This Had Oscar Buzz - 208 – This Is Where I Leave You

Episode Date: August 22, 2022

It’s time to sit shiva with a slew of stars and 2014′s This Is Where I Leave You. Adapted from Jonathan Tropper from his own novel and directed by Night at the Museum’s Shawn Levy, the film casts Jason Bateman as a man whose life falls apart at the hour of his father’s death. His … Continue reading "208 – This Is Where I Leave You"

Uh-oh, wrong house. No, the right house. I didn't get that! We want to talk to Marilyn Hacks. I imagine by now you are well into the excessive facial hair phase of your depression. It's not a good time, Wendy. Dad's dead. What?

Nice, sis. Mommy. What's different about her? The boobs. She had a little touch yet. Your father had one final request, and we are going to honor it. He just wanted his kids under one roof. So for the next seven days, you are all grounded.

Hello, and welcome to the This At Oscar Buzz podcast, the only podcast that doesn't know if we're equipped to be loved like this. Every week on this had Oscar buzz We'll be talking about a different movie That Once Upon a Time had Lofty Academy Award aspirations But for some reason or another, it all went wrong. The Oscar hopes died, and we are here to perform the autopsy. I'm your host, Chris Fyle, and I'm here, as always, with my therapist lover, Joe Reed.

We are here to perform the autopsy and then to yank out the breathing tube somewhat harshly, as Jane Fonda does at the beginning of this film. That was an upsetting scene as someone who has had a left one who has had to have a breathing tube removed and they do kick you out because it is not as pleasant as...

No, that is my understanding. I've watched enough Grey's Anatomy to know that that is not the play. Yes. Really, what Tina should have said to Jane Fonda to get her stop, that it is Shonda versus law. You cannot.

That's right. Or Shand law. Yes. Yes. Shandaland. How dare you? We're here to perform the autopsy, and then we're going to, this is going to be our longest episode ever.

Uh-oh. It might take a while for us to upload it because we are then going to sit a full Shibba. Seven days. Seven days. Yes. This episode will be seven days long. Uh, the movie feels like it is seven months. I do feel like we may be made an error in not having anyone of Jewish descent as a guest on this podcast to just sort of act as a reference point for exactly how Jewish or not Jewish, for lack of a more elegant phrase.

I was going to say, don't you mean like the mistake that this movie made of not having barely anyone of Jewish descent in the cab. They kind of write themselves a little bit of a permission slip where they make Jane Fon. character, not Jewish. So all the kids are, are, you know, half Jewish and not religious. So the, which to me is like, okay, so then like, I'll stop writing my little op-ed. But it still feels like, well, then why are we framing this movie around a family sitting Shiva? And I guess you can make the argument that, like, the family's discomfort with this as a religious tradition, is maybe part characterization on, you know, on the film's part. But it feels like a little bit of a weak defense.

Two things. It is so pointedly said those things that you've said, how the dad was like Jewish only in lineage. In that the point that it's like, the movie feels like it tries to stress that in that scene so easily. And then, of course, there's the twist at the end where it's like, It wasn't even the dad's idea. It was the mom's idea. It's all kind of so odd that you can't believe that these characters would actually submit

themselves to this, especially when the movie itself is so broad. But I guess that's just kind of one of the things that's hardwired into it that you just kind of have to buy into and go with. I felt that same way when I read this book, though I maybe hated it. the book even more than I had. Had you read the book before you had seen the movie? I had. If you can believe it, the book hates women even more than this movie does. That's interesting, I don't know if I walk away from this movie thinking it hates women so much as it just sort of doesn't do a great job of characterization across the board. Right. Well, I mean, if I'm remembering the book correctly,

it opens with basically, it opens with Jason Bateman's character, Judd, walking into seeing his I don't even remember if it's his boss in the book or not but his boss for lack of, you know, whatever. His boss and his wife having sex and him like so sardonically wittily, darkly describing the vision of this man ejaculating. So it was very much like that kind of book.

I don't know. I still think that the movie kind of Where do you feel like the movie hates women? It takes a lot of joy, I think, and thinks it's very funny putting basically all of its female characters in these, like, humiliating, like, situations or circumstances or making these kind of really outlandish choices, especially with the Catherine Hahn character. That's just that's definitely the most disappointing, especially when you've cast Catherine Hahn, who's so, talented and can do so much, and to give her that little to do and have it be what that ends up being, which is so unimportant to the greater plot, feel so extraneous. You absolutely could have cut that character out pretty much entirely and lost nothing. I guess it's the impetus for the big,

very cliched front lawn fight between Bateman and Corey Stoll that I guess you wouldn't be able to write around. But, like, you know, other than that, that felt like maybe the movie's biggest missed opportunity. I don't know if I go necessarily to feel like this movie is anti-women so much as it is just, it leaves a lot, it leaves a lot of meat on the bone in terms of all of these characters. Nobody feels like they are investigated too. Interestingly, and my feeling with this movie for the most part is this is a movie with a pretty weak script and non-interesting direction that tries to paper over all of that with a really incredible cast like this movie is cast so far above the level of what the movie is that it feels like

oh, maybe we can save this by, like, casting 10 phenomenal actors in this movie. And this movie is really an object lesson in the limits of what a great cast can do for a movie where the structure and the skeleton of it is bad. Right, right. And, like, also the structure and the skeleton of it is something that we've seen a dozen times before. Yeah. And, like, usually not necessarily great, but, like, awards-eer or awards-adjacent. So there is kind of a high expectation that, like, it comes with, especially when you launch this at a major film festival.

The Oscar buzz for this movie almost entirely comes from the shape of it, right? Do you look at a movie like this? And you're like, oh, like this has done a movie with this premise or with this, you know, what vibe we seem like it's, it seems like it's going for has done well. The other thing about this is where I leave you, not to get too far into it, is I do think it's a watchable movie Nothing about this movie feels excruciating to me Or like unbearable

I don't think it's terrible I think it's just so flat And I think because then The cast is so talented I find myself getting more frustrated Because it could have been You get this collection of talent there And you could have really had something

And but like as As it stands I saw this movie before when it first came out. I saw this movie again last night. I did not have a terrible time with it. I did not you know, I wasn't clawing my face off waiting for it to end, but I was

just like, it's just so flat. I definitely think it's maybe worse. I mean, it's not the worst movie we've watched. It's certainly not the worst movie we'll be talking about this month on our podcast. Right. But like, I definitely think it's

worse than you do, but I do think all of your points are Absolutely correct. And it's even more frustrating because, like, everybody who is seemingly cast in this movie could themselves carry a movie. Yeah. Or are people that have, like, either been in movies. I definitely want to talk about Tina Pay and Tina Pay's performance in this because, I don't know, man. This is where I leave you. Yeah, all right, we're going to maybe, we're not going to entirely disagree, but we're going to maybe have a little bit more of a discussion about it, I will say. Yeah, we'll have that discussion when we have that discussion, but largely, like, everyone else, like, Connie Britton can carry her own movie. Why is Connie Britton in that role? Connie Britton is good in, like, the scene and a half where it actually asks her to do something.

Adam Driver. It's maybe my favorite performance in this movie. Adam Driver is very good. And, like, if you had given him something more to play, like, if you had given that character a second. level. On the one level, he's still sometimes pretty entertaining in this movie, but you feel like he can do so much more. Ditto Corey Stoll. Ditto Roseburn.

Ditto, obviously, Jane Fonda. Catherine Hahn... Which, like, this... I feel like the, the, like, hatred or, like, you know, the way that this movie at least positions women in this movie, the sexualization of Jane Fonda's character. The movie

is so absolutely certain that it's so funny that this older lady has big boobs and likes putting them out there, and that that is so funny. And it's just like, I don't know, maybe if you did that in a different way where the jokes land, but, like, does not land, it just becomes cringy. It feels to me like it's part and parcel of a character who embarrasses her kids with, like, her sexual frankness, and that comes out of her identity as an author, right?

