Ep. #274 - Gotti

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss...

[0:02] Gari!

[0:04] Forget about it!

[0:06] I feel like it doesn't get better than that!

[0:30] Hey everyone, and welcome to The Flophouse. I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:39] Hey, I'm Stuart over here. Stuart Wellington, that is.

[0:43] And I'm Elliot Kalin, Ellie Bag of Donuts. Yeah, from The Block. Yeah! One of the boys.

[0:49] As you can tell from our, uh, period-appropriate and region-appropriate accents, we're talking about the movie Gotti today on The Flophouse.

[0:58] That's right, because what do we do on this podcast, Dan?

[1:01] Wow, we're really getting into it fast this time. Okay, uh, we watched a bad movie.

[1:05] Oh, sorry, Dan. Should we dilly-dally more? How was your guys' weekend?

[1:09] Usually we dick around a little bit.

[1:11] How much trampolining did you do this weekend? Because I did a fair amount.

[1:15] I would say I spent zero hours trampolining.

[1:18] Is trampolining like a new thing kids are doing?

[1:21] Yeah, yeah, it's a slang innuendo for jumping on a trampoline.

[1:25] Oh, wow, cool, cool.

[1:27] Hey, guys, how many times did a four-year-old boy demand you play a Monty Python-based card game with him?

[1:32] I don't know.

[1:34] Because that is –

[1:36] Can you describe the mechanics to me, please?

[1:39] Well, it's a variant of the game Flux.

[1:42] So it's a card game in which the goal and the rules of the game are changing, and you want to collect certain items that match a goal card as long as that goal card is in play.

[1:52] This is a game that was gifted to me.

[1:54] I know certain people hate the word gifted that you use that way, but I don't care, whatever.

[1:58] Shakespeare made up words all the time.

[2:00] Gifted to me by my wife, and we said to my son, it says on the box it's for ages 13 and up, so it might be a little complicated for you.

[2:06] We'll play this with you another time.

[2:08] Instead, my son absorbed the rules as if by osmosis almost instantly and loves the game and wants to play it constantly.

[2:15] So anytime he is not like in the bath or in the car or eating, he's like Monty Python, Monty Python.

[2:21] Let's play Monty Python.

[2:22] Daddy, can you guess what I'm thinking right now?

[2:24] Monty Python.

[2:25] Hey, Daddy, I'm thinking of a game that starts with M, Monty Python, and we played it three times this morning.

[2:29] He beats me one-third to two-thirds of the time we play.

[2:33] Elliot, you can't see because your camera is off, but I'm crying right now.

[2:37] We've said to him we're like Stewart is going to be very happy to play a game with you someday.

[2:42] Sammy is – Stewart, I've been talking a lot about you because he seems to grasp game mechanics very quickly, and he's all about games.

[2:50] And he actually – it's worrying me a little bit because he started designing what he calls a murder world where he wants to put people through what he calls games with the ultimate risk and the ultimate penalty.

[3:02] So I don't know.

[3:04] He's already got the tagline on the box ready.

[3:08] And he started building a prototype with his Legos, and, I mean, it seems like it works pretty well.

[3:13] Nobody has seen the mailman in a few days.

[3:15] I mean I feel like the game with the ultimate risk and ultimate penalty was already designed, and it's called Don't Break the Ice.

[3:21] No, I would think it was Don't Wake Daddy because the secret was, Daddy, he's an alcoholic.

[3:26] Yeah, you don't want to wake him.

[3:28] He has rage issues.

[3:29] Now, on the other hand –

[3:30] Well, Elliot, it was so nice to hear you describe how to play a game.

[3:33] Usually she's on the other foot for me, and I have to describe a game to you or Dan to various levels of complaining.

[3:42] I wouldn't say complaining.

[3:43] Maybe glazed disinterest.

[3:46] Yeah.

[3:47] The last time Dan came over for a game night, every time it was his turn, he let out the most audible sigh.

[3:52] It was amazing.

[3:54] And then he did the best out of everybody.

[3:56] So –

[3:57] I mean, well, that's – Dan, at this point, the sigh doesn't really mean what we think it means.

[4:00] He's more sigh than man at this point.

[4:02] And the sigh is just the way he interacts with the universe.

[4:04] Okay, that being said, Dan, rather than give you a chance to counteract that, let's – enough.

[4:10] Let's cut the shit, okay?

[4:11] No offense.

[4:12] Let's like – guys, we got real family business to deal with around here, real top business because, Dan, what do we do on this Love Pod Nostra Prostra of ours?

[4:23] Well, we said it already.

[4:24] We watch a bad movie, and then we talk about it.

[4:26] I couldn't remember because of the dilly-dally.

[4:28] What do we do this week, Dan?

[4:29] We watch Scotty.

[4:30] We watch Scotty starring Johnny Travolta.

[4:33] Johnny Travolta as Johnny Gotti.

[4:35] That's right.

[4:36] John Gotti, the Teflon Don, the Dapper Don, Donald Duck, Don Johnson.

[4:43] Yeah.

[4:44] Well, yeah, I guess that's fair.

[4:46] He had a penis.

[4:47] Prove me wrong, Stuart.

[4:48] Okay.

[4:49] I got to do the math.

[4:50] Well, it checks out.

[4:53] Now, Gotti had the – it was in the 2018 Hall of Shame as it topped the list of many people's worst movies of the year.

[5:00] Do we feel the same way?

[5:01] Well, let's just say that it was directed by E from the Entourage TV show and leave it at that.

[5:06] Holy shit.

[5:07] That's who it was?

[5:08] Yes.

[5:09] I knew I recognized that fucking name, but I didn't know.

[5:12] After many years being attached as a possible Barry Levinson project, this book was finally handed into the equivalent hands of E from Entourage whose name I can't remember.

[5:23] I'm sure he's a fine human being.

[5:24] I don't know, but it seems like he was not as up to the task as, say, Barry Levinson.

[5:29] Now, let's say one thing about Gotti.

[5:31] This movie wants to be Goodfellas so badly.

[5:34] It so wants to be Goodfellas.

[5:37] Everything about it is aping Goodfellas.

[5:40] I think it's missing out on – just to spoil a little bit, it misses out on the main point of Goodfellas, which is that the mafia life is very seductive for good reasons, but it's also very self-destructive, and it will ruin your life.

[5:51] It feels like somebody watched only the like – only watched Goodfellas once while it was screening on like TBS and missed the end of it.

[6:02] They watched the first half of it and then got a phone call, and all they saw were helicopters and him getting a nice new house at the end.

[6:09] They were like, this looks pretty cool because this movie is about how the mafia life is very seductive because it's great, and sometimes you meet really wonderful people like John Gotti.

[6:18] Now, guys, going into this movie, what was your level of knowledge about John Gotti?

[6:23] I knew he was a mafia kingpin, and that was it.

[6:28] I was pretty sure he was dead.

[6:30] Okay, and Stuart, similar?

[6:33] Yeah, I mean I watched this movie with my wife who had a much larger knowledge base of John Gotti having grown up and lived all her life in Brooklyn.

[6:43] Yes, because this movie really seems to assume a very large amount of knowledge about John Gotti and his life on the part of the viewer and also a real desire to connect with John Gotti.

[6:55] There are scenes that come up in the movie where you're supposed to be like, oh, this is what's going to happen.

[7:01] And so they'd mention people's names, and I'd be like, okay, who, what?

[7:04] Like there's a bunch of scenes where they're just mentioning the names of other real-life mobsters, and it was like at this point –

[7:09] and this is what it must feel like when I'm talking about Star Wars in front of certain people where I'm just like, oh, yeah, yeah.

[7:14] Well, you got Moma Nadon and you got Ponda Beba, and they're just like, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, syllables.

[7:18] Yes, that's what some of the scenes in this movie are like.

[7:21] Yeah, this movie loves to introduce new characters, loves it.

[7:24] It's a mix of that and almost William Gibson-esque disregard to people's knowledge of the situation.

[7:32] But also there will be scenes where they'll explain everything so explicitly that you're like, Stacy Keach, John Gotti would know the names of the five different boroughs of New York.

[7:46] You don't have to explain it in the greatest scene in the movie.

[7:50] Well, just skipping ahead, John Gotti is plotting to murder his own mob boss, and he's talking to the underboss played by Stacy Keach.

[7:57] Stacy Keach goes, you're going to have to have the heads of all five families and the heads of all five boroughs, Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, Queens, Staten Island.

[8:07] John Gotti is absorbing this information like a Padawan at the feet of a Jedi master, and you're like – you'd think it would be shorthand he would understand.

[8:16] Okay, so let's start with the movie. We open. John Gotti is standing next to – which bridge is that?

[8:21] Was that the 59th Street Bridge or the Manhattan Bridge? He's standing next to a bridge in New York.

[8:27] This is an important detail for us to get correct or else people will disregard our opinion of the movie.

[8:32] I know. They'll be like, that was the right bridge.

[8:35] But it looks as if he just whacked Woody Allen and Annie Hall and is standing next to the bridge they were looking at.

[8:41] He addresses the camera, and he talks about how he's from New York, and he made it big.

[8:44] He started from the gutter, and he made it big.

[8:46] And then he says what I thought was maybe the funniest line in the movie.

[8:49] Oh, I love this line.

[8:50] This life ends in one of two ways, dead or in jail. I did both.

[8:54] And it's like, dude, everyone does both if they go to jail because it's not like there's a mob boss who's been in jail for 200 years.

[9:01] It's also wrong.

[9:03] The Grim Reaper, it's not a Final Destination scenario where the Grim Reaper wants to steal the soul of Sam the Chinjaganti, but Sam's in jail.

[9:11] He's like, these bars will stop my skeletal fingers.

[9:15] Yeah, his side keeps setting off the metal detector, so he has to bake it in a cake.

[9:21] He tries to sneak in his side through a cake, and they're like, nope, try again.

[9:26] Try again, embodiment of the abstract notion of death and unbeing.

[9:30] You did not nail it.

[9:32] Yes, Sammy. Yes, Dan. Sorry.

[9:36] It's fine. You can think of me as your son.

[9:38] I do kind of. I already do.

[9:41] It's also wrong in another way, which is there's one way that life ends, and it's in death.

[9:46] It's not like the other option is jail.

[9:49] I pick jail where I will live forever.

[9:53] Well, he's talking about the life, the mob life.

[9:58] Mob life. I see.

[10:00] In 1973 and Gotti is and also we we have to point out that

[10:05] In that opening sequence and like much of this movie John Travolta's wearing

[10:09] Like actual clothes the actual clothes of John Gotti

[10:13] He had gotten a lot of John Gotti's actual wardrobe to wear during this film

[10:18] Oh, I didn't realize that because the movie it is based on the memoirs of John Gotti's son John jr. Uh-huh

[10:25] So I didn't realize that so he's wearing John Gotti's suits. Is that why he felt the need to put on

[10:30] Strangely varying amounts of makeup at different points depending on the age. He thinks John Gotti is supposed to be because

[10:37] Just to spoil something hit the he has some of the worst old age makeup. I've seen in a long time

[10:42] It's like he saw Guy Pearce in Prometheus and was like I can do better

[10:45] I can outdo that but he hit there at John. He's when he's playing old John Gotti. He's wearing such heavy makeup

[10:52] I thought he was supposed to be 95 years old and then I looked up John Gotti at the end

[10:56] They say John got a dead at the age of 61. I was like, wait a minute

[10:59] I looked up John Travolta is older than 61 right now

[11:01] So I guess they had to make him look older than he is now

[11:04] So they made him look like an elderly like like like a mummy

[11:07] I mean, I guess so he had been he had been like going through cancer treatment. Maybe so maybe I mean, maybe

[11:14] It usually doesn't make you look elderly. I don't know. Yeah, it's great that there's

[11:19] That they go so overboard with his old age makeup

[11:24] But for the actor who plays John Gotti jr

[11:27] They're the only nods to age changes are his hair is slicked down when he's younger

[11:33] It's straight up when he's older and I think he has a little bit of gray on the sides

[11:38] J Jonah Jameson stuff. Yeah, and he wears glasses that he they put glasses on him

[11:42] There's a seat so John John jr

[11:44] Is played by this guy who must be 21 years old through the whole movie and there's a part at the end where he's saying

[11:49] Goodbye to his family and his kids are all like eight ten years old and I was like wait

[11:53] Are these his younger brothers like hold on a second?

