The Big Picture - The Tom Hanks Hall of Fame. Plus: The Snubs and Surprises of the Independent Spirit Award Nominations. | The Big Picture

Episode Date: November 22, 2019

The Spirit Awards typically act as Oscars counterprogramming, rewarding outliers and underseen indies in the race. Sean and Amanda break down the 2020 nominations and what they could mean for the big show (1:09). Then, with 'A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood' hitting theaters, we discuss the long and brilliant career of America's Dad, Tom Hanks, by constructing a hall of fame with his 10 most essential performances (16:15). Finally, Sean is joined by director Marielle Heller to talk about Hanks and how together they captured the essence of Fred Rogers (1:09:49). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guests: Marielle Heller Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, guys, and welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. Binge Mode made its grand return earlier this month, and Mallory Rubin and Jason Concepcion are deep diving on the Star Wars franchise, covering every movie, the newly released Disney Plus series The Mandalorian, and fan favorite characters. You can check out new episodes every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, wherever you get your podcasts. And up on the site, we have more Mandalorian coverage written by Micah Peters, Alison Herman, and Ben Lindberg, as well as staff-wide surveys throughout the season. You can check it all out on TheRinger.com.

I'm Sean Fennessey. I'm Amanda Dobbin. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about being a good neighbor. Today, we turn our attention to Tom Hanks and the new film, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. Later in the show, I'll have a conversation with Marielle Heller, the gifted filmmaker behind The Diary of a Teenage Girl, Can You Ever Forgive Me? And this true life story of Mr. Rogers, sort of, and the journalist with whom he crossed paths. But first, let's go to today's news. Amanda, the Independent Spirit Award nominations have been announced. Yes, they have. Is that exciting to you?

Sure. I love independent films. I love independent films as well. I love award shows. This is a useful award show, I would say. Not because I don't think it particularly dictates where the Oscars are going, but it might dictate where they're not going. If we look back at last year's winners, we can see a lot of great films getting rewarded. In particular, If Beale Street Could Talk, for example, or Richard E. Grant, or Bo Burnham, or Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Witte. A bunch of people who didn't win any Oscars. I thought you were going to add Glenn Close in there. Also Glenn Close, a very good note, star of The Wife, a film we've seen.

And this year's set of nominations, I think, is very interesting. There's a lot of takeaways. What was your instant reaction upon seeing this? I'm excited for Marriage Story, and I was briefly concerned about the rules of the Independent Spirit Awards because Marriage Story is nominated for Best Feature, and it is winning the Robert Altman Award for Best Ensemble. But because it wins the award for Best Ensemble, it means that Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson are not in the Best Actor and Best Actress categories. And I didn't understand those rules immediately,

so I looked at Best Actor and Best Actress, and I didn't see Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson. In particular, with Adam Driver, I was concerned. It's a reasonable concern, especially if you look back at last year's Robert Altman Award winner, which was Suspiria. Do you remember when Luca Guadagnino followed up his triumph with Timothee Chalamet with the remake of Dario Argento's Suspiria? That was very strange.

I remember that it happened. It certainly happened. I love Luca. I hope he makes more films. Suspiria was an odd one. I guess it's hard to say whether this is great or not great for a marriage story. It's obviously still nominated for Best Feature, as you said, and is, I think, one of the three sort of heavyweights entering the Oscar race. The other nominees for Best Feature are pretty fascinating.

I think the only one out of this bunch that is here that we could reasonably say has a strong chance, if that, at Best Picture is The Farewell. Yes. The rest of the slate here is Uncut Gems, which had a great many nominations here in this category. And I wonder if Uncut Gems is ultimately bound to be a spirit champion. It's very much, it's not so much an Oscar movie, but it feels like it has a good opportunity to run the table on this show. Yes, certainly. In the Ringer universe.

In the Ringer universe as well. It's basically a part of the Ringer universe or the timeline. timeline yes yeah truly um a hidden life is another film that is here terence malick's new movie which has gone largely unremarked upon in the awards conversation thus far which is interesting i also don't understand how fox searchlight movies continue to get nominated for the independent spirit awards because they are now owned by disney but that's a whole other conversation i guess this movie was acquired so you can make the case that it was financed independently. Anyway, and Clemency, which is a movie that is opening in late December that we have not spent a lot of time talking about here on this show that stars Alfre Woodard.

I think you have noted previously that because of that late release date, it may hold back some of its award season chances. Yes, though I believe there's a lot of talk around Alfre Woodard's performance in Clemency and she is nominated for Best Female Lead here. And I think it's easier for a late-breaking performance actor or actress to break into the category than it is a movie itself. I agree. Let's look at some surprises and snubs here. I was very surprised to see so much love for Honey Boy and The Lighthouse.

Two movies I like. Two movies we've talked about here on this show. I guess they're pretty spirity. Yeah, well, The Lighthouse, I'm surprised that you're surprised because that seems to be the indie favorite. The A24 merch bro loves The Lighthouse. Yeah, but that's not necessarily where the spirits go. That's true.

You know, if Beale Street could talk, I would not say is necessarily the home of the A24 merch bro. That's true. I just feel like, and that is also doing a disservice to the lighthouse, which again was,

it was fascinating to me, not for me, but there are a lot of, it's obviously a feat of filmmaking and cinematography in particular, and there are a lot of people who have really responded to it. So it's not just the A24 film. It just kind of has that energy right now. Like it's the cool kid indie film. Definitely. I think Honey Boy is a little bit different. I wonder if this is the rare film here that will actually have its Oscar chances boosted by being in the press.

Al Maharel, the director, both Shia LaBeouf and Noah Jupe were both nominated for Best Supporting Actor. I feel like the more light on this movie, the better for its chances going forward. We spent some time earlier this week talking about it. It's an interesting entrant into the field because there's a lot of potentially explosive aspects of it, but it's also a good watch, and I think a good watch could go a long way. Yes. Tough watch. Good watch. Tough watch. The big studio champions, no surprise, A24, 18 nominations.

I would make the case that it's maybe low, given some of the other films we'll talk about here in terms of the snubs. I could have seen a world in which they had 25 nominations nominations given the slate they had this year neon also has 10 nominations neon and a24 right now kind of the the alpha and the omega of the the new indie business and as everything gets resettled and commodified and conglomerized these are really the two studios that i think that that the spirits have to lean on to find product. And it's interesting, too, because Parasite has the best international feature here, but it's not eligible for any other categories. What is that? I think it's because they don't take non-English language films in the traditional categories.

And so it only has the one nomination, and if it were eligible for more, maybe it would be more dominant for Neon. I mentioned A Hidden Life. Have you seen Give Me Liberty? No, I have not. Neither have I. This is an interesting film from Music Box that premiered at a couple of film festivals. I think it played Tribeca.

It played Berlin. And it's tough to see. It was released in August. Every year at the Indie Spirit Awards, you get two to three movies that'll have you say like, what is that? Did I see that?

When will that be released? Well, maybe we'll give me a chance before we get to the Spirit Awards. So we'll have some awareness of what to do with it. A couple other smaller films that we've talked about on this show. Diane, I had a Kent Jones and Mary Kay Place nominee here for the movie on the show earlier this year. That's a beautiful film. It'd be interesting to see where Kent Jones takes his career now that he has decided to depart the New York Film Festival. Loose,

a movie you didn't love that I liked quite a bit. A couple acting nominations for that and for its director, Julius Ona. The Climb, which is a movie that I've still yet to see, but was in some respects the talk of Telluride. Sideways on bicycles is how it has been described in the

log line. About two friends cycling, I think, through France. I look forward to this movie. Sony Pictures Classics picked it up. It's coming out in March. And Marriage Story, you know, it's not a surprise that it was eliminated with the Altman Award. It was to me, actually. Yeah.

Well, I guess we know the rules, but will it really matter for Marriage Story? I don't think so. No, because even if you buy into the speech helps with the voting, like the Independent Spirit Awards are literally the day before the Oscars. Exactly. They're going to be on people's minds where they aren't. Do you watch the Spirit Awards? I always watch the clip of the hosts, the opening monologue, which is often very funny. It's definitely much funnier than the Oscars always.

And there's always one great speech or kind of one notable moment. But no, I can't say that I, you know, go to some stores and then go home and turn on the Independence Fair Awards in the afternoon. That is exactly what I do. I know. We know that you love to go to stores. I love to go to stores. And then you go home. It's only because it's packaged with the Oscars.

And I think for a decade now, Oscar Sunday has been like a working day for me. So I'm just trying to get that Saturday. And no disrespect to the Independent Spirit Awards, which seems like a really fun time. Way more fun than the Oscars. Absolutely. Nick Kroll and John Mulaney have been hosts in the past. And that's all you really need to know about the taste of the Indie Spirits. They know what they're doing.

Some snubs. Yeah. I'm genuinely surprised by the waves, the lack of love for waves. I would have thought that this is exactly where waves would live and would get multiple nominations, and it got just one for Taylor Russell for Best Supporting Actress. I would have as well. And there are a lot of people who genuinely really love this movie including our boss bill simmons that's right um what a tweet a fantastic endorsement yeah and i had a lot of people in the comments being like you you gotta talk to bill yeah um no everyone is allowed their own experience

at the cinema and their own reactions um but i do think that it's a it's a polarizing film it gets reactions i'm kind of surprising that it shook i'm surprised that it's a polarizing film. It gets reactions. I'm kind of surprised that it shook out this way. Feels like the kind of film that usually thrives at this award show. Not the case this year. Similarly, another A24 movie, Midsommar, not nominated. Florence Pugh, not nominated. I thought that was pretty shocking.

I know Midsommar, also a divisive movie in a way, but more or less a box office hit. And she's emerging as a very relevant figure in Hollywood. Do you think it's too mainstream at this point? Wow. I mean, just the number of Midsommar Halloween costumes alone that I saw. I'd love to ask Ari Aster about how he feels about being too mainstream. That movie's fucked up. I know, but I really think it got memed. I don't know how many of these people have actually seen the movie.

You might be onto something. But I do think it transcended the indie bubble. And I wonder if that plus Florence Pugh is already being discussed for supporting actors for Little Women. So there might be a little bit of, okay, well, we don't need to do this here because she's already going to be in the mix elsewhere. Possibly. I don't know. I wonder if Uncut Gems is one crazy movie enough. to do this here because she's already going to be in the mix elsewhere. Possibly. I don't know. I wonder if Uncut Gems

is one crazy movie enough. You know, like Midsommar has a sort of anxiety that is not totally dissimilar from some of the anxiety that you feel

when you're watching Uncut Gems. And I don't know, maybe they just didn't like horror. They did love Get Out when it was released a couple of years ago.

So it's hard to say. Harriet, zero nominations. Again, this is like the secretly the independent hit movie of the year. You'd think it could thrive here. No love.

High Flying Bird, just one nomination for Terrell Alvin McCraney's script. This movie, way under the radar. Flying under the radar like a bird. Wow. Right there. Good job. These puns are free, folks. One I was disappointed about was Her Smell.

