The Bill Simmons Podcast - Ep. 110: The End of Deflategate With Bill's Dad and Summer Movies With Wesley Morris

Episode Date: July 15, 2016

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons brings on his dad to discuss Tom Brady bailing on Deflategate (6:00) and the current feelings in Boston on the Red Sox's recent trade for Drew Pomeranz and on Celtics draft pick Jaylen Brown's inability to finish around the basket. Then, 'New York Times' critic at large Wesley Morris talks pitfalls of the summer movie scene (26:00), the relevance of 'Good Times' today (35:00), Blake Lively's shallow character in 'The Shallows' (52:00), and how to deal with the tragedies poisoning our times (1:02:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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We're going to build some wells with some of the proceeds from this merch. All right, we're going to call Wesley Morris in a little bit to talk about summer movies and a whole bunch of other stuff. We're going to call my dad first to talk about the end of Deflategate and all this other stuff. And also, if you listen to the Ringer NBA show, Chris Ryan and I did a whole summer free agency thing that you can check out on there. But right now, my dad, Deflategate, here we go. Tom Brady has given up Deflategate. Our 18, 19 month national nightmare is over my dad is on the line

my dad the flakey got so bad that my dad briefly quit on Tom Brady as a Patriot fan he feels bad about it now but you can say your last words now

go ahead I vehemently deny that I ever quit on Tom Brady you kind of did there was one day I might have had a moment of weakness

during the long ordeal. What are you, like Bill Clinton in the Oval Office with Lewinsky? What do you mean a moment of weakness? A moment of weakness. I got caught up a little bit too much, but I'll tell you, I'm kind of surprised. I don't know about you,

but the papers here, even this morning, talked about most likely in the next week he'd be asking for a stay before Supreme Court Justice Ruth Ginsburg, most liberal justice, and most likely the stay would be awarded. Yeah. And he might get to play through the whole season. So I think people are going to be a little surprised if they haven't heard this news already. You know, on the other hand, maybe he was worried that those four, if the four-game suspension came down later, it could come down at any time,

either during the season or even during playoff games. And he'd rather take the games now, particularly when three of the four games are at home. Are you surprised? Yeah, I think he was tired of fighting this. And I think even last year, from the inside info that I have, he really was almost ready to fold it in last year. He just didn't want to keep going through it,

and it was taking a big toll from him. And I think he was worried that it was going to affect his football, and he just wanted to get it over with. But I think the union people in his life were like, no, no, you didn't do this. Keep fighting, keep fighting. And at this point, if the fight had kept going, he would have gotten a stay,

and eventually the last place this could have ended up was the Supreme Court. And when you think of all the stuff that's going on with this country right now, not a great look for Brady to take this. I mean, the Supreme Court has to have more important things to deal with than this, you know? And maybe he was just like, you know what, this is, I'm going to take the four games and get this over with. I mean, that's obviously a very valid point.

Although, even though Brady has dropped the fight, so to speak, and will serve the four games, I don't know about you, but I'm not going to be shocked if the Players Association doesn't move forward asking for a stay and asking for a hearing before the court, because for them it's a contractual issue, obviously. You know, it's the right of the arbitrator to do what he did, in this case Goodell. I'm just not going to be shocked if, despite Brady dropping everything and serving the four-game suspension, the union doesn't move forward to see if they can get relief, ultimately, with the contract issue. Well, we've been talking about Deflategate ever since my podcast came back last October. And I think the biggest thing that people don't seem to understand,

some people understand it, who've actually followed the story, but most people don't, is that this story stopped being about Tom Brady at some point during this whole circus. And it really became about Goodell's ability to protect his power to do whatever he wanted. Because in one of the CBAs, I can't remember which one, they basically allowed him to become the sheriff of the NFL. And his word was the law. And he decided player punishments. And if there was an appeal process, he could make himself the judge of the appeal. Well, the union only has itself to blame.

Yeah, that's the thing. This was a CBA fall. They gave away the ship. Yeah, they gave away all of their rights in the arbitration and appeal process when they allowed that language to be inserted into the CBA that gave Goodell that much power. But hold on a second. But you know how this works because you're a superintendent forever. They're making a business deal with somebody. They're giving up certain things to get other things. And I think they're concentrating on, say, PDs.

They're trying to get stuff from Goodell. And in return, they're like, all right, we'll give you this. And what it led to was this entire deflacate saga where all of the science that we have disproved any sort of case that the league had against those balls being deflated. And then it just kind of became about Goodell saying, well, it doesn't matter. I can do whatever I want. I already decided on this. And that's what this was about.

I understand all that. And you're right that when you're in negotiations, there's a give and a take, and you want certain things, so you have to give certain things. But in retrospect, I think the union and the legal counsel representing the union just really missed the boat on identifying the ramifications of giving away what they did. And I don't know what they got back in return. I mean, you'll never know there's such give and take. But I mean, they gave away so much with allowing Goodell to have that much power. And the way negotiations work, they're going to have an extremely difficult time the next time they sit at the table trying to get Goodell and the owners to backtrack. Well, I was going to say you saw it with the Ray Rice thing too, right? He decided on Ray Rice. He

gave him a two-game suspension. The video comes out. Goodell re-suspends him for the same offense, saying that Ray Rice didn't tell me what happened. And then it comes out that when they had the hearing in July, Ray Rice told him exactly what happened, so he had the information, and he just unilaterally said, I'm going to suspend this guy a second time for the same thing. And the union couldn't do anything about that either. No, and as the Second Circuit has said, none of that matters. The facts of the case really are apparently

irrelevant based on the CBA language that gives Goodell so much power, so much authority. And he is the jury, the judge, and the executioner. Literally. And I can't imagine another contract with another professional sports league that has anything like that kind of language. So it's so unique that Goodell has that authority. All right, so with all of this said, I'm going to say two things. One, I'm always going to be disappointed at Bob Kraft that he rolled over last spring. I agree with you. He gave away our first-round pick, and he made it seem like Brady was guilty.

