BONUS The Friday Show - The Best Bests
Guest:If you gave someone the script treatment for that car chase under the elevated tracks, everyone you gave it to would do it differently than this guy did it.
Guest:And a lot of the people you gave it to would do it in a similar way to each other.
Guest:But no one would do it the way this guy did, where he was like, I basically am going to make a documentary of racing cars.
Guest:And if we wind up killing someone, that's going to be a side effect of this.
Marc:Hey, Chris.
Marc:Brendan, how's it going?
Guest:It's going great.
Guest:It's another five-episode week.
Guest:How do you do it, man?
Guest:God bless you.
Guest:I don't fucking know, dude.
Guest:It's not something I would do regularly.
Guest:I mean, the weirdest thing is I do four episodes regularly now, which was doubling my workload.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And these clip shows...
Guest:Man, they, like, it's so funny.
Guest:I get it around my head.
Guest:Like, okay, just got to do the clip show and we'll be good.
Marc:And they take forever.
Marc:I bet.
Marc:I bet.
Marc:How do you decide what to put in there?
Marc:By being an editor.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You just have to, you have to listen to things or, I mean, like there are some that are recent enough that, you know, I had a good memory of them and be like, okay, this is specific.
Guest:You know, you want everything to kind of work with the theme.
Guest:Like, I don't want to just put something in there that's like Mark and Mark Ruffalo goofing around about
Guest:something like you wanted to be specific to hey why is this guy if it's not about the actual nomination it's at least about like the character right right or it's about it's about like how mark ruffalo gets to that point where he's you know how he's thinking about his work how his work turns into an oscar nomination an oscar nomination it's the highest point of their profession anyone involved in film and
Guest:So, like, that's the story to tell in five minutes or however long you can get out of these clips.
Guest:And then you just got to find that throughout.
Guest:And so, yeah, it was, you know, especially with the ones that I had to go back to and really, you know, have my memory jogged.
Guest:It took a while.
Marc:Oh, I bet.
Marc:And yeah, the clips you did were fantastic.
Marc:I actually never listened to the Poor Things director's episode.
Marc:Oh, Yorgos?
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:So I want to go back and check that out.
Marc:They became little buddies after that.
Marc:Did they?
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Like your ghost would come to the comedy store and they would like go out to food afterwards.
Marc:That's amazing.
Marc:Holy shit.
Marc:I did not know that.
Marc:Crazy.
Marc:I really enjoyed Ben Mendelsohn.
Marc:But I gotta ask.
Marc:Did Mark show Ben that Kate Simon picture of ACDC?
Guest:Oh yeah.
Guest:I believe they were hanging out afterwards and they, you know, looked at that stuff.
Guest:I don't know what the, like I didn't hear any story about it, but I do remember, I always can tell like when I get a text from Mark that says it's done, right?
Mm-hmm.
Guest:And that way then I can, you know, tell publicists or anybody who's asking, yeah, yeah, they're finished, you know.
Guest:But sometimes they don't leave right away.
Guest:And I can always tell how long it's going to be.
Guest:Like, you know, there's usually either a gap in text or there's a gap in the amount of time before Mark sends me the file.
Guest:And that one went on for a while.
Guest:So I feel like they spent a bunch of time hanging out and –
Guest:I don't think anyone was with Ben.
Guest:Like sometimes people come over totally alone by themselves.
Guest:So they're not worried about like, I got to, you know, go back with this studio publicist or something.
Guest:So yeah, I think they were just hanging out.
Guest:And that guy was just a, he was a hangout dude.
Guest:He just wants to, you know, he was good with chit chat.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, it's funny.
Marc:That episode kind of started with Ben being like, well, I'm here to promote this show.
Marc:And it kind of had the feeling that Ben, and nothing wrong with this, but Ben didn't really know Mark or the show.
Marc:And
Marc:throughout the process of the conversation, he started to become like, you know, do his thing where he's talking about like this scene he did in Animal Kingdom and he's like invested in this story and he can't help but remember like this and that.
Marc:And I just like...
Marc:oh my God, like he's in it.
Marc:Like he's, he's getting why Mark is like this guy.
Marc:And then of course, you know, Mark tells him like, oh yeah, I worked with Robert De Niro once.
Marc:And his like reaction, he pops so hard.
Marc:That was genuine.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It was so great.
Marc:He's like, oh my God, yes, you, I remember this.
Marc:And it was, it was so, so delicious.
Marc:Like what?
Guest:I've had that happen to me.
Guest:Like somebody's like, oh yeah, I did this thing.
Guest:I'm like, wait, you were that guy?
Guest:I remember that, you know?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That's great.
Marc:Who'd you do that to?
Marc:Do you remember?
Guest:I remember that kind of happened to me all throughout my life.
Guest:People telling me that they had something to do with a certain graphic that I admired from TV.
Guest:Oh, that's awesome.
Guest:They're like, oh, yeah, yeah, I made that thing.
Guest:I always remember the craziest one...
Guest:ever that where it happened to me was when I was working at WNYC.
Guest:And, uh, there was this guy, Dylan, who, uh, worked, uh, like he was, he was an editor.
Guest:I think he worked on the show called on the media, which is still on to this day.
Guest:And, uh, I was a nighttime guy.
Guest:So I would see him in an adjacent studio, just working.
Guest:Hmm.
Guest:And I wave it through the glass.
Guest:Oh, hey, there's Dylan, whatnot.
Guest:And, you know, one time I had to get something from his studio or mention something to him.
Guest:I forget.
Guest:I just wound up being, you know, interacting with him.
Guest:And he's a guy I didn't know very well.
Guest:I just knew him as like the editor for On the Media.
Guest:And I went in there, mentioned something.
Guest:And he wound up mentioning something about, oh, yeah, I had a band.
Guest:I was in a band and we played at that place or whatever it was we were talking about.
Guest:And I was like, oh, really?
Guest:You're in a band?
Guest:and he was like yeah yeah yeah it's called uh marcy playground what sex and candy guy yeah sex and candy and and like a three-person band like that's not a lot and i was like wait a minute like the marcy playground yeah it's the basis for marcy playground i was like get the fuck out of here and then i go and like look it up i'm like oh my god that's dylan who sits in there he's he's the guy from the sex and candy video wow that's crazy
Marc:Very cool.
Marc:Very cool.
Marc:I'm shocked how much ACDC talk there was this week.
Marc:That's one band that my wife will actually like swerve into another lane of traffic to like turn off.
Marc:She, for some reason, hates ACDC.
Guest:All ACDC, like there's no differentiation.
Guest:She doesn't know the difference between like the old and the new.
Guest:It's all the same level of that.
Marc:I don't think so.
Marc:She hates that lead singer's voice.
Marc:And she, like I've asked her about it.
Guest:There's two lead singers.
Marc:That's the problem.
Marc:I know, but she's just like, how is this?
Marc:How does anyone find this good?
Marc:This is just like screeching.
Marc:And yeah, so, so yeah, maybe I'll, I'll, I'll compare the two, but I'm pretty sure she will hate both of them for some reason.
Guest:Did I ever tell you about this story about when I put on ACDC in the car when my son was little?
Marc:No.
Guest:What happened?
Guest:He must have been like four or five.
Guest:He was definitely, you know, he was old enough where I didn't mind him listening to like approved ACDC.
Guest:Like I wasn't going to put on everything.
Guest:But, you know, I was like, okay, he doesn't have to just listen to the wheels on the bus or whatever when we're in the car.
Guest:This is fine.
Guest:But he was also young enough that he still like had a connection to like,
Guest:Sesame street and stuff like that for real little kids.
Guest:And, uh, and so I put on thunderstruck mostly because I thought like, Oh, he'll like this.
Guest:Cause it's got like a lot of guitar, you know, the fast guitar starts it out.
Guest:So I'm like, this is good for kids.
Guest:So he's listening to it.
Guest:And then all of a sudden Brian Johnson starts singing and he goes four year old kid in the backseat of the car.
Guest:He goes, is this Elmo?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And now I can never listen to it ever again without imagining that it's Elmo.
Guest:What a great reaction.
Guest:There was a similar situation.
Guest:story right around the same age and probably because it was that age where i started playing like rock music in the car we were in a supermarket or something and he's in like the front of the uh of the of the cart and they're pushing it around and uh whitney houston's uh i want to dance with somebody is on the supermarket music okay and she's like hitting that high note toward the end and he goes is this getty lee what
Marc:What is happening in your sense?
Guest:I don't know, but I like both of those things.
Guest:I want a universe where both of those things are happening.
Guest:One where Elmo is fronting ACDC and one where Geddy Lee is singing Whitney Houston covers.
Marc:Oh, that's tremendous.
Marc:Oh, man.
Marc:Kids are funny, aren't they?
