Bandsplain - MOVIE NIGHT: ‘The Decline of Western Civilization’ with Alex Ross Perry, Plus An Interview With Director Penelope Spheeris

Episode Date: March 5, 2026

Yasi and filmmaker Alex Ross Perry (Pavements, Videoheaven) revisit The Decline of Western Civilization films, Penelope Spheeris’s seminal trilogy that began in 1981 with the birth of Los Angeles punk. They discuss the DIY filmmaking that matched the scene it immortalized, the bands and personalities whose legacies were defined on the screen, and the visual language that would influence and shape so much of culture, most evidently in '90s MTV. Next, Yasi is joined by the legend herself, Penelope Spheeris, for a wide-ranging talk about her iconic career, from the Los Angeles punk scene that started it all to navigating the Hollywood studios with beloved comedies like Wayne’s World. CREDITS:Host: Yasi Salek @yasisalek Guests: Alex Ross Perry @alexrossperry, Penelope Spheeris Producer: Rob Sundermann  Editor: Adrian Bridges Additional Production Supervision: Justin Sayles Theme Song: Bethany Cosentino Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey guys, I just wanted to say something quickly here at the top before we get into the episode about the decline of Western civilization. We cover a lot of artists and bands who engage in questionable and fairly indefensible use of Nazi iconography. We never mean to gloss over that in these episodes. The truth is the idea that anyone on earth would support or condone Nazi ideology is always so preposterous to me. but also I'm aware that that's so naive of me to think that there aren't many people in the world today who do uphold those abhorrent and hateful beliefs. My job, you guys, as I see it, is to provide context in every instance that I can. The context here, specifically in relation to the germs, is that they did prominently use Nazi iconography and imagery, and it is highly visible in the first decline film.

As young punks, the germs obviously were interested in provocation and pushing people's buttons, like the sex pistols and a lot of other punk bands that came before them, they used Nazi imagery to that end. The rest of the context here, for what it's worth, is that Darby Crash and Pat Smir have both gone on record in interviews saying they do not hate or discriminate against Jewish people. The early 70s punk scene was, by all accounts, or at least most accounts, quite diverse and inclusive. I wasn't there, but this is what I've learned from my research. 50 years out, of course, it's still pretty difficult to reconcile and understand these things, and it's certainly not our place on this show to defend or uphold any of it. There is no perfect way to talk about this stuff, but I just wanted to take a minute up top to address it more directly and more thoughtful. and more seriously, and just again, to try to do my job to provide as much context as possible.

So I just wanted to say that for you into the episode. And now let's talk about the decline of Western Civilization and Penelope's Fieris' film career. What's with this band anyway? I don't get it. Can you please explain? Wait, like, Bansplaine? Hello and welcome to Bansplaine. host, Yassie Salick. This is a show where I invite an expert guest on to help me explain a cult band or iconic artists, or it is usually. Today's episode is a little bit different. Today's episode

is a movie night, and it is about the decline of Western civilization. My guest today is filmmaker Alex Ross Perry. Also, we have a very special interview after this with the director herself, Penelope Spirious, so make sure to stick around for that. First, Alex, how do they let all you long hairs in here. Into the Spotify offices? Well, it's 1980, can't you afford a haircut? I was just quoting the decline. Right, right, yeah.

Yeah. I believe that's leaving saying that. Did they scan your backpack at the entry of this building? No. Okay, very good. I think you look maybe more suspicious than you do. I love that this movie. Again, like, seen it many times.

Inimitable in many ways. And then you turn it on and I'm like, I'm not sure I've ever seen a movie where the subjects read the filming disclaimer in the movie. Which I love, and I wrote that down, and I was like, what a genius. Yeah. Just already from Jump, this is genius. And the way each of them reads it is like so much personality. It's also so punk how they read it.

Like, Darby's like unintelligible because he's obviously wasted. It takes a second to realize what they're doing. Because it's not impossible that at this time or at any time. Some grandstanding punk would pull out a piece of paper and make some statement during a show. Propaganda, less talk, more rock. And, yeah, just to have that be the beginning is instantly clever in meta, much like the beginning that you've just set up that I bungled by not realizing the quote. Okay, attention. Attention.

For the third time. Attention. Please be advised that. Please be advised by your entry upon these. It's just like always really sticks with me because I'm like, oh, that's such like a 70s thing, like long hairs. You know, like, okay, before we just get into all of it, tell me about your relationship to this movie. Like, when did you first come across it? How old were you? And what was the context? You know, like, it's one of those things that growing up was just kind of always in the ether.

For me, this would have been in the late 90s where it was kind of, like many things at that time in, like, it's both legendary, but it's also a bootleg. Totally, because it was very difficult to access back that. So I feel like the title loomed large. And even before I knew what the movie was, you knew that that was the name of a movie. And I don't think I would have seen it prior to when I moved to New York and started renting from and then working at Kim's video. Which I started renting from as soon as I started going to NYU. And then I started working there. And I just have so many memories of where, you know, Kim's had so many bootlegs and things of dubious legality.

or even just the old out-of-print tapes that if you live somewhere else, you wouldn't be able to track down these films, or certainly three was just not available at all. And I just remember watching it in the store constantly. Like, it's just made that be on in a store selling movies or music. It's so true. Because it's like you can jump in at kind of any point

and there's so many iconic scenes that you can see. I've watched the decline once a year for like 10 years. I never get sick of it. This year I've watched it like four times. Considering how aggressive it is and how loud and brash the subjects and, you know, for the taste of some people, I'm sure the music is, it is weirdly just kind of like relaxing as something that you could just throw on because its rhythms are so peculiar and that it's just like talking song, talking song, talking song. And it kind of feels just like meditating. in a way if you can take pleasure in the music, which I'm sure many people can't. So I remember getting to the store and finally having access to it.

And then, yeah, that's, you know, like, you were in love? Well, we were just like, I had a lot of friends, and we, well, no, I didn't have a lot of friends. But of the friends I had, a lot of them, we would regularly curate cult movie Saturdays where two different people would pick different movies, double features, so that they would be two completely incompatible movies. And one of my friends was a real music nerd, underground musician. So he would always want to put these movies on or Urr a Music War or things like that that the rest of us were just not keyed in on.

And around that time, it just became, yeah, like something that if it was sitting there at the store, you would put it on. And you had a pre-existing relationship with the bands, obviously. At that time, X, yes, which is something I'm curious. curious to talk about. Like, I feel like at that time, I had X and Black Flag, and that was probably around the time that the germs collection came out. Right. Like, the full germs. I don't think at that time I had any relationship with fear. Right. At that time, I probably had no, I mean, who am I forgetting? Catholic discipline, Alex Bag, band, and circle jerks. Yeah, I mean,

circle jerks, I feel like were around, even. Even still because they, like, as of the 90s, were still considered, like, if you were into, like, California punk, you would end up getting circle jerks or, you know, stuff like I always loop them in with something like the vandals, even though I'm sure their careers don't start at the same time. They don't, but they do. The vandals are go back pretty far as well, though. Because they're in, they start off dudes, which was not, was like 83, I want to say. Penelope Spirious's film, dudes, which is, by the way, if you. guys have not seen incredible it's john crier i forget the other actor's name but flea is also in it and it's like a dude buddy comedy but a punk one and the vandals are the band that starts it off um are you

talking about suburbia no i'm talking about dudes because flea's also in that yes please also in many suburbia thoughts but so i guess yeah like by that time if i'm watching the movie half or two thirds of the bands are known to me yeah at least in passing and then i mean alice bag i guess i'm more aware of now isn't like i feel like she had a longer career than in this movie. Yeah, she's sort of like a punk, what do you call it, like a person that's like just out in these streets kind of always like speaking about the truth of the word of punk. And then, yeah, some of them I had no relationship with then and still don't.

Okay, well, let me just do it for a second before we get to in the weeds. It's hard to know how to approach the movie. I feel like as I told you, your dig conversation was so thorough and focused and informative. I have a lot to live up to. No, you're going to be great. I can already tell. Well, the decline of Western civilization is a documentary. film directed by Penelope Spiris that was filmed from December of 79 through May of 1980,

sort of at like, I don't want to say the peak, but kind of. It was like the swell of the LA punk scene that after that didn't really exist in the same form. It features seven bands, Black Flagg, the Germs, X, Circle Jerks, Fear, Alice Bagband and Catholic Discipline. Penelope Spheres was dating at the time and then actually later married Bob Biggs, who was the, I believe, money guy behind Slash magazine and then kind of the proprietor of Slash Records, which was actually partly to do with why so many of these are Slash Records. And yes, favorably shown in the movie. Well, it's funny you say that because I actually listened to an interview with a, I don't want to docks the name, but kind of like an 80s hardcore band guy who was like, trying to sort of besmirch Penelope's Furious by being like, oh, this was kind of like a, like a marketing film for Slash.

And Penelope, when I asked her about it, and you're here in the interview, she was like, Bob literally made fun of me. He did not want me to do this. No one was supportive of this. Like, it absolutely was not. She was like, these were just the bands I had access to because of my friendship with Slash, which totally makes sense because, like, who else is going to let you film them, you know? Yeah, no, I mean, even like, and this is something else that at the time was very apparent as someone who had grown up, like, you buy like a black flag record, it comes with an SST catalog, and then you're like mail ordering five more.

100%. So you sort of like, to me. Next thing, you know, you have Sackeren Trust seven inches and you're like, hell, yeah, let's fucking go. To me in the early 2000s, like grouping things under the umbrella of a company made sense because that was kind of the only way you could curate. yourself. Totally. And that was also like a good part of the scene. I mean, there's a couple of bands that you would think that might have made sense to also be in this.

Like the weirdos would have made sense. They were very much part of that scene. But they were also like really art school, you know, so like they might not have fit in quite as well. And we should talk about when we get more into it about how X kind of sticks out like a sore thumb a little bit amongst these bands. I have a great many thoughts about X. Yeah. I love X. They were the band I certainly knew the most.

like just as a young radio hits in the 90s. Like what? Well, I mean, I think they were old. They were older songs. They would play Nobody Walks in L.A. That song is not called Nobody Walks in L.A. This is like K-Rock shit. They did not play this in Philadelphia.

Oh, okay. X were not on the radio. Like, I grew up listening to X songs on K-Rog. Yeah, that makes sense. I feel like they're very much in the pantheon of like California bands. I have so many thoughts on X that are. But, like, you know, Los Angeles and Wild Gift were albums that, anybody had to go through those albums by the time you were 20 years old if you're growing up listening to punk music so it was very much like it was them black flag although obviously at this time my younger fandom was like oh this is like pre henry rollins black flag how interesting because to me i was just

like two or three singers yeah you know it right because you don't know how much did you know about that yeah there's no like this is ron radio with everyone's members uh listed This one's Ron Ray. Yes. Which is also to me an interesting aspect of like kind of one of the many things that this movie kind of miraculously puts a pin in, which is like the kind of low-key multiculturalism of these scenes, which are often accused of being anything but. And then like be it dead Kennedys or like Ron Reyes or like even Slayer. This is a California thing. And I will die on this. California bands are pretty much always multicultural.

because California is so multicultural. Like even the germs, Pat smear is half black and I believe half German. Slash. Alice Bagg. Slash. Oh, I remember the deaf tone. You can go all over the map. It's just funny to me that to me that was so obviously a part of anything like this.

And then years later, it's like, oh, these. Being accused of being. Yeah, like this like exclusionary scenes that were very like, it's like, yeah, I don't know. My impression was always like, no effects as like, you know. White trash too. He's in a bean. Exactly. Like, a lot of these.

bands have some combination of those things. Yeah. Well, I just touch in a couple of things about Penelope and then we can dive in. So I don't know if you know that she was raised in a carnival. Okay. If I knew that, I don't know it today. I just think it's such an amazing detail because, I mean, you're a filmmaker and you've made documentary.

And I asked her about it so you guys should listen to the interview. But I was like, I can't imagine what would shape a better person to make films like this than growing up in a carnival. Like being able to handle and thrive within chaos, how visually arresting. What kind of a carnival? Like a midway or like a circus? A literal like traveling carnival with like freaks. Okay.

Until she was seven. And then she went to high school in Orange County going up to L.A., seeing shows Dick Dale and stuff because she's a bit older than the subjects of decline. And then she studied biopsychology. and then went to UCLA Film School. Right. Which I thought was really interesting because at that time, you would not think that I can be a director. I'm a woman.

So she didn't go to be a director. She just went because she liked film and she knew they had equipment. And she might be able to use it. And she was like, I'll become like a script supervisor. Sure. Just like, can you imagine? Not like, because I feel like some people with similar trajectories were there to study photography or they knew that they could make documentaries

but they wouldn't get like the big opportunity. Yeah, but she was just like, it's not on table for me. But then she learned, and then she founded through friends, she had a very cool and eclectic group of friends. One of them was at a big label, I want to say it's Columbia, but I'm not totally sure, and was like, you know how to make films. Can you make music videos for us? This is 1974.

There was no MTV, nothing, but they needed these, you know, it was mostly live. It was bands playing. It wasn't like concept videos. Yeah. And so she had the first music video company in LA. It was called Rock and Real. Okay. And she would make music videos.

And later, this is my favorite fact. And again, I talked to her about it. So listen, Lorne Michaels was her friend. Right. I remember. Yeah. And he had started S&L. She also tells a funny story about him coming to her and the friends and being like, I want to start S&L and then be like, okay.

But he was like, oh, I have this comedian. He's great, but he doesn't want to be a player on S&L. He wants to direct, but he doesn't know how can you teach him. And that man was Albert Brooks. Yeah, you told me that. And I feel like this connection, like when you grow up, you know, growing up, you already knew Wayne's world. At least I did. Then later you're like, oh, that's interesting.

The woman who made these rock movies was hired to do that. And then somehow later, like, not when I'm 10, but later you're like, oh, so she actually had like a connection to that world of entertainment already. It wasn't just. Yeah, she wasn't tapped. We like your documentary remake this movie. Right. Also, like some preexisting relationship where she felt like she could be called up to the big league. to do, like, the SNL movie.

Well, we talked to her about that, too, so I don't get into it. But anyways, I just, the reason I want to point out these biographical details were just because I feel like they all sort of intersect to make, to me, how she was able to make decline makes so much sense. Like, you grew up in a carnival, you've directed live, like, live band footage. That's, like, kind of where you've cut your teeth, so you know how to do that. And then she was just really interested in music, and she said she saw this punk rock scene again through this boyfriend and was like, I need to document it.

And can you imagine? Thank God. It's like one of the only visual documents we have of that time of this specific scene that's not just photos. Right. I don't want to be ignorant. Yeah. And say like, oh, there's nothing else because then people are going to be well-actually.

You know, there's so much. There is like, as I texted you when you reminded me when I was in Las Vegas to go to the punk museum. Right. Like there was like a video of the journey. Like there's, you know, people brought in these video cameras and there is. But there's a difference in my mind between like people record, people taped those shows versus like something beautiful and artistic was made about this scene and moment.

And part of what I love about this movie is again, as you're, if you're 19 or 20, you're looking at so much of the material that was made in New York. Very well documented. Very well. Every direction to even like list how much of that there is would be pointless. But there's so much punk and no wave and new wave films, fiction, documentary, performance, photography. And to me, what I always found fascinating about this is that to my mind at the time, it was the only thing like it. I'm sure there's something comparable.

But certainly 10 years into like downtown New York being the artistic center of the world, people were filming and documenting. a lot of what was going on. Yeah. And I'm just so curious if anybody would have seen this absolute debauchery and just, you know, to me, incredible, but objectively awful sounding music in some cases, and thought, like, there's actually something really interesting happening here. Someone really needs to make a note of this because generations from now this will be essential because it really seems like it would have been very easy to overlook and be like,

yeah, there just was this scene that kind of nobody, knew about or paid attention to because they're just playing in these clubs and a couple dozen people are there. And of course, no one ever thought to bring a camera in. So you don't have any footage of these bands at their prime. If you think about it, it's borderline a miracle that she found it when she did and captured it because it, like the germs, I mean, Darby Crash dies before the film even comes out, you know? So the germs are annihilated. Always a great thing when that happens. Like when there's some movie made. and like Sid versus Dying before the Great Rock and Roll Swindle comes out

where it's like the thing becomes a eulogy. Right. It's very Nirvana unplugged in New York where like it looks like he's playing his own funeral because it's so like the gravitas. And also the film poster for Decline is Darby laying down on stage with his eyes closed who looks deceased. It's really intense. I feel like the Todd Phillips G.G. Allen documentary also came out after he was dead.

Yeah, it's really... Hated. But besides that part, and this is another thing I want to talk to you about as a filmmaker, because I know this just from all of my research and stuff, but what she also captured, although it's not explicitly stated in the film, because she's not really making statements in the film. She's more of an observer. But, like, this was, like, kind of at the point where, like, Black Flag was bringing in this contingent of what they called, like, HBs or whatever, this Orange County in South Bay kind of, like, aggressive test as I think Mike Wat called it like testobros or something like a really different punk contingent that was like really clashing with like what the LA one was was kind of like freaks and queers and like and it was the whole thing kind of imploded because of that right like it created hardcore yeah and it split things and this is like kind of at the precipice of that and she captures that you know like that is like you feel that that is definitely what happened

was that like the simply by the by virtue of their energy black flag like introduced a different well they courted it apparently this is just what I read in my many like oral histories like what I read was that they had they saw a way to kind of up their numbers of their of their crowds by kind of courting this new upright it's something the germs kind of accidentally created because People were interested in going to germs shows because they were so psychotic and they were like, oh, this is like anything goes. But the germs were still part of that old, you know, that original punk wave, which was like, be weird and sort of, you know, just be anarchist or whatever for its sake not like, let's go whale on people, you know. But I think Black Flag kind of like ushered that in on purpose to bolster their numbers. And it was happening anyways. But they courted it and it kind of bifurcated. the scene, you know? That's fascinating.