[11:55] He does not it looks like these friends of his that he brought home from school. They're on a sleepover with him

[12:01] It was it's hilarious. But and so to make John Travolta look younger when he's young John Gotti

[12:05] They just make his hair so black. It's like gravity can't escape that light can't escape the gravity of his hair

[12:12] It's so black. But anyway, yeah, so it's 1973 and young John Gotti

[12:15] He's heading a team for Carlo Gambino of the Gambino crime family to find a kidnapper who kidnapped somebody I guess Carlos son

[12:23] I'm not sure. It's like why they choose John Gotti to do it

[12:25] Who knows the next scene they're in a bar the kidnappers gear that they shoot him in the head as smoke on the water plays

[12:31] How do they find him? Who knows who cares? He's John Gotti

[12:34] He's just good at that stuff. And now he's a made man cut to he's an old man in jail again

[12:39] Looks like he should be guarding the one true grail in a cave somewhere

[12:44] So that Donovan can't can't drink the life of eternal youth from it. Yeah, he should just pick the right Pepsi, right?

[12:50] That's the thing

[12:52] Pepsi your face melts. Yeah, I think that's how those commercials used to work. Yeah

[12:56] He's recovering from cancer and he tells his son John jr. Who again looks like he's about 15 years old

[13:01] Although he is playing the married father head of a mob family not to take a plea deal because that's the cowards way out

[13:08] Cut back to him in jail as a young dad

[13:11] He won't let his son be a cop for Halloween and we get to see him and his wife and he and his wife are

[13:15] Like an SNL version of a mob couple if they are and it's his real-life wife

[13:21] And I believe that I believe that scene if if it was a sketch on Saturday Night Live, it would have been titled

[13:27] What's the matter with you?

[13:29] And they would have hosted a show from their wood paneled basement

[13:33] Yeah about what's going on in in on the block in the neighborhood

[13:36] but there it's this it's like a the old the like Boston sketch from from SNL whether the

[13:43] Bostonians like is a is a scene of restrained character work

[13:48] And at this point the movie is just

[13:50] ping-ponging back and forth between the present and the and the

[13:53] Pat I guess the the future of the pet

[13:55] I mean they're not as distant past in the very distant past in a way that I think is supposed to again set up thematic

[14:01] Lessons

[14:03] Like Goodfellas does but instead is it's just kind of it feels like a quilt like a crazy quilt the craziest of quilts

[14:09] and you're talking about the Batman villain not the

[14:13] The hired gun card from the Doomtown collectible card game. You read my mind, so

[14:20] It's also very confusing the the time jumps because I

[14:24] Like there will be like scenes within like the same year where like I was watching this with a friend

[14:30] And she kept being like how much time has passed how much time spent like?

[14:35] Because there'd be scenes between the same year where like you have no idea and then there would be like

[14:39] title cards occasionally that would tell you the year mm-hmm

[14:42] But then there would be like title cards that would tell you the year

[14:44] And it was the same year as it was the last time. They told you the year like

[14:48] Five ones that said 1985. I'm like okay great. Thanks

[14:54] Fucking sale on 1985 title cards

[14:58] So these 1985 title cards are just not moving the way they used to we got it

[15:02] We'll put a bulk discount on them the it's it's a movie that it has some storytelling issues

[15:07] Yeah, Dan. Let's put a positive spin on it and say that it's it always keeps the audience on their toes

[15:12] It's a movie that challenges you to really pay attention to catch all the clues

[15:18] Portrait and

[15:20] The keeping keeping the audience on their toes a good choice of words Elliot because it was around now in the movie where

[15:26] We have a scene where the character John Travolta is talking to other mafioso guys

[15:30] And they're just like standing out in the street, and they're using terms that

[15:35] incensed my wife

[15:37] Because she had to jump up stop the movie and explain to me that there is no way that

[15:43] Mafia guys would stand around referring to things as the mafia and specific

[15:49] I mean the fact the fact that Lacosta Nostra is literally the code word for the mafia because they don't want to say mafia

[15:55] But yeah, they all have the fact that the month. It's one of the it's like we were saying

[15:59] It's a movie that will withhold the special information like who is John Gotti and where did he come from and why is he doing this?

[16:06] But then it will spoon-feed you the idea that like there's a family called the Gambino family

[16:12] Okay, great

[16:13] Also, we're the mobs so we murder people yeah, okay, that's like oh that guy is from the Greek Mafia

[16:23] It's a part of part of storytelling is knowing what information is necessary and whatever information to be withheld and I feel like they like

[16:29] Did the photo negative of that?

[16:31] I wish that when when we because this movies on Amazon Prime

[16:34] I wish that when I pressed press play a title card came up that said wait

[16:39] Don't watch this movie until you receive the information packet in the mail

[16:42] and then I would just get like a

[16:44] special booklet in the mail called so you're going to watch Gotti and it would explain a lot of the things I needed to know

[16:49] Because we were watching the subtitles on and that didn't really help that much. Oh totally

[16:54] Now there's a scene there

[16:55] I would want to mention very quickly my second favorite line in the movie after when he names all of the boroughs which is

[17:01] John jr. He's at the Military Academy

[17:02] He says a new story about his dad on the mafia for being in the mafia because his dad is also famous

[17:07] Always which was true in real life, too

[17:09] But then it cuts to for some reason John Gotti

[17:12] Giving his other kids money to see a movie to get them out of the house

[17:15] He goes go see that movie you love about spaghetti meatballs

[17:20] And there's just something so stupid about that one the specificity of like look we got to make sure everyone knows what year it is

[17:26] So I'll have the ghostly meatballs, but I was like he's Italian. So he's gonna think the movie is really about meatballs

[17:32] Oh forget about it. Isn't that crazy? Come on like it's such a it's such a

[17:37] Dumb moment talking about meatballs. Jesus Christ

[17:44] So anyway, yeah, he's plotting crimes on the street using terms

[17:48] They wouldn't use he could tell some guys to stop plotting crimes for a moment to help an old lady with her groceries

[17:53] And he's keeping it. He's keeping an eye on local businesses to make sure they're safe and supported

[17:57] He's just a guy taking care of the neighborhood

[17:59] Anyway, more and more John jr. Is getting pulled into the life John Gotti is meeting lots of other mobsters

[18:04] There's a scene where he's at a disco and other mobsters are just being pointed out to him

[18:09] and it feels like it's the recap at the beginning of a mob show like they were there just like remember all these guys and

[18:16] And it's he's hanging out. Is this busy hanging out with Stacey Keach at this point? Yes

[18:21] He's hanging out with Stacey Keach who is what? What's this character's name Nick or something? I can't remember Neil

[18:26] He's up Neil. He's he's the underboss to Paul Paul Castellano

[18:31] Who's the head of the family that they're in and everyone's like Stacey Keach?

[18:35] You should be the boss. You shouldn't be the underboss Stacey Keach seems pretty happy being the underboss

[18:40] But John Gotti has a problem with the boss Paul, which is that Paul doesn't care about family. He just cares about money

[18:46] He's only in the mob for the money. He's not in the mob for all the bullshit

[18:51] Macho loyalty garbage that gets thrown out the window

[18:55] Constantly because the thing about this movie is it's like whatnot

[18:57] It's almost like the last samurai of mob movies where it's like

[19:02] This is a group of warriors and men of honor who care only about their dignity and about each other

[19:09] But then everything in the movie is about no

[19:11] they're just like violent jerks who beat people up and

[19:13] Only want it and want to take stuff like that

[19:16] Everyone in the movie is and John got he's like I'm all about loyalty loyalty is the most important thing to me

[19:20] no, you're gonna help me kill my boss or what and

[19:24] But I the

[19:26] Meanwhile

[19:27] Being a mob boss. It's not all peaches and cream. It's not all champagne and roses guys

[19:32] You know what being the head of a violent murderous?

[19:35] Crime syndicate that likes to pretend it is a sort of quasi religious fraternal organization

[19:39] built on love when that love is enforced mainly through violence and money and also the abuse of

[19:46] Women and hatred of minorities and all sorts of things

[19:49] It's not all it's not all it's not all the dream. It sounds like because God he's other son

[19:53] Frankie is hit by a car and killed with all the subtlety of us in

[20:00] insurance scare commercial that they show you when you go to an insurance office to

[20:03] get you to buy more insurance.

[20:06] It almost tears the family apart and this is a real tragedy that can happen to anybody,

[20:11] not just a mob boss.

[20:12] This is when we see John Gotti really come to the fore as a husband and as a man because

[20:16] even though he is constantly gone either in jail or plotting crimes and most of his interaction

[20:23] with his sons involves giving them money to go see spaghetti movies, here he is really

[20:27] there emotionally for his wife who falls apart and he puts his mob life on hold for

[20:33] a couple of weeks to take his wife on a vacation and guys, wouldn't we all do the same if our

[20:38] children were killed, put our jobs on the hold for a couple of weeks to take our wives

[20:41] on a vacation so that they can get over it?

[20:44] As long as we're men of honor, then yes, of course we would do that, Elliot.

[20:48] I guess so.

[20:50] He's a made man, so I'm not super into the mafia stuff.

[20:53] Being a made man is like being a knight, right?

[20:57] Very much so and similarly in that being a knight was also gussying up violence and oppression

[21:03] of the weak with this idea of you're doing something holy and better.

[21:07] The mafia is just like that, yes, only in this case.

[21:11] Can any made man make another person a made man like the way a knight can knight someone

[21:15] else?

[21:16] I don't think so but I don't think it's like a vampire where you can just bite.

[21:20] A made man bites a made man and turns them into a made man, although it's one of those

[21:24] things where they show a made man ceremony later on when John Jr. becomes a made man

[21:30] and it's basically like they take some blood from your finger and I guess put it on a picture

[21:35] of the Virgin Mary and there's a candle there and they make you swear an oath and they tell

[21:39] you that if you ever rat them out, they're going to kill you and then they're like,

[21:42] now you're our brother and we're all brothers because I don't know about you guys.

[21:46] We all have brothers.

[21:47] I don't usually enforce my relationship with my brother with threats of death if he turns

[21:52] on me.

[21:53] Growing up, there was a lot of that actually.

[21:57] My brother is getting married next year and we've been talking about his bachelor party

[22:00] stuff and I'm not like, David Kaelin, you're my brother, you're always going to be my brother

[22:05] but if you rat me out, so help me God, I'm going to kill you, I'll kill your family which

[22:09] is my family so I'm going to be really sad but I'll do it.

[22:12] If you get, I have a little idea for your brother's bachelor party, you should get a

[22:19] special guest, Gritty, the hockey mascot.

[22:23] He would love that.

[22:26] My brother is the kind of person where I can imagine Gritty shows up at the party and then

[22:29] starts taking the costume off and there's a strip underneath and he's like, no, no,

[22:32] no, put the costume back on.

[22:33] I want to hang out with Gritty.

[22:34] David would be crying because it's like finding out that Santa is just your dad.

[22:39] Yeah, that has been destroyed.

[22:43] I mean, our dad is Santa.

[22:45] He's Tim Allen in the Santa Claus, that's our dad.

[22:48] When we were a kid, my dad hit Santa with his car and had to take over the role and

[22:51] it was hard.

[22:53] It was hard growing up with our dad being so deep in the Santa life because he often

[22:56] wasn't there.

[22:57] He was with his underbosses, his capos, the elves and he would have to plot on his list

[23:04] which kids would get good presents and which kids would get whacked and that's the secret

[23:08] about Santa on the naughty list.

[23:10] Those kids, they just disappear them and I wanted to be a maid elf and I tried so hard

[23:15] and he took me aside and he's like, you're weak, I'm sorry, you're weak, you're never

[23:18] going to have what it takes and that's why I turned state's evidence and why my dad's

[23:21] in jail.

[23:22] This is a mashup worthy of a Facebook promoted t-shirt.

[23:25] There's got to be some sort of Santa mob, like the same way that there was that period

[23:31] where everyone was everyone, where I was constantly seeing people wearing those Looney Tunes like

[23:36] gangsta rap mashup shirts where Bugs and Daffy and Taz would be wearing a ton of rings and

[23:41] gold chains.

[23:42] There's got to be some kind of Santa mafia.

[23:43] Yeah, yeah, like I didn't choose the Santa life, the Santa life chose me or something.

[23:47] Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.

[23:48] The other thing about that, um, that La Cosa Santa, something like that.

[23:53] Or like, or like Mrs. Claus painted up like a, like a Dio Dos Muertos lady with a couple

[24:00] like a pair of nickel plated 45s in her hands.

[24:02] Okay.

[24:03] I mean, that's a kind of different criminal organization that's not the mafia, but it's

[24:07] still really cool.

[24:08] I mean, that's, I mean, I think, I mean, I thought we were blue sky in it right now.

[24:14] Oh yeah, yeah.

[24:15] There are no bad ideas.

[24:16] No bad ideas.

[24:17] Dan, do you have any bad ideas?

