Casino with Emily Yoshida

[00:00:02] [SPEAKER_03] David! Yep? We did a live show. Yeah, remember? Ranking Scorsese at the Bell House in Brooklyn. We did the definitive power ranking of Martin Scorsese things. It was so fun. It was very silly. Ben and Marie were with us. That's right. Hey everyone. Or should I say oh! Oh! And thanks to our friends at Dynasty Typewriter, it was live streamed for the first time ever. But also, the replay is still up there, but only until October 30th.

[00:00:31] [SPEAKER_02] So just a few more days. Yes. You can get it at Dynasty.tv. Dynasty.tv! It's $20. We had a blast, and the Spreadmaster really got to work. Oh yeah, I was moving things around. Laptop was on. I don't know if I'd ever seen you that happy. You were thrilled. You were like a pig and shit. I was locked in. Yeah, very locked in, and you were funny. Thank you. You were funny. You were also funny. Oh, thank you. And if you want to see like, you know, Griffin's Shinebox on camera.

[00:01:01] [SPEAKER_03] It's the only way to see it. You might see me shine my shoes. Exactly. Yeah, if you're into that sort of content. If that gets you off. Okay. So once again, that's at Dynasty.tv.

[00:01:39] [SPEAKER_03] Listen to me very carefully. There are three ways of podcasting around here. The right way, the wrong way, and the way that I podcast. You understand?

[00:01:48] [SPEAKER_02] I feel like actually, this isn't a quotable movie on the level of Goodfellas or whatever, but there are so many runs that you could do. It's got good lines. Yeah. And just like the way they fucking talk to each other. It's just, I could listen to them talk to each other all day. These, you know, I hate to bring him up so quickly. It really reminds me of Donald Trump.

[00:02:09] [SPEAKER_02] Oh, yeah. Just the way they talk. Yes. The way they talk where I'm like, I think you got your point across. And he's like, I'm going to repeat it six more times before the sentence is over. You know what I mean? Well, so everyone's. And it's a lot of like, he's a big guy. This guy, he's a big guy. And he's big. And he's a guy. And he's a big guy. And he's coming for you. And when he comes for you, he'll come right at you. And he's going to come at you real hard. And you're like, uh-huh. Okay.

[00:02:31] [SPEAKER_02] There's a lot of people reasserting. Of course, that's how Trump like communicates like domestic policy versus, you know, mobsters running a casino.

[00:02:39] [SPEAKER_03] There's a lot of people reasserting how strong and how tough and how smart they are. Yeah. Verbally.

[00:02:46] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, also, I feel like people often say that this administration has run like the mob. Well, well, well, well, well. I really came to that conclusion on my own while watching this movie again for the 15th time or whatever. It's like, it's true what they say.

[00:03:04] [SPEAKER_03] You know, sometimes I watch the news and I say, who directed this? Martin Scorsese? Except not the one who did Age of Innocence or Last Temptation. No. The mobster one. The mobster one. The reductive one.

[00:03:17] [SPEAKER_00] Killers of the Flower.

[00:03:18] [SPEAKER_02] This guy could fuck up a cup with coffee is one of my favorite lines. Yes.

[00:03:22] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. What are the choice quotes? What was, what else? I feel like I always ask this. What were the runners up for us quotes?

[00:03:29] [SPEAKER_03] Let's see. I mean, the, the, tempting to do like the opening or closing monologues, but they're really long. They're really long. They're really long.

[00:03:38] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, the, the, the monologue about the, the new era of corporate podcasts. Yes. Yes.

[00:03:45] [SPEAKER_02] Yes. The closing. Yeah.

[00:03:47] [SPEAKER_00] Guys, I love this movie.

[00:03:49] [SPEAKER_02] I love it too. I really, I, I've had a long kind of like sort of like tempestuous girlfriend relationship with this movie where I'm like, I don't know. You're a lot. And then I'm like, oh, but you're so interesting. Like coming back to you. It is. You're so wild.

[00:04:03] [SPEAKER_03] So watchable. And not to sound like Mr. Bill Simmons. Yeah, please. But this is the kind of movie almost designed to play on cable television. And you just like dip in for an hour and then you're like, okay, okay.

[00:04:14] [SPEAKER_04] Whoa, whoa.

[00:04:15] [SPEAKER_00] I need a sandwich or something. It's probably like five hours. It's probably five hours long. Which is like how you spend your afternoon. Right.

[00:04:21] [SPEAKER_03] It's a lazy Sunday.

[00:04:22] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:04:23] [SPEAKER_02] It's so long for a movie where the plot is he ran a casino and then after a while the vibes got bad. Yes. Like that is the plot of the movie. Yes. The movie ends with like, and I'm like, oh, what intricate shit happened? It's like, no, no, everyone just got sick of each other.

[00:04:37] [SPEAKER_03] Because when you see the poster, you almost wonder the first time, is the movie about the creation of the first casino? Sure. Is this movie about how Vegas found it? Because she like makes the first dice. Right.

[00:04:48] [SPEAKER_02] Exactly.

[00:04:49] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. You know, it's like Scorsese is making a casino movie. You imagine it has to be the ultimate casino movie. And you're like, no, it's the story of one casino. And basically the story of like two guys.

[00:05:00] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah.

[00:05:00] [SPEAKER_03] Two guys, a gal, and a gambling place.

[00:05:03] [SPEAKER_02] Two guys, a gal, and Don fucking Rickles. Just frowning in the background. Billy Sherbert.

[00:05:09] [SPEAKER_00] There's so many reasons this movie should not work. And I was really watching it with that hat on, the like writer hat. Like what's needed in a movie? Like, you know, so many of the preceding like mob gangster movies, which I rewatched in preparation for this episode. Just make them fresh. So I watched Mean Streets and Goodfellas, which are, you know, all obviously kind of riffing on same themes in different ways.

[00:05:33] [SPEAKER_00] But those feel so like, you know, chef's kiss of construction, of character development, all that, like making you invest in these different people. And this one shouldn't work on those, you know, levels. This movie shouldn't work. Like we are introduced to a pretty stoic guy who just seems to have it all from minute one. And there's not like the, oh, I came up from, you know, shine and shoes or whatever.

[00:06:01] [SPEAKER_00] Like he's just arrives fully formed and the boss of everything, which should not be compelling. But it is because it's of the world.

[00:06:10] [SPEAKER_03] It's kind of crazy how much this movie doesn't explain that much how he gets to the starting point. Yeah.

[00:06:17] [SPEAKER_02] The book explains more. The movie is just kind of like you need to understand. No one was more ready to run a casino than this fucking guy. That's how the movie starts. Yeah. This guy was born gambling. The concept of casinos. He rocks at it. Yes.

[00:06:30] [SPEAKER_00] Like just two scenes of, in, you know, sepia-toned Chicago of him running some odds. And it's like, yep, that was the guy.

[00:06:37] [SPEAKER_03] You need to understand that in 1972 there were empty casinos waiting for Ace Rothstein. Ace Rothstein, a.k.a. Lefty Rosenthal. Lefty Rosenthal. Correct.

[00:06:46] [SPEAKER_02] Yes, yes. Ace Rothstein's a good name, though. It is. That's a good, that's a solid casino mob boss in the 70s name. I mean. If you ask me. Ace Rothstein.

[00:06:56] [SPEAKER_03] Yep. Ginger McKenna. Love it. Lester Diamond. Billy Sherbert, of course, my favorite character name. Maybe my favorite character name ever. To point to Don Rickles and go, this is Billy Sherbert. Is one of the best things to ever happen in movies.

[00:07:11] [SPEAKER_02] Billy Sherbert. Billy Sherbert.

[00:07:13] [SPEAKER_03] One assumes that's a made up name.

[00:07:14] [SPEAKER_02] All the names. Yes. Are trend, you know. Sound alike.

[00:07:19] [SPEAKER_00] But the, I mean, they really made Lester Diamond sound cooler than he is. Because it's still, it's like, I don't know, Blandon or something. But it's not, like, Diamond is a sick last name for, you know, a pimp, like, groomer.

[00:07:34] [SPEAKER_03] It's also such a, I mean, this only gets more extreme as we go later into his career. And I feel like Wolf of Wall Street's the most extreme version of this. Right. But Scorsese being so powerful. Yes. That it's like, this guy's like a James Woods type. And you're like, but this role's a little too small for James Woods. Just call him. I said it was a James Woods type. And the second he comes on screen and you're like, oh, so it's James Woods with a mustache? Bad news. Got it.

[00:08:00] [SPEAKER_02] This is also, and we'll talk about it, and then we should introduce our show and our guests. It's just the movie where Scorsese's like, oh, you like what I do? How about I do, like, the most of it? Yeah. Oh, you like, you're cool with, like, a narrator? We're going to have, like, eight narrators. Yes. You like musical montages? The whole fucking movie is that. The first 20 minutes definitely is that. And the last 20 minutes is just, like, pop music. Yes. With montages and shit happening. It's a Baroque documentary. And, like, you can handle anti-heroic character?

[00:08:29] [SPEAKER_02] You can handle characters that maybe aren't on the up and up? Great. No one in this movie is likable. No one is good. You're not rooting for anyone, like, as a hero. We don't know any cops. We don't know any, like, law enforcement guys.

[00:08:43] [SPEAKER_03] Is this the point, though, for people who are late Scorsese doubters where he goes off the rails? If you think that late Scorsese has, like, lost his focus, this is the start of, like, I'm putting everything on the pizza. No movie will be shorter than three hours long. Right. I'm going to just give you as many interesting scenes as I can think of.

[00:09:04] [SPEAKER_02] Because, like, bringing out the dead is two hours.

[00:09:06] [SPEAKER_03] Yes.

[00:09:07] [SPEAKER_02] And that is obviously, like, for late Scorsese restraint. But that movie is so punishing, I remember the two hours feeling long.

[00:09:14] [SPEAKER_03] But on paper, it's sort of a return to classic Scorsese. New York. Traitor.

[00:09:19] [SPEAKER_02] Street level. Yes. But, yeah, I mean, apart from that, it's like Gangs of New York is, like, three hours plus. Totally. I feel like that's the peak of that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Departed is 240 or, you know, two and a half. Shutter Island is a, he's 218. That's fucking so short. I mean, that's like his most streamlined movie at this point. Hugo is 26. Yeah. Wow. But that's for children. Hugo being 26 is like a normal movie being five hours long. Yeah.

[00:09:49] [SPEAKER_02] Wolf of Wall Street, three full hours. Silence is two hours 40. Irishman, of course, that's where he's, you know, that's Casino Plus because he's like, it's like this plus sleepy. Yeah. That's three hours and 29 minutes long. You know the flower moon is three hours and 26 minutes long.

[00:10:06] [SPEAKER_00] A brisk 326, I would say.

[00:10:09] [SPEAKER_03] You know the concept of the Irishman Plus, right? Go ahead. When we were doing the George Lucas live streams, George Lucas talk show live streams during the pandemic, Connor decided at some point that our format was called the Irishman Plus, which meant every live stream had to run at least one minute longer than the Irishman. And if we raised enough money during the live stream, because all of those were for charity or for some business that was struggling during the pandemic or something, if we raised

[00:10:37] [SPEAKER_03] enough money, then we would watch the Irishman after we reached an Irishman Plus. Right. So then it would become a double Irishman with an Irishman watch.

[00:10:45] [SPEAKER_01] A double Irishman. I'm just saying you got hammered on some double Irishman last night.

[00:10:49] [SPEAKER_03] You said casino plus and I had to respond to that. Right. It was an activation phrase.

[00:10:55] [SPEAKER_02] I love it. I think he should. We should pitch that to him. I don't think we'll be thrown out with our heads is the battering ram for the door. The Irishman Plus. No, Marty, it's a great idea. Big guy is just coming. I just love it. He's like, head first. Specifically throw him out head first and his door hits the door. You understand me? You don't open the door and throw him out head first.

[00:11:18] [SPEAKER_03] There's a very specific nature in which I want this man to be thrown out.

[00:11:21] [SPEAKER_00] I always laugh out loud when I say it. It's just so silly.

[00:11:24] [SPEAKER_03] Scorsese always makes this joke that like Departed was the first movie he ever made with a plot.

[00:11:29] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:11:29] [SPEAKER_03] And he's like, and that's why they finally gave me the Oscar. I made a movie with a plot. Yeah, yeah. Right? But this is the start of this era where like even the movie doesn't have a story as much as it has like a subject. A subject.

[00:11:41] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:11:41] [SPEAKER_03] And he's just going to let you like luxuriate in this world and the scenes don't have narrative build in a conventional sense upon each other.

[00:11:48] [SPEAKER_00] Well, this is my super hot take on this movie is that, you know, I never say this about anything. Usually it's the other way around where it's like, oh, this show should have been a movie. This movie kind of should have been a show. Like if it if this idea was pitched by Scorsese now or in the last 10 years, it would be, you know, a 10 part. Never would have been a movie.

[00:12:10] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah.

[00:12:10] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. And it would be I think it would be well served by that. Like I think that all of these little vignettes in it that like I've seen this movie so many times, but every time I watch it, I'm sort of like, oh, this part comes next because sometimes it doesn't necessarily feel like A leads to B leads to C. Yeah.

[00:12:27] [SPEAKER_02] You are trying to untangle, right? Like when is when are the peaks and valleys here? Yeah.

[00:12:32] [SPEAKER_00] There's so many like flashbacks and, you know, you're in switches in perspective. Yes. And I feel like all of these little vignettes are like could be full episodes. It would be really great. But I and I just want to say I don't ever argue for anything to be TV instead of movies. But this I was like, be a good show. But Emily, you work in television.

[00:12:51] [SPEAKER_03] I do. I do. Movies are getting adapted into TV shows. It's true. Some of them you have worked on in the past. Yeah. I might be familiar with that. Yeah. Does it not feel like you could see this being announced any fucking day? Totally. Yeah. It screams out for it.

[00:13:08] [SPEAKER_00] It would be so expensive, though.

[00:13:10] [SPEAKER_01] Like, I don't.

[00:13:11] [SPEAKER_02] They fucking did Cape Fear. Yeah.

[00:13:13] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. I mean, it would have to be Scorsese producing it. Like, I don't know. But, you know, we're not in the golden era of vinyl anymore. Like, I don't know. You could even command that. Tell me about it. That is what vinyl was. Vinyl was. Yeah, yeah.

[00:13:28] [SPEAKER_02] The pitch was like, can we do the same thing for the music industry?

[00:13:31] [SPEAKER_03] But you know that vinyl started as a three hour movie. Right. Which makes sense. It's a good script to be a three hour movie to be like, I want to explain how the record industry rose and fell.

[00:13:41] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:13:42] [SPEAKER_03] And then they decided it was too unwieldy to contain as a film.

[00:13:46] [SPEAKER_00] Were they going to take it all the way to Napster or what? Like.

[00:13:50] [SPEAKER_03] No, it was called vinyl.

[00:13:51] [SPEAKER_00] I know. But then, like, that's the end of the show. It wasn't called. It'd be funny.

[00:13:55] [SPEAKER_02] It's like, Cannavale's in, like, old age. He's like, fucking Napster! Kill that Sean Parker! We need to put a hit out on him!

[00:14:03] [SPEAKER_00] Sean Parker gets whacked.

[00:14:04] [SPEAKER_03] I think the plan was, like, go from the 70s to some point in the 80s. Makes sense. Maybe they would have gone to the 90s and he's like, there's fucking hippity hop.

[00:14:12] [SPEAKER_02] Or he hears, like, Pearl Jam and, like, takes 20 Quaaludes or whatever the fuck.

[00:14:16] [SPEAKER_03] There was going to be something he was disgusted by. Vinyl. It is still the hardest I've ever laughed. I'll save this. We're going to do an episode on vinyl.

[00:14:27] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah, yeah. Oh, fine.

[00:14:28] [SPEAKER_03] We're going to combine vinyl and Boardwalk Empire, the two pilots. Okay. Which together are seven hours long. Wow.

[00:14:35] [SPEAKER_02] Boardwalk Empire. Well, it might be two hours long.

[00:14:36] [SPEAKER_03] I think they're two two-hour pilots. It might be.

[00:14:38] [SPEAKER_02] The second one definitely is.

[00:14:40] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. But I'll save a story. I will say one of the hardest times I've ever laughed in my life was a thing on the set of vinyl. But that's not what we're talking about today. Today we're talking about Casino on Blank Check with Griffin and David. Wow. And Griffin... I'm David. It's a podcast about casinos. That's true. Directors who are given a lot of chips early on in their career. I'm going to abandon this. It's a podcast about filmographies. Directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of

[00:15:08] [SPEAKER_03] blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. And sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce baby. They crap out. Yes. There you go. You could say that sometimes they got the backing of the casino and sometimes they don't.

[00:15:21] [SPEAKER_00] Sometimes they get a $62.5 million check to open the Tangiers. I'm always just... That is quite a blank check project. It is. Yeah. Well, I think in real life... And now I'm kind of mixing up the movie and the book. But it was existent already, I think. It was just like... Like that was the money to kind of update it and turn it into like the first like mega casino. Yeah. Like what we think of as a modern casino in Vegas.

[00:15:50] [SPEAKER_03] But yeah. This is a miniseries on the films of Martin Scorsese. It was The Stardust.

[00:15:55] [SPEAKER_00] It was The Stardust. It was previously The Stardust. It was based on The Stardust.

[00:15:57] [SPEAKER_03] Or what it really is. Yeah.

[00:15:59] [SPEAKER_00] It was based on The Stardust. Okay.

[00:16:01] [SPEAKER_03] The series is called Podcast Fellas because that's what we are. Or a couple of podcast fellas. True. And today we have a podcast mommy with us. God. That's disgusting.

[00:16:13] [SPEAKER_01] Yes.

[00:16:15] [SPEAKER_03] A mother of blankies. To talk about the film Casino, our friend Emily Yoshida returning to the show.

[00:16:21] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, thank you so much for having me. Of Shogun. Yeah.

[00:16:24] [SPEAKER_03] We're not allowed to say what you're working on right now.

[00:16:26] [SPEAKER_00] No, we can talk about it. I think it will be... I think they're literally announcing it today.

[00:16:30] [SPEAKER_02] November 8th. Yeah. So I assume the news will be out.

[00:16:33] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. And it's... I think it's going to be out in late 2027. I'm working on Point Break. A film... A film being covered on this very podcast. That's true. It's true. Yeah. No, I was very... You know, when I started working on it, I had to tell you guys. You did. I was just, you know, very... Felt like a full circle moment.

[00:16:50] [SPEAKER_03] It really was. Yeah. It is. It continues to be.

[00:16:54] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. One Long Wave.

[00:16:58] [SPEAKER_03] So you're going to sustain One Long Wave for 10 episodes? Is that the plan? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:17:02] [SPEAKER_00] It's really weird. It's a really weird show.

[00:17:07] [SPEAKER_02] I love Point Break. It's a good movie. It's really good.

[00:17:10] [SPEAKER_00] Did you see the 4K? Yeah. They were in theaters for a while. They put it... I think it was like... They re-released it? Yeah. Got the dance.

[00:17:17] [SPEAKER_02] Got the steel book. I do have the steel book, I think.

[00:17:20] [SPEAKER_00] Fun to watch on a big screen.

[00:17:20] [SPEAKER_02] Did we say her name?

[00:17:22] [SPEAKER_00] I said her name. Okay. Podcast Mommy. Yes. Podcast Mommy. I don't know if you actually did say my name. Did we say Emily's name? I did. I said Emily Oshita.

[00:17:29] [SPEAKER_02] Emily Oshita's here. It's nice to see you, Emily.

[00:17:32] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, it's so great to see you guys.

[00:17:33] [SPEAKER_02] Welcome to New York. It's been waiting for me. As of course our favorite citizen, Taylor Swift, once said.

[00:17:40] [SPEAKER_00] You know, when I moved to New York when I first came here, that song was literally in the air. Like that was the song.

[00:17:46] [SPEAKER_02] On the last episode of Girls in Hoodies, they played it for you. Yeah. And you started crying. You know, possibly in horror, but you did.

[00:17:51] [SPEAKER_00] No, because I love that song so much.

[00:17:53] [SPEAKER_02] Of course.

[00:17:53] [SPEAKER_00] It's so beautiful.

[00:17:54] [SPEAKER_03] You have said that that episode made you cry.

[00:17:57] [SPEAKER_02] That was a really nice emotional episode. I remember actually listening to it. I was driving. I was in like South Brooklyn. I was listening to it in my car and I was like, this is so sweet. And I texted you something along those lines. It was, yeah. R.I.P. Girls in Hoodies.

[00:18:08] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. It was a good run we had there.

[00:18:10] [SPEAKER_02] Welcome to New York is a song that is used in the secret lives of pets, I believe. Has your daughter gotten into this? She's seen the movie and she went to a sort of one of the summer campy things she went to, you know, every week they do a new movie or book or something. And one week they did secret lives of pets. And I was like, the fuck, like performance are they going to do for this? And they did a dance to Welcome to New York. Okay.

[00:18:33] [SPEAKER_03] And I was like, hey, good job, guys. Yeah. Yeah. No, they do use that song maybe twice. Yeah. That movie stinks. Yeah. I think that movie is not good.

[00:18:43] [SPEAKER_02] I watched most of it with her and I was like, well, it's also just Toy Story with dogs. Yeah. It's really annoying.

[00:18:48] [SPEAKER_00] Is it different than Hotel for Dogs or whatever?

[00:18:51] [SPEAKER_02] Well, Hotel for Dogs is live action, right?

[00:18:53] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, is Hotel for Dogs live action? It is. I believe so. Oh, I mean so.

[00:18:55] [SPEAKER_02] Ben said Hotel for Dogs expert.

[00:18:57] [SPEAKER_03] Hotel for Dogs is live action and it is humans who make a hotel for dogs. And Ben is beaming. Ben is glowing just at the mere thought he's ready to shed a tear. Was it yours? I've seen the movie.

[00:19:07] [SPEAKER_01] Was it your hotel? I wish.

[00:19:09] [SPEAKER_02] I would be a great manager of a dog hotel. Right. Casino, who knows? Dog hotel, you're on it. Yep. But then what if there's like a Pesci dog who's like, and you're like, oh God, I got to deal with the pet. And he's got like kind of a funny hairdo. Pesci would have been good in Secret Life of Pets.

[00:19:25] [SPEAKER_03] Did your Pesci never voice a dog in his life?

[00:19:28] [SPEAKER_00] That's crazy if he didn't.

[00:19:29] [SPEAKER_03] Is there a Pesci animated role?

[00:19:32] [SPEAKER_00] Wait, is he in like, not, this isn't dogs, but is he in a, what's it called? Shark Tale? He's not. He's not.

[00:19:38] [SPEAKER_02] Sava, the heart of the warrior, is the only Pesci. He was. I forgot about. No, no. That's the title of the project? Yeah, it's some fucking like profit money laundering thing. Yeah. The only, he was the original voice for Mushu in Mulan. Right. Wow. I knew there was something. Like clearly there was some conversation where like, this isn't quite right. No, no, no, no. Eddie Murphy. Eddie Murphy's the answer.

[00:20:04] [SPEAKER_02] Who should voice the Chinese dragon who is the emissary of the ancestors?

[00:20:09] [SPEAKER_03] Eddie Murphy. I just assumed that Disney spent all of the 90s trying to get Eddie Murphy to play an animal sidekick. So it makes sense that there was one that didn't pan out.

[00:20:19] [SPEAKER_02] My favorite thing about Mulan, which my dad is the one my daughter is fucking obsessed with right now. We have to watch it every single day. Yeah, Mulan's solid. Like Mulan is fine to watch, but is, I looked this up, like Eddie Murphy gets offered the role and he's like, I got to go all the way to fucking Burbank or wherever the hell you record this shit. I'm not doing that. And they were like, no, no, no, no, no. You can record it in your basement. We will, whatever is best for Eddie, we're going to, we'll come to you. So, so they moved heaven and earth for Eddie. In New Jersey? Was it? New Jersey.

[00:20:49] [SPEAKER_02] In Englewood, New Jersey. What are they called?

[00:20:50] [SPEAKER_03] The Bubble House or something like that? Bubble Hill Mansion. Bubble Hill Mansion.

[00:20:55] [SPEAKER_00] That's just, that's what I didn't, I had no idea. That's the name.

[00:20:58] [SPEAKER_03] He lived in New Jersey. Of Eddie Murphy's New Jersey set Graceland. I think he finally has moved out of there. I think he's now in the LA area.

[00:21:05] [SPEAKER_02] I'm sure this has been mentioned already, like by many people, but also, it is also just so weird that BD Wong doesn't get to sing in Mulan. It is the strangest thing. He can sing. He's a Broadway actor.

[00:21:15] [SPEAKER_03] In the world. I remember that. And they have fucking Donny Osmond singing. I remember that being a thing in those movies. Because I was a kid, I, you know, the new Disney movie comes out. I scan the cast. I'm obsessed. I learned so many adult actors from Disney, like James Woods. Like. Right. That's how I found out who James Woods was. I was like, who's the voice of Hades? Give me a sense of what his cultural context is. Well, Hades is a real James Wood type. He is. He's kind of a Lester Diamond.

[00:21:40] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah.

[00:21:41] [SPEAKER_03] Allegedly.

[00:21:42] [SPEAKER_02] Allegedly, sometimes James Woods' behavior resembles that of Hades, the god of the Greek underworld. And I want to make clear that we are saying that's allegedly true. Allegedly. I do love it. Anytime on Twitter, anyone's like, I know James Woods is crazy, but he's so fucking good as Hades. Like, he still pops up. I know why they still use him for like. That's what's so funny is Disney.

[00:21:59] [SPEAKER_03] Disney's like, James, come back into the studio. But what were you going to say? No, there would be things like Pocahontas and I'd like look at the voice cast and I'd be like, oh, John Smith, Mel Gibson singing voice for John Smith. And I'd go like, I got it. Mel Gibson can't sing. I'm learning things here. And then I had the exact same experience with Mulan. And then I saw B.D. Wong on Broadway. And I was like, the fuck are you talking about? I don't know why they robbed him of that opportunity. It's so bizarre. Donny Osmond.

