This Had Oscar Buzz - Intro to 70s Spectacular

Episode Date: April 29, 2024

May is upon us and that means it’s time for another May miniseries! How could we top last year’s 100 Years, 100… Snubs! success? Well, we’ll be doing a deep dive into the Oscar era that was the 1970s! In the month of May, we will be looking back at each year of the decade … Continue reading "Intro to 70s Spectacular"

Oh, oh, wrong house. No, the right house. We want to talk to Mel and Hack, Melon Hack and French. I'm from Canada water. Dick Pooh. The award for the best picture is never lightly given. And now to divulge the contents of this year's most important envelope is a very important contributor to world entertainment.

And someone, quite likely, Hello, and welcome to the This Had Oscar Buzz podcast, the only podcast that is dancing up a storm underneath the little moon with the Coke spoon at Studio 54. Welcome to the podcast where we normally talk about movies that once upon a time had Academy Award aspirations, but for some reason or another, it all went wrong on the Oscar hopes died, and we tend to perform autopsies. But today, we are kicking off a month's worth of autopsies. kinds of autopsies? 1970s autopsies. 50 years worth of autopsy

old-ass bodies. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, we're going to limit ourselves to the technology that was available for autopsies in the 1970s, which, as far as I understand, is just like, hyperscopic. Yeah, it's just spoons. We're just, like, digging into bodies with, like.

Coke spoons, in fact. Yes, in fact. This is not a traditional, this had Oscar Bush episode, and we believe you will forgive us for shortchanging you because we are about to deliver 10 whole episodes of 1970s goodness in the span of a month, so we're pacing ourselves. This is the chips and salsa. This is the

veggie tray that we lay before the large day. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Welcome to the crudite, yes. If we sound a little tired, listener, we are, because we're in the month of May, what could we do to follow up 100 years, 100 snub. Well, this is the thing, and we'll talk about it. But to give a full smorgas board. And here, today, on this day,

we're going to set the table for what is about to come in the month ahead. We, okay, so to sort of zoom out, to really set the table. We've done mini-series for our podcast in the month of May since we began. Our very first one was on the films of 2003, a sort of a year where famously the biggest Oscar buzz titles went awry in some way or another. We ended up spending four or five weeks talking about Cold Mountain in the context of other things.

Every episode was basically a Cold Mountain. Every episode turned into a Cold Mountain episode. We were very, very happy with it. Then the following year was the pandemic. The first pandemic already was upon us, so the first pandemic year. And we did the films of our beloved Naomi Watts, our misbegotten, beloved Naomi Watts. Year three, we did the films of Focus Features, one of our favorite indie studios, our indie shingle-dependent studios. and what was it what were our focuses I'm trying to remember well uh we started with October

films right yeah yeah right as chosen by our listeners yes the muse um the muse we did um possession no yes what was it called what we did possession is that what it's called the air and that is the first focus feature yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yes um officially station agent was that one of our no no hold please thank you yeah i suppose i could just like scroll up in the thing that's right in front of my god damn face um i am secretarial this episode uh the other focus features possession less caution the place beyond the pines and boy erased exactly thank you chris uh the following year where we sort of, the 2022 miniseries, we began to play with format a little bit, where we grafted onto our May miniseries, the Entertainment Weekly seasonal movie previews.

So in addition to talking about whatever movie was on the cover of that issue, we talked about that issue of EW itself. So those were very long episodes. In a whole year, we did spring, summer, fall, holiday. Yes. And then a listener's choice. And then a listener's choice. Yes. That's the other thing is we kept finding the month of May having five Mondays in it. So we were supersized for all these years. We did Panic Room. We did the Da Vinci Code. We did ransom. We did the Pelican Brief. We did Notting Hill. We had a very good time of that one. So to top that last year, we decided to absolutely destroy our lives. No, this. was maybe one of the most fun things I've ever been a part of, which was 100 years and hundred snubs, a five-part extravaganza, I'm just going to say it, of snubbed performances and

accomplishments and films. And we had a hell of a time doing that. And the response to that one was really, really positive. We were very, very happy that you all seem to like it so much. And so that was great. Especially because we were so nervous being that we were going to just completely off the format. Right, exactly, exactly. So we were very, very happy with how that turned out. And that happiness lasted several months until it sort of started to dawn on us that like,

