Blank Check with Griffin & David - A Serious Man with Marc Maron

Episode Date: October 12, 2025

The time has come for us to lock the gates. On the occasion of the end of WTF, Marc Maron joins us to talk about chaos, God, mathematics, and Jewish identity as we dive into 2009’s A Serious Man. Highlights of this episode include Marc asking, “Is this a bit?” when David opens the dossier, Marc’s discussion of his audition to play Larry Gopnik, and Marc telling Griffin that he’s proud of him. Not a dry eye in the house, folks. This is a special one. Listen to WTF Sign up for Check Book, the Blank Check newsletter featuring even more “real nerdy shit” to feed your  pop culture obsession. Dossier excerpts, film biz AND burger reports, and even more exclusive content you won’t want to miss out on. Join our Patreon for franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. Follow us @blankcheckpod on Twitter, Instagram, Threads and Facebook!  Buy some real nerdy merch Connect with other Blankies on our Reddit or Discord For anything else, check out BlankCheckPod.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lock the gates. Hello, this is Blank Check with Griffin and David. I'm Griffin, Newman. Welcome to the pod. Blankies, blankstables, blinkers, blankers, blanku-pie wall streeters. Blankarekans. Blankadians.

This is the pod. This is me. This is Griffin. Big show today. Serious man. Mark Marin. Serious man's the name of the movie. He is a serious man.

And a funny guy. He's a nice guy. He's a good guy. We had a good talk, good chat, good episode, long time. In the making, we'll get to that. But I think you guys are going to like that one. I just shit my pants Dunkin' Donuts

Raspberry-flavored coffee What's new? What's new with me? What's going on here? My dryer is broken It still gets hot, but it doesn't turn. The drum doesn't turn. Got to get someone to fix the dryer. I got clothes that are clean, but they're wet. Not ideal. Not ideal.

Cat update. I don't have cats. I still don't have cats. No cats. That's the update. I'm allergic to them and I don't like them on a personal level. Trying to keep my head on straight. Trying to stay normal.

Trying to be healthy. Do read the Reddit sometimes. Probably a mistake. But some of the things I'm reading on the Reddit get me a little worked up. What else? What else? I guess, yeah, just Here's our talk with Mark Marin

Talking a serious man He's been dream guest One of the ultimate are white whales I think Mark didn't really know what to expect Definitely had never listened to the show before Was surprised how long we were going Didn't tell him that this was probably The shortest episode we've done in years

But it's a good length It's a good length, it's a healthy length I think you're going to like it Are we adding these intros just to pat it out? No, I thought it was a cool, stylistic exercise. Anyway, here we are. Serious man with a serious man himself. And a very funny guy, Mark Merrim.

And I'm David. So the way we usually start with podcast is I do a quote from the movie. So go do a quote from the movie. And I ham fist the word podcast into it. But I sort of think at a tribute for this episode, we should like cut it, like fade in on this. Uh-huh. In the mid-conversation. This part right now?

Right. Yeah, okay. The way you do. Sure. Where it's like there's not the hard start to the conversation. Yeah, it's true. Right. So we're getting to the table setting.

I've coped that. Yes. I mean, you're the king. Everyone's copped every guy. We don't do it. We do abrupt start, but we've copped like 40,000 other things for me. I've already done the, are we rolling? Yeah, we're talking.

Yeah, so now we're doing it. So now I'm going to do the quote, but now I've set up the quote, okay? Okay, so let me just, um, uh, I, I, I, I've had, you didn't have this queued up. I had it cued up. Okay, great. I was getting into the character. We've been talking about process for the last half an hour. You've got to let me find it.

I have it right here. I have a screenshot. It's right here. Can you give me a moment? Okay. I've had quite a bit of serious lately. Marital problems, professional, you name it. This is not a frivolous request.

This is a serious, I'm a serious, I'm, I'm, I've tried to be a serious podcast, you know? There you go. Right? It just felt like the obvious thing to do. I guess so. There's so many things. Could Sussman sleep? Pall, you just shit my pants.

I had to do, I had to do it. Just coffee.coop. We did that for years. We did not have the sponsorship. At any time I drink coffee, I would say that. give them the free plug that was worth a penny the other ones they were initially upset about that until it changed their business entirely really yeah the original guy oh they were like come on the association yeah yeah yeah they didn't love it this is on tooth the mail orders were coming in

right yeah right so when we when we started this podcast it really originally had a different premise it took us about a year to figure out what the show actually same with us was yeah and when we started i think we were trying to in a way the framing was more satirizing other podcasts. So we were lifting from every other podcast we listened to and then repurposing other podcasts accidental and purposeful catchphrases into our own. So I feel like we've eased off of them. But there are like six marinisms that were in our lexicon for a very long time. Oh yeah. So how I just shit my pants. Who are your guys? We did a lot with. The one I love, and I brought up with Brandon once and he said he didn't remember it, is the day you were working the door at the

comedy store and Damon Wayans walked in and said, I'm just going to do a jazz set. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We repurposed jazz set a lot. Yeah. In context that no longer makes sense. Yeah. And then lock the gates. We do, we do a lot of lock.

I mean, whenever we talk, because I feel like I also will reference people involved in the movie we're talking about. If you have interviewed them, I will pull up things that they said on your show. But we will exclusively refer to that as like when Jeremy Strong locked the gates. Yeah. Right. Right. That's good.

The gate lot. Yeah, exactly. And we also did almost famous early. Yeah, we did. Camera Crow is one of our first blank check guys. Because he is, he's ultimate blank check career. Yeah, like, he gets to a point where he's making movies that don't make sense on paper. I don't understand what happened to that guy.

I really, because there's only really the two movies, right? I mean, what he wrote first times, right? Yes, okay. Which is a masterpiece. Totally. Say anything almost famous during the wire. Those are the three undeniable. But that's fine.

Yeah, totally. I mean, I don't know what we expect out of these guys. I don't love singles, but I think singles has its place or whatever. Yeah. To me, it's just. We're pro-vanilla sky, but vanilla sky is more divisive. Yeah, but what he did was so fine line, right? Of like, it's going to have five acts and it's going to be very touchy-feely, but it'll be funny.

And it'll be, and it's just like the minute you lose your tone calibration on that, it's going to be just terrible. I don't know what happens to certain guys when they lose their tone. Is it that they get too successful? Like to, you know. I mean, this was originally the premise of our show was the idea of like, is blank check status kind of like a monkey paw that gets people in their heads? And the first five or six people we covered all fit that paradigm of the success maybe was the worst thing that happened to them.

Yeah, but I think, but it's not in terms of that they necessarily get too comfortable. I think they, the buckling under the expectations and starting to think in terms of those expectations as opposed to the movie. Yes. it becomes a real struggle. Yeah. And to us, now we've moved on and we'll cover it like the Coens. You know, they have little peaks and valleys, but it's not like the first half

their career is good and then they lose it and never get it back. But they're a film. The Coens as filmmakers for me and not unlike how I talk about, you know, literature or music, that there are certain works of art that if you go back to them at different points in your life, they deepen. Yes. And they take on different meaning. And for me, that is the indicator of a true work of genius, that you have a lifelong

relationship that evolves with the art that evolves as you evolve. I agree completely. And I think they've done a good job. Part of what we're talking about that I think fucks other people is people don't know how handle it when they get to the stage where you become the blank thing as a proven formula, the Cameron Crow thing, right? Once you had done it a couple times in a row. it was like, great, make a Cameron Crow movie.

We all know what a Cameron Crow movie is. You don't need to prove it to us anymore. You've, like, nailed it. And that burden of expectation, I think, starts to get in people's heads where they're not fighting against a pressure we're trying to find the thing. Well, yeah, it's, but it takes, you know,

so people appreciate or have the reverence for, there's an expectation for people to keep delivering. Yes. No matter what. And that's a, it's a diminishing returns, if not a dead end as a creator that was one of the the greatest moments uh in in my podcasting experience was when i talked to mccartney and i threw him that curveball it's it's the greatest moment for for me because i i really i don't i wouldn't say i have i definitely have

the ability just out of my own ego to to not have like to not audibly have uh an uncontrollable amount of reverence for somebody i i couldn't sure i couldn't hide it with keith yeah and we that's fine we all know that people who listen know that well all right well marron's just going to do when he takes out a cigarette on mike in that episode and you just start giggling it's the best it's incredible is is that was great yeah but like mccartney oddly when i went into the mccartney interview and i hold on to this and it was really part of it there was part of me that was sort of like i am in my heart i'm like mom a john guy but i'll i'll talk to pa yeah but it's like you know everyone else that's like, it's a beetle. And I'm like, I know, but, you know, I'm a John guy.

David kicked his head down. So that moment where, oh, I've talked to a lot of musicians of that generation. And just because of their egos, they have to believe they're doing their best work ever. You know, when you talk to Roger Waters and he's, you know, talking about his fourth or fifth solo album. Yeah. You know, they're kind of saying, well, this is really what it. So knowing that, I asked Paul, and I imagine you heard it, I said, so a lot of people I talk to of your generation, you know, think that they're doing their best work now. And then, by the way, he was promoting a bad record. Well, which record was it, Egypt Station?

It's a pretty, and I said, even by his late standards. Yeah, I said, you know, they think they're doing their best work ever. And he just said, I was in the Beatles. Right. That's a pretty high bar. That's the healthiest attitude you can have, though. The best. It's perfect.

And I think the Coens have done an incredible job as much as every single movie they have made in their career is distinctly a Cohen's movie, couldn't be made by anyone else. right is in some way capturing that Cohen brothers thing totally what that could be is very varied they have stretched it in multiple directions sizes genres and all and most in a lot of the later movies you know we're we're paying homage to Hollywood yes to being movie fans yes you know like no one talks enough about hell Caesar and I never shut up about it fucking master incredible movie fucking masterpiece is right yeah a double feature of Barton think and These are they they they're almost it's almost a sequel or it's the same movie same time yeah yeah they're both capital pictures yes the first time i saw it i was like yeah it's good and david was like no it's a masterpiece i've always

And I have seen it four times since then. And every time I watch it, it's what you're saying. Oh, my God. And it's only been fucking eight years or whatever. Every time I watch it, I go, there's shit in this. I did not see. Oh, my God. I did not get.

It keeps getting deeper. And Clooney, one of his funniest performances. Yes. Like, when he's in that armor in that communist meeting, trying to adjust on his chair. Here's like, here's indication of guys who know how to handle their career really well, though, right? Sneakily. And they always write it off as like, I don't know, we don't overthink these things. things, right? They make no country. It is their highest grossing film up until that point

in time. They win three Oscars. They win best picture. They're each walking out of there with three trophies. They already, at the time they're on the Oscar stage, have burn after reading in the can. Their follow-up to no country is something that is seen as kind of like a goofy lark. Why are you doing this? I had to rewatch that. I love that movie. I love it now, too. Yeah. I just have a, I have some sort of strange issue with Malkovich sometimes. interesting that to me is like maybe the best application of him ever but i'm with mark david can you share your malcovich wait what's my no what that he's a sundried tomato he's a sundried tomato you know it's like you put eight sundried tomatoes on a sandwich and then you're like right i'm eating a sundried tomato

sandwich yeah my take you can't put him on any sandwich you got to build a sandwich properly that's the thing my take on him and i love him sometimes oh no he's great i i love malcovich but but the burden of malcovich is that in how i use usually frame it is that there's the movie that's the movie and then there's the movie he's in yes right and it's a separate reality yes benizio sometimes is like that too it's like he's great yeah but he's obviously in some other he's going to do whatever he wants to do and if the movie happens to sync up with him because i just interviewed west anderson for the new movie yeah and he says the star of and he said while we were talking about benicio he's like i know this is trite but i'm looking at the monitor with

Bruno, who's my DP, while we're filming it. And I said to him, like, it's like, we're watching a movie. And Bruno was like, I know what you mean. You know, like, it's like, just his face. Anything he does is watchable. Just his face is crazy. Yeah. And the space they occupy.

