‘Eddie and the Cruisers’ With Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, and Van Lathan

Summary

The Rewatchables: “Eddie and the Cruisers”

Hosted by: Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, Van Lathan, Craig
Date: April 7, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode of The Rewatchables dives deep into Eddie and the Cruisers (1983), a cult-favorite music drama about a mysterious, Springsteen-esque Jersey bar band. Long considered a pet project on the pod, Simmons and company celebrate its belated streaming revival and dissect why this cable TV fixture became a generational touchstone. The group unpacks the movie’s music, myth-making, cast performances, and what it means to be a rewatchable film—warts and all—with their trademark blend of nostalgia, ribbing, and film nerdery.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Eddie and the Cruisers: Rewatchability & Legacy

• Cable Resurrection: The film bombed at the box office but became a classic thanks to endless HBO airings in the 80s.
  • “This is the biggest fuck-your-algorithm movie ever.” — Chris Ryan [04:01]
• The hosts reminisce about how the limited rotation on HBO led to cultural touchstone status.
• Sherman Alexie’s quote in the Washington Post: “The VCR turned movies into songs, into hit songs.” [09:05]

2. The Music: The Heart and the Hook

• Power of the ‘Dark Side’: The John Cafferty/Beaver Brown Band single not only defines the movie but actually cracked the Billboard Top 10 (#7 overall).
  • “It was the number one song on the rock billboard charts. It was number seven overall.”— Bill Simmons [08:12]
• Discussion about how rare it is for a movie soundtrack to take off so long after theatrical release.

3. The “Musical” Debate & 80s Movie Structure

• Is Eddie a musical? The consensus: Yes, if you count films where music drives plot and scenes.
  • “A musical if the music drives the story—a lot of people think it’s only if dialogue is sung, but here, the musical numbers drive story points.” — Chris Ryan [12:23]
• Love for "writing songs on the fly" scenes, which the film nails.
• Sal’s (Matthew Lawrence) lounge sequence gets special praise for "most effort put in by a supporting character."

4. Cast & Character Performances

• Michael Paré (“Eddie Wilson”): Apex mountain for him; great lip-sync performance, mysterious charisma.
  • “It’s one of the best... lip syncing where it really seems like he’s singing.” — Bill Simmons [12:55]
• Tom Berenger (“Word Man”): Could have been a bigger star, great physical presence, but film’s rough edges may have held him back.
• Joey Pants (Joe Pantoliano, “Doc”): Steals scenes, marks his ascent as a Hollywood ‘that guy’.
  • “He is clearly so good and knows exactly who this guy is.” — Van Lathan [25:52]
• Ellen Barkin (“Maggie”): Underutilized, iconic smoker, not fond of the film herself and vocal about it.

5. Thematic Resonance

• The myth of the "lost genius" band, stories of greatness cut short, and the aching nostalgia of "almost making it."
  • “These guys for like, 18 months had it, and now... it just doesn’t work out for anyone. I think that happens a lot.” — Bill Simmons [21:37]
• Film mirrors its own journey: a bomb finding second life and fandom via cable and VHS.

6. The Film’s “Space-Time Continuum” Problem

• Anachronistic Music: The band’s Springsteen sound predates its supposed 1963 setting by at least a decade, making for “Back to the Future” levels of musical time warp.
  • “Rock opera, 70s music... at sock hops in 1963? It’s like Marty McFly inventing rock.” — Van Lathan [29:00]
  • Debate over whether the movie could have just set itself in the 70s for credibility.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On why the film can’t be dismissed as ironic rewatching:
  “I’m 100% sincere with it... I love bands coming up with songs on the fly. It taps into something.” — Bill Simmons [21:37]
• On Joey Pants’s legacy:
  “We talked about how in this and Risky Business (Guido, the Killer Pimp), he’s a full-fledged that guy by ’83.” — Bill Simmons [25:39]
• Classic Rewatchables banter over aging & casting:
  “They don’t give a fuck about de-aging. Berenger is exactly the same age in every shot—no effort.” — Chris Ryan [48:57]
• On the “weak link” of the movie:
  “Doc’s plan of torturing everyone for the tapes… just ask if they have the tapes!” — Bill Simmons [56:56]
• On the enduring fun of movies with glaring flaws:
  “Wasn’t it better sitting down and finding reasons to like what you were watching?... You just had more fun with movies.” — Chris Ryan [36:37]
• Amazon and streamers skipping to next episode:
  “Let me enjoy the end of a movie for 20 seconds before you send me to Harry Potter Season Seven!” — Bill Simmons [61:42]
• On fictitious bands, top 5 list:
  • 5. Josie and the Pussycats
  • 4. The Wonders (That Thing You Do)
  • 3. Spinal Tap
  • 2. The Five Heartbeats
  • 1. Stillwater (Almost Famous) — [66:00]
• Zane Lowe impression re: modern Eddie and the Cruisers:
  “You’ve just seen your own face on Media Magazine, season in hell never even came to fruition, but you—what have you been doing, man, since palace of depression?” — Van Lathan as Zane [87:32]

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Important Segments & Timestamps

• Opening banter & why this episode matters: [01:22–02:57]
• HBO/cable rotation/algorithm talk: [03:41–07:27]
• Origins of the film’s cult status and the “VCR turned movies into songs” thesis: [09:02]
• Discussion: Is this a musical? [12:10–12:43]
• Michael Paré & “Apex Mountain” debate: [12:43–16:12]
• Supporting cast, especially Joey Pants and Ellen Barkin: [25:39–26:20]
• Anachronism critique—Springsteen before Springsteen: [28:08–31:16]
• Most rewatchable scenes rundown: [37:48–47:05]
  • The “writing Dark Side” roof scene: [39:52–41:44]
• Nostalgic 80s movie traits—smoking, ageless casting, TV displays: [47:05–49:50]
• Debate over what’s aged well/badly, especially for Black characters: [52:53–59:44]
• Nitpicks & “unanswerable questions”: [83:44–91:46]
• Who Won the Movie? [92:19] – Consensus: Beaver Brown Band for their music’s lasting impact.

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Awards & Category Rundown

• Dion Waiters Award (Scene-Stealer): Ellen Barkin (Maggie)
• Best Character Name: Frank Ridgeway (“Word Man”), also Sal Amato.
• Recasting Couch: Michael Keaton as Kenny the Drummer (hypothetical)
• Best/Hottest Take:
  • If the movie had two more great songs, is it as big as Grease? (consensus: not quite, but it’d be closer)
  • Craig’s wild take: Word Man tried to kill Eddie.
• Best Hang: Maggie/Ellen Barkin
• Worst Hang: Sal, constantly sweating and crying
• Apex Mountain: Michael Paré, Beaver Brown Band

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Final Reflections

• This movie is emblematic of an era when repetition on cable could turn a box office flop into a generational cult classic.
• The pod celebrates the emotional resonance of bands chasing greatness, the ineffable nostalgia of 80s HBO culture, and the enduring power of a killer movie song.
• Despite its dated quirks and unintentional hilarity, Eddie and the Cruisers endures because it’s both sincere and rewatchable—a perfect fit for the pod’s canon.

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Standout Soundbites

• “This movie is all buildup and no payoff.”— Bill Simmons, quoting Roger Ebert [33:00]
• “Let me enjoy the end of a movie… before you send me to your next thing. So you can bill your fake streaming hours to me!” — Bill Simmons, ranting about streaming services [61:41]
• “If we can’t be great, then there’s no sense in ever playing music again.” — Sal Amato [45:50]

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Double Feature Choice

• The perfect pairing: That Thing You Do – Another affectionate tribute to the mechanics and mythology of a one-hit-wonder band.

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Closing Thought:
Even if the timeline’s off and the rock authenticity’s shaky, sometimes rewatchability—and one transcendent song—are all a movie needs for immortality.

Transcript

[Bill Simmons]

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[Chris Ryan]

Absolutely.

[Bill Simmons]

And Higher Learning. And Higher Learning and the Midnight Boys.

[Chris Ryan]

You guys got to raise the roof when we.

[Van Lathan]

Is this like a. Yeah, this is like the thing you guys do for it.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, Joel invented raising the roof.

[Van Lathan]

Okay.

[Craig]

We investigated that on the NFL draft show and. And he's right. I believe he did invent Raise the Roof.

[Chris Ryan]

Joel invented Raising the roof.

[Van Lathan]

Didn't Arsenio hall raise the roof?

[Bill Simmons]

No, it was Joel.

[Chris Ryan]

No, Joel invented it.

[Bill Simmons]

Ringer Tailgate is like the. What was the album Michael Jackson put out before Thriller off the Wall? Yeah, yeah. It's in the off the Wall stage Thrillers happening this.

[Van Lathan]

I feel like it's like the Velvet Underground first record. Like everybody who hears Tailgate is going to start their own podcast.

[Bill Simmons]

Anyway, CR just came coming off CR Month. America was captivated.

[Van Lathan]

Where do I go from here?

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

America wants to know when it's happening again. You know what we did? We kept see our month going. We brought the little chocolates out at the end of the dinner.

[Van Lathan]

That's right.

[Bill Simmons]

Put it on the check. And we said, oh, hey, here's a little extra free chocolate. I know you already paid.

[Chris Ryan]

I thought, hold on for a second. You said we brought the little chocolates out at the end of it. I thought it was like, am I the little Chocolate.

[Van Lathan]

I'm like, what's happening?

[Bill Simmons]

No.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

Is that what I was saying?

[Craig]

He kind of gestured towards us.

[Chris Ryan]

He gestured towards me. We brought the little chocolate.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm like, wow.

[Van Lathan]

Bill and I were like, you know what we need for CR Month is like an amaro after the big meal. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Like a little after dinner. Drink. Compliments of the house.

[Van Lathan]

No, no, no. Drinks are on the house.

[Chris Ryan]

The house.

[Bill Simmons]

A movie we've circled for five years, and this is a victory lap for us. Because this is only a couple times this has ever happened.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Where we badgered America and the streamers and the companies to just basically revive movies that we love.

[Van Lathan]

One thing about corporate America is they listen.

[Bill Simmons]

They do Eddie and the Cruisers. All right. Eddie and the Cruisers. Best musicals ever.

[Van Lathan]

Grease.

[Bill Simmons]

Eddie and the Cruisers. And that's it.

[Chris Ryan]

There's only two drops off right after that.

[Bill Simmons]

Those are the big two. There's no even big three. It's a big two.

[Van Lathan]

All that jazz. I mean, there's a lot of really big musicals.

[Bill Simmons]

Eddie and the Cruisers.

[Van Lathan]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

Drop off, Chicago. I don't want some Oscars.

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

Uh, I. I know my story with this Van.

[Chris Ryan]

What?

[Bill Simmons]

I was surprised you liked this movie. Cause we'd never talked about it. And then you were like, I love this movie. So what was your history with it?

[Chris Ryan]

The film beat me into submission.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Cause it was on for eight straight years.

[Chris Ryan]

On so much. This is the biggest fuck your algorithm movie ever. Everything now is controlled by an algorithm. You get told what to watch. My 80s and 90s algorithm was just superior because they kept. It was probably not even a computer program. It was some guy named Jim that would be in charge of programming. What was on hbo? Some dude. Right? And they put this movie on until I had watched, like, Major League and all. That guy. From time till I had watched stuff with Ellen Bartlett to go, you know what? Fuck it. I'm gonna watch it. And then after that, I watched it every single time it was on television every time.

[Bill Simmons]

Same for you.

[Van Lathan]

I have a weird relationship to this movie, which is. I'm sure I watched it in its heyday on HBO when it was on in the 80s, like, every other minute. But I think that, like, if I remember correctly, one day I was in the car and I was like, whatever. This song is Rules. And it was Dark side, because the soundtrack popped off in the mid-80s because of the HBO revival of this movie. So I think Dark side. I was like, what's this band? And it was like, it's a band with a movie about it. But the band isn't real. And that blew my mind.

[Bill Simmons]

My background was 1984. Flipping channels and watched the last six minutes of this movie, including the surprise ending.

[Van Lathan]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

And I was like, huh. Week later. Watch it from the beginning now I'm furious. I know the surprise ending.

[Chris Ryan]

Think about how long it was on cable, though.

[Bill Simmons]

And then it was on over and over again. And I think it's One of the 20 movies I've seen the most of my life. Yeah, I know all the words to everything. I know all the scenes like. And I'm not proud of. It was just on all the time. We had less channels and they didn't have a lot of movies like cr. You have the HBO little Guides next to you on that little stand over there. They didn't really have a ton of movies because they only had licenses for whatever. So they would just rerun the same. Like they ran either the first or the second. Rambo was just on all three times a week. Yes. Nine o' clock at night.

[Chris Ryan]

Back to school. We ride to Dangerfield all the time.

[Bill Simmons]

So this was just in the thing. And. And the thing with music movies is, you know, you. I'll just watch this part and all of a sudden you've watched a half hour. The middle of this movie, there's what, 15 minutes in the middle when he goes to the lounge to see Salamato.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

That is just like one of my favorite 15 minute stretches in a movie. And I'm taking you back to HBO 1984. Craig, here's what they had boxing. This is when Tyson was coming into his own. They had the comedy specials because they had Eddie Murphy Delirious and George Carlin and some of those guys.

[Van Lathan]

Is Comic Relief around now?

[Bill Simmons]

Not yet. That's 86. Not necessarily. The news that started, which was their answer to snl, the Hitchhiker, which had nudity in every episode. Basically, the premise of the Hitchhiker was somebody fucks somebody else and then they die. And that would be the episode.

[Van Lathan]

Is there any hitchhiking involved?

[Bill Simmons]

Or at the end, the guy would have his little. He'd have his little fortune cookie thing. CR Thought CR Month would give him immortality. What he didn't realize is it would kill him. And then he would just walk away with his thumb out first and 10 with OJ they would have some concerts. Diana Ross had a pretty famous concert on there every once in a while. And then just movies. Lots and lots of movies. They weren't really making the original movies yet at this point. I think they had The Terry Fox story, maybe one or two others. So something like Eddie and the Cruisers once got in the rotation. That was it. But what's crazy is this movie bombed when it came out and found life on hbo.