[24:18] No, but I wanted to say that the other thing about that, uh, made man ritual or whatever,

[24:22] like the fact that they did that stuff with the blood and burning the photo, I was just

[24:26] like, I guess this is, you know, like based on this book that you said, so this all has

[24:31] to be accurate, but I had no idea that the mob was so silly.

[24:35] Yeah.

[24:36] Yeah.

[24:37] Just like everybody poops based on a book.

[24:39] Everybody poops.

[24:40] Yeah, yeah.

[24:41] Just like that movie, uh, two girls, one cup based on the book.

[24:43] Everybody poops.

[24:44] Uh, yeah.

[24:45] It's the model.

[24:46] I mean, here's the thing.

[24:47] One, anything that, uh, New York guys from the block do is inherently silly.

[24:54] They're the silliest of all people.

[24:55] And I say that as somebody who grew up in New Jersey, who lived a lot of long time in

[24:59] New York, who really loves those types of people, but they're very silly.

[25:03] But also the mob, it's, that's the thing is like the mob is at heart.

[25:06] It's a criminal enterprise and I know I'm going to, I know I'm putting my life on the

[25:09] line by saying that guy, so I need you to protect me.

[25:11] The mob's a criminal enterprise, but they need to pretend it's more than that or else

[25:15] people will just turn them into the cops all the time so that they don't go to jail.

[25:19] And so they have to pretend it's a, it's a religion essentially.

[25:21] Now if I was a real radical, I would say that all religion is in a sense an organized crime

[25:27] that guzzies itself up with silly nonsense, but I don't believe that, so I will not say

[25:31] it.

[25:32] Yeah.

[25:33] Well, yeah.

[25:34] It's like, uh, it's like the cult leader in Mandy once, uh, once his like aura of fear

[25:37] is punctured, uh, his strength, he loses his power.

[25:41] Yeah, exactly.

[25:42] I mean, once, once the cult leader in Mandy, he's got to gussy it up or else he's just

[25:46] a kind of, uh, a kind of like frail ex-folk singer walking around with an open robe with

[25:51] his penis hanging out.

[25:53] At which point, are you going to go kill Nicholas Cage's wife on his word, on his say so?

[25:57] I don't think so.

[25:58] Okay.

[25:59] Anyway, John Gotti Jr.

[26:00] He keeps falling into the life, but John Gotti lies to his wife and says that John Jr. is,

[26:04] is going to be kept away from that life.

[26:06] Meanwhile, uh, there's another tragedy in one that the movie treats as almost bigger

[26:10] than the death of a child.

[26:12] When cops wiretap Gotti's best friend, Angelo, played by, played by a character actor, Pruitt

[26:18] Taylor Vince.

[26:19] Who's awesome.

[26:20] Yeah.

[26:21] Although he's another one of these characters that showed up in the movie.

[26:23] I'm just like, were you in the movie before they're like, they're like, this was his dad's

[26:28] best friend.

[26:29] Ang.

[26:30] Ang was his best friend.

[26:31] I'm like, really?

[26:32] Cause they haven't spent any time together until this moment when he needed to the story.

[26:35] Apparently, apparently early on in the production, this role was supposed to go to Joe Pesci and

[26:39] then he gained a bunch of weight and he wasn't able to, then they gave him a different role

[26:44] and he sued them and they had to pay him money.

[26:47] Yeah.

[26:48] This, this movie, wait, wait, hold on, hold on.

[26:50] The production.

[26:52] No, no, Elliot.

[26:53] Shut up for a second.

[26:54] For what?

[26:55] For once in your life.

[26:56] Shut up.

[26:57] They gave him a different role because he gained a bunch of weight.

[27:00] Pruitt Taylor Vince is not a small man.

[27:02] No, no, no.

[27:03] For the role.

[27:04] And then they're like, actually, we, we got Taylor Vince nominated for Academy Awards

[27:09] like you, Joe Pesci.

[27:12] It's the, it was a, they, they, uh, I think Joe Pesci won, didn't he?

[27:17] Yeah.

[27:18] Good fellas.

[27:19] But, uh, and, but, uh, the production history of this movie is almost more interesting than

[27:24] the movie.

[27:25] Like this was going to be like an A-list movie with big name people in it.

[27:28] And then over time, and this happens to movies all the time, it just kind of like slipped

[27:32] through the cracks and filtered down to this netherworld where it's being directed by

[27:36] a guy from Entourage and MoviePass is one of the big investors.

[27:39] Yeah.

[27:40] So, and, and then John Travolta, we have to say big star, but he is giving one of the

[27:46] worst performances I've ever seen.

[27:48] I mean, he's having fun guys, right?

[27:51] He's having a good time.

[27:53] It's a thin line.

[27:54] He's making a meal out of this thing.

[27:56] He is so good in the People vs. O.J. Simpson and that performance is not that different

[28:00] in some ways than this one, but there, I think he's so good at it, but he's playing

[28:04] this very flamboyant, strange man.

[28:06] And here he needs to be playing a guy who can be taken seriously as a cunning mob boss.

[28:11] And instead he's playing it like this weird, flamboyant, strange man.

[28:15] So if it was like, if this was a movie that was called like the craziest mob boss and

[28:19] he was the mob boss where everyone was like, can you, what's the deal with this guy?

[28:21] He's so weird.

[28:22] And that point, I mean, he's, I don't know, John Travolta's got a weird energy about him

[28:26] that I like.

[28:27] He's kind of like, but in this one it doesn't work.

[28:29] Okay.

[28:30] And the whole time while watching this movie, I kept expecting Frank D'Angelo to walk in

[28:33] and start singing a song.

[28:35] It does feel like a Frank D'Angelo movie that Frank D'Angelo turned down.

[28:39] Like he's like, I've got standards.

[28:42] No thank you.

[28:43] You know, I left my heart in San Francisco.

[28:49] So the cops wiretapped Angelo and on the tapes, he says things about bad things about the

[28:55] big boss, Paul.

[28:56] And also he talks about unsanctioned hits and stuff and crimes that Paul didn't sanction.

[29:01] The thing that, that lesson I learned from this movie is that mobsters for all their

[29:05] talk of loyalty and respect and honor, they're constantly pulling off crimes their bosses

[29:09] did not give them permission to do.

[29:10] That seems to be the running thread.

[29:12] And Paul wants those tapes and Gotti is like, well, we got to kill Paul.

[29:15] I got to save Angelo.

[29:17] Meanwhile, Gotti beats, beats the rap on a Rico case.

[29:21] There's a big street celebration that I think is also the 4th of July where fireworks are

[29:24] going off in the city streets and some cops are like, hey, we got to shut this down.

[29:28] But John Gotti stands up to them and the cops stand down and the neighborhood cheers because

[29:32] who's really in charge?

[29:34] John Gotti.

[29:35] Yeah.

[29:36] The cops realized that the small folk are with Gotti.

[29:39] Because once you get the money, then you get the fireworks and then you get the power.

[29:44] Yeah.

[29:45] But Gotti just keeps trying to kill Paul and he has a meanwhile, there's another childhood

[29:51] friend of his who he has killed because he was an informant.

[29:54] But then Stacy Keach dies and Paul, the big boss, he does the worst thing, doesn't show

[29:59] up the.

[30:00] funeral and John Gotti is like this is unacceptable and it is a pretty dick move like it's like

[30:06] if you didn't show up at the funeral of the person you're closest to because I don't

[30:10] remember what they said he had to do.

[30:11] I think he was on a boat or something or he had to do a personal appearance on The Price

[30:17] Is Right or something.

[30:19] Where do you think he was that was more important than his underboss's funeral?

[30:22] He had Saturday Night Live tickets and he had put so much money into those.

[30:38] He really wanted to see the rehearsal because the show we all see the show but the rehearsal

[30:43] that's where the magic gets made and sometimes some of the best sketches show up and then

[30:46] get killed but so John Gotti he still wants to kill Paul and now he really wants to kill

[30:51] him and so this is when they pull off the one scene in the movie where I was like oh

[30:54] yeah I remember this stuff where Paul Castellano is assassinated outside of Sparks Steakhouse

[31:00] in Manhattan.

[31:01] Let me just say this guys.

[31:02] Let me just say this about Sparks Steakhouse.

[31:05] I wish as someone who loves steakhouses I have a personal favorite steakhouse that's

[31:09] Keen's in Manhattan.

[31:11] I wish that Sparks was up to the same level of quality that I feel the band Sparks is

[31:16] at because I don't think it's that great a steakhouse and if I was a mob boss, I would

[31:21] be kind of disappointed if I was killed in front of Sparks Steakhouse.

[31:24] I'd rather be killed in front of Keen's, Peter Luger's, maybe even Wolfgang's, the oldest

[31:33] steakhouse in New York and at a certain point, I might even pick being killed in front of

[31:38] a Ruth's Chris.

[31:39] I mean if we're talking about chain steakhouses, Ruth's Chris is pretty great.

[31:44] Yeah or a Morton's.

[31:46] Ruth's Chris and Morton's are fine chain steakhouses.

[31:48] Sparks, not as crazy.

[31:49] So again, I just want to make it clear if I'm ever a mob boss and you want to kill me

[31:52] in front of a steakhouse, please kill me unless it's the fact is like you're killing me in

[31:57] front of Sparks because you're like he's going to be disappointed in this steak.

[32:00] I want to not make him feel that disappointment.

[32:01] I'll kill him before he eats it because if I get shot in front of Keen's, I'll be so

[32:05] disappointed that I'm not going to be chowing down on one of those dinosaur sized prime

[32:08] ribs underneath the ceiling hung with clay pipes surrounded by old newspapers from the

[32:13] 19th century.

[32:14] You don't want to eat in a place that's with walls plastered with pictures of Don Shula

[32:19] and other members of the Miami Dolphins franchise.

[32:22] Well, no, that's why I wouldn't eat in front of Shula's if I was going to be assassinated.

[32:26] Although Shula's not the best chain steakhouse.

[32:28] They're okay.

[32:29] They're not terrible but I remember this being like this was a big event when it happened

[32:35] and this was the one time where I was like, oh yeah, here's something I know about John

[32:38] Gotti.

[32:39] Now, of course, this is maybe the most famous thing he ever did other than I guess dying

[32:42] in jail and this is one where they go so overboard with the archival news footage and here's

[32:49] one thing I liked about this movie is that they show you a lot of archival news footage

[32:53] of John Gotti like just news stories covering him during the 80s and it's like, oh, I kind

[32:59] of wish this was a documentary that was just like pieced together from old news stories

[33:03] and didn't have all this other stuff.

[33:05] Did you guys ever feel that way?

[33:06] I mean, I love watching old news stuff.

[33:08] I certainly felt like whenever the news reports were on, like were the only times I understood

[33:12] what was going on in the movie.

[33:13] I'm like, yes, thank God, like someone's explaining what's happening in this film.

[33:18] Thank the maker.

[33:19] Finally.

[33:20] Yeah.

[33:21] It's like you pause the movie and it had the IMDb trivia pop up on the side or it listed

[33:29] what actors were playing what roles and you're like, that's who that is.

[33:33] Yeah, I dug it.

[33:34] It's it's with the archival news footage and it was a little it was a little disorienting

[33:38] because they do except for like one specific thing they do make no effort to disguise what

[33:47] John Gotti actually looks like and what John Gotti Jr. actually look like.

[33:51] So it's a little weird to see in a movie to see those two things to see that and then

[33:55] Travolta in his crazy makeup.

[33:58] I mean, to see how much fatter the real John Gotti Jr. was was a real shock.

[34:01] He isn't like a super buff dude.

[34:04] He wasn't.

[34:05] And apparently was not 21 years old.

[34:06] His whole life.

[34:07] He didn't look like a high school football player his whole life or a high school swimmer,

[34:12] I guess.

[34:13] I thought it was a tin drum situation where he decided he would never he would stop aging.

[34:18] That's the power of the mob.

[34:20] Yeah.

[34:21] Yeah.

[34:22] He's like, I'm never going to stop.

[34:23] I'm never going to stop aging.

[34:24] And my hair is never going to change except for getting taller or flatter.

[34:29] Let's make him look older.

[34:31] I know.

[34:32] We'll give him a kid and play haircut.

[34:33] That's what I'll do it.

[34:34] That'll really age him.

[34:35] But it was a little jarring to see, although it bugs me when they do in movies sometimes

[34:40] more jarring when they have fake archival footage with the actor in it.

[34:44] But it was jarring to see the real John Gotti, who just in his news footage exudes much more

[34:49] charisma than John Travolta exudes here.

[34:51] And then to see the real John Gotti Jr. and then see like it didn't feel a little bit

[34:55] like you were you suddenly were watching the community theater performance of a famous

[35:00] a famous movie or something like that.