And obviously trusted Goodell, and they made some— I guess what Kraft must have thought was some sort of a handshake deal that, all right, we'll accept this penalty, just don't throw Tom under the bus. And then Goodell proceeded to make that deal and then still throw Tom under the bus so that was one thing I think the craft's rolled over I think craft feels bad about it he said as much but um I wish he had stuck up for his quarterback in the moment uh second I was disappointed with Brady today you know he had all these Patriot fans and all these people defending him over and over again

really passionately getting in fights with fans from other teams like not real fights but you know and pleading his case and all this stuff and then I feel like today he just rolled over and accepted it like if you're gonna accept a suspension come out really strong and say

I just want everyone to know I didn't do this I think it is insane to know I didn't do this. I think it is insane that Goodell decided to do this 18-month smear campaign. Come out with some strong anti-Goodell language. Make me feel like this affected you in some way. Don't just roll over. I felt like he rolled over today. Well, as I listened to you, I hadn't thought about it that way.

I mean, his statement was a tweet. To come out on Twitter on such an issue that has... Facebook also has galvanized the New England area. It is pretty weak. I wish he had come out with a strong statement as you delineated, but maybe he's just tired of the whole thing. I'm sure he is, but acknowledge all the people that fought for you. I don't know. Maybe that will be forthcoming.

I mean, maybe we'll get that in the next couple of days. They had to make a decision by next Wednesday in terms of moving forward with any kind of request for a stay because it would have started with the Second Circuit first. So maybe this is just the first statement, the first information coming forth from the Brady camp. But I agree. I wish he'd come out so strongly. He has no reason at this point not to criticize Goodell very strongly. All he has to do is come out so strongly he has no reason at this point not to criticize goodell very strongly

all he has to do is come out yeah come out and say look all i've done is busted my ass for for the nfl and for the patriots for my entire career i've never been in trouble i've always carried myself the right way i've already i've always carried myself in public and in private i've tried to be a role model i have no idea why they went after me like this. I will never for the rest of my life figure it out. And if they think that as I'm trying to prepare for the AFC championship game, that I had time to try to figure out if the balls were 1.5% less deflated than they should have been, then these people are insane.

They just come out and say that. The only thing I can think of that would make him not want to say that is if he has a defamation lawsuit coming, which cannot be ruled out. If they have a plan for a stage B here, I'm going to accept a suspension, and now I'm going to do a defamation lawsuit against the league, then maybe that explains why he was so passive today. But I don't know. There's a small part of me that makes me wonder.

The fact that he didn't do that makes me wonder if maybe he's 20% guilty of some of this stuff. I don't know. Nah, I don't want to. I made that mistake once before. I don't want to. I made that mistake once before. I don't want to go there. I really don't think one has anything to do with the other. Pete's laughing.

I think he just got a message out today, and I'm very hopeful that this is not the only message he's going to get out there. I have an idea. I know he's been very unwilling with the court action ongoing to have interviews about the Flakegate. Yeah. I think it's time to follow up Ben Affleck and come on Any Given Wednesday and talk about it. I'm ready.

The invitation is wide open. Any Given Wednesday. Tom Brady, if he wants to come on and plead his case. I've been fighting for him for 18 months. Come on. Let's talk about it. I think it makes sense. You've been one of his biggest advocates.

I don't want to see you backtracking a single second because you've already criticized me for backtracking in a moment of weakness. I stand behind Tom Brady. I just want to say that I feel like I would have stuck up for any quarterback who was in this situation. I just think Goodell has been ridiculous for 10 solid years. And it's been, you know, it wasn't just the flake gate. It was Ray Rice and it was bounty gate and it was all the stuff they pulled with concussions.

And I just think this guy's full of it. And he seems like he thinks he can do whatever he wants. Well, but apparently he can. Apparently he can. Yeah, maybe we got to look at the players even a little bit. Quickly before you go, the Red Sox traded

their best pitching prospect for Drew Pomeranz from the Padres, who is one of the two pitchers we need to win the World Series if this team has any chance. Red Sox fans not happy because this was the best pitching prospect we've had in a while.

On the other hand, you and I have watched people like Casey Kelly, Henry Owens, Manny Del Carmen, Kevin Morton. I mean, how many pitching prospects have been can't miss for the Red Sox that have missed? You know, that's true. None of them, though, had Pedro Martinez saying Espinoza's going to be the next superstar pitcher on the Red Sox.

So you don't like this trade? I don't like this trade. I remember where I was, Nantucket Island, the day that I heard on the radio they had traded Bagwell for Larry Anderson. Oh, come on. I shook my head and I said, you don't make these kinds of trades. But you and I talked as soon as they hired Dombrowski with his record in Detroit for trading prospects for veterans or pitchers that had experience or hitters that had a few years in the league. We expected that he'd be trading out of the farm system. I just wish he hadn't traded their number three prospect.

Can I make a counter? Sure, you always do. Larry Anderson, we rented him for like two and a half months, and then he left. And you and I had watched Bagwell in New Britain killing it. We were waiting for him to come up, and they just misfired. They didn't realize how good he was. And remember the, I think it was New Britain,

the manager after they traded him was like, I wish Lou Gorman had called me. I would have told him not to trade Jeff Bagwell. He's amazing. So that was one thing. Second, Pomeranz, we have him under contract for the next few years. He's only 27. And, you know,

four or five years ago, he was one of the better pitching prospects in the entire league. And we have him under contract for two years after this year that's a good thing I wish he hadn't had arms

shoulder surgery last October and if you look at his record which I did today because they obviously had his whole career

in the paper today yeah there's nothing spectacular there. A lot of strikeouts. Maybe the All-Star team? He's already pitched more innings in the majors than he ever

has in his career. And he's never pitched... It's one thing to pitch in Oakland and San Diego where nobody shows up. You know what Boston is like. I know, that's my one fear. I mean, we are crazy fans here. We expect, I mean, look at even

what David Price is going through. He has a bad outing, and people write him off. So this guy is pitching next Wednesday at home, his first start for the Red Sox, against the San Fran Giants, it would be wonderful if he had a good outing because first impressions will be lasting impressions

with the Red Sox fan base, including your father. The good news is that Boston fans won't completely flip out if he sucks in that first start. I will. What are you talking about? No, I know. Yeah, there is a lot of pressure. That was the one thing I worried about, because the stats were good.

