The Prestige TV Podcast - ‘Disclaimer’ Episodes 3-4: Cat and Mouse

Episode Date: October 21, 2024

Jo and Rob break out the preserves to recap the third and fourth episodes of ‘Disclaimer.’ They discuss Nancy Brigstocke’s spiral following her son’s death, the potential inconsistencies within the flashback sequences, and Kevin Kline’s career as a whole (4:11). Along the way, they talk about the camerawork as a stylistic choice in these two episodes and what part of the story they’re most drawn toward at this point (27:00). Later, they unpack how Catherine’s unlikability as a character is grounded in realism (41:47). Email us! [e-mail] Hosts: Joanna Robinson and Rob Mahoney Producer: Kai Grady Additional Production Support: Justin Sayles Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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I'm Joanna Robinson. I'm Rob Mahoney. We are coming to you from the recent past as we recorded this episode well in advance of when you're hearing it, just for some scheduling reasons. So if you have sent us, an email about the TV show Disclammer, which is what we're about to talk about

in the last week or so. Perhaps we have not gotten to see it, but we have gotten a couple of emails for you guys already. We are excited to you hear what you all have to say going forward. Rob, remind the listeners where they can find us on email, please. I'm so glad you threw this to me, Joe. They need to send their emails immediately

to grief cardigan at gmail.com. That's grief cardigan at gmail.com. Not to be confused in these episodes with grief pink blanket. Also, very powerful, very moving, but it just doesn't hit like the cardigan does. It's true. It's true. Okay.

Follow-up question. Were we a bit hasty on the email address? Because I have a couple options to throw to you based on episodes, installments, chapters three and four of disclaimer, which is what we're here to talk about today. Should we have considered sexyota

at gmail.com? It was right there. We just didn't watch enough. See, here's the thing. If we had just said after one and two with no context for our listeners. By the way, our email is Sexyota at gmail.com. I think you get put on a list somewhere.

No, I feel like they trust us at this point to know what we're talking about. Follow-up question. Speaking of being put on lists, Kylie's nipple at gmail.com, do you think that would have put us on a list somewhere? Or how do you feel about that? I got to admit,

I had lots of thoughts watching these episodes. We're going to get into it. One of them was, how would Kylie Minogue feel about all this? Yeah. I would love to get the interview. Can we get a Kylie interview? you at some point on this season

of this podcast, I think that would be wonderful. We would be thrilled and honored. Ms. Kylie Minogue, if you would care to join us. Last but not least, and I don't know if this is really going to convey the event, but I'm going to go with fingertie at gmail.com or finger stirred tea at gmail.com? Anything you want to say about this

incredible prestige TV moment we experienced? This is just a huge moment for fingers. You know, it's... I don't even know what to say. other than, look, it's just an extremely weird look if what seems to be true turns out to be true, which is that a grieving mother is writing fan fiction

about her son getting the old fingers up the back end. There's no wrong way to grieve, but that's not the right way. No, I wrote, what did I say? It's kind of sick of Nancy to write this sexually explicit content about her son, but sick is, I had other words, perverted, perhaps, I don't know, I don't want to be judgmental of Nancy. We all grieve in our own ways. I kind of do, though.

This is quite a way to grief is what Nancy. So we're going to talk a lot about Nancy. The finger tea I was most sort of alluding to, do you remember when like Oh, the finger tea? Oh, I see it multiple finger teas in these episodes. When Catherine is being annoyed

by her coworker and she just like throws a tea bag in, doesn't let it steep, tosses out, stirs it with a finger and gives it to him and was like, get out of my way. And he's like spluttering. He's like, but you can't, I'm like, once the lady has stirred the

tea with her finger. I don't think you need to talk to her about the technique. This is a, this is a fuck off gesture entirely, my friend. Like she's, she's knuckles deep in that, in that cup of tea. Okay. Chapter three and four, something we thought about doing in the first couple episodes was talk about sort of filmography of Kevin Klein, and I do want to get to that, but I do think we have to start with Nancy, because Nancy as our assumption being that all of these vignettes that we're getting in the past in Italy were essentially reading the perfect stranger along with Robert in the diner, etc., etc. Nancy has written this very sexually explicit story starring her teenage son and a woman that

she doesn't know and as her way of griefing. Now, if you had to rank the grief tactics, would you rank this above or below quasi-draining yourself in the bathtub to just to know how it feels to have been? Jonathan. That one's not great. It does strike, I mean, it comes from a very empathetic place, clearly, of trying to put herself in her son's position.

She wants to feel how he felt. Completely. Writing the full sexual escapades that you imagined for your son based on some photographs is a different level. And I think the biggest tell we have in this direction so far

is the glaring Kylie Minogue poster on his bedroom wall. I knew that Rob Mahoney Room Detective would clock the Kylie above It feels very Kaiser-Sose. Like she kinds of Kaiser-Sose together this story based on the items in his room. Yeah.

