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- [00:00]
A
This episode is brought to you by Focus Features. Don't miss Focus Features Anemone, starring three time Academy Award winner Daniel Day Lewis in his long awaited return to the big screen. It's the most anticipated performance of the year. Anemone tells the story of two brothers wrestling with their past and the one secret that has kept them apart for decades. Anemone, Rated R under 17. Not admitted without a parent. Only in theaters October 3rd. I need support staff to clear the room.
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B
Stand up and walk now.
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A
Hello and welcome to the Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor@theringer.com and joining me in the studio, adhering to military grooming standards, it's Andy Greenwald. We're back. Yeah.
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B
We're finally welcomed back in the Pentagon.
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A
NSF back. Landman back. Clooney back. Let's go.
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B
Huh? Do you think you can find the common denominator between those three things? Men, man. Y chromosomes.
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A
It's great to see you. We're recording this on Wednesday for release on Thursday.
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B
Okay.
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A
It'll be our last session that we're doing in the studio for a little while.
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B
Well, in. In an American studio.
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A
Yeah.
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B
We might talk about it. Well, no, I just, you know, I. I am getting back on a plane. I'm going back to London.
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A
Yes.
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B
For reasons that are secret.
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A
Yeah. Well, if you watch Slow Horses, then you'll know.
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B
Perhaps. Chamber of Secrets.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Who can say?
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A
Who can say?
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B
Who can say? But I'm looking forward to getting back into the vibrant Instagram food scene over there. All these months of just grinding tape of top jaw James, Dimitri, like I'm finally going to be able to weigh in on the subjects that matter the most.
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A
What is the perfect pint? What's the best thing these days?
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B
Currently a robust zero.
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A
Okay.
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B
A zero pint strategy is what has.
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A
Been getting me through this is that you will continue to, like, be.
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B
To embrace sobriety. I don't think that's possible there. You know, here's the thing about me, like Andrew Yang. I believe in no labels. And I sometimes. Sometimes I'm beer curious.
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A
Yeah.
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B
And sometimes I'm sober facing, you know.
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A
But you also love an oaky shard, don't you?
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B
Not oaky. No, no, no. Crisp, minerally acidic.
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A
Okay.
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B
It's gonna be an interesting adventure and I'm excited you'll be over there with me because you have been there through thick and thin with me.
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A
I'm not going over there with you for the entire time. No, no.
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B
I see you there at some point.
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A
I'm going to be on vacation over.
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B
There at some point. I did pitch you on coming with me the entire time. I think I do have space in the flat, but you've seen me, you know, be quite abstemious and on my best behavior. And then there was a time over the summer when we'd both been doing family stuff and you saw me approach a pint at Bad Brother the way Winnie the Pooh approaches a pot of honey. Yes. In that you didn't see my face until the bottom of it was showing.
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A
Yeah. And then you took a 45 minute walk just to clear my head.
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B
It was a nice walk.
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A
It was.
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B
Yeah. So that'll be fine. But I do. We will still be doing the podcast, but I'll miss your musk. It'll be different.
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A
Maybe you might miss a couple at bats. We may pinch it for you here and there if schedules.
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B
Is that a cricket reference?
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A
No, baseball.
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B
You thought about it.
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A
You're gonna miss Red October.
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B
Listen. Oh, my God.
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A
You're gonna miss Eagles crisis talks.
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B
You've explained VPNs to me enough that I think I might be able to watch some Eagles games, but I don't think I'm gonna see.
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A
I know exactly what's gonna happen. You're gonna get there. You're gonna be texting me about like, how do I make this work? Then you're gonna say, $80, I'm not doing this. And then you're gonna just be miserable watching sporting events on gamecast.
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B
No, I'm. First of all, I am the king of watching sporting events on gamecast. Refresh, refresh, refresh. And then sometimes it goes back a few plays and you can see that Alec Bohm struck out or whatever. I'm willing to pay the money this time. Big of you. Thank you. Well, I'm saving all that money on pints.
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A
That's true.
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B
We'll see about that. But I am wrestling with. There's two truths. One, because of the time difference, I think I will not see a single pitch of Phillies playoff baseball. Ergo, they are going to win the World Series. I have no doubt.
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A
We'll see. We'll see. I think it's a wide open National League.
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B
I don't think the Reds are part of that open conversation.
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A
Yeah, but I think it's just. It's going to be a just a daffy playoffs. I think. I really do. I. I will be here for you for all your VPN assistance needs. Not that I use it, because I'm just right here. I got all my you're very public.
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B
You use a very public network whenever possible.
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A
Kind of chaos menu. Today we don't really have. I don't really feel like the second episode of Slow Horses. You did watch.
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B
I did.
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A
And do you continue to love the.
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B
I love the season. I think that Saul Metztein, who directs it, has such style to the way he shoots London at night.
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A
Does it get you jazzed up?
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B
Well, yeah. I mean, what he's really, really talented at is making the mundane look beautiful and just like council estate flats or the suburban road where river and hoodie guy with a push knife whose name I don't remember yet go like. It's just. It's just so beautifully composed. I wouldn't say it's like the tourist brochure for London necessarily, but it's beautifully done. My question for you, and I feel like this is not even particularly spoilery for people listening to the pod who are not caught up on Slow horses or maybe never engage in slow horses, because I think it's a question that's applicable to other long running shows.
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A
Sure.
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B
Which is, have you ever had a point with the show where you feel like the shtick that is the engine of the show might be limiting it?
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A
Are you asking if we've heard Jackson lamb fart too many times?
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B
That is the builder's tea version of the question. Yes. The version that I meant was specifically in this episode. Again, I don't think this is a spoiler, but there's a scene when the whole gang is gathered at an unexpected location.
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A
You might as well say spoiler. I mean, we can say spoilers for.
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B
This isn't even a spoiler. They're all in a fancy hotel bar, which is a place they never would be. And everyone gets their turn getting dunked on by Jackson and the fact that river is still sitting there getting shit on in the exact same way five seasons in. In that moment, I was like, you know, let Garry get his shots off. Like, let him do his thing. But also, I would be ready for. And maybe it's coming in the season, a moment when Jackson isn't 10 steps ahead. A moment when he isn't as dismissive. You know, only because, look, last week I was praising the show for sitcom logic and how beautifully it works because of that. That every time a character walks into a room with two others, they have such strong personalities that you know how it's gonna go. And that's kind of like what made the Office work also.
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A
Yes.
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B
When you are. It's always been a balancing act. For a show that is also like, there are terrorists with giant guns menacing London and he's still quippin. This is a very small nitpick, but I wondered if you had a reaction to it in this or if it's applicable to other shows, long running shows.
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A
I think that that tension is actually dramatized in this season and it will continue to be so. I think that this is the gift and the curse of long term planning. So if you are thinking to yourself, if Gary Oldman is down to play this part for years and years and years and has said, I will play this part for as long as I am physically able to, then you've got something very reliable on your hands. And anecdotally, this is one of the few shows that I find people being like, oh, I, you know, I had a kid, so I, you know, well, I, I watched three seasons of Slow Horses when I was on night duty.
