The Comedy Cellar: Live from the Table - Censorship

Episode Date: March 11, 2022

Michael Mailer has been working extensively in the independent film world since graduating Harvard University. His first feature film, A Fool And His Money, starred Sandra Bullock and George Plimpton. Since then, Mailer has gone on to produce over 25 features. His father is the American novelist, Norman Mailer.  Nick Griffin has appeared on Conan, The Late Late Show, in his own half-hour Comedy Central special and was featured on The Late Show with David Letterman eleven times. He is a Comedy Cellar regular. 

🎵 This is Live from the Table, recorded at the world-famous Comedy Cellar here in Greenwich Village, New York City. Coming at you on the SiriusXM 99 Raw Dog channel and the Laugh Button Podcast Network. Dan Aderman here. Back from Aruba. Tan.

I was back last week, too, I guess. Yeah, you were already there. But my Tan is still here. Noam Dorman, of course, owner of the world-famous comedy seller Periel Ashenbrand is with us. She is the producer, and not just a producer,

but she has somehow managed to become an on-air personality as well. And again, it didn't start off that way, but it just sort of started to happen. Has the show gotten better or worse? We didn't start off that way but it just it just sort of started as the show got better or worse we didn't say anything send your emails to podcast at comedyseller.com

and if you turn the show off before you finish listening to it tell us the last thing you heard before you said you had enough podcast at comedyseller.com we could use constructive criticism or just compliments just anything you like about the show. Help us help you to get a better podcasting experience.

We also have with us Nick Griffin, Comedy Seller, regular for a number of years. Nick told me something a little bit disturbing before the podcast. I think it's worth discussing. He feels obligated to do this podcast. That's not true. I said I turned Perrielle down three times, and then I did feel like I should definitely do this podcast. That's not true. I said I'd turned Perrielle down three times and then I felt, yeah, I did feel like I should definitely do this one.

Well, you're certainly not doing me a favor. Yeah. We need to highlight that. We thought we were doing you a favor. Were you Howard Stern trying to get me? No, because what you're saying has no basis. Noam doesn't care whether you do it or you don't. Noam didn't even know I asked you. It's not going to affect anything

regarding your spots here. Listen, this is the thing. I tell people I shouldn't eat on the air. I know. It's really, what is going on over there? He's like a pile of fucking pita. You don't need to get that heated up about it. I don't like to ask. I told Juanita in the car the other day, I said,

if I'm going to teach my kids one thing in life, I want them to try to go through their entire life without ever asking anybody for a favor. Just like, just see if you could just never ask anybody for a favor. Not even within the family? Well, that's not as bad,

but preferably not even within the family. I mean, they can ask me for a favor, but that's different. I'm their parent. ask me for a favor, but that's different. I'm their parent. That's not a favor. Because when you ask somebody for a favor, it's just, it's a drag.

And it's 10 times worse. And I know this. I try to tell you guys this all the time. I don't like to ask comedians for anything, not to do the podcast, anything. Because it's, as Louis famously said, when he realized that when he asked girls to masturbate in front of him, if he could masturbate in front of him, it's not a question, it's, as Louis famously said, when he realized that when he asked girls to masturbate in front of him,

if he could masturbate in front of him, it's not a question, it's a predicament. This is what he wrote in his apology letter. But that was the smartest thing he wrote in that whole apology. And it's true. And I know that when I ask people something, it's not a question, it's a predicament.

So I don't want to ask them for anything. Well, the other big thing that we were talking about before we came up after I said, oh, I feel uncomfortable on the show. I've already said no three times. Was also that I don't know anything about anything. We know that, Nick. Okay. As long as that's clear up front. Well, also, Nick, oftentimes I want you on the show.

But the problem is Noam and me, we're basically doing two different podcasts. I'm trying to emphasize, if not outright comedy, at least a more comedic approach. Whereas Noam fancies himself sort of,

I don't know if Charlie Rose is the right word, but he really tries to get... First of all, fancies himself sounds snide. You could say either I am or I'm not. If I fancy myself the right word, but he really tries to get... First of all, fancies himself sounds snide. You could say either I am or I'm not. If I fancy myself, it means I'm not really. He fancies himself a musician. He thinks he is. In any case, he likes to get more into

real serious talk about weighty issues and oftentimes gets into great detail that I don't know what he's talking about oftentimes. And oftentimes the comedy guest doesn't know. Can I really give you a big picture? It might be interesting to do. Podcast at ComedyCenter.com. Last thing you said. Last thing you heard before you turned it off.

I'm having a pretty happy life in general. That's awesome. Text messaging and smartphones ruining it notwithstanding. And one of the reasons is because basically since I graduated law school and didn't practice law,

I have not spent any time doing anything that I didn't want to do because it interested me. It was playing music, whatever it is. And the podcast, although I'd like the podcast to be more successful, and really, I thought at times I should really, because I think I definitely could make it more successful. But the main reason I like to do the podcast

is to talk to interesting people. Like me. And so, yeah, I like to bring these journalists in, whatever it is, because I find that interesting. It's not because I fancy myself anything or anything like that. It's just like, well, I'm doing something because what do I want to do with my life? The clock's ticking, Dan. We haven't got much longer.

It goes like that. Well, I'm intermittent fasting, so I expect to be around for some time. So like, I floss, which apparently adds another year to your life. A guy like Alan Dershowitz, I know people don't like Alan Dershowitz.

It's just his first name that comes to mind. He's this famous guy. We grew up in his movies. He's the famous lawyer. And he has an opinion. He's one of the smartest people there is, whether you agree with him or don't agree with him. And because of the podcast, I'm able to have Perry Elk call Alan Dershowitz, and he'll come in here and he'll talk to me about something. I thought that was just because he likes me. Did he feel that

Sean Penn based that character, that lawyer character in Carlito's Way? Carlito's Way on him. Jesus Christ, Nick. Was that one of the podcasts you turned down? That's such a good question. You say you don't know anything. That would have been fantastic to ask you.

Yeah, but I didn't see it. That Jewish Sean Penn character. Yeah, yeah. Maybe the see it that way. That Jewish Sean Penn character. Yeah, yeah. Just the hair and maybe the look. Not the behavior. Yeah, I didn't perceive it as, other than the fact that he's Jewish. No, but non-Jewish. Yeah, I guess if you're not Jewish, you lump us all together.

But I personally didn't perceive it as Dershowitz-esque. A Dershowitz-esque character. But our friend Gary Goleman, when he jokingly compiled a list called the Kikis, which is the award for the most Jewish, stereotypical Jewish character in the movies, and that's one of his top picks. Who were the other ones? The guy who runs the bazaar in the Star Wars movie?

No, the guy, James Wood's character, I think, in Casino. And John Turturro gets a lifetime achievement. James Wood doesn't play a Jewish character in Casino, does he? I think so. Yeah, he plays the boyfriend. He's not Jewish? Something diamond. I never thought of him as Jewish.

