Oscars Recap, ‘White Lotus’ S3E3, and ‘Severance’ S2E7

Chris and Andy recap the Oscars and talk about some of their favorite moments from the show (4:26) and the trailer for ‘Andor’ Season 2 that dropped during the broadcast (10:52). Then they break down the latest episode of ‘The White Lotus’ and the burning questions they have now that we’re three episodes in (25:36), before discussing ‘Severance’ S2E7 and how this episode was a masterclass in directing for TV (44:24). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Senior Producer: Kaya McMullen Video Production: Chris Thomas Video Editor: Stefano Sanchez Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Chris Ryan?

  This episode of The Watch is brought to you by Coffee Mate. Coffee Mate has been searching the globe for flavors that pair perfectly with coffee. So when they heard the new season of HBO's original series, The White Lotus, was set in Thailand, they were inspired to brew up two new flavored creamers, Thai Ice Coffee and Pina Colada flavored creamers. They're available for a short time only, so for the love of coffee, go try them now.

• 0:24Speaker 01

  I need sports staff to clear the room. Stand up and walk now.

• 0:29Chris Ryan?

  Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at theringer.com and joining me in the studio with his dog-eared copy of All Quiet on the Western Blunt, it's Andy Greenwald. Yeah.

• 0:48Andy Greenwald?

  Good to be back. Look at his energy level.

• 0:50Chris Ryan?

  Hollywood's biggest night is in fact whatever day you come through LAX, Ben. You know what I'm saying?

• 0:56Andy Greenwald?

  Should we, first of all, thank you. Nice to see you. Should I talk about the funniest thing that I should have done? Which is I did return

• 1:03Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 1:03Andy Greenwald?

  this weekend.

• 1:04Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 1:05Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, from a fortnight abroad and as I was exiting, I did notice one of the, uh, ride dri- like, not Uber drivers, like the limo drivers

• 1:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:14Andy Greenwald?

  with the names was the person there to pick up the esteemed French director Jacques Audiard for his, uh, time at the Oscars.

• 1:22Chris Ryan?

  But you guys could have rapped about the last episode of The Bureau if you jumped in the car with him.

• 1:25Andy Greenwald?

  Or what if they cut, like, if I had just gone up to him and said, uh, bonjour, I could have been at the Oscars.

• 1:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I think they would have, uh, you have the exact same hairstyle as Audiard.

• 1:34Andy Greenwald?

  I think, well, I would have worn a hat like he did. I think the level of interest Hollywood showed in Emilio Perez would have meant that I could have just sailed through.

• 1:43Chris Ryan?

  Um, Greenwald, before we get started, we're gonna talk about the Oscars, we're gonna talk about Severance, we're gonna talk about White Lotus, we might do a little Thousand Blows.

• 1:50Andy Greenwald?

  You're cagey about it.

• 1:51Chris Ryan?

  Chat a little bit about it with Manzoukas. I mean, I'm not cagey about anything.

• 1:54Andy Greenwald?

  That's non-canon.

• 1:55Chris Ryan?

  I know, I know.

• 1:55Andy Greenwald?

  If we talk about things with-

• 1:56Chris Ryan?

  If you're not there, it didn't happen. I understand.

• 1:58Andy Greenwald?

  But similarly, when I talk about things when you're not on the show-

• 2:00Chris Ryan?

  I don't care.

• 2:01Andy Greenwald?

  I know. So, sorry.

• 2:03Chris Ryan?

  Housekeeping, you're watching us, if you're watching us, you may be doing it on YouTube at ringer-tv. You could also do it on Spotify now, where you listen to our show and you can also just watch it right there on the player on Spotify. Please follow us on Instagram at the watch pod underscore and email us at the watch at spotify.com.

• 2:22Andy Greenwald?

  Do you watch yourself on Spotify?

• 2:24Chris Ryan?

  Uh, yeah, I mean, just to do a tech check, keep everybody out here in line, make sure performance is at the levels that I'm accustomed to.

• 2:30Andy Greenwald?

  Whoa.

• 2:30Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:31Andy Greenwald?

  Wow.

• 2:31Chris Ryan?

  Octane, baby. Yeah.

• 2:32Andy Greenwald?

  Cool.

• 2:33Chris Ryan?

  Um, welcome back.

• 2:35Andy Greenwald?

  Thank you.

• 2:36Chris Ryan?

  From one NATO country to another.

• 2:38Andy Greenwald?

  For now.

• 2:38Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Uh, let's talk about the Oscars, unless you want to do some opening, kind of like, just, you want to get loose? You want to talk to me about England?

• 2:46Andy Greenwald?

  No, I mean, I just want to say, I may, I am a little loose because I, I was just saying to Kaya that like, flying there, I'm great.

• 2:53Chris Ryan?

  I don't understand this at all, dude.

• 2:55Andy Greenwald?

  On going there.

• 2:56Chris Ryan?

  I cannot go east.

• 2:57Andy Greenwald?

  I.

• 2:57Chris Ryan?

  Coming west, I'm like, who wants to, let's play two.

• 3:01Andy Greenwald?

  God, that's funny. That's the same advice that the Third Reich got, you know?

• 3:06Chris Ryan?

  That is funny.

• 3:07Andy Greenwald?

  It's true.

• 3:08Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 3:08Andy Greenwald?

  Um, they didn't listen. Um, thankfully. Uh, yeah, I can go east, no problem. I get there, hang out, have dinner, wake up, I'm fine.

• 3:18Chris Ryan?

  I don't understand.

• 3:18Andy Greenwald?

  I come back here, I am destroyed.

• 3:20Chris Ryan?

  You don't wake up at 1 a.m. and just start like, and you're not like shocked awake.

• 3:24Andy Greenwald?

  There?

• 3:24Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 3:25Andy Greenwald?

  No.

• 3:25Chris Ryan?

  Wow.

• 3:26Andy Greenwald?

  Here, yes. Yeah. So you're seeing me, I think that if we had done this pod, I think my sweet spot probably would have been around 4:45 this morning. I think I was pretty locked in.

• 3:37Chris Ryan?

  That's where all the severance takes are coming from.

• 3:39Andy Greenwald?

  I was up, here's the way the brain works at that hour, because the thing is, you're just like, your body does become accustomed to taking coffee at a certain point.

• 3:47Chris Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 3:47Andy Greenwald?

  And so for me, that point is midnight LA time, when I'm like, boy, I really need that first coffee. So when I did wake up at four, four, four.

• 4:00Andy Greenwald?

  I was having really, really strong thoughts about, well, about television. I really thought I could have podcasted. But I was also like, I'm a bit peckish. And then I was like, you know what would be a good idea right now? Crack that bag of tortilla chips.

• 4:12Chris Ryan?

  You had tortilla chips at four in the morning?

• 4:13Andy Greenwald?

  I didn't. I'm just trying to explain to you what's going on in here.

• 4:16Chris Ryan?

  Okay. All right. Well, we're gonna take care of you. We're gonna treat you gently. We're gonna teach you with kid gloves.

• 4:21Andy Greenwald?

  Sure. No, I could bare knuckle, like Thousand Blows.

• 4:25Chris Ryan?

  Okay, let's talk a little bit about the Oscars. Obviously, Sean and Amanda have done the Lord's work.

• 4:29Andy Greenwald?

  Sean was dressed like he was doing the Lord's work. That was amazing.

• 4:32Chris Ryan?

  They had a truly the greatest day in the Enora verse. Sean and Amanda did a pre-show. They did a post-show. You should definitely be listening to them when it comes to actually analyzing what this all means, what it means for the Oscars, like how we got here in terms of this awards race.

• 4:49Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 4:50Chris Ryan?

  Just their wonderful thoughts on the films themselves. I wanted to hear from you as someone who, I think sadly, to be honest, is probably more representative of the larger audience than we'd like to admit.

• 5:02Andy Greenwald?

  This is the first time I've ever been the late person.

• 5:04Chris Ryan?

  Which is that you have not either had a chance or the opportunity or the desire to see a lot of the films that have been nominated.

• 5:12Andy Greenwald?

  That's correct.

• 5:12Chris Ryan?

  So you probably can't weigh in too strongly outside of like personal preference, right? Well, I mean, nobody's gonna stop you. You know, it's a free country.

• 5:19Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, but you are right. I think that I have seen three of the 10 nominated films.

• 5:24Chris Ryan?

  Conclave, Brutalist, and Dune 2.

• 5:27Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, that's right.

• 5:28Chris Ryan?

  And Wicked.

• 5:30Andy Greenwald?

  Kids saw it without me. Then they keep watching it without me. Which is fine, by the way. I'm cool with it. Kids were so mad that Ariana got robbed, in their opinion. Like, really upset about that.

• 5:41Chris Ryan?

  If they were listening to The Big Picture, they wouldn't know what was happening, what was coming.

• 5:43Andy Greenwald?

  I was like, guys, Gomorrah won.

• 5:48Andy Greenwald?

  And they were like, no, no, Enora won. I'm like, no, no.

• 5:50Chris Ryan?

  Guys, Lion is Joe one.

• 5:53Andy Greenwald?

  Wait, by the way, that's right there. The Gamora move, like, we could, you know, like, put it to Nora. Do you see what I'm saying?

• 5:59Chris Ryan?

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, she's just, she's just a girl, you know?

• 6:04Andy Greenwald?

  But she's green.

• 6:05Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 6:05Andy Greenwald?

  But it's not wicked. See? Everything's working for me. Yeah, I agree with you.

• 6:09Chris Ryan?

  I want to ask you, though, what you thought of it as a piece of television.

• 6:11Andy Greenwald?

  Um, as a piece of television, it was a little perplexing. There were, there were very entertaining moments. I thought Conan was good. I'm happy to see him having a good time and laughing. And I thought his jokes mostly landed and he had a good winning spirit. And I loved the blue tuxedo.

• 6:25Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 6:25Andy Greenwald?

  I have to say, that was really sharp. Um, I also really liked the cinema streams bit.

• 6:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 6:31Andy Greenwald?

  I thought that was very good.

• 6:32Chris Ryan?

  We bring you this salty snack. Yeah, that was good.

• 6:36Andy Greenwald?

  The, uh, what did they say the screen was? A thousand smartphones stitched together? Thought that was good. Um, I thought what was particularly, well, there are a couple of very strange things, like there are every Oscars. One was that the set and kind of vibe was very, very, very, um, uh, third Reichy, to pick the second reference.

• 7:02Chris Ryan?

  Really?

• 7:03Andy Greenwald?

