Ed Wood with John Hodgman

[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

[00:00:20] Kathy, I'm about to tell you something that I never told any girl on a first date But I think it's important that you know I like to wear women's clothes I like to wear women's clothes, panties, braziers, sweaters, pumps It's just something I do

[00:00:34] And I can't believe I'm telling you this but I really like you and I don't want it getting in the way down the road Does this mean you don't like podcasting with girls? No, I love podcasting with girls Well not today

[00:00:45] That's my favorite dialogue exchange when I'm moving No, I mean it's good, I just look glossy, you know You could have done look glossy That's podcasting, motherfucker Right, exactly No one gives two fucks about podcasting Pull the strings, pull the podcast Yeah Podcast it No, you know what

[00:01:09] POD THE CAST POD THE CAST Be aware, be there I always like here's a thing I hate Go ahead This is one of my five favorite movies, I'm just out with it I love this movie This is top five for me all-timer

[00:01:24] I'm with you, I love it too This is a wonderful movie And I feel like unfairly now A lot of this film's legacy Is Samuel Jackson is constantly shit talking the fact that Martin Lando beat him It certainly was for a while, I think it's gone past that

[00:01:40] He used to complain like he was up for pulp fiction And he used to complain like Ed Wood, no one even saw that thing Like come on I get one of the most iconic performances of all time Who even talks about Martin Lando and Ed Wood

[00:01:53] I talk about it literally every night It's the performance that you could imagine beating almost anybody And the other hard thing about it is Samuel L. Jackson's never gonna get another swing No At an award Probably not

[00:02:06] You know how many movies did he have ahead of him at that point? He gets so few bites at the apple I know, right exactly Martin Lando was only 95 years old Like here are two crazy facts One, Martin Lando lived another 20 years after the movie

[00:02:20] He was a noodle He lived to like 99 Oh really? He made it a long time No, he lived to 89 Really? Yeah He looked about 99 He was an old man Wait a second, he was 35 in Ed Wood? He was sort of Martin Lando much like Belogos is a cartoon

[00:02:38] Eastern European that you kind of can't believe was a real person Martin Lando was kind of a cartoon old guy Yes Like right, I only think of him as an old guy You see pictures of him in Mission Impossible Space 1999

[00:02:50] Space 1999, you're like oh right he was your ass That's my default Lando Interesting Space 1999 Okay, fair enough I would think more of Mission Impossible Who's yours? Crimes and misdemeanors No, it's Ed Wood Ed Wood For me it's default Probably crimes and misdemeanors

[00:03:06] No, but see he disappears into this role You like leading Lando though He doesn't look like Martin Lando in this movie Well that's it This movie wins two Oscars It wins Lando and the makeup Which is one of the least showy

[00:03:18] The most effective makeup jobs in film history It's crazy It's incredible how well they transform without it looking Like a Sasha Baron Cohen character Where it's like his face doesn't move He looks like he's a band of rubber And they have dramatically different faces

[00:03:31] Yeah, Martin Lando has such a very distinctive face And Belogos he has a very distinctive face There's a thing on the It's such a good job that he can watch a movie With the real Belogos They intercut the real thing And you're like yes Yeah, it's Belogosy

[00:03:45] Well also he was supposed to be a withered shell He's a run-down But it looks like that's a withered shell Of that real guy there On the DVD on the special features They have like a whole thing with Rick Baker

[00:03:57] And he was like, you know, I love Lugosi I was like really honored that Tim reached out to me And like offered me this thing And I said like this is impossible Like these are fundamentally different faces Lando has this very long face

[00:04:10] Got a long sort of Frankenstein-y shape to his face More Carlos And he was like a super-duper lip It got long because he was in that low gravity environment Space 1990 You're gonna hijack this and just party like it's Space 1999

[00:04:24] I don't know if I've ever seen that much space 1999 Not a lot was made Right I'm pretty sure I saw all of it but not since I was What was the concept? It was like the run-off battle star It was well before battle star Oh really?

[00:04:37] Was it Jerry Anderson? It was Crazy Wait, it was fully live action Jerry Anderson It was post Thunderbirds It was a marionette Weirdly She's like I'll take the press photos But I'll be a marionette in the show Is it like a space station show? Oh here's the premise

[00:04:51] Okay Space station moon base alpha on the moon Moon base And then there's a bad explosion The moon gets kicked out of orbit Oh dear And it's traveling through the cosmos But we're still circling the moon No, Earth is left behind Okay It's not very scientific

[00:05:08] Because their whole premise is How are we going to get the moon back to Earth When they should have figured out Oh Earth is finished now We're done You know the story about when Jerry Anderson pitched Landau Space 1999 right? No I do not know it

[00:05:22] He asked Landau to come visit him on the Thunderbirds set And he was like it's going to be like this It's a show you'll be the leading man voicing it But it's going to be all puppets And Landau said pull the strings and I'm in

[00:05:32] Hello everybody my name is Griffin Newman Pull the string There you go pull the strings Pull the strings Pull the strings What's your name? Oh David Sims I'm sorry It's Blank Check with Griffin I was so horrified by your joke That I was like trying to resettle myself

[00:05:47] Bullishly scaredy-druck This podcast about filmographies Directors who have massive success early on in their career And are given a series of blank checks To make whatever crazy passion projects they want Certainly like Edward Yes Timberton at this point is firmly in this sort of

[00:06:01] One for me one for them mode But all his ones for me Were also very expensive and done on a major studio level And this was the first one where he really had to like Fight to make a movie that seemed aggressively Uncommercial Right And was Right

[00:06:17] But he was like such a big populous studio filmmaker He had like somehow made these very esoteric interests Of his into like very mainstream things Right you're saying like Edward Scissorhands No one's going to say like oh that's a short fire Box office success and then it was

[00:06:31] Right So this I guess he could be like well no one Thought Edward Scissorhands would work this will work Yes Yeah people go to see Edward But like no one wanted to make this fucking movie No And then it did poorly but it's my favorite film of his

[00:06:44] It's one of my favorite movies of all time That's the thing that surprised me I didn't realize it was a bomb It was a huge bomb Because I was a grown up when this movie came out Yeah I'm a very old man Where did you see it Timber?

[00:06:58] By the way my name is John Hodgman Oh John Hodgman's here I guess John Hodgman Judge John Hodgman the Honour Bull is sitting there And Judge John Hodgman podcast co-star Of the Tick season 2 Oh my god Hey With Crven Newman You're like the big new character

[00:07:11] Wait when is this posting now I'm going to check Sometime in 2019 February of March Yes early February February of the 3rd Does it have a premiere date? No I've heard Conflicting rumors You know what's good Quarter 1, 219 When you hear conflicting thing I love it I'm not

[00:07:30] I'm not stressed at all I haven't been losing sleep for months Now you get your sleep Yeah I'm not trying You have to understand it's hard for them to press the button To put the thing on the stream It's so tough

[00:07:44] It takes a while for them to get to the room The button room Yes yes and to be fair They're on a very rushed post production schedule of 9 months We finish filming season 2 I think in 1984 That's right Yeah It wasn't No it wasn't that

[00:08:00] When it comes out it'll be a while But you're phenomenal on the show You're an incredible actor Well come on you're an incredible actor As I said on set apparently You said to me I wanted to know I don't remember this line

[00:08:14] You said I think you're a very good actor And I said oh come on And you said no I mean it And I know about acting Because I've seen murder on the Orient Express That was your line Was that really my line?

[00:08:25] No no no you said I just watched on a plane So I know about acting That was a very important movie going experience for me Watching murder on the Orient Express on the plane Had you just watched Right you were a OCI

[00:08:35] You had literally just ingested the Orient Express I opened my mouth You'd taken the ride Why isn't there a ride You'd boarded the train Why isn't there a theme park God universal should open a whole Poro land Sure Are they doing a Marpleverse or like a Christy verse

[00:08:52] They're doing a Poro follow up They're doing a death on the Nile Yes You could get in that you should be in that John Can you imagine like we're in Cairo or something And it's like you've got a fan You're holding him running after him with a telegram

[00:09:07] Sir You know you're wearing like a khaki suit Thank you very much girl A little old to play a bellhop It would be a sad Not a bellhop I'm saying like his Sad It would be a sad bellhop I'm saying like a Peter Yusinoff type

[00:09:19] Well I guess Yusinoff played Poro And that was he was my Poro Right Sure Space 1999 was your Landau Yes That was my Landau Yusinoff was your Poro But I remember that somehow I did not manage to see Black Panther When it came out that week

[00:09:37] But I did manage to see We're going to New York Express On an airplane and I realized For a straight white only child From Brookline, Massachusetts That was my Black Panther That was your Black Panther Yeah We're going to New York Express It's like finally someone sees me

[00:09:52] Right And it is such by the culture As a massive moment For representation in American media Yeah Sorry I don't want to say side track Sure But that was a side track No, I'm not saying a bellhop But I feel like his like Sala You know Uh huh

[00:10:10] Like I want you to be playing The Josh Gad role in this movie I'm imagining I think we got to plus it off No, you should be like the mayor Or the local You know Dignitary Commissioner exactly You know, they go to an office

[00:10:24] Or a palace or something And you're sitting there behind a desk I do a lot of desk work Yeah You're flapping a fan In streaming media Film and television Yeah I'm mostly known for my desk work I think desk work is good Also, check out

[00:10:37] Check out my incredible back of the head Act in the Nick season two Oh yeah Yeah, incredible Incredible Your big thing And not no spoilers But your big thing in tick season two You kind of redefine clipboard acting Oh, you noticed

[00:10:54] This man holds the shit out of a clipboard In tick season two It's actually a tablet that kept Oh, right It was like a high tech clipboard That kept freezing up That kept freezing up Or like yeah Go to the whole screen or something Yeah

[00:11:07] Anyway, we had a great time We had a great time Working together I became a true blanky check head But you had a great time So you're saying And David, I met you at a wedding Yeah, that's true Nice to see you were the DJ

[00:11:16] I was the DJ You did a great job Thank you very much The greatest moment was the bride Freaking out at you When you were moving on from one song So soon Then I thought that was very funny Because you were doing a very professional job

[00:11:28] You were like, you know Fading in and out of things And you were, you know, it was like I was trying to keep it moving Yeah, exactly But then there was one song That I guess the bride Yeah, I guess it was her special day

[00:11:39] Right, it was like No, it was like Well, we must finish this one And you were very, you were a good deal You're like, oh, of course You know what's fine I put it on repeat over and over And I walked away Fine, fine

[00:11:54] You threw your headphones to the ground Jesus Uh, yeah Okay, Landau Oh, this is what I was saying I was an elderly man Sure I mean, I was a grown man then When this came out In 1994 Yeah 23 years old I remember reading about it

[00:12:11] I remember reading about how much You remember reading about me Going to see the movie? Yeah, that you were just killing it Prima your life September 30th Is this a good month for you? September 1994 1994 Yeah, I had moved I just moved to New York There you go

[00:12:24] New York City In January of that year And now I'm trying to remember Maybe I saw it at the Chelsea Theatre I was going to say, yeah Did you see it in a theater? What's now the the synopolis? Yeah, yeah, yeah That one on

[00:12:36] Used to be a United Artist, I believe Um, sure I don't The 23rd The 23rd Street Yeah, yeah, yeah I think that that's probably That's where I've seen a lot of movies There were a bunch of movie theaters Up on the Upper Upper West Side Where I lived

[00:12:51] I was 105th Street in Broadway So there were a couple of movie theaters Oh, the 84th And Broadway loves, of course But there was a New Yorker theater But that closed when I was a kid Right, right Because I used to live out there Yeah, I don't know

[00:13:03] There were others The only place you lived as a kid That's right We're not talking about where you lived As a kid We lived in New York And that's the end of the story And we can move on I did Amazing to have spent your whole childhood

[00:13:13] In a whole city The entirety of it It's a big time It was the big time You must have really seen A different way of life So you see the movie I loved it Your 99th head Lando is back But you know I'm a

[00:13:27] At this point in my life I'm a huge Tim Burton fan And supporter And I would say I guess I am now Sure He's not the filmmaker That he was But that was a miracle In the day Right, he'd done The Batman's And Edward Snow

[00:13:43] And this is an exciting new Right And Pee Wee's big adventure Pee Wee Of course And so And Beetlejuice And this was This movie seemed like Such a step forward Yes And how he was going to direct movies It felt like a big evolution And then

[00:14:00] I guess he decided That was wrong Well, it's also It's his first movie About real people Like no offense To Pee Wee or Beetlejuice Or whatever These are humans Who have regular needs And he did a good job with humans This is great job

[00:14:15] It's his first grown up movie And he brings a board Like Johnny Depp is sort of Is as close as Johnny Depp Has ever gotten to playing Human 100% I think it's Depp's best performer Oh, I do too Is that even incredible I mean, I guess he's given

[00:14:26] A lot of performances This is my favorite This is his real In the pocket A couple years too Because Donnie Brasko's Probably his best He's so good in Donnie Brasko Like serious movie Like fully serious performance That's him like Going for it Being like

[00:14:40] He's not attention to me I am a serious actor I'm walking here He was walking He's walking all over Donnie Brasko Yeah, that's right Donnie Brasko's sitting in a chair Most of the time He's doing some chair work Yeah, kind of That's a lot of Pacino chair work

[00:14:52] Yeah But this is like This feels like a performance That only this one actor At this one period of time Before he became Right A wine vampire You know Could have given Depp's the dexter And European rock star European rock star General all around creep Yeah But yeah

[00:15:10] This performance feels like I mean, I think this is when he sort of becomes Like For a certain group of people The guy Like this is kind of the weirdest Most interesting leading man He's got Dead Man The next year too Yeah He's so good in the 90s

[00:15:24] Like really in this run He has a very cool run in the 90s Cause Gilbert Grape is the year before Mm-hmm Then yeah The next year is Dead Man And Don Juan de Marco Which is a nice little movie I don't like this at all

[00:15:36] Now that I'm seeing you Oh, gotta put your computer out You don't like that he's got the computer And he's looking at a computer Well, otherwise it's gonna be a lot of like Man, what did he do? Yeah You know, come on When I'm making dinner

[00:15:47] Listening and I have you in my head You think it's off the dome I feel like it's totally off the dome Well But it's not It's off the pad He's not all off the pad Look, he's roasted me now Now I feel roasted Yeah No, that's good