Marc:They say the darndest things.
Marc:They do.
Marc:I was also, I'm embarrassed because Mark was saying that he was ashamed to admit.
Marc:that he was at a concert to see Journey and ACDC opened up for them, which makes me sad because when I worked at Sam Goody in the mall in the 90s in Staten Island, you might have heard Journey playing on repeat.
Marc:And if that happened, it's because I loved Journey.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:That was your version of High Fidelity?
Guest:You were like, I will now get 12 people to buy Journey's Greatest Hits.
Yes.
Marc:So I would, I'd be playing Wheel in the Sky so often.
Marc:There was also, there was also like an Atari video game for Journey.
Marc:And like, I remember beating it and like that song would be on.
Guest:Wait, what?
Marc:Journey had an Atari game?
Marc:I don't know if it was their Atari game.
Marc:I just know that that music was in it and I like dug it.
Marc:It was it was great.
Marc:I'll have to like Google it.
Marc:But yeah, I'm pretty sure there was a Journey Atari video game that I played a whole bunch.
Marc:Did you ever go to a concert with for like the opening act or like is there a concert that you remember going to that you're like ashamed of?
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:But I had the experience of going to a concert and not expecting to see the bands that I wound up liking the most.
Guest:Like what?
Guest:And it was this touring thing back in the 90s called the Horde Festival, H-O-R-D-E.
Guest:It all stood for something.
Guest:It was like around Lollapalooza time.
Guest:These festivals with multi-stages were very popular.
Guest:And I remember the headliner was Neil Young and Crazy Horse and Beck,
Guest:Those were the co-headliners.
Guest:And they were on the main stage.
Guest:And there was a second stage, a smaller stage.
Guest:And I had every intention of heading over to the main stage for the big bands.
Guest:And instead, the first band I saw on the smaller stage was Ween.
Marc:And I was so hooked.
Marc:Oh, cool.
Guest:oh like i i did not i only knew ween from like one or two goofy videos on mtv that i didn't pay much mind and then saw them live and i would i just became a huge ween fan and then it happened again the same show there was another band that i watched right after ween called kula shaker they were fine and i still you know hear their music every once in a while but you know didn't
Guest:Didn't change my life or anything.
Guest:But then after them was Ben Folds.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Guest:Ben Folds 5.
Guest:Holy shit.
Guest:That's great.
Guest:Yeah, and that was just like Ween, where I was like, okay, I'm in.
Guest:I'd like all of your stuff, please.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:Yeah, they were great.
Guest:And Ben Folds 5 and Ben Folds Solo, I have seen multiple times in live since then.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, they never disappoint.
Marc:Yeah, I remember, I remember checking out a guy in like, I think like Brooklyn back in the day.
Marc:And it was just like, like a bar.
Marc:But he was great.
Marc:It was it was Ben Lee, one of the Ben.
Marc:Oh, yeah, Ben Lee.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And he was fantastic.
Marc:And I like was like just a fan.
Marc:Like I was just like I just kind of walked into a concert and yeah, I was just sold.
Marc:I was like, this guy rules.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He's he's a WTF fan.
Guest:Oh, no kidding.
Guest:Now and then.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Every now and then I see him like, you know, make mention of something he heard on the show.
Marc:Oh, awesome.
Marc:Yeah, love, love Ben Lee.
Marc:Loved his performance.
Marc:So yeah, been a Ben Lee fan, Stan since then, I'd say.
Marc:I do, I am also embarrassed.
Marc:Wait a minute, you've been a Stan?
Marc:Why, I mean, I don't know.
Marc:Is that, that's a saying?
Marc:The kids say that, right?
Marc:Yeah, but that's bad.
Marc:Is that bad?
Marc:If you're a Stan, you're an obsessive psycho fan who might kill the person.
Guest:Oh, yeah, no, no, I'm not.
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:It comes from that Eminem song.
Guest:Oh, is that really it?
Guest:That's what it is.
Guest:Yeah, a stan is too much of a fan.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Marc:No, strike that from the record, dear.
Marc:Ben Lee, if you're listening, you don't have to worry about this fucking guy.
Guest:Dear God.
Guest:It's a legit possibility he might be listening, so I figure he should know that.
Marc:Well, I bought a ticket to see Creed back in the day, but only because I loved the opening act, which was Our Lady Peace.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I actually, I distinctly remember seeing Our Lady Peace and it was a great time.
Marc:And then they got off and then Creed started.
Marc:And I was like, me and my friends were like, all right, let's get out of here.
Marc:And it was just like the worst music.
Marc:But yeah, Our Lady Peace, I went to see them just, you know, with the Creed ticket.
Marc:I remember having a paper ticket with Creed and Our Lady Peace.
Marc:I really miss those paper tickets.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I saved every single one of mine.
Guest:I have a box with all my tickets in it.
Guest:I have all my tickets.
Guest:I have all my playbills.
Guest:I legitimately go through it sometimes, and I'm like, what was this?
Guest:I don't even remember this show.
Guest:And it's me.
Guest:I remember everything.
Guest:But if I didn't have the playbill, I'd be like, wow, I saw this?
Marc:I don't even remember seeing this.
Marc:That's crazy.
Marc:Man, I feel like such a jerk.
Marc:I remember my wife, when she was moving in with me,
Marc:There was like, she was just terrible at packing.
Marc:And I was just like, look, this stuff, we have to get rid of it.
Marc:It's not going to fit, this and that.
Marc:And one of those things was her playbills and tickets.
Guest:And I feel like a jerk for having- But if she didn't care about them enough to say, no, no, no, I got to hang on to these, obviously it doesn't hold the same-
Marc:promise i suppose but like it's it's just so cool that you have those things and can look yeah but it's just one box like i i'm i'm on board with you like i don't like saving a ton of shit and and and it's like there's if i like if it got more than one box i would have a problem with it right okay good because i'm pretty sure i let her keep like the the old band t-shirts that that she got from uh some from concerts so you know yeah there's there there's a limit to my uh stuff that we can save
Guest:speaking of old bands and concerts you you glossed over something that i feel like uh it's a it's an amazing bit of trivia that you should let people in on you talk about working at the staten island mall yeah there is a very prominent 90s late 90s music video shot there you care to enlighten the folks on on what was shot there
Marc:Yeah, what was it?
Marc:The new radicals, you only get what you give.
Marc:That's right.
Guest:Takes place right there at the Staten Island Mall.
Guest:Yeah, the old Staten Island Mall.
Guest:But dude, that part is still intact.
Guest:Is it?
Guest:Yeah, Dawn was just there the other day and she's like, oh yeah, it looks exactly like the video.
Marc:That's crazy talk.
Marc:Well, I remember that because I didn't get invited, but my friend Tom, who was working with me at the time at Old Navy, he was leaving work and he had like my girlfriend at the time, like put like polka dots in his hair, like, you know, blonde polka dots.
Marc:Oh, right, right.
Marc:And and I guess the producer was like, hey, kid, you groovy.
Marc:You with the leopard head.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:You want to be in a music video?
Marc:And he's like, sure.
Marc:So like they filmed at like 1 a.m.
Marc:at the Staten Island Mall for that.
Marc:So, yeah, he got to be in the music video, which is pretty cool.
Guest:Do you spot him in it if you were to pull up that video?
Marc:I don't think I've ever spotted him, honestly.
Marc:I mean, that was at a time where music videos were kind of ending, especially for my viewing.
Marc:But yeah, I don't think I spotted him.
Marc:Speaking of Mark performing, so he's on the road now.
Marc:This is the tour, right?
Yeah.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I mean, like technically his tour dates started in like San Diego, San Francisco, but this is the first like driving around on the road all weekend tour dates.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So does your work get different and like complicated or you guys kind of have this down to a sign?
Guest:Yeah, not particularly.
Guest:I mean, there might be times where he's away and he's going to have to do everything from the road, but that's not... That's more of a pain for him than it is for me.
Guest:Well, it's mostly intros and outros, right?
Guest:That's right.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:And it definitely, you know, crunches us down to the... on the schedule and who we can book and where.
Guest:But, you know, we've had a bunch of interviews already in the can.
Guest:You know, I think like our next...
Guest:several weeks are all set so um hey i could do that here actually you know there's times when i can't because we've got moving pieces but i can tell people right now for the next two weeks we have our schedule completely set uh and that's thirst and more from sonic youth on monday's show
Guest:And then Todd Glass back on Thursday's show.
Guest:And then two returning comedians the following week, Monday, March 18th, Dave Attell.
Guest:And Thursday, March 21st, Eddie Pepitone.
Guest:So those are your next two weeks.
Guest:And those are not moving past that.
Guest:We've got some things that are, you know, we're waiting to record and we might move people in and out.
Guest:But and you all know that like the Carol Burnett episode that's coming up.
