Always with Richard Lawson

Is it possible for Steven Spielberg to make a movie that doesn’t exist? Well, he sure tried with 1989’s Always, a film where John Goodman plays Monterey Jack of the Rescue Rangers, Richard Dreyfuss riffs to no one as an annoying ghost, and Holly Hunter falls in love with the most dull hottie at the Plane Depot. Our beloved Richard Lawson joins us to talk planes, boy bands, Marlboro merch, and the enduring mystery of what happened between Kathy Bates, Holly Hunter, and Fran McD in that famous apartment. Listen to Little Gold Men https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/little-gold-men-by-vanity-fair/id1042433465 Sign up for Check Book https://blankcheckpod.substack.com/welcome, the Blank Check newsletter featuring even more “real nerdy shit” to feed your pop culture obsession. Dossier excerpts, film biz AND burger reports, and even more exclusive content you won’t want to miss out on. Join our Patreon for franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. http://www.patreon.com/blankcheck Follow us @blankcheckpod on Twitter https://x.com/blankcheckpod?lang=en, Instagram https://www.instagram.com/blankcheckpod/?hl=en, Threads https://www.threads.net/@blankcheckpod?xmt=AQGzctAh4mbWTwYzCV1pzNT6AMV9o99EOfymi8TLR5mTde0 and Facebook https://www.facebook.com/blankcheckpodcast/! Buy some real nerdy merch https://kinshipgoods.com/blankcheck Connect with other Blankies on our Reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/blankies/s/gpcOkQr8Sv or Discord https://discord.gg/Q6YGSR3JrA For anything else, check out BlankCheckPod.com https://www.blankcheckpod.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Griffin Newman?

  David.

• 0:03David Sims?

  Yep.

• 0:03Griffin Newman?

  We did a live show.

• 0:04David Sims?

  Yeah, remember?

• 0:05Griffin Newman?

  Ranking Scorsese at the Bell House in Brooklyn. We did the definitive power ranking of Martin Scorsese things.

• 0:12David Sims?

  Uh, it was so fun. Uh, it was very silly.

• 0:15Griffin Newman?

  Ben and Marie were with us and they're with us right now.

• 0:18David Sims?

  Yeah, hey.

• 0:18Speaker 02

  Hey, everyone, or should I say, oh?

• 0:20David Sims?

  Oh.

• 0:22Griffin Newman?

  And thanks to our friends at Dynasty Typewriter. It was livestreamed for the first time ever. But also, the replay is still up there, but only until October 30th.

• 0:31Speaker 03

  So just a few more days.

• 0:33David Sims?

  Yes.

• 0:33Speaker 03

  You can get it at dynasty.tv.

• 0:36David Sims?

  Dynasty.tv.

• 0:37Speaker 03

  It's $20. We had a blast and the Spreadmaster really got to work.

• 0:43David Sims?

  Oh, yeah. I was moving things around.

• 0:45Griffin Newman?

  Laptop was on.

• 0:46Speaker 02

  I don't know if I'd have seen you that happy.

• 0:48Griffin Newman?

  You were thrilled. You were like a pick and share.

• 0:50David Sims?

  I was locked in.

• 0:51Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, very locked in and you were funny.

• 0:53David Sims?

  Thank you. You were funny. You were also funny.

• 0:56Griffin Newman?

  Oh, thank you.

• 0:57David Sims?

  And if you want to see like, you know, Griffin's shine box on camera, it's the only way to see it.

• 1:02Griffin Newman?

  You might see me shine Marie's shoes.

• 1:04David Sims?

  Exactly.

• 1:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, if you're into that sort of content.

• 1:07Griffin Newman?

  If that gets you off.

• 1:09Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:10Speaker 03

  So once again, that's at dynasty.tv.

• 1:39Griffin Newman?

  I know now that the podcast we hold back is the only pain that follows us here.

• 1:46Speaker 04

  It's a good dreyfus.

• 1:46Griffin Newman?

  Thank you.

• 1:47David Sims?

  I was about to say, just fucking nailing that dreyfus.

• 1:49Griffin Newman?

  I mean, this, that's why I went for that. Look, I'll admit.

• 1:51Speaker 04

  It was a little more Krippendorf than always.

• 1:53Griffin Newman?

  It was a little older.

• 1:54David Sims?

  How many times will we be saying Krippendorf on this mini series?

• 1:58Speaker 04

  Well, you're doing the whole Janet Elfman season, right? So.

• 1:59Griffin Newman?

  Uh, I talked about this in another episode recently, Richard. I did a, a triple feature of Disney's.

• 2:05David Sims?

  Triple horn.

• 2:06Griffin Newman?

  A triple horn. Uh, Walt Disney Pictures 90s.

• 2:10Griffin Newman?

  Culturally problematic comedies.

• 2:11Speaker 05

  Jungle to jungle.

• 2:12Griffin Newman?

  Jungle to jungle. Krippendorf's tribe. And the third one is.

• 2:16Speaker 05

  The air up there?

• 2:17Griffin Newman?

  Man of the house.

• 2:18David Sims?

  The air up there is kind of too culturally sensitive to make. Krippendorf's tribe makes the air up there look like a documentary.

• 2:26Speaker 05

  It's Margaret Meads, the air up there.

• 2:27Griffin Newman?

  But the sneaky one is Man of the House, which is Chevy Chase tries to bond with Jonathan Taylor Thomas, who is the son of Farrah Fawcett.

• 2:36Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:36Griffin Newman?

  And it's all about they do some weekend like.

• 2:39Speaker 05

  That's right.

• 2:40Griffin Newman?

  Quote unquote, Indian group thing, where it's all like George Wendt explaining the principles of the Native Americans. And Chevy Chase being asleep.

• 2:51Griffin Newman?

  But Krippendorf is the peak.

• 2:52Speaker 05

  But speaking of series.

• 2:53David Sims?

  It's the peak of American culture.

• 2:56Speaker 05

  Speaking of series, this is the second film in your hap series, right? After Insomnia?

• 3:01Griffin Newman?

  Correct.

• 3:01Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 3:02Griffin Newman?

  Richard, this is why we bring you on. Look at that. David's threading his fingers together.

• 3:06David Sims?

  Hap, uh, hap good in, um, uh, The Apprentice last year as Fred Trump senior.

• 3:12Griffin Newman?

  Hap great in The Apprentice.

• 3:13David Sims?

  Not a obviously big role, like probably just a few scenes, but he really nailed it, I thought.

• 3:18Griffin Newman?

  A classic, I mean, just like killer supporting turn.

• 3:21Speaker 05

  Just pure hap, yep.

• 3:22Griffin Newman?

  Happen all over the place. This, look, I was a little tempted. Dreyfus is the one I have in the pocket. It was kind of T-ball. Weight in there for me, but this is a movie where looking at the quotes page, you're like, you got a couple of big swings on voices you could do.

• 3:38Speaker 05

  Do you have a hunter?

• 3:41Griffin Newman?

  I was trying to, I was last night, I was trying to do it a little. I was like.

• 3:45Speaker 05

  It's getting there.

• 3:45Griffin Newman?

  I was, I was trying to parrot it back. But it's, there's something about her voice like transforms within a sentence.

• 3:54Speaker 05

  It does.

• 3:55Griffin Newman?

  She has this almost like Beetlejuice-y thing of like, she kind of has four voices or Pee Wee Herman, you know, those characters where it's like, sometimes it's this, Richard, sometimes it's that. Like she's like, it's, it's tough to pin down.

• 4:08Speaker 05

  It is, and she's selectively southern depending on the movie she's in.

• 4:11Griffin Newman?

  Yes, I think it was in the piano episode, I talked about how odd it is that that is her like Oscar winning performance and is so out of step with the rest of her filmography.

• 4:20Speaker 05

  Cause she's like a firecracker. I mean, she's literally in a movie called Miss Firecracker.

• 4:24Griffin Newman?

  I referred to her as a Texas firecracker.

• 4:26Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 4:26Griffin Newman?

  And then a bunch of our listeners said that she is from Georgia?

• 4:29Speaker 05

  Georgia.

• 4:30Griffin Newman?

  Is that correct?

• 4:30Speaker 05

  But she was in a movie called Miss Firecracker and then the Texas Cheerleader thing.

• 4:35Griffin Newman?

  I just needed to address those are the two things I was.

• 4:37David Sims?

  A Georgia peach.

• 4:38Griffin Newman?

  She's a Georgia peach.

• 4:39Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 4:40Griffin Newman?

  Um.

• 4:41Speaker 05

  Who used to live in an apartment with Frances McDormand.

• 4:44David Sims?

  Well, we've talked about that fucking apartment.

• 4:46Griffin Newman?

  But do you know this? Can we litigate this if you don't know this?

• 4:49Speaker 05

  I probably don't.

• 4:49David Sims?

  We can briefly litigate this. We obviously.

• 4:51Griffin Newman?

  There were three people who lived in that apartment.

• 4:52Speaker 05

  Okay, Fran, Holly and?

• 4:55Griffin Newman?

  Kathy Bates.

• 4:56Speaker 05

  My goodness.

• 4:56David Sims?

  And the question we ask and asked, when did this come up?

• 5:01Griffin Newman?

  I think at the Ramey series. Must have been, right?

• 5:03David Sims?

  Cause Ramey was friends with the Coen brothers and all that. Everyone's in that apartment.

• 5:06Griffin Newman?

  Cause that's the thing, the Rameys and the Coens all cross pollinate with that apartment.

• 5:11David Sims?

  Why has Sam Ramey and the Coen brothers never used Kathy Bates if they were like pals with her back in the day? Did Kathy Bates leave her hair in the shower?

• 5:20Griffin Newman?

  Then we started like going through and we're like Holly Hunter and Frances McDormand have basically never worked with Kathy Bates.

• 5:27David Sims?

  Right, right. Is everyone just like, don't let me near Kathy Bates?

• 5:29Griffin Newman?

  Did she like shit in the shower? Like what the fuck happened?

• 5:33Speaker 05

  Didn't Holly Hunter play Bill Clinton in Primary Colors though?

• 5:37Griffin Newman?

  I did not have sexual relations with a woman.

• 5:39Speaker 05

  Wow, okay.

• 5:41Griffin Newman?

  That's the most interesting thing. And you're like Kathy Bates, she must have been in four Coen brothers movies.

• 5:44Speaker 05

  All right, this is a spin off investigative podcast.

• 5:46David Sims?

  Matlock, get Matlock on it. Kathy Bates Matlock. No, that's not the real Matlock. Twist for Matlock.

• 5:51Griffin Newman?

  Were the Ramey brothers and the Coen brothers going over to this apartment and staying up late drinking with Holly Hunter and Frances McDormand and like Kathy Bates comes in with a broom.

• 5:59Speaker 05

  She has her curlers in?

• 6:00Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 6:01Speaker 05

  She's like, I'm doing Night Mother in the morning.

• 6:03David Sims?

  Will you stop dreaming up criminal schemes for idiots to get involved in in your stupid movies?

• 6:10Griffin Newman?

  Okay, but what if a guy is really dumb and he has a-

• 6:13Speaker 05

  A lesbian road trip comedy?

• 6:16David Sims?

  Let's backburner that for 40 years.

• 6:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 6:20David Sims?

  Wow, how did we get on this? Oh, Holly Hunter, of course.

• 6:22Griffin Newman?

  Holly Hunter.

• 6:22David Sims?

  Star of Always.

• 6:23Griffin Newman?

  The star of Always.

• 6:25David Sims?

  What's the podcast?

• 6:26Griffin Newman?

  The podcast is Blank Check with Griffin and David. I'm Griffin.

• 6:29David Sims?

  I'm David.

• 6:30Griffin Newman?

  It's a podcast about filmographies.

• 6:32David Sims?

  Yes.

• 6:33Griffin Newman?

  Directors who had massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. Sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce, baby.

• 6:42David Sims?

  Yes.

• 6:42Griffin Newman?

  I would argue-

• 6:43David Sims?

  This is not a bounce, but it's close.

• 6:45Griffin Newman?

  It is.

• 6:46David Sims?

  It's kind of a bounce, obviously by his standards, it's a bounce.

• 6:51Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 6:51David Sims?

  But it's not a 1941 style actual bounce of like, oh no, you've spent too much money and made not enough, right?

• 6:59Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 6:59David Sims?

  Like, this is more of a sort of like, well, that kind of got ignored and was a bit of a waste of your time, but it made some money.

• 7:07Griffin Newman?

  I think 1941 is the only outright calamity-

• 7:12David Sims?

  Yes, and even 1941 made money and stuff.

• 7:15Griffin Newman?

  Sure, but like, this absolutely came in under its budget and got bad reviews, right?

• 7:19David Sims?

  This movie.

• 7:20Griffin Newman?

  Well, I'm saying 1941.

• 7:22David Sims?

  Over its budget, you're saying. Not under its budget.

• 7:24Griffin Newman?

  1941? Made less than its budget or-

• 7:26David Sims?

  Oh, oh, oh, wait, but I'm saying the movie went over budget and then, of course, yes.

• 7:29Griffin Newman?

  Yes, right. I'm saying, like, Always and Hook are kind of in a similar zone of like, it feels like sky high expectations.

• 7:35David Sims?

  Sure.

• 7:36Griffin Newman?

  And then people are kind of like, eh, and then Hook has become the most beloved movie of all time.

• 7:40David Sims?

  And Hook also made lots of money, at least.

• 7:43Griffin Newman?

  But, I sent you guys that 60 Minutes clip and we'll, we'll talk about when we get to our Hook episode. But I watched, like, you read the press from Hook two weeks in and people are like, it's doing well, but it's not doing really well.

• 7:55David Sims?

  The man has set a high bar, this is the thing.

• 7:58Griffin Newman?

  And I think Always was a similar thing where it's like, this didn't lose money, critics weren't like savaging it, but it does feel like it is his single most forgotten movie.

• 8:05David Sims?

  Without, without question.

• 8:06Griffin Newman?

  And I was doing the ranking on Letterboxd and it is far and away by some margin, his least watched feature film, or least watched.

• 8:13David Sims?

  Yeah, no, of course.

• 8:14Griffin Newman?

  It feels like the one that people actually just don't know exists.

• 8:17David Sims?

  Dawson has it hanging in the closet, right?

• 8:19Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 8:20David Sims?

  Dawson's Creek. Dawson has every Spielberg poster in his room, but always is in the closet.

• 8:25Speaker 05

  Right.

• 8:26Griffin Newman?

  Kind of a mean joke.

• 8:26Speaker 05

  But the weird thing is, for me, it was one of the few VHS tapes that we owned as a child. Was, I think my mother had seen it and liked it or something. So for me, it was like Spielberg's biggest movie, other than Indiana Jones and Jurassic Park.

• 8:41Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 8:42David Sims?

  Do you want to give the bottom five feature just Steven Spielberg movies on Letterboxd in terms of like longer?

• 8:49Griffin Newman?

  I know this because I checked this last time.

• 8:50David Sims?

  Yeah, but tell me.

• 8:51Griffin Newman?

  Okay, well, so we're not counting Twilight Zone?

• 8:53David Sims?

  Not counting Twilight Zone and not counting, obviously, any of the TV movies.

• 8:55Griffin Newman?

  Right, Wicked or something evil. Okay, so it's, it's Sugar Land?

• 8:59David Sims?

  So Always is the least, then 1941.

• 9:01Griffin Newman?

  Oh, right, then Sugar Land?

• 9:02David Sims?

  Then Sugar Land.

• 9:03Griffin Newman?

  And then the two above that are?

• 9:05David Sims?

  Slightly more surprising, only slightly.

• 9:07Griffin Newman?

  Yes, uh, duh, duh, duh, duh, duh, no, because I know, because I was.

• 9:12David Sims?

  One, we did a perfect episode on with no notes.

• 9:14Speaker 05

  Almost dead.

• 9:14Griffin Newman?

  Almost dead.

• 9:16David Sims?

  And the other, we did a perfect episode on, but some people don't like the episode because we don't like the movie.

• 9:21Speaker 05

  Almost dead, too?

• 9:24Griffin Newman?

  People don't like it because we, it's not the War Horse episode.

• 9:26David Sims?

  It is the War Horse. Like, as much as people generally like that episode of ours because we're having a lot of fun.

• 9:30Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 9:31David Sims?

  Some people, sort of meekly, I see sometimes being like, I actually like War Horse and I feel like they're not very nice to it.

• 9:36Griffin Newman?

  Look, I think I, the.

• 9:37David Sims?

  And I think War Horse has spectacular stuff.

• 9:39Griffin Newman?

  When I saw War Horse.

• 9:40David Sims?

  Such as that horse.

• 9:41Griffin Newman?

  Well, God, if I could get my dick on that horse. That's a callback that doesn't make sense if, that sounds like I made a huge, if you haven't listened to the episode.

• 9:51David Sims?

  The episode we talk about, everyone's really in love with that horse.

• 9:53Griffin Newman?

  That it feels like the movie is sexualizing the horse.

• 9:56David Sims?

  All right, let's cut to a montage.

• 9:57Griffin Newman?

  Let's cut to a montage?

• 9:59David Sims?

  I think Ben's right, of like us yelling.

• 10:01Speaker 05

  You guys lusting after a horse.

• 10:02David Sims?

  They really want to fuck that horse, that great episode.

• 10:05Griffin Newman?

  Everyone in this movie really wants to fuck this horse.

• 10:08David Sims?

  Even in war, like, we're all gonna want.

• 10:09Speaker 04

  To fuck the same horse.

• 10:11Griffin Newman?

  You never made a movie where people were trying to cuck a horse?

• 10:13Speaker 04

  It's just hot. It's just like a hot horse.

• 10:15Griffin Newman?

  This is the human condition.

• 10:17Speaker 04

  And you raise that we want to fuck this fucking hot horse. What is the deal with the horse?

• 10:24Speaker 05

  Fuckability.

• 10:24Speaker 04

  He wants to fuck the horse. Everyone wants to fuck the horse.

• 10:27Griffin Newman?

  Right. John Ford brings him into his office and he goes, I heard you want to be a picture maker. And he goes, yeah. And he goes, let me ask you a question.

• 10:34David Sims?

  You want to fuck this horse?

• 10:35Griffin Newman?

  Do you want to fuck this horse?

• 10:39David Sims?

  Ah, yes. Now that you have that context.

• 10:41Griffin Newman?

  Great. Let me finish the intro.

• 10:42David Sims?

  This is a clip show, by the way, Richard. We're not going to get to you.

• 10:44Speaker 05

  Oh, yeah. Oh.

• 10:45Griffin Newman?

  Decade of dreams.

• 10:45David Sims?

  Tell you ahead of time, sorry.

• 10:47Speaker 05

  Let's play the clips from all my appearances.

• 10:49Griffin Newman?

  This is a mini-series on the early works of Steven Spielberg, the first half of his career. We're calling it Pod Rastic Cast.

• 10:57David Sims?

  Bet your bottom dollar.

• 10:58Griffin Newman?

  A lot of notes. This is the first episode I want to say we've recorded since the artwork and the title was announced. And people are not happy about it.

• 11:05David Sims?

  Why not? What's their fucking problem?

• 11:08Griffin Newman?

  Jerkastic pod. They want pod encounters of the close.

• 11:12David Sims?

  Can I ask you?

• 11:13Griffin Newman?

  Cast, yeah.

• 11:13David Sims?

  Where are you seeing criticism? Because I'll say, the Blankies subreddit.

• 11:17Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 11:18David Sims?

  Honestly, has kind of just become a movie discussion board, which is fine by me.

• 11:21Griffin Newman?

  Fine by me.

• 11:22David Sims?

  Like, it's not even, it barely touches on our podcast anymore, which is A-OK.

• 11:25Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 11:26David Sims?

  So where are you even? I guess I'm not on Twitter anymore.

• 11:29Griffin Newman?

  Ben Brantley took us to task.

• 11:30Speaker 05

  Did you think about cast encounters of the pod kind?

• 11:32Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, I thought about all of it. This is the thing people don't understand. I think about all of it. There's never one that I'm like, oh, fuck, I should have done that. And a big part of the calculation is, I just need to say.

• 11:44David Sims?

  Yes.

• 11:45Griffin Newman?

  I type them out, I write them out, I go, what looks funny? And then I go, let me say it out loud.

• 11:49David Sims?

  Yeah, of course. You're going to have to say it out loud several times.

• 11:52Griffin Newman?

  And it's like, sometimes there's one that's funny, but is actually going to be impossible to pronounce.

• 11:56Speaker 05

  Right.

• 11:57Griffin Newman?

  I want it to be clunky. I don't want it to be too clean.

• 12:02David Sims?

  Of course.

• 12:02Griffin Newman?

  I want a funny bit of tension. Right. But this is Pod Rastic Cast, a really nice thing to say. Just rolls off the top.

• 12:11David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 12:11Griffin Newman?

  The first half of Spielberg's career, because two presidential terms ago, we covered the latter half of his career.

• 12:18David Sims?

  Hmm.

• 12:19Griffin Newman?

  Um, and now, now we've, we've circled back.

• 12:23David Sims?

  Yep.

• 12:23Griffin Newman?

  In that series, our guest today covered Saving Private Ryan.

• 12:26David Sims?

  That's right.

• 12:27Griffin Newman?

  One of his absolutely most essential films.

• 12:29Speaker 05

  And I believe we recorded that the week after a certain election.

• 12:33David Sims?

  Who?

• 12:33Griffin Newman?

  It, it, there is an upsetting direct mirror on the timelines of these two series.

• 12:39Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 12:39Griffin Newman?

  Yep. But, but today, he is returning for one, another one that loomed very large in your

• 12:47Speaker 05

  Yeah, it was before Private Ryan. It was like a big, yeah.

• 12:50Griffin Newman?

  We had another guest booked, a friend of the show who will have on for something else, a friend of all of ours. We're excited to have him on.

• 12:56David Sims?

  Katie Rich, you can just say it.

• 12:57Griffin Newman?

  And we were just sort of like, we should just have Katie do Always, right? I don't think anyone cares that much about Always. Katie will probably be a good guest for Always. And then we booked it, and then you texted me and we're like, who's doing Always? Always is really important to me.

• 13:10Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 13:11Griffin Newman?

  And I said Katie, and you went, that'll be great. That'll be great.

• 13:13Speaker 05

  No, I support Katie being on this episode. So, goodbye.

• 13:16Griffin Newman?

  Katie's New York, trip plans change.

• 13:18Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 13:18Griffin Newman?

  Window opens up.

• 13:19David Sims?

  You have to go to the Golden Globes.

• 13:20Griffin Newman?

  You get to mount the case for Always. Richard Lawson, Avant Fair, Little Gold Man.

• 13:25Speaker 05

  Thank you for having me. I'm ten-

• 13:26Griffin Newman?

  Twelve timer?

• 13:27Speaker 05

  Oh, I think it's more than that.

• 13:29David Sims?

  Here we go.

• 13:30Speaker 05

  But ten years for you guys.

• 13:31Griffin Newman?

  A decade of dreams.

• 13:32Speaker 05

  That's a big show.

• 13:32Griffin Newman?

  Decade of dreams. Saving Private Ryan, Lady in the Water, Big Guys.

• 13:37Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 13:37David Sims?

  All right, wait a second. You're, you're-

• 13:39Griffin Newman?

  I'm not going in order.

• 13:40Speaker 05

  K-19, The Widowmaker. Everyone's favorite episode.

• 13:41David Sims?

  I'll go in order. Lady in the Water. Vanilla scur.

• 13:45Griffin Newman?

  Vanilla scur.

• 13:47David Sims?

  Sherving pervert rur.

• 13:48Griffin Newman?

  Sherving pervert rur.

• 13:50Speaker 05

  Gersperm.

• 13:51David Sims?

  Totally forgot that you were on the K-19, The Widowmaker episode, probably because my brain has erased that trauma.

• 13:57Griffin Newman?

  I remember-

• 13:57David Sims?

  Not of your part.

• 13:59Griffin Newman?

  I remember why you claimed that episode.

• 14:01Speaker 05

  Why did I?

• 14:02Griffin Newman?

  A lot of my boys in it.

• 14:03Speaker 05

  Oh, that's right. That's right. Those were my boys' projects.

• 14:06David Sims?

  You love the, the Fatherland.

• 14:07Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 14:07Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 14:08David Sims?

  Spurngrur.

• 14:09Griffin Newman?

  Spurngrur.

• 14:10David Sims?

  Germ again.

• 14:11Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 14:12Griffin Newman?

  Uh huh.

• 14:12David Sims?

  Big Eyes, as you say. So that's seven. We're at seven there. One, two, three.

• 14:18David Sims?

  Philadelphia.

• 14:20Griffin Newman?

  Philadelphier.

• 14:21David Sims?

  Oh, another one my brain has erased. The Witches.

• 14:24Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 14:24David Sims?

  Robert Zemeckis is The Witches.

• 14:25Speaker 05

  That was our, um, Richard's drinking during this recording.

• 14:29Griffin Newman?

  We were all drinking during that recording. That might be the single least existent movie we have covered on the show.

• 14:35David Sims?

  Truly, truly.

• 14:35Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 14:36David Sims?

  Like, he made Pinocchio as a challenge.

• 14:38Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 14:38David Sims?

  But it could not exist less than The Witches. It still exists slightly more than The Witches.

• 14:43Griffin Newman?

  But even like-

• 14:43David Sims?

  He was trying to get below The Witches and he couldn't.

• 14:45Griffin Newman?

  Martin Breas' AFI project. Exists more, like, like, the early ones that are lesser seen, at least they have, like, the historical importance.

• 14:53David Sims?

  A Shit I Just Took is a more seen movie than Robert Zemeckis is The Witches with fucking Anne Hathaway. The Pur of the Dirk.

• 15:01Speaker 05

  Oh, right. Yeah.

• 15:02Griffin Newman?

  Oh.

• 15:03David Sims?

  Spurdeker.

• 15:04Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 15:05Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 15:05David Sims?

  The Curious Case of Benjamin Burton.

• 15:07Griffin Newman?

  Mm-hmm.

• 15:08David Sims?

  And we met him. We loved him.

• 15:10Griffin Newman?

  Black. Mr. Black.

• 15:11David Sims?

  Mr. Joe Black.

• 15:12Griffin Newman?

  Mr. Joe Black.

• 15:13Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 15:13David Sims?

  So-

• 15:14Griffin Newman?

  Is this 13?

• 15:15David Sims?

  I think it's 14, isn't it?

• 15:18Speaker 05

  That's amazing.

• 15:19Griffin Newman?

  A Lawson's dozen.

• 15:20Speaker 05

  That's more than one year.

• 15:21David Sims?

  This is the 14th. And of course, let's never forget that on our Patreon, you did experience the trolls.

• 15:27Griffin Newman?

  You experienced the trolls.

• 15:28Speaker 05

  We did. Yeah.

• 15:29Griffin Newman?

  Or you let us experience your trolls.

• 15:31Speaker 05

  Yeah. I welcomed you into my world.

• 15:34David Sims?

  How many trolls have there been at this point? I know you completely lost control of your trolls long ago, but there's only been three.

• 15:39Speaker 05

  They unionized and it was a disaster.

• 15:42David Sims?

  You tried to crush them.

• 15:43Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 15:43David Sims?

  So, World Tour, and then they banded together?

• 15:46Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 15:46David Sims?

  Not sure that I saw Band Together. I did see World Tour.

• 15:49Griffin Newman?

  Band Together came out last year. It kind of underperformed quite a way.

• 15:52Speaker 05

  I reviewed World Tour because that was, like, at the start of the pandemic.

• 15:55David Sims?

  Right, where it was-

• 15:56Speaker 05

  And I was like, we have to, I have to find something to write about.

• 15:58Griffin Newman?

  World Tour was the first studio movie that had not gone to theaters-

• 16:03David Sims?

  Right.

• 16:03Griffin Newman?

  That announced $25 iTunes rent.

• 16:06Speaker 05

  That's right.

• 16:06Griffin Newman?

  Like, it was the canary in the coal mine of, does this work?

• 16:09David Sims?

  Right. The answer was, not really, but sort of.

• 16:12Griffin Newman?

  Sort of.

• 16:13David Sims?

  Right.

• 16:13Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 16:14David Sims?

  Uh, but I remember World Tour being like a huge step up from Trolls 1.

• 16:17Griffin Newman?

  Hmm.

• 16:18David Sims?

  Uh, but I did not see Trolls, uh, I already forgot the name, Band Together.

• 16:22Griffin Newman?

  We have a lot to talk about today, but I just want to say that I, I need to complain about this, and this is why I refuse to see Band Together at a protest.

• 16:27David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 16:28Griffin Newman?

  The big thing was, Justin Timberlake plays a fucking grump-

• 16:31David Sims?

  Branch.

• 16:31Griffin Newman?

  -in those movies.

• 16:32Speaker 05

  Branch.

• 16:32Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, I know his, the character's name is Branch. I'm saying he's a grump. He's playing against Timberlake today.

• 16:37David Sims?

  Sure.

• 16:38Griffin Newman?

  I think I've talked about the experience where my therapist related-

• 16:42Griffin Newman?

  My own psychology.

• 16:43David Sims?

  Your outlook to Branches.

• 16:44Speaker 05

  Yeah, sure.

• 16:44David Sims?

  Said you needed some poppy in your life.

• 16:46Griffin Newman?

  Right. She said, it's just because my kid's been watching it a lot, but I'm hearing what you're saying. It's reminding me a lot of Justin Timberlake's character in Trolls. And I went, yes, Branch, I know what his name is.

• 16:54Speaker 05

  That would be a gut punch if my therapist said that to me.

• 16:57Griffin Newman?

  And David's 10-point joke in response to that was, you need to stop going to Lights, Camera, Jackson for therapy.

• 17:03Speaker 05

  I mean, the drive to Albany alone.

• 17:05David Sims?

  Doctor, doctor, give me the news.

• 17:08Griffin Newman?

  But he's a sourpuss grump, right?

• 17:09Speaker 05

  Right.

• 17:10David Sims?

  He's got a bad case of.

• 17:11Griffin Newman?

