The Rewatchables - ‘Fletch’ With Bill Simmons, Sean Fennessey, and Chris Ryan

Episode Date: June 16, 2020

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons, Sean Fennessey, and Chris Ryan charge it all to the Underhills' account after rewatching 'Fletch,' the 1985 comedy starring Chevy Chase, Dana Wheeler-Nicholson, and Joe Don Baker. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Get State Farm like a good neighbor. State Farm is there. Get a quote. Find an agent at statefarm.com. Somebody's bucking for a promotion. It's probably that pet or assed hand-rah-hand. Fletch is coming up next. They call him Fletch.

Fletch. Fletch and Fletch. He's good at defending himself. better tire your shoelaces. Disguising himself and getting himself into trouble. Well, it'd be Fletch. Go ahead, make my day. He's a reporter.

Universal Pictures presents Chevy Chase as Fletch. My hero. Welcome to it. All right. Sean Fantasy is here. Chris Ryan is here. He wasn't ashamed to admit to us recently that he has syphilis. and it's been a rough ride for him in March.

Is this podcast going to be 110 minutes of us just quoting this movie to each other? Yeah, I think it is. This is one of the most quotable movies ever made. It's weirdly rooted in the 80s. I tried to watch this with my son. He left after 20 minutes. He was like, this sucks. Made me question the whole thing.

It came out 35 years ago. It's fantastic. It makes me laugh every time. and it is the most quotable movie of the 80s with maybe two or three exceptions. Sean Fantasy, your number one take on this movie. I think if you don't get Chevy Chase,

you will never get this movie. And Chevy Chase is a relic of a different time. I was just chatting with our producer, Craig, before this started, and he was like, what's the deal here? Why is this a thing? I don't get it. And I think that that's going to be not uncommon

for everybody who was born after 1995, but for us, Chevy was more than a thing. I mean, he was one of the comic icons of the late 70s and early 80s. And so if you like Chevy, then you like this movie. We're not starting with this energy. We are not starting off with Craig and Bill's son don't like this movie. This is a stone cold fucking classic, and we need to put respect on Fletch's name.

Very fair. I had a whole Chevy Chase thing that I put at the top of my document here because I don't think we can discuss this movie without talking. talking Chevy Chase. Background on him for the non-believers like Craig and my ass all son. First season of S&L, there's only one breakout star. It's Chevy Chase. He's on weekend update. New York Magazine comes out probably 11, 12 weeks into the premiere of the show. He's on the cover and it says, I'm Chevy Chase and you're not. Becomes a breakout breakout show star, the logical successor to Johnny Carson transcends the show to the point that after the first season,

it's a contract negotiation, whether he's going to stay, he wants more, some agents get involved, all of a sudden he's leaving. He leaves four episodes into season two as the show is becoming what it became, which really happens around season three when it becomes entrenched. He goes on to make movies. From 1978 to 1980, he makes, I separated this in the series. I separated this in the six quadrants and we're going to talk about each quadrant as we go here. There can't be six quadrants, though. There are only four quadrants. Well, I have six and I don't like your tone. Fow play, foul play, huge hit with Goldie Hawn.

Chevy Chase is a movie star. Here we go. Oh, heavenly dog. Uh-oh. Chevy Chase might not be a movie star. Caddyshack. Boom. Well, it's not totally a Chevy Chase movie, we're still not sure. Seems like old times. Him and Goldie Hawn again. Yeah, might be a movie star. Let's just talk about those four films first. Sean, you go first. Well, I was trying to figure out who Chevy Chase thought he was trying to be. And there's a little bit of confusion, I think, at the outset of his career where he imagines himself because he's a tall, handsome guy who is a very confident performer. It kind of seems like he thinks he's like Carrie Grant or Jimmy Stewart.

I was going to say Carrie Grant. It's Carrie Grant. Yeah. Taking on those kinds of parts and taking on, you know, the kind of like lighthearted mystery movies or the mix-up movies where there's some dramatic tension, but he relies on his comic charm to get us through the story, always with a very able foil female lead. Goldie, obviously one of the best from that era. And I think that those movies are okay. It's amazing how they don't have any reputation. Like if we think it's hard to get people to understand what Fletch is. You know, foul playing seems like old times were big movies. I feel like foul play in particular was like a Golden Globe nominated movie. You know, these were movies

that had a big profile, but nobody really talks about them anymore, mostly because I think Chevy was kind of miscasting himself for what he should have become. And then he kind of starts to resolve that once, once Caddyshack comes in the mix. What do you think, Chris? Yeah, it's tough because I think that this is a guy who essentially doesn't give a shit. That's his bit. You know what I mean? And that may not be actually what Chevy Chase thinks, but his greatest quality is playing up being a wise ass who kind of is too cool for school in every case. And that's such a foreign thing for our movie stars now. Like I can't think of a star right now whose entire aura is he's just like,

this is beneath him to actually be doing this and he'd rather be doing something else. He'd rather be hanging out with a supermodel or smoking a cigarette by a pool. Chevy Chase had that quality and it was a really distinctive. vibe from him. So he's also going against type because on Saturday Night Live he's not just the Wiseess, but he's the Pratt Fall guy. And he's doing Gerald

Ford just falling over in different sketches when Gerald Ford was the president. And he's also opening the show and each S&L opens with a Pratfall until he gets hurt. He actually like, I think he either ruptured his testicles or some sort of bad podium accident

and end up missing a show. So I think he was going against type with that. Out of those first four movies, Caddyshack is the closest to what I think we all wanted Chevy Chase to be in a movie because he's Ty Webb. We haven't done Caddyshack on the rewatchables yet.

I don't want to tip anything off, but there is a 40-year anniversary coming up this summer. You know, we like anniversars on the rewatchable sometimes. Ty Webb is one of my favorite characters. I think he's ad-libbing most of it. It's really if you're going to say Ty Webb,

Ty Webb versus Fletch, What are the differences in similarities? I don't think there are any differences. Fletch is basically Tye Webb. Is there anything different? Maybe just that Tye Web seems rich and Fletch doesn't. Yeah, and I also think that there's a difference in having Fletch be in every shot of Fletch and Tye Webb kind of being more of a tertiary character in Caddyshack.

True. All right, so now we go. So we're in pretty good shape here with Chevy. Which quadrant are we in? We're heading into the second of our six quadrants. It's the third bird master, but the third bird master of the six quadrant. Also, I really like to, you know, foul play, Sean's right, has not, is not a movie that's discussed anymore.

I think seems like old times has held up in a lot of ways as kind of the precursor to the rom-com era that comes in the 90s in full steam because she's married to Charles Grotin. Her first husband is Chevy. It's actually a good one. It's a good rewatch for the people listening out there. 1981, things fall apart. He makes under the rainbow, huge bomb, and he makes modern problems,

which I remember seeing in the theater because I love Chevy Chase so much. And it's just abominable. And it's even worse than that because he almost gets electrocuted during the filming of modern problems. Do you know this whole story? Yeah.

No. What happened to him? His character is wearing landing lights because he dreams that he's an airplane. The lights malfunction. An electric current passes through his arm, back, and neck muscles, and he almost dies. It's a near-death experience.

He's also battling, like, cocaine and other stuff during this time. Goes into a huge depression. His marriage ends. And that's 81. Does not make a movie in 1982. So now he's like so many people in this era of Falling Star, which moves us into the third of our six quadrants. vacation.

Yeah. The comeback. A movie that I think is directly the, like the father of some of the Apatau era comedies. You see a lot of the same kind of DNA in there. Todd Phillips stuff, yeah. I feel like this is where he figures out that he has one other pitch. This is where he figures out his fastball or his curveball. So his fastball is smartest guy in the room,

probably the biggest asshole in the room. His curveball is, thinks he's the smartest guy in the room, but it's actually the dumbest guy in the room. And as soon as he hits that, he kind of figures out how to be more of a movie star. One of those two. So, to be fair, in 1983, he also made Deal of the Century, which is an amazing Wikipedia run.