Guest:But but yeah, those next two weeks, those four guests, those are set in stone.
Marc:So does Mark moving around kind of open up your booking for people who are not in L.A.
Marc:or just like happen to be like in the area?
Guest:Yeah, I mean, it's very rare when he's doing something like this where it's like he's just trying to make towns and he's going to go from Portland, Maine to Boston to Providence and he's just in and out, in and out, in and out.
Guest:There's a time later in May where I think he's going to do a layover in New York for a few days between like, I think he's got like a show in DC and then like a couple days off and then a show in Pittsburgh.
Guest:So it doesn't make sense for him to go back
Guest:Like he shouldn't go all the way back to LA, but he's also got nothing going on.
Guest:So he's just going to like camp out in New York and that'll be a good time if we can line somebody up.
Guest:But, you know, Mark has gotten to the point where the remote interviews are not the most pleasant thing for him to do.
Guest:So, you know, he, yeah, he would rather only do them if he has to.
Guest:But sometimes when you're in New York, it makes sense.
Guest:Like, hey, we're never going to get this person again.
Guest:Like might as well do them.
Marc:Right, right.
Marc:And kind of like what he was saying with Rory in Thursday's episode.
Marc:He doesn't like staying over and doing two nights, which I found fascinating.
Marc:I figured comics would enjoy doing a second night.
Marc:But no, apparently Mark doesn't love it.
Marc:I also really enjoyed it because I was wondering, because he's talking up this Chris Rock story.
Marc:of tag that he was given.
Marc:And Rory was also talking about like, oh, giving someone a tag.
Marc:And Mark gave Chris Rock a tag years ago.
Marc:And that whole text was hilarious.
Marc:But it got me thinking like,
Marc:I can't imagine Mark ever accepting a tag or just a suggestion from just anyone.
Marc:I'm pretty sure he would just tell them to go fuck themselves.
Marc:I've seen it happen, actually.
Marc:Oh, yeah?
Guest:Yeah, and it's like, you know, Mark is friends with these people.
Guest:It's not like he's like, anyone who's making that suggestion to him
Guest:is doing it in good faith.
Guest:They're not big-timing him.
Guest:They're being comics.
Guest:They're doing what he did to Chris Rock, what Chris Rock did for him.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But I've seen, like, we're at the comedy store, and somebody comes up to him who's, you know, just gone up.
Guest:So they were standing in the back, and they're listening, and he's walking out, and they're like, hey, you know that thing you said?
Guest:You should end it with this.
Guest:And he's just like, oh, yeah, yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that's it.
Guest:Like he doesn't, it's not like he takes offense, but it's not, it's like, it's totally like, I guess you just said words, but that's fine.
Guest:Like he doesn't, he doesn't necessarily compute them or, you know, and it's, I don't get the sense that he offends the person.
Guest:It seems like a normal part of the process.
Guest:You know, that that, you know, you think of a thing you tell a person, but I get the sense from most comics.
Guest:It's like they're just doing it to get it off their chest anyway.
Guest:They're not actually like hoping you use it.
Guest:They're just like, hey, I thought it was funny thing.
Guest:And they say it and maybe you use it.
Guest:Maybe you don't.
Guest:yeah yeah i i also love the idea of mark doing a greatest hits of uh lost jokes i i thought that was really funny i went to a night of that once and it's no kidding oh yeah it it was um back when i was working at sirius one of the comedy channels hosted it at like gotham comedy club or one of those one of those places in midtown and you know they had a bunch of the people who did the comedy on their channels plus other people i remember nick de paulo there for some reason and
Guest:pete corrielli and yeah they did the whole premise of the night was you know do jokes from someone else and it was not good oh really yeah yeah yeah no it's there's a reason why it was not good and it just yeah it just doesn't it's like it's like uh uncanny valley stuff yeah
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Oh man.
Marc:It's like remnants from a, from a forgotten time for a reason, you know?
Guest:You know, I remember the people who actually did well that night were people completely swerved away from the material.
Guest:Like, like if they were doing somebody else's bit, what they started getting laughs at was like some physical impression of that person.
Guest:Like it wasn't that the, it wasn't, they weren't getting laughs off the integrity of the bit.
Guest:Gotcha.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Maybe it's even just the knowledge of it ahead of time is a problem.
Guest:Like if you show up at a thing and you know, oh, people are like, there's part of like the magic of standup is you think these people might've just thought of these things right on the spot, you know?
Guest:Like there's this sense of like,
Guest:oh, I'm hearing this guy telling jokes for the first time ever, even though it's been, you know, worked out for a year.
Guest:Right.
Guest:There's an illusion that goes on there.
Guest:And once you tell everyone, hey, guess what?
Guest:I'm just going to say jokes that I learned from someone else.
Guest:It breaks something.
Guest:It doesn't hold.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's like seeing a bad play or, you know, like seeing a movie where it's like, okay, this just isn't working.
Marc:Yeah.
Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Also, it's almost like seeing a play where all the actors are animatronics.
Guest:You're like, I know I love this play.
Guest:It's a good play, but man, I'm not into this because there's no heart behind this.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:That's interesting.
Guest:The last time I went to Disney World, we went to that thing that's in one of the Epcot pavilions, the America pavilion, that is a full animatronic show.
Guest:And I remembered it from being a little kid where it's like, it tells like the story of America with robots.
Guest:It's like Ben Franklin robot.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Marc:Not the carousel of presidents, but something else.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's not the president hall, but it's, it's like that.
Guest:It's, it's, it's built out from that.
Guest:And it's a full play.
Guest:Like, I think it's Mark Twain is telling you the story, right?
Guest:Like at a campfire.
Guest:Oh, you're going to snuck up on me.
Guest:You know, like that kind of thing.
Marc:I think, oh my God, that, that for some reason, I remember.
Marc:Nothing else I remember.
Yeah.
Guest:And we, you know, I remembered from being a kid and having, oh yeah, this, that America thing.
Guest:And we went to see it with my son when he was little.
Guest:And I was like, this sucks.
Guest:I was so conscious of that multiple times at Disney World as an adult where you're just sitting in a room.
Guest:They put a bunch of adults in a room.
Guest:There's children too, but we're adults here.
Guest:And we are in an empty room.
Guest:And the only thing we're looking at are robots.
Guest:It might as well be Chuck E. Cheese's band.
Guest:We are watching these robots and pretending this is a show.
Guest:This is not a show anymore.
Guest:This is a button that gets pressed every half hour, and this thing happens.
Guest:It's like watching a player piano do its own thing, right?
Guest:And then my mind will start to drift, and I start looking around the room, and I'm like...
Guest:this is essentially a fucking warehouse.
Guest:Like we're in a, we're in a big box shop.
Guest:Like this might as well be best buy.
Guest:And they emptied it out and put like robot Abe Lincoln in here.
Guest:And we're just like, yeah, pay my money.
Guest:Here I am.
Marc:You're paying for air conditioning, really.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:It was the same thing on going on It's a Small World.
Guest:I just started looking at the ceiling and I'm like, that looks like Sears.
Guest:I've seen this before.
Guest:It's when I'm shopping.
Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So by the way, am I supposed to be buying rental car insurance?
Marc:I don't do it.
Guest:No, there is.
Guest:There's one.
Guest:What?
Guest:There's one that your own car insurance won't cover.
Guest:It's the liability waiver.
Guest:there's a there's a thing you just ask for it specifically when you go to when you're at the rental car place just they say oh do you want this premium insurance everything has all these different names and tiers forget about all that you just ask for the loss damage waiver that's it
Guest:sometimes it's on the sheet as the ldw or whatever but that's that's the only thing there's no but personal insurance will be covering that nothing even if you have like amazing insurance auto insurance your personal insurance does not have a lost damage waiver so you know you put that on it so it's like that combined with your um your own personal insurance that should have you fully covered and
Guest:I mean, granted, like you might have to add other things depending on what your insurance has.
Guest:If your insurance doesn't cover like, you know, a tow truck or a rental car, if you need a new rental car, that kind of thing.
Guest:Like, you know, you're broken down.
Guest:You need to get another vehicle right away.
Guest:Make sure your insurance covers that kind of stuff.
Guest:You can always add that on when you go to auto insurance.
Guest:But yeah, I used to do exactly what Mark's doing because I was in the mentality of like, I don't want to, I want all bases covered.
Marc:Right.
Guest:I don't want to, I don't want to be in a situation because I did that once and I'll never fucking do it again where I was like, I passed on the insurance and then I had a little ding.
Guest:It was like my side view mirror and another guy's side view mirror, you know, like,
Guest:hit each other and his cracked and mine didn't so we went we just you know went reported it and it was fine but when i went and turned the car back in at the end of that week they were like and there's a insurance claim on it you don't have insurance so we'll take care of this but you got to pay us now and it was a few hundred dollars and i was like fuck
Guest:like the insurance would have been cheaper if I had done that in the moment.