I have a lot of thoughts on Black Flag's role in this. Greg Ginn specifically, actually, is what the oral history said. I mean, this does. They pinned it on Greg Ginn. He's kind of painted as the villain. This does. Oh, really? Yeah.

Yeah. After the movie, my wife was like, she looked him up on Wikipedia. She's seen it before, but she, like, you know, doesn't know Greg Ginn from. Yeah. She didn't read the recent New York Times profile about the new Black Flagg with him in the four 22-year-olds or whatever. I think like really, for my money, the best iteration of the band to date. Is this one right now?

Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Like, this is the definitive lineup. But she was like, oh, yeah, like, look, he has like these troubles, this custody dispute. And I was like, oh, no, you don't understand. He's like the villain of punk rock. He's a cartoon villain of punk rock. I was like, oh, it's funny. To him, to you, he's like this kind of well-spoken guy in a short-sleeve polo shirt

leading this band. And like, to anybody else, he's like a figure with no difference. offenders in the world of music or punk. But I would believe that he would have some kind of design. But to me, like the Black Flag side of that is interesting because you say this, and I believe this could be true. My question, like on a lot of this movie, and even if you're saying that they kind of created this audience of people, hardcore bros, what were those people doing prior to this? Like, where did, to me, like, it's very easy and what I find fascinating about this movie, which is kind of like beautifully uninformative. Yeah. Like, it provides no context for

anything that you're watching. It provides no information. No. I know, I don't need information because I know who all these bands are except for the one that everybody forgets. Well, I'll talk to you about that. It's actually that man is the most interesting man in the world. Okay. I'll take your word for it until you prove, do you prove your point? But like, yeah, I don't need the context because I know what this is, but if you're like, oh, this is supposed to be a seminal documentary, we should watch it, and learn about the LA punk scene. You don't really learn anything. You just learn that these rooms were crazy. Yeah. The bands were outrageous, sometimes playing really poorly, and the figures in them were maniacs. Yeah. And I love how uninformative it is,

but watching it, like, if you were watching a comparable film, right, like, imagine a movie that doesn't exist that's just like seven New York bands, 76 to 79, you would be like, well, the The context for this is that New York downtown had been a happening art scene for a decade. Right. Dating back to Andy Warhol and this and that. And you've gotten here after 10 years of this culture brewing. In this, I look at this and I'm like, I have no idea where this comes from in L.A. I don't know what preceded it.

I don't know what market this was servicing. And I don't know what this disrupted. Well, I want to push back a little bit. I think you're right in terms of like not placing it in the context of music culture. like, yeah, she doesn't say like, oh, before this was David Bowie and glitter and this pushed that out or this came from that. But what she does do, and she does this in all of her declines, and it's clearly like a very interesting, I think, preoccupation of hers is she does show the context of how these kids

became punks with all those interviews of these, like, I mean, Eugene. The fans, yeah. Yeah. Eugene is an HP, you know, like, you go from, and you hear the story. of each of these kids who's like coming from these like terrible

and broken homes and turning towards this like new thing that's like very aggressive so I feel like that's the place she puts the context I mean the context is there

and that's you know the culture of that era you see in like movies like over the edge or kind of seminal or like Rivers Edge Rivers Edge yeah

yeah yeah runaways and like out of the blue like you see in these movies of this era the wayward youth kind of lost in this period of the 70s, but in as much as like this trilogy

can be seen as like, there was this movement and then there was this movement as someone who didn't grow up in L.A. Yeah. Like in my mind, I don't even know what the scene to make a documentary, like if there was a decline zero, I don't know what it would have been.

It would have been Rodney's English disco. Okay. Yeah, it would have been what came, what it directly preceded this was like glam. It was like, well, they called glitter in L.A., but they would like, the kids were like, the runaways came out of that, right? It's like, that's directly before this is the runaways, but they were like going, they were obsessed with Iggy Pop and David Bowie and Queen, and they would go to Rodney's English disco and do drugs and wear like platforms.

And that sort of gave way to this. But that also kind of carries, like that kind of bridges over this also. I think of some of that is like dying off in decline two. Okay, so completely changed, when it gets to decline two and now it's glam. metal, which is a little bit different. But punk was something totally different. But for example, Darby Crash was obsessed with David Bowie. That was like his be-all end all, you know?

And they loved Iggy Pop. That was kind of what it came up. Yeah, yeah. But those are international or, you know, rust belt-based artists. Like, the runaways are... You're saying what was happening in L.A. I mean, it's just unknown to me because, yeah, I'm going to, like, again, I pride myself on knowing nothing about the doors.

The doors were the first. first punk band. So you've said. I will die on this hill. Okay. There's actually, I felt so happy because I hadn't read it before. Has anyone ever, when you've said that, been like, totally? Well, interestingly, not to my face, but when I was reading one of the, God, I don't remember, I read so many punk histories when I was doing the germs episode, but I want to say it was John Doe's maybe. The entire prologue is about that. It's someone making that exact case, which probably predates me making that point, which I hadn't read it yet. And I was like, But when were they active?

60s. Okay, so but that is a long time before this. But here's what happened. Did they not go into the early 70s? Iggy Pop saw Jim Morrison and was like, I want to do that. Sure. And he channeled that energy. And then you could, I think you can definitely make the point that, like, at least

musically, the first punk band in America was the Stooges. Right. It's just fascinating to me to imagine, like, you know, we know the chronology of, you know, Ramon 75, 76, 77, like, what is that wherever these people are coming from in L.A. in 75, 76? Has it just not gotten there yet? And this is something I couldn't stop thinking about during the movie.

Because at least as history has it, in New York, these things kind of slowly crept out of other things. Yeah. And I just, you know, the runaways are, of course, a great example. I don't really know if it's easy to imagine any of these bands in particular, like, thinking that they were... The germs were obsessed with the runaways. Pat and Darby were, like, runaway's groupies.

Sure, okay. They thought they... That's like, they saw them and was like, we can make a band. So the germs, I didn't listen to your episode so that I wasn't just repeating things you'd already said back to you. But it seems like... I'll repeat them to you. The kind of classic, like, a band who objectively is terrible, obviously great in their way, but, like, what they're obsessed with are things that are really slick.

You're talking about the runaways now. And David Bowie and, like, their idols. are things that they can't really reach. And that is what they are reaching for in their own. They were trying to be like musically adept is what you mean. I mean, even, but like, you know, it's not saying, oh, yeah, their role model was. And then you say something that like, you know, the MC5, something that's like, oh, that's within reach for them. It's like you're saying things that are quite well produced.

And then you watch the germs and you're like, really, they were obsessed with David Bowie that seemed like. But they didn't want to make that kind of music, I don't think. But yeah, there's a really great story of Don Bowles, call. when he wanted to join the germs and name-dropping all these, like, really obscure, like, punk and noise kind of projects. And Pat and Darby being like, we like, queen. Yeah. And him being like, what? And they're like, yeah, we like, we like, we're like, okay.

So, yeah, I feel like we're getting. We're getting a little far from God's light here. But, again, like, it is just such a, such a unique snapshot. And it is, for my money, what makes it inimitable, so beautifully made. And even like when the restorations came out like a decade or so ago, just to see it not on a bootleg. The quality of her images and the photography that she created and the power of those shows combined with like the really now what you would call like not staged, but like the way the interviews are done in these movies are very deliberate. Yeah. They're not fly on the wall interviews no matter how much they seem like they are.

And the quality of the filmmaking and the editing is so strange. It's so peculiar. It's so not informative. Like, you're left to draw your own conclusions. Yeah. Because it's not like, it's not saying, like, in 1973, Rodney Bingenheimer did this, and that led to this. Like, it really is just kind of the sensation of, like, walking down the street, hearing something coming from a venue, opening the door, and walking it. And your understanding, because, like, I've seen quite a few music documentaries, but, like, ones that predate this,

isn't really my wheelhouse, that wasn't really the vibe, right? Like, it was a totally different kind of filmmaking. And like, even back in the 2000s, like the music documentary section at a store would be so small. Yeah. There just wasn't that much of it.

Inimitable artists of that caliber would have these films made and give me shelter. And, you know, they're the best ones ever because at the time there weren't that many of them. And they tended to be made about towering artists who warranted, cinematic exploration. And they had a purpose which was promotion.

Yeah. Right? Even back then, it's like you're making Gimmie Shelter because you're promoting your own band and your own myth. Like this is something not that. This is something different. Right. And it's, but this is, yeah, it's so ethnographic.

Yeah. In her exploration that she then carries across for years that it can't help it be kind of its own thing and not that it was like massively influential at the time because it just wasn't like oh it's everywhere everyone's seen that movie but it does kind of very easy to look back on it and say that it colored the kind of like we should make a documentary about these people we should go make a documentary about these people well not even just that like I think the thing that I'm always struck by when I watch it is that and we're around the same age so I think maybe you would see this as well but like that style

her specific style is 90s MTV. A hundred percent owes to Penelope Spheres what we grew up watching. Those freeze frames. Yeah. The sort of like fluidity of like vibes-based band convo followed by a performance. Totally. Very 120 minutes where you would just make these people talk. So much of MTV is, and I think at the time they were like, oh, she copied MTV, which is an insane thing because MTV came out six months after this.

documentary came out. Yeah. Like it is post, but, you know, people like to say it. And I asked her, because the freeze frame thing I'm obsessed with it, I think it's so genius. Every time I see it, because it's funny, and it kind of puts a point on things. And I asked her about it, this will spoil it, but I just have to tell you about it, because I'm so into it. She was like, yeah, she was like, honestly, like, we had to, like, finish the song. And so it was really just to, like, we needed more footage and we didn't have it.

so we would linger on a shot in a freeze frame to make sure we go to the end of a song. Interesting. That's so cool. Came out of necessity. Yeah, yeah, because it would have been much easier to just keep rolling sound. Yeah.

The style of these, we'll kind of accidentally talk about the others in a way, but like even just like sometimes like the blips of cutting into a song are just so funny. It's just so jarring.

And it makes the whole thing seem so haphazard, but achieves for me the best thing of all which the second film does in spades also is like it does just, it is kind of a movie that just feels like what the music is. It's kind of incredible, kind of unpolished, kind of has things in it that feel like they're an accident,

has things in it that are transcendently brilliant that you don't know if they're there on purpose or if the artist even, you know, it just feels like being with these bands. Yeah. And it's just endlessly rewatchable. Like it's just a totally funny thing to have this movie that is like occasionally pretty, pretty abrasive.

And just, you know, it could be a comfort movie as it is for you if you watch it. You said ethnographic, and I think that's a perfect word for it, because I think it's important also to remember that these people were absolute freaks at that time. Like, people were like, we don't know punks. They scare us. And so she's capturing them like in, like kind of in that way. I mean, she gives them humanity, right? But, like, capturing that for people who are not part of the scene to watch it at that time was probably so – it's like, oh, this is how they talk to each other.

This is how they live. Like, they wouldn't screen it places because the subculture was considered so alien. Freaks would show up. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that's another thing that's obviously 30 years past anyone being able to wrap their head around. But the idea that there is, like, an unknown subculture who you're aware of vaguely, who you may be – That's transgressive. Yeah, you like maybe see if you accidentally, like, end up on the wrong side of town.

Yeah. And that somebody would take a camera there and make these subjects into movie stars. It kind of recalls that now this is similarly like an iconic film, but streetwise was always kind of the same thing where it's like, you can make a poetic, beautiful documentary about junkies. Right. If you're just in the right place at the right time, and you can take these real lives and turn them into heartbreaking nonfiction.

Maybe it's a little staged. Maybe the audience shouldn't ask, like, if this is nonfiction, why is it shot on tripods? Right, right. But, like, the bottom line is it's putting subjects in front of audiences, thus achieving, like, the true purpose of journalistic documentary, which this movie doesn't seem like it is. It seems like it's a mixtape celebration of a wild scene, but it does, in retrospect, really, for me, function as, like, a great document of something where you could show this to kids today. who are like, I like punk, and you see the way Black Flag live. And you're like... One of the most iconic scenes.

And you're like, this, not only do you not know that this happened, you couldn't understand. You couldn't wrap your mind around living in a closet at the church where you record. Yeah, like that's just not a part of anybody's understanding of the era and were it not for somebody bringing a camera into their home. Yeah, you could see photos of which there are thousands of the squalor that these people lived in, but to actually have them explain, like, costs $16 a month. Yeah. And this is how we do it. And we kind of, like, made this little loft.

And here's, like, the panties someone left behind. It is so fascinating. And one of the, not faults I have with the movie, but, like, I feel like on rewatch, the Black Flag narrative going into their home, Greg Ginn, like, speaking, kind of eloquently. I mean, say what you will about him, but he's obviously a smart guy. Yeah. And then the Derby Crash stuff where he's, like, making breakfast. kind of cutting between him and the manager, which is the only time the movie, like, makes a story out of something

that, like, is not happening in front of you is that, like, the subsequent chapters of the movie with the other artists don't actually give as much, like, actual insight into who they are as those two do, and the movie starts with them, not literally, but, like, they're in the beginning of the movie. I think the X scene is also pretty evocative. I mean, the X scene is funny just because they're so normal

and like in their own way compared to what you've seen already. Right. But like by the end of the movie, the idea that like you could learn something by hanging out with Alice Bagg and like there'll be more insight into the way. She lived, like the movie kind of abandons that

either because the material wasn't there. It just didn't happen while they were filming because those two parts of the movie like the Derby crashed stuff making the eggs is like so good she did it again. I know in decline two. Three. Oh, two.

Also with Ozzy, yeah. And then in three also there's like an egg making scene. So it's like she knows that there's like something very real and just like, yeah. What does this punk do when he wakes up after the show? Which is something no one would have ever thought about. It's like he stumbles home, he's fucked up. He's got to eat breakfast the next morning.

Like it might be 9 a.m. when he gets home or it might be 4 p.m. when he wakes up. A fun fact about that from behind the scenes is that's not even his house. Sure. Same as the Aussie thing. Yeah, that is like Tony the Hustler's house who is like a male prostitute that Darby lived with. It's weirdly nice looking. It looks nice.

Because he made a lot of money, Tony the Hustler. And that tarantula is Tony the Hustler is that Darby gifted him for like Christmas or something. And Tony the Hustler actually makes sort of an accusation in, oh, I don't want to call it an accusation, but a statement in one of the oral history is that he felt that he put Michelle, who is the woman with him, who's like one of his inner circle. Darby had this inner circle of women who just like, like, treadlocks in her face. Yeah, did all his bidding and loved him and whatever, paid for everything. that he was kind of trying to not seem gay by having this woman with him in the house while he makes breakfast.

Again, I don't know if that's true or not. That's simply what Tony the hustler said. But it's still an amazing, so he doesn't matter if you know if it's real or not. And it's very easy to imagine at a time where media is so small to just imagine like, well, they're making a movie about me. So if I have this girl here,

that will be the only insight people have into my life. Yeah. Like there will be no subsequent questions if the movie that they make about me features me making breakfast with some chick. Yeah. It's very fascinating, but I do love the insight into those lifestyles.

I think it's amazing. A movie doesn't continue to do that. And maybe it's because, and you would know this better since you're a filmmaker, it might be because they tried it with other people if they're not... Because Darby Crash, I think arguably

is the centerpiece of this movie, right? The germs, but mostly Darby. He's the star. And then the black flag stuff is secondarily the most interesting. And it's possible they tried to do it with the other bands and it just wasn't compelling. I don't know, you know. Do you think when you watch something and you make objectively a true statement? Yeah. It's like the best parts of this movie are the two best well-known bands. Okay. Do we say that because they are the best well-known? Are they the best well-known because

this movie helped their reputation? Or do they pop in the movie because they had like? No, I think you're, I think. Who else is going to pop if not Darby Crash and Blackflike? That's what I say. I think the germs were just like inarguably important. You know, like you could make the case that there would be no hardcore without them. I mean, they were just so important. And you can see how compelling Darby is. I mean, even through everything I've read, the whole thing about Darby crash is that he could have started a cult and thousands of people would have joined people. Were like captivated by this person. It's so funny. I mean, there's just, as always when you hear that about somebody and then you look at the material, you're like, they were captivated by this person. But that's, you hear it

from like every person in these oral histories were like, he had some. something magnetic about him. There's a great story. I am retrading the germs episode a little bit, sorry, but I think it's so interesting. There's a great story in it about he and Pat, and I want to say it was the brother of Kira Rossler, went into the Scientology Center when they were in, like, high school, and they took the tests, and they, like, Pat got a zero, and they were like, you have a personality disorder, you need to come, we need to help you.

Kira Rossler's brother got, like, a medium score, and they were like, we can help you, whatever, and Darby got a perfect score, and they asked him to come, like, teach there. They were like, you're obsessed with you. Interesting. Is that in the movie? Does Shane West do that scene? Oh, my God. I guess Scientology. Honey, we can't even get into that movie. I literally tried to put it on while I was doing my germs research, and I was like, absolutely the fuck-not. You didn't watch it. You didn't make it through. I got like 20 minutes in it. And I was like, these wigs. Yeah, I've never seen it. The Hague. I would like to see it. Egregious. Yeah. Worse than the dirt for you? Hard to say. Yeah. These are, you can't make a fictional movie.

