The Bechdel Cast - It's a Wonderful Life

Episode Date: December 14, 2023

Welcome to this week's LIVE episode on It's a Wonderful Life, recorded in LA at Dynasty Typewriter! Thanks for helping us raise money for ANERA and PCRF. Also, Please check out linktr.ee/BechdelCast for tickets to Santa University on December 21, and our upcoming tour in February 2024!  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey, y'all. Niminie here. I'm the host of a brand new history podcast for kids and families called Historical Records. Executive produced by Questlove, The Story Pirates, and John Glickman, Historical Records brings history to life through hip-hop. Get the kids in your life excited about history by tuning in to Historical Records. Listen to Historical Records on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Gianna Pradenti. And I'm Jemaine Jackson-Gadsden. We're the hosts of Let's Talk Offline from LinkedIn News and iHeart Podcasts. There's a lot to figure out when you're just starting your career. That's where we come in. Think of us as your work besties you can turn to for advice. And if we don't know the answer, we bring in people who do,

like negotiation expert Maury Tahiripour. If you start thinking about negotiations as just a conversation, then I think it sort of eases us a little bit. Listen to Let's Talk Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On the Bechdel cast, the questions asked if movies have women in them. Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands or do they have individualism? The patriarchy's effing vast. Start changing it with the Bechdel cast. Hello, Bechdel cast listeners. My name is Caitlin. And my name is Jamie. And this is the Bechdel cast. You know it, you love it. If this is your first time,

catch up, baby. Yeah, because it's an unusual week, thin and unusual months on the cast. And I celebrate that. This week, we are releasing a live show and not just any live show, a live show we just recorded in Los Angeles as of this recording less than 24 hours ago. Yes. And speaking of live shows, so we'll get to the episode in just a moment. But before we do do we want to take this opportunity to let you know about more live shows that we are going to be doing because we have a tour planned for February 2024 we are going to the Bay Area we'll be doing a show in San Francisco and Sacramento. Then we are heading to Texas for shows in Dallas and Austin. And then we were swinging back around to California and doing a show in San Diego. Now at the time of

us recording this, we're still finalizing some of the details, but a few ticket links are already live and up on our link tree link tree slash Bechtelcast which is also linked in the description and yeah we're super excited to be back on the road we hear you Bechtelcast listeners that we need to get off our asses and get off the west coast so you'll see a lot of that in the coming months. And we're excited. We were particularly excited to go to Austin because we had a show in Austin that was sold out, scheduled for April 2020.

And you'll never believe what happened next. So we are excited to finally, almost four years later, make it back to Austin and head over to and head over to dallas as well so and we're we're just pumped to be back on tour yes and for this live show you'll know from the title we covered it's a wonderful life uh is it we spent some time pondering deciding and another deciding. And another important element of this show is that half of the proceeds from this show went to ANERA and PCRF. These are both nonprofits that are contributing to aid taking place in Gaza right now. Of course, if you're listening and you are a person in the world you are very likely aware of what's going on in gaza right now there is not a lot of aid reaching gaza because of the horrific genocidal practices that

are taking place around gaza however we we wanted to do what we can not just by making our politics very clear on this show i know we've referenced it, but for the sake of just being explicit about it on the feed. Yeah, so half of the money from the show went to the PCRF, short for Palestine Children's Relief Fund, and NARA is short for American Near East Refugee Aid. So that money has been donated and sincerely hope that the aid that is being sent is able to actually reach the people of Gaza as soon as possible. Free Palestine. Seas fire.

America is the worst place in the world. So that was what we, we, you know, are doing in addition to continuing to to raise awareness as we can that said we really appreciate everyone who came out to the show we had a really great time and who watched the live stream bought tickets to the live stream yes really appreciate you supporting us supporting this fundraising effort thank you so so much. Yes. We recorded, it was our first show

at Dynasty Typewriter in Los Angeles. So huge shout out to Dynasty and their team. God, it was so cool. The live stream set up there is wonderful. The vibes are immaculate. And we had the best time. We really did. If you caught the live stream, thank you. If you were there and got to hang out, even better. And we're excited to hit more cities and see more listeners soon. So true. But for now, we've got business to do. Well, and then one more live show for you to plug, Jamie. Okay.

Yes. If you're in the Los Angeleseles area and you should be please head out to the elysian theater where we've also done live shows in the past the elysian theater in la we will be doing a live reading of the first and most recent certainly not last installment of santa university if you're listening to the bextel cast and you don't know what santa university is get with the program shame on you shame on you kind of santa university is a bit but is it that it's real it's okay it's a documentary it's hundreds of pages i've written at this point so i feel like it has to be real um it's a scream a 600 allegedly

600 page screenplay that we've been doing every holiday season I'll write a new 20 to 30 pages depending on how much time I give myself to write it each year it's super jokey it's super goofy uh we can link an example in the description but it's like my favorite thing to do in the world because besides the Bechtelcast of course it's like the most it's the most brain my favorite brain dead activity in the entire planet is writing Santa University I don't use one brain cell I have six panic attacks and it's not good so you should come caitlin will be reprising their treasured holiday role of sully okay best character scene stealing where's the spinoff you know six seasons in a movie for sully sully high school sully high oh my gosh i'll find i'll write it you don't have

to twist my arm just to give you an idea of uh the kinds of characters found in this world sully is a character who's from boston massachusetts who fired the protagonist dan santa from lids um and generally wait kitlin will you do sully's iconic line oh my god you're so fucking beautiful so it's also a feminist text sully appreciates women and he cat calls all the right reasons um anyways you should come hang out we're uh donating all the proceeds from that show to a non-profit that i love very much i volunteer with them sila that supports the unhoused community in LA. So even if it's the worst show on the planet,

and it might be, your money's going to a wonderful place. So come out, we'll link that as well. But you know what show definitely wasn't the worst show in the world. It was in fact one of the best and maybe in fact the best. The one that you're about to hear so without much further ado please enjoy our live episode of it's a wonderful life

so y'all this is quest love and i'm here to tell you about a new podcast I've been working on with the Story Pirates and John Glickman called Historical Records. It's a family-friendly podcast. Yeah, you heard that right. A podcast for all ages. One you can listen to and enjoy with your kids starting on September 27th. I'm going to toss it over to the host of Historical Records, Nimany, to tell you all about it. Make sure you check it out. Hey, y'all. Nimany here. I'm the host of a brand new history podcast for kids and families called Historical Records. Historical Records brings history to life through hip-hop.

Flash, slam, another one gone. Bash, bam, another one gone. The crack of the bat and another one gone. The tip of the cap is another one gone. Bash, bam. Another one gone. The crack of the bat and another one gone. The tip of the cap is another one gone. Each episode is about a different inspiring figure from history. Like this one about Claudette Colvin, a 15-year-old girl in Alabama who refused to give up her seat on the city bus nine whole months before Rosa Parks did the same thing. Check it. And it began with me.

Did you know, did you know? I wouldn't give up my seat. Rosa Parks did the same thing. Check it. Get the kids in your life excited about history by tuning in to Historical Records. Because in order to make history, you have to make some noise. Listen to Historical Records on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16, 2017, was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate.

My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhearts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, everybody.

This is Matt Rogers. And Bowen Yang. We've got some exciting news for you. You know we're always bringing you the best guests, right? Well, this week we're taking it to the next level. The one, the only, Katherine Hahn is joining us on Lost Culture East. That's right. The queen of comedy herself. Get ready for a conversation that's as hilarious as it is insightful.

Tune in for all the laughs, the stories, and of course, the culture. I feel some Sandra Bernhard in you. Oh, my God. I would love it. I have to watch Lost. Oh, you have to. No, I know. I'm so behind.

Katherine Hanken's thing. Oh, I'm really good at karaoke. What's your song? Yeah, what's your song? Oh, I love a ballad. I felt Bjork's music. I just was like, who is this person? I got to hawk this slalom, Luge.

Not hawk the slalom. I absolutely love it. It was somehow Shakespearean when you said it. It was somehow gorgeous. Yee, my slok, you hollum. Listen to Las Culturistas on Will Ferrell's Big Money Players Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get

your podcasts. Hi, welcome to the Bechtelcast! Wow! Hello, LA. Wow. It's us and we live here and you live here, maybe. We went shopping together this morning to get these fits together. I have a very cool shirt under this and maybe I'll take this sweater off at some point it's okay because we haven't

done an la live show in in a bit and i think that one of the last ones we did at least you did an actual strip tease because we were covering magic mike yes round of applause if you were at that show. Wow. So you saw. That was one of the most, wait, Titanic quote. It was the most erotic experience of my life. Up until then, at least. Last March. And then you and I start making out right now. And then we start making out and then you start drawing me?

Yeah, I guess that's how that would work. Yes. Anyways, thanks for coming. Thanks for coming at 4 p.m. too. We're like, do people come out at 4 p.m.? Let's find out. It's a little scary. It's dark out though. It feels like

night. And that concludes our kind of warm-up portion of the show. Shout out to anyone watching the live stream yes hi hello yeah say woo for them they're so mad they're not in the little seats aren't they they're um okay give it up if you have uh if you have listened to the bechdel cast before. We like to take a chance. Okay. Free applause.

Give it up if you have been dragged here by someone who listens to the Bechdel cast and you're scared and you don't know what's going to happen. Oh. Oh my. The lights went off and I just saw one guy like, woohoo.

Fear got in his eyes but he was ready he's good we're scary yeah we're scary we're scared but we're wearing nice little outfits so

it's all about aesthetics that's true so the movie we're covering today if you can't tell from our very festive apparel

is a movie that we have I feel like because our show has been around for so long, we have covered so many holiday movies. Yes. Right down to the one that came out on Netflix last year where Lindsay Lohan gets bonked on the head.

But we hadn't covered one that is considered a classic, which is It's a Wonderful Life. That's right. So just to take the temp once more, give it up if you have seen and enjoy A Wonderful Life. All right. And if you haven't seen it. Okay.