[00:22:29] [SPEAKER_00] Donny Osmond is his singing voice. Correct.

[00:22:31] [SPEAKER_02] He sings one song, which is I'll Make a Man Out of You. Yeah. The big song. I mean, Mulan only has like four songs.

[00:22:36] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:22:37] [SPEAKER_02] It's that weird kind of where they're like, we're not a musical, but we're kind of backing away from it a little bit. Yeah. It's more of an action movie. Yeah. I've seen it like once. Who doesn't have a song? No. Mushu. No. There's just Reflection and I'll Make a Man Out of You.

[00:22:49] [SPEAKER_03] And there's a girl worth waiting for. I like that number. That's pretty good. Yeah. Harvey Fierstein. They let Harvey sing.

[00:22:57] [SPEAKER_04] What do we want?

[00:23:00] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. It was Emily. It was never one of my. We're the same age, basically, and we were a little too old for it, I feel.

[00:23:05] [SPEAKER_00] But I feel like in that era, though, like I'm one year older than you, I think.

[00:23:10] Okay.

[00:23:11] [SPEAKER_02] Well, and rank on me. Something like that. Sure.

[00:23:13] [SPEAKER_00] But that in when you're like 12 or however old we were, that's like an eternity. It's like, oh, yeah, I was into like Pocahontas last year, but like I'm too old for this shit now or whatever.

[00:23:25] [SPEAKER_02] Everything's changed. That Pocahontas to Tarzan era is where I'm like, oh, I guess I'll go, but I don't really care. Yeah. So, yeah, my daughter being into Mulan, I'm like, huh, I've never seen this. And I'm like, hmm, looks kind of good. Just discovered through the carousel on Disney Plus? No, no. They heard Camp did Mulan Week. This is. She played the role of Mulan beautifully.

[00:23:44] [SPEAKER_03] She's going to film school? What is this camp?

[00:23:47] [SPEAKER_02] It's like pretend camp. It's a very, I mean, it's very chill. She had a great summer. I would not say she was intellectually stimulated, perhaps, but that's fine. They're really nice people.

[00:23:59] [SPEAKER_00] Is that what camp is for these days? No. No. Intellectually stimulated.

[00:24:01] [SPEAKER_02] By the end of summer, I was like, hmm, I'm feeling the need from you. Like, the desire from my daughter to maybe do a little bit more than just kind of run around playing all day. You know, like, as much as it's fun to run around and play. But Mulan. Yeah. So Mulan's cool.

[00:24:17] [SPEAKER_00] This is a podcast about Mulan.

[00:24:18] [SPEAKER_02] This is a podcast about Mulan. No, Mulan. But she's cool. I did. It was funny where I was like, I'm trying to try to receive this. And I Googled it and China was basically like, this is offensive. Yeah. And he was like, sorry. Casino. Yeah. So David. Can you set up this bit? Oh. Where do you think? Oh, well, I'm watching. It's not a bit. It's a truth. Yeah. It's a truth. You're right.

[00:24:53] [SPEAKER_02] I'm watching casino here. Basically. But then occasionally I'm just like, I'd crush running a casino. Don't you think I'd do a good job? It's like, no. And I'm like, okay, okay. But what if I had the help of the mob? Now, can I share something, David? Go ahead. I think I would be pretty good at a small time as a small time hustler. You think you could do.

[00:25:11] [SPEAKER_01] Oh, a small time hustler.

[00:25:13] [SPEAKER_03] So you want to run some like little sort of. You want to be the guy with the motor on the leg.

[00:25:17] [SPEAKER_00] With the little, doing the Morse code on your leg. Exactly. You know what happened to that guy?

[00:25:22] [SPEAKER_03] His hands got fucked up.

[00:25:24] [SPEAKER_00] No matter what you do, your hand gets fucked up.

[00:25:27] [SPEAKER_03] So they're the two guys. There's the guy who gets his hand hammered. Yes. And then there's the vice. Who goes, I'll leave. Right? Yeah. Do you know who that guy is? Who's that? His name is Joseph Reedy. He is Martin Scorsese's longtime first AD. Love that. Legendary AD. Kind of king of the New York ADs. But Scorsese puts him in the movies a lot. And he's always really fucking good. Yeah.

[00:25:51] [SPEAKER_02] Scorsese's so good at that. Yes. At just kind of meeting a guy and being like, your camera's going to love you for five minutes.

[00:25:56] [SPEAKER_03] The energy is just what I need to come across for five seconds. Yes.

[00:26:01] [SPEAKER_00] You know, his lawyer in this is actually Frank Rosenthal's lawyer.

[00:26:06] [SPEAKER_02] I love that. Yeah. And I feel like that happens all the time with Scorsese where he meets some guy to consult on. Okay. Tell me how this. And then he's just like watching. It's you, obviously. You'd be great. You'd be great. We should put you. You know. Yeah.

[00:26:18] [SPEAKER_03] Bo Deedle is in a lot of. Bo Deedle. Yes. I don't know if you folks are familiar with Bo Deedle.

[00:26:22] [SPEAKER_02] I'm very familiar.

[00:26:24] [SPEAKER_03] No. Bo Deedle was the former. Was he the police chief? No.

[00:26:29] [SPEAKER_02] He was an NYPD police detective. And I don't think he ever rose to high ranks. But he became Jordan Belfort's head of security. Yes. Which is, I believe. But he's in Goodfellas.

[00:26:44] [SPEAKER_03] So like Scorsese's known him for forever. Well, there's, here's the other thing with Bo Deedle. Bo Deedle is allegedly, allegedly, allegedly James Woods, allegedly the inspiration for the bad lieutenant. When asked about this, Bo Deedle goes, yeah, it's true, but only the good parts. Bo Deedle is also. Which is an interesting statement to parse.

[00:27:03] [SPEAKER_02] You know, he's one of those guys who's like, I'm going to run for mayor. My policy. Hey, fuck you. You know, whatever. And he goes on Fox News and says like eight racist things. And then like, you know, Scorsese will put him in other people. People will be like, why is he putting in Scorsese clearly? It's just like, he's so fucking funny. Like, he's just ridiculous. This person, you know, he's one in a million. There's no character like him. Right.

[00:27:25] [SPEAKER_03] Bo Deedle also made his own film. You know, oh, oh, what? You're going to make a movie out of me? Make me the bad lieutenant. I'll show you who I am. He made a movie. I think it was called A Good Cop. Oh, for real.

[00:27:40] [SPEAKER_04] That's so funny.

[00:27:41] [SPEAKER_02] And was that title ironic? Let me pick up what the exact title is. One Tough Cop. One Tough Cop. Starring Stephen Baldwin. That's a tough guy. Yes.

[00:27:53] [SPEAKER_03] Stephen Baldwin, that's a tough guy. I was confusing A Tough Cop with One Good Cop, which is the terrible, incredible Michael movie movie.

[00:28:00] [SPEAKER_02] He plays Detective Bo Deedle in this movie. Correct. They didn't even call him, like, Bob Deedle. Poorly received by critics, I'm seeing.

[00:28:10] [SPEAKER_03] Interesting. But he loves, yes, he loves collecting guys like this. Yeah.

[00:28:14] [SPEAKER_00] No. And I feel like that's the right, like, if you're talking about, like, you know, the weird shadow of a vague Trumpism over these characters, it's like, that's the correct, like, format for that, you know, personality type. They should be big characters in a Scorsese movie, not, you know, rulers of the fear.

[00:28:32] [SPEAKER_02] That's how you should be making your money.

[00:28:35] [SPEAKER_03] There's a lot of hypotheticals that we're constantly entertaining in our modern hellscape.

[00:28:39] [SPEAKER_04] Uh-huh.

[00:28:39] [SPEAKER_03] If Scorsese had given Donald Trump a one-scene role in the 1980s, would he not be president today?

[00:28:46] [SPEAKER_02] There are so many off-ramps that weren't taken. Who knows? I will just, I want to have great news for you, Griffin. Please. The Boardwalk Empire pilot is only 73 minutes long. That's wild. The vinyl pilot is 113. It's 113? So it's under two. I thought it was two. Wow. Okay. Yeah.

[00:29:01] [SPEAKER_00] Almost two hours. I believe that at least the Boardwalk Empire pilot feels like it's two hours, but.

[00:29:07] [SPEAKER_02] I do remember, and we'll talk about it on that episode, but like. I was so hyped. Yeah. Next year. Yeah. And then I was like, that was, that was pretty good. They had a whole boardwalk. Like, I was not like, oh my God. Like, this is the next event series of my life.

[00:29:22] [SPEAKER_03] The Boardwalk pilot, I believe, cost $20 million. Sure. And the vinyl pilot, I believe, cost $30 million.

[00:29:29] [SPEAKER_02] An issue with Borough is that they landed on Marvin Gardens and it had a hotel. Yes. So that inflated the budget a lot. And then, you know, they, they, guys, it's in Atlantic City. Yeah. Yeah. I know. I got it. I'll do more of those jokes. You know what? TBD, more Monopoly jokes next year and you have to laugh at them.

[00:29:46] [SPEAKER_03] We're plugging one Patreon episode so hard here. Do you want to know my favorite thing about Casino?

[00:29:51] Okay.

[00:29:52] [SPEAKER_03] My single favorite thing about just the entirety of the film Casino. Sure. The way Joe Pesci is holding the two dice on the poster. That's your favorite thing? And I think this is an excellent movie. I don't mean that backhandedly. It's more a statement to how much I love the way he's holding the two dice. He's holding snake eyes.

[00:30:10] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. I think I've said this on this podcast. Like, when I was a kid, I was like, is this movie about board games?

[00:30:15] [SPEAKER_01] I think I just listened to the episode you said that about. I was like, Casino, they're having fun. They're playing games, right? This looks great.

[00:30:21] [SPEAKER_02] He's got these awesome red dice. Now, he does have a bit of an expression on his face that suggests he's a little mad at you.

[00:30:29] [SPEAKER_03] He's also got flesh-colored tape pulling his eyes and cheeks back.

[00:30:34] [SPEAKER_00] Ah, Hollywood facelift.

[00:30:36] [SPEAKER_02] He looks fucking insane in a different way on the poster where it's like airbrushed versus how he looks in the movie where he also looks insane.

[00:30:43] [SPEAKER_03] Yoshida, do you know this? Because we were talking about this a lot in the Blank Check group text. He is not recently recovering from a facelift in this movie.

[00:30:53] [SPEAKER_00] No, yeah, yeah. He's just doing the Hollywood facelift.

[00:30:56] [SPEAKER_03] Yes, yes, yes. Okay, I wanted to make sure we were using the same terms here. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:31:00] [SPEAKER_02] For the audience that doesn't know.

[00:31:02] [SPEAKER_03] This is like a classic Hollywood technique. We will share this article. There is an Entertainment Weekly article about my cousin Vinny, which is shortly before this movie, but the same technique is being used here that was often used for aging actresses of the 50s and 60s. Yeah, yeah. Where they were like, this is what Lucille Ball did in Maine.

[00:31:20] [SPEAKER_03] And they used like flesh colored tape and pulled it at their like wrinkly areas back around their head and attach wires to it and tighten it and then put a wig over that.

[00:31:32] [SPEAKER_02] It's all hidden in the hairpiece, says Carmen Willis, one of Vinny's makeup technicians. We attach tabs and then we tighten it through a hook and eye system.

[00:31:41] [SPEAKER_03] Hook and eye. I know when they're saying hook and eye, they just mean like that's the type of fastener.

[00:31:47] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was constantly like snapping.

[00:31:49] [SPEAKER_03] It sounds so grab Brazil shit.

[00:31:51] [SPEAKER_02] And they'd be like, cut, cut, cut, cut. His fucking face broke. This is... Reset the hooks and eyes.

[00:31:57] [SPEAKER_03] This is conjecture on my part, but if you watch Cousin Vinny in HD today... Oh, it looks crazy. No, no, no. You see the tape.

[00:32:03] [SPEAKER_02] I mean, you just... It looks crazy.

[00:32:06] [SPEAKER_03] You see the tape and you see that they've just kind of put concealer over the tape. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But you see the lines. In this, it's much more subtle, even though his face looks so insane. Yeah. Where I think they actually created like prosthetic pieces of like fake, more minimal crow's feet to put over the tape. That's so funny. Because I kept pausing and looking. And it's like, they've done such a good job covering it up, but you see the tension.

[00:32:31] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Oh, weird. I did not notice that part, the prosthetic.

[00:32:35] [SPEAKER_02] I think so. He's just supposed to like... Because he's a scarier character. Yes. It just doesn't bother me in the same way. Oh, yeah. And my cousin Vinny was like, what? I'm a Brooklyn lawyer. I'm a normal guy. Like in Casino, I'm like, that's what some fucking crazy mobster might look like, right?

[00:32:49] [SPEAKER_00] Well, that guy moves to Vegas and is like, oh, I'm in the West. There's, you know, a plethora of plastic surgeons. They've just invented a new thing called plastic surgery. We're still working out all the kinks. Yeah. But I think I'm going to go under the knife. What?

[00:33:02] [SPEAKER_03] Like literally Brazil yanking his face back. Yeah. It's just so funny to me that like at this era, Joe Pesci got this vein as like, you know, a what? Like 50-year-old character actor, Oscar-winning character actor that he needed to do this. But you're right. No, the tension of his face does kind of work for this. It's funny that the justification he gave for my cousin Vinny was that they cast Mercer Tomei as his girlfriend. And she's like, well, she's so much younger than me. Right. I got to look younger.

[00:33:30] [SPEAKER_03] And I'm like, yeah, because that guy would never have a fucking 20 years younger girlfriend. What are you talking about? I mean, okay, so. I'm supposed to be 30 in this movie.

[00:33:39] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, it's interesting that he doesn't actually get plastic surgery though. No. Like that he won't cross that bridge, which feels also like totally.

[00:33:47] [SPEAKER_03] And you look at him now and he looks old. Like he clearly is, he's aging in a way that shows a lack of work at any point, I would say.

[00:33:58] [SPEAKER_02] He's 52 when he makes this, or 51. Wow. He's in his early 50s. He's older than De Niro, right? He's older than De Niro by six months. They're the same age, basically. But what I want to, the guy he's playing died at the age of 48. I mean, this is so true in all these movies where these mobsters all died young because, you know, they get shot and shit. Sure.

[00:34:23] [SPEAKER_02] Um, so like, obviously he's sort of a, he's a stretch in the early parts of Casino. Well, his face is high stretch. But it doesn't bother me at all.

[00:34:35] [SPEAKER_00] But I, but I would say also like an actual, uh, period accurate mobster 48 in the seventies probably is closer to like a 60. A hundred percent. And the 90s.

[00:34:46] [SPEAKER_02] The mugshots.

[00:34:47] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Yeah. They don't look youthful. He actually looks so much like the real guy. Yes. It's what?

[00:34:55] [SPEAKER_02] Four billion cigarettes a day. Like, right. Like they just ate, what did they eat?

[00:34:58] [SPEAKER_03] Like steaks and baked potatoes? I don't know. Bacon sandwiches. Uh, it's, it's crazy. You're right, Emily. I've watched, there's a, there's like a vintage nineties TV special, the story behind the story that's on the, the 4k of this movie, or it's on the Blu-ray disc at least. Um, that, uh, is like Pileggi telling the story with reenactments, but also showing photos and stuff. Yeah. And you're like, I bet after fucking Goodfellas and Raging Bull, they were just like, look, it'd be fun to just do it with Pesci again.

[00:35:28] [SPEAKER_03] Even if Pesci is not really a match for the real guy. And everyone's like, this guy was so fucking short. He was.

[00:35:34] [SPEAKER_00] This guy was so diminutive. He was called the ant.

[00:35:37] [SPEAKER_03] Yes.

[00:35:38] [SPEAKER_02] Now his name was Anthony, I believe. Yes. But yeah. Can you imagine how excited they were?

[00:35:44] [SPEAKER_03] When they read this book and they get to the description of this guy and they're like, Oh, we can just cast Joe.

[00:35:50] [SPEAKER_02] It's just like, what is he? 1-800-Pesci?

[00:35:52] [SPEAKER_00] Well, it's just funny because like, like De Niro looks nothing like Frank Rosenthal, but Pesci already looks like him a little bit. And then you can see like down to like the little streak he does in his hair. Like he is just doing a one-to-one of this dude and it works. It's yeah.

[00:36:08] [SPEAKER_03] And even Pesci doing the Midwestern accent very subtly.

[00:36:12] [SPEAKER_02] I'm a Chicago guy.

[00:36:13] [SPEAKER_03] Demdare. Demdare. He's got a little bit of that Demdare. Deep dish.

[00:36:17] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Deep dish. The beam. Deep dish.

[00:36:18] [SPEAKER_01] Wrinkly field. You should just do this. The bears.

[00:36:23] [SPEAKER_02] Um, casino. So casino is a film by Martin Scorsese written by Marty and Nicholas Pelleggi based on the book by Nicholas Pelleggi, which is called Casino Love and Honor in Las Vegas, which is sort of his followup to the book Wiseguy, which he wrote in the 80s and in a similar style, I feel, having read both and that got turned into Goodfellas. It is a runback of a formula that had worked very well. Right. Would we all agree? Yes. Like, you know, the package.

[00:36:51] [SPEAKER_02] I say I'll look at the research in a second, but the package is kind of like, you liked Goodfellas.

[00:36:55] [SPEAKER_03] If I'm not mistaken, and JJ will clarify this in a moment, this was a case where Pelleggi comes to Scorsese and goes, I think I got my next subject. Right. And the movie and the book are basically being developed concurrently.

[00:37:07] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah.

[00:37:07] [SPEAKER_03] But there was even a thing where Scorsese wanted the book to be published after the movie. I think it was, wasn't it? Lost World style.

[00:37:14] [SPEAKER_00] I think they flipped it. Okay. That's fine. Yes. It was about the same time, though.

[00:37:17] [SPEAKER_03] But it was basically, all of this was happening at the same time because, like, one of the ways that they got the real Lefty to agree to collaborate on this. The book came out a month before the movie. Yeah.

[00:37:27] [SPEAKER_00] Okay.

[00:37:37] [SPEAKER_02] Because at that point, De Niro's just like, you know, it's the ultimate respect, I guess.

[00:37:42] [SPEAKER_03] He also was like, I love Goodfellas. You're telling me you want to make Goodfellas about me?

[00:37:46] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. It's the whole thing with the mobsters that you always hear is they are like, oh, well, that's not how it happened. But they love the movies. They love the movies. And like, yeah. Sorry, Emily.

[00:37:54] [SPEAKER_00] That's like the beautiful romantic thing, I think, about that brand of criminal at the end of it. I mean, this is a total tangent. But like, I always say that about, like, people taking somewhat dirty money to make films still to this day. You know, these kinds of guys, like, they're still at least not like private equity because at the end of the day, they want to go to Cannes and they want to hang out with movie stars because it's cool. Like, and it's fun. And like, they're right about that.

[00:38:20] [SPEAKER_03] What's the worst type of financial criminal? I mean, this is like, you know, the one who doesn't even care about the arts at all. Yeah. Yeah. The last 15 to 20 years of Scorsese's career have basically been bankrolled by guys like this who are just like, if you're telling me I get to smoke one cigar next to Leonardo DiCaprio, I will give you $40 million. Yeah. And Scorsese stacks like 10 of those guys up and makes a picture. Yeah.

[00:38:48] [SPEAKER_02] Emily, your relationship to Martin Scorsese before I open the dossier. Is there anything particular you want to speak to?

[00:38:55] [SPEAKER_03] You have multiple pages of notes in front of you.

[00:38:56] [SPEAKER_00] No, one is just a list of outfits. Good. So I have a funny history with Martin Scorsese, I would say. I, you know, when I was in high school around the time I started realizing I wanted to go into film, you know, it was just obviously like he was one of the top, like one of the main guys. And I think I...

[00:39:20] [SPEAKER_03] He's mentioned as the shorthand guy.

[00:39:21] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, the guy. And there were two things happening though, which was that I felt just like contrarian from the jump about that. Like I was like, you can't tell me that's the guy. Even though I did, I really liked Goodfellas, but that was, I watched Goodfellas because like I liked The Sopranos and I was like, I want to see what it's referencing. Sure. But, but yeah. And then at the same time, I would say that's still not, that's maybe my least favorite era of Scorsese.

[00:39:50] [SPEAKER_00] Like I'm not a Gangs of New York person. I'm definitely not an aviator person. And so it was kind of convening at this time when I didn't love the new stuff.

[00:39:59] [SPEAKER_04] Right.

[00:39:59] [SPEAKER_00] So I really was not what I would call a fan of his for a while. And then I don't know where it turned exactly, but like, I think, I think I got into this movie a lot, like in my, my late twenties, I would say. Like, I feel like it was one of these things that was on Netflix streaming early on, uh, all the time. And, uh, and I don't know. I, I think this and Age of Innocence was, which was the other one I sent to you guys is like, you know, the ones I would do an episode on.

[00:40:30] [SPEAKER_00] Like they kind of opened up to me the Baroque emotionality of Scorsese that I think goes under disgust, especially when you're talking about these crime movies and stuff. And that to me, like, it's so operatic. It's like, you know, it's like maximum movie and it serves me and my interests more, I would say. And so I found like, I kind of found my way into like really loving him and admiring him a lot. Um, but it was later.

[00:41:00] [SPEAKER_00] It was like after film school and all that. I was very resistant before that.

[00:41:04] [SPEAKER_02] And there's so many ways in with him. Yeah. So as you're saying, right. You know, so it's like, even if he is sold as the, like, you must. Yeah. Acknowledge this is the greatest American director or what, you know, like, and then it can be a little overwhelming. You watch this movie in the crib, David? Who, me? Yeah. Uh, why do you say that? Cause I love gambling? No, I just feel like this movie is very imprinted on your soul. Is it? I mean, I guess it is. I really do like this movie.

[00:41:33] [SPEAKER_02] Um, I find it very upsetting. The end really bums me out. Oh, it's dark as fuck at the end. I was really, not in like a bad mood after I watched it, but I was really like, Jesus Christ. You know, like, and even though I'm like, can't wait for the cornfield. And then I'm like, God, it's so awful. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I mean, uh, when did I first see this movie? Probably whenever I was, you know, doing my Marty thing. Right. And like, I went to some Saul Bass exhibit when I was a teenager that I remember like having a big impact on me.

[00:42:04] [SPEAKER_02] And like, this is one of his last title sequences. It's so beautiful too. And it's such a cool title sequence. It's so good. And I remember like, cause I think, I think my early impression of Casino is I was like, well, okay, well that's like Goodfellas, but not quite as good. Right. Like that was, that was sort of my teenage take.

[00:42:19] [SPEAKER_03] I can tell you my exact first impression, which is I'm, I'm flipping through channels on TV. I believe I'm at my grandparents' house. My dad walks in. He goes, oh, Casino. Martin Scorsese's Casino. I go, is this good? He goes, it's kind of just him doing Goodfellas again, except Sharon Stone's really good in it. And then my dad says, and I don't even like Sharon Stone, but she's good in this.

[00:42:40] [SPEAKER_00] That's the, one of the main things I would say puts this movie above, above Goodfellas for me in the end is that, you know, fucking Ginger, amazing character.

[00:42:48] [SPEAKER_03] It's an amazing character. But, but that's how I was introduced to this film is very much like it's cultural reputation for a very long time that I think has now balanced out finally in the last 10 years.

[00:42:59] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. But I mean, it'll never be on.

[00:43:00] [SPEAKER_03] But it was just, he tried to do Goodfellas again. It's not as good, but Sharon Stone's a standout. That was certainly how like the Academy Awards reacted to this movie.

[00:43:09] [SPEAKER_02] It's lone nomination.

[00:43:10] [SPEAKER_04] Mm-hmm.

[00:43:23] [SPEAKER_02] I'll open the dossier and I'll tell you that while Newscore says he's working on the screenplay for The Age of Innocence, which is a film that was out before, Casino, he's also working on a long gestating George Gershwin biopic called Mine. He's working on Silence, which is a long gestating project. We'll get there. He's working on Gangs of New York, which is... We'll get there. And he's working on something else with Pileggi called The Neighborhood, which he never made. This I want to see him make now.

[00:43:52] [SPEAKER_02] I know, which is like, he's basically like, it's the story of my family. Like, it is the courtship of my parents. It goes right to the war in the early 60s. It's a story of like immigration and like Sicilian ethnicity and little Italy. Flashes back to his grandparents in Sicily. We're going to go back to Sicily. And then like, you know, it's like Italians, Italian Americans, American Italians. Right. You know what I mean? Like it's charting the whole generation. It's really long. He thought about doing it as a miniseries. Nothing has ever come of it.

[00:44:20] [SPEAKER_03] I want him to circle back to this. I feel like everyone needs to do their Fablemans, their I was born, but...

[00:44:27] [SPEAKER_02] Right.

[00:44:27] [SPEAKER_03] Their I'm ready to tackle my childhood and my parents movie.

[00:44:30] [SPEAKER_02] Now, there's some other insane shit that he got like, you know, briefly attached to. There's a movie called Ocean of Storms, which was like an aging astronaut love story. That was going to star Warren Beatty and Annette Bening. That sounds so fucking cool.

[00:44:48] [SPEAKER_03] You know who else? Eventually died out. In 1995, you know who else I bet was going to be in that movie? Who? Gary Shanling in space. Sure. Anytime Warren Beatty and Annette Bening did something together, they were like, get our friend Gary over here.

[00:45:02] [SPEAKER_02] Well, it's just funny because Beatty and Annette, of course, did do Bugsy, which is another story of Vegas that is bad, in my opinion. A really boring-ass movie. But quite tobacchian. Yeah. Not tobacchian enough, perhaps. I don't know. Tobac touch. Marty was attached to Clockers. Yes. You know, which eventually gets given to Spike Lee wisely. He's attached to a remake of High and Low, which had like, of course, was eventually made by Spike Lee in a different way.