[Van Lathan]

Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

Which led to on the Dark side, Finding radio station. What, And a year after it came out.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah. And the fact is, is that the band, Eddie and the Cruisers from the movie almost mirrors the story that Eddie and the Cruisers tell us. Where people are like, wait, what? What's this band? And like, even, you know, John Cafferty winds up getting like a cup of coffee because of this band, because of this movie. But, like, it's essentially the same story as the movies, minus the possibly missing Bob Dylan esque figure.

[Bill Simmons]

So you think John Cafferty should have done that? Tried to like 10 years.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

Been interesting, Interesting move.

[Chris Ryan]

But it doesn't just become like a regular hit. The song that goes like number three.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

It's like a gigantic.

[Bill Simmons]

I actually have it. It became. It was the number one song on the rock billboard charts. It was number seven overall.

[Chris Ryan]

Number seven overall.

[Bill Simmons]

There was a week where it was number one. The fix was number two. Bruce Springsteen, Lindsey Buckingham, David Bowie and U2 were the top six. Yeah, that was the level it was at. It was on all the time.

[Chris Ryan]

Consider that, though. Consider how much. I mean, obviously the song starts to get radio play and stuff like that. But think about how much the movie has to be on for that song. Then to make it from the movie into people's minds. Then radio then. And this is a year after the film has already. It's like that's almost would be impossible for it to happen now.

[Bill Simmons]

Also a crazy music year. It's not like 1980, cracking 1984 was like a real huge. That was like so many major stars at that point.

[Van Lathan]

I was reading the Washington Post, did an article about this movie, Staying Powered. And they talked to the writer, Sherman Alexie, who's this great novelist, wrote Reservation Blues. And he actually had this great quote. It was the VCR turned movies into songs, into hit songs. So movies that you could play over and over and over again. And that's basically what this pod was originally about, was about movies that you wound up just walking in midway through, maybe only sitting down for one or two scenes. I don't want to get up and go to dinner yet. Because this might happen in this movie. And that's kind of like what happens in Eddie the Cruisers is if like you're passing by and you're like, oh, wait, is. Are they about to go to the writing of Darkseid.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

Okay. I'm gonna stick around for. Watch them write Darkseid.

[Chris Ryan]

Interesting. What is the pot about now? C.R.

[Van Lathan]

well, it's just about. I think it's more about great movies. Right. Or movies.

[Bill Simmons]

But that was the initial conceit of the. Of the pod. To me, it's like there's maybe like five or six moments where HBO became, like, really part of pop culture. And the fact that it could take this movie that bombed and was nothing and turned it into a iconic, rewatchable movie for everybody who grew up in the 80s and 90s, that's like, up there with the Eddie Murphy delirious concert. That really, like, pushed him to another level. Comic relief, them having, like, real boxing. Like, I. I think I watched. I want to say I watched Cooney Holmes or one of those in 81. Maybe it was prior or Gwayo. Just fights that they would have.

[Van Lathan]

Just.

[Bill Simmons]

You would have to go close circuit. And instead they were on HBO and. And some of the comedy specials they had. But it just all of a sudden felt like it's like, holy shit, they're mainstream. When they got inside the NFL, that was a huge deal.

[Van Lathan]

It's kind of the model Netflix is doing now, right?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. And it's funny because I was going back and reading the perception of HBO in 83:84, where they were like, we don't want people to come to theaters. It was basically all the same Netflix dialogue we'd have 40 years later. Michael Perret in 2018, talking about this movie, said, the whole idea is to leave your mark on the world and impact people, to make them think. And in that way, I think the movie was pretty successful. We didn't get much of a theatrical run, but we've got history.

[Van Lathan]

Is that your Michael Perret voice?

[Bill Simmons]

I didn't do my Michael Perry voice yet. But this movie is so beloved that they end up making a sequel that for some reason, Van watched recently. I don't even know the sequel. I didn't like the sequel.

[Chris Ryan]

I'd seen it before the sequel. Just like, it wasn't even on as much. They didn't put it on kid's list.

[Bill Simmons]

It was bad. Eddie has a mustache in it. The music's not good.

[Chris Ryan]

You could tell that. Obviously, like most sequels, they thought, hey, there's fertile ground to continue this story. But they didn't think of actually a way to actually story first. Continue the story.

[Bill Simmons]

So, Craig, we've talked about this movie for five years. You don't have to Tell us what you thought yet. But what was in your head? What did you think it was going to be versus what was it?

[Craig]

I gotta say, when you texted, I didn't know what the movie was about at all. And when Bill texted us saying it's a 95 minute musical drama, I was kind of thrown off my tilt there a little bit. You and musicals I don't usually put together. I don't even know if I'd really call this movie a musical. It just has music in it.

[Bill Simmons]

It's not a musical.

[Van Lathan]

There's like eight musical performances are legion. And they are like we're doing the whole song.

[Craig]

Like, we're not getting like pretty much that full song.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, the movie.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, God.

[Van Lathan]

No, you go ahead.

[Chris Ryan]

I call something a musical if the music drives story. So if the music in the movie drives story, a lot of people think that it's a musical if the dialogue is sung at some point.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

But if the music, like in this movie, the musical numbers drive different story points. And to me, that makes it a musical.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, we gotta talk about Michael Perret.

[Van Lathan]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

This was literally the apex mountain for him. And he had a couple other at bats, but Eddie became his signature guy. He's lip syncing everything.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

And it's one of the best. I'm trying to think of a better lip syncing where it really seems like he's singing. The voice of the band sounds like his voice. He's got the charisma of a leading guy. The way he moves around the stage, really convincing. The only other one I can really think of is Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody, which won him the Oscar.

[Van Lathan]

I think Chalamet's pretty good as Dylan doing like when they were like recording.

[Bill Simmons]

So I thought he was actually singing.

[Chris Ryan]

I thought he was actually singing though. Wouldn't he?

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, I just mean like the way he moves around with a guitar and like, like.

[Bill Simmons]

But I'm saying Michael Prey never sings in this.

[Van Lathan]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

Like Chalamet sang Val Kilmer, who we talked about in the Doors was incredible. But he's actually singing. This is him lip syncing the whole time. And it actually works. It shouldn't work.

[Chris Ryan]

He also pulls off mysterious rock star. Super awesome. The whole movie is based around this mystery. That there was just more going on with Eddie than we thought there was.

[Bill Simmons]

Right.

[Chris Ryan]

And even in death. And for your first role, this is his first big deal, right?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

For your first role.

[Bill Simmons]

They found him.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. For him to be like, brooding rock star, mysterious guy, he really sells that really well. And if he doesn't work, then obviously the whole movie's fine.

[Van Lathan]

Being an actor in a band is probably like being an actor in a basketball movie. Like, you can either choose to get the guy who looks right playing music or the guy who's like the good actor who you can like, cut around. Like, I don't think I know Behringer, like, learned a bunch about, like, playing keyboards, but they are cutting around Behringer. They never show Behringer's hands.

[Chris Ryan]

Really?

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, they are. They got Eddie, like in full wide shots, like walking around with the guitar.

[Bill Simmons]

His guitar moves going into the crowd

[Van Lathan]

at one point, kind of mimic. Like, they're pretty close. Like, I don't know how whether he learned to play guitar for this, but it was. It looks pretty good to me.

[Bill Simmons]

I mean, he's also carries himself like the leader of a band. Like, you actually buy that he's in charge of the band. He's ordering these guys around. And the movie taps into. I don't know. There's some pretty cool themes in this that I don't even really fully know if they. What they were getting into when they wrote this. I don't know how much thought they put into the script, but about the concept of, like, how great can somebody be?

[Van Lathan]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

You know that, like, they're making these. They're selling out this club every night. Everyone in the band is delighted to. To be there. And Eddie's, like, pursuing something that's a little higher than everybody else that he's with, and that's really all he cares about. And the other guys don't see it. It's kind of cool. We've seen this theme in some other movies and TV shows, but I like how they do in this.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, it's based on the novel, right?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it is. And the novel's more of like a mystery.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, it's like somebody is like, did he get killed? Was Eddie murdered?

[Chris Ryan]

Interesting. I have thoughts on that at the end, by the way, but it seems as if from what I researched, the novel is, like, incredibly important. Like people were saying it's one of the best rock and roll novels ever.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

So there was some sort of Kluge,

[Bill Simmons]

Klugel, Kluge, something like that. I give Michael Perret two possible awards that we have in flex categories we never use. The Sasha Jenkins award for actor you can't believe didn't become a big star. And the Ted Levine award for a performance so good and distinct it might have inadvertently ruined his career.

[Van Lathan]

Ted Levine also on something Very bad is going to happen, by the way.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, really? Yeah. Were you surprised when you watched this that this was his peak? Michael Perret?

[Craig]

Yeah, I had that same category written down as a flex possibility. I think he has incredible stage presence. Like, his physicality is so good. When he's. The scene where Eddie's at the college and he's talking to the crowd, there's like that edge. There's a suspense where you're like, I think this could turn dark. He's angry and he kind of like commands the attention of everyone there and is holding you on that, like, edge of I don't know if something's going to happen.

[Van Lathan]

It's pretty impressive.

[Bill Simmons]

He's really good.

[Van Lathan]

He's good.

[Craig]

He's good on stage. The stuff off stage where he's just delivering lines, he's not as great.

[Van Lathan]

He's.

[Chris Ryan]

He's limited in that stage.

[Craig]

He's great.

[Van Lathan]

Director gave him hell too. So it sounds like it was like a tough shoot in that regard because,

[Bill Simmons]

like in Greece, Travolta is just really good. Like, you watch that and you're like, yeah, that guy's good at this.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

And that's how I feel about Pere. Except he's somehow not singing. And then you have Behringer, who you mentioned Word man, who did this, and Big Chill in the same year. The Word Man, Big Chill, massive movie. Like kind of a generational adult movie. He's with all these actors. This is Lawrence Kasdan, but he's also in this, which doesn't do well. And he's probably a little embarrassed by this one. And then somehow they both live on.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you put Barringer in the. William Peterson? Like, what happened? Because he. Both guys. William Pearson, of course. You know, I love William Pearson. Both guys seem like they have everything to be just like one notch higher.

[Bill Simmons]

So I would argue he actually delivered on some of that.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

Because he Platoon, he gets nominated. That's a great part. Someone to Watch Over Me. Ridley Scott, we love that movie. He's in Shoot to Kill, Betrayed, Last Rites and Major League all in like two years. Like he had like, I don't know, seven year run of like he was leading movies.

[Van Lathan]

Not unlike if you take the. The group of guys who was in Big Chill. You know, he and William hurt had really good 80s.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

And then started to fade and get

[Bill Simmons]

passed by the Costner.

[Van Lathan]

There's Gold Blue pushed through the 90s pretty much.

[Chris Ryan]

So that's what I'm saying though. I'm saying that like, I mean, when you think about it. The nomination for Platoon is a, like, big, huge deal. And he's fantastic in that movie. Like, terrifying. But Klein and Goldblum is what I would have thought just like, a little bit more because it gets to a point. Then he went. By the time you get to the Sniper era, he's almost out of. I love that movie.

[Van Lathan]

And the Substitute.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, he's almost out of gas and being taken seriously.

[Bill Simmons]

Possible he led a mildly hard life.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah. I mean, he's still.

[Bill Simmons]

He looks pretty rough and sliver. And that's 1993, and it looks like he's 20 years older than this movie.

[Van Lathan]

He's an Inception, which is a. He's an Inception. I haven't seen him much recently.

[Bill Simmons]

There's an amazing what if with him. Do you know what TV show he turned down?

[Van Lathan]

No.

[Bill Simmons]

Sonny Crockett.

[Van Lathan]

No shit.

[Bill Simmons]

Turned it down.

[Chris Ryan]

That straight up doesn't work in no way, shape or form.

[Van Lathan]

It doesn't work if he's Sonny Crockett.

[Bill Simmons]

I think he has too much baggage at that point because he's been in movies and we know who he is. Don Johnson had no. Nobody knew who he was.

[Van Lathan]

Right.

[Chris Ryan]

Don Johnson.

[Bill Simmons]

I think Barringer could have done it, though.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, man. Don Johnson is. He's beautiful. He's a little slimy. He's a little mysterious. Like, it's a completely different show if Tom Behringer is something.

[Bill Simmons]

Don Johnson's funny. No, you're not. You know, I love Don Johnson, of course, but I think Barringer, it would have been okay. Yeah. I always liked him. I always thought there's some Costner with him. There's some leading man stuff. Like, he's good in this role. He's good at playing a cop. Platoon's probably the biggest. I don't know, swing he took, but major league, he's just kind of like the good guy. Like, you're like. That guy's a solid guy. I trust this guy.

[Van Lathan]

He's like Kevin Costner with, like. With like a more like, weathered face. You know what I mean? But he can play sports, he can play action. He can do that stuff.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Tell you one thing. Yeah. Pretty incredible chemistry with him and Ellen Barkin.

[Van Lathan]

Him and Maddie.

[Bill Simmons]

She's ready to fucking hop on him in every scene.

[Van Lathan]

They're like four. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

She's just sitting on his des.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, every. Like, every scene, she's bringing it. She's not in the movie. For some reason. I remembered her being in the movie more than she was.

[Van Lathan]

I know. It's like she's in three scenes that seem to have been shot like, in a completely different set.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

You know, it's wild to go back to movies like this and watch it when like, everybody in the film is probably like. It's like, Matthew Lawrence is in this movie. He's like, got more screen time than Ellen Barkin. Right?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

To go back and be like, can you tell the Joey pants. Ellen Barkin and Tom Behringer are the ones that are really going to pop out of this cast.

[Bill Simmons]

Right. So he. She was in Diner in the year before and this year was in Tender Mercies and Eddie and the Cruisers and started coming up. The smoking is. I don't know when we're going to cover that. I don't think she doesn't have a scene where she does. Isn't Barringer's always banging A kiss.

[Van Lathan]

The only place Barringer doesn't smoke is school. Is high school.

[Bill Simmons]

Elite smoking movie. And everybody is like, really smoking. They're not like, don't give me the fake cigarettes. They're. They're sucking them down.