[35:02] Anyway, there's John Gotti gets named the new head of the Gambino crime family.

[35:07] Now he's famous.

[35:08] He's on the news all the time.

[35:09] Lots more mob shenanigans.

[35:12] Gotti's best friend Angelo has tried some unsanctioned hits on Gotti's enemies.

[35:16] And to save his life, Gotti exiles him from the family.

[35:19] A year later, he dies, as John Gotti says, a voiceover of a broken heart.

[35:24] Oh, so sad.

[35:25] Okay.

[35:26] Just like Queen Amidala.

[35:27] Yep.

[35:28] Yep.

[35:29] Yep.

[35:30] They're very similar in a lot of ways.

[35:31] He's like a guy with a broken heart just like Queen Amidala.

[35:35] And there's also a medical bot next to him.

[35:38] So now John Gotti is sitting on top of the world.

[35:41] He's the head of the Gambino crime family.

[35:43] His son's a made man.

[35:45] He's forgotten that his other son died.

[35:46] His other best friend is gone, so he never has to buy him a birthday present anymore,

[35:50] which is a lot of pressure to figure out the right thing to buy for a friend or a good

[35:54] friend for their birthday party.

[35:55] Or a good fella.

[35:56] Yeah.

[35:57] Or a good fella.

[35:58] There's a scene in the movie where they're like, yeah, so-and-so's a good fella, but

[36:01] da-da-da-da.

[36:02] And it's like, wait, you know that they didn't really say good fella, right?

[36:05] Like the term was wise guy, but there was a TV show called Wise Guy, and that's what

[36:08] they called the good fella.

[36:11] It's a movie.

[36:12] It's a mob movie made by people who know the mob from mob movies.

[36:14] But anyway, John Gotti sits down to his sleep.

[36:17] I almost expect him to call him a good feather, because that's about the knowledge of the

[36:21] fucking mob movies they have.

[36:23] That would be so funny if they're all constantly bobbing their heads like pigeons.

[36:27] Trust me, I saw Animaniacs.

[36:29] I know what the mob is like.

[36:31] And then for some reason, John Gotti sings a song with every country in the world in

[36:36] it.

[36:37] So John Gotti sits his son down.

[36:40] He's got a big goal.

[36:41] He wants to build a nationwide mob empire that will last 100 years.

[36:45] And it's one of those moments that's like, okay, hold on a second.

[36:49] Maybe that was his ambition, but that's one, crazy.

[36:52] Two, it's stupid.

[36:54] Three, he sounds like Hitler when he says it.

[36:56] And four, the movie presents it as if he's a real man of vision, and this is an amazing

[37:00] goal that he should be working towards.

[37:03] When in any movie has anyone ever said, I want to build something that's going to last

[37:06] 100 years, and it hasn't either, one, fallen apart instantly, or two, been evil?

[37:11] Yeah.

[37:14] I mean, when they created the ring of satellites around the Earth to prevent geostorms, it

[37:20] just made geostorms.

[37:21] So I think that was one mistake.

[37:24] Yeah, we all remember when that happened.

[37:26] Yeah.

[37:27] Well, they shouldn't have given the Gambino crime family the contract for building those

[37:31] satellites.

[37:32] The geo-satellites, yeah.

[37:33] Yeah, because then when they took the geo-satellites down, they're just full of guys who had to

[37:36] disappear.

[37:37] This is kind of –

[37:38] They just stuffed them full of bodies.

[37:39] This is kind of tough at this point in the movie.

[37:40] This is where I was getting kind of bored, and I was like, do I have to put enough attention

[37:46] to this movie, or can I just sit here and unlock more characters in Smash Bros.?

[37:51] Because I'm just working on trying to get Wario unlocked, because I kind of see a lot

[37:56] of –

[37:57] It's pretty hard, right?

[37:58] Yeah, and I kind of see a lot of myself in Wario.

[38:02] Because you're both an evil version of someone else?

[38:07] Yeah, and we're both like business-minded.

[38:11] So what is Wario's business?

[38:12] We both have like really recognizable laughs.

[38:15] Stuart, you've mentioned Wario being a small business owner before.

[38:18] What is his business?

[38:19] His business is beating the shit out of Mario, dude.

[38:22] Wait.

[38:23] So do people hire him to do that?

[38:25] And it's booming.

[38:27] Is money changed at some point?

[38:30] But guys, I think you're both going to be happy to know that I, like Wario, had the

[38:37] professionalism to not do that and focus on the movie.

[38:40] Yes, good.

[38:41] Because you know who were the original Smash Bros.?

[38:44] The Mafia.

[38:45] So moving along, John Jr. gets married, and he has his first dance to a song about a dad

[38:50] giving advice to his son.

[38:51] Because even John Gotti Jr.'s wedding has to be about John Gotti, which is crazy.

[38:56] It's the least romantic song anyone has ever danced to.

[38:59] It's pretty sentimental mob malice.

[39:00] Shirley was so mad there was no Frank Sinatra song.

[39:04] I mean, they're not going to pay for the rights for that.

[39:06] But they should have done the thing that – so Dan and Maya's friend, Eric Marcinak, once

[39:12] told me about a wedding he went to where the DJ said, Hold on.

[39:16] Look who's here.

[39:17] It's Old Blue Eyes.

[39:18] And then kind of a mascot version of Frank Sinatra with a huge Frank Sinatra head walked

[39:23] out and was miming singing into a microphone as a Frank Sinatra song played.

[39:27] And it was the funniest thing I've ever heard, I think.

[39:29] That would be incredible.

[39:31] I went to a Sweet Sixteen that was the most Bensonhurst Italian thing you could go to.

[39:38] And at one point, the DJ said out loud, Is anybody here Italian?

[39:44] And everybody lost their mind, and then the Tarantella started, and I had to get the fuck

[39:49] out of the way or else I'd be crushed.

[39:51] In the rush to the dance floor.

[39:54] It was awesome.

[39:55] Now, you were almost – and when you died, your autopsy report would have said,

[39:59] Clause of death.

[40:00] Hospitalliano.

[40:04] So now John Gotti, uh-oh, but he's on trial for the murder of Paul,

[40:07] and Sammy the Bull Gravano, that murderous rat,

[40:10] testifies against him in exchange for

[40:13] life in the Witness Protection Program. The movie does not mention

[40:16] that Sammy the Bull eventually went to jail anyway for drug dealing.

[40:19] Not the great guy that we were led to believe, this man Sammy the Bull,

[40:22] who was a hitman.

[40:24] They made a point when that character was first introduced

[40:27] that John Gotti didn't trust him.

[40:30] It's like his Gotti sense was tingling,

[40:33] even though his boy Chris Mulkey

[40:36] was backing him up. Character actor Chris Mulkey.

[40:39] Yeah, there was absolutely no reason

[40:42] at that point in the movie for John Gotti to suspect him.

[40:45] Except for the fact that later on we have to know that he's going to be a bad guy.

[40:48] Yeah, that's called brilliant foreshadowing.

[40:51] So there's some

[40:54] unsanctioned killings as a result.

[40:57] John Junior puts his foot down, no more killings.

[41:00] Mrs. Gotti is very upset that her son's a gangster.

[41:03] You said you'd keep him away from that life and so forth.

[41:06] So John Gotti goes to jail, because he did it. He committed that crime.

[41:09] Gotti got it. He got a sentence in jail.

[41:12] And John Junior gets arrested.

[41:15] And this is that great scene where he says goodbye to his kids,

[41:18] who all look older than him somehow.

[41:21] So he can be in jail and then get out in time for his kids to be his age.

[41:24] And Gotti Senior says, no,

[41:27] if I was you, I wouldn't do that. I want to go into that courtroom one last time

[41:30] and stand up to everyone. And he says, and break their holes,

[41:33] which is a crazy way to describe it. And it's like

[41:36] such a gross way for someone to talk about

[41:39] being a man and standing up for himself.

[41:42] I'm going to go in there and break their holes.

[41:45] It's so disgusting.

[41:48] So you're not going to steal that line for when you have

[41:51] the talk with your son?

[41:54] I don't know. I'm not sure which talk.

[41:57] Which holes are they talking about? I don't understand.

[42:00] Now, let's take a moment and talk about that, because the human body only has

[42:03] so many holes. There's your nostrils,

[42:06] your ear holes, your mouth hole, your pizza pile.

[42:09] There's the holes in your eyes that let light in.

[42:12] There's your pores. Maybe he's talking about their pores, like covering them in gold paint

[42:15] like the woman in Goldfinger, and they asphyxiate

[42:18] because of the pores. And then there's the other holes.

[42:21] There's the front hole for urination

[42:24] and the back hole for defecation. And now those holes,

[42:27] there's multiple uses for them. Sometimes you're putting things in

[42:30] for pleasure. Sometimes you're taking babies out of them.

[42:33] But it takes a lot to break them.

[42:36] People put their holes through a lot of punishment

[42:39] for pleasure, and they rarely break.

[42:42] And they're often fixable.

[42:45] Is this what the movie Holes is about, what you're telling me right now?

[42:48] Not having seen it, I'll have to assume that, yes,

[42:51] the movie Holes is about a young Shia LaBeouf.

[42:54] Based on the expression that Shia LaBeouf has on the box art,

[42:57] I think, yeah, it's about that.

[43:00] No, I don't know if it's about a boy whose holes are broken and has to get them fixed

[43:03] or a boy who's under threat of having his holes broken.

[43:06] But it's like at a certain point you have to wonder

[43:09] – to say break about an organic part of the body that's not a bone is weird.

[43:12] Those holes are soft tissue.

[43:15] So to say break is like – it's gross to say tear their holes,

[43:18] but that's more accurate.

[43:21] And there's often some tearing, say, during natural childbirth,

[43:24] during vaginal childbirth, and that's a natural thing that happens

[43:27] because babies are huge and they're coming out of a very small space.

[43:30] Now to say break implies that there's a hard structure to it,

[43:33] that there might be cracks or some kind of fracturing

[43:37] where maybe pieces flake off or fall off.

[43:40] Like it pebblizes a little bit.

[43:43] So I don't know what he's – is he talking about first that he's going to freeze them

[43:46] with liquid nitrogen and then smash them with a sledgehammer?

[43:49] Specifically their hole area.

[43:52] Just the hole area.

[43:55] So he needs to use one of those little doctor hammers that you use to test your reflexes

[43:58] so he doesn't break the whole body, or maybe it's a localized use of the nitrogen

[44:01] to just freeze that part.

[44:04] It's a very good question. What holes is he talking about and how is he going to break them?

[44:07] And it's the subject of today's episode of The Flop Holes.

[44:10] I'm guessing it's the ear holes.

[44:13] Now here on The Flop Holes we talk about holes and things that people do with them.

[44:16] And today we're talking about breaking holes.

[44:19] That's right. Break into electric hole-a-loo.

[44:22] And my guests today are Dan McCoy, hole specialist.

[44:25] Dan McCoy is a – and Stuart Wellington who often –

[44:28] Stuart Wellington who often shops at Whole Foods,

[44:31] a place for food that goes into your holes.

[44:34] Now guys, when I say break your holes, what does that conjure up in your minds?

[44:37] I just want to get your first impressions.

[44:40] Why did Dan look at me?

[44:43] Well, I mean I feel like we've already kind of covered what I get in my head.

[44:46] I get like a guy with a big sledgehammer kind of just like cracking into someone's butt.

[44:49] Okay.

[44:52] And now does this – now the butt already has a crack in it.

[44:55] Yeah.

[44:58] This is creating new cracks or different cracks?

[45:01] How does this work exactly?

[45:04] You just –

[45:07] Be very extreme in your detailing.

[45:10] It's more about shattering the pelvis I think.

[45:13] Okay. Now you're talking about that.

[45:16] Okay. So Stuart, now your experience with holes is a little different.

[45:19] Whole Foods is a chain of grocery stores owned by the Amazon company which also distributed Gotti, the film we were talking about earlier.

[45:22] Yeah.

[45:25] Now, when you're saying break Whole Foods, would that mean like what?

[45:28] To literally demolish a storefront or is he talking about driving the company into bankruptcy which will be hard to do since Amazon has such deep pockets?

[45:31] What do you think, Stuart?

[45:34] Yeah.

[45:37] I mean I think that's a tough one.

[45:40] I think putting a second crack on a butt is kind of like a madman's gambit.

[45:43] I think people haven't considered horizontal as a possibility.

[45:46] So more of a hole or reorientation than a breaking?

[45:49] I'm going to get out some crap paper here in a minute.

[45:52] And I think – I mean I don't know about the angles.

[45:55] There could be an issue.