I don't think he was Jewish. Oh, well, I thought that he was. His last name was Diamond. So, also, I mean, I think probably the number one stereotypical Jewish role in film history goes back many, many years to March of the Wooden Soldiers with Laurel and Hardy, the character of Barnaby, who was like the old landlord that was trying to evict Bo Peep from her shoe. Barnabas. Barnabas.

Barnabas. He was trying to evict Bo Peep from her shoe. Not Bo Peep, but Little Miss, whoever lived in the shoe. Little Miss, no. Old Mother Hubbard. Old Mother Hubbard. Yeah, but Mother Hubbard's daughter was Bo Peep.

And he was like, but perhaps if your young daughter would be nice to me, perhaps we could work something out. So I read in a book that the very first million-selling record was a comedy record of a guy doing a whole bit about a Jewish landlord. Oh, really? Yeah. I can't remember the name of it.

It's funny. It wasn't, yeah. I was trying to think of the album, but I can't think of it. Anyway. Anyway, getting back to me. the album, but I can't think of it. Anyway. Anyway, getting back to me. So that's what I want to do. Okay, and I understand that. So my choice of words was perhaps inappropriate.

Not that inappropriate. You fancy yourself. Although I did think you fancy yourself, and rightly so. And by the way, I've said many, many times. You have. I'm an intellectual of some weight. And I've credited you for being, I think, just as insightful as Ben Shapiro, for example. But even if...

You took out a backhanded compliment. Ben Shapiro is a smart dude, but I listen to him sometimes in the car. I know, but he's loathsome. Can we pick somebody else? Well, you know what? I didn't used to find him loathsome when Trump was president because he was a good devil's advocate at a time when it was like a stereo against Trump that was warranted by Trump's being

a disgusting character but wasn't warranted in terms of the facts sometimes but now since Biden's president he's loathsome I've been saying it from day one. You don't even listen to him. You don't... He is disgusting.

He says horrible things about gay people, about trans people. Oh, God. Can't we pick somebody a little bit, like, maybe more like Bill Maher? Nick DiPaolo? Nick DiPaolo, yeah. I guess Sam Harris would be, then,

a more appropriate comparison. Okay. Sam Harris, I'll take. Or what about Bill Maher? That's a good one. Who has the highest ratio of strong opinions to lack of knowledge you've ever met? It's got to be Perrielle. Like, she literally has the most strong opinions.

I mean, they're so strong that basically every opinion is on 10. There really is no fine gradations in her opinions. This is basically fine. Everybody's either loathsome or fantastic. No, brilliant. A genius. Yeah, you may be right. She may have that highest ratio.

You must give her credit, though, for all this fundraising she's doing. No, I don't. I give her credit for virtue signaling. Why don't we talk about letting us know that she's doing for... No, I don't. I give her credit for virtue signaling. Well, why don't we talk about letting us know that she's doing it? What's the cause that everybody's worried about? Oh, let me make sure that everybody knows I'm raising money for the Ukrainian people. You can say that, but, you know, it's not true.

Perrielle is raising money for Ukraine. I see her on Instagram with all her photos and with all the stuff she's sending over there. Perrielle, do you have a particular connection to this cause? My super's from Ukraine. It's white people. That's what I think. She's racist. Actually, we're making boxes

just for the Africans in Ukraine. That's not bad. She's sending tampons to the Ukrainian women. That's literally what she's doing. No, I don't have any connection. That's not bad. She's sending tampons to the Ukrainian women. That's literally what she's doing. No, I don't have any connection. That's not a joke. Okay, yeah. Well, we're actually getting lists from specific places in Ukraine of what they're asking in those cities, wiseass.

And some people are asking for tampons. Let me make a point. At any given time, there's the cause that everybody's worried about. And it would be wrong to think that because it's the cause of the day, that it's actually more serious than things that go on all over the world all the time. Agreed. There's people starving to death in various places. In the same place for long, long, long periods of time.

Forever. And, hello, sir. Come on in. And why not do this? When there's a cause in the news like Ukraine, why not say to yourself, you know what? Everybody is raising money for Ukraine now.

Why don't I raise money for one of those causes that nobody seems to care about? Come on in, sir. Where's he going to sit? Right there in the guest of honor. That nobody cares about. Raise money for the people in, I mean, I might not be correct, Rwanda or where there's people starving.

Nobody's starving in Rwanda. That's number one. Number two, the answer is this. Is that true? Well, I have no idea. I'm saying it's like, let me just, let me just, oh, there's a thing that everybody's talking about. Let me go get boxes and Instagram about it. I mean, maybe you're not.

Are you on Instagram or are you just taking this as hearsay? I just assume. Because I just told him. Maybe you're not virtue signaling, but it really does feel like you're virtue signaling. Okay. First of all, as I've said numerous times on this show, I could cure childhood cancer and no one would find some way of why it's, you know, self-serving or obnoxious or virtue signaling.

Let me say there's a bandwagon thing about what you're raising money for. Listen to me. I wasn't trying to raise money and I'm still I'm actually not raising money. My super put bins in our building asking and the building sends out an email asking for donations. I am the second grade mom of my son's school or class. And I said, can we put some bins out in front of school and have the kids bring stuff? And then it just spiraled out of control. And I can't help it if you know I'm popular and people trust me and I do a fucking good job I sent 61 boxes with a crew of volunteer moms today that are on their fucking way to Odessa don't roll your eyes what are you doing complaining about getting too many text messages

okay well look obviously it's better to do something than nothing. Michael Mailer is with us. Hi, Michael. Hello. Hi, Michael. How do you do? He's been working extensively in the indie film world since graduating Harvard. Very prestigious. Harvard.

That's a school in Cambridge, Maine. Dan only got into Penn. I didn't apply to Harvard, but one can assume I wouldn't have gotten in had I done so. He's gone on to produce over 25 feature films, including A Fool and His Money with Sandra Bullock and George Plimpton. Other films include Seduced and Abandoned and what other films have they... Are you stumped? He's very, very...

We're really on it. I directed a film called Blind with Alec Baldwin and Demi Moore. I did a film called Heart of Champions where, in fact, Harvard was the bad guy. It's a rowing movie with Michael Shannon. I just wrapped the film with Morgan Freeman called The Minute You Wake Up Dead. So you came on my radar because I wanted to talk to you about the book that was a Random House declined to publish. But just before you do that, because you mentioned Alec Baldwin and you're into films, you have a take on Alec Baldwin and that gun thing? Oh, I don't know if I want to weigh into that. I mean,

you know, I do. Listen, I've been around guns on sets and there's a very strict protocol, which obviously wasn't being followed. You know, I don't, I can't put the blame on Alec for what happened. I mean, it was a series of events and, you know, it was just a tragic accident. I don't put the blame on him, and I tended to be very sympathetic to him. And even as I'm saying it, maybe this isn't even fair, but until he came out with this, I never pulled the trigger.

It went off on its own two months after it happened or something. But then, you know, it's easy for me to judge. I mean, he's trying to keep himself out of big trouble. Sometimes you got to do what you got to do, right? Yeah. I mean, I'm not going to parse the nuances of, you know, how he's defending himself, but I, it just, it was a series of mishaps that just led to this brutal accident and should never have happened. Yeah. You should try not to be judgmental, Perry. I know it's hard for you, but you should really imagine yourself in other people's shoes.