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B
Or that would be great.
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A
It was like people have been telling me that they have been catching up with or finally gotten into Slow Horses and I think it's because of the really specific, like, not only do they feel like it's worth the investment because everybody keeps saying it's season five and it's still really great.
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B
Yeah.
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A
Those seasons are digestible, they're exciting and they are comforting.
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B
Yes.
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A
I can't think of a better delicate balance. But you're, you're identifying something really, really, really smart. What do you do when the things that make your show so reliably entertaining also start to make it feel a little bit unrealistic? Now, I personally thought that this season was fantastically constructed because it's compressed, it's very much in London. It's a London almost chase thriller. Cat, mouse.
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B
And you've watched the season and I.
- [08:43]
A
Did watch the season. Yes. So I'm not trying to give anything away.
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B
No. But it's good to know that you feel good about it.
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A
But I think that the way that they have decided to depict Lamb in the show is, is like Yoda E, you know, like where he is just like always the wisest, always like, you know, and, and I think that what it is is that he is like, this is my kingdom. Like, I know how to do what I do here at Slough House and has no interest in moving anywhere.
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B
Yeah.
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A
And so if you have a character who is like, I don't want to go anywhere and you have an actor who's like, I don't want, I'm fine putting on this wig or growing my hair out and Eating Chinese food and having bans with really good actors that I think that that's good. Now. It's funny that we're saying, like, is this show a little bit. You're like, oh, maybe it's stuck in third gear or something.
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B
Yeah. And I want to be clear, I'm never going to stop watching it.
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A
We were like, what the fuck is this?
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B
Where's our show?
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A
When river was like super soldier son of a cult, I think it was.
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B
Just more the beauty of a stable, consistent show is that you can maybe take a little biopsy of one moment or one scene and just talk about it. And so I think that what I was hoping for in this episode, an episode that I was thrilled to watch, that I was entertained throughout, and I'm eager and ready to watch the subsequent episode when you have. The show is relatively stingy with probably good reason about its Diana Jackson scenes. Kirsten, Scott Thomas and Gary Oldman sharing the screen. They're always memorable when they do. When she comes to Slough House, which I don't. I don't remember if she's done before. Maybe she has once or twice in the past and she confronts him in his office. I wanted to see another side of both of them because their long history, their essentially, like, bumpy truce that they have is really interesting. I find that depth and backstory more compelling than who River's dad is. And I kind of wanted a little more of it shown to me in that scene. But the larger thing about the larger conversation about long running, ongoing shows, what makes them successful, what makes them successful and consistent over time, inevitably leads to not everything has an endless road. Not everything is Grey's Anatomy, which basically has shuffled the deck so many times.
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A
But they've also replaced the cast six times.
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B
It's been interesting.
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A
They haven't done that with this show. They're bringing slowly. I think Shirley came in in the third season.
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B
Yeah.
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A
Or second season.
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B
What they is. They do what the Golden State warriors couldn't do. They do bridge the future. You bridge the future. Ongoing rebuild. And they do it better than any show I can think about.
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A
And Loudon, who is the second season of Gold, is finally streaming in America starting next week on pbs.
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B
Wow.
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A
Yes.
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B
What a turn.
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A
And that has been uniformly glowing reviews for that. So I have not seen any of that yet, but I can't wait to check it out while he's in that.
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B
He's also the star of the new Netflix Pride and Prejudice and he is the star of the Berlin Berlin spy books.
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A
That's going to be on Apple, right?
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B
Eventually, yeah.
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A
Is he too big for this part at this point? I don't. I don't know.
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B
It seems like a pretty. Not the heaviest lift.
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A
I did not expect to be concerned trolling this because I'm like, I'm not concerned because I think actually what this, this season does really, really well is make the very difficult magic trick of satirizing a moment while also probing, like extremism in all factions of life.
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B
I love the show and I'm grateful for it. And TV would be poorer without it. And I honestly, there were more of these. I wish there were more shows. I wish there were more B versions of Slow Horses than a lot of the other stuff that we see thrown on the screens. I guess I had a different perspective of it only because I watched the episode last night after my now fairly regular nightly viewing of Rewatching the Office with my daughters. And I've referenced it's similar than it is to that.
- [12:43]
A
Than it is to.
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B
It kind of is the Bureau. And it was fun watching. Cause I started it with my younger daughter. My older daughter was skeptical of it and not sure she wanted to watch it with us. And now she's completely smitten, both because she kind of locked in on the love stories in the background, which she finds compelling and interesting. But also she said last night there's a Stanley joke. And she's like, I love him. He's my favorite character. And then she said that about someone else and she's like, actually everyone's my favorite character. And that is a real skill. That is a situation. So Slow Horses is.
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A
You do the same with Slow Horses.
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B
It's a situational thriller.
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A
I think it's interesting. You know, Will Smith is leaving the series after this season, I believe. And he has talked about there is a Mick Heron kind of standalone, but in the Slough House universe book, I think it's Secret Hours. And it's sort of a. I think it's a Jackson Lamb Rivers uncle. And who's the name of the woman who's like basically like the librarian, who's almost like the Connie of John Kerry stand in. It's a. It's like a prequel about them. So during the Cold War.
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B
And it says chronologically it's after the eighth book, but then set in terms of Revelations.
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A
And that's the book that Will Smith is like, I'm most interested in. That's cool tackling that if I were to come back or.
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B
Yeah, it's like 90s spy stuff.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Okay, so it's. Don't threaten us with a good time, Will.
- [14:12]
A
But like, Will Smith leaving the show. I wonder if he's like, this is. I've written every great Jackson Lamb joke I can write.
- [14:20]
B
Look, I think people often point to Veep as maybe the only successful showrunner swap in history. I would argue that West Wing was actually still pretty good after Circuit Left. You know, I'm a big John Wells defender.
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A
I keep getting served. Matt Santos, Arnie Vinick.
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B
We used to be a proper country.
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A
When he's like, you want to be my secretary of state?
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B
Jesus Christ. Look at us reaching across the aisle.
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A
I won't do a single thing for you to get you reelected.
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B
You know, what was the batting average champion the years when the West Wing was on? I bet it wasn't 304.
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A
God.
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B
You know, I had the same conversation with Sean outside, and you know what he said? What happened to our beautiful game? I know, but we all feel it.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Just.
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A
He wasn't right.
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B
I think that.
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A
And when a guy who's, like, batting.320 because he doesn't have a lot of at bats or whatever, like some dude. I saw some dude playing for the. I don't know, was it the Reds or something last night? And he had a really good batting average. And the announcers are just like this jackass.
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B
What? Why?
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A
Because he's like, oh, all this guy does is get hits.
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B
Oh, and we don't like that. Yeah, it's not the one true outcome. The two true outcomes.
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A
It's three true outcomes. Right.
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B
Not anymore. Not in this America.
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A
There's shave your beard or get a new job.
