Dr. Strangelove... with Sean Fennessey

[00:00:00] Blank Check with Griffin and David, Blank Check with Griffin and David, don't know what to say or to expect, all you need to know is that the name of the show is Blank Check. Survival Kit Contents Check.

[00:00:23] In them you'll find one .45 caliber automatic, two boxes of ammunition, four days concentrated emergency rations, one drug issue containing antibiotics, morphine, vitamin pills, pep pills, sleeping pills, tranquilizer pills, one miniature combination Russian phrase book and Bible, $100 in rubles, $100 in gold, nine packs of chewing gum, one issue of prophylactics, three lipsticks, three pairs of nylon stockings, shoot a fella could have a pretty good podcast with all that stuff.

[00:00:53] Boy oh boy. I didn't know what you were gonna do, I didn't know if you were gonna do Strangelove or... I felt like some of them are so over quoted that I almost felt like I couldn't do them. That was good, I liked that.

[00:01:08] Doing Fighting in the War Room feels like we're stepping on our buddies at Fighting in the War Room the podcast. Mm-hmm, that's true. And then it's like, I was like, what? Sir, I have a plan, Mein Führer, I can podcast. Like that's not...

[00:01:20] I don't wanna fucking say Mein Führer at the top, I wanna wait 30 seconds before saying Mein Führer. I wanted you to say Mein Führer, I can podcast. Is Mein Führer, I can walk? Is that actually the last line?

[00:01:31] Does anyone say anything else after that? No, right? No, no. Then it's just it. Apart from the song, the song, right. It's a pretty good last line. I'll also say this, like I, for whatever reason, Battling Insomnia was watching Robin Hood last night, Disney Robin Hood. Okay.

[00:01:47] And the second I started doing that butchering, I was like, oh fuck, even though I watched Strange Love this morning, I'm having a hard time staying in the moderately more grounded Slim Pickens than Sheriff of Nottingham Slim Pickens. It's like, oh listen here, I'm gonna get Robin Hood.

[00:02:04] It's the last thing I do. The only thing Strange Love is missing is Roger Miller songs, I feel like. That really would have taken it over the top. A little whistle stop, you know, that would have been beautiful.

[00:02:13] Could you imagine if the Crazy Frog did like a remix of a Strange Love song? Wait, I'm sorry, what is that a reference to? You remember Crazy Frog? I remember Crazy Frog, sure. And Crazy Frog had like, beepity-ah-beep-a-dow-a-bow, right? Oh, that's right. Okay.

[00:02:32] It's a sped up version of one of the Roger Miller, Odelali songs and Robin Hood. Do you guys want to start over? Nope. Yeah, 100%. Oh no, we're gonna keep it going. That's right. It's perfect. Yeah, it's perfect. Wow. How else to talk about this movie?

[00:02:47] We're aiming to do the Doctor Strange Love podcast episode, something that is both so intelligent and savage in its razor sharp wit, but yet funny, just fucking gut busting. Like it's so serious, but so funny at the same time. I think we're nailing it. I think we are.

[00:03:06] Yeah. I want to put forward a thesis very early on in this episode. Mm-hmm. Is this one of those movies that just like absolutely ruined a lot of filmmakers? Okay, what do you mean?

[00:03:19] I do think a lot of people go off the deep end trying to make this movie in particular. A thing that like very few people have ever even got close to doing. What's a movie you're thinking of?

[00:03:29] Like what's an example of a whatever, a satire gone wrong I guess or whatever you're thinking of? Last 10 Years of Adam McKay. That's a good, I would say that's a good example. There you go.

[00:03:41] Yes, because you can always say like, oh, I'm doing the right, the light dark thing like Strange Love. Right. It's gonna be, it's gonna have a message. It's gonna be intelligent. It's gonna be researched, but also it's gonna be funny. And that last part's really hard.

[00:03:55] It's gonna be silly. Like we'll have some broad comedy in it, you know, we'll have comedic performances. It's not just like bone dry satire. That mix of tones.

[00:04:06] I mean, I'm gonna come up with some other ones as we continue talking, but I feel like the other ones are more maybe errant films in people's careers, but they tend to be some of their biggest bounces. Like 1941. Sure. Yes. Yes. Right.

[00:04:23] That's trying to mix light and dark. I don't know. What do you think? Guess, speak. I mean, it depends, right? Because it's all contextual, right? It's like in the 60s, it's a little bit easier to push this and be abrasive and impressive because there's no social media.

[00:04:35] There's no commentary universe. There's no podcasting. So the first person who created the first black comedy about nuclear warfare was always gonna be the victor. Right? And it just so happened to be maybe the smartest person who ever made a movie.

[00:04:51] And so when you put those two things together, I got out there in front. Right. Yeah. He kind of he shit all over the landscape for lack of a better phrase. But I think you're right, though, that McKay is this is probably his North Star, right?

[00:05:04] As a movie. This is like the number one thing that has been made that he is striving towards and just changing the subject ever so slightly and trying to do absurdist, ridiculous, deathly serious all at the same time. And it's hard to do.

[00:05:18] This movie is a one of one. There's not a single thing in the movie universe, I think, that you can accurately compare it to.

[00:05:26] Well, and not to like gang up on McKay, but it is one of those things where you're like, oh, he pretty much made like four or five masterpieces in a row to start off his career.

[00:05:35] But it was because he found his own recipe for like cranking up the goofiness, the silliness, the absurdity, and then putting a surprising amount of seriousness underneath it.

[00:05:47] And then the more he's been like, I want to get the exact Kubrick ratio and tonally present itself on that level, the more you're like, these have become less funny and the points you're making start to feel less nuanced and more you're yelling at me.

[00:06:01] Like it's the thing that doesn't work is when people try to make exactly this movie.

[00:06:07] Like Iannucci has done a great job doing things that are similar to this, but finding his own style and tone rather than directly trying to lift the strange vibe that I think dooms a lot of people. Look, this is a podcast called Blank Check with Griffin and David.

[00:06:24] I'm Griffin. I'm David. Very fast. It is a show about filmographies, directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. And sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce.

[00:06:39] And this is a miniseries on the films of Stanley Kubrick. It is called Pods Widecast.

[00:06:45] A lot of people were disappointed that we didn't make the miniseries title a riff on Doctor Strange Love or How I Learned to Stop Wearing and Love the Bomb just because there were so many words to play with there. Missed opportunity.

[00:06:57] Yeah, I guess they thought that would be funny. Oh, you think it's a missed opportunity? Shit. All right. Well, we can always go back. Yeah, How I Learned to Stop Poding and Love the Cast. I mean, that's right there for you. I know.

[00:07:09] Pods Widecast just felt so funny to me. Griffin was resolute about this. It was immediate. And sometimes we fight and sometimes I'm just sort of like, yeah, okay, that's fine. You know, and I just I seeded this one immediately.

[00:07:24] I did not have a hot counterpoint to this one. So it's Pods Widecast. I just think it's rare. You have like a three word title where you can sub in pod and cast, and it so clearly could only be one movie.

[00:07:39] And I think Eyes Wide Shut is such a good title to begin with. If I were to have taken a crack and just be clear, Pods Widecast, it was like first pitch, best pitch. I just said we're fucking going with this.

[00:07:50] We never even took it to the lab. We never threw it up on the whiteboard and tried to break down Doctor Strangelove. If I had tried to crack it, I think my approach would have been putting pod and cast in there three times each.

[00:08:02] Can I suggest one other option here? Yeah. You had full pod cast right in front of you. Sure. As an option. And it seems simple, and yet it is so elegant. Full pod cast. What about Pod Metal Jack Cast? Sure, that's less elegant. But Sean, you're getting exactly.

[00:08:24] You're getting a window into this brainstorming process where someone suggests something fairly simple and GIFs like, uh-huh, uh-huh. And it sort of works its way through some little Rube Goldberg machine and comes back out really weird. Yeah. Yeah. And that's why I've learned not to fight.

[00:08:40] And love the bomb. Essentially, it's like someone comes to me with a miniseries title suggestion, and then I go, like, let's get that up on the fucking treadmill. Let's build a little sweat on that thing. Let's get you a little winded. You're doing a pleasant stroll up.

[00:08:58] It's like fucking Mandrake walking up and just going like, sir, I found something. I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm going to put you through the paces. Doctor pod cast or how I learned to stop podding. I'm getting off of it. Who cares?

[00:09:11] I'm getting a little pod to cast. I think that's it. Oh, that's great. And the best one, the best movie to invoke. I mean, that's the one you really want. Or podcast. How did they ever make a podcast out of?

[00:09:24] I want to say like three things based on other conversations we've had. Okay, please. Also, by the way, our guest is Sean fantasy. Hi, the ringer universe host of the big picture. Fairly permanent sort of co-host of the rewatchables. Right. I'm on most of those.

[00:09:41] I'm on a lot. I'm just delighted to be witnessing naming of podcast series, which is one of my favorite things that you guys do. So this is an honor.

[00:09:49] It's good to hear that that is enjoyed by people because sometimes you have the thought who on earth would want to hear this. Well, but by me, I'm not saying by people. I enjoy it. By person. You're a smart guy. It's enjoyed by person at the very least.

[00:10:03] You are bar none one of the most requested guests in the history of show. You weren't the one. This is I said this to my wife yesterday, Sean, I apologize. My wife doesn't know who you are.

[00:10:14] I said like, oh, the podcast tomorrow we have like a big guest and she was like, who? And I said, Sean Fenton. She's like, I don't know who that is. And I was like, well, he's our most requested guest. That's how I put it to her.

[00:10:26] That's very sweet. I I'm grateful to her for not knowing who I am and or caring. I am grateful to anybody who is excited and I'm excited. And as you guys know, I love your show.

[00:10:35] I love your show and I love Doctor Strangelove and I love Stanley Kubrick and everything else that you're doing. So this is we it's weird. It's almost like I don't have anything to say. You know, that feeling when you've seen a movie and you're like they nailed it.

[00:10:47] Like I got nothing, you know, like this is a perfect document. Good. Good. Good. Good. 10 out of 10. No, but there's two things I want to say already. So there are things to say. Yeah. You had a list of three things. Yeah. I forgot one of them already.

[00:11:02] How this defeats comedic filmmakers. Does it help that Stanley Kubrick isn't funny? Because maybe Stanley Kubrick isn't funny. We're going to do that's why Doctor Strangelove works right? Because the seriousness is so crystal like it's so is so perfect, you know, and that's what makes every joke funnier.

[00:11:20] And then my second point pin in that my second point is Mandrake secretly the funniest of the three sellers. Absolutely. Like the actually the most underplayed. Yes, but actually the funniest. Yes, Mandrake talking about being captured by the Japanese is the funniest part of this

[00:11:36] whole movie and I don't even know. I don't even understand that scene in full but his performance is amazing. I feel like he could just and I assume he was just sort of do that for like hours.

[00:11:48] Just kind of keep talking in this like absolutely like chummy way about horrible things like just yeah, just endlessly it would it would this the perfect like modulated it would be so funny to watch him just rattle stuff like that off.

[00:12:03] It's kind of incredible like obviously yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna go to limb here. I think Peter Sellers had quite a bit of range as an actor and it is stunning that arguably his best work has come from across his career the times he like almost violently underplayed

[00:12:25] things like when he plays boring people better than maybe anyone in history for someone who's capable of going fucking huge and I was talking to a different podcast luminary named Sean our buddy Sean Clements of Hollywood handbook and the flagrant ones and everything we were

[00:12:44] texting about I remember what it started we were texting about but it got to us talking about De Niro and Jackie Brown and how incredible a performance that is and I was saying to him

[00:12:56] like I like study that performance once a year going like what is the difference between how full this guy feels even though De Niro is almost spitefully going out of his way to underplay it in every single moment do as little as possible and when you get to

[00:13:15] like De Niro and limitless where you're like well now he's actually doing nothing and it's such a thing where it's like to actively play someone who's got so little going on is so deceptively difficult because you watch something like this like Mandrake and you're just like

[00:13:33] this could have been played by any stuff shirt any dramatic actor Kubrick hired to fill this you could have had sellers play a different character in this dynamic you easily could have had sellers play the Sterling Hayden character and then you just have a guy who's like a

[00:13:46] straight man right who would have been fine but wouldn't have made this character as funny and it's like how is he making such active choices for such a passive guy it's kind of

[00:13:57] a magic trick he is well one he was he was supposed to play another character right there was supposed to be that fourth character is supposed to be Kong and he wasn't Kong but

[00:14:07] so that's also a testament to how he could have basically played any character like is he in that realm of is there any character in any movie that he can't play that I guess

[00:14:16] is a man because I I don't know I mean he really is unusually good at tonal shift and performance across a movie like how many movies did he play multiple characters six seven

[00:14:29] like he did it over and over and over again there's not really I guess Eddie Murphy is in the conversation for that Alec Guinness there's like only a handful of people who

[00:14:36] really have been able to do that the way that he has I mean you're of course forgetting and spoiler alert the end credit scene of DC League of Super Pets in which Dwayne Johnson simultaneously voices crypto the super dog Black Adam and Black Adams dog and all three

[00:14:52] share a scene together and it's it's a really thrilling way how did they pull that off all three of them sharing a scene my god you can't believe the synergy on screen I mean this this

[00:15:02] this thing the fucking ice IP surprises are off the chart I love I'd be surprised I'm more about Black Adams dog what kind of dogs it yeah what's his name I think he's like

[00:15:13] a Doberman they never named him that's why I'm calling him Black Adams dog they never name him on screen he talks a lot he has a lot of dialogue it's an end credit scene that feels interminable where you're almost like is this am I just watching the sequel

[00:15:27] now is this going to be another 90 minutes of my life that's the one thing that strange love is missing I think is like is a stinger you know like yeah he's saying strange love

[00:15:35] to that's what I it's almost missing if I dare get the specific Black Adams dog I feel like that's the character in that fourth character that Seller should have played I mean I do

[00:15:46] remember watching this and being like so you know I knew sellers had almost played the pig and character and I was like well who else could he have played and I was like well

[00:15:52] he could have played Jack D River right he could have been struggling Hayden I was like why didn't he do that and then finally I was like oh right he would have been playing both

[00:15:58] characters in the same scene with no other characters I guess that would have been hard I right but then I even considered that for a while very doable I was like I could have

[00:16:08] done that is is a testament to his how good he is at this I think Eddie Murphy is really funny I'll just let that sentence stand I think he's really funny sure that's bold yeah right and I I think sometimes when he did the multiple characters obviously was

