The Prestige TV Podcast - ‘The Curse’ Episode 1 With Sean Fennessey and Bill Simmons

Episode Date: November 10, 2023

Bill and Sean come together to discuss ‘The Curse,’ the new project from the Safdies, Nathan Fielder, and Emma Stone. They talk about the melding of tones going on in the show, Emma Stone’s choice to be in a TV show despite being such a huge movie star, and the strangeness of the TV streaming landscape right now. Hosts: Bill Simmons and Sean Fennessey Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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It's on Showtime. It's on Paramount. I can't keep track, Sean. I watched it on Paramount, but it's also on show. When is this going to end? When is our streaming nightmare going to end? Yeah. Our buddy CR likes to say it's all one long podcast,

but I'm starting to feel like it's all one long stream. Everything is about, we're inside of a big streaming machine these days. Well, this show we've been focused on for a while. Our guy Nathan, Emma Stone, top three favorite actress for you right now? Top five. Very high, very much the belt holder for actresses in Hollywood. We have a safti. Benny?

And we have small dicks. So it's really like this is a smorgas-sborgus stuff. All your favorite things, yeah. I've been waiting for all these things to merge together into a TV show. This is a 10-episode show. It's one hour each. I'll start here. This is kind of more American horror story than just like a funny Nathan Fielder show.

This show is dark. It's trying to do a bunch of stuff. What was the biggest thing that jumped out to you? Yeah. I think it's really his first pure scripted project. And so it's interesting, him collaborating with the Safdi's who specialize in discomfort and awkwardness and sometimes violence that he's made something that is, a little closer to David Lynch and horror

than the kind of goofy, real-life, imitating art, imitating real-life thing that we expect from Nathan Fielder. But it is still very much a Nathan Fielder thing, too. He has not abandoned his tone, his sense of humor. So I like it as a fusion of the two sensibilities.

Well, he's the king of cringe, and I think the Saftees might be the princes of cringe. So it was just, it was a cringe collaboration for the ages. Yeah, they do squirm and he does cringe. So together, our bodies are contorting as we watch this show. Yeah, there's a couple scenes in here. Your body's naturally just like turning to the left. Your shoulders are dipping when he takes the $100 back from the little girl.

When he's talking with Corbyn, did you recognize Corbin Burtson right away? I did. I had read that Corbin Brinson was in the series, which is one of the only dead giveaways that this is a fully scripted series. I did not know it was him because I hadn't read it was him. He's in, you know, the kind of the standout scene of this episode. But I was like, wait, is that Gerald McGraney? Like I was just going through my 80s actor catalog. I'm like, is that?

And then finally I had to look it up. I was like, oh, my God, it's Corbynson. This guy was, I don't know, one of the three most handsome TV actors of the late 80s was considered to be, he was right in there, like the Rob Lowe of the late 80s, basically. and now is just this really dark small penis father-in-law who's just peeing on flowers. It was an amazing performance by her. Well, there's always something a little slimy about Corbin-Burston, right? So the fact that he has aged into this uncomfortable father figure and clearly a slum lord.

I mean, that's the character that he's playing is a guy who's taken advantage of people in the community where the show is set. And sets the stage, I think, for a show that is very much about people who seem to have good intentions, but are actually taking advantage of these communities, like in this case, in the Southwest. But I think he's perfectly cast. He's hilarious. He's Roger Dorn 35 years later, basically, from Major League. So this show's trying to tackle some big stuff.

If you had to dive into Nathan's brain on this one, what do you think he was trying to do? Is he trying to make fun of people's kind of fake wokeness and fake sense of, you know, the virtual, signaling that is a big part of our culture basically for the last 10 years? Is there other stuff? What is he trying to do? Yeah, I think that is definitely an aspect of what he's interested in, which is this idea of a kind of progressiveness that also benefits people who are greedy. And the idea that, you know, in theory, you could make a better world and also make an HD TV show

out of it and that there is a way for those two things to fuse. I think the Benny Safdi character is there to show us that making reality television is a really unscrupulous, kind of immoral act and that the only way to make it entertaining is to reconfigure. I think it's really interesting that he's so interested in the idea of what is and is not reality. And his last two series, the rehearsal and Nathan for you, are very much about finding real people to make a reality show that is constructed. And this is a show that is about finding movie stars and actors to make a reality.

reality show that is in a scripted series that is meant to feel real inside of a real community. And so it's like, it's a real mirror image of everything he's been trying to do. I think he has a lot of contempt for people who make reality TV. I think he has a lot of contempt for people who virtue signal. I think he has a lot of contempt for a weird, small, dicked, awkward guys. I think, you know, it's, it is, there's a lot to come in the series. I've seen a few more episodes and it continues to evolve, but particularly the idea of people, who either move into these communities

and attempt to gentrify and then make money off of the people in those communities or people who are already there and pretend to be accepting of the people around them but are actually still taking advantage of them which is very common

not just in Arizona or New Mexico where this takes place but in Brooklyn, in Los Angeles and we see this all over the country. I've only seen one episode because I'm a man of the people. I like to watch it with the people. Well, I didn't know I was going to be...