All right. Now, I had a big argument with a, I don't want to say his name on the air, but it is an important intellectual who would not believe that this story, I'll let you tell the story about your dad's book, the decline to publish your dad's book. You want to bring us up on that story? Sure. I mean, his centenary is next year. Random House asked us to put together a proposal for

a collection of essays, political essays, sort of outlining the fragility of democracy, which we're all experiencing in one form or another now. And the proposal was very well received and, you know, things looked like they were marching forward. We didn't have anything in writing, but a couple of weeks thereafter, they just decided not to go forward. And you think that's because? Well, you know, our, the agent to the estate, you know, told us that there were some issues with some junior executives who were opposed to the idea of publishing Norman Mailer because of his past, you know, issues with the women's movement and the use of the word Negro in his seminal essay, White Negro. That was the main—that was what I read was the main thing,

the use of the word Negro. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's all hearsay because I never had direct conversations with anyone at Random House about it, but they were going forward and all of a sudden they weren't. So clearly someone got scared. So Michael Wolff, is that his name? Yes. He wrote it up and he's not that reliable. I think we know that. But after hearing Random House's denial, it was, if you parse it, it wasn't

actually directly denying it and it didn't seem,it wasn't convincing to me that Wolfe's story wasn't accurate. But then Wolfe didn't defend himself on it, really. Wolfe just dropped it. So then I began to think, well, maybe he did— No, it was a fairly accurate accounting of what happened. It was? Yeah. And at the same time, you're railing against this kind of wokeness and political correctness.

So how does it all tie? Yeah, I mean, listen, I was so disturbed by these trends that are happening. I mean, you know, publishing is the last refuge of democracy. If you can't, you're afraid to publish ideas and to create an exchange of ideas, where are we culturally as a country? And I just, you know, the trend is very dangerous. I mean, it's cultural fascism is what it is. What did you think about when Woody Allen's autobiography, Apropos of Nothing, I believe it was called, was rejected by his publishing house and he had to go with a smaller independent publisher? Yeah, I mean, listen, my feeling is if you don't approve of him, don't buy his book. But don't tell other people

what they can or cannot read. Well, and with your dad, so this essay, White Negro, what was it about? You know, it was a seminal essay published in the... Was it with him and James Baldwin? Was it something to do with James Baldwin? No. I mean, I think they had a friendly

disagreement about the substance of the piece, but it was basically an essay comparing the statistical tragedy of the Holocaust to the black experience in America and how hipsterism kind of evolved out of this need to find personal expression against the overwhelming conformity of the Eisenhower era. And at the time it came out, he was considered in good standing with liberal people, right? And they're judging it now by a standard that didn't exist at the time and trying to rewrite his whole, like where he's... Yeah, we're entering the cultural door cages right now where, you know, books are being taken off of library shelves. You know, I mean, it's a matter of time before they remove Mark Twain. You know, it's, or take down Picasso's from, you know, museum walls because, you know, he mistreated his, the women in his life.

I mean, I don't, you know, again, it's, it's this, we should be living in a free exchange of ideas. As long as those ideas are not promoting, you know, overt violence, there's no reason to censor anything, frankly. And I just think it's, it's a very slippery slope when you start doing that. And I don't have a very optimistic view of where we're going. You agree with that, Perrielle? Absolutely, 100%. Because she's kind of woke, but she's a rare species of woke because she agrees with everything woke, except that she's not censorious. Is that the word?

She doesn't object to people being able to say what they want. And she also has a soft spot for men who take liberties with women. I have to say it. I can't put it any other way. She actually does because she has a story she tells where men took liberties with her and she was turned on by it. Well, I mean, that might be. No, you're not. But it was, you know, it was sort of invited, you know, like I don. I was never really taken advantage of by any of those men.

A famous man, without asking, put his hands... I can't even say it. I mean, I say it on stage. You can say it. Well, you say it. You say it. Well, you started it, so say it. Now this is where your line is?

Anyway, say it real quick. Say it, say it. A famous is where your line is? Anyway, say it real quick. Say it, say it. A famous musician. He's dead. You can say his name. Lou Reed. Lou Reed. Put his hand in my underwear.

And I have a whole bit where I say it was so uncalled for and so inappropriate. And I really liked it. Well, I appreciate your honesty. So she's setting the cause of women back. But yeah, we, anyway. How did I never hear that story? Well, you usually don't stay in the room when I get on stage.

Ah. Yes. So now there's something else. I don't know that much about you, but there, so I, and you don't know about me, but I had a very, very kind of larger than life father figure. And that was, that was tough, but I managed it all right.

A lot of children don't. You had a huger than life father figure. What kind of scars did that leave on you? How did you manage that? You know, when you have a father like Norman Mailer, there's very little you can rebel against. So, you know, listen, it's a hard comparison to make because it's all I knew growing up. And, you know, my father wasn't around that much when I was young. I really got to know him in my teens when I moved back to New York to live with him.

But, you know, before he died, he said to me, I could not have been the writer that I am today and have been more of a father to you. And I, you know, I understood that and forgave him and said, you know, I'll take quality over quantity any day of the week. How old were you when he kind of had become a big thing? I mean, was he at any— I mean, he became a big thing long before I was born. Oh, okay.

But I mean, you know, listen, I grew up in a small town in Cape Cod. You know, I had no idea really who he was, you know, in a larger cultural sense. Right. I don't think kids really know that, right? Like, you just know that it's your dad. You don't— Exactly. Yeah.

Exactly. And, you know, maybe you were better off for that. Okay, I'm going to make an analogy. Don't get upset about it. It's just an analogy. But there was a study that came out yesterday or the day before that

the conclusion was that the Japanese who were interned during World War II actually ended up being much more successful financially because apparently this internment broke the cycle of their life and wound up in some way benefiting them. I'm sure they wouldn't, if they had it to do over, they wouldn't want to be interned. And of course, we shouldn't have interned them. But it was this odd thing that actually, according to the study, according to empirical evidence, they benefited in some way. You would say, no, I want my dad.

But in some way, maybe you did benefit because you weren't smothered in that way. By having this huge figure there soaking up all the attention all the time. And you were kind of free maybe just to be yourself and grow up. Sure. I mean, you could certainly look at it that way i you know i you know as i said i i got to know him really in my teens and then um you know his he had a love for boxing so you know when i was five he gave me a pair of boxing gloves and said this is your sport and you know we you know up until again i I spent quality time with him. It was sort of the way we communicated

with each other was in the ring. Didn't he get in the ring with somebody famous? Yeah, he was very good friends with Jose Torres, who was the former light heavyweight champion of the world. I think they sparred, actually, on one of the talk shows at the time, Dick Cavett.

Hilarious. Buckley. But I, yeah, it was they sparred actually on one of the talk shows at the time, Dick Cavett or. Hilarious. Yeah. Buckley or something. But I, I, yeah, it was, it was kind of our way of relating to each other before I became verbal

enough to take it to another level. I mean, he was awesome. And there's a documentary about Norm Milliman, but anytime you see him on TV, like was it with, was it with Gore Vidal? He was debating on Dick Cavett.

