The Rewatchables - ‘Airplane!’ With Bill Simmons and Bill Hader

Episode Date: September 23, 2025

Looks like we picked the wrong week to quit rewatching movies. The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by actor, writer, and director Bill Hader to revisit an all time comedy classic, ‘Airplane!’ starring Robert Hays, Julie Hagerty, Leslie Nielsen, and Robert Stack. Producers: Craig Horlbeck, Chia Hao Tat, and Ronak Nair Chad Powers - Series Premieres Sept. 30 on Hulu Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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All right, the man, the myth, the legend, Bill Hader is here. We haven't done this since COVID. It's been almost a half-decade drought for you in the rewatchables. That's true. That's very true. But you're back, and I asked you, let's do a movie. I sent you a bunch of titles, and you saw airplane, and you were out of your mind excited to discuss.

Yeah, yeah, I've talked about airplane. I'm in that book that came out about airplane, but that is such a formidable movie for me, you know? So, yeah, that was the one that my eyes immediately went to, you know? So you didn't see it when it came out. Did you? You saw it after, probably? Yeah. No, that movie came out when I was like two years older.

something. But I can't remember a time when that movie wasn't in my life. You know, it's like, you know, whatever, like Star Wars or Indiana Jones or something like that. It was just always, I don't know if I can like remember the exact moment when I saw it. It was just always there. Because it was on cable for 30 straight years. And then it was also like on TBS and WGN and where I up in in Oklahoma, like, we got those channels. And so it was like edited for those. And so I mean, it was just constantly on television. And I'd watch it every time I was on. And still to this day, I just, I just showed it to my girlfriend, Allie hadn't seen it. And since she was a kid, she said, and we watch, I was like, oh, we got to watch airplane. Yeah. We watched it. And I'm still,

I know every word to it. And I'm still like dying, laughing, you know, just watching her reaction to it. was really fun. Well, it was funny reading the book. The book came out, I think, two years ago, and it's like a mix of an oral history, but there's a lot of people like you in there. Because I saw this movie in the theater. I think I was 10, the summer in 1980. And just immediately it was like, this is, I can't believe this happened. And then it was in my life like for the next 45 years. And I always felt like it was one of the great movies, like the great comedies, influential, the whole thing. But I didn't know how many other people felt that way. And then you see that book, and it's like a who's who of all these people, like, yeah, that was the moment.

Yeah, that was the movie that, like, you go, oh, that's how you do it. You know, there's certain films like that for me, like Spinal Tap or Monty Python, the Holy Grail or Life of Brian, you know, these things where you went, oh, or those, you know, young Frankenstein and Blades and Saddles, and then the early kind of Woody Allen movies like Love and Death and some of those things. they were always they were just kind of like oh that's how you're supposed to do comedy and then you would see other whatever more famous comedies and they wouldn't do it for you because there wasn't this kind of edge to it yeah but airplane is different because i don't know if you could do because my friend of keva just did that naked gun movie which was really fun and but the the thing is with this movie airplane which is so hard to replicate is that Everybody, whether it's Saturday Night Live or just whatever, all these people do a funny version of themselves, you know? Yeah. And an L airplane, I remember my dad telling me, he's like, if you, that movie's funny, but if you grew up watching like Sea Hunt and watching with Lloyd Bridges or those movies, you know, a forbidden planet or Poseidon adventure that had Leslie Nielsen in it, like all these movies where they were always the straight guy. Yeah. Robert Stack watching The Untouchables.

as a kid and being like, I'd never seen them be funny. I only knew them as that specific kind of character, which isn't even like around anymore, those very super serious things. And then playing it straight and actually having the real people instead of comedians,

he was like it was, you know, yeah, it was, it wasn't, it was like a hallucination or something. It was like, wait, you're allowed to do that? Like, it was, it was great. Well, they cracked the secret sauce, right? Because if you think you're doing a movie like this,

you're going to have Harvey Corman as in the Wesley Nielsen role, and he's going to be hamming up. You have Chevy Chase and the Robert Hayes role, and they're trying to be funny. Somewhere in there. The only comedic actor, I think, in the whole movie is Jimmy Walker, and he doesn't have any lines. He falls off.

Texas, yeah. Yeah, he's a guy. He's a gag in the background, you know? but I mean, Peter Graves, I mean, that thing of him talking to a little kid in the cockpit is one of the funniest things ever, and it's so disturbing and funny when you watch it now or he's like, you're like movies like that. I mean, I don't know what time in my life or my friends and I weren't quoting that, you know, you ever hang around the gymnasium? Like, any people go into the gym, in elementary school, you go, you ever hang around the gym? You know, it's just so weird. And also a comedy, too, that those, it was like, you know, Zucker brothers and Jim Abrams.

And you can just tell these guys, like, grew up in Milwaukee, and they're just following their intuition. Because there's some of it, it's like not like jokes, like when we, you know, you work at SNL or something where it has to kind of have some sort of meaning or. Yeah. Just you could tell they were just watching. zero hour of that movie and then just like riffing on it and just being stupid and making themselves laugh and they just trusted their instincts to be like, well, if we find this funny, we'll just go for it, you know? Well, it's funny.

There's two things going on at the same time. One, it's like a high volume joke movie, right? They're just getting off stuff left and right. And sometimes you don't even catch it right away, right? So it's like they're almost like firing a bunch of threes in an NBA game. But then on the other side, there are these long, well-constructed, minute-long where nothing seems to happen,

but it's all leading to some joke they want to get to, like hold five and keep, what is it, the ham on the mayo, whatever that one is. Yeah, yeah. But he said it,

they set it up for like 35 seconds. You're like, what are they doing? And then it's like, oh, that's why they did that. And they have a million of those. Yeah,

it's this whole long lead up to, yeah. And I had seen this movie first. And then I saw a naked gun, the original, when it came out. Yeah. That came out when I was 10. And I saw that in the theater. And I remember that was like, you know, I'd never, to this day, I've never experienced a theater, a comedy theater experience like that.

Like, people were genuinely losing their minds. Like, the whole baseball sequence at the end of that movie, people were going. When he sang the national anthem and then the scene when he gets stoked on saying strike and he starts. dancing as the ump. Do you remember like, oh yeah? People like lost their minds. I mean, like literally like people jumping up out of their seat and going crazy and like that you may see you're like people falling in the aisles. Like people were genuinely falling all over the place. And I had never seen anything like that. So I was a big fan of theirs. And then I went back and saw a Kentucky Fried movie.

And I remember I brought that to a sleepover when I was in fourth grade and the mom. Some nudity. Yeah. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Yeah. Catholic high school girls in trouble. They were like, whoa, what's this? And I was like, I haven't seen it yet. I haven't seen it. It says it's the guys who made airplane and the director of Animal House. And they're like, what is this? You know, but yeah, this, that style is so bad.

They just kind of made up their own thing. Well, it's funny you mentioned that theater thing because we did naked gun a couple years ago, and I told the story about seeing that in the theater. And the baseball scene, like, almost caused a riot. It was so funny. People fucking lost their minds. I only remember two comedies. because the other one was there's something about Mary.

Oh, yeah. There's two comedies. And then the closing credits and the hangover was the other one. People were just like, could not believe what was happening and just laughing their asses off. But for the most part, you kind of remember when the whole theater is dying, laughing at the same time. It's such a unique experience. Yeah, it's such a wonderful experience. And yeah, you miss it.

And that's what was nice going to see the new one with Liam Neeson that, Akie. I did because I was like, oh my God, I'm in a theater and everybody's laughing. I haven't, they don't make comedies really anymore. So it was kind of awesome just to have that experience where you're like, I mean, you can go to the theater and get scared, you know, but you can't go to the theater and like laugh as much like that anymore. And I was telling my, you know, my kids, I was like, okay, we're going to watch the original one.

And, yeah, that baseball scene, because you guys have no idea from beginning to end, the place was going nuts. Well, especially using real announcers. Oh, yeah. Every joke killed. I remember I went when I had to go to it. When I got Barry, the head of HBO was like, you got to look like you were once in the military,

so you got to go to the gym because you don't look like you're in the military. So I went to this gym in L.A. is a small gym, and David Zucker was there. And so that's how I met him. And I was like, you know, over there going like, oh, my God, that's David Zuckerman. Zucker, holy shit, you know. And he was so nice. And I, I mean, he answered all my questions where I was like, how'd you guys get, you know, all these people to do it? What was it like with the announcers? What was, you know? Yeah. And then an airplane, too. And then I once had lunch with Jerry Zucker. And they're so open about like, oh, yeah, Robert Stack totally got it. And like, he loved it and just was totally on board. Lloyd Bridges is a little bit confused. You know, Peter Graves, like, wait, what did you guys get me?

me into and then like Leslie Nielsen like immediately got it and was like a pro you know and it was just it was just really cool getting yeah this the secret sauce of this is the views in the non-comic actors which now we've been doing that for 45 years but back then nobody thought that way one of the SNL episodes that I was a part of that was like one of the hottest episodes ever was when it was Brian Williams because he they had only seen him you know do the news yeah to see seen Brian Williams. I remember he was on a Bronx beat that sketch with Maya and Amy. And he was just like, hey, how you doing? And like the place was going crazy because they had no one. They had never seen him. They were like, I didn't know you could do that. Or like when John Ham first hosted, I don't think

anybody knew that John was funny. They only knew him as like Don Draper. Remember that episode when he came out and was being funny. The place was like, well, like they just went crazy. Yeah, the rock was like that too, where we had just seen him as a wrestler, but nobody realized that he actually was funny. Yeah, he's very funny. Yeah, he's very funny and, like, has great timing and, like, yeah, all those guys could do that. But even, like, that Leslie Nielsen knew, like, they just, that's why I asked those guys, was like, did they know how to play that, you know? And they're like, yeah, Leslie Nielsen, like, we didn't have to tell him anything. Like, when he has this stethoscope on and he's like, yes, I'm a doctor.

