
It’s totally legal
This is probably the biggest upside of taking a technodelic trip. Even if you go to a place where psilocybin has been decriminalized under state (or city) law, its status as a Schedule 1 drug at the federal level will make it a nonstarter for many people. (And tripping while keeping one eye open for the man isn’t exactly relaxing.) That’s not an issue with digital psychedelics. Unless you happen to live somewhere where music, pulsing lights and vibrating massage tables are against the law — in which case you’ve got more problems than psychedelics can solve.
2 $249 is the ceiling — not the floor
The price I paid was for one of the more expensive experiences: a 60-minute session on the waterbed-like Wavetable. Also on offer are half-hour sessions with the same set-up (for $149) and a couple of options that swap out the squishy layer of mineral-heavy liquid for a vibrating massage table (one hour for $99, a half-hour for $59). That’s not including any potential first-timer discounts like the promo code that shaved $50 off my maiden voyage.
The cost of a session could drop all the way to zero if you’re a qualifying military veteran. According to Chia, since it opened last year, the center has provided free treatments to 250 veterans and their families and discounted services to another 50. (Interested veterans should reach out to the Reality Center through its website for additional information.)
3 It’s super-convenient
The length of a druginduced trip depends on a lot of factors. If you ingest magic mushrooms, you’re essentially booking a four- to six-hour flight with some lingering effects that can be felt long after that. When you go the digital route, an hourlong session is just that, making it possible for overscheduled Angelenos to wedge this approach to sensory wellness into their lives as easily as booking a massage or taking a yoga class. (The day I visited the center, one of the foursome I arrived with at 11 a.m. said: “I’ve got to be somewhere at quarter of 12, will that be OK?” It absolutely was.)
4 It can be a real trip
I was surprised that the digital trip felt so much like the analog ones I remembered from my college days. Most familiar were the trippy visuals (though here through closed eyes instead of open ones) and the midtrip epiphany, the realization that we’re insignificant specks of dust and integral parts of the great cosmic game plan at the same time.
5 Consider it preflight for a deeper dive
Doubleblind editor in chief Hartman said digital psychedelics — not just the treatments offered at the Reality Center but also virtual reality and augmented reality experiences in the space — also can be valuable for otherwise unprepared first-time psychonauts.
“I think for sure what they can do is give people a sense of what the sensorial experience of being on a psychedelic might be like,” Hartman said, “specifically when it comes to visuals. If you haven’t done a psychedelic in which you’ve had a strong visual experience, it’s very hard to understand what that’s like — it can be profound and it can be overwhelming.” She explained that the kind of drug-free drug trips served up by the Reality Center can give people an eye-opening sense of what they’re in for if and when they embark on an old-school psychedelic trip.
6 The bottom line
Because the pop-culture ascendancy of the magic mushroom is all but assured (another bill to decriminalize psylocybin in California was introduced late last year), the Reality Center’s biggest value may be that it’s not just giving us a glimpse inside ourselves but at the future too.
WHEN Joel Kim Booster meditates on the current chapter of his life, he gets the sense he’s in a personal era of new beginnings.
The writer-comedianactor’s hunch is understandable considering the myriad professional and personal milestones that occurred for him in 2022. Booster wrote and starred in feature film “Fire Island,” which debuted on Hulu. The adaptation reimagines “Pride and Prejudice” as a modern queer romcom for the ages.
“I sort of burned it all down in 2022, in a good way, in the best possible way. It was the biggest year of my life, both personally and professionally,” says Booster, who describes the time as a constant stream of dopamine hits.
His comedy special “Psychosexual” also dropped on Netflix; he co-starred in the Apple TV+ series “Loot” opposite Maya Rudolph and Michaela Jaé Rodriguez; and on the romance end, he and his boyfriend — a union that marks Booster’s first relationship — met each other’s families over the holidays.
While getting to see his creative labor come to fruition has been exciting, Booster acknowledges that being booked and busy can take its toll on the body. These days, two self-care practices, in particular, help shed the stress: high movie nights at home with his boyfriend and going to the gym.
“The gym is a really big source of comfort for me. It feels like maybe one of the only areas of my life that I can control completely,” Booster says, elaborating on the uncertainty of working in the entertainment industry, from which projects move forward to the types of roles you get to take on. “And then on the other side of the equation, I really enjoy getting high. Sinking into the couch underneath a gravity blanket with a joint in hand, while watching a movie with my boyfriend, is my happiest place. That’s the most beautiful part of living in Los Angeles.”
Now, with Booster back in work mode, his sights are set on laying the groundwork for another bountiful year. “This year really feels like sophomore year for me. Even though I’ve been working in this industry for the better part of a decade, ‘Fire Island’ felt like my introduction to the big leagues,” he says. “I’ve got my bearings and I have to figure out what the next project is. That’s the scariest part about this year for me, looking ahead and deciding what I want that next big thing to be.”
Here, Booster takes us on a journey of how he’d spend an ideal Sunday in Los Angeles. This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for length and clarity.
10 A.M. ENJOY THE RAIN INDOORS
If I had my way, my ideal Sunday would begin with a rainy morning and clear up by the afternoon. It’s such an invitation to stay in bed and not do or go anywhere. I love the weather in L.A., but there’s something about the sunshine and good weather that automatically guilts you into not staying inside.
10:15 A.M. DIVE INTO THE ‘REAL HOUSEWIVES’ MULTIVERSE FROM BED
Unfortunately I’m at this age and point in my life where my body refuses to let me sleep past 10 a.m., no matter how late I’ve been up the night before.