  Like, I thought it was very, very intense and serious looking. And similarly, like, the in memoriam segment with those wild-

• 7:09Chris Ryan?

  The music was weird for that, yeah.

• 7:10Andy Greenwald?

  Choral numbers. And the whole thing felt very, I'm not, here's, I'm not saying that the Oscars should ever be business casual, despite what Adam Sandler was wearing. It's just that it felt, everything felt so overly overwrought and formal. It didn't match with the sort of scrappy, I guess, we're kind of the independent spirit now, you know, and that we kind of want people to just, please come watch movies. In the same way that TV, the Emmys used to be like, well, we're not movies, but we're trying here. Like, that used to be the vibe of a lot of Emmy shows. So I thought that, that overall sense of, like, portentousness felt a little at odds with what could have been a little bit-

• 7:48Chris Ryan?

  The set, the physical set.

• 7:49Andy Greenwald?

  The physical set and the, and the staging of a lot of it, um-

• 7:54Andy Greenwald?

  But then again, like, considering how these things can often go, I thought there were a lot of good speeches, mainly powered by the fact that Sean Baker is an unnaturally charismatic and talented and funny guy to be, especially for someone who won, he won four, like personally, did he win four?

• 8:11Chris Ryan?

  He won editing, directing, writing.

• 8:14Andy Greenwald?

  And he's a producer, so he won picture too.

• 8:15Chris Ryan?

  And picture, yeah, so and then he would have, I guess he was the casting director of the movie. So next year, as Sean was talking about, they have casting his next year and he probably would have won that as well. But he, it is crazy. I think he has more Oscars now than Steven Spielberg.

• 8:31Andy Greenwald?

  That's, I'm just sort of sitting with that for a second.

• 8:33Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 8:36Andy Greenwald?

  But I, so, so the speeches were good, that, you know, and generally, I thought, I don't know.

• 8:42Chris Ryan?

  How was it watching it not having seen the movies, though? I mean, typically, you probably get closer about half, six, seven, you've been in and out of the country, like.

• 8:50Andy Greenwald?

  I've sometimes gotten closer to nine or 10.

• 8:51Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. And so what was it like watching and just having seen just a couple of things? Like, did you find yourself cheering for Enora, having, or not, like DG Kim?

• 9:00Andy Greenwald?

  So, so just full disclosure, I've been desperate to see Enora for months and have not made it happen for various circumstantial reasons. I did finally, on the flight back, decide, I'm like, okay, enough is enough. Because I thought I would be able to watch it while abroad, but I forgot to download it in any capacity in American airspace. So it is not streamable in the UK, it is in theaters still. So, so I had no choices. And so then I was on the 11 hour flight and I was like, I gotta pull, I gotta rip the Band-Aid. I know this is not how Sean Baker intended for me to see this film, as he said last night, but he also made an entire movie on an iPhone once. So really, come on. So I did fire it up and pretty clearly realized that it would just be naked ladies.

• 9:45Chris Ryan?

  It's about the first hour, yeah.

• 9:46Andy Greenwald?

  For, for a long time. And I, I did, I did do like a politeness check to see if there were any babies around me. And there weren't, but I still was like, this doesn't feel awesome. This just doesn't feel, and again, in the scheme of things, like, why should I be prudish about a film about sex workers when the man across from me was just absolutely unabashedly watching Craven the Hunter? Like, I feel like he had more to be embarrassed about, but I stopped it. So all that is to say, I still haven't seen Enora, even though I feel pretty strongly that I would be, I will be. Retroactively pro and or.

• 10:20Chris Ryan?

  I can't tell with you anymore. You know, the ones that you have seen, your takes have been spicy. Uh, I thought that, uh, to your point about the indie spirit awards, you know, I think these things go in cycles. I think that there's probably still some residual COVID and strikes.

• 10:36Andy Greenwald?

  That's true.

• 10:37Chris Ryan?

  Sort of entropy happening within the industry where even last night, as Sean and Amanda pointed out, I thought wisely, there was just not even a lot of trailers for movies. You know, like I thought like the big, the, the most gasp, this is great to see trailer was Andor, uh, which we haven't really talked about on this.

• 10:54Andy Greenwald?

  No, we haven't because it dropped as we were recording last Monday.

• 10:57Chris Ryan?

  Uh, which aside from whether or not I, I'm, I think it's pretty divisive that the Steve Earl pick. Cause it's just like a little bit more like you, the fucking real ones know.

• 11:09Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 11:09Chris Ryan?

  But it's not.

• 11:10Andy Greenwald?

  Let's go.

• 11:10Chris Ryan?

  Thunderstruck by ACDC, which is what I think it starts out as, you know, and as a riff. Um, is it looks better than anything Star Wars has done.

• 11:23Chris Ryan?

  Oh. Since the JJ Abrams, like since Force Awakens and the Ryan Johnson film. Honestly, it looks like some of the visuals in that show look astonishing this year. And I wonder if it's going to be much more action packed.

• 11:36Andy Greenwald?

  I, I, I mean, should we just talk about that instead of the Oscars?

• 11:39Chris Ryan?

  I was just going to say that there was.

• 11:41Andy Greenwald?

  Chris, Chris, Andora.

• 11:44Andy Greenwald?

  These ideas are free. They're just coming off the dome. I'm going to go to bed in 90 minutes. So take what you can. Um, this is good.

• 11:52Chris Ryan?

  Usually I think you have, uh, you made fun of the Oscars for being like my movies. Like the movie exceptionalism and Hollywood and stuff.

• 12:01Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah. Not, not feeling so smug now.

• 12:03Chris Ryan?

  It was a, a show with a lot of humility. I think, uh, acknowledging both the tough time LA has been through, the tough time the industry has been through. Um, I thought there were pleas from. The artists to go see these films in the way that they have intended for them to be seen, to keep the theatrical experience alive, to keep the communal aspect of movie going alive. The shots at Jeff Bezos, the shots at Amazon, like the weird juxtaposition of celebrating James Bond that has just been basically like taken over by Amazon while also making

• 12:44Chris Ryan?

  Amazon jokes. Like, it definitely seemed to be a show with a little bit more of a raised middle finger this year, which I kind of thought suited it for the time, but it was not an overtly, at least from the Conan perspective and for a majority of the speeches, not an overtly political or grandstanding night, which may have worked for some people and may have disappointed others.

• 13:05Andy Greenwald?

  So when you say political in that sense, do you mean in terms of the politics of the business or just politics in general?

• 13:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I mean, Daryl Hannah, like, and Robert Junior obviously spoke about Ukraine. The No Other Land victory was momentous and obviously was incredibly like touching moment of people pleading for recognition, not only of this conflict, but also of their film.

• 13:24Andy Greenwald?

  I also thought, just as a note about that, that it actually, I know we love spontaneity on, at award shows and on the stage. I thought that was a really lovely example of some forethought in the sense of like, who spoke first, who spoke second, what they spoke about and how they spoke together was really beautifully choreographed and very effective in the moment that they had on stage.

• 13:43Chris Ryan?

  So, yeah, I just thought this, this Oscar show just to me felt, even though Enora had this historic night, Enora sized in a weird way. Like, it was kind of like, yes.

• 13:56Andy Greenwald?

  Well, I think that's...

• 13:58Chris Ryan?

  Like, there are these big movies that had no shot, right? Like, Wicked and Dune had no shot. Then there are movies that feel very Hollywood, like Conclave or Complete Unknown, that were outsiders. And I just, I kind of, I thought it was interesting that this was a celebration, this, this, this came down essentially, I know Conclave was a late breaker with BAFTAs and that in the betting markets, it was getting closer. Before that, Conclave had kind of replaced The Brutalist, which had been the kind of... You know, like the other competitor for Nora for Best Picture and Best Director and stuff like that. And like, those two films are two of my favorite movies of the year. They're both in my top five.

• 14:35Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 14:36Chris Ryan?

  They are not Barbie and Oppenheimer, ultimately.

• 14:39Andy Greenwald?

  Well, I mean, that's the thing. You asked how it felt watching the show, having only seen a certain number of the nominees. The truth is, only a certain number of the nominees were relevant on the awards campaign. Like, as you said, most of these movies were not going to win anything, and that was very clear from the beginning. What's odd is, as you just said as well, when it came to the major awards, not the technical awards, Dune Part Two had as much of a chance as Nickel Boys. Now, again, that's not a quality comment. I look forward to seeing Nickel Boys, and I really like Dune Part Two. But it is a very strange moment, although one that kind of mirrors the American economy, that the entire middle of an industry has been hollowed out.

• 15:15Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 15:16Andy Greenwald?

  So, the big studios, I mean, Warner Brothers spent a ton of money doing F Y C stuff for Dune Part Two. Like, it was everywhere, posters, and obviously, there's going to be a Dune Part Three. So, it's just, it's not like a, there's still something to claim from that investment.

• 15:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, but I continue to say this, which is that the third Dune story, I would not describe as the Return of the King.

• 15:38Andy Greenwald?

  No, I've heard this as well.

• 15:39Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 15:41Andy Greenwald?

  Is it the fifth one, where there's the descendant who's part worm? I feel like that's the one I'm ready for.

• 15:45Chris Ryan?

  I feel like he gets pretty wormy himself in Three, but we'll see what Denis cooks up.

• 15:50Andy Greenwald?

  But, um, but it is odd that nobody, like, what is the target? Are people trying to hit the target? Because the studios, in the case of Warner Brothers and Universal, are doing their best. They're like, look what we did with Dune, and they're proud of it, and rightfully so. And Universal's like, look what we did with Wicked, where we developed this over a long time, this beloved musical, and we nailed it, in the sense of, like, the fans love it, Broadway people love it, it made a ton of money, there's a sequel, it's launching, you know, Cynthia Erivo into a different level of stardom. And then they go to these awards, and they win the technical awards, and they sit there being like, what do we have to do? It's, it's, it's a little bit, it's a little bit strange, and it feels, it feels odd.

• 16:33Andy Greenwald?

  I thought, I mean, I know nothing, and I am not really qualified to be commenting on this, having not seen most of the movies, but I was texting with Sean and Amanda because I saw that they both had picked Inora to win big picture, to win the best picture.

• 16:46Chris Ryan?

  Texting with Sean and Amanda, huh?

• 16:48Andy Greenwald?

  I was waiting for that. Well, first, I texted them the Jacques Audiard sign at Alix, like I texted you. I'm gonna be honest with you.

• 16:56Chris Ryan?

  You do a lot of copy, paste, send out a bit to a bunch of people?

• 17:00Andy Greenwald?

