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- [00:01]
Marc Maron
Sometimes when I travel now, I get to a place and I don't really want to do much of anything while I'm there. I want to be there, but I don't feel all the pressure to do things, you know, like I was in Chicago, and I've been in Chicago a lot. And, you know, I used to go to Chicago and I do go eat the meat. I go to the museum, and I go all to, you know, all the interesting places. But the last time I was there, I was just sort of like, dude, you've done it. Just you like the city. Just, you know, enjoy the poetry of the place. And look, if you go away and decide to do nothing now, you can still host your home on Airbnb while you're away and not have to worry about doing anything. That's because a co host can do all the hosting for you. You can get a high quality local co host to take care of your home and your guests. They manage all the hosting details and even send messages to your guests. Then they're available to be on hand when your guests are at your place just to help out with anything that might come up. So do nothing while you're away and still make some cash. Find a co host@airbnb.com host all right, let's do this. How are you? What the fuckers? What the fuck, buddies? What the fuck? Nicks, what's happening? I'm Marc Maron. This is my podcast. Welcome to it. You're just getting here. It's not that you're too late, but there's a lot to catch up on. How's everyone doing today on the show? I talked to David Cronenberg. David Cronenberg. The impact of that dude's stuff. I mean, I'm sure many of you have seen the movies if you don't know who he is. Maybe you saw Scanners, the Dead Zone, the Fly, A History of Violence. Eastern promises many, many movies. He's got a new film out. It's called the Shrouds. Some of his movies are challenging for different reasons. Some of his movies are challenging for narrative reasons. Some of his movies are challenging for graphic kind of, you know, grotesque body horror, which is just a subgenre imposed by critics on Cronenberg. I think he's just a filmmaker that has a thematic kind of. I wouldn't say obsession, but, you know, he is working out life through art in the way that he does, and a lot of it is a bit on the gnarly side. The new film is. Is. Is really Kind of a complex meditation on grief and mortality. And I enjoyed it. I rewatched some of his movies, and I watched some for the first time, and some of them, like the ones I hadn't seen. I'm like, why? How the fuck did I not know about this movie? I mean, I never saw Cosmopolis. Did you even hear of it? Cosmopolis, with that guy. What's his name, Pattinson? It's kind of a great movie. And it's based on a Don DeLillo book. And I'm like a Don DeLillo guy. I mean, I haven't. I kind of lost touch with don after the 911 book. The Tower. I can't remember what that was called. But early on, I'd read all his books. I was obsessed with Libra. I was obsessed with White Noise, Great Joan Street, Ratner, Starr. I mean, they were great books. And he's got a very specific tone. And when I watched Cosmopolis, which is based on a DeLillo novel, I was like, oh, my God. It's all, like, DeLillo language. And it made me miss reading DeLillo. But it's kind of a great examination of that first wave of tech, money and these young men who became filthy rich. There's kind of an element of American Psycho in there, but not the violent element. And there's an amazing performance by Giamatti, who kind of comes in at the end. But I watched that, and I watched Maps to the Stars again, which is based on a Bruce Wagner book. And Bruce Wagner wrote the screenplay. And I had watched the movie before. And Bruce Wagner is a genius. He's a fucking seer. He's a mystic. I had him on here. His books blow me away. And I remember watching that movie, but I don't remember the movie. And then I watched it again. I'm like, this is a dark, amazing movie. Kind of rides the edge of. Of satire of Hollywood and just kind of tragic arc to that story. And I watched the Brood. I watched. I watched History of Violence recently. I watched. I didn't rewatch the Fly. I watched some very early. I rewatched Scanners fairly recently, but some very interesting and challenging films. It was kind of an honor to talk to the guy. I'm at Dynasty, typewriter tomorrow. That's April 29th. Then I'm in Toronto at the Winter Garden theatre on Saturday, May 3rd, for two shows. Burlington, Vermont. I'm at the Vermont Comedy Club for two shows on Monday, May 5, and one show on Tuesday, May, May 6. Portsmouth, New Hampshire. I'll be at the Music hall on Wednesday, May 7. Then I'm in Brooklyn for my HBO special taping at the Bam Harvey Theater on May 10th. Two shows there. You can go to wtfpod.com tour for all my dates and links to tickets. Go there, get the right ones. And here's something that was brought to my attention by Kit. And you know, we can only do what we can do and I hope you're doing it, whatever that may be. Ultimately it's not going to be satisfying because we are up against a lot of a tsunami of authoritarian bullshit. But here in la, and this is local, but the latest budget proposal is set to close multiple animal shelters and reduce more than 120 staff positions. And look, you know, I am a cat guy, I'm an animal guy. You know, Kit is a cat person and a dog person and you know, she was involved with Pasadena Humane for a while. And I mean this just means less care for sheltered animals, fewer adoptions and more killing of animals that can't be taken care of. And it's tragic. This is the, the, the, the killing of true innocence. If you live in LA, there's a gathering today at 3pm downtown at City hall to speak out against the funding cuts. You can also call your council member and tell them why they should restore. The funding organizing on this is being led by Beezy's Rescue in la. So shout out to them. Let's, let's, let's, let's help the animals. I mean, if you can't do anything else or you haven't figured out a way to. If you live here in la. I mean, this is a, it's a very tragic, sad thing. I get very emotionally invested in animals. As you know, with Charles the, the ever evolving story of Charles. Yeah, that's taken a big turn. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace. When you run your own website like we do, life is easier thanks to Squarespace. We never have to worry about updating the site or dealing with bugs. Squarespace handles all of that. Plus, Squarespace gives you everything you need to offer services and get paid all in one place. From consultations to events and experiences. Showcase your offerings with a customizable website designed to attract clients and grow your business. You, you'll get paid on time with professional invoices and online payments. Plus streamline your workflow with built in appointment scheduling and email marketing tools. And with blueprint AI, Squarespace helps you design a fully custom website in just a few steps. Check out squarespace.com wtf for a free trial and Then when you're all set to launch your new site, use offer code WTF to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's squarespace.com WTF offer code WTF. So, Charles and I, I did go to the fish show on Saturday. I'll tease that right now. All right. But I'm going to talk about Charles for a minute because I know people are dug into this particular arc. The fish arc is sporadic, but there. There was anticipation on the behalf of fish fans and people who don't like fish. My listeners, in terms of. After I talk to Trey, would I indeed go to my first fish show? And I did. But first, Charles. Charles. Charlie. Charlie Beans. Charlie Beans. Roscoe has been problematic as of late. And as you know, we had a massive diarrhea event, a very large and ongoing aggressive behavior events where Charlie was experiencing stress and anxiety and beating up on the other cats. And when I was away, he was shitting all over the house. And it got to such a. A. A level of chaos that I put him on Prozac. And two weeks into that, I felt awful and I took him off the Prozac. And then I just kind of waited it out, and he was still beating up on the old guys. And then I came across. Well, my vet came across something, or, I mean, she knew. I mean, she didn't come across it. She had given me some. Prescribed some gabapentin, which is a painkiller, and a doofus maker, which I still have on tap. I haven't used it yet, but I tried this other stuff. She said zilkene or Xylkene, and it's some sort of supplement, you know, derived from bovine milk. And I was ready to try anything. And this was easier. It was capsules, but you could open them up and mix them with the food. She prescribed two a day for Charlie. And I just was. The other night, a few nights ago, I was like, I'm going to try this at night, because that seems to be when he goes nuts and gets really kind of crazy. And I gave him this zilkeen in his food, and within a couple hours, he returned to normal. He was, you know, loving and kind of warm and sweet and connected. All the aggravation had left. He wasn't aggro. He wasn't beating up on the cats. He was just having a nice time. And it was a fucking miracle. And I just hope it sticks and the weight off of my back. I mean, when you live in a house with animals and they're fucking out of their minds. It is stress all day long. I can't even imagine. I mean, with kids it's gotta be crazy. But I'm not a kid guy. I'm a cat guy. And it was just causing me so much anxiety, as you guys knew. And I gave him this stuff. Oh, yeah, And I bought a cat tree. I put together a cat tree. And that's now taking up space. But it's not as terrible. And he's into it. He's like back to his old self, sleeping with me, being sweet. You know, he's still an asshole and he's still a troublemaker, but that. That fundamental aggravation is gone. And it was such a fucking relief. I just hope it sticks, you know? Cause I gotta take one more trip out there on the road and I guess we'll see. You know, I've got the gabapentin on backup and this. This zilkin stuff. She said I could give him twice a day and may maybe we can keep him level. But it was almost like it reconfigured his brain, you know, back to who he used to be. It feels like he was stuck in this aggravated space. And God knows I relate to that. I mean, you know, you don't know what's going to make something pass. But I feel like I don't know if this is the direct effect of administering the medicine, the supplement, or whether, you know, he's just kind of re engaged with himself and with me. And now I'm going to disrupt that this week. So we'll see. But what a relief for me and for those of you who are going through that with me. So, okay, most of you know that I interviewed Trey from Fish not long ago. And all of you knew that I was entering that interview after years of people pestering me to do it. Not really being a Fish fan, but not really knowing anything about Fish either. I was judging the phenomenon. I was comparing it to, you know, the jam band that was around when I was younger but already old, the Grateful Dead. And I just assumed it was this sort of proto hippie stuff, which I don't really have a problem with. But, you know, my joke was, you know, I don't have. I don't know how much time I have left, you know, in terms of letting another jam band into my heart. But nonetheless, after I talked to Trey and listened to some Fish, I realized it was a completely different music in a lot of ways. And the jam band I grew up with to a degree, and I Used to live with Deadheads, and I'd been to a few shows. I was never a guy who traveled with them, but I, I can get into the Zone pretty easily. And I lived in the zone for, you know, a couple of years with these guys. And so I, I knew the groove in terms of what a jam band show should be or what a jam band event is and what jam band music does and how it works. I, I, I can lock into it. I didn't know what to expect from it, but Trey said, I told him I'd never been to a show. He said, you gotta come to a show, and I'll get you into the show when you wanna come to the show. And they were here in la, so I reached out and he got me a nice box over at the Hollywood bowl to see my first FISH show. Now, look, there's no doubt that they're great musicians, okay? But what I didn't expect going to