The Rewatchables - 'Training Day' With Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, Sean Fennessey, and Shea Serrano

Episode Date: May 31, 2018

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, Sean Fennessey, and Shea Serrano “didn’t know you liked to get wet,” but they did know you liked to rewatch the 2001 crime thriller ‘Training Day,’ directed by Antoine Fuqua and starring Denzel Washington in an Oscar-winning performance for the ages and Ethan Hawke. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Here's a great description on IMDB for a movie. On his first day of the job as a Los Angeles narcotics officer, a rookie cop goes beyond a full work day in training within the narcotics division of the LAPD. Wait for it. With a rogue detective who isn't what he appears to be. That's just great stuff. Training Day coming up right now.

Jails because of me. Judges have handed out over 15,000 man years of incarceration times. based on my investigation. You got today and today on to show me who and what you're made of. You hear me? It's it. That's what I'm talking about. First day on the job, you hit a $3 million seizure.

Police officer. Get away from the girl. No, no, no. We're not racking up arrest today. You let them go. What more you want? Justice. Is that not justice?

That's street justice. What's wrong with street justice? Oh, what? Just let the animals wipe themselves out. God willing. You can't be like this. Open your eyes, can't you see? All right, Chris Ryan here.

Fantasy here, fresh off our award-winning podcast of the social network last week. What award did we win? We won the Pulitzer. I forgot to tell you guys. Yeah, it's great. They've never given one out for a podcast, but that's how good it was. I have a quick question before we get started. Do you like to get wet?

Like having your shit pushed in? Let's do this, man. Training Day. I didn't even know where to start, but here's Jake Hoyt, played by Ethan Hawke. Here was just his day. He smoked PCP for the first time. He fought two rapist crackheads. He got beaten up by a Latino street gang.

He had approximately 29 guns pulled on him at some point. He got beaten up by Denzel Washington. Pretty convincing. I have that scored as a 10-8 round. We can go with that later. Then he jumped on a car and then got slammed around on the car, but then somehow had enough faculties. I'm sad to say he did not pass concussion protocol.

He's going to be out next week. Yeah, I think it definitely tell the truth moment for Jake at the end of the day. What a day for him. Kind of a Grankowski performance, though, right? It really hard to take him down after all that. I see, I think Jake's more, like, we're going to get into Jake Hoyt's football career, but a real slot receiver. Like, takes a lot of punishment.

So I like that, like that, like a Wes Walker. Yeah. Well, I like that. They said he played strong safety in college. North Hollywood High. Or not at high school. He must have been like a Jim Leonard type, right? You know, a real signal caller from in the backfield.

So that's where when the ringer has its sports movie consulting company. I would have said now strong safety that doesn't want a cornerback. He's a shutdown. Yeah, he's a seahorn. Yeah, he's a seahorn. Sure. Strong safety doesn't make sense to me.

So I haven't seen this movie in a while. It's on Netflix, actually. We should say it's on Netflix until June 1st. So I assume people out there have Netflix. A couple of days to watch it. You can bang it out. It's just incredible Denzel. Yeah.

I mean, we knew that. He won the Oscar for it. It became the standard Denzel impression. is basically like when Jay Farrow does an S&O impression of Denzel, he's doing Denzel on Training Day. Yes. He's amazing in it. He passes the Oscar test of who else could have played this part.

We're going to talk about that, I think. What is his war? What's the baseball stat? Yeah, it's a proper placement. Yeah. Or is VORP. Value over replacement. Denzel's Vorpe in this movie compared to any other actor they could have picked is off the charts.

And it's his best movie. It's not a controversial statement. I think some people would say Malcolm X. I think they're crazy. He's amazing in this. This movie shouldn't have worked like it did. Nobody should have won an Oscar for this movie. Chris Ryan's looking at me funny.

No, I'm looking at you. I don't know if I'll go there with Malcolm X, but I'm looking at you in deep agreement otherwise. It's just like this is his part. Nobody else could have played it. Will Smith and Training Day is like, this is weird. Why are you doing this Will Smith?

There are a ton of what ifs. I know we'll get to the what is soon. But I think that where this sits in the Denzel performance is actually maybe a little. little bit more controversial than you're saying. But it's a very good debate. I'm ready to have it now because before we get to the categories, it's a good one. I loved, I loved his performance and he got game. I thought he was great in that. I thought he was great in Malcolm X. He's kind of not great in Philadelphia, which I think is. I think he's pretty good in Philadelphia. That performance has an

age well. That movie has an age well and the performance has an age well. But also in 1992, it was what it was. Yeah. But now you watch you're like, all right. Depend on what Denzel you're looking forward. There's Denzel that's like the leading man Denzel and that would be like Crimson Tide. Yeah. There's Denzel. Pelican brief crimson tied Denzel. Then there is like kind of toxic seedy Denzel, which is man on fire and flight. What's the movie when he's out of time when he's the crooked sergeant? Yeah. And he's sleeping with Dean Cain's son-a-Latham. Yeah. He's sleeping with Dean Cain's wife and it's like there's money and there's a double cross. I like that, Denzel.

I like sweaty. I might have a drinking problem. Philo Juarez, Denzel. Flight, Denzel. Yeah. There are three. There's the two that you just mentioned. There's the like, is he good?

Is he bad? Is he slick? He's in a Tony Scott movie. He's in a Carl Franklin movie. Then there's obviously, you know, really, really movie star-ish. You know, the Pelican brief guy you're talking about? And then the third guy is important, Denzel. This movie matters, Denzel, right?

It's like Malcolm X, Mobetter Blues, fences. Like, he takes movies that are like, this is a, statement on society, on the world, on who we are now. And you can make the case that he has three different peaks, right? I would say there's a fourth, Denzel, because it's like the, the he got game Denzel of the, just the average black guy whose life didn't work out and has a certain tone and vibe to him and kind of an anger about what happened, but a hopefulness too. Yeah. He taps into that in a way that I don't feel like Will Smith was ever able to tap into Well, you know, Ethan Hawk on your pod talked a lot about his absolute, just marveling at Denzel's run that he's been on, that he's remained relevant for these decades.

And I think the reason why he still remains such an object of interest for people is because he combines, he is the combination of all the things we're talking about. He has Tom Hanks likeability, but he has De Niro Pacino chops. You know, he can get dark. He can go to these dark, dark places. And he's got to blow the other guy off the screen. kind of chops too. Yeah. I mean, like Ethan Hawk is holding on

for the first half hour of this movie. And then he eventually... They play that up. Which is perfect for the movie, though. Yeah. Yeah, he also, you know, he has like sex appeal, like women love Denzel. He ticks every single box for the movie star that you want.

Well, you know what's funny about Denzel? And he might be the only actor like this right now. Whereas if you're at a party and you said, you know, I fucking hate who's totally under-overrated, Denzel Washington. People are like, whoa! What is happening? I'm going to another conversation.

It would just be like the most insane thing you've heard all week. Like what? You don't like Denzel? Why? And then you can name like 20 movies. And if that person doesn't like those 20 movies, you'd be like, all right, like, you'd almost be suspicious of him. You think he's like a Russian spy?

Yeah. It's like this is some take from somebody who hasn't lived in America. I've never heard it before. I've never heard someone say I don't like him. I think he has a unanimous approval rating. Yeah. It's amazing. It's like we talked about that in the NBA where Janus is at this nice point right now

where he's got a unanimous approval rating. it's not a lot of people. Even like the Sixers, Simmons and Embed, it's kind of turned to them already. Sure. And Denzel has kept it for... Thanks. Tensel's kept it since...

I'm trying to think when the first time I even knew who he was. He was on St. Elsewhere, which was really one of the first pivotal hour dramas. And he was great on that. I think he was always a first round draft pick for like, that guy's going to be a good actor. Yeah, I think it all like locks in for real in glory.

Yeah. That's when he became... People were pretty into him in a soldier. Story. Soldier story, cry freedom. He had big roles in movies, but... I still don't feel like a lot of people saw glory.

A lot of kids in middle school history classes did. I think it's after the fact. I'm just saying that year it wasn't like, who's this guy? It was like he won the sporting actor for it. And people got excited about that, but I don't... Maybe I'm completely wrong, but I don't know if the box office,

it wasn't like this gangbusters movie. No, it wasn't massive. I mean, it would... He put him on the... $1 million. Right. It put him on the map as this guy's the next guy.

Yes. And then that led to Philadelphia and all the movies that came. And there's a nice little him versus Hank's thing that it's funny they're in the same movie

because you could argue Denzel could have really been the only other person who could have been the Hank's role and castaway. Interesting. I would have wanted

to be on an island with him for an hour. Interesting. He would have been compelling. I think he would have had a great conversation with the volleyball. Probably a different relationship

with Wilson. Yeah. Angrier. You like to get wet, Wilson? That's how you know, though. You like to get wet. Wilson! That's how you know that a guy

is a really powerful movie star, though, because rather than play the game where you swap him out in the movie that he's in, you start swapping him into everybody else's movie and say, would this be better with him? Well, what was that movie the pursuit of happiness, Will Smith made?

It's good. Yeah, but it's better. If Denzel is in that, that's an Oscar winner. Yeah. Wolf Finches wasn't, he's not a good enough actor to carry that movie.

It's also a testament to, and sometimes I don't think he always, Denzel Washington always picks the best material necessarily. No, he does some paycheck movies. Which is a, you know, it's up for debate about as to why. But if you remember that Black Mirror episode that John Ham's in where like you look and like you can't see the person, it's just the outline of the person. If you just have the outline of the person in Training Day and it's the movie training day, this movie does not hang together.