You know, Penelope said something really interesting about suburbia, which I know you love or you just want to talk about. I love suburbia. And I feel like Suburbia is basically she remade this movie as a scripted film. Not literally, but like she made a fiction film. Because they told her. In the world of squatters and punks. Yeah. Because they literally basically told her if you want people to watch your movie, it has to be a fictional film. If you want to watch a movie about punks. And she was like, okay.

And it is, I mean, a film I saw way later than this. Yeah, same. Not way later, five years later. And I was like, wait, this movie's a masterpiece. Like, it's just so lived in. And it feels more like a documentary at times than this does. This feels more like MTV. Yeah.

And that feels more like what we now think of as a documentary. And it clearly has a lot of non-actors in it. Well, I was going to say, because she said, this made me bring it up, because she was like, it's easier to teach punks to act than it is to teach actors how to be punk. Of course, historically, probably the most embarrassing thing for people to do. is try to act. With very limited exceptions, but a great film, and much like this,

was always kind of in and out of availability and distribution. So, like, part of her reputation suffering over the years or just not suffering, but, like, not soaring, is that her best work was kind of hard to see. You would see her mainstream work, but the declined films kind of, as far as... I thought this was true. I still think this is true.

didn't come out on DVD until 2016 or 2015 or so. I think that's the year that the decline was put into the National, the Library of Congress. And then there was like a three DVD box set. Yeah. But as far as I recall, had only existed as bootlegs and bootlegs of the tapes. Right. And Suburbia was always available as a really cheap, bad-looking DVD, and then that went away and then wasn't on Blu-ray for a very long time. And I feel like this always, it makes things into cult.

objects, but it prevents them from being canonized, no matter how crucial they are. But to me, they're a perfect, I mean, they are just like two sides of the same coin, and it's almost unbelievable that she made them essentially back to back. Yeah, they're a great part and parcel to watch together. Which they did with streetwise also. There's like scripted streetwise, which is American Heart. Oh, I don't know about that. The same filmmakers basically made like a movie about the same, it's the same story.

And it's Jeff Bridges and Edward Furlong as like wayward father and son in the northwest dealing with addiction and homelessness, which is kind of an interesting like micro trend. Which one's better? Well, Streetwise is one of the greatest films ever made, much like this. But it's an interesting micro trend of like, oh, you stumbled upon in Streetwise photographers, in her case, like a music lover. You stumbled upon something now make it into a real movie. Right. And in both cases, the real movie becomes less well-known and less below. of it.

Right. Than the authentic thing. Yeah. But, I mean, the germ stuff is just great and the germ stuff in the punk museum in Las Vegas is also, they're very well represented there. It's hard to overstate how important they were. Yeah. It's an interesting case of like, people got mad at me when I said this on the germs episode.

And I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I just, the music is good. Yeah. Okay. There are great songs in there, but it is not an album that is like, okay, here's the top 10 albums of all time, you know? Yeah.

They were very young. They were very rudimentary. They could not play their instruments that well. You know, like Pat Smir may be accepted and Lorna was okay. But watching the scenes in this movie, like, it almost plays as a joke how many people are like, he doesn't sing into the microphone and they can't play. Right. And it is, again, I say this as a fan.

It is like worse than anything watching them play. And you really get the idea. The movie almost seems like this subject is dead by the time the movie comes out, even though, obviously, that's only known in retrospect. But it is like, considering that the movie is, like, considering that the movie is, starts with X, who are very slick and very talented even when we see them, right? It's, what's the first song in the movie? It starts with nausea.

Yeah, yeah. It starts with nausea, and what's really interesting is they were upset because the crowd that's shown is not their crowd. Sure, a classic trick. And they were like, our crowd is not like that. Our crowd is not agro like that. Like, we didn't want that. And it makes sense that it makes a better film moment.

No, it almost does every other band no favors to start with X. There's their heads above. these other bands. Yes. Musically. Yeah. Musically, there's no reason X are in this movie. No.

Like... But they were in the same scene. They were all friends, you know? That's clear. And obviously the New York punk, like, and, you know, British punk. Not Blackfly, really, actually. There's always like... And, you know, it's like, oh, well, they're in the same scene.

They don't really sound alike. Yeah. Ramones and Blondie don't sound alike. Yeah. Et cetera, et cetera. Talking heads, yeah. That's like one CBGVs. Yeah, like they don't sound alike, but it's very easy to imagine them all playing together.

X. To me, like, again, a band I have probably... have had CDs of for 30 years. Like, what have X influenced? Who, like, who, in the last 20 years? Right, is that it? Is that, like, what happens is that that becomes, like, the punkabilly, like, social distortion?

Like, when I listen to X, I can really hear, like, alternative music. I can hear the beginnings of real, what is called 90s alternative music. It's baked in that. Even, like, pixies stuff. Oh, definitely, that. You know? Like, lately, I just don't know. if I've heard anything in 20 years that I'm like, I hear a lot of X in this.

Well, maybe that should change. It could. There's always those artists and filmmakers as well that, like, just disappear from favor. And you know nobody is, like, watching them anymore. And then you see a retrospective, and you're like, how come no one, like... X was touring into, like, two years ago. Aren't they still? I think they just stopped.

Okay. They're like one of these, the rare case, maybe you have artists like this in your list of, like, again, I probably bought Los Angeles when I was 13 years old. And at the time, I think they were inactive, right? Or like maybe in a hiatus that, you know, was reaching into its 15th year. And then they started touring again. It's one of those artists that I was like, oh, I have no interest in going to see them. Oh, no, they're so good life.

Those albums will never not be fun for me. And yet, like, old X, I just was never like, I got to go to that. I don't know why. Interesting. I love their inclusion in the film because I do think they're so capital. Like Billy Zoom, just watching Billy Zoom's weird smirk face the whole time and you're like, I have no idea what this man is thinking. Also, unlike every other band in the thing, like the way he plays guitar and he's showy and like, that's like kind of rooted back in old rock and roll and you're like, oh, that's interesting. Totally, totally. And that's in them and like there's no denying like compared to the squalor of Black Flag and. But they're also in squal, right? They're doing stick and poke tattoos and they're talking about how they like live.

lived in a guy who died of cancer's home and drank his beer and his, like, liquor. But there's that, like, funny quality that you were kind of correcting me on when I was saying, despite repo man, like, I don't think of Emilio Estevez as being very punk. Like, that funny quality that is all over this movie of, like, man, these guys are, like, the real fucking crazy punks. And they're wearing, like, polo shirts. Those are the, that's what we were talking about. That's kind of, like, the ex-uniform of, like, John Doe is, like, wearing.

But Ex-S crowd wasn't like that. Exitraud was like definitely punk and artsy. Their crowd. But I'm saying like the sort of visual makeup of the band. And John Doe is like a very good looking guy. Like that's the other thing that always helps people reach these levels of like, oh, they're better than everyone else. It's like Darby Crash is, you know, by all intents and purposes, like a fairly revolting seeming person to be around. Yeah.

Despite cult charisma. And then there's always the person that's like, you know who's just like classically handsome, this really successful talented person. Yeah. Why do you think they're so successful? Like probably because he's good looking and people like being around him and he seems smart and funny. Yeah. Well, that does go a long way. But they bring like a very grounded quality despite seeming like just awesome.

Like he's good looking and cool. She's like good looking and cool. Yeah. They have names like Billy Zoom and Bone Break and like. DJ Bone Break. Just everything about them seems cool. And then the music is so like gentle compared to Black Flag. Right.

But not compared to 1979. Right. I think if you went, again, I can't know I wasn't around, but I think if you went to an X-O-979, that was transgressive music. You know, it's just hard to see that now where it's like that's dad music. But that's what I struggled with is like it's hard to see that now because they've been in my life for so long. And when you get to them halfway through the movie after Black Flag after the germs,

I really was like this is, you know, some bands just, some everybody films like, some things just stick out. Like they're part of it, but they're not. like 70s filmmakers whose movies aren't new Hollywood movies. So they're like part of an era, but they're not artistically linked. They're just the same because they were there at the same time. And there's all that overlap. And X, you know, like, it's always fun to have these kind of like, well, they're part of it,

but like they don't sound like all of their peers. And then they like kind of continued on. I have to say, like, one of the great tragedies of my life is this, which is that I can never understand what it is to, see the decline in 1981. Right. I'll never know what that is. And none of us will, right, unless you were around.

Because these bands were nobody. So now we talk about, I mean, a black flag shirt is a dime a dozen. Everyone knows who the germs are. X is famous. Even the circle jerks, you know, we said quite a lot of them. I believe circle jerks are out there. Keith Morris has never stopped working. That is the hardest working man in showbiz, and punk rock show business.

But at the time, these were all nobody's. And there's just, I can never experience that. I can only go into it having these sort of preconceptions. But you said this about people being good looking or likable. One of the, I wanted to ask you about your favorite characters in general in the film. One of my favorites is Chuck Tchaikowski. I feel like he jumps off the screen. He's so charismatic.

When you send me the picture, I thought it was the guy in SLC Punk, who was clearly styled. Yeah. I realized when I just got it confused on my phone. I'm just really struck by how, like, he's so charming and he's so, like, funny in well-span. He could have been an actor. Yeah. That's always the funny thing is, like, when you are involved, like, even peripherally as non-musicians and, like, going to, like, punk houses or, like, seeing shows, there's always those guys that are just, like, fucking hilarious. Yeah.

Just, like, a total goofball with, like, a big happy face. And there's always the guy who's, like, has the worst energy and no one wants to be around. And they're always kind of in the same room together. Yeah. So often in the same band. Yeah. And like there is a kind of self-styled mythologizing that these people are clearly doing when a camera is put in front of them. Even at a time where like media images were not thought of as being like lasting forever.

They weren't like, this is going to be my legacy. But they're turning on a kind of performance. And they're being, as everybody is when a camera is on them, like an extra version of themselves, whether that's like a gross version or a charming version or a, you know, like an astute version. They all know that like I can't just mumble through this. Right. I would even go one step further with this film, which I think is an interesting layer to think about if you're watching it, is that they were all pretty mistrustful of Penelope because she was the label boss's girlfriend. She was kind of the man, you know, like this wasn't like their punk friend.

make, so you can kind of feel when you're watching it, they have this like, not derision exactly, but they're, they're like at a distance and they're kind of trying to play her, right, with these acts that they're putting on. Although it's pretty transparent, but you can tell, except for Darby, who I think is just like saying what he's saying. Of course, of course. But, like, this is the great, like, contradiction of why the, there's such a shallow pool of honest film and, like, art.

about these kinds of musicians is that like true punks or metalheads couldn't get it together to raise money to make a film. About themselves, yeah. So it's very rare that it would be like

something is made by one of our own. Yeah. And I do find that exception when it comes up like Alex Cox making Sid Nancy like that guy is clearly legit like the guy who makes Rupertman and Sid Nancy.

I just don't think she was seen that way by then. To us now, she was obviously as legit as it. comes. Yeah. But you always, like, there is no world where your associate in the band picks up the camera and makes the movie. So there always is this circumspect distance, which I think really is very fun in Decline 2.

Oh, my God. And in Decline 3 has kind of collapsed to the point that, like, the subjects don't care. Yeah. Certainly, and like the drop-off from the celebrities into, but it is very understandable to be, like, every scene is insular. And obviously this community would have been very insular and paranoid of outsiders, even if it is somebody who is cool. Two of a minutia should agree to, because I think Penelope said it was like, I was just like, they were like, you weren't here from the beginning. And she's like, I came one year later.

Just like the worst kind of like clubhouse mentality. There's, of course, what you like about these things if you're part of it. Right. Just being a complete, like, exclusionary jerk. But which also, like, eventually undoes any scene. Right. Like, there's too many rules. Do you want to make a case for this terrible band in the movie?

Yes, okay, not for the band. It's pretty obviously visually noticeable, but if you're not really paying attention, you might miss it. So that is the band of the slash writer, the French slash writer, Kickboy Face. Yeah. Who's real name was Claude Bessie. Incredible person.

Let me just give you a little. Yeah, this is all, I have the floor to kind of... Let me just give you the highlights of this man's. No one would just watch this movie blind and have their takeaway be like, I want more on this guy or this band. But I just needed to know, because I've seen it so many times. I've probably gone down a rabbit hole.

I can tell you about all of these people. But I was just like, All right. What's up with this French guy? Born in Normandy, Bessie was kicked out of the Sarban after showing up drunk at 9 in the morning, brandishing a bottle of brandy and threatening a teacher. He then moved to the U.S. in 1966 and to L.A. in 1967. He later left for Afghanistan to deal hashish, then went to detox from methadrine in a French asylum.

In the 70s, he came back to L.A., worked out as a bus boy and a waiter, and then founded LA's first reggae fanzine Angelino Dred. Then he helped launch Slash. Okay. I'm sorry. This guy's fucking cool. I mean, he passed away now. What did he do after this movie?

Like what comes after? The day Ronald Reagan was elected president, which was November 4th, 1980. He left America because he was like, fuck this. And then he went with Filamino, when Stanley, he was also in the film with the short black hair. That was his partner. They went, I want to say Barcelona or something. and he's passed away many years, like 20 years now.

But he did not continue making music. No, he actually, okay, no. Or he was involved with the record label. Oh, no, he did, babe. He was the resident VJ at the Hacienda in 1982. Then he did PR for rough trade. No, he's lived his whole life being the fucking coolest guy alive. Okay, interesting.

I mean, that would be... And I'm not a fan of French people, okay? I'll say it on record. Fair. But this guy, kind of changing my mind. That would be an interesting, I mean, that is an interesting life story. this part of the movie grinds to a halt as a film in my opinion that band is not is not good it's very it's very much giving

the part of the LA like an alternative scene that probably gave way to like a million other bad bands like that that you would see in LA all the way up through like the 80s and 90s what are bands like that in your opinion I could not answer this question if someone had a gun to my head I mean I just think that they have these like kind of roots in like talk speaking singing with like again they are a little rockabilly in that same X way, except just not successfully.

You know, it's this like kind of through line of Americanaism, but I guess through the lens of a French guy. He's wearing like winkle pickers or like creepers or whatever. It's just like a thing that like we don't need. Where do you think that rockabilly influence comes from in X or any of the other? Because that is like, that's real West Coast shit. Like there is none of that in any New York bands of this era. You know what?

This is like me fully like doing a hail. Mary idea, but I can't remember what episode it was because obviously I have brain damage from doing this much research. But in the 50s, 40s or 50s, a lot of Dust Bowl people moved to Southern California because it was advertised as having like similar farming climate or something. And they brought with them country music. And I think that streak of sort of like, And plus then you get the Bakersfield sound country music, you know. I feel like it kind of comes from that. If I had to guess, it's a full guess on my part.

It plays while actually me to death if you want. But that makes sense to say, like, on the East Coast, like, folk was hanging over punk in a real way and on the West Coast. It was more cowboy country. Yeah, yeah. Because, I mean, the cramps. I mean, it's psychobilly. There's a whole streak of it, you know. Cramps are great.

We used to have a festival. I don't know how long it lasted, but I went when I was like 12, 13 years old, called Houten Nanny in Irvine, and it was all rockabilly and psychobilly bands, and I saw X and the cramps there, and it's like you would go and see women with like seams tattooed up their legs. You know what I'm talking about? You know, you know, which is still pretty alive and kicking in Southern California. One of those things that will never decline to zero.

Yeah. That subculture will never go away, and it will never get bigger than it is. It's a strong part of the 90s that people, like people, I think in my estimation, love to remember the 90s in one specific way, and it is everything was Kurt Cobain and cool alternative, but it's like, no, honey, everything was also headchops and everything was also rockabilly and everything was also swingers. Sure. Like that bowling shirt vibe.

There was all this other shit going on in the 90s that no one wants to think about or remember. Well, unfortunately, as at East Coaster, we have to put like the blame for that swingers culture on the West Coast, very, very firmly. Listen, we have a lot, we offered a lot, we took a lot of swings and some of them missed. Yeah. That's all I'm going to say. Yeah, but that's, to me, like, and I sort of have like a coda, but I want to tee it up so that you, I don't blindside you with it. Because I'm so interested in where, as a thought exercise that we can end on in, you know, whenever.

We're not ending, but we have three more documentaries. If she had not been like, the follow up to this is L.A. music scene in like a glam sleazy era. Yeah. If she had been like, I am going to follow punk music as a subculture. What would that have looked like? Yeah, because to me, like, this movie ends at what is, you know, for my money, like, about to be the best time in some ways. What was about to have, like? I mean, you're about to have, like, well, like...

Jane's Addiction? No. Like, within five years, you have, like, the formations of, like, Berkeley-Gilman Street music, and you have, like, Reagan Youth and you have, like, D.C. Hardcore. You have, like, some of the most... Like, you have minor threat and operating. Ivy coming down the pipeline. When this movie ends. The Nalbyspireis is not a...

I know, this is what's fascinating to me. She's a Los Angeles film anchor. So that didn't happen in Los Angeles. But like, and I know, and that's what's interesting to me. But like, correct me if I'm wrong. And I was trying... I started, like, looking up, like, where is this band from? Where is this band from?