Because William Friedkin's the director, but it's a comedy and Sigourney Weaver's in it, and Gregory Hines and Chevy Chase. and it was reviled. Is that about arms dealing? Yeah. That movie and Best Defense quickly ended the arms dealer

comedy genre that it was for some reason developing just ended. Until they brought it back with war dogs. Yeah. So now we're still not sure with Chevy.

It's like, did he just get lucky with vacation? What really happened there? Then we hit 85 and 86 where he rips off Fletch, European vacation, spies like us

and three amigos. and suddenly he's one of the biggest stars in the world again. And all four of those are good choices. The three amigos gets him back with Lorne Michaels, which is huge. He works with Dan Aykroyd and spies like us. He's back in the good graces of that late 70s comedy community, right? Because the Bill Murray, all those guys, they kind of turned on him. So now he's back.

He's figured it out. I think he goes to drug rehab in 86 too and cleans up a painkiller thing. But at that point is one of the OGs. It's like he's neck and neck with Bill Murray. And, you know, if you're just talking like biggest comedians, which leads me to quadrant five, he hosts two straight Academy Awards, which I'd forgotten.

Then that leads us to the last quadrant. 88, 89, he does the couch trip, Funny Farm, Fetch lives, Fletch lives and Christmas vacation. So he makes 16 movies in 12 years. and has four different incarnations of himself. And if you go back and you read the old William Goldman pieces that he wrote for New York Magazine, like he's talking about Chevy Chase, like as one of the biggest stars in the movie. If you have Chevy Chase, you can open a movie, stuff like that.

The 90s come, the wheels come off, and that's it. But it's a really, really bizarre up and down arc. And you can only blame the drug era as well. one of the reasons why. This is the 80s. Weird shit happens in the 80s. As we keep saying over and over again, it's just hard to even come up with a common theme

to a career like that. One of my favorite bits that I saw when I was reading up about Chase's earlier specifically, but just that 80s run, is something that I think was in the New York Magazine bit where they were talking about him as a possible Johnny Carson replacement. It's a really great what if with him

where I guess he made like a kind of a sideways comment about not, you know, I would never want to have to like talk to TV stars five nights a week. You know, I would, I would hate to be tied down to a job like that forever. And after that, Carson kind of took a shot at him in public about his ad-libbing ability. He couldn't ad-lib a fart after a baked bean dinner or something like that. And you just kind of wonder, because obviously he has a personality that is absolutely perfect for being a talk show host, for doing that kind of opening monologue and that breezy banter. What his career would have been like if he hadn't made that one offhanded comment about the Tonight Show.

Right. It's, it's funny that you say that, though, because I watched him on Carson last night when he was promoting Fletch. I don't know if you guys have seen this clip recently. It's the one where he comes out and he's wearing the Lakers uniform and they've got a basketball hoop set up and he, like, does the same move that he does in the movie where he puts the ball behind his back and then through his legs and scores. And then he comes and he's kind of out of breath and he sits down next to Johnny.

And there's something just a little bit tense between him and Johnny. It's funny, but you can sense that Johnny just thinks that Chevy Chase is an asshole. And it is a thing that is kind of coursing through his relationship. So while I agree that he would be probably ace at doing the bits that you need to do to be a talk show host, he's such an ungenerous performer. Like everything, he doesn't sell other people. He sells himself all the time. And for Fletch, it's perfect because he's right in the middle of the frame the whole time.

It's all about him. But anytime he has to be with somebody else, he just doesn't work as well. But it's funny what you were saying about weird 80s shit, Bill. Do you remember who he co-hosted the Oscars with the first time you hosted? No, who was it? So in the 80s, they used to do this thing where rather than there be one host, if they didn't feel like they could get a strong enough person, they'd have a number of people.

And then we saw this later on when like James Franco and Ann Hathaway did this. But it was a callback to, in 1987, he hosted with Goldie Hawn, who he had starred in two movies with. And Paul Hogan, Procodile Dundee. And Chevy obviously was the best part of that. And so the next year they invite him back and he hosted solo. But, like, this was a very weird time to be a comedy celebrity. You know, you could do a lot of different kinds of things.

I'm a certified cheviologist. And the best thing ever written about him was in the Saturday Night book by, I think, Doug Hill and Jeff Weingrad, I think were their names. And you can get it. It's available as an e-book. I think it's out of print. And it's honestly one of the best five TV film books, I think, of all time. It's about the first 10 years.

Saturday Live and just incredible reporting and all the stories. And they wrote a whole chapter about Chevy Chase in there about like his life basically unraveling because of how famous he was where that show is being watched by 35 million people. And he was the breakout star. And a lot of the stuff that he did that was genuine. Like a lot of like the Pratt Falls and goofy and class clown stuff. All of a sudden you start doing that, but you're a star and everybody is just laughing at whatever you do, and it's heading into the cocaine era. And he just kind of unravels. And Bill Murray has a good quote.

There's also the oral history of Esenel that Tom Shales and Jim Miller did, where Bill Murray says, when you become famous, you've got like a year or two where you act like a real asshole. You can't help yourself. It happens to everybody. You've got like two years to pull it together or it's permanent. And he's talking about Chevy. So Chevy has that stage, but he leaves SNL.

He goes to L.A., becomes a movie star. And he just becomes an asshole. And he was a legendary asshole. There was the piece, the Washington Post piece. When was that? Like four or five years ago? The future about him. Yeah.

Just like, this guy's a huge asshole. They have that Comedy Central roast where they, all these people who don't know him because they could barely get any friends because they really have that many friends. And they come in, they just skewer him. And it's really sad. It's, he's definitely a Hollywood fame, drug era, casually in a lot of ways because it seems like people,

he would keep coming back to S&L. He hosted a few times. It's like Lauren couldn't totally let him go, but Lauren kind of also won how it played out because they had this power struggle, Chevy lost. The whole thing bums me out, though. I really love the guy. And I honestly, like, the reason we're spending so much time

of them this, I feel like he was a 101. I don't think there's ever been anybody quite like him, you know? And you could say that about Murray, and you could say that about John Belushi to some degree. but Chevy's like nobody's come before since that did exactly what he did. Yeah, and I think that that's why Fletch is so good is because every other person in Fletch lets him cook. Like everybody else in Fletch plays the straight person.

The only person who even actually takes the bait is the Joe Don Baker character, Chief Carlin. Almost everybody else seems oblivious to him doing his bits. And it actually makes the movie what it is. because if everything stopped every time he gave himself a fake name and was like, I'm Ted Nugent or who whatever, if Tim Matheson's character was like, wait a second, Ted Nugent, I know who that is,

the whole movie falls apart. But if you just pretend, like this guy is the biggest prick but also the funniest prick you've ever met, you can make anything you want like that. I agree. Yeah, I agree too. I mean, it's funny.

Most of the people just regard him with like a mild bemusement, you know? like Emmett Walsh's doctor and your icon, Dana Wheeler-Nickleson. She just kind of like smirks at him a lot and is like, aren't you cute? And never really interrogates anything that he's doing ever. It's kind of an amazing trick. So Chevy says, this is what he said in one of the oral histories. Fame is a huge thing that is in your life.

We know that taking drugs is self-medicating, but what are we medicating? Something that's hurting us. Usually depression of some kind or some sort of sadness or something stressful, right? that's what we're self-medicating. Well, fame is extremely stressful. That's why so many people who become famous so fast self-medicate. And what is there to self-medicate with? A $100 bill, and if it's 1975, some cocaine or some pot or something.

And then he says later, it's also a very frightening thing because it's one of the most stressful things. There's a certain amount of post-traumatic stress involved in being a regular guy and then suddenly becoming an extremely famous one. I know Chris battles with this every day. I mean, as we watch Chris become, when the Pacino imitations really went to another level, like we worried about Chris and he's started,

when your cocaine issues started. Well, I mean, like, I just liked, you know, you guys have to book me now through, through my team at Gersh, you know. He also says, this is really, I mean, Chevy has some great quotes about this. In all children,

there's this reservoir of self-doubt and guilt, sense of low self-esteem, I think. So one lives with this kind of dualism, this disparity between the marvelous magic of becoming accepted by so many so fast, and at the same time, a lingering sense that one doesn't deserve it, and sooner or later will be found out.

