U Talkin’ U2 To Me? - U Talkin' Talking Heads 2 My Talking Head? - True Stories the Movie (w/ Stephen Tobolowsky)

Episode Date: December 2, 2020

Actor Stephen Tobolowsky (The Tobowlosky Files, Groundhog Day) joins Scott and Scott to discuss the 1986 musical satirical comedy film True Stories directed by David Byrne and co-written by Stephen himself. They also talk about Stephen being cut out of Freddy Got Fingered, the existence of alternate footage of his Ned Ryerson scene from Groundhog Day with every kind of weather imaginable, and when he first heard of Talking Heads.

from it is imbra this is you talking talking heads to my talking heads? Head? Heads? Head? The comprehensive and encyclopedic compendium of all things talking heads. This is good. Rock and roll up. Music. Music.

Good. Rock and roll. Music. Good. Rock and roll. Music. Rock and roll. Good. Rock and roll. Music. Welcome back to the show. I have an exciting show for you today. Before get to that i want to introduce myself my name is scott ackerman i am the main creative force behind you talking talking heads to my talking head the also the spiritual heart of the podcast chopped liver over here meanwhile over here we have chopped liver uh he is that i just said that like is it like using the expression never mind keep going god this is why you'll never be the main creative forces i'm sorry behind you talking talking heads to my talking head because you just get in the way you're like a speed bump keep going it's like i'm driving down podcast street at 65 85 105 miles an hour and suddenly mr speed bump comes along and forces me to to dip you know down to to 15 MPH. You know what, Scott? And I've wanted to say this now for five, six years.

And now that we're face-to-face, I finally can. And I've finally drummed up the courage to say this to you face-to-face. Hi. Hi. So good to see you you too uh this is adam scott is here hello adam hi hi i'm so glad that you stopped being a coward and were able to say that to my face finally it felt really feels really good feels really good to say hello to a friend it always does always there are times when you see a friend and you'll be like all right cut the shit and you'll just get down to brass stacks right away and there will be no pleasantries at all and that's usually you know when you see friends that's usually how it goes is like all right cut the shit yeah that's the first thing there's a i think it's zogby someone did a poll just like

what is the very first thing you say to your friends and it was overwhelming it was like 78 to 99 something like that somewhere in that range everyone in the united states at least first thing they say all right cut the shit and then they yeah continue their relationship that's right and that's just the united states i mean that i don't know what they do up there uh in knucksville canada that you know i mean they're far too polite i don't know what bob and doug mckenzie are yeah wearing their toques but uh by the way when you were a kid, and when I say kid, I mean anywhere from two years old to 32 years old. Sure, that's a great range. Did you watch Strange Brew over and over and over again?

Weirdly, I didn't when it came out. Wait a minute. Is this an episode of I Love Films? I think it is. Hey everybody, welcome to I Love Films. This is Scott. And this is Scott. And we're talking about films today.

We're talking about- What else could we be talking about? That is what we talk about. That is true. We're talking about, um um i got three little words for you that are going to excite the film lover in all of us say ne ma love it love it and when i'm talking ma i'm talking of course mom pa kettle uh no no no i'm'm talking about the recent film, Ma. The recent horror film. Oh, yeah, yeah. Ma. Ma.

Ma. Ma. Ma. Ma. Ma. Watch out where you're going. Ma's coming. Strangely, Ma was not as good of a horror villain as Freddy Krueger or Jason.

Hey, Ma. Yeah. Come on in here. It doesn't have the ring to it. Hey, Ma. But of course we're talking about films. I mean, the whole breadth of films from, you know, from that train coming right at the screen to...

Which freaked the fucking shit out of people. Yeah, it freaked the fucking shit out of people. Yeah, it freaked the fucking shit out of me. Me too. Are you kidding me? I was there for the first, very first screening of it. Really? It was like an industry screening?

It was an industry screening on the Paramount lot. Got an invite through SAG. SAG Awards Committee. Yeah. This is very inside baseball talk, that is you know we're not talking about baseball that's a different podcast oh yeah go wait a second is this an episode of i love baseball it might be

hey everyone welcome to i love Baseball. This is Scott. And this is Scott. And of course, this is the podcast. It's a subsidiary of Barstool Sports. What's up guys? What's up fuckers? Fuck you. Where we talk about baseball, the crack of the bat. Nothing else than cracking beers and high-fiving. That's right.

Oh, fuck. That's and high-fiving. That's right. Oh, fuck. That's us high-fiving. That's us cracking beers. Hey, how is baseball played? Take a ball, take a bat, and you just start fucking around. Yeah, it'll work itself out. You know what I mean? It's like having sex.

Take your ball, take your bat. Take your bat. You'll figure it around. Yeah, it'll work itself out. You know what I mean? It's like having sex. Take your ball, take your bat, you'll figure it out. Yeah. If you have any sense at all, you will figure out how to do it. That's the birds and the bees talk that we all do. Birds do it.

Bees do it. Even chipmunks in the trees do it. You know what I mean? Don't they? Don't they? Hey, I like baseball, but the World Series, huh?

Ugh. I'm running out of things to talk about when it comes to baseball, especially when we're not playing baseball right now. No, it's not appropriate right now because of the... But, you know, the World Series this year was exciting. Was it? Yeah, it had a lot of ups and downs. The Los Angeles Dodgers. Oh! was exciting was it yeah it had a lot of ups and downs uh the los angeles dodgers oh home team they they played in the uh world series they played in the world series that's

crazy why didn't i watch that i'm the host of this podcast i love baseball oh did you miss it this year i miss i think i was watching um i think I was watching The Circle on Netflix instead. Yeah, I was watching Emily in Paris, so I missed it. Emily in Paris? That's right. That's how it's pronounced, by the way, so it rhymes. Emily in Paris? Oh.

Emily in Paris? Okay. I'm writing that down. Yeah, write it down, please. Anyway, baseball... I don't know. There's not a lot to talk about. No, no.

Neither of us are particularly interested. We don't follow baseball, nor are we interested in it. So why are we doing this? I don't know, but this podcast is so popular. Yeah, we hate to give it up. I know that we have no interest in it, but... It's beyond me that it's... What is it?

In the top two or three on iTunes? Yeah, top two or three. That's a great... They have this category on iTunes, top two or three. And sometimes it'll be two, sometimes it's three. And you just never know and you would think that chart would be super long but it's only like two or three it's two or three things every every time you look at it all right we'll see you next time bye But I'm stuck here too.

Good job. Oh, boy. But speaking of baseball, great baseball films, The Natural. Oh, God. A league of their own. A league of their own? A league of their own? A league of their own. That's, their own? A league of their own. That's, by the way, the way I said it is the way I guess.

I've never seen it, but John Lovitz, I would imagine, plays a manager or the owner of the team or something, I would think. Just from context clues, from me seeing clips or whatever. Am I right or am I wrong? Tom Hanks. No, no, no. Like, John Lovitz, isn't he in it? I don't remember. Okay, okay well I think he's in it

and I think he must just from the types of characters John Lovitz plays he probably is either as a cigar he's a reporter yeah he's a reporter who's reporting on wait what are all these women doing playing baseball or he's the owner of the team who's going like you can't hire women or whatever but that's I was saying it team who's going like, you can't hire women or whatever. But I was saying it in his character of like, a league of their own? Ah, yes. I'm going to look up, by the way, is John Lovitz,

what do you want me to say to Google? Is John Lovitz in a league of their own? Sure, that'll do the trick, I think. I always, I love that scene in three amigos with john lovitz phil hart just comes back google just comes back yes take the amigos clothes yes or that's phil hartman that says that take the amigos clothes oh and joe montagna that's such a good film. He is in A League of Their Own and wait. No, he's not. Oh no, he is.

He plays Ernie Capodino, AAG PBL scout. Great film, great actor. This is what we talk about on I Love Films. You know what? I don't think that film has gotten its due, but as far as I'm concerned, there's one line in that movie that deserves to be one of the all-time classics.

Enshrined in the film hall of fame, in the film dialogue hall of fame, which by the way, I believe is in Cooperstown, right next to the baseball hall of fame. That's right. Isn't it? They're next door neighbors, aren't they? Yeah.

And the film dialogue, the Cooperstown baseball hall of fame is's right isn't it they're next door neighbors aren't they yeah and the film dialogue uh uh the cooperstown baseball hall of fame is always like hey stop being so loud because it's always like i'm walking here and yeah they're noisy and uh we need a bigger boat we hey look at the super big guy he's eating our boat where's the the bathroom from Sex, Lies, and Videotape? And Sex and the City. And Sex and the City. The one line of dialogue that Sex, Lies, and Videotape and Sex and the City share is where's the bathroom. An iconic, famous line from both pieces of entertainment.

It's interesting because once you notice it like i i can't tell you how many times i saw all the star wars films and i never really noticed the fact that they say i got a bad feeling about this in every film yeah but once you notice it it's hard not to notice it um and the same thing with sex in the city like every episode you watch now it's like someone goes i've got to go to the bathroom it's like yeah oh they said it again and you can tell in sexualizing videotape at least since it was a theatrical release you can tell right after the line is said they edited in a bit of a pause because they knew there would be a reaction yeah there'd definitely be applause break people assuming it's intermission uh and going to refill their popcorn so they took

like a 10 minute pause 10 minute pause and the actors just sit there in the scene listening to someone going to the bathroom no well they sit there before james spader actually goes to find the bathroom they just stand there which by the way sex in the city too they're having more sex in a different city um they don't the middle too they're having more sex in a different city um they don't the middle east they don't say it which is why it flopped yeah they needed to at least on the flight over there someone needed to say where's the shitter which would then lead into the iconic line of dialogue i have to go to the bathroom that was one of my favorite scenes from

sex in the city too is when they're on the flight sex in the city as well six sex in the city also they're going to the middle east on a flight in first class sitting at a bar on the 747 The 747 raising their glasses to their nannies. To their nannies? It was the most relatable scene. I mean, honestly, I've done almost all of that. Other than the nannies part, I think I've done all of it. I tell you, it feels like it should be illegal when you're on a plane with a bar. But they let you do it.

You don't want the pilot to be you. You don't want to see the pilot sitting next to you. Suddenly you're watching the movie Flight here, if you know what I mean. Yeah. Jodie Foster? Yeah, of course. Flight. Oh, Flight Plan.

Flight Plan. Yeah, you didn't let me finish. I was taking a long pause. Oh, I'm sorry. I interrupted you. Plan. Okay, there we plan. Yeah, you didn't let me finish. I was taking a long pause. I interrupted you. Plan. Okay, there we go. Yeah.

We're talking about great films this episode. Let me hype what we're talking about on this episode. We're talking about one film in particular. We're talking about 1986's True Stories. Oh, yeah. True Stories. Classic. Directed by Mr. Burns himself. we're talking about 1986 is true stories oh yeah true stories directed by mr burns himself and uh coming up a little later we will have uh we'll be talking to one of the co-writers of the film a great actor uh stephen toboloski will be joining us so and now this is exciting now this is exciting. Now this is podcasting. Now this is podcasting.

Like everything we've been doing, it's been on the periphery. The whole 13, 14 years of the medium, throw it away. This is the first day. That's right. This is podcasting. You know, Old Testament, New Testament, you can delineate like which part of the Bible it is by Jesus shows up. This is the Jesus of podcasting. This right.

Not even when Stephen Toblowski comes on this right now. This is Jesus. This is Jesus. Well, Jesus and podcasting are the same thing. We hope that we don't get crucified for this, if you know what I mean. That's a little play on words. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Jesus got crucified.

I don't know if you remember that. I think I understand. It's a... Hold on, I just... Are you looking it up? I'm looking it up. Siri, did Jesus get crucified? Siri, what does Scott mean by crucified? um i think no i don't get it i don't i don't understand but

it's uh the greatest story ever told but it has a real sad ending doesn't it i mean dude up there two two common thieves next to him to the right and to the left of him yeah bugging him they don't get it how important this is yeah it's like come on guys like what did you steal a hyundai i'm jesus here i ain't done nothing wrong hotwire a ford mustang come on never would have been able to because it was so long ago yeah they didn't know how no one knew how to hotwire mustangs for thousands of years yeah they were people were just driving them all over the place but only people who had keys only people who had keys there were some people who tried to hot wire the the horse the mustangs they would like fiddle around down there and be like here i what if what

if i took this thing and they would just course great film passion of the christ passion of the christ oh yeah did that happen in passion of the christ i think it did i think that's and then they ripped it off in uh kingpin i believe that's right that's where that came from yep um but we're talking about great films we're talking about films like uh raking bull and uh raking bull raking raking bull um where i don't know if you remember but uh uh roberto de niro gained approximately uh 40 pounds in order to look more like me right now. I think.