[Chris Ryan]

It makes sense too. Sucking them down while it makes sense too. Rock stars, the life they live, making them seem cool. She's pretty cool. She's a cool character. She's not in the movie that much. She's smoking at that time. That was seen as a little bit sexier. It's a character, a little something.

[Van Lathan]

Do you like this movie ironically at all, or are you. Sincerely, Eddie and the Cruisers is just a great film.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm 100% sincere with it. Well, it taps into something else that I really like. The. Well, I love. I love bands kind of on the rise and bands coming up with songs on the fly in scenes that make no sense. They're two minutes long and they come up with a hit song. But I like the concept of. And this. We did this a little bit in the Counting Crows documentary when it seemed like he did the first album. And then dur. It's like kind of goes off the deep end. And it doesn't seem like they're ever going to record again. And the guys in the band are like, I just was almost touching the sun. And now I'm just back to my life. Like, what just happened? And I like the theme of, like, these guys for like, 18 months had it and now it's like Salamato's at the fucking Holiday Inn lounge with Eddie Ripoff guy. And Joey Pants is drinking pizza in the locker room. In his dressing room. They're followed by some lady on the piano who's like. But I and the guy. Kenny's a blackjack dealer. And it just doesn't kind of work out for anyone. I think that happens a lot.

[Van Lathan]

Joanne's doing choreography.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. You know, I think when I watch the movie again, to your point, it is dated, right? I mean, obviously it's dated. It came out a long time ago. And even in performance, like, all these people grew so much as performers, like, after this movie. To me, like, the scene when there's a fight between Eddie and Joey pants characters. And it just, like, does not look real at all. It doesn't look like there's any real rage happening. It looks demonstrative. But the themes of the movie. And like, we were a part of this really amazing thing, and this was as good as it was going to get. And we really didn't know it. We thought it would go on for, like, a long time. And Eddie, his search for greatness being the thing that actually sabotaged the run of the band. That we see that.

[Van Lathan]

Or even, like the idea that Frank coming into the band and being like, let's do Rambo poetry and like, really get deep is what breaks it up. Because that's always like, one of my favorite moments is when Sal yells at him in the studio, like, we were fine before you showed up. It was you. We could have played Tony Martz, like, forever, you know, like, we. We could have just been the best band in Ashbury Park.

[Bill Simmons]

But instead, I mean, you could make this movie every 10 years. You could have done a hip hop version of this movie in the 90s and set it, you know, was said it was some group in, like, 1984 that self combusted. And we're.

[Van Lathan]

There's just like, the hardest thing to do about. In movies like this is to make the song or songs, but the song specifically, because there's always got to be one. A song that people want to hear.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. And this one has, like four, but

[Van Lathan]

it has one main one. And then it also has. And that's the same thing for that thing you do. Like, that thing you do has some good songs, but what you want is to hear all these different iterations of that thing you do. And the same thing with Darkseid. You want to hear them do Darkseid three times.

[Chris Ryan]

All you have to nail in a movie like this is the music. That's it. If you nail. It's hard to even conjure a film to where you like the songs, particularly the main song. And in some way, you don't respond to the music. Because if, like, for that thing you do, which I'm gonna talk about later, that song is so good, is so catchy, that you could see why the Wonders got famous so quick and why they couldn't recreate it because it was such lightning in a bottle. And with this one, they sell you on the fact that Eddie and the Cruisers are dope. And that's really all the movie has to do to create the mystery around the band.

[Bill Simmons]

Did you watch Daisy Jones and the Six?

[Van Lathan]

I did.

[Bill Simmons]

Did you watch it, Greg? Did you watch it?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

So that has some of the themes of this. Of like you're watching this band try to put it together. It's going back and forth and it's trying to do all the 2000s. There's slight mystery to what we're watching all that stuff, but for the most part, same kind of themes and not being able to keep it together.

[Van Lathan]

I get music in that too.

[Chris Ryan]

Heartbeats. We'll talk about it later. Like, a movie like that, they got a banger of a song out of it. It orients the whole movie.

[Bill Simmons]

Joey Pants was the other one we didn't talk about. Who has this. And Risky Business. Guido, the killer pimp in 1983. Goonies running scared, La Bamba and then midnight run in 88. He is a full fledged. That guy in 1983.

[Van Lathan]

He's also to my. My taste, blowing everybody off the screen in this movie. Like, he is clearly so good. And not only that, knows exactly who this guy is. I can't tell if he's wearing a prosthetic nose or not or if he's just really young. But he.

[Bill Simmons]

The hair is definitely a little weird.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

But he. He is the guy who's like, I. To your point. He's like, I had it for one second. Like, you bet on all these bar bands and you get lucky with one of them.

[Bill Simmons]

I struck oil, now I'm a DJ in New Jersey.

[Van Lathan]

And now I'm like sitting in a overhead lighting in an overnight shift at a. At a radio station.

[Chris Ryan]

So much so to where he pulls some Scooby Doo shit.

[Bill Simmons]

Right?

[Chris Ryan]

Like, the desperation.

[Van Lathan]

We didn't get into that.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Like trying to like, take on Eddie's Persona and do all of that Stu. It's like they sell that. They kind of create that. At the beginning of the movie, look, he's working in this small little room. Word man comes in. He has all of these ideas. Maybe we can be technical consultants. It's the first time I ever heard of a technical consultant on a Movie. Maybe we can be in the movie. And you know how desperate he is from that time on.

[Bill Simmons]

So I think my favorite Joey Pants in this is when they're on the roof, which is a great scene. And they're just. Frank's, like, playing that song and he's like. Can barely sing. And he's sitting there, he's like, side coming. He's just out and he's there laughing. And he's like, this guy can't sing. He can't write. He can't. And he just eviscerates him. But it's just classic Joey Pants. And you can see all the seeds for. Who's the Sopranos character?

[Chris Ryan]

Ralphie, Ralphie, Ralphie Cipher. It's like all of the characters that made him famous. There's a little bit of them.

[Van Lathan]

Markstone Bail Bonds is right there.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

Did you tell Jack?

[Bill Simmons]

Everybody's telling me to go. Myself. The Beaver Brown Band, we mentioned they were found by Lou Eisen, the or or Kenny Payne, the technical consultant for the film, who was Louise in the Executive, who's like, bunch of jerk offs. $10,000. Found these guys and they wanted the Cruisers to be this Jersey bar band. So there's some. There's some shades of Springsteen in this. I have, I think, was a bigger deal.

[Van Lathan]

Basically massive. You're like, I watched this 100%. Seriously, I watched this like, 70, 30. I think the 30 comes from the fact that there is a break in the space time continuum of rock history that happens in this movie that I cannot get over.

[Bill Simmons]

What is it? Tell us.

[Van Lathan]

Well, Eddie and the Cruiser sound almost exactly like Bruce Springsteen.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

Bruce Springsteen would have started in the early mid-70s and really starts to sound like Eddie and the Cruisers or vice versa in the mid-70s. They make tender years in 62 or 63. And they're working on season in hell in 64. That predates the Bob Dylan record Bring It All Back home and Highway 61 revisited. It predates the Beatles doing Rubber sole and Revolver. It predates.

[Bill Simmons]

Eddie was ahead of his time, man.

[Van Lathan]

Bill. It's beyond ahead of his time. Time like Ray Charles and the Shirelles is what was on in the radio. They would not have a rock band with a sax player doing rock opera, 70s music. And you're asked to believe that, like, this guy is basically Dylan going electric, but without Dylan having ever happened. Like, the only thing that drives me nuts about this movie is that if they just said it in 73, then they would have been able to be like, yeah, we're trying to get like this feeling back. And then it's just 10 years later in 83, when they're like, Eddie disappeared. But now, 10 years later, there's a revival. But the idea that this is happening at, like sock hops is kind of like Marty McFly going back and starting rock and roll and back to the future.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, man, they're all fair points. One of my favorite white supremacist scenes of all time. Marty and Vince. Rock and roll. I love that. Is this done to make Eddie seem like he's a once in a generation rock visionary?

[Van Lathan]

Book is set in, like the Doo Wop era.

[Chris Ryan]

I see what you mean.

[Van Lathan]

And they made it more like we want this to sound like Jay Giles band, John Mellencamp.

[Chris Ryan]

Because they go from runaround suit. They go from covering runaround suit.

[Van Lathan]

Yes.

[Chris Ryan]

Straight to Darkseid. And it's like.

[Bill Simmons]

And then Season in Hell.

[Chris Ryan]

And then Season in Hell. By the time Season in Hell comes out, they're like in excess. So it's like.

[Van Lathan]

But when Season in Hell happens, they're like, this is like avant garde. And I'm like, this sounds like an Eagles song from the long run. Like, it's not that bad.

[Bill Simmons]

What other movies you want to ruin now? The Warriors. Could we ever get 40,000 gang members in one spot?

[Van Lathan]

No, I'm just saying this is an easy fix that they. They chose not to make. I don't know why.

[Bill Simmons]

I think they could have made. Definitely could have made it three, four years later and probably not lost anything.

[Van Lathan]

I think they really wanted the innocence of the early 60s. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, in that scene at the college, they literally pull up and Sleepwalk is playing, Right?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Which is the scene, the song, the instrumental that you play to say, hey, we're in the 60s and the 50s. It was a different time.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah. Stand By Me.

[Chris Ryan]

Stand By Me and Sleepwalk is playing. And then they come on there and just their energy completely disrupts everything that the college has going on. If they were playing that disruptive music

[Bill Simmons]

way ahead of their time scene in

[Chris Ryan]

63, like, what would they have been playing?

[Van Lathan]

It's just these guys are doing.

[Bill Simmons]

Laughed at the Rolling Stones.

[Chris Ryan]

Exactly.

[Van Lathan]

I wouldn't have. Because they didn't exist in this universe.

[Craig]

You know what I mean?

[Van Lathan]

Like Eddie, apparently they don't go on Ed Sullivan. The Beatles are not on Ed Sullivan in this universe.

[Bill Simmons]

They had the sax player from Beaver Brown. Michael Antunes is the sax player in the movie that was the only one that cast over Wendell. No lines.

[Chris Ryan]

Tough. Well, he does. He makes an impact.

[Bill Simmons]

He makes an impact.

[Chris Ryan]

I Got Things to say.

[Bill Simmons]

Zero lines. The album. They re released the soundtrack in the fall of 84, a year after the movie came out. And it goes quadruple platinum and all the shit. And even Tender years peaked at 31. So two. Two top 35 hits. And it just kept going and going. So the director is Martin Davidson. He wrote the screenplay of this sister and basically got screwed over by the studio who paid for it. Couldn't figure out how to release it properly, and it ended up on hbo. And he was like, nobody's ever gonna see my movie. Not realizing HBO was about to come

[Van Lathan]

and not realizing that the rewatchables would force streamers to put it on. I think shout victory.

[Bill Simmons]

But the real reason we're doing this is because we need Kiss of Death back. And if we have an Eddie and the. We brought Eddie and the Cruisers back to life, much like Eddie Wilson at the end of this movie. And now Kiss of Death has to be next. Craig. 95 minutes plus five on the horrible scale.

[Craig]

Five under par. Pretty impressive. This movie is as good as it is, as enjoyable as it is because it's 95 minutes. If this movie is two and a half hours, it's unwatchable.

[Van Lathan]

Oh, my God.

[Craig]

Unwatchable. And it just goes to show you how much that matters. Like, the 95 minutes is a part of why this movie is so great.

[Van Lathan]

Though, that being said, for my probably answerable questions, I have some questions about what you would like to see more of.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

So one of the reasons it hit on HBO was it was 95 minutes.

[Chris Ryan]

Very easy.

[Bill Simmons]

They could put it on and it would be done at 9:35, and they could go right into a comedy special. $5 million budget made. 4.7 million. Roger Ebert, two stars. Eddie and the Cruisers is all buildup and no payoff. He wrote that they could have had a good movie here. They had the cast, for one. They even had the music. The soundtrack is terrific, but the ending is so frustrating. So dumb, so unsatisfactory. Gives a bad reputation to the whole movie. I have a counter for Raj.

[Van Lathan]

Go fuck yourself.

[Chris Ryan]

Wow.

[Bill Simmons]

First, go fuck yourself. Like, with a capital F, like, to start there. I really like the ending. I love that he lived. I mean, granted, I saw this first when I was 15 years old, but him coming back with the beard and being like, oh, my God, he's fucking alive. He was alive the whole time. Because they're hinting at it, but you don't actually think they're going to do it. And then they actually do it. And I don't know. I'm still into it, but to Roger's

[Chris Ryan]

point, it doesn't really mean anything. By the time we find out that he's alive.

[Van Lathan]

It's the last second.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. By the time we find out that he's alive. What?

[Bill Simmons]

Well, he wanted respect, right?

[Chris Ryan]

He did want respect.

[Bill Simmons]

20 years. Right now he's watching through a window.

[Chris Ryan]

He's watching tv, Season of Hell and all of that stuff.

[Bill Simmons]

I finally got my respect.

[Van Lathan]

It's too bad you saw it the way you saw it, because I would like to know whether you thought watching the movie you're like, is Eddie breaking into people's houses and looking for the Season in Hell tapes?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I don't see. I knew the ending. Well, let's find out from Craig, who knew nothing about the movie. So the twist ending, what did you think?

[Craig]

Well, unfortunately, I knew there was a sequel called Eddie Lives.

[Van Lathan]

I think it's tough.

[Craig]

I didn't have a problem with. I thought, yeah, I considered maybe. I didn't know what was gonna happen in a nice way. I was let down by the Joey Pants ending, to be honest. And because I. They just signaled that way too clearly. I actually thought that was going to be like a classic red herring because he was so ridiculous. He would be my first culprit. I thought it was going to be like Salamato who wanted to be the leader and that's why he killed Eddie. Or it was Eddie coming back or something like that.

[Van Lathan]

But Salamato cut his breaks. Is that your.

[Craig]

That was what I was take. Yeah. Because I thought he was like, you're screwing us up. I can lead us to the promised land by doing Run around sue for 20 years. But I didn't have a problem with the ending. To me, like, the movie's already over at that point. It's just like a fun button at the end.

[Chris Ryan]

Definitely over. The movie kind of overs with the rekindled between Word man and Eddie's girl classic dirty Mackin hating cucking happening in this movie behind Eddie's fucking back. Word Man, Are you crazy?

