Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - The Broadway Babies

Episode Date: December 11, 2021

Soren talks about all the different Broadways he knows! And Danie defends and then destroys the work of a legendary director! And as always big thanks to our sponsors.  Thanks to Postmates. Use code QQ  to get 50% off your first 5 orders of $50 or more at Postmates. Thanks to Jiminy's. To learn more and save 20% on your first purchase, go to jiminys.com/QQ and use code QQ20 at checkout. Thanks to Skillshare. Skillshare.com/qq and one-month free trial of Premium Membership. Thanks  Hello Tushy.  10% off + free shipping HelloTushy.com/qq  

So hello again and welcome to another episode of Quick Question with Soren and Daniel, the podcast where two best friends and comedy writers ask each other questions and give each other answers. I am one half of that podcast, author of How to Fight Presidents, staff writer for Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, and globe-trotting writer-at-large Daniel O'Brien, joined as always by my co-host Mr. Soren Bui. Soren, say Soren. Soren.

Nice. Nailed it. That's a way easier one. If you tell me exactly what to say, then these become a lot easier. Was that one of our couch gags at one point? Was I doing that? I think I did. I was telling you to say, what was I?

Yes. It was like, Sorin, make like a World War II bomb and ring in their ears. Except, you know, ones that were better. Yeah, no, I have some notes for myself. Just the editor in me is like crossing it like, why is it World War II bomb? Could have been any bomb, it's not specific. Why is it ring in their ears?

Why couldn't it be go like like make like a bomb and go off but there's specificity that i had in my head that never really translated which was that people down in bunkers there they go get a shell shock because they're all the bombing was ringing in their ears for so long i see oh so this so the podcast so uh your words on the podcast don't destroy people. They just live with them for a very long time. Yeah. You give them metaphorical tinnitus. Yes. It's something they're forced to live with the rest of their life and is not comfortable.

Okay. All right. Okay. I'm back on board. Thanks to Hello Tushy for supporting Quick Question. Make the restroom your best room with the complete Tushy system, to Hello Tushy for supporting Quick Question. Make the restroom your best room with the complete Tushy system, including the Tushy bidet attachment, ottoman, toilet brush, and Tushy stand and tissues. Get 10% off plus free shipping at hellotushy.com slash QQ.

Thanks to Skillshare for supporting Quick Question. Skillshare empowers you to accomplish real growth. Do something today you couldn't do yesterday with classes designed for real life. Skillshare is an online learning community with so much to explore, real projects to create, and the support of fellow creatives. Explore your creativity at skillshare.com slash QQ and get a one-month free trial of premium membership. This episode is brought to you by Jiminy's, maker of sustainable dog food made with cricket protein. Cricket protein is a superfood, dude. Delicious, nutritious, sustainable, humane, and prebiotic.

To learn more and save 20% on your first purchase, go to jimineys.com slash QQ and use code QQ20 at checkout. Thanks to Postmates for supporting Quick Question. With Postmates, I get all my favorite foods from local restaurants in my neighborhood delivered. No leaving the house, and even better,

no getting in the car or finding a parking spot for a limited time postmates is giving you a little something new customers will get 50 off your first five orders of 50 or more when you use code qq uh we're gonna get into the show where we ask each other questions and give each other answers um do we have any updates to start let's see yeah anything going on uh i had family here recently i had my wife's family her entire family stay with us which is very exciting for me because when we got this house we thought oh we'll do a thanksgiving here and everyone can come and then the pandemic happened and no one has ever come to our house yeah and then finally we had a time when we felt comfortable bringing everybody over. My son has had his first shot

and my daughter is still breastfeeding. And so we feel like we're the healthiest we've been in a while. And we got to have everybody here. That's her sister and brother-in-law and their child and then her mom and dad. And they all stayed with us and we made a big Thanksgiving dinner.

And it was great having a full house in a way where i was like oh yeah this is what it feels like to have help all the time because there are times where you with your children and i love both my kids but where you just feel like you're there's no way out of this moment you're like they're both some things were going wrong with both of them one of them's crying the other one is upset about something and like you don't you for whatever reason like you don't have any help you can't go anywhere you can't just like be like guys just sit down and watch tv because my daughter doesn't even my daughter fucking hates tv oh yikes and so you're there's just these moments you're like we are gonna have to just barrel through

this we're just gonna have to sit here in this line at panda express and just like i know everyone's giving me looks doesn't matter like we are just gonna barrel through this and now you've got just to have somebody who comes and says oh do you want to go back to bed i can watch them this morning and you're just like are you kidding me that's an option yeah yeah i would love that yeah one of the things i've found as uh a guest of people with kids is sometimes all you need to really do is like be the adult shaped figure that occupies space with a child for a period of time. And that's the gift. And that's it.

Yeah. They, you, you, there's so little work that needs to be done. Yeah. When you're supervising, all you need to be is the alarm.

So like if something starts going wrong with the kids, you can be like, Hey, Gilly's getting on the roof or whatever. And then I can come out and deal with that or but like if you don't you just need yeah you need something you need the scarecrow somebody who's there who just is like the semblance of authority yeah well that's fun that's exciting yeah i have a good time i have the opposite of company i have so as we know i'm uh

traveling to la for two weeks oh we should hang out yeah that'd be great um we uh we will uh and every time i do this i i usually try to take some kind of trip around this time every year in between seasons because i have so much extra time and i have my parents watch my dog because it's, again, it's a two-week trip and I don't want to spend the money of putting him in like a New York kennel for that amount of time because it's very expensive. So I always give him to my parents and they take him to North Carolina. And we don't make special trips for this. I'm not going to like drive down there just to give them to him. So I always give them, give him to them a little bit early.