  It's kind of Timberlake playing against type.

• 17:12Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 17:13Griffin Newman?

  And the hook to band together was, we're going to do a meta-commentary on Timberlake's boy band pass. You're going to find out that he was a member of a Trolls boy band with his brothers. And the big announcement was, NSYNC is reuniting for this.

• 17:24David Sims?

  Ah, sure.

• 17:25Griffin Newman?

  NSYNC is recording five new songs for the Trolls Band Together.

• 17:28Speaker 05

  Right.

• 17:28Griffin Newman?

  Soundtrack. They're going to do live performances. NSYNC is back. David, what are you looking at?

• 17:33David Sims?

  I'm just looking. So NSYNC kind of passed me by slightly. I was like a little too old for NSYNC, right? By then, it was, I was a more poppy, optimistic kid than some, the teen than some, right? But I didn't really know NSYNC that well. Chris Kirkpatrick, the fuck is going on there?

• 17:54Speaker 05

  I genuinely.

• 17:55Griffin Newman?

  His general look?

• 17:56David Sims?

  Yeah. Because usually you see their look and you're like, I can see what, like, what the idea was here, right?

• 18:02Speaker 05

  If I can be mean, sort of, is that that was the interesting innovation of One Direction, which was like, oh, all five are cute.

• 18:12Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 18:13David Sims?

  Because you're supposed to be like, two are cute. One's okay.

• 18:16Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 18:17David Sims?

  One is busted in an interesting way and the other one does not exist.

• 18:20Griffin Newman?

  Well, there's an old one.

• 18:22Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 18:22David Sims?

  There's always an old one. And like, just that thing where they, it felt like they were like, we saw 80,000 people to be in this band and we ran out of good ones after three.

• 18:32Griffin Newman?

  This was like the together thing of like what the formulation is of the weird balance of the thing, you know?

• 18:37David Sims?

  Like, I mean, because like The Better Man, the Robbie Williams biopic, like, doesn't really touch on Take That's, you know, lower members, no offense to them.

• 18:46Griffin Newman?

  Are they depicted at all?

• 18:47David Sims?

  No, no, no. Take That's a huge part of the movie. As humans, of course. Only Robbie is a chimpanzee.

• 18:52Griffin Newman?

  Kind of offensive to the other members of Take That.

• 18:54David Sims?

  But like Gary Barlow is obviously the main part of the... Have you seen Better Man?

• 18:57Speaker 05

  Uh, no, I've not, actually.

• 18:59David Sims?

  Great movie.

• 18:59Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 19:00David Sims?

  Gary Barlow was the head, the front man for... And Robbie was kind of the cute one off to the side.

• 19:04Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 19:05David Sims?

  And then there's another cute one, and then there's the two other ones. Now, no offense to the fans of the two other ones, but it's true. Like, they would always just kind of have like two spare fucking guys.

• 19:13Griffin Newman?

  I feel like the 90s version of that was...

• 19:16David Sims?

  Could Chris Patrick sing? Was he... Obviously. It would turn out that the Kind of Nothing one was a good singer.

• 19:21Speaker 05

  It is my understanding that he was really instrumental in like bringing the group together. And like, he kind of like, yeah, yeah.

• 19:27David Sims?

  Just dug out.

• 19:28Speaker 03

  I think it was how he could wear dreadlocks.

• 19:31David Sims?

  Right.

• 19:31Speaker 05

  Right.

• 19:32Speaker 03

  I think that's really what...

• 19:33David Sims?

  Which he didn't initially, but then he, he brings those out.

• 19:36Speaker 03

  He brings them out, baby.

• 19:37David Sims?

  Take That also had a dreadlock guy for a while.

• 19:38Griffin Newman?

  I was gonna say, those groups all needed one guy who was sort of like a weird alt-subculture guy.

• 19:44Speaker 05

  He was the A.J. McLean from Backstreet Boys of NSYNC.

• 19:47David Sims?

  But then in Britain, you would have Boyzone or Westlife or whatever. It was truly just like, it looked like they'd just cloned people.

• 19:53Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 19:54David Sims?

  Like, it's just all kind of like blond, dead-eyed action figures.

• 19:57Speaker 05

  With spiky gel hair.

• 19:58Griffin Newman?

  And I was, I would argue that was part of what didn't make them stick.

• 20:02David Sims?

  Yeah, cuz you need some spice or some...

• 20:04Griffin Newman?

  And I also think having the weirdos would make the, the Nick Carter or the Justin Timberlake pop a little more.

• 20:10David Sims?

  But was it really tough to be like, I'm an 11-year-old girl and I love NSYNC and I'm one of the 1% that's like Chris? I'm, I like Chris.

• 20:19Speaker 05

  I was always fascinated cuz my sister, you know, well, I was into the bands too, but like her friends, they would talk about it. And one of her friends was like of the Backstreet Boys. She's like, no, I'm a Kevin Richardson girl. And it was like, whoa.

• 20:30Griffin Newman?

  Kevin was like the Chris Patrick. He's the one who kind of brought them together and held them together. Sir, my, Jamesy, my little brother, Jamesy Newman, was a big Backstreet Boys guy. And I think I had like the posters on his wall and was watching them. We were a Backstreet Boys household.

• 20:43David Sims?

  It's like a Pepsi family.

• 20:45Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. The videos would be on the TV or James would be like, you know, having a poster. My dad would just walk by and look at A.J. and go, "That guy's such a greaseball." He just could never not comment on it. He goes, "What is up with this guy?"

• 20:59Speaker 05

  "In my house, we drank RC Cola and listened to O-Town." Okay, that was...

• 21:04Griffin Newman?

  Right, we were ginger ale and Backstreet Boys, Canada Dry and Backstreet Boys.

• 21:08David Sims?

  How did we get on? Oh, because you're talking about trolls.

• 21:09Speaker 05

  Well, because Holly Hunter was originally, she worked with Lou Pearlman in Orlando.

• 21:13Griffin Newman?

  How did we even get on the fucking troll? Oh, we're counting on your episodes. This is episode on Always.

• 21:17Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 21:19David Sims?

  Um, this is the episode on Steven Spielberg's 1989 romantic fantasy pseudo remake Always.

• 21:26Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 21:27David Sims?

  Uh, uh, which starred Richard Dreyfuss?

• 21:30Griffin Newman?

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:31David Sims?

  Holly Hunter.

• 21:32Griffin Newman?

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:32David Sims?

  John Goodman on the poster, although, you know, kind of not, not a big character in a weird way to the movie.

• 21:38Griffin Newman?

  Pitting that, we're gonna talk about it. I have a lot of things to say about that.

• 21:41David Sims?

  Everyone's favorite movie star, Brad Johnson.

• 21:44Griffin Newman?

  Ben.

• 21:45Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 21:45Griffin Newman?

  So, I assume you weren't, uh, doing any, uh, kind of ancillary digging or, or checking of the dossier? And that this was your first time seeing him, that actor?

• 21:54David Sims?

  You watched the movie Always, I assume.

• 21:56Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. Brad Johnson, that's his name, right?

• 21:58David Sims?

  Brad Johnson, who plays the, you know, the new love interest after Dreyfuss's call.

• 22:02Speaker 05

  Kind of the himbo.

• 22:03Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 22:04David Sims?

  There you go.

• 22:04Griffin Newman?

  To your awareness, this is the first time you've ever seen this guy, right?

• 22:07Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 22:09Griffin Newman?

  What, if you had to guess, and I told you this was his first movie, how do you think he was discovered?

• 22:16David Sims?

  What do you think he did before they were like, hey, should you try acting? Like, in a movie acting?

• 22:21Griffin Newman?

  Sure, uh... This isn't like a setup for a bit, I just think you might get this right.

• 22:26Speaker 05

  Chippendales.

• 22:27David Sims?

  You're close. He was a literal Marlboro man. Like, an actual, like, put that hat on this fucker. He was gonna sell some cigarettes.

• 22:36Griffin Newman?

  He was a rodeo performer?

• 22:38Speaker 05

  Uh-huh.

• 22:38Griffin Newman?

  Who then was spotted?

• 22:40Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 22:40Griffin Newman?

  And became the Marlboro man for a chunk of years?

• 22:43Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 22:43Griffin Newman?

  You know, was one of many Marlboro men, but had it?

• 22:46David Sims?

  Well, because that was like being Lara Croft, right?

• 22:48Griffin Newman?

  Or Ronald McDonald.

• 22:49David Sims?

  Right, it would cycle, yeah.

• 22:51Griffin Newman?

  But he was a Marlboro man, and then it led to a straight-to-video horror movie, and then this.

• 22:56Speaker 05

  And all the Marlboro men, they lived in an apartment complex together. They had fun. They would have fun adventures.

• 23:01David Sims?

  They would do last few competitions.

• 23:03Speaker 05

  Yeah, they were dating and it was fun.

• 23:05Griffin Newman?

  But it's the weird, like, it is a part of this movie. I'd never seen this film before. It's a part of the film.

• 23:10David Sims?

  Oh, you've never seen it?

• 23:10Griffin Newman?

  I'd never seen it before. It's a part of this movie's legacy that always fascinated me was like, part of the framing of this movie was like, we're introducing a new movie star. Spielberg has found a guy.

• 23:22Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 23:22Griffin Newman?

  And there was like a lot of People Magazine press of like, the co-stars talking up like, this guy's got a huge career.

• 23:28Speaker 05

  We're gonna have him do impressions, like, we're gonna show a range of talent.

• 23:32Griffin Newman?

  We're like crafting the role around this guy's innate sort of like charisma.

• 23:36Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 23:37Griffin Newman?

  And he does like a couple other movies and some TV.

• 23:40David Sims?

  Yeah, I mean, he worked. I think he mostly was in kind of, you know, straight to video kind of stuff eventually.

• 23:46Griffin Newman?

  And then became a real estate agent and died of COVID.

• 23:49David Sims?

  He did die, he did die from complications from COVID in 2020.

• 23:52Speaker 05

  And the real estate he worked in was specifically ranch real estate. So he went back to the Marlboro roots.

• 23:57David Sims?

  Marlboro Man is one of those things that I will like, explain to my kids and they will be like, the fuck are you talking about? Where I'm like, so cigarettes started to get filtered, right?

• 24:05Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 24:06David Sims?

  Okay, I mean, if cigarettes are even still legal at this point, like.

• 24:09Speaker 05

  You might as well wheel a penny farthing bicycle into the living room.

• 24:11David Sims?

  And they're like, and people thought filtered cigarettes were feminine. So Marlboro came up with this brilliant idea of like, what if a cowboy was like, hmm, so good. And it was the most brilliant advertising campaign anyone had ever heard of, that a fucking cowboy smoked this shit. Like, that's all Marlboro Man is.

• 24:29Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. Well, yeah, because you know what the rival campaign was? That fucking penis-faced camel had like billiards halls.

• 24:37David Sims?

  It's just so funny how.

• 24:38Griffin Newman?

  Someone came in and was like, what if it's a handsome dude? They were like, yeah, that might push cigarettes.

• 24:42David Sims?

  Obviously, it's what Mad Men, you know, the pilot is about. But like, you know, like, right, that all these companies are like, we all make the same basic thing, which is a deadly product that you're addicted to. And how do we find an angle on selling this to people? Just eight different companies with just like, yeah, one guy's like, hey, you should have a camel.

• 24:58Speaker 05

  Newport's had the market cornered on people smiling while playing tennis. That was their marketing.

• 25:03Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 25:03David Sims?

  God, it's so fucking weird. Anyway, we were a Marlboro household, so I was very acquainted with the Marlboro Man and I had lots of Sports Illustrateds and he was, Marlboro Man was always in those.

• 25:13Griffin Newman?

  Was your dad collecting the points?

• 25:15David Sims?

  Yeah, dude, it was a whole fucking moral dilemma for my mom because we would get free shit.

• 25:20Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, what kind of stuff?

• 25:21David Sims?

  I remember I had a sleeping bag. I would take that thing to kids' houses, right, for sleepovers and shit and it had the fucking Marlboro logo on it.

• 25:28Griffin Newman?

  I will say this in all honesty.

• 25:29David Sims?

  It was like a red sleeping bag. It probably looked like a lit cigarette.

• 25:33Speaker 05

  It was full of cigarettes when it arrived at the house.

• 25:35Griffin Newman?

  I remember going to a friend's house with parents who smoked heavily and would have the catalog and I'd look through it. I'm surprised to hear this. I like stuff.

• 25:42David Sims?

  To be clear, for people who don't know, you would like send in box.

• 25:45Speaker 05

  Marlboro box. Marlboro Miles, Marlboro Miles.

• 25:47David Sims?

  And you would get points and you could get free shit out of a catalog.

• 25:50Speaker 05

  And you could go to the Marlboro Lounge at the airport.

• 25:51David Sims?

  My dad smoked two packs a day.

• 25:52Griffin Newman?

  It was an expansive catalog that contained almost every type of product you could imagine branded with Marlboro and it was like, as you said, from like an ashtray to like a fucking motorcycle.

• 26:02David Sims?

  Yeah, you could save up and buy a private island or something. I don't know.

• 26:05Griffin Newman?

  And as a kid who loved catalogs, I'd like leaf through my parents' friend's house and be like, God, I wish my parents were chain smokers.

• 26:10Speaker 05

  If you saved enough of them, you could get a part in the movie Always.

• 26:14David Sims?

  Yeah, in Always. Spielberg's like, I'll cast you. I mean, it was, no, I think I've said this to you guys before, off mic probably, but right. My mom would, we would go through duty free when we started living in England. And then we would travel to America, you know, and in duty free, you could buy cigarettes so much cheaper because they were tax free. And cigarettes are taxed up the ass, as they should be.

• 26:33Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 26:33David Sims?

  And.

• 26:35Griffin Newman?

  Like walking out with long boxes.

• 26:36David Sims?

  My mom would walk out with like, right, 20 cartons of Marlboros. And my mother never smoked a cigarette in her damn life or whatever, barely ever did. And she would just, it was this,

• 26:47David Sims?

  he's gonna, your dad's gonna buy the fucking cigarettes. Do we save hundreds, thousands of dollars right now and indulge his deadly habit or do we not?

• 26:55Griffin Newman?

  And in the process also.

• 26:57David Sims?

  Get some fucking box tops, get a sleeping bag. It's so, it's so evil. This is what I'm saying. My kids are gonna be like, what are you talking about? Like, how is any of this allowed?

• 27:05Griffin Newman?

  But that's like part of this cultural moment where like fucking Spielberg's casting director sees a Marlboro ad and is like, what about this guy? And this is a movie. Where it's like, I feel like at one point, he tried for years to get Tom Cruise to play this part.

• 27:18David Sims?

  Yeah, Cruise was the, we'll dig into the dossier.

• 27:21Griffin Newman?

  Such a big move for like Spielberg to be like, you know what?

• 27:25David Sims?

  I'm anointing a face here.

• 27:27Griffin Newman?

  And we talk about in our, our later Spielberg series and when we've had to come back to him in like new release movies, that it feels like from the 2000s on Spielberg really kind of kept whiffing on picking new leading men.

• 27:41David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 27:41Griffin Newman?

  He kept on trying to like identify people, none of whom had as little of a background as Brad Johnson. I think you're Jeremy Irvine's.

• 27:48Speaker 05

  You're Eric Bannas.

• 27:49Griffin Newman?

  You're Eric Bannas.

• 27:50Speaker 05

  Which was a little, that was a little different.

• 27:52David Sims?

  Eric Bannas kind of almost got there, not just through Spielberg.

• 27:56Griffin Newman?

  I think it's even more the younger dude, the, the Ty Sheridins where I, I like some Ty Sheridins were.

• 28:01David Sims?

  He's still around? Yeah, he's not a bad actor.

• 28:04Griffin Newman?

  But that was sort of framed as the moment of like Spielberg's about to elevate him.

• 28:07David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 28:07Griffin Newman?

  And in fact, it caused him to go like, I gotta go back to smaller stuff.

• 28:11Speaker 05

  What is the, the Belgian actor, Tintin, what has he been in?

• 28:15David Sims?

  The boy reporter?

• 28:15Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 28:16David Sims?

  Well, he's currently on assignment. There's a big asteroid with a mushroom on it. He's checking that out.

• 28:21Griffin Newman?

  His best pick in the 2000s was Shia and then Shia like attacked him, like basically like a dog bit back at him.

• 28:29David Sims?

  I mean, honestly, his best find of late is, well, Gabriel Labell is a great find for him. But is Rachel, I mean, friend of the show Rachel, like that's untrue, like I found someone out of nowhere.

• 28:37Griffin Newman?

  But I'm talking about the male leads.

• 28:39David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 28:39Griffin Newman?

  Were the thing that he was kind of struggling with.

• 28:41David Sims?

  He found this rando fucker that Ben's friends with called Dan for Lincoln. I don't know. Dan L.

• 28:47Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 28:47David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 28:48Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 28:48David Sims?

  I'll say. I think Dan did a good job.

• 28:50Griffin Newman?

  We were all just at the New York Film Critics Circle Dinner. We were all just at the New York Film Critics Circle Dinner where David put together a very nice evening.

• 28:58David Sims?

  I had, I did. I mean, it was, it went fine.

• 29:00Griffin Newman?

  As this year's chair.

• 29:01David Sims?

  I was this year's chair.

• 29:02Griffin Newman?

  And the final award was best film for The Brutalist.

• 29:06David Sims?

  Yes.

• 29:07Griffin Newman?

  And it was presented by Robert Pattinson.

• 29:09David Sims?

  Our Pats.

• 29:10Griffin Newman?

  And we were sitting very close.

• 29:12David Sims?

  Yeah, you guys had the best seat in the house.

• 29:14Griffin Newman?

  We were about two feet away.

• 29:15David Sims?

  Right.

• 29:15Griffin Newman?

  And Ben just turns to me and goes, Bob looks great.

• 29:19Speaker 03

  He did.

• 29:20David Sims?

  I will say this.

• 29:21Speaker 03

  He was wearing a really like, nice suit.

• 29:24David Sims?

  His suit was out of control.

• 29:27Griffin Newman?

  The angles on the guy.

• 29:28David Sims?

  Oh, I mean, if I can briefly rant about this.

• 29:30Speaker 03

  I got a perspective on him too. I mean, we both did. Where you could just see how pronounced his jawline was. Like, we were seeing his profile. It was crazy.

• 29:39David Sims?

  I've interviewed Robert Pattinson when he's in, you know, cash clothes.

• 29:43Griffin Newman?

  Sure.

• 29:43David Sims?

  Uh, and even then, obviously, he's incredibly handsome and charming and, you know, you, you get, you know, a star vibe. Him walking into that room, the critic circle, where there's lots of famous actors and Hollywood people and such. And he walks in there in that perf- where you're like, this is another level of like, people paying attention to what he wears and how he dresses and what his hair looks like and just his inherent quality. This is a fucking A-list movie star.

• 30:10Griffin Newman?

  He had an Elvis entrance too. That was the other thing.

• 30:13David Sims?

  He came in from the back. There was, if I can reveal, I guess, off, you know, he, I was telling Richard this already. He was supposed to come at 10. Uh, he was our big get, you know, and he's like, I'm gonna drop in. I'll just drop in to present. And we're like, well, it's the last award of the night. We're, we'll ballpark around 10 o'clock, show up. The, the ceremony starts and I immediately am like, oh shit. Like, we're running fast. No one's rambling. No one's like,

• 30:39Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 30:41David Sims?

  Whatever. Like, whatever we budgeted for in terms of like, eh, one thing will go long or one thing. I realize I'm not rambling. Some, I think, hosts ramble more than I do. I'm kind of just like, and now we're on to this award and now we're on to this, you know, like, I'm not like, I, there's a fair clip.

• 30:55Griffin Newman?

  And said, you were, your hosting had the energy of you trying to, in real time, edit JJ's dossier.

• 31:01David Sims?

  Yes.

• 31:02Griffin Newman?

  This is what David's introductions felt like. Uh, the movie was made for five million bucks. It came out, got decent reviews. So anyway, let's talk about it.

• 31:09David Sims?

  I had to bring people on. There's a lot of awards and then you start, so there was frantic behind the scenes, like, we need to rush Pattinson to, like, you know, he needs to get here a half hour earlier. And he did, God bless him.

• 31:19Griffin Newman?

  But, but here's a point. It is fascinating that, like, Spielberg has identified, there, there are your, your Zeglers, right? But I feel like, especially with male stars.

• 31:29Speaker 05

  Stuff.

• 31:29Griffin Newman?

  He has broken very few people in a way that's kind of interesting. And in the 2000s, he started having more roles that felt like this is an opportunity for a young guy to pop. Even like Justin Chatwin War of the Worlds is another one we talk about, you know?

• 31:44Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 31:44Griffin Newman?

  And you look at like, he was not like pinning Pattinson, Harris Dickinson, you know, Jacob Elordi. Like, I, I mean, I'm saying the guys who did end up getting the right parts that made them. Spielberg is in theory, a guy who should be able to just like, put the scepter on someone's head.

• 32:01Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 32:01Griffin Newman?

  And have everyone just accept that they're real.

• 32:04Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 32:04Griffin Newman?

  And the Brad Johnson thing is just kind of fascinating because this movie is sort of built around like, we, we had caught lightning in a bottle. We found this guy you've never seen before.

• 32:15Speaker 05

  He is supposed to like bowl you over, like.

• 32:17Griffin Newman?

  Totally.

• 32:17Speaker 05

  Yeah, with his charm.

• 32:18Griffin Newman?

  On a poster with like, three like very familiar faces to American audiences. The movie's like secret is all this kind of guy.

• 32:30Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 32:31David Sims?

  Yes.

• 32:32Speaker 05

  Mmm.

• 32:35David Sims?

  Is that the Cine's cow?

• 32:36Griffin Newman?

  The Cine's cow is back.

• 32:37David Sims?

  Haven't heard from her in a while.

• 32:38Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, she's reactivated because she's horny for chicken fingers.

• 32:44David Sims?

  Okay.

• 32:44Griffin Newman?

  And she's excited for the streaming debut of Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma.

• 32:49David Sims?

  Wow.

• 32:49Griffin Newman?

  The cow likes chicken.

• 32:51David Sims?

  Remember cow and chicken? Let's look it up. While, while you, while you tell the, the great listeners about the great stuff on movie.

• 32:58Griffin Newman?

  What movie is a global film company bringing great cinema to the world and to you? Curating and elevating visionary filmmaking, all handpicked, always. That's what movie does. Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma.

• 33:10David Sims?

  Yes.

• 33:10Griffin Newman?

  One of my favorite movies of the year.

• 33:11David Sims?

  Absolutely.

• 33:12Griffin Newman?

  You can feel the rush now at home. There's a hole at the bottom of the lake where the movies come from.

• 33:18David Sims?

  That is a line in the movie.

• 33:19Griffin Newman?

  In the new movie from Jane Schomburn, Past and Future Guest.

• 33:22David Sims?

  Past and Future Guest, a great filmmaker, a great podcast guest.

• 33:26Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 33:26David Sims?

  Great friend.

• 33:27Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 33:27David Sims?

  Um, this movie rocks. It's got, of course, it stars Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson.

• 33:33Griffin Newman?

  Uh huh.

• 33:33David Sims?

  You know, legends and I tip my cap, but Zach Cherry.

• 33:36Griffin Newman?

  Performances, friend of the show.

• 33:37David Sims?

  Friend of the show Zach Cherry.

• 33:39Griffin Newman?

  Zach Cherry.

• 33:39David Sims?

  Also in it.

• 33:40Griffin Newman?

  This is true.

• 33:41David Sims?

  Such a cool movie. One that queer Paul McCann, if you haven't heard about this movie, I don't know what's going on with you, but like it obviously has, it was out in theaters this summer and now it's on movie.

• 33:52Griffin Newman?

  Hannah Einbinder plays the filmmaker attempting to reboot the Camp Miasma franchise, trying to track down the original final girl from the first movie to, to make some sort of legacy sequel, who's played by Gillian Anderson, who lives at the summer camp.

• 34:06David Sims?

  Yes. And you know, and then they hang out and it's regular.

• 34:10Griffin Newman?

  What happens? It's, it's one of those Hollywood's out of ideas. No, it's very much a movie about Hollywood being out of ideas while being an example of there still being new stories to tell.

• 34:22David Sims?

  It's now streaming exclusively on movie and you can try movie free for 30 days at movie.com slash blank check. That's M U B I dot com slash blank check for a whole month of great cinema for free.

• 34:34Griffin Newman?

  They got so many great movies on there to watch, but worth it for 30 days for Miasma.

• 34:45Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 34:45David Sims?

  Yes.

• 34:46Griffin Newman?

  He lurks in shadow. He slips into dreams. He casts no reflection. Audible presents Bram Stoker's Dracula, a new full cast audio thriller starring Ella Purnell as Mina Harker, Jonathan Bailey as Dracula, and an A-list cast, including Maggie Gyllenhaal as Van Helsing, Amy Lou Wood as Lucy, David Johnson as Dr. Seward, and many more. That is an all-star cast.

• 35:06David Sims?

  Yeah, this new full cast thriller locks Mina Harker in a battle of minds with the Count. When Mina's fiance Jonathan Harker, Louis Partridge, vanishes in Transylvania, Mina pieces together letters, diary entries, and chilling testimony to hunt the predator stalking those she loves, only to discover Dracula's already hunting her.

• 35:26Griffin Newman?

  Joined by the enigmatic Van Helsing, Mina and a small fearless band race against time to stop this ancient terror. Using her intellect, her resolve, and a gift for drawing the unseen lines between clues, Mina may just hold the key to bring down the Count if he hasn't already found his way inside her mind.

• 35:42David Sims?

  Featuring a haunting original score by Elon Eschery and a spatial dolby Atmos sound design, Audible's Dracula invites you to welcome literature's most shadowy figure into your home. Feel the terror of being hunted and the thrill of the hunt. Don't miss this year's best new audio thriller, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Audible's new full cast original adaptation, written by Robin Ahearn, now on Audible. Listen to the darkness. Go to audible.com/listen to Dracula.

• 36:17Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 36:17David Sims?

  Yes?

• 36:18Griffin Newman?

  Ugh.

• 36:19David Sims?

  Uh oh.

• 36:20Griffin Newman?

  It's November.

• 36:21David Sims?

  Ah.

• 36:22Griffin Newman?

  And you know what that means? The old stereotype about November.

• 36:25David Sims?

  Turkeys?

• 36:26Griffin Newman?

  One long sprint to the finish line.

• 36:27David Sims?

  Oh, of course.

• 36:29Griffin Newman?

  Packed schedule, questionable food choices, and somehow a social calendar that got way fuller than you planned. And I ain't talking about Sam Fuller. We're not covering him yet in the podcast.

• 36:37David Sims?

  No, though, maybe we should.

• 36:38Griffin Newman?

  We might get there eventually.

• 36:40David Sims?

  I can't remember. Big Red One. We call the Big Red Podcast.

• 36:43Griffin Newman?

  Listen, when things get complicated, not when life is easy and when you got time for a whole routine, right now, when everything is full and something has to give one scoop cold water every morning before anything else, as I like to say, scoop there it is.

• 36:57David Sims?

  You do like to say that every morning you text me, scoop there it is. And that means I now know that you had your AG1.

• 37:03Griffin Newman?

  And I'm awake.

• 37:04David Sims?

  Uh, but yeah, you're, I know you're, you're a daily AG1 user and it's basically the, uh, the glue that holds your internal organs together at this point.

• 37:12Griffin Newman?

  It's not just marketing. AG1 Next Gen is backed by four separate gold standard clinical trials, not weekend a study.

• 37:20David Sims?

  Thank you for that, boy.

• 37:21Griffin Newman?

  Four independent studies with key nutrient levels improved within three months of consistent use. This is the thing I like about AG1. They're not resting on their laurels. They constantly work to better themselves.

• 37:32David Sims?

  Um, yes, AG1. They've got now AG1 Pro.

• 37:36Griffin Newman?

  For the professionals.

• 37:37David Sims?

  Same daily drink now with the performance and recovery layer built in. So you've got five grams of Cre vitalis, a premium German made creatine monohydrate, and one of the most studied compounds in sports science, plus CAHMB for muscle protection and zinc carnosine for gut support.

• 37:56Griffin Newman?

  Thank God.

• 37:56David Sims?

  Next gen is the foundation pro adds what your body needs to recover.

• 38:00Griffin Newman?

  You might be having some big meals this November. AG1 is what you need to keep your gut in check. Keep things, as I like to put it, regular.

• 38:08David Sims?

  Yes. So for a limited time, visit drink AG1.com slash check and get a free immune support bundle, including omega three, fish oil and vitamin D three plus K2 with your first subscription of AG1 next gen or AG1 Pro. That's drink AG1.com slash check. And after checkout, be sure to let them know that Belank check send you.

• 38:39David Sims?

  All right, look, so you'd never seen Always.

• 38:41Griffin Newman?

  No.

• 38:42David Sims?

  Ben, you'd never seen this movie, right? You weren't a big Always guy. You had seen Always because you owned it.

• 38:47Speaker 05

  Dozens of times.

• 38:47David Sims?

  I was a never guy.

• 38:49Griffin Newman?

  Oh, that's good. Five comedy points.

• 38:51David Sims?

  Have you seen it? A Blockbuster is like, how about Always? You're like, how about Never? See you later.

• 38:55Griffin Newman?

  And then Ben would have to go to a different Blockbuster to be able to make the joke again without it.

• 39:01David Sims?

  This guy fucking recommends Always to me. Why would he do that? Nobody likes that movie. Yeah, I just hope he does.

• 39:07Griffin Newman?

  Ben would go in and be like, I'm looking for a movie that's like, like ghost.

• 39:10David Sims?

  About like firefighters.

• 39:12Speaker 03

  It's like ghost cuck game kind of. I guess you don't know what the word cuck means yet, but you'll find out.

• 39:18David Sims?

  Did you guys like the movie? Clearly Richard had some fondness for the movie as a youngster.