What were you going to say? I just think it's clear that she has these discrete data points that in themselves are true, right? Jonathan was with some woman at the beach or saw some woman at the beach. He has photos of her in all kinds of suggestive positions. He loves Kylie Minogue. And I think based on Catherine's previous helpful flow charting,

we can assume that there's maybe like a waiter in the mix who saw them together at the restaurant and so maybe she even knows that they had dinner together or had a drink together. There are like enough things here that are true that she has drawn a straight line and I think probably based on what we know of the character of Nancy so far,

genuinely believes that line to be the truth. Yes. The problem is that now like Robert believes that line to be the truth. Other people are going to come in contact with this story and because Catherine herself is not filled in any of the gaps and seems very reluctant to. Right. The truth is getting away from her.

Right. And Robert says, like, the, you know, the voicemover says a couple times on behalf of Robert, like he can only trust what's written in the book here. She has lost her ability to tell her side of the story for him. And I'll get back to Robert and his, like, extremely efficient tactic of getting her out of the house. Here are the two competing contextual clues that I think it's worth thinking about.

One is what Stephen says about his son. when they are first in Italy identifying the body. He says that he considered Jonathan privileged and misguided, and he couldn't think of any other time when Jonathan didn't put himself first before anyone else. That is sort of Stephen's assessment, but then confronting the fact that his son died a hero. And so he's like, oh, I must have been wrong.

But was he, question mark, wrong about the nature of his son? I think putting that up against the sort of like quivering, of this young man. Again, Louis Partridge, as Jonathan, if he has been instructed to do like a caricature of like an innocent lamb in over his head, this is what we're getting sort of in the restaurant scene in this episode.

But contrasting that with what Stephen says about his son, also how did he get that cut on his arm? The X marks a spot on the arm and a few other inconsiderate. And then putting all that up against Nancy's reaction to finding out that she was like the subject of Jonathan's like photographic experiments, you know, and how pleased she was to be like the object of his attention and how that part of her would bump up against discovering these photographs where Catherine is the object of his fascination. So how do all of those pieces sort of fit together for you? I really relish this time, kind of getting to know the Brickstocks before and during the processing of Jonathan's death. Because right off the jump, their relationship and the balance between Stephen and Nancy is very peculiar.

And I'm like trying to put my finger on it. This whole like, you know, he's doing all the grilling. He's clearly like taking care of her in a way. She's kicking back and relaxing. But when the doorbell rings, he needs to be the one who goes and gets it. It's like there is a way. which she's kind of bossing him around that I think is fascinating

from the jump. And then of course you see the quick evolution or devolution of who Nancy is and what she cares about and what Stephen honestly even is to her, which at the start we see her as somebody who wants to get out in the world. She

wants to go see this new RIM brand exhibit. An Almodovar film. She's ready. So I did some forensic accounting on this front. Nicholas is 25 years old in our present-day timeline. He was four years old in the version that we see of Jonathan's death. So it's been 21 years since Jonathan has died based from the present day. If we assume the main timeline is roughly 2024, that puts us somewhere in the

ballpark of either talk to her or bad education, which, look, you got to make your, you got to make time for those. You got to make it to the cinema. It's definitely talked to her. I definitely think that that's the album of our film. A little movie about passion and obsession. What would that have to do with any of this? Who knows?

Love that. Thank you for doing that. value you as a colleague. We did get an email from a listener, and I agree. We didn't point this out, but given that, okay, it's early aughts, Jonathan's traveling out with his Nikon. Yeah. And he takes a selfie.

He and Sasha take a selfie. And our listener is pointing out, that's not really what you do with the night. Like, we didn't really take selfies. And that's true because you couldn't tell whether or not you captured it. You know, like anyway. So maybe some people were, but it was not a common thing to do. The fact that he, like, kind of perfectly framed them in the icon is, I mean, Jonathan, I wasn't aware of your photograph game.

We're much closer to the mirror selfie era than the true selfie era. Correct. Okay. So you were talking about, so Nancy's someone who wants to, who's cultured, wants to get out, wants to be in the world. And then we see this like decay and decline of her, of the state of the flat, of the garden. Oh, yeah.

Again, we are in the fleab bag universe. The foxes are at the gate. I mean, I don't mean to be flip or callous. Like, I have a tremendous amount of empathy for Nancy. Completely. But I think at this point in the story, we are meant to be really interrogating because on the surface level, the story is Catherine is this, like, horrible villain and Nancy, the poor grieving mother. But I think we are supposed to be constantly questioning what we're being fed, what we're being told.

And so in that way, Nancy's grief is tremendously understandable. But, like, where she directs it, that's the... I think the question we should be asking ourselves. So what else do you want to say about Nance here? It's also a lot of Nancy's grief and Nancy's story from Stevens' perspective, who is literally outside the door unable to get

in for a lot of this portion of her life. And I really did admire the way that even the parts of this that seem really warm on first glance end up kind of twisted in retrospect. You know, like the still image of them standing out in the ocean together, holding

hands, feels like such a comforting moment until you look back on it and realize, like, this is Nancy, like, examining, looking for every possibility, anything to cling on to to explain what happened to her son, beyond what people are telling her. And for Stephen, it feels like he's actually trying to process grief. He's actually trying to absorb what happened to their son. And admittedly, his relationship by his own admission is very different to Jonathan in a way that almost kind of mirrors Catherine.