Yeah. He had a very pugnacious relationship with a lot of his writer buddies. And they were constantly falling in and out of friendships. But Gore was one of them, though they became very good friends towards the end. Full charisma. Yeah, Buckley. I remember. He baited Buckley often.

Was it Sacha Baron Cohen as one of his characters that interviewed Gore Vidal? Yes. Talking about your hair products? Yes. He was talking about Vidal Sassoon. Yes. It was amazing.

I think that was the Ali G character. Yeah. I think he rolled with it pretty well. I read it. I don't want to talk about your father all the time, but I read most of the Executioner song, and I didn't put it down because I got bored of it or anything. It just said, I think COVID ended.

But, I mean, he's a great writer. Yeah, I learned about sex through that book. Yeah, there's a lot of sex. I mean, there's a lot of intimate sex in that book, and it's, you know, my young teenage brain just soaked it in. Well, if you enjoy books about sex, our own Perry Alashian brand has written two. That's right.

On My Knees and The Only Bush I Trust is My Own. These are memoirs of her sexual adventures as a young lady. They're not just sexual adventures. But rest assured, sexual adventures are a play or a role. Yes, they do play a role. Do you have a number? No, I don't. Well, you have one.

I have no idea. No, no, I have no idea. It's so high that I couldn't... No, I'm just kidding. No, I don't. Is it high because you pretend like it might be high? I don't pretend anything. You guys have decided pretend like it might be high. I don't pretend anything. You guys have decided.

We let our mind race. Yeah. Well, who counts anyway? Well, I have a list. Dan does. I have a list at home of all of my conquests. Do you? Yeah, and it's not that long.

And the receipts? Not that long. No, there's no receipts. That's very Jewish of you. There are no receipts? Not that long. No, there's no receipts. That's very Jewish of you. There are no receipts, but actually I don't list those. But there is just, you know, some of them I don't even have names. I'll just have girl from Cincinnati, you know, that I met because I don't remember.

But maybe about 30. By the way, Dan wrote a book, too. Dan wrote a novel. It's excellent. You should get him a copy. Well, I'm happy to do so. I'm happy to read it. He's a film producer.

I'll tell you what. I will actually buy it on Amazon and add to your bottom line. No, no, he'll give you a copy. Dan's like, no, no, I don't buy it on Amazon. It's called, well well I make an entire four dollars a copy it's called Iris Spiro Before COVID it is a novel with some autobiographical

you know elements to it and not just that but there's people in the comedy world because it takes place in the comedy world so Noam is in it in a in a veiled way or not so veiled way in a veiled unsubtle way as the comedy club, so Noam is in it in a veiled way, or not so veiled way. In a veiled, unsubtle way. As the comedy club owner. It's really, and, yeah, so since you brought it up.

So getting back to the cultural fascism, which is an issue that we all care about, what are we doing to change it? What's your, just sit back and. No, I think, you know, I mean, people have to speak out against it. I mean, I, I, you know, I wrote a editorial that got picked up by the Spectator and then the Boston Globe, you know, um, I mean, you know, not that it's going to move the needle, but I think, you know, people speaking out against it, it, people writing about it,

you need to create the ripples that lead to a wave of change before it's too late. And some people would argue that it is already too late. I mean, when you have someone like Random House declining to publish one of their longstanding authors' collection of essays, there's something inimical about that. It's crazy.

What should be the... Like, a publishing company obviously doesn't have to publish everything that comes across their desk they and they don't have to and they can certainly drop uh you know authors if they wish what should be their criteria if they feel that business is going to suffer because of a backlash do they not have even an obligation perhaps toward their shareholders if they're public? I mean, yes, I guess you can make a financial argument for justifying it. Though, again, it's like controversy used to be a good thing in the publishing world. Now it's seen as something that is to be avoided at all costs. And they're trying to merge now with Simon & Schuster. So they don't want anything rocking the boat.

And it's just too bad. I mean, they, you know, back in the McCarthy era when everyone was being canceled in Hollywood, you know, they tried to cancel writers like my dad. And the publisher was like, no, we're going to keep publishing. Right. And they stood up to it.

And, you know, enough people stand up to it, you can affect change. But people are afraid. Noam has really the same issue with booking comedians because they're – well, Louis C.K., for example, was a controversial figure and Noam had to make the decision whether or not to book him. And Noam chose to book him. However, Noam has said that if the crowd reacted in such a way that business was affected negatively, he wouldn't have booked them at some point. But I'm sure it wasn't affected. I'm sure you had a sold-out house.

And again, it's like if you disapprove them, don't go see a show. Come closer to the mic. Yeah. Yeah, well, listen. So you've made that argument many times. But I have to say that, and I think you agree with me i don't really think these companies are making financial decisions i think that um i keep going back to it when barry weiss resigned from the time she said that the uh twitter had become the editor-in-chief of the new

york times twitter has i don't as much as we understand that Twitter is influential, I don't think people have fully integrated into their heads how much influence this thing has. And these executives just want to be able to go to cocktail parties and hang out with their peers and not have somebody, you know, book Norman Mailer or wrote it. I don't think it's financial at all. I think it's all about wanting to be on the right side of social pressures. I mean, to say like – so Spotify, I mean, this Joe Rogan thing was huge. He referred to black people as Planet of the Apes, right? They stood by him. They suffered no business repercussions. At least I haven't seen any.

So why would anybody think Random House would suffer business repercussions for publishing Norman Mailer, of all people? I don't think they would have, but whatever. I mean, I don't know who's pulling levers in the higher corporate offices when it comes to this stuff. I just think it's a dangerous trend. And yeah, you can make an argument that they didn't see any financial gain to be had or upside to be had in publishing them. But again, to your point, I just think it's a general desire to avoid any form of controversy. And as a result, you're getting this kind of overt censorship of ideas. There's no longer a free market of ideas.

I just think it's very bad for our cultural identity. It's terrible. So when we, I noticed it with the comedians, when we had this Louis controversy, like one or two people would tweet at a comedian, I don't want to mention his name, like, why are you still working at that comedy store place? They book Louis C.K.

And the comedian freaked out and was ready to stop performing. Like, he panicked. About two nutty strangers on Twitter. He was so devastated. He lost all perspective. The asymmetric impact of these tweets was really something to see.

And I get it, too, because I was in the center, but I know how it feels. And the executives at Random House are no different. thrall of the far left, even though politically it seems like a no brainer for them to move to the center, given his polls, given the fact that Bill Clinton was in a similar situation and moved to the center and winded up becoming one of the most popular presidents ever. But for these people to withstand these these tweets and the call being called racist and all this stuff, it's more than they can take. You know, I do have an analogous story before Twitter. Yeah. I did a joke about rape many years ago. It was certainly not a joke.

You had a lot of jokes about rape back then. No, I only had one. I'd say two. And it was certainly not a joke that advocated rape. It was my date rape joke that you might recall. I don't. It was a joke where I said, date rape, you know, a date rape, I thought that meant when you force a woman to go on a date with you.