• 39:24Speaker 05

  I think so. Um, as of this recording, I've been working on something for work where I'm ranking all of Spielberg's films. So I've been watching every single one of his films in chronological order. Um, I, I did not do that with Always. I kind of skipped past it because I wanted to save it for this. But, but, um, uh, a lot of movies are just totally different through the lens of Fabelman's now, a lot of his early stuff, um, in a kind of profoundly strange way.

• 39:50Griffin Newman?

  It's been really interesting for us, waiting this long to do the first half of his career and being able to do it with the Fableman's concept.

• 39:56Speaker 05

  That's what it was all about.

• 39:57Griffin Newman?

  It changes every single movie.

• 39:59Speaker 05

  I would argue except this one.

• 40:00Griffin Newman?

  Interesting.

• 40:01Speaker 05

  This one feels like it's other, it's own little side thing that was just sprouted from a conversation or conversations with Richard Dreyfuss. It is less like big and sweeping than I remember it being. It just, it really does feel like a kind of like one for me little project that, yeah.

• 40:18Griffin Newman?

  I like this movie quite a bit.

• 40:19Speaker 05

  I like.

• 40:20Griffin Newman?

  The first half of it, I was like, do I love this?

• 40:22Speaker 05

  That's the thing.

• 40:23Griffin Newman?

  I don't think.

• 40:24Speaker 05

  It starts really well.

• 40:24Griffin Newman?

  It makes any major mistakes.

• 40:26Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 40:27Griffin Newman?

  But it does just kind of peter out.

• 40:29Speaker 05

  It's a lot faster than I remembered it being. Like, it just kind of arrives at its conclusions pretty quickly.

• 40:33Griffin Newman?

  Which I think it takes a lot of time setting up its dynamics. Like, Dreyfuss doesn't die, spoiler, until like thirty plus minutes into the movie in a way that you feel like other movies would do that five, ten minutes in. And I was like getting excited by how deliberate the table setting was and feeling like this is really drilling into these characters. And then the second half moves really fast and just felt like it lost a little of that sensitivity. Here's what I want to say about it not changing with the context and the Goodman point I was making earlier. Uh, have always been fascinated by this as the attempted launching of the Brad Johnson thing, right? But I, I always was just like, yeah, it's a remake of like a guy called Joe. I've never seen that. I know it's about like ghosts and planes and a love triangle and whatever.

• 41:17Griffin Newman?

  I just always assumed from the poster.

• 41:20Speaker 05

  Oh, right, of course, yeah.

• 41:22Griffin Newman?

  I was like, and Brad Johnson, I guess, must be some like hunky romantic rival. But I thought this movie.

• 41:28David Sims?

  It's about getting Hunter and Goodman together?

• 41:30Griffin Newman?

  I thought it was. H and G? I thought it was Ghost Town. I thought it was.

• 41:34Speaker 05

  Ah, okay.

• 41:35Griffin Newman?

  Dreyfuss and Goodman are best friends. Dreyfuss dies.

• 41:38David Sims?

  Oh, and so.

• 41:39Griffin Newman?

  Ghost Dreyfuss is leading Goodman.

• 41:42David Sims?

  Right.

• 41:42Griffin Newman?

  To romance his wife.

• 41:43David Sims?

  Right. Instead, it's just kind of Ghost Dreyfuss going like, hey, hey!

• 41:46Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 41:47David Sims?

  Hey, Hunter, come on, come on, come on, listen to me, listen to me, listen to me. She's like, oh, like, you know, she didn't really.

• 41:51Griffin Newman?

  I don't want anyone fucking hurt.

• 41:53Speaker 05

  At one point, talking to the guy, the neighbor guy from Home Alone.

• 41:56Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 41:57David Sims?

  Yeah, uh, Robert's Blossom.

• 41:58Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 41:59Griffin Newman?

  Right, who I think he says, what, hermits are like a radio to the.

• 42:02Speaker 05

  Who knows what the crazy old hobos, he just, I think he calls them crazy old hobos.

• 42:05Griffin Newman?

  Crazy old hobos. Um, but I'm watching this, I'm like, I can't wait for Hollywood. Hunter and John Goodman to fall in love. And I think I thought like Brad Johnson was the sort of like Rick Rossovich in the

• 42:17David Sims?

  Yeah, they're like, ah, the replacement. We don't like this guy.

• 42:20Griffin Newman?

  Right, that she's attracted to this hunky guy and Dreyfus is like, now that's just my fault for letting that narrative build in my head.

• 42:26Speaker 05

  Right.

• 42:27Griffin Newman?

  But I'm watching and I'm like, if this were that movie and that's what happened in the second half, I'd be like, go into the mat for this so fucking.

• 42:34David Sims?

  I think the bro code would bar Goodman from hooking up.

• 42:38Speaker 05

  But bro code was not installed until 1990.

• 42:41David Sims?

  Oh, that's right.

• 42:42Speaker 05

  So it was, yeah.

• 42:43Griffin Newman?

  And you know.

• 42:43David Sims?

  That was a H W Bush brought that in.

• 42:46Speaker 05

  Exactly.

• 42:46Griffin Newman?

  You know what bro code also didn't bar?

• 42:48Speaker 05

  Uh huh.

• 42:49Griffin Newman?

  Spielberg's family Fabelmansing out of control. Like, that's the other part of it is I'm watching this being like, oh, the interesting Fabelmans context of this. It's gonna be a dude convincing his best friend to fall in love with his wife, his love.

• 43:03David Sims?

  On the Oscar press tour for the film, he's like, well, the thing that happened is my dad's best friend broke the bro code. That's why I made this movie. I needed to take him to Taz. The bro code was violated.

• 43:13Griffin Newman?

  What if the Fabelmans had been called bro code? Do you think it would have made more?

• 43:16David Sims?

  Yeah, of course.

• 43:17Griffin Newman?

  If the poster was like Paul Dano with his hands like this and Seth Rogen with like a ghost logo.

• 43:24David Sims?

  Yeah, an X through him.

• 43:26Speaker 05

  With Michelle Williams and the monkey poking out, you know, from diagonally from behind him.

• 43:30Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 43:30David Sims?

  And Gabriel Bell has like pinoculars. Oh, this sounds great.

• 43:34Griffin Newman?

  From the dudes who brought you Always.

• 43:36David Sims?

  She's cooking him.

• 43:38Speaker 05

  Yeah. I think the problem with the second half in terms of that, Griffin, is that the movie so well establishes the rapport between this couple and their friend. You see them in moments of suspense, moments of pleasure and joy, a fight, you know, about something substantial. You really get to know these people and their dynamic. And then he dies and then this other guy comes in and you're like, wait, but who's that?

• 44:03Griffin Newman?

  And I kind of liken the abstract, this thing of him being like, I saw a woman one moment a year ago.

• 44:09Speaker 05

  Right. That echoes the way that Dreyfus felt about her.

• 44:12Griffin Newman?

  But I agree with you. That is the exact structural problem with the movie. Have none of us seen the original?

• 44:16Speaker 05

  I haven't, no.

• 44:17David Sims?

  I haven't. Wait, I want to, Ben, what did you think of Always? Yeah, all right. So I think Ben and I are a little more aligned because it sounds like you like Always.

• 44:25Griffin Newman?

  You were just out on it.

• 44:26David Sims?

  I don't like Always. I've seen it a couple of times and I think I have.

• 44:29Griffin Newman?

  You've never liked Always?

• 44:30David Sims?

  I.

• 44:30Griffin Newman?

  You always disliked it?

• 44:32David Sims?

  I have a huge problem with Always, and I think, I think a huge problem I'm discovering in myself.

• 44:37Griffin Newman?

  Interesting.

• 44:38David Sims?

  I don't like Richard Dreyfuss. I think he's an annoying little rat fuck man. I don't like his fucking face.

• 44:44Griffin Newman?

  Cause I feel like he's one of the most beloved people in the world. It only grows.

• 44:50David Sims?

  I've ranted on this podcast a bunch about Mr. Holland's Opus, which I think is like one of the most demented, quietly demented movies ever made because it's like an inspirational drama about a teacher, but it's basically two and a half hours of this asshole yelling at everyone. And then at the end, he's like, my opus! And they play it and it's drivel.

• 45:08Griffin Newman?

  This is obviously, this is the third Dreyfuss movie we're covering in this series.

• 45:13David Sims?

  Of course.

• 45:14Griffin Newman?

  But this is the one.

• 45:15David Sims?

  And I think he gives it a wonderful performance in Jaws, obviously.

• 45:17Griffin Newman?

  And a wonderful performance in Close Encounters.

• 45:19David Sims?

  And a wonderful, although very nervy and kind of frightening kind of performance, yes.

• 45:23Griffin Newman?

  But it just, I think this is the episode where we really have to unpack the Dreyfuss thing. Not that we haven't been talking about him, that is totally valid. And I feel like the reviews I read of the movie at the time were just like, I don't want to watch Richard Dreyfuss as a romantic lead.

• 45:38David Sims?

  Not really.

• 45:39Griffin Newman?

  What I kinda like about the movie, and Dreyfuss-

• 45:43David Sims?

  And he's sort of a pseudo-romantic lead because he's, he starts out as a romantic lead and then he blows up.

• 45:48Griffin Newman?

  Which is what kinda works for me.

• 45:49David Sims?

  Sure, yeah.

• 45:50Griffin Newman?

  I also think this movie's take is very similar to your take where it's like, this guy sucks.

• 45:56David Sims?

  Does the movie have that take?

• 45:58Griffin Newman?

  This guy's like an annoying arrogant piece of shit. Like this feels like the movie where Dreyfuss is kind of, whether consciously or not, owning the exact thing that had like turned the American audience off of him at this point in time. It is fascinating that this movie's 89.

• 46:14David Sims?

  Uh, this movie's 1989.

• 46:16Griffin Newman?

  So 75 is Jaws, 77 is Close Encounters, 79, he's the youngest man to win, best actor.

• 46:23David Sims?

  77, he's the youngest man to win. It was Goodbye Girl.

• 46:25Griffin Newman?

  Oh, you're right. You're right. Right. Right. This is a little over a decade later and he basically-

• 46:31David Sims?

  His 80s, just to, you know, his Down and Out in Beverly Hills, Tin Men, Nuts, like there are movies, but it's not-

• 46:39Griffin Newman?

  Well, here's my point. Bruce Filanç did a very good episode of WTF. And he was talking about his history with Bette Midler and how when Eisner started Touchdown Pictures and were like Disney, we're gonna make movies for grownups. Their big thing was, let's find a bunch of dinged stars and get them in overall deals. Let's get like Mazursky, who the other studios have kind of gotten bored with, but is like a solid, steady hand, great with actors, right? And their big thing was like, five picture deal Bette Midler, five picture deal Richard Dreyfuss. These are people who have like Oscars or nominations, but the public got kind of tired of.

• 47:13David Sims?

  Right, yeah, yeah.

• 47:14Griffin Newman?

  Right, and like bring them back. And he was like, Down in Beverly Hills was basically designed as four people who couldn't get arrested.

• 47:21David Sims?

  Right.

• 47:21Griffin Newman?

  In a movie that was just gonna work.

• 47:23David Sims?

  No, see Midler, Dreyfuss, and of course, Little Richard.

• 47:26Griffin Newman?

  I was gonna say Mazursky. Little Richard was popping at that point. But then I looked at it and I'm like, the space between Goodbye Girl and Down in Out in Beverly Hills is kind of fascinating. After Down and Out, he has a run of like mostly touchdown movies. Stakeout and Moon Over Peridot and whatever, and these movies that are like solid hits, are like reasonable hits.

• 47:45David Sims?

  The thing with Stakeout is, that's the movie, that's the star vehicle for Richard Dreyfuss.

• 47:51Griffin Newman?

  Yes, that's the correct one.

• 47:52David Sims?

  Where he plays kind of a creep.

• 47:53Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 47:53David Sims?

  Kind of an annoying guy.

• 47:54Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 47:55David Sims?

  And Always is the wrong kind of role for him, but anyway, yes.

• 47:59Griffin Newman?

  I think the movie is hinged on his arrogance and, and when I heard this Valance statement, I was kind of digging into it, where he was just like, Dreyfuss just couldn't get hired for anything. Studios just didn't want to fucking deal with him. And I was like, that timeline is so tight to him winning Best Actor. How'd it go that wrong that quickly? You look at the actual movies, they're not movies that have really lasted, but none of them were like calamities when they came out.

• 48:23David Sims?

  I can tell you what they were. 1978, he was in a political comedy thriller called The Big Fix.

• 48:28Griffin Newman?

  Uh huh.

• 48:29David Sims?

  Um, in which he played a police detective, good name, Moses Wine. Uh, which was, yeah, a small hit.

• 48:36Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 48:37David Sims?

  Uh, in 1980, he's in a movie called The Competition, a Joel Oliansky movie with Amy Irving.

• 48:43Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 48:44David Sims?

  It's like a sort of serious movie about a piano player. You know, gets a couple like below the line Oscar noms. Uh, in 81, he does Whose Life Is It Anyway?, which is obviously like a big stage play that I assume makes no sense as a movie. Cause like, that's very much a stage.

• 49:01Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, it's a hospital bed.

• 49:02David Sims?

  Yeah, exactly. So I, I assume that's like an Oscar play that just doesn't work because nobody remembers that movie. Then he's not in a movie for three years.

• 49:09Griffin Newman?

  Mm hmm.

• 49:10David Sims?

  In 84, he's in a movie called The Buddy System, uh, with Susan Sarandon, Nancy Allen, and Gene Stapleton.

• 49:18Griffin Newman?

  Mm hmm.

• 49:18David Sims?

  It's about a single mom who forms an unlikely friendship with a school security guard. Do you know this movie?

• 49:24Griffin Newman?

  Nope.

• 49:25David Sims?

  That's it. Then Down and Out in Beverly Hills.

• 49:26Griffin Newman?

  So that run you just listed is what comes directly off the heels of this guy being the lead or one of the three leads of three of the highest grossing movies of all time.

• 49:40David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 49:40Griffin Newman?

  In the span of seven years.

• 49:42David Sims?

  Saying American Graffiti, of course, along with Jaws.

• 49:44Griffin Newman?

  Jaws and Close Encounters.

• 49:45David Sims?

  And then wins an Oscar for Goodbye.

• 49:46Griffin Newman?

  And then wins an Oscar. And then immediately he's in this zone of like, none of these are like calamities. None of these are like embarrassments. A lot of them are small hits and get kind of middling reviews or whatever. And then I was digging in interviews with Richard Dreyfuss, famously normal and chill things to read. And he was just like, I, everyone just hated me. Like he owns it where he was just like, I was out of my mind on coke. I was a fucking nightmare and everyone was annoyed by me.

• 50:09David Sims?

  Geez, he's annoying so per imagine him on coke.

• 50:12Griffin Newman?

  Oy. Right, but like by the time you're in this sort of like eighties comeback period, what he's trying to claw back from is understanding that everyone in Hollywood is like, it's not worth it to work with Richard Dreyfuss.

• 50:25David Sims?

  Right.

• 50:25Griffin Newman?

  And the American public is like, Jesus, this guy's a lot. Like the public had turned on him, not even because.

• 50:30David Sims?

  And he tends to play people who are kind of a lot.

• 50:33Griffin Newman?

  Right. But it was like, they were so into it for seven years. And then it is kind of like, the second he stops being boyish.

• 50:39David Sims?

  Mm hmm.

• 50:40Griffin Newman?

  People were like, this is just annoying now.

• 50:42Speaker 05

  And I think in this movie, which I, I don't mind him in this movie, but I, I understand the complaints, but, but you know, in, in the context of what we're talking about, he does seem to be leeching off of his co-star, who's one of the most radiant, appealing movie stars maybe to ever exist.

• 50:59David Sims?

  And not only that, Holly Hunter's a very. Specific magical thing.

• 51:03Speaker 05

  And he's like drafting off that energy and you're like, no, that's hers. Like you, you don't get to take that.

• 51:08David Sims?

  Also, he's like, I don't know if I want to say I love you to Holly Hunter. And I'm like, I hope you die fast. I hope your plane crashes to the ground.

• 51:14Griffin Newman?

  That's where I think he's kind of well cast. I don't.

• 51:16David Sims?

  Sure, he's well cast as an asshole.

• 51:17Griffin Newman?

  Other people could have done this better. And I don't think this is like a great performance from him. But I think there are other Richard Dreyfuss comedies of this period where I'm like, Jesus Christ, can you cool it down? And in this one, the frustration of like, this guy needs to fucking realize.

• 51:33Speaker 05

  Right.

• 51:33Griffin Newman?

  That he sucks. You know, like he needs to eat shit.

• 51:37David Sims?

  It means a lot of the movie is him yelling.

• 51:40Griffin Newman?

  I agree.

• 51:40David Sims?

  At people who can't hear him, frustrating to watch and annoying.

• 51:44Griffin Newman?

  I agree. Now, the counter to that is, as you said, like 10 minutes in, I'm like, you know what? This movie is an automatic three stars for me because any vehicle built around Holly Hunter in this time period is just playing with house money.

• 51:55Speaker 05

  Unbelievable. It's unbelievable.

• 51:57David Sims?

  That, that'll.

• 51:58Griffin Newman?

  It is unreal.

• 52:00David Sims?

  And hey, Goodman essentially being Baloo from Tailspin.

• 52:03Griffin Newman?

  Fine with that.

• 52:04David Sims?

  Nothing wrong with that. Like, that's, that's some great salt.

• 52:06Griffin Newman?

  If Goodman was romancing Holly Hunter, it maybe would be an automatic five for me. If the like, if the resonance.

• 52:11David Sims?

  They are a physical mismatch. And Goodman is.

• 52:13Griffin Newman?

  That's part of what I found compelling in this Minds High version of the movie.

• 52:17David Sims?

  I guess it's kind of a Fred Flintstone Wilma.

• 52:19Speaker 05

  The physics alone, yeah.

• 52:21Griffin Newman?

  Kind of Baloo and Mowgli?

• 52:24David Sims?

  Doesn't hook up with Mowgli.

• 52:25Griffin Newman?

  No, but they're very good friends.

• 52:27Speaker 05

  What version of you? Is that in the Favreau one?

• 52:31David Sims?

  It's in the Andy Serkis one. He went off the leash.

• 52:35Speaker 05

  Um, no, I was watching her in this last night and I was just, and I'd seen it before and I, and I was like, oh, right. When I was a kid, that, I mean, it was the plane stuff and her. I was just like so mesmerized. I was like, who? I'd never seen someone be that way, you know?

• 52:50Griffin Newman?

  Here's what's crazy. I'm gonna, I'm gonna make an extreme statement, but I stand by this. She's like kind of as good in this as she is in Broadcast News. Just in a movie that is nowhere near as good.

• 53:02Speaker 05

  Right.

• 53:02Griffin Newman?

  Like, that was the part of me that was like, she is so powerful at this point in time that if you just give her this much runway, she will like motor an entire movie into feeling like it's kind of important anytime she's on screen. Broadcast News is also giving her like a perfect screenplay and a perfect structure with perfect castmates.

• 53:18David Sims?

  A more interesting character and also like. Half of this movie is her having to interact with Brad Johnson, who is a less compelling scene partner than Albert Brooks or William Hertz.

• 53:28Griffin Newman?

  But that's why I'm like, she's like making this feel like something out of nothing. Her character is not really written.

• 53:34David Sims?

  Look, this movie features Keith David playing a character called Powerhouse. It should be a five star masterpiece, and it is not.

• 53:43Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 53:44David Sims?

  It's also a Steven Spielberg movie, and he does set a high bar for himself.

• 53:49Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 53:49David Sims?

  And this thing is curio at best to me. Every time I watch it, I'm like, come on, there's a gem in here, right? Like, this is-

• 53:58Speaker 05

  Because the world is so interestingly rendered, like the place, the setting, like the profession. I just find like the way that Holly Hunter rides her bike from her cabin to the airfield. Like, you're like, I want to live in this world. And then the story kind of just drags you away from it, weirdly. I don't know.

• 54:16Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, it's maybe his most frustrating movie on that level, but I feel like I hear a lot of people being like, obviously his worst movie.

• 54:24Speaker 05

  I strenuously disagree.

• 54:27David Sims?

  It's certainly not his worst movie.

• 54:29Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 54:29Speaker 05

  1941 is his worst.

• 54:31Griffin Newman?

  There are at least five movies I have like underlined bold and below this. Like, I even think the only-

• 54:38David Sims?

  I only think I have a couple.

• 54:40Griffin Newman?

  The only other movie in his filmography, I would argue, is him trying to do this kind of thing again. Is The Terminal.

• 54:47David Sims?

  Is The Terminal, which I think is worse than-

• 54:48Griffin Newman?

  And I greatly prefer this, The Terminal.

• 54:50David Sims?

  Although-

• 54:51Speaker 05

  Although I rewatched The Terminal-

• 54:52David Sims?

  The Terminal's got some stuff!

• 54:53Speaker 05

  And it actually, like, it's not as bad as I remember it being.

• 54:56Griffin Newman?

  I don't hate it.

• 54:57Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 54:58Griffin Newman?

  But I do think I like the world this movie is building, even if it feels like it doesn't-

• 55:03Speaker 05

  But I will say-

• 55:04Griffin Newman?

  How to land the plane.

• 55:05Speaker 05

  I will say about Always, I was watching it last night, and I haven't written this ranking that I'm gonna do, that'll be long out by the time this airs, but I was like, for that first 20, 30 minutes, I was like, is this gonna be in my top 10?

• 55:18Griffin Newman?

  I was, yeah.

• 55:19Speaker 05

  And then it doesn't, you know, then it doesn't deliver. But like, yeah, the opening is, and that's what Spielberg is good at, is being like, you know, compared to Jurassic Park where you're like, I buy that every one of these scientists actually works here and knows what they're talking about. And like, I bought The World of Always, you know? And then I just don't think he figures out what to do with that.

• 55:37Griffin Newman?

  We should crack open the dossier, but I also just find, within the arc that we're covering here, this is such a fascinating movie because, A, it's the first time he tries to do the Spielberg doubleheader year.

• 55:49Speaker 05

  Right.

• 55:49David Sims?

  Uh.

• 55:50Griffin Newman?

  This thing he loves.

• 55:51David Sims?

  Where, well, he loves or he just kind of ends up doing it, but he come this came out the same year as Last Crusade.

• 55:57Griffin Newman?

  Yes, and but every time he does a double header year, it's like that where it's kind of like two different types of movies. It's not just two movies that happen to get finished around the same.

• 56:06Speaker 05

  Can we run through, because I know it's obviously Jurassic and Schindler, Lost World and Amistad.

• 56:11David Sims?

  Yes.

• 56:11Griffin Newman?

  War Horse and Tintin.

• 56:12Speaker 05

  War Horse and Tintin.

• 56:13David Sims?

  You're forgetting one in the, in the middle there.

• 56:15Griffin Newman?

  Uh, and the one in the middle is Minority Report and Catching the Cat.

• 56:19David Sims?

  And War of the Worlds in Munich.

• 56:21Griffin Newman?

  Right. Wild. Yeah. So, I mean, they're almost always kind of like serious and popcorn.

• 56:26Speaker 05

  Right.

• 56:27Griffin Newman?

  You know?

• 56:27David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 56:28Griffin Newman?

  And on varying levels. Sometimes it's a really wide gap.

• 56:31David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 56:31Griffin Newman?

  But they're sort of like, uh.

• 56:33David Sims?

  This is one of the narrower gaps.

• 56:35Griffin Newman?

  Agreed, but I also think this is him coming off of Color Purple and, uh, Empire of the Sun.

• 56:41David Sims?

  Mm-hmm.

• 56:42Griffin Newman?

  Where he's done this swing of like, I want to prove to you guys that I'm a grown up. And everyone's like, just fucking cool it, man. Can you go back to being Steven Spielberg?

• 56:49David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 56:49Griffin Newman?

  He makes Last Crusade, which is like seen as a total commercial triumph, and it's like you're back to just having fun.

• 56:56David Sims?

  Yeah, but not that's, yeah, but it's, but he's not reinventing the wheel at all and, and like, yeah.

• 57:02Griffin Newman?

  But it's a sort of like, welcome back. You're doing the thing we've all wanted you to do.

• 57:05David Sims?

  Sure.

• 57:05Griffin Newman?

  And then always feels like him being like, can I make a grown up movie infused with the things that people like about Spielberg movies? Rather than the Empire of the Sun, Color Purple, I'm trying to fight against some of my instincts.

• 57:19David Sims?

  Yeah, I think the answer is no.

• 57:22Griffin Newman?

  It's, you feel like he should be able to do this and it kind of hasn't ever worked for him?

• 57:27David Sims?

  It hasn't ever really worked for him. And this movie maybe was not as big an Oscar play as say, The Color Purple or Empire of the Sun. But it's an Oscar play-ish. It could be this, if this movie had hit, right? It would be an Oscar player.

• 57:40Griffin Newman?

  December 1989. Like it was positioned.

• 57:42Speaker 05

  They are, they shoot Holly Hunter in particular. He shoots her in a way that feels Oscar-y. I mean, like, you know?

• 57:48Griffin Newman?

  She's coming off a broadcast news nomination, award she probably should have won. There is a feeling of like, hey, if someone gives Holly Hunter another great vehicle like that, they'll probably throw her the.

• 57:58Speaker 05

  And I think Miss Fire. Cracker had gotten great reviews and maybe got like critics prizes or something, but it didn't quite hit at Oscars.

• 58:04Griffin Newman?

  She was like, not overdue yet, but she was ready to be anointed.

• 58:07Speaker 05

  And then they said, then the industry said, well, let's just wait until she plays a mute New Zealand person.

• 58:12Griffin Newman?

  She has to stop talking.

• 58:13David Sims?

  Such a bizarre Oscar year.

• 58:15Griffin Newman?

  Eighty nine?

• 58:16David Sims?

  Yeah, so.

• 58:17Griffin Newman?

  This is the Driving Miss Daisy?

• 58:18David Sims?

  It's the Driving Miss Daisy year. Obviously Driving Miss Daisy winning Best Picture is a mistake by the Academy Awards. I don't think any of us can deny that.

• 58:25Speaker 05

  That's the only one they've made, though.

• 58:27David Sims?

  They never made a mistake again after that.

• 58:29Griffin Newman?

  Cause it should have gone to Batman.

• 58:31David Sims?

  The other nominees that year are Born on the Fourth of July, which it's almost inexplicable that it hadn't won, but I assume it was kind of a like, we gave Platoon Best Picture four years ago, we're gonna give another Vietnam drama from the same guy.

• 58:44Griffin Newman?

  Going in was sort of seen as the front runner.

• 58:46David Sims?

  And it wins Best Director.

• 58:47Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 58:47David Sims?

  So like, it definitely was.

• 58:49Griffin Newman?

  It is the funny thing, though, that like, people were like, it's probably gonna win Picture and Actor, and then it lost those two, and instead they give Stone another.

• 58:55David Sims?

  Another Oscar to both, yeah, exactly. Dead Poets Society, which, there's a world where that could win.

• 59:03Griffin Newman?

  It was certainly a big hit.

• 59:04David Sims?

  A big hit.

• 59:05Griffin Newman?

  With a beloved star.

• 59:06David Sims?

  Beloved star, big director, but I guess maybe just a little too sort of small, but then again, they gave it to the fucking car.

• 59:11Speaker 05

  And the beloved star is Robert John Leonard?

• 59:13David Sims?

  Yes. Field of Dreams, which only gets two noms, Picture and Screenplay, but is the best movie I've said so far, in my opinion.

• 59:21Griffin Newman?

  Is, is actually rude they didn't give it more, but that was sort of their kind of like tip of the hat. It was kind of nommed in a way they would nom a lot of Spielberg movies where they're like, we are acknowledging this is very effective.

• 59:33David Sims?

  This went over well.

• 59:34Speaker 05

  And Field of Dreams is that Amy Madigan movie?

• 59:37David Sims?

  Right, keep going.

• 59:38Griffin Newman?

  Just keep doing this for every movie.

• 59:40David Sims?

  My Left Foot, the original, like Miramax has unearthed a European or British or Irish or whatever, you know, movie.

• 59:48Griffin Newman?

  Little Story that could, yeah.

• 59:50David Sims?

  Like, none of those movies in my, well, no, I would nominate Field of Dreams. Like, sure, I would nominate that, but like, you know, they're ignoring.

• 59:58Griffin Newman?

  The Do the Right.

• 59:58David Sims?

  They're ignoring the right thing.

• 59:59Griffin Newman?

  Snub year, yeah.

• 1:00:00David Sims?

  They're ignoring When Harry Met Sally, that's two. They're ignoring Crimes and Misdemeanors, kind of insane of them, cause that gets a bunch of other noms. Uh, they're ignoring Batman.

• 1:00:10Griffin Newman?

  Thank you.

• 1:00:11David Sims?

  They're ignoring.

• 1:00:12Griffin Newman?

  Ghostbusters Two?

• 1:00:13David Sims?

  Uh, Ghostbusters Two.

• 1:00:15Griffin Newman?

  Ghostbusters De.

• 1:00:16David Sims?

  They're ignoring Henry the Fifth, which again gets noms, but not a Best Picture.

• 1:00:21Griffin Newman?

  But gets Best Director and Actor.

• 1:00:22Speaker 05

  They stole that score and used it in every trailer for ten years.

• 1:00:24David Sims?

  I've never seen any of the other Henrys.

• 1:00:29Griffin Newman?

  Is he the only guy who can pull off that joke?

• 1:00:32David Sims?

  Yes. Yes, he is, and I was charmed.

• 1:00:35Griffin Newman?

  Not find it funny and charming coming from Ben.

• 1:00:37David Sims?

  Let me tell you, as an expert, or not an expert, as someone who knows a bit of British history, Henry III, that'd be a very boring movie. One and two, those are interesting. Four, obviously Shakespeare had his field day with that one. Three, no, no, no.

• 1:00:50Griffin Newman?

  Ben's been saying that he wants to get into playwriting. Maybe you should take on one of the earlier Henrys.