oh, we're going to have to like do another May miniseries. We're going to have to top this somehow. And like we had long discussions and, you know, pragmatist that I sometimes am. I'm like, maybe we just like don't. topic. Maybe we're like downshift, like, consciously downshift to like lower expectations. And I think to your credit, I think you were like, we should, we should push. And I think that was probably the right idea. But we had a lot of ideas where we were sort of throwing around. And there was a lot of like, yeah, we could do that. That'd be a really good one. We had a lot of ideas

that would have been really solid miniseries. And we were sort of had this workman like dedication to it. And then when the idea of the 70s was broached and we really sort of like dug into it and we kind of asked a couple of our friends to weigh in and at some point I think it clicked for the both of us and we both were like oh this is going to be fun this is going to be huge and insane but really fun but so talk talk a little bit about our why why the films of the 1970s is such a thing for this podcast that we do well there's a couple there's a couple like heads to that drag yeah and the first of which is you know we always regularly have listeners asking us to do older and older movies the oldest movie we've ever done

back when emily st james came on to talk about john ford's moby dick is back in the 50s we're not going that far back but you know and that's a huge outlier because like the gap between the oldest movie we had done and the second oldest is 30 years 31 years Yes. And, like, this particular head of the dragon also has multiple heads, because the reason we don't go as far back is, like, the simplest thing is so many of these movies that are remembered or would have been in the position for it got Oscar nominations somewhere. So you'd be surprised. You'd be surprised how hard it is to find a movie that has been sort of lost to history that then, anybody listening to this podcast would remember it all. Do you know what I mean? We're at least when we do our episodes under our own rubric,

we're doing episodes from the last 30 to 40 years. And we remember these ones, even though they did not get recognized by the Oscars. The farther back you go, if a movie totally went under the radar and is not part of some, like, celebrated autort's, you know, filmography, these movies really do sort of like fall into the cracks of movie history and unearthing them becomes sort of a little bit of a different thing than what we do.

Then it becomes historical or excavational and that's not quite what we do. Well, and this is where I've been somewhat of the maybe over-pragmatic mind on the show is when you're dealing with a smaller pool of movies, that are available for our format that, like, fit our rubric. I've been the one that says, we got to be careful about burning those off too soon, you know, because we would like to have them more spread out if we ever want to dip the toes into that. This is how we've held on to, this is how we've held on. The same mindset is how we've not done an episode on the producers in five years because we're like, we can't, we can't deplete our musicals.

We got to hold on to some musicals. But we do have more musicals coming at us that we could do. We could do the prom, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. God, what a threat. Yes. What a horrible threat you just made right here in front of everybody. I'll have you arrested, sir. James Corden will pull out a hit on us for the things that we will say.

What did you say about James Corden when that movie came out? You were like, James Corden should be brought up on war crimes or something like that. Exactly. Maybe that's what he's awaiting litigation. That's why we don't hear from him any. More, Hail Satan. So that's the first thing, you know, of this was an idea that we felt listeners would want because it's a deep dive into older movies than we normally cover.

I think the other idea is the kind of widespread belief that the 1970s are a golden era for the Oscars and for cinema at large as well. You know, this is a period of time that I think conventional wisdom is the Oscars were never picking as good of choices as then and... It's a reputation that I will say kind of holds up. You know what I mean? Yes and no, because I feel like when you're really looking granular as we have, because by the way, listeners, this entire miniseries, we're recording out of order, we'll explain why... Kind of for the first time, we never record out of order. I know some podcasts do and manage to, like, you know, make that feel very seamless. We...

And if we have, it's been like an episode out of order. These are all kind of loosey-goosey. Well, it's like Lucy Goosey front half, Lucy Goosey back half. And you'll see why we had to sort of do that when we explain the movies. Right, right, right. What path was I on getting to that? Shit, what was I saying? You were saying movies of the 1970s.