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B
That's basically it. Yeah. Anyway, all of that is to say I have full confidence that Slow Horses will be on the list of shows that had a successful showrunner transition. Yes, it is such a smoothly running ship. And look, we can move on from it, but it's funny to nitpick a show that gets so much more right than it has ever gotten wrong. But that's the beauty of having a podcast.
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A
I wanted to ask you about the Landman trailer that dropped today.
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B
Well, we watched it together. I think we did.
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A
Recorded it today. We're recording on Wednesday. The show's coming out on Thursday. And then Landman comes out day before my birthday, November 16th. Okay, so big present for me.
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B
Do you think they'll show that in countries outside of America? I think the tariff alone probably makes it.
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A
I think it's actually just like American propaganda.
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B
It's only airing on the Voice Of America, radio stations, telegram, it's being. They're dropping DVDs of it over the capital Cities.
- [16:37]
A
You joke. Yeah, but there is like, there is like a American oil, American jobs, like banner flying in this one. I am. I still remain a fan of the first season, as ridiculous as it is. I'm excited to see Sam Elliott back at a Taylor Sheridan show. He's so good. In 1883, he joins the cast. I have to assume he is like Billy Bob's. Tommy's character, the older brother.
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B
I think he's going to be his dad. I think this whole show.
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A
Sam Elliott, how old is Sam Elliot?
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B
Sam Elliott is in his 80s, I think.
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A
Is he.
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B
You know, he's 81 years old and.
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A
Billy Bob is what, early 60s, mid 60s?
- [17:16]
B
Billy Bob is 70. But Billy Bob is 70 playing 50 on this show.
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A
Is he playing 50? I think he's playing 60.
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B
I think that in his mind and this entire show is through his mind, he's playing 40. Like he's 100% a young and vital Landman in the show.
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A
Yeah.
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B
They would not surprise me. I'm not saying that's true. We don't. We don't know. I don't think what's happening.
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A
That's going to be fucking funny if Sam Elliot is playing Billy Bob Thornton's dad.
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B
I mean, why not? I'm looking it up.
- [17:48]
A
I was hoping it would be his older brother. In any case, the whole gang is back. Ali Larder, the lawyer who went to Northwestern, did she ever mention that? All the oil wild cats. And then it appears.
- [18:03]
B
I'm sorry. Sam Elliott is joining the cast of Taylor Sheridan's Landman for its second season as a series regular, reprising his role as Tommy Norris, father, a character known as the Legend or simply Pops.
- [18:15]
A
What do you mean, reprising? He's not in the first season.
- [18:17]
B
No. This is clearly a. AI slop.
- [18:19]
A
But I would say that, you know, it's been.
- [18:22]
B
That's so cool.
- [18:23]
A
It's been talked about that Demi Moore is gonna. Demi Moore is gonna have like a big part this season.
- [18:29]
B
Yeah, clearly.
- [18:30]
A
And this is coming off of her Oscar nomination for. And I look forward to that.
- [18:38]
B
Can I weigh in on it?
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A
Yes.
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B
Are you sure?
- [18:41]
A
Yeah.
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B
I want to commend everyone involved in the marketing and presentation of the show because they, in 2 minutes and 30 seconds, they have made Landman look like an extremely plausible ongoing television drama. This trailer contains much of what the season that we've seen lacks. It seems to have stakes, structure, momentum.
- [19:04]
A
I mean, stakes he gets kidnapped like multiple times in the first season and.
- [19:08]
B
He walks out of all of them with his silver tongue. His silver 26 year old tongue or whatever it is. Yeah. No, I enjoyed our experience with season one. There were even moments, as we said repeatedly during our coverage that were compelling.
- [19:22]
A
Yeah. Like Jerry Jones dying.
- [19:24]
B
He didn't die.
- [19:25]
A
I know he doesn't die.
- [19:27]
B
Yeah. How dare you?
- [19:28]
A
He's just in the hospital. While Ham's in the hospital.
- [19:30]
B
He gives him a pep talk about the beauty of life and Ham is like, sick. I gotta go film your friends and neighbors.
- [19:36]
A
The Philly came out of me.
- [19:37]
B
Jerry Jones dying. How dare you, sir? It's just that every time something started rolling, Billy Bob would just start explaining to a woman what truth was. Or Ali Larder would make a salad and then have a tantrum like that. It's just the Taylor shared an experience.
- [19:56]
A
Doesn't she do a Moroccan film?
- [19:58]
B
She makes a paella at some point. I think the Taylor Sheridan experience is the opposite of a trailer. It's just like, here's something I like and here's also something I like.
- [20:06]
A
Seven minutes and we're serving it all.
- [20:08]
B
To you buffet style.
- [20:10]
A
It's Cheesecake Factory.
- [20:11]
B
It is. But, yeah, there is a very modern sensibility of shows clearing their throats for a first season. And Demi Moore had very little to do with the first season. I think she was 1.1. Yeah.
- [20:24]
A
It was a very strange situation. She swims laps, then she shows up for spoilers for the first season of Landman. Okay. She shows up for Jon Hamm's somewhat ambiguous death, where we were all kind of wondering whether or not Monty was going to pull through. And then I would imagine her sobbing over his corpse. Answered those questions, as did Jon Hamm being like, I'm not on Landman anymore.
- [20:49]
B
Thank you for your question. I will not be reprising my role in Landman, but if you lay that track, at least have it pay off. And it seems like that's a more interesting dynamic to me already. Like the show is beginning in a more interesting place.
- [21:03]
A
She owns the company, that she is the owner of the company. But Tommy runs the company. He was bequeathed some operational control.
- [21:10]
B
And in the absence of Ham, the kosher setup of the company, if you will, means that everyone's coming for them.
- [21:17]
A
Yes.
- [21:17]
B
And that's interesting. And Tommy's son is no longer the newbie. He's now.
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A
I think that kid struck oil.
- [21:25]
B
The trailer suggests that he may have struck some oil.
- [21:27]
A
Yeah. Since he's covered in oil.
- [21:28]
B
Since he's completely head to toe. Roger Sterling, season six of Mad Men. Yeah.
- [21:35]
A
Well, see you in November, brother.
- [21:37]
B
So that's what I have to come home to. That's what I have to look forward to. Like, all these weeks of reading about.
- [21:42]
A
The decline of America, the shows, you know, if you have a better idea about what to talk about, you're welcome to offer it up. I. I'm just taking what I didn't make you talk about Terminal List. Dark Wolf, did I.
- [21:53]
B
Did you watch it?
- [21:54]
A
I watched some of it. Oh, well, it' project that I'm working on.
- [21:59]
B
You're reading Richard Rohr books about spirituality and watching.
- [22:02]
A
Your departure from the United States is very convenient for me as I get through TLD dubs.
- [22:08]
B
Okay, all right. That's fine. I think that it's also a product of having a podcast run by two people pleasers. Like, I just want you to be happy.
- [22:14]
A
Thank you.
- [22:15]
B
You know?
- [22:15]
A
Thank you. What I. I think to me, what Landman is to me, J. Kelly is to you. I don't really have any observations to offer about the second trailer for this Noah Bomb teaser.
- [22:27]
B
Now we have the full.