[00:45:30] [SPEAKER_02] His next actual project is A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies, which is the best. I highly recommend it. A four-hour documentary where he's just talking about movies. It's so cool. He did it with the BFI. But Casino is his next figure. And we'll talk about that later, I think.

[00:45:47] [SPEAKER_03] We're not going to do a designated episode on it. It will come up in conversation.

[00:46:00] [SPEAKER_02] Like, do so well that Universal is, you know, much more interested in him as like a financial prospect, right? Yeah. He is no longer cursed by like the Last Temptation bombing.

[00:46:12] [SPEAKER_03] Right. Cape Fear was his biggest hit. And that was, he had done that for Universal. And that was, right, exactly. The trade-off of them agreeing to do Last Temptation.

[00:46:20] [SPEAKER_02] And at this point, he's kind of like doing a one-for-me, one-for-them thing of like, I'll do Goodfellas, Age of Innocence, Kundun, Notice of Passion Projects, Cape Fear. You know, that's more than Casino to him is, he says, a little more of a commission. You know, he'd done Cape Fear with Universal. They wanted another film. Pileggi brings him this newspaper article about, you know, the initial newspaper article is about when the cops came to the house, when Sharon Stone's trying to get, you know, when

[00:46:49] [SPEAKER_02] Ginger's trying to get, you know, about like the breaking up this fight, you know, charting this like 10-year journey to this moment where they're fighting in the front yard. Because like the FBI are taking pictures of it. The cops are trying to deal with them. Like, what the fuck is all this? So, you know, Pileggi lays out the story for him. These are all real characters. And it's kind of the Lost World Jurassic Park. Yeah.

[00:47:13] [SPEAKER_02] Where it's like, okay, go, you go write a book and we'll work on the screenplay and everything will come out together. Then they actually write the screenplay before the book because Scorsese backs out of clockers, comes on to Casino and is like, let's just write it. The book does come out a month before the movie. But yeah, they get the screenplay down. And then have you read the book?

[00:47:37] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, I didn't finish it, but I read a lot of it.

[00:47:41] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Pileggi's thing. And it's like, why is this guy he has some parts where he writes? Yeah. But it's just blocks of dialogue.

[00:47:47] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, I was just thinking this wouldn't, I mean, obviously it's all edited and you choose what to put in and everything, but I don't think it was necessarily like a huge lift writing wise as like some other things. Research and interviewing. Yeah, yeah. Just doing all the interviews, like taking the time to talk to these guys.

[00:48:03] [SPEAKER_02] The Wise Guy book, it works so well because you're like, yeah, this is all these fucking guys did all day was yak. With the Casino book, you're a little bit more like, can you explain? Yeah, yeah.

[00:48:13] [SPEAKER_00] I get lost so often because they will just continue just dropping names like, and then Milwaukee Phil was there. And I'm like flipping back being like, was I supposed to know who Milwaukee Phil? Okay, it's okay. It's fine. He's a guy from Milwaukee named Phil, I suppose.

[00:48:30] [SPEAKER_02] Scorsese admits it's a bit of an ambitious story. He's like, you could make 10 movies from these guys' stories. Like there's so many different characters that are interesting. When this gets announced, I think there's a little bit of a like, how many more mob movies is this guy going to fucking make? At this point. You know, because it's like Age of Innocence is this thing where it's like, goddamn, he can do anything. Yeah. And he's like, but next mob movie.

[00:48:53] [SPEAKER_00] But people didn't like Age of Innocence when it came out.

[00:48:55] [SPEAKER_03] It was very polarizing. Yeah, yeah.

[00:48:57] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, it's true.

[00:48:58] [SPEAKER_03] I think I want to use this as the term now. It's a bit of a vervolve. Oh, excuse me? Vervolve. Robert Eggers, where we have our movie group text. And the day that got announced, oh, on Christmas Day, Focus Features will release Aaron Taylor Johnson and Willem Dafoe and Robert Eggers, like, historically accurate period monster movie. We were just like, come on, man. This is what we would say to make fun of you.

[00:49:25] [SPEAKER_02] And it's like, well, I'm like, well, I'm sure he'll, I can picture the movie. I'm sure he'll do a good job. He knows what he's doing. That sells itself. But you're not like, oh, my God, like, wow, like him taking a crack at that is so cool. Yeah. I think that's the exact. Is he going to do Frankenstein?

[00:49:42] [SPEAKER_03] Frankenstein. I know for the listener at home. It'll all be in like Bavarian German. I know it's called werewolf and not verwolf, but I will forever call it verwolf.

[00:49:54] [SPEAKER_01] Verwolf. Verwolf.

[00:49:56] [SPEAKER_03] It's if you're a studio executive and they come in and pitch this and they go, hey, you know, that movie that was just a hit. What if I take two of the principal actors and pick a parallel subject matter and release it around the same time? They're going to go. Yeah, obviously, I can see that movie. That's an easy sell to audiences and especially to movie obsessed people like ourselves. It feels too easy to visualize, which is what feels lazy.

[00:50:19] [SPEAKER_02] Here's Marty's defense.

[00:50:20] [SPEAKER_03] Yes.

[00:50:20] [SPEAKER_02] I don't know what to say. I can't defend myself. I can't defend myself. I'm attracted to the same territory. I'm attracted to characters because they play right on the edge. There's life and death in every decision they make. And then his other defense is, look, Hitchcock made the same movie every single time. You know, a guy who seems innocent, looks guilty. How does he get out of it? Like, he kept doing the same fucking movie.

[00:50:39] [SPEAKER_03] My other thing is, Goodfellas is like the greatest shit on earth. That's true. If the offer is, hey, do you want the second best meal of your life? Charitably. Like, why are we being assholes about this? Yes.

[00:50:53] [SPEAKER_00] But it's like the, it is literally like the Vegas of that movie. Totally. Like, if, if, if, if Goodfellas is, is New York City. Yes. Like, yeah, because you know, it's New York, New York, the casino. Like, it's like, it's the overblown Fantasia of it that like has so many more resources.

[00:51:12] [SPEAKER_02] Different landscape. You know, like he, it's all about the prom of the dream of Vegas. Right. You know, and the, you know, it's, it's totally different. And what, now this might shock you having seen the film. What might surprise you is that one appeal, this score says it was the idea of excess.

[00:51:30] [SPEAKER_00] No way.

[00:51:31] [SPEAKER_02] No limits. Yes. Yes. Everything being heightened.

[00:51:35] [SPEAKER_03] That's the other place where this movie feels like a turning point to me.

[00:51:40] [SPEAKER_02] He doesn't care about gambling. Like he's not interested in casinos. He doesn't really like the games or whatever, but he likes that vibe.

[00:51:47] [SPEAKER_00] Me watching casino, writing down on my notepad, excess. What were you about to say? No, Camp My Ass. I was making a Camp My Ass reference. Yeah. I mean, my, my other ulterior motive in coming here to talk about this movie today is to just talk about Las Vegas, which is one of my favorite things to talk about and places to go and, you know, things to think about.

[00:52:07] [SPEAKER_02] Now, when you started going to Vegas, I'm assuming that's sort of in the mid 2000s.

[00:52:11] [SPEAKER_00] I think I went, I was trying to remember who's 06 or 07. One way I could, yeah, remember it would be that I went to the Frontier Casino in its last year of existing. Like they still had slot machines that had tokens that had coins that came out, Mr. Jackpot style. And there was like a shitty buffet. There was like, you know, it was, it was a real crusty former era. One of the last ones remaining.

[00:52:39] [SPEAKER_00] And yeah, they, they imploded it like the next year. Um, and that, and then I think the Riviera was shortly after. Like the whole process that they're talking about at the end of, of Casino, like I kind of went at the end, the very end of that process of moving out this whole previous era.

[00:52:57] [SPEAKER_02] But I feel like the era of Vegas that you are falling in love with is now, people are now also like, and now that era is long gone and it's in this newer, even more corporate era or whatever, more sort of kid friendly or tourist friendly.

[00:53:11] [SPEAKER_00] Well, I think that what we liked about it, I actually, I went to, I went to Vegas for the first time with, uh, the late Harris Whittles. Uh, I was friends. R.I.P. Harris. Yeah. My, my roommate was, uh, dating him at the time. So, and we were all friends, uh, it's a group of comedy people. And, uh, so it was a comp room that we all like crashed on and it was at the Excalibur. I remember. And I was not 21 yet. I, so I couldn't gamble legally.

[00:53:41] [SPEAKER_00] I couldn't like order drinks legally, but just sitting at a slot machine at the Excalibur, I was doing both of those things and nobody like, and they'd come and bring me like a Midori Sour or something like, um, for free. And that was the appeal of Vegas at that. I was like the way low rent version of what they're talking about is in this movie, which is like Vegas is all about like taking care of the customer and like making sure they

[00:54:07] [SPEAKER_00] just feel like happy and, you know, welcome and everybody's nice to them and you get some free stuff so that you just keep sitting down and spending your money.

[00:54:17] [SPEAKER_03] You trick Mr. Nobu into playing forever.

[00:54:19] Yeah.

[00:54:20] [SPEAKER_00] Um, that was basically me then. I just flew in on my, on my jet. Um, uh, but yeah, I, I think, uh, being able to go as like a 20 something kid just driving in from LA and like spending very little money, but just being in this like kind of crappy Disneyland of like excess and Americana was just so compelling to me.

[00:54:42] [SPEAKER_03] Crappy Disneyland's a really good way of putting it. I mean, I, I, you know what I find interesting? They play EO 11 in this movie as one of, let me check my notes here, 8,000 songs played across the running time of the film, but that's the song from Ocean's 11, the Sammy Davis Jr. song. A great movie. Well, a movie we watched and is profoundly boring. We, I mean, we, it was on. I don't know how much I actually watched it.

[00:55:09] [SPEAKER_03] We, uh, engaged with something being in the same room. Is it Dante Ferretti, who did the production design in this movie, which is fucking incredible. Um, uh, and was like a Fellini, uh, protege. Um, he said that Scorsese asked him to do it and he was like, I know nothing about Vegas. I know nothing about casinos. And he's like, just learn.

[00:55:31] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah.

[00:55:31] [SPEAKER_03] And he, he made him watch Ocean's 11.

[00:55:35] [SPEAKER_04] Sure.

[00:55:36] [SPEAKER_03] And beyond the fact that like the original Ocean's 11 spawns the better remakes and sequels, I'm also like, there is some value to that movie just existing as a time capsule of that.

[00:55:49] [SPEAKER_02] The only good thing about it is. Right.

[00:55:51] [SPEAKER_03] The visual of like, here's Vegas. Yes. Because Scorsese basically was just like, this is the best document we have. Just study this and recreate this. And that feeling of just the endless lights and the whirring and the sounds. This is what my brain feels like. It's just endless rows of slot machines.

[00:56:10] [SPEAKER_00] I love the sound so much. And Don Rickles.

[00:56:12] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah.

[00:56:13] [SPEAKER_00] It's the...

[00:56:13] [SPEAKER_03] What the fuck are you doing? Don Rickles is constantly telling me off in my own brain. This is the same year as Toy Story.

[00:56:21] [SPEAKER_02] I was going to bring that up.

[00:56:23] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, yeah.

[00:56:23] [SPEAKER_03] It was a good year for Rickles. Do you think anyone suggested a split Best Supporting Actor prize? I'm sure someone did.

[00:56:30] [SPEAKER_02] Another thing I note, you know, is that much like this, this movie, much like Goodfellas and obviously much like Mean Streets, like is about the middle of the mob mostly. Like it's like he has no interest in the top of the mob. Yes. And like obviously you see the boss in here and you see Paul Vario in Goodfellas. But like... It's not about the crime family. He's like that. Like the Godfather doesn't interest me. Like I'm not interested in the highest level. I'm more interested in the incremental stuff. Like I like, you know, Lefty keeping his trousers in the closet because he doesn't want to ruin

[00:57:00] [SPEAKER_02] the crease. Yeah. Incredible detail. Like I like these little details. Like I never, you know... And like of course that's what Marty is bringing to the gangster movie after The Godfather. Like that is why the Goodfellas in this are so important. Because I think the mid-level mobster is, you know, it's what the Sopranos does too. Like, you know, he's not the boss when the Sopranos begins.

[00:57:21] [SPEAKER_00] Well, I mean, it's interesting to... Like you can still tell that story of the mid-level mafia guy and have them literally running a casino. Like one of the biggest cash cows ever. But they're still not the top. They're not quite up there. Yeah. Like they're still kind of, you know, at the beck and call of somebody else and, you know, back at some shitty grocery store in Kansas City. Like and that's... I think that's like a really fun part of it.

[00:57:46] [SPEAKER_02] And he also found a biblical angle. Can you believe this? No way. It's just an angle. He's like, it's an Old Testament story. Gaining paradise, losing it through pride and greed. Like thinking you can reform Ginger or can, you know, control her or whatever. No one stays at the top forever. No one stays at the top forever. It's a great poster. It's a great tagline. Hold on the dice. The way they start their relationship, I don't think it really starts in a great place.

[00:58:12] [SPEAKER_03] You could kind of predict, yeah, that I think it's not going to end well. You don't think it's great if you propose to someone and their response is, I don't love you.

[00:58:19] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:58:20] [SPEAKER_03] And yet it ends with an engagement.

[00:58:22] [SPEAKER_00] You don't think that's a healthy start? You don't think it's cool if you get married to somebody and then you find them out on the phone with like the guy who groomed her as a teenager and she's weeping and she's like, no, no, I'm fine. I'm good.

[00:58:32] [SPEAKER_03] On your wedding night? Yeah. On their wedding night.

[00:58:34] [SPEAKER_00] No, I think that's a bad thing. You think that's a red flag?

[00:58:36] [SPEAKER_03] And that guy's played by James Woods?

[00:58:37] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, the guy is James Woods. That's kind of shorthand for James Woods.

[00:58:40] [SPEAKER_03] Now that you mention it, okay, I feel fine about it.

[00:58:42] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, we could talk forever about Ginger. I love her so much. I love Shannon Stone's performance. Yes. Um, I, and what I think is fascinating about, I mean, I guess, I guess there's the thing about pride and, and not, and, you know, thinking that you can control Ginger, but I feel like from her perspective, like it's the story of like, I, I love money. I'm a Vegas lady. I'm a, I'm a, a hustler and a call girl.

[00:59:08] [SPEAKER_00] I live for the dollars and this guy is offering me everything on a platter. Like the life that I dream of, like all the comfort and luxuries and everything, but it's still not enough to buy me because I have something deeply fucked up about me that is emotional, that is human and messy, that trumps any, you know, capitalistic impulses that I also have.

[00:59:35] [SPEAKER_00] Like, obviously, like it's, it's, it's weirdly beautiful in a way, even though it's also very dark, like there's some, some sort of glimmer of hope in that and that like money can't do it all. The most fucked up type of love persevere, right?

[00:59:49] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Yeah. Right. In theory, you're like, Hey Ginger, like this guy's rich. Yeah. You don't need to be, you know, like the sort of hustler that you were. Why don't you just like sit in this nice house and like wear nice clothes? And she's like, you know, I just lit a mat, lit the lighter, looked through the flame. He's got a prop, he's got a prop, he's got a prop, he's got a prop. Are cast in the film. Yes. Sounds good. Sharon Stone, however, slightly more interesting. Obviously, Basic Instinct is 92.

[01:00:19] [SPEAKER_02] Yes. So after that, she's at the point where she's producing her own stuff, Quick and the Dead, which we've covered on this show. You know, that's like a stone project more than anything else, right? A hundred percent.

[01:00:30] [SPEAKER_03] As we talked about in both of those episodes, Sharon Stone is this classic example of a humongous movie star who is immediately kind of mocked and criticized incessantly.

[01:00:41] [SPEAKER_02] Right. This is definitely like her prestige sort of leap. This is the big play.

[01:00:49] [SPEAKER_03] Like she's never been in a movie like this before, I feel like. In the crassest way possible, this is, quote, Sharon Stone proves she can really act, which is bullshit because I think in both of the movies you just mentioned, she's phenomenal.

[01:01:03] [SPEAKER_02] But like. But it's a little bit like, well, she's a big movie star. She's good at being a movie star, but can she do something more demanding? I guess like, you know. I mean, it's her only Oscar nomination, obviously. Susan Sarandon wins for Dead Man Walking. Which is a little bit. I mean, that's a good performance, but I think it's also a little bit of a like, it's your moment, Susan. Susan, she did win the Golden Globe. So she was in there.

[01:01:30] [SPEAKER_03] Stone famously worked the Globes hard.

[01:01:34] Yes.

[01:01:34] [SPEAKER_03] The rules got changed because of how hard Stone worked the Globes. Like Stone got a lot of Globe nominations. Is that a euphemism? It's not. Let me actually clarify this to make it very clear.

[01:01:45] [SPEAKER_02] I think just the old fashioned, you know, dinners and gift bags or whatever.

[01:01:50] [SPEAKER_03] They nominated her for The Muse. Yeah. The Albert Brooks movie. I don't think she won for The Muse. But she got nominated. Not a bad movie. But it came out that she had given every member of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association a very expensive watch. Look, it's like 98 members. That's the thing. You could buy every member of the Hollywood Foreign Press. It's a manageable number.

[01:02:12] [SPEAKER_02] That was one of their issues, I would say, is they were easily bought.

[01:02:14] [SPEAKER_03] So I don't mean that she worked them euphemistically. I just mean that she would like hit those parties hard. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She would glad hand every single person. She would shower them with gifts. Yeah. She got nominated for The Mighty, I think. She did, which she's good in that movie.

[01:02:28] [SPEAKER_02] Although a stretch, I think, to nominate her. But she's very sweet in that movie. It's a sweet movie. It's a powerhouse five. This is the Golden Globe five. Yeah. For drama actress. Which might be the, it actually might be the five Oscar nominees. It might match. But it's, it's her. It's Susan Sarandon. It's Elizabeth Shue for Leaving Las Vegas.

[01:02:54] [SPEAKER_02] Another Las Vegas movie that involves substances and yelling. Emma Thompson for Sense and Sensibility. And Meryl Streep for Bridges of Madison County. Yeah, that is the five. And I believe that's the five Oscar nominees too. Yes, it is. So wait, what was going on in comedy? Nicole Kidman in To Die For, Annette Menning and American President. Tony Collette and Muriel's Wedding. Yeah. Wow. Sandra Bullock and While You Were Sleeping. Great performance. Then Vanessa Redgrave in A Month by the Lake. Whatever the fuck that is. That sounds a little bit more like a golden...

[01:03:24] [SPEAKER_04] Did you watch that weekly?

[01:03:27] [SPEAKER_00] A Month by the Lake. I am seated.

[01:03:32] [SPEAKER_03] That's a fake movie.

[01:03:33] [SPEAKER_02] That's a fucking fake Samuel Goldwyn production. It sounds mildly fake. It's got Edward Fox and a young Uma Thurman. Okay. Chicago Tribune said sexy, funny.

[01:03:45] Funny.

[01:03:45] [SPEAKER_00] That's on the poster. Was it sexy, dot, dot, dot? No, it's sexy, exclamation point.

[01:03:49] [SPEAKER_02] Funny. Wow. I just wanted to imagine someone sitting down. Man. The golden age of film criticism. But I mean, like, you know, Kidman and Tony Collette and Nippa, you're like, damn, this was a, you know, this was a big year. Yeah. No, 100%. But yeah, she and De Niro really loved each other. Apparently, they knew each other already. De Niro said she's like, she's such a good actor. Scorsese said it's such a scary role.

[01:04:18] [SPEAKER_02] Like, you know, when she's taking coke in front of the kid. When she's wearing the crazy... He really likes the David Bowie type gold lamé outfit she wears for the last third of the picture. Scorsese was like, she was trying to look fucked up. Like, and we, like, you know, she was like really paying attention to looking as bad as she could when the wheels are coming off, you know?

[01:04:36] [SPEAKER_03] I mean, it's, it is an overused term, especially when actresses tend to work around sexual material. But it's like, she is, her superpower is being kind of fearless, right? That Sharon Stone just fucking goes for it.

[01:04:53] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Which you need in this role. It is quite a fearless performance. I agree. Anthony Rickles, of course, is a bit of a connection, I would say, to old Vegas. Yes. And that he knew Frank and Dean. Yes. And Sammy. Yes. What I liked about Vegas at that time, even though it was controlled by, for lack of another word, the mob. I think that's the right word, Don. Yeah. Was that there was one boss. It wasn't like corporations today. Now you need five guys to get a permission for a cup of coffee.

[01:05:23] [SPEAKER_02] In those days, you went up to the main office and you saw the boss, so to speak. Like, it's so funny that Rickles is like, just flatly to the press, to the Los Angeles Times. Like, it was better when the mob was in charge.

[01:05:35] [SPEAKER_03] Rickles maintained that until his death. I have watched and read so many interviews where he said the same thing, where he was arguing for the better status of the mob run casino.

[01:05:47] [SPEAKER_02] I'm trying to imagine, like, the mayor of Vegas being like, I'm proud to announce the mob is back. We will be partnering with the mafia to run casinos.

[01:05:56] [SPEAKER_03] But this raises a good point. I think this is the other reason that Scorsese likes to cast people like Bo Dietl and whatever. And obviously, Don Rickles is a real actor and a real performer. Sure.

[01:06:05] [SPEAKER_02] He's a real performer. But he doesn't do a ton of it. He's done a lot of acting. Yeah. Yeah. But obviously, like, this is one of his more substantial roles.

[01:06:12] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. But in the 50s and 60s, he had, like, a real actor. He could be on camera with each other. He's an ex. The man with the x-ray eyes. And he's in Kelly's Heroes. Is that what it's called? Sure. The Clint Eastwood movie. And he had his own sitcom and whatever. Yeah. I think he likes having guys on set who, like, can testify to these things and be bullshit detectors. And can also just lend, like, immediate authenticity.

[01:06:34] [SPEAKER_00] I don't think that it's the craziest claim to make that the mob run Vegas. Was better experientially than the current iteration of it.

[01:06:42] [SPEAKER_02] His take also seems to be, though, that, like, it was great. You could go talk to the boss. And I'm like, well, you maybe could. I'm not sure everyone had that experience. Yeah. It was great.

[01:06:50] [SPEAKER_03] You could walk up to the boss and call him a hockey puck. I think that's a little bit limited to your own world.

[01:06:57] [SPEAKER_02] The film was shot largely in the Riviera.

[01:06:59] [SPEAKER_01] In the Riviera.

[01:07:00] [SPEAKER_02] Which was open until 2015.

[01:07:02] [SPEAKER_01] Yeah.

[01:07:03] [SPEAKER_02] The primary tower used in the film was built in 1975, according to Scorsese. It was one of the rare local haunts that had basically not changed. And obviously, they were willing to shut it down. They could only have the casino in the middle of the night. So for six weeks, six nights a week, they did a military invasion at midnight, redressed it, and had to clear out by, like, 10 a.m. Like, that's how they shot it.

[01:07:26] [SPEAKER_03] The shot at the end of the movie where the old people come in in the morning. Right. He said, like, every morning, 6 a.m., 7 a.m.

[01:07:32] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:07:32] [SPEAKER_03] There'd be the rush of the senior citizens. Yeah.

[01:07:36] [SPEAKER_00] Man.

[01:07:37] [SPEAKER_03] But this is another...

[01:07:38] [SPEAKER_00] I did go to the Riviera once before it closed as well. How was it? It was cool. It was very romantic. I had very much romanticized the Riviera. The Riv, they called it. The Riv. You know, I didn't... I mean, the thing there was the showgirls. That was like the... And I think they were still doing a show. The ones from Paris? Like, yeah, the real... The gals from Paris. What is your favorite place to go in Las Vegas?

[01:08:04] [SPEAKER_02] Great question.

[01:08:05] [SPEAKER_00] Place to go in Las Vegas now? Or a casino, whatever. Casino. I mean, the thing is that I don't have any real, like, emotional attachment to any of them other than, like, the Venetian. Because the Venetian is, while an enormous and stupid casino, it's still... It's tacky in a way that I like. It's so... You know, it's like the closest thing to Liberace Vegas that exists on the Strip now.

[01:08:33] [SPEAKER_00] And, I mean, I guess the Bellagio is sort of that too. But I don't feel... I feel nothing when I walk through the Bellagio, whereas, like, I do...

[01:08:41] [SPEAKER_05] She feels nothing? I feel...

[01:08:42] [SPEAKER_00] When I walk, you know, across those canals with the eternal blue sky over me, I'm like, Vegas baby.

[01:08:49] [SPEAKER_02] I've never been to Las Vegas. I'd love to go. I know, and that's insane.

[01:08:52] [SPEAKER_00] I'm always asking you to go to Vegas.

[01:08:54] [SPEAKER_02] Well, the reason I've never been is... You have to get on a plane. Well, no. It's because I didn't live in this country. I wouldn't have been able to do much there anyway. My parents abhor gambling. Like, they were not like...

[01:09:04] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, my mom, of course. Well, I never went to Vegas as a kid. Yeah. No, but then you lived in LA. Like, you get...

[01:09:08] [SPEAKER_02] And then, like, I moved here, and I never had any fucking money. So, like, if I was like, I'm going to Vegas, I think everyone in my life would have been like... Physically restrained. Yeah, yeah. David, you have about 500 bucks when you pay your rent. Like, I don't think you should be planning any Vegas trip. I've been to Atlantic City, obviously. Yes. I've been to, like, Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun or whatever.

[01:09:28] [SPEAKER_00] We've famously been to Atlantic City together.

[01:09:31] [SPEAKER_02] All of us went to AC together. I went there recently for my 40th birthday. I had a great time. Wow. But Atlantic City... And he won. He won some money. Oh, he won? Yeah? Yeah, it won, like, 800 bucks.

[01:09:42] [SPEAKER_00] Hell yeah. He's crazy. Like, what are you playing? Jack? Blackjack or craps?

[01:09:45] [SPEAKER_02] Mostly craps. Some blackjack. Some roulette. I love roulette.