And she has sort of always kind of been, I will say, this movie, I kept comparing it, not the first time, but definitely this time, I kept comparing it negatively to the Family Stone, which is another movie that isn't universally beloved. And a lot of people do find that family structure annoying to, but the Family Stone does a lot better with its characterizations and with making it feel like a family that exists. And the Diane Keaton character in that movie, I think, is similar to that in that she is sort of extravagantly frank and sexually progressive in a way that often embarrasses her kids or often sort of puts them off balance a little bit. And I think that's what this is where I leave you is

trying to do as well. But again, it just doesn't do it all that skillfully. The writing isn't very sharp. The writing isn't incredibly funny. And without that, I think it does leave that room for interpretation of just like, oh, are we just making boob job jokes? Like, what are we doing? Yeah. Well, I mean, like, Family Stone's a great comparison to this, because, like, it also has a certain level of authenticity for, like, the dynamics of families with multiple siblings like this, where it's like everybody

kind of has different degrees of, you know, affection and or sometimes and sometimes. The Family Stone is a movie about sitting Shiva for somebody who's not dead yet. Yeah. Essentially. She's gathering her family around her for Christmas and what she knows will be her last Christmas. You don't really find this out till closer to the end of the movie.

But, like, that's essentially the same structure. Yeah. It even has, like, Rachel McAdams as the sort of surly sister, the way they want Tina Faye to be in this movie. Yeah. I mean, not poor Tina Faye, but, like... I also think part of the problem is it's a lot... The strategy appeared to be, let's get a lot of really likable actors in seemingly every role and the ones that we can't get a Connie Britton for, we're going to hire New York theater actors who are also very good.

To the point where, like, Will Swenson is the dad in a flashback. I know, which means, like, canonically, Audra McDonald is spiritually Jason Bateman's mother in some way. now, I feel like, somewhere, in some six degrees way. Audra McDonald and Jane Fonda are aligned in some type of way. Yes. Yeah. It makes sense. I don't normally think about this, but I do think about this a lot to the degree of which, I don't buy that this is Jane Fonda's child in some of the... Oh, I don't buy that most of these people are related to each other. I think that's one of the big

problems with this movie. It's a good collection of actors, but I think the movie really struggles in making those family connections feel real. I think it happens in fleeting moments and maybe I'll talk about those as we go along. But I think in general, the movie, again, I bring up the family stone again. I think that's a thing that the family stone does very well, is they all really, really seem like a family and siblings with connections. You know how much sibling cinema appeals to me and how important it is to me. It's half of the reason why I loved Nope as much as I do. Sure. Nope is a great sibling movie. Yes, great sibling movie. And I think this movie

really struggles in selling this family as siblings in a way that you need it to. Because even more so than their relationships with their late father or their relationships with Jane Fonda as the mother, this movie depends on those four siblings to be the emotional core of the movie. And that shortfall is a big part of the reason why the movie is as flat as it is. I think one of the things that the book probably made more pronounced and kind of gave more backbone to like the way that these characters are built is like they're all essentially when they're all back home together, you know, it's stirring a lot of shit up from when they were younger or in high school, like, I think the relationship between Tina Faye and Timothy

Oliphant is not really well defined in this movie, whereas, like, it was made some of the better moments of the book. And he has some really good moments in his character, sort of isolated from other things. I think, again, that's a point of you're casting an actor who is really good and who I think is really interesting and ultimately not really serving him super well. Right, right, right. And then you have the Rose Byrne character, too, who, what is Rose Byrne doing in this character? She's, like, asked to just be basically Zoe de Chanel.

Right. And it's like, you know Rose Byrne can do so much more than that. And it's like, maybe Rose Byrne, who is a genius, is doing, like, a meta version of the you feel the movie actively resisting making her the quote-unquote manic pixie dream girl. They don't give her so many quirky affectations. I do wonder if there were earlier versions and maybe in the book, who knows, earlier versions of this movie where that character was a little more, you know, manic pixie-ish, right? Had a little bit more quirk to her.

Because it does feel like the movie is trying very, very hard to not go too far in that direction. Well, what I think you get is that the manic pixie dreams girl is a front. It's like a front-facing persona that she presents to the world, but isn't really the real her, because, like, you see when she, like, stops doing it and, like, get serious. And it's like, you know, and when she's fucking around, that's, like, the person she kind of pretends to be, which. But, like, ice skating isn't that quirky. Ice skating isn't so quirky. Liking Cindy Lopper isn't so quirky. You know what I mean? And the movie sometimes feels like it's kind of resting on that stuff. But again, I also think she's incredibly likable on a scene-by-scene basis. And I'm like, I'm not mad when she shows up. I don't really think it's any one performer's problem.

I think almost all of these performers are innocent. We'll talk about Tina Fey. But I do think that the Roseburn character, it kind of clicked for me why it ultimately isn't. The movie ultimately doesn't work in her, like, I realized in her scenes, the movies, like, On a vibes level or on like a what this movie is like attempting to be tonally, this movie doesn't want to be the family stone. It doesn't want to be a James L. Brooks movie. This movie wants to be like Garden State for 40 year olds. And I just don't, maybe if you're not dealing with 20 characters, you could be that movie.

But the thing about Garden State, for as much as people may hate it or for as flawed as it is, and I don't hate it. Although I have been, even more so than American Beauty, Garden State is the movie I'm most afraid of revisiting because I did very much like it at the time. And I really don't want to implicate myself by going back if I find it very cringy. I haven't watched it probably in 15, 20 years, something like that. And like, I would be curious to revisit that movie. The thing is, it's just like, it's probably just a movie for young people. And that's fine. you know and that's fine but i also feel like that's a movie where you love him or hate him but

zach brough put a lot of himself in that movie right you get the you get the really feel of the writer-director star in that and you know sean levy and i don't again i think sean levy's maybe an easy person to dump on i don't want to do that but sean levy like this is not sean levy writing and directing and a touring this movie this is he's not that kind of of a director. He's not a director who puts so much of himself in his movies, right? He's the ninth of the museum guy. He's the, you know, um, you have to wonder if like, he clearly has, like, good relationships with people in the industry. You have to wonder if his level of clout, I guess, for lack of a better word, is part of the reason why this movie has the cast. He's a

director whose vibe trends more towards a producer versus a director whose vibe trends more towards a writer. I do feel like there are certain directors like that, where I think Sean Levy's talents may be in, right, talent gathering, in, you know, I mean, he did, he's got an Oscar nomination for producing a rival, you know what I mean? And a lot of that was, through his production company, finding the right people to make that movie. I don't think he was ever attached to direct that movie. I think he was, you know, a big part of getting Denny Villeneuve onto that project. And so I think one of his talents, more so than being this great director, and again, so many, I mean, this is, you know, his most recent movies I find kind of excruciating.

He's the guy who directed free guy, right? But, like, he's had, makes these, like, amusement park ride movies. He's been very successful, like, the night at the museum movies, you know, are unadulterated successes, right? Like, they've done very well. They've made a shit out of money. Exactly. And I feel like there's nothing wrong with those movies being what they are. No, absolutely not.

I just feel like maybe structurally he thinks he can make the, like, structure of that movie fit with a movie that is thematically and, like, the text of this movie like that, you know? And, like, I think this movie has a really fraught relationship between its balance with comedy and drama. But, like, it does feel like, I don't know, the rhythms of it are trying to be, like, the rhythms of a night of the music. This movie needed a Nicole Hollifsener. This movie needed somebody who has more, for lack of a better term, more of a soul, puts more of a soul into their movies. And I know that it's based on a novel means you are necessarily coming at it from a place of the director is not going to have that kind of authorship. But there are directors who are able to sort of inject a real, you know, streak of feeling into a movie.

And I don't think that's Sean Levy's strong suit, unfortunately. Well, let's go ahead and do the plot description, because then we can really get into, like, some plot specifics and things that don't work for us. Once again, we're here to talk about, this is where I leave you, directed by Sean Levy, written by Jonathan Trapper, based on his own book, starring Jason Bateman, Tina Faye, Jane Fonda, Corey Stoll, Roseburn, Adam Driver, Connie Britton, Catherine Hahn, Deborah Monk, Timothy Oliphant, Aaron Laser, Dax Shepard, Abigail Spencer, and Ben Schwartz. That is a lot of known names to get that deep into a cast list. The movie was a TIF Gala and then opened two weeks later wide on September 19. 2014. Yes.