- [22:28]
A
I feel like the teaser was very. Explained the plot.
- [22:32]
B
Yeah.
- [22:33]
A
But why don't you talk a little bit about why this movie is beckoning to you?
- [22:38]
B
I love movies about show business, baby. No, I love movies. I mean, I love Noah Baumbach movies. I love Emily Mortimer as an actor, but also as a writer. I thought her show, the Pursuit of Love, she came on the podcast to talk about. It was just one of those. We should at some point just make a list of things Amazon did that. I don't know if Amazon knows.
- [22:56]
A
We saw that Peter Freelander went back. Went from Netflix to Amazon.
- [23:01]
B
Oh, we should talk about that news. Let me just finish by saying why.
- [23:04]
A
Youy Love J. Kelly, sight unseen.
- [23:07]
B
I'm just psyched for this movie. I like movies about aura. This entire movie seems to be about George Clooney's charisma.
- [23:15]
A
Yes.
- [23:16]
B
And he's very, very good in movies where he plays slightly bruised versions of himself. That's basically his best iteration, I think.
- [23:25]
A
What would you say is another example of that?
- [23:26]
B
Descendants, Michael Clayton, the American.
- [23:28]
A
I. I think those are, like, playing against type.
- [23:31]
B
Right. Well, no movies in which he is valued for his face or his charisma.
- [23:38]
A
Right.
- [23:38]
B
But his soul is broken.
- [23:41]
A
Okay. Yeah.
- [23:42]
B
You see that?
- [23:43]
A
I think. I think you're. You're talking about, like a slightly different version of George Clooney would be like, this guy has it all. It's Ocean's. It's Danny Ocean. You know what I mean?
- [23:50]
B
Oh, right.
- [23:51]
A
Well, actually, though, I guess he doesn't have it all because he doesn't have tests in the beginning of the first movie. So it's just. Yeah.
- [23:57]
B
So anyway, it's a great cast. It's a good. I don't know what you have against it.
- [24:01]
A
Nothing.
- [24:01]
B
You're just mad that I'm seeing that instead of weapons.
- [24:05]
A
I am mad that you're not seeing weapons.
- [24:07]
B
Am I gonna see Weapons curated for me?
- [24:10]
A
I guarantee you, you're gonna start weapons on a flight and you're gonna be like, this is fucking awful.
- [24:15]
B
No. What? Oh. Cause at the beginning, was it begin with, like, a bunch of kids dying?
- [24:19]
A
No.
- [24:19]
B
Okay, well, then I can handle it.
- [24:20]
A
I can't spoil it.
- [24:21]
B
I'm not gonna watch it on a. I've remained unspoiled. I intend to watch it, but I'm trying to figure out. I'm still just trying to, like, it's the best way to get me through this, you know? Like, I. I did think theater was best because I couldn't leave movie theater.
- [24:35]
A
Oh, to see weapons.
- [24:36]
B
Yeah.
- [24:36]
A
Yeah.
- [24:38]
B
But I have a lot of time. My hands. Coming up.
- [24:40]
A
So the little news item that we just mentioned, which was remarked upon, I guess this happened like, two weeks ago about, I think, the new.
- [24:48]
B
The. The.
- [24:48]
A
Peter Friedlander left Netflix about six weeks ago, right? Months ago. Months ago. And Peter Friedlander had been, you know, Andy and I had gotten a chance to chat with him a little bit around the time of Black Doves, I think, season two filming now in London, or season two. I will tell him good luck for me.
- [25:04]
B
I genuinely will.
- [25:06]
A
But he had overseen Netflix's scripted TV offerings. Correct.
- [25:11]
B
He was one of the earliest employees of that side of their business and had grown with it and had a hand in a lot of the Netflix shows that we covered. And so we developed kind of a.
- [25:22]
A
Friendly rapport and left the company and was a free agent for a few.
- [25:28]
B
Weeks and then very short amount of.
- [25:30]
A
Time, very interestingly so. He is replacing Vernon Sanders essentially at Amazon now as the head of tv for moving and comings and goings of executives may be of little interest to our listeners, but what they do mean is the kind of programming you get. And to me, you know, Amazon is one of the strangest. We should actually do a history of Amazon prime video original programming one of these days, because in the beginning, it was literally subsidizing, like, great art for seemingly, like, no reason whatsoever. Whether it was like the Romanovs now whether all these shows were great, that's for the viewer to decide. But like the idea of just being like Matthew Winner. Here's a blank check to make your dream project.
- [26:16]
B
The shows that they did at the beginning whether it was transparent or like luring Woody Allen to make a TV show like the Roy Price era is absolute creative chaos in a kind of interesting way.
- [26:26]
A
And it bled into subsequent years where you know whether it was 000 or too old to die young. The Nicholas Lending reference the English there were still remnants of it. I would say that this last year has been the like.
- [26:43]
B
Ah.
- [26:43]
A
Okay. So this is what is success. I sometimes struggle frankly with understanding the new version of like what we call ratings which is stuff that like Julia Alexander writes about really well for Parrot and Entertainment Strategy Guy writes really well about in his newsletter. But I honestly like. It's the. It's kind of like. Like slash lines in baseball. I'm like is there a batting average anymore? Like what is. How many people are watching it? Is it popular? And I've kind of almost thrown my hands up but I. I kind of feel like what we've seen from Amazon in the last year is like this is actually what people watch.
- [27:20]
B
Yes.
- [27:21]
A
This is somewhat prestige. Procedurals, Bosch spinoffs, Special Forces shows.
- [27:28]
B
Yeah.
- [27:28]
A
And ya.
- [27:29]
B
Reacher and ya. Yeah. And what's interesting to me about this is it took a long time and took a lot of money and Amazon certainly has no shortage of either to reach something that most channels in the old days. Streamers in the current world struggle to find. Which is clarity. They aren't. The majority of the offerings aren't what we. We don't cover a lot of them. Or. It's not necessarily prestige but it's stick to your ribs or punch until you break ribs kind of mainstream programming and then fallout. You know being like a. It's elevated. But it is also.
- [28:08]
A
I think you could say it's the same for rap power. You know, like that. That's a massive genre adaptation.
- [28:15]
B
But. But really I feel like it's Terminalist and Reacher that kind of clarified their strategy and.
- [28:22]
A
And Bosch and Ballard and like that. That whole like.
- [28:25]
B
So that works. Yeah. What's interesting about bringing in Peter is that whenever we had spoken to him or had any interaction with him, he's advocating for the black doves of the world. The sort of the B side to maybe the headline story on Netflix's slate. And I'm very curious if he can go into a place that is famously fractured. I wouldn't on the outside Say dysfunctional because I don't have any insight necessarily into how it functions. But the stories you hear about how Amazon makes decisions is very, very, very much like tech world, not necessarily Hollywood. And sometimes you see that in the results where like the shows we're talking about the English or pursuit of love or 000 you had to like really search for it to find like Amazon has the ability like Apple does to be like okay, sure. And then move on from something without investing a lot of marketing into it if they don't believe in it or if it doesn't fit with a larger paradigm. Hiring Peter could mean they just need another need to replace a trusted steady hand in Vernon Wells with someone else who is trust, sorry Vernon Sanders who is trusted. And you know, it has good relationships. Or it could suggest that Amazon feels for whatever reason, whether it's prestige, whether it's relationships, whether it's Emmy hunting or whether it's diversification of their slate that they want to do pursue a strategy that Netflix has really perfected, which is Netflix at this moment is incredibly good, if not like pathologically, relentlessly assassin level expert at programming for 18 different people at the same time.