It is like one of my favorite movies to watch. I'm just saying that like the plot of the movie is pretty, it's being held together by dental floss and Denzel Washington. He is a genuine villain in this movie, and you're rooting for him the whole time, which is like what we talk about with Heat. Why am I rooting for Neil McCauley, who's a horrible guy who, when things go wrong,

he lines his trunk with garbage bags, and you're going to just go in the trunk, and he's going to kill you, and he's suspicious of everybody, and he'll walk away from anyone in his life in 30 seconds. I'm in on this guy. I love this guy. And the same thing with Denzel.

It's like, it's a horrible person. person. I hope he makes it. I hope he doesn't die at the end. Who doesn't love an outlaw? I forgot whether he died at the end. I didn't see it in a couple years. So can we do, because you mentioned Philadelphia a couple of times and we talked about, can we talk about Hanks in Washington's 90s just for a quick digression? I mean, Hanks wins the 90s, but it's great. So Hanks is League of Their Own Sleepless in Seattle, Philadelphia, Forest Gump, Apollo 13 Toy Story, that thing you do, saving Private Ryan, you've got mail. Toy Story, too, pretty much. And then he ends it with Green Mile.

He does too. That kind of. romantic rom-coms. He wins two Oscars and is also in the most iconic animation movie of that ticket. That's pretty unassailable. And a couple other good movies, too.

I think I'm going Denzel. Yeah, Washington goes, Mobetter Blues, Mississippi Massala, ricochet. Malcolm X, much ado about nothing. Philadelphia, Pelican Brief, Crimson Tide, virtuosity, devil in a blue dress.

Courage under fire. What are you guys doing? Which is military Denzel, another subsection, Courage Under Fire and Siege. Siege is an amazing Denzel performance. Courage Under Fire with a really bad Meg Ryan miscasting. Courage Under Fire. Incredible Domen. Incredible Domen, like almost died.

Yeah. Preacher's wife. What are you guys doing? Fallen, he got game, the Siege. What case are you making? I'm making an argument. This is like Clyde Drexor versus Michael Jordan. It's ridiculous.

I think I actually like all these Denzel movies a little bit more than the Hank's movies. Forrest Gump is the biggest movie. of that decade. I would watch, he got game 100 times out of 100. It doesn't matter. It's just talking about who had the better 90s.

You're talking objectively. This is not about objectivity. He won more Oscars. His movies made more money. His batting average was higher. He was in three different genres in a giant way. I love Denzel,

but come on. Denzel had some ones you'd never watch again. Guess what you never watch again, Rickash. I kind of like Ricochet. I take an issue with that. I take issue with that.

Rickishish. Isn't he like roofing him and set him up for a like a rape? John Lickman. Yes. Or he gets raped? Somebody gets raped.

No. He sleeps with a woman while he's been roofied and is filmed. And then that video is sent to his wife, as I recall. That's a tough beat. He's blackmailed. Yeah. That's a tough beat.

It's an interesting debate. I actually liked Rickrache too. It's a bad. We got a back on Team Rikersh. It was bad, though. It was one of those when you watch you. Like, oh, man, how did they not get there? A good.

Total testament, though, to him just lifting the boat on every movie. I think Pelican briefs a loss. They had to cut out the sex scene That was during that weird era When Hollywood wasn't totally ready Right When they had to cut the Eddie Murphy scenes Not Denzel's fault

I think they filmed it though They came in Julia Went a couple rounds We need to see that We'll never see it American needs that We'll never see it They chopped it out

God really, I have Denzel I have a plus 400 Underdog against Hanks in the 90s Does Castaway count in the 90s or 2000s Castaway is 2000 So you could say it cap the decade Would you rather have had Denzel or Hanks and Castaway? I think I would rather have

Can we have it? Is it too late? Castaway too. Castaway too? It's definitely like a plot line of flight is like that plane crashes and he's the only one who lives. And then he's just on the island with no cocaine, freak it out because he's got... You know what Castaway doesn't work with Denzel? Because he's taking Helen Hunt at the end.

He's not like, we're good. Stay with the dentist. Denzel's like, we're going to go fucking my car. Is this your number one movie obsession? Is the Helen Hunt Tom Hanks relationship in Castaway? No, I'm just, it's a direct Hanks versus Denzel question. Yeah. Because it's hard.

You can't say like, could Hanks have played Malcolm X? Like there's movies Denzel made that Hanks just couldn't have played. Hanks could not have played the guy in Training Day. Should we explore Hanks as Malcolm X a little more, though? It's controversial casting. But like, Hanks couldn't have been Training Day and he wouldn't have wanted it. Well, Plymouth Rock didn't land on us. No, it's true.

There's no one-to-one, but I don't know. I think I just like watching Denzel more. Hanks might be the more successful movie star, but I just like watching Denzel more. I don't think Hanks could have... I think Denzel could have done more of the Hanks movies than vice versa. Even removing like the Malcolm X, like the Impossible Ones. He got game and things like that.

It's just, Hanks and Rickashade just becomes a weird movie. I don't know what that is at that point. And this isn't interesting because we're talking about the 90s and, you know, this training days 2001. It's an interesting time for both of those guys. I think at that time, you know, he's coming off, remember the Titans, he's coming off the hurricane, he's coming off the bone collector. And the hurricane was supposed to be, I win the Oscar for this and he didn't.

And it wasn't that. And by the way, it's flawed. Not a great movie. It's a little stiff. It's also a movie that was a song. Who directed that one? That's Norman Jewison, who is very, very well-known, legendary. I'm not sure how that movie didn't work.

The Hurricane? Yeah. I wanted that. I wanted that to be like my favorite movie of 1999 and I would never watch it again. I just remember it was like kind of a rough watch. The Bob Dylan song kind of gave away the movie for a lot of people. It's a story that they all already knew. That's like I can't miss story though.

But anyway, I bring it up because he's at this interesting inflection point in his career. And he made a left turn. But you forgot that he had won an Oscar. He had one for supporting, but he had never been best of us. Best actor. That's like winning a sports Emmy. Wow. You said it.

I wonder of several sports enemies. The difference in bed, think of all the people have won best supporting actor or best supporting actress. No doubt that best actor is much more of a flex. And it seems like he's hunting for it a little bit at this point. He gets, he's obviously passed over famously from Alchem X. Yeah. Famously passed over for he got game.

Passed over for the hurricane. Pass over for Remember the Titans. This is the left turn. This isn't a movie you would think I'm going to win the Oscar for. No, quite the opposite. I thought that this was like a pretty genrey summer movie that winds up getting elevated specifically by him. And with the director who hadn't really done anything.

He'd been bait and what was the other one he did? This was his third movie. He's done the replacement killers. That was his first movie. And then he did bait and then Training Day. You didn't see those first two movies and go, the third movie this guy makes is going to win Oscars. But it was still a time when I think that pre-superhero movies

where people were like, I'm going to keep plugging away at this. And, you know, obviously had like a... I still think actually Antoine Fook was pretty underrated. And I think that what he does in this movie is a very specific thing that allows not only Washington, but crucially, Washington and Hawk to operate a lot together. There's a lot of two shots.

Hawks talked about this before. It's like they made sure that they like got a lot of the two of them interacting in the frame together. And I think that that's like a huge part of this movie. I agree. want to do some categories Let's do it Most rewatchable scene

I had four You might have more Denzel bullying Ethan Hawking in a smoking pot Which turns out to be PCP It's just kind of an amazing Mental chess match

Of just challenging somebody's manhood And getting them to where You want them to go I loved it The robbery scene of Scott Glenn Hold this thought When they go back And shoot him

And take his money He's just an incredible nine minutes. And I forgot that he shot the guy with the bullproof vest, and he actually really did shoot him. It's just great. And then Ethan Hawk does any part of it. And that's about as good of a nine-minute action movie scene as you're getting. The poker scene with the Latino gang at Smiley's House.

Great stuff. Love it. No Denzel in that scene. As he's right, no Denzel as he's slowly kind of figuring out what's going on. And then the final Denzel versus Hawk, which you know is coming the whole time. Denzel using his... I guess that would be a fifth scene.

The shootout in the house... Yeah, I mean, we'd drag it into the Kinkang part. One right in. One right in. Just their first meeting in the diner. Tell me a story. Tell me a story, Hoyt. Okay.

That's five. So what do you got? This is a newspaper. Exactly. That whole thing... I don't know if I can... Chris, is there like a character in your lifetime of watching movies

that Alonzo reminds you of in any way. Because I remember watching the movie for the first time and thinking like, I just have no idea where this guy's going. No, that's the thing that's so incredible about this movie, and I know this is going to sound like bullshit, but Alonzo reminds me of guys I knew. Not guys I knew.

Not guys I knew who were like smoke this dust, but guys you knew, especially when you're like in high school and they're seniors or you know, like maybe there's older guys on a team. And they have like this A, but it's a charisma, but it's also like your school. terrified of them. And especially if you're on a team and there's like a little bit of like physical

interaction, like you're maybe there's like you playing football or something like that. There's a chance that this guy could kick your ass. But there's also a chance that you would like die for this guy because he's so charismatic. And you're just like, I don't know what like they're fucking with you, but they're also like trying to indoctrinate you into something.

And you're just like completely confused as a younger man. I thought that way about Dave Jacoby. Love Dave Jacoby. It's not threatening though. Jacoby's not threatening. You didn't know. them back when.

So we're going most rewatchable as what? I'm going diner scene. Sean. You got him. It's amazing. It is that you could be out there with a fine bitch for a year. And the most entertaining story that you can come up with to tell me is a drunk stop. But I don't believe you.