Joe Reed. Yes. Are you ready to give a 60-second plot description of all of the turmoil, resentments? Yes, one second for every big-name cast member. All right, then, your 60-second plot description for it. This is where I leave you starts now. All right, so, Dax Shepard, and his flatter than it should be asked is fucking Jason Bateman's wife, which is bad news. And then Jason Bateman's dad dies, which is even worse news.

and he has to go home to sit Shiva for seven days with his family. Mom, Jane Fonda, who is sexually frank and author and got a boob job, sister Tina Faye, who's got kids and kind of an asshole husband who's always on the phone, brother Corey Stoll, who runs the family's sporting goods store and whose wife, Catherine Hant, can't conceive, and youngest brother Adam Driver, whose character bio is, what if fuck boy, but incredibly tall, and who comes home with his older therapist, girlfriend Connie Britton, even though he immediately starts cheating on her with local hussies. The townies include Deborah Monk as a friend of the family,

and Timothy Elephant, as her son who suffered a brain injury when he was younger, which led to his breakup with Tina Fey, and Rose Byrne, who enjoys ice skating being incredibly available for whenever Jason Bateman realizes he loves her. The family time is full of tensions and resentments. Meanwhile, Jason Bateman's wife, Abigail Spencer shows up and tells him she's pregnant, so he's got to figure out what's to be done about that situation. And also, it turns out Jane Fonda and DeBronk are late in life lesbians together, and a pair of Lucille Bluth, good for her gifts for them both.

Other things happen and low-grade conflicts are ironed out, and then Jason Bateman drives to Maine, I guess, to find himself for low longer than seven days. That's it. You got it. I got it. It's not it all in there. You, uh, and then it ends with him going to Maine and his trip to Maine signifying personal growth. Except this is the thing.

The whole thing about the idea of him driving to Maine was supposedly about this, like, his inability to sort of just do something with an open-ended, you know, mission statement or whatever, just sort of like take the open road and go where it takes him. Except we've already established that he's got to be back within a week to give, you know, to get with Rose Byrne. And then also. And then also to, well, I don't think he's being irresponsible. I think he's being, you know, free on the open road for a very limited window of time, which feels very regimented, right? He's going to be back in a week to be with Roseburn. And also his wife is pregnant and he's going to have to, you know, raise, you know, help her with the baby, which he's already made a firm commitment to. So it's like, enjoy Maine, but like it's going to take you a day to drive there and a day to drive back. So like, very instigay, sudden vacation. Yeah, yeah, yeah, well, exactly. So, yeah. Jane Fonda, Deborah Monk, the most demure lesbians I have ever seen on. I will say this. Deborah Monk gets maybe three scenes worth of work.

Her biggest scene of substance is the one early on where she's in the kitchen with Jason Bateman. And it's literally like she gets maybe five lines in that. She's incredibly good in those five lines. It's like it's not a whole lot of heavy lifting. It's a lot of just like very naturalistic stuff. And immediately, I'm just like, I want to watch a whole movie about this woman's character. About the neighbor friend lady. I think she's, again, this is what this project is doing with the cast,

which is that like we're going to bring in these incredibly talented actors, and hopefully they can make every scene work as well as that one does. And ultimately, they can't. But I do appreciate the moments where, where it does seem to work. I will also shout out, and this is jumping to the end of the movie, and this is maybe corny and whatever, but, like, it worked for me. The thing with Jason Bateman and Adam Driver touching foreheads

the way that their dad would do with them, I thought that moment at the end of the movie, and Driver's like, are we doing this ironically? And Bateman's like, you can tell yourself that. And then Driver starts to choke up just a little bit and then runs back into the house. I was like, okay, well, that got me. like that was good um but again those moments are so fleeting and have no connective tissue between them

that it's hard to feel all that satisfied with them which is too bad and i mean at this point driver is also just a new york theater actor plus girls that's one thing about this cast that i will say is it is a kind of shocking assemblage of people who are famous from tv um yeah or like we're working in TV because Jane Fonda is also doing the newsroom at this time, even though she's Jane Fonda. Jane Fonda was on the newsroom at this time. Catherine Hahn was on Transparent at this time. Transparent wasn't yet. 2014? Let me look.

I thought so. No. Transparent wasn't that long ago. Transparent premiered in February of 2014, my friend. So I guess maybe she... Yeah, and she shows up. the end of that first season, I'm pretty sure. That's right, because Transparent had like a million years between seasons.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think damages had been, was done by this, so Roseburn wasn't on that anymore. But, yeah, this is a really interesting moment in Adam Driver's career specifically, where Girls kicks off in early 2012, I want to say. and he had been sort of a darling of New York theater for a good year or two leading up to that. I saw him as Lewis and Angels in America. I'm very jealous that you did.

He was incredible. I didn't see him on theater until recently. He was in that play with Carrie Russell. The Burn This Revival. Yes. Which he was very, very good in, I thought. 2012 he's in very briefly both Lincoln he's the one at the end of the trailer for Lincoln where he like is having that sort of like quiet moment with Lincoln that they put in the trailer and by then again yeah that's the end of 2012 so we already know Adam Driver as like the fuck boy asshole from girls like he hadn't even been redeemed on girls yet you know what I mean by the end of that series I think Adam gets redeemed decently well on that show Um, but that hadn't happened yet.

And, uh, what's that character's name? Jessa. Basically, yes, he and Jessa basically just like live in a cesspool together by the end. I loved, we all talk enough about Jess. I loved Adam and Jessa. I like, for as much as I hate shows that shouldn't be about shipping to become about shipping, by the end of that show, I was like, I only care about Adam and Jessa being happy. Like, that's the only thing I give a shit about.

Um, I mean, I liked that relationship. I thought they fit each other in a surprising way. Oh, totally, but like in a way that they're both like dumpster people. I always liked them a little bit more than maybe I was supposed to. But there's a good core to them, but like they're always going to make bad decisions. They were also by far the best actors in that ensemble. Like, by a good margin, I always thought. I know that Marnie is maybe even more unlikable than Hannah.

It's a close competition, for sure. I always hated Shoshana the most. I do think Allison Williams. Allison Williams made an impossible character just like shockingly natural. I won't disagree, but like that's a whole other conversation. We can't get into the girls' conversation. We can't get into girls. We can't.

2013, Driver shows up. He's very funny in his brief moment in Inside Lewin Davis. Obviously, outer space becomes a, a fun little meme for all of us. But he's also in that movie that was in Canada, was titled The F Word, but it was released in the States as What If, which was Daniel Radcliffe and Zoe Kazan in what I thought was a pretty charming rom-com that got mostly slept on by people. And Adam Driver and McKenzie Davis.

I'm one of them. I never saw it. Oh, my God. Chris, check it out. I think you might really like it. Unless you really hate Daniel Radcliffe, which, like, I don't. I have no opinion on Daniel Rockclam. Give it a shot then.

Give it a open. hearted, non-judgmental look and see what you think of it. Adam Driver and Mackenzie Davis play the sort of like secondary couple who are so wonderful and so entertaining and I really loved it. I love them both.

And then 2014, he's in While We're Young, which is the Noah Baumback movie, where he gets cast essentially as the embodiment of empty, millennial, foe artist Joe Swanberg avatar

object of Noah Bombach's derision, right? And does that... I don't love that movie, but please feel free to drag Noah or feel free to drag Joe Swanberg. I like certain projects of Joe Swanberg. I'm not going to drag Joe Swanberg. I think Noah Bomback would like to, and I think that's mostly the point of Wolverine Young.

He's also in a movie that played Venice and also Tribeca called Hungry Hearts. that I thought he was really, really good in. Have you ever seen that movie? Didn't he and the lead actress win, like, the Venice acting prizes? I think that's right. Yes, they did. It's a really heavy movie about postpartum depression, but the acting is really, really good in it, I thought. And then this is where I leave you is sort of the, well, while we're young, while we're young comes out the next year, right? while we're young I think premiered in 2013 but didn't get released until the spring of 2014 I think it's the opposite because I was at the TIF that it premiered and or I think it not the opposite but the next year it premiered at TIF 2014 and then in the States 2015 because I wasn't at the TIF at 2013 and I definitely went to the premiere of this movie it was the first big gala premiere I went to at TIF ever so then this is why I leave you was the first

the final movie this year, and then he got cast in Star Wars, and his career sort of took a jump from there. Where do you come down on Driver's performance, and this is where I leave you? There are moments where I feel like, oh,

this is great, and then there are moments where I was like, this is a mostly missed opportunity. I do think it's ultimately a missed opportunity, but I think he comes out probably more unscathed than most of the cast.