[00:16:24] incredibly successful but it never felt like this right like there's no Eddie Murphy multiple role performance where you're like man these are really distinct instead it's like I already

[00:16:36] Murphy found like a stupid thing to do as mama clump or what I don't know am I wrong is that rude I mean I like that any professor the main two characters obviously sure I love

[00:16:46] that yeah but beyond that is there an Eddie Murphy character I I sort of love as much as one of these three maybe I'm being rude to I think so I mean you're talking to nutty

[00:16:57] professors coming to America Norbit and is there another one I'm forgetting where he plays multiples Norbit is the one we need to set aside I think that's a little America both fingers both

[00:17:11] finger fuck obviously both finger that is the one again but that is the one but they're really distinct so distinct and especially because one of them is like that's absolutely no transformation I think what's just so unique about this is Eddie Murphy when he

[00:17:25] would do it with sort of like sketch instincts go for like big handles on characters like really distinct right define looks voices clear internal games and this it's like sellers chooses to have two out of three characters essentially be straight men you know like

[00:17:43] very very buttoned down quiet characters it makes sense that they wanted him to also play another big crazy guy right and it also makes sense that they title this movie after the biggest most cartoonish character he plays because this movie's existence was pretty

[00:18:01] much predicated on Peter Sellers playing multiple characters seems to be big at the box office right and that the takeaway from Lolita was like sellers maybe saved that movie commercially we need more of that that I mean I think that that was also true for Eddie Murphy after

[00:18:21] yes the Nutty Professor which makes sense it's it's a it's slightly different though because the idea of green lighting a nuclear age black comedy from the difficult man who made Spartacus and Lolita being predicated upon sellers playing four characters is outlandish

[00:18:42] I mean it is like forget about in 2022 like in any time in the history of Hollywood that being the like okay we're a go picture here yeah take take a shot at it it's it makes

[00:18:51] it feel impossible it's almost like if like Catherine Bigelow making zero dark 30 was dependent on Will Ferrell playing three characters or Chris Pratt right or Mark Duplass yeah Duplass should have actually done that because Duplass is the man of a thousand face anytime

[00:19:09] he shows up I'm like who is this yeah what's even weirder is okay yes sellers had done the mouse that roared and you know that's he's playing multiple parts parties happened at this point or is the party later the party is later the party is surprisingly late 1968

[00:19:28] okay I remember when I was shown the party it was like one of my mom's friends I was at like a dinner party and I was bored and my mom's friends like you can watch a movie

[00:19:39] and she put on the party and she was like this movie is really funny it's it's offensive but you know it's really funny and I was like I'm like 10 years old I'm like okay and even

[00:19:50] at 10 I was like hmm it's a seem offensive but um no the party had not happened yet no my point was he'd done the mouse that roared and then like you say he only plays one character

[00:20:00] in Lolita but I guess because that character changes his outfit and his manner enough they were like well he was kind of doing it in Lolita and that's that a Hollywood

[00:20:11] studio would look at Lolita and be like more of more of sellers is what we need to make a Kubrick film hit it's like you say as Sean it makes no sense well it's also you I mean

[00:20:24] at this point our Lolita episode would have come out but we haven't recorded it yet we haven't yet no we're doing it next week have you have not rewatched it have you David I

[00:20:34] actually just rewatched okay so I mean there is like the therapist scene where he's fully like in a disguise playing a full character where some of the other stuff is more like oh he's like loosely affecting a personality yeah there's that scene like on the on like

[00:20:49] the patio yes where he is has his back to James Mason and is effectively playing a different person but doesn't identify as it doesn't have a name or anything no it's one of those

[00:21:01] things where I think he's simultaneously kind of the best part of the movie and ruinous to the movie totally but I think everyone was sort of like why is Kubrick making this movie why is Mason making this movie this movie is going to be a career ruiner this

[00:21:17] is disastrous don't touch it and something about the sellers thing kind of like floated along salvage that movie from being like a career ender for everyone involved and I think they were like well this was a little more profitable than we thought it would be

[00:21:33] and it must be because people love Peter Sellers putting on different glasses I mean I think that the critical thing that happens though is that he makes the big panther like if he doesn't write the big panther immediately after Lolita then I think the thing what you're

[00:21:47] positing and the idea that this movie like that's why the movie got made right yeah strange love got made because he became Clouseau and he had already been a widely celebrated comic actor and he was this chameleonic figure and you know the other thing too is like I

[00:22:00] love the fact that he's like going through a divorce while he's making this movie you know he's like having a very personal like a real personal struggle which is why it's shot in England because he can't leave so he has to shoot at Sheppard in studios like

[00:22:11] all this stuff leads to it being a movie that probably like would you say it doesn't work at all if there's no Peter Sellers in it no I mean this is getting back to David's

[00:22:21] point is like I think the alchemy of this movie is that like one guy was pretty much handling the comedy and one guy was pretty much handling the seriousness of the thing and when we talk

[00:22:34] about other filmmakers like jumping off a cliff trying to replicate this the problem is usually it's a funny guy getting too self-serious or a serious guy trying too hard to be silly and that's usually where the tone gets affected versus this movie where it's kind of like

[00:22:49] two guys meeting in the middle and I don't know if there's another comedy star of this moment that could have done that I'm trying to find the one thing I want to find is when

[00:23:01] they shot this just read the Pink Panther because right this although I guess the shot in the dark is this same year that it's 64 Sean the Darker 64 the Pink Panther is 63 because this movie was delayed because of the assassination of oh that's right you know

[00:23:16] right yeah so I won I'm trying to remember when it was shot but it looks like it was shot in 63 so I don't know like it I think it came together in 63 so I but it's just

[00:23:27] look I got obviously I have our dossier we can we can get into how this movie got green little a little bit but it is something that should just not work and it wouldn't work

[00:23:37] most of the time most of the time if you get people together to do a nuclear war comedy it's probably just not going to work but I mean I guess also every movie that's a nuclear

[00:23:45] war comedy now has just the strange love shadow that you can't escape and when you joked about this movie having a tag I remembered that don't look up has a tag right yes and

[00:23:58] and and I get the tag I get why they did the tag because they're like well we have to have something funny at the end here and a little bit of poetic justice but it also kind of

[00:24:08] undercuts the big sentimental ending of that movie and I don't know if we want it or we need it I don't know anyway no I think just thinking about the stakes look I think the

[00:24:16] ending is the best part of that movie I either like me to look up more than most people or hate it less than most people I don't know which of those truths I'm closer to but I'm

[00:24:27] certainly less negative on it than a lot of people but I think the ending is the thing it gets right and the tag is like a perfect encapsulation of everything it gets wrong

[00:24:37] and like the joke too it's too strong it makes your teeth hurt and also the Jonah Hill performance like doesn't work it's it's the exact example of this where it's like here are two smart guys like McKay and Hill making the most surface level observations about a

[00:24:53] dumb kind of person who represents a lot of the ills of current society with nothing to say beyond isn't this guy annoying isn't like social media stupid like everything he says is dumb yeah I feel similarly on don't look up as as you Griffin which is like there's

[00:25:11] definitely good things in it there's stuff in there I agree with that it's not it's not it didn't totally cohere and it's almost like two stars that it for its own good and it

[00:25:22] feels like it's after some sort of like Poseidon adventure towering inferno kind of a thing but um it's ironic because you could make the case and David you basically already said this like the last line of strange love might be the funniest moment in the movie

[00:25:35] funny yeah and and the end the last the final moments of don't look up or like deathly sincere like over like so earnest that it's almost painful and it's effective but it almost betrays

[00:25:48] the whole tone of the movie and then it makes you think like maybe Adam McKay should have just made an earnest movie about you know climate change and annihilation I think so yeah because he's so earnest like he's in such an earnest place I think as an artist

[00:26:05] and I do think you're right he should just be making very earnest movies because it's often the satire that isn't functioning as well in the recent stuff yeah I don't know there's a human comedy and don't look up that works well where I'm like I think the dynamic

[00:26:21] between Chalamet and Lawrence is kind of interesting in terms of just like that movie yeah just like how do you recalibrate your entire brain if you know that you're going to die in the entire world's gonna end and nothing fucking matters right why wouldn't I hang out with

[00:26:36] this dumb stoner kid in a parking lot like that stuff is good and then anytime it's like what if the president cared about how many followers she has I'm like I don't give a

[00:26:47] shit I really like you have nothing to say here but but yes this movie I mean and you talk about the ending being the funniest part of it's also like infamously this movie was

[00:26:59] supposed to end with this extended pie fight which would have been like the broadest sequence in the movie and Kubrick watched it and he was like this is too silly it's too goofy

[00:27:08] so you end like five minutes before it was intended to end and you end on like a comedy edit like the ending is funnier because the movie then and so abruptly I completely agree

[00:27:20] it's like it ends on a jump cut to an explosion that's amazing that's genius yeah it's a it's like a McGruber edit that's what it is I just realized that's what it is yes that's no and

[00:27:30] you know what and Kubrick was actually ripping off McGruber and people love that's you can read there the letters that Kubrick wrote to Will Forte and Yorma Taccone where he said I've studied your new three part sketch they weren't letters they were faxes you know he

[00:27:44] liked to send a fax right how did you do it how did you find this mix I think it was actually teletype as I recall it was not yeah yeah you're right you're right you're right he

[00:27:52] had a teletype machine in Spielberg's office or whatever this is my first Kubrick I assume it may have been yours as well or am I wrong maybe 2001 I guess would be a lot of people's

[00:28:04] first Kubrick but I was like 10 when I saw this movie they were pretty close together it was it was either that this or 2001 I watched this because AFI in the year 2000 did their 100 years 100 laughs which I was obsessed with as a comedy obsessed kid I'm

[00:28:22] like finally here we go the comedies and then it was one of those things where I sat there flummoxed trying to my parents going like this must be the funniest movies of all time

[00:28:30] what is this serious black and white nuclear warfare movie doing right why is there all this discussion of missile codes and right switching to channels or whatever and I remember blockbuster had the like 100 years 100 laughs display where they put all of those VHS is

[00:28:47] in the same little section so this was like a quick rent for me after that special because it was I think they put it at number three of all number three number three above any

[00:28:57] hall and behind Tootsie right feel like they redo a lot of this Tootsie I'm like it hot number one yes I remember to is just strong wild I don't know do you disagree with that

[00:29:09] Sean we all like Tootsie we all like Tootsie after that and like Tootsie made a lot more sense to me as a kid than this movie did but even still I was like this isn't the second

[00:29:18] funniest movie ever made that's absurd well this movie and Tootsie have a lot in common right because they are extremely funny movies at stages but they feel important and Tootsie and Tootsie I think particularly to Hollywood feels very important you know it's like this

[00:29:34] is about acting yeah and transformation and identity and soul of art and so it was like you know really valorized by the business and then that's what like the list that you're

[00:29:46] talking about and I I was just like you guys I worship those lists I learned a lot by just looking at them and saying like what's on my checklist what do I have to go through

[00:29:53] that's probably it's definitely the reason why I got into strange love in the 90s when they did the first AFI 100 years right movies and I think he had the most movies out of any filmmaker on that that list from I think 98 I think it was probably Clockwork Orange

[00:30:07] strange love and what was the third one 2001 2000 and Spartacus he had four more on there too so for yeah Sean I threw this trivia out at David recently can you guess who is the

[00:30:22] actor who is currently the most represented on the main AFI 100 list oh it's an interesting one I mean like gut you would say like John Wayne or Catherine Hepburn or someone like that I don't know who is it Robert Duvall oh yeah you have two Godfathers apocalypse

[00:30:43] now to kill a mockingbird network and I think there's one other one mash mash and mash six Wow but not but not a single lead performance exactly yeah right he was that's true even

[00:30:54] though he led dozens of movies yeah yeah but none of his lead to Val and network my single favorite funniest monologue ever when he's toe to toe with Holden after Holden fails

[00:31:06] and you know you know we had a big fat big titted hit that that whole thing is like that is the pinnacle of overacting in my opinion he's amazing that's but that's another movie

[00:31:15] that's similarly like this gets sort of an impossible tone right and in that it's like no traditionally comedic actors you have guys who mostly come from drama and it's such a fine tonal line on that film and we talked about a different episode and a shining episode

[00:31:34] I think we talked about coming later that Kubrick was like one of only three people who even met to direct that movie and he and Chayefsky they never they never clicked why did I think that they would have been a match right Chayefsky essentially said like look

[00:31:48] you're great and you're you would do a good job but we would kill each other like we can't do this like it's true I mean and like and it makes sense and he picks Sidney Lumet and

[00:31:57] like that makes sense to like it's just I don't understand that if if if blank check in the big picture can get together I don't really see what the problem is and that's right anything is possible because we're we're such fierce competitors Alpha yeah for for

[00:32:11] Alpha's in the same zoom window right now I mean producer Ben Alpha is the most by not even speaking he's a fucking letting us all hang ourselves with her words Ben when did

[00:32:21] you see Strangelove for the first time my uncle showed me when I was a kid and I was similarly like Griffin very underwhelmed crazy I thought this was so funny when I saw it

[00:32:33] as a kid I think I'd like it remember it's like a thunderbolt moment when he says you can't fight in here this is the war room as a kid I was just like oh that's like brilliant

[00:32:44] oh I understand like okay like and for I guess maybe the sellers thing was enough for me to lock into the humor of it or maybe I was just also just compelled by the story because

[00:32:54] it is like a compelling story they are trying to avert World War 3 like there are stakes but I was like so into this movie when I saw it as a kid I as a kid I think I didn't find

[00:33:07] anything funny in the movie until Strangelove himself shows up where I'm just like well this is recognizably comedic everything else was too subtle for me where I even think like there's no fighting in the war room like a lot of those lines are delivered so straight

[00:33:20] that as a kid I just was like this is not pitched like a comedy I don't get this yeah like George C. Scott didn't read at all as like comedic performance but then watching

[00:33:32] it so fun like earlier today he's like incredible he's amazing like one of I think my favorite performances in the whole movie he's kind of the Deval of this movie where he's like

[00:33:43] he's towing a really fine line of like overacting but with like a foot in reality and just making very small choices that sort of throw everything off the hump I was reading that he was he

[00:33:57] was kind of unhappy with this movie right because yeah Kubrick used his more over the top line readings and like he identified the comedy but you know George C. Scott is like one of the more serious theater and film actors of the last 50 years so it's amazing