Yeah. Which is a genuinely independently made movie and stars a famous person, Elizabeth Moss. It was released early in the year by Alex Ross Perry, who I guess is divisive for some people. And the movie also similarly has a kind of intensity and can be tough to watch at times. But this feels like where this movie is supposed to thrive, too. Yeah. I wonder. Her Smell is a movie that I still have not seen. And I know you loved it. And our friend Sam Donsky emailed me the last time I said I hadn't seen it and was like,

it's the most important movie of the year for me. You need to see it. But I do know that it's long and difficult to watch. And it came out in the year and I just haven't gotten there. And I wonder if there are a lot of people who just have not gotten there yet. That's very possible. I would hope if you're voting for the Spirit Awards, you would pop the screen. We hope a lot of things about a lot of people and how they vote. And it just basically never works out.

If you haven't seen Her Smell, I would recommend it. I'm negotiating my 2019 top 10 right now, and I'm trying to find a place for it because I really, really loved it. The Last Black Man in San Francisco, only one nomination for Jonathan Majors in supporting. Similarly, movie released in the summer. Maybe people are forgetting about this movie. Yeah. I liked it.

I liked it as well. I think Jonathan Majors was the standout. This kind of, this seems appropriate. Yeah, I feel like it's the beginning of big things for Jimmy Fails and Joe Talbot, maybe not for this movie. Interesting that Lulu Wang was not nominated. Now, The Farewell got a Best Feature nomination, which is big, obviously, and Zhao Xu Shen for Best Supporting Actress was nominated. It's a big, splashy story about her in The New York Times this week. No Lulu. Yes. I wonder if that's similarly in the Midsommar vein of, is this too mainstream? Is it that Lulu is making a strong bid for Best Director or is it just that she was overlooked here?

It's hard to say. It's interesting that Farewell was nominated for Best Feature, but Lulu Wang was not nominated for Best Director. Lorene Scafaria for Hustlers was nominated for Best Director, but Hustlers was not nominated for Best Feature. Though we should note, Jennifer Lopez, the queen of independent anything, is nominated for an Independent Spirit Award. Thank you. Thank you to the Independent Spirit Award individuals. We appreciate you. Nothing screams independence like Jennifer Lopez.

I just do kind of wonder whether people are trying to spread the wealth a bit. Yeah, you never can tell. That's the thing. And I feel like a lot of these conversations that we have about these awards bodies, we imagine them to be this locked door composite group of villainous humans. And maybe in some cases that's true for the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, but for every other group, the New York Critics Circle, the Academy, these folks who are convened to vote on the indie spirits it's just humans with flaws

and and complex emotions are they even complex emotions or is it just lack of thought i mean how much time how much time do you think someone spends filling out their ballot for any spirit for we can put oscars. Maybe people spend a little more time on that. Funny you should ask. Okay. I am a voter. I know this. I know you Instagram the ballot every year.

I got it. For the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. How long do you... I don't... How long you spend on it is not representative of what anyone does. Well, here's all I can say. Put me in the Academy. Okay.

Put me on the Independent Spirit Jury Award. Let me vote for the Emmys. Let me vote for the MacArthur Genius Grant, the Nobel Peace Prize. Just put me on your jury and I will take my time and I will devise a system that is rational, fair, thoughtful, deep, and true.

And then will you release the votes? Then I will release the Snyder Cut of my votes. Nope. Absolutely not. I think that, I hope people the Snyder Cut of my votes. Nope. Nope. Absolutely not. I think that, I hope people care about these things as much as I do. They don't. They don't. We know that they don't. You care the most. I care

second most. That's why we're here making this podcast. We'll see what happens at the Independent Spirit Awards, whether it has any bearing whatsoever on the Oscars. I look forward to the telecast. We're going to talk about Tom Hanks and A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. But first, let's hear a quick word from our sponsor. Amanda, I want to share something really exciting with you. Marvel released that new podcast about

the Fantastic Four called Marvels, based on the graphic novel by Kurt Busiak and Alex Ross. The show is set in New York City, and it does an incredible job of immersing you in the real world of the Marvel Universe and the lives of the people who inhabit it. The story takes place as the city braces for its first encounter with Galactus, but it's an audio drama that follows a journalist, student, and photographer's mission

to unravel a super-powered conspiracy. If you want to give Marvels a shot, just go to stitcherpremium.com and sign up with the code PICTURE. You'll get a free month trial of Stitcher Premium, which will let you listen to Marvels right now, at StitcherPremium.com with the promo code PICTURE. Amanda, we're back. We're talking Hanks. Now, in trying to figure out how to talk about Tom Hanks, we have a couple of different platforms, structures that we use to talk about these famous people. Sometimes we do a top five. Sometimes we do a career arc. We look at the entire span of the work. We categorize, we rank. I want to do something different with Hanks

because Hanks is like talking about the American flag. You know, Hanks is like talking about Cadillac. He's like talking about pie. He's like talking about something that's been in our lives that we take for granted and we don't even think about. He's a brand. He's beloved. An American ideal. He is something we aspire to. And so I don't think we can analyze him in quite the same way. So what we're going to do is we're going to talk about the Hall of Fame. We're going to create a Hall of Fame for Tom Hanks performances, things, aspects of his persona that are important to us. Before we do that, as an actor, a brother, a husband, the random person that you are working with, you know, anybody should be. He's a representative of good.

When I said he is the American ideal, I think that he is. He represents a way that we all hope that we could treat and be treated by others. I think that's ultimately true. I wonder if it's a chicken or the egg thing. Is it because he's played so many decent people or is it because he communicates decency? It's funny that really his breakthrough movie was Bachelor Party, which is probably the slimiest movie that Tom Hanks has ever made. Everything that follows after that, and I guess Splash is around the same time as Bachelor Party, but everything that follows after that,

even Jimmy Dugan in A League of Their Own, heart of gold. Yeah. You know, tough exterior, but heart of gold. He's always got a heart of gold. Yeah. Do you think he's been typecast into this, or do you think it's just his strength as a performer?

I think it's certainly his strength as a performer? I think it's certainly his strength as a performer and I think he probably is typecast to an extent. He tries occasionally to do something different and people are a little I'm thinking of the Lady Killers right now which I just like I don't know what that was and I think some of that is that we expect Tom Hanks to be a certain way at this point. He is he's both being typecast and America receives him as Tom Hanks to be a certain way at this point. He's both being typecast and America receives him as Tom Hanks. And I think to an extent, he's always Tom Hanks in a movie instead of the character he's playing at this point anyway, in the later half of his career. And much like Denzel is like that, and Julia Roberts is sort of like that, the movie stars of that generation kind of became them bigger versions of themselves.

Yeah. And that's, I think, true in the tradition of most movie stars. If you look at Jimmy Stewart or you look at Marilyn Monroe or these icons of film history, it's not dissimilar. However, there's one interesting wrinkle to this. If you look at Jimmy Stewart, for example, this has been cited recently as people are analyzing where Hanks kind of lives in our consciousness. In the 50s and the 60s, he started to make changes to the kinds of parts he took on. He starts making movies like Vertigo, and then he starts working with Anthony Mann and starts making Westerns that are a little bit more morally ambiguous. Sometimes he's playing villains. And he changed his persona and he adapted to a new kind of a thing.

Hanks was profiled in the New York Times recently by Taffy Broaddus or Ackner. Interesting piece that was essentially like a piece about how it's hard to write about Tom Hanks. A lot of Taffy's stories are sort of meta commentaries on how to write about the person, how to portray the person. Hanks in particular,

I think is worthy of that kind of approach because he seems very uncomplicated and nice and the opposite of dark and the opposite of undiscovered. And he kind of messes with Taffy in the reporting of the piece where he's sort of like, I do have a dark side and I've been waiting to tell the New York Times, and so I'm ready to tell you right now. And you can sense his sense of self and his self-effacement and his sense of humor in the piece.

But anytime he's ever tried to do something like Cloud Atlas that shows a little bit more of a darkness to him, he's kind of struggled to transform. He doesn't really transform. He can't do even that sort of paranoid desperation of the character in Vertigo that Stewart plays. And I think one of the reasons that after a pretty tumultuous, not tumultuous, unsuccessful 21st century of films up until Captain Phillips and Sully, and I would say now A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, this sort of trifecta of redemption, is that all those people are very decent. And sometimes they're like extraordinarily decent to the point of ridiculousness. And it just feels like he has decided

that he shouldn't push himself beyond those places. You know, he's Woody. He's Josh Baskin from Big. And is there any part of you that wants to see him heel turn to something a little bit darker, more evil or weird? No. I mean, this is a guy who he's on Twitter and he's a great Twitter user. He's just like helping people find their lost gloves and stuff. And he signs every tweet T period Hanks.

So which is both with Hanks with an X. But so it's both Tom Hanks, his name and also thanks. Yes. I mean, so that's just he is. You should start signing tweets. Me? Yeah. Amanda or just A.

Maybe just Dobbins exclamation point. That would be funny. Okay. And it's like it's cornyny but he also is in on the joke and he is just so demonstrably a nice guy that and we have so few of those i i think it's really telling um right after the harvey weinstein was published and during the very beginning of the publication of the Me Too movement, you know, a thing, a conversation you might have is just like, when we were learning a lot about a lot of people and learning a lot about some people that I think

various people had lionized, a conversation would be like, who could you just absolutely not abide if it turned out that they were a predator or a part, you know, had done terrible things. And Tom Hanks was always the go-to example of just people were like, if Tom Hanks is involved in anything, I will lose it because Tom Hanks is this ideal of good. And we need Tom Hanks. And I imagine that must be a burden. It must be kind of exhausting to be the person, the squeaky clean example of what is right and possible in the world. And I think what's interesting about A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood is he is kind of engaging with that a bit. I always like metatext, and this is certainly a part of it. But no, I'm like everybody else. I recognize an essential goodness in Tom Hanks and let's keep that.

I agree with you. I think if it were 10 years ago and we were in the aftermath of Saving Private Ryan, then I might have thought, let's see a darker turn. Let's see you evolve as a performer. But candidly, like I said, those three movies that I've really liked that he's made in this decade speak exactly to that thing. And even though Captain Phillips is not a movie about being a nice guy, the decency that we're talking about is fundamental to that character. Yeah. There's also a thing of there are actors or artists or individuals in the world having nothing to do with movies who are chameleons and can do different things and who can their their talent is reinvention. But sometimes you just want people to be really good at the thing they're good at. And that may not be as creatively satisfying, but especially musicians, sometimes you're just like they've released their sixth album and it's, you know, a brand new, a brand new sound. And we really discovered some stuff

while we were traveling wherever. And you're just like, no, I want you to play the music that I liked you for. That was good. And there is value in people just doing the thing that they're very good at. I completely agree with you. How do we, how do we choose the thing that they are very good at. I completely agree with you. How do we choose the films that best represent that and that show some diversity and show some general interest? Because I think one of the challenges of him is he's got two Oscars. Yes, he does. They came in consecutive years in the 90s. Yeah.

He hasn't been nominated for an Oscar in 18 years. So what you get is this really compressed period basically like 1988 through 2001 he's the most important thing in movies more or less you know it's juliet's denzel like you said it's mel gibson there's a handful of people on the list of like these people are movies and then they're hollywood american cinema i don't want it i don't want this Hall of Fame to be too compressed. But we're going to walk through it. I think one variance is that there are different genres here.