Guest:So at that point I was just like, okay, anytime I do a rental car, I'll just get the full insurance.
Guest:And at some point I was like, am I being stupid doing this?
Guest:Cause like I have a car, you know, I have insurance and I just called my insurance up and I was like, what do you cover?
Guest:When I get a rental car and they told me everything.
Guest:And the only thing that's missing is the lost damage waiver.
Marc:Hmm.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Good to know.
Marc:Cause like I've been on vacations like in Mexico where I had to like buy
Marc:give them like a ten thousand dollar hold on my credit card just so i can like take out the car because i i declined their insurance it was like a real fucking nightmare also i'm just paranoid the entire time that my car is going to get you know hit with something you know and i'll have to pay through the uh through the butt but uh okay lost damage waiver that's my best advice
Guest:My best advice, though, is for anyone listening, if you have this situation where you have a car, you personally drive and you have auto insurance, and then you're getting a rental car and you want insurance on the car, but you don't know if you should pay for it, if your current insurance will cover it, just call your insurance.
Guest:Just call them and just ask them, what do you cover when I go rent a car?
Guest:And they'll tell you.
Guest:You don't have to try to guess.
Guest:You don't have to look at your policy and piece things together.
Guest:Just call them and ask them.
Marc:This has been Car Talk.
Marc:Give us a call.
Guest:I'm fart and funk and whatever their names are.
Marc:Man, that was a great show back in the day.
Marc:Oh, man.
Guest:Well, I used to work at WNYC, New York's big public radio station, and
Guest:that was like those i think those guys both died and they were still putting the show on the air every week because like it just had it had a massive massive audience like it was like the number one thing that when people did like the pledge drive they were like don't you fucking take car talk off yeah
Guest:oh wow i just do remember being like this is absurd like people be getting laid off all the time and it's like we can't take this car talk thing off and they're like oh no they'll kill us we will come to the station and burn it down if we take car talk off wow npr very scared you know geez louise okay oh wait wait okay can i ask you one more thing yeah
Marc:Mark starts off Monday's episode with Waiting for the Man, a Keith Richard cover of, who was that, Lou Reed?
Marc:The Velvets, yeah.
Marc:I didn't know that that song was about drugs.
Marc:Did you know that song was about drugs?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I guess I'm just naive.
Marc:I'm just like, this guy's waiting for it.
Marc:Like, maybe it's just a- I am waiting for a bus.
Yeah.
Marc:I don't ever get any subtext, apparently.
Guest:Here's what I would say.
Guest:I go the other way.
Guest:It would surprise me if you told me a song by any band from the 70s was not about drugs or sex.
Guest:Essentially, if you're like, oh, you know what that is about?
Guest:It's dog.
Guest:I'd be like, oh, really?
Guest:He's waiting for his dog.
Guest:Oh, okay.
Okay.
Marc:Well, isn't like Blackbird about like a like a black woman or something?
Guest:So Beatles stuff, there's so much debate and, you know, there are varying different stories.
Guest:there's apparently paul mccartney claimed that there was some freedom rider connection to blackbird right that he was he was writing it on about uh you know some i forget the actual story but someone else has said that that was a load of horseshit that they were there at the time it was written and it was not about that or whatever and he's retrofitting it so who knows okay yeah all right
Guest:I tend to think with the Beatles, it's rough because you really only got Paul around now and he gets to decide what all the history is.
Guest:Isn't Ringo still alive?
Guest:Yeah, but he doesn't give a shit and he never has, right?
Guest:The guy lucked into the greatest life in anyone in the history of ever.
Guest:What does Ringo care?
Guest:He's just sitting around staring at giant piles of money all the time being like, how the hell did this happen?
Guest:Well, listen, I'm glad that we were able to get all this stuff this week and last week and basically a successful Oscar season for us.
Guest:I tried to make it clear on the bonus episode this week just why we tend to do this.
Guest:We've got a lot of reception from people wanting to get on the show around Oscar season because they feel like it's a good outlet for Oscar campaigns.
Guest:And then
Guest:it just becomes good business for us to do it.
Guest:And look, it's not at right angles to the show.
Guest:We talk about this stuff.
Guest:Mark likes talking about it.
Guest:Mark likes talking to performers, creative people.
Guest:Mark likes the Oscars, right?
Guest:And so this has always kind of made sense, and that's why we continue to do it.
Guest:We continue to play it up.
Guest:We did an extra episode last year.
Guest:It was a success, so we did an extra episode this year.
Guest:And now we just have all this stuff here on the Full Marron.
Guest:where we can do the bonus episode like Mark on Movies on Tuesday.
Guest:And this year on the Friday show, Chris and I had our own little idea of how to cover the Oscars.
Guest:Because I don't think it's worthwhile.
Guest:We don't have to go through the current Oscar ballot.
Guest:And Mark and I at one point did a look at the Best Picture winners going back to the 60s, I think.
Guest:And instead, I said to Chris, I was like, you know, why don't we make...
Guest:Basically like an all-time Oscars ballot with our winners on it.
Guest:What I mean by that is I wanted us to take not what we thought should win any given year or movies that are our favorites and what we would give best picture to.
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:Take the actual winners.
Guest:go back all the way.
Guest:I wanted us to look back all through history and decide for ourselves, two separate ballots, what are the best of the best, the best of the winners.
Guest:And so, you know, we did it with the top six categories, right?
Guest:Best picture, best director, actor, actress, supporting actor, supporting actress.
Guest:And I don't know, what did you pick, Chris?
Guest:Did you do like a normal ballot, like five each?
Guest:And then you picked a winner?
Marc:That's right.
Marc:I narrowed it down and then decided on a winner.
Marc:And some categories were easier than others.
Guest:I'll just say that.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Well, so just to sum up here, in case anyone was confused, what we're going to do here, we are going to give you the Chris list and the Brendan list.
Guest:These are not collaborative.
Guest:We have not talked about this ahead of time.
Guest:And this is, we are drawing from the list of winners.
Guest:Right.
Guest:In history, only winners.
Guest:You can't just have been nominated.
Guest:So if you are a winner of best actor, I have picked five.
Guest:Chris has picked five.
Guest:Could be different ones.
Guest:And of those winners, we have narrowed it down to each of us, our favorite winner.
Guest:And that's for six categories.
Guest:All right.
Guest:So that now that we've got that laid out, why don't we do what they do on the Oscars and
Guest:and start with a supporting category.
Guest:Usually the first award of the night is supporting actor, supporting actress.
Guest:And you, Chris, said to me that you were having a really hard time with supporting actor.
Guest:So I am interested.
Guest:Let's start there.
Guest:I've been interested all week in knowing how you wound up narrowing it down.
Marc:This is the hardest category.
Marc:Like there are amazing performances here.
Marc:So my top five for best actor in a supporting role are Robin Williams in Good Will Hunting, Javier Bardem in No Country for Old Men, Christopher Plummer for Beginners, Tommy Lee Jones for The Fugitive, and
Marc:And my winner, Joe Pesci for Goodfellas.
Guest:I strongly believe that's where you're going.
Guest:I thought you were going to have either him or Tommy Lee Jones.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:So what's your reasoning for Pesci?
Marc:Joe Pesci's performance.
Marc:is an all-timer.
Marc:It's this deadly cocktail of comedy and horror.
Marc:It's all fun and games until Tommy doesn't get a drink or he's called funny or he's asked to get his shine box.
Marc:This performance, I've never saw anything like this in movies before.
Marc:He is so very funny and deadly and
Marc:And it's a performance that I have seen copied many, many times afterwards in various movies.
Marc:This is the defining role.
Marc:Like if you're trying to make a gangster movie or any other type of movie like this, you need to have a little bit of comic relief that's also sinister.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Anything that needs that hot wire.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And Joe Pesci was the first and
Marc:the best, and he is my pick for best actor in a supporting role.
Guest:Well, that's a perfect summation of it.
Guest:And, you know, look, I don't think you could go wrong with that, but I will say you said you had a hard time picking this one.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And I did not because I knew what my winner was going to be before I even went and looked at the list.
Guest:I was like, I know what the best supporting actor performance, in my opinion, of all time is.
Guest:And one of the things is I really kind of hold this as a standard.
Guest:I want a supporting performance to truly be supporting performance.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I feel like that's a problem that you see a lot of times is they there's a lead performance that gets named supporting.
Guest:Joe Pesci is a perfect example of a true supporting role.
Guest:He's gone with an hour left of the movie.
Guest:So, you know, you you you there's no doubt in your mind that this guy is, you know,
Guest:Not the lead character, but the integral character, right?