I was going to say the exact same thing. I think the way in which we're given these family units that are sort of fractured and favoritism and like subgroups inside of a family unit is a really interesting parallel that is being somewhat overtly but not like overtly overtly drawn. And I think it's interesting to think about, again, it has to do with perception or what kind of person are you, how much do you share with other people? And then, yeah, how you can just feel alone inside of your own family. And that's something that, you know, if we get, and I feel like we must,

Catherine and Stephen screen time, will they be able to find any sort of common cause in their life experiences? Completely. Or not, you know. Well, especially because the modern version of Stephen is barely recognizable from the version that Kevin Klein is portraying here. And if anything, you know, part of what makes Nancy's dissent and increasing isolation and her version of processing her son's death or not processing it, what makes it so traumatic and so hard to watch

is the way that it weighs on Stephen too. And how increasingly, how quickly they go from two people who are doing this together to he is now on his own and the way that Kevin Klein delivers the line about how he can respect her decision to move into the room,

but can we please talk about this? Like, can we please have a conversation and there's no more conversation to have? Like, Nancy is too far gone. And the fact that he berates himself after the fact for not pushing himself into that room, for not confronting her about all of that, I thought. Yeah, and I think there are reactions to, there are different reactions to seeing the body of their son.

Again, like, all modes of grief are modes of grief, and I'm not here to judge one or the other, but I do think we're supposed to note, you know, that Stephen is asking questions. Like, why isn't his face bloated? Why is that cut there? And, you know, he's holding his hand. There's tenderness there.

But as he says, you know, the grief breaks Nancy, that her mind becomes this dark thing. And we see that Leslie Manville, an icon of her era, the way she is over his body. And then from and then just like continually withdrawing into herself screaming that she hates Stephen as he pulls her out of the bath, like all this sort of stuff. Again, I have a lot of empathy for her. Right. But then we are seeing the after, I mean, to her credit, she's not the one who self-publish this book and is like systematically trying to destroy Catherine's life, but it is the ripple effect of her particular coping style, which was to concoct, it seems to me, a fantasy version

where her son is tremulous victim and then and also hero at the same time. And Catherine is so obviously like a cold, heartless bitch who is playing games with her son, The woman who can just walk away before the body is even cold on the beach and ignore the fact that this happened because it's more convenient for her if he goes away. I think there are enough of those tells too that the distortion and even caricaturization of both Jonathan and Catherine in that story on both ends. There's just no way that that's an accurate portrayal of anything. Right. I do think, so to go back to that thing that Stephen says that he considered Jonathan privilege and misguided, and it couldn't think of any other time

that Jonathan didn't put himself first before anyone else. I think then we should go back to that train sequence where we meet him for the first time, having sex with Sasha, the train collector comes in and he takes the blanket away from her to cover himself so that he can get the ticket. I think these are details that we were meant to be processing and thinking as we compare it to this fantasized version that, again, Nancy has written alone in her room.

But what is important also for us to process is that because the flip can't entirely be true. It can't just be that Catherine is like, because Catherine says to Robert, as he's kicking her out of the house, that she wanted Jonathan dead. She did. There's a difference between wanting someone dead

and doing what the woman in the flashback does, which is just see him actively drown and not say anything. I don't know if that will wind up being the case exactly, but there is some, again, as we said last week, there is something that Catherine recognizes in this version of her that's in this story. And I think there could be some competing theories that are along very similar narrative lines, but the tone is totally different, right?

If it's as simple as she has this affair, but Jonathan is maybe obsessive with her in an unhealthy way, if he's stalking her, if he's following her, that reads is very different than him just, her just kind of like blowing him off when he's no longer of use to her. Right, exactly. As far as the Jonathan piece of it goes, and, I agree with you, like, the portrayal of him as the person clinging to the sheet to cover himself as a great comparison point. I mean, as far as we understand, that's also a scene from the book. And so is this a distortion of reality or is this just a character on an arc, Joe?

You know, is this just Nancy being an excellent writer? Wow, I don't know if you know how much I like a character on art, but I'm a fan. I'm a big fan. Okay, let's talk about Kevin Klein as a performer inside of this. One thing that I, a little, it's not a little detail, they do it a bunch of times, but his, like, habit of opening the freezer to, like, I guess, cool himself off because they don't have AC. Yeah. I don't know. And then he does it across timelines. It's just like a little moment that I really love that is, you know, either probably in the strip or is his choice.

Kevin Klein, okay, wait, I want to play a quick, quick game with you inside of this, like, very, somewhat dreary show that we're watching. Have I ever talked to you about the game that my friends and I. invented called the Robert Dynne Jr. game. I actually don't think you have. Please explain the rules. This game always hits with people like you, like Kai, who have seen a lot of things.

So the game goes like this. We think of an actor, and then the game is, I was just a guess for you. It's called the Robert Dynion Jr. game because I first played it with friends about Robert Dany Jr. But like, what is the film that you most, you Rob, most identify

with this actor? And I have to guess, based on what I know about your tastes. Interesting. What did I know about how old you are and like what you might have seen? And it's not necessarily like the movie you saw first. Yeah. Or even like the movie, it's just like if I say Kevin Klein, what is the movie that comes? Okay.

Yeah. Yeah. Do you want to play this game? I would love to play. Okay. Do you want to guess for me first? I would. Joanna Robinson.