[Bill Simmons]

Tough Some guy code being broken.

[Van Lathan]

Lucky he just called him Toby Tyler and made him work for it.

[Chris Ryan]

But like the movie, to me it was always, there's no real story. Like, I enjoy this movie. This is like, legitimately, this made me homesick for Louisiana. Like, I watched the movie and it felt like I'm back in General Jackson, Baton Rouge, Gardere, Pizza, Eddie and Cruisers, and so on. But like, it's not actually like a real movie in Any way, shape or form she starts off and she's gonna be looking for him, that just kind of goes nowhere.

[Van Lathan]

You get rid of that.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, they just fucking go, okay. Like, really? If the movie was driven by her trying to get this story.

[Bill Simmons]

You talk about Ellen Barkin.

[Chris Ryan]

Ellen Barkin, Yeah. The payoff would almost make more sense.

[Van Lathan]

It's two framing devices because they've got to get Ellen Barkin to Tom Barringer. But when they get to Tom Bar, it becomes him going around meeting people from his past and having these referees remembering his days with Eddie and Christ.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't think we were putting a ton of thought into stuff in the

[Chris Ryan]

80s, but we were having fun, though.

[Bill Simmons]

We were having a great time.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, we're having fun.

[Bill Simmons]

Stuff didn't add up. We didn't care because it was like

[Van Lathan]

season in Hell somehow came out two years before Highway 61 revisited.

[Bill Simmons]

Who cares?

[Chris Ryan]

But wasn't it better, though? But wasn't it better? Wasn't it better sitting down and, like, finding reasons to, like, what the fuck you were watching? Yeah, it was better, like, to say, hey, this has great music. This is a cool story. You have an interesting lead, or I guess Tom Behringer's the lead. You have an interesting character here. Just sit down for 90 minutes and have a good time rather than get off and, like, pull everything apart and overanalyze it also. Well, yeah, you just had more fun with movies, and it's what you get

[Craig]

out of it being 95 minutes. You could explain it more if they added 20 minutes to get into some stuff. But then, is it as enjoyable of a movie?

[Chris Ryan]

No, probably not.

[Bill Simmons]

Take a break. We'll do the categories. This episode is brought to you by Athletic Brewing Company.

[Van Lathan]

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[Chris Ryan]

All right.

[Bill Simmons]

Most rewatchable scene. Opening credits. S done. CR yeah. Cold open, Dark side's coming. Now nothing is real. And this is to meet everybody doing

[Van Lathan]

dark side at the college, I would imagine.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. And then it cuts to Ellen Barkin honor. Like 17th sig of the day. It's like 12:30 in the afternoon.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

Given dog walking. Every guy in the room full of

[Chris Ryan]

Guys, she's just dropping lady.

[Bill Simmons]

They're all in love with her. And she does. You ever hear of a poet named Arthur Rambo? Committed suicide not in the flesh, but of the mind and soul. Pretty good hook.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Good song.

[Chris Ryan]

Everybody's off. Everybody's skeptical. You're fucking crazy. Eddie fucking died.

[Bill Simmons]

Who cares?

[Van Lathan]

Maggie, what's the hook?

[Chris Ryan]

What are you doing? Like, what's the deal? And she's like. And that's why you think that the story is going to be through her perspective. But it scene sets up the entire film.

[Bill Simmons]

We got Word Man's flashback to meeting the Cruisers at the Tony Mart. Word man. Frank Ridgeway. Jerseysaur62. Needed to say Zor.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Timely pause. Barkin goes to see Frank at school. Sits on his desk the night Eddie's card. The night Eddie died. The Cruisers died with him, right? He was my friend. You I just met Fake Cruisers band at the Sal Lounge leading into the memory of being on the roof, creating on the Dark side, which might have been the best seven minutes of the 80s. I don't know. Hagli hearns in this?

[Van Lathan]

Better than Danger Zone.

[Bill Simmons]

Better than Hagwe Hearns.

[Van Lathan]

And get away from her, you bitch.

[Bill Simmons]

I love Fake Eddie. Fake Eddie comes out with this 1983 lounge band and has the leather jacket and kills it. We get the whole word of music thing. Get the performance with the coming back to the COVID guy wrapping it up. But we get to. I just love when watching somebody create a song from scratch.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. I also love any scene where a band is together creating a song and there's an unexpected missing ingredient. Like there's an unexpected look. Stop. So he does it twice. He does it when he's explaining to them we're gonna marry. What we do in bar rock with high literary concepts and all of that. But then he does it again. Listen. He's got something that nobody else has. And the difference between Eddie and the rest of the band is Eddie can hear it and they can't.

[Bill Simmons]

Michael Perret said the scene on the roof, which is awesome. He said, I've been told that that scene at top of Tony Mart is the way rock and roll happens. You take a melody and just make it rock and it just sort of happens. It's one of the most flattering things you can say.

[Van Lathan]

I mean, it's an awesome scene.

[Bill Simmons]

Nothing is funnier than when a. When a hit song comes together in a movie in two minutes.

[Van Lathan]

I love it.

[Bill Simmons]

Like, hey, come in.

[Van Lathan]

Play the Perry is like, what are you, on vacation? Literally comes in on Time. No, perfect. Like, boom ba boom.

[Bill Simmons]

Sax guy comes in, he's got a solo already planned out. Girl comes in on the drums. Joanne. Banging the. Banging.

[Chris Ryan]

The thing I love also when, like, everybody catches the vibe and then they have to be a part of it, people start dancing, hitting the tambourine. They add melodies. All of a sudden they got a song. When that Beatles documentary came out, did you watch that?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it was a little like this.

[Chris Ryan]

It was. It was like.

[Bill Simmons]

It just took 15 minutes. Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

And there would be, like, lots of, like, dudes being like, did you watch the Johnny Carson show last night?

[Bill Simmons]

That was really good.

[Chris Ryan]

Cause you think about Get Back. And when you think about some of the songs that the Beatles made, you think that these songs were handed down from the gods and given to Lennon and McCartney. And you just see him going. What sounds best? Tucson. Is it fucking Tucson or Phoenix? What should we put in the song? And after they fucked around till they hit on something that people will remember

[Van Lathan]

forever, but they just have this Darkseid comes out fully formed.

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

I thought Barringer does a good job. Even though you never see his hands of. He's got like this head knob and. And parade in that scene where he's like. He's just so happy it's happening. And you can feel like the. The Eddie charisma. Yeah, it's a good scene. That leads to Sal's last song with the fake Eddie Band. Right into Wild Summer Nights. We go back to 63. We go wild Summer Nights right in Tender Years. Really good parade performance again, but ending with the Behringer piano, the sax guy coming over.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, that's putting that. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Putting the elbow on the piano just like.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah. Do you have a favorite? Not Dark side Eddie song?

[Bill Simmons]

Tender Years is good.

[Van Lathan]

Tender Years is.

[Bill Simmons]

It's like just a flat out solid song. I don't know if you notice this, though, but it comes back to Sal after Tender Years. And they're wrapping up and they play some oldie but goodie song. And all the people in the audience are holding cigarette lighters on their lighters. And he finishes it. And it cuts to the crowd. And there's this lady in the front row, like this really funny social clip. This extra is just going for it. She's making like five bucks for three hours, just like throwing herself into it. Sal. Word, man. Eating pizza. I enjoy. So let me test drive this one for you. Cause Sal's really going for it. He's got the sweaty lips. He's eating pizza. He's about to start crying. I think he might be a Peter north award for most effort loaded into one movie.

[Van Lathan]

Matthew Lawrence.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

It's like he's got this nothing bass part. He's throwing himself into this full speed, 100%.

[Van Lathan]

You kind of need him in this movie.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, you do. Think about the little soliloquy that he does after the song. And he's sitting down there and he's telling them. Remember when you used to driving around and things getting wild in the backseat. You're touching on her and all of this stuff and everybody's starting to feel. Remember that first time. Remember that first time.

[Craig]

This is my flex.

[Bill Simmons]

What is it?

[Craig]

Salamato. I. I used the bam out of Bio. Where the did that performance come from?

[Van Lathan]

Mel from 90210.

[Craig]

Dude. Salamato in the nightclub. Like he could have been at the Copacabana. He was smooth as.

[Van Lathan]

Because he always had that. He was just like I can't be Eddie, but I'm really close.

[Bill Simmons]

Nice.

[Craig]

On stage that night.

[Bill Simmons]

He's pretty good. He was in. He was the gay guy in San Elmo's Fire. He lived across the hall from. And then peaked Inano Tumno. He was David Silver's dad.

[Chris Ryan]

David Pops.

[Bill Simmons]

He served Donna Martin champagne. Got her drunk. She passed out at the high school graduation and then wasn't allowed to graduate. And they revolted. And it was all because of Salamato. Salamato serving underage kids champagne. I thought he was great in this. The Toby Tyler move we mentioned into Frank and Maggie. Which I think every scene with Barringer and Barker is just really good. Yeah. And I had this coming later. But Barkin like hates this movie.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes, hates it. She fucking.

[Bill Simmons]

She shit all over shit.

[Van Lathan]

That was to pay the rent.

[Chris Ryan]

That was to pay the rent. We didn't know who was in charge. The movie fucking sucks. Everybody was on drugs. And she hints to being actually mistreated on the movie. In a way if you watch how just viciously she treats the film.

[Bill Simmons]

Hurt my feelings. Wendell dies right into Eddie crying and being able to sing Tender years. Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

My best friend died last night.

[Bill Simmons]

Season hell going sideways. This is what I've been waiting a year for. A bunch of jerk offs making weird sounds.

[Chris Ryan]

That guy. That guy is funny as he's so mad.

[Van Lathan]

Who's that? Lou Eisen?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. He paid them $10,000, gave him 10 grand.

[Chris Ryan]

And they came back with some experimental. When he's trying to get the kids at the fucking Sock Hop to dance.

[Bill Simmons]

Really funny. And we ain't great. We're just some Guys from Jersey. If we can't be great, then there's no sense in ever playing music again. Sal.

[Chris Ryan]

That's why I think before every tailgate,

[Van Lathan]

it does haunt Eddie. Through the sequel, Eddie lives. You know, he's like, I just don't want to get up on stage unless it's going to really mean something, you know?

[Bill Simmons]

And then the ending. That's it for rewatchable. What do you got?

[Van Lathan]

I'm gonna go writing Darkseid.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I think that's me, too.

[Chris Ryan]

That's what it is.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Though did you enjoy Eddie in the flashback in the fucking junkyard castle Palace Depression.

[Bill Simmons]

The palace of depression, which apparently actually exists.

[Van Lathan]

Did.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, I love that scene. Cause that's when Eddie. When Eddie starts to crash out towards the end of the movie. The middle to the end of the movie. Those are my favorite parts of the movie. He crashes out in front of.

[Bill Simmons]

Comparing himself to the Ansell.

[Chris Ryan]

Yep.

[Van Lathan]

I think it's cool because for the most part, it's all of Behringer's happy memories of it. And then it's like when Joanne is like. Kenny and Joanne are like the ones who were like, it wasn't all happy. You know, like, it was like there was some dark.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Then CR is like, this wouldn't have even existed. Two years, first deadline. What's the most 1983 thing about this movie? No caller ID really jumps out.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

When Joanne keeps getting these calls now you would just be like, who's this number?

[Van Lathan]

She couldn't even. I don't even think they had star 69 yet.

[Bill Simmons]

Watching a row of TVs through a department store window.

[Chris Ryan]

Definitely.

[Bill Simmons]

It's very 1983. That doesn't exist anymore.

[Chris Ryan]

It's a trope that continued to come back up.

[Bill Simmons]

Now it'd be like a homeless guy with no pants on watching through a Best Buy and then peeing on the window. That would have been the end of it. Talking about is Eddie the homeless guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Van Lathan]

I have a couple here for the 83. One is Darkseid. Just sounds like Brian Adams or Southside Johnny or John Mellencamp. So, like, very classic, early mid-80s rock sound. And then Ellen Barkin working for Media magazine, which is, in fact, a television news program, was like, a very big thing, at least in Philly. They had one of these. I think it was called.

[Bill Simmons]

We had one too in Boston.

[Van Lathan]

I think it was called, like, Entertainment Magazine or Entertainment Week or something like that. But it was like two hosts.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

And then they would be like, hard hidden stories. Bruce Willis and Sybil Shepard. They're back on screen for Moonstruck.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Van Lathan]

Like. And it's. It's. It was just like a really weird phenomenon back then. Regional entertainment news programs.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it would be the celebrities that passed through that they were in an interview.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

But then it would be like a hard hitting piece about some school that lost its funning. For the school play.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

11 the smoking. Very 1983. How much smoking they have in it?

[Van Lathan]

Maybe even more than 83. Was they had non smoking sections by then.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, the smoking. Also the fact that in this part of the 80s they just did not give a fuck about aging or de. Aging or anything like that. In any way, shape or form. Like in no way, shape or form.

[Bill Simmons]

Behringer is exactly the same.

[Chris Ryan]

They don't give a fuck. They would take you, mess your hair up a little bit, put you in an open shirt. You're 14 years old. You're 14. He in this movie is 83. Right. He's 34 or whatever. So when he joined the band he was 14 or 15 years old.

[Van Lathan]

I think it's supposed to be 1737. But this is. This is another problem with the space time continuum.

[Chris Ryan]

It's like Joey Pants. He looks the same. Then they give him a little baldy. He's 20 years older. The whole nine. Just in the 80s. Just didn't care. You're younger, it doesn't matter.

[Van Lathan]

Joanne barely looks different.

[Chris Ryan]

She looks almost exactly the same. They just changed her wardrobe.

[Bill Simmons]

She just looks great.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. They didn't put a lot of thought into this stuff. It almost makes you think they thought it was going to be 1968. And then they decided in the editing to shave six more years out of it or something.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, I think it's closer to the book. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Behringer basically looks exactly the same. There's no difference at all for the Floyd Gandali butter on my ass and lollipops in my mouth for something I just enjoy. I said it already. But watching in a movie or a TV show a band create a song from scratch. Gets me every time I have.

[Van Lathan]

When the quiet part of a rock song makes way for the loud part of a rock song via isolated guitar riff and hand claps.

