Speaker 1: On the Big Dog Cast. The questions asked if movies
Speaker 1: have women and um are all their discussions just boyfriends
Speaker 1: and husbands or do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef
Speaker 1: and best start changing it with the Bell Cast. I
Speaker 1: hope if you're listening to this in your car, you
Speaker 1: just crash. You just literally got into an accit. I
Speaker 1: don't hope that. Well, I don't hope that. But if
Speaker 1: that's what you're dealing with right now, it is our fault. Hi.
Speaker 1: I'm Jamie Lofton and I'm Caitlin Dronte And this is
Speaker 1: the best episode of the Big Dog Cast ever. I'm
Speaker 1: so excited. We've never been less excited about anything. I've
Speaker 1: been stewing in my juices for days now. I'm so
Speaker 1: thrilled to be talking about a star is born with
Speaker 1: our friend and Asne. I just I blew it and
Speaker 1: my freaking what if I just needed my turn? Like
Speaker 1: she's been vibrating at the table. Oh it's so good.
Speaker 1: I just I every song is almost good enough to
Speaker 1: be a real song, Like they are real songs. I
Speaker 1: but I but the way sad I was like, this
Speaker 1: song actually kind of slaps, but it's not quite a
Speaker 1: real song. Oh I love it so much? So hey, hey,
Speaker 1: here we are. We're the Betel Cast. We talked about
Speaker 1: the portrayal and representation of women in film. We use
Speaker 1: the Bechdel test to initiate a larger conversation about women
Speaker 1: in film. Was that the Bechdel test is. It was founded, invented,
Speaker 1: created by cartoonist Alison Bechdel, and it requires that a
Speaker 1: movie has too female identifying characters with names. They have
Speaker 1: to talk to each other there for at least a
Speaker 1: two line exchange, and their conversation cannot be about a man. Well,
Speaker 1: good luck with this franchion. Okay, so wait, we should
Speaker 1: do with a dry round of the Bechtel test. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's do it. Hey, Caitlin, will you ask me a
Speaker 1: question and I'll ask you what to ask me? Wait?
Speaker 1: What it's passing so far? Don't say my name? Hey, Jamie? Okay, Caleb,
Speaker 1: If I ask you to ask me a question and
Speaker 1: give you the copy, will you say will you ask
Speaker 1: me that question? Yes? Okay, here's the question I want
Speaker 1: you to ask me. Okay, what do they have an Arizona? Hey?
Speaker 1: Hey Jamie, what do they have an Arizona? Nuts? Navas
Speaker 1: and nowhere to go. That was a long way, but
Speaker 1: that all passed. Yeah, that all passed. That passed the
Speaker 1: beck That was great. That was the longest pass That's
Speaker 1: like a full conversation with someone like okay, in the
Speaker 1: history of cinema, I love my favorite part of the
Speaker 1: Bechtel test. And that doesn't have to be good writing.
Speaker 1: It just has to be writing. But the word, Hey,
Speaker 1: should we introduce our guests? Yeah, okay, right, well let's
Speaker 1: give her a proper introduction. She's a friend of the cast.
Speaker 1: You've already heard her on her She's all that episode.
Speaker 1: She is one half of Ethnically Ambiguous, and she's a
Speaker 1: producer here at how stuff works. Ana and I sleep
Speaker 1: under the table every time you guys record true fact. So,
Speaker 1: so here we are talking about the two thousand and
Speaker 1: eighteen A Star is Born. So, and this is quite
Speaker 1: a hot request, which I think is one of the
Speaker 1: only reasons Caitlyn agreed to do it. Also, I blackmails
Speaker 1: you guys, I will be the guest, and that is
Speaker 1: that I do have a memory of you walking towards
Speaker 1: us as you're like, we're gonna to A Star is Born? Right,
Speaker 1: and then two nights later, we were in the theater
Speaker 1: fully reclined. Guess what. I bought tickets asap. I bought
Speaker 1: tickets for everybody. I was like, great, we're going and
Speaker 1: said us a paragraph long venmo. Yes. It was like
Speaker 1: you guys had to ask for my permission, please give
Speaker 1: me do A Star is Born? Pause? You knew you
Speaker 1: were going south? Yeah, You're like, I'm not excited to
Speaker 1: see this, Like that was the first thing you said
Speaker 1: when I got in the car, was like, Oh, this
Speaker 1: is gonna be fun. Take a hit of weed and
Speaker 1: you're like no. I was like, weed gives me panic attacks.
Speaker 1: I'm very cool. Love this movie. Smoke weed in the back,
Speaker 1: freaking seed stars. Okay, So Jamie and Anna, you've both prepared,
Speaker 1: I would say more than adequately so, but I still
Speaker 1: feel completely all over the place. Okay, just to be clear,
Speaker 1: not in organized, prepared, but I have all the thought
Speaker 1: I need. Good. Okay, So, Anna, what is your history
Speaker 1: with this, this film or the general A Star is Born?
Speaker 1: So franchise if you will. I mean, as you know,
Speaker 1: this movie is a remake of a remakeup remakeup remakeup remake,
Speaker 1: and the original film was actually called what Price Hollywood,
Speaker 1: which was the original one who no one's seen because
Speaker 1: who carries it was a Selznick joint. Yeah, yeah, exactly who. Um.
Speaker 1: A little known fact was the son in law of
Speaker 1: Louis B. Mayor of Notorious Rapist. Um. Yes, because almost
Speaker 1: an email executive of that era, but yeah, he was
Speaker 1: a film executive and he yeah, they're all rapists. So
Speaker 1: then the film that was remade based off what prize
Speaker 1: Hollywood was A Star is Born with Janet Gainer. I
Speaker 1: have not seen that version. I was from nineteen thirty seven. Seven.
Speaker 1: That's a little too far back for me. I took
Speaker 1: a thirties film class in college and I was like, yawn,
Speaker 1: enough of these Joan Crawfords. Okay. And you know I
Speaker 1: was never a fan of that whole censorship era. Well,
Speaker 1: it lasted from the mid thirties till the late sixties,
Speaker 1: so no interest. I've seen the thirty seven. Sorry, I
Speaker 1: haven't seen a long time. I didn't commit, but I
Speaker 1: one of my favorite fun fact about that Star Is
Speaker 1: Born as Dorothy Parker helped write the script. I just
Speaker 1: feel like women usually are involved in writing the scripts,
Speaker 1: which is so interesting because the woman has no power
Speaker 1: but um, and then I saw the Judy Garland one
Speaker 1: a while back. Um, it's like three hours long. I
Speaker 1: recommend it if you like. Yeah, I have three hours
Speaker 1: or eight a very strong edible and I can't move. Um.
Speaker 1: That one I think is the best because I've seen
Speaker 1: The barberstriceand one and actually rewatched The Barbersicean one last night,
Speaker 1: and god, damn is streisand a mess. Uh that's I
Speaker 1: think the worst one because I listened to a podcast
Speaker 1: you must remember this about the making of a star
Speaker 1: is born the Barbersrrice and one, and boy, it was
Speaker 1: not good. She was a real bit. She led Chris
Speaker 1: Christofferson to drink like a bottle of tequila a day,
Speaker 1: so he just basically became the guy and it wasn't
Speaker 1: just being method. And apparently she cut her own edit
Speaker 1: at the end that had her basically include more shots
Speaker 1: of her ass. But she was like, so she's like,
Speaker 1: there needs to be more male gaze. I do kind
Speaker 1: of love, like I wish that every actor demanded that
Speaker 1: they got their own kind I want to see, like,
Speaker 1: what the what is the Taylor Lotner cut of Twilight
Speaker 1: too as more of his I think maybe it's not
Speaker 1: even gendered. It's like, like, this is my movie. My
Speaker 1: ass should be in it as much as possible. I
Speaker 1: get it. Yeah, that's basically when it's got so many
Speaker 1: shots to get your ass in from a big crowd.
Speaker 1: I get it. She's insane. Okay. I've also seen the
Speaker 1: seventies six one. I could not get through it this time.
Speaker 1: I got forty. It's such a mess, like it even
Speaker 1: looks like it looks like a mess on the set.
Speaker 1: I was just like, what is it? It's and now
Speaker 1: you both have seen this two eighteen version twice. Now, okay, great,
Speaker 1: we've seen good job you're all. You're way more prepared
Speaker 1: than I am, because I've seen Bradley Cooper's A Star
Speaker 1: is Born one time. Honestly, you catch yourself some yeah
Speaker 1: you know what that thank you. I don't know if
Speaker 1: you recall, but I did watch all six mission Impossible
Speaker 1: movies to prep for the episode. So I so I'm
Speaker 1: coming in not having a whole ton of background for
Speaker 1: this film. And it's because, yeah, I don't especially like
Speaker 1: this genre. I this is gonna make me sound psychotic,
Speaker 1: but I don't like to watch people sing. I think
Speaker 1: it's so boring. That's okay. Some people find musicals completely uncomfortable,
Speaker 1: like they can't like, I'm not a huge fan of musicals.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't classify this as a musical because all the
Speaker 1: music that's happening in this one is diagetic. Is in
Speaker 1: like it's happening as a part of the story, and
Speaker 1: they're like not breaking out into random song. Yeah so,
Speaker 1: And at least if there's like a song and dance number,
Speaker 1: it's like they're there's fun, there's choreography. This one, we're
Speaker 1: just watching people sing and I could not be more bored.
Speaker 1: And I just, yeah, I don't, I just this is
Speaker 1: not for me. But I did enjoy the first thirty minutes.
Speaker 1: Yes to Amy, you're raising your hand. You have a
Speaker 1: question my history this movie. I love Judy Garland so much.
Speaker 1: She was my hero when I was little. I feel
Speaker 1: like all young queer people slash very very very quiet
Speaker 1: young women. For some reason, there's something about Judy. I
Speaker 1: would record all of her movies on Turner Classic and
Speaker 1: it would be to the point where it's like my
Speaker 1: family would write it on the calendar Judy Garland's birthday
Speaker 1: because there would always be a marathon. Would you take
Speaker 1: a cake to school every I wouldn't talk to anyone
Speaker 1: at school but that. But my one of my parents
Speaker 1: was like usually home and so they would switch at
Speaker 1: the VHS table to start recording the next one. So
Speaker 1: I've seen every Judy Garland movie ever, love her so much,
Speaker 1: and then I wanted to, you know, experience the Judy
Speaker 1: Garland extended universe. And so that's why I watched the
Speaker 1: other Stars born to be like. I know that she
Speaker 1: had she was the best one, but let me just
Speaker 1: cross check and confirm, uh check. And then I found
Speaker 1: out Dorothy Parker helped write the first one I was like,
Speaker 1: and then Joan Didion helped write the Barbastres, and there's
Speaker 1: a lot of famous woman. The interesting fact about that
Speaker 1: is she started to write it and then Barber stration
Speaker 1: was so hell she left, but because she was like
Speaker 1: still like you know, credit as a writer. She made
Speaker 1: more money that she'd ever made in her entire life
Speaker 1: off that movie basically, so she was like set for
Speaker 1: life and all she had to do was like meet
Speaker 1: with Barbara like five times before. She was like this woman. Honestly,
Speaker 1: it sounds like worth the amount of the any like
Speaker 1: story of Barber strikes and on set of anything, you're like,
Speaker 1: holy sh it, this is this is a lot, what
Speaker 1: a legend this is? She truly truly a diva. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I love this movie. But I just I think I
Speaker 1: just wanted to say I love Judy Garland. And I
Speaker 1: think we between the three of us, we've seen the
Speaker 1: trailer maybe five times. So I do recall when that
Speaker 1: trailer first appeared on my YouTube, Like I remember when
Speaker 1: it first appeared, yes, because I think I brought it
Speaker 1: to you guys. I was like, you see this, and
Speaker 1: then we proceeded. I made you watch that. I made
Speaker 1: you watch that in a bunch of like we with
Speaker 1: Mark Wahlberg films. But I I haven't stopped watching it.
