[00:00:01] Blank Check with Griffin and David, Blank Check with Griffin and David Don't know what to say or to express All you need to know is that the name of the show is Blank Check Sometimes I wonder about my life. I lead a small life. Well, valuable but small.
[00:00:26] And sometimes I wonder, do I do it because I like it or because I haven't been brave? So much of what I see reminds me of something I read in a book when shouldn't it be the other way around?
[00:00:37] I don't really want an answer. I just want to send this cosmic question out into the podcast. So good night, dear podcast. It was between that. It felt like for this movie it feels appropriate to pick one of the email monologues.
[00:00:56] I mean, you could also do the whole purpose of places like podcast is for people with no decision making ability whatsoever. This is the thing. I mean, the quotes page for this movie is very long and I was struggling to find a good one.
[00:01:09] And you said you're surprised because this movie does have some good zingers but I feel like they're longer. This movie doesn't have like something like when Harry Met Sally is so snappy. She has no podcast. Can I ask a question? Please.
[00:01:24] This may make me seem like an uncultured roux when he's taking the caviar. Yes. What is that thing? Egg salad. That the caviar is around. Oh, I thought it was a goat cheese. It was a big cheese ball. Is it a cheese? It looks so yellow.
[00:01:39] It's a gigantic cheese ball. Yeah, that's like covered in like a coating, I think. Oh, I thought it was egg salad when I watched it last night. Right, it almost looked like egg salad but then I'm like why is eggs and caviar seems like egg.
[00:01:50] Oh, I like that. I would too. It's just sort of a funny combo. I don't know. If I saw a ball of egg salad surrounded by caviar, I would have skipped the caviar and gone right to the egg salad. Right.
[00:02:02] Meanwhile, here Mr. David Sims is pretending that he's a country roub when in fact he blocked out everything but the caviar. He went so caviar crazy the second it was on screen. He couldn't even process what other food was happening. Give me that cav.
[00:02:16] I mean, he couldn't be cavalier about the caviar. The best part about that scene is it's so utterly Nora Efron to comment on an etiquette issue.
[00:02:25] Like she is, I'll never forget Nora Efron being like writing in, I don't even remember, maybe Heartburn or something else where she was like, you gotta buy a round table. That's the table.
[00:02:35] You know, these little like advice things that she gives without being condescending somehow is throughout her whole career. She even puts it in a freaking movie that says the caviar is a garnish. She can't eat the caviar like that. It's a garnish.
[00:02:50] The other thing I noticed last night that I'd never noticed before is when they're talking, she's taking the caviar off his plate and putting it back onto the plate, which is insane.
[00:02:59] Whenever Nora Efron puts in like a Nora-ism, it reminds me of watching Seinfeld where like they just fully put one of Jerry's stand-up lines. They're saying, right? And you're like, this has no business being in this episode.
[00:03:12] It's just something that Jerry said on stage once they got a laugh. Like sometimes these like the Starbucks lines are just things that Nora has said to friends, you know, and she just dropped it in.
[00:03:21] Right. And in the same way that like Seinfeld had like 15 hours of really strong material that he could pull from across all the seasons of Seinfeld, Nora Efron had an entire life of things like this.
[00:03:34] I have so much to say about this, but I was talking to my sister who will never be a guest on the podcast again about the role of food in Nora Efron movies.
[00:03:48] And she was pointing this out and obviously her last movie is her like overt food movie. Right. She finally makes the big food movie.
[00:03:56] But there are so many food scenes that are memorable throughout her films, whether they're overtly about food or whether they're just sort of using food to make some sort of point of characterization. The apple in Sleepless in Seattle.
[00:04:09] Right. And even obviously like hats is deli in when Harry Met Sally and the garnish here like and the pie in Heartburn, like between the film she wrote, the phone she directed, the carbonara and bed. Carbonara.
[00:04:22] I would say her thing with like food, but mostly about hospitality, I think is a big Nora Efron thing. It's like, I said etiquette, but I think I just mean hospitality.
[00:04:32] Like, you know, the way to make people feel the most comfortable in your space is what she's the most concerned with. And it comes up again and again and again.
[00:04:42] And for some reason, she never ran out of ways to say kind of the same things over and over again, which is like the best thing a writer can do. Yeah. And the way that she fits it into a movie like this is really so charming.
[00:04:55] I mean, you I just want to say this is my favorite movie. Like you're not catching me saying anything bad about this movie. This is this is it for me. You already knew that, but this is why we're having you.
[00:05:06] In fact, I mean, a we got some table saying to do here speaking of etiquette. We got some we got some caviar setting to do here. This is this is blank check.
[00:05:19] This is a podcast about filmographies, directors of massive success early on in their career and given a series of blank checks to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. And sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce baby. It's a mini series on the films of Nora Efron.
[00:05:34] We've gotten to the titular film, the one that inspired the mini series title. Because of course this is you've got podcast. We're talking. We really put so much thought into that. Yeah, really? I mean my pitch was you've podcast. Right. Which I hate. Separate words. I like that.
[00:05:55] It only works if you say it that way. Yeah, right. Right. Otherwise it sounds like you've podcast. What are you? What is that a verb now? Uh huh. But our guest today. A quick return, a quick return from their last appearance.
[00:06:12] But it was when we recorded our last episode. They asked who are you doing like for the next two mini series. We brought this up and they said like, oh my God, we have to be on in Nora Efron.
[00:06:23] We had in fact booked someone else to do you've got mail. But we realized no, we gotta do a swap here. We gotta rearrange the table because this movie is so fucking important to the two of you.
[00:06:36] And we knew that and then as we started talking about more, we realized even more layers to sort of the history both of you have with this movie collectively and separately. Our guests returning from the Who Weekly podcast, Bobby Finger and Lindsay Weber.
[00:06:52] Yes, the one of the first projects pre Who Weekly that Bobby and I ever worked on together was an annotated screening of you've got mail at the Housing Works bookstore. I don't know how we pulled it off. It had like pop ups.
[00:07:05] It had interactive saying and had a raffle with items from Nora. It was right before Nora died and she donated all these amazing items. We both have these signed DVDs that I have gotten framed in my kitchen.
[00:07:18] It's like one of the most important events of my New York City life. And it made the movie even more like endeared to me personally. I went to that. It was a fully great event. Re-watching the movie last night, I kept on going, wait a second.
[00:07:37] How did they pull that off? Because the last time I'd seen the movie was at that show. Wow. Really? And I was remembering. Eight years ago. Eight years ago. It was Valentine's Day-ish like the day before Valentine's Day 2012.
[00:07:51] And Bobby, why do you remember so specifically when that happened? Because it's the day I met my husband. Fucking Bo-shell. Experience share host Josh Vielstad, the best podcast in the big. Which is crazy. We met after a screening of you've got mail. That you organized. Wow.
[00:08:10] Which that's the fact I didn't know until after we had finally made the swap and said let's do it. Bobby and Lindsay, you fucking you've got mail is responsible for your marriage. Bobby. It's like so on that it's a little too much.
[00:08:23] I don't even like thinking about it to be honest. It's like, it's a little. It's like too much. You're like, no, come on. That's not. No, it's so cute. And it's really like I worked with Josh and I peer pressured him as long as
[00:08:36] well as my other coworkers, including Taylor co-host of the iconic podcast, Pokemon. Podcast, which I believe my way onto twice and I will do it again. His favorite show in any medium. Here you go. You have to come to this.
[00:08:54] Like I hope people come to this like it has to be a big thing. Right. It was the two of you and Andrea Rosen and let me point out that it was it was such a big thing that I remember I watched the entire movie from a staircase.
[00:09:06] Like it was. That staircase. Yeah. I was on that spiral staircase. It got it was just so because of the movie and I think also Andrea is like, Andrea is good. Andrea is good at what she does. She's a producer. She's still a producer.
[00:09:24] And so because it was Nora Ephron, it was very easy to get press for this thing. And I think I think it was it even had a little blurb as like something you do in the New Yorker. Like it was in the print issue.
[00:09:35] So like it got the word got out in ways we never expected Andrea is so good at like getting the word out and talking to people and knowing people. But also we got getting just random the call for artists that we
[00:09:48] just knew on Tumblr donate stuff that we can raffle off. We got the weirdest coolest stuff. We just reached out to Nora Ephron's assistant out of the blue and said, like, does she want to come talk? That would be great.
[00:10:01] We because no one knew she was sick at this point. Right. That's what I was going to say. And I remember you making a point of the fact that like she left things downstairs with her doorman, which I picked up
[00:10:12] but that you didn't get to meet her and she didn't come to the event in retrospect it became clear it was because she was very sick. Yeah. And Lindsay couldn't I had to go alone and because we all
[00:10:23] sort of felt like, oh, maybe maybe we'll look out and she'll be there and right handed to us. And no they handed a big regret that I have is I threw away the bag that she gave all the stuff in.
[00:10:34] It was because she gave us some old tote bags from the shoot. She gave us a lot of DVDs. She gave Lindsay and Andrea and I just DVDs for ourselves. But it was like a lot of also like like crew hats and like promotion stuff.
[00:10:48] I can't believe I didn't steal some of that stuff. The bag that the that the assistant gave it to me in was for was from an orthopedic shoe store. Right, right. You made a joke about that. Oh my God. This is Nora Ephron's orthopedic shoe store bag.
[00:11:04] And I threw the bag away when I moved departments at some point not thinking and I was it was a yellow was a yellow bag. Anyway, I'm so sad about that. But I think the reason why has your blessing there was a email.
[00:11:17] Nora has your blessing knowing that she knew that we were doing it was enough knowing that like right. She had maybe read about it in the New Yorker or saw that like that these young people were we're doing something silly
[00:11:34] with it and is all truly all that I could ask for. But you also like I mean you guys are being self-effacing about and saying it was like a silly thing. And Bobby you're saying it's so weird that you met your husband there.
[00:11:48] But it's also like a bunch of young people like a generation later doing a you've got male screening at a bookstore in order to raise money is something out of a Nora Ephron movie. Like it is very much the type of event that the couple
[00:12:06] meets at or has their second or third argument at you know you're right. Yeah and and housing works bookstore is the most shop around the corner book store. You could get downtown. I mean it is the epitome of that. Yeah, truly.
[00:12:21] And the two of you wrote like you did all these like media facts and jokes about the movie that were like part of the video. There were it was like pop up videos like VH one. Yeah, there were like graphics popping up.
[00:12:35] That was the thing while rewatching this last night where I was like wait a second how did they actually do that? Well, Andrea's ex-boyfriend Ricky who is now the host of many videos at AOL build you might you definitely guys. I have been interviewed by him.
[00:12:52] Yeah, great guy. He volunteered. Well we pressured him to do all of the graphics work on this thing and I made all the graphics. Okay, okay, okay. He overlaid them. True true true. But what's even funnier about this and maybe makes it
[00:13:06] more special is that that cut is lost. It was on his hard drive some hard drive got messed up. We don't even want to get into it. It's very depressing but that cut is lost to time. One night only. One night only.
[00:13:20] Yeah, well truly one night only for hours and hours of work. We had to cut. HousingWords gave us a hard out and so we had to cut I think like 25 there was a very specific number of minutes
[00:13:33] that we had to cut to the movie to make it fit between the raffle the opening the you know the goodbye to leave. It's a long movie. It just so happens we were like what is this movie is perfect how are we gonna cut anything?
