Speaker 1: Welcome to Movie Crush, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Hey Everybody, and Welcome to Movie Crush Friday Interview Edition,
Speaker 1: Friends and Family Edition. I had the great pleasure today
Speaker 1: of having my old friend Jason Jenkins in here. Jason
Speaker 1: and I went to college together. We uh we worked
Speaker 1: at MEXICALI Grill in Athens, Georgia together, and we in
Speaker 1: fact we're hired on the very same day. And Jason
Speaker 1: became a good friend right away. And as I tell him,
Speaker 1: I had the great opportunity to tell someone something face
Speaker 1: to face that was meaningful, which is something that everyone
Speaker 1: should do when you get the chance. And I was
Speaker 1: gonna put it in an email over the years, but
Speaker 1: I finally got to sit down with Jason and tell
Speaker 1: him what a impact he had on my life. Uh.
Speaker 1: He was a big influence culturally, introduced me to so
Speaker 1: many things, took my life in a in a direction
Speaker 1: culturally that I was might not have gone in otherwise,
Speaker 1: who knows. And I listed off some things that he
Speaker 1: introduced me to, and then since we recorded, I kept
Speaker 1: thinking of more things and I texted him things like
Speaker 1: D'Angelo and Frank Sinatra in earnest and uh, it's just
Speaker 1: the list goes on and on. Jason's a great dude.
Speaker 1: He has done a very interesting thing with his lifestyle
Speaker 1: and that he uprooted his family in the States and
Speaker 1: said we're gonna live all over the world. And he's
Speaker 1: lived in Tokyo and Spain and Malaysia and Thailand in
Speaker 1: Mexico and it's really cool. He's got a blog in
Speaker 1: a podcast called an Epic Education where he details this stuff.
Speaker 1: And if you are interested in doing something radical with
Speaker 1: your life and moving your family all over the world,
Speaker 1: uh Ja sends a good person to get some good
Speaker 1: advice from, and he is open to it. Great guy,
Speaker 1: great old friend. And we had a wonderful talk about
Speaker 1: his movie Crush the Fantastic hal ashby Peter Seller's Jim
Speaker 1: from Envy and Nine being there. So here we go
Speaker 1: with Jason Jenkins on being there. Pull that a little closer. Yeah, sorry,
Speaker 1: sounds right. You can sit back, you can just pull
Speaker 1: the mic you need to do to be comfortable. Um,
Speaker 1: we were, and we came back to Japan about six
Speaker 1: months ago, and before that we were in Mexico for
Speaker 1: about two years. Right, we were in the Yokatan, Mexico. Man,
Speaker 1: it would have been great to see it. It's a
Speaker 1: it's a killer place. It gets a really bad rap here,
Speaker 1: and I mean deservedly. So there's some some rough spots,
Speaker 1: but throw the whole country out as ridiculous. That's a
Speaker 1: whole conversation. It looks amazing. Emily and I want to
Speaker 1: go to Wahaka at some point, all right, right, right right, okay,
Speaker 1: Uh that's my sister got married there really yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: she up married six years ago at this really cool
Speaker 1: place called Puerto Wescondido. And then it's the best wedding
Speaker 1: I've ever been, best family memory we've ever had. It's amazing,
Speaker 1: like you know, the bioluminescence where you know, the glow
Speaker 1: in the dark sky and then like you know, releasing
Speaker 1: sea turtles. Your your girl would love it and you
Speaker 1: would love it just because it's kind of laid back
Speaker 1: and not crowded. Well we're big into free to callow too,
Speaker 1: So it's a lifelong dream to go to the casa.
Speaker 1: Did I tell you? Like when when my girl and
Speaker 1: I went to Cossa Azul, we listened to the stuff
Speaker 1: you should know, free to go, Free to call morehand
Speaker 1: and it was it was awesome. Yeah, that's great. Mexico City.
Speaker 1: If you want to city escape, Mexico City rocks. If
Speaker 1: it was a little more stable, we would live there.
Speaker 1: I mean as far as museums and food and culture
Speaker 1: and events and like cool neighborhoods to walk around. It's
Speaker 1: it's amazing. It's amazing. It looks like Europe in a
Speaker 1: lot of ways. Well, just for the benefit of the listener,
Speaker 1: I want to explain kind of because I want to
Speaker 1: plug what you've got going on too, because you this
Speaker 1: is my friend Jason from college, which we'll get into
Speaker 1: that in a second too, because I have a lot
Speaker 1: of like thanks that I need to give you that's
Speaker 1: long overdue for some things. I don't know about that,
Speaker 1: but okay, but uh, you made a radical choice, which is,
Speaker 1: you know, it's only radical in view of the regular
Speaker 1: American way, but the radical choice many years ago when
Speaker 1: you got married and had kids, to do something a
Speaker 1: little different with your life and to move all around
Speaker 1: the world with your family. And uh, you have started.
Speaker 1: What all do you have now? Do you have a
Speaker 1: podcast and a blog or you still have the blog?
Speaker 1: Oh definitely got the blog going on. The podcast has
Speaker 1: been on hiatus for about a year. Okay, well, because
Speaker 1: see my guests, this is actually my first experience to
Speaker 1: have a podcast face to face, like in a studio,
Speaker 1: because you do remote stuff. Well, my podcast was all
Speaker 1: about family travel. I was always interviewing family travelers who
Speaker 1: are a not experienced with pod casts and be always
Speaker 1: in some far flung place with spotty WiFi and in
Speaker 1: the studio. So it's someone in Peru with a dog
Speaker 1: barking outside, or it's someone in Cambodia and her husband
Speaker 1: is like zipping the suitcase behind her, like can you
Speaker 1: stop that? You know? But when we were in Mexico
Speaker 1: recently are they were putting fiber optic into our neighborhood
Speaker 1: and it was just so the but the wife I
Speaker 1: was on and off. So I just kind of put
Speaker 1: it on hold. And then we were moving back to
Speaker 1: Japan and so so but I'm I'm making it going again.
Speaker 1: So it's called an epic education. Uh. And where all
Speaker 1: of you lives now since where you started in Japan?
Speaker 1: Just give us the rundown. Okay, Well, I'm crazy awesome.
Speaker 1: I left the States in you and I, which we
Speaker 1: may get it too, were college buddies, and I graduated
Speaker 1: in ninety four, and I taught elementary school for three years. Ok,
Speaker 1: that's where I was teaching. I taught in South Florida,
Speaker 1: and then I taught in South Atlanta, and I was, um,
Speaker 1: I was getting a little stressed out. I was, you know,
Speaker 1: I was intentionally working in whatever out at risk neighborhoods
Speaker 1: for lack of a better teaching art. I was the
Speaker 1: art teacher. So I saw all the kids in the school,
Speaker 1: but I was, at least in Florida, I was having
Speaker 1: chairs thrown at me, you know, got stabbed with the
Speaker 1: colored pencil and the scissors once or twice, you know.
Speaker 1: And so which I mean, I chose that job. That's
Speaker 1: what I wanted to do. I wanted to be the
Speaker 1: you know, the hero of dangerous minds or something to
Speaker 1: do what I mean. But after three years, I was
Speaker 1: getting Uh, I needed a break. This is pre internet,
Speaker 1: you know. And I heard people taught English abroad. So
Speaker 1: I went to Taiwan. Actually I mean, and I'll truncate
Speaker 1: this story. So I went to Taiwan, taught English there
Speaker 1: for a few years. Uh, then moved to Tokyo and
Speaker 1: lived there for thirteen years, and moved in from business
Speaker 1: English teaching into I got a job with the newspaper
Speaker 1: and then an ad agency. And then your wife is
Speaker 1: Japanese wife of Japanese. We we met here. She was
Speaker 1: a school teacher in in Atlanta, and she sends her regards.
Speaker 1: She wanted me to tell you hello, long it's been
Speaker 1: a while. It's been a minute maybe since she Well,
Speaker 1: we'll talk. I don't know if we want to talk
Speaker 1: about that, but but but anyway, so uh um. Basically,
Speaker 1: I moved to Taiwan and and then she followed me back.
Speaker 1: She left the States and came over, and then we
Speaker 1: moved together to Tokyo and we lived there for thirteen years.
Speaker 1: I knew you were there for a long time, and
Speaker 1: uh And that's where the kids were born. And then
Speaker 1: in I was working for an ad agency. She was
Speaker 1: working for a bank, and we just didn't see her
Speaker 1: kids anymore. We just we were we called ourselves a
Speaker 1: tag team single parents, because you know, I would pick
Speaker 1: him up one night and she would come home at eleven,
Speaker 1: and then she would pick him up the nice and
Speaker 1: I would come home at eleven. So we wanted to
Speaker 1: make a change. So I worked out something with my
Speaker 1: company to work remotely, which is a whole story in
Speaker 1: itself that i'll I'll spare you now. And uh, we
Speaker 1: started kind of moving around right. We went back to
Speaker 1: Taiwan to show the kids, you know, this place that
Speaker 1: we loved so much, and then Chang Mai, Thailand, and
Speaker 1: then Malaysia and that was two months each. It was
Speaker 1: too fast, and so then we went back to Malaysia.
Speaker 1: We lived in Malaysia for a year, and then we
Speaker 1: went to Spain and lived in Valencia, Spain for two years.
Speaker 1: That wasn't sucked, it was terrible. And then uh, and
Speaker 1: then we went to Mexico and we lived We started
Speaker 1: in the Yokatan Peninsula for a few months and it
Speaker 1: didn't really click. And then we went to the sort
Speaker 1: of the what do you call it, the high plains
Speaker 1: in central Mexico, a place called San Miguel Day end Day,
Speaker 1: and ended up staying there for almost two years. And
Speaker 1: that brings us up to this summer. And uh, this
Speaker 1: summer we moved back to Japan. This time we're in Osaka, Keiko.
Speaker 1: My wife's family is in Osaka and the kids, Uh,
Speaker 1: this is sort of the last chance for them to
Speaker 1: experience home. For you, guys, does it feel like home.
Speaker 1: Japan doesn't, even though I've been there at least once
Speaker 1: or twice a year since since my wife's family. But uh,
Speaker 1: but we wanted to kind of live there. I was
Speaker 1: thrilled to be back in Japan after the time away.
Speaker 1: I love living in Japan. I didn't like working in Japan.
Speaker 1: I mean, I didn't like the kind of hours and
Speaker 1: stuff that I was having to put in. But uh,
Speaker 1: you know, the kids first language is Japanese and they
Speaker 1: can't speak it. Now really they're there. I mean the boys,
Speaker 1: all right, the girl can barely speak, but they're fluent
Speaker 1: in Spanish and they're fluent in English, which they weren't
Speaker 1: when we left. They were not. I mean, they could speak,
Speaker 1: but they couldn't read or write on their level. So
Speaker 1: we kind of we left and worked on their English,
Speaker 1: and then we moved to Spain and we put them
Speaker 1: in local Spanish schools where they made friends, and then
Speaker 1: the same thing in Mexico. So so there, you know,
Speaker 1: and they just didn't identify with that side of themselves,
Speaker 1: so we wanted to go back. Or that's one of
Speaker 1: many reasons. But the boy's gonna graduate in two years
Speaker 1: and he's it's going to go off to college. So
Speaker 1: this is yet he has no idea America or he's
Speaker 1: looking at, um, some places in the States. We're gonna
Speaker 1: do a couple college tours. We'll go to California in
Speaker 1: the spring and then come to the East Coast in
Speaker 1: the uh in uh um in the summer. He you know,
Speaker 1: he still has a bunch of buddies in Spain and
Speaker 1: various places, and so he may look at Europe, but
Speaker 1: probably the States. It all depends, you know, on a
Speaker 1: variety of factors. He doesn't he's seventeen. He wanted he
Speaker 1: doesn't know what he wants right right? So what is it? Um?
Speaker 1: What's it been like? And what's it been like for
Speaker 1: your kids? I know, like to do something like this,
Speaker 1: everyone's got to be game somewhat. Um. How much pushing
Speaker 1: and pulling was there? Or is it like you would
Speaker 1: think it is in a movie where everyone's just like,
Speaker 1: great dad, where are we gonna what's the next adventure?
Speaker 1: How I wish it was like that, Like what are
Speaker 1: the ups and downs and the benefits and the bad things?
Speaker 1: There's I mean, there's definitely been uh you know, there's
Speaker 1: been pros and cons. I think the pros are Our
Speaker 1: kids were you know, sheltered in a way almost like
Speaker 1: Japanese kids, right, you know, because that's where they grew up.
Speaker 1: And they're much more uh self confident, and we're sourceful.
Speaker 1: They can handle themselves. I mean, we just let our
Speaker 1: sixteen when he was sixteen, he backpacked through Europe this
Speaker 1: summer on his own so well with a bunch of friends,
Speaker 1: but like but a bunch of other seventeen eighteen year
Speaker 1: old kids, and so you know, he can kind of
Speaker 1: swing that kind of stuff and he can manage a
Speaker 1: lot of different things. In our girl, you know, she's
Speaker 1: she's she's got it together in a lot of ways.
Speaker 1: The downside of that is that they were just tired
Speaker 1: of moving around eventually, I mean they were they were
Speaker 1: meeting friends that basically when we moved, when we moved
Speaker 1: to Mexico, it was like, can we stop moving around?
Speaker 1: We want to stay in one place for a while.
Speaker 1: And when that happens, is it like as parents, you've
Speaker 1: got to heat that request. They're they're feedback, you know
Speaker 1: is a big part of it, you know, and so
Speaker 1: but uh, you know, and so we thought make skill
Speaker 1: might be that and it was. It was great for
Speaker 1: the time that we were there, but the schools weren't
Speaker 1: really prepping the boy for for college that I wanted.