You just binge all that. and then you come down off your high castle to tell us what you think. I honestly really don't like to do that and I don't like when podcast hosts do that, Bill, but I didn't know that I was going to be covering this on the show. And when I started watching it, I just got addicted to it. Because I love, we both love Nathan and I thought the premise was so funny. So I think the also, I'm curious what you thought about Emma Stone, because obviously she's insanely famous and is playing a character and giving a performance.

Like Nathan is kind of doing a variation on the Nathan character here. Benny Safdi is kind of doing a variation on some of the scummy characters he has played in the world that the Safeties have made. Emma Stone is an Academy Award-winning megastar, and she has dropped herself inside this world of squirm and cringe, playing, I think, a really interesting, complicated character.

And yet, I'm like, it feels weird that Emma Stone does just on like a show on Paramount Plus, doesn't it? You feel like she's overqualified in some ways? Well, I think it's really cool that she did it because I love the people that are doing this show. And I wasn't distracted by it because I think she's such a good actor. But as I think about the decision to do it, it is still stunning to me that she is along for this ride.

Well, first of all, I think it's a great career move. Because, I mean, what were her last? So she did, poor things? Did that come out yet? It comes out in December. No, okay. If you look at her last couple years, she's been pretty all over the place, right?

Well, she hasn't really since La La Land was her last big one, but she'll do weird shit. Like, I thought it was weird. She was in the Battle of the Sexist movie as Billie Jean King. Yeah. It's a strange choice for a role for her. She seems determined not to go down that rom-com path or, you know, do the single mother, Oscar.

Like, it seems like every choice she makes is because she really likes to script. to the part or just being weird. So to me, this made sense for her. Yeah. I guess I think it's maybe it's because if this was on Showtime five years ago when Showtime was still Showtime, it would have made a little bit more sense. But I think because of that streaming thing that you were talking about at the top, there's almost like, will like 10 million people watch this show or like 88? I have no idea. So for someone to, you know, and she's adventurous. You're right. She always does something

interesting. She also got married and had a baby in the last few years and has been a little bit out of the center of the frame in Hollywood, not like when, you know, in the La La Land days are the favorite. But I thought she was, did you think she was good? What did you think of her? Because, you know, she's,

she's a different kind of performer than the people who were in the show. I thought she was actually incredible. Yeah. And I think the show is in love with her and really goes out of their way to just kind of leverage the fact that she's an awesome actress

with great expressions who you're just constantly watching her face. That first scene when, when they put the tears on the mom and they're just say, you know, we're just in full-scale reality shenanigans. And she knows what's going on, but she's trying to present this pleasant kind of upbeat. You know, she's got intentions to become like a star from the show. And then the camera, it stays on her for, I'm going to say like 40 seconds.

And she's doing all these things with her face. And it just kind of goes in and she's smiling and you just can kind of see her brainwork. And I thought it was really, really high level. Like that's about as good. as to acting. And then, you know, she's also willing to be like in a crazy vibrator scene. You know,

I think there's a fearlessness to her that I really like. And I think of some of her contemporaries that I think I've been disappointing, like Brie Larson's somebody that I think's been really disappointing in the last few years, like the parts that she's picked and just that kind of career she wants to have. And that I just, I really appreciate that Emma Stone's like,

I don't give a shit. There's something so perfect about the marvels, the new Brie Larson Marvel movie, opening this weekend the same time that this show The Curse is opening. I mean, also the Emma Stone movie, Poor Things that is coming out in December is also an incredibly bold movie. I think

it'll be divisive, but the stuff she's doing in it, there are very few mainstream movie actresses, I think, would participate in a movie like that. So, yeah, she's incredible. And I agree, there's like a real patience and a real willingness to be awkward that not every actor

can pull off. And she's, she's ultimately a comic actor. You know, she's not ultimately a dramatic actor. But we knew this from EZA, and even super bad. Like, she, this is kind of the where I like her the most. Yeah, me too. I think that the show does really push the limits, though, of your willingness. This is way beyond curb your enthusiasm territory.