Yeah. Yeah, I rewatched Burn After Reading. And it, to see those, to see, and Cooney does it in a lot of the Cohen movies, it's very specific and almost broad comedic choices as actors, like that, the stuff that he and Brad Pitt were doing in Byrne after reading is some of the best comedic acting on screen. I agree. And I think Clooney and Byrne is like specifically underrated because he has so many other

Cohen's performances. And because that guy. It's so big in that movie and all that. It's such a guy that I've never seen anyone play before and you immediately go, I've met 20 of these dudes across my life. That scene in the restaurant where he takes a bite and he doesn't know if he's got shellfish, he's like, ah, ah, I'm okay. And even his initial, his character introduction is him having the odors and talking about whether he's lactose intolerant or if he has acid reflux. I always took it as him make in front of Pitt a little bit because Pitt's always eating or whatever.

And then he's kind of like, I could do some busy eating if you want me to do some busy. But I've been trying to do that as an actor lately, not be afraid to get involved with the food. But then you have to like eat it, like take after take or whatever. That's where you got to be strategic. No, you get a spit bag. Right, right. You're a spitter. No, I haven't eaten that much

But yeah, I have spit That's the best story That Tom Arnold story Do you remember that Where he was on a movie For the first time Or I don't know if it was first time But he had to eat donuts

And he didn't know about the spit bag So he was just like By the fifth take He couldn't You know he was so full of donuts That he was sick And he didn't know that that was an option It's kind of funny

My problem with food is Is that it's a continuity thing Like you know You've got to do the thing And they can cut around it usually, but you do have to be aware. Like if you eat once, if you're committed to that bite on that fork, you're in for it. It's not so much to food, but you've got to time it. It's another thing you have to think about it.

Now, do you enjoy that game? Because I kind of like the additional stressor of this is giving me a structure to my handle on this scene. It can, but like, yeah, it's not my nature to think about those things. I'm more want to be emotionally present or just press. present, but there are some dudes that love it. Like, I had Eric Stoltz on my show, Marin, and he had a salad, and he was all about it. Yeah. Like, he, you know, he was eating it, and then he was, like, cat, you know, he was, like, storing it.

And he knew, like, it was definitely a part of a thing that he loved about acting was the challenge of getting that continuity correct. Well, and also, like, in, in meal scenes, by and large, you're seated. You're having a seated conversation, which is so static. Yeah, I'm big on putting the fork down. That shit is great. For accentuation, just put the fork down. Oh, oh, you do it at the top. Just so I don't have to eat.

Yeah. You know, but I'm noticing on Stick, this new Apple show them on that I do, I do the, I'm doing the mug work. I'm doing, I'm doing some eating. Because your guy loves the hotel breakfast. Yeah. Yeah. But there's also just sort of like, all right. It's written in as a character.

Yeah. This character is something you can handle. Let's try to work this other muscle. Let's go. Let's do the mug thing. I just think, right. Both to like sometimes use it as an exclamation. point on lines and other times use it as a way to throw away lines but there's also it does imply

a naturalism yes exactly you know like you can you can be aware of punctuating things in there within the arc of any scene yes but when you when you do do it and i'm watching it i'm like it it makes it seem more real yes if you do this this movie has a very subtle version of that which is uh what's his name george wyman uh the the second rabbi who tells the story about the And his fucking tea work, his teacup work and when he chooses to take a sip. Great. When he's just holding a higher up in preparation. George Weiner.

When he goes, the goy. Yeah. Well, that's, I need to talk about that line. That's a very important line. Who cares about the guy? He's kind of taken off guard because he's refocused his attention so much to the teacup that the idea that this guy's still hung up on the story is surprising to him. Yeah, because the story is a story he's told a million times that, you know, and the

closure of that story, it's, it's not about the story ending. It's about some sort of strange, I don't know if you would call it, uh, it's not really an allegory, but it's a fairly classic Hasidic tale where, you know, you're waiting for an end, but there is never an end. What's a microcosm for the whole movie? And it's the same as the, the fake Yiddish tale at the beginning of the movie. Well, those are all those stories like if, you know, that, like that Martin Buber translation of the Hasidic tales. Yeah. And, you know, Woody Allen was definitely kind of preoccupied with some of that as well that that there there is no conclusion right really that is satisfying in the way of an ending no and and i tried to when rewatching a serious man to talk to

you guys like i was really trying to to understand on some you know uh story level why they opened with that with that the fable the fable oh that's what the fable that's the word i'm looking for and it does have implications for the the actual story of a serious man, but it's still peculiar. It's a peculiar story because, you know, when the rabbi walks back out into the night with the ice pick in his chest,

it is not conclusive. Like he's saying, he might be going to die, he's going to be dead. Right. And she's completely confident in her assessment of the situation. But there is zero resolution.

You don't know if this guy's going to die, if he's supernatural or not, and whether or not it's going to come back to them, either way. Yes. And they were, they've been very adamant when they talk about this movie,

that they were like, this feels like the kind of thing that should open with a Yiddish folk tale. Yeah. They looked around, they didn't find one they liked. And they wrote one. They wrote one.

Right. And they've been like, it has nothing to do with the movie at large. It doesn't link in. A lot of critics at the time were like, I think they're being sneaky. And this is some like,

ancestor of the family. And everything that's happening to this guy is the long tail curse of that, which I don't think it is. I think it's more just about the idea of, These things happen to us. There's no reason why it happened to us. We did nothing to bring it upon ourselves

and we'll have no sense of resolution at the other end. Judaism is a search for meaning in darkness. Yes. And that often the story you will be told is one of suffering and you're like, oh, okay, and then what happened? And they're like, I don't know, more suffering later. Sure. The fact that all of Judaism basically was retroactively turned into the pretext

prequel for Christianity, right? You never think about that. The Old Testament is like... Right. But also our religion is like Star Wars up until the ending of Empire Strikes Back where everything's really bad. And then Christianity was like, and what if a guy came along and kind of fixed it and slowly, like, taught us lessons that gave us like a sense of optimism? I don't, but I think more than optimism, it's the humanness.

Yes. That bridges the gap between the celestial and the human. And it also makes it user-friendly. Because, you know, with Old Testament Judaism, there, you know, everyone always talks about the, you know, the vengeful God and this God or the angry man in the sky. But I think in that same conversation with the T that was his name, was it Nussbaum that that rabbi that Wiener played? Well, you know, what he says that I think is the key to one of the keys to the, knock, knock to the movie is that it's not up to us to decide. right you know what god is intended it's it's up to us to to to live you know he's not going to give us answers right we just have to honor the the rules right and i i think that's a that's sort of

the key to the whole thing which the building blocks of all religions are basically like children's tales to teach you lessons on how to behave that's right they're like just so stories and grimm's fairy tales the ten commandments are just basic rules to for civilization they know that if you fuck your neighbor's wife, that that's going to probably end in murder, or somebody's going to lose their land. Much of the Old Testament, right. It's just kind of like, it's practical. Yeah, exactly.

Because that's the whole thing with all the kosher stuff where you're like, that stuff will get you sick. It's 4,000 BC. That's right. Don't be eating bottom feeding shellfish. You're going to pour of milk on top of a pig? What the fuck are you doing? It's crazy.

Yeah. But there are just rules to maintain order in a community. And then in the vacuum of a direct relationship or direct conversation with God in modern society and us spending thousands of years going back to the original text, we keep trying to put more and more on them. And this guy keeps on going to rabbis and being like, explain to me why this is happening.

And they don't view it that way. And he just keeps thinking, I'll get to a higher rabbi who's in touch with something deeper who gives me the perspective. And the highest rabbi who won't talk to him will only talk to his son. Because he has to. Because it's the only thing he left in his basically ceremonial job.

The only thing he wants to talk about is like, Jefferson Starship kind of slag. Airplane. Excuse me. Airplane, but he does the lyric and then he goes, now what? Yeah. But also the Jesus thing is really, you know, you can talk to Jesus. Yeah.

And there's a set of answers. Right. You can say, hey, Jesus, thumbs up, thumbs down. Well, no, I fucked up, forgive me. Right. And that too. It's built into the structure where they're like, this is how you talk to Jesus. We're always listening.

Yep. And I did a bad thing. Forgive me. And then the priest will forgive you or the Jesus. as you have in your head will forgive you. You're pre-approved. But you know you're flawed. And that also is fully Old Testament.

It's just chaos. And nobody can follow these rules completely unless they're enforced by modern laws like murder and some of the other ones. But everyone's flawed. Everyone's going to fluctuate. And that's just the nature of people. And that's a given. And I think people want more answers than that.

Yes. And the sense of forgiveness is not built into the same, the Old Testament in the same way. So the idea that you're flawed comes with the recognition of failure. And the weight of it. The weight of it. And the constant. I tried to be a serious man. That's right. And the constant conversation, whether it's Talmudic or it's just Jews argue with God all the time. Yes. Jews defy God all the time. Yes. And either they get what's coming to them or they don't. Right. But either way they feel bad about it. That is the cornerstone of Jewish guilt. Or they succeed tremendously. Yes. And you have to assume that they'll feel bad. But they're something.

things eating them up inside. Who knows, right? But they might not. That's the scariest part, yeah. But the thing that struck me about rewatching it, because it's one of those movies that keep going back to, and I have a certain, you know, there is something familiar to the beginning of middle class Jewry, you know, in terms of, you know, the kind of once Jews are reluctantly invited into the community or the social circle is just regular

people. So you were New Jersey and New Mexico, right? Yeah, I, you know, my parents, yeah, my parents are from Jersey, but I grew up in New Mexico, and there was a, at the time we moved there, in my temple, there's probably 500 families, but, you know, it was a similar kind of on-clays culture within a culture. This is, yeah, conservative middle-class Jewish. Yeah. And, you know, and I've talked about this a lot lately is that, you know, many Jews, you know, the identification, it's not that it's all cultural, it is still religious, but most Jews were never taught, unlike Christianity, to sort of have an. active and sort of practical relationship with God. Yeah.

That, you know, usually it was more about Israel and about, you know, ritual and about, you know, showing up occasionally in the community. But that is the nature of Judaism. Yes. But we, you know, and even in terms of like, you know, is there a heaven or hell? And it's never been made clear to me. Yeah. In Jewish, they don't know.

No, they don't know. But he talks about it. He talks about some of the deeper talmudical stuff of the different possibilities of post death. Yeah. And then you assume that the Kabbalah, which is this uncrackable code, has some sort of a deeper understanding of the mystical. Yeah. Which is what, and in this movie, that is what Richard Kind represents.

Yes. Is that he is writing the Kabbalah. Yes. And there is a moment where you're like, oh, this is a schizophrenic. This guy has mental problems. Right. And then he turns to the page where there's a Hebrew in the middle of it. Yeah.

That he's trying to decipher in his, you know, either slightly schizophrenic sense. Uh-huh. You know, he's trying to make sense of the universe, and he's obviously jealous of his brother, who is a mathematician, who is a guy whose job it is to get the answer. So the control freak element of the main character is built into the mathematician thing. That as a character, why wouldn't that guy want answers? And the idea that he can't get answers for a guy that is, you know, has done the work to get the answers is kind of a great character. and in the dream about what's his name

the guy who's having an affair with his wife where he's at the blackboard the massive blackboard Cy Abelman is where he writes out the uncertainty principle The uncertainty principle Well that is modern

Talmud or whatever like that is like mathematicians being like let me explain to you why nothing makes sense about the world It was the other line I thought about quoting it at the beginning but what a perfect piece of writing the uncertainty principle

it provides we can't ever really know what's going on so it shouldn't bother you not being able to figure anything out, although you will be responsible for this on the midterm. Yeah. And then in that dream, you know, Sai, who is now a dibick.