But, like, you know, by the mid-80s, there are so many, like, California punk bands. Like, no effects are coming. Yeah. The Vandals, which I think we've already talked about. I mean, the Minutemen. Yeah. I would have liked to see...

There's so much more of this coming. and instead she like pivots to making like, you know, kiss and Ozzy Osbourne in a documentary. Because I think, I don't want to speak for her, but from what I gathered by speaking to her is like she made this, right? And then she went off making some other films. And the next thing that seemed different was glam. She probably didn't want to make something about the continuation of this one thing. Although what I would have loved to see, which I guess it's sort of side by side with glam would have been. Jane's Addiction, Red Hot Chili Peppers, because that was also happening around that same time, you know?

But I don't know how good of a film. I just sort of like that footage, I guess, you know. I'm sure someone has. Well, Red Hot Chilipppers are in Thrasion, if you want to watch. And obviously, Flea is her friend in these movies, and he was in fear. I had no doubt that he was in this movie. No, he's not. I'm just placing suburbia on top of this. Flea would have been young. This is only three years before Suburbia.

Yeah, but I think he was in high school. Is he like 15 in suburbia? Yeah, because he joined fear. No, no, no. But I think he's like, I don't think he is a teenager. He joins fear as a teenager. Yeah. And that's how he gets into suburbia is through being in fear.

Because Lee Ving, I think, introduced them. I do love through him and Pat Smir, the like, supporting player in like degenerate punk bands turned like stadium legacy artist. Like, it's a very specific thing that happened to like three people. Yeah. But like. Also, honestly, Josh. Fris, the drummer of the Vandals, is now like the go-to drummer for, he was even just in fighters and famously made him.

It's like a very short list, but it kind of seems like it always happened to like good, good people. Like it doesn't seem like. At Spheres apparently like an incredible, again, I don't know when I talk about how people play their instruments, it's cosplay, but I'm from everything even reading from early germs, he was always like an incredible guitar player. He played like, yes guitar lines, like just by listening to them. Yeah, it's a funny thing that happened like to people that all kind of orbited her.

Yeah. At least in those two guys. If it was you, you would have made a film about, like, isocracy and what was happening at Gilman Street. I mean, I would love that movie to exist. I know. Wouldn't it be cool? Like, that's another thing that was just so... Even just the photos of Operation Ivy are, like, burned in my brain. They look so fucking cool.

Not to keep plugging... Not to keep plugging in the Punk Museum. But, like, there's so much of that there. And it is, like, just absolutely incredible. Yeah. And, again, you mourn for the fact that nobody walked in with a camera, with a 16mm. Well, they were so DIY these punks, right? And it's like you could make a zine by yourself, but to make a film, you know, to get funding.

I know. But again, that's where the, that funding combined with the desire to look at these bands, cancels out all the time. This still happens. This is why like. But does it? This is a fucking, this is a masterpiece. Declient of Western Civilization, one is a master piece.

People are happy when it exists, but no one wants to pay for it. Yeah. Although I do know the bands, some of them, and also the people that were in the scene, don't. like that film and they, you know, classically. Which one this one? Yeah, they're like, there was, this is unsubstantiated, but in one of the lexicon devil, maybe, Casey Cola, who was the woman that nearly died with Darby but survived, she said that he had seen a screening of it before it came out and came home despondent.

Right. Well, that's the most, I mean, I had no disrespect to the, uh, the deceased or the feelings of the living subjects, but like, that's the most boring response in the world. and I hate when subjects do that. Yeah. Well, I mean, he was obviously incredibly mentally ill and depressed, and he was like 19 years old. But even if you're well-adjusted, there's nothing I struggle with more than like a subject's lack of desire to be like. There's only one response that I'm okay with.

It's cool that I'm in this. I just don't think anyone can, to this day, can understand what being perceived is like until you are perceived. And it's horrible. Yeah. And you know what? Just say no. Because I don't think, I get it. It's very few people can handle that.

You were captured one specific way. And then you're like, no, but I'm like a thousand things. And you're like, nope, not in this movie. You're that one thing. Yeah, but the- And then you're forever that one thing. True, but the alternative is like, we're talking about these bands because they're in this movie.

The alternative is Penelope didn't film you. I think we would have talked about Black Flag and Germs even. Declined didn't even cross people's desk until much later. But we have these iconic images of them. The alternative is like, you were there too, but nobody filmed you. like the bands that were at Woodstock but didn't sign the release to be in the documentary and therefore, like, they have a lower profile. I think for posterity, I'm glad it happens, but I'm just saying on an individual case basis

I understand why people might have their like psyches shattered. Oh, totally, totally. It just bores me as a filmmaker to imagine negotiating that with people that's like, this will be good for you. Not today, not tomorrow. In 30 years, you'll be in the Library of Congress of like significant films because you let me do this. Do you think bandsplain will be in the Library of Congress? I think so, yeah.

Do you think it's my Dave Matthews band episode That'll make the cut? I think they would put them all in. Okay, thank you so much. It would fit on a thumb drive. They could just put it in there somewhere. So one thing she does in this film was she does, there's two things that she does in this film that she does in all three that I really like.

One is she always includes a counter figure, right, to show that this is a subculture and how it's thought of. And the first one, it's that the old man and his wife who are honestly probably our age. Yeah. Wayne Mott, the owner of Club ADA and his wife, talking about these frees, basically. Yeah, just these people who, like, unfortunately, their business became the locus of this scene. And they're like, look, the kids show up every day. I hate this, but what am I going to do? And the second thing, which, again, I said it already, but I want to underline it,

because by the time we get to three, which I think is the most underrated, and frankly, in some ways, most important one of these, is she is super interested in what mechanism. causes these teenagers to turn towards this kind of subculture. And she has said before she was trying to understand her own teenage self, you know. But like we talked about Eugene, who I think I said this to you over text, but Eugene is now a musician that goes by Yuge from the coast and lives in Berlin and makes island folk music. He made it to Berlin.

He lives in Berlin. Yeah. I mean, imagine if you found that guy to put in your film 14 years old. The funny thing is like Eugene looms large for me. And, you know, my friends get beat up by my friends. Because he was one of the HBs. He was one of those surf punks. But like he looms large for me.

He's in like the first three minutes of the movie. Yeah. With that light bulb. But then I realized finishing the movie on rewatch, you know, there's like four of those people in the movie. He doesn't loom large because he's the most charismatic of the 20 people she interviews. He's like one of three non-musicians. It's true. He is very charismatic.

But it is funny how few of those subjects are in the movie in my mind. Until you get to three. Well, right. Then it's all of them. Yeah. But in this. I was like, yeah, he's in there because he's got the good lines and his voice is very, very recognizable. But actually, there's just not a lot of those.

But of course, that's very compelling is like, who are the people in these audiences? What draws them to show up and, like, get into a fight while listening to Black Flag? And it's Eugene. Yeah. Can we just talk just two seconds about the most insane line to me of all of the decline of Western Civilization One? Okay. It is when they're discussing finding the dead body, Michelle and Darby. Sure.

After the party. And Penelope Spiris goes, didn't you feel bad that the guy was dead? And Michelle's answer is, not at all, because I hate painters. Yeah. Yeah, that's pretty good. I hate painters? Yeah. Why?

House painters? Why? Well, you know, the punk ethos of like, what do you, and this is Marlon Brando, like, what are you rebelling against? Like, what do you got? Painters. Painters, I know. Although it is kind of like really unfortunate because right before. that Darby app definitely uses like an ethnic slur about the guy.

And then it's kind of really hard to ride for Darby in any of those situations because you're like, man, you're a fucking idiot. Decline 3 is about gutter punks in L.A. in the late 90s. It came out in 1998. So the homeless punk youth. It's kind of a little bit less about music, although there are bands in it. That's the fascinating pivot in her franchise trilogy. Because she went towards what she's really interested in, which is disenfranchised youth. And that's what that is about. It makes like the subtext text. It's incredibly dark.

It's really moving. I ride for this film. It is more like streetwise, which is why I feel like that kernel. But it's not fun to watch. You don't put that on all day. Like you can't revisit it. She does this, she does some incredible reveals about these kids. It's heartbreaking.

One of them dies during the making of the film. One stabs the other one afterwards and goes to jail. It's a whole thing. So it's 98. So like that's at the time that I would have started going to like house shows in Philadelphia. and like been around crust punks and like you know folk punks and like

so it's suddenly like that movie catches up to a world that I lived in and like working on St. Mark's in the 2000s at Kim's like There's still crusties on totally I mean it's like a writer passage They used to be on Melrose when I was a teenager and I like now when I go to Melrose I don't see them at all

They go to Portland where they go? I made the same observation I think they just hopped a train and went to Portland because L.A. is very inhospitable to homeless youth now But that culture on St. Marks was like front and center for me for the whole time I worked there. And it's very interesting to have gone, like, part one is this fantasy of a world that I would have killed to have been a present at. Part two is like... A cartoon, basically.

And then part three is like, oh, I know these people. Yeah. I've like, you know, been in the basement of like shows of these people and like some of the worst smelling environments of my life watching like a punk band with like an acoustic guitar player. Totally. And, you know, it's funny, like, I've seen this many times, two, countless times, and I think I've seen three, like, maybe twice. It doesn't really lend itself to rewatches. But it just wasn't, it just wasn't out there. Again, like, I'm talking about these bootlegs of one and two that were in record stores or video stores.

Like, three went straight from, like, it exists to it's not available. Well, one and two have incredibly famous people, and three doesn't. You know, so it also makes sense, like, you have Ozzy, especially two. Two has the most famous people. I mean, you have the dudes from Aerosmith, you have Ozzie, you have Lemmy, you have Paul Stanley. Paul Stanley, you have Ace Freely. Is Lemmy standing in two in the same L.A. scenic backdrop that the guy in this movie is in the beginning? In the fine one.

Yeah. There's the exterior interview in this movie where the guy is standing. Oh, it's Brendan. Yeah, I think it is. Is that the same? From the mask. I think it is. Is that the same spot she puts Lemma in?

And I think Lemmy's at night. But it just looks so similar to me. He later said that he thought that she filmed him from far away to. to make him sound stupid. Yeah, let me. He doesn't, he doesn't sound stupid at all. He actually sounds like

one of the most, like, erudite and, like, educated people. See, that's why you can't trust anyone who's the subject of a movie is like, he comes across great in the movie. Well, those guys also, some of them also said that they felt she killed hair metal with that film,

which is like, I think you guys killed it yourself by being absolutely ridiculous human beings. Yeah, I mean, that is like kind of the magic of two. But again, that's why I'm like, I love that movie. And there's so much in it to love. And obviously it has so much mega death in it.

And it's just like. Because, you know why? Because Megadeth are great. No, because Guns and Roses pulled out. Oh, right, because they were blowing up. And so she called in a favor because she had done, I think, music video from Megadeth. And they were like, she needed a performance. But Mustaine's on like the cover of, like, at least of the tape.

Well, Mustaine does the, Mestaine grounds the entire thing. Because otherwise it would actually be kind of a joke film. And then having Mestain's talking at the end, he's really smart and he's serious at the end. And I will, you know, I can stand up now for, I think the new Megadeth album is very good. Okay. I don't know if you've given it a shot yet. I went and bought it. I bought the CD of it at my local record store.

Love that you're out here in the physical media streets, even on CDs. The primary theater of listening for me is in the car. In the car, yeah. And, you know, like, to shout out to where we're, like, Spotify is huge for me while I'm working. Right. Just to have, like, an incessant amount of stuff on. And also, like, it's just easier to discover things. things. But like if I'm in the car, I just was like, I might as well just buy the Megadeth CD.

Yeah. Support the store. Totally. Support Dave Mustaine. But like, two is obviously like, you know, it's just pure pop. Like it is the most fun. It's the most, you know, like the last time I saw it was at a screening when they restored it. It's like, you know, not like a special screening with guests. Just like, here's this restoration. And it just, it is a comedy. Like, part one's a drama. Part two is a comedy and part three is a tragedy. A tragedy. And it makes so much sense, A, well, why should go. Wayne's world because of two. But also, all three typify the era, right? The 70s are really captured, I think, a lot in decline one, the spirit of it, at least the spirit of that subculture.

And the 80s, the sort of like mechanizing principle of these people she's interviewing is I want to be famous. That's all. Right? Like, I want to be successful, rich and famous. And the fans in two are so buffoonish. Everyone kind of is buffoonish in two, except for like... I mean, it's a silly subculture. I honestly think Lemmy is the most ground. person in that movie. And, well, I guess, and Joe Perry. Yeah. Famously, you know, a grounded type.

But, like, that comes off as less of a surprise. Again, I think she did a smart thing by sort of like, she said she actually didn't want to include as much of the glam metal. Yeah. And the funders wanted it because they thought it was more visually arresting and interesting. I think she left her own devices. She would have gone more towards the Guns and Roses, Lemmy, like sort of like this medal. Sleazier. Yeah.

Who's glamiest into? Poison. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, poison's there in like full makeup. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, I want to rewatch that now that I've watched this. It's good. The Chris Holm scenes in the pool is just like the most major and iconic. That plays in my brain. Yeah. That I don't need to rewatch,

but that is obviously great. Two, like, tangents on that is like heavy metal parking lot. Yeah. Which predates, I think, this movie. Two? Yeah. I think it's 85 or 86.

Yeah. So this is 88. So heavy my mother walked out. But like is kind of the same thing, obviously. One of the most perfect films ever made. Now I'm finally going to confront you something I've been haranguing you about. Did you watch the Ozfest one? No, I haven't watched yet.

Did you ask her about it? Yes. Okay, good, but don't spoil it for me. It has a name. We sold ourselves for Rock and Rollo. I did ask her about it. Okay. So stay tuned for that.

I have the, you know. And she actually, she was like, she was like, oh, I'll send you a better version. Oh, good. Send that to me. Yeah. Yeah. So just to tee that up, like. sort of unofficial decline for

2001. She was, I guess, hired to make some, I think, fairly quotidian documentary about OzFest. In my opinion, it turned out to be much better. It's much closer to her work. And it circulates as a bootleg. But for years, it just didn't.

And then, I don't know, 10 years ago, it finally was like, declined for, quote unquote. It really, it would have been declined for because it's basically a new metal. Yeah, it's death tones, I think, are in it, right? Yeah, yeah. So you're like, it just is OzFest whatever year she was filming. I think maybe OzFest 2000 or 99. And, you know, it's pretty

open-hearted, but it's not like in L.A. It's clearly like a tour movie. Yeah. But it's unofficial. I've been trying to get you to watch it. I'm going to watch it. And I said the one thing I wanted her to actually just explain. It's like, what's to deal with that movie? Yeah. I had to watch all the declines over again and dudes in suburbia and Wayne's World. So I was just busy this week. But shining a light on anything like that can potentially be like the reason that something finally gets released. Yeah. If we talk about it

and perhaps you and I can start a campaign. I just don't think people like even like when I was trying to find it a couple months ago when Ozzy died just like there's so much

Reddit of it. It's like here it is and then it's like a link from two months ago but then it doesn't work anymore. I think my great hope is just that like people

I think enough real heads put respect on Penelope's name and know like what a fucking boss and God she is you know and like how much

how much a visual culture that we take for granted now was crafted in her hands. I mean, Wayne's rolled a long day, but I mean, you don't even tell you, and you at home should not need me to tell you, but, like, that is the comedic sensibility of 90s comedies was forged

in the fires of her hands. You know, she is if you watch if you watch the iconic Bohemian Rhapsody, headbanging scene, that's in dudes. Okay. I haven't seen dudes. Okay, dudes is amazing. So, it's Flea, John Cryer, and I'm so sorry to the other actors, I just can't remember.

And they're driving from New Jersey to L.A. or something. And they start singing Hava Nogila. Okay. And then they start head banging into it. And that is kind of what, it's so cool and you see it because it really worked there. And then, you know, she did it in Wainsworth. And obviously, it's the most iconic scene of the entire film. Yeah.

Did you ever see the meme that was, like, a picture of Toby McGuire in Spider-Man with, like, a hoodie, a polo and glasses? and the meme was like, when you go to the hardcore show and this guy's the bassist, you know shit's about to be crazy. Like, I thought of that so many times during this movie where it's like the one guy in the band who just like basically has like a really nice haircut and a polo shirt on and then just like it's all like truly. I think of circle jerks look pretty clean cut. You know, because they were they were sort of Orange County punks from cut from that call. Although obviously they weren't, you know. I just remember when like I met some guy at the playground years ago and he was like a clean cut. And then it turned out he was like really into punk and metal and my wife was like oh it's so funny like I wouldn't think he would be into this music and I showed her that Toby McGuire meme and she was like I don't get this and I was just like fuck this is one of those things I'm gonna have to spend six minutes explaining yeah this two sentence meme because to me it's so obvious you see that guy like the guy at the punk show who's just like oh that guy's gonna be fucking crazy yeah and that is kind of the black flag like little clean cut kind of maybe in good shape.

maybe like runs a lot. That's the Emilio Estabas Street. This is what we talked about. Like that is a very... And I actually, I really can't wait to do a Black Flag episode because I want to dig deeper into like the bifurcation of punk and hardcore that was sort of spearheaded by Black Black Blacks.

I think it's really interesting. I would posit that will be harder than doing a Kiss episode. Oh, I mean, the amount of people that have been in this band. Should we pin now that you have promised you'll do Kiss one day? Yeah, and that you're the guest.