And like when they're here for Thanksgiving, here's Jackson, you take my dog now. And then I'll get him when they're up here again for Christmas. And what that means is there's a chunk of time on either side of my vacation where I just don't have him. And I hate it oh i don't know if there's if you'll have an analog for this where like because i know that sometimes you are away from your family and you're staying in a hotel and that's different because they are all of your

context is different and and the whole thing is a treat but you're not looking at the rooms they used to occupy yes you're never are you ever in your home for uh uh any extended period of time where colleen and the kids are are all gone the last time it happened was three years ago so before gilly yeah it was a night um there was we drove to to drove to Tucson thinking we'll do an overnight trip to Tucson. It was great that we'd done it before and it went great the first time. But this time Ronan was just like too big for the car seat. He couldn't sleep as well in it. And so he was just like up and crying the whole way there.

And it was a nightmare. And so on the way back, Colleen was like, I have to get a flight on the way back with him. And so she booked a flight. I drove back alone. And I drove back and I had, I think I had two nights before she was returning where I was just in the house alone. And, uh, I thought it was magical. I, but it's only because it was so novel to me to have a space that was entirely my own. I also realized how much being alone means to me. And because I, it wasn't ever something I'd ever really thought about before, except growing up, I lived out in

the woods. I had a lot of time to myself. I got a very accustomed to what I, to my own company and sort of lost that along the way somewhere. And so anytime that I rekindle that, I'm like, oh yeah, oh yeah. I know. I like this. Yeah. I, there, there are some parts of it that I rekindle that, I'm like, oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I know. I like this. is built around his schedules, his bathroom and all that kind of stuff. So I can't be, I'm normally not away from my apartment for too long, especially because with pandemic and working from home, he's gotten so used to me being around almost all the time that I will go to a movie and then come straight home. There's no reality where I'm just wandering around the city.

And when he's not here, I do that. I go to a show or I go to a movie and then instead of getting a lift or a cab or a subway home, I'm like, it's three miles, I'm just going to walk. I'm going to walk and I have the freedom to stop into a shop and do some browsing, whatever I i want to do which is a thing that i don't normally allow myself so like there's definitely some freedom to it that is nice but there's it's it's just weird not having him here there's like the baseline loneliness stuff of like that's my buddy and and and my buddy's not here and also just like uh you know, the first thing I do is take him for a walk in the morning. And that's not just like a good way for me to wake up. It's also like now I find myself at 2.30 in the afternoon being like, what is it like outside?

Yeah. Your purpose is gone. Yeah. Well, it also doesn't help that you're not working either. No. You have nothing regimented in your right i now i wake up i i do my morning meditation and then uh i look at my to-do list and it and it just says nothing there's like four different items that all say nothing

because no one needs me to do anything or expect me to be anywhere yeah it's got to be hard also going to bed at night i would imagine where, where you, at some point, you're just like, well, now I'll go to bed. And then you turn off a light and it's just completely quiet and you didn't have to like, there's no, does your dog sleep on your bed? Yeah. Yeah. So you're just like, I guess I'll, let's, let's see what happens if I move over here. Yeah. Okay. Well, that's, that's fine, I guess. Yeah. Those are the two biggest things are nighttime ritual and morning ritual.

Waking up and taking him out and then like taking him out at night is the way that the audience knows that the episode's over. Yeah. That's the last thing we do. And then now I can get into sleep clothes and go to sleep. Yeah. I'm sorry, Dan. I'm sorry that you don't have your buddy there. It's totally fine.

Like, my parents are sending me pictures of him every day. Do you remember the very first time that you worked with Jackson? Like, that you didn't have him and you were at your house? Because I do. You do? Yeah, because I had him it I don't uh that sounds right I I don't know if I remember the the thing that I remember is uh I'm sure this is true of a lot of pet owners uh you assume you're gonna love it as soon as they're gone I I and I I fool myself. I always think like, I'm going to drop him off and then I'm going to, and then that's freedom.

That's my swinging bachelor lifestyle. And then you come home and there's no one excited to see you. And it's like, oh no, I missed the thing. Yeah, you hadn't been away from him. And obviously with anything that you love, the very first time you're separate from it, it feels so alien and terrible that you're like, no, no. We were supposed to be together.

You had to pack that night, and then you were getting up early in the morning to leave. It just made more sense for you to drop him off at night. Right. We had him, and I got texts from you that were just like, I hate this. And I got texts from you that were just like, I hate this. You were so sad to not have him. And I was like, it's okay. Like, he's doing great.

He's all right. Like, we're playing. It's fun. He's doing okay. That's so funny that I did that. I texted that the second I gave him to my parents this time. Nothing's changed. Almost 10 years later. And I hand him off and I get in my car and I just text him like, I want him to my parents this time. Nothing's changed. Almost 10 years later.

And I hand him off and I get in my car and I just text him like, I want him back, please. But I changed my mind. I'm never going anywhere. I canceled my flight. Yeah. I don't get that same feeling from a cat. And I think that was by design. But I do with my children.

But what really, it's not not even like i will miss them over time i would think that the first night or whatever that even the first two nights it's very novel to be completely without responsibility and i know that they're as long as i know that like they're good the element that really drives me crazy is if i see them going and like they don't want to go or like they don't want me to go and then that's all i can think about after that point is they my daughter crying and reaching for me where i'm like what am i even doing this isn't about me the story's not about me what am i doing um but yeah i it is the the times the only times that I get, I really don't like it when I'm alone is that moment when I'm going to bed.