[01:09:48] [SPEAKER_03] It was dangerous, though. He bet three future miniseries. He put that down on the table. And I said, David, you don't have the authority. I put Guillermo del Toro, and then there's a little statue of him.

[01:09:58] [SPEAKER_02] But I'd push it in.

[01:10:01] [SPEAKER_00] You can afford to lose him. It's okay. It's not like it's a kid's college fund or anything.

[01:10:06] [SPEAKER_02] Jesus. Jesus. So, you know, they shot it in a casino. It was great.

[01:10:11] [SPEAKER_03] I was going to say, this is the other thing is, like, this is the starting point of Scorsese being, like, I get everything I want. We're not going to build a casino set. We're going to use a real casino. We're going to have just endless production value.

[01:10:26] [SPEAKER_02] Right, exactly. But, I mean, like, it's so much work, clearly, doing that. And it's such a strain. But they do it. The houses, that was difficult for them, too. Like, there are very few, like, 50s Vegas houses still standing because it's such a city of, like, endless renewal and kind of like, no, everything's got to be, you know, so.

[01:10:45] [SPEAKER_03] They renovated a real home. Yes. They, like, put a family up in a hotel for months and, like, tore down walls and reconstructed it.

[01:10:52] [SPEAKER_00] For his house? Yes. The golf course one? Wow. Yes. Yeah.

[01:10:56] [SPEAKER_02] The costumes, they had 52 costume changes for Robert De Niro. Just for De Niro. Mm-hmm. They chose all the colors very carefully. Every morning, they would narrow down, choose shirt, choose tie, choose jewelry.

[01:11:08] [SPEAKER_00] Student designer. Anybody have a great question?

[01:11:11] [SPEAKER_02] Rita Ryack and John Dunn. And Ryack says, like, as he's getting more power, we wanted it to get more flamboyant. Mm-hmm. Like, his jackets had, like, crazy loud linings that we'd never really see, but it was important for the actor, you know? He felt it.

[01:11:25] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:11:26] [SPEAKER_03] Scorsese said that the outfits were toned down from what the real Lefty wore.

[01:11:31] [SPEAKER_01] I believe that. Yeah.

[01:11:32] [SPEAKER_03] Uh, and that Lefty was, uh, present in every costume fitting to prove that they would pass the sniff test.

[01:11:38] [SPEAKER_02] It is so vital when Pesci, like, two hours into the movie, is like, you look fucking insane. And De Niro's like, what? You know?

[01:11:45] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, it is. That was something that... Because it's a frog-boiling thing where it's just like, you know, he's just adding a little bit every time. Meanwhile, Pesci looks super normal, as we've established. But, yeah, that is the thing in the book where, like, he was so obsessed with this. Like, he didn't drink, really. He didn't really have that many vices.

[01:12:03] [SPEAKER_02] This was his money thing. Yeah, it was the suits.

[01:12:05] [SPEAKER_00] And it was like, there's some quote of, like, he would walk into a tailor shop because he would get everything tailored, like, ten times. And, like, the tailor would shrivel in fear every time he would walk in the door because it was just going to be another, like, you know, multi-hour session of him, like, being so exacting about what he wanted.

[01:12:22] [SPEAKER_03] Another thing Marty said, knowing that the movie starts with the car bombing and that you're going to circle back to that, but that's going to be the first look you see. He and De Niro were like, let's just fucking lead with the peach-colored jacket and shirt. Let's lead with something so garish and over-the-top and aggressive. No, but also just, like, this is the color temperature of this movie. You have to get used to it now.

[01:12:44] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Do you know he was walking out of Marie Callender's in real life? Oh, really? Which is so funny. Like, wearing a peach suit in a Marie Callender's in 1983.

[01:12:55] [SPEAKER_02] It's so funny because the famous, like, you know, New York mob hit, like, Umberto's Clam House or Sparks or whatever, like, where it's like, right, that restaurant's famous for, like, someone got shot outside of it. Yeah. And there's some Marie Callender's like, someone tried to blow up a mobster outside this Marie go. Um, Super 35, it's the first time he's shooting on Super 35, which is a larger frame, you know, film stock. It's his first time working with Robert Richardson, who he's going to work with again on bringing

[01:13:21] [SPEAKER_02] out the dead, Aviator, Shutter Island, Hugo, Shine a Light, and the living in the material world. So they work together a lot. Um, right? Richardson was hesitant about 35. You have to have a reduced quality negative. Yeah. It's all optical. You, like, blow up the frame, but he likes how it looks. I mean, the movie looks pretty fucking good. It's a gorgeous, gorgeous movie. I had my 4K steelbook. Watch. Watch it.

[01:13:44] [SPEAKER_03] Well, Ben watched the 4K steelbook. You cracked that steel, didn't you, Ben?

[01:13:48] [SPEAKER_02] No. I watched it on a... I watched a little bit. Okay. But yeah, I mostly finished it on my iPad at home.

[01:13:55] [SPEAKER_03] You watched... You broke it into...

[01:13:56] [SPEAKER_02] As it should be viewed.

[01:13:57] [SPEAKER_03] You broke it into two chunks. I watched it on my Apple Watch. Yeah. Um, I was going to say, uh, the reason they shoot it on Super 35 is because this is peak VHS TV era where directors are getting so protective of, I can't let my shit get pan and scanned. And so Scorsese was like, I prefer anamorphic. I would have used anamorphic, but I'm going Super 35 because that way I can do the double

[01:14:23] [SPEAKER_03] framing in the monitor at the time and at least control that however people are seeing this movie. It reflects my vision. Mm-hmm. Uh, Richardson hated it and refused to use 35 until... Again, until Kill Bill. Wow. Because he said...

[01:14:38] [SPEAKER_02] She crushed it on that one too.

[01:14:39] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. But, uh, because digital intermediates had been introduced, he felt like he had more control over the final image at that point.

[01:14:45] [SPEAKER_02] Thelma Scumet. This is a great quote from the great Thelma. Mm-hmm. It's the first movie she digitally edits on Avid. Oh, wow. I made it on Casino and I was a very bad girl. I didn't want to do it and the producer told me I had to do it and I was very grumpy. That is her quote. This is one of the most beautifully edited films I've ever seen. She had to put a quarter in a jar anytime she said to her, like, assistant editor or whatever, I could have done this better on film. Wow.

[01:15:11] [SPEAKER_04] They're like, that was? Uh, that was.

[01:15:13] [SPEAKER_02] Finally, she says, after about two weeks, I did finally lock in with it and it was, it is faster. Like, I can do, like, four edits for Marty of a scene instead of one. Mm-hmm. Like, there's cool things about it. So now I'm more fearless about, like, improvising and stuff. It does feel like one of those things where it's like, they handed fucking, you know, one of the, like, Rembrandt, like, a computer to paint on or whatever. And he's like, this sucks. And then after a while, he's like, well, actually, I could probably do, like, a 40 billion cool

[01:15:43] [SPEAKER_02] things with this. Because, like, her editing after this, like, goes bonkers.

[01:15:47] [SPEAKER_03] But I feel like this movie is bonkers.

[01:15:48] [SPEAKER_02] She's just crazy experimental shit.

[01:15:50] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah.

[01:15:51] [SPEAKER_02] I'm saying, like, from this moment on. 100%. Yes.

[01:15:54] [SPEAKER_03] Fully agree.

[01:15:55] [SPEAKER_00] I always think of the edit the first time that Pesci sees Karen Stone. There's, like, the three. Like, it's almost like blinks of, like, going closer and closer. And it's, like, such a, it's such a flourish. Like, I'm surprised. I mean, I think of the editing on Age of Innocence as being very similar in tone. Yes. That's a good point. And that was right. Feeling. But that was still by hand. Nope. That's, yeah. Yeah. Wild.

[01:16:18] [SPEAKER_02] And then, of course, the film has a lot of voiceover. You might have noticed. This movie? It has, in my opinion, the greatest use of voiceover ever, which is Pesci being like, anyway, so then I went to the cornfield and everything was fine. Ow! So, that's the end of the voiceover.

[01:16:32] [SPEAKER_00] It's so good. It's so good.

[01:16:33] [SPEAKER_02] It is one of the cleverest tricks he plays on you. Yeah. I think. Because you're just like, well, I'm in the hands of a voiceover, so I know, like, he's telling me. Yeah. It's so fucking crazy.

[01:16:43] [SPEAKER_03] I think a close second is Frank Vincent not having a single line in this movie. Until it cuts to his voiceover and he just goes like, this fucking piece of shit.

[01:16:50] [SPEAKER_02] I'm fucking at the light of the bus now.

[01:16:52] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah.

[01:16:52] [SPEAKER_02] This is fucked up. Scorsese says, it lets you in on the secret thoughts of the characters. Yes. Thank you, Marty. I did notice that. I understand. Yeah, I picked up on that. It has this wonderfully comforting tone of someone telling you a story and then it has a kind of irony, especially the tirades by Nicky where he's basically like bitching about his bosses. Yeah, it's really interesting. The MPAA gave it an NC-17 four times before finally they edited it enough to get an R.

[01:17:20] [SPEAKER_02] The vice scene, they had to make the flying eyeball a little more, leave that to the viewer a little more. And it's still so gnarly. Yes.

[01:17:32] [SPEAKER_03] It's gross. Is that the only thing they mentioned specifically cutting out?

[01:17:37] [SPEAKER_02] The vice thing is, but just the violence generally. But I think the vice was the big problem. They had to like really massage that scene. Why? Are you thinking of other scenes? I mean, the baseball bats.

[01:17:48] [SPEAKER_03] I was just curious. This doesn't, I mean, maybe it speaks to how desensitized we have become by this point. This movie is very violent. I don't think of this as being like NC-17 level. The extreme moments of violence, I think, are the problem.

[01:18:02] [SPEAKER_00] It also feels so downstream from like reservoir dogs and stuff. Yeah, that's the thing. Like, and you know, I still think it would have been shocking at the time, but I feel like it comes in context of like, okay, we're doing this.

[01:18:12] [SPEAKER_03] It's still shocking today. Yeah. It just doesn't feel, yeah, yeah.

[01:18:16] [SPEAKER_02] I guess, right. The cornfield is just very, very brutal. It's so. It's pretty high on the kind of like what the MTA could probably tolerate at this time.

[01:18:24] [SPEAKER_03] I think you're right though that Tarantino is the correct comparison point. Like Tarantino running concurrently in the 90s is the sort of like the language of film violence is changing a little bit. This feels almost classical.

[01:18:36] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. But the violence in specifically in the cornfield, I think is shocking because of its lack of like Tarantino escrow. There's no flourish at all. Exactly. It is just about like, oh no, this is actually what it was like every time these guys put a hit on somebody and they buried them in a hole in Vegas. Like it was, it looked like this, like there's no gloss of like, but it was kind of cool.

[01:19:00] [SPEAKER_02] Like it's just dark and brutal and horrible. There are some like, you know, in the sequence where the people are getting murdered, you know, some more classic kind of cool, you know, like the guy getting shot with the silencer where you're like, right, clean. And obviously the point. You're talking about the death in the snow. Obviously the point of the baseball bat murder in reality was like to send this message of like these guys fucked up beyond repair. Like you're, you know, this can happen to you. But Marty says like, Nicky's horrible.

[01:19:29] [SPEAKER_02] He's a terrible man. But there's something that happens for me watching them get beaten with bats and put in a hole. It's a tragedy. It's the frailty of being human. I want to push audiences, emotional empathy with these characters. Like even though they are villains and he's like, and I saw the pictures of like what they, you know, what the real guys looked like. Like we shot that very straight. Like we were not trying to sensationalize or anything.

[01:19:50] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:19:50] [SPEAKER_02] A lot of songs.

[01:19:52] [SPEAKER_00] Few songs.

[01:19:53] [SPEAKER_02] Two disc soundtrack. Yup.

[01:19:54] [SPEAKER_00] Guys, how do you feel about the Rolling Stones?

[01:19:57] [SPEAKER_02] I got no beef with them. But I mean like, he's got fucking Bach in here. You know, he's at Van Mars. I mean, Fleetwood Mac. They tried to keep it. At the end. House of Rising Sun. House of Rising Sun is sort of like the, it's like this movie's Layla. Like it's the everything's fucking over song.

[01:20:17] [SPEAKER_03] Different Devo tracks. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You got Whip It and their Satisfaction cover. That's right.

[01:20:24] [SPEAKER_02] It's like the music and then Sharon Stone's outfits are really helping tell you where you are and time.

[01:20:31] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. They mark the time. Even if they're not doing a Chiron for every passing year, you kind of know what the music is and how she's dressed.

[01:20:39] [SPEAKER_03] Right. Because they do the Chiron for where they are more than when they are. Yeah.

[01:20:43] [SPEAKER_00] You mean back home.

[01:20:44] [SPEAKER_03] Yes. Back home is so good.

[01:20:45] [SPEAKER_00] I love back home every time it pops up.

[01:20:47] [SPEAKER_02] And then like Scorsese says, like, I considered this my final curtain on the mob. Like this was my last statement. I've said everything I need to say. He doesn't really make a mob movie again until Irishman. Departed is about organized crime. But like it's a little different, I guess. That's the other one where you could say like, now come on, Marty. Like you made it.

[01:21:09] [SPEAKER_03] It's the one that throws it off a little bit. I think when you have fucking Jack Nicholson beating people with a baseball bat. Yeah.

[01:21:15] [SPEAKER_02] But obviously it's not about the mafia. No. Yes. No. But, you know, I think that's one reason he was resistant to Irishman for a while. Where De Niro's like, I really want to do this. And Marty's like, I think I said everything. Irishman does feel like a true goodbye though. Well, that's what I love about it. He finally figured out how to say goodbye. De Niro kind of talked him into it. Yeah. Yeah. So that's what I have to tell you about Casino.

[01:21:41] [SPEAKER_00] Is there, have you guys gotten any insight? I don't know how far, if you're doing these out of order or what. Not in order. We're pretty in order. Okay. Yeah. Do you have any insight on who the Pesci was? And also the De Niro and Mean Streets? Like that guy. This is like a guy he's continually comes back to. Like up until this point, this sort of like rabid dog that like somebody has to keep under control, but still feels responsibility to. Is there a guy in his real life that was like this?

[01:22:10] [SPEAKER_00] Because it's such a type and it's so specific.

[01:22:13] [SPEAKER_02] He's in the Rebecca Miller movie. You see. If you've watched that. If you watch, is it called Mr. Scorsese? Yeah. Mr. Scorsese. There's a guy who's like that. There's the one guy who they're all the rest of them are like, he was fucking crazy. Right. Like, you know, where they, I can't remember all their names. Yeah. That's right. Um, but like, it does seem like that because that, and that is like Johnny Boy.

[01:22:29] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. The Johnny Boy. He's Johnny Boy more than he's the Pesci character.

[01:22:33] [SPEAKER_00] Okay. Okay.

[01:22:34] [SPEAKER_03] I feel like the Pesci character is more a guy he would witness than a guy he knew.

[01:22:38] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. And Pileggi is obviously unearthing these. It is funny that Pesci two times, like in Raging Bull. Yeah. Pesci's a flawed character, but he's close to the moral center of the film, I guess.

[01:22:52] [SPEAKER_04] Right?

[01:22:52] [SPEAKER_02] Like, and like, that's where they begin to collaborate. Right? And then like in Goodfellas and Casino, it's just like, and then there was this one guy. This one fucking guy.

[01:23:00] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, it really does. Like.

[01:23:03] [SPEAKER_02] Obviously in Goodfellas, he's playing a psychopath who even the mob couldn't really hit. In Casino, he is relatively put together for a while.

[01:23:09] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Watching Goodfellas and Casino back to back, I was really actually reminded of, um, you know, in Twin Peaks, The Return, the little guy who runs around with an ice pick.

[01:23:18] [SPEAKER_05] Yes. I love that guy. That's why he's so normal.

[01:23:20] [SPEAKER_00] He is the descendant of Pesci in these movies. He's like.

[01:23:24] [SPEAKER_02] It is obviously also, as we have mentioned, just so crazy that parallel to all this, he's like, I'm a family movie star now. Right. Like, I mean, maybe by mistake almost, but like that I knew who he was and I hadn't seen any Marty movies. The first Home Alone is the same year as Goodfellas.

[01:23:41] [SPEAKER_03] 1990. That's just insane. That's insane to have a year where you're in the biggest hit film and you win the Oscar and the two movies couldn't be further apart. And you're just like, everyone in America, illogically, loves Joe Pesci.

[01:23:54] [SPEAKER_02] Little Joey Pesci. And like, I guess, I feel like it really starts with Lethal Weapon 2, right? That's sort of like when he moves to comedic energy. Yeah. As like, yeah, he can play like a motormouth, like a sort of guy who pops up in your movie. Right? Like all his other 80s stuff. Yeah.

[01:24:13] [SPEAKER_03] After this, it's like Lethal Weapon 4, Ben's beloved Eight Heads in a Duffel Bag.

[01:24:20] [SPEAKER_02] Yep.

[01:24:21] [SPEAKER_03] And then he basically goes into hiding. Don't forget Gone Fishing. I forgot Gone Fishing. I forgot Gone Fishing. I'm so sorry. Never forget.

[01:24:27] [SPEAKER_02] Joe Pesci, Danny Glover have gone.

[01:24:30] [SPEAKER_03] But he doesn't make a movie between 98 and...

[01:24:34] [SPEAKER_02] The Chicago Tribune said, big laughs! Chicago Tribune was...

[01:24:37] [SPEAKER_00] Sexy, funny.

[01:24:39] [SPEAKER_02] Horn out the coast.

[01:24:41] [SPEAKER_00] Just saying.

[01:24:43] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah, no, no. That's the end of it. That's when he...

[01:24:45] [SPEAKER_03] He makes the small appearance in Good Shepherd.

[01:24:47] [SPEAKER_02] Yes. Very good performance.

[01:24:49] [SPEAKER_03] And then he's in Love Ranch for HBO. You can forget. But he doesn't have a significant role in a theatrical feature film until The Irishman, right? Love Ranch was...

[01:24:58] [SPEAKER_02] I thought that was a... HBO. It was a theater.

[01:25:00] [SPEAKER_03] HBO movie. No. Hackford? Yeah. HBO.

[01:25:04] [SPEAKER_02] No. You say no. I'm saying HBO. Right, but it was released in limited U.S. theaters on June 30th, 2010. It was not released in limited U.S. theaters. It's not HBO. It's not HBO. Wow. You're just making that up. Why was I so certain it aired on HBO? Because it feels like it's a fucking HBO movie. It really does feel like it was an HBO movie. But you, of course, are thinking of Cat House, the series, an HBO reality television series following the lives of sex workers at the Moonlight Bunny Ranch in Nevada. I know from Cat House.

[01:25:30] [SPEAKER_03] Don't correct me on Cat House.

[01:25:31] [SPEAKER_02] That's just what happened when I Googled Love Ranch HBO. Yes. Okay. Yeah. No, he calls it quits. I mean, it always feels with him, like the story of obviously like how they cast him in Raging Bull where he's like, eh. I'm done. I don't really want to do it. Like, it always feels like he was almost being strong armed into acting. Yeah. He's very good. He's a good actor. He can do specific things. He's great at kicking people when they're on the ground.

[01:25:59] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah. He's going, you, fuck you.

[01:26:01] [SPEAKER_02] Incredible at that. He's really good at that.

[01:26:03] [SPEAKER_03] And it's also, we know that De Niro is bad at that.

[01:26:06] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah. Yeah.

[01:26:07] [SPEAKER_02] I mean, does Lefty like raise a, sorry, um, Ace. Uh-huh. Does he like raise a hand to anyone in this movie? Like, it feels like. Okay. Can I throw out? I don't think he ever moves quickly at all. When he's fighting with Ginger, maybe like they're kind of like pushing and shoving and stuff. But he's pretty still.

[01:26:26] [SPEAKER_00] He never like hits her, I don't think.

[01:26:28] [SPEAKER_02] No, it's like, it's more withdrawn than Jimmy Burke in Goodfellas. Like, you know, like, okay, go ahead. Can I throw out the big question? Sure. Okay.

[01:26:35] [SPEAKER_03] The film's set in Casino. No, that's why it's called Casino. Thank you. That was the one answer I've been waiting for for an hour and 26 minutes. Well, we're done. Yeah. I think De Niro is excellent in this movie. Sure. However, when you read about the real guy, everyone's like, he was so outside of this world. He was so heady. There was nothing scary about him. There was nothing physical about him.

[01:26:56] [SPEAKER_02] He's just a weird gambling nerd, essentially.

[01:26:58] [SPEAKER_03] He needed a Pesci to manifest the physicalization and protect him in this world because he was the last guy you could ever see getting into a fight. This is what he looked like. Yeah.

[01:27:08] [SPEAKER_00] That's even him playing up a mobster thing. Totally. Like, he's doing the lip thing and everything.

[01:27:14] [SPEAKER_03] But he looks like a bit of a dork. He was sort of reedy looking and he had blonde hair.

[01:27:18] [SPEAKER_00] He was kind of a weird, pale, skinny guy.

[01:27:20] [SPEAKER_03] Midwestern Jew.

[01:27:21] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:27:22] [SPEAKER_03] Yes.

[01:27:22] [SPEAKER_00] And I have had, you're taking the words out of my mouth. This is something I've been thinking about a lot that I think, I don't think he is. I think he's great in it. It's far from my favorite part of the movie, though. And I really like thinking about who else in this year could have. Okay, so I got it. Oh, you got one. Okay.

[01:27:40] [SPEAKER_03] And I'm stealing this from Connor Ratliff.

[01:27:42] [SPEAKER_02] And obviously the film has to star Robert De Niro because of his involvement with Martin Scorsese and all this. Yeah, yeah, of course. Yeah. Right. It's not like they talked to other guys and then Robert occurred to them.

[01:27:53] [SPEAKER_03] Right. But it's one of those things where, like, I think that, and that De Niro is a bit of a superpower in terms of even getting access to casinos in Vegas and whatever. He's the kind of movie star that opens doors in production and saves you money in weird ways. Right. And Nobu wouldn't exist if not for this film. That's so true.

[01:28:11] [SPEAKER_04] What?

[01:28:12] [SPEAKER_03] Yes. What do you mean? The big high roller who they trick to cancel his flight to get him back to the table to lose his money is Chef Nobu. Oh, wow. And that's how De Niro meets him. And the restaurant gets founded. Crazy. In Tribeca, which is now closed.

[01:28:28] [SPEAKER_00] The Tribeca one was the first?

[01:28:30] [SPEAKER_02] The Tribeca Grill is closed. Oh, Tribeca Grill is closed. I think Nobu is still opening. And obviously there's many other Nobu sort of things.

[01:28:37] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, but his first, I think his first restaurant, though, is Matsuhisa in L.A.

[01:28:42] [SPEAKER_02] Nobu's. I mean, Tribeca Grill was De Niro's, you know, big spot in. Yes. And then finally closed. Okay. Rip.

[01:29:02] [SPEAKER_03] I think every acting choice De Niro is making is excellent. I think he brings too much baggage of this guy belongs in this world. He makes sense in this kind of movie. Of course he would be associated with these guys, which is removing the friction that everyone describes in the real situation. Conor Aleph has long thrown out, if this movie was cast with Dustin Hoffman, does it not get any of the Goodfellas comparisons? Does this movie stand totally on its own if it's Dustin Hoffman in this era?

[01:29:31] [SPEAKER_03] I think the Pesci involvement would, you know, would still brook some comparisons. But it would be a different dynamic between the two of them.

[01:29:37] [SPEAKER_00] I think Hoffman is too good looking in this era. I think he... Okay, so here's an interesting little butterfly effect.

[01:29:45] [SPEAKER_02] Interesting take. Hoffman's too much of a hottie in the 90s. Really interesting take. But carry on, carry on. Like Sphere Hoffman? Compared to that guy? Well, Sphere Hoffman's hot. But compared to... No, no, but Griffin's saying more like he has a slightly different image. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like a little... He could feel nebbish a little bit more. Outside of the world. Yeah. Yes. Yeah.

[01:30:02] [SPEAKER_00] What if... And I'm not saying that this was the right commercial choice or whatever would have happened. But if Buscemi was ace...

[01:30:12] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah, that is... I mean, obviously...

[01:30:14] [SPEAKER_00] Do we not have Boardwalk Empire then? Do we save ourselves all of that?

[01:30:17] [SPEAKER_02] Buscemi's not like ready as a star or whatever. He's not. He'd be good, but like, you know... Yeah, he'd be incredible.

[01:30:22] [SPEAKER_00] But I mean, this is the same... Oh, no, it's like two years before Lebowski. I mean, he's like still been all these... He's a guy. Tarantino's.

[01:30:30] [SPEAKER_03] He's in Reservoir Dogs. He's awesome. He goes the year after this? Correct.

[01:30:33] [SPEAKER_02] Yes. But obviously, like, what's interesting about Buscemi in Boardwalk Empire, though, was that like, he's so quiet in that move, in that show. And he's so like, you know, he's doing this kind of thing. But in the 90s, the whole thing with Buscemi was like, hey, he never shuts the fuck up. Yeah, yeah. This is the motor mouth. Buscemi. We should correct ourselves, by the way. Yeah. This is Hoffman in that. My good friend. This is Hoffman in Sphere.

[01:30:58] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:30:58] [SPEAKER_02] Sphere-sman.

[01:31:00] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, to me, he's also just...

[01:31:01] [SPEAKER_02] He's got this kind of like, I'm not young.

[01:31:02] [SPEAKER_03] I mean, I'm not. I'm so young. He was always doing the squinty sort of pouty look on the poster.

[01:31:06] [SPEAKER_00] That's sort of also exactly what De Niro is doing in this movie. 100%. Like, yeah. I mean, but I think... Yeah, you're right. He can play some different notes.

[01:31:13] [SPEAKER_03] If you give him white or blonde hair. Yeah.