Yeah. Yeah. I think he's very likable. I think the moments where he's sort of, I think for lack of a more fleshed out character, I think he, you can see the moments where he just decides to be weird as something to do. I think when he greets his mother at the funeral

with this sort of like open arms and calls her mommy and whatever and is very sort of ostentatiously. Again, he's like, he's a fuck boy, essentially. He's sort of the fuck boy. It's wild to me that for a movie that has so,

many performers that are known for being great at comedy, it feels like he's the only one who might be improvbing at moments. Isn't that weird? I do feel like Fay and Bateman have their moments of this very sort of like relaxed and easy chemistry. The problem with that is

their scenes often have to do the heavy lifting of like moving the emotional beats for the movie, which is... There's too many scenes where they asked Tina Faye to cry. This is... Okay. Not in her This is where we're going to have this conversation. I absolutely agree with you. I think the thing about Tina Fey in this movie is, when she is asked to be sardonically funny,

I think she hits the nail on the head every time. All of those line readings where she's sort of given a sarcastic aside, or even when she's like, Princess Cut, bitch, after she hits Death Shepherd or whatever, like, nails, hits the nail on the head. I think she's... I would also say, like, when she is allowed to be funny in this movie, you also can buy her as the like tough big sister right like when she has to be sensitive it's like the entire characterization goes out the window but like for a movie that never asks jason baitman to cry never asks corey stole to

cry only gets adam driver to sort of choke up a little bit at the very end never really asks jane fonda to cry why are we asking tina fay who is not good at this to do it five five times in the movie. She's introduced in the movie with a really bad fake cry. She can't do it. She just cannot do it. And I think it was on Sean Levy to realize this and to work around it because you are hanging this woman out to dry by making her do this so many times.

And she is just demonstrably not good at it. And the movie doesn't even like cut away from her or like do anything to help her out. It really is just sort of like leaving her there on screen to flounder. and I felt really, really bad. Because I think, again, she's the only one of these siblings who breaks down in this way. And it's so... Multiple times for multiple reasons. And it's so glaring every single time.

And it's too bad because I do feel like she is good when her character is, you know, sardonic and funny and dark and all that sort of other stuff. I mean, like, it does feel like that is more of her lane, even though. though, like, I don't think actors should have lanes. I think it's fine for actors to... I think it's fine. I mean, I do think... I don't need every actor to be so adaptive. Like, top-tier ones, yes.

But, like, I think it's fine, especially for comedic actors, to have the things that they are good at. Right. But, I mean, I definitely completely think you are right about it's a directing problem too, because why wouldn't you... There are ways to work around this. It's also clearly a character choice. It's like it doesn't look, it doesn't seem like Tina Faye wants to just be crying in all of these scenes and like you go for what is the natural thing, what is going to actually

bring out the character that she is playing and like, just let Tina Faye do her thing at the very least because it's like, that's the moments when we actually understand who this woman is, and it doesn't feel like a square peg being shoved into a round hole. And, like, yeah, I agree. Where do you come down on Bateman at the center of this movie? I'm not a Bateman fan. In anything? Not in anything, but I think when he is cast very well and appropriately, I think he can be

exactly right. I think he's great. Juno. See, I think he's tremendous in Arrested Development, and I think this movie wants him to do something similar, which is ask him to be the sort of

low-key eye of this hurricane of dysfunctional family members. And because the volume is so low on the other family members, it doesn't, like, you've missed that vibe.

Right. Like, it needs to be either, a complete farce or you know, you're just casting the wrong actor. I don't know who else you kind of cast considering the hurricane that surrounding that I. And like it, I don't

know, it seems like the easy choice and that's maybe my hang up with Jason Bateman is when you see him in a lot of things he's always kind of well the easy choice for this role, but I've felt doesn't bring enough interesting

texture to it. I think this movie specifically needs. Yeah. I don't disagree. Except for the fact that, like, if I saw this on paper, I would be like, yeah, you cast Jason Bateman for that. Like, that's sort of who

and maybe it is sort of the arrested development of it all that does it. But I think he's capable of playing the emotional beats that he's as a sort of quasi-romantic comedy lead, I think he's very average. But I think you can work with average.

That role is not the kind of role that needs to be spectacular if you have ensemble characters who are well-fleshed out and who are, you know, who are bringing it. And I think his romance with Roseburn is fine. I think his scenes with Abigail Spencer are fine. I think his scenes with Tina Fey, like I said, are actually pretty good. I think they have a good, you know, rapport with one another. I think, again, as I said, the problem there is that, like, all of those scenes are just sort of, like, talking about the major themes of the movie in terms of, like, laying out what Jason Bateman's character. Richter's problem is, you know what I mean?

And ultimately it's like, oh, God, like, you've got maybe your two most, like, comedy-ready performers, and you're asking them to talk about, like, why Judd doesn't do well with complicated in his life. And it's like, you could be doing more and funnier. Well, I don't know if he is an actor who brings a lot of emotional. emotional depth or a lot of like emotion under the surface of things. Yes, that's fair. To the characters he plays. And I do think, and I mean, maybe he does in something where it's like he's playing

like a complex note like in Juno. But in this, it's just like, I don't know. You need someone who like has a screen presence of when you see them. you know that they're dealing with some shit. Like, that has, like, I don't know. And it's a performer that, like, brings an emotional core to everything they do to make a character. Like, this actually work and be someone that, like, we're interested in, like, his growth. I don't think that this character's, like, I don't think we get invested in his, the emotional point that he is supposed to get to.

and partly that's the limitations of the actor playing him. Yeah, I think that's probably true. All right, moving on down the sibling line, I suppose. Corey stole in this movie I feel mostly bad for it, because ultimately this is the Stick in the Mud character, right? This is not a character who is going to, even in the best circumstances, pop more often than not, he's just sort of the... guy who's there to be frustrated

by other people. He's the one... On the page, he doesn't bring much to the family dynamic. Right. Like, you could solve a lot of problems by writing out this character. Right, except I think the story really wants to hold on to that idea of the store and the

legacy, and then, you know, you need Adam Driver to have somebody to sort of bounce off of and rebel against who isn't Jason Bateman's character because you don't want that. Like, he's got enough conflict to deal with everywhere else. He doesn't need to have this major thread where he and Adam Driver are beefing or whatever. Corey Stoll's an actor I've always liked. And this was again,

he was kind of emergent at this point in his career. The first thing I had ever seen him in was Midnight in Paris playing Ernest Hemingway, and he's tremendous. Had you seen him in anything before that? House of Cards was the first time that I saw him. And of course he, is killed in the first season, but he is fantastic in that first season. And it's like, it felt, I remember watching that season and feeling like this is a next major actor. So had you not seen Midnight in Paris for a while after it came out? I saw that movie late. Okay. I saw that really late. Like, I don't think I even saw that movie until after the Oscars. For whatever reason, because House of Cards was 2013. So it would have been a good deal later, a couple years later.

I mean, I remember seeing it late and not being particularly charmed by it in the way that everybody thought that that movie was so charming. Yeah, I think the parts of Midnight in Paris that I like, I really like. And that's Corey Stoll, Adrian Brody as Dolly. Kathy Bates. Kathy Bates, Tom Hiddleston and Allison Pill as F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald. All of that I really loved. Everything else to do with Owen Wilson and Rachel McAdams. Talk. I mean, you want to talk about a movie that hates women. Like Rachel McAdams' character in that movie is a prime example of that. But I thought Stoll to me was the standout as Hemingway in that. I thought he was incredibly funny and, you know, I thought it was a very skillful performance. So from there, he's in House of Cards, as you mentioned. He sort of starts showing up in smaller roles in movies that I'm seeing more.

Moore. He's in The Born Legacy. He's in Non-Stop, the movie where Liam Neeson has to avert an air disaster on an airplane that is, like, shockingly well-cast. Non-stop is Liam Neeson, Julianne Moore, Lupita Nyango, right after she won the Oscar. She had already made this movie by then. Corey Stole, Michelle Dockery, Scoot McNary. Like, it's an insane, Linus Roche. It's an insane cast. We love Scoot. Non-stop was so fun. And then TV, he had done House of Cards, and then he had also been in a production of A View from the Bridge on Broadway, which starred, give me a second. Oh, that was the one that Scarlet-Johansen won the Tony Award for, was that revival. What does she call Ryan Reynolds in her Tony speech, The Canadian That Lives in My House or something? It's something like that. That's funny.

actually give me a second because now I'm looking and I'm seeing that that production was Scarlett Johansson, Leav Schreiber and Jessica Hecks. So I wonder if he was like a, so yeah, Leav Schreiber is the lead, the male lead in that, and then Corey Stoll played a supporting role in that. But yes, Scarlett Johansson won the Tony. Did Scarlett Johansson win the Tony the same year as Catherine Zita Jones? And then that was the big story that like all our Hollywood stars are coming for our Tony Awards. I feel like I remember that. I forget if that was the same year. year.