[00:34:16] for one we should acknowledge that George C. Scott was the friendliest nicest person who ever worked in Hollywood and everyone got along with him of course easy have you seen that oh my god wait have you seen it's so good fuck what's the Jiminy Glick interviewing

[00:34:29] Nathan Lane and asking about George C. Scott drinking on stage and Nathan Lane like just is in hysterics unable to answer him it's so I'll find it and send it to you guys but

[00:34:40] I'm watching so much Glick really to fucking funny the funniest shit in the world I think he's like taking over Tick Tock or something I don't know why I'm getting more of him recently but he's sort of everywhere right now I've been watching Glick Supercuts how is that

[00:34:53] not streaming in its entirety anywhere it's crazy and it also could and should come back right now and just be a series it would work so because it'd be better probably there should

[00:35:03] be Glick every year like there was some year where he did the red carpet at the Spirit Awards or something they gave him a little cabana and he was interviewing like Ed Begley

[00:35:12] Jr. and shit and I'm just like send him somewhere to do something on camera at least once a year as Glick he should do the Barbara Walter special every year before the Oscars like

[00:35:21] that should be his lane now right yeah I should just do that yes I just remember him asking at Begley Jr. how does it know to has a feel to know that you'll never surpass your father

[00:35:33] and he's like well I'm still alive I'm still working he's like Ed it's not gonna happen the George C. Scott thing is I mean he's he's an ordinary guy as as you may know but he

[00:35:48] would do these quote-unquote sort of practice tapes that would not like that what you know Kubrick was supposedly assuring him like we won't use these well let's kick off with these over-the-top performances get it out of your system get it out of your system exactly and

[00:36:05] then he quote-unquote use these warmups in the final cut and George C. Scott says he didn't like that but then there's also this whole thing where they would play chess all the time because I guess George C. Scott fancied himself a chess man and he respected

[00:36:17] that Stanley Kubrick like annihilated him at chess he was like right you know anyone who's good at chess is is a okay by George C. Scott what are you drinking there can I

[00:36:27] have one of those hammered chess George C. Scott is also a show I watch yeah 100% that's like hot ones from the 1960s yeah I love that that might be a great YouTube idea just playing

[00:36:41] chess with celebrities who were like what does the night do again and killing them also like more directors should take lessons from hot ones and realize like oh maybe all actors would be most interesting 10 wings up 10 wings down when you get them to a state of just raw

[00:36:58] honesty no I was gonna say it's funny cuz I feel like I've read so many different anecdotes about quote-unquote serious or dramatic directors who work with like comedic actors trying to cast them against type and that their process will often be to do the Kubrick thing and

[00:37:16] be like after 100 takes Jim Carrey is so exhausted that then you get the one real take out of him you know like Peter Weir Michelle Gondry talk about that where it's just like you have

[00:37:28] to push him to go as big as possible because he's going to go as big as he can and get like 10 takes that wear him out so much that the 11th take is the first usable one because

[00:37:38] it's when he's just tired and then Kubrick actually reverses his own system on this movie and is like to get one good take out of a notoriously self-serious actor I need to tell him it's

[00:37:50] a rehearsal and it doesn't count and they disregard everything he does after that it's funny too cuz George C. Scott was not he was not George C. Scott at this time no like

[00:38:01] he had made the but like he done he hadn't done a lot of stuff and like his early stuff is much more and this is true in Anatomy of a Murder to he's much more like serpentine

[00:38:12] and kind of sinister and not big not yelling he's got that fucking beak of a nose that makes him look so predatory I mean I love George C. Scott and certainly an early actor

[00:38:24] for me where I was like I like whatever this guy's doing but you're right like I think he's it's later when he's doing the really like to the rafters kind of acting that I

[00:38:38] guess is the apex of that is is patent right like that's when it's like this guy has found a public figure that can fit you know how big an actor he is and Patton's good I like

[00:38:51] that and like humongous hit wins Best Picture and is the second time George C. Scott publicly refuses to be nominated there are a lot of guys who goes don't even talk to me about

[00:39:03] right he really upped the game and no one's been able to surpass it because you have your people who are like look I think competition amongst creatives is stupid I refuse to attend

[00:39:13] a ceremony if I win I won't accept it George C. Scott was like no I'm telling you you didn't nominate me and they're like we did you're on the list and he's like absolutely not

[00:39:23] I decline your offer if you look at his IMDb awards page and it says refused to even be nominated refused to even be nominated and for Patton says refused to accept the nomination

[00:39:34] and the award because he did not feel himself to be in any competition with other actors my single favorite thing about that though is that the following year after refusing the Academy Award he was nominated again again yeah they're like oh you like that all right

[00:39:48] they're like I'm still voting for this guy Frank McCarthy the film's producer accepted the award in Scott's behalf at the ceremony but returned it to the Academy the next day and keeping the Scott's wish it grand opening grand closing you know just get it out of

[00:40:01] here yeah take this piece of shit what a legend he put it in a big slingshot straight into the Kodak theater that's what they're not mentioning they returned it through a fucking office window it's just funny because when you hear that and you know about

[00:40:19] George C Scott you do he almost becomes like a Daniel Day-Lewis figure in my head not that Daniel Day-Lewis didn't happily accept his Oscars but where you're like did that guy just like never work and he was really specific about the kind of stuff it's like

[00:40:32] no not at all he did like great horror movies he did a lot of TV later in life like final film was Angus that's true his final film was Angus no no Griff he was in the Gloria remake

[00:40:43] after that oh Jesus right but you know like it's not he was not like a pretentious actor I guess is my point right you know he was he's a real working guy and I think he was

[00:40:56] he was well I mean no disrespect but he was obviously drag him he was a bad man he was a bad man he was a really bad drunk yeah horrible drunk and like many actors of his

[00:41:07] generation like needed to make money at the end of his career and so did a lot of genre stuff very famously did it exorcist 3 and like one of the crazier performances right

[00:41:16] I think he rules in that yeah it's great but it's like it's so different even from just like the changeling right he's in the changeling which is really like solemn serious so amazing actually incredible that movie is really scary but right that's a very

[00:41:28] literary serious horror film right and like so yes he jumps from both of those like within six years it's kind of amazing we talked about this I think in a patreon episode for some

[00:41:38] reason but he also voiced smoke in cartoon all-stars to the rescue he sure did Barbara Bush Priest I can't remember why because I think Ben was saying there should be a villain who's just drugs right and he essentially plays that like he's like a sentient cloud

[00:41:53] of smoke who's like hey smoke this crack but it's George C Scott playing like full intensity Wow you just brought me back to cartoon all-stars to the rescue which is something I probably not thought about since 1989 a George C Scott picture my my

[00:42:09] brain is melting yeah it's just wild that he did it like he was one of those guys who yeah I think you know would do things for a paycheck but was like but I'm gonna

[00:42:17] act like he wouldn't fucking arrive on set cynically you know it was just funny that he was like it's a job I just do my job you pay me to do my job and it's also funny

[00:42:29] that like Campbell Scott his son I feel like is one of the most gentle actors alive like Campbell Scott never raises his volume above this level he's like permanently in NPR mode have you not seen Jurassic World Dominion this is the first time

[00:42:42] that's he goes off the rails his most unhinged performance and it is still he's like I'm gonna play this like Tim Cook doing a keynote how dare you do this to me why did you

[00:42:51] unleash my dinosaurs and no offense to Campbell Scott who I think is a great actor and I think he's incredible in so many movies but I I think I said this to Griffin him being in Jurassic World Dominion felt like they called three bigger names and they were

[00:43:08] all like forget it and Campbell Scott was like sure I'll do it who cares in an office whatever the best performance in that movie the best part of that movie and it almost feels like he's giving a strange love-esque performance mmm he's doing something in

[00:43:22] that movie yeah one other thing before I want to give you guys I'm gonna crack open the dossier but Griff a question for you so George C. Scott is my winner in 1964 on my beloved spreadsheet you put him as leader supporting supporting actor okay

[00:43:38] Peter Sellers is my winner for best lead actor and Wow okay do you think George C. Scott would refuse my award yes absolutely okay okay good I'm glad to hear it David's spreadsheet is a sham why is he retroactively nominating things 70 years

[00:43:54] later he was not alive in 1964 and I refused the nomination and the win I don't care if my name is in bold he would have to be deleted control F.C. Scott delete all mentions if he hated award shows imagine how he would feel about podcasts Jesus

[00:44:11] Jesus oh he would absolutely despise he would be grinding his teeth listening to this to this on pocket casts right now George C. Scott okay but yeah moving on from George C. Scott to why Stanley Kubrick makes this movie so this is post

[00:44:29] Lolita well I don't know I was almost gonna say like is this his first like true masterpiece but I might go to bat for the paths of glory I don't know yeah what you guys think yeah but this is sort of the first canonical masterpiece maybe

[00:44:46] within its time recognized as such right yeah cuz Spartacus is a huge hit but not recognized as a masterpiece I think it's a such an interesting question with him you guys have already talked about I assume a few of the movies yeah so I've

[00:44:59] spent more time like digging in but you know there's a pretty strong contingent of people that would call the killing like one of the best heist and noir movies ever killing fucking rules it rules I can't I can't argue with that

[00:45:12] and at the time it wasn't hailed as such but and there's a lot of retroactive love for it and like I think Tarantino was like really really advocating for that movie in the 90s and so a lot more people got onto it that are more our age

[00:45:24] but I think in this sort of like in the AFI sense of the masterpiece word like this is definitely the first one where it was like okay our geniuses upon us like our 1960s auteur hero in America has arrived right and even just the framing

[00:45:38] of like the killing is a B picture you know has of glory doesn't hit in its moment Spartacus is humongous but it's seen as a Douglas victory more than a Kubrick victory because he was sort of for hire right this is the first one

[00:45:51] where it's like Stanley Kubrick auteur it comes out critics love it it's liked by audiences it's a hit it gets Oscar nominations this is the first one maybe where he's defining the like the specialness of a Stanley Kubrick film

[00:46:06] upon landing it's also the beginning of like everything he does is from now on is now going to be in a new genre is going to be a landmark film in that genre is going to feel like this just Titan effort this like gargantuan right thing

[00:46:21] of like full metal jacket is the only one that maybe isn't quite there but like the rest of them obviously are anyway Stanley Kubrick becomes obsessed in the late 50s with nuclear holocaust makes sense both in terms of his personality

[00:46:36] and the Cold War the the times people are living in I was thinking watching this movie for how much I panic about everything especially the realities of the world that I cannot control and it's not like it's no longer a concern I

[00:46:53] cannot imagine the base level of anxiety I would have during like the atomic panic yeah I don't like the idea of just knowing that this could happen I well not that of course it could still yes I it sucks it sucks but I'm like

[00:47:08] if I had been like a kid in school being taught like duck and cover I would have been like I'm out I don't want to be alive this sucks but there's there's a case to be made that it it felt that way because it was narrativized to the

[00:47:20] public that absolutely like right that is something that as you just said David like it's still true like we are on the absolute brink of nuclear annihilation right now as we are recording and wouldn't it be a great episode to be

[00:47:31] just all went belly up at this exact yeah it'd be pretty good yeah thank God no one ever have to listen as long as long as it's after the Patreon billing

[00:47:39] in the month I'd be fine with it I it is no it is I it is the thing that is so scary about like nuclear weapons is that it's it's a you just have to push the

[00:47:49] button one time and it happens like immediately you know but it is movie forces you to think about it the same way that the government was forcing you to think about it when you went to school every day and I we just don't live

[00:48:01] in that society right now no we just now have agreed to not really talk about it that exactly yeah let's let's not worry about it and that's what Kubrick is sort of fascinated by is as he's like digging into all this stuff on nuclear

[00:48:13] war and all this is like this is the quote I like hers like what has struck me is their cautious sterility of ideas like where he's just like you're reading this absolutely bananas stuff but it's really like it's like a really

[00:48:27] like a book that's written almost academically with the sort of like yeah and then of course you know the world will be blanketed in you know ash and like if this one little thing went wrong or if this strategy didn't make sense

[00:48:39] you know like he just it's very funny to think about it this way he's not even getting to that yet but like just the the ruthlessness of what he's reading yeah and then the clinical way it's being presented is very Kubrick

[00:48:52] yeah I'm sure he agreed and so he scoops up this book called red alert which is of course what dr. Strangelove is based on by Peter George that is a serious nuclear thriller it's it's not a comedy at all right it's heavy as I

[00:49:07] assume no one's ever read red alert no I have not no no I mean he liked it just because he says it just sort of like you know had the right kind of knowledge in it and but he brings in Peter George and he's like I'm not

[00:49:22] gonna read it as they're breaking the script and they're joking around Stanley Kubrick is like would this be better as a comedy like and that's where things start you know I guess they're just like what if what if one of their jokes is

[00:49:37] like what if everyone's hungry and like a sandwich delivery man shows up to the war room like things like that you know like they start to do jokes and they're they just they can't get away from the silly jokes of all this stuff so what

[00:49:49] it what if dr. Strangelove but with Postmates like is that what that joke is yeah it's funny yeah I mean do you guys think that's funny a deadly guy I mean that's that's draft one they kept it out it's hard to believe you had to call

[00:50:02] Terry Southern to get involved well there here's the thing 100% they bring in Terry Southern to transform the screenplay into something satirical because they are actually not funny people the other thing that's important is that Stanley Kubrick had been offered the novel failsafe another

[00:50:23] nuclear right right this is often sort of misrepresented right right well basically there was some kind of lawsuit filed during the production of dr. Strangelove that meant that failsafe had to come out after dr. Strangelove yes

[00:50:41] and Columbia put out both movies so they didn't care but it does kind of kill failsafe which I've never seen you're a Sidney Lumet complete as Griff have you seen failsafe no I weirdly haven't seen failsafe and there was sort of famously

[00:50:54] the early 2000s or late 90s George Clooney failsafe yes yes which I've seen that that's pretty good that's a shoe but I've never seen the original yeah that was that was done sort of like Playhouse 90 style like live to write

[00:51:07] right it was why yes that's why I was cool yeah yeah I've seen I've seen the original failsafe it's fucking amazing it might really be the best movie like I highly recommend how it is so taught and interesting and very different from a

[00:51:19] lot of his other movies and it's really really fascinating to imagine a world in which these two guys like flipped these movies if Lumet takes on strange love it's it's math out yeah math out it's math out bond is the president right

[00:51:35] yes and Henry Fonda's president can I amend a thing quickly from our Spartacus episode okay I don't remember anything about our Spartacus episode I talked about Tony Curtis after he had gone to Hollywood and was successful

[00:51:48] driving back outside his old acting class and yelling at Walter Matthau that he couldn't get pussy that's I believe the quote that I attributed to Tony Curtis I looked up the original quote the other day the thing he drove back outside his

[00:52:02] old acting class Walter math that was standing outside in the rain holding a newspaper above his head and the thing that Tony Curtis yelled out was I fucked Yvonne DeCarlo which I just think the specific of that is so funny I I had to

[00:52:16] amend it fair enough thank you for making that clear can I request a like a patreon only episode about math out sex life yes Tony Curtis made it sound unexciting I mean Curtis really worked the best he could on the sex life

[00:52:34] I mean Curtis really worked the bag on math out sex life you know Walter Matthau had a bunch of kids he had a couple wives I'm sure he had a little fun in there like anyway they bring in Terry Southern and he I guess is the one

[00:52:52] who gets sellers involved in some way right no I'm sorry I'm the other way around sorry sellers is the one who gets Southern involved because sellers had given Kubrick a copy of the magic Christian very Southern and so that's

[00:53:08] how it all happens JJ's read on the screenplay though is that it's Kubrick wrote it George inspired it and Terry Southern like finalized it and made it funny that gotcha okay the first page of the screenplay says the story will be

[00:53:23] played for realistic comedy which means the essentially truthful moods and attitudes will be portrayed accurately with an occasional bizarre or super realistic crescendo there the acting will never be so called comedy acting so basically the script tries to make it very clear like play this about as

[00:53:40] straight as you want right like don't you know like the seriousness will help the comedy which I think is true I don't know I mean with the occasional flourish from Peter Sellers essential sure or some of the bigger George C.