Lauren used to say that Coke was God's way of telling you that you have too much money. He used to say, don't stay on one thing. If you're going to take anything, rotate them. This was a long time ago. Lord Michael's with some drug advice. So for the kids staying at listening at home, don't stay on one thing. If you're going to take anything, rotate them. But yes,

very easy to shift away from cocaine, move on to orange juice for a while, you know, and shifts back into, you know, lemon water and then back to heroin and then back to cocaine. And just that's the virtuous cycle of addiction. I think the thing with Chevy is that everybody was rooting it at, like, I didn't know he was an asshole when I was 16, 15. I just, I knew him as the guy who was the really funny guy in Weekend Update, who was great in Caddy Shack and who made the Goldie on movies. So when he reemerged here in 83 and rips off all these comedies, everyone's on our side. And we don't know that he's an asshole. We didn't know that he could have been the next Johnny Carson and all that stuff. It's, you know, he, he was out of the guys from the 70s. I think him and

Bill Murray specifically were able to navigate what came next with the Letterman era, the sarcasm era, basically. Letterman, Seinfeld, all those guys. Chevy actually fit in better in that era than the previous era. I just don't think that being a wise ass is really celebrated anymore. Like, something changed where we don't really identify that person as the funniest person. But that, you know, you've talked about it even with the Chandler character on Friends, like all the way up the chain through the 90s. That was the funniest guy. And it was interesting how you're just reading those quotes that he's, when he's reflecting on what happened to him, because he sounds so vulnerable when he's talking about the problems that he had and dealing with fame. But his comedy persona is

completely invulnerable. Like he's never showing a soft side. He's never letting anybody in. He's just always the same. And in Fletch, like, does he even have feelings in Fletch? He's just the joke machine. Yeah, and it's like,

I feel like we've kind of gone through the cringe comedy period of Curb through Nathan for you and this kind of almost like experiential, like observational humor where the main character is also, is also like very cringe-worthy. And that is so different from Chase's thing where no matter how desperate Fletch gets,

he's always a step ahead of the person who he's in a scene in with. It's interesting because I just saw the Pete Davidson movie, the Staten Island movie. He's basically doing 2020 Chevy Chase in a lot of ways in that movie. He's wisecracking, can't be serious guy. So it is an archetype, and he's just a different version of it, right? He's covered in tattoos and he's had a bunch of personal issues we know about. but it's kind of the same setup. And I'm with Sean.

I kind of enjoy it. I don't know why it became a lost star. And what's interesting about this movie specifically, you know, it became a phenomenon after the fact with Blockbuster, cable TV. It's the perfect TNT, TBS, Comedy Central, movie with commercials.

It's an hour 37. It's almost like they made the absolute perfect length of a movie to have commercials. There are also no bad scenes in this movie. Yeah, and it just keeps going. You get sucked in, all that stuff. So they decided around 2000, Kevin Smith wants to remake it, goes through this multi-year odyssey with Harvey Weinstein. He wants Jason Lee, Kevin Smith.

He's convinced Jason Lee should be the next fletch. Harvey Weinstein's like he's not a big enough name. Somehow Affleck enters the conversation, which is really interesting because I feel like Affleck is kind of a wise ass. Then that dies. Then Bill Lawrence comes in and he's hot from scrubs and he wants to do it. And it's been in development hell for, I think, 20 years. And nobody's redone it.

And it's now we're on our fourth decade without Fletch. But it seems like a really easy thing to resurrect. I'm shocked that it hasn't happened. Chris, who would be your ideal, 2020 Fletch? It's tough because I was just thinking about like the other examples on TV or in movies of people who are trying to do Chevy. And like Joel McHale is doing Chevy Chase in community with Chevy Chase

in the show. I think I would probably do Gosling. He might be a little too pretty, but in some of the stuff that he's done, especially nice guys, he has that kind of smart assery nailed down. And he's actually way closer to like Chevy Chase's sense of humor

and his talk show appearances than he is in the movies that he's in. Yeah. I think my, it's funny, Michael Keaton was the other kind of wise-ass guy from the 80s. Yeah. That had a great run with him. He was really sincere though. Like, I mean, like, he was in gung-ho, you know, like he had. True. But I'm saying, like, when he, like, he's in night shift, that guy's just like a cocky shithead, basically. At some point, we're doing night shift on the rewatchments. Night shift is kind of like, uh, seems like old times, though. That's like a movie that I don't think people have seen. Like, it didn't get that, that cable streaming bump that, you know, you know, other

people did. Is night shift about corpse fucking? What's going on there? Craig, Craig, can you come on the Zoom for one second? Yeah. Craig, would you believe in 1982 they made a movie? These two guys worked at a morgue. They ended up taking over, becoming pimps for a bunch of prostitutes and running it out

of the morgue, that that was a very successful 1982 comedy. It sounds like a rewatchable as we would do. That's very little. That's a good answer. Yeah. There you go. Thanks for popping in, Craig. All right, let's talk about Fletch really quickly.

So it's a Gregory McDonald novel, which I'm sure Chris owns. Chris, do you read these books? I've read one of them, yeah. Yeah, they're very good. They are, all the noir stuff, all the voiceover stuff feels very of the book. But the scenes and his obviously ad-lib dialogue is kind of a very, on it. It's a deviation from it. So a producer named

Somebody Burroughs, I deleted his first name. Beginning in July 76, got the rights. And then every studio rejects it for eight years. And then Michael Douglas was the one who got it over the finish line as a producer. Back when he was the most interesting man in the world and starring movies, but also producing them. $8 million budget made $59 million bucks.

24.4 million in video rentals. And God only knows how many millions they've made just in networks licensing it for a month. I bet 1.2 million of those are just like Bill Simmons' late fees on returning Fletch throughout his life. You know what's funny? It took me like probably four years to really embrace this movie. I saw it once.

It was fine. It is one of those movies that wears you down. because he and it's why it's a rewatchable it's oh shit all right he's at the country club i'll just watch the scene and it becomes one of those movies because there's some bad scenes in this movie you know i don't know about i gotta nothing's happening for five minutes like you don't like jim's worth out of an aimless movie but the the rewatchable stuff just carried it as a cable cable comedy i feel like it's one of the o gs um 77 on rotten tomatoes i know Sean cares.

No, meaningless. Roger Ebert. Raj, come through, man. Two and a half stars. Raj said, this is tough. The problem is Chase's performance tends to reduce all the scenes to the same level. Yeah, that's the point, Raj. At least as far as he's concerned.

He projects such an inflexible mask of cool detachment of ironic running commentary that were prevented from identifying with him. Fletch needed an actor. more interested in playing the character than in playing himself. Raj, fuck off. That is just awful. Really? Talk about missing a movie.

Ebert's comedy takes are really consistently bad. That's amazing that he didn't see this movie. Sean, Defender Boy. I can't. I rewatched the Siskel and Ebert segment from at the movies when this movie came out last night. And Siskel nailed it. He was on it.

He was like, Chevy Chase has been miscast for years. He's been waiting his whole career to have a guy, like this to play, where the ironic detachment was the whole point of the character, just set him up to knock him down. And he very clearly in the moment gets what the point of the movie is. And then Raj comes through and he's like, no, this is wrong. This is not how movies should be. Movies should be about the character being invested in the story and the audience being invested in the character. And he just missed it. He missed the point. Did Ebert want it to be like the big sleep or something? I don't know. I don't know. Sad for Raj.

Ebert thought it was a drama. He was confused by all the one-leaders. Do you know what was going on? Why isn't this like the killing field? Why isn't this like chariots of fire? He thought Dith Prawn should have been one of the sidekicks. Let's go to the categories. Most re-watchable scene.

It's funny that there's not really a re-watchable scene for about 20 minutes, and then Fletch goes to get a physical. And then they just start ripping off re-watchable seeds from that point on. You know, if I did some sit-ups in the morning or bent over like this, I'd probably feel 100% Moon River. Thank you, Doc. You ever served time?

Breathe easy. Breathe easy. You know, I was surprised that Alan was able to get that policy. I know there's a history of cancer in the family. There is? Yeah. As a matter of fact, you using the whole fist, Doc?