I feel like it might have been. There was what, the 2010 Tonys? Scarlett Johansson is at least in the, like, kicked off the thing of movie stars are coming for all of our Tony Awards. But it's like, if you in the theater community are feeling that way, why vote for Scarlett Johansson to begin with? Yeah. Well, okay, yeah. So, yes, Scarlet Johansson won. Catherine Zeta Jones won

Also, Denzel Washington and Viola Davis won for fences Also, even though it's kind of a backwards way, Eddie Redmayne also won for Red that year and he wouldn't become sort of the movie guy until after. That sort of helped launch him into becoming

a leading man in movies, but still. And this is still at the time that Viola Davis was considered more of a theater actress, but she would have had an Oscar nomination. Right, I was going to, yeah, she had had one Oscar nomination and was about to get her second one for the help. So, yes.

But I think in general, I think I think any of those in isolation probably wouldn't have led to that. Maybe Scarlett Johansson on her own. But like the accumulation of all of that at once, where it was like five Tony awards are going to you know, movie stars. She won a

supporting Tony and like when all of the, not think pieces, but when all of the stories of that were running, she's the photo that they use. Yes. Scarlett. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, that was the same year. Remember we talked about in the Martha Marcy May Marlene episode, Maria Dizia getting nominated for the Vibrator play. That was that year. Scarlett beat her out for that. And I think also probably what played into it was, Scarlett was nominated alongside her co-star, who was Jessica Hecht, who is far more of a- Also a legend. Far more of a theater Broadway actress. I imagine people in the community. There was probably a good deal of resentment among that. vote for Scarlett Johansson. Well, I don't vote for the tones.

Maybe I don't understand how the Tony's work. I do feel like, yes. I almost literally said something completely off the top of my head that I had no factual basis for and I stopped myself because I was like, Joe, you don't know that. You're only assuming

that do not speak like you know who votes for the Tony Awards because you definitely don't. What I do understand about how the Tony's are voted on is that there are there's like nominating committees but then I think it's a broader voting body that picks a win which is the case for a lot of things

the SAG Awards are like that BAFTA now yeah yeah yeah yeah all right back to the this is where I leave your cast I think we both mentioned we both like Connie Britton for the limited range of which she is allowed to show her stuff in this I do like

this is where I maybe push back a little bit at the idea that this movie hates women because I feel like this movie allows that character more grace than a movie sometimes gives that character. Sure. I think that scene with her and Jason Bateman where she's like, and she even, she gets, too, she gets a scene with Tina Fey and a teen with Jason, uh, my God, I can't talk. A scene with Tina Fey and a scene with Jason Bateman. And both of them, she's like, listen, I'm not an idiot. I'm not some, you know, flusy.

I'm not this sort of caricature that you may think that I am. I know what this looks like. I know what this is. And yet, my feelings are my feelings. And I fell in love with this idiot. And I think in the Tina Fey conversation, she's sort of trying to convince Tina Fey but also herself. And in the Jason Bateman conversation,

she's sort of admitting defeat, right? She's just being like, well, you know, this is not going to work. And the movie allows her a level of great, that other movies, maybe even other better movies, wouldn't make time for with that character. And I did appreciate that. Yeah. And I mean, I feel like my appreciation of that, though, comes from her performance because, like, Connie Britton feels like the only conceivable human person, sadly.

Like, other people are given more to do in this movie. But, like, they don't feel, like, people in the way that she does giving that performance. So I would still. put it on the performer. Yeah. Is this our first Connie Britton? I feel like Connie Britton has shown up in something. I literally was just making the list earlier, so hold on a second, and I'll tell you in two sheds. It luckily is not our first Catherine Hahn, because

this would be shameful to be the first Catherine Han movie. It is, I think, our first Connie Britton. Yeah, it's our third Adam driver. It is our fourth Catherine Hahn. Yeah, I think that's For as starry as this cast is, we haven't done most of

these people very much on this podcast. So that makes it interesting. Not a lot of opportunities to do Jane Fonda. I was going to say, it's only our second Jane Fonda. Kind of a shameful Jane Fonda. Okay, let's get into the Jane Fonda thing. Because her career is very, it's easy to talk about in the fact

that she was gone for 15 years, right? So then it's very easy to sort of segment her career as this sort of like, what's late Jane Fonda? Well, it's everything from Monster in Law and after, right? And so, 2005, Monster in Law, we just literally talked about this when we were on with Billy Ray, how much I do enjoy Monster in Law. And then she works, she's been working really steadily ever since for a woman who is, I'm just checking her age now, because I want to make sure I get it right. But it's like, I always remember being like, yeah, she's 84 years old.

This is an 84-year-old woman who is working steadily and working, I would say, quite well. Icon. Monster-in-Lond, 05. Georgia Rule in 07, where she's not only like in this movie, but in this like media firestorm, right, with all the Lindsay Lohan stuff and whatnot. She plays Nancy Reagan and the Butler. Whenever we do our Scattergories games, I always remember to bring that up. Actually, that's so much fun when I do alter ego. that I can just

anybody from the butler who has played... It feels like it's been a year since we've done Scattergories. It probably has been. Hey guys, remember Zoom? Let's do Zoom. We should do that again. This is where I leave you was 14.

The following year, she comes incredibly close to getting an Oscar nominations. The one thing that hasn't happened in this late stage of her career is she hasn't gotten another Oscar nomination since coming back. She came very close for youth.

I was very conflicted. I think on a global level, I would like Jane, Fonda to have another Oscar nomination for this phase of her career. I hated that movie, and I thought that movie made her a grotesque in a way that I did not appreciate. Even though I think on a performance level, it's pretty good. But, like, anyway, she's in a movie. I'm pretty sure I'm the only person who saw, which was Our Souls at Night, which was one of those Netflix movies that never existed for anybody.

She and Robert Redford play an older couple who, I believe, they're both widow and widower, I feel like. I believe you and my mother have seen that movie because I definitely have gotten a text message from my mother saying, have you seen this movie Our Souls at night? I was like, Mom, this sounds like a horror movie. What are you watching? She's like, actually, it's a roo. It does sound like a horror movie. Yeah, he's a widower. She's a widow.

They live like next door to each other, essentially, and they begin a romance. 2018, she's in Book Club, a movie that I found far more entertaining than I had any right to. If you're ever looking for a movie... Good, horny Jane Fonda is in Book Club. Yes. If you're ever looking for a movie where

Mary Steenberg and Craig T. Nelson dance to meatloaf, that is your movie. If you're ever looking for movies that make the title of Werner Herzog documentaries into vagina jokes, that is a movie for you.

Cannot wait for Book Club 2, by the way. She's in the upcoming movie 80 for Brady, which is a movie about four seniors who take a road trip to Houston to watch a Tom Brady football game to watch Tom Brady play in the Super Bowl. It is Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, Rita Moreno, and Sally Field.

I hate Tom Brady, but I will absolutely be watching this movie. I do not want to support any kind of Tom Brady hero worship. And yet I will absolutely see that movie. Sally Kirkland is also in that movie, Bob Ballabin. What? Sally Kirkland, Bob Balabin, Glenn Termin, Ron Funches, who I find delightful. Harry Hamlin, Billy Porter.

Conceivably, Tom Brady is in a scene of this movie, so it's fine. But, wow, we're watching this movie. Yeah. Jane Fonda, her last Oscar nomination, was, I believe, 87. The morning after? The morning after. Which I've never seen. Morning after.

Is it good? A complete, like, piece of shit movie that is fully watchable and entertaining on the back of Jane Fonda. She makes that movie. And, like, she's playing, huh? Interesting. Sydney Lumet. Right.

It's like a thriller where she wakes up from a blackout and thinks that she killed someone, you know, basically the flight attendant. But, like, it's not a good movie, but, like, she actually is really good and gets this Oscar nomination for this piece of shit movie that... Honestly? Purely because she is entertaining in a movie star way that is so rare that, like, you and I talk about and we appreciate it. It's, like, Viola Davis and Widows. Yeah. It's kind of a cool nomination for a terrible movie.