Speaker 1: And also at the same time, we realized that they
Speaker 1: couldn't speak Japanese and this was the last chance, so
Speaker 1: we decided to go back. So when he graduates in
Speaker 1: whatever it is, one, I guess we'll you know, he'll
Speaker 1: head off and then we'll decide, you know, our daughter
Speaker 1: has a vote, and like we're gonna stay in Japan
Speaker 1: and we're gonna move somewhere else. With the States, it'll be,
Speaker 1: you know, she'll she'll be in that feedback. Are you
Speaker 1: ever going to live in the States again? I don't know.
Speaker 1: I felt like maybe I feel like when you left
Speaker 1: all those years ago, when you left, I felt like,
Speaker 1: this is it. Jenkins is never going to come back.
Speaker 1: I hadn't thought about moving back in a long time. Um,
Speaker 1: but it depends on where my kids are if they
Speaker 1: if they wanted to move here, sure you want to,
Speaker 1: you know, I'd want to be a little close to them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it all. It all depends on what's go
Speaker 1: went on in the States as well. But uh, I'm
Speaker 1: not I haven't written it off. But it's not It's
Speaker 1: not my first choice right now. I'm happy to be
Speaker 1: back in Japan for a while. What is your family,
Speaker 1: uh thought about all of this? Well, I mean they thought,
Speaker 1: like I thought when I left, I was going for
Speaker 1: a year, and that's all I was. I was going
Speaker 1: to go. So I was the only one that knew
Speaker 1: that child astradamis over here. Yeah, they they thought I
Speaker 1: was gonna leave for a year and I did too,
Speaker 1: and I was like, I'm not ready to come back,
Speaker 1: and I stayed, and you know it, probably the first
Speaker 1: five years they were like when are you gonna come back?
Speaker 1: And then they realized I'm probably not, at least not
Speaker 1: anytime soon. So so, but it's been tough, you know.
Speaker 1: I mean I'm the only kid with grandkids. My sister
Speaker 1: never had kids. My brother may may not, I don't know,
Speaker 1: but it doesn't have it yet. So you know, for
Speaker 1: my parents has been kind of tough. So, I mean
Speaker 1: you were talking about some of the downside. You know,
Speaker 1: I adore my parents and it you know, it hurts them.
Speaker 1: Do that, Um, may I take off my shoes whatever
Speaker 1: you want. You can take off all your clothes, Jason,
Speaker 1: I've seen that body before. Uh So what Um, what
Speaker 1: would you like to tell people to seek out of yours? Huh?
Speaker 1: What would I want them to see of mine? Because
Speaker 1: I know there are a lot of people. I know
Speaker 1: for sure we have listeners that live in Japan right now,
Speaker 1: some really active movie crushers, and I know that they
Speaker 1: there are people that are interested in doing things like this,
Speaker 1: and I think people can be scared away from it.
Speaker 1: It's intimidating. Um, and I think you could be a
Speaker 1: good resource for encouraging this kind of lifestyle. Sure, well,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe before I say you know where to
Speaker 1: point people towards when you say you have friends or
Speaker 1: listeners in Japan, let me just tell you that you
Speaker 1: have listeners all over the place. I have bumped into
Speaker 1: people in your multiple countries. I thought I wrote you
Speaker 1: about that. Maybe I didn't, but I've had I've had
Speaker 1: people in multiple countries. You know, when you start talking
Speaker 1: about podcasts, like oh have you heard this one? Stuff
Speaker 1: you should know? And I'm like, hey, yeah, I actually do.
Speaker 1: And they don't just say oh you know that guy,
Speaker 1: They go, you know, Chuck Bryant. It's so funny. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've had people come at my sister's wedding in Mexico,
Speaker 1: somebody like basically pushed everybody out of it and came
Speaker 1: up to me. And there's there's been I mean, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, let me just take a moment to say
Speaker 1: I'm thrilled for you man than dude. We would have
Speaker 1: never how do I put this? You know, I would
Speaker 1: have never predicted that this would have been your career path.
Speaker 1: But of course not. We didn't even know what a
Speaker 1: podcast was. But to see, you know, the kind of
Speaker 1: success you've had and the sort of you know, being
Speaker 1: able to do something you love. I love it. I
Speaker 1: love it. I'm really really happy for you. I appreciate
Speaker 1: it and I for you. So we met. We'll tell
Speaker 1: people where to where to find you. Just my My
Speaker 1: website is www dot and epic education dot com. The podcast,
Speaker 1: the old podcast episodes are there. And then I've got
Speaker 1: a lot of pieces on you know, saving money or
Speaker 1: how to do this, or how to deal with flights
Speaker 1: with with kids on long term and travel gear and
Speaker 1: hotel a lot of you know we were we've done
Speaker 1: Yeah maybe didn't mention that, but you know, we've done homeschooling.
Speaker 1: We pulled our kids, our kids were in local schools
Speaker 1: in Japan when we left, and then as we moved around,
Speaker 1: we did homeschooling or we would put them in local
Speaker 1: schools in various places. We've done a variety of different things,
Speaker 1: and I've I've written about it and kind of given
Speaker 1: tips on our experience, and we made a ton of
Speaker 1: mistakes so people can learn from those. But uh, but yeah,
Speaker 1: there's you know where to stay, what to take with you,
Speaker 1: and what not to take with you, and then the
Speaker 1: podcast is just a different traveling family. Some articles are
Speaker 1: about traveling with little kids and others are about a
Speaker 1: specific destination. They're all over the place, and so if
Speaker 1: I fire it back up, I may give it a
Speaker 1: more focus one particular thing because it was kind of
Speaker 1: all over the place. But are you on Twitter or anything?
Speaker 1: I am? I am. That's uh an epic e d
Speaker 1: u all because I think you would be comfortable that
Speaker 1: people hit you up, Yeah, absolutely personally for questions instead. Sure, sure,
Speaker 1: a lot of people right into the blog. Um maybe
Speaker 1: I should say a lot of people lately have been
Speaker 1: writing in about the Spanish like residency visa because we
Speaker 1: I mean, I wrote these long pieces because it was
Speaker 1: a it was a saga to get that as an
Speaker 1: American citizen, you know, when you're you you can stay.
Speaker 1: So a lot of people write me about that, and
Speaker 1: I'm happy to help if I can. But Spain bureaucracy
Speaker 1: is always changing. You'll get a different answer in every office.
Speaker 1: So a lot of people write me on questions that
Speaker 1: they're already in the post somewhere, or I can't really
Speaker 1: answer it because this was my experience three years ago
Speaker 1: and may have changed. So if you're listening right now,
Speaker 1: when you want to move to Spain and you want
Speaker 1: to get the permanent residency, or you want to get
Speaker 1: your kid into FIFA football like my son did ye,
Speaker 1: I'm happy to help if I can, but I may
Speaker 1: not have the answer because the rules are changing all
Speaker 1: the time. Uh. And what is your job right now?
Speaker 1: What are you doing? Actually just just the blog? That's great.
Speaker 1: For a couple of years, I was um, I was
Speaker 1: working part time, you know, when I was talking about
Speaker 1: arranging something with my job. I worked for an agency
Speaker 1: in in Tokyo and I was just a glorified copywriter.
Speaker 1: Did you work for Nikon? Well that was our client
Speaker 1: was our clients, So you know a lot of camera
Speaker 1: brochures up until if you looked at a dslr uh
Speaker 1: brochure that was me. Yeah, well, basically it's translated. And
Speaker 1: then I kind of, uh, you know, it would depend
Speaker 1: on the camera. You know, I would have to sort
Speaker 1: of massage the text for because it was all, you know,
Speaker 1: translated by camera nerds and engineers and so oh it's
Speaker 1: an entry level I have to write this the way
Speaker 1: a housewife would want to read it, and pro I
Speaker 1: have to write it the way the pros were. And
Speaker 1: so I got to go on some commercial shoots. That's
Speaker 1: how I met you that last time when at the
Speaker 1: premier at the Center of Puppetry Yards. Remember that. Hell yeah,
Speaker 1: I was coming back from Costa Rica. We were shooting
Speaker 1: a commercial with Moose Peterson, this nature photographer. But um,
Speaker 1: I'm getting lost track of time. So that's what I
Speaker 1: used to do. And then when I proposed to them
Speaker 1: to you know, to like not come in the office anymore,
Speaker 1: there was a whole lot of my job and I
Speaker 1: couldn't do what do you think about me not showing
Speaker 1: up exactly? So I basically just I proposed cut my
Speaker 1: salary in half and let's see how this works. And
Speaker 1: and it worked for three and a half I guess
Speaker 1: of the last six years, Yeah, which was great. And
Speaker 1: then but you know, nikon Canon, all of are getting
Speaker 1: hammered because everybody using their phones now so so their
Speaker 1: budgets got lower. And my boss, who was a friend,
Speaker 1: he's like, I don't know how much longer I can go.
Speaker 1: I said, it's all right, you know, you let me go.
Speaker 1: Need But by that point, you know, we were using
Speaker 1: some of our savings and using money that the blog
Speaker 1: was coming in. I mean, we're not rolling in Doughe
Speaker 1: by any means. And anybody who has questions about this,
Speaker 1: you make a lot of sack defics. Yeah, to to
Speaker 1: live this way. Sure, so so that was a big
Speaker 1: part of it. That's awesome, man. I have so much
Speaker 1: respect for the move, the moves that you've made and
Speaker 1: doing something different. I think like growing up watching movies
Speaker 1: like about these like the Mosquito Coast and these kind
Speaker 1: of it's always presided in films as these crazy crazy dads.
Speaker 1: Uh well, yeah, I mean there's a probable it maybe
Speaker 1: a little bit of that, but it's also so rooted
Speaker 1: in practical things like you still have to educate your kids,
Speaker 1: you still gotta uh so, I gotta get the job
Speaker 1: if you know, in different places, and it's a lot
Speaker 1: to do that if you're single or you're just a
Speaker 1: young couple. But when you got kids, you gotta make
Speaker 1: your family. Man, you gotta make sure they have a
Speaker 1: place to sleep well. I mean, if it was just
Speaker 1: if it was Keko and just to feel secure, stay
Speaker 1: in dingy little places and save every every dollar for
Speaker 1: some big ticket items. But you can't do that, right.
Speaker 1: You gotta be able to. It's really cool, man, so cool.
Speaker 1: So we met in college and I was telling Emily
Speaker 1: the story last night. We got hired on the same day.
Speaker 1: We started on the same day at MEXICALI Grill as
Speaker 1: Chip Boys, and um, it was a steam title I've
Speaker 1: ever held. I think. Yeah, I didn't know that it
Speaker 1: was gonna be such a fortuitous thing. Um, not only
Speaker 1: meeting you, but the things that have happened in my
Speaker 1: life because of that job, that dumb job. I met you,
Speaker 1: and through you, I met Clay, were still one of
Speaker 1: my great friends. Through Clay and you, I met Bill,
Speaker 1: who's still one of my great friends. Through that job,
Speaker 1: I met Justin, still one of my best friends. You're Justin.
Speaker 1: I met Timmy, so one of my great friends Meredith extet.
Speaker 1: We remember Meredith, right, we're in touch, Like we lost
Speaker 1: touch for a long time, but we're now back in
Speaker 1: great touch. So you want to go to New York. Um,
Speaker 1: the list goes on. It's like that weird Mexican restaurant,
Speaker 1: like non existent. Now it's gone, it's gone. But that
Speaker 1: is just amazing. How it's crazy, man, Like, what would
Speaker 1: have happened had I not gone in there for that
Speaker 1: job that summer? Uh? And then through meeting you. So
Speaker 1: here's the thanks of gratitude. Um. I was coming out
Speaker 1: of high school as a as a Baptist boy, um,
Speaker 1: sort of starting to explore different thoughts and pathways in
Speaker 1: life and alternate ways of looking at the world that
Speaker 1: weren't just through the church. You are a preacher's kid
Speaker 1: who got a head start on that stuff. Uh, and
Speaker 1: preacher's kids like, there's one of a few ways you
Speaker 1: can go. I think you can. You can really rebel
Speaker 1: and be bad, you can super follow in the footsteps,
Speaker 1: or you can kind of go in that middle area,
Speaker 1: which is I think where you went. I guess you
Speaker 1: could a certain degree, Yeah, for sure. I mean I
Speaker 1: rebelled a lot and did lots of stupid stuff, but
Speaker 1: I was still I'm still comfortable in their world. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's not my world for you know, the
Speaker 1: lack of a better phrase, but I'm still completely comfortable.
Speaker 1: I go, you know, you know, I go to church
Speaker 1: with them. When I come back and you don't feel
Speaker 1: like your skin is burning. No, no, no, no, not
Speaker 1: anymore anyway. But uh no, but I adore them there.
Speaker 1: They walk the walk. They live the life. Their parents
Speaker 1: are great, They're they're awesome, and they they lived the
Speaker 1: life that you know that they profess everyone should live.
Speaker 1: And I admire them for that. Yeah, they're they're good people.
Speaker 1: And uh so you had a bit of a head
Speaker 1: start on um sort of everything that I caught up
Speaker 1: to later, and you really like you, You took you
Speaker 1: sent me on a different path more so than anyone
Speaker 1: else did I you did uh musically, I mean I
Speaker 1: could there's a laundry list of things I could live.
Speaker 1: You literally turned me onto like you're the one who
Speaker 1: came over and said, fucking we're watching Reservoir What dogs tonight?
Speaker 1: I saw this movie with me. I don't know if
Speaker 1: you remember that, right, you guys, just get your ship
Speaker 1: and come over and that's fine, And uh watched that
Speaker 1: movie for the first time with you do. You introduced
Speaker 1: me to Jim Jarmash, You introduced me to Miles Davis.