When I'm now dictating when I'm going to go to sleep because I'm not responsible for anybody else or anything. And at some point I'll just be like watching TV or watching a movie and I'll be like, I think I'll go to bed now. a movie i'll be like i think i'll go to bed now and then going turning off all the lights in the house brushing my teeth upstairs we're an entirely dark empty house and then getting into bed and just being like why am i sleeping on the side what am i doing like where this is all i'm just like continuing this routine as though they're i'm living with ghosts and I don't have to do that. But I don't like that feeling. I hate that feeling. Everything else I love.

Yeah. I love a lot of the freedom that I have in theory that I'm not taking advantage of. Yeah. I will say like even when I know that I don't need to be home to take care of him or anything, it's, it's really hard for the mind to override the body. Cause my body is so trained at this point of like, oh, I saw a movie and the movie is two and a half hours long. And I saw it at like a weird time of the day for Jackson. So I need to, I need to get back there. Even though there's no Jackson, my body is still like, you know, it's, it's like trying to breathe underwater doing anything that the the body is not used to doing i'm so finely tuned to this this little ungrateful fucker's clock yes um i the time that i did have this time alone i still think about it um because it was also it just sort of like some things coincided for me perfectly where i was out that night i was like i'm gonna just go to a movie i don't care what it is i'm gonna go to the movie theater and i'm gonna pick one while i'm there and these are all things that are completely foreign and alien to me uh and did it we enjoyed the movie and then afterwards i was like i still want to be out and so i started calling friends and i was like do you

want to hang out and everybody was busy with the exception of my friend, Jesse Johnson, who, uh, I don't know if I've talked about him on here before, but that's Dakota Johnson's brother and Don Johnson's son. And he was like, yes, I want to come up for Dakota Johnson that she gets top billing. This is exciting. She was like, yes. Or he said, yes, come out with us. So I went to Sunset Tower, which is like, have you ever gone out on sunset before, Dan, in Hollywood? Not once in the 10 years that I lived in Los Angeles. It is. It's exactly what you expect it to be. I mean, the streets are humming.

Everybody's very exciting and driving Range Rovers for some reason. And you go into these places and they are all, they're so Hollywood. Like they're so quintessentially Hollywood from the architecture and the decor down to the actual people that are there and the conversations that you're overhearing. Uh, it's, it can be, that's like, that's fun for four hours, but I got there, uh, got the sunset tower and Jesse's there with his then girlfriend who was uh sean penn's daughter and so sean penn is also there at dinner and uh valeria galeno do you remember valeria galeno she was like hot shots can you okay valeria okay no i don't remember her who was she in hot shots she was the love interest in Hot Shots.

Oh, I know who she is. I didn't know her name. She's Italian and she has like a very thick accent. She was there and John McEnroe's daughter was there. Like they're all just having drinks. And I was like, yeah, yeah, this is what exactly what I wanted. This is what I was never having. this is this is what i was never having uh and so it was just like this perfect experience that he

invited me into because he's like oh yeah you're fucking busy oh come out with us and uh enjoyed this night so much because it was so different from uh everything i had done for the past decade. That is fun. And you could like, without lying to people, if you introduce yourself as Soren Bui and they see your last name, they can assume you're also someone famous as kid.

Yeah, it's true. Yeah. I'd have to imagine that some of them probably knew him and knew that there's no way but uh it was like this very surreal experience like that is not my that was never my life that was never who i was that was never something that was happening for me but like it was very fun to pretend for an evening uh anyway i really enjoyed it and uh that being said if my parents if i was away from my children for more than three days which which I've done some, a couple of work trips for, it gets really awful and dark.

I'm sure. Also my wife. I really enjoy the company of my wife. I realize on these trips where I'm like, Jesus, like there's so many blindnesses that I have that she's covering for me. that I have that she's covering for me. And that are, you realize not only their inherent value, but also just like, you miss like just hugging somebody or like sleeping next to somebody. Sure.

You know, Tushy, they've been one of our sponsors for a long time and we love them. We want to give our family and friends something more memorable than a gift card this holiday season, but it can be tough to think of a meaningful gift. We want to give something useful, yet unique, cool, yet eco-friendly, techie, but actually affordable. Hello Tushy Bidets tick all the boxes. Buying for a lot of

family members? Hello Tushy Bidets are a great fit for your eco-conscious cousin, neat freak sister, farty dad, and anyone who poops. We all deserve a better clean while contributing to a healthier planet. The Hello Tushy Bidet is the gift that keeps on giving. Everyone I have recommended it to has loved it. It cleans your butt way better than wiping, and it cuts your toilet paper use down by 80%. It's great. That saves trees and gallons of water,

thousands of gallons of water, used to convert them into toilet paper. And this Tushy Bidet attachment comes with a book full of poop jokes. My butt is thrilled. I have a Hello Tushy bidet attachment comes with a book full of poop jokes. My butt is thrilled. I have a Hello Tushy and I love it. My favorite part about it is that it cleans my butt. We love partnering with Tushy and we have a deal.