[00:15:59] I'm glad to know that you're human It's really Truly human I mean, it really Yeah, okay It makes me feel more comfortable Humbly So I see this movie Yeah And it's an amazing film A huge step forward for him A really enjoyable film

[00:16:15] Gets a huge amount of critical attention I grew up in the 90s believing this movie did good Yeah I did not know until yesterday That it did bad It did badly It did poorly It was like critically acclaimed across the board Pretty much an international acclaimed

[00:16:32] Which any studio loves to win an Oscar It won two Oscars In a very competitive year I mean, 94 that was the Forest Gump Quiz show Pulp Fiction Shawshank Redemption Yeah, there's a world right where I guess a less crowded year Would have maybe gotten some more nominations

[00:16:47] Samuel L. Jackson was robbed that year I believe And Larsonie His big thing was like Look, I gave this performance that was so iconic And they gave it to Lando as a Lifetime Achievement Award I think you watched this This is not a lifetime achievement No

[00:16:59] This isn't just a guy showing up And like this isn't Donna Metzsche And Cocoon No Like oh he's charming This is like such a fucking real deal A huge, huge career And a really tricky performance Well the thing was Samuel L. Jackson is a quasi-lead anyway Agreed

[00:17:17] And they ran him in supporting Because they were running Travolta as the lead But they have equal screen time Right So they were kind of just like splitting the difference And like that may have done him in I don't know

[00:17:27] Tom Hanks was probably always going to win Best Actor This is why I always said on set How many times did I say this? Awards? Literally you said it Can I curse on this? Yes you can curse You said it during every take Yeah

[00:17:40] Which we lost a lot of good footage So sometimes I try to be polite And just ruin my own takes Yes no You would often do it during our lines You would step over our lines to say awards Quick word Awards are bullshit Yes right Don't let this

[00:17:56] Peter Serafin was Don't let awards get into your head They're bullshit Well you know I got at your table He was surprisingly fine with it Because he's so comfortable in that costume He was like please eat up as much time as you want Yeah

[00:18:05] I can go all day Work talk Oh god And we met at a wedding David We did meet at a wedding That's true Of two blank check guests It was a blank check wedding We won't say who It's a total mystery I guess Let's do some cross calculation

[00:18:21] I figure which two blank check guests are now married If you're listening now And you've figured it out Go to your If you have your Grid of blank check guests And you've been drawing all the connections You should be able to figure this out Send in your guests

[00:18:39] The first top three guesses will get An audio boom mug Yes And a decoder ring Yes We're gonna start making decoder rings So what happened when this movie didn't do good One an Oscar Two Oscars But I mean when it became a commercial failure

[00:18:55] What happened with Tim Burton after that Burton is already working on his next project Which he sees as like a sister to this movie Which was Mars attacks Mars attacks And I guess they're thinking like Oh well that'll play That was the thing

[00:19:08] Mars attacks I think they viewed as an obvious home run Like he's gonna make a big disaster film And he was like I just got off and making Ed Wood I wanna make a modern version of that Sort of typo sci-fi movie Right

[00:19:19] And then that was so expensive Right And bombed harder in relation to its budget Sure And then I think he starts to And is not critically appreciated No it wasn't at the time I think now it started to build more ahead of Steve

[00:19:32] Well listen to Paul F. Tompkins It's a modern masterpiece Well we'll never listen to him Especially not on the subject of Mars attacks He's not welcome here He's not welcome here Much like you were not welcome here But I think that's when he really starts to get scared

[00:19:46] Okay And it is a thing where I think this is the origin of his more Craven like Where circus come do the Tim Burton take on things Cause then the run is Sleepy Hollow Planet of the Apes Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Now it's like

[00:19:59] Do a Tim Burton take on a thing that everyone already knows That's when it all feels like You're just putting on a thick paint of Gothic emo gloss Yes On other stories You're throwing his aesthetic sensibilities Onto things we already know

[00:20:09] And there was the initial excitement of like Oh I'd love to see a Tim Burton Charlie and the Chocolate Factory But came like Oh god we're gonna have to see a Tim Burton Like Alice in Wonderland You know it became just sort of resigned

[00:20:19] Like oh god here we go Oh the bottom Carter's gonna be in it At some point or another someone's gonna wear Red and white stocking Right But there's this thing I feel like I talk about this with people all the time Where they say like

[00:20:30] So why does that actor like Still do all these shitty movies Or like why is that that director make those choices Like people will ask me Like genuinely I don't understand Why Bruce Willis is doing this You know Right And my answer is always

[00:20:42] I think if you're ever like At the very top It gets scary to lose it Yeah Even if you're a guy like Tim Burton Who I don't think starting out Had delusions of becoming one of the most Powerful filmmakers in Hollywood He was an animator

[00:20:56] He expected to be anonymous basically And then when he was doing live action A distinct visual style It was like Disney was like We don't know what to do with this guy Like give him some of my Mcfrankin weenie or whatever Right

[00:21:08] And then his movies kept on like growing and growing And then he made this like blockbuster That redefined like The studio system Sure Like Batman changes everything And then like the blank checks he'd get from Batman That was the unfinished sequel to Batman Batman changes everything

[00:21:21] Batman changes everything Right Yeah That was gonna be his third after Batman Returns It's municipal He's changing to pension systems Plumbing Like he's changing the whole city of Gotham Right it was Batman just deals with legislature He rolls up his bat sleeves It's time for someone you know

[00:21:38] Those bat sleeves are spiky too They're so hard to get So he rolls them up and they puncture Okay Let's go But I think then it's scary to like Lose that I'm the comtroller Gotham deserves Yes he was a maverick He came and you know

[00:21:53] He was an outsider that Gotham needed Yeah But I think that kinda like Fucks things up Because until this point He's like following his own bliss And even when he's making a Batman movie He's like I'm doing the Batman That no one else would think to make Yeah

[00:22:09] And then this Except for Frank Miller maybe Right A little bit But then even like the whole visual sensibility And everything But then I think it starts to become like Fuck what do people want out of a Tim Burton movie You know Right And I think

[00:22:25] Perhaps if like Mars attacks had done really well He would have felt more comfortable being like Every other movie I'll do a smaller character That was when we talked about which movie to see I was like Edward with a bullet Yeah

[00:22:37] I was just like that's the one I wanna talk about Even though there are People who are much more qualified to talk about this movie And you should have You should have gotten Dana Goulden here immediately But that's another story Oh please Dana's not welcome here

[00:22:49] Yeah he's not welcome here Of course not And he'll never be here He'll never be here But Because that was the one where I felt like Oh that's the last And I had forgotten about That Mars attacks came after Cause I Yeah

[00:23:01] Saw that movie and I immediately forgot it Cause I did not care for it Have you Never seen it since Okay well I think you'd love it today Right Well maybe so Yeah But I was like Oh that was That was the last time he was

[00:23:12] Like I feel that Tim Burton was really Pushing a Burton envelope And making a movie and trying I would argue Mars attacks is the last one of those And then yeah And then I think the rest of them Start to become

[00:23:23] It's going to be haw a little bit Even though I like Tim Burton I know you're listening I would love to work with you on any project That's not what I'm saying We'd both love to work with him But there was a time when you were a filmmaker

[00:23:31] And then there was a time when you became A fairly consistent interior decorator Of movies I feel like My friend Louie always had this theory That was like I think he just kinda got happy Yeah I think he stopped feeling tortured And he found some complacency within himself

[00:23:45] And he seems fairly well adjusted now And I think he starts making these decisions Of like what should I be making now As opposed to like What is the song of my heart? It happens to some directors The budget creep thing Where it's like

[00:23:57] I can't imagine making a small movie And I'm so used to the whole Industry that you know Around it's like I'd have to make like a little thing Like it's a pain It must be so hard to say no If they're like Right

[00:24:09] If they're like come make Dumbo Here is so much money We will provide every resource you need You can do anything you want You can hire any actor you want Right, exactly All it really needs is there It does have to be an elephant

[00:24:19] In it with big ears Right Apart from that Like do what you want It's Dumbo It's a 50 minute movie Like you know Mess with however you like That must be so hard to turn down And then I think The times that he's tried to

[00:24:32] I mean this is the first pretty thing There is a left turn I forgot in a later part of his career In the 2000s I think he tries to make Three turns Yeah All underperform in relation to the movies Before and after them He takes three left turns

[00:24:44] And winds up at the same spot Right So it's like If you're Tim Burton And it's like Here on one end is like Sweeney Todd Right Then Alice in Wonderland And then Big Eyes Right And maybe I'm forgetting one in between But it's like

[00:24:58] Well all the encouragement seems To be coming from the fact That Alice in Wonderland Made a billion dollars worldwide Right Why would I go back to making these other two movies That people were confused by Right You know Big Eyes and His Heart Doesn't Seem In It

[00:25:10] In my opinion We'll talk about Big Eyes I've not seen Big Eyes But it was written by these guys The guys who wrote Right It was the closest I think he's come to doing another Atwood It's nowhere near as good as Atwood's A film I really like

[00:25:21] It lacks the visual panache of Atwood Which is sort of disappointing God this movie looks Right Gorgeous This movie just looks insane Like it's And unlike any other Tim Burton Certainly And I also watch it And I go like How did he pull this off

[00:25:34] Like his aesthetic idea For this movie is Make it look like a shitty movie But beautiful Right Like it's like a beautifully executed version of a really marginal B picture Yeah And when he's When Bella Lugosi Spoiler Commits himself for treatment for drug addiction Major spoiler And

[00:25:56] And Ed Wood is talking to the doctor And there's this scene I just There's this scene in a hospital hallway That truly looks like they're standing in front of a scrim Like it is the cheapest looking And the sets are very like

[00:26:09] That's the thing where I just go like How the fuck did he pull this off Because you have the scenes where he's shooting his movies And the joke is that The sets of the Ed Wood films are terrible But you're also in an airplane hangar Right

[00:26:22] But then the airplane hanger that the set is built in Is also a set And he makes that set look artificial Well there are some shots Like the wrestling ring Where it's a full crowd And he has summoned to do This is like CGI Right And the

[00:26:40] What do you call it The premieres Yeah Especially that one where they open And everyone is throwing popcorn at each other And you know It looks like Expensive It looks beautiful Yeah, Batman changes everything money Right Yes They paid him so much to not make that movie

[00:26:57] $18 million was the budget of this film Yeah So it was set up with Warner Brothers Which was his main home studio at that point Other than Edward Scissorhands Everything he had done had been at Warner's at that point

[00:27:06] And it's usually who he works with them a lot to this day Right Or has he Now he goes between Warner's and Disney I feel like those are the two he flips between But at that time he was almost exclusively a Warner's boy

[00:27:15] And he sets it up there And he's very adamant about the fact that he wants it to be black and white Excuse me He's a Warner Bros He's a Warner Bros He's rolling with the bros And everyone's like When you think bro, you think Tim Burton Oh yeah

[00:27:32] He's a Warner Bro Yeah Everyone is like this black and white idea is death Making a movie about a bad movie is a bad idea Sure And Johnny Depp is like Edward Scissorhands is his only big box office success At that point as a leading man

[00:27:49] Well I mean I would look at his tomography But I'm afraid Hodgman's gonna roast me No I'm not roast No I'm kidding Gilbert After Edward Scissorhands he'd only made two movies Gilbert Grape which was Not a bit Not a bit I made 10 million Oh really?

[00:28:05] And Benny in June Which you know didn't like the world on fire But it made a little money too He's a guy at that point in time It solidified his silent comedy Right His silent comedy impersonation chops But after he

[00:28:18] I mean he's still only a few years removed from like 21 Jump Street Like he is still I suppose This is when he started to become like the thinking man's heartthrob Because it's like oh but he's weird He looks like Buster Keaton and shit

[00:28:30] Like he's very handsome but he doesn't want to do that cookie cutter shit You know Yeah that was I feel like that rep Speaking of someone who is a full blown adult when this movie came out That rep was locked in Everyone was buying it

[00:28:41] Like we were discerning We get Johnny Depp The public doesn't Yeah You know and they were like Johnny Depp's a leading man But he's not big enough to Like validate your vision of making a 20 million dollar black and white film About a bad director

[00:28:55] And a bad director that Really not everyone had heard of In a way that they had I mean No it's In large part because of this movie a lot of people have heard Well also Yes But it was still Science Theater 3000 where is that

[00:29:08] That is not there yet That doesn't exist yet Cause that's the thing is like I feel like once that's kicked up Then you have this They start to show these movies All of that Yeah It became I discovered a distressing Thing Uh huh Which was that

[00:29:23] According to the Wikipedia See I use the internet too I'm not a I'm not a I'm not a I'm not a super mind Just a guy with the internet Like anybody else I think he was a bit of a super mind That's all the internet According to Wikipedia

[00:29:35] Playa 9 from outer space Started getting cult following When it was named As the worst movie of all times Yes In this book called The Golden Turkeys Or some Right By the Medved brothers Oh crazy Michael Medved obviously was A film reviewer before he Became what he is now

[00:29:51] Which is a right wing Yes Radio talk show host And kind of a monster But I think that book was kind of The beginning of like That was in 1980 Yes Of bad art culture Like it was the beginning of like The 90s especially with Mystery Science Theater

[00:30:07] And books like that that were starting to get written Of like actually sometimes these shitty movies Are like fun Right And people obsessing over Bad works And it was like that was the Ears were the era Like the psychotronic film guide And research magazine

[00:30:21] That would cover all these weird This is the era of my friend Nick McCarthy Bringing us all over to his house Stay up all night to watch bad movies on VHS Right And then in the 90s you know This movie comes out and then Mystery Science Theater

[00:30:34] MSD3K comes out and starts Codifying this subculture And bringing out into a larger audience The idea of cult things Starts to become mainstream But in 1994 that was not It's still cult It's like literally it's like an inside whisper Like network

[00:30:49] Certainly no studio is going to be fired up About the idea that you're Going to do a plan nine for outer space Movie Most of them wouldn't even know what it was You know Right So Warner Brothers like Puts the film and turn around Griffin you're wrong

[00:31:04] It's not Warner Brothers Was it Sonya? It's Columbia Fuck it was Columbia I think Warner Brothers turned it down maybe Maybe because it's because Alexander and Karazuzki Who had written Problem Child And Problem Child too I believe I think you're right And I think they thought that was

[00:31:18] Like an albatross around their neck We got to get out of this Why would they feel that way Two modern classics Yes right Well because the script was so good That it put them in a washing machine Like the script itself