[01:31:15] [SPEAKER_00] But I do think... I think the point, though, that like, he doesn't come off as enough of an outsider. Like, I think the real test to me is when he is in the era where it's all kind of going to shit and he starts his TV show.

[01:31:27] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. And I really got to watch some of that.

[01:31:30] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. I know. Is that on Netflix or something? Can we watch that? It must be. On Howdy?

[01:31:34] [SPEAKER_00] It's got...

[01:31:35] Howdy.

[01:31:36] [SPEAKER_00] Um, I always forget about Howdy. Howdy. Howdy original. Um, but that moment, like, should be, I think, the peak of the, like, dark absurdist comedy of this film. And to me, it doesn't quite get there. Uh, just because the idea of Ace being flamboyant isn't exactly...

[01:32:01] [SPEAKER_00] Like, the comedic idea with De Niro as Ace doesn't have that friction of, like, a bit.

[01:32:07] [SPEAKER_02] He's too confident from the get-go. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, of course he's the boss. It's only reflected in the clothes, really. Of course he's the boss. Yeah. And he is so funny. And, like, the movie plays the joke of, like, now you gotta lay low. And he's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. Sure, sure, sure. The left, the Ace Rothstein show. When you get to that in the book, you're like, what are you talking about? Like, you know, it is so crazy that he had a TV show that Sinatra was on. Yes, it's not. I assume it's him just being like, and, uh, um, you're a singer? And Frank Sinatra's like, yeah!

[01:32:36] [SPEAKER_02] You know, like, I think he was terrible on the show, right? Yeah. Like, you're correct.

[01:32:39] [SPEAKER_00] He's not an intelligent presence. And that was the thing. Like, his thing was he was a numbers guy and he was the best numbers guy. And all the other kind of Vegas stuff maybe didn't come to him as naturally as just being fucking amazing at gambling. Right.

[01:32:52] [SPEAKER_03] You're correct that he's quiet in this and he's more taciturn and he's trying his hardest to shrink. Yeah. To not feel powerful. Yeah. But he just innately carries too much weight as a movie star.

[01:33:06] [SPEAKER_02] And he throws the fit so perfectly and he just, yeah. I mean, the thing, too, is he's so good looking. Yeah. So striking. Sharon Stone is with, like, her girlfriend being like, this fucking guy. I'm like, you've got the good life!

[01:33:18] [SPEAKER_01] Are you kidding? 1995 De Niro. Come on. Yeah.

[01:33:20] [SPEAKER_03] You're, look, Emily, you're hot for Dustin Hoffman aside. In that scene, I buy her turning him down a lot more. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If it's Dustin Hoffman. Totally. That's true. Where she's just like, you're kind of weird.

[01:33:33] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, there's a scene in the book where Jerry, the real life gingerer, is like, it's like one of the first times they sleep together and she's like, they're like in bed and she's like, you've never slept with anybody who looks like me, have you? Right.

[01:33:45] [SPEAKER_02] And he was like, yeah, she was right. In the book, it makes more sense because the whole, you know, the thing in the book is just like, right, this guy was so good at everything. And it's just like, but he and his fucking lady could not stop fucking each other up all the time. Yeah. Like that's the unstable element he can't control. David, who else is in Sphere? Jaron Stone. Good call. And do you know who else is in Sphere? Jerry. That's the alien, except it's not an alien twist. Watch Sphere to find out more. I've never seen Sphere. Sphere rocks. Can I pitch to someone? Please.

[01:34:16] [SPEAKER_02] This might be kind of a Queen Latifah. Wild card pick.

[01:34:20] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah, go ahead. Queen Latifah.

[01:34:22] [SPEAKER_03] She's in Sphere. She gets killed by jellyfish. Yes. Ben's got his Google search results of the real guy. So I've been looking at photos of the real guy. And Jerry as well. Yeah.

[01:34:30] [SPEAKER_02] And Sharon Stone really looks very close to him. Yeah, it's a good match. Yeah, it's a really good match. But I'm looking at this guy. What about Rodney Dangerfield? That's exactly what I thought. He's got a Rodney vibe. That's exactly what I thought. Could Rodney pull it off?

[01:34:42] [SPEAKER_03] He's skinny. He's very, he's like real thin, but otherwise he's got a little bit of... He's got the Rodney sort of hair.

[01:34:48] [SPEAKER_02] Like thing.

[01:34:49] [SPEAKER_03] There's something sad-saggy about him. Yeah.

[01:34:51] [SPEAKER_02] Might have some thoughts on the level of respect afforded him in his dad. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's true. And it might take over the movie a little bit. Bring up the fact that respect was not being shown at the proper amount. And when Rodney is complaining about his wife... Yes. ...I might, as a viewer, recall some of his routines. Yes. If you know what I'm talking... You know what I mean? Right. Like some of Rodney Dangerfield's comedy, and you guys are not comedy nerds like me, so you might not know this, was about his wife.

[01:35:21] [SPEAKER_02] Right. And how she behaved around town.

[01:35:24] [SPEAKER_03] Well, here's another issue. Here's a character who has to survive a car bombing, and I would be so worried if this guy had to leave the scene of the crime and check him with his Dr. Vinny Boombat. That's the kind of advice that Dr. Vinny Boombat would give him. I don't know if he would make it.

[01:35:43] [SPEAKER_02] I haven't spoken to my wife in years. I don't want to interrupt her. He would show up there, third degree burns on his body.

[01:35:50] [SPEAKER_03] I'm just imagining him doing this about Sharon Stone. On his arm.

[01:35:52] [SPEAKER_00] On his TV show.

[01:35:53] [SPEAKER_03] He'd say to Dr. Vinny Boombat, is my arm going to make it? And he'd go, you're ugly. And he'd say, excuse me, sir, Dr. Vinny Boombat, I want a second opinion. And he would go, you're stupid, too.

[01:36:06] [SPEAKER_02] My wife's jealousy is getting ridiculous. She looked at my calendar and she wanted to know who May was. That's a good one. That's a thinker. That's a thinker. That's a Rodney joke. Anyway, I got some more here.

[01:36:18] [SPEAKER_03] Rodney's one of the greatest.

[01:36:19] [SPEAKER_02] I told my wife, Amanda's like, wine. He gets better with it. She locked me in the cellar. That's good. My wife was afraid of the dark. Then she saw me naked. Now she's afraid of the light. I'm not even doing it that good.

[01:36:33] [SPEAKER_00] You're doing it pretty well. Yeah, it's really good. Danger Field Sims. I don't know.

[01:36:39] [SPEAKER_02] Danger Field Sims. One of the easiest ways for me to just calm myself down or cheer myself up is just Rodney. Just put Rodney into YouTube. You'll be fine. You'll be fine.

[01:36:52] [SPEAKER_05] I didn't know this about you.

[01:36:54] [SPEAKER_02] It's the best. Especially just Carson. And Rodney. He had the long, thin socks. He's always putting his leg up and kind of picking at the sock. God, I love Rodney. He'd be great. So he should have cast Rodney. When's the cartoon? River Danger Field? Yeah, when's that?

[01:37:15] [SPEAKER_03] A few years later. Yeah, I know my sex life is terrible. My wife put a mirror over the dog's bed. Actually, she did put a mirror over a bed. She said she likes to watch herself laugh. That's pretty good. Thank you. I don't think the impression was good, but the joke is incredible. The fact that the first joke is actually just a setup for the second joke.

[01:37:35] [SPEAKER_02] No one does it like Rodney. Rodney is only in one film in 1995, and it is Casper, in which he is one of the faces, right, that he turns into or whatever. When Bill Pullman washes his face. Right. He also turns into Claire Eastwood and forget who else.

[01:37:47] [SPEAKER_03] You watched Casper recently. No. Me? Really? Yeah. Someone shared your letterbox log for Casper.

[01:37:54] [SPEAKER_02] Is that old? No, I have not. I have no letterbox log for Casper. Really? It must be thinking of something else. I mean, I've seen Casper.

[01:38:02] [SPEAKER_03] Was someone trying to start a fight between you and I, or did I dream a one-star letterbox log for Casper?

[01:38:09] [SPEAKER_02] I do have it logged with one star on there. Oh, well, I will. I mean, like, I've assigned it one star. From what? Memory? Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry to Casper.

[01:38:18] [SPEAKER_03] Might be time to spin that steelbook. Yep. Crack a steel on that bad boy.

[01:38:21] [SPEAKER_02] I think we need to have him revisit. Yeah. Don't use it, Casper. Yeah. It's just like, it's crying out for a reboot, because that would be the perfect moment to, you know, check in with his friends. And what are the big ghosts called?

[01:38:36] [SPEAKER_03] The ghostly trio, Fatso, Stinky, and Stretch. They're his uncles. They're not his friends. They're his uncles. And they're quite mean to him. I feel like there might be a modern update on some of those things. We go, V, Stinky, and Stretch.

[01:38:51] [SPEAKER_00] I'm just, like, guessing here that Casper was a movie that Young Griffin imprinted on heavily.

[01:38:58] [SPEAKER_03] It's about a special little boy? No, it's about a sad little boy who can't stop thinking about death. Yeah. And Christina Ricci. Yeah, well, it's very much about Christina Ricci. The thing I find fascinating about this movie, and we talked about the ginger side of it.

[01:39:13] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah.

[01:39:14] [SPEAKER_03] But the ace side of it, like, here's this guy whose character is, he knows more about betting than anybody. He is right all of the time. He is not driven by emotions. He is driven by logic. He's, like, gambling Spock. He doesn't make mistakes. Right? It's my way or the right way. I fucked up the line that I already fucked up at the beginning of the episode.

[01:39:40] [SPEAKER_03] And yet, he sees Ginger and is like, this is trouble. I will never be able to quit this. Like, this is the worst calculation I could possibly make.

[01:39:50] [SPEAKER_02] It's why Sharon Stone is ideal casting. Yes. Because, like, she's someone, especially at that time, where you're like, yeah, any behavior I might overlook. Right. I'd ruin my life for this woman. Yes.

[01:40:01] [SPEAKER_03] Like, he should not be falling for this type of woman, period. Yeah. Sure. And then when he finds out about her history with Lester Diamond, he should run for the hills. Yeah. The fact that she doesn't seem to like him that much, too, might also be. When she says no to his marriage proposal, he should say, fair enough. Yeah.

[01:40:17] [SPEAKER_02] And walk away. He has to say, I can trust you three times. Yes. Until she says, yes, you can trust me.

[01:40:24] [SPEAKER_03] Right, right. That's not a good sign. He's trying to talk her into it. And, like, Pileggi said that the way the real guy lefty talked in life was just like, well, you work through an issue.

[01:40:34] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah.

[01:40:34] [SPEAKER_03] You logic it out. You fix it. That's so true. And he was like, she's got a drinking problem. We'll fix that. No more drinking.

[01:40:39] [SPEAKER_00] Literally, I can fix her.

[01:40:40] [SPEAKER_03] Right. Yeah. Yes. Yes. But he respects her hustle skills, too.

[01:40:45] [SPEAKER_02] He does. That's a big part of it. That's true. She's accomplished in her way. And she knows Vegas so well in a way that he maybe even doesn't. Yeah.

[01:40:56] [SPEAKER_00] But I think, like, him expecting her to completely put all of that aside. Yeah. Like, there's a point near the end, like, when she's really off the rails where he's like, go inside and be a wife. It's like, ah, yes. That's how that happens. You know, like, all the things you were attracted to about this woman, her hustle, her, you know, gregariousness. Like, that's, you wish to own that and make it go away. Like, it's. Yes. Yeah. It's.

[01:41:22] [SPEAKER_03] It's classic Madonna horror stuff.

[01:41:24] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:41:24] [SPEAKER_03] Yes.

[01:41:25] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Yeah. I do think when she locks her child to a bed. Ties. Yeah. You know, handcuffs or whatever. You know. It's just like nylons.

[01:41:34] [SPEAKER_00] It's like, it's fine. It's so scarves.

[01:41:36] [SPEAKER_02] Because she was going out.

[01:41:38] [SPEAKER_00] To the Fleeney Tower Italian restaurant.

[01:41:41] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah.

[01:41:41] [SPEAKER_00] No, it's insane. But then it's like that whole I know we're skipping all over the place. But that like I said, that's sort of how I experienced this movie. But it's like when even at that point, it's like he doesn't get you don't get a hot reaction out of De Niro kind of until he's like sitting across from her at the restaurant. And even then it's like, yo, she's like could have killed your child. And like, it still seems muted for that. It should be end of discussion. Like, we're not.

[01:42:07] [SPEAKER_00] But I think like that's sort of I mean, it mirrors the Pesci relationship, obviously. But one thing that occurred to me, speaking of Nobu, is like, you know, he kind of holds up this whale as an example of how we're always, you know, the town's always going to get you in the end. Because a guy is like me. Like, you can come in. You can take all this money from us. But we'll just keep you seated long enough so you lose the money again. It's not your town. Yeah. And it's like and it's and he's telling us this at the top of the movie where it seems like he's in control of everything.

[01:42:36] [SPEAKER_00] And it's like, yeah, like this guy is smart. He knows how it all works. But it's like that's essentially what happens to him. That's you. Ginger. Yeah. It's just with a woman. So he doesn't recognize it as the same phenomenon. But it kind of is on.

[01:42:49] [SPEAKER_03] But it's also what happens with the Cowboys. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, I mean, what's that guy's name? He's so good. It's the guy who directed Boy and His Dog.

[01:43:01] [SPEAKER_00] LQ Jones.

[01:43:03] [SPEAKER_02] Yes. Yes.

[01:43:04] [SPEAKER_00] Like the commissioner, state commissioner or whatever. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:43:08] [SPEAKER_03] But like the guy who just feels like the fucking the cowboy of Nevada. Yeah.

[01:43:12] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:43:12] [SPEAKER_03] And is just like, you don't belong here. Yeah. This is not your land.

[01:43:16] [SPEAKER_02] It is what's so crazy about the mob taking over it and like, you know, just the history of the of the city of the sort of like. But they did answer to one ultimate force they could not control very well, which was these sort of odd hicks who'd lived here for 100 years. Yes. Yes. Like the Nevada community of the 1950s, the political powerhouse that it was.

[01:43:42] [SPEAKER_00] Have you guys read Ebert's review?

[01:43:44] [SPEAKER_02] No.

[01:43:45] [SPEAKER_00] It's really it's good. And it's got some really good lines in it. But it really made me think. Sexy. Fun. Sexy. Fun. It did make me like he has a line that's basically like, you know, the thing of Vegas didn't exist, it would have to be invented.

[01:43:57] [SPEAKER_02] And he says the same for the mafia.

[01:43:59] [SPEAKER_00] Same for the mafia. But I don't even think it's like that the cowboys really control anything. I think the idea of what Vegas is, what it represents as an outlet for humanity cannot actually be controlled by anybody. There are caretakers at various times. And right now it's like these, you know, corporate interests or whatever. But they don't even really own the kind of ginger-like untameability of the American id that is represented.

[01:44:29] [SPEAKER_00] And I guess now it's the world's id because it's become like so totally international. But like that that is just a, that's kind of just a force. It's like, it's like a supernatural force that exists in the desert. Right. That various people try to harness at some point. It shouldn't exist. No, no. It definitely shouldn't exist. I guess. Yes.

[01:44:49] [SPEAKER_03] I don't know. It's pretty cool. Don't knock until you try it, David. You gotta go there first. I'm pro Vegas. I don't have a problem with it.

[01:44:54] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, when you are there, it is like, it's funny because you fly in and like once you've been there a couple of times and you know how vast all of these places are and you see them small and you think about all the sheets and all the laundry and every single monumental thing that goes into making this place where all the water that's pumped in, you look at it from afar. And to the extent, this is sort of how LA is too. And you're like, this is a bad idea. This shouldn't be here. And then you get in and you're like, yay, it's awesome.

[01:45:24] [SPEAKER_00] I love it.

[01:45:26] [SPEAKER_02] It's very stimulating. We should talk about Casino. So Casino. All right. Ace Rothstein. Oh, well, we began with the car bombing, obviously, which is so fun.

[01:45:35] [SPEAKER_03] And then you go into opera. Do you not?

[01:45:38] [SPEAKER_00] Is that the Bach?

[01:45:39] [SPEAKER_03] Yes.

[01:45:40] [SPEAKER_00] That it starts with.

[01:45:41] [SPEAKER_03] It's Bach at the beginning. Yeah.

[01:45:42] [SPEAKER_00] And it's like, and the thing of his body flying through the flames are instantly like, oh, we are so Baroque now. Yes. Like, I hate to keep using that word, but I mean, you know, it's Bach.

[01:45:54] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. For sure. No. And also Scorsese, a very Baroque director. And we are entering his Baroque phase. Yeah. Which he has not quite exited.

[01:46:01] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. But it's the, I don't know. It's like the, yeah, the gilded version of it or something. It's so exciting. I love that moment.

[01:46:10] [SPEAKER_02] And I love, say you're going in cold thinking like, maybe this is being narrated from beyond the grave. Like, you know, they're sort of setting you up for like, and then he fucking blew up and his body flew into hell. Right. Right. And he's just, now he will tell his story of like, I bet you're wandering. I don't know how I ended up. Yes. In this on fire car. Freeze, Frank. Because it is, I feel like Pileggi probably is like, I think I'll write the book when he reads like, and then the car blew up and he did not die. Yes.

[01:46:41] [SPEAKER_02] Right.

[01:46:41] [SPEAKER_04] And you're like, okay.

[01:46:42] [SPEAKER_02] I can interview that guy now.

[01:46:45] [SPEAKER_03] And he was in a car bomb.

[01:46:49] [SPEAKER_02] So he is, I like the first 20, 30 minutes of this movie are just pure. I could watch them anytime. Yep. Just the whole kind of like, here's how everything works. Well, it's especially, yeah. That's your shit. That's gambler of all time. These are the rules. This is how it all works. This is the system. These are the players. Here's the money room. Here's how the skim works. Here's how I can be in charge, even though I don't have a gambling license. That's my favorite. Alan can explain it to him. We'll just change your job title every few years.

[01:47:18] [SPEAKER_02] Like, it'll be constantly in review. Yeah.

[01:47:20] [SPEAKER_00] It's all a system story. It's like, they're talking about like bureaucracy and all of these, you know, how the system works. It's not a character story. And yet I am so riveted by it. Like, I, because it's like, okay, this is insane. And these are the people that choose to operate here. Okay. Like, that's telling me something about the world that we're living in. Like, people who thrive on this shit.

[01:47:44] [SPEAKER_03] Do we want to try to, in micro, explain the system of how he gets into power?

[01:47:50] [SPEAKER_02] Um, sure. What do you mean? The skim? Oh, the skim? Or what are you talking about?

[01:47:56] [SPEAKER_03] The whole, what's his name? Frank Green, the, um, uh, Kevin Pollack character.

[01:48:01] [SPEAKER_02] Right. So Philip Green. Philip Green. Played by Pollack. Which is, who's good. Yes. But it's kind of funny casting a Pollack where I'm like, Pollack is another kind of motor mouth. And he's like basically playing a guy who never talks. Like, or like does anything. But right. Like, he's the front man. Ace is the brains, I guess. And I guess Nikki is the muscle. Although I feel like Nikki kind of just decides he's the muscle. So Philip, Bill Green, who's Kevin Pollack.

[01:48:27] [SPEAKER_03] Right. Is given this humongous check by the Teamsters Union. Right.

[01:48:31] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah.

[01:48:32] [SPEAKER_03] To buy the casino.

[01:48:33] [SPEAKER_02] The Tangiers. Right. You know. And, and like the Chicago mafia are behind this. Yes. And, but I feel like what's important sort of is that Nikki, uh, you know, Joe Pesci. Yeah. He's, it's, he hasn't been sent with the same level of authority. No. They're not like, and you will be in charge of like, you know, security and enforcement. He's just kind of like, everyone's sick of me. I'm going to go over there. Yeah. He assumes the position. And make everyone sick of me over there. And he also.

[01:49:01] [SPEAKER_02] And if you have a problem with it, I've got this vice. Right.

[01:49:04] [SPEAKER_03] That I love putting heads in. Well, it's like, on one hand, it feels like there's a strategic level to, is there land to be grabbed here? Can I make a big power move? On the other hand, this guy just seems to love beating the shit out of people and recognizes that there's less competition to do that if he goes to a new place.

[01:49:24] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, he's like a guy who moves somewhere, like say from New York to Los Angeles, for a change of pace. Got to get, got to get out of here. But like, refuses to assimilate at all to the culture, the local culture. Indeed. You know, still complaining about how I can get a piece of pizza or something.

[01:49:41] [SPEAKER_03] Pretty quickly banned from all casinos permanently in the black book.

[01:49:44] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Yeah.

[01:49:45] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah.

[01:49:46] [SPEAKER_00] But he doesn't like, he doesn't even show up and initially say he's going to work for Ace. He's more like, I'm just going to be here and do my thing, which is like, we're just going to do robberies. Like there's, there's a line in the book where it's like, or maybe it's in the movie. I can't remember, but it might be in both, but where he's just like, this is the land of free money. You can, you can do all sorts of scams to build people out of millions of dollars and you're robbing people's houses. Yeah. Like that's just love of the game at that point. Right.

[01:50:16] [SPEAKER_02] It is. No, he likes the doing. Yeah. He doesn't like the power. Which is of course why the mob eventually turns on him because I love that whenever we see the mob, they're just so conservative. Yes. Like, you know, the high level of the mob, especially back then, they're just like these guys who were like, I just don't want anyone to talk about anything or do anything like troubles. I want to eat a sandwich. I want to have some espresso. And I just want to sit around this grocery store. One of the most like chilling moments of the movie is when they decide to kill, what's his pants in the snow? Alan King.

[01:50:46] [SPEAKER_02] Alan King. Where everyone's just like, he's a good guy. He's not going to talk. And everyone agrees. And then the boss is like, yeah, but you know, me and me, like, maybe we just don't worry about it. Yeah. Exactly. And they're just like, okay, guess he's got to die. Like, you know, just that's the level they're operating on. And Pesci gets away with more because he's like kind of in the family. But, you know.

[01:51:13] [SPEAKER_00] Also, people just don't know what to do with him, I think. Right. And it's far away back then. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:51:18] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. But the pen scene is the big one where you're just like.

[01:51:22] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, yeah. Yeah.

[01:51:24] [SPEAKER_03] Why is this guy going this hard? For someone who is meaningless. Right. Yes. He also is a little guy.

[01:51:32] [SPEAKER_02] He is. But he is short. So intimidating. And he is like fucking with people who are way bigger than him. I mean, that's the Pesci magic. But he's so intense.

[01:51:40] [SPEAKER_03] The Pesci magic is he's shorter than fucking Macaulay Culkin. And you're like, this is the scariest guy I've ever seen in my life.

[01:51:47] [SPEAKER_02] Like, he's, you know, I always, he's, yeah. And it's, and the weird facelift just makes him scarier. Like, he's. Yeah. He looks like a gargoyle. He looks like a gargoyle. He looks a bit like a gargoyle. The only thing that's crazy is that Sharon Stone has sex with him. Not in a, of course, you understand what, the power play she's making. But that's crazy.

[01:52:07] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, yeah. I think the thing that's terrifying about a guy like that is, is the stature. Right. Physical. Because, and the fact, the combined stature and not giving a fuck. Because it's like, you don't see the signs in front of you that other people would be like, oh, maybe I shouldn't fight this guy. Or maybe like, you know, this wouldn't be the best idea for me. But he doesn't care. And so he becomes the scariest guy in the room.

[01:52:29] [SPEAKER_03] This guy sees no walls. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:52:33] [SPEAKER_00] I really do think of, like, my dog a lot. Watching him in this movie. Your dog's a Pesci? My dog's gotten a few scrapes trying to take on guys that were bigger than him. But he doesn't win quite as frequently as Pesci does. I'll say that.

[01:52:47] [SPEAKER_03] Your dog stabbed a Mastiff with a ballpoint back?

[01:52:50] [SPEAKER_00] Well, he did snap at a giant yellow lab and got his ass handed to him. So, yeah. Got a chip on his shoulder. Nothing wrong with that. Yeah.

[01:52:58] [SPEAKER_03] So, the first chunk of the movie. Trying to see when Ginger enters. What her first appearance is. Oh, sure.

[01:53:07] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah.

[01:53:08] [SPEAKER_02] You know, it's just this kind of setup. You've got Frankie Marino. Frank Vincent, you know, is sort of like the more, whatever. The right-hand man for the bosses. Right, exactly. Yes. And then, yeah.

[01:53:26] [SPEAKER_03] Ace falls for Ginger. She enters almost exactly 20 minutes in. And he's watching on the monitors as she's, what did they call it? Chip hustling, I think.

[01:53:37] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Where it basically, like, what? She sits next to you while you're gambling. You look like you have this awesome lady on your, you know, arm. You pocket some chips. And then, right, like, she's taking chips and then she expects you essentially to, like, give her some of your winnings.

[01:53:52] [SPEAKER_00] I think she was already, like, doing a hustle with that guy. Because the idea is that they were going to split or there was going to be some sort of split of what they made at the table. And then he only gives her, like, a little bit of money. And, you know, she's like, fuck you. Where's my money? He's like, it's in your bag.

[01:54:09] [SPEAKER_02] And De Niro sees this and is like, I like her gumption.

[01:54:11] [SPEAKER_03] Right, right. That's the first warning sign is, like, he's witnessing the kind of thing he exists to catch. And rather than catch it, he's like, I want to own this.

[01:54:20] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, he's got, like, a league of guys in the rafters who are, like, looking out for this shit and is still like, nope, let her through. This is alluring.

[01:54:27] [SPEAKER_02] I'm going to marry this woman. Yes. An ego thing of, like, I can fix her, right? 100%. Yeah, yeah.

[01:54:34] [SPEAKER_03] That makes some sense to me. But you're introduced to the idea of Lester, like, immediately. It's like, I knew this girl's history. There was this pimp she had a long history with. She couldn't quit him.

[01:54:45] [SPEAKER_02] Pattinson, of course, Robert Pattinson, of course, based his Odyssey performance on James Woods in this room.