Speaker 1: I'm glad you guys have have had a great time
Speaker 1: with this so far. I have a somewhat unhealthy relationship
Speaker 1: to the part on the trailer where Lady Gaga starts
Speaker 1: for like full Lady Gaga moment. It's good, And then
Speaker 1: when it was coming up that whole scene, they it's
Speaker 1: almost like the scene like whoever is editing, It's like, oh,
Speaker 1: people are gonna be so excited for the part where
Speaker 1: she just yells, and so they make you. It makes
Speaker 1: you wait for it and wait for it and wait
Speaker 1: for it, and then she finally hits the mic and
Speaker 1: you're like, I think we all like grabbed hands hearted.
Speaker 1: Levitating five feet off the ground was crazy. I do
Speaker 1: remember when it was about to happen, an old man
Speaker 1: got up to go use the bathroom, and I was
Speaker 1: so fiercely offended, like I was like fucking kidding me
Speaker 1: to stage. Yeah, if you're listening, sir, biggest parents love it.
Speaker 1: Is this the a star is born's universe or as
Speaker 1: stars are born or a stars are stars is born?
Speaker 1: What would you how do you? How do you what
Speaker 1: would you refer to this? Um stars is born stars
Speaker 1: or stars? A star is born stars the stars the
Speaker 1: stars are born born, Stars born stars. That's like porn.
Speaker 1: Star the star is would have been a great one
Speaker 1: missed opportunity for this round, because this this film, it's
Speaker 1: not even a franchise, this story that refuses to die. Generally.
Speaker 1: It was like coming up once once every twenty years.
Speaker 1: And they skipped the nineties, which would have been a
Speaker 1: great Curtain Courtney adjacent but they didn't. They skipped the nineties, right,
Speaker 1: But it was originally supposed to be Clint Eastwood directing,
Speaker 1: with Beyonce attached. Yeah, and then Will Smith was attached.
Speaker 1: I think as as whoever this one for the two one, well,
Speaker 1: the one that was that was in the works before
Speaker 1: this one, you know, came out with every version who's
Speaker 1: played it was Esther for the first three No, I
Speaker 1: think the sect Judy Garland. Then they make it like
Speaker 1: Vicky or something. No, they change so they change name
Speaker 1: and most of them. There's like a few things they
Speaker 1: don't do in this movie that they She normally starts
Speaker 1: as Esther Blodge and they change her name to Vicky
Speaker 1: Lester to make her like hot. But this time she
Speaker 1: starts as Ali and we'd never find out her last name,
Speaker 1: and then they don't change her name, and then she's
Speaker 1: all because she is that's important until her last name
Speaker 1: is the man's last name. Well, and that's something that
Speaker 1: happens every movie too. There's a few well can there's
Speaker 1: a few things that happened in every version of A
Speaker 1: Star is Born, and they're all regressive and we and
Speaker 1: Cooper could have done something about it. Also, who heard
Speaker 1: that Vicky was the fun like the fucuble name Vicky.
Speaker 1: I'm Vicky Xon, shall I do the recap please? I'm
Speaker 1: gonna not. I'm not going to do a good job
Speaker 1: because I've only seen the movie once and I I
Speaker 1: don't worry. You've got yet fill in the blanks. Okay,
Speaker 1: So we meet Jackson Maine. He's a country question Mark.
Speaker 1: Well his songs sound a little bit like but people
Speaker 1: love it. It's like country rock. He's like a Willie
Speaker 1: Nelson of sorts. Yeah, but like hot and all the
Speaker 1: he's such an alcoholic that all the blood is at
Speaker 1: the surface of his face for the whole it's distracting.
Speaker 1: So we meet him. He is a famous musician, and
Speaker 1: but not at his peak, not quite at his piece.
Speaker 1: I don't know. He's already peeked and now he's on
Speaker 1: his way down off the piece. He's playing festivals, right,
Speaker 1: but I think he's playing festivals because he's like a
Speaker 1: legend in that sense. But he's at this point on
Speaker 1: his way down. He's still famous, but right, he's not
Speaker 1: at his peak anymore. He gets off of the gig,
Speaker 1: he goes to a bar where there's a drag show.
Speaker 1: Literally goes to the Virgin and he goes to the Virginal,
Speaker 1: a bar that we've all been at many many times.
Speaker 1: I eaten ship into that very microphone. It's wild. So
Speaker 1: there he meets Ali Lady Gaga's character, Yes, and he's
Speaker 1: smitten with her and he waits for her after the
Speaker 1: show and peels off her tape eyebrow. His lives spoken
Speaker 1: like out of context, you're like nobody now if he
Speaker 1: wasn't a famous musician and just creepy drunk guy like
Speaker 1: and we'll talk about that because that is certainly worth
Speaker 1: talking about, or like a theme later was like could
Speaker 1: I touch your nose? Like, oh my god, stop right.
Speaker 1: So they hang out the rest of the night and
Speaker 1: he finds out that she's an aspiring musician as well
Speaker 1: punch a cop. She punches a cop. They go to
Speaker 1: a grocery store to get some frozen peas about it.
Speaker 1: They are are bonding and he's like, hey, why don't
Speaker 1: you come to this gig and she's like, no, I can't.
Speaker 1: And then and then she goes, anyway, oh quick trailer talk,
Speaker 1: so this is your specialty. I didn't I forgot the
Speaker 1: famous much memed trailer moment of hey what that's how
Speaker 1: I would the noise that goes that. She's like but
Speaker 1: that is also spoken, and at least the Judy Garland version,
Speaker 1: it's in the stressand one too. Oh is that's the
Speaker 1: thing they pulled as well, that that whole just won't
Speaker 1: take another look at you because I'm weird And every
Speaker 1: other incarnation the actor in question separates the words. It
Speaker 1: doesn't say the whole sentence as if it's one word.
Speaker 1: But that's just kind of the coops take on the sentences.
Speaker 1: It's just a word, and the word is one. Well,
Speaker 1: it could be because he is drunk, because his character
Speaker 1: is an aggressive alcoholic. Yes, but even but even when
Speaker 1: he's sober, he's still still kind of slurring. You know
Speaker 1: that scene at the piano where he's like just got
Speaker 1: out of rehab, but he's like, yeah, playing with the
Speaker 1: dog outside, like he still can't talk. Like all his
Speaker 1: reactions are like sorry, he's so I mean, he's so famous,
Speaker 1: no one will ever tell him. It's like I think
Speaker 1: part of the like part of his character is like
Speaker 1: he doesn't know he's weird to an extent because he's
Speaker 1: been famous for so long that he just doesn't know
Speaker 1: he's weird because everyone's like, oh, Jackson Maine, you're Simon
Speaker 1: didties Jackson. You know. So basically they start to hang
Speaker 1: or like the second time they hang out, she goes
Speaker 1: on stage at one of his shows and like sings
Speaker 1: the song and that's the right, the iconic. Oh, and
Speaker 1: then you go that road and array not very good, right,
Speaker 1: And he's like, otherwise I'll plagiarize. So I was like, well,
Speaker 1: the steaks are there, they are right, Yeah, So she's
Speaker 1: basically forced to go and sing her song on stage
Speaker 1: with him, and this starts to kind of propel her
Speaker 1: music career forward because people see it, and people take
Speaker 1: video of it, and there's a bunch of YouTube views
Speaker 1: and people start to take notice of her. And as
Speaker 1: that's happening, they're developing a romantic relationship. And there's you know,
Speaker 1: some struggles along the way because he again is a
Speaker 1: little bit suffer like suffering from alcoholism. There's nothing like
Speaker 1: having to always wait for your significant other to wake
Speaker 1: up from his drunken stupor so you can hook up, right, Okay,
Speaker 1: well I'll just wait till you wakept. It's h two
Speaker 1: pm tomorrow, okay, five am, Okay, cool, awesome. There's and
Speaker 1: also Sam Elliott is Bradley Cooper's brother and he's thirty
Speaker 1: years older. This is a plat point that never I
Speaker 1: was like, why couldn't he Like why does the brother
Speaker 1: have to be elderly? But he is. And sam Elian's
Speaker 1: character is his like manager road dog buddy, and he's
Speaker 1: always like, you need to take better care of your
Speaker 1: hearing because Bradley Cooper's character's hearing is got tonight, Like say,
Speaker 1: I don't know that this is an Arizona farm boy accent,
Speaker 1: but Sam Elliott talks the same fucking way Bradley Cooper does.
Speaker 1: Bradley Cooper is doing a Sam Elliott impersonation back to
Speaker 1: Sam Elliot because Sam Elliott comes. There's one scene that
Speaker 1: you can't make a word out the entire thing, but
Speaker 1: Sam Elliott walks up with Bradley Cooper's hearing aid and
Speaker 1: he's like Jack Copper. And then there's that one scene
Speaker 1: when he walks up to punch him, and it's just
Speaker 1: a shot of their two faces, like just right in
Speaker 1: front of each other's artisting at each other. Are we doing?
Speaker 1: This movie should have been subtitled for Drunken Men, like
Speaker 1: their women do not get drunk in this movie. It
Speaker 1: is only useless men who can get drunk it there,
Speaker 1: and then later on I got confused. There was a
Speaker 1: part where I was like, Sam Elliott works at SNL
Speaker 1: now because she's on SNL, right, why is he there?
Speaker 1: He said? He I thought I would stop on see
Speaker 1: how she's doing. And he's like, what what's that? What?
Speaker 1: Like you can't hear anything because he has he's damn it,
Speaker 1: you know how like when you have tonighta's you can
Speaker 1: just treat everyone in your life like trash um. So
Speaker 1: then at some point Ali and Jack get married, but
Speaker 1: he's showing no signs there. It's a whole thing, right
Speaker 1: and Eddie Griffin, Eddie Griffin's also there. Yeah, he rolls
Speaker 1: through everyone's at the wedding. Andrew Dice Clay is Allie's dad,
Speaker 1: explains YouTube video counts at one point it's a great movie.