Was he playing you? In quarantine? Yeah, I think he was. I don't know. I was confused the entire time that I watched it, but I assumed he was playing me because suddenly he ballooned up after he stopped working.

Very relatable to me yeah there wasn't a quarantine involved but it's a really cool story i um of a guy who balloons up yeah after after his job ends and also that story has a it's about not only ballooning up but it is about balloons they have a lot there's a lot, there's a lot of balloons. There's a lot of balloons, yeah. It is in black and white, but much like Schindler's List, there are pink and orange and yellow balloons, sometimes baby blue, too. Floating throughout scenes. Just floating throughout scenes.

I do, when I first got a DVD, when DVDs first came around, I got a DVD of Raging Bull. And of course, it was like, you know, the crown jewel of my collection. Like, oh man, this is going to be awesome. And then I put it in. I was watching it alone at one point. And I'd only seen it once or twice before then. This is the 90s.

And suddenly, like, there were little glimpses of color in it like thing like certain things in the background would be yellow a lot and i'd be like oh wow i'd never noticed it before but but raking bull did what spielberg did in schindler's list where there are pops of color everywhere yeah and i kept watching it and going like this is so crazy because it's like every scene this is happening and then i realized my dvd player was broken and it just was like something weird in it was making the image yellow like like it had oh are you are you serious yes yes oh and so i watched the entire thing like going like this is a really interesting cinematography style that i'd never noticed in the times i've watched ragging bull in the theater

watch it on vhs like 40 times and never noticed this but on dvd it's so crystal clear i remember right when i got my first dvd player naomi gave me a dvd player for Christmas, the first year we were going out, I guess. Wow. So she knew you loved films. Oh, listen, it's the first thing she knew because it's the first, after I say cut the bullshit, I say I love films. Well, first you said, I have a new number two.

You went in the bathroom. Came back. Came back and said, cut the shit. Cut the shit. Cut the shit. I love films would you like to spend the rest of your life with me would you like to grab this bat and ball and figure it out yeah uh getting the that dvd player

and like goodfellas was one of the first ones i bought and like having yeah friends over and being like look at this picture yeah and everyone kind of pretending to be impressed but it couldn't have been that impressed because now looking at dvds they look like shit well yeah i mean now compare them to like 4k blu-rays and stuff yeah um but uh but it was considerably better than vh's. Yeah, you're right. I remember the one for L.A. Confidential. One thing about DVDs is occasionally they had to be dual-sided because you couldn't fit enough information on the top end. Or a double disc.

Yeah, so instead of doing double discs, L.A. Confidential was so long that it had to stop relaying the information from the top and then go to the bottom yeah you flip it you well sometimes you had to flip it but la confidential it would just like um oh i think i think the la confidential one was they they put one a bunch of information in one way and then they like clockwise and then they did a bunch of information in one way and then they like clockwise and then they did a bunch of information counterclockwise but there was a tiny almost imperceptible pause in the movie when kevin spacey disgraced former actor kevin spacey um got shot spoilers obviously you're listening to isla

films you've watched every film so you know exactly what happens but he gets shot and dies at the kitchen table and right as he's dying there was just like a little pause while it then switched and started to reverse and i was like looking at it going what the fuck because i'd never this has never happened on a dvd player before i was just like did he freeze is that like is that his acting and And I went back and watched it several times going like, he's like frozen for a second. And then I figured out it was the DVD player. A lot of stuff happening with DVD players where I can't figure it out.

A lot of action with the early DVD experience. You know, I remember those early DVD days just spending so much money on these fucking things and like the more deluxe i mean naomi naomi spent the money oh you're not talking about the players no the the dvds themselves well every time you buy a dvd you would buy a player for it as well yeah well i yeah with my collection of dv, I had hundreds of players. Because every DVD deserves its own player. That was one piece of information back in those early days that people just didn't quite sink in, was that you only needed one player. But we eventually figured it out.

Sure, yeah. Hundreds of DVD players later. And then you have to buy, of course, a DVD player storage. All of the wires necessary for hundreds of players in your apartment. But yeah. But you had quite the collection. Yeah. And now it's all just either in storage or at Amoeba.

Well, I think I told you maybe on this very show that I walked into my condo one day and thousands, not maybe not that, no hundreds, hundreds of DVDs were suddenly just gone. Someone had walked in and taken them all. Right.

And we think it was my neighbor. But because when Kulop went up to tell her and to warn her, hey, someone ripped us off. She was like, they're not in here. Do you want to check my place? Oh yeah. Yeah. That's not in here do you want to check my place oh yeah yeah that's

not exactly the reaction you're looking for um but uh yeah i uh but uh by the way the film we're talking about true stories did you uh uh you didn't watch a blu-ray of it did you did you watch it uh you you rented it is that right on uh itunes or what true stories the film oh yeah on iTunes or something? Of what? True Stories. The film we're talking about today. Oh, yeah, on iTunes. The Criterion Blu-ray is exceptional. Looks amazing. I don't know how your transfer was, but... Well, the iTunes one looks really good, but I was... Because I knew there was a Criterion.

I wish it was on the Criterion channel, but it is not. It's not. Ah, that's the thing. That's the thing. but we are talking about that criterion channel though yeah pretty outstanding i don't have it because i have so much i buy the actual blu-rays why do you buy blu-rays still because they're not available on the channel and we're this is the exact conversation we have on our sister show about buying music. So you can have it because things go away on channels.

Not really. Like you wanted to watch True Stories and it's not on the Criterion channel. And instead, I got the nice little package that has not only the movie in very sharp, beautiful Blu-ray, but it also has the soundtrack and it has the complete soundtrack for the first time ever released. That you can get on iTunes. Sure. But it also has this wonderful booklet that is in the style of a World Weekly News

that has a lot of essays from different people and it has all the bonus features that uh are not i'm sure not on the all the bonus features are on youtube and i can get a pdf of that newspaper in who for me seconds for me i'm not yeah will you make a pdf of that and send it to me all right let me get my scanner out hold on hold on i'm scanning it how many you want every page as a new page uh yeah look i gotta do this after the show okay um because we have a big show coming up any by the way what's uh any any uh feature film you've seen recently that you want to talk about with our listeners here of I Love Films? Ooh, yes.

I watched a film night before last that I found very interesting, very intriguing, and very good. Okay. I mean, this is everything that I Love Films likes to cover. Films that are interesting, films that are good, films that are, what'd you say, very good? Intriguing. Intriguing. I love, Scott, I love that word.

Mmm. It's spelled like it would be intriguing. Yeah, it's a strange, that's part of the, wait, is this an episode of I Love Words? It might be. What are words for? When no one listens anymore. Words for?

When no one listens, there's no use talking at all. Hey everyone, welcome to I Love Words. This is Scott. And this is Scott. And words. Words. You know what? Can I just point something out not only am I saying

words right now but your introduction to this podcast wouldn't be possible without words they were words their podcasting would probably not exist without words if they were just random grunting sounds no there's no there's no question I mean you know someone would listen to grunting and farting and shitting. We talk about everyone. We talk about the cavemen and how they invented the wheel. Oh, so boring, darling. The wheel isn't a wheel without the word wheel.

That's what I always say. When they invented the wheel, you know what they did? They pointed at it and said wheel. Words were the first inventions. There you go. That's what you're, that's the point. That's what I love about you, Scott, is that that's what you're that's the point that's what i love about you scott is that you're i love you trying to drive home the point i love you those are some words sorry that i've wanted to say for a while i love you and i appreciate that

and those words carry weight because they are words three little words that have a little more weight than other words like if you were to take three other random words like uh you know fish frame uh bozos fish frame bozos is this an episode of fish frame bozos Hey everyone, welcome to Fish Frame Bozos. I don't know what we talk about, but this is Scott. Oh, and this is Scott. And I don't know what we talk about on this show, I really don't. Oh, well, we talk about fish, we talk about frames, and I'll tell you, I'll never get tired of talking about bozos no so three

separate things we're not talking about fish frame bozos no no no are we the fish frame bozos huh that's or are our fans fish frame bozos see that's the eternal question i don't know anyway we'll see you next time. Thanks, bye. Bye. Anyway, words. We'll see you next time. Thanks, bye. Bye. What are words for? When no one listens anymore.

Words for? When no one listens. There's no use talking at all. Good eps. Two great eps. Two great eps. Yeah, not bad. Not bad. Well, what was the film that you saw, by the way? Oh, it's called The Nest, the Jude Law, Carrie Coon movie.

It's so good. The Nast? The Nast. Is that what you said, or The Nest? The Nast. It's about doing the nasty did you say nest the nest oh okay it's about this the um temperature cage in your home okay great i cannot wait i have a lot of trouble with that whenever it's offline so i i hope that this is very instruct are you sure you didn't just watch a youtube video a how-to video about how to turn on your nest

it may be it may be a youtube video except carrie coon and jude law are doing the instructional jude law the guy i stood next to at a vampire weekend show in new york yeah that one that exact guy interesting well um great to hear your wrecks uh and effects and uh we need to take a break here on i love film and when we come back we are going to be talking about the film and it is a film uh true stories 1986 mr burns co-wrote and singularly directed it and um very exciting to talk about this and we will have a wonderful guest we'll have steven toboloski will be here with us um we need to take a break when we come back we will have more from i love films yes i just have a quick question is this the first guest we've ever had on i love i love films hell to the yeah it is it is yeah this is

exciting okay great yeah we're gonna be uh talking with him when we come back so we'll be right back with more i love films after this. Come on back. Welcome back to I Love Films. This is I Love Films, isn't it? Not I Love Film? I think we have two different shows, Adam, don't we? I Love Films and I Love Film? That's right. This is I Love Films.

This is I Love Films. What is the difference between these two shows? Why do we do two different shows? Well, the guys that do the show I Love Film, they're specifically talking about physical film that you work with. Oh, like film processing and Kodak. Sure. I'm sure it comes up a lot.

Yeah. There's a real love for that stuff. And these guys like to express it. Nitrates. Nitrates. I mean, that's a different show. So we don't want to- Literally explosive.

Literally, yes. This is I Love Films, though the the podcast where we talk about the medium of film we talk about aspect ratios uh we talk about how many images per second and i believe it's something around 29.33 or something per second or maybe that's tv i as the host or co-host rather of i love films i should really figure this out. Maybe it's 24. Absolutely. That stuff doesn't really matter, Scott. I think in the realm of this particular podcast, we just like talking about films and what they mean to us. That's right. Sometimes, you know, you put all these multiple images into one second and that makes up one second of film but

that's right it's more films are more than that the films i don't know if you've ever thought about this adam but films are a bunch of images strung together in rapid succession that tell a story and that story trance just like uh uh transcends the medium of a bunch of different pictures like you could you could take a bunch of pictures randomly you know uh have them strewn around your apartment and that's not a film is it i'm so glad someone's finally saying this and and i'm so glad that you agree with me it is you but i'm backing you up. So it's also me. Well, it's kind of my idea. But yeah, go ahead. I'll give you part of it.

But I had thought it before you said it. These stories mean something to people. The communal experience of going to the cinema, watching a film. These are things. It's a valuable experience. This is what I'm saying. And not you. These are things that will never, never dissipate.

I mean, I kind of said it. You basically just rephrased everything I said in a more pretentious way. I love it. I don't think so necessarily. I think it's actually a little more reductive than what I was saying. I don't think so. I think what I'm saying is more important. Thank you.

You're right. I'm going to give you this one. All right. Thank you. Um, but anyway, we are talking about films and we're talking about films, uh,

filmmaking, filmmaking as well. Uh, we definitely cover that. And, we're talking about one film in particular on this episode and it's

1986 is the year that it was I consider films to be born it's a film's birthday I mean they are a lot like human beings in a sense of they have a life of their own. And sometimes you put it out there in the world and it grows up and it isn't exactly what you thought or hoped or dreamed it was going to be.