Go to hellotushy.com slash QQ to get 10% off plus free shipping. Stop just shoveling around your business around your butthole with toilet paper. Start washing with Hello Tushy. It washes your butt with fresh water. It's way better clean than toilet paper. It's so easy to install, so easy to use. It's just a simple spray and you pat it dry and it attaches to your existing toilet. No need to call a plumber or electrician. You can do it all by yourself. It installs in less than eight minutes. Join the millions of happy Hello Tushy customers who take care of their yule logs the dignified way.

You can give the gift of a clean butt to yourself or your loved ones this holiday season and get 10% off plus free shipping right now at HelloTushy.com slash QQ. That's HelloTushy.com slash QQ. Sart once said that the chief motivation behind all artistic creation is the desire to feel necessary in relationship to the world. That's really all we want, right? I mean, you think a lot of the things that you do, like learn to play guitar or ride a motorcycle, or maybe to get somebody from the opposite sex or the same sex, whoever you're interested in. But no, it goes deeper than that.

Really, everything that you're doing is for you to feel necessary in relationship to the world. Well, Skillshare can help you with that. Skillshare is an online learning community that offers membership with meaning. With so much to explore, real projects to create, and the support of fellow creatives, Skillshare empowers you to accomplish real growth. I don't know if you're a dabbler or you're already a pro or you're a hobbyist or let's say you've already mastered these things. It doesn't matter. You're creative and you can discover ways to use that creativity with these classes no matter your level experience real improvement with hands-on

projects and classes designed for real life classes like youtube success script shoot and edit uh you can have another one on this one i like a lot indoor gardening grow houseplants veggies and herbs there's portrait photography, shoot and edit, Instagram worthy shots. These are all great ones that you could find on Skillshare.com. And an annual subscription is less than $10 a month. One that I've been looking at recently, and I can't wait to try, is the Ultimate Self-Care Playbook, Discover and Nurture Your Centered Self with Jonathan Van Ness. Dan has been going on and on about his transcendental meditation. And I think I like the idea of that, but I hate the idea of copying somebody. So I'm going to just try some other avenue and try and get the same results. And

honestly, this looks like it's right up my alley. So explore your creativity at skillshare.com slash QQ and get a one month free trial of premium membership. That's one month of a premium membership at skillshare.com slash QQ. All right. Well, Dan, I have a quick question for you. Okay. What's something that you hate that you're subscribed to, but you will never ever be able to unsubscribe from? I'll give you some some examples for i'll go first if you'd like at my old school there was a mom who had had some struggles in her life and i knew about them and then she started selling uh wine and i showed an interest in the wine now connoisseur her own wine no no no she's not making it she's just like

a distributor and uh connoisseur ins of the show will know that i famously don't sprint by it we love it we love connoisseur ins i hate wine it's like it's i just dislike it i there's never been a bottle a glass of wine that i've had that's felt distinguishable from another glass of wine to me it's also a drink that gives me a headache right away i just dislike it but i was like we'll buy wine from her uh from that point on i was on a mailing list and then also i think that somehow when I bought that wine, I subscribed to a, like, I get like a wine a year from her now. And I know that I'm paying for it because I can see the bill for it. But I, so I'm getting a full list every single month. I think it's actually more often than that.

It's like a week of like these vineyards and like what they're doing. And like, here's the, here are the new hot wines. And then I'm getting a wine and I'm buying it. these vineyards and like what they're doing and like here's the here are the new hot wines and then i'm getting a wine and i'm buying it and i can't imagine that her distribution list is more than like 30 people so not only can i not get out of this wine thing where i'm just like getting a wine from her constantly till the earth is swallowed by the sun but also i can't get off the the email damon either because i guarantee she would notice if I just went and clicked on subscribe. And then that's a bridge burned, I think.

Right. I can't imagine that's a huge list of subscribers, right? I'm just stuck. I'm stuck. And I'm going to get these for the rest of my life, I think. Yeah. Man. Well, that's one.

Yeah. life i think yeah man well that's one yeah i have uh right in the beginning of the pandemic i uh subscribe to broadwayhd.com it's a streaming service exclusively for uh musicals i mean not musicals just like like theatrical productions So like some straight plays too. It was something that me and Kay and two of our other friends decided to do as a weekly pandemic tradition. We would watch a new musical together and live chat. We were the Broadway babies. it was a fun weekly thing when everyone was coming up with with strange like zoom happy hours or whatever we were doing at the beginning of the pandemic when we thought it was novel this was our tradition just like group movie watches except it was specifically broadway and uh can i ask how babies is spelled when you guys would spell it out it's spelled with an s

i tried to do broadway pals with a z and I was overruled and we're Broadway babies. I expected a lot more ease, but no, no, it's Broadway babies because, because, because there's a song.

I'm just a Broadway baby. Oh, okay. That's why. Um, yes. And there's no song called Broadway pals because I just, I can't fit it.

I can't crack this musical that I'm writing. I just can't. Well, it's what the meditation rhymes with pals. So we did this thing and I i you're not the the the biggest like you're not steeped in the musical theater scene but you can probably you can probably already guess that uh you know broadway hd is not netflix or hulu or hbl max you're not getting a ton of new musicals every week you're sort of tapped out already yeah and uh i still have this service because there's no

like personal connection where i feel like the person who runs broadway hd is going to know if if i if i cancel at some point but it's i still would wager that it's a pretty short list of people who are paying for this service because it's a very specific service that made sense for this tiny group of broadway babies and i'm not getting rid of it because of that reason i also think like what if the broadway babies ride again someday? I'm going to feel stupid if I cancel and then have to resubscribe. So I'm just like holding out the idea that this group will get together and do this again, even though we've watched every show that we want to watch that this service has to offer. And the other tangentially related part of this is all of us got matching sweatshirts that were tied to this

