Shakespeare in Love

Hey everybody, one of my favorite podcasts, Talking Pictures, is back for another season. You know this. It's from TCM and HBO Max. It's a podcast all about movies and memories hosted by Ben Manquitz and he gets to sit down with some of Hollywood's most influential actors and filmmakers to discuss the movies that inspired him. I've been on the show. It was the most fun and this season he is talking to people like Edgar Wright about pacing and montages in film and Rosie Perez about her acting career and how it kind of just began on accident. He's also talking to Pat Nozwald, Susan Sarandon, Hiramurai, who is a director who did a lot of Atlanta and the great new show Widows Bay, Sally Field, Tony Goldwyn and so much more. This season Ben and his guests are on camera so you can also watch Talking Pictures on HBO Max and Spotify or listen wherever you get your podcast. This spring on Disney Plus, 18 Plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. It is the year 1998. Do me a speech. Do me a line. Parting is such sweet sorrow. No, no, no, little problem. What do we do now? The show must. You know. Go on. The film Shakespeare in Love. Hello, everyone and welcome to. Yes, welcome to unspooled. This is a podcast about good movies, critical hits, fan favorites, must sees and in case you missed them. We've covered the AFI top 100 and now we are taking off movies from three major lists. The letterbox top 250 films with the most fans, the IMDB top 250 and the New York Times top 1000 essential films. That's right. Amy will also be chasing our own curiosity too. As we look back at an Academy Award classic, there's a lot of talk this year about Hamnet. Another how did Shakespeare come up with this style movie and this is the this is the parallel that we're drawing. I'm Paul Shearer, an actor, writer and director and I've never seen Shakespeare in Love until right before this episode. Wow. I'm Amy Nichols and I'm the film critic for Los Angeles Times. I'm a sucker for honestly most Shakespeare adaptations. I even will stick up for the Roland Emmerich anonymous one. Like it's a thriller about who really Shakespeare was. Oh my God, I remember that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, look, I'm all on board and if people are unfamiliar, this was a very controversial Academy Award win. Did it deserve to win? We're going to get into all of that. Is it just a good movie? We'll talk about it all, but let's first set the stage. The year is 1998 and a comedy about a drama has spent the decade at the center of some major drama, both offstage and soon onstage at the Oscars. Yeah, let's rewind to the start of the 90s. Director Edwards Vick is becoming a big name. He's recently made the movie Glory that majorly launched Dental Washington. Morgan Freeman. He's also co-created the TV show 30 something. My parents were obsessed with 30 something. Oh my gosh, I had to watch it. I hated it. I was like, oh, why do I have to watch 30 something? I love Timothy Busfield. I've never seen it. I've wondered while he's working on 30 something, this writer named Mark Norman comes up and pitches him on a story that is Hollywood meets Elizabeth in England. William Shakespeare is just another struggling writer director. That's right. And Zwick, who was an English major in college, likes this idea and he wants to direct it. The script really doesn't feel Shakespeare. It's not witty and clever. This doesn't feel alive. But Zwick once directed a college production of the comedy, Rose and Cranston Guildenstern are dead. You know, that's a Hamlet joke. So he flies to London to convince the author of that, Tom Stoppard, to rewrite this draft. And Tom Stoppard says, I'll do it for a million dollars. In Universal, the studio says, uh, no. By the way, Amy, did he do that dressed as Dr. Evil? Honestly, a million dollars. Thank you. Well, anything Tom Stoppard says sounds brilliant. So maybe it also you can come up with zingers like that. Rumor is Tom Stoppard also helped rewrite, uh, Revenge of the Sith. Wow. I mean, Tom Stoppard. Where's it? Return of the Sith. Turn. Revenge of the Sith. One of the Sith. One of the Sith. He's got a lot of Sith in him. Ready to launch your business? Get started with the commerce platform made for entrepreneurs. Shopify is specially designed to help you start, run and grow your business with easy customizable themes that let you build your brand. Marketing tools that get your products out there. Integrated shipping solutions that actually save you time from startups to scale-ups, online, in-person and on the go. Shopify is made for entrepreneurs like you. Sign up for your $1 a month trial at Shopify.com slash setup. Welcome to Inside the Art House. The go-to destination for cinephiles and the number one place for art house cinema and filmmaker conversations. Each week, today's most visionary filmmakers pull back their curtain on the art of cinema, sharing how stories are made and why they matter. Hosted by Greg Lemley of the legendary Lemley theaters, a family that shaped the movie business for over a century and Raphael Sparge, actor and award-winning director. Together, they explore the creative process, the struggles and the triumphs behind the camera and the bold ideas shaping film today. From indie debuts, documentaries to international art house cinema, Inside the Art House dives deep into a world where passion meets craft and where the love of film lives loud. Inside the Art House, conversations with today's most visionary filmmakers. Listen or watch wherever you get your podcasts. Unspoiled. Someone is going to pay Tom a million dollars and that someone is universal. They agree to pay him a million dollars when the perfect actress says, what a period rom com? I'll do it. That actress, Julia Roberts. Now, she had just won an Oscar for pretty woman, a movie that we actually did on the show and she is the hottest actress in town at age 24. Now with this mojo of Julia Roberts coming on board, Tom Stopper being given this go to go ahead, he writes a script that is awesome. It's about Shakespeare finding his muse and a rich girl named Viola who wants to be an actor. She dresses in male drag to play Romeo in his new play Romeo and Juliet and Julia loves the script. She says it captures this crazy feeling of falling in love and Edward Zook is super excited. This he says is the movie that he has wanted to make his entire career. Amy, this movie is a go and that's the one that we're talking about all the time. Julia Roberts and Shakespeare in love. Am I right? Exactly. No, what happens is this movie gets going pretty fast. Universal builds a replica of the Globe Theater and then as Zwick and Julia are on their flight to England, he realizes that crazy feeling of falling in love is taking over his actress who tells him in the air that she always falls in love with her co-stars. And mind you, at this moment in Julia Roberts' history, she's just called off her wedding to Kiefer Sutherland three days before they were supposed to get married. She had a brief, passionate fling with one of Kiefer's Lost Boys co-stars, Jason Patrick, and now she's all heated up and she wants Zwick to cast one actor, only one actor, to play Shakespeare, Daniel Day-Lewis. So when they land in London, Julia sends Daniel Day-Lewis two dozen roses and a card that says Be My Romeo. And to her credit, I bet that version of the movie would have been pretty good, right? I mean, that pairing, this big film, I feel like I can see it, but here's the thing. DDL, he can't do it. And Julia rejects every single other actor as Zwick asks her to meet Hugh Grant, Rupert Grace, Colin Firth, Sean Bean, and his top pick, Ray Fiennes. And then six weeks before filming is supposed to start, she gets spooked and she leaves the country without saying goodbye. Yes, she leaves another man at the motion picture altar. So Universal shuts down the movie. They're out $6 million. Zwick gets other actresses interested in it, Kenneth Branagh, Jude Law, Winona Ryder, Johnny Depp, but no other studio wants to take over the project because they'd have to pay Universal $6 million. Okay, so now how do we get to our Shakespeare in love? Let's just say that probably some version of this happens. Gwyneth Paltrow reads a script at Winona Ryder's place and convinces Harvey Weinstein to do it. And Universal wants Miramax to give them use of Peter Jackson to make King Kong and the big studio and the indie studio make a trade. But when Harvey Weinstein takes control of this project, he tries to push Zwick out, lawyers get involved, lots of petty stuff happens. Zwick ends up staying on not as a director, but as a producer. John Madden gets hired to direct instead. And finally the movie does get made with Gwyneth Paltrow as Viola and a different finds brother Joshua finds as Shakespeare. And then the rest of the cast gets filled out with Gwyneth's boyfriend Ben Affleck as an actor named Ned. Jeffrey Rush is a theater producer. Tom Wilkinson is a financier. Game, Judy Dench is Queen Elizabeth and Imelda Stanton as Viola's nurse. Now most of these characters are real people by the way. And when the movie opens on December 11th, 1998, it is a big hit. Now this film cost 25 million. It makes 289 million and gets more Oscar nominations that year than anyone. 