[01:54:49] [SPEAKER_00] I did not know that. Really? Yes.

[01:54:52] [SPEAKER_02] God bless. He said in interviews, like, I was thinking about, like, James Woods in Casino when I was going for, like, sleeve slimeball, suitor, you know. You should have had the mustache and the hair. You should have. Yeah. That's a scholar right there. Somebody get these beggars out of here. Somebody get these beggars out of here is one of the most golden memes we have been handed in a million. It works in, like, 50 different scenarios.

[01:55:16] [SPEAKER_03] As a first blush, I never would have guessed it had the legs.

[01:55:18] [SPEAKER_02] It's all about the line reading. Yeah. Like, me saying it doesn't, you know, it's just the smirk and the kind of, like, you know, self-consciousness because he knows his world is falling apart.

[01:55:27] [SPEAKER_03] Did you see, I think it was at Venice, the, like, press conference where Pattinson talked about this. Go ahead. Where he was, like, when I was growing up, we would, like, watch Jim Carrey movies and Mike Myers movies obsessively. And we would quote lines and we were obsessed with the way that things were said. Not just what the lines were. Yeah, the cadence and all that.

[01:55:48] [SPEAKER_02] Because that's the magic of Carrey in those movies. Right.

[01:55:51] [SPEAKER_03] It's just, you're like, I can't believe he said that word that way. Right. There's, like, eight syllables in it. How did he do that? Because I think they were asking him, like, are you, like, befuddled by these things becoming memes? And he's like, it's not like I try to create memes, but I think memes are the modern version of what used to be us doing impressions on the playground.

[01:56:07] [SPEAKER_04] Yeah.

[01:56:07] [SPEAKER_03] And, like, that is a thing I aspire to and I think was missing from movies is, like, actors making big enough choices that anyone can quote the intonation of the line.

[01:56:19] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[01:56:19] [SPEAKER_02] Woods, I'm trying to see, like, where. Because, obviously, like, James Woods is, like, an Oscar-nominated actor who can be the lead of your movie. Yeah. Although I would say if he's the lead of your movie. It's a smaller movie. It's a smaller movie. It might be about vampires. And how John Carpenter wants you to pay attention to it. Yes. He owns these vampires. Possessive. Like, yeah, his. All right, wait, no. Not selected credits. Give me the whole thing, baby. At this point, he has two noms.

[01:56:47] [SPEAKER_02] And he's obviously nominated for Best Actor for Salvador, which is an incredible performance in a pretty good movie. And supporting for Ghost of Mississippi. That is the next year. Got it.

[01:56:57] [SPEAKER_00] Salvador is, what, 92 or something?

[01:57:00] [SPEAKER_02] No, it's 86. Oh, whoa. The whole thing with Salvador that's crazy. Same year as Platoon. Is it's the same year as Platoon. Yeah. Right. Right. He's very good in Salvador. And, but it is like, mostly he's a supporting actor. I mean, and like. The character guy. Yeah. Like, he's in stuff like Immediate Family and True Believer, where it's like, yeah, he's like a co-lead. There's that movie, the buddy cop movie he made with Michael J. Fox, The Hard Way, which was like an insta-bomb.

[01:57:29] [SPEAKER_03] I have always been jealous of the premise of that movie.

[01:57:31] [SPEAKER_02] Which is. Have I ever admitted this? You love James Woods and want him to imitate his career exactly?

[01:57:36] [SPEAKER_03] When, like, The Tick was about to come out and people were like, you should have a pitch for a movie in case the show's a hit. I thought I came up with an incredible pitch and then I realized it was the exact premise of The Hard Way. And which is? It's an actor has to play a cop in a movie. So he goes undercover with a real cop to train. Right. And it's like fancy, like, soft hand actor boy. That's Michael J. Fox. Right. Is teamed up with, like, real cop and sees real shit. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:58:02] [SPEAKER_02] Great act. Great premise.

[01:58:03] [SPEAKER_03] Great premise.

[01:58:04] [SPEAKER_02] Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is kind of the perfect version of that. Yeah. Agreed. But that's P.I. Yeah. That's tough. Yeah. I'm just like, I'm trying to wonder, basically, like, was Woods sort of doing a favor being in this movie a little bit? I think so. But, like, he's had a run of kind of bombs, I guess. So maybe it's like, and also it's Martin Scorsese. So, you know, he's also in Nixon the same year. He's amazing in Nixon as Haldeman.

[01:58:29] [SPEAKER_02] And then the year after he has Ghosts of Mississippi, which is, you know, I've never seen it, but he's playing the old racist murderer.

[01:58:36] [SPEAKER_03] I believe he plays the spirit of racism, basically.

[01:58:37] [SPEAKER_02] The ghost of racism, past, present, and future. He's got a bunch of makeup on. Yeah. And obviously that movie was not very well received, but it was one of those kind of like, you know, supporting noms where the Oscars are like, I don't know, you fucking yelled and shit. Like, take your nomination.

[01:58:51] [SPEAKER_03] Do you guys know what he looks like in Ghosts of Mississippi? It's crazy. No. He looks like old Rose from the end of Titanic.

[01:58:59] [SPEAKER_01] No.

[01:59:00] [SPEAKER_02] Trying to find a big picture. Here we go. Yeah. I was a dish. I mean, like, the premise of Ghosts of Mississippi is interesting of, like, you know, these people who tried to prosecute these racist murderers who were in the Klan decades after the crime. You know, once it was like, everyone was like, everyone knows he fucking did it. Like, you know, this crime that happened 30 years. Right. You know, like, Byron. Yes. Yes.

[01:59:29] [SPEAKER_02] Like, you know, is just kind of a little too like treacly and obvious with sort of the hit on it. Like, but I don't know. I don't know. I feel like this is the start of a really good supporting actor era for Woods. Oh, sure. Because it's like Nixon and then like Hercules and then like Contact he's amazing in. Yeah. Yeah. There's a movie. I love movie performance. But then like Virgin Suicides. He's amazing. He's great in that. Any Given Sunday he's so funny in. Real Life. General's Daughter. That's a movie I've seen.

[01:59:57] [SPEAKER_02] I'm pretty sure he played a bad guy in that one. I would guess. For sure. Yes. What's real life? Is he ever nice? No, I'm just, I'm saying movies. No, I know what you're saying. Maybe that question might apply for his life as well. Well, like Virgin Suicides, he's playing a sympathetic character. Yeah. Like, I mean, like they don't know what, you know, those parents are all fucked up. Right. You're like, did this guy fuck up his kids? Yeah. Right. But he's not evil. Does he play an out and out good guy? I really struggle.

[02:00:28] [SPEAKER_02] I'm like looking at all these things and I'm like, not once? Has he ever played a chill hang? Has James Woods ever? Because like in Salvador or whatever, he's a hero, but like, you know, a very flawed and cynical person. And then even stuff like that show Sharky did. Yeah. Which had a, you know, a great premise. You know, he's the good guy, sort of. But the idea is that he's a scumbag who's trying to be a good guy.

[02:00:54] [SPEAKER_03] I think the answer is no.

[02:00:56] [SPEAKER_02] I remember Shark.

[02:00:57] [SPEAKER_03] Spike Lee directed Shark?

[02:00:58] [SPEAKER_02] The pilot. Yeah.

[02:00:59] [SPEAKER_03] He didn't direct every episode?

[02:01:01] [SPEAKER_02] Not that I know of.

[02:01:03] [SPEAKER_03] I mean, like, is Videodrome the nicest guy he's ever played? What a shark guy. Like, possibly. Every man. That guy is like possessed, but he's not evil in the same way. Like, that's closest to every man. Truly.

[02:01:17] [SPEAKER_02] That might be. He has so many credits and I certainly haven't seen all the movies he was in. So, you know, listeners weigh in. Like, when did John James Woods play a relatively nice guy? In The Simpsons, he's very sympathetic as himself. I love that. That episode's really funny.

[02:01:33] [SPEAKER_03] Isn't he a recurring character on Family Guy as well? I think he is.

[02:01:41] [SPEAKER_02] Anyway, and he's still around.

[02:01:43] [SPEAKER_00] Is he nice in Riding in Cars with Boys? No, isn't he like the mean dad who yells at her?

[02:01:48] [SPEAKER_02] Don't ride in cars with boys. I have one rule in my house. Okay. I can't remember. I did see that when that came out. I don't. We'll watch it again one day.

[02:01:58] [SPEAKER_00] Do you know what the budget was on Riding in Cars with Boys?

[02:02:01] [SPEAKER_02] 70 million? Not quite that high.

[02:02:04] [SPEAKER_00] What if I told you it was just about the same as Casino? It's crazy. Yeah, it was 47. Yeah, that's crazy.

[02:02:09] [SPEAKER_02] Is that just like everyone getting their quote? I have no idea.

[02:02:14] [SPEAKER_03] Charlie's Angels and like... I was looking up because we're recording this the day that Practical Magic 2 comes out. And I was like... 9-11. Ben's been waiting all episode. I'm sorry. He's been waiting all episode. He asked if we should start the episode with a moment of silence. I said, Ben, it's not coming out on September 11th.

[02:02:36] [SPEAKER_02] Yes, of course. We are recording this on the release date of Practical Magic 2.

[02:02:41] Yeah.

[02:02:42] [SPEAKER_00] Most importantly.

[02:02:43] [SPEAKER_03] Finish your thought. And I was like, that movie wasn't a huge hit at the time. It's thought of as like a cult hit, but it didn't cost that much. And then I was like, oh, it cost 75 million?

[02:02:52] [SPEAKER_02] That movie was an underperformer. That's the whole thing. Yeah. 75? I mean, I think... Well, Sandy got full quote. Yeah. And Nicole wasn't quite on her level, but she got, I'm sure, a hefty sum. Hollywood doesn't...

[02:03:04] [SPEAKER_03] Aiden Quinn doesn't come for free.

[02:03:07] [SPEAKER_02] He probably did.

[02:03:08] [SPEAKER_03] You don't get him at the bottom of a cereal box. Yes.

[02:03:14] [SPEAKER_02] By... There was a tweet that I thought was very funny. David Hearing, whoever he is. Uh-huh. Hollywood. Why aren't people going to the cinema anymore? Also Hollywood. Practical Magic 2 is 130 minutes.

[02:03:26] [SPEAKER_00] Insane.

[02:03:27] [SPEAKER_02] I mean, it's going to open to like 50 million? I'm seeing 40. But hey. Hey. Anything for a movie where the reviews were bad! Phoned in!

[02:03:37] [SPEAKER_03] Directed by Suzanne Beer? Like, everything about it is strange.

[02:03:41] [SPEAKER_02] It's a... As a defender of Practical Magic, it ruins me. Yeah. Because they're like, we made a sequel. And I'm like, oh, cool. I'm basically sold. And they're like, here's what it is. And I'm like, I will never see this movie. No thanks. You're just like sucking your teeth. Apparently it sets up a third installment, too.

[02:03:56] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, great! Oh, good.

[02:04:00] [SPEAKER_03] Do you know the popcorn bucket is a margarita blender?

[02:04:03] [SPEAKER_02] No.

[02:04:04] [SPEAKER_03] They do drink a lot of margaritas in the first one. They put the lime in the coconut.

[02:04:07] [SPEAKER_02] I just think that movie, the first, the Griffin Dunn one rocks. Because it's mostly just like so acidic. Just like all his movies. Yeah. You know, and it's... Yeah. Whatever.

[02:04:17] Fine.

[02:04:17] [SPEAKER_02] The movie Casino. Yeah. There's some practical magic going on in Casino. Tell me about it. I do think it's crazy. I'm not sure how embellished this is, Emily. That he's the one who's like, well, we should have a sports book in the casino.

[02:04:30] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, yeah. He's kind of credited with inventing the modern Vegas sports book. No one ever fucking thought of this? No. I mean, there were all these little like hole-in-the-wall joints that, you know, you see especially hanging out at. Right. Right.

[02:04:41] [SPEAKER_02] And because like that shot... I mean, like that's the whole thing where you're saying about the budget. Like obviously this is a big budget movie and they spent their money well. But like that shot of the sports book, you're just like, like this is staggering. And I know he's using real locations and stuff. Yeah. This is... He's really... It's like peak performance shit for Marty. Yeah, yeah. Visually, this movie.

[02:05:00] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, well, but on the sports book front, I mean, that's another really interesting thing about it right now because, you know, as we know, everything is betting now and on sports and other things. Like that is just mainstream culture.

[02:05:12] [SPEAKER_02] Right. I'm betting on the running time of this episode, right? I'm riding some calci waves up and down. David's been trying to fix our episodes.

[02:05:18] [SPEAKER_01] Oh, is that what's happening?

[02:05:20] [SPEAKER_03] I want a taxi driver to be short. I had a hard out.

[02:05:24] [SPEAKER_02] We had another episode to record that day. That is the bone chilling reveal at the end of that episode.

[02:05:30] [SPEAKER_03] But I find out that David has a prop bet for three hours and 57 minutes with ads.

[02:05:37] [SPEAKER_00] Were you guys... Were you guys... Did you take the over or were you...

[02:05:43] [SPEAKER_02] Griffin's talking. I'm like, more, more.

[02:05:45] [SPEAKER_00] When you took the over.

[02:05:47] [SPEAKER_03] You're giving me the taffy pull gesture.

[02:05:49] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. And Tracy's like, another thing. And I'm like, yes, one other thing.

[02:05:52] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, my God. I took the under. You took the under. Sucker's bet. Yes. No, it is fascinating. I was being hopeful. I don't know. But, I mean, it's also... And the book goes into such rich detail of it because it spends so much time before he actually starts working at the casino. But it's just like the amount of research you did to be one of these guys. And it was the opposite of what, you know, the modern, you know, FanDuel or whatever thing is or Calci today where it's like...

[02:06:19] [SPEAKER_00] A lot of times he just wouldn't put a bet down because there wasn't a good bet that you were going to make any money on. But it was like he had everybody, you know, at all of these practices for college basketball or whatever coming in and giving him like, oh, this guy has a cold or whatever. And, you know, it's one of these things where when people talk about the fun of doing things rather than having like AI do them, for instance. Sure. It's like clearly he just liked like in a very, you know, spectrum-y like OCD way,

[02:06:49] [SPEAKER_00] probably like he just loved knowing all this stuff, like gathering all this data and using it. Like that was, you know, he's kind of a peculiar guy in that way, but that's what brought him joy. And, you know, that's sort of the last of this era of a guy, like a human doing that work, having all these relationships, getting, you know, the intel from the bakery about your muffins, for example. And like being the person who oversees everything. Yeah.

[02:07:16] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, it does also feel in a way like, you know, a little, not that everything needs to be a one-to-one about filmmaking, but it did remind me of that a lot of like when people get to a level like probably much like Marty was in when he made this film where it's a huge mechanism at this point. You cannot have your hands on everything. You have to delegate, but it's like, can you do it?

[02:07:35] [SPEAKER_03] You still want to be detail-oriented. Yeah. Yeah.

[02:07:37] [SPEAKER_00] And like, it brings you joy to be detail-oriented, but at a certain point, you can't, you can't be the person who's overseeing everything. And, you know, I don't.

[02:07:47] [SPEAKER_03] It's interesting. It's also, it is, this guy's downfall is he's got one employee who is so bad at the details that he's just like, either you're dumb or you're in on it. Yeah. Either you're fucking with me or you're incompetent. And either way, I can't handle this. And he finds out that this guy is the brother-in-law of the cowboy gaming commissioner. Of the gaming commissioner. Right. And he just takes the meeting with the guy and is like, I got to fire him. And he's like, I beg you to reconsider.

[02:08:17] [SPEAKER_03] And he's like, there is no discussion here. I cannot abide by it. And that happens an hour and 20 minutes into the movie.

[02:08:26] [SPEAKER_02] It's the ball rolling on his own destruction. It's his control freakery, you know, coming to, you know. But he's right. Of course he's right. Of course he's right. That guy's a fucking idiot. Of course he's right. Yeah, you have to grease palms, baby. It's Vegas. It's the desert. I totally understand. But it's like, every time I watch it, I'm always like, man, it's impossible for three people to win in a row like this. Are you really that fucking stupid? What a fucking yokel. Yes.

[02:08:49] [SPEAKER_00] But at the same time, it's like, I think, yeah, he's blind at the moment to the relationship aspect of it. That like, yeah, okay, you lose a bunch of money on this day. But if you keep that guy around, you discipline him in some way or another, then you might still have your casino.

[02:09:05] [SPEAKER_03] I think it's even bigger than that, Emily. I think it's that this guy's entire existence is based on being empirically correct at all times. Knowing all of the angles and being correct. And if he lets one thing slide, then it's like, then who the fuck am I? It's also why he refuses to give up on Sharon Stone because he can't be incorrect about her. He is wrong about her.

[02:09:28] [SPEAKER_00] No, at a certain point.

[02:09:29] [SPEAKER_03] But he can't concede that.

[02:09:30] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. He starts talking about her in terms of like, you're going to embarrass me. And it's not like embarrass me because we're going to fight in public. It's like you're going to, you know, it's going to be on the record that I couldn't control you.

[02:09:40] [SPEAKER_03] I bet on the wrong horse. Yeah. Yes. But it is like that scene, I think, is so fascinating. The demeanor between the two guys is so wildly different. He keeps just trying to be like, don't you kind of know how it works here? I beg you to reconsider. Yeah. And De Niro's just like, well, I understand, but I can't do it. And I'm sorry to stay in the conversation.

[02:10:01] [SPEAKER_02] He even kind of concedes and he's like, just give him a shitty job.

[02:10:04] [SPEAKER_03] Right. Yeah. You don't even have to give him the same job anymore. He gives him a way out of the problem. And he's like, what's the lowest job? Like, can you put him in the trough? And he's like, this guy is so bad. I can't do it. I can't do it. I'm going to fire him. And unlike Goodfellas, where it's the rise and fall and the fall happens in like a hyper cranked 20 to 30 minutes. Right. 60% of this movie is just slow loss of power.

[02:10:31] [SPEAKER_02] But also like, it's just interesting that this and good. So Goodfellas is like a guy who's like, I just wanted to be a mobster. Yeah. Right. And then he's a mobster. And then he's like, what the fuck? What do I do with myself? Just because I sold coke and heroin and, you know, was insane and people died. Now I have to not be a mobster?

[02:10:50] Ah!

[02:10:51] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Whereas this is just like, Ace is at the end. He's just like, well, I'm still good at what I do and I still do it. I'm just sitting here. Yeah. Miss Vegas. It rocked when we ran it. Now it's bad. Okay.

[02:11:02] [SPEAKER_03] I just think like, it's fascinating that this movie cuts out the rise. It starts with him being handed the thing. Yeah. Pretty much. Then it shows you how he sort of like establishes cruising altitude.

[02:11:13] Mm-hmm.

[02:11:14] [SPEAKER_03] And then there's an hour and 40 minutes that are like, now your best friend is going to fuck your wife. Your best friend is going to fuck up everything. You're going to be investigated by like the feds, by the press. Yep. By the gaming commission. Everything is just going to spiral out of control.

[02:11:30] [SPEAKER_00] It's like death by a thousand cuts. A bunch of money. Right.

[02:11:33] [SPEAKER_03] It's going to unwind over years.

[02:11:35] [SPEAKER_02] The end is when they're just like, okay, you've been denied your thing. Yeah. You know, and he realizes like there's nothing he can do. You know, he can't make his argument. He can't. But of course that's in the middle of the movie and then there's still. Totally.

[02:11:48] [SPEAKER_00] But it's so funny when that happens because you realize all of this has been taking place while his license was apparently under review. Being processed. Over a decade or whatever. Yeah. And that's like how he was like then. But it sounds like that's how a lot of people ran their entire careers. You apply for the license. You make all your money. At some point they're like, well, I guess we have to give you your license now. But, you know, the fact that he, you know, just tripped over himself right at the wrong moment.

[02:12:17] [SPEAKER_03] He needed them to not look.

[02:12:18] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Yeah.

[02:12:19] [SPEAKER_03] Like Alan King's whole argument is the pile is so big. It takes forever. You're allowed to operate it while you're still under review. Yeah. And he's like, and what if I finally come up for like top of the pile? And he's like, then we change your position. Then we resubmit. Then we start all over again. But the second they're paying attention to you, you're fucked.

[02:12:36] [SPEAKER_02] Now, can I say, this scene that we're talking about where the, you know, the license is denied and Rothstein starts to be like, you know, were you not at the dinner when I was at the, you know, like, he's like, I don't know. Dix Mothers.

[02:12:52] [SPEAKER_00] That's such an amazing moment.

[02:12:53] [SPEAKER_02] The real guy in that scene is Harry Reid, who is later senator from Nevada. Oh, shit. Oh, wild. You know, he was the Nevada gaming commissioner. And he says Frank Rosenthal is the only person when I was Nevada gaming commissioner. Yeah. And like it was being leaned on all the time that I was ever afraid of. Wow. And that Rosenthal like confronted him and started berating him and saying like, I have done you so many favors. You've been to lunch with me.

[02:13:19] [SPEAKER_02] You've been, you know, and Reid like confessed to Rosenthal like, yes, yes, you're right. Like I, you've done me favors. Whereas you've like covered up like undesirable news or whatever. Like, and then there was like a bomb on his car, you know, which he assumed like the mob did. Like it didn't go off. Like they caught it before, you know, but isn't that crazy? Wait, Harry Reid? Yeah, in Harry Reid's car. Yeah. They tried to blow him up. Crazy. The whole thing about Harry Reid was that he was this kind of like Reedy centrist, you

[02:13:48] [SPEAKER_02] know, who is like, you know, it's like Harry Reid, why can't you get healthcare passed? And he'd be like, we're working our best, you know? And then people were like, you know, that guy used to like fight with the mob in Vegas in the seventies. Like there was one moment where like someone tried to bribe him while he was wearing a wire, while Reid was wearing a wire. And Reid is like, you're trying to fucking bribe me and sort of strangling him. And like FBI agents had to like pull them apart. It's just crazy. Anyway. He was cool. Cause he also was a UFO guy. Yeah.

[02:14:16] [SPEAKER_02] He was one of those, like there's more files and I'm going to find them. Although I will always say about those guys, when they rise to the top, they're like, I'm still looking. There's somewhere. I swear to God, they covered this shit up. They never seem to find any. I don't know. Well, they do, but they're just not what we're looking at. It's always like a blob. It's a blob. Yeah. And people are like, I don't know.

[02:14:37] [SPEAKER_00] It seems weird. Yeah.

[02:14:38] [SPEAKER_01] Pretty crazy.

[02:14:51] [SPEAKER_02] So that's where it all starts to fall apart. He starts hosting the TV show. Right.

[02:14:56] [SPEAKER_03] Cause he has to change his job position once again. Right. And now he's head of entertainment.

[02:15:01] [SPEAKER_02] Nikki starts to be crazy. So Ace starts kind of being like, Nikki, can you leave? Like nobody likes you here. And so like, they're not friends anymore. I'm putting friends in quotes. Cause I'm like, were they ever friends? They were childhood friends. Childhood friends. Yeah.

[02:15:15] [SPEAKER_00] And that's, I think.

[02:15:16] [SPEAKER_02] Like each other's company.

[02:15:17] [SPEAKER_00] That's the thing I think that is missing a little bit. That the movie could benefit from, you know, another hour or so of their, you know, before Vegas times. The chemistry. Yeah. They were, I mean, they were, they were like pals. Right. Worked together for, I think there was a lot of loyalty and like an actual emotional connection there in real life. And you don't get as much of a sense of that in this. It's more like, okay, my weird old coworker is coming, is moving to my town. Like, how am I going to deal with this?

[02:15:46] [SPEAKER_02] He's going to yell at everyone. Yeah.

[02:15:47] [SPEAKER_00] He's just going to be a little monster.

[02:15:48] [SPEAKER_02] Cause like Goodfellas really gets across that like fundamentally what Harry Hill wanted to do was sit around with these guys. He wants to hand. And carouse. Yes. Right.

[02:15:57] [SPEAKER_03] Basically today he would have just started a podcast.

[02:16:00] [SPEAKER_02] Of course. So many of these mobsters now have podcasts. They do. It's crazy. And you watch like TikTok clips and they're like, now you would never cross John Gotti unless, and I'm just like, what is this?

[02:16:11] [SPEAKER_03] I get fed these clips of like mobsters, like 80 year old mobsters with hair that looks like it is applied. Like a cement mix. Chet Black. Yeah. Like dyed facial hair and eyelashes. Just being like, and then I killed another guy.

[02:16:30] [SPEAKER_02] And I'm like, what is this? What is this? Which happened to the guy who shot Tupac. Yes. Where he started doing podcasts cause he was like, he thought he would, he'd made a deal like for immunity about something else. Correct. And he was like, I'm immune. Right. And then so he goes on podcast. He's like, so when I shot Tupac, I used to gone and I fired the bullets into his body. And the DA was like, this is a confession to a crime. He wrote a book entitled. There is no statute of limitations on murder.

[02:16:53] [SPEAKER_03] How I murdered Tupac so hard.

[02:16:55] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah.

[02:16:56] [SPEAKER_03] Do you know about this, Ben? I do. This is straight up what happened. Yeah.

[02:17:01] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Caught. It's insane that like after all these years it was a fucking podcast.

[02:17:04] [SPEAKER_03] He truly was like, I thought podcasts didn't count. I had been led to believe that podcast didn't count. And we know nothing counts more than podcasts.

[02:17:14] [SPEAKER_02] And it was also just so disappointing after all the years of Tupac. It was like, so why'd you do it? And they're like, we were mad at him. He's like, why? He's like, because they're like bloods and crip shit. You're pissed off at him. Fuck him. And you're like, that's it?

[02:17:25] [SPEAKER_04] Like, that's okay.

[02:17:27] [SPEAKER_03] Shot in Vegas.

[02:17:28] [SPEAKER_04] Yep.