Like he knew not to like be weird or like, yeah, I'm like, he just, the stethoscope and him being straight was what the joke was, you know. And that it's, uh, it. Well, that's, that's why these movies have had trouble because people have been trying to do this format ever since. And there's, this is the one that played it straight the best. And I was like the silliness kind of seeped in over the next 45 years when people did this. Yeah, well, that's like this insecurity thing. thing of like, oh, God, will people know or if we're joking or not? Or I don't know if that's just, yeah, I don't know what.

I mean, that was a thing I remember early on, like 20 years ago when, you know, you'd go, I got the SNL and I would go on these meetings with people about silly movies. And there was like, I remember people were like, there's smart. Someone told me there's smart. It's easy to do a smart comedy, like, you know, at the time, like knocked up. Yeah. A dumb comedy, like, at the time it was Hot Rod was with the guy, because I was in that movie and he was like, like, Hot Rod. He goes, it's really hard to do smart, dumb comedies.

Right. He was like, an airplane and naked gun were like the best one where it's like it's dumb, but it's smart, you know? Like, those are really difficult. And those guys just had the, I think what they just naturally found funny is what made it work. I think the best comedies for me always felt like, I've said how to have times, just like, oh, the group who made it, they're just trying to make themselves laugh.

Like, they're like, I don't know, this is like funny to us, you know, and then suddenly, you know, I showed my kids when they were young, this movie, a naked gun, and they're dying laughing. I mean, I have three daughters in the scene where the woman knocks the,

where she's playing the guitar, and she knocks the little girls, tube out and she starts dying. They thought that was hilarious. They were like crying, laughing. And the face she's making and everything. They just thought that was great. Well, so in that book, there was a bunch of people that weighed in.

These are some quotes. Trey and Matt. They said, Airplane was sort of the Star Wars of comedy. The tone of it was just something we'd never seen. We went to see it several times with different friends and everything. It was a big deal. That's true because... Caddyshack came out a couple weeks later,

and it was, these were when you would just go to the same comedy movie, like, four times. Like, we had, like, we had, like, five channels. Like, so if something funny was out, you just kept going back to it. Yeah, yeah, now those would be, like, a TV show or something. They're like, well, how can we make this a TV show or something? But when it was a movie, yeah, you would go out, you'd see it over and over again.

And I do think it was that Star Wars thing is the kind of apps where you can't kind of make a delineation of like before and and after airplane in some ways. Even the look of airplane I saw in other movies where it was airplane, I think, purposely was kind of like harsh light and the sets were like obviously kind of fake and it has this thing. And then you see 80s movies, like comedies just become that, you know, like these kind of lower budget movies.

There's one called like Jekyll and Hyde back together again with Mark Blankfield and then Crime Waves, Sam Ramey movie Crime Waves. There's a bunch of them where they have that look, you know? Yeah.

But yeah, that's very much like, oh, it's like an early 80s comedy. But I don't know. Yeah, I just, yeah,

I agree with those guys. There's nothing like. Here's another one. Here's Apatow. When you make a list of the best movies of all time, you're always going to put airplane on it. If somebody made a movie as funny as airplane right now would make a billion dollars yeah yeah i mean yeah that was that time though you know that's

like like they apparently i guess showed it to michael isner who was ahead of paramount at the time yeah michael isner's kids loved it like they were like we don't know if he liked it but his kids like cracking up and so i think we all owe a oh a debt to mike michael isman's kids because they were the ones that were like, holy shit, this is so funny, you know. Pat and Oswald said a lot of comedies in the last 30 years have wanted to be airplane. They were gag, gag, gag, gag,

where airplane is really structured, driving the story along the whole time. You've got to play comedies if it's deadly serious. You've got to play weirdness as if it's the most normal thing in the world. That's something you've been good at. Yeah. And a lot of those stuff you've done is like,

people are being weird, but it seems completely normal as they're being weird. Yeah, that's probably got it from watching airplane a lot as a kid. That's why I mean it was like you don't, you don't like showcase like, oh, this is, people ignore stuff, which is funny. Like in comedy, you always have that where, at least in my experience, where it's almost, you know, they go, well, that guy should react, right?

And it's like, no, no, no, no, just you keep moving, you know? That's like one of the things that screwed up, you know, is say, you know, whatever. you know, like that scene where it's like, are you a doctor? Yes, I'm a doctor. He's a stethoscope. If you cut back to that girl going, well, that's weird. He has a stethoscope. It kills the whole thing.

And I've been in those situations where a producer or somebody's like, well, wouldn't they, in reality, this would happen. It's like, right, this isn't reality. Right. It's like its own weird universe, you know. And it's like a weird movie reality. But, Letterman said. Oh, Letterman. Oh yeah, Letterman auditioned for it.

Letterman auditioned for it and was relieved he didn't get it because he didn't think he was a good actor. And he loves this movie and he said, my son and I, when we're driving the city, he will say to me, just move over Elaine. And I'll say, I'll move over, but quit calling me Elaine. It just goes on and on. Film comedy became different after that movie. And it makes so much sense that he loved that movie because I'm like an early Letterman guy. And a lot of the absurdist like deadpan, people being weird but not knowing they're weird,

that stuff was like in the first couple years of his show. It's definitely a movie where you could see the filmmakers grew up on television and like grew up on like. Right. You know what I mean? Watching streets of San Francisco. Beretta. Or like, yeah, we're like watching the stuff from the early 60s and late 50s. That's what I mean, you know, watching Sea Hunt or.

Yeah. Those shows were so deadly serious. But it's like, Jimmy, we got to get you home because, you know, it's all very wholesome and stuff. I mean, having Jung Cleaver do jive in it, you know, leave it to Beaver's mom is doing jive. And I mean, it's very clear like, all these dudes like grew up on TV and just sitting around like making fun of it. And that's why it's like, oh, no, it's got to be those guys, you know. Well, the story of it was that they randomly taped this movie, Zero Hour, because they would tape TV and look at the commercials and they were trying to figure out of this different comedy stuff. stumbled across this movie that came out in the late 50s.

And the structure of it is basically identical to airplane. There's a really good YouTube video, some crazy person did. Or they do the comparison. Yeah. And they're just like the scenes of like the nuns singing to the little girl. Like there's like five scenes that they just take somebody coming into the cockpit. Yeah, you got to have like those things are so specific. They had to come from another source.

And it's fun because I didn't know. about the zero-hour thing. And then one time I just had TCM, I would just have a plane in my house. And then, yeah, I was watching that and I was like, God, this movie is like airplane. Right.

And I go, and then looking it up and go, oh, yeah, this is what airplanes based on, you know? Well, the other one was airport 75. It ripped off a few things from that. But I hadn't seen any of the airport movies, and that's what, again, my dad and my uncles, his brothers were the ones that were kind of like, the older brother kind of guys for me of like,

well, it's airport movies, but it's also this and it's also this. Like they were giving all the context of why it like was even a bigger thing for them than it was for me. I was just like, oh, this is hilarious and weird and, you know.

Yeah, because when I was little in the 70s, this was a whole industry. The airport. Poseid an adventure, all the airport movies, Towering Inferno, Black Sunday.

Yeah, they were like the superhero movies. of the 70s. Yeah. And then I played the same way. There was always famous people in it. Like, O.J., I think, was in Towering Inferno. I'm sure, yeah.

And also, there was one called The Swarm. It was like Bert I. Gordon movies. And, yeah, all those guys, I'm blanking on the other guy's name, the big guy. But, yeah, there's one about bees with Michael Kang called The Swarm. Oh, Jesus. That's kind of a bunch of big-name actors. Just people go.

I'm going to get away from these bees. It's just crazy. Keenan Ivory Wayans said they took what Mel Brooks did to a whole other level. They not only made fun of the genre of the main story, but within that, they made fun of 10 other movies, which is true. Nobody had done that either. I think that's a good point. Like all of a sudden, Saturday Fever is being parodied in this out of nowhere. Yeah, yes.

It was Saturday Night Fever and, I mean, there's so many other things in there. And then, Kenar-Wainz, I mean, I'm going to get you stuck as a great movie. I think it's very, very funny. But, yeah, they encompassed it. Because, again, like, Mel Brooks was doing the parody thing, but it was all comedic actors. And those movies are great, but it was all comedic. And they're ham in it up. Yeah.

And they're having fun and they're going crazy. I mean, I mean, I love Harvey Corman and Blame. Sattles is so funny to me. But, yeah, it's definitely big. And then they were, that's why I mean these, the Zucker brothers and Abrams, like, they were savvy enough. But it's also the thing you find, like, they were just, they just watched a lot of shit. I guarantee it just were fans of stuff. And they're like, why would we do that?

They already did that. Let's do this thing. Right. You know, Matt and Trey are very much like that, where it's like, well, why are we going to do this when that's what everybody's doing? Let's try to, let's make it, you know, puppets, like Thunder, you know, Team America, I'll do it all the comments. You know, fuck it. Let's do that.

Because it's more exciting for us. This last quote was from Katzenberg, who was one of the execs on the movie because he worked for Eisner. And he said, what happens to the movie business today? There's no resemblance to the movie business, 70s and 80s. We were always determined to do unique and original. There was no franchise business, sequel business. It was all about original ideas.

And you look at it, I was looking at the movies that came out in 1980. and there's like, you know, barely any sequels. There's really no superhero movies. And it's all these original idea movies. Some of them fell by the wayside. Others stuck. But, you know, I feel like that's starting to come back a little bit now in 2025, but not totally. So, I mean, yeah, I think I was just talking to Patton the other day and he was like, you know,

it says something that the Indiana Jones movie, the last Indiana Jones movie lost to five nights at Freddy's or something. that I sound like an old man, but, but, like, but that that movie is so clear, people are like, oh, he likes something, just something somewhat original and not like your mom and dad's sequel. It's like, we want the original stuff. Yeah, I feel that, definitely. And you can feel it in some superhero movies now where you can feel the filmmakers and the writers trying to, like, get things, you know, artistic and try to get things through, but in the superhero way.