13 nominations to Saving Private Ryan's 11 and winds up winning seven of them, including supporting actress, actress, and of course, best picture. Today those wins have become very controversial. It's just sort of fashion will be like saving private Ryan should have won instead. Obviously. Who cares about that? But I do want to come on this podcast and you know, give Shakespeare and Love a chance to stick up for itself. And rewatch the movie for itself because I don't know, something tingles my spidey senses about the fact that people just think Saving Private Ryan is the Oscar movie over a romantic comedy when romantic comedies never get a chance to win at the Oscars. There's something belittling about that. Shakespeare and Love was the very first comedy to win the Oscar since Annie Hall in the 70s. But it is also re-worth watching this Oscar showdown because you can see when Harvey Weinstein gets up there to take best picture. Edward Zwick is there, standing there. He's been told he gets to speak. He's like, this was my thing. This was my idea. I got Tom Stoppard. I did all of it. And he's been told he's going to be handed the mic, but instead, Harvey Weinstein edges him out, does all the talking, and Edward Zwick never gets to take any credit. Wow. He's a little bitter. Brutal. Yeah. Brutal. I mean, but par for the course. You know, Harvey Weinstein, in many respects, muscles Shakespeare and Love to the front of the pack, right? Mirror Max is this at that point, not struggling, Andy, but cool indie studio. And this is their movie that they really plant their flag in and it opens up the next, what, 10 years of Mirror Max or, you know, roughly within that world. Like they become the cool hip place. Yeah. Period pieces, indie. That is what we consider to be an Oscar movie. Hamnit comes into this as a front runner this year. One of the major front runners, I think because it is a Shakespeare indie. And now watching this movie with fresh eyes, with no like baggage attached to it. I don't care that it won the Oscar, but man, oh man, besides having great actors in it, this is a very slight, fun movie. I mean, it's, it's just a very simple rom-com. I mean, and I love it. It's great. Fantastic time watching it. But I think I was shocked at how I was like, oh, this is it. Like, first of all, didn't even realize it was a comedy until I was watching it. I just thought that, you know, it was like a period piece. But to see it just as a pretty like old fashioned middle of the road movie was kind of shocking to me. Well, it's likable as hell, right? I think it's a sweet spot that as an audience member, I really like. Where you're watching a film that you laugh, you can smile, a little bittersweet, you know, shrug, but it makes you feel smarter because you're thinking, oh, I know that reference. I know that reference. I know that reference. And it's flattering. I enjoy this. I think it's a really well written script. Well, beyond being well written, it also has like the A plus. And I don't know if I'm looking at this with 2025 eyes or 1998 eyes, but everybody that I love, right? Like it's just a murderer's row of killer performers, right? So when anyone is on screen, you're like, yep, I love them. Great. What are they doing? I'm on board. The only person that should have been in this that was missing is Rowan Atkinson. Like, why doesn't he have a part in this? I don't understand why I need to go back and get him in this movie. Yeah, he definitely could have been like one of the clown figures of the person playing the nurse, right? Absolutely. I would have loved it. Yeah. But I mean, but it has that also thing that we love from our Oscar movies, which is, oh, it's just about the movie industry. Right. Of course. There it is. I didn't even think about that. But you're right. This is a movie about a writer and an actor in a theater company and putting on a show. It's a big ensemble film. Like I literally was thinking about waiting for Guffman while watching it, right? It has that same kind of vibe to it. It does. It does. I was thinking about that and I was thinking about the movie we just saw, Uncut Gems. That's what we talked about last week. I mean, you have kind of that energy here. The guy who runs this theater company, the guy who is played by Jeffrey Rush, who is a real character in history, Phillip Henslow. A lot of what we know about the theater of Shakespeare's Day comes from the diaries of Phillip Henslow. He wrote a diary that was like, here's what I paid for this. Here's what this costs. Here's what our sets cost. Oh, I just wrote this, this playwright and I said, make me a sequel. Your last one was really good. He is a prototypical theatrical producer like you'd find in Hollywood. And so courtesy of him, we know a lot about Shakespeare's period. And I love that we have him in this play, though, as a guy who's like, oh, I'm short on money. I'm short on money. I got this. I got this. I can cover it. I can cover it. He's basically Adam Sandler here with his literal feet to the fire being like, I will make you money with this new play. I have a wonderful new play. Put the back in. It's a comedy. Cut off his nose. It's a new comedy by William Shakespeare. And this is actually I was watching this movie since we did these two films back to back. I was like, what can I call this? Is it uncut stanzas? What is it? Well, you know, obviously this movie takes some liberties here, right? It's a historical fiction, but that doesn't mean it's historically accurate. And I don't think anyone is going to sit here and complain about that. Right? Yeah. I mean, Shakespeare's wearing a leather jacket. I think I could buy Shakespeare's jacket on Melrose right now. And it is cool. It is green. It's very hip. I mean, also the I would say if we're going to point at one of the big historical inaccuracies, Shakespeare was married to Anne Hathaway, not the actress, but another Anne Hathaway with three kids during this period. Right? Not that that matters, but they make a reference to it. Right. They make a reference to it. That if you have seen Hamlet already, then watching Shakespeare in love afterwards is very funny because he was like, oh, no, I hate my wife. Ha, ha, ha. I guess he did. I was a lad of 18 and Hathaway was a woman half as old again. A woman of property. She had a cottage. One day she was three months gone with child. And your relations. On my mother's side, the Athens. No, your marriage bed. Four years and 100 miles away in Stratford. A cold bed, too, since the twins were born. The banishment was a blessing. So now you are free to love. You cannot love nor write it. I guess he did. Yeah. Oh, yeah. He mentions that he hates his wife. He doesn't like her. I mean, the story with him and Anne Hathaway. And this is historical fact based on the very little we know of their marriage, which is nothing like what we know about Shakespeare and his first wife really comes only from like census reports. OK. He was married to a woman who was older than him. She was wealthier than him. They did have three kids and one of them died. And that's about all. And they did mostly live apart. He was most of the time in London. She was most of the time back home. Now, I do think that this is a movie that starts a little bit of a trend. If it's not a trend of things that get made, but things that are being written or being developed, which is this kind of a wink at the creative process. There was a script going around for the longest time that I loved about Hitchcock. Oh, they may have actually made it at one point. They may have been an HBO show where like Hitchcock goes through every climactic moment in one of his films, and that's how