[02:17:28] [SPEAKER_03] He was. On the strip. I went to record Gabrus and Adam Pally's podcast, Staying Alive. Yeah. I haven't listened yet. Yeah. A thing I struggle to do.

[02:17:38] [SPEAKER_02] Staying Alive? Now you're crushing it. Come on now.

[02:17:40] [SPEAKER_03] Hey.

[02:17:40] [SPEAKER_02] Is that what it's about?

[02:17:41] [SPEAKER_03] It's about trying to, yeah. That's what it's about. But the producer was like, you know, Biggie was shot here. Biggie was shot in LA. I will say. It just felt so lame that podcasts are recorded there now.

[02:17:53] [SPEAKER_05] Yeah.

[02:17:55] [SPEAKER_02] That is true. Yes. That is true. Anyway, look forward to all these people being on. Our show. Of course. We're going to have the mobster guys that we're talking about.

[02:18:04] [SPEAKER_03] And the Tupac guys. We're going to have Biggie and Tupac. We're going to get them back together on the show. Break bread.

[02:18:09] [SPEAKER_02] We're going to have the AI generated version of Tupac on.

[02:18:12] [SPEAKER_03] The hologram. The hologram. It was not AI generated. It was just a hologram.

[02:18:15] [SPEAKER_01] It's pre-hologram.

[02:18:17] [SPEAKER_03] Or pre-AI.

[02:18:18] [SPEAKER_01] Or pre-AI, I mean. Yeah.

[02:18:19] [SPEAKER_02] But they've rolled out. They've improved the technology. So he can talk now?

[02:18:23] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. I mean, it was just a pepper's throat solution.

[02:18:26] [SPEAKER_02] Holly market. Whatever. What would like AI Tupac?

[02:18:29] [SPEAKER_03] It is so funny how much. My energy drinks. When that happened, people were like, what the fuck? We're losing our minds. And you watch the clips now and he looks like a force ghost. So silly.

[02:18:38] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, did I ever tell you guys about the day I spent with a guy? Like, let's talk about mobbed up people who was in charge. Oh, I've heard a lot about this. Yeah, yeah. Yes. Fucking psycho. In charge of what? Of the hologram? Yeah, yeah. He had made it his business. I mean, it was like his 16th weird ass business venture. It was like.

[02:18:55] [SPEAKER_03] And he started like a hologram theater on Hollywood Boulevard.

[02:18:58] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, it was in downtown LA and I went to it and that's where he was doing the, I believe, the Whitney hologram. And yeah, I don't think that lasts very long. But yeah, I spent a day when I was at The Verge shooting a video with him just, you know, because I was just like, who is this guy? Let's go. Let's go hang out with him. And it was one of those strangest days of my life. And then we didn't end up using anything from the video.

[02:19:22] [SPEAKER_03] So I just have memories. To quote Mike Carlson from Podcast The Ride, when you hear about guys like that and you're like, and then he lost $110 million on holograms. You're like, this is proof that money isn't real. That money is a lie that they used to oppress us. What are you talking about? He lost $110 million.

[02:19:40] [SPEAKER_00] It's but like his whole operation was so janky, though. Like, I think that's the thing is like you hear about these volumes of money that people are throwing at these sort of weird, you know, supposed cash cows. And like you go to their office and it's like pipe and drape and like a crooked signed autograph of like Travolta or whatever in the corner. And it's just all so low rent.

[02:20:03] [SPEAKER_03] They're doing like shadow puppet rabbits on the wall next to a hologram Tupac.

[02:20:07] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, it's just so I don't know. I really I'm very compelled by that kind of shit.

[02:20:13] [SPEAKER_03] Chris says he should make a movie about that guy.

[02:20:14] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, yeah. Oh, God. What's his name?

[02:20:16] [SPEAKER_02] The King of Holograms. The King of Holograms. Imagine if Scorsese was like, I want to do a big Tupac movie now. I'm doing it. I don't think that would go over super well either.

[02:20:27] [SPEAKER_00] Well, oh, well, I will say that shortly after he meets Ginger, they are seen at the Peppermill, which is a wonderful place in Las Vegas. It still exists. You can go there. I go there every single time I go to Vegas. It's a diner, 24 hour diner with like this lounge with this sort of sunken fire pit. This looks pretty fucking good. It's one of the vibiest places in the world. Oh, my God.

[02:20:48] [SPEAKER_02] It's very purple.

[02:20:50] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Yeah. It's all like pink and blue lights. It's bisexual lighting before there was bisexual lighting.

[02:20:55] [SPEAKER_02] Vegas invented bisexual lighting.

[02:20:58] [SPEAKER_00] But it rolls and I'm always happy to see it in film. It's in a lot of things.

[02:21:02] [SPEAKER_02] Sure. Because it's such a I mean, it's such a striking location.

[02:21:05] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[02:21:07] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Yeah. Like we haven't really talked about the part of the movie where we're seeing Pesci kind of get started in Vegas because we've talked a lot about the casino operation. And about Ginger. And about Ginger. But that's that's a big chunk of it as well. Yeah. Yeah. And it's just all the different shady pies, you know, that he's got his fingers in.

[02:21:29] [SPEAKER_00] The Gold Rush jewelry shop. Like it's just I mean, and again, and all the counter surveillance he was running, like almost from the jump to like he just knew he was being watched by everybody and had, you know, just got the same spy shit that they that the FBI was using on him to just watch the FBI back. It's so like I mean, one thing when I watch, you know, these movies is I just I start to just feel really tired on their behalf.

[02:21:59] [SPEAKER_00] I'm like, this is no way to live. So exhausting. So exhausting.

[02:22:02] [SPEAKER_02] Up all night every fucking night. You feel the opposite way. You feel like I could do this. I should do this. I just need to keep Pesci away. Just the mob. I just I wouldn't I would enlist the mob to help me.

[02:22:11] [SPEAKER_05] Yeah.

[02:22:11] [SPEAKER_02] No, it's just funny that it's like so complicated. But the mob part is simple in a way where they're like, right. And in return, you'll skim some money off and we get it. And that's that. And then like when they learn that somewhat where it's like, yeah, and like some of the skim gets skimmed. They're like, this is an outrage. Yeah. Like you guys are stealing money. Some of the skim gets skimmed. You're shocked that other like some of the money falls out of the bag as it's being brought to Chicago.

[02:22:40] [SPEAKER_02] And they're like, oh, what the fuck? We need to kill everyone over this. I just I mean. More hubris. More hubris. Yes. I guess there's more hubris.

[02:22:49] [SPEAKER_00] The house always wins.

[02:22:51] [SPEAKER_02] Right. Not when I go, though. Thank you, Ocean.

[02:22:56] [SPEAKER_03] I do. I do. I do think there is like the important note of otherness in this, too, though, that gets lost with it being De Niro, which is like this is a movie about being of of one group and trying to step out into a different space. Yeah. Yeah. Like there is a turf war here between like the cowboys and the mob and a Jew steps in the middle and is like, right. But what if I just do it better?

[02:23:19] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Yeah. What if this could be, you know, a meritocracy on skill and knowing how to do a good job instead of just like beating people over the head when you don't like what they do?

[02:23:29] [SPEAKER_03] And it works as long as he's not pissing anyone off.

[02:23:31] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[02:23:32] [SPEAKER_03] But the moment he steps on the wrong toe, it's like, well, actually, you never belonged here anyway. Know your place.

[02:23:38] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. I mean, it's interesting because like in the voiceover narration, he clearly understands that aspect of Vegas. Like and Ginger also represents this in a way of like the soft power of Vegas of just the people skills and, you know, remembering. And having. Yes. Right. Slipping everybody a hundred every time you see him, like just keeping everybody happy and.

[02:24:01] [SPEAKER_03] Greasing those palms.

[02:24:02] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Greasing the palms. And yet he still doesn't at the most critical moment, he doesn't abide by that. That kind of cardinal rule of Vegas.

[02:24:12] [SPEAKER_02] Right. No, he doesn't. He's too, you know, whatever. Bad at person to person stuff, I guess is the way to put it. I could say this more flippantly and it would. But yes, he just. He doesn't relate to people. Great. He relates to numbers. Great. That's Ace's problem. And Nikki has this problem where he's a violent sort of sociopath. So he's got that. But, you know, he'll climb in the film.

[02:24:40] [SPEAKER_00] I think there is supposed to be some sort of magnetism, though, to Nikki. Like, I think that there's like. I think, you know, I think they mentioned that when movie stars or something would come to Vegas, they'd want to hang out with Nikki because he owned a restaurant and he was sort of what everybody had in their mind. Their imagination of a Vegas gangster was this guy. And it's like you could go hang out with him at, you know, a club or whatever for the night and tell it. Tell the story to all your friends back in L.A.

[02:25:06] [SPEAKER_00] And I think that dichotomy is another thing that I think because of casting isn't as clear, but is a really interesting. It's like, you know, it's just such a ready made kind of these these mythic almost figures that represent these two sides of doing business in this time in Vegas.

[02:25:22] [SPEAKER_03] Counterpoint, though. So is that not sort of the magic of Pesci? Like, you know, Krumholtz was saying like Pesci is the perfect example of this guy shouldn't be a movie star. And yet audiences keep going like, I don't know, there's something there.

[02:25:35] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. No, I don't think that he's not magnetic. I think it's just like to me, like De Niro is just this, you know, 100 pound gorilla. And it's like, you know, like who you're telling me they want to hang out with Pesci more than they want to hang out with. De Niro is too cool. Yeah, he's so cool. But I mean, but I understand that as a phenomenon. Like he is. Nikki is the more colorful character. You would feel like you could go up and talk to Nikki, even if you were kind of afraid and you were taking your life in your hands by doing so. Whereas I don't know if people necessarily felt like they could just walk up and start

[02:26:04] [SPEAKER_00] chit chatting with with with Ace or with Frank Rosenthal.

[02:26:08] [SPEAKER_03] I don't know if it extends to wardrobe, but I assume it must. But do you guys know that De Niro has a clause in his contract that he gets to keep any prop he touches for the archives? Is that true?

[02:26:20] [SPEAKER_02] I'm not sure if that existed like then.

[02:26:23] [SPEAKER_03] I don't know when it started. Because then he'd be rolling in it. I was going to say, if he got to keep all the rings and watches from this movie. Because they rotate. They're different in basically every scene.

[02:26:34] [SPEAKER_02] Right. Yeah. There's a famous thing of like, I think it's in Goodfellas though, where he was like, I don't like the fake money. I want real money that doesn't feel as good. And so the prop guy had to give him like five grand. Oh my God. So like fucking anyway. He's particular. You know, Ginger starts to get a little unpredictable, starts stealing money. She kidnaps their child to go hang out with Lester. Well, the child is hanging out with essentially a pedophile or whatever we want to be called.

[02:27:03] [SPEAKER_02] A pedophile, drug dealing, hustler, pamp. The relationship, the James Woods relationship. I get it, but it's just so hard to keep seeing her go back to him. Oh, it's brutal. Yeah, it's brutal. But right. I mean, it's, and it's, and again, we met her in the middle. Yes. But we can infer kind of everything by his inescapable. Yeah. That she's been groomed and programmed. Yeah. But it's such a bummer.

[02:27:28] [SPEAKER_03] The moment of her doing coke in front of the daughter and saying, honey, this is bad. Don't do this.

[02:27:33] [SPEAKER_00] Still shocking, but also so funny. I'm sorry.

[02:27:36] [SPEAKER_03] But that's the kind of thing that like Stone just is going to have no compunction about playing.

[02:27:40] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Yeah.

[02:27:41] [SPEAKER_03] Do you want to read your outfit list or did you do this more just so you could start searching for?

[02:27:47] [SPEAKER_00] I started writing them down and then I didn't, I didn't get through the skim through again, but I just, I kind of.

[02:27:53] [SPEAKER_03] Call out some, some highlights.

[02:27:55] [SPEAKER_00] One thing for sure is the two piece Paco Rabanne baby blue skirt suit, like a mini skirt and jacket. I think it's when they go to the bank together.

[02:28:05] [SPEAKER_03] When they fill up the safe deposit box.

[02:28:07] [SPEAKER_00] It's still super, like it's, it's funny, like her early looks and it's still kind of feel like the remnants of mod 60s.

[02:28:15] [SPEAKER_03] I was going to say almost like Jackie O. Yeah. Yeah.

[02:28:18] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. A little bit. It's like, it's like the kind of curdled 70s version of Jackie O, like a little more garish. And, um, but yeah. And then, and I mean her first outfit that he's, you know, sees her in like all, all the sequined dresses and, and, and all of that is so, yeah, it feels like this sort of more. The, the Rat Pack version of, of Vegas. Like it's slightly more genteel than what was to come.

[02:28:41] [SPEAKER_02] Um, yeah, it's a little classier. I mean, whereas the costume designer said right by the seventies, the whole thing was like space age fabrics are the best, right? We need to be wearing the least, uh, you know, the most synthetic shit at all times. Yeah. And so that sort of dominates the, the clothes at a certain point.

[02:28:59] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, the furs are also ridiculous. Yeah. Yeah. Chilla. That's the only one that really calls to me. It looks so nice when she puts it on. I've never been a big fur gal myself, but, uh, but that looks really, really nice. But then when she's like kind of in these abominable snowman type, uh, fur coats later on, it's, it's.

[02:29:17] [SPEAKER_03] She becomes a snow bunny.

[02:29:19] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Just like the, you know, the tearing across your own lawn in that coat, like having a screaming fight with your husband. Like, I don't know. There's something about that scene near the end and that coat specifically where I'm just like, I don't know why. Cause it's not like I'm at risk of any of this happening to me, but I still have a, like, don't let this be you.

[02:29:40] [SPEAKER_03] Oh, a hundred percent. Yeah.

[02:29:42] [SPEAKER_00] It just feels like it's so burned in my brain. I was like, no matter, you know, things could get pretty crazy in a relationship. Don't be her. Like, don't do it.

[02:29:50] [SPEAKER_02] She, she makes some errors.

[02:29:52] [SPEAKER_00] She makes a few errors. She makes a few errors. I will, I'm not here to say that Ginger did nothing wrong. No, no. By any means.

[02:29:58] [SPEAKER_02] Ginger makes mistakes. But Ginger is like this, like wounded, sad creature when we meet her. And I think Stone is so good at communicating that while still being fabulous looking and still being crazy and still being so, you know, like electrifying in the scarier ways. But I think that's why it's such a good performance. And she's not an actress where I'm like, oh, Sharon Stone is appointment viewing for me. Like, I love everything. She's, you know, like I like Sharon Stone. I love cooking the dead. You like to get stoned.

[02:30:27] [SPEAKER_02] I like to get stoned. And I, you know, obviously like Basic Instinct never really one of my movies, but like electrifying performance. She's so great. I like it, but it's like, I think I've seen Basic Instinct like two or three times. Right. You know, it's not like, um, yeah, Sliver, Sliver's bad. Sliver's pretty bad. I've never seen Sliver. I'm seeing, I own the 4K. I own the like Vinegar Syndrome 4K with the great I'd say by Beatrice Lozheim.

[02:30:49] [SPEAKER_01] You own a Vinegar Syndrome of Sliver.

[02:30:50] [SPEAKER_02] Of course I do. They, they, they, uh, I enjoy Sphere very much. I'm a hearty Sphere defender. Um, yeah, it's, it's, yeah, you know what? You look at her career and it's so short. Yes, it really is. Like, you know, because like Sphere is 98 and then it's like Catwoman 04.

[02:31:08] [SPEAKER_03] Yes.

[02:31:08] [SPEAKER_02] And obviously she had like.

[02:31:09] [SPEAKER_03] And Catwoman's like a comeback role after several years away. Yeah, that's, um. On paper.

[02:31:15] [SPEAKER_02] I've both come back in place. Yeah. No, I know. Yeah. For the listener. Because the, the plot is she's an evil makeup woman.

[02:31:20] [SPEAKER_03] Well, she creates a skin cream that makes her skin. Skin diamond hard. Diamond hard. Yes. Right. I would see that one.

[02:31:27] [SPEAKER_02] It's just so funny that they were like, Catwoman's a girl, right? Should the villain be like a fashion lady or something? Cosmetics or some shit. Like girl. It's like. Girl fighting.

[02:31:36] [SPEAKER_00] What's a scary girl thing? Skin care. A movie. Neither written nor directed by women.

[02:31:43] [SPEAKER_02] Teresa Rebeck has a credit on Catwoman. Really? Which really amuses me. It's a story credit. Yes. And that it feels like something where Teresa Rebeck, who is obviously a celebrated playwright, but also, you know, she worked on Law and Order and she, then she wrote and created Smash and was fired from that one or pushed aside or whatever. Like she probably had a different take is my guess with Teresa Rebeck. I'm not sure. Yes. Broken Flowers. I really like her in. She's really good in that. Sort of a forgotten movie, but a pretty good movie. But yeah, I mean, like.

[02:32:09] [SPEAKER_00] I really want to read her memoir. The Beauty of Living Twice. Yeah. It's been on my list for a while, but.

[02:32:16] [SPEAKER_03] No, she'll show up and stuff briefly and be really good, but it feels like she, the actual proper comeback eludes her.

[02:32:23] [SPEAKER_02] Right. Like everyone respects Sharon Stone, you know, like, or whatever you like. But yes, she never quite had the kind of like Demi Moore in the substance type. Like, hey, wow, you're back.

[02:32:34] [SPEAKER_00] You know, it's gonna, it has to happen. I think that there's a, I think maybe more so than Demi Moore, she had a reputation for being a pain in the ass on set, which who among us, or I should say who among them as in like male stars. Right.

[02:32:47] [SPEAKER_02] She went producer mode. Yeah. And because she was a woman, it was like, can you believe it? She has like opinions on how to do the movie.

[02:32:53] [SPEAKER_00] It's a classic that thing. It's like she flew too close to the sun, even though, you know, she's just doing her job and trying to get a buck. But I'm sure she was, I'm sure she was a pain in the ass on set.

[02:33:04] [SPEAKER_02] I think also like had to be. Yeah. But I think Sphere is the classic where it's like her and Dustin Hoffman are both maybe at their worst. Yeah. It's a movie where like, you really just have to sit down and remember it's about the Sphere. It's not about me. It's not about you. It's not about money. It's not about ego. The Sphere. The Sphere rules all. We must obey the communications of the Sphere. Sam Jack is the ultimate, like, just do the work. I think Samuel L. Jackson was probably a little bit more like my line is I'm afraid of the Sphere. I'll say it. I understand my responsibility.

[02:33:35] [SPEAKER_02] Great movie. Great book. Um, yes. Casino. Yeah. So then, you know, the House of the Rising Sun, it just it's all it's all over. I don't I mean, like, are we forgetting anything here? I mean, the confrontation in the front yard where she's just completely melting down.

[02:33:53] [SPEAKER_00] Well, I mean, before the the and Ace has her stuff that starts to fall apart with with with Ginger is also like her going to to Nikki for protection and like eventually plotting to kill him. Right. Uh, which, you know, again, not what I would do.

[02:34:06] [SPEAKER_02] I wouldn't do the phone call of like, let's kill him while he's there. While he's there. Yeah. I don't know if I would do that phone call. Would you? I wouldn't. There's a lot of things in this film I wouldn't do. I also wouldn't plot to kill a mobster generally.

[02:34:19] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. No. Bad idea. This whole movie for me is just three hours of I would choose to take a nap.

[02:34:25] Yeah.

[02:34:26] [SPEAKER_03] Instead of doing that.

[02:34:27] [SPEAKER_00] What if we slept?

[02:34:28] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. Um.

[02:34:29] [SPEAKER_00] Well, especially at the end, like when when Nikki's on till and they just start like going ham and not sleeping and just being up all night doing coke and like, you know, gunning down policemen and like for no reason. It's like take a nap.

[02:34:41] [SPEAKER_03] She's just looking for a sponsor.

[02:34:43] [SPEAKER_02] And those cops who shoot that guy thought he had a gun because he had a big hero sandwich. Okay. And it was shiny.

[02:34:52] Uh.

[02:34:53] [SPEAKER_02] It is crazy that like the big set piece for her at the end is she's just trying to get back in the house because she wants the safe deposit keys so she can get the money. And then it's like it's a long extended sequence. It's so wrenching. The daughter's in the neighbor's house watching through the door. Right. You know, like she gets in there. She gets the money. And then he's like, yeah. And then, you know, she blew it on drugs. And died. Yeah. Like, you know, that's it. That is the tragic thing.

[02:35:16] [SPEAKER_03] She got a bad dose.

[02:35:17] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. She got a whatever. But she's she's an addict. And she's like hanging out with worse and worse people. No plan. No. It's she's been saying I got to get my jewelry. She keeps coming back to that. She gets it. And it leads to her demise.

[02:35:32] [SPEAKER_03] But I think how does Ace Warden? He calls it a hot dose or something like that. There's a implication that it might have been a fixed thing.

[02:35:40] [SPEAKER_00] It's like hanging out with Hell's Angels or something. Like, it's just like. Right.

[02:35:44] [SPEAKER_03] And when you read about the real Jerry, Jerry, there was a lot of mystery surrounding her death of whether it was just an accident or whether it was the walls closing in on everybody. Yeah.

[02:35:57] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. But I think I mean, yeah, the tragedy of hers that she was taught so young that what her power and value was. And like we meet her at sort of the zenith of that. Her ability to use her charm and her looks to like have beneficial relationships with people without having to either commit to anybody or have any sort of emotional intimacy with anybody, but also like not receive any herself. Yeah.

[02:36:26] [SPEAKER_00] Her metabolism for like having any kind of healthy emotional life is just fucked from the start. It's like there's no universe in which she's able to like accept, you know, even if it was somebody less controlling than Ace, it's like you could give her the best possible circumstances and she'd probably still reject them.

[02:36:43] [SPEAKER_03] It is the thing that's interesting about this movie presenting them to us as fully formed is that they just become almost like mythic cautionary tales. Yeah. Yes.

[02:36:54] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Then, yes, Nikki gets beaten to death in front of his brother. His brother gets murdered in front of him, which makes it worse.

[02:37:01] [SPEAKER_03] Even though his brother's like not a character we're particularly like familiar with. And to be clear, they don't beat him to death. They beat him. Yeah, they beat him near death. He's still breathing and then bury him alive.

[02:37:09] [SPEAKER_02] Well, we should shout out the brother does spit into a sandwich and then give it to a cop, which I think is pretty funny. I think that's a good thing. You like that. You would do that.

[02:37:18] [SPEAKER_00] We should keep a running list of the things we would and wouldn't do from Casino.

[02:37:22] [SPEAKER_02] There's just, you know, I think something like vaguely audacious. That is the brutal end of the movie, right?

[02:37:30] [SPEAKER_00] Well, it's like the whole like Order 66 ass ending of, yeah.

[02:37:36] [SPEAKER_02] It's all over, right. Exactly.

[02:37:38] [SPEAKER_03] Luminara and Julie gets taken down.

[02:37:40] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. But like the AC is just like, but I still provide a service. So here I am. I've got my big ass glasses. Those glasses are huge. They're big. They're big. They're big glasses. They get bigger as he gets more extravagant. The glasses are getting bigger and bigger until they're like sticking out like the final shot. Like way beyond his head. Oh. But like for Marty to just sort of send you out on this kind of like, it's like not even a big bummer note. It's like a little bummer note. Yeah. Just kind of like, yeah. What's the last line?

[02:38:10] [SPEAKER_02] I mean, he's like, it used to be like Disneyland. I don't know. I think it's literally like, and that's that. Yeah. Right.

[02:38:14] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. That is the last line.

[02:38:16] [SPEAKER_02] And they just fucking roll the credits. Um, yeah.

[02:38:19] [SPEAKER_00] But yeah, you know, that whole montage at the end, like they hold on the, you know, the golden lion in front of MGM for a really long time. And like, it's just wordless. And it's just like this sort of robotic, futuristic looking like idol in a way, like in front of this, you know, spotless green edifice. And it's just like, there's no soul here. And you're kind of left to just look at that for a while and think about it.

[02:38:43] [SPEAKER_03] Electronic eyes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and that's, that is the final line. And what, and subprime loans have now replaced them.

[02:38:50] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. He's like, how do they build New Vegas with fucking junk bonds? Now it's like Disney. And he's doing the whole sort of like, is it any better thing? But it's not even in some triumphant way. He's just like, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. I'll just sit here. Gambling. Look at my books. Yeah. Like, I like Boston. Yeah. Points and rebounds. Uh, this film opened November time. I have one last thing I wanted to say about the movie.

[02:39:16] [SPEAKER_02] There is the news reports talking about ACE and reminded me of our show girls episode. Chip Smith. Of Chip Smith. It feels like a very Chip Smith. Yes. Ian. And that it's like, why is this local news report happening right now? I'm sure Chip Smith. Hey man, being a local news reporter in Vegas, especially in the 70s, that must've been a pretty wild job. Yeah. I'm sure.

[02:39:41] [SPEAKER_03] Can I call out two little moments I love? Yeah, of course. Uh, I, it's towards the end and one of the things are starting to spiral, uh, when, uh, Pesci is paranoid about ACE becoming aware and a guy walks by and Pesci interrupts himself to go, who the fuck is that guy? And it genuinely feels like it's a background actor. Yeah. Yeah. Or, or, or a background actor who walked at the wrong time. Right. Or a civilian who walked through the frame. Yeah.

[02:40:09] [SPEAKER_03] And he's so present as an actor that he was just like, this guy would call that out.

[02:40:14] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. That's really funny.

[02:40:15] [SPEAKER_03] It's not him like breaking character. It's actually the more honest thing to not ignore the guy. Um, my favorite rhythm scene in this movie, just in terms of like classic Scorsese rhythm is weirdly not any of the mob scenes, but is the first reporter who goes and speaks to ACE who's like, so you're the boss.

[02:40:35] [SPEAKER_00] Uh-huh.

[02:40:35] [SPEAKER_03] And he's like, no, uh, green's the boss. And he's like, but when green's gone, he goes, I run things. Yeah. And he keeps getting him until you hard cut to.

[02:40:44] [SPEAKER_01] The headline.