[Bill Simmons]

This is good stuff.

[Van Lathan]

When it's just like here we go, Darkseid's about to kick in.

[Chris Ryan]

Sleepwalk being like a fucking soundtrack for like the 50s and 60s. It always gets to me. But also I like Frank's dirty Mackin man. Frank Wordman. Don't Even give a fuck. She walks into the bar. He sees her. He's like, oh, shit. Little something walking in. What's going on right now? And then fucking Eddie comes in and he kind of tamps it down. But as soon as Eddie is gone,

[Bill Simmons]

he's trying to get right back on his shit.

[Chris Ryan]

Trying to steal Eddie.

[Van Lathan]

In college, some bad things happen.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

I actually watched it like two or three times. Being like, did I miss the part where she's like, me and Eddie are on a break. It's like, no. She's right back in Eddie's arms like the second after he makes out with her. It's tough, man.

[Chris Ryan]

Can't trust him. Chris R. Did a song about it.

[Van Lathan]

Listen.

[Bill Simmons]

Woman Empowerment, 1963. Head of her time.

[Chris Ryan]

She can sleep. Who with? Whoever she wants. Bill.

[Bill Simmons]

She wasn't being checked.

[Chris Ryan]

He doesn't own her.

[Bill Simmons]

What stage is the best? Mentioned a couple already. But I think Wendell is. Is a home run in this movie because he has no lines. But you feel him in the movie. Which made me wonder, do we create the Wendell Newton Award for best performance with no lines? Zero lines. Have we ever had a no line?

[Van Lathan]

It's weird because it's not even like, hey, man, grab me a Coke. It's nothing.

[Bill Simmons]

Doesn't speak.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Doesn't even say like, yeah, nothing. Not even one word.

[Van Lathan]

Heroin, Very powerful.

[Chris Ryan]

You know, hell's a drug. Yeah. But you know his whole fucking life story by watching him play with Eddie and the Cruisers.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

You know, exactly. He's playing for a long time in a jazz band. Eddie heard him someplace. Brings him into the Cruisers to change his fucking life. Him and Eddie have a whole song. He even taught Eddie some music. He was Eddie's like musical Obi Wan to.

[Bill Simmons]

This was the Springsteen issue for this movie when they thought it was a Springsteen ripoff. Cause Clarence Clements was the. The probably the biggest he'd ever. Most famous he'd ever. Yeah. Hall of Fame smoke. We mentioned. I like Jersey shore in the 60s. I have Jersey Shore also like Jersey shore in the 70s, the 80s and the 90s. It was really fun to go to. I like when Eddie gives Frank the green light to write songs and then he does the. That's the most you'll ever get out of me word. Man. They little like bonding on the beach. And then Behringer just is completely committed to this the whole time. But I like at the end. The end's ridiculous. When Joe Joey Pants is like, I'm going to get the tapes. We're going to get. I'M going to make the best deal we can. He drives away and Baringer comes flying in. He's like, go get him, dog. Just makes me laugh. What do you have for what stage? The best.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, this is oriented around a conspiracy theory that Eddie is still alive. Yeah, that was very much alive then. That was the heyday of Elvis is somewhere hanging out in Montana. We did it again in the 90s.

[Van Lathan]

DB Cooper, a big part. DB Cooper.

[Chris Ryan]

We did it again in the 90s. Tupac lives in Jermaine.

[Bill Simmons]

Tupac's the best one.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Like almost 30%. 30%. He might be Andy Kaufman.

[Chris Ryan]

People thought Andy Kaufman, like, the conspiracy theory that the movie is wrapped around, that's really aged good. I want to hear your Tupac theory, though. What happened to Pac? If Pac's alive, like, where is he?

[Bill Simmons]

Just saying, I believe that one the most.

[Van Lathan]

Did he get shot, though?

[Bill Simmons]

Like, he's like, in hiding. No, he. Sadly, he died. But that was the one I really wanted to believe in the late 90s.

[Van Lathan]

It's a bill Simmons exclusive.

[Craig]

He can.

[Van Lathan]

He can confirm that Tupac is dead.

[Bill Simmons]

If you put drinks at me in like 1998, I would have. I would have gone nuts for it.

[Chris Ryan]

We all thought it, like, everybody was sitting and it was so funny because

[Bill Simmons]

he's still releasing music, bruh.

[Chris Ryan]

It was funny because, like, my mom caught me up on it one time. My mom goes, remember how stupid you used to say we looked when we would say that Elvis was still living or something like that? Remember? I soup. Y' all are doing the same thing. I was like, but this is different. I got pieces of autopsy music is still dropping. He said this on this song. If you listen to it right there. These Jordans that he's wearing in this video. Mama, these Jordans wasn't even out, I

[Bill Simmons]

believe it was really good. It died. I'm gonna say, like early 2000s. It became ridiculous. But it did have a really good two year run, right? Great shot. Gordo Award, most cinematic shot.

[Van Lathan]

I don't have a specific cinematic shot. I want to give a shout out. Really good extras acting in this movie. All the bar scenes with the crowd. Everybody's like, acting like someone.

[Bill Simmons]

Concert's great.

[Van Lathan]

The college concert's great. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Big Kahuna Burger, where best used food and Drake S pepperoni pizza.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

As you know, I love a good old school greasy slice. He never takes a bite out of it, though, though.

[Van Lathan]

There's also a lot of people drinking what seemed to be seven and sevens, which is a very 83, 80 you know, like that early kind of like 80s drink chest rock.

[Chris Ryan]

They both come from that scene. The PBRs, though. The PBRs tells you what kind of guys these are. Want a beer? It's a PBR for.

[Van Lathan]

And Schlitz. They're drinking Schlitz too?

[Bill Simmons]

Yep. Chess Rockwell. Best character name. Frank Ridgeway is pretty good. The weird man, Frank Ridgeway.

[Van Lathan]

I had Salamato, but.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, Salamato's good, too. Dennis Benny on award scene still in locations. Got to be the junkyard, right?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, yeah, it looks great.

[Bill Simmons]

Cr.

[Van Lathan]

You have a flex Category Vincent Chase Award. Are we sure this character was good at his job?

[Craig]

Frank?

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, Word Man.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, I thought you were almost certainly gonna go with. With Joy Pantsy.

[Van Lathan]

I wouldn't say that. Word man is blowing my mind with his words. Like, Dark side's a good song, but I don't know if you deserve the title. Word man for the Dark side.

[Bill Simmons]

Whoa, whoa Tender years Would you wash away my tears?

[Van Lathan]

He also steals his bandmate's girl, which I not. It's a knock for me in terms of being in a band and having a band mate. And he kind of forces them into a life of obsolescence when he Spring season of Season of hell on them. It wasn't for Frank, they probably would have made Tender Years Part two and done.

[Bill Simmons]

Could barely play the synth.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, exactly.

[Bill Simmons]

Had to be taught just how to do this.

[Van Lathan]

He's like, no. Play these cool chords. He's like

[Chris Ryan]

Word man. Kind of a.

[Van Lathan]

That's what I'm saying.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Yeah. No, you. You know, I thought this. We talked about.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm having a great time.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, we're a man kind of a word. Man up everybody. Also somebody's girl.

[Van Lathan]

Class trader.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, exactly.

[Van Lathan]

He's basically like a little art student.

[Chris Ryan]

A straight up hoe. Yeah. Like he. He gets to the college. He is like, really slumming. What did they say to Departed? You're dropping your ass hanging out on the.

[Bill Simmons]

Like.

[Chris Ryan]

That's what Word man is doing.

[Craig]

Word man is.

[Van Lathan]

That's what Eddie says to him. He's like, I didn't say better. I said different.

[Bill Simmons]

You know, you like this movie 90 10.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

I didn't like the 7030 Butch's Girlfriend Award. Weak link of the film. Doc's plan of torturing Joanne and everyone else for the tapes and wrecking their apartments over. Just asking them if they had the tapes. I don't know. I have some notes. Maybe just ask Joanne. Hey, do you have the tapes?

[Chris Ryan]

We never really come back to the Fact that he walked into his apartment and it looks like someone was killed there. Signs of a struggle, like, going crazy. It's like all that stuff, it just comes in the movie.

[Bill Simmons]

It's just like, go get it done.

[Van Lathan]

What changed? The worst is Tom Beringer's acting when he sees that his apartment's been trashed. First of all, he's working in a. He's a schooler in a trailer park. Park in Vineland, New Jersey. But he walks in, it's completely destroyed. He's like, okay. Starts smoking a cigarette.

[Bill Simmons]

What stage the worst? The sequel.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, tough.

[Bill Simmons]

Why did they do this? 89, for some reason, gave us. Wait, 88 and 89 gave us Caddyshack 2.

[Van Lathan]

Another 48 hours.

[Bill Simmons]

Another 48 hours, which we've begrudgingly decided. We like liked. There's just a bunch of bad ones where they were just. Just trying to capitalize, I think, on the rewatchability of these movies on cable. Being like, maybe these dumbasses will go see a shitty version of a sequel.

[Van Lathan]

You know how you don't remember the pods we did during COVID Yeah. Did we do another 48 hours, like, two. Two months ago? Yeah, we did. We did.

[Bill Simmons]

We did, we did. Did you get the COVID vaccine again?

[Craig]

No, I.

[Bill Simmons]

Just kidding, boy.

[Chris Ryan]

Bill's going forward. I can't wait till what happens in a couple of months. Bill's right on the edge, guys hear the things that are being said.

[Van Lathan]

But what's going to happen?

[Chris Ryan]

Did you get the COVID vaccine? A little bit. It's going further. It's. Let's watch.

[Van Lathan]

Oh, you think he's getting red pills?

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, no, Bill, I don't remember anything

[Bill Simmons]

that happened in 2020 or 2020.

[Chris Ryan]

What you're saying because of the.

[Bill Simmons]

Apparently the bucks.

[Craig]

He's been saying that before.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm telling you, it's getting. Look it. So what's age the worst? Is that. Okay, so there's. How many black guys are in a group?

[Van Lathan]

One.

[Chris Ryan]

One. He died. It would have been one thing if everybody in the Cruisers, like, had a drug problem. If they were sharing needles in the whole deal. Like, it was the 80s. They missed the opportunity. One of the guys could have, like, become HIV positive. I shared a needle with two black guys. Two black guys.

[Van Lathan]

The poor guy gets replaced, and he's just like, I just want to say that the great, the greatest saxophone player who ever lived died.

[Chris Ryan]

This motherfucker's holding his saxophone like, God damn, I'm trying to keep up with this and that. That's what's age worse.

[Van Lathan]

Let me ask you a question. It's probably unanswerable. End of the day, Wendell goes home. You think he's like, man, I'm in this great band, Sadie and the Cruisers. I play sax, I don't talk a lot, but man, I love being in this band. Or do you think he's like, I gotta get back into a hard bop combo. I gotta get back to jazz?

[Chris Ryan]

What a good question. Is he calling home, being like, man, some of the stuff Eddie wants to do is stuff like I've never fucking heard before. Or is he like, fuck, how did this happen to me?

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, I think I knew.

[Chris Ryan]

Fucking miles.

[Van Lathan]

12 second solo over a terrible blues rock band.

[Bill Simmons]

So do you think Frank never would. It's realistic that Frank never would have known that he overdosed in heroin at the Ebb Tide Motel, man.

[Van Lathan]

It's crazy.

[Bill Simmons]

Like.

[Van Lathan]

Like, I guess that's because Kenny the

[Bill Simmons]

blackjack dealer is like, where were you, man? When are you gonna wake up?

[Chris Ryan]

This goes into my hottest steak lady.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

What stage is the worst? None of these characters ran into each other for 20 years.

[Van Lathan]

And they all live in the same state where there's not a ton to

[Bill Simmons]

do 20 minutes apart. They never had some sort of 10 year reunion. Nothing. I thought that was weird. The Springsteen shadow we mentioned mentioned Ellen Barkin hating this movie. I have one more big one. Does anyone have anything else?

[Van Lathan]

They hinged the entire insult of Eddie's insult of word, man. On stage at the college on the Toby Tyler character from like a Disney movie that was around back then. I don't really know if that's really hidden in 2026. People are like, oh, yeah, Tyler and Van mentioned it. Behringer and Schneider look like they don't look at all day older than when they were in high school. Oh, one more thing. We gotta fix this. Amazon and Apple, their posters for this movie are the Salamato Band. Oh, it's fucking crazy. It's Eddie and the Cruisers. And you're like, neither Eddie nor Beringer nor Barkin are in the poster. It's Salamato and his holiday in band.

[Bill Simmons]

That ties into what by what stage the worst was. And then this is. I'd like to do this as a public service to all the streamers watching this right now. All of them, including Netflix. So this movie's ending, right? Surprise ending with Eddie in the window and he's got the beard and the. And the closing credits. Come on. Amazon's counting me down in the bottom right corner because it's about to send me to the next thing.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

And now I really want to hear the ending. And you have to, like, grab your phone or your remote, frantically try to stop it so they don't send me to, like, fucking Harry Potter season seven or whatever they're going to send me to. And it's like, fuck off. Yeah, let me enjoy the end of a movie for 20 seconds before you send me to your next thing. So you can bill your fake streaming hours to me when all I did was leave my TV on and you pretended I watched something else. Fuck you.

[Craig]

Some of your best work, Bill.

[Chris Ryan]

This is what? This is the fucking shit, bro. This is the shit.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it's fucking bullshit.

[Chris Ryan]

Fucking sucks. Can't stand it. Can I finish?

[Craig]

God forbid they don't push you to the next show.

[Chris Ryan]

You know what, Bill? Good for you.

[Bill Simmons]

Thank you.

[Chris Ryan]

Good for you for saying it. Despite current business situation

[Bill Simmons]

across the board,

[Chris Ryan]

Let me watch the fucking movie before you give me five different things to watch.

[Bill Simmons]

I'll change my settings and be like, you know what? You can't do this for five seconds.

[Van Lathan]

I don't want to live in a country where we can't say, it's time for me to watch the next episode. I'll click over to that. Now, if you need someone to spoon feed you the next episode of the next movie before you've come to the conclusion of the artistic statement that you are taking in, we can't say, right, we're done as a country.