Tell me a story is just so incredible. I'm going poker scene. I love the poker scene. I love the Latino Street gang. Hey, Pig. You ever had your shit pushed in? Your shit pushed in. Simple question.

Nah? Yeah. Had my shit pushed in. Oh, yeah, man. I had... I should... Pushed in, bro. Big time.

We have a new category. New one. Biggest Oscar travesty. We've circled this in these podcasts, but now we're just making a category. And I think it's going to be really funny for when we do, like, Roadhouse. And I make the case for Ben Gazera,

who's robbed in 189. Jeff Healy Band for Best Original Song and Roadhouse. This was a dark, dark, dark, dark, Oscars. 2001, Beautiful Mind wins for Best Picture. Yikes. The other nominees were Gosford Park in the bedroom, Lord of the Rings and Mulan Rouge, no training day. That is not age well.

Best director, Ron Howard wins for Beautiful Mine. Ridley Scott, Blackhawk Down, Robert Altman, Gosford Park. Wow. Peter Jackson, Lord of the Rings. and David Lynch for Mulholland Drive. No Antoine Fukuwa. I actually like a bunch of those movies.

I like in the bedroom a lot. I think Gosser Park's pretty good. But Antoine Fugua should have been nominated. For sure. And I think Training Day should have been nominated. I can't, I don't know if we could, we'd ever be able to go back and figure this out. But I feel like Lord of the Rings was a tough hang for the Oscars.

I feel like Lord of the Rings sort of soaked up a bunch of nominations for a couple years, especially on the technical side, obviously. But even Best Picture, Best Director. And then it wound up winning for the third one. Right. Yeah, I've always been confounded by Lord of the Rings's ability to get all those nominations in a way that, like, Star Wars couldn't. Even though I would take the Star Wars movies a hundred times.

I don't understand that. Was there still some Miramax involvement in Lord of the Rings or was it like? No, I mean, I think Peter Jackson was really well respected. But anyway, you know, Fukuwa, sure. I think that would have been interesting what it would have done for his career if he would have gotten that kind of validation early on, if it would have set him on a different course because the movies that he makes after this movie are training dayish. So I still haven't gotten to the biggest.

I'm not scared travesty yet. Denzel, by the way, beats Russell Crowe, Sean Penn and I am Sam, Will Smith and Ali, and Tom Wilkinson in the bedroom. I'm good with that. Highley Barry won for Monsters Ball. Best Supporting Actor. This is one of my... This one that keeps me up at night.

It's a travesty. Read the list. It's a travesty. I'll read the whole list. I won't tell the listeners who won, and they can guess. Ethan Hawke Training Day. Ben Kingsley and Sexy Beast. Ian McAllen, Lord of the Rings.

John Voight and Ali. He's in it for like three minutes, although he is really good. And Jim Broadbent and Iris. It's tough. The winner was Jim Broadbent and Iris. Very tough. Now, I don't mean to compare

this movie to Rain Man because that's a weird comparison, training day. But I do think it's one of those movies and I like when this happens in a movie when the guy who blows everyone away in the part, obscures how good the other guy was in the other part? Absolutely. And Rain Man actually, this is different. Training Day, Denzel is the best person movie. In Rain Man, Tom Cruise is the

best person in the movie, but it's a Dustin Hoffman movie. He won the Oscar. Ethan Hawks so good in this movie, and we're going to go over the casting what-ifs with it to not get blown away by Denzel, to do all the things he has to do in this movie, to be on PCP for like a half hour, to be believable in the fight scenes. I love that you're giving him credit. Like it's like Chris Paul playing with a hamsterner. He didn't really smoke PCP. He had to pretend he did, though. Yeah.

And then all the other stuff he did. And it's like, man, I don't know what else he had to do in this movie. Well, they had to say the nominations again. Was Kingsley and Sexy Beast? No, no, no, no, no, no. There are some people out there who would. He's good in that. Yeah.

Hawks amazing in this. Hawks amazing and you should be. I'm obsessed with the two-handered movies where it's like, you know, whether it's Butch and Sundance or The Sting or The Sting or Color of Money. or this or Rain Man like you're saying. And the way that they kind of, directors or filmmakers will choose to emphasize one character over the other.

And it's a real choice to how you basically present the straight man and whether or not you establish a straight man in the movie. Like, do you think that there's, is Redford the straight man and all the president's men? No, I actually think he's more important

than that movie than Hoffman. Right. So it's almost like he's more of the leading man and Hoffman's kind of the best supporting actor. this movie, Ethan Hawks in more scenes. You could argue that he's the best actor and Denzel's the best supporting, but you can't do it that way. And it worked out the way it was.

But really, they were both best actors. It would be like if you did Thelman Louise and you made Gina Davis best supporting actor, like it's stupid. Right. When this movie starts, it starts with Ethan Hawke. It's an Ethan Hawk movie. Yeah. Yeah.

What's age the best? For me, the Dr. Dre still. Still. Yeah, nigga. I'm still fucking with you. Still water's run deep. Hearing that, that movie, that song is so... We in the office movie?

I'm terrified with 2001. And then Dr. Jay ends up being in the movie later, but just hearing that, it took me, like, really to 2001. It's like the second decade of hip-hop, basically. It's a legitimately L.A. movie, too. It feels L.A. that, to me, the music and the L.A.ness of it has aged the best for me. What else would... What other candidates would have? I mean, just watching those two performances that we've been talking about for 30 minutes, I think they're still, like, work perfectly well.

Yeah. I think also there's something about like the kind of what a crime movie is now. It feels like a little bit closer to kind of where like TV started going. This is kind of the time of the shield. There's like it's kind of the anti-hero. Yeah. Anti-hero quality that became very consistent with storytelling, especially cop movies and like drug dealer movies.

So I think that stuff holds up pretty well. Yeah. I think the performance, the Denzel performance specifically, it's interesting because it splits the difference between, I guess, the next, what wound up being next 17, 18 years of actually probably fewer crime movies than everybody in this room would like to see. I mean, there hasn't been a lot of them. But with, and still pays homage to some of the Sydney Lumet stuff, some of the French connection stuff of the 70s. And it has that kind of, that documentary feel almost, that kind of really

gritty feel. So I think it's the performances that age the best for me. I thought it's really well directed too. It's directed in a totally modern way. There's nothing that feels dated. which I don't know what the year was when stuff stopped feeling that dated maybe it's like somewhere in the late 90s like to me Fight Club could be on right now and people, if you hadn't seen it, you wouldn't know it came out 20 years ago.

Fuqua's interesting. I don't know if he has like a specific directing style. He's very slick. A lot of, it's very bright a lot of his movies. It feels like a little dirty but like Hollywood dirty.

Yeah. It's interesting. Like it definitely has great. His movies have good pace. You know, you're always like locked into the storyline. And not all of his movies are good, but they're always very, like, propulsive. No, and like we were saying before, parts of these, this movie does not hang together, you know,

and there's parts of this movie that you feel like maybe got shoved in for certain purposes or taken out for certain purposes. But he hangs with it the entire time. And it's like that nice combination between, like, Michael Bay and William Freakin, it's pretty slick, but it has, like, a real, like, you're in these streets and you're, the locations they chose are all authentic. It's really good. Ethan Hawk, I think, is age really nicely. It's just a good point in his career.

He'd banged out the reality bites before sunrise, Gaddaica, part of his career. He's one of those guys who... This was like the next step for him. They're going to give him an Oscar when he's 70 for some grand old man performance, but you could have said for six or seven different movies he deserved an Oscar. Yeah, I agree. He's like one of those guys that never won the MVP, but could have wanted a few years. What's age the worst?

Dr. J's performance is just bad. It's a bummer. It was bad then. Yeah, it was bad then, and now it's even worse. and we have more of a history with Dr. Dre, and it was a miscast. Snoop's good, too. Yeah, Snoop's pretty good, so it's in sharp relief. Yeah, so he won that head-to-head battle.

Yeah, Macy Gray also makes an appearance at one point in this movie. It wasn't bad to me, but it does stick out like a sore thumb because Macy Gray is just not a part of the culture anymore. Yeah. Like, we just don't see her nearly as much as we see Snoop and Dre. I was having a hard time of this one. On one hand, I want to say the very, very first scene, like the Jake kind of family establishing shot scene

seems like it was like they tested the movie and they were like, we need to have a shot of Jake's family. Can Jake's wife be in this? Yeah, we need a strong female character. And that one just always, like, it's like a weird bad first five minutes. And the dialogue is really bad where he's like, baby, I know I got to bring it, like, you know, go out there and be ambitious and make the shield so that we can like, so that we can raise our time. It does feel like it was filmed after the fact. I do think though it might have set up him coming back at the end of the thing going back to his house.

Sure. Sure. Like, oh, how was your day today? It was crazy. You're not going to believe this, actually. casting what ifs presented by zip recruiter Can we talk about zip recruiter for a second? You know it's not smart?

Casting Toby McGuire for this movie in the Ethan Hawk role. Would have been disastrous. Would not have been smart. I'll tell you who would not have recommended that, ZipRecruiter. I don't know how they would have figured this out, but they have the powerful technology.

They can scan thousands of resumes to find people with the right experience for your job. Poor Toby McGuire spent two months going on narcotics runs under cover and lost all this weight and got in crazy shape

and Anton Fouca was just never 100% sold on him. That must have been very disruptive for his poker playing. It would have been so good in that one scene though. Yeah, that's true. He would have crushed Smiley.

He would have had to pretend he wasn't great though. It would have been a stretch from him holding pocket rockets and destroying Smiley. It would have been good stuff. Well, it was almost like Antoine Fooker had ZipRecruiter

because he picked the right person. ZipRecruiter learns what kind of candidates you like, invites more to apply. So effective, 80% of employers are post on ZipRecruiter, get a quality candidate through the site. And just one day, they're the presenting sponsor of the Bill Simmons podcast.