[45:58] Maybe if I fold the graph paper, it might work that way.

[46:01] We'll find out.

[46:04] Great. Now while we give Stuart some time, let's go to our next segment, The Flop Hole Recommends, where we recommend movies or books related to holes.

[46:07] Now of course I'm going to recommend Disney's The Black Hole, the story of a spaceship that literally goes into a person's butt and finds a portal to hell.

[46:10] Wait. Is that what happens in that movie?

[46:13] There's also a movie called The Black Hole.

[46:16] It's a story about a man who's trying to find a portal to hell.

[46:20] Wait. Is that what happens in that movie?

[46:23] There's also a lovable robot and also kind of a mean robot, and I guess they all fit into somebody's butt.

[46:26] Now my runner-up recommendation is of course the movie Holes starring Shia LaBeouf, which I haven't seen but I have to assume is about a boy who either has a broken hole that he needs to fix or is in danger of having his hole broken.

[46:39] Do you guys have any recommendations for the recommendation segment of The Flop Hole?

[46:42] Sure. I will recommend Ace in the Hole starring Mark Douglas, originally called The Big Carnival.

[46:46] Which would be inappropriate for this segment if it was named that.

[46:49] It's a very cynical examination of how the media can drum up a story.

[46:52] Now it's also about someone who gets trapped in a collapsed mine, which is literally a broken hole in the earth, right?

[46:55] That's a good point. I'm going to recommend The Hole Nine Yards, which I think is better than its sequel The Hole Ten Yards, which I mean though is still appropriate for this segment, didn't come to mind for me.

[46:58] It's a very cynical examination of how the media can drum up a story.

[47:01] Now it's also about someone who gets trapped in a collapsed mine, which is literally a broken hole in the earth, right?

[47:04] That's a good point. I'm going to recommend The Hole Nine Yards, which I think is better than its sequel The Hole Ten Yards, which I mean though is still appropriate for this segment, didn't come to mind for me.

[47:15] And now it's time to turn to our sponsor. We're sponsored tonight by Hole Buster, which is both a video store that only has movies about holes and also a place to go to get your hole busted.

[47:26] Which hole do you want? How much do you want it busted? That's up to you. Hole Buster.

[47:31] It's what? A scale of one to ten? Or do they have different face images to represent the amount of busted?

[47:39] No. I can't say I've never been there, but I'll just say Hole Buster. Go there. You get 10% off with the code flop. Hole Buster. Busted makes you feel good.

[47:50] Now turning back to Gotti, John Jr., he signs the plea agreement. John Gotti, he doesn't want to leave jail. He fights his cancer in jail. He refuses a pain-killing coma, and also when a priest comes to administer last rites, he waves the priest away as if to say, no, I like being a mobster more than I like the grace of God and more than I like going to heaven.

[48:10] I'd rather go to hell a mob boss than go to heaven kneeling at the feet of that hole god.

[48:16] Now here's another sponsor for the Flophole, the Whole Earth Catalog. Now the earth has a hole in it that leads to Pellucidar, a hidden land of dinosaurs. You might want to order something from there, the Whole Earth Catalog.

[48:32] Now John Gotti dies and it's all over the news, and again, this is when I learned that John Gotti was actually younger when he died than John Travolta is now, and yet they caked John Travolta with enough makeup he looks like Little Big Man at the end of his life.

[48:45] And we see period footage of John Gotti's funeral and a lot of local mooks talking about how John Gotti was so great and he kept the neighborhood safe.

[48:53] This is the point at which I was like he's dead. Why isn't the movie over?

[48:56] Nope. It just keeps going.

[48:59] People at the time – I mean they showed archival news footage. There were riots when Gotti was put in jail. People were walking around wearing free John Gotti shirts. I wish it was gone Johnny. That would have been better.

[49:16] Or John Gandhi. He was a mob boss who believed in nonviolent crime.

[49:20] I think you're only allowed one crazy digression per 20 minutes, Elliot.

[49:26] Fair point. My parole officer is shaking his head. He agrees with you.

[49:29] So John Junor is still on – he goes on trial even though he signed a plea deal.

[49:34] They never really explained what happened there, but I guess it's that the government is like going after him with case after case and charge after charge to oppress him because the government just hates Gottis.

[49:44] You look at the oppressed cases in American history, and you've got of course slaves, Native Americans, different types of worker, and of course the Gottis, among the most oppressed by the government.

[49:55] And John Gotti – and Mrs. Gotti puts on this – she finally has her big scene where she yells at him.

[50:00] the court about how this is crazy

[50:02] stop harassing him

[50:04] and but the

[50:06] but we've seen him do crimes guys yeah

[50:09] he's done a bunch of crimes it's not like he's not a criminal

[50:13] he is a criminal but he gets acquitted

[50:15] and there's some end text stating that the government kept going after

[50:19] the Gottis and they released hundreds of killers

[50:22] to get their testimony

[50:24] to uh...

[50:25] put John Gotti Jr. and John Gotti in jail

[50:28] and the implication is that

[50:29] the government so hated these two guys that they unleashed a wave of monsters

[50:34] in exchange to try to capture them

[50:36] that it was it was literally a case of

[50:38] we gotta catch these two rats so i guess we'll have king cobras all over

[50:42] america in every bed biting our children

[50:45] and then we cut to John Gotti again in front of that bridge and he goes

[50:48] if you live to be five thousand you'll never see another guy like me

[50:51] and it's like dude i've seen so many guys like you in the movies in the

[50:55] white house in the state i grew up in like

[50:57] the movie really fails to cross what was special about John Gotti so guys

[51:01] what do you think was special about John Gotti that they decided to make this

[51:04] movie about him

[51:06] uh... his

[51:07] hair

[51:07] i mean he's a larger than life he was a larger than life

[51:11] like actual organized crime figure

[51:15] who captured the public imagination i don't think i mean he was on the

[51:18] he was on like major news publications covers like

[51:22] that's true that's why they made a movie out of him

[51:24] that's true he was one of the few he was that he was the bachelor for one

[51:27] season too

[51:30] the

[51:31] it's it's kind of weird though because i'm assuming i'm assuming his family had

[51:34] a lot of input in the making this movie

[51:38] uh... it actually kind of remind me of uh... another biopic that dan and i

[51:41] watched recently uh... bohemian rhapsody

[51:44] which was clearly like

[51:46] deeply influenced by the surviving members of queen so it like

[51:50] landed out all the possible drama

[51:54] and painted all those characters in a very specific light and it's very much

[51:58] an advertisement for this like that was an advertisement for the music of queen

[52:01] this is i guess an advertisement for

[52:03] i don't know the mafia

[52:04] i guess so yeah and they're both movies like built around one specific

[52:09] performance

[52:10] you know john travolta in that old age makeup wearing john gotti's clothes

[52:14] rami malek in his makeup wearing freddie mercury's mustache and teeth

[52:19] fake horse teeth

[52:21] so did they dig up freddie mercury and take off his mustache and his teeth

[52:25] so that rami malek could use them in the part? no he had to break into the

[52:28] rock and roll hall of fame and get them

[52:31] yeah it was a heist

[52:33] i forgot now there's a movie rock and roll heist

[52:37] i mean that's isn't that like the pick of destiny the tenacious team movie

[52:42] i guess it is yeah

[52:44] i think maybe you're right

[52:46] uh... i guess this is a point which we do final judgments usually

[52:50] yeah it is i mean this movie it leaves me so exhausted

[52:54] why break the chain

[52:55] yeah yeah good bad movie or bad bad movie or a movie you kind of like

[52:59] the question will the circle be unbroken is asked and dan says no it will not be

[53:02] we will do final judgments

[53:05] so i'm gonna go first i'm gonna say this was

[53:07] it has so much potential to be a good bad movie because there's so much

[53:10] wacky stuff in it

[53:12] but it just

[53:13] it just pounds you down

[53:14] i would say the first half of this movie is like good bad and by the second

[53:17] half you're just like

[53:19] i don't know it's just scenes being thrown at you and there's no it's hard

[53:23] to understand what's going on and it really gets the point like it just takes

[53:27] it so much for granted that the audience is on john goddy's side from the

[53:30] beginning

[53:31] that he doesn't have to win you over he's such a lovable character

[53:35] it's you know

[53:37] the the one thing they're missing is i guess like the pope canonizing john

[53:40] goddy at the end

[53:42] it's i would but i would say bad that it i wish it lived it like lived up to the

[53:45] hype of being a really bad movie

[53:47] but it didn't live up to the hype of being the most fun bad movie of the year

[53:51] guys what do you think

[53:53] was it supposed to be the most fun bad movie of the year was that the word

[53:55] about it

[53:56] i don't know

[53:57] uh... cuz i yeah i think it's bad bad i

[54:00] think that

[54:02] john travolta's performance is

[54:03] comically

[54:05] over the top

[54:08] there's so many funny things like they're like these crazy needle drops

[54:11] all the time in the movie there's so many like music cues

[54:14] they have all these pop songs that don't really relate to what's going on

[54:17] on camera

[54:19] yeah i'm just let me know that the lines like you say are so stupid from time to

[54:23] time but

[54:24] the fact that i just couldn't follow a god damn thing

[54:27] means that

[54:29] i just can't recommend it at all for like a bad bad movie

[54:33] that it manages to at the same time give too much and too little information

[54:38] yet you by the end of it you're like you're you're struggling under all the

[54:42] all the facts they've given you and yet you have no idea what any of the mean

[54:46] no i think actually think you have the right of it and i think it

[54:51] the beginning is

[54:52] feels like a good bad movie and then like

[54:55] as i said like

[54:56] it it makes you long to go and grind out some more characters on super smash

[55:02] brothers ultimate

[55:03] uh... maybe i would say watch it until

[55:06] angelo dies

[55:07] maybe until they exile angelo because there's the funny part where

[55:11] he exiles angelo and then angelo leaves the kind of dank

[55:15] social club that all the mobsters hang out at

[55:17] and they just all look away from him as if they can't see him and it's very funny

[55:20] that it's like

[55:21] the ultimate mob punishment the cold shoulder

[55:25] he walks out and they react like john cena's waving his hand in front of his

[55:29] face

[55:35] hey max fun listeners

[55:37] have you been listening to max fun for a while and you've just been wondering

[55:40] where's the new flat earth podcast i keep hearing about well here it is we

[55:44] give you all the facts on nasa's lies and how we know that the earth is

[55:49] actually flat

[55:50] just kidding this is ono ross and kerry and we join fringe religious groups we

[55:57] undergo alternative medical treatments and we hang out with people like 9-11

[56:00] truthers flat earthers we find out why do people believe strange things we join

[56:05] them and we tell you all about it we have a lot of fun we make a lot of

[56:08] friends yeah we do we join the mormons we join the scientologists we got

[56:12] acupuncture we got fire cupped we got ear kindled we've done it all and we're

[56:16] gonna keep doing it all why don't you check out ono ross and kerry at

[56:19] maximumfun.org

[56:27] hi this is rachel mcelroy hello this is griffin mcelroy and this is wonderful

[56:31] it's a podcast that we do as we are married and how's the ad going so far

[56:36] because i think it's going very good we talk about things we like every week on

[56:39] wednesdays one time rachel talked about pumpernickel bread it was so tight you

[56:42] cannot afford to miss her talking about this sweet brown bread we also talk

[56:46] about music and poems and you know weather there is one weather one time

[56:52] rachel talked about baby beluga this song for like 14 minutes and it just

[56:56] really blew my hair back so check us out on maximumfun.org it's a cool

[57:01] podcast with chill vibes amber is the color of our energy is what all the

[57:05] itunes reviews say they will now

[57:11] there's no sponsors this week but we do have a jumbotron that I read uh-huh and

[57:19] it goes a little something like this this is a this message is for dad do you

[57:28] want do you want us to leave the room because I know these solo dan reads are

[57:31] the very popular people love them okay sorry for I mean this is a jumbotron so

[57:36] I don't think it I don't think it works okay cool you're not gonna take as much

[57:40] liberty with the text yeah I'm not gonna spend as much time being a

[57:43] self-deprecating lovable teddy bear and this one this one's for dad which is

[57:48] very non-specific I mean for one person it's very specific yeah I like a Dan was

[57:56] like I'm not gonna do this the way I do a solo ad read and then immediately

[57:59] started going going after the subject of this what I assume is going to be a

[58:04] heartfelt jumbotron if it's to dad well I just you know I want to make sure it

[58:12] gets to the right person and I don't know if dad's clear but I assume that

[58:16] from the context of it it's the same way that when my family gives me a

[58:20] Father's Day card it just says to dad it doesn't say like to Elliot Kaelin the

[58:24] dad of these children with our fingerprints and the birth certificate

[58:28] stapled to it yeah first of his name this is they don't they don't print out

[58:34] my ancestry.com tree and my 23andme results to make sure it goes to the

[58:39] right dad and you're twinning celebrity look-alike percentage oh Eddie Deason

[58:45] excuse me I don't I would be honored to be Eddie Deason's twin so this one's for

[58:51] the man's a national treasure and a Beatles expert this is a from Parker

[58:56] that that narrows it down yeah yeah sure and Parker says dad first of all thank

[59:04] you for buying the Elliot's book I can't wait to read it with you in my first

[59:08] six months here on earth you've exposed me to a lifetime of podcast content but

[59:12] I can tell that Stewart Dan and Elliot make you lol the most since I'm a baby I

[59:17] don't get why it's funny neither does mom but it makes me happy to see you so

[59:22] that's interesting okay well I applaud Dan for not reading that in Dan's like

[59:29] affected baby voice that he does yeah as his character baby boy Dan McCoy his SNL

[59:34] audition piece yeah where he's like quick I gotta get into makeup and then

[59:40] smears jam all over his lips okay well that's that was the whole message Dan

[59:51] yeah that's it that's a very sweet message that's adorable how nice and I'm

[59:57] impressed that this baby could handle the the max fun

[1:00:00] Jumbotron Interface, not because it's difficult,

[1:00:01] because the baby is so young.