[00:13:45] And we cut the Dabney Coleman subplot and it turns out that if you cut the Dabney Coleman subplot entirely and the father it was the precise number of minutes that we needed to lose and no one cared. And there's outside of those scenes they're only referenced
[00:14:01] by characters maybe once. So enchanting thing. They never and it makes sense. There's maybe one stray reference that Tom makes whenever he's not in a scene that we had to cut and like no one noticed it. You need 20 more minutes of Dabney Coleman
[00:14:17] if you're gonna really like how that makes sense because anytime that's brought up you're like what's the dynamic here? His dad and grandpa are too horny and evil. The grandpa went on one date with her. Right and it doesn't really add to
[00:14:32] Joe Fox doesn't need the added layer of bachelor like we don't really need to know his like oh why is he like this? It's like we get it. He has an annoying girlfriend. He's like a self-involved rich person like that's we don't need to know that he has
[00:14:48] like a bad family life and that's why he's like this. I think it's there to soften him right? It's sort of like I mean look at his you know dad and grandpa. Yeah he's a victim of circumstance. He's cursed with a horny dad and grandpa
[00:15:02] who gave him millions of dollars in a business to run. I also I think that it's funny I didn't even realize you would cut that stuff from it but it makes sense because as I was rewatching I was like huh I don't remember
[00:15:14] any of this Dabney Coleman stuff. Like every time I watch it and I've seen it one million times every time I watched it I'm like oh right this. And it was sad because Dabney Coleman had died and I remember being feeling a little fairly recently at that point.
[00:15:29] Yes and I felt terrible because Andrea like made a point to say like Dabney Coleman and we had cut him from the whole movie. Essentially I had dated Dabney Coleman as well and that was another conflict of interest. Right yes yes they met at Zabars actually.
[00:15:43] I think you mean that John Randolph would die. Dabney Coleman still alive. Oh my god are you kidding? Dabney Coleman lives on. He's 88 years old baby. Wait wow I'm misremembering. You can't fuck with Buffalo Bill. We're recording this episode in the middle
[00:15:59] of a national pandemic in a global pandemic. Sure. Who's got eyes on Dabney Coleman? Can we put him in a panic room? What do we do to make sure if he's lived this long we cannot lose Dabney Coleman. The last time I remember seeing him was
[00:16:14] remember he was in Boardwalk Empire he was very old and he played like Nucky Thompson's old mentor whatever and he was like in a wheelchair and he was like ehhhhh How am I remembering that Dabney Coleman died? That is like a very weird. I remember that too.
[00:16:30] I had the exact same memory around that same period. That's like a Shazam memory that we're sharing or whatever a Kazam memory like a fake memory. Right this is a Bernstein Bears memory. Yes. Yes. When you said he died it did ring a bell to me.
[00:16:43] I was like yeah I definitely read a Dabney Coleman obit. Yeah and it was like Buffalo Bill. I do remember it just being a real problem because we both the movie was so precious to us that we were like we can't cut anything
[00:16:56] like we're gonna have to cancel the event we can't cut a fucking frame out of this movie but then when you watch it you're like oh none of this needs to be here. Two hours is a long running like Slipless in Seattle
[00:17:08] which has a more convoluted plot than this. Yeah. Is an hour 45 and that's about right. Yes especially for this movie especially for the content of this movie you're right it should be sweeter it should be shorter. Right I'm never having an unpleasant time
[00:17:22] while I'm watching it but it does seem like perhaps the Dabney cut or the Dabney list cut is stronger. I will say too that like in terms of the backstory, the character shading all of that you get a better sense of the Dabney Coleman
[00:17:38] and the John Randolph characters just from the scene where Tom Hanks is explaining the relationship to the two kids. Yeah. Then you do from any scene that they're in. This is as if they're in you're like oh these must be his bosses. Right. There's just no family relationship
[00:17:56] that's really clear it doesn't matter. Dabney and John Randolph almost like humanize them a little too much. They seem like nastier people when they're off screen like especially John Randolph it's like oh what a sweetie so it just skipped a generation Dabney Coleman is the only bad one.
[00:18:11] John Randolph is famous for many things of course but I know him as the man that Jerry Stiller replaced as Frank Costanza. Right. And on the DVD they have the original cut of the episode so you can see his one performance
[00:18:28] and you totally see what's wrong with it because he's just playing George's dad is this kind of like old guy who is kind of doddering like it's he doesn't have an angry take on it. The episode that he's in did they reshoot it with Jerry Stiller later?
[00:18:45] Yes, first indication. Because on Hulu it's the original cut too I watched that first episode. I did all of Seinfeld recently. They reshot it for syndication you can watch on YouTube like side by side. Wow. All the actors came back and everything it's crazy.
[00:19:00] Because it is so bizarre I mean there's like three castings of Jerry's dad right before they land on the right person but you can watch those and none of them bump and to see one performance of Frank Costanza not being Jerry Stiller is like very upsetting.
[00:19:15] It's very weird. He's not good I mean no offense to him. He's usually good. No offense to him. Fuck that performance John Randolph. Wait one thing that they did cut from this so there was a longer subplot about a serial killer killing people from rooftops.
[00:19:31] Right because Steve Zahn holds up the newspaper about it. Right so there are like dots of references to that which is so funny to me because they kind of don't make sense like she really should have gotten rid of the whole thing
[00:19:42] but I think it was the fear of meeting somebody online she wanted to to... It's the joke. Yeah like what if it's the serial killer like maybe you know whatever so like I I love that she had this like catfish thing in there
[00:19:57] but then had to cut it but it still kind of like remains in pieces with Steve Zahn who does a good job with what he's given which is very little. That script is like out there on the... Like if you want to read the original script
[00:20:10] all the rooftop killer stuff is in it. That's amazing. It's there, it's redefined. So she was like look I'm gonna mash it all up Barnes & Noble displacing West Side Books The Summer of Sam, The Internet. It's all going in one pot baby.
[00:20:25] You know and it is like it isn't that much of a loss because like that's I mean a plotline that is really of a time and a place in 1998 you don't need it watching the film in 2020 because now we know of course if a woman meets a man
[00:20:38] on the internet everything is safe and nothing bad could possibly happen. Every man is being honest and fair and gentlemanly on the internet and that behavior will carry into the real world. They compose whole messages to each other with like periods and commas and stuff. Such good writers.
[00:20:56] I really love that in the final version though the rooftop killer gets like it's two references and the final one is so funny when they wonder why he ghosted her on the date and then the cover of the New York Post is like they caught the rooftop killer
[00:21:12] and they're like well that explains it and then they're done. It's so funny. It was him. So I gotta say I watched this I think I'd only seen the movie twice before I think I saw it on VHS when it came out and then I saw the screening
[00:21:29] the Dabney List cut. So like this was I mean a fairly new viewing for me because A that was almost a decade ago and B I was watching it without pop-up facts but with extra Coleman and Randolph and the previous time I'd watched it before that
[00:21:46] was VHS full screen. A it's very bizarre that I didn't see this movie in theaters specifically probably old enough what do you mean like 9 or 10? I was 9 or 10 but the bigger thing was I of course grew up in New York City
[00:22:01] downtown Griffey Nooms so not quite my neighborhood not quite my tempo but still the city I love my mother at this period in time was like all about protecting saw all businesses and fighting against chains taking over New York City. That was her entire fucking thing
[00:22:19] she was trying to make a documentary about it for years. There's this guy Reverend Billy who's like a performance artist or no Reverend Billy. Right who's like the church of stop shopping we would go to all of his rallies like my mom's entire life
[00:22:35] that she was bringing my brother and I into was all about like we have to fight like Banana Republic and Barnes & Noble was like a big target and protect small bookstores. I don't know why she didn't make us go see this movie in theaters but I pointedly remember
[00:22:49] only saw it at home when she rented it on video ever many months later I wonder if it's because she thought it was going to be flippant about that subject but I remember watching it with her and both of us being impressed with like how
[00:23:05] sad the movie is in that aspect. Yeah well it definitely it doesn't give up but it doesn't solve her business problem like her store closes. That's why the movie works I think. If she defeated him it'd be like oh fuck this like you know this is stupid
[00:23:21] but it's also I mean it's treated with a lot of weight like it's not just like well this is sort of the thing you need to do to set up the movie and I feel like the movie has a very similar approach to sort of the vanishing
[00:23:33] New York that my mother did at the time. Context come on. Well that's what I was going to say so I was watching the bluray of this movie which is weirdly fucking packed including all of Shop Around the Corner on the second disc which I watched for this
[00:23:51] and this amazing featurette where they're like Nora clips of her talking about the different locations they shot in and why they shot there. That's so cool. And like a bunch of featurettes and stuff so I went deep watching everything on the disc
[00:24:03] last night. It seems like the origin of this movie was in the movie. I know what the origin of this movie was. I was going to say it. Oh excuse me. Yeah but I'm from the Upper West Side it's Uptown Davy
[00:24:13] Sims is time to shine. We all know that you're from the Upper West Side it's the only place you've ever lived we all know that you're Uptown Davy Sims. So I grew up on 89th and Amsterdam of course and you live there yes wow until 1985
[00:24:27] Wow this rivalry this I didn't know there was like a war between Uptown downtown. Well it's a basic fact that he lived on the Upper West Side and continued to do so so in 1998 he probably saw this movie and I don't know the 84th street AMC
[00:24:43] I mean then a Lowe's right? It was a Lowe's back then but no I saw this movie on a plane actually I remember that very clearly but I lived in Britain I lived in Britain by the time this movie came out you lived in Britain yes yes yes
[00:24:57] Oh yeah right I've heard that See they know Griffin see they know and I realized that once again for the eighth episode in a row I have forgot the bit. I fucked up the bit that we were trying to do which is
[00:25:09] I am confident in the fact that he lived in England and him being from the Upper West Side surprises me. That's what the bit supposed to be and I fucked it up and here's a peek behind the curtain and we're keeping it in and we're doubling it
[00:25:19] It actually did surprise me because I thought I did think you were actually from England only I didn't know you had this other place you were also from And that's why the bit would be funny if I had remembered him I did grow up I lived on the
[00:25:31] Upper West Side till I was nine I lived on 89th Amsterdam and there was when I was a kid this big controversy when the Big Barnes & Noble which is it still there I believe it's still there on Broadway in 83rd moved in which is like
[00:25:47] basically a full city block this giant fucking super store and it killed a lot of businesses including West Side Books which was like the nice neighborhood bookstore right around there and so obviously I mean this is just she's completely doing that
[00:26:03] like it is in the Upper West Side Upper West Side movie Harry Metzali has some Upper West Side content but it's kind of all over the city you know some of it's downtown some of it's in the village it's you know
[00:26:15] cats is the Met right but like this is that this movie has that feeling of the Upper West Side in the 90s where it's like we don't need to leave these 40 blocks like everything I need is covered from like 59th to 110th
[00:26:29] like you go to Zay bars you go to Fairway you go to the park like that's all you're gonna do like you know you got your culture down in Lincoln Center like that weird hermetic feeling of that neighborhood and
[00:26:41] that's why everyone was so horrified by that Barnes the Noble which if you've been there is colossal and when I was a kid was a total paradise because you could just run around like for kids it was unfortunately exactly what Fox Joe Fox is
[00:26:55] promising well that's what I was gonna say that's what Joe Fox says big chairs like now I'm nostalgic for that fucking place like that place is gonna go soon Chris Messina not knowing about the shoebox Messina, Sarah Ramirez there's so many people in this movie
[00:27:11] everyone in this fucking movie I mean I said this to you last night David I was texting you and I was like every single person in this cast is a ringer and some of them are just like oh this person's a little
[00:27:21] over qualified to be doing this role at this time and some of them are like she fucking picked Chris Messina 10 years in advance the casting on this movie is flawless everyone is perfect everyone is even people who aren't people that are picked so
[00:27:37] smart like it's everyone is perfect everyone is perfect. Yes Katie Finnarin as the nanny who plays the woman who comes into the store the author who ditches them to do the book signing at Fox Book she's incredible who was the Seinfeld Laffer to all what
[00:27:57] she is great she's the she's the woman who laughs too much at Seinfeld Wow during his bit yes I forgot that cheese I forget who she is but she's great her name is Vianne Cox there we go thank you something that the movie is
[00:28:13] really smart about or maybe it's not smart maybe this is a stupid compliment but I like the fact that it's you have the weight you it very clearly communicates the importance of this like small town thing and like how how awful it was when these big
[00:28:29] box stores came and destroyed the neighborhood in a way it's smart enough to recognize Meg Ryan's like privilege and her like sort of inherited wealth because you have there's never a moment where the movie wants you to think that she's going
[00:28:41] to become destitute after this happens and if anything she's going to become even more wealthy because she's gonna get this job as like a children's book editor yes so like yes the movie is very the movie never makes you sympathize with her
[00:28:53] and that level it's very much about the death of a community not like the death of this woman's income and I think it could have gone that way and you would have been like shut up we always kind of mock the Meg Ryan character because what I love
[00:29:05] about her is that she's so specifically not perfect she's like out here being like me and my mother twirling and Daisy's are my favorite flower like she is not she really is out of touch so part of you kind of does look at Joe Fox