Speaker 1: He's like, you know, for everyone doubts how many people
Speaker 1: seen it? I wanted two hundred times. I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is great. It's unclear. I'm still not sure where
Speaker 1: this movie is supposed to be taking place. I do.
Speaker 1: I've reached the conclusion it's Los Angeles, Yes, I believe so,
Speaker 1: But why they're they're talking like newsies. I thought she
Speaker 1: was upstate New York because they all have New York accents.
Speaker 1: But then they get on a motorcycle go to Arizona
Speaker 1: like twenty minutes and they get there like two seconds.
Speaker 1: List I'm like, they didn't drive across the country. And
Speaker 1: then when Lady Gaga goes in the house, she's like,
Speaker 1: what the button exactly, like this is not New Yorker.
Speaker 1: Think her accent comes and goes like it's nothing, And
Speaker 1: let me introduce you to the concept of moving. People
Speaker 1: sometimes move from one location to another expand on this period.
Speaker 1: I don't know, there's inconsistency where But then she made
Speaker 1: it sound like they had lived in that house her
Speaker 1: whole life, Like she's like, da, how many times do
Speaker 1: you carry the piano for me? Oh my god. Okay,
Speaker 1: so this has been a thing. A star is born
Speaker 1: in the mystery of where Lady Gaga's character lives starts
Speaker 1: a hilarious debate among film critics. Okay, so this has
Speaker 1: been a point of contention. We don't know where anyone's from.
Speaker 1: I don't think that's how people from Arizona sound, but
Speaker 1: I'm not very well. I was also trying to gauge
Speaker 1: where they lived together in that house of his. Is
Speaker 1: that like supposed to be like the Hollywood Hills or something?
Speaker 1: I thought, okay, because at one point she goes like,
Speaker 1: I have to play the Forum tonight. Will you meet
Speaker 1: me there? And then she leaves, so it's like, clearly
Speaker 1: if you're somewhere else he lives, like l ash or something.
Speaker 1: I don't know. She's like, oh, meet me at the
Speaker 1: Forum and right and then and then he says hey,
Speaker 1: he says, I don't want but this time it's sad
Speaker 1: because he's going to kill him. Okay, so sorry. As
Speaker 1: she's advancing in her career, he is, you know, still
Speaker 1: drinking a lot. He becomes verbally abusive different points. He's jealous. Um,
Speaker 1: he rubs a bagel on her face. There's lot of
Speaker 1: icing ends up on face. Brad like Cooper's got I'll
Speaker 1: go on the record. He's got a thing with the
Speaker 1: cake on the face. There's a lot of cake in
Speaker 1: the face in the movie. Every top Bill character gets
Speaker 1: some cake on the face. Day of Chappelle gets cake
Speaker 1: in the face. I don't know if Eddie Griffin gets
Speaker 1: cake in the fast. So then she wins a Grammy
Speaker 1: because she's become so famous, she's at that point in
Speaker 1: her career. It was a nice touch that Lady Gaga
Speaker 1: dressed like a Grammy because that's what Lady Gaga would do. Yeah,
Speaker 1: her dress is like a Grammy dress. But at this
Speaker 1: Awards ceremony, Jack is so drunk that he like stumbles
Speaker 1: up onto the stage and then pisces himself, like on
Speaker 1: camera on the stage and watching now, I don't know why.
Speaker 1: I was like, first, sure, Bradley Cooper method pepe himself,
Speaker 1: but it's definitely a post PEP. It's a I kind
Speaker 1: of how to tube, like a tube of those like
Speaker 1: we're going to excessively PP. I don't know, you know
Speaker 1: how you can just sort of tell, Well, I'm a hacker,
Speaker 1: so I can tell when things are computer but I'm
Speaker 1: pretty sure it was computer PP. He wouldn't actually have
Speaker 1: pped himself, No, I think maybe he tried, but he
Speaker 1: got a nerve. I thought there was like a little pepee,
Speaker 1: little two PP. I think it was a practical effect.
Speaker 1: I think, really I feel that way. I feel like
Speaker 1: this is this is what I love about movies Like this,
Speaker 1: someone knows or someone that's in the process of trying
Speaker 1: to find out what the deal with the PP is.
Speaker 1: Bradley Cooper is known for being a practical effect genius hangout.
Speaker 1: He was James Cameron. He all that face. He just
Speaker 1: laid in the sun for ten hours for that facial.
Speaker 1: Whatever was going on is a bloated red face the
Speaker 1: whole time. Yeah, I love it. Okay. So at the
Speaker 1: award ceremony, he p's himself and then he's like, oh crap,
Speaker 1: I've hit rock bottom. Better go to hit the rock
Speaker 1: of Peppy. So he goes to rehab and Ali's all like,
Speaker 1: I still love you. We can make this work. You're
Speaker 1: going to come back home, right, And he's like, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I think so. She way over dresses to go to rehab. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I didn't think her outfit was appropriate for rehab. He
Speaker 1: gets back home, he's in recovery and her manager, whose
Speaker 1: name is rez Gavrin, I believe British villain, British twink
Speaker 1: villain off head of you. And then she's like in
Speaker 1: her Scott records and he literally goes over to probably
Speaker 1: Cooper's house. He's like, I would be real help if
Speaker 1: you killed He basically tells Jack that he has ruined
Speaker 1: Lady Guga's career and that they've had to do like
Speaker 1: so much damage control. So Jack this prompts him to
Speaker 1: commit suicide Fish so it's like the the British Guy.
Speaker 1: And then there's like a tribute song at the end
Speaker 1: where she's like, I'm Ali Maine and she sings a
Speaker 1: song and everyone's sad. This is original, the actual Let's
Speaker 1: take a quick break and we'll come back and watch
Speaker 1: A Star is Born again. Let's take a quick break
Speaker 1: and then we will be right back and we're back. Okay,
Speaker 1: So where do we want to begin with this? Because
Speaker 1: I just have so many thoughts I don't know where
Speaker 1: to start. Well, I personally would like to draw attention
Speaker 1: to Jack's behavior in the beginning of the movie, where
Speaker 1: I think we can apply the Bushemi test to this,
Speaker 1: where early on he's apply that not super like you
Speaker 1: were saying, like the not super famous guy. I think
Speaker 1: if someone that hot who was a nobody was doing
Speaker 1: that ship people would also not be having it. Sure.
Speaker 1: I mean, basically, after they've met, for they've known each
Speaker 1: other for less than twenty four hours, he's like, Hey,
Speaker 1: come to my gig tonight, and she's like, I can't.
Speaker 1: I have to work. No thanks, and he's like please though,
Speaker 1: and she's like, no, I can't. She's telling him no
Speaker 1: several times. Then he sends his driver to her house
Speaker 1: to pick her up to follow her right um, and
Speaker 1: then she's like no, I can't. But then eventually she
Speaker 1: decides to get on this private jet and go to
Speaker 1: this gig after all. Uh. And then a few scenes later,
Speaker 1: she's sleeping in her bed and she wakes up and
Speaker 1: Jack is there and she's like, how why are you here?
Speaker 1: And he's like, oh, your dad let me in here.
Speaker 1: I am. So this is like, Dice, what are you doing?
Speaker 1: I respect your daughta. What the are you doing? That
Speaker 1: a good line read by Dice. We have to remember
Speaker 1: he is one of comedies most notorious misogynists, one of
Speaker 1: the most successful misogynists in the entire industry. Good for
Speaker 1: him though. He did a couple of goods my daught Yeah,
Speaker 1: he had a great lines beginning. Take a look at
Speaker 1: her To all his buddies, you know, some with the
Speaker 1: most talent, they just don't make it. It was like,
Speaker 1: you fucking assho. Literally after she comes home starts cleaning
Speaker 1: up after him and his gross friends. Although I think
Speaker 1: It was a super producer, Sophie, who said, uh, Dice
Speaker 1: is squatted in every scene in this movie. He's got
Speaker 1: like no less than four old men with him, just
Speaker 1: like being like, Dice is the fucking I think that's
Speaker 1: his like real life entourage. He's like, I don't come
Speaker 1: on set with less than four fucking gross dudes. I
Speaker 1: think though probably I could not figure out that was
Speaker 1: Dice to save my life because I realized I had
Speaker 1: never seen andrewdies Clay's eyes because he always wears his sunglasses,
Speaker 1: and that was fucking me up until the last same
Speaker 1: of the credits, and I'm like, is that andrewdiese Clay?
Speaker 1: And I like felt like a fucking idiot. It really
Speaker 1: actually took me out of the film a little. It
Speaker 1: took a couple of scenes to figure out it was Dice,
Speaker 1: which is too bad because I think that all of
Speaker 1: us right now could play his girlfriend and a thing
Speaker 1: about the right age. My boyfriend is Andrew night Anna
Speaker 1: my daddy. But you know what I mean, I'm so
Speaker 1: sorry about that funked up stuff I said. But in
Speaker 1: any case, the behavior the Bradley Cooper's character is doing
Speaker 1: is troubling. It's stockery. It's predatory, but because he is
Speaker 1: a man with fame and power and influence, she's like, oh,
Speaker 1: how romantic. So I was truly surprised how quickly they
Speaker 1: just started making out. I was like, really, that girl,
Speaker 1: I don't mean, you don't really know much about him
Speaker 1: on the knees a famous person and seems drunk as fuck.
Speaker 1: They I feel like they try to work around that
Speaker 1: by saying like, oh, she does at least go to work,
Speaker 1: but then someone's like, you're fucking late, and she's like,
Speaker 1: I fucking quit, and then she gets in the limit
Speaker 1: that followed her. I don't know. I didn't. This is
Speaker 1: kind of like the inception of this relationship changes. I
Speaker 1: think there's versions of it where it's done better in
Speaker 1: past stars, and there's also versions where it's like way creepier.
Speaker 1: But they're the first two stars born. Happens between actors.
Speaker 1: This one and the Strisan one are musicians, but it
Speaker 1: usually starts with like them they meet she's a little
Speaker 1: girl from nowhere who just moved to Hollywood to become
Speaker 1: a big staw and she's an extra and she's a
Speaker 1: waitress in the whole bit, and then he like gets
Speaker 1: her an audition, which is less creepy than sending someone
Speaker 1: in a in a vehicle to follow her around. Um yeah,
Speaker 1: I feel like they're really trying to push the like
Speaker 1: this is an undeniable love situation, but that didn't work
Speaker 1: for me. Like I I didn't believe that they were
Speaker 1: like undeniably attracted to each other, and we're just being
Speaker 1: pulled without their control to each other. And that's why
Speaker 1: they started, like, you know, almost hooking up almost immediately.