All the advanced metrics backed it up, except he does throw a lot of pitches. But the one thing... I have to take Espinosa's picture that I framed and put up in your bedroom upstairs off the wall. I haven't been in that bedroom ever. I've been an adult for 25 years. Yeah, no, I, I, I'm a little concerned about, about the Pomerantz part, but I fully support trading pitching prospects. I think with the,

with the number of arm injuries with the amount of guys that we see who either they don't make it or the people that do make it sometimes are late bloomers. If it was a hitting prospect, like if they had traded Moncada or Devers or who's that? Oh, Ben Tendi. What's his name?

Ben Tendi. Yeah, I wouldn't have touched those guys because I think hitting prospects are sure things. Of course, the paper talks about one of the big headlines today was their other minor league pitcher, Kovic, who hit 105 on the radar gun this week. Oh, my gosh. And then this morning they signed their number one draft pick, Rooms, who I guess is a stud.

And, I mean, maybe in their minds they're going to have two A-plus future starters coming up through the pipeline. Yeah. But it's just a risky trade. I like it. Last thing, and then we have to go because we've got to call Wesley. This team's offense is great. I think they have a chance to make

the World Series. We need two more starters. So we got one. Now we've got to get another one. But I think this team could make the World Series. They score five runs a game. I understand that way of looking at it and I also obviously understand that we're not going to have Ortiz next year.

Hitters are having career-type years. It is a year to go for it. I just wish they could have gotten this pitcher by not giving up one of their top three prospects. That's all. All right. And you're excited about Al Horford? I'm really excited about Al Horford.

You've always liked him. I've always liked him. I've always liked him. I think I know he's the type of player you love because he has such an impact on the rest of the team. He's a good guy. Good character guy. You get much more than the guy who's playing

on the court. Well, he's taking Jared Sullinger's minutes, so I feel pretty good about that. He made the All-Star team last year. And also, I think Jalen Brown's going to send you into the hospital with your first heart attack

is my other prediction. Will he ever finish? No. I mean, you and I hate guys that go to the rim. Looks great. They get all the way

in there. Yeah. And the ball bounces off the rim. It looks great. I warned you that when you asked me, like, who is this guy? Is he going to be good? I was like,

it's like the best version ever of Jeff Green. The same kind of, those Jeff Green moves. He looks like he has heart, whereas Jeff Green never had heart, so the games may be a little bit similar, but at least it looks like he has heart, whereas Jeff Green never had heart. So the game's maybe a little bit similar, but at least it looks like he tries 120%. Yeah, Jeff Green would try once a week.

One final point to make. All kinds of rumors up here in Boston about Blake Griffith coming here. No, it's all fake. Don't believe any of that stuff. Nothing's happening. Nothing's happening. You'll be the first to know if that changes. All right. God. Yeah. Nothing's happening. Nothing's happening. You'll be the first to know if that changes. All right.

Thanks, Dad. Enjoy the weekend. All right. Talk to you, son. See you. Take care. Bye. Let's talk about the perfect mattress sold directly to consumers.

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line, one of my old Grantland comrades now at the New York Times but still lives on in my heart. Wesley Morris, how are you? I'm great. I still live on in your heart. That's great. Feels weird. We built this whole website and this whole, whole culture, all these people here. And I keep waiting for you to just show up and you just, I don't know. It's like the end of,

it's like the end of a sad movie. We're just kind of, you just kind of have your picture up on the wall. Just kind of look at it. But you know, I'm around. I know. We're still alive. It's not like you died. And reading the site, it's not like, you know, I do feel the same way. I know.

Yeah. There's been a couple, a couple of people out there that it's just, uh, it feels weird not to have them involved, but who knows? Maybe time will change everything. Uh, summer movies. But you know, I will say, can I weird not to have them involved. But who knows? Maybe time will change everything. Summer movies. But you know, I will say, can I just say conversely? Yeah. I have a picture of Larry Bird that we're going to put up in my recording studio.

I'm working on a podcast that does not exist yet. I really appreciate that. Thank you. Somebody just today bought a Larry Bird picture for me in memory of you. Thank you. And I'm putting it in my little studio. That's really nice. Summer movies, um,

thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs sideways so far, man, I don't know what's going on. I mean, between what is happening on the planet and what is happening in the movie theaters. I,

I don't know. I feel like, I feel like there's this thing going on where the studios have decided that the best way to sort of compensate for things in general is to kind of apologize for who's been omitted from the movies during this time of year by making movies about how apologetic they are about this. Give me an example. The Tarzan movie. Have you seen this? No. Well, I mean, first of all,

the only way to be sorry about Tarzan existing in the first place is to not make another Tarzan movie. Yeah. That's the only solution. Seems like a good idea. But they have basically taken history and twisted it all around to make Samuel L. Jackson's character, who really was this important figure in history, black figure in history, and make him basically Tarzan's sidekick? Except he's played by Samuel L. Jackson, so he's kind of strange anyway.

The whole thing is just weird. You have this Matthew McConaughey movie, Free State of Jones. Have you seen this? No. I don't even know if I'd pay-per-view that one. I'll pay-per-view anything. I'll literally pay-per-view anything. I don't know if that's on the list.

That movie is so... I actually prefer a movie to just be flat-out racist. Just be racist. Don't be sorry for racism. Just like tell me you hate me. Don't like tell me you like me and don't don't then don't give any black people anything important or interesting to do. Yeah. Except the stuff they've always done in the movies.

Like, just don't do that to me. Just be just be D.W. Griffith. Just be don't apologize for this stuff. I don't know. Just make another Central Intelligence, which is a movie I actually kind of really enjoyed. So have you written about Black-ish? I can't remember. I mean, I have in the context of other stories.

But not an actual, yeah, yeah. I've not written it. I mean, I feel like there are just other people who write about tv all the time who have written really smart things about blackish and the things that i have to say about it aren't so radically i don't have any sort of radical ideas about that show all right i i don't i don't have a radical idea but i have maybe a semi-interesting idea so my kids love blackish it's it was it's on like hulu or one of those and they watched all of them and blackish is kind of it's where what good times

was in the 70s and then there was an evolution to cosby and i don't i can't even really explain what happened in the 90s and 00s, but now you have Black-ish. And it's a traditional sitcom, but it's really not. It's a family sitcom, but it's really not. And it deals with Black issues and some of the stuff you're talking about as well as anything I've ever seen. The shootings episode is really one of the best half hours I've seen on TV in the decade. But what's interesting about it is my kids, who know nothing, who have a pretty sheltered life, they watch all the blackishes.