[Chris Ryan]

If that's the case, you know what? I wonder what the actual calculation is here, because I bet they don't want it to get too deep into the credits before you've already.

[Van Lathan]

They don't even want you to think,

[Bill Simmons]

yeah, they want us on the next thing.

[Chris Ryan]

They want you on the next thing to keep you on the thing.

[Van Lathan]

It's ruining shows. If you end on a cliffhanger, you're counting on the fact that somebody's like, I have to see what happened to this nurse in the pit. Start the next episode.

[Bill Simmons]

Anything to add, Craig?

[Craig]

It's anti below the line. I want to see who lit the movie. Let me see their names.

[Van Lathan]

Who say their names. Who's the ad? Sorry. I care about these things.

[Bill Simmons]

Things. Stop telling us you actually care about the movie industry and you won't let us see closing credits for who was

[Craig]

Salamato's assistant on set? I want to know.

[Bill Simmons]

It was the key grip. Really annoying. All right, we'll take a break and then come back with Vance Flex Ruffalo hand And Ruben Partridge over acting award. Kenny the drummer.

[Van Lathan]

When are you gonna wake up? I had Joey pants.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm getting something mad at Word man for.

[Van Lathan]

He really goes for it.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah. He's like, this is my one scene I'm gonna get really mad at Ridgeway.

[Chris Ryan]

You guys are gonna like. I have Eddie whenever they're not on stage. Oh, whenever they're not on stage.

[Bill Simmons]

Just going for it.

[Chris Ryan]

Eddie is just fucking going for it. He puts his whole body into when he shoved what you call it. Like whenever they're not on stage. Eddie is dialing it up in the middle of it, man.

[Van Lathan]

My favorite part of that Kenny scene is when he's like, you remember those days in the backseat of a car balling some jaw. Your song comes off, I should put ball in him.

[Bill Simmons]

What stage is the best?

[Chris Ryan]

Ballin some shit.

[Bill Simmons]

When was the last time Ballin was said?

[Chris Ryan]

It was funny. And then they cut to the audience and all the guys in the audience are like, yeah, I remember that.

[Craig]

That's Chris and Sean. You remember back in the day, we were balling some chick. The watch comes on

[Bill Simmons]

van. You have a flex.

[Chris Ryan]

All right, so it's a list. Top five fictitious bands ever.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

I do not have Eddie and the Cruisers in this just because we're doing the movies. Number five is Josie and a Pussycat.

[Van Lathan]

Okay?

[Chris Ryan]

You gotta count them. Iconic shit. Number four, I got the Wonders, man. I'm that thing you do. Truther.

[Van Lathan]

Punch it in.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Like, I love that movie. It's Almost Lost Time. Nobody talks about it as much as they should.

[Bill Simmons]

I love that. Should we add it to the list?

[Van Lathan]

I think it's a really good rewatchable.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. I love that movie. Number three, Spinal Tap. Gotta have Spinal Tap in there. Rest in peace, Rob. Number two, the Five Heartbeats. Ok, now this is an underrated fictitious band. The music is fantastic. Robert Townsend, Robert Townshend. Shout out to him. The story is very reminiscent of the Temptations, obviously, but they're amazing. The music was amazing too.

[Bill Simmons]

I like that movie.

[Chris Ryan]

Number one for me, Stillwater. Stillwater from Almost Famous. They sound like a real band. They have the real band chemistry and angst. Stillwater.

[Van Lathan]

Can I ask a follow up question?

[Bill Simmons]

Good lead singer presence too, by Jason Lee.

[Van Lathan]

No, forget the movies that those bands are in. Best music of a fictitious band.

[Chris Ryan]

So to me it would be. Excuse me. The Five Heartbeats, the Wonders, Eddie and the Cruisers. They gotta be up there. And the Stillwater stuff is awesome. To me it sounds kind of like Stillwater's really good.

[Van Lathan]

I Just don't think Fever Dog is as good of a signature song as Dark side or Dark side.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

That thing you do.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, that's fair. It was a good list. I want to, like, nitpick and say you missed one, but I can't think of one that you missed.

[Chris Ryan]

No. So there was one thing that I couldn't really decide. I went back and forth with Kimberg about this is the revolution in Purple Rain.

[Bill Simmons]

Doesn't count.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay. Because he's not playing Prince.

[Bill Simmons]

Doesn't count.

[Chris Ryan]

I think they're called the.

[Bill Simmons]

Wendy and Lisa are in his other.

[Chris Ryan]

Everybody has the regular names. The time is in it. But. But we couldn't decide whether or not that was technically a fictitious band or not, because if they are, they're obviously number one.

[Van Lathan]

We just did an 80s soundtrack and

[Bill Simmons]

the time doesn't count either.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

The only one I would add to it is Sex Bomb from Scott Pilgrim.

[Chris Ryan]

From Scott Pilgrim, yeah. That's a fucking miss by band.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

What about Matt Damon being, as he's

[Chris Ryan]

calling himself the third Euro Trip?

[Bill Simmons]

Scotty doesn't know.

[Chris Ryan]

Scotty doesn't know.

[Craig]

Dan Band. Real band. Right, The Dan Band.

[Van Lathan]

Oh, hey, that's my bike. Hey, that's my bike from Reality Bites.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a good one.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, CB4.

[Bill Simmons]

So we never see Citizen Dick singles. We just hang out with them.

[Van Lathan]

But they are Mud, honey, so they're pretty good.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Wait. Wait a minute. Oh, yeah. No, they're the only fictitious band in singles. Cause everybody else is like Alice Chains.

[Bill Simmons]

They never perform, though.

[Van Lathan]

To me.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm dick.

[Van Lathan]

Touch me. I'm sick. Yeah. Touch me. I'm dick.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Touch me. I'm dick. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

We see them on stage doing it.

[Van Lathan]

No, we just hear their record.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Yeah. We don't see it, though.

[Chris Ryan]

Touch me, I'm dead.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a good one. CR thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison Ford. Hottest take award. I don't know how hot of a take this is, but if this movie had two more great songs in it, what happens? Does this become Grease?

[Chris Ryan]

The level to which Grease is better than this movie is difficult to articulate. Articulate. So, no, I mean, Grease is better in every way.

[Bill Simmons]

Right, I'm aware. Except for.

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

Except for everyone in the movie is 38 years old, high school kids.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, yeah, true.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

So would you want another song that was like, Dark side, or do you feel like we needed, like, another Joanne solo song?

[Bill Simmons]

Well, I was gonna do this later for either nitpick or unanswerable but you assume all the songs we hear on the Dark side, Tender Years, they're all on some album, right? They're on Tender years, released in 63.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, they're on Tender Years.

[Bill Simmons]

We don't know anything about the release of that album. How well the songs did, how famous were they? Did they get to go on the Ed Sullivan Show? No, we know nothing. We only know that they're back in the studio, that they got $10,000 to do their album after it.

[Van Lathan]

We don't know if John and Paul saw Eddie and the Cruisers on TV and were like, did they start the Beatles?

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

But. But there's this whole missing section, so. Craig Gas. Like, I love that this movie's 95 minutes. I actually agree with them. I think you could maybe cut out seven minutes and add. I just want to know what happens when the album comes out. And did it make them more successful? Did one of the songs become a top song and then heard another song during that.

[Van Lathan]

Here's my take on that. Is that most records in the early 60s, like, that were a collection of singles for the most part.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

And so, like, I think that those songs were probably like, a collection of, like, the 10 things that they were playing that were the biggest original songs that they had when they were playing live. But it wasn't like, here's our lp. It was, like, songs people were pretty familiar with.

[Craig]

So was. Was the Dark side on Tender Years?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Craig]

I thought Frank helps them write Darkseid, so Frank knew them.

[Van Lathan]

I don't do Dark. I don't think they did Tender Years until after he had been in the band for a while.

[Craig]

So then what did Sal mean then when he was like, we were doing just fine without you?

[Van Lathan]

Because I think he was like, we were just bars doing Runaround Sue.

[Chris Ryan]

They were already moving, like.

[Craig]

But Tender Years took them to a whole another level, I guess.

[Chris Ryan]

I know, but it seems like that was uncalled for.

[Bill Simmons]

From South.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, it feels like that Word man. Joining the band was the. The final piece to them becoming, like, a mainstream kind of successful band. But to your point, we don't know how successful.

[Bill Simmons]

If there's one more great song in this movie, I think it. I think something different.

[Van Lathan]

Can I do a hottest take of piggybacks off of this, which is that the best part of this movie, which is also, like, the thing that I think fucks this movie up is that they play Darkseid first, and it's out of context of the entire movie. They just play the best song that these guys have to open the film.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

And even though that happens at the college, which we know is a dark moment for the band, if you make us wait to hear Darkseid and you get to see them do the big full band version of Darkseid after you've seen them write. Blows the top off the movie. It's so much better.

[Chris Ryan]

But that would denote that the movie had a regular story structure, which it doesn't, because it really is not that concerning. So that's where if you had that

[Bill Simmons]

extra great song, that song leads the movie. And then it all leads to Dark side, which is.

[Van Lathan]

But if the movie starts with Tender Years.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, you can start it with that.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, I guess. But I think people would be like, yeah, it's a pretty good song. But it starts with Dark side. You're like, whoa, Holy. This is pretty good.

[Chris Ryan]

You know what to your question, though, at the beginning of the movie, I guess, is when they frame how successful of a band that they've become.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

She's trying to talk about. But even as she's doing it, she's almost informing them of how big they were. It's not like they had like. It's not like they were like, oh, my God, it's Darkseid from Eddie and the Cruisers. It's still kind of ambiguous to a degree.

[Bill Simmons]

There's a talk show, five minutes, them going on a talk show or an Ed Sullivan type show that could have been in this movie. That would have been fun.

[Van Lathan]

Did you have a hottest take?

[Chris Ryan]

I do. I think Wardman tried to kill Eddie. I think he actually killed the saxophone player. I think this entire movie.

[Van Lathan]

I think he cooked up a hot shot for Wendell.

[Chris Ryan]

I think he did. Cause there's no way that's why he

[Bill Simmons]

lived in a trailer to that point.

[Chris Ryan]

There's no way he didn't know. I think actually his jealousy. Cause I watched this movie just. It doesn't make any sense. He's openly trying war Man's fucking crazy, guys. He's openly trying to fuck with Eddie's girl. Can you imagine? We all work together. We're a band. Can you just imagine? We're at, like, I don't know, ringer party or something like that. And I'm just over there with, like, one of y' all's wives, like, trying to figure out what the fuck is up. Like, what, like, is. Is this shit is. It blows my mind every time I watch this. My dad used to fucking hate it also.

[Bill Simmons]

Maybe she didn't make Eddie. Didn't make her toes.

[Van Lathan]

Squirrel Van is Really onto something. Because if. If you come to the end and it turns out Word man is the one who's been flipping people's apartments up and down. And it's Kaiser Soze and he did his own. The reason why he didn't get upset when he saw his apartment is because he's like, I know you have the

[Bill Simmons]

Kaiser Soze ending at the end.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah. Where he's just like, all I wanted was the tapes to get out of there so I could get out of my dumb teacher job.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Guys, let me tell you something. In Eddie and the Cruisers 2, Eddie is performing music. But he still refuses to let people know that he is Eddie.

[Van Lathan]

He's like, I'm Joe West.

[Chris Ryan]

He's Joe West.

[Bill Simmons]

Right?

[Chris Ryan]

Do you know why? Because he's fucking scared of Word Man. The whole reason why Eddie has gone into hiding.

[Craig]

That's true.

[Van Lathan]

I haven't seen Eddie in the cruises. Eddie lives in a long time.

[Bill Simmons]

He's a pseudonym.

[Van Lathan]

But is he scared of Word Man?

[Chris Ryan]

This is in my brain. He's scared of Word man because he knows Word man tried to kill him, which is why he's hiding this whole thing. Word man is.

[Bill Simmons]

So when we see Eddie at the end, Eddie and the Cruise, there's one walking away. Word Man's behind him with a weapon.

[Chris Ryan]

So he's stalking him.

[Bill Simmons]

But you don't see it because Amazon has already cut to the next Harry Potter Season 7. Casting what ifs Parade claims they were ready to replace him with Rick Springfield.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, that's interesting.

[Bill Simmons]

And that he had to do that first concert where he had to lip sync all the songs and act like Eddie. And if he sucked, they were going to replace the him. And Rick Springfield admitted that he did. He did think about trying to get the part. Would have been cool. Instead he lives on in Jesse's Girl on Boogie Nights. That ends up being his legacy. Even though we don't see him.

[Chris Ryan]

If Rick was in it, it would have been a box office success. I bet little bit more people would want to see it.

[Bill Simmons]

Per was discovered in a New York City restaurant working as a chef. So still hope for Dave Chang. Even in his mid-40s, he might still be an actor.

[Chris Ryan]

Weird one.

[Bill Simmons]

This isn't a casting whiff, but one of the people in the opening scene that when Maggie's telling them about Rimbo Scott the mustache Barry Sand. He was an original Letterman producer in the first five years of the show and was on camera a lot.

[Van Lathan]

Really.

[Bill Simmons]

And I never understood why he was in this movie. It's really Strange. I mean that's like a deep, deep Letterman cut. That's the NBC. But it was just fucking weird. It would be like if Daniel Kellison was. Was in the movie. Just randomly, just in a scene. That's that guy. Joey Pants. Not eligible. John Stockwell is in this. The lead guy from Christine and also in Top Gun. He's the guy that knows.

[Van Lathan]

He's wizard from Top Gun. Yeah. Oh yeah, the werewolf. I can't remember. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

But the winner is Mitchell Lawrence for sure. Matthew Lawrence as Mitchell Lawrence was his brother.

[Chris Ryan]

Twin brother, right? Yeah, Twin brother.

[Van Lathan]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Matthew Lawrence. Yeah. Not Mitchell Lawrence.

[Van Lathan]

Matthew Lawrence also now does or did sports talk radio in Lexington, Kentucky.

[Chris Ryan]

Wow.

[Bill Simmons]

How many episodes does David Silver's dad in? 90210 do you think? If you had to guess how many episodes is.

[Van Lathan]

What did you watch?