he, you know, writes psycho and the birds and, you know, in vertigo. Like it's this idea of it's like a biography, but also like a fun way of looking at something, you know, in this, you know, Shakespeare's walking down the street and someone shouts out a famous line. You know, it's like how the world inspires you. And what I do love about that is it's a love letter to the creative process. Is at least I see it, which is something that's incredibly collaborative, right? Not just like Shakespeare's a genius, let him cook. He's got this, but he is a person who is being inspired by every person. Everything happening around him. And this work is a sum total of those parts. Yeah, you could almost watch this movie where Shakespeare gets the idea for Romeo and Juliet for his twist on it from, you know, Christopher Marlowe, or he gets his lines from his new girlfriend that he's in love with. As saying that William Shakespeare is maybe mid, I wasn't that great. But you could also spin it in to say like he was one of the best writers who ever lived and he needed to take so much inspiration from everybody around him. Right. Because it does devalue it on some level. It's like, oh, every one of these things happened to you. Like, oh, she thought you were dead. And, you know, like, but again, who cares about that? I don't think this movie is trying to do anything more than create a fun farce that, to your point, makes you feel smart and you go away and you feel like I do like Shakespeare, but that really is Tom Stoppard, too, right? Because it's picking the right parts of Shakespeare. If you haven't picked up a Shakespeare player, seen, you know, a work of Shakespeare in a long time, everything here is the is the easy pickings of Shakespeare. Like you recognize that you you understand these connections. It's not that we're not going too deep with the references. Oh, yeah, it's it's the big hits. And I mean, Edward Zwick, I love that he got Tom Stoppard to do this. Tom Stoppard hasn't written that much in Hollywood. He hadn't before he passed away besides Return of the Sith. He did Brazil. He did Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. But Zwick said that Tom Stoppard. It's so good. But Zwick said that Tom Stoppard is to him the only writing genius he ever met. So if you ever do believe in writing genius, they really only think it's Tom Stoppard and in return, Tom Stoppard, when he won the Golden Globe Award for his writing, he made a point of thinking Zwick right up at the top. Well, it says, please wrap up in England. That means my flies are undone. So. I only have time to to thank the people to whom we owe it all. In alphabetical order, Ed Zwick. Sorry, Harvey. Thank you. No, I should say, as we can members this and his Oscar speech, a little differently that Tom Stoppard was like, and fuck you, Harvey, which is not what happened. But it's there. Well, look, this is a really interesting moment because. You know, Zwick is kicked off of his own film. And I don't know how you get over that, right? I've been in situations where I've had people like kind of edge me out or work on things, especially when you're creating something, right? Because in this moment where. You know, if you think that we're all working together, somebody can kind of run with something and then make it their own. And it seems like Harvey Weinstein was really good at that. And, you know, there are stories from a lot of the actors in the late 90s, early 2000s who tell these horror stories of Harvey Weinstein taking final cut away from them. And there's even a story that Weinstein tried to get Zwick off as a producer, which is even more mind-boggling. I mean, let him have a producer credit. You know, and when Zwick found out about that, he sends like a letter from his lawyer to like threaten Harvey. And Weinstein calls Zwick at midnight while like Zwick's father is like dying in a hospital and basically tells him and kill your whole family. You know, and then and then like and then then the next moment's like, I'm so sorry, you're brilliant. And like he's just going like he is a monster during this. He's mucking it up so much that there is this unofficial rule that gets put in place by the producers guild that basically it's it's called the Harvey rule, which stipulates that to earn a producer credit on the film, that the producer must have performed some real role in making the finished film. And so Harvey does the thing where he goes, I actually I took a leave of absence from my duties at Miramax to work on this movie. So I I am I am I am I'm a real producer on this. And, you know, people that were working at Miramax, like that's total bullshit. He did not do that at all. He just wanted to be a producer. He wanted to own this movie in any way that he could. Yeah, it almost feels like the movie itself makes a joke that if he was a producer taking control of it, he would have cut out because it's making fun of stuff like vanity credits, like what he was trying to warn himself into, you know, when they have that joke. Yeah. When the play bill goes up here for the production of Romeo and Juliet, it says by permission of Mr. Burbage, a Hugh Fenningman production of Mr. Henslow's presentation of the Admiral's men and performance of the excellent and lamentable tragedy of Romeo and Juliet with Fenningman, the other guy as the announcing he's the apothecary in the biggest letters. And it's not saying Shakespeare at all. So it's the idea of who really gets the credit for something. And I think there's a great irony that in this film, there are producers who are crass and rude and gross. And it's the thing that has always happened. I mean, the producer here, Fenningman, he walks into a brothel and he's like, legs open, everyone. A famous speaker, he kicks and legs open and on the house. Oh, what happy hour. And he's defanged only because Shakespeare and the other producers smart enough to know, give the guy a role. And then he'll feel like if I get on stage, then I'm great. Right. And that's exactly what happened in the awards for this movie. It's pretty mind melting. I mean, it really is. He can't see. We were talking about this with Uncut Gems. When Sandler's character is watching that play, he can't see what's actually happening. Like that play should be a cautionary tale to himself, but yet he's just kind of in awe of like the effect of vomiting coins. Yeah. And I kind of darkly respect the idea this movie just points out. Kind of that this is always how it's been. If you really dig into the history of, you know, the Chamberlain's men, one of the acting troops here, one of their major producer and actors was accused of rape and kicked out of the society. You know, that there was a lot of awful shenanigans happening around this time, that there just, that corruption is not new, it just needs to be consistently fought. And I actually admire that even back in Shakespeare's day, they're like, oh no, F that guy, he's out of here. Well, I think people want to take credit for something. And, you know, there's a Taylor Swift quote. And I'm going to butcher it. No, but it's really good. Shakespeare of our day. Yeah, she is. Um, where it's like people are jealous of your success, but not the work that it takes to get there. And I feel like when you see a story like that, that's what's, that's what you're seeing is like, oh, these people worked for a decade on this. You came in and now you want to own it. And you just want, you want the accolades. Yeah. One of Harvey's notes is like, this should have a happy ending. They should just get together. And Tom Sopert is like, what? I mean, if you want to hear like the full, full story, I'm sure you've already read it, Amy, but Ed is like, does break it all down and hits flops and other illusions, his book. Um, and it's, it's like a whole chapter on this, if not more, it's really interesting, but I will say this, uh, if one thing that Harvey gave us, the one thing he definitely put his fingerprint on in this more than anything else is Ben Affleck in this film. Like he wanted Ben Affleck in this film. He was a believer in Ben. Now this is before goodwill hunting comes out. So this is another thing too. Like watching this film, I'm like, oh, people didn't know who he was at this point or felt like they, you know, he wasn't, it wasn't like stunt casting, I guess. Well, people hadn't, we hadn't seen him in it yet. Like goodwill hunting comes out in 97. So they're making this movie before everybody knows what a big deal he's going to be. I think he's known mostly as like Gwyneth Paltrow's boyfriend at this point. He would have, I think, been a great Shakespeare, honestly. He would have been a fantastic lead. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And when he shows up, yeah, when he shows up as like this movie star, Ned Allen, I think he's fantastic. And I love seeing how this is a movie about also working your way around gigantic actor egos, the way that Shakespeare is like, oh, no, no, no, this play is, it's about you in your minor role. What is the play? And what is my part? One moment, sir. Who are you? I'm, I'm the money. And you may remain so long as you remain silent, pay attention. You will see how genius creates a legend. Thank you, sir. We are in desperate want of a mucuscio, Ned, a young nobleman of aroda. And the title of this piece, mucuscio. Is it? I will play it. And also when his character just clocks straight away that he doesn't think Gwyneth Paltrow is up to the role of playing Juliet, that song he sings just to humiliate this young male performer that he thinks is blowing it is stuck in my head all the time, all the time. Really? Gentleman upstage, ladies downstage. Gentleman upstage, ladies downstage. Are you a lady, Mr Kent? I'm very sorry, sir. I mean, come on. Doesn't that just rotate and rotate and rotate? I mean, no, I, well, my first time seeing it, it does not, but maybe, maybe it will. Ask me in about a year and I'll tell you. You'll just get a walk around humming whenever you see like your kids in the wrong part of the kitchen, just go, gentlemen upstage. All right. Ladies downstage. Now I will say this. This is a movie that kind of launches Gwyneth Paltrow into. Superstarter, right? This, this is the movie. This is this is her launch. This is her pretty woman, if you will. And there is no turning back after this. Like this is huge for her. And it's interesting when you watch it, because I think that she is. Great in this, but she's also in a sea of fantastic performances. But I really feel like. I wonder if this is also Harvey's influence pushing her to the front of the line as well. Well, I think she's been building this way for sure. I mean, we talked about her in seven, which was one of her first roles, but by this time she's also done Emma, which was a very big deal for me. Yeah, I love that. Sliding doors, another giant deal for me. And she had a little bit in a talented Ripley, which we should totally do on the show sometime. But this one, I don't think this movie works without someone like her. Because what I think Gwyneth really brings to Shakespeare in love is she does feel fresh faced, intelligent, clear eyed, ambitious and easy to fall in love with and rich. And I think it's hard to find somebody who could play that as effortlessly. I do think Julia Roberts could have done it. I think Julia Roberts seems, and maybe I'm too off base here, too southern for it. Right. I don't know if I would. There's something about Gwyneth Paltrow that, again, in a cast of a fully British cast, besides Ben Affleck, that I buy that she fits in that world. I don't know. Well, yeah. I mean, Emma, I think definitely helps. And she had her accent going. Yeah. And she has obviously done this before. Like, she has been there. And she has to have that face, too, where you could see her putting on a mustache and tricking people, which I think Julia Roberts could have also done. I think you're right. I think she could have. I mean, it's a little, I would say, maybe catty or unfair that people think she didn't deserve to win Best Actor against Kate Blanchett, who was nominated for Elizabeth. I think that that was considered the highbrow choice. It was almost like the highbrow foil to this. It's another movie with a big role for Queen Elizabeth. It also has Jeffrey Rush. It also has Josephine's. And I adore Kate Blanchett, but it feels almost like, like snobby. Like, how dare you let this grow when Kate Blanchett should have won. And also, we're not talking about that performance in Elizabeth. I don't believe we are. Like, years later, that might have been, you know, she's also up against Meryl Streep. Right? She was, but nobody ever expects Meryl to win because she's so good. She just always gets nominated. But I like the populace of, I mean, I think you're right. People don't rewatch Elizabeth. And I think sometimes where I really come from when we talk about the awards is I want the Oscars to represent movies that people want to go see and not just in like a lowest common denominator, obviously, Zootopia should win. I just want the major studios and the major playmakers and our movie stars to throw their weight behind making intelligent, big stuff. I 100% agree. And I think that, you know, whenever anything becomes too popular, there's always a revolt against it. And like you said, Gwyneth has put in her time. She's chased down this part. She's gotten in there. She has fought for the right choices here. You know, she was known to to really fight for what she believes in because, you know, there's these moments. And I think a lot of this stuff came out because she was one of the first people to speak out against Harvey Weinstein. And as a result of that, I think people feel comfortable to tell these stories at these fights that she had. And even like, I think Blythe Danner even said like, oh, yeah, I would hear her on the phone with him and she would stand up to him. You know, he was difficult. She had this fraught relationship with him. And she talks about this moment, you know, when she's up on stage giving this acceptance speech, you know, she she she thanks, you know, Harvey, like in a way that's that is incredibly effusive and, you know, and believes that that support was so important. But she also felt like at that moment was when everyone turned on her. Like she felt like people were rooting for her. And then it all turned. So she gets her this launch moment and kind of walks off stage feeling like, oh, now you hate me. It's the opposite of the Sally Field moment. Right now, we don't like her as much. And I don't know if people are using they don't like Harvey or they don't like that Harvey like snuck in here and push this movie forward. And that she becomes a part of that because everything on screen, you're right. She's a great comedic leading actress. She is funny. She is beautiful. She's great. She nails everything. There's no reason to hate her. But that crying on stage, I think becomes like a joke. And all of a sudden she is, you know, just, you know, I think it's this tough moment for her because where does she go next? I mean, I really hate it that one bad person can cast a shadow over an entire production like this. I do feel like this is something that will come up all the time. Whatever you talk about a great movie, the way that even recently when we were honoring Diane Keaton, I was like, I want to talk about Annie Hall as a Diane Keaton film. Right. You know, that's her. If we take Annie Hall out of out of the cannon, we lose that performance. And I'm not willing to sacrifice her because somebody else is an asshole. And, you know, we're even talking about how Harvey Weinstein had so little to do with this movie in a way, in actual real practical ways that the producers of Gildeeven had to get involved. But that shadow that he casts looming over her, it's hard. And it's, it almost adds a layer to the fact that this is a movie about people working within a system and the powerful people who are controlling it. You know, here you have the master of revels who's like controlling whether or not playhouses can even be open based on the plague ostensibly. But then he's really like, oh, it's just because I kind of want to bone this guy's girlfriend. And if I say that the theaters are open, then he'll be gone and I can get into her bedroom and I can just like cancel plays when I'm mad at people. And when you work inside a system like that, how do you play along? You know, or play along even makes it sound like you agree. Just how can you put work out there when there are bad people in charge? Well, and I think that sometimes a bad person can, you know, suck up all the oxygen. You're right. It's it's it's ceases to become about the the ingredients. And especially when that bad person is a criminal, but also on top of it is making enemies along the way. And there's all this kind of press that recently came out with Gwyneth Paltrow talking about this movie because she's