You know, it's kind of like, Scorsese called him smugglers, but, you know, it's like the filmmakers like, Douglas Serk or something. He would make these melodramas that were women's pictures, quote unquote, but were really his, he's just, you know, German guy who fled the Nazis and it was all his

kind of like, you know, thinking how America was so, you know, it's about American life, you know. He was getting all these ideas and this kind of of, you know, critique of America within this like Rock Hudson Jane Wyman movie, you know. And I feel like you're starting to see that with some superhero movies. But hopefully, yeah, they'll be more and more original stuff. I mean, that's why it's so great when stuff like weapons and sinners does well.

You know, like it's always nice when that happens, you know. We had take a break and then come back. One more thing to throw you. before we get to the categories. This episode is brought to by Hulu. Glenn Powell is Chad Powers coming September 30th to Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus. Eight years after flushing his college football career down the toilet,

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Terms Apply. 1980. Blues Brothers comes out June 20th. Airplane comes out July 4th and Caddyshack comes out July 25th. Wow. And I look through because I'm a psycho. I went through every year and tried to figure out, is there anything remotely appropriate approximating that and there just isn't like there's been stretches and you were even involved in one

where it was like an oh seven knocked up and super bad and tropic thunder all came out in the same year but nothing like nothing like this these three like influential where we hadn't had a lot of rewatchable comment is like i remember pineapple express and tropic thunder came out like a week apart or something i remember that like there was a couple there was like and knocked up and yeah knocked up was at the beginning of summer and Superbad was at the end of the summer, but nothing like that where you're like, well, those are three massive comedies that were still,

you know, people still talk about and they were all like within two months. You're like influential ones because I was looking at like the comedy eras and like mid-90s, that was all the sudden we had all those Jim Carrey, Adam Sandler, Chris Farley movies, but they're pretty spread out in the late 90s

had the Farley brothers and American Pie and Austin Powers and multiple Sandler movies and eight. millimeter, which I now consider a comedy. Yeah, machine was arguably the best comedic actor we had. But nothing, the only other, and you were involved in the era that was

like the last, like distinct era, when it was Apatau. It was for, you know, Pineapple Express, it was the hangover, and it just felt like for five years there, we were just firing out these classic comedies. Yeah, bridesmaids. Yeah. And it just kept going

all the way through like, basically, this is the ended neighbors, but, um, but nothing like this stretch of just three movies in a row that became like iconic. Yeah, it's pretty crazy that those are all that close together. And, um, but I, I mean, I will say I've watched those films a lot and, and airplane is the one, nothing gets those other movies, but airplanes is the one I keep going back to because it's just so unique, you know. Yeah. It feels the least dated for some reason. Yeah, it's just, it's like, it's its own thing that you can't. And then Blues Brothers is very funny and it's so like extravagant that movie,

like the car chase scenes. You're just like, they had so much money for a comedy. And cocaine. There was a lot of cocaine decisions. Yeah, a lot of Coke decisions. But, and I mean, Blues Brothers is so funny because of all the shit in that movie, the thing that I, the only thing I hold on to for that movie is Orange Whip.

I mean, my friend, orange whip, orange whip, John Candy. Right. That's like what we say. We'll say that like orange whip. When I'm asking people if they want stuff and then I'm like orange whip, you know. But and then Caddy Shack is so, you know, it was really funny. But I was just as a side, Caddyshack for all the comedy, I mean, again, to what we're talking about. When I watch Caddyshack, there's so many funny people in that movie.

And obviously, they're all amazing. But the person I always think about is Ted Knight in that movie is so fucking. funny because he's not he's not he just feels real he feels like such a do you know what i mean he has that when he's talking to his golf club at the end like oh billy many like it's so funny and weird and he has like all the states of the movie are in his eyes like he's so like his son he fucking hates and like all that i just i think he is so funny in that and and yeah so It's one of my favorite characters of any movie ever, Judge Schmills. It's a tour de force.

It really is. Like, he really, again, because there's something rooted in reality in it, that's very funny to me, you know. Oh, Billy, Billy, Bill, Believe, I was thinking with Airplane, one of the things that's crazy and different than Caddyshack has it, especially if you play golf. But this movie had so many bits that you. just became part of conversation, like in my family, my friends. Like, you had a story about good luck. We're all counting on you that you told me. Yeah.

Yeah, that's what Alec Berg would say. And yeah, or I think it was Alec would say that to me. Or I would say it to Alex. He was like writing, he had some deadline and pull up some scene and you would just keep opening his door. Oh, yeah. I keep opening his door going, good luck. We're all counting on you.

And then I would call him in the middle of the night. I'm going to be like, good luck. We're all going. Just keep it going. But we had that. We had the Shirley must be serious. Stop calling me Shirley. That was a running thing.

Yeah, that's huge. What a big one for my... The other thing is, oh, yes, I had the fish. That was the other thing that we would always say. Like, if it wasn't on the menu, that's the other thing in my family, we'd be like at a, you know, what did you guys have? Oh, I had the burrito. I had taco.

I remember, yeah, I had the fish. Right. You know. A big one in my family. family was the... I had lasagna. Sorry, I fucked it up. I had the lasagna. Yeah, the lasagna.

The people that are sitting next to the Robert Hayes character who are committing suicide because the stories are so long, we've had that as a running joke of my dad's family for 45 years. Because we have a couple of relatives where you're just like, and you see them trapped in the corner and we start looking and like it pulling out the same right sword. And also all those care actors are so good. That old lady is so funny. where, I mean, after she says like, oh, she's lovely, you know, supple, breast,

amazing figure, you know, and all that. But then when he starts talking the way she takes her glasses off, like, oh, no. Like, yeah, I didn't want, oh, this guy's going to continue a story, you know. I like my coffee black like my men. That's lasted 45 years. Yeah, that's huge. Have you ever been in a Turkish prison has just been undefeated? Yeah.

Leon's getting larger, big money. Leon's leaning larger. The fog is getting thicker in Leo. And then it looks like I picked a bad week to quit doing blank. Yes. Or whatever. Yeah, that was always a little. That keeps going forever.

It's like I'll pick the wrong week to stop sniff and glue, whatever you want. And then the other one, my wife and I do, I don't know if this is enough, but anytime I do something, because we've been together since like 1998, if I'm like, yeah, I'm not going to have coffee today. And she's like, hmm, Bill always has coffee. the morning. That's like eternal. I feel like that keeps,

that's going to keep going to keep going. I guess that was based on a commercial. It was. Yeah, it was based on a coffee commercial. Quickly before the categories. So we mentioned all the stuff that they borrowed from,

Paramount bought it, and a big thing was them convincing the studio that they didn't need comedy actors that they wanted to get people like Robert Stack and Leslie Nielsen and all that stuff. And it's funny,

McKay says this in the book, which is a long line to what you just said with Brian Williams, about anytime we had older high status white dudes on the show hosting when they weren't really actors, they were the easiest to write comedy for because they could fall a lot further. And it was so fun to hear them say crazy, crazy things. It's true. I mean, think of when William Shatner says, get a life at the Star Trek convention. Sketch, people still think about that because it was William Shatner going, get a light, like him and you.

It was like, and you were shocked. You're like, oh my God, I've only seen him be Captain Kirk and him actually doing that. I will say incidentally, when I rewatch the movie, the thing that in Kenan Thompson and I would talk about this all the time, I think maybe my favorite part of the movie now when I watch it. There's so many favorite parts. I really like the end of the movie when Robert Stack is talking on the record, and to Robert Hayes and Robert Hayes leaves, and he keeps talking. I mean, yeah, it was a child. childhood was a living hell.

You know, he goes to get kicked in the head with an iron boot. And then he gets in his head, he goes, of course you don't know what that's like, Ted. No one knows. I forget I said it. I don't know why I said that. Like, he's just completely spinning out. And he's like, municipal bond's head. Like that thing was so weird.

And that Robert Stack played it straight. We in Ken Thompson would do that all the time. We'd go kicked in the head, an iron boot. So written directed by the Zucker Brothers and Jimmy Abrahams. The original title was Flying High. And then it was called Kentucky Fried Airplane in the like the script process. They knew they were going to call that. It was a part of the Kentucky Fried Theater.

Yeah. And then they did Kentucky Fried movies. So that's it. Anyway, $3.5 million budget. It made $171 million. It was the fourth biggest movie of 1980. And obviously a massive hit for Paramount. out that help the

Eisner piece. Roger Ebert, our guy three stars, said it was a comedy in the great tradition of high school sits, skits, the Sid Caesar TV show, Mad Magazine, blah, blah, blah. The reason it's funny frequently is because it's sophomore, predictable, corny,

etc., but he liked it. All right, categories. So I tried to narrow down most rewatchable scene. Red zone, white zone argument. Listen, Betty, don't start with your white zone shit again, that whole part. The Jive Guys, boarding the plane.

Yeah. I mean, the Jive guys with June Cleaver's was pretty shocking. Like, it's still like, it just, you don't expect that bit to take that turn that leave it to Beaver's mom's going to show up and be like, I speak, jive. And then I saw on like, Patton sent me this thing that was funny, which was on the making of airplane, like the 25th anniversary or something, they had those two actors who played the jive talking guys,

and they were speaking, you know, obviously like normal people. But underneath it, they subtitled them in jives. So it was like reverse to the movie. I was like, oh, that's funny. So, yeah, and they made up a lot of that stuff. Those two guys, yeah, that's what one of the Zuckers said. they were like, oh, those guys deserve a lot of credit for that because they were just making stuff up.

Yeah, they unleashed at least one of the actors. I think his name was Al White and how to just like, hey, can you write this? Yeah, they just let him out. Yeah. That was so funny. Kareem loved it. I was surprised.

Kareem said I loved the abonic scene because they poked fun at a very real subject without finishing it. Oh, that was funny. When he says, I don't, to the kid, that is very funny. Yeah, I got that one. It's not, because you don't see that.

coming either. So I have Ted's story about meeting Elaine when we're in the disco. There's a stunt woman fight that just keeps going and going. Yeah, two Girl Scouts or something. It makes, yeah, I don't know what it's about, but it's so funny. And that goes right into. And he starts, like, pointing to the knife in his back. And Julie Haggerty thinks it's a dance.