Like, this show eventually goes to places where you're like, if you think the small dick pissing on the tomatoes thing is weird, like, this show gets really, really weird. But I like it. Like, I'm really along for the ride. I think she's amazing. The real challenge of the show, and I think this will determine whether or not people really stick with it, is, do you think that Nathan Fielder as an actor can hang with Emma Stone? I think definitively, he does, which is kind of crazy to think about, given his background and what he has been. He's never been

a performer quite like this. And he's asked to do a lot. He carries the show at times in ways that are really intense. You know, you mentioned that taking the money back from the little girl sequence. that's kind of the tone setter for who this guy is. And so I think, I don't know, what did you make of Nathan dramatic actor? It's weird because I don't know how much of it is him acting and how much of him is creating this character. Like this scene when he flips out on the TV interviewer, I actually thought like, ah, that's not great acting by him.

But then I'm like, no, that's actually like he's trying to be, because he's trying to do something. So I don't know, he's playing chess and I'm watching Checkers basically. And I, so I haven't seen enough episodes yet to figure out what his intentions are. But I do feel like, I mean, part of the key of the, especially the HBO Nathan show, what was that one called? The rehearsal. I actually thought he did some really good acting in that show, like especially when he when he was in the fake relationship that got super intense. And I was like, man, I didn't know Nathan had this in him.

So I'm excited to see where it goes. that show really towed the line of performance because it was still improvised. He still had to react to what we were told were real people that he had cast for the series that he was making. This is, I'd love to know if this was fully scripted or if this was,

I feel like, I think it was, I think some of it was improv, would be my guess. Because if you're him, why wouldn't you take advantage of that? I'm sure they had stuff laid out structurally and beats and things like that.

But I would also bet that they kind of bounced around. in the scenes. Yeah, I wonder. Is that something Emma Stone is good at? You know, because that's a skill, being able to improvise through sequences like that. And to be able to hold the tone of the show. The tone of this show is really delicate.

And if you break, it can go too far and become like parody or too goofy or go too serious. You don't want to go too serious in a way because then you're going to kind of ruin the fun of it too. So. Yeah, I don't even know, is this show serious or funny or what? But it's definitely in that weird bend diagram that's super small. and there's not a lot of people that play in this space anymore.

Yeah, I mean, it reminds me a lot of my guy Albert Brooks, you know, where the Albert Brooks movies, especially those early 70s and 80s movies like modern romance, Lost in America, where you're like, this is so painful to watch that it's giving me like glee, that I'm like cackling inside, but maybe not externally.

And very few people are capable of kind of wrapping their arms around that. I was actually watching Annie Hall recently. and I feel like he might have invented that Woody Allen, especially some of the stuff in that movie, like when they go to L.A., and it's just like you're just cringing the whole time. And I wonder if he's like, you know, the ground station of cringe,

if he was the first one who's like, I just want to make people uncomfortable with scenes like this. And then Albert Brooks, and then it kept going. Definitely somebody who mainstreamed it, you know, made it like not just something that you could do,

but something you could do successfully. And Nathan feels like he's in the lineage. of that. So I think this is a really, really clever show. There are episodes in the future that I think are among the funniest things I've seen in five years. Like so bizarre and absurd that they're incredible. But at the center of it is this really like this relationship drama between these two people and whether or not, like, do you think that these people actually care about each other, care for each other? Because you kind of have to buy into that. Yeah, because they have that moment in the kitchen where I'm like, all right, these two have chemistry

is weirded as it is. They have their little, you know, they have their little sex sessions where the neighbors coming in and crazy shit like that. But can we talk about Safdi for a second?

Yeah. Who is like this person? Benny Safty, who's, I guess, an actor, but he's also director. Like,

this is something that used to happen in the 70s and 80s more where somebody started out as a director and then they started acting and then they would kind of bounce back and forth. but we don't really have these people in the same way anymore.

Because I feel like I think he's a good actor. I actually liked him in the PTA movie. But I also think he's a really interesting director with his bro. And they just had that documentary that was really good. He's pretty unique. There's not a lot of people like him right now. He's doing something that I love. So one, he's kind of always been a performer.