[1:00:05] I think we have a genius on our hands.

[1:00:07] Yeah, so we've got some live shows to promote, right?

[1:00:11] Let's do it.

[1:00:12] We got two live shows to promote.

[1:00:14] You've heard us talking about how on January 26th

[1:00:16] we'll be at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

[1:00:19] in beautiful Madison, Wisconsin,

[1:00:21] Saturday, January 26th at the Wisconsin Union Theater,

[1:00:24] Shannon Hall, I believe is the location.

[1:00:26] We'll be talking about Venom.

[1:00:28] That's right, my favorite Marvel character, circa age 13,

[1:00:32] got his own movie, I still haven't seen it yet.

[1:00:34] We're gonna talk about it.

[1:00:35] I think Venom is kind of like the John Gotti

[1:00:37] of Marvel heroes.

[1:00:39] Uh, in that he's a lethal protector?

[1:00:41] I guess so, maybe.

[1:00:43] And because John Gotti was covered

[1:00:46] in a symbiote from outer space.

[1:00:48] Yeah, John Gotti had that huge tongue

[1:00:49] that people on the internet find sexy for some reason.

[1:00:52] Do they?

[1:00:53] That's weird.

[1:00:54] I can explain the reason if you want me to.

[1:00:55] No, I get the reason, but.

[1:00:58] John Gotti is very similar to Venom

[1:00:59] in that Eric Larson also did not like drawing John Gotti

[1:01:02] and decided to make him as monstrous and crazy as possible.

[1:01:05] Hence the long tongue and the teeth.

[1:01:06] Okay, it would take a young Mark Bagley

[1:01:10] to reassert that Venom is not just

[1:01:12] a slobbery monster drool creature.

[1:01:14] Okay, now we have a new show to advertise.

[1:01:18] Guys, can we talk about it?

[1:01:19] Dan, can we say it?

[1:01:20] Yeah, I guess, wait, yeah, I'll allow it.

[1:01:23] There's nothing in the rule book

[1:01:24] that says you can't promote it.

[1:01:25] Okay, that's right, boys.

[1:01:27] We're going back to our old stomping grounds

[1:01:28] of the bell house, Brooklyn, New York,

[1:01:31] ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-bell house.

[1:01:32] Sunday, February 3rd, that's right, Super Bowl Sunday.

[1:01:36] We'll be talking about, or can we say the movie or no?

[1:01:40] Yeah, we can say the movie.

[1:01:41] Yeah, so we'll be talking about, I think,

[1:01:42] what, the happy time murders?

[1:01:44] That's what we decided on.

[1:01:46] Yeah, it should be fun.

[1:01:47] Football themed show, Super Bowl Sunday.

[1:01:49] Hey, do you guys hate football like I do?

[1:01:52] Come to the one guaranteed show my brother won't be at.

[1:01:55] Sunday, February 3rd at the bell house

[1:01:57] in Brooklyn, New York.

[1:01:58] I mean, just based on law of averages,

[1:01:59] even if you like football, it's most likely

[1:02:01] that your team isn't in the big game.

[1:02:04] So why don't you come watch us instead?

[1:02:06] That's true.

[1:02:07] And guys, I'm gonna have a little extra pep in my step

[1:02:09] because it's gonna be the day after I celebrate

[1:02:11] my grandmother's 90th birthday party.

[1:02:13] So watch out, I might be a little hungover,

[1:02:15] but that's okay.

[1:02:16] Super Bowl Sunday, February 3rd in Brooklyn

[1:02:19] and January 26th in Wisconsin.

[1:02:22] Get your tickets to those ones, the bell house ones,

[1:02:24] the tickets might not be available yet,

[1:02:25] but hopefully they will be soon.

[1:02:26] Yeah, and do you really wanna just go along

[1:02:29] with a fucking crowd?

[1:02:30] Do you like football that much?

[1:02:32] No, you don't.

[1:02:33] You're just gonna watch the Super Bowl

[1:02:34] because that's what everyone in the US is doing.

[1:02:37] But why?

[1:02:38] Wow, okay.

[1:02:39] One, it's an American tradition, everybody loves it.

[1:02:42] Two, there's always the chance that it'll be

[1:02:44] like my favorite Super Bowl that year

[1:02:46] when the lights went out in half the stadium

[1:02:48] and they had to stop the play, but they kept broadcasting it.

[1:02:50] And it was just confused football people

[1:02:53] wandering around in the dark,

[1:02:54] wondering what was gonna happen next.

[1:02:56] That was my favorite football game of all time.

[1:02:57] It was so real.

[1:03:00] Can we announce the, yeah, I don't know what I'm asking.

[1:03:03] Dan will edit this out if I'm wrong.

[1:03:05] And Dan and I are gonna be guests

[1:03:07] at another show at the bell house on Saturday, January 12th.

[1:03:10] We're gonna be guests on a live Ono Ross and Carey show.

[1:03:15] Oh, cool.

[1:03:16] Hopefully we're gonna get electrodes attached

[1:03:19] to some part of our bodies.

[1:03:21] One of your holes is gonna get broken.

[1:03:22] Which one?

[1:03:24] And how?

[1:03:25] Yeah, you gotta show up at the bell house to find out.

[1:03:26] Yeah, they haven't told us exactly what crazy experiment

[1:03:29] we have to take part in yet, so.

[1:03:31] Yeah, I mean, I hope they don't tell me

[1:03:33] until I literally walk out in front of a room full of people

[1:03:35] and then I go, ghosts?

[1:03:38] And then ghosts come and tear my body apart.

[1:03:42] That's what you hope for, right?

[1:03:44] Yeah, yeah.

[1:03:45] So that's your best case scenario.

[1:03:46] That's my best case scenario.

[1:03:49] Okay, interesting.

[1:03:50] So we got those live shows.

[1:03:51] Guys, let's move on to the next segment, which is letters.

[1:03:55] All right, thanks for telling me.

[1:03:58] Oh, wow, thanks for keeping your foot

[1:04:00] on the gas here, Elliot.

[1:04:01] Yep.

[1:04:02] Let me pull up the letters.

[1:04:04] While Dan's doing that, hey, Elliot,

[1:04:05] what's going on with you, buddy?

[1:04:07] You watch any new TV?

[1:04:08] You see that Romanoffs?

[1:04:10] Didn't take that long, I had it right here.

[1:04:12] I saw a little bit of Romanoffs.

[1:04:13] I've been watching that Haunting of Hill House show.

[1:04:15] Oh, is it too spooky?

[1:04:17] It's very spooky.

[1:04:19] And you know what the spookiest thing about it is?

[1:04:22] Carl Gugino just does not seem to age.

[1:04:24] It's amazing.

[1:04:25] Is she a ghost?

[1:04:26] I don't understand it.

[1:04:27] Yeah, is she planning to play John Gotti, Jr.

[1:04:30] in an upcoming biopic?

[1:04:33] I don't know, maybe.

[1:04:34] That's a weird leap.

[1:04:35] She's playing Joan Gotti

[1:04:37] in the gender-swapped version of Gotti.

[1:04:40] Or Joan Gotti, Jr., in this case,

[1:04:42] since that actor didn't age.

[1:04:44] Dan, let's power forward.

[1:04:47] Okay, football.

[1:04:51] It's basketball.

[1:04:52] Oh, is it?

[1:04:53] I was trying to relate it back to the Super Bowl.

[1:04:58] Hey, you did a great job.

[1:05:00] You did a great job.

[1:05:01] Thanks.

[1:05:04] This letter's from someone that I don't have the name.

[1:05:09] So I apologize that I do not have your name.

[1:05:13] I hope that you will still enjoy

[1:05:15] hearing your letter read on the air.

[1:05:17] As always, five-star community outreach

[1:05:19] and customer service, courtesy of The Flophouse.

[1:05:21] This letter's from Anonymous,

[1:05:23] so make sure that you're wearing

[1:05:24] some kind of cool V for Vendetta mask.

[1:05:27] Or writing the novel Primary Colors,

[1:05:29] a Romana Clef about the Clinton campaign.

[1:05:31] Now, The Flophouse really knows

[1:05:34] how to make its listeners feel special.

[1:05:38] Okay, moving on to the letter from Anonymous.

[1:05:43] My wife and I recently watched Hitchcock's

[1:05:45] 1937 film Young and Innocent,

[1:05:48] a crime thriller in which the daughter

[1:05:49] of the local chief constable risks it all

[1:05:51] to prove the innocence of a man she's only just met.

[1:05:54] We were really enjoying the performances

[1:05:56] and the cinematography and the effects were impressive.

[1:05:58] At the end, though, things got a bit weird.

[1:06:01] The climax of the film-

[1:06:02] Are they gonna talk about the blackface stuff at the end?

[1:06:05] Elliot, don't fucking spoil the letter.

[1:06:08] Okay, sorry.

[1:06:10] Hey, I don't know.

[1:06:11] Hey, I don't know.

[1:06:12] Hey, if I knew who wrote it,

[1:06:13] I'd be worried about offending them,

[1:06:14] but it's just an anonymous letter

[1:06:15] that a bird dropped in your lap.

[1:06:20] Thinking that your head was a rock

[1:06:21] that it could break open the letter on it

[1:06:23] to eat its sweetmeats inside.

[1:06:25] It just dropped it on you.

[1:06:26] The climax of the film takes place in a hotel restaurant

[1:06:29] with a crowded dance floor and live band.

[1:06:31] The heroine and her companion are searching

[1:06:33] for the man they believe to be the killer

[1:06:34] who they know has a twitchy eye.

[1:06:36] We're treated to some dramatic irony

[1:06:37] as the camera makes a very slow push-in

[1:06:39] across the dance floor to the band,

[1:06:42] to a close-up of the eyes of the band's drummer,

[1:06:43] which we see to be twitching.

[1:06:45] This is all very tense stuff and great filmmaking,

[1:06:47] or at least it would be,

[1:06:49] if not for the fact that halfway through the push-in,

[1:06:50] my wife and I realized that the entire band,

[1:06:53] other than the white singer,

[1:06:54] was white guys in blackface.

[1:06:57] Holy shit, we both exclaimed and basically lost it.

[1:07:02] They said, holy shit, we explained.

[1:07:04] Some shit is holy,

[1:07:05] if it comes out of a saint, maybe, or the Dalai Lama.

[1:07:10] We finished the movie.

[1:07:10] It'll be stuck in a reliquary

[1:07:11] and then sold off by a traveling, you know,

[1:07:15] giga salesman.

[1:07:16] Yeah, giga, and when the new Dalai Lama is born,

[1:07:19] they hold out poop from three different people,

[1:07:21] one of them the old Dalai Lama,

[1:07:23] and then two random strangers,

[1:07:24] and the child must reach out to the poop

[1:07:27] that belonged to him in a previous life.

[1:07:29] Dan, continue with the letter.

[1:07:30] We finished the movie after a bit,

[1:07:32] but it kind of spoiled the mood.

[1:07:34] Has something like this ever happened to you?

[1:07:35] Can you think of a time

[1:07:36] when our older movies seemed timeless,

[1:07:38] right up until it really, really wasn't?

[1:07:40] Keep on flopping in the free world,

[1:07:41] R-O-C-K in the USA.

[1:07:44] Now, I'm gonna say, one,

[1:07:46] this happens in a ton of old movies,

[1:07:47] and, but that part doesn't really bother me,

[1:07:50] and I'll tell you why.