Yeah. The movie that hits you first when I say the name Kevin Klein is a fish called Wanda. Rob Honey. that is correct. Okay, okay. Rob Mahoney, the film that you think of first, when I say Kevin Klein, I'm less certain. Is it Dave? It's not, although that's probably honestly the other movie of his I've seen most recently. He's delightful, as expected in it.

Okay, I'm going to guess again. And basically you can guess until everyone's tired of guessing, but I won't drag it out on a podcast. Rob Mahoney, is the movie you most identify with Kevin Klein, the Ice Storm? It's not. I don't think you're going to get it. I'm embarrassed to say that the answer is Wild Wild West. Wild West is an incredible answer, and now I feel like I know you a bit more.

Some of its introduction. It's how are you first introduced to that actor? And as a kid, for me, it was, who was this guy? And honestly, I think Wild Wilds is an absolute garbage fire of a movie. But it does capture something very important to Kevin Klein, which is the sort of upright, over-educated sensibility that he plays in a lot of his roles. And I would say the counterpoint, the fish called Wanda counterpoint, is erratic weirdos.

And the fact that he's getting to be both of these things on this show is what I'm loving about his role in it so far. So something that I told you that I was talking to Sean Fentasy about the show and he was asking me about Kevin Klein's filmography. And I think what's really wild about Kevin Klein is like sort of the choices that he's made in the last, I guess, two decades. Because then, you know, 80s and 90s, Kevin Klein makes a lot of sense to me. Would you call him at any point a movie star? I think he's an excellent actor. I think he's a welcome screen presence. I think he was a fixture in a lot of movies of a certain quality and a certain kind.

But did he ever hit that, like, bankable level that we talk about with the other kind of, you know. Oh, in terms of, like, can open a film? Right. I just never thought of him that way, necessarily. I think when he wins the Oscar for a fish called Wanda. Right. And then does like things like Dave, things like French Kiss and things like in and out. I would say all of those are like in and out for sure.

This is a Kevin Klein vehicle. We're here because we know who Kevin Klein is. I wouldn't say that is a broad, you know, marker of his career, though. But I would say he had his era in that sort of like in the 90s, essentially. But yeah, I mean, to your point, he's like, you know, he starts, he's, he's like, he's a Shakespeare guy, he's a musicals, Pirates of Ban Zanzan's guy. Like, he is, like, a stage actor that is, like, part of his thing. And so I think some of the choices that he makes to make a mid-summer night's dream or, you know, various other things, the Emperor's Club, which is just basically a dead poet society, like swing and a slight mess. Feeds into that.

Eccentric Weirdo is my favorite mode, I guess, which is why I just called one. It's very good. This is what I most identify. But also like in and out, which is just like allowing him to lean into that eccentric weirdo side of him. So, yeah. But yeah, after DeLovly, which was sort of like his last sort of big bid for, which is a Cole Porter by I pick, a last big bid for maybe I can get another Oscar is sort of what DeLovly seemed like. Or a passion project for someone who loves a musical. the choices he makes after that are

are like sort of increasingly confusing to me anything you want to shout out from like the post 2004 Kevin Klein filmography I wish there was I think literally the only thing I've seen him in or in this case not seen him in but heard him in in the last 20 or so years is Bob's Berger's which he is excellent in oh he's wonderful in that amazing is Mr. Fishoder but like other than that I'm probably pulling back to like Prairie Home Companion

As far as the last time I saw him on screen, I'm not a definitely baby guy. You know, that's not where I'm coming from. I can't believe he's in no strings attached, presumably as, like, somebody's parents. Is he one of the strings? I definitely saw Ricky in the Flash. Okay.

In which he is the co-lead. So that is something I definitely... It does exist. And then he plays crazy old Maurice. He's always good for a laugh and Beauty and the Beast. And that was a choice in of itself. I don't know, Last Vegas. Like, there's a lot of things that he did that I'm like, but why Kevin Klein?

You don't have to do this. You're Kevin Klein. He also just doesn't, I don't know, maybe this is me being like overly optimistic about the bankability of Kevin Klein or whatever. It doesn't seem like he cares that much about working. I don't know. It's just stuff here and there. It doesn't make a ton of sense to me.

Griefcardigan and gmail.com, if you feel like you can make a better sense of Kevin Klein's last 20-so years of his career. But here he is. And again, affecting a British accent, having to play a man over several decades of his life. I love in the sort of styling him department, the socks and shorts where we first meet him grilling when he finds out about what album with Jonathan.

Also the short sleeve button down that he wears. Also when they go to identify the body and, you know, he's wearing as they're standing out in the ocean together. This is just great, great little character detail work of a man who has just always been, like, sort of just looks slightly ill-fitting sort of wherever he is. Do you know what I mean? Also, not to be needlessly cruel, but elite dad looks at the time where he is saying goodbye to his dadhood. You know, it's, it's tough.