• 1:00:54Speaker 05

  Henry III was sort of a Richard Dreyfuss figure, right?

• 1:00:58David Sims?

  He was crowned as like a nine month old, like he's a weird, anyway.

• 1:01:03Griffin Newman?

  The point I feel like you're making here is this was a field-

• 1:01:05David Sims?

  It feels like the Oscars don't know what to do.

• 1:01:07Griffin Newman?

  But also, this is a field that if Always was, had even a little passion behind it-

• 1:01:12David Sims?

  Risen to the top.

• 1:01:12Speaker 05

  Who was an actress?

• 1:01:14David Sims?

  That's what I wanted to get to.

• 1:01:15Griffin Newman?

  Okay, Jessica Tandy wins.

• 1:01:16David Sims?

  And then we'll crack open the dossier. Jessica Tandy wins best actress. I don't think there's anything wrong with that win. She is number one, good in the movie. She's number two, an icon.

• 1:01:24Griffin Newman?

  I've never actually seen it.

• 1:01:26David Sims?

  That's crazy.

• 1:01:27Speaker 05

  It's entertaining.

• 1:01:27David Sims?

  It's quite entertaining.

• 1:01:28Griffin Newman?

  That's what I assume. I almost avoided it because I don't want to be like, it's kind of fun.

• 1:01:32David Sims?

  It is an incredibly dated and silly movie.

• 1:01:35Speaker 05

  Did Dan Aykroyd get nominated for that?

• 1:01:36David Sims?

  Yes, he did. He's good in it. He's not amazing, but he's good.

• 1:01:38Griffin Newman?

  In the same year that he appears in the film Always.

• 1:01:40Speaker 05

  He's not as good in 1941, just word of wording.

• 1:01:45David Sims?

  Sure. He's had some peaks and valleys, old Aykroyd. Tandy's really good in Driving Miss Daisy.

• 1:01:50Griffin Newman?

  I believe it, yeah.

• 1:01:52David Sims?

  You know, she's playing a character who won't say her feelings, like, you know, like, and so like, you know, no, she's good.

• 1:01:56Griffin Newman?

  And she's a legend, a living legend.

• 1:01:58David Sims?

  Right, and she was the oldest winner ever. The Oscar, obviously, obviously, should have gone to Michelle Pfeiffer in The Fabulous Baker Boys, which is like one of the great-

• 1:02:06Speaker 05

  And she had won every Oscars prize, right?

• 1:02:09Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, right.

• 1:02:09David Sims?

  But probably was just doomed with like, oh, she's young, we'll get to her. Tandy's got to win this year, right? The other nominees are Isabella Johnny, the legend, for Camille Claudel.

• 1:02:19Griffin Newman?

  Wow, okay.

• 1:02:20David Sims?

  So a bit of a boring, you know, kind of Tony, Frenchy movie, but like Isabella Johnny, she rocks. Pauline Collins in Shirley Valentine, the charming, you know, British, you know-

• 1:02:32David Sims?

  Little movie that could, right? Where she's like, ah.

• 1:02:35Griffin Newman?

  I have, for whatever reason.

• 1:02:36Speaker 05

  That sounds great.

• 1:02:37Griffin Newman?

  Watched the 1989 Siskel and Ebert If We Picked the Oscar Special several times. They're just like perplexed. They won't stop harping on, we're really gonna nominate this? Like, they keep on going like, it's fine.

• 1:02:52David Sims?

  It's kind of an early version of the, you know.

• 1:02:55Griffin Newman?

  What's going on here?

• 1:02:56David Sims?

  The Billy Elliot's and the, you know, these little British movies that could. Like, they would just charm the pants off of people.

• 1:03:01Griffin Newman?

  I don't remember who they were arguing, should have been in that slot, but they were just like, really? We couldn't find anyone else?

• 1:03:08David Sims?

  I should watch that. That sounds fun. Because the fifth nominee is Jessica Lange for Music Box, which is like a forgotten Costa Gavris movie. Like, a very serious movie about an attorney and like a war criminal in Hungary and stuff like that.

• 1:03:22Griffin Newman?

  In between her two wins.

• 1:03:24David Sims?

  Right. But like, does kind of feel like one of those ones where they're like, whoa, very serious. Like, now if I, a hundred people out of a hundred have never heard of Music Box.

• 1:03:32Speaker 05

  I mean, like, you're Louis for tells of the world who know every single nominee since 1930.

• 1:03:36David Sims?

  Even Louis might, like, take 10 seconds.

• 1:03:39Speaker 05

  Yeah, that's true. Yeah, there would be.

• 1:03:40Griffin Newman?

  But he did produce Music Box.

• 1:03:42David Sims?

  Yeah, the question.

• 1:03:44Speaker 05

  So does Jessica Lange play Mariah Carey?

• 1:03:48David Sims?

  Cute. Thank you very much.

• 1:03:51Griffin Newman?

  Well done.

• 1:03:51David Sims?

  Like, and if I look at like the Golden Globes, right, where you're sort of like, who else is in there? Okay, Sally Field for Steel Magnolias. Kind of weird that she whiffed on that. Like, she's good in that.

• 1:04:00Speaker 05

  But Roberts gets the nomination. It's strange.

• 1:04:03David Sims?

  Wow, she fucking rocks.

• 1:04:04Griffin Newman?

  It's actually weird though, because they liked her.

• 1:04:06David Sims?

  Yeah, they really did.

• 1:04:07Speaker 05

  They really liked her.

• 1:04:08David Sims?

  Uh, Andy McCallum, Sex, Lies and Videotape got a Globe Nom. An amazing performance, in my opinion. Meg Ryan got a fucking Golden Globes Nom. Maybe throw her a bone.

• 1:04:16Griffin Newman?

  That's what they should have done.

• 1:04:17David Sims?

  And Meryl Streep got a Golden Globes Nom for She Devil, but that wasn't getting an Oscar Nom.

• 1:04:21Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, do you know that She Devil is one of the best movies ever made?

• 1:04:23David Sims?

  She Devil rocks, but obviously was, you know, not a hit.

• 1:04:26Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, but she rules in it. And the reviews at the time were so fucking mean to her.

• 1:04:29Speaker 05

  Was She Devil 89?

• 1:04:31David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:31Speaker 05

  So, so this is the movie Goodman got after one season of Roseanne, and that's what she got.

• 1:04:35David Sims?

  That's what Roseanne got, yeah.

• 1:04:36Speaker 05

  That's interesting.

• 1:04:37David Sims?

  And Kathleen Turner for Wars of the Roses, which is a good movie that she's good in.

• 1:04:41Griffin Newman?

  That would have been a good nomination.

• 1:04:42David Sims?

  Maybe that movie was just a little too, like, poisonous.

• 1:04:43Speaker 05

  Do you think if When Harry Met Sally in, I mean, obviously it would be, wouldn't be as eighties, but like if, if that quality were into comedy with that kind of central performance came out now, would Meg Ryan get an Oscar nomination?

• 1:04:55David Sims?

  I think yes, assuming it was a big, big hit.

• 1:04:58Speaker 05

  Cause I think sometimes history, like Academy history, it was kinder to comedy.

• 1:05:02Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:02Speaker 05

  But in some ways, it wasn't. I don't know.

• 1:05:04David Sims?

  Not so much. I think at this point, they're really starting to trend towards the more prestigious stuff.

• 1:05:09Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:05:10David Sims?

  This is the late eighties. It's your Out of Africa, your Last Emperor.

• 1:05:13Griffin Newman?

  This is the era that defines what we still, like shorthand, think of as quote unquote Oscar bait.

• 1:05:18David Sims?

  Right. And Driving with Daisy is a comedy, sort of, but it's like a weighty comedy about issues.

• 1:05:24Speaker 05

  Exactly. Who is it, like, in the seventies, is it Marcia Mason who got like three nominations for Neil Simon movies? You know, and like, but then that, then the eighties were like, no more of that. We're not doing that.

• 1:05:33Griffin Newman?

  Exactly. Yeah.

• 1:05:34Speaker 05

  Well, maybe we'll get like Diane Weest something in supporting, but like, we're not.

• 1:05:37Griffin Newman?

  Right. And like Broadcast News was just heady enough. As Good as It Gets is just dramatic enough.

• 1:05:42Speaker 05

  Working Girl was just dramatic enough.

• 1:05:43Griffin Newman?

  That was the thing they loved was you start out like funny comedy of manners, characters, and then it gets really dramatic at the end.

• 1:05:50Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:05:50Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:51David Sims?

  So I'm cracking open the dossier.

• 1:05:52Griffin Newman?

  Please.

• 1:05:53David Sims?

  Steven Spielberg, now, I don't know if you guys know this, but he had a childhood.

• 1:05:56Griffin Newman?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:05:56David Sims?

  And he would watch movies.

• 1:05:57Speaker 05

  It was great, right? He was happy and settled.

• 1:05:59David Sims?

  No cooking, yeah. And...

• 1:06:01Speaker 05

  Were there any monkeys? No, right?

• 1:06:05David Sims?

  Like, the graph of his childhood, it's like zero monkeys, zero monkeys, zero monkeys. One monkey! Uh-oh, things are really bad.

• 1:06:10Griffin Newman?

  We had Brian Michael Bendis on for the Raiders of the Lost Ark episode, and he just called out the monkey, which we were like, holy fucking shit. I can't believe we never thought about that.

• 1:06:22Speaker 05

  An evil, scheming monkey.

• 1:06:23Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:24Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:06:25David Sims?

  So, uh, when, uh, young Steven Spielberg was a lad in Arizona, he would watch old movies, sometimes on the television.

• 1:06:31Griffin Newman?

  Mm.

• 1:06:32David Sims?

  And there was a movie called A Guy Named Joe, a 1943 wartime MGM drama, directed by Victor Fleming, who definitely never screamed anything at Judy Garland. Uh, scripted, as you may know, quite dimly by Mr. Dalton Trumbo.

• 1:06:47Griffin Newman?

  Get these bubbles out of the way.

• 1:06:50David Sims?

  Clickety-clack, splishity-splash. Starring Spencer.

• 1:06:54Griffin Newman?

  Had to put down the ducky for a moment in order to type out the rest of the script.

• 1:06:57David Sims?

  Spencer Tracy, who, let me tell you, makes sense in this role. Like, you know, like Richard Dreyfuss.

• 1:07:03Griffin Newman?

  Makes sense as the Richard Dreyfuss of his time.

• 1:07:04David Sims?

  Richard Dreyfuss wishes his ass with Spencer Tracy. Irene Dunn, the great Irene Dunn. And Van Johnson, no relation to Ben Johnson, or whoever it is, and always.

• 1:07:13Griffin Newman?

  Van Johnson, let me say, I like Van Johnson, but it kind of was more the Richard Dreyfuss of his time.

• 1:07:19David Sims?

  Sure. And then Ward Bond as the John Goodman role. Anyway, it's about a World War II fighter pilot. He dies and then he becomes back to Earth as a ghost and sort of tries to get his former lover together with her new beau. And Spielberg said it was the second movie after Bambi that made him cry. I didn't even understand why I was crying, but I did. Like, the Tracy character being powerless, he's like this piece of furniture, but he's trying to affect things anyway. As a child, I was frustrated, maybe I saw my own parents in it.

• 1:07:51Griffin Newman?

  This is the part of it that I do think has the Fableman's lens. The other thing that says a lot.

• 1:07:55Speaker 05

  There it is.

• 1:07:56Griffin Newman?

  Is that, like, you know, his father, who was kind of like a Paul Dano type.

• 1:08:01David Sims?

  It was a bit of a Paul Dano type, but fucking flew planes in the war.

• 1:08:05Griffin Newman?

  This is the thing, and like, didn't want to talk about it and didn't know how to relate to Spielberg on his own shit.

• 1:08:11David Sims?

  Yes.

• 1:08:12Griffin Newman?

  Right? That Spielberg would watch this movie and feel some emotional connection to like, this helps me understand my dad.

• 1:08:17David Sims?

  Now, this, I'm sure JJ got this wrong, because I don't think Richard Dreyfuss would ever behave this aggressively, but on the set of Jaws, they're making, Spielberg's working with Richard Dreyfuss, and they find that they both love this movie. My name is, Guy Called Joe, My Name is Joe is a Ken Loach movie, which is really good.

• 1:08:33David Sims?

  They've both seen it dozens of times, and Dreyfuss says, if you ever remake that film and cast anyone else as Pete, I'll kill you. Now, that can't be true. Dreyfuss would never talk that way to somebody.

• 1:08:41Speaker 05

  No, I can't imagine. Was he wiping his nose at that time?

• 1:08:46David Sims?

  Rubbing his teeth.

• 1:08:47Speaker 05

  Yeah. Was he smoking four cigarettes at once?

• 1:08:51Griffin Newman?

  He was crying, Pope.

• 1:08:54David Sims?

  Right, his body was like, we're full. You're gonna start sweating it out, buddy. You want me to catch the runoff? You can sell this shit.

• 1:09:04David Sims?

  Spielberg and MGM does start to work on maybe remaking the film.

• 1:09:10Griffin Newman?

  It was an MGM picture. They had the rights.

• 1:09:11David Sims?

  Dreyfus, Spielberg, in his infinite wisdom, is like, Dreyfus makes absolutely no fucking sense for this movie. I want to cast Robert Redford. Yeah, no shit. Good job, Steven Spielberg.

• 1:09:23Griffin Newman?

  Well, but here was the problem. His idea was, great opportunity to do another Newman and Redford team up.

• 1:09:29David Sims?

  He wants to team up Redford and Newman, I guess with Newman probably as the deceased pilot and Redford as the new beau, right?

• 1:09:36Griffin Newman?

  The whole issue was...

• 1:09:37Speaker 05

  That's interesting.

• 1:09:38David Sims?

  They both want to be the pilot.

• 1:09:39Griffin Newman?

  They both want to be the pilot. They couldn't settle.

• 1:09:43David Sims?

  Other actors considered? Harrison Ford in the John Goodman role.

• 1:09:48Griffin Newman?

  Interesting. That would have been disorienting?

• 1:09:51David Sims?

  No, I mean, you also just don't want to let Harrison Ford in your plane.

• 1:09:56David Sims?

  He's gonna start just randomly picking people up.

• 1:09:58Speaker 05

  That would have been how Audrey Hepburn died.

• 1:10:02David Sims?

  Also, Deborah Winger makes a lot of sense early 80s.

• 1:10:05Griffin Newman?

  Ton of sense. The exact person that Holly Hunter replaces for Broadcast News.

• 1:10:09David Sims?

  Yeah, and of course, another person who never, ever did cocaine.

• 1:10:13Griffin Newman?

  Could you imagine? I know these are different versions, different eras, but could you imagine if Deborah Winger and Richard Dreyfus made a movie together in the 80s?

• 1:10:22David Sims?

  The poster is like covered in powder. People have to like, what's the movie called?

• 1:10:28Speaker 05

  The director is still missing to this day.

• 1:10:29David Sims?

  The poster is a mirror, but you could just sniff off of it. Alright. So, first draft was written by this guy Jerry Belson, who I think has the sole credit on the movie. Well, we'll talk about it.

• 1:10:40Griffin Newman?

  Okay. He did end up getting the sole credit. There's a weird thing where in all the early marketing materials, it's a co-credit, and then the final film, it's a single.

• 1:10:47David Sims?

  Diane Thomas, who wrote Romancing the Stone, does a subsequent draft. And as you say, some promotional materials include her name, but only Belson got credit. Tom Stoppard did pass at it.

• 1:10:59Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:11:00David Sims?

  Whatever.

• 1:11:01Griffin Newman?

  We talked about Diane Nelson or Romancing the Stone episode, has this like insanely tragic life. A story where she dies under horrible circumstances, right after Romancing the Stone, kind of makes her the toast of the town. And you feel like she would have been one of the major screenwriters of the next four or five decades. And she doesn't write Jewel of the Nile because Spielberg plucks her for this. Suddenly, and then like, she was the original writer on Last Crusade in a different version. I should say on Indiana Jones 3. Like it was like-

• 1:11:31Speaker 05

  Cause that was a much different plot at one point, right?

• 1:11:32Griffin Newman?

  It was a haunted house movie?

• 1:11:33Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:11:34David Sims?

  Sounds good.

• 1:11:34Griffin Newman?

  But like Spielberg and Lucas basically did the casting with her. Where they were like-

• 1:11:38David Sims?

  It's a drunk driving accident, it's very tragic.

• 1:11:40Griffin Newman?

  It's like a horrible, horrible story. But, but yes, I, I think a lot of her work does end up in the final film.

• 1:11:47David Sims?

  Sure.

• 1:11:47Griffin Newman?

  But she never got to complete it.

• 1:11:49David Sims?

  Spielberg says, no script though could really find the right balance between humor and sensitivity and romance. Some are too funny, some are too sappy. Uh, and so it takes him a while to find a screenplay he really likes. In my opinion, he should have kept looking. And-

• 1:12:05Griffin Newman?

  My point I want to make is I just almost feel like had she lived, she might have been someone who had gotten there eventually.

• 1:12:11David Sims?

  Maybe. I mean Spielberg's, the interesting thing is that the earlier elements were, uh, scripts were like Spielberg-y. So like he walks through walls and shit. They were like, let's give us a chance for some VFX. Like he's a ghost.

• 1:12:23Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:24David Sims?

  And, uh, when he finally does make the film, uh, he is going through his divorce from Amy Irving, uh, which he doesn't talk about too much, but clearly was very, very hard on him. And so on and so forth.

• 1:12:39Griffin Newman?

  Let's also just make it clear, obviously the MGM version stalls out. He walks away for, from a while, from it for a while. He has a big deal at Universal now. Um, and he just, he comes back to his thing he wants to do. There's a rights acquisition. Suddenly it becomes like, we're fast-tracking this.

• 1:12:57Speaker 05

  I'm getting, I mean, it's interesting because he had, he had a weird eighties.

• 1:13:00Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:13:01Speaker 05

  Right? Like not an unsuccessful one, but it's just interesting that he, I mean, I guess, what am I saying? Of course he had the clout to get this made. It's just, it just arrived at such a weird time in his career to be able, for a studio to be like, yeah, sure, go, go.

• 1:13:13Griffin Newman?

  This one 60 Minutes interview I'll keep referencing and I'll make sure we- Posts on the social media, but it's in the hook moment, which is fascinating to me because it's right before the year. It's the last moment before his Schindler Jurassic year.

• 1:13:24Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:13:25Griffin Newman?

  Where it's like, this guy can kind of never be questioned again, right?

• 1:13:28Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:13:28Griffin Newman?

  And he's showing them this like giant compound that is the Amblin offices. This huge house that has like 80 arcade cabinets and multiple floors and just like, looks like a luxury villa, right? And it's at Universal and they make it very clear that Universal just built this for him. Unprovoked and said, hey, we don't have you under contract.

• 1:13:54Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:13:54Griffin Newman?

  You don't owe us anything. Just feel free to stay here on the lot.

• 1:13:58Speaker 05

  If you want.

• 1:13:58Griffin Newman?

  And anytime you want to do a movie with us, we'd love to hear it. Like his power was so great, even within a weird eighties.

• 1:14:04Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:14:04Griffin Newman?

  That's what they do after E T.

• 1:14:06Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:14:07Griffin Newman?

  It's that that moment where they're just like, we just want to be closest to him geographically whenever he has a new idea for a movie. We're even coming off of a few that didn't connect that hard.

• 1:14:16Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:14:16Griffin Newman?

  If he goes to them and is like, what if I want to make Always? They're like, absolutely. Well, buy the rights. Who do you want? They're still just like.

• 1:14:23Speaker 05

  Cause I would imagine also there was, they were like, well, that has some commercial potential.

• 1:14:26Griffin Newman?

  Sure.

• 1:14:26Speaker 05

  You know, there's plane scenes and explosions.

• 1:14:28Griffin Newman?

  Especially coming off of him making like two very heavy dramatic movies.

• 1:14:31Speaker 05

  Right, exactly.

• 1:14:32Griffin Newman?

  You're like, this is like a supernatural romance?

• 1:14:34Speaker 05

  Right, great.

• 1:14:36David Sims?

  Spielberg says he also couldn't find the right guy to play Pete and then he watched Stakeout and was kind of like, I guess. Dreyfus has aged into the role.

• 1:14:45Griffin Newman?

  He's kind of experiencing a second wind at this point.

• 1:14:48David Sims?

  Uh, Holly Hunter, he sees broadcast news and is like, that's definitely the person I want.

• 1:14:52Griffin Newman?

  I would say that was a pretty good call on his part.

• 1:14:54David Sims?

  That's a good call.

• 1:14:54Griffin Newman?

  Yep.

• 1:14:56David Sims?

  And he didn't want to make the movie with like, you know, big glamorous stars. No offense to Richard and Holly. He wanted the more earthy, real type people anyway.

• 1:15:04Speaker 05

  Which is a great choice, I think.

• 1:15:06David Sims?

  John Goodman, obviously he'd seen Roseanne and loved him in Roseanne.

• 1:15:10Griffin Newman?

  I mean.

• 1:15:10David Sims?

  Had not seen Raising Arizona.

• 1:15:12Griffin Newman?

  Interesting.

• 1:15:13David Sims?

  Or at least had not thought about Raising Arizona. He said only once he starts making the movie, he realizes like, oh, right. Holly Hunter and John Goodman were already in a movie together.

• 1:15:20Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. I mean, this is weirdly one of the other pieces of this movie's legacy. One of the only reasons it ever comes up in conversation. Is John Goodman, one season of Roseanne, gets cast, he's gonna be above the title with his fucking face on the poster in a Spielberg movie. He goes to the first table read, he like feels so validated, like I'm being recognized by like the top people in the industry. And he gets to the table read and Spielberg stands up and he was like, I want to introduce my cast, Holly Hunter, Richard Dreyfuss. And ladies and gentlemen, I have found my live action Fred Flintstone, John Goodman. And everyone applauds and Goodman's like, oh my God, he only fucking called me because he wants to do a Flintstones movie. And like Flintstones takes five years to happen.

• 1:16:03Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:16:03Griffin Newman?

  But Spielberg had been like, wouldn't it be cool to do live action Flintstones?

• 1:16:06Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:16:07Griffin Newman?

  And Goodman just talks up feeling so demoralized about like, he views me as a cartoon character. Which this movie uses him in a very earthy way, but uh, he like, was like, I didn't want to do Flintstones. I had no interest in ever doing Flintstones. And in that moment, when he made everyone applaud, I was like, I guess I can't not do this. The world is telling me I have to do this.

• 1:16:29Speaker 05

  Right. And Spielberg was right. It was very, very cool to do a live action Flintstones.

• 1:16:34David Sims?

  Very cool.

• 1:16:36Speaker 05

  What a cool movie.

• 1:16:37Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:38David Sims?

  So Audrey Hepburn, the, in the original movie Lionel Barrymore, it's a male, uh, whatever, angel, voice of God character.

• 1:16:47Speaker 05

  A male hap?

• 1:16:48David Sims?

  A male hap, right.

• 1:16:49Griffin Newman?

  Who'd he want?

• 1:16:51David Sims?

  Sean Connery.

• 1:16:51Griffin Newman?

  Sean Connery.

• 1:16:52David Sims?

  Um, he's like, oh, that's Sean Connery. Sean Connery's like, I'm, I'm under the sea right now. He's making Red October.

• 1:16:58Griffin Newman?

  Which he jumped on to like three days into filming.

• 1:17:01David Sims?

  And Audrey Hepburn, I mean, when had she even last been in a movie?

• 1:17:06Griffin Newman?

  They all laughed?

• 1:17:07David Sims?

  And like, is basically just like a UNICEF ambassador, right?

• 1:17:10Griffin Newman?

  She got paid one million dollars for this movie and gave that one million dollar check directly to UNICEF.

• 1:17:15Speaker 05

  Good for her.

• 1:17:15Griffin Newman?

  Basically said like, I have been soft retired.

• 1:17:18David Sims?

  Yeah, they all laughed, which is 81. So, you know, it's eight years prior.

• 1:17:22Griffin Newman?

  And, and the, the gaps had been big. Like she

• 1:17:25David Sims?

  100%.

• 1:17:25Griffin Newman?

  Marion is like 78.

• 1:17:27David Sims?

  That's 76. She does like two movies in the 70s. Like, you know, bear. Yeah. She's good. I mean, it's, it's, you know, it's all kind of just like, oh shit, that's Audrey Hepburn.

• 1:17:37Griffin Newman?

  I was gonna say, it is effective stunt casting.

• 1:17:38David Sims?

  Right.

• 1:17:39Griffin Newman?

  It is kind of the thing where he talked about like, Connery doesn't want to do it. And he was talking to Holly Hunter and was like, who like would represent like God or like, you know, an angelic force on screen.

• 1:17:53Speaker 05

  A calm, benevolent God.

• 1:17:55Griffin Newman?

  And it was just like, oh, duh, Audrey Hepburn.

• 1:17:57Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:17:58Griffin Newman?

  And it's like, you know, more weight lent to it by it, her, being her final film.

• 1:18:02Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:18:03Griffin Newman?

  And it's not like an incredible performance, but it is like, I find it to be remarkably effective stunt casting.

• 1:18:09Speaker 05

  It's her final film, but she did two seasons of Roseanne.

• 1:18:11Griffin Newman?

  She did do two seasons.

• 1:18:14Griffin Newman?

  She played the lunchbox.

• 1:18:15David Sims?

  Yeah, she was on Bobby's World.

• 1:18:18David Sims?

  Just trying to think of the most irrelevant cartoon I could have.

• 1:18:20Griffin Newman?

  Hey, that's a very relevant cartoon.

• 1:18:22David Sims?

  You're right.

• 1:18:23Speaker 05

  It is fun that forever John Goodman will have been in a movie with Audrey Hepburn.

• 1:18:27Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:27Speaker 05

  It's a strange pairing, but it works.

• 1:18:29Griffin Newman?

  Like, do you think they like, obviously they don't have scenes together, but like, did they, did they like talk it crafty?

• 1:18:35Speaker 05

  I would hope so, or at the cast party?

• 1:18:37Griffin Newman?

  My favorite anecdote I saw is Audrey Hepburn provided her own wardrobe.

• 1:18:42David Sims?

  Oh, sure.

• 1:18:42Griffin Newman?

  And they were

• 1:18:43Speaker 05

  That deeply tracks.

• 1:18:44Griffin Newman?

  Yep. And they were, Spielberg was very intense on like, she has to have this heavenly glow around her, you know? And, and she's brought this delicate white cashmere and we can't sully it. So crew guys would have to carry her to and from her marks on a stretcher. Not because she couldn't walk, but they were like, you can't touch dirt.

• 1:19:01David Sims?

  Dirt on this, right?

• 1:19:01Speaker 05

  It has to be immaculate.

• 1:19:02Griffin Newman?

  In the woods, but you cannot touch the woods until the moment we roll.

• 1:19:08Griffin Newman?

  Like I just, I mean, she's 62 in this.

• 1:19:11Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:19:12David Sims?

  Is that right? She's that young?

• 1:19:13Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:19:13Speaker 05

  And she died the next year, right?

• 1:19:15Griffin Newman?

  Yes. And she had already kind of like, I mean, it's what we were talking about in the Color Purple episode of like, legendary movie stars used to just kind of like slowly retreat.

• 1:19:24David Sims?

  Yeah. She had, she had like a very rare kind of abdominal cancer came on suddenly. The big change he obviously makes is it's no longer a World War II movie. They make it contemporary and they sort of make this interesting pick of like, yeah, fire, you know, a-

• 1:19:39Speaker 05

  What else use as planes?

• 1:19:41David Sims?

  Right, yeah.

• 1:19:41Griffin Newman?

  I love it. I think it's really interesting.

• 1:19:43David Sims?

  And a kind of an odd niche, you know?

• 1:19:46Griffin Newman?

  That's the thing. It's got that like, this is like a very specific subculture I just don't see depicted. Let's also, I'm just gonna call out, not to be a bummer-

• 1:19:53David Sims?

  And we're watching people-

• 1:19:54Griffin Newman?

  The time we're recording this episode-

• 1:19:55David Sims?

  Try to put LA out.

• 1:19:56Griffin Newman?

  It is the week of the tragic kind of incomprehensible situation going on in Los Angeles.

• 1:20:05David Sims?

  Yes.

• 1:20:05Griffin Newman?

  And there is something, it was, there was no circumstance in which I could watch this movie, especially the first 30 minutes and have it-

• 1:20:14David Sims?

  It, yeah, sort of jolting.

• 1:20:16Griffin Newman?

  It's jolting, you feel such a catharsis and when they're able to put stuff out, you feel the stakes of it so much.

• 1:20:21Speaker 05

  For sure. And I think, I think it's such an interesting choice and it's referred to directly in the movie where they're like, you're not fighting in the war, where it's like, it's about hotshot ace fighter pilots without a war to fight.

• 1:20:33Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:20:34Speaker 05

  And how it makes Dreyfus a little more reckless and like, you know, I think it's, I think it's actually kind of about a generation in a way.

• 1:20:41Griffin Newman?

  And I'm like, this, Dreyfus would be disastrous casting if he had to be a military man in any way.

• 1:20:50David Sims?

  Yeah, no, he wouldn't fit that at all.

• 1:20:52Griffin Newman?

  There's something about him being-

• 1:20:53Speaker 05

  He can be the elder of a tribe, but not in the military.

• 1:20:57Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. And he like, right, he can't have that sort of like valor to him. Right.

• 1:21:02Speaker 05

  Yeah, that's, that's the problem.

• 1:21:08Griffin Newman?

  David? Yeah? This episode is brought to you by XYZ Films and the acclaimed new documentary Capturing Bigfoot. On October 20th, 1967, Roger Patterson captured 59 seconds of film showing a creature walking through the Northern California woods. I wonder if you can log that on Letterboxd?

• 1:21:25David Sims?

  It is an iconic video.

• 1:21:27Griffin Newman?