Guest:So he is on my list.
Guest:It makes my final ballot here.
Guest:Joe Pesci in Goodfellas.
Guest:Also, Tommy Lee Jones from The Fugitive.
Guest:Also, Javier Bardem from No Country for Old Men.
Guest:Three of our nominees overlap there.
Mm-hmm.
Guest:Then also I have Christoph Waltz for Inglourious Bastards.
Marc:He came close, yeah.
Guest:But the number one best supporting actor performance of all time, will always be for my standards, I doubt I'll ever see one that I love more than this performance, is Kevin Kline in A Fish Called Wanda.
Mm-hmm.
Guest:That is, and here's another reason why I think I give that more weight and credence is because the Oscars are terrible overall at honoring comedy.
Guest:For some reason, it is mistakenly believed that comedy is easy or effortless when it is so much harder.
Guest:Like, you know, it's funny looking at all of these lists over the past week that,
Guest:There are so many performances that won where I'm like, that was a day out for that guy.
Guest:That was their off day.
Guest:They basically did a coffee break and won the Oscar because they were asked to be sad the whole time.
Guest:That's up and down the line.
Guest:You're looking at all these awards like, oh, gosh.
Guest:But man, the novel nature of that Kevin Kline performance.
Guest:Talk about with Joe Pesci that you've never seen this before and then you've seen it copied all the time since.
Guest:You've never seen this Kevin Kline performance copied because you can't.
Marc:Right.
Guest:It's so crazy how this is the funniest thing you've ever seen from a psychopath, like a true psychotic murderer who is the most hilarious guy that you'd want to hang out with him all the time.
Guest:And part of it is that it is a true supporting performance.
Guest:So you're always wanting more of him, more, more, more.
Guest:And he just...
Guest:owns the movie the whole time.
Guest:Look, I don't know when the last time, if you're listening to this, the last time you watched A Fish Called Wanda, maybe you never saw it.
Guest:You just gotta watch this for this Kevin Kline performance.
Guest:It's still, to this day, is one of the funniest things you'll ever see.
Guest:You'll ever see!
Guest:Uh, so yes, I, I mean, I get it.
Guest:They were, the list goes on and on of these supporting performances and supporting performances by nature are very showy and you, you know, you, you, they're almost designed to win awards when they're good.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, this is just the most undeniable one to me.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you're right.
Marc:This has never been occurred again.
Marc:Not in this way.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You know?
Marc:Right.
Marc:I mean, people have probably tried, but it does not work as effortlessly as it does with Kevin Kline.
Marc:Like, he is, yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Fantastic.
Guest:I think there's something to do with him being like a Shakespearean trained actor.
Guest:And he's in there with these other Brits.
Guest:But so he's like got this and they're all great comedians to Michael Palin and John Cleese.
Guest:But he's got this ability to like find their frequency.
Guest:And at the same time, be completely on his own level as this boorish American.
Guest:And I really think it's like, wow, that classical training had to have paid off there.
Guest:Like he knows every second what is like buffoonish about the performance and what is just like the most like mockable thing about this guy.
Guest:But he's also like...
Marc:super cool and you're like so self-assured and i like i i could watch it i could watch it now and then i could watch it again tomorrow and i would be just as happy yeah it's it's kind of funny we left off our list robert de niro in godfather 2 and uh jk simmons in whiplash like it's a it's a very good category i found this to be a very challenging exercise because
Marc:A, I don't want to just kind of go with the movies and the performances that I grew up with and watched a million times.
Marc:But also, B, I don't want to talk over my skis.
Marc:You know, I don't want to pretend that, oh, yeah, you know, I don't know, Around the World in 80 Days was like the best movie.
Marc:You know, like, you know.
Guest:And it wasn't.
Guest:It sucked.
Right.
Yeah.
Marc:And by the way, I did my homework.
Marc:I watched two movies I've never seen before.
Marc:Oh, no kidding.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, I take this seriously, Brendan.
Marc:Are they going to come up or you?
Marc:They're not there.
Marc:I was just like, OK, they're fine.
Marc:Midnight Cowboy.
Marc:Fine.
Marc:And what was it?
Marc:Oh, oh, I saw Amadeus.
Marc:Oh no.
Marc:What?
Guest:You watched current Amadeus though.
Marc:You watched it, you downloaded or something.
Marc:Why can't I find the theatrical version of this movie?
Guest:They, they had not, but I just saw it announced that they are releasing it finally.
Guest:God damn it.
Guest:So you saw the shit version, which is so depressing because Amadeus is the one movie where you can actually watch the director's cut to learn why a director's cut can be bad.
Marc:Oh, no kidding.
Guest:All the choices made in the director's cut make it a worse movie.
And...
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:Worst movie.
Guest:Like a 100% worse movie.
Guest:And the movie itself is an absolute masterpiece.
Guest:Fascinating.
Guest:And you cannot watch it.
Guest:You cannot watch the version that won the Academy Award.
Guest:That's fucked up.
Guest:That's so fucked up.
Guest:I just saw that there's a 4K restoration being done and they're going to finally release the theatrical cut, which is good news for everyone.
Marc:Good.
Marc:Cause like I'm watching this movie and I'm just like, well, it's like 20 minutes too long.
Marc:And apparently that's 20 minutes was, was what they added to this.
Guest:It's also so fucked up because the, the, the theatrical version, the movie is about Salieri.
Guest:The version you watched is way more weighted about Mozart, which is not the story.
Guest:The story is Salieri.
Marc:Huh?
Yeah.
Marc:Oh, man, I feel like an idiot for watching this movie.
Guest:I wish you had told me.
Guest:I would have told you to avoid it.
Marc:But no, I wanted to.
Marc:I would have made the list.
Marc:So, yeah.
Marc:So it does not come up again, though.
Marc:Well, it does for me.
Marc:Oh, no kidding.
Guest:Because that version does make a list.
Guest:The theatrical version does make the list.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:But let's move on, though, to supporting actress, because I feel like what you were just saying about not wanting to be out over your skis, at least for me, comes up here.
Guest:So why don't I go first?
Guest:I'll tell you what my picks are for best supporting actress.
Guest:And we start back in the 50s with Eva Marie Saint in On the Waterfront, a beautiful performance.
Guest:Now here, I picked this one almost to make a point.
Guest:And the point I would like to make is that this does not happen enough that people get awarded for a very small amount of screen time.
Guest:And Beatrice Strait in Network, I believe, has two and a half minutes of screen time and won the Oscar.
Guest:And that should happen more.
Guest:And she, I mean, Ned Beatty was nominated for a similar amount of screen time.
Guest:He did not win it.
Guest:Also, should be nominated more often.
Guest:Just because you're in one scene doesn't mean you didn't offer support.
Guest:And if you're great in that one scene, you should be honored for it.
Guest:And she's great in that one scene.
Guest:Hey, guess what?
Guest:Spoiler.
Guest:Everyone's fucking great in network.
Guest:She's really great.
Guest:And it's as good of two minutes of acting as you're ever going to see.
Guest:And I'm super psyched that she won an Oscar for it.
Guest:And that's why she's on my list.
Guest:Okay, continuing.
Guest:Tilda Swinton, Michael Clayton.
Guest:Patricia Arquette in Boyhood, which I put almost as an endurance award.
Guest:Like the degree of difficulty to nail that performance in the conditions of that film, which in case you don't know, was filmed over the course of 12 years, a little bit at a time every year.
Guest:That's a remarkable performance.
Guest:But here we go.
Guest:My winner.
Guest:That tops those four excellent performances.
Guest:And I would be lying if I didn't say I put this on here almost as a sign of defiance, an act of defiance.
Guest:because this is truly one of the great performances of our last, I don't know, 30 years, however long it's been since it came out.
Guest:And it was roundly mocked for this person winning the Oscar, so much so that they made up a story that was not true, that she was not the winner and the person announced the wrong name, proven as total horseshit.
Guest:And we now know this is a great actor.
Guest:She has been nominated multiple times since.
Guest:She's one of the great presences on screen.
Guest:No one is upset when they see her in a movie.
Guest:They're thrilled, frankly.
Guest:And that is Marissa Tomei.
Guest:for the Tour de Force performance as Mona Lisa Vito in My Cousin Vinny.
Guest:Another comedic role that absolutely deserves an award, and to me, deserves the best award in the history of the supporting actress category.
Guest:It's a generational performance, too.
Guest:Like, like every like if you're of a certain age, that's what you think of when you think of that type.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Remember that movie came out with that Joseph Gordon-Levitt made where he was like a himbo who Don John, I think.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Mm hmm.
Guest:And Scarlett Johansson, herself a movie star, is playing, you know, this type of character.
Guest:And everyone compared her to Marissa Tomei in My Cousin Vinny.