Yes, he's a degree, yes. That's a great point. He has basically become a dibic in this guy's life. That's right. And in the dream, you know, that what sort of eventually happens is I know he's calm until, you know, he's like, I fucked you're a wife.

Right, right. So that is the human, like it's all, the whole movie is just different versions of that opening Yiddish scene that that these are all those stories exactly that's the point of the opening well and I also think Judaism is like what should we do yes you know like most conversations you're having mm-hmm David yeah you're a money monster or self-proclaimed oh sure yeah I care of my money I want to you know keep track of it save I mean, here's the thing. Most people can't name all of their financial accounts for what they're worth. 401Ks, properties, investments. I speak of other people. I can't relate to this. It can be very overwhelming, of course, keeping track of whatever you've got saved and whatever you got invested or whatever you got. Yeah, of course. But it's so much worse than that, David. What's going on? This lack of awareness leads to leaving money on the table. That's my least favorite place for money to be.

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Check. Monarchmoney.com, code check. Check. This film, my mother was... It's a blank check with Griffin and Dave, by the way. I'm Griffin. David. It's a podcast about filmography,

directors who have massive success early on in their careers and are given a series of blank checks. I like how this was prompted by me saying, my mother. Go ahead. Yeah. Sometimes those check clear

and sometimes they bounce baby. This is a mini-series on the films of the Cohen Brothers, and Ethan Cohen. Yep. It is called Pod Country for Old Casts. Sure. Today we were talking about a serious man.

Yep. With Mark Marin. Hi, Mark. As I was sort of setting up, Burn after reading. You're going to use all that stuff. Every, all of this. Oh, yeah.

We don't edit that. It's all staying in. Burn After Reading comes out like six months after they win the Oscar. Yeah. This is the first movie they make with the Oscar success. Correct. One of their best movies. I think it's arguably their best.

But it is certainly in the argument. They're guys where you're like, there are five movies that would be undeniably the best film in anyone else's career and those five movies are fighting with each other. I think they've got 10. They never buckled under what we talked about before. That's what I'm saying. For this to be the post-Oskar-winning movie

when most people would go, now is my time to make true grit, my big Western epic. They wait to do that. They were like, we got to tell this weird, small, kind of punishing story with theater actors. But no movie stars. And with complete meticulous control of the story, and it's still sort of totally a Coen Brothers movie.

But it's an interesting example. They never, and it seems like they've sort of stopped working together. They're in a weird place. But there's rumors that they'll read it. But they could be done. Why not go out, you know, like, how are you going to argue with any other? I even watched the Hudsucker proxy again. One of my favorite movies.

It's a great movie. I love it so much. You forget that you buckle to react. without having the personal experience to other people's reaction to it but you rewatch it they did exactly what they set out to do yeah it is a perfect movie on the terms

that they set out for themselves if people were just confused by it obviously their interviews were always a little nit and cryptic but they are not guys who were like ah that one we could have used another week on that one or like ah we fucked that one of me they never they gave you what they wanted they realized it's the only one where they're like

it feels a little amateurish to us because we didn't know what we were doing it's simple their first movie it's great though It's great. Yeah, it rocks. But that's the only one where they're like, I watched some of it and I wish I'd done it differently because I just didn't know. But they were finding their way. I watched Miller's Crossing the other, like a couple weeks ago.

Great. It's great. Yes. It's great. So your mother, Judaism? You can get to that later if you want. No, we got to get into it now. My mother was raised in Utica, New York.

I think you know that of state New York. And I think it's similar to what you're talking about of like, there were Jews. It's an Italian, Irish city at that time. But, like, there's enough Jews. And she's conserved. It's the 50. This is the exact same shit, I think. And I don't think I've ever seen a movie

Have a more profound, you know, Proustian Eaton the Madeline effect on her than this movie ever. Yeah. Because the whole thing is a poet. It's a meditation on the... Picket fence Americanism and the struggle of Judaism. The struggle of Judaism at the same time. And it's...

What about the goy is the line where she was like, you have to understand we didn't care about the goi. Like the goys. They get that... And now the goys know it and they're angry. Right. And we're all going to pay. Now everyone's living next door to the guy from this movie.

That's right. Next door isn't gritting his teeth and saying it under his breath. They named Char Ellen. Like, they picked the most American name. They sent her to public schools. They wanted her to be as American as possible or whatever. But at the same time, like, I feel like there was that. Well, we don't really care about the guys.

Yeah. So my dad grew up in Rye, New York. Sure. Lower. Yeah. In the state. But it was a similar thing where it was like three Polish families. cousin families that all immigrated together

bought like a row of houses and basically made their own neighborhood and then became friends with like three other families that had done the same thing, mega family groupings, right? And my grandfather was like the dirty Hungarian who broke in and basically had

to abandon his family in order for them to accept him. So it was the Newman's, the Rabinowitz's and the Orlovskys and the Rabinowitzes were atheists in the like 1950s. sure and that was this sort of like don't say it too loudly well yeah there were there there were atheists there were uh communists yep like my uh great aunt and uncle were of the you know kind of communist bent

yes uh old old timey uh commy jews yeah uh there was a lot a lot going on in terms of jewish identity then but i think one of the things that i take away from this film in watching it again is that it really documents in a very unique and specific way you know something that is has been approached before, is that the changing of the culture towards, you know, the 60s coming in. Yes. Because that Jefferson Airplane album is already out. So this has got to be what year.

It's got to be like, what, 65? I think it's 67. Yeah. 67. So everything is on the precipice of change. Right. And it's going to take a minute to get to Minnesota, but it's happening on the coast. But it's happening in middle class culture because they're picking it up from youth culture.

Yes. And the kid is on the pulse of it. And the fact that during the, the, uh, the dental story, they're playing Hendricks's machine gun is, it's crazy. Yes. It's because that song is a very specific meaning. Yeah. And, you know, and whatever it indicates about signs or symbols. Yeah.

But during that whole song, the, the, the, the, the, the, the Hebrew lettering, help me, please help. Yeah. And it's like, why that choice? And I think that what they're exploring, even at the end with, uh, with the, with the, with the, with the old rabbi is that it's at that time where the chaos that has now reaped the social reaction that we're seeing now to the quote unquote freedom of the 60s and the open-mindedness that it implied is that that was an embracing of a chaos that none of them could understand and that it was it became a cultural movement yes to sort of you know not just anti-war

but psychedelics yes right and the idea of pot and that like when he's up on the roof with that antenna and all of a sudden he has that moment where Hebrews coming in, TV shows are coming in, you know, sounds of the Yiddish are coming in, and then he looks to the sun that you're caught in the middle of a tremendous cultural shift that's about to happen. And that at the end of it, the old rabbi is, you know, he understands that, right? He understands that moment when the truth is revealed to be lies. You know, he's like, what, what, what's now what? But also what's the only thing that matter. you want somebody to love like basically that hits him he doesn't get that far

yes right that's true he doesn't get that far but you have to imagine that's the thing that kind of locked in for him is this song is identifying isn't that kind of the core need that all of us are driven by at the end of the day i guess so but i do like the idea that on the periphery of jewish mysticism in general and jewish uh stories in general is something unknowable but something that must be sort of accepted is just life and now you know there on all over this movie we're entering the psychedelic era where where that unknown that it was once terrifying is now going to be just embraced and you're just going to throw yourself into it and with that comes vietnam on the other side but i i think that the way that suggested and referred to in the

film as this slight you know kind of uh it's not meant to be menacing but but it is happening yes in the scene where she smokes pot with him. Yeah, absolutely. And he's just looking at the glass. Yeah. And then he says, that's the psychedelic moment. It's bonafide. They shot it that way and he's just looking at the glass and he says maybe the young rabbi was right, the first rabbi. It's just all my perception. Well, they also do, they shoot that scene with this vignetting around the edges of the frame. And I think the only other scene in the movie they shoot that way is the folk tale at the beginning. Interesting. They're the two kind of hallucinations. What were you about to say? I was open the dossier. Can I say a thing before that?

Okay. What's the dossier? Is this a bit? No. No, this is real. This is a no-bit. A researcher who does great work for us, you know, digging up sort of production history and stuff like that. I was just going to say, because I, you talking about your mom, maybe realize, I don't think my dad's ever seen this movie. That's insane. I'm also

realizing that he basically, I think, would have been Bar Mitzvitts for this exact year. Same with my mom. I mean, I think he's like, like, exact. They used it there, too. Oh, yes. Yes, you're right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. When he's What seems where characters are stone. And that's psychedelic moments.

I mean, it's so fucking funny. A timeless psychedelic moment. Because it's so captures what it's like to be high on pot. Especially when you're a teenager. But to be a high on pot at that moment, that is crazy. In front of God. People speaking another language. You're holding the

Yud. Is that what it's called? I think, you know, that when the scraping sound of the Yud that they do. My favorite thing is the guy going like, to get the Torah. Those things are fucking heavy. The old guy. Yeah. But the pressure of that moment, and And then sort of like, you know, realizing your high, one of the funniest beats of that movie is when he sees the buddy he got high with.

Yeah. Knowing that he's in that, it's not even hell. It's a mystical moment. And he taps into an ancient frequency. Yeah. Which is really, that is the God consciousness. Yeah. That's my implication with the, who's the oldest.

Oh, I just had that realization. That psychedelia, the chaos of psychedelic experience, and the chaos of, war in Vietnam. That is all in the God consciousness. That's where Marshaq is, supposedly. He's above it. Exactly. Because the inspiration, as you said, Gryf, they wrote this the same time as no country

and Burn After Reading. They wrote them all at the same time. Yes. They've said they've never been so productive. Which is in their fellow period. It's coming off of two consecutive flops. They write three masterpieces basically all in a row. What were the flops?

Lady Killers and Intolerable Cruelty, which were their sort of two. Entelible cruelty I'll stick up for, but certainly their least. critically successful movies. I don't even feel compelled to go back to those. Maybe I shouldn't. If you like Clooney in Cohen's mode, he's great. It's kind of them doing a Preston Sturge's movie. Okay.

But those movies at the moment were absolutely flops. That's all I'm saying. And it was seen as them trying to level up and make more commercial studio films. That ended up being too idiosyncratic for audiences and critics treated them as if they were selling out. Scott Ruden is like, hey, I've got this Cormack McCarthy novel. They're like, okay, well, look at that. They start working on Burn after reading at the same time. They start working on this at the same time.

And the inspiration for this is what they call, like, an ancient rabbi that they knew when they were kids, who they call like a sort of a Semitic Wizard of Oz or like this weird Yoda-like rabbi who is they all kind of revered, but he never spoke. Like, that's the genesis of a serious man more than anything. But this film is set earlier than their childhood would have been, right? Yeah, no. No? No. No. They'll cop to this is pretty autobiography. I just remember when it was announced.

They got to be like he's got, Joel's got to be like 70. They were born in, correct. Joel's 70, even 67. They were born in the mid-50s. They're basically like a couple years younger than my mom. Like, and they were Bar Mitzford in 67, I think. Yeah. Yeah. When this movie was announced, and they usually do kind of an era of mystery around what the project is if it isn't based on some public work.

What they say is not autobiographical is like that that's not their dad. No. That's not their family. But that's what I felt interesting. I remember them saying, like, they're going to follow up no country with a movie about a boy getting bar mitzvah that's autobiographical. And it really felt like, oh, they're going to do their, like, Avalon, their fablemen. Right, right. And then when the trailer came out and it was like, it's about the dad.

Right. They talked about that at one point, it was more split narrative, like the boy and the dad in equal measures, even though the dad was a complete creation. And then the final product ended up swinging wildly in a different direction. It's just, like, what's amazing about it. And I really, because the more I thought about it this morning, I do think that, you know, outside, I think that the core character struggle of the main guy is specifically Ten Commandments shit.