Speaker 1: You introduced me to Moment the Flaming Lips and the
Speaker 1: Butthole Surfers and Salvador Dolly and the Church of the
Speaker 1: SubGenius and like, oh, what a great list. I don't
Speaker 1: think I could I could keep going. But I don't
Speaker 1: think you realized at the time, because we were just
Speaker 1: kids that I was just this sponge soaking up whatever
Speaker 1: you threw my way. Uh. And I don't think I
Speaker 1: realized till later what a big impact that had on
Speaker 1: me because that it was amazing, man, that sent me
Speaker 1: in a direction. Uh. And you always did it in
Speaker 1: a way that was like it was never oh you
Speaker 1: haven't heard of this, or right with that sort of
Speaker 1: snobby like yeah, man, it was always you. You've always
Speaker 1: had this joy about it all and like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: can't wait to play you some bebop music, or you've
Speaker 1: got to see this movie because you will love it,
Speaker 1: not because like I wanted to share with my friends.
Speaker 1: That was like, man, I just want you got to
Speaker 1: see this. It was I mean, it was annoying, I'm
Speaker 1: sure sometimes it was always amazing, just really open mindes
Speaker 1: to a lot of stuff, and I'd like, honestly, oh
Speaker 1: you're a huge debt. Thank you man. Well, oh man,
Speaker 1: the pleasure is all mine and I miss your recommendation.
Speaker 1: So we need to get that dialogue going again. Yeah, sure, sure, sure,
Speaker 1: I'm not as in the loop, you know, by any
Speaker 1: means that you used to be. I know, I like
Speaker 1: what I like, but uh, it doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: the coolest new hit band. You know. Well basically, you know,
Speaker 1: I used to I used to write for the Japan
Speaker 1: Times about various music and it was just it was
Speaker 1: an easy way to get into shows for free or
Speaker 1: meat or meat bands that I liked, you know. I
Speaker 1: got all Diplow and inter poll and all. Yeah that's
Speaker 1: all that kind of stuff, because you were shooting a
Speaker 1: lot of the festivals and yeah, well I was working
Speaker 1: at the Fuji Rock Festival managed uh, I mean, and
Speaker 1: it's the English language team that I got Clay a
Speaker 1: job on that one time, and when he came back there,
Speaker 1: remember that it was But um about when I stopped
Speaker 1: writing about that, I just I don't know, I like
Speaker 1: I still explore new music, for sure, movies, but but
Speaker 1: not with the kind of rabid news you know, maybe
Speaker 1: you get visit. It was I can't remember if it
Speaker 1: was David Letterman interviewing Conan O'Brien or the other way around,
Speaker 1: but Letterman talked about when he was ready to quit.
Speaker 1: It was like when he came home and his wife
Speaker 1: or his kid asked him, like, who was on the
Speaker 1: show tonight? He was like, I don't remember, and well,
Speaker 1: I think I was like that with music. I was
Speaker 1: just consuming and not you know, and then just you know,
Speaker 1: going out and grabbing more. And now I'm kind of cherishing. See,
Speaker 1: I've been gone for twenty years, so when I come back,
Speaker 1: I like to listen to whatever, the classic rock Station three.
Speaker 1: It's like, oh my god, it's Creez. You know Creed
Speaker 1: Its clear kids. Have you ever heard this? You know,
Speaker 1: they have no clue, So it's fun. Yeah. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've kind of I always told myself that I'm never
Speaker 1: going to stop seeking out new like independent music, and
Speaker 1: I kind of have in a lot of ways because
Speaker 1: you know, how does he get busy? But I still
Speaker 1: try and at the end of the year, I'll read
Speaker 1: end of yr list of people I trust, and I'll
Speaker 1: pick out a few things. It's just not quite as much.
Speaker 1: But I still go to live music all the time.
Speaker 1: Are you still playing? You got a band? Right? Yeah?
Speaker 1: We still play with and Chris and Jim, I says
Speaker 1: the drummer. All right, okay, very cool. If you ever
Speaker 1: met Jim, I know the name because he's in that
Speaker 1: same circle, but I haven't. He's a friend from high school.
Speaker 1: So it's like all these friends, we all ended up
Speaker 1: living like within four or five miles of each other
Speaker 1: in Atlanta, after many of us going in many different
Speaker 1: directions for many years. Uh well, because you know, I
Speaker 1: kind of lost touch with Clay for a while, and
Speaker 1: we've all kind of converged as adults here and it's
Speaker 1: kind of it's great, and you know, some of us
Speaker 1: have kids, and it's great. I'd love to hang out
Speaker 1: with your kids. At some point. Bill's daughter, why, it
Speaker 1: is awesome and we hang out with her some and uh,
Speaker 1: it's kind of this two point oh phase. That's I mean,
Speaker 1: your kids are graduating now, but it's fun now having
Speaker 1: our kids be friends with each other. Sure, yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: it's just a really it's something to be cherished. I
Speaker 1: think you know, I agree and fostered like I don't
Speaker 1: like that we've lost touch as much as we have,
Speaker 1: we have it. Now we're back. I'm glad I got
Speaker 1: to thank you in person. I was going to send
Speaker 1: it in an email one time. That's humbling. Thank you.
Speaker 1: I having here, Redsward Dogs, Flaming Lips, Jesus Lizard, Miles Davis,
Speaker 1: Jesus Lizards music. Now, Miles Davis opened up the whole
Speaker 1: jazz world. So that right, it's not just Miles Church
Speaker 1: of SubGenius take a planets. I think that's it as
Speaker 1: far as the list goes. Um, you knew Chuck Johnson
Speaker 1: passed away, didn't you? Did you hear that? You wrote me?
Speaker 1: You wrote, Okay, that's right. Yeah, that's how I found out. Yes,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know what happened, but I
Speaker 1: adored that. I think he had a aneurysm and just
Speaker 1: drop dead alone. It was horrible. I know, it's uh,
Speaker 1: it was terrible. Chuck was one of our fellow waiters.
Speaker 1: Chuck was the first really good gay friend that I had.
Speaker 1: That's why everyone from those days still call me Chucky,
Speaker 1: because there was already Chuck that worked there. So a
Speaker 1: lot of those Mexicaliti people still call me Chucky on
Speaker 1: Facebook and stuff. Meritithectent still calls me Chucky. Yes, after
Speaker 1: all these years. But it was really sad to lose Chuck,
Speaker 1: and I was I was trying to get together a
Speaker 1: little reunion and didn't get around to it. But that's
Speaker 1: something that we should probably do at some point. That'd
Speaker 1: be great. I'd love to see all of those those kinds.
Speaker 1: Should we talk? Yeah, sure, being there, let's do it.
Speaker 1: I watched it last night. This is the how Ashby
Speaker 1: film from nine, obviously starring the great Peter Sellers, who
Speaker 1: just got his a biography two days ago. Showed up
Speaker 1: in the mail that I know is just going to
Speaker 1: ruin everything because he was he was kind of a
Speaker 1: monster apparently, so he was like, you know, borderline personality disorder. Yes,
Speaker 1: I don't know if he was always that way, if
Speaker 1: it was like that near the end. Now, I think
Speaker 1: he was always that way and a really tough person
Speaker 1: in real life. Uh And and admitted, um, I mean
Speaker 1: one of the reasons I did a lot of research
Speaker 1: on this one, uh self admitted fan of chance or
Speaker 1: Chauncey Gardner and this role because he felt like he
Speaker 1: identified with him as an empty vessel. An empty vessel. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I read I read something like that too. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: he was very well known for um, for no one
Speaker 1: really knowing who Peter Sellers was, because he's always in character.
Speaker 1: He always fell into some role and didn't really come
Speaker 1: out of it until the next one came along. Right.
Speaker 1: But not a good husband, not a good father. Uh.
Speaker 1: And I'm I wanted to read this book because he's
Speaker 1: just I'm such a fan of his work. And I
Speaker 1: know what it's what's going to be in there, right, um,
Speaker 1: and it's not gonna be pretty, but I read it anyway. Well,
Speaker 1: this is one of my favorite movies. But I you know,
Speaker 1: I can't say I'm some uh Peter Seller's aficionado or something.
Speaker 1: I think I love the Pink Panther movies because I
Speaker 1: love to watch my dad laugh you know during those
Speaker 1: I mean stick, I thought there was nothing funnier when
Speaker 1: I was again the same same I mean, I laugh,
Speaker 1: My dad has one of those laughs that just is contagious.
Speaker 1: So so we we even watched those now. But I
Speaker 1: wasn't a fan of of Doctor Strange Love really well,
Speaker 1: I mean I saw it once time ago. It was
Speaker 1: too slow paced, and I never watched it again. Now
Speaker 1: that we've I've kind of done this research and watched
Speaker 1: this movie, i'd probably like it now. But being there,
Speaker 1: there was something about it that I connected with, and
Speaker 1: then I watched it, and we'll probably get into sort
Speaker 1: of the the sort of analogies that are made for
Speaker 1: work today passed. But I watched it maybe ten years
Speaker 1: ago during the w years and thought, you could put
Speaker 1: this movie outright, You could put this movie out tomorrow
Speaker 1: and if the film quality in the clothes didn't give
Speaker 1: it away, it would look like it was just made yesterday. Um. Now, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm sure. Well, you know, there'll be some part of that.
Speaker 1: We'd get into that. But uh, you know, out of
Speaker 1: all the movies you told me to send you some movies,
Speaker 1: and I looked at my list and it's the only
Speaker 1: sort of quiet, subtle movie. All my other favorite movies
Speaker 1: are Bombasted, Indiana Jones and Baron Munchausen and Iron Monkey
Speaker 1: and all this sort of like in your face and
Speaker 1: then there's Being There, which is this singular, uh subtle gym,
Speaker 1: you know. But yeah, but it's still it's still Connects.
Speaker 1: I watched it, you know, I watched it a week
Speaker 1: or so ago, so before this, and it's just as
Speaker 1: good as it was then. I totally agree. Um My
Speaker 1: entree into this film was Believe it or not, the
Speaker 1: Mad Magazine parody real Yeah, So I don't know if
Speaker 1: you're into Mad, but I was a nut for Mad
Speaker 1: Magazine growing up, and they had their big film parodies.
Speaker 1: It was, I think usually to each issue where they
Speaker 1: would parody a film, and I remember it was called
Speaker 1: being Not All There, and APPROPRIATE read that before I
Speaker 1: saw the movie because I was you know, I was
Speaker 1: a little kid and nine year old and Gosie being
Speaker 1: there and uh then saw the movie years later. But
Speaker 1: it's funny I've had I had a few of those
Speaker 1: were Mad, like that's the Exorcist spoof and the Aniguable
Speaker 1: Horror spoof to look into that, and a bunch of
Speaker 1: those that I saw, like way before I saw the films,
Speaker 1: before you saw the film. Oh that's class absolutely, Well,
Speaker 1: maybe this is the right point to say. Another unique
Speaker 1: thing I find about Being There is well, let me
Speaker 1: back up and say, once we decided on doing Being There,
Speaker 1: I grabbed the book and I read it Okay, so
Speaker 1: you did well. I audio book, but it's a very
Speaker 1: short book. It's only like the audio book itself was
Speaker 1: like three hours. I mean I listened to it on
Speaker 1: a you know, on a trip to Kyoto to check
Speaker 1: that out. It's really good, and it would be it
Speaker 1: would be one of the only books or one of
Speaker 1: the only kind of stories I could say that I
Speaker 1: would recommend reading it after seeing it. I hate to
Speaker 1: read a book after I see the movie, even after
Speaker 1: the trailer, because the characters are burned in and I
Speaker 1: don't I don't formulate my own characters, right. I see
Speaker 1: the faces, but the story is smaller. That's another unique thing,
Speaker 1: the story. They actually flesh the story out. There's characters
Speaker 1: that don't exist in the story in the book. Uh
Speaker 1: you know, there's whole sort of subplots and little extra jokes. Um.
Speaker 1: And the ending, which I'm sure we're going to talk
Speaker 1: about it is not in the book, right. I think
Speaker 1: I knew that because um, I saw that it was
Speaker 1: not in the original screenplay. The original screenplay, the Eve
Speaker 1: and Chauncey find each other in the woods and just
Speaker 1: get in a car and leave. Is that how it
Speaker 1: happens in book? If I remember correctly, it was just
Speaker 1: like he's you know, the there's there's people in like
Speaker 1: the smokey back room political you know, trying to trying
Speaker 1: to figure out who's going to run for president, and
Speaker 1: they're talking about him, and he just kind of walks
Speaker 1: out a door where in the movie. I'm sure we'll
Speaker 1: get to this, you know, it's the funeral and the
Speaker 1: pall bearers kind of whispering it as he kind of
Speaker 1: wanders off into the woods. Is strange, possibly christ like moment.
Speaker 1: I don't know, it's like, you know, but that's that.
Speaker 1: I definitely want to, you know, get to that because
Speaker 1: I would love to know what how you feel at
Speaker 1: that ending. But the book is but but the book
Speaker 1: is is is great. It's read by Dustin Hoffman. Oh interesting, um,
Speaker 1: which I wondered if this was chosen because, you know,
Speaker 1: doing my research, somebody was saying, maybe Chauncey Gardner. And
Speaker 1: I'm assuming if you're listening to this, you're you either
Speaker 1: read the book or your or you saw the movie
Speaker 1: or your board already, right, but you know, he's this
Speaker 1: sort of dimwitted guy, and somebody was saying maybe he
Speaker 1: was autistic or something. Whether that's true or not. The
Speaker 1: book was sort of a strange, a strange twist, but
Speaker 1: highly recommended. Yeah, it's interesting because there we don't know
Speaker 1: what the diagnosis is, and to see this through a
Speaker 1: modern lens um is much different than when it was
Speaker 1: made in you would just well, the whole premise of
Speaker 1: the movie is that no one understands that he has
Speaker 1: any sort of affliction. I guess that back then they
Speaker 1: would have called him slow or something or nobody. That
Speaker 1: no one picks up on it. That's the whole premise
Speaker 1: of the movie is is that people see what they
Speaker 1: want to see. That's right, absolutely, I mean that's the
Speaker 1: running theme. Um real quick on how Ashby he he
Speaker 1: owned the seventies, maybe like no other director owned the seventies.
Speaker 1: He went this was his run Harold and Maud and
Speaker 1: seventy one, the last detail in seventy three, Shampoo and
Speaker 1: seventy five Bound for Glory, and of any six coming
Speaker 1: home in sight and then being there in seventy nine.