- [29:57]
A
Yes.
- [29:57]
B
Whereas if you like a.
- [29:58]
A
But they do not. They have not turned their back on and in fact I think pride themselves in adolescence in, you know, like, this.
- [30:05]
B
Is what I mean. And. And if you go to Netflix to watch adolescence, it will say suggested viewing and it will be something else. Highbrow, high minded for the greater good. Intellectual. You could also go to Netflix for, as you know, the easiest joke in the world like floor is lava or whatever. Like. But they will service that audience to the best of your ability. And so you can be a Netflix subscriber and you can be one of 30 different algorithmic types and feel fed. You know what I mean? Whereas if you go to Amazon, if you are a certain type of person, you probably have to sift through a lot and maybe find something. So I wonder if there is some. If they're interested in some of that. Which actually gives me hope both as a critic, as a fan and as a creator. Because more diversity programming is good generally.
- [30:51]
A
For the industry, I would imagine. I don't know how many of the shows that we talked about that are sort of the staples of Amazon's current lineup like say Terminalist or whatever Summer I turned pretty. I don't know how many of those that Skydance participated in, but you would imagine that Paramount is going to become the new home for some of that stuff.
- [31:15]
B
Yeah.
- [31:16]
A
And that's a good point. You need to diversify the portfolio. Especially if Paramount's like, we're supercharging dad TV procedurals, military dramas, et cetera, which I don't know that that's what they're going to do because Cindy Holland, who runs Paramount TV now, has got a hugely, widely diverse set of tastes and relationships in Hollywood. But I don't think Amazon's ever going to go back to Joey Soloway adapting Chris Krause books. I think what they're going to go back to or try to find is a lot of good international TV out there to be bought. You know, Amazon prime should be. Should have the Gold Season 2, not PBS. I agree.
- [31:58]
B
Why are you kicking PBS when they're not kicking pbs?
- [32:00]
A
But I think Peter Friedlander has shown an ability to scout internationally for tv. And B, there is a middle ground between terminalist Dark Wolf and, and Joey Soloway and trying to find that something for people to watch. It's also interesting Amazon has not really exploited the MGM library the way I think we thought they would since they took over now they've fully taken control of James Bond. I would think that inevitably there will be like the money penny TV show or whatever or like a. I imagine that they will now start to try to derive revenue out of. Out of that universe in a way that the Broccoli family was always very protective of. But it's notable to me that there is not a creed TV show. Right.
- [32:51]
B
Not yet. It's worth hitting on lightly since we're doing industry talk. Not the show industry, which is I think coming back in January, but just the current Hollywood industry. The moves Paramount has been making. The moves that Paramount has been making are not. I don't mean this in a political sense, but they are not ideological. Like you don't necessarily get a sense of the type of programming that Paramount writ large as a company wants to pursue from what they've been doing. What they've been doing is stamping their feet and making a lot of noise. So that included signing the Duffer Brothers for all of their post stranger Things.
- [33:27]
A
Including like theatrical releases, which I think was a problem for them with Netflix.
- [33:31]
B
Exactly. Which is like buying like the hottest, the town's hottest R rated comedy spec script and being like, you know, outbidding everyone for it, proving you're real players.
- [33:41]
A
Well, they did that with the James Mangold Timothee Chalamet motorcycle crime movie they also bought.
- [33:47]
B
They came out on top of a big bidding war for a Mangold Chalamet movie. And then doubled down on it yesterday by signing Mangold to an overall deal.
- [33:53]
A
Yeah, but like that Mangold makes the kind of movies that generally speaking, 55 year old men love watching.
- [34:02]
B
So I have some ways to go before I get into him.
- [34:03]
A
No, but like when you look at 310 to Yuma and you look at Logan, complete unknown. Complete unknown. And Forden versus Ferrari and whatever else he decides to make and you know, all of these overall deals are kind of ridiculous because it's like James Mangold's also making a Star wars movie for Disney and you know, like it's a.
- [34:21]
B
Way of sweetening the pot basically and building relationships. And it is interesting the way that even in this diminished version of the entertainment industry that we're living through, the one thing that can rearrange the tides and the weather is a new player in town. Paramount, obviously not a new player, but the Skydance takeover has made it such. And so there is an attitude of excitement and optimism that I haven't seen in a while. Mainly because once someone, once a whale comes back to the table, all the starting bets go up.
- [34:57]
A
Yeah, I'm very curious to see over the next 24 months if. Not only do we, if we have some more mergers, some contractions of networks or at least, you know, moving and shaking going on between, you know, people leaving some network to go to another. Right now I routinely open Apple TV and I'm just like stunned at the star power that is on shows that are so unstarlike, you know, like what I just kind of crazy to look at like Jessica Chastain's making like kind of a really high end, like procedural.
- [35:38]
B
Like the one that got delayed.
- [35:39]
A
Yeah, the one that got delayed. The, the savant, you know.
- [35:42]
B
But she's also making a, an Apple show about the art world.
- [35:45]
A
Yeah. McConaughey and, and Woody are reuniting for a show that's coming on Apple soon. Maybe there's that a little bit of like there's now a renewed kind of like. Yeah, but it's TV famous. Do you know what I mean? Like, well, with all due respect, can Jessica Chastain like open a movie? Like nobody can open a movie anymore. It's like there's no rhyme or reason to that.
- [36:07]
B
No, I do think one of the most influential careers of the last few years is Reese Witherspoon. Nicole Kidman certainly is in the mix as well for being like, you know what I'd like to do? Act. Let's go.
- [36:19]
A
I like to work and I like to play the parts that I want to play, and the place where I can do that is tv.
- [36:23]
B
But the Reese Witherspoon arc is so fascinating of, like, seeing the moment, like, doing. She got an Oscar for Wilde, right?
- [36:29]
A
I believe so.
- [36:29]
B
I think so. And that's like, okay, I've reached the pinnacle again. Or even if I don't remember, I think she won. But regardless, like, that was. She reached it. She did it. And then she's like, okay, now I want to build an empire, right? And so going to tv, she's pretty.
- [36:46]
A
Fired up about AI.
- [36:47]
B
Well, this is the thing. Picking projects, producing the projects, starting a production company, selling the production company for untold millions, if not billions, and then. And then, like, hard pivoting into just whatever tech is coming next.
- [37:00]
A
Yes.
- [37:01]
B
I'm a little. I'm personally a little cynical about it.
- [37:04]
A
I think I'm cynical about it where I. I just. I don't really understand the need to be at the forefront of.
- [37:12]
B
Of all this stuff, like, empowering women's voices.