[00:53:53] Scott moments I did finally have the breakthrough watching this of how much of an influence this movie must have been on the Zucker Brothers and John Abrahams like it feels like this is the style they lumb on to of like oh can we

[00:54:07] even go bigger from here what if we have the actors play it flatter and the things they're saying or doing become even more ridiculous well but also they don't allow for what strange love does where strange level have whole sequences

[00:54:21] of technical discussions or relatively like realistic military like code things like whereas in the Zuckers are like yeah okay but there has to be a joke every 20 seconds like you know no matter what is happening like and at the very least

[00:54:36] something funny has to be happening in the background or written on a sign or something but it does feel like this is a launching point for them I think also Kubrick is a little bit more comfortable even as absurd as this movie is

[00:54:49] at times doing things that if you don't think about them seem banal or like as like set up but are actually a joke I mean the whole opening title sequence is just one big dick joke you know it's just about how like bombs fuck the world

[00:55:05] and like the idea of refueling a plane in midair like I'm sure the first two or three times I watched that movie I never even thought about that I was like oh this is just a way to like get us into the story you know no you're

[00:55:15] just zoning out right aircraft footage like I'm sure the first two or three times you're like oh that's a weird joke I don't know how to make that joke like it's just so much right a hundred percent and then the more you read

[00:55:26] about it the more you think about it the more you're like oh every single sequence here is a sight gag or is a part of the point and you know the Zuckers in Abrams are like what David said there just like you will be

[00:55:38] entertained at all times like I we will never take our foot off the gas Kubrick eventually said to someone right like yeah the whole point of strange in this big orgasmic finish like I was going for something with that. I think I'll find that somewhere.

[00:55:50] Anyway, they bring in sellers as we all said it's a stipulation of the studio that you play four roles for the price of a million dollars. Apparently Cuba kind of groused about that at the time, but also there's this really funny sellers quote where sellers

[00:56:03] would be like Stanley would be sitting outside my front door saying what about Buck Schmuck? You've got to play Buck Schmuck and you know, like so that like Stanley Kubrick is just like leafing through the screen play being like what about this guy? You could do this.

[00:56:14] What the movie also costs like two million dollars like he was all sellers. Yeah, it was all sellers and and in retrospect, I think they were like kind of a bargain. Yeah, he gives you three incredible performances. I really love Stuart Freeborn who does the makeup for this

[00:56:30] movie says that for Muffly he gave him this giant bald cap to give him this like bulbous head and he does look incredible as the print like because it doesn't look exaggerated but he really does look like a different guy as a result.

[00:56:43] Like yeah, it's it's quite drastic without being he just looks like a you know, middle-aged guy with with no hair like it's not I don't know. I really love muff. I love all three dollars performances and the thing where

[00:56:56] he sprains his ankle and he can't do Kong everyone seems to think that that's basically that's kind of just an excuse like he just wasn't into it. He didn't like doing the voice and they just moved on and they got slim picket.

[00:57:08] I mean he always said he didn't want to do it that he didn't feel comfortable doing the voice. They didn't think he had a grasp on the Texan accent and I think that role works a lot better with like slim pickings

[00:57:19] like hire the real type you want this role to fit into and have him play it straight rather than having sellers do a satirical take on it if you're going to have him. I mean we were talking about before like which characters

[00:57:33] of this movie couldn't keep play that's arguably one of the characters that most needs to be played by someone who isn't straining to affect something else upon their their natural disposition, you know, I think especially in that the final

[00:57:48] sequence where you know, the Yahoo and all that like it would have felt too broadly comic. Yes. Yes. Yes. It would have just felt like I don't know how yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, but but you even like you could very easily see a version of this movie.

[00:58:04] I think where sellers plays Buck and strange love instead of strange love and the president, you know, especially because in those early scenes before strange love enters buck is like the driving motor, you know, the original plan was to cast for Jack D Ripper the sterling haven world.

[00:58:23] No, I don't Gene Kelly Jesus. Isn't that crazy? Wouldn't that be cool? Yeah, I mean Kelly played Jack D Ripper. If it was like Gene Kelly wound up to psychosis like firing guns and talking about fluids. I don't know. I just love that idea. That's who Kubrick wanted.

[00:58:41] He wanted Gene Kelly when he doesn't get Gene Kelly. He casts George C Scott and George C Scott then was like, I want to play Buck Tergesen instead and Kubrick was like, okay, and then he brings in sterling Hayden from the killing. It all works out.

[00:58:57] I mean, it does everything's good. Yeah, Sterling Hayden is great in this. It is fascinating because Gene Kelly was notoriously kind of an asshole and unpleasant guy. Yeah, sure. But his screen persona was so tightly controlled and I like it's like I did he ever play against type?

[00:59:15] Was he ever anything but sort of gentle and genial on screen like as much as there are off-camera stories where you're like, oh, I can imagine that he could be a guy who was like yelling his head off taskmaster.

[00:59:29] I just wonder if he ever would have let himself be captured on camera doing that. There's two funny things about it, right? Because on the one hand he was kind of he's pretty good at playing a shit heel who changed throughout movies, right?

[00:59:42] Yeah, he was often like like redeemed. His characters are always this incorrigible guy. Yeah, but he had this like genteel virility, you know, it was like he was very sexual and physical but it was very it was very safe and appropriate and like Ripper is the exact inverse.

[01:00:03] You know, he's like this emasculated psychotic man who is so full of rage because I don't like I made I guess his dick doesn't work like whatever however you want to read it. That's where I'm reading it. That's how I'm reading it.

[01:00:17] And so that would have been really it would have been fun to see Gene Kelly do that. I think Sterling Hayden is the right person for it, but it would have been fun. That's spot-on Sean like the thing about Gene Kelly was that

[01:00:26] he was so comfortable as a performer and he made audiences comfortable and he could take characters that were a little unsavory and make them sort of family-friendly without you really interrogating what's going on underneath the surface,

[01:00:37] which is why a character like this who is like all text no subtext and shouted loudly. It's like just hard to imagine him letting go enough to do this as much as the idea of him doing it is interesting.

[01:00:51] Jack D Ripper also is very obviously based on Curtis LeMay who was the head of the Air Force at the time who is basically famous for like during the Cuban Missile Crisis whenever you read any book about Kennedy and he it's basically Curtis LeMay

[01:01:07] is in there being like listen you pansy we need to nuke now like he's the one who's just constantly like my recommendation bombs. So and he later ran for vice president with George Wallace. I want to say cool.

[01:01:21] Couple of cool guys famously chill dude, but then they throw in that disclaimer at the beginning of the movie. I guess to cover their asses and not freak people out too much that disclaimer that almost reads funny because it's so

[01:01:38] again so straightforward where they're like the Air Force is assured. It's nothing like this could ever happen. You're like, oh cool. Like thank thanks like that really settles me down. It almost feels like a like a Monty Python thing. Right, right. It's just it feels like bureaucratic language.

[01:01:54] Yes, the movie gets interrupted to have Eric Idle say like we are of course obligated by lawyers to and then while they're shooting it, you know Sellers is improvising some of his dialogue which you could then write down and put into the original

[01:02:10] shooting script James Earl Jones as you guys know is in this film. It's his first film appearance. I believe yeah, and he was supposed to he had a big role. He's the one who questions the mission and is like pushing

[01:02:28] back against everything inside the plane and eventually Kubrick decided he didn't want the guy protesting to be a black guy and cuts everything out. Wow. And so and so that's why James Earl Jones is kind of in this movie but doesn't really do anything.

[01:02:43] He's just like an x-wing pilot. I mean they just cut to him a lot in the right pit saying yes or whatever and James Earl Jones said to Kubrick like but I took this part because of all the good stuff right that you're

[01:02:55] cutting and Kubrick was like we don't need it and that was that so that's that's the James Earl Jones story because he's already pretty fucking established as a as a stage actor guy this point right? Yeah, and and you just imagine people viewed his move to films

[01:03:11] as somewhat inevitable. I guess as much as a you know black actor could feel that way in the 1960s. Yeah, I don't know. He also was not he was not like a character actor. He was like he was like Hamlet like that's the thing he was in shakespeare.

[01:03:24] He had done heavy duty. Hello. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And like he done all kinds of giant Shakespeare stuff and I guess the great white hope is a few years after this and that's gets turned into a movie that that is asking nomination and

[01:03:39] all that but yeah anyway, I just remember as a kid I knew who James Earl Jones was and I was yeah, of course in this movie but it's it also just like it it feels weird to see this voice coming out of him.

[01:03:52] Like I'm sure if you were a theater goer in the 50s or 60s and you saw James Earl Jones on stage you'd be like man this guy can project and then when there's like throwaway lines by James Earl Jones in a cockpit in this movie looking like

[01:04:04] a young snack. You're like who turned up the fucking bass on this thing? Like you know what I'm saying? Like there's no reason for him to be like pontificating. Right, right. He's got a great voice famous. Incredible.

[01:04:18] I would say the other big thing is Ken Adam doing the production design. He had just done Dr. No and Stanley Kubrick had loved Dr. No obviously Ken Adam is best known as the James Bond designer,

[01:04:31] but the design in this movie is so crucial to it working right and it's it feels so Kubrick Ian obviously to have these like big angular sets and the war room just feels perfect for him. But like a lot of that is driven by Ken Adam who justified

[01:04:47] that it should be triangular to Kubrick who is very skeptical of that and he and Kubrick together design the whole lighting scheme so they could stop the cinematographer from designing any of the lighting because Stanley Kubrick always would fight with his DPs about lighting.

[01:05:02] This movie is like the last vestige of the Kubrick documentary style in pieces and I think so much of that is just that his hand is forced by sellers who like notoriously just hated repeating himself and doing the same take over and over again.

[01:05:22] So Kubrick was like I just had to set up six cameras and just get what I got you can't be as meticulous and this movie shifts between like very deliberate Kubrick compositions, which Lolita was obviously moving towards an away from that

[01:05:35] sort of more fly on the wall approach and then from this point out. It's like everything is fucking locked down and precise. I feel like there's still some dissonance for me as somebody who has just read a lot about him and a lot about the productions

[01:05:50] of his films and you get conflicting reports pretty consistently and this movie feels like an interesting turning point where you know, you talk about the production designer who's this legendary figure who's well known for basically having like shaped the look of the most powerful ongoing franchise in movie

[01:06:06] history, right? Yes, and he obviously designed this movie and that in the production of this movie. There's a lot of like commentary or counter commentary about how Kubrick was a real like collaborator, you know that he

[01:06:19] was a person who would like sit in a room and every morning for an hour people would talk and share ideas and he would just pluck the best ideas and he would curate but I feel like publicly his reputation is like monomaniacal obsessive singular tyrant, right?

[01:06:34] And so like I can never kind of figure out. Well, is he a great collaborator? Like if you see film worker, you know that that movie about you know, his right hand person for many years like is so

[01:06:43] laudatory and you know, like really warm about what it was like to work with him. But on the other hand, he has that like hundred take psychology that makes him seem like a demon and I can never kind of

[01:06:55] figure out like what is true or maybe both things are true about it. Do you have thoughts on this David because I certainly do. I let me say my thoughts because I mean obviously it comes up more and more especially as we're going deeper into his

[01:07:05] filmography and he becomes more powerful, right? Like he has more clout and it really does remind me of Fincher and when I did this piece interviewing all of interest collaborators to may have said in a different episode. It's like the same thing of like the absolute warmth all

[01:07:20] of them have towards him and like how dismissive they were of like all the multiple takes like people like doing that, you know, people were just you know, they were just like come on it's acting it's work.

[01:07:31] We all come here to work and we're having a great time and that's the vibe you get from so many of these. It's not like Hubert collaborated with people one time and then they moved on like he would people would return to him

[01:07:42] and clearly found the process of you know, big Ken Adam for example, he wins an Oscar with Kubrick for Barry Lyndon a few years later like so it's obvious that if you bought in or if you got onto his wavelength or whatever that there was

[01:07:58] such a rich like collaboration you can have with the guy and then it just feels like the stuff like the Shelley Duvall stories. You're like, well, this is someone who clearly was like, what you know, they were not in any kind of Symphony or

[01:08:14] what, you know, like they were they were just there's just some kind of crossed wire and like the communication seems so horrible here and then it just that just sounds like torture when it's being described to you. Yeah, I mean the I think it's a weird.

[01:08:28] I mean, I have made this comparison already in other episodes, but like he's compared so much to Hitchcock and the precision of the vision and everything like that, but Hitchcock was a guy who like the movie exists in my head. It's perfect.

[01:08:43] And now I need to figure out how to communicate to you idiots how to do exactly what I want. Right? Yes, right. Sure. Yes, whereas Kubrick I think was really looking for things that excited him like he wanted Discovery, you know, he wanted exploration.