Just relax. When my son didn't love this scene, I really started to question whether I was his father. I might have to have a DNA test. I was like, how do you not think this is funny? Thank you, Doc. You ever serve time? He used the whole fist, Doc.

He's just moon river. He's just ripping it off. And my son is just stone face watching. I'm like, all right, I give up. Just go. Go play your video games. Destroy the next generation in this country. Next rewatchable scene.

It's a short one, but the Lakers dream sequence is so goddamn enjoyable with Chick-Kherne. Kareem. Six-five, six-nine with the Afro, the sports footage. All of that's great. Next one, Fletch fixing airplanes with buck teeth. What do you think? It's the bypass line, right? I think it's the bypass line, yeah.

I'm going to need some pliers and a set of 30-weight ball bearings. What? Yeah. Tell you what, I've got to go to my truck. Fred gets here before I'm back. You can tell him to start without me. What the hell you need ball bearings full? Oh, come on, guys.

It's so simple. Maybe you need a refresher course. Hey, it's all ball bearings nowadays. It's all ball bearings these days. It's off. Was that Jim Varney? No. No, it's not.

It's the guy who looks like Jim Barney, but it's not Jim Barney? It's the guy Jim Varney market corrected. Yeah, he marketed that guy. Then the second tennis club visit. Now, I'm happy to put the first tennis club visit in, too. It kind of ends abruptly. The second tennis club visit, which includes him ordering caviar twice. Charge it to the underhill, signor.

Yeah, that's right. Do you have any caviar? Yes, signor, peluga, but it is $80 a portion. Well, then I better just take two portions of that. How's a lobster thermidor? I recommend it, sir. Good, that'll be fine. Bring two bottles of Don Perignon

to Cabana one. Very good, see ya. And put down $30 for yourself, huh? Much a gracias, that's the nicest place. The Gail Stanwick opened the door in a towel. Can I borrow your towel? My car hit a water buffalo.

I just got out of the shower. Yeah. Can I borrow your towel for a sec? My car just hit a water buffalo. Nice place you have here. The guy's delivering the double lobster and the two bottles of champagne. Give each other $20.

the guy, Mr. Underhill getting the bill. Two bottles of Don Pignon, $100 a pop. Jesus, H. Christ, where is it? He is with Ms. Stanwyx. Where is she? Jesus, H. Christ! That was the first time I'd ever heard that in a movie. And then the...

Mr. Stanwyck! Mr. Stadwick! Just all of that five minutes. And then Fletch saying like, hey, I'm actually this reporter from The Only Times. Your husband's a fraud. and Gail Stanwick just nonplussed. It's like, oh, really?

My husband's a fraud? He's been married to another person? It's all bouncing off her. Everything about it's great. Gail Stanwick's just a great hang, man. No, we're getting into her later. Next rewatchable scene, Fletch steals a kid's offer Mayo, although the kid was stealing it.

Afternoon, smock patrol. Had your emissions checked? No, sir. Pluricarbons, ozone? No, sir. Well, let's check it out. What is saying? Hey, uh,

Smells pretty good. Escapes the police. Somehow there's no helicopter. It never gets broken into the local news. It ends up at Fred Dorfman's lunch and does the whole Fred Dorfman. Probably chase his best 90 seconds of the movie, all things considered. The way he works the crowd, gives a speech, gets him to sing, God bless America. All that's really good.

Thank you very much, Sammy. Thank you. I couldn't wait. It was a very nice introduction, and I am very thrilled. and proud to be here today. And a wonderful ceremony so far. Here on behalf of our own, Fred, the Dorff, Dorfman. Many of you don't know that Fred was darn near death recently,

and he wasn't ashamed to admit to me that he'd had a sip of listen. Thank God he stopped into his tracks. It's tremendous. And then the last one is, I'm just going for the tail end. I really like how it ended. He's on the beach with Gail. When it came to basketball, Gail was a loss. but we had our own version

one-on-one, and she thought I was the bravest guy in the world, which of course I am. By the way, I charged the entire vacation to Mr. Underhill's

American Express card, want the number. Boom, movie ends. So satisfying. I don't know what beach they were on where there's literally nobody on the beach,

though. Any other re-watchable scenes for you guys? Yes. Yeah, a lot. I mean, I broke mine down

into Mr. Barbar, Dr. Rosen, penis, John Cocktholeson, Mr. Poon, and Igor Stravinsky. So I would just say that with Dr. Rosenpienus, you have to have the autopsy in there.

Like when he... I don't know why I'm just cracking up. But he's just like, you never get used to the smell. It's just incredible shit. Just camera tight on his face the whole time. Oh, feel good. Boy, you never get used to the smell, do you? I like when he wakes up.

and then the, uh, the physicians in there and they're just like laughing. Yeah. Yeah. The guy's eating. The guy doing the autopsy when he says, uh, he's like, well, I haven't sterilized my hands. He's like, you're going to not, you're not going to make this guy any sicker. Hold this. Listen, I'm not really prepared for this. I haven't sterilized my hands. You're not going to make this guy any sicker.

Yeah, you're right. That should have been in there. What else you have? Um, I, you know, just the entire Mr. Poon scene, uh, with the SEC and him talking about Hammer Han, as you mentioned and, and, uh, Mr. Boyd getting really up, up in his face. And, uh, I also had, yeah, I actually, I actually liked, like all the moments of him in the motel in Utah where he's just doing the different voices and the woman running the desk just keeps looking over in him. It was just like, it's Igor Stravinsky. I'm here to check it on that ranch property. Uh, so yeah, yeah, those are the couple that I had.

I love the interrogation with Chief Carlin. There's one other character, F. Fletch, Fletch. He's like, what do you do for a living, Mr. Fletch? I'm a shepherd. He's like, officers, could you excuse us for your minutes? He's like, yeah, why don't you guys go down to the gym and pump each other? And he's like, why are you doing this, Mr. Fletch? And he says, I like men.

I like to be manhandled. I like you. And then he winks at Joe Don Baker. It's an incredible moment. my uh my single favorite is is when he goes to the tennis club the second time it's just a perfect like six minutes i order lunch that's great why did you order lunch here because it's where i knew my mouth was going to be right it's just he's just ripping him off left and right i think my favorite my favorite character that he plays is the uh the airplane mechanic and it there's a tremendous

amount of gook on these windows. And just like all the, well, he's the boss. And those guys just bullshitting with each other. That's my most rewatchable. Yeah, his best moves are the buck tooth airplane guy. And then just that one scene where he's got, he's like a monk or whatever with George Carlin's hair when he's roller skating. And it's really Chevy Chase and he's doing roller.

It's kind of amazing. What do you have for most rewatchable, Sean? Definitely, Dr. Dolan. And Babar, two Bs, one B, B, A, B, A, B.R. Now, how long have you had these pains, Mr. Barber? Now, that's Bbar. Two B B B Bs? One B, A, B A R.

That's two. Yeah, but not right next to each other. I thought that's what you meant. That's my favorite part of the movie. There's a really subtle one when it leads to Dr. Rosa Pienis, when he looks at the director and every doctor has Rosen. It's like 13 doctors, Dr. Rosen, Rosen.

Where's the records room? What's age the best? So Tim Matheson is cast as the villain, Alan Stanwick, who is trying to get Fletch in there so he can eventually murder Fletch and burn his body. There's a really cool animal house symmetry here that I always appreciated because Chevy Chase was supposed to be an animal house and was basically too big of a star at that point and felt like it was a backward move. But when they wrote Animal House,

they wrote Tim Matheson. I think his character was Otter. Yeah. They wrote that character. They thought it was going to be Chevy Chase. So then when you watch Animal House, Tim Matheson is just doing a Chevy Chase impersonation. It's not actually Chevy Chase.

So I was like that they circle that full steam where it's like, I got to find this guy who looks like me to go kill him. And it's Tim Matheson playing the guy. What's age the best? Mr. Underhill, two scenes. The first one, the first one, he just just rips the waiter to shreds.