I just need six months to prep. Yeah. I was to be on the lookout for that someday. You said something on text, and I wanted to ask you more about it, but it's also such an incredible snapshot of, like, we said the 80s is excess, right? The 70s is like you're trying to, like, do a new thing. And the 90s is just the end of it, right? We're at the end of the 90s, and it's kind of the end of alternative.

Sure. Because by the 2000s, we're back to pop to Mism, but like NSYNC, Britney Spears and New Metal. And it's a complete, like, everything that we cherish is kind of dead. And it's literally captured in this film. Yeah, she couldn't have made a, like, if the Osfest one is four. Yeah. She couldn't have made, like, a fourth one of these movies. And that's what, like, again, I mourn for the punk follow-ups.

Like, why didn't she go to that? But, like, yeah, I'm very glad that she made three instead of, like, the Blink Winni-A-2 jawbreaker. Right. Like. I don't think she was very interested in that. Yeah, like, like, 94-95, like, who else would have been, like, Offspring. Yeah, like, I'm glad that that wasn't her, like, end point of this, even though, like, for us, musically and historically, that kind of was the end point.

Yeah. Of what started, you know, around the time of two or, you know, within the decade prior. And there just is no more, there's just no more hope after three, after the millennium, that something like this could monoculturally matter. Yeah. And this is why four, as a new metal movie, functions as like a fine epilogue. Right. Because you can sort of draw a straight line. That's a great way to put it.

Certainly from two to four. An epilogue is a great way to put it. But yeah, watch three. This is like kind of my imploring to people, because I think most people have not seen three. It's dark, it's difficult, but it's also like, doesn't, she's such a genius because it doesn't start that way. She starts just like all her other movies.

These characters are so charismatic and compelling. They're so cool looking. You love watching them on screen. The music is literally unlistenable because gutter punk and cross punk music with love and respect to propaganda. Bandai is not listenable. Just, again, watch this film. It's incredible.

There's not a nary a phone in sight. Yeah. They had pagers, which they talk about, because it's the late 90s. They're squatting. They are panhandling. They're spanging. All these words. They're taking photos with tourists on Hollywood Bullgard.

Like a Spider-Man photo and then a photo with a gutter punk for a dollar. Right. But they're really, like, to bring it home to some of the OGs. Like, there is no future after that. Like, that is the end. if these mainstream artists that we're talking about that really sold millions of albums like if that's literally the end

it opens the door to like something that is not subcultural not that two is subcultural but like what you would have made if you had found anything LA rock LA punk punk anywhere eight years after three

in like the kind of you know roughly every decade or so every you know that she was making these just would be just something nobody want to watch. Like, you know, what would it be, like, newfound glory and, like, do you think, like, the 2000s decline if she had kept doing it, like, the up-sails? It's like, email music, I guess. Like, it would just be, like, by that point, there was too much filmmaking. There was too much media saturation. Yeah. And the idea of bringing a camera into these spaces and into these

shows and into these people's homes just would not have been even remotely relevant or interesting. Yeah. One minute passed when she kind of realized her, her trilogy was at an end. Well, the 2000s are really ugly, like I keep saying. But also, a question I kept having, and this is, I want to ask you, is probably the last thing I want to ask you is, you would think that now that it's so easy to make a film, right? I'm not saying it's easy because filmmaking is easy, but I'm just saying like, Penelope Spheres had to beg,

borrow, and steal to get, like, whatever, 50 grand to make a movie and have, like, huge, clunky equipment, and it's on film. And, like, and now you can just take your iPhone and make a reasonably decent film if you have a subqualmie. if you want them to. No one does. Or maybe they do. I don't know about it. Do you think it's just because now subcultures are so kind of already on the internet and already self-mythologizing with all social media and all content that just kind of kills the necessity to document these kinds of things? Well, you could produce that. Ringer films? Bang my line. Yes. I'm sure. Bill Simmons,

would you like to make a documentary about Young Lean and Blade? Yeah, why not? Straight, to Netflix. Obviously, this is like well-trod territory, but like, this goes back to what I was saying earlier of at this time, like, nobody knew what it meant to have a camera put in your face, but they knew you had to perform for the camera. Yeah. Whether that manifests the way Darby Crash does it or the way Chris Holmes does it in two or Paul Stanley in two, like, you had to do something because the idea of like, oh, they're

making a movie and I'm in it was a big deal. Yeah. Now that's irrelevant. Like, now that everybody doing it. the filmmakers, the subjects, would only be approaching it from a perspective of marketing and branding and content creation. Or if they're you, how do I make it really weird? Yes, well, that's my, yes, my approach.

You guys should watch pavements. Yes, like, obviously, you can still do it. But, again, that was also hard to get money for. But, like, if you were just like, oh, there's this, you know, there are hardcore scenes now. Hardcore scenes actually quite popular these days. Incredibly popular. Like, you could make a film of, like, what is the state of, like, the hard-corps. kids today, I would watch that.

I would totally watch it. But to put a camera on somebody now means something night and day from what it meant 30 years ago. 35 years ago. Everyone is like a little too media savvy, a little too... It's just in the DNA now.

It's not even like people know what they're doing. It's just, it's been bred into people now that it would, you would not get what you have in these films if you filmed people today unless you found like a unicorn subject who like genuinely seems like they come from another planet. And as much as we said, like, there was an awareness starting with Decline one of these subjects of they're being filmed and they're kind of putting on a show, there's still something incredibly unselfconscious about them when you're watching them in the way that you don't see anymore.

Yeah, and like if Decline 1 is right before MTV and Decline 2 is like peak MTV. Yeah. And Decline 3 is right before reality TV. like there's nothing after that. Right. There's no truth in filmmaking after the real world and after... Right. Like, what is the end point of what we're talking about?

She makes an unreleased Ozfest film and then the Osbournes. Like, what she's doing and reality TV and what MTV started right after this movie all collapse. Yeah, totally. As soon as the millennium comes. And Ozzy is obviously in, if you count four, which, you know, quotes. but he's in two films that she made. And then immediately he's like a buffoon on a reality show. And what she was doing, I mean, I never watched a minute of the Osbournes,

but I watched it like in my brain, even though I never saw it. Everything that show was trying to do was trying to get back to him making the eggs and decline to it for five years. You're so right. I watched it, and I think you're right. Millions of dollars and money and franchising and marketing and commercials and Austin Powers cameos, all they're trying to do is make that scene where he pours the eggs all over the counter, which she did not because that's real,

but because she knew that that was good filmmaking. Yeah, and it wasn't real, actually, but we'll talk about that. Some other day. Listen to the Penelope interview. Alex Ross Perry, thank you so much for joining me to talk about Penelope Sparis in the declines of Western civilization.

Thanks for having me, Yossi. I'm excited to listen to this interview with her. Me too. You guys, stick around now for my interview with Penelope Spiris. You guys, what a pleasure and an honor to be joined by Penelope Spiris. I'm over the moon. I can't explain it.

I'm such a huge fan, Penelope. Thank you for making time to come talk to me. Oh, are you kidding me? I mean, whenever I ask anybody about Yassi, they're like, oh, you got to do it, you got to do it. So I'm doing it, you know? I'm going to cry. She's so cute. Well, I'm using this excuse of the episode is ostensibly about the decline of Western civilization, which is obviously monumental and iconic.

But I want to just talk more broadly about you and your career. And what I really see is like the way you shaped the visual language of what I go. grew up in, which is 90s MTV. Like, I really don't think any of that would exist without the work that you did prior that influenced and impacted everything that came after it. Oh, my Lord. Thank you so much. That's a fine, fine compliment, Yassie. Well, it's very true, and we'll get into it a little bit further in my questions, but even if you just rewatch the decline, as I do once yearly, like a totally normal person. You know, the confessional vibe of the interviews,

the light bulb, the font, the freeze frames, that is classic 90s MTV filmmaking. And it came from you. Well, you know what's freaky is when I did the decline, it was shot in 79 and 80, and you're going to be better at this than me, but MTV was born in... I think it was 82.

Yeah, something like that. Yeah. Yeah, but it was after I did the decline. And I used to always get journalists asking me, Penelope, why do you copy the editing style and the shooting style of the MTV videos? And it's like, no, you got it backwards, man. I did it before that, you know?

It launched August 81. So your film was done, and I think it already, maybe premiered by them. Oh yeah. Yeah. It was February. It came out. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, I don't want to bust him for it, but then again, yes, I do. Well, I, listen, I'll let you not have to do, you can, you can just sit back and, you know, bask, because I'm happy to go in these streets and fight over it. Because I really think, well, and also, okay, I'm just going to take it from the top, but I went to a screening of decline. I want to say it was last year at Vidiots. Do you remember this? You were there. Yeah, I was there. Yeah. It was at Vidius, yeah. And I learned some very interesting information from that

as well that I want to talk about. But I want to start with what, okay, a couple of things that I didn't realize until I was sort of digging. I'm unfortunately addicted to research. Okay, so, and a lot of this stuff is out there, but just for people that aren't aware. So you were raised in a carnival. Let's start there. Oh, boy. Yeah, my father owned a carnival, and I was on a carnival, and I was seven years old. He got killed in an argument. Yeah, defending a black man in a racial dispute, right? He was defending a black man in Alabama in 1952, which you, you know, if you're defending a black man back then, you're guilty. And so the guy got off, you know. So every time I have to go to court right now, even jury duty, I free.

freak out because when I was seven years old, I was so freaked out. You're just a kid, you know? And I whenever, I mean, I just got out of a court case, which I thankfully won. But every time I have to deal with that stuff, it just put fear in me, you know? But yeah, I mean, my life was perfect until I was seven years old and then, you know, everything went to hell. Yeah. And I've been recovering from it ever since. And I think part of the reason I make the most, you know, movies that I do is because it's a way to work out my, you know, pain and issues from that experience. Totally. I mean, I was really struck by, well, number one, I subscribe to the theory that zero to seven really shapes your understanding of the world. You were brilliant because that is exactly what psychologists and psychiatrists say is that by the time you're that age,

you, before seven, you have your personality formed. Totally. Okay. How do you know that? You just researched it. Yeah, I'm really into self-help. Well, I'm just really into psychology.

And I've gone to the same Jungian therapist for 13 years. I'm just very interested in that sort of understanding. And then the idea that the subconscious, which was formed by the time you were about seven, is sort of running the show of your life until you're able, to excavate and sort of bring it to the surface and be like, oh, wait, my six-year-old self decided this worldview. That my six-year-old self is different than now. Right. You've got to get that in your head. Yeah. Because I really, you know, honestly, I have to fight it all the time. Totally. You know, if I have, oh, I got a court date on April 3rd. Oh, Jesus. I got like, you know,

you know, that gut-wrenching fear. It's stored in your body that feeling. Totally, man. And you cannot change your brain. you know, you just have to make it a separate thing. Yeah. You know, you're so smart for knowing that. Oh, my God, stop. Thank you. I've just been so crazy for so long that I've been like,

how do we undo some of this craziness with a few little, you know, looking into the... Well, you're beautiful and crazy, so that makes me like you. Thank you. I'll be right back at you. Well, I just, I was struck by the fact that I would assume growing up in something that is sort of chaotic, but in a beautiful way, like a carnival. But also aesthetically, I'm sure, so vibrant and interesting. And I mean, carnivals have freaks, right? You know, like, it's part of... Most of the things on our carnival were sideshow acts, we called it. Yeah.

And that's the thing is, at that early age, those people were normal to me. Right. And so I am very attracted to those freaks. Literally freaks. I'm attracted to them. And it makes me feel like that seven-year-old where everything was okay. Yeah. Yeah. And it makes sense to me why time and time again in your work you've been drawn back to these subcultures of freaks. Yeah. Because back in the day, you know, when I did the first decline, you know, the average person that saw the movie, well, the first screening I had and the first comment was,

how dare you glorify these heathens? Okay, that's what the average person thought about punks in 1980. And I'm like, heathens, oh, they're just people to me. Yeah. They're just kids. They're just kids. Yeah. But, you know, we talk about it a lot on Vansplain in our regular episodes when we talk about bands. And we just did an episode on the germs last week. And it's very funny because when I talk to younger people, and again, I wasn't around then, but even younger people, they're so saturated by alternative culture. They grew up without knowing that that was ever actually transgressive, that that was actually people would beat you up or spit on you or so that they now think that that's kind of like the germs are corny. And it's like you

can't understand what risks they took just being who they were in the world. They set the stage for everything that came better or for worse from there. I never heard the word corny associated with the germs. Can you imagine? These people need to go to school. They need to be Well, I think it's interesting just on a cultural level that the younger people now don't understand it and interpret it that way, you know. It was, but those same people, they're wearing mohawks and they're wearing torn up clothes and safety pins, you know what I'm saying? Totally. So they don't know where that came from. And that's, it came from that day.

A hundred percent. and Darby and all the people in the, you know, punkstein back in the early days. Again, I'm so struck by so many of the similarities between your story and then a lot of the subjects of your documentaries. But you moved to California because your mother remarried. My mother was married. My mom was married nine times. She was like Elizabeth Taylor, bitch?

I don't think so. Well, you. Okay. Hold my beer. My mom used to say, ha, I beat Elizabeth Taylor. She was only married eight times, but I was married nine. Did she have any advice, or did she leave any advice? Because I've been married zero times, and I'd just love to get to, like, a one or a two, maybe.

No, you don't. Forget about that, I'll see. You're right. You don't need it. Okay, I have my podcast. I have my cat. You got the cat, but you got a lot going on, and I've never advised people to get married. I'm not married now.

I've been with a gutter punk from the decline three for. 28 years, you know, and he's schizophrenic, believe it or not. And I don't want to get married, and he doesn't want to get married. I mean, that's a good way to screw things up. Yeah, it's also very, it's very traditional. But that brought you out to Orange County originally, is that where? Well, yeah, she married this dude. He was in the army, that one, and we moved to, I think it was San Diego first, right around there, Chula Vista National City. And then she divorced him and married a sailor. And then we had that, you know what?

She was really doing the YMCA of the husband. The thing about my mom is she's all about like, we've got to have health insurance for the kids. So she goes and, you know, she marries so that she would have, most of the time she married just to help us out, you know. So then we moved to Long Beach. And we moved all over Orange County. It sounds like you were always drawn.

to music and it sounds like it was for the same reason that teens for eternity have been drawn to music to kind of escape the pain of your life yeah exactly and I get it of course why did I love music why you're here yeah what in the so this is I would assume the 60s what kind of music were you going to what kind of shows were you seeing back then I really what as a kid as it's like a 10-year-old, I was into, you know, rock and roll. And then as 60s came along, I wasn't really, I never really tapped into the hippie philosophy because to me the world wasn't all peace and love and beautiful. Okay. So in the 60s, though, all the hippies were, you know, with the long hair, I got into that music.

And then the 70s came along, and I was still kind of transition. I mean, all my hippie friends, we were all doing drugs back then and everything. But, you know, we kind of left them behind, and I started focusing on this punk thing in the mid-70s. Right. And how did that kind of come around? Like, I know, so you had gone to school. Was it psychobiology that you were studying? Yeah, believe it or not, that was.

was a name of a class or a major back then, psychobiology. It sounds like crazy biology. Psychobiology. And it really basically is the study of human behavior, which I see you're interested in as well. You know, it was Pavlov and Skinner and those guys that did experiments try and understand human behavior.

And that was fascinating to me. I wanted to know. why my mom treated her kids that way, which was not good, because she was cuckoo. Love her, but she was nuts. And when I started making the movies, why are these kids acting this way? Yeah. And the best, I can say, just to sum it up, Yossi, is every generation has to have their own identity. Yeah.

You know, and, you know, there was the rock and roll, then there was the hippies, and then there was the punks, and then there was the Seattle Grunge guys, and then soon after that, it kind of melded into homogenized oatmeal. Yeah. I have a theory about that, and my theory about that is that when the Internet came, it stopped time, kind of, because people just started referencing people. back even more than they were before because it was so easy to do so, and they stopped making new things. That's so smart. It's true. I'm trying to figure out what happened because there were, you know, generations that had an identity from a specific kind of music. Yeah. And you didn't cross over. Like it wasn't. No, you didn't. Yeah. And we talk about this on bands playing a lot. Because even when I was a team, because that was, you know, the early to mid-90s, you, you didn't, you were one thing. You were one thing.

That's right. Those are the skaters who listen to punk. Those are the ravers. They do ecstasy and go to raves or whatever. Yeah. It did not. And then there was hip hop. And then there was hip hop.

And there were still hippies. There were still like the kids that listened to like, you know, Led Zeppelin and kind of lived in the past. But you didn't really do both. And now everything is. Everybody does everything. And they don't know where it came from either. Well, that's the sad part. Yeah.

That's why you're good to be doing this show. Well, because I think it's important. It's funny. I was thinking this morning, I was finishing up rewatching Decline 3, which I'm so excited to talk about. And I was just like, man, like, it was difficult for you to get funding, to get how much equipment you had to, like, when we talk about Decline 1, we'll talk about how like a lot of it, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, came about because you had equipment that day. It wasn't just easy. And now I'm like, everyone has a, Everyone has the equipment. It's in your pocket. Yeah. But there's no films. There's no, where of the doc, there should be a documentary a day coming out of every corner of the world.