  Well, no, I sent it to you. I've been on a plane for 12 hours, and I got a laugh from you, but I wasn't fed enough. Like, I wanted more laughs, and I realized I should've sent it to all of you. And I did think about adding you to that thread, too, and asked you to sort of play along.

• 17:14Chris Ryan?

  It's funny, because I know exactly what you mean. We were just like, that didn't get the response that I needed.

• 17:18Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 17:19Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 17:19Andy Greenwald?

  So I tweaked the language a little bit, and I got nice reactions from them, which I appreciate.

• 17:23Chris Ryan?

  That's good. I'm glad they were there for you.

• 17:25Andy Greenwald?

  But my secondary reason for texting them was that I saw that they had picked Inora, and I was surprised by that, because I just thought, again, based on nothing, just a lifetime of watching this stuff, that Conclave was likely to be the winner because it was the most okay of it all, in the sense that it's relatively crowd-pleasing, it looks beautiful, I think it's an incredible-looking film, and coming off of BAFTAs, it was like, this just seems like a more genial consensus Oscar movie. Again, I'm not saying that pejoratively, it just felt like, given the competition, that that seemed the likely winner. Then Inora was a little too indie, a little too spiky to be the runaway favorite. I was completely wrong about that.

• 18:02Chris Ryan?

  A little too sex workery, is what you're saying.

• 18:04Andy Greenwald?

  Well, I stand with sex workers, and always have on this podcast. I'm not sure. You're very silent on this subject.

• 18:10Chris Ryan?

  I stand with them.

• 18:11Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, great.

• 18:11Chris Ryan?

  I do.

• 18:13Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, but I thought that was interesting, that it went that way. And I guess it's nice when they... I mean, Sean Baker's a great filmmaker. I like his movies always, so I think that's pretty exciting that he has such a big night. I was gonna talk about the brutalists, but that's fine.

• 18:30Chris Ryan?

  You see real pain?

• 18:32Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I saw that one. That's another one I saw. Is that four?

• 18:35Chris Ryan?

  Uh, that did not get nominated for best picture. It was up for best support. I would, I just wanted to talk about Kieran Culkin for a second.

• 18:41Andy Greenwald?

  Great speech.

• 18:41Chris Ryan?

  As a father, uh, how did you feel about him being like about to

• 18:46Andy Greenwald?

  About let's go?

• 18:46Chris Ryan?

  Throw another baby in there.

• 18:47Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, I was interested. I feel like I'm sure that the Culkin family is very close, but like traditionally that story of their childhood is not one of like, it's not really.

• 18:55Chris Ryan?

  I think he's, yeah.

• 18:56Andy Greenwald?

  He's trying to re-

• 18:57Chris Ryan?

  I'm not trying to psycho- psychoanalyse Kieran Culkin on the watch. Yeah.

• 19:00Andy Greenwald?

  Um, no, I, he, I, I really enjoy him on the award circuit and I thought he gave a great performance in a movie that I thought was pretty good.

• 19:09Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, uh.

• 19:10Andy Greenwald?

  I didn't feel much more about that movie. Did you, did you have strong feeling about the movie?

• 19:13Chris Ryan?

  I, I, I was very, I loved that movie.

• 19:16Andy Greenwald?

  Did you?

• 19:17Chris Ryan?

  I, uh, I did not, I don't, I no longer understand, like if it's the best script of the, like if it's one of the best scripts, I, it, it feels like it should be one of the best pictures. Like sometimes I, I, I understand that Oscars kind of annoys things and says it's at this level. So, but we want to give you recognition and, um, I thought he was very good, you know?

• 19:38Andy Greenwald?

  In the movie or on the circuit?

• 19:40Chris Ryan?

  I guess the question I ask myself is when, I, I kinda, I really want to see Kieran Culkin and Glenn Gary Glenn Ross. Because I want to see him in an environment where the rhythms and the language of mammoth is very precise.

• 19:54Andy Greenwald?

  Did you ever see him in Laundergen? Have you seen him on stage before?

• 19:56Chris Ryan?

  I didn't. I've never seen him on stage, but I, I feel like every time I've seen Kieran Culkin, he is a character actor. He's doing Kieran.

• 20:02Andy Greenwald?

  He's doing a particular character.

• 20:03Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, uh, but Ricky Roma, who he is playing in Glenn Gary Glenn Ross, which has been played by Al Pacino and-

• 20:09Andy Greenwald?

  He's playing Ricky Roma?

• 20:10Chris Ryan?

  Yes, uh.

• 20:12Andy Greenwald?

  This is, this is a production with him, Bill Burr, Bob Odenkirk.

• 20:15Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 20:15Andy Greenwald?

  That is coming to Broadway soon, imminently.

• 20:18Chris Ryan?

  Um, in, in like a week. Yeah. Uh, so I really want to see him in that because I want to see him play between the hash marks.

• 20:26Andy Greenwald?

  I completely agree with you. I completely agree with you. I mean, I think my-

• 20:31Andy Greenwald?

  My feeling about that movie was a little bit schizoid because I thought the script was great and I really liked, I liked Jesse Eisenberg's approach to the subject matter and the tone of the movie. And I thought that in a vacuum, I think Kieran Culkin was very moving and very invested in the character and very alive. I didn't always feel like he and the movie were in tune with each other, if that makes sense.

• 20:54Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 20:55Andy Greenwald?

  I think that Kieran Culkin performs a very specific kind of Kieran Culkin neurosis that in my experience, in a lifetime in an Ashkenazi neurotic body, doesn't really, doesn't really match. But it was good. Yeah, I think that's sort of a very like tightrope walking way of saying, I agree with you. I'd like to see what else, what else he can do.

• 21:19Chris Ryan?

  A huge fan of Mikey Madison's performance in Onora and her in general. Loved her in Scream, the reboot.

• 21:27Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, she's in that as well.

• 21:28Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, she was part of the, I believe she's in the one that's the in-between, the, the like new trilogy. There was one that came out with like Emma Roberts and I think another Culkin.

• 21:42Andy Greenwald?

  Rory.

• 21:43Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and so that, I think Mikey Madison is in that one, if I remember correctly, and she's quite good.

• 21:48Andy Greenwald?

  She was very good in a show we never really talked about.

• 21:50Chris Ryan?

  She is in the first.

• 21:51Andy Greenwald?

  She was in Better Things.

• 21:52Chris Ryan?

  She is in Better Things, yeah. But I'm a huge fan of hers. Sorry, sorry to do me more. You know, she's, she's had a great award season.

• 22:00Andy Greenwald?

  Listen, she's gonna be running an oil company soon on Paramount.

• 22:02Chris Ryan?

  I mean, dude, S2, I expect big things from Kami.

• 22:07Andy Greenwald?

  I'm sure.

• 22:08Chris Ryan?

  Let's, let's get off the Oscars. I thought, I had a nice time watching it.

• 22:11Andy Greenwald?

  Last thing, what did, what did you feel about the actor, best actor? Did you, I know you had some Timmy stock.

• 22:18Chris Ryan?

  I thought Chalamet should have won. I think Brody is very good in it, in The Brutalist.

• 22:25Andy Greenwald?

  Does he get points for being on this podcast? I think so.

• 22:28Chris Ryan?

  Uh, yeah, I think that, but.

• 22:32Chris Ryan?

  I'm not, I don't wanna, I don't wanna overweight appearances on the watch, you know?

• 22:36Andy Greenwald?

  Really?

• 22:36Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 22:37Andy Greenwald?

  That's all I wanna do.

• 22:38Chris Ryan?

  I thought Chalamet was, I would have loved to have seen Chalamet win. I guess that's what I mean.

• 22:43Andy Greenwald?

  That's where I wanted Rafe. For whatever misgivings I had about Conclave, I just think he's incredible and he deserves an Oscar.

• 22:49Chris Ryan?

  I would love to hear your thoughts on A Complete Unknown, honestly.

• 22:52Andy Greenwald?

  I still haven't seen it.

• 22:52Chris Ryan?

  You'll either, you'll either have the best time or you will walk out 20 minutes in.

• 22:57Andy Greenwald?

  Walk out of my own home?

• 22:59Chris Ryan?

  That's right.

• 22:59Andy Greenwald?

  Walk off of an airplane? I... Goodbye, sir. You, sir, with the Craven the Hunter on. I did, I really like Adrian Brody as an actor and I think that he, I thought The Brutalist showcased the things that he is just unmatched at, in terms of intensity and emotion, like performing with his whole body and self, but I didn't think the movie set him up to success and kinda left him, I think it left him a little exposed sometimes. I don't think, I don't think that, you know I had some issues with that movie, but one of the things that I didn't love about it is that other than Guy Pearce, I did not think it had a lot of good performances and I think it came from the direction, which I did not think was necessarily flattering to actors because Brody was giving

• 23:42Andy Greenwald?

  everything of himself and everything that he gave made it onto the screen and I feel like it seemed like too much.

• 23:49Chris Ryan?

  I'm fascinated, I, I wanna talk to you about this.

• 23:51Andy Greenwald?

  I felt that way about Felicity Jones' performance too. But go on.

• 23:54Chris Ryan?

  Okay. I, I, see, I, I think I was way more

• 24:00Chris Ryan?

  into Felicity Jones generally, that, that, then it seems she was, it was generally received, although she did get an Oscar nomination. I think a lot of people were like, that did not work.

• 24:08Andy Greenwald?

  That was me. I was that person.

• 24:11Chris Ryan?

  As far as Brady Corbey setting them up for success, I think maybe that is a little bit of how much you liked the movie or not, because I think he actually exposed them in an intentional way. I don't think that they're supposed to be necessarily like heroic or villainous people. I think.

• 24:32Andy Greenwald?

  But my comment has nothing to do with like the, the characters. It's just, I think that they're, I mean, actors will often tell you that like they don't, the director and the editor are in charge of their performance. They will give. They'll give takes, they'll give options, they'll give-

• 24:47Chris Ryan?

  It's funny, they don't really say that when they win awards, do they?

• 24:50Andy Greenwald?

  It's a great call, but they will generally give you like-

• 24:52Chris Ryan?

  He's like, "Oh man, I didn't do shit, this was all the director at the end of it."

• 24:55Andy Greenwald?

  Thank you for finding me in this.

• 24:57Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, right.

• 24:57Andy Greenwald?

  But, but it's true, like you could craft very different performances out of the raw footage that usually is collected on a film set.

• 25:05Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 25:05Andy Greenwald?

  And I feel like they, that, that The Brutalist showcased the Spinal Tap, this performance goes to 11 takes of these, of these actors.