Basically like, maybe next, I'm sure you'd want a gratuity. Well, maybe next time. It's just so evil. Does it look like I'm finished? And then the second one, when it's $400. Jesus, Christ! He's just such a great parody of a country. It's like they took Judge Smales.

just crossed him with Hitler and gave him Mr. Underhill. Another one's age the best, Kareem's IMDB, which inexplicably has that Bruce Lee movie, Airplane, and Fletch. What a run. Unbelievable. You could argue he's probably the most successful athlete actor, right?

What else is on there, Sean? Most successful athlete actor. Just, no, IMDB. No, I'm not saying actual success. I'm saying if you just glance at the IMDB and he's in Game of Death where he has a pivotal scene in that, right? Was that Game of Death?

It's Game of Death, yeah. He's incredible in the Game of Death. I mean, Airplane Fletch. He was done a lot of TV. He did an episode of 21 Jump Street. That's tight. He was in D2, the Mighty Ducks. Oh, wow.

And he was in a really pivotal different strokes. Yep, and he was in Save by the Bell of the New Class. And he was in basketball. He had a run. Great job by him. I have a contender for this title. Yeah. Jim Brown.

So, Jim Brown, Mars attacks, any given Sunday, running man and dirty dozen. Pretty good. It's pretty good. And I'm going to get you sucker.

Dirty dozen was like an actual real role in a great movie. Yeah. That he has speaking lines and stuff. I got to say, you know, he's not red hot right now, but I think O.J. Simpson, towering inferno,

naked gun. We're two iconic ones. Cool. What quadrant is OJ in now? What quadrant is OJ in? Wait, did we ever get the final three quadrants of the six quadrants of Chevy Chase? You guys made fun of it.

I just remember. Another what's age the best. The secretary going, I'm sorry, who are you again? I'm Frida's boss. Who's Frida? My secretary. He just moves on.

Here's the complete list of pseudonyms he used, other than what was it, Fletch, Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch Fletch, Nuggen, Dr. Rosen, Dr. Rosen, John Cocktoe Stone, Mr. Poon, Igor Stravinsky, Gordon Liddy, John Levinstein, Don Corleone, and Harry S. Truman. I forgot about the Don Corleone part. Yeah, that part is straight too in Utah. Hold on a second. Craig, come back. I'm here. I'm here.

Craig. Yeah. So you telling me you didn't laugh when she goes... I never said I didn't like Fletch. I don't know. When the lady comes up to him and says, sugar, Mr. Poon?

This whole movie was me like after a joke like looking to Liz and being like pretty good, right? And then she's like, no. This movie is just... What we're learning is... This movie is all dad jokes.

It is not dad jokes. It is not dad jokes. Oh my God. This is terrible. Wow. All dads love to lose. Wow. I have no children.

Let me just say that. And I love Fletch. Same. I think you react too much to what Liz's reaction to the movie is. Maybe you should stand up for yourself a little more, Craig. Thank you. Good note.

All right. Back to what's age the best. Music by Harold Faltermeyer. Amazing 80s. Oh, yeah. You know what? I feel like we need to hear a little bit. Yeah.

I like how he starts out and you think like, oh, it's going to be this kind of music. But then the key with Harold. Hold that. He puts in that second one. The little Thomas. Thomas Dolby.

There's levels. He starts doing this. You can hear the Thomas Dolby influence. So he has this in Beverly Hills cop right next to each other. Can I? He'll be coming up in Apex Mountain later. Honorable mention for the song played during the Alpha Romeo Chase. Get out of town.

Get out of town. Get out of town. Get out of town. I think those were the only lyrics. Isn't bit by bit in this as well? Yeah. Yeah. Isn't that like the theme from Fletch?

Pretty, pretty interesting music. If I bet. Stephanie Mills. Stephanie Mills, yeah. Siskel made a very obvious, but good point in that, in that clip that I was talking about, where he's basically like,

as soon as Beverly Hills cop hit, this movie made a lot more sense. Because you could put two big action sequences in it, and you could put the Harold Faltermeyer music in it, and then all of a sudden, what seems like a weird, rye comedy, all of a sudden becomes an action comedy, and it's easier to sell to audiences. You can make the trailer a lot more easy.

You can give it a little bit more energy. I thought that was smart. A little ahead of its time there. Any other what's age the best for you guys? Yeah, I want to give a special shout out to Fletch's apartment with the Magic Bird, life-size poster, and the pretty full basketball hoop on the wall. Yeah.

The perfect bachelor pad. It's like the guy who still has the sensibility of, like when he was in college and would just like randomly put sports shit up on the walls and call it decorating. But it's like, you know, divorce, day only cares about the writing for the paper and the Lakers. And it looks like actually perfect for the character. And then I had one more, what's age the best. I just really like his Lakers jersey in this.

Just that old school 80s. It's kind of a jersey and kind of like a, like it's more expensive than a t-shirt, but less expensive than a jersey. whatever was going on with that look in the 80s, but it's a little faded, it's a good purple. That's a really fun Lakers year, too, because that was the year the Celtics beat them in the finals.

I was just going to say, I'm surprised that you like this movie, given how much Lakers fandom is a prime part of it. Oh, no, wait a second. They beat us in the finals. Ah, fuck this. I recant my statement. Yeah, this is 85.

Should we cancel this pod? Yeah. Damn it. Well, I mean, Craig already threw a big bucket of water on it, but we'll spread. Craig killed the energy. Craig's going to get what he'll get thanks to Twitter when this comes out. People are going to be very upset at Craig.

I'm just telling you. What's age the worst? Wait, wait. Can I do one more? What's Age the best? Yeah. My guy Michael Ritchie, one of the all-time greats. You love Michael Ritchie, yeah.

This one came out of nowhere, too. We thought Michael Ritchie might have been done. He hadn't made a big movie in a long time. And he comes in, it's like a for-hire job. This is the all-time best sports movie director ever. Look at his IMDV. has the best run downhill racer, bad news bears, semi-tuff, bad news bears go to Japan, and Fletch and Wildcats. That's amazing. And then Dixtown in the 90s. That's incredible run.

Sean, we don't speak of bad news bears go to Japan. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. He was just a producer on that. He never happened. He didn't direct that. He just produced it. He directed all the other ones. Am I imagine this or did he do shampoo? He didn't do shampoo. No, that was Hal Lashby. Yeah. He did runnings too. And did he do Golden Child? He did Golden Child,

which is a mess. Didn't he do something from the 70s that was signature beyond Downhill Racer? The candidate. The candidate. That's what it was.

Yeah, yeah. He's really underrated. I watched a candidate two months ago, and it's still great. I really, really highly recommend the candidate if you're super bored.

It's on Amazon. It's on all over the place. What's age the worst? Alan Stanwick's plan it's just ridiculous. I don't know what he's thinking is, I've been scouting this crack addict for two weeks who looks like me and I'm going to have him shoot me.

But then when he comes to shoot me, I'll actually, I'll kill him and then I'll burn his body. And there's no such thing as DNA or dental evidence yet. I don't know what he's doing. It's very Raymond Chandler. And like, you know, those plots for these kinds of L.A. noir books are, you know, famously inscrutable.

Like even I remember there's like this famous. his story about William Faulkner trying to adapt a big sleep and he calls up Raymond Chandler to ask him to explain the plot and Raymond Chandler's like, I have no idea and I wrote it. So it's not surprising that there are parts of the Alan Stanwick part of this movie that don't make any sense. Also,

if the book was in the mid-70s, it made a little more sense that you could burn somebody and pretend it was you, but by the time we get to 85, we have some sort of science going at that point. What's age the worst? You know what? I don't like the Stephanie Mills bit by bit at the beginning. Whoa.

Yeah. I think you just go right to Faltermire. Let the chef cook. Because they have her for the first two minutes. And then right as we're about to get to the last five credits, it audibles to Chevy on the beach. And then Faltermire comes in. Just let the chef cook.

I don't know why they overthought that one. It was almost like Stephanie Mills. It's like she's hot. She'll really help the movie. She's on her way up. We'll sneak her song is. I don't like that. More what's age the worst.