Guest:Like, oh, she's doing the Marissa Tomei character.
Guest:Like, Scarlett Johansson has her own screen presence and is a star in her own right.
Guest:And she was compared to this role.
Guest:Like, this is a defining role.
Marc:Yeah, that's a great pick.
Marc:And a movie that I've also seen like a hundred times probably.
Marc:Yeah, that helps too for me, right?
Guest:Like I've seen this performance so much that I'm like, oh, again, like Kevin Kline, I could watch it again tomorrow and I'd enjoy it just as much.
Marc:My list is similar.
Marc:My list included Marissa Tomei in My Cousin Vinny, and also Patricia Arquette in Boyhood.
Marc:But it also includes Whoopi Goldberg in Ghost,
Marc:Regina King in If Beale Street Could Talk, which... That's a good performance.
Marc:I just love that movie so much.
Marc:If you haven't seen it, please seek it out.
Marc:But my pick for the best actress in a supporting role, Tilda Swinton in Michael Clayton.
Guest:I can't argue with you on that one.
Marc:So, I mean, I've thought about this and like this movie is a car with four tires, right?
Marc:There's Clooney, Sidney Pollack, Tom Wilkinson, and then there's Tilda.
Marc:And if any of those tires were not properly inflated, this movie would not be able to go 100.
Marc:And I know there's an exploding car in this movie, and that makes that metaphor very strange.
Marc:But I just want to say that her performance, from the first time we see her, to asking her colleague about taking out Michael, to Michael confronting her at the hotel, is amazing.
Marc:Fucking perfection.
Marc:Like her falling to her knees out of focus as Michael walks away and the cops walk in is like the cherry on top.
Marc:This is my favorite performance an actress has ever had in a supporting role.
Guest:And, you know, name another Tilda Swinton performance that's exactly like this one.
Guest:You can't.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:There isn't.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:She's, you know, part of her greatness is that she's such a chameleon and she can, her range is almost unmatched.
Guest:And this is, I mean, I love a performance that you can use as like one frame of it can be a meme to represent all types of things in real life.
Guest:You know, it's like when...
Guest:Whenever there's some story about, you know, some corporate executive who is selling their soul for just total garbage, like that woman from NBC who went to work for Elon Musk and runs Twitter.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like any time she releases a statement, there's like a picture of Tilda Swinton from Michael Clayton accompanying it, in my mind anyway.
Guest:And that is a beautiful thing to do, much like Marissa Tomei, to draw the archetype from scratch, to basically be like, you are now, this is what you're going to think of when a person like this rears their head in real life.
Guest:And I got no argument with it.
Guest:It could have very easily been mine.
Guest:I was just filled with a fit of pique over Marissa Tomei taking shit that she didn't actually win the award, motherfuckers.
Yeah.
Guest:Wow, you're very angry.
Guest:You're very annoyed about that, huh?
Guest:Oh, that's one of the dumbest, worst things.
Guest:In case anybody doesn't know, I think it was revealed later that it came from some other publicist.
Guest:Oh, no kidding.
Guest:Yeah, it wasn't like somebody looked at the envelope or something.
Guest:It was a rumor.
Guest:It was a whisper campaign that was started just to undercut her after she won.
Guest:Total nonsense.
Marc:Yeah, that's shitty.
Yeah.
Guest:All right, before we get back into actors, let's put a break in here and do best director, okay?
Guest:Because I feel like, you know, that way we're not just doing the same stuff we just did with actors.
Guest:And then it separates us for best picture, which, you know, I did really think hard about this.
Guest:What...
Guest:differentiates for me whether or not it's a movie that you would clarify and say this is the best directed movie versus just the overall best movie yeah and looking at them it did become clear to me like i was like oh yeah that that this is the best directed movie and so i'll go with my list here first the ones that i came up with were
Guest:Jerome Robbins and Robert Weiss for West Side Story, literally the best direction of a movie musical.
Guest:Francis Ford Coppola for The Godfather 2, because he did not win for Godfather 1.
Guest:So I put him on here for 2 as a true achievement to direct, to get his arms around that massive scope and the scale of that story and direct it as legendarily as he did.
Guest:Jonathan Demme for Silence of the Lambs.
Guest:Joel and Ethan Coen for No Country for Old Men.
Guest:But to me, the best directed film, the film that if you took this director away from it, it would just so instantly become a lesser film, even if you had all the other elements in place.
Guest:And not only did he direct it in a way where it's undeniable, he made a film that then people patterned their directing on after this.
Guest:In any time you're watching Fast Cars, you're watching Cops,
Guest:it's all patterned after this.
Guest:And that is William Friedkin, The French Connection.
Marc:Yeah, great choice.
Marc:That's on my list as well.
Guest:Yeah, oh, well, that makes me happy.
Guest:I felt like, oh man, this is an overlooked guy.
Guest:This is the best directed film that won over the history of the Oscars in the sense that just try to... If you told someone, if you gave someone...
Guest:the script treatment for that car chase under the elevated tracks.
Guest:Everyone you gave it to would do it differently than this guy did it.
Guest:And a lot of the people you gave it to would do it in a similar way to each other.
Guest:But no one would do it the way this guy did, where he was like, basically, I'm going to make a documentary of racing cars.
Guest:And if we wind up killing someone that...
Marc:that's gonna be a side effect of this uh but you'll you'll never see it again because it was so dangerous but that's part of the the amazing quality of it yeah great great choice uh i've actually i've only seen it like twice uh so i i did not put it uh as my as my winner uh but yes i i can i can definitely uh see where you're coming from but my list and it's on your list
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So my list includes The French Connection.
Marc:I think I'd be shot if I didn't put in The Godfather Part II by Francis Ford Coppola.
Marc:I also put Jonathan Demme for Science of the Lambs.
Marc:Wow.
Guest:Look, this is crazy to me that we, you know, we did not talk about these ahead of time.
Marc:No.
Guest:I get it that we have similar tastes in that, but it's like we looked at a whole list of every Oscar winner and the same ones are coming up on our list.
Guest:It's pretty crazy.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But one that didn't make your list was Steven Spielberg for Saving Private Ryan, which I thought was fantastic.
Marc:And my winner, though...
Marc:Joel and Ethan Coen, No Country for Old Men.
Guest:Yeah, very hard for me to argue against that one.
Marc:Look, this movie is after they made Fargo.
Marc:This movie has tension.
Marc:All of these scenes are so perfectly constructed.
Marc:To the second.
Marc:Yes, to the second.
Marc:To, like...
Marc:the look in a character's eyes, like the, the, the coin flipping scene is so filled with dread.
Marc:I found myself like gulping, just, I'm just terrified, terrified of what's going to come next.
Marc:But this movie is amazing.
Marc:The best directed movie like like these guys did something so special with this movie that I can't see anyone, you know, topping them like it is just it is just perfect.
Guest:Well, think about also how many stretches of the movie there are with minimal or zero dialogue.
Marc:Yes.
Guest:So all the storytelling is visual.
Guest:And the sense of space is perfect.
Guest:You know at every time, at every moment, where other characters are in relation to the one you're watching, where things that have been...
Guest:Set up earlier when they play out, you know exactly when and where and why they have like the briefcase that's put into the air duct.
Guest:And you just you have it is completely assured of where it is at in time and space at every moment.
Marc:Yeah, that's right.
Marc:And I just love it.
Marc:And I don't think a movie comes close to topping it.
Marc:So, yeah.
Marc:No Country for Old Men for me is the tops.
Guest:All right.
Guest:Well, let's get back to the actors.
Guest:We'll do Best Actor and then Best Actress.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:And for me, this Best Actor category was the problem that I had, the narrowing down problem.
Yeah.
Guest:Part of that is, I think, Hollywood chauvinism gave all the best parts to men over the initial hundred years of making movies.
Guest:But when I look at the ones that didn't even make my top five, Lawrence Olivier, Gary Cooper, Alec Guinness, Paul Schofield, Denzel Washington, F. Murray Abraham and Amadeus, Peter Finch in Network, none of those make my top five.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Guest:It's crazy.
Guest:So who did?
Guest:Okay, who did?
Guest:Best actor.
Guest:Gregory Peck in To Kill a Mockingbird.
Guest:Could have very easily made this my winner of best overall.
Guest:Gene Hackman in The French Connection.
Guest:Robert De Niro in Raging Bull.
Guest:Daniel Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood.
Guest:Now look at that.
Guest:I mean, come on.
Guest:Daniel Day-Lewis, Robert De Niro, Gene Hackman, Gregory Peck.
Guest:Who's going to argue with any of those?
Guest:that just pick one pick one of the four it's easy but you cannot because the number one performance of all time as a male what do they call it best actor in a leading role now yeah yeah
Guest:is Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront.