• 25:16Chris Ryan?

  Gotcha.

• 25:17Andy Greenwald?

  When I think there were probably more subtle variations on some of the scenes. Basically, I feel like it should have been longer and shown more variations. I didn't like the movie.

• 25:25Chris Ryan?

  I, one day, we'll discuss it all.

• 25:27Andy Greenwald?

  One day, we'll talk about it.

• 25:30Chris Ryan?

  I just noticed that I did something with my shoulders, where I was like changing my posture.

• 25:34Andy Greenwald?

  Hmm.

• 25:35Chris Ryan?

  And that to me means it's time to talk about White Lotus.

• 25:37Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, do you notice that about yourself?

• 25:39Chris Ryan?

  Well, I do, I do, I did think, I have been thinking about my posture generally, because I can't tell whether it's age or like phone, but I do feel like a little bit more hunchbacky or slumped or kind of like-

• 25:49Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, so you're thinking about Lachlan?

• 25:50Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and I was thinking about that kid and the, the homie who was like, "You gotta do this, you gotta do that and don't cross your legs and everything." And I was wondering whether or not I would enjoy that kind of session. I have to say that the season of White Lotus, we're talking about episode three now, unless you wanted to do any more Oscar stuff?

• 26:06Andy Greenwald?

  No, I feel good.

• 26:07Chris Ryan?

  Uh, you know, I would generally say has gotten off to a slow but incredibly pleasant start.

• 26:13Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 26:13Chris Ryan?

  Um, I do feel like now that we are at the end of episode three, a couple of balls are rolling downhill now narrative-wise, I'm not, hey, I'm, I'm here for the hang, it's okay.

• 26:22Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 26:22Chris Ryan?

  I'm not making a big complaint, but I am saying that, um, I do think that this information that we got out of the first three episodes and the overall feel that we got out of the first three episodes probably could have been an episode and a half. Maybe that's being cruel or, or not fair, but I do think for me, I was just like, a lot of shots of water, a lot of shots of like-

• 26:43Andy Greenwald?

  Couple monkeys.

• 26:44Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, a lot, like, I just feel like there's a lot of interstitial, kind of like vibe setting, which I get, and, and I'm still very into this show, I was just saying, I was happy to get to the, the end of the third episode and be like- I get where Rick's going next. These gals got some conflicts, like, let's go.

• 27:00Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, I think I completely agree with you. This is how I feel about the show. I have not been bored once, but I did note

• 27:09Andy Greenwald?

  that three hours have elapsed and no, there are no.

• 27:13Chris Ryan?

  Are they saying that's still the same people that they were when they checked in? Is the question you're asking yourself, basically, when you're watching?

• 27:19Andy Greenwald?

  No, it's that there's, there's no variation in any of the conflicts that were laid out in the opening moments of the pilot thus far.

• 27:28Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 27:28Andy Greenwald?

  That when the Ratla family arrived and Jason Isaacs is clinging to his phone, and then there's some, something that's worrying him, that has continued to worry him. And now the FBI is in his office. Yep. His sons are on the same journeys they were on at the beginning. His daughter has gone to the monastery twice.

• 27:49Chris Ryan?

  Yep.

• 27:49Andy Greenwald?

  And not.

• 27:50Chris Ryan?

  Mark Capozzi keeps taking lorazepam.

• 27:52Andy Greenwald?

  Keeps taking them pills. And.

• 27:55Chris Ryan?

  Is that what she's taking?

• 27:56Andy Greenwald?

  They don't really say. I think it's, it's possible.

• 27:58Chris Ryan?

  I thought there was like a.

• 27:59Andy Greenwald?

  She seems to have a couple of options.

• 28:01Chris Ryan?

  Oh, well.

• 28:01Andy Greenwald?

  Do you think she just?

• 28:04Andy Greenwald?

  Think that would help with your posture?

• 28:07Chris Ryan?

  I think it would send it the opposite direction.

• 28:09Andy Greenwald?

  Slump it out.

• 28:11Andy Greenwald?

  But yeah, but like, I, I do think that we generally, especially because of the, the tenor and vibe and pace of a lot of television these days, we probably overrate strong zags as opposed to the unsexy work of, you know, it's like, it's like offensive line play. You know what I mean? Like, that's really where the game is.

• 28:30Chris Ryan?

  Television is one of the trenches.

• 28:31Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 28:32Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 28:33Andy Greenwald?

  So, so now, next week, if we're talking about episode four, and we haven't really moved anything in any direction, we might revisit that. We might want to dial up some explosives.

• 28:45Chris Ryan?

  Yes. I wonder whether or not also, just personally.

• 28:52Chris Ryan?

  Healing.

• 28:53Andy Greenwald?

  Hmm.

• 28:54Chris Ryan?

  If that's what there's, there are ideas of like that you can pay to heal, which I think is sort of um, an underlying idea and theme of this season. Uh, and that you can try all this different stuff. You know, you can do the stones and you can do the classes and you can do digital detoxes and all these things, but you're still you.

• 29:14Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 29:14Chris Ryan?

  Um, is interesting, but maybe not as interesting as some of the clashes of characters. I also feel like in the first two seasons, like there was already more overlap between the disparate groups of people.

• 29:27Andy Greenwald?

  The groups, yeah.

• 29:28Chris Ryan?

  Uh, which I think is sort of the, the spice of life when it comes to White Lotus is Dodario being confronted by Sweetie, you know, like.

• 29:35Andy Greenwald?

  Vacation friends.

• 29:35Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 29:36Andy Greenwald?

  Not friends.

• 29:36Chris Ryan?

  Or just like the beef around the pool and stuff like that. So I was happy to hear that um, Patrick Sforcenegger had gotten himself a yacht invite, you know?

• 29:45Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, that's good for him.

• 29:46Chris Ryan?

  Just like get, let's get some folks talking to other folks.

• 29:48Andy Greenwald?

  Things go really well historically on the show when characters go on boats. Um, I do want to just respond to your comment about paying for healing. I don't really know how our Walmart branded holiday segment was put out into the world if people listening saw it, where we, we got gifts for each other. But whatever you paid in real CR or Walmart bucks for that portable theragun that you got me.

• 30:10Chris Ryan?

  Are you implying that there is a CR Bitcoin now? CR bucks?

• 30:14Andy Greenwald?

  I would invest and I'm glad the government is finally strengthening that marketplace. You got me a little portable theragun, which by the way, that healed me on this trip. That was really a kind gift. That really helped.

• 30:28Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I, I, I think overlap would be good, but I also don't want to look past the things that we are getting. And the, the, through three episodes and I think really.

• 30:36Chris Ryan?

  I'm just making content. I like, I love the way.

• 30:38Andy Greenwald?

  No, I know.

• 30:38Chris Ryan?

  But I was just, I'm just like, I'm just talking, you know?

• 30:40Andy Greenwald?

  Well, let me, let me, let me throw this on the, on the fire.

• 30:43Chris Ryan?

  Allow me to retort.

• 30:45Andy Greenwald?

  The third episode, uh, really underlined that Walton Goggins is doing god tier work, as he always does. And I think that there may have been a little bit, so.

• 30:58Andy Greenwald?

  What the show is saying this season particularly, or might be starting to say about a certain kind of capitalist malaise masculinity is kind of interesting. Like Rick and

• 31:12Chris Ryan?

  Greg.

• 31:12Andy Greenwald?

  Greg, Gary, we talked about this last week, just sort of staring into space as they're

• 31:18Chris Ryan?

  As they lose their hair and pay for younger women to date them.

• 31:22Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, and just take no pleasure in anything because their entire existence is just maintaining whatever it is they've been able to accrue. So they're basically just playing a life of defense, you know, against everything, including the ravages of time.

• 31:38Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 31:38Andy Greenwald?

  Or potentially

• 31:39Chris Ryan?

  Or their past, like in terms of Belinda coming up to him and being like, I know you.

• 31:43Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, and then particularly this episode where we see different sides of Rick, because we see him go up to Sitala and, you know, and be charming, or at least change, put on a performance for that. And then we also see him get super hot. That was an aggressive, those were some aggressive pulls on the joint that he took. That was pro level stuff. And then seeking freedom for snakes.

• 32:06Chris Ryan?

  Going to a tree.

• 32:09Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah. I mean, that was, that was really good. And I kind of, I'm just, what I'm watching, and this speaks to your point too about potential overlap between the various groups. The way that the three friends, the women are behaving, you know, it's season, that's, in some ways, that's the most White Lotus storyline so far, where everything seems perfect when they get there, and then immediately the fault lines are exposed, and then now they're noticing them, and it's starting to get a little toxic. I was thinking about that, those relationships, they are best friends, but they kind of loathe each other.

• 32:49Chris Ryan?

  Don't seem to know a whole lot about each other, yeah.

• 32:50Andy Greenwald?

  And they don't want to know, or they don't like what they discover. And then I was thinking about Rick, and wait, why am I forgetting Jason Isaacs, Mr. Ratliff? What's his name?

• 32:57Chris Ryan?

  Oh, you know, I just called him the Ratliff's. Let me look it up while you're sitting there.

• 33:00Andy Greenwald?

  Ratliff Senior, I'm sorry, I'm blanking on it.

• 33:05Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, Tim. Tim Ratliff. I keep wanting to say Theo Ratliff, but that's just my Sixers fandom talking. Okay, better or worse, season three, if Theo Ratliff is married to Parker Posey?

• 33:15Chris Ryan?

  Honestly, I would take I would take Theo Ratliff back on the Sixers today.

• 33:19Andy Greenwald?

  Oh my god, defense would improve at any age.

• 33:21Chris Ryan?

  No texts from you about that, by the way.

• 33:23Andy Greenwald?

  About the Sixers?

• 33:24Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 33:24Andy Greenwald?

  I'm shutting myself down for the season two.

• 33:27Chris Ryan?

  You're severing.

• 33:27Andy Greenwald?

  Thank you for asking. The Tim and Rick thing, where they just like instantly, even though they probably on some level have an enormous amount in common, in terms of just trying to maintain something, even when the, long after the thrill is gone. They just instantly hate each other and then just the only things they say to each other is fuck off, basically.

• 33:47Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 33:48Andy Greenwald?

  That relationship compared to the women kind of being in a similar place, but saying like, we love you. We love you is an interesting through line to watch.

• 33:56Chris Ryan?

  The Trump conversation between Jacqueline, Kate and Lori was one of the best scenes in this show.

• 34:01Andy Greenwald?

  Totally agree.

• 34:02Chris Ryan?