Oh, the idea that the 70s are the best, yes. Yes. So this idea that the Oscars are the best, I think as we have been having these conversations, this era of the 70s, I think when you look at it more granularly, you do realize that there are a lot of, for lack of a better term, finger quotes, Oscar behavior. or Oscar, like, defaults or whatever

that are very present in the 70s as well. Like, the type of wins, the type of Oscar logic that everybody maybe complains about in certain type of movies, like the Belfast, et cetera, the reader, you know, they were still very present in the 70s. And I think the, the other, The other thing about doing this miniseries, too, is getting to do the research, and it's very difficult to a lot of the resources that, you know, we maybe rely on things like the Wayback Machine or just our general, like, nerd experience in not letting anything in our time as Oscar Watchers go. Basically, you know, the research of this has been more focused.

I mean, I don't think I could have gotten through this mini-series without Inside Oscar the truly textbook throwback. Open the schools, make everybody read Inside Oscar. That's, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Let me pull up my copy to Show Joe on Mike. Yeah. It is, I had to, because I don't believe it's still in print. It might be print for, like.

If you can find it somewhere, get you a copy, I definitely have mine. Yeah. You're going to end up buying used versions of Insid Oscar listener. Worth it. If you do buy it, because mine, you can see, has old library labels on it. Oh, I love that. Oh, I love it. Because, like, this is what you've got to do to get a print copy of this book. The first time I ever read Inside Oscar, it was in my college library.

It was in, it was part of the collection there. And boy, did I just tumble down some rabbit holes. It was great. Yeah. Inside Oscar goes basically up to the 90s written by Mason Wiley. and Damien Bona. There is an Inside Oscar 2 that follows the 90s to 2002-ish. Yeah, it's only a matter of like six or seven years or whatever, but yeah.

Yeah, yeah. But it is textbook size. And when you read the chapters for each year, too, it's really a great source in terms of reporting at the time. But it's not like Oscar is now where, you know, that's people. People's job just to report on a one season and such. So it is a very, very different beast. They were relying on your real old school gossip columnist, your Liz Smith's, your Cindy Adams, is, you know what I mean? Like, that's where a lot of these, like, Liz Smith gets quoted in that thing a billion times. You know what I mean? And it's just like, or your army archards. You know what I mean? Out West or whatever. And yeah, yeah, it's tremendous. And the idea of like Oscar campaigns, which I know some. of the, like, some of our listeners who are not as enmeshed in award season and such don't

necessarily know what a campaign is, uh, or what that looks like, you know, in terms of press, luncheons, et cetera, et cetera. Pressing the flesh, as they say. Yeah. Right. Right. Um, you know, putting your Oscar hopefuls out on the town to, you know, shake hands, kiss babies of voters, etc etc but also advertising marketing yada yada yada when you're talking about this era of movie it's a very different thing because as some of the movies that will eventually talk about you know when the quotes are pulled from the trades or whatever or gossip columns in inside oscar aggressive campaigns are like campaigns consider the ones that we're considered aggressive at the time, or gauche, were, like, movies that ran 20 ads in variety

over the course of a season, which is insane. Yeah. That's insane. Like, movies today would have 20 ads in variety. If we saw a movie that only got 20 ads, we would be like, what is IFC doing with this movie? Like, that's... We would be like, we would be like, uh, we would be like, oscilloscope was not the right distributor for this movie.

They're only running 20 ads. So it also then becomes this thing where we're sort of looking backwards to this moment where having Oscar buzz kind of meant that you got Oscar nominations. You know what I mean? Just like it's just sort of so we tend to these 10 movies that we have picked for the most part are movies where we're going on things like prestige reputations for the talent involved, whether it's the director or the star or there's source material sometimes, which are things that we go on now when we're choosing

movies from the present day. But that's also, you know, why those movies then have this observable Oscar buzz that we have. So we had a fun time, I think, choosing this 10. But before we let go of research, one of the most fun things about researching for this miniseries for me is I've just been watching a bunch of movies. I've just been watching a bunch of movies from the 70s that I've never seen before that were Oscar nominees, just to sort of like put myself into, you know, the milieu of that time. And it's been great. It's been really, really fun to all these things that were like forever sort of like holes in my film watching. I am now patching up and it's, I mean, again, this decade has its reputation for a reason. And we'll

talk about, you know, in the episodes we've already sort of started to record, there's a lot of talk about, you know, the changing face of Hollywood through the decade of the 70s. It really does sort of like walk out like a lamb or walk in like a lamb and out like a lion. kind of a thing. That's another thing I would say about like doing this granular research on this decade that I think we who like movies all think we know. But the one thing that's coming to really like come to the forefront for me, especially for our earlier episodes, it's a transitional time for the industry, but it's also a transitional time for Oscar in a way that feels like there are some parallels to.