- [37:14]
A
The same thing with, like, Matt Damon with Bitcoin.
- [37:16]
B
I'm like, you didn't need to do it.
- [37:18]
A
Like, did you give all that money to, like, build Wells? Maybe you did. I have no idea. Like, I've. No. I've. No. I don't really, really care about this stuff. There's way bigger problems in the world. But I. I think that it's been interesting to be immersed in Redford's career, because we're doing Redford Month on Rewatchables. And by no means was Redford, like, beyond using his fame, you know, or. Or just enriching himself.
- [37:45]
B
Sure.
- [37:46]
A
But the things that Redford did with that fame and riches were, like, pretty significant. Same thing with Paul Newman, who I think he used as, like, a model in his career. And, yeah, those guys were, like, movie stars, and they got to, like, have cool lives, but they were also. I don't know that Robert Redford would have been like, God, you know, what's great is fucking AI.
- [38:04]
B
You know, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have been. But I also wonder who's. Is it smart or is it cynical? Because, you know, we were. The other day, we were talking about one battle after another and how DiCaprio's career is now. It is. He's like the last Mastodon. Like, it is completely unique and is celebrated. Right. That he doesn't do genre schlock or he doesn't do superhero movies. He does genre schlock. He's just.
- [38:30]
A
With Martin Scorsese.
- [38:31]
B
Well, he works with great directors. Great directors.
- [38:33]
A
Only he doesn't make superhero movies.
- [38:34]
B
And he gives advice to the younger generation who now want to try and follow his path. But can they? Because it's like, Chalamet's doing his best by, like, I'm working with great directors, and I'm gonna try to see my way through the thicket of this era of my fame, because I want to do this for a long time. But he also made Wonka, you know, which definitely got burned in my house, and I'm very burned out on it.
- [38:54]
A
Sure.
- [38:55]
B
But is that career even? I don't know. We don't need to go down the road of, like, what kind of career one can have. But we were talking about, like, it is interesting to see some actors use the TV shows as like. Like, leverage plays for their stability and their standing or just frankly to, like, cake up, you know, like this. This is gonna work for me for two years while I pivot to taking on mom or dad roles instead of the roles I'm used to playing or whatever.
- [39:23]
A
Diminishes. Is there something weirdly like, walled off? Even though Apple is a popular television streaming service at this point, it has Ted Lasso. You know, I mean, I think that honestly. And we have. We live in a very specific environment, but, like, a lot of people we know either are, like, watching or frankly working on Apple shows. It's true. Like, that's kind of the TV business quiet has kept and where it's just like, yeah, man, I like watching platonic.
- [39:52]
B
Yeah, well, that's me.
- [39:53]
A
But is that they've almost now, like, bankrolled reliable television.
- [39:59]
B
Yeah.
- [40:00]
A
Like, it. It kind of doesn't go that too high up, doesn't go that too far down. It just is what it is.
- [40:05]
B
Yeah.
- [40:06]
A
And you can, like, sit there with your partner and watch platonic. And it's pretty good. And then you can go about your day. It's not like I need to get my Franciscan theology books out for task, but it is. It is entertaining television. And that's where a lot of these people who I would consider to be celebrities, are gravitating.
- [40:25]
B
Yeah. I mean, that's also Apple's business plan because is because it's worth it to them to spend however many billions they.
- [40:31]
A
Spend to have underwent Jennifer texting on that show.
- [40:33]
B
Not just have them texting on the show. Yes. But also so that every Apple store, all the screens in unison are showing Jon Hamm in his show or Ted. Like, it's just. It's all promotion.
- [40:46]
A
Yeah.
- [40:46]
B
For this for the same product as the place to be for everything tech or New Orleans pretty or skinny or whatever. The new.
- [40:53]
A
I used to think that there was not speaking of doing like a short history of Amazon prime video, like I think it would be useful to do it for Apple TV too because I used to think that there was no guiding aesthetic or storytelling ethos to those shows. But now I'm starting to really detect one where I, you know, obviously like Apple is like one of the only places it's like keep making seasons. You know, they could keep making platonic for four or five years. You know, like and the same goes for they're bringing Ted Lasso back. I'm sure the golf show will come back like stick. I, I'm sure, you know, if if Brothers the Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey show works, they would back up the money truck to get them to do another season of that.
- [41:37]
B
I think it's an interesting conversation to.
- [41:39]
A
Have, but it's strange to see Harrison.
- [41:40]
B
Ford in a Bill Lawrence show as a supporting actor. Yeah, I think it's, I think it's, it might be an interesting framing for an upcoming episode or conversation to think of Apple as the baseline in the sense that not in terms of its cost, which is just wild compared to what everyone else spends on things, but that everyone is responding to it. That Apple's entry this many years into it now five plus years in, they are in many ways setting the tempo of the industry in a different way in terms of what the other shows are, what the other streamers are programming, what they're able to put together, what they value. You know, when we first started talking about task on hbo, I think that one of the first things thoughts that I had was what would the show have looked like had it been developed for Apple? And one of the main things is I don't think Tom Pelfrey would be the other guy on the poster. Yeah, that's just not their business model. I think the show is better because it has an exceptional actor on the cusp of a certain kind of familiarity or stardom next to the Incredible Hulk. But that's just not Apple's model. They wouldn't do it. They would have cast that at the highest possible level.
- [42:48]
A
I have like sort of a closing conversation topic for you.
- [42:51]
B
Okay. Is it about the slow arriving season three renewal of Lioness?
- [42:58]
A
It just. They had to get Nicole Steel. Right.
- [43:00]
B
You know, were you, were you across that?
- [43:02]
A
No, but I, you know, Kidman also is just. It was announced that her Marriage is ending.
- [43:08]
B
Okay.
- [43:09]
A
Sorry to hear that.
- [43:10]
B
Yeah. Is it time to shoot your shot?
- [43:13]
A
I ain't reading all that. I'm happy for you. Or I'm sorry. Like, I don't know whether she. Maybe she's thrilled.
- [43:19]
B
Let's leave it to ringer dish.
- [43:20]
A
Yeah, exactly. But yes, it is going to be a long delayed season three. But trustin Taylor and I just don't want to see a single fucking beard on that show. That's all. I know.
- [43:30]
B
Everyone's better. Everyone better be trim af no Nordic pagans.
- [43:34]
A
Although I guess those guys are in special operations, so they are allowed to have beards. According to Pete. Pete Hegseth?
- [43:39]
B
Is that what he said?
- [43:39]
A
Yep.
- [43:40]
B
I'm just glad.
- [43:40]
A
Do you know this joke? Do you know not. No. I joke, but do you. Did you watch any of his speech?
- [43:44]
B
I found it very inspiring.
- [43:45]
A
Okay.
- [43:46]
B
I think all the generals must have been thrilled.
- [43:48]
A
They were like, glad I flew across the planet.
- [43:49]
B
This seems worth it.
- [43:51]
A
Okay. You're on your way. A little adventure, right?
- [43:56]
B
A long adventure. Yeah.
- [43:57]
A
When you go on a trip like this, do you pre plan I'm bringing these books.