Brave, brave. I had it. I don't know. I haven't seen shit i i watched the godfather in march and i was like it's pretty good you guys they're kind of the godfather's kind of slay these uh these frank c's know how to direct a movie and that's a reference to this movie directed by frank capra and francis ford coppola

who maybe was also called frank i don't know we don't know there's no way to know because he's alive i just remembered so we could ask him um to get to get started caitlin yes what is your history with the movie it's a wonderful life 1946 so i saw the movie for the first time and i was like probably 18 or 19 i did not grow up with this movie so i have no nostalgic attachment to it and i controversially do not really like this movie sorry thank you okay i have good reasons i find jimmy stewart irritating sorry thank you again he's irritating okay i disagree with that a lot of people do i am in the minority i do think but i find his character to be mostly unlikable. And yeah, I just, I'm not a fan, but I'm gonna set that aside

and look at this movie objectively for this episode. And wink. And can I just say, I would just wanna start by commending you for your bravery. Thank you. For watching the movie on, oh, I want, okay. Wait, my history with this movie. Yes, yes tell me is that i had not seen it uh like most movies we've covered on this show it's usually my first time watching it um unless it's like the lizzie mcguire movie i'm like yeah i've seen this movie

500 times i've seen bad movies 500 times this one I hadn't seen. And I started watching it. It's available for free on Roku TV right now. Asterisk, they couldn't afford the music. So they've replaced it with like baby Einstein music. And I would really recommend that experience. Because it's so jarring. If I hadn't been watching the movie with someone that was like, hold on, something is very wrong.

Because in the Roku TV one, every time Clarence, not the elf, in my mind, okay, the things I'm going to fuck up repeatedly in this episode, I'm going to call him Clarence the elf. And I'm going to call Bedford in this episode, I'm going to call him Clarence the Elf. And I'm going to call Bedford Falls New Bedford, Massachusetts. And that will keep happening, and I will not apologize for it. That's fine. But yeah, anytime, like, and this,

I don't even know what happens in the original score, but they add in this royalty-free alphabet song. every time clarence is on screen it goes like and you're just like this could twinkle twinkle little star abcdefg it's the same tune oh that is it caitlin abcd twinkle okay yeah i see it the lack of trust between us it's the same i only learned that from like clickbait in 2012 or something i don't know it's like did you know some crack.com shit on their on their crack.com shit anyways um i had not seen it before i started watching it with the wrong music and i got scared uh and then i watched it for a second time with

the correct music and i liked it better uh i i have complicated feelings towards this movie because i didn't grow up with it uh my family never showed it to me and and I asked my mom why, and she answered with one word, which was boring. She's not wrong. She's not wrong. The thing is, like, I think this is, I, well, actually, round of applause if you grew up with this movie and watched it as a kid. Weirdos.

This is such a depressing, weird long movie it opens with with a man about to take his own life because he's been told by society that he's worth more dead than alive and you as a six-year-old we're like let them cook like that's that's that's interesting i yeah i think that if i saw this when i was a kid i would have uh left the room and been like can we turn on spongebob but like yeah or muppet christmas carol the only christmas movie right right i like because we're babies and yes so anyways i hadn't seen it i watched it for the first time to get ready for this episode and i have like complicated feelings towards it because i think in some ways ways there were parts where I felt very emotional.

I was like, wow, I like am surprised that these sort of values are being shown in a movie from the forties. And then in other ways, I'm like, why is he yelling at his wife in every scene there? Why is he yelling or aggressively forcing a kiss on to Donnana reed in every single scene and so i would

say i don't know i'm willing to be swayed okay and i am a and i and i will also qualify that with i am actively afraid of fans of this movie um and i don't want to get yelled at but i but we have a job to do. And that's why you're here. And we've famously never been wrong before. So true. Why start now? All right, shall I do the recap?

Caitlin's famous recap. Let's do it. Okay, here we go. Wow, thank you. All right, so we're going to place a content warning for suicide right here. Which is a wild we're going to place a content warning for suicide right here. Which is a wild way to have to open a holiday movie. That's like, okay.

Yes, okay. So we open in Bedford Falls, USA. New Bedford, Massachusetts. Ever heard of it? I think it's in upstate New York is my best guess. That's what upstate New York is my best guess. That's what upstate New York is really like. I was reading, I went in so deep on the parts of this movie that don't matter. There's been arguments for the better part of a century of like,

were they referencing this town in upstate New York? Or was it just a guy being like, there's a town? It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It's New Bedford. Yeah. town um it doesn't matter it doesn't matter it's new bedford yeah so there are a bunch of voices praying asking that george bailey be helped then we see some stars in the night sky or is it heaven the heavens even maybe they're talking because the stars are actually angels and they hear

people's prayers about george bailey and they send an angel named clarence to help george not before insulting clarence oh my gosh uh being like where's i i feel like Clarence has big Dan Santa energy to me in that they're like, this angel looks like shit. He can't even read. He can't even read. We don't like him. We don't respect him. But, and that shows what the heavens feel about George Bailey.

They're sending him their very worst. So true. Okay, so the reason Clarence is going to go help George George Bailey. They're sending him their very worst. So true. Okay. So the reason Clarence is going to go help George is because he is thinking of ending his life. Clarence has not gotten his wings yet, his angel wings. So the other angels say that if he's able to help George, he will get his wings. So ulterior motives, they're there it's true he

doesn't give a shit about actually helping someone he's just like I want my wings right and we could argue you know the level of like how well does Clarence actually do at his job I mean it's kind of up for you know it's up for this guy and I hear that there's some Clarence heads and that are like he did what he had to do clarence i think ultimately spoiler alert at the end when clarence does get his wings i just like wanted like a centerfold like a nude centerfold with clarence and his wings oh and you want him to be nude for that for me he would have to be nude for that there can you imagine the cover december 1946 clarence gets his wings and then you open the magazine it's nude clarence huge wingspan wow and this would be where in like in playboy magazine magazine oh okay yeah horny sex god magazine okay all right well anyway so

um the other angels start telling clarence about george and so most of the movie is flashbacks to george's life starting with george bailey as a kid he saved his little brother harry when he fell through some thin ice uh then george who works at a drug store um child labor alert he prevents someone from getting poisoned because the druggist mr gower accidentally tries to give someone poison capsules instead of medicine. Because his son died, Caitlin. Yes, I'm sorry. His son died so he was crying so he couldn't see the huge jug of poison. He got confused.

He was having a bad day. It could have been any of us. It's true. It's true. Who among us has an accidentally poisoned child? Okay. So we also meet mr potter he's played by lionel barrymore um he's the richest man in town he's very mean he's very evil and he's always trying to put the building in loan that george's father and his uncle billy run mr potter is trying to put it out of business all the time. Mr. Potter, very much the villain.

However, I think one of the most, like I haven't seen a more iconic movie wheelchair than Mr. Potter's. I mean. He's had it retrofitted into a full throne. A throne, yes. And I respect that about him and nothing else. Right. Yeah. Okay, so we cut to george bailey as a

young man he's now played by james stewart um his whole thing is he can't wait to get out of his town of bedford falls aka new bedford massachusetts yeah he wants much more than this provincial life i literally wrote that in my notes that's that's why he keeps fucking saying it i'm like have you not seen beauty and the beast 1991 bitch yeah so he can't wait to get out explore the world he has a trip coming up that he where he's going to go to europe and then he's going to go to college after that so then we meet some townspeople, such as Ernie, the cab driver, Bert, the cop. And then we're like, okay, Bert and Ernie. And then we're like, oh, no, Wikipedia is ahead of us on this.

And it's a coincidence. Sorry. Yeah, right. You're going to start a conspiracy. Jim Hansen, you fucking liar. Okay, then we also meet Violet. She's blonde and she's hot. She's an icon.

I love Violet. I mean, I wish we knew more about her. Violet's done so dirty in this movie. Well, we'll get back to it. We also meet George's mother, another woman we barely know anything about. Anyway. What's her first name? Mama.

Mrs. Okay. George heads to his brother Harry's graduation party. This is where he reconnects with Mary, played by Donna Reed. And they see each other and they're both like a wuga and they start dancing and then there's this whole thing where they fall into a swimming pool i i this is a like i'm okay with a swimming pool jump scare that's gonna be good for me in every movie however this whole sequence and i know that like i don't know there's no good way to do this other than

truly casting a younger actor to play the character when they're younger but there's a whole 20 minute chunk of this movie where a visibly 40 year old jimmy stewart is supposed to be 21 yeah and it's so confusing it's unbelievably confusing because you have to like go through all of these layers of dissonance which is first of all like even riverdale wasn't pushing like this yeah you know it's like he looks his age and that's great but he keeps being like how old are you and i'm like how old are you and he's like 21 and you're like no you're not you're not you fucking liar and then you and then on top of that, you have to weave through the fact that the age gaps between hetero Hollywood couples have always been so huge

that Donna Reed does look closer to the age she's supposed to be. And Jimmy Stewart looks 40. And I'm like, is this canonically predatory or is it just casting predatory? And anyways, it's casting predatory and Jimmy Stewart's definitely 21.

Yeah. So confusing. Also another movie where at least young characters, maybe not young actors, but young characters are in a swimming pool

thinking. Fully clothed. Fully clothed. Just like, say it with me now, Leonardo DiCaprio. Fake fans. Un-fucking- believable look it up no yeah people fully clothed in the pool having a coming of age moment yeah it's a timeless trope

it is yeah well normally the the like young people having a coming of age moment are in their like swim wear yeah but if you're leonardo dicaprio you're fully clothed every time and we don't know why yes exactly okay so they fall in a swimming pool and then we cut to later that evening they're walking around they're flirting they walk past this old run-down house that mary loves We'll put a pin in that. And she's wearing a robe because her clothes got wet from falling in the swimming pool. And so there's this part where her robe falls off and she's naked and she's hiding in the bushes.

And we will just have to talk about that later because it's too much right now. Then George gets word that his father had a stroke he dies from it so george feels obligated to cancel his trip to europe and to take over his father's business um the bailey building and loan the evil mr potter who is a board member tries to dissolve it but george makes this impassioned speech and the board votes to keep the building and loan going as long as george is in charge which like messes with his plans to go to college and explore the world so now he's stuck in bedford falls he's a 40-year-old college freshman. He's way behind. He keeps, like, it really is so,

watching this movie for the first time in the past week was so jarring because he's talking to his father. He's like, I have to go to college. I'm like, yeah, man, hurry up. You're running out of time. Yeah. So he feels stuck in his town, at least until his brother Harry finishes college so that Harry can take over the family business. But four years later, when Harry returns from school, Harry's wife's father has offered Harry a job.