My listeners can try it for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash BS ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. Okay. So here's some casting what-ifs. This movie had a lot. I was surprised. Davis Guggenheim was set to direct

with Sam Jackson and Matt Damon as the stars. Sam Jackson and Matt Damon is an interesting movie. It's definitely not winning an Oscar. I think Sam Jackson would have been almost a parody version of Denzel in this movie. Chris said the same thing before we started recording. I think it could have worked. I think he's one of the only people. I think he's one of the only people who could have credibly given you something.

It would have been more like red meat. When Denzel is there, it feels like more real. It feels more cinematic. With Sam Jackson, it's like meta. You're like, you know, he's doing a bit. Yeah. Can you, I mean, he essentially has done King Kong and Got Shown Me like in every single movie, including maybe even King Kong.

But I don't think I would have believed it the way you believe it with Denzel. I agree. Eminem and Christian Bale turned down the part of Jay Coyt, apparently, allegedly. Again, this is all half-ass internet research. Eminem is, that's a really also interesting left turn in the history of culture, you know, because he's really good in 8-mile.

He could not have played this role. I don't think so either, but how much different is Eminem's career if he decides to Will Smith it? If he just says, like, I'm moving out of music, and I'm focusing on being a movie star. I think he could have had that career. I don't think he has the same kind of like acting chops that Ethan Hawk has, but that's just an interesting what if.

He's good and funny people. He's very funny. Yeah, that's like probably the funniest. It's really hard to imagine Eminem getting punked for 90 minutes in a movie. Or being in a fight scene with Denzel Washington. I think that would have been surreal. Yeah.

He would have gotten his ass. He would have gotten his ass. He would have been a skinny. Yeah, come on Eminem. Mickey Roark was Antoine Fuku's first choice for the part of Roger. Studio turned it down. allegedly Bruce Willis turned down Alonzo.

That had the potential. Gary Sinise was attached at one point. Gary Sinise and Tom Seismore. Seismore was basically making training day on his own in Illinois. Yeah. He's coming around L.A. with PCP. The Dion Waders Award. Best Heat Check.

Nominee Snoop Dog and Wheelchair. Eva Mendez in a rookie performance. I have some thoughts on her that I'll share in a second. Great. Tom Barringer? Yeah. You know my Tom Barringer bit? What is it?

He looks exactly like my dad. Does he really? Yeah. It's disorienting. Tom Berringer now? Yeah, Tom Barringer with gray hair. Tom Barringer, from training day to inception, is like watching my dad in a movie. It's unsettling.

He's also playing a narcotics cop in this movie, which my father is. Sean, every day of your life after 1986, did you walk around your house screaming? Borns! Tom Barringer, massive star for... About six years. Yeah. Yeah. After the big chill

and platoon and stuff, yeah. Someone to watch over me. I was just going to say, I just saw born on the 4th of July the other day. He shows up as the Marine to recruit crews. Someone to watch over me is year seven of the rewatchables. I have a lot of thoughts. Is that movie?

Mimi Rogers? Yeah. Love Mimi Rogers. In love with Mimi Rogers in that movie. Other heat check people, smiley and bone. Those are the other two heat check performances. So can we talk about Scott Glenn here?

Is Scott Glenn a Dionne and Dionne Wade's candidate? No, Scott Glenn's coming up in a different category. Okay. I'll have to talk about him yet. Chris is vibrating right now. Who's your heat check? Scott Glenn.

Good stuff from Snoop. Snoop, by all accounts, should have been bad. What you need, hom? Crack. 20 bucks? Crack. Smell like bacon and this motherfucker fuck. What I look like a sucker to you, nigga?

Fuck, you rookie. Snoop and a wheelchair should have been one of the biggest movie disasters we've had. I would also like to throw out a nomination for Harris Ewan. Oh, God. Hold that thought. Because we have another new category coming. All right. So we all agree on Snoop.

The Harris Hewlin Award for Best Harris Hewlin. Who was Bone? Do we know who Bone was? I mean, Clee Shaheed Sloan is the name of the actor. I thought Bone was good. Yeah. And also enjoyed Smiley. So Bone is an American activist, actor, and documentary director from L.A.,

California. While still a member of Athens Park Bloods, a Los Angeles street gang, Sloan worked to reform gang culture to put an end-to-gang violence from the inside. and that's actually an interesting bit in this movie just to how much Foucair tried to work within the structure of the gang culture in Los Angeles to make the movie seem authentic. Yeah, it certainly seemed authentic.

I think I'm going to give it to Cliff Curtis for Smiley. I really like Cliff Curtis. He's on Fear of the Walking Dead now, I think, and he's great in this movie called Sunshine that Danny Boyle directed, but Smiley does not have to be this interesting of a character. Yeah. And he is really good at kind of maybe giving you

a feeling like, it'll be okay. We're just playing cards. And then like, but there's that menace right underneath. Also like, you know, just generally all the tattoos, I think, or the menace. But I thought he was great. Smiley's great. I'm giving Snoop Dogg just because it was so unexpected. All right.

New category. The Joe Pantiliano Award. Nice. Best performance by a then-that guy who then became a that guy or a non-that guy. Okay. Joe Pantilione for five years was like Guido the Killer Pimp, the guy from Midian the Cruiser, that guy. And then he was in running scared.

Is it Pantiliano? Pentaliano. And then he was in the Matrix. Joe Pantiliano. And then he was a guy. Joey Pants. He was a guy. But there was five years ago, five years there were me and my buddy Jim Grady would be like,

that guy. Oh, that guy. I love that guy. Yeah. So the Joey Pants Award is going. Who are the nominees? There's two. Scott Glenn and Harris Eulen.

I know Scott Glenn and Scott Glenn, but to a lot of people, he's like, that guy, that guy from wasn't he in Silence of Lambs? Like, I don't think every. Everybody, Scott Glenn's rolling off the tongue? No. The name? Right. I mean, Harris Eulen is a flat out that guy.

He's been in a hundred movies. He's almost always evil in some way. He's usually the lieutenant, or somebody who works in the DA or the mayor's office. Yeah. You know, like, amazing theater actor. Yeah, Harris Eulen's like, he's a G. You see Harris Eulen, you know, like, he's something bad's going to happen. I mean, he has two iconic performances burned in my brain.

He's a very, very, very well, very well, respected theater actor. But the first one is Ghostbusters 2, where he plays the judge. For whatever reason, I've just seen that a million times. But the most important one, by far, Scarface. Yeah. There's Melbourne. That's right.

Oh, yeah. He's really, he's awesome in that movie and unforgettable. And then I feel like he's just doing that role for the next 35 years. Yeah. This is kind of a version of that. So Scott Glenn. What's your last name? Hoy.

Hoyt. Strong safety, North Hollywood High. That's right. How'd you know that? How the fuck did you know that? I follow all the good players. There's in the director's cut of apocalypse now. Yeah.

When Martin Sheen finally gets to Marlon Brando's compound. Scott Glenn is there. He is the guy who had done the mission before Martin Sheen to go find Marlon Brando and just decided he was going to stay there. And he shows up in one shot, I think in the director's cut, where he's just like got... paint all over his face and is surrounded by native Mottnard Indians and it just looks insane.

And in my mind, that character comes back to the States and becomes a Los Angeles drug dealer. Yeah. Who has got a hobby of scouting high school defensive backfield players. Can you explain to me why Scott Glenn is wearing a black tank top tucked into jeans? He's ripped. With a green bathrobe.

drinking scotch at 10 in the morning and then pre like any real YouTube mixtapes we're talking 0102 is like got a photographic memory for a guy who must have been playing high school football 10 years before that maybe 15 yeah and it's just like

he is the invention of pro football focus he is scouts right there right that too so he is just the amazing character this is what elevates this movie as weird little flourishes like Scott Glenn knowing that he played football. So my understanding of Roger,

the Scott playing character, is that he's an ex-cop. Yeah. And he becomes a drug dealer. So there is like a brand of cop, and I know this, knowing cops, that are just like really into like local athletics. You know, they'll just like go to high school football games

for no reason, just watch them. Don't have the team this, how are the wildcats this year? Yeah. And they'll want to know all about the quarterback's progress. And it's like a very provincial thing. he feels like one of these guys. He's probably got a Letterman jacket since like 1957 from LA County.

Whether he was a nom or not, who knows, seems plausible. You have to ask your dad do the crooked cops hang out like this? I don't think he's willing to answer that one. Maybe when he retires. And then, you know, this is this movie when the script was written it, they'd been banging around since like the mid-90s

and it's based off of the rampart scandal in L.A. So a lot of this stuff is drawn from the Raphael Perez case and cops stealing drugs and selling them on the streets. Oh, no. This was like, this was the rapfiel Press case basically. Yeah. Yeah.

He modeled his beard and his look and all that. Yeah. So, I mean, I just love the Glenn character. And Glenn's performance, like when he's just like, shit, Alonzo, you got your son. He's high as a motherfucker. Chris thought he was going to extend this Scott Glenn conversation for too long. We need more.

I've got a separate wrinkle. Let's go. The old Wesley Morris game, there can only be one. Okay. What does he call that one? the market correction. If there's no Tommy Lee Jones, Scott Glenn wins. Tommy Lee

Jones, market corrected Scott Glenn. It's funny because I've always thought that David Carrading and Scott Glenn have been in a war for many years. It's Tommy Lee Jones. And there was a moment I'm older than you guys. Urban Cowboy with John Travolta. Scott Glenn's the kind of bad guy in Urban Cowboy who fucks Debra Winger and he's like Travolta's rival in that movie. That is a really weird movie to rewind.