It's tough. But he has to transition in his wardrobe as he transitions in life. And honestly, for as much as we need to unravel about what happened in Italy overall, how Stephen Bristock became this older version that we see in the story is probably the most interesting mystery to me how that character became

that version of that man. I hope we get to see more of the interim years. It's been many years, or at least it seems so on his face since Nancy died because we see him bury Nancy. There's that heartbreaking

idea that Jonathan has his plot and Nancy's buried next to him, which is what she would want, and that he'll be buried alone. Devastating. but he looks still eons away from where he is when we meet him here, which I don't know on the timeline he's that much further away, but like the isolation, the loneliness,

even though Nancy locked herself away from him, at least she was there, but once she was gone. And even earlier when they find out that Jonathan's dead and the police ask if there's anyone who could go identify the body for them, and he says there's no one. So, like, this is such a small family, and he has so few people. And Jonathan dies and then Nancy dies.

And he has his pal, his colleague, who's a little perturbed that he wants to create a Facebook for a fictional teen. But like... A little creeped out, rightly so. A little weird out, but other than that. Well, first of all, a huge flaw in your supposed research methods, there are no teens on Facebook. It's true. You're barking up the wrong tree. It's true.

We should be on TikTok. I would love to see old Stephen Bristock try to figure out TikTok. Snoring, gasping during sleep, feeling fatigue, ask your doctor about Zepbound, terseptite. The first and only FDA-approved prescription medicine for moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnea, OSA, and adults with obesity. Zepbound is a prescription medicine used with a reduced calorie diet and increased physical activity to help adults with moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnea,

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Severe side effects may include inflamed pancreas or gallbladder problems. Tell your doctor if you experience vision changes before scheduled procedures with anesthesia. If you're nursing, pregnant, plan to be, or taking birth control pills. Taking Zep bound with a sulfonel urea or insulin may cause low blood sugar. Side effects include nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting, which can cause dehydration and worsened. problems. Talk to your doctor. Call 1-800-545-9-9 or visit Zepbound.lily.com. I do have two theories as to how he may have devolved so quickly. Tell me. One, eating all these old preserves. It seems like it could age your man.

It's not great. It's not what you want. Like riddled with Nancy's hair. I know. It's not wonderful. It's not wonderful. And along the same lines, like, whatever it is that's growing in the fish tank, I think we could be inhaling some some few. that could really challenge your whole system, really. There's also just like a general swamp area in the backyard at this point. So, yeah. Another thing I want to point out, and I don't know how important it is or not, in among Roberts' devolution inside of these episodes,

there's a moment where he's sitting on the desk and he looks at a photo of younger Catherine with Nikki when he was a baby. That's Kate Blanchett, a younger Kate Blanchet. And that is a younger Nick than the Nick we mean. in the flashback. So again, I wonder, I mean, I think it would have been, I wouldn't have liked it if they had digitally de-aged Kate Blinch it to put her in the flashback.

But if you're going to cast someone else to play her younger, why is that not the face in the photo on the desk? Is it meant to further underline what a fictionalized version of Catherine were watching in the past? Do you know what I mean? I'm guessing that's part of it. I'm guessing part of it's also just kind of narrative visual simplicity of avoiding that moment of confusion of like, who's that other woman in the photo?

Like, why would that be there? But I agree with you. Based on the timing of what we know, it should not be Kate Blanchett, particularly because we've seen photographic evidence of what she looked like in the past, supposedly. It's not just the conjuring of these scenes. We've seen the photos in present day. Yeah, you're right, you're right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, never mind. And then it's just like a production design, more than anything else. Okay. Robert, I mean, we talked a lot about the style of the camera and the cinematography in last week's episode. So we don't need to go like long on it. But I do want to, the Robert camera work really stuck out to me in these two episodes.

We are like in just an out of control space with the camera that's following him on the bus in the diner. There are these jerky, erratic zooms in on his face or we're like in a camera that's in a car going past him. as a choice to have the camera so clearly mirror the chaos, the turbulence is going on inside of him, but does that work for you in the context of the other stylistic choices in the show or does it stand out to you? How do you feel about it?

It absolutely worked for me. I think both the disorientation of that sort of style and movement, also the focusing on these minute details, whether it's the snapping pencil, the like Alka-Seltzer boiling in the cup, basically. All that stuff really worked for me. And the idea that this person is clearly distracted, clearly at least hung over, if not just outright drunk, still at this point.

I don't know where he got the bottle of booze from. Did he pick it up on his way out of the house? Did he steal it from that pub? He took, you know, no, I don't know. He stopped at the corner market and got it. The age-old British or alcoholic question lingers on. Here in to see him a disclaimer. Well, and to see him go from this man who is like, has this refined wine-tasting palate to someone who's like,

like swigging the swill from the bottle is, you know, I mean, I did not play bottle detective on the, it might have been a very expensive bottle of whiskey or whatever he was drinking. But he does seem out of sorts in general. I think it's not just the camera work, but him on the bus, him in the cafe. The status of the wig is quite ruffled. How much you think like a wig ruffler? Like I would love to know the day rate to be the ruffler of the wigs. I think I could do that job. I think you'd be great at it. but I think you can aim a little higher in your life. Thank you.

I think you can do more. No offense meant to the wig rufflers of the world. Something worth thinking about in all of this in the Sasha Barron Cohen of it all is like how much do you want to spend with Robert in these episodes? Who's the character you most? We get very little modern-day Catherine in all of this. Who's the character you most want to spend time with? Where is your attention most drawn in the show? I think my attention is most drawn to recent past Stephen.