[00:31:30] I have not seen either of the problem children Neither have I The video box is John Ritter in a washing machine How come the sequel to Problem Child Wasn't Problem Children Where they weren't thinking about it It also wasn't Problem Child comma two

[00:31:40] Which I'm sure literally the sequel I think the sequel Literally is about a second problem Like it's now there's a girl too You know there used to be just Yeah no it should be called Problem Child Yeah Yeah Problem kids And our branding savvy here in the year 2018

[00:31:56] Of backwards in time Sure hindsight's twenty twenty Cause we look back on it Of course a meta film about Ed Wood That's hilarious Right But the nineties barely existed at the time When meta didn't exist in that way So if you were caught up in the hurricane

[00:32:09] Of like Problem Child fever You could barely think clearly I mean the tagline This PC culture is getting out of hand It's one of those classic two tagline posters So top of the poster This summer junior has a brand new friend Problem Child too Right

[00:32:26] There's two of them right But below he's bad She's worse Two taglines does not bode well Especially when both of them are half a tagline Really You know what I mean It's like they couldn't really settle They were like well So that was the premise

[00:32:40] What they had a girl They probably put them both on there They added a girl And they put Redder in the washing machine And they probably put both taglines in So some mid-level You know executive wouldn't get mad Right It was like

[00:32:53] He's bad she's worse was Bob's idea And he's really gonna not like it If we don't put that in there somewhere Yeah right I think that was the idea though Was like they had written this thing That then became really successful

[00:33:03] But was sort of seen as like a piece of shit And a joke Right So they have this script they believe in Right because I'm sure They're getting like a thousand offers To make shitty family comedies And they're like

[00:33:13] This isn't really what we want to get stuck doing So they set this script up with Burton And they were like That's when they're like I think he was really good at that And so there was a big

[00:33:45] Yeah, which is an incredibly I mean that that is not a great that's not a successful film. No, but it's financially but artistically I think even Michael Lieman if you're listening I think he would you would acknowledge that it did not work the way it was supposed to

[00:34:00] but it had a sense of humor that was a little bit mind-breaking right but it was met at a time when meta wasn't in part of the the vocabulary right but now I understand why

[00:34:12] he was like maybe I should just go make airheads like maybe after Hudson Hawk flop he's like maybe I shouldn't make the weird homage to the bad director that's a good movie like maybe I should just make the idiots you know hold up a radio

[00:34:25] store one I think that was probably an idea of like you make a down-the-middle comedy right it's a bad film it's a bad director and you make a comedy about a guy who's inept and Tim Burton laughs on this idea of making the movie like

[00:34:37] the most considerate positive biopic ever yes I mean that and if that if that's I mean again what you feel that he is bringing that that's the thing with this movie is tone management is like the name of the game he's walking such a fine

[00:34:52] line where you think about most biopic especially like of artists right and it's like either like here's an inspiring story of someone who like broke through a glass usually sucks changed history and they like deify them too

[00:35:04] much right they stop being human or it's the like here's an artist you love and here are their demons here's the shit you didn't know right right and this is a story about a man who thinks he's in a biopic about how he changed Hollywood

[00:35:15] right yeah and and he gives him the movie the guy thinks he's in yes and yes the the exploration of his character or the reveal of his character as a fundamentally decent yes eccentric self-deluded but not completely self-deluded

[00:35:34] there are times when he's like I don't think I got it right and so Jessica Parker has to talk him talk him into it but that's like that's what that's so beautiful and I have to say that there are a couple of times in this movie where you

[00:35:44] see a glimpse of what it might have been otherwise yes there are moments particularly in the montage when he's shooting plan 9 for Matters Space everything's going wrong right and he loves it all and the movie is just

[00:35:56] and movies basically saying look at these terrible sets right this is terrible right right the guy scratching his head with the gun right yeah and those are just a few moments where you have to show them obviously it's kind of earned it

[00:36:07] at that point you can have a couple laughs but it's all of that about a hundred percent yeah but I think you know Burton talks a lot about how he was sort of just this like this movie on the board growing up like he is a byproduct

[00:36:20] of the first generation to have like television and movies playing constantly and especially these like shitty B movies that were just sold in the packages and he just ate everything up and I think was just intoxicated by

[00:36:32] movies right like he loves the idea of the range of what a movie can represent I'm in pictures right and he is like applying that to this guy who like burgers often said like I'm surprised at any my movies work I think I don't

[00:36:45] know am I right he's like I don't know how to judge a script like on paper these things feel like they're too like specific to connect with people at large and I think he feels like I'm a lucky version of Edward like I'm an

[00:36:57] Edward that somehow is connecting with people yes but my motivations are no different than what he's doing I have my little family of weirdos I like working with the same people yeah I'm following my own bliss and it's and it's a

[00:37:07] vision that a lot of people would say I don't think this is a good idea movies are very much fetish objects that my own psychology spilled out on screen you know you just need Vincent D'Nofrio with Marisa March's

[00:37:18] voice to tell you follow your vision and did it right and he's like there but for like the grace of God I remember right I remember sitting in my kitchen in Brookline Massachusetts with my print edition of the Boston Globe

[00:37:29] and I read the casting for the Batman movie that was going to come out sure and it was Michael Keaton yeah and I remember setting the paper down and saying to the air it can't be done right even weird and you're a

[00:37:42] fan of Pee Wee's big event at that point you go this is a train right I was I was a huge fan of Beetlejuice and Michael Keaton and I was like this is not he's not Batman everyone felt the same way yeah until

[00:37:54] and I'm told about halfway through the movie I would say like and then I became convinced but and then he's like cool it takes place in like a weird retro futuristic version of the 1930s it looks like a German expressionist horror

[00:38:05] movie I'm doing an homage to both that and the 60s Adam West Batman but it's neither right it's also serious they're making me use a very funny right which like totally against all his shit but no one could have been

[00:38:20] more pre-sold for any version of Tim Burton's Batman then you were all and even I had skepticism right and took some winning over and so it is incredible that these movies connected and then when you heard about a guy with scissor hands you were like gosh a regular

[00:38:36] he can't pick a damn thing up yeah that seems to me to be too much of a problem right too many that's what fingers yeah I mean look even if the guy is lacking hands and needs prosthetic scissors is the worst choice

[00:38:50] yes do you know what I mean you'd be better off with chopstick hands much better yeah I mean yeah or Luke Skywalker hands I mean if he can get a rubber a robot hand only got one rabbit hand I do feel like you know his

[00:39:04] thing he said at the time when people were like how did you know that Michael Keaton could play Batman especially looking at the work he had done up until that point right how from collaborating with him on Bielder's

[00:39:12] you see he was right for that part and he said I just I saw it was all in his eyes and I knew that character was so much about because of the costume the

[00:39:19] eyes and I saw he had that in him yeah and in retrospect you're like God look how smart he looks that he called that but on its face that doesn't sound any different than Ed Wood like seeing the chiropractor and being like you have

[00:39:31] the same eyes as Bell Legosi that is also why it's fascinating that Tim Burton tried to make a Superman movie with Nicholas K which also on the face of it seems ludicrous and then of course we never saw it so in our

[00:39:42] heads it will always just be here's the thing was going to play Brainiac and Chris Rock was going to play Hulk Hogan was going to play Brainiac. Rock was going to play Jimmy Olsen like it was going to be insane and it was

[00:39:52] just like I guess if they let me make this all like follow my like bliss on this right and to be fair if it happened it would have been ludicrous that right didn't necessarily mean it wouldn't know that's the thing

[00:40:02] it's a that's the thing at some point movies are kind of ludicrous you know what I mean yeah and and yet they work like Edward yeah lovely Edward anyway no it was a Columbia movie okay he wants to shoot it in black

[00:40:14] and white because they had it set up through Lehman and yeah right the Columbia at a first look problem child was Columbia and that's that sure possibly and so Burns putting his name to it to give it to you because

[00:40:27] Michael Lehman is going off to do airhead so but it's got to be black and white it's only makes sense as black and white it is hard to imagine this film in color wouldn't work and they're like no no no no like

[00:40:38] absolutely not then there's a bidding war because he's still so hot exactly right everyone wants it yeah but Disney takes it they say here's 18 million dollars we figure you'll do fine we won't bother you again right touchstone

[00:40:54] at this point they weren't like well change you they were just like you're Tim Burton I'm sure you'll be fine here's your money like go make your movie I think that this is 95 right this is 94 so is this the same note

[00:41:05] before Christmas comes out the year before yeah but they're deep in that Disney's clearly trying to like get back in the movie is made in 1993 the Henry Selick film a nightmare before Christmas yes the film Tim Burton's

[00:41:17] Nightmare Before Christmas directed by Henry Selick right I think they want him back in their fold I mean they eventually get him back you know but I think for them it's also an investment of like let's do Tim Burton a

[00:41:28] favor so maybe he'll want to like come here and do some more big family movies for Disney mm-hmm I feel like they must have viewed it as something of a right off and maybe it works and maybe you get his next movie who made

[00:41:39] Mars attacks Warner Brothers he goes back to Warner Brothers and then after that he starts to become really a free agent then he's like flipping all around the place right sleepy hollow is who is Paramount okay and the

[00:41:51] Apes is Fox right like then it becomes about who owns the property because it comes him remaking properties right Warner's has Trilogy of Chocolate Factory Alice's Disney right Alice's Disney franchise flipper exactly goes in and and does the house and flips it and

[00:42:07] it is partly the Batman thing it's like well we gave you a franchise way back when and you did something magic with it so yeah what do you want to take a swing at X like Dark Shadows yeah you just reminded me that Tim Burton

[00:42:19] directed a movie that starred Mark Wahlberg correct that's weird one of the weirdest things it is a weird move that is a that's a I saw that in the theater sir also at the time I was truly excited for that movie where you

[00:42:32] because the man I was well how I maybe never make up I was like 14 years old I guess grown up in New York City hardscrabble kid on the lower East side no other frame of reference only knows the hard streets of New York playing

[00:42:45] stickball with Jack Kirby yeah Jack Jack I'm walking here let me tell you hey there's a car coming I gotta see this a the tapes movie you know Sims as a member of the antsy street gang right oh he was based on oh my

[00:42:56] goodness yeah I would like send the thing one of those letters where it's like you're a crumb bum it's clobbering time again that you see straight game won't leave me alone I start calling people crumbums again you know every fantasy the only second

[00:43:11] you won't believe what they did they call me a crumb um I never really figured out who those antsy streeters were those kids told me to go pack sand pack sand I've always heard pound sand I love that I'm like well I'm gonna get

[00:43:26] out my bag right but out of the beach and pack some sand people need bags of this stuff I guess I'm the one to do it Benji the wizard is on the loose we

[00:43:36] have to fight him I don't know some kid walked all up to me told me to go suck a lemon I don't know if I got the mood to fight crime God he is he

[00:43:45] is a wildly depressive guy I mean make it easy easily made of rocks he's an easily triggered libtard he is get out of here send away ambulance he's an NPC we can't talk about the fantastic four because I'll go down a fantastic four

[00:44:00] and I would love to talk about the fantastic four with you our worst ever done negative zone the worst episode we've ever done this podcast was we tried to cover all four fantastic four movies in one episode very early in

[00:44:11] the podcast well that was a high concept you swing in for the fences much like Tim Burton's early career yes yes you had not become complacent and starting to you know flip your franchise no we were we were risky we're taking

[00:44:23] risks no I mean that's that's when it starts to become like you feel like Tim Burton probably wasn't really excited by Mark Wahlberg and Mark Wahlberg in interviews when they asked about Plan of the Apes was like I

[00:44:36] thought like Tim Burton is crazy I want to be in that movie I don't really care about Plan of the Apes I didn't want to be in that fucking thing but I was like Tim Burton he's cool right like neither of them seemed very excited

[00:44:45] about the movie they were working on right they're extremely expensive like where people have to put on makeup that probably takes like eight hours and they're just like you know whatever I don't know plan of the Apes was all

[00:44:55] kind of full Apes. All as weird Tim Burton regulars is like extra apes and the right like the fatta ring attack. Yeah right exactly no I mean that's really the turning point for me. Sure that makes sense but

[00:45:10] but Ed Wood we'll talk about that in another episode with not me without me. Well maybe you can come back. Look maybe I'll never leave. Yeah. Third house. So Disney picks it up they give me $18 million and he makes

[00:45:24] American masterpiece. He does he makes his best movie I think. That's what thinking back like I guess it did. Yeah so disturbed that it didn't do well. Yeah it just struck me as like oh yeah you feel like within your circles everyone was obviously like in my coastal

[00:45:40] elite circles. Yeah but I just felt like I think most people critically say oh that's a good movie. Yes yes the battle was just getting people to see it. That was the thing. And not did not occur to me that that was a movie

[00:45:51] that would have put his rep in Hollywood at risk. Do you know what I mean as being able to helm either as a write off for Disney. Yeah in order to get him to come do something else or as something

[00:46:04] where he might have to course correct. Obviously Mars attacks took that took that part for him and one wonders if that hadn't been there. I don't think it made Hollywood doubt him as much as it may be made him

[00:46:14] doubt himself because he was such a savant in so many ways where it was just like this stuff just connecting then when it doesn't once he's like what am I missing this time. Right. I imagine he's a guy who

[00:46:25] probably couldn't figure out why certain movies work and certain movies don't. Sure you know. But his take on this movie is absolutely the perfect take for us you know like whereas maybe right he approaches planet the Aps doesn't have a hot like a very good concept of

[00:46:40] what the movie should be like his idea that you were talking about where it's like the movie kind of looks like a Nebwood movie but also is sort of sumptuous and beautiful to look at in a weird kind of a way.

[00:46:49] It's meta but I think like a lot of Tim Burton stuff that is meta it also is very sincere. Yes. And the idea to make it like through bed would rather than about it right you know it's like it's not

[00:47:01] like look at this wacko it's sort of very sincere catch which is other thing that he's really kind of owning at this point where there's like no ironic distance which is so big at that point in the 90s of just like or it's coming it's coming into fashion.

[00:47:14] Yes. And you know I I've seen the movie I saw it when it came out and probably set another time and then the last time I saw it before watching it again for today was maybe two years ago.