Oh, yeah. It's kind of hard to believe that movie happened. Has an aged well at all. Has not aged well, and it's just weird. And at one point, like, I can't remember somebody, like, legitimately domestically abuses Debringer. I think it was Travolta. Yeah.

But then they make up, it's fine. It's a little rough. Sorry, sorry, I gave you the black eye. Like, you can't even believe it. But Scott Glenn, he's the bad guy in that. His career starts to take off. Tommy Lee Jones is in the executioner song with Roseanne Arquette, which is great. And that was like her star making performance.

and they're kind of parallel. And they're parallel for most of the 80s. And then the fugitive and under siege, and then Tommy Lee Jones is an A-list actor? Yeah. And Scott Glenn is left behind and he has to play Roger. It's a really interesting, he is a very interesting generation of actors. It's always, it's very instructive to look at the Big Chill

and see those guys who came out of the Big Chill and they were huge, Kevin Klein, Tom, Tom Barringer's in the Big Chill. Scott Glenn's not in it. He's in the right stuff. but is in these early 80s. Like the Silverado type of movies. Yeah. In terms of endearment,

like these early 80s, kind of like Jeff Daniels was in a bunch, you know, a couple of those movies. And those guys like kind of got their careers a little derailed by the action movie boom. Yeah. In the mid to late 80s,

because I don't think that they ever really were able to like, they just weren't making those kinds of like drama thrillers that much. They ended up taking, I think what happens to Scott Glenn is kind of interesting because he starts taking like second in command and war movie kind of role. You know, he's in the hunt for Red October as one of the captains. He's in Silence of the Lambs. He's in Silence of the Lambs.

He's like sexual tension with Jody Foster, allegedly, but we never see one scene where we felt it. I think that's more in the book. He's in, he's also in the player. He's in Backdraft. You know, he's in all these movies that are like good 90s movies. He's like the sixth guy in Backdraft. Yes. It's wild.

He doesn't, he didn't become a star. Yeah. You know, he's an absolute power. I group all those guys together. Klein, Costner, Dennis Quaid, Scott, Glenn. He is. He's looking at you.

Yeah. Hey, Chris, thanks for this. This is the highlight of my week. He's in Castle Rock coming up. You know what's another really weird movie that hasn't aged well that Scott Glenn is really good in? Personal Best.

Yeah. Oh, you got those attention. Robert Towns directorial debut. I ride for Personal Best. It's a really interesting movie. Scott Glenn's character is crazy. It both has an age well and then it's also aged incredibly well. Yeah.

It's a very interesting movie. Because it really tackles this whole, what if, I don't know, there's a lot of stuff going on that movie. What if two athletes fell for one another is an interesting. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah. Wow.

Yeah, he was in a lot of stuff for a long time. He's good and personal best. I'm down with that movie. That'll never be on the rewatchables. So who are we giving it to? Scott Glenn? I think Scott Glenn. Do we promote this podcast as Scott Glenn's training day?

And also we'd talk about Denzel Washington. Just very quickly, I think it has to go to Harris Euland, because Scott Glenn before this movie was fucking Scott Glenn. He was Alan Shepard in the right stuff. He was a known quantity. That was 20 years before Twitter Day came out. But we knew. Well, like, that was a big movie.

This is his best part. I mean, this is a great part. It is very good. If you're an actor, he's in three scenes. But three great scenes. Yeah, okay. All right.

I'll take him in personal best to end the right stuff over this. Plus, who knew more about high school football in Los Angeles? I know. Seriously. Rogers. Like, remember that game against Crenshaw? He picked off two passes.

That's amazing. One of you guys went nickel in the third. quarter on third and six. I couldn't believe that. You had that safety blitz on third down. Check out my bathrobe. Want some scotch? Half-ass internet research.

We covered some of it already. During the scene when Jake plays cards with the Latino gangsters, Antoine Fukuwa gave certain instructions to the actors playing the gangsters without telling Hawk, who didn't really totally understand what card game they were playing because he wanted them to seem more confused. Interesting.

I love when directors did. weird shit like that. The word fuck is used, what's you over under? What would your guess be for the word fuck in this movie? 72 times. 47. 211. Yeah. Yeah.

The coffee shop in the beginning of the movie, the scene you liked, also used in 7 when Morgan Freeman and Gwyneth Poutreau. Incredible scene. Great diner. Oral history of that diner? There's a lot of bad shit that happened between two people in those two scenes. There's a lot of dark core of humanity going on there. It's on West 7th Street?

Our next to oral history should be an oral history of that diner and oral history of the 2013. There's a couple of diners around L.A. that they just used for shooting, right? Yeah. Maybe in the, well, there's definitely the one down by Lachma that is used for shooting all the time. Yeah. What's the Johnny's, Johnny's, whatever? Glendale or? No, the one on Wilshire. That's one I'm referring to by Lack. Yeah. John is. In the spirit of we should buy the Bugie Nights House, should we just buy that diner on 7th and put the ringer offices there?

It'd be into that. I'd be into it. I'd love to work out of a coffee shop like that. Wait, where's Pulp Fiction? I don't know where that is. No, that's in the valley. In the valley, okay. Although I had always heard it was also on, on La Sienaiga between Beverly and like Fairfax. Oh, I know where that is.

And then they knocked it down and changed it. But I don't know. I don't know the true story. I know where that diner is on La Siena. We're doing the SNL sketch. You guys know that right. The Californians. Yeah, but it's like a high level movie nerd version of it.

Okay. Yeah. I've decided I might not be able to be on the Pulp Fiction Rewatchable. Why is that? I just have a lot of problems with it. I've seen it too many times. You can fucking retire. Bruce Wilson's girlfriend is the worst 10 minutes of my life.

Bill, I swear to God. The worst 10 minutes of my life. All right. We're moving on. We're moving back to training day. I'm taking a nap. Do you find your watch, Bruce? That is the worst scene.

I can't believe people think that's a good scene. No, no. You're defending that scene. I'm, let's just not now. Come on. Don't do this to your. You have a really high cue rate. right now.

People really like you right now. Guess who else aren't very good. Tim Roth and Amanda Plummer. Jesus Christ. They're just not good. They're not good. Guess what's great though. Guess what's getting steam for me?

The gimp? No, the dance scene is the the Uma Travolta dance scene. I forgot how awesome that was. Who has brought more joy to people dancing than John Travolta? Anybody? I don't know.

We just took Urban Cowboy apart bit by bit. Seems like you wanted He let a ball on that. He didn't dance. No, I love Pulp Fiction. I've just seen it too many times. It's like how I'm critical.

My daughter was soccer. How many times do you see Training Day? Not many. I would say eight. Okay. It's probably in 10 plus for me. It was a good, I was in college when it came out. It was a good, just throw it on the DVD while we're hanging out.

I went to it twice in two days when it came out. Really? I went, saw it. I think I may have gone and seen it by myself or something. I went on a Thursday or something when I got out of work at a record store. And then, like, that night, I was like, anybody who wants to see Training Day has any interest, like, let's go. It's so amazing. It bugs me that Chris Ryan and I lived in the same city and saw movies by ourselves, but didn't know each other. You guys found each other.

It's a beautiful story. Yeah. Shakespearean almost. I love going to movies by myself. The Mark Ruffalo Award for overacting. I don't need to do the, they knew. And really, there's one person, Smiley's crazy poker buddy in that poker scene. He's a, really feeling it really feeling it yeah really ratcheted up yeah it was almost like antoine was like

just get go up two more levels like just a little crazier let's do it again he passed him some of that PCP yeah he was he was out of control I also really like the kid the white kid in the Volkswagen Beetle in the driver seat

he was like hey man I'm sorry that guy he was really selling Fran Krans right is that John Whedon's guy oh my god Apex Mountain I'll save Denzel for last for this.

Any chance Denzel's in the overacting category? No. No chance? He really does draw out the diner scene. The two gun scene is like he's like I'm going to win the Oscar on this one but I don't find it to be overacting.

The diner scene I think is the only case you can make. That's why I didn't put that for rewatchable for me. I thought they hadn't fully figured out that character yet and he's doing the Jay Farrow, Denzel and not just being... All right, okay.

All right. Okay. He's doing all like the ticks. Apex Mountain. Ethan Hawk? No. No. What would your Ethan Hawke Epex Mountain be just out of curiosity?

Before sunset. The second one, I think. Second one? Yeah. So after training day. I think so. Okay. That would have been my answer, too.

I like that. He's got a little bit. I really like him in before midnight and I really like him before sunrise but I'm saying I think there's a bunch of other really good I mean you could make the argument that his apex as like a movie star as reality bites

yes I don't know I think also regardless of what you think about this movie I know I think you're maybe you're not as crazy about it but he's amazing in boyhood he's perfect he's amazing he's incredible I just feel like he's not on the screen that much so it's hard let me let me just look at his eye does who you're married to at the time count

this is I'm not I'm not getting in this with you. I'm just saying is it a career? Is it a work apex or an everything apex? Well, you invented this show and this category so you can be the determining factor there. I think it, to me, it's, I think, only a performance, not like what's happening in your life. Because you could argue O-1, training day, he's in a hot celebrity couple. He's a respected actor who now has proven he can be in an action movie. He's had a lot of wins at this point. Things are going well, 0-1. I see what you're saying. You know, I'm going to switch my pick to 01.

I'd say that it's before sunset for me. I want to give a shout out to when he appears in Antoine Fouk was Brooklyn's finest and basically plays Alonzo. Yeah. And he's very good in that movie. That seemed like an idea that came up with a 2.30 in the morning after like eight bears. Yeah. Yes.