Honestly, Jane Fonda, Jeff Bridges, Raul Julia in a Sydney Lumet movie, I will probably seek this out. Like, I will, I've been meaning to do my project where I go backwards through all the best actress nominations and see them in reverse chronological, the ones that I haven't seen. I want to do that too. Maybe we need a shared project. Imagine the eyes of Laura Mars stripped of all of its like. Okay. Excesses? Yeah.

Yeah. That's kind of the vibe of morning after. That's what you're going for. While at the same time, we mentioned also earlier, she had been co-starring on the newsroom as Leona Lansing, the owner of the cable company that this news station is on. She gets a couple of Emmy nominations for that. Does she deserve them? Who's to say what deserve means? The newsroom is a show that I found at times unbearable and also quite compelling, and it is really all over the map.

And a lot of people couldn't stand it. The worst of Sorkin, yada, yada, yada. I don't disagree. And yet that second season, I'm just going to say it, slaps. Grace and Frankie premieres in 2015. My mother's favorite show. I love that show. That show lasted 94 episodes over seven seasons.

it was never worse than pretty good. You know what I mean? It had a nice little baseline level. She and Lily Tomlin had, of course, Perpetually watching. Wonderful chemistry together. I think at the beginning, a lot of people, especially a lot of gay people that I saw

who tried out that movie, were really edgy about the Sam Waterston, Martin Sheen gay relationship in that. I will confess to being one of those people that I kept watching. I thought it was fine. I thought they were fine. I thought they were, you know, Dorky old gays of a certain age trying to... That is a story where gay characters sort of trying to find their way in a world that they're unfamiliar with made a lot of sense in a way that like this Neil Patrick Harris show for Netflix where he's newly single in his 40s and trying out the dating scene and is sort of bewildered and repulsed by everything that he finds.

Okay, so everybody talks about 30 rock jokes. That show felt like an other two joke. Yeah, yes. It's so obnoxious. I think there are television shows and things in the culture now that I'm like, that sounds like an other two joke. Yeah, it's such an obnoxious show. I really couldn't stand it.

Yeah, so Jane's also, she had also, didn't she do something on Broadway around that time? She got a Tony nomination for, The Moises Kaufman show. Yes. Variations, something about variations. Yes. A show that I don't remember people liking, but it was like, but it's Jane Fonda. Yes.

Live in the flesh in front of you. Yes. I feel like she was nominated and lost to Marsha Gay Hardin. Hold on. Now I'm going to pull up Ivy D.B. I'm trying to, again, learn the lesson to not speak out of my ass when I could just look things up. And Archie Gay Harden tackling her entire cast, dealing with puke on stage in God of Carnage, was very transcendent for me. She absolutely earned that Tony Award.

I thought she was so good. That was the Tony Awards where she was up against Harriet Walter and who was the other nominee for, what's that? But Harriet Walter and the other woman in Mary Stewart were both nominated. Janet McTeer. and when they read the nominations they showed Janet McTeer when they read Harriet Walter and it's one of those things where the camera's in the aisle

and the women are seated right in front of each other so the camera's on the one and then moves to the other and it was totally backwards and you could see the awkwardness on the faces of both of these women as they're like oh my God, like he's on you when they say me and he's on me and they see you and Marsha Gay Harden to her endless class

and wonderfulness corrected that from the stage after she won. She said, like, oh, the camera didn't show their faces right, but our wonderful actresses, Harriet Walter, and Janet McTeer, which was great. Why am I not getting, oh, here we go, 33 variations is what it was called. Sure. She was nominated for the Tony Award in, yes, 1999. It was her second Tony nomination. after 1960, there was a little girl.

There once was a little girl. Until I turn 40, I think I'm going to take this joke that now only you and our listeners will understand. Like next year, I'm not turning 36. I'm turning 36 variations. Very good. Endless, endless variations and permutations. Anything else to say about the supporting cast? We both feel like Catherine Hahn was done dirty by this movie.

we both like Deborah Monk I thought Oliphant was great Poor Ben Schwartz Timothy Oliphant that character Had more of effect on the book Than in this movie Yeah Oh so that that's a storyline

That plays better in the book I think so Yeah or they at least define that character A little bit more Because I still feel like Even reading the book When he shows up in the movie I'm like who's this guy

Oh yeah Yeah The guy who has the dramatic head injury. Poor Ben Schwartz gets hit in the dick by Adam Driver countless times in this movie. This is a movie that thinks it's funny to call a character boner. I thought that was so embarrassing. That is a decade's old joke. That was a joke on growing pains, y'all. Like, that is how freaky. That joke is. Like, do better. And it's too bad because I do, I love Ben Schwartz. Anytime he shows up in something, I tend to really love him. So that was too bad.

Yeah, just in general is a movie that, again, I can be very actor-focused. And so when I see a movie with a cast like this, I get very excited, even though I was kind of, so this was, this gala premiered at the 2014 Toronto Film Festival, which was my first. That was the year that I went and bought tickets because I did not get press-approved. Did you see this at that, TIF? Did you wait two weeks? So here's where a brag and a shame in the same sentence. I had to be very choosy about the things that I saw at this because I wasn't able to see everything and things cost money. Or I had to like wait in very long rush lines for things, right?

And lose a whole day to that. Right. So I had to make my choices. The gala's I saw, I didn't see very many. And I didn't go to the gala's, right? I had to, like, find other, you know, screenings for him. But I saw Foxcatcher and I saw Wild. And I, oh, the Riot Club was a gala.

I definitely saw a press screen. Or no, it wasn't a press screening because I didn't, I only, I had to rush the press screenings. Lona Sherfigs, the Riot Club, which was the director of an education who followed that up with this movie about these, like, rich, white British Oxford kids who like bullied their way around this like

secret society or whatever but it was like Sam Claflin Max Irons, Douglas Booth like all these actors these young British actors who looked exactly the same

and even the name of our game we always play with Katie Rich the riot club indistinguishable basically Sam Claflin Max Irons Douglas Booth

and as it goes down the list I think it gets more interesting It is a movie that stars both Ben Schnitzer and Freddie Fox, who are both in Pride, so they get an eternal pass from me. But, yeah, yeah. And, like, Ali Alexander's in it. You know what I mean? Like, that kind of thing.

The women are Jessica Brown-Finley from Downton Abbey, Holiday Granger, who is, like, forever. Like, if you could do the same game with, like, young British actresses of a certain word, it's, like, Holiday Granger, Tuppens Middleton. Oh, is Holiday Granger the one who's in Tulip Fever, or am I thinking of somebody else? This is the question. This is why you play the game. Anyway, the Riot Club was one of those. So I made the active decision to, like, I put Maps to the Stars off because I knew it would be at New York Film Festival.

I think I put off something else because I knew I would be able to see it. And I put off, this is where I leave you, because A, it was opening like the next week. so I know I'd be able to see it soon. And B, I think seeing the Sean Levy of it all, I was like, I'm not going to get fooled by this starry cast. And ultimately, I was right, and that's a brag. But I will deflate myself a little bit because at that very same festival, I decided to see the film Black or White by the Mike Binder movie, which starred Kevin Costner and Octavia Spencer. he as the grandfather of their they're each grandparents of this granddaughter

who they have in common who the parents die and there's a custody battle or Kevin Costner's, I think it's Kevin Costner's daughter dies and Octavia Spencer's son is maybe like not fit so she's raising the kid and then Kevin Costner sues her for custody and it's like but what of the race?

implications, and it's handled so ham-fistedly, and I remember seeing that... I have not seen it. I ran for the hills from that movie. You made the right decision. It was really bad. Anyway, some interesting other gala presentations at that TIF. I remember showing up for my first TIF, going to pick up my tickets on King Street, and of course, everything is adorned with TIF stuff, and there are posters and there are whatever, and I was sort of like ooing and eyeing my very first major film festival. And I remember being so struck by this like giant like horizontal wide poster for the equalizer. And I'm like, that's so weird.