the Fish show, and I guess I should have, is there's, you know, obviously a lot of Fish fans listen to that Trey episode. And most of them, I would say 99% of them loved it, and Trey loved it. But I didn't really realize, stupidly, that this community is so interwoven and so tight and so specific that I was walking around and they were like, ah, you made it, huh? He got you here. Yeah. I mean, a lot of people are like, hey, man, this is it, huh? The first Fish show. Have a good set, man. You know, and it was, it was kind of overwhelming. I was like. And I felt pressure. I felt a little pressure, you know, like all eyes were upon me when they weren't on Fish, but they weren't. But there were some people watching me. And so I got set up in the box and, you know, Kit came about, you know, half hour later, she had gotten off work. And the groove of the Fish community was exactly what I anticipated in the way of, like, come, let's get, let's do this, you know, let's get into this groove and see where it takes us. The lights were amazing. The sound was amazing. It's not too loud at, at the bowl, and, and the, and it was good. You know, the first set was, it was kind of, you know, songs with not a lot of exploration, and then there's a nice break and then they come back and they do the other thing, which is the journey, I imagine. I don't know. I'm just, I didn't do any research into how one speaks about these things. And I wouldn't say I'm part of the Fish fam at this point in time, but I understood how it worked. And it was good. It was good. But the odd thing about a jam band world and the jam band community is that, you know, if you have. If you know the songs and I knew none, so that level of excitement was not there. And if you are part of these experiences, these shows, and you go too many of them, you're waiting for different versions or comparing versions of songs or versions or sort of experiences with the second set, with other second sets, and I know all that exists, but I knew none of the music. But I was. I was able to walk into the. To the songs and kind of, you know, I did the jig, I wiggled, I did the. I grooved a little bit, I rocked back and forth. I got into it. The headspace was, I know how to get there without weed, without shrooms, without that help. There was enough weed around me to where I'm sure I got a little buzz, but. But the music itself will get you there. And I understood, you know, how it worked. You know, I knew we were building towards something in that second set. But, you know, I think that once you know the songs, if you know the songs and you wonder what's going to come next or what they're going to put together, I get it. I get the Journey. I was on the Journey, but I got to be honest, I left early, and I don't want to be judged for that. It's just. It's my anxiety, it's my age. And in my defense, I left the Stones early. I do not want to be caught in traffic. I do not want to be caught in some sort of massive exodus. But I stayed for about an hour and a half of the second set and the full first set, and I was there an hour before. I hung out. I talked to people, saw a lot of people I knew there, and. But my experience was good and I enjoyed it. I get it. The music was great. The Journey was good until I stopped it on my own to take my own journey home before everyone else did. But I did feel. I felt like I was sneaking out because I felt like there were some eyes upon me, like Marin left early. But, no, it was great. And I thank Trey, and the guitar playing was amazing. But that's my takeaway. Great show. Great set. I don't know the Fish fam language, but my mind is now open. Okay, everybody. Good guys. Close your eyes and imagine what you'll look like six months from now. Even if you've got thinning hair, maybe you think it looks the same or maybe you picture even less on top. 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So look, folks, as I said earlier, David Cronenberg is on the show today, and I think we got a good conversation out of our experience here. The Shrouds, the new movie, is now playing in theaters. This is me talking to David Cronenberg. Bruce. So I, Yeah, I texted Bruce because I was watching, you know, I kept watching your movies and I'm, I'm a huge Bruce Wagner fan.
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David Cronenberg
Me too, of course.
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Marc Maron
Well, I. But my feelings about him are kind of strange because I, I think he's some sort of mystical seer.
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David Cronenberg
He has that element. Yes.
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Marc Maron
To the point where it's like, when you read his work, you're like, where does this even come from? Yeah, like, like he's like being. He's a vessel of something.
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David Cronenberg
It's funny because I remember trying to talk somebody into getting Bruce to write a screenplay, something. And he said, well, you know, Bruce is basically a satirist.
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Marc Maron
Yeah.
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David Cronenberg
And I thought, no, he's not basically a satirist. There is satire there. But that's not, that's not all of it.
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Marc Maron
Yeah, that's just a delivery system.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
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Marc Maron
Well, that's kind of interesting. The nature, the notion or the nature of satire. Because like, for me, in horror, in a general sense, it feels like a high percentage of horror is satire. Yeah, right.
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David Cronenberg
I agree.
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Marc Maron
But when. In talking about Brusso and I guess we could. It's very. When I, When I have a reaction, when somebody has as many films as you and such a big amount of work, like I usually write, you know, I usually watch, and then I just. I scribble, like something that looks like a math equation.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah.
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Marc Maron
In terms of what I'm trying to think about it. And then at the bottom of this equation, it just. The depth of his secular anti mysticism would rather deal with the meat, the machine mutations of desire and pain.
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David Cronenberg
You're talking about me or Bruce?
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Marc Maron
You.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah, it makes sense.
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Marc Maron
The Meat and the machine.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah.
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Marc Maron
But how you interface with the work of other writers is interesting to me because I'm a huge fan of the movie Dead Zone. And then that was Stephen King. And then you did Burroughs, and then you did Bruce and you did DeLillo.
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David Cronenberg
DeLillo.
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Marc Maron
Yes.
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David Cronenberg
And Patrick McGraw with Spider, actually.
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Marc Maron
Oh, really? And then also with the History of Violence. That was a graphic novel, Right.
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David Cronenberg
Yes.
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Marc Maron
But the ones that you seem to have chosen, you know, on your own to. To engage with are very specific kinds of writers. I mean. Right. So Stephen King's a horror writer.
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David Cronenberg
Yes.
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Marc Maron
And Burroughs is sort of a. I would say a kind of astronaut. Satirist.
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David Cronenberg
Yes, I would. I would. I can agree with that. Yeah.
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Marc Maron
And then, like DeLillo, I had not seen that film before, and I think it's great. Cosmopolis.
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David Cronenberg
Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. I mean, I. I mean, it's. I wrote the script in, like, six days, and I did it by just taking his dialogue.
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Marc Maron
That's it.
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David Cronenberg
And because his dialogue is so good and so unique, and I thought. I wasn't sure if it would be a movie. And I thought, okay, I will just take the dialogue and use it verbatim and see if it's a movie. And I thought, not only is it movie, I just written the script, you know, in six days. Yeah.
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Marc Maron
Well, that was, I think, the challenge, I mean, I guess, as a director as well, is to. I had the experience when I was watching Inherent Vice as well, which is a penchant. And that's hard in dealing with actors where you're like, these are the words of a writer who writes novels.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah.
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Marc Maron
So they're not necessarily the same.
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David Cronenberg
That's correct.
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Marc Maron
As writing dialogue.
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David Cronenberg
That's right.
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Marc Maron
And it's really up to the actors to figure it out.
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David Cronenberg
That's correct.
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Marc Maron
And how did you direct them on that?
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David Cronenberg
I say figure it out. You know, I mean, because famously now. But Diane Krueger was really a little bit freaked out when she came to Toronto and discovered that there was no rehearsal time blocked for actors. Yeah. What she called the table read, which is sort of a theatrical for the.
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Marc Maron
New movie or the not for the shrouds.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah, for the shrouds. And you know, where you sit around the table and you read the script to each other. And I said, well, I don't rehearse. I don't want to rehearse. And what's more, I don't want to micromanage your performance. I want you. When we block the scene on the day that we're gonna shoot it, that's when I'm gonna hear the dialogue for the first time and I'm gonna hear what you feel works.
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Marc Maron
Yeah.
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David Cronenberg
Your intuition, your. Actually, I cast you because I think you can do this.
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Marc Maron
Yeah.
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David Cronenberg
So, I mean, that's one of the things about directing that young filmmakers don't really hear from film school is that half the battle with acting is in the casting. As a director, you need to be a good caster. And it's tricky. It's a black art. So. Yeah, so it's at that point the script is being the director.
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Marc Maron
Right.
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David Cronenberg
And is directing the actors through the dialogue.
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Marc Maron
Well, I think that that's not. I think there's two schools of it, or maybe more, because I remember I talked to Walter. Is it Walter Hill?
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David Cronenberg
Yeah, Walter Hill.
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Marc Maron
Yeah. You know, he doesn't engage with actors at all, other than like, I cast you because you're the guy.