And, you know, sometimes your film only lasts three days, you know, and then it's gone forever much like human beings jesus which isn't probably what we want to talk about on this show i don't know that that's a subject that we need to get into but we are talking about uh a film whose birthday was uh october 10th 1986 true stories a film directed by david byrne I won't say a film by David Byrne because a film is a collaborative medium, certainly. Absolutely. And one of those collaborators, and I think he'd appreciate being called a collaborator. That's not something you probably want to call someone as well as you're a collaborator, but he did collaborate on this film. Uh, he is the co-writer of the film and he is a wonderful

actor in other films. So he definitely, uh, I mean, he's ripe to be a guest on this podcast. You know him as, uh, uh, I mean, maybe most famously to me as ned ryerson in groundhog day um but he has a wonderful filmography uh look do yourself a favor go to imdb.com and just look this guy's name up and spend the day there you know just like crazy don't watch any of the things that it lists just like click click on different films and go, oh, he was in that. He was just spend 24 hours straight there. Yeah. Just stay on that IMDb page.

That's what you're that's what you're suggesting. That's what. Well, click around on the links and like, oh, wow, he was in this. He was in Don't Look Under the Bed in 1999. Don't watch any of the movies. No, heavens no. But he is a first time guest. First time we've ever had a guest on this show. Please welcome've written to IMDb and said, well, maybe could you take these off of my IMDb? Because I have no idea what this movie is or what I did in this movie.

And they said, no, because we don't know you're really Stephen Tobolowsky. You know, you have to prove to us that you are. to us that you are. And so I've been unable until recently, I think, to get some of these credits taken off. But you could still spend some time there clicking on. Spend the day, of course, pack yourself a picnic lunch and do it outside to be safe during these COVID times. And just spend the day on the computer, just flipping around IMDb. So can I ask you, Stephen, if it's correct that you're in Freddy Got Fingered? I was in Freddy Got Fingered, but Tom cut me out of every frame of it. Oh, my goodness.

They didn't even put like one little frame of you in those 29 per second? I'm not sure. You know know i didn't watch it uh but but you know i i wanted to do the movie because my son uh robert loved tom more than anything tom had that show on tv and and my son was a nihilist much like tom and and so i was very eager to shoot and tom and i had a great time shooting in Canada one of the main reasons I wanted to do Freddy Got Fingered is that Julie Haggerty was in that film the great Julie Haggerty from Airplane and the recent Marriage Story yeah and I wanted to meet her and spend time with her and so unfortunately every time I went up to Canada to shoot Freddy Got Fingered, Julie was going back to Los Angeles to work on something else.

So I never got to meet her on the 10 weeks. 10 weeks? 10 weeks? You never got to meet Julie Haggerty? And not only that, but 10 weeks of footage of Stephen and Tom Green that will never be seen by the world. One of which is Tom Green and I dancing in a vat of Bavarian cream. This is a scene that- We got to get the Criterion collection of Freddy Got Fingered out there.

How in the world could you shoot for 10 weeks and all of it gets cut? That seems insane. Well, you know, as an actor, you know, the first option you go to is, I must have really sucked. Yeah. No, no, no, no, no. But then you think structurally, what they did is they basically cut out act one of the movie and they begin the movie kind of with act two and three. Yeah.

So maybe they felt like they had too much preamble. Got it. That happened to me on the Between Two Ferns movie. I had to cut an entire subplot out of the movie with actors that we had on the movie for weeks. And I wrote to them all because what you say, Stephen, is I want them to know that they were really, really good in the film. It just like for whatever reason, that subplot wasn't testing well. And I just don't think there's any. And Adam left weirdly enough sorry i'm back he's so bored by me talking about the one film i've directed sorry this is i know i know this story though but keep going yeah yeah but yeah i mean it's it's hard you have to you have to like tell everyone oh no you you were really really good it's just like, for some

reason, that subplot, the audience is not interested in and it's easily excisable. So it just gets cut. Yeah. You never know what's going to work, right? Well, you never know. And, and, you know, sometimes you get the bear and sometimes the bear gets you, which is a very important, uh, maxim to know in this business that sometimes the opposite happens and you come into a situation that you're supposed to like in terms of like californication uh so i came on i was supposed to do is this an episode of are you talking to rhcp remy wait no it's not it's not continue you know you go on you're supposed to do three shows and you end up on the show for four years. Oh, wow.

That's like the Urkel effect. The Urkel effect. Or the Fonzie as the people of an older generation call it. Sometimes it works out in your favor and sometimes you just get cut out of the film. But the happy epilogue to the Freddie Guff, I always have to try to end with a happy epilogue if you're going to continue in this life. That's great storytelling. in Mornings at Seven. She played my girlfriend and Julie Haggerty was my girlfriend on Broadway in a highly successful Broadway show, Mornings at Seven,

nominated for more Tony Awards than any other straight play in history. And I got to be with Julie for a year. So that was fabulous. It would be interesting if you never met her during that. Like she did her scenes on Broadway and then she took a plane, right?

Like immediately after getting on stage, and suddenly you walk on stage. Yeah, that would have hurt. That would have hurt. Oh, my gosh. Well, she is a delight, and she would be a wonderful guest on this show, talking about Lost in America and her filmography. But, of course, we have you, Stephen. And we talked before you came on the show about your last name, how it can be pronounced a bunch of different ways. So the fact that you said it a different way than me is okay.

I was just showing you up. Yes, thank you. Okay, you didn't do that just to make me look like an asshole. No, no, but you know, I'm used to saying it my way and you could say it your way, but just so the audience knows, any way you say it is fine. Is correct. Is correct. You have such an amazing filmography. I mentioned Groundhog Day. Before we get into the film that we're here to talk about, let's talk Groundhog Day just for a second.

Could we? Absolutely. Is it the one you're asked about the most, probably, would you say? Well, probably. Groundhog Day is such a fantastic – it's difficult in movies. I think it was Harold Ramis said the formula of a film is you have to be good in a good movie that people see. If any part of that equation is wrong, off, it's a disaster. If you're bad in a good movie that everybody sees, it's the end of your career.

And if you're good in a terrible movie that nobody sees, it's just a trivia question. Right. You know, and everybody loves Ned. Why was Harold Ramis saying this, by the way? Was this during a break or was he, does he call you at home and just leave that on your answering machine? Well, during our scenes, you know, I would sit next to him and he would, and I was a little panicked as we were shooting because I was feeling my performance was a little large that it could like play in the Roman Coliseum. And so I would sit next to, I'd sit next to, I said, is this okay? You know, you want me to tone it down? And he would explain to me all sorts of things about filmdom. And since you are lovers of, was it film or films?

We're lovers of films. The other guys are lovers of film. You're lovers of films. Here's something are lovers of films. Okay. You're lovers of films. Here's something very fascinating. He told me about Groundhog Day that I've kept with me for my entire life. And he said, Stephen, comedy lives in the two shot. He said, you always have to have the world and you have to have in that shot the force that's wacky in the world so you get the reaction to it that's why bill and i are always shot in two shots and as the movie continues only near the end of the film do we start to get bill and a lot of singles with andy mcdowell and i see this all the time with people shooting comedies now that a lot of times directors don't realize that it's highly effective if you shoot comedy scenes in a two shot.

And what's really particularly special about Groundhog Day is that Bill in the, is able to do both. So in the earlier scenes in Groundhog Day, Bill is the aberrant force of the world, and Andy McDowell is the world. And we get that in a two-shot. So we get Bill's arrogance and everything. He's the aberrant force. And in the movie, Bill is the antagonist. He's the jerk.

He's the guy we don't want to be until he meets me on the street. And then when he meets me on the street, I am such a jerk. I am the aberrant force. And in that scene, Bill Murray changes from being, you know, he becomes the protagonist because of that, and he becomes the world. So it flops because of your introduction into the world. And then we see the world through Bill's eyes, and now we have empathy for him whenever he steps in that puddle. So that was an interesting— Was that something that Harold Ramis was planning or is it an interesting, it was, wow. Smart guy. Smart guy. And I look at comedies now, when I shoot comedies

now, when I am shot in comedies now, I'm always thinking like, is the director going to be able to get a good two shot of this particular scene? Interesting. Well, you know, it's in comedy, especially the one that I made, not to bring it up again, Adam, are you going to leave again? No, of course not. But in modern comedies, there's so much improv and we were making a, oh God, he's gone again. I'm back. We were making an improv film that was shot like a documentary where we didn't know what was going to happen in any scene. It's kind of hard to shoot that

in just two shots. You can do it in basically two different ways. You can do it in like group scenes and then the person that they're reacting off of is in a single or you can do it when two people are talking you have to do it in two singles because otherwise you can't edit it together like improv different takes and stuff like that so it's it's very interesting uh to

hear that comedy is done in two shots i wonder if there was a script if if to shoot it more in two shots would be more interesting and also also Groundhog Day is a particularly strange film because of the format in that the day is repeated. So a lot of people have asked me, you know, how much improv did you and Bill do? And on that film, we did almost no improv because the day has to be the same. improv because the day has to be the same. Even the weather, there's only one scene in Groundhog Day with Bill and I that really is completely improv. And that's when Bill meets me on the street and he hugs me and it's, hey, Ned, it's been so long since, what are you doing later? That was not in the script. Bill completely made that up up we shot that in one take and harold ramus had it in two shots both a wide two and a close two and when we finished i had no you know i just tried to run

off camera because i didn't know what to do after he hugged me so i just vanished and uh harold said like well we got that you know so that was like one shot one print he got a two takes amazing did you did you do all of those scenes one after the other and how did they they and look this is the show i love films so we're getting into the weeds on this but how did they make sure that the lighting now that you mentioned it's the exact same day each time but as you are shooting it the sun would all would move how are they tracking that now see we have not really met except under that tent at Sarah Silverman's show. So you didn't know you were tossing me a softball. Oh, okay.

So this is what's really fascinating about Groundhog Day because the day is repeated. The day has to also be the same meteorologically. So Harold Ramis, when we started shooting, didn't know what the day of the film would be. Sunny, rainy, snowy, because we're shooting outside of Chicago. So Bill and I were always on a will notify, which for the people who don't love films. This is all about call sheets. It's all about call sheets. Yeah, we love to talk about.

We had no set. We were always on call. So if it began to snow, we would get the call in our rooms, Stephen, Bill, go down to Main Street. Let's shoot the scene in the snow. Let's shoot the scene in the rain. So we shot our street scenes, and there were originally about nine of them, and I think it got cut down to

about four we originally yeah uh do you have that mute button for uh coughs we do unfortunately i wasn't i wasn't pushing it but we love coughs yeah i love coughs okay next time you cough hold up your uh hold up your hand and kind of wave it like this and i'll i'll press it i mean it's a giant red button right here. Ready? Here. Let's practice. Here it goes.

Okay. Here we go. Ready? Ready? Waving the hand. Here comes the cough. Okay. Here we go.