[00:47:27] I just I decided to turn it on and show and I'm watching with my son who at the time was 11 12. I'm like I'm not sure you're gonna like it. You're gonna connect with this movie and yeah you don't know

[00:47:38] what plan nine is right if you don't have any of this kitchen or whatever. Yeah. And there's obviously cross dressing and other stuff that maybe deserves a discussion at some point but let's just watch it and he's like I love it. That's a great movie.

[00:47:51] Yeah. It's such a winning movie. Well I realized what it was rewatching it today is like it's the Mubbot movie. It's a sure because it's like a family of family of weird colorful people trying to get into Hollywood which you're talking about my favorite kind of story.

[00:48:05] Yeah. Right. The movie where at the end you sort of see everyone together and you're like oh right they've also been in this together. The Ractite Group that becomes family right and then fights against the odds. Oh it's the same old like drug addicts and misfits. Right.

[00:48:19] But it is like especially like it's one of those movies where I get choked up when it does the sort of end post script right catch ups on the characters because you're like what a fucking group he built around them.

[00:48:30] Totally like wacky people who all like they were all misfit toys who ended up on the same. And they had all been drawn to LA presumably for the same reason because they all loved movies or television. Sure. Yes. I mean and you know Bunny Breckenridge was

[00:48:45] this actor who this is the thing I didn't realize Paul Marco the actor who played the cop who's played in this movie by Max Cicella. Yeah. The great Max. Yeah. The great Max is a younger Max Cicella. The baby face. I know.

[00:48:59] But right and pre he's in the sopranos and he's like fuck you. You know like which has became his thing. But Breckenridge was this financially very wealthy socialite gay drag performer. Yes. Who and he was an experience Shakespearean. He's very well trained. Right.

[00:49:19] He's like of the Breckenridge's right. The famous one. Yeah. He's like his great grandfather was a secretary of state or something like that. Yeah. Let's see. And he grew up in Paris. He was he was married for some unknown reasons. President. OK. Yeah.

[00:49:33] And and he got into the circle because he was sharing an apartment with Paul Marco. Yeah. They were like roommates. Right. And like this is rando people like him. Yeah. My my roommate trying to live in LA right now. This movie like changes the timeline of certain

[00:49:48] people coming in so that you don't have to introduce everyone separately. But I read that the way that Paul Marco got into show business was that Griswold like predicted he was going to have a big career in Hollywood. Yeah. I heard that too. Sorry. Yeah. Griswold. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:50:02] Clark Griswold. Clark Griswold. It's in it's if you watch Vegas vacation it's in that movie. Yeah. He just turned to the camera all of a sudden. Right. No but Griswold did like say like I predict you will become a major movie star.

[00:50:14] He's like I guess I got to be in movies. Right. Well like here's the thing I always thought about was like Paul Marco's daughter was my like chorus teacher in like middle school. Okay. Holy moly. Okay. And she like told me she was like you know

[00:50:29] my dad because there's the whole thing where he sets up the Paul Marco fan club that they say at the end. Yeah. The end right. That they like Disney had reached out more like Tim Burton doing a wood movie we'd love your participation and he was like I'm

[00:50:39] so angry at these people like making fun of Ed Wood making this cottage industry this thing that was really sincere and was like really against it because he felt like everyone's asking him to give quotes on these books of like the worst movies of all time. Right.

[00:50:52] We were coming from a really pure place. Yeah we were friends. Right. They were all friends. And he was like it was my father's like greatest regret in life that he couldn't believe that they would be making a sincere like compassionate movie about him

[00:51:04] when he saw it he was so touched that they like. Oh right. Keyed into what was infectious about this guy why all these people were drawn to him. Yeah. And it is that Muppet show thing where you're just like why does Gonzo think that

[00:51:14] there's a place for him in the industry. Right. Like with that routine. Right. But it's like he literally can't conceive of anything else and the same thing. There was still a lot of chicken based vaudeville though in 1979 to be fair. There was a touring opportunities

[00:51:27] that sort of thing. But all these people like that he gathers around them fit into that sort of like oddball space where it's like I got no other options. And you believe there's no moment where you don't believe that they are all happy being there together. Yeah.

[00:51:42] Like you know because you know what I was getting in the lake right. It's like yeah like Vampira you know she'll take his calls because she kind of knows he's sort of like weirdly winning guy even though he's kind of hassling her he's like you know I

[00:51:56] that by right like you know it you know because he's not he's I don't know there's something about him right like that's the movie. The movie is not what I hate about the biopix which is what you were saying is if it's about some genius

[00:52:06] there has to be the moment where the genius has the moment of genius and then he does you know decides to van Gogh decides to paint the sunflowers or whatever. And it's very hard to represent that in a film. Yes. Like to represent creativity light

[00:52:19] bulb over the head. Right. Done. Shit. You're right. Look what the hell. And it's classic. Obviously this movie you don't see that on your computer. This guy's never seen tune before. Sorry go ahead you were saying this movie doesn't do any of the bullshit where it's like I

[00:52:36] don't know Ed Wood sees like a hubcap and he's like that looks like a flying. So it doesn't do any of that stupid short. It just it's all about his personality like everything that's the core of the movie. And so everything that follows from

[00:52:47] it just makes a weird sort of sense even though it shouldn't make any sense at all. He's also a survivor like it's all like instinct because people keep on throwing these like curve balls in the way and he just adjusts and it's like I just

[00:52:57] need to make the thing. Right. I believe in myself so thoroughly that compromises be damned this movie will be a winner once it's finished. But also he believes in the and the weirdos that he surrounds himself right. And that whole thing where they up

[00:53:09] all night and and Lugosi gets into the water with the fake octopus. Yeah. And Marcos lost the octopus motor one of the great two words put together. Yeah. They make sure to say like four times because it's such a good phrase. And they and they've been

[00:53:23] shooting all night and then they get back to the sound stage and they have to keep shooting. Yeah. And he gives each of them this little pep talk that is totally sincere and like you if you were around him you would do that too.

[00:53:35] I would be in that right. And these are people who are could say no to them. Yes. These are all people who are all in show business for the right reasons because it's clear to all of them that they're never going to make it like real big. Right.

[00:53:45] You know everyone below Ed who believes that he is going to have the breakthrough is like I've sort of found my like mid-length spot. Yeah exactly. Chris Wells doing weird predictions. But they love doing the work. They don't know how to do anything else and they love the

[00:53:59] infectious spirit of other people who are as trapped as they are. What's the line where they and I don't know how historical this is but he gets the money from this Baptist church to make. I believe that's a great yeah. And they have it's like and he

[00:54:10] says to Paul Marker keep your Sunday open the Baptist we're getting baptized. We're getting baptized. And I can't remember whether it was Chris Wells or someone else says to him like how do you get all of your friends. It's funny, funny Breckenridge. Right.

[00:54:21] It's like how do you do it at it? They're all like standing in the pool right. And it is so. And it is so. Pomer is almost drowned and he just looks like I don't know how you do it and get all your friends to get baptized.

[00:54:29] Murray does nail that. Right where it's like do you renounce Satan and not sure. That had to have been a Murray like. It's so he's so good. And this I mean this was like where was Bill Murray at this time then and I were talking

[00:54:45] about that because he's in the middle. He's in them like he's about to enter his kind of family zone I feel like larger than life is like yeah. I'm at Groundhog Day is just the year before so I guess. All right. I mean that that was

[00:54:58] obviously that's a wonderful movie. But then his his next movies are Kingpin larger than life Space Jam the man who knew too little. Wild things like what's weird is that like this period he's like really good when he's taking supporting roles and his vehicles aren't as good. Right.

[00:55:15] Yeah. You know man his his monologue after they've wrapped on Bride of the Monster. Mexico was a nightmare. Oh my that is so beautifully played. And that's like an example. You look at this movie like from 1994. Yeah. And it's established that right. Check the computer David. 1994.

[00:55:33] Look up on the computer. Is it what year this movie was released was 1994. Yes. The Year of Our Lord. Maybe you want to check the computer though because it's there you might as well use it right. September. September. Oh it was at the New York Film Festival. September 23. 1994.

[00:55:46] I just think I'm sure this is a thing that all of you gentlemen have found as well but you watch almost any studio comedy from the years in 1981 to 2004. And the level of just like casual homophobia. Right. And transphobia is just like off the charts like very few

[00:56:05] make it through without one thing where you're just like Jesus fucking Christ. Sure. Yeah. Right. And like here's like a movie that's actually dealing with like at this time like pretty marginalized sexual orientations and fetishes and things like that. In the time of the movie

[00:56:20] and weirdly in 1994 still. Still. Right. And most comedies you think would really make a joke out of like and the weirdest thing of all is he wears their clothing. Right. You know like that would be the Kudugraa like set piece thing and the movie like it walks

[00:56:34] once against this fine line but it's like it doesn't take it so seriously where it then feels like condescending to be like you don't understand his struggle. Right. But it has a lightness of touch it allows him to be fully rounded people and human but

[00:56:48] there's like no shaming to any of their styles. No. I mean it's why I love their shirts so much. Right. How comforting it was for him like you know and you understand anytime he's dressing like up especially in public like he's relaxed he's trying to de-stress

[00:57:04] like it never feels like just a visual punch line like oh look there he is again right. No and the moment where he it's the same rap party. Yeah. In the in the. Oh yeah where he does the dance. The meat locker that's owned

[00:57:18] by the cowboy who gave the money to make the movie. Rance Howard. Right. Ron Howard's father. Oh is that who that is? Oh really good. He was really great. Really great. Yeah. So that dance so he comes in. He's a good boy. He's a little slow.

[00:57:31] He's a good boy. I think you can make one hell of a leading man. I want there to be a big explosion at the end. You know that that's sort of like I mean I giant up thing he always said was like his two inspirations for this performance

[00:57:47] were how do you duty and Ronald Reagan. It was just that sort of like bobble headed like enthusiasm like well make that work. Yeah. He's all teeth. He's all smiles. But except when he doesn't have teeth because he takes his teeth out. Yes he does.

[00:58:00] To become to have a little some Dracula in him. And when he does the dance and he's in his Angora and he's wearing a veil and he takes the veil off at the end of the dance and he doesn't have his teeth in it is a resting image.

[00:58:15] Oh I mean amazing images I've seen in movies. And like you know then Sarah Jessica Parker freaks out and says like don't see you know it's not that it's not that moment like look at this freak wearing women's clothes. And in fact it's like this

[00:58:29] this guy has layers upon layers in him that we are just seeing a little bit of. But those are also the only moments in the movie where I think the film passes judgment on characters is when there is a character who passes judgment on right the oddballs. Right.

[00:58:45] You know because it's like they're just living their life. Yes. You know it I mean there's something so sweet. About it that like everyone just on Facebook like there's a moment you know you barely see Tor Johnson and Bunny Bracken Rich like corresponding.

[00:59:04] And then Tor comes up to him at the party and says what does he say like Mr. Bunny what happened to your operation. And it's just like is he the one who prompts that mom. Yeah he's already saying Mexico was a nightmare. Yeah. You just go like everyone

[00:59:17] when they get into this like weird family goes like what's your deal cool got it cool got it like they're all so disparate but they're all just like fine with each other. And they don't judge each other at all. And just in terms of in terms

[00:59:28] of writing and filmmaking. Yeah. That exchange is eminently cuttable. If you got to get right because it has no bearing on the doesn't move anything forward if anything it provides a glimpse into this character who is really not a main obviously not a main character. Right.

[00:59:45] No who's you know you go like hey studio here's going to help sell your movie we've got Bill Murray who have funny one-liners and then I'm not so cynical that I thought of it in those terms. But I'm saying this is the scene that makes him a tragic

[00:59:56] figure. Yeah. Right. They're like don't put that in there we want him to just be the funny one liner guy. It's Bill Murray playing camp and they're like no we're going to make him like a man with like pathos and struggles. But it's also the source of

[01:00:07] one of the funniest lines in the movie which is when he said I'm like I would have died if not for these men and he gestures to the Mariachi band. And that's there. There is plus one he brings them with them all the time

[01:00:17] now because they're the only thing still. And suddenly there's this whole other back story movie that I would love to see. It's he lost his luggage. He lost his boyfriend but he claimed with him a Mariachi band who now will not leave his self.

[01:00:29] And I don't know whether that was scripted or whether that was a feels right. Like that feels like that's what it does for this movie. It makes the world feel real deep meaningful. You see that connection which I had forgotten about between Tor and Bunny. Right.

[01:00:44] That makes that reveals this is what's happening in the background. They're all they're all hanging out together. They're all friends. They have camaraderie camaraderie set camaraderie. Right. Like you and I shared on the Tick season two camaraderie. Sure. We're both engaged in a I'm just I'm not

[01:01:01] I'm sorry if you didn't feel it I definitely don't know. I mean the Esprit de Corre sound stage where we filmed was often negative 15 degrees. So you and I would usually huddle together for warmth. Yeah. Right. Right. You had to be together simply because the human body generates.

[01:01:15] So much of so much of the set camaraderies bonding through trauma. Right. That's yeah. So we got very close. Yeah. I'm just I'm just pointing out the very yeah we saw it. We saw a lot of shit together. Right. That David didn't see because

[01:01:28] I just met you at a wedding. That's true. But we saw a lot of shit at that wedding. It's true. Some good meals. Right. Like working on a show. I don't know why I'm trying to play this up. Never mind. Then added this out.

[01:01:38] Working on a show like the Tick season two how difficult it is. It's a hard show to make. Yeah. It does have that feeling sometimes like the Edward thing where you look around and you're like what the fuck are we doing. Yeah. Not in dismissive way but

[01:01:51] you're like what how is this happening. There are like PAs getting on their walkie talkies like hurriedly yelling that someone needs to come and touch up a nipple. Right. You know because they're like prosthetic nipples and we have like puppets and like robots and suit malfunctioning

[01:02:05] my character has 20 nipples. Is that true. No. It's the tick it could be true. But there are things like my character's name Nipslip. There are things like that. No. No. No. There are things like that on set where it's like PAs very seriously saying

[01:02:21] like is the nipple flying in. What's the ETA on the nipple. It's taking the most ridiculous stuff seriously. Right. Which is what this movie is about and what this movie is. I hope this works. Right. Like I think this is funny. Like we're all just like

[01:02:35] in it together and like I mean like a sub zero weather. That's right. That's that Peter's costume. And then you and Peter hired that mariachi band. We hired a mariachi band to carry his phone. His costume is very warm. Right. It's very warm so they had

[01:02:46] to drip like he would still be sweating in the costume and the rest of us were all like hyperventilating. It sounds like a great way to do things. It's just like no one's happy. One is hot. Everyone else is cold. I was happy.