And you're like, you push her into the movie theater and say, get in there, you whore. But anyway, so it's a funny joke. But one person said to me, you know, joking about rape, it's a terrible thing. And I just stopped doing the joke.

Now, in my case, I have such a plethora of wonderful jokes that I didn't miss it. But to your point, it was just being accused of being, of something, not in this case racism, but misogyny. That's a really funny joke.

It was enough to get me to say, you know what, I just don't feel like, I don't want to do battle. And so I just said, fuck it, and I didn't tell it ever again, except here on the show. That's crazy. That's so crazy that you stopped telling that joke because one person came up to you and said that it was misogynistic. And they want to believe that. They want to believe that if they say something or tweet something or fill out a comment card that Dan Natterman shouldn't be saying that,

that it'll affect that. It's crazy. I mean, I'm the same way. I had a similar thing happen to me, and it freaked me out for weeks. I didn't do it for weeks, but then I went back and started. Can you tell us more specifically what the nature of it was? It was just some joke about suicide.

A lot of your act is about depression plays a big role in your act. Right, yeah. But anyway, this woman said, how could you do that? My friend killed himself two weeks ago. And I said, sorry, I didn't know your friend. I certainly didn't have him in mind when I put this together. I thought she was kidding for a minute, and then she just would not let it go. I had a lady the other night say,

I never get depressed. She was sitting right there. There was no chair. She was just sitting right there. She said, I never get depressed. She said it like that. That depressed me. That's how sensitive I am.

She said, if I start to get down, I look at the ocean or a sunset or kids playing. I'm like, yeah, I guess that works for a minute, but I can't go to the park and stare at kids all day. Some guy's going to come over. Which one's yours? None of them. No, it just makes me feel good.

Yeah. My dad once said, beware of anyone who's incapable of being embarrassed by himself. That's a good one. And we're becoming a nation of people who are terrified of being embarrassed. Yeah. I mean, there are these stories. So this guy, was it McNeil?

I forget his first name. Is it Don? No, Don McNeil. At the Times, he got fired because five years prior to his firing, it came out five years later or something, that when somebody asked him a question and they used the N-word in the question,

he repeated back the N-word in his answer. Right. Not in any kind of racist way. Just said the word, you know. And don't forget, it was at a time when people did say the word, you know. And he got fired for that. Elvis Costello, by the way, sung the word.

Remember that song, Oliver's Army? Well, so did Randy Newman. He still hasn't gotten away with it. Randy Newman had a song called Rednecks, and he says, keeping the N-words down. It's a song that's written from a character's point of view, from Huey Long or something. But he was the Disney composer,

and somehow nobody's caught up with this yet. Anyway. Until now. Until now. You've outed him. And it's still on YouTube. But anyway, so McNeil got fired. That was bad enough.

Then Mike Peska, who had this podcast on Slate called The Gist, in the Slack channel on Slate, when they were debating McNeil being fired, Mike Peska wrote in the Slack channel, well, I don't think he should have been fired. I think there are times when it's appropriate in a conversation merely to say what it is you're talking about.

And Pesca got fired for that. And that can't be a business reason. That is pure intimidation. Fear. The employees complain. It's fear. And it's like everybody is so afraid of being slimed because once you get that slime on you, you cannot get it off.

Right. I mean, what a, what a terrible time. Now they're, they're, they're firing people who they feel might be insufficiently antagonistic to Putin. You see that they're firing ballet dancers. They're, it's, it's madness. Wait, what? Yeah.

They're, they're, they're firing people who they are finding out might be sympathetic to Russia or... Who's firing? Some ballet company fired... I can't remember. Sounds like a story I would tell.

I have a handful of bread, but Nicole, can you Google that? Like fired for being insufficiently ballet dancer fired or just fired for being pro Putin. And like, I'm not pro Putin, but like, I wouldn't, I don't care. Somebody, I don't get furious if I find out somebody has, I have a really good friend who has a different take on the Russia thing. What am I going to do? Fire him.

I mean, there was a time when people could really disagree. I don't know. Yeah, yeah. No, we're entering the French Revolution, you know, with Robespierre cutting off heads. And eventually, you know, the cancelers will be canceled themselves. I mean, that's where this is going. It happens all the time.

By the way, speaking of the French Revolution, I do have a recommendation. A lot of people on Facebook want to know what's good to see on Netflix. Bonfire of Destiny on Netflix, I think that's what it's called, is a very good series. You have something more to say about it? I have very little to say about it? I have very little to say about it, except that people often I see on Facebook say, hey, what should I watch on Netflix?

You ever see it? I haven't, but you've got my curiosity. Bonfire of Destiny. There was this famous fire in Paris in 1897 that killed like 120 very upper-class Parisian women. And it talks about the aftermath of that. It's fictionalized, but based on this true event. So here's the first story she wrote up.

Denounce Putin or lose your job. Russian conductor, I won't, Valery Gergiev, given public ultimatum. Star conductor and close friend of Putin dropped by his management ahead of deadline to speak out or be fired from Munich Philharmonic. And by the way, this is it. It's legit.

That's legit. It's not legit. A close friend of Putin. Done. Out. You're out. All right. So this is how it's metastasizing.

And I thought of this when Michael said, but I forgot to follow up on it. We're seeing companies now unilaterally pulling out of Russia and all this stuff. Now, companies never did that before. And I find it hard to believe it's because they have this new moral compass. I think this is related to this kind of woke thing and this kind of cancel culture. Maybe in this one instance, it's a silver lining to that cloud because we're kind of happy probably to see this additional pressure put on Russia. But I have a feeling someday in the future, we might regret that these companies are setting this precedent now that they have an obligation to get involved in foreign policy. I could see that turning out

bad, not just with Israel, which is my first worry about everything in life, but in various other things. I mean, I'm happy that Pepsi or whatever doesn't want to sell in Russia, but they're really just doing it for the, I mean, it's not going to hurt Russia really. Yeah. That's a tricky one, I think, to respond to. I like the fact that these former financial havens like Switzerland and the Caribbean Islands and Panama, they're kind of closing the loopholes for all this money that's flowing in dirty. But I don't know. I personally am appreciating the corporations withdrawing from Russia. You appreciate it?

I do. I see it as a solidarity. I mean, I don't... What he's doing to women and children, I mean, indiscriminately, they just bombed this maternity ward. You can't compare that to... What is your friend's other take?

I mean, I know there are people that have other takes. I will in a second. But let me just, I'm happy that they're pulling out as well. Sometimes good things happen for the wrong reasons. But this is, in my mind, related to the idea that everybody has to fall in line with what is the accepted opinion of the day. In this case, we have almost unanimity on the opinion of the day,

so it's not our ox that's being gored, so we're kind of happy. Yeah, I see where you're going. I mean, I would draw the line on violence. You know, I mean, one should not publish something that provokes and suggests or encourages overt violence. I mean, to me, that's where you cross the line. But I could totally see a war between two countries where the good guys and the bad guys were not so obvious,

but like the left kind of took one side because for whatever reason, because they were like, that's just to be over the top, because they tend to take the side of the people of color. So the left will probably just fall in line and other people might say, well, you know, it's not that simple. And then I could totally see all these companies

feeling the pressure to do the same thing they're doing now with russia to take the side of this and it might actually be quite unfair because twitter controls everything that's just i could be wrong i see where you're going yeah i mean i you know so that so the the other side of this russia thing is that um for a long, a lot of very important foreign policy minds have warned us against Eastern expansion. Robert McNamara and Mirsham and even Kissinger, to some extent, have warned about poking around in Russia's backyard, especially Ukraine, because Ukraine has a lot of Russian people. I don't know the percentage, but it has always been a Siamese twin to Russia.