I missed it again. Maybe I need more of a- We need like a 10 minute, if you have 10 minutes. Yeah. That wasn't really a frog in my throat. That was like a salamander. It was long. frog in my throat that was like a salamander it was long uh the thing about the day of groundhog day somewhere there is a vault with bill and i doing those street scenes in every weather condition

imaginable and they're and just in case just in case and in the end harold decided that the day that would be repeated as you mentioned the sun is always in the same place. The day would be the gloomy day. And near the end of the film, when snow begins to fall is when time begins again. So so but he had all that footage to play with to decide how he wanted to decide. Wow, that's incredible so yeah i mean normally you would think that that kind of stuff would be planned out ahead of time of like okay we're repeating the same day all the time so it's got to look like this and every single day has to look like this but he he did

options well of course but you're outside of chicago and you cannot you know the sunshine is not guaranteed especially when you're shooting in January and February. So when you look at a film like Palm Springs, which obviously was influenced by Groundhog Day, they're doing it in the sun out in California where you can replicate the same day over and over. Do you look at them and go, what a bunch of pussies? I'm thinking they're taking the easy way out. Yeah, I'm going to tell them so were you guys all in groundhog day were you guys all staying close enough that you could just run down and out to the street to to shoot or did you have to like get in a van and drive 20 minutes and i was i was staying in a room on the square wow that's so they could just and bill is in every scene of the film and so he's always with the crew he's always there. And so it's

like, go down to the street scene. They're basically just calling me to get out of bed and come down there and get ready to go. So did you ever accidentally shoot in your pajamas because you were just getting out of bed and forgot to get dressed or anything? It was too cold. No, it was like an army experiment. Thank God for that cold. Oh yeah, thank God or I would have done it. You know, a lot has been reported on Groundhog Day. I think there were like a bunch of newspaper articles about kind of the tension between Bill Murray and Harold Ramis. Was that evident

when you were working on it or was that sort of kept away from you? It was kept away from me. It was not evident. i didn't get a glimpse of it from harold ramus i certainly got not a glimpse of it from bill's performance i thought he was amazing one of and people think like well was bill really funny was he really grumpy what was he like i'm like, he's like one of the best actors I've ever worked with in my life. Every take, every take was in the moment. Every take was just as kind of spontaneous, but within the realm of the movie as possible. It was amazing to be a part of it. Do you think that his improv background there at the Second City in Chicago, does that have a lot to do with it? Yeah. Yeah,

that had a lot to do with it, but it also takes a certain amount of discipline. The improv has to be tamed a little bit with the discipline of the tone of the film and the story you're telling, and you have to be able to do that in the moment. So that's a great skill set to have. Well, amazing. Groundhog Day, one of my favorite films. For a while, I was saying it was my favorite film. And maybe it is.

I don't know. Saw it up in Sacramento and would imitate you all the time, Phil, Phil, which is just such a wonderful thing to be repeated. And so thank you for indulging us here at I Love Films because Groundhog Day is a film that we love here on I Love Films. Well, I'm glad you love it. There's one other, just as an happy epilogue. Oh, good.

There is one other improv scene in there for sure. And that is at the end of the movie when Bill came down, they rehearsed he and Andy in the bedroom going out into the world and it was snowing. And so they rehearse the scene. But you know, there are a lot of people on a crew and there's footprints. And so you have to get rid of all the footprints and all the stuff before you shoot again. So when they came to do the take, Bill came down with Andy and the snow was such that it blocked the gate and he could not open the gate to get her out of there. So rather than wait for a calling a cut,

wait, having them shovel snow or whatever, bill lifts Andy up in his arms, lifts her over the threshold over the gate. And it became this kind of beautiful, like through the threshold into the world. That was Bill in the spur of the moment. And it's one of the beautiful scenes in the movie. That's amazing.

I mean, as someone who, I don't know that I'd call myself an actor, but someone who has definitely been in front of the camera, usually I'm the kind of guy who would be like, oh, should we cut? You know? And it's always, oh, guy who would be like oh should we cut you know and it's always oh i can't get through can we cut it's always the temptation to do that if something isn't the way that you planned it in your head but uh those happy accidents that's what david lynch would do on uh you know all of his films he views those accidents as like integral to the filmmaking process sometimes it can really work out. And in terms of the I love films, you know, the idea of what the hit is, the difference between a play and a film, the hit of a play is that you are creating reality on stage. You are creating a world on stage.

The audience knows they're seeing a play. They paid for the ticket. Yeah. Usually I can see like a person's head in front of me too. In front of you. You know what I mean? And there aren't people's heads in front of me during life. And there are lights up, there's lights down, they're wearing costumes, they get laughs, they hold for laughs yet at the same time.

And I'm eating a sandwich usually, like a really stinky sandwich, you know? Yeah, why do you always bring a stinky sandwich to the theater? That is the theater to me. I don't have a lot of time. And so when I go see a play, I like to just sit there, have a three-course meal, a stinky, stinky egg sandwich, and just relax. Egg sandwich.

So the hit of theater is reality. But the hit of a movie is different because there are edits, there is music, there's all sorts of stuff. And it doesn't matter what you watch on film, no matter how much you love film, there is a distance between you and what you're seeing on that film. You could watch horrific murders, you could watch love scenes, whatever, and you're only kind of partly involved. So the thing the really great directors try to do is create surprise, create moments of surprise where the actors are surprised in the scene, where they're thrown by something and they're able to capture that moment on film.

And that moment has terrific effect on an audience because it doesn't look so canned. So the hit of film is surprise, whereas the hit of theater is the simulation of reality. Speaking of horrible murders, you ever see that movie Ma? No, too many horrible murders. Yeah. Can't do it. She's very scary. I Ma? No. Too many horrible murders. Yeah. Can't do it. She's very scary in it, though. I imagine she's scary.

I can't do it. I can't do it. Ma, you killed me. But I'm becoming such a softie. Oh, yeah? Yeah, I can't. What types of films do you like to watch these days? I watch Michael Clayton.

I've seen Michael Clayton about 12 times. I just saw it recently. That's terrific. It's very relaxing. I watch Michael Clayton. I've seen Michael Clayton about 12 times. It's very relaxing. His car almost gets blown up, but instead he's just gazing at a horse. So there's not a lot of drama in it. It's not pulse pounding. It's just a very kind of pleasant look into a guy's life who is in a terribly stressful situation, but nothing really bad ever happens to him. Do you know, as someone who's gone into the weeds on Michael Clayton, the scene where he sees the horses right on the hill and that is what makes him get out of it. Spoiler alert.

Look, this is I Love Films. People have watched every film before they listen to this podcast. So he goes up to see the horses, right? But we also have in that book with the red cover is. So George Clooney, in the scene where he comes into Tom Wilkinson's apartment to see if there are any clues as to why or how he was killed, sees the red book that we hear about, and he opens the book to the page and is thumbing through various pages. And we see Tom Wilkinson's notes in the corner. Then George Clooney turns the page, and there at the top of the page are the horses, the

horse and the trees. It's the same shot that we see earlier and later of the horse and the trees. It's the same shot that we see earlier and later of the horse and the trees. And, uh, what, okay. I've always sort of wondered why he gets out of the car to go pet a horse. And,

and that, I mean, I would, if I saw a horse, I'd go pet it. And, uh, so we were talking about it earlier on,

on the show about petting horses and trying to hotwire a Mustang. We, that. Yeah. So they're saying that he stops the car to go look at the horses because it's an image he had seen previously in the book in the book but but because of the way the movie is shot in that you see the uh car exploding and the horses before he sees the book and after afterwards. So it's kind of, and, and the image of the horses in the book, it's an ink drawing at the top of the,

of, of a chapter page with the trees, exactly as we see it in the shot with one horse, as opposed to three horses, one horse instead of three. It's exactly. So it was added in post. That picture was added in post by artists on the top of the page to emulate the frame of film before.

That they actually had shot previously. So it is an Easter egg in Michael Clayton. Do you think they should have lingered on that shot of the book more so that you could put it together a little easier because that is one of the questions i always had coming out of that film is like is it a little convenient he goes out to pet a horse something i would do again something that i were i to see a horse as i was driving hot wire a mustang i definitely would but but do you think they should have lingered on it or does it make it more artistic and beautiful the fact that they don't and it's something you can put together later in your mind? I have gone over that myself because I've seen the movie several times

before I found out about that little secret of the film. And I wondered, should they have lingered longer on that? That's exactly what I just asked, but you're just kind of rephrasing the same thing. I'm just rephrasing it. Yeah, I don't know. It seems like everyone's taking credit for all of my ideas well um we we could talk about

michael clayton and other films for for hours but uh we are here to talk about one film in particular and that is the film true stories which was born. Its birthday was October 10th, 1986. It's having its 30. It just had its 34th birthday, I believe. So I am so old. I am. I am. We all are these days, if you know what I mean.

I don't even know if I know what I mean. But we want to talk to you because you are the co-writer of the film and you have such an incredible career. You're an actor, you're a writer, you're a director. Again, if you take a look at your IMDb page, you'll be scrolling forever if you go from top to bottom. All of these things combined, when did you first hear of Talking Heads? I had heard of Talking Heads, I guess, life in wartime, psycho killer. I wasn't a fan of Talking Heads. I wasn't not a fan.

I was just listening to a lot of Bonnie Raitt at the time and a lot of Louis Armstrong, you know, you only have so much time in your life. And then there, of course, was Once in a Lifetime, which I think had just come out a little bit before I met David. So, I knew who the talking heads were, and I knew sort of what some of their hit songs were, but I didn't know a lot about them. of what some of their hit songs were, but I didn't know a lot about them. And I guess my girlfriend at the time, Beth Henley, Beth was always an actress who never could get an audition, who never did anything. And so we were in graduate school together and she said, well, maybe I should be a writer instead of an actor. And I go, sure. You know, or think of dentistry. Think of something that people will pay you to do. You know, something, you know, sure.

Be a writer. Good choice that she ended up making. Yes. So we were in graduate. Beth and I fell in love in college. We were in graduate school together. And she saw. At SMU is where you went.

Is that correct? Where Janie Haddad Tompkins graduated from. Oh my God. I know. It's shocking. It's shocking. Yeah, that is true. We went to graduate school at the University of Illinois.

And Beth saw a play written by Claudia Riley, who was the only student in the playwriting program at the University of Illinois. And on the walk home from seeing Claudia's play, Beth is like, we're walking across campus. And she says, you know, that's so brave what she did to write a play. And I go, well, I don't know if you call it brave. It's not like Davy Crockett at the Alamo. I mean, she's in graduate school in playwriting. You know, she paid the people. That's what she's supposed to do.

I love the way that you're talking to your ex-girlfriend, by the way. Like, she brings up anything and you're like, honey, just please. She's in school. You know, it isn't like a real act of courage. And she said, well, I want to be a writer. So, Beth, the first thing she wrote was a screenplay. She wrote a screenplay, a couple one acts acts but the first full-length play she wrote won the pulitzer prize for drama incredible i mean she's an incredible playwright crimes of the heart

crimes of the heart you know i directed uh i directed and acted in crimes of the heart and uh in high school i thought you were gonna say the movie my God. You're lying right now. But yeah, it's an incredible piece. And of course, you know, we don't talk about stage productions necessarily on this show because we talk about films, but we can do a little sidebar here for a moment. And you were with her while she was writing that. is that correct yeah it's like when when we were she was walking around our little house together in la with tons of little notebooks with pieces of paper all over the place writing typing so i start reading her play which at the time was called something like either three mississippi sisters or old granddaddy's dying so so that was the name of the play. So I'm reading this play, and I'm going like, damn, who am I living with? This is like brilliant. Pulitzer worthy.

This is brilliant. And it was Beth is typing, and I'm getting to the end of the play, and she's typing near the end of the play, and she pulls out the last page of the play and gives it to me. And I'm reading it there, and I start crying in the living room. I'm going like, this is the most beautiful play. This is so brilliant. And you cannot call it Granddaddy's Dying or Three Mississippi Sisters.

This play needs a title. This play is going to be on broadway beth this is one of the best plays written in our lifetime this is phenomenal so anyway we were going to do an equity waiver production of crimes of the heart in la for free you know with all of our friends in this play and And then the girl who was going to play Meg, Sharon Ulrich, gave the play to her agent who never read it, and her agent gave it to his boyfriend who never really read it, and brought it back to New York

and handed it off to Gilbert Parker, who happened to be an agent of Lillian Hellman, Tennessee Williams, Mark Medoff, some of the great writers in America. And he read the play on the stack of plays and go, oh my. And he called Beth up on the phone. And I pick up the phone. This is Gilbert Parker. I'm calling Beth Henley. And I said, yeah, yeah, Beth's here. And I go, Beth, the phone for you? Gilbert Parker? And he said, I'd like to help you with this play.

And she's looking at me like shrugging like, I don't know who this – I don't know what's going on. And she said, sure, sure, not knowing he was probably one of the most powerful literary agents in the country. So after that, Beth won the Great American Play Festival in Louisville. She ended up winning the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for Crimes of the Heart. And here, this is our entree into true stories. So Jonathan Demme's former wife and producer Evelyn Purcell was looking for projects she could work with and wanted to work Crimes of the Heart, and she introduced Beth to Jonathan Demme. And Jonathan was thinking, well, maybe we could do a movie of Crimes of the Heart. So both Jonathan Demme and Evelyn Purcell were glomming onto Beth, thinking like, here is a real writing talent, and we may be able to work with her and use some of her work.