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David Cronenberg
Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, I do more than that. But on the other. I was just talking to Paul Schrader a while ago in Toronto and he said, rehearsal is everything. And I said, paul, rehearsal is nothing for me. So it works for you, but it doesn't work for me. I find when you do rehearsal in that artificial situation where you're just sitting around a table, you get into all kinds of strange things. Actors get competitive. There's these. You start to over interpret. And then when you get on the real set with the real lighting and the costumes, everything changes.
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Marc Maron
Yeah.
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David Cronenberg
The dynamic is completely different. So I feel that the time spent that way as rehearsing is really useless. It's a waste of time.
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Marc Maron
Well, I guess I can understand, like the thing I could see working for a read through is that if you as a director want to tweak things as it's scripted, you know, once you hear it out of mouths. But I guess you can do that scene to see.
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David Cronenberg
But you can do that when you're blocking.
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Marc Maron
That's right.
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David Cronenberg
You know, say, yeah, you're doing too much.
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Marc Maron
Right.
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David Cronenberg
You're overemphasizing.
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Marc Maron
You lose that line.
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David Cronenberg
I mean, even as simple as saying you're overacting, bring it down.
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Marc Maron
Right.
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David Cronenberg
You know, and that's about it.
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Marc Maron
Right.
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David Cronenberg
But the rest is, unless they're really somehow derailed, I don't really have to say much.
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Marc Maron
Yeah. So with this movie. And it's a. It's a lot, this movie, there's a lot.
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David Cronenberg
I mean, this is the most dialogue that Vincent Cassell has ever had in any movie.
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Marc Maron
Yeah.
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David Cronenberg
And it's in English, which is not his first language. So he was. It was nervous making for him. You know, it was a big challenge for him.
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Marc Maron
But what's interesting to me in terms of your work is it really seems that, like, I don't know where. Well, I kind of do, but where you're at in terms of your career. But it seems like all of your themes are in this.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah, I honestly, I don't really think about it. I mean, I. I know that it will happen naturally because all of my movies come from me and my nervous system and whatever, but I don't. I really take each movie as my first movie. It's like I never made a movie before and I'm trying to make it work within its own little universe. In other words, I'm not self referential deliberately. There are some directors who do like to do that. They like to refer to their own.
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Marc Maron
Okay. Well, maybe not self referential, but. But for me, as somebody who talks for a living, you know, on stage, that I've noticed over time that there are things that I am either, you know, not repeating structurally, but it seems that there are areas that I am still working on.
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David Cronenberg
Yes.
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Marc Maron
That will show up every, you know, year or so in the hour or two that I develop for the stage.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah.
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Marc Maron
And I don't know that if that's a movement towards a resolution or a movement towards more understanding.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah. I think for me it's just a question of more understanding, you know, And I don't expect there to be any resolution because I don't think there is one.
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Marc Maron
Well, you think there's one.
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David Cronenberg
Yeah. It's death that's the big resolution, but it's really not a resolution. It's just the end of you. Yeah. And that's not the same thing as a resolution. The resolution is perhaps for people who have been left behind, let's say.
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Marc Maron
Right.
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David Cronenberg
But. And I find that's interesting now because with, with this movie, some of the criticism that is basically negative is exactly that, that there's no resolution. That they feel that the film wanders off into conspiracy theories that are not relevant and all of that. And I find that that really brings up the question of what does somebody expect from a movie? What do you expect from a narrative? Do you. Is it really like the old Victorian well made play where every string has to be tied up at the end and every. Every conflict resolved? Is that what you expect and you want or is there more open ended kind of thing from. From a film?
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Marc Maron
Yeah, well, I mean, but the way that people. I don't know why anybody would approach. You've done several types of movies. I mean, there are movies that you do that you know, have a narrative resolution.
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David Cronenberg
Yes, that's right.
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Marc Maron
And you know, whether they were. Were jobs or of your own intention, but the expectation from cinema along those lines, it seems naive to ask that of you.
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David Cronenberg
Well, I think it's wrongheaded actually. As I say, each film is its own little universe and some of them demand to be resolved in some way or not. And others have a very open ending, which I feel the Shrouds does have.
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Marc Maron
Well, that's the, you know, the sort of stark poetry of what you do. Right. Is that, you know, with, with a movie like you're not like the resolution. And it wasn't your script or the resolution of both Maps of the Stars and of Cosmopolis was. Was your script. I mean, you. That. That marriage at the end of Cosmopolis doesn't resolve itself.
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David Cronenberg
No, correct.
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Marc Maron
And you know, and that's an intentional moment.
- [30:10]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [30:11]
Marc Maron
To let them like linger there. But in this film, I guess what I wanted to discuss, having been through a situation myself, is that it is informed by grief, which was yours. And there seemed to be an attempt to somehow not explain it, but to acknowledge that it is part of this human process and what the hell do you do with it?
- [30:41]
David Cronenberg
I would say that's accurate. Yes. That was why I made the movie, basically. It's not to a lot of people think, has it lessened the grief? Has it been therapeutic? Has it been cathartic? And I say, no, absolutely not. It has not changed any of that. But I did have the desire to discuss it with myself, let's put it that way. And then I invite the audience to come along and watch me discussing it with myself and see how it, how it feels to them. So in some ways it's quotes, autobiographical and in very important ways it's an invention. These are fictional characters and so on.
- [31:21]
Marc Maron
But also the zone of. Because you go out of your way near the beginning of the film to talk about Jewish burial.
- [31:30]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [31:30]
Marc Maron
And something very specific about it that I couldn't even find in. I didn't Go deep enough into cabalistic explanations for rituals. You know, but being a Jew myself and, you know, understanding the. The. The need to get people into the ground quickly in something that can re. Enter the earth organically. And, you know, the shroud, from what I. My brief research, was a kind of an equalizer that everyone, no matter what their status in life, is wrapped in the same fabric. But the idea that the reason the Jews buried people so quickly is so that the decomposition can have a similar kind of period of the soul detaching.
- [32:15]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, I mean, the way it's structured is, and it's explained is you don't cremate the body because that doesn't give the soul which used to reside in the body. It doesn't give it enough time to say goodbye, to say goodbye, to detach from this body that it loved and it lived in and experienced life. And so you want the body to slowly decay with the soul kind of hovering around it. And in the movie, it's a sort of a soul that looks a little like a firefly fluttering over the body and illuminating the body with its innate light. To look at it, to think about it. And eventually the soul gradually accepts that the body is decaying and it must now detach itself from that body and ascend to heaven. Now, as an atheist, I don't believe that literally, but I did find that a quite beautiful metaphor. And it occurred to me only recently that in a weird way, Karsh is that soul. He is the soul of his dead wife. He is fluttering. He is hovering over her. He is trying to allow the body to decompose so that he can try to detach from her and from that grief. So for me, it's a metaphorical thing. And Karsh does explain in the movie that he is an atheist, but somehow he does have this kind of religiously structured dream. And that's the connection that I made between those two things.
- [33:44]
Marc Maron
Well, it's still interesting to me that you make room for the soul in the film that I will have to rewatch again because there is an intentional lighting effect that to you, represents the soul. But you don't fundamentally believe that.
- [34:00]
David Cronenberg
I don't.
- [34:02]
Marc Maron
And the idea of the shroud is sort of loaded too, because at the beginning of the film, because of my brain, it's sort of like, well, is the shroud a something that is going to absorb the soul?
- [34:18]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [34:19]
Marc Maron
And. And then we go from there with whatever technology is going to. Is that where we're going with this? But it didn't Go that way.
- [34:25]
David Cronenberg
No, it didn't. And as I say, I sort of think of Karsh himself as that.
- [34:29]
Marc Maron
Right.
- [34:29]
David Cronenberg
That soul.
- [34:30]
Marc Maron
But why the shroud? I mean, what was it that, what was the. The beginning thoughts on this film in terms of that?
- [34:36]
David Cronenberg
But basically the, the shroud is a camera. I mean, it's allowing you to continue to have a discourse with the body of your loved one as it decays and so that you haven't. Carr says he wanted to get into the box with her, with her body as it was lowered into the ground. And I had that feeling myself. I mean, that's how I got had that understanding. But of course you can't get into the box with the dead person. You would die yourself and that's not really what you want. Karsh being a high tech entrepreneur and that is his creative outlet, he would look to technology for a way to maintain a connection with this body even though he's not literally in the ground with her. And so he came up with the idea of a shroud, which is a traditional burial garment. Yeah, but in his case it's also a sort of. Weirdly, it's a surveillance device, you know, if you want to think of it that way.
- [35:35]
Marc Maron
But something that provides more detail than just a camera in a box.
- [35:38]
David Cronenberg
That's right. That's right. It's more like. It's like a combination mri, X ray and so on.
- [35:43]
Marc Maron
Right.
- [35:43]
David Cronenberg
And I must say the technology exists. You could do that now if you wanted to do that. It's quite possible. So this isn't even sci fi. This is quite literal. Right.
- [35:53]
Marc Maron
Well, a lot of it isn't sci fi at this point, you know, in terms of. Yeah, yeah. And I think some of your movies are. Were relatively prophetic.
- [36:03]
David Cronenberg
They were sci fi when I made them and they're now just reality. Yeah, but.
- [36:09]
Marc Maron
But it did strike me that, you know, as in something that I have thought about in, well, like, you know, the. Ernest Becker's book the Denial of Death had a profound impact on me.
- [36:22]
David Cronenberg
Yes, I know the book.