Processing, trying to understand Nancy, trying to get his way through the door, Stephen. Like that era, I think, is the character I'm most interested in at this point. But I love present-day Catherine, too. Look, I love Kate Blanchett spinning out, as I have mentioned before. This is ultimately an episode that does not give her that much to do in the present day. but I can always use more. I'm never going to argue with that.

I think the Robert piece of it is interesting because part of his anxiety in this episode is not just feeling jealous, but feeling small about his place in the book. That he's like an afterthought in the book. Doesn't even get named? Doesn't even get named? And he may end up being an afterthought in the show

in the grand scheme of things. That's interesting. I think that I think the puzzling part of my brain is most drawn to watching the vignettes of the perfect stranger book and trying to figure out what's the truth underneath this

thing that Nancy has strung together from various context clues. Yes. And one thing I want to think about when I think about that is we talked about the beauty of the cinematography in those vignettes

and it continues. We get the lighting and the restaurant was just like absolutely incredible. This restaurant scene overall I think is just spellbinding stuff. Yes. It's ridiculous sometimes.

There were a couple line reads that genuinely made me laugh, including You Touch Kylie's Boobes, question mark. Yeah. It's brilliant. Nancy. What a writer, Nancy is. Really? She's got a gift.

No, I agree. I was sort of like I was compelled. I was drawn in by all of that, obviously. But like the lighting is so gorgeous. The, even before they go to the restaurant, when the camera's just following them, like, Jonathan's carrying Nikki and they are walking up to the hotel, that is just like one long shot. Yeah.

That is a handheld camera that's different from the jerky zooms that we're getting around Robert. It's sort of like a more, like it's almost like a queasy sort of like swinging handheld camera that like made me feel a bit crazy because we're we're barreling towards an inevitability. We know where this is going, which is to Jonathan's death. So every choice that's made, every step that's made is drawing us close to that. when we see the kid with the injured foot get rushed past by the lifeguards, we're like, okay, we are moments away from like disaster here, because that's where the lifeguards were when they should have been helping with Nick and Jonathan. All that's to say, the golden hour of the accident itself, the fact that it's shot as the sun

is setting, the sun is like going down across the horizon as Jonathan dies is some of the most beautiful thing, like the light on the water, the camera on the water, all of it is so beautiful. And in addition to the beauty, it is, I'm sitting there wondering, like, what I'm meant to be taking or retaining from this, because we know the outcome. We know that Jonathan is going to die. We know that he does not survive this. So there's no dramatic, will he make it tension there? No. So what does that, how does that sequence hit with you, knowing, knowing that we're sitting there, knowing how this is all going to play out? I think the tension is so much more about Catherine.

And it's so much more when she gets back to the beach with Nicholas, what will she do? Is she going to draw anyone's attention? Is she going to point out to the water? Is she going to do literally anything, or at least this version of Catherine that we get? And spoilers for the season of industry, I thought there's a lot of overlap between the like, oh, I see someone dying out in the water and I'm going to consciously choose maybe not to do anything about it. I thought that this kind of mustache twirling moment from book Catherine. Yeah.

It's a lot. It's telling. It's still incredibly dramatic. And I love the way it's, I love the way that the actors are playing. And I love the way that the scene unfolds. And I think there's something incredibly realistic about true to this idea of Nancy anchoring on moments of truth and creating a narrative around them. The idea that a child would be in danger in the water and other people are swimming out to get the child. And you get the child back to the beach with such urgency and such care and such attention that you forget one of the other people that went out to save them. seems entirely plausible to me. And so the overall sequence of events

makes sense in the way that it probably made sense to Nancy. It's both plausible and there were multiple times where I'm like, how is he possibly not going to make it? Like, here are two other strapping men swimming out here to get him. Why does he not just like hook his tired arm over the back of the dingy to like get towed to shore?

Like, there's no way. There's so many people in the water. There's no way. And then he does. And to your point, I like, I agree. They're all swept up. And they're, like, they're patting the backs of the two men who like to Nick to Shore, all this sort of stuff like that.

So there is a tremendous amount of tragic tension in that where I'm just sort of like, well, how possibly could they forget him? He's right there, you know, and yet they, and still and yet they do. But Catherine doesn't. No. And that version of Catherine, that fictionalized version of Catherine, like, yeah, is more evil, which then, of course, yeah, prompts these people who've read this book to be like, aren't we so delighted she got her punishment?

She absolutely. they're really hammering that note. Who do you think in this story will be the first to refer to book Catherine by the C word? Because that is coming. Someone will do it. I don't know who it's going to be yet. Look, in the book, it's exactly what we were talking about last week.

You brought up the easiest way to turn an audience against a female character is to portray them as a bad mother. And she is the mother who is leaving Nicholas on the beach to go bone with this teenager in the shower and falling asleep and completely ignoring her son. Yeah. It's all coated right there in a way that would make it very easy for a reader to think, oh my God, this woman is the worst.