So Beth and I are doing Pilates way before Pilates was cool. You know how we know that you've already said True Stories is like 112 years old. What was it? You said like 30, 35? I did 36 or so. Oh, God. So so anyway this was before then we were doing pilates so we were doing pilates when no one knew about it and beth and i are walking from pilates class and a car stops on the street in a very threatening way and it was jonathan dimmy and he yells out went hey kids i'm going over over the academy to see my latest film that I did. It's a rough cut of Stop Making Sense.

Have you guys heard of the Talking Heads? And I go, well, yeah, sure. You know, life during wartime. Yeah, sure. We know who they are. Psycho killer. Says, well, come on, jump in the car, you know, follow me over there.

We're going to, you know. Jump in the car and follow you over there? Well, we had our little Volkswagen Rabbit. We jumped in our car and we were going to follow him over to the cabin. So did you know him? Had you already done Swing Shift at this point? No, no, no, no, no. So you knew Jonathan?

No. No, he just was interested in doing it. He didn't end up directing Crimes of the Heart. No, no. But he was interested in working with Beth. Right. And he was interested in working with Beth. Right. And he was interested in developing that relationship. And so was his wife, Evelyn. So he just sees you on

the street. I don't know if I, you know, I produce things like Auntie Donna now on Netflix. Please watch it. But if I were to see those guys on the street, I don't know that I'd be pulling over going like, hey, you know, come follow me to whatever I'm doing. What an amazing thing for Jonathan Demme to do just to see you on the street and say like, hey, come on by. Well, that's the kind of guy Jonathan was. That's the kind of guy he was. He was very open, very friendly guy. Used to invite me over to his office to play Fireball because I loved that game and he loved that game. What is Fireball?

Is that a video game or what is it? that game and he loved that game what is fireball is that a video game or what is it it is uh it was a great pinball game oh at the time you know bing ding bing ding ding i know what pinball sounds like yeah the one the vertical one that goes down it has a spinning disc in the middle and so as the silver ball is going up it gets caught on that ball and gets thrown off in all sorts of crazy directions. But he loved Fireball and I loved Fireball. Do you think that spinning disc in the middle is what gave Jonathan Demme the idea to put his movies on DVD? Boy, you know, I never made that connection before. I mean, crazier things have happened.

Now, we knew who Jonathan was because of Melvin and Howard, right? So we knew Jonathan from Melvin and Howard. Film lovers, of course, know this is a film and not just guys he knows. Right. Yes, yes. And it's a good movie. It's a super good movie. And so we follow Jonathan over to the Academy.

And for the people who are lovers of film but don't know the inside of the Academy. Not everyone is invited into the Academy. No. That is a big, big theater. It's like 1,900 seats. So that's where Jonathan is going to screen his rough cut. So Beth and I walk in, and the theater, the 1,900 seats are empty, except for David Byrne, Tina, Chris, the talking heads, Jonathan and Evelyn, and me and Beth.

So this wasn't something that he was inviting a bunch of people to. He just was like, you were tagging along and it was just you guys. It's just us guys. So Beth and I sit in the middle of the theater. Behind us is sitting David Byrne. And so I'm going, oh, oh, I recognize this guy from MTV. Oh, God. And then Jonathan and Evelyn were sitting there. And I think Tina and Chris Franz, I think they were up front of the theater. And so what was unique about this experience for Beth and for myself was not only were we watching a great concert film, not only were we watching a great concert film with the director and the artists who were in the concert film, but this was the first time we really heard the Talking Heads music, and we're hearing it in the massive stereo of that theater on the big screen, and it was an overwhelming

experience. Wow. I bet. Oh, take me to the river, slippery people. All these amazing Talking Heads songs in the brilliant way. Amazing grace. Speaking of songs, I'm just speaking of great songs. I just wanted to segue

for a second. That's a great song. I just wanted to throw that in. Just make sure you were paying attention as well because they don't play that in Stop Making Sense. They don't play that in Stop Making Sense, but it is a great song. It is a great song. You have to agree. And it's good country

and it's good any way you cut it. Like John Lennon said, any way you do a great song, it's great. Exactly. Any style. So when Demi brings you in, he introduces you to the band and says, these are my pals, or are they looking at you like, who are these guys? What happens? I think he generally introduced us, but it wasn't like a major deal that we just sat down. And as I mentioned, the bigger deal was David was sitting in the row behind me, kind of where he could kind of see me. So when the movie was finished, the movie is done. And Beth and I are completely overwhelmed. Jonathan and David saying, well, we're thinking about going out to eat. Do you guys want to come eat with us? So, of course, we're going to say yes to that. So, we go up somewhere snazzy above the Sunset Strip, some Chinese place, I think. We're all sitting together, and I end up at the end of

the table where David Byrne is. And so Beth is next to me. She's more talking to Jonathan, and I'm face-to-face with David across the table. And so David said, like, all right, I want you to know everything you did not like about the movie. I go, well, David, I loved it. No, no, no. Everyone always says I loved the movie. Everyone always says they love what we, I don't want to hear what you loved. I want you to tell me everything that didn't work for you. And that is the essence of David. Interesting.

You know, he- Yeah, he's not satisfied. He really does want to know the negative. He wants to know the negative because he is always working. Always working. He doesn't want the pat on the back. He doesn't want, oh, well, this is just brilliant. He doesn't want yes men. So David and I-

So what did you tell him about what you didn't like? Did you- I, well, I- Were you like sort of trying to come up with things just to i was what i the only thing i could do was i talked to him in very specific frame by frame song by song of what how i experienced the movie and it all turned out to be sort of positive and he said well did you feel this part was too? I said, not for me. And you have to understand, I don't know your music. So this was my introduction to you. I

wasn't a fan coming in here. So that's a good perspective. Yeah. So he probably wasn't getting from a lot of people. Yes. As someone who's not a fan, this is what I felt. And who is still not a fan. You threw that in. By the way, I still don't like your music. Still not a fan. You threw that in. By the way, I still don't like your music. Boy, I'm, well, actually, I'm a huge fan now.

I'm a huge fan of Davidson, all of his new stuff and everything. Well, you should come on our sister show, You Talking Talky Heads to My Talky Head. But, of course, that is not this show. This is I Love Films. Yeah. Did you go see American Utopia on Broadway? Did you get a chance? No, I've seen it on cable, though, a few times. Sure, sure.

Yeah. When I'm not watching Michael Clayton. That's right. Those are the only two movies. Just ping-ponging back and forth between those two things. So you have this dinner with David, and then how does the relationship continue? He invites you over to his house? Is that what happens?

No. It was more bizarre even than that. So he said, so where do you live? And I said, well, we live up in the Hollywood Hills. He says, oh, so do I. Do you have a swimming pool? And I go, well, yeah, David, we have a swimming pool. He said, well, I'm shooting a video for MTV for a song we did, Road to Nowhere. Can we use your swimming pool for that? And I go, well, sure, David. I am so green. You know, I don't know about the litigious age of people getting hurt or drowning in swimming pools.

Sure, yeah. If someone were to drown you an immediate like you're liable for getting getting this was someone you had just met just met so i said sure come on over so david and uh the people who are working on that came over they set up camp in our backyard and when you see the video of Road to Nowhere, the scenes shot underwater in that song were shot in our backyard in our swimming pool.

Do you think that David Byrne was talking to Jonathan Demme one day and was like, okay, hey, if you have any friends with swimming pools and you see them on the street, would you invite them to my movie?

I am not. Is he playing 3d chess here i it could have been i'm so i'm and why didn't he just use his own swimming pool he he lives in the hollywood hills david david well i'll get to david's place in a second uh but it's pool this we can assume it's poolless that was for sure that's one thing you can say about his house it was it was poolless and and so they're shooting and so i said well do you guys want to have dinner you know i could barbecue so i barbecued some salmon or something was barbecuing salmon open up a bottle of wine yeah oh wine. Do you mind doing that for us right now? Oh, you know, I'm gearing up for Thanksgiving, guys. Oh, okay. Yeah. Sorry.

A little too much prep time. A little too much prep time. And so I'm cooking and David stays for dinner. And while we're at dinner, Beth asks him, so what are you working on now? You know, what are you doing now? He says, well, you know, I'm working on this idea I'm calling true stories. You know, whenever the talking heads, whenever we go on the road, we always stop at 7-Elevens or whatever to get coffee. And they always have these amazing magazines in the rack there about these stories that you know are absolutely

impossible, but they have to be true. You know, the gardener who, you know, an alien, he sees an alien having sex with his weed whacker. Now, I'm not making that up because it uses the word weed whacker and alien and sex in the same thing. There was actually a story in World Weekly News at a 7-Eleven alien, you know, gardener. How does the physiology work with that? That's totally true, though. That's totally true.

Well, it can happen. I mean, so aliens, sexual organs, I'm assuming the alien is female and the weed whacker is going inside? Is that... No, no. I don't even know if you want to go there. I can't even speculate on how that would be possible.

Maybe the alien just got to second base with the weed whacker okay that's possibly true and and he just by the way alien baseball this is our sister show i love baseball as well alien baseball there are 34 bases so second base is really like nothing is going it's like nothing especially with a weed whacker maybe he just turned it on in the it started spinning he thought like, ah, she's there. So anyway, David's saying, I just wanted to put together a movie with all these absolutely incredible stories where all these different characters have these stories that are unbelievable but are true stories and then beth says to david very um fortuitously well you ought to talk to my sweetie that was me uh you ought to talk to my sweetie about what happened to him in college because that that's like completely unbelievable and david said oh well what happened to you in college and so i told david, well, what happened to you in college? And so I told David

the story of what happened to me in movement class. We had a movement retreat in my sophomore year where we decided to do exactly the same things we do in movement class, but two hours outside of the city of Dallas by a lake where we're closer to mosquitoes. So we're like breathing in and out around the fire and all this. If people haven't been to acting school, movement classes, essentially, they call movement. It's not dance. It's just like getting in touch with your body and learning how to move your body around so that. But it's essentially dance class. Although when I took it, it was, we never like dance class was separate.

It was mainly just like, Hey, here's how to move your body on stage to communicate ideas. Is that pretty much what it is, Stephen? That's what it was. But this was more like breathing. Right. Yeah. A lot of breathing exercises, a lot like how to, how to prepare your body to be an actor. This was, this was like in the like like 1970 i'm thinking so

breathing was considered an exercise back then right like that's how i showed a few lbs just by breathing yeah it's like and you had to breathe correctly you couldn't breathe too shallow had to use your diaphragm all this so we're, we're around the fire and our movement teacher says, okay, we're going to go around the fire. And I want you to say the first thing that comes into your mind, which was also big in 1970. And so Lord of the Rings, people were reading that book now. And so they're going like, going around the circle, they're going Frodo, Frodo, Hobbit, like going around the circle they're going frodo frodo hobbit hobbit gandalf wait people people this is the first thing that's coming to people's mind yes frodo frodo yeah because and then they're going weed beer everybody's kind of laughing right and then they get to me and i have this

i feel this kind of sound is all i could describe it in my head. I hear the sound in my head and I look across the fire and I say to our movement teacher, I get that you're not who you say you are. Pause. You said this to your movement teacher? Yes, across the fire. It just popped in your head? Yes. I hear the sound in my head popped in my, I said, I get that you're not who you say you are. I hear the sound in my head popped in my head. I said, I get that you're not who you say you are. And he says, well, what do you mean, Stephen? I said, well, you say your name is this, but you're living under an assumed name, and your real initials are JK or JL. And then he-

Was it JK Rowling? No. Oh, that was- I didn't go to that good of a school. Okay, you didn't go to Hogwarts. No, no, no. So then they keep going, go, all right, let's continue on.

And then the next person goes Gandalf. They're still thinking about the Lord of the Rings. Frodo, Frodo, Hobbit. Can't shake them from this Lord of the Rings. Guys, we're here in nature. Stop thinking about this dumb book you just read. So we finish and I decide I'm going to drive back to Dallas, you know, instead of spending the night. Did it come back around to you and did something else pop in your head or was that the only time?

That was it. So I'm walking to my car and on my way to the car, my movement teacher stops me. He comes out of the shadows and said, Stephen. Scary. Why did you say that around the fire? And I explained what I explained to everybody here. I said, I hear this noise in my head, and that's just what came to me. He said, because it's true.