So George has to stay with the building and loan. Then George's mother urges him to get with mary who has also been away at school until now but george doesn't want to compete with his friend sam wainwright who was very much like all the adults in the graduate who were like you gotta get into plastics that's sam wainwright huge yeah he started the trend yeah yeah he's also in love with mary um well but is he though because you cut to him on the phone and you're like well he seems to be cheating on her today yeah and he more calls for a business proposal than like a social call he's calling to talk to george which is interesting because the house he calls george does not live at i know um but you know i think that that is

just like hollywood coding for he's a dog we don't care yeah about this sam wayne wright character in any george is a good guy but then you're like is he is it a wonderful life even? We don't know. Anyway, so George goes over to Mary's house and she's very excited to see him, but he is such an asshole to her in this scene and she gets visibly upset about it. And then he grabs her and screams in her face, but don't worry, they will get married in the next scene cut to their marriage their wedding i was watching this with someone near dear to my heart and they were crying through that entire

scene i was like i don't understand what is beautiful about the scene but um but you know life comes at you fast yes okay so then george and mary are headed to their luxurious honeymoon with a stack of cash which is really cool of them i mean is that what happened in 1946 like here's my budget like it's just in your hands scary yeah this is like pre Venmo certainly I know that oh my god okay then the stock market crash of 1929 happens

I think that happens in Titanic too did it happen in real life sound off in the comments. Okay, so everyone's rushing to take their money out of the bank. So George turns around and goes to the building and loan where a bunch of people are demanding their money. But Uncle Billy had given away all the cash to the bank to pay off a loan or i don't know what i love about uncle billy is that he's

professionally known as uncle billy you never hear anyone call him billy whether they're his peer his relative his client they're all like, Uncle Billy, you fuck up. Yes. Get that bird out the way. Okay, so they don't have any cash on hand to give to the customers, and Mr. Potter is threatening to steal all of the customers and close down the business.

So then George has to shell out his own personal stack of cash that he was going to use for his honeymoon. And he gives it to all the townspeople in order to save the business. Then he's like, oh, right. It's my wedding day. I have to call my wife. He's like, oh, yeah, I left my wife in a running car six hours ago. Better check in.

And she's like, come to this address so he shows up and it's the like old rundown house that mary has always loved and now it's their house i think they're squatting in it i actually think i have uh well i was gonna say this later but like i think that that is like if that is because i wasn't able to find any uh maybe some listeners understand the plot reason why that happened but if they really did see an unclaimed house and then just reclaimed it i think that that is like one of the more radical things that happens in the movie it's true yeah i'm fine with it yeah i mean that happens now and it's like necessary and cool because there's so much housing that's just like left empty so i'm like yeah this mansion

you've been throwing rocks at for 20 years clearly no one lives here move the fuck in see who see who yells at you yeah but she has prepared a little honeymoon for them at this house we cut to some time later george bailey has set up this place called bailey park where a lot of his customers have built homes. People who used to live in Mr. Potter's shitty houses and, you know, pay rent to him because he's an evil landlord, but now they're homeowners thanks to George. Then Mr. Potter offers George a job, I think in an effort to like eliminate him as a competitor and he's offering george much better pay which would give him the freedom to travel around the world but george is like no i just remembered that i hate you so no thanks i i do like that scene though because he's like offer you know like

he has like a carrot dangled in front of him of like isn't capitalism the best? And George is like, yeah, I want a nice shoe. And then there's this like great slash weird acting choice from Jimmy Stewart where he shakes Mr. Potter's hand and then he pulls it away because he's decided that capitalism is bad actually. But he's pulling it away like there's something on the hand.

Like pee pee and poo poo. It's something on the hand like pee pee and poo poo it's like they're like wait a second mr potter has shit on his like or cum or jelly or just something unpleasant to find on a hand yeah and that's what changed that's what made him realize capitalism was bad yes yes was cum on the we can all agree with that yes add it to the wikipedia page so george then goes home and his wife tells him that she's pregnant yeah and then she just starts T-shirt gunning him out. Oh, my gosh. Greg, Greg, Greg. Four Gregs in total.

Yes. Yeah. But also, there's a war on. There is. So before that, you know, they have a couple kids. Mary fixes up their house. George continues working at the building and loan. And then World War II begins.

A bunch of men go to fight in the war did that happen in real life i wonder i don't know once again what is this uso they spoke i don't know but george stays behind because of a hearing impairment that um when he saved his brother from falling through the ice he lost hearing in one year then his brother harry comes back a war hero if there's any such thing as a hero of war again very brave thank you so much um okay anyway it's christmas eve now, and Uncle Billy is about to make a deposit to the bank of $8,000 in cash. I did the math. That is about $125,000 in 2023 money adjusted for inflation. Not to come down too hard on Uncle Billy, but if you saw how many squirrels are in this man's office, would you give him that amount of money in cash

to deposit he's simply too eccentric to give that amount of money in cash it's true and what he does is absentmindedly tuck the cash into a newspaper that he then hands to Mr. Potter, who realizes Uncle Billy's mistake, but doesn't tell anyone and just steals the money. Spoiler alert, even with the happy ending of this movie, Mr. Potter gets away with this. It's really interesting. I mean, realistic. I think, well, yeah, it's another part of the movie I like.

Not that that happened, but that it's realistic. Rich people get away with shit all the time. Yep. Oh, too real for you okay wait does that happen sound up in the comments okay so uncle billy is obviously freaking out about having lost this money george is freaking out if they don't come up with it they'll go bankrupt and maybe even end up in prison so george goes home he screams at his wife and his children he kicks some furniture over we'll also talk about this scene in more detail like what why are you upset

uh then he leaves and goes to mr potter asking for a loan of eight thousand dollars and mr potter wants some collateral so george offers up his life insurance policy worth fifteen thousand dollars and he realizes he's worth more dead than alive so george leaves he gets drunk at Martini's bar. He crashes his car into a tree and then he goes to a bridge and is about to jump and end his life when suddenly someone else jumps in the river. It is Clarence, the guardian angel who was sent to help him. So George jumps in to save Clarence and we cut to them in some place. That part of the movie is like where the baby Einstein gets especially scary. Where through this whole like really intense,

not just emotionally charged, but like socially charged scene because we're talking about how suicide is perceived in the culture at this point and it's just baby einstein twinkle twinkle little star playing beneath the whole thing it's interesting you should check it out superior cut yeah go to roku.com uh okay so as they're in this like office i don't know they're drying off and warming up and george is like oh everybody would be better off if i was never born and clarence is like

oh really because let me show you how things would be if you were never born you're like wait a second there's only 20 minutes left in the movie he's starting the christmas carol now yeah and he is he is doing that i also liken it to the second half of back to the future too when marty goes back to 1985 and like biff is the president or whatever i haven't seen it oh my god i'm so young sorry guys okay so clarence takes george around town to show him this alternate reality if george never existed a hot take it looks fun it looks so much more fun pottersville they're like we replaced the loans office with a strip club you're like great nice but that's not what the movie would have you think it's like oh my god look how disgusting this place is now shouldn't there be more municipal buildings here okay first of all the town is no longer called bedford falls

it's now pottersville that's bad fine most of the businesses are bars nightclubs, strip clubs, casinos. That's fun. Potter is kind of the cool guy in the end. He knows how to party. None of George's friends recognize him. Everyone is just kind of like mean and in a bad mood. Mr. Gower, the druggist, is an ex-con and an alcoholic because George wasn't around to stop him from accidentally poisoning someone brutal george is like what the fuck is going on his brother is

dead yeah yes but i was i i kept well this is like way too far in the weeds but i was like but really if we thought about it if george never existed would his brother have even been invited to that ice hang that day probably not and maybe the world would be better makes you think yeah maybe it would be better if he didn't exist but that's not the point of the movie sorry it does not explore that at all um i was upset at that idea sorry okay so Okay, so George goes to his house, but it's not the nice house that his wife fixed up. It's still abandoned like it was when he was a teenager. His family isn't there because Mary never got married.

She's a quote-unquote old maid who became a librarian okay and this this scene is so iconic it's so awesome where they're like what if you were 31 years old wearing warby parker lenses with a job and you're like I would fucking kill for that, dude. That's like, that's great news for her. And she reacts appropriately because there's a man chasing her around, which is also how he acted when he was her husband.

She arguably got a better deal in the dystopia. Absolutely, yes. Because she could just go to bars and strip clubs with her own money yeah uh george is like chasing her and then she i think faints because women be fainting she's also more brunette in a way that felt aggressive but yeah no the movie acts like her like never getting married is the is a fate worse than death yes also george's mom does

not recognize him he learns that his brother harry died as a child because george wasn't there to save him when he fell through the ice and clarence is like see george you've touched so many people in your life and if he's referring to all the times that george bailey violently grabs someone then yes he has touched so many people got his ass got his ass um but clarence was like george you've had such a wonderful life it's a wonderful life and that's the name of the movie and it would be a mistake to throw it all away so george is like okay you're right so he runs back to the bridge and he prays to be alive again and that happens and then burt the cop shows up parentheses a cab and yeah a cab includes burt and i would is ACAB and... Yeah, ACAB includes Bert.

And I would... And I would say, like, in an obvious way. Yeah, yeah. And when you think about it, yes, all cops are bastards, but all cops are Bert. Wow. It's a wonderful life.

The wonderful hive is gonna come for us for this one. Or if we're like hot take george shouldn't have been born okay so burt the cop is like hey george i remember i know you and then george is like wow you recognize me so then he runs back through town he's like merry christmas he goes back home and then some men are there to arrest him for this eight thousand dollar deficit but he doesn't even freaking care because he because it's a wonderful life it turns out yeah and then all of his friends show up and give him

a bunch of money because they heard he was in trouble. Which is what the minions do with Gru. Wow. In Despicable Me 1, 2010. I've been sitting on this information for days. The end of It's a Wonderful Life very much mirrors the end of Despicable Me to the point where it may be a direct influence. Wait, which part?

Where Gru is trying to crowdfund his effort to go to the moon, and then the minions give them, gives Gru their money, because at this point it appears the minions are paid, which goes away in later installments. Wow. But in installment one, they have money, and they crowdfund Gru's effort to go to the moon. That's right.

Anyway, so his friends show up i like to think that like the because i feel like they only each give like one dollar so i think he has like 274 dollars at the end but that means 274 friends i mean wow that's i mean not that many people came to the show like that's really cool if you have 274 friends i mean not a cop for you know george bailey but that's so true but then his rich friend sam wainwright is like here's a bunch of money and then so he saved the end that's the movie so y'all this is quest love and i'm here to tell you about a new podcast i've been working on with the story pirates and john glickman called historical records it's a family-friendly podcast yeah you heard that right a podcast for all ages one you can listen to and enjoy with your kids

starting on sept September 27th. I'm going to toss it over to the host of Historical Records, Nimany, to tell you all about it. Make sure you check it out. Hey, y'all. Nimany here. I'm the host of a brand new history podcast for kids and families called Historical Records. Historical Records brings history to life through hip-hop. Flash, slam, another one gone. Historical Records brings history to life through hip-hop. Each episode is about a different inspiring figure from history.