  Footage that became the most analyzed and debated in history. 59 years later, a reel of 16 millimeter film discovered in a safe changes everything. Capturing Bigfoot reveals the untold story behind the world's- Greatest mystery told for the first time by Patterson's own son and the people who were there. This is a story about family legacy, broken friendships, and how far people will go to protect a secret.

• 1:21:49David Sims?

  Of course, you got the classic, what they call Patterson Gimlin film everyone knows of Bigfoot out in the woods, like the famous Bigfoot picture. This has other stuff shot by him that no one's ever seen. That's what makes this movie different.

• 1:22:01Griffin Newman?

  But we're also talking brand new 4K scans of the original film taken from the Patterson family archives that some historians have called the best rendering of the footage ever seen.

• 1:22:10David Sims?

  I feel like we've all seen that footage as like grainy.

• 1:22:13Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:22:13David Sims?

  You know, that you see, you know, whatever, you see it in a documentary for two seconds, but this is restoring it and making it look much more clear.

• 1:22:20Griffin Newman?

  There's also a companion podcast, the Capturing Bigfoot Podcast, which goes deeper into the legend and lore of Bigfoot and the Patterson Gimlin film, featuring weekly episodes with experts in cryptozoology, urban legends, and filmmaking.

• 1:22:34David Sims?

  I'm something of an expert in cryptozoology.

• 1:22:36Griffin Newman?

  Well, of course, yes, but that's more of a hobby.

• 1:22:39David Sims?

  Yeah, this podcast, Capturing Bigfoot Podcast, is hosted by the director of the film, Mark Evans, and it's available for free on YouTube and Spotify with exclusive episodes and content available on Patreon to members of the Capturing Bigfoot Society.

• 1:22:54Griffin Newman?

  Capturing Bigfoot is now available to rent or own on Amazon Prime Video. Learn more about Capturing Bigfoot at capturingbigfoot.com.

• 1:23:10Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 1:23:11David Sims?

  Yes?

• 1:23:11Griffin Newman?

  Uh, uh, who are you wearing?

• 1:23:13David Sims?

  Uh, who am I wearing?

• 1:23:14Griffin Newman?

  I'm doing like an impression of a red carpet correspondent, asking who you're wearing right now.

• 1:23:18David Sims?

  Well, I am wearing Quince.

• 1:23:21Griffin Newman?

  Well, well, well, what a Quince, Quincy dance.

• 1:23:26David Sims?

  It's a Mongolian cashmere zip sweater.

• 1:23:30Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 1:23:30David Sims?

  It's a sort of a brown. Would you agree?

• 1:23:33Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, it's like, maybe like a, what would you, a chocolate?

• 1:23:36David Sims?

  Sure. I have been seated next to people wearing this item of clothing and they have brushed against me, not to brag, and gone like, so soft.

• 1:23:43Griffin Newman?

  Oh, a soft boy. But listen, the best pieces in your closet are the ones that you can count on whether you're heading to work, going out, or keeping things casual. And this time of year, Quince makes finding something great for everyone else just as easy. This holiday season, it's where I'm shopping for myself and everyone on my list.

• 1:24:00David Sims?

  Quince does rock. It's got high quality staples made with these premium materials like 100% Mongolian cashmere.

• 1:24:07Griffin Newman?

  Like you're wearing red.

• 1:24:07David Sims?

  14 karat gold?

• 1:24:10David Sims?

  Italian leather.

• 1:24:11Griffin Newman?

  Mamma mia.

• 1:24:12David Sims?

  All timeless, versatile pieces that feel special to unwrap and become everyday favorites long after the holidays. These cashmere sweaters, like the one I'm wearing, start at just $60. Lineup doesn't stop there. You've got premium down jackets, wool outerwear, cashmere accessories, everything your loved ones need to stay warm and look good together all season long.

• 1:24:31Griffin Newman?

  And everything at Quince is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. They work directly with ethical factories and cut out the middlemen so you can give luxury quality pieces without the luxury price tag.

• 1:24:44David Sims?

  Um, so yeah, obviously I'm wearing Quince sweater right now. I've got Quince bedding at home. Ooh, they've got Christmas stockings.

• 1:24:51Griffin Newman?

  Oh, well, well, well.

• 1:24:52David Sims?

  They got tree skirts. Garlands, if you want to go Christmas mode.

• 1:24:56Griffin Newman?

  Your tree deserves to be dressed in Quince as well. And when it comes to gifting, Quince has a lot more than clothing. Think fine jewelry, leather bags, the aforementioned hotel quality bedding, chef-grade cookware, and five-star luggage. Basically, plenty of ways to find something special for everyone on your list. If you want to give the gift of quality this holiday season, download the Quince app for app-exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. That's a year. Now available in Canada and the UK, too. Ding dong. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was Blank Check. It's the best way to support the show.

• 1:25:44Speaker 06

  Welcome to 215 Maple Drive. We just put this property on the market. Love the crown molding. Oh, wait until you see the walk-in closets and the bathroom tile. Does it have Verizon FiOS? You know, 100% fiber internet. No FiOS, but it looks like it's got cable. Let's check out the kitchen. No FiOS? Yeah, no, thank you. Don't you want to see the rest? Okay, bye-bye. Get Verizon FiOS because when you're moving, it's 100% or nothing.

• 1:26:16David Sims?

  Uh, the big, uh, challenge for this movie is filming like forest fire sequences is

• 1:26:22Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:22David Sims?

  Fucking hard.

• 1:26:23Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:26:24Speaker 05

  Just ask Harry Long.

• 1:26:25David Sims?

  Yeah, they would bring in like fake trees to set on fire. Uh, they would sort of, I don't know, like re-burn areas of the Yellowstone fire. I, it's, they, they photographed some actual forest fires, right? They like go to Montana and like shoot actual forest fires. A lot of it is sound stages and they do have like fake trees that they set on fire and stuff. I don't know. The, the whole thing seems pretty.

• 1:26:53Griffin Newman?

  There's something, despite the fire feeling very real and visceral and scary, there is something very kind of like Golden Age Hollywood to the way he films the planes and the cockpits. Uh, a, a level of artificiality that I like. I couldn't tell how much of it was sets, you know, on gimbals and how much of its models or whatever, but I liked that quality to it.

• 1:27:15Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:27:15Griffin Newman?

  And I think, and it's like a good level of like Spielberg doing Spielberg whiz bang without also turning it into too much of a Spielberg stunt show.

• 1:27:23Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:27:23Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 1:27:23Speaker 05

  I think the sound design is really crucial for balancing the kind of artificiality with the realness. But the, the sound of the propellers, the engines, like when it, when a plane crashes through a fiery tree, like it, it does register. I mean, as a kid, I was like, it was like, I was in awe of it in a kind of terrified way.

• 1:27:39Griffin Newman?

  Before we started recording, I asked the question, is this the movie with the most overhead plane sounds? And I was like, it genuinely might be more than like shit like Top Gun. Cause something like that has like peaks and valleys. And this, it just feels like you're constantly hearing.

• 1:27:56David Sims?

  DP is Michael Solomon, who had shot The Abyss and was recommended to Spielberg, um, from, by Jim Cameron. Uh, but does like backdraft of this and then basically becomes a director. He's directed tons of Spielberg television stuff and other TV stuff. Uh, he did Band of Brothers, uh, Rome, Alias, uh, you know, a bunch of stuff. Um, but it's funny that he only worked with Spielberg the one time.

• 1:28:20Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. Well, cause I mean, right after this.

• 1:28:22David Sims?

  She's about to. Well, um, Hook is shot by Dean Cundy.

• 1:28:26Griffin Newman?

  Cundy as well. Yeah.

• 1:28:27David Sims?

  Yeah. Uh, and then, yeah. Um, but anyway, uh, always. And yeah, then they make the movie and we'll get to its release, but it certainly is forgotten by current generations because it just kind of went over okay and was quickly forgotten. Like, I think, I don't, I don't think it was like the hardest movie ever shot or anything, but like, it was like, you know, it was a real movie and they, they had to figure stuff out and do stuff. And then it comes out and it's just, everyone's kind of like, meh.

• 1:28:54Speaker 05

  It was, we were entering an era then when like Ernest romantic dramas were kind of falling by the wayside.

• 1:29:01David Sims?

  It's kind of caught between two eras in a way. And it, I do think it's like too sappy.

• 1:29:08Griffin Newman?

  And Spielberg caught between like two poles.

• 1:29:10David Sims?

  A little bit.

• 1:29:11Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:14David Sims?

  So it doesn't like, it's like, who's this movie for?

• 1:29:18Griffin Newman?

  It is funny to me. I don't know if funny is the right word, but like this sort of Spielberg, you're not profound. You don't have serious adult thoughts. Don't try to do this. You're out of your depth, right? And then he like immediately like cracks the code on Schindler. And, you know, seven years ago, we covered the second half of his career where like no one questions when he announces, I want to make a world war two film or a film about the Munich Olympics or whatever, you know?

• 1:29:45Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:29:46Griffin Newman?

  Like it, the, the growth, like the internal development in him is fascinating. And obviously he still is capable of making like super sappy, kind of sugary, emotional grown up movies like this. But it does feel like for the first half of his career, it's like, there are things you were good at and things where you were out of your, your depth.

• 1:30:06Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:30:06Griffin Newman?

  And then even though he makes good and bad and great and terrible movies after that point, post Schindler, it's like, you can do anything you want. We trust you to work in any genre, at any size, at any tone. And also like at any visual palette. Like you can make movies look very different.

• 1:30:22Speaker 05

  Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Yeah. It's just, it, this is in some ways, I mean, there's a lot of technical skill in this one, but this, you know, right before his kind of, you know, king of the universe thing, like this movie does not have a ton of brand identity to it.

• 1:30:35Griffin Newman?

  No.

• 1:30:35Speaker 05

  As a Spielberg movie, it's just kind of like a solid studio release from 1989.

• 1:30:40David Sims?

  Yeah. It almost feels like the answer should be this was directed by John Turtle Top or whatever. Is John Turtle Top around right now?

• 1:30:47Griffin Newman?

  At this time, I think it's a little early.

• 1:30:49Speaker 05

  Like, if you had told me that this was like Ed Zwick or something, I'd be like, sure.

• 1:30:53David Sims?

  Zwick.

• 1:30:53Speaker 05

  That tracks.

• 1:30:54David Sims?

  Zwickaroonie. And excuse me, he's Turtle Hub is about to poke out of his shell with Think Big in 1990.

• 1:31:02Speaker 05

  That's a sequel to Music. That's a sequel to Music Box.

• 1:31:05Griffin Newman?

  You know what it really kind of feels more like, and I know the timing is just a little off because this is the same year that that guy activates in a certain way.

• 1:31:14David Sims?

  Oh, boy.

• 1:31:14Griffin Newman?

  It really kind of feels like a Reiner movie.

• 1:31:17David Sims?

  Sure.

• 1:31:18Griffin Newman?

  Right?

• 1:31:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:31:18Griffin Newman?

  Like, you could just see this being a castle.

• 1:31:20Speaker 05

  Carl Reiner, you mean?

• 1:31:21David Sims?

  I could, yes. I could see Ron Howard making a movie like this around this time.

• 1:31:25Griffin Newman?

  Absolutely.

• 1:31:25David Sims?

  Again, like where it's like Ron Howard made sturdy.

• 1:31:29Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:29David Sims?

  Sort of C plus, B minus, star featuring.

• 1:31:33Griffin Newman?

  Movies, star movies.

• 1:31:33David Sims?

  Movies that cost like a middle amount of money.

• 1:31:35Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:37David Sims?

  That could be sappy.

• 1:31:39Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:39David Sims?

  But not like, you know, so sappy. Well, kind of sappy.

• 1:31:43Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:43David Sims?

  This movie is that.

• 1:31:44Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:31:45David Sims?

  With some Spielbergian flair in the aerial sequences.

• 1:31:49Griffin Newman?

  And even just in, like, the, his classic, the blocking, the fucking.

• 1:31:53David Sims?

  Well, the blocking is good.

• 1:31:54Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:55Speaker 05

  Oh, it's, oh, it's also, because I'm, you know, I've been watching all of his movies. I noticed this. It's yet another of his movies, kind of from his era, where Mark Heldenberger is treated terribly. No, I'm kidding. There's no other movie that that happens in, but.

• 1:32:07David Sims?

  But Mark.

• 1:32:07Griffin Newman?

  She really, she gets the business.

• 1:32:09David Sims?

  She really.

• 1:32:09Speaker 05

  What the hell?

• 1:32:10David Sims?

  When she shows up, you're like, oh, Mark, it's a pleasure to see you. And the movie's like, no, no, no, it's not a pleasure to see Mark.

• 1:32:15Speaker 05

  She's pathetic and no one likes her.

• 1:32:16Griffin Newman?

  Don't lead her on.

• 1:32:20David Sims?

  You know, I, the movie starts in this, I mean, like, what, Top Gun's just a couple of years before.

• 1:32:25Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:32:26David Sims?

  And Richard Dreyfuss is the fucking maverick of this, you know, band of Oregonian, you know, fire, aerial firefighters, right? Like, it's like, you're always, your plane's too close to the trees, you crazy man. You always let your fuel tank run out.

• 1:32:41Griffin Newman?

  The, this, the stuff I kind of like about Dreyfuss in the role, right, is that. This guy's kinda like King of Shit Mountain, right?

• 1:32:50Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:32:50Griffin Newman?

  Like, the work they do is important.

• 1:32:52Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:32:52Griffin Newman?

  But he feels like he's a rock star.

• 1:32:54Speaker 05

  Well, and she says-

• 1:32:55Griffin Newman?

  You have gray hair.

• 1:32:56Speaker 05

  Right. And she says in the movie, she's like, she's like, if he was like saving actual people, like, you know, if they're actual lives, then maybe I could understand it more, but you know.

• 1:33:05David Sims?

  He's largely saving trees, I suppose.

• 1:33:08Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:33:08Griffin Newman?

  The movie frames it more as a conservation effort than a-

• 1:33:12Speaker 05

  Right, right.

• 1:33:13David Sims?

  Um, but he does do something that is daring, obviously. He flies these big fucking things and, you know, gets skilled. You have to dump fire material. I don't know, it's, it's kind of cool. And there's a sort of pretty dazzling opening sequence that, you know, is him not dying.

• 1:33:33Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:33:34David Sims?

  You gotta get one sequence of him seeming like he might not make it, but he makes it.

• 1:33:38Speaker 05

  And scaring her. She bends a spoon in her hand from stress.

• 1:33:41David Sims?

  Right. Um, and, uh, she's kind of like, "Look, I love you. I want to drink Budweiser out of a champagne glass of you for the rest of your life." And he's like, "Yeah, look, you're great, but my heart belongs to my plane."

• 1:33:55Speaker 05

  I have some notes about that dress, you know. I mean, I know, I know, no, I mean, I don't, nothing specific. I just, I know it was 1989, but like, oof.

• 1:34:03David Sims?

  Well, especially-

• 1:34:04Speaker 05

  It's rough.

• 1:34:05David Sims?

  Cause the movie is like, "Va-va-boo! Look at her!"

• 1:34:08Speaker 05

  Her girl clothes.

• 1:34:08David Sims?

  And like, right, there's that vibe too. Of like, "Did you know Holly Hunter could like look hot in a dress?" And everyone's like, "Yeah, fucking, of course she'd look good in a dress."

• 1:34:17Griffin Newman?

  She just wore the best dress in the history of movies, like, two years ago.

• 1:34:20David Sims?

  Um, so, she is kind of like, "Why don't you just take a teaching job? We can settle down. Like, things can be a little arse risky." And he's like, "Ah, but I just love wearing sunglasses."

• 1:34:31Speaker 05

  And she says, actually, well, okay, then I'm gonna go become a pilot myself. I mean, she can already fly, sort of, but she threatens, basically, to, to start doing what he does. And he says, "No, you can't do that."

• 1:34:40David Sims?

  Um, and then they do one last run. It takes a while, like you say, Griff, but there's also, it's sort of, you know, opening sequence, and then, "Let's get to know Richard and Holly." And, and hey, Goodman's there, having fun.

• 1:34:53Griffin Newman?

  But like, I'm gonna throw out a weird analog, right?

• 1:34:56David Sims?

  Sure. And then, sequence where he dies.

• 1:34:58Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. A movie like Jack Frost. Right? Where the whole thing is like, "This guy's gonna die."

• 1:35:03David Sims?

  He's gonna be a snowman.

• 1:35:04Griffin Newman?

  Right. And then he's gonna have, he's gonna be struggling to connect with the people he, he didn't quite love enough.

• 1:35:10David Sims?

  He's gonna go into, uh, the fly machine with, uh, some snow and George Clooney.

• 1:35:14Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:35:16Griffin Newman?

  In my memory, he's alive for like less than 15 minutes in that movie. There's like one scene where he's like, you know, I gotta go on the road and play my jazz music.

• 1:35:25David Sims?

  I got a scarf.

• 1:35:27Speaker 05

  She's a jazz.

• 1:35:27Griffin Newman?

  He plays like white man blues.

• 1:35:30David Sims?

  Those white man blues, a snowman. No whiter man.

• 1:35:33Griffin Newman?

  You see him do like one concert sequence over opening credits.

• 1:35:37Speaker 05

  A Fabelman-esque movie in 30 years in which a young Damien Chappelle watches Jack Frost.

• 1:35:45Speaker 05

  In awe.

• 1:35:46David Sims?

  Oh, boy.

• 1:35:53Griffin Newman?

  That movie just does the alternate like family comedy shorthand of like this guy doesn't spend enough time with his family. Right? It's like one scene of him being like, I gotta go. Then you see him play a bad fucking concert.

• 1:36:04David Sims?

  And then he's like, oh shit, the snow.

• 1:36:05Griffin Newman?

  Over opening credits, truly. And then like tour bus flips over, whatever the fuck. It's like so quick where you're like, I mean, this is Michael Keaton. I don't care about this guy. You're like going through the motions so much.

• 1:36:17David Sims?

  Yeah, make him a snowman already.

• 1:36:18Griffin Newman?

  Right. I like that this movie basically spends, gives Dreyfus's character 30 minutes to like provide him the rope to hang himself.

• 1:36:26David Sims?

  Well, here's my problem. I don't like him.

• 1:36:28Griffin Newman?

  But this is.

• 1:36:29David Sims?

  When he dies, I'm like, yeah. And then he comes back as a ghost and I'm like, boo, banish him to the shadow realm.

• 1:36:36Griffin Newman?

  I ask you.

• 1:36:37David Sims?

  Yes.

• 1:36:37Griffin Newman?

  Knowing the promise of the premise, does that not kind of work in the movie's favor? That you're like, this movie is ultimately gonna be about this guy needing to fucking let go? That we know we're not rooting for them to be together? That this movie's kind of about him being wrong for her?

• 1:36:52David Sims?

  In my opinion, it should work in the movie's favor. And I guess I kind of just get hung. And to be clear, I think this movie's kind of like a five or six out of 10. Like, I don't think it's like a disaster.

• 1:37:00Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:01David Sims?

  But like.

• 1:37:01Griffin Newman?

  And I'm also not saying this is like a great performance or even necessarily a particularly good performance. But I think it, it, it uses his weird status in a way that I think is kind of interesting. Because as you're saying, it's like, there's the moment you think he's gonna die, he doesn't. And then you as an audience member, knowing what you bought a ticket to, are so frustrated that you're like, this guy won't fucking admit that he loves her?

• 1:37:25Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:37:25Griffin Newman?

  He needs to turn everything into some sort of snarky joke? He needs to play cooler and above it all?

• 1:37:31Speaker 05

  Yeah. And I think the problem is, is that he, that

• 1:37:34Griffin Newman?

  No, he sucks.

• 1:37:35Speaker 05

  That the Dreyfus unlikability maybe carries that characterization too far.

• 1:37:39Griffin Newman?

  I would agree.

• 1:37:40Speaker 05

  And I think some of the way that like, he, he talks to her pretty, like, not misogynistically exactly, but like, something close.

• 1:37:48Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:48Speaker 05

  And maybe with a, a more like traditionally charming leading man actor, that would play a little bit better.

• 1:37:56Griffin Newman?

  This is the era where Paul Newman is really successfully transitioning into being a salty dog, right?

• 1:38:02Speaker 05

  Right, right.

• 1:38:03Griffin Newman?

  Where he's really like loving playing kind of shit heel parts.

• 1:38:07Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:38:07Griffin Newman?

  And broken men. And you could certainly see if this movie was Newman and Redford, right?

• 1:38:13David Sims?

  Yeah, sure.

• 1:38:14Griffin Newman?

  It, it would, it would probably totally work.

• 1:38:17David Sims?

  I don't agree with it.

• 1:38:17Griffin Newman?

  Even if the script isn't perfect, I think it would totally work as just kind of like a movie movie.

• 1:38:23David Sims?

  Um.

• 1:38:24Griffin Newman?

  I think Newman would be able to play the same kind of like glib arrogance where you're like, dude, get out of your fucking way. But also, there is a base level charm from watching Paul Newman and being like, I know this guy isn't a monster. In a movie star coded way.

• 1:38:38Speaker 05

  Paul Newman would have been old, though.

• 1:38:40Griffin Newman?

  This is the problem.

• 1:38:41David Sims?

  Yeah, and also you would have

• 1:38:42Griffin Newman?

  You wouldn't be able to cast Holly Hunter. You'd need to put someone else in there.

• 1:38:44Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:38:44David Sims?

  You would have the weird problem of Newman and Redford being in scenes together but unable to interact.

• 1:38:52Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:38:52David Sims?

  It's kind of like a weird arm behind your back thing.

• 1:38:54Speaker 05

  Like, like Hoffman and Hackman in Runaway Jury?

• 1:38:57Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. Well, that's why they had to give him the urinal scene.

• 1:38:59Speaker 05

  Right, exactly.

• 1:39:00David Sims?

  The urinal scene is the diner and heat scene of Runaway Jury.

• 1:39:03Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:39:04Griffin Newman?

  They talk about that they were like halfway through filming and they were like, wait a second, we don't have them in any scenes.

• 1:39:09Speaker 05

  Well, what the hell are we thinking?

• 1:39:10Griffin Newman?

  Um, yeah, it, it's, I, I mean, here's the other thing. Dreyfus plays so old in this movie and then you do the math and you're like, he's 38? Like, how old was Dreyfus when they filmed this?

• 1:39:21David Sims?

  That's a great question because Dreyfus's age is always kind of hard to pin down because he went gray early and all that. But, all right, he was born in 47.

• 1:39:28Speaker 05

  So he's 40, he's in his early 40s.

• 1:39:29David Sims?

  Yeah, so he's like early

• 1:39:31Speaker 05

  Goodman was like 35 when they filmed it, I think, 36?

• 1:39:33David Sims?

  Yeah, so Dreyfus is early 40s.

• 1:39:36Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:36David Sims?

  Which, yeah, doesn't

• 1:39:38Speaker 05

  And Hunter was only what, like 32, I think?

• 1:39:40Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:40David Sims?

  Good call.

• 1:39:41Griffin Newman?

  Cause I guess Redford and Newman would have both been

• 1:39:44David Sims?

  Hunter's a full 11 years younger than Dreyfus.

• 1:39:46Griffin Newman?

  And Redford and Newman are like 10 years older than Dreyfus.

• 1:39:50Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:39:50David Sims?

  Sure, and Goodman's kind of in the middle of them. He was born in like the early 50s.

• 1:39:54Griffin Newman?

  Yes, you'd have to, you'd have to Passed that part differently.

• 1:39:58Speaker 05

  Right, right.

• 1:39:59Griffin Newman?

  Which-

• 1:40:00Speaker 05

  But, but in terms of like actor charisma, you're right that it would work very well.

• 1:40:04Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:04Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:40:05David Sims?

  Um, so-

• 1:40:06Griffin Newman?

  The Goodman thing is also just destabilizing. I mean, my, my mental movie is the most extreme version of that and is on me, but also, like, as you said, it's only one year into Roseanne, and yet this movie knows that America loves this guy so fucking much.

• 1:40:21Speaker 05

  It acts as if everyone is like deeply familiar with him.

• 1:40:25David Sims?

  But like, the thing with Goodman is-

• 1:40:26Griffin Newman?

  He's gonna be more important than being the supportive friend. He's certainly gonna like exceed being the Harry Connick Jr. in the Independence Day of this triangle.

• 1:40:35Speaker 05

  Right, right, yeah.

• 1:40:35David Sims?

  It's funny because it's like Goodman is obviously good in the movie.

• 1:40:39Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:40David Sims?

  Because he's rarely bad, and at this point-

• 1:40:42Griffin Newman?

  He's one of our finest.

• 1:40:43David Sims?

  But especially at this point, he can't really miss. And of course Goodman made movies like the Babe Ruth movie that did miss.

• 1:40:49Griffin Newman?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:40:49David Sims?

  Where you're like, John Goodman is Babe Ruth. That's like the easiest shit in the world. It's like, yeah, but the movie stinks, you know, but like-

• 1:40:53Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 1:40:53David Sims?

  But like, it's not like Goodman's bad in any of these things. Goodman's always good.

• 1:40:57Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:57David Sims?

  Is it a mistake to have someone who's almost too good? Like, in a way?

• 1:41:02Griffin Newman?

  There's that thing where like, I remember watching Revenge of the Nerds as, for the first time on like Comedy Central, and John Goodman pops up like six minutes in, and I was like, oh my god, cracking my knuckles, John Goodman movie. And then the movie proceeds and you're like, oh, this must have been before he got famous. I'm ready for John Goodman to be all over this movie, but the movie doesn't understand what it has yet.

• 1:41:23Speaker 05

  Yeah, exactly.

• 1:41:24Griffin Newman?

  But always in the way it is sold, clearly knew they had something.

• 1:41:28Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:41:28Griffin Newman?

  And yet the part is like too small for him. He is like too compelling.

• 1:41:33David Sims?

  It's, it's a problem almost, right? He's overheating the movie in a weird, like, not-

• 1:41:37Griffin Newman?

  To be a character who basically is just like a sounding board for the other characters.

• 1:41:42Speaker 05

  And to have him in this supporting friend instructor role.

• 1:41:46Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:47Speaker 05

  And to have the new shiny guy who is supposed to sweep all of us off of our feeds.

• 1:41:52Griffin Newman?

  Totally.

• 1:41:53Speaker 05

  Along with Holly Hunter, to have him be like pretty inert.

• 1:41:57Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 1:41:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, he's fine. I mean, but he, but it's, it's not like, you know, I'm trying to think of like someone who walks on screen and you're like, Jesus Christ. Like, like those people do, I mean, you know, Brad Pitt in Thelma and Louise or something.

• 1:42:07Griffin Newman?

  Sure.

• 1:42:08Speaker 05

  Um, and, but to have like then Goodman, you're like, can we just go back to Goodman?

• 1:42:11Griffin Newman?

  That's the wild thing is watching this, it almost feels like the movie is framing him to be a Baxter.

• 1:42:17Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:42:18Griffin Newman?

  And when I get to the point where I'm like, oh, wait, no, this movie is working towards them ending up together. That's where we're, what we're supposed to be rooting for. It feels wrong. Like, it feels incorrect.

• 1:42:29Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, I, I, I, yeah, I agree. The calculation is off or something.

• 1:42:33Griffin Newman?

  And I'm like so much more into even removing my projection of it leading in a romantic direction. Goodman like reconnecting with her and being like, you have to come back to the world of the living.

• 1:42:45Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:42:46Griffin Newman?

  Like, I'm like, if you almost just remove the element of her falling in love with someone else. And it is just like the best friend and the lover of this dead guy. Working through their grief as his ghost kind of hovers around. That also maybe works a little better.

• 1:43:02Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:43:03Griffin Newman?

  There was the part of this all coming from a movie that Dreyfus and Spielberg have watched thirty seven times. And like live so large in their head that I don't think they were ever gonna consider reworking.

• 1:43:15Speaker 05

  No.

• 1:43:15Griffin Newman?

  The story that much.

• 1:43:17David Sims?

  No, whatever. I mean, it's just sort of the quandary of like, it's Steven Spielberg. He can get anyone. So of course John Goodman wants to do it. Yes, John Goodman will eventually be crestfallen that. He thinks Spielberg just sees him as a big old, you know, guy in an orange and black.

• 1:43:32Griffin Newman?

  He just wants him eating brontosaurus eggs.

• 1:43:35David Sims?

  Right. But you're not gonna say no to Spielberg. And so Spielberg can get kind of an overheated cast. And I think Spielberg often wisely avoids that problem. And has guys in his movie where you're like, well, that's a great actor who I don't know as well. And like Spielberg's picked well, you know, for these small roles, like.

• 1:43:53Speaker 05

  His casting is fascinating in that he like, like I'm just off the top of my head, like watching Minority Report and you're like.

• 1:43:57David Sims?

  Dude, I was literally about to bring up Minority Report.

• 1:44:00Speaker 05

  Yeah, like, like Catherine Morris. Okay, that's Francis O'Connor in AI.

• 1:44:05Griffin Newman?

  Timon Nelson.

• 1:44:06David Sims?

  But like, Minority Report's a great example. It's like, you got Cruz, so you don't need anyone else, right? Max Von Sydow, he wants, you know, this like guy he respects, Colin Farrell.

• 1:44:15Speaker 05

  He's playing himself in that movie.

• 1:44:16David Sims?

  He is, of course.

• 1:44:17Speaker 05

  He was doing that.

• 1:44:17David Sims?

  True, pre-crime.

• 1:44:18Griffin Newman?

  Colin Farrell, they paid two point five million dollars.

• 1:44:21David Sims?

  This is a hot young thing. And Spielberg's like, I get it. But then everyone else, it's like Neil McDonough, perfect.

• 1:44:26Griffin Newman?

  Peter Sturmer.

• 1:44:27David Sims?

  Stormy are perfect, but then also guys like Eric Gross.

• 1:44:30Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:30David Sims?

  And Daniel London, like where it's just like, these are not guys who necessarily, like you could get a bigger person for that role, right? But like, they're perfect.

• 1:44:39Griffin Newman?