Yeah. And I think the rest of it, the brother, is a mystical interpreter. Yeah. That, you know, has a mental illness. Because even as a Jew growing up, you always knew that there was a cousin that had problems. Yeah. But this guy, like, who might be a genius.

This guy literally covets his neighbor. wife. Totally. All of it. He does hit on those commandments. He's pretty hard. But like to sort of draft off what Mark was saying, the Coens do say like obviously 67, that's when Joel's 14, he thinks 10. They like the idea of like Jewish liturgical music and Jefferson Airplane were kind of like intertwined for them in that.

Two different belief systems basically. Right. Right. Rock and roll and like I think. But they're asking, were they? Yeah. American. Were they different beliefs systems?

Isn't that the, at the end of all the Jewish systems? stories there's just this chaos and there's like a shrug of like we don't know we don't know it's magic yeah I guess you know and like but also like boomer sort of you know the sort of tail end of like conservative like post war and kind of like the building of radical Jewish American culture right that's kind of assimilation post-war Judaism that's simulating with the sort of like doctor the lawyer like the old my dad's family oh by Michael Lerner great incredible but like no one in my dad's sort of like cousin families right the rabbinowitz's were like outwardly atheistic the other ones were like can you believe it but weren't casting them out no one even pretended to have a relationship to

god it was all we got to do this stuff because of tradition it's like the dinner scene in uh in crimes of mr yes yes that's and like when my grandfather died everyone was like we don't care about this right and even when he was alive we do like the abridged satyr yeah it was the sense of we got to do this because our ancestors did this we don't think we're communicating with anything. This is kind of ritual. Right, but that's almost all of it. Absolutely.

But part of that was, I think, them being like, we cannot be seen as Jews, period. We have to be Jewish Americans. Yeah. Which means our culture needs to be meshed with theirs. We can't be living in our own body. But at the same time, you see your neighbor, I think this, you know, like your neighbor, the going neighbor looking at you and you're like, right, they don't. I'm never going to be that.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, there definitely was a difference, but I remember... Your head still needs to be on a swivel. And I remember as a kid that, you know, the bonds that I created with, you know, from second grade on, with the Jewish guys, you know, that there was definitely a shorthand. There was a shorthand about sex, about everything. Like, there was, like, an openness and understanding.

Like, I'm still friends with David Kleinfeld who, like, I've known since second grade. Yeah. And, you know, and I remember because, like, these are just one of the... This is a good example. Like, when we were in second grade... grade. His father was, I think, an ophthalmologist and was killed flying his own plane. We were in second grade. Yeah. And I remember David, you know, the weeks after that, you know, at Hebrew school and just, you know, I remember seeing his dad sitting in this yellow car out in the parking lot. But it,

there was no answers. Right. And, you know, and he had, you know, three brothers and sisters. And I know his mother and everybody else. And, and life, you know, eventually went on. It's profoundly terrible and yet kind of meaningless. But he had, we still, the community was still there. And there's still there for all of them for the whole time. Right, which is also this reactionary, like we're trying to assimilate, but also we need to protect each other because we're not that far off from feeling like we are the target of the universe. Right, from the Holocaust, totally. And it is sort of amazing that there was no Nazi point of reference in this. There was an American Jew-hating reference in a dream, and it's suggested, but it's rare that you see a movie of this era that

close to the end of the Holocaust that there was no point of reference yeah yeah and that's kind of that's that's that's in and of itself kind of amazing i agree and it is a testament to passing and and to integrating yeah right we don't want to talk about we can't wear it too but just the way that he talks about that he can talk with his colleagues who are jewish and they can use words yes with each other that they wouldn't slip in a couple yeah yeah but they're writing this story initially it's a kind of father-son story and then they're as they're writing it they're like we really just like tormenting the dad like this is going to be a movie joke about the dad yes yeah and as you say they'd claim with the yiddish folk tale the ghost story they're just so like

it's kind of like an ambassador for the movie it doesn't have any connection to anything whatever but in that in that it does i agree it teaches you how to watch the movie because as you said every single scene after it is a version of it in a way and then it ultimately not unlike those tales the entire arc of the movie whatever builds the movie you know at the end you know it's it's not a happy ending but it's an ending you know it is tragic you know that you know i was talking to brenda before that and there was a suggestion that as a consequence for him rationalizing keeping the money changing the grade to help his brother the next thing that happens is you know you got to come in there's something on your ex yes and then a fucking tornadoes it's how i feel all the time

Yes. Anytime I'm like, should I like, you know, should I do? And then you're just like, yeah, but no. Should we start her on wireless service provider? But I, but because of the tornado to. Which is a real tornado. Okay. That really happened. Oh, wow.

To imply that there is consequences that are being delivered to you specifically by a god. It is ultimately in the conclusion of the movie does not add up. Right. It is not, whatever that. implication is you can't actually chart if this happened because of this you're manufacturing right and early on when he's in conversation with the Korean kid yeah he's like there has to be consequences and the Korean kids are like no there doesn't yeah there are consequences for your actions yes no there doesn't have to be doesn't have to be that's

right and and ultimately anything you impose on this in terms of a moral consequence is something that you are putting on it correct and that that's the nature of the movie and what is trying to say, that it is all relative to your perception, that all you can do is try to be a decent person, and that you have no control over anything else. Well, also, for movies that are so fun to read into and analyze and search for meaning in. You can teach a course on this for a year. Absolutely. On this movie.

The Coens have always kind of made fun of people who try to break down the symbolism of their films or the intent or what they're trying to say. But this one craves it. Except the mystery. But then yet, the movie is telling you to do it. To do it and also accept that you're never going to get answers to satisfy you. The dad says, except the mystery. It's never going to lie now.

Yeah. Look, serious, so their last movie, I'm just briefly touching on this research. Obviously, Burn After Reading has a zillion stars in it. They don't have a budget on this movie. Burn After Reading was also a big hit, which people forget. But they really want a lead actor who's basically unknown to the audience. Obviously, Michael Stulberg was sort of a Broadway name-ish, face-ish, not really. It was a Tony nominee.

Now, you know who auditions for this role, right? You can tell me, Mark Mirren over here. I did, yeah. Yeah, it was, I was it for the, it was for the lead, for Larry? Yeah, it was a very low level, you know, first. Did you meet with the Cohen's? No, no. It was just like that first sort of, you know, throwing out the net, you know, met with the casting agent.

Ellen Chenoweth? I think so. And, you know, I went in and they taped me, and I remember had a full Van Dykey kind of beard situation. But I really wanted it. Yeah. You know, and I really read. And I thought that, like, I could do that. But I didn't have the chops to do that.

And I'm not thrilled with their choice of him. Really? Yeah. Well, here's what I thought watching it again last night is that, like, you would have fit perfectly somewhere in this movie. And I think you would fit in so well in a Cohen's movie in general. I think you innately would be too powerful and forceful. I couldn't have gotten to the vulnerability of it.

Yes. Yeah. Yes. But I think there's even just like a baseline. level of indignation within you at the world that you cannot totally diminish there wasn't there wasn't really a part in this movie for me unless i really had better chops as an actor then which i didn't yeah you know i i imagine that i could play the lawyer i probably could have played um i think you could have been arthur it's a different arthur right the richard kind you know like

oh it'd be a different arthur but very i can see that again they're just sort of like but again that's doing with a that's a that's a wire version it's a weird it's a beaten man yeah he's and he's so good because he's right the physicality of kind like the shoulders he's so and also like i had we had a cousin brent you know there was just like you know there's one in every family right that you know he's mensa yeah but he doesn't do anything yes you know right for years i tried to make a joke work about that and it actually is sort of a a jewish um you know uh open-ended tale joke yeah where like i remember when i was a kid my brother my dad had this cousin brent yeah who was like a genius that's all we heard brent's a genius

he's in mensa and at some point during the early 70s brent and brent went on to do he was a chef uh-huh like you know like not even at a high-end restaurant the genius right the disappointment right it was always that was the tone of it yeah and i remember like knowing this about brent and then him and his girlfriend stopped over in new mexico when they were driving cross-country uh you know to you know stay the night and i just remember it was like this is the genius and he was just this like kind of hippie as dude with this woman and then when they left the before they left to get back on the road they they they made us breakfast and my punchline and i really tried to make it work was like and i got to be honest with

you those are the best eggs i ever the genius eggs yeah but but it never landed and i thought like how else do you end that story it's a perfect end to it but i think you got to have the that that is actually a thing you kind of can't communicate in a way yeah you know and i think the kind character is such a heightened version of it that he works in a way that reads for the story even if you don't have someone like this within your family structure it is also funny to consider that at the time this movie came out he is undeniably the biggest name like sure he's your most famous face i don't know if you remember this as like i guess fred was i think fred was really just a guy who's in Woody Allen movies back then, right?

He had done, like, seven Woody Allen movies and voiceover roles. Like, Amy Lanarkard's similarly mostly done voiceover. Like, half the cast are, like, local people that were found in Minnesota. Adam Arkin was probably the second biggest. He's great. Larry is not cheap. He's just really good of that shit.

Do you remember when they announced this movie and all the fucking, like, Oscar Prognosticator websites were just like, I guess Richard Kine for Best Supporting Actor, sight unseen? Right, right. Like, he'll crush in some Coens. If the Coens were making another movie and now they're oscar guys and kind is in it let me tell you about and this is like the least oscarry part ever despite how great kind is it's not designed to give

someone and this is also the kind thing like no you know the implied sort of competition between the brothers at one point yes like obviously they were both mathematics guys yeah and and kind's life just didn't work out so he's doing this like massive schizophrenic project to beat his brother yes at the same game and also draining his cyst and like crying spacious cyst That would make me pretty mad But that's such a That like

If that's what I ended up Having to do every day I know but I feel like that's another Like thing Like the sort of 5060s It's like yeah people have like a thing Like oh we're so biblical It's like a big wheezy device

Yeah no I know Yeah I get you I get you Like a weird 60s machine Oh right Just joe gets boils Yeah Yeah in the story

Okay But he's also like you know There's a biblical dynamic A biblical you know A biblical brotherly dynamic yes you know well the cane and able thing right you know but there is something about you know the nature of of two brothers and one is painfully compromised yes uh yet there there's still like and there's a resentment to him yes that you know that you know he doesn't direct at his brother

but he directs it god yes but ultimately in that moment at the pool it's at his brother it's like why Hashem looked out for you you have a job you have you know like the jealousy and the fury. And this guy's life, by the way, is crumbling. Like, the guy whose life he covets is, like, absolutely crumbling. But he looks at, like, you have the firmament of what looks like a normal American life. And I have the monoculus or whatever it is. The metaculous. The metaculous. Which is a very, it's a very thought-provoking deep movie, you know, in so many ways that, like, I'm surprised that it took me kind of moving through it again in the last few days because I watched it recently and I I watch it primarily because it's

familiar to me and I never really set out. It is weirdly comforting. Yeah, as a Jew. If you live in our headspace, it is a weirdly comforting movie to watch. But it's unlike any other Jewish movie. It's unlike any depiction of Jews. And it wasn't until, you know, and I've always sort of half tried to figure it out, but to sort of, you know, put into some sort of criticism around all of the, not just a story, but the characters and also the changing of the eras and the nature of chaos and the nature of coincidence and the nature of trying to have control. Like, it's one of those movies, and the reason why it's a masterpiece, is all of those are touched upon.