[01:09:02] He wanted the things that he couldn't come up with himself, but I think it was like his his sort of exacting control freak nature came in the relentless pursuit of I'm not going to stop until I find that thing and when he finds

[01:09:18] the thing it's like it's exactly that that it's that without moving an inch to the right or to the left and I think sometimes he would hire people and say like, you know, I'm hiring a collaborator like Peter Sellers and what I'm

[01:09:34] hiring him to do is be Peter Sellers and give me a lot of material to keep generating until I find the thing I want and then sometimes be it on camera or sort of, you know, in craft positions or whatever.

[01:09:47] He'd hire people to say I like that thing you did in this other movie and I want you to replicate it here. I already completed the process of finding what I want because I saw it in your previous work now just do it again.

[01:10:01] And I think that's when like he had difficult relationships with people because then they were like, I'm not being encouraged to create. He just wants to use me as a color on a palette. Whereas other times I think he was saying I haven't found it yet.

[01:10:15] I'm hiring someone to give me options, you know? Yeah, I think I have a kind of a reverse relationship though to Kubrick and Hitchcock because I think I like Hitchcock at his most powerful. I like him in the North by Northwest Psycho the birds, you

[01:10:31] know rear window that era are my favorite films of his when he's like I'm in Hollywood and I'm in control of everything and Kubrick it does eventually get to this place right where he's like and you guys I'm sure we'll talk about this at length in the future.

[01:10:45] But you know by the time you get to Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut, I really I love those movies, but you can feel a man holding a stick very tightly. Yeah, those movies in a way that this movie is like you

[01:10:57] could the hundredth time you watch it. It feels surprising the hundredth time you watch it. You're like boy a lot of really fascinating like risk-taking people seem to be in a room together making this happen. And I that's just for whatever reason for him.

[01:11:09] It's just a slightly more charming for me slightly more exciting. It's also so interesting because like Spartacus the story is like I got hired by an actor. I'm on this set with all these fucking August well-established ego driven actors and I'm fighting to like get what I want

[01:11:27] to have this in any way reflect my voice and he comes off of that being like I'm making movies my fucking way. I'm not working for anyone else ever again, but then this is a movie in which he views an actor as a true collaborator

[01:11:38] and then you get to stuff like, you know, Eyes Wide Shut where he's working with Tom Cruise at like the peak of his fame and he's like you are an instrument, you know, they're all the stories of Tom Cruise coming to him like crying going

[01:11:49] like what do you want Stanley? Tell me what you want and Tom Cruise is so obsessed with being the guy who's like I can execute anything right and Kubrick's like you're a cat just wander around until I find what I want.

[01:12:01] You know, you can't deliver it to me also his last three movies shining Full Metal Jacket Eyes Wide Shut. I think the reason the Shining and Eyes Wide Shut are more successful in that they are two of my favorite movies then

[01:12:15] Full Metal Jacket, which I think is a very good slightly flawed movie is that like the Shining and Eyes Wide Shut are about the most tightly wound protagonists imaginable. So they really fit with a very tightly wound ultra controlling

[01:12:29] artist who is crafting these like very hermetic and frightening and claustrophobic movies. Whereas Full Metal Jacket, I'm like I feel like I'm in a room and I'm supposed to be in Vietnam. Like, you know, I'd struggle a little bit with Full Metal Jacket for that reason.

[01:12:45] You're so right. And also all three of those movies are really psychological and I Strange Love is intellectual, but I'm not sure it's psychological. No, no, I mean, no, I think the only stuff where it feels more like Kubricky is is the stuff I'm referencing where it's like,

[01:13:00] oh wow. Did I just watch guys put codes into a box for five minutes? Like, you know, that's just where you're like, I think a lot of directors wouldn't do that. And I like that he does to be clear.

[01:13:10] I like that he's so obsessed with the process because part of the satire of Doctor Strange Love is there's all these fucking processes and rules and, you know, fail-safes and things built in and then everyone gets in a room and they're like, oh shit.

[01:13:25] There's so much stuff that we actually can't tell these guys to turn around. Like there's so many stupid codes and so many like, you know, systems built up to stop that from happening that one crazy guy just ended the world.

[01:13:38] Oh, and then like that's what it equally as funny when the Russian guy, the Russian ambassador shows up and it's like we built this doomsday thing. I don't know. You guys are so crazy. We figured we had to do something crazy too.

[01:13:51] And they have to explain all these like logic of that like the absolutely ridiculous logic of these things. Not not to like but it was the thing that was like so unnerving from the moment Trump got elected was like, here's

[01:14:07] this guy who spent the last 10 years going online and going on talk shows and going like if I were present, I would just do this instead with no thoughts about like what is the chain of actions that happens from you saying that and then he

[01:14:19] got elected and gained no perspective on the chain of action from what he says and it is like it's it's the absurdity of when you cut to a fucking room like this and it's a bunch of guys in suits sitting in chairs being like first pitch

[01:14:34] bad pitch, but what if and you're like the repercussions of what you're casually throwing out are so wild. To think of how much they hinge on like a conversation is kind of insane. Yeah, I feel like he's also gotten a little bit stuck in

[01:14:51] a good way on process and technology being portrayed on screen and like 2001 that like there's a huge stretches of 2001. They're just like pressing buttons on how and trying to figure out like what is the right way to do something the same.

[01:15:04] I think is even true of Clockwork Orange where there's like long stretches of deep programming where you're just like thinking through what you have to do to the human brain to fix it and he kind of like gets way far away from that stuff

[01:15:17] as he gets further into his career, but you can see like the same way that I feel like technology just sat right on top of society from like 1960 all the way through our present day. He seems really invested in that and so that's part of the

[01:15:29] reason why I think he's like we're going to sit in this plane for watching this movie for like the 60th time. I'm like God, this is a lot of time on this plane for a 90-minute movie. Yeah.

[01:15:39] Yeah, for when it barely matters except I guess at the end you're like, oh, I guess we needed to know that the plane was damaged etc. So, you know, we need to understand why at the very end this plane just can't be caught like these guys are actually

[01:15:53] too good, which I'd love that. I love it where when Muffly is like it's initiative like what am I supposed to do? He's on the phone to the Soviet guy. He's like we train them to get away from them dude when

[01:16:06] he goes into the safe and pulls out the hat like that that is part of the plan. Yes. Do you know what I mean? Like God that it's like Looney Tunes level joke, but so good, but I mean it also gets to like what you were talking

[01:16:20] about Sean of like the dick measuring contest of this shit, you know that it's like the idea of being like the cowboy of the atomic bomb, you know, the man wild enough to ride the thing and that it wasn't an impulsive decision but that

[01:16:37] like this guy was going to go out like a fucking cowboy when the moment called him. Yeah Kong almost like channels Ripper once he accepts that plan R is real like once he's accepted it. He's like your goddamn right.

[01:16:50] We're doing this how exciting you know, what a weird impulse to be like it is doomsday. It's here and I'm fired up and I'm going to do it like a fucking man. I also I love in and win who plays the the Colonel who bat

[01:17:07] but what back guano is that his name who shows up and you know, there's just the super extended sequence of Mandrake just be like for God's sake man. Give me some money. I need to call this guy on the phone the president and he

[01:17:21] just like the the like the so slow Ben's laughing. I mean it well, he's like he's like you're going to have to deal with it's a great final line but like just just every time you see the layers and layers of rules that have been

[01:17:37] created out of some sort of like, of course we need these kinds of rules to have a just society that will not bomb, you know at random and then you just watch how all those rules just make everything impossible. It's it's really good.

[01:17:52] Should we attempt to go through the plot of this movie? Oh, yeah more plotty. It's potty then then maybe its reputation would suggest. No, it is but it's just also surprisingly simple or at least doesn't have a lot of sets. You know what I mean?

[01:18:10] It's sort of like you've got the plane. You've got the you know, the 80 843rd bomb wing or whatever. Yeah, you have Jack D Ripper on base with Lionel Mandrake and you have the war room and that's it right like there's the one scene of George C.

[01:18:28] Scott with his girlfriend the only woman in the movie. I'm guessing right? Yes. Yes, so there's no yeah Tracy Reed and that's everything right? I'm not I'm not forgetting something. It's one of these deceptively sort of cheap economic films

[01:18:48] like even though it looks so broad and these sets are so impressive, right? Right. It's basically three sets. I guess for if you include George C. Scott's bedroom apartment right apartment. Yeah. So actually while we're recording this I was preparing an

[01:19:05] episode of my show and the theme of the show is like the best one crazy night movies and I was like is this one of the best one crazy night movies like this interesting kind of a kind of the I the ultimate one crazy night.

[01:19:18] It's a fair point. It is absolutely one crazy. It's practically an afternoon. I mean, yeah, it's a short a short period of time but Sean what about the wolf pack? I mean that night was so crazy couldn't even remember it the next morning dad. That's a wild one.

[01:19:32] That is a wild. So these guys wait, wait, Sean. What was the peg for one crazy night? Is there one crazy night movie coming out or something? I know I just is bodies bodies bodies. Of course, right? Right bodies bodies bodies. Go. Yes, I know.

[01:19:46] I just imagine August is the toughest for the big picture because it's like looking at the schedule. What could be possibly, you know, one could make the case that every episode is tough to do at this stage of Hollywood, but that's okay. It's true.

[01:20:00] I admire the opportunities that you guys have to talk about the great films. We design this well by accident. You're right. It was certainly a thing like especially when the pandemic hit where I was like God am I happy that five years ago

[01:20:14] we committed to a format that does not revolve around any current going on. Well, no. Well, that's the thing. But then anytime we actually do have to like, you know, review a new movie. We're like, oh, this is so annoying. We have to do it within a week.

[01:20:30] I know it's maddening. It's like the bane of our existence now. Wait, I mean in the early days we would be looking for excuses to cover new movies where we'd be like, oh, we both like Jack Reacher. Let's do an episode because Jack Reacher 2 is coming out.

[01:20:43] We're deciding that that is worthy of being in the pantheon of what we cover and then now we're almost like trying to find ways to disqualify new releases by technicality. Yeah, it's like I think there are downsides to the format

[01:20:58] that you guys have but for me, it's like so I can I ring 37 minutes out of bullet train like really do I have 37 minutes of conversation about a movie that is vanished into dust the minute I exited the theater. Yeah, that's that's the challenge.

[01:21:14] But hey, we're all professionals, you know, we can all do it right and look certainly I mean we'll cover movies that are like that but also have the added benefit of being decades old and not seen by anybody. Those are my favorite episodes though, right?

[01:21:29] And then exactly we can have fun being like, well, what's this over here? You know where is it's right what you have for lunch. People were like what all time best tangents Griffin asking David what he had for lunch in the Loveless episode.

[01:21:43] I had a burrito but let me tell you guys I ordered it. We got home this morning. I we there's no food in the house. I ordered deliveries from like a place around the corner. Thank you. And they sent me the wrong order.

[01:21:55] They sent me a different David s's order. Oh my two David s's ordering at the same time David s Ward and I just called them and they and they just ran me my order and I gave them the other guys order back it all worked out

[01:22:09] that could have been an inspired bit in the sandwich delivery scene and dr. Strangelove the Cooper conceived like what if they got the wrong? Mr. President sandwich, that's what he was missing. That is actually what he was missing.

[01:22:21] The joke was right there Stanley David and you running down the basic shape of the plot which I do think we should delve into a little more. I do think that's a thing watching this is like a 10 year

[01:22:31] old or whatever that confused me is I was actually a kid who liked this type of movie where there's like a fundamental misunderstanding or miscommunication in the chain the ripple effects of which put the entire world on edge, right?

[01:22:48] Like we talked about some recent episode how much I loved the Russians are coming. The Russians are coming. Yeah kid, which is a movie that is like kind of similar in its setup where and it is also like a comedy about the Cold

[01:22:59] War, you know, Cold War comedy similar era 66. Yeah, right or I mean one of those ways that I remember thinking was so funny as a kid and yet I don't think I could tell you a single thing that happens past the 15 minute mark

[01:23:11] the gods must be crazy a movie. I assume plays terribly today, but one of those things where my parents could pitch me like here's the premise of the movie they find a coke bottle and it destroys their entire understanding of reality and I'm like funny.

[01:23:24] I understand like comedic cause and effect this movie. I think if you're watching it as a kid, it's hard to even gauge when the realization of what's going on with Ripper has happened because it's done in such a sedate dry way.

[01:23:42] It's it's it's very ordinary until it's not right then he gets crazy but like that happens so much later than the point where Mandrake figures it out and it's when I guess it's when Mandrake has the radio, right? Like that's what it is.

[01:23:56] Yeah, that's that's the revelation and again sellers underplays it just so well. He's like, you know funny business. Yeah, I was listening to the radio here, you know doing all I wish I could do him. Yeah, I don't know about the plot grip like it's like yeah, you

[01:24:09] see the planes they're airborne and then you see man, you know you see Ripper issuing wing attack plan are and you see them doing all the communications and all that and then eventually Mandrake realizes there's no attack order. Nothing is happening.

[01:24:25] Ripper is just gone mad Ripper locks them in the office starts talking about fluids and then we cut to the war room pretty much right where we cut to book with his girlfriend and then we cut to the war room hinging on this sort of overthought

[01:24:39] idea that once that plan is put into effect all communications have to be ceased because they're too worried about their enemies interfering with false communications that now a false communication has set them in a place where no one can correct them with the real message.

[01:24:55] Yes, the only guy who can undo it is insane. Yeah, I mean he's also you know, there's a lot of unfortunate kind of like sexual metaphor to read into the entire movie, but like he's trying to put a prophylactic around the whole base

[01:25:07] right and everybody else especially George C. Scott is like I'm ready to fuck like a movie literally starts with like him in the bathroom getting ready to fuck and then he's like well, I can't fuck here but I have to go downstairs

[01:25:19] and fuck in the war room, you know, like that's sure every setup is about a man trying to have sex with something. Well, and it gets back to like the weird cowboy sort of fascination with with the bomb of like it's all these like it's it's it's

[01:25:36] sport for these guys. You know, it is like a sexual thing. The idea of being able to dominate on this scale to control that much power conquering if it fucking kills them right they feel like I'm going to die like John Wayne right?

[01:25:51] It's what Scott plays so well is you do buy him as the general that don't you presenting options to the president but then just like the hint of excitement. He clearly has it like look, what if we actually do it, you know,

[01:26:06] we could catch up with their pants down, you know, we've you know, the famous, you know, I you know 10 20 million will get our hair must but like that that he's like look I've spent my whole career planning for something like this.