[Bill Simmons]

902020. No. Yeah. 36. Oh, you're basically on the show at that point. Yeah, they did over 200 shows.

[Chris Ryan]

What we've never talked about is a 920 parent ranking. Because you have.

[Bill Simmons]

He's the best one.

[Chris Ryan]

What about. What about Dylan's fucking dad? Dylan's dad was the man who was Dylan?

[Van Lathan]

Who played Dylan's dad?

[Chris Ryan]

That guy. We've seen this guy. That guy.

[Bill Simmons]

Jack McKay.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, like Jack McKay was the man. He's shady. What is.

[Bill Simmons]

He blew up though. Should have looked out for his family better.

[Chris Ryan]

But he was like some kind of fucking mobster or something like that.

[Bill Simmons]

I would have thought you would like David Silver's dad. Cause he was like constantly messing around with the dental assistance.

[Van Lathan]

You don't like Brandon and Kelly?

[Chris Ryan]

Brandon and Kelly's parents got on my nerves.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, they were terrible.

[Chris Ryan]

They got on my nerves the whole family. I didn't enjoy.

[Bill Simmons]

Actually my favorite was Kelly Taylor's mom because she had the drug problem and was.

[Van Lathan]

Oh, Brandon and Brenda. Is that where Brandon and Brenda and

[Chris Ryan]

then also Steve's mom because she was like famous.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, famous.

[Chris Ryan]

She was kind of cool.

[Bill Simmons]

Dion Waiters Award Ellen Barkin Unless you want to give it to the. I didn't pay for a bunch of jerk offs making weird sounds. No, I think Barkin Recasting Couch Director City Can I offer you Michael Keaton as Kenny the drummer? Just randomly being in this movie.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, I could take that. That's good.

[Bill Simmons]

It's like a year after night shift just looking for work still.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Gets this big scene playing as a blackjack dealer.

[Chris Ryan]

It's going crazy.

[Van Lathan]

I like it when Kenny puts the comic book down and just gets on a Kit and just immediately just like

[Bill Simmons]

lays into it the Van Lathan Award for. Did this movie need more black people?

[Chris Ryan]

No, we were treated poorly, but no, it doesn't. Perfect. And that's another thing about these 80s movies. Don't fucking put it. Not where we just do the thing. Okay? Just do the thing.

[Van Lathan]

It's a white band, but with a black saxophone.

[Chris Ryan]

It's a white band, black saxophone player. That's cool. You know what I'm saying? We don't need to just. It's fine. I'm telling you, it's fine.

[Bill Simmons]

Craig has a Flex category.

[Craig]

I did it. It was the Bam out of Bio. It's a Salamato.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah, you did.

[Bill Simmons]

Where the fuck does that come from?

[Craig]

Him at the nightclub.

[Bill Simmons]

First time somebody did Bam out of bio. Is the flex category the 83 point game. It's going to live on forever. Half asserting research. Behringer said he did not try to learn piano. Did practice some keyboards in his trailer. Well, he read big's chilled dialogue.

[Van Lathan]

Is that a euphemism? Yeah, keyboards don't bother me.

[Bill Simmons]

Matthew Lawrence did learn how to play the bass Parade remembers that when they all played together, it was a little like Stillwater. It was a college concert. The extras were into it. Everybody was going nuts and they were really pretending they were the band. And then the palace of Depression. Depression was a real place in Vineland, N.J. does not exist anymore. Fraternity house was at Haverford College. Where's that?

[Van Lathan]

Outside of Philly.

[Bill Simmons]

Tony Martz was an actual place until the early 80s and then demolished. And then we didn't mention this. Joanne, played by Helen Schneider was a pretty famous like German music star in the 70s and 80s. A lot of. A lot of like, success apparently.

[Van Lathan]

I kind of like and wish there was like 10 more of her losing it a little at the end where she's like, I have to get ready. Eddie's here. And it's like kind of glorious. And I'm like, oh, yeah, this would do more of that. Like she's been hanging on waiting for this call for 20 years. That's great.

[Bill Simmons]

Like you go in her room and it's just all weirdo dolls. Fake Eddie did some research on him.

[Van Lathan]

John Cafferty or the Eddie that was with Salamato.

[Bill Simmons]

The Eddie with Salamato, played by Joey Balin, who put out an album in 1994. If you want to download it on your way home. The Joey Balin's solo work. Apex Mountain. Michael Perret, definitely.

[Van Lathan]

Oh, wait, I had one more half ass Internet Research for you. In that same Washington Post article that I mentioned, Barringer claims that they filmed a scene in a roadhouse with the Cruisers. Watching the Beatles on Ed Sullivan and making fun of it. And he has, like, the whole thing he talks about. And then after that, after this quote, Martin Davidson's like, we never shot that. That's fair and just full of shit. But I really like the idea that they at least thought about the Beatles in this movie.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. I love when there's, like, violent disagreements like that.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

It just goes to show you, like, people were probably using substances while making

[Chris Ryan]

it high as shit.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

I mean, it was 1983, apex. That's why we're. The Grantland Oral history will never happen.

[Van Lathan]

Because of the amount of drugs we.

[Bill Simmons]

No, because of. 20 years later, people can just start making up.

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

Like, Bill came back from the All Star Game and he got in this huge fist fight with CR. Just like after 20 years, you overrate submarine movies.

[Van Lathan]

Dickhead.

[Bill Simmons]

Apex Mountain. Michael Pere.

[Van Lathan]

Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

Tom Behringer.

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Bill Simmons]

Ellen Barkin. No. Matthew Lawrence. I'm going to say David Silver's dad, probably. So that show's pretty. Big. Beaver Brown Band, yes. Jersey Shore movies? No. But I also can't come up with a better one.

[Van Lathan]

I'm going to get killed for this, for not knowing.

[Bill Simmons]

Do you claim the Jersey Shore? What's your relationship with Jersey?

[Van Lathan]

It's like the summer destination for most of Philadelphia people. But I don't know of a better Jersey Shore movie than this.

[Bill Simmons]

Never really figured it out as a great location.

[Craig]

Yeah. I mean, not. Not a movie, obviously, but the Jersey Shore.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah. Yes. The show is probably.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, the show.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Yeah, obviously.

[Bill Simmons]

Did you like that show?

[Chris Ryan]

No, no, of course not.

[Bill Simmons]

Do you ever hang out with those people during your early Hollywood days?

[Chris Ryan]

I think.

[Bill Simmons]

I think during the situation.

[Chris Ryan]

Ever go party, see a couple of them? Not. I never like that show. As a matter of fact, that show, to me, is when I realized, oh, you know, I don't have to fucking. Fucking like what everybody else likes. It never made this grotesque in a way.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow. That got dark.

[Chris Ryan]

No, no. I just. I never understood it.

[Van Lathan]

I get it.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, everybody was so into it either. No, everybody was so into it.

[Bill Simmons]

I loved it for two years.

[Chris Ryan]

See, I just never. Everything else that had come from mtv, like Road Rules Challenge, all of that stuff into it for some reason. Jersey Shore, just never.

[Bill Simmons]

Fucking Arthur Rimbaud.

[Van Lathan]

I think that he's had bigger moments than this.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Helen Schneider. Sounds like Germany was pretty hopping.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

What happened? You would have thought that she'd have been around. She was like, what?

[Bill Simmons]

Went back to Germany.

[Chris Ryan]

Interesting.

[Bill Simmons]

1957. Chevy's probably not Cruz or Hanks. What about Hanks as word man?

[Van Lathan]

I. I had cruise as Eddie because Cruz has priors of doing the outsiders. Dave cruises.

[Chris Ryan]

Eddie Cruz is Eddie.

[Van Lathan]

He basically played a greaser in the outsiders. And that's kind of the way Eddie dresses. Like Eddie is just full outsider.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, Craig's all in.

[Craig]

Eddie and the cruisers. Come on.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Come on. What are you doing?

[Bill Simmons]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. It makes a lot of sense.

[Van Lathan]

And I think you could actually. This is one of the rare times where you could do cruises. Eddie and Hanks is Frank

[Bill Simmons]

Scorsese or Spielberg.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, I have Scorsese.

[Chris Ryan]

Scorsese.

[Van Lathan]

Tri state area.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Best hang. We're saying best hang, Sal, Is pizza fun dressing room?

[Van Lathan]

Best hang is absolutely Maggie.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, I got Ellen barkin.

[Bill Simmons]

Good point. Yeah. I gotta add, Maggie.

[Chris Ryan]

I got Ellen barkin as the best hang. I got worse hang, Sal.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, how come? Just talking about the old days. No, Sal, I had Doc is the

[Chris Ryan]

worst thing when you think about it.

[Bill Simmons]

Doc. Doc's tough fang, Sal.

[Chris Ryan]

You come in there, he offers you a slice of pizza. He sits down, the pizza's in his hand. He never fucking eats it. Right. He's just hanging off.

[Van Lathan]

He's always crying and sweating.

[Chris Ryan]

He's crying, he's sweating. He's doing the whole thing. Word man. He's skeptical of word man, which is probably because he knew that wordman was a psychopath.

[Bill Simmons]

Right?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

So, like, I think probably Kenny would be best hang playing.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Telling blackjack stories. Just talking about ball and chicks, these guys counting cards. And then we balled in a car. Why didn't you have Maggie in the throw your life away area?

[Van Lathan]

That's a good question. You took it out of flex. But that's a really good one.

[Bill Simmons]

Picking nits. Would there have been more interest in Eddie's disappearance or way more interest. Felt like this would have been one of the bigger stories of. Of 20 years.

[Van Lathan]

I think that there is something to be said for how local news was back then. So I think it would be a huge deal in New Jersey and maybe get to Philly, But I don't know if it cracks the big apple.

[Chris Ryan]

This speaks to the question of how big of a band they were, because that's a part of it. However, they never found a body. Being that they never found a body. It's always funny in 80s movies where they go, something. Something happened. That body was never found. People would never fucking let Go of it. That's the DB Cooper thing. Don't know where he went or what happened to him.

[Bill Simmons]

We mentioned Behringer's too old for word band. We talked about word. Ban and Joanna kiss. Joanne kissing. So at the end. This is a super nitpick, but Media magazine's doing their big feature on Eddie and the Cruisers and Eddie Wilson. How brilliant he was. And they're showing video of him at the college concert. Yes. How were they Filming that in 1966?

[Van Lathan]

Full color video with close ups is what I had. Probably camera crews. No, fuller color video. Video with close ups and editing at the 1963 Spring Dance of Benton College.

[Bill Simmons]

There were nine cameras apparently there and then. But they're showing the crowd.

[Van Lathan]

It's like Sunday Night Football. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Pretty tough. Come on, Van, you're not stinking that by me after I've seen this movie 78 times.

[Chris Ryan]

I love it. I agree.

[Bill Simmons]

Any other nitpicks?

[Van Lathan]

Just that the one bit we hear of Season in Hell is pretty vanilla compared to like, they were like this mind blowing avant garde noise. You can't put it out. It's like this is just a slow blue song. Like, this is not that complicated.

[Chris Ryan]

I. I guess my big nitpick that I've always had is like, is Wordman Mozart? Like, how you learn to play piano that fast? Word Man's around. He doesn't know what he's doing. All of a sudden he's playing piano. He's got solos.

[Van Lathan]

No. Word man knew how to play piano, didn't he?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, he is. The piano solo earlier.

[Chris Ryan]

He has to play. I'm talking about early. No, earlier. Like, if I'm not, doesn't Eddie. Am I maybe?

[Craig]

No, no, no, no.

[Van Lathan]

Eddie's showing him rock chord.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, so he already knew how to play.

[Van Lathan]

So he's like, I know how to do it it. But Eddie's like, no, you have to groove down at this end of the keyboard.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. That's why I love this podcast. I thought that for 30 years. No, no.

[Bill Simmons]

Craig's ready to go.

[Craig]

It's not the movie for nitpicks.

[Van Lathan]

Sure.

[Craig]

I don't think any of these people would have hung out. Like, this band makes no sense as humans outside of the band.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, I think Sal and. And Joey Pants would have hung out. Yeah. And that's it.

[Craig]

That's it.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Sequel prequel Prestige tv, all by cast are untouchable. So. So Prestige tv. I think you could do this. And you probably make it an 80s band and you set it in 2000 or maybe you make it like the Strokes like that era, early 2000s New York and now. And then it's like today coming back today. Yeah. Where it's like the.

[Van Lathan]

The some song has gotten big on TikTok.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Think about what we already did. This is begging. Begging to be like a Tupac situation. Begging to be like some big prestige deal where some rapper that we thought was killed in a beef back, but he's alive in the whole nine. This is begging to be remade with that exact spin to it.

[Van Lathan]

There is.

[Bill Simmons]

You would do it with the. Yeah, yeah. Yes. Because you change it and make it a female singer.

[Van Lathan]

The coolest thing to do would be to like basically try to Blair Witch it where you're like, we've discovered these tapes.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh.

[Van Lathan]

And it's like. And now this band. Like, it would be basically like a viral marketing campaign.

[Bill Simmons]

Blair Witch crossed with Eddie in the Cruisers. That's pretty good. Is this movie better with Wayne Jenkins, Fergie, the Flores?

[Chris Ryan]

Let's do it.

[Bill Simmons]

So many others. Or Zane Low.

[Van Lathan]

Eddie, man, here you are. You've just seen your own face on media magazine. The lovely Maggie reporting it out. Season in hell never even came into fruition. Never came to harvest. Never came to flowering. But you, what's you. What have you been doing, man, since palace of depression? Tell me. Take me to the palace and let's get out of this depressive zone.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm so glad Zane finally got to

[Van Lathan]

talk to a musician instead of a cop.

[Bill Simmons]

Bring me back to Tony Mart that day.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Van Lathan]

The other option would be Zane interviewing Wendell. But like Wendell doesn't say anything back. Wendell, man, you played with. Played with Dexter Gordon. Now you're on junk and Wendell's like, no one's ever asked me a direct question.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, man. Just want to ask her who gets it. Soundtrack or original song?

[Van Lathan]

I go original song. Dark side music.

[Bill Simmons]

I'll give you best music original song. That year our winner was Flashdance. What a feeling by the one and only Irene Cara.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, man.