He's made, he is often, he has the same quality, but he makes a lot of different types of movies. Maybe that's what makes him so special too. Is there's a particular movie that will end up on this list that you love. Maybe two movies because of where your passion for movies is. There's a couple here for me as well. Yes. There's a couple here for fans of animation. Yes.

There's a couple here. I thought those were for you. Well, they are in some respects. There's some if you like directing. There's some if you like writing. There's some if you like Tales directing there's some if you like writing there's some if you like tales of whimsy yes do we start with big i think you have to right so what we're going to do is we're going to go through and nominate our 10 films for the list and at some point we'll hit

10 and there will still be tom hanks films that qualify and that's where it gets a little dicey for you and me right do you think we'll be fighting no i don't know qualify. And that's where it gets a little dicey for you and me, right? Do you think we'll be fighting? No, I don't know. That's not the spirit of Tom Hanks. This is a spirited discussion, but based with decency and with honor. All right. We'll try to be nice to each other as we go through this. I mean, I mentioned Bachelor Party and Splash earlier. I think they're both significantly important movies for him. As I was going through this list with my wife last night, she said, the Money Pit is so important, but it stresses me out, and I can't watch it, but it's so important. Eileen.

Shout out to Eileen being stressed out by a Shelley Long comedy. I don't think that any of those movies ultimately would make my list. I think Big is the first one where we felt like, oh, we have someone special. There's so much iconic about Big, despite the fact that it is... The plot itself is hashtag problematic. Yeah. A grown woman sleeps with a disembodied 11-year-old boy. I don't know what to say. The 80s were a different time. Truly. But we're putting it in, right? Yeah. I think it's his major breakthrough.

Also, if you can just think of one scene, like when you think of the Tom Hanks highlight reel, him on the piano is in there. And I think that alone qualifies it. No question. Did you know he was nominated for an Oscar for this performance? Really? Yeah. I didn't. Feels like the kind of movie that doesn't usually get love at the Oscars.

I was going to say the 80s were a different time. Crazy time. I didn't. Feels like the kind of movie that doesn't usually get love at the Oscars. It's going to be the 80s or a different time. Crazy time. I love Big. I think it's perfect. A movie that I would really love to put in the Hall of Fame that I don't think

you would reasonably allow is Punchline. I don't think I've seen Punchline. Okay. I think Punchline is a fascinating movie. Is it a good movie? I think that's highly debatable.

It came out immediately after Big. Wow. I just read the description of this. Absolutely not for me. Why don't you read it? A medical school dropout and a housewife slash mom. Thanks for, okay. Try to make it as stand-up comedians. They become friends and help each other out at an NYC comedy club. I don't want to see people failing at comedy ever. I just, that is not my idea of a good time at the movies or in life. I'm not coming to your comedy show. I'm sorry. See, the energy just changed. What happened in Decency?

I'm sorry. I forgot about that. What happened? You made a promise and you broke it. One mention of stand-up comedy and you lost it. It's incredible. I just got really uncomfortable. Tom Hanks wouldn't want me to be uncomfortable. I think that's part of what's appealing about Punchline and being a credible stand-up comedy and you lost it. It's incredible. I just got really uncomfortable. Tom Hanks wouldn't want me to be uncomfortable. I think that's part of what's appealing about Punchline and being a credible stand-up comic

is difficult. I think that's both part of the problem and what makes the movie interesting. Neither Sally Field nor Tom Hanks are gifted comedians. They're gifted comic actors.

Right. And so you can affect being a good comedian but it's not until you get to a movie like Funny People where you watch Adam Sandler on stage and you're like, oh, that's how you be a comedian. You can't fake it. Even though I think Tom Hanks seems not just on screen, but in his life to be a kind of funny, voluble, charismatic kind of a dude. So we don't put punchline in.

The Burbs? No. I like The Burbs. Okay. I'm not saying I don't like it. Okay. Turner and Hooch. This, I mean, this is. It's on the line. It's on the line. But it's more, is Turner and Hooch a good movie or is it just literally the fact that Turner and Hooch was made and you can look at that poster and just like get a laugh but also feel good every single time? Chemistry is everything. And he's clicking. He's sparking.

With Hooch, I guess. Hooch is the canine. You know, when we did a Rewatchables with Aaron Sorkin, he was very fond of Turner and Hooch. He mentioned it while we were chatting. I thought that was unusual. That's very charming. Turner and Hooch lives on.

It does not live on in the Tom Hanks Hall of Fame, unfortunately. Joe vs. the Volcano, candidly, just one of my favorite movies of all time. What an absolutely bizarre, brilliant, weird, perfect kind of movie unto itself. You know, written and directed by John Patrick Shanley, the playwright, who is not exactly known for this kind of work. He wrote Moonstruck, won an Oscar. But, you know, I think he's more well-known for things like Doubt. You know, he wrote Doubt, and he is a very, seems like a very serious fellow.

Jovers of Volcano is a total farce and a hilarious movie. Probably not in the Hall of Fame, though, unfortunately. I wouldn't put it there, but if you feel so strongly, why aren't you fighting for it? Well, it's because there's another Meg Ryan, Tom Hanks movie that we have to put in sure and I mean how many Tom Hanks there's probably two Tom Hanks Meg Ryan movies I have to put in but I'm gonna argue for one but what yeah okay I feel you but those are of a piece and this is different and it's showing a slightly different side of Tom Hanks gosh I would like to I don't know if I can make the case. Okay. All right. I was just offering you the opportunity. This is a

supportive podcast. Your generosity is extraordinary. Thank you so much. The Bonfire of the Vanities? No. It's hilarious that this happened. I rewatched this recently as I was going through the films of Brian De Palma. It's obviously a complete and total fiasco. And there was an entire book written about what a fiasco this movie is. It interesting too because this is another example of hanks trying to play a character who is slightly less um i don't know scrupulous maybe yeah uh and it doesn't it doesn't work he doesn't fit he's just not right for the part doesn't seem like a dick and you have to be a dick to succeed in this adaptation of Tom Wolfe's book. Yes.

A league of their own. I think this is, this has to be. It's a pretty, pretty, pretty, close to a perfect movie. Yeah.

Close to a perfect performance. It is a little edgier. He is, he is gruff. I think you're shown, well, you're not really shown it, but you definitely hear him

pissing on screen for comedic effect for a very long time. He's the iconic, there's no crying in baseball line. That's right. It's perfect. I think that, and it also, he is, would you call this a supporting role? I would. Okay. I would.

I would as well. I think Geena Davis is the star of the movie. Right. And it is about the women primarily, and he's just there on the side. So. Pretty savvy move by him, though, to take this on. After the bonfire of the vanities kind of burns out, a couple of years go by. It's unclear if superstar Tom Hanks is actually going to happen. And then he really rights the ship with the League of Their Own and then just goes on one of the more insane runs in recent movie star history, Sleepless in Seattle. You have to.

Has to be in. You have to. Has to be in. Because this is where he becomes the rom-com romantic lead and kind of the decent guy that all of America loves. And kind of like you would probably marry Tom Hanks, but also you wouldn't have him as a friend. He just kind of seems like the person you want in every situation. I agree. So we've got three in right now.

Yeah. But we're right in the middle of his hottest streak. I mean, we just have to be honest. We have to be honest. Philadelphia, yes, is going in the Hall of Fame. He won Best Actor for Philadelphia. He did. His first Oscar.

Directed by Jonathan Demme. Interesting movie that has been, I think people wanted to recontextualize 10 years ago as insensitive and now are recontextualizing again as uniquely sensitive. Obviously, the movie is about gay identity and the AIDS crisis and the workplace. And I think the relationship between Denzel Washington's character in the film and the sort of intensity and awkwardness that he feels with Hanks' character gives Hanks an opportunity to act in a very un-Hanksian way. It's quiet. It's more subtle.

He's very frail in the film. He's not doing that kind of like puffed out smiley chest thing that he does in so many films. I think it is a feat of acting. It's an interesting movie. Like all Demi movies, it is deeply empathetic. And that is like the, that is his,

his raison d'etre. Like he is, he really wants you to understand what humanity, what human life is really like for people that you don't always think about or don't always take seriously.

Forrest Gump. We have to. I mean mean it's like i i think it's great against my better judgment i am still flashing back to your rewatchables with bill and you guys just talking about the the sexual life of forrest gump for far longer bill bill talked about it i sat traumatized um as he attempted to recreate some very unfortunate things. I do like Forrest Gump. I think it has flaws and I greatly acknowledge those flaws. I have not seen it since I was a child or since I was 10. I think I was 10 when I came out. It definitely works for a 10-year-old. Same. I was 12 and it worked on me. Yeah. And it

has that sweeping old school big movie feel that you don't really get anymore. Yes, you do. Here's how. Alan Silvestri's score drives Forrest Gump. You know what other movie Alan Silvestri's score drives? Avengers Endgame. Okay. I'm just trying to have a nice conversation about Forrest Gump and about Tom Hanks. You know, he's not playing Tom Hanks in this movie. No. He is playing someone else. I don't really think that this is the space to relitigate how the film Forrest Gump handles that character and its unique abilities. But it's not a charm-forward performance, or it is a charm-forward performance, but it's a different type of...

It's not always the confident, smooth-talking, not quite center of the party, but the person who is making everyone else comfortable. Yeah, your good neighbor, like you said at the beginning of the conversation. He's not doing that. But the charm still does come through, even in situations that are unexpected and awkward. And I do think it is the charm that makes the character so winning, ultimately. Let me ask you this. Do you think Hanks could have played Thanos?

Okay, I'll take that as a yes um apollo 13 one of your favorites i love this movie i have seen this movie probably 75 times and i cry every single time you finally see those balloons on the screen and it's houston it's got it's good to be home um this is him this is maybe the most essential Tom Hanks a leader of men decent honorable reserved this is when the mold dried yeah on this part this is when he was like for the most part this is who i'm going to be in movies now right exactly and you know he still he gets to be a hero and he gets to have dignity he still does have that charm but it's um like bill paxton is kind of having he's the goofy one and kevin bacon's there to be hot and um what is that is that the case yeah they just show him shirtless like four times in Apollo 13 for no reason. Is Kevin Bacon hot?

Yes. Okay. Wow. Not something that ever crossed my mind. Wow, yes. Okay. Over like decades. Okay, great.

I don't know if you saw the I Love Dick, the Amazon show. I'll be honest, I only saw the first episode, but he looked great in it. But that character is like, I'm a hot guy. Well, sure. So that is, what, 2017? And this was 1995? My guy has it. Going forward, we'll have to look at a Kevin Bacon Hall of Fame.

Until then. Okay. But I agree with you. I just think this. And also, he's playing an American hero. So it kind of solidifies him as an avatar for some sort of national identity. The next one is Toy Story. It has to go in.