I worked with her once, too, and I asked her about it. And she was like, oh, I go, were you guys laughing a lot on the said of that and she goes well you know how it is no you're kind of like trying to get it right you know and then they go cut and you'd be like oh god i hope that was all right you know and right so there wasn't like oh we're having a hard time keeping it together because the tone was so weird so she's like i had a great time but i just remember trying to like keep my she's like the nicest human being on the planet julie haggerty is and but she was like i was just trying to like make sure i was getting the right tone and everything it was very it was very sweet did you have a

movie where everybody was just laughing on the set the entire time and almost being able to, or is it just serious comedy every time? No, I mean, I mean, super bad we laughed a lot on. I remember super bad. I mean, it's on the DVD. There's a whole scene I couldn't get through because I kept laughing. What scene was it? When I tell my glove and I'm sorry, I blocked your cock. I couldn't get through this line. I just kept laughing. I just could not stop laughing because I didn't realize Christmas class was going to be naked in the scene and like under the covers and we walk on him with this girl. And so just seeing this nerdy guy with, you know, it was just the whole image of him and me as this cop apologizing to him. It just, it just, I was like, guys, I don't think I can do this.

And it went from being funny to then, you know, people like, you know, like, dude, get your shit to get people getting bad at you. Come on, man. Please get it like get it together dude. But that one was a lot of fun. I remember I was laughing a lot on that. A couple more rewatchable scenes. Well, the kid bringing the coffee to the girl when they're both like little kid adults.

Yeah, Republican kids or something. Yeah, I don't know. That just was a fun idea. Captain Over meets Joey and Roger meets Joey too. We get all, we're playing all the hits on this one and then it goes to the Kareem, which I got to say, when I saw this at age 10,

and I knew Kareem as just this guy who had no emotion when he played basketball, just shot the sky hook, had the goggles. He had no feel for him at all. He was the biggest star in the league. And then to see him an airplane that like broke my brain. Because I love basketball. Basketball fan, do you think the kid's dad has a point?

That was what was great about that scene, was that was the rap on him, that he only tried in the playoffs, and that he was on autopilot during the season. The sports, you know, sports, you know, master, what do you think about what Karim set back? Do you think his, like, have your old man, I've been hearing that shit ever since UCLA, have your band, Drad. Do you think that?

I loved it. Well, I was going to talk about this later. The funniest thing with the Kareem thing is it's, we have this category, Apex Mountain. It's literally his Apex Mountain because they just won the 1980 title. He had had the best game of his life in game five where he got hurt. He sprained his ankle. He came back. had this real game.

Oh, so he's like at the top of his. Yeah, and he just finished like this incredible 11-year run, you know, at the top of the mountain, he's playing with magic. He's in L.A., but nobody had a feel for him. And then when he did this, like, I actually think it really helped him from a public standpoint. People are like, oh, Kareem's not an asshole. Oh, he has like a sense of humor about himself.

Yeah. And also, athletes weren't in movies. Like Bernard King was in fast break. Dr. Jay was in Fish that said say Pittsburgh but they weren't in movies like this. There was no real hockey guys and slap shot, right? No.

A little hockey guys in that and then long as... It was just so unconventional. Like by the time... I guess it would be like retired people, right? Right. Yeah, right, yeah. Well, and then you go 35 years later, you did train wreck and LeBron is in it, right?

And at that time, we're used to athletes doing shit like that. But with Kareem, we were not. Yeah. You said LeBron was good, like good, like a good actor though he was really good what i thought was funny about lebron was that jud um you know he he was pitching some kind of things like i remember oh what if you know you go you guys go to it was like bigger kind of set piece stuff like more comedy stuff and um and and

and lebron was more into like the idea that he was cheap he thought was really funny like and that was just the thing i was saying like to him like i had met somebody who was like really famous and like really rich and had a dinner with. I just had a dinner with them. And I was like, and dude, they like, we split the check. It was crazy. It's like one of the most richest people in the world. And we split the check.

And LeBron was like, oh, I should do that. Like that was like he got really excited by that. And he was like, oh, let's do that. You know, which I like, oh, man, he's funny. He's got like a real comedy, you know, brain. And he played it great, you know. Yeah. And then Judd was so.

delighted by that. He was like, oh, he wants to do, oh, that's so awesome. Yeah, he was great. A couple more scenes. The, uh, the, the, the, the playing the song for the sick little girl goes right into Ted's story about living in Africa when they're teaching basketball. Oh, yeah. The soldier ends up killing himself. That all stretch. Uh, my favorite part, we didn't talk about yet, uh, the inflatable pilot getting blown. Oh, yeah, that's the kind of, yeah. When I was 10, that was the height of comedy for me. I just, It felt edgy. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to see it.

Also, the funny thing about that scene is that some of the WGN and TBS, like, my memory is one of them cut it and the other one didn't cut it. And I was like, I wonder if they understood what was happening in that scene or not, you know? I mean, the inflatable head smiles, like the guy smiles so clearly it's like it starts going up and down at one point. It went up and down, like, this was awesome. But, like, yeah. Yeah, like, I remember it got cut and some of them and the other ones that wasn't cut. And I thought that was interesting.

Well, that goes right into the attack golden retriever. And then it goes right into the guy covering himself and gasoline. Oh, yeah. Holding the match. And she's like, hey, Ted, you want to? The guy gives him the nod. Like, please, please go. A couple more quick ones.

The lady who freaks out and everyone lines up to hit her. That was borrowed from one of the airport movies where somebody's freaking out and somebody slaps her and they just decided to take. How funny, like, also, Leslie Nielsen, it's so brutal, he slaps her, and they go, doctor, they need you, and he slaps her one last time. He goes back for another. And you're like, Jesus Christ. It's like so mean. That's still shocking to me when I see it, because it's like you're kind of used to this thing.

Yeah. For no reason. I was like, God damn it, that's awful. The stewardess I speak, Jive. Yeah. Here it is. This is a small one, but Randy breaking down when she's like, I'm 26 and I'm not married, and that other lady comes in, it says, I have a husband.

Classic. And then the landing in the plane has the, I just want to tell you, good luck. We're all counting on you. I quit the wrong week to quit sniff of glue. All that's, it's playing all the hits down the stretch. Oh, yeah, where he says, also there's that weird moment where Lloyd Bridges is talking and that, and he's in that spear for no reason just flies into the and then he goes and if we don't do it this thing will go right down to the ground and then a giant watermelon falls down by the yeah you're like what

is happening they were just throwing jokes at the end they're like I don't know watermelon falls yeah like you know and all right so what's your favorite what's your most rewatchable at that moment with Robert stack where he loses it at the end where he's like municipal bonds ted I just reason I like it because it really, it just, I get logically why those guys did it, but it's an intuitive thing that you realize that this guy who's like so cool just really wants a friend and he's just trying to connect to somebody and that he had a horrible childhood. It's just really funny to me. And no one's on the other end.

It's like, why would anybody? It's just that he picks that time to unload all his shit on film. Ted is very funny. I have inflatable or I have the cockpit, obviously. I mean, the cockpit led to more jokes over the next 30 years just in real life than anything. And especially those, it's just, anyway, what's the most? Oh, I also liked at the time, because my grandmother used to listen to it all the time, was the Ethel Merman. You'll be swell!

Right. Like, it's such a shocking thing that it's actually Ethel Merman. It was very funny. What's the most 1980 thing about this movie? All right, nominees, the second cup of coffee being a parody of a coffee commercial that was in the moment, but nobody would know now. Somebody's saying I haven't felt this awful since I saw the Ronald Reagan film. Or the Anita Bryant concert. Yeah, Anita Bryant concert, Ronald Reagan film, like just some of the pop culture that's in here.

They do a disco's dead joke. They're smoking and non-smoking sections to the airplane. that was yeah that was the my dad and his brothers told me the biggest laugh of the entire movie and the Zucker Brothers told me too is when it's like where Disco lives forever and it takes it hits the thing right

people were so sick of disco he said that thing it like stopped the movie like people were cheering for like the next two scenes because people hated disco so much but that point it was so played out a movie starting with a Jaws parody

the announcer going pinch hitting for Pedro Borbonne, Mini Muta. I have Harry Krishna's in an airport because there's just not people handing out stuff in airports anymore. I think that era is long over. Also, I will say,

I mean, people do cocaine jokes, but the old lady's sniffing the cocaine and the coffee. Yeah. But Anita Bryant concert is pretty, and also just like the look of it, I don't know, for me, I'm always like just the look of like the harsh lighting.

and their shadows and stuff, like very 80s to me. My answer is Kareem. Kareem still with hair, especially when they pull them out the end of the goggles, and it's just like, that's clearly Kareem in 1980. In death,

they just admit it. Yeah, it was Kareem. All right, what's age the best? So, the premise is just pretty good for, a movie. A crew becomes sick with food poisoning and an erotic pilot must safely land the plane full of passengers. This is a good premise. Yeah. Being stuck to next to somebody on a plane

who won't shut up, you just instantly think of airplane. Yeah, totally. If you're like, so where are you flying? And you're like, oh boy, here we go. Oh, no. All the hidden jokes we mentioned earlier that you don't maybe catch the first time, but like, for instance, in the newsstand where it says whacking material. Wacking material is also the idea that every time they cut to the model, you know, the

exterior of the plane, the sound of the plane is that's not what the plane sounds like. It's a propeller. Yeah. It was very funny. The wordplay stuff of like this woman has to be gotten to a hospital, hospital, what is it? It's a big building with patients, but the fact that they just keep

doing that over and over again, but that's not important right now, 19 different things. I thought that the theme music's pretty good. Yeah, it's Elmer Bernstein, right? Yeah, yeah. It's pretty good. I want to throw that in there. And the Zucker brothers, and they're in it. Yeah, Jim Abrams is, he's one of the Harry Krishna's, and then the two Zucker brothers are the ones where, you know,

hey, Tony, yeah, they're the... Oh, yeah, the air traffic guys. The air traffic guys, like, where it's over there. Yeah, that's his own. So, Leslie Nielsen, being a comedy actor, has aged the best since this unleashed him into three naked gun movies and police squad and all kinds of different things. And then I think the Air Israel joke is really underrated. I can't believe they did that at the moment, but I think they felt like they could get away with that because it was Jewish. But it was just like it's so stuck in where there's a plane and it's got like a beard on the bottom.