doing press for Marty Supreme. And she's like, I hid my Academy Award. I was embarrassed by it. I, I felt like. Now I, you know, I achieved this thing. And where do I go? I didn't know if the work was good. I couldn't even watch the film. And she said like only recently within like the last like couple of years, like her husband was watching it. And she walked into the room and she sat and watched a couple of scenes. And she's like, you know what? This is actually pretty good. It stands up to the test of time. But you also see how at 26 years old, she gets this part that she wants. She nails this part. She gets the highest accolade for this part. And now her life has changed because now she's under public scrutiny. People are like, well, are you actually good? Or are you just like one of Harvey's people or whatever it is? Whatever she's carrying with her, everything becomes now. What will she do next? And will it be as good? And I do think that, you know, hearing her talk in the last couple of months, I was like, wow. I don't think about that pressure, especially I think we do that a lot with women. Like of winning an award like that. Maybe it's great that Meryl Streep is never won. Rarely or we feel like she wins too much. But, you know, I feel like within that this movie, there's almost this way of putting up a fight about how to get better roles for women, right? Because this is a film that starts with Shakespeare basically saying like, my boner is my creativity. Or he's like sitting down with that like old therapist who is like a priest of the psyche. Right? And Tom Sopert is clearly having fun likening Jenna Taylor to the act of writing. It's as if my quill is broken. As if the organ of my imagination has dried up. As if the proud tower of my genius has collapsed. Interesting. Nothing comes. Most interesting. It's like trying to pick a lot with a wet herring. Tell me, are you lately humbled in the act of love? How long has it been? But the Shakespeare's first inspiration for this character is a woman who's just sort of bopping around, seems friendly, sleeping with everybody, whatever. She's a very different personality than the actual one he falls in love with, Gwyneth Paltrow, who like sticks up in male disguise for men who write roles that just over fantasize of women that aren't really about what a real woman is like. Remember when they're in that boat together as they're rowing across in this like water taxi? Eddie's talking about her sweet pipins or something and she's like, you're just writing fantasies. Tony is... is she beautiful? Well, Thomas, if I could write the beauty of her eyes, I was born to look in them and know myself. And her lips? Her lips? The early morning rose would wither on the branch if it could feel envy. And her voice like lark's song? Deeper, softer. None of your twittering larks. I would banish nightingales from my garden before they interrupt her song. Oh, she sings too? Constantly, without doubt, and plays the lute. She has a natural ear and a bosom. Did I mention her bosom? What of her bosom? Oh, Thomas. A pair of pipins as round and rare as golden apples. I think the lady is wise to keep your love at a distance. For what lady could live up to it? Close to when her eyes and lips and voice may be no more beautiful than mine. And I love that because it's like you have to engage in order to pull things in a better direction, right? Right. Like you should go to just slap them and be like, I never work with this guy again. I'm out of here. But she's like, let's do a better thing. Let's create a better thing. And then at the end of the movie, he's basically writing, all of my heroines for all time will be her. And I think Shakespeare does write really great women, you know, characters who are like, they can be evil and strong and smart. Merchant of Venice ends with a speech by the female character of Portia that I think is one of the most powerfully written intelligent arguments of all time. And so maybe he didn't need a girlfriend to teach him that. But like, I like that in here we see his evolution. Yeah, absolutely. You know, talking about great female performances in this, we have to talk about the other award winning female performance, which is best supporting actress Judy Dench, who is on screen for what? Seven, eight minutes of this movie. But she really makes the most of them, doesn't she? Oh, apps. Yeah, I wasn't even slamming it, but more than like, wow, she this is where she comes in. And I feel like when you first see her in the film, the movie kicks into another gear in the way that I was like, OK, I like this. This is fine. But then there's some real stakes added to it. It is the shortest amount of screen time in regards to winning an Oscar. I believe it like, oh, here it is. Her actual screen time is five minutes and 52 seconds. Because it really feels like at least 15. Yeah. And Beatrice Straight in network one, one with five minutes and two seconds. But who did she beat? Kathy Bates in primary colors. Sure, I buy that. Rachel Griffiths in Hillary and Jackie, Lynn Redgrave in Gods and Monsters, which is a great performance, and Brenda Blython in Little Voice. And, and, you know, I think that I think she got it. I think she deserves it. I think this is like one of those things where, you know, sometimes best supporting actress is an interesting category for the Oscars. It's where you get the Marisa Tomei win. It's it's kind of like supporting actors is where the Academy feels like really loose. You don't know what you're going to get from it, you know. And. And again, to your point earlier, she wins for playing Queen Elizabeth. And that's the same year that Kate Blanchett, like we said, is playing Queen Elizabeth. Yeah. And she really comes in feeling so regal, doesn't she? It's not like she's immediately like flawless and immaculate and like mannequin perfect. She's falling asleep and she has a stupid laugh and she's like just yelling and heckling. She's really into dogs, but she carries herself like she knows that she's a complete command and you believe it. I mean, the way that she dresses down Gwyneth Paltrow in front of her, it just like when in front of everybody, you get this sense that like not only is the Queen completely in charge of every scenario, she kind of sees herself, I think, as like a proto standup, right? Like she's kind of. Yes. Kicking up for the crowd, dropping quips. She's really into performance. You are the one who comes to all the plays at Whitehall at Richmond. Your Majesty. What do you love so much? Your Majesty. Speak up, girl. I know who I am. Do you love stories of kings and queens, of feats of arms, or is it courtly love? I love theatre. To have stories acted for me by a company of fellows, isn't it? They're not acted for you. They are acted for me. And? And I love poetry above all. Above Lord Wessex. My Lord, when you cannot find your wife, you better look for her at the playhouse. But why I really think she wins the award is because it's her more than anybody who gets to bring this whole thread together by saying, I know something about being a woman in a man's profession. She gets that last scene where she gets to set everything right, kind of like royal people even do when Shakespearean plays. But then make this film, I would say like the right tone of a feminist message where it doesn't feel like, yes, we're the girl Avengers high five. It just feels like this is how the world works and I will do what I can to fight to make it a better way. And not that she comes out and says like, I declare that we should always have women on stages now. She just says, I'm the queen. I wouldn't see anything bad. Therefore, I declared that this is not going to be bad. And by the way, it's sort of worth noting that it wasn't even like there was a law against women acting. I think it was more just not done, like saying don't put like a chimpanzee on stage. And it was about 50, 60 years after this that King Charles II finally made a statement saying that women will play all female roles going forth. But that's because he was a dating an actress. He had a secret mistress named Nell Gwynne. So he was like, get her on stage, get her some work. You know, and I think that there's something about this where the character is, I don't think it's like a cameo. It's not a cameo because, you know, she does create the most tension that the movie has. And she kind of plays this character broad, right? I mean, I think a lot of the characterizations