[00:29:21] and say like I know we're supposed to think you're bad but also like you're doing what you're you know like you it's not this easy split like she dates the worst guy right like she is dating Frank Nevasky who's based on a real person and it's like
[00:29:37] you can everyone is groaning at this guy even though his intentions are supposed to be in the movie good he's like trying to do all these things but he's so up his own ass that you're like if she's dating this idiot like she is
[00:29:49] she's so far from perfect you know it's one of those like the movies very well balanced in that sense that it finds a way to make the characters that seem unsympathetic sympathetic and it finds way to make the characters that are naturally sympathetic a little bit unlikable
[00:30:03] yes exactly oh it's so good Frank is I think Frank digiacomo right the guy who used to run the transom at the observer I mean when I was a kid I watched this movie and I was like that's what my ceiling is I'm gonna maybe get to write
[00:30:19] for the observer and be kind of a you know pain in the neck who's a little self-satisfying you'll be that nut at the observer when he's at the party and he and Parker Posi says she's read his piece and he goes
[00:30:31] wait uh you read it I just I really didn't expect people for you put stuff out there and you you don't know if people read it I was like this is my life this is Twitter which is also which is a scene that's ultimately
[00:30:43] like lifted from when Harry Metzeli yeah yeah shock at being red the partner right yeah can hear in this I feel like at the time he's in this movie he's in a couple others around this is post as good as it gets
[00:30:57] right given as opposed to Oscar now right and most of his other roles are after this around this time are the third guy who gets dumped or whatever with the villain or whatever right like he's the Baxter yeah right then the next year is mystery men
[00:31:11] where he's like the Baxter of super heroes right 100% and like he's not quite playing the bill polem and role in this you know what I mean like it's a different vibe well can I throw out some context yes because it's interesting David you were so fast
[00:31:29] to trump me with explaining the context of where this movie came from but somehow you didn't cover the things that I was going to say well I just wanted to talk about the Barnes and Noble well great work congratulations 10 profundity points it's dealia nor Efron go see
[00:31:49] as good as it gets and they go fuck that guy would be good for that part but he's clearly about to blow up I mean he was clearly like getting the best reviews was going to get an Oscar nomination do you
[00:32:01] think there's any way he would take this role they offer it to Keneer and Keneer says I'd love to do it but as it kind of feels like the ending was supposed to be Meg Ryan dumps him after the argument at the movie theater
[00:32:17] that was supposed to be the ending of it and he said I feel like I've seen that in so many movies this thing where like the guy reveals himself to be a little bit too much of a pill there's some brutal breakup you know what is
[00:32:29] the more traditional like bullpelman kind of role right he's a drip or he's an asshole or whatever it is and he was like can we do something a little more modern it's entirely a Greg Keneer pitch this is the rest of it they both yep I love that
[00:32:45] idea that's Keneer Keneer said I'll do the movie if this is how my character line ends I love that scene too yeah it's a good scene you wouldn't even think to write that it almost feels unfinished but then when you watch it you're like oh this is
[00:33:01] this is great isn't incredible though that like everyone was like oh you're right that's better and it feels like such an effroncy but that was Greg Keneer being like these are the terms of me taking the part I'll do it if you do this right there's also just
[00:33:15] no guilt like in the beginning when they're both kind of hiding their computer activity you're like well nothing has really happened yet is this emotional cheating we're bordering but like not quite not quite so you don't you don't you don't really get them cast in that like cheater
[00:33:29] realm kind of just because you have these girlfriend boyfriends who are so kind of annoying and you know they're not right and you know they're all kind of like about to break up in a weird way there's it's like kind of a magical thing that Nora and Dealer
[00:33:41] are able to do by making it making you not hate them for kind of being a little shady with their yeah well even the scene when they're watching the Jane Adams show yeah he's flirting with her and Meg Ryan is like very like openly recognizing
[00:33:55] that he is flirting with her and that she's flirting back you can sense this like relief in her she's like okay i'm not the only one like we're both doing this right it's it's somehow manages to be cute so much movie is like towing
[00:34:09] the line between like these people are fucked up yes these people are really really sweet so and she is so fully anticipating the reveal that he's with Jane Adams and when he's like no no no no but do you think yeah so on board to give him advice
[00:34:23] and be like no it seems like the two of you would fit well together I think by also one of my favorite lines which well maybe one of my favorite line nor Efron lines ever is yours is the only show I do watch
[00:34:37] so much to do with Greg's delivery but still yours is the only show I do this is the thank your they do that thank your your thank your thank your for a little more context as often seems to be the case in nor Efron's career despite the fact
[00:34:55] that she was already very well established before she starts directing movies and had numerous hits most of her movies seem to come out of another rare powerful woman in Hollywood at that point in time setting the movie up so like so much
[00:35:09] of a career is like Amy Pascal and Linda Oates and this one is Lauren Schuller Donner it's like these female producers or executives who had risen in a time that was not very hospitable to women in the industry unlike now where the internet is safe
[00:35:23] for all women and women are all ruling Hollywood and it's great and girl boss and it's a great hashtag yay but everything's perfect we fix the world Lauren Schuller Donner who mostly I mean obviously is known as Richard Donner right and even if you look at her career
[00:35:41] prior to like X-Men and everything it's mostly pretty masculine films she did a lot of well Richard Donner movies right so like free Willy free Willy she did Dave Oh I love but I'm also looking here like assassins weapons movies any given Sunday I mean yes
[00:36:03] after this she starts to make some more female driven films but then she also just makes a lot of X-Men movies she gets sort of tied into the X-Men thing totally but this is I think Warner Brothers reaches out to her they've merged with Turner
[00:36:19] so they've just inherited a lot of the Turner library which includes so many classics and Warner Brothers is now with all these new films they've acquired aggressively trying to figure out which ones would make good remakes so Lauren Schuller Donner looks at the library and goes
[00:36:37] shop around the corner that's a I mean that thing has legs it's been already remade once it was a musical like that seems like based on something yeah right so many versions of it yeah right so then she said that seems like a good nor Efron project
[00:36:51] reaches out to nor Efron nor Efron goes oh Deely and I that's one of our favorite movies ever and one of our favorite musicals ever and the two of them go let's take this thing which obviously is sort of just like potent and primal enough that it's
[00:37:05] worked already in a couple different forms and figure out how to put as much of our own interests into it as possible all the Upper West Side stuff it's exactly what you said Bobby which is their big thesis for this
[00:37:17] movie the thing they said that they wanted to do was New York is so often even in movies where New York is a character as we know New York is often above the title and it's almost like a character in the movie itself but it's often treated
[00:37:29] as this very overwhelming kind of hostile massive thing and they wanted to make the movie about how New York City is a series of small towns that any sort of like six block neighborhood in New York City does feel like a small town where you have
[00:37:45] your local places and the people know you have all of that sort of stuff so that was one of the things they were bringing to it that they thought they could update the film with in a modern way and then the other thing was the book angle
[00:37:57] like that the two of them specifically love children's books that Delia had written a bunch of children's books at this time that they were like the loss of city books was like fresh to them and every previous version of this story she loves me shop around the corner
[00:38:13] and in the summertime she's like the other three versions are centered around they work at the same store and they hate each other and as opposed to what you're saying Bobby where if the shop closes Meg Ryan is not going to be destitute in this movie
[00:38:29] in the other versions it's very much this isn't an economic crisis if people lose their jobs they might become homeless so so much of the rivalry between the two characters is they're fighting for who becomes the most valuable employee of this store
[00:38:43] because if one of them nudges out the other their entire life might be ruined and she brings to it the whole element of oh it's its rivals in different companies within the same business which is almost a little bit of an
[00:38:59] nochka I mean she's pulling from like a different Lubitsch movie which is here are two people who are opposite sides of the coin don't realize they get along that well and then the sort of secret correspondence element which only makes
[00:39:11] more sense in an email age than it did in a letter age oh yeah which is crazy to me it's still crazy to me that Delia and Nora who were born in the 40s I'm there my parent how did these two women write an internet movie
[00:39:27] I to this day do not understand it is still to this day difficult to write movies about people on the internet people texting people doing anything computers how do you get somebody to be interesting behind a computer that to me is insane that they figured it out how
[00:39:47] did they do it I still don't do not know and the other what's so amazing about it is maybe the reason why this movie is so good is because of how little they really know about the intermissions of online communication
[00:40:01] they're just like let's just say it's letter writing which is when the IM pops up that's as far as we're getting into this computer that's why it doesn't feel dated even to this day because all they're really doing is emailing and we still email
[00:40:13] so they never get into the weeds of what like we don't see that like if we had seen the AOL interface a lot or if we had seen how the internet actually worked then we would have been a little like oh wow this didn't age well
[00:40:25] but all you see is the email box really and they don't have phones that they don't have phones where the emails pop up I'm the one a great part is when he ghost her and she's walking home and she doesn't have
[00:40:37] any access to even say where are you or you didn't come or did she has to go home open the computer check the mail shut the computer like that to me you that's just it's so lucky almost that it was
[00:40:51] this time that they chose to do this because it would not work outside of that context and like even just this title I mean do you remember this movie like seeing the trailer and going fuck that's a slam dunk title like what a good idea
[00:41:05] and two years later the title wouldn't work like two years later it was overplayed and three years after that AOL was sort of bombing yeah and that AOL let them use it free I mean obviously why would they not but they let them use it and
[00:41:19] and that it became such a catchphrase and it still has meaning nostalgically to us as like a generation right it's such a perfect snapshot I mean it's also there's this long feature on the Blu-ray that I think is from ported over from the 10th
[00:41:34] anniversary DVD so it's Hanks and Efron and Ryan sitting in a very nice living room on White Couch's drinking coffee like in 2008 and then they cut in talking head interviews with D'Elia and Lauren Schuler Donner and they're talking about how the movie got made and they're all
[00:41:54] sort of saying like ten years out how surprising it is that the internet has grown into what it has but also that the film doesn't feel like a relic like it is so much better than a movie like The Net which is so explicitly about like we understand
[00:42:10] the internet and everything in that movie feels so fucking dumb now and this movie it was surprising for someone who doesn't seem very like computer literate even sitting on that couch ten years later nor is like understanding of the sociological impact of the internet
[00:42:30] was so on point and I think it circles back to the food thing it's like her movies up until Julie and Julia are not explicitly food movies even though she is known for being such a foodie in her real life but the things she really understands
[00:42:44] that she put into all of her films is the sociological power that food has you know what it means to have a meal with somebody or to have someone make a meal for you or where you're eating it or what you're eating or
[00:42:58] the sort of as we were saying like the social decorum around food and I think she just was one of those people who understood those things so well that even in 1998 or even in 1996 when she's writing the script or whatever she understood
[00:43:12] how the internet was going to change human interaction well she also never forget one of my favorite Nora Efron things is kind of later in her life she started a huffpaw blog about divorce to even know how to start a blog
[00:43:26] like I know that she obviously had helped she was friends with Ariana Huffington I'm sure and like Ariana was like Nora we gotta get you back on the internet or on the internet a lot of writers at her level would have really
[00:43:36] looked down on the back that they would be able to blog her and she embraced it and Alec Baldwin were the two people blogging when I worked at AOL it was like those two people like it was and it was shocking that even
[00:43:50] they were doing it but Nora always got how important I mean even just making Julia and Julia into a movie from start to finish like how cool blogs were and how important they were and how to translate the idea of a personal web blog into narrative or whatever
[00:44:06] it is particularly fascinating that Alec Baldwin was blogging because that was after he had said goodbye to public life he had fully retired from public life and then we never saw him again yeah we still haven't seen him since it's actually why
[00:44:18] he was so angry and he was like what are you doing I'm gonna go talk to him and pop up and tell us he's okay and then punch someone in the face let him play his words with friends he's busy fighting for a parking
[00:44:32] spot or whatever he was he has to I gotta say I heard a story that Alec Baldwin and his 17 children with Hilaria were applying to move into a different apartment and they were like I wasn't gonna say that but I think that this was when they were
[00:44:52] looking for the apartment before that they bought a friend of ours of Childhood Apartment and combined it with the floor below it or above it I forget the details really? Was it the building they were already living in? No I think they bought
[00:45:10] I don't think they were already living in it I think they bought it and the one next door he's like that's my childhood bedroom it's very weird The gossip I had heard was that around that time when they were looking for the new apartment or apartments