Oh, yeah, yeah. It looks like a rabbi. Yeah. The famous Jewish sports legends pamphlet is funny. Yeah, very small. Yeah, light reading material. And then I got to say, I'm throwing her in her, Lorna Patterson.

I've had a crush on her for like 45 years. I don't know how she is now, but she's great in this movie. And she had a great voice and home run all the way around. Any other would stage the best for you? I know. Just the things we've been talking about earlier. but just like it's its own thing it's like i can't describe it's like you can't it's like it's a one-on

it's a one oh yeah it's like you can't i don't really know what else you can really compare it to you know um zipping through some quick categories the big cahuna burger award for best use of food and drink has to be the poison fish oh yeah the poison fish and the whole reaction him talking about it and him puky yeah peter graves is very good in that scene where he has to do all the symptoms We have a great shot Gordo Award for the most cinematic shot named after Gordon Willis. The water nailing them on the beach when they get covered in seaweed. Pretty good. Yeah, it's pretty great.

Yeah, that's a good shot. I also like, there's a, the shot where they're in the cockpit and the one he's telling them, you know, you have to land the plane and everything. But the light is very, it's all very dark. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's good. And everything, it's very, like the lighting and the cockpit suddenly changes. It's a horror movie. It's very funny.

Kid Cuddy Pursuit a Happiness Award for Best Needle Drop. This has to be the BGs. Sped Up BGs and the Disco. Yeah, yeah. Chess Rockwell and Brocklanders are word for best character name. Ted Stryker is really good unless there's one you like more. Yeah, Ted Stryker is, yeah, and you hear it so many times throughout the movie, too, and it's always funny. And Leon, I don't know what Leon's last name is, but I like that that guy's name is Leon.

Poor and Leon. And then we don't get to give this out all the time, but the Sean Penn, I brought my own PAC Award for Excellence in On Screen Smoking. Stack and Bridges are simultaneously just heat and darts and just look like it is not the first time. No, that seems like they're just, yeah, they were smoking off camera and they just were like,

well, I'm not going to be out. Yeah. All right. The Butch's Girlfriend Award for Weeklink of the film. I have one unless you want to go first. So we never say this on the rewatchables. We always are

mad that the movie's too long. This movie's like five minutes too short. I could have gone a little further. I like it that it's so short. I like that they just are in, they leave you wanting more, you know? I had some ideas. I could add one more scene with the job guys. I could

have had Stephen Stucker who is trying to steal the second half the movie in the first half of the movie maybe for 20 seconds yeah i could have done one more round with the kids acting like adults and then there's nothing with the airplane bathroom that just seems like there could have been a scene in the bathroom something you got the mom their mom that's the zucker brother's mom's lady putting on the yeah the makeup and everything i mean i i mean yeah i don't want to see more about the relationship of the the guy's wife and the horse i don't really know that I like just knowing what we know.

That's pretty good. Because this movie's like 80 minutes. Wait, Craig, Craig, you're on this, right? You're listening? Yeah, I think it's 88 minutes. Craig's the shepherd of this movie is too long. So was this movie the right length for you, Craig? Or could you have gone five more minutes?

I mean, if we're picking five minutes, sure. But I like that you keep people wanting more. I like it wanting more. Yeah, most movies, especially now, I'm always like, How the heck was that so long, you know? Oh, it's like I guaranteed two plus hours now, anything you go to. I've been in movies where like you're at the premiere and they're like, all right, the movie is two hours and 45 minutes and we're in it and the whole cast goes, what?

That was the second it movie was really long. Yeah, second it movie is that was it. We were at the premiere and they were like, yeah, so this movie is like over three hour or something. And it was really funny. The whole cast, we're all sitting in one row. the premiere. We all went, what? How long we all looked at the director and he was laughing and, like, put his head down? We're like, why is it so fucking long? What did you guys?

Keep everything? Then afterwards, be like, it was that long, but you cut the scene where we did the, you know? He can't wait. Somehow we still didn't make, you know, the cut in some way. It was very funny. I only have a couple what stage is the worst, but we'll do them right after the break. The playoffs are here, and you can predict the action all the way to the finals with Fandul predicts follow all the playoff dishes swishes wishes wishes and misses predict the spread the total points and even the game winner sign up for fanduel predicts and predict it from the couch offered by

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Grand Rapids invites you to find a rhythm all your own. Season after season in Pure Michigan. find your season at experience gr.com. What's age the worst? So Robert Stack was offered an extra 20K or a percentage of the movie, and he took the 20K. And he's been mad about it ever since, just kicking himself because the movie made almost $200 million.

Tough one. Yeah, it's a tough one. The jive scene when they dub it in other languages has caused complete chaos. And they said, when they do it in Germany, they use a thick Bavarian dialect. That sounds amazing. Oh, wow. Yes, I don't know how that translates in French, Portuguese, whatever.

And then the shock impact of Kareem being in this, we mentioned earlier, which now in 2025, but it really was shocking to see him in this. Now as the years past, that's kind of faded. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, but I'm sure that was like, yeah, you couldn't believe it, how shocking that was at the time. I mean, and it's funny for me because I was so young. I probably knew him from this first and before. Yeah.

You know, it was like later. I was like, oh, Skyhook. Oh, that's the guy from Airplane. Right. The only other one I have you mentioned already, which is when Leslie Nielsen goes in for that second smack. Yeah, when he hits that lady again, it's so shocked. It's like, I'm laughing because it's just like, Jesus Christ, it's so horrible. Yeah, I don't know if that's happening in 2025.

Yeah, I don't think that's good. Also, I mean, there's also like, I don't know about all the African guys in the basketball is the other one. That doesn't, I mean, when I watched that with my kids, they were kind of quiet during that scene. They were like, I don't know about this. I mean, that was a moment in any more. movie I watched. My kids always had to be like, it was the 80s. You know, like, watching Back to the Future. And when, like, Martin McFly's dad's, like, up in a tree, like, watching girls undress. And my kid was like, he was a pervert. And I'm

like, no, no, no, you're going to want to see him win at the end of the movie. Yeah. Just trust me. Just trust me. She's like, fuck this guy. I'm not watching this. Like, this guy, that's disgusting. Fuck this, dude. Yeah. It's, it's the 80s is a great excuse for a lot of behavior. It was the 80s. It was the 80s. It was all made by white guys for white guys. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

But yeah, they lasted through this one, but some of them, like, back to the future. And some of the other ones, they were like, no, we're not into this. The CR thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison Ford Award for the hottest take. I'm going to throw this one at you. I think Lorna Patterson should have been a bigger star. I don't really get it because she was in this and then Private Benjamin

which was the TV version of it and she was on that for three years and it never kind of happened and then that was it every guy that I knew had a crush on her in this movie but it was a hard time though at that time

for actresses well they didn't have there wasn't that whole rom-com infrastructure yet that doesn't have to the late 80s but I think if she's 10 years later now there's like different types of things for it because she would have been good in a rom-com yeah yeah yeah she was really good in this i mean everybody across the board

i mean when i'm just thinking about the performances there's not i don't know everybody's so funny in it i mean well this has more casting what-ifs than any movie we've had in a while including we mentioned ted striker was written for david letterman yeah and then he couldn't even david letterman yeah yeah He couldn't pull it off. The studio pushed Barry Manilow at one point. But David Letterman, you can go on YouTube and he has the Zucker brothers and Abrams on late night. Yeah, the early 80s.

And they show his audition on that. It's really, yeah, you could see the what if. Like, that's what the movie would have been if it was Letterman. Yeah, the scene is him in the hospital as Ted Stryker. Yeah, he spits the water. Yeah, that, you know. I love Letterman. George Zipp.

George Zipp's another good name. Sorry. Oh, that was a good one. Yeah, yeah. I'm glad Letterman's not in this movie, because I think as the years pass, it makes it weird. He kind of overpowers it.

I don't think he should have been either. I think it's great as Robert Hayes and Julie Haggner. It's like, I just think the casting across the board's like perfect. I can't imagine anybody else. Fred Willard said that he was offered the role of Ted Strecker and didn't really understand the script and turned it down. Yeah. Tim Matheson was offered Ted Stracker,

but was filming 1941. And then they said, Bruce Jenner at the time an Olympic gold medalist and trying to get into acting audition for Ted did not get it. Wow. Now, Caleb Jenner. Yeah. I mean, Robert Hayes is

just the one for me. I just think because he plays it straight. And he's not trying it off. He seems like if they were making that movie now, like if they're making an honest version of like Paramount was like, hey, we want to do a straight remake of Zero Hour. Those are the two people they would cast

as the lead. No question. You know? It works. Elaine's part was auditioned for by Sigourney Weaver and Shelley Long. Wow. Went to Julie Haggerty, and Shelley Long had a quote where she's like, I thought I had it. It was like one of those. Like, she's kind of surprised she didn't get it.

That's a terrible feeling. I know that feeling. What's your number one I thought I had it movie? I don't want to say what it is. But yeah, there's been a couple where... Tell me after the podcast. I'll think after the podcast, but there's been a couple where they're like, do they love you, get rid of it?

ready. I mean, I've had the whole thing where I do the, you know, the wardrobe fitting, everything, and then they give you a call and go, oh, dude, someone so-and-so read the script and they're a bigger name, sorry, you know. Or you just lose it. I will say forever, when I would audition, I could put money on it that Adam Scott was reading for the same thing. This is like 20 years ago. Oh, interesting. I would walk into a room and he'd be walking out and we both just start laughing. I'm like, of course. I was like, God damn it, Adam read for this. There's no way I'm going to get this. You know, he's so good.