in this are broad. I think that that actually separates Gwyneth Paltrow from everybody else and also Joseph Fiennes. Like they're a little bit more grounded, maybe melodramatic, you know, but that's more Joseph Fiennes. But she's broad, but it's like it's the what you need, I think for this movie to work, right? Because it's still funny, like that woman's a woman, that line, the walking through the puddle, right? I think that you are very lucky to get the fact that she's a dame. She's a dame before this movie comes out, a legend. And she brings that kind of energy with her. She brings, I am a legend here, even though maybe people at this time don't know her as such, but she brings that. Yeah, I mean, I loved watching clips of her on all the talk shows, doing the rounds to kind of build up support of her win. Because she just sits there like it's a throne. That looked like it may have weighed 50, 60 pounds. Easily, easily that. What's that like? How do you get into that? It takes you four hours to get into it. It takes you over two hours to get the makeup done. Do they lower you into it? No, I wish they had. Do they fire the costume at you and it hits you and you go, oh, I'm in it? I mean, how does it work? No, it's just, it's stretched on you. You know, absolutely. It takes three people to hold it, to carry it. And then somehow you're into it, and once you're into it, you can't get out. I mean, you could die, she could have died, and two weeks later she'd still be standing there. They wouldn't know. They would never know, especially with that white face. Well, Ed, to your point about her playing it big, I mean, she wears her finest spiky pearl headdress under a cape to go into hiding at the theater, right? It's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's great. But now can I ask you what you think about her quote, right? She says like, playwrights teach us nothing about love. They make it pretty. They make it comical or they make it lust. They cannot make it true. Do you believe, as someone who's watched a tremendous amount of film, that that is true? Well, I think, A, I love that line because famously we don't know anything about her love life for real, what was really happening. And so they do that she could be a judge in love, I think is maybe a tiny low key joke. But I think I want to stick up for plays that capture lust. I mean, to me, Romeo and Juliet became more interesting when I finally realized in high school that I didn't have to see it as a story about true love. I could see it as a story about teenagers my age who were just acting up and thinking they were in love. And I think he writes that really, right? Really well. And I appreciate maybe even watching Shakespeare in Love not as a story of true love, honestly, because they don't wind up together either, but just hormones. You know, fantasy, art, hormones, infatuation, that romance, I think is what this is. And I buy that more than true love. Maybe that's not really an answer, but I think I really respect plays that are also about infatuation. Well, I think that this movie captures an energy, right? Of falling in love. And that probably is the most easy thing to capture. But when you think about love, that's where you probably connect to. I know that movie that just came out this year, Eternity kind of deals with that. Like, would you rather be with the person who you had this, oh my God, this could have been amazing, or the person you lived your whole life with? Because it's a different type of love. It's that excitement exploration of what is to come or that comfort and that, you know, the positives and negatives of someone that you spend, decades with. You know, I think that that's harder to capture. I think that that's what's so interesting about that movie conceptually. It's like, oh, both are real. Both are true. Both are hard to capture. But I think the latter one is harder to capture because you either see people being miserable, but you don't see the love. And it's hard to see, or you see the couple that is kind of perfect and been together forever, and you don't see any of the problems. Love is complicated. And this movie is complicated and plot in the sense of like there's a lot of machinations going on. But I think it's so funny that Tom Stoppard writes a movie in which the conceit is playwrights can't do this. And yet he did it. But yet he's also saying, and I think I'm doing it too, right? Is it like there is a moment where it's like, well, Tom Stoppard is saying, he's not saying that Romeo and Juliet. Oh, I guess he is. But I also feel like it's a reflection on his own script. He's like, and I did it because you watch this and I did it too. So I like that. Because I'm a genius. You heard Zwick. I'm a genius. Yeah, I do think it's kind of interesting. And like just to call your own shot like that to write as a writer to write something saying, you can never do it. Oh, you did it. Now, we talk a lot about Ed Zwick, but I want to talk about John Madden, not the NFL great. But this British director who, you know, just directed Judy Dench in Mrs. Brown, you know, he did Prime Suspect, Inspector Morris, Sherlock Holmes. He is a staple. Don't leave out like exotic Mary Gold Hotel. Second best exotic Mary Gold Hotel. There it is. Proof is probably his best. You know, and what do you think about him and what he did here? I think he does a good job, honestly. I think he was handed something and directed it well. I think it moves really well. I think it looks great. I love that it has the fantastical costumes. I really enjoy it when a director knows that what we want to do is we want to go back into the Globe Theater and imagine being with the crowd of people, the groundlings eating apples and seeing a play that we know so well for the first time. Like, I'm not a huge fan of Hamnet, but to me, the best scenes in Hamnet. Besides that little boy who's fantastic. Or when you're with that crowd watching these twists of Hamlet being like, Oh, no, is he going to live? Is he going to die? And getting that here and watching this crowd gasp when Juliet comes back to life. Where is my Lord? I do remember well where I should be and where I am. Where is my Romeo? Dad! That's what I think he gets so well. And of course, he does my favorite thing that you have in an old fashioned London movie that we talked about in the Muppets, throwing trash out of the window. Love it. Ugh, gotta fucking love throwing trash out of the window. Gotta get the trash out of the window. It's so good. Listen up. Huh? That means you. Yes, you. We know you're pointing at yourself. When it comes to party power games, we've got a place made for all sorts. From the experts to the drama queens. It's me, the JC. The finance bros. Look at those stocks, lads. We'll stick with slots. It's what we're good at. And not forgetting you. Yes, you, the one listening. Because at party power games, we've got all sorts of games for all sorts of trickles. I do want to tip my hat to Madden because I think he understood what makes this movie work, which is to what you said a little bit earlier, which is let's make it vital. Let's make it sexy. Let's make it passionate. Let's take it out of the academic realm, make it accessible, make it cool. And that, in my opinion, is why this film works. It's not inside baseball. You know, so many people, directors that Harvey was approaching didn't want to do it because they thought it was like, oh, I don't know. It's, it's, it's too much of an in joke. And I think what Madden realized was and why it feels contemporary, but not like Shakespearean is he made it timeless. And I think Shakespeare's stories are timeless, but I don't always think the interpretations of Shakespeare are timeless, if that makes sense. And I think he was able to merge the two. Yeah, like I think if you want to find your in jokes, your deepest in jokes, they're here. Like Marlowe saying that he's working on a play called Massacre at Paris, which the full version of that has never been found. So there's definitely some English majors out there pushing up their monocles. I mean, like, oh, the Massacre of Paris. I love that in joke reference. I mean, it also the people who are really into stuff like, oh, and John Webster, he'd come out and he would be like this new bloody gruesome theatrical writer right after the time of Shakespeare. I think they adore having him show up here as like the nasty little rat boy. I was in a play. They cut my head off in Titus Andronicus. When