Dentsa Washington holding a gun. It's so weird that that was a festival movie. That was one of the gala's. I mentioned Foxcatcher, infinitely polar bear, famous eventual Golden Globe nominee, Mark Ruffalo for infinitely polar bear. The judge, which I knew I was going to stay away from. Even though that would have saved me some time because eventually I had to see it because Robert Duval was an Oscar nominee for it. Laggies, which I didn't see there,

but I saw later the Lynn Shelton movie Laggies, which I really like. Which I still need to see. Oh, Kira Knightley, Chloe Muretz, Sam Rockwell. It's really good. I like it. I know I'll like it. I know I'll like it.

The closing night film was a little chaos, the Alan Rickman movie, a little chaos where... Which I want. Kate Winslet designs the garden for Versailles. It is a good little movie. I didn't see it there. I saw it a little while later.

A friend of the show, Richard Lawson invited me to the premiere in New York, and I came within an arm's length of Kate Winslet. That was very fun. Wonderful score for that film. I will say I will always dip into the score for a little chaos.

Pond Sacrifice, the Edwards Wick movie Pond Sacrifice, about Bobby Fisher. Edwardswick Chess movie, yeah. Yes. What else? What else? Wild, I mentioned.

Yeah, so big successes were sort of hard to come by. I think the big ones were Foxcatcher and Wilde in terms of what translated to Oscar success that year. What was the... Oh, the audience award went to the imitation game that year, which was not a gala premiere. That was just a special presentation. I only just realized in assembling our outline for the... episode, we've kind of accidentally, until next week's episode that ends August, every episode

we've done has been a TIF Gala this month. We almost accidentally had a theme. Wow, leading up to our grand return to our favorite place. That's wonderful. Anything else we want to talk about in terms of, wait, let me go into my notes, because I feel like I wrote down some things. About this is where I leave you. I did like Roseburn's song choices for ice skating, both time after time and never tear us apart. I enjoyed that. Oh, when I mentioned the Family Stone is like the best version of this, I feel like there's like a goofus and gallant sort of dichotomy of

family movies like this, and the good version is the Family Stone, and the bad version is Dan in Real Life, and I feel like this field, this movie had a real Dan in Real Life vibe to it. Just a lot of really cliché. scenes. Like I said, the brawl on the front lawn is a scene we've seen in so many things. The smoking weed in the back room and bonding

scene is a thing we've seen in so many things. It was a little... The ice skating is a scene we've seen in so many different things. Yes, absolutely. I do appreciate that Tina Fey got to tweak Adam Driver's nipple in a movie. Like, that

was nice and good for her. Oh, Sean Levy. I sort of delved into his little history for a little bit. Not the most interesting of filmmakers, but like I said, incredibly successful, producer on arrival. He also had a brief bit of an acting career, and the fun little tidbit there was he was in the episode of Beverly Hills 90210 where they walk out in support of Donna Martin, who was drunk at prom. He's in the Donna Martin graduates episode where he and his other counterpart rally the junior. class members to join the seniors in their walkout in support of Donna.

Because the lines of division are so clear. Well, the juniors were God, it's amazing how much I remember about that episode. The juniors resented, the juniors were more sort of agitated and active, and they all resented the seniors for having one foot out the

door, and they were like, well, if you go to bat for your friend who was drunk at prom, also demanded that they cancel the dress coat, that they're going to implement and we'll join you and whatever. But that's a, I remember, once I looked up Sean Levy 902 and O on Google and I saw the face, I'm like, I remember that guy.

Like, he was in that episode. What else? I think that's it. What else do you have about? You mentioned Doc Shepard's surprisingly flat ass, and you were right to do so. Yeah, I feel bad. I don't want to like body shame people. But like, from the looks of the rest of him, he got so, like, pumped up at this stage of his

career. He was very, like, gym body. the camera angle the Sean Levy It's very possible Not you know friendly In his shot angle Adam Driver enters this movie

Listening to DMX Yes Rest in Peace DMX Just more of the cringe Sexualization that happens in this movie And also scenes that are in a million other movies The baby monitor scene Oh right

It's in the trailer It feels like It thinks that sexual humiliation is so fun in a way that almost feels like porkies or something. There's, you know, Corey Stoll and Catherine Hahn finally having, you know, sex or whatever, and it gets caught on a baby monitor, which then, like, when they try to turn it off, it has backup batteries, so it's like they have to basically break the thing. I did think that was one of those good Tina Fey lines,

is where Debra Monk unplugs the baby monitor, and it keeps going, and she looks at her, and she just goes, backup batteries. Like, she was very good at all of those kind of lines in this movie. Why is that baby monitor there? Doesn't the dad take the babies when he leaves? That dad comes and goes in this movie, like, apparates and dis-apperates at will. Like, sometimes he exists and sometimes he doesn't, and it's just random. Total plot device.

Tina Fey married to Aaron Lazar. Nice work if you can get it. What do I know him from? He is a New York theater. I see. He replaced Matthew Morrison in Light in the Piazza. I never saw Light in the Piazza. That was before I moved to the city.

Well, and you can't watch it. it now because some sadists, some cruel person, some dictatorial asshole removed the PBS version from YouTube, and I am not in the least bit resentful of that.

Anyway, he is in that production that was on PBS. Lighten the Piazza, to my mind, the great unfilmed movie musical. It would be a perfect movie. Anyway, that just like having Catherine

Han scream, put a baby in me. Yeah. It felt like Sean Levy... One star to merit. It felt like Sean Levy saw Stepbrothers the week before he cast this movie and decided we're going to cast Catherine Hahn and we're going to make that character her stepbrothers character. Like the scene where she comes on to Jason Bateman is directly out of that movie. Like it's directly her coming on...

God, that's annoying. But like the tone of it. all even, just sort of, like, play is exactly like that. Yeah, yeah, and it's, it's just, like, a humiliating... Was this a well-regarded book? I kind of had no experience of it as a novel. I read it because I saw it

recommended an EW. Interesting. So, like, I think it's a book that's sold. Yeah. Just a little more history on the movie. Before it opened, but after it played Toronto, it played something called the Wine Country Film Festival.

Oh. Which I looked up. And I don't think it survived the pandemic if it even existed, you know, pre-pandemic. If someone wants to revive the Wine Country Film Festival and wants two judges for their, for their panel. This just sounds like our home. These two guys would whore out for your festivals so readily. Invite us, pay our way, and lodge us in Wine Country, and we will judge your. Festival. Wine Country Film Festival just sounds like the nickname for like the circle of like gay movie Twitters that we move in. Fair. Fair. Is this where we leave? This is where I leave you and

move into the IMDB game? Yeah. Why not? Why not explain to our listeners what the IMDB game is? All right. Here's the deal. Every week, every week we end our episodes with the IMDB game. DB game. What do we do there? Well, we challenge each other with an actor or actress and try and guess the top four titles that IMDB says, quote, unquote, they're most known for. If any of these titles are television or voice-only performances or non-acting credits of any kind, we mentioned that up front. After two wrong guesses, we get the remaining titles release years as a clue, and if that's not enough, we drive up to a funeral, blasting DMX, and we give out a free for all of it. All right

Joseph Reed Would you like to be in the position To give or guess first I'll give first All right Hoomst do you have for me Once again I always whenever I'm faced with that decision

I literally every single time go Do I always give first Or do I always think that I always give first And thus am I always guessing first And I cannot for the life of me remember From week to week So anyway Sean Levy

throughout his vast directing career, his very first feature film. He started in, like, Disney Channel and Nickelodeon and doing a lot of those sort of kid shows. First feature film that he directed was, of course, the seminal Frankie Munez, Amanda Bind's feature, Big Fat Liar. I think we all remember where we were when that movie made its landing. Among that film's cast is an actor who I'm pretty sure we both like very much, Mr. John Cho. so why don't you make your best effort at john chose known for is there any television no so not the 130 rock episode where he plays a canadian meth dealer the world's most cheerful canadian meth dealer who has one of my favorite 30 rock lines where it's alec baldman and elizabeth banks are in canada

and she's about to have the baby and she doesn't want to have the baby on canadian soil because then her baby will be Canadian and not American, so they're trying to get back over the border, and he's trying to help them. And it's all very fraught, and he's got a van because he's a meth dealer, and he's driving him. And finally, at one point, he just sort of looks at him, and he goes, oh my God, where are my manners? Do you want to try meth? He's like, I'm sorry, I'm so rude. Would you like some would you want to try meth? It's very funny. I'll try and find the line, because he obviously delivers it better than I did. But, yeah. John Show has had a long, very busy career. So this is going to be hard. Harold and Kumar go to White Castle. Very good. Very correct. Had to be.