So I’m usually in bed by myself essentially, with my sleeping boyfriend next to me, for a couple of hours until he wakes up. Sunday mornings are when I usually catch up on “Housewives” and all the shows he doesn’t want to watch. I treasure those hours of alone time so deeply. Our media diets are so intertwined now that, like, infidelity for us has nothing to do with sex and has everything to do with television. If I were to watch one of our shows without him I would be in deep sh—.
12 P.M. FIND THE BREAKFAST BURRITO OF THE DAY
I am a Postmates warrior, an Uber Eats warrior. I love to open up that app and figure out a new spot to see what kind of breakfast burrito we can find from the farthest reaches of L.A., along with the strongest cold brew I can find. We just had a great breakfast burrito from Sweet Butter Kitchen. I really loved their steak breakfast burrito, it was excellent.
1:30 P.M. OFF TO THE BEACH
I’m a former New Yorker, and as a New Yorker you’re always searching for reasons to get out of your house because it’s so small and there are so many interesting things to do around the city. Whereas in L.A. I find for me it’s about curating your circle of friends so specifically that you can exist outside of public spaces.
Not that there aren’t a million things to do in L.A. on a Sunday, but for me, I just want to be around my people. Usually that manifests in some sort of house party, whether it’s a pool party or just a gathering, a game day — we’re big game people. We love a game night.
The best version of a Sunday
Funday I can imagine would be having energy to head over to the Westside for a beach day. Ginger Rogers Beach, the gay beach here in L.A., is the best gay bar in L.A. to me. You’re sort of towel to towel, body to body, on a good day when it’s packed. It’s like seeing everybody that you’re normally so used to seeing in nightlife, in the daytime, out in nature by the f— ocean. It’s really wonderful and it’s social and great.
Everyone brings their Bluetooth speaker and there’s a cacophony of different styles of music that you’re sort of battling with the entire day. On one side, it’s your standard pop, it’s Ariana Grande, Lady Gaga. There’s house music playing on the other side of you, there’s EDM playing somewhere else, you get it all on the beach there. People really get aggravated by it, but for me, I think that mish-mash of sounds is part of what I love about that beach-going experience.
Ideally, I’ll be at the beach until the sun has practically set. It is the perfect mix for me of the private and the public. I’ll spend a couple of hours with my book on my own on my towel, some sort of science fiction or a George Saunders short story. I’ll get up and socialize, I’ll go back to the book. We’re drinking, we’re having fun, we’re dancing. It’s sort of a mix of all the parts of L.A. that I love in one place.
6 P.M. GROUP DINNER
It’s time to grab dinner at this point. It’s fun to gather together a hodgepodge crew of people that are meandering away from the beach into one big annoying table at some restaurant nearby that we’ve decided on. I love the experience of cramming as many of my friends into a meal as possible at a restaurant. I know it’s annoying and I know people hate it, but it is one of my favorite things to do.
I really love Genghis Cohen. It reminds me of the kind of Chinese food that I grew up eating in the Midwest. It’s very much not authentic but it is, to me, so comforting, and the atmosphere is great for a big group of people. There’s nothing I crave more after a day spent on the beach thinking about not snacking than Chinese food.
I’ve been good. People saw my body in a Speedo for the last six hours and now I’m ready to destroy it all in one meal at Genghis Cohen. When it comes to dessert, my rule of thumb is always look, no matter if you think you feel like it or not.
8:45 P.M. DANCE IT OUT AT HOT DOG SUNDAYS
I’m a notorious peer-pressure fiend in terms of continuing the party. I want it to go on as long as possible. There’s a party that happens in Silver Lake every Sunday. It’s called Hot Dog at El Cid .Itismy favorite Sunday activity, bar none. I love it so much. They serve hot dogs if you’re still hungry. They have amazing disco house music going on indoors, and then outdoors it’s just a sea of all of your favorite people chatting. And one of my favorite vintage shops does a pop-up at this party and I spend way too much. How long I stay depends on how my Monday looks, but let’s say it’s a holiday weekend. I would close the place down, quite honestly. They close at 11 — I’m closing it down, I’m there until they kick us out.
11:30 P.M. THE AFTERPARTY
Sometimes against my better judgment — and it is always a bad idea, but at the same time it’s the best idea — is the afterparty. It’s my favorite part of L.A. nightlife culture. Our bars don’t stay open very late comparatively, especially coming from New York. And so you really have to dig into this network of people who own homes that are willing to open them up for an afterparty. For me, now that I’m a somewhat new homeowner, hosting the afters is my favorite thing about having a house.
My afterparties, especially if they’re happening on a Sunday, are like the oddest assortment of people that I’m very close to and then people that I’ve never met in my entire life who I’m connecting with for the first time on my porch, sharing a cigarette. Which I shouldn’t be doing and I only do when offered by a stranger, basically. It’s like the best way to connect. I have an amazing view on my back porch and there’s nothing I enjoy more than meeting a new person over a cigarette at an afterparty on my back porch.
3:30 A.M. THE WIND-DOWN
It’s a nice slow trickle until I finally hit my limit and kick everyone out.
There’s a full decompression mode that has to happen and usually that involves watching one to two episodes of “Shark Tank” with my boyfriend. It is our biggest guilty-pleasure show. We cannot get enough of “Shark Tank.” It’s kind of embarrassing but we love it. Next, I do a full skincare routine and then bed.
In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town so you can find inspiration for how to enjoy life on the weekends.