[01:26:19] We might as well add the ball went down the hill. I'm not going to go get it like right. Let's just let's see what happens. You know, maybe we knock him out his biggest concern at this

[01:26:29] point is almost just being blue ball like he's so close to the thing that he's waited his whole fucking life or prepared for it's how it ends to you know, and he's like we need to be prepared when they take over more underground caves so that when we

[01:26:45] emerge our numbers are stronger. Right? My chef Gavin. Yes. No and like I muffly is a very funny performance. Like it is a good comic performance from Peter Sellers is a slightly ineffectual wet blanket of a president.

[01:27:02] He modeled it on Adlai Stevenson like he's doing a thing but you're also kind of watching this guy be like plainly heroic and he's like fuck it. I'm going to call the Soviet premier. I'm just going to give him to like location of these planes.

[01:27:15] I'm going to like plainly be on military, right? I'm going to I'm going to just be like to shoot those guys down. We're sorry total mistake by us. He's not going to like be an evil Warhawk.

[01:27:26] You're watching a guy, you know do the decent thing in a weird sort of a way. It doesn't really work but like school. It's cool. It's such an interesting point too because to Griffin's point about don't look up in the Meryl Streep character.

[01:27:39] It feels like the last time in American history where a satire like this the most reasonable person in the film was the president and that's a great it's because Kennedy was the president and he seemed like a if not reasonable at least

[01:27:51] a measured person in the face of possible nuclear annihilation. And so yes that choice to make everyone around the president crazy is so smart and works so well in this movie, but that's the thing that Nixon breaks where it's like now we know a

[01:28:06] president can exist in the modern age in the media who can behave on presidentially at their very core not just do corrupt things but like clearly lose it, you know, like not be able to hold their shit together on camera.

[01:28:22] And then from that point the possibilities comedically get a little out of control. Can I throw out 1960 is the year the Bob Newhart releases the button-down mind and button-down mind strike back, right which are like the best-selling albums of that year and win

[01:28:40] the Grammy for album of the year. Yeah, sure. I feel like a heavy influence on the way the president's phone call with Russia play out in this movie like they are essentially doing the Peter Sellers. I'm sorry the Bob Newhart bit like Peter Sellers is doing

[01:28:57] Newhart where the joke is in filling in the blanks of what they must be saying on the other end of the phone only getting the reactions in a conversation where it feels like the other person is saying the larger things and isn't isn't it isn't

[01:29:11] that the album that has Abe Lincoln versus Madison Avenue. Yes, it's like the presidential inspiration connected there too. I do think like that's the most clear-cut example because he's really kind of pulling Bob Newhart's format which by the way, what's his name?

[01:29:29] Shelly Berman kind of created before Newhart Newhart maybe lifted a little bit but Newhart at least popularized to a different degree. But but even just comedically, I think the whole tone of this movie is very much on that wavelength of the Abe Lincoln versus

[01:29:44] Madison Avenue where it's like can you really dig into the banality of these conversations around things that we view as being very important and dramatic. All right. I mean there was some quote from James Earl Jones where he was saying that like Kubrick's main thing was he constantly

[01:30:00] wanted them to be eating that he kept on giving them like Twinkies to shove in their mouths and shit and he was like, I think he was just really into putting these very banal mundane things in the middle of a very high-pressure situation which

[01:30:12] gets to the meal order and everything. Right? This is the quote. I think that was a comment on how people deal with fear. I think he liked the mundane aspect of horrific events and it makes sense like again, that's sort of that feels like

[01:30:28] a Kubrick operation that would not be observation. Jesus that would not be obvious to other people. Yeah. I think all that little detail stuff is so funny. Like obviously the big lines in this movie hit it when it gets broad it works.

[01:30:42] They were probably right to cut the pie fight or whatever like they probably recognize the moments where it was like too much like strange love is probably the limit of how broad a thing can get but strange love works too, but I just love

[01:30:55] all the little stuff you're talking about like the conversation with the Russian premier or whatever like all the little haggling that George C. Scott does like that stuff is just as funny as anything else the line where he's like, he would see the big board when

[01:31:12] he's protesting the ambassador showing up like God I have to say too because and he's come up in a later episode already, but I just was really getting Tim Robinson vibes at times from George. We have to stop invoking Tim Robinson on her. Okay, I'm sorry.

[01:31:32] It's just I couldn't help it. You don't understand Sean. There's like 20 minutes of talk about this on the shining episode more more no, but it is it is that thing of like the complete commitment to absurdity, you know, just like full throttled. I strongly believe what I'm saying.

[01:31:50] I'm getting too emotionally worked up about it. I think the only other person who could do all four of these roles is Tim Robinson. Yeah, he imagined the remake we're starting to realize that perhaps Tim Robinson is the only person who could have starred

[01:32:03] in every Kubrick movie aside from who he actually cast. Yeah born too late. The only yeah, I mean like so the attack is happening. They're trying to figure out how to recall it. They bring in the Soviet ambassador.

[01:32:14] They you know, they try to call up the premier on the phone and he reveals well, we have this doomsday machine that if anything goes off in our country, it's just going to blanket the world in nuclear fallout. And so everything will be destroyed and that's when dr.

[01:32:28] Strangelove comes in. I feel like he's the last element to arrive and I remember as a kid, like you say Griff. I was like, I get that. This is funny. Obviously, this is a big broad performance, but what is going

[01:32:40] on? Like sure is this why would he be here? And I remember my parents having to be like, well after the war, you know, there are all these German scientists like, you know, they having to explain the context of that bit to

[01:32:52] me. It makes me laugh so much now and it's almost a more understated performance than I remembered. Yeah, is that crazy to say? No, no, actually kind of, you know, he's kind of quiet with the lines. Well, you know, you just remember him shrieking and he doesn't

[01:33:08] really shriek that much like it's it's am I I don't know like it's it's almost subtle at times. It's the one character that plays most in close-up. Yeah, right. I feel like this is a movie that's really big on wide shots

[01:33:24] and and holding like, you know, your master shots for like the entirety of a scene as long as you can and and his stuff is played really close. Like when he starts talking he is kind of the only thing that exists on screen.

[01:33:38] And so so if he were over the top it would play even bigger at that range and you're right that he is actually pretty Controlled and he saves the mania. I mean, he really takes a while to build up to it and picks his moments very strategically.

[01:33:55] I can't remember. I don't know. I'm going to get the title of this wrong. So forgive me, but you know, there's a story that Orson Welles used to tell about starring in a play called something like waiting for Mr. Wong and he was playing Mr.

[01:34:09] Wong and everybody had to wait through the first two acts of the play for Mr. Wong to show up and that like you really needed to deliver on Mr. Wong because everybody who showed up for that thing, Dr. Strangelove is kind of the same thing.

[01:34:20] I mean you have to wait almost 55 minutes just to get to Sellers as strange. Why is the movie called Dr. Strangelove? And even at the end of the movie, I'm not even totally sure why it's called Dr. Strangelove. It's just the best title.

[01:34:30] Yeah, but it's not the most representative title and there are like so many titles that they that they messed with that. I'm sure you've seen David like there they Kubrick wrote down like 30 different titles half of them are kind of genius and

[01:34:42] would have been great for the movie and yet somehow Strangelove and that character like it became the most emblematic thing, but you're right that it's kind of a miracle that the character actually does deliver. He does that it feels like a heightening when we've already

[01:34:56] had like two Sellers on screen because they only create that expectation by calling the movie that like they the movie is not foreshadowing him right if his name were not in the poster that pressure would not be on the character.

[01:35:11] You could see reality in which the film had one of the other titles, which I'm sure David's about to run down and that then when Dr. Strangelove shows up you're like, oh pleasant surprise in the last act. There's this Peter Sellers character.

[01:35:23] You'll never see coming versus me as a kid. I'm leaning and going like when are we getting a fucking Strangelove? That's where the money is right? Like Wonderful Bomb is a funny one that he he came up with that is kind of amusing. Dr.

[01:35:37] Doomsday or how to start World War 3 is one that feels like probably came close. Sorry, how to start World War 3 without even trying. Okay, the weird one is Dr. Strangelove's secret uses of Uranus. I don't know what got cut from the screenplay that that would make more sense.

[01:35:57] What else I'm looking at? He has like there's this like a note page. Yeah, that piece of paper that he'd like you don't knock the bomb. Dr. Doomsday meets Ingrid Strangelove. He's just like writing shit down. I don't look up. Don't look up.

[01:36:14] Yeah, the big the big short. What was it called? How do I not remember? Yeah, I got it. Yeah, some of the names they don't use General Buck Schmuck Alexei Alexei Dostoevsky. I said was going to be called Ambassador to Assad. That's kind of funny.

[01:36:33] Major Nance, Lieutenant Quentin Quiffler. I like the idea of Peter Sellers saying not only am I refusing to play Buck Schmuck, but there should not be a fucking character in Buck Schmuck. And as we take that out of the goddamn script, one of the funniest

[01:36:49] scenes to me and tell me if this is too dark is when Sterling Hating kills himself because of the monologue that Mandrake is doing. That's so banal. He's like, yes, some water on your neck. That's what you need.

[01:37:01] You know, that'll wake any man up like the whole it's so funny and then he shoots himself. It gets me every time. Yeah, it's fine. I don't know what you guys think of that. It's funny. Sure.

[01:37:10] I'm just trying to look at some of these other and I'm trying to look at these other names. I just feel like the bomb and Doctor Strange love or how to be afraid 24 hours a day is just an amazing how to be afraid 24 hours a day.

[01:37:21] Yeah, I like that. That's really good. But it's interesting that Doctor Strange lover how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb is the only or title that works like even the other titles that are good.

[01:37:32] You're like you could have picked the back half of the front Half when you put the or in there, it's too much. I think it has to be called Doctor Strange love and they were right to pick that even though it doesn't really set you up

[01:37:46] for what the movie is going to be just because it's just a great name. It just it just sits in your head so well, you'll never forget it. Yeah, and and and also just the fact that like when the character

[01:37:58] arrives as you said he delivers so it it feels earned in your You know, there's no more context about this movie. Like this is like the most chill Stanley Kubrick shoot. He doesn't fight with the studio that much everybody's basically on board with what he's doing.

[01:38:13] Sure George C. Scott's a bit much but he respects him like this is just the one that is not loaded with either big fights with his producers or crazy tales of a hundred takes driving people mad or anything

[01:38:28] like that like and like you say Griff like it's a hit, you know moderate hit and more importantly gets Oscar nominations and whatever becomes just whatever the most respected comedy of all time in some circles. That's why when Sean picked it, I was like wow you picked kind

[01:38:45] of the most unimpeachable one in a way like it's it's an interesting pick Sean you had your pick a Kubrick that was I'm very grateful for that. Of course. Well you were I don't think I said when I first saw it and I

[01:38:55] actually don't know when I first saw it but it is definitely not the first Kubrick that I saw. So what was I definitely saw the shining before this and I definitely saw Full Metal Jacket because it was on HBO non-stop circa 1990.

[01:39:08] So I may have even seen 2001 before this as well. So then that's the only one I'm not sure I may have seen that first. It was right. I saw it but just to see this movie and like not know anything

[01:39:21] about Killers Kiss or The Killing or Lolita or Spartacus or any of the I didn't I never saw any of those movies before I saw this but I had seen all of his sort of like later period masterpieces and this is the biggest what's it to me?

[01:39:32] This is the biggest like how come you never tried anything like this again because you're so good at this and it's the one that is the most singular to me. It's the one that I probably watched the most obviously the funniest

[01:39:43] but it's also, you know, there are 900 million like New Yorker.com essays about this but it's the one that's like this movie still applies. It is nothing has expired about it at all. And even though we don't live in an age of nuclear panic.

[01:39:55] It's like this is exactly how government works. This is exactly how power operates. This is exactly how like masculinity motivates people to do awful stupid things. And so it's it's this unusual document a lot of his movies. I'm sure you guys are talking about like really continue to

[01:40:10] resonate strongly but this one in particular. I'm like it nails the absurdity of modern life in 1963 like that's wild but there there is the interesting aspect of I mean you asking why wouldn't he do this again when he nailed it with this

[01:40:27] is like it felt like he was sort of competitive with himself in terms of if I've succeeded doing something then the next challenge is to take on a different type of movie. I have not made before and see if I can make it better than everyone else, right?

[01:40:41] I'm going to make the scariest movie of all time. I'm going to make the most sort of like intellectually respected comedy of all time. I'm going to step up to the table pick a genre pick Amelia, whatever

[01:40:52] it is a technical challenge and like once I knocked out of the park I have no interest in repeating myself. I think part of the other reason that it's interesting to me is the last thing that you said David which is that it's not a film that

[01:41:05] is mired and like production controversy, which I do think create creates a lot of interesting conversation, but he's one of the few people who I'm like, I don't really care about that. Like I I do care about it with David Fincher for whatever reason

[01:41:16] but with Kubrick the movies themselves are these big ideological tentpole concept driven films that I think are worth just like tearing apart and looking at closely especially also starting with this if Kubrick fights with people he wins he always triumphs.

[01:41:33] It's not like some of these other Ocher's where it's a you know, whatever a give-and-take or but like one for them one for me like right? Yes, Kubrick loses some battles on like Spartacus and Lolita but

[01:41:45] after Doctor Strangelove like as much of a pain in the ass as he could be he ends up making a revered movie that is discussed Forever like that's that is so it gets a little boring to talk about it.

[01:41:57] I think it's an interesting point you raise because I feel the same way but I almost think I I have become less interested in that side of Kubrick over time because of how much other people are obsessive about it and and focus on that more than the movies

[01:42:14] themselves like, you know what I will read any fucking interview with like Fincher or Soderbergh or any of that classic guy James Gray these guys who are like so good at explaining their process their interests their tastes their beliefs on the industry at large there.

[01:42:33] There's nothing elusive about them. They are they're charming and funny and intelligent and their open books about like this is exactly what I was going through. This is how I work. I want to demystify the thing and something about how elusive

[01:42:45] Kubrick made himself makes it so easy for people to project all This fucking shit onto it. And I think also they want to believe that he was just this absolute Galaxy brain genius who saw everything more clearly than everyone else and did everything perfectly and it's like

[01:43:03] that's so much less interesting to me, you know, I mean like Terrence Malick is another person who is like spent decades being reclusive by design doesn't speak to the press doesn't explain his own work their questions about his process and

[01:43:17] all of that but as much as I find his process more interesting to consider because it's so organic and shapeless until it comes together. There's that lack of intentionality. I'm also not like I need to read diaries of the day-by-day accounts of how he's working.