Speaker 1: Like I didn't trust the way it was done in
Speaker 1: the movie. I didn't believe it necessarily. There's so much
Speaker 1: in all of these stories, but speaking to like the
Speaker 1: eighteen one as well, that like there's so many elements
Speaker 1: of this story that go completely unexplored, and I think that,
Speaker 1: like one of the greatest weaknesses of this story is
Speaker 1: that it is like sort of doesn't give it's the
Speaker 1: star who is born a k a. The one woman
Speaker 1: in the movie who talks really enough, not even like
Speaker 1: it's like Lady Guy was very present in this movie,
Speaker 1: but there are certain elements of her personality that are
Speaker 1: totally unexplored because this character that esther Bladget or Ali
Speaker 1: who fucking knows is like the woman who stands by
Speaker 1: her man, and it's like the message of this whole
Speaker 1: franchise is like, hey, if you're in a relationship with
Speaker 1: an abusive alcoholic hanging there, maybe he'll die. Like it's
Speaker 1: just not good. But but there's a few like, Okay,
Speaker 1: some things that occurred to me. And I haven't done
Speaker 1: a lot of reading about this Star is Born, just
Speaker 1: because I just I've been too busy watching it over
Speaker 1: and over. But some things that occurred to me about
Speaker 1: Ali and Jackson's relationship that we never addressed, aside from
Speaker 1: being in a relationship with an addict, which we can
Speaker 1: get to because that is like weight glassed over, like
Speaker 1: he was mean to her one time, Like that's not
Speaker 1: how I know. But one thing that's never touched on is,
Speaker 1: you know, the power dynamics in this relationship from the
Speaker 1: jump are off, and they're off in every incarnation of
Speaker 1: this story. And so I don't I mean, I don't
Speaker 1: even know where a land on this. But there's some
Speaker 1: times where I'm in the story and I'm like, well,
Speaker 1: Ali like probably would feel weird leaving him early in
Speaker 1: that relationship, even though he's clearly a fucking mess, even
Speaker 1: if she does like him because her entire career is
Speaker 1: dependent on him, which is a power dynamic he introduced.
Speaker 1: But you know, it's I think that that adds some
Speaker 1: complexity to her character. If it's not just like she's
Speaker 1: so in love with him and she can't leave because
Speaker 1: she loves him so much. It's like, well, what if
Speaker 1: she sort of wants to leave but her entire career
Speaker 1: is tethered to this one person. Like that's something that
Speaker 1: happens in the first half of the movie that I
Speaker 1: thought would have been at least interesting to acknowledge. But
Speaker 1: that power dynamic is never They're like, well, they love
Speaker 1: each other and correct me if I'm wrong, But I
Speaker 1: don't think he ever does anything to like promise that
Speaker 1: he's gonna, like uplift her career and get her to
Speaker 1: where that doesn't happen, right, He's always like, I'll get
Speaker 1: too far. He does, he does that and in the
Speaker 1: other versions, but I mean, it still feels pretty heavily implied,
Speaker 1: like if she left that tour, it's not like she
Speaker 1: could just you know, like I think the story would
Speaker 1: have you believe she needs to be on tour with
Speaker 1: him at the beginning, and you know, establish herself as
Speaker 1: his sort of like right hand singer before she can
Speaker 1: become you know, and meets everybody she has to meet
Speaker 1: and then she can take off on her own. But
Speaker 1: she couldn't have technically started on this path in this
Speaker 1: story without him. And that's like to sort of a
Speaker 1: dynamic that they don't acknowledge at all. Right, And I'm
Speaker 1: not saying that this thing happens in this I'm not
Speaker 1: familiar enough with the other ones to know if this happens,
Speaker 1: but like it's reminiscent of situations where someone like Harvey
Speaker 1: Weinstein targets a young up and comer who's like, I'll
Speaker 1: take you far if you just come to my hotel room,
Speaker 1: or you know, like making promises, and what they're really
Speaker 1: doing is just manipulating and abusing and ruining their lives.
Speaker 1: They felt like sorry, there was a selfishness to his
Speaker 1: behavior in the sense that he actually didn't want her
Speaker 1: to grow beyond being a singer with him, right, And
Speaker 1: that's when he starts to get the kid. That's when
Speaker 1: the cake is in the face when she starts to
Speaker 1: out achieve him, and she does call him out and
Speaker 1: was like, you're jealous, but it's like, I do like
Speaker 1: the part where she lets him headbutt a TV or
Speaker 1: she's like, you want to play? Lest fucking play? And
Speaker 1: then he had butt the TV and she's like it
Speaker 1: just like passes out into it. Yeah, and then she
Speaker 1: gets the cake off her face, she goes, what the
Speaker 1: fund is this? This? I did want to see more?
Speaker 1: Sad thing is like a lot of her attitude came
Speaker 1: out in the beginning and then sort of just became
Speaker 1: passive at the end, Like she didn't defend herself, shen
Speaker 1: stand up for herself. She just kind of went along
Speaker 1: with what people told her to do. Thing Like, she
Speaker 1: doesn't have much agency in this story. She things happened
Speaker 1: to her, but she's not necessarily I mean you could say, like,
Speaker 1: you know, the the hard work she's put into being
Speaker 1: a singer and you know, working on her craft, but
Speaker 1: we don't really see that. The story picks up basically
Speaker 1: right before she's propelled to start them, so right, I mean,
Speaker 1: we at least get the moment of like we know
Speaker 1: she's good enough, she has what it takes. It's not
Speaker 1: like they need to fake her talent at any point, right,
Speaker 1: which I appreciate it, it's not like, what's that fucking
Speaker 1: movie with Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant Florence Foster Jenkins.
Speaker 1: It's not a Florence Foster Jenkins sitch, right, But yeah,
Speaker 1: but everything happens to her. Yeah, so she's not necessarily
Speaker 1: going out and making active choices, and arguably that's because
Speaker 1: it's Bradley Cooper's character who's the protagonist of the story,
Speaker 1: who's driving the narrative. But it would still be nice
Speaker 1: to like to see her, I don't know, just be
Speaker 1: more active in the pursuit of something. But it's a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff happening to her and her kind of
Speaker 1: rolling with the punches. It does seem like there's this
Speaker 1: overall like male savior vibe throughout the entire film. It
Speaker 1: like it's very broad because it starts with him, you know,
Speaker 1: giving her her first break to like that guy being
Speaker 1: like I'll make you know, signing Interscope Records, and then
Speaker 1: it ends with him killing himself because he's like, I'm
Speaker 1: doing this for you so you can go on and
Speaker 1: live your life without being drinking myself. Yeah, Like I'm
Speaker 1: here for like this is all because of you. I'm
Speaker 1: trying to make your life better and it's like she
Speaker 1: could have easily have succeeded fine and gotten her life
Speaker 1: together as you have not killed yourself. And also it's
Speaker 1: she could have divorces like there's there's there's a lot
Speaker 1: of like missed like things that you're like, you would
Speaker 1: think that it would go more challenge but just doesn't.
Speaker 1: Which is I mean, I don't know, I still love
Speaker 1: the movie so much, so hard, but but there's so
Speaker 1: there's so much where it's like she really doesn't have
Speaker 1: another element. Okay, another I think we've already talked about
Speaker 1: this because we've been talking about this movie for a week.
Speaker 1: Where Ali does. I mean, we see the sort of
Speaker 1: song she's writing at the beginning, she's ah, and then
Speaker 1: when she becomes a pop star that goes away and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden she's like, why would it the
Speaker 1: that that it's all the time they're good, but they change, right,
Speaker 1: she becomes a pop star, and there's one scene because
Speaker 1: she does she sells out immediately, which is not even
Speaker 1: a moment on the character because we don't really know
Speaker 1: her well enough to know what her code of ethics
Speaker 1: with this is. But you know, the British guy is
Speaker 1: like you go to die your hand and learn to dance,
Speaker 1: and so she does. And then there's one scene, the
Speaker 1: one scene in their entire relationship where Bradley Cooper is
Speaker 1: an alcoholic and mean to her. He comes in, she's
Speaker 1: in her fucking grammy bathtub or whatever, and he is
Speaker 1: He's like, so, what we're singing songs about s now?
Speaker 1: Which is which is like one of the only good
Speaker 1: points he makes in the entire movie that goes totally unexploited.
Speaker 1: Like he points out, like, hey, you have changed a lot,
Speaker 1: and you are. And he's saying that partially because he's jealous,
Speaker 1: but also there is an element to that character, yeah,
Speaker 1: where he's like a pure artist or whatever he thinks
Speaker 1: he is, and he looks down at people who aren't
Speaker 1: like that. Should have approached it differently because also in
Speaker 1: that conversation, he's telling her that she's ugly and that
Speaker 1: she has no talent. She's an embarrassment now because of
Speaker 1: how she's taken her opportunity and like used it to
Speaker 1: become this pop star or just mostly I don't know,
Speaker 1: I guess let go of her true inner musician to
Speaker 1: cater to people who will give her that kind of attention.
Speaker 1: In money and you know which isn't I think that's
Speaker 1: a really interesting theme that they drop after that Like that,
Speaker 1: it's just because as flawed and bad and as much
Speaker 1: of a sign of like, this is a toxic relationship
Speaker 1: as that scene is. He makes that point and she's like, no,
Speaker 1: that's my song. I wrote it. It's great, and then
Speaker 1: it's like, but we know that it's I don't know.
Speaker 1: That was one thing where I was like, that would
Speaker 1: have been another interesting element to this character. But the
Speaker 1: story is so committed to making her a perfect angel
Speaker 1: that she's a boring character. Sure. I would also real
Speaker 1: quick argue that there's some gratuitous nudity in that scene,
Speaker 1: because why does it take in place in a bathtub
Speaker 1: and then she stands up out of it and you're like,
Speaker 1: see her whole naked body, just a quick glimpse of it.
Speaker 1: But it's like, that's even the past stars bathtubs a lot. Okay,
Speaker 1: Like the actual scene where she's putting on makeup on him,
Speaker 1: like that happened in the stridesand vers and I think
Speaker 1: it happened in the Garland does on the version also
Speaker 1: argue that we didn't necessarily need that nudity in that moment,
Speaker 1: but maybe I'm just approved. I decayed it, but I
Speaker 1: can't wait to print it on iTunes and pose it.
Speaker 1: So another thing that I thought could have been explored
Speaker 1: far more that wasn't is the sort of pressure that
Speaker 1: is placed upon usually women in the entertainment industry to
Speaker 1: change the way they look and cater to a specific
Speaker 1: image that like whatever studio or record label is voisting
Speaker 1: upon them. Because early on in the film, Ali is
Speaker 1: talking to Jack. I think it's like the night that
Speaker 1: they first meet, and she's describing right, She's like, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, I haven't gotten my break in this industry yet,
Speaker 1: because you go into these rooms and there's all these
Speaker 1: men looking at you and they tell you that you
Speaker 1: sound great, but you don't look great. And she expresses
Speaker 1: some insecurities about her nose and stuff like that. So
Speaker 1: she's talking about this and then she gets her big
Speaker 1: break and it starts to work out, but then her
Speaker 1: manager is like, we need you to dye your hair
Speaker 1: blonde and don't tell the dances not to go on stage.