The way they're like cut back and they're still having sex in the shower and I was like, meanwhile, back in the shower, this is still happening. First of all, we know enough about Jonathan's work to know that that's not how that's going. Some pitchers only have one one speed, you know? And I appreciate that Sex Yoda is doing all she can do to coach him up. They've been together one day. Yeah. Not even 24 hours and he's like, you know I would do anything for you.

Nancy. Once again, Nancy, I have some questions about the way that you've written your son here. Incredible stuff. As you are, want to do occasionally to weigh in on perhaps the NBA accuracy of a likeness of an actor or something like that I would like to bring to bear my exterior expertise, which is how bookstores work. And I will just tell you this from me to you right now. Please. It's incredibly hard to get a self-published book to be placed in a bookstore in the first place, not to mention a bookstore as small as that bookstore. And not to mention a self-published book with the most self-published book-ass cover I have ever seen. Exactly. So let's say you can't. Let's say we do get the owner to read it as it plays out in the book. She does love it. She wants to champion it. You are getting a stack of five at most at the register. That is the most we can do it. We are not taking half of our window display and like a ton of bookshelf size and a whole entire display table inside of the store to promote your with love. and respect self-published book.

Unless you are EL James and you've written 50 Shades of Grey, that is our exception. So I just had to call bullshit a little bit on the placement of the book. The fact that it's there in the bookshop and he scoped out which bookshops she would go into, that all could still have worked with like five copies stacked at the register. We still could have caught Catherine's attention and made her queasy. She also does strike me as someone who would hashtag shop local. You know, she's going to the small bookstore for sure.

Absolutely. I mean, she got her soul at the local fish market. That's fishmonger, by the way. That guy was legit. I need a fishmonger like that in my life. Do you not have, I really feel like you should have a fishmonger. You seem like a kind of guy we should have fishmonger. Even living coastal, finding a good fish guy is harder than you would think. A monger in general is not sort of easy to come by outside of the UK, I would say. My kingdom for a monger. Yeah, cheese monger or something like that. Okay. What else we want to talk about inside of these two episodes. We don't get a lot of Nicholas

in these episodes. He pops up a little bit and I think kind of as a pawn of Roberts in a way he's kicking Catherine out of the house. He's bringing Nick home who obviously it was her decision to kind of push him out into the world

out of the nest in the first place and hope that her 25-year-old failed son could do literally anything. But Robert needs someone to commiserate with and I think wants some company and what it admittedly is a very difficult moment. And I think there's a larger conversation to be had about

Robert is understandably very hurt and very wounded and very angry. And you can even hear it in sort of like his internal monologuing as he's seeing other women in the world and the attributes that he ascribes to be positive versus negative. It's like he's clearly in a very fragile and angry space. Oh, right. He's also committing blatant fraud at work in a way that this whole like manipulation of the truth idea

that is clearly so central to this show. The whole purpose of the meeting is in is like, how could we create a narrative that explains all the money laundering. When he starts to shout about integrity to Catherine at the end, and my parents always said you had no integrity and I abandoned them for you. And then, yeah, he's committing active charity fraud. It's not great. Not the best. But so Nick, he has brought Nick home. And one thing, I would love to outsource this to our listeners, because I'll admit, I'm out of my depth as far as Nick commiserating about his football club and its current state. I would love to know if

people have a guess as to which club a creep like Nicholas would be into. And so if you want to email us at Griefcardigan at gmail.com with whatever club aligns most closely with the Nicholas we've seen so far, I would love to hear it. I have an answer, but I don't want to say it because I don't want to piss off those supporters.

Joe, you simply have to say it. I have to say, I will add my opinion if when we get other, I don't want my opinion to be the lone opinion that's sitting here. So let's just get some other voices in the mix, and then I will add mine. Can I say this? I have the utmost respect for you as a colleague. I love doing this pod with you.

You're being a coward. Well, what's your guess? I have no guess. I don't know anything about football. It's West Ham. Okay, so you flagged this last weekend. It was a really good flag because I think we get another sort of red flag on it this week. Gisou, who's Catherine's assistant, who is looking into Stephen,

gets put off the case by Catherine and is pissed about it. And I do not believe for a second that she is not going to continue her own little side investigation into what is going on with Steve. Frankly, as she should, because Catherine comes in and is so mad that Jisu is literally doing her job. And this is, I guess, the challenge of the show, or a challenge of the show. Catherine, not a great person, generally. No, no. Tough hang. Not great. Not terrible, but not great. And that's what we're, the sort of choppy waters were forced to navigate here is to sort of like, can we continue to find.

to sympathy for this person as we peel back the layers on them. What made them not great in the first place? What happened in their life to get them here? All of that sort of stuff. I really appreciate how unmistakably unlikable she is, though. Like, she's not over the top intolerable, but it's so clear. It comes out in most of her interactions with most people. There's like a part of her that is just very unpleasant. Well, just to Robert's assessment, this idea of Like, she's used to getting her own way. She's always gotten her own way. Yes.

Robert not listening to her is the first time in their entire relationship that he's not just sort of allowed himself to be led by her, it would seem. I'm curious to see more of her interaction with her mom. Like, I recognized her mom's voice on the phone. The actor is Gemma Jones, who's great. So I assume we're going to see, you know, where is she going to go when she gets kicked out of the house? I assume she'll go see her mom.