uh actors fund charity so we all bought these uh light tan sweatshirts with a truly inscrutable logo on it i don't know what the logo says we didn't get them custom there's just like whatever the logo is we all got them and uh uh uh dobs devotees know that i'm moving and i'm just going through everything that i have and getting rid of stuff that i don't need or don't use and like really culling my wardrobe over and over again and in the same way that i can't cancel the subscription i can't get rid of my fucking broadway pals broadway babies a sweatshirt that i've i've worn precisely one time and it was to take a selfie to send to the group chat when we were all wearing our stupid sweatshirts

that's the only time i've worn it and then i put it back in my closet and I was going to donate it like days ago, put it in my donation bag. But then I thought, shit, Dana, who's one of our one of the Broadway babies, she's coming to New York in a couple of weeks. What if all of us want to get together and wear our sweatshirts? I better hold on to this. I'm going to hold on to this thing I don't like and never wear in case the Broadway babies ride again and I can wear it to that. Yeah, man, you're stuck. I know.

I don't know why I'm using this tone because I'm trying to like preempt groans from the audience. I love the Broadway babies. It's a blast. I'm not embarrassed about the fun that we have watching Memphis and Shrek the musical. Yeah, once every two years. I also am a subscriber to Sirius XM Radio, which is just satellite radio.

And it's in my, I have it now in both my cars. But I've been a subscriber since I got my Volt years ago, like 2014. And I hate it. I imagine you probably listen in the car to your own Spotify, like via Bluetooth and whatever. Yeah. Generally, that's what I'm listening to, especially when my kids are in the car. There's only two things I listen to on Sirius XM.

Let me guess. And both of them uh 77 broadway sirius on broadway oh my god you know me so well uh and then there's another one that's just an offshoot of that channel that only does broadways but like sad ones yeah absolutely i love you're so you're clearly a member of the community because you said they only do Broadway. They only do Broadway. So yeah, we should go to a Broadway. We should, honestly. Everyone wants your top five favorite Broadway's.

I would love to be in your Broadway's group. You guys wear sweatshirts to Broadway's. So I listened to two shows, two different stations on there. And actually there's three. One of them I do legitimately like the other two make me feel like such a scumbag listening to them. Like I don't even like myself. I'm not the demographic of these shows and I don't know why I listened to them other

than like, they bring me some very minor modicum of joy, some semblance of it. And so raw dog comedy. Yeah. Raw dog comedy is one of them. So every once in a while, a while raw dog comedy will play someone like uh nate bergazzi who is somebody i genuinely enjoy or um give me a second while you're thinking nate bergazzi is uh if anyone doesn't know he's one of the best doing it right now and like especially if you've got if it's the holidays and uh you're with family uh he's not he's not a divisive comedian at all not families and like little kids but like aunts and uncles or you're with your parents nate bergatti is is uh perfect across the aisle

hilarious smart comedian yeah and all and i would say like And I would say he's not broad, but he's also still universally funny, which is such a weird and hard thing to tap into. The other one that they play on there a lot is Gary Goldman, who's a comedian I really, really love and enjoy. But the majority of the time, I am not the demographic it's like nick de paulo and it's dudes who are they're they're the ones who are at great not graham norton ed no what's edna jim norton jim norton like people who are the great comedy with here comes ed norton most of their jokes are about like transvestites or about like how how uh delicate everybody how fragile everybody is nowadays like humor that i just it just feels so stale now and uh there are times where i have to i make like a visceral noise and change the channel i'm like oh yeah and we'll change it

um i'm not that i'm not the guy also you could tell i'm not the guy because every time they do their interstitials where they're like, Rod, Rod Dog, Rod Dog. And it's like this big slamming noise. And then they're like, hey, Rod Dog's taking a break. Why don't you go grab a beer? It's like, no. That's not what I do. I'm not that type of person.

We'll be back in five minutes. Take this time and slap a woman. If you don't have a lady in the house go make yourself a sandwich and I'm like oh fuck you that's so tired and awful and so I hate that I listen to it and then the other one that I listen to is fantasy radio and it's

football it's fantasy football I have to believe that I'm one of five people listening because they'll do things where they're like, and there's got to be seven or eight different shows on here and different guys that all sound identical. And they're like, all right, we're going to take some calls here in the next hour.

And then you get to the next hour and they're just sort of breezing through it and winging it because nobody's calling. And then eventually a call will come through and you can tell that they're desperate to have it because the call comes in like all right nate from colorado you're on the air nate are you there nate and they'll sit there for a long time just hoping nate picks up they're not just gonna like be like okay well he wasn't there fuck him next caller and the calls are always so dog shit there are people that are like okay uh i've got um a aaron a aaron rogers and uh i wonder if i

should trade him for and then they'll like come up with like some seventh string running back or something like that and it's like no don't do that obviously and some of the advice that they give is genuinely good and i like it but these kernels are so far in between they're like it is like just coming up with like digging up some gary goldman on this other channel but i still i can't help it it's what i listen to and then this time of year is the only time that xm radio is really good for me because there's a channel otherwise would just be yacht rock or the billy joel channel or something like that and this time of year it is the holiday channel and they play nothing but christmas songs and i love it yeah i didn't i thought you didn't like

i thought you only liked that one eagles christmas song that's my very favorite christmas song no i love christmas songs oh i have a lot yeah, I've got a whole list. I've got a whole Spotify playlist of my very favorite Christmas songs. And I love it when I'm listening to this channel and I hear a new one that I haven't heard before. And I'm like, yes, okay, here we go. I like what I, because I will often just go straight Christmas playlist or channel because I love it. But I also really enjoy this time of year because sometimes Christmas will infect the other channels that I listen to. And that's a fun treat.