He's appeared in a lot of their movies over the years. You know, he plays Robert Pattinson. brother in good time. He's exceptional in Oppenheimer this year. He has a critical part in Oppenheimer. And he's a really, really talented actor. There's a little bit of like, I don't know, Sidney Pollock going on here, you know,

where he's like a really talented filmmaker. But when he shows up the movie. Spenders in the Orchie. I mean, honestly, I'm sure the Saftees love eyes wide shut. This one is just Benny. It's not, I don't think Josh is a part of this show. But he is playing a character who is the most cartoonish to me, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

because I think that people who produce shows like this are kind of cartoonish. You know, they are kind of ridiculous. You've crossed paths with a reality TV producer here and there over time. You know, like he's riffing on a model, like from the world of The Bachelor, from the world of the HGTV, kind of like house flipping shows. Like, that's a, that's kind of a scummy weird.

That's part, like an area of Hollywood that you and I are not a huge fan of. And so, or at least we don't hang out in that place, but it's there. if you go walking around Vine, you might run into that guy, you know, stepping on a Machiaado and being a dickhead to somebody on the phone. Right. Hanging out at the Soho House for seven hours, working on his, on his Lenovo think pad. Yeah, rolling calls over talking, you know, saying people's famous loud names. So I think he, but I think he's very, very good in the show.

And I think he just brings something, obviously, creatively that Nathan never, never quite had before, which is like this sense of menace. You know, there's something really uneasy about the series, and you really feel like something awful could happen at any moment. And that's obviously something that the Safdi's are incredible at, just like this sense of like rollicking but impending doom. And so I like, I really liked him a lot on the show. But whether or not he goes on to be an actor is an interesting question, because he's doing all of these little character parts now. Would you go see a Benny Safdi movie starring Benny Safdi? I don't know. I think this is who he should be, just this guy who pop.

pops up as like the fourth or fifth person and all these different really good movies. And it seems like in the creative community, in the director community, that the people love the Saffty's. So I'm sure he'll keep popping up in those things. The reality show that he shows them is the funniest part of episode one. Love in the third degree. That is one of the funniest 90 seconds of the last five years. It was a reality show of a guy wearing a mask. And then it turns out he's been badly burned in a fire and the woman have to decide whether he wants to stay. And it's Dan Cortez is hosting. Every single piece of it is perfect. And then the end where the fire shoots up and they're playing this song, The Fire Down Below. It's just like, it's a

home run. I loved it. It was so good. And then Nathan's watching it and he's kind of horrified, but he's kind of like, oh, this is the world we're walking into. Everything's great. It's a perfect summation of the show, which is that there are times when you're watching the show where you're just like, this is so ridiculous. This would never happen. This is not real. But then you second guess yourself and you're like, would Fox put on a

burn victim dating show? Like, maybe they would. Like, I just watched them a season of love. I watched the season of Love is blind for the first time this season. I haven't, I didn't watch the first four of my wife and I watched season five. And at least 15 times during the watching of the season, I was like, is this fucking happening? Like, this is a real show?

Yeah. Like, people get engaged after talking through a wall. The HBO show where the people are naked, to me, once that show happened, like love in the third degree is completely conceivable to me after that show. It's on the table, right? Like, you could imagine a world where they did that.

And what was the, well, Joe Millionaire, obviously, is an inspiration for this. And there was one other one that was like that. Was there another masked man show, like a man who had ever revealed his face? Yeah, they batted him around a couple of times. Yeah. So I bought it. It was really funny. Are you looking for support?

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a thing as it might have been five years ago because of what's happened with HBO and with Max, where Max is just, there's so many things on there now. And the whole concept of like Sunday nights on HBO, I'm wondering if it might have ended with succession. Because the last succession was whenever we're going to find out with true detective and curb and when everything comes back, if Sunday nights are even a thing. I just wonder if Thursday night, Friday morning has become the new Sunday night HBO. Like the killer, we're taping this right now, the killer, which I just watched 35 minutes of before we start taping. Killers on Netflix. And it's like late Thursday night or Friday morning is now like the most important thing that comes out. And so this comes

out on Paramount and Showtime. But Paramount's had such a spotty track record with shows that I do think it's going to hurt the audience of the show. So it's going to be word of mouth. Can you even have word of mouth anymore? And there's something like this. almost have to be on Netflix now? Is Netflix like the only monoculture now? These are all things that I've been thinking about lately and like if this was on Netflix would this be a hundred million viewers

show? I feel like it might. I do think if it was on Netflix it would be much, much bigger. There's so much to unpack about what you just said. One, the actor's strike just ended and I think if Emma Stone had had three months of pre-release promotion to do for this, because she has poor things coming in December and this show now,