Craig. Craig's age the worst? Craig's age the worst for his take of not liking Fletch. It's going to age terribly. Producer Craig. The biggest, the most tension we've ever had on a rewatchable is the dad's getting really hurt my feelings. Any other what's age the worst? Can I just talk a little bit about what Chevy's wearing in the movie?

The scene when he goes in to see or he's taken in to see the police chief, he's wearing long jeans with wide bottoms. He's wearing a, what looks like a white linen button-down shirt tucked in with a big collar. He's got three buttons open on top. Two pockets on the breasts. He looks like a clown. Like his clothing is so bad in this movie.

But he wears it well. Well, he's like 6'5 and a handsome guy, but it's really, really rough 80 style. Him and Eddie Murphy had a real knack. for being able to wear absolute dog shit clothes and make them look really cool. Like Eddie Murphy, the Mullenberg state t-shirt

and Beverly Hills Cop and just like a hoodie. And then Chevy in this movie is essentially dressing like a Venice Beach junkie and looks great doing it. But then later in the movie when he's wearing Tim Matheson's suit, you're like, oh yeah, you're Chevy Chase. You could be Carrie Grant if you wanted to be.

Like he looks amazing in the suit, but most of the clothes he's wearing are just terrible. with the rare exception of the Lakers uniform that you pointed out, Bill. I have a mild what's aged the worst that's a direct assault on Chris Ryan. You better not say to be talking about DWN here. Bill, come on, man. What's up with you? Listen, I love her.

She brings back a lot of great memories. I'm all in on Dana Willer Nickerson as Gail Stanwyck. Not a great actress in this? Wrong. My wife was watching the last hour with me. at one point was like, what's up with this lady's acting, which to me is always a red flag. I still like her. I'm glad she's in the movie. She brings back some fond memories. I'm not really sure she was exploring the studio space with the Gail Stanwyck character, is my point.

Gail Stanwyck is the greatest hang of all time. Like, she is just rolling with it. She is the absolute whatever you want to do, let's hang out, let's eat lobster thermadores, let's drink champagne at 2 o'clock in the afternoon. give me tennis lessons. Let's go to a Lakers game. Teach me all about basketball. Absolute all-time or hang. But you don't think we could have accomplished that same vibe with a different actress?

Who seemed a little more surprised when Fletch is like, hey. But nobody is surprised in Fletch. Nobody is surprised in that movie. Like Tim Matheson, he doesn't blink when he's like, I'm Ted Nugent. Well, I love her, so I'm fine with it. But I do think it would have been interesting with an actress who was a little more interested.

and really anything. Sean, what do you think? You may recall from the Tombstone podcast that I noted that she is a bad actress and she's not good in Fletch and if you just put Elizabeth Shoe or Sharon Stone in this movie, it's a thousand times better.

Can't argue. Can't argue the point. This is just a tense rewatchable. I would say here's one of my what's age is the worst is we don't get enough time getting to know Sally Ann Kavanaugh. That's true. It was apparently a smoke show, but we would,

they could have snuck it in one of the low-key, funniest scenes is when Fletch goes up to the, uh, the airline counter to check on the tickets, to reconfirm his airline tickets. And she's like,

and you bought another ticket and he's like, oh, is it for Mr. Singling? And she's like, no, Kavanaugh. And she's like, Sally Ann Kavanaugh.

You bought the ticket yourself. He's like, doesn't mean I want her sitting next to me. Great scene. But I really want to see, I wanted to have a, a Gail Stanwick, Sally, and Kavanaugh face off. Casting what-ifs.

Bert Reynolds, Jeff Bridges, Charles Grotto, and Mick Jagger, and Barry Bostwick were among those considered to play Fletch. The author had rejection rights. He rejected Bert Reynolds and Mick Jagger. He said, no thanks. Not interested in those people playing my guy Fletch. The original producer, Jonathan Burroughs, all right, get ready. Break out the imitation machine, Chris.

Okay. Jonathan Burroughs originally wanted Richard Dreyfus after Chevy Chase, who was this high school classmate, his managers rejected the part. Gail.

Gail! I charged it to the underhills, Gail. That wouldn't, that would, Dreyfus would not work. That was, that would have been bad.

Bill, where are you at on Bostwick? I feel like he really had like the, one of the worst possible outcomes on his career that he could have had. He got market corrected just over and over again by other white guys.

Yeah. The Commodore 64 of white guys. He corrected him. Tim Matheson was market correcting him who was getting market corrected by three other guys. So yeah, it's tough. He never got that big one. George Siegel, Sean's guy at one point considered his Fletch turned it down. He might have been good.

In the late 70s, he might have been good. Yeah. Yeah. Best that guy, aka the Joey Pants Award. Richard Libertini plays Frank, the newspaper editor. I don't even know where that guy's from, but I know I know that guy. Also, it's just a great character. Great character.

Larry Flash Jenkins is George Went, the other guy, Gummy, sort of drug addict. We're not really sure, but... That's your guy. No, not really, because he's season three of the White Shadow, which you can see over my shoulder. Season three is when the wheels came off. So I look at Larry Flash Jenkins as one of the symptoms. Like the same way, you know, Chris looks at Tobias Harris as the guy, the official sign of the process got fucked up. Not a lot different.

And then another of that guy, that guy who played, who kind of looked like Jim Varnie, but it was a Jim Vardy. Right. The guy who got marker corrected by Jim Varty. And then the other one is the guy who does the physical on him is one of those guys. Emmett Walsh. She's one of the all-time great that guys. Yeah. credible character actor.

So I would go with him. There's some more. Kenneth Mars, I feel like is on the list too. He plays Stan Boyd. Yeah. He's like, he's been in tons of movies in the 70s in Peter Bogdanovich movies and he's in tons of TV shows and murder she wrote and shit like that. There were, who else, Chris?

There's somebody, there's a couple other people here. I mean, does Gina Davis go into that guy here? No, stop it. Okay. Allison Laplaca as the person, she's the woman working at the airline, at the airline desk. I forgot to put Gina Davis. and Wood Sage the best, but she's coming up later. Is Joe Don Baker, Joe Don Baker?

That's a big question. Yes, he is. So to the three of us, he definitely is. What percentage of the people listening to this podcast do you think could identify Joe Don Baker if they saw a photo of him and write down his name? I think if people are 35 and over, they know it's Joe Don Baker. He was a real guy. Oh, yeah, Walking Tall, man.

Yeah, Walking Tall was kind of a borderline phenomenon when it came out. I think it's a single-digit percentage, but I think that there are some people. who could do it. I mean, his best thing was when he was in the mystery science theater, the movie that they did, he's a detective with the one name. He's kind of fat and bloated in it. And they're just making fun of him the whole time. Final justice.

No, that's not the name. Right? I don't think that's the name in the movie. I thought the guy had like, he had like a one name. It's a movie named after the guys. It's like, oh, Mitchell. That's what it's called. Oh, Mitchell.

I've never seen that. So if you go on YouTube, the mystery science, I always never understood why they didn't do more modern movies. They do Mitchell, and it was my favorite one out of all of them. And they just rank on Joe Don Baker. Like there's a running scene. They're talking about how out of breath he is, and it's really funny. Let's give Richard Libertini the that guy award,

because he's just that guy from this movie. Vincent Hanna, give me all you got for Best Overacting. It's a two-man race between Richard Libertini and Joe Don, Baker. Well, I got a deadline. So the name's Carlin with a K, right? You dip shit.

You go back to the goddamn bitch and you won't live to regret it. All right. Joe Don, I don't know what movie he's in, but it's not the movie that we're watching. He's... Yeah, he's playing it as like a 1970s

exploitation movie. Yeah. I don't know if they told him it was a comedy, and I don't know if he cared. but he dials it up. The Brandy Booth Award for Best Performance by a Pet. The Doberman Guard Dog, incredible.

Jump through the window. A lot of screen time. Yeah, great job. We'll give six out of ten. Dionne Waiters. Gina Davis. George Went. The guy in the autopsy.

The guy giving the autopsy, you never get used to the smell. And I got to say, Dana Wheeler-Nicklson is eligible. Not saying she's going to get it, but she's only in four scenes. Is this one of those nights when Dion is like three for 27? Jesus Christ. For Dana? No? I'm giving it to, I'm giving it to Gina because I find her to be just a delight in this movie.