Like when I'm in the car listening to Sirius 90s on 9, this is the only time of year where they will sneak in. Mariah Carey's All I Want for Christmas is You. And I love when it comes in unexpected. Yeah. Yes, I agree with you. That's part of the reason I like that Eagles song so much is that it will just show up in Target sometimes while I'm walking around and I'm like,

ah, let's just like walk, like stepping into a warm bath. Like I didn't know I was getting this treat today, but here it is. Yeah, I love Christmas. You know, we could do a whole episode on our very favorite Christmas songs. I'd love to get some new ones under my belt. I think we probably can't

because we're recording these. We're recording just some inside baseball stuff for our listeners. We're recording four episodes today that will take us through the end of 2021. So I guess they're going to have to wait till next year for our Christmas songs episode. Or we could do like, I guess we do whatever the fuck we want. We might as well do it in February.

Yeah. Fuck it. Did you know feeding your dog with foods made from cricket protein uses less land and water to produce? And it drastically reduces greenhouse gas emissions compared to traditional animal protein dog food. Meet Jiminy's nutritious sustainable food and treats for your dogs made with cricket protein and other delicious plant-based ingredients like sweet potatoes oats peanut butter and flax. I love Jiminy's it's good for food

sensitive dogs with allergies. Insect protein is considered hypoallergenic food source. Beef, chicken, lamb, soy, and even fish are the most common ingredients that trigger dog allergies. Insect protein is an alternative protein for dogs, and dogs have not been seen exhibiting allergies to this protein. In fact, veterinarians are already using Jimenese in elimination diets to determine food allergies. Jimenese uses more humane and safe production methods. Crickets are raised in cricket condos inside barns, which allow them to live in a way as close as possible to how they would live in the natural world.

Harvesting time comes near the end of their natural life cycle, which is approximately six weeks, FYI. This comes after they have mated and laid their eggs. Insects raised in clean indoor farms have been found to be free of common pathogens that plague the meat industry, like E. coli, salmonella staph, and listeria. I love Jiminy's. Jackson loves Jiminy's. More important, it's for happy pets and healthy planet. Jiminy's, I have for him the original cricket cookie, peanut butter, and blueberry recipe. They're great. I'm going to read you off some hit ingredients here. Peanut

butter, yum. Crickets, all right. Flaxseed, lentils, and blueberries. He loves them. To learn more and save 20% on your first purchase, go to jimineys.com slash QQ and use code QQ20 at checkout. That's J-I-M-I-N-Y-S.com slash QQ with the code QQ20. Look, everybody's got their favorite spots in their neighborhood. I've got three that I want to go to, I would say weekly. Three spots that I absolutely love. And I love ordering them through Postmates because then I don't have to go there. One of them's got a tight little parking lot that it shares with a dry cleaner and a secondhand toy shop. And I just, I can't understand why that toy shop is so crowded. I don't get it, but the parking lot is always a such a bummer. And so I don't want to go there. I want them to come to me. And it's so easy through Postmates. I get my meal. It's always perfect. The order's right. And

I will say that when I get it from this Mexican restaurant that I really enjoy, the cheese is still hot and melty. It's wonderful. I don't get that sludge that you would get if you went and picked it up yourself, sat there in line, waited for the order to come, put it in your car, brought it home, took it out, and all of a sudden everything's coagulated and congealed on your plate. With Postmates, I get all my favorite foods from local restaurants in my neighborhood delivered. No leaving the house, and even better, no getting in the car or finding a parking spot. And Postmates isn't just all burritos and sushi. You know, I can order things like toothpaste and phone chargers on demand too. It's basically like having a personal assistant. My favorite part, when the app lets me know that my food or items have been delivered, everything is right outside my door. I don't even

have to talk to the person who delivers it. I've already tipped them. The interaction is done by the time it lands on my doorstep. Just download Postmates on iOS or Android, find your favorite foods or that one thing you forgot to get from the store the last time you were there and get lands on my doorstep. Just download Postmates on iOS or Android, find your favorite foods, or that one thing you forgot to get from the store the last time you were there and get it delivered on demand. And for a limited time, Postmates is giving just our listeners a little something.

New customers get 50% off your first five orders of $50 or more when you use code QQ. That's code QQ to get 50% off your first five orders of $50 or more. Max savings of $100 per order. Just download the Postmates app or sign up online and it's super easy. Offer is subject to change and taxes and fees apply. Offer valid in 30 days after you add the promo code to your account. Well, that's cool. I have a quick question or it's not really a question. This is more of a

quick statement. Yeah. Lay it on me. me well i'm trying to introduce a new segment um called hot take theater i don't know why i'm naming it i don't think we've named any of our other hit segments on this show um but in this segment one of us will take something that has made the rounds on the internet uh where it seems like everyone is in agreement and your take is uh the opposite of that so here's the context in case you don't know director ridley scott uh recently blamed the failure of his movie the last duel which is a two and a half hour period piece uh with adam driver matt damon ben affleck and jody Comer. It didn't do well at all. And he blamed it on Facebook and phones. Here's his quote.