today, not quite to the extreme that they were in the 70s, because, you know, when we launch into our 1970s episode coming this May 1st, later this week, you know, that's the year that Patton wins. And it's coming off of 19, like the late 60s where you have Midnight Cowboy winning a Best Picture Oscar, which is kind of revolutionary, not just because it's an X rating, but because of the content of the movie, you know, and you're talking about a decade of movies where they're giving My Fair Lady Best Picture Oscars. You know, it's the big, splashy musical decade.

But you also have things like anti-establishment movies coming through. Easy Rider, obviously, being the big example. It doesn't get a Best Picture nomination, but it does land two Oscar nominations, which is somewhat of a feat when you consider...

I mean, obviously, American culture is going through a huge transition in the late 60s, but certainly cinema. and in the early 70s you see this kind of old guard trying to hang on to certain things, but you also see this movement within the industry of certainly a generation of actors who didn't grow up watching the Oscars on TV, so they, for that reason and among other reasons, don't take the Oscars seriously, and they kind of resent the Oscars.

Obviously, the big example being George C. Scott. Yes. Even though the longer narrative over this decade is also Dustin Hoffman, who rejects the Oscars and then ends the decade winning an Oscar. And, you know, showing up to it when he hadn't shown up before. Yeah. So it's an interesting decade in a lot of ways. When Mark Harris wrote his book Pictures at a Revolution talking about sort of of the giving way of the classic old Hollywood to the new Hollywood. He centered it around

the 1967 Best Picture lineup, which is a smart thing to do because it sort of allows you to sort of see the ways in which those different versions of Hollywood are budding up against each other very much like in competition. And you'll end up seeing that a lot throughout. We'll talk about a lot not only the movies that we've selected, but also the awesome from that particular year. And you'll see a lot of that of these lineups, which are an amalgam of a little bit of the old style, a lot of the new style. And you'll see as the years go by that new style, the new Hollywood kind of becomes more and more prevalent. You'll also see it when we talk about stories from the Oscar ceremonies, which a lot of these are available to

watch on YouTube. And you'll see just these actual conflicts between the old guard, your Bob Hopes and Frank Sinatra's and John Waynes and whatnot, and the ways in which these sort of like the newer generations, some of whom sort of bristled against the idea of the competition aspects of the Oscars being very embarrassing or antithetical to art. You'll get not only Dustin Hoffman and George C. Scott, but, you know, Glenda Jackson will throw a quote in there, or Joanne Woodward will throw a quote in there and talking about, you know, the flesh parade and the, you know, not wanting to be so desperate to win a trinket, you know what I mean? And so it's an interesting decade to go across for our purposes.

And it's, it really, really did energize us in a way where, like, I almost feel like I've signed up for like a four-week course, a five-week course at a college where I'm just like, just going to, like, just learn so much doing this miniseries. So, Joe, let's get into the full format of what we're doing, if

listeners are not already fully aware. We're doing the entire decade. We're doing the entire decade of the 1970s. One film per year, that makes 10 episodes. Normally, in a given month with five Mondays, we don't only get five

episodes, but we are giving you 10. Now, 10 with an asterisk, which is you'll get all 10 if you are a, a Patreon member, signed up for this at Oscar Buzz, Turbulent Brilliance. We are doing eight main feed episodes and then two on the Patreon to round us out with a full 10. There's some really good ones. We're, you know, we're not trying to pull a fast one here. We're crowding the main thing. We're crowding the main thing. schedule as it is. So we're using the Patreon. We were giving ourselves a break as an outlet fact too. Let's spread it over into the Patreon. But I think also spreading it over into the Patreon allows us to even further kind of break the mold in what we normally do in a really fun way. We'll get to those when we're going to go through chronologically and we're going to tell you what movies we're talking about. And also, we also committed ourselves to doing guests for every single main feed episode for the month of May.

So we're also very excited. That's also part of the reason why the scheduling has been a bit off. You try trying to schedule eight people for an episode within the span of a month while also holding down your own full-time jobs and family commitments and whatnot. It's been, and like planned vacations and stuff like that. So, yeah, it's a lot. It's a lot going on. All right.