  No, he's usually really good at that. And I also think he's usually good at it not being destabilizing. Like he has such a big picture notion that he's like, if you're putting an overqualified person in a small role, it has to be like a small, high impact role. You know, it has to be like one scene in which a surprisingly big person shows up.

• 1:45:00Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:45:00Griffin Newman?

  But you understand why you cast Audrey Hepburn in that way.

• 1:45:03Speaker 05

  Correct.

• 1:45:03Griffin Newman?

  Because for those five minutes, the movie is all.

• 1:45:06Speaker 05

  Well, they didn't have the budget for any white cashmere, so they were like, well, Audrey has some that she'll bring.

• 1:45:10David Sims?

  She fortunately has a briefcase filled.

• 1:45:13Speaker 05

  She opened a door to her room and it was all sweaters.

• 1:45:16Griffin Newman?

  I'm watching this and like the moment when Dreyfus explodes.

• 1:45:20David Sims?

  And he do blow up. And I think that set piece is very effective before he blows up. And the way he blows up is really, it's great because it's just like, it's not overplayed. It's just this moment where suddenly Dreyfus realizes like, oh, I'm for real fucked. And then that's that.

• 1:45:35Griffin Newman?

  And he's fucked himself saving Goodman's life.

• 1:45:37David Sims?

  Yeah, yeah, he did. He did the right kind of daring do.

• 1:45:40Griffin Newman?

  Right. And he like suddenly just completely explodes and they cut to Goodman pushing his face against the glass of his cockpit, reacting to having just seen this guy die.

• 1:45:48David Sims?

  And that's why you cast Goodman.

• 1:45:50Griffin Newman?

  And this is what I'm saying. Like there's the automatic Goodman warmth. That's just like a fucking, it's.

• 1:45:55David Sims?

  That guy can heat a house.

• 1:45:56Griffin Newman?

  Totally. Right? It's a, it's a hearth.

• 1:45:58Speaker 05

  And the goofy sidekick is supposed to die.

• 1:46:00Griffin Newman?

  Totally.

• 1:46:01Speaker 05

  Not the big hero.

• 1:46:01David Sims?

  Yeah, the goose.

• 1:46:02Speaker 05

  There's like a shock in his face where he's like, but that was not what was supposed to happen.

• 1:46:06Griffin Newman?

  That part of it is, is fun. And he's good at all of that shit and setting up and like, this is the warm cuddly guy who you don't want to see die and whatever. But then it is like moments like that, moments like him trying to sort of shake Holly Hunter back into reality. It's almost like as beloved as he was, people didn't realize how much depth he had.

• 1:46:24Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:46:24Griffin Newman?

  Where you're like, oh, Goodman can actually sell any emotion you want. He's not just a fun guy.

• 1:46:30Speaker 05

  Clocking into work at the rock factory.

• 1:46:32Griffin Newman?

  Absolutes sliding down and the tail, lunch pail that's made out of stones.

• 1:46:36Speaker 05

  All those emotions. Um. Being near a bird that says it's a living.

• 1:46:40David Sims?

  So that sequence is cool.

• 1:46:42Griffin Newman?

  Ribs that are too big and they destabilize you.

• 1:46:44Speaker 05

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 1:46:47David Sims?

  It's, yeah, Drivus dying is very not yabba dabba doo. We could say that.

• 1:46:51Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:52David Sims?

  It's a yabba dabba don't.

• 1:46:53Griffin Newman?

  It's pretty yabba dabba dyer.

• 1:46:56David Sims?

  And I like cutting right to the forest.

• 1:46:57Griffin Newman?

  Uh huh.

• 1:46:58David Sims?

  And he's just walking through there and then Tenet.

• 1:47:00Griffin Newman?

  Whistling.

• 1:47:00David Sims?

  All that Audrey has for him is a word.

• 1:47:03Griffin Newman?

  I, I, I do love that.

• 1:47:05David Sims?

  Which is such a stupid layered joke that I'm only making because of Richard Lawson. That Hap also plays the guy in Tenet.

• 1:47:13Griffin Newman?

  Of course.

• 1:47:13David Sims?

  Who says Tenet.

• 1:47:15Griffin Newman?

  Decade of dreams.

• 1:47:16David Sims?

  I just love Donovan's just sitting there in his armchair. And like 20 years later, Nolan's like, hey, can you say Tenet in my movie Tenet? It's like, I've been waiting for this phone call.

• 1:47:26Griffin Newman?

  I'm, I'm gonna put forward, is Donovan another when's he bad guy? Has he ever been bad in anything?

• 1:47:34David Sims?

  I, I, I don't know that I've seen every Martin Donovan movie. I mean, but I, what I love about Martin Donovan is that he's in like the Hal Hartley movies, right? Like, you know, you watch early Donovan and you're like, fuck, this guy rocks. You know, and then he's great in like Portrait of a Lady.

• 1:47:48Griffin Newman?

  I was gonna say, older character actor Martin Donovan. There's a real range of what he's been asked to do and he kinda always fucking nails it in Heron Vice.

• 1:47:57David Sims?

  Oh, yeah. Love that.

• 1:47:58Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:59David Sims?

  Uh, so he bow up and Audrey's there and she's sort of like, you're dead, but you are here to sort of guide, I guess.

• 1:48:13Griffin Newman?

  You can't really talk to people.

• 1:48:15David Sims?

  But you can kinda like, kinda really throw a vibe.

• 1:48:18Speaker 05

  Well, she's like, you'll become spiritus, you'll become inspiration.

• 1:48:20David Sims?

  Yes, the divine breath.

• 1:48:23Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:48:23David Sims?

  And a cleverness, a clever, like, sort of quiet thing that they do is like, time has just moved on.

• 1:48:29Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:30David Sims?

  Because I think this movie would stink really hard if it's like the day after and he's just like sitting at his funeral, right? Like in Holly Hundreds just crying and.

• 1:48:37Griffin Newman?

  And there's even an elegance to, I mean, what, she says like five months and he goes, it's been five months already? And she's like, wait, sorry, it's six months now.

• 1:48:44David Sims?

  That's cool, yeah.

• 1:48:45Speaker 05

  Wait, I said that the romantic drama was on the wane, but actually Ghost was about, what, like a year away?

• 1:48:50Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, Ghost is the year after this, right? It's 90 or 91?

• 1:48:54Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:48:54David Sims?

  Uh, Ghost is ninety.

• 1:48:55Speaker 05

  Yeah. And that really digs into the moments after the death. No, you're right. In a way that this movie kind of skips past.

• 1:49:01David Sims?

  Right, which I think Ghost is a more effective movie than this movie. Ghost is also just like, kind of stupid, but Ghost rocks. Right, but Ghost is just like stupid but rocks.

• 1:49:09Griffin Newman?

  People get angry every time you say Ghost has rocks in his brains. But also Ghost is like, it's like trying to be every type of movie simultaneously. It is such a like feast of like thriller, comedy, romance, drama.

• 1:49:21David Sims?

  Yes, it's what a weird movie.

• 1:49:23Speaker 05

  It's the movie you knew his lacquer brother was gonna direct someday, you know?

• 1:49:26David Sims?

  It also just has lots of subway, which is why I prefer Ghost always.

• 1:49:29Griffin Newman?

  I just did my annual rewatch of all three Naked Gun movies.

• 1:49:33Speaker 05

  That's pretty good.

• 1:49:33Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, the first, second, and third funniest movies ever made.

• 1:49:37Speaker 05

  I mean, yeah, you're not wrong.

• 1:49:38Griffin Newman?

  And, and Jim Abraham's died sadly very recently.

• 1:49:42David Sims?

  That's true.

• 1:49:43Griffin Newman?

  Very shortly after we in an episode talked about, is there any way we actually could cover their combined works? It is just so bizarre, the kind of like.

• 1:49:52Speaker 05

  It's surreal, it's strange.

• 1:49:54Griffin Newman?

  Trifurcation that happens between the three of them. And then all three of them like, the one who directs Ghosts and gets fucking like a best picture nomination, makes one of the highest grossing films, then just sort of like slows down to a crawl, makes two more movies over ten years, never does it again. Jim Abraham slows way the fuck down and the one you wanna stop working won't stop making stuff.

• 1:50:12Speaker 05

  Exactly, yeah, yeah.

• 1:50:16David Sims?

  So, uh, six months have elapsed, um, so because, um, you know, Dorinda's sort of moving past his death a little bit. Uh, she's at the flight school now.

• 1:50:28Griffin Newman?

  John Goodman took the job that.

• 1:50:30David Sims?

  That Pete was supposed to take, Draper was supposed to take. Um, and, um,

• 1:50:36David Sims?

  who's at this flight school, but Ted Baker, played by Brad Johnson.

• 1:50:40Griffin Newman?

  Oh, this guy's pop.

• 1:50:41Speaker 05

  Who we encountered briefly earlier.

• 1:50:43David Sims?

  We did.

• 1:50:43Griffin Newman?

  Right, he sees them dancing.

• 1:50:45David Sims?

  Who's kind of truly just a shitty Pete, like where it's like, he's also a bit of a hotshot and he's also kind of like a little too big for his britches in the plane or whatever. But like, none of that reads.

• 1:50:55Griffin Newman?

  No, also.

• 1:50:55David Sims?

  Like, people are telling us that, but I don't get it from that guy at all.

• 1:50:58Griffin Newman?

  No.

• 1:50:59David Sims?

  He just kind of feels like an empty guy to me.

• 1:51:01Griffin Newman?

  But this is the part of him that makes him feel like a Baxter, where you're just like, there's something just a little blank about this guy. You know, and like-

• 1:51:09David Sims?

  He's pretty fucking blank.

• 1:51:10Griffin Newman?

  The selling of him in the media and the lead up to this movie is like, you're not gonna believe how sexy this guy is. And it's like, he is incredibly handsome.

• 1:51:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:51:19Griffin Newman?

  You know?

• 1:51:19Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:51:20Griffin Newman?

  And he's like charming enough. He like holds the camera enough, but there's not like an electric charge there.

• 1:51:28Speaker 05

  And here's, here's the thing, it just kind of hit me now, is I don't buy Dorinda, um, being attracted to him.

• 1:51:34David Sims?

  No, neither do I.

• 1:51:35Griffin Newman?

  No, you know why?

• 1:51:36David Sims?

  Outside of just sort of like, eh, I might as well-

• 1:51:38Speaker 05

  Like, he's hot. She's like, yeah, he's beautiful.

• 1:51:40David Sims?

  Yeah, he's good looking.

• 1:51:41Speaker 05

  I don't think she'd be attracted to his personality.

• 1:51:42Griffin Newman?

  No, and here's another reason why she wouldn't. The first thirty minutes of the movie show her staying with Richard Dreyfuss, who looks like Richard Dreyfuss and is the most irritating-

• 1:51:54David Sims?

  In nineteen eighty-nine.

• 1:51:54Griffin Newman?

  -man in the world. So I'm like, okay, she has very specific tastes in men.

• 1:51:59Speaker 05

  Right, right.

• 1:51:59Griffin Newman?

  I'm not saying she's only gonna fall for someone else who fits the Richard Dreyfuss type.

• 1:52:02Speaker 05

  Right.

• 1:52:03Griffin Newman?

  But if you're that hung up on Richard Dreyfuss, I don't think your panties drop for fucking Brad Johnson.

• 1:52:09Speaker 05

  No, exactly.

• 1:52:09Griffin Newman?

  I think you're like, that guy's kinda boring.

• 1:52:11Speaker 05

  You might fuck him, but I don't think you're gonna be like, this is my next great love affair.

• 1:52:14Griffin Newman?

  Right, I, I, yeah, she's clearly interested in difficult men.

• 1:52:18David Sims?

  Now, here's the other thing. The rest of the movie is Dreyfuss yelling very hard at people who can't hear him to kind of try to influence them.

• 1:52:28Griffin Newman?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:52:28David Sims?

  And a kind of boring romantic drama playing out between Hunter and Johnson. Goodman kind of vanishes from the movie, which is like a real problem.

• 1:52:36Griffin Newman?

  To my great disappointment.

• 1:52:37David Sims?

  Like, it's like, he should, there should be more space for him, there's less.

• 1:52:40Griffin Newman?

  I'm kinda into the Dreyfuss yelling stuff just because it's sort of fun that the movie is cucking him. That it's like making Dreyfuss-

• 1:52:48David Sims?

  That's your, I get your read, yeah, right, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:52:50Griffin Newman?

  For me, it's just like, the moment where I go like, oh, it's not a secret masterpiece, is when the romance becomes the central thing.

• 1:52:57David Sims?

  Right, and I do feel like the movie just kind of runs out of steam.

• 1:53:00Griffin Newman?

  It does.

• 1:53:00Speaker 05

  And he's not really interested in staging really more than one or two romantic scenes, you know? Like, there's the big, there's the big dinner thing, and then he's like, okay, like, there's a little impediment to this relationship, but I'm not really gonna spend much more time on that.

• 1:53:13Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:53:14Speaker 05

  And I think that's a problem, because we need to fall in love with this guy, and we don't.

• 1:53:18David Sims?

  Um, we do, and-

• 1:53:21David Sims?

  Would a better actor, who's a good actor for this role? Like, who, who fits? Is there someone who fits?

• 1:53:27Speaker 05

  I think Tim Robbins would have been fun.

• 1:53:29David Sims?

  Tim Robbins.

• 1:53:29Speaker 05

  Like, you know, he was, he was kinda cute in Bull Durham around then, you know?

• 1:53:33Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, I mean, that's sort of the vibe you want, is a guy who's a little bit of a doofus, but in a way that is like bizarrely compelling.

• 1:53:40Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:53:40Griffin Newman?

  Um, I mean, so that's, this is the role that he wanted Cruise for originally, is that right? But, but in the earlier MGM version, right before Cruise became Megamind.

• 1:53:50David Sims?

  Look, it's not in the dossier, but according to one book, yes, Cruise was considered for that role. I mean, Cruise is obviously way too famous now, but right in the early eighties, you could, I guess, see it, although he'd be really young in the early eighties. But he was hot, I mean.

• 1:54:04Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, I do think you're on to something that he needs to be funny. He can't just be hot.

• 1:54:10David Sims?

  Yeah, he needs to have a personality.

• 1:54:13Speaker 05

  It's a really strange choice to cast like a stone-cold Marlboro Man hunk.

• 1:54:17Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 1:54:18Speaker 05

  And I know it's supposed to be to offset the, the dryfus at all, but like, it's just, it, he's too alien in the world of the movie, that like someone like Tim Robbins or someone shaggy like that could, who also has a, an appeal, a youthful appeal, I guess, at that time. Like, that works so much better.

• 1:54:34Griffin Newman?

  Even, it's complete opposite direction, but the reason I keep going back to the Newman Redford idea in my mind is like, Redford's obviously one of the most beautiful men in the history of movies, but also is just like a prick. Like, there is that like difficult, sort of thorny nature to him, that like makes him more complicated.

• 1:54:52Speaker 05

  Yes, exactly.

• 1:54:53Griffin Newman?

  Which, right, you need the guy to be like, right, goofier or more serious?

• 1:54:59Speaker 05

  Yeah, something. You need, you need, you need a strong personality.

• 1:55:02Griffin Newman?

  Yes, thank you. You need a strong personality, yes.

• 1:55:05David Sims?

  And I also think you maybe need something more dynamic in the plane sequences, because the plane sequences get a little samey.

• 1:55:15David Sims?

  And there's the sort of big water landing at the end of the movie is like the big sort of new set piece idea, right?

• 1:55:21Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:55:22David Sims?

  And it's kind of effective.

• 1:55:23Speaker 05

  Uh huh.

• 1:55:24David Sims?

  But, right, don't you feel like you, after the first part of the movie where the plane stuff is kind of arresting, you're sort of like, well, I'm kind of used to the plane stuff at this point.

• 1:55:32Speaker 05

  I also, as a kid, you know, because when you're a kid, like a two hour movie feels like it's six hours long in kind of a cool way. Like you're really in it for a long time. I remembered like the buildup to Holly Hunter jumping in the plane and flying off on her own to be much bigger. Watching it now, I was like, oh, she kind of just decides to do it and then it happens and then she crashes and then she's fine. I wanted more of occasion, like what is this particular fire? Why is it so bad?

• 1:55:54David Sims?

  There's a slightness to this movie.

• 1:55:56Speaker 05

  There is.

• 1:55:57David Sims?

  And maybe that's what did it in is like Spielberg's kind of like, well, I'm making kind of more of a regular person movie and like, it's not a big epic and it's in between two giant projects of mine, right? I want it to be smaller and it just kind of feels smaller.

• 1:56:10Speaker 05

  Yeah, I think that's what I kind of like about it is it's the first time he's able to really try that.

• 1:56:18David Sims?

  You know?

• 1:56:19Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:56:20David Sims?

  Uh, yes. Um, I guess, yeah, like what's the, yeah, there really isn't, I mean, honestly, E T. Is the closest example before this of him making a smaller scale movie. And he always calls E T like a tiny epic, like, because E T really is.

• 1:56:39Speaker 05

  I mean, that's the, that's the miracle of E T.

• 1:56:41David Sims?

  Right, exactly.

• 1:56:42Speaker 05

  It takes place in a suburban house.

• 1:56:43David Sims?

  Yeah. Yeah, and like it's mostly just about kids, but obviously E T also does have like a spaceship and an alien and visual effects and flying and all this stuff.

• 1:56:51Speaker 05

  But it's in service of a very small intimate story. It's about putting a little alien in a wig. That's what that movie's about.

• 1:56:57David Sims?

  God, he looks so good. What if that's our bit on that episode? Is E T hot when he's in the wig?

• 1:57:03Speaker 05

  Ooga, rewatching that movie, I was like, I cannot believe how funny this visual is. It is astounding. It is astounding. And it's so cute and it's, I just like. You know what's crazy? And look, we'll have devoted a full episode to it at this point that you'll all have listened to is probably 20 hours long. It's the greatest movie ever made.

• 1:57:20David Sims?

  It is.

• 1:57:20Speaker 05

  Uh, E T in the fucking bed sheet dressed as a ghost is almost as funny as E T dressed like a lady. It's so good. It's so simple, but just the weird E T walk under a blanket. And knowing that the whole time Drew Barrymore thought it was real, like, it's just like. Yeah, you know what movie?

• 1:57:39Griffin Newman?

  Rules.

• 1:57:39David Sims?

  ET.

• 1:57:40Griffin Newman?

  The extraterrestrial.

• 1:57:41Speaker 05

  It's good.

• 1:57:42David Sims?

  Yeah, that's a good one.

• 1:57:43Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:57:43David Sims?

  Uh, Always, on the other hand, is just okay.

• 1:57:46Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 1:57:46David Sims?

  Um, are there other things in Always we need to talk about plot? Well, I truly just kind of like.

• 1:57:51Griffin Newman?

  On, on Apple, I don't know if this is on the Blu-ray, if this is on other streaming versions of it right now. But if you watch the Apple TV version of Always, at the end of the credits, the very end, after the Amblin logo and such, in what is clearly a more modern font, this is the final image on screen, just very dire, black, white text, quote, caution, colon, inhaling of helium from balloons is dangerous, comma,

• 1:58:24David Sims?

  Oh, because they do that at the start.

• 1:58:25Griffin Newman?

  and can cause serious injury or death, period, end quote. Like a modern content warning, as if it was Disney Plus being like, don't smoke cigars.

• 1:58:34Speaker 05

  So the impressionable kids of today, who no doubt have watched Always all through the end credits and were like, okay, now we're gonna do the thing from with the helium.

• 1:58:42Griffin Newman?

  They see John Goodman talking in a squeaky voice and they're like, this is gonna become a fucking TikTok trend. If we don't warn children.

• 1:58:49Speaker 05

  You haven't, it already is, he Always-ing?

• 1:58:51David Sims?

  I've done that. I mean, you guys have done that, right? Everyone's done the old steal of helium.

• 1:58:57Speaker 05

  I tried it once and it didn't work.

• 1:58:59David Sims?

  Classic.

• 1:58:59Speaker 05

  And I, and I was embarrassed because I was the only one it didn't work for.

• 1:59:02Griffin Newman?

  Can I, can I say something?

• 1:59:04David Sims?

  You go ahead.

• 1:59:05Griffin Newman?

  Real helium voice, not done in post, but really actually sucking helium and saying something serious afterwards?

• 1:59:10Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:59:10Griffin Newman?

  Almost as funny as ET dressed up as a lady.

• 1:59:14David Sims?

  Uh, there's a really, yeah.

• 1:59:15Speaker 05

  I believe it.

• 1:59:16Griffin Newman?

  I kind of Always works for me, Always.

• 1:59:20David Sims?

  Um, there's a, um, this is so obscure, but I'll just say it. Uh, in the early 90s or the, there was like a BBC, there was a rule that the, uh, the Irish Republican Party, uh, sorry, the Irish Republican Army, uh, and then, and thus Sinn Fein, its political wing, could not be like shown on the BBC.

• 1:59:37Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 1:59:37David Sims?

  Because like the crown, I guess, you know, because Britain's state, it is Britain's state, whatever. They were like, that is an enemy of the state. We cannot, so like, they would have to have weird workarounds where like a shadowy person, you know, would, would be like, and this is what Jerry Adams said, would like recite his words, right? Like they like couldn't, and it was like this absurd kind of. Illustration of like how Britain did not know how to deal with Irish independence and all this stuff, right? And in The Day to Day, Chris Morris is brilliant. Have you ever heard of The Day to Day?

• 2:00:05Griffin Newman?

  I have, I've never seen it, but I know it.

• 2:00:06David Sims?

  Satire of news from the early 90s. Steve Coogan does Jerry Adams and they're like, to combat the IRA, Jerry Adams must take a hit of helium before he says, you know, anything on camera. And it's just Coogan taking a hit of the helium and going, you know, Sinn Fein is a legitimate political party in like, in the helium voice. And it's so fucking funny and it's a funny piece of satire and I always think about that.

• 2:00:29Griffin Newman?

  I have bad news.

• 2:00:30David Sims?

  What's that?

• 2:00:30Griffin Newman?

  Hold on.

• 2:00:32Speaker 03

  What is happening, Griffin?

• 2:00:33Griffin Newman?

  As featured on the recent Blank Check Substack Holiday Gift Guide, I purchased a new toy replica of Willem Dafoe's pumpkin bomb from the same Remy Spider-Man movies.

• 2:00:45David Sims?

  Yes.

• 2:00:45Griffin Newman?

  But the thing that activates it is if you roll it and I accidentally hit it with my finger and then it does a countdown and then has a fake Dafoe laugh.

• 2:00:52David Sims?

  You're saying that you pulled a bit of a Denzel? You rolled it? You were feeling alright and then you were like, I'm gonna roll it.

• 2:01:00Griffin Newman?

  This just might, I'm realizing now for the first time, this might be my version of you giving David the slinky, that I have a thing on the desk that at very little prompting can suddenly make a ridiculous series of noises.

• 2:01:15David Sims?

  Yeah, and maybe we move it.

• 2:01:17Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, to my lap.

• 2:01:19David Sims?

  Um, so, yeah, is there, Drifus is yelling at folks, like, what do you want me to say?

• 2:01:27Speaker 05

  I was gonna bring up that, although maybe it's not worth it because it's depressing, but like-

• 2:01:32Griffin Newman?

  Hey, bring it up.

• 2:01:33Speaker 05

  If you look at what Holly Hunter's career was after this.

• 2:01:37Griffin Newman?

  I wanna do Holly Hunter career rundown. This is a good-

• 2:01:39Speaker 05

  It gets depressing fast.

• 2:01:40Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:01:41Speaker 05

  In a way that it was like, oh, she was an actress who they were like, you're how old? You're 40? Okay, goodbye.

• 2:01:45Griffin Newman?

  I wanna, I wanna talk through this, okay? Thank you for bringing this up. First of all, can you gentlemen guess what Holly Hunter's last theatrically released film was?

• 2:01:55David Sims?

  Was it Batman or Superman? No, well, Incredibles.

• 2:01:57Griffin Newman?

  Correct.

• 2:01:58David Sims?

  Right, yeah.

• 2:01:59Griffin Newman?

  Which was seven years ago.

• 2:02:01David Sims?

  2018.

• 2:02:01Griffin Newman?

  She's not appeared in a movie in seven years.

• 2:02:03David Sims?

  She's done lots of television.

• 2:02:04Griffin Newman?

  She's done a lot of TV.

• 2:02:05David Sims?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:02:05Griffin Newman?

  She's done a lot of TV. And has reprised the voice of Helen Parr in like seven different video games.

• 2:02:11Speaker 05

  Has she done TV recently?

• 2:02:12Griffin Newman?

  She did her work on Succession, that was great, but that ended in 2019.

• 2:02:16Speaker 05

  Right, of course, yeah.

• 2:02:17Griffin Newman?

  She did two episodes of The Comey Rule in 2020. She did Mr. Mayor, The Weird Ill Begotten, Ted Danson, Tina Fey Show.

• 2:02:25Speaker 05

  A nice idea in theory, but didn't quite.

• 2:02:28David Sims?

  Right, nobody really got into it.

• 2:02:29Griffin Newman?

  2018, she did Here and Now, which was that Alan Ball?

• 2:02:33David Sims?

  Uh, Here and Now was the, yeah, it was the Alan Ball thing, yeah.

• 2:02:36Griffin Newman?

  But it's like Incredibles 2 in 2018 is her last theatrically released movie. 2017, Song to Song, which is obviously a strange case, but then Big Snack.

• 2:02:45Speaker 05

  She's in a bizarre movie with Carrie Coon.

• 2:02:48Griffin Newman?

  Is it called Strange Weather or Breakable You?

• 2:02:50Speaker 05

  It's called Strange Weather and it's about a woman who's grieving her son, um, who wants to get revenge on the person who stole her son's idea for a hot dog business. Legitimately, that's what that movie's about.

• 2:03:02Griffin Newman?

  That, that, I will agree with you, that does sound bizarre.

• 2:03:05Speaker 05

  It's not good.

• 2:03:06Griffin Newman?

  Um, but my like realization watching this of like, does any movie with Holly Hunter in this era immediately gain a star and a half for me? Right?

• 2:03:14Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:03:14Griffin Newman?

  Her first film's The Burning, then like Uncredited, Voice and Blood Simple.

• 2:03:18David Sims?

  Yes.

• 2:03:18Griffin Newman?

  Swingship, which she covered and she is incredible in that.

• 2:03:21David Sims?

  She's awesome in Swingship.

• 2:03:22Griffin Newman?

  Where you're just immediate like, who the fuck is this?

• 2:03:24Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:03:25Griffin Newman?

  Raising Arizona, obviously she is incredible in that.

• 2:03:28David Sims?

  Yes.

• 2:03:28Griffin Newman?

  Uh, End of the Line, a film my father worked on.

• 2:03:31David Sims?

  Oh, I don't know that movie.

• 2:03:33Griffin Newman?

  You would actually probably like it. It's a fucking railroad movie with Kevin Bacon, Holly Hunter, Wilfred Brimley and Mary Steenburgen.

• 2:03:39Speaker 05

  What?

• 2:03:39Griffin Newman?

  And Levon Helm from the band.

• 2:03:41Speaker 05

  If you've not seen this film.

• 2:03:42Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:03:44Griffin Newman?

  Then after that, Broadcast News.

• 2:03:46Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:03:47David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 2:03:47Griffin Newman?

  Miss Firecracker.

• 2:03:48Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:03:49Griffin Newman?

  1989 is something called Animal Behavior. Karen Allen, Armand Assante, Josh Mistel and Holly Hunter, the four names on the post.

• 2:03:57David Sims?

  The big four.

• 2:03:57Griffin Newman?

  The big four, and then Always 89, right? 91, Once Around, I don't know what that is.

• 2:04:03David Sims?

  Once Around is a Lasse Hallström movie.

• 2:04:05Griffin Newman?

  Starring?

• 2:04:06David Sims?

  Richard Dreyfuss.

• 2:04:07Griffin Newman?

  Dickie Dreyfuss.

• 2:04:08David Sims?

  Uh, about a woman who falls for and eventually marries an overbearing older man who proceeds to rub her family the wrong way. I don't know who played that role, the, uh, older man.

• 2:04:17Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, I can't imagine. Ninety-three, she wins Best Actress for the Piano, the same year she gets a Supporting Actress nomination for The Firm.

• 2:04:24Speaker 05

  And credit, great, great credit to Jane Campion for seeing some of those remarkable performances that could not be more different from what the piano asks her to play and being like, oh, no, there's something in there.

• 2:04:34Griffin Newman?

  She is the least obvious casting choice in the world for that film.

• 2:04:37Speaker 05

  Fascinating. And then, and whereas The Firm is very, like, up her alley and she's wonderful.

• 2:04:41Griffin Newman?

  It's an interesting, cause she is not someone I think of as being chameleon-ic at all. You hire her for the Holly Hunter thing.

• 2:04:48Speaker 05

  Yes, exactly.

• 2:04:49Griffin Newman?

  There is a wide range of how the Holly Hunter thing can be applied and within that she can hit any emotion you want.

• 2:04:56Speaker 05

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:04:56Griffin Newman?

  Um, but she's not someone who transforms or disappears.

• 2:05:00Speaker 05

  No.

• 2:05:00Griffin Newman?

  And part of that is probably just how distinctive her voice is.

• 2:05:03David Sims?

  It's the voice and she's, you know, got particular physical, you know.

• 2:05:06Griffin Newman?

  You take that away in the piano and suddenly it like frees her up in this way that she, it's just, we, we talked about her full episode, but you're like, it is so bizarre, that's her only Oscar win and there is no other performance in her career like that. But then you're like still on this good fucking run of Copycat, Home for the Holidays, Crash, I would say the moment where it starts to go a little pear-shaped, another film we've covered, A Life Less Ordinary.

• 2:05:30David Sims?

  Right, but would, but Crash is getting her in trouble. As much as I like that movie.

• 2:05:35Griffin Newman?

  Masterpiece.

• 2:05:35David Sims?

  It's a, right, a fascinating movie, but that movie at the time, people are like, you are insane for being in this film.