- [36:23]
Marc Maron
Yeah. In terms of transference and the need of people to feel part of something larger than themselves in terms of belief to justify their existence and push back the terror mortality. Right.
- [36:35]
David Cronenberg
And I think it's a question of meaning too, because a death is meaningless if you're an atheist and you really accept the absurdity of life in general. But we are really, I think we have evolved to need meaning. I mean, that's what's made us such a powerful species. But how do you accept Meaning for something, for an event so earth shattering as a death, when you think it is meaningless. And one of the ways that you can do that is through conspiracy.
- [37:07]
Marc Maron
That's exactly right. That there's a dogma to conspiracy minded thinking.
- [37:12]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [37:13]
Marc Maron
That builds on itself.
- [37:14]
David Cronenberg
Yes, that's right.
- [37:15]
Marc Maron
Like religion.
- [37:16]
David Cronenberg
Yes. And it's a. It's a sort of replacement for religion.
- [37:19]
Marc Maron
Right. Yes, well, that, you know, I definitely saw that. Well, well, the thing was, when my partner passed away quickly, tragically, without any warning, my first thought was, this is not unusual. It's tragic, but it's not unusual.
- [37:34]
David Cronenberg
That's correct.
- [37:35]
Marc Maron
But no matter how intellectual you are about that stuff, you don't factor in the profound trauma.
- [37:43]
David Cronenberg
That's right. And it's. Every nerve in your body, every cell in your body feels it. Yeah, that's right.
- [37:50]
Marc Maron
And paralyzing.
- [37:51]
David Cronenberg
Yes. And it doesn't go away. I mean, this is the other thing. It's. However many other relationships you might have and you go on with your life, that is still there. It won't go away.
- [38:01]
Marc Maron
No, it just integrates.
- [38:02]
David Cronenberg
Yes, that's right.
- [38:03]
Marc Maron
And you know, I'm doing a piece now on my stage show about that about like it never goes away. It's something you live with and it does, you know, integrate itself. But it's right there.
- [38:15]
David Cronenberg
Yes. I mean that's, that's sort of what the meaning of the last scene in the movie is when they're on the airplane. And there seems to be a fusion between Karsha's new girlfriend and his wife. His dead wife.
- [38:28]
Marc Maron
Right, right in the plane. Like she appears.
- [38:30]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. And he kind of dreams it. It's kind of a dream of a fusion of the two women. And he understands that any woman that he makes love to, his wife will be there too in some way because that was the lovemaking of his life, you know, so that's basically how I imagined it sort of to deliver that idea cinematically.
- [38:55]
Marc Maron
Oh, interesting. And also there's like the different ways that one, you know, tries to relieve themselves of grief.
- [39:03]
David Cronenberg
Yes. And I think in the movie Karsh, I think he's accepting that he's not gonna. It's not gonna be alleviated, it's not gonna. It's not gonna go away.
- [39:14]
Marc Maron
Well, he doesn't want it to.
- [39:15]
David Cronenberg
And that's the other thing is to. To do that would be an abandonment and a betrayal and it would cause guilt, which often is also one of the basic things behind a conspiracy theories, that guilt. You know, did we do the best? Did we Find the best doctors, did we find the best clinic? Did we do what? Everything that we could do. There's always that trace.
- [39:37]
Marc Maron
Well, that's interesting because then like, you know, with your own guilt around those questions, you know, once you play those out, you have to put something in that is emotionally founded in judgment in. In order to. To sit with it. Like the idea whether, you know, how it's presented in the movie that his wife had been betraying him.
- [40:06]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. That she had been having an affair with her oncologist, for example.
- [40:09]
Marc Maron
Right. So there you have the anger.
- [40:11]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [40:12]
Marc Maron
Which will give you a reprieve from self flagellation.
- [40:17]
David Cronenberg
Yes. But on the other hand, it's also a kind of self flagellation as well because of the sort of the. The guilt aspect of it as well.
- [40:27]
Marc Maron
Right.
- [40:27]
David Cronenberg
So. Yeah. And it's, you know, can you question her existence that way? You know, is it thinking that she betrayed you with somebody else and you didn't know about it until after she died? I mean, I actually have known situations like that.
- [40:43]
Marc Maron
Sure.
- [40:44]
David Cronenberg
Said a woman was a neighbor. I mean this. I was just a kid. But her husband died and only then did she find out that he had a mistress. Had had a mistress for so long. And suddenly all of her grief was. Was put into turbulence by her anger and the sense of betrayal and shock that she didn't really know him. I mean, it goes on and on, you know.
- [41:07]
Marc Maron
Yeah. How do you negotiate and navigate that?
- [41:09]
David Cronenberg
That's a tough one.
- [41:11]
Marc Maron
Well, I think that's like the area that. The human area that you deal with in terms of desire and violence played against these technologies or disfigurement or whatever, or violence in a literal sense. It is the human journey of a lot of your characters.
- [41:36]
David Cronenberg
Yes. Yeah. Although I must say, the Shrouds is pretty nonviolent, really, compared with some.
- [41:41]
Marc Maron
No, absolutely. But in the third act, whether it did or didn't happen, an intimate violence.
- [41:51]
David Cronenberg
Yes, there is that. There is. That occurs. Yes.
- [41:54]
Marc Maron
In order to sate these problems of grief and lack of control.
- [42:02]
David Cronenberg
Yes, I agree with all of that. Yeah.
- [42:05]
Marc Maron
Yes. But I think where I started with this was that in place of a spirituality that has a structure, this sort of moving through technological relationships, conspiracy minded thinking and dreams, or non dreams kind of in a chaotic way is the spiritual element of the film.
- [42:33]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, well, you know, when it comes to spirituality, I have red flags that come up with that word. Well, even though it just. It's when it really becomes another word for religion, it's a problem. I mean, you know, Christopher Hitchens, the sort of polemicist journalist. And he said three words. He said, death causes religion.
- [42:57]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [42:57]
David Cronenberg
And I thought, oh, that's pretty accurate. I mean, if you're going to summarize it, every religion offers a reprieve from death.
- [43:10]
Marc Maron
Right.
- [43:10]
David Cronenberg
And to me, it's a delusional thing, but if people need it, they have it. Of course, billions of people believe in various religions.
- [43:19]
Marc Maron
Well, it's sort of like, you know, Carlin and I tried to do a bit about this until I realized it was too close to Carlin. Said, like, if you believe in God, you'll kind of believe anything. And that's where you get spirituality.
- [43:29]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [43:30]
Marc Maron
Well, yes, you got to be pretty vigilant about that door that you let God into. That's exactly if you're going to lead a rational life.
- [43:36]
David Cronenberg
I think that's. So that's what I meant when I said there's a red flag there.
- [43:40]
Marc Maron
Sure.
- [43:40]
David Cronenberg
Not that I. If somebody said this person is very spiritual in some ways, I can completely understand what that means. But I also wonder if it means religion or not, you know?
- [43:52]
Marc Maron
Well, I guess what I'm using it is in. Is in your first impulse about that. What that means is that it fills a void.
- [43:59]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [44:00]
Marc Maron
So what you have here, and maybe I misspoke in terms of the semantics of it, is that whether it's artificial reality, the dream state, the shroud or whatever, the engagement with conspiracies, real or not real in the film, that is filling the same void as kind of, you know, hypothetical explanations of religious experience.
- [44:25]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I take it to mean usually spirituality means empathy, sensitivity, awareness, good things, you know, without referring to a transcendence of human existence.
- [44:42]
Marc Maron
That's interesting, empathy. Because I'm trying to think of moments in this film where it happens.
- [44:47]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Does it? Yeah, I think. I mean, between Morrie and Karsh, there is empathy because they have both lost sisters, each in a different way.
- [45:00]
Marc Maron
And the casting of Guy Pierce as a nebbish or schlepp was kind of. I think he did a great job.
- [45:08]
David Cronenberg
Oh, thank you. Yeah. I mean, he was pretty excited to do it. I remember I was just talking to Brady Corbett in New York and he said that while they were shooting the Brutalist, that Guy said he was very excited to. To do. Play this role that you just mentioned.
- [45:22]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [45:22]
David Cronenberg
Because it's very different from what he normally. Kind of thing.
- [45:26]
Marc Maron
He plays kind of a. A nerdy, schleppy Jewish guy.
- [45:29]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Nerdy schleppy Jewish, paranoid.
- [45:32]
Marc Maron
Yeah. Ne. Yeah. But I, I was really impressed because when you see an actor, like he. Kim, who can get a lot of mileage out of his looks.
- [45:40]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [45:41]
Marc Maron
You don't have to play totally against it. You can really see what they're made of.
- [45:44]
David Cronenberg
Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. He was not afraid, Trust me. He was happy to do it.
- [45:47]
Marc Maron
Oh, I bet you had a great time. But I, I, it makes me think about, like, you know, even watching movies from, from early on. Even, like, even Stereo, the first film.
- [45:58]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. You've seen that?
- [46:00]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [46:00]
David Cronenberg
Okay.
- [46:00]
Marc Maron
I'm impressed that, you know. Cause, like, there was something about the way you shoot that, like, was curious to me because it's very matter of fact, in a way. I don't know if that's the right way to frame it, but there's a starkness to it.
- [46:16]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [46:16]
Marc Maron
And, you know, in going back, I was like, is this always intentional? And it is.