It's been a lot. If in June, we sound absolutely run ragged, trust and believe, we do this all for you. And we'd have it no other way. Okay, so, Chris, do you want to start off, or should I start off, with the film of 1970? Kick us off with 1970. What is the film? Why is the film?

And who's joining us to talk about it? Yeah. So, like I said, in a lot of these, we chose based off of the, prestige and reputation of the talent involved. We also kind of scoured ancillary lists, whether it be the Cannes Film Festival, the Golden Globes, the critics, circles, and whatnot. And I managed to find in 1970 a Golden Globe nomination for one Miss Angela Lansbury for a film I had never heard of, which was the directorial debut of no less a theater luminary than Harold Prince. It's called something for everyone. The vibe is very saltburn.

Bavaria, which I'm into, it was somewhat difficult to track down. It is not super available, although hit up your local eBay and see, and maybe you can catch a copy. Is it also on YouTube? No, the clips, there are clips on YouTube, and the clips on YouTube are a very poor quality. Like, it's very, it's tough to make out what faces are happening there. But anyway, Angela Lansbury, Michael York, bisexuality in the French and Austrian Alps, it's a time. And so to talk about this movie, we brought, we're bringing in first-time guest, my wonderful friend Chris Schlecker, who you may know from, he's a writer, was a writer on the Mindy Project, who's also on camera on the Mindy Project, I believe, Nurse Chris, never have I

ever, and Saved by the Bell, the remake, and my beloved champions that was so short-lived on NBC. All of the shows Chris has worked on, I love. Really, that's one we've got in the can. That was a very, very fun conversation. I'm very, very excited for people to listen to that one.

When we settled on that movie, I was like, I don't know how this first episode's going to go, but it's a pretty good thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Chris, for 1971, we decided to go the Chris Files Special, and one that's very close to your heart. Very close to my heart. You can wait for the episode to find out about that.

It will also be an interesting conversation because this is a director who would be a major factor kind of half in, half out throughout the decade. I'm talking about the one and only Hal Ashby. We will be talking about 1971's Harold and Mod. Yes. The movie I adore. Joe, I can't wait to talk to you about it.

And I can't wait to talk to our guests. about it. Film critic Katie Walsh is joining us for the first time. Very excited to welcome Katie. I have of course read her stuff, but also she's been recently also indoctrinated into the screen drafts family, and I've very much enjoyed Katie on that. So that'll be really a lot of them. I feel like we're a cult. We're all wearing the same nighties, drinking the same Kool-Aid, all of us in the pool of screen drafts. Right. Yes, exactly, exactly. One of the first movies we kind of locked down for this series.

I believe maybe the first one was just like, well, because we had already... Kind of already planning to do this one. We were already in talks with the wonderful Jordan Hoffman, who will also be a first-time guest on this episode, to do a Barbara movie, and one of the ones that we had discussed was Up the Sandbox. 1972 is Up the Sandbox. So we were like, why don't we just slot that into our 70s series, and we'll have Jordan on, and we have not done this episode yet.

I am so excited to talk to. Every once in a while, ever since we did our episode on Nuts, Barbara's movie from 1987, I'll get the stray DM or text from Jordan about Barbara, about Barbara's performance and nuts. So I, the desperation I had to include Jordan in this episode talking about Barbara, he was also want Blank check for their Barbara Streisand, God, it's going to kill me, episode, or their miniseries, rather. And so I'm dedicated to turning Jordan into one of this country's foremost authorities on Barbara. And so that like whenever there's like a documentary made about her, that Jordan will be a talking head that they, that they ask. Absolutely essential that that happened. Yes, yes, yes. All right. What's our 73 episode? We've already recorded this one, too. You brought up blank check. David Sims is coming back to this had Oscar buzz. We are going to be talking about Nicholas Ruggs. Don't Look Now.