• 2:05:40Speaker 05

  It pushes her too far into like esoteric, yeah.

• 2:05:43David Sims?

  Right, to be clear.

• 2:05:44Speaker 05

  When was Living Out Loud? Did you say that one?

• 2:05:46Griffin Newman?

  That is the following year, ninety-eight.

• 2:05:48Speaker 05

  Cause she, there was like, she had like some mild awards buzz for that and it never materialized. So did Queen Latifah, I believe.

• 2:05:53Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:05:54Speaker 05

  Um, but then that was kind of it in terms of that for a long time.

• 2:05:57Griffin Newman?

  I feel like she enters this phase, basically starting at that point, which has now continued for like, uh, twenty-five years plus, where every couple of years, she will pop up again and people will be like, oh, right, Holly Hunter. Holly Hunter's one of her best living actors. And then immediately forget her again.

• 2:06:14Speaker 05

  It was like.

• 2:06:15Griffin Newman?

  Take her for granted.

• 2:06:15Speaker 05

  She got the thirteen nomination and then many years later.

• 2:06:18Griffin Newman?

  Right, fucking Holly Hunter, we should use this.

• 2:06:20Speaker 05

  And then like Big Sack didn't quite materialize, but almost did.

• 2:06:23Griffin Newman?

  There will be these sort of like, and a lot of it is just like, a lot of movies that kind of like, don't totally exist.

• 2:06:28Speaker 05

  There's not a movie where she drinks piss and then gets blown up?

• 2:06:31David Sims?

  What is happening, Griffin?

• 2:06:32Griffin Newman?

  I have some terrible news for you.

• 2:06:33Speaker 05

  Oh, there is one?

• 2:06:34Griffin Newman?

  There is one.

• 2:06:35Speaker 05

  Is that what Living Out Loud is about?

• 2:06:36Griffin Newman?

  In her defense, she thought it was Granny's pee.

• 2:06:39David Sims?

  Can we discuss something about Holly Hunter that we think haven't discussed? Maybe we have, I can't remember.

• 2:06:44Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 2:06:45David Sims?

  She was the original voice of Chicken Little, right? And this sort of original formulation of Chicken, of Mark Dindell's Chicken Little.

• 2:06:52Griffin Newman?

  I am so excited about where this episode's going. You just watched Chicken Little for the first time, is that correct?

• 2:06:56David Sims?

  I wouldn't say just, but I would say like so, you know, I'm at the mercy of Disney Plus's carousel sometimes where like I'm trying to show my daughter X movie and she'll see a picture-

• 2:07:04Griffin Newman?

  If she sees the tile.

• 2:07:05David Sims?

  Of Y movie and she sees a picture of a cute little chicken with glasses, wearing a shirt.

• 2:07:10Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:07:10David Sims?

  And she points at it and goes, "I want that." And I was like, "You know what? I don't think I ever saw Chicken Little. How bad could it be?" Mark Dindell, director of The Emperor's New Group. I put it on. What the fuck happened?

• 2:07:21Griffin Newman?

  Dog shit.

• 2:07:21David Sims?

  Not just dog shit-

• 2:07:22Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:07:23David Sims?

  Is a movie.

• 2:07:24Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:07:24David Sims?

  Which it is.

• 2:07:25Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:07:25David Sims?

  Insanely terrible looking.

• 2:07:27Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, everything about it's bad.

• 2:07:28David Sims?

  Embarrassing looking.

• 2:07:29Griffin Newman?

  Everything about it's bad.

• 2:07:30David Sims?

  She doesn't love it, to be clear, either. But she's watched it a few times.

• 2:07:33Griffin Newman?

  I am so happy for you.

• 2:07:35Speaker 05

  I love Kid Logic. She didn't really like it. We only watched it seven times.

• 2:07:38David Sims?

  Pretty much.

• 2:07:39Griffin Newman?

  I have terrible news. My knee just hit the desk.

• 2:07:42David Sims?

  That thing-

• 2:07:43Speaker 05

  Jesus.

• 2:07:43David Sims?

  Has got to go.

• 2:07:45Griffin Newman?

  Okay, I'm gonna push back. I just, we have to let the laugh play out.

• 2:08:01Speaker 06

  Welcome to 215 Maple Drive. We just put this property on the market. Love the crown molding. Oh, wait until you see the walk-in closets and the bathroom tile. Does it have Verizon FiOS? You know, 100% fiber internet? No FiOS, but it looks like it's got cable. Let's check out the kitchen. No FiOS? Yeah, no thank you. Don't you want to see the rest? Okay, bye-bye.

• 2:08:25David Sims?

  Get Verizon FiOS, because when you're moving, it's 100% or nothing.

• 2:08:34Griffin Newman?

  Chicken Little only makes sense through the prism of its moment, right? Which is, they're losing Pixar. That is the moment where Eisner had gotten cocky and been like Pixar's gonna have a flop. And once they have one movie fail, we'll have them over the barrel in terms of renegotiations. And then they kept succeeding and they hated Eisner so much that they were like, we are going anywhere else. And that's sort of Eisner's last bid before they push him out largely because of him fucking up the Pixar deal.

• 2:09:07David Sims?

  Right.

• 2:09:08Griffin Newman?

  And that movie is them being like, we need to figure out how to make our own Pixar in-house.

• 2:09:12David Sims?

  Right.

• 2:09:12Griffin Newman?

  And yes, it was originally supposed to be Holly Hunter with entirely different premise. I almost want to say a different design style.

• 2:09:19David Sims?

  Probably.

• 2:09:20Griffin Newman?

  I think it was Dindel from the beginning, but Emperor's New Groove is obviously like a very serious sort of like Mayan epic that wasn't working. And then they bring in Mark Dindel and he's like, what if it's all funny bits?

• 2:09:32David Sims?

  Right.

• 2:09:32Griffin Newman?

  And reworks the movie in one year and does this like a major sobbing job?

• 2:09:35David Sims?

  Holly Hunter, Chicken Little had a big bow on her hair.

• 2:09:38Griffin Newman?

  Right. They like-

• 2:09:40David Sims?

  Subtle stuff.

• 2:09:40Griffin Newman?

  They made Dindel Dindel his own movie?

• 2:09:44David Sims?

  Stop using the word Dindel.

• 2:09:45Griffin Newman?

  And they just kept being like, I don't know, more aliens? Who's on sitcoms right now?

• 2:09:50David Sims?

  It's such, it's such a weird movie because it's like, he thinks the sky is falling and then he's humiliated.

• 2:09:55Griffin Newman?

  Ben, Richard, do you know what the plot of Disney's Chicken Little is?

• 2:09:59Speaker 05

  I mean, I know the story of Chicken Little.

• 2:10:01Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 2:10:01David Sims?

  Right.

• 2:10:01Speaker 05

  No.

• 2:10:02David Sims?

  He thinks the sky is falling, he runs for everyone to save their lives, he causes all this chaos and it turns out that like, everyone thinks that potentially just like a tree branch landed on his head and he was just freaking out over nothing.

• 2:10:11Griffin Newman?

  Pebble or whatever.

• 2:10:12David Sims?

  Then 45 minutes of the movie is him trying to join the baseball team to impress his widowed chicken father played by Gary Marshall.

• 2:10:20Griffin Newman?

  Yes. While like original Bear Naked Ladies song play. It's the era where Disney's like, we can't do musicals.

• 2:10:27David Sims?

  Is this Bear Naked Ladies? And I was like, it can't be like-

• 2:10:31Griffin Newman?

  Little miss.

• 2:10:33Speaker 05

  And Jessica Lange got an Oscar nomination for this?

• 2:10:35Griffin Newman?

  Chicken Little! For writing.

• 2:10:38David Sims?

  There is an original Bear Naked Ladies song. There's a whole sequence that's like just them playing baseball.

• 2:10:43Speaker 05

  You haven't mentioned that the chicken is Zach Braff.

• 2:10:45Griffin Newman?

  It's Zach Braff is the chicken. Peak Scrub Zach Braff is the chicken. So you're watching this and you're like, where the fuck is this all going? The hook to the Disney Chicken Little is that Chicken Little was right about the sky falling. What he witnessed was a malfunctioning of one of the video screens that aliens have placed in the sky to obfuscate the fact that they're getting ready to invade us.

• 2:11:07Speaker 05

  What?

• 2:11:08Griffin Newman?

  And Chicken Little is the only one who's aware that there's an alien invasion happening and no one believes him.

• 2:11:14Speaker 03

  As I'm listening to this, I'm just picturing an empty desert and just like wind blowing.

• 2:11:19David Sims?

  It's one of those movies, like Twin Peaks, like ominous wishing. It's one of those movies where you're like, God, this is interminable. And it's like 70 minutes long.

• 2:11:28Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:11:28David Sims?

  It's so short.

• 2:11:32Griffin Newman?

  It sucks. Yeah.

• 2:11:33David Sims?

  Anyway.

• 2:11:34Griffin Newman?

  I feel like there are, you can see online the animation tests of Holly Hunter as Chicken Little.

• 2:11:39Speaker 05

  That I would like to see. I mean, I'm sure that was good.

• 2:11:41Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:11:42Speaker 05

  But we just need more of her. We need like another big movie role or something. Cause she's like this movie, a lot of her stuff is a reminder, but like watching this movie, I was like, I think that when she's really on, she's my favorite actress.

• 2:11:55Griffin Newman?

  I, I had the same thought.

• 2:11:57Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:11:57Griffin Newman?

  I had the same thought. I was like unquestionably, she's in my like Hall of Fame 10.

• 2:12:04Speaker 05

  Yeah. Oh, yeah. Easily. Yeah.

• 2:12:05David Sims?

  Of course.

• 2:12:06Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:12:07David Sims?

  Look, she, the first time I watched this movie, I was like, I love this performance so much. I would like nominated for an Oscar, like even though the movie doesn't totally work for me. And like on rewatch, I think I got grumpier that it sort of doesn't do enough with her.

• 2:12:26Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:12:26David Sims?

  That she is kind of the girl, like as much as they, they try to kind of get beyond that, like in the second half of the movie, she's always kind of defined by the boys. She's, you know, quote unquote, falling for or resisting or whatever.

• 2:12:39Speaker 05

  And worried about and yeah.

• 2:12:41Griffin Newman?

  I think that's the other part of it is like the.

• 2:12:45Griffin Newman?

  She has so much energy on screen and even if with Richard Dreyfuss, a lot of that is negative energy, when the second half of the movie asks her to just go Gaga for Brad Johnson, you're just like, this makes her feel small.

• 2:13:02Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:13:02Griffin Newman?

  Right?

• 2:13:02Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:13:03Griffin Newman?

  Like, why is she becoming reactive to someone who's like sturdy versus like, Dreyfuss is at least conjuring emotion, even if the emotion is, I want to strangle this man.

• 2:13:12Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:13:13Griffin Newman?

  You're like, you can't be passive about him.

• 2:13:16Speaker 05

  Yeah, exactly. And it's like, oh, just settle down with some boring guy, you know? And I don't know, it's just, it's a bad match.

• 2:13:21Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:22Speaker 05

  And it's weird that like, I guess, I don't know, I mean, maybe they did see it when filming and were like, well, it's too late now, like, we have this Marlboro contract and we can't get out of it, but.

• 2:13:32Griffin Newman?

  I don't know, but he did.

• 2:13:33David Sims?

  Yeah, but what if it is that Marlboro's like, this is the girl, like, you know, like the fucking actual Marlboro man comes in and Spielberg's like, I can't argue with big tobacco.

• 2:13:42Griffin Newman?

  Uh, is it Flight of the Intruders?

• 2:13:45David Sims?

  Uh, sure, that's a movie.

• 2:13:47Griffin Newman?

  That's like the only other.

• 2:13:49David Sims?

  Flight of the Intruder with Danny Glover and Willem Dafoe and Brad Johnson.

• 2:13:53Griffin Newman?

  Right, I was gonna say, it's like the one.

• 2:13:55David Sims?

  It's a John Milius movie.

• 2:13:56Griffin Newman?

  Where his name is above the title. And I feel like was the one time after this that they were like, even though that wasn't a hit, I guess.

• 2:14:03David Sims?

  He makes sense as a guy that Milius would be like, I love this guy.

• 2:14:06Griffin Newman?

  Totally.

• 2:14:06David Sims?

  He's American as hell, you know?

• 2:14:08Speaker 05

  Even that name sounds made up, you know, it's just like.

• 2:14:10Griffin Newman?

  Every time I say it, I feel like I'm saying the wrong name.

• 2:14:13Speaker 05

  Right, yeah.

• 2:14:13Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, that I'm correcting it to something more basic, but it is like, right, he does that two years after this.

• 2:14:21Speaker 05

  Is it?

• 2:14:21Griffin Newman?

  And then he's basically immediately like a TV direct to video guy.

• 2:14:24Speaker 05

  It's one of Spielberg's strangest bits of casting.

• 2:14:27Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:14:27David Sims?

  Uh, it's definitely one of his biggest misfires because as you say, Griff, like a Ty Sheridan or a Jeremy Irvine, I'm like, you know, those are guys who have been good in movies, like Ty Sheridan, obviously, starting with Tree of Life or whatever.

• 2:14:39Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:14:39David Sims?

  Jeremy Irvine, I don't think, I, I, I think Jeremy Irvine is like, one of the worst actors who works. I really apologize to him if he like, ever hears me say that.

• 2:14:51Griffin Newman?

  You know?

• 2:14:51David Sims?

  Because I feel bad saying it because I'm sure he's fine.

• 2:14:54Griffin Newman?

  Blink check, Decade of Dreams, right? There's a part in which we still just feel like this show is only listened to by the people on our Reddit.

• 2:15:03Speaker 05

  Oh, and that's yeah.

• 2:15:03Griffin Newman?

  And increasingly, we will find out people are listeners and immediately David and I do the calculus of what is the worst thing we've ever said about that person on the show?

• 2:15:09Speaker 05

  You need that Tina Fey, I don't think so, honey. Like, you're too famous to be saying.

• 2:15:13Griffin Newman?

  Just try not to take stray shots of people who aren't the explicit subject of the episode.

• 2:15:18Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:15:19Griffin Newman?

  And most people who we say something negative about, I've always said we will also say something positive about in the grand balance of the thing. Cause there's very few people we holistically disregard. I agree with you. I think Jeremy Irons is maybe the most boring actor alive.

• 2:15:31Speaker 05

  But if you want to offset that, I think unfortunately you've just kicked open the door. I am gonna come on and do a Stonewall episode with you guys. Kidding. Never.

• 2:15:40David Sims?

  I'm also, like, they're finally making another Silent Hill movie. Christoph Gans, who made the first movie, which I think is like kind of a masterpiece, is making it.

• 2:15:46Griffin Newman?

  He's coming back?

• 2:15:47David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 2:15:48Griffin Newman?

  Cause he didn't do the.

• 2:15:49David Sims?

  He didn't do the, like, truly execrable sequel, which is one of those.

• 2:15:53Griffin Newman?

  Resurgence, redemption, retribution?

• 2:15:54David Sims?

  Silent Hill. It might be retribution. Uh, I truly have to look it up. Revelation.

• 2:15:58Griffin Newman?

  Reawakening?

• 2:16:01Griffin Newman?

  Revelation.

• 2:16:02David Sims?

  Which is one of those, like, if we do it on Patreon one day, which, hey, if there's a third one, we probably could.

• 2:16:07Griffin Newman?

  Sure.

• 2:16:07David Sims?

  It's one of those, after the first movie, we're like, that was pretty, that was awesome. Like, this is it. And then you queue up the second movie in one minute and you're like, we've made a huge mistake. Like, what the fuck is going on?

• 2:16:16Griffin Newman?

  It's Cocked on Dundee 2.

• 2:16:17David Sims?

  Yes. Um, but fucking Jeremy Irons is the star. And I'm like, god damn it. Like, we couldn't get someone better. Um, anyway.

• 2:16:23Griffin Newman?

  Well, look, this is what it boils down to, right? Like, you saying people with personality. Dreyfus is such a good example of, like, what an unlikely movie star. In a way that, like, removed from context, I think it's just kind of confounding to people where you're like, why was this guy so big and so celebrated? And it was like, he was cast very well a couple of times in seismic movies where he was kind of kept on rails. And what you needed was someone coming in with a lot of personality, right?

• 2:16:56Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 2:16:56Griffin Newman?

  Like, he is not an obvious movie star, but like, those parts demanded someone with a weird energy that does just kind of make you lean in. The complete unknown, like freak. Show thing, right?

• 2:17:07Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:17:08Griffin Newman?

  Um, and I think sometimes in this like corridor of like when Spielberg falls into the boring boy problem. It's that he picks guys who like on a surface level are like, this guy seems like a movie star. He's got good shoulders and a good jaw and a healthy voice and he works well on camera. But there is just kind of a blandness.

• 2:17:27Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:17:28Griffin Newman?

  And sometimes it is like someone like Ty Sheridan, who can really come alive in smaller projects. But when you put them in the machinery of that kind of thing, they can't figure out how to build a character.

• 2:17:39Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:17:39Griffin Newman?

  In that structure, especially when the character on paper is just kind of like the hero. Or the cute guy, you know?

• 2:17:47Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:17:47Griffin Newman?

  And it's why like Shia, it did feel like was him sort of finding a new Dreyfus. Where he's like, this guy isn't a normal leading man. There's something kind of annoying and manic about him.

• 2:17:57Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:17:57Griffin Newman?

  You know, they both are people who seemingly have severe mental illness that can manifest in a way that is sometimes electrifying on screen. But it does feel like he specifically has a problem whenever he's trying to cast quote unquote, like a new movie star, like a new matinee idol.

• 2:18:17Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:18:18Griffin Newman?

  And the LaBelle thing beyond him being a good pick is like, well, he's casting someone to play him. He's a weird, complicated character. He's not looking for someone to just be handsome and charming.

• 2:18:30Speaker 05

  Right. And like you can only find, and he didn't even find him.

• 2:18:35Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:18:35Speaker 05

  One Harrison Ford every fucking 50 years.

• 2:18:38Griffin Newman?

  With established movie stars, he can do it.

• 2:18:40Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:18:41Griffin Newman?

  He's very good at seeing someone do something while another movie.

• 2:18:44David Sims?

  I know exactly what project to give that person.

• 2:18:46Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 2:18:46Speaker 05

  But he wouldn't be good at minting a Harrison Ford.

• 2:18:49Griffin Newman?

  No, weirdly, weirdly kind of, right? Cause he's even like taking Dreyfus from.

• 2:18:55David Sims?

  You could argue he minted Harrison Ford in that like Star Wars obviously minces Harrison Ford, but there's a world, I guess where it's like, he was just Han Solo and no one could ever figure out what to do with the guy. And it's like Spielberg using him correctly is what makes Harrison Ford Harrison Ford.

• 2:19:08Griffin Newman?

  I think I would argue he is very good at solidifying people.

• 2:19:13Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 2:19:14Griffin Newman?

  Like, he can't kind of like build someone from scratch. Or like locate it in a vacuum. But he can sort of go like, you know what they should do? They should go 20 degrees off from what they're doing right now. And placed into this context, they might come alive and expand.

• 2:19:31Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:19:31Griffin Newman?

  And he's done that a lot where he's helped movie stars unlock new chambers.

• 2:19:36Speaker 05

  The Lois Smith before Minority Report is not the Lois Smith after Minority Report.

• 2:19:40Griffin Newman?

  Right now, that's like guaranteed $20 million opening.

• 2:19:42Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:19:42Griffin Newman?

  Because people saw.

• 2:19:43David Sims?

  Yeah, because she's gonna be the new king.

• 2:19:45Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:19:46Speaker 05

  Actually, wait, that sounds great.

• 2:19:49David Sims?

  Always, I'm just reading from the dossier's sort of release part. It opens Christmas season 1989, grosses just 3.7 million on 1,000 plus screens. So it has legs because it ends up at 43. But I think it's kind of DOA.

• 2:20:04Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:20:05David Sims?

  In like a.

• 2:20:06Speaker 05

  What did it cost?

• 2:20:07David Sims?

  Uh, 30.

• 2:20:08Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:20:09David Sims?

  So, you know, it kind of made its budget back worldwide, probably, you know, plus, you know, blah, blah.

• 2:20:14Griffin Newman?

  It received two Saturn Award nominations and nothing else from anybody.

• 2:20:18David Sims?

  David Denby, who used to, you know, fucking execute some kill shots, says, was there no one among Spielberg's associates with the intellectual stature to convince him that having cried at a guy named Joe when he was 12 years old was not a good enough reason for him to remake it?

• 2:20:34Speaker 05

  Damn.

• 2:20:34David Sims?

  Critics used to be really mean, man.

• 2:20:36Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:20:37David Sims?

  Sheila Benson had the obvious, but I think necessary, a better title would be Forever, which is roughly its running time.

• 2:20:44Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 2:20:44David Sims?

  Woo! You might want to set off the goblin bomb again.

• 2:20:47Griffin Newman?

  Don't tempt me. It is, it's basically two hours on the nugget, right?

• 2:20:51David Sims?

  Uh, yeah, it's like two hours, five minutes. It's pretty much the exact same length as A Guy Named Joe.

• 2:20:55Griffin Newman?

  Yeah. I mean, there is this sort of subgenre it falls into, and I've been thinking about this recently because of the movie I'm about to cite. But like, uh, remakes that are directors who have been obsessed since childhood with a movie and sort of make their own version of it to try to work through, why am I so hung up on this?

• 2:21:16Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:21:17Griffin Newman?

  And like, I think Eggers' Nosferatu is that.

• 2:21:20Speaker 05

  Mm hmm.

• 2:21:20Griffin Newman?

  I think Jackson's King Kong is that. Like, movies that almost feel like them expanding the lore of like, when I was a child, I interpreted it this way. Or I didn't know why this movie made me cry.

• 2:21:31Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:21:31Griffin Newman?

  And you're sort of doing this like, very loving, faithful expansion. You know, and like, blowing it up to a bigger scale in a way that almost feels like making a big budget, like, dissertation.

• 2:21:44Speaker 05

  Yeah, and I think it's why, that's one of the reasons why Spielberg's most profound, and I think best movie ever, AI, is saying goodbye to that.

• 2:21:54Griffin Newman?

  Yep.

• 2:21:55Speaker 05

  He's like, okay, you get to do this one more time. You get to return to the childhood thing and kind of try to excavate something.

• 2:22:01Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:22:01Speaker 05

  But then we're saying, good night, it's over. I mean, he didn't quite do that with the rest of his career. But like, you know what I mean? Like, it just like, he did recognize that something like Always was like, I was trying to grasp for something irretrievable.

• 2:22:13Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:22:13Speaker 05

  And, yeah.

• 2:22:14Griffin Newman?

  No, it's like, it's just fascinating how completely the Schindler experience, like, just connects him to something deeper. And I do think, when we covered the second half of his career, the times post that, that he tries to go back to more of a like, Amblynni Spielberg, are always, I'd say, other than Tintin, which is kind of its own weird beast, I think sort of being activated by the different technology. When it feels like, now this is kind of the insincere version of him. Versus the color purple, where you're like, stop pretending to be a grown up.

• 2:22:47Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:22:47Griffin Newman?

  You know, it's like, it does feel like he is firmly in a sort of world of grown up ideas now.

• 2:22:54Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:22:54Griffin Newman?

  And when he's like, I want to make a classic movie for children, it feels a little hollow.

• 2:22:59Speaker 05

  Right, there's no, like, watching Empire of the Sun, there's really not much indication that that same person would make Munich.

• 2:23:05Griffin Newman?

  Right.

• 2:23:05Speaker 05

  You know?

• 2:23:06Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:23:06Speaker 05

  Which maybe is a weird comparison, but like-

• 2:23:08Griffin Newman?

  No, no, but I think, I think is a, is a good point. Yes, and like, the version of Always he makes after Schindler is-

• 2:23:15Speaker 05

  Totally different.

• 2:23:16Griffin Newman?

  But then you're also just like, post Schindler, does he go like, why am I trying to remake this?

• 2:23:20Speaker 05

  Schindler forever complicated his nostalgia.

• 2:23:22Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:23:22Speaker 05

  Where he's like, oh, actually, all that, that era that I pine after was horror. You know, there was so much horror happening in the world.

• 2:23:28Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:23:29Speaker 05

  Um, but yeah, and again, that's why I think AI is really like, the key. Not, maybe even more than Fableman's in a way, although the two are in dialogue with each other, I think, but-

• 2:23:39Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:23:40David Sims?

  Um, should we play the box office game?

• 2:23:42Griffin Newman?

  So I did see what was number one because in reading pieces about the movie at the time, I saw people being like, it's pretty embarrassing that the Spielberg movie was beaten out by this.

• 2:23:52David Sims?

  Okay, well, always opens number five, so it's beaten out by four things. Well, what are you thinking?

• 2:23:56Griffin Newman?

  Tango and Cash?

• 2:23:57David Sims?

  So Tango and Cash is new this week, but it is number two at the box office.

• 2:24:02Speaker 05

  Tango and Cash is, is that, is that Mel Gibson?

• 2:24:05David Sims?

  No, Stallone and Russell.

• 2:24:07Speaker 05

  Stallone and Russell, and it's really crass movie, if memory serves me.

• 2:24:11David Sims?

  It's crass, but a lot of fun.

• 2:24:13Griffin Newman?

  And Stallone was coming off a bit of a bad run, so people were, I think, underestimating that movie and overestimating like, it's Spielberg making a weepy, this thing's gonna own the holiday season.

• 2:24:24David Sims?

  What's the joking community where, uh, like Joel McHale sees Rob Corddry and they're like, Tango, Sundance, and he's like, we were in two different, like, duos. I can't remember what, it's something like that.

• 2:24:37Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, I think so.

• 2:24:37David Sims?

  Um, anyway, number one, though, is a holdover comedy big hit.

• 2:24:43Griffin Newman?

  Big hit comedy.

• 2:24:44David Sims?

  Sequel.

• 2:24:45Griffin Newman?

  It's not Ghostbusters 2. That was a summer release.

• 2:24:48David Sims?

  Yeah, sure.

• 2:24:48Griffin Newman?

  But it's a sequel. It's not Beverly Hills Cop 2?

• 2:24:50David Sims?

  No.

• 2:24:52Griffin Newman?

  Big, is it a two?

• 2:24:55David Sims?

  I think it is, it is the second, I'm pretty sure, but, uh, it's not, doesn't have like a two in the title.

• 2:25:00Griffin Newman?

  They dropped a deuce, but it's the second.

• 2:25:01Speaker 05

  It's not Music Box 2.

• 2:25:03David Sims?

  Uh, not yet.

• 2:25:04Griffin Newman?

  It's not Jewel of the Nile.

• 2:25:05David Sims?

  No.

• 2:25:06Griffin Newman?

  No, but it doesn't have a two in the title.

• 2:25:08David Sims?

  Uh, no.

• 2:25:09Griffin Newman?

  Huh?

• 2:25:09David Sims?

  Oh, you know what? I take it back. This is the third entry. I'm so sorry.

• 2:25:13Griffin Newman?

  Well, thank you. That is...

• 2:25:14David Sims?

  I had to triple check because it doesn't have a number.

• 2:25:16Griffin Newman?

  No, I appreciate you doing the work. Appreciate you doing the work. Doesn't have a number. It's the third.

• 2:25:21David Sims?

  I'm sure Ben's seen it.

• 2:25:22Griffin Newman?

  You're sure Ben has seen it?

• 2:25:23David Sims?

  I don't feel like Ben loves this franchise.

• 2:25:26Griffin Newman?

  It's not Cheech and Chong.

• 2:25:27David Sims?

  No, but it's a star.

• 2:25:29Griffin Newman?

  How much you love that franchise?

• 2:25:30David Sims?

  We've covered another movie with this star that Ben did love.

• 2:25:34Griffin Newman?

  It's a Chevy?

• 2:25:35David Sims?

  It's a Chevy Chase.

• 2:25:36Griffin Newman?

  Is it Christmas Vacation?

• 2:25:37David Sims?

  It is National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.

• 2:25:39Griffin Newman?

  I mean, a big movie.

• 2:25:40David Sims?

  I love those movies. Okay. Yeah, I wasn't sure where you were.

• 2:25:43Speaker 05

  Christmas is the best one, I think.

• 2:25:44David Sims?

  You think it's the best one?

• 2:25:45Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:25:46David Sims?

  Who?

• 2:25:46Speaker 05

  Well, it's the one I've seen the most.

• 2:25:47Griffin Newman?

  We'll never talk about this franchise.

• 2:25:50David Sims?

  We'll never talk about this franchise. Now, this one is directed by Jeremiah.

• 2:25:53Speaker 05

  Your shitter will never be full.

• 2:25:54David Sims?

  Jeremiah Chechik.

• 2:25:55Griffin Newman?

  Yes. This is the movie that Chris Columbus famously quits days into filming or days before filming.

• 2:26:01David Sims?

  Basically being like, I cannot fucking work with Chevy Chase. And Chris Columbus seems like basically the nicest man in Hollywood.

• 2:26:07Griffin Newman?

  I have only heard that he might be the nicest person on planet Earth.

• 2:26:10David Sims?

  I have met Chris Columbus.

• 2:26:11Griffin Newman?

  Yep.

• 2:26:12David Sims?

  Like, he is a truly, you can just tell, like, a truly menshy dude. Like, a really great guy.

• 2:26:18Griffin Newman?

  Borderlands saintly.

• 2:26:19David Sims?

  Yes, and.

• 2:26:20Speaker 05

  You're talking about the explorer?

• 2:26:21Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:26:22David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 2:26:22Griffin Newman?

  Only do good things.

• 2:26:23David Sims?

  And everything he did was good, right? And all of his discoveries were his alone.

• 2:26:26Griffin Newman?

  In my opinion, I think we should give him 10 days.

• 2:26:28Speaker 05

  He's a credit to the Italian people.

• 2:26:30Griffin Newman?

  Columbus month.

• 2:26:32David Sims?

  Um, and right, he quit it. So it was directed by Jeremiah Chechik, who has like one of the most insane filmographies of all time because it's this, and then Benny and June.