she could have been on the cover of Vogue. You know what I mean? She could have been on every late talk show talking about this weird project and talking about how fun it was. Emma Stone's Big Gamble, headline. Yes, exactly. That whole, and maybe that still will all play out

in the next month or two, and people will be able to catch up with what the show is. And Nathan obviously has a loyal fan base. There's, you know, 350,000 psychos who just love to watch him be awkward on television. As far as the HBO thing goes,

the reason I think it's not an HBO show, and this is completely speculative theorizing, is that it's mocking what Max has in part become. They are literally making an HGTV show called Flippanthropy, which is a show for HGTV, which is owned by Warner Brothers Discovery. And so I can imagine that they looked at this show. I imagine it was pitched to them. I imagine they looked at the show and they were like, we're not going to make fun of what's at the center of our business strategy.

So that would probably mean that the next best place for it to go would be paramount. I could be wrong about that. Maybe they didn't have a good experience with Nathan. Maybe they just weren't ready to do a show like this. Who knows? Maybe it was too expensive. It's impossible to know. I just find her to believe with Emma Stone attached, which I assume she was when they were shopping it. That HBO, the old HBO from five years ago wouldn't have been like, oh yeah, we're doing that. You have to do that with us. Don't do it with Showtime. We're bigger. We're more important.

I agree with you. I don't, I'm not sure how many people have Paramount Plus. I mean, I think it's like running like sixth or seventh in the subscriber rankings, which is not not ideal. But honestly, like, ultimately, I don't care about it. I do think that Sundays could be back if True Detective is good. If True Detective is good, then this will be in a relevant conversation. But if it's just okay, then you're right. We may be in a new era. I think also people are as aware of streaming movies now as something to look forward to as they are streaming TV shows. And so, like you mentioned, The Killer, you know, basically every Friday from September 1st through January 1st,

Netflix has a new movie from a big director. Like, it's crazy how they do this. every fall. So the balance of power is definitely shifted. This show is like, it's not really in that realm though. You know, like Nathan never made a show this big. This is a, it feels like weirdly a much bigger project than anything else he's made. As you said, like every episode's an hour long. Yeah. So it's a real scripted full length series. And it feels more like Twin Peaks to me than it does Nathan for you. I'm trying to think are there three bigger actresses than Emma Stone though? I feel like that the fact that she's in this makes it feel big.

It's like her and Jennifer Lawrence and if you're just talking like under under 40 actresses. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Wow, that would have been interesting. I don't know if she's. I barely buy Emma Stone and Nathan Fielder together.

So I'm not totally sure if I can buy Zendaya. Well, there's an age difference that I, yeah, I don't know if that would have made sense. But yeah, I was thinking about it just feels like since the pandemic, this is turning into a separate combo. But since the pandemic, the whole concept of this structure we had with new shows being released is just completely been blown up. And, you know, it's like this show just comes out on a Thursday night.

And it's a Showtime show, but it's on Paramount. And that's where we are. And by the way, not promoted, as you pointed out. And I guess that's a small piece of the puzzle to raise awareness. But ultimately, like, if she was on Jimmy Kimmel's show and she was on Vogue, like, is that going to ultimately change the audience? of the show, I don't know. But if it's on Netflix on that button and it's the number one trending thing, then it's like 100 million people. And I just think this is where we are now

with TV. So this show, if people love it and it's a word of mouse show, like I don't know what the audience is for it. I don't know what the audience is for this podcast. How many people have seen the curse? You know, we might have 5,000 people listen to this. I honestly don't know. I do think that there are, I think there will be some memeable aspects of the show. This is a very internet friendly show. It's a very ringery show, I would say. I mean, of course, of course. But like, not to put on my old guy analyzing young people culture hat too hard, but, you know,

if this show finds its way to TikTok and becomes, you know, that trendworthy in that way, I could see it picking up audience. I think how many people have Paramount is just a big factor. And how many people are really, and Paramount kind of skews a little older historically, and this is kind of a weird, fun, younger kind of a show. I hope it does well. To me, like, this kind of adventurous