Like this one about Claudette Colvin, a 15-year-old girl in Alabama who refused to give up her seat on the city bus nine whole months before Rosa Parks did the same thing. Check it. And it began with me. Did you know, did you know? I wouldn't give up my seat. Nine months before Rosa, it was called a woman. Get the kids in your life excited about history by tuning in to Historical Records. Because in order to make history, you have to

make some noise. Listen to Historical Records on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption

that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey everybody, this is Matt Rogers. And Bowen Yang. We've got some exciting news for you. You know we're always bringing you the best guests, right?

Well, this week we're taking it to the next level. The one, the only, Katherine Hahn is joining us on Lost Culture East. That's right, the queen of comedy herself. Get ready for a conversation that's as hilarious as it is insightful. Tune in for all the laughs, the stories, and of course, the culture. I feel some Sandra Bernhardt in you. Oh my God, I would love it. I have to watch Lost.

Oh, you have to. No, I know, I'm so behind. Katherine Hanken's thing. Oh, I'm really good at karaoke. What's your song? Yeah, what's your song? Oh, I love a ballad. I felt Bjork's music.

I just was like, who is this person? I got to hawk this slalom, Liggy. Not hawk the slalom. I absolutely love it. It was somehow Shakespearean when you said it. It was somehow gorgeous. Yee, my slok, you hollum. Listen to Las Culturistas on Will Ferrell's Big Money Players Network

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I think it's fun that sam was like remember when you when uh you aggressively uh quote unquote stole my girlfriend doesn't matter man here's a million dollars that's great that's progressive i love that it's almost like the movie cares what mary wants yeah but it doesn't no um all right so we're gonna before we get into the discussion we're gonna do a little fun little thing and it's a i'm gonna give you the rules to a drinking game that you can play okay at a later time when you're watching the movie if you want i'm excited okay so here are the rules is everyone ready

okay so you drink every time and that one's you're right to say this you're right to say this thank you so okay i love that i i also find myself wandering around the city being like can i have a million dollars hot dog i thought it was great also i realized i didn't say it and this this is a podcast it's an audio medium people will want to know so it says drink every time george bailey says hot dog it's true parentheses by raw dog by jamie loftus okay and you're right to say it and i'm right to say that next slide please so drink every time every time someone insults clarence the guardian angel the other angels insult him and then so does george bailey later on relentlessly it is very like yeah they're like dude you look like shit no wonder you

don't have wings yeah you have three brain cells that are currently operational. How are you going to stop me from my problems? IQ of the rabbit is how he's literally introduced. Yes. Yes. Next slide. So drink when George Bailey as a child says he's going to have harems and multiple wives. That only happens once in the movie, you should still but it's a worth it

it's a heavy sip take a heavy sip finish your drink even it's impactful yeah yes okay next line so drink every time the plot is contingent on you understanding how a building and loan operates but unfortunately you don't understand and you don't know what that is. You're just like, shouldn't it be one or the other? I don't. I read about it and I still don't understand how it works. This is not a reading podcast and we've said that many times. We hate books.

Except for Rod Dogg, which is Jivai. But we love that Mary becomes a librarian so we contain multitudes okay next slide please so drink every time you're reminded that houses used to cost ten dollars and that we are all dying of capitalism also uh there's mention of like a house being worth five thousand dollars i also did the math for that that is the equivalent of eighty five thousand dollars more or less in 2023 and once again we are recording this in la where houses cost at least a million dollars yeah and that's if they leak that's if they're kind of shitty uh and in the valley no disrespect oh my god to the valley i do not stand by the comments

sorry we just lost 50 patreon subscribers how dare you round of applause if you live in the valley i'm know your audience i'm so sorry and enjoy the drive home okay next slide. Okay, drink... Drink every time there's an enormous jar of poison at a pharmacy for some reason. Okay, next slide. Drink every time Violet Bick and George Bailey are so horny for each other that they nearly pass out.

We'll get back to that, yeah. Yes. Next slide. daily are so horny for each other that they nearly pass out well we'll get back to that yeah yes next slide drink every time george and his mother kiss on the lips it happens at least twice it's nuts how much this happens she's and like and i feel like it is indicated in this slide that she is initiating it. I don't know which version is worse. I'm like, is this just like a 1940s things? Did adults? You're like, wasn't the Hays Code in action by now? Yeah.

Why can you French kiss your mom? Priorities all over the place at this time truly yeah um they're like we can't have gay people on screen but you can kiss your mother on the lips and in fact you should do it twice okay next slide a drink every time there's a random animal at the bailey building and loan that's really i have something to say about that okay later on yes we see a crow or something pictured here um it's a raven but thank you sorry that's my friend um next slide please drink every time uncle billy is horrible at his job this squirrel is so... Has anyone seen The Squirrel? The Squirrel is like the best actor in the movie.

The Squirrel is hitting their mark. The second that Billy is sad, The Squirrel is like... It's really exciting. Next slide, please. It's just a close-up. Oh, yeah. Of The Squirrel. Okay, we agree.

Yeah. Okay, next slide uh and then drink every time annie is the best character in the movie now annie did not appear in the recap because uh she's not relevant to the plot at all but she is the best character and we will talk about her later yes that's the end of my drinking game okay okay context about this movie so this movie came out in 1946 just after the end of world war ii it is directed by frank capra we'll talk about his whole history because it's weird and complicated. But this was a movie that was adapted from a short story called The Greatest Gift. The Greatest Gift was published in 1939. There were a lot of writers that worked on this movie because it went through a lot of rounds of casting. And basically, every famous old Hollywood person was considered for every role

but it went to Jimmy Stewart it feels right for Jimmy Stewart whether you like him or not like it feels like a very classically Jimmy Stewart role but I think what's what's interesting about it is that a lot of the writers for this movie were later accused of being communists awesome but there there were a lot of leftist writers associated with the production of this movie although none of them were finally credited the final credits on this movie credit the screenplay to Francis Goodrich Albert Hackett and Frank Capra with some work from Joe Swirling. The two leftists that worked on this movie were Dorothy Parker and Dalton Trumbo, who is like one of the big ones.

They made a movie about him. Yeah, and it sucked. I didn't see it. And that's too bad. It's for free on Roku TV. And they played Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star the whole time. What's interesting to me about that,

because this movie flopped when it came out in 46, and I know you, do you have? Yes, I have some information about that. A box office failure in the sense that it needed to earn twice the production cost, and it only earned about the same amount that it cost to produce and make the movie so it was considered a flop so much so that when the copyright of this movie lapsed in 1974 everyone was like no one liked that movie no one went to go see it and so we're not even gonna bother to renew the copyright which means it

fell into the public domain which allowed tv stations tv networks to broadcast it basically for free they didn't have to pay any licensing or royalties on it which is why it was broadcast so relentlessly um yeah like decades and like in every christmas eve was it like broadcast or something like that yeah something like that um there's an adam ruins everything about this if you want to look that up all this to say it was a box office failure which is interesting because uh it got like a fair amount of attention outside of people who went to see it which was not too many people there's all these stories about how this movie got famous so long after it came out that some of the child

actors who played jimmy stewart's kids um jimmy stewart and donna reed because she will be erased throughout this movie uh their kids like didn't even see it until it came out on tv so it didn't become like really popular until yeah the 70s 80s 90s yeah but at the time when it came out on TV. So it didn't become like really popular until, yeah, the 70s, 80s, 90s. But at the time when it came out, it was interrogated by the FBI for espousing communist values, which is, you know, J. Edgar Hoover is gonna,

J. Edgar Hoover, right? But there's, this is, I found a piece from Tribune magazine by Reese Hadley that was published in 2021 that sort of unpacks the ways, there's a whole FBI file for It's a Wonderful Life

for being too communist. The reasons that they lay out are very interesting. The first one is that the, quote, values or institutions judged to be particularly anti-American or pro-communist, interesting, are glorified in a movie. Examples, failure, depravity, the common man, the collective. And the FBI hate that. We can't be having that in a movie. The collective. And the FBI hate that.

We can't be having that in a movie. Horrible. Another reason the FBI had an issue with this movie. They argued that the movie may have portrayed Mr. Potter as, quote, following the rules as laid down by the state bank examiners in connection with making loans. I don't even understand that sentence the fbi was like what's wrong with predatory loans oh okay that's what this country was built on and it's true okay um and then finally the fbi uh said that it's a wonderful life is a problem because it espoused, quote,

values or institutions judged to be particularly American are smeared or presented as evil in a movie. Examples, the free enterprise system, industrialist wealth, the profit motive, success, the independent man. Wow. And that like speaks to basically everything i like about this yeah same is that is and i know we'll talk about it but like the the whole um the message of this movie that i like is uh encouraging people to uh work in favor of their collective versus the individual which I think is really cool and not something you see often, especially in American movies. But it's interesting that this movie specifically

was taken down for being potentially communist because both Jimmy Stewart and Frank Capra were lifelong Republicans, hugely. Jimmy Stewart had just, I mean, Jimmy Stewart served in World War II and wasn't sure if he was going to come back to a movie career. And Frank Capra, who has a very, very interesting background, he immigrated from Italy when he was very young. He worked his way up in the movie industry

and then just kind of got America pilled in the way that unfortunately people do. And even though his movies were most popular during the Roosevelt era and are very associated with that era, he was a lifelong Republican to the point where he skewed fascistic, where he worked with Dalton trumbo but he was also like what about this mussolini guy seems like

he has some good ideas i'm truly like i'm not being uh i'm not you know and it's interesting he came like his most famous movies i think think would be, it happened one night. Mr. Smith goes to Washington also with Jimmy Stewart and this movie. And in spite of, um, you know, he,

he came to the U S as an immigrant and then he kind of became a nationalist over time as did Jimmy Stewart. And so the main two creative voices in this movie are very far from communists and I mean that as an insult uh but it's just like this weird back and forth because I I like that FBI file a lot because they're like why is this movie awesome let's kill them um it's just like a weird kind of web because it's like you, I think that the FBI file is very funny

and that those values are very clear in the movie. But then the fact that the director has praised Mussolini, you're just like, what do we do with this? But I guess from what I've gathered, and I'm not a Frank Capra expert by any means, but that Frank Capra, who skewed pretty right.