• 2:26:42Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:26:42David Sims?

  And then Diabolique, the remake of.

• 2:26:45Speaker 05

  Speaking of Isabella Jannini.

• 2:26:46Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:26:47David Sims?

  Uh, uh, and then the not marvels, but, uh, Britons, The Avengers with Ralph Fiennes, Uma Thurman, and Sean Connery, which is a, a classic, like, half the movie is gone, right? Like, where it's like, it's 82 minutes or whatever, and you're like, what just happened? And they're like, ah, we don't know. We, we don't know what just happened.

• 2:27:05Griffin Newman?

  It's 82 minutes, but then you check your clock and you're like, were they counting the time I was online for concessions? Are they baking the trailers into the runtime of the movie?

• 2:27:14David Sims?

  Uh, like, just such a weird directorial career. Anyway.

• 2:27:17Griffin Newman?

  And that basically ends his career?

• 2:27:19David Sims?

  Yeah, he, he directed the, like, ESPN Bronxes Burning mini-series. Like, he still worked, but, anyway. That movie's number one, uh, Christmas, Xmas Vacation.

• 2:27:29Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 2:27:29David Sims?

  A hit. Tango and Cash is number two.

• 2:27:32Griffin Newman?

  Certainly, like, lasted.

• 2:27:33David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 2:27:34Griffin Newman?

  I feel like it's become a, a kind of a tradition.

• 2:27:37Speaker 05

  A staple. Yeah, I watched it most, most Christmases, yeah. Tango and Cash, I meant.

• 2:27:42Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, of course.

• 2:27:43David Sims?

  Yeah. Number three, it's a film I actually mentioned, a very, very dark comedy, um.

• 2:27:50David Sims?

  Director of career, yes. Danny DeVito's War of the Roses.

• 2:27:53Speaker 05

  That's a great movie.

• 2:27:53David Sims?

  Yes. And obviously DeVito is someone we will one day do on blank check.

• 2:27:58Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:27:58David Sims?

  He's not like someone we're rushing to, but it's an interesting career.

• 2:28:01Speaker 03

  It's a fun, short one.

• 2:28:03Griffin Newman?

  That's the other thing. It's a, it's a nice little slot.

• 2:28:05Speaker 05

  He is fun and short.

• 2:28:06Griffin Newman?

  I mean, that's my friend Sarah Rubin, the great Sarah Rubin, past and future guest, said, "Rubin sent the text, have you guys ever considered Danny DeVito colon, "short series for a little man?"

• 2:28:16David Sims?

  Good call.

• 2:28:17Speaker 05

  That's good.

• 2:28:17David Sims?

  I just watched the Abbott Elementary crossover episode of It's Always Sunny.

• 2:28:21Griffin Newman?

  Congratulations.

• 2:28:21David Sims?

  Which really did a perfect job.

• 2:28:24Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:28:24David Sims?

  Watching It's Always Sunny and kind of being like, "This is which, what every character would do." And it's like, yeah, Mac would go with the principal because they're both schemers.

• 2:28:33Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:28:33David Sims?

  Like, the, the nice teachers would try to teach Charlie how to read, like, and it's like Danny DeVito, "What does he do? He gets in a fight with a janitor and starts putting batteries in the garden." Like, it's like Danny DeVito's having fun.

• 2:28:43Griffin Newman?

  I saw, I read an interview with Kenta. I've not watched the episode yet. But I, I read an interview with her where they were like, were you worried at all about how you make these two tones compatible? And that show is so much more explicit and has a very different audience. And she was like, "Here is the thing we cracked immediately. "Our show's a mockumentary, which means these characters know that they're on camera."

• 2:29:01David Sims?

  Right.

• 2:29:01Griffin Newman?

  Which means they're behaving slightly better.

• 2:29:04Speaker 05

  Oh, that works.

• 2:29:04David Sims?

  The best version of that joke is that Glenn Howden's character spots the cameras immediately. He's like, "I can't be filmed." And just like runs off camera.

• 2:29:10Speaker 03

  Oh, my God. Wait, that's so fun.

• 2:29:12Griffin Newman?

  That's really smart.

• 2:29:13David Sims?

  Every other time he's briefly on camera, he once again, he clocks them and he like runs away again. It's really funny.

• 2:29:18Speaker 05

  Have you seen the sunny episode with the Apple people?

• 2:29:21David Sims?

  I have not yet.

• 2:29:21Griffin Newman?

  That, I think that doesn't air for-

• 2:29:23David Sims?

  I think it hasn't aired yet, but I'm very excited.

• 2:29:25Griffin Newman?

  Their season's not until the summer. There's a weirdly long gap between them.

• 2:29:28David Sims?

  But very excited for whatever that is. And also, within the world of Abbott Elementary, it does make sense that they're just like, "Are you the guys who run that terrible bar in South Philly? "Like, I've seen you on like TV, on the news."

• 2:29:41Griffin Newman?

  I very much want to do DeVito. DeVito is a real, like,

• 2:29:46Griffin Newman?

  "One year off of a March Madness winner. "We're gonna look at the schedule and go like, you know what? "We could just knock DeVito out in five weeks and then do this."

• 2:29:53David Sims?

  Yeah, it'll happen.

• 2:29:54Griffin Newman?

  It'll happen. Also, fucking War of the Roses remake.

• 2:29:58David Sims?

  Oh, what's that?

• 2:29:59Griffin Newman?

  Well, of course you remember.

• 2:30:00David Sims?

  Musical or whatever with Brian Darcy James, right?

• 2:30:03Griffin Newman?

  You're forgetting the very obvious-

• 2:30:04David Sims?

  Oh, that was Dave Weinberg's.

• 2:30:05Speaker 05

  That's, that's, yeah.

• 2:30:06David Sims?

  Yeah, I'm sorry.

• 2:30:07Griffin Newman?

  You forget the very obvious, announced War of the Roses remake starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman.

• 2:30:13David Sims?

  Uh, okay.

• 2:30:14Griffin Newman?

  That is real and not a thing that Richard made up as a joke. For the podcast. I'm forgetting who's directing it.

• 2:30:21Speaker 05

  It's the guy who made The British Avengers.

• 2:30:24Griffin Newman?

  I think it's literally, they're calling it like The Roses now or something.

• 2:30:28David Sims?

  It is called The Roses. It's directed by.

• 2:30:31Speaker 05

  Oh no, he just made a face.

• 2:30:32Griffin Newman?

  David?

• 2:30:33Speaker 05

  He made a really sad face.

• 2:30:35David Sims?

  Of all the names.

• 2:30:36Griffin Newman?

  He did the deepest inhale.

• 2:30:39David Sims?

  Jay Roach.

• 2:30:40Griffin Newman?

  Oh my god.

• 2:30:41David Sims?

  What the fuck is happening in our culture?

• 2:30:45Griffin Newman?

  Here's the thing. Here's the, here, here is the thing, okay? If you were like, Jay Roach is remaking War of the Roses with Ben Stiller.

• 2:30:56Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 2:30:56Griffin Newman?

  And fucking Reese Witherspoon or whatever, right? I'd be like, sure, fine, whatever. That makes sense. To do the Tony British casting of it and then cast Jay Roach.

• 2:31:06Speaker 05

  Horrifying. Yeah.

• 2:31:08Griffin Newman?

  Feels so at odds with itself.

• 2:31:09Speaker 05

  And it's gonna take place during the 2008 election.

• 2:31:12David Sims?

  I don't know, man. I don't know. Maybe it'll be great.

• 2:31:17Griffin Newman?

  Look, at least it seemingly stopped him from making Oceans 2.

• 2:31:20David Sims?

  Is that a thing that was gonna happen?

• 2:31:22Griffin Newman?

  Yes.

• 2:31:22David Sims?

  The Gosling.

• 2:31:23Griffin Newman?

  Gosling and Margot Rownan.

• 2:31:25David Sims?

  Okay, number four of the box office, a sequel. We've covered it on this podcast.

• 2:31:28Griffin Newman?

  It's a sequel that we've covered on this podcast. It's a big movie. In 1989.

• 2:31:35David Sims?

  1989.

• 2:31:36Griffin Newman?

  It's once again not Ghostbusters 2.

• 2:31:38David Sims?

  No, but it is a 2.

• 2:31:40Griffin Newman?

  It is a deuce. They dropped a deuce. It's a. What? That's, that's, don't give me that look.

• 2:31:47David Sims?

  Rolling my eyes at the poop joke.

• 2:31:48Griffin Newman?

  Don't give me that look. It's a big sequel.

• 2:31:51David Sims?

  It's a big sequel. It was a big hit, not a hit on the scale of the original.

• 2:31:55Griffin Newman?

  Did we cover it? Main feed or Patreon?

• 2:31:56David Sims?

  Yep, main feed.

• 2:31:57Griffin Newman?

  Main feed. Main feed.

• 2:31:59David Sims?

  Main feed.

• 2:32:00Griffin Newman?

  89.

• 2:32:00David Sims?

  You like it more than I do.

• 2:32:02Griffin Newman?

  I like it more than you do. Oh, oh. It is Back to the Future, Part 2.

• 2:32:08David Sims?

  Part 2.

• 2:32:08Griffin Newman?

  Part 2. They dropped a deuce.

• 2:32:11David Sims?

  Um, number five always. Number six is Disney's The Little Mermaid.

• 2:32:15Griffin Newman?

  Mm hmm.

• 2:32:16David Sims?

  Incredible movie.

• 2:32:17Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:32:17Speaker 05

  How long has it been out at this point?

• 2:32:19David Sims?

  Been out for six weeks.

• 2:32:20Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 2:32:20David Sims?

  Uh, it's very early in its run. It's made about thirty million dollars. It's gonna make, you know, more than a hundred.

• 2:32:25Griffin Newman?

  No, it it ends up below a hundred.

• 2:32:27David Sims?

  I guess the re-releases put it above a hundred, but back then getting, you know.

• 2:32:32Griffin Newman?

  Oh, no, no, no, it did well, but it's one of those things where you read the press at the time. People are like, I know I'm gonna sound crazy. But the new Disney movie is good. And it just kind of hung in there for months.

• 2:32:42Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:32:42Griffin Newman?

  And then like.

• 2:32:43Speaker 05

  Primed the pump for Beauty and the Beast to be.

• 2:32:45Griffin Newman?

  Then explosion, then the next four are all like mega hits. Yeah.

• 2:32:50David Sims?

  Uh. Number seven is Steel Magnolias, another big hit of the fall.

• 2:32:55Griffin Newman?

  Mm hmm.

• 2:32:56David Sims?

  Uh, number nine is the, uh, um, sort of satirical comedy Blaze.

• 2:33:04Griffin Newman?

  Oh, sure.

• 2:33:05David Sims?

  The Ron Shelton movie with Paul Newman as Earl Long.

• 2:33:10Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:33:11David Sims?

  Um.

• 2:33:12Griffin Newman?

  See, I've been interested in, I I've been meaning to watch that in my interest of like old CAD Paul Newman, like salty asshole Paul Newman.

• 2:33:18David Sims?

  I would like to fill in some Newman gaps. That's certainly one of them. Not like a hugely remembered movie.

• 2:33:23Griffin Newman?

  I'm sorry, I'm, and I know this is moving back a film, but I'm doing the math in my head. Is there a Patreon series that is like? Steel Magnolias, Fried Green Tomatoes, Divine Secrets of the Yaya Sisterhood.

• 2:33:35Speaker 05

  Oh, like Southern.

• 2:33:37Griffin Newman?

  Ensemble.

• 2:33:38Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:33:39Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:33:39Speaker 05

  I think there, I think there's something there.

• 2:33:41Griffin Newman?

  Right?

• 2:33:41Speaker 05

  Yeah, for sure.

• 2:33:42Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:33:42Speaker 05

  You'd probably have to watch some pretty bad movies, not the ones you named necessarily.

• 2:33:46Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:33:46Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:33:47Griffin Newman?

  And we curate.

• 2:33:48David Sims?

  Um, number nine is the, I would say fairly forgotten Sidney Lumet movie, uh, Family Business with Connery Hoffman and Broderick.

• 2:33:57Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, now.

• 2:33:59David Sims?

  Yes.

• 2:33:59Griffin Newman?

  If I were casting a movie in which I had to cast three generations of men in the same family.

• 2:34:03Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:34:04Griffin Newman?

  Grandfather, father, son.

• 2:34:05Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:34:06Griffin Newman?

  I think the first three names that would come to me who just fit really well together are Sean Connery, Dustin Hoffman, and Matthew Broderick. Three people who absolutely share.

• 2:34:15David Sims?

  Related!

• 2:34:16Griffin Newman?

  DNA strands out.

• 2:34:17Speaker 05

  It's almost as good as that movie where Glenn Close plays Mila Kunis's mom, which, you know, totally syncs up.

• 2:34:23Griffin Newman?

  Absolutely.

• 2:34:24Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:34:24Griffin Newman?

  Uh, no, there's just, the poster for that movie in my memory is sort of like ones at a desk, ones over the shoulder.

• 2:34:28David Sims?

  Connery's sitting and the other two are over the shoulder.

• 2:34:30Griffin Newman?

  It's kind of a great things come in bears sort of setup.

• 2:34:33Speaker 05

  Is it like a crime thing?

• 2:34:34Griffin Newman?

  It's, it's, they're, they're like a media family, is that right? Is, do they work in the news?

• 2:34:38David Sims?

  Uh, I don't know, because the tagline is, there's nothing like a good robbery to bring a family together. So let's find out what this movie is.

• 2:34:45Griffin Newman?

  I just feel like that's a movie where the poster just sets up, hey, one of these guys fathered one of these other guys that fathered the other guy. And America's just like, absolutely not, we are not buying that.

• 2:34:55Speaker 05

  Nope, nope, nope.

• 2:34:56Griffin Newman?

  That is, we refuse.

• 2:34:58David Sims?

  Uh, yeah, it's like, uh, Sean Connery is a gangster and his son, Vito, Dustin Hoffman.

• 2:35:10Griffin Newman?

  Uh huh.

• 2:35:11David Sims?

  Hmm, because Sean Connery has a Sicilian wife? Sean Connery's Scottish in the movie.

• 2:35:16Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:35:17David Sims?

  This, you, I can tell. Hello, this is my Italian son, Vito. I can feel the screenplay like, like going. I'm gonna rob a bank. Look, he has a Sicilian wife.

• 2:35:25Griffin Newman?

  Dad, grandfather, what are we doing here?

• 2:35:28David Sims?

  And Vito, again, Dustin Hoffman plays Vito.

• 2:35:32Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:35:32David Sims?

  Uh, has a son, uh, Matthew Broderick, who he's trying to keep away from the business.

• 2:35:39Griffin Newman?

  Uh huh.

• 2:35:40David Sims?

  But so Broderick doesn't know even that his dad is Grandpa's a gangster.

• 2:35:43Griffin Newman?

  And his name is Miguel Sanchez? Matthew Broderick?

• 2:35:47David Sims?

  Uh, his name is Adam.

• 2:35:49Griffin Newman?

  Okay.

• 2:35:49David Sims?

  And I guess they all get involved into some like heist that they do.

• 2:35:53Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:35:54David Sims?

  This movie sounds insane. People did not like the movie. It got a bad reviews.

• 2:35:58Griffin Newman?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:35:58David Sims?

  Uh, number 10 at the box office, a film we'll never discuss, Look Who's Talking.

• 2:36:01Griffin Newman?

  Hmm.

• 2:36:04David Sims?

  That's me looking at who's talking.

• 2:36:05Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, and none of us were talking at that moment.

• 2:36:07Speaker 05

  That was me doing my Holly Hunter in the piano impression.

• 2:36:11Griffin Newman?

  That's really good.

• 2:36:12David Sims?

  You know, always.

• 2:36:15Speaker 05

  Yeah, I have to say, I have very fond memories of loving it as a child that were a bit tarnished, but I still hold that those first 30 minutes are great.

• 2:36:23Griffin Newman?

  I'm with you, and I kinda like, I think Hunter pushes it over the edge to being a gentleman's six for me.

• 2:36:29Speaker 05

  Yeah, I think that's totally fair.

• 2:36:30Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:36:31Speaker 05

  I would give it three stars on Letterboxd.

• 2:36:32Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, that's where I put, I'll say this, like halfway through the movie, I like logged it on Letterboxd and gave it a heart.

• 2:36:38Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:36:39Griffin Newman?

  And then like 15 minutes later, I was like, I'm gonna take the heart back.

• 2:36:41Speaker 05

  Okay, fair enough.

• 2:36:42Griffin Newman?

  I don't do stars, but I truly was just like, you know what, I'm enjoying this so much, that heart is gonna last an hour from now. And then I was just like, yonk.

• 2:36:52Speaker 05

  Is anyone else craving the smooth taste of a Marlboro cigarette right now?

• 2:36:55Griffin Newman?

  So badly. You know what I would love to do? I'd love to, especially in this brutal winter, I'd like to get snug inside of Marlboro sleeping bag.

• 2:37:04David Sims?

  Oh, God.

• 2:37:06Griffin Newman?

  With a long box of duty free packs.

• 2:37:08Speaker 05

  The lining is just crushed cigarettes.

• 2:37:12Speaker 05

  That's so crazy.

• 2:37:13Griffin Newman?

  What were the other, do you remember other items you got?

• 2:37:15David Sims?

  No, the sleeping bag is the thing I remember. And my guess is that most of the items were useless, like to a family.

• 2:37:22Speaker 03

  Exciting news, there's some available on eBay, ranging, yeah, ranging from 80 to even down to $20.

• 2:37:32Griffin Newman?

  What about like the motorcycles? Can you find the motorcycles?

• 2:37:34Speaker 03

  Oh, God, then that is it. That's it, right there.

• 2:37:36Griffin Newman?

  That's the one?

• 2:37:36Speaker 05

  The next Blank Check Live is just gonna be, everyone files into Town Hall, and David is just asleep on stage in a Marlboro sleeping bag, and that's the whole show.

• 2:37:44David Sims?

  What I want, you know, in my life is a used sleeping bag. I mean, that's what I'm really trolling eBay for.

• 2:37:50Speaker 05

  A used cigarette sleeping bag.

• 2:37:52David Sims?

  How many people have slept in this?

• 2:37:53Speaker 03

  What could go wrong?

• 2:37:54Speaker 05

  How many people have smoked in it?

• 2:37:55David Sims?

  And it's got a cigarette logo on it? Good.

• 2:37:58Griffin Newman?

  I want, I just really...

• 2:37:59David Sims?

  Because you want to associate cigarettes with sleeping, two things you should have together.

• 2:38:02Griffin Newman?

  In my opinion, the cornerstone of a great sleeping bag is the mileage.

• 2:38:06Speaker 05

  I have a Cool's tent if you want to go camping.

• 2:38:12David Sims?

  Uh, so I have to pee, Griffin.

• 2:38:15Griffin Newman?

  Wow, okay.

• 2:38:16David Sims?

  I'll be back because I know how long you take.

• 2:38:18Griffin Newman?

  I was, I was gonna ask Richard for his plugs and it's gonna seem really rude if you're pissing while he-

• 2:38:22Speaker 05

  I don't really have any plugs, so.

• 2:38:24David Sims?

  Pissing all over his plugs.

• 2:38:26Griffin Newman?

  He can piss on Ricky's plugs?

• 2:38:28Speaker 05

  Don't piss on my plugs and tell me it's Marlboro, I don't know.

• 2:38:32Griffin Newman?

  Uh, Little Gold Man.

• 2:38:34Speaker 05

  Little Gold Man, uh, still going strong-ish, uh-

• 2:38:37Speaker 03

  Wait, I have a joke to finish.

• 2:38:38Speaker 05

  Oh.

• 2:38:39Speaker 03

  Marlboro Golds, cuz piss is gold.

• 2:38:41Speaker 05

  Oh, there you go. I used to smoke those.

• 2:38:43Griffin Newman?

  Uh, this will, this will come out after the Oscars have happened. Do you wanna put any bold predictions?

• 2:38:49Speaker 05

  Oh, I think Timmy Moore is gonna win. I think, based on the SAG nominations, I'm, I'm swinging back to Timmy winning-

• 2:38:55Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:38:55Speaker 05

  -over Adrian. Um, there's just something in the water there. Yeah, and, and also, uh, Bengal getting the DGA nomination.

• 2:39:03David Sims?

  I just think the reaction to Timmy's performance was like universally like, I didn't know he had it in him. And I really think that's what kinda gets you an Oscar.

• 2:39:11Griffin Newman?

  Can I say it on mic now? And I might be proven very wrong, but I just wanna say it cuz I feel like it's a position no one's taking. I still think Ralph Fiennes is gonna win.

• 2:39:18David Sims?

  This has been your take?

• 2:39:19Griffin Newman?

  This has been my contention.

• 2:39:20David Sims?

  Conclave is, is lacking in buzz currently.

• 2:39:23Griffin Newman?

  What he needs to do in order to win is-

• 2:39:26David Sims?

  Start sucking those d's.

• 2:39:27Griffin Newman?

  -mount a new wave of excitement in the time between this episode recording and the ceremony in two months, but I sorta think it's gonna happen.

• 2:39:32Speaker 05

  I, I, that would be fun, and he, I was at the NBR's, the National Border Review Dinner, um, and I was at their table. Um, I didn't get to talk to Ralph much. I mostly talked to Edward Berger, but, um, onstage, they had, they won an ensemble award and Ralph spoke for a bit and he was quoting D.H. Lawrence. He quoted T.S. Eliot, and I was like, oh, wait a second, I want more of these speeches. Like, he is like very nice onstage, yeah.

• 2:39:55Griffin Newman?

  And him showing up at the fucking New Year's Eve-

• 2:39:57Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:39:57Griffin Newman?

  -thing, I was like, oh, he's kinda maybe gonna be campaigning.

• 2:40:00Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:40:01Griffin Newman?

  I think Shalhoub, if Shalhoub doesn't win, I would not be surprised if he wins. If he doesn't win, I almost think it's a like, do we wanna Dreyfuss him thing?

• 2:40:10Speaker 05

  Right.

• 2:40:11Griffin Newman?

  You know, where it's like,

• 2:40:11David Sims?

  That is the thing.

• 2:40:12Griffin Newman?

  Do we laud him this much this early when we know he's on a track to continue doing good work for decades?

• 2:40:17David Sims?

  Yeah, but with Brody, it's like, do we give him the second Oscar for the second good lead performance he's given?

• 2:40:23Griffin Newman?

  I don't think Brody wins. I think it's probably

• 2:40:25Speaker 05

  They did it with Hillary Swain.

• 2:40:26David Sims?

  Alright, that's what I'm saying.

• 2:40:27Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:40:28David Sims?

  And they, I think, regretted it a little bit.

• 2:40:30Griffin Newman?

  And the Zellweger thing as well. I feel like they feel embarrassed when they do that.

• 2:40:33David Sims?

  Yeah.

• 2:40:34Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:40:34Griffin Newman?

  After a couple of years.

• 2:40:35David Sims?

  And like, he won the Globe, but then I reminded myself, like, right, he didn't win the Globe for the penis. Not that the new Globes really care about who won old Globes, I guess. I don't know.

• 2:40:42Griffin Newman?

  Um, and then, uh, Saldana and

• 2:40:47Speaker 05

  I, I, I doubted Saldana for a while because I wasn't sure what people, how the industry actually thought about Emilio Perez. But Odiart getting the DGA and stuff, yeah. I think Selena's road has ended, though.

• 2:41:01Griffin Newman?

  I, I would agree with that.

• 2:41:02David Sims?

  Don't let the stands hear you say that.

• 2:41:04Speaker 05

  I mean, we'll never see, yeah, exactly. Um, so that, those are my ask replies. Oh, by the time this is up, I will, it'll be months old, I think. Um, I do have a full ranking of Steven Spielberg movies with like a paragraph for each thing, explaining my reasoning. Um, excited to dive into the writing of that.

• 2:41:18Griffin Newman?

  Can you spoil? Do you know right now what your dead top and dead bottom are?

• 2:41:22Speaker 05

  Dead top is AI, I think. I'm almost positive.

• 2:41:24David Sims?

  Yeah, that's my dead top, too.

• 2:41:25Speaker 05

  I watched it again for probably the fifth time.

• 2:41:27Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:41:27Speaker 05

  Like, last week, and I cried for the last 30 minutes in a way that was like genuinely cathartic and, and meant something. It wasn't just me responding to stimuli, you know?

• 2:41:36David Sims?

  Did Gigolo Jogo? Where is he?

• 2:41:37Speaker 05

  It's an incredible movie. Um, and then number one, or the last place with an absolute bullet is 1941, which is a complete catastrophe of a movie.

• 2:41:45Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, for some scheduling reasons, we have not gotten to that episode yet.

• 2:41:48Speaker 05

  It is the

• 2:41:49Griffin Newman?

  We've recorded almost all of them. It's been the thing at the end of the road.

• 2:41:52Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's, it's, it is really his only fully irredeemable movie.

• 2:41:56Griffin Newman?

  I have never been able to make it past maybe the 15 minute mark.

• 2:41:59Speaker 05

  It, well, because a strenuous slapstick farce that is not for one second funny is incredibly painful to listen to.

• 2:42:06David Sims?

  It is the worst kind of like peanut butter and, yeah, olives, like where you're just like, ah!

• 2:42:11Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:42:11David Sims?

  Alright.

• 2:42:12Speaker 05

  Anyway, that's that. Thanks for having me.

• 2:42:14Griffin Newman?

  You're the best, Richard.

• 2:42:14Speaker 05

  I'll see you for 15, whatever that might be.

• 2:42:16David Sims?

  Are you gonna text us like in an hour saying the episode was bad?

• 2:42:20Speaker 05

  No, I was thinking about it. I'm not gonna do it.

• 2:42:22Griffin Newman?

  I, yeah.

• 2:42:23David Sims?

  Great app.

• 2:42:23Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 2:42:24Griffin Newman?

  Let's just say that Decade of Dreams, that you text us

• 2:42:27Speaker 03

  Usually.

• 2:42:27Griffin Newman?

  The evening of, or the next morning after, almost every episode and go, "Guys, I feel like I let you down. I'm so sorry."

• 2:42:33Speaker 05

  Yeah, and then I wait for months for the episode to come out.

• 2:42:36Speaker 03

  And we respond, "You did, and you should be."

• 2:42:38Speaker 05

  Yeah, no, it's really a piece of-

• 2:42:39Griffin Newman?

  What are you talking about? And the only reason I'm bringing this up on Mike, although David was the one who opened the box, is that you are one of the most important people in the history of the show, and you're always great.

• 2:42:47Speaker 05

  Well, thank you. 100%.

• 2:42:48Griffin Newman?

  And I always am so excited when you're coming on.

• 2:42:51Speaker 05

  Me too, and I really appreciate that you guys often do, like, get an annoying text message from me and actually are like, "Okay, you can do that." You know, because I know it's your show, not mine, so.

• 2:43:01Griffin Newman?

  No, but it always, every time, every episode you've ended up on feels like, "Oh, that makes sense." And sometimes there's another plan that shifts. Sometimes it was always from the get-go, you were supposed to go there, but it's-

• 2:43:12Speaker 05

  You think K19 and you think me, you know?

• 2:43:14Griffin Newman?

  It's a thing I always look for, too.

• 2:43:16Speaker 05

  No, exactly.

• 2:43:17Griffin Newman?

  I love you, love the episodes.

• 2:43:18Speaker 05

  Thank you. Thank you for having me. Congrats on 10 years.

• 2:43:19Griffin Newman?

  Love our time together.

• 2:43:20Speaker 05

  Um, I just have one last thing to say.

• 2:43:22Griffin Newman?

  Please.

• 2:43:22Speaker 05

  Happy.

• 2:43:23Griffin Newman?

  Happy. Uh, thank you for listening. Tune in next week for?

• 2:43:29Speaker 03

  Uh, for Hook.

• 2:43:32Griffin Newman?

  Um, an episode I predict our listeners will be really, really-

• 2:43:37Speaker 03

  No complaints.

• 2:43:38Griffin Newman?

  Normal about. No one's gonna get angry at me. And as always-

• 2:43:44Speaker 03

  Well, wait, over on the Patreon.

• 2:43:46Griffin Newman?

  Oh, over on Patreon?

• 2:43:47Speaker 03

  Because when this episode comes out, it will be the last day of our March Madness voting.

• 2:43:55Griffin Newman?

  That's wild to think about.

• 2:43:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 2:43:56Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, okay.

• 2:43:58Speaker 03

  So hopefully, listeners have been following along with that.

• 2:44:02Griffin Newman?

  Yeah, you'll have had a high-value month of all the extra March Madness content over on Patreon.

• 2:44:08Speaker 03

  As well as, you know, voting for our main feed.

• 2:44:10Griffin Newman?

  Yeah.

• 2:44:11Speaker 03

  And, and we are in the midst of our, uh, Star Trek Picard series on Patreon.

• 2:44:19Griffin Newman?

  Uh, so that will be fun. Check that out.

• 2:44:22Speaker 03

  All right, now wrap this up.

• 2:44:23Griffin Newman?

  And as always, please, please, do not murder me for what I say on the Hook episode.

• 2:44:36Speaker 03

  Blank Check with Griffin and David is hosted by Griffin Newman and David Sims. Our executive producer is me, Ben Hostly. Our creative producer is Marie Bardi Salinas, and our associate producer is AJ McKeon. This show is mixed and edited by AJ McKeon and Alan Smithy. Research by JJ Birch. Our theme song is by Lain Montgomery and the Great American Novel, with additional music by Alex Mitchell. Artwork by Joe Bowen, Holly Moss, and Pat Reynolds. Our production assistant is Minnick. Special thanks to David Cho, Jordan Fish, and Nate Patterson for their production help. Head over to blankcheckpod.com for links to all of the real nerdy shit. Join our Patreon Blank Check Special Features for exclusive franchise commentaries and bonus episodes.

• 2:45:21Speaker 03

  Follow us on social @BlankCheckPod. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, Checkbook, on Substack. This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Productions.