Guest:Just a knock your socks off at any time in your life, no matter what age you are, the first time you see this, it's like the Dorothy opening the door in The Wizard of Oz and the world is in color.
Guest:Despite this being a black and white film.
Guest:I remember the moment I watched this movie and he and Eva Marie Saint are on the swing set and she accidentally drops her glove and he picks it up and instead of giving it back to her, plays with it as he plays out the scene.
Guest:And it was just one of those moments where I was like, oh, that's, that's what you're supposed to do.
Guest:You're just supposed to treat this like it's real life.
Guest:Like you're not supposed to, and there's nothing affected about it.
Guest:There's not anything that you're like, oh, this guy's doing a weird thing here with a glove.
Guest:Like he would do later in his life, right?
Guest:Like Brandon became like the guy who was, you know, playing with Coca-Cola cans or whatever.
But yeah.
Guest:This is just one of those things.
Guest:I can't even, there's something about it that can't be explained.
Guest:And so therefore, that is why to me, he's the winner.
Guest:That you watch this and you're like, there's magic going on here.
Guest:I can't explain it.
Guest:And therefore, it's transcendent.
Guest:It rises above my ability to explain him.
Guest:So, yes, I I'm I'm taking that strange step off of a pier here, going out on a real limb and picking Marlon Brando as the best actor winner of all time.
Marc:Yeah, I remember seeing that movie for the first time.
Marc:I saw it at what is it?
Marc:Bryant Park.
Marc:Oh, that's great to watch outside.
Marc:Yeah, which was great.
Marc:But the audio, I couldn't hear the audio that well.
Marc:So I rented it from Netflix from, you know, their DVD when they had DVDs.
Marc:And yeah, I watched it and it was it was sublime.
Marc:Like what a performance and what a movie.
Marc:Fantastic.
Guest:Great job.
Guest:Amazing movie.
Marc:So Marlon Brando makes my list, but for a different movie.
Marc:For The Godfather, of course.
Marc:But he is not the winner.
Marc:My other nominees for Best Actor in a Leading Role are Jack Nicholson for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Peter Finch for Network, Denzel Washington for Training Day.
Marc:But the winner for me...
Marc:God damn it, the finest performance I've ever seen.
Marc:Daniel Day-Lewis.
Marc:There will be blood.
Marc:God damn, dude.
Marc:God damn this performance.
Marc:It's an all-timer.
Marc:Dude, this performance.
Marc:I mean, you talk about method acting.
Marc:Apparently, this guy is very method, but hopefully he didn't beat Paul Denno to death.
Marc:To death with a bowling pin?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:But his ability in this movie to invoke menace, terror, and madness is just...
Marc:sight to behold, dude.
Marc:It's a horror movie.
Marc:And the devil himself does not care about anyone.
Marc:There's like two scenes in particular where after Daniel was made to profess that he abandoned his son in order to get baptized by this preacher, Paul Dano, that preacher comes back in the last scene to his home and asks for help.
Marc:And
Marc:And goddammit, Daniel Day-Lewis returns that sermon with rage and venom that is the most disturbing thing I've ever seen put onto screen.
Marc:It is burned into my memory.
Marc:This, for me, is the scariest scene I've ever seen in a movie, let alone in a horror movie.
Marc:This is simply...
Marc:the best performance in a movie.
Guest:Well, I like that you call it a horror movie, basically, and a horror performance because I don't think those are honored enough.
Guest:And I don't just mean like slasher movies.
Guest:I mean this, the horror of humanity.
Guest:And it's, you know, a lot of times we go through these lists and you look at these people who have won and it's because they won because they're largely playing characters that made people feel good about themselves.
Guest:For sure.
Guest:forrest gump or you know uh it's it's uh it's very rare just like it is with the comedy for people to be rewarded for playing something truly despicable because even like you know javier bardem in no country for old men or or heath ledger playing the joker it's like they're bad but they're kind of fun like you're like oh yeah this guy he's just chaos he's awesome that's
Guest:People have been dressing up as the Joker, that Heath Ledger Joker every Halloween since, you know?
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Nobody's out there as Daniel Plainview.
Guest:I'll tell you that for sure.
Guest:And yes, he is the devil.
Guest:And it's a great allegory of capitalism.
Guest:And it just, it all works 100%.
Guest:But that horror element, that is factored massively into my pick for best actress.
Guest:And so the nominees I have from the list of winners, Jane Fonda in Clute, which is just an insane performance.
Guest:Diane Keaton in Annie Hall.
Guest:Might have been my winner if this other one didn't exist.
Guest:Jodie Foster in Silence of the Lambs.
Guest:Another great performance in a horror movie, but not a horror performance.
Yeah.
Guest:Frances McDormand in Fargo also easily could be the winner.
Guest:But my all-time Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role goes to Kathy Bates from Misery.
Guest:That's the one.
Guest:It's to say, just rewind what you just said about Danny Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood, and that's what I have to say about Kathy Bates in Misery.
Guest:which I just watched again, maybe about a year ago, I want to say.
Guest:And it hit just as well.
Guest:In fact, I enjoyed the performance even more.
Guest:I was like, man, she is so good in this.
Guest:And it is all because of that menace and there's humor in the menace, but it's never, you're never at a point where I'm like, Oh, she's so fun.
Guest:I,
Guest:I want to keep watching this like I do with the Joker when he comes in and like, you know, beats those guys, you know, make the pencil disappear or whatever.
Guest:It's nothing like that.
Guest:You want nothing to do with this Annie Wilkes.
Guest:In fact, she's one of the most terrifying conceptions because it feels real, like it could happen to anybody, right?
Guest:And that is, and the fact that she was a known commodity as an actor, of course, but persona wise was not widely known.
Guest:when this movie came out.
Guest:And I think that played to her advantage massively that here was this woman look like a kind of everyday regular person that you might see in the grocery store.
Guest:And she is terrifying.
Guest:And that is amazing.
Guest:Kathy Bates, my winner for best actress of all time.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:She, that performance sticks with me because, and for a very similar reason to Daniel Day-Lewis, like it is so believable.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Like she, and just like at the end of the movie, like she could be anywhere and she couldn't be anyone, especially in this day and age where, you know, there are stands as apparently I now know.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:she is she's the main stand yes she is the main stand so yeah that that performance though when she is you know trying you know you know helping him but then it just turns ever so slowly into oh no this guy is trapped here and when she breaks his his legs man
Marc:Oh, man.
Guest:I have also adopted many of her aphorisms in my life.
Guest:Like what?
Guest:Oh, cock-a-doodie.
Guest:All the time.
Guest:And there's a point where she calls James Caan Mr. Man, which I love and I say a lot, especially when we used to have a cat.
Guest:I called him Mr. Man all the time.
Guest:Like if he jumped up on something, what are you doing there, Mr. Man?
Guest:Oh, that's great.
Yeah.
Marc:yeah but she makes your list too huh yes she makes my list she's not the winner though also on my list is Frances McDormand for Fargo Jodie Foster for Science of the Lambs and Helen Hunt for As Good As It Gets but my winner that's a good performance oh so fucking good like really good performance my winner though Julie Andrews Mary Poppins
Guest:That's a great pick.
Guest:I felt bad that I didn't have her on mine, so I'm glad you went with her.
Marc:This is just, she's just someone every child wanted as a babysitter, you know?
Marc:We talk about a magic performance.
Marc:Holy cow.
Marc:Absolute magic.
Marc:She is magic.
Marc:Like, to this day, I'm just like, well, she's just a magician.
Marc:She captured the imagination of children and adults.
Marc:I can actually watch this movie without my nephews in tow.
Marc:This movie slaps.
Marc:The songs are incredible.
Marc:And it's really her performance.
Marc:Not just her singing, but just her ability to sort of...
Guest:take this role and sort of just just embody it like this is like my favorite performance from an actress also is it does it it has to be right greatest debut performance in movie history is this her first movie first movie holy shit that i mean i know we've talked about that before with alan rickman but this this has to win right
Marc:Yeah, I mean.
Guest:No, I mean, I think the thing with this, too, was that, you know, she was already a stage star, so people knew her.
Guest:But the whole thing was, you know, she was not cast in the film of My Fair Lady, which was a role that she made famous because she wasn't a known movie star.
Guest:Interesting.
Guest:So that's why they put Audrey Hepburn in the role.
Guest:She didn't sing the part.
Guest:She had it dubbed by Martin Nixon.
Guest:But Julie Andrews was unknown and was in terms of Hollywood and was not given the role.
Guest:But the same year...
Guest:gets mary poppins and the justice is it's uh it's this as you've said one of the greatest performances in human history and gets your award for greatest uh best actress winner of all time and uh everyone knows and loves this every age every every grouping of people knows and loves julie andrews is mary poppins it's a uh it is uh a legendary performance
Marc:That's right.