Speaker 1: To build on that point, it was almost as if
Speaker 1: they couldn't acknowledge that her looks didn't matter until she
Speaker 1: got signed off by another man to be like, hey,
Speaker 1: well I approve and then they're like yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: But the entertainment industry has like a very long, troubling
Speaker 1: history of like shaping women into, you know, the person
Speaker 1: that whatever studio wants them to be. For example, you
Speaker 1: can take a look at Judy Garland's career where she
Speaker 1: was like forced pills to like keep her thin, to
Speaker 1: keep her peppy and eight years right, and then you
Speaker 1: know there's other Garland was also famously molested by Louis B.
Speaker 1: Mayer himself when she was like thirteen or fourteen years olds.
Speaker 1: So it's like, but yeah, different, you know the studios
Speaker 1: network's record labels, you don't have an image in mind
Speaker 1: for you know, whatever young anginue they are trying to
Speaker 1: build into a superstar, and they basically decide, Okay, here's
Speaker 1: what you look like, here's what you're gonna wear, here's
Speaker 1: what you're going to act like. And I think, right,
Speaker 1: I think the movie could have explored that a lot more.
Speaker 1: But especially it's not the story, I guess, especially because
Speaker 1: it's like you have Lady Gaga here, you have a
Speaker 1: fucking expert on this topic in the room. She can
Speaker 1: tell you, but I don't know. This is. This is
Speaker 1: also I believe this is the only version of this
Speaker 1: script that is written entirely by men. There's usually at
Speaker 1: least one woman involved, but this is There's a lot
Speaker 1: of themes that go like surface explored, Like I think
Speaker 1: that they're trying trying to make a statement by like
Speaker 1: Lady Gaga's nose, but then she's famous anyways, and like cool,
Speaker 1: but it is it's also surface where she basically still
Speaker 1: ends up folding to all of their demands and that
Speaker 1: ends up working out in her favor. There's really no
Speaker 1: consequence for that happening, So like, what's the comment, like
Speaker 1: do it? There is a part in her smart and
Speaker 1: I think that like she does kind of decide to
Speaker 1: just give it and take it into her own hands
Speaker 1: and be like, fine, I'm going to do all this,
Speaker 1: but I'm going to do it my own way, Like
Speaker 1: when they said, oh, make your hair plan and Blonde's like, no,
Speaker 1: I'll do orange, which is weird choice. But there is
Speaker 1: things that I think like, oh, well, she was actually
Speaker 1: like even though it wasn't necessarily the right choice and
Speaker 1: it was selling out, she made the choice to sell out,
Speaker 1: which was like, I don't even care that this character
Speaker 1: sells out. I'm not even critical of her for that.
Speaker 1: But it's like they don't even talk about that, they
Speaker 1: don't even look at that, just like they're like, well,
Speaker 1: this is what happened. I'm like, but this is the
Speaker 1: star who's born. Why don't we get to here where
Speaker 1: she'd think about nothing? Right? It's so the whole thing
Speaker 1: is it's about this woman, but the whole story unfolds
Speaker 1: from the point of view of men around. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: have to see I mean, you know, as much as
Speaker 1: I love seeing Bradley Cooper and Sam Elliott crying together
Speaker 1: in like three different scenes, it's like, okay, we uh,
Speaker 1: there's there's there's there's so much I mean. And then
Speaker 1: the last big note I had for things that go
Speaker 1: unexplored in Ali's character is her relationship to her father
Speaker 1: where there's a scene that I find so frustrating with
Speaker 1: Ali and Dice, uh towards the end of the movie,
Speaker 1: and it's after Jackson Pepete himself and now he's in
Speaker 1: rehab and she's like, eat us up a breakfast. Sorry,
Speaker 1: I'm stressed. The whole thing and Dice it's already been
Speaker 1: acknowledged several times that Dice is also an alcoholic seems
Speaker 1: to have had a drinking problem. That tracks in terms
Speaker 1: of like, you know, children of alcoholics very often end
Speaker 1: up with alcoholics. R I p me, but um, but
Speaker 1: the same though. Yeah, I mean it's it's we've got
Speaker 1: we've got evidence in the room. Uh. But he starts
Speaker 1: to apologize to her, starts to be like, I'm sorry
Speaker 1: I wasn't a better father to you. And I think
Speaker 1: her character acts, I mean, it makes sense that this
Speaker 1: would be a conversation that would happen, But in terms
Speaker 1: of moving the plot forward, I found it very frustrating
Speaker 1: because she's like, it's totally fine, It's totally fine. You
Speaker 1: were supportive of my music career. You carried my piano
Speaker 1: up the stairs once, and you like paid attention to
Speaker 1: me in that way. It's fine. You didn't do anything.
Speaker 1: And then Dice goes, you're the best person in the
Speaker 1: world kidding me. Something I know, you know, just throughout
Speaker 1: a lot of movies or just even in real life,
Speaker 1: is that women, no matter what, even if we get
Speaker 1: the abuse and we have to take it, we still
Speaker 1: have to be the ones to make sure the men
Speaker 1: are okay, right, It's like she's the one going through it,
Speaker 1: but she's still reassuring her father that he's okay, making
Speaker 1: sure he eats. It's like she literally had to go
Speaker 1: on the Grammy stage and while her Ben Pete himself
Speaker 1: and she was like, we're having a lot of fun tonight.
Speaker 1: Like that was the most cringe worthy moment where you're
Speaker 1: just trying to just like keep your ship together for
Speaker 1: your trash ass. She's so accommodating, and it's it is frustrating.
Speaker 1: It's like these people around you are fucking up and
Speaker 1: you're just taking care of them and like not reacting
Speaker 1: to it. And if that's a part of who your
Speaker 1: character is, fine, but like show us that and show
Speaker 1: us that it causes her pain outside of like you
Speaker 1: hurt me, which happens like three times. Yeah, at that
Speaker 1: moment where she forgave him, I was like you need
Speaker 1: to slap him across the face because you hurt me,
Speaker 1: and him being like taken Jesus Christ, And that's like
Speaker 1: another like if if this movie was a different kind
Speaker 1: of movie, it could have explored the dynamics of an
Speaker 1: abusive relationship where it's not like if you're in an
Speaker 1: abusive relationship. It's out of the question that someone would
Speaker 1: say something really fucked up to you and you would
Speaker 1: say I forgive you to avoid further conflict. But it's
Speaker 1: presented to us as like they love each other and
Speaker 1: they're working through some stuff. But that doesn't, I mean,
Speaker 1: in context, seemed to be the reality of this relationship
Speaker 1: at all. Also a question, uh that goes back to
Speaker 1: our Fifty Shades episode, what amount of time does this
Speaker 1: movie take place at? No, that is a good question.
Speaker 1: I think two years max. The only time that we
Speaker 1: know has passed is when he says he's been at
Speaker 1: rehab for two months. That is the only time really
Speaker 1: acknowledged time time twenty four hours where they meet and
Speaker 1: then a few hours later she's on a private jet
Speaker 1: to go to his gig and sting with him on stage.
Speaker 1: It's crazy. We got to take a quick break, but
Speaker 1: let's explore this more when we return. And we're back,
Speaker 1: I have a quick comment about juxon Main's character um
Speaker 1: compared to pass versions of this character. The first one
Speaker 1: is Norman Maine, I believe the second one is also
Speaker 1: Norman Maine. And then does Christopherson have like a weird
Speaker 1: John Harman Howard they're all variants, and then Jackson Maine
Speaker 1: all variants in the same name Bradley Cooper's. I think
Speaker 1: one of the adjustments made that I don't even know
Speaker 1: how I feel about it. I think it's just kind
Speaker 1: of like it makes sense, but it also creates a
Speaker 1: lot of problems. That we've been talking about is that
Speaker 1: Bradley's Jackson Maine is of the four, by far the
Speaker 1: least despicable version of this character and by far the
Speaker 1: most lovable, because the previous three are drunk in ways
Speaker 1: that are more violent. I believe in the first one
Speaker 1: she literally is hit uh in in the straisand one
Speaker 1: he cheats on her. There's like more clear implications of like,
Speaker 1: this is not a good guy, which makes it more
Speaker 1: frustrating at the end where she's like I have him,
Speaker 1: but also creates, I mean, a more disgustable relationship or
Speaker 1: a more real relationship that could actually have happened, where
Speaker 1: Bradley Cooper is sort of Jackson Mane presented as like,
Speaker 1: as far as we know, he never cheats on her,
Speaker 1: as far as we know, he is mean to her
Speaker 1: one time, and and there's a cake in the face
Speaker 1: but he's pretty good natured about everything and he stays
Speaker 1: generally supportive. I I feel like, just based on talking
Speaker 1: to my my friends about it last night, because I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, I wonder, like, what the Because I
Speaker 1: think if you left any of the first three, no
Speaker 1: matter how you feel about it, you leave being like
Speaker 1: it sucks that he killed himself, but he was a
Speaker 1: bad guy and he he wanted to hurt her, you know,
Speaker 1: And in this one, I think you leave like Bradley Cooper,
Speaker 1: it was so nice, but so like they make adjustments
Speaker 1: to the character, they kind of neutralize It makes it
Speaker 1: harder to criticize him. And I don't even know how
Speaker 1: I feel about that, but it's just weird. A lot
Speaker 1: of that also feels like the reason Bradley Cooper's like
Speaker 1: the worst he gets is, you know, being on stage
Speaker 1: and you know, berating her a little while she's in
Speaker 1: the bathtubs. That also just feels like the industry working
Speaker 1: behind Bradley Cooper to be like, well, I mean, you'll
Speaker 1: be a shitty drunk, but we're not going to have
Speaker 1: you hit her because we don't want people to see
Speaker 1: you in that nature. You know, Like there's something working
Speaker 1: there where Bradley has that control over how his character
Speaker 1: like as how evil his character can be. So it's
Speaker 1: like you're, yeah, like you come away from watching this
Speaker 1: relationship different than any of the other three, where you're
Speaker 1: you it's almost like cheesier and sweeter than any of
Speaker 1: the other ones, where he's the best guy out of
Speaker 1: all of them, but he's still awful And I don't
Speaker 1: even know, it's just like it was a change that
Speaker 1: I get why, Like, obviously I'm not like man, I
Speaker 1: wish he hit Lady Gaga, but because like his alcoholism
Speaker 1: is portrayed in such a it's more like goofy and
Speaker 1: embarrassing than dangerous and harmful. In the way it's portrayed,
Speaker 1: it just kind of it just makes it bizarre. And
Speaker 1: it's not I mean, not that movies have to be
Speaker 1: a realistic portrayal of everything, but it just the way
Speaker 1: that relationship is. You leave kind of still liking him
Speaker 1: anyway that I don't think that character is supposed to work.