But, yeah, a lot of actors, you usually have that person that's always reading the same thing you are. Dr. Rumac, Leslie Nilsson's character. Turned down by Dom DeLuiz, Christopher Lee, Vincent Price, and Jack Webb from Dragnet. And please. Christopher Lee and Vincent Price both said it was the biggest mistake of their career. Oh, yeah.

That'd be pretty amazing. It's got to be Leslie Nielsen, though. just too. I agree. He's just perfect. Every line, everything he does, even the weird egg thing, like he does. And when he cracks the egg and the bird flies out, he does that like almost like karate chop hand where he's like, it, it's unbelievable. Like he's so good. Vincent Price does not, I don't see that one. It just makes it a different movie. It just makes it a different thing, you know. And he would be doing campy, funny stuff by then, you know, for years. So it's got to be Leslie Nielsen.

Well, this would have made a different movie, too. They wanted Pete Rose for Roger Murdoch, but it was during baseball season and he couldn't do it. So they got Kareem. Pete Rose. There's somewhere, I think, in that book where they have the script pages for Pete Rose. I think it's in that airplane book where they have the scene that they wrote for Pete Rose. That would have been interesting. Well, it turned out to be Kareem.

And then Jive Lady Translator was supposed to be Harriet Nelson from Ozzy and Harriet. She turned it down. They went to June Cleaver. And then this made me laugh too. Peter Graves said no because he thought the script was tasteless. But then they talked them into it. And he still didn't really understand the cockpit stuff. And they told them later on in the movie, we're going to explain it.

But they never did. And she's kind of rope-a-doped them. him to get him to sail the lines. Yeah, they told me Jerry was usually the person that had to talk to the actors. Yeah. Jucker was the one that was really good at explaining what they wanted and that and that they had it. The thing I always say is that they had explained to Robert Stack like, remember the

thing of Robert Stacks like it's his ball game now. He's the big cheese, the head honcho, the blah, blah, blah. He goes, you know, it's like what you do and, like he was doing it wrong. And Jerry Zucker was like, no, you know, it's like when you did, you know, this scene from this movie you did. And he goes, I had to do Robert Stack to Robert Stack to get him to be Robert Stack. He goes, no, no, no, it's that. Da-da.

It's a, you look at the list. You do that a lot in your stuff, you know. And he didn't get it. And then he nailed it. They loved it. You probably had moments like that on SNO with different actors, right? Sometimes. Yeah, yeah, where you're like, hey, so I was wondering.

My thing I always had to do is I would have to do an impression of somebody to them. I had to go in like John Malchovich or Christopher Walken or Robert De Niro would have to go into their dressing room and say, hey, I'm doing you in the sketch. You know, so I just want to do it. So we're not just out there. I hope you're okay with this, you know, and I would do the, that was very weird. Because you were worried that if you did it out there, it would throw them off or something? Yeah, throw them off. Like, well, it's just like I just felt like that was a respectful thing to do instead of like in front of a ton of people and like not like on the,

live show is when we're doing rehearsal, like in front of a bunch of people, like, surprise them by doing them. Yeah. Sometimes you would do an impression of people and they didn't appreciate it, even if, you know, it was like not bad. You know, I would have people, you know, stop ahead and like that or whatever. Not a lot, but it happened a couple of times. So with those guys, I respect them so much. I was like, hey, do you want to hear it or whatever? And they go, yeah, yeah, what is it?

And so you would like to Christopher Walken. Christopher Walken was like, oh, everybody does me. Don't worry about it. I had to do Malcovich to Malcovich, and he was so sweet about it. He was like, oh, that's good, that's good. You know, like, it was very nice. Not many people have gotten mad. Like, I remember Mark Wahlberg got mad at the India Sandberg.

Mark Wahlberg got mad, and he got really upset at that. Yeah, he got really... He had to, like, come on the next week to get his turf back. He came on the... He was at the show that Sarah Palin was at, which was like the most watched show. My time there was the most watched show of the... Yeah.

Like in the history of the show or something. But yeah, I remember that was weird. Yeah, he was really upset. I think that was probably of all the impressions I saw. And I don't know. I don't think Palin liked Tina's Palin, which made sense. But my stuff was always like I would go to a restaurant and the person would be there. You know?

Right. They'd come over and be like, I didn't like that or whatever. and you're like, oh, sorry. Oh, somebody would say that to you? Yeah, that happened twice. Oh, Jesus. But it wasn't. And then usually it's fine.

I would say 98% of the time it's totally fine, you know? And Elliot Spitzer, I saw him, and I like kind of, it was at this event, and I kind of froze. Like, oh, my God, Elliot Spitzer, and he immediately went, I'm not mad at you. He gave me a hug. And then just about three months ago, I finally. I met Pacino and I bet Al Pacino and he came up and he was like oh my god that was I never got a chance to meet you that was great like he was oh that's good he was so sweet like it was crazy I was so starstruck I was like oh my god I called him sir sir thank you so nice meeting you sir like I was just like holy shit you know you ran into Ted Levine and Ted Levine was furious about Buffalo Bill that's been ruining my life I don't I don't talk like that why'd you do that? You're acting like a big, great, fat person.

No, no, yeah, but yeah, it is very rare that that happens. Next category is Best That Guy Award, and this movie's filled with that guys, but I wanted to shout out, that guy from Breaking Bad is working air traffic controller who ended up having like an awesome career. One of the best line, Mike from Breaking Bad. Jonathan Brooks. Jonathan Brooks. No, sorry, Jonathan Banks.

Jonathan Banks, yeah. Jonathan Banks from... Also in Midnight Run. He's been in a lot of good stuff. He's going from like, what, 8,000 feet to 200,000 feet? What an asshole. And then he's great.

And then the guy who gets sick, who's married to the lady who was like, Jim never has a cup of coffee. He's the dad on Parker Lewis can't lose, right? He's the dad in risky business. Oh, that's right. He's a dad in two years. Joel.

He was the chancellor in 902 and O. He was in there for 20 years. He was not on Parker Lewis. Can't lose. Take that back. He was risky business, better. Risky business. That's way better.

I'm thinking of another guy. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. He was in risky business. And that's, yeah. Joel. So he's our winner. You notice something, Joel?

Yeah. Dion Waiter's Award for the best heat check in the movie. Our nominees are Ethel Merman. Yeah. Kareem, the Jive guys, Lloyd Bridges, or Stephen Stucker. I think Stephen Stucker is just... I think he wins it. And Stephen Stucker wins it because he comes out of nowhere and just he does.

He just owns the movie. He starts just stealing scenes out of nowhere. And you could tell, like, he was in there, he was in the Kentucky Fright Theater with those guys. And he's in Kentucky Fried movie. He's really funny. He's a stenographer in this one sketch. and a courtroom sketch. And you can just tell they just loved him.

And they're just like, yeah, do whatever you want. Yeah, go nuts. And he's on, I mean, for what is arguably one of the funniest movies ever made, he steals one of the funniest movies ever made. Yeah. I think he's one of like the, like, what could have been. He died unfortunately really young and he could have been like massive, that guy. He was so funny.

Recasting Couching, Director, City. I'm going to give you this one as a thought experiment. One more character on the plane, a famous actress, and it's Linda Carter. We just get Linda Carter in an airplane for no reason, just for 90 extra seconds. Maybe there's an autograph thing. Maybe she sits next to Ted and kills herself,

dressed as Wonder Woman. I don't know, something, just some sort of era-specific. Oh, era-specific. Oh, era-specific. Yeah, like Cheryl Lad, Linda Carter, somebody from that era. Wasn't that usually the part for like, you know, it was always like a famous actress. Yeah.

And then she has like an assistant who's like. Yeah. Yeah. We needed some famous thing. All right. Some half S internet research. The Red Zone wide zone scene, they hired the real life married couple who had recorded the announcement tapes at LAX

and just had them do it because they couldn't find better actors. Perfectly normal thing. I mean, you want me to get an abortion. Right. Jesus crazy. Robert Hayes said the dais were so funny that the studio had to add a second screening room for the daisys

because so many people wanted to come to see the dais sweet. That's sweet. This was Ethel Merman's final acting role before she died in 1984 at age 76. You mentioned Elmer Bernstein. He did the scores for Ten Commandments, Magnificent Seven, to kill a Mockingbird, and the Great Escape.

And they went to him and they were like, can you do a goofy version? of what you were normal? And he just immediately understood what they wanted and banged it out. Elmer Bernstein was the first famous person I ever saw in L.A. like the day I moved to Los Angeles, my friend and I... Did you recognize him? So the way we know, we went to

this restaurant with his like... So my friend, his cousin worked at Universal. It was like one of those things. Like you moved to L.A. and it's like, I have my roommate's cousin works at Universal. So like that's in to get jobs or whatever. And we went to this restaurant and it was like the nicest restaurant I had ever been in and we were just eating and this guy that was playing the piano and this older gentleman walked over and starts talking to

him and the guy at the piano goes get out of here and he goes no and he takes out his driver's license and it was over over Bernstein and the good piano player went ladies gentlemen is elmer burnstein and he sat down at the piano and went bun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun Oh, my God. They started doing, and I was like, this is what Hollywood is. People just sit out. Like, I had never, and by the way, I'd never seen anything like that since, but he just sat down and, like, he showed the guy's ID and then played stuff.

And the piano player was like, dude, you're the man. Like, yeah. You know what that sounded like in the basketball podcast? They always ask, like, La Mello Ball, be the guest. They'll be like, what was your welcome to the NBA moment? And it would be like, oh, I was playing LeBron dunked on me. that was like your welcome to Hollywood moment. Yeah, it was my welcome.

Being at a restaurant with Elmer Bernstein playing the piano. He just went over and started playing a, oh no, it was, uh, dun, dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun

yeah. Unbelievable. Yeah. Bum, bum bum bum bum, um, hey one other research thing. The cream was in there

because in zero hour they used Elroy crazy legs Hirsch was one of the three pilots who is this famous who had received. in the 50s. He was like the Amon St. Ross St. Brown of the

mid-50s. And so that's why they did that. They wanted to do that. And then... Crazy legs. Al White was one of the jive guys. They asked him to write the drive. And he went and got a couple of books.