Speaker 1: I don't know if, like any other director can can
Speaker 1: claim a run like that one, two, three, four, five, six,
Speaker 1: like classic films by anyone standard inside a tenor period.
Speaker 1: And then he I don't know how much you know
Speaker 1: about him. He kind of went off the DV Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think he kind of fell off the radar in
Speaker 1: his own head too. Yeah. I got really bad into
Speaker 1: heroin and cocaine and was sort of looked at his
Speaker 1: unhirable for a while and tried to get back in
Speaker 1: the game late, and I think made one more one
Speaker 1: more movie that didn't do so well, but I had
Speaker 1: this great run and then that was sort of it.
Speaker 1: And there's a little parallel with Peter Sellers himself there, right.
Speaker 1: He made only one more movie before his death, and
Speaker 1: it was some lame like Foo Man Chew. It was
Speaker 1: like the Curse of Chew or something I remember, which
Speaker 1: was you know, it was a nothing burger. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: he made, you know, one of the best films, one
Speaker 1: of my favorite film a very end of his career
Speaker 1: with how Ashby doing the same thing. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: he was sort of problematic for his personality problems. This
Speaker 1: at this point in his career, after really cleaning up
Speaker 1: in the sort of sixties and early seventies. And it
Speaker 1: sounds like it was Peter Sellers that actually was pushing
Speaker 1: Ashby to make this movie. He read this book by
Speaker 1: a guy named Jersey Kosinski. I'm probably butchering that name.
Speaker 1: But he read the book and spent like eight years
Speaker 1: pushing Ashby to make this movie and um yeah, and
Speaker 1: it's it's a gym. Yeah. And I think how Ashby
Speaker 1: wanted uh full control and got some deal with a
Speaker 1: group called Lori Mar Pictures, and um, I think they're
Speaker 1: the ones that ended up kind of wrecking his reputation.
Speaker 1: I'm not exactly sure why, because this was a critical hit,
Speaker 1: it was a financial hit. Um. I mean it did
Speaker 1: really well, so it's not like they had any you know,
Speaker 1: egg on their face for doing this, So I'm not
Speaker 1: sure what the deal was. Maybe it was like interpersonal stuff.
Speaker 1: But um, the way, and you know, we don't have
Speaker 1: to go like in order of the movie. You can
Speaker 1: kind of jump around. Um. I guess we should just
Speaker 1: talk about the sort of the the way he played
Speaker 1: this role, Like the physicality and the voice was just
Speaker 1: so spot on, and he just inhabits his character so well.
Speaker 1: I wonder, yeah, like I wonder if if he's one
Speaker 1: of those method guys that would have stayed like that,
Speaker 1: but he did. Yeah, that's it's kind of shocking, you know. Um,
Speaker 1: and watching that makes me do it makes me rethink
Speaker 1: the autism thing. I don't know, I just I guess
Speaker 1: it's on my mind. I just read this book last
Speaker 1: year called I Wish You to remember the name of
Speaker 1: the author. It's like the Curious Incident of the Dog
Speaker 1: at Night. Have you known this book? It's a play
Speaker 1: and u uh in a book. It's really it's a
Speaker 1: real quick read. But it's written from the perspective of
Speaker 1: an autistic teenager and written and he's trying and assault
Speaker 1: the crime of like the dog across the street was murdered,
Speaker 1: and basically, you know, almost you know, for a normal person,
Speaker 1: nothing almost happens. He's like he takes a train and
Speaker 1: but it it's written in this way, thinking the way
Speaker 1: he thinks. What rewatching? I could see this, I could
Speaker 1: see a little bit of Chauncey Gardner. Yeah, but this idea,
Speaker 1: this character that had never left, had never left the
Speaker 1: walled garden, and it was so obsessed with with television.
Speaker 1: And there was a lot of parts that I remember
Speaker 1: of him that would then show up later where you know,
Speaker 1: he would be imitating something that happened on television and
Speaker 1: at just the right moment at the right chance. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is you know, the whole idea of being there,
Speaker 1: and the little moment of chance was just it was
Speaker 1: so well timed. Yeah, everything from the way he uh
Speaker 1: and you'll see him, you know, hone in on something
Speaker 1: on the television, and the almost at a certain point
Speaker 1: you start to get what's going on. You know that's
Speaker 1: going to come back. Like the way he shakes hands
Speaker 1: and when he when he first met the president Jack
Speaker 1: Jack Gordon, who was fucking phenomenal, and the way he
Speaker 1: shakes his hands so vigorously, both hands and Jack Warden
Speaker 1: can't get his hands away from him. Or the way
Speaker 1: you know he sees some stagecoach driver tip his hat
Speaker 1: and then later he tips his hat, and the or
Speaker 1: right at the right moment when the woman who's in
Speaker 1: love with him comes in, Uh, he sees somebody kissing
Speaker 1: on television, right, he does it the same way. Oh,
Speaker 1: can we just stop for a moment. Like some of
Speaker 1: the uh, some of the little TV moments are so
Speaker 1: brilliant and I kind of remember them from you know,
Speaker 1: my childhood. That was like the but you can call
Speaker 1: me Ray and you can call me j And there
Speaker 1: was the basketball Jones at you know you know who
Speaker 1: did that as Cheech and Chong Man. Oh really yeah,
Speaker 1: which I doesn't make sense, like I rewatched, it doesn't
Speaker 1: sound like them. But when you look at credits, it's
Speaker 1: it's Basketball Jones. Yeah, but that little that little you know,
Speaker 1: weird kind of cartoon. And but then and other stuff
Speaker 1: like Sesame Street and Mr. Rogers and you know, Peppermint
Speaker 1: patty commercials and all these weird little things. And a
Speaker 1: lot of times I liked how they would kind of
Speaker 1: clue in, Like in the Basketball Jones it's saying, you know,
Speaker 1: I need someone to stand beside me, and it's paralleling
Speaker 1: this woman who's sitting right next to him. And yeah,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of slide little things like that.
Speaker 1: There was a lot of little found objects that sort
Speaker 1: of kind of mirror the situation in a subtle way. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So he's in in Washington, d C. And at the
Speaker 1: very beginning of the movie, um, which is another parallel
Speaker 1: that will play out in his second life at the
Speaker 1: Biltmore State in North Carolina, right, which have you ever
Speaker 1: been there? I haven't, but it's pretty amazing. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: something else you should check it out at something that's
Speaker 1: another difference in the book is the book takes place
Speaker 1: in New York City and so this is and in
Speaker 1: the summertime. But so the movie is actually better with
Speaker 1: the winter and the stuff like uh and the you know,
Speaker 1: the political climate. I thought that was great. And then
Speaker 1: overcoade and the umbrella and the whole look, you know,
Speaker 1: sort of completely complete that look for sure. But he,
Speaker 1: you know, the old man which is what he calls him,
Speaker 1: whoever his his own this house that he's lived in
Speaker 1: as the gardener. The old man has died, and um,
Speaker 1: he has to leave the house. And that that very
Speaker 1: early scene where the two uh, I guess real estate
Speaker 1: attorneys or whatever they are basically tell him, you know,
Speaker 1: you gotta leave. Um are you going to try and
Speaker 1: make a claim against the estate, And that sets up
Speaker 1: the whole recurring thing with the claim, like, you know,
Speaker 1: and I don't want to make a claim, but he uh,
Speaker 1: it's interesting to look at that today, like this was
Speaker 1: the seventies. They were basically like, this guy clearly needs
Speaker 1: help and they just toss him out on his ass.
Speaker 1: Today that would there would be someone to help him.
Speaker 1: They would put him in touch with the social network,
Speaker 1: absolutely support network. I think it's some kind of support
Speaker 1: net to get him going, a case workers, a social
Speaker 1: worker or something. And it's funny to look back at
Speaker 1: the seventies and they're like, oh, this guy who was
Speaker 1: like you know, obviously has some at the very least
Speaker 1: some pretty big learning disabilities. Uh, you're out on your
Speaker 1: ass in the middle of Washington, d C. And uh
Speaker 1: credit to I mean the music choice there when they
Speaker 1: are playing the two thousand theme, I had the discode
Speaker 1: up version. Diodado is his name, I can't remember. It's
Speaker 1: like a Brazilian. He was like a contemporary check Korea.
Speaker 1: All these guys human Diodato or something like this sort
Speaker 1: of Latin disco thousand ones pretty great, which you know
Speaker 1: is short of you know, was probably a nod you
Speaker 1: know to uh to the movie itself. He sort of mood,
Speaker 1: you know, emerging into the world, and Uh, it was
Speaker 1: just it was it was classic. I've actually been listening
Speaker 1: to it since, so really, yeah, it's funny as hell. Man.
Speaker 1: It was nice. Uh. And then there's one of the
Speaker 1: most and I think it's sort of was played for
Speaker 1: laughs in nineteen seventy nine, but watching it last night,
Speaker 1: it was such a heartbreaking scene when uh, he meets
Speaker 1: the sort of street toughs, and the the guy flicks
Speaker 1: a switch plate in his face and he tries to
Speaker 1: change the channel. He picks up his remote control and
Speaker 1: points it at the guy and clicks it. So sad,
Speaker 1: but so sad. It's kind of funny, but in seventy nine,
Speaker 1: I'm sure it was like a laugh riot. I'm watching
Speaker 1: it as a forty eight year old man in two thousand,
Speaker 1: nineteen or twenty, and I just wanted to start crying
Speaker 1: because this guy has never been faced with reality and
Speaker 1: he's trying to change the channel. Alsothing that's scary. Also
Speaker 1: not in the book, that whole, the whole part. And
Speaker 1: I got a fact for you, the little trip yad
Speaker 1: all right to that kid, the kid that's like you,
Speaker 1: you tell that chicken chip mother like that guy. His
Speaker 1: name is Otel Burbridge, and he was the bassist for
Speaker 1: a band called Aquarium Rescue n What Yeah, I have
Speaker 1: no idea for the listeners. Aquarium Rescue Unit was one
Speaker 1: of the only kind of jam band types that I
Speaker 1: got into. Bruce Hampton, Colonel Bruce Hampton. Colonel Bruce Hampton
Speaker 1: looked like your high school Jim coach. He had this
Speaker 1: big tom Selleck mustache and more like Jim shorts and
Speaker 1: a beer belly. And then he had this freakazoid band
Speaker 1: with like some you know, weird hippie guitarist and then
Speaker 1: had this fishbone ish looking basis guy. I mean, look,
Speaker 1: you turned me on the fishbone too, by the way,
Speaker 1: how that you mentioned it? And I'm proud of that.
Speaker 1: But anyway, and there he is. And I don't know. Uh,
Speaker 1: I knew that before I looked it up on IMDb,
Speaker 1: but I went to confirm it before I told you that.
Speaker 1: But this These guys played at the Georgia Theater and
Speaker 1: a variety of places when we were in college. Why
Speaker 1: the hell he's in being there? I have no clue
Speaker 1: and I have no idea what he's doing. Kid, maybe
Speaker 1: he was. Maybe we also turned me onto bad brains
Speaker 1: speak King of DC dude. Yeah, yeah, bad brains. These
Speaker 1: are gonna keeps h I mean this a while back,
Speaker 1: means maybe five or not so great. They're not doing
Speaker 1: back flips on the stage. Yeah, none of us are, Jinkie.
Speaker 1: Um so yeah, he he leaves the house and then
Speaker 1: has a very fortuitous thing happens. He gets backed into
Speaker 1: by a car of the wife of a very rich
Speaker 1: and influential man. Uh, these days he would be these
Speaker 1: days he would be a tech billionaire. It's fund manager.
Speaker 1: He's one of Warren Buffett or something basically, but has
Speaker 1: you know, he's has such influence that he has the
Speaker 1: ear of the president played by Jack Warden. The wife
Speaker 1: is played by uh Trulie McClain, and Melbourne Douglas is
Speaker 1: the his new old man and he kind of falls
Speaker 1: from one situation, falls right in, right into the same
Speaker 1: goddamn situation. Yeah, and you know, it couldn't have been
Speaker 1: more perfect that he finds it and he's even and
Speaker 1: that's one of the beautiful things is that he's not
Speaker 1: deceiving anybody. He has no idea that they don't know. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know that he doesn't. He thinks he's doing exactly.
Speaker 1: It's like, oh, wow, this is just now you'll make
Speaker 1: my lunch. You know, that's kind of you know, Louise
Speaker 1: made my lunch, and now you'll make my lunch. And
Speaker 1: this is where at this point, this is where the
Speaker 1: sort of comedy of errors of misunderstandings and hearing what
Speaker 1: you want to hear really kick in. As he's at
Speaker 1: dinner and like this army of waiters and butlers are
Speaker 1: serving the meals. And he starts to talk about that,
Speaker 1: you know, his house closed down and the attorneys closed
Speaker 1: it down and this you know, this character what's his name, Rand,
Speaker 1: which is a perfect for this too, you know exactly
Speaker 1: or you know Iron Rand and all of that. It
Speaker 1: was just it's perfect. Uh, you know, he he what
Speaker 1: he hears is not the literal nous of what he's saying,
Speaker 1: but that uh, you know, and he says, I want
Speaker 1: to work in your garden and comes and all this
Speaker 1: and what this metaphors funny and he hears it as
Speaker 1: metaphors and the you know, the American entrepreneur has to
Speaker 1: you know, till the soil and you know, and plant
Speaker 1: the seeds. And then when he talks about like all
Speaker 1: I have is the room, you know, this is Chance
Speaker 1: talking to or Chauncey. Yeah, because they misunderstand. He says
Speaker 1: Chance the gardener in the book, there's Chance and Chauncey.
Speaker 1: Uh you hear from his Chances perspective, and Chauncey, which
Speaker 1: is kind of nice, but here he's Chauncey to everyone.