He said it on Mark Maron's podcast. He said, Disney did a fantastic promotion job. The bosses loved the movie. I was concerned it was not for them. And his explanation for the horrible box office performance was millennials. I think it boils down to what we've got today are audiences who were brought up on these fucking cell phones. The millennials, he actually said millennium, do not ever want to be taught anything unless you're told it on a cell phone. This is a broad stroke, but I think we're dealing with it right now with Facebook. This is a misdirection

that has happened where it's given the wrong kind of confidence to the latest generation, I think. given the wrong kind of confidence to the latest generation i think now twitter spent two full days dunking on this there's a lot of people who are uh pointing at various simpsons memes of of uh old man yells at cloud or principal skinner saying no it's the it's the children who are wrong just everyone loved clowning on this very old director who says my movie didn't do well a movie that by the way i have to say again is over two and a half hours long and also um features the same unambiguous sexual assault scene twice uh so there are i bring these two things up to say that there are plenty of reasons to not want to go see this movie in theaters oh also we're in a pandemic another reason people might have not flocked to go see this movie um but

anyway people have been dunking on him for for what feels very much like an old man take like yeah no one saw my movie because of their damn phones and facebook uh my counterpoint i i think this rocks i think it rocks that ridley scott is saying his movie is great and the promotion for it was perfect and the reason it didn't perform is because the audiences are wrong uh it's that's like as a writer creator it's the it's the the second best future i can hope for myself. The first is that I continue the somewhat neck-breaking pace of successfully making things that people like until I or the audience dies.

But my second favorite is this one, where I just have confidence forever. Because there are a lot of directors and aging filmmakers. Here are what I think are three directions aging filmmakers can take. They can retire early. They can do their absolute best to give a disconnected audience

what they think that audience wants, which is like a genuine fear that I have for myself that I will one day do. Or they could do this thing that Ridley Scott does where they just stay, oh no, there's four things. They could do the thing that I mentioned before where they stay on top of their game forever.

Or they could do the Ridley Scott thing where you just say, fuck it, the audience is wrong. I think it rules. I think it rocks. I think it's tight that the guy who made Blade Runner and Thelma and Louise and Gladiator and Alien tells the audience, you're fucking wrong for not liking this because who else but him can say something like that?

Yeah. I have one small hitch that complicates my hot take. Are you ready for it? Yeah. Can I guess what it is? Sure. Is it the very last sentence he said? No.

Okay. So it's not about the entitlement? No. Okay. Go ahead. I'm one of the few people who saw the last duel in theaters and it sucks well what do you know you're fucking millennia millennium you stupid millennium on your facebook i know think dreaming about broadway's well you should be watching this movie i spent so much time on facebook and that's why i sat through two hours and 37 minutes of the last duel and then walked out saying this sucked the poor guy referenced facebook which was like he was just lining himself up to be dumped on at that point but uh i i mean i was agreeing with him what you were saying until the very last sentence,

which was that he somehow equated it to entitlement. Yeah. Which I don't totally understand. Maybe he could elaborate. Given the wrong kind of confidence to the latest generation. Oh, right. The wrong kind of confidence. I don't know what the fuck that means.

Like that everyone gets to criticize this movie. Well, that was always been the case. Ridley Scott. Everyone's always been allowed to do that. But I think he's totally right about phones and not in a way where like kids don't care about anything unless they read about how good it is on their phone or whatever. I think I've talked to you before about Squid Game and why I like Squid Game so much. I was forced to watch it because I had to read the subtitles.

And boy, did I enjoy that show because I had to watch it. I had to read the subtitles and boy, did I enjoy that show because I had to watch it. Any show that forces me to act, any movie where I'm not one foot out the door, just kind of like playing on my phone and seeing what's happening on Twitter or checking out my fantasy football lineup or whatever, then that movie, I will guarantee I will like that movie more because I was, I had no choice but to be absorbed in it and so you got these movies that are released i don't know if this one's on streaming yet is it last duel yeah i don't think so okay but that's part of the like i would not be incentivized to go to the movie theater it'd be like reading a book to me because i have to sit there and i

gotta read it and i it's i know i going to enjoy it while I'm in it. But getting there feels like a slog. And if I can watch a movie at home where every once in a while I check out to go get some water or check on what the weather is going to be like on Thursday, like that kind of stuff. I want that kind of relaxation. Yeah, it's I as someone who loves going to the movies and still tries to go as often as possible i do the experience is worse for me post pandemic uh because i really do think per your point and and ridley

scott's point something has happened to my attention span where i like having my computer and phone usually both of them close at hand when i'm watching something on tv so even though i love the i used I love the, I used to love the experience of being in a movie theater and just like, it's a big dark room with a loud thing that is going to shoot sound at me and pictures. There's I'm like physically less comfortable sitting in a theater. And, and the first thing I do when I get there is look at how long,

like what's the running time for house of Gucci or ghostbusters. And then I'm just like, I'm sitting there feeling that running time for house of gucci or ghostbusters and then i'm just like i'm sitting there feeling that running time and thinking i i want my computer again i want my phone again yes also you're at a point in your life where you've watched enough movies or you've written enough that you know where the ebbs and flows are of the story you know that in the beginning you're going to get something that's fairly heightened and exciting and visually appealing to lure you in and then things like