Of course. No one's arguing. Obviously, it unlocks the Pixar future for animated movies, but it's also a feat of great voice acting. And, you know, I don't know if Tim Allen has become a terribly fun or interesting person to talk about in the last 20 years, but him and Tim Allen together at the time was kind of a big deal. And Home Improvement was thriving and Tom Hanks was the most successful actor in America. So it felt like a very noisy thing to have done. And shout out to Tom Hanks for sticking with it through four movies. Yeah. Have you seen a recent clip on the Graham Norton show, which is my favorite talk show,

even though I only watch it on YouTube because it's in the UK. And Tom Hanks and Tom Holland were on the same show. And Tom Hanks is explaining how to do voice acting, but he's sort of he's explaining it to everyone, but he's using Tom Holland as his partner and explaining this so he makes Tom Holland run lines and kind of keeps giving notes on it and he's putting him through the paces and it's actually like slightly more aggressive Tom Hanks than you're used to he it's like it's real actor Tom Hanks he's in control of the situation and Tom Holland is being adorable Tom Holland and really game. It's fascinating. It was interesting to see how he thinks about the voice acting and also just

remember, oh yeah, Tom Hanks is a very successful Hollywood actor. You know, it's funny you bring up Tom Holland because I think of all the young successful actors in Hollywood, the person who has the best chance to scoop Hanks's mantle, I think, is Tom Holland. He has a kind of innate and natural decency that makes him such a good Peter Parker. And there's an innocence to him and a fun and a kind of wiliness under the surface. But he's doing a thing next, a movie called Cherry. Yeah. Directed by the Russo brothers who made the Avengers movies. That is not something Hanks would have done at that time.

It is very dark. He plays a opioid-addicted veteran who comes back to his home in West Virginia, I'm not sure where, and does some nasty things. So it'll be curious to see if we can ever have a Hanks type again, because we don't really have anybody else like him in their 40s. I really honestly feel for 15 years, probably from 2000 until 2015, every year on the cover of GQ or Esquire, someone was like, so-and-so is the next Tom Hanks. And it was really Hollywood was looking for who is the next person

that will be this kind of decent movie star that can open movies for us. And there is no other Tom Hanks. He is pretty singular. And also the way that we make movie stars have changed. Tom Holland is in a position to be like Tom Hanks because he is Spider-Man and has been Spider-Man for a very long time and has a built-in fan base, including Grace Fennessy. Shout out, Grace. Shout out to Grace, as always. This next one. Yeah, you threw me about on this one. I love that thing you do. It's so good. It's so good, and it holds up, and he casts himself as the band manager and is delightful. And again, he has a heart of gold, but he's the the wise kind of cynical uh older figure somewhat exploiting them

but also guiding them and and and is there to give the speech of kind of like well that's what happens kids um and kind of using already some of his hollywood experience positioning him as himself as the old hand um He also wrote and directed this. He wrote and directed it, which is that's the number one reason I put it here, which is that that's hard to do. It's, you know, it's perhaps a bit rude and unfair to say this, but it's by far the lowest performing movie that he makes like in a 20 year span of time. But he also had to do a great deal to get this across the line. And he obviously has so much affection for this time in music. And that's the thing you get the sense from him is whether he's making a movie about space

or a movie about a lawyer who's struggling with a disease or that thing you do about pop music in the 50s and 60s. You sense that he is like invested deeply in the story and in the people's lives and that there is a kind of like there's a kind of intelligence research, for lack of a better word, that is behind all the choices that he makes, which I appreciate. Sometimes when you make a Cloud Atlas, it doesn't always work out. I think choice is something we'll talk about as we get into the 2000s. But before we get there, Saving Private Ryan, you know, I think it has to be there. It's the most serious film

he's ever made it's it is a bit more of an athletic performance there's something physical and grueling and not just in that opening 45 minute

storming Normandy beach segment but really throughout the film the sort of trudging through France aspect of the movie and

it also starts in addition to just being a very famous performance in a great and beloved movie, it also starts out his career of producing and interest in historical films and documentaries. I mean, he does a lot of not just World War II stuff, but has produced, I believe, several World War II projects at this point. It's also his first time working with Steven Spielberg, a notable collaboration for him. You've Got Mail.

Yes. So, interestingly, You've Got Mail is number 10. So, at this point, and we have some more films to go, including one that just absolutely has to be on there. So, it's going to get dicey. Can you have Sleepless and You've Got Mail? Do you need them both? Well, this is tough. I am of the school of thought that You've Got Mail is a better film than Sleepless. And that I think is a more interesting Tom Hanks performance because he is a little squirrely. He and Meg Ryan are pitted against each other. It's more classic screwball rom-com of their enemies until the very end. And You've Got Mail also ultimately relies on a speech that Tom Hanks gives to Meg Ryan where he, as the character she knows, has to make her want to fall in love with him.

And then he has to go to the park and be like, also, I was the guy that you were talking to online and I've been lying to you all along. And he has to make that work because basically his character is in the wrong if you're actually analyzing it. It's not okay to have a relationship with someone online and then also have a separate relationship with them in real life, not identify yourself and try to trick them into liking you based on information you're getting from your online relationship. He catfished her. Well, he didn't catfish her because he was himself.

An inverted catfish. Okay. It's an inverted catfish. Anyway, it's not okay. It's a butterfly presentation of a catfish. And if literally anyone else is giving that pretty treacly speech by a lovely Upper West Side brownstone and then showing up in Riverside Park and being like it was me, no one else can pull that off. And it's the most moving thing I've ever seen. It's romance.

I've got bad news for you. Yeah. It's out. Why? We didn't even, it didn't even get to be on for a second. It's 1998. But like, Sleepless is fine. We have 21 years of movies.

Sure, but it's really good. Okay, it's really good if that were the bar, then Toy Story 2 would also be in. Sleepless is fine. He just like calls a radio station. Hmm. You know, and he's, like, with the cute kid and the kid's doing all the work. And then he and Meg Ryan only, like, meet at the very end. Spoiler alert.

Oh, I'm sorry. Jesus Christ. Okay, well, we'll circle back on You've Got Mail. Toy Story 2, lovely movie, not in the Hall of Fame. The Green Mile, can't say it was for me. I did not enjoy it. Cast Away. Now, an interesting candidate, a huge performance because it is essentially the only performance in the movie.

Yeah. No shots to Wilson. This is not a movie that I've responded to historically. I know it's a big Bill Simmons movie. Yes. Frequently referencing it in its columns over the years. Threatening to do a solo rewatch of Wilson. Threatening to do a solo rewatch of Wilson, which I hope happens.

Me too. We just draw Chris Ryan's face on a volleyball. We can't have anyone else in the room, but just lots of cameras. I hope it happens. You know, I certainly see the case. I think it's such an archetypal performance. Everyone references it in terms of, you know, when we're talking about Damon and the Martian, I was like, okay, that's his cast way because it's someone showing that they can carry a movie. That they honestly, they don't need anyone else.

And it's him by himself carrying the movie. That's intense to do from a performance level and also holding the audience's attention level. It has just become a shorthand in pop culture. So I think you have to give it

to him based on that. Okay, we'll put it on the long list, but we're going to have to whittle it down, unfortunately. Okay. Road to Perdition. We mentioned this earlier when we talked about Skyfall

on the rewatchables and Sam Mendes. Damn good movie. Worthy of reexamination. Probably not in the Tom Hanks Hall of Fame, though it's as close as he gets to a scurrilous type. But even when he plays an assassin, he's got to have a little cute little kid. I don't remember this movie. I don't mean to be rude.

It's pretty good. It's based on a graphic novel, actually. Catch me if you can. Jammin' movie. Great movie, but it's a Leo movie. It's based on a graphic novel, actually. Catch Me If You Can, jam and movie. Great movie, but it's a Leo movie. It is a Leo movie. And respect to Tom Hanks for the Damon quality that we were talking about of willing to be in it and kind of being in the background and being the necessary foil or partner for Leo. Yeah, he's setting picks.

Yeah. You know, he's setting picks so Leo can go to the hole, and it's great. Lady Killers, it's not what you want. Absolutely not. It's just not what you want. It's a very depressing thing that exists in the world. Tom Hanks decides to make a movie with the Coen brothers, and this is what they made. Bums me out.

People try stuff. Okay. The Terminal. The Terminal. Confession, I've never seen it. I think I did see it. I mean, this is another thing where it just, it became a joke reference so quickly. This is the only Steven Spielberg movie I've ever seen. He's just in the

airport like Chris Ryan. That's right. He's just in the airport like Chris Ryan. If you don't understand that reference, please listen to our Matt Damon podcast, The Polar Express. I mean, do you like this? it's legendary for being creepy it's not for me they showed this movie every christmas at my elementary school like they forced us to meet in the gym and they put it on a projector screen i think it actually is a generational thing too for us where the 10 years between us indicates that this movie probably has a bigger bigger shelf life in the minds of 20-somethings and teens than it will for us. When it came out, I was an adult man living in New York City. I

wasn't going to go to the Polar Express. Congratulations to you. How cool. Thank you very much. I am very cool. It's still terrifying to me, though. It's not endearing to me. If I'm supposed to be the representative of my generation, I'm going to do a bad job for this one. But it was too soon to use that technology to make a movie because many a child was horrified by the film. I also just never really connected with this book. I know it won the Calicot, but. I've never read it. I can't say I care. It's not for me. Speaking of not connecting with a book, The Da Vinci Code. Wow. That's rude to say. It was in the Louvre. It's in the Louvre. Are you kidding me? That's hilarious.

I don't even know what you're talking about. I freaking love it. I just spoiled it. I'm sorry if you haven't yet seen or heard The Da Vinci Code. What are you doing? Just spoiling every Tom Hanks movie for the dear listener who's trying to enjoy this podcast. The Da Vinci Code is an international sensation. Like 13 years ago. If you haven't seen it, I don't know what to tell

you. Piece of advice for you. When I say a movie's title, don't reveal the ending. But it's so funny to me. But can I just explain to you why that's so funny? Sure, go ahead. So, Da Vinci Code, and I'm just going with it. It's not a very good movie, but I don't care. You can't laugh at me before I start. Okay. So The Da Vinci Code is about Robert Langdon, played by Tom Hanks in the movie, who is like a world famous art historian. And more than an art historian, he like finds codes in art. And he's also maybe, or maybe he is a decryption expert who is often used by artists, but I think he's an art historian. Anyway, the Holy Grail goes missing, like the actual Holy Grail.

Okay. And so they have to find it before a creepy monk, Opus Dei. Do you know what that is? I certainly do. Yeah. Before the monk who's a part of Opus Dei, like, finds it and destroys it and also somehow destroys the world. I don't really remember this part of it. Anyway, so he's just going on a lot of clues that he's like, he's on a search for the Holy Grail.

He's on a search for the Holy Grail. And there was like a bunch of symbology, including kind of arrows that point up and down. Stop laughing. I'm going to get through this. And they go all over the world and then ultimately and then they're trying to decrypt the up and the down things but then because he's an art historian somehow the knights of the templar they are involved in this somehow don't worry about it you're doing a bang-up job keep going ultimately once upon a time, buried the Holy Grail in the art historian's true sanctuary,

the Louvre, which, if you will recall, is decorated by a very large pyramid facing upwards at the cathedral or the courtyard outside, and then also has a smaller inverted pyramid down below, which is where the bones of the Holy, it's where the Holy Grail is. Also, the Holy Grail is something different having to do with Mary Magdalene. I haven't really gotten into that, nor do I totally remember it. But so it's in the Louvre. And that's the last thing is that it's in the Louvre. It's so funny.