They watch the shooting episode, and then they come to us and they're asking questions about it. And not questions like stupid questions but like genuinely like it got their brains going and well these are your children bill i mean they're not going to ask you stupid questions no i know but i just thought i i think it's an important show and to bring it back to what you're talking about with movies um and this is a conversation we've had before which is when movies try to make people think in that in that direction it's always you know it's like like what we talked about in october about if they made creed and if creed was going to get nominated for an oscar it would have had to have been set in the 1860s and creed's a boxer trying to box his way out of some cotton farm in Virginia. And then the Oscars would be like, oh, yeah, okay, 1860s.

Yeah, done. Michael B. Jordan nominated. Yeah. Movies can't seem to figure this out. No. And I think one of the problems is that there aren't enough black people involved with the making of the movies. Right. Which we've discussed.

Right. Something like Free State of Jones is completely the product of Gary Ross, who, you know, really wanted to make a movie. It's just that movie is so defensive on its face. And I don't even want to get, I mean, the thing that I really wanted to start to talk to you about actually was the degree to which the movies this summer are sort of so political in their mere existence. Yeah. You're not really going to the movies.

You're going to the polling station. Like this Ghostbusters thing, for instance. I mean, I'll get back to Black-ish in a second, because I actually do think that show is doing something really interesting that is possible only because those Norman Lear shows existed and the Cosby show in A Different World existed and Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Martin. All of those shows had to exist for Black-ish to be able to be as self-conscious and self-aware as it is. Well, hold on. Hold on. I'm going to interrupt you one second. Black-ish knows this because the last episode was basically a Good Times tribute. Yes, exactly.

The last episode. Go ahead. I'm sorry. And it also identified the thing that was most annoying about Good Times at a certain point, which was that it went from being, it was trying to figure out, and I can say this because I am now, I have now watched all of Good Times for this book that won't die. Yeah.

It, Good Times sort of ran into a problem in that J.J. became really popular and they had to figure out a way for J.J. to have more stuff to do. Yeah. And so Jimmy Walker kind of became the star of the show, even though, you know, Esther Rolle and John Amos were the actors. Those two were like, they were serious actors. Yeah. Great actors.

And the show got hijacked by this jive talking, you know. Who the audience applauded every time he did anything. Right. That's why John Amos was like, kill me off. Just call Florida and say I've died in a car accident right exactly and I think that was during an era when when you know the wacky neighbor smart mouth son that's when a character could steal a show and become like a Kramer or a Fonzie or something like that I mean Jimmy Walker is one of those. I mean, J.J. is one of those characters,

one of those five, like, stole-the-show characters. No question. And Wilona was probably in the top 27. Yeah. I love the Wilona cameos. Right. But, I mean, to go back to the summer movie situation, I just feel like more than ever,

we've gone from sort of discussing what's wrong with the politics in the movies themselves to the politics around the movies before we've even seen what the movie is. Yeah. And I don't like that. And it's also very different from how, say, when we were kids, the outrage over something like Basic Instinct with gay and lesbian groups being upset that the killers in the movie were lesbians. When lesbians aren't killers. Yeah. Generally. They're not the people you're rounding up on murder day.

Murder day. Is that a movie? I guess that's The Purge. It's The Purge, right, right, right. I mean, OK, let's get to The Purge this second because that's another series that I really like, but it's like turned a corner into Obviousville. Yeah. But I just feel like now with this Ghostbusters movie, especially with the Ghostbusters movie, so much of what seeing it entails is basically like voting for Hillary. Like you have to vote for Hillary if you believe in humankind, and you don't want these Neanderthal internet assholes to win in terms of saying that a movie like this shouldn't exist. And I actually don't think a movie like this should exist,

but I don't think it should exist. It shouldn't exist because four amazingly funny women are in it. I think it shouldn't exist because the movie already exists with four men. And it was fine. It's not the gender thing. That's the problem for me. It's just like, you can't find four,

you can't find a movie for those four women to do somewhere else. It's, it's a great point. It's the recycling that drives me crazy. It's the lack of ideas. Can we just go back to good times for one second? Yes, by all means.

As you know, one of my favorite shows of all time and I'm always willing to talk about it, but it's been on a lot lately for some reason. And I think it's on the old TV Guy channel, which is now TV one. I've been trying to get my kids into it. Not hard with JJ. Wait, TV one is the old TV guy channel?

I think it is. Yeah. That always seemed like super black to me. Anyway, go on. The JJ obviously resonates with the kids. It's just funny. There's no question. But the old joke about how every Good Times episode was about James thinking he was about to get a job and starting to spend.

And then the job fell through. And then it would end with him in Florida in bed being like, well, it's fine. We still have each other. And then the audience would applaud. That was like 40% of the Good Times episodes. It's unbelievable. And I know you just watched all of them for your book, but it's so bleak and yet inspiring at the same time, because really that show is about like,'re probably screwed but we're our family is very close and we love each other and that was the theme of almost every single good times episode and it's a really good theme and it was genuine but yet yeah it was it was also formulaic and i

don't know how i feel about it watching it in my mid-40s um well i I mean, you're just, you know what the formulas are, but if you were watching that as like a, I mean, I saw it in reruns initially, and I remember thinking, I mean, for one thing, the idea of not being able to pay your bills, the idea of not having a job, the idea of losing your job, not having like gas to cook. I mean, those were all like, that was, that was a part of my childhood. Like the fear that we wouldn't be able to eat the way we wanted to eat some nights because, you know, there was just not enough money and the bills didn't get paid. I mean, that's like a real, and the show didn't exploit that the way, the way another show might have. And it didn't, the comedy was never in the poverty. The comedy was in the situations that created the poverty.

I mean, it was- Okay, good, because I felt guilty about how much I loved Good Times as a kid watching how they'd kind of turned the family into a formula. But at the same time, as I said, I really do feel like it was a genuine show. And I don't feel like it exploited the characters. But think about what the formula was, right?