And Putin has made it very clear how he regarded this. It's maybe more intense than our Monroe Doctrine because we don't feel kindred to the country's bias. We just feel you should stay away from them. And we didn't heed it. But at the same time, apparently we had no real intention of expanding NATO into Ukraine. So it was kind of just causing trouble for no good reason. And a lot of people were not at all surprised that Russia said enough is

enough. We're going to control Ukraine. Stop messing around in our backyard. Now that's not the whole story. On top of that is showing weakness, pulling out of Afghanistan as we did, letting them get away with Crimea, blah,

blah, blah. And maybe some of it's just happenstance, but they should have never been allowed to get away with Crimea, blah, blah, blah. And maybe some of it's just happenstance. They should have never been allowed to get away with Crimea. That's number one. Number two is that these are fucking humanitarian war crimes. So if you want to know, well, but that's post the invasion. So the other thing is that we bombed Kosovo,

which apparently I looked into, was a violation of international law. It was a humanitarian mission. We all agreed to it. But the Serbs, the Russians were sympathetic to the Serbs in that thing. And they looked at us and said, well, they're a bunch of hypocrites. When they want to do something, they go ahead and do it, let alone bombing Iraq and whatever. And then we stuck our nose in the coup that went on in Ukraine when Yanukovych, is that a name, got ousted. And there's a list, there's a bill of particulars. Many of them have some legitimacy, none of which would warrant Putin invading Ukraine,

but which would, like a friend of mine put it, it's like like we knew he was holding oil in his hand, but we didn't care about waving matches around it. It's not like, you know, he had any moral right to take Ukraine. But a lot of people say, well, we should know better. You know, I don't endorse. Well, I don't know if I endorse it. None of it justifies him taking Ukraine. But yeah, I thought, so just not to bore. I mean, listen, nothing justifies what Putin is doing.

I mean, it is a war crime. But for the life of me, I don't understand why Zelensky just didn't rule out absolutely that Ukraine would not join NATO. That's right. That I just don't understand because it just, it seemed to me definitely one of his, one of Putin's red lines. And, you know, which I can understand from a geopolitical point of view, but, you know,

and I don't know, frankly, if he had announced that, if it would have changed Putin's mind, because I think he does see it as part of greater Russia. He doesn't like an independent Ukraine. And that's a problem. It's a huge problem. It's like China and Tibet.

It's like you can't just go into places because you want them to be part of you if they want to be an independent country. That's right. I like having somebody here who agrees with me. There's another layer. We all agree with you, Perrielle, but it's not that simple. So, and also, what I think is interesting is that Trump came into office saying,

let's essentially, let's make friends with Russia. It would be very, very good for the world if we were friends with Russia. And then he was so, so soon into his administration, he was accused of being like a Russian spy. It became almost impossible for him to do that without people saying that he's doing it because he's in bed with Putin, even though it would have been a very smart thing to do in retrospect. And there's a subtle hypocrisy that's going on. The people are so outraged at what's going on in Ukraine now. We're so adamant that Trump should absolutely not find any deal with Russia,

that there should be sanctions against Russia for invading Crimea until they leave Crimea, even though we know they're never going to leave Crimea. So sanctions till the end of time. This was all unwise. So can I ask a question? And I don't want to credit Trump with being smart about it, because I don't know. He might have been, but that's not the point the point is if Trump had made some kind of deal with Russia in 2017 he probably could have avoided this and he wanted to maybe he wouldn't have been able to but he

wanted to yes go ahead so you know nobody loathed Trump more than I do. Nobody. Is it fair to say that Putin never would have done this under Trump? That he just doesn't take Biden seriously and he never would have dared fuck around like this under Trump?

That's your husband talking, by the way. What do you think? No, shut up. It is not my husband. No, it's not at all. What do you think? I, shut up. It is not my husband. Absolutely, don't lie. No, it's not at all. What do you think? I'm a moron? I couldn't figure this out for myself? Well, don't answer that. Go ahead. I don't think Putin took Trump very seriously at all.

Wow, okay. Listen, it's very possible Trump would have made it very clear to Zelensky and the Ukrainian people that the U.S. would not be supporting them on any level. But I think Putin's designs on Ukraine were part of a larger picture. And frankly, I don't, I mean, the NATO issue was a big issue, but I still think he would have done what he did at some point, you know, whether he delayed it a year or two or longer, who knows. But it's, you know, it's a bloodthirsty act of,

you know, an illegal war. Let me answer you this way. I tend to agree with most of what he said. I think that when Trump was president, Putin would have faced a higher degree of unsureness about what the United States reaction would have been. Whether that would have carried the day with him, we don't know. I think when Biden was president, he knew 100% for certain he did not have to worry about a military response to the United States of America. And he also felt he knew for certain, even though it wasn't true, that the sanctions would be weak because they've always been weak and that that there wouldn't be unity from the West. So he miscalculated those things, but he felt he knew them for certain. But definitely,

he could count on a weaker response from Biden than he could have been sure about with Trump. I think that's right. But he may have done it anyway. I don't know. He probably would have said, you know what? You take Cuba. It belongs to you. I'm taking Ukraine. That's the deal. And it's so interesting, right? So we're all afraid of nuclear war now. And it's always, Dan, are you? No, I'm looking at Michael's movies as I do want to discuss that.

So I'll say this and then you bring it up. So I thought at the time, Dershowitz disagreed that we should have flooded the zone in Ukraine as soon as there was a buildup in Ukraine. I don't know much about these things, but it seemed to me the right thing to do ideally would have put some sort of trigger wires there where you have to kill Americans before you go in to give him that to think about. But I understand why that was scary to do because, well, what if he does it? It could lead maybe to a nuclear war, right? But the irony is,

and this is one of those cognitive biases about inaction versus action, the risk of nuclear war is much higher now because of our inaction versus action, the risk of nuclear war is much higher now because of our inaction and because this thing has taken a life of its own, because he's in there now, because now we're facing him, than I think it would have really been if we had put that tripwire there. I think if we'd put that tripwire there, he probably would have found a way. And if at the same time we offered some back-ch channel deal, some face-saving thing, we promise you we won't have Ukraine and NATO for 50 years and you can have Crimea and,

you know, like Cuban Missile Crisis, kind of like double dealing thing. That would have been the smart way to handle it, but it's scary. And the thing is that when you back down from these scary scenarios, you oftentimes find yourself in scarier scenarios because there's no good answers when you're dealing with a Putin. Yeah. Listen, people have made the argument that, you know, the Vietnam War was fought precisely to avoid a nuclear Armageddon, that conventional wars deter nuclear exchanges. You know, you can make an argument for or against that concept, but you know, the

yeah, I mean, listen, my concern is that this has been a huge embarrassment for Putin. And, you know, he's not the type of guy who walks away from a bloody nose. And so I just, you know, I don't see where I don't see a happy ending.