[02:40:45] [SPEAKER_03] When, when green is gone, I am, I guess, functionally the boss. I guess I'm the boss. Headline. I guess I'm the boss.

[02:40:52] [SPEAKER_02] That's good. Uh, this film opened November 22nd, 1995, 1600 theaters, the highest, uh, the widest opening Scorsese had ever received. Wow. It opens to $9 million. So fifth place at the box office, somewhat disappointing, but it holds pretty well made $42 million, 116 worldwide. So broke even maybe a little over. It was nominated for one Oscar.

[02:41:20] [SPEAKER_02] Uh, it's certainly like Goodfellas had broken through more, but I do feel like it is the peak era of Marty being like, I guess they just don't really like what I do. Yes. You know, like I know I'm celebrated. I get to make big movies, but I'm not really Oscar. There's, there's a ceiling to it. Yeah. Yes. Uh, I get under people's skin. I make movies about irredeemable people. Blah. Ebert loved it. Maslin. He loves Marty. Maslin and the times liked it. Todd McCarthy liked it.

[02:41:49] [SPEAKER_02] Rosenbaum, uh, didn't like it. Um, Scorsese, his final quote here. Speaks to some people. Joe Pesci was playing golf and a couple of older men were on the same course. Afterwards, they all changed in their street clothes and it turns out they're monseniors. You know? Okay. You know? These men of the cloth. And they go to Joe and they say, we really like your work. Joe figures that he's, they're going to say like, we like Home Alone or whatever. And they're like, we were like Casino.

[02:42:16] [SPEAKER_01] Priests famously love Home Alone.

[02:42:17] [SPEAKER_02] They love Home Alone. Well, how often are they stuck Home Alone? They were late. They say, we were like Casino. We really felt bad for how you died in the movie. We really felt for you in that sequence. And Joe's like, Joe then like tells Marty the story and is like, that's what you were going for. Right. And Marty's like, yeah, I wanted you to wonder if he deserved his fate. Like even if he's like a nasty piece of shit. Anyway, just funny. Uh, so this film opens number five, Griffin. Uh, November 21st. 24th, 1995. I'm pretty sure we've done this box office before, but cause you wouldn't, what's number one?

[02:42:47] [SPEAKER_02] Number one is Toy Story. Toy Story.

[02:42:48] [SPEAKER_03] Opening this week.

[02:42:49] [SPEAKER_00] It's the first week. Wow. Yeah. So, so this was the counter programming for Toy Story.

[02:42:56] [SPEAKER_03] They were like, Rickles fans will show up one way or another. Hang in the box office. Um, does that mean that Heat is already out or does Heat come out next weekend? Heat is Christmas. Heat is Christmas. Yeah. I just remember that Heat was still also being beaten by Toy Story, but Toy Story is the number one movie of the year. It runs the table for the rest of the box office season.

[02:43:15] [SPEAKER_02] Number two of the box office is an action film that we've covered on our Patreon. It's an action film. Came out last week. It's a big hit. It's a big hit. It's in a franchise of films. Yes.

[02:43:25] [SPEAKER_03] It's, and it's a pure action franchise. You would say.

[02:43:28] [SPEAKER_02] I would certainly say it is the action franchise of all cinema.

[02:43:32] [SPEAKER_03] Uh, it's not. It's, it's.

[02:43:35] No.

[02:43:36] [SPEAKER_03] What number is it in the franchise? It's 16 or whatever. It's 16. So it's a Bond. Yeah.

[02:43:41] [SPEAKER_02] I don't know what number it is.

[02:43:42] [SPEAKER_03] Is it, uh, Goldeneye?

[02:43:44] [SPEAKER_02] Goldeneye. Goldeneye. Goldeneye. It is the 17th. Wow. It was close. I was close. That was good. The 17th James Bond film. That was impressive. Uh, Goldeneye. Great movie. And soon we'll have a new James Bond. Yes. I predict an English actor or British of some sort.

[02:43:59] [SPEAKER_03] Maybe Irish. Do you think James Bond will be announced by the time this episode comes out?

[02:44:04] [SPEAKER_02] It does seem like it's brewing to the point of.

[02:44:07] [SPEAKER_03] Would you like to make a final prediction on this table?

[02:44:09] [SPEAKER_02] I think it's going to be Jack Laudan. I'll go with the obvious thing right now.

[02:44:11] [SPEAKER_03] Okay. So I'm going to take the weirdo pick and I'm going to pick that guy that they say is, uh, on the short list who I've never heard of. Yeah.

[02:44:17] [SPEAKER_02] I mean, that's often a good way to go.

[02:44:19] [SPEAKER_03] Cause you're like, how do you make the short list? Yes. What's his name? Britain or something? I don't know. Great name. His name is Great Britain. Number three at the box office is a comedy sequel. It's a comedy sequel. It's not Father of the Bride part two. No. Am I close?

[02:44:34] [SPEAKER_02] You're close in that it's a similarly like, let's make a sequel fast. Uh. But not close otherwise. Let's make a sequel fast. I would say, I would, I would. Is it, is it, uh, When Nature Calls? It is Ace Ventura, When Nature Calls. Which came out, I think, like 18 months after the first Ace Ventura.

[02:44:51] [SPEAKER_03] I think the first Ace Ventura is January 94, February. And this is November. Yeah. Impressive. It's impressive.

[02:44:58] [SPEAKER_02] And it's an impressive film, of course.

[02:45:00] [SPEAKER_03] I like that film quite a bit. I haven't seen it. I think that film, dare I say it, is well directed.

[02:45:07] [SPEAKER_02] It's Oda Kirk, right? It's Oda Kirk. Yeah. Take it over from Shady.

[02:45:09] [SPEAKER_03] I've always been a fan of the cinema to Oda Kirk.

[02:45:11] [SPEAKER_02] Thumbs. The Thumbs. Um. Ace Ventura, When Nature Calls. Any, uh, any, uh, take on Ace Ventura from you, Emily Ishida? Mother of Blankies. I've never seen either of them. Wow. You've never even seen the first Ace Ventura? No. I was not allowed to. Are you aware that he says, do not go in there? Yes.

[02:45:28] [SPEAKER_00] Uh, yeah. Yeah. It's about, um, it's about like a scary dog. It's a shark. Yes.

[02:45:36] [SPEAKER_03] We all know that humans talk out of their mouths, but Ace Ventura dares to ask, what if sometimes I talked out of my butt? His derriere, if you will.

[02:45:44] [SPEAKER_00] Uh. Yeah. No, it passed me by, and by which I mean I wasn't allowed to see it as a child.

[02:45:48] [SPEAKER_02] I think I've said it, but we were supposed to see Blank Check. Mm-hmm. The theater was sold out. My dad was like, eh, let's pivot to this thing. I think it was kind of like, that's why. I'm not sure, because it was a PG-13 movie. Yeah.

[02:46:00] [SPEAKER_05] Mm-hmm.

[02:46:00] [SPEAKER_02] You know, it was more risque. Yeah. And I was 94. I was eight. Yeah. And, but he was like, I think it was seven. I hadn't even turned eight. Wow. But he was like, eh, you know, Jim Carrey, whatever. And I mean, it was just, I, I think probably the happiest I've ever been in my life. I love it. I just, I really, I remember it was me and my dad and George Jetta. Shout out to you, George, wherever you are, uh, out there in the big, this big blue marble we call Earth. And we were just like, this, this isn't legal. What this man is doing. This is the funniest thing I have ever seen.

[02:46:29] [SPEAKER_03] It's how I felt watching Austin for the first time. Austin? Powers? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[02:46:36] [SPEAKER_00] Um, number four. That one, that one hit bigger for me. Yeah. That one's one hit. Yeah.

[02:46:40] [SPEAKER_02] It's pretty shagadelic, my film, if you think about it. Number four at the box office is, uh, an action comedy film. Okay. It's a buddy comedy. Buddy comedy is 95. A story of two buddies who had already been buddies in another movie. Oh, I love this. Yes. Okay. And they're just kind of being ported over to this one. Is it Money Train? It is Money Train. It's Money Train. With Wesley and Woody. Wesley and Woody. Get on the fast track. Mm-hmm. That was the tagline. Their third film together.

[02:47:05] [SPEAKER_03] Wow. Yes. What's the, what's the other one? Uh, I was about to call it Lady Bugs, but it's not called that. It's called Wildcats. The one where Goldie Hawn. Oh, yes. Manages a football team.

[02:47:13] [SPEAKER_02] Never seen that.

[02:47:14] [SPEAKER_03] Both of them are in that. White man can't jump.

[02:47:17] [SPEAKER_02] Um, but yeah. Like, insanely a movie I've never seen given that it revolves around the subway. And Money. Two of your favorite things. And I love Wesley. Uh-huh. And I love Woody. Yeah. Mm-hmm. But people don't like it that much. J-Lo. It's supposed to be quite bad. But this is one of those movies where I'll throw it on now, probably, and be like, ah, crisp mise-en-scene.

[02:47:36] [SPEAKER_00] Beautifully shot. Who directed this?

[02:47:38] [SPEAKER_02] Otakirk? Uh, Joseph Rudin. Okay. Rubin. Sorry. The director of Sleeping with the Enemy. Mm-hmm. Seen that? Yeah. And The Good Son? Sure. You know, kind of the guy. Stepfather. Good movie. You know, solid trash. Do you like Money Train? I've never seen it. You like Wesley or Woody? I love them both. J-Lo? Yeah. J-Lo. Young J-Lo.

[02:47:56] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, yeah. Jenny from the block? Jenny, yeah. From the block?

[02:48:00] [SPEAKER_02] Chris Cooper.

[02:48:01] [SPEAKER_03] I'm going to guess playing a villain. Nice mentor. I don't think so.

[02:48:05] [SPEAKER_02] Uh, number five is Casino. Number six is The American President, which has only been out for a couple weeks. Number seven is It Takes Two. I'm assuming that's with the Olsen twins, right? And Gutenberg and Kierstie Alley.

[02:48:17] [SPEAKER_00] I believe I saw that in theaters. Mm-hmm.

[02:48:19] [SPEAKER_02] I don't think I did. Right. They're under the wedding table. Yes. Going like this. Mm-hmm.

[02:48:26] [SPEAKER_03] It takes both of them. To do what? Get them married. Right. Right.

[02:48:31] [SPEAKER_02] I think it's not that the parents are divorced and that he's getting married, but they're going to get the parent trap. It's a parent trap type situation. But it's close to the parent trap. Yeah.

[02:48:38] [SPEAKER_03] It's like a reverse parent trap, I feel like. I think they're both supposed to marry other people, maybe?

[02:48:42] [SPEAKER_02] I think this tagline, by the way, is over-explaining. Okay. Explain it to me. When it comes to making the perfect match, two heads are better than one, especially if they look exactly alike. We don't need...

[02:48:53] [SPEAKER_04] We can see their faces.

[02:48:55] [SPEAKER_02] You don't need to tell me they're twins.

[02:48:57] [SPEAKER_03] The film focuses on two lookalike girls who meet by chance in a summer camp.

[02:49:02] [SPEAKER_02] That's fucking parent trap. It's just parent trap. I have seen this film. It's ringing about. One is an orphan.

[02:49:06] [SPEAKER_03] The other is a wealthy heiress. They decide to act as matchmakers.

[02:49:10] [SPEAKER_02] But how do they explain that they look alike?

[02:49:12] [SPEAKER_03] I don't fucking know. Okay. Well, I guess because one of them is an orphan. There must be a twist. They do some switcheroo shit. Yeah. Do you think there's a twist? I think there has to be a twist. Yeah. So it's a social worker gets paired up with a wealthy widower who owns the camp.

[02:49:26] [SPEAKER_02] Great. Number eight of the box office is Get Shorty. Wonderful movie. You could have called It Takes Two that. Yeah. And you could have called Casino Get Shorty. It's true.

[02:49:38] [SPEAKER_03] Because they do get him.

[02:49:39] [SPEAKER_00] In the end. Takes three hours, but they do get him.

[02:49:43] [SPEAKER_03] Toy Story you could have called Get Shorty. Get Shorty could have been the title of most films at the top ten right now. A lot of short actors in Hollywood. Number nine. Get Shorty rules. New at the box. Great movie.

[02:49:51] [SPEAKER_02] Great L.A. satire. Hackman King in that movie.

[02:49:55] [SPEAKER_03] Unbelievable performance from Hackman.

[02:49:56] [SPEAKER_02] And Delroy Lindo is on fire. Farina. Unbelievable. The whole cast. The whole cast. Rene Russo never hotter, except for every other movie she's ever been.

[02:50:05] [SPEAKER_03] DeVito's monologue where he goes, that was the stem of the character.

[02:50:09] [SPEAKER_02] Russo hotness rankings for me. Like the first movie she was in tied with all the other ones.

[02:50:15] [SPEAKER_03] One for all of them. DeVito's got his monologue about how he plays the character where he says, that was the stem. I just had to wind him up and then I just let him go, man. I let him go. I think about it all the time. I probably misquoted it.

[02:50:29] [SPEAKER_02] Nick of Time. Number nine. Sure. Johnny Depp with a watch. It's the movie where Johnny Depp looks like Charlie Sheen on the poster. Sure. What?

[02:50:35] [SPEAKER_00] I don't know.

[02:50:36] [SPEAKER_02] It's a political thriller directed by John Badham that takes place, Emily, in real time. Whoa. Ticking clock. Christopher Walken. I've never seen it. I should check it out. Of Time. Number 10 at the box office is a movie I really like. Is his name Nick? No. That's the thing that sucks about that movie.

[02:50:52] [SPEAKER_03] Fuck, they fucked up. Seriously. His name is Gene. Jesus. It's the dumbest shit in the world. Why? It needs to be called Nick of Time. What the heck? It makes no sense.

[02:50:59] [SPEAKER_02] If it's called Nick of Time, then like Steven Seagal is in it or whatever, right? It needed to be called Nick of Time. Oh my God. Number 10 at the box office is the very good Jodie Foster directed film Home for the Holidays. Oh yeah, that's a good movie. Which I really like. Stack test. With a fantastic Robert Downey Jr. Yeah.

[02:51:16] [SPEAKER_03] At his messiest. What he describes as the most relaxed performance in the history of cinema aided by heroin.

[02:51:21] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah, the little alley-oop there from heroin. So that's the box office. It's an interesting box office. It is. It's a lot of hits. Yeah. It's not one of those things where you're like, you know, goddamn like.

[02:51:33] [SPEAKER_03] Well, American cinema is being redefined right up there at number one. So I don't know what you're fucking complaining about. Are you a Toy Story girl?

[02:51:40] [SPEAKER_00] I mean.

[02:51:41] [SPEAKER_02] You don't like Pixar.

[02:51:41] [SPEAKER_03] I know very much.

[02:51:43] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. I mean, I do like some Pixar. I, you know, I saw Toy Story and theaters and it opened the weekend just like every other child that year. Um, I don't know. It hasn't been my thing historically. At times I've been quite, I would say, irritated by it. But I know I'm like in a church right now and I shan't speak ill. No, it's fine. What are you talking about? I should talk to you.

[02:52:04] [SPEAKER_03] Just to save space as I check my lily pads. I know. What is your favorite Pixar movie? Really good question. Right?

[02:52:14] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, I, I, I really liked the Incredibles a lot for a long time. I don't know how much, how well that has aged.

[02:52:21] [SPEAKER_03] I've seen you. For me. Yes.

[02:52:22] [SPEAKER_00] Over time. Uh.

[02:52:24] [SPEAKER_03] But at the time that was your favorite.

[02:52:26] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. I think that kind of took the spot when that one came out. I mean, I hadn't been like what I wasn't like what it wasn't cars. What was like the third? A bug's life. No, I don't. Yeah. I, there is another one I'm forgetting right now that's bugging me that I do.

[02:52:40] [SPEAKER_03] A good dinosaur.

[02:52:41] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. You love the good dinosaur. Yeah. Yeah.

[02:52:44] [SPEAKER_03] Elemental. You like when fire and water hold hands.

[02:52:47] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Oh my God.

[02:52:48] [SPEAKER_03] This episode's three hours long.

[02:52:50] [SPEAKER_00] We just can't help ourselves. Who would ever think that they would be able to hold hands?

[02:52:53] [SPEAKER_03] Well, and wait until they have to meet the in-laws. I guess.

[02:52:57] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. That's.

[02:52:57] [SPEAKER_03] What are we talking about? Power of animation. Oh God.

[02:53:00] [SPEAKER_02] David. I mean, what did you expect? Nothing. It's an episode. Mama's here. We're going to go long. Mama's here. I'm not even mad and it hasn't even felt like a slug. I just looked up and I was like, oh, wow. Another casual three for us. Yeah. It's a dirty three.

[02:53:12] [SPEAKER_00] It's got to at least be the length of the movie. I think.

[02:53:16] [SPEAKER_02] You know what? This is an argument I see on the Reddit sometime. I reject it forcefully. I definitely. I can't believe New York, New York wasn't as long as the movie. And I'm like, that's an issue everyone has with the movie. This is true. That it's too long.

[02:53:29] [SPEAKER_03] If you want. Why do you need us to match it? If you want that episode to be as long as the movie, here's what you should do. You should take every conversational point we make and repeat it six times in a row. You can do this in the edit.

[02:53:41] [SPEAKER_02] And we're all just like yelling at each other. Like.

[02:53:44] [SPEAKER_03] Just up the volume till it crackles. Well, we had actually the best part of the episode taken out. What was that? New York, New York. Oh, you're joking. Yes. In three years, we'll release the director's cut of that episode. That has 15 minutes. Lane and I did a duet.

[02:54:00] [SPEAKER_02] It rocked. Yeah. It was great. And it was like, you guys just improvised the song. It was perfect.

[02:54:05] [SPEAKER_03] It turns out David has the voice of an angel that whenever he's doing like dot, dot, da, da, da, da. That's like him being funny. But when he really wants to sing and he connects to the lyrics, it's stunning. So in two years, you can hear those 15 minutes.

[02:54:18] [SPEAKER_00] And you had to take him out because of rights, right? Oh, yeah. Totally. No, it's because Lynn and I are going to take it to Broadway. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[02:54:25] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. Emily, thank you for being here. Wow.

[02:54:29] [SPEAKER_00] Thank you for having me.

[02:54:30] [SPEAKER_03] It had been too long, but we got you twice in one year.

[02:54:33] [SPEAKER_00] I know. I'm so thrilled to have gotten in a Marty. Like I said, I've been on a journey with him as a viewer. And I feel like I have, you know, I don't know. I came the long way. Everybody else just knew like instantly they loved him so much. And I had to really work my way there. But it's like been so rewarding, I think, to become, you know, a big fan of his. He's good at making pictures. Also, like I should say, I'm sure you guys have talked a ton about Mr. Scorsese over the course of this season. But that was like that really knocked me backwards.

[02:55:02] [SPEAKER_00] It's so good. It's so good. It really made me mad. Like in a satisfying way. Like, you know, in that kind of professional jealousy. Yeah, I wish I could have done something. Yeah. Totally. It's just so. Yeah. Anyway.

[02:55:16] [SPEAKER_03] I wish I was this little guy.

[02:55:18] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. Yeah.

[02:55:19] [SPEAKER_03] Yeah. Anything you want to plug?

[02:55:21] [SPEAKER_00] Well. Well. Point break. Coming in 2027. I also will. I mean, it's going to still be a ways off. But Kennedy on Netflix. Yes. In May. Which I also wrote on.

[02:55:36] [SPEAKER_03] Which is about Jamie. Right. It's about the experiment. That was the working title.

[02:55:45] [SPEAKER_00] The experiment. Yeah. That's, you know, it's about a family that nobody ever talks about or ever has any opinions about. I'm excited for it. I'm very excited. And Shogun season two.

[02:55:58] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. One day?

[02:55:59] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. At some point. Yeah. We'll see.

[02:56:01] [SPEAKER_02] It takes a New York minute to make that one. It's a fancy show. A New York minute. Yeah. But that. And you guys will have already done the Refocus Film Festival by this point. Oh, yeah. Right? Yeah.

[02:56:14] [SPEAKER_00] When is this episode coming out?

[02:56:15] [SPEAKER_02] November 8th. Oh, yeah.

[02:56:17] [SPEAKER_00] Well, it just happened.

[02:56:18] [SPEAKER_02] Yes.

[02:56:18] [SPEAKER_03] Are you going to join us on stage?

[02:56:21] [SPEAKER_00] If you'll have me. Please. If this is an invitation. Yes. On here on air. On mic. Yeah. I'm happy to. Well, I'll just plug it for next year then. The Refocus Film Festival in Iowa City, Iowa. I am now on the board of advisors for it. So, yeah. We got them. We got Ben and Griff coming out two thirds.

[02:56:42] [SPEAKER_03] It's focused on adaptation. Yeah. And so I was asked by friend of the show, Rachel Yoder, what would you want to do? And my immediate answer. Obviously. Like, three beers in. But it was my immediate answer. I was like, well, obviously the most interesting adaptation in American cinema is the Garbage Pail Kids movie. And so that's what we're going to talk about.

[02:57:00] [SPEAKER_00] It's good to know that it was three beers in because I'm sure soberly you never would have thought to suggest such a film.

[02:57:08] [SPEAKER_02] It feels like if you're getting Griffin solo, if I'm not involved, that that's a Griffin area of expertise more than I.

[02:57:16] [SPEAKER_03] And I know Ben has fucked with the film as well. Right. Exactly. You have seen it before, perhaps not in a sober state.

[02:57:23] [SPEAKER_00] I think I was probably stone cold sober when I saw it. Okay. But I did have an intense, I remember having an intense feeling of rejection. My eyeballs didn't like it. And I got mad and I think I left the room.

[02:57:38] [SPEAKER_03] Oh, so you've never seen the ending? No. You've never seen Wendy Winston fart?

[02:57:42] [SPEAKER_00] I have seen Wendy Winston fart.

[02:57:44] [SPEAKER_03] They make that kind of the Chekhov's gun. His real big farts the end of the movie.

[02:57:47] [SPEAKER_00] Oh, okay. Yeah. Okay.

[02:57:49] [SPEAKER_03] Okay. Fascinating. So I can't wait for this. This is great.

[02:57:52] [SPEAKER_00] I'm eager, you know, I'm eager to revisit it. And, you know, I'm tougher now than I was then. I think I was probably like 18 or something.

[02:58:00] [SPEAKER_03] Well, it's a tough movie too. I think the movie might have challenged you at the time.

[02:58:04] [SPEAKER_00] I mean, it's really good that we're going to be discussing this, like, you know, refocus runs concurrently with the Iowa Book Fair. You know, people, you know, from the literary community, some very, you know, fancy people writing books.

[02:58:17] [SPEAKER_03] They'll be involved. Right.

[02:58:18] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. They'll be, they'll all be in attendance.

[02:58:20] [SPEAKER_03] I'm going to talk about my trading card movie.

[02:58:22] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[02:58:22] [SPEAKER_03] The most disgusting film ever made.

[02:58:24] [SPEAKER_00] It's really foul, I think.

[02:58:25] [SPEAKER_03] It's foul Phil. He's one of the characters. He's got stinky breath. He's a baby. I'm trying to see if there's a, oh, an Emily? Yeah. An Emily card? There must be. Yeah.

[02:58:36] [SPEAKER_02] Okay. I have here emptied Emily. What does she look like? I mean. One of those Russian-vesting dolls.

[02:58:43] [SPEAKER_03] That's fun. Hey, hey. But it's fun. Junk. Garbage. No. Guts. Oh, she's ironically not empty.

[02:58:50] [SPEAKER_00] I thought it was like, yeah, there was empty, like, soul-wise.

[02:58:53] [SPEAKER_03] I feel dead inside. Yeah. Thank you for being here. Thank you. Of course. It's always honor and a privilege. We love you. Thank you all for listening. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe. Tune in next week for... Kundun. Kundun. Which is the last one I haven't seen.

[02:59:12] [SPEAKER_04] I liked it. Fun. Yeah.

[02:59:14] [SPEAKER_03] I'm excited to see it.

[02:59:15] [SPEAKER_02] Over on Patreon, we've recently just put out our final episode in the Resident Evil commentary series. The Raccoon City. Welcome to Raccoon City. But in a few days. November 11th. Yes. We'll be releasing an episode about the Bob Dylan documentary. There are two documentaries. There's two documentaries. No Direction Home and Rolling Thunder Review. Correct.

[02:59:40] [SPEAKER_03] Which Sharon Stone is in. Oh, cool. Has a prominent role. I have not seen it yet. People love this movie. With the Rolling Thunder Review. Yeah.

[02:59:47] [SPEAKER_02] It's awesome. Yeah. With guest, and I'll say it now, and then if it doesn't work out, then we'll cut it. But James Austin Johnson. James Austin Johnson.

[02:59:56] [SPEAKER_03] So check that out. Yeah. King of the Dylan Impression. Patreon.com slash link check. Yes. Check all that stuff out. And what was that look, Ben? No. Did I say it in a weird way? No, I did. Okay. Well, I say everything in a weird way.

[03:00:12] [SPEAKER_02] We've been here. We do this for three hours.

[03:00:14] [SPEAKER_03] My brain is dying. And as always, I would simply rather take a nap than run a casino.

[03:00:27] [SPEAKER_02] Blank Check with Griffin and David is hosted by Griffin Newman and David Sims. Our executive producer is me, Ben Hosley. Our creative producer is Marie Barty Salinas.

[03:00:37] [SPEAKER_03] And our associate producer is AJ McKeon.

[03:00:40] [SPEAKER_02] This show is mixed and edited by AJ McKeon and Alan Smithy. Research by JJ Birch. Our theme song is by Lane Montgomery in The Great American Novel. With additional music by Alex Mitchell. Artwork by Joe Bowen, Ollie 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.

[03:01:06] [SPEAKER_02] Join our Patreon, Blank Check Special Features, for exclusive franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. Follow us on social at blankcheckpod. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, Checkbook on Substack.

[03:01:19] [SPEAKER_04] This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Production.