Yeah. I mean, the formula was really about how to keep going and how to stay alive. And the argument the show made most weeks was, well, if we can stay together, we can probably figure this out. And in the history of this country, having a black family be able to do that, given what this country had done to black families, is a powerful thing.

I think it's a really important show, and it still is. And if you watch the reruns, it's a show that doesn't really exist now. Black-ish is kind of the middle class. I would say even they're a tad higher than middle class. Oh, no, those people are, I mean, I would say they're affluent. Well, yeah, but definitely compared to the Evans family. Well, compared to a lot of people on TV.

One of the things I like about Black-ish is it's also kind of secretly an L.A. show. There's some L.A. wrinkles to it that I don't think you would get if you lived in, say, Kansas City. But with the Evans family, it's the same thing that I think The Wire resonated with so many people. Everybody was talking about, oh, The Wire, David Simon. It was these five seasons. He laid out the blueprint of how drugs and the police and all this stuff has ruined,

has ruined the inner cities. And yeah, that was the biggest part of the show, but it was also about all these characters who were persevering with all these obstacles against him. It wasn't much different than the Evans family, you know, like somebody like bubbles who had a drug problem.

That whole show was about him trying to persevere the four kids in season four, all trying to get through, trying to make it. And that's what we're not seeing with movies now. And I think that's why The Wire was so important, because it reflected something that I don't feel like films have really reflected. Fruitvale, I think even for 90 minutes,, you know, tapped into that. Right. It doesn't happen enough. Well, I mean, it doesn't happen enough.

I think something like Black-ish, though, is also trying to correct for the problem of the idea. I mean, there's a really interesting tension among, I mean, maybe I'm creating the tension part, but there's obviously a class discrepancy among depictions of black life in this country. And the question isn't really a matter of what is more authentic as much as how much of one representation do you get versus another representation. And what is the story that black people want to tell about themselves as opposed to a white producer like Norman Lear or David Simon, right? Like, if black people had the chance to tell their own stories, what would they say about themselves? This has always interested me.

And it's like a strange question to be able to like have to ask because it is so infrequently answered. Well, hold on, though. So does that mean that he might not be the best director we have right now? Excuse me. He's a very, very, very, very good director, but in a lot of ways,

Ryan Coogler might be the most important director right now because I don't know who else could get that movie made easily other than him, who's a black director. Can you think of anyone? No. The movie that both of us want to see, who else has the juice to go in and get the money and get the stars and get all that stuff?

Who else has the juice to do it? Who's a black director? Okay. So here's some things that are, I mean, I think Ava DuVernay is somebody who is obviously positioned to be able to tell a kind of story that she wants to tell. I guess, I don't know what she would say her limitations are in terms of her,

what her financing would be. But I mean, I definitely think she's somebody at this point who could get a certain class of movie made on her own terms, um, without the struggling that she used to have to go through to get a movie made. She might correct me and say that I'm still struggling. Um, I think that, you know, D Rees is, I mean, there's a handful of filmmakers who are, I would say, in the same sort of age peer group who have stories to tell, want to tell them, and are finding ways to be able to tell them. I saw a movie three weeks ago, one of the best movies I've seen this year. I won't see very many movies that I like as much,

probably, called Moonlight. And it's by a guy named Barry Jenkins who made a movie that six people saw, uh, many years ago called Medicine for Melancholy, which is Wyatt Cenac walking around San Francisco on a date with a woman. It's, you know, it's a, it's a slight movie with a big idea. Uh, I'm in on Wyatt by the way. I think he, I think he's going gonna have a good run here coming up but god uh i hope so i love wyatt he's a wonderful human being and really really smart and uh i want him to do everything um i think this movie moonlight is incredible it is it is there to i won't ruin it for all the people who are going to see this movie

because they should it comes out in october uh it's just the story of this kid who lives in miami in the 80s at some point and he thinks he might be gay and his mother is a functioning drug addict and his his there's a drug dealer who's his father figure and there isn't a huge story but three things happen and they're amazing things and the filmmaking is just astonishingly beautiful and inspired and it's about this kid figuring himself out but not in the obvious ways that a normal movie like this would. It's like a coming of age story in which like the shades go down on a character and like he is struggling to pull them back up.

It is just a really incredible portrait of one person. And you watch him go from being a little kid to being a teenager to being a grown man. And the third part of that movie is it just takes this turn into just, I don't know, it's just, it's erotic. It is beautiful. It is moving. It is everything that I've been hoping would just come out once a week. You know, this is the first time I've ever seen a movie like this, and I've been watching movies for almost 40 years.

So this is your favorite movie of the year so far? The O.J. movie is my favorite movie of the year. The Ezra Edelman documentary is my favorite movie of the year so far. Moonlight is up there. I think this movie called crecia um that nobody did you see crecia no you should see that like as soon as we get off the phone you're gonna love this movie it's the story of a woman who goes home for thanksgiving and just you know crazy things happen um it's like stanley kubrick listen you know you know me at this point. I love either holidays or weddings when families get back together and horrible things happen.

I love... Yes. My wife and I watched a movie. It was an English movie where two couples were having a baby, and one of the babies died before the childbirth, and the other couple decided to figure the other couple basically got jealous of the of the couple who actually had their baby and that is one of my favorite plots one of my wife's favorite plots when somebody is jealous

of somebody else's baby and it becomes that it always works when does it not work because what movie is this oh Oh, man. It's something below. Tate, will you look it up for me? It's on Netflix. It's something below. And the only actor I know from it is the guy, he played the guy with the eye patch in The Walking Dead. But it's that Hand That Rocks the Cradle plot, basically.

We both love Blank from hell movies i love blank from hell and i love i'm jealous of your baby and i think i'm just gonna take it but i'm gonna do it over the course of an hour and a half the best and the mom thinks the mom thinks she's going crazy and you know like the best part in hand that rocks the cradle is when she squirts out all of her asthma inhaler. Yes. Those are just real that's like real terrorism, dude.

It's like personal individual terrorism. That's horrifying. Did you find the name yet? Below Zero? I don't know the name. It's on there. It's on Netflix somewhere.