You can do it yourself. Well, thank God because there are people that are making them, but they, here's the thing. They don't know how to get them distributed. And recently I've been getting, I don't want to call it submissions, but people sending me their work and saying, how can I get this, out to the world without selling my soul and not make any money on it or whatever. But I try to advise them. I got an email back from one guy and he goes, why are you so kind and helpful? And I answered him and said, well, because I got screwed over so bad in the studio system and in the independent world and learned a lot of lessons and I'd like to pass them on

so you don't get screwed over. Totally. I mean, what else is there? Now I'm going to get a a lot of submissions. Yeah, I know. Everyone's like, Rip, Ripley is going to get info at her inbox she already does. Well, I want to ask you, because you went to UCLA Film School. Yeah. And back then, the idea of becoming a director as a woman was like, you were going to walk on Mars, right? That wasn't really, that wasn't really like on the table. So what did you aspire to do? Like, why did you go to film school? What did you think you were going to do? Well, I went to film school because when I was studying psychobiology over at Long Beach and then Irvine University, some guys said they have a film school at UCLA. I'm like, oh my God, they have a place where

you could learn how to make movies. I love movies. I'm going to go there. So I went, but I still had this urge to understand human behavior. And so I kind of put the two together. You know, and I wasn't trying. I mean, the decline, the first decline, you probably know, Yossi, is recently inducted into the Library of Congress of National Film Registry. Where it belongs. Back then, I couldn't get a theater book. Back then it was like a smut film. They were like, that's pornography and we will not show that.

That's right. It was considered trash, okay? And then it goes into the Library of Congress. And I tell that not to congratulate myself, but more to let young filmmakers and people in general know if they truly believe in something, which I believe in that film and the series, you know, that stick with it, you know, it can work out. Trust your instinct. Trust your instinct. There's something you think is important. You should document it.

So you had started making music videos prior to the decline, right? Yeah, I had the first music video company here in Los Angeles. Rock and real? Rock and real. Yeah. Great name. How did you get into that making music videos? Well, I had a friend who had seen some of my short films from UCLA.

Peter Philbin is his name, and he worked at CBS Records. And one day he called me up and said, could you make us a music video? Well, he didn't use that term then. He just said, could you shoot one of our main? Yeah, because it was like, there was no MTV, so it was just promotional, a promotional video. Well, here's what happened is all of a sudden one day the record companies figured out that they didn't need to send the whole band around the world to tour. They could just send a little three minutes of 35 millimeter or 16, you know, is about like that. Yeah. They could just send that and then the hotel rooms wouldn't get destroyed and, you know.

Sure. All the lawsuits. Much less liability. Exactly. Yeah. So that's when all of a sudden I started getting all these gigs because nobody else was doing it, you know? That's so cool. Yeah.

And I mean, I filmed, but it was just performance. It wasn't concept. Right. Concept videos came a little bit later. Yeah. Once MTV got started. Right. And then I started doing the concept videos too.

Yeah. And then the budgets went, I used to get like, I don't know, $20,000, $30,000. And Peter and the people at CBS would say, here, go shoot the performance, and then if you have any money left over, you can have it. Right. Okay. I don't have any money left over. Like we're making it a good video.

We've got to use the budget. Yeah, exactly. But now, you know, once MTV got rolling, you know, they were doing million-dollar budgets. Oh, yeah. Hype Williams was out there with plenty of money to make these incredible videos. Yeah. I don't know the exact timeline, but, well, two things. You just said you were making short films in UCLA.

And I do want to just talk about two of them. I don't know and hats off to Hollywood, which, I mean, I just feel like you were so ahead of your time. These were short films starring trans actors that were your friends, right? Through school, I guess. And, I mean, no one else, right? Was anyone else doing films about trans people? Well, I mean, Andy Warhol was. Sure, of course.

Duh. Yes, of course Andy Warhol. And Kenneth Anger to a degree. But I was highly criticized for making the transgender friends of mine stars of my student films. They were not accepted well back then. Well, now they're playing at the Whitney. Yeah, yeah. So again, follow your instincts.

But I just like my transgender friends because they were the most interesting people. I knew. I mean, they were hilarious and still are, you know? I mean, and, you know, they've had to go through a lot of difficult, you know, criticism and people making comments and all this and developed an amazing sense of humor from it, you know. And so that's, yeah, I was ahead of my time on that one, I guess, because now, Thank God, it's being more accepted that you can change your gender. Totally.

Okay, I want to ask about Lorne Michaels, and this is the thing that struck me the most at that video. I need a drink of coffee for this one. So I was quite surprised to learn that Lorne Michaels had asked you to teach Albert Brooks how to direct. Can you tell me a little bit more about this? How did you know Lorne Michaels that he came to you? Thank you for asking that because, you know, Rob Reiner, God bless his soul. When he did that movie about Albert, they never talked to me. You're not mentioned in the story.

Well, what happened was I was friends with John Head and Gary Wise who had just done a movie on Jimmy Hendricks, and I helped him with it. and Lorne was their friend. And we all lived in this house together down on Tupanga Beach, and Lauren would hang out there. And one morning I was making an omelet. To this day, Lauren still says I make the best omelets for Lauren. And he's looking at the Sunday paper,

and he goes, you know, I think I'm going to go to New York and try to start a show late on Saturday night for people that don't have any. thing else to do. And we all went, sure, Lauren. Go ahead. Great idea, babe. Yeah. And then he asked me if I would go to New York and work on the show. But at that point, I had a four-year-old daughter, and I didn't want to have to yank her up and move, you know. So he said, well, could you, if I need something out in L.A., could you do it for me? And I said, hell yeah, just give me a couple bucks, you know. So he called me one day and he goes, I've got a brilliant comedian, but he doesn't want to be a player.

He only want to make movies and he doesn't know how. So can you please teach Albert Brooks how to make movies? I said, oh, yeah, here's my address for the check. Yeah. I didn't get paid hardly anything. But to be honest with you, I was kind of a fan of Albert because he's a genius comedian. I had worked with Richard Pryor before that. Okay?

So all of a sudden I got like, now I got Albert Brooks, another genius comedian, but he was kind of difficult to work with. Albert was. Oh, yeah. Honey, he gave me that, I call it the Hollywood Hebe-Geebies. Okay. So it's like, Hollywood, oh God, you know, it's like everything. I don't know.

There's got to be some sort of psychological diagnosis for whatever the hell he is. has. Well, I personally think fame should be in the DSM-5. I think fame is a mental illness. I think so, too. Nobody can survive it. It's difficult. It makes you crazy. It's very difficult. Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, Albert, he was a pain in the ass, but I did teach him how to make movies. We did a bunch of shorts on Saturday Night Live. And then I produced his first feature. Real life. Thank you. God, you're good. I have notes. You're so smart. You know your IQ? You're very smart. I don't know my IQ. You don't? It's between God and my brain. I don't know. Wow, that's a trip. Yeah, so anyway, that was hell. And then he went on to make all these other movies and the bastard didn't even call me to help.

To be part of it. And I said, well, screw them. I'm going to go direct my own punk rock movie. And we were hanging around with all these Hollywood types at the time, Rob Reiner, George. James Brooks, you know, Billy Crystal, all of those guys. And they were all making fun of me for wanting to do a movie about punk rock. But I did it anyway. Yeah. So there you go. Number one, thank you for doing that.

Because indirectly, you helped create some of the greater films like defending your life. I mean, those would not exist if you had not taught. This is a real butterfly effect. Well, somebody would have taught them. probably or he would have gone to film school. But not the same way. I'm sure the way that you taught him had an impact. You know, they never gave me any credit for it.

And fuck them. I don't care. Yeah. Well, you know, this is another one of my galaxy brain theory is that sometimes people don't like. And I mean this very archetypically. But I think inspiring and being a muse or, you know, kind of creativity is a very feminine. that's a feminine realm. Credit is very masculine, right? Because it's the patriarchy. It's capitalism. It's, and doesn't mean that women shouldn't get credit. Women should get credit. But that is so masculine

to get credit and also to not want to give credit because they want to keep it for themselves. Oh my God. My life is summed up in two sentences. Jesus. When I did Wayne's World, okay, We had a screening at a village theater of the first opening night, and all the guys, men from Paramount, were there in the lobby afterwards. And we knew that that film worked, okay? How could you not? Yeah, they were all, we were all in a circle about as big as this table, and they were all saying how great they were for making the movie. and then they all closed me out and I was ending up looking at somebody's back,

like suit back. So, yeah, never got that credit. Yeah. I don't like it. I don't care for that. I don't care for that. Well, yeah, it's true. What are you going to do?

I wanted to ask you how you sort of fell into punk and it seems to me like you're just sort of tapped into subcultures anyways and you're into music. But I also read, because I'm researching the runaways right now, that your sister dated was... Sandy West. Yes. Okay. The drummer.

Yes. And I was like, wow. The other thing that I was so excited, since we're talking about your family, and then I promise we're going to go into the decline next, was that your first cousin is Costa Gavras. And, okay, so my friend, Sarah is good friends with his son. And she was like... Roman? And I was texting with her because she's my best friend. And I talk all day.

And I was like, this information is so cool. And she was like, oh, let me ask Roman. And then he said that, and please tell me if this story is true, because I really hope it is, that you guys didn't know that until the 90s when you were at a dinner together. And you struck up a conversation about your families. And it turned out they were like both from the same village in Greece. My version of the story is that my brother Jimmy, who was a brilliant, singer and songwriter and played every instrument without ever taking a lesson. Jimmy was walking

down the street in Venice in the late 70s. Okay, because I remember inviting Costa to the opening of the decline. So it was before 1980. Okay, okay. Whoever my brother was with knew Costa and said I'd like to introduced you to Jimmy Sphiris, and Costa said, that's my mother's maiden name. Wow. And we figured out that Costa's mother and my father are brother and sister. It's so insane. Well, it makes you think, too, that maybe the, I don't want to say talent, but the ability to direct films might be genetic.

That's exactly what I thought. And just in general, like artisticness or creativity, because, again, your brother was a very talented musician. You know, you and Costa are celebrated filmmakers. All of Costa's children, I believe, make films. That's right. I think coming and making a carnival, that's a creative act, you know? It might not be that you're making a creative product in the world, but that's not a normal person. It's entertainment business.

It's entertainment, exactly. God, you know more about me than I do. I'm really sorry. I know it's scary, isn't it? No, no, no. It's flattering. I should work for the FBI. Awesome. But I find these things so interesting because I do think, like, what I hope with these interviews

is that people that don't know anything are getting a really broad and great look at the kind of filmmaker you are on what you've done. And the people that are mega fans, I hope they learn something new, you know, because. I hope so. I mean, I didn't do it for nothing, you know, and I didn't think I was going to get this far. So, I mean, I feel lucky. You've done us a great service. So you found, you kind of were tapped into this punk scene. I heard in an interview, you were also friends with Brendan Mullen already prior to him even opening the mask.

So you just saw this subculture and you were like, I want to make, I want to document this. You know, Bob Biggs, the Coke dealer and I. Also the found, he ran slash records and the magazine. Right. Yeah. In addition to his other jobs. I was always hanging around the Slash office. And Slash was a punk magazine.

Right. Iconic. And so we went to all the punk shows. And there was a point when I said to Bob and Philly and Steve Samioff and Claude Bessie, I'm going to try to make a movie. I have like some little, you know, hi-eight camera. Sure. and I would drive around and film all the punk graffiti and everything.

Yeah. And they were like, well, even they called me crazy. What are you doing? You don't need to make a movie about punk. Which is so crazy because I heard you say this, so I was like, A, insane. But B, I was listening to a podcast, and I'm not going to dox the person because I honestly can't even remember who they were or the name of their band. But they were sort of trying to be like, oh, I talked to the guy from the weirdos. and he said that the whole thing was Penelope made this because it was like all Slash bands and

it was Slash wanted this promo movie and I was like, oh, they can go kiss my big fat, white ass. Respectfully, like from A, from what I've heard from your interviews, but B, from what I've There's a reason why they call them the weirdos. Yeah, and I'm like, also I've read a lot about Slash with love and respect at my heart. I do not think they could have gotten that together to think about like, oh, we're going to make a promo movie about our bands, you know? No, no. And here's the thing, here's the tragic thing, is that the bands that were in the movie, I mean, yeah, they were associated with Slash Records, but it was just because I knew

them, you know, wasn't because I was kissing Bob's ass or something. Yeah, I mean, you, you had to have access and you had to have people that would agree to film with you, and obviously you're going to go. No, that's a really lame interpretation of my motives. And also, It has to do with your theory about men giving credit. Exactly. Okay, they don't want to give me credit. Exactly. They want to give the credit to the men who ran last records.

Yeah, yeah. And the thing is, X, the band, who really sort of starred in the movie. Sure. I don't think they like me. I don't care. Right. But it's just a misunderstanding. Totally.

That makes so much sense that you say this because there is like a feeling of sort of like you're the man. Like I can feel it when you're watching the film that there's a mistrust a little bit. Yeah. You know? And that makes a lot of sense because I've read what those bands have said about Bob Biggs and they were not fans. And they did feel that he took advantage of them. Well, he was just like every other record executive record. record label owner trying to exploit bands to make money.

And that's what he did. Yeah, the germs deal was like draconian. Like people don't like know about this. I don't think that much. But if you look into it, it was like just as bad as like a major label record. They didn't have any representation. They didn't have any money. They didn't have anybody to watch their back.

Totally. Yeah. You know, Bob was all about just taking advantage. Yeah. So there are, is it five bands, six bands in the decline? Were there other bands that you were into or aware of at the time that you wish you had included? I was going to say the weirdos, but now I won't. You know, tomato de plenty.

Sure. The screamers. And the funny part, you're going to love this, is, The go-go. See, I wanted a woman band, a female band in the movie. So the go-goes were just about to break out and become the big band that they were. And they were supposed to be in the movie in the decline. But they ditched out at the last minute, just like Guns and Moses did for Decline 2. Same thing happened. But the funny part is, you know, they made it big, yeah, whatever. And then years later, I get a request from some management somewhere. Could we please license some footage from the decline just to prove that the go-goes were there during that time? I'm like, you mean you really want to take part of my movie that they didn't want to be in to give them credibility? Kiss my butt.

Like they could have had the credibility at the time. I mean, it is, but then, you know, gums back around, they didn't get the credibility because they're women and they blew up. You know what? They're a pop band. Here's the thing. That's right. I'm glad that didn't work out because they're bubble gum, you know. And so I don't, I didn't need that in the decline anyway.

Yeah. And you had Alice Bag, you know, and you have women. You have a scene. You have Alice Bagg. Yeah. She don't like me either. Alice Bag. Yeah.

Interesting. Well, she's pretty good at, she better at promoting herself than me. But yeah, she says I came into the scene really late and she was there a long time. Who cares who came first, man? She didn't know me until she knew me. She didn't know what the hell I was doing before that. Well, I'm not going to get started on her. Well, I think it's very interesting and I want to talk about when we go into decline too,

but I want to come back to that because I do think the like rules and the like fascism of punk, which actually the literal fascism in which, you know, it's very interesting how, and you knew Darby, I didn't know him, I've just read, but clearly it was kind of a bit of a genius, right, in some ways, on a different level anyways. Accidental genius. Yeah, I mean, I think he was kind of touched. Yeah, it's not like, oh my God, this guy's Einstein. Right. You know, it's like he just did shit that was, wait a minute, it's accidentally genius. Yeah.

Yeah. It's really crazy to me reading about his theories and views. And also just in general that people read books back then. Young people read books and they were very proud to read books. That wasn't any internet. Yeah, but even punks. I mean, fast forward to the gutter punks of Decline 3. They're not reading books, I don't think, you know.

And now, I mean, young people barely read books. But, number one, did the name the decline of Western Civilization? come from Darby because I know he was obsessed with the Oswald Spangler book The Decline. Well, it was just a coincidence. That book was called The Decline and Fall of Western Civilization.

I just took the fall out. Right. Because it was just, it was kind of a popular text. Popular is a wrong word to say about a German nationalist, but you know what I mean. But it was.

It was kind of a very talked about book in the late 70s. Oh, yeah. It was well known. Yeah. And by the way, for people that are naming their books or their movies, titles are not copyrightable.

Interesting. You can use it. I could make a movie called Gone with the Wind. Well, they probably don't. Your audience doesn't know what that is. Hold on. I could make a movie called Jurassic Park.

Or like how someone else made a movie called Suburbia. Or like Linklander did that like a dip shit. He did change the letter sizes. Yeah, I know, because he knew he was doing something wrong. That's why he did it, Yossi,

because he knew it was wrong. You're so good. God. But anyways, what I'm obsessed with is this, the idea that a young person like Darby who's disaffected, all the young people in these stories, that's, I think the through line is, you know, they're disaffected, they have difficult home lives, society is not fitting them in.

He was, you know, very into the idea of fascism and, you know, Bowie before him had talked about it. And it just makes me think about fast forward to 2026, right? And if you're online at all, fascism is also very popular with a sect of young people who are not punks. They are right wing. But that is the new transgression. And I'm like, if Darby Crash was born in 1997, you know, in 1997, would he have been an online troll of the right wing instead of a punk? if clavicular. Do you know who clavicular is?

It sounds like a disease. Actually, I'm desperate. I would love if Penelope Spiras would make a documentary about clavicular. Clavicular is an online figure. I told this to my therapist last week, and I could tell she was just like so depressed that I had brought her this information. Like, she wished she didn't know it. He's 20 years old. He live streams all day. That's his like, and he makes a lot of money. his main thing is that he is a looks maxer. So he takes testosterone, he works out, he gets like facial augmentation. He is all about like being a prime physical specimen.