[1:07:51] One, the audience of the movie

[1:07:54] is not supposed to be enjoying

[1:07:55] that those people are in blackface.

[1:07:57] To me, it is a moment in entertainment history

[1:08:00] from England in the 30s when blackface was common,

[1:08:03] but you, the viewer, are not supposed to be like,

[1:08:06] I love it, this is great.

[1:08:07] This is the villain of the movie,

[1:08:09] is in disguise as a performer in blackface,

[1:08:11] and so I don't feel like the movie is saying

[1:08:14] this is a fun thing that everyone's gonna enjoy,

[1:08:16] as opposed to, say, A Day at the Races,

[1:08:18] which is an okay Marx Brothers movie.

[1:08:20] It's not one of their best,

[1:08:21] but it's okay until the big number

[1:08:23] where they're dancing and singing

[1:08:24] with the village full of black people

[1:08:26] that suddenly appeared out of nowhere behind,

[1:08:28] and they're all talking in dialect,

[1:08:29] and the Marx Brothers, for a brief moment,

[1:08:32] try to hide by putting grease on their faces

[1:08:35] so that they are in blackface,

[1:08:37] that's supposed to be a funny moment.

[1:08:39] It's supposed to be something

[1:08:40] that the audience is amused by,

[1:08:41] and that doesn't work for me,

[1:08:42] but something like the scene in Young and Innocent,

[1:08:44] I don't think the audience of the movie

[1:08:46] is supposed to be like, this is hilarious

[1:08:47] that they're in blackface.

[1:08:48] I think it's more of a detail

[1:08:51] that's meant to help disguise the identity

[1:08:52] of the real criminal that much more.

[1:08:55] What do you guys think?

[1:08:57] I mean, you still have a reaction to it

[1:09:01] as a modern viewer, though.

[1:09:02] I guess so, but it doesn't ruin the movie.

[1:09:04] The movie doesn't feel tainted to me

[1:09:06] in the way that other movies do for that.

[1:09:07] There's a, I forget which Fred Astaire movie it is,

[1:09:10] there's one where he does a dance in blackface

[1:09:12] as a tribute to Bill Bojangles Robinson,

[1:09:15] and it's a really beautiful dance,

[1:09:17] but it's very hard to get through the fact

[1:09:19] that he is doing it in blackface,

[1:09:21] but even there, he's doing it

[1:09:23] not from a point of view of this is hilarious,

[1:09:25] or like, I'm doing an exaggerated cartoon version

[1:09:28] of a black man.

[1:09:29] That one's more complicated and complex to me,

[1:09:31] but it's like, I don't know,

[1:09:35] there's so many times in old movies

[1:09:36] where you have to be like, okay, I don't like this,

[1:09:39] but that's either from the time,

[1:09:42] but there are other times when you're like,

[1:09:43] this is not okay at all still,

[1:09:45] and it shouldn't have been then,

[1:09:46] but I don't know, it's so complicated, guys.

[1:09:49] Yeah, the other day, the other night I was at the bar,

[1:09:55] and after RuPaul's Drag Race finished up,

[1:09:57] I was about to turn the TV off,

[1:09:59] and then VH1 started playing.

[1:10:00] playing pretty woman so I'm like I'm leaving the TV on and then as pretty

[1:10:04] woman was wrapping up like big mistake huge and I was gonna turn the TV off

[1:10:09] again and it was dirty dancing and I'm like oh I'm definitely leaving the TV

[1:10:13] on and then I was about to turn off the TV again at like 2 in the morning and

[1:10:17] then 16 candles came on and 16 candles is a movie that like I on tape as a kid

[1:10:23] and I watched so many times and I haven't seen it in years and I know it's

[1:10:26] terrible like I know that like the there's so much gross shit and the

[1:10:36] long duck dong character is so horrible like it's terrible but I don't know I

[1:10:42] watch the opening credits I'm like I still like the opening credits and then

[1:10:48] because it's horrible I mean you you you hit my go-to Elliot with day at the

[1:10:55] races so there's a lot there's a lot of movies like that that I really like but

[1:11:00] then they mishandle ethnic characters I mean like I mentioned once in a live

[1:11:05] show that like I love Westerns but every Western I watch I have to deal with the

[1:11:08] fact that it is about the elimination and demonization usually of another did

[1:11:14] of an entire type of person unless it's one of those Westerns they made in the

[1:11:19] 60s where they're like oh well we'll tell things from the native point of

[1:11:22] view but we'll still kind of say it was a good thing that that we settled the

[1:11:25] West but uh there's I was watching Music Man with my son recently as he

[1:11:30] called it it was a four-day movie because we're not gonna let him watch a

[1:11:33] movie that long all at once so it took him four days to watch it and I love

[1:11:36] that movie but there's a scene in it where they have the song Shapoopy which

[1:11:39] is maybe my least favorite song in the whole movie partly because I don't like

[1:11:43] the term Shapoopy I don't understand it and it doesn't sound good to me my son

[1:11:47] loves it because it's now he has a sanctioned way to say the word poopy is

[1:11:51] if he says Shapoopy but there's a there the whole song is about going after a

[1:11:55] girl who's hard to get because she'll relent eventually and there's these

[1:11:59] there's one verse in it where it's like give her a squeeze give her a pinch when

[1:12:03] she isn't looking get a pinch back and that's fancy cooking and it's like mmm I

[1:12:06] don't approve I don't approve of just going around pinching girls when they're

[1:12:10] not looking so that that's one of those moments where I was like uh but my son

[1:12:14] was so distracted by the word Shapoopy that he didn't care what the actual song

[1:12:18] was about so that was fine yeah hit us with another letter Dan maybe one with

[1:12:24] a name attached yeah sure okay um this one is from Shane wait hold on no wait

[1:12:35] this one's from Landon okay and keeping up my let me explain do I need to

[1:12:41] explain how letters work I like the idea that I somehow mistook the word

[1:12:52] Landon for Shane two most different names no um this is from Landon last

[1:12:59] name withheld who writes I absolutely love slapstick and physical comedy a la

[1:13:05] Chaplin Keaton Cary Grant straight through to Steve Martin John Ritter and

[1:13:09] Melissa McCarthy however I find these types of movies lesser quality ones

[1:13:13] anyway are often plagued with unbearable unbearable caricatures character tropes

[1:13:19] archetypes stereotypes and just downright unfunny characters that

[1:13:23] immediately make me furious for instance any low-rent version of a Jerry Lewis

[1:13:28] character or the entirety of the 1967 version of Casino Royale are there any

[1:13:34] types of characters that drive you batty love always Landon last name withheld

[1:13:39] and there's one like we're not just talking about comedic characters I don't

[1:13:45] think I think it's open to everything but there's one that really bothers me

[1:13:49] and that's the overbearing mother archetype like I just don't find that

[1:13:55] funny at all there's no but Dan your favorite movie is where's Papa I just

[1:14:02] like gorillas I mean it's not a real gorilla well doesn't matter you can

[1:14:10] pretend it is all you want no I just find that I just find it upsetting I

[1:14:14] find the overbearing mother character upsetting and unpleasant and I don't

[1:14:19] find anything funny about the way that these characters often seemed devoted to

[1:14:23] ruining their children's lives like pardon me I just find it very bothersome

[1:14:31] and of course any I don't like sort of like the sassy black character because

[1:14:37] I find it very like uncomfortably like racially tangibly the you prefer black

[1:14:43] characters to know their place and not talk back no that's not it I just like

[1:14:48] in an all-white movie when they like turn to like the black characters it

[1:14:53] just like say something snappy and like I think that would probably apply also

[1:14:58] to the one gay character in an otherwise straight movie yeah I'm

[1:15:01] guessing too right where it's like your job is to be the jester you're going

[1:15:05] your your job is to do that is to do the the comments that make everybody laugh

[1:15:09] and you have no interior life that kind of thing exactly yeah but and yet you

[1:15:16] and yet you love the mannequin movies I you know I just like this you like our

[1:15:22] ships he likes magical necklaces I mean I mean what about rapping granny's do

[1:15:29] you like rapping granny like when like a stuffy stuffy person says something in

[1:15:34] slang oh that's now you're hitting on my least favorite comedy I didn't expect

[1:15:40] them to sound like that I mean we've talked about a million times but I think

[1:15:44] I think we're all quite sick of the like like the the nagging girlfriend or

[1:15:51] bitchy ex-wife character all the characters that Judy Greer seems to be

[1:15:54] forced to play unfortunately she's so much better than that and I'm gonna go

[1:15:58] with the this is a character type that I guess starts with what like Bill Murray

[1:16:05] but has become kind of in a different way Chris Pratt's big thing where it's

[1:16:12] like the hero who's kind of a jerk to everybody but it's supposed to be

[1:16:16] charismatic and is really incompetent and really foolish and yet he's the hero

[1:16:24] that everyone's supposed to love and another character is always pulling

[1:16:27] their bacon out of the fire but they but there but the other characters not the

[1:16:31] hero of the movie instead the guy who's a jerk who can't get his act together as

[1:16:34] the hero and you know of course I a character trope that I will never get

[1:16:41] sick of is the medical examiner or coroner who is always eating a sandwich

[1:16:46] on the job Hollywood if you ever need somebody to play that character I would

[1:16:50] love to do it thank you very much I mean that's lovable the thing that it really

[1:16:53] points out is the lack of workplace labor regulations for coroners they

[1:16:58] don't get a lunch break they gotta work straight through the day oh wow they're

[1:17:02] like video game developers yeah exactly they're working 80 90-hour works weeks

[1:17:08] so that electronic arts can get that game out on time or that autopsy and

[1:17:12] it's just not fair to them yeah I keep putting the phone down in between these

[1:17:20] letters and I shouldn't because I should just keep it open yeah can we talk do we

[1:17:24] have another layer that's gonna bring up negative stuff yeah do we have another

[1:17:28] letter that that has to involve us grandstanding about things that we feel

[1:17:31] better than no we've got a fun letter to end on it's from Shane last name withheld

[1:17:38] aforementioned Shane mm-hmm oh yeah I've been looking forward to his letter hey

[1:17:44] hi guys y'all mention you all mentioned piranha 3d yep I was in that when I was

[1:17:50] 16 uncredited background not even that not even an extra just sort of wandered

[1:17:55] onto the set cool some trivia about the shooting location there was a huge die

[1:18:00] off of carp that summer due to a carp specific herpes going around in the

[1:18:04] water and everything in the whole area smelled like dead fish rotting the boat

[1:18:09] and one of the caverns is still intact and sitting on my old boss's property I

[1:18:13] tried to get into the movie as a stunt performer by waiting outside the

[1:18:16] director's office and doing flips when he would come out for a cigarette that

[1:18:20] didn't work like that moxie though years later yeah years later I ran into the

[1:18:26] director at an Irish bar in Tempe Arizona he gave me his card and I lost

[1:18:30] it I'm also friends with someone hi is that that Irish bar in Tempe Arizona

[1:18:37] that fuck what's that Rother there's this like author who writes these

[1:18:41] fantasy books about a fucking druid who lives in Tempe Arizona and the he's

[1:18:47] always hanging out at one bar that actually exists and it's the weirdest

[1:18:50] fucking thing okay go Dan I don't know why you raised a question that could not be

[1:18:54] answered somebody will write in yeah yeah sure it was sure you or I would

[1:18:58] know about someone who writes the books about book about druids in Tempe Arizona

[1:19:01] but here's the I think here's the cautionary tale this letter and knowing

[1:19:05] it hasn't finished yet is when someone gives you a business card you want to

[1:19:08] hold on to don't do any flips until you put it on your nightstands or maybe in

[1:19:12] your files because I have to assume he did a flip in celebration and it fell

[1:19:15] out of his pocket yeah yeah or cuz bazooka Joe did something hilarious yeah

[1:19:20] he just flew backwards with the contents of his pocket spilling out everywhere he

[1:19:26] finishes the letter I'm also friends with someone high up in the local water

[1:19:28] department who said it might not even have been herpes that killed those fish

[1:19:32] but I forget what his findings indicated it was guys that sounds like we got

[1:19:36] another mystery on our hands look at some flights to wherever they shot that

[1:19:40] I think we got a lot of leads here we got more information about this book

[1:19:45] series do or talk about this thing that I feel like that is a was was some like

[1:19:53] false lead that David Koechner created his murder spree was not pinned on him

[1:20:00] We've clearly got to start at this Irish bar in Tempe, Arizona, and then eventually get back there.

[1:20:05] We've got our team. Now, I'm the stealth guy because I'm short and I'm small, so I can hide in the shadows.