One was on Black English by J.O. Dillard. The other was on another one on Black Language. And he basically created the sentences and just showed them to the Zuckerers and Abrams. They were like, okay, cool, man, do your thing. And he wrote Barbara Billings' stuff as well. Oh, my God. So, and then this made me laugh for some reason.

Jim Abrams said that one joke was cut from the opening montage in the airport. A very attractive woman was walking through the airport. Suddenly she turned and hawked a lugie on the wall. And in the screenings, nobody laughed, so they took it out. But they thought it was like the funniest thing ever. Sounds like they should have put that back. back in. All right.

Apex Mountain, which I wouldn't even bother to explain to. Basically, is this the peak of somebody's career? Robert Hayes. So he's on Angie at the same time on ABC. Yeah. I'm going to say yes. Julie Haggerty, it's probably the Albert Brooks movie, right? Modern problems.

Yeah, or lost in America. And yeah. Her losing all the money and lost in America is like, lost in America, yeah. That's like, she's so good in it. movie. The Zucker's and Abraham's as a as a combo

probably naked gun, just because now they had that police squad and airplane under their belt. And I feel like, yeah, I mean, naked gun is pretty amazing. But to me, this one is the one that's like, well, when do you think they had their most juice

to do whatever they want to? Because that's kind of the category. Yeah, I see. But I mean, airplane, it's hard for me because for me, airplane and naked gun are very, it's like it's like the two yeah you're right it might be air it's like I can't it's like I can't say one's better than the other because they're both so special but

I definitely think this one I don't you do a movie that kind of like changes the thing like you look at comedy differently it's kind of hard to yeah that's fair how about how about a spoof movies did we peek with this one was this the best one we've ever made I don't know it's pretty amazing

I mean, airplane's great, naked guns, great. I mean, I really, you know, young Frankenstein when I was a kid, I thought that, I mean, I wrote that movie. I'd vote for airplane. Steven Stucker, yes. Kareem, we covered, yes. Lorna Patterson, unfortunately, yes. Unexpected movie nudity in an 80s movie. Oh, it was just a breast that come across.

I was almost thinking like this summer, yeah, we have the, the, uh, All of a sudden we have bouncing breasts. We have in Caddyshack, they sneak in a couple. And then the shining. Yeah, shining, yeah. Caddyshack, though, it's like they actually tried to make it like a real love scene with my clip. Right, like a raunchy, sexy. Like an actual, like, it was like dissolves and the movie and everything.

But this was almost like, okay, here's a pair of tits because we have to have a pair of tits in the movie. It's so gratuitous and stupid. Yeah. Also, what I like about that is like it comes across, it makes no sense. There's no sense for it to be in the movie. And then it cuts those two guys sword fighting, like two packages are sword fighting. And it's just kind of like, everything gets crazy.

It's like, all right, here's the action. Here's everything you guys want. Right. It's like, it makes no sense. So, yeah, I like it. Yeah. Inflatable pilots, definitely. I have a section on that later.

Bridges and cult, no. And then the last one, lovable lanes. The nominees would be Elaine Benes and Seinfeld or Elaine in this movie. I still my heart's with Elaine and Airplane. Yeah, which is pretty great. All right. Yeah.

Okay. Next category. Cruise or Hanks? You could have either of them in this movie in any role at any point in their life. I mean, Cruz just because if he, if Cruz played, because Tom Hanks did so much comedy and everything and he can do everything. Cruz being really like serious cruise would be pretty. funny. Yeah, initially I thought Hank says Ted

Stryker, that's no-brainer. Like, early mid-80s, Hank's, he's just playing it straight. There's something so kind of funny about him, but yeah, it's like, yeah, it's maybe, but I like... No, you're right. The answer's Cruz in like the Robert Robert Stack part. Yeah, like one of those. Aze's a

thunder era cruise and something would be really funny in this, you know, it's just a whole, it's all there. How about Scorsese or Spielberg? Only one of them can direct this, yeah, just one. You have to pick. I don't know, man, that's a tough one.

I mean, they both would make, I mean, part of what's so great about it is that it looks janky, you know, it's got to be, you know. I mean, the thing is, like, when they both have done comedies, like, you know, it's like Spielberg when he does 1941, it's so fun, but it's so bombastic, you know, so crazy. I pick Spielberg because it's. And if Scorsesey did it, there would be some sort of Catholicism thing, you know, or whatever. I don't know. Yeah, Spielberg, I guess. Yeah, if I had to pick one, Spielberg. Yeah, I said Spielberg, because he'd kind of done this in 1941, you know, and he could have blown out.

All right. So normally this next category is what role would Philip Seymour Hoffman have played? I have to flip it because you're on here. What role would you have wanted to play? If time machine, you could go backwards. Oh. And play any role in the movie at any point in your career. What do you pick?

I mean, I would love to be Lloyd Bridges in the movie because I just think he just, I just like him just and that you get to play this guy who's like, he starts out calm and then you watch him just slowly go crazy. That's very fun to do, you know, where he starts off like he's really got it together and he's the guy in charge. And then he just, by the end of it, he's hanging it's upside down, snorting glue and stuff. That would be really fun. I got to say, Lloyd Bridges. I, in hot shots,

he is very underrated in hot shots. He's so funny in that movie. I got to say, I'm shocked. I thought you were going to do a different, have a different choice. I thought for sure you would have been Peter Graves. Oh,

no, no. Peter Graves is great and Leslie Nielsen is great, but I just like Lloyd Bridges. I thought you would have wanted to be in the cockpit and just rattling off lines like, no, would you have been in a Turkish prison,

get to hang out with Kareem? I got to do so many Here's the thing I've done things where you're in a cockpit before It gets old fast Where you're like This is claustrophobic

Can I go to the bathroom And I don't know You can't go anywhere You know In the newsroom You get to hang out You get to like You get to like

You know All that But it really is just That character Really goes off the rails He gets to jump out of window You know Like he really goes nuts

And that's really funny All right Pickin Nets So Ted fought in World War II, Korea. What war was he in? And he's like 27, but it's 1980? Was it supposed to be Vietnam? What's happening?

And all the flashbacks are from World War II, but also during the inventions of planes. I forget what the thing was. But then remember when he says, like, they're attacking their flanks and blah, blah, blah. She was like, oh, when are you leaving? He goes, I can't tell you that's classified after he's told her the entire mission. But I forget what the mission is. I think it's war. It's supposed to be World War II, I think.

So the little girl in the singing scene, and they knock out the tubes, and she immediately starts convulsing, that probably should have been just an oxygen mask, right? Yeah. Why would she start convulsing? Because the tube got, like, what was being fed into her body? I don't know, but I think visually it's nice to see that thing go and like,

and then you want to see her face making those faces. Right. Because Jim Ascon, you can't see her face. And it's kind of probably more disturbing. Yeah. You get to see her do a silly face. Because I'm sure, I'm just guessing. But it's like, all right, we're doing a bit.

And the joke is that a kid does? Like, we got to make sure it's silly. Yeah. And let her do that stupid, like, stupid. This is why we call it picking this. You know? That's why, yeah. Would it the poison fish have made people throw up?

or have diarrhea. Like, one of them better, like, it seemed like that it was almost like all the pastures were roofied by the fish. But I think in real life, it's just like, I think the bathroom is just getting annihilated. Yeah, yeah, it would just be throwing up or sick, but it wouldn't be passing out. And yeah, wouldn't be like, ah, I don't feel good. Yeah, yeah. Just like us.

And it wouldn't have happened that fast either, I think. No. And then where did they put all the sick people? Wasn't a giant plane. I was, I was, I was, I was, I was, I, I was a kid. When I was a kid. I honestly thought they were throwing them out of the plane. When I was a kid, I was like, oh, my God, they just threw Kareem out of the plane into, like, the ocean.

Yeah. Oh, I also like the scene when Robert Sackos, all right. All right. So we're going to show you everybody. Okay, so Ted, have you ever flown, you know, this kind of plane before? And he goes, no. And he goes, Jesus, crap. We're fucked.

Just route him into Lake Michigan. Better than killing a bunch of innocent people. Like, there's been this buildup that Robert stacks the guy who can save the day and out of the gate. He's like, fuck it. This isn't. Right. Sequel, prequel, prestige TV, all blackcast are untouchable. So they did make a sequel.

I like the sequel. I'm in the, I know different people made it, but I think the sequel, even though they're running back a lot of the bits, I think it has some funny moments. Yeah. I think I ever saw the sequel. I think I kind of stayed away from it because I like the original so much. Yeah, it's not bad. And I think I was so. kind of like, oh, did the original people

have something to do with it? And if they didn't, I was like... You had real honor, even as a little kid. Yeah, even as a kid, I was like an insufferable movie geek. They had, they reenacted the slapping scene, but it was with somebody who's like, I can't believe I'm going to die a virgin.

Oh. And then it was just the same line of guys, but so there was a couple of, like, the job guys were in it. Space. Yeah, they're going to space. All right. The cockpit guys back. That was the funniest part an airplane too is the guy the little kid brings the dog in

scraps. And Peter Graves is like, do you like when scraps rubs up and down your leg? And he does that. They took it up a notch. Next category. Is this movie better with Wayne Jenkins, Danny Trao, Mad Dog, Rousseau, Doris Burke, Buffalo

Bill, Sam Jackson, Nell, Byron Mayo, Tony Romo, Chris Collinsworth, Daniel Plainview, Long Legs, or Wilford Brimley and the firm? I think Buffalo Bill would have been nice. Chris Collinsworth. Chris Collinsworth, you want to do that one? Chris Collinsworth being like, I had the fish, you know.

Oh, man, I had the fish and it's making me sick. Oh, that's making me real sick. Oh, man. Oh, God. Just one Oscar, who gets it. The writing? Yeah. I mean, I don't know.