[00:45:24] they kept on getting rejected by different co-op boards because they'd be like we don't want him fucking punching a guy in the paparazzi taking pictures right outside our door like every time he has an altercation like that it's outside his front door of his building and all these
[00:45:40] buildings were like we don't want to get dragged into that shit Well, or it's on a plane because he wants to play words with friends David you are muted Oh, what the fuck My headphones have been a full Buster Keaton ever seen right now
[00:45:56] he is talking very empathetically with his hands like he's saying You're fully muted David There you are You're back You had to restart my audio Also not to be depressing about it but I'm wondering when you guys were watching this let's put into context right now
[00:46:16] I've never been more depressed than I've never truly never been more depressed You mean about what the movies sang? No, about New York City about looking at New York City in an idyllic way right now New York City in the fall like everything they say about
[00:46:32] New York City in the fall is cuts even deeper than it ever has They CGI'd those falling leaves Did you know that Bobby? No, I didn't know that If you can listen to the commentary with which is Nora and Lauren Shuler Donner The greatest double act in
[00:46:48] I have the blue rape Gryppen's been talking about but I haven't listened to the commentary Yeah Bobby we gotta listen to this commentary They're like all of the fall stuff is CGI baby We were shooting this in the summer or whatever There's a lot of tips like that
[00:47:02] Look, it's May 2020 this is a time of great political turmoil I really don't want to get cancelled in a moment of great sensitivity I really don't want to get cancelled but I texted David this last night and I feel strong enough
[00:47:18] of my convictions here that I feel like I need to repeat it on mic Go ahead Consequences be damned I heart and why You Apple it? I Apple it I was watching this movie last night and Lindsay just like you were saying please ignore a front episodes
[00:47:36] all of which we've been recording in quarantine I almost cry or cry in any one of these movies with the way she photographs New York City feeling a loss for a city that I currently still live in and it's not just the vanishing New York element of oh
[00:47:52] a lot of these businesses are gone from 20 years ago it's literally just seeing people walk around the city I love without masks on the opening of this movie is like beautiful everything I love about living here is walking around holding a coffee and just looking around
[00:48:08] it's so funny you're forgetting that of course the actual opening of this movie Bobby is a pixelated and he's a wonder brother zoom into the earth yes which is great the moment the cranberries start that's it we haven't even gotten into the soundtrack
[00:48:26] we haven't even gotten to the soundtrack of this iconic film but Nora gives you a pass for feeling as the sappy sentimental feelings that you sometimes feel about this place and it makes you recognize that like it's okay to think those things because look around you
[00:48:46] this is a perfectly acceptable feeling this place rules absolutely this is a movie about the New York the Upper West Side of Manhattan whatever love's passing into memory like even though she's making it just as it's happening she knows what's going on right
[00:49:04] I'm getting a phone call one second oh my god Jesus Christ Hollywood Sims over here when what's her face complains about having to maybe move to Brooklyn and then Steve Zahn says that he has a 6 bedroom for 450 a month I was like
[00:49:18] I can't what in New York is this so much fucking shit going on she is great what is her name Heather Heather Burns I know her best from Bored to Death I know her best from the Scogeniality and she's in so many of the San Jibuilic movies
[00:49:36] she seemed like a weird San Jibuilic good luck charm because she's in 2 weeks notice as well I think yeah she is yeah yeah you know who's also so good that we haven't Dave Chappelle I thought you were going to say Jean Stapleton but yeah
[00:49:54] would we say equal they're both giving equal I just because well because lady Gaga's iconic album chromatica came out last night we did a listening party for our fans and we were listening to Gaga A Star is Born and I was thinking about
[00:50:12] A Star is Born and then I saw I was watching this and I was thinking Dave Chappelle like so good in A Star is Born just incredible what a great actor and this was his first one of his early movies I would say for sure
[00:50:26] this and half baked or the same year maybe he's so natural they kind of put him in a weird place as a character he's not quite flushed out but like he still is so able to say things like call her hot many times
[00:50:42] call her say that she's not a dog so many times and somehow it's like it's weird but it's not the worst no no and I think like look this is an ultimate example of that thing I'm kind of obsessed with but I always bring up
[00:50:58] on this podcast where big A-list movie star casts an up and coming actor 20 years younger than them to play their best friend to make them seem a little more modern and current yes yes yes but and very often very often it is a person of color
[00:51:16] to make the white A-list are feel a little more hip as well totally they're used for that sort of like modern cachet but he is so good in this that somehow you actually kind of buy that they're friends and like we also kind of buy that Tom Hanks
[00:51:36] his character doesn't really have a lot of close friends only close assistant guy doing the construction that's why it's so it's almost like it's not crazy that he'd be working out with him at Equinox or wherever they're not Equinox but like pre-equinox whatever watching
[00:51:54] the TV or something like it's not that crazy but I did like watching this made me wish and I understand a thousand the bigger, crazier things happen in his career and he you know adjusted accordingly but I wish he were in more
[00:52:10] movies even if it was just a role like this or role like stars born is such a good actor and he talks about I think in his inside the actor studio how he didn't just want to be a stand-up who would then appear in movies
[00:52:26] and just sort of be doing his routine how he was like taking acting classes when he was 18 years old because he recognized that the stand-ups were best in movies had an acting background weren't just I'm funny on stage I'll know how to do this
[00:52:40] and Dave Chappelle has genuine chemistry friend chemistry with Tom Hanks here it's not just that he is funny I mean he is a really fucking skilled actor in a part that's not actually demanding that much of him I also get a sense that Tom Hanks
[00:52:54] is very good at creating friend chemistry with almost any person he's ever worked with on film I think that's definitely part of it I do think being opposite Tom Hanks is about the best it's quite easy I feel like right yeah it's believable that both
[00:53:08] Tom and Meg Ryan wouldn't really have that many friends like Meg has her Meg has her boyfriend and she has her mom's best friend she has her coworkers and Birdie she has inherited her mom's best friend along with her mom's business
[00:53:22] she has nothing that she made on her own that's what this movie is kind of quietly about right it's like even though her life is so cute and she's got this great place it's not hers it's like she is kind of living this
[00:53:34] it's like who is this person even her apartment she probably inherited then she says maybe nobody will remember me but people remember my mom and they loved her like that is the leekest sentiment oh my fucking god
[00:53:50] this is my whole take I was saying this to Griffin last night because we have been talking about going through this many series it's like the big Nora hits are the movies that people think of as more like these sort of like lovely slightly sappy kind of
[00:54:02] like you know sleep is in Seattle you've got mail right like you know that's true love the right people to finally find each other what people think of as the Nora Ephron movies when they talk about Nora Ephron movies
[00:54:14] and the ones that bomb are the ones where she tries to go kind of acidic and like mix nuts, lucky numbers which you know the ones that are closer to her writing as a humorist I mean the stuff that she's eating her bones right
[00:54:28] this is kind of I think the salty sweet movie you just have to sort of be aware that these characters are all a little sad and like that the ending is nice sure they get together I you know I hoped it would be you but like
[00:54:40] like you know I don't know that it just feels like something sort of dying in this movie there's a harder edge to their fighting than I remembered their being it's not like he's a jerk yeah he's a total asshole when he humiliates her
[00:54:58] like when he goes into the cafe and she's waiting he just rips into her that is probably the cruelest thing you could do to somebody that's unforgivable in a way you know it's why the ending is you know you got your beautiful Summer of the Rainbow cover happening
[00:55:18] but she like breaks down into tears because she's like oh my god you were so mean to me and I knew I wanted it to be you so badly but you were such an like it's sad she's remembering all of these things
[00:55:36] it's like it put a magnifying glass over the sadness of her life and she's like thank god I have this happy ending but oh my god what a terrible trajectory there's a version where she's like whoa whoa wait a second so you stood me up
[00:55:52] and then came and visited me to torment me like can we just I'm sorry can we go through a couple of events before we kiss right she's crying not because it's him but because she wanted it to be him something so destructive
[00:56:06] about them being attracted to each other and think about the kind of the through line about niceness and meanness it's like he's too mean she's too nice like he's teaching her to be mean and she's teaching him to be nice and like that's like how do we meet
[00:56:24] in the middle but ultimately when they're both mean it's not actually that cute like no one is really doing meanness in the way that they think they're doing meanness I think her snap her clap backs are even worse than his original
[00:56:42] meanness in a way like I don't know especially because of the types of people they are which is kind of both a little lonely do you think I just wanted to be in sleepless in Seattle I'm such a saint
[00:56:52] I want to play this as a little more of a jerk like you know I'm gonna put my read on this guy I hope I think so because I think he has to his hurdle to being mean is big he has to really try to be mean
[00:57:06] that ten years later retrospective thing they talk a lot about the Cafe Lalo scene which there are pretty much only three scenes in this movie because it really uses chop around the corner and the play that was based on the two later versions the musical
[00:57:22] and the movie musical it pretty much just uses that as a spring board it takes a lot of you know new directions from it but there's three scenes that exist almost verbatim in all three movie versions which are the scene with
[00:57:36] the friend the Dave Chappelle scene where he takes a look at her and like down to specific wordings she almost has the same coloring as that line exists in all three movies which is such a weird line in context when you hear it for Dave Chappelle which that's
[00:57:52] where I start to go like man Chappelle is fucking good in this movie because he can pull off saying she has the same coloring as that woman Kathleen Kelly like that is not how Dave that's not how a person would say she looks
[00:58:04] like Kathleen Kelly and if you look up the actor who played the best friend role in shop around the corner it's like an older Eastern European man with a mustache who's from the Nochka and that line sounds normal coming out of him and
[00:58:20] recognizing having seen them in such close to session like oh my god Chappelle is about to do this word for word almost as if it were from the original script how will you pull this off his actor pulls it off that seems
[00:58:32] almost identical and she says she picked Cafe Lalo because in the other versions of it it's that thing where even in the original it's like the cafe is elevated so the friend is able to walk up the stairs and the guy in the street
[00:58:44] level isn't able to see it the cafe scene itself is very similar without being word for word it's beat for beat very similar and then the scene where he visits her when she's sick is very very similar beat for beat which is truly one of our favorites
[00:58:58] to rag on that's that's Meg ballin out fully off the is off the rails right the explanation for that is she likes that scene being in the previous movie and how they need to put it in there Meg is so kookiness is so pronounced in
[00:59:16] Harry Metzali and sleepless and in this it's a little more muted even though she is still a kook as we've been discussing like you know it's not really there in the same flibber tigivity kind of way this movie is so much more honest about how sad she is
[00:59:32] like sleep is in Seattle makes vague references to it and one of them is more of like a joke but the scene that I always think of as like a really sad scene in sleep is in Seattle that's like my favorite
[00:59:44] line in sleep is in Seattle is when she's trying on the wedding dress and it tears and she goes it's a sign and her mom goes you don't believe in signs and it's just like even when she's trying to open up
[00:59:56] her mom is like no no no this isn't you you know like that's kind of the extent of the window into her sadness that you get in sleep is in Seattle as opposed to just her being like overtly crazy the entire time but like
[01:00:08] and you've got mail she is a persistent refrain of this movie is that she's so lonely and she misses her mother so much and she understands that she will never have the impact that her mother did and her entire neighborhood was was built up around this like
[01:00:24] the true piazza like Tom Hanks says that he built the piazza but it's like she had the original piazza in this neighborhood and she's like I'll never build anything and that's like that's so persistent throughout the whole movie and that doesn't exist in either of the other
[01:00:36] ones like I'm looking at the I'm looking at the quote like just quotes and there's I forgot this part where he's where Frank Nevasky is reciting something to get her pumped up for something and he says you are alone read standing tall waving boldly in the corrupt
[01:00:52] sands of commerce and she goes I am alone read and he goes yes you're alone like he's like telling her like you're alone like he she lives with this man and he's like you are alone but on a fundamental level you are alone in this world
[01:01:08] it's so bleak there's also the godfather you know the which is a classic different thing like Casablanca and Harry Metalli and the dirty does she loves to references like movies that men love but like there's the repeated like you got to go to the mattresses
[01:01:24] right but she never does she never goes to war like she doesn't even try that's not even a problem she goes on New York lawn and does she goes to the press her war is that she begs her boyfriend to write an op-ed or whatever
[01:01:36] and she's like would that be a conflict of interest and I immediately out loud was like yes what's the he can't do that he says yes too and then he says no he's like oh I don't know yeah I just love how immediately that doesn't work too like
[01:01:50] like isn't it the next scene birdies like no no no difference and then you're basically just cutting to them at Stapleton's house where they're like yeah well the decision is no more store but it's too real that is such a real thing though like raising