And this is a thing. And there many people follow him. And it's all these disaffected young men, right? And I just, I'm like, I want, I need Penelope to make a documentary about these young people. I couldn't even stand to be in the same room with that dude. How could I make a documentary about him? But I want to know. I need to know more.

He said something in his New York Times article. No, what you need to do is ignore him. He's ridiculous. If what you described is true. But it's a thing, right? You go make a movie about him. I know. You want to have that freak on the show here?

I used to like freaks, but not that kind. It's a different, but it's still a freak, you know? It's still a freak. I can't. My brain goes too galaxy. Well, I mean, here... I'm sorry that I've informed you about clivicular. You were living a beautiful life when you didn't know the clivicular existed.

No, I mean, I'll go check it out right now, but for me, something that's attractive in a person is imperfection. Right. Totally. Not perfection. Yeah. You know, and perfection, I mean, here's the thing. I told Ripley this morning, my assistant, my lovely assistant, who's 26 years. old and she already has a boyfriend, does or don't.

But anyway, I told her this morning, I said, the one thing I really like about Yassi, because I checked you a little bit, is she's not all Kardashianed out, you know? No. And that's what really makes me sad is that so many young people follow that model, and that's a pun, by the way. of how looks are so important and how you're supposed to have the lips and the fingernails and the deed, do, do, do, do, de, de, and all this. And I'm so glad that some people are starting to step away from it.

Well, I think what's the craziest part for me is that they are doing all of this and then they're not living life. Like, they don't have sex. They don't do it to have sex. They don't do it to live in the world. It's kind of like a Zembek, right, or GLP-1s, where all these people are now very thin,

but it has killed their libido for life. What you're saying is it's not rewarding on a spiritual level. Yeah, and it actually diminishes. It almost is like inverse relation. Like the hotter they get, the less they are involved in the real world. Okay, so doesn't that apply to that dude? You were just... A hundred percent.

He also is like, I would rather not have sex. I would rather just know that I can. And to me, it's really depressing to me. But I'm fascinated by it. I don't like guys that are so into themselves that they can't be into other people. Totally. And compassionate and empathetic. The whole thing is really depressing to me.

And I think we're going to hit a breaking point where people are going to, like, remember that there's the point. The only point of ever, like, being hot is to have. fun in the world or to like have sex or to engage with people or be a good person. Well, yes, the main point. But it's just like why be hot to what end? To take photos of yourself? Right. To be a two-dimensional.

I think it's internet damage too, social media damage. Totally. Yeah. Totally. Okay. Did you have a personal favorite subject in the film? Personal favorite. And not maybe that you like personally the best.

That's like saying which one of your children do you like the most. Right. Like maybe like the most magnetic or you're most interested maybe in their storyline? I think in the long term. Yeah. My favorite is Keith Morris from Circle Jokes. Interesting. He is such a good dude.

Yeah. He's got his head in the right place. He's been a punk forever. Yeah. And stayed by his standards. And he's still performing. And I just think he's a wonderful guy. Yeah.

He definitely put his money where his mouth is. I don't think he made any money, but... My personal favorite is Chuck Dikowski. Every time I rewatch, just more because I'm like, wow, this guy could have been an actor. He could have been a star. He's so magnetic. He's very charismatic. He's very charismatic, you know?

I don't know him personally. I just when you watch back, I was like, wow, like, the camera loves this man. Like, he was just like so funny. Well, as a director over the years. when I do audition videos, I learn, man, the camera either loves you, hates you, or doesn't give a shit. Right, or is indifferent to you. Yeah, indifference.

Thank you. That's cleaner. But, yeah, I can always tell when the camera loves you. Because sometimes these people off camera, they're like, huh? You look at them and you're like, what? But, you know, like the camera loves Brad Pitt and Nicole Kidman. Yeah, big time. You know, but take them off camera and it's like, what?

I don't get it, you know? Yeah. Can you tell me about the freeze frames? I have not seen a place before this that it's so pronounced as a style choice and that how much it came after that people did that. What made you think to like do that? Because it's very funny. It does something really fun with the pacing of the film. It kind of gives punctuation in a cool way.

What were you thinking when you were like doing that edit? like let's do a here. A lot of it, Yassi, honestly, comes from the lack of having enough footage. Okay, interesting. No, that's great. I mean, so many amazing creative things come from limitation. That's true. And so if I've got a song going on or somebody talking voice over, you know, like leaving when he's singing,

and this girl just burned her arm and declined three. and it's like everybody's got to have something and I got to have another beer and he was still going on but I needed a freeze frame so I could let that song complete and that's one reason and then the other reason of course is emphasis

and freeze frames were a thing you did back when I was in college and people didn't do them that much lately you know. I mean and you know you continue in Wayne's World, which is a comedic twist. And it's just, it's so... Did I do frames world?

Frames world. There was definitely... Did I do freeze frames? Oh, yeah. Yeah, you know. Okay. The Wayne. Yeah.

When you were filming Darby, because that was near the tail end of his personal decline. And did you sense... Was there like a real darkness about him or around him when you were spending time with him? Well, here's the thing. I've been around. drug use my whole life. My daughter's father died of a heroin overdose. You know, my mom was a flat-out drunk, you know. I've been around fucked up people my whole life. So they used drugs like that

to perform because of stage fright and the fear of getting up in front of all those people. It's the way to calm the nerves, you know? And he just kind of overdid it. Now, If you ask me, addiction and drug use and overuse comes from environment, yes, but primarily genetics. Okay? Because his brother had the same problem. His brother, you know, his brother was a drug addict, but, you know, he died, he was murdered by a drug dealer who gave him like an overdose dose on purpose. On purpose, because he owed him money and left him in a car in Venice. It's not horrible. And that's where the scene in Suburbia comes from, where they bring Sheila back to her parents' house and put him in her, his parents' car.

Faith Baker was Darby's parents and his brother died before him. Suburbia is the next film that you made, 83, so it was not that long after. Mm-hmm. How did it was the decline received? Did it, like, because you're saying it was very difficult to even get it screened. Yeah, I couldn't get a screen. All I wanted was one midnight show. I asked the dudes over at Chinese theater, and they said,

nobody wants to see a documentary, and nobody wants to see punk rock. Right. So I went across the street to the Hollywood Theater, and they said, we'll give you one midnight show, but we're sure nobody will come. And then so many people came that the, The chief of police wrote me a letter afterwards and said, don't show this movie in Los Angeles again. 300 motorcycle cops showed up. Oh, my God.

I mean, we have pictures of it. The thing the guys that at Man's Chinese said was, if you want to make a movie about punk rock, ha, ha, ha, go ahead and write a narrative piece. And so that's when I wrote Suburbia. Just to backtrack for one second. I feel like you approached decline one and honestly all the declines with a completely sort of like, you know, objective lens. Like it doesn't, didn't feel like you were trying to show any sort of. No, I don't want to stuff it down their throat.

Right. So then to have the subjects in the aftermath sort of be negative about what they thought that you did. Like, where do you think that came from and how did that feel? Who's negative about it? You mean just some of the players? Yeah, just some of the players. Did it hurt your feelings given that you knew that? You knew that you went.

You know, Keith Morris is the only one that ever thanked me for being in the decline. And guess what? I'm not so sure any of those other bands would be too well known if it wasn't for the decline. But here's what I learn in life. If you're going to give something, you can't expect to be thanked. Totally. You just have to give it and do it out of the goodness of your heart. And don't expect anybody to thank you.

Yeah. And that's the way I work my life. Yeah. And I do think people aren't aware of what it might feel like to be documented because it's hard to see yourself documented, you know? Yeah. I mean, Eugene, in the first decline, you know, like the dirty old people on the bus or whatever he called him. He used to call me, and he doesn't do it anymore because I let him talk to my badass boyfriend.

but he used to call me and go, I'm so sorry I was in that movie. You know, people always coming up to me and criticizing me for this and that. And I'm like, dude, you said it. I didn't tell you to say it, you know? Yeah, but I wish I wasn't ever in that movie. And then he would say, send me some money.

Eugene. I sent him a few bucks, and then he bugged the shit out of me, so I just told him to fuck off. Yeah, Eugene. and there's we've already paid you. So you said you made suburbia because someone said you need to make a narrative film

if you want to make it about punks. But it really does sit in this like really interesting space between documentary and narrative and it sounds like it's because you took a lot of the story from real experiences that you do that. Yeah.

Is that also why you wanted to cast mostly real people or non-professional actors? The real punks is who I cast. And I had to convince the producer or the financiers that it was easier to teach punks how to act than it was to teach actors how to be a punk. Because nobody knew what a punk was back then. Right. You know?

Yeah. And it's not until like, I mean, I just rewatched Repo Man recently. And I was like, okay, by then they kind of like, but even a lot of those kids in that, I think were real punks. Like you can kind of see the extras and stuff. Cox came to me when he was going to make that movie. And he goes, I'm so scared. What am I going to do? What am I going to do?

And I'm like, well, you'll do it, dude. Go on. He was scared of the punks. No, he actually did hang out with him. I think he was scared to make a movie. But I saw him lately at a film festival, and he's such a sweetheart. So you had gotten some financing, and then you went to Roger Corman to ask him to match it. Right.

How did you know Roger Corman and why did you feel he might be the right match for this fellow? I knew Roger Corman because in the late 60s he did a movie called The Wild Angels. And it did pretty well. And then he wanted to make a movie called The Naked Angels. And it was about a motorcycle gang. And I was an extra in a Roger Corman movie. and I was surely Animal's girlfriend. Good God.

And I was trying to make money. You know, 50 bucks a day, you know. And my sister worked for Roger as a set decorator, and he was so cheap that she would have to drive around the alleys in Venice where the stage was that he had and find Matt. so that the stuntman could land on them. Right. Yeah.

Anyway, I was an actor in The Naked Angels. Yeah, it's embarrassing, but whatever. Why? Why? Well, I mean, I'd rather be remembered for being a director than an extra. Well, I don't think anybody remembers you for being an extra. So I think you're doing okay. Most people are very aware that you have a great movie.

And also, it's a really bad movie. And I'm like, whatever. Can't win them all. No shit. And he was down. He was like, I'll co-financed this movie. That sounds cool. Yeah, he, it cost $500,000, which was a lot back then for an independent movie.

And Bert Dragon pitched in 250. I went to Roger, got another 250. And I remember walking down the street afterwards going, man, I'm going, man, I'm going to make this movie. I can't believe it, you know. And Roger, it wouldn't have been as violent as it was, but Roger told me, Penelope, you've got to rewrite your script, and you've got to put either a sex scene or a violent scene every 10 minutes. I'm like, I can't do that.

He goes, well, then you can't make the movie. Okay, shit. So then I go back to the typewriter, and I go back and I rewrite the scripts. so that every 10 minutes. And there's shit in there that I would have never put in, like the girl with getting the dress torn off. That didn't happen. It punk shows, you know.

But I mean, if somebody did that, you get their ass kicked, yeah. But, you know, I rewrote it just because if I didn't, I wouldn't be able to make the movie. Yeah. Looking back, do you regret that? Like, do you wish that it had a different? No, I don't regret it.

I'm thankful to Roger Ann Bird for letting me. make that movie. It was my first dramatic piece. But what I do regret is that I have a whole, Ripley knows this. I have two or three file cabinets full of scripts that I could never get made. Okay. And they would have been more like suburbia if I could have gotten them made. But after I did Wayne's World, I could only get hired to do comedies. This is something I wanted to ask you. So you do a couple films after Surabia. The Boys Next Door, Hollywood Vice Squad. Dudes, a film I've never seen, but I randomly growing up had the vinyl of the soundtrack.

Because I got it at a garage sale. And so I have the like imagery burned in my brain. And I bought it. Yeah, I bought it because it was such a cool soundtrack. It's great. It's like a real kind of. Kathy Nelson is my best friend to this day. And she did more soundtrack album.

You should have her on the show. I would love to. Oh yeah, you should. She's great. She did more soundtrack albums than anybody else in the world. You should look around. It started with Repo Man and Beverly Hills Cop. Oh, my God. Ended with Top Gun. Oh, legend. Every time I mention a movie to her, she goes, oh, yeah, I did soundtrack. Well, this one I love because it's a real, it's a real like punk into glam metal, right? You can see because wosses on there. It was a mesh between the two because my brain at that point. I was riding the fence between

metal and palm. Yeah, I can see it's a real decline one into decline two is right there. Recognizing that. And then you did Wayne's World, which that's my culture. That's my childhood. That is, that film is burned into my brain. You knocked it out of the park. No one can deny that.

It's one of the best comedies of all time. Thank you very much. So you had done declined to you in 1988. I read it in an interview that you noticed this is such an LA thing like you're always driving around in your car right in LA and you saw a line outside the Roxy is that right and these

were like... Honey not a line it was people spilling out into the street because there were so many people there to see a metal band which I have no idea who it was because you couldn't see the damn the marquee

you know and I'm like wait a minute all these people have long hair now so forget about the short haircut with punks and they're wearing cowboy booths with bandanas on them. Okay, I got to see what's up. Yeah, I'm so interested in that, because had it died down a little, right? Like, as the punk scene that you documented in Decline 1, which did sort of peter out, right, like by the mid-early 80s.

Every generation needs their identity. Totally. And then the next swell, so I guess it would have been very noticeable if you see a throng. outside. They're doing the opposite. Yeah. You know? Yeah. Well, and it's, it is, that's, that was the fascism thing I want to talk about because we did an episode on Mali Cruz. I really had to like retrain myself because again, I came up in the 90s, so we thought that was like the worst shit ever. We were like, a lot of it's bullshit too. Yeah. But then, you know, you go back and you're like, listen, like the New York Doll started this thing. You know, a lot of the hair metal bands were

rooted in some punk, you know, like Duff McCagan was in punk. punk bands in Seattle. Blackie Lawless is a very punk person, I feel like spiritually. Like he's so cool and so like kind of lives outside of the, did you have a different lens on it because you weren't part of it the way you felt more connected to punk? Well, I think my soul rests in punk rock, you know, just in terms of the standards and ethics and philosophies, you know. I always felt uncomfortable in the metal scene because it was so sexy. first of all. I was a lot older than, well, for all the guys in the scene, they like really under, I mean, not under, but young girls. Okay. Sometimes underage. And I was older. I was older by then. And so I just, I felt a bit like an outsider. I did like the bands, though, you know.

Yeah, there's some great music. Yeah, and I think poison is hilarious and declined too. They're so funny. Yeah. I mean, the whole thing is very, tonally, it's so funny. It is funny. And you know what? It wouldn't have probably been that funny if it wasn't for the two producers who kept,

is Jonathan, Dayton, and Valerie Ferris that Miles Copeland hired, that or actually Paul Collishman that worked for for Miles, I don't want to get that wrong, but it wouldn't have been as frivolous as it was if it wasn't for them and Paul because they were fascinated with the melding of the female male look that happened back then and everybody was like, you've got to get these guys that look like girls to be in the movie And all of a sudden, so that's funny to start with, you know, because they weren't really transgender. No, no. They were actually kind of like violently heterosexual.

Yeah. But they were dressing and looking like that because they were after such young girls that they figured if I look like a girl, I won't be as intimidating as I really am. Yeah. So they all dress up like girls so they could get late. Yeah, it's literally like how vapes came in like pineapple flavor for children. Like it's really like. What a good comparison. Kind of right.

Like it's like a kiss more makeup because they were like cartoon characters. Right. They wanted to appeal to kids. Yeah. And then you get to the glam metal. It's also very interesting because they're clowns, right? That's clown makeup. You know, no wonder they're funny.

You know, it's baked in that they're doing theater and Vodville almost in this. That guy Tommy Tutton and Decline 2. Yeah. My boyfriend at the time was this 6'5 dude that looked exactly like Blackie Lawless, except he was better looking. But I'm sorry. That's terrible. We love and respect Blackie Lawless on this program.

This guy was coming on to me or something, this Tommy Tutone kid. And Simon picked him up. in the whiskey go-go-go he picked him up by his hair and he was walking through the crowd with this guy with Tommy two-tone by the hair that was so funny I mean I think the irony of the that scene is that you have to be quite beautiful of a person to pull that up physically yes like like if you look at Motley crew like Vince Neil fell off a little bit obviously quite quickly but they were gorgeous like Nikki Six's bone structure, Tommy Lee.

These were beautiful. Do you want to know where the Motley crew look came from? Please. It's a guy named John James. He was in a band called the Joneses. John was my boyfriend for six years. John is the one with the sticky up hair and that whole Motley crew look. That's where the look came from.

That's so interesting. I would be walking down the street and people would yell out, Motley Crew! And I'd look at John and go, what are they talking about? Because I didn't know who Motley Crew was at the time. But it was because John and Nikki were heroin buddies. Oh, my God, that's so funny. Yeah. And I know part of it also came from the New York Dolls.

And I always found that so interesting because the New York Dolls did it because of the Ronnettes, which I think is such a cool trickle-down, right? They wanted to look like the Ronnettes. Anyways, I'm fascinated by it. Is that Ronnettes? They took it off the Ronettes. They were obsessed with the Ronnettes. So that's why they had the big hair.

Oh, wow. I didn't know that. And then Nikki's... Yeah, the two black lines. Because he played football in high school. He was a football player. He's a jock. I mean, a lot of these guys were...