The writing's pretty great. and I would I mean I would have Leslie Nielsen up there as like a supporting actor yeah he's so well as you know they don't respect comedy in the Oscars they don't care that was when I first was like I don't know about these Oscars

when I was a kid because I assumed when I was nine after I saw planes trains and automobiles that John Candy was going to win an Oscar I was like oh he's going to win an Oscar I laugh super hard and at the end He made you cry. He's going to win an Oscar, you know?

And then I saw it, and I was like, what the hell is this? Yeah. Yeah, and it was Sean Connery for the Untouchables. And I remember, like, looking at my dad, and I was like, John, John Candy wasn't even nominated? And my dad's like, no, and I go, why? And he goes, and he said, it was in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1987, he was like, they don't like comedies. Yeah. Like, he just knew it.

Like, okay. Yeah. Still the case. Yeah, still the case. probably in answerable questions. So did planes actually have inflatable pilots in 1980 or they make that up? I think they made that. I think,

I'm assuming they made that up, but I don't know. Because I would also believe it. If it was like, no, they tried it. Or maybe they tried it. And then,

yeah, too many people were giving it blow jobs. And they had to. That was it. This is a great one. This question actually is unanswerable. The nude scene that we mentioned, earlier, the topless scene.

Nobody knows who the actress was. And this actress who was like a playmate and a soft core porn person named Kittenatidad claimed to have done it. But then on the internet, you can find people debunking this and talking about her body type and breast

size. It definitely wasn't her. And it's just this mystery who did this. And I could not, I actually was like, I'm going to fucking find out who, and I couldn't find it. So we'll never know. I think it's best left done left to the imagination. Can imagine if it was like somebody's grandmother

and she's like, hey, did you ever see the movie, Airplane? Yeah, it's like this weird secret she's holding on to. 45 years. Like the people who killed Jimmy Hoffa? Just like, oh, you all watching an airplane in there? Why don't you want to watch this, Grandma? Oh, it's all right.

Like, that's putting you through school. You don't know it. What piece of memorabilia would you want or not want from this movie, if you could take anything? I would like the model of the plane, like the one that they're using any time it cuts to the exterior.

That's a good answer. I would like that. I think that'd be fun. I wanted the automatic pilot, Auto. Yeah. But apparently they said it was in Jerry Zucker's garage for years, and it disintegrated. And they didn't realize it just became like rubber dust.

So it's just auto's gone, and they only had one version of it. Coach Finstock Award for Best Life Lesson. I would say just don't forget to zag when you're making a movie. These guys zagged on playing actors, playing it straight over doing comedies. Yeah, they just kind of stuck to their instincts, you know? And the fact that they just stuck to the instincts and made something new. And you see that like now, like you see someone like Nathan Fielder or Tim Robinson.

Like those are guys that when I look at their stuff, I'm like, oh, man, they are just making what they find funny. It's like they can't help it. Right. Stuff come out that way, you know, and that, and I always, I always find those things really inspiring. Best double feature choice? You'd go naked gun. Yeah, I think airplane gun. Yeah.

Yeah. That's, I mean, that might be just too much because if you're laughing so much during airplane and then you try to do another one. Or maybe it's zero hour in an airplane. Yeah, it's zero hour and then airplane might be really fun, you know, to do that. All right. Who won the movie? I'm going to, I mean, Steve stuck. I just love him so much in the movie, but Leslie Nielsen or him, I would say that.

I would thought I was going to say the Zucker's and Jim, but I actually, because I think they did win in a lot of ways because then it parlayed it into a bunch of other things. Totally. But I think it's Leslie Nielsen. Yeah. Because it completely changed his career and then he ended up getting another 20 years out of doing this too, but I'm happy that people got to see Steve Stucker like what that dude was. Right. And I think I just have heard other things about him where people are like, do you have no idea how funny that guy was, like seeing him live and doing sketches and shit.

Like he was somebody that, you know, when you meet other people and so it's so great that you have a record of like, oh, that guy was, look. how funny that dude was. We got to bring in, I was bringing producer Craig at the end for his take, especially when it gets to movies from the 80s. It gets super exciting. Craig, you have to join the Zoom. There he is.

I actually have seen this movie many times. This is a movie that my dad showed me growing up that I just adore. Because I grew up, you know, I grew up in like basically the early 2000s was when I was starting to watch comedy movies. So I was kind of around like the last great era of comedy movies. And so I was still trained to like love comedy movies and it was something that I was

still seeking out. So this movie's awesome. I mean, this and naked gun just the, the jokes per million jokes per minute style is something that like the hard joke style is something that is completely gone now. And I love it. I just love it. Yeah. It's so good. That's true. Yeah. I mean, yeah, it's fine because Woody Allen did stuff for like love and death. There's a Woody Allen movie called Love and Death that is really silly. Like he did those silly movies and he would cast people that weren't comedians in like smaller roles, but he was always the lead of it. So you're always kind of like, okay, there's Woody Allen being Woody Allen or whatever.

Yeah. But they were silly movies. But this one is the one where like, yeah, they changed the whole, it changes the whole game. And like what you're saying, Craig, like hard jokes, you know. It was like, yeah. You see it on TV, you know. You can still watch South Park and see, like, them do jokes, you know? Yeah, or even, like, VEEP had a lot of just, like, hard jokes.

Yeah, totally. But it's going away now. And I don't know. It's, you know, Paramount, all these major studios taking risks on these movies. It's just great. You know, I think the idea now is that you need a movie to appeal to everybody. And they won't make it unless they think it can appeal to everybody. But I almost think you should go the other way.

And if it is, comedies are coming back. I hope so. I feel like it's going to happen. Well, it's also, like what you're saying, Craig, too, is like, it used to be, you know, I'm sure if you go through how many movies were made in the 80s and I remember when I was, like, late 2000s when I was going out and, like, you know, meeting on movies and stuff, there was so many things getting made. It was like, you know, and now it's just kind of like, I mean, this is like,

it's like, we're going to put all our eggs in like these four baskets. And so they have to work. Right. And if they don't work, we are so fucked. You know, so there's so much pressure and everything on those movies working. And it's like, you know, when I worked at a movie theater in the late 90s, you go like, oh, there's like indie movies next to like Armageddon. And then, you know, this movie, there's such a variety of it.

And now you have that on like a streaming service. And now I watch my kids and it's like so overwhelming. There's like a mile of those choices, you know? So it's just a different, it's a different world right now. But I hope, I do hope that it was such a nice thing going and seeing that naked gun movie and taking my kids and people laughing on the theater and how weird that was to be like, oh, I haven't heard people laugh in the theater like this in a long time. I also just, I respect that paramount.

Like this movie, you guys are talking about how it feels low budget and it is low budget. But it also makes the movie better. Like there are, there's a, is it? Is this his name Robert Stack? Is that the actor's? Yeah, yeah. When he's walking through fighting everybody, as they try to, like, pin flowers on him

and give him clothes in the airport, you can see boom mics and you can see the pads on the ground that he's, like, flipping people onto. But it's okay, and they understand it's silly and it plays into it. To me, that's just something that would never fly now, and I really respect it back then. Oh, yeah, there's just people want their,

it's just hard, yeah, because I get, on the other end of it is you hire these technicians to be in the movie, and they want their stuff to be good. You know, and to be good, it costs money. So you have like a DP that's like, you can't go to your cinematographer and be like, hey, can we make you look kind of shitty?

He's like, no, my name's going to be on it. Fuck you. You know, it's going to be, you know. Yeah, I mean, a good DP, like I have Palo Widovo in the first two seasons of Barry and she made everything look way better than I, I learned so much from her, you know? So it's like, I get it.

You know, but it's just so expensive now, you know. That's why it's all on television. Can I point out one scene that you guys did in that is quietly one of my favorite scenes in the movie? You could kind of use the Sean Penn. I brought my own pack award for excellence and on-screen smoking. But the scene right after the blowjob with the autopilot, and it just cuts to Julie Haggerty and the pilot, the blow-up doll just awkwardly sitting next to each other and you can feel the tension between them. And they're both smoking and she gives him like a glaring look.

And it's just, you just hear like the hum of the plane. It's just a still shot of them for like five seconds. I'd explain me. Craig, would you have squeezed Danny McBride into this movie? I'd squeeze Danny McBride into every movie. That's Craig loves him. Danny McBride pops in the movies. Oh, that's funny.

Yeah, he could have, I don't, that's the thing is nobody would have, there was no room for a Danny McBride because they didn't want like, he's so big. Basically, Stephen Stuckers is the only one who's allowed to do stuff. like that. Yeah, yeah, it's kind of like, yeah, I guess Stephen Stuckers, the other, him and Jimmy Walker. And I think that's a really, that was a famous stand-up comedian to, or an ache big comedian at that time, who's the guy in the Ethel Mormon scene. You remember it's like, oh, that's so-and-so, he thinks he's still and he's like, I found a hole. Oh, yeah, yeah. He was like a gong show guy. Yeah, he was like on gong show and stuff like that. So I think there was a couple of comedy people in it.

but yeah Danny would just I don't know what he would have done in it Has your son seen this movie Bill? Has Ben seen it? Who? My son, yeah. Yeah, I threw this one at the kids

pretty early. Probably a little too early. But, you know. Yeah, the cockpit stuff really plays. It just does. The Turkish, the gymnasium, all that stuff. Because then we could just do the lines.

Anything where you can do the lines after you see the movie around the house is always a big way. You like movies about gladiators. I mean, Turkish prison is, you know, I guess representing Minai Express. Right. Just go to Turkey and have sex with each other. I mean, yeah, it's really. Yeah, how the, I thought Naked Gun did better with my kids, though, than Airplane.

Oh, my God. Naked Gun with the beginning when O.J. get shot and he, like, falls in the paint and then the cake and everything. my kids like lost their minds at that. I thought it was really funny. Yeah. All right. Well, this podcast was produced by Craig Horlebeck.

Thanks to Gahau and Ronick as well. And thanks to Bill Hater. Next time we have to do this in the studio. Yeah. We'll bring a third person. Well, it was great to see you. Thanks for coming on. Appreciate it.

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