Wait, I have two questions for you, two really important questions for you. Based on what we were just talking about. There's a movie, you see the poster, you know nothing about it, and the title of the movie is Ferguson. What's your reaction? Hmm. Like, is your first reaction oh no i hope i hope this wasn't done by i don't know some fill in the name of a white director i i i would hope i would assume that it would be like a d reese or ava duvernay making that movie um that would be like a Degrees or a Ava DuVernay making that movie. That would be your hope?

That would be your default hope? Or would your reaction be, oh, no? Well, my first reaction is always, oh, no, with those things. It doesn't matter who winds up directing it. But I also think that just, I don't know. This is so tricky, right? Like I think a black director making that movie so soon probably has something to say about that movie or something to say with that movie and just something to say about that situation. I just can't imagine that making that movie for someone else is that much of a priority. And I am immediately suspicious, and history creates my suspicion right um history tells me to be suspicious when i see something like that so immediately ready for mass consumption that way and then called something like ferguson

um that's kind of how i feel about the Boston Marathon bombing movie. And that's also how I felt about the Nick Cage 9-11 movie. It feels like we need the seven-year moratorium before we're ready to make movies about stuff that... Yeah, statute of limitations on subject matter is a really interesting idea. I feel that way about the Snowden movie that is also by Oliver Stone, who made the 9-11 movie you're talking about. I think that he's got the Snowden movie coming up.

I don't know. I think things like that are always problematic to me. I mean, the Snowden movie is obviously Citizen Four, and I don't know how you top that, that Laura Poitras movie. I don't know how you top that, that Laura Poitras movie. I don't know how you do it. Um, you know, Oliver Stone hasn't been himself in a long time. I would say he hasn't really been himself since, since, uh, the Jennifer Lopez, uh, what was that movie called? Uh, the Jennifer Lopez, Sean Penn movie that's got a U-turn. Uh about that one. He hasn't been right since then.

And the idea that he's taking on, I think topicality is always like a death sentence for movies. I felt this way about the Steve Jobs movie. Yeah, I did not like the Steve Jobs movie. I don't like it at all. And I feel like the attempt to sort of psychoanalyze these people,

it really doesn't work. And the only person who's really good at it is Peter Morgan. I think he's really good, but he's not really doing psychoanalysis. He is creating drama out of predetermined situations, right? He's looking at a moment in time and speculating about what the conversations were among the people in that moment, whether it's Queen Elizabeth or George Bush. He's good at that. And I, as you know, my least favorite type of movie is like what we would call a biopic or something that tries to like take a real event and then dramatize it. I just rather see a documentary

i'm with you uh second question um second question could lupita nuongo have starred in the shadow in the shallows and if so does it does does the movie do well in the first week and does it happen and all that stuff? Let's think about what we're really talking about. Yeah, let's talk about it. Yeah. We're talking about two different things. Okay. The first thing we're talking about is getting Lupita Nyong'o to star in a movie where she'd basically be by herself. It's her, two, like, you know, a couple

surfers, an animatronic bird, no shot to the bird if it's actually a real bird, but it seems fake to me, and a shark. The second hurdle you've got is how do you explain that this this the shallows actually explains blake lively's relationship to the water at least or why she's gone to this to this remote beach in mexico yeah um you'd have to come up with a backstory to explain why la pita niango is a surfer um i mean i'm open to buying it but you you need to tell me why that's happening. And then, I mean, and as you know, like, I don't have an objection with the existence of The Shallows because Blake Lively is in it and Blake Lively is like, you know, white or anything. You wrote a great piece about it.

I wrote, my problem with that movie is that it doesn't have a Blake K. Dutton in it because I thought I was going to go see. Yeah. But I just, I feel like the real question is, where is LaPete and the Yongo Shallows, right? It's not that I don't want Blake Lively to have that movie, although that's a, I mean, that's a different issue. But I was fairly, I was convinced by that movie. I like Blake Lively. Yeah, you're not, you movie. I like Blake Lively.

You're more down on Blake Lively than I am. Can you speak about this, please? Sure. She's sexy. Yeah, I'm going to say it. No, this has been the response from many people who... She's got a sexuality to her that

I think works. Is as you know anybody else yeah but as you know one of my favorite tests is could you have starred in basic instinct sharon stone is is is 100 100 on the sexuality scale she's the most sexual actress we've had probably in the last 30 years just every role even if you see her i was watching that she's the most sexual actress we've had probably in the last 30 years. Just every role, even if you see her, I was watching that. She's in, she plays Steven Seagal's wife in a movie. She's carrying a baby the whole time and she's still super sexy. So her sexiness that just exudes from her, no matter whatever part she played was going to manifest itself at some point

in a movie like basic instinct. Now Blake Lively doesn't have that, but there's something sexy about her. Now, in the town, not sexy because her Boston accent was so bad it just overpowered the movie. But I do think she's sexy. And I think this is why everyone was so intrigued by Megan Fox for a while, and she couldn't figure it out ultimately, but there was a confidence about her that should have worked in movies and just didn't for whatever reason what was the one she made that jennifer jennifer's

body that was like her movie to cut that was her make or break am i a star or not movie and it just for whatever reason didn't work uh well i think that movie just lacked, I mean, it just, it didn't have, I think the script, I think whatever it was that Diablo Cody was hoping that movie would be and do just didn't, I couldn't tell if that was a script she wrote 10 years ago or a script she wrote 10 minutes before it went into production. Right. But there was something, there was something like not finished about it. Like, here's the thing.

If you put Megan Fox from eight years ago as the lead in It Follows, she becomes an A-list star. Which is, couldn't find the right part. And that's kind of what you were saying. Are they remaking that? Did I hear that correctly?

What? Is that being remade? What? It Follows. How do they, they just came out. How are you going to remake a movie that just came out?

Oh my God, are you kidding? I just feel like that, that is, that seems like an inevitability. But you're probably right. I'm making that up. Did you see Hush on Netflix? Oh, the Gwyneth Paltrow?

Oh, that's your genre. No, not Gwyneth Paltrow. Not Gwyneth Paltrow. It's this movie about she's deaf. She's in a cabin. She's a writer, and this guy comes and kills her best friend and then decides to terrorize her and try to kill her for the whole movie and it's just her in the cabin. What?