Speaker 1: But you know, Chauncey says something about that all he
Speaker 1: has now is the man upstairs, and that just hits
Speaker 1: home to him, the to the to this billionaire because
Speaker 1: I have none of that. I have none of that.
Speaker 1: I'm going to the man upstairs next. Yeah, don't you
Speaker 1: talk about that? And so it really sets this sort
Speaker 1: of snowball in motion of just everybody wants him to
Speaker 1: be there, their savior, there, their their sage. It's interesting,
Speaker 1: there's so many like it's a comment on so many things,
Speaker 1: everything from uh dumb, dumb TV culture to politics too,
Speaker 1: people not listening, truly listening to someone and filling in
Speaker 1: the blanks that they want to hear. Um. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's a satire. It's not as funny as I remember it's.
Speaker 1: It's pretty dramatic film. It's dramatic and you know, um,
Speaker 1: you know uh rainy in if this is going off
Speaker 1: on the wrong the wrong way. But I'm not a
Speaker 1: fan of like today's cringe comedy you curb your enthusiasm
Speaker 1: and all that. I don't I don't dislike it, but
Speaker 1: it makes me uncomfortable and I don't enjoy watching it
Speaker 1: because no, no, I'm not saying I hate all of it,
Speaker 1: but I don't watch all of it because it's just
Speaker 1: it's a very uncomfortable situation. Is well, this movie has
Speaker 1: that a little bit of that, But I relish it
Speaker 1: because I just can't believe they're I say, can't but
Speaker 1: there that they I think the differences and something like
Speaker 1: The Office, which I loved, it's an obnoxious character who's
Speaker 1: making everyone uncomfortable. And this he is so pure of heart.
Speaker 1: There's none of that. Maybe that's it. He's a good guy.
Speaker 1: He's he's honest to a fault because he knows nothing else.
Speaker 1: All he knows is how to talk about the thing
Speaker 1: right in front of his face, or the thing he
Speaker 1: knows about, which is gardening and television. Television, so good. Um,
Speaker 1: And then you know this, this budding romance starts to
Speaker 1: bloom because Rand is a dying man. He has this
Speaker 1: younger wife who's desperate for some sort of attention and
Speaker 1: romance that she's never had, and she that's she sees
Speaker 1: that in him, and then so she doesn't see anything else.
Speaker 1: And Shirley McLain is so great in this. Um, I
Speaker 1: read some of the behind the scenes stuff like he
Speaker 1: was Sellers was in character the whole time. She is
Speaker 1: just a world class kook and always has been. Um.
Speaker 1: So she was on set talking about her numerology and
Speaker 1: all her writer past lives or something past lives. Hal
Speaker 1: Ashby is they're just stoned out of his mind. Ashby
Speaker 1: is what they call uh. And apparently it was just
Speaker 1: like a pretty crazy scene I believe on the set
Speaker 1: of being there. But through all that you get this
Speaker 1: very docile, sort of calming film. It has that effect
Speaker 1: on you when you're watching it even right it's it's calming.
Speaker 1: And then there'll be these moments where, oh, he's going
Speaker 1: to get found out right now somehow. I mean like
Speaker 1: the point where he goes he finally sees another black
Speaker 1: person and he goes, do you know Raphael, And you're like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, he's about to give that message, but
Speaker 1: you don't get that to the credits, right, which I
Speaker 1: want to talk about that later to a very controversial
Speaker 1: right sort of thing. Um. By the way, the DP
Speaker 1: as well as was Caleb Deschanel, who is Zoe desion
Speaker 1: else father. Yeah all right. Um. Apparently how Ashby used
Speaker 1: to work almost exclusively, exclusively with the great Haskell Wexler,
Speaker 1: but he was not available, so they went to Caleb Deschanel,
Speaker 1: which is pretty interesting. Um. So he's in this new
Speaker 1: situation that is just like the old one. People starting
Speaker 1: to find him out a little bit because of two reasons. One,
Speaker 1: you basically have two people investigating him. You have secret
Speaker 1: Service because of his eventual meeting with the president and
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, this guy's getting quoted on
Speaker 1: the evening news as this economic stage. Uh. And then
Speaker 1: you have the other group investigating the Russians or you
Speaker 1: mean the attorneys, the attorneys, um, and you get the feeling.
Speaker 1: And the doctor he's sort of one of those is
Speaker 1: sort of like what he was. He's another added character.
Speaker 1: That's good. There's some person who is sort of suspicious.
Speaker 1: He's like, this doesn't really match up, and and he's
Speaker 1: great in the movie. But what's interesting that hit me
Speaker 1: last night, after all the times I've seen this is
Speaker 1: they are all I think. I think they think they're
Speaker 1: after a con man. Uh. They don't come out and
Speaker 1: really say it, but they're like, something stinks here, like
Speaker 1: this guy's putting one over on us. But like you
Speaker 1: said earlier, that's not the case. He is a mystery
Speaker 1: man and he and there is no documentation. There is
Speaker 1: a mystery to be solved. But he's not cunning anybody, right, Right,
Speaker 1: there was that great scene where you know, he has
Speaker 1: the FBI director and the CIA director and he's like,
Speaker 1: all right, this guy, you know he's got it. You've
Speaker 1: burned his records. Neither of them know anything, but their
Speaker 1: own pride stops them from saying we don't know anything,
Speaker 1: because they're like, well, he's a man, and so in
Speaker 1: that point, they're not seeing in him what they want
Speaker 1: to see. It's like literally their own pride is you know,
Speaker 1: uh office skating their their own view, and they can't
Speaker 1: they can't admit that they don't know. So another series
Speaker 1: of chance where people's own fallacies and they're people's own
Speaker 1: sort of you know, problems with their own ego that
Speaker 1: they want, you know, allow this guy to move forward.
Speaker 1: That's right. Oh, I know the other the investigator that
Speaker 1: I was thinking was the the reporter from the Financial
Speaker 1: Times or whatever, because he's the first one that calls him.
Speaker 1: And that's such a great scene the phone call he gets, oh,
Speaker 1: and he's like he starts doing yoga, basically moving the
Speaker 1: phone away from his ear, like he doesn't even fully
Speaker 1: understand how the phone works. And this guy's like are
Speaker 1: you still there? Are you there? And he like has
Speaker 1: fully set the phone down because the television is on. Right,
Speaker 1: it's like my four year old right, and he's like,
Speaker 1: I've been on television because at that earlier scene he
Speaker 1: had been remember when he's like when he got hit
Speaker 1: by the car. He got hit by the car. He
Speaker 1: was standing there. That was a great moment because two
Speaker 1: thousand one disco version is is kind of fade out
Speaker 1: and he's standing there and there's like a moon and
Speaker 1: some something behind there to kind of ship, and he
Speaker 1: sees himself on a video recorder. So when they asked
Speaker 1: him to be on the talk show and he's like, yes,
Speaker 1: I've been on television again. Honest, he never lies. He
Speaker 1: never He's never anything. He's and at the same time
Speaker 1: as he's doing these idiotic things when people are not
Speaker 1: looking or you know, just or just watching television and
Speaker 1: saying these empty platitudes or well they're not even platitudes
Speaker 1: to him, they're just straight forward facts about gardening. You know.
Speaker 1: I just I wrote down some of the things that
Speaker 1: people were, you know, they what they called him. They
Speaker 1: called him smart and sensible, they called him level headed,
Speaker 1: they said, you don't play games with words, Chauncey. You're
Speaker 1: direct and straightforward. You know, you have the gift of
Speaker 1: being natural, you know. And then I feel safe with you.
Speaker 1: And then, uh, you know, you seem to be a
Speaker 1: truly peaceful man. And those are all those are true,
Speaker 1: you know. But and that's another thing about this is
Speaker 1: that he's never lied and deceiving and you know, uh,
Speaker 1: he's not trying to stay one step ahead of them.
Speaker 1: He's just which is in a way, I was trying
Speaker 1: to think of an equivalent to this movie where someone
Speaker 1: stumbling I think, and I haven't seen it since I
Speaker 1: was maybe ten years old, but like an early Tom
Speaker 1: Hanks movie where it's like The Man with the One
Speaker 1: Red Shoe, where it's like everybody, this is just some
Speaker 1: schmoll but everybody thinks he's some spy or something and
Speaker 1: doesn't realize it. But by chance, you know, somethings stumble
Speaker 1: into place. But you know, aside from that, I can't
Speaker 1: think of any other think Forrest Gump tried to do
Speaker 1: some of this stuff in a way more obvious and
Speaker 1: ham fisted and fisted way. Absolutely, um, I think I
Speaker 1: think it wanted to be it being there in some way,
Speaker 1: it's interesting. Yeah, you're not wrong. I don't even I
Speaker 1: don't know why I didn't think of that one, of course,
Speaker 1: of course, but the sort of slow, mentally challenged guy
Speaker 1: who stumbles through life makes every week and everybody loves him,
Speaker 1: and he thinks, but this is so much more real
Speaker 1: and substantial, and like the I mean, how I A
Speaker 1: should be played it. And I think he got someone
Speaker 1: else to help him write the script aside from the
Speaker 1: someone did, like a uncredited rewriter or whatever. But I
Speaker 1: think they made all the right moves. Um. One of
Speaker 1: my favorite shots early on that I wanted to mention
Speaker 1: was before he even goes to the second Old Man's house,
Speaker 1: when he's walking up the median toward the Capitol Building
Speaker 1: with with the the umbrella in the briefcase or the
Speaker 1: suitcase or whatever, and the cars are going on both
Speaker 1: sides of him, and again it's just that that childlike
Speaker 1: sort of thing, like I don't even know if he knows,
Speaker 1: like he'd never been in a car. He said, so,
Speaker 1: I've never been in an automobile, and he didn't know
Speaker 1: what an elevator was. And that was one of the
Speaker 1: great lines, is where the but the butler thinks he's
Speaker 1: this hilarious guy, like, how long do we stay in
Speaker 1: this room? This is the smallest room in the house,
Speaker 1: and he's like, oh, yeah, that's the smallest room. Card well,
Speaker 1: and then and that part is kind of sad later
Speaker 1: on when he gets in and the butler just sort
Speaker 1: of cracks up and then quickly apologizes and so I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: I thought you were gonna he's one of those great singers.
Speaker 1: But he feels bad about it, and I felt bad
Speaker 1: that he didn't that he felt bad. You know, it
Speaker 1: was one of the things because Chauncey couldn't say he
Speaker 1: just has Yeah, well that's the thing is to well
Speaker 1: and you know, I don't think we've got to this directly,
Speaker 1: but you know, we've talked about how people see what
Speaker 1: they want to see. But he's this sort of distinguished
Speaker 1: looking man with a placid face, and he's very well dressed.
Speaker 1: He has good posture, and he speaks slowly and deliberately,
Speaker 1: and the most people on the planet that means authority
Speaker 1: figure and so everybody projects onto him. This is someone
Speaker 1: with authority, and so that man was trying to he
Speaker 1: was he was trying to connect with him. He thought
Speaker 1: he was going to do with those jokes, and then
Speaker 1: suddenly he's like, oh, I can't do this because I've
Speaker 1: overstepped the line, and you know, in chances to sit
Speaker 1: and has no idea the first if I can kind
Speaker 1: of circle back right, you know, before he even before
Speaker 1: he even got uh Um into the house. The first
Speaker 1: time when this happens is where maybe right after the
Speaker 1: scene you were just talking about, where he walked down
Speaker 1: the meeting and he's near the White House or something
Speaker 1: and he sees a tree and he touches the tree
Speaker 1: and then he sees a police officer and says the
Speaker 1: stupidest He's like, this tree is sick. We need to
Speaker 1: help it. And because he's if if he was if
Speaker 1: he was a homeless black man, if it was if
Speaker 1: it was me or a teenager that said that, you know,
Speaker 1: that cop would be like, funk off and get out
Speaker 1: of here. But because of the way he looks and
Speaker 1: the way he's dressed, he literally calls it in. He
Speaker 1: calls it in because this guy looks like someone that
Speaker 1: you have to listen to. It's right, he could have
Speaker 1: been a senator or whatever. It's funny you were talking
Speaker 1: about the authority. There's that great scene later with once
Speaker 1: he only gets on TV and you see some of
Speaker 1: the reactions of the people from his past. And there
Speaker 1: is the African American woman who worked with him, as
Speaker 1: I guess she was like the housekeeper. Yeah, and she's like,
Speaker 1: this is a white man's world, to be sure, and
Speaker 1: this is nine And that was so relevant. Um, like
Speaker 1: you were talking about so many things I was picking
Speaker 1: up on, uh that it could have been in like
Speaker 1: a contemporary film. And she flat out says it. She's like, like,
Speaker 1: it is a white man's world, Like that guy doesn't
Speaker 1: have two brain cells rubbed together. Oh no, she she said,
Speaker 1: like Rice Putting tells a jackass. Ain't nothing but Rice
Speaker 1: putting between his ears. Such a great line rise putting
Speaker 1: between his ears a jackass. I love that. But and
Speaker 1: and I don't want to keep doing this. But that
Speaker 1: is not in the book either. Louise is dead in
Speaker 1: the interesting in the in the book, so I'm so
Speaker 1: glad that they brought her in. Yeah, that whole issue
Speaker 1: would have not would have not been addressed. And I
Speaker 1: think is one of the most important parts of the
Speaker 1: book and most of the like one of the most
Speaker 1: relevant things in the movie that continues on today. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's a comment on race, uh and uh,
Speaker 1: status and privilege. Oh, just so relevant to today, especially
Speaker 1: with what's going on in the White House right now.