  The performance, especially Bib, the way she nailed, "I'm an independent", was so good.

• 34:10Andy Greenwald?

  That was an amazing line.

• 34:11Chris Ryan?

  And I thought that the turn of her seeming like air of kind of like moral superiority, like kind of like, you know, enlightenment that she's having when she's drinking that glass of wine and kind of her strong posture. To juxtapose that with the way that the kind of shadows fall on her when she sees Jacqueline and Lori talking without her and obviously talking about her. I'm unclear exactly like what the auditory prowess of everybody on this island is. There's a lot of hearing things from distances that I personally could not.

• 34:50Andy Greenwald?

  I don't think they spent as much time in rock clubs as we did in their twenties.

• 34:53Chris Ryan?

  She should have seen Hot Snakes three times. She wouldn't have been able to fucking hear a thing.

• 34:57Andy Greenwald?

  And she would have been happier, right?

• 34:59Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 34:59Andy Greenwald?

  Because you would, what are you guys talking about? Talking about Hot Snakes concerts? I saw a couple.

• 35:05Chris Ryan?

  Um, but that was my favorite part by far. And just like, uh, there is something about the cadence. Mike White definitely has been in those conversations, has had those conversations and has got the cadence of the, the dance of like, who have you voted for? What have you done? Why? Like, you know, the way it starts with the conversation about church. I just thought it was incredible.

• 35:26Andy Greenwald?

  By the way, Wikipedia seems convinced that it's lorazepam. Wikipedia is like,

• 35:30Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, well, the reason I brought it up was, I think it was people, but it doesn't really matter. Felt the need to, I guess there was like a concern troll about like, are people going to watch White Lotus and start doing lorazepam for fun?

• 35:46Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, that's seems like a very genuine concern to have.

• 35:49Chris Ryan?

  I honestly, at this point in this country, it couldn't hurt.

• 35:52Andy Greenwald?

  Take the edge off everybody?

• 35:54Chris Ryan?

  Let's.

• 35:55Andy Greenwald?

  Just chill out.

• 35:56Chris Ryan?

  Maybe we need to bring lewds back. Someone needs to get headsets some lewds.

• 36:04Andy Greenwald?

  Why are you burying the spiciest takes in minute whatever this is? That's great. Do you think? Well, do you think it's evidence of lorazepam in this country or a sign of the need for it? That the New York Times ran a Marine Dowd column called, He's Rootin' for Putin? Like, what? Like, do you think, where are you on the lorazepam dial? There you go. There you go. You just made it relevant.

• 36:29Chris Ryan?

  Thanks.

• 36:30Andy Greenwald?

  That's nice.

• 36:30Chris Ryan?

  Um.

• 36:33Chris Ryan?

  The kids?

• 36:34Andy Greenwald?

  Hmm.

• 36:35Chris Ryan?

  The, the Ratliff kids.

• 36:37Andy Greenwald?

  Mm-hmm.

• 36:38Chris Ryan?

  What's up with Piper's spiritual journey?

• 36:42Andy Greenwald?

  Hmm. Do you think it's, do you think she's doing it because of something that had happened to her?

• 36:47Chris Ryan?

  I, you know, it's, it's maybe a consequence of two seasons of White Lotus where people do a lot of theorizing, but I also think it's a result of the way Mike White is telling the story where there is a blank spot. Either in the emotional motivation or actual biographies of a lot of these characters. What did Tim Ratliff do? You know, like, what is this? I mean, we obviously it's some sort of financial crime or whatever. Why? Or what? To what extent are the Ratliff kids touchy feely with each other? Why is Parker Posey's character? Pretty much like in a sarcophagus of her own pharmaceutical design.

• 37:31Chris Ryan?

  But also like weird whenever she peeks her head above the parapet? Like when Kate comes up to her and she's just like, I don't fucking know you. Like, what's up with that? Why is Rick so pissed? You know? Why is, uh, why is Chelsea with him? You know?

• 37:46Andy Greenwald?

  They're soulmates, remember?

• 37:47Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, exactly. Sure, but like, I don't even know how long they've been together, you know?

• 37:52Andy Greenwald?

  What does she say? We're soulmates? And he says, our, our signs don't even.

• 37:54Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, right? Scorpio and, uh, what is she?

• 37:57Andy Greenwald?

  I don't remember.

• 37:58Chris Ryan?

  I can't remember.

• 37:58Andy Greenwald?

  But I, uh.

• 38:00Chris Ryan?

  I also don't know anything about astrology.

• 38:02Andy Greenwald?

  What, what's your sign?

• 38:03Chris Ryan?

  Scorpio.

• 38:04Andy Greenwald?

  Oh.

• 38:04Chris Ryan?

  Me and Goggins.

• 38:06Andy Greenwald?

  You and Goggins and, and Drake, I believe, right? The Holy Trinity.

• 38:12Andy Greenwald?

  Guys have a lot of, lot in common.

• 38:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, on the CR bucks. It's like the pyramid, but it's like me, Goggins and Drake.

• 38:19Andy Greenwald?

  Are you all holding like your arms are touching?

• 38:22Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, there's, we each have a third eye.

• 38:23Andy Greenwald?

  That's beautiful.

• 38:24Chris Ryan?

  Uh, sorry. Um, okay.

• 38:27Andy Greenwald?

  Are you worried that a listener is gonna be like, Taurus and Scorpio should never podcast together?

• 38:32Chris Ryan?

  Too late. We've been doing it for like 12 years now, right?

• 38:35Andy Greenwald?

  That's a full Chinese zodiac cycle. Since the last year of the snake.

• 38:39Chris Ryan?

  You like the, the connective tissue across?

• 38:42Andy Greenwald?

  13 years.

• 38:43Chris Ryan?

  Okay. Our podcast has been bar mitzvahed.

• 38:46Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I know.

• 38:47Chris Ryan?

  What did we get?

• 38:48Andy Greenwald?

  You were, um, hopefully some CR bucks, um, in our crypto wallet.

• 38:53Chris Ryan?

  I, you, I used to fucking really be. That dude at bar mitzvahs, you know that, right?

• 39:00Andy Greenwald?

  Would you, would you just like show, show out?

• 39:02Chris Ryan?

  I went to like three, but I feel like the, well, it was bat mitzvahs. The girl who's bat mitzvah it was.

• 39:08Andy Greenwald?

  Only invited to the ladies.

• 39:09Chris Ryan?

  I went to a couple. There was bar mitzvahs, bat mitzvahs, as you may be aware.

• 39:12Andy Greenwald?

  Thank you.

• 39:13Chris Ryan?

  I got asked to dance first by the birthday girl at two different ones. Yeah.

• 39:18Andy Greenwald?

  What?

• 39:18Chris Ryan?

  And it was like back in my Parker Lewis can't lose rayon shirt.

• 39:22Andy Greenwald?

  Holy shit. Wait, yeah, yeah.

• 39:24Chris Ryan?

  And I just fucking.

• 39:25Andy Greenwald?

  Slow dance you got asked to do? Okay, now.

• 39:28Chris Ryan?

  Once was to stairway to heaven. So, you know, obviously like there's a shift.

• 39:31Andy Greenwald?

  That's a tough one. My main memory of.

• 39:34Chris Ryan?

  And the other one was if I, I'm, I have in my mind, it's, it was crazy for you by Madonna, but I don't know if that's true.

• 39:42Andy Greenwald?

  That's probably right. I, I, my, my first slow dance at the middle school dance was to Wham! careless whisper. It's a nice one. Really felt the saxophone solo, I thought was a nice time to.

• 39:54Chris Ryan?

  Like I'm an Ashkenazi Jew.

• 39:59Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, I didn't need to lead with that. Um, nor do I now. I, the main issue with the, the dancing at bar mitzvahs is that they usually hit right in the sweet spot. When all of the girls are three feet taller than the boys.

• 40:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I know.

• 40:13Andy Greenwald?

  So there's a lot of like.

• 40:14Chris Ryan?

  And they're still three feet taller than me.

• 40:16Andy Greenwald?

  So you were just, so you were a short king before you were a king?

• 40:19Chris Ryan?

  Well, I was like, I was a pretty short kid and now I'm a short man.

• 40:24Andy Greenwald?

  But you, but you punched above your weight.

• 40:25Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, right. I'm not getting any kind of like experimental hip breaking surgery to like make myself five, 10.

• 40:32Andy Greenwald?

  You, you can't, you can't buy confidence.

• 40:34Chris Ryan?

  I want to get back to the text here.

• 40:36Andy Greenwald?

  I, I don't. I'm loving this digression.

• 40:38Chris Ryan?

  What is your reaction to the interconnected plot lines of the three seasons? So we've got Belinda from season one back in season three on this retreat to the White Lotus Phuket. Where, where are we?

• 40:51Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, we're in Thailand, Phuket.

• 40:52Chris Ryan?

  Um, we've got Greg slash Gary, who was Tanya's strange con man paramour.

• 41:01Andy Greenwald?

  They met in season one and he had her killed in season two.

• 41:04Chris Ryan?

  And now he is in season three. I saw some speculation online that season three was in fact taking place at a different, like in between one and two or whatever. I don't think that's happening.

• 41:12Andy Greenwald?

  Definitely not the case.

• 41:13Chris Ryan?

  Um, do you like it?

• 41:16Andy Greenwald?

  The overlaps?

• 41:17Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, just curious, like, is this, is this something that you thought this show, this is giving this show kind of like a ballast that it didn't have?

• 41:25Andy Greenwald?

  For me, it is another sign of what makes Mike White very successful, which is that he has, he has a lot of thoughts about, um, identity and wellness and, uh, your worth as a person and how you express yourself in the world and how you can never escape yourself, but he is also an entertainer.

• 41:43Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 41:44Andy Greenwald?

  And to me, I mean, it, sometimes you can't point to your Eureka moment for successful TV shows, but it does seem like the origin story for the, for the White Lotus and for Mike White's career, it's not even a resurgence, but this was leveling up to a different, completely different degree, can be traced to kind of one of those moments. And it was just like, everything that he likes, but with very strict guidelines, in the case of like, during COVID era, it's like, these characters in this place and they can't leave. Um, but also just a very simple conceit of, I'm gonna show a body in the first few minutes. You know, like-

• 42:19Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 42:19Andy Greenwald?

  Season one-

• 42:20Chris Ryan?

  A crime, yeah.

• 42:20Andy Greenwald?

  We're gonna show a crime. Like, both seasons, I think-

• 42:23Chris Ryan?