[1:20:10] Stuart, you're obviously the muscle and also the face. Dan, you're our herpes expert for obvious reasons.

[1:20:16] We're going to have to solve the problem of what's killing carp in this unnamed lake.

[1:20:20] Dan's our tech guy, right, because he's good at handling the emails and stuff.

[1:20:24] Now, Elliot, why are you trying to sell this pilot, fish herpes detective?

[1:20:29] Yeah. It was called Fish Herpes Detectives. It starred us, but we also had a cute kid that we had to adopt and went with us.

[1:20:35] The kid had a funny lisp, so it would be like herpes, and we'd have to try to hide what herpes was because they're not ready for that knowledge.

[1:20:43] Now, here was the problem that a lot of the networks had with it.

[1:20:46] One, the word herpes in the title, but I stood firm on that. That wasn't going anywhere.

[1:20:50] Two, the budget I was asking for of $20 million an episode just for the three of us, not counting production costs.

[1:20:57] The rest would be kind of on a shoestring, and three, that we were going to investigate one specific fish herpes mystery but never solve it like the way Twin Peaks was supposed to be done.

[1:21:07] Also, I was going to try to get the log lady back out of retirement so that she could be a main character on the show, maybe even the villain.

[1:21:13] Who knows? But it was hard to secure her involvement, to get her attached.

[1:21:18] Again, herpes in the title, not huge, and at the time, a lot of the networks said we're not buying fish shows anymore because fish police was such a big disaster.

[1:21:26] And I was like, that was a long time ago. People are ready for fish shows.

[1:21:29] Remember Fish, the spinoff from Barney Miller? And they were like, no, we don't. No one remembers that.

[1:21:34] I feel like tons of people are ready for fish shows. I mean they play like multiple nights around New Year's Eve in Madison Square Garden.

[1:21:39] Oh, right.

[1:21:42] But you're laughing to have the guy survive.

[1:21:47] So Dan, is that the end of the letter or was there more?

[1:21:50] That's it. It was just a fun story about Piranha 3D.

[1:21:54] That was great.

[1:21:57] Thank you for clearing our palate from the very serious letters that came before.

[1:22:02] We might have to have a discussion with Dan about maybe just having one feeling bad about types of people letter per show.

[1:22:08] Yeah, I mean it's called like a shit sandwich where you have bread and shit and bread.

[1:22:14] Okay, sorry.

[1:22:18] That bread doesn't help me out that much.

[1:22:21] You would want the other way around, dude.

[1:22:24] It's not like a double-decker or whatever that thing is. The double dudes?

[1:22:28] I got to choose between one of them? Is that what you're saying?

[1:22:32] Yeah, you have to choose. It's like choosing the ball or the sword in Lone Wolf and Cup.

[1:22:36] Okay.

[1:22:37] Yeah, or the lady or the tiger. Keeping in mind that the lady is a lady that you don't want to talk to.

[1:22:43] Like someone at the DMV or what?

[1:22:47] A lot of fine people work at the DMV, but yeah, she does work there.

[1:22:51] Her name is Sherry. She works at the DMV.

[1:22:54] Okay, so now for the last segment on the show.

[1:22:58] This crazy show of ours.

[1:23:01] Dan, when was the last time you went to the DMV?

[1:23:04] I don't know.

[1:23:08] Last time I went to the DMV, the lady who was handling my case was delightful, super professional, and it didn't take very long.

[1:23:16] California DMV. Ask for – I forgot her name, but she was really good.

[1:23:20] Okay.

[1:23:21] She was the one – you know you're in good hands when the person who's handling your case is the one everyone else is coming over to to ask questions about forms they need.

[1:23:28] Yeah.

[1:23:29] And she has the answers. It's like I'm in good hands. This is the expert.

[1:23:33] Okay. Well, thank you guys for schooling me about my stereotypes about the DMV.

[1:23:41] You'd think since the first two letters were literally about stereotypes, you would know not to step in.

[1:23:47] I would think you would like the DMV because it could be – like those letters could stand for Dan McCoy vehicle.

[1:23:54] They could. That's factually true.

[1:23:59] Or Darth Murray Vader since Murray is Darth Vader's middle name.

[1:24:03] But, Dan, I know your stereotypes about the DMV come from Patty and Selma on The Simpsons.

[1:24:07] By far the most offensive stereotype on The Simpsons that these two ladies who work at the DMV are very unpleasant.

[1:24:14] Wait. Hold on.

[1:24:15] Otherwise extremely PC show.

[1:24:18] So this last segment of the show is where we recommend movies that we saw that you should watch instead of Gotti.

[1:24:25] Please, Lord, watch anything instead of Gotti.

[1:24:28] Yep.

[1:24:29] I saw two movies last night, both of which I enjoyed.

[1:24:33] Gotti.

[1:24:35] One was Under the Silver Lake, which has not been released here yet, but I have friends who had –

[1:24:42] Yeah, I didn't see that, Nutsack.

[1:24:44] Friends had access to a French DVD.

[1:24:47] Oh, I know the friend.

[1:24:50] So it's the follow-up from the guy who did It Follows. It's a –

[1:24:56] So this is what follows It Follows.

[1:24:59] Yes.

[1:25:02] Congratulations.

[1:25:03] If I were there, I would high-five you.

[1:25:05] Yeah, put like a zinger sound effect in there.

[1:25:08] Yeah, add in just a zoo-zoo.

[1:25:11] But it's nominally a mystery.

[1:25:14] I mean it is a mystery, but, like, none of it makes any sense.

[1:25:17] It's all – it's kind of in the tradition of, like, stoner L.A. mysteries like The Long Goodbye or Big Lebowski.

[1:25:25] But it's much more absurd and weird and nonsensical than either of those films.

[1:25:31] Like, it's about a unemployed guy played by Andrew Garfield who –

[1:25:39] there's a woman who goes missing in the middle of the night who he had a moment with and he wants to find her.

[1:25:45] And he sort of becomes convinced that there are all these hidden signals around him,

[1:25:51] like that – these messages that – I mean it's all – it's about the interconnectedness of all things,

[1:25:58] except for, like, everything that he – every clue that he follows up on is totally absurd

[1:26:03] and should not lead to him solving the mystery, but somehow does.

[1:26:09] Spoiler alert.

[1:26:10] Sorry.

[1:26:12] And so I watched that.

[1:26:13] It hasn't even been released yet.

[1:26:15] Yeah.

[1:26:16] And I saw – I also saw Mausoleum, which is a great bad movie about a woman who is possessed by a demon

[1:26:25] after she goes into a mausoleum and that's shown by her eyes turning green

[1:26:30] and her doing, like, crazy things with her brain powers.

[1:26:34] Sounds awesome.

[1:26:35] And talking about stereotypes, there is a very, like, minstrel-y, like, lady housekeeper

[1:26:41] who gets scared of the supernatural thing in the middle of it, so that's kind of wheezy.

[1:26:46] But the rest of it –

[1:26:47] Yeah, you would have thought Mausoleum would hold up.

[1:26:50] But the rest of it is, like, so bad and funny and so of its time,

[1:26:54] and there's just – like, there's a twist ending at the end that is completely nonsensical in the most delightful way.

[1:27:04] So if you're looking for a bad movie to watch, I say Mausoleum.

[1:27:07] Awesome.

[1:27:09] I'm going to recommend a movie.

[1:27:12] I – after seeing You Were Never Really Here earlier this year,

[1:27:15] I've been slowly dipping back into Lynne Ramsey's catalog,

[1:27:20] and I'm going to recommend We Need to Talk About Kevin, a spooky little joint starring Tilda Swinton,

[1:27:30] John C. Reilly, Ezra Miller.

[1:27:32] That's the full quote on the poster, a spooky little joint.

[1:27:35] Yeah, I thought it was really fun.

[1:27:38] It's – I think it's a great little horror movie about an evil kid.

[1:27:42] It's shot beautifully.

[1:27:44] It's built around an incredible central performance by Tilda Swinton.

[1:27:50] And, yeah, I mean I – it bounced around in time.

[1:27:55] It postulates a universe where Tilda Swinton and John C. Reilly are married, which I love that idea,

[1:28:02] although I don't know if – I feel like their child would be even more alien than Ezra Miller, but who knows.

[1:28:10] Yeah, I like it.

[1:28:12] I also really – my big – my favorite thing to do is to watch movies that elicit strong reactions on IMDb user reviews,

[1:28:21] and We Need to Talk About Kevin is very much like that.

[1:28:25] Apparently people thought it was based on a true story.

[1:28:30] Now, I mean it uses a couple – the movie uses some kind of on-the-nose music cues, but it works.

[1:28:38] I don't know.

[1:28:39] The whole thing works.

[1:28:40] I like it.

[1:28:41] Watch it.

[1:28:42] Spooky kid.

[1:28:44] Spooky little joint with a spooky kid.

[1:28:47] Yep.

[1:28:48] I'm going to recommend a movie that's also – well, it's not spooky at all, but it is haunting.

[1:28:55] I'm going to recommend the movie First Reformed, Paul Schrader's movie with Ethan Hawke about a priest who is a – not a priest, a reverend.

[1:29:05] Sorry, a reverend at a down point in his life.

[1:29:08] He is too much into alcohol, and he gets wrapped up in the life of a married couple where the husband is pretty much on his way to becoming an eco-terrorist.

[1:29:15] And in a lot of – now, the last Paul Schrader movie I tried to watch before this, Dog Eats Dog, I could not get through.

[1:29:21] This movie I found super spellbinding and just like really disciplined and restrained in a really great way.

[1:29:27] And it feels like it's his take on Ingmar Bergman's Winterlight, which is also about a religious leader who is – who gets traumatized basically by his experience dealing with a man who is in crisis because of larger world issues that he really has no control over and suffers because of that loss of control.

[1:29:47] But at the same time, it's also like a companion piece to Taxi Driver in the way that Ethan Hawke's character develops over the movie.

[1:29:53] They're both about men who get very intimate looks into people's lives but have found that they can no longer connect with the world anymore.

[1:30:00] As a result, they become radicalized in different ways, only this one, the thing that's radicalizing

[1:30:05] him is like a real problem, which is the destruction of the environment, but I thought that Ethan

[1:30:08] Hawke was really great in it.

[1:30:10] Cedric the Entertainer has a role in it.

[1:30:11] He's really great in it, and I've just found it to be a really powerful, affecting movie.

[1:30:17] Don't watch it looking for a good time, but at the same time, watch it.

[1:30:19] Trevor Burrus Yeah.

[1:30:20] We need to talk about Kevin for that.

[1:30:21] Jay Carruthers Yeah, but it's one of these movies that came

[1:30:25] as close as I can think of to an American take on what is usually a very European type

[1:30:31] of movie, something that's grappling with religious issues in a serious way, grappling

[1:30:35] with larger forces and the way that individuals can or cannot influence the world around them

[1:30:41] in a larger way, and I just thought it was really, really well done.

[1:30:45] So first, Reformed.

[1:30:46] Trevor Burrus Yeah, and that's being talked about for award

[1:30:50] seasons, right?

[1:30:51] Jay Carruthers I mean, it won some independent spirit awards

[1:30:54] and some critics' choice things it was nominated for, but I think it should – I would love

[1:30:59] it to win some awards.

[1:31:00] I think it's a really great movie, and it's the kind of movie that would be easy to dismiss

[1:31:05] as – I don't know, either too – this is too boring or too depressing or too serious

[1:31:11] or too bleak.

[1:31:12] I don't care, but it's just – I found it really powerful, and there was never a

[1:31:16] moment where I was bored with it, even when the movie was moving at its own pace.

[1:31:20] So try it out.

[1:31:22] First Reformed.

[1:31:23] Ethan Hawke.

[1:31:25] You love him.

[1:31:26] He's handsome, right?

[1:31:27] Cedric the Entertainer.

[1:31:28] He's hilarious.

[1:31:29] I mean, the part he's playing is not funny, but he's very good at it.

[1:31:31] So three movies you can see and one movie you can't see.

[1:31:36] Dan was just dangling that one in front of you to show how cool he is.

[1:31:40] Now what do we do, Dan?

[1:31:43] Now we say, get the fuck out of here.

[1:31:46] Wow.

[1:31:47] Where was that accent earlier?

[1:31:50] Dan, you had so much opportunity to do your Bridge and Tunnel Guy accent, and you just

[1:31:55] didn't do it.

[1:31:56] Dan, I need to ask you a serious question.

[1:31:58] What's the matter with you?

[1:31:59] Oh, no.

[1:32:00] Maroon.

[1:32:01] Oh, wow.

[1:32:02] Really, really, really buried the lead on this one, Dan, you're really loading up

[1:32:09] the back with all the stuff you