Speaker 1: And and you touch on this where like him committing
Speaker 1: suicide is like this act of sacrifice and he's doing
Speaker 1: it for her, and it also makes him seem like
Speaker 1: kind of a martyr and almost heroic, where it is
Speaker 1: like a pretty irresponsible way to frame suicidality. I do
Speaker 1: appreciate that the movie does acknowledge alcoholism as a disease
Speaker 1: because addiction, addiction is a mental illness, and I think
Speaker 1: that a lot of people still don't quite realize that,
Speaker 1: and that's because of the stigma surrounding mental illness and
Speaker 1: things like that. At least, I mean, could it have
Speaker 1: been explored more sure, especially because that's a huge component
Speaker 1: of this movie. Was one conversation with just one line
Speaker 1: where persons then the line is it's a there. I
Speaker 1: did love that, Like I should have broken up with
Speaker 1: him in that scene, but she doesn't. She just goes
Speaker 1: it's a disease. That's what is really frustrating to me
Speaker 1: about this movie is that even though he is not
Speaker 1: the worst of all the renditions of this character, he
Speaker 1: still mistreats her. He still puts her in positions where
Speaker 1: she's constantly worrying and suffering and all this stuff. And like,
Speaker 1: and maybe this is just the cynic in me where
Speaker 1: I'm like, she should have lift him and like not
Speaker 1: put up with this bullshit. But like I wish the
Speaker 1: ending that we saw to this movie is rather than
Speaker 1: him killing himself, she leaves him and she goes on
Speaker 1: her own path and been a great like updated version
Speaker 1: of how the story goes, because that is like a
Speaker 1: convention of he always kills himself. The first two he
Speaker 1: runs into the ocean drama and he like drives really
Speaker 1: crazy and then gets in a car accident. Everything. I
Speaker 1: don't even think it's like technically a suit I don't know.
Speaker 1: It's basically the boyfriend husband of Barbara streisand who is
Speaker 1: producing it, said he can't kill himself because that would
Speaker 1: make him weak, so it has to be like an
Speaker 1: unintentional death, which is like yeah, so the third one
Speaker 1: and technically at suicide, but that was like cannon to
Speaker 1: the story that he kills himself and then she goes
Speaker 1: to a function and says, I miss his mane and
Speaker 1: that's we love that. That's when we find out what
Speaker 1: her last name is. It's the last name of the
Speaker 1: man um. Sorry, is this the only one that he
Speaker 1: goes to rehab? Usually he goes to jail, jail, usually
Speaker 1: he does in the first stress and I don't think.
Speaker 1: I don't know the Streisan one, the streisand one I
Speaker 1: think is the only version where he cheats on her
Speaker 1: right and then in the first two the husband does
Speaker 1: something drunken disorderly and goes to jail and she has
Speaker 1: to bail him out of jail. So I think that
Speaker 1: that's version of they all have like a Grammy Awards
Speaker 1: Show meltdown, though oscars are Grammy's. Yeah, Okay. The bottom
Speaker 1: line is updates were made to the various renditions of
Speaker 1: this story, so I think an update could have and
Speaker 1: done to the ending where he doesn't kill himself and
Speaker 1: instead she's like, I'm not going to put up with
Speaker 1: your behavior anymore and the ship that you put me
Speaker 1: through goodbye. And then they meet up ten years later
Speaker 1: and he's like, I've been sober for ten years. You
Speaker 1: get back together and whatever, or they don't and she
Speaker 1: does the thing where she tries her face. I keep
Speaker 1: doing that my boy friend's face. He doesn't like it.
Speaker 1: I'm just like a face tracer. It's not who hasn't
Speaker 1: seen the sore as. You can't just do that to
Speaker 1: someone and CVS when they're not expecting. You cannot do that.
Speaker 1: It's bad. Uh, just like a quick face trace. But yes,
Speaker 1: I totally agree that like a version of this where
Speaker 1: she leaves him would have been so effective or if
Speaker 1: if if they're like no, she absolutely cannot leave him,
Speaker 1: then explore why other than she loves him. That sinister
Speaker 1: Another thing that I was apparted with feminist icon Alice
Speaker 1: Wetterland because it just I need to talk to everyone
Speaker 1: I encounter about a star's board now has her take
Speaker 1: on I think that's a good point about the nature
Speaker 1: of suicidality, of the way the British manager comes at
Speaker 1: Bradley Cooper's character at the end and it's like kill yourself?
Speaker 1: Does he literally? I mean, that's that's that whole scene.
Speaker 1: And she made the point of, like, you know, someone
Speaker 1: with suicidal tendencies, it just excuse what that actually is
Speaker 1: and makes it bizarre of like, you know, someone committing
Speaker 1: suicide very suddenly, it's usually prompted by something small and
Speaker 1: like it's it wouldn't just be like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: spreading the idea that suicidality is spread by someone saying
Speaker 1: kill yourself is just a total misrepresentation of what that
Speaker 1: sort of depression is like. It's usually something like and
Speaker 1: and that could have so easily happened in that same
Speaker 1: scene where it seems more likely, like the the some
Speaker 1: like a manager like that would be like passive aggressive
Speaker 1: and pretending to be nice. And maybe that is something
Speaker 1: that triggers him because he understands that I don't know
Speaker 1: it was so this movie is over the top. The movie.
Speaker 1: It does set up that he has had suicidal ideation
Speaker 1: before when he was a much younger guy. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that it was not handled the most responsibly.
Speaker 1: I think that what happens at the end of this
Speaker 1: movie is like a very nineteen fifties understanding of suicidal ideation.
Speaker 1: The cowboy hat. His character hasn't evolved from that era.
Speaker 1: Like his character is still like the gruff, Right, I
Speaker 1: have to wear socks, my shoes, you know, I'm a man,
Speaker 1: Like he does no drink. He's yeah, he's not. He's
Speaker 1: not progressive in any manner, Like he's still the old guys,
Speaker 1: Like he didn't go to the women's arch. Yea, yeah,
Speaker 1: where's your pussy hat? Bradley, I like that last shot,
Speaker 1: puts his hat down and he's like, all right, I'm
Speaker 1: laying this down for the last time. It is such
Speaker 1: and he's drunk. He dies drunk, uh like pills. He's
Speaker 1: something he definitely mists stoggering he's stogg yeah, and then
Speaker 1: it ends with this is pretty consistent across the four.
Speaker 1: The star whom is born is depressed and then has
Speaker 1: asked to do a function in which she sings song,
Speaker 1: and then she introduces herself as missus. I think in
Speaker 1: the first two it's Mrs Norman Maine, like, she doesn't
Speaker 1: even use any of her names, so this one, she
Speaker 1: saysn't it it's my name is Ali Maine, defining herself
Speaker 1: as she relates to a man, right, I mean, which
Speaker 1: wouldn't bother me as much if we knew it. Her
Speaker 1: maiden name was I never had a last name. Husband
Speaker 1: was one of those people that switch exactly what she says,
Speaker 1: um and Ali critique not a critique, world critique. There
Speaker 1: are no women in Alle's life at all, and this
Speaker 1: is not addressed once well. Interestingly enough, she relates most
Speaker 1: to the women in drag that she works with at
Speaker 1: the beginning, or their men in dragons. Drags are drag queens,
Speaker 1: drag queens. Yes, she worked at the drag bar, and
Speaker 1: then it's clear that she's known the drag queens for
Speaker 1: a long time. And then she has Oh, what's the
Speaker 1: name of her friend? Oh, Ramon is Ali's friend. He's
Speaker 1: an ally to Ali, if you will, former former Hamilton's actor,
Speaker 1: really only the best in a stars born. Oh my god. Wow,
Speaker 1: he's good for him and he's also he's a part
Speaker 1: of that system that like pushes her to go and yeah,
Speaker 1: he encourages her, like hey, and this guy who's creeping
Speaker 1: on you and like send his driver into your house.
Speaker 1: She goes to his door when he's passed out. He's like,
Speaker 1: wake him up, shake your titties at him, which is like, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's maybe not a great friend, but there are no
Speaker 1: even an Ali. We don't know anything about Ali's my mom.
Speaker 1: In the earlier versions with Esther Blodgett that her mother
Speaker 1: is in the various conditions of being alive, but she
Speaker 1: is acknowledged at any point. We don't know anything, never
Speaker 1: references the mom. We do know what happens to Jackson's mom,
Speaker 1: but she's also killed off and first for what you know,
Speaker 1: her death doesn't impact him the way his father's death does.
Speaker 1: It's just all all the narrative impact is coming from
Speaker 1: men doing shitty stuff in real time, or the shitty
Speaker 1: stuff men did back in the day where so much
Speaker 1: of Jackson's alcoholism is attributed to the fact that he
Speaker 1: was dead drinking buddy, and you want to knock one back,
Speaker 1: and he days drinking. But and I do feel like
Speaker 1: maybe implied, sorry, I mean to cut you. Oh I
Speaker 1: couldn't kept going, I'm sorry, I mean to interrupt your impression,
Speaker 1: um that he was dealing with tenitus, because they do
Speaker 1: say that at a very young age, that he may
Speaker 1: have gone in for putting his head in like you know,
Speaker 1: the grandmophone. So I feel like a little part of
Speaker 1: his imply that he drinks a lot because of that tonitus,
Speaker 1: that he's just trying. That's what I under hear that tone.
Speaker 1: I kept forgetting about me remembering he had tenightus was
Speaker 1: in and out the whole movie, because there were some
Speaker 1: points where you you're hearing his tonitus in the sound design.
Speaker 1: But then I was like, oh, just but half of
Speaker 1: his dialogue is like what's that because he didn't hear
Speaker 1: what someone said to him. I was constantly reminded said
Speaker 1: it's like, how's your tonightus, And he's like, I'm here
Speaker 1: with my wife. He's like the dude, he does change
Speaker 1: the subject a lot where you're like fucking hell. Okay,
Speaker 1: but I also was confused because he seemed like he
Speaker 1: got Tonight's at a young age. But then he also
Speaker 1: tells Ali he was born with an ear thing so
Speaker 1: he couldn't hear, so so he's either like had an
Speaker 1: ear issue and then also got tenitis, which is probably
Speaker 1: just fucking hell. I don't understand how that, like, if
Speaker 1: you can't even hear normal things, but then there's also
Speaker 1: like a ringing in your head at all times. That's
Speaker 1: like a very probably unbearable situation that he should be
Speaker 1: wearing those things that they were making for him, right,
Speaker 1: but I guess it takes him out of the music
Speaker 1: that he's playing. See that's saying it's he's making so
Speaker 1: many excuses to not get better that it's just like
Speaker 1: there's no justification at all for like any of his behavior.