And it's awesome. And the thing I've learned from movies, especially from Netflix over the last 15 years, is don't go into a remote cabin to do work. Just don't just make sure you have some connection to civilization because if you're in a remote cabin, guys with masks show up. That's just what happens. That's what I've learned.

Yeah. This is why I'm writing this book at a desk near a dingy canal. Yeah. Good. Because if anything happens, you can get out and you can at least find one person right no yeah no it's true that's that's the hope i i mean i i don't i feel like megan fox is just an interesting i feel like there is a way in which misogyny and sexism like also have to like they conspire against some of these women in a lot of ways.

And that's another – that's a whole other thing that they can't even control, right? True. Like Megan Fox can speak out against it and then suffer. Or you sort of put up with it like most women do and you hope for the best. It's a really – I think it gets talked about a lot, but not enough. And the degree to which it really does harm and hinder careers when you want to get past being looked at and to be appreciated for other things,

you have to be convinced. You have to be twice as convincing as Channing Tatum or you know Paul Walker R.I.P. you've just you've just you've it's just your your your your obstacles to success are so much higher as a woman because the thing that's expected of you is so obvious and so limiting and so reductive um and you know so timeless it's like this is we've been we could have been having this conversation 70 years ago, except, you know what, the parts would have been way better. Yeah.

There would have been so much more for a Megan Fox or a Blake Lively. I mean, you know, I don't know. This is probably, this is me sort of being suppositional about this. I also think that, you know, 30 years ago with those actresses we have now, you would just see a lot more things with Cate Blanchett and, you know, Julianne Moore and Jennifer. I mean, the same actresses who are dominating the movies now would still be dominating 30 years ago.

I just think that the opportunities for a Blake Lively or Megan Fox would have just been more interesting. Hey, we got to take a quick pause. We got to say hello to a couple of our good friends. I hate shaving. I never know what razors to use. I never know when to stop using one razor and move to a fresher one. In college, my roommates used to come into the bathroom and watch me shave. They would make fun of me.

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It's only $60 a month. Go to 54club.com. Use promo code BS at signup. You get 50% off your first package. F-I-V-E-F-O-U-R-C-L-U-B.com. 5'4 Club promo code BS. I'm going to leave you with two things. Number one, I watched Kramer vs. Kramer again last night because it was on.

Because it was on. It's one of the best. It's my movie. I was a child of divorce named Billy, and it resonates with me. I lived with my dad. It was just me and him. No black people in the movie. Nope.

Welcome to New York in the 1970s. Literally, it's a goose egg for black people. It is amazing. They didn't even give the token, have the judge be black. Nothing. Just white people. It's amazing. The movie won all these Oscars. It's basically white person's New York. So I noticed that that jumped out at me. I thought that was a goofy thing that made me not like the movie like 10% as much. Second, my daughter's favorite actress. She has a favorite actress. Are you ready to hear it? Yes.

Do you want to guess? I'll give you three guesses. Is this an actress that was famous when you and I were kids? No. Is this person like a new- you know, new-ish person? New-ish, yeah, sure. Jennifer Lawrence. No, good guess, though.

It's, uh, her favorite actress is Jennifer Garner. Ooh. Yeah. How about that? Favorite actress. Shut up. Favorite actress. What up. Favorite actress. What other Jennifer Garner movies can I see?

Oh, wait, this is a question for me? No, no, this is what she asked us recently. Oh, boy. Well, what movie was she watching that made her feel this way? 13 Going on 30 is her godfather. Oh, yeah. It's her godfather one and two together oh my god it's she loves it that that movie means so much to so many women i can't even

i mean i'm saying it's their godfather their godfather too or anything but i i can't i can no longer defend against it because really my only defense, my only problem with it is that, is that they dance to the Ron Michael Jackson song at that, in that party. Um, but I know a lot of women where that's just like a meaningful movie and I, I, I don't like it, but I'm so open to what it means to other people that I stopped arguing against it. I can't even, I just give, I gave up on the,

on the, on the thriller dance too. I just felt like they should have been dancing and want to be starting something, but that's a different, that's my movie. Well, you know,

I think you'd probably need to write about this. I think it's important. This is, this is what we've learned from this podcast is that we need a Wesley piece on, uh, why 13 going on 30 is one of the most important movies in the 21st century why how this happened it certainly

it would definitely save me the hassle of like having to think about what's actually going on in the world which i can't stop thinking about right now. Yeah, that would, it's a good diversion. Yeah. Well. Jennifer Garner, solution to the depressing state of the country. Yeah, I didn't want to talk about that with you because it makes me happy to talk with you and I knew we'd all get sad. I'd rather do that if we were just at a bar and get drunk. I won't try to be too sad.

No, I'm not. But I will say. Yeah, go ahead. Say. Can I just say, I want to just put this out there. I've had a number of conversations with people about what's been going on in the last week or so, and what's been going on around the world in the last year or so, and then larger what we put in the last two years.

And I just want to say that it's really important to me that when your black friends are talking to you about how they're feeling, just listen. Don't try to tell them what is actually going on in the world because they kind of know. You don't have to listen to like, you know, police or racist, you know, asshole scumbag pigs, because that's not productive. But when your black friend is basically just saying, hey, look, man, I feel an immense amount of pressure that I've had my entire life being black, whether it's hailing a cab or getting pulled over by the cops or getting asked for my ID for no reason, just say, yeah, man, I'm really sorry about that. I

hear you. Don't try to say it's not that bad or you're not the guy the police want. That's not the case. Black people in general, I feel like they're all in this together. And most of us, a lot of us have white friends. And when we're talking about this shit, just listen. That's all anybody wants. That's it. It's good advice. The one thing I once that's it it's good advice the one thing i the one thing i think that's important that happened this summer is that i think there's a segment of this country that now at least is starting to understand when black people say oh when this shooting happens i just want you to know that when i walk down the street this is in the back of my head that this could randomly just be me someday. And I think that's what's changed this year.

I think it started, the conversation, you know, the conversation's been going on forever, but in terms of a big picture standpoint, it seemed like it started weirdly when the Fruitvale Station movie, and that was like one of those things where I didn't even know that that happened. I mean, I'm buried in my work.