I mean, this thing could go on for months and months and maybe years. And a lot of people are going to die. And I just don't think he really, there's an off-ramp for him where he saves face. Right. That's why the nuclear thing is so scary now. Yeah.

And if he loses badly enough, you know, this guy is, you know, megalomaniacal, which he clearly is and has messianic visions, you know, I could see him pressing that button. Or just this, he knows he can't lose. If he loses, he's done. Yeah. Personally done. No, I know.

And so it's, you know, perhaps he's so homicidal that he's suicidal. I don't know. Go ahead, Dan. You want to talk about the movies? First of all, I'm looking at his Wikipedia page, Michael's, and his date of birth, which I will not reveal. I will only say that he looks very, very good. Handsome, rugged-looking guy. He's handsome.

He's rugged-looking, but he also looks— My blue eyes. My Jewish blood. He looks younger. He looks a little like Rutger Hauer. Jewish Rutger Hauer. Jewish Rutger Hauer. But Rutger Hauer actually played a Jew in the movie Escape from Sobibor, which I thought was ridiculous. But Michael doesn't look

Jewish at all. He looks quite, as I said, like Rutger Hauer. But he looks younger than the years that he's been on this planet, which I will not reveal. Not that hard to find. I'll just say he's about Noam planet, which I will not reveal, but not that hard to find. I'll just say he's about Noam's age. I'm 57. Now, so, yeah, I mean, is, well, I'll just ask if you see, like the film, are films a passion of yours

or it's just sort of a business that you're in? No, it's a passion. I mean, there are much easier ways to make money. I don't, I mean, probably my fault is that I don't really see it enough as a business. I tend to make movies that I, that turn me on and they're not always considered commercial product. So I, I, but it makes you happy, but it makes me happy and i'd rather you know be passionate about what i'm doing than you know be bored by counting dollars is there a genre that you stay in or is it no i mean i'm i'm an indie guy so i guess you could say that's my genre but

no i i'm i'm i'm just passionate about film and storytelling. So, you know, if the story appeals to me, I'll try to make it. I mean, you know, whether it's a very dark drama or something that is very genre oriented. Are you a Godfather guy? Do you love The Godfather? Yeah. Who doesn't love The Godfather? I'm very old. I like The Godfather.

I thought for just all out popcorn fun, Goodfellas was a better ride. Yeah, I just never, I love Goodfellas. I just, I don't know. You never watched The Godfather. I know. The Godfather's a fine film and perhaps like a cinematographically more impressive, I guess. That's exactly right. But The Godfather, you strap yourself in.

I mean, that's like a roller coaster. I can literally go home and watch it every night when I go to bed. It's an epic drama that's set out over an historical time period. I mean, Goodfellas is fun to watch. The first half. I think the whole thing is fun. Yeah, but it's a very kind of minute time frame, right? Whereas The Godfather just expands.

It's not as saggy. It's an historical epic. Well, one thing about The Godfather that I just don't get is, here you have this guy Waltz, this movie producer. You're a movie producer, so you get what I'm... This might be of interest to you. Remember the guy Waltz? They come into his house, they say,

you know, we want to put Johnny Fontaine in the film. We want you to put Johnny Fontaine in the film. Johnny Fontaine never gets that film. And another thing. This guy Waltz, he knows who he's dealing with. He knows who these guys are. And yet he's got the balls to say he'll never get that part, you guinea wop. And I'll tell you why.

You know, I mean, is that realistic? He was the best piece of ass I ever had. I had him all over the world. But Johnny Fontaine made me look ridiculous. And a man like me cannot afford to look ridiculous. Sorry. Go ahead. That sounds like Putin.

But he knows who these people are, okay? And he caves immediately as soon as they kill his horse, as if he didn't know this was coming. Khartoum! What I would have liked to have seen is... You should ask that question to Mario Puzo. Oh, he's not around. What I would like to have seen... You should ask that question to Mario Puzo. Oh, he's not around. What I would like to have seen,

I've made this point before, is for Waltz to call him up after they kill the horse. Waltz calls up, he goes, oh, good one, you got me, you got me. I'll tell you what, I am going to put Johnny Fontaine to film, but I changed the role a little bit. He plays a severed head, you cocksucker.

And then he sends Fontaine's severed head and he really he goes to you know I would have rather seen that but anyway that's not what happened in the movie he caved immediately as if he didn't know they were going to do something like that I think he was into self-preservation

at that point but why the hell was he mouthing off in the first place he knew what he was dealing with maybe he didn't know listen people can't control themselves you think he's the first guy? He knew what he was dealing with. Maybe he didn't know. People can't control themselves. You think he's the first guy to mouth off? Maybe he thought he was so powerful and so prominent that nobody would touch him.

Hollywood back then was its own nation state. The mob never actually infiltrated Hollywood. That's probably another reason why he was emboldened. Didn't they say that... I'm going to talk about Sinatra being. But he says,

yeah, I ain't no band leader. I heard that story. There was no six family running California. I mean, the police were the mob.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I know. What also gets me out of The Godfather, I know what I'm talking about, but so if you watch

Godfather 1 and Godfather 2, Al Pacino is so fantastic and he's so controlled. And then Godfather 3, it doesn't even seem like the same character. Well, then he becomes the scent of a woman, Al Pacino. Yeah, but it's almost like he couldn't remember how to play Michael Corleone anymore. That's true.

It's funny, I was reading today, as a matter of fact, an interview that Coppola did where he's bemoaning, where he's cursmoaning the, where he's cursing the success of The Godfather because everything he did thereafter was always compared to that film. And, you know, and he could never, you know, he could never achieve equal success. And it became, you know, this bugaboo for him. Well, I have a theory about Coppola. Now, what's his name? Brian Koppelman told me that I'm out to lunch on this. And I think Judd Apatow doesn't agree. But I think that he's a bit overrated. I think that... Coppola. benefited from being an Italian guy from that who understood the atmosphere of that culture very, very well.

And he's an artistic guy. And he had a huge talent for capturing that atmosphere. But the script and all the classic lines, these are directly out of that book. I mean, and he looked into, and I know he edited the script. I'm not saying

that he has zero to do. He's a fine director and he made a great movie. But judging by the fact that none of his films, as opposed to Scorsese, were one after another from different points,

like you see, it's brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. Yeah. I mean, listen,

Apocalypse Now is one of the great films of all time, I think. Well, so here's my thing about Apocalypse Now. Oh no.

When it comes on cable, now everything's different, but when it used to come on cable, I found I would never watch it again. I enjoyed it when I watched it, but it did not really, and when they released

like a director's cut, let's forget it. But, and and when they released the director's cut, forget it. And I think that to be a great movie... I actually think the director's cut was not good. I thought the cuts they restored actually hurt the film.