[01:02:57] But it's the thing like you just because you're in the company of Mr. New. I was in good company and did not have to wear one of those costumes. Right. No, you got to wear normal person clothing. Right. You had the least intense

[01:03:10] costume of anyone on the show. Yeah. And not only was it non non styrofoam or whatever you have going on there. A lot of different things. Not not yeah. Not only was it non confining. You're wearing zero circuitry. It was very forgiving. Soft clothes. Yeah. Yeah. Soft clothes.

[01:03:28] Soft clothes. Yeah. All right. So Edward yeah he he's director and was in Hollywood. I mean this movie is pretty much about the production. I'm trying to remember the plot. What are your favorite things about the movie David? What you're putting me on the spot. Well that's fine.

[01:03:41] Look it up. Look it up on your computer. Favorite things about that. Well one thing I wanted to talk about that I occurred to me as your is one thing I like about his love of Lugosi over Karloff right. So obviously Boris Karloff is a legend.

[01:03:55] I do not have a personal animosity. He's a real actor who lives. He did exist. He was a legend. No no no. Mr. Williams. Um no but you know obviously Karloff was more about the makeup as well you know that way. Sure. That early scene when Ed

[01:04:12] is watching Lugosi do the hands and Ed is sort of mimicking him on the couch. Yeah he's doing this classic creepy summoning Dracula hands. Is like that I did the pure charisma of Lugosi as a performer and like the physicality like mattering so much more than

[01:04:31] anything else which is so crucial to Ed Wood because he has nothing to work with. He has to steal or scrimp like you know anything he's even using as a set or a prop. Um I love that. I love I just love Lugosi.

[01:04:43] And he says it in the movie but Bell Lugosi was the first choice for Frankenstein and he was like this is not a part but fitting a real actor. Right. This is like a stunt man party. It's just right special effects. Right exactly I'm just groaning

[01:04:55] what you know Dracula is about. But that movie was huge and Karloff who was like 50 at the time had been like a struggling actor forever like overnight became a star and then that led to him getting to play like romantic leads and verbal parts like it opened

[01:05:09] up all these other doors for him. For Karloff. Karloff's amazing. I mean because didn't Lugosi eventually play Frankenstein? Yes so the crazy thing is like in one of the late sequels. Dracula they don't really make the same amount of straightforward sequels as they do with the other monsters.

[01:05:23] They do like Dracula's daughter and shit like that right. Right. Frankenstein immediately becomes like franchising in the way the Wolfman did or Wolfman didn't really but Invisible Man certainly did. Right. And so the first Frankenstein movie has Fritz who's like the Igor equivalent right. OK.

[01:05:40] The second one doesn't have a character filling that function and then the third one Lugosi had like it was such a fatal mistake that he had turned down Frankenstein. There weren't Dracula sequels being made. He had sort of lost his moment. He needed money.

[01:05:51] He comes back and he plays Igor. So his character is Igor and it's he's the one who is like the prototype. Right. That's some son of Frankenstein. The hunchbacked sort of like assistant sort of guy. He's more of a like Romanian gypsy sort of type. Sure.

[01:06:07] But it's with the hunch and the whatever and he then becomes sort of the major antagonist of the sequels. Right. He becomes this like weird Machiavellian like sort of right. He's oh yeah he's not a lot of leader not King Lear the Richard the third sort of figure.

[01:06:22] And then the ghost of Frankenstein. Yeah which is the next one is the first one that Karloff is not in. Lottie Jr plays him. Yep. Correct. Ends with Igor getting his brain implanted into Frankenstein's monster so he has the power of Frankenstein.

[01:06:40] Why are you saying Igor is Igor isn't it because his character name is Y G O R. Oh I'm so sorry. Because then in Frankenstein meets the Wolfman Bella is now Frankenstein. Right. So they were like he really wants to play Frankenstein. So why goes brain

[01:06:55] transfers into the monster. Correct. So that's enough excuse to just like sure he can. Right. So now wait a minute. Now the monster Frankenstein's monster has got why goes brain in his which means he now looks like why gore. No that doesn't make any sense.

[01:07:11] Well here's the crazier thing I'm about to tell you guys. OK. Can't wait. So his character gets blinded which is also why he wants himself put into Frankenstein's monster. Through that through that through those old decomposing power he's got clear eyes again what have you right.

[01:07:24] But the logic chain that they follow is oh no but he's blind in his brain so when you put him in a new body even if it has correct eyes he won't see. Now why gore Stein is blind to do. So they shoot the whole movie

[01:07:37] where now Frankenstein's monster can talk. He sounds like Bella Legosi. Yes and he's blind. So he spends the whole movie with his arms out in front of him feeling around like groping out to make sure he doesn't walk in talking like Bella Legosi and they screen

[01:07:52] it they test screen it and the audiences think it's fucking ridiculous. Right. They're like why does I don't want to hear Frankenstein talking certainly not in that accent. Right. He has way too much dialogue so they cut out almost all of his dialogue.

[01:08:03] He's in the movie for like less than 10 minutes and that is why without context because they don't explain it all kids impressions of Frankenstein's monster is the arms out. Right. Right. Because that's this weird vestige of he's feeling around to make sure he doesn't walk into a wall.

[01:08:18] This was ghost of Frankenstein. This is Frankenstein meets the Wolfman. Right. That is the one in which he is the monster. It's mostly a Wolfman movie and that's like Junior is the top liner there. And that's sort of the end of his like what year would

[01:08:30] that have been. That is nineteen hundred forty four. Internet. I asked. Yeah. That's like end of the line for him in terms of like the series Universal Monster. Right. Yeah. I'm trying to find like a list of his because he made I mean it's right.

[01:08:41] You know you look up any of those old actors and it's like their filmography is a fricate. Right. It's a scroll. He becomes like a guy where it's like I'll do like one thing. You have to deal with a lot because of your reliance on the Internet.

[01:08:51] It's hard to parse. Some of us are like wearing off the dome. He also like one scene in Nochka. He played Dracula in Abbott and Castello meet Frankenstein. Right. It doesn't even get like good Bill. No. You know no not at all.

[01:09:04] He also was in a movie called Bella Lugosi meets a Brooklyn gorilla. Of course. Is probably my single favorite movie title of all time. It's a good movie title and it's got like two guys who are being like they were Dean Dean, Mark and Jerry Lewis knock

[01:09:19] off right but they're not right. Yeah. They're just sort of you're supposed to get the idea. Right. Have you guys seen Dracula like the the Ridge Ridge Dracula go see Dracula. It does. Yeah. It's a really good scene. It's a good movie. It's a really good bad boyfriend

[01:09:34] movie which is mostly what it's about is like you know my daughter is like acting all weird and then at night like he just shows up at the window and he's like I am Dracula and it has no music. Yes. Because it was made so early in

[01:09:47] the sound days that they couldn't have dialogue and music at the same time. So Todd Browning. Todd Browning. And so if he made Freaks after and then that kills freaks Freaks is his blank check. Yes. Right. And so when you watch it you can watch it these days

[01:10:01] there are like I think like Philip Glass wrote a score for it that like an orchestra or whatever but it's fun to watch it with no I'm not going to watch it unless it's Danny Elfman music. Well we could probably rope him

[01:10:11] in but it's weird to watch it with no score because there's no movie that's like this. The sound of just like the castle. Just the sort of hum. Yeah. And like where like someone's walking up the stairs and Dracula is like creeping up behind him and you expect

[01:10:25] the like and instead it's just silence and Dracula just grabs him. That's very scary. It's very weird. And then the other crazy thing is they were like we should make one for Spanish speaking audiences too. So at night when they wrapped Oh, they would use the same

[01:10:39] sets and costumes. Shot the same movie with Spanish actors. Wow. Speaking of that one. Yes. A lot of people think that one's better. Really? But Lugo is so good. They're very similar. They but the lighting is a little more interesting. It's a little more stylized. Who was Dracula?

[01:10:55] And I don't know the guy's name. Wait a second. I've got a computer in front of me. I bet I can lock this up. I will say this the lead the female lead of the Spanish Dracula is past and hopefully future guest Chris Whites is a grandmother.

[01:11:09] Lupita Tovar. Is that her name? Yes. Wow. Which is crazy. Carlos Vilar is close to Dracula. That's good. And what else did he do? Doesn't look like he had a long career. He's only got a few movies. He did. Carlos Vilar meets a Spanish gorilla.

[01:11:30] A Spanish Harlem gorilla. You gotta stick to the New York. Sorry. All right. I never saw that original Dracula. It's worth seeing if it's ever like at a. But he was a seducer. Right. Very much a romantic scary romantic. That's why I didn't want to

[01:11:46] play that was a monster. He wasn't a monster. He was like I don't realize himself as a romantic lead. I'm sexy. I'm verbal. The problem was he has this very thick accent and what studios if you really train your ear you can pick it

[01:12:00] up and studios are like this guy can't like play anything but Dracula. I know. I mean the idea that the idea that this guy never mind the accent I mean physically he kind of looks like a monk fish. Right. Like yeah and yeah I

[01:12:13] understand that he was a leading man in European cinema. And on the stage right he would do all his his traveling Dracula stage. Traveling drag. Right which is such a weird thing to think about where it's like that's what happened to most actors is like their

[01:12:28] autumn years would be like reprising their most famous role in local theater. Like Jimmy Stewart did like Harvey for like 15 years. Yeah because there was in VHS people that's how people would see the movie. That's it. Laura that Laurel and Hardy movie that at this point has

[01:12:42] already come out and been forgotten is about their last tour together where they're doing the same old bits like or they might be adapting them to a radio play. Like there are so many radio plays that were made based on Alphagecock movies. You just you'd have your

[01:12:55] shtick and put it in like wherever you could. Yeah. No I mean that that was the loosy thing was sort of like the vanity of like you know I will not succumb to being a lowly monster. Which is also like the most that's the most terrifying

[01:13:13] horror story in Hollywood. Right. That's where you like here is where I take my stand. Right. And it's the most the worst decision right. It's where you have a vision of yourself. The rest of the world doesn't have. Karl Auff like had like no career beforehand does

[01:13:25] Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein and like blows up and then his next universal monster is the mummy and the mummy he only looks like a mummy for like five fucking minutes. He rises from the tomb and then very quickly becomes a very suave romantic lead.

[01:13:41] And it's the kind of part that Lugosi wanted to play and Karl Auff like took the monster role and then became the kind of actor that Lugosi wanted to be for the next several decades. What was it that Bunny when they're getting baptized and the chiropractor who's

[01:13:56] replacing Lugosi who's now dead. Yes. As a body double and there's that gag where Edward says cover the bottom of your face and he's like it looks just like Lugosi. That's the same head. It's like no it's canny. It's pretty canny. He does not look like him at

[01:14:11] all. And Bunny says have him say Karl Auff is a coxswain. Right. Let's see if that works. It's such a beautiful like when characters in an ensemble like that when the characters reveal that they have shared jokes. Yes. It's such a it's such a. Well that's why that

[01:14:31] dancing scene is so great too. You're like oh right they're all so bought into all of it. Right. They're also cool with it. But and that's revealed with such gentleness because of you're looking at it through Ed's eyes. That's why I think the movie

[01:14:44] is so brilliant right where it's like Ed sees Bella. He meets him right. He knows something's up with him like Bella is a sad figure. He lives in this crummy house out in the middle of nowhere. You know there's a library says a big star like you

[01:14:56] must you must have tons of pictures lined up. Right. Cannot. Can't fathom it. And then you know in that first when you know when Bella goes off to obviously like take you know his heroin. Right. You have that amazing like sort of like shadow play.

[01:15:08] And to Ed like Ed knows something is up but he doesn't really think about it that hard. Yeah. Do you guys know that I love kids. You guys know that I was a literary agent. Yes. In the nineteen ninety four I was working at Writers House

[01:15:24] Literary Agent when this movie came out. OK. And do you know that I was the literary agent to Bruce Campbell the actor. Really. If Chins could kill or whatever Chins could kill. That was the book. That was the book that I sold for him. Wow.

[01:15:37] That was a big book. That book was everywhere. Yeah. Like I would anytime it was in a library it would be prominently displayed. The library is fast. Sorry. Sales. Seeds. They buy one book. These jerks. These cock sucking librarians. Eddie. You don't even have to pay for membership.

[01:15:58] If there are librarians listening to this now let me tell you stop stealing from me John Hodgman vacation and available in bookstores for sale so I can feed my children. Wait. So it was Bruce Campbell your agent to sort of complete the circle once you started writing books.

[01:16:15] It would be fun. You know. Well he would have done a better job for me than I did for him. What do you mean. Well no but it was it was a thing where like we had just gotten the internet in the office.

[01:16:26] And first thing I did was type in my name. Yeah. Nothing came back. Next thing I did was type in Bruce Campbell. Because five million angel fire pages. Yeah. Exactly. Including his own. Right. Sure. So he had a GeoCities or something and he was before

[01:16:43] there was blogging was blogging was writing like here's this weird story from when I was on set for Mikael's Navy. Tom Arnold or whatever. Right. And he was a funny writer. So I wrote it all. He'd been around. Yeah. And I and I and I clicked

[01:16:55] the email thing and I said have you ever thought about writing a book. I'm sure you're and it was the same things like you must have dozens of movies lined up. Right. He's like no I'm living on a lavender farm in Southern Oregon. Crazy.

[01:17:07] I have all the time in the world to write this book. And so he did. And I also felt like well this is my this is my big break. Yeah. Like I've got a celebrity book. I've got a celebrity client. Right. You know that Bruce Campbell

[01:17:19] star of Evil Dead and our army of darkness. Yeah. Right. These this was music to no ears in crazy in publishing in 1997 or so very well. It did of course because people were dumb. Right. Yes. Like it's hard it's hard to imagine a time now. Yeah.

[01:17:38] When what we term as nerd culture or geek culture or a movie culture or anything. I mean this was in the mid to late 90s there was barely an internet at this time. Yeah. And you know Bruce was this classic guy who if he

[01:17:56] went to a horror movie convention. Right. People go bananas. People go bananas in the convention hall. Right. And in the lobby he'd just be this shemp that no one would know who he was or care. You know and the people who are buying books at the time

[01:18:07] were a lot more lobby people. They were you know they're like get me I don't know these movies these movies are this adventures of Briscoe County Junior wasn't that show canceled. I've every like yeah but there wasn't much of an argument to make for that.