[01:02:08] money for a cause and everyone getting fully around it and getting so into it and giving all their money and it doesn't make a difference because a year later there it's the same issue or you know nothing has changed the economy hasn't changed like the situation hasn't changed
[01:02:22] so it's just like yeah it is it is actually a truly like a very compact lesson in that where it's like everyone's willing to rally around and does really care but cannot focus their entire lives around saving this business that is no longer a business
[01:02:38] that can stay alive and it's like the author who's like I need to promote my book of course I'm gonna do it at Fox books like that's where I'm gonna get more readers right there's there's a very earned cynicism and sort of like
[01:02:50] honest cynicism to the idea that yes oh everyone loves the emotional idea of this store existing but also everyone loves saving money on books and being able to get a coffee at the same time as much as they're invested the idea of shop around the corner
[01:03:04] they cannot turn down the convenience of Fox books yeah and just the idea that 22 years on we miss borders love those Barnes and Nobles that are still standing like the one square the one in the other way like those are great places like they're part of the firm
[01:03:20] of in New York and if anything those stores are dying and little bookstores are coming back so you have now the reverse how would Nora even deal with this I'm so curious how she would respond to the idea that it's like now it's the reverse the curation
[01:03:36] of the books is so much more valuable to people that Barnes and Noble is not really a thing anymore because people are buying books online when they want to buy kind of cheap used books she'd reopen a store she will yeah in the sequel she reopens the store
[01:03:50] books are magic I was just thinking about and Jean Stapleton is so good in this movie like she feels like she feels like a true gift you feel very privileged to have had this no more she's so good and you want to say Nora thank you so much
[01:04:04] how did you know it's just what I wanted it's so gentle and funny when she's like this from behind the thing we're fine when she when she walks up and the whole but when she walks past the the window display of the author at Fox
[01:04:18] Books just to continue our last conversation like she's not angry she's sort of like she's like well we knew this was bound to happen like she's not upset she's just very sad it's business yeah I mean you can tell this woman is a she's a volunteer
[01:04:34] you can tell she's volunteering Birdie is not getting a check she just knows the software what do we think is on we haven't mentioned I love Zon I'll take any Zon I can get he's so he's very very very good especially this time period he is so
[01:04:49] in the pocket of just like my favorite kind of character actor and I put Heather Burns into this too where it's like you can give them one scene and without sealing too much focus they somehow find a way to make everything interesting they're both just kind
[01:05:03] of innately interesting as performers their energies bizarre their voices are bizarre but they're also intelligent actors like they know how to underplay stuff they know when to take good moments they're both really good actors this is the same year as out of sight which is awesome
[01:05:19] he's such a good foil to her to Meg Ryan's character too like she needs to be grounded by people who are like living a real life and these people are living a real life you know I had a false Kazam like memory that Zon
[01:05:37] and Burns ended up together at the end of this movie and watching it I think I just want that to happen I think I just did slap in my head you also want Nevasky and Parker Posey to get together like somehow you want them just to switch
[01:05:51] I remember that happening too in my head we can just declare a canon that that probably happens she definitely gives him a book deal and Parker Posey is of course in Mix Nuts she's the rollerblader along with John Stewart so she had worked with Nora before
[01:06:07] and I hate to rewatch it her and Nora were good friends that could not make more sense to New York women I've not seen Mix Nuts since watching it since renting it with my family when soon after it came out and everyone was like
[01:06:21] what the fuck was that and I was like oh that movie sucks and I never gave it another thought very bizarre this is when she's in this I feel like she's just fully the queen of indie cinema right like she's been like in generation kicking and screaming
[01:06:37] suburbia, Basquiat, Halsey waiting for Guffman that's all leading up to this movie when she's in it's like oh Parker Posey like the coolest girl if you guys haven't seen the remake of High Fidelity TV show which is shockingly good I don't even know how I
[01:06:57] oh my this has no right to be good it literally should be against the law for it to be good and it's fantastic and there's an episode that you could just watch this episode where Parker Posey is in it and she plays this New York City
[01:07:09] Upper West Side woman who is selling her shitty husband's records to them and she is so good and it really reminded me of this woman it's like the future of this woman whose name I'm now... what's her name when you got mail? what's her character's name? Patricia Eden
[01:07:27] oh yeah Patricia oh cause Patricia makes coffee coffee nervous okay sorry yeah so she I always think of that High Fidelity woman as the future Patricia like that is just what she became you know that woman Hank said like so perfectly
[01:07:43] she's perfect casting and her performance is perfect because from the moment you see them on screen together you're like oh this is a temporary thing yeah but it makes it makes sense that they would have found a way to connect at some point
[01:07:55] and say hey this sort of works on paper they're both same in the same kind of way in the way that Keneer and Ryan make sense on paper but they're like yeah unfortunately we just don't love each other but it works on paper
[01:08:07] do you think Nora's like the movie's too cute as it is with the little you know with the email like maybe I shouldn't have everyone else linking up at the end I don't know I thank God she didn't the movie's long enough we don't need
[01:08:19] like the two butlers getting together we don't need it the babysitter and the the ballet get together like we don't need it Nancy Myers is starting you know around the same time as this movie's coming out and she's like yeah baby everyone's gonna be together at the end
[01:08:35] I think that it's better for the film that having been said Jeffrey Welles style I would like to ask the ghost of Nora Ephron to quietly send me the footage of Steve's on and Heather Burns fucking on a soundstage because they filmed it they filmed it
[01:08:53] Bobby you were gonna talk about the elevator scene I just love the elevator scene it's just I think that it's something that Nora does very well take a situation that seems very contrived and add a lot of humanity to it and turn it into something actually memorable and
[01:09:13] sort of very profound like something about like getting trapped in an elevator with who like essentially cliche is like the Upper West Side witchy which ritual with no personality other than the fact that I have a small dog and I'm rich and the you know
[01:09:31] we haven't shouted him out yet and the fact that like it's it's weird to see like this like Upper West Side woman like Nora Ephron like sort of right people who were in the service industry and you're like oh this is probably gonna
[01:09:45] come across as condescending and shitty and like it's not and he actually he is the reason that Tom Hanks is like this sucks wait what am I doing I'm doing this all wrong that line that I'm getting a poorly paraphrased now I was envious of a man
[01:10:01] knowing with such confidence what he wanted life he realizes that guy has it much better than he does that could have been so so condescending and it's not and the and also the idea of getting trapped in an elevator is like kind of a big New York
[01:10:17] thing not just because it's we live in buildings we live in old buildings so elevators break all the time so the New Yorkiness of that is right those weird old shuddery elevators they're still all over the Upper West Side and that everyone has this sort of like
[01:10:31] folk remedy to fixing like right in an elevator everyone jumps if we push all the buttons I don't know maybe everything about that rings true even though the situation feels so comical and implausible and I feel like most versions of that scene are the meet cute or
[01:10:47] the scene that finally makes the two people work through their issues and realize that they kind of love each other and instead she uses it to end the unnecessary romance of a different character you know he finally sees her well it's also because she's like if I ever
[01:11:03] if I ever get out of here I'm getting my eyes lasered and then he goes to say something like beautiful like everyone else and she says she's like where are my tiktaks and then she goes what it's perfect can we dissect a similarly crucial scene the Zabars
[01:11:21] line yes oh my god what a great ceremony which is another classic as you're saying like kind of New York situation it's like what if you got in the wrong fucking line and it was a show only and all the people with their smoked fish are behind
[01:11:37] you with their picture and only a Zabars Tuesday the worst time to go it's so cute and it does it really pushes the neighborhood thing that you would run into someone at Zabars like very likely and I think a lot of people
[01:11:51] do run into people they know at Zabars you know that's not unusual and so like the fact that they run into each other is not one of those rom-com meat-care things it feels like a real situation that she's already she's already set it up so that you believe
[01:12:07] that which I like a lot that these two would keep running into each other and then kind of run into each other on purpose Sarah Ramirez is I would say Sarah Ramirez is like her best moment is whenever she goes from smiling and being
[01:12:21] charmed by Tom Hanks to being like completely like despising of Meg Ryan that facial transition is always hilarious it was the first movie ever to shoot at Zabars which is crazy because it feels like everyone should have been using this location for 30 years but um
[01:12:39] the other thing is they would only give them one night to shoot it and it was like in between operation hours so they filmed the entire thing from like 10 p.m. until 5 a.m. and Hanks, consummate pro he is mayor of Hollywood inherently kept on getting
[01:12:57] on the Zabars PA system which they used to announce like which items are special deals to entertain all the extras and keep spirits high at like 4 o'clock in the morning the one that that Nora Ephron quoted which is too fucking charming to handle is he apparently got
[01:13:15] on the PA and went ladies and gentlemen shoppers at Zabars want to announce that Meg Ryan is appetizing Meg Ryan is appetizing wow what an angel sent from heaven the shoe might drop that's how good he is the shoe is about to drop
[01:13:37] I worry every day of my life I also feel like this is to me it seems like such an accurate representation of who Tom Hanks is as a person like he's a rich and powerful man like he's an asshole well he's a rich and powerful baby boomer
[01:13:55] man of course he's an asshole of course he could be snarky but he's also a sweetie pie and I think that this is the closest not that I know Tom Hanks but like to me this is how I picture him in real life the dude loves a typewriter
[01:14:07] who is also like you want nothing more than to be friends with him like this is what I wanted to say about the Zabars scene what you're talking about essentially she's in the line, she can't pay but she doesn't have cash so she's pleading for
[01:14:23] to use her credit card Sarah Amiris has given her the hard line then Tom Hanks that comes in does the same thing and what's the message here? it's not like he's like you catch more flies with honey she wasn't being rude
[01:14:37] she was doing the same thing which is just like look I'm sorry what am I going to do like you know and Tom Hanks just comes in and sort of mansplains the exact same he's like there's a credit card reader and Sarah Amiris is like
[01:14:49] well alright so it's the idea is just like he's just automatically gets a pass because he's a rich charming guy 100% yes I think that's part of it and I also think the statement here is you're casting Meg Ryan who at this point is still firmly America's sweetheart
[01:15:05] everyone calls her America's sweetheart she's like the cutest most charming we all want to be her we all want to be with her movie star in the 90s and Tom Hanks is sort of the male equivalent of that but also he is objectively
[01:15:21] playing the asshole in this movie he is playing the villain to the business conflict of this film I think the point is cause I was thinking this before watching it the inverse of the bonfire of the bandit's problem where he's supposed to be on savory
[01:15:37] in that movie but even when he's playing his most unsavory there's still something kind of charming and likable about Tom Hanks and he cannot dim the point is it's not that he's being better to Sarah Ramirez than Meg Ryan is it's not like she's not being considerate
[01:15:55] she's being very sincere and sort of like considerate in her earnest plea please just help me out but the scene is there's something undeniable about Tom Hanks even when he is going to be responsible for shutting down her business he's come out and said
[01:16:13] remember when there was that all that weird press around him being like I don't play villains or like I'm not he was like I don't want to play a villain but I think it's also that maybe he's not meant to play a villain
[01:16:27] he's not really good at playing a villain and a lot of directors and writers maybe know that like looking for a Tom Hanks vehicle Bonfire is also his biggest failure like that's his biggest mistake as an actor I think he took that L hard and it's not about
[01:16:39] like I don't want to ding my reputation it's I fundamentally know there are things the audience will not buy me doing right but I think that's why the Mr. Rogers role was so successful for him because if you it's more it's referenced in the movie
[01:16:55] it's referenced in a beautiful day in the neighborhood but in the documentary it's very explicit that like his children don't really like yes they had a terrible relationship they had a lot of problems with him as a father like he kind of was an asshole too
[01:17:07] like so I think that thing where he has to play a little bit at both but ultimately Charmer wins is the thing that he does best that movie's incredible it's because it's tying the Hanks persona to the Rogers I read this Mariel Heller interview where she said
[01:17:21] I couldn't make sense of how to tackle this movie and then I reread the script and I realized Mr. Rogers is the antagonist of the 100% with him being the villain he's the obstruction that scene in beautiful day in the neighborhood where he
[01:17:37] starts taking out the toys to talk to Matthew Reeves is like a horror scene like Matthew Reeves is like stop it stop it I'm not into this yeah like Tom Hanks is the same character in our culture as Mr. Rogers is in people
[01:17:51] who have Mr. Rogers in their culture he is this this iconic nice man but he is unknowable and there's like a force field around him right and we get everyone who knows him could say he's a great guy I know him but like you don't
[01:18:05] know him no one will ever know him and that is that's why that casting was so great because it is like if when there's a movie made about Tom Hanks maybe there is one day it will have to be the same type of structure who's gonna play Hanks?