I think it's quite possible there's another Harold and Kumar in there. Um, Star Trek. Indeed, 2009's Star Trek. Um, smaller movie, but in a lead role, uh, I did not like this movie searching. Searching. A movie. Deborah Messing Cinema. All right, here's what I will say. I think a lot of people liked searching a lot more than I ended up liking searching, but I will say I did not regret watching that movie in a theater, and the Deborah Messing character arc in that movie I think is worth the price of admission. It's so insane. Maybe if I had seen it with a crowd of unruly gays, but I saw it with a crowd of like suburbanites happy to be watching a free movie. I saw it with one good friend gay, and that was good enough for me. That movie turns into a

greeting card so quickly that, like, I just wanted to, like, puke in my popcorn. Hey, did it. Um, okay. One more. You've only got, uh... And two franchises, two franchises that I think could conceivably

also be... Wait, are you still on a perfect score? Have you guessed anything incorrectly? I don't think you have. Yeah, I just guessed searching. Yeah, searching is correct. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Um, ever since you said his name, I'm getting caught up

in him being in... He's an American pie, right? I think he is, very briefly. One of the side characters. Yeah. And I know it's not that. Hmm. I don't know. And I don't think years are really

going to help me. Now I feel the pressure to get a perfect score on Jon Cho. Is it Columbus? It is not Columbus? I think I would have also guessed Columbus, but it is not. I think too small. Searching is small, but Columbus is much small.

And I don't think he actually got like award nominations to give him the boost there in the algorithm. Yeah. So that's one strike. So your perfect score is obliterate. Is Star Trek Beyond or Star Trek Into Darkness, the one where they made his character gay? That's a good question. I think it's into darkness, so I'm just going to guess into darkness.

You're correct that it's Star Trek into darkness. Damn it, I should have guessed it before I guess Golom. I think it's Star Trek Beyond where they make his character gay, or at least canonically gay. But we can look that up. Yes. So you got it. Almost a perfect score.

not quite. Your over your outsized faith in Koganada has proven to be your downfall. All right. I also went the Sean Levy route for you. I went a little more basic in the Sean Levy route. Someone who surprisingly we haven't done before is Ben Stiller. Mr. Benjamin Stiller.

All right. Are they all movies that he's at least an actor? in. Yes, though I will say. Some are probably director or producer or something like that. No. On his known for, the billing on each of these is as a producer. Yeah. I mean, he produces almost everything he's in.

Everything he's in, he produces. So I don't think that's going to help you. It doesn't. No. But like... Yeah. No, that's what I figured. Okay. So, God, this is the other thing about Ben Stiller is he's in so many movies that make money. Just so, so, so many movies that make money. It also has to be like, it has to be some type of like industry status thing that producer still is bumped to the top of every IMDB because he has more than double acting credits of what he has as a producer credit. And it's still producer for him.

Um, Ben, producer, stiller, uh, like candy producer, muse is how I always think. Um, I'm going to guess Zoolander. Correct. I'm going to guess, there's something about Mary? Incorrect. Shoot. If it's Zoolander, too, I'm going to be annoyed, but I'm not going to guess that at the moment. What are, like, the Ben Stiller movies?

Honestly, I'll guess Night at the Museum. Incorrect. Damn. All right, what are my years? I think Night at the Museum is his highest grossing movie, so it's surprising that it's not there. But, like, people don't talk about those movies. I think they're probably just sitting on Disney Plus and do people and their children watch them. I don't know.

I think probably they do. I think you could not find a movie that is more outside of our sphere of interest than Night of the Museum. but, like, I think people really like this. I would probably like them if I watched them. I've never seen them. That's my challenge to you. By the time we see each other in Toronto, you'll have watched all over the night of the museum movies.

I've got shit to do. Maybe I'll watch them. I don't know. Your years, however, are 2008, 2013, and 2016. Well, now Zoolander 2 is in play, because I don't know what year it was, but it's plausibly either 2013 or 2016. What's 2008?

the first one? Yes. So that's Tropic Thunder. Correct. Tropic Thunder. All right. God, if 2013's Walter Middy, I'm going to be annoyed as well. 2013, 2016. All right. Is Zoolander 2 one of them? Zoolander 2 is 2016.

That's so annoying. Zoolander 2 shows up for like Canelopee Cruz or someone. Christian Whig. It's on Christian. Whigs. I'm pretty sure. Yeah. Wow. Maybe Zoolander 2 is everyone on the poster. That is a movie I've still never seen because I really, really loved Zoolander one and I didn't want to like ruin anything. I saw it and I don't think I, I'd like rented it or got it from Netflix discs and I don't think I finished it. Okay. No, it is not because Will Ferrell is on the poster and it is not in

his known for it. Is 2013 Walter Middy? It is Walter Middy. That's the craziest shit. The most non-entity movie. Okay, I need to see if it's still in Penelope Cruises. I don't think it was ever in Penelope Cruises, Zoolander 2. I'm pretty sure it was at some point, but it is not now, so justice has been served. Okay. Yeah, everybody's favorite Ben Stiller movie. Zoolander 2 and The Secret Life of Walter Middy.

That's crazy. Oh, wait, now I want to bring up Ben Stillers, because, like, I can, I can, Like, there's something about Mary absolutely should be on his known for instead of those movies. Not to play the I Should Be Right game. Like, why are you booing me? I'm right. But, like, why are you booing me? I'm right.

What else should be on there, honestly? Ben Stiller. As I scroll through. I mean, his greatest performance in the Meyerowitz stories, which... Myrowerwood Stories. Dodgeball, huge. hit you know what I mean like yeah everyone watched it I certainly did still talk about it when they talk about Noah bomb back I will say oh wait my what stories you're talking about I'm talking

about dodgeball everybody did see dodgeball oh okay if you can dodge a wrench you can dodge a ball Justin Long has a scene where he's uh dodging a essentially a pitching machine that keeps throwing dodge balls at him that is generally one of my favorite Justin Long things of his into her career cable guy though like reality bites for Pete's sake like come on guys let's get your act together huh

all right I think that is our Meet the Parents my God Meet the Parents alright Okay Meet the Parents is a franchise we've fully moved on from like no place in the culture whatsoever and I think it's because Little Fockers was so terrible

Yeah but I really liked the first Meet the Parents I watched that movie a bunch of times I even had fun with the second one, mostly because of Barbara. Sure. Yeah. Is Barbara in Little Fockers as well? She is, and, like, that's part of the thing of Little Fockers is, like, why it's so terrible and so, like, evidently terrible is, like, none of those people except for Robert De Niro and Ben Stiller were ever on set together. Now, see, if you wanted to do, this is where I leave you, that was more authentically Jewish, you would cast Barberton.

Strysand and like not even bother with the mom's not Jewish line just you know what I mean like make them an actual Jewish family Barbara Streisand is the mom in a movie with this premise I think would be gold like absolute gold barbara's not going to show off her boobs I mean was Jane Fonda showing off her boobs in this lot line too yeah move the character showing their boobs anyway yeah I was gonna say if we're making that change we can make a couple more changes. Yeah. Yeah. All right.

That is our episode. If you want more, This Had Oscar Buzz, you can check out our Tumblr at Thisheadoscarpost.ttomber.com. You should also follow us on Twitter at Had underscore Oscar underscore Buzz. Joe, where can our listeners find more of you? They can't. What if I just said that? What if I was just like, no.

Stop looking for me. I don't wish to be found. If you ever heard, you never heard my name, you don't know my face. I am someone who kind of wants to delete their Twitter. Yeah. Of the two of us, of the two of us, you will end up deleting your Twitter before I do. I will say that. Definitely. That is, yeah. Anyway, you can find me on Twitter and letterbox at Joe Reed, read spelled R-E-I-D. And you can find me on Twitter for now and letterbox indefinitely at Chris V-File. That's F-E-I-L. We want to thank Kyle Cummings for his fantastic artwork and Dave Gonzalez and Gavin Mievous for their technical guidance. Please remember to rate, like, and review us on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Google, Google, place. It's wherever else you get your podcast.

Five-star review in particular really helps us out with Apple Podcasts visibility. So get loud on that baby monitor with a nice review. That's all for this week. We hope you'll be back next week for more bus. Bye. Oh! Oh, yeah.