I love that you thought that I wanted you to describe the entire plot of the Da Vinci Code. It's so funny. It's in the loop. It's like, what? It's like, I'm sorry. It's in the loop, folks. I think that Tom Hanks tried his best. And he explains the symbology and the Knights Templar and all that shit pretty well.

But it's really weird. Almost as well as you. I had a nice time. Next up, Charlie Wilson's War. A movie I like. I like it too. Do you want to do the whole plot right now? I don't remember the whole plot.

I'm basically just going to be like, and then Philip Seymour Hoffman yells. I think that what's being held against this movie is that it's a Mike Nichols movie written by Aaron Sorkin. And that should probably be the greatest film ever made. Yes. And unfortunately, it's not the greatest film ever made. It's just a perfectly fine, breezy, entertaining tale of international espionage and CIA work with some...

Isn't it about Russia's involvement in Afghanistan? It is ultimately, yes. That is what the Philip Seymour Hoffman character works with the Hanks character to accomplish. Okay. And Julia Roberts works as the Texas, it's like an oil heiress, a very wealthy woman who's kind of helping the U.S. government fund some of their operations in Afghanistan. Okay. If you watch it and then you get to the end of the title card, you realize why we have civil conflict with Afghanistan historically because of a lot of the things that happened in the 1980s. That's what I remembered.

And I was kind of like, oh, I should revisit that. Sure. You could also just read a book. That would be helpful too. Okay. I did. I read The Da Vinci Code. You did.

Well, so now we're going to Angels and Demons. So if you would like to do the plot of that. No, Angels and Demons is bad because it's not the Holy Grail anymore. It's like in Rome and it's a the holy grail anymore it's like in rome and it's a lot grosser and there's like branding okay thank you for all the details toy story three there's going to be a lot of people that are making the case that this is one of the 10 best movies of the 2010s this is this movie was released in 2010 are you going to be one of those people perhaps okay we'll save that for another podcast coming down the road.

I like it. I don't think it goes in the Hall of Fame. Okay. Now, there's a huge gap here. We're crossing many years after putting consecutive films in. That's true. Through the 90s. We're going through a long period of time. We will not be adding Larry Crown.

No. Perhaps the worst film the man has made. I don't think that that's fair. Okay. It's nice when people try things. He did direct this movie. Yeah. He did co-write it with Nia Vardalos, who he became friendly with when he produced My Big Fat Greek Wedding.

Right. It's not very good. It's not very good. It's not the worst because we're about to talk about Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Also not going in. Okay. Also tough. Yeah.

This is not a movie anyone should ever rewatch. Mm-mm. Cloud Atlas? Points for effort? Yes, but not enough points. Not going in. Captain Phillips. This is an interesting one.

Love this movie. It's a great movie. And it's sort of, it's not quite Catch Me If You Can because he is Captain Phillips and the movie is called Captain Phillips. But it's like, it's as much about the things going on around him as it is about the performance himself. Yeah. Barkhad Abdi's performance in the movie was a big talking point in the aftermath. I'm the captain now. That whole spiel.

But people routinely point to the kind of final three to four minutes of the performance after he is saved and traumatized at the end. And the acting that he does in that sequence is haunting. Pretty incredible. Some of the best acting that he does in that sequence is haunting. Pretty incredible. Some of the best work that he's ever done. And it's one of those, like, this is why you take the movie moments. And I'm going to put it in for now. And we'll see in the whittling if it survives. That's 12.

Okay. That's 12. Saving Mr. Banks. It's nice. I mean, we're in the period here where he's playing a lot of real life people. Captain Richard Phillips was a real life person. Walt Disney, of course,

and saving Mr. Banks, a real person, you know, Walt Disney has a complicated history as a, as an imagineer. You know, he's given us some of the greatest inventions of modern and historical

Hollywood. He also has some, uh, sort of a complex backstory. He also has some complex backstory. Yes. He drove people very hard. He had some difficult opinions about

Jews. Yes. There's some challenging aspects of Walt Disney. This movie doesn't really touch on that. Bridge of Spies, a movie I also like quite a bit.

He plays James B. Donovan, also a real person. Yes. It's a good movie. I like this movie, but I find myself not really being able to remember him in this movie. It's a good movie. I like this movie, but I find myself not really being able to remember him

in this movie. It is the Mark Rylance performance, for sure. I think that's in part because Chris Ryan just yelled about Mark Rylance in Bridge of Spies for like a year straight.

I mean, he won the Oscar. Yeah. It's a good performance. A hologram for The King, a movie most people have not seen based on a Dave Eggers novel. Nor have I.

Okay. We can move forward from there. Sully. Sully. Okay. We can move forward from there. Sully. Sully. Yes. What? You didn't go into a plot description.

I was waiting for you to explain that a man was flying a plane and he landed it. Are you going to yell at me for spoiling a real life event? No. I observed this plane landing. Oh, you did?

Yeah. You just like ran outside? No, I was in a skyscraper and I watched it happen. Oh, okay. I think I kind of watched it on early twitter or the internet okay um anyway do you do you remember this i went to see this on a saturday afternoon and was like oh this is really good and oh yes yeah and then you and your wife went to see it kind of like a few hours later and then we all saw each other and we're like hey sully great movie pretty great pretty great yeah

it was good i I think there's a Clint Eastwood sliding scale of quality and, you know, we'll talk about Richard Jewell in this show next month. This is one of those

like, ah, Clint, still got it. Yes. You know, one take Clint, still crushing. Right. And it's a great

Hanks performance and he's perfectly at home in the role of Sully Sullenberger. There's something about the competence of Sully in this that Tom H's something about the competence of Sully

in this that Tom Hanks brings to it that he's just kind of calm and in command that I really respond to. I don't really need this stuff as much where he's calling his wife. I mean, I guess that's useful for character development or whatever, but the scenes of him just kind of very precisely explaining what's going to happen or what happened. I think it actually, it's of a piece with Hank's performances, but it's something that you haven't quite seen before. I was at a dinner party recently and I erroneously was telling everyone that Hank's had been nominated for Captain Phillips and he might've even been nominated for Sully. And in fact, he was not nominated for either, nor was he nominated for Bridge of Spies.

We may be taking him for granted a little bit because we know he has two Oscars, which was kind of a talking point of a lot of the Hanks campaign around A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. There was no conversation for him for Inferno. I did see this. I saw it as well. I can't say I'd recommend it. This is the third Robert Langdon film that he made. And then for those of you who did not see A Hologram for the King, I assume you also did not see The Circle, another Dave Eggers adaptation that Tom Hanks is participating in for some reason um the post you skipped past the whole david pumpkin situation oh my gosh which i know are you putting pumpkins in the hall of fame no i thought you were going to i i did like the david pumpkin sketch i think it's now overrated yeah it's one of those things where just people take it too far. Yeah.

Okay. I just, I thought we should talk about it. I mean, you could make a case for Hanks as SNL host. I think he has hosted among the most of anybody in the history of the show. He's a terrific sketch comic actor. Part of the thing that we've talked about here is his approachability and a little bit of his sense of the absurd, I think, is really strong. Hence the pumpkins thing working so well. I'm not going to put it in the Hall of Fame, though.

Okay. The Post is a movie I like. Me too. Could it have been a different actor as Ben Bradley? Probably. Yes, I think so. I think we've just seen so many Ben Bradleys at this point, and it's still also not the number one Ben Bradley with all respect to Tom Hanks. Yes, it's very good, but it is not elite, elite.

Toy Story 4, good movie. Okay. I liked it. I trust you. A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. I think we have to discuss it. I think he's tremendous in the film. Yeah.

And you can certainly make the case the movie doesn't work without him. It super doesn't work without him. And I think that a lot of that is by design. The way that the movie is created and is truly like a supporting performance. Mm-hmm. You know, Matthew Rhys plays Lloyd Vogel, who's a journalist. He was essentially Tom Junot. And the movie is focused on him, but the sort of structure, the framing device for the movie is that this is one long episode of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. And it opens with Fred Rogers sort of introducing the Lloyd Vogel character as one of his friends on the show.

And the movie frequently returns to this superstructure. But the parts that work best for me in the whole movie are when Mr. Rogers kind of comes in as like a Greek chorus or like an angel on the shoulder for the Lloyd character. And they have one-on-one conversations. Yes. And that's where Hanks gets to be. It's sort of a summation of what makes him good. It is. It is very much a later period comment on the career and on how America has responded to him and what people will remember when they talk about Tom Hanks. And it is very much in conversation with that. But he's also doing amazing work and is really back to that

essential, just connecting with someone on screen, which is harder than I think we often think. There's one scene in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood that's really extraordinary to me. I can't remember. It's when they're on the show and the Matthew Rhys character is watching Mr. Rogers, Tom Hanks' Mr mr rogers do i believe it's a no dan is daniel tiger is not on that's a that's a kid's show now but who's the who is the puppet that he is speaking to throughout the the movie um well there's there's there's little rabbit is is lloyd's sort of like mantra puppet anyway it's it's mr ro Rogers doing one of the puppets and they just kind of

close in. You've got it. Daniel Stripe Tiger. It is Daniel Tiger? Yeah. Oh, okay. And the camera just closes in on not even on Daniel Tiger, but on Tom Hanks behind the scenes operating Daniel Tiger giving a piece of advice

and concentrating on it and feeling it and there is something pretty extraordinary and really intimate about it I can't you often you experience a lot of emotions with Tom Hanks but you don't often like see behind the curtain and I that has stayed with me there's's something very, very patient, calm, quiet about the role, about the performance, about everything that he's doing. And you can feel Tom Hanks slowing down a little bit. You get the sense he has an active mind. And if you know anything about his collection of typewriters or his short story writing or all of the sort of eccentricities of his personality, you know that he's kind of a whiz-bang kind of a guy.

And so this performance, I think, is one of the best he's ever had. We've got 14 movies on our list. Okay. Now, typically, let's say you're going to the Baseball Hall of Fame. You get a plaque. That plaque indicates in the hall. What position did I play? You want me to know what position you played?

You were saying that I'm going to the Hall of Fame. That's a good question. You're kind of a, you're like a were saying that I'm going to the Hall of Fame. Um, hmm, that's a good question. You're kind of a, you're like a little bit of an aggro first baseman. Okay.

You know, like a little chatty, make friends, but then under the right circumstances, you'll lean over and be like, don't you ever fucking lean in on that pitch again?

I accept. Okay. Um, if one were to get a baseball plaque, it would list the teams that you played for and then there'd be

a paragraph essentially about your exploits, about your achievements, about your accomplishments, but there's only so much room on the plaque. were to get a baseball plaque, it would list the teams that you played for. And then there'd be a paragraph, essentially, about your exploits, about your achievements, about your accomplishments. But there's only so much room on the plaque. So we've got to pick 10. I'm going to give us our 14

really quickly and we've got to cut four. Okay. Big. Yes. A league of their own. Sleepless in Seattle, Philadelphia,

Forrest Gump, Apollo 13, Toy Story, That Thing You Do, Saving Private Ryan, You've Got Mail, Castaway, Captain Phillips,

Sully, and A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. Can I ask you about our strategy here? So are we trying to be like cute and smart or are we trying to be truly, honestly representative? We're trying to be the Robert Langdon of podcasts about movies. Okay. I think that's option b okay um i'm i'm i'm i think we have to cut you've got mail i mean what you had to start with that i did do you understand how mediation works you don't start with the most vicious thing this is a tom hanks podcast jesus christ good point okay

that's do you accept? Well, then you can cut my heart out with the next one. You're going to try to cut out Toy Story? I'm not going to cut out Toy Story because I'm not an idiot. Like, Toy Story is on the list. I understand how the rules work. Okay. What rules?