Speaker 1: Uh someone who. I mean, the parallels are there with
Speaker 1: the television and yeah, I um, you know when I
Speaker 1: first when I rewatched this and then I started kind
Speaker 1: of reading up and there was all these pieces on
Speaker 1: this is exactly. It's being there all over again, and
Speaker 1: at first I kind of pushed back, not that I
Speaker 1: didn't see it, but I thought, well, there's some significant differences. First,
Speaker 1: the similarities we you know forty five are President now
Speaker 1: is obsessed with television. This guy's obsessed with television. Forty
Speaker 1: five is uh he says things and tweets things, and
Speaker 1: then people interpret them in different ways and see read
Speaker 1: what they want to read and hear what they want
Speaker 1: to hear. Those are both there. But of course our
Speaker 1: president is sort of really kind of a hateful and
Speaker 1: sort of he is and I he's a con man,
Speaker 1: whereas uh, you know, Chauncey Chance is pure. He's he's
Speaker 1: an he's an innocent. He doesn't even realize he's an innocent.
Speaker 1: He doesn't you know, he's almost he's almost not sentient
Speaker 1: in a way. I mean he's almost like a single
Speaker 1: cell amiba that just goes from television to to lunch.
Speaker 1: Louise cooks me lunch. You know. Yeah. It's interesting in
Speaker 1: the in the framework of looking at a film character
Speaker 1: because a lot of times you either identify or there's
Speaker 1: something about the character that like he plays it so
Speaker 1: just flat that it's interesting that you root for him, Um,
Speaker 1: like you want him to be okay, but why you
Speaker 1: want him you know, you're like you worry that he's
Speaker 1: about to be found out, when it really he really
Speaker 1: should be found out because he could really do damage
Speaker 1: to the world if somebody misinterprets something he said, and
Speaker 1: he would probably be taking care in some way, he
Speaker 1: would probably be put somewhere. But instead he's falling into
Speaker 1: like he's like a breath away from the White House
Speaker 1: by the end of this movie exactly, he's you know,
Speaker 1: paddling around with a Russian diplomat and that's another great Uh,
Speaker 1: that's another great you know, um, misunderstanding or reading what
Speaker 1: you want to read the guys like you know, I
Speaker 1: think you you must or he says, we're not too
Speaker 1: far apart you and I, and he goes, yes, our
Speaker 1: chairs are next to each other, you know, and then
Speaker 1: he got you know, the Russian guy spins into this
Speaker 1: narrative and then he's like, I think you like Kree
Speaker 1: loss fables and I looked up Cree los ables. It
Speaker 1: was basically a Russian guy who did a lot of
Speaker 1: sort of you know, uh a fable. So he started
Speaker 1: with Esop and then kind of moved into more Slavic
Speaker 1: culture stuff. But then he just recites some of one
Speaker 1: I guess in Russian and you know, in Chance giggles
Speaker 1: because he's never he talked funny. It's basically probably was
Speaker 1: going on in his mind. And because he laughed, and
Speaker 1: because it was a joke, he's like I knew it,
Speaker 1: knew you spoke. And then I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: how far can this go? And apparently it could almost
Speaker 1: go to the presidency. Well it's interesting because Ruby is
Speaker 1: four and a half, and um, you remember this from
Speaker 1: when your kids were young pre sarcasm, before they understand
Speaker 1: what that means everything is. So it's like Chauncey, everything's
Speaker 1: face value, everything is taken is what the worlds are
Speaker 1: and literal that is coming out of your mouth. And
Speaker 1: I will be sarcastic about stuff like, oh, that's that's fantastic,
Speaker 1: that's great, and she's like, why did you say fantastic?
Speaker 1: How could you say that like a sarcasm? Ruby will
Speaker 1: understand it one day. But he plays it like that,
Speaker 1: except he doesn't even have the personality of a four
Speaker 1: year old, you know, he plays it just so flat. Um,
Speaker 1: it was pretty risky, I think because it's not a
Speaker 1: lot to draw you in. Uh. It very much leaves
Speaker 1: you on the sidelines as a viewer, I think because
Speaker 1: you can't relate to the guy. You're rooting for him,
Speaker 1: but not because you know, Forrest Gump, they took it
Speaker 1: too far in the other direction. They made you know, well,
Speaker 1: he had a personality where where a chance is a
Speaker 1: blank canvas and everybody just paints on him. They just
Speaker 1: paint what they want on him. And he's like you whatever,
Speaker 1: the empty empty vessel or whatever Sellers himself said, He's
Speaker 1: just this empty canvas that people project what they want
Speaker 1: to see on him. Where you know, guys like the
Speaker 1: President or Forrest Gump, they have, you know, for better
Speaker 1: or worse, they have their own opinions and personality, those
Speaker 1: kind of quirks that come through where this guy is uh,
Speaker 1: you know, not even I was gonna say a shape shifter.
Speaker 1: But he's not trying to shape shift. He's just this
Speaker 1: thing that you know, shows you what you want to see. Yep.
Speaker 1: Everyone is projecting onto him what they want to hear.
Speaker 1: And it can get a little frustrating at times too,
Speaker 1: but not because like someone listened to him, he really
Speaker 1: has something to say, because he doesn't. Um. They are
Speaker 1: like the man. I think he's fresh spect he's so enlightening,
Speaker 1: you're just like okay, or he's so funny he stows straightforward. Uh.
Speaker 1: Shirley McClain. That that the love making scene, you know,
Speaker 1: one of the one of the great lines is I
Speaker 1: like to watch to watch and she of course takes
Speaker 1: that as as I wanted. He wants me to masturbate
Speaker 1: in front of him. Right. One of the things that
Speaker 1: they cut out of the movie and probably understandable for
Speaker 1: the time nine seventy nine was remember the gay character
Speaker 1: comes up and says, if you know, would you have
Speaker 1: you ever had sex with a man. Somehow it gets
Speaker 1: to I liked I like to watch, and he goes
Speaker 1: hold on I'll go get Warreden, you know, which was hilarious.
Speaker 1: Um in the book, he actually goes up with somebody
Speaker 1: too really and the guy takes his clothes off and
Speaker 1: starts masturbating and he gets his shoe on him or whatever.
Speaker 1: But in in chance his mind he thinks the guy
Speaker 1: sick because he's twitching and moaning and right, and so
Speaker 1: he comes back downstairs where you basicals, Oh I was
Speaker 1: with YadA YadA, he was sick. Oh, you're so considerate
Speaker 1: taking care of him. Another case where just these and
Speaker 1: these and and you think when he's happening, how how
Speaker 1: is this going to happen? Yeah, but it comes through
Speaker 1: stumbles through it something. Yeah, I think it's interesting. The
Speaker 1: Mr Magoo, that's who he reminds me of. Mr McGoo.
Speaker 1: It just came to me. But like Mr McGoo was
Speaker 1: just walking through life and he would walk off the
Speaker 1: side of the building and it would just happen to
Speaker 1: be when the elevator cage got there, or or he
Speaker 1: would land on a bank robber and everybody would think, oh,
Speaker 1: you saved the day. But you know he's sort of
Speaker 1: totally Yeah, I see more comparison to that than Forrest
Speaker 1: gump me. Yeah, I thought it was interesting how he
Speaker 1: handled death because he faces it twice with the both
Speaker 1: of the old men in his life, and he immediately
Speaker 1: just kind of turns to the TV uh in both
Speaker 1: cases or leaves like that's his his blanket essentially. Um,
Speaker 1: he doesn't understand what's going on. But again with like
Speaker 1: there's never any emotion at all. Um. And I think
Speaker 1: people read that as like a stoicism, right. You know,
Speaker 1: there there's a single tear in that last scene. There is,
Speaker 1: there is and that and which was that much more
Speaker 1: powerful because there's nothing before that. It was like he
Speaker 1: really finally gave you something. He really he really cared
Speaker 1: for that guy, where the guy he lived with his
Speaker 1: entire life. He was ready to watch Captain Kangaroo, you know,
Speaker 1: as soon as he died. But but not to diminish
Speaker 1: what you're saying, but there's so little emotion and he
Speaker 1: and then he may have had that tear and gone
Speaker 1: right back to he would have tuned out into anything
Speaker 1: that was on television. Yeah, that's really important though, Like
Speaker 1: they did, they gave you that one little nugget, that
Speaker 1: one tiny little tear, which was super impactful. Uh. And
Speaker 1: you know as the it feels like a sort of
Speaker 1: a seventies mystery in some ways, like the net is
Speaker 1: closing on him as the movie goes on. The whole
Speaker 1: sort of second hour of the movie has these various
Speaker 1: storylines where everybody's investigating him. They're getting closer and closer,
Speaker 1: and like there's nothing on this guy's you know, they're
Speaker 1: taking his fingerprints off of a glass. Yeah, it's like
Speaker 1: for real, they know that his suits were made in
Speaker 1: nineteen that's right, you know, That's that's all they know
Speaker 1: about him, you know, no fingerprints, no hospital records, yea.
Speaker 1: And so they's made into this man of mystery and
Speaker 1: he's just do just kind of walking around. I could
Speaker 1: see them remaking this movie. I hope they don't. I
Speaker 1: hope they don't. This is one of those certain remakes
Speaker 1: would be good, and it would depend on who it is.
Speaker 1: I mean, I would see it if it came out,
Speaker 1: But I hadn't even thought about that. That should be
Speaker 1: something I should have prepared for this for this podcast.
Speaker 1: And if it was remade, who who? Who could pull
Speaker 1: it off? Man? Um? I don't know, Like I see
Speaker 1: Paul Rudd doing it. I mean, even though he's a
Speaker 1: the animated guy. Yeah, see, I can see him doing
Speaker 1: the flat I can see him pulling that off. Or
Speaker 1: if they did, if they wanted to, like I'm sure
Speaker 1: like a Jim Carrey or Will Ferrell would die to
Speaker 1: do something like this, to really kind of take a turn. Yea,
Speaker 1: either of them, Either of them could pull this off.
Speaker 1: But there's so much here that is so relevant because
Speaker 1: these days it would be internet research and there would
Speaker 1: be parallels. But you know, you played the president in
Speaker 1: a different way because Jack Warden isn't a bad guy
Speaker 1: in this movie necessarily as the president. Um, he gets
Speaker 1: the endorsement, which is interesting. How would this movie play
Speaker 1: out if it was in in present day with with
Speaker 1: social media and then in the two hour news cycle,
Speaker 1: it would be all it would be more like it
Speaker 1: wouldn't be nearly as quiet and slow Bernie. It would
Speaker 1: be a bigger deal. Um, the President would be like
Speaker 1: some big buffoon. I think you'd just be more over
Speaker 1: the top and kind of every way. Can you imagine
Speaker 1: Chaunsey Gardner's Instagram feed? I mean would totally work. He
Speaker 1: would just be staring off in his sunset and it
Speaker 1: would be like, flowers are strong. It's like Jack Handy,
Speaker 1: Jack Nice, Nice Nice. I think you turned me onto
Speaker 1: Jack Handy too. I'm just gonna say you turned me
Speaker 1: onto everything, Jinkie. I'm just glad I turned you on, sweetheart. So, uh,
Speaker 1: I guess you know we can get into the ending. Yeah,
Speaker 1: one of the classic most most classic, un uh not unambiguous,
Speaker 1: ambiguous endings in movie history. I think the old man dies,
Speaker 1: like you mentioned before, the Paul Bearers. You hear the whispers,
Speaker 1: the way they intercut that last scene, it's just so great.
Speaker 1: The editing is just so wonderful. Did you notice the
Speaker 1: Illuminati sign on the grave? Yeah? Wow, that was that.
Speaker 1: I didn't notice that the last time I saw Yeah,
Speaker 1: the Illuminati, And I think it even says life is
Speaker 1: a state of mind on the grave, which is the
Speaker 1: last line of the movie. Right, So the President is
Speaker 1: eulogizing Rand and true to form or true to his nature.
Speaker 1: Chauncey or Chance has wandered away into the woods to
Speaker 1: look at flowers and trees and to be himself. And
Speaker 1: he and if you've never, like, if you haven't seen
Speaker 1: the movie and you want to, and you've gotten this far,
Speaker 1: stop listening, because I don't want to ruin it. It
Speaker 1: is one of the great great endings in movie history.
Speaker 1: All right, if you're still here, uh in the book,
Speaker 1: like we said in the original script, it doesn't in
Speaker 1: this way. But he goes to the edge of the
Speaker 1: pond and walks starts walking across it on water, And
Speaker 1: if you wondered if he was really walking on water,
Speaker 1: he kind of pauses and then sticks his umbrella down
Speaker 1: into it and then gets up and which apparently was
Speaker 1: an improv moment, was it. Yeah, Peter Seller stopped and
Speaker 1: put the umbrella down. But you know, they built a
Speaker 1: little pier a few inches below the waterline. And one
Speaker 1: of the great filmmaking decisions of all time, I think,
Speaker 1: is to change that ending, because it really makes It's
Speaker 1: one of those endings that makes you rethink everything you've seen.
Speaker 1: And two bottles of wine later after the movie, you're
Speaker 1: discussing it with people what you think it means? So
Speaker 1: let's hear it. What do you think it means? I
Speaker 1: wanted to ask you first, but uh, well, I've kind
Speaker 1: of changed over time. I think when I first watched it,
Speaker 1: I thought it was this whole comment on on religion
Speaker 1: in general too. I thought, uh, oh, this is Jesus.
Speaker 1: This he is, He's not, he is not Jesus. But
Speaker 1: it's basically trying to say Jesus. Maybe Jesus was dimwitted,
Speaker 1: or maybe Jesus was just a normal guy and people
Speaker 1: saw in him what they wanted to see, and then,
Speaker 1: you know, fast forward a hundred years of interpretation and
Speaker 1: interpretation and misinterpretation, and then he's all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: maybe this guy really was just a carpenter who told
Speaker 1: a couple of stories about sheep and goats and do
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? And uh, and and then
Speaker 1: it was sort attorney So I thought it was this
Speaker 1: total commentary on that now, um, you know, in a
Speaker 1: part of it, though, I thought that was kind of
Speaker 1: a a little bit. Yeah, I kind of thought that
Speaker 1: was a bit of a cheap joke at the end
Speaker 1: because there was no but it was sort of a
Speaker 1: one two punch. And maybe that's where I was too,
Speaker 1: and I was cheap joke all of this, Jesus is
Speaker 1: a dumbass, do I mean? And I was like, and uh,
Speaker 1: but maybe at that time in my life that that's
Speaker 1: what I I projected onto that. Yeah, this is a
Speaker 1: very sharp criticism of organized religion. And I was the
Speaker 1: same way dude, and we were both church boys. So yeah,
Speaker 1: and maybe that's that's just where I was at that point,
Speaker 1: and I, oh, it's all the sham and blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: Now I've I've kind of looked back at it as
Speaker 1: sort of a life as a state of mind, which
Speaker 1: is the last line in it, and it's sort of
Speaker 1: this idea of, uh, you know, he's he's been able
Speaker 1: to do everything. It's almost like he's some supernatural creature
Speaker 1: that can do whatever he wants and people are sort
Speaker 1: of charmed by it. And so the water is just
Speaker 1: as is under his sway as much as anyone else.