  All you need is a girl and a gun. Somebody said that about what it takes to write a good screenplay or a good make of-

• 42:28Andy Greenwald?

  And a Bob Mitzen in the 90s. Um, the, I think White Lotus would be a successful and entertaining and thought provoking show without the central crimes of the first two seasons. I still think it would be good, but in terms of hooking people, in terms of getting people talking, redditing, obsessing, those were essential, um, essential decisions to have made and to have put into the show. I say that because to me, that's what the overlapping stuff is. It is not, uh, it's icing. It's not the cake. And it's fun. Um, and maybe at some point, there will be some grand, uh, you know, grand, uh, connected narrative about what the show is actually saying, and it's all about Belinda, but- We'll see.

• 43:07Chris Ryan?

  These are, each hotel is a room that the macro data refinement team are refining.

• 43:12Andy Greenwald?

  Is that a sign that we're gonna, we're turning the page?

• 43:14Chris Ryan?

  That's, that was a, that was a suggestion that we could. I was gonna ask you about Guy Talk and Mook.

• 43:20Andy Greenwald?

  I love Guy Talk.

• 43:20Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I feel like that guy might have a great season.

• 43:23Andy Greenwald?

  You think things are gonna go downhill for him?

• 43:25Chris Ryan?

  I think he's too pure for this world.

• 43:28Andy Greenwald?

  He is pretty pure.

• 43:29Chris Ryan?

  So I don't think he's gonna die necessarily.

• 43:31Andy Greenwald?

  He's very sweet.

• 43:32Chris Ryan?

  But I am worried about where his character is going because that dude just has like, he's just like, I love, I love standing right here.

• 43:39Andy Greenwald?

  This is fine.

• 43:39Chris Ryan?

  And flirting with this woman.

• 43:40Andy Greenwald?

  He likes going to the fights.

• 43:41Chris Ryan?

  I don't know why he wants to be a bodyguard, but I guess that's just like, you know, that, that would be a step up financially. But like, who, who really wants to be?

• 43:51Andy Greenwald?

  Well, he just wants to be the-

• 43:51Chris Ryan?

  A heavily armed bodyguard.

• 43:52Andy Greenwald?

  He wants to be the guy behind the guy, or in this case, in front of the guy.

• 43:55Chris Ryan?

  But it seems like he has actually a relatively easy gig if nobody is trying to bum rush the hotel to rob it.

• 44:00Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, but isn't it fundamentally that Mook just sees him as the nice guy who's just opening the gate? And if she's, maybe he thinks that if she saw him.

• 44:07Chris Ryan?

  That's why you're the writer. I'm just a, I'm just a proletariat who's like, show me more, more sunshine.

• 44:13Andy Greenwald?

  Just the guy throwing on a rayon shirt, being like, let's go ladies! Electric slide in five!

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• 44:51Chris Ryan?

  Let's talk a little bit about Severance.

• 44:53Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 44:54Chris Ryan?

  I wanna open with this thought.

• 44:57Andy Greenwald?

  Hmm.

• 44:59Chris Ryan?

  Severance's authorship, the author of Severance has been something that kind of has, I think, changed in the course of the last two seasons and the development and production of this show where Dan Erickson wrote this script.

• 45:12Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 45:13Chris Ryan?

  It's his concept.

• 45:14Andy Greenwald?

  Created by?

• 45:15Chris Ryan?

  I think Ben Stiller has been the public face of the behind the camera work that's been done. So at Knicks games, on podcasts, tweeting, just doing it all. He is like the voice of the show and the face of the show. And I would assume a lot of what's happening on this show is down to him. But that being said, I just want to give a shout out to the director of this episode and the director of photography for many of these episodes of Severance, Jessica Lee Gagne, who I thought shot the shit out of this thing.

• 45:49Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, my God.

• 45:50Chris Ryan?

  And it is one of the more virtuoso directorial performances you will see on the small screen or the big screen, honestly, in the last couple of years. And I have really enjoyed reading about all the practical ways they did certain shots in this episode, Chikai Bardo, using no CGI, doing like crazy production design and moving sets and moving the camera through things. The one that a lot of people have noted is, and spoilers for this episode, is immediately after the reveal of Gemma's miscarriage, there then is this sort of like layered nesting doll of who's watching who. It goes to a scene

• 46:35Chris Ryan?

  where Mark and Miss Hayes are talking, and then it jumps down to another level of the Lumen maze where an older, but still Mark looking, although I doubt that that's really in any way Mark, but an older man is MDR-ing. Or like watching a computer while.

• 46:57Andy Greenwald?

  Coming from the inside, right.

• 46:58Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 46:58Andy Greenwald?

  The suggestion that they're being watched through the screens.

• 47:00Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and that Dr. Maurer, who is also the dentist and the fertility doctor and the weird captor husband of Gemma in these different rooms, is standing there with the guy with the frolic tattoo. And I thought that that was a great moment. She just, she kept me like, I thought she did an incredible job directing this episode. So I wanted to start with that.

• 47:22Andy Greenwald?

  I think if I could, like, I also have a bunch of positive things to say, and one of them is the star of the show, I mean, you're saying who the author is and who the star is could be debated, but I think the star of the show is the camera. Even though Ben Siller, he's directed some of the episodes, others have come in, there is a consistent visual language, and some of that has to go to Jessica Leganier, who's shooting every episode, not just the ones that she directed, as the director of photography. There is real inspiration and beauty in some of the most simple things, like the match cuts of rooms that resemble each other, especially as Mark is coming undone, that like, that

• 48:01Andy Greenwald?

  a room on the severed floor will suddenly crackle and basically be a room above, but with different furniture, different color scheme, different lighting, like, that stuff is very, very, seems simple, very challenging, and very consistent, which is really nice. I think, yeah, I mean, I, I don't watch stuff for camera movement. But I recognize excellence when you see, when I see it, you know what I mean?

• 48:28Chris Ryan?

  So where Brady Corbe is like, god damn it.

• 48:33Andy Greenwald?

  Not to say, I mean, that's the correct count, I mean, that's, you're right. Like, I, when I watched this episode, and I'll let you keep going because I have other positive things to say, too, I was thinking a lot about our friend, and despite what many of our listeners may think he is our friend, Sam Esmael, would say, like, he, he is a director himself, he's a filmmaker himself, and aesthetically, this is unimpeachable. It's stunning to see this done on such a level. And often when you're, when, especially for other filmmakers, when they see creatives and enormously talented creatives, given the time, space, and priority to do what they do best and what they love to do. It can be, it's not just dazzling, I think that can be really affirming. And this is a absolute, this episode is a masterclass in how to make things visually.

• 49:20Andy Greenwald?

  Just excel, shine, you know?

• 49:23Chris Ryan?

  I was watching something last night. It actually doesn't matter what it was. It was a screener for something that's coming out.

• 49:28Andy Greenwald?

  Was it The Brutalist 2?

• 49:29Chris Ryan?

  It was The Brutalist 2.

• 49:30Andy Greenwald?

  Deleted scenes, just extra content, just that Doylestown after dark.

• 49:36Chris Ryan?

  We got that.

• 49:37Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 49:37Chris Ryan?

  We got that in Brutalist.

• 49:38Andy Greenwald?

  We got Doylestown.

• 49:39Chris Ryan?

  Little jazz, little, little, little smack.

• 49:41Andy Greenwald?

  I know. Did you know that that was just, just near our homes?

• 49:44Chris Ryan?

  I was watching something and it's, it's actually a good show with a very good reputation. But I'd watched it relatively soon after seeing Severance and it struck me just even 85% of other television. Kind of looks like shit, you know, like it just, you know, the light has nothing to do with the drama, you know, like the sets all feel like you're shooting this in Vancouver or.

• 50:10Andy Greenwald?

  And for what it's worth, that is, that's time and money.

• 50:13Chris Ryan?

  It's an economic reality. I completely understand that. I'm just saying that like, I sometimes want to like say Severance is doing something very special visually and I think that that honestly is enough. I will watch probably every episode of the show because of that.

• 50:26Andy Greenwald?

  I think, I, I'm sure I've said some version of this before, but like it, the, where you, where, where people have gotten into a lot of trouble and not trouble, but well, although maybe trouble and then they end up in like TV jail. But during, especially I think the now ended like super, um, super premium prestige bubble that we had for about a decade was everyone thinking everything should be cinematic, but then having the budget of a basic cable show or whatever. And then so you have people coming in with big hopes and big dreams to do even a fraction of what Ben Stiller and his team do on Severance. And then they come crashing into the reality of eight days to do it. And you end up kind of in the mushy middle

• 51:07Andy Greenwald?

  where you see the intent for like grandiose execution of visual ideas and then you just can't actually execute it.

• 51:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 51:13Andy Greenwald?

  So seeing it done, I think is, judgment of the show aside, is a celebration for that kind of work. The possibility and the potential of that kind of work on the small screen.

• 51:23Chris Ryan?

  I also just thought I'd throw this out here. I don't know when, otherwise I would mention it. It is occurring to me that Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one of the most influential films of the 21st century.

• 51:33Andy Greenwald?

  Totally.

• 51:33Chris Ryan?

  Uh, I don't know that I would have thought that, but like, I feel, I would, I would not necessarily have thought that 10 years ago. But I feel like visually and also the ideas that that film played with, this idea that you could, um,

• 51:49Chris Ryan?

  Basically, uh, play within your own mind and go around and, um, interact with your own memories in this way. The way it's visualized, I think is a huge influence on this show. A huge influence on this episode specifically. And the idea is that the brain is somehow like this landscape that we can traverse. It's not, first, it's not the only time it's ever happened, or the first time it's ever happened is Eternal Sunshine, but I feel like the way Gondry brought that to life. And the, the things that people were trying to heal from inside of their own minds.

• 52:26Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 52:26Chris Ryan?

  Are very similar and are very resonant in this show. And I feel like I just don't have anything at the fingertips. I have to Eternal Sunshine my own references here. But it does feel like it's worth noting that is a huge, huge influence on, on a lot of stuff that's come since there.

• 52:42Andy Greenwald?

  I totally agree with you. I think it is also interesting to note though, that, um, I think Gondry would be the left hemisphere version of, of the, of the brain though.

• 52:53Chris Ryan?

  And Charlie Kaufman would be the right?

• 52:54Andy Greenwald?

  No, Stiller is the right, right? Left is the creative one, the artistic one?

• 52:57Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 52:59Andy Greenwald?