We made this up. I know. But, you know, the rules of list making. Bobby just did this on our doc like we decided it. I haven't agreed to this, okay? I haven't signed. Undo the cross out. No, I saw a strikethrough, so I think we decided it. I haven't agreed to this, okay? I haven't signed. Undo the cross out. No, I saw a strikethrough, so I think we're done.

You said okay. Well, I just... Can we talk about Sleepless in Seattle versus You've Got Mail? If you want to cut it, you can, but you're going to have to answer for it on the internet. Can we revisit it? We can revisit it. Okay. Between Captain Phillips and Sully, what goes?

Well, this is my thing. Are we being cute? Because I think Sully is kind of the more interesting performance, but I know that Captain Phillips is more widely understood to be an important movie and an important performance. If you want Sully, I'll give you Sully. Why do we turn adversarial?

This is a joint project. It's not adversarial. It's about communicating clearly. Yeah, like I said, I just don't totally remember him and Captain Phillips except for that last bit. Okay, strike through Captain Phillips, Bobby. Okay. This is great when we just like cut Sully two seconds later. Beautiful day in the neighborhood? Is it going to make the highlight reel?

The all-time reel? It will absolutely make the highlight reel. You think it'll be nominated? Do I think he'll be nominated for an Oscar? For this performance? Yes, I do. I feel like I turned to you as we left this screening and I was like, I want Brad Pitt to run in best actor because I'm concerned about Tom Hanks. I think this is wildly effective. Yeah, I agree. You know, and I think you and I both respond to Mr. Reiter's content. I think we grew up watching it. I was very moved by Won't You Be My Neighbor,

the documentary that came out a couple of years ago. But there are enough people in America who are going to watch Tom Hanks, this person who we have an invested emotional relationship with, just being so lovely. It's irresistible. I agree. So if you're keeping it in, we got some tough cuts to makeresistible. I agree.

So if you're keeping it in, we got some tough cuts to make here. No, I know. I would make the case that if you're going to keep it in, we should also cut Sully. Yeah, that's what I was saying.

We're going to cut Sully. That's fine. Cut Sully. It's fine. Sully is out. I just think that when we do highlight reels forever, it will be Tom Hanks

wearing the Mr. Rogers sweater. Oh my gosh. Okay. Don't you? It's hard to say. But he's literally singing, Won't You Be My Neighbor. I'm really emotional just thinking about it. It is, as you said, highly effective.

Okay. Two more got to go. That means two more legendary, potentially legendary movies. There's a couple on here that are personal choices. So are we doing this as performances or lifetime achievement? I think it's more lifetime achievement. The Hall of Fame is top fives are performances. Hall of Fame is for achievement. Okay. In that sense, I think that you should keep that thing you do, which I guess means that I have to get rid of You've Got Mail. Okay. There it goes. Now comes the hardest cut.

You've Got Mail is out. That means we have to cut one of Big, A League of Their Own, Sleepless in Seattle, Philadelphia, Forrest Gump, Apollo 13, Toy Story, That Thing You Do, Saving Private Ryan, Castaway, or A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. Are we cutting Castaway? That's insane. Well, what are we going to do? I honestly think that I would cut Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood before I kind of passed away. Do you want to do that?

That means the man hasn't made a great, memorable, important Hall of Fame film since 2000. Okay, well, are we doing a holistic list or are we being honest? That's what I keep asking you. Well, I guess we're deciding. You just killed Mr. Rogers on this podcast. I didn't kill Mr. Rogers. I just talked about how important Mr. Rogers is. Here's what we learned on this podcast. You didn't kill Mr. Rogers. I just talked about how important Mr. Rogers is. Here's what we learned

on this podcast. You think Kevin Bacon is hot. This is not a controversial opinion. You have a somewhat strong grasp of the plot of the Da Vinci Code. Somewhat strong. Somewhat strong.

There were some holes in it. And you assassinated Mr. Rogers on this podcast. I'm wondering... And the last 20 years of Tom Hanks' career. Okay, then leave it. But then do you take off Saving Private Ryan? Yeah.

Okay. Let's do it. Good night, Saving Private Ryan. Okay. We did it. We have our 10. You feel good about it? I think so.

This is an amazing exercise. I can't wait to do it with other people. Yeah. I mean, it's very fun. You know, I feel like we each had to lose some things. I think this is pretty representative. I agree. I look forward to hearing from the rest of the world on how deeply we failed and how fucked our opinions are.

Thanks, everybody. We appreciate you, too. Please stick around for my conversation with Marielle Heller, which is significantly sweeter and features a lot less content about the Da Vinci Code. Delighted to be joined by Mariel Heller. Mariel, thank you for being here. My pleasure. Mariel, you have a new film called A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. I'm wondering how soon after Can You Ever Forgive Me this came across your desk? There was a bit of an overlap. I wasn't totally done with Can You Ever Forgive Me,

but I think we were picture locked. I've been trying to remember exactly what the timing was. I tend to only be able to work on one project at once. That's the only way my brain can kind of focus because movies are so all consuming. You like live, sleep, breathe, dream that movie for so long. So I know I was sort of emotionally just coming up for air the day that Peter Seraf sent me this script. And I was already familiar with the writers, Noah and Micah. I had worked with them on Transparent. I had heard about this project, so I had some familiarity with it, but I can't remember the exact timing of it now, but it was basically when I was in like the finishing phases of Can You Ever Forgive Me? At the risk of getting too meta, I think I asked if I could speak to you for Can You Ever Forgive Me? And they were like, well, she's shooting,

so it can't happen. And I was like, okay, well, that was quick. It was a pretty crazy turnaround. I mean, Can You Ever Forgive Me? was actually finished for many months before it premiered at Telluride. We knew we had gotten into Telluride and we were so excited about that

as a launch pad for that movie. So we had finished the movie, I think the November before. So we had like 10 months where it kind of sat on a shelf knowing when it was going to come out. Cause I could never have really made two movies literally one year apart that came out. That's actually insane. People do it. They are insane, but they do it. I don't know how, because really, even with that, the only reason this timing worked out

was because I had finished Can You Ever Forgive Me? Cause I really was, yeah, I mean, I don't think it would have been physically possible for me at least. What did you learn about the experience on that movie? Because that was a movie star in the lead and it was a bigger, sort of a bigger project than your first film. Can You Ever Forgive Me? Yeah. And so before you headed into A Beautiful Day, what did you take away from the kind of full stop experience of Can You Ever Forgive Me? I mean, I think every movie is a huge learning experience. It's so difficult to make movies.

We don't really talk about how honestly, practically impossible it is to make movies. They're like a miracle when you make a movie. Number one, it's just hard to get a movie actually, all the pieces to come together to actually make a movie. It's really hard to get a script that you feel passionate about and that feels right and to get all the right actors together and to get the money together. It is a slight miracle when a movie comes together. And then it's just such a long process. And I think without anyone meaning to, there's a lot of ways for a movie to get ruined over the course of making a movie.

Nobody's trying to make a bad movie. Nobody's ever trying to ruin you making a bad movie. But there are a lot of forces at work that sort of try to go against a movie. You have to guard a movie against it getting ruined sort of over the course of— What can happen? A million things can happen. And I really mean this. It's with the best intentions. It's a lot of people either giving thoughts, giving notes, putting up roadblocks, making it harder. It takes for a couple weeks, you edit for a couple weeks, the whole thing's done.

You can't believe how quick it goes. And when you work on a movie, I mean, every detail matters. You're spending so many months just agonizing over the entire thing. You spend so much time prepping. Then you get into shooting. Everything can fall apart when you're shooting. It's just a really long marathon. So I feel like I learn so much about myself and about the art of making movies, the art of trying to not let movies get ruined,

and also just staying true to your own voice. It's really easy to get. People can kind of pull you off track without meaning to. You can lose track of what you intended the movie to be over just many months if you don't pay attention. A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood is not a $300 million blockbuster, but it is a bigger movie than your first two films. Did you consciously want to have a bigger production? No, no. I mean, in many ways, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood is like a character piece. It's a movie about this friendship between these two men that really changes the course of their lives. And I never thought of it as something somehow bigger or with higher expectations than my first two movies. I mean, obviously, Tom Hanks, people have heard of him.

He's kind of a big deal. So that was a little bit of a bigger deal, but the challenges are the same. Didn't feel somehow that much bigger. Also, I filmed Can You Ever Forgive Me in 28 days, and this was 33, so it wasn't like it was so much more time. That is very fast. Yeah. Were you familiar with the Tom Gineau article upon which a lot of the film is based? I did not know the article until I read the script, and then I immediately went and read the article, which is, if you haven't read it,

it's just one of the most beautiful articles. There's something so weird about it. It's so different than most articles you read, and it's disarming. It's very vulnerable, and it's very touching. But I hadn't read it before I had read the script, no. Do you think if the script was just about Mr. Rogers, would you have been as interested in this? No, it wouldn't have worked if it was just about Mr. Rogers.

It was very clear to me that Mr. Rogers can't be the protagonist of a narrative film. He's a great subject for the documentary, which I thought the documentary was incredible. Because he's so evolved he's such a um conscientious person who's very he's he's living his life the way he chooses to live his life he's somebody who actually sets out to be a certain type of person and is going through with that I mean how few people are that self-aware um but self-aware, self-conscious, you know, conscientious people who have figured life out a little bit don't make great movie protagonists. Our protagonists in films traditionally, they need to go through a huge life change. They need to become a different

person from where they begin at the beginning of the movie to where they end. And anything that would have forced that on Mr. Rogers would have been forced. It would have felt like we were trying to show how he became Mr. Rogers or something. And I think it wouldn't have felt real. Lloyd Vogel, who's the character based on Tom Juno, is such a great conduit to get Mr. Rogers' message. He's this cynical journalist who comes in sort of not believing that Mr. Rogers can really be true. He feels like he's too good to be true. And I think he can represent the cynic in all of us who has a hard time with that level of sincerity right now in this world.