- [46:22]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. I sometimes think that as a sort of a Samuel Beckett kind of element of paring things down to essential simplicity. And as I, you know, became more and more experienced as a film director, I realized that I didn't have to cover everything from every angle and every lens. And I ultimately knew what I wanted from each scene at each shot. It could become simpler and simpler and simpler.
- [46:49]
Marc Maron
Right. But the simplicity adds a menace.
- [46:52]
David Cronenberg
Well, that's nice to hear, actually. But, yes, it can be. I mean, it's, it's forceful and it really directs the audience in a specific way.
- [47:03]
Marc Maron
Right. But from the very beginning, the themes of what we don't know about the meat, the human being, the human mind, has been sort of a portal for you all the way through.
- [47:17]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Well, I do think of, first of all, of course, as a filmmaker, the thing you photograph most is the human body. You know, that's, that's your material.
- [47:27]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [47:27]
David Cronenberg
And that is how you discuss the human condition. And I do feel that the body, as in my last film, Crimes of the Future, there's the mantra, body is reality. And I believe that to be totally true. I mean, just the way that we perceive reality is. Has to do with our eyes and our ears and our. How our nervous systems respond different from other creatures. So the body is my medium. There's no question about it.
- [47:57]
Marc Maron
But in the mental landscape, because even in the shrouds, the idea of dream and artificial reality and manipulation of those things technologically, and then the bigger conspiracy that whatever. I didn't read much criticism, but the idea that some of that stuff about China and whatever goes unresolved, there's no need for resolution.
- [48:19]
David Cronenberg
I Agree with you. I'm glad to hear you say that because that's my attitude. It's like it needs to be spoken and acknowledged. It doesn't have to be resolved.
- [48:28]
Marc Maron
Yeah. And also it doesn't have to be real. So positing the idea that. Because, like in the film, there's no reason not to believe most of it.
- [48:36]
David Cronenberg
That's exactly right. Yeah. Yeah. It's still. The whole movie would work if it was all real, all of the conspiracies were for real.
- [48:42]
Marc Maron
Right. And it leads. It leads the view viewer to react to it. Not unlike one would react to a conspiracy theory. Like, there's enough meat here to believe it. Yes, that's true. And it's relieving to do so because I don't want to do the homework that would refute it.
- [49:00]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, I like that interpretation. I really do. And I think it's accurate. I think it works.
- [49:05]
Marc Maron
But going back when people talk about horror, I literally kind of was on a mental, you know, like a spin yesterday with, with watching the work that, you know, the definition of horror is very, very specific and short.
- [49:23]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [49:24]
Marc Maron
You know, it's like, it's.
- [49:26]
David Cronenberg
I, I agree. I mean, body horror is not a term that I ever came up with. I just was reading somebody who had done research and found that it was first used by some critic in 1983 about you. About me?
- [49:38]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [49:40]
David Cronenberg
It's not. To me, it's very minimalizing. It's very. It's giving short shrift to. To what I was doing. And I, I didn't really. I didn't. Of course, I understand what they mean, but I didn't really relate to it at all.
- [49:51]
Marc Maron
But that's a film term. It's a sub genre. It's a genre term when they're talking like that.
- [49:55]
David Cronenberg
Well, that's right. That's right. And of course, critics love to play. Play with.
- [50:00]
Marc Maron
Well, yeah.
- [50:00]
David Cronenberg
But as I say to them, just thinking about genre does not give me anything to work with as a filmmaker. I don't think about it. I don't. Yeah, I can't use it, you know, and you think, well, Eastern Promises was a gangster movie, a Russian gangster movie. So. But the. Within the genre, I think it's more a marketing and a critical question is how do we sell this movie?
- [50:25]
Marc Maron
Right.
- [50:26]
David Cronenberg
We'll sell it as a horror film.
- [50:27]
Marc Maron
Or we'll sell it, or how do we approach it critically. Yeah, right.
- [50:30]
David Cronenberg
That's right.
- [50:31]
Marc Maron
But the definition of horror is an intense feeling of fear, shock or disgust, period.
- [50:36]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, well, that's a big. That's a big universe. Right, Right. Yeah.
- [50:40]
Marc Maron
So why not just work with that?
- [50:41]
David Cronenberg
Yes, I agree. I agree.
- [50:43]
Marc Maron
Because, like. Because I don't. You know, my girlfriend's a big horror fan, but I don't really think in those terms. I don't seek horror out.
- [50:50]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, yeah.
- [50:51]
Marc Maron
But I've always watched your movies, but. Because I didn't. I didn't categorize them.
- [50:55]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. I mean. And honestly, I mean, a movie that I've made, Dead Ringers, Is that a horror film? It has, I guess, horror film elements, sort of.
- [51:03]
Marc Maron
That's a crazy movie.
- [51:05]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, well, it's crazy, but is it a horror film?
- [51:08]
Marc Maron
It's funny cause I didn't rewatch that. But the one thing I remember, which is sort of a classic reveal that probably goes back to, if I'm thinking in my film history studies class, to Rome, Open City is the reveal of the tools.
- [51:23]
David Cronenberg
Yes, well, right. Yes.
- [51:28]
Marc Maron
And then I realized that, you know, that my. My family, my aunt had that book that. That was based on.
- [51:34]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [51:35]
Marc Maron
Of those two doctors.
- [51:36]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [51:36]
Marc Maron
I think the book was called Twins, wasn't it?
- [51:38]
David Cronenberg
Yes, but, you know, it was really. We had to use that, you know, acknowledge that that novel Twins.
- [51:47]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [51:48]
David Cronenberg
But it really was not the basis of the movie. There was actually an article in Esquire called Dead Ringers that was much more the origin of.
- [51:59]
Marc Maron
So was it more of a twin story outside of medicine?
- [52:04]
David Cronenberg
It was a very accurate description of the Marcus brothers, who were actual Jewish doctors, twins, gynecologists in New York. And the novel went quite in a different direction, which my movie does not go into. So, as I said, it's really. That article, Dead Ringers was really the basis of the.
- [52:22]
Marc Maron
Well, I guess if you were a critic and you wanted to categorize it, you could put it into the horror category.
- [52:28]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. And in fact. No, I don't think many critics do, though, actually. It's sort of like based on a true story kind of thing.
- [52:35]
Marc Maron
Like, because my. My girlfriend is just like. She was like, oh, the brood. And that's like a horror movie.
- [52:40]
David Cronenberg
Yes. But it's once again, it's sort of somewhat autobiographical in that I had experienced a very devastating divorce.
- [52:49]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [52:50]
David Cronenberg
With a kid involved. And so when people talk about, you know, autobiography or not.
- [52:57]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [52:58]
David Cronenberg
I say, really, the Brood was my first involvement, let's say, with my real personal life ending up on screen.
- [53:09]
Marc Maron
Oh, yeah. How'd your ex wife respond to it?
- [53:11]
David Cronenberg
Sorry?
- [53:11]
Marc Maron
How'd your ex wife respond to it?
- [53:14]
David Cronenberg
Well, I have no idea, actually. But let's just say we're not very close.
- [53:21]
Marc Maron
Because, like, you know, I read that that, that that was the impetus of it and, you know, to sort of materialize causes of childhood trauma based on the. The divorce as these little monster kids.
- [53:40]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, well, you know, at the time there was a movie, Kramer vs Kramer with Dustin Hoffman and I, and it was about a divorce and how they all were sort of supportive of each other and all very loving.
- [53:56]
Marc Maron
Yeah, yeah.
- [53:56]
David Cronenberg
And I said that the Brood is more realistic, even though it's a horror film, than Kramer vs. Kramer was.
- [54:04]
Marc Maron
Well, because I think what you. You're left with at the end. End is a traumatized kid.
- [54:08]
David Cronenberg
A traumatized kid and two very angry people.
- [54:12]
Marc Maron
Yeah, yeah. But. But there is resolution in the brood.
- [54:16]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, well, the guy. Yes and no. Yes and no.
- [54:18]
Marc Maron
But he legitimately has. Has incentive and. And reason to kill his wife.
- [54:26]
David Cronenberg
Yes. And. And of course, it's. You might want to kill your ex wife, but normally you don't actually do it. But you might think about it.
- [54:34]
Marc Maron
Why not make it a horror movie?
- [54:36]
David Cronenberg
Exactly, exactly.
- [54:37]
Marc Maron
But from movies like, where do you feel. Because, like, you know, in terms of disfigurement and, you know, and then kind of moving through the Ballard stuff, you know, with Crash and this sort of mutation of desire that comes from, you know, disfigurement.
- [54:56]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [54:58]
Marc Maron
When do you think that. That that portal was opened for you? Because I have an experience with. With. With a book called Very Special People, which was about P.T. barnum's anomalies.
- [55:13]
David Cronenberg
Oh, yes, yes. I don't know the book, but I.
- [55:15]
Marc Maron
And then, you know. But many of them were in the movie Freaks. Todd Browning's Freaks.
- [55:18]
David Cronenberg
Right. Yeah.
- [55:19]
Marc Maron
And then I sought out the few existing sideshow performers.
- [55:23]
David Cronenberg
Oh, yes.