Speaker 1: It's just like you're just choosing to not deal with
Speaker 1: all your own issues. And then you bring Ali into
Speaker 1: your life, and she loves you, so she's not going
Speaker 1: to force you to deal with I mean, she makes
Speaker 1: points to be like stop drinking. You smell like alcohol.
Speaker 1: We'll see how long it lasts till you drink again,
Speaker 1: Like she does make jabs in him, but she doesn't
Speaker 1: fully stand up for herself until that moment they get
Speaker 1: in a fight when she's in the bath, and it's
Speaker 1: only because he calls her names and says all those
Speaker 1: rude things, like she barely even when she saw he
Speaker 1: was drinking, she doesn't say anything. She kind of lets
Speaker 1: it go, which seems like it's a carryover of how
Speaker 1: she treated her dad. And so it's like, I understand
Speaker 1: why Ali gets into this relationship for a few reasons,
Speaker 1: is like he has power in an area that can
Speaker 1: help her career. That's not the only reasons she's in
Speaker 1: this relationship, but it's clearly a part of it. And
Speaker 1: you know she's predisposed to uh, messy dudes who have
Speaker 1: alcohol issues. But yeah, she like never, I don't know,
Speaker 1: there's just so and and then and you were saying earlier,
Speaker 1: like the concept of his like suicide is sacrifice where
Speaker 1: he kills himself so he won't embarrass her anymore. He's
Speaker 1: like letting her go and setting her free right like
Speaker 1: actually really causing her quite a bit of pain. And
Speaker 1: that's another eighteen update that they try to make the
Speaker 1: kind of rings hollow as there's that scene with Lady
Speaker 1: Gaga and Sam Elliott. Imagine that I never would think
Speaker 1: that would be a sentence. But that scene where Lady
Speaker 1: Gaga and Sam Elliott are crying and he's like, you're
Speaker 1: not Your fault is jet fault alledged, which is like
Speaker 1: a clearer view of suicide than any of the past
Speaker 1: movies have offered. But that's still not how it's presented.
Speaker 1: When it happens. It's presented as a sacrifice, but then
Speaker 1: they're like, oh, but it's actually not. But then it's
Speaker 1: still I don't know where what is? What is this? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Does anyone have any final points? While I think it's
Speaker 1: a great film, I really enjoyed it, you just have
Speaker 1: to suspend your disbelief that like women are on the top,
Speaker 1: like it all is just it's a fantasy of like,
Speaker 1: oh I was discovered and I made it and thank
Speaker 1: God for this man. Like you really have to just
Speaker 1: let all that go to go watch the movie and
Speaker 1: then you know, slowly think about it later, because it
Speaker 1: does the more you think about it's like, Okay, like
Speaker 1: this entire movie is happening because of a guy being like,
Speaker 1: oh you're hot, and a good singer, you know, like
Speaker 1: that's his whole interest in her was like, first, I
Speaker 1: believe it's because she was a good singer, and then
Speaker 1: as he got to know her, he's like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: I'm very attracted to you, and I'm going to make
Speaker 1: everything happen. And then it proceeds to be like only
Speaker 1: men around her, and that's a frustrating thing. It's a
Speaker 1: great film if you just you don't want to have
Speaker 1: a good time, but don't expect to get a lot
Speaker 1: of depth when it comes to strong women do whatever
Speaker 1: they have to do, or even women interacting, which brings
Speaker 1: us to the matter at hand. Does this movie pass
Speaker 1: the Bechtel test? Well? Sort of. There is a conversation
Speaker 1: between a woman named Gail, who's like, I guess like
Speaker 1: a stage hand or something, tour manager type assistant person too.
Speaker 1: I agree with Sophie feminist icon Gail Feministon. Gail shows up.
Speaker 1: Ellie has known Jack for about eighteen hours. She shows
Speaker 1: up at his gig. Hi, I'm Gail. Yeah it. Gail
Speaker 1: meets him at the car that just brought them from
Speaker 1: the private plane or whatever to take them into the venue,
Speaker 1: and she goes, hi, I'm Gail. So we're all got
Speaker 1: her name him. She's like, Lady Gaga was like hey,
Speaker 1: and she's like, how is your flight? And then Lady
Speaker 1: Gaga was like, oh, it's great. And then she goes, oh,
Speaker 1: just leave your bags and they're like okay, and then
Speaker 1: she's like, come this way, and then she goes, Wow,
Speaker 1: it's so big here. And then she goes like, oh,
Speaker 1: watch out because something's like coming out and Gail's looking out.
Speaker 1: I love I love Gail. I hope that that actress
Speaker 1: just improvides the name Gail and she's like, you know what,
Speaker 1: we want this movie to pass the test. I've read
Speaker 1: the whole script. She's like, Hi, I'm Gail. Because it's
Speaker 1: not a character that necessarily makes sense to name, but
Speaker 1: she really because we never see that character again. So
Speaker 1: she stands next to Sam Elliott at the concert looking
Speaker 1: board as fuck. Now, the question has been post to
Speaker 1: us if whenever Ali talks to the drag Queens, does
Speaker 1: that pass the Bechdel test? You know, I originally when
Speaker 1: I first saw the movie, in my mind said oh,
Speaker 1: that pass because she was telling to the drag Queens.
Speaker 1: And then I was like, oh wait, but does that count?
Speaker 1: And I don't know, drag queens when they're in drag,
Speaker 1: you know they're using sheet pronouns. You know, they're using
Speaker 1: a lot of like feminized language. But at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, drag queens are men who identify as
Speaker 1: men who do drag. I am tempted to outsource this
Speaker 1: one as well. A tray listeners have better intel than us.
Speaker 1: None of us are drag queens, So probably you do
Speaker 1: let us know for for today, I feel like we're
Speaker 1: saying no that those scenes, but they do happen. If whatever,
Speaker 1: it's a it's a great We're not totally sure for
Speaker 1: sure Gil passes. Yes, Yeah, but also maybe the test
Speaker 1: could be your needs to be updated to be more
Speaker 1: inclusive where it's you know, if two non binary people
Speaker 1: talk to each other, could that pass the Backdel tests?
Speaker 1: Could you know, a gender fluid person and a woman talk,
Speaker 1: could that past? So I think it's worth acknowledging that
Speaker 1: there could be some perhaps dates. Let's call up our
Speaker 1: friend Ali Bechdel. Yeah, there is a few seconds because
Speaker 1: I do think at one point towards the end of
Speaker 1: their interaction, she goes, he's very excited to see you
Speaker 1: or something like that. So it breaks that it breaks
Speaker 1: the test and she goes back. They go back to referencing. Well. Also,
Speaker 1: the whole context is like, hey, you're here to watch
Speaker 1: a man, So if you factor in context, it's a
Speaker 1: little murkier. But but she does talk to one other
Speaker 1: woman who is Dave Chappelle's wife, whose name is never
Speaker 1: ever acknowledged, and I believe the only thing they talked
Speaker 1: about is like, I'll get you a wedding dress to
Speaker 1: marry him, which is I would say. Also, Dave Chappelle
Speaker 1: and his family are the few people of color in
Speaker 1: the whole movie. Otherwise it's a largely white movie. Of
Speaker 1: the four, it certainly does the best. You know, two
Speaker 1: straight white protagonists. That's not pushing much forward, but I
Speaker 1: think compared to other major releases, it does all right.
Speaker 1: Lady got guys Italian. She she why the boiler out
Speaker 1: on the Count. Andrew dice Clay, one of his buddies
Speaker 1: is an older actor, who's that guy. He's a character
Speaker 1: seen a million Yeah, there's a lot of character actors.
Speaker 1: Like I feel like I've seen Gale before, Gil looked familiar.
Speaker 1: I feel like I've seen the woman who takes a
Speaker 1: picture of Bradley Cooper at the gross room. Yes, she's
Speaker 1: also a character actress that I've seen places. I've seen
Speaker 1: her a million players. They're pulling a lot of like
Speaker 1: the like kind of famous that you see guests are
Speaker 1: and everything. Yeah, there's a lot of vaguely faces in
Speaker 1: this movie, including Bradley Cooper's dog, feminist icon, Bradley Cooper's dog,
Speaker 1: which is his real dog, Bradley Cooper's real dog, and
Speaker 1: really doctor basically understanding Bradley cast a lot of people
Speaker 1: he knew, like the drag queens he knew. Those are
Speaker 1: my favorite scenes in the movie. The first thirty minutes.
Speaker 1: It's fun, there's there's comedy, there's jokes, there's drag queens.
Speaker 1: I'm having a great time. And then it starts to
Speaker 1: I could not be less thrilled. Yeah, Ali is like
Speaker 1: neutralized through as a story goes on. I suppose this
Speaker 1: is the time where we give our nipples. Let's right,
Speaker 1: nipple wise, yes, scale one or zero to five on
Speaker 1: basil how truths women? That's right. I'm gonna go with
Speaker 1: a solid two. I suppose where it's a story about
Speaker 1: a woman, but we don't get to know her that well.
Speaker 1: The story is told from a man's perspective, both in
Speaker 1: terms of the Jack main character and the director and
Speaker 1: writers and everything like that. So I think a lot
Speaker 1: of things that could have been that, like the opportunity
Speaker 1: was there for the movie to comment on, like the
Speaker 1: fact that women in entertainment are often held to this
Speaker 1: insane standard of beauty and image that gets touched on
Speaker 1: but doesn't go any further than that. Things like Bradley
Speaker 1: Cooper's characters creepy predatory behavior where she says no, I
Speaker 1: can't come to your gig and he's like, Okay, I'll
Speaker 1: send my driver to pick you up. Um, showed up
Speaker 1: is troubling. Maybe two is too generous because like I
Speaker 1: can't really think of anything that makes me think that
Speaker 1: anything was progressive about this movie. So yeah, I like
Speaker 1: that there's a representation on screen of drag queens. That's awesome. Um.
Speaker 1: So so like like it's a lady. Lady is a
Speaker 1: queer icon. She she has a literal queer I think
Speaker 1: that every with the exception of Janet Gaynor, every woman
Speaker 1: who's ever played this part is a queer icon Streisande
Speaker 1: in Garland. I mean she's in good company and that's
Speaker 1: oh That's one last thing I wanted to say about
Speaker 1: Ali's character that is like a standby of this character
Speaker 1: that makes Lady Gaga such good casting as she's supposed
Speaker 1: to be a character who is considered a little bit
Speaker 1: too old to be becoming famous, and she has an
Speaker 1: unconventional like she's not like a model in terms of like,
Speaker 1: and that's why the nose comment in the whole a
Speaker 1: bit and that's right there. Ye. Yeah, she's supposed to
Speaker 1: be like thirty or thirty one or two or whatever,
Speaker 1: like older older two, but she's thirty two. Okay, here's
Speaker 1: what I'll give the movie two nipples because of the
Speaker 1: scene that's basically an exact replica of a scene from
Speaker 1: Titanic where in a star is born. Allie's behind like backstage.