- [44:05]
B
Yeah. I'm.
- [44:06]
A
I'm gonna make time for these records. Like finally gonna get into the oh yeah, we talked about geese record.
- [44:12]
B
Is that a gee shirt?
- [44:12]
A
It is a gee shirt. It's a geese, but it. Then it's a cowboy. It's like, what the is up with that? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [44:18]
B
Keep going. That's the cowboy in the 3D country.
- [44:21]
A
Are you. Are you like. I'm. I got a menu of stuff I'm choosing from as I. As I embark. Or are you like life just come at me, man. Let's see. Isn't the tube trains go by, you.
- [44:35]
B
Know, revealing the landman posters? Like the last year when I was there, it was on every tube stop. Yeah, I think you're hitting at something. I mean, this is the. That is the crux of modern existence. Right? Like, we want to be present and alive to possibilities in every moment. But also, I do not want to leave the house without at least seven hours of interesting programming locked into my iPad. Yes, there are certain things that I'm grateful for. Like one is you were mentioning a show like Platonic. Platonic. I have not finished.
- [45:05]
A
Oh, you haven't?
- [45:05]
B
I've got those in the hopper now. I've got. I know. You do the work.
- [45:10]
A
No, well, my wife was on a real platonic jag.
- [45:12]
B
I have the screeners for Nobody wants this season two. So there's a certain light Entertainment that works well with jet lag that I'm excited about. I think that's Tim Simons show. I believe he's the star of it.
- [45:22]
A
Hitmaker is in it.
- [45:23]
B
Yes, I believe that's why it's a hit. And the other thing that I do because, you know, I gotta be me, is like, I also make sure that I have at least five or six three hour movies by obscure Japanese art house directors. Log, like downloaded on my Criterion app. Do you really always the mood may strike me somewhere over Greenland to like, to finally delve into like Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy or whatever that movie is called by the guy who made Drive My Car. You know, like, this could be. This could be my moment.
- [45:50]
A
Hamaguchi, right?
- [45:51]
B
Yes. Yeah. So, yeah, I guess. And then to your point, I think this question derived from the fact that you asked if I was rocking the Geese record yet. And I have dabbled, but I also already decided I'm really.
- [46:06]
A
You've got a little bit of a thing going right now where I feel like you're not, unlike Detective Grosso, withholding your essence from me.
- [46:16]
B
Oh, with this record.
- [46:16]
A
Yeah, like, you've got me. I'm like, do you want to talk about Geese? Do you want to talk about one battle after another? And you're like, yeah, I do want.
- [46:23]
B
To talk about one battle after another.
- [46:24]
A
But even on Big Pick, I feel like you were kind of like, it was a very. It was a very timely film.
- [46:29]
B
Well, also, listen, I walked into that little behind the scenes thing. I walked into the big pic thing. They'd been talking about the movie for all of last week and all of like two hours before I got in there and I came in cold. I didn't know what they had already said. You know, I wasn't setting the tone right.
- [46:43]
A
So listening to the Big Picture is not on your list of things that you.
- [46:46]
B
First of all, let's be honest. Do you know how many. Do you know the kind of work Shiel is putting into Philly Special and the Ringer NFL show? Literally spend more time in the car with him than my children. But also, I had only just seen the movie, so I hadn't rewatched the episode, so I didn't know the conversation. So I was more muted because I didn't want to step on the things they'd already said. When it comes to Geese, I feel like I'm being respectful of the true art because I love all the singles. I love everything about this band up to this point. And I also know this, this record Enough that I am not really locked into it when I'm trying to make the turn at Rowena. You know what I mean? Like, I. I feel like I need to get on an airplane and then be like, okay, boys.
- [47:27]
A
Yeah. What do you. What do you have to tell me about Greenland?
- [47:29]
B
Please tell me something about being alive.
- [47:31]
A
Keep this plane in the air, brother.
- [47:33]
B
Please. Let's do that. Do you. Do you either have suggestions of things you think I should preload in my library to think time well spent, or do you? Because in terms of books, you asked me too. Like, I have right now.
- [47:44]
A
You find me at a moment of a crisis of faith with music. First of all, like, you're reading all the spirituality. No, but the. I think that my likely undiagnosed adhd. Well, I mean, it's definitely undiagnosed, but whatever.
- [47:58]
B
You're like, boy cavalier.
- [47:59]
A
No, I think it's just like, whatever personal issues I have with Focus have met a moment now where too much is available to me at all times. So if I'm in the car and I'm like, what I'm gonna do now is finally listen to the first five can albums.
- [48:18]
B
Now is the time.
- [48:19]
A
Yeah. And then I'm like, I don't really want to do this. And then I. You know, and I. You just wind up being like, but what I am gonna do is listen to the first five, listen to Williams albums again, you know, and then I just don't even know how to be anymore sometimes with music. That's why when I come across something, whether it's Geese or that realize record from earlier in the year, that's the TR truth, where I'm just like, this is all I want to think about. And so Geese has been on constant repeat. I will say it has been heartwarming to see geese have left the nest and they are migrating towards big band right now, which is in a way that I haven't really seen since probably. I mean, I'm gonna date myself. But I guess, like, 1975, this happened to. I guess this happened to arctic Monkeys like, 15 years ago or whatever. But, like, you can tell, like, you know, Killian Murphy is like, I love geese and my son loves geese, you know? And, like, they're. They're big now.
- [49:15]
B
Well, they made a big record. Like, they went for it, but they.
- [49:18]
A
Made a cool record.
- [49:19]
B
Yeah, they did.
- [49:20]
A
And it's cool that it's their third record, and it's not exactly like. It's not like they made a record for mass approval. They didn't Make Born in the USA they made.
- [49:29]
B
It's a weird.
- [49:30]
A
A fucking weird record that sounds like Frank Zappa and Van Morrison and you know what I mean. Like Kenny beats on the deck with like real swing.
- [49:39]
B
Do you know the common thread between us and the band Geese?
- [49:43]
A
We all went to Quaker schools. Yeah.
- [49:45]
B
Can't fake the funk.
- [49:47]
A
If you're. If you're still. If you're. If you're still reading this, it's not too late.
- [49:50]
B
Yeah. It's the light within.
- [49:55]
A
My music listening is all over the place. And then I think I just find it really like comforting now to try and watch as many like of the. The DVDs that I'm buying.
- [50:10]
B
Yeah. That's a whole other thing. I don't know where you find time for that.
- [50:14]
A
Nighttime.
- [50:16]
B
That's when I'm asleep.
- [50:17]
A
Yeah. And then. Yeah. Reading wise. You bring books or do you buy books there?
- [50:22]
B
Both. I have to bring a couple books for work, I would say. Yeah. Things that.
- [50:27]
A
How does magic work?
- [50:29]
B
Things you know about, but also things you don't know about. But I have to bring those. And then. We've both been loving. We mentioned this in the other show. The spy fiction of. What's his name? Oliver Harris.
- [50:40]
A
Oliver Harris, yeah. This is a Zack Baron recommendation.