Larry? She's incredible. And I don't understand why Fletch never kind of looked at Larry. So you're going Larry over William trailer as Mr. Underhill. Oh, that's pretty good. Yeah, Mr. Underhill does bring the heat. Yeah, that's good. Jesus, H. Christ!

Also, I think Charge It to the Underhills has become like a thing people say for 30 years after this. Yeah, that's fine. Good call. Recasting couch. All right, earmuffs, Chris. Is this a better movie if they just flip Gina Davis and Dana Wheeler-N? Yes. I think it is.

I'll do respect to DWN. I don't know what they were doing with. Gina Davis thing. Like, she's adorable. She's clearly headed for bigger and better things. And she's just kind of relegated to this bit part as like Fletch's lackey at the LA Times. It's her second movie. Yeah.

Was Dana William or Nicholson's like second or third movie? I don't know. She's also perfect to play. She always played against really tall leading men, you know, like opposite Goldblum and the fly. She's great opposite Chevy. She's six feet tall. Gina Davis is huge. we've never really had the Gina Davis conversation on the rewatchables,

but I'm excited to have it. And I don't even know what movie would be. I guess it would be. A league of their own. Yeah. Or Thumb and Louise. One of those too, right? Yeah.

I think a league of their own. I think that's like her marshalling all of her incredible power. She's amazing in that. Yeah, she's really good. So recasting couch, I would flip them. That would be my move. Yeah, you know where I stand. You know where I stand on this.

Elizabeth Shoeh, I think, is a little too young? Is Dana Wheeler-Nicherson like your mom or like your mom's best friend or something? What's the deal? There's some sort of email relationship or something. I, it's not, that is not the case. I think she is just a dynamite lady. I wish I had been of an age in the 80s where I could like date a lady like with Dana Willer Nicholson. She seems like an awesome hang. She is like, she is of the Diane Cannon School. Like she is just like out on the town hanging out. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go to, you know, Wolfgang Puck and get a steak. Chris made a good case if she rolls with the punches in this movie in a really good way. It's because she's not acting.

Half-ass internet research. Alan Stan Rick's house is the same house used in the godfather when Jack Waltz finds the horsehead in his bed. that has what a great I love that those are the only two movies that said Fletch and the godfather

So perfect Khartoum I can't afford to look ridiculous Let me tell you something my Crout McFrend An original run of movie posters shows Fletch

in his various disguises including one is a hockey player just never made the final cut Were the LA Kings weren't in LA in the 80s, were they? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

There's another fantasy moment that was cut where he pitches in the World Series and Lassorta pulls him from the game. The sequence never made in the movie, their existing production stills of Fletch on the pitcher mound, Lassurda coming to take the ball away. That's why he says later in the movie, Tom, Lassort, I hate that guy. That was going to be one of my picking nits. Why he said that? Yeah, because if he's such a huge L.A. sports. fan, what's his problem with Tommy Lusorta? Yeah, I mean, that's Pete Dodgers right then, right?

Tom, or you could argue he's so entrenched in L.A. that he knows the secret, which is Tom Ilisota was an asshole. Maybe that's what it was. Maybe it's another level. Ah, I'm just saying. Isn't 85 the insane oral Hersheiser season? No, that was like 87 or 88, right? 1985, he was 19 and 3.

No, 88 was the horat. 88 was Hersheiser. Yeah. Wasn't it the Gibson year? Gibson, Oral Hirschizer, and like basically nobody else. All right, Apex Mountain. So Chevy Chase is an interesting one because I almost feel like he's a double, he has two different apexes, right?

Saturday Night Live, clearly Apex. He's one of the biggest stars in the world. But then it kind of rounds back in shape somewhere around here. I'm not sure it's this movie, but it's somewhere in the vicinity of here. I would say it would be the new Apex Mountain. But you could even say it's a year later. It's somewhere 85, 86 when he reclaims his A-List movie stardom. It makes sense he would host the Oscars.

It makes sense he would have a Fox TV show at some point. I'm going to say yes. Danny Will or Nicholson. For Chris, her apex has been going for 35 years. It's just one long sustained apex, yeah. I think others would say it's this movie. Harold Faltermeyer. So he's got cop and then this movie.

I think after this, the sky's the limit for Harold. Quite literally with Top Gun. Yeah. So I would say here, this leads to Top Gun. Okay. Karim Abdul-Jabbar. Book of basketball 3.0. Let's go.

Break it down. Yeah. Well, 1985, wins the title against the Celtics. Wins a deciding game six in the Boston Garden becomes the first Laker team to beat the Celtics and does it on their floor. wins finals MVP in 85, 14 years after he won in 1971.

He's just broken the scoring record. So he's the greatest score of all time. He is now being discussed as the best player of all time. This is a year before Larry Bird starts getting best player of all time run, which then leads to Magic Johnson, the late 80s, the Michael Jordan, the early 90s, and then on and on, where he just gets completely forgotten. I think he released giant steps

his autobiography either a year before or this year. He's starting to become more humanized. He's in Fletch. I'm saying yes. I think you could say this or 1980 because in 1980. I think this year and this era is maybe as apex.

I don't think being in Fletch is his apex. I was combining it with the 85 finals and some of the other stuff. Okay. But the correct answer, I think, is 1980 because the Lakers win the title that year with magic, and he's an airplane. And airplane's a giant movie.

And he's still at the peak of his powers. He's still the best player in the league. We're sure it's not 67, 68, 69, national college player of the year. They win the title all three years he plays in college. That's not the absolute apex of Kareem. No. Greatest college basketball player of all time in the conversation? Nah.

You could go 71 bucks, too, when he's final MVP that year. a lot of apexes. Do you guys think that it's the apex mountain for Arnold J. Pants, Esquire? Chick-Hern, I think it might have been, though. Wow. Is that his apex? He's at that point a true legend.

The Lakers win the 85 title, and he has a really important scene in Fletch. When did it get better for Chick-Hern? When does he get the street named after him? Chick-Ain Court. Chick-Cirn-Court? Does that happen without Fletch? No. Fletch pushed it over the top.

I think you're right. The Fletch, Jersey, becoming an actual thing that people wore like when I was in college and stuff. Not quite an apex yet, but it is something that happened. I meant to fight that. Any other apex mountains for you? Venice? It's right before Venice really falls apart. Venice for me would probably be white man can't jump. Exactly. That's what I was going to say.

My only other apex mountain here is cans of cores. really, really great, great beer drinking by Chevy in this movie. How about newspapers? Newspapers. Apex Mountain for investigative reporting? Yeah, maybe. Picking Nits. This one's bothered me 35 years.

Why was Gail Stenwick so bad at tennis? Like, did she have some sort of muscle disorder? How could somebody not hit a tennis ball forward? It's the worst tennis anyone's ever played. It was like, I could have put my, two-year-old kid out there. They would have connected with more forehands that Gail Stanwick did. Why'd they make her that bad?

That was just DWN improvising that she can be bad at everything. You know, she really wanted to show that she wasn't just bad at acting, that she was bad at all aspects of life. I don't think tennis was that widely practiced by people back then. That's my take. What? Yeah. I think tennis was like...

Terrible take. No, tennis was like, you actually, you had to like be like a rich kid to play tennis. Now, she's a member of a tennis club. Yeah, she's in a tennis club. Maybe she likes swimming, hanging out with the underhills, chopping it up about local politics. Also, what tennis club had like cabanas like that? That cabana was like a $2 million house. The California racket club.

Not like that. That was really impressive. If that still exists, I'll step on the egg there, but I don't know. That was a really nice one. And then Mrs. Stanwick seeming completely in phase when Fletch told her everything. any other picket Nits you guys have? No, it's mostly the

Dodgers thing that anybody obsessed with the Lakers like that wouldn't be punching pictures of Tommy Lusorto especially glass glass framed pictures. I could take some issues

with Alan Stanwick's plan. I wouldn't say it's exactly bulletproof. Even despite not having DNA evidence around burning Fletch's body, it's still, it's a pretty extravagant story there.