the emotional wrap-up it's less important for you to be looking at the screen yeah and so you're just like the as soon as you feel that emotional wrap-up coming you just your hand instinctively starts reaching right across the couch for your phone um anyway that's all the stuff i had to say about that i think i think he's right i guess that's not all the stuff that i had to say like like uh sorry to interrupt you but i completely divorce it from whether or not he's right about what facebook is doing or what phones are doing or why his movie failed because there are plenty of arguments they're like some in his favor some against his favor uh i separate from all that i i really like a director who loves his movie and cares about it to come out and say the audience is wrong i think that's really refreshing i think it's really neat uh history may judge us both harshly for that but i don't know what

what uh what cooler thing he's supposed to say you know he's he's spent a bunch of time and a lot of other people's money really working hard to make this movie and it fucking bombs what's he supposed to say yeah you're right i i really blew it this time i think it's cool that he's like nah you're uh you're idiots i'm the guy who made blade runner and alien and thelma and louise and gladiator you should just you should see every movie i ever do you fucking morons what's it gonna take how many blade runners do i have to make before you just like decide it's a Ridley Scott movie? Yeah. And also just fucking have a little patience through it.

Like sit there and really explore. If you don't like it, fine. What didn't you like about it? Maybe that detail's there on purpose. Now try and figure out why it's there. Take the time to actually examine what you're watching and it's not just a bunch of shadows hitting you in the face like from a screen yeah i understand that impulse that's what we used to do with crack studios all the time

cracks everything that we made by crack studios we never felt like it did very well and every every single time we'd be like well these fucking animals don't get it yeah we had to make a movie for dogs the of course we don't know what they want we're just shooting in the dark and we tried to make something we liked right um and famously i did did anything from crack studios do very very well no not not by not as well as as after hours or honest ads. And we worked so hard on them all. Yeah. Those were the things we worked the very hardest on.

We were so loving with the scripts and worked. Oh, we want it to be good. Oh, well. Oh, well. Poor Ridley Scott. His brother's dead now. Poor Ridley Scott, just out there toiling on his version of rum.com. I get it, brother. Everybody's got one. We are the same, Ridley Scott, just out there toiling on his version of rom.com. I get it, brother.

Everybody's got one. We are the same, Ridley. Everybody's got Dispatches from Goddamn Space somewhere in their library. I can't imagine it hurts him at all, though. As a director with that much clout, you make the movie. You care about it. You love it. Once you give uh you make the movie you care about it you love it once you give it to the public you obviously know it's theirs at that point and they can do what they want with it and if they don't like it you're not going your movie doesn't make back the

money that you spent on it you don't go to director jail or anything like that for no you don't have to pay that money you fucking made your money you still get to make movies there's really no issue with other everybody hating your movie. He released Last Duel and then four months later, House of Gucci. He directed two, two and a half hour movies that both came out this year. With Adam Driver in them. That's wonderful. Yeah, his life will go on.

He will be fine. So in that respect, I'm like, all all right well what what do you mean with your last sentence there because you have all the power sir like you have all the confidence in the yeah anyway i do think something that he's talking about with with facebook and phones is not an attention thing as much as much as it's like um we we are seeing the shrinking influence of movie critics and that can be even as I'm saying that sentence I'm picturing

very tiny violins like who gives a shit about that but that is a thing I've heard like a lot of directors worrying about and whining about which is it used to be that like trusted film critics would come out and tell you which movies to see and then you would go see those movies uh but if you like

and now that's not happening anymore and it's bad for movies but if you stretch that complaint out to its logical conclusion it's like okay that's what used to happen now it's happening people are listening to their friends who have seen the movie and they're tweeting about it and saying it's bad? Okay. It doesn't mean the movie was better when there were only critics telling you what to do. It just means like like yeah that

makes total sense. 20 years ago Roger Ebert would say go see this movie and I would do it because Roger Ebert was the only one who saw it. Now I go on Twitter and I see a bunch of my friends who saw it and saying it's bad it's like okay then i'm not gonna do it that doesn't mean uh i want to say that doesn't mean the people are wrong but i think my whole take was that the people are wrong hmm this one's gotten away from me. Any way you can sum it up? Sum it up, Soren?

Go see it. Go see the movie. And if you don't like it, then let Ridley Scott know. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know what to tell you. I gave my two cents. And I was agreeing with you. Yeah.

Alright. Well, I think we've talked enough for today. I think so, too. So, I think we're going to end it here. tell you i i gave my two cents and i i was agreeing with you yeah all right well i think we've talked enough for today i think so too so i think we're gonna end it here i want to tell you how you can get in touch with daniel or me if you want to oh yeah before you do that uh i don't know i guess this episode will be coming out second week of de. I might not even be on Twitter anymore. I'm toying around with deactivating my account for a month to see if it makes me happier. Okay. And then that might be forever.

All right. You can give them my handle just in case. Okay. Because I might go two days without an account and get real itchy and need it. I'm curious how you will end up getting your news. Yeah. Okay.

Well, you can follow Daniel on Twitter for a limited time at dob underscore inc. You can follow me, Soren, at Soren underscore ltd. You can follow our CFO, Bacon, at makemebaconplease, spelled P-L-S. And you can follow Quick Question at QQ underscore Soren and Dan. Or let's say you want to email us. You could do that at QQ with Soren and Dan. Or let's say you want to email us. You could do that at QQ with Soren and Daniel at gmail.com. We also have a Patreon. It's just Patreon slash Quick Question.

And then you can... You know what? I'm not even going to say that you can follow or find or hire our sound engineer and producer and engineer because I don't think you ever can. I'm just going to say our sound engineer, producer, and editor is named Gabe Harder. And that's it. Yeah.

The end of that. I sure hope he got his sight back. All right. Bye. Bye.