Classic. Classic horror cinema. Yeah. December release, also in the year of a major horror movie opening in December and doing well at the Oscars. This thing crashed the Bafas. This had so many. many BAFTA nominations, and the Oscars were like, nope, sorry, we heard you had sex for real. We will not be including you at all. We'll be talking about that sex scene. We'll be talking about the movie, obviously, that Oscar year. Donald Sutherland, Julie Christie, lots to talk about in that film. Donald Sutherland, he never nominated, but given an honorary Oscar, Donald Sutherland. Exactly, exactly. For 1974, I feel like we had a lot

to choose from, from what I recall, that there was several movies that we could have gone with. One that intrigued me was, oh, we could talk about a Billy Wilder movie, who's, you know, I don't really associate Billy Wilder with the 70s as much. His sort of heyday was before that, but to be able to do a Billy Wilder Jack Lemmon Walter Mathau movie for 1974, we are talking about the front page, the adaptation of the stage play that was also adapted many decades before into His Girl Friday. We are welcoming back our beloved Roxanna Hadati to talk about the front page with us, and also the Oscar year that was 1974, which was just packed with intrigue, just a lot going on at the 74 Oscars. And we talked about a lot of it. And it was a real good time. So

very excited to hear you talk about that. Now, Chris, 1975 is when we will make our first Patreon excursion. Sorry, this wouldn't be an excursion. We're setting aside the exception excursion. We're doing an exception. Listen, we can't break our brains too much. We're not breaking the Patreon format necessarily. Right.

But for the full scope, the full experience of the this had Oscar Buzz 70s spectacular. you're going to have to sign up for the Patreon. We understand. We support you if you do not wish. But I think all of our listeners want to hear us talk about the Who's Tommy. Yes. And Ken Russell, Anne Margaret, and Margaret's incredible nomination for this movie. Tina Turner, Elton John, Platform Boots, Roger Daltrey, Pinball, all of it.

Oliver Reed. Right. right yes is this our only time to talk about well i guess we don't have oliver reed or alan bates we kind of talk about them in one of in one of the episodes we get into talking about women in love so we definitely talk about oliver reed yeah a little right right yeah yeah yes but we're doing an exception episode on tommy for nineteen seventy the whom's thomas um worth signing up for the patreon just for for that episode. All right,

1976 is a one close to my heart, and now that I know that Chris is on board in the cult of this movie, we are... This is going to be the wildest episode. We are dedicated to spreading the gospel of 1976's The Ritz. Terence McNally's play-turned film

starring Rita Moreno. Rida Moreno Vehicle. Oh, my God. F. Marie Abraham in a titty-tinty towel. Rita Moreno, pushing the boundaries of good taste, but all for our benefit. And we are welcoming another multi-time guest, one of our faves, Christina Tucker, will be on to talk about the Ritz. It's a movie I hounded Chris to see for the better part of a year, and he did, and now we can all just like...

And I lost as I knew you would. It's such a fun movie. and this was a Golden Globe nominee. This had Tony Award prestige to it, so we're not stretching it too much. If you don't know what the Ritz is about, the Ritz is a sex far set in a gay bathhouse in New York City in the 70s. If that is not enough to make you sprint to go find wherever this is streaming, I believe it's on VOD. I got to tell you, when I went to go just like do my rental for this movie, movie so that we could record the episode. I was like, I'm just going to buy it.

I'm just, I'm going to, I'm not going to do the $3.99 rental. I'm going to do the $9.99. You're going to buy it. You want it. It's a good purchase. You'll get a lot out of it. All right. Chris, the year 1977, the filmmakers are also going to be very excited. The filmmaker is one you may have heard of.

The guest is one you may have listened to on this podcast before. We are. Listen, sometimes Thanksgiving comes twice a year. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Yes. Katie Rich is coming, and guess what we're talking about? We're talking about none other than Mr. Scorches, Nueva Jork, Nueva Jork.

If you did not get enough of us on screen drafts talking about Martin Scorsese, we decided that we were so bummed that New York, New York had already been drafted by the time. It was our turn to opine on the films of Martin Scorsese that we were like, well, we can't, we all watched it in preparation. We all had a ton of opinions that were just sort of roiling inside us. So yeah, we're going to talk about New York, New York. We're going to talk about Liza. We're going to talk about Robert De Niro as the worst boyfriend, perhaps, in cinema history. It's all happening. 1970s Marty, as Chris said, Thanksgiving does come twice a year. We're very, very

happy to have Thanksgiving in May with Katie Ritt for 1970s. That Joe, for 1978, also on the Patreon. Yes. We're giving a first attempt to something we haven't done before as the excursion on the Patreon. We're doing a live

commentary. Not a live, I guess a commentary. It's live for us. It'll air... It's live for us recording it. It can be live for you, listening to it, watching the movie. We're going to do a commentary on the seminal 1970s fashion thriller. I fully strong-armed us into things. Deep normal movie, Eyes of Laura Mars.