- [55:24]
Marc Maron
That were still touring. When I was, like, in junior high, I went to the state fair to see Ronnie and Donnie, the only living Siamese twins. You'd go there and you just. You'd walk up on a platform and you'd look into a trailer home, and the two of them were just sitting there watching TV from behind. But you could see the connection. Yeah, the connection. But what I realized at that time and also the work of Joel Peter Witkin. I don't know if you know him. He's a photographer.
- [55:48]
David Cronenberg
I don't.
- [55:49]
Marc Maron
That there is a window into humanness that is profoundly affecting, that, you know, either you gravitate towards or you don't. Do you remember where you first gravitated towards that?
- [56:04]
David Cronenberg
Well, I certainly remember seeing Freaks, the movie Freaks, and being very impressed by It. And it's still a very unusual movie. There's no question about it.
- [56:15]
Marc Maron
Yes.
- [56:15]
David Cronenberg
But it really had to do more with the desire to change the body. You know, humans have never really been accepting of their body as given that we will always be doing tattoos and changing things. And even 3,000 years ago, people were doing operations on each other's brains and so on. I mean, it's so. It's. It's. To me, it seemed like a sort of normal part of human existence that you would change the body, that you would not. It wouldn't just be aging, that would change your body. You could actually will your body to be changed. And I think tattooing is part of that, but also the medical. You know, once you're enmeshed in the medical structure because of some disease, some chemotherapy, some surgery.
- [57:08]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [57:08]
David Cronenberg
Then you are having to deal with the changing of the body of somebody that you love. And how does that affect your relationship? You know that.
- [57:17]
Marc Maron
Well, that was in this movie, the new one.
- [57:20]
David Cronenberg
It's very specific.
- [57:21]
Marc Maron
That's very specific.
- [57:22]
David Cronenberg
You have a breast amputation, you have an arm amputation. You have staples in the body. And is this person still the same person? Is it still a person that you could desire sexually? Does it turn you off? Does it turn you on? So I'm thinking more in that way than what you talk about with Freaks, which is a more natural kind of occurrence of bodily dysmorphism.
- [57:49]
Marc Maron
Well, that's interesting. So that kind of feeds into the idea or the reality of the film. The substance being a homage to a sensibility or a concept.
- [58:01]
David Cronenberg
Yes. Yeah. I mean, I know the director, Coralie Fargia. I mean, I met her.
- [58:06]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [58:07]
David Cronenberg
And undoubtedly there are, you know, she says, very straightforward, is very influenced by my movies. Also Julia Duke, Cournot with Titan, which. Which also is a movie that is sort of connected to my films that way.
- [58:24]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [58:25]
David Cronenberg
And it's lovely. I mean, I. I love the idea that I have these sort of cinematic daughters who are influenced by me and so on. It's really. It's very sweet.
- [58:33]
Marc Maron
It's the way art works.
- [58:34]
David Cronenberg
It does. It absolutely does.
- [58:36]
Marc Maron
Well, I guess then the sort of the peak experiment in that idea of yours before it became personalized in this film, was the fly. Really?
- [58:48]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [58:49]
Marc Maron
And that becomes like an accident, right?
- [58:53]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [58:54]
Marc Maron
That the desire to just teleport becomes this other freak accident.
- [59:00]
David Cronenberg
Yes, that's right.
- [59:01]
Marc Maron
Changing the body, accepting it initially, and then realizing that the hubris involved.
- [59:07]
David Cronenberg
Well, hubris is the name of the game for human beings. I mean, we are always Challenging in a very arrogant way, I suppose, from some points of view and just sort of a kind of. Sort of physically challenging kind of way from other points of view. That is what we do. I mean, we don't accept our bodies as we don't accept the Earth the way it is. We are also always altering it, changing it, manipulating it and so on. Yeah, that's what we do.
- [59:41]
Marc Maron
Can't ever be happy.
- [59:42]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [59:45]
Marc Maron
But then, like. So was the underpinning of like a movie like Scanners really just a fascination with the side effects of a medication? Is that where that started?
- [59:57]
David Cronenberg
Yes and no. I mean, the. It. But it was an acknowledgment of, you know, what was happening there with thalidomide.
- [60:05]
Marc Maron
Yeah, that's what I mean.
- [60:06]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, it was. I suppose young filmmakers right now wouldn't know about that era, but that was. People were really quite traumatized by the.
- [60:15]
Marc Maron
Effects of thalidomide, which was primarily disfigurement.
- [60:19]
David Cronenberg
It was basically disfigurement and a complete, you know, production of human beings who were really quite different from what we considered normal.
- [60:29]
Marc Maron
What was the original intent of thalidomide for pregnant women?
- [60:33]
David Cronenberg
I think it was for. It was for pregnant women and it was to. I think it's a tranquilizer, basically.
- [60:40]
Marc Maron
Oh, really?
- [60:40]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [60:42]
Marc Maron
And so. And that became sort of the foundation of that being a telepathic gift.
- [60:48]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. I thought, okay, if it's something that causes strange anomalies in unborn children who then are born and become quite different from normal people, instead of it just being sort of physical, dismiss disfigurement. What if it was sort of psychological nervous system, strange brain, disfigurement. That is not obvious. If you saw this person, you wouldn't think that there was anything unusual.
- [61:15]
Marc Maron
Yeah, yeah.
- [61:16]
David Cronenberg
But they were able to. They were telepathic. Yeah, basically.
- [61:20]
Marc Maron
Which is like, you know, that. That was your first movie, was a telepathic movie. You're kind of fascinated with telepathy.
- [61:27]
David Cronenberg
Yes. Yeah. I mean, it was. Scanners wasn't my very first movie, but.
- [61:32]
Marc Maron
I mean, like, going back to stereo.
- [61:33]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [61:34]
Marc Maron
Was.
- [61:34]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, yeah.
- [61:35]
Marc Maron
It's a telepathy movie.
- [61:36]
David Cronenberg
There was. Yes. Always that idea of what. I mean, if you considered the brain and the electricity in the brain, why not. Why. Why could there not be an extension of the electrical.
- [61:49]
Marc Maron
Yeah. How do you feel? Because I. It has to be possible.
- [61:55]
David Cronenberg
You would think. You would think. And in a way, we do it anyway. We do it through, you know, so the brain controls what we speak and what we see.
- [62:03]
Marc Maron
Yeah, but also it's so nuanced. Like, you know, I own cats. And like a cat, no matter how you're acting, two days before you leave.
- [62:10]
David Cronenberg
They know you're going, well, maybe all cats are kind of scanners, actually.
- [62:16]
Marc Maron
Of course they are. But it's like. It doesn't have to be as kind of sci fi is like reading your mind.
- [62:23]
David Cronenberg
Well, that's the thing. Because when. As soon as you say reading, you're really restricting the possibility to something familiar.
- [62:30]
Marc Maron
Right.
- [62:31]
David Cronenberg
But it's quite different from reading. It's a sensing. It's maybe beyond verbiage. It's beyond words.
- [62:38]
Marc Maron
Yeah, but. Yeah, yeah, but it's there. So what is your. What was your relationship with William Burroughs work? Cause I just talked to the guy who did Queer, and, you know, his approach to Burroughs was very human in terms of his life in the one book that was very much autobiographical.
- [63:04]
David Cronenberg
That's right.
- [63:05]
Marc Maron
And I thought it was kind of a beautiful movie.
- [63:07]
David Cronenberg
I did, too. And I've talked to Luca about that, and he's seen the Shrouds, and he was very complimentary about it. But he was worried that when I saw Queer, that me having done Naked.
- [63:22]
Marc Maron
Lunch.
- [63:24]
David Cronenberg
That I would be critical or something. But actually, I did think. I did think it was a very effective and very beautiful movie. And quite different from mine. Even though. Even though there's a monologue that the Burroughs character speaks that's exactly the same monologue that my Bill Lee character speaks in Naked Lunch. Because I did. When I talked to Burroughs, I said, you know, William, I'm gonna have to. I wanna. I can't make a movie out of just the book Naked Lunch. I need to incorporate some parts of your life, like the fact that you shot your wife accidentally.
- [64:02]
Marc Maron
It's so funny. That's the one part. We gotta start with that.
- [64:05]
David Cronenberg
Yes. And then I also wanna use some of what you wrote in Queer, because it's very interesting to me. You know, there were some. The gay community. Some members of the gay community were very negative about Naked Lunch because it suggested that at some point he was denying his gayness. But in fact, if you read Queer, you know that he did go through a period where he wasn't. He didn't know that he was gay or he couldn't accept that he was gay or. Or whatever. And so I did incorporate all that into my movie Naked Lunch, which is quite. And it became quite a different movie, of course, from Lucasfilm, which, as you say, is a very physical and very human and quite very biographical in terms of birds.
- [64:54]
Marc Maron
But also, like, you know, the idea of being closeted in the 40s and 50s was, you know, it was, you know. Yeah.
- [65:01]
David Cronenberg
Burroughs. It was not exempt from that. Yeah, not exempt from that.
- [65:04]
Marc Maron
Illegal.
- [65:05]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, it was illegal. And. And socially not acceptable, period. So there is that element in. In my movie, but what you chose to do is.
- [65:15]
Marc Maron
Is kind of, again, break the wall between a reality and the visions.
- [65:21]
David Cronenberg
Yes, yes. Because, I mean, in a way, his drug taking was his way of escaping the boundaries of reality.