And I said, what? He says, I do have an assumed name, and my real initials are JK. So I ask you again, how did you know this? And I go, I have no idea. time about what happened and she goes we're gonna make a fortune and and so she started bringing people from the theater department to me and i would sit down i would look at them i would hold their hands i'd hear a sound in my head and i would say things to them so were you hearing these sounds before the fire or or was this the first time was the fire and suddenly the fire was the first time i could and you figured out a way to tap into it somehow when you would see these other people that's just that's just what that's just what happened you know i and and i was in college and you know i i just assumed it was all made up and not anything real anyway.

And I started telling people in my drama class what they were seeing, what I was saying, and with a terrible high rate of accuracy. And a lot of these things weren't happy things, weren't good things. You know, I would say, you know, there's a problem, you know, with you and your father at home. There was some sort of abuse and, you know, they would start crying and they'd run out of the room. It was not good. So anyway, I'm telling David Byrne this ridiculous, and Beth and I did. But before you tell David Byrne, did you make a lot of money? Are you rich now from this?

Oh, man. Well, we. How many bozos did you make? We charged, I think, something like 25 cents to sit down and have me do this. And as it got more popular, a dollar. So I think Beth and I made somewhere in the realm of like 20 bucks. Wow. But this is 1970s money. That's like $5 million. Yeah, it's $5 million in post, you know, inflation money. And so I told this story to David Byrne and he's like, oh, oh, interesting. So anyway. That's about as effusive as he gets. Oh, interesting. A few days later, I'm in my car driving in the Hollywood Hills, and there's a knock on the window of my car.

And I look up, it's David Byrne on a bicycle. And he's got a helmet on. He says, are you going back home soon? To that place with the pool? There's something I want you to hear. And I go, oh, okay. So I go back to the house. David comes over about 30 minutes later with his guitar.

And he said, I just wrote this song. And it's based on your story. I want you to hear it. And there in my living room, he played Radiohead. And I'm going like, oh, wow. wow uh i go he says so is this okay you know tell me what you don't like about it you know always with david tell me what yeah i said david it's amazing it's it's an amazing amazing song and it thrills and moves me that, thank you. It's just beautiful. Thank you. And so anyway, he called Beth in to talk to him about being the writer of this movie,

True Stories. Beth goes over, meets with David, comes back over to the house a couple hours later and said, I have no idea what he was talking about. I have no idea what he was talking about. I have no idea. David lives in the strangest place. And I can't, there are pictures all over the place. I don't know. But anyway, I told him that maybe he should call you.

Because you're- I love she's pawning him off on you all the time. So you're good with structure and you're good with those kind of ideas. And I thought maybe you could work with David because I had no idea what he wanted. So David calls me on the phone almost at that moment and says, are you doing anything? Beth said, maybe you should come over. So I said, sure, David. Yeah, I'll come over.

So I went in and David had, it's slightly an overstatement, but not an overstatement. He had this house in the Hollywood Hills that he was renting that had no furniture in it. I mean, you walk in and it's like a house hunter's house before they work on it. It was empty house. It's a flip, essentially. He had one of those tables that you eat at in a cafeteria where the legs were pulled out. And he had a couple folding chairs by the table. But there was – and I figured, like, well, David lives in New York, so probably has all the stuff in New York. But on the wall of his living room, on the wall were about – again, I don't know the exact number.

I didn't count it. But it seemed like 200 drawings on pieces of paper that were probably, oh, eight inches by eight inches. And these squares were taped all over the wall. And David is an amazing graphic artist. He went to the Rhode Island School of Design. The guy can draw. So he has all these pictures taped onto his wall, like some sort of serial killer. Psycho killer. Psycho killer. Can you make a movie out of these pictures? And I said, well, let me look at them and for the next couple of hours not a word was

exchanged between david and i but i went to picture to picture to picture writing notes down as to what each picture was every damn picture on the wall and and david was silent he didn't interrupt me that's another thing about david Because usually when you are presenting something, you get nervous about it and you're like, you know, you're trying to guess what the people are thinking. You'll interject and be like, well, what did you weigh away? This thing is a picture of, you know, you like start to talk a little like what I'm doing right now, probably. But it was like, not at all.

It was, you know, David, we were silent. We were silent for a long period of time. And then I finished. This is like the dream between me and my wife. Like how I wish our relationship was. And then I said, I looked at it. And again, David didn't say like, what's up? I just, he was waiting for me to talk first. And I said,

I think maybe I could do something. This is what I'm going to do, David. Let me go home and work on this and I'll bring you something tomorrow and we'll see if it makes any sense. He says, oh, all right. All right. So I went home and that night I wrote an outline out for the movie True Stories and I wrote 35 pages. That night? That night. 35 pages of partial scenes, character description, potential scenes, whatever. And I brought it over to David and my presentation to him was this. I said, any movie you're going to do, the main event of the movie is going to be the songs. So what you need, rather than a plot,

is you need a structure that songs can exist in, a reality that the songs can exist in. And in Texas, at this time, they were celebrating Susquehanna Centennial of various cities like San Antonio. Susquehanna Centennial. Susquehanna, which is 150, is that what it is? Yeah, 150, right? Something like that. Like 125, 150, it's an odd number. number. And I said, so this would be this small town in Texas with all these different characters in it celebrating one event that could bring them all together, that you can do music to,

that you have the freedom to go to these different places. And then we outlined, and I had different scenes written down for a computer guy and et cetera. And they're all characters that David created, the lying woman and the part John Goodman ended up playing. And David said, I like this. I like this. So he hired me to be the screenwriter. And then he called Beth up on the phone and said, would you work with Stephen as a screenwriter on True Stories? And she said yes. And so the catch was – Even though she didn't really understand it, she was like, hey, two paychecks?

Yeah. Great. And so the catch was – well, I think they wanted the kind of prize of having the Pulitzer Prize winner working on the script. Sure, yeah. You know, she carried all the kind of – The weight of the creative partnership. Little did David know he was talking to a future Ned Ryerson. No, nobody knew they were talking to a future Ned Ryerson or future don't look under the bed.

And so what Beth and I did is we had it. There was a catch. We had to deliver a first draft drum roll in 19 days. Why? Why so fast? I don't know. The producer said that there was a window open that they were going to try to get this thing rolling to shoot before the next Talking Heads tour. So it had to do, I think, with David's schedule. But we were at the stage in our pathetic careers that when somebody says,

yes, you, you don't question it. You say, we'll do it in 19 days. Well, Hey, I wrote a draft of scary movie three in seven days.

So I know it can be done. It can be done. It can be done. And we did, we did it. We turned in a draft to David in 19 days. We finished the entire film and then we did not hear from David

for one calendar year. So not a fiscal year, but a calendar year. Heard nothing like, good job, guys. Thank you, guys. So you turn in a script. You must have like dropped the pages off

at his house or something? Did you have a copy of them? He was right around the corner. Well, this was when the age when the Mac 512 was just being invented. So we wrote this script in longhand. And then we transferred it to the computer. Was this like the computer that I started writing on that would only save up to 20 pages at at a time and then you have to erase it and then write the next 20 on it? We had to get a separate hard drive that back then, the hard drive that had 500 megabytes cost $2,500.

Jeez. You know, it was a whole different world back then. We give David the script. We hear nothing for a year. And then I run into David. Were you trying to call him or say like, hey, were you leaving messages or were you just like, hey, if he liked it, maybe he didn't like it? Yeah, maybe he didn't like it or whatever. I mean, he knew where we were or whatever. And how close was this script to what ended up being the movie? to what ended up being the movie. Oh, well, the next time we saw David, like a year later,

David goes, oh, hi, guys. You know, we went on the road. We were on tour. And I want you to know I've rewrote the script and it's all pretty much different from what you did. But David completely changed the script. The format, the form is still the same. He changed all the dialogue.

He changed a lot of the scenes. And a lot of the scenes are kind of changed to go with the songs that they ended up writing for the movie. I think Beth and I got to the point where we counted the lines that we wrote that remained in the film. we counted the lines that we wrote that remained in the film. I think we each have about a dozen in the film that are still there or little scenes that we wrote that are still there. Not like a total page one rewrite. David asked me to be in the movie to play the computer guy. I was busy at that point doing something else.

So I said I couldn't do it. He ends up shooting the movie. And then I get a call from David one night. Again, after months of not talking, he says, I need to ask you a favor. And I go, sure, David, what is it? He says, well, I don't want the film to go out and say, you know, this is a movie directed by David Byrne, starring David Byrne, written by David Byrne. He says, I don't want to do that with songs written by David Byrne. be listed as the head screenwriter of the movie. And I kind of look at Beth like, sure, you know. I go, Beth, you want to? And she goes, no, no, because we really didn't have much to do with it.

I said, well, if it helps you, you could say I'm the head screenwriter. So that's how I got head screenwriting credit. You know, sometimes you get the bear. Sometimes the bear gets you. But what's interesting is this all has to do with residuals too like credit on the reason people fight over credit on on films is because the residuals play into that and whether you get paid or not you know so like david is basically giving up a i don't know you know how much the residuals ended up being on you know it. It's out of life for the last 34 years, but this is like a nice financial gift to you guys as well, isn't it?

Well, it wasn't a big financial gift because we were both very low on the financial gift totem pole. However, I still get a few residual. Just recently, I got residuals for True Stories. residual just recently i got residuals for true stories uh i still get residuals for freddie got fingered even though i'm cut out of every damn frame because i am as you say my agent fought for me still to be in the credits to be in the credits so you get so anyway uh my dad who flew helicopters in king kong in the 70s still gets residuals. Yeah. Did he really? Yeah. But later I ended up, right after we wrote True Stories, I ended up directing Beth's play in New York,

The Miss Firecracker Contest. Which Holly Hunter starred in the film. That is correct. And she starred in our production. Oh, wow. She starred in our play. And she was who we wanted you know for years you know we we one of the best actresses to ever do it yeah ulu grossbard uh great director uh was a friend of beth's at the time too and he said i have read your miss firecracker contest and i know

who needs to play carnell scott and that is this actress, Holly Hunter. And so, during the Crimes of the Heart in New York thing, we had met Holly just before that all broke, and Holly was very excited about Beth doing Crimes of the Heart. And we said, well, the second play, her second play is Miss Firecracker contest. We think you're the perfect person to be in this. So then it was a matter of keeping Holly busy to where she could be in the Miss Firecracker contest. So Holly ended up going in as for Mary Beth Hurt. She became these replacement cast in Crimes of the Heart, replacing Mary Beth Hurt on Broadway.

And then we kept moving Holly to whatever thing Beth was working on to keep her busy until finally Miss Firecracker got a New York production. And David Byrne said that I could stay at his apartment in New York because he was going to go on the road if i wanted to so i stayed at david's place uh in gosh it wasn't even tribeca but it was in the south part of manhattan and he had no furniture what is that in new york in new york so i stayed at his place in new york and he had a metal table and he had these metal chairs with holes in the back and holes in the seat so if you sat in those chairs naked which i'm not saying i did or i didn't but if you sat in the chairs naked it would make red donut holes on your back and on your buttock you know made it look like you had smallpox and and then i opened his closet and he had no clothes in the closet but this white suit that he always wears like even in

uh what if what if he just had like 40 identical big suits from i think he does i think he does but but you know i could have taken one and he wouldn't even know but but it was great you know you know i was so glad that it was that david let me stay there that was sweet. And the firecracker turned out to be a big success. That was great. It got a film deal. If he had said, by the way, I don't have any furniture, would you have stayed there? Or would you have found other arrangements? You know, it never even crossed my mind that he would have no furniture in either place.

But that was kind of David. You would think he would have artistic furniture but it just leads you to believe that he's he is like the alien having sex with the weed whacker like he he might be a being from another uh he might be you know a galaxy or something that doesn't has no need for furniture because of the contortions his body turns into when no one is uh when no eyes are upon him he just like melts into a puddle or something like that yeah you you would think you know beth and i used to talk about that going like do you think david is from another planet uh because he was again the work ethic in him was so powerful more powerful than almost anyone I ever met.