Everything is touched upon that makes us human and questioning, if you do that. Yes. Most people don't. Yes. David, this episode is brought to you again by Mooby, a curated streaming service dedicated to elevating great cinema from around the globe. From iconic directors to emerging otters, there is always something new to discover with Mooby each and every film is hand-selected, so you can explore the best of cinema

streaming anywhere anytime. But what, David, what if the cinema is actually kind of TV? Wait, this is a debate now. This is a debate. No, it's a very cool thing. We allowed to log this ad read on Letterbox, is the debate. to mark the 35th anniversary since the release of the groundbreaking television show Twin Peaks. The complete original series, plus its 2017 follow-up, the limited event series,

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We did all at Twin Peaks. Maybe you want to watch along, maybe you want to rewatch, maybe you want to watch for the first time. It's a great, great opportunity. David Lynch's distinct vision and, here's the word I always mispronounce, aesthetic, have made his name synonymous with a unique cinematic style. Lynchian. Oh, this is a very Lynchian show. She breaks the borders of reality to expose the unsettling truths hidden behind the American middle class happiness and allowed the viewer to indulge in a bittersweet and dreamlike confusion. Why has this become like a wrestling promo?

Because I'm trying to hype people up. Okay. Obviously, you should go watch Twin Peaks if you haven't on movie, and then you can go listen to our long discussions about it on Blank Check. That would be exciting. There's also really cool other television on movies, such as Coriata's Going My Home, Laura's Frontier's The Kingdom.

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Pre-sale tickets for future events subject to availability and varied by race. Terms and conditions apply. Learn more at amex.ca. So Stolberg, I just want to tell you, initially auditioned to play The Husband and the Yiddish story. Oh, wow. He learned Yiddish. He learned the entire scene in Yiddish, like how to do it. He does the audition for them, and they're like, huh.

And then months later, they ask him back to read for Uncle Arthur and then for Larry. Yeah. And then they meet with Richard Kind, who I think they're thinking about for the lead role. It's kind of, yeah. And they just are like, we just really want, you know. He would have made a meal out of it. He would. Right.

Right. You also need someone, like, Kind, in the shorthand way for the brother because you're not going to spend that much time on him. and the look gets you like half the way there to the characterization. And, yeah, like, Kind had, I guess, auditioned for Burn After Reading. They knew, you know, who doesn't know. But had never worked with them before. Had never worked with them before. They initially wanted him to maybe play a rabbi in this, and then they were like, no, he'll work for Arthur.

Also would have made a mail out of that. Yes. And Fred Melamed had auditioned for them all the way back for Barton Fink for the Michael learner role for the studio head, which makes sense he's got that velvety voice thing, you know. But you look at his career. before this and he truly it's like seven Woody Allen movies and three other credits until this as Joel says sigh is the sex guy in this movie every film needs one and I do just love that everyone in the movie is like I mean it's fucking sigh able this is a robust guy yeah yeah but everyone's

like this guy but he on he right right but the like the idea that he's a sex guy even in this film yes you know it was so grounded in something fundamentally Jewish and fundamentally not sexy and even the Jewish way. Yes. You know, you know, it's not Elliot Gould you deal with. Right, right. You're right. You're right. And it's only that sort of that implication of like, you've got to let it breathe.

Like, like he's a sophisticated, charmer. He is a serious man. Yeah. They made the movie for $7 million to quote Ethan Cohen when you're making a movie about a Jewish Midwestern community in 1967 and Fred Melamond is the sex guy. They don't give you a lot of money. They shot it in Bloomington, Minnesota, which is where the Mall of America is. They looked, you know, they looked around for basically suburban neighborhoods that looked like their childhood neighborhoods. Shot for 44 days, finish ahead of schedule, which is like the classic Cohen's story.

It's like under budget and finished early. And they at this point have their thing worked out with working title where most of the time they'll just let them do whatever they want. Yeah. Yeah. And Deacons, Roger Deacons, their DP, shows up with all these what they call swing and tilt lenses that are, that disneyed skew the focal plane and stuff where that he had just been doing them using them on the assassination of

Jesse James. Right, yeah. Which is so funny to think I'm working on that, an incredibly painterly movie and then showing up to this and being like, this will be good for the stone scenes. But also burn after reading. But also from the roof scenes. Yes. Yes. Burn after reading was the first movie they hadn't done, they'd done without

deacons in over a decade. You know what's interesting is, oddly, in terms of, you know, psychological terrain and and sort of almost mystical interpretations. The closest movie to this of theirs is Barton Fink. Yeah, 100%. Like in terms of the liminal kind of like dream reality. Yeah, what sort of feeling.

The unknown. But a thing I find so interesting is, like, such a recurring theme of theirs is a guy who is so obsessed with a sort of outside perception of his own mediocrity that he needs to prove himself, punch above his weight class, do something demonstrably great in a way to win everyone's respect and just gets in over his skis and torpedoes his whole life in the process.

This is not that guy. This is a movie that starts with a guy who is pretty comfortable with where things are and everything starts collapsing around him. And he's looking for an explanation for why it's happening to him because he has done nothing to bring it upon himself.

But I think that's probably his biggest sin. Absolutely. And also, like, he pulled it off. He became an American. Right. And maintained his Jewish identity. But he is living what was presented as the American dream. This is what we're here for.

Yeah. We're not, you know, we're not the first wave immigrants. Yeah. We're the second generation. We've now integrated into the middle class. I have a house. I have kids. I have a job.

I'm about to get tenure. I did it. Right. But Barton Think is like a pretentious, elitist, self-centered, weasel, you know? And also a socialist Jew. Yeah. Yes. Jerry Lundergarten Fargo is a guy who's like stacking up crimes in order to like get over the hell and prove that he's like a big man. Right. This guy is just comfortable tapping out at bare minimum, right? But also he believed he had principles. Yeah. And that he had artistic integrity and that his art meant something, which I'm

Pardon. Barton. Yeah. But Lungarten is also the neighbor. Yes. It's also. Absolutely. Yeah. Right. I mean, this movie is basically... Is the goy. Is centered around the guy who Lundegarde tries to sell the true coat to calls him a fuck. Right? Yeah.

It's like an entire... A fucking liar. A fucking liar. But it's an entire movie centered around a guy with that energy. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Who's just like, I'm on the receiving end of Jerry Lundergards every day of my life. The sweaty Goodman in that book.

In Barton, Fink, it's just the best. And the bugs. That movie is so good. That's David's favorite, right? Fink, yeah. Yeah, you're a Fink guy. But this is, I think, right up there. Yeah.

And maybe, yeah, they're linked for me because of that movie. Stoolberg already had a Tony nomination at this one. He's in the pillow man, the McDonough play. Which I will say, he plays a developmentally disabled adult man in that. It's a tough role. It is maybe the only time I've ever seen someone do that where I was like, this is 100% respectful and not embarrassing. I saw it on the London. stage and Adam Godley played that role and he was wonderful.

David grew up in the UK. I moved to the UK when I was nine. Oh, that's nice. It is nice. It's wonderful. They have some real history. Yeah, they do. To live in a place where there are walls from 600 AD.

I mean, yeah, it's lousy with fucking castles. Yeah, yeah. When they're designing this movie, Mary Zofrease is their costume designer, finds a Sears robot catalog that's called Deep Autumnal, he says, from the sixth. see there you go autumn i basically use all of that for si abelman and i like this she'd bought this tahitian fabric for leo decaprio and catch me if you can and she'd never used it and then for sye abelman she was like that's what si's gonna have he he's he went traveling yeah yeah yeah sigh's a kind of guy who comes back wearing some kind of like it's like the lush shirt or

that he's wearing or whatever it also this movie has jolly roger would be appropriate Griffin. Yes. Surely, you just. This movie has that smart art direction costuming thing of, oh, it's like 67, but everyone here is basically still and the drags of the 50s.

Right, no one's at the tip of the cultural sphere. And that's what Mad Men is. You're just like, well, why does Don Draper still wear a hat? Isn't it the 60s? And it's like, yeah, but like, he's not going to start fucking dressing like a hippie to part now, you know. I grew up, you know, just on the cutting edge of, I guess,

I'm the last boomer. And we were still, you know, when I was in high school and junior high in the mid-70s, it was still the crashing wave of the 60s, the way 60s, 71, all the music. And that's the furniture everyone still has in their homes. It's not like 1960 hit and people threw shit out. Yeah, nobody swapped everything out for beanbacks. Yeah, exactly. It's a little bit of it going on, like in the in the game room or the family room.

There might be a bean bag in one of the kids. The fringe is. It's just starting to leave. Yeah, yeah. And you assume when these guys. go off to college it's going to be open season what's going on though it's like the kid what the boy just wants to watch f troop which is like that that shows just sort of a western sitcom right like they're that's a very traditional yeah they had a fort it was a very store yes yeah the guy with

let me say it the famously huge hog right wasn't the other guy in ftrop one of forest tucker forest tucker okay i don't know that is on the milton burrell list oh really yeah on the leam nison list a lot of good it did him he was on f troop yeah i know david had to google his name. F. Troops fuzzy. Larry Storch was, like, a comic. Kind of like, quietly, you could argue an early alt comic?

Kind of, yeah, like him and Professor Irwin Corrie. Yeah. Because he was kind of doing character stuff. Yeah, almost his persona, yeah. There have always been weirdos. Yes. Yeah, in terms of comedy. There's always been a couple that were undefinable.

Right. But I feel like he was an early version of, is this guy from Mars? Sure. Not the sort of making jokes self-referencing how weird they are. Crazy guy. Yeah. Yeah.

But yeah, the kid just wants to watch F-Troop and listen to Jefferson Airplane and get stoned. Girl just wants to go out with her friends to the mall. And wash her hair. Wash her hair. If it does have to learn his Haftora. He does. Which was a nightmare. You know, I think if I go on to think about this movie more, I'll try to figure out, you know, what was the topic of that Haftoara.

Bar Mitzvah? Well, I know what mine was. Oh, yeah. I did. Oh, figure out. at what it is in the film what story is he telling yeah what portion is you reading what did you do i'm trying to remember now i guess it didn't really land to me i have to i have to go look at my book jerusalem syndrome again to remember what the topic was it was i all i remember was that it was relatively short

and i got lucky smart yeah yeah or luck yeah what you look that up what was the torrid portion he read that well i know i was never burmiston no but i mean in the movie okay okay i'll look it up Um, so, but I, yeah, I wasn't Burma's, but because we'd moved to England and my mom, I mean, not to talk about my mom too much on this podcast, but it is a serious man, I guess, uh, was kind of like, I don't like the vibes of the Jewish, Jewish people here. Like, she couldn't find the kind of reformy. Oh, no, it's hard. I remember, I was always fascinated when I interviewed British Jews. Yeah. Because like you just don't associate them. Or you don't really talk about it. American middle class Judaism is the stereotype. Yep. Right. The close. most as she could find was American transplants in London. Right. We have a little thing here for, you know.

And also you've got to figure that the Jews were there forever. Yeah. Oh, yeah. You know, so it's a totally integrated thing. It's like Jews from the South that were here that came over before that first European immigration. Yes. You know, slavery business. Yeah.

I mean, there were Jews in the, you know, plantation south. Yeah. That, yeah, it's kind of crazy because we all have such a strong identity with this middle class, you know, 50s. Judaism that kind of built us but there's like I remember that going to the the Yad Vashem in in Israel the the Holocaust Museum and there's just the the they showed like Jews from around the world because you identify you think you know Jews and then they're just showing like you know Africans and you're like oh my god what a like a myopic idiot I am yeah you know but they're not Jews like us right right his Torah portion is Leviticus and like I do think it is funny

when you get handed. This Torah portion, we're like, oh, what's it about? And it's basically just being like, oh, if you have a farm, you better not have a farm too close to the other guy. You know, it's just some rule, right? And then, right, everyone in their bar mitzer translates it to like, it's like in school when you have to resist the temptation

to cheat off of someone else's test. And everyone gives them like a fucking round-up plan. But like, literally, it's just like you shall count seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so the time of seven weeks of years, she'll give you 49 years. It's a bunch of math. And I bet you the co-inspicked it for that exact reason, right?