And he's somebody who's going through part of what I really related to when I read the script was he's somebody who's going through he's becoming a parent for the first time and I think there's this thing that happens when you become a parent where your own childhood comes into focus and you get faced with your own mortality it's actually a very big emotional moment sort of a coming of age that happens that we don't really talk about what that feels like. I feel like that idea is a bit unspoken. It is unspoken. And I have a five, almost five-year-old and I've watched all of my best friends go through a really emotional experience of becoming a parent and what that means in terms of like, who do you want to be in the world? Who do you want to be as a parent? It makes you think about your own parents. If you've lost your parents or your parents haven't been around, that can be an incredibly painful experience of becoming

a parent and thinking about that person. And it really faces you with your own mortality in a way. And so Lloyd, the character, is in that moment of his life where everything is sort of being turned upside down by the fact that he's becoming a parent and he's estranged from his own father. And Mr. Rogers comes in as this sort of father figure who helps him to deal with his own childhood trauma and his inner child and his feelings. And what is so radical and amazing about Mr. Rogers is he always had this philosophy that our feelings matter and that we all need help learning how to cope with our feelings. And I think a lot of us as adults can relate to the fact that many of us haven't totally figured out how to do that yet. I don't know how to do anything. All three of your

films have a kind of quasi real nature in part because they're based on, if not real people, then simulacrum of real people. Is that something that you are particularly drawn to? No, it's weird that it's sort of ended up that way. I never intended to make movies necessarily about real people. The Diary of a Teenage Girl was obviously based on a real person and her experience. And I think the reason I related to it so much and cared so much about it was because it felt so real and it felt like a voice and a perspective I had never heard in film. And I guess that makes sense that that came from such a real place. But I really didn't intend to keep making movies about real people.

And then Lee Israel was just such a fascinating character. I'm drawn to stories that are sort of about, that are coming from a perspective that we don't get to necessarily hear often in film. So hopefully bringing voices to screen that are less represented or perspectives about life and what it means to be human and what it feels like to go through this journey of being on this earth together. But somehow I've just ended up making three movies about real people. It wasn't intentional. The Lloyd Vogel character, how much of that are you dramatizing? How involved is Tom in conversation about how to portray a person that was in his position, if not exactly the things that happened to him? We were very clear from the beginning that it was going to

be inspired by Tom Juno's article in his life, but it was not going to be his life story. So we took a lot of artistic liberties in order to portray what felt like the best dramatic arc between him and Fred Rogers. You know, what's really real is the impact that Fred Rogers had on his life and his marriage and his ability to be a father and his own relationship with his own father. So the main building blocks of that story are his, but a lot of the details are not, which is why we changed his name. And he's been wonderful. He's been a great resource for us. You know, he came to Pittsburgh while we were filming and kind of anything we wanted to hear from him, he gave us.

So it's been great. But, yeah, we tried to be really incredibly truthful about every detail of Mr. Rogers' life and Mr. Rogers being in his set and how he ran the show and all of those things. But it's a fictionalized movie about this relationship. I love what you've done with Fred Rogers in the movie in a couple of ways. One, the way that you insert him throughout the story without centering on him. But specifically, you said he's a conscientious person and a self-aware person, but he's not frictionless. No.

And there's always this feeling with him, and I think you see it in the documentary as well, that there's something that you can't quite put your finger on that isn't right or is unresolved, even though he feels, as you said, so evolved. Well, I think we have a misconception about somebody who is evolved being therefore always happy or always at peace, which I don't think is true. I was listening to a lecture at a Zen Buddhist center in Brooklyn at one point where they were talking about, you know, being evolved does not mean that you somehow are immune to the suffering of the planet. It actually means

that you're feeling the suffering of the planet even more. You're feeling it fully. And I think that sort of summed up for me, Fred Rogers, I think he felt the pain of people very deeply. And it's something I relate to about him and feel connected to how he took that pain and tried to actually create action with it. But it didn't mean that he was just somehow always happy or feeling great about the world. I think, and you saw it in the documentary too, I think he really struggled and felt a lot of pain about, you know, he was very aware of the hardest parts of life. You know, he didn't shy away on his show from things like death, divorce, assassination. I mean, he talked about really heavy subject matter and he tried to give kids safe ways

to cope with these really difficult subjects. And I've found that to be a character that's really fascinating. Somebody who is in many ways like a vessel who's holding the pain of all the people that he meets. You know, we would talk to people and say, you would talk to the people closest to him, his wife, Joanne, you'd say, did he tell you about all of the people who would come to him with their problems and heap their problems on him?

And she'd say, no, he didn't really talk to me about other people's issues. Maybe you should ask Bill. I wonder if he talked to Bill about it. And we'd go to Bill Eisler and say, did Fred talk to you about it? And he'd say, no, you should ask Joanne. I bet he talked to her about it. The truth is he held people's stories. He was this conduit, this vessel for other people and their problems. And I think he really held them internally. And we try to allude to that. Yeah. He's like a priest or a sin eater or something where he has to kind of absorb everybody else's pain, which is such an odd position to be in. Did you and Tom Hanks specifically talk about that before the film? We did. Yeah, we did. We talked a lot about sort of Fred's spiritual energy and what that does to a person's physical body and what it

is to be such a receiver. You know, so much, I think a lot of us spend our time kind of like putting our energy out into the world. And frankly, even Tom Hanks, like he's a really funny, charismatic guy whose energy kind of flows out from him. He's really magnetic, really charismatic. He's fun to be around. He's funny. He's sarcastic. Fred was more absorbing. He kind of was this open being who was not necessarily outputting all this manic energy, but who was very still and was sort of letting other people's energy absorb into him. So that was sort of our jumping off point for the character and the physicalization of the character. But it was really like an energy shift that Tom had to embody for this character. Did you rehearse?

We did. Okay. So you saw him because it's a transformation, but not an imitation. Exactly. That was always the intention. We talked early on about not wanting this to be an SNL sketch of Mr. Rogers, which is why we didn't do any prosthetics. We weren't trying to get his walk perfectly right.

It wasn't about an imitation because to me that was actually going to become a barrier between the audience and Mr. Rogers. We needed them to feel like he was right in front of their noses, the way you felt when you watched the original program. You felt like he was talking directly to you. There was no space between you and him. And so that was the intention, was to create that same feeling. And if you were aware of him doing an imitation, it would create a distance between us as an audience and him as a performer. So we worked and talked early on really a lot about the same things that Mr. Rogers would do to connect. You know, he talked about how he viewed the space between himself

and the children watching as a sacred space between the television and the child. And that when he would film the program, he would try to imagine one child whose eyes he was looking into. So I was constantly reminding Tom of that concept. And we were really trying to kind of click into that Fred Rogers energy. I think you got it. I love how you've integrated the kind of neighborhood showmaking into the film. Yeah. Was that on the page? Is that something that you created around the story? It was on the page conceptually, but of course, trying to figure out how to make that actually

happen and work and integrate with the story was a real fun challenge. How did you do that? So we always had this idea that the movie was essentially a large episode of Mr. Rogers for adults. And there's this wonderful device of framing the entire movie as a big episode of the film of the program. but it meant taking mr rogers neighborhood and going further so we used the rules of mr rogers neighborhood and tried to use those rules for the entire filmmaking rules um which meant we didn't want to go cg or like too flashy or too slick there was a handmade quality to the show. There was something about the miniatures and the way the program was made that felt so lo-fi, but therefore felt so

nostalgic to us who grew up with the program. So for example, we start the movie with the exact same miniature that we're used to seeing from Mr. Rogers' neighborhood. And as we pull out from his miniature neighborhood, we boomed up. But we did it all practically. We boom up to see all of Pittsburgh and then pan over to see all of New York City and very practically had lights come on. But it's all a miniature version of the world. So it was sort of like we took and that miniature sequence took us so many months to conceptualize and figure out and then build because we really didn't want to be breaking the rules of Mr. Rogers. And, you know, the original concept in the script kind of had it like zooming out and showing all of the East Coast and doingodi Lee Lipes, who's our wonderful cinematographer and our team of people who built all these miniatures, to figure out the emotion behind these decisions, these creative decisions, and how they could work and integrate with the story.

It's really effective and really intimate the whole time, which is not something you would necessarily expect. I'm interested in the characters that you're interested in. I feel like they're all kind of fascinated or tortured by a certain kind of taboo, whether that's sexuality or artistic credit or parental absence. These things that are sort of in the culture and in our lives all the time, but that people feel a little uncomfortable talking about. Yeah. What draws you to people like that who sort of say something that you wouldn't? And I think even in a way, Mr. Rogers, even though Lloyd, I think, is the version in this film, Mr. Rogers is kind of talking about decency all the time. Yeah. Which is something that we have a kind of a hard time accepting as what we should do.

We do. Yeah. I'm going to spend my whole life struggling with what it means to be a good person and what it means to be an artist and what it means to be somebody trying to live within the world and have relationships with people. And I am drawn to characters, I think, who are sharing something really intimate about their own struggles. And it has to be something I can relate to. So, you know, I felt with Diary of a Teenage Girl, I felt like I was Minnie in so many ways, even though it wasn't my story. I didn't have an affair with my mother's boyfriend when I was 15 or anything.

But as a sexual young 15-year-old, I felt really conflicted about what that meant for myself in the world. I felt confused about how I would be viewed. I felt like I was misunderstood. So many things about her as an artist I felt like I related to. And I felt all those struggles she felt as a teenage girl and what those meant and who I wanted to be within the world. And so for whatever reason, I just, I loved her. And I felt the same way about Lee and Jack also, the characters in Can You Ever Forgive Me? These were characters who, you know, I think every artist is probably afraid deep down somewhere that their fate will end up like Lee's.

Their fate, their biggest, all of our biggest fear is that we'll end up sort of alone in a room, not able to do our art, and nobody will care. And I mean, that's right. That's the artist's fear. That's a true existential dread. Yes. And we all have that. And I think, you know, as freelance artists, everybody is constantly, we're all scared we'll never work again. And yeah, that you'll end up where nobody knows who you are and cares, and you can't even do your work and you're alone and you've somehow your own mind has pushed everybody else away. I mean, to me, that's an incredibly relatable fear. Do you feel like a freelance artist? That's an interesting,

I've never heard a filmmaker describe themselves that way. Yeah, that's what I am. Yeah. I mean, that's so interesting. That's the job, right? You're always looking for what the next thing will be. And, you know, I think I'm getting to a point where I'm no longer afraid that I'll never work again. But you spend a lot of years. I mean, I waited tables for 15 years. Like you spend a long time thinking you'll never work again. One creative job does not necessarily always lead to the next creative job. Help me understand the kind of the trajectory of your career. Yeah. Because. Because waiting tables for 15 years. always lead to the next creative job. Help me understand the kind of the trajectory of your career then.

Because. Because waiting tables for 15 years just to. Well, that's intense. And that's, that's scary. And. It's not so bad. But you, you stuck to it and you, I assume, I guess this wasn't exactly what you thought you were going to be doing. No, I started as an actor.

So I went to theater school. I went to UCLA. That's where I met my husband, Jorma. We've been together since we were, since right when I turned 20. So went to UCLA. That's where I met my husband, Jorma. We've been together since right when I turned 20, so 20 years ago. And yeah, I got out of school, theater school, thinking I was going to be a real freelance theater actor. I worked in many theaters around California, kind of doing regional work, doing Shakespeare, doing like plays. I'd go on unemployment in between plays.

That's how actors survive. And then at some point I started to get frustrated with the types of roles I was being offered, being like in my 20s, a young woman who I felt like I was like bursting with creativity and depth. And all I was getting was really one-dimensional characters, and it was making me nuts. And so when I read the book that Diary of a Teenage Girl was based on, I was like, this is a character. This is a real, complete, complex girl.