I write plays, they'll be like Titus. You admire it? I like doing the cut heads off and the daughter mutilated of knives. What's your name? John Webster. Okay, I mean, Paul, maybe you don't have gentlemen upstage ladies downstage, duck in your head, but do you have? I saw her puppies. I love it. I love that line. Where? There. I saw her puppies. I wonder, I mean, watching this film in the modern era, if there's also a little knife twist about the hypocrisy that nobody out there can even tell somebody's gender, right? They're pulling up the wrong person's hands. Oh, right. And then they're acting shocked about a person they weren't shocked about two seconds ago. That feels accidentally really pointed and relevant. I mean, absolutely. And what difference does it make, right? Right. And no one knew it and no one was any of the wiser. I do love that. I do want to talk about the ending. So apparently the ending of this movie was an issue. The movie tested fine, right? Didn't test great, tested fine. And John Madden has said, oh, we reworked and reshot multiple times after these test screenings. And it kind of led to this version that we now have. They didn't know what the tone should be, right? They wanted to keep the lover separate, but convey the sense of like love and inspiration. And have you heard the one ending that I guess like Weinstein pushed for, which I think is funny? What exactly was it? All right. So this one, I believe is on a region to DVD as well. As Viola goes off to the new world, her ship is wrecked as she struggles up on the beach. She asks the first person she comes to, what country is this? And is told, this is America, lady. So Madden was like, I don't like that. Feels not really poetic. And this is the one that Weinstein was like, we got to do it. We got to do it. But it was again, Tom Stopper, who comes in to save the day, which was let's end the film by suggesting the idea of the next film with, which is 12th night. And I feel like that, you know, I feel like that's that ending works. It works, you know, it feels to me like it continues what this movie is already doing. And you could see the sequels as we go on in William Shakespeare's life as he continues to fall into every one of his plots. Well, yeah, it's about putting the spotlight back on the creative process, which is what this movie is about. Not this movie saying that being in America is death. Yeah. And now Madden not win the Academy Award for Best Director, though. That did go to Steven Spielberg. And we, I know people don't want to hear me complain about this anymore, but I find that to be the most infuriating delineation of like, yeah, best picture, but not best director. And but you know what? It celebrates the whole ensemble. I do want to talk about, yes, there's a Spielberg versus Madden, but also the movie that's also in this mix that didn't win is Life is Beautiful, right? That's the same year. I think it might have won for best foreign film or best, definitely best actor, because we all remember Bonini climbing over the seats. And I was like, I was interested in that. You know, it did win one best international feature. I'm surprised in a weird way. I feel like if it happened today, Life is Beautiful probably would have won the... I don't know. I don't... Like, I know everyone wants to talk about saving Private Ryan, but I feel like Life is Beautiful was the other giant hit of that year. I wonder, I could see it getting an Amelia Perez takedown, though. Right. It's hard to say. It is. It is. You know, I mean, and it's a... You know, it's interesting because he's another actor who, I guess maybe that year we were just full of snark. Like, he was beloved. And then when he won, people are like, fuck that guy. Right? Like, it was an interesting thing. Like, we like, I think to your point last week, this Oscars season goes on for such a long time that people get sick of the person. Right? I'm laughing so much because I haven't seen DiCaprio out as much as I've seen him out in the last couple of months with one battle press. I'm like, wow. Most I've ever seen of him not in character, out doing interviews, making videos. And it's a thing where I get, like, after you're done with this run, you want to be like, I'm done. Get me out of here. I can't do this anymore. I wonder if this is a moment where everybody is getting a little bit of backlash here. Well, I think we keep going through these different stages in the Oscar evolution. I mean, this is the year that's really pointed to as one of the years that made it clear that we were all going to have to get into negative fighting now, where people claimed that Harry Weinstein was walking around town being like, eh, you know, say, private's fine, but everybody only likes the first 15 minutes. We're a whole movie. People want to watch our whole movie. This idea of like going back and jabbing people on the elbows. Maybe now we're in a moment where people are officially going to start being very sick of consistent campaigning, right? Right. Where this could start backfiring. I could imagine a world not that long from now, five minutes from now, where like, it's the actor who plays it cool just as a few things and doesn't make everybody hate them that way. Well, I mean, here's the thing. And I put it in perspective. Harvey Weinstein spent $15 million on the Oscar campaign. The movie cost 24. That's unheard of at the time, right? Or I guess the budget was 25. And I do think that that's interesting to it's the same thing we see with politics, right? You know, this is, he is going out there like making his actors like politicians. Yeah, it's a campaign. And I want to say when we get sick of an actor, I don't even feel like we should blame that on the actor. I think it's not fair of us to be like, we raise you up, we take you down. Yes. I really don't love participating in that cycle. Right. I find it exhausting. I find it like it just distracts from what we're actually here for, which is enjoying good movies when they get made. And, and I think that, you know, we are putting this stuff up against each other. And what difference does it really make? Right. If people watch Shakespeare in love now, it's because they like it, not because it's like part of the, you know, the film world that we have to embrace. Like no one wants to have homework in this world. Right. It's really just a moment in time that we've embraced. It's where the cookie is crumbled. And I think as you get further and further away, you start looking at these performances, you go, wait, that one, that lost, that didn't get recognized. And I think the only award that you can ever walk away with is that 28 years later, however long ago it was, you're still talking about this movie and the movie is still good and fun. And you could put this movie on right now and I did and I enjoyed it and I loved it. I think that that speaks more to, like longevity speaks more than a statuette. Well, yeah. And part of what I dislike about the era that comes after this is I think a lot of those Mira Maxi wins that happen next, nobody watches them again. Yeah. Right? I feel like I got radicalized by doing our first season of Unspulled where most of the films on the AFI 100 list, there was a lot of overlap between what was great and what won Oscars. And then we've seen, I think, an increasing schism, especially in the 2000s, 2010s between what gets Oscars and what people want to watch again. And I'm just, every time that that shifts and those two things align, like I think they will this year if it's either one battle or sinners like they did when everything everywhere comes out, I get really relieved. It's nice to see something big and great, a Titanic, if you will. I would love it if we had more good Titanic's in the world. Obviously, Hollywood was like leading towards, you know, Spielberg winning or maybe wanting him to win. But I also love when the Oscars shake it up, like, give me these, give me the weird ones. Like, it almost makes for a more interesting conversation. And that's maybe what we're talking about is the Oscars are about the reactions, the hot takes, this shouldn't, this should have, like, we're talking about it and we almost get mad when things win because inevitably it's all great art fighting against each other. And you can make a good point why it's something else. Like, you're not going to have four duds in there. You know, it's about popularity. It's popularity contest. And maybe this is the new version of