Right. And it is just so funny when you read the Bible and half of it is like, yeah, he fed this fucker to a whale because he doesn't listen to him. The other half is like, if a lady has her period, steer clear for it. Yeah, yeah. And you're just like, they wrote that down next to that. Right. That causes the same kind of like spiral that this movie is

about of being like, how does this relate to my life? What am I supposed to take away from this? Yep. Yeah. Or I don't even know it. Right. The stories. Yeah. Like, you know, there's no implication in middle class Judaism that anyone knows. the Bible. No, I have struggled with my relationship to Judaism and not that it was, I wasn't even bar mitzvitz of it, so it wasn't that pushed on me that hard. Yeah. But, you know,

um, the only time when I'm in a temple and like, the only magic to it to me is like people said this shit 3,000 years ago. Sure. The same shit we're saying right now. Like, you know, these words. It's the same as seen fucking Romeo and Juliet staged or whatever. We were like, this is crazy. This text is like, there's some magic to that. And also, you're singing in Hebrew. I, you know, we did. Adona Lum at the end was always, and then, you know, someone brought a new version in and it's like, what are we doing? What's with the fact, I, I like, Adon Olam. Oh, yeah, you don't like the new music. Right. Yeah. And then all of a sudden it's, I don't know, don't a lump, a share my love, like I was off. What's happening? Yeah. I mean, that, and that does happen. And then,

oh, yeah, my mom, reform synagogues. Like, what's with the guitar? Why is there stained glass in here? Yeah. My parents definitely tried to push that on me to be like, this one's fun. They're puppets and an acoustic guitar. Yeah. Yeah, where the guy's like, you know, stories are like a little, kind of like about the Avengers. It's not about the fucking Avengers.

God didn't know about marble. Give it the way it deserves. Exactly. Yeah. God was kind of the original Iron Man. Yeah, yeah. So, Larry Koppnick, yeah. He lives in St. Louis Park.

He's got a wife who pretty much, first thing she says to him is I need to get, I'm divorcing you and I'm marrying Simon. You know how we've been having trouble. No hanky-panky. Right? like there's not it's all above board right so and i believe her i feel like it is just that she's like this guy's so magnetic it speaks to what a sex guy he is that she's ready to leave

her husband just at the idea of fucking si abel because the idea is that si abelman's wife just died right because later adam arkin is like she's barely in the ground but it's been three years right that's the thing they keep correcting right yeah but also he's like an an adventurous spirit yes and he knows about why he's expansive yeah yes he's he's culturally yeah the expansive thing again with the psychedelic you know undertones it's it's it's all about you know not being locked in to this pattern he knows about things outside of this enclave in minnesota yeah yeah um so that's kind of just that's all it's really going on in the movie is just with it's the inciting thing he's up for tenure then it's right a series of sort of there is a young student who

is blackmailing him because he's given him a failing grade what are the other things stacked He's got his brother sleeping on his couch. Columbia House keeps calling. That's my favorite. And you're with him. Every time he walks in and she's like, he's on the phone again, he's like, I can't do it. When I was a kid, I did it. Yeah, I got the 12 cassettes for a dollar or whatever.

And my uncle would just like sign up false addresses or whatever. I feel like it was so easy to fake it. The ones that were that I got that made an impression were Aerosmith's first album. Joe Walsh, the smoker, you drink, the whatever you get. I don't want Santana Abraxas. Yeah. That might have been one of them. I didn't do anything.

Yeah, yeah. But then did you do the monthly? Would you cancel them or would you get locked? No, eventually you got to get your parents to step up and get you out of it. Right. I mean, you don't have the money. Yeah. You know, because you would tape like a penny back at the number or whatever.

Well, you had to buy like three or four records at regular price. Right. You get the 12 for free. You get the 12 for a pen. And then you got to, you know, you got to buy a certain number of records. The free thing was actually a brilliant business strategy to be like, well, kids just fucking take the initiative and mail it in and the parents get stuck with the bill. Sure. They don't have to ask for permission the first time.

And also you get new music. Yeah. You know, like you're like, that sounds good. Yeah. Um, Steve Park who played, um, obviously. Mike Yanigida. Mike Yanigita and Fargo plays, uh, the student's father. I'm trying to think of like, Clive as the student.

Yeah. student right which is also right like another form of assimilation is like here is this foreign family that has moved here and named their son clive oh that that that assimilation too is very interesting yes because like the one moment where the neighbor actually reaches out is like is you need help here right because the guy was asian right is there a problem he's like the the hierarchy of we can both hate them yes yeah that can bond us yes yeah yeah and if the movie if the movie has the structure, it's just these three visits to rabbis that he makes that are him seeking answers. His wife is demanding a get.

Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. A traditional Jewish divorce. Right. And he's hoping he can also get some kind of clarity for why his life is in the place it is. All at the same time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And he sees first Simon Helberg, Rabbi Ginzler, and then he sees Marsh. This is an Evak Simon Helberg film. Right. Then he sees Nockner. And he never sees Marshaq. He doesn't get to see him. You see Marsha. His son gets to meet Marshaq.

And, yeah, there's not much, no one's saying anything about the actual politics at the time. Is there, do they even reference Vietnam maybe in the... I don't think so. No. And it's like, like you're saying, the sort of cultural shift is on the edges all the time. The reference is machine gun. Right. The reference is art that's about Vietnam.

Right. other stuff um but yeah like you're not talking about who's president in this movie right no yeah no it's it's it's all a biblical struggle yes yes and he is put upon in ways that you initially can keep track of and eventually you do start to kind of think like someone actually does need to intervene here yes but everyone he and it's a series of meetings it's all meetings yes he's meeting with Saie Abelman, he's meeting with rabbi, he's meeting with the lawyers, right? Like, it's always just him being like, isn't there something we can do? Yes. Right. Yes. But I think interestingly, if I think about it, that, you know, the beginning of the third act is the Bar Mitzvah. Yeah. So, you know, what you have there is a coming

together and an understanding. That's the other thing. Everyone who keeps meeting with keeps, like, saying, like, pretty exciting bar mitzvah is coming up. You know, it's the big event culturally. And also that's the moment where there is if there is any sort of reunification of the of the wife in him yes it's in that moment they're proud of their son that's right right right but there it is fraught with expectation because he's stoned yes and they're all wondering they should be proud of him he's dancing on a pinhead i mean he's yeah well they're reading that hebrew yeah he almost didn't do it i know i know he's hitting those notes like they were nervous because they didn't know if he was nervous or what but there's a moment like is he going to pull it off right they do say they do keep saying to him like you got to cherish this right

You know, like the people will be like, ah, you know, your kids are young. Oh, sure. And I guess there is the implication that Larry cherishes nothing. Like, it's hard to know what Larry likes. He cherishes math. I guess so. But he also doesn't seem to derive great pleasure from it. It doesn't seem like he's into teaching.

Right. Everything feels like a burden on him to some degree or another. I don't know if I got that with the math. I think that, you know, it was his salvation. Right. And that, you know, the fact that he could share that. I mean, being a teacher, I mean, there's another important position, you know, biblically speaking, that everyone's framed that way. And that the context of his teaching was, if you knew how to do that, you could be effective and share the wisdom.

But he also seems so beleaguered at the struggle of how to communicate it to other people. Right. As much as it is. He's teaching kids. He's teaching Schrodinger's cat. Right. Like really complicated, abstract stuff. I think he's not easy to teach.

I think he puts value on this system in this language that makes sense to him and helps give him a sense of that's in the world. Everyone's searching for meaning. But there is a, but there is sort of a nebushy hubris to his position. Yes. And all he wants is tenure. He wants the minting of you get to be this guy forever. Yeah.

Your status is not in question. And also no expectation to like he hasn't published. No. Yeah. But like he is seeking. Now that I think about a rabbinic. position of like yeah once you get tenure you'll sit in your office yes people will come talk to you and you'll be like you become an elder of the community but not so much uh-uh-uh it's just sort of like

there in math there's there's no wiggle yes or no this is right or wrong right period right and yeah but life not that easy it's solvable so he first goes to see helberg who tells him look at the parking lot uh and there is a comedy to this that i feel like is so true in religion when you do have to confront someone who's like, hi. Like, I got to be a priest like 20 minutes ago, but I am nominally like a representative of God The three rabbis in the movie are like a guy who's younger than him, a guy who's a contemporary and a guy who's his elder. And immediately he's sort of sitting with this guy with the disappointment of I really thought I was going to talk to the big guy. But like Gensler's not going to tell him, he doesn't know about divorce.

No, but he's just waiting for this guy to kick him up the chain. You know, he kind of, you can tell that he goes into that meeting knowing he's not. going to get anything that he's happy with. But in... But I do, he gets the best advice from that guy. That's right. He does. The perception advice.

Yes. Like that, actually he should listen to. Yes. Of just like, just look at the parking lot. But he's pre-committed to the outcome of this guy has nothing he can teach me. Things aren't so bad. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. But that's what he goes back to. Right. It's also funny that it's a parking lot, which goes back to Fargo as well, where this guy's entire life is built on the idea of if I can get this parking lot deal, my father-in-law will respect me. Right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like the parking lot of the most...

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Let yourself run, lift, flow, and go. Explore the new Peloton cross-draining tread plus at OnePeloton.C.A. And then you got Nockner, who tells the teeth story. I think this is the crowning moment of the movie. I mean, once again, it is a movie that has like four things that would be the undeniable crowning moment in any other film. There's just something so wonderful about how involved you are in it. Yeah, I think that that story is, in a way, the, the, the, is it the parable? Is that what we call them?

Sure. Yeah, a fable, whatever. That is the fable that it explains the movie in the context of the opening fable. And it is, it is what the movie is. Yes. And the fact that the reason I say that is because he did take the letters and break down the cabalistic math of what the numbers of the letters. Right.

of the letters implied on a cabala level right yeah he did go yeah he did go to the supermarket where the number was for expecting something and that that is the entire search of the movie that is the movie right in in that parable form and we were talking about before recording the like the semiotics in visual storytelling in like the great movies yeah and how a movie that's really humming you're like you could look at the back of the teeth and they would tell you something and And this is literally a guy who's hyper fixated on the back of the teeth, which are saying something so specific and yet nothing at the same time. And the further he dug, the less answers he got. And that also the, I guess the interesting thing is, is that there is a level of wanting coincidences to mean something.

Yes. And wanting how you perceive things in relation to things that have happened before in your life or or suggestions of things that happened before in your life as having some sort of arc or continuity to it. And if you look at that, that story about the dentist, he never asks the guy. Yeah. How did these, do you know you have this on your teeth? Right, right. That there's a whole other side of this story. He's not asking the essential question.

That's right. Right, to the essential person. But also, like, this is how we read movies, right? Like you're saying, like, you look for answers and meaning and things, right? And purpose and all of that. And yet movies are like this many people came together and put this much time. and money and effort into something that exists in a fixed time, right, that is a finished work. So you want to look at it and assume that every single decision has some meaning

behind it. So whether purposeful or accidental, there's something to be inferred by the decision of every line reading, of every costuming choice, of every sound cue of all of that. And sometimes it's just a collaborative coincidence. Kismet. And we're watching a movie that feels so tightly constructed by these guys who make things that similarly open the same kind of questioning that keeps telling you, I don't know. Yeah. And also, like, the dentist, you know,

obviously he couldn't talk about it with anybody but the rabbi. Right. And that when he tries to look at his wife's teeth, it has to be why she's sleeping. I thought that was sort of an interesting thing about, you know, how women are handled in this movie.