Speaker 1: Is that that is that the accurate? Well, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: there's no right answer for sure, because is there any
Speaker 1: not at all. I looked and there's no there is
Speaker 1: no right answer. I think he very much wanted it
Speaker 1: to be open to interpretation. Um. I saw it as
Speaker 1: a religious allegory as well when I was younger, but
Speaker 1: now it's a little bit more like he doesn't know
Speaker 1: he can't walk on water right, right, right, And that's
Speaker 1: true to his character to make that leap of faith,
Speaker 1: not religious, but um, to step out onto it Uh,
Speaker 1: but it's really happening. So, I mean that's the cool
Speaker 1: thing about movies like this. I think it's or is
Speaker 1: it really happening, like you don't have to if you
Speaker 1: start nitpicking? Or is this the final metaphor? Right right?
Speaker 1: This is this the final metaphor that that we are
Speaker 1: projecting onto you everybody, you know, everybody thinks he's speaking
Speaker 1: in metaphors. Really funny the entire time, totally what it is.
Speaker 1: You know, it's like the characters spend the whole movie
Speaker 1: doing that, and at the very end the audience is
Speaker 1: doing that. Yeah. Wow, I think we're figuring it out.
Speaker 1: It's such a great ending though, and it's really it's
Speaker 1: one of those that you know, when they do these
Speaker 1: big Oscar Award, uh super cuts of all these great
Speaker 1: moments in cinema history. Inevitably there's a shot of Johncey
Speaker 1: Gardner walking as you always see it. It's like they're
Speaker 1: singing in the rain. There's uh, there's rain man, there's this,
Speaker 1: there's Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn, Like
Speaker 1: this is one of those cinematic moments. Uh, and it
Speaker 1: almost wasn't there. But do you think this movie is
Speaker 1: on everybody's radar. You you're more attuned to those things now,
Speaker 1: But I always thought of this is sort of this
Speaker 1: small little film that I knew, But I don't know
Speaker 1: if it's of those I think as a whole. Like
Speaker 1: when I list off last detail in Harold and Maud
Speaker 1: like film, people know what those movies are. But when
Speaker 1: you say great filmmakers of the seventies, people probably start
Speaker 1: talking about Scorsese and and uh, well Lucas has to
Speaker 1: be debated. But um, I don't think how Ashby is
Speaker 1: on the tops of everyone's list, and he should be
Speaker 1: because that run of films was incredible. It was, and
Speaker 1: he had a way about him and his movies Harold
Speaker 1: and Maud, you know they were all they weren't very
Speaker 1: just sort of straightforward Hollywood films. He always had a
Speaker 1: unique angle on everything. I think it was really a
Speaker 1: great matching of material, actor, director all coming together for
Speaker 1: It's like it's really a combination special sauce. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Walking across that water just the best. I could watch
Speaker 1: the ending a hundred times and I'm trying. I think
Speaker 1: Mad Magazine ruined it for me. I didn't believe saw
Speaker 1: the magazine version of that first. But I mean I
Speaker 1: didn't see this movie until much later. It might have
Speaker 1: been college. That's probably where I saw it first. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I didn't see it as a kid. And
Speaker 1: I talk a lot on the show those early college
Speaker 1: years when because of people like you and then getting
Speaker 1: the job at Vision Video and really going down that
Speaker 1: road that early nineties independent cinema boom, from Jarmish to
Speaker 1: Spike Lee. It was just like it was such a
Speaker 1: great time there was to be one years old and
Speaker 1: like really exploring that. The whole room full of movies
Speaker 1: to watch. Yeah, whole room full of movies. I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean we would sit around and record, uh, what's
Speaker 1: his name? Who was the preacher they ended up doing
Speaker 1: the Reverend Bob Tilton. Reverend Bob Tilton. Put your hand
Speaker 1: on the screen. Put your hand on the screen. You
Speaker 1: were YouTube man, Like later on on YouTube people would
Speaker 1: do him like farting and stuff. Whereas you guys would
Speaker 1: just record that ship off late night TV and we
Speaker 1: would sit around and watch it, and I had tons
Speaker 1: of stuff I remember us watching that, uh that you know,
Speaker 1: haralda were Vera getting hit with a chair and the
Speaker 1: nose like in slow Mo play by play every time.
Speaker 1: I can't. You guys were YouTube every time I came over,
Speaker 1: you had something on a video cassette that you were
Speaker 1: recorded that we would all sit around and watch. And last,
Speaker 1: who was the tap dancing Bandit? Do you remember that? Jessico? Yes, Jesso, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that era of stuff, right man. I totally forgot about that.
Speaker 1: He was great. And what was his name? Ye oh,
Speaker 1: I can't remember exactly what it was. It was Jessico,
Speaker 1: but he was the whatever tap dancing bandit or something
Speaker 1: like that. And then um, we would listen to uh
Speaker 1: Dr Dre's The Chronic and play street Fighter and Mortal Kombat.
Speaker 1: That was That was Clay and Jason Hughes. I was
Speaker 1: not a big fan of Dre, but we did. Really no,
Speaker 1: it was never a big I mean, I liked a
Speaker 1: lot of hip hop. Im was born in Public Enemy
Speaker 1: back then. But Luna and Camper, Camper van Bato and
Speaker 1: there was tons of stuff we all love to know.
Speaker 1: It's the best. I still love Luna. I just saw
Speaker 1: them recently and I'm trying to get Chuck d on
Speaker 1: the show and I finally got an insider connection. Who's
Speaker 1: someone who knows him personally and they talked to him
Speaker 1: and he was like, he literally has like a hundred
Speaker 1: interviews lined up, and he said, but you know, I'm
Speaker 1: into it, but it's not gonna anytime soon. If if
Speaker 1: that ever happens, I'll let you know so you can
Speaker 1: like accidentally be in Atlanta. Yeah, yeah, I would love that.
Speaker 1: I would love that. Yeah, he's he's a guy that's
Speaker 1: like high on my list for you know, dream guests.
Speaker 1: I would love to sit down with him. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's no Christopher Walking talking about foot loose, right, dude.
Speaker 1: I couldn't even listen to that. Really well, I was
Speaker 1: so uncomfortable for you. Well you knew it was a gag, right, No,
Speaker 1: that wasn't real. That was a guy that was Kevin Pollock.
Speaker 1: So you thought that, well no, I just I just
Speaker 1: saw it. It was in aprol Fool's episode. Oh okay,
Speaker 1: because I was like, what the hell? And so then
Speaker 1: you're like, so, I'm so nervous about this is so
Speaker 1: I don't know if your publicists do that, and then awkward,
Speaker 1: and then he started and it was too awkward. I
Speaker 1: was like I was, I was so nervous for you.
Speaker 1: I turned it off. I didn't even see the date
Speaker 1: when it came out. That's funny. It was an April
Speaker 1: fool thing. Kevin Pollock, the actors, is a master impressionist
Speaker 1: and we cook that one up classic class. It's funny
Speaker 1: because some people are fooled and some people are like,
Speaker 1: that was the worst walking I've ever heard. I'm like,
Speaker 1: what are you talking about? It was great? Oh dude,
Speaker 1: this is so much fun. You got any final thoughts
Speaker 1: on being there? No? No, I think I think we
Speaker 1: I think we cracked it. Yeah. I think it's the
Speaker 1: final metaphor. We are the painters of the canvas man. Nice. Uh,
Speaker 1: you should come on again next time you come through town.
Speaker 1: I'd like to make this a regular thing. Yeah, right on.
Speaker 1: That fun thanks brother, Right, all right? Perfect? That was great? Yeah,
Speaker 1: very cool. I had the questions answered to. You have
Speaker 1: some questions? Oh hold on? Yeah? Yeah, oh wait, wait
Speaker 1: before we go, we still recording. Uh, we gotta do
Speaker 1: the five questions. I haven't done this with a real
Speaker 1: guest in so long. We've been in so many like
Speaker 1: round tables people in the office that it fell off
Speaker 1: my radar. So what was let me see if I remember,
Speaker 1: and what was the first movie you saw in the theater. Um,
Speaker 1: it was funny. I had, you know, since I'm in
Speaker 1: the States. I went and asked my mom about it,
Speaker 1: and she says that the first movie I saw was
Speaker 1: Herbie the love Bug Fox at the Fox, like you know,
Speaker 1: probably in a stroller or something when it came out
Speaker 1: when the Fox still showed movies. But I mean, this
Speaker 1: is just how many brain cells are gone. Only the
Speaker 1: first movie I remember seeing in a theater, um kind
Speaker 1: of there it mixes with your second question about our movie.
Speaker 1: I remember sneaking into d C cab Oh. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: one like I think Bill Maher and Mr T or somebody,
Speaker 1: isn't it like some ridiculous movies? The first time I
Speaker 1: saw boobs on a screen and I remember that vividly.
Speaker 1: So at TC. Yeah. Um, so that's the first movie
Speaker 1: that I remember that I still remember on the screen.
Speaker 1: I'm sure I saw some you know, I probably saw
Speaker 1: Bambi or something like that that I don't remember. But
Speaker 1: sneaking in so first R rated movie DC CAP. I
Speaker 1: think before that, the first R rated movie I saw
Speaker 1: was Halloween in Gatlinburg in a hotel room. Cable my cousin,
Speaker 1: older cousin like foolishly said, Hey, we're gonna go watch
Speaker 1: Halloween in our hotel room. Do you want to watch it?
Speaker 1: I don't know what we were in Gatlinburg for, but
Speaker 1: and I went sure. I didn't even know what it was.
Speaker 1: I thought it was like a Charlie Brown special. And
Speaker 1: I saw Halloween at whatever age it came out and
Speaker 1: was on cable in a hotel room, and I was
Speaker 1: afraid of the dark for years after that. Halloween really
Speaker 1: scared the ship out of me and so so. But
Speaker 1: I I vividly, vividly remember that. And then how were you?
Speaker 1: I should have looked up when, you know, like I
Speaker 1: should have done sort of a backwards but I had
Speaker 1: to be ten, you know, maybe I would way too
Speaker 1: young to see that. For sure. I'd have to look
Speaker 1: at when it came out. I mean what Jamie Lee
Speaker 1: Curtis was like Siego, so so I must have been
Speaker 1: much younger than horror movies. Not really, My girl is
Speaker 1: into it right now, and that was from Stranger Things
Speaker 1: she went from because she's the same age as like
Speaker 1: a protagonists. So I started looking up horror movies and
Speaker 1: of course, you know, preparing for this episode, I went
Speaker 1: and listen to Evil Dead because Evil Dead Too is
Speaker 1: one of my favorite movies of all time. In Army
Speaker 1: of Darkness. I used to watch that every Halloween until
Speaker 1: Keiko just couldn't take it anymore. Like nope, because her
Speaker 1: birthday is Halloween, and she's like, I do not want
Speaker 1: to spend my birthday watching blood gush. Can we do
Speaker 1: something else? She Actually, she didn't say that, but it
Speaker 1: was I need to watch I'm I think my girl
Speaker 1: is uh is old enough to watch it now. Now
Speaker 1: you know, a year ago I tried to show her
Speaker 1: Kung Fu Hustle and it was too violent for her.
Speaker 1: This is just this. You'll be looking for order this
Speaker 1: with Ruby when she gets within a year. She wants
Speaker 1: to watch it with me, do you know what I mean? Scary?
Speaker 1: Which I'm too scared. So I maybe watching some horror
Speaker 1: movies with her if she goes in that direction. But
Speaker 1: when I've tried to suggest something, she's like, Dad, you
Speaker 1: don't get it. I want to watch it because it
Speaker 1: has people my age. You know, I wanted to watch
Speaker 1: Stranger Things because there's people my age. I don't want
Speaker 1: to go see people stabbing each other unless there's a
Speaker 1: thirteen year old on screen. It's like okay, alright, so
Speaker 1: and she sounds great. Yeah, she's cool. Uh what is
Speaker 1: number three? UM? I think it was Have you ever
Speaker 1: walked out or would you walk out of a movie?
Speaker 1: All right? You? Um? In general, I don't go to
Speaker 1: the theater as much and I walk out of a
Speaker 1: movie with you? Did? Do you remember close close? What
Speaker 1: was it we walked out of something and went into
Speaker 1: True Romance again? Right? Demolition Man? Demolition Man's that's the
Speaker 1: last movie I can remember walking out of. I probably
Speaker 1: have walked out. I didn't know if you were with me.