  Like, it, it's, there's something that is just fundamentally messy about Michelle Gondry's filmmaking. I mean, it's, it's a lot of it is handmade. Some, you see, you see beautiful ideas and then you see some like just misses and mistakes. And Eternal Sunshine is the best example of it all coming together. Although if you talk to anyone who worked on the making of that film, everyone was like, we are a day away from a catastrophe.

• 53:21Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 53:21Andy Greenwald?

  Like this, we, they did not think they had a masterpiece. And sometimes that happens and that's a beautiful thing. But not until like way into the edit do they think, oh, oh, it works.

• 53:30Chris Ryan?

  It works.

• 53:31Andy Greenwald?

  Um, Stiller and Severance, and this is an aesthetic choice, this isn't a value judgment, is much more, uh, clinical. It's much more anal. It is precise. Everything is straight lines.

• 53:41Chris Ryan?

  I, I set up this pun already, so I don't expect, I'm not correcting you, but I will say. Eternal Sunshine is about kind of going into your memories to try and keep or lose like this heartbreak that you have, but is indefinite conversation with that. This is about cutting that fucking stuff out. The reason why these people presumably thought they chose to do Severance, it may become evident that Severance chose them as we keep going, and that's certainly what this episode suggested.

• 54:15Chris Ryan?

  Was to cut out the derational experience of loss, right? Or grief, or whatever it is that the feeling that they want to get away from is. So I think that that is like the main difference. They're trying to get away from their memories.

• 54:28Andy Greenwald?

  I think it's totally right, and I think it is a, I think this conversation is really interesting in terms of different ways that you can express aspects of the human condition, particularly through, can we ever separate parts of ourselves? Can we ever become different people? But I do think, again, this is not a judgment thing because we do not, and the judgment things are coming. But I do feel, I bristle against comparisons of Severance to things like Eternal Sunshine or other, you know, interesting, boundary pushing stories about, about the self, like, like Lost Highway or something, because Eternal Sunshine and Lost Highway come from a place of real

• 55:11Andy Greenwald?

  messiness, risk and danger. Like, you don't really understand intellectually what's happening, but at times you emotionally-

• 55:18Chris Ryan?

  I don't know if I intellectually understand what's happening on Severance.

• 55:19Andy Greenwald?

  Feel it, but I feel like Severance is set up for there to be an intellectual answer.

• 55:23Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 55:25Andy Greenwald?

  And that, we'll see how that resolves. Maybe, maybe that tension is the text. Like, maybe that's ultimately what it's going to be about, that you cannot do that, and thus there are these verdant goat-covered hills of humanity that just exist spilling outside of the, you can't contain it in this white box at the Lumen headquarters. I'd be really interested in that. But they are very, very different ways aesthetically to tackle an, you know, an intangible idea.

• 55:52Chris Ryan?

  There's a moment in this episode where Gemma is going through her sort of various, maybe actually towards the beginning of when we're getting introduced to her doing this, but like- The dentist's office, the whatever is happening in these rooms. She's getting intrigued by Sandra Bernhard's Cecily character, the nurse, and Robbie Benson's doctor character, Dr. Mauer.

• 56:12Andy Greenwald?

  By the way, kudos to Stillers Rolodex.

• 56:15Chris Ryan?

  Great, great casting.

• 56:16Andy Greenwald?

  Phenomenal casting, like people who are known and out there with careers and successes. But I wouldn't say Bernhard or Benson are like on the bench, but I don't know if they're at the top of anyone's like yes star list.

• 56:28Chris Ryan?

  Smart places to put those people.

• 56:30Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, it's cool.

• 56:31Chris Ryan?

  Sandra Bernhard could easily have been Devon, but it's something very creepy about her as a nurse ratchet, or maybe a slightly more sympathetic nurse, not that there's only one nurse, you know, like.

• 56:43Andy Greenwald?

  Do you want to talk about your feelings about nurses? I feel like there's something here.

• 56:45Chris Ryan?

  Nurse Dana among my favorite people in the world right now.

• 56:48Andy Greenwald?

  God bless her.

• 56:48Chris Ryan?

  Um, there's a moment where Gemma says to Dr. Mauer, can you please just talk like a normal person?

• 56:55Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 56:55Chris Ryan?

  That was one of the highlights of the season for me.

• 56:58Andy Greenwald?

  Me too.

• 56:59Chris Ryan?

  Because I, I can only be me and I, I do ask these questions and I do want to know what level of artifice we're living in, um, what normal people in this world are like, because the only people we really know are characters who are obviously like totally obsessed with what's happening with Mark, you know, or in what's happening.

• 57:23Andy Greenwald?

  Very invested in it.

• 57:24Chris Ryan?

  They're not, there's not like another, even, and even when we get to see the door company or, you know, whatever, like you're like, this is highly stylized and very clearly like about mirroring Dylan, you know, and there's stuff going on in that. Gemma and Mark marking their papers while donating blood, probably also the point where Bluman started analyzing who they were in the first place.

• 57:50Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 57:51Chris Ryan?

  Was this this like breath of fresh air for me, uh, as was, and I think it's supposed to be, it's all lit warmly, it's all lit like normal life.

• 58:00Andy Greenwald?

  I want to talk about that.

• 58:01Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 58:01Andy Greenwald?

  I feel like that was in many ways, the first crucial piece of information that we've been given this season, and maybe it's subtle, but. Because the show is such a tightly siloed box of aesthetic choices, it was, to me at least, deeply unclear whether the color palette of the Audi world was a stylistic choice to mirror the inner emotional lives of people like Mark and to be a contrast with the bright

• 58:30Chris Ryan?

  Or a physical reality kind of thing.

• 58:32Andy Greenwald?

  Exactly. So the fact that the world, at least the way the world was lit, or the way the seasons work, was suggested to be, quote unquote, "normal" by this episode, was enormous. That prior to all of this going south for him, he seemed to exist, at least in a world that looks more or less like our world.

• 58:51Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 58:52Andy Greenwald?

  It's crazy that that's where we are with these things, but that's... These are the little things that I've... I don't think, I don't know if I've ever, if I've always articulated it clearly, but like, I don't understand the playing field of the game we're playing, the parameters of the stadium, or the conditions on the field, or if this is a unique... I need that stuff to ground myself in my viewing.

• 59:13Chris Ryan?

  I think there's just... The show is so expansive and it's so capable of going down levels in Lumen. Who's refining the refiners? Who is minding the goats? Like, you can keep dropping down levels, and I find myself wanting, maybe wrongly, for the show to go up levels and be like, "Who is the governor of the state where Lumen is? And does that person care that this is happening? Like, does anybody give a shit?"

• 59:45Andy Greenwald?

  Does that person have to answer to his constituents in town halls? Is that what you're wondering?

• 59:49Chris Ryan?

  That's right. That's right. God, there's a lot to unpack here. I guess I would say that the... I loved a lot about this episode and deeply, deeply disliked the Devon Ragabi scene at the end.

• 1:00:07Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:00:07Chris Ryan?

  Towards the end, where Mark has been discovered, obviously, and I guess any scene where Devon and Ragabi are kind of like talking about...

• 1:00:16Chris Ryan?

  Harmony, uh, what to do next? Take my word for it, he'll be fine, but I have done brain surgery on him, but I'm also very quick to leave him. Her kind of vagueness as a character and to the extent to which she is really there only to push the ball forward about Mark's reintegration and Mark becoming fucking Neo in The Matrix or whatever they're gonna do with him.

• 1:00:40Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, she's, yeah.

• 1:00:40Chris Ryan?

  I'm like, neither of you are making any sense in this scene and that you can only have one person who's not making any sense.

• 1:00:48Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, the, what's her name, Regabi? Like, that, that's not a character, that's a, she's a plot point. And I find that very frustrating. And particularly to your point, like, that, in that scene, Devin is like, I, I get out of here, I, you can't touch him, you're hurting him, I'm gonna call, uh, Kobell.

• 1:01:03Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:01:04Andy Greenwald?

  And then the doctor's like, fuck this, I'm outta here. And then she goes, you can't leave him. You just, like, she, the doctor explained what her terms were. Don't call her. So now they're arguing about it.

• 1:01:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, right.

• 1:01:15Andy Greenwald?

  Even though she could just behave differently to get the outcome she wanted. It, it, that, that was...

• 1:01:20Chris Ryan?

  It was just a very disorienting scene that I think was essentially there to get Regabi out and get Kobell back in.

• 1:01:26Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:27Chris Ryan?

  And...

• 1:01:27Andy Greenwald?

  Sometimes you can feel that the, the marionette strings...

• 1:01:30Chris Ryan?

  I haven't, I haven't seen ahead. I mean, I assume Patricia Arquette is coming back to the show at some point and having a, a sort of...

• 1:01:37Andy Greenwald?

  She's an EP this season.

• 1:01:38Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, so it's weird that she has been in like eight minutes of it so far.

• 1:01:41Andy Greenwald?

  I'm fine with that.

• 1:01:42Chris Ryan?

  Um...

• 1:01:42Andy Greenwald?

  Personally. I, I had a question. So, I, I mean, I, people who have been listening know this, like, and I will just be upfront about it, like, this, this show is in a, in a emotionally closed box to me. I, it doesn't work for me, I don't get it. I don't feel for these characters and I, I'm not really moved by it. I wish I was. So I, that's why I'm trying to focus on more of the aesthetic things that I think really are remarkable. Um, that said, this episode clearly worked for a lot of people who considered to be, I think, the best of the season, if not the series so far. And I was wondering your feelings about the show's, um, the, the goal of the episode,

• 1:02:22Andy Greenwald?

  because it was, again, it, it was forced to do something that is quite, quite challenging. And I say that with, again, the caveat that the majority of viewers think that it did it successfully. The challenging thing is, can you retroactively inject a storyline, characters, a couple, a relationship with enough emotional juice to earn what you're going to do with them?

• 1:02:47Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 1:02:48Andy Greenwald?

  We have, this was the first episode where we ever saw a glimpse of Mark and Gemma Scouts, if she changed her last name, I don't know, I'm not judging, their life together.

• 1:02:57Chris Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:02:59Andy Greenwald?

  It's a remarkably heavy lift on a number of levels. First, it's a really hard lift on an acting level because Dyke and Lockman and Adam Scott have only ever played Mrs. Casey and Mark S. together, I believe, on screen.

• 1:03:11Chris Ryan?

  I believe you're right.

• 1:03:12Andy Greenwald?

  So to suddenly have to flirt and have this warm relationship that in just a few pages of script has to convey, you know, great depth of feeling and history, that's really hard. And I think for the most part, they succeeded. I think Adam Scott was really outstanding in this because he got to play some notes that he's been known for in his career that he doesn't always get to do on the show. And I know that he's spoken about what a great opportunity the show is for him to show the other parts of himself and that, you know, the dramatic side.