Yes. And from the very beginning, when the woman just kills the guy, the divvick, right? And without, you know, asking the, husband or anything. You don't know what the hell they're going to do. Right. And then there's a woman on the beach who's, you know, kind of flirting with him. Yes. That there is something in in that subtext and the way that that women are handling these relationships. Because once the dentist

forgets about the teeth, the shot is he's telling a story to his wife. Right. Right. You know, and it's clearly not the dentist. He's reconnecting with his wife. That's right. Yes. And it's kind of interesting that they they hold sort of a mystical unknown space in this movie. Yes. Something that men are not going to get into and can't understand. Larry's wife also basically disappears for close to an hour in this movie. She's really not back until. She's really not back until.

Her presence is anytime he goes over, you just hear her wailing, but you don't see her. He's talking to the kids and you just hear her crying upstairs, inconsolable. And that's what the kid says when he's like, Dad, you have to come home. Mom won't stop crying. It doesn't tell him why. They, like, throw it out to him as, like, background knowledge of, like, well, yeah, Saibulman died. And then she doesn't, I think, appear physically again until the bar mitzvah.

And then, you know, he's going to get her back. He's going to get tenure. He's going to get his wife back. He's going to get his family back together. And then he's going to die of freaking... Yeah, it'll all resolve itself. But that's really interesting if I think it out loud about the mystery of women in this movie. Because it's definitely...

Because Land Decker is obviously the neighbor. is like a, you know, nymphs. Exactly. Like, she's like a mystical figure. And then there's a woman, you know, kind of, you know, forwarding with him on the beach and ready to go in for the kill, you know, if he'll take her. And then there's the wife. And then there's the daughter. And he literally says that she, my daughter mostly washes her hair.

And it seems to be very many steps to the process. Women are like seen as unknowable. A total enigma. Right. And it's not our job. It's just like God. like Hashem. Right. And like as Nockner says to him, it's like, it's one way. We, he owes us nothing. We can't ask Hashem what's going on. Yes. Like, it's not like Christianity where you can

be. But it's accepting that relationship, which is crazy. But a teeth, we don't know. Assigned from Hashem. Yeah. When he's like, what's the ending? Couldn't hurt. Yeah. Exactly. That's always it. That's right. Couldn't hurt. That's the weird trick of Judaism and why we never shut up with each other. The more you overanalyze the text, the further you get away from the idea, which is like, don't be an asshole. It's not like some belief systems where they're like, you have to be nice, or you're in trouble. But over-analyzing the text is the nature of Judaism. And it's, it's the nature of Jewish community. It's the nature of Jewish men sitting at a deli. It's the nature of debate. I do think that's why I've always struggled with very strict Jewish Judaism, which of course exists, like mega-Orth, where I'm like, you guys think

that's definitely it? Right. Yeah, but the thing is, is it like, but, Right. But it's absolutely in the sense of that their knowledge of what you're talking about as being these weird stories about math, that's a week of conversation with a chisidim. Right. You know, like they're going to like read into that. They're going to interpret it. They're doing five blank check episodes a day. Just about single pages of the. That's right. There's an endless amount of text. It's not as simple as the New Testament. Right. So that, like, however we're going to, and God knows, I try to compartmentalize, if not. not, you know, condescend or am outright anti-Semitic about the city community. They have an almost infinite material for dialogue and debate outside of their ritual. But an infinite well in a very fixed text. Sure, but I think, moving text. Yeah, but middle class Judaism becomes a fixed text. Yes.

It's simpler and it integrates the possibility of democracy in America. Right. But, you know, yeah, and you don't have to wear the same outfit. How do we translate this to a modern culture gives them new things to analyze in a way? Speaking to Mark's point about the things that go unspoken, there's also the unspoken thing that Arthur is gay and is sort of up to private hanky-panky, right? And, you know, like, and when he gets. And torment. And that's obviously right. That's the dark thing he wants to understand more than anything, right? Right. And then when that is revealed, sort of obliquely revealed by the cops,

Right. It's never discussed again. No. I mean, I guess he talks to the lawyer about like you're going to need a criminal attorney or whatever, but no one sits on and they're down being like, how can we help you or what's going on? No, but that conversation didn't exist then. Right. But there was acceptance.

There's no path. There was acceptance. Yeah. But they don't, they can't believe that in a weird way. But with the brother. It's a quiet unspoken acceptance. But with the brother, there was unconditional acceptance and love to the point where the dream is. I'm going to help you get out.

And I was going to say, I find the dream so affecting because the Carter Burwell score in this is incredible. His scores for all the con movies are incredible. But this one is so ominous, so repetitive. It is so limited in sort of the motif of what it is repeating. And the first major variation of it is in that dream sequence where he's putting the same baseline melody, but then he's putting this kind of like sweeping emotional, orchestral thing on top of it.

Yeah, it's the end of a movie. For the first time there is the sense of possibility and uplift, which is he takes the kid's money. Yeah. And he buys his fucking brother a canoe and sets him off to Canada. Just a sign that says Canada and the idea of if you cross the border, maybe over there, you can live an uncomfortable life. Which also speaks to the Vietnam time. Like this, it was a thing. That's interesting.

You go to Canada to get away from America. Canada is the abstract kind of like bizarro America, which is us without our problems. My uncle was going to go to Canada. But that's a good point, though. Because ultimately you don't escape the violence. No, the guy shows up and shoots him in the boat. He's an American. And he wakes up screaming.

An anti-Semitic Jew hater. Yes. Yeah, so the Jews are, you know, either way. And the only other time the score repeats that sort of tone is at the end with the reveal of the tornado. Yeah. So why does he change the grade? Is he just sort of like, is he affecting, feeling it like, things are starting to go better for me? Maybe I shouldn't be too tough on this kid.

I think it's like the law bill and he... Right, he gets the law bill and he's like, maybe I can just... He's so scared off by the nightmare of trying to help his brother escape to a different life that he... But he has the same compulsion within him to protect him. I think especially now that he understands his sexuality and understands the unspoken thing that's never going to be solved within this guy, that he feels like the ultimate mitzvah he can do is get this guy back down to zero. Yeah, and who's going to be the wiser? Right. Yeah.

Right. And then the minute that I had, there was a real, it's called Black Sunday. It was a real tornado system that ripped through Iowa and Minnesota. And they must have killed lots of people. Right, lived in that era. Right, right, 1967, like right then. The order of it is, does his superior come in and give him the indication that he's about to get tenure right before the doctor phone call? Yes.

And then the tornado. It's tenure. Then he gets the bill. Right. Then he changes the grade. Okay. And the doctor calls. I love the thing with the tenure, too, where...

So you're right. He's feeling the fact that he's a little invincible because he's gotten a tenure. Was Sai the one writing the letters? Again, I know. I know it's silly to ask questions of this movie when we should be accepting the mystery. But right, that's the... That's the feel, though. That when at the bar mitzvah, the wife says, like, Cy was writing letters to the tenure board for you.

And they go out of their way to say how eloquent the letters were. How poetic they were. Right. That they weren't... This isn't someone who English is not the first language. Well, so then... you know, if you're going to believe that, then then sigh is the devil. Yeah, and Cy also.

Or he's this mystical dark beast. No, he's so manipulative. He has evil intent. Yes. But Cy's whole thing is playing it all as like, look, this is just, it's an intellectual exercise, right? It would make sense for you to go to the Jolly Roger. It's the right thing to do. This isn't emotional, right?

Larry, we have to think. The Jolly Roger with an empty pool. Right. And he, no, but he, biblically, he is the, it's not even a, Faustian character. He is the only representative of human evil. Yes. And he is also He took his wife. This is his way of cucking him before he's literally cucked him, right? Sent him out of his home. Yes. Oh my God. He is trying to diminish his reputation. What are you saying? Oh my God. When he has that conversation and he's like, why don't you move into Cy's house? And they have this

look of like, are you kidding me? Yeah. It makes me so mad because it's so. deeply unfair. It's so like they've made this decision amongst each other and there's no like other alternative way. And that's when he says surely you jest. Yeah. And I don't even actually understand is there some kind of like religious aspect to that? No, I really don't think so. No, no. It's not religious. It's societal. It's like, don't break up the family unit. Exactly. She's the head of family right so she is defining to him you have to leave because the family unit is changing with him moving in right and the house is the continuity and you're the part that's replaceable not but also yeah he might not even really care about her that much he doesn't seem to really have any level

of intellectual intimacy he's a uh uh instigator of chaos yes he's a a biblical bad boy you also get the sense. I don't know. I mean, my inference is that... Who's your favorite biblical bad boy? I don't know. I got to think about it. I get the inference in this that it was kind of one of these quiet, kind of, like, passively arranged marriages, right? That this was sort of a... Not that they were actually set up to like combined family estates. It's hard to imagine Larry taken charge. Right, but you're just sort of like, this is probably like the girl he met when he was 14 and everyone was like, you should

marry her. Just trying to think of any other... Well, yeah, he's got a good job. I mean, it's as a range. as expectations are exactly the rabbi is busy he doesn't look busy he's thinking I'm just trying to think of like any other because this is such a quotable there's a part where he's talking about

their relationship had you seen this before Ben no I'd never seen it before and he's like she's usually right about this stuff and it's in reference to like their relationship crumbling yeah like I love that he's even not sure about that yes that he's leaving it

kind of up to her right that he falls in line with what she's telling him with very little resistance and then has to do the work to actually make her reality of cucking him in it tangible you know what i'm saying yeah that she's like i need to get you have to get the get for me well okay one other thing the bus scenes the bus scenes they're great they're so fun it really captures what it's like at that age to be on the bus with your friends Yeah, yeah. And I love the kid that keeps just saying fuck all the time. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Just really, it's like he's really at that age where you're like, I'm, I've learned this word and I'm going to fucking use it, man. And also that the really kind of like those are those kids are American. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. First and foremost. Like, even at the Hebrew school, like on the bus. Yeah. Those are kids that are fully integrated.

And you have the old teacher guy who. who feels like he said, and my mom would talk about that, how you'd have these teachers who were Holocaust survivors. Yeah. Like, because, like, that was her generation

and that they were so from another world. Right. This doesn't relate to me. And she's like, yeah, I watch, like, leave it to beaver. Like, it's like, sure, she doesn't, yeah,

and F, true. Yeah, yeah. Also, right, the movie starts at the cold open, right? We got a shout out, Fiveish Finkel. Sure, legend of the Edithist theater.

Of course, rules in this. Yeah. And this, right, this idea of saying, like, I ran into this guy, you remember him,

died i swear to you he died there's no chance you saw that guy and he shows up and the whole question is was the the gossip wrong right or is this guy supernatural which she then takes the initiative stabs him another example of a walks out into the coal taking charge right right and and the question is did that doom them forever um yeah like adam and eve and like and gossip is another very specific commandment and adam and eve the first gossip right is i hear if you eat that tree yeah yeah yeah but then you go into this like void of darkness, right? The credits come out like really quickly, almost like Superman the movie flying at the screen with this weird humming that turns into the Jefferson airplane. You see the small

kind of like circle of light. And as you push in on it slowly, you're coming out his ear canal. You're going into the speaker. You've been in the mind of the sun who is so secondary to the narratives of this movie. But here he is sneaking music. The teacher takes it. The money is tucked into the radio, right? Which he needs to pay. the bully back for for the lid he's running away every day he's just got this quiet subplot the whole movie which is just this big kid keeps chasing him down the street and he's got to figure out how to get at the end he's trying to give the kid and the kids like there's a tornado yeah we're about to fucking oh yeah all right all right we got to put it go ahead girl we've not

been going long i have to go to the natural history museum what are you doing at the natural history you're going to look at the whale hell yeah my girlfriend's never been there that is my favorite and she's a dinosaur freak that it might my my my phone pictures, my daughter in front of it. Sorry to spoil the whale for it. Yeah. I'm sorry if I... No, no, no, Mark, didn't. No, no, no, you're fine. Absolutely not. No.