What if he came back? You played your version of Dead Zelda? That's great, man. Do you have any cigarettes? This is the... Oh, we got to do more. Apex. Antoine Fukuwa.

It's got to be, right? I mean, I think he's had a good career, but this is like, how do you talk directing Denzel at his peak performance? It's like, that's you tell your grandkids about that. It's so interesting, too, because he's now made, once the Equalizer 2, Bill's most anticipated movie of the year comes out. Oh, my God. No, it's my dad. It's not mine.

Sorry. My dad is going to be there Thursday. Your dad likes the Equalizer? It's like one of his, he loves Denzel and he loves the Equalizer. He fucking loves it. That movie's like, those movies are. brutal. Like, he just, like, watches Denzel kill people?

He loves Denzel. We should have had Dr. Bill in this episode. He would have been great. He would have been, if we do the equalizer. The Doc needs to do man on fire with us. Doc Loves manned fire. There will be no man on fire episode. There will.

I think it's, they've made four movies together. This is by far the best. Yeah. Eva Mendez, though. No, I don't think it's her apex mountain. No, none of the supporting people. And then Denzel. You kind of seem to think it's the apex of Scott Glenn.

I don't think I'd go that far. I can't either. I can't either. I can't either. Because in the 80s, he's thinking he's an A-list actor, potentially. Yeah. Denzel, I'm going to say yes. Malcolm X.

Malcolm X. Are you talking? No. I think you're wrong. Okay. It's a subjective award. It's a subjective thing. Malcolm X is a movie about one man, but featuring three primary characters

played by the same guy. Yeah. It's an amazing thing. He plays... A 19-year-old gangster. And I hate those kinds of... It's a 25-year-old militant and it's a 30-year-old spiritual leader.

It's an amazing... Yeah, and I generally dislike like my life story movies. And he's just unbelievable in it. I'm still going training day because I have the body of work. At this point, if I'm Denzel, America's most beloved actor,

I have unanimous approval rating. The one thing I don't have as an Oscar. And the one thing I don't have is like my Michael Jordan 1992 finals kind of moment. It's the one thing I'm missing. And then I go and I play this part that nobody else can play and I'm fucking awesome in it. And a movie that doesn't, that shouldn't have worked, works.

It's neck and neck, total coin flip. Do you have a favorite Denzel movie of like the last 10 years? I've been a little spotier. I like flight. Flight's growing on me. I like taking a Pelham, one, two, three. Oh, that's good. And I like the two Tramolta.

I was going to say, I think Unstoppable is better Chris Pine is really fun. I think one thing we forgot to mention with Denzel is, I do think he inhabits the characters for better and worse with whoever the character is. So like when he's smoking cools in Training Day, I think he's smoking cools for those three months. And when he's the drunk pile and in flight, I think he's actually like drinking all the time.

I think he's all in on everything. We talked a little bit about this last year, though, around Roman J. Israel and the Oscars. The only time when he struggles now, and part of it is because of what you're talking about, where he has this body working, we have this identification with him is when he tries to do something

that is smaller and tries to recess. If he can't tap into the essential Denzelness, for some reason it just doesn't work for people. They don't want to see that. The easiest category we have, could Danny Treo have been in this movie? I mean, is there any role...

He could have played all the parts in the poker scene? He could have played all five guys. Could have been any of the dirty cops. He could have been any of the dirty cops. He could have been, yeah, he could have been in. in every one of these scenes.

I think there's only three roles he couldn't have played in this movie. The three wise men, that's it. Everybody else. He could have been Alonzo. He could have been Jake Hoyt. This is like David Air LA crime movie is where Danny Trejo

eats. I actually googled why wasn't Danny Trejo in Training Day and nothing definitive came up. It's kind of a slight to Danny Treo. I can only assume he was doing something else, but like he must have seen this

and been like, what the fuck? I was right here. Seriously. What? Wait, what? I've not in this. He could have been one of the cops. He could have been like Dr. Dre's partner.

Yeah, let him be the waiter in the diner. Just get him in there. Come on, Anton Fuqua. Picking Nitz, it is a movie that hinges on a really weird, almost rape scene that Ethan Hawks on PCP, but sees something, and there's this crackhead fight, and he saves this girl, and then he just randomly picks up the wallet, but carries him. it around and then somehow that saves his life later. Like, we're picking Nitz, but it's flimsy.

The premise of the movie that Denzel is going to break in this kid who he is eventually going to frame for a murder at the end of the day. For Roger's murder. Which only, I mean, we could debate whether or not that's his intention for the whole day, but only ever becomes clear after he has lunch with the Three Wise Men is pretty flimsy.

I think also the fact that he gets his hands on four million and is like, I'm staying and doesn't just leave the country right away. He's got too many kids, like five kids. Really? Does he really care about that? No, you're right.

He almost uses one of the kids at the end. He can't get away from the streets. There's just a million moments where you're just like, why are you doing that? Yeah. And if the performances weren't so compelling, I think if you started to analyze every character choice, you'd be like, well, I don't know about this. I think that whole like the police corruption,

what the three wise men are doing in relation and the Russians and all this other stuff that's happening. is like another movie. And they dip into it a little bit. But for the most part, this movie and the reason why this movie is so rewatchable is that you can turn it on at any 17-minute interval and there will be a Denzel Ethan Hawke scene

that you're like, hold on one sec, I just need to finish this scene. Right. And there's the four scenes that are, or the five scenes, I guess, that we talked about the most rewatchable. They're staggered in a way that you know either one's about to happen

or it's coming up. It's a good point. They're like every 20 minutes. Yeah, now that I'm thinking about it, I'm like, now that I'm thinking about it, now that I'm, thinking about it, I'm revisiting it and I think it might be, the most rewatchable scene might be the drug when he makes him take drugs over the diner.

That scene is incredible. When he pulls the gun on the other cart, the other motorist, the guy is just like, cool, no matter, it's cool. Yeah, he has to flexes in this. He just stops in the middle of intersections. It's good. As a drug dealer, yeah. One more picking nits for me.

I don't like that. We don't see what happened in Vegas with him kill. killing the Russian because it's such a big part of the movie. If I had to, if I had to weigh in, I would have gotten rid of the first five minutes with Ethan Hawk and his wife. And oh, you're such a great. You would have the Vegas prelude? Yeah.

And then I would have the credits. There could be, maybe even should be a prequel, an Alonzo prequel. And who plays Alonzo? Sean. And an Alonzo prequel. Well, that person is basically playing younger Denzel, which no, but nobody wants that part. Great challenge, though. If you're a fucking

one of suicide mission You can't play young Denzel I mean when they made this a TV show They were just like actually we're going to switch the races Because we don't want to try to make another Denzel They should have gone further They should have switched the genders You could make a prequel that was about the Three Wise Men

And about the corruption I mean David Ayer has been trying to make that movie Like 20 years now I guess you know We say this every episode But that's an also awesome 10 episode Netflix series Yeah How about Tiffany Haddish's training day We go the other way

that's not the tone of the movie, I don't think. Well, man, you're saying she doesn't have an in her. I believe in you Tiffany Haddish. I love Tiffany Haddish. I'm not sure she's shown us quite the dramatic chops yet. One more nitpick is, I do think there's a tiny bit of a woman in this where Denzel stumbled on this new character. They hadn't really played yet. King Kong.

All that. Oh, they. And then kind of became that guy in like seven more movies, like how Pacino became a son of a woman guy over and over and over. You are, she's got a great ass. You got your hand all the way up there. Best quote,

King Kong ain't got shit on me, ad lib, by the way. Man the fuck up, finish that shit, all that jelly, no toast, the shit chest, it ain't checkers, and about 100 other runs. It's got to be the King Kong one.

I'm the man up in this piece. You'll never see the light of you. The fuck you think you fucking win. I'm the police. I run shit here. You just live here. Yeah, that's right. You better walk away.

Go and walk away because I'm going to burn this motherfucker down. King Kong ain't got shit on me. I mean, Shea wrote a whole column on the ringer about it. Yeah, that's speech in general. The speech is great. I love that somebody ad lib that too. Yeah. That he's just like, I haven't, I'm not taking the scene far enough.

I'm going to also ad lib this King Kong line. I love a, I'm the zigzag man, who the. fuck are you. That's a good random one where he's just in the car and Jake's asking them questions. There's a lot of just great Denzel popping off lines. You have any unanswerable questions? I didn't really have any other than I guess

I don't know enough about PCP. What is Jake's tomorrow? That's another sequel. It's just Jake the next day. Is it a day after training? Yeah. What's he doing? Is he still a cop? Is he like good double feature with this movie would be L.A. Confidential because it's basically

the same thing about corrupt cops in L.A. what they do and what they don't do and then what happens. And like Edmund Exley, you know, the guy Pierce character in that movie, is very similar to Jay Coit here. You know, it's a straight arrow, wants to do good, sees the dark side, wants to rise. I think there'd be a similar trajectory where you try to become a lieutenant very young and he'd rise up the ranks. Maybe the wise men are like, what do we have to do to keep you quiet about all this?

Forgot to mention the studio wanted to cut the wise men out and he fought to keep that scene in, allegedly, according to my half-sets. It's one of the movie. Yeah. Thought they needed it. I really think they should have started with the with the scene. Oh, it just started with him killing the Russian in Vegas credits. I think it's good, though, that there's like a 30, 45 minutes period of time in the movie

where they keep referencing his crazy weekend and he's just like, I'll take care of it. And you don't, if you'd seen him like... How about a flash? Would you want a flashback? I'm okay with flashbacks. I like, just like, tell me a story. This is the biggest part of the movie. He needs $4 million because he needs a million dollars to pay off for this. thing he did in Vegas that we don't get to see.