When was that? I want to say it was in 2007, something like that. My sister gave it to me as a gift for Christmas. And, um, and I just really, what I was drawn to was this idea of like, why can't we show women as full people? I don't want to just play one dimensional people. So I started writing and I really started writing because of that project. And I wasn't intending to become a director. I just, I wrote that first as a play. I played the character. I had been playing teenagers a bunch on stage, and I played the character of Minnie on stage

when we created the play version of Diary, and it was the best creative experience of my life. And after that, I realized I wanted to make it as a movie. And I didn't want anyone else to direct it. Just the thought of somebody else directing this project that I had been at that point working on probably for six years was like more than I could bear. So I applied to the Sundance Labs. And it was this great sort of training ground for me. It was sort of like boot camp of film school because I didn't go to film school.

I felt really insecure about the things I didn't know about making films. But I came out of that program feeling like, no, I know how to direct this movie because I'm the person who knows what this film needs to be. I know everything that needs to happen creatively in this movie, even if I don't know about lenses, even if I don't know about light setups, even if I don't know how to write a shot list. I know what this needs to feel like. I know what the story is. I know how it needs to sound. I know how it needs to look. I know how it needs to feel. So that was what launched me into directing. And as soon as I started directing, I thought, oh, this is what I have been waiting for. This is the creative fulfillment that I thought I was going to get out of being an actor that I never got. I'm the one telling the story.

I'm the one creating everything you see on screen. When you were adapting the story into a play and then going into the labs process, did it feel like a purposeful transition away from acting or was it just, I need to get this done and then figure out what's next? No, yeah. It never has felt like a purposeful step away because I think for me it's always been I just want to make things. So whatever I have to do to make things, I'll do it. And if I need to act in it to make it, if I need to write it, if I need to direct it, if I need to produce it, I'll just do what I have to do to tell the story. And it's always story first, which is why it's funny, like, trying to talk about myself as a director or talk about my career because I don't think about it like that. You know, I think about stories. People constantly ask me questions about, like, do you try to get your

directing style on certain movies or make sure they all look a certain way? And I'm like, no, I'm guided by the story itself. Like, what does the movie want to be? I'm irrelevant. You know, I'm like trying to bring this thing to fruition. But the story is what matters. And that's what's guiding the entire thing, hopefully. Can you, I hope you take this the right way. Can you explain what it's like

to be the hot young thing on your sort of your second career? You know, saying like when Diary came out, I remember Sundance and it was like, this is an important new voice. And there's a certain kind of way that a person is talked about. Yeah. But you were a little later in your life. I don't know if you were a mother yet, but I was, I had just had my kid. He was five weeks old when Yeah. like an underdog outsider because I think I spent so much of my life and that's sort of the life of a theater actor. Honestly, we take a lot of pride in sort of being like unsung heroes who just work hard and don't get a lot of credit and care about the craft. That's like our thing, right? We're kind of hardcore about it. Like we're kind of nerds about it. And that's what I love about theater actors is we are not in it for the fame we're doing it because we love the craft of

acting we think there's something really honorable about it and there's like a you kind of like have a badge about being like an outsider um it's like being a public school teacher yeah you're not gonna get rich you think you're doing something decent and meaningful for the world. films where I'm like, I'm going to hold on to this because we're like the last people who want to make movies. And I feel somehow similar about theater as I do about film where I feel like, no, we need to keep the craft. We need to hold on to the art of it. Do you think, is that a true thing? Because like, I don't know. On this show, we talk about that all the time. It's like, are movies dying? Is this a downturn? How do we know? But you're inside it. You make them. You've now made three. Yeah, but I make them by myself. I mean, it's like our movie's dying is this a I don't know how do we know but you're inside it you make them you've now made three yeah but I make them by myself I mean it's like you know

we think about Hollywood as this like big collective or something like I I don't get to hang out with other directors I don't get to is that true yeah I mean I'm married to one but other than the one I'm married to and the ones that I seek out and I seek out friendships with other directors constantly because it means so much when we actually do get to connect. But in general, there's no system for us to even know what each other are doing. Or like, you know, Lulu Wong has been in Berlin, came to Berlin, and we just figured it out on Instagram that we were both in the same city. So we spent a bunch of time hanging out and getting to know each other. And that's been wonderful. And like, I form friendships with female directors whenever I can, because I feel like we have to

have each other's back. And Greta and Elizabeth Banks, like we all kind of text and try to keep up with each other. But it takes effort because there's not really a system by which we get to hang out with each other and know what's happening for other people or what's happening even in the industry. I live in New York. I'm a mom in Brooklyn, like living my life, trying to make movies, but it feels like I do it in a bit of a vacuum, you know? Even though movies might still be the underdog, do you feel like you have an underdog mentality? Because this is a Tom Hanks movie. Like this is a major studio is putting it out and a lot of people are going to see it. And now it's not, it's not dire anymore.

No, it's not. Yeah, I don't know. I guess I'll probably never get rid of that mentality. It's sort of my like, yeah, deep down rebel that can't let go of feeling like I'm an outsider, you know. But I guess I am. I'm part of the system. I'm part of the problem now, right? I don't know.

It's not a problem. It's a good thing, but you are truly in it. Yeah. Do you know what you want to do next? I don't know what I want to do next. I'm kind of, you know, doing these two movies back to back has been exhausting is the truth of it. It's been wonderful. It's been such a great experience. And making this movie has truly been one of the best experiences creatively of my whole life. But I'm tired. I'm really tired.

Do you have any anxiety about the way that your films are received at this point? Yeah. I mean, that never goes away. I don't think so. Are you like a review reader? Are you looking at box office mojo? Do you feel part of that? I read everything and I try to not care. And I try, right now, I'm using Fred wisdom whenever I can. And I'm really just trying to think about what would Fred Rogers think about all of this. And I'm constantly trying to remind myself, like, we made this movie with the spirit of collaboration and kindness and love and the people who I made this movie with are wonderful and I feel proud and filled with this sort of mama pride of being the one who got to make this movie and I that is the opposite of being pitted against other artists

like that feels like the antithesis of what we're in right now, which is like the awards race where suddenly we're supposed to be competitive with other people we respect and who did better, us or them? And I'm just trying to remind myself all the time that that ego stuff isn't real. And it's hard not to get wrapped up into it, but I'm trying to remind myself that none's none of that is what matters the art is what matters the work is what matters I would love for people to see this movie I would love for it to reach people I would love to feel like it you know it finds its time in its own time because that was the hard thing with Diary I was incredibly proud of Diary and it it made an impact in a way that felt wonderful but it also didn't get seen by as many people as I wished it had been seen by. I feel like Can You Ever Forgive Me probably gave you a taste of award season. Yeah. But I'm going to guess that this is going to be even more so the case. You never know.

I mean, we were really on that trail last year, and the movie got three Oscar nominations, BAFTA nominations, all that stuff. So I feel like I did it. Luckily, I was also editing this movie while I was doing all of that. So I couldn't get too wrapped up into it. Will you be thrust into it more so on this one? Probably, probably, but I'll try to, you know, stay grounded and do other things. So I don't feel like it's, it becomes the only thing are you comfortable kind of kissing babies and shaking hands I love babies but there aren't any actual babies on the award trail for the Oscars that would be the best sometimes it feels like babies vote for the Oscars yeah it's true um I I like people I'm not one of these I know there are a

lot of people making movies who also kind of are antiisocial and I feel lucky that I'm not antisocial. I don't mind going out and making friends with people. And I actually really do like people who make movies. It's something that, you know, I did this LA Times roundtable yesterday and it's really fun to sit down and get to talk about the craft with people. So that part I really, really like. I, you know, I don't love feeling like we're pitted against each other. That's my only thing. And especially women.

Like there's something about being, there's so few of us women directors and I feel like people tend to try to make it into a competition. And that for me feels really wrong because I feel like we all are actually friends and have each other's backs. And I just would never want to feel that way. Is there a filmmaker that you have wanted to seek out, either a friendship or advice that you haven't had a chance to connect with? No, I tend to go up to people as soon as I can if it's somebody who I really admire and want to talk to. You know, like last night at the Governor's Awards, I got to like chat with Olivia Wilde.

And we got to talk about all the things we care about from a feminist and mother perspective about making movies. And I've been a champion of working French hours, which is something I did on this movie because I think it helps more parents and mothers in particular be able to make movies, which is shorter, more condensed hours and something I've been really vocal about. And she was just saying like, thank you so much for fighting for this. I'm going to do that for my next movie. We need to talk more about it. I want to hear how you did it. And so I love having those interactions where we're all figuring out how to, how we want to work within this business and support each other. And so I tend to, especially if I'm in a room full of men, if there's a woman there who's a director or whatever, I tend to just go right

up to her and just chat. That's really great. Mario, we end every episode of this show by asking filmmakers what's the last great thing they've seen. The last great thing I saw, and I'm embarrassed that I hadn't seen it until now, was on my plane ride here. I watched Vice finally, and I loved it. I just love bold filmmaking, and I don't think we always appreciate how hard it is

to do things that are really ballsy in our actual filmmaking. And geez, that movie is ballsy. I mean, there are certain things that I have never seen in any film that really, really work. I mean, that credit sequence partway through is just hilarious genius even things like just cutting to a piranha moving through the water as a conversation's happening that works emotionally where i'm like i can only imagine the notes he got and the number of people who told him to cut things like that or who told him things were too weird or who told him that something didn't make sense and it i just loved the boldness of it. I had such a similar reaction. And also, there's a moment in your movie where Lloyd wakes up in a kind of experience

that is not unlike what you're describing. I've never really seen anything like that. Was it hard to get people on board with a little bit of the supernatural, the extra real? Yeah. I mean, for me, like a certain level of it's emotional realism, but surrealism when it comes to storytelling is something I love. And if it feels right, if it feels emotionally real, you know, I don't think of and I think it's something that as a theater artist, we're much more comfortable in theater with things leaving reality. You know, in many ways, Can You Ever Forgive Me was sort of the most linear, straightforward storytelling I've ever done in my whole life, you know, separate from just my film career,

but also like writing and even acting like that. That was actually a very straight movie for me, whereas Diary and this movie both have a certain level of, I view it as emotional realism, but there's magical realism that comes into it and surrealism that kind of plays through that I think gives us, I believe that when you allow yourself to leave linear reality, you actually make things more real. There's a hyper-reality to it. There's something more present, more truthful about what that emotional experience can be. Like, how do you tell the experience of somebody who's having essentially a emotional breakdown,

who's coming to a breaking point in his life? How do you do that in a purely linear way if you're trying to really feel what it feels like to be in his skin? You know, I think it becomes more real to do it in a way that feels slightly surreal. It really worked on me, and this has been more than real, Mario. Thank you. Good.

My pleasure. Thank you to Mario Heller. And thank you, of course, to Amanda Dobbins. Please tune in next week. We'll have two episodes for the holiday on Monday and Tuesday. On Monday,

we will have a top five murder mysteries podcast with Monday and Tuesday. On Monday, we will have a Top 5 Murder Mysteries podcast with Amanda and I, and the reason for that is because I also spoke with Ryan Johnson, the director of one of the great murder mysteries of recent years, Knives Out.