Extreme normal. You've never seen more normal. You've never seen a more normal movie than Eyes of Laura Mars, featuring none other than the aforementioned Barbara Streisand on love-themed duty. She's not in the movie, but she's singing the love theme over the end credits. Does a movie about a serial killer whose killings are viewed through the main character's eyes when she gets a vision of the killings? Does that kind of movie deserve a love theme? Who's to say? We'll talk about it. I'm very excited.

Do you want to watch an even more gay, that's so Raven? Oh, my God. Do you want to see suspicion fall on Renee Abrejonois just because he's her gay friend? Do you want to see that? Tremendous, very excited to talk about Eyes of Loram Mars. Do you want to see less homophobic Brian De Palma movies? Honestly, true. All right. To close out our 1970s spectacular from 1979, Chris...

Talk about it. We will be talking about... I couldn't be more excited. We can't do a miniseries without a musical. Yeah. Though I guess we have two musicals in this mini-series. If you count New York, New York. And I do.

We are doing the, for 1979, the behind-the-curve adaptation by Milosh Foreman of the musical hair. We're back in the Milosh business. It's not a bad movie. It's a good movie. and we are taking a one-way trip to the age of Aquarius with him. And we have none other than Natalie Walker joining us. First-time guest, Natalie Walker, so excited. So excited.

We locked this episode down, and Natalie immediately sends me a picture of her at the stage door with Will Swenson from the Broadway revival. Trust and Believe, we will be talking about that revival. This is what we are bringing you. Yes. Oh, my God. Tremendous. Joe, I think it's going to be a wild mini-series. I hope listeners are excited about this. I hope everybody has fun. We should say these will be coming at you at an irregular schedule.

In order to spread these out over the month of May, we are spreading them out as we see fit. So as follows. Check our Instagram and Twitter. You will be able to find the calendar there. of when the episodes are coming. But in general, I'll just lay them out to you. Publish dates for these films on the main feed. Something for everyone will drop on May 1st.

Harold and Maude on May 6th. Up the Sandbox on May 9th. Don't Look Now, May 13th. The front page, May 16th. The Ritz, May 20th. New York, New York, May 23rd. And then Hair on May 27th. Chris, remind me of the Patreon dates.

Those are coming on the Saturdays after their respective episodes. So that will be May 18th and May 25th. You're going to have to wait. Patreon subscribers are going to have to wait a little bit longer than... We got a fun little bonus coming for you, so you don't have to wait. Exactly. But those episodes will be coming in there. Go check out the Patreon to find out what that is.

Indeed. But you guys. I'm so excited. I know Chris is so excited. I know our guests are really excited. I think we planned these movies well, too, because even if, you know, we're maybe not talking about Robert De Niro when people would normally be talking about Robert De Niro in the 70s. Or we're not talking about how Ashby when it would normally be talked about. You know, we're getting a lot of people that you talk about when you talk about this era into the conversation. We enjoy talking about, you know, the. movies from people who, you know, that aren't always the ones that you think about right away. So I think we're doing a really interesting Streisand. I think we're doing a really

interesting Scorsese. I think we're doing, like you said, Milosh Foreman and Billy Wilder and you know, Hal Ashby. Yeah. And it's, it's going to be a time. It's already a time. Already the ones that we've recorded. We can already promise you a time. I'm watching so many 70s movies. I got 70s movies coming out my ears. It's, um, and ones that, like, normally I would, like, I don't know if I would have, you know, sat down and watched, uh, I don't know, the French connection. Women in Love? Well, no, Women in Love was at the top of my, I don't think I would have watched a touch of class. And now I, listeners, you don't have to watch a touch of class, a touch of class.

Let us talk about a touch of ass. Uh, that movie's up. No, a touch of ass makes it sound fun. Uh, a touch of ass. Yeah, that makes it sound way more fun than the movie is. I hope listeners do as you do, because I know that we have listeners who want to watch all of the movies before they listen to the episodes, but I hope listeners also, you know, expand your horizons into some things on your 70s watch list that you just never got around to. My watch list is just the longest possible, and just the most accusatory thing in my life is the list of movies. that I keep meaning to watch and have not watched.