Mm-hmm. I mean, Mussolini. Yeah. Would most often collaborate with leftist writers, and they would end up with this fucking weirdo in between anything that I feel like is clear, and it's a wonderful life. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Number one, I hate Jimmy Stewart even more now. I did not know that he was a Republican. Number two, so one of the credited writers, Frances Goodrich, who is a woman? No. Oh my gosh. She worked on a draft of this script with her husband albert hackett another credited writer

but there was a pretty big dispute between them and frank capra so francis goodrich is quoted as calling capra a horrid man and a very arrogant son of a bitch so we love to see it so we we love to see pro-muzzle and eat pimple characterized that way um so that that's the background yeah for the movie should we start by talking about miss mary bailey let's do it okay so what do we know about her well it's a short list yeah uh we know that she is his wife we know that she has loved george bailey ever since she was a child for what reasons i don't know she is a talented artist and interior decorator okay this is something that like i i think is really uh i mean so much of mary bailey's story is erased in this in spite of the fact that she does have like a pretty significant like she goes through a lot but you just don't see any of it

right including she goes through a full extreme home makeover yeah of this busted ass house that she's like we are reclaiming this house that is broken and we are a part of the problem because we were throwing rocks at it and she fixes the entire house over the course of years she does like what happens on abc every weeknight and we don't see any i mean because i feel like the labor that mary does is assumed that this is just what a woman does and so it goes unseen unpraised unacknowledged uh but she's doing a fucking lot she's doing a lot but the main thing we know about that as far as like fixing up the house is that george is really ungrateful about it because he screams and has a whole monologue about how he

hates this house and it's cold and drafty and all of that um well she didn't i well that's the other thing because uh mary as far as we know like mary they they grow up together i think she's the age of harry his younger brother. So she's like about four years younger than him, which is very confusing when he's 40 and she's 23. And you're like, I don't know. Is this okay? No.

But, you know, like she goes to college in, I think New York. Ever heard of it? She has a whole sex in the city era. Yeah. And we don't hear about fucking any of it. We don't know what she majored in and we only know,

because I feel like the character of Mary in a way that I find frustrating because I like her, but she ultimately always comes down to these very like American white feminine values of the post-war era, which is like, okay,

you had your moment, you got to get some education, you got to run the USO for a little bit. And now, you know, it should be your priority to settle down to be a wife and a mother. And that's right. And we don't know about her ambitions beyond that

right so yeah i feel like she's done a very big disservice by the narrative and also by the character of george bailey i would like to wait wait wait i want to talk about an important character really quick okay because i just was like ranking the most important characters to me that I wanted to talk about. First is Mary. The second was the crow. Oh. Do you know about the crow, Caitlin?

I don't. Okay. You guys, I have a slideshow presentation. I would like to do. It's about Jimmy the Raven. if we can get him up okay wow jimmy the raven feminist ally or agent of patriarchy now caitlin let's start it like a battlecast episode what was your experience with Jimmy the Raven? I had never seen him before.

Oh, you silly podcast host. Jimmy the Raven is the most famous movie bird of all time. I also didn't know this before three days ago. But no, Jimmy the Raven is a very famous movie bird uh one of his most famous but not even his most famous appearance is in it's a wonderful life let's go to the next slide we see here uh vincent price with jimmy and a movie that he is co-starring in it's called the raven wow uh he's an icon he's a legend did you know that ravens live 30 years because i didn't his movie career spanned 18 years so whoa here's the okay someone's laughing at the lifespan of a raven it's not funny here's the thing about jimmy okay so jimmy uh was born in the mojave desert in the 1930s uh he was found by a cowboy uh named curly twyford because of course he was

now don't laugh at the name curly twyford he was found by a cowboy named curly twyford uh who was a world war one veteran who decided that he was uh you know going to make jimmy a star uh-huh interestingly this worked uh you wouldn't expect it. And I was really surprised. I did not know about Jimmy the Raven. And I say this as a big fan of famous birds. If you go to the next slide, my favorite famous bird is Andy the Goose. Who? He's wearing shoes, you'll notice.

Yeah. He was originally known as Andy the Goose with no feet. But then this guy put shoes on him, and he was okay. If you go to the next slide, there's me with Andy the Goose. I drove to Nebraska a couple of years ago to go visit his grave site. Andy the Goose, at the time, he was a real icon in the 80s. If you go to the next slide uh there he is riding a bike he was really special and then unfortunately next slide he was murdered oh my god

and you can google that on your own time next slide back to jimmy the raven i just want to plant and the Goose in your mind because he's a fascinating cultural figure. But we're talking about Jimmy the Raven today. He was a star and he was a star from the beginning. Next slide. Here's a news clip. Jim the Raven in new flicker.

Hollywood, one of the hottest stars in pictures is a quaint character named Jim. He is only 22, but has a life expectancy of 140 years. Not true. What? 30. Jim, who has stolen every movie scene in which he has appeared, is a raven. And boy, is it true. But is Jimmy the Raven a feminist? That's the question I wanted to ask. He's had a really intense career. You know, here we have the next slide is he was in The Wizard of Oz.

Yeah, playing, you know, a star-turning part as a crow when in fact he is a raven, right? The next slide, Betty Davis. They're about to fuck. I don't know if that's obvious but to me it's obvious next slide uh him and Vincent Price and he's drinking wine I mean cheers to that the next one the scariest slide of all in which he is wearing a little soldier's uniform. And then there's one more.

It's him and Curly Twyford. And Jimmy witnessed the birth of Curly Twyford's baby. He became a part of the family. Okay, we're just going to sort of go through the next few because there's just so many pictures of Jimmy. Okay, the next go through the next few because there's just so many pictures of jimmy okay the next one and the next one that's him on tv he's wearing a suit and then the next one okay that's him and jimmy cagney uh finally i want to go to the to the next slide because when the question came down to is jim the Raven a feminist? I was looking into his personal history.

And he's problematic. Oh, no. So I know. Was he like, Mussolini is awesome. No, not that far. He wasn't Frank Capra bad. But he was a problematic guy. You know, Jimmy, he was a very trained actor.

He could do things like opening mail, operating a typewriter, lighting a cigarette, flipping magazine pages, and dealing a hand of poker. Wow. Jimmy Stewart, okay, this was kind of fun. On the set of It's a Wonderful Life, Jimmy Stewart could not be called Jimmy because Jimmy the Raven would respond.

So he's also a bit of a diva. He's the first Jimmy on the call sheet. Wow. I love Jimmy the Raven so much. He was insured for $10,000 by the Red Cross, question mark. We don't know why. He got a Presidential Medal of Honor.

Also don't know why. And people talked about Jimmy in ways that were not always kind. Curly Twyford, for example, his father, explained that Jimmy had no fewer than 21 stand-ins,

most of whom were women ravens. It has been speculated since that maybe Jimmy was a woman and that there was gender confusion. There was, you know, we don't know because Jimmy's been dead for 100 years.

But Curly Twyford said, do you guys like this? Curly Twyford said, I was like in my bed making this I'm like well people hate this I think it's interesting okay Curly Twyford who plopped Jimmy's egg from the Mojave desert said Jimmy is a great egotist he likes variety and what he means when he says that is that Jimmy would have a different woman delivered to his cage every day.

And that Jimmy was insatiable sexually. I'm sorry, when you say woman, are you talking about a female raven? Or are you talking about a human woman? Well, when you say woman... No, Betty Davis had you go to his cage um i'm not i know that human women don't have probably i hope don't have sex you don't know the use of the word woman when referring to female ravens was just confusing me jimmy needed a different woman in his cage every day i mean

he was a polyamorous king yes exactly exactly maybe he was simply ahead of his time exactly but at the time he was referred to as an egotist and a diva um he also wouldn't eat meat strips delivered to him after he'd been in movies for a while because again because they said he was going to live for 140 years they're like jimmy was in over a thousand movies he was in 30 okay but including the wizard of oz and it's a wonderful life so a great career nonetheless not meaning to cut down jimmy but by the end of his career when he was very very successful he wouldn't eat strips of meat that were delivered to him unless they'd been sprinkled with sugar wow and one of his human co-stars said i'm disenchanted by him i think he's got a star complex wow uh jimmy stewart said the ra Raven is the smartest actor on set they don't have to do as many takes for him as the rest of us

so he's also kind of a genius he's the Daniel Day Lewis of birds Frank Capra was especially a fan and we don't like Frank Capra however Jimmy was basically like Scorsese, De Niro, Frank Capra, Jimmy the Raven. Okay.

He's in all of his movies. It's really bizarre. Ultimately with Jimmy, I was like, is Jimmy a feminist? You know, it was unclear given the information I had. Okay. And I'll tell you, I was not able to figure it out however the raven you see in this scene that is not Jimmy the Raven

scandal that is Coco the Raven who's that? one of Jimmy's stand-ins Caitlin of course oh my goodness and so I found this blog from 2009 brag

that is strictly around character actors that have been forgotten called the unsung Joe that explains who Coco the Raven is I'm going to quote from it and then there was Coco more than a stand-in less than a performer

Coco was a slightly older but less versatile bird who deputized for jimmy in those scenes that called for the presence of a raven but not for any of the tricks which jimmy alone was capable of the only drawback that arose from the lack of activity in coco's job was a susceptibility for that old actor's complaint klieg eyes i didn't know about that old actor's complaint. Klieg eyes. I didn't know about that old actor's complaint. I'll tell you what it is. Coco would find himself fascinated

by the huge bright studio lights and would stare into them, hypnotized, until his eyes became inflamed, turning from their inky black to a dark green, whereupon he would become distressed and curly twyford would have to remove him from the set he never learned though he loved those lights i love coco and i think there's an important scene on the next slide where coco is present and it's the scene in which Uncle Billy

is once again banned at his job, and there is a raven on the desk. This is not Jimmy the Raven, and don't credit him as such. That is Coco the Raven, because Coco the Raven was good at one thing, and that was standing still. So in conclusion,

was Jimmy the Raven an ally? And I know you were all wondering that when you walked in the answer is final slide uh Jimmy a bitch justice for Cocoa okay that's all I have to say for this show but if you have anything else to say feel free no I think that I've been working on this for seven months uh yeah no I just have a few more things to say

um we are running out of time but I'll you know I'll go through oh did that take 25 minutes look I have a section called George Bailey and his crimes yeah allow me starting with exhibit a the robe scene I have a section called George Bailey and his crimes. Yeah. Allow me.

Starting with exhibit A, the robe scene. Yes. Yes, exactly. So just to recap this a little further, this is the scene where George and Mary are walking around after the party. They had fallen into the pool, so they put on other clothes, and Mary put on a robe, and she's presumably naked underneath. They're walking around.