[01:43:35] It is fun though to hear Adrian Brody talk about making the thin red line in a way that like maybe it's not as interesting to hear people talk about the production on the Kubrick films right because because you like when it's like you're gambling

[01:43:49] when you're getting cast in a Terrence Malick movie, you know, 100% 100% Yeah. No Malik is so much more fun. Right? You're like Kubrick. What was it like working on Kubrick movie? He was very demanding and exacting and he made the exact movie.

[01:44:01] He wanted to make it was a lot of takes. He had it in his head, right? Yeah, Alex interesting because Malik shoots like a fucking choose-your-own-adventure book and people are just like well they didn't choose that adventure. It's not in the book.

[01:44:13] Well and also Malik just it's like he's this like Fae creature from like an Elvish land. They're just like, oh, you know this sort of jolly mysterious guy in a straw hat and you know, I had just done the best

[01:44:25] acting of my life and he was shooting, you know a dandelion instead or whatever and then he like a sample of the movie news like you're not in except for one shot. You should come to the premiere and I went and I saw it and

[01:44:35] I wept at a masterpiece like, you know, it's like it just sounds like a delightful experience, but they all call him Terry in every they all call him Terry and none of us idiots will ever call him Terry but every actor who has been cut

[01:44:48] out of his films is like well Terry is a dear friend David by the way, he'll never call them and say you've been cut out by the way come to the premiere and assistant or producer will say you should come to the premiere and they show up

[01:44:58] in their fucking finest wares waiting to see themselves up on the big screen. I think I just remember I remember a Clooney interview where he now I told him like you're not really in the movie, but I'm using your one speech birth in red line and Clooney said

[01:45:16] I begged him to cut it out. Like yeah, I was like, please don't just have me in one scene. It would look so weird and Malik was like no, what are you talking about? And Clooney said like I love the movie like yeah, whatever

[01:45:28] but but just certainly upon hearing it was just like please don't do that. Please don't happen be sticking out in one weird scene. The first time I ever watched thin red line. It was with my buddy Doug Rosenberg who is a college and we

[01:45:41] rented it from like the school library and went to a private viewing room or whatever and when Clooney came on screen, I think he literally like fell off the chair onto his knees and was like he's introducing George Clooney two and a half

[01:45:56] hours in like this so disrupts the ecosystem of every you can't just casually throw in a quick Clooney monologue George Clooney like at his absolute hottest season for VR, you know Three Kings like really it's I love that movie. I need to rewatch it. Yeah, fucking masterpiece.

[01:46:15] We got to do Malik. We got to do Malik. We should do Malik. Yeah. Yeah. Should we do Malik Sean? Who should we do? Yeah, I mean I want in on on song to song. I just feel like that is like really so disgust mastery going

[01:46:29] on in song song capturing the hotbed of Austin circa 2011. I think that was really I think those three hated movies are really interesting. I do too. I really love Night of Cups the most. That's the one I weird ones.

[01:46:42] Yeah, but song to song is the one that I like just remember seeing it like the Dolby screening room and being like, I don't know. I have to write a review. Oh shit like and I would like to return to it.

[01:46:54] That's the one that I had the most trouble with but I do like all those movies. I like all his movies. It's fascinating that a hidden life is like I mean part of it. I guess is timing or whatever but was like the most quiet

[01:47:06] comeback movie of all time fucking rule like he had this mysterious legacy then made three bombs that made everyone go like is this guy a false King and then he had this like return to form movie that already I feel like has kind of been forgotten.

[01:47:20] He foretells the like onstage personal crisis of Ben Affleck arguably better into the wonder than in gun girl. Like he is like ahead of the curve who that's happening to Ben Affleck, you know, like they're Malik.

[01:47:33] He knows more than he lets on and I feel like I should rewatch to the wonder for that reason where it's like I saw it when it came out and I was like, oh, this is sort of interesting Netflix in it.

[01:47:42] And now as part of the Affleck taxonomy, it is a was be would be feel crucial. It's an interesting text. God. I somehow had completely forgotten that he has made a Jesus Christ movie with guess. Yeah, right as Jesus Christ and Mark Rylance is Satan that

[01:47:59] that's something five years away in the editing room from us getting to see I mean Malik rules. There's no debate about that. He absolutely rules rules, but he's only 78. He's got he's got a bunch more twirling left. It's great.

[01:48:11] It's we're going to get more Malik should play the box office game guys. We do that. Yeah. Are there any final thoughts you have Sean? Yeah. Is there any strange love stuff? We haven't mentioned my favorite tidbit is that Stanley Kubrick

[01:48:27] cast one of his heroes daughters in this movie and put her in a bikini in a scene. That's just absolutely absurd. Like he Carol Reads daughter is Tracy Reed. Yeah, and you know, like he really aspired to make these

[01:48:39] sort of like patrician beautiful English, you know, he makes Barry Lyndon later on and so I just there's something very perverse. The whole movie is very perverse but that in particular is a very perverse act in my opinion. Yeah, that is interesting.

[01:48:54] That's not a closing thought but it's a little indicative of like have we really put our finger on just how quite twisted Stanley Kubrick is the guy who made Lolita and Eyes Wide Shut like he's a he's a weird horn dog and needs to be reminded

[01:49:07] of that a weird horn dog. Oh boy, would I not want to be in that bedroom? Like yeah, and I'm a horn dog. I respect it. I'm just like both this you're right both like all the movies here and Eyes Wide Shut.

[01:49:20] I'm like, I don't I don't think I'm interested in whatever this is unique predilections for sure. Did she have a thing with Peter Sellers? Because I'm looking in like after this or two biggest credits are shot in the dark and Casino Royale.

[01:49:32] She was married to Edward Fox all the way up until the production of this movie. Okay, and then they split up and then I think it makes it seem like maybe she made a leap to sell her suit.

[01:49:44] I mean, obviously he was very active at this period in swinging was we landed. Yeah, another guy where I'm just like I imagine having sex with Peter Sellers was the most vacant activity in the world. I mean, it's obviously the thing everyone talks about were

[01:49:58] like there was no guy there beneath the characters. Well, but imagine if he stayed in character during the act and it'd be thrilling. I'd like to find some of these guys. Yeah, God. No, keep you away. No, I don't want it. I don't want bits. No bits.

[01:50:14] Those are my closing thoughts. Stanley Kubrick is a perv. Yeah. Okay. So this movie which box office game should I do? Should I do the one where it actually is on the charts? Which is the end of February 1964? Why not? Yes. Okay.

[01:50:29] Yeah, when does it technically come out that December? Technically came out right at the end of January 1964. Oh wow. So it's getting nominated for Oscars a full year later. Yeah, man and like shit. We didn't even talk about those Oscars. I don't even know what beat it.

[01:50:44] Do you guys let's talk about that? Let's fucking pull it up. My Fair Lady, My Fair Lady pretty boring. I mean, I love My Fair Lady, but that's not a good movie and like, you know, whatever. Yeah, George Cukor wins best director Rex Harrison wins best actor.

[01:51:03] Come on. This is boring. Yeah, this is pretty boring and Julie Andrews, of course, wins best actress. That's a great Oscar win, but that's a great lady for Mary Poppins. But then Peter Ustinov wins supporting actor for Top Cappy

[01:51:17] even though he won for Spartacus like five years earlier, you know, you give that to George C. Scott. I don't know. That just feels like a Christoph Waltz thing where they were just like we just love with this guy's too and give us as much as he can.

[01:51:31] Has an actor ever been nominated for best actor for playing multiple parts since this happened? I think this is the only one. Kind Hearts and Coronets. Nicholas Cage adaptation. Oh good. Good call. Page and adaptation is a good call.

[01:51:48] I don't think Guinness got a nomination for Kind Hearts and Coronets. Okay. Yeah, double checking that obviously that's a notorious multiple no, he didn't but that's pretty cool. Just lavender Hill mob. Just 11 home. Oh, okay. So just to see like not multiple roles all three characters

[01:52:04] being nominated for that performance and then thinking about what a Rex Harrison doesn't my favorite, you know, Rex Harrison God bless him. He's very talented. But come on Peter Sellers and Dr. Strangelove. Come on. Yeah, I agree. Army Hammer, of course not nominated for Social Network.

[01:52:22] I know Paul Dano not nominated for there will be blood. I'm looking at like lists of yeah, famed multiple roles. These are all twins though. You're all twins or yeah, I know. I know. I know. I know. I'm excited separate and distinct humans. Yeah. No, I know.

[01:52:37] Yeah, Tom Hanks not nominated for Cloud Atlas rude, right? Ewan McGregor not nominated for the Island. It is it is an interesting that is a good performance, especially the second guy. I think is a really good performance. I agree.

[01:52:53] It's an interesting point and you're framing it as like how insane is it? They snub Peter Sellers. I look at this where I'm like, how cool is it that they nominated him despite him being a big movie star at the time

[01:53:04] this being a big film and whatever it is such a unique nomination To be like this guy is the lead of the film because he plays three supporting characters in an ensemble, right? It's true. Yeah, you're right and it's a big look.

[01:53:18] The other nominees are Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole both for Beckett. So to fucking Titans yelling at each other in robes for three hours like that's you know, that's Oscar catnip and then Anthony Quinn for Zorba the Greek and they all lose to Rex

[01:53:35] Harrison being like where my damn slippers. I'd look I love Rex. Harrison, but it is like if I Peter O'Toole or Richard Burton, I'm like, come on. I put it all on the stage for you like a most fucking acting. Yeah, I had a damn crown.

[01:53:49] I had a crown. I did have another thought about a real missed opportunity on two different roles, which is John Travolta at Sean Archer and Caster Troy in face off. I feel like you know because he's bodying when his face is removed. He's playing a second.

[01:54:05] He's playing Caster Troy in John Travolta's body. Yeah, like we've never had an opportunity for that computer sellers do that. Yeah, I think he could maybe good. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's one of the things that's impressive about sellers is like he disguises himself less the really than

[01:54:24] a lot of the other people were talking about who throw a lot more on top of themselves to differentiate the characters visually, you know, like I mean they talk about how like he wanted the head shape change for the president.

[01:54:38] So they didn't just put a bald cap on it, but they sort of elongated the shape of his face and whatever but he's still like basically got the same face and he puts different wigs and mustaches on top of himself for most of these movies,

[01:54:49] you know, he's not a major like prosthetics guy. No. Yeah. The other thing too about the Oscars is like it's a missed opportunity to nominate Sterling Hayden. Yeah, and he's like a very complicated character in Hollywood history.

[01:55:03] I don't know if you guys talked about this on the killing but just his participation in who act and this is amazing documentary that was made about him and his life is kind of falling apart in the 80s, but he this is the first time

[01:55:15] when like his personal struggles like were actualized in a movie and then I felt like filmmakers only use this in movies going forward where they were like, this is a man falling apart who has like an ethical crisis going on and like

[01:55:28] in The Godfather and in The Long Goodbye and it's really it basically like it fortifies his persona going forward in a way and Kubrick like identified that really well, and he's really great in this movie. Yeah. I mean The Long Goodbye performance is the one that really

[01:55:40] jumps out to me of like the the idea of a sort of Golden Age Hollywood actor who became too messy for that controlled era and then a new Hollywood can kind of be reclaimed as the guy who's gone through the shit who's like on the other

[01:55:59] side and sort of towing these lines. I mean his performance in Long Goodbye is like spiritual. It's it's it feels like he's just operating on a different wavelength than the rest of humanity. I love him. I do feel like we didn't mention the who acting mostly because

[01:56:14] that's I guess that happens after the killing right? Like when the killing is what 48? Right. It's between the when's the killing. No, I'm wrong. What are you talking about? What? The killing is 56. Yeah, it's before it's before he's like he's gets real. Yeah.

[01:56:29] He gets reintegrated into Hollywood in some ways, which is kind of unusual. But I if people haven't seen it, I can't remember the name of the film the documentary that it's like a Greek produced documentary about Sterling Hayden.

[01:56:39] That is one of the most like punishing things I've ever seen about a guy at the end of his life being like what have I done? I think it's called Pharaohs of Chaos or something like that. Is that what you're talking about? Yeah, it's high too. Yeah.

[01:56:52] He yeah, apparently he's smoking hashish and drinking heavily throughout so that they have a record of alcoholism. And yeah, this sounds crazy. He's torn asunder. It's wild. I got an amazing thing and he's just saying this is the worst

[01:57:07] thing I ever did that I you know, that I operated with who I can all that. Yeah. Well, he's just also one of those guys with the most incredible, you know slab of a face and I love to look at him and like

[01:57:19] fascinating at every age and shot shot below like he's Mount Rushmore in this movie to that angle that he shot from. Yeah, it looks like a giant statue is yeah harrowing. Okay, the box office game yet. So the at the Oscars, it's just a boring Oscar year.

[01:57:32] It's my fair lady. It's a lot of Beckett. It's over the Greek never seen over the Greek neither. I know it's an incredible 64 is an incredible year for movies in my opinion. You got women in the Dunes which is actually nominated. You got umbrellas of Sherberg.

[01:57:51] You've got hard days night for crying out loud the Beatles, you know, it's a great time working like a dog. But anyway, this movie comes out. Let's all right. So number one, it's you know, you were talking about Russians

[01:58:06] are coming and what's the other one you were talking about Griff? God's must be crazy as much later. But yes, yeah, but both of those are movies where the poster has a million guys on it, right? Yes.

[01:58:17] Yes, the posters trying to give you the sense of like, oh my god, there's so many people this number one at the box office is a comedy with a set the same vibe like you won't believe how many people are involved but it's not mad mad mad mad

[01:58:31] world. It is it is mad mad mad mad world. Yeah, I mean that's another one. I was fascinated by as a kid where I wonder if I watch it now if I would find anything in it funny.

[01:58:41] It's gone all the way around this the globe for me as a kid that my aunt showed me probably like 15 times and ever I would sleep over her house. It was her favorite movie and as a kid I got so sick of it

[01:58:50] and hated it and then I rewatched a couple years ago and I was like, this is a masterpiece really really. It's really really hard to do this. Yeah, really hard to do ensemble zany comedy.