And so many of those movies are these classic 70s things. And finally, finally, I've been able to, you know, watch them. And so many of them are so good. I finally saw Five Easy Pieces. I'm going to be talking about that movie forever. It's so good. All the actresses in that movie. I'm saying, I'm saying.

Joe, before we forget, one thing that we have tasked all of our guests with this month, We are asking them the question because the 70s are so heralded as a great Oscar decade. We're asking them what their favorite Oscar win of the decade is. Yes. And I think this is the opportunity for us to give out art. All right. I'm going to do mine first because then I'm going to guess yours, because I'm pretty sure I know what yours is. I think you know it.

And so would have been near the top of my own list as well. So I'm going to pick something else. And the other thing that I'm going to pick is maybe not as exciting, but the Deer Hunter, best picture in 1978, is a movie that might keep some people away because it is 18 billion hours long and about a bunch of friends going to Vietnam and having their lives, you know, changed for the worst because of it. But I will tell you, Michael Chaminos, the Deer Hunter, delivers. I saw this movie for the first time, only a few years ago, and it's so impressive. It's so... I remember the night you watched that movie, and I got, you know, Russian novel texts. Eight billion texts about how good it is.

It's so fucking good. De Niro's so good. Walkin, who wins the supporting actor, Oscar. Merrill's in this movie. This is very early Merrill. But it's also just, like, it's amazing how captivated I was, by this movie that just sort of like keeps, you know, it keeps on going. It's somewhat episodic, but it's the mood of sort of sad resignation for just sort of the

path that these friends are all going to have to trot. It's a tremendous companion piece, I will say, to defy bloods. Like, I would put both of those movies together in a rep screening at some point. But anyway, uh, picture in terms. director and supporting actor and won a bunch of Oscars that year and well deserved. Chris, talk to us about Liza Manelli and Cabaret. Oh,

do you think that's my choice? Yes, is that not? It's not my choice. It's not my choice. If I was going to choose the best actress win for the decade, it would be either Glenda Jackson and Women in Love or Ellen Burstyn and Alice doesn't live here anymore, probably. Oh, so not even clout? Actually, or Jane Fonda and Clute. I mean, Oh, I thought for sure you were going to do Lison Cabaret.

No, no. I mean, is this where people yell at me because I don't... I have some reservations about that cabaret adaptation while still thinking that it is yes, a masterpiece. I must be thinking about somebody else who's... The second love story that is not in the stage show, it's just not anything worthwhile. But, like, Liza is incredible. No, mine is... If I tell you this, maybe this will get you to guess it correctly. I'm glad I didn't guess yours, because I never would have actually guessed your pick. It's below the line.

Oh, okay. Oh, God. Well. It's below the line, and I've included it in our mini-series art for the show. Oh, my God. Wait, okay. Is it a song? It's a best original song.

Is it the theme from Shaft? No, but that's also pretty fucking rad. No, it's Donna Summers. Oh, Last Dance, D. So we both picked from the same year. That's so funny. Yeah. We would have both been very happy this Oscar year, I guess.

Yes, yes, very true. Actually, no, because my favorite best actress nominee is from this year. Oh, wait, let me guess. So the nominees, Jane Fonda for Coming Home, you, oh, Jill Claiburg, an unmarried woman. Yeah, you love an unmarried woman. We know that movie Rips. I mean, I would have been also wanting that

to be the best picture winner. Yeah. I haven't seen it. Maybe I'll see it before we do our 19278 episode. Yeah. All right. Chris, I'm so excited. Listeners, Gary's,

all of you out there, we hope you are excited for this. It's going to be a banger. We are going to drop dead of exhaustion by the end of May, but we will do it all for you. So I just saw the first omen, so it's all for you, Damien, and it's us jumping off of a building to deliver our main miniseries episodes. Maybe my favorite Oscar nomination of this decade is Obis satanis. A Satan worshipping song that nominated for an Oscar. Great.

The 1970s were on one as great. What a time. All right. See you in only a couple of days, Gary's. We will be back with our episode on Something for Everyone on May 1st, and we're going to get rocking and rolling.