Always working, always writing, always coming up with ideas for projects for- This sounds like me. Wow. So all you have to do now is write a really good song. A really good song. Yeah. I wrote one and then i realized it was just happy birthday oh yeah especially i should have known from the lyrics which were basically happy

birthday to you happy birthday to you you know i went to uh i went to beth henley's uh christmas party one year oh wow yeah i wonder if you were there steven. It was Christmas 2001. Are you still friendly with Beth Henley? Oh, sorry. Well, no, and it isn't that we're enemies. We're not. It's just we really parted company. We parted company, and I ended up getting – I've been married now to someone completely different than Beth Henley for 31 years, and I have two children to prove it. So, you know, Beth –

I'm going to need that proof. So if you don't mind bringing your children into the frame. And DNA tests and stuff like that. Yeah, all that. I have a friend, Maury Povich, who can administer the DNA test if you like. All right. Thank you. And we can do it live.

Sure, yeah. Reveal the results on air in in some of my stories you know i've i kind of what i do is write true stories of the weird things that happen like like the story i just told you with david burn and the and radio head and how that was my way in very interesting by the way that the band radiohead is based on your experience in college in the 70s. Crazy. Yeah, because they were like, what, on a Friday? That was their original name?

On a Friday, yeah, exactly. But they loved David Byrne. Which is a lot like when we're taping this. Right. They loved David, and they loved the song Radiohead. So they had a band meeting, and they changed their name. So that was... Band meeting, guys.

We love David Byrne. My sideways entrance into the Rock and they changed their name. So that was- Band meeting, guys. We love David Byrne. My sideways entrance into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. That's incredible. Another follow-up to this story, do you still hear the transmissions that the song Radiohead was inspired by? Yeah, this is what I want to know as well. I keep getting these things, but what happened was what I tried to explain to Beth and to people, Beth wanted me to keep doing this because she thought it was really cool, was that the more that happened to me, the more I heard. And it wasn't that I had to sit next to somebody, it was like in one of those movies where you go into a restaurant and then you start

hearing the sounds from all the tables and all the people sitting at the tables and it was nightmarish and so i tried everything i could to stop it you know to stop block it out to block this is a lot like uh the the superhero daredevil when his heightened senses come around. He has to train himself. Of course, the ninja that trained him, Stick, has to train him to block everything out. Otherwise, it would drive him crazy. Do you relate to Daredevil? I related to it in that Ben Affleck played Daredevil.

And I did a series before Ben Affleck was Ben Affleck. You know, we did Against the Grain, and he was a kid when we did that together. So a lot of similarities with Daredevil here. A lot of similarities with Daredevil. My wife, Ann, you know, she always is like, when things get desperate, she says, use it now. You have to do it now. So, like, I. So, you can access it occasionally?

I had a situation in which I had just finished doing a few TV shows together, and I felt enormously successful. I had amassed $17,000 and I decided I would take this money to the bank. 17 bozos. And so I got the check and I got the deposit slip and I'm going to be really healthy and I'm going to ride the bike to the bank. And so I ride to the Bank of America and I stand in line, get up, pull out the deposit slip, reach in my pocket. The checks are gone. Now they've all been signed. They've all been endorsed. 17 bozos gone.

So I come home and I tell my dear bride, Ann, I said, Ann, this thing happened. And she looked at me very seriously. She pulled out the chair. She says, sit down and do the thing you do with your head. Do it now. Now is when you need to do it. So I said, okay, don't get mad. I just need quiet.

I sat down and I saw the three checks. They were in midair on a fence. And I thought, okay, I rode my bike to the bank. Where is there a chain link fence between here and the two miles to the bank? And I thought, wait a minute, I did ride under the freeway and the freeway is right by the Los Angeles River, and the Los Angeles River is surrounded by a chain link fence.

So I rode my bike back a mile trek toward the Bank of America. I got off under the freeway. where the Los Angeles River was going, there is a fence, and there are the three checks being held up in the wind up against the fence. Come on. No. So I got the checks. The other horrible thing was Ann was doing a birthday for me, a birthday party for me, and I play the piano, right? And mainly classical music, and I'm not very good. But as a birthday gift, Ann did a little surprise, you know, she did a little surprise, but she wasn't going to tell me what was going to happen. So, she said, well, we're going to go out to lunch and we're going to have a birthday gift, your birthday gift.

And I said, okay, Ann, you know, all the time you keep talking about the ESP thing. And I know I'm telling you I don't have it. I think the whole thing of the checks is that some part of my brain saw those checks leave my pocket when I was riding my bike. And my brain stored that image and brought it back later. So I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to take out a pen right now, and I'm going to take out a piece of paper, and I see what my birthday gift is, and I'm going to write it down on a piece of paper. I'm going to seal it, which I did. I'm putting it on your computer, and we'll all come come back home and we'll have a big laugh about it. And what I wrote down on the piece of paper was, I am going to drive to Disney Hall. You've arranged for me to play the grand piano on stage

at Disney Hall. And so that's what I wrote down. Right. It's laughable. It's laughable. You saw that image in your head, though, and you wrote it down. I saw it. I wrote it all down. So Ann says, okay, well, we're going to have lunch first. So, you know, we're going to be meeting someone. So maybe if you dressed up like you're seeing an important person.

So maybe if you wore a suit and a tie or something. I said, okay, okay. And I said, so where do I go? She says, well, why, you know, there's a nice little restaurant I know downtown. It's across from Disney Hall. And suddenly the blood runs out of my head. I go, okay, okay. She said, you know, it's so expensive to do the parking here at the restaurant. Why don't you just do the parking under Disney Hall? And I'm going, motherfucker. And so I park the car down there.

We go up the elevator and there is the plant director of Disney Hall waiting for me at the elevator. My friend, Robert Brinkman, cinematographer is there with his camera and my piano music. And he said, we have it arranged for you to play the grand piano in Disney Hall. And I am about to drop dead now because I'm thinking like, I am going to be so killed when I go home. Right. So I go in and I play, and Robert filmed it. I go and I play for about an hour of the piano on the stage of Disney Hall. It was an unforgettable experience.

It was absolutely magnificent. We go home. Anne opens the envelope and is absolutely furious that i must have been on her computer looking at her right to be like a snoop to be like a snoop that i had somehow ruined the whole birthday that it was and wow but this is incredible but she believes you that you didn't do that and i think like maybe any married couple. What a weird cover story this would be, though. We've been married for 31 years.

And, you know, at that point, you believe your partner, certainly more than 50%, but less than 100. Right, right. So you go like, yeah, okay. I think there's 3% of her that believes maybe I still looked at her emails. Right. Can I ask, are you getting anything from Adam about when he went to a drive-in movie theater and he found an envelope on the ground? What was in the envelope originally, Adam?

Don't tell the whole story, but originally... Nothing. Nothing was in the envelope. He went to the drive-in movie theater. They said, hey, we need $19 or $9 or something for you guys to come in to see the movie. He went back to the envelope, and $9 was in the envelope. You're absolutely kidding. No.

This is the most incredible story that Adam— No, this happened to me when I was 11 years old. He's never been able to figure out why. Are you getting anything from that? 11 years old he's never been able to figure out why are you getting anything from that well just my logic would tell me that the standard entrance price was nine dollars and so some mother gave for three people oh there you go yeah somebody gave their their they had their money to go to that event that cost that amount and that fell out of their pocket okay but what so it was a different envelope is what you're saying that's what that's the image that you're getting is that

it was i i'm getting no image at all you're getting no i'm just i'm just used i'm just using logic here what about who stole all my dvds in my old condo are you getting any that was probably that was adam oh you motherfucker steven how dare you yeah that was well this is incredible steven i i can't thank you enough for for being on the show this is these are incredible stories you uh uh i mean wow so so much background on this that you you wouldn't even know from watching the film just incredible stuff and your connections to radiohead and just amazing stuff it's amazing truly we can't thank you enough i mean you are truly a film lover and this is the show where we love films so uh you know this is going together like

peanut butter and jelly which is a you know a reference from our other show i love sandwiches um which also ties into my Broadway experiences. I Love Eating Sandwiches at Broadway is a different show that we do, but- Stinky Eggs. Stinky Eggs, that's totally different, by the way. That's a totally different show. But Steven, thank you so much.

Appreciate you being on the show. Thank you very much for having me. Yeah, thanks, man. We need to take a break. When we come back, Adam and I will just wrap up and talk about our thoughts about true stories. But we're going to take a break. Thank you so much, Stephen.

We will be right back with more I Love Films after this. welcome back i love films this is cocktail desperado which is a song that plays in the film i love i love no this is i love films And we're talking about the film True Stories. But I love True Stories. Welcome back, Stephen. An incredible guest, right, Adam? Oh, yeah. I mean, the guy is, he has stories. And they're all true stories, much like this. I mean, and strangely enough, that's what this film sort of covers is these kind of made up stories about people with larger than life things that happened to them in this tiny town in Texas, Virgil, Texas.

So he almost could be a character in the film. Celebrating, was it specialness day what was the the uh big celebration they're they're leading up to the celebration of specialness to mark the celebration of 50th anniversary of texas's independence um all right let's talk about the film uh came out in 1986 and uh did you watch it when it when it came out adam yeah i did but i can't remember if i went to the theater to see it i can't remember um because it was a big deal i know particularly through my brother which is where i kind of right figured out what was cool and not especially with music and through him.

We're not talking about music. We're talking about film. Right. But my reason for going to see True Stories would have been through Talking Heads fandom, which was through my brother. And so I know he was super excited and definitely went to see it. I don't remember if I went to see it or if I eventually saw it on VHS. I can't. Weirdly enough, when it came out, I was hyped for it. And I got that Time magazine, you know, where he was Rock's Renaissance Man. And I loved Stop Making Sense. And I think Something Wild came out the same year. And I love that film. And so I was like, prime person. I was in the demographic of people that they were trying to market this to.

And something happened where it came out and maybe it got a bad review that I read or something like that. And so I just was like, eh, I'll just skip it. And I didn't watch it until it was on, I think first on VHS down the line. And this is the third time that I saw it when I watched it yesterday.

So I watched it on VHS and then I watched it in a theater and then I watched it yesterday here at home. But yeah, weird that I just, I'm a huge Talking Heads fan, but also the record came out and wasn't that big of a hit. And so I think I just kind of skipped it. Plus, look, I'm in high school and the hormones are raging. kind of skipped it. Plus, look, I'm in high school and the hormones are raging. And I, you know, and I'm just like far more interested in, I was going to say girls and cars, but really it's just drama and comic books. But the weird thing is I remember really being into the album and the movie in the summer of 87. So that must mean that i saw on vhs vhs and it seemed like it was really absorbing into culture that summer as well like the songs were still on mtv the movie

was kind of affecting culture a little bit it must have been like a vhs thing it took a while to marinate well the videos that they made i think three videos out of it which were all and they're all kind of in the movie too like or at least portions of them are in the movie um so yeah so i've seen it three times at this point and had probably three different experiences with it each time because each of them were maybe a decade apart. I saw it in probably the early 90s on VHS. For the first time. For the first time. And I think I was relatively underwhelmed by it

the first time I watched it. The second time I watched it was in a theater I hosted probably 10 years ago, 11, 12 years ago, I hosted a series of film screenings at a local theater, Santa Family, where I would have comedians pick their favorite films and would interview them about them, usually before the film, before people watched it. And Tim and Eric, Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim, picked True Stories. And they, it's their favorite film.

And what I didn't know was that it has totally influenced their work and their aesthetic. Yeah. So I watched it then. This is a decade ago. And again, was relatively underwhelmed by it for whatever reason. And then this time when I watched it yesterday, maybe my expectations were different or something. But I had a much more.

Also, it was during the day when, you know, I'm not sitting there in a theater wanting to be entertained or something but i had a much more also it was during the day when you know i'm not sitting there in a theater wanting to be entertained or something i was just kind of like watching it it was a much more pleasant experience for me in what what do you mean like you you thought it was better or funnier or more interesting i thought it i thought it was way more interesting this time than before when i was maybe a little more impatient for it like this time it's languid pace essentially you know the film doesn't have much in the in in terms of narrative structure no it's a it's a bunch it's a bunch of vignettes strung together and uh i was watching the best of and and i guess mr burns before he um approached beth henley and and steven he tried to get the writer of nashville uh

robert altman's nashville to write it and she uh took a look at all of his pictures similarly to what steven and beth did and um instead she said, you don't need someone to write it. You should just write it yourself. But she did give him a little piece of advice, which was, he said, well, how did you get all these stories in Nashville? They're all separate stories. How did you get them to work together?