You wouldn't have wanted to watch that scene? What if it was a deleted scene? It honestly feels very, and Chris is more of an expert in this than I am, but it feels very crime novel to me, where in crime novels are always referencing stuff that happened before as a means to get to where we're going in the future. And so it doesn't feel that weird. It's very similarly to one in the Three Wiseman scene when Harris Eulen tells that story about the peanut butter up the guy's ass.

And that also is very crime novel to me. It feels a little different than the rest of the movie that we're in where they're just like speaking to like a wider mythology of crime that has happened in the city. Yeah. I was okay with it. Any other in answerable questions, Chris? No. Did you ever at any point when you watch this movie want to try PCP or did you wonder how long it would take for the PCP to wear off?

No, but it did. It did give me pause about. about laced pot. Yeah. That was like a real like, oh, okay, that's something to look out for. Possibly smoking dust. That was the first time that it crossed your transom? No, it occurred to me before, but never was I like,

and I could wind up in a situation like this if I accidentally smoke it. In the event that you were a narcotics detective trainee. We're just a guy working at record stores, you know, like things happen. You know, you never know. I was in the Bahamas with my wife and we wanted to get pot, which we didn't bring. And we went downtown to some shady part of the Bahamas. It's good that you didn't bring pot to the Bahamas.

This is one of the all-time great what-ifs, how Bill didn't get murdered. No, no. Trying to buy drugs in a foreign country. And my wife is like, I got this. And she went off. Wow. Yeah, she's the alpha dog in these situations.

She was Alonzo and was it dust? She's great. No, it was great. What's the statute of limitations on this crime you guys committed? 17 years ago, I think we could. I'm going to call Shay now to get his who won the movie take. I think we all. Nobody wants to make the ESPN.com.

Actually, maybe the 538. Actually, maybe Ethan Hawke won this movie. No, I have no. Denzel Washington won this movie. Actor low. It's a higher. Maybe Shay's going to come in with a Scott Glenn take. You never know.

All right, we're going to call him now. Sean, thank you. Chris, thank you. Always a pleasure, Bill. All right, before we get to Shay, I just wanted to mention some of the pods on the Ringer Podcast Network. If you love pop culture, check out Channel 33. That's where the big picture with Sean Fantasy is.

That's where Jam session is. That is where the press box was Shoemaker and Curtis is. That's where damage control with Justin Charity and Kate Nibs. Just a very smart podcast. And also, on Shuffle, Michael Peters talking music with ringer staffers and outsiders. just launched that one. It's really good. And finally, Bachelor Party is back because the Bachelor is back this week. And if you haven't listened to that one, that's hosted by Julia Lippman. So that's the main style. Oh, and then the watch with Andy Greenwald and Chris Ryan, one of our

long running staples from back in the Grant Land days. Shea Serrano on the line. We just broke down training day with all the categories. We saved who won the movie for you. I think we know who won the movie. First question, is this your favorite Denzel movie? This is my favorite Denzel movie, yes. Okay. I'm a big, big fan of bad guy Denzel. Yeah.

He does it better than almost anybody else. That's how I feel as well. That's how Chris felt. That's how Sean felt. Were you rooting for Denzel by the end of the movie? Oh, no. Not at all. Okay, good.

I was ready for the Russians to run down Denzel for sure. Okay. Why wasn't Danny Treo in this movie? What's your take? We argued about this. Danny Traill can't be in every movie. And this would have just made, of all of the movies, this would have made too much sense.

If you would have said, hey, there's a scene in here with a bunch of Mexican gangsters. I would have been like, how many lines does Danny Trao have in it? I don't understand it. I wonder, like, did he have something else to do? What was his reaction when he saw the movie and he saw that scene?

How is he now? I mean, all the different part. We figured all the times we've had this category, this movie had the most parts Danny could have played. He probably saw the script and was like, nah, I want to do this other movie where my head gets cut off and put on a turtle or something like that. It just was a little too arty for him, I'm sure. I wonder if there's a way to CGI the poker scene where he's playing everybody in the poker table. Because I think that also could have been realistic. You, one of your passions is the under-representation of Latino and Mexican actors in movies.

Is this like a top 10 for the number of people who were able to squeeze into one great movie? Oh, absolutely. As soon as they pulled up and you started, you hear things like Cypress Hill playing in the background or something like that, they're about to run up on a whole bunch of Mexicans right now. And then it happened and I was so excited. I saw this movie in college. I went to the movie theater and watched it like on two days in a row. back to back. That's how excited I was about this particular moment. That's seen especially when he

at the table with the guys. It's unbelievable. Does it bother you that Ethan Hawk did not win an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for this movie? Yeah, who won it that year? Uh, Jim Broadbent, Iris. We covered this earlier as well. Oh, that's terrible. Yeah, it should have been Ethan. It's not great. This was one of the few times where, where Ethan was, or where an actor or an actress was like right there with Denzel. We saw it in fences with Viola. Yeah. We see it here with Jake.

I'm with Jake with Ethan as Jake. Yeah. We saw it in Glory with Morgan Freeman. Like it's only happened a few times in all of Denzel's 195 movie career. This was one of them. He should have gotten that award. Hanks in Philadelphia. And then finally, I can be honest, like Ray Allen, the basketball scene.

It's a great scene. They really go. Denzel gets an early lead. It's surprisingly good. Yeah, Denzel gets the early lead and Ray Allen actually gets mad in real life and starts coming back. Yeah, he started, Denzel started talking trash.

You could, when you're watching that scene, you could tell the moment is when Denzel takes the extra lap. Yeah. You see it on Ray Allen's face. He's like, you know what, fuck this. I got to get this guy. It's great. That is, I think, my favorite eight minutes in any sports movie

because apparently Ray Allen was supposed to win the game 10-0. thought that's what was going to happen. And Spike Lee said to Denzel try to score on him. And so all those baskets that he scored, I think he scored like four in a row. None of that was in the script. And I think Ray Allen didn't know what was happening and then started getting pissed off. Yeah, you can see it on his face.

It's fantastic. Another thing we argued about was Denzel versus Tom Hanks in the 90s. And the conventional wisdom is Hanks had a better decade, which is actually where I stand. Sean and Chris felt like Denzel actually had the better decade. I almost hesitate to ask you because I know what your answer is, but you would be pro-Denzel, right? I would be pro-Denzel. You know what is this?

This is like the Jay-Z versus Nas debate, where you've got one, like big showy, big-budget guy versus the R-D-E going to do a couple of weird choice things. That's what this is right here. Me, I'm for Dindel in that particular argument. But it's not like a blowout. It's 95-94 basketball game is what that is. Do you think this was Denzel's apex, or would you go with Malcolm X or something else?

As far as acting, I think you have to go Malcolm X. We're talking about one performance. But if we're talking about cultural apex, like a Denzel moment, it's training day for sure. It just all felt like as soon as the movie came out, they go, okay, this is when he's getting his Oscar. He should have got it from Malcolm. He's going to get it here. And everybody just was sort of following along, waiting for it to happen. And he had that great moment.

That was the same year where Hallie won an Oscar. Yeah. And so Dino, he had won it right before him. She had won right before him. And then he gets up there and he makes two birds with one stone comment or stuff. It was all perfect exactly how it played out. You're at a party and people are arguing about basketball and somebody's like, I can't stay in Russell Westbrook.

He's not good. And then nobody takes it that personally and it just keeps going. you're at a party and somebody there says fuck Denzel Washington he's not good he's the most overrated actor we have what's your reaction that's a fight that's a fight on site is what that is there's no way to not have that fight you know I got into a similar argument

with my brother-in-law he's a principal at a school here in Houston weren't hanging out one night and he started telling me that Jamie Fox was better than Denzel was his argument and I couldn't believe what I was hearing there are people who actually think that that's a real thing because now Jamie is incredibly talented of course you can sing

you can play the piano he can act he can do all kinds of things but Denzel is in a very special level when it comes to to acting where there's like you've got movie stars who are who get to a point and they can only be that movie star then you've got movie stars

who are the top level but can become a character and you never see the movie star version of them like Daniel Day Lewis somebody like that but there's like a tiny tiny part of the pyramid as you would say, above that where only one or two people can get where he can transcend all of those levels and get there. That's where Denzel is, like, the greatest actor,

the greatest movie star of anybody's lifetime, it feels like. Training Day 2 gets announced. The premise is that Alonzo actually didn't die at the end of Training Day, even though he got shot 48 times. He took 200 bullets to the chest, but he hid through it. He was wearing a bulletproof vest. A lot of them hit the car. He was in a coma for three years.

He's out. He pretended to reform. But now he's kind of going on the dark side again in his early 60s because the medical care was so much from the 48 bullets he got. And now he's dipping into the dark side again. Are you there opening night? That's all the information you have. Is Benzel in it? Yeah.

He's Alonzo. He's back. Every Denzel movie on their opening night. No questions asked. So he's your season tickets guy? Yeah, he's one of my season tickets guys, for sure. I didn't know what Fences was about. I just went and saw it as soon as they announced.

I'm like, oh, I guess I'll get tickets to that. I was actually in L.A. in my hotel room, and I saw it was playing like two days early. And I just walked to the theater for no reason at all. Yeah, because if you didn't know about the play and you hear that Denzel is in fences, it could go in any direction, right? It could be a baseball movie.

It could be a cop movie. You just don't know. It could be anything. Yeah. It's just wide open. He could have started a shoe company called Fences. Who knows? Could Denzel have played the guy in Castaway instead of Tom Hanks?