I'm not sure he's going to pull that one off. He seems like not a bright, bright guy. Yeah, he has a plane. Like, he presumably could get to Brazil on his own. He doesn't need to go through this whole my dead body thing. Yes.

I also want to know how somebody has a second marriage that's covered extensively in the LA Times with big photo and the cover in the mid-80s without somebody else kind of picking that one up. Like, why I get married at all? No Google. Could this be remade as a 10-episode Netflix show? Please know. Probably unanswerable questions. This one is a real one that I actually struggled with over the ears with my column.

What is the correct spelling of John Cocktoastone? It's actually Cock Tolstoy. Yes. Like Leo Tolstoy, but with cock in the beginning. I thought he said Cocktoastone. It sounds like he says Cocktoeson, but yeah, apparently according to IMDB, it's Cocktollstoy. You're going to trust IMDB of your own ears? I think he says Cocktoe Stone.

Yes. Wow. You'd never make it as an investigative reporter, Chris. I'm going K-O-K-T-O-S-T-O-N. Did you say K-O-S? K-O-K-K-T-O-N? I'm certain it's with a C. It's definitely with a C.

I think it's with a K because it throws you off a little bit. I think we're finding out that we're all three of us dyslexic while trying to discuss a fake Chevy Chase name in Fletch. Next question. did you think Fletch actually retired from the LA Times at the end of this movie? Well, we know that Fletch lives, right? Well, that leads us to our next question. Did Fletch 2 happen?

Because I like to live my life like it didn't happen. It was a hugely immensely disappointing movie experience, and I've never seen it since. I think I've seen it twice, maybe. Maybe once. It's okay. I'm not a big fan. I feel like one of the only guys who makes it from Fletch to Fletch lives is Mr. Underhill. He's one of the only actors who's in the second one.

I don't remember that. Yeah. I just remember being let down over and over again in the late 80s with sequels. 48 hours two, Godfather 3, which we did on this one. Fletch lives. It was just like over and over again. Caddyshack 2. Caddyshack 2.

I do like Chevy and Caddyshack 2, though. I feel like that movie. He's really funny in that. And then Beverly Hills Cop 3, which was a little later. I think that was like 93. range. That was so disappointing. It's such a weird movie. I can't believe like, Eddie was not like washed up by any means at that point. It's weird that that was the movie they settled into. Who won the movie? Chevy Chase is the obvious answer. Yeah. No question. Yeah. And

Dana Wheeler and Eckerson second. I wish they hadn't fucked up the sequel. It feels like this character could have, if there's a flaw in this movie, it's, it's, it's, it's, that there's some seat by the pants kind of stuff that they were clearly kind of doing on the fly, that if they had structured a little better and had bigger cameos and bigger people in it, I think there's a better version of this movie that comes next. Maybe not as funny or maybe not as beloved. But I do think they could have blown it out. Like a really good example is Beverly Hills Cop 2, which is better than Beverly

O'S Cop 1. They needed to make like six of these. If they were going to make more than one, it needed to be like a detective. series where... It's the Pink Panther. It should have been the new Pink Panther. Yeah.

It should have, right? I'm not crazy to think that, right? And honestly, like, nobody cared about, like, narrative coherence. Like, it could have come back three or four years later, and it could have just been,

like, he's doing another case. We don't care about what happened to Gail or whether or not, like, one case leads to another. It's just, like, just give him, it's Fletch and the case of the blank, blank, and it would have been great. I agree with that.

It's like not figuring this out as a series, and then the, Calcomer just not get enough traction with the saint, I think are the two biggest movie tragedies in the 20th century. Your love for the saint is top six weirdest rewatchables thing. Which quadrant is it in? It's not weird. You just haven't seen it in a while.

Okay. It's a good movie. The music's incredible. It's very well done. And it just came out at the wrong time. But listen, I like Valcimer the most of anyone on this podcast. That's fine. That's fine. I'll support Val wherever. I'll go to the island of Dr. Moreau with him. I'll go. I'll do the saint with him. Whatever. You guys, when he's blind, when he's a blind guy with Mayor Sorvino, I'm in. I hope he figures it out. You guys, you guys are conditional with Val. It's fine.

Here's the power rankings of how strongly people feel about the saint. Okay. Number one, obviously Val Kilmer. He cares the most. Number two, Bill Simmons. Number three, the nine. guys who worked at Paramount Pictures who were immediately fired after the sun came out. That's the whole list. Nobody else cares. People did care. It did pretty well. And a great soundtrack. You keep saying that.

Who was on the soundtrack? All kinds of disguises. Remember all those Valcomber disguises in that movie? You love disguises. That's what we're learning based on this movie and the saint. Wait. I did it really bomb? No, it did well.

Yeah. See, now you're just. slandering the saint. First of all, your guy Philip Noyce directed it. Yeah, that's okay. He's good. Oh, you guys are assholes. Budget 70 million. It made 169.4 million. It was like more than doubled its budget. If you had to choose from the two greatest Philip Noyes films of all time, you'd have to choose between the saint and Sliver. Where are you going? You're not going to go dead calm? Sliver was bad. Clear and present Dangerous, good too. We'd love to clear and present danger on this podcast.

Thou Kilmer earned a golden raspberry word nomination for worst actor. That is such bullshit. Fuck those people. I can't believe that. Wow, you're so mad. Such a good soundtrack. Six underground by the sneaker pimps. Orbital, Moby, Fluke, Lucius Jackson, the Chemical Brothers. But I've never heard you talk about this kind of music in any other context, but the same. It's the only time I ever liked it. It was a two-month stretch. 12-part podcast series Electronica exists hosted by Bill Simmons

Yeah, solo pod That era of music Just you on ecstasy Talking about the same soundtrack That era music was a thing For eight months Everyone's like It was the next grudge

And then it ended abruptly With no backlash Everyone just kind of moved on That was it It lives on with Valcomer and the saint The saint died What are you talking about? It's over

The moment is over Doesn't live off No, it shouldn't be over It's bad that the it's bad that it's over. I really... Wait a second. I'll stand by the saint.

Yeah. You got... You're saying six underground. Why hasn't Ryan Reynolds made Fletch? I know. I thought when you were saying Ryan Gosling, Ryan Reynolds is what popped in mind

because he really is the guy who stole the Chevy Chase playbook. Deadpool is Fletch. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. Bill's just thinking about Val Kilmer. Yeah.

Do you think Jason Lee would have been a good Fletch, though? I don't know if he would have, but at that time, I was all in on Kevin Smith. And I was following that. news very closely, like a nerd reading A&Cool News online and getting excited about the prospect of it. And I thought Jason Lee was one of the last guys who did that archetype that

we're talking about, where he was actually at his best when he was pure asshole, when he was just a completely smarmy dude. And I definitely would have watched it. I would have been interested. There's one other guy we didn't mention with this was Vince Vaughn. It's in the kind of the area. It's a little different. It's his own spin on it. it's a little more parody-ish. Also a tall guy. Yeah. Motor Mouth.

But Vince Vaughn as Fletch, I think, could have made it. I would have signed up for that. Vince Vaughn and the Saint, I think also would have looked really well. Feet. Do you think they should have passed this like how in Batman, different people became Batman? Maybe that's how, maybe that would have been the solution for the saint. Different people in the lead role. I honestly feel like I'm on a Nathan for you episode right now.

How about this? Well, I'll watch the saint and we'll decide whether it was good or not. Why don't we all watch it? What happens if Chris and I both don't think it's good, but you do? Does that mean that we get to do the podcast with you? Sean's on the HBO Max app, like sifting through. Like, oh, the blob!

Oh, it's back! Just, he's in like 1953 on the HBO Max app. He's like, I want to be the one guy who watches all the 1953 HBO Max offerings. better that than furiously beating it to Dana William Nicholson like Chris, you know? Why am I catching strays? He's the one making fun of how you spend your time. All right. It was a raucous episode.

Enjoy Fletch. It's available nowhere. You have to rent it on Amazon or Voodoo or Apple. But we enjoyed it for Chris Ryan and Sean Fantasy. We'll see you next time with you watch us.