They're flirting. There's a guy in the neighborhood who is yelling at George and being like, kiss her, and George is like, fine. I'll kiss her so freaking hard, and then Mary runs away at that, butorge was standing on her robe so it falls off as she runs away and now she's naked so she hides in the bushes when george realizes this and realizes that he can exploit this situation he absolutely does immediately until he finds out his father died that's right because he's like she's like please i beg you give me my robe back and he's like no she asks him so many times he refuses uh she says

she's going to tell his mother and tell the police parentheses a cab um well but then he says you know i think the police would be on my side and you're like that's kind of an a-cab line because they probably would they would be yes unfortunately um but the point is she is like feeling very vulnerable and naked and he's like i'm gonna just like tease you and exploit this situation in a very cruel awful way well i think that that the two pivotal moments in their early relationship are defined by that dynamic right where when they're kids you can almost write it away by the fact that uh mary leans over and says you know but we know because he cannot hear out of that ear he cannot hear her and so when he comes up and says i'm gonna have a harem he's just being weird yeah and he's not you know being necessarily

antagonistic but that scene that you're describing where he is actively taking advantage of power over her but then also in the scene immediately before cut to them getting married. I think that dynamic is equally present. Like Mary's agency is cut out of this narrative at every possible opportunity. It's cut out by the fact that she's hiding in a bush. Yeah. Naked. It's cut out by the fact that her mother is watching. Her boyfriend is on the phone and George has her in his hand.

Yeah. her boyfriend is on the phone and George has her in his hand uh yeah I've broken down that scene as well where uh so he I don't know why he's in a bad mood he's just kind of a bad guy sorry but he's like you know lumbering around all pissed off and he clearly deliberately goes over to Mary's house to try to run into her but he acts like he was just passing by well and he also makes it very clear that she was not his first choice because he tries to hook up with her friend but then gets annoyed when her friend doesn't want to climb a mountain yeah so he's like oh i guess okay i'm not gonna fuck a girl who's not gonna climb a mountain you're like okay so then he goes over to mary's bumble account and he keep well jamie this was pre-bumble just like it was pre-venmo so nothing to come in so he goes over to mary's house and he keeps being like i

don't even know why i'm here i wasn't even planning to come here, even though like it was a very deliberate choice on his part. Mary is trying to give him a warm welcome. She like displays the little drawing she made for him. He doesn't like notice or appreciate anything that she has done. He spends the whole interaction just like feeling very sorry for himself and being a complete asshole. Then he's jealous that that other guy, Sam, calls and is like interested in Mary. So he storms out. He comes back in. Sam is like, what about plastics?

And then George throws a fit. He grabs Mary. He says, I don't care about plastics and I don't want to get married to anyone ever. Do you understand that? Smash cut to them getting married so that's bizarre and then he also like there is a forcible kiss because she's crying she's crying she's crying because of how mean he's being i just i yeah i mean i there there comes a point in that dynamic where i don't even understand what's going on because with Mary,

it does, it's just like her agency is always undercut by at least one person in the scene, but often multiple people in this scene, the scene, uh, right before they get married, you know, it's,

it is clear that Mary is interested in George, but he's only terrible to her. Uh, in that same scene, we know that she's gone to college, but we are not allowed to know anything other than the thing that I've seen repeatedly written about with Mary and how I feel like her character plays out is that like, okay, fine. She went to college. She's a modern woman, but ultimately she just wants to be a mother in her hometown, which is not an inherently bad thing,

but I feel like it was reinforcing what the encouraged norm was at that time for a woman who had education, especially coming out of World War II, where women, for the first time, had just been encouraged to be working and encouraged to be out there. And because this movie coming out in 1946 feels really prescient because it's like,

okay, let's reel it in. You know, like know your role. And I feel like the way that white womanhood specifically moved ahead with Donna Reed sort of at the helm in the 1950s. And that's not even a slight to Donna Reed because it's not her fault but her but her show i feel like is the most commonly cited in terms of like what a white housewife

was perceived as being in the 1950s in spite of the fact that behind the scenes she was producing her own show and doing all of these things that were not encouraged for women to do to perpetuate this view. It's just, I don't know, it's really, it's really, really frustrating, especially because at the end of the movie, it's Mary who pulls the community together to give George this experience that makes him want to live again. And so we have this whole sequence with Clarence that is impactful, it's very well staged, you know, like I don't wanna take that away from fans of the movie, but everything that happens off screen

is Mary and his family pulling together the community to reward you with the final shot of the movie. Mary does all of that, and I feel like that really goes under appreciated and under examined, but she did all that shit. She did so much. I mean, she like renovated a mansion and he is so ungrateful about it.

He hates it. And then she's, she like pulls him off the edge. And that is also unacknowledged by the plot. It's made to seem like, well, Clarence got his wings and that's why George, you know, believes in life again.

But it's like Mary did all the fucking organizing to make this happen. And she's cut out of so many scenes earlier where it like, I feel like it's always presented as, or it's most commonly presented in the movie as like George gave away all of his money to the community from his wedding.

And that's all him, him, him. And it's like, that's Mary's money as well. And she is not invited into those scenes. She's not. And I think those scenes would be improved by her presence. And she's like not even welcome until the end where George is like, oh, where the fuck is Mary at? And you're like, you left her outside, man. yeah i don't know yeah and then there's like there's two other

scenes where george in a pretty major way is being extremely cruel to a loved one there's the scene where he's like screaming at uncle billy after he's lost the money. And then there's the Christmas Eve scene where George comes home after the money has been lost. And he is just being extremely cruel to his wife and his children. And then he storms out. So when George Bailey is being pleasant in the movie, which does happen occasionally, it's almost always to his customers when he's being awful it's almost always to his family member or to mr potter so he basically treats his family the same way he treats the villain of the movie which i don't like and it's because like the closest i can get to playing devil's advocate there is like the way that George's life is shown is so inconsistent that you see him at his worst a lot.

Yeah. And so he does not come off well as like, I don't understand why people are like, this guy's awesome. You're like, well, I've seen him yelling as much as I've seen him being nice. Right.

I don't know. I mean, the things that I know we him being nice. Right. I don't know. I mean, the things that, and I know we are running out of time. The things that I think this movie does very well, or at least very well for

1946, is the commentary on collectiveness and on individualism, like American individualism, which is something that is very, very much pushed to this day to our detriment to working towards the collective. I think that part of what makes this movie work for me, in spite of its many, many, many flaws,

down to Capra being like, Mousseline, what do we think? Is the core idea of you know the american dream is inherently rarely achievable and george's life is not valueless because he spent it making sacrifices for his community i think that's that's a really beautiful idea it's a complicated idea and we could talk about it more i mean the scenes i i literally broke down my george discussion into like scenes i liked georgian versus scenes i don't yeah scenes i don't most of them with his wife

he goes out of the way to like berate a female teacher on the phone like yes he clearly does not have a lot of respect for women not to mention that mary is barely characterized and then the two mothers we see in this movie mary's and george's their only interest is husband and then our mid-children getting married that's all the scenes i liked georgian were the ones that were more politically minded and so it like ultimately i was like wow he's like very dsa bro coded yeah like where his politics are awesome but he hates women somehow um you know scenes i like georgian and i say that as a dues pay member. Okay. No, but I'm right. And scenes I like Trojan include when he's a kid

and he defends his dad against Potter. The scene where he, I mean, like he does make a series of sacrifices in order to hold some, like to sort of hold the line to prevent capitalism from completely demolishing his hometown.

That is sort of what he's doing throughout. And there's a scene where he, I mean, early on, where he just fucking mows Potter down and tells him that he's trading people like they're cattle. And like, I mean, that's really,

really powerful. And as well as when he turns down Potter, uh, for taking, you know, the sellout contract for like, you could live comfortably forever if you just shut the fuck up about housing people who don't have money.

And like, I think that that is like a, a really cool core minded thing, as well as the fact that his community and the scenes that we see them in are also like of the same mind where when George is like, hey, you know, Potter is going to, you know, he's offering you money now, but he is buying you and you will be fucked in the long term and they listen to each other and they collectively decide we're not going to be okay with this and then at the end they pay it forward to to george because of mary which no one cares about so i think that like politically it's a really cool movie and uh everything else basically not as much yes i don't know why I did an evil laugh there, but... Anyway, so we have to wrap up. There's more to talk about, but you'll just have to listen to the episode because we will just record some pickups later. And here are those pickups. So look at us, future us. Wow. know it sounds it reminds me of youtubers when like

we should be i guess we are like wearing you know like when you're watching a youtuber and then they add in a note when they're editing and they're wearing a hoodie and they're like hey it's future mommy here and i just wanted to add a note it's's what we're doing. That's this, yes. No offense to YouTubers, but they all do it. I don't know. Anyways. Okay, so just a few things that we didn't have time for in the live show. And so first, I just want to kind of, we already hinted at this a little bit and made a few references, but just wanted to pay a little more attention to the way the movie frames his his community his town

george's town you know new new bedford which actually becomes pottersville right uh if george had never existed and just sort of like the implications there right it's like look how unsavory this town is i feel like violet is implied to be a sex worker of some kind. Did you get that sense too? I did as well. Or like in as explicit a way that you could at that time. Yeah, I noticed. And this was something that was supported in, I guess, like a roundtable talk that I

encountered from Smithsonian magazine. Ooh, ever heard of it about, yeah, the implications of Potter'sville. Cause as we said at the show, Potter'sville seems like kind of a good time for a weekend, but I think,

yeah, like the signifiers and like speaking to the, um, in spite of, you know, this movie very much having its moments, there is like an element of rigid, like rigidity

in terms of like what is considered appropriate society and what isn't and it feels like this um that pottersville is associating it with sin capitalism well right it's like to me it's like two things where it's like explicitly capitalistic which i which is as close as i could get to understanding but yeah it's like sin meaning sex work and jazz music which seems like proximity to blackness and like and right that is let me just pull up the quote I have here from this piece that was compiled by Christopher Wilson quote Capra's hints at the degradation of the town come in the form of the black music jazz

heard pouring out of the taverns in Dima Dance Halls. Higgins, one of the roundtable participants, also noted that Mary's fate as an old maid in this alternative universe portrayed as hideous and sad is presented as perfectly fine, appropriate, and desirable for Annie

in the real world, unquote. Right. It's a world where things that are completely normal and should be socially accepted are presented as a dystopia, which is sex work and jazz and being a single woman over 30 and having a nice time with your life. Exactly. Yeah. So again, with like Violet implied, because I think you see her coming out of a strip

club or something that's implied to be a strip club. It's just all very sex worker, shamey. It's shamey of, yeah, like unmarried women. And of course, like that reflects the values of the time and is it exactly yeah strange you know to to be applying a like 2023 lens to a 1946 movie sure but um but i feel like it's it's like i i i i get frustrated when like encountering that criticism of like well what did you expect it's 1946 it's like yeah we're not saying we expected better of 1946 but it's just like uh we're having it's still i think the more relevant discussion is it's still wildly popular in 2023 and that's why it's a relevant

discussion you know yeah yeah these archaic and shamey and patriarchal values haven't gone away. No. So and, you know, they were perpetuated by movies like this and reinforced by movies like this. And those ideals have lasted for millennia. And so are the I mean, I think we talked about this a fair amount during the live show, but also I think that the more, the more like the, the cooler areas of this movie, which is like the idea of it being a life well lived to work for your community and serve your community instead of working towards individualistic

and personal gain, which is such an inherently American value that the bottom falls out of all the fucking time. And that's not to say, I mean, I think that it's, I kind of like where it falls because the takeaway from George's experience with Clarence is like the best message that the movie has.