Tricky. I think he could have played it. I don't think it would have been as good as Tom Hanks. Yeah. I think you need that Tom Hanksie kind of vulnerable character. And that's the thing that Denzel is. just a little too dominant of a personality. It feels like watching him.

Like, I don't know if he could have reached that point where you feel like he's going to die. You're working on this podcast idea for us that we're going to launch sometime the next 19 years. And I think Denzel or Hanks could be like one of the eight episode ones. Just go all in. Just have put to each one, do scoring system,

have Kurt Goldsbury do stats. Let's just go all out. Oh, yeah. Let's make the case. once and for all. What is your favorite scene in this movie 17 years later? My favorite scene is the best scene in the movie. It's the table scene,

which is crazy because it doesn't even involve Denzel. That's what... It's one of a few scenes that doesn't involve him, and it's the best one. That was my case as well, and the boys picked the diner scene. The diner scene is good. I think it's the poker scene is an incredible nine minutes.

It's really great. That's the one scene where I watched it, and I was like, like, tense. My back was all knotted up. My stomach was nervous. I had no idea how he was going to get out of that moment. I knew they weren't going to let him die. There was going to be some sort of way. And then they snap all the pieces together, and you go like, oh, my God, that happened because of this or whatever.

But yeah, him sitting there at the table with those guys, it's unreal how tense they're able to make it. Like, if you're in a room with ganges, you're in a room with ganges, is one thing. If you're in a room with gangsters and they take your gun, that's one thing. If you're in a room with gangsters and they take your gun and your ride leaves, that's one thing. If you're in a room with gangsters and they take a gun in your ride leave, and then one of them asks you, have you ever been F in the A? Like, it's over.

That's the end of the line. There's no worse scenario than that right there. Yeah, I agree. Your wife decides she wants to become an actress and she ends up in a movie with Denzel Washington where she's playing his mistress. Do you just assume you're never going to see her again? That'll be it? I would.

I would sit by the door, assuming she's not coming home, and then as soon as she comes home from her love scene where she's naked in the bed with Denzel, I would ask, what does Denzel smell like? That's what I would do. I would have any other concerns or worse. Yeah. Yeah. He's a magnetic man.

It's funny. he's out of all the actors we have, he's the only one who I kind of feel like as an athlete where like even we're going to play at the tail end of this podcast, we're going to play Ethan Hawk, the podcast I did with him where he tells the story about Denzel. But the way he described being in scenes with Denzel

is kind of the same way people describe being on a team with like Kobe Bryant or Michael Jordan where it's like, you got to raise your game or he'll destroy you. You know, he's an actor. These guys are just reciting lines from a script. and he was talking about him like it was like game seven in the finals that first 20 minutes

yeah the first 20 minutes Ethan Hawke now the character is doing part of this but you could feel a little piece of the actor too just trying to like hold on because Denzel was like Denzel's like I'm in this is game seven right now we're going and Ethan Hawke catches up to him eventually and now they're a tip for tat

but the first 20 minutes whether it was by design or whether it was really the actor so it's just good You were doing the half-assed Internet Research Corner section of this? Yeah. Did you come across a thing that says whether or not Ethan Hawk knew in the diner scene that Denzel was going to slam the table? Did that ever come up? Like, okay.

Did not, but. I feel like he didn't know. And Denzel knew he was going to do it. And he did that as to like throw him off a little bit. You're probably right. Because the two things, he definitely ad lib the King Kong line. And apparently in the poker. scene, they mixed up the rules on Ethan Hawke.

So he would be, because they were telling him to actually play poker, but they mixed up the rules. And he told the other guys to do weird stuff during the game. So that Ethan Hawk would be a little confused and uneasy, just trying to figure that part out because he thought it would help the scene. I thought that was pretty cool. Yeah, that's great. Shea, this is Denzel's finest achievement.

You've written about it. I googled. You've written two different pieces about this, about this movie, basically. He went back to the well. You did Denzel versus the guy he played an American gangster. And then you did a long, long breakdown that I was very proud of because I love when anyone else on the site goes long on the King Kong speech and everything that led up to the historical accuracy of all the claims in that speech.

But that was, that's way up there for Denzel. What an actor. One of the things I love about you is that you love Denzel as much as I do. we're just like all in all in at all times on Denzel and have been for a long time. Anyway, Training Day, by the way,

Shay, on Netflix until June 1st. Not sure if you're aware. Oh, I'm aware. It's on every day. Just out of loop. Well, maybe I'll see you at the finals this week. I'll be there. All right.

See you. Last but not least, you might have heard this already. Ethan Hawk was on the BS podcast a couple weeks ago. We mentioned that during this podcast, but wanted to play the entire section of him talking about what it was like to work with Denzel Washington on this movie. We're sticking this at the tail end just because if you already heard it,

you can just not listen if you don't want to. If you haven't heard it, I would highly encourage you to listen to this because Ethan Hawke was a great guest and his whole take on Denzel and what it was like to work with the guy is really, really great. It's exactly like when I do those kind of pods with celebrity actors, I'm always hoping for nuggets like the stuff that he dropped in this. So check to that. That's coming out right now.

Thanks again to ZipRecruiter. Don't forget to check out ZipRecruiter.com slash BS if you want to start working on it. So we're back in the rewatchables next week. I am not on the next one, but it's going to be a good one. Oceans 11. Oceans 8 is coming out, I think, the day after we're posting this. So, yeah, June 7th, Oceans 11, breaking it down.

I know Chris Ryan's going to be. it up and we'll get two or three more. That's coming up if you want to watch that one ahead of time. Thanks as always for supporting the rewatchable. Spread the word for us until then. Training Day 2001. Did you know that was going to be a monster? Totally.

You have MJ in his prime. You have a great script. You have a good director. I read that script. And you know, you're picturing what Denzel, the intersection of Denzel at that moment in his career with this great piece of writing. Antoine Fukuo was a really exciting young director at that point,

and he was ready for that job. Yeah. And I wanted that part so bad, because I knew what a good film that could be. And I met Antoine, and it became kind of clear to me that Antoine and Denzel wanted me, but other people didn't want me. And I was going to really have to jump through some hoops and audition. And it was one of those great moments. in your life where you're like, you know what?

Because I was already being offered movies and things were going well, but I was like, you know what, I'm just going to, I'm going to do, I'm going to get this part. I'm going to eat a little humble pie and I'm going to go in and I'm going to get this part. And I did and I was glad I did. Is that, is that, I'm trying to think what movies had people come up to him

and just throw lines at you? That's got to be in the top three, right? Oh, yeah. You know, Jake, Jake, you got the money, Jake. You know. It's got nothing on me. I mean, you know, people say that to me pretty much daily. Was he biggest force of personality actor you worked with or was there somebody else? Bigger force than Denzel? Just like day to day.

Let me say something. Have you heard of the expression alpha male? Yeah. Right? Yeah. Well, if there was somebody who was bigger than Denzel on a set, I wouldn't want to be there. because that would be... He was friendly with Michael Jordan.

I always wondered, like, what happened when they hung out together that they didn't just fight to the death? I mean, but Alpha males can get along with... I just mean that he's amazingly confident man. And he knows... He knows who he is. And he fills the room.

And he knows what he wants. And he expects a lot from other people. And, you know, I worked with him again on Magnificent Seven. I love working with Denzel. I love to work with him again. I mean, he's great at what he does. And if you're some shrinking violet, it's going to be a hard time for you.

And... It sounds like Jordan. Look, you know, he's, you cannot excel at that level for that long. I mean, it's an unbelievable accomplishment what he's done. Yeah. 30 years, major international movie star, right? And a world-class great actor. I mean, you know, he's on Broadway right now doing Ice Man Cometh.

His performance in flight is like anybody else does that movie flight. and it's like a charming kind of neat indie movie, right? Yeah. Danzel Washington in flight, that is an event. It is a man, I mean, he's one of our finest actors and a genuine, bona fide, card-carrying movie star. Yeah. You know, I mean, he's a better actor than, you know,

when you think about other generations, like Clark Gable or, you know, one of these people. I mean, he's on a par with Marlon Brando, but he's sustained it for 30 years. he's doing it carrying the burden of, you know, being African-American in this country and having to carry a lot of extra weight. Yeah. You know, as a role model, as a leader in his community, having to face racism, having to fight through it.

I just saw in Brooklyn the other day, they did a anniversary screening of Malcolm X. I guess it's 25 years. Yeah. It's a towering achievement. And if you see that movie in a crowded house in Brooklyn and on the big screen, you know, It's like a rock concert. And it makes, I was thinking about it's like, man, he should have won five Academy Awards for that movie. It's just so much better than most of the movie performances that guys win Oscars for.

I would say that with sports where the MVP trophy should be different weights depending on how good it was. Yeah, like I love this player. It's like a 40 pound Oscar. Yeah, it's a 40 pound Oscar. Like Iigadala when he won MVP. The finals. Yeah, it's kind of like, all right. It's like a four pound MVP.

Yeah. You know, I mean. He couldn't figure out who to give it to because he kind of wanted to give it to Curry, but he didn't really deserve it. No, he didn't play well. And so, okay, we'll give it to the guy who missed like 80 million free throws. Right. And so whereas truthfully, LeBron wins, if they just push that to seven games that year, LeBron, even losing wins that MVP.

He needed to, you know, he was to buy what he had, the most assists, most rebounds, most steals, most points of anybody in the series. and he didn't win MVP. Rookie of the years like that this year where Donovan Mitchell and Ben Simmons were both so good. That's like a 40-pound rookie year. Give them a little extra bonus one.

Yeah, give them bonus ones. Well, I'm glad you liked Denzo.