She's terrible in such a really realistic way of someone you know. who's just sort of has been privileged in every way, like, you know, is absolutely gorgeous, is absolutely wealthy, is very smart, very successful, all of that sort of stuff. And so it's never, well, I don't want to say never, because we don't know, we don't know the story. There's something that happened in Italy and we don't know what happened. And we're making assumptions just as Robert was on the bus

about the various people he was seeing there. So that's like, that's part of the lesson of the show. The show really wants to catch us out and be like, aha, you thought that, and I'm like trying not to fall into its clutches. We don't want to be the sanctimonious twits. Only Robert. Only Robert. All right.

Anything else we want to say about these episodes? I think there's like a couple of small throwaway things. I want to just flag for future reference. Please. In Catherine's home office on what I think was like a window sill, there's like a poseable figure, but it has the head of like a bull or a minotaur or something. I don't know what the thematic or symbolic significance of that would even be,

but it's not something that everyone has in their office. I'll tell you that. She also's like giant green horse statues in her office that I thought were pretty excellent. I really liked them. She is 100% a horse girl. It's not even close. She definitely grew up with a lot of equestrian access. Quick sidebar on Kate Blanchet cat owner.

Kai shared with us this piece that was in The Hollywood Reporter where they were reporting on a on stage Q&A that actually saw a video clip of later where Alfonso Cororan was talking about how Kate Blanchett ruined the cat that was hired to play. the gray cat inside of the Ravenscroft's household because that the cat wrangler was upset because the cat used to be like, took years and years to get the cat well trained, and now the cat just does whatever it wants or more importantly, whatever Kate wants it to do. And that according to Alfonso Cuaron, quote, she has ruined the cat. And Keplerichette's response to this is my favorite. I don't know that this made it into the article. Maybe it did and I missed it, but she said,

Cat Wrangler is an oxymoron. She was just sort of like, who wrangles a cat in the first place? So ruined or liberated. Yeah, exactly. The ring is a cat. Come on. I am contractually obligated, as you are, too, to mention any possible flea bag comparisons, and we've already talked about the foxes.

In a sexual encounter, or at least a suggestive one, a character tells another one to kneel. And look, that's just always going to be flea bag-coded to me. Correct. Andrew Scott says, you can't steal my entire game. What are you doing here? I did think in the grand scheme of how Jonathan is portrayed in the book, in these book scenes, which, again, are quite racy.

In a way that I think we were led to believe based on the photos alone, those could have been a plot device without being as suggestive as they are. And so the fact that it ultimately got as erotic as it did, again, very weird move for Nancy. Also very weird that Jonathan

basically turns into like Austin Powers with the camera. Again, wild inconsistency inside of this character. Completely. Nancy is spitting a compelling yarn. We were spellbound by the restaurant scene, but in general, the depiction of the characterization

of Jonathan, just keeps on moving around the map in a way that, again, is supposed to set off alarm bells, I think, for us. But, yeah, like, his quivering mass that he is in the restaurant versus, like, taking control of the camera and giving her lingerie to pose in and stuff like that is, like,

what are we doing here? Even within the bedroom, the pitch of his moans is not consistent with the Austin Powers-esque figure that is art directing this entire photo shoot. And frankly, the sheer amount of candles that are lit in that room is not, a realistic depiction of any kind of reality. I'm sorry, it's just not.

That is one of the most beautiful hotel rooms I've ever seen in my entire life. It looks incredible. It looks like something out of a book. All right. So I think we did it. Nancy, we have some questions that we do respect your grieving process, but you didn't need to take it there, maybe necessarily. But there we are.

Here we are. Their meaning where exactly? Which there are you referring to? All of the sex Yoda-ing, I would say. The number of times the phrase Kylie's nipple is uttered. I think is where I would offer some edits for Nancy. Yes. Personally.

I mean, it got flagged by legal, that's for sure. How is this book publishable? Again, the rules for self-publishing are very... Pretty fast and loose. Very last. But yeah, they'll be hearing from Kylie's lawyer, I'm sure. Okay, so here's your assignment, prestige listeners. Find Rob a fish or cheese monger somewhere in the peninsula of Bay Area.

That would be great. And please tell us who you think Nikki is... is cheering for. Nikki and Robert, it's their shares team. So, like, what is their team? We might be able to figure out

if we did forensic look at the TV screen that they were watching a couple episodes ago. That might be something to pursue. If you're a West Ham supporter, you don't have to email me. It's okay.

I know you're mad. I would recommend if you did, though. I support you in your anchor. It's fine. We will be back next Monday. We only have one episode to break down, so we might do sort of like a bit more of a granular speed through.

Also, let us know. know if you should eat old preserves with your wife's hair in it. I don't know. They're preserved for a reason. I think this is the last a long time. I mean, the canning process is quite effective, but a decade, I don't know that I'd be doing that. Yeah, I feel like once there's like a thick layer of dust on them, then like maybe it's time to move on. Also, hashtag let that bug out of that jar. That's all I say. Release the bug. Free the bug. Thanks to Kai Grady. Who's the best always. And we will see you soon. Bye. This episode is brought to you by Netflix's remarkably bright creatures.

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