- [65:30]
Marc Maron
Yeah. And also his intelligence around, you know, archaeology and symbolism and. And his fascination with bugs.
- [65:39]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Well, actually, he wasn't as fascinated by bugs as you might think.
- [65:44]
Marc Maron
How would we know?
- [65:44]
David Cronenberg
Because I was, but I see that. And what happens when you adapt a novel like that. Like that is there's a fusion between you, the filmmaker, and Burroughs, the writer of the novel. And he knew that. And he was very fascinated by my insect typewriters. But he. That doesn't exist in Burroughs. There are no insect typewriters. That was my version of a fusion. And I asked him, I said, william, do you. You know, insects. Were you ever really interested in insects? Because he talks about Venusian insects, you know, the insect creatures from outer space. And then.
- [66:22]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [66:23]
David Cronenberg
The planet Venus. And he said, well, I like butterflies. You know, he wasn't really. He wasn't into insects at all.
- [66:29]
Marc Maron
Well, there's later in books there, and I'm not sure it was part of the trilogy, you know, Cities of the Red Knight, the Western Lands and Place of Dead Roads.
- [66:42]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [66:43]
Marc Maron
So there is in one of those books where he goes pretty in depth. Depth. Into the toxins available.
- [66:50]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, of course. Yes, toxins would be. And yes, he was interested in centipedes, of course.
- [66:56]
Marc Maron
Centipedes, man. A lot of centipedes.
- [66:58]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Although centipedes are not insects.
- [67:00]
Marc Maron
I was rereading the Western Lands recently because, you know, the trickiest part, and I think you probably had to deal with it, obviously, with Naked Lunch, is that where's the Story?
- [67:10]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Yeah. And I wasn't worried about that. Right. Yeah. I mean, I didn't feel that that was the game that he and I were playing, you know, was the story.
- [67:21]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [67:22]
David Cronenberg
Resolution, you know.
- [67:23]
Marc Maron
Yeah. I just talked to Weller a couple weeks ago.
- [67:27]
David Cronenberg
Oh, yes. Really?
- [67:27]
Marc Maron
Yes. Yeah.
- [67:28]
David Cronenberg
Oh, how lovely.
- [67:29]
Marc Maron
Yeah. He had.
- [67:30]
David Cronenberg
Where was he?
- [67:31]
Marc Maron
Peter. Peter. He was. He was here. He's here.
- [67:35]
David Cronenberg
Oh, because he. I think he lives in Italy, doesn't he?
- [67:38]
Marc Maron
Sometimes. He just wrote an art history text.
- [67:40]
David Cronenberg
Oh, really?
- [67:41]
Marc Maron
Yeah. And, you know, I had him in here and he had nice things to say about you and. But he's very, you know, one of those guys that's just hungry. Intellectually hungry, and has.
- [67:50]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, he's a lovely guy. Yeah. It's interesting how his career veered away from acting and movies. Yeah.
- [67:56]
Marc Maron
Well, he's like. He got his PhD in art history.
- [67:59]
David Cronenberg
Yes. And he's teaching. It's not.
- [68:00]
Marc Maron
Yeah, yeah. And he just wrote a book I did like. Tell me about. So your relationship with Burroughs, you were fortunate to have him alive.
- [68:11]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [68:12]
Marc Maron
But you liked the work.
- [68:14]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. I mean. And he and I got along very well. It was lovely. We went to Tangier together. We hadn't been there in 17 years. Oh, wow. Because. And I went there with him and with Jeremy Thomas because we were planning to shoot Naked Lunch in Morocco in Tangier, which is sort of becomes interzone in his book. And we hung out with Paul Bowles. They hadn't seen each other in so many years. You know, these two cagey old guys who were brilliant writers, kind of being kind of fencing with each other, you know, they had a sort of love hate relationship, I think. And it was fantastic for me to see that and be there with them. But we got along very well, you know, and there was a. He had a tough guy Persona when he was sort of lecturing or speaking.
- [69:07]
Marc Maron
Hombre, invisible.
- [69:09]
David Cronenberg
But he was. There was a sweetness, though, a real sweetness to him that he wouldn't let people see very easily. But it was definitely there when we were talking together.
- [69:19]
Marc Maron
I think that's what Luca was.
- [69:21]
David Cronenberg
And Luca tapped into that. Yeah, Luca did tap into that. Yeah.
- [69:24]
Marc Maron
And what was. So what was your relationship with JG Bauer?
- [69:29]
David Cronenberg
We. Very congenial. I really liked him very much.
- [69:34]
Marc Maron
What struck you about his work, mostly?
- [69:36]
David Cronenberg
Well, the fact that, I mean, he was very different in person from what you might think if you read Crash, because Crash was a very tough, very difficult film, and the characters were not very sympathetic and not very attractive. But Ballard primarily came to Cannes when we premiered Crash, and we were attacked by many journalists. It was a big scandal. Which was it about what? I mean, there was an English. Very famous English journal critic who said that this is a movie beyond the bounds of depravity. He said, and we were attacked for.
- [70:18]
Marc Maron
Being good for you.
- [70:20]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. And. And at one point. So I was at Ken. I had my whole cast there, James Spader, everybody. And Ballard was there, and he said, you know, David, this is very intense for a writer. You know, most writers are not. Don't have this experience of the publicity and the Glamour and the pressure and everything of a film festival like Cannes. You're mostly at home in your room writing alone.
- [70:44]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [70:45]
David Cronenberg
But he was there to support the film, which was terrific.
- [70:48]
Marc Maron
He loved the film.
- [70:49]
David Cronenberg
He loved the film. And this is the thing. There was a journalist who I think was Scandinavian, Swedish or Norwegian who got up to attack the film in a different way. Rather than saying, it's a perverse, horrifying movie. He said, you have betrayed the book. This is not really the book Crash. You should be criticized and be ashamed to have made a movie like this from the book. And then Ballard said, well, actually, I think the movie is better than the book. And the guy just sort of said, oh, okay. He just kind of sat down and shut up. So that was very sweet of Ballard. He's right. I mean, in the. In the sense that the. Once again, it's a fusion.
- [71:34]
Marc Maron
Sure.
- [71:35]
David Cronenberg
I mean, the people in the movie are very beautiful and they're beautifully lit, and they're very sensual and sexual. And that's not the way you would experience the book Crash, where it's very clinical, almost very cold and clinical. And it's just the way that it evolved when I was writing the screenplay based on the book. And Ballard responded well to that. I mean, he didn't feel at all that it was a betrayal. He really loved the movie. So that was the kind of, you.
- [72:01]
Marc Maron
Know, what a rare and amazing moment. It's like that moment in Annie hall when he's online and the woman. The guy behind him is talking about Marshall McLuhan, and he brings Marshall McLuhan.
- [72:12]
David Cronenberg
It was absolutely like that. Absolutely like that.
- [72:16]
Marc Maron
What a victory. What a beautiful thing that is. Well, I mean, it's. It's. It's difficult because I'm working with a guy right now who's one of my best friends and he wrote a book and that I'm trying to make into a movie. And, you know, in getting him to write the script, which he wanted to do, you know, it becomes a tricky or undertaking.
- [72:34]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [72:35]
Marc Maron
And so I said to him, I said, sam, look, the book exists. This is the movie.
- [72:40]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, exactly. You have to. I've often said, and I still mean it in a way, you have to betray the book, to be honest. To be honest with the book. Well, yeah, because it's a different medium.
- [72:52]
Marc Maron
Right. The freedom you have in novels to go off on things is much different. The whole. Structurally different.
- [72:58]
David Cronenberg
So structurally different.
- [72:59]
Marc Maron
You have to choose your story within the novel.
- [73:02]
David Cronenberg
You do. You have to. It's a betrayal. That's not Really? A betrayal.
- [73:06]
Marc Maron
No.
- [73:07]
David Cronenberg
And if you try to be literal, you're going to have a dead movie.
- [73:11]
Marc Maron
Oh, my God.
- [73:12]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [73:12]
Marc Maron
That was the gift of having Bruce Wagner write that movie because that book is huge.
- [73:17]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [73:18]
Marc Maron
The maps to the stars.
- [73:19]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Yeah.
- [73:20]
Marc Maron
And, like, I was amazed because, you know, I, like, look, I just read his Marvel Universe and the two books from that trilogy. It doesn't matter. We already talked about Bruce. But the fact that he had control and I guess he had. It was his script, right?
- [73:35]
David Cronenberg
Yes, it was.
- [73:36]
Marc Maron
It was tight as hell.
- [73:38]
David Cronenberg
Yes. And, yeah. And I think I had some input, but not much. I mean, Bruce is. He's an expert screenwriter also, so that really helps because he knows all that. He's not trying to protect the book in some weird way. He knows that this is a different medium and it needs to be something else.
- [73:56]
Marc Maron
And also, that's a movie with resolution. That's horrendous.
- [74:00]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, yeah. It's not a resolution that makes you feel good about.
- [74:06]
Marc Maron
Not an uplifting marriage at the end.
- [74:08]
David Cronenberg
Not at all. Oh, my God.
- [74:10]
Marc Maron
So I just, I also. And I'm sorry if I'm just going, you know, jumping around, but I, you know, I watched Eastern Promises recently now, when you decide to direct a movie. Because I know, and. And this is another thing that I didn't bring up. It's like, how was, you know, I talked to Mel Brooks years ago and it was great.