That's where it gets interesting, right? It's like punk gave way back to jocks almost, back to popular guys, you know, who just wanted to get girls and drink beer. It's all about getting laid. Let's face it. And it was funny. said, it's partially because of your producers. Partially, I think it's inherently funny.

Okay, so you already said you asked Guns and Roses, and they said no. Well, at the last minute, the day before we were going to shoot, their manager, Alan Niven, he came down to the set, and he said, he called me up afterwards. He goes, no, I'm going to pull them out. We're not going to do it because he knew they were going to break and get big. He knew. And so managers don't want to take a chance. Right when they're going to break out.

So that's why he pulled them. I mean, you got some huge names. Yeah, but not to perform. Right, right. I mean, except Megadeth was, I mean, that was my idea to bring Megadeth in because I needed something serious to end that movie with. I didn't want it all to be bubble gum and bullshit, you know. And it does end really well because Dave Mustaine is actually so well-spoken. And so, like, what he says is serious.

serious, exactly. Can you tell me a little bit about a thing that I was obsessed with that you do in all three declines is that you put a anti-figure? In the first decline, I guess it would have been that old couple. Yeah. Right? And in the second decline, it's a police officer, a probation officer. Yeah, parole officer. Was this to sort of like reinforce that this was like a subculture, like that this was. was going against the grain. Well, yes, and I didn't want it all to be one-sided. And also, Yossi wanted to show what the rest of the world felt like about these subject matters. Right. Yeah, I think it was really effective. Okay, before we move on from Decline 2, I want to talk about the two most iconic scenes. Obviously, Chris Holmes from Wasp wasted in the pool with his mother.

I read that you said that when you filmed it, you thought it was like you would have to throw that away. Yeah. Isn't that weird? Yeah. I took Jeff, what the hell is his name? Cameraman, Zimmerman, Jeff Zimmerman, behind a tree in the yard. We were shooting at Miles Copeland's house, by the way. That was his pool.

That was his pool. And I take Zimmerman over there, and I'm like, dude, we don't got it. we're going to have to figure out how to shoot it again because this guy just fucked up and we don't have it. And then I went to the producers and I said, I need to shoot that over and they said, we don't have the money, figured out. So I cut the scene together. Turns out to be the most iconic scene in all three declines, excuse me, him and Darby. And Darby, yeah. By the way, I'm sure you know this by now, but that that was not his house.

That was Tony the Hustler's house. I don't think Darby had a house back then No, I think he was living Either still with his mom or with one of those girls Yeah But was it your idea to have Chris Holmes' mother there? Oh yeah

Because that's the best That tall dude that held Tommy Two Tone up Yeah He was friends with Chris Yeah And so It was Chris Holmes And so

He said I said I want to get I asked Blackie to be in Decline 2, and he's too cool. He can't do it. Okay, fine. So I'll just go to Chris because I knew Simon, knew Chris. And we went over to Chris's house where he lived with his mom. We went to the back room where he's got his Harley inside the house.

And, you know, drank some beers, shot some tequila and smoke some cigarettes. And don't tell anyone. And I asked him if he would be in the movie. And I met Sandy, his mom at the time. And I liked how she was so, you know, indifferent to. Right. Like permissive. They're bikers.

There's a whole family of bikers. Wow. So it's like, well, that's just the way life is, you know. I love that. And that's what she looks like at the side of the pool. Oh, it's amazing. That's your genius, I think, was. putting the mother there because that's for me what makes the scene so impactful.

Because she's just kind of like rolling her eyes. And when he says, have some, have some drink mom. And she's like, okay. Like it's, but then she looks like any old regular mom. She gives him some sideways looks. For sure. When he's talking about like, I bring four girls to the hotel room every night. And he goes, what do you think about?

Oh, I think you ask actually. You said, what do you think about that, Sandy? And she goes, I don't think about it. Yeah. It's great. Okay. And the second one... Well, thank you. I don't know. I mean, I just did it because I'm still trying to figure my own mom out, I guess. I thought that really drove at home for me, because otherwise it would have been just a little bit of like a boring, sad drunk guy in the pool talking about. Yeah. Guy was screwing up. That was water, you know, at one, you know. He drank the bottle of vodka. But vodka is the same color.

is water, which I know, because when I was a kid, I used to pour my mom's vodka out. Who amongst us didn't do that? Put water in so they wouldn't get so drunk? Oh, I didn't do that. I would do it so I could steal the vodka for myself. And they didn't notice. My parents were not big drinks. Shit, I didn't think of that.

That's funny. Anyway. Okay, and then the Ozzy Osborne scene, which has been much, you know, memed and clipped and people love it. But I read and tell me if this is right that the orange juice scene where he spills it, that was put in after the fact and he didn't actually spill it. And if that's true, was that something you asked them if you could do that? I confess it was fake. Right.

Here's what happened. We shot the scene and I noticed while we were rolling that Ozzy said we took all kinds of stuff. with smoked pot and Valium and blah, blah. While he said that, I noticed he was pouring the orange juice. So when we were done with the interview, Sharon and Ozzy went in the other room. And we had given him the bathrobe to wear. And so I said, give me that bathrobe back.

As I put it on some grip or somebody working on the film, and I'm like, could you just pour the orange juice and spill it? And that's when I cut that in. And it got a great laugh. Yeah, it's very funny. Did they get mad? Sharon and Ozzy? Yeah.

No. They don't get mad about stuff like that. Okay, great. Well, I'm just curious. Because it's very funny. No, I know what you mean. They didn't get mad. No, Sharon is showbiz incorporated.

Okay, she knows that shit like that happens. Yeah. You know. Yeah. I did a movie after, because I was friends with Sharon and Ozzie before I did decline too. Yeah.

Well, you did the Ozfest documentary, the much storied, which has not come out. In 99. Yeah, but it has not come out, right? Oh, God, here. So I'm so sorry. You want to see me cry now? We sold our souls for rock and roll that I shot in 99.

With Sharon and Ozzy never came out because they couldn't clear the music. And I would, I did the movie because the producer, Scott Wilder, I ask him, go ask Sharon, are all the rights clear? And the answer was, they're clear because Sharon includes that with the bands. When they sign up for all sides. Sign up for the tour. Yeah. And then when they told me that it wasn't clear, I talked to a lawyer and he said, no, no.

Sharon doesn't do contracts with the bands because she wants to fire him if she wants to. Yeah, because what a great lineup, Slayer, deftone, system of a down. The only version that is available is some crappy version on YouTube. But let me tell you something. This movie is gorgeous. It's beautiful. We showed it at the Motion Picture Academy a couple years ago at the museum. A thousand people.

And it was, I wish you would have been there. Amazing. We got to get this out here, you guys. There's a lot said about how Declined 2 came out just right as hermemic. died where, you know, Grunge came in and killed it. Right. Somebody said I killed. Yeah.

I was going to ask. Is that what you're going to ask me? Yeah, well, because I was very surprised by this. I was like, I'm sorry, like, I think hair metal was going to die anyways. But like, apparently Dave Mustaine said it in a book. Oh, did he? Yeah. I couldn't find the book.

It's called Hellbent for Leather. But he said it in VH1 documentary called Heavy, the Story of Heavy Metal says it. And it's like, well, what is the claim that they looked like? such ridiculous clowns, people didn't want to fuck with them anymore? Like, I don't know if that is enough to kill an entire genre. If I killed hair metal with the decline part two, I think I deserve a purple heart. I agree. I agree, honestly.

No, you know, for them to, if I was a dude, they wouldn't blame it on me, okay? I'm a woman, so I get blamed for shit. It's also like, I think people forget exactly what you've said. Every generation needs their own thing. And it is a bit of a pendulum, right? And so there was too much excess. There was too much misogyny. Of course it's going to go back.

And, you know, I have a theory about grunge is that, you know, a lot of these grunge front men were raised by single mothers, you know? And that's why they're more feminist and more, you know, this is something that they grew up with a different kind of set of values. And they also revere punk, the original punk, like kind of in the way that like it was a different set of ethos. And they didn't want these these hair metal type guys were the guys that beat them up, you know. So they were going to come and sort of oust that. That's right.

And they did. Yeah, there'd be fights in the parking lot. Yeah. Stuff like that. I have a theory that Grunge was born. out of a reaction to punk because punk your anger and your aggression sort of was outward right grunge it was inward yeah you know it was like oh poor me I mean I'm so miserable and it's cool to be miserable it's shit like that you know it's like to me I was never into grunge

because I like it when you know it's more outward if you're going to to be pissed, be pissed. Right. You like an outward expression. Because you can't be pissed and depressed at the same time. It's the same emotion, you know, but it's just directed different ways. Totally. Yeah, depression is, my therapist always says it, depression is anger directed in words. Same thing. Yeah. Same thing. Yeah. Well, as a grunge girlie, I respect your opinion, but I love it. You love grunge? I was born in 1982, you know? I was 11 years old when Kirk Cobain died. I still remember the day. Yeah, he's always playing that

grunge stuff, you know, and I'm like the only one I liked was Temple of the Dog. Okay, so that one, Chris Carnal's voice makes me cry. Same. I mean, and also, you know, Soundgarden is very directly rooted in SST bands, Black Flag. You know, they, oh, 100%. I mean, they have, and then also in the drop detuned.

from Tony Iommi from Black Sabbath is like what gives a lot of grunge, not Nirvana, but the other ones, their sound, you know? So they do have interesting roots. Anyways, we don't have that. Boy, that's a tweaky little detail about Tony's tuning. Huh. Okay, so you did Wayne's World. I mean, we need to remind people you were nominated for a Grammy for the music video, the Bohemian Rhapsody. I watched just that scene again this morning. Just pure perfection. The B-roll, the choreography. of the head banging, the drunk, picking up the drunk guy and sticking him in the middle. It's just perfect. It's perfect. You know where it came from? Tell me. It came from a movie I did called Dudes with John Cryer and Flea. Right.

And I did a scene in a Volkswagen bug with John driving and Flea in the shotgun seat. And they're doing Hava Nigelah and had. banging. Habba, and it worked, you know. And I knew if, I knew it was funny. And so when we started shooting it, Mike was going, this isn't funny and it hurts my neck. I'm like, trust me, it's gonna work.

And then guess what? I mean, it worked and now it's just the classic thing. What do you think that James Cordo, whatever his name is? Totally. Carpool karaoke. Where'd that come from? Same thing. Do I get credit for that?

No, thank you, Albert. It's one of the most genius scenes of music in any film, I think. Like, it's funny. It matches the song so well. It's just perfect. Well, thank you. Yeah, people like it. You did this movie.

And then like you said, you have all these scripts that were not comedies, but people wanted you to do Black Sheep or Beverly Hillbillies, which you did, Black Sheep. a wonderful movie and the little rascals and the little rascals so what would you have wanted to do like let let's say you were afforded the opportunities to do whatever you wanted after wayne's world what would that have looked like what kind of films would those have been if i could have done the films i really wanted to do and that are sitting in my file cabinet still i would have done social comment uh you know uh sort of studies about toxic waste

and abandoned children and so many different topics. Not necessarily political, because I shy away from making political statements, you know, leave that to the masses. But I would have done films that I like to make a comment about helping people and bettering our culture and also our social situation. narrative. Narrative. Written.

Yeah. Right. They are written. I wrote the scripts and they never got made, you know? That A is tragic, but B makes a lot of sense to me because then you made the decline three, which I have to say, and there's no best, like you said, it's like picking my children. There's three declines. It's like picking my children. But the decline three to me is the most poignant.

It is the most affecting. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. and I believe the same thing. It's so, I mean, everything that you talked about from the beginning

of what you were interested in, the psychobiology, understanding your own childhood, understanding trauma, understanding what having a fucked up childhood does is all in there. And it's, I think people misremember it

as this like funny, you know, oh, look at the funny gutter punks. But it's... People didn't see it. Yeah. Which is crazy. No, it's the way

my life is. People didn't see the first decline either. There will be some day that there will be. Decline three will be appreciated. I didn't know I was making a movie about homeless kids. Look at homeless now. I know. Look at where we stand now. It's really 30 years later. Because you do something, you do a real magic trick with that one where you get people in in the beginning with like, because all of these kids are very charismatic and charming and funny. And you get them in with like, wow, look at they're so intriguing and they look crazy and they make jokes. And you slowly reveal one gut punch after another. Like when you, oh my God, I'm sorry, I'm going to cry. But when you're interviewing Darius, who's been in the film the whole time,

and this is like, we're more than halfway through the film. And he's talking about the car accident. And that's the first time that you pan back to show that he's in a wheelchair. And you don't know that until then. That broke my heart. heart. I mean, and I watched this before. I just didn't remember these details. And the fire, well, for you to notice that I did that as a reveal, we call it, with Darius in the wheelchair, is extremely astute of you and makes me think that you need to be a filmmaker. No, not kidding. You're good. You're good. You could be good. I'm going to cry, but I'll be a stop. I got plenty of reasons.

I actually do dream of making films. Again, I always say to the camera, if anyone's listening and wants to finance a biopic about the slits, that's my pet project. Another girl band. Well, I just find their story really interesting. So send your money to blah, blah, go fund me page. Go ahead and send it right to my bank account.

I think it's such an incredible document, which, again, like you have a knack for this. of the end of the 90s, that kind of world doesn't really exist anymore, right? And I'm not saying there's not homeless children and there's not abused children. Of course, that's a tale as old as time. But this sort of like gutter punk subculture on the streets, like I remember, this is 98, right? So I remember, you know, I would have been 14 or something and having my cousins older friends. They weren't gutter punks, they don't live on the streets, but they were like subhumans patch,

Mohawk showing me about bands and we would go to Melrose and see these crusties and gutter puns. Oh yeah, they're out there with spanging. Yeah, spanging, exactly. Like taking photos with tourists, that sent me. They were like Spider-Man and a gutter punk.

We could dig a photo. Yeah, and then give me a dollar. Yeah, and I might be wrong and I'm happy always to be corrected, but like it really felt to me the end of an era of like it's pre, you know, we don't have smartphones. It's, you know, I remember... Well, you're right, because see, that's really when the

internet kicked in. And that's, and the internet, for some reason, we're in a whole transition stage right now, still 26, 27 years later, you know, absorbing this gigantic technology change. Totally. And, you know, it's almost like everybody's identity is lost. Yeah. And even though it was so sad because it is. It's sad and it's tragic. But like the beautiful thing about Decline 3 is that this is a family and in a community. These kids found each other. That's right. And they take care of each other. Just like in suburbia. Just like in suburbia. Yeah. And they're on the streets together and they're looking out for each other and they, you know, one gets an apartment. They all crash there. Then they all get kicked out. And then they all get kicked out and they're

squatting. It's like, where did you get your, what happened to your parking, or what happened your ticket because they get a ticket for crossing the street wrong or something, you know, I ate it. You know, they don't give a shit. Who's going to find them? How? I mean, now, but now they would. Now there's like everything's surveillance society. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You couldn't, it's pretty impossible to even live like that if you wanted to. Now, of course, we still have unhoused people, but like I walk around Hollywood. I walk down Melrose. I don't see any crusties. No, but you better have somebody with you because it's not safe. No. But yeah, if you guys haven't watched Decline 3, if that can be my like parting words for this interview is like, please watch Decline 3. It is.

That's my film I'm most proud of. I think you nailed it because you really in a not heavy-handed, super subtle way, slowly show how these kids had no other choice, you know, how they were pushed to live on the fringes of society by these really fucked up circumstances. is parents that were abusive, parents that were meth heads, you know, so many things. And then the tragedy within the film, you know, the fire, Stevie dying, and then we don't have to talk about it, but the, you know, the murder that happens after the film of one of the main kids and by one of the other, you know, featured players. Well, if you, if you have a audience that's interested in understanding that time, I would be so happy if people watch that film because,

I think it's an education and it would help kids to watch it. I agree. And especially, I think if you can watch it and compare it in your mind to what was happening on MTV and, like, in pop culture, teenagedom and how divorced those two things were. That were separated, totally. Yeah. Yeah. Penelope, this has been, honestly, such an honor and a pleasure. I'm so happy that you came.

I really, sorry I had so many questions. I've just, your work has been really important to me. I was so, I don't like to do on. camera interviews, you know, and I was so nervous. My assistant Ripley knows. I was like, I didn't, I can't do this. No, you're amazing. And you've made it so nice and easy. And I wish this table wasn't so big because I would give you a big hug right now. Well, we can have a big hug right after. Oh, there you go. And I hope you guys know this chick is the bomb. Okay. And I'll be, thank you so much. I got to put my shades back on because I'm crying. No. Okay. Yeah. Thank you, Yassi.

Thank you. Come back next week for a new episode of Bansplaine. I'll second that. If you liked what you heard today, subscribe for more episodes of Bansplaine. Our guests today were Alex Ross Perry and Penelope Spiris. This episode was produced by Rob Sunderman and edited by Adrian Bridges with help from Justin Sales. Video production by Bell Roman. Executive producers for Bansplaine are Gina Delvec and me, Yossi Sallick.

Our gorgeous and catchy theme song was composed and performed by Bethany Costantino and Jennifer Claven and graciously recorded by Carlos Delagarza in Los Angeles, California. Special thanks to our producer emeritus, producer Dylan, aka Dylan Tupper Rupert, and also Sean Fennessee and Tuna Fish Sandwich. Come back every Thursday for a new episode of Bandsblane on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. Party on, dude. Okay. Okay.