[01:18:23] But I would say look he's going to these conventions and he'll sit there and sign things that people bring to him for two hours. Right. And the one thing that he's not signing is something that he owns his book. What the other thing is you

[01:18:37] go like OK so maybe only 2% of the population in 1994 knows Bruce Campbell by name but every single person in that 2% is going to buy that book. It's not like oh yeah right Tim Allen describing the economic model of all podcasts. Right. It's when like pop culture

[01:18:52] changes where it's like they realize like well if you have a really engaged niche right you can produce the same numbers as someone who is known by everyone. Right. You most people might not know you but you can be enough people's favorite thing.

[01:19:03] But it was at a time when you if you if people are beginning to acknowledge that if that a niche was something you could sell to but it was also before there was still a mainstream though now there isn't right. I think I've told this story

[01:19:16] in the podcast before but I went to cover VidCon the YouTuber social media vlogger convention for a TV show that then got canceled after we produced the package of me covering VidCon and we were in the lobby checking in and it was just like Beatlemania times a billion.

[01:19:34] Oh yeah. Every five seconds another kid with like good sneakers would walk out and would get mobbed by forty seven thirteen year olds and their moms and we were like check in and be like do you know that? Do you have anybody who that's if you've even heard

[01:19:46] of these people and then I was like oh shit look over there and it was Katie Couric surrounded by like six bodyguards. Right. And she closed it was like fuck let's just walk quickly. I don't want to get spotted and no one no one care.

[01:19:59] And you could see her going from being like defensive like I don't want to be bothered to being like why is no one bothering me? Right. But it was that thing where it's like every single person who's a fan of this fucker with the swoop haircut and

[01:20:11] the and the dunks is standing right next to him right now. Right. And they will pay any amount of money for anything he touches. You guys are familiar with the genoschians. The genoschians come on. A troop of young prank video makers from Oh, they're Australian.

[01:20:29] I want to say yes. I'm not familiar with these people in 2013. I'm taking an airplane. They look like someone like just randomly cast a bunch of people to play YouTube. Exactly. I thought you were mispronouncing the name of the battle obsessed alien bug species

[01:20:46] from Star Wars episode to attack the clones the genoschians. The genoschians. No, the Janoschians. Yeah, I took this plane to Chicago for for a comedy festival. A couple of these doofuses got kicked off the plane. Oh, they were they were were they doing a prank on the plane.

[01:21:04] They were trying to pull a prank on the flight attendant. The flight attendant says no. What was right? I don't think the pilot was like we got a couple of genoschians and like well. Probably all I all I know is that they they came these three young dudes.

[01:21:21] I run a kid. Hijack came giggling down the aisle sure to take their seat wherever they were sitting. And then there was a lot of whispering among the flight attendants and then they came giggling back up the aisles. They're escorted off the plane. Wow.

[01:21:34] And then the pilot got on and said sorry about that, ladies and gentlemen, we're laid for a few moments. A couple of passengers had to be escorted from the plane. They were not the kind of people who like to have flying. They don't deserve to fly

[01:21:49] with us today. Wow. Seriously. You got heavy. But then I landed and on the other side, everyone get off the plane and said what was that? What was that? Geno skins at these these YouTube kids and they they were coming to do something completely different.

[01:22:04] They're not part of the comedy festival. Yeah. But they finally arrived. They got the next flight and they were staying in my hotel. Oh boy. And I had never seen this happened before. But by the next day, there was a constant vigil of hundreds of

[01:22:22] teenagers outside the hotel. Jesus Christ. All the time. Like if you were and it was and they were just waiting for them to come out. Yeah. I mean, I'm not exaggerating like hundreds of young people sitting on the ground. Yeah. And it was like this is a

[01:22:36] kind of thing you would think like the Beatles. Right. I mean like anyway, people knew about Ed Wood and mainstream because this movie came out in 1994. Sure. I did not know generally who Bruce Campbell was. Right. And it was that might have heard of the evil debt. Right.

[01:22:50] Like that. And I was definitely Ed Wood to Bruce Campbell's Bella in that point. I was like, this is so incredible, Mr. Campbell. Thank you so much for having me. I was taking the time. It's like sure kid. But here's a movie about people who were not popular,

[01:23:03] successful nor critically supported. Right. You know, it wasn't like, oh, they were the undone sort of forgotten essentially. Yes. I mean the thing about plan nine there's two. I mean, bright of the atom, I guess the funny thing. Have you seen the movie? Have you guys seen these?

[01:23:20] I've seen plan nine. I've seen plan nine. I've seen all three of the movies that are in this film. As those are essentially the structure is it's three films. Glen or Glenda, Bright of the Monster is what it was actually called him plan nine and

[01:23:32] bright of the monster really. It's just the thing where Bella is like flopping around with the octopus that I guess is called Bright of the atom or Bright of the monster. Real deep internet knowledge right there. Thank you. Yeah, you're welcome. Glen or Glenda is a truly strange

[01:23:48] thing because it's not ever seen. It's not like a Schlock movie, like the other ones like are it's a real song of his heart. Yes, yes, and he's in it obviously, but then also it has these cuts to Bella Lugosi as a weird scientist man who's

[01:24:01] pulling the strings pull the string right and all this stock footage of like buffalo stock where you're like, I mean that's the one that is aggressive outsider art. Like, you know, you're just like I can't understand how anyone ever thought that's one of my favorite little

[01:24:14] like seen more slits is the early chunk of the movie where he's working on the studio. And he sees the footage guy that brings him in. He's like, what would you make out of this? And he's narrating how he would work it into a narrative. Right, right.

[01:24:26] Yeah, because the octopus is going to be his big climax. Right. That's what's so good about this ways. I mean, Kara Seussky and Alexander are such good writers. They did the American Crime Story, right? You know, they did other things like they're sort of

[01:24:36] going to weaving all that in like organically that's when he then writes the script with the octopus in it like 50 minutes later, like, you know where you got the idea. Of course. Right. Yeah. And then plan nine, I feel like it's not just that it's it's so crummy.

[01:24:51] Yeah. But it's also the bellow thing, the the dentist thing. Right. It became a movie where you get the chiropractor. It's just right. I'm sorry. The guy is so big he couldn't come out of the grave. The actor died. So they hired a chiropractor like behind the scenes.

[01:25:02] It's when you're telling stories to each other as you're watching this thing where you're like you can't you won't believe like what is the backstory here. Right. Yeah. Unpacking plan nine is a lot more fun than watching plan nine. Right. And vampire is in it. Oh, yeah. Right.

[01:25:14] Yeah. I mean, a lot of these movies are just conversations mostly like in a room. Yeah. Exactly. Oh God. I love it when Dolores comes in and plays the secretary and he's like that was great and she's like I know it was. That whole chunk of her like

[01:25:32] coming in asking for her motivation, right? You're a secretary. You're a file clerk. You're going to file some things. Oh boy. Um, right. He there's just enough regular person in Edward for him to not seem like a total space alien. Right. Like when he gets

[01:25:48] frustrated, you're like OK, I'm glad the guy's frustrated because obviously is beginning to mount on. But I think that's the reason like the thing that differentiated Edward from a bunch of other guys is that like this was never hack work for him. Like he was like right.

[01:26:02] These are all opportunities to make a big picture. Right. Right. These are opportunities for me to really say something. Right. And the whole sort of Orson Welles thing that like he views himself as obviously that scene is wonderful. Right. Which you know, I mean,

[01:26:16] this is a thing that I love is that your man Vincent Ben Ben's best friend. I'm not sure. The other person. Well, are you a Jannofi? He's real into the kingpin. I'm super into his performance as kingpin. We also went to the same high school. Really? Oh really?

[01:26:31] Yeah. Ben tweeted at him and and did not free or retweeted. He did. But didn't give a follow back. No follow. But that's OK. I'm going to get to a bad way to get to not for you on the show someday. You think so, Vinny? Talk ditches.

[01:26:47] Sure. Yeah, we'll talk some ditches. One time my children I live in Park Slope, Brooklyn and my children decided to have a stoop sale and sell off some old books and stuff. You know what? The dumb thing in Park Slope. And maybe it was also a lemonade

[01:27:01] stand. Maybe it was like a combination bell and pizza. Side by side. And they were youngish. They couldn't just be out there on the street without having someone there. And boy, was I glad that I was there to keep an eye out because at some point I've noticed

[01:27:22] this guy is just standing off to the side just like watching my kids for a long time. Oh yeah. And then a really weird detail was that he was smoking a cigarette. He was keeping the cigarette behind his back. So every now and then he would

[01:27:36] just puff in the cigarette and put it back behind his back. Just kind of watch my kids celebrate and kind of nod along and take it all in. And it wasn't getting a real sense of menace necessarily, but there was definitely an odd vibe.

[01:27:50] And then I realized, oh, that's Vincent D'Onofrio. That's Vincent D'Onofrio. That's fine. The D'Onofrio was just his way of being. That's just him being out in the world. I definitely remember seeing him in situations like that in the early 2000s in New York City. Like, oh yeah.

[01:28:06] Like in his like criminal intent years where I was just like, oh, who's that weird guy? And he's like, oh, that's famous character actor Vincent D'Onofrio. It is so weird that he was on a long order show. Yes. Where he played a Sherlock Holmes

[01:28:17] guy who would like look at the air and be like the killer was left handed. You know what I mean? He's shit like that. But he was sort of this like regular kind of like uneasy presence of like Brooklyn and downtown Manhattan in those years.

[01:28:31] They cast him, I think, because of a physical resemblance to Orson Welles. Yeah, certainly not for his voice. Obsessed with Orson Welles and is like this is like I want to like really represent this man in this one scene. They shoot it. He doesn't sound enough like

[01:28:45] Orson Welles. They dub him with Maurice Lamarche. With the brain. Voice of the brain. He is the brain. And he's the premier Orson Welles in person. Every time there's a cartoon character that sounds like Arsh. He is what Orson Welles sounds like to me.

[01:28:58] Like, I mean, when I hear Orson Welles, I'm like, you could maybe lay it on a little thicker. Do you know that like this becomes D'Onofrio's like Waterloo that he couldn't get the voice right? And he keeps on trying to play Orson Welles. And he eventually

[01:29:09] a self-finance directed and starred in a short film. No, that's like Orson Welles getting ready for like a mercury production. Five minutes, Mr. Welles or something. And he got the voice down like to his credit. I bet his voice wasn't even that bad.

[01:29:23] And I'm going to say this right now. I love that scene. It's a little. But it's really jarred. Oh, you mean the dubbing itself? It is. Well, and even and I love Maurice Lamarche. Right. I love the brain. I love the brain, but it is the brain.

[01:29:35] But it is so it is it is such a bit. Yes. Yeah. That it does it doesn't feel right. And this is a weird sort of mythic way to it because it feels otherworldly in the scene or sure. He's trying to take over the world. Quality. Yes.

[01:29:50] He has tried to take over the world. Same thing he's plotting every other night. Right. Right. No, you're right. But but D'Onofrio really does look like Orson Welles and the mannerism mannerism all of it's acting. It's not just what he looks like. I remember my mom. He's lit.

[01:30:02] Like when I was watching this when he was the first time. Because Orson Welles was lit a very specific way even if you were sitting in a bar working on a working on getting something for Don Kehoeke. Right. No, he'd always bring in a fill like someone was

[01:30:17] talking to someone frozen peas who worked on one of the Mission Impossible movies and they said Tom Cruise a fan comes up to him will always stop take the picture with him but he'll make a lighting guy run in and hold up like a key light. Oh really?

[01:30:28] Yeah. And I was like that guy's a fucking pro. Yeah, because he's a pro. He's given him a good photo. He knows his angles. He's like he just come in here and just three quarters right here. Absolutely. And probably wants the other people to look good too.

[01:30:38] Yeah, right? Yeah. Boy, it's not often that people will ask for a photo with me. Uh-huh. But no, not maybe when I'm on tour. Yeah, you're very visually right. When I'm on tour, like when I'm on tour for like Judge John Hodgman we'll do a meet and greet

[01:30:53] after and then there'll be some photographs. Sure. But people just like I I feel very happy that I've spent some time in front of the camera so I know a little bit of how light works because people have no idea. Yes. Like they backlight themselves all the time.

[01:31:06] All the time. Yeah. Yeah. Just a little inside base. A little light. I've told the story about how do you feel about the fact that Vincent D'Onofrio as the kingpin is currently the acting attorney general of the United States? See, that's okay. That seems a controversial choice

[01:31:22] of conflict of interest also. By Donald Trump to choose Vincent D'Onofrio He made it clear though as the kingpin. As the kingpin as whatever the fuck his name is Whitaker. Do you know what I find funny about this? Like at the right. It's you want to say uncanny?

[01:31:35] I'm not talking about like bella goce looks like this chiropractor. No, it's one to one. What I find funny about this is at the time we're recording Matt Whitaker is Matt Whitaker acting AG. Right. AG by the time this episode comes out. Who knows?

[01:31:48] Even odds that Wilson Fisk is actually actually he jumped out of the pages of comic books. Looks like it will be literal Marvel super villain Wilson Fisk. My first act is to crush the spider. Right. A stilt man will be head of agriculture. Oh, sure.

[01:32:05] I like I like stilt man. But in high school was the high school. Uh huh. But New Jersey was where the misfits recorded their first album Walk Among Us right which references a lot of these films. Yes, the misfits have Ed Woodsong. Yeah.

[01:32:21] And in New Jersey is famous for being the only city in the United States of America that actually is located entirely within one boot. Right. It's an old dirty boot in a river in a ditch. Well, yeah, with a population of four thousand.

[01:32:35] What happened to that town is then they flooded. It's a party. They flooded. They flooded. They flooded. That's right. It's a battered old port key on a hill. So the former town that was built in a boot is under the river now. Oh wow. Apparently yours like an

[01:32:49] Atlantis. Your waters were the first to be coronated. I'm reading a Wikipedia entry for New Jersey. They have a site for where the chlorination happens. The motto is a great place to live and work, which there's a question mark. They say a second.