[01:18:21] Ansel Josh Gad Tommy I think you're right and obviously like Hanks is very effective in a number of different types of roles including man who's very good at his job but there's something about when he uses that tension knowing that he can never play full villain but like
[01:18:41] the thing going on here and in beautiful day in the neighborhood and even sort of it's the flip side of this but something like um a road to perdition which is sort of like the most villainous character he's like he's literally like a murderer and a
[01:18:55] gangster but that movie plays all that's the thing it plays off that tension of when it started out and the guy seems like a sociopath and he's totally cold and shut off but the crux of the movie is he's gonna let too much of the Hanks shine through
[01:19:09] there's something about this guy that is willing to die in order to preserve his son's humanity I don't think him not want to play villains is a protectiveness ego thing I think it is just right he can yeah I think so too
[01:19:21] and that's but it's funny because that's how it came out through the press where he was just like I just don't like playing bad guys everyone's like when road to perdition comes out which he is not a bad guy but he is a murderer yes there was a
[01:19:33] fucking like you know they had to have a whole PR thing of like yeah Tom Hanks he's gone dark you know he is the hero of that film he plays the Mark Zuckerberg character in the circle a very bad guy yeah that's true he's a villain in that
[01:19:49] that movie is unfortunately not very good no it's it's so unfortunate how bad that movie no no no that book is great it's so sad how bad that movie is it's really sad he's also of course the villain the ladycoz I'm trying to think of any other
[01:20:03] lady killers a huge flaw for him I mean that was the I know he's good and the circle great no he's really funny and lady killers is the movie there's ends his 10 year 100 billion dollar grosser run like and that was the last time he was like pure
[01:20:17] villain even if it's funny I think so right I will the circle but it doesn't exist it doesn't exist as many times as you want it still doesn't exist and that's a fact I welcome you to the circle Griffin join the circle John Boyega is in that movie
[01:20:33] no way no he isn't because it doesn't exist you can't be in a movie that doesn't exist in the circle Emma Roberts catches him having sex Emma Watson catches him anyway that movie is so bad it's so bad so so bad I find your fan fiction very interesting
[01:20:51] Lindsay describing him because it doesn't exist true true true okay I wanted to talk about we spent a lot of time on Tom Hanks but I wanted to talk about Meg Ryan because the year before this she was in another New Yorkie rom-com
[01:21:03] that I saw for the first time recently we talking about the master piece addicted to love addicted to love which is a very downtown New York movie a very a very caustic movie that movie is in my neighborhood that movie's got some big downtown
[01:21:19] Griffin name sign I love that movie the movie is not very good it's really interesting that's outrageous this movie that movie is great I can't I can't call it great it's tough for me I've only seen it once also David has many times
[01:21:33] tried to sell me on the idea of doing a Griffin Dunn mini series because he so badly wants to cover addicted to love that's practical magic those are the two those are the twin pellets I love practical magic but I think I think that Meg
[01:21:47] other reason I bring it up is I think that it's the opposite here I think Meg can do both I think Meg is capable of being like a really dark villainous questionable character like addicted to love is pretty straightforward but if that were more of a thriller
[01:22:03] and you were supposed to be like what is Meg Ryan up to like she's capable of being like a villain and addicted to love she plays an asshole she plays like a true lunatic it just happens she meets someone else who's a lunatic but
[01:22:17] despite being a full stop movie star Meg Ryan has more character actor versatility than Hank's does in terms of how she can play with a persona in the cut that came right after Tom Hanks could not do the equivalent of being the cut
[01:22:31] well I'd like to see him try I would too I would love to see Tom Hanks do the weird rom-com I think Meg Ryan can do the weird rom-com maybe pre-sleepless in Seattle he could have right where he's maybe not quite as established as Tom Hanks
[01:22:45] yeah turn around Hooch, that's his weird rom-com because the money pit is like weird but it's a pretty straightforward right that's the thing, Joverse the Volcano the Money Pit Burge that's sort of like when that's the answer but he's not a bad guy Meg Ryan post this
[01:23:03] because like this movie is a big box office hit she's had some flops in between this and sleepless in Seattle like Courage Under Fire didn't really work addicted to love was a flop I feel like French Kiss was not I think it did okay
[01:23:17] I love French Kiss and you can't stream it anywhere that's weird, I mean IQ was definitely a bomb that's a weird so weird what a weird movie think about how different the 90s were where you just listed four or five bombs in between and even still
[01:23:31] that entire time period she was uncontested America's sweetheart I would say so she didn't lose that title this year she has, you've got mail and she has City of Angels which despite being a remake of a German masterpiece is roundly just dismisses like chick flick
[01:23:49] at the time right? we wouldn't have uninvited without City of Angels I am not dismissing it I'm saying that one of the most heartbreaking twists in cinema can I Bobbie and Lindsay can I give the two of you
[01:24:03] the pitch that I came up with in our previous episode oh god yeah I think Nicholas Cage and John Travolta should have done a face-off style swap I think Nicholas Cage should have played Michael and John Travolta should have been in City of Angels with Meg Ryan
[01:24:19] didn't he play an angel in Michael? that's amazing I'll face off Angel Swap that's amazing you're both films? oh you're saying Cage should have been Michael? well Michael was so weird I don't even think Michael the character that's correct I think Cage is weirder
[01:24:39] in a way that would fit Michael and Travolta is a little more successful at playing a conventional romantic lead at one moment Michael would have worked if it was Nick Cage I'm thinking about how good of an idea that is right? that's good sorry nobody's ready to
[01:24:57] reclaim Michael but if it was Nick Cage we might be ready to reclaim Michael we spent two hours plus in our last episode trying to reclaim it and I'll tell you it's kind of impossible yeah it's impossible sorry go ahead so Meg Ryan
[01:25:11] she's doing great when you've got mail comes out right big hit I think she's about 36-37 when this movie comes out then she has in 2000 hanging up which Griffin on Patreon we're doing that as a Patreon bonus because that's true and so that's not a hit but whatever
[01:25:33] it's sort of similar to like a french kiss where like it did okay didn't hurt anyone's feelings she's got proof of life and the big sort of Russell Crowe quote unquote scandal where she and Dennis Quaid break up which in 2001 she has Kate and Leopold which I love
[01:25:49] is a decent hit and is a great movie and that's more her just being like I'll do a rom-com but then after that it's over like she does in the cut and then it's just over the Russell Crowe thing totally ruins her
[01:26:03] and what is it? Russell Crowe ruined it it's Russell Crowe and in the cut they're very separate things but like Russell Crowe ruins it and then in the cut people are like no you're not allowed to do this we give up right and then the cut is amazing
[01:26:15] it's also one of those things with distance where you're like it is so incredibly sexist that the Russell Crowe thing destroyed her that hard when Russell Crowe only grew in prominence because of it it was literally good press for Russell Crowe and bad press for her
[01:26:31] and also how many fucking times did Dennis Quaid cheat on her I'm not speaking to any knowledge I have but come on like water is wet no that she was she left Dennis Quaid that was the story it was like can you believe
[01:26:45] this idiot woman we thought she was America sweetheart and she just ruined this like perfect marriage that's what the story was he was like a cokehead for like that entire period of time he's still an asshole he's still such an asshole in the 90s it was just that
[01:27:01] there was that thing of like if two movie stars are married to each other that is the ideal marriage that was just how people magazine etc thought of it Bruce Willis and to me more married can you imagine
[01:27:15] without their son Jack Quaid who's turned out to be a really good actor and choosing amazing projects even though again he's not been in that many projects but he's out here doing like The Boys which was great on Amazon and fucking plus one
[01:27:29] one of the best romcoms of the past five years somehow that got nowhere but I'll say this too Jack Quaid a friend worked with him on vinyl great guy he is also one of those dudes who for being his son of two massive movie stars has
[01:27:47] no fucking ego no entitlement whatsoever he is like just fucking amazing actors work ethic I'm gonna do whatever I can to make the scene work I'm gonna go out of my way to treat everyone well on set I want to believe he got that from head Ryan
[01:28:03] but he is just sort of like he's a fucking great guy he's the real deal so you're saying he's the opposite of Chet Hayes he's Tom Hanks he's what you want Tom Hanks in this underage do you think Chet Hayes
[01:28:17] will play Tom Hanks in the Tom Hanks movie ten years from now he'll try he's gonna play Peter Stolari I feel like we already talked about this on this podcast but I still will always cherish the day when Tom Hanks had coronavirus and
[01:28:31] Chet Hayes became a voice of reason on why when he was like one love to everyone like dad's doing okay on Instagram and I was watching it sincerely being like oh he's giving me news about Tom Hanks and I appreciate it right I always call Chet Rita's son
[01:28:49] that's Rita's son that's Rita's boy that's Rita's boy but on that day he revealed himself to be a steady hand of reason I absolutely appreciated his content that day and not the content of the leaders of our country right like I was like at least Chet
[01:29:07] is giving me facts on the ground I mean he's he's weird but he got sober in the past few years so he went from being truly a terror to being just weird, just weird you know I don't chat with Hayes when he's an Oscar
[01:29:21] I want him to prove a song that's the original song it's happened we're best picture he's not terrible in shameless he's on shameless or he was on shameless review episodes he's not the worst he's not great he's something as an actor often in a very small role
[01:29:37] I'm like fuck he is pretty solid he's okay I have no idea who was in shameless but it is also like if you pointed a gun at me and were like is shameless still on the air I'd be like yes and they'd be like what season is it
[01:29:51] I'd be like I don't know 11 it's like the longest running show on pay table it's showtime's gun smoke yes, yeah it has more episodes than Ozzie and Harriet when Felicity happened with the prison she was like well at least we'll always have the shameless paychecks shameless money
[01:30:09] shameless was a UK show and the premise of it is like what if there was a family that was wacky that lived on the wrong side of the tracks and showtime was like we'll take that premise thank you and milk it for a generation I mean that show
[01:30:23] is very problematic in many ways but a lot of people really love it because it is like one of the few shows that's like about poor people in a way that like a lot of shows are not even though the show itself when you watch it
[01:30:37] because it's been going on for honestly way too long has had to have so many storylines that it's just gotten so far out of control even Emmy Rossum was like I can't even do this anymore and this show made me who I am
[01:30:49] I have to get out of here but like the show is weirdly interesting and if you look at it from that lens but only very briefly shameless just ended in January it's 10th season on air there have been 122 episodes and they're doing an 11
[01:31:05] of course they are an angel well as long as William H. Macy steps up to the plate they'll do it can I offer my big take on this movie please I want nothing more for how much I feel like Norah Fran movies are sort of quoted in short-handed
[01:31:23] being like the most generic prototypical like it's well executed but it's like oh you know that type of like romcom the two Hanks Ryan movies which are seen as like the big ones are both weirdly experimental in their approach to a romcom because sleepless in Seattle is obviously
[01:31:39] like you create a romcom with chemistry between the two actors without them ever actually communicating until the last scene of the movie and then this feels like an opposite test which is like they're in the movie a lot together but what you guys were sort of talking about
[01:31:55] of like the Hanks character is so much more of an asshole than you're used to this character being and the Meg Ryan character is so much sadder than you're used to this character being in any sort of like oil and water