And she said, well, in Nashville, we found that emotion would connect the scenes. So not necessarily storytelling where in one scene something happens and then you continue to tell the story in the next scene with a bunch of different characters but the emotions were the same and so it made it all make sense somehow and that's and that's what he was trying to do here in true stories which i thought was interesting i don't know what it was about it yesterday but but I was far more receptive to it and far more in the mood for it. And the whole aesthetic I found now a little more charming.

Maybe I've been too cynical in the past for it, but it definitely doesn't feel like a film where Mr. Burns is making fun of small town Texas people. It seems a little more like a gentle, like affectionate. Yes. Whereas I think even with like Tim and Eric stuff, it straddles the line of like use because the,

the, the things that are similar with Tim and Eric's work in the aesthetic are using real people as actors, um, and using eccentric weirdos as actors yeah and i think their work always straddles the line of like making fun of the people and being a celebration of the people but which i'm always a little like i don't know but um but for true stories i definitely felt like it was it was uh on the side of affectionate this time that's it huh no i mean that's that's interesting because i thought it was

certainly on the side of of making fun yeah but not in a not in a totally sort of derogatory way i feel like it was it's particularly for the time it was it was uh i think it ended up being really influential as far as look at how ridiculous this is and the celebration of american-ness and it definitely does feel like a new york artist Examining Americana in a way, but, and I think a lot of it at the time is a little dated to, to sort of these observations that now feel well-worn. Like,

especially at the time. I remember at the time being sick of everyone. The hot dogs. What? The hot dogs and the hot dog buns. That's like a standard comedian's riff. Yeah. They talk about, oh, why are hot dogs sold in packs of 10

and hot dog buns are sold in packs of 12? You know, that's like a standard stand-up comedian. Yeah, like losing the socks in the dryer. But I was thinking that at the time even, I was sick of everyone having to comment on televangelists. Yes, televangelists. I remember that being so old hat in the late 80s that I remember when one of my favorite bands, Crowded House, came out with their single Chocolate Cake in 1991. in 1991 uh i thought it was the worst crowded house song i'd ever heard because it talked about tammy tammy faye baker and and and i was like people in other countries i remember being on

a crowded house message board and much like you on your rem message boards and someone in australia was like this is this song is so funny what are you talking about i'm like you don't understand in america we've had eight to ten years already of this shit like it's not funny anymore to us and the person the person in australia going yeah i guess some people just don't get it um and it's like no no we get it we've gotten it too much so i i understand what you mean the god the god i know isn't short of cash mister yeah exactly um so i i get it but you know what's interesting though i i did watch the deleted scenes in the making of on the the really exceptional criterion box set of the film you work for criterion um i do um i'd love to actually i'm angling to get into that closet i think if we mention them enough

maybe some of our listeners might uh start tagging them so that you and i can go in the closet look i realize you could go in your the closet by yourself they'll invite you there i just want some of that runoff some of those runoff blu-rays that i can get as being your side piece that'd be incredible um but but watching the making of there were certain things that they filmed that they cut out because Mr. Burns thought it was too cynical or too mean. And he didn't want to, like, there's a really, in the talent show portion, which is sort of the climax of the film, if you can really call something a climax in this film. But there's the thing they cut out was a local person who had put on a presentation of how not to get abducted if you're a kid. And so he does a whole like theatrical thing involving like actors of how if you're ever in a situation, what you're supposed to do. And it's really dry and very southern and and he mr burns cut it out because it it was too dark and he wanted everything to be more affectionate if that makes sense so i

for some reason the affection really shone through on this viewing for me it's sweet i think my main issue with it is that there's nothing in it that's that grounds it for me like it's all like swoozie curds weirdness in yeah swoozie curds not leaving the bed is a cool idea but i there was nothing uh kind of grounding it for me so the whole well also nothing there's nothing really interesting about her scenes necessarily she's she's just sitting there it's just she's well conflict is the essence of drama as we've always said on the show if you see a gun in the first act i mean and check off paging mr checkoff we found your gun oh my goodness oh my god um speaking of actors though uh john goodman i think it's a really they're all good spalding gray too i i love spalding gray spalding gray uh i loved what he was doing with his hands and in the making of they talk about how

mr burns talks about how politicians sprinkle that stuff in moderation throughout their speeches like almost like bill clinton with the thumb and all this kind of stuff all these weird hand gestures but if someone were to really focus on them and do them continually throughout a speech how weird it would be and that's what spaulding gray is doing in this interesting which is interesting but john goodman um essentially had done practically nothing at this point um but the casting director loved him john and john goodman he was i think he was on she was saying he was on broadway uh maybe in big river at the time and the casting director loved him and was like you got to see john goodman he is the lead of this and he auditioned once and and they said that both he and mr burns are both awkward kind of like personally and so they didn't hit it off and mr burns was like i don't know and she said well

i'll tell you what he's gonna do he's gonna come back he's gonna re-audition for you and he's gonna blow you away and you're gonna end up casting him in this right and mr burns was like okay and then he came back and blew everyone away and um it it really is interesting to see a film where he's just like really going for it yeah you know like he's he's he's giving 110 especially in the lip sync scene yeah he's happy to have a big role in a movie high profile gig it's really it's really funny this is before raising arizona obviously and he got in with the coen brothers before roseanne right yeah so that's really good but the other actor that i thought was really funny is the person who plays the lying woman uh joe harvey allen so essentially her story is that she's from texas and she she the casting director knew of her

because she did a one-woman show down in long beach about texas where she just played like crazy caricatures of texas people and and the casting director said to mr burns you got to go down and see her so mr burns went down to long beach drove down saw her play and was like hey i think you'd be really good for the the part in this movie and wrote down his number on a mcdonald's bag gave it to her she lost it and then but finally somehow like through the casting director got back to him and said yes i will do your movie and i want to do every female part in it and mr birds is like uh no no i think you'll just do the one part in it and she's like all right and just did the one but she like improv'd a lot of her lines and just threw in a bunch of crazy stuff to the point where she would bring in pages every single day that she had written, which can sound obnoxious, but they were so funny and so good, they ended up shooting them all.

Wait, which actor is this? This is the lying woman who's always lying about her experiences. But is that Annie McEnroe or is it? No, no, that's Joe Harvey Allen. Okay, Joe Harvey Allen. So she would just be in the background of certain scenes, like the scene in the church, but she would bring in pages and go,

hey, I decided I should talk in this scene and do this monologue. And they would read the monologues and they'd go, yep, these are good. Okay, let's set up a camera and shoot you. Which is just such a funny collaborative way to do a movie, which I and the fact that they loved it and weren't annoyed by it. No, that's cool. She must be like a local Texas actress because she's in all these movies that look like they probably shot.

And yeah, she's in well she's in a bunch like fried green tomatoes and and all the pretty horses and stuff but i i i think she she moved to la and was just like a weird performance artist who was doing stuff with slideshows and and stuff like that that david byrne really felt uh like a kindred spirit in a way and just like an eccentric almost like marilyn rice cub when i first saw her she was doing like a kindred spirit in a way. And just like an eccentric, almost like Marilyn Rice cub. When I first saw her, she was doing like a bunch of transparency, one woman shows and stuff,

which was really interesting. There's also Tito Lariva is in it who started out in the plugs, which was the band that did all the music for repo man. Oh yeah. And he, which was the band that did all the music for repo man oh yeah and he he went on to um score a lot of robert rodriguez's movies uh with tito and the tarantulas and um he sort of plays he plays steven's part in a way of he's the guy who hears transmissions from people's heads okay um so in swoozie kurtz we mentioned and then pop staples from the staples

singers um mr burns lured him into it by uh because he didn't want to do anything that was satanic because he's playing a voodoo priest almost and mr burns was like oh no no no no this is uh it's more of a gentle like he's a good guy who just wants to help his friend and so pop staples is like okay i get it so he's great at spalding gray of course the late great spalding gray is really funny and so a really good cast i think if you're if you go into it with your expectations of being like hey nothing's gonna happen in the movie yeah it's just almost like an art piece of vignettes that are interestingly shot then um i i i had a pleasant experience this time yeah i i guess so i i i agree it's a it's a cool like artifact um but as far as like a movie it you know it was it was great for the time and um i love the music and stuff but

right not uh not incredible not not gripping no but that's fine not like a film like the godfather oh my god no um the godfather or even and this is controversial but godfather part two that's a great film but surely not better than godfather one i don't know see that's the thing what's a sequel being better than the original people usually think of sequels as being inferior but i'll put it out there that godfather 2 might even be better than the first one that is a a controversial hot take. I don't know that I agree, but you're getting me to think about it in a totally different way. I appreciate it.

I know that it's a crazy thing to say. And part three too, maybe even better than the first two. Better than both of them combined, I think. Absolutely. And Godfather 4, even though it's never been made, maybe that would be better.

Well, some films could be considered Godfather 4. Sure. You know what I mean? If you really look at it, you know, in a certain way, like the adventures of Lava Girl and Shark Boy in 3D. I was going to say the Jason Segel Muppets. Yeah. The Jonathan Livingston Segel.

Absolutely. The Segel, the Chekhov play. Yeah, Chekhov. Speaking of, hey, Chekhov, we're talking about your Segel. seagull absolutely um the seagull the checkoff play your checkoff speaking of hey check off we're talking about your seagull calling checkoff's gun um yeah so you know mr burns got uh as as they say on the show that i mentioned uh when we were talking to demi at did you ebay uh we were both on um our friend's show called Blank Check. Griffin and David have a show called Blank Check where they talk about the blank check

that certain directors get to make whatever they want at a certain point. Mr. Burns, after the success of Stop Making Sense, I think they've mentioned that he got his blank check of where, all right, here's $3 million. Just go make what you want yeah and uh he cashed that check and and you know i don't know that he never got another chance to make another film or if he just decided to pass on making further films but i think this one wasn't

necessarily incredibly successful at the box office or the bo as we call it. Yeah. The Boffo BO. Uh, yeah, I don't, I don't know either. Although American Utopia quite successful, quite good. Quite good. But he did not direct that obviously, but, um, and he's never, never directed another film. Who knows why? Maybe he doesn't want to. It's entirely possible. He did. He did. He did. I read that he considered himself to be more of a filmmaker than a musician after this.

For how long? He never made another one. I don't know. I don't know how long that ended up happening. But an interesting, you know, this film is the reason why they didn't play live aid talking heads because he was he thought this film was going to be way more important than live aid and was going to make the band talking heads like even more famous and it did not it kind of like almost nailed put the nail in the coffin for them um which is what you want to do with coffins

certainly you want to put those nails in them so the bodies don't get out did they really you think it really like almost put the like broke broke up the band i guess i don't know about the personal personal element of it but i certainly think talking heads were no longer considered um to be worthy of the attention they were getting like the time magazine cover and all that because the album wasn't a huge hit so because the album wasn't a hit and the film wasn't a hit so it was kind of like oh all right well that that was a whiff yeah um so i think like this is the the right before true stories came out was the peak of how much attention the mainstream media or the lamestream media let's be honest um was paying to talking heads and after this it was kind of like okay we don't need to do

these major covers with them anymore all these like incredible pieces on them anymore because uh it wasn't a hit yeah um anything else we want to say about true stories here, Adam? I don't think so. I think that might be it for this episode of I Love Films. All right. Well, you know, until next time, I hope you see a film. We'll see you next time. Thanks.

Bye. Bye. Bye. Good ep. Great ep. Great ep. Wow. Longer than usual. But terrific. Definitely longer than, yeah, some terrific stuff.

Well, that's going to do it for this episode of You Talkin' Talking Heads to My Talking Head. Boy, we didn't talk about anything on this episode. No, but I think maybe we will next time, huh? Maybe we'll next time. Next time we're going to talk about the, it'll be our final episode. We're talking about naked or necked, as they say. Naked, butt naked.

We're going to be talking about Stephen sitting on that chair. Yeah, yeah. Sitting on David Byrne's. I wonder if David Byrne knows that Stephen rubbed his balls all over his chair. His balls fell through those little holes. He does now.

He's obviously listening. All right, that's going to do it for us. We will see you next time on the show. And until then, we certainly hope that you have found

what you're looking for! Bye!