[01:33:04] We can have a workshop that a little bit more. You know, it's only a little bit more specific. I just think it's a great place to live and work. Perfect. Yeah. I mean we are a sunken city where the Atlantis of New Jersey can come up with

[01:33:16] something a little bit more. Like even the Atlantis of the Garden State. A chlorine soaked ditch hole. A toxic Avenger which discovered at my high school because he was a janitor and they said. Wait a minute. When you said that, I thought you were kidding. No, that's true.

[01:33:31] You know that was actually a toxic Avenger. Actually the toxic Avenger. Yes. I thought that was a joke. No. We talked about that. He was like we used to call him Melty. And then he got booked. All right. I can't even keep track of it.

[01:33:45] I don't know the truth this anymore. New Jersey is all satire anyway. It's a very ironic state. I'm bent to grow up in Strollmobile. Is Bhutan, New Jersey in pork roll territory or Taylor Hamter? Or good question. Or no, Taylor Ham. Taylor. Well, you are dead to me.

[01:34:02] Get out of here, Ben. Wow. John is shaking with rage. This is... You could have given me some warning. This is one of those ways it's hard to talk about because it is just like oh, it's just perfect. Here's another scene that's perfect. What's wrong with that?

[01:34:19] We talked about a lot of the scenes I feel like that particularly strike. I'm trying to think if there's anything else where I'm like. I mean there I'm trying to think of like other elements I feel like we haven't talked about. Yeah, I like that.

[01:34:29] I like that the the disgraced senator from Godfather 2 got work as a Baptist preacher. Yes. I also like what is it? Mike Starr, the guy who plays the producer who's like, look, I make crap. Like I already saw the poster in New York, Mississippi.

[01:34:44] Oh yeah, that guy is very funny. So a thing I find interesting just because I'll bring this up later but I have seen the actual Christine Jorgensen story. The one where the company, she actually sold the rights to which was slightly more respectable. Right.

[01:34:59] A real kind of like schlocky melodrama company. So they weren't like schlocky like, you know, genre films but it was like ripped from the headlines true melodrama stories and that movie feels like the kind of thing that Burton is then riffing on in big eyes. Uh huh.

[01:35:18] Is that sort of like Kitchie weird the kitchen sink drama thingy right. Sort of like real tale of like can you believe it? A movie is boring. It's interesting. Yeah. Boring is the opposite of interesting. I call it interesting eyes. The other one that

[01:35:39] I saw that I'd never seen the other Tim Burton movie that I'd never seen recently was Big Fish. Oh yes. Sure, another big one. And I know you guys are going to cover that. We are. But now that we're, you know, it's like, yeah,

[01:35:49] it feels as though this movie Mars Attacks, then he goes into retreat mode. Right. That's sleepy hollow. Then it's playing the apes and then Big Fish comes after that big fishes him sort of sneaking out being like, you know, can I be that?

[01:36:02] Was the one that was taking another here's a movie with real people is like his sort of Oscar coming out movie where it's like, yeah, here finally the critics and the audiences and the awards voters are all going to like shower this with attention

[01:36:14] and I'm made for best score. Sure. And it did OK. And I saw it 10 times in theaters. That's bizarre. I was obsessed with it. Really? Yeah. I had never tried during a movie and that movie just destroyed me in the last 20 minutes and I

[01:36:27] was like, I got to keep on getting this. That movie makes me cry. I think the ending is lovely. And I think it's perfect. I think but it's OK. I haven't seen it since I saw it. So what did you think? What do you think?

[01:36:38] I saw it in an unusual circumstance. It was being screened on the pack of a big fish. On to one. Yeah, it was hard to follow. You just swim real fast. Scalo vision. I was seeing it in underwater Bhutan, New Jersey. Sure. No, I had

[01:36:57] I went to a wedding in Puglia, Italy. Oh, Drew Scott, one half of the property brothers got married and invited me to his wedding. Are you serious? Are you friends with them? I'm friends with both of them. How did you become friends with the property brothers?

[01:37:15] Well, you know, some people follow me back on. Sure. You know what I mean? Hey, hey. Like, did not for you. No, yeah. Still haven't I still haven't corrected the Nafrio code. Yeah. But the Scott, but the Scots are fun guys. And somehow they invited me

[01:37:29] to why say they, you know, it's just one of them, but they are a unit. He and his he and his lovely bride, Linda, invited me to their wedding in Italy. Like, I can't not go. Sure. Yeah. And and I had an extra day

[01:37:42] there and Drew was like, come on over to our villa. Most everyone's gone home, but the family and I are going to watch a movie. You just watch big fish and watch big fish. Is this like in this is recently within the last year or the spring.

[01:37:55] So they were just like, what should we watch tonight? I guess big fish. It's his favorite movie. Wow. His favorite movie. And I was like, wow, this is it was obviously unusual to see big fish under the stars projected off his computer onto a screen.

[01:38:09] But it was kind of it was kind of so appropriately surreal and magical. That seems like a fairly good environment to see that. So I enjoyed it very much. I'm a big fan. I don't think it's perfect, but I do think that was

[01:38:20] another attempt at a big evolution for him. I mean, you have the human was punished or rewarded for that. I think sort of in the middle. I think in the middle, it wasn't like enough of a bomb for him to absolutely. I think when you're a guy like

[01:38:31] that who's had such highs, right? If it's middling, you're like, I don't know. I guess I should like go back to the other stuff, you know? Right. And I think the other thing is he's always offered that kind of shit. Like he's never going to have a

[01:38:43] shortage of people going like, do you want to reboot? Like, you know, like fucking this or that, you know, right? Do you want to do a please believe it or not or whatever? Those things that people are coming to him and saying like this.

[01:38:55] And he's like, I don't know. I guess I could use this as a vehicle to make this thing. You know, I guess I could use that gives me access to this technology or this shooting location or this actor or whatever that I think it's like,

[01:39:07] I mean, we talked about this in other episodes. We'll talk about other episodes. But like in the early 90s, he was like developing a lot of stuff that was like weird passion projects that all now have seemingly like fallen by the wayside that he's not pursuing.

[01:39:20] Which of those would you like him to revisit? There's the one understanding that he is now he's grown. He's in a different place in his life. Maybe he's not interested. But what was the one that you wish was the one that got away?

[01:39:30] So the Iron Boy, it's based on a manga and he was going to make it as a musical and sparks wrote all the songs. Right. Oh, cool. The melancholy birth of the Iron Boy. Yeah. Crazy. What's your what's your what's your fish that got away?

[01:39:44] See, I'm not a big fish that got away. I'm a person guy like the way the Griffin is. Very funny. I liked it a lot, John. I'm trying to get the other ones. I mean, yeah, you know what he really was going to make instead of this? What?

[01:39:55] Mary Wiley. Right. The sort of Jeffrey Hyde from right. That was developed as Tim Burton with Winona Ryder. Right. And the studio was like we're hiring Julia Roberts and he was like, all right, forget it. I'll go do something else. Star of Amazon's Homecoming. That's true. Yes.

[01:40:12] Formerly a podcast. Hey, you think some of them make someone will make a very visually distinctive podcast about blank check, like where it's like all spiral staircases and shit. Yeah. Yeah. Same as Mel's been talking. Well, those of you who can't see those who are listening at home

[01:40:26] can't see that this room is full of spiral. This is a kind of an MC Escher upside down. I insist it. Minescape. It's good for the acoustics. No, it's good. What does that matter with me? No, I got it. The only other thing I want to

[01:40:43] talk about in the movie is the ending. Yeah, I'd like to talk just very briefly at the beginning as well, because I think the beginning is smart. Okay, cool. All right. So we'll knock it out. What order should we do it in? From the middle first.

[01:40:57] What about the beginning? No, I just think it's such a smart table setting and I don't know whether this was in the script or his idea. But I think it puts a perfect frame around the movie and the sort of pitch it's going to be

[01:41:07] at and the tone and sort of the kind of film it's riffing on even if you haven't seen those movies. Because starting with the Criswell Rising from the The Coffin and the Hollywood set performance, this is one of the I think played by the very, very talented but

[01:41:24] appropriately unemployable. Yes, Jeffrey Jones extremely unemployable. Hollywood's probably most talented pedophile. One of the most wildly unemployable man. I think there's stiff competition, unfortunately. Let's not use those words. Industry of scum bumps. Crumptors. Not even scum bumps. Crumb bumps. I mean, not even crumb scum bumps.

[01:41:44] Is this the first? No, what's the first Jeffrey Jones? Beelges. Right. We should talk about this on Beelges. We've talked about and we talked about Sleepy Hollow, which we've already recorded all these things. OK, so you were saying Criswell emerges from The Coffin. Right.

[01:41:57] And you're like even if you didn't grow up watching guys like this, his performance is such a certain type of entertainer, the language with which he's speaking, the terrifying true tale, believe it or not, of Edward D. Wood, it really sets the tone and then those.

[01:42:13] And that miniature house that you let you go. You have all these models, the beautiful like the title cards on the gravestones. It's also just like a fucking practical thing that you like. Well, the practicality is what's so fun about it in general. And then that great transition

[01:42:27] from like a lot of houses. Then you have the stop motion tentacles and everything. And then there's the beautiful transition from like that to now we're in a real. How come they didn't get a stop motion tentacle into big fish? Did they have one in there?

[01:42:40] Because that's at that point he knows CG. Oh, sorry. You were saying. No, I just think it's like artificiality, artificiality, artificiality, height and height and height and you're seeing what Edward's mind his movies would look like. Right. This is like full Tim Burton artistry. Right.

[01:42:55] And then it literally brings you down to earth to like Rainy Theater. Here's Edward. Like now you understand what he is seeing in his mind's eye. And I just think it like lays everything out perfectly. And I like that at the end they bookmark it with the

[01:43:10] like reverse footage of Chris while going back into the coffin. Right. That's what you were going to talk about at the end, David. You just stole your thing. Anything about the middle you wanted to get to? I love how it connected the beginning to the end.

[01:43:24] It does do that very well. It's a great bridge between the two. It really leaves the two together in a very satisfying way, right? Yeah, the middle is great. Good solid middle. Because I was like how is this going to end? Right. Yeah. And then the end came.

[01:43:36] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And the middle was kind of a bridge to that. You were like how is this going to end in the movie? It was like we'll get to that. Right. Hold your horses. Well, so I consider the opening credits to be the beginning of a movie.

[01:43:47] The entire movie is the middle. Right. And then the closing credits at the end. For me, a movie ends if you ask me and this is just my opinion. A movie ends after the end credits have finished rolling. Right. That's for me. That's it.

[01:43:59] That's the end of the movie. And the lights come up when a guy comes out sweeping a popcorn. What about the post-credits sequence? Well, I mean this is where it gets tricky. So once again, I don't want to get political here. For me, if there is a post-credits

[01:44:12] sequence. Just in case he gets too political. The movie ends after that. And if there isn't a post-credits sequence, it ends before that. Obviously, we're going to have to cut that out. That's way too inflammatory. That's from you when a film ends. And we're back. So the ending.

[01:44:25] No, just just well, the loveliness of everyone being collected together at the theater, but just his the one of the great lines that we all reference to this day. This is the one I'll be remembered for. And the like guilnessness of it. And that it's also true.

[01:44:41] This is the one he's remembered for, right? And it is yeah. And that he gets to give you Tora's family, his wife and son. I want to know what that actor who played the son is doing now. He really looked at him. No, he's Chris Pratt.

[01:44:56] He should have been in Charlie and the chocolate factory if they only made it a few years earlier. He had a little gloop. George-Yamal Steele in a great fucking performance. He's so good. That first scene. That's like one wrestler playing another wrestler. The first scene where Edward's

[01:45:08] like, I want you to be in the picture. He's like, I'm too ugly for movies. You know, when he's lying on his front. He just like sees the thing in everyone. The other, I mean, at least Marie is great as I just love the thing where

[01:45:19] Tora has all the lines because no one wants to speak in the movie. There's that thing. Why is he so intelligible? And he goes, well, Legosi's dad, Vampire won't speak. We've got to give someone the dialogue. Oh my god. Everything's so logical to it, you know? Yeah.

[01:45:37] I mean, that's that other beautiful piece of writing is they walk out of the theater. He feels like he's a mill, you know, walking on sunshine because it's like the first screen of his. Maybe the only movie that does not use that song.

[01:45:49] And this might be the one. Right. But it's like this is the first premiere of his life that didn't end with like tomatoes being thrown in. Do we know why they're all rioting in that middle? Yeah, that was a weird. Is that explained?

[01:46:00] Why I think it was just like like a frummy theater. Right. It's just like where's the movie and they're rioting. I'll hear like interviews with like people who grew up in that era being like the theater was a madhouse. Like it was just children. Yeah.

[01:46:14] And they'd play like six movies in a row. Right. And they're just like eating candy and throwing soda. Right. Like it's like the Schlock Theater. I get it. It's just sort of it's such a thing when they open the door and it's like absolute chaos.

[01:46:25] But he feels that sense of victory and he loves the people he's surrounded by and he like says to push a shark head like let's go get married. Let's drive out there. His car with raining and the hood is broken. And he was like I'm sure I'll

[01:46:36] clear up the second we turn the corn. It's a beautiful optimism of the guy. And that he found someone who liked loved him for who he was. Yeah. All of the the other thing all of the rehab stuff like in that. Yeah. But yeah it's all it's also

[01:46:52] unjudgmentally handled as everything is in this. And I love that when the final footage he shoots with Bella is like the one time that he's kind of soberly seeing everything. I mean that plays it really well where it's like he's doing this just for Bella.

[01:47:06] So Bella has something to live for. This isn't him being like I can get this movie. Right. I'm using you. I'm going to get this to make money here and do that. It's like you probably have a week left so I want you

[01:47:17] back in your element to feel like you're a star again. Right. That was that was very beautiful. Yeah. It's a beautiful it's a beautiful friendship they have. And I was going to say I mean you were saying like the vampire thing I mean he's like he's so good.

[01:47:29] Lisa Marie so good. And he's kind of a pest the whole time. But I think finally breaks her down is that like he's also the first guy to call when her career goes bottom up. Yeah. Like he keeps on like trying to get her in there.

[01:47:42] OK value now I'm single. She's like a beautiful woman like user in some way and that's like front page of the newspaper. They cancel her show. She can't get arrested in town. And she's just like he still doesn't care. She gets that it's not transactional with him.

[01:47:56] He he just is an admirer. He likes right. You know that you know that Dana Gould was to vampire what Edward was to bella lo goce. Really. Yeah. Oh wow interviewed her. Oh really. Then became her friend and wow caretaker to the end of her life.