[Craig]

Banger.

[Chris Ryan]

Fame. I don't care.

[Bill Simmons]

Tough nude scene for her. And fame. Saw fame recently. Really emotionally scarring as a 10 year old.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

It's like now take your shirt off that creepy photographer guy. Do you like Fame?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, I do. Fame like. Well, at first I watched the TV show first. That was the first thing I saw TV show. And then I went back and watched it.

[Bill Simmons]

I saw Fame in the theater. Probably a little too early. Probably age 10. You know, fame, really good idea for a movie. I'm actually surprised they have it Run that back.

[Van Lathan]

Are you a Flash Dance fan?

[Bill Simmons]

Not totally. Yeah. Maniac from Flashdance was also nominated over you from Tender Mercies and then two Yentl songs. Feel like we could have snuck in Dark side.

[Chris Ryan]

Dark side in there.

[Bill Simmons]

And to maybe bump the second best Yento song.

[Van Lathan]

That would be incredible if it's like Academy Award winning Eddie and the Cruisers.

[Bill Simmons]

Probably unanswerable questions. What happened to Media magazine? Maggie moves on to where I think she does she get that like doing like Live at five in New York City, replace Simmons.

[Van Lathan]

Maybe she moves up to People or Newsweek or Time.

[Chris Ryan]

Did Eddie always.

[Bill Simmons]

And then gets lung cancer? Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

So my question is, did Eddie always pull out or did his boys not swim? How did she not get pretty pregnant?

[Van Lathan]

Who?

[Chris Ryan]

His girl.

[Van Lathan]

Joanne.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, Joanne. They're on the road all together. Music field, Lusty Love Making, falling in

[Van Lathan]

the back of a car, listening to your own car.

[Bill Simmons]

Or maybe not a lot of sex because he was so driven by the art. That's why she was.

[Chris Ryan]

Or like, that's why she got with Word Man. But something doesn't make a lot of sense. How there was no like, Eddie baby,

[Van Lathan]

at some point questions was just like, what did Word man think was going to happen when he. Like when he shows up after his long date with Joanne and he's like, is it time for us to play? Like, of course Eddie's gonna with you now, right?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Toby Tyler got off easy.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

What did DOC sell the tapes for? And what happened next? Is it unanswerable?

[Van Lathan]

The musicals? You want Neo?

[Bill Simmons]

It's like.

[Van Lathan]

I think it's a. I think it is anticlimactic. I think people are like, this isn't that good. I like. I'd prefer Darkseid. And it just doesn't go anywhere.

[Bill Simmons]

Does it come out on eight tracks? What were those things? Not the seat, but between cassettes and CDs.

[Van Lathan]

Eight tracks.

[Bill Simmons]

Eight tracks? Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I think the eight track is dead by 83 though, right?

[Bill Simmons]

I think it's still around in 83. That was the last year.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Like cassettes, right? No cassettes.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't think Season Hell does that.

[Van Lathan]

Well, me neither.

[Bill Simmons]

And I think it's a big bust. And DOC probably is arrested for fraud in some way.

[Chris Ryan]

How do they position it? Do they do music videos where they. Because this, the age of the video is starting to happen. But the Cruisers don't.

[Van Lathan]

Well, they have all that incredible footage of Eddie and the Cruisers playing BET in college so they can use some

[Bill Simmons]

of that secret handshake club memorabilia that you'd want from this movie. I like the photo of Joanne with the two guys that's in her place.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Just be a weird one just to have on the wall right now. People are like, what the fuck is that? Eddie the Cruisers, 1983.

[Van Lathan]

That's the original staff of Brantland.

[Bill Simmons]

Coach Finstock, Mr. Miyagi were for best. Worst life lesson. Guys like me and you, they strike oil under your garden and all you get is dead tomatoes.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, shit.

[Bill Simmons]

Thought that was pretty good by Salamato Philosopher.

[Van Lathan]

That's good.

[Chris Ryan]

If we can't be great, then there's no sense in ever playing music again.

[Bill Simmons]

Best double feature choice. That thing you do. Who won the movie? Beaver Brown Band. And they're still dining on this 40 years later.

[Chris Ryan]

HBO. Good call, HBO.

[Van Lathan]

I was good. I was entertaining, Perry. But I think. I think you're right. I think it's Beaver Brown Band because those songs still get played. Those guys still probably make money off this.

[Bill Simmons]

Craig, let's hear it.

[Craig]

Had a great time. Loved it. Super likable.

[Bill Simmons]

Did you watch it with Liz or Solo?

[Craig]

I tried to get her. I badgered her to watch the movie with me and she wasn't interested, unfortunately.

[Bill Simmons]

Just not. She doesn't care as much about the ringer as she says.

[Craig]

I was like 15 minutes in. I was like, you. This would be fun. We can just throw this on and you can, like, half watch it. She don't want to do it, but. And I think she would have liked it.

[Bill Simmons]

You should have told her there was, like, some sort of ad potential out of it. Done it at that point.

[Craig]

Yeah. There's a great sponsorship.

[Van Lathan]

Bill's actually in this movie.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. I was almost certain you'd hate it.

[Craig]

No, no.

[Bill Simmons]

I knew. I knew he was gonna like it. We don't. First of all, 95 minutes, you're 80% of the way there with.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Like, music provides such a high floor. Like, it's like you're just gonna win 48 games with a couple good songs in it.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Craig]

And I don't know, there's a level of, like, how much you take the movie seriously, and then that allows you to be comfortable and enjoy it. Which is why I think, like, I went into LA Confidential, and I don't think I loved it as much as everybody else did, but the expectation versus reality. I liked LA Confidential. I didn't love it.

[Chris Ryan]

I don't know.

[Bill Simmons]

You need to watch it a couple times.

[Craig]

I don't know why.

[Chris Ryan]

LA Confidential.

[Bill Simmons]

First watch. There's a lot going on.

[Chris Ryan]

You know what?

[Craig]

Thought it was a little cheesy.

[Chris Ryan]

Can I be honest with you? I get. Will be hard for me to understand that because the movie was legitimately the biggest fucking thing in the world. Everybody was talking about it.

[Bill Simmons]

And you saw it eight times.

[Chris Ryan]

And I saw it eight times. I saw it in the theater.

[Van Lathan]

And you didn't go into it being like this.

[Chris Ryan]

You know what? That was a boomer response. I could see that. I could see now it being a

[Craig]

little tough for people also with this movie. I love. I do. I've always been interested in, like, the second album, Theory of a Band. You know, I always find that to be interesting. There's a little bit of, like. Like, Pet Sounds to this. Brian Wilson, Eddie Wilson.

[Van Lathan]

Sure.

[Craig]

With the Beach Boys and, like, the controversial Pet Sounds album. Nobody liked it. And then, you know, down the Road is a masterpiece. This movie.

[Van Lathan]

People liked Pet Sounds. It was like Wild Honey or whatever the next.

[Craig]

I thought Pet Sounds was considered very abstract and.

[Van Lathan]

Oh, no, it has good vibe. I mean, it's abstract, but it was like. It blew up.

[Craig]

Oh, I thought it came out the gate and was. And was not reviewed well.

[Van Lathan]

Oh, okay.

[Craig]

Maybe you would know better.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, Pemberton is like that from Weezer. Like albums that come out and people go, what the fuck are you doing? And.

[Bill Simmons]

But is this amazing.

[Chris Ryan]

What the fuck is Pemberton?

[Craig]

Is this kind of movie the 80s equivalent of, like, a current Netflix movie? Like, Gaslit by My Husband, which I have great disdain for a movie like that nowadays, but I'm like, is that just what this was in the 80s? I don't know.

[Van Lathan]

Bill was like, what's the double feature? In a weird way, I feel like the double feature for this movie should be Legend of Billie Jean, because it's kind of like the same. Kind of like. Like, regional local sensation, huge story in my town, but wouldn't have. Wouldn't have made it out to, like, LA where people were like. And I think. I think it's hard to almost replicate that now because of social media. And it's just weird that, like, this

[Craig]

movie is looked like you guys are looking back on it with, like, charm and nostalgia. But I feel like a lot of the current, like, Netflix movie slop or the streaming movie slop is not looked at that way. Nobody, like, honors those films anyway, and they will disappear even if people watch them. But these movies, we look back on and we're like, oh, Eddie, and the Cruiser's like, such a fun, easy watch. But no one's gonna do that to Gaslit By My Husband.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, but we don't know what would happen with some of those movies. If there were only seven movies on Netflix and they played them for a year.

[Bill Simmons]

I would say give Gaslit by my husband and Cheers a couple years to marinate.

[Chris Ryan]

To me, the difference in that is that like those movies, first of all, you have to be active in watching those films. You have to go search for the movie and then put it on. That right there means that there had to be a reason for you to do that. Right?

[Craig]

People weren't doing that to this movie. It was on hbo. Didn't it just come on? And you had a little.

[Chris Ryan]

So the difference.

[Van Lathan]

We didn't have as much else. Stuff to Other stuff to do. Like people barely had Atari 2600s back then.

[Chris Ryan]

With Gaslit by My Husband or any of these other movies. There's like this cultural conversation that gets you to go watch the movie. Cause you heard it with Eddie and the Cruisers. There's none of that. I never had one con. This is the first conversation I've ever had with friends about Eddie and the Cruisers ever.

[Bill Simmons]

My other was only my mom. Cause my mom loved this movie.

[Chris Ryan]

We talked about it. My dad would watch it. My dad would be like, you watching them same people again. Why them people always on tv. Tv. But like, is. Is like with this movie was just on all the time and you just had a situation with it. It was almost like, you know what

[Bill Simmons]

I would compare it to? You know, if. If you listen to an album a lot and you listen to it like 20 times and then like the eighth best song in the album, you're like, song's awesome. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

I really like this and.

[Van Lathan]

But I love when that happens. But there's that song where you're like, I don't know about this one.

[Bill Simmons]

Does that happen anymore? Because every. These songs are just all released almost like you can. You can cherry pick them on Spotify.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm gonna keep it real with. I don't know that it does.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't think it happens in the same.

[Chris Ryan]

Cause I don't think the albums last long enough for them to like, for that to happen. Like, I think that the artists are dropping music so much. Like, you're getting so much more stuff. There's so much. I don't think that that happens here and there.

[Van Lathan]

I think it happens here and there. Like, the Geese record's a good example of like. There was my original run through it. I was like, I love these five songs. Then there was like two more, three more that became really favorites of mine.

[Craig]

It's also crazy how much Hollywood had screwed up. I can't believe that John Cafferty and the Beaver, the fact that they didn't turn into anything is insane to me.

[Van Lathan]

It might have been because of the band name. I think it might have been because people were like, you're Eddie and the Cruisers. I mean, there's like, a little bit of, like, a poison chalice to that.

[Craig]

That song you said was number three in the Billboard charts that year.

[Chris Ryan]

Seven.

[Craig]

Seven.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, like a legitimate hit in a monoculture time.

[Craig]

We're in a different. Completely different world now. But, like, nobody even knows who the singers are of the K pop demon hunter songs, and yet that's like the biggest band in the. Literally no one knows who sings it, and yet they knew this band and these people, and they couldn't get them relevance and they couldn't get them another album. That's crazy to me.

[Chris Ryan]

Same thing happened to Eddie when Jack

[Bill Simmons]

O and House were here, like, a year ago. You told me this was on tcm

[Van Lathan]

and I recorded it. Let's tape it. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

And we watched it in the morning and we were all, like, completely into it. I don't. I don't know. I just think that the. I don't think there's a lot of these movies, which is one of the reasons why it's endured a little bit. There's just not enough music movies.

[Van Lathan]

If there are or if they're in the works. I think all of it is based

[Bill Simmons]

on whether the song and whether you like the band. Right. Well, think about Rock of Ages with Cruz was a bomb. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

So stupid, though. You know what I mean? That movie almost doesn't take itself seriously. This movie takes itself incredibly seriously. So you get. There's a sincerity about this. Maybe it's obviously not perfect, but there's a sincerity about the movie. Movie.

[Bill Simmons]

Would you watch a movie about. Done. Love Story, JFK junior Style, about Lenny Kravitz falling in love with Lisa Bonet? We get all the. Lenny's music.

[Chris Ryan]

The entire thing would love it.

[Bill Simmons]

Debbie, it's a good idea.

[Craig]

Zoe Kravitz plays Lisa Bonet.

[Van Lathan]

Oh, shit.

[Chris Ryan]

You like that type of shit? I'm into that.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a good idea.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm into Lisa Bonet.

[Craig]

I'm into Zoe Kravitz and Lisa Bonet. Sure.

[Bill Simmons]

Everyone loves Lenny Kravitz. I don't even mind that. I don't like the NBA NBC song.

[Van Lathan]

You don't mind that you don't like it.

[Bill Simmons]

I just. I. I'm never gonna. I'm never gonna be mad at Lenny Kravitz or anything.

[Chris Ryan]

All right.

[Bill Simmons]

CR month this was. It's no longer Sierra Month. That's okay, man. It's a little chocolate right after.

[Van Lathan]

Yeah, little, little.

[Bill Simmons]

Those little gum things. What's the one that. It's got the. There's like different ones that they'll bring out.

[Van Lathan]

Well, they've got the mints, you know, chocolate covered mints.

[Bill Simmons]

That's. I feel like that's lazy when the restaurants do that.

[Van Lathan]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

I like when I felt like there was dessert. The dessert chef made me something. I like when they. I feel like they prepared something for me. It's true. That's it. I don't know what's coming next week. This was fun. Good to see you, Ben.

[Chris Ryan]

Of course.

[Bill Simmons]

Good to see you soon.

[Van Lathan]

See you guys in San Francisco. If you're.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh yeah, San Francisco.

[Craig]

Two days from now. This will come out on a Monday. We're there Wednesday.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I'll do the little intro for that. But yeah, we're going to be doing Basic Instinct, the three of us with Mallory at the Tony Rempe Theater. Yeah, that's. I think that's.

[Van Lathan]

Doesn't that guy play for the Rangers? That's Mike.

[Bill Simmons]

Tony Remy hit like 280 last year. Yeah. We will be there in San Francisco thanks to Geha. Thanks to Eduardo as well. And we'll see you next week in the rewatchables.