I'm doing a million things. I didn't even know about that. And then I didn't know until he started doing publicity for the movie. And then it seemed like it started and then another one happens, another one happens. And now in 2016, the way people are writing about this and the conversations we're having, I just feel like the light with what we can see and not so much the way I can tell you how I'm feeling makes me feel, you know, like, or like, like how I'm, how the world is

making me feel. I think there's also a lot of disaffection and, and, and, and alienation, which is how you wind up with, I mean, we don't know what happened with that guy in Nice and that awful truck mauling. But I mean, it was the guy who acted alone and, you know, is an, you know, an Arab French citizen. And I feel like the Orlando shooter, same thing. Like there is a degree of alienation and, and aloneness and and outsiderness or something that people feel. And I don't know, it's much safer to me, I feel at this point, to be together rather than apart. And I know this sounds uselessly optimistic, but it's really much better what I'm saying to you now

than how I was feeling a week ago. I gotta be honest. And I do think that empathy is a huge thing. And I think people understanding what empathy is and being able to practice it is really important. And I'm not just saying for black people, I also think it's important to listen to police when they talk about, like, the difficulties of their job, which I'm aware of. I understand, you know, I feel like this isn't just a policing problem. This is like an American institutional racism problem that you can't just pin on the police. And I just think the police are like immediate actors in these situations. And a lot of the way that we talk about this stuff is framed through law enforcement and perpetration um i just i i feel

like there's just i don't i don't like the term national conversation i think that's one of the dumbest terms ever in the history of like talking to people i think it's much more useful to talk about empathy and policy and changing that sort of stuff. I don't know why I'm talking about this. It is just so on my mind and I've been so sad, um, like for a week. I mean, I cried at a meeting the other day. I've never done that before in my life. And I just have been feeling like really, I've been feeling really hopeful, hopeless and kind of down.

And, you know, this convention is happening next week and i'm hoping that goes okay yeah um but then i saw this movie a couple weeks ago and i just been thinking about that this moonlight movie i have to say like it is really good and made me so happy just to see like a movie about two black men just figuring themselves out together. It is so beautiful. And, you know, to have it be by another black man is really important. And, you know, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know what I'm really saying.

I'm just feeling both optimistic and kind of sad about stuff. But as a friend put it the other night, like all the stuff about Obama being this like earthquake and being really important for America to get to this next place by leveling all this previous stuff is a good idea. But like, as with any earthquake on a, on a coast or like in the, in the ocean,

there's a tsunami that comes. And I think what the Trump thing is, is, is a tsunami and it's going to destroy a lot of things and level a lot of things and bring a lot of shit to the surface but you know hopefully it'll pass and the devastation won't be too bad

and we can rebuild on top of that well said hang in there buddy that's not even why you called me listen I figured there was a chance we might talk about it but you know it's tough

these are tough times what's the tenor of things out there how do they feel you know it's not great like last week we had Mike in our office he's from Baton Rouge you know and he eventually wrote a really good piece

about it that took some time and we wanted to give him the time and let him get his head to the right place where he could write what he wanted to say and it wasn't too raw and you know I think LA is I don't know LA is

just so different than New York, New York. You're around people all the time and it's so much easier to just go to bars and go to restaurants and you're just running into people and it's easier to have conversations than it is in LA. LA is spread out and you have to make an effort to be around people to some degree. So it's, it's, uh, I think a lot of people just experience the stuff on the Internet. Yeah, that's very good. And they're reading stuff.

You see last week it was just this wave of people writing variations of the same piece, and all of them were powerful. It was like how many times can a black person get murdered? How many times do we have to watch this? Is this going to be the rest of my life? And, you know, I think the, the totality of those pieces were really powerful. Um, I don't know. I think all of us, I don't, I don't care what color you are, how old you are, where you

came from um there's a fear this summer that reminds me of what 19 reading about 1968 which was before i was born but just like that summer and the way people talk about in the documentaries that have been made about it um and and how it just felt like the steering wheel was broken for the country it It's starting to feel like that a little bit. And I think that's the part that's scary. Yeah, I would just say that, you know, there are obviously some really important differences, right, though? Like, I mean, there hadn't been those assassinations.

Like, there had been no, there's no equivalent of the King assassination or the Kennedy assassination. No. Or Malcolm X. The energy around, you know, no riots in Newark, No. Or Malcolm X. But the war is basically the war that's going on in the country with guns. That's become its own version of the war. And also, it's only early July. We have six months left in this crappy year.

The framing around the 68 thing is also because I think things have been so racialized for so long. And I think that like, it feels like things are coming to a particular head with the convention next week. And I think there's a lot of fear given what we've been talking about with open carry States and people, people agitating for something. And I don't know,

I can't say which side, I mean, cause you read these stories and it's like, nobody's innocent in these, in these skirmishes outside these Trump rallies, it seems like. And so, I mean, there is, there is some, there's an, there's an energy that people, people want to come bring this to a head. And I, I'm, I'm really worried that Cleveland is going to be, it's going to become a place where people are looking for trouble. I am worried about that, too. I'm not looking forward to next week.

Yeah, I mean, neither am I, to be honest. And, like, forget, like, the potential for violence. I mean, the convention itself looks like it's going to be a nightmare. It's, I don't know. I don't know. What's weird is Cleveland has always had this football team where every year they have terrible choices for quarterback, and they have these training camp battles between, like,

Jake DeLome and Seneca Wallace, and the poor Browns fans look around and they go, Oh my God, these are our choices. And now America has become the Browns. And we just look around like, wow, these are, this is their choices. Jake, the loam and Seneca Wallace. This is it. Is there anybody else? It's like, no, this is it.

And, uh, I don't know that that is as sobering as just about anything else all right we have to go hang in there oh man i know uh people be happy try to try to find some i mean i don't know somebody said that to me the other day and i got mad don't listen to me feel feel how you feel it'll you'll get over it come out to la and let's talk about all this stuff over like 17 alcoholic beverages not on a podcast yeah alright we'll do that

the ones below is the Netflix movie by the way if you want to watch a baby stanching movie I don't know I think people should save that for Moonlight

and Carisha is available on On Demand by the way K-R-I-S-H-A awesome really good movie Wesley Morris thank thank you. Read him in the New York Times.

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