Of course, this is only a message that is accessible by a white guy even though he's a white guy that's suffering a lot of poverty and and personal distress like that's i'm not i don't mean to discount that uh but you know that the narrative is only accessible to him not mary who has organized and made this all fucking possible he wouldn't have a damn roof over his head and he wouldn't have the money if it wasn't for mary we know this but i think that it being important that george worked for his community and served his community and that presenting it but they're also like it's not devaluing his life as an individual because that's the whole Clarence thing is that like you as an individual are an important part of

your community. And without you very possibly overemphasizing George's importance, but the message, the message, a lot, I think, right. Like,

but the message feels relevant that's like one of the more i think i that's my guess of like why this movie is other than just being you know really pummeled over the head if you live in the u.s i i understand why that message is still really powerful that like you that serving the collective is valuable and that you are a valuable part of that collective that's beautiful right and that's fine if a movie you know kind of like exaggerates that but the movie like especially that sequence of like pottersville it credits george for like saving women all the women in the town from these quote-unquote horrible fates of you know sex work and being a quote-unquote old maid who's a librarian who's so undesirable because she wears glasses like and that also feels like

I don't know I mean we've talked about this within period pieces too where like obviously we can't apply a 2023 lens to 1946 but I think even so if like if this movie had any interest in Mary it could present her I mean I think it's very like flat in the way that her being a quote-unquote old maid and wearing Warby Parker glasses is presented where it's like the value of the movie is that happening to you is bad whereas I think there's a way to present it of like that's what happens to her that's her life that's her choice she's happy with it but society isn't happy with her you know and I think that there's a way to present a historical reality of the mid-20th century, which is that, you know, especially post-World War II, it totally makes sense. We're like heading towards one of the most sort of rigid housewife eras

in the US. It makes sense that she would be treated poorly for wanting to have an independent life. But this movie doesn't show any shade of gray. It's just like, yeah, this happens to you, you're fucked so thank god george bailey was born and you're like i don't know right because there were movies like classic hollywood movies from this era that do examine and like subvert gender roles and sexism and patriarchal values but this movie just simply is not one of them it's just like presents it as fact yeah yeah so that's rather frustrating uh let's talk about annie yes please so she is the i believe only person of color in the entire movie with any kind of speaking role and just kind of the only person of color you see

on screen period there there are a few background actors who are people of color but it's certainly the only speaking role by a country mile yes she's played by lillian randolph so she is the character who works for the bailey family as like a maid or a housekeeper. So she's in a very, you know, stereotypical role for black actors to be in at this time. Roles for black actors were often relegated to service roles helping white people. And that's also a trend that continues still to this day still yeah so i think that she's she's also presented as i mean she's presented as comic relief yes and speaking to like lillian randolph's performance great and and i and i was reading more about lillian randolph and it she played the comedic relief role many many times because those were the only

roles that were made available to her throughout her career and she does it incredibly well like she's clearly a very talented actor she has all the best lines in the movie well and I think if they're not delivered with her performance they would be weird but like she makes it work and she's not given really anything to work with but yeah i mean she's presented as the the help she is presented as the comic relief and she's also presented as less smart than the people that she works for where i mean the first exchange she has is with George's mother who as we talked about in the live show also has nothing to do other than my husband my son my husband my son right yeah but one of the few exchanges they have is I mean it's so well presented by Annie that you're like

I'm on any side but it's like presented that like she doesn't understand why. Oh, because she says something like, why are there only girl children? And you're like. George and Harry are upstairs roughhousing, even though they're like adults by this point. It sounds like they're, well, they're both 40, but you're like, oh, I guess you're 18. I know, I know, but you're still like.

It's distracting. It's distracting. Anyway, they're making a lot of commotion. And Annie is like, you know, hitting the broom against the roof. And then she says something like, this is why all children should be girls. And then Mrs. Bailey responds with something like, but if all children were girls, then never mind. As if like, Annie doesn't understand how procreation works like annie in the world of the scene it's delivered as if she is making a joke and the mom doesn't get it but it

doesn't seem like it's written that way because the whole movie is written so disrespectfully towards her and then shortly after we see her assaulted by harry. And that's presented as a joke too. I went back to the original script to see if that was in the original script. Uh-huh. And it was. It says, quote, as he pushes her through the kitchen door, he slaps her fanny. She screams. The noise is cut off by the swinging door. Like it's presented as a button to a scene.

Yuck. Yeah. presented as a button to a scene yuck yeah so that is also and and she's i mean not not the only woman in the movie to be sexually harassed uh i think that that is a pretty evenly uh that is an evenly distributed crime throughout the movie but it's in i mean with a character who is on screen for all but two minutes only in service to white characters and as comic relief she still is sexually assaulted on screen as a joke horrifying um she does have my favorite line of the movie at the very end when all the community are like pitching in and giving money to the bailey family she says i've been saving this money for a divorce

but you and then like you can have it though and i'm like okay first of all annie keep your money don't give it to george bailey get your damn divorce whatever he did whatever he did he's a dog i know i read it as like she doesn't even have a partner yet. She's the way that some people would be like, oh, I'm saving up for a wedding. She just like knows that inevitably she will get divorced. I mean, I don't know. I thought she was married. Well, that speaks to how little we know about this character. We don't know if she's got a husband.

We don't know anything about her. Yeah, it reminds me of the Dr. Ian Malcolm quote from Jurassic Park when he says, oh, I'm always on the lookout for a future ex mrs malcolm and i'm like yeah breakups happen and we all know it anyway you're brave you're brave it's true and then we i guess we didn't really get to talk about violet very much uh no because we just we didn't have a lot we were just goofing around so much, you wouldn't understand. But speaking of Violet, I mean, another character we don't get a lot of screen time with. She does get certainly more of an arc than Annie does, but it's a very charged arc where she's presented as, I feel like it is kind of a Madonna horror situation that we're presented with.

Yeah, she's like the quote unquote town floozy. She's Samantha Jones coded. She's like really the Samantha Jones of New Bedford. And good for her. And good for her. And so she's I think the way the plot treats her is very, very inconsistent to me. Because it's clear that Mary is presented as the, you know, angelic alternative to a woman like Violet. However, they are friends.

And they, as far as I can tell, remain friends. Although we don't, we would certainly never get a scene with them together. Well, that's the thing. They're friends or maybe even kind of frenemies as children yeah but we don't because we don't see them in any scenes together as an adult we have no way of knowing if they've actually remained friends that's true and in that and that also demonstrates how disinterested the plot is in mary which we already know um yeah when we see violet presented as an adult i mean she's really slaying in a lot of these scenes jimmy stewart uh george is always like kind of leering at her in certain

like towards the beginning of the movie like he goes humina humina humina when she walks past the car she gives a great one-liner keeps walking this in in a run of scenes that really troubles me it's the scene first where i think it's a holiday party and as we discussed jimmy stewart does kiss his mommy on the mouth hard um during that conversation she's talking about the one thing that's on her mind which is her son and she's like why don't you marry mary and he's like i don't want to and then he's like but i'm gonna go fuck tonight is basically the takeaway and he stomps away being like i'm gonna this sucks this is weird and then he goes into town spots violet she is interested in him arguably the whole movie you're just like why didn't you two get together it i think it bums me out because it presents violet as kind of a floozy but also like whatever they're both horny and walking around so sure yeah have sex but and

then um he wants her to climb a mountain and she's like what no and then he yells at her which is a very george thing to do yes experience slight resistance from a woman specifically and start screaming at her he's so fragile oh my god he does that and stomps away as he does in many scenes with women yes and then we see him go to mary's house and have a scene we've we talked about in the live show but like it not only doesn't paint a flattering picture of violet because i think we're supposed to leave that scene with a negative picture of Violet like she doesn't get him right you know and then it also presents Mary as not his first choice and that sucks for a character that we like like it sucks well I think she would be his first choice except that again because of his fragility he's like well i can't mary belongs to another man

she should belong to me but sam wainwright's already staked his claim right and it's like you know in a monogamous relationship sure don't actively pursue someone else's partner but also don't treat them cruelly because you're attracted to them. That is what most men do. And worse. And so much worse. And then at the end with Violet, we get a very, again, weirdly horny scene with her and George. But you do get some closure that is taken back. You think you're about to get a cool arc where she goes to george for a loan a building and loan

we're not sure i think she doesn't intend to build because she's moving to new york city ever heard of it in a move i was not expecting from this story george is very supportive of that and he's like yeah good get the fuck out of here sucks Sucks here. Best of luck. Weird kiss. Fine. Not even on the, he kisses his mom on the lips, but well, he's married by that point. I was like, he shouldn't kiss her on the lips,

but like a long lingering kiss and there's like a kiss mark left on his cheek and then the bank inspector is there and he's like, um, hello, I've come here to arrest you. But anyways, like that for me would have been great closure for Violet. She gets out.

But instead, we first see the flash forward where, oh no, if George wasn't born, she might be a sex worker, which is implied by the movie as the worst thing that could happen to someone. And then in the present day, by the movie as the worst thing that could happen to someone and then in the present day by the end she comes back and is like actually i've decided to stay and you're like a fate worse than death we don't know why she decided to stay we don't know what she was intending to do in new york or why she was moving again she's characterized so little beyond just like the very tropey oh she's the you know hot busty blonde who walks around town and all the men like wolf whistle at her like that's just the trope

that she adheres to and she's given no interior life or interests or anything like that yeah it sucks and i feel like that is one of the clearer presentations of what this movie's values are because on one hand yes it is a life well lived to serve your community but i feel like the there is an undertone of this that is like city folks are sinful don't go there you know never leave the place you were born in which erases so many reasons why you would leave um which in violet's case might be because everyone treats her like shit so there's that there's that i want to talk really or just mention really the there's another female character who hasn't come up yet and it's cousin tilly who works at the building and loan she's george's cousin presumably uncle billy's daughter not that you

really ever see them interact she also calls him uncle billy oh so oh why is that so who knows i think that's his government name because everyone first name uncle last name billy billy's his government name. Because everyone calls him that. First name Uncle, last name Billy. Billy's his last name, yeah. Also, that means his name is Billy Bailey. That's fun. I love him. I love him and his tiny brain and his little squirrel. His little squirrel and his little, you know, strings around his fingers so that he doesn't forget things, but he still forgets them all the time.