[01:48:15] That's not not live in caretaker. I do like that the movie acknowledges the Elvira kind of stole her bit. Yeah. Dana has incredible you should get you should we should I mean you should you should drop your embargo on Dana Gould. You know that you feel very

[01:48:32] strongly that you should never be a part of this. Ben just make a note to lead this episode we're going to rerecord next week with Dana Gould. He's got an incredible story. Yes. No that's that's that's not. Yeah yeah. And maybe you know in the

[01:48:45] future when Dana is getting on in years you can be able to do that. I would absolutely love that. Right. No it's it's just a lovely movie and a wonderful bunch of people. I'm going to I have one thing that I want to ask you guys.

[01:49:01] I do not have an answer for this. It's not like I've got something you know. Prepare. We all wish that Tim Burton would find that passion project that he set aside in the 90s or has a new one today. Yeah. We also know that he's going to be

[01:49:16] flipping franchises. He's going to be putting a fresh coat of paint on some beloved old properties. He'll make a he man next or whatever. What what you're actually like to see what what franchises if I had to let him lose at a franchise. Right. Right. Like 1999.

[01:49:34] All right. He's never made a sci-fi. I know Mars attacks is sort of a but it's like space 1999. Hang on. Hang on. I'm still marveling. I'm still reveling in this amazing idea. This full circle of it. But it's also yeah. It's also a great idea. Right.

[01:49:52] Tim Burton's Space 1999 goes flying off into the galaxy or whatever. Tim's ladies and gentlemen and and and I don't know binary listening. There there is. I mean the tricky thing with him is you go OK so it's like one of two columns.

[01:50:08] That sounded like I was making a joke of the expensive non but I don't say ladies and gentlemen anymore that was before that reason. And that was a that was a verbal tick and I and I take it back. David Sims listeners. Yeah. To this podcast. Folks.

[01:50:21] Well ladies and gentlemen right it's just a person. It's like stage pattern. Yeah. Right. Still anyway. No it's a genius idea is what I'm saying. It's a great idea. Greenlit in the room that is I think that's the line I think you might want to make it like

[01:50:32] 2099 just nope. 1999. Fair enough. It's all about the star Vincent D'Amofrio. Now that's what I call music compilation. No I you know I think the better line of thinking is like what genres has he not played in yet. Because there is that thing

[01:50:50] where you go like OK well you pick something that feels like it's right in his wheelhouse there was the rumor a couple of years ago that he was going to do a stop motion Adams family and you were like they don't need

[01:50:58] to make that we all have it in our heads. You say it and I can picture the whole thing. It's a waste of time. But then the opposite thing of like what if he did a take on something that you never think Tim Burton would do.

[01:51:08] You're like but I know what that's going to look like too. So you kind of stop stalling Griffin. What do I want him to do the tick. Yeah that's the answer. No I mean not the worst idea in the world. No I'll tell you like I

[01:51:23] would like I think it would be cool to see him return to the superhero world but do something like like Deadman. You know that'd be cool. Yeah those weird sort of like pulpier sort of mystical sci-fi son of Satan. Right. Right. Do some Jack Kirby shit.

[01:51:43] Etrigin the demon. I mean I just feel like there are things like that where it's like it's a property but it's not a hugely well known thing but you're getting in because it's the DC umbrella or something and give him a really functional like three act story.

[01:51:59] Can Tim Burton make the correct Fantastic Four. I don't think he's the guy but I don't yeah. I mean I would see his Fantastic Four circa whenever they want to make a Fantastic Four movie for the first time. Right you know like right whenever we have one every

[01:52:17] year. I'd be fine with that. You like offer me the choice of no more Fantastic Four's and just every year there's someone else takes a crack at it. Yeah. I'd take the latter. I feel like based on this movie and the sense of offbeat

[01:52:31] off-kilter family that he was able to create in this movie. Yes. There's a version of that you can see. I feel like the logical end game here is that Marvel is just going to let Peyton make the Fantastic Four movie. Wouldn't that be an incredible full circle.

[01:52:46] That's what I'm hoping happens and they let him make something that's fairly close to what he really originally wanted to make. Obviously the landscape has changed. We now have to fit into this larger machinery but if they let him make a sort of like period stylized Fantastic Four

[01:52:58] movie which I think at this point the only way they could really work Fantastic Four into the Marvel Universe this late in the game is to flashback to do a different time period to do an alternate dimension. Alternate dimension that gets sucked into our dimension or

[01:53:10] something. I don't know. Even do a period movie and then there are people out of time. I would love if you did a real kind of life. I mean give it to Peyton Reed in like Flint kind of. I think Peyton Reed is the

[01:53:21] I have to assume he's at least mentioned to Kevin Feige like one day if you want to do Fantastic Four I'm here. I'm a proven guy for you, you know. That's I think the end game here that that is so but what's your answer with Tim Burton?

[01:53:36] I think Deadman. I think that would be a cool thing. I'd rather see him pick something like that that doesn't come with a tremendous amount of cultural baggage. You know where there isn't a real strong preconceived notion of like well I know what the regular Dumbo's like.

[01:53:49] Then you got one. You got a Tim Burton franchise flipper. Is there a rave franchise? I'm sorry about rave movie. Like yeah. Do you just want like Tank Girl or something like that? Something like that in the 90s? Right. Yeah. All right. I'm just trying to

[01:54:06] think of some cultures from the 90s that I would be interested to see Tim Burton have a take on a class of rave culture. I hear he's going to he's going to reboot the singles universe. That'd be fun. Making video time and it's coming back.

[01:54:21] His only onscreen acting appearance was that he plays in singles the guy who runs the video dating service. Tim Burton does. Correct. Right. I have to leave. He did that without the Internet. I know. Well we have done. We did do a singles episode

[01:54:34] which I do have to leave. So yeah, we're done. We're done. We're just playing the right way. So we've heard all the pitches. Tim Burton singles. Right. Tim Burton's Deadman. Yeah. Tim Burton Space 1999. Yes. Obviously. Folks listening within the sound of my voice. Get ready for

[01:54:54] Tim Burton Space 1999. Greenlit in the room. Absolutely. Well, that's the winner. OK. Absolutely. I'm sorry. People don't even get to the introduction of you have ultimate green light power in Hollywood. Oh yeah. That's true. Well when people find out that I agent to Bruce Campbell's book

[01:55:08] they're like let's not second guess this guy again. What was what was the widest this film ever went? The widest this film ever went was six hundred and twenty three theaters. It made a total of five point eight million dollars. So obviously it did not make its

[01:55:25] budget back. Did not cross out. No, it didn't cross out. Also just weird to think about Disney making a film like this today. It's crazy to think about Touchstone back in the day. Yeah. The weekend to September 30th was it opened the New York Film Festival.

[01:55:38] It just came out in theaters. Yeah. It opened on two screens this weekend so it's not in the top five. So your number one movie is a movie that I truly appreciate and love. It is a like kind of like a white knuckle thriller slash domestic drama

[01:55:55] starring an Oscar winning person. Lady or a gentle lady is it trying not to give you a little river while because I knew if I said lady you would just know I had a feeling it was a 10 point two million dollars Benjamin Bratt yes Bratt bacon Strathairn Strathairn

[01:56:15] it's got what a cast I always love when Strathairn is above the title he's above it. What a good name to put above a title do we say is it Strathairn I believe so. David Strathairn that's how I say it. I think that name is fun

[01:56:26] to read fun to say and I have a great time every time I say Strathairn fun to watch fun to watch a real actors actor actors actors actor actors actors love Strathairn sure who wouldn't royalty. He's the Strathairniest of them all now number two at the

[01:56:43] box office was number one the previous two weeks as a sci-fi actioner. Oh wow that I enjoy a enjoyable piece of 90s marginalia did it get any sequels it must have it didn't get any like theater see it didn't become big franchise there must be some

[01:57:04] straight to VOD like I don't know maybe not in the first sci-fi based on a comic book I believe from you know a director that we've covered one of his movies we've covered one of this director's movies there was a directed TV DVD sequel starring Jason Scott Lee

[01:57:23] with the subtitle the Berlin decision and you'd be bad at this job you'd be so bad at it bad at this job 10 girl it is no it remains the highest grossing film for this actor who is like a 90s star and was on Amazon at one point

[01:57:41] oh it's a John Claude Van Damme film that's true Oh I know it what is it time cop that's right I would be very bad at that Peter Himes time cop and Peter Himes of course directed running scared running scared yes

[01:57:55] now number three is a film I did not know of so time cop in the theater also the Chelsea so long as the Chelsea time comes up at Ron Silver not bad on silver right that's a big silver yeah so this is

[01:58:07] bold this is a film I've never heard of apparently it is an erotic drama how dare you pitch right I dare right at African American audiences erotic drama pitch right at African American are you being sarcastic no really I am not being sarcastic it was a

[01:58:24] Gramercy picture which I think was an old universal like label yeah yeah starring Jada Pinkett bokeen woodbine Alan Payne I've never heard of this movie it was fairly well received it came out it made 20 million dollars came woodbine another name that is just a say absolutely electric

[01:58:43] pleasure to watch on screen yeah I love him like this was like well received I've never heard of it I don't think I have heard any really is one of the things that year of my my twenty third year on earth and I should you were hot

[01:58:54] this is prime hot I can't believe I should have known this I was I didn't have children I was going to movies all the time I was living at the Chelsea theater it's whatever Houston does that help I don't think I know it's

[01:59:05] just sort of amazing to think of studios like bothering to make yeah all kinds of movies back then we would yes let's let's say yeah called Jason's lyric Oh I do know that title I had no idea what that movie was but I knew that title yeah

[01:59:18] so there you go number four is the best picture winner of 1994 so it's for scum yes still going strong still going strong and it's 13th week it's made 269 million dollars my sister Romley watched that money for the first time and very recently was like what the fuck is

[01:59:34] that thing it is one of those things really I can't explain it but everyone was crazy for the time for Quadrant blockbuster yeah you watch it now and you're like is this offensive like it's not just three or like I don't know it's a

[01:59:48] feel of this right yeah you're like I think this movie is just make it Lee offense but she was like she was like I don't know if that's good or bad can you just explain to you how that fits into the history of our culture

[02:00:00] of our species what was that it's like the ultimate baby boomer movie but also it's this offensive comedy I don't know like anyway farce come what do you think a farce come to Jason Jason John John John John right Sean Hunter and Jason's lyric

[02:00:14] that's why it was yeah I don't know what Jason's lyric made for us. I have not seen it since it came out Wow and I remember being a little turned off right well I was turned off by its political point of view sure hippies are bad

[02:00:31] yeah they're bad yeah man that promiscuous sex and you know you'll end up in the coffin or whatever. What a fucking weird movie very weird movie very weird movie but I love Tom Hanks so much I do too. Number five is another of the

[02:00:44] best picture nominees a great movie about how wasps run and ruin the world. Quisha love quisha quiz show quiz show Robert Redford's quiz show starring Ray Fiennes John Titero and the other guy the guy from Northern Exposure who's doing that bad Boston accent Rob Mara

[02:01:03] Rob Mara whose daughter's name is I don't know Robba to his our name is to Mara I swear to you his daughter's name is to to you. I believe that's one of those things that it feels like you have been waiting four years on this podcast for someone

[02:01:19] to mention Rob Maro. You know that fact that fact before I knew who Rob Mara was they do have a daughter named to my wife grew up think to an Atlanta and in elementary school. They had a like fifth fourth grade and then a classmate

[02:01:35] son of the local police chief chief hand. His son's name was Dixon. Oh boy. Guess how they guess how they made fun of him? Guess what his nickname was Dixon and I'm trying to think about you could work that into something. I know it's crazy right.

[02:01:53] They were two they didn't even recognize the joke. Really. They called him Jupiter largest of the planets because he was usky. Oh boy. They were too. It was right there. Couldn't they couldn't get themselves. They couldn't bring themselves to make a Dixon hand joke. Wow.

[02:02:10] Well, talking about a Dix you got a TV show called called Dick Town. Oh, I'm not sure that when will that be? Will that still be far off in the horizon animation takes a long time? We're I mean we're told some time in the spring of 2019.

[02:02:27] So he'll be OK. So there is there is a show that I'm working with David Reese as a past and future guest. I'm going to get it back in animated show for FXX maybe by this time FXX X, they might add a few more it's a

[02:02:46] very is a fun little show and some great voice acting by Griffin Newman, oh you're amazing. Snuck a little little voice on my little tush on that show. And if this is the plug portion, you can also listen to me every week. Judge John Hodgman a podcast

[02:03:03] from maximumfun.org. And you can buy my book Vacation Land now available in paperback stores. Don't go to the library I hadn't heard that had been released in paperback. I feel like I'm getting the word out about that

[02:03:13] Yeah, yeah, you can go to libraries and you can take it out of the library too. That's fine as long as you keep it Yeah, right. Oh, we have a deal the part here's it. Here's the thing It's a special bonus

[02:03:23] We've got a range with the publisher if you buy the book it frees you from the obligation to read it So that's a good deal for you. Yeah, oh, I see right you can just buy it

[02:03:33] Barrow it from the library you got to read it. That's that's how you pay I like the idea of you using your like million plus social media followers to just fully take down the American library

[02:03:44] You're just like this is my battle. I really liked John Huntsman until that tourney took later Just kidding You know libraries or was such precarious ground and Hodgman put his pressure on now is all it took

[02:04:00] Throw a Molotov cocktail to your local library remember to sign it from John Hodgman At their back and they fell over the cliff Do take responsibility in England like King Edward the fourth he kind of like he took all the monasteries

[02:04:16] I ever the six sorry not fourth. Yeah, you want to be that but Right at the end yes, King Edward the sixth Go to Blinks out reds I come for some real nerdy shit. Thanks to answer good over so for me

[02:04:34] Do laymon coming for a theme song job on Pat rounds for artwork season two of the ticks I'm coming out at some point cannot wait if you like this episode It's like that for ten episodes of a TV show extra nipples extra nipples spoiler lot of nips nips

[02:04:49] nefarious dr. Nipslip yeah Tune in next week for our What's next week? Yeah, Paul of Tompkins. Yeah, Paul Tompkins is not welcome. He will not be on the show

[02:05:02] Right exact care so tune in to see who we have as a guest on in his place right right next week and As always I forgot to say this in Mayster's on the films of timber and it's called power with scissors