us, you know, from 97 on, that we are embracing it as a campaign, as a popularity contest and the art has gotten smaller and smaller. Yeah, but it is a bummer that I think the standing of Shakespeare in love has diminished because people think it wasn't a worthy win. I don't think that's fair because the further away you get from something, I think the less you forget that it was good or maybe you never saw it in the first place. You just remember it as being corny or that it is or dumber than it is or flimsier than it is. Our memories do not hold up to scrutiny a lot of the time. No, and by the way, public perception creates that too, right? It's like, that's the other part of it. It's like, oh yeah, she cried. We don't like one-eth. Oh, he was annoying. That movie didn't deserve it, you know? And maybe there's some that are right. I think when you look back on Crash or something like that, you're like, okay, maybe, I don't know. Or the big debate of, we talked about this too, dances with wolves and good fellas. Or Green Book. Green Book, of course, right? But I think it's sort of like, I think the Academy Awards wants to buck trends but also wants to play into them. And I'll be very curious this year to see who that person is. Is it Jacob Elordi kind of flipping the script on all those great supporting actors? Is it, you know, nothing that he's not deserving, but like that seems to kind of be out of, coming out of nowhere lately. So I'm curious. Well, you want to know one of the funniest fallouts from the movie Shakespeare and Love? Yeah. Okay, so Colin Firth is in this and he's great, right? He's playing this suitor who wants to move to America, who really wants to get into tobacco. It's that old, you know, storytelling trope. He's going to marry her because she has money. Her parents are going to make her marry him because he has a posh name. We get that really awful scene between him and her dad where they're just talking about her like property. If anyone is the villain in this movie, it is definitely this guy. And yet, apparently, one very powerful person watched this movie and thought he was the hero. Prince Edward, you know, Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Elizabeth II, her third son. Right after this movie came out in 1999, he got married and when he got married, he got to choose his title. And he was like, Wessex, Lord Wessex, that name hasn't been used in a really long time. I like that Wessex guy who is in Shakespeare and Love. So he brought back Wessex and now Wessex is his name. Nobody had been a Wessex who connected to the throne since like 10,066. Oh my God. I think that was the last time there was a Wessex. And he was like, yeah, he's my new hero, I guess. Why would you want to be called Firth? He is so clearly terrible. Well, I mean, it's a good sounding name, you know what? And we remember calling Firth because we like him. You know, I don't think of his character as that terrible. Maybe he's the same character as the guy from Love, actually. We like that guy. Do we? No, we don't. He's such a jerk. He is kind of. They're all jerks. Well, Amy, great to kind of revisit a much maligned classic, but I will say happy to have watched it. And I can't get on a high horse right now and be like, oh, I saved my private Ryan should have won. Our life with beautiful should have won because I did enjoy it. And you don't like saving private Ryan as much as everybody thinks we should. Neither of us do. No, yeah. I mean, I kind of agree with Harvey Weinstein that like the first 15 of prose the best. It is. That movie matters to people because it made them go home and hug their dad or understand their dad. And that has value. That has value. I'm not saying it necessarily has more value than this. It kind of goes in my category of movies like Dunkirk where I'm like, I respect Dunkirk. I never need to watch Dunkirk again. Yeah. You know, and it's like, and again, that's fine. It was an impressive filmmaking feat. I don't, but it's like sometimes war movies don't do it for me. And especially that is like, I get it. I get it. I don't know. Well, yeah. And I don't love that we assume a war movie is more important than a movie about like love and happiness. And happiness in creativity. And I do think that the unfortunate thing is that this should have maybe opened up the door for more films like this. I think, yes, we've opened it up to 10 films, but I like a show. I still believe that we should adopt what the critics choice or the Golden Globes do and have like a comedy musical category. Although it shouldn't actually be a musical category because then only the musicals will ever always win. Oh, but it's so screwy. All right. So if you were going to guess right now, sinners, one battle after another, what category are they in for the Golden Globes? One battle after another is definitely going to be comedy, right? Yes. And sinners, I mean, I imagine that's going to be drama. They put it in drama. Okay, we can scrap this then. You got it right. I mean, no, you don't have to scrap it, but I was like, no, I understand that because it's so fucked up. It's like, it's like, it's like, it's known for its great musical number edits in drama and one battle after another is in comedy, musical comedy. Because it's also because it becomes part of this other game too. Like, we'll put them over here. I've been a part of conversations. We have to submit people for different categories and like you game it. It's like, it's like, oh, I put the person here and I actually said they're supporting or they're not, you know, it's, it's wild. It's absolutely wild. It's a game. And I guess maybe that's what we're coming to. It's a game. So why, why do we care? Why, why rage about how the game got it wrong? If it doesn't mean anything. And that's how we say enjoy the award season. Wow. The only thing it means is it gives people a chance to ask for more money on their next movie. Yeah. Troy Kotzer, Wednesday Oscar for Coda, and now he's in primate. Hopefully. Wow. Okay. I don't even know what I want to say about that. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Is that a good thing? He's actually good. He's actually good at primate. The cast is actually very good at primate. The cast is good. How's the movie? The cast. Yeah. Ridiculous. Okay. You say comedy. Love and a bit with a dog. That's what they want. Hey, well, Paul, this has been fun. And you know what? I'm all fired up to talk about geniuses right now. So I think we should do another Tom Stoppard. Let's do another Tom Stoppard. All right. Can we do Brazil? I would love to do Brazil. I haven't watched Brazil in such a long time. I didn't realize until you said it earlier in the episode that Brazil was a Tom Stoppard joint. So all right, I'm excited about this. This would be fun. Yeah. All right. Oh, good. I'm really stoked to do Brazil. I really want to rewatch Brazil right now. All right. Well, let's do it, Amy. Brazil it is. You can find Brazil wherever you get your streaming films. And make sure you check out our sub-stack each and every week to go a little bit deeper on the movies that we talk about here. It's always free. So join in the conversation. Unschooled is produced by Amy Nicholson, Paul Scheer, Molly Reynolds, and Harry Nelson. Sound engineered by Corey Barton, music by Devin Bryant. Episode art by Kim Troxel. Show art by Lee Jameson. And social media production by Zoe Applebaum. This is a realm production. See you next week. Bye for now. The war is over and both sides lost. Kingdoms were reduced to cinders and armies scattered like bones in the dust. Now the survivors claw to what's left of a broken world. Praying the darkness chooses someone else tonight. But in the shadow dark, the darkness always wins. This is old school adventuring at its most cruel. Your torch ticks down in real time. And when that flame dies, something else rises to finish the job. This is a brutal rules light nightmare with a story that emerges organically based on the decisions that the characters make. This is what it felt like to play RPGs in the 80s. And man, it is so good to be back. Join the Glass Cannon podcast as we plunge into the shadow dark every Thursday night at 8 p.m. Eastern on youtube.com slash the glass cannon with the podcast version dropping the next day. See what everybody's talking about and join us in the dark. Just a T. New episodes every week. If it's trending, we're talking about it. This is Roxanne. And Chantelle. Let's get into it.