Marc:Which brings us to our best picture, my friend.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Now, wait.
Marc:Before we get to best picture, do you have any wild cards?
Marc:Like, a wild card category?
Marc:I didn't.
Marc:I didn't do anything wild card.
Marc:Gotcha.
Marc:So, can I just throw out... My wild card category is best score.
Marc:Okay?
Marc:Best score.
Marc:And I have...
Marc:Of all the best scores, these five make it.
Marc:And that is Mary Poppins, Godfather Part 2, La La Land, The Social Network.
Marc:But my winner is Jaws and John Williams.
Marc:Oh, Jaws.
Guest:I was going to say, there better be a John Williams score here.
Marc:Yeah, I get it.
Marc:Star Wars and Jaws.
Marc:I mean, going through the list, it's like, okay, okay, oh, wait, now we're in the John Williams era.
Marc:And it just kind of happens.
Marc:There's E.T., there's Star Wars.
Marc:So, yeah.
Marc:So for me, though, Jaws is the defining score.
Guest:There you go.
Guest:Well, it's also a lot of movies that win for best score are ones that, you know, in hindsight, probably should have won for best picture.
Guest:And so you're almost like default, giving them their flowers there.
Guest:Yeah, totally.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, speaking of best picture, what do you have as your list of five best pictures and your winner?
Marc:Well, listen, man, I went big on this one.
Marc:I did best 10, but I can cut it down.
Marc:No, no, do all 10.
Marc:It's fine.
Marc:Do 10.
Marc:So for me, best pictures.
Marc:I got Argo, Casablanca, No Country for Old Men,
Marc:Silence of the Lambs, The Godfather, Godfather Part II, The French Connection, The Apartment, The Sound of Music, and Ben-Hur.
Marc:But my winner is The Godfather Part II.
Marc:So that to me- Two.
Marc:Yeah, two, ponderous.
Marc:But yes, Part II is the superior movie, okay?
Guest:I'm not that.
Guest:I'm not that guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I go with one.
Guest:No kidding.
Guest:Is that your pick?
Guest:Yeah, I like one better.
Guest:No, no, no, not my pick, but it's on my list.
Guest:And as far as Godfathers go, I understand I'm in the minority there.
Guest:Most people like two better, but I don't.
Guest:I like Godfather one.
Marc:No, I mean, Godfather, I mean, I get it.
Marc:You know, there is like that whole scene in the restaurant, of course, but for me, it's Robert De Niro's involved and we're getting like split timelines and it just adds to the magic of it.
Marc:Like this is like a movie I can just put on and just watch because I just love every moment of it.
Marc:So yeah, Godfather part two is my pick.
Guest:All right.
Guest:Godfather Part II did not make my five.
Guest:I didn't pick 10.
Guest:I picked five.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:But most of your other ones did.
Guest:Casablanca is on here.
Guest:The Godfather, original recipe.
Guest:As mentioned, Amadeus, theatrical version, not the shitty version you watch.
Guest:I wouldn't know.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And Silence of the Lambs.
Marc:Uh-huh.
Guest:But I ultimately had to come down to the thing I usually do when we're making these type of lists.
Yeah.
Guest:what one would I put on right now?
Guest:If I'm looking at my choice of these five movies and I have to watch one right now and watch it all the way through, which one do I pick?
Guest:And the answer, and we've already talked about it, is No Country for Old Men.
Guest:That is shocking to me because I didn't think going into this as an exercise that that is my mental consideration for the best picture winner.
Guest:But I looked at the list, and I sat there with these names when I narrowed it down to five, and I thought, okay, what one is my favorite?
Guest:What one is the one I will watch right now?
Guest:And it's that, No Country for Old Men.
Marc:Yeah, I don't blame you.
Marc:I mean, for me, it was very hard to separate best picture and best director.
Marc:But yeah, I got there.
Marc:But yes, No Country for Old Men.
Marc:I mean, it's...
Marc:It's just a great goddamn movie.
Marc:You know, the Tommy Lee Jones of it all.
Marc:Like, it's just, it's just brilliant, brilliant stuff.
Guest:So why don't we go through our list again before we wrap this up so everybody can hear, you know, what our top picks were.
Guest:So what were yours from starting back at Supporting Actor?
Marc:Supporting actor, my supporting actor was Joe Pesci in Goodfellas.
Marc:Supporting actress, Tilda Swinton.
Marc:Best director is Joel and Ethan Coen for No Country for Old Men.
Marc:Best actor in a lead role is Daniel Day-Lewis.
Marc:Best actress in a leading role, Julie Andrews for Mary Poppins.
Marc:And the best picture, The Godfather Part II.
Guest:All right, and my list is Kevin Kline, Best Supporting Actor for A Fish Call Wanda, Best Supporting Actress Marissa Tomei for My Cousin Vinny, Best Director William Friedkin, The French Connection, Best Actor Marlon Brando on The Waterfront, Best Actress Kathy Bates in Misery, and Best Picture No Country for Old Men.
Guest:Good job there, buddy.
Guest:I feel like we've done it.
Guest:Nobody has to talk about movies ever again.
Guest:We solved it.
Guest:Yes, we solved movies.
Guest:That's the list.
Guest:Those are the best ones.
Guest:No, seriously, if you have ideas, which I'm sure you do, send us your lists of your best bests.
Guest:bests of the bests uh that's the link in the episode description right there just click on it send us your comments and uh enjoy the oscars that's gonna kind of wrap up our oscar week here uh you know we've if you haven't listened to you go back and listen to the bonus episode with me and mark talking about oscars we got the special oscar uh compilation show that we released earlier this week with all the nominees that have been on wtf
Guest:And look, just go back and listen to some of those interviews.
Guest:If you're looking for something to do before Sunday's ceremony, Mark will not be watching Sunday's ceremony.
Guest:As he mentioned, he'll be performing in Tarrytown, New York.
Guest:Good luck to all you who are heading out to that show.
Guest:Make sure you set your DVRs.
Marc:It starts at seven, by the way.
Marc:The Oscars start at seven this year.
Marc:Seven?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Oh, wow.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They want to wrap this thing up.
Marc:I guess so.
Marc:I guess so.
Guest:Actually, God bless him for it.
Marc:Yeah, seriously.
Guest:Because the past is way too late.
Marc:Did I ever tell you my Oscar story?
Marc:About missing the one big moment?
Marc:Yes, about missing the one big moment.
Marc:Do you mind if I mention that real quick?
Marc:Go for it, yeah.
Marc:So I went to LA during Oscar week, and...
Marc:I went to a brewery to watch the Oscars with my wife.
Marc:And this was the year that Jimmy Kimmel hosted.
Marc:And we're watching the whole night.
Marc:And, you know, it starts early there.
Marc:Starts at like 5.
Marc:So it's like 5 o'clock.
Marc:And it ends at like 8 or 9.
Marc:And, you know, I'm getting hungry.
Marc:And we're winding down.
Marc:We're getting to Best Picture.
Marc:And I turn to my wife.
Marc:I'm like, listen.
Marc:I think we know it's going to be La La Land.
Marc:Because we had won a bunch of awards.
Marc:A bunch of awards, you know?
Marc:So, you know, Emma Stone famously won.
Marc:So I was like, listen, can we go and get sushi?
Marc:Want to get sushi before, like, I don't know, people in L.A.
Marc:are done with their Oscar party and then go out for dinner, maybe?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:So we leave...
Marc:during the commercial break for Best Picture, and I drive to the sushi place, I sit down, and my phone's ringing, or not ringing, but I get texts, like a few dozen texts, and it's you being like, oh my god, holy shit, I can't believe it, and I'm just like, what happened?
Marc:And I missed...
Marc:The fuck up with with La La Land winning and Moonlight, you know, being the real winner.
Marc:So I left during the most famous fuck up in all of Oscars history.
Marc:And I can't believe I did that.
Marc:I never again, folks, I'm watching this whole thing.
Marc:I'm going to see every slap, every every cheer, everything.
Guest:So, yeah, I can't believe why I don't leave baseball games for the last hour.
Guest:It's like the same thing.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Thankfully, I was a Mets fan when I was six and learned that the game is not over till it's over.
Guest:So, you know, that has taught me that, but you should have applied that same lesson to the Oscars.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, I also didn't care that much, you know, but I mean...
Marc:I didn't also, yes, nor should I. But yeah, I didn't, I didn't, could never have imagined a scene that transpired that day.
Marc:But yeah, that's my Oscar.
Guest:Listen, don't turn the show off early.
Guest:You never know.
Guest:And if anything terrible did happen and you missed it, I guess we will talk about it here next week.
Guest:That'll do it for the Friday show.
Guest:Until next time, I'm Brendan and that's Chris.
Guest:Peace.