Speaker 1: I remember very it was you and Chappie and maybe
Speaker 1: maybe Clay I I can't remember, but I remember Brett
Speaker 1: being there for sure, because I think he was the
Speaker 1: first one that said. He was like, let's let's get
Speaker 1: out of here, and we went and saw True Romance again.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, but I mean that was that was
Speaker 1: a great decision. So listen. I have walked out of
Speaker 1: movies before, but I can't think of any. I think
Speaker 1: maybe I've walked out of one that was too scary
Speaker 1: for the kids when they were like young. Can't but
Speaker 1: I can't even remember what it was because he were
Speaker 1: It's weird. In like places like Malaysia and Thailand, you
Speaker 1: will go to see Frozen and they will have a
Speaker 1: trailer for a slasher film before it. They don't match
Speaker 1: it up, and they don't match it up, and so
Speaker 1: the kids would be like, we have to leave now,
Speaker 1: and it's like, no, Frozen is not gonna be like this. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I still remember in Chang Mai or something. But uh,
Speaker 1: there's some movie that I that I just misjudged how
Speaker 1: they were and I've walked out, but I can't even
Speaker 1: remember what it is now. I remember seeing Pulp Fiction
Speaker 1: on opening day with you guys too, and that was
Speaker 1: such a big deal becau as the Reservoir Dogs thing
Speaker 1: like that was. That was when Quentin Tarantino was like
Speaker 1: an unknown or at least unknown to us. I'm sure
Speaker 1: he was off a lot of people, but like because
Speaker 1: of Dogs, we were all like primed for. They have
Speaker 1: to go for this like noon showing Friday of Reserve Politician.
Speaker 1: I think we went to go see the opening the
Speaker 1: opening night of was it brom Stoker's Dracula together, because
Speaker 1: well I was just a big Gary right back then.
Speaker 1: I thought could do no wrong. So now learned that
Speaker 1: he can do well, he's usually doing wrong to fund
Speaker 1: some movie he wants to make himself like that. Uh.
Speaker 1: Number four, I think is when I usually tailored to
Speaker 1: the guest. Right, boy, what should I go with here? Then? Jinkie? Um,
Speaker 1: all right, how about this? You're an artist? Uh? What
Speaker 1: movie about an artist is like your favorite? That's a
Speaker 1: good question. I've got a few that come to my
Speaker 1: mind already, but I don't know if I like Boski
Speaker 1: Yat the first one that came to mind that was good.
Speaker 1: There was one about Jasper John's that Ed Harris was in.
Speaker 1: I didn't like. I don't know he was. Oh no,
Speaker 1: I'm Jackson Pollock. Thank you, thank you, I said Jasper John. Um.
Speaker 1: Trying to think of some others. There's one with Willem
Speaker 1: Dafoe doing Van Govan that I haven't seen yet. I
Speaker 1: thought I really liked Salma hi x movie on on
Speaker 1: Free to Carlo. But also because now I know the
Speaker 1: whole back story. I don't know if you read that
Speaker 1: whole piece about her experience with Harvey Kai and how
Speaker 1: he bullied her. What did I say, poor guy? Um?
Speaker 1: So anyway, Weinstein was, you know, such a creep. And
Speaker 1: then but for her. To have been able to pull
Speaker 1: that off with all of that makes me love that
Speaker 1: movie even more. Yeah, for sure, But what are some
Speaker 1: others I'm just maybe I'm just drawing a black baskot.
Speaker 1: It's certainly a great one. Um. Which is the one
Speaker 1: that uh? Or maybe I'm thinking because he is an artist,
Speaker 1: Julian Schnabl Schnabel, but he didn't make a movie about
Speaker 1: an artist, but his films are great. Yeah, I liked him.
Speaker 1: I like the stuff that Berk's husband did too. He's
Speaker 1: a he's an installation artist, really famous guy that I
Speaker 1: can't remember his name. It's interesting. Andy Warhol has been
Speaker 1: in a bunch of someone playing Andy Warhol has been
Speaker 1: in a bunch of films From the Doors too. You know,
Speaker 1: He's popped up in a lot of movies as a character,
Speaker 1: but no one's ever really nailed a good shot. Andy
Speaker 1: Warhol was good. But that was that where Bowie played him,
Speaker 1: I can't remember. But that was more about the girl
Speaker 1: who shot him than him. But um, yeah, a good
Speaker 1: Warhol biopic would be interesting. A good Warhol biopic would
Speaker 1: be good. Um. Maybe a question who would I want
Speaker 1: to see? Uh? Well, a Dolly film would be great
Speaker 1: a great Dolly film about Dolly, not you know, not Dolly,
Speaker 1: I mean Dolly directing. I don't if you ever saw that.
Speaker 1: That may have been some sort of clay in Jason
Speaker 1: YouTube thing. Did you ever see Dolly's films, like the
Speaker 1: ones he did with Disney or the ones he did
Speaker 1: on his own, I don't think so. Dolly has this
Speaker 1: one bit where this I don't know is this strange
Speaker 1: little midget comes up and hands him a piece of
Speaker 1: foil and there's like a bust of some Greek god
Speaker 1: sitting on a piano next to him, and as he's
Speaker 1: looking at the screen, he's literally looking at you eye
Speaker 1: to eye, and he's fiddling with this piece of foil
Speaker 1: in his hand and he's talking and then he just
Speaker 1: shows it to you and he's made like a freeze, like, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, he's made the face of the bust as
Speaker 1: he's talking to you. It's insane. It's insane. So I
Speaker 1: would love to see that. We actually went to his mausoleum.
Speaker 1: It's a little bit north of Barcelona, and it's like
Speaker 1: it's like it's a museum in itself. It's incredible. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I would definitely like to see a movie about uh,
Speaker 1: Dolly's life. I remember you telling me, I gotta got
Speaker 1: so many specific memories about you from college when you
Speaker 1: told me about when Dolly was on the Tonight Show
Speaker 1: and he put a duck on his head and said,
Speaker 1: Dolly is not crazy. That's right. Like I remember you
Speaker 1: telling me that story one after it's not crazy, or
Speaker 1: that's right, that's right. So Dolly would be great. You know,
Speaker 1: I'd like to see a moneyball type movie about Coons,
Speaker 1: because Coon's is a controversial guy in how he produces
Speaker 1: his art and how he gets money. Same with Hurst,
Speaker 1: Damien Hurst, love him or hate him? Uh, he has
Speaker 1: he has played the art world and ways of course Banksy,
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, there you go. You want to talk
Speaker 1: about art, art movies about artists, I consider Banksy and
Speaker 1: artist and Exit to the Gift Shop. That was absolutely brilliant. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was great and it was funny. Actually the way
Speaker 1: we watched that was we bootlegged it. And this this
Speaker 1: he would have appreciate. Dutch friend of mine basically scout
Speaker 1: scouted out um a roof in a Monte Sando in
Speaker 1: this area of Tokyo where we used to hang out,
Speaker 1: and so it got a projection screen and had a
Speaker 1: screening of it on the roof on like a projection screen,
Speaker 1: so we watched it. It was very it felt it
Speaker 1: felt that way. We all felt like we were rebelling
Speaker 1: in one way or another, but we had to be
Speaker 1: quiet because it was like a residential building and nobody
Speaker 1: knew we were up there. But it was fun. Are
Speaker 1: you still doing stuff? You still painting or dude? I
Speaker 1: wish I was. No. I mean, you know, I still
Speaker 1: do some photography and try to nurture that in my
Speaker 1: kids too. Um, I haven't done I haven't done any
Speaker 1: real creative things for myself in a while, and I
Speaker 1: need to remedy that. I still had that crazy chalk
Speaker 1: that you did for me. I did one for you, Yes, dude,
Speaker 1: you gave me one when we when we moved away. Wow,
Speaker 1: it's like a crazy sort of fluorescent creature eating his
Speaker 1: own hand. He's doing something. I've got it in my closet,
Speaker 1: have kept it all these years. Next time you pull
Speaker 1: it out, snap a shot of it and send it
Speaker 1: to me, just I'd be curious to see what it is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So it's awesome. Um, and then what's your deal in
Speaker 1: the movie theater? What do you sit, what's your routine?
Speaker 1: Top depends on what country? Yeah, well yeah, I actually
Speaker 1: I put different things. As far as where I sit,
Speaker 1: I usually try to sit near the back on the aisle. Uh.
Speaker 1: And it depends on which way the bathroom is. But
Speaker 1: like you know, top top left center, do you know
Speaker 1: what I mean? Where I like to be your top
Speaker 1: right center. Um. As far as what I you know,
Speaker 1: eat in there, it all depends on the theater. In
Speaker 1: Japan you can bring in stuff you can just so.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'll carry in sushi rolls and cans of beer. Um.
Speaker 1: In Malaysia you have to buy stuff there, and they
Speaker 1: don't have butter popcorn. They have like Earl Gray tea
Speaker 1: flavored popcorn. Get that or else. Sneak stuff in um
Speaker 1: then uh, Spain usually just popcorn, butter popcorn. I used
Speaker 1: as a kid it was milk dots. But it was
Speaker 1: all milk dots. But then now it's popcorn. In Mexico, Uh,
Speaker 1: Mexico's theater, it's it's takis and beer. I was bring
Speaker 1: talkies and beer, but then uh, in Japan it would
Speaker 1: be beer in sembey that kind of stuff I just
Speaker 1: gave you that. I just brought a few little snacks
Speaker 1: for chap from from Japan, and I would bring a
Speaker 1: couple of those bags. And I've only seen one movie
Speaker 1: in a different country. Actually that's not true. I saw um,
Speaker 1: the most recent Spike Lee movie in Australia. Um. But
Speaker 1: I saw pulp fiction. Brett and I saw pulp fiction,
Speaker 1: and I guess it was where was that? We were
Speaker 1: in Vienna? All right? Okay, so we went and saw
Speaker 1: pulp fiction in Vienna. Awesome because we just wanted a
Speaker 1: foreign film experience, right, which wasn't a foreign film at
Speaker 1: all of course for us. But it was interesting. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean theaters they looked the same all over, you know.
Speaker 1: I mean the theaters in in Thailand or in Spain.
Speaker 1: You know, we're pretty much the same. The theater in Mexico.
Speaker 1: But the rules by which people, uh you know, experience
Speaker 1: that I think. I listened to the I forgot her name,
Speaker 1: but your Princess Bride episode and she was talking about
Speaker 1: how she was she was a susher and I am
Speaker 1: a I am a shusher too. I actually just did it.
Speaker 1: I did it when we went to go see Knives
Speaker 1: out the Night. My kids get embarrassed. But the woman
Speaker 1: in front of us was on her phone. I mean
Speaker 1: she wasn't talking. No, she wasn't talking, so this isn't shushing.
Speaker 1: But she was literally just like with her phone on
Speaker 1: all bright and I was just leaned over. It's like,
Speaker 1: excuse me, could you turn that off? You know, just
Speaker 1: for an hour and a half. And my kids like,
Speaker 1: oh god, what she did? What the lady do? She
Speaker 1: turned it off? Okay, you know, but in in in Mexico,
Speaker 1: it seems like every other person was doing that and
Speaker 1: I just would give up. I would get the people
Speaker 1: to turn it off near me. But in Taiwan ten,
Speaker 1: you know, ten fifteen years ago, people would answer the
Speaker 1: phone and well, I'm just in the movie, what are
Speaker 1: you doing? So? But I think those rules are changing
Speaker 1: but interesting. But yeah, but etiquette, movie etiquette. You know
Speaker 1: that you still get the same uh you get. You
Speaker 1: still get the same announcements, please turn off your please
Speaker 1: don't talk, but you know some people take those and suggestions.
Speaker 1: That's really interesting. Yeah, well, when you come back, we'll
Speaker 1: have to talk more about that, because that's fascinating to me.
Speaker 1: Sure would be great. It's like people talk, people love
Speaker 1: movies all over the world, and I think in America
Speaker 1: you get a very America centric mind set um. But
Speaker 1: it's like people love movies everywhere they do. And I'll
Speaker 1: leave you with this one fact that you know, if
Speaker 1: you find this stuff interesting, you can't find this interesting.
Speaker 1: When we were when we were living in Malaysia, we
Speaker 1: lived in Penang, this all island close to the thigh
Speaker 1: border and super fancy theaters. You know that we're freezing cold,
Speaker 1: like you know, I literally I walked into flip flops
Speaker 1: and I brought a fleece because it was so cold.
Speaker 1: But uh, when movies came there, And this is advice
Speaker 1: when people ask me about going to Malaysia if they
Speaker 1: want to go to a movie, which we recommend, it's
Speaker 1: a nice experience, but you need to see the movie
Speaker 1: right away because in Malaysia they have the latest Hollywoo
Speaker 1: with blockbusters in English. But then they also have movies
Speaker 1: in Bajasa, they have movies in Tamil, they have movies
Speaker 1: in uh Fukian, Chinese, in you know, Cantonese and Mandarin,
Speaker 1: and so the turnover is so fast because language version
Speaker 1: for like a week a week, unless it's like you know,
Speaker 1: Star Wars or something like that, but if it's just uh,
Speaker 1: if it's just the middle of the road blockbuster, you know,
Speaker 1: a knives Out would stay for a week, maybe four days.
Speaker 1: So it's like as soon as it comes, you gotta
Speaker 1: get we gotta go, we gotta go see it. That's
Speaker 1: so cool, awesome, all right, Well, thanks dude, Hey, my pleasure,
Speaker 1: and we'll definitely get you back in here again. I'd
Speaker 1: love that, all right, all right, everyone, I hope you
Speaker 1: enjoyed that as much as I did. I hope we
Speaker 1: did not talk too much about the old days to
Speaker 1: the detriment of the show, but we were catching up
Speaker 1: a little bit it and I hope you've got a
Speaker 1: nice little peek into that. Jason, it was so good
Speaker 1: to have him in here. I love him like a brother,
Speaker 1: and it was so good to reconnect. And we are
Speaker 1: going to keep in better touch from now on. We
Speaker 1: made that pledge to each other. A lot of great
Speaker 1: thoughts on being there. Just as I knew uh he would,
Speaker 1: I knew he'd be a great guest because Jason has
Speaker 1: a great taste and he is a smart dude. So
Speaker 1: thanks Jason for coming in here. Thanks to you all
Speaker 1: for listening, um, and we will see you next time.
Speaker 1: Body Crush has produced, edited, and engineered by Ramsey unt
Speaker 1: here in our home studio at Pont City Market, Atlanta, Georgia.
Speaker 1: For I Heart Radio. For more podcasts for my heart Radio,
Speaker 1: visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.