I just, we have to play the box. Of course. The last thing we do before we finish the episode. Griffin, do you remember when this film came out? This came out in September or October 2nd, 2009. Mark, Griff's going to, I mean, and feel free to join in, but Griff's going to try and guess the movies that were top of the box of this movie when this film came out. When? October 2nd, 2009. Oh, I'm not going to have you.

So my... This film opened it, I think, Toronto, or... Yeah, that sounds right. You know, it had like a festival release. My relationship to my father was largely solidified in that he shared sports with my brother. I was the first child. I had no interest in the thing that he cared about the most. Well, my dad didn't care about anything, but go ahead.

In an effort to connect and come up with an equivalent thing to my dad and my brother coveting the sports scores in the Daily News and the New York Post every morning. Yeah. My dad tried to build the same ritual over checking out the box. office top 10. Oh, that's nice. Every Monday morning, I guess. And so it started this thing of all of these being locked in my brain. So even though this movie comes out in a point in time where I'm ostensibly an adult and not living with my father. You still care about this. Most of our relationship is on Sunday being like, you see that number? Oh, yeah. The per screen was wild on

that. So all of these things are just baked into my brain. I'm a little tick. Yeah. Okay. October 2009. Yeah, it's opening on six screen. It's the limited release. So it's not number one. But number one is new this week. Griffiths an action comedy. It's a sort of horror action comedy. Is it Zombiland? Yeah. Good job. Thank you. Okay. So I remember there being three new releases this weekend. You're right. There's actually four. Well, let me say, I'm going to pull one thing right out of my ass.

Go ahead. Toy Story, Toy Story 2, 3D double feature re-release happens this weekend. You're so fucking. I was hoping it was going to overtake zombie land. I had some personal. Wow. So that's number three is a re-release. You're saying it's the first two Toy Story. We did a double feature because both those movies are under 90s. So it was like a, right, it was like a three-hour double feature with some, probably one of the greatest moviegoing experiences in my life. So number one is Zombie Land. That's number three. Number two is it a children's, an animated film.

And is it also a new release? No. No. It's a, uh, coming down from number one. Coming down from number one in 2009. So it was a September release. You struggle with this one. It's based on a children's book.

It's based on a children's book. I've struggled with this one in the past. one in the past uh which studio released it sony it's a sony release you know he struggles of this one mark could have been oh oh it's cloudy with a chance of meatballs there you go yeah uh i always just don't think about that because now you have a car you're in the bad guys is that your cartoon yes yes bad guys opens in august hell yeah can i say this mr snake i i love every time you talk about going to the first screening and hearing that everyone else did kind of their regular speaking voice oh yeah yeah and wondering why you put so much effort into it i got to do this every time i

talk as a cartoon i just want to say to you i took my little cousin who's like uh now 10 but i guess was eight or seven when the first one came out to see that movie opening weekend and i was like god fucking marron's locked in he's delivering he's putting in the work yeah i want you to know the vocal strain you put in that role is appreciated oh well thank he was laughing at the snake i'll say that oh good he doesn't he doesn't know from w t f he's not laughing because it's you yeah you also played lex luther yeah that's true that i i I didn't even know what that was. I will say.

It does kind of come across in that performance versus the snake where I'm like, you got a handle on this? Yeah. No, I didn't even know it was a big movie. Is that the pets? Super pets. I'm like, all right, I'll do it. Because when you do animated, it's like you drive to Burbank.

It's the dream. And you just do the thing. The absolute dream. And I had no care about any of that. Yeah. But yeah, but I put it in with the snake. And then like, when did people stop doing cartoon voices? I agree.

So, though Anthony Ramos definitely steps up. He does. Everyone's good in it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sam is good in it. But I just, I like that you came up with a full character. Yeah, thank you. Yeah. Number three, uh, for Griff, it's a kind of a bomb.

It's a sci-fi kind of action movie with like a movie star who's getting to be in his dotage being a older. He's over the hump. Yeah, he's retired now, but a... He's retired now? He is, yes. For sort of, sort of sad reasons. Oh, it's a Bruce movie. Bruce Willis.

Is it surrogates? That's right. It's the film Surrogates. Yeah. A movie I've never seen. Me neither. Robots. Jonathan Most out, right?

And the number five, it's new this week. It's a comedy from sort of a, I guess, a comedy oter of sorts. You said that with a bit of an eye roll. You know, I don't know. I have a complicated relationship with the guy. I think most people do. It's not due date, is it? No, no, he's British.

He's British, and you have a complicated movie. He's, like, starring, and he's directing, and he's writing. Is it the motion picture the invention of lying? Ricky Jervais. Now, I've heard a scurrilous rumor. Yeah, speaking to movies about God, right? heard he doesn't believe in the guy no i i i swear where did you hear this i deep deep gossip circles de moire was posting about it um you never did your vase right you never talked no i'm not sure why

i did go to the premiere of that movie with c k though right and ck ditched me cool he just needed so he just wanted to go with somebody but this is you know the nature of that friendship when it existed yeah like i was in l a he's like you want to go this thing and then i i i i just wanted to go this thing and And then I go, yeah, okay, that sounds fun. So I go over to his hotel, Beverly Hilton or something. And then we go to the thing, we go to the premiere, we get out of the car, he walks to the line, he says, you're all set, you know, you've got a ticket. He leaves in the car. I sit and watch that horrible movie.

He didn't stay for the movie. No, but then the car, you know, took me back to the, like, I somehow lost my keys, and I thought they were in his hotel room. and I can't even remember how that resolved itself because I had to go back to the hotel and get them to go into the room to see if I could find my car keys and my car was at the hotel. God, how did that resolve itself?

But what about the goy? Yeah, that is like a serious man-esque trial of small indignities. And the most indignity is that like, I don't remember where, how that resolved itself. Sure. But I remember it was a horrendous panic. Well, yeah, I got my car, but I don't think I ever found my keys.

CK is clean-shaven in that. And it makes it feel like the movie's a hallucination. Right. I feel like it's right before the show. Sure, sure, sure. When he's sort of like a sense. It's a horrible movie. It's always a terrible film.

But it feels like watching Henry Cavill with the CGIed out mustache where you're like, this face doesn't move right. Yeah. Number six of the box office is Whippet, the Roller Derby movie, really fun movie. L.A. Hibar Moore's only directorial effort. Yeah. And then you've got fame. I guess is that a remake of fame? Yeah. Big time.

Okay. And then the Michael Moore movie, Capitalism, a love story. yeah so that was what up to 250 million domestic at this point made 4 million oh and then you got the Soderberg movie the informant which is a great movie very good yeah and then something called love happens what the hell is that was that Aaron Eckert Jennifer Aniston I think he plays like a Tony Robbins-esque motivational speaker right and she's a florist yes and love happens love does indeed happen but that's it wow that's the box office game we're done mark we're good I mean we'll we'll send you off

You have to ask, not to, not to. That's his thing. I'm a, I try to beat my own time. Are we allowed to ask you that? What? Are you, are we good? Yeah, we're good. It was great.

Yeah, I did, I did realize during this conversation that I am definitely not a math Jew. And I definitely do not have the obsessive attention span of a film nerd Jew. And I am definitely more a mystically bent Jew. Yes. So you're more listening to. To airplane. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

All right. Thanks, guys. This is dropping. Yeah, this is coming out in a while, yeah, in the fall. So. We all have the special out there. Yes. Is that on HBO?

Yeah, HBO, the special is called Panicked. You shot at a BAM, right? I did. I shot it at the BAM Harvey. The bad guys is coming out in August. Hell yeah. Can't wait to hear that snake, grovel. We'll see what happens with this feature film that I starred in,

an independent called the In Memoirie. And then the documentary. The documentary, hopefully will have a home where you can watch, are we good? In Memorium is the one that's about the guy who wants to make the Immemorial. Yes. At the Oscars, right. That's a great premise. It's funny.

You guys are really. That's an out kind of. I think I did all right. Where you watch that every year and you're like, huh, that guy didn't make it. Yeah, yeah, why is that chop liver? Yeah. There's politics involved. That's the thing that people don't know is that, like, you basically don't make it unless someone

submits you. Right. someone's got to remember that you died right someone's got to make the case they all remember jean hackman or whatever but never forget yeah uh thank you so much for doing this thanks for having me thought yeah i mean it's a real joy we're a huge fan i hope i i i stepped up enough no absolutely but it's also it's one of those things where it's uh hard to imagine that we would be doing this if you hadn't done what you did as much as this show is very different well thank you i appreciate that and i'm happy for you guys that's at the end of day that's all that matters yeah

I've been waiting for my dad to say that. I'm proud of you. So long, but it may be more coming from you. Wow. Thank you for saying that. Thank you for being here. Thank you, Brendan, for making this happen.

Yeah, thanks, Brandon. I'm hanging out. I'm in the room, respectfully. Enjoy the naturalistram museum. Yeah. Thank you. I'm looking forward to it. Yep. Thank you all for listening.

Please remember to rate review, subscribe. Sure. I say that. That's a thing I say. Tune in next week for True Grit. Yeah. The biggest hit.

That's right. That was their follow-up here, right? Yeah. And as always, embrace the mystery. I was happy with that mystery. There we go. I was happy with that episode. I was happy with that episode.

He was very generous with his time. But then he had to leave because he had to go. the Museum of Natural History. He wanted to see the squid and the whale. That's what he wants to see. He wanted to see that. That's not a bit. That's real.

Thank you to Brennan McDowell for making that happen. Total Mench. Great guy. Well, thank you for listening. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe. Of course, the full archives, blank check archives, are available for free wherever you get your podcast.

We've talked about Mark Mareen a lot in the past. We've stolen a lot of his bits Most of that really originates With our almost famous episode From year two 2016 So here's a little A little clip of that

Our original Mark Merrin conversation If you want to listen to that You can go back to listen to the episode Down there No no no no no no no no no lock the gates Great time Boom I just shit my pants Just coffee.coma

Oh God he says that all the time Remember when all the podcast which is WTF that was like the only podcast that was the only format that people wanted to do oh my god and then you were like great they're like two years and you're like I've now heard every comedian give an interview a long-form interview yeah to each of the other comedians it got to a point where it's like so you've been to open open mics for a couple years so tell me about your process like what are you interviewing yes how much time you got at this point you got what you

got 40 you got you got tight 20 it was one of those things where it's like you know, you were, is there a saturation point? Like, will they eventually do all the comedians? And then you're, after a couple of years later you're like, yep, yep, they did it. They did all the comedians. David, let me ask you a question. Yeah. Who were your guys? There you go.

So there's, there is that. Hope you like the episode next week, true grit. Stavros Halkius, the comedian, the Rebel Rouser, the podcaster, the man, the myth, the legend, on the show

Talking True Grit Goodep I think you're going to like that one Lean Montgomery did our music WTF version of the theme extra noodily

macaroni linguine I don't know I don't know what I'm saying okay catch you all next time bye Bullmer lives.

Blank Check with Griffin and David is hosted by Griffin Newman and David Sims. Our executive producer is me, Ben Hossley. Our creative producer is Marie Barty Salinas, and our associate producer is A.J. McKeon. This show is mixed and edited by A.J. McKin and Alan Smithy. Research by J.J. Birch. Our theme song is by Lane Montgomery in the Great American Novel, with additional music by Alex Mitchell.

Artwork by Joe Bowen, Ollie Moss, and Pat Reynolds. Our production assistant is Minnick. special thanks to David Cho, Jordan Fish, and Nate Patterson for their production help. Head over to Blankcheckpod.com for links to all of the real nerdy shit. Join our Patreon, Blank Check Special Features for exclusive franchise commentaries and bonus episodes. Follow us on social at Blank CheckPot. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, Checkbook on Substack. This podcast is created and produced by Blank Check Productions.