[01:32:07] romcom like this where it's like a Hepburn and Tracy they fight and they fight and they fight until they realize they have to be together movie that's pretty much always the dynamic like one is always like a little too snide and flinty and one
[01:32:19] is always like a little sad and lonely and ultimately they realize they have to be together and this movie is her two things to their furthest extremes that she can because you have this narrative conceit in the middle which is in the email exchanges
[01:32:35] they can just be pure romcom bliss like in the scenes where they're not actually together they can be the most romantic the most charming cross cutting in different rooms so that allows you to be like we're going to actually investigate like
[01:32:49] the sadness of a manic pixie dream girl so that she no longer becomes that and like the horrible qualities of like the confident like man with a quip at the ready at all times until he no longer becomes a good guy. Yeah I just saying there's something about
[01:33:05] you saying this wasn't the way that romcoms were prototypically then but I think Nora Efron she made now going forward romcoms are the way that Nora made them like she changed the now we all think of now every romcom is sleepless and is you my god is
[01:33:25] whatever you guys like yes that's Lindsey that's kind of what I was going to say it's like I think there's been so much for the past 10 plus years there has been that like bubbling narrative of like man I wish we had romcoms again and like unpacking
[01:33:41] that unpacking that narrative another two hours and it's it's its own mess but I think speaking for myself because I felt the same way for a long time but then I think it was like a few times ago because I watched you've got mail a few
[01:33:53] times a year and it was maybe a maybe a year or two ago I was watching it and I was like wait a second I don't miss romcoms I miss Nora Efron romcoms I miss like three or four you know like of course
[01:34:09] these aren't going to come back because she's dead and this was a very specific time and place like it's not that I miss the romcom I miss this specific thing and guess what I can watch it whenever the fuck I want and I think the close
[01:34:21] which is why I think the romcom that I think is my favorite since you've got mail is probably enough said which I think captures this dynamic pretty closely in that you have this person like these people who are being deceitful and people who are being
[01:34:39] really really messy because they are in love and people who have to deal with their own personal shit before they can deal with another person shit and that's part of it but it's like I miss Nora Efron I miss you've got mail
[01:34:51] it's not that I miss the general concept of a romcom I miss the way these people talk and I miss the way these people like I think there's also the missing the romcom thing is also just the loss of like a mid-tier movie
[01:35:03] the loss of like that's I always think of it it's not even like romcom it's just like what's a movie that cost X amount of money that's not huge superhero or an indie dirt cheap yeah so it's like everything in the middle is lost maybe we'll come back
[01:35:19] as well I mean it's a movie that is driven by a star and not a franchise the franchise is the star and actors want to make those movies though they want to but they have a hard time finding the ones that then become whatever I think
[01:35:35] like for example I don't know if it's even good but like the lovebirds that movie that just came out that's on netflix is one of those types of movies I don't know if it's good again but like that feels not a romcom but mariel heller movies too
[01:35:47] longshot the longshot great romcom one of those movies felt in between somehow not crazy expensive or dirt cheap had a star and didn't do well I mean I opened it against Avengers is still one of the weirdest things yes I do I do think
[01:36:05] um I mean I have a couple things to say here but the one that I always jumped to when I think about like what's my model for the best romcom of the last 10 years like modern is sleeping with other people which I love and I
[01:36:21] feel like Leslie headland is someone who is kind of an era parent too and she looked there are a lot of things that that Leslie headland is good at that she could do in her career I'm very excited to see her make a star war show but I
[01:36:33] also feel like she is someone who could have a more effron or Nancy Meyers yes thank you so brooks type career where she is a writer director with a very specific sense of sort of like a service comedy character driven comedy good
[01:36:49] star body knows that's one of my favorites that is one of my favorites fucking rules so hard but I do think that's another problem we talk about what killed the romcom you know the main culprit is they are very cultural they're very specific
[01:37:03] to cultures and stars and comedy is very cultural and in the 10 years where the industry ships to being very global you want movies that play equally well in any country romcoms go first and then non-romcom comedies go second because those things don't translate as well but the other
[01:37:21] part of it is I think if you look at the 2000's and more and more romcoms start to be written and directed by men and you know I'm not saying only a woman can make a romcom but I was watching the movie thinking about the fact we have
[01:37:35] covered now four filmmakers on blank check who have predominantly done romcoms or a romcom adjacent movies and their Cameron Crow James L. Brooks Nora Efron and Nancy Meyers and two of those four guys got best picture nominations and best director nominations and the women did not Brooks one
[01:37:55] yeah the women did not she got like a nomination for sleep bliss in Seattle right and one for when Harry met Sally one for silkwood that's it right and Nora Nancy rather got the private Benjamin nomination but like when this movie came out obviously ignored
[01:38:13] it's not a real movie Meg Ryan got the token Golden Globe Nom and that's it and like even though this movie was a Christmas hit like there was there would never have been anyone to suggest like oh well we should like take this seriously
[01:38:27] like even the fucking globes didn't nominate Brooks like that's insane and I do think you know there are other things you can analyze in terms of the differences between the Efron canon the Myers canon and on the other side the Crow Brooks canon but it does sort of
[01:38:41] speak to a thing of just how much seriously these films seem to be taken when they're directed by women oh it's just pure entertainment that's not a substantive movie but yet the ones that linger tend to be those ones that are written by a very specific sense of
[01:38:57] respect to viewpoints writer director female a tour like Hall of Center like like headland but this is the final thing I want to say I know I just have something I need to tell you this is the final thing I want to say in that 10 years later retrospective
[01:39:11] Hanks talks about how difficult making this movie was in a certain way because Efron was known for being very exacting and he was saying the scene the cafe Lalo scene is like the hardest scene he's ever done as an actor it was a four night shoot it's an
[01:39:25] incredibly long like 12 page scene or whatever it is and Nora Efron I didn't know this did extensive rehearsals for all of her movies in a way that the only other person I know who did this in the last 30 or 40 years was Sydney Lumetz where she would collect her
[01:39:43] actors in like a black box theater and take out the sets and give them fake props and run every scene with full blocking weeks in advance before when they film so that when they actually get to the set it's just perfecting the fine details
[01:39:59] but was locking everything in she was very rigorous which people don't talk about because they assume she's just kind of funny and light and she hires movie stars and they show up and they do the work and Hanks was like I was pulling out
[01:40:11] my hair trying to figure out that scene it was the hardest thing they've ever had to do and he said I think it is the most sophisticated scene I have ever seen in a movie that is not as sophisticated as it is to be viewed as sophisticated
[01:40:25] and I think that's such a great descriptor for everything she did well it's like the sophistication she is applying to everything in terms of form in terms of actual just insight is so invisible and she's not asking to be taken seriously as a prestige movie
[01:40:41] she is trying to make pure entertainment for people. As a writer she was already a director I mean she was born to be a director even but the writers who say the actors can't improvise you got to say everything from the script that was her from the beginning
[01:40:55] and maybe that would have been seen as uptight when for like a man it's seen as like he's just very precise you just have to stay on script it's part of the film or whatever but it's like she was already at that point and I think also
[01:41:09] it's something like these actors are willing to give Nora whatever she wants at this point like that Tom Hanks who up until her death I mean I remember he did a Broadway show that I went to that he wrote like he would do anything for her
[01:41:23] you know and so that was from the very start to do that type of elaborate rehearsal for a movie like this like I think he almost pointedly did that play because he knew she was dying like he wanted
[01:41:33] to pay tribute to her one time that play was weird I gotta say weird play weird play very strange play anecdote before David says is very important thing in the steam is getting so much build up for something that's gonna be total
[01:41:49] everyone's gonna love it and David's about to win another obi but Hanks was saying he was pulling his hair he couldn't make sense of the Lalo scene and he just couldn't get over like why is he here like why does he go into the cafe why does he
[01:42:03] stay this long why does he torture to this extent and he kept on trying out different things and wasn't working and the script supervisor is the one who came to him and just said Tom you want to tell her it's you your motivation
[01:42:17] this scene is you think if you stay longer you'll finally build the courage to say it and that's what he's playing and it's so good and that's why that scene is so good well you want him to say it too right David
[01:42:27] is now gonna say the most important thing that anyone's ever said in the history of this podcast so Griffin you pointed out I know I mentioned Meg Ryan nominated for Golden Globe best performance by an actress in a comedy or musical she lost she did not win
[01:42:41] as you might guess she lost to Gwyneth Paltrow for Shakespeare in Love who goes on to win the Oscar right nothing crazy about that right but then you all you also mentioned Tom Hanks was not nominated for best actor so can you tell me the five
[01:42:59] nominees for best performance by an actor in a comedy or musical at the 1998 Golden Globes okay and just to be clear Hanks was nominated for drama actor the same year he was for Saving Private Ryan he famously lost to Jim Carrey who was then snowed by the Oscars
[01:43:15] so best comedy 1998 here's what I want to say to you I think you can get four I don't think you could ever get the winner unless you just remembered him winning I definitely watch the ceremony live is Ben Stiller for something about Mary one of the nominees
[01:43:31] no he is not camera Diaz did get nominated uh yeah she did okay I'm trying to think comedies of 1998 are they all comedies or is one of them sneaking in under the musical I don't know that I would explicitly call any of these movies a comedy
[01:43:47] but certainly they all fit but none of them are musicals they are all comic dramas or comic adventures one of them I guess is kind of a comment I don't fucking know zero nominees from this category are nominated for Oscars comic adventures 1998 so zero of these nominees
[01:44:09] go on to get Oscar nominations wait this list it's like the worst only three of the drama nominees made it they sub in two other guys who were ignored by the globes you couldn't pay me anything to watch these movies in a row this is the worst
[01:44:23] movie marathon are these movies mostly like some of them are good movies I like a couple of the movies yeah I would say by and large these were hits there's one kind of oscarie there's a couple of oscarie I don't know
[01:44:35] there's really only two hits in here actually god damn it what the fuck alright so here's some clues one of them is it's like a big adventure movie a huge action hit from 1998 and it's actually good job on the globes for nominating this performance
[01:44:51] it's a great performance and it's sort of underrated although I feel like now everyone's talking about this movie again fun movie for an oh Anthony Bender's Nazca Zorro that's right okay so that's one two is an actor two is an actor we talked about
[01:45:05] extensively just now he's been multiple norah f-run movies and it's sort of weird that the oscar snubbed him this is like a big acty performance from him playing a basically playing a real guy a real guy versus it's travolta in 1998 oh it's a big novel adaptation wow okay
[01:45:29] so that's two three is one of the huge comedy stars in the 90s in a massive hit it just happens to be a terrible movie is it another Jim Carrey movie no but it's a big comedy star in the 90s and it happens to be terrible
[01:45:45] and I'm close terrible movie but it was a huge hit yeah it's a terrible movie it's a huge hit was he a comedy star who came out of tv yes I mean and this was definitely being positioned as an oscar movie it just fucking sucked