[01:58:58] It's also funny that I loved it so much as a kid and it was my introduction to almost all of their people in their screen personas like you compare that to something like dumb analogy, but grant me this for a moment end game where you're like,

[01:59:12] does this movie have any weight for people who haven't watched the fucking 25 things leading up to this? This movie isn't doing the work of setting up the characters themselves for this one film perhaps a mad mad mad mad world distills everyone's comedic persona so well that I'm like

[01:59:28] I get what buddy Hackett's deal is, you know, I'm not like coasting off of my love of seeing buddy Hackett show up and cut it up with Ethel Merman. I'm meeting both of them and immediately understanding their appeal. It's a great call. That's funny. Now.

[01:59:44] I want to rewatch that. I don't think I've ever seen that in full. I've seen on TV. Like I don't know that I've ever very long movie. One of the one of the longest comedy is ever made.

[01:59:53] Number two at the box office is the best picture winner of 1963 one of the most forgotten and derided Bix best picture winners of the 60s, but a movie I like partly because it stars one of my favorite actors around the world 90 days. No, I've never seen that shit.

[02:00:10] It's not great to show on Earth. No, I've never seen that shit either. Those like the two best picture winners have like I'm like I'm not rushing to those right? Fuck that. I don't want to see him. It's not Tom. No, it's it's Tom Jones.

[02:00:22] I don't feel like that's that derided. I know you love Tom Jones. I'm always on Letterboxd seeing people file their three stars best picture question mark reviews of Tom Jones. Yeah, no, come on now. That's like a cool best picture winner.

[02:00:37] That's one of the ones that makes you think maybe the Academy should not be torn down. It is crazy that in the middle of like a lot of you know, very stayed Oscar winners. There's just one costume drama where it's like what's it

[02:00:48] about and it's like the horniest guy. Everybody wants to fuck him. What do you think of Tom Jones three stars on Letterboxd? Best picture question mark. I think it's a little bit of a thank you for changing British

[02:01:04] Cinema movie, but this is the least good of your good movies. Wow, like it's not as good as a taste of honey loneliness and long-distance runner not as good as the loved one which comes right after it. It's cool.

[02:01:15] It's a movie that's built on one performance, you know Finney is which is a very good performance. Yeah, he's great. But it's like it's pretty it's pretty mid. I would say yeah, it's also just again but again to give you the run of best pictures in the 60s.

[02:01:28] It's at the apartment West Side Story Lawrence of Arabia. Tom Jones my fair lady the sound of music like it's like all these very totemic movies and then Tom Jones kind of sitting in the middle there. Anyway, Tom Jones is number two at the box office.

[02:01:42] Number three is dr. Strangelove now number four is a movie that I almost brought up. It's another political thriller with kind of a similar vibe, but it's serious and it's a movie. I really love but it's also about like the military clashing

[02:01:56] with the president in a big Cold War plot. It's not it's not failsafe. No, I'm sure you like this movie. It's written by Rod Serling Griffin. Why am I not thinking of what this fucking is? Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck because it's really didn't write that many movies.

[02:02:20] Sean, do you know it? You know what I'm talking about here? Great ensemble cast is is it is it is it seven days in May seven days in May Frankenheimer's wonderful political thriller Burt Lancaster Kirk Douglas Frederick March Ava Gardner.

[02:02:38] So I just want to share a take that I've shared in the past before which is that this movie comes in the middle of the Most underrated five-year run in any American filmmakers history, which is John Frankenheimer from 1962 to 1966 makes

[02:02:52] Bird of Man of Alcatraz the Manchurian candidate seven days in May the train seconds and Grand Prix. So wow, that's fucking good. It's very similar to what you were just describing Griffin where Cooper cuz like I'm going to try a different kind of

[02:03:04] a thing every single time slightly different genre moves slightly different style of filmmaking and I'm going to nail it every time and all of those movies are brilliant. Okay, that's my sorry. That was my spiel. I've seen all but the train. I gotta see the train.

[02:03:17] How have I never seen a movie called the train might be the best one Burt Lancaster plays a French resistance fighter at the end of World War two. The Nazis are trying to steal very valuable French art and

[02:03:28] get it into Berlin and he's trying to make them not make the train go the whole movie is how he doesn't want the train to move. It's great. Wow, who plays the train Thomas the tank engine plays the train. Yeah, it's a performance.

[02:03:42] Yeah, it's like James Earl Jones in this where you're like, I didn't realize he was acting at that point seven days in May completely Fox movies used to be so much simpler where you could just say hey, it's Burt Lancaster in the train. I'd be like they're done.

[02:03:58] Sounds good agreed. It's it's just great star in the blank and you're like perfect can't believe no one thought to make a movie about that before number five at the box office is an auto Preminger movie big big movie got a bunch of Oscar nominations including

[02:04:17] I think best director, but maybe not best picture. It's not man with the golden arm. No, it's not fucking anatomy of a murder. No, it's it's not his performance as mr. Freeze on the Batman TV show. It's not that good call.

[02:04:37] But no, it's not that I believe it's a religious drama. Which might be a clue to its title. Is it the cardinal the cardinal? Oh, yeah. Thank you. Sean not a movie. I've seen nope. I wouldn't I would not have gotten it without religious drama.

[02:04:52] That's the only auto Preminger religious drama. I'm familiar with some kind of you know, Irish Catholic priest moral drama kind of thing going on. I don't know. Interesting fact about bass poster. I'm looking at right now. It's a very cool poster.

[02:05:07] Yeah, and Pope Benedict the the later to be Pope Benedict the 16th was the liaison officer from the Vatican for this one. Wow, a little bit of trivia for you. It was it was also the first 35 millimeter blow-up.

[02:05:21] Oh, that's the first movie to be shot in 35 but projected on 70th some other movies in the top 10. You got man's favorite sport question mark the Rock Hudson Howard Hawks comedy which I've never seen all apprentice. You've got love with the proper stranger. That's that Natalie Wood movie.

[02:05:43] That's a wild that up recently. Yeah, I thought it was talking about it. What reason to see the Queen seen that I haven't I just would like to acknowledge that I have a big crush on Paul apprentice Justin.

[02:05:55] I'd be remiss if I didn't say she's really she has my heart and always parallax view. What else is she in? Oh, she's in the separate catch 22 separate. Why what's new plus? Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[02:06:05] Oh, and she was in in a sitcom with Richard Benjamin called he and she married to Richard Ben. She's been in Richard Benjamin's life for many many years. They're still still still kicking since 1961. They're both still alive. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, Richard with Benjamin. It's just a ridiculous person.

[02:06:21] A 60 year plus marriage good for them. Good for me. Shout out. Yeah, it's awesome. Those kids those kids might make it what if like by the time this episode comes out? She's filed for divorce. Oh gosh, I hate that guy. Differences.

[02:06:37] What was the thing I was going to say love with a proper stranger. Neither of you have seen it, right? I haven't seen it. It's a fascinating movie because it's like it's it's about abortion at a time where you cannot believe a movie can that

[02:06:49] candidly be about it, but it's also about it in a relatively light way and it's one of McQueen's first movies and it's like essentially it feels like viewing an alternate path his career could have gone where you're like, what if Steve McQueen was Paul Rudd instead? Right, right.

[02:07:09] Like he's just kind of playing like young glib guy in it and he's very funny and it's a good movie. Now, he was really good in it. You've also got the victors which is a war film starring Albert Finney among other people big boring Carl Foreman movie.

[02:07:27] You've got the misadventures of Merlin Jones. That's a Disney comedy, right? That's a Robert Stevenson movie. Yes. Yeah, okay. Sure and I don't know Merlin Jones and Benson bullshit all kinds of stuff happens. One of those things and then you've got Sunday in New York

[02:07:45] the adaptation of the play starring Jane Fonda and Rod Taylor. It's a lot of movies. I haven't seen this is an interesting box office game. You know, it's a lot of stuff that with movie stars that I don't really know that well in Fonda reflected in 2018.

[02:08:02] She was surprised how many people say they love Sunday in New York. Why I do it surprise Jane Fonda not a fan, but yeah, that's it. I don't know and then Doctor Strangelove goes on to be a moderate

[02:08:12] hit and then Stanley Kubrick goes on to make a little movie called 2001 a Space Odyssey and by that point he's like on the other side of his divorce. He's remarried and he's firmly established in London, right? Like that's sort of like the beginning of like Stanley Kubrick

[02:08:28] the Fortress leader on right but like this is the one where it's like it shoots in London because he's going through that or what you know, like because there's like reasons and like I feel like by 2001. It's like yeah, you come to me like here.

[02:08:40] I am I'm here. It's the last time. It's the last time you also like makes a movie in 18 months for the last time and then from here on out. It's like everything will take five years, right? Right. Yeah, right. Yeah, right. It's it's also right.

[02:08:53] He'd like kind of rewrites the rules of what a director career can be in a certain way. It's also just funny like I was watching the fucking making the shining or whatever. It's called the Vivian Kubrick documentary short every time I see a clip of Stanley Kubrick speaking.

[02:09:09] I'm once again surprised. He doesn't have a British accent and I know like I know he's from the Bronx. I know he wasn't British but I just half expect that he like from being there for so long affected a Madonna esque Lilt

[02:09:25] at the very least and then every clip of him is just like I don't know. I don't don't fucking do that. That's my Stanley Kubrick impression. And I don't do that and I ain't no good. So my entire family is from the Bronx and Brooklyn.

[02:09:39] Yeah, and let's just say that hearing Kubrick interviews is a nice warm bath for oh sure. No, it takes me home. Yeah, you do think of him as English in your head. It's true. That is like and even just like when you look at photos of young Kubrick.

[02:09:55] I'm like I see that guy living in the Bronx and then when you see old sort of wizard Kubrick right with the beard. I'm like that guy must be British a British voice must come out. We're done Griff. We're done. I just ended the podcast forever.

[02:10:11] This is our final episode Sean. Thank you so much for being on the podcast. Well, what do we have left to do? We had Sean fantasy on people been asking for this for fucking seven and a half years. You're right.

[02:10:21] Well, we have to have Sean fantasy back now. Oh, that's a reason to keep going. No, I said Griffin. I we haven't discussed this but I said to David that I would only do this if you guys came on the big picture so I have

[02:10:31] to figure out that's true. We're going to do a home and home. I wanted I don't know what you want to do, but I want to do what you want to do. So you tell me what you guys are to talk about on the pod.

[02:10:40] That's a good question. So brainstorm it we will air them in the in relative vicinity to another. Yeah, we have we have a few months. Okay. Yeah, and if you if you wanna if you want to theme it up,

[02:10:52] we can theme it up, you know, if you wanna, you know, if you want to just write strange love to on the fly on a pod. We can do that too. Cool. I leave it in your hands both of you guys all three of you guys.

[02:11:03] This was an honor. I'm I feel blessed. Thank you. Oh, thanks. Thank you for doing the show. Hey, it's so cool. Truly. It's it's one of those things. I mean, you've been a supporter of the show for a while and

[02:11:16] anytime our listeners would see you tweet like a new stack of blu-rays or see you logging on letterbox one of the directors brings me such joy. Yeah, right there. Perverse joy every mini series they go like which one is he fucking doing? That's very sweet.

[02:11:33] I mean it honestly just because I am listening to the show and watching the movies with you guys until now, which is nice. Oh now which look it's much appreciated but but I think it has driven people insane.

[02:11:44] I think they have had blue balls for like three fucking years. We kind of screwed up. We should have just never done it. That was maybe I know it was a good bit. But what it would have been and you can keep him guessing

[02:11:54] you'll come back at some point and okay, you know, all right. Yeah, just keep them guessing. Well, should we just back girl this episode? Yeah, what if we put it on the shelf? What if we realize that we stand to make 70 million dollars by never releasing this episode?

[02:12:08] Sorry, your tax loophole. We had him on the show, but it saves us millions. What should I tell you? You could never hear it. The fourth the fourth the fourth the windfall of this episode is just going to be insane sold which means no one will ever

[02:12:21] even hear this conversation. No, and it's a problem actually because we've already recorded the next episode and Michael Keaton's in it and now that's not going to make sense because we haven't established him. Michael Keaton's gonna appear like three more times in this

[02:12:35] miniseries and everyone's gonna go like when did they make him a permanent third host? Well, I feel comfortable announcing that I'm actually going to be the next Batman. I'm the post Pat Batman. So, you know, that's I'm breaking it here for you guys.

[02:12:49] I love the idea of Michael of Michael Keaton being Batman twice, but the second time never being seen. Right? He's just out there. Yeah, there's just a lost three movie Batman arc Sean. Everyone should listen to the podcast that you do that.

[02:13:06] They already listened to because they're the biggest podcast was the big picture. Listen to rewatchables. I just I just finished the unforgiven episode. I'm caught up. Thank you for listening. Thank you for having me and thank you for all the work that you guys do love your show.

[02:13:19] Yeah, that's a wow. Too nice of you to say. Thank you. Take us out Griff. Thank you all for doing all the work that you do in listening to the show and I ask you to continue that work by rating

[02:13:31] and subscribing the annoying things that we just have to tell you to do every week. Thank you to Marie Barty for our social media and helping to produce the show. Thank you to AJ McKeon Alex Baron for our editing Pat rounds Joe Bowen for our artwork.

[02:13:47] Lane Montgomery the Great American all for our theme song JJ Birch for our research go to blank check pod.com for links to some real nerdy shit including our patreon blank check special features where we do commentaries on franchises among other things.

[02:14:02] We're currently doing the Roger Moore Bonds movies that have a lot of Doctor Strange love war room typesets. It is funny how this movie this hiring a James Bond guy to design the war room changes the way you're allowed to put

[02:14:18] these things on screen forever like now they have to look like this or they feel too boring. I don't know if that's a final point. I shouldn't be making mess. There's like I'm trying to end the podcast. What the fuck am I doing?

[02:14:30] Tune in next week for 2001 a Space Odyssey a pretty big movie. Yep. Yes TBD. Yes TBD. Yeah, we can't we can't even say and as always. I was looking at a list of actors who played multiple roles, but didn't get an Oscar nomination and there are a couple

[02:14:54] big ones that we forgot about that. I just want to quickly shout out people who should have gotten Oscar nominations including in past episodes Lindsay Lohan and the Parent Trap. Of course Michael J Fox and Back to the Future part 3 sure. Yes, right.

[02:15:11] That's I guess two and three two and three. Yeah. Yeah, you should gotten two best actor nominations back to back years. Wait, I have another one here. Fuck. I don't know I give up great good done. No, wait, what's um, what's his name in Assassin's Creed?

[02:15:30] He plays two characters. Yeah, great. That's the final one. That's the end of the episode. It's Michael Fassbender in Assassin's Creed.