That's often the case. Same thing with Lawrence of Arabia. It was not better when they made it longer. Yeah, in fact, I think the story is that Coppola's cut of The Godfather was so tight that Paramount, I believe it was Paramount, made him restore an earlier version. Oh, really? With more footage, which you never hear of. It's always the opposite.

So I like Apocalypse Now, but I can't watch it over and over, so I would say to, for me to consider it one of the greatest films, I have to want to watch it more. Like, I can watch Gone with the Wind many, many times. I know it's not,

you would never watch it. It's politically incorrect to watch Gone with the Wind now, but I can watch it over and over. I can watch My Cousin Vinny over and over. I can't watch Apocalypse Now over and over. But anyway, so Coppola made Apocalypse Now. That was very, very good.

But he made that movie with Robin Williams playing the overgrown kid. Was it Jack? Was My Cousin Vinny? No, no. He made the, was it Frankenstein? No, that was Kenneth Branagh. Well, he did a version of Frankenstein.

He did Dracula. Or Dracula, yes. Dracula. Yeah. Scorsese did a Frankenstein thing. No, Branagh did. Branagh did Frankenstein? Frankenstein, and yeah.

Yes, he did Dracula. Yeah. And he did a bunch of things that were good, but not brilliant. Tune in next week when Noam says Van Gogh was pretty good. I'm just saying, there's very few films where the script, I think, I shouldn't say there's very few films. Scripts are really important. I mean, I'm no expert on film.

But that script, that Godfather script, I mean, this is a huge thing. You're saying it was mostly the book, the script. Yeah, it was mostly the book. It was a huge thing. You're saying it was mostly the book, the script. Yeah, it was mostly the book. I think it was just a really lucky John and Paul. Puzo wrote the script too, didn't he? No, well that's the thing. He's credited with the script, but if you've read the book The Godfather,

it's really all the meat is line for line from the book. It's kind of like John Lennon and Paul McCartney meeting. To have a director who was so artistic and could capture that atmosphere of that book so well with someone who could write that book, I think that's really what made that movie. Yeah, I mean, listen, it's, you know, at its highest level, it's the perfect match between literature and the visual, you know, and listen, I, listen, he, he thread that needle perfectly. Um, I don't think you're giving him enough credit.

Yeah. Well, you know, when you say, when you say someone is overrated, it can have the connotation that you don't think they're great, but that's not what I mean. I just think that he's, they, they consider him as great a director as that movie. Right. And I don't think he's a director on par with that movie. Yeah. Well, I mean, listen, he made a lot of bad movies. Yeah. This is Rutger Hauer, by the way. Oh, my God.

Look at that. Now I know who my doppelganger is. So who are some of your favorite movies that you aspire to match the greatness of? Oh. I mean, you know, one of my favorite films is a little indie film called Sexy Beast. Oh, I love that movie. That was Ray Winstone. Yeah, yeah. And Ben Kingsley.

And Ben Kingsley. That's right. That is such a good movie. Ben Kingsley of all people going from Gandhi to playing this gruesome mob killer. Terrifying. Absolutely terrifying character. That was a great movie. Kingsley played not only did he play

the head Jew in Schindler's List, but he played Adolf Eichmann in that... I forgot the name of the movie, but the movie where they find Adolf Eichmann. You talk about range. He's amazing. Incredible.

But that is a great movie. That was one of my father's favorite movies shortly before he died, Sexy Beast. Really? I loved that movie. I think everybody loves that movie. Yeah, it's a masterpiece. Kingsley is part East Indian, I believe, right? Yeah, he's Indian.

Because otherwise, I don't think he could have ever played Gandhi. Glazer, something, an English director. Last name Glazer, I don't think he could have ever played Gandhi. Glazer, something, an English director. Last name Glazer, I think. Anyway, just a superb film. What's another one? Believe it or not, this movie called To Live and Die in L.A. I've never seen that. I've heard of it.

Jeff Bridges and... Yeah, it's William Hurt. Not William Hurt. Kind of blanking. Not Defurt. Not William Hurt. I've got a blanking. Not Defoe. Yes, Defoe. Anyway, it's the first one I ever saw where the lead character is killed off

halfway into the film. Wow. I mean, it's... But you've never seen before. I mean, that's just an extraordinary thing to do in a movie. It's a crime. You know who I... We have to wrap it up.

You know who I think is a brilliant director? You probably, it's Christopher Nolan. Yeah. I mean, just, that's what I mean. Like every single movie he does, no matter what it's about, whatever it is, like, whoa, like this is a huge talent. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

No, he's immensely talented. What about Black Cat, White Cat? I don't know that film. I think Kusturito? I'm not pronouncing that. No, no. Wow, okay. Anyway, you've got a couple things coming up.

Cut Man and Savage Lands, those are currently in production? I'm just looking on. No. Cut Man is something I hope to start shooting in late May. That's a very intense drama about a single mother ravaged by heroin traveling through east texas with her 10 year old daughter looking to get back the man who ruined her life wow so you're now in and what they call pre-production uh pre pre pre-production what you're trying to find money does that mean is that what that uh it's it's coming in i'm

actually casting i'm hoping lenny Kravitz actually plays the male lead in it. Probably no role for me in that one. Savage Land. Second choice. Are you looking for a career in film? I'm looking for a paycheck however I can get one. This was, I thought, a very good discussion

Noam I hope you were satisfied with today's episode I'm happy to make friends with anybody who's fighting the good fight against what we all hate

that's going on in our culture anyway I'm happy to meet you yeah no this was very enjoyable have me back again please I would love to

you live in New York City yeah in Brooklyn oh come hang out down in the altary some night half off half off on Wednesday enjoyable. Have me back again, please. I would love to. You live in New York City? Yeah, in Brooklyn. Oh, come hang out down in the Altree some night. Half off on Wednesday. Do you guys actually,

do you do regular stand-up as well? Well, I'm a stand-up, and Nick is a stand-up. Noam, Perry Owls also started to do stand-up.

She's a relatively newcomer, but she's making progress. And Noam is a musician and a fine one. Okay. Yeah, I would love to come check out your routines. And also every Monday night, Noam. And last night was really crowded. I guess you guys are getting like a following or something.

You've always had that core. Yeah, some nights are busy, some nights. Every Monday night they perform in the restaurant. They do music. That's a really good musician's company. Okay, cool. Come in the restaurant. They do music. That's a really good musician. Come see the comedy. What night do you... I'll be in touch with you.

I'll invite you down. There's a lot of interesting people, writers and intellectual types that hang out regularly down here as well. It'd be fun to hang out. That's what Tracy Morgan once said to me. I like to make you laugh you is intellectual

podcast at comedyseller.com again as noam announced at the top of the podcast we really want to know what what you like best what you don't like best about this podcast to make it as good as it can be a perry. Ashtonbrand, thank you. Nick Griffin, thank you. Noam, thank you. And Michael Miller, especially thank you. And we'll see you soon next week on Live from the Table. Thank you so much. Ba-da-ba-ba-da-bum-ch.