[01:45:59] but it was a huge hit like it made 100 million plus dollars so Robin Williams okay fourth is one of the most famous movie stars of all time in a movie that he made I believe it got a screenplay nomination eventually the movie was kind of a flop
[01:46:17] it's absolutely demented yes number five is the winner I can't believe he won for this everyone's favorite movie from 1998 this is a how it was a movie that was like it's a British film it's in that British film zone of the 90s
[01:46:39] where they you know I feel like once a year Weinstein or some fucking Weinstein pretender would get his hands on some inspirational British films and just cram it down everyone's throats be like you'll never you won't believe how charming this is
[01:46:53] surround I remember this is one of the very iconic this is like the movie that in your local newspaper would somehow get like three quarters of the page and it would be covered in quotes and stars and you'd be like
[01:47:05] I've never heard of this and this is only playing at one theater in my city is it the guy from Waking Net Divine no I mean a fair guess but that would be a more charming thing I forgot this guy was in this movie
[01:47:19] I've seen this movie I could name like several other actors in it he's a famous actor I forgot he was in it I certainly forgot he won a Golden Globe wait a second did Michael Caine win Best Actor in a Comedy for Little Voice yes wow
[01:47:37] he's undoubtedly supporting I was even thinking about it because he's supporting little voice it's so weird like Travolta seems like kind of a slam dunk you know what I mean like why why were they like you know what let's give it to Caine it's also it feels like
[01:47:57] were he not trying so hard to prove that he was a serious actor they would have put Carrie in comedy for Truman Show yes but they came in drama which I get but Truman Show is more of a comedy than say the Martian is 100% yeah
[01:48:13] you can sell it as a comedy who cares Jesus I mean the primary colors I mean these are comedies yes but like they're drama comedies but it sounds so funny that Little Voice got Actor actress but didn't get film or wasn't even nominated for film
[01:48:29] like Patch Adams made it to the big category but this little voice that got both of those performances did not even get the nod for itself did Little Voice ultimately get a supporting actress nomination for the Oscars Brenda Blethen who gives a
[01:48:45] one of the worst performances of the 90s in that film and she snuck in because they had just given her the nom for secrets and lies which she's good at yeah and this is kind of a beef with Brenda Blethen I love Brenda Blethen Bobby scroll down
[01:49:01] my rap beef with Brenda Blethen in it years ago scroll down to the best original song noms I gotta say an incredible lineup just one of the finest you have the prayer rich which one reflection Christina Aguilera uninvited from City of Angels which was already
[01:49:17] brought up in this conversation when you believe the Whitney that's a great one for best original song good list, good list right this is also the year that aging rocker comedy still crazy was nominated for best picture by the Golden Globe but like the weirdest
[01:49:37] thing and then we'll be done we can do the box of this game and then we'll be done the best actor nominees they carry over Hanks from Private Ryan McKellen from Gods of Monsters and Nick Nolte from Affliction those three got
[01:49:49] Globe Noms and then they add in Edward Norton from American History Acts sort of surprising that the Globe snubbed him and then Roberta Benini is the winner why did the Globe snub him he should be beating out Michael Kane right he was the flavor of the books
[01:50:03] yeah exactly here's the box office for December 18th 1998 is this her biggest hit does this end up being her highest grossing I believe this is her biggest hit do you guys know I think let me find out that's right it made $250 million and it must have been
[01:50:23] I mean which is another one of those things where people like these rom-coms don't travel it was a huge worldwide hit like it's not like this movie was ignored elsewhere yeah but a rom-com is not going to make a billion dollars
[01:50:35] that's the dumb thing I mean it's that story Disney wouldn't make a sequel to the proposal because it didn't make enough for them and it made $300 million it made less than sleepless in Seattle domestic but more worldwide just to answer your question
[01:50:49] so number one though is you've got mail $18 million, number two is a movie we just mentioned it's a Christmas animated film Prince of Egypt Prince of Egypt and this is December yeah okay what do you guys think of Christmas Eve
[01:51:05] even though Prince of Egypt is an Easter movie it's a Passover movie I love the Prince of Egypt I like it they were trying so hard to compete with Disney and Disney wouldn't have been a summer film so they wanted to take that holiday
[01:51:19] it's no Rugrats Passover special but it'll do Prince of Egypt is one of the best, is better than so many so many Disney movies from that time period that's true and when you believe is one of my favorite CDs the most stacked cast of any animated movie
[01:51:35] are you kidding me incredible guys is Katsubur calling in all the favors Kilmer, Ray Fiennes, Michelle Pfeiffer Sandra Bullock, Jeff Talbot, Danny Glover Patrick Stewart, Helen Mirren, Steve Martin Martin Short amazing I need to rewatch it, I haven't seen it since the K-Mountiers I guess they staged
[01:51:55] a production of it somewhere I don't know there's a new cast recording maybe it's coming to Broadway but the cast recording is out and I listen to it it's good, it's on Spotify number three Griffin as I imagine your favorite cartoon sorry animated film of 1998 A Bugs Life
[01:52:13] correct although I need to rewatch Prince of Egypt but I think it's a Bugs Life that movie of Fox it thrusts its consciousness into me number four at the box office and it's sort of crazy this movie came out at Christmas he was not a huge hit
[01:52:29] compared to it's a sequel in a long, long, long running franchise and because the last movie had done so well I think they were kind of emboldened to make this like a big deal release Scream 2? No, sci-fi franchise oh, it's Star Trek Insurrection that's right, yeah
[01:52:51] where they're like okay first contact huge hit let's do one where it's like F Murray Abraham is a villain and he wants to do more plastic surgery he's got too many wrinkles it's a wrinkle thriller exactly and let's throw in like a Patrick Stewart Donna Murphy romantic plot
[01:53:09] all the decisions they made you're just like what were you thinking this is the worst pivot anyway number five Griffin is a Christmas family comedy that I feel like is now just best known as a horrifying internet meme how to describe it's a bad meme
[01:53:31] now it stars one of your favorite actors oh yeah it started one of my favorite actors oh yes this movie is a terror it is called Jack Frost with Michael Hewitt now do you know a fact about this movie I know that he turns into snowman
[01:53:49] I know that during in the trailer which I've seen like 400 times even though I've never seen this film at one point like some snowballs hit his snowman body and he has boobs and he's like I don't think so that movie sucks that movie is a nightmare
[01:54:05] that's what they should make people watch it out of the crowd I do want to say that movie the snowman is largely a practical effect animatronic so they had to build it he's a big weird puppet
[01:54:17] a long time in advance they spent a lot of money building this puppet but they built it I think it's a form of the likeness of theσω actor who was supposed to play the title role who dropped out very late you have told me this who is ...
[01:54:31] look at orchestra Jack Frost it is pointing to snowman George Clooney it's meant to be showing how did George Clooney every consider being in this like even at the time after he finished filming Batman and Robin
[01:54:47] I might need to get a little more selective than what I do. Right, he's like clear the decks. I'm only doing Soderbergh and Cohen movies for a few years. That's one of the best fun facts I've ever heard. It does! Does it not look exactly like snow?
[01:55:00] Yes, it does! Oh my God! Clooney should be paying Keaton like wage still, like paying him because he got out of this movie. Yes. Like monthly, a monthly salary. I think that's how Michael Keaton survived without making a film for the next 10 years. I think it was. Right.
[01:55:16] Clooney was just like, come on. He was paying him in Tequila and Nespresso or whatever he sells. Right, it was in Alamo or whatever. It's George Clooney! Oh my God! Yes! It's crazy! And it's when he's like a rock musician who dies and then returns as a snowman.
[01:55:33] She's worse. He's like a Bruce Willis style Bruno the Kid white man, a harmonica based blues musician. But it's also incredible because Michael Keaton has such a distinctive face that would be so easy to caricature on a snowman
[01:55:49] when instead he's got like the Clooney Chen, the little button nose, the black and blue eyes. It's also just weird that one Batman threw it to another man. I know! And that Keaton was already... They threw the, they lobbed the snowball at the other one, yeah.
[01:56:02] Also what is with the, what is with the, with the genre of dads having to be dads despite crazy circumstances? Like, he wants to be a good dad. Like the mommy Moedino where the shitty father becomes a dog.
[01:56:15] Like he wants to be a good dad, but he's a snowman. Like how is he going to do it? He wants to be a good dad, but he's a dog. I'm forgetting who it is. He wants to be a good dad, but he's Santa Claus. This is crazy.
[01:56:25] Griffin, I'm seeing that the Jack Frost is 101 minutes long. It is long. That feels like an eternity. It's long. It's long. It's really long. It's really long. Like I would be sure 100% be 73 minutes with credits.
[01:56:39] It's also weird that like Keaton is already on a downturn at this point. Like the sixth lead in Jackie Brown. It's great. Anyway, no disrespect to the Ray Nicolette. Oh, he's amazing in it, but I'm saying he's not like his leading man,
[01:56:54] Bloom is like sort of off the rose at this point. Multiplicity is the end. So for them to spend all this money building this snowman and just feel like, I don't know fucking Michael Keaton. We just need to film. We cannot swallow the money on this snowman.
[01:57:08] Last, last thing I want to say what we're talking about Jack Frost. Keaton. Fuck, fuck, fuck. I was about to say something that was funny. What? Ray Nicolette. I don't know. I might have lost it. I might have lost it.
[01:57:23] I'm going to listen to this episode and I'm going to scream at myself. I had one really funny short anecdote to say that I think was adjacent to Jack Frost. And I can't remember it in the episode. Well, why don't you play us out.
[01:57:32] And maybe while you're doing that it'll occur to you. And as I'm doing that remind me of the things we were just talking about Bobby and Lindsay. Thank you for being on the show. I'm glad you're listening to Who Weekly. One of the best. Thanks for having us.
[01:57:44] We'll take any excuse to talk about you've got mail. It's the best. Yeah, truly. We have our own if you're a if you're a patron subscriber to Who Weekly there's a full DVD commentary track of us just doing more bullshit talking over the film.
[01:57:55] That's a good selling point. Just saying that's a good selling point. And follow both of you on Twitter to the best thing game. Why not? Yeah. This was really fun. Thanks guys. Yeah, thanks for having us. Yeah.
[01:58:08] You know, until our president outlaws both of you from tweeting personally. I pray he does every day. I'd love to be sweet release and thank you all for listening and please remember to rate and review subscribe. Thanks to you and for good for co-producing this show
[01:58:26] and doing our social media. Thank you to Rachel Jacobs editing help lay my coming for a theme song. Joe Bowen and Pat rounds for artwork go to blankies dot right.com for some real nerdy shit. But a patreon dot com backslash blank check for our show blank check
[01:58:45] special features where at this point we are covering the mention of possible movies and as David said, I think right around this time we'll be doing a special episode on hanging up Diane Keaton's one feature film directing credit.
[01:58:58] One other where my sister just texted me and said how is it possible that there is a movie starring Diane Keaton, Meg Ryan, Lisa Kudrow written by the Efron sisters directed by Keaton. And I've never heard of it and I said because it's that movie.
[01:59:14] It is the only version of that movie that you would have never heard of. It's a weird one. We'll talk about it. Were you about to say something, Bobby? You had your finger pointed up. Oh, I was waiting until the episode was over. Is it over? Finger.
[01:59:28] Tune in next week. For lucky numbers. Do you want to announce the guest? We almost certainly know who it is, but I don't want to say it just because in case anything goes wrong. Okay. But I think people will be very happy with it.
[01:59:43] Very on brand, a favorite guest returning. And as always Dave Chappelle is Tom Hanks's best friend. But I was also very tempted to do Starbucks. No, what is that? What are you doing? You're taking all the podcast. That podcast is a garnish.
[02:00:09] That was, I was between those two.