Love that. Anyway, Cousin Tilly, she has like three lines in the movie. And I mean, justice for Tilly, I guess is what I'm saying. Yeah. Because she's another person we don't know anything about. I'm ashamed. I didn't even remember. Like she's not in.

I didn't. Even though it's like, yeah, she's absolutely, she sure is there. And she has a whole story that we don't know about. The final thing that we alluded to in the live show, but is good to have noted explicitly is that we do have in Mr. Potter. And also, how distracting is it to have a character named Harry and a guy named Mr. Potter in the same movie? His name's Henry Potter. Oh. His little truck says H. Potter, and you're like, this sucks. Anyways, they should have known that in the future

something terrible would happen. But Mr. Potter is a disabled character, and we've talked about this on the show many times of how people with disabilities are extremely frequently coded in fiction and in movies by extension as inherently villainous. And the counterpoint to that, I think, in this movie would be that George himself has a disability. He can't hear out of one ear because of an accident when he was a kid and it is explicitly stated in the movie that that

disability prevents him from serving in the military so I feel like at the at very least while that trope is present um our hero who's an asshole um also has a disability and it is not presented um it's presented in a very different way than mr potter's yes that's true but the fact remains that the movie does attribute a disability to the villain the villain who is played by lionel barrymore who is the great uncle of drew barrymore wow iconic strike disrespector and anyways no but it's it's there that's a whole other story because if i'm remembering correctly the barrymore family in general has been very very good historically of respecting strikes so it was a noted you know step away from very more family values for for drew to to be a piece of shit like that what the hell drew well

anything else um i just i don't think this got brought up in the live show but in the christmas eve scene when george is absolutely throwing a fit and not communicating to his i understand why he wouldn't tell his children this maybe but why would he not tell his why his wife what had happened like this this missing money he just comes in acts like a complete terror she's's like, what's wrong? What's going on? He does not openly communicate anything to her. He just screams at her. He says, you call this a happy family? And then he's like, why do we have to have all these kids? He says that within earshot of his children. And he says all these other things that i think we did mention in the live show but i just like how are we supposed to like this guy when he screams at mary tells her that the house and

home that she built for this family literally built that the house sucks he hates it and why did we have all these kids saying that within earshot of the kids it's i i understand that we are seeing george at the lowest moment in his life and i know that theoretically you do not judge someone from the worst moment of their life but he's really swinging for the fences with being a piece of shit here he apologizes for it and then he disappears he does apologize for it but then he disappears well he apologizes and then he gets mad again because his family is like appropriately reacting to how awful he's being and then he yells again and then he leaves and to mary's credit she says why are you torturing the children and i was like

thank you mary why is he torturing the children uh i I was like, thank you, Mary. Why is he torturing the children? I know that he's at the lowest point of his life, but I just, come on. That doesn't give him an excuse to be horrible to his family. Well, I'm not suggesting that. I'm just saying, like, I think that the issue with his quick to anger is that we have seen him not at the lowest moment of his life, also quick to anger.

It is like an escalation of behavior we've seen from him already. And so that's, yeah. Yes, and I think that is all I had. Did you have anything else? No, let's return to the stage. Let's do it, yes. So this brings us to the Be. Let's do it, yes. So this brings us to the Bechdel

test. So yeah, we're going to go back to the live show and see if this movie passes the Bechdel test. No. The answer is no. It definitely doesn't. The only

scenes we get are between Mary and her friend and they're like our boy is cool yes so the answer is also well uh mrs bailey george's mom and annie briefly talk about how they're um going to be old maids but then annie is like speak for yourself i'm saving up for a divorce and i'm happy about it which is like great yes but presumably divorce from a man yes due to the policy of the time yeah yeah um so i'm gonna say it doesn't i mean it doesn't spiritually pass certainly yeah i think definitely it's gonna be in that one yeah but our nipple scale the perfect scale the perfect metric where we rate the movie based on a scale of zero to five nipples and examine the movie through an intersectional feminist lens and i think i have to give the movie i'm gonna give it one nipple for its rejection of the capitalist ideals that Mr. Potter is projecting.

And everyone's like, no, it's actually awesome if we're a community and we band together and say boo to you, Mr. Capitalist. Because Mr. Potter is capitalism, the guy. In any case, from a class perspective i think this movie is pretty cool from an everything else perspective i don't think it's very cool and george bailey is not nice to his wife his wife um so i'm only giving it one nipple. The end. And I'll give it to Annie, who is played by Lillian Randolph. I'll meet you. I'll give it one nipple.

Yeah, I think this movie for women is not good. This movie for women is maybe in fact bad and reinforcing a lot of negative stereotypes around women at the time which is that uh when your husband is on screen get out of the scene um i don't care for that and that happens in almost every scene in this movie however um i i agree with you i mean i think that the class politics of this movie are at least in step with if not ahead of its time in spite of the politics of the director and the star which feels like really uh interesting and i think that like it's endured for a reason i think that it is really nice to have classics in American canon that are not rooted in individualism

and like really remove themselves from the whole idea of the hero's journey where like if there's anyone that goes through a hero's journey in this story, it's George's brother and you don't see any of it where he goes from humble beginnings to being a war hero and going through all this stuff you don't see that you see his brother who is actively remaining kind of trapped in the class and the place that he was born in and like i think that there's a lot of value to that and there's a lot of value to being to appreciating that and to seeing the value in that because i think that you know like in in most movies and a lot of media in the western world you're encouraged to only see success in your life as having ascended in the traditional sense and that the idea of of uh remaining within your

community and serving your community is not valued at the same rate and i think that you know it's a wonderful life does that on its face and that's really nice it does that for george it does not do that for mary even though she's doing the same shit and it's all off screen and for some reason they're like what if there was an old ass angel reading tom sawyer you know like mary's doing the same thing the whole movie but they just don't want to show that um at its core i think that the the movie has a good message uh i'll give it one nipple it's bad for women it's bad for people who aren't white and they're and i'm gonna give it to jimmy the raven obviously okay yeah and Coco I'm gonna split it with Jimmy

and Coco sure sure sure yeah okay do we end the show now I think I feel like we well yeah I mean I just I just feel like Caitlin like I was wondering as I was watching this movie with Clarence the flop angel yeah what would the world

be like without the oh what would the world be like without the best oh what would the world be like without the bechdel cast certainly we don't have anything prepared well um i was thinking about wait wait dax could you softly play dominic the donkey thank you so much just as we discuss this important topic uh-huh okay so I was thinking about this too and uh if the

Bechdel cast had never existed um what would the world be like well first of all Michael Bay would be president of the United States of America that is you're so right is, you're so right. You know? You're so right. I was thinking that if the Bechdel cast didn't exist,

Alfred Molina would never have learned what an MRA meant. True. And he would have gone down that path himself. Wow. I know. I know. Wow. I know.

I was thinking if the bechtel cast never existed that the minions kevin bob and stewart yeah uh would have broken up and we wouldn't have been there to get them back together i was thinking that in a world without the bechtel cast, I would have ended up working at the job I was working at when we started the Bechtel cast, which was as a fact checker at playboy magazine question mark. And I would have worked there forever and I would have married Hugh Hefner and I would have killed him instead of just him dying.

Wow. That would have been so scary if that happens yeah i'm glad it didn't and uh also i think that if the bechdel cast had never existed that james cameron would have never directed titanic because he specifically made it for jamie and myself yeah 20 years before we started the podcast and that's what the world there would be no titanic sorry and in conclusion i would like to say in a world without the beckville cast and then i just wrote in asterisk minion joke asterisk and so we would like to say thanks for coming to the live show and that was the episode everyone thank you for tuning in thanks once again to

everyone who came to the live show or bought tickets to the stream and watched the stream really appreciate you doing that and supporting live podcasting wow what a treat. Yeah, and if you enjoyed that and you live in the following cities, San Francisco, Sacramento, Austin, Dallas, San Diego, we're coming to a venue near you soon. Check our link tree right now. Tickets to your city may be live soon. If not, they will be very soon. Yes.

And we will make a specific post to the feed when that is the case the live shows are so fun we always do meet and greets afterwards we have exclusive merch and it's just a great community event i know of at least two serious relationships that have come out of meeting at a back to cash. It's a great place to meet a friend or a lover. And also, if you live in LA, please come to Santa University at the Elysian on December 21st at 7.30pm. That ticket will also be on our Linktree. Again, it's just Linktree slash Bechtelcast. And speaking of links,

you can click on the link patreon.com slash Bechtelcast and subscribe to our Patreon. This month, it's Zoe Saldana in space September. And we swear that the Matreons voted for that. The Matreons voted for that to happen. And there's also over 100 episode backlog, close to 150. We've had the Patreon going for many years. And it's a blast.

We get goofy. We have a nice time. And also, if you want to gift a subscription to someone for the holidays, it's only five bucks a month. And that gets access to everything. Yeah. And speaking of gift ideas, if you need them for either yourself, okay, treat yourself or gifting to a friend or lover, you can go to tpublic.com slash the Bechdel cast and grab some merch all of it is designed by a one Jamie Loftus ever heard of her uh and we also if you're coming to our tour we sell exclusive tour exclusive posters and uh just so you know on the tour we, we will, for the most part, in most cities, be covering the movie Barbie.

Yeah. So if you want to hear us talk, since people have been shouting that at us, we were saving it because we wanted to wear little outfits. And we will be doing that. So with that, that's an episode, folks. See you on the flip we got uh we we have one or two uh more episodes coming this calendar year and we'll see you next week we sure will bye the bechdel cast is a production of iheart mediaMedia, hosted by Caitlin Durante and Jamie Loftus, produced by Sophie Lichterman, edited by Mo Laborde. Our theme song was composed by Mike Kaplan with vocals by Katherine Voskrosensky. Our logo and merch is designed by Jamie Loftus,

and a special thanks to Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about the podcast, please visit linktree.com. Get the kids in your life excited about history by tuning in to Historical Records. Listen to Historical Records on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated. Crooks everywhere unearthed the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state.

Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Gianna Pradenti. you get your podcasts. to for advice. And if we don't know the answer, we bring in people who do, like negotiation expert Maury Tahiripour. If you start thinking about negotiations as just a conversation, then I think it sort of eases us a little bit. Listen to Let's Talk Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.