Speaker 1: He's trying to coax her on stage to be like
Speaker 1: sing your song or else I'll plagiarize it, and she's like, no, Jack, No,
Speaker 1: I couldn't possibly Jack, And that basically happens in Titanic
Speaker 1: between Jack and Rose. The name is even the same
Speaker 1: with Jack. So yeah, two nipples. I will give both
Speaker 1: nipples to Lady Gaga because we see her nips in
Speaker 1: this film. We sure do I'm going to give it
Speaker 1: this version. Uh one and a half. Yeah, I can't
Speaker 1: in good time. It's weird because I am going to
Speaker 1: see it for a third time, but you know I
Speaker 1: contain multitudes as well. I reserve the rie. Uh yeah. No,
Speaker 1: It's like, it is not a story that treats women well.
Speaker 1: It's never treated women well. And and as to this
Speaker 1: version kind of doesn't update it in the way it
Speaker 1: treats its female character really at all, which is a
Speaker 1: bummer because it is two thousand eighteen and there's in
Speaker 1: fact less women involved in the production of this movie
Speaker 1: that have been involved in past versions. So ultimately, I
Speaker 1: think by making the alcoholic character more lovable and making
Speaker 1: the female protagonists taking away her last name, we get
Speaker 1: no acknowledgement of how this toxic relationship is really affecting her.
Speaker 1: There are only men in her life that's never called
Speaker 1: attention to. It's like, and then there's a lot of
Speaker 1: like false setups, like you were saying, Caitlin, of like
Speaker 1: she mentions that you know, she's like not the perfect
Speaker 1: Western standard of beauty and that's held her back in
Speaker 1: the past, but that's never really commented on, and she
Speaker 1: doesn't seem to mind when they totally change her. And
Speaker 1: and you know, there's a few moments of like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, I don't know, I don't know, but she
Speaker 1: always does it aside from her hair, uh, she always
Speaker 1: goes through the way that we don't know how she
Speaker 1: feels about that, um, and we don't know how she
Speaker 1: feels about her relationship. She refuses to tell us how
Speaker 1: she feels about her relationship with her father. And so
Speaker 1: the character is there. There's like an interesting character there,
Speaker 1: but we just we just don't get at her, which
Speaker 1: is too bad. Uh. So I will see it again
Speaker 1: this week and one a half Nippy give one to
Speaker 1: Lady Gaga, and then I'm gonna give one to um
Speaker 1: Bradley Cooper's dog. Sure, I'm sorry the other half Um
Speaker 1: I would give it to. I would give an honoraryone
Speaker 1: just for the cinematography. I thought it was just very
Speaker 1: well shocked um No streisand asked in this one. But
Speaker 1: you know what, I just really like that kind of
Speaker 1: aesthetic where you when they shoot like music or just
Speaker 1: even concert, that you feel like you're like breathing it,
Speaker 1: like they get all up in his business, which I
Speaker 1: think is an interest choice. Actually, though they don't really
Speaker 1: do it with Lady Gaga as much. They really get
Speaker 1: into like Bradley's like air, like you feel like you're
Speaker 1: like breathing the same areas when he's like playing. That's
Speaker 1: from my film school background, but the real, the real
Speaker 1: I'm really giving it two nips because, like Jamie was saying,
Speaker 1: the whole like male savior vibe of like you needed
Speaker 1: a man to make it was kind of whatever, like
Speaker 1: that's not that interesting of a trope, Like it's kind
Speaker 1: of like, oh okay, Like it would have been interesting
Speaker 1: if I don't know, they real lesbian couple. Who knows,
Speaker 1: like they could have mixed it up in some way,
Speaker 1: so it wasn't just like Bradley Cooper's chance to be
Speaker 1: Bradley Cooper like and everyone kepting like, oh, how great
Speaker 1: he is in the film, Like yeah, but he's a
Speaker 1: great actor, Like we know he's going to be fine,
Speaker 1: Like we know he'll be able to transform himself, like whatever,
Speaker 1: he'll play a d agent next time. It's fine. He
Speaker 1: was a different accent, Like I'm not super moved by that,
Speaker 1: but like I was very impressed with Lady Gaga because
Speaker 1: I've never really seen her act before, Like I didn't
Speaker 1: watch when she was an American horror story or anything
Speaker 1: like that. And I thought it was great that she
Speaker 1: because I know I've read before in the past that
Speaker 1: she really struggled for a very long time, like I
Speaker 1: believe she was raped at nineteen by music industry person
Speaker 1: and so she her whole She's admitted that her whole
Speaker 1: facade of how she would dress up was just like
Speaker 1: her hiding like from the world and like covering up
Speaker 1: and wearing all this makeup and having all these wigs
Speaker 1: and having all this like crazy costumes. Was her distancing
Speaker 1: her real self from like the madness of like you know,
Speaker 1: everyone and people were coming at her. And so I
Speaker 1: thought this was like a very strong role for her
Speaker 1: to be like completely sands makeup, completely sands anything. And
Speaker 1: And while it was, you know, it was acting her
Speaker 1: like growing into this pop star and you kind of
Speaker 1: see it happening. It was like a very interesting growth
Speaker 1: to see within a film that you don't really see.
Speaker 1: You never see like someone becomes like sell out so aggressively,
Speaker 1: Like that's rarely that trope is really done in films,
Speaker 1: unless you're like watching films specifically about industries like acting
Speaker 1: or music or whatever. So that was cool to see
Speaker 1: and I really appreciated Gaga's work and I'm glad she
Speaker 1: kept the music as pure to Gaga as it could be,
Speaker 1: like her voice stage, she didn't try and change it
Speaker 1: for anything like that. So when I first heard that,
Speaker 1: I was like, Oh, that's Lady Gaga. Like that's when
Speaker 1: you know it's Gaga when she doesn't try and change
Speaker 1: her voice for anyone and she keeps it how it's
Speaker 1: how it's always been. She's got that very powerful voice,
Speaker 1: and I was moved by her singing. I think she's
Speaker 1: an amazing artist and just a performer who knows what
Speaker 1: she's doing. And yes, I did just watch her Lady
Speaker 1: Gaga documentary and I highly recommend it because she's so
Speaker 1: I don't know, you really see her struggle. She has
Speaker 1: like aggressive like nerve pain that like ruins her everyday life,
Speaker 1: where she'll just be like a complete and total like
Speaker 1: just in a coma of pain and can't move. It's
Speaker 1: like she has to deal with a lot of that
Speaker 1: and it's all like from PTSD of being like raped
Speaker 1: and all the anxiety and trauma from her life that
Speaker 1: her entire body, like spasms and complete pain, and she's
Speaker 1: gotten through a lot of it now, But I don't know.
Speaker 1: She has a very interesting story and I think it
Speaker 1: kind of parallels a lot of this storyline of a
Speaker 1: woman becoming less. So she made herself, you know, by
Speaker 1: herself and not with the help of a man. But
Speaker 1: like there's an interesting juxtaposition of her turning into this person.
Speaker 1: And then you know, I have this hope that Ali
Speaker 1: slowly turns back around and goes back to her original
Speaker 1: like artists, you know self. So I give one nip
Speaker 1: to Lady Gaga and her performance in this film, and
Speaker 1: another nip to Angela from the drag Queen crew, who
Speaker 1: apparently had to be convinced by Lady Gaga to be
Speaker 1: in the film. And I think her character is so
Speaker 1: funny in the beginning, as like this, you know, she's
Speaker 1: just not having it. She's not impressed. She's like, get
Speaker 1: the funk out of here, I have shipped to do.
Speaker 1: She's so funny to the other drag queen who has
Speaker 1: him signed his tits like she he already signed your tits.
Speaker 1: Stop making him sing for you. And the fact that
Speaker 1: she was in the Virgil is we've shared a stage
Speaker 1: with Lady So great anyway, two nips, one honorary for
Speaker 1: the cinematography, which is one more point for Lady Gaga.
Speaker 1: As of today, she wrote a long op ed about
Speaker 1: suicide and it doesn't directly say it's because of how
Speaker 1: it's portrayed in the movie. But did a great job, so,
Speaker 1: you know, cleaning up a little bit of Coope's mess. Maybe.
Speaker 1: So she's she's just the greatest. She's an ally got
Speaker 1: to us all alive the ally. Yeah. Well, Anna, thanks
Speaker 1: so much for being here. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: having me. This was so fun. Yeah. I've had a
Speaker 1: great time singing and dancing choreography. Yeah yeah. Where can
Speaker 1: people find you online? What would you like to plug?
Speaker 1: You can listen to my podcast with Shrine Units, who
Speaker 1: did the Latin episode of this show, Ethnically Ambiguous. We're
Speaker 1: on the House Stuff Works network. You can find us
Speaker 1: on iTunes and whatever. I'm a producer at House to
Speaker 1: Work So I also produced the daily site Guys, which
Speaker 1: the Day Yes News and Sorry that song you know
Speaker 1: Jamie Klin have both been on it um. I also
Speaker 1: produce Couples Therapy. It's a really cool new show. That
Speaker 1: I recommend checking out, hosted by naomiic Perrigan and Andy Beckerman.
Speaker 1: And then I also host an independent podcast called Will
Speaker 1: You Accept This Rose. It's about the Bachelor franchise and
Speaker 1: it's hosted by Arden Marine and it's really fun time
Speaker 1: and we hang out with batched peeps. And yeah, you
Speaker 1: can find me on Twitter at Anna hosting A A
Speaker 1: N N A H O S S and I E H.
Speaker 1: You can follow us on social media at becktel Cast.
Speaker 1: You can got our website becktel cast dot com. There
Speaker 1: we have our merch store where you can get all
Speaker 1: kinds of wonderful goodies design check them out. Strong female Protagonist,
Speaker 1: feminist icon, Beetle Juice Team dry Scab and we've sold one.
Speaker 1: We have sold one that's upsetting. Also, I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: keep buying our stuff. Also, go to our patron ak
Speaker 1: Matreon and subscribe to that. It's five dollars a month.
Speaker 1: It gets you to bonus episodes every single month. Also,
Speaker 1: we have some live shows coming November three, Philadelphia at
Speaker 1: the Good Good Comedy Theater. We have November four star
Speaker 1: dates November four in Washington, d C. Toward As of
Speaker 1: this recording, the venue has not been confirmed but keep
Speaker 1: John look out for that into the ground for the
Speaker 1: star dates November five, New York City as a part
Speaker 1: of the New York Comedy Festivals at Baby's all right
Speaker 1: in Brooklyn, New York. More like tours. All right, so
Speaker 1: we're on the door, so go to back to Castle Colm.
Speaker 1: Our live appearances tab will have ticket links to all
Speaker 1: of those shows. So he's hoped to see you there
Speaker 1: are tour otherwise, thanks for listening to what's all this
Speaker 1: butt do? When he on the counter. I just wanted
Speaker 1: to get one more though here Jim, yeah, here look
Speaker 1: at Thanks so much. Okay, bye God