- [50:43]
B
A Shadow Intelligence is the first book in his spy series and I love it so much that I'm savoring it and I'm intentionally saving reading it slowly so I have it with me on the plane and I can get the sequel Ascension over there.
- [50:54]
A
You want me to leave it to you or. No, you can have it.
- [50:56]
B
I'll go to Daunt. I'll walk over to Daunt Books and grab it. It's my new. My other life if you're looking for Andy. My Shadow Intelligence life. But the thing I would say about this book and may maybe we'll talk more about it. It's unfair to do book talk without Kya because she's an essential part of it when we do this on the show.
- [51:10]
A
I think she also is a good counterbalance to some of her tastes.
- [51:13]
B
She's given me some good recommendations recently.
- [51:15]
A
I know.
- [51:17]
B
I know this is a little bit niche and maybe not everyone would vibe to this, but this book, it's about an MI6 agent and it's incredibly interior. Like it's all told from his perspective as he comes in from the cold and then goes back out into the cold without cover.
- [51:32]
A
Basically literally the cold. Cause he goes to Kazakhstan.
- [51:34]
B
He goes from the Middle east back to London briefly then into Cast Kazakhstan. And you're just locked in this guy's complicated head as he walks through sub zero conditions in, like, an artificial capital built on the.
- [51:46]
A
You may be thinking, I don't know a lot about Kazakhstan. You will.
- [51:49]
B
You sure will. The thing that this book reminds me, the two writers that. That. That this book reminds me of, is Le Carre, obviously British spy stuff, but also Haruki Murakami, which is such a weird pull for this. But my favorite Murakami books are all about kind of weird, blank men wandering, wintry environments.
- [52:08]
A
Yeah. And like. Like Marriotts and looking at the steel paradise of a city. And it's like, been built.
- [52:13]
B
I asked for my third beer, and it's like, that might be me. You never know.
- [52:18]
A
Yeah.
- [52:19]
B
So I. God, that was a great wreck by Zach. I love. I love, love, love that book.
- [52:24]
A
Cool.
- [52:25]
B
Yeah. Cool, right?
- [52:26]
A
Yeah. I mean, it's very. It's always difficult when you fly to England because the bookshops there are so great. They also have shit on paperback that you're like, you know, it's not out here on paperback yet.
- [52:37]
B
You see me rocking Percival Everett's James in paperback earlier in the year. People are like, where'd you cop that?
- [52:42]
A
That's right.
- [52:43]
B
England.
- [52:43]
A
I'm currently reading. I think I've mentioned I'm reading Falling Upward by Richard Rohr, which is unlike most books I read.
- [52:51]
B
Yeah.
- [52:52]
A
And I am rereading, although finding that I have very little recollection for Vineland.
- [52:59]
B
Interesting. Yeah. I think I mentioned that.
- [53:00]
A
Vineland is fucking hysterical.
- [53:02]
B
Vineland was with me in England, as we talked about last time.
- [53:05]
A
Yeah. I really, really, really want to read the new Ian McEwan novel. That seems what we can know.
- [53:12]
B
That might be the thing for us to go on a journey with our listeners on. I think we're almost ready for that.
- [53:19]
A
Which I have to admit, was warmly endorsed by Anthony Jeselnick, the comedian who really does not lead me wrong with his book recommendations.
- [53:26]
B
Are you waiting for Mulaney to be like, my recommendation is Ian McKeown.
- [53:30]
A
It's. It's. It's. It's a really. It's a hot competition right now for. For guys recommending books to other guys? I mean, how big can the playoffs be? It's like what the college football guys ask themselves.
- [53:42]
B
Is the world that bad when it's just guys recommending books to guys? Like, I know men are a problem generally, but, like, this seems okay.
- [53:51]
A
Yeah, let us have this.
- [53:52]
B
This seems okay. Do you know, I did read Colored Television by Danzy Senna you did mention that. I mentioned that. I really recommend it. It's very, very well written. It's very. I mean, it is relevant to what we cover. And it's about an academic who decides to save her life and her future by selling out and working for television. I did read Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner. If you didn't know a lot about caves, you will.
- [54:19]
A
We talked about this, didn't we?
- [54:21]
B
I don't know if we talked about how I was a little more mid than you, but I did enjoy the journey. I think she's like. She's the coolest hang reading. The books are the coolest. I just. We really didn't come out of that cave, did we? Do you know what I read also is a book called you'd Table is Ready by Michael Cecchi Azzolina. And it's like the Kitchen Confidential for maitre d's, because that's how much I care about restaurants. Restaurants. And it is very entertaining because. What if I told you he was a maitre d at, like, at Raul's and the Water club in the 80s into the 90s?
- [54:54]
A
Oh, shit.
- [54:56]
B
People used to get after it in restaurants. You know what I mean? Maybe they will again in Vice President CRs. America.
- [55:01]
A
Yeah.
- [55:02]
B
But it is. It is quite Body. That is a real. That is one that I regret.
- [55:07]
A
Is it like. Like McInerney body, or what is it?
- [55:11]
B
Oh, yeah, yeah. Yes, it is. It's a tell all kind of thing about a certain era of New York that I'll never get tired of. And I'll say that I wish I hadn't. I wish I hadn't read it in, like, a day and a half, a few weeks ago, because.
- [55:25]
A
How long is it?
- [55:25]
B
It's like 3, 400 pages, but it flies. It wasn't a day. Okay, it's three days. But it's very, very readable.
- [55:31]
A
I'm asking you. I was just impressed.
- [55:32]
B
It's very, very readable. But it is also the kind of book that I wish. I mostly read fiction, as you know, but, like, one of the life's great pleasures is holding a book, a nonfiction book that, you know, you could just devour for a long plane ride. Like Bill Buford's dirt about, like, learning how to cook in France. That was an entire transoceanic flight.
- [55:52]
A
Yes. I need, like. I don't think you can do. Pinching on a flight is tough. Right? But I think you can. You can bang out some spy fiction for reason. Nonfiction.
- [56:01]
B
Do you think this part's gonna get clipped for Instagram. Pinching on a flight is tough, guys. We gotta be honest, I don't really.
- [56:08]
A
Know what the clip would be from this this episode because it's just been a free FL conversation between two friends. Talking about culture, talking about reading, talking about Pete Hegseth.
- [56:17]
B
Yeah. The real lion in the lioness's den.
- [56:20]
A
I wish you well.
- [56:21]
B
Thank you.
- [56:21]
A
This is actually the last time I'm going to see you, so I will see you soon in another place.
- [56:27]
B
That sounds worrisome, but I think I know the place.
- [56:31]
A
And I will be back on Monday with you. Recorded Today, we're going to be talking about the fifth episode of Task.
- [56:36]
B
I'm not missing Task Talk as we go forward.
- [56:38]
A
Yeah. Okay, everybody be well.
- [56:41]
B
I, I, I'm still connected to the mobile.
- [56:43]
A
Thanks to Kai, thanks to Kaya, thanks to everybody. We'll be back.
- [56:46]
B
Thanks to all my American baranskis out there. We'll see you soon.