• 1:03:37Chris Ryan?

  Right, because he's been basically doing comedy for a long time, but he was more or less a trained dramatic actor until like he shows up in Step Brothers and everybody's like, well, you're

• 1:03:45Andy Greenwald?

  Totally.

• 1:03:45Chris Ryan?

  You're one of the five funniest people to put in a movie.

• 1:03:47Andy Greenwald?

  But he's also super, super just effortlessly charming and has good chemistry with people. And that was, that was nice to see on the show.

• 1:03:54Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:54Andy Greenwald?

  Especially with the sunlight. But so, but it's not just challenging from actors, it's challenging from a writing perspective and then a directorial perspective because this just has to do so much heavy lifting. And I wondered, A, if you thought that it was effective in terms of your viewing experience, but B, and I kind of maybe, if I wasn't super jet lagged, I would have done more research on it. Or I should have done research on it while I was awake this morning instead of thinking about eating corn chips before the sun came up. But I'm glad about that decision, by the way. I wondered how many examples of this we have of being done well, you know, of backfilling something. I think, I was thinking Lost, attempted versions of this multiple times per season, you know, of like, to understand what a character left.

• 1:04:33Chris Ryan?

  But if I remember correctly, like the flashbacks in Lost were essentially thematic

• 1:04:41Chris Ryan?

  Foundations for what the character was gonna be doing in the episode.

• 1:04:45Andy Greenwald?

  In the present.

• 1:04:45Chris Ryan?

  Current.

• 1:04:46Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, it was just like a moment from the past that that that.

• 1:04:48Chris Ryan?

  Illustrates why.

• 1:04:49Andy Greenwald?

  With their current predicament.

• 1:04:51Chris Ryan?

  Right.

• 1:04:51Andy Greenwald?

  Or why they behave a certain way.

• 1:04:52Chris Ryan?

  Why Saeed's gonna do this, yeah.

• 1:04:53Andy Greenwald?

  I guess I wondered if you had a lot, any mem- if you had anything on the top of your head of this being done particularly well, or if you would say, this did it well.

• 1:05:02Chris Ryan?

  You know what's making this, that stuff actually work for me a little bit? Is this show is maybe a little bit more emotionally complicated than I thought it was because, not that I thought it was, but I'm, that I was giving it credit for, because the entire time we're watching this very heartbreaking story of a relationship. I was also thinking about the fact that this dude is in love with Helly.

• 1:05:27Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, right.

• 1:05:28Chris Ryan?

  Um, so.

• 1:05:29Andy Greenwald?

  Part of him is.

• 1:05:30Chris Ryan?

  Well, but the bifurcated part of him is about to.

• 1:05:33Andy Greenwald?

  Unify.

• 1:05:34Chris Ryan?

  That, that, yeah, so like when this dude wakes up on the couch with tears in his eyes saying, sir, sir, where is my girlfriend?

• 1:05:41Andy Greenwald?

  President.

• 1:05:41Chris Ryan?

  Or wife? Who's president? Sorry, sorry, what happened with NATO?

• 1:05:46Andy Greenwald?

  He's an independent, he's an independent.

• 1:05:50Chris Ryan?

  I think that that is, that is what I'm most interested in seeing is that like the, you know, one soul can love two people, or maybe he doesn't even love Helly, I don't know, I mean.

• 1:05:58Andy Greenwald?

  No, but that's.

• 1:05:59Chris Ryan?

  Maybe that's just like literally his work wife.

• 1:06:01Andy Greenwald?

  Or maybe I'm just a simp, but like, I, I'm into that story.

• 1:06:06Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I'm into Helena.

• 1:06:08Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:08Chris Ryan?

  Being like, more dim sum, please.

• 1:06:10Andy Greenwald?

  Hmm, she didn't order that much.

• 1:06:12Chris Ryan?

  She didn't order anything.

• 1:06:13Andy Greenwald?

  He ordered everything.

• 1:06:14Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:15Andy Greenwald?

  There was no food left.

• 1:06:15Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:16Andy Greenwald?

  Is the issue there.

• 1:06:17Chris Ryan?

  Um.

• 1:06:18Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, I, yeah, i- it's just.

• 1:06:24Andy Greenwald?

  It's a forest and trees thing, and these trees, and in this case, I mean, like, the different sort of banal torture rooms, I say banal because it's like the dentist, turbulence, like, these are real everyday things, these are just sort of amplified horrific versions of them, um, are so. Wild, unexpected, and so beautifully designed.

• 1:06:46Chris Ryan?

  But also the kinds of things that you would want to forget or be severed for.

• 1:06:50Andy Greenwald?

  That's a great point. But also, like, I find that entertaining. I didn't feel anything for the Gemma character, like, other than that sucks. It's tough. Is potentially, do we feel like there's something, I mean, you're on the boards. Is the sense that, like, Gemma's doing this to save Mark, to have a baby, because that was the goal?

• 1:07:15Chris Ryan?

  I definitely think that the amount, one of the things I really liked about this episode is the amount of, like, biological surveillance these two people were under. From giving blood to the fertility clinic, where there is a quick moment where Dr. Mauer is in the clinic, walking by. They're, they are being watched, they are being surveilled, down to their bloodstreams, for a long time.

• 1:07:41Andy Greenwald?

  Now, I should say that you're saying this as someone who wants that in terms of, like, just making your flights easier. Because I was just like-

• 1:07:48Chris Ryan?

  Anything they want.

• 1:07:49Andy Greenwald?

  That is one of my favorite things about you.

• 1:07:51Chris Ryan?

  Literally Bradley X-Delta may have, like, my DNA.

• 1:07:57Andy Greenwald?

  As long as it reduces your wait time in certain lines at L I S.

• 1:08:01Chris Ryan?

  Just let me get my Uncrustables faster, you know?

• 1:08:03Andy Greenwald?

  Beautiful.

• 1:08:05Chris Ryan?

  I just think that what I don't understand is, did Gemma volunteer for this? Or was she taken for this? And if she was taken,

• 1:08:20Chris Ryan?

  I don't know what that means. I mean, obviously, there's a criminal aspect to what Lumen is doing. But, like, I don't, did she go down there because, like, they've talked about the world you will sire? Were they gonna make her fertile? I just, I just don't know where that's at.

• 1:08:35Chris Ryan?

  I feel like I've like picked up though. I've like, this was, this was an episode where I was like, this, there's a little bit more coming together for me. There are still parts that bother me a lot, but I think I am looking at much more enjoyably as a puzzle to solve rather than, I think where you're coming from is like, I'm not emotionally connecting with this. And I also, while I respect the virtuosity of the filmmaking, that's not enough for me to be like on board with what's happening.

• 1:09:02Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, but it is, but it is enough for me to be impressed. Like I, like, not to sound completely bloodless about it. Like, I, I think it was, it's, it's a dazzling, it's dazzling, and it is a triumph in the ways that aren't always my priority in viewing experiences. And the other thing that I really do appreciate about the show, though, for as much as my criticisms over the last few weeks seem to be pointed at it being, you know, just nothing but a mystery box show, it, it churns forward. It may not churn forward at the schedule that I want, or, you know, the types of revelations that I'm more interested in.

• 1:09:39Chris Ryan?

  We're not maybe arriving at any recognizable ports of call where you're like, ah, okay, so then this.

• 1:09:44Andy Greenwald?

  That said, it did a flashback episode. It did do the backfilling that I was saying is challenging, and it went for it. And it tried to do it in a way that was narratively and aesthetically consistent with what has come before. And that's not nothing, you know? It is not running from stuff. I continue to say like for, and I, and I feel like this is the one point that people who listen to the podcast and disagree with me will agree with me on. I think we are united in saying that the finale is going to be super wild.

• 1:10:14Chris Ryan?

  And important.

• 1:10:14Andy Greenwald?

  The season finale.

• 1:10:15Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and important.

• 1:10:16Andy Greenwald?

  Like, it, it, they are not scared. And they, and I respect that.

• 1:10:19Chris Ryan?

  I gotta say, one of the other things that fucked me up this episode, in a bad way, was I do not remember anything about Devon at the birthing retreat from an episode in the middle of the first season three years ago. And that was apparently an important thing about why she knew how to get in touch with me.

• 1:10:33Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, she, she was, Harmony was cosplaying as her night nurse.

• 1:10:38Chris Ryan?

  I didn't remember.

• 1:10:39Andy Greenwald?

  And seems to be super interested in other people's...

• 1:10:40Chris Ryan?

  Obviously, I don't remember the constant and what happens in that.

• 1:10:43Andy Greenwald?

  No, but you've been doing a great job bluffing here. I'll say that I did find the whole episode more understandable and enjoyable when I realized that it was just a metaphor for jet lag. And that, that Mark's experience of being like, I'm in my kitchen, I'm on the kitchen floor. I was like, finally, I'm seen.

• 1:11:00Chris Ryan?

  Your version of that is just like you have like a mouthful of toast.

• 1:11:03Andy Greenwald?

  There's just crumbs everywhere.

• 1:11:05Chris Ryan?

  Um, here's what we're gonna do.

• 1:11:06Andy Greenwald?

  Okay.

• 1:11:06Chris Ryan?

  We're gonna complete the podcast there, because we had such a lovely conversation.

• 1:11:09Andy Greenwald?

  You knew, you have such an innate sense of timing. You were being real cagey about Thousand Blows, and you knew we just didn't have the runway for it today.

• 1:11:17Chris Ryan?

  It's not even that, it's just I, I, I want to gauge your level of engagement. And also, we have the pit, we have a thousand blows and maybe Daredevil for Thursday.

• 1:11:27Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, well, I think we can do all of it. I'm engaged by Thousand Blows. I'd love to talk to you about it.

• 1:11:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:31Andy Greenwald?

  I'd like to talk specifically about how it mirrors my own experience as a newcomer to London. You know, how dangerous it is to dodge horses and buggies.

• 1:11:38Chris Ryan?

  As a guy who likes taming lions, yeah.

• 1:11:40Andy Greenwald?

  I mean, metaphorically, yeah.

• 1:11:41Chris Ryan?

  Uh, Greenwald, it's wonderful to have you back, man.

• 1:11:44Andy Greenwald?

  I'm back. I mean, I'm back.

• 1:11:45Chris Ryan?

  And thanks to Kaya and everybody behind the scenes for making the show today. And we will be with you again on Thursday.

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