TV making, like, what Nathan's project is, he's a one of one. Like, he is singular in what he is trying to unpack about our modern culture, about the way that people interact, about the way that people pretend to be certain ways in front of other people. That's his whole idea is like,

everything that you see is a false performance. And this is like the ultimate example of that. So I hope he gets to make shows like this forever. I do, it has struck me that this is such a bold risk for him. And I'm wondering if this is the kind of thing he wants to do. Like, does he just want to make actually like more scripted narrative stories going forward as opposed to these experiments, which get harder and harder the more famous he gets? You know, like now that he is known, he can't make a fake show. He has to. Right. He almost has to go to scripted. Well, I think the

Albert Brooks comparison is, is pretty good. Albert Brooks was had a lot more, I think, stage slash comedy slash sketch in front of people experience and, you know, and was just had a different career arc than Nathan did. But I do feel like they occupy the same types of space. Like the stuff he was doing in the late 70s and 80s, feels like what Nathan would have done if he, if he was there in the late 70s and 80s, right? Now what Nathan's doing might be where Albert Brooks had gone. I think he just would have been way weirder. So when I just watched the Albert Brooks documentary that Rob Reiner directed that's going to be on HBO,

I think this weekend, maybe next weekend. And there are tons of clips of the Tonight Show because Brooks did the Tonight Show like 100 times. Yeah. It's like one of the best guests ever. Yeah, Carson loved him. Like you can see, you know the moments when Carson is like losing it.

It's like Rickles. There's like a very short list of people who killed Carson. And it reminded me a little, I swear, I'm being honest when I say this. It reminded me a little bit of when Nathan went on your pod. back in the Grantland days, and you were just, like, losing it. Like, you just couldn't, you're trying to figure out, like, what was he trying to do? His energy is so weird. And you were just tickled.

And I remember how happy you were after doing that interview. He has that ability, you know, like people who really appreciated and admire comedy and the kind of, like, the creativity that he brings to the table, he's on that kind of upper tier of creativity and sense of humor. So I love him. As far as TV shows go, though, I mean, in theory, this is about to be a better. time. You know, like Fargo's coming back. There's this new FX show. I think it's called a murder at the end of the world with, um, Brit Marling that is supposed to be quite good.

We're covering a bunch of things on prestige. So strikes over, writer strikes over. In theory, we're getting back to a good time in television. I think it's been kind of a brutal year for television personally, but this isn't my main area of focus. So I don't want to talk down on it too much. Yeah, but I mean, people have asked me because the prestige, that was one of our biggest podcasts, especially during succession. And then we kind of stopped doing it. for a couple months. And I had people like, hey, what happened to prestige? And I'm like, what show should we be covering?

There are no prestige shows. Now they feel like they're starting to come back. I've seen the first two episodes of True Detective. That's definitely a show that is a prestige TV show. But, you know, we try to keep the bar at least relatively high. And then for the guilty pleasure stuff, we're going to use ring or dish for that for, you know, the morning show, which is just a show, one of the most appallingly bad shows of the past five years.

We can't do prestige. TV podcast episodes about the morning show. It's awful. So this is the type of show that we want to do. We tried not to step too much on what's coming because you've seen some. We're going to have Joanna next week. And I think we should cover this every week, though, don't you? I definitely do. A lot of stuff happens that I think is worth unpacking. This is just a table set or episode. This is just a setup for these two people are trying to get their show going for HDTV in this community where they're trying to pretend to be good actors, but in fact have slightly more insidious or ignorant approaches to this project. And what's at the center of it is the awkwardness

in their relationship, the unspoken problems of their relationship. It's really, it's a very funny table setter with a lot of ridiculous moments, but a lot transpires that is worth, I think, unpacking much more closely. So look forward to doing it with Joe. And I'm happy to have a TV show that I love on TV right now. Huge thumbs up for me. Huge thumbs up from you. Thumbs up, I love it. I think it's really entertaining. Are you worried about the future of this show when CR introduces a new character on the rewatchables on Monday that might just kind of blow it away from, I don't know, an impact standpoint? Don't say the character. I do wonder, does that just dominate the discourse next week when CR unleashes his new one?

You know, having done like hundreds of pods with me at this point, that there's probably like five times when I've really just lost it, you know, where I've really just will be. like I can't breathe. And the one we recorded on Wednesday was one of those. Yeah, there you go. That's a little plug for the rewatchables. All right, Sean Fantasy, you can hear him on the big picture. And you can hear them on the rewatchables on Monday. We're going to be doing the curse every week.

We also have the crown coming. And a couple more of, you know, we'll be ready if there's some more good shows. This podcast was produced by our guy Bobby Wagner. Pulled them over from Big Picture Duty. Thanks, Bob. And we'll see you on the prestige next week. Thanks, Phil.