- [74:25]
David Cronenberg
Yes.
- [74:26]
Marc Maron
And we talked about lynch and then we, you know, and I didn't. I don't know if I, you know, realized that you worked with him for. With the Fly, right?
- [74:34]
David Cronenberg
Yes, that's right. That's right.
- [74:35]
Marc Maron
And, you know, what was that exchange like?
- [74:39]
David Cronenberg
Well, Stuart Kornfeld was his guy. His guy.
- [74:43]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [74:43]
David Cronenberg
And he came to me and he said, mel and I would love for you to make. To do a remake of the Fly and we have a script, and would you read it? And I read the script and I said, look, the first thing I would say is, we gotta throw away the first 17 pages. Yeah. And then secondly, the dialogue, I would have to rewrite it all, you know, and probably you don't want to do this. And they said, no, we do want you to do this. And I said, well, let me think about it. And I was thinking about it, and then finally I decided, yes, okay, as long as you accept that I'm going to rewrite the whole thing and it's going to be completely different because it was in that script that existed to me. The only really good thing about it was the absorption of the concept of DNA, which of course, when the original movie the didn't know anything about it. And so that was interesting that it was a fusion of the flies DNA with human DNA, which is technically feasible, but the rest, the relationship of the characters and so on, I didn't find that very interesting. Once Mel said, absolutely. You have the freedom to rewrite this completely. We want your vision. And so on and so on. That's when I did it. And Mel was lovely. I mean, he really was, you know, very amenable and amiable and, you know, we had lots of discussions about things. But basically I got to make the movie the way I wanted it. You know, Howard and I talking about the music for the Fly. We said, okay, look, this is really three people in a room.
- [76:29]
Marc Maron
Howard Short.
- [76:30]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, yeah. Howard and I are saying this movie is basically three people in a room. And it's very operatic.
- [76:36]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [76:36]
David Cronenberg
So let's treat it like an opera and the music will be operatic. And so there's a point where. Where Jeff Goldblum is walking down the street and the music is huge.
- [76:48]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [76:49]
David Cronenberg
And Mel. And Mel says, david, you know, the guy's just walking down the street. Why is the music so huge? Huge. We got this big orchestra and stuff. And I said, mel, he's not just walking down the street. He's on his way to meet his destiny. And he said, oh, yeah, you're right. And so that was that discussion.
- [77:11]
Marc Maron
He was funny. I can't remember exactly what he said, but I was asking him about lynch and he had seen Eraserhead before. He wanted him to do Elder man. And he's like, it's about a horrible baby. All babies are horrible. Like, you know, this movie that people have been wrestling with.
- [77:26]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [77:26]
Marc Maron
For decades. You'll never like. Got it.
- [77:29]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, yeah. No, he. Of course, he's a very smart guy and he still is.
- [77:33]
Marc Maron
Okay, So. I know. Okay, you gotta catch a flight. But I guess the list of movies that you're almost involved with, like, you know, Witness and Return of the Jedi, Flashdance, Top Gun and stuff like that, but whatever the stories are around why things do or don't happen, you do make choices about which ones that aren't your material that you do for specific reasons, I would assume.
- [77:53]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Sometimes they fall through.
- [77:55]
Marc Maron
Yeah. But you. But did you really have interest in doing Flashdance?
- [77:59]
David Cronenberg
No, I. I really. There was a studio who had a woman whose name I can't remember right now who really was convinced that I was the one to direct Flashdance based on what I said. You know, if I direct this, I will actually be destroying it and you won't be happy. Yeah, I knew it wasn't for me.
- [78:21]
Marc Maron
But you did. M. Butterfly.
- [78:22]
David Cronenberg
And Butterfly is a very different kind of story. Quite interesting.
- [78:26]
Marc Maron
Quite.
- [78:26]
David Cronenberg
You know, multicultural, kind of, you know, an interesting story. Yeah. Yeah.
- [78:31]
Marc Maron
Because it's interesting. The ones that I brought up earlier. But even, like, something like A History of Violence, which was a graphic novel, which, like, lends itself to perfectly the way you shoot.
- [78:41]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. Although, honestly, I abandoned the essence of that graphic novel. If you look at it again and look at my movie, my movie is much more almost realistic because the graphic novel went off into some strange stuff that I didn't. I wasn't convinced of, I must say.
- [78:59]
Marc Maron
But outside of story, the idea of placing humans at the center of how you shoot, what we talked about earlier, that there's a starkness to it because, you know, there's an economy to it. Really worked with those characters.
- [79:11]
David Cronenberg
Yes, I agree.
- [79:12]
Marc Maron
Because the characters were so well defined because they come from that.
- [79:16]
David Cronenberg
Yeah. I think that is accurate.
- [79:18]
Marc Maron
And it was sort of an exploration of a different type of transformation of a human being.
- [79:24]
David Cronenberg
And that's true also. Yes.
- [79:25]
Marc Maron
I love that movie.
- [79:26]
David Cronenberg
Oh, thank you. I was very happy. Oh, yes. No, I was very happy. I mean, it was lovely because that's how I met Viggo.
- [79:34]
Marc Maron
Yeah.
- [79:35]
David Cronenberg
And we got along, obviously, very well.
- [79:37]
Marc Maron
We've done many movies.
- [79:39]
David Cronenberg
A bunch of movies.
- [79:40]
Marc Maron
Seems like a great guy.
- [79:41]
David Cronenberg
And he is a wonderful human being. He really is a great guy.
- [79:44]
Marc Maron
I never talked to him, but. But also, like, it says American Psychos on this list.
- [79:48]
David Cronenberg
Yes. I really was interested in doing American Psycho and.
- [79:52]
Marc Maron
But you did it. Cosmopolis is pretty close.
- [79:55]
David Cronenberg
Yeah, it is somewhat close. Although there's some violence in American Psycho that is not in Cosmopolis.
- [80:03]
Marc Maron
That's right.
- [80:03]
David Cronenberg
Yeah.
- [80:04]
Marc Maron
Well, look, it was great talking to you. I don't want to have you.
- [80:08]
David Cronenberg
Well, no, we could sit here all day, actually, if I didn't have a plane to catch.
- [80:14]
Marc Maron
And I thought the movie. The new movie, was. Was beautiful and challenging and it got my brain working. And as all. As all the work does. And thanks for taking the time.
- [80:23]
David Cronenberg
Well, thank you for having me here.
- [80:30]
Marc Maron
There you go. David Cronenberg. That was interesting. Again, the Shrouds is now playing in theaters nationwide. Go see it. There's a lot in it. A lot happening there. Hang out for a minute, folks. People, we love la. And I'm saying we because I already love it. And I know that when you visit here, you'll love it too. Whether you're looking for the best taco trucks or a standout Michelin star restaurant, la's got you covered. I just went down to Joy on York in my old neighborhood of Highland park, which I love. For the authentic Taiwanese food. You can go to Bodmash up on Fairfax across from Canters, kind of hot rotted Indian food or go to Canters. I actually go now for a vegan Reuben. And of course LA is known for entertainment, but this place is also a world class hub of art, music, museums and live theater. Check out the European art collection at the Getty Center. Go to hear the LA Philharmonic at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. And you can also come here and do all those LA things you've heard about. Go to Universal Studios, check out the Griffith Park Observatory, see the view from Mulholland Drive, check out the Hollywood sign. You can't pass up all the classic LA stuff. Find more ways to love los angeles@discoverla.com hey people. On Thursday, David Harbour is back in the garage. Mostly because I had such a good time talking with him the last time. That was back in 2018 on episode 921.
- [81:58]
Kit
I remember being made fun of and I remember like around eight months in just like. And the audience would howl with laughter when she would like make these jokes about him like not being able. And I just remember like about eight months in having these like little dizzy spells where I'd just be so mad at the audience for laughing at me. Cause I'd so deeply. Like I realized I spent more time in that house. Like I would spend three hours a day, eight shows a week. So I spent like so much time actually in that house experiencing that. It was almost like oh yeah, you.
- [82:28]
Marc Maron
Cross like you're lit.
- [82:29]
Kit
Yeah, it's almost like you're actually living that life more than you are your own.
- [82:32]
Marc Maron
So the upside down was a prophecy?
- [82:35]
Kit
Exactly.
- [82:35]
Marc Maron
The upside down was actually theater for you. Exactly, exactly.
- [82:39]
Kit
There was funny stuff that happened too though. Like we would like about like eight or nine months into this was crazy. Like you do a play, it's the same play, you know, for eight shows a week. And I remember about eight or nine months in being ready to make my entrance of the door and like having this like heart stopping fear and going like, somebody get me a script. I don't know any of my lines. Someone get me a script. I don't know anyone. And they would open the door and it would just come out of your mouth and you just like for some reason this fear would just wash over me that I didn't know you'd been.
- [83:10]
David Cronenberg
Doing it for so long.
- [83:12]
Marc Maron
Somebody get me a script that's episode 921 with David Harbour and you can go back and listen to that before Thursday's episode. It's available for free on all podcast platforms. To get every episode of WTF ad free, sign up for WTF plus Just go to the link in the episode description or go to wtfpod.com and click on WTF Plus. And a reminder before we go, this podcast is hosted by Acast. Here's some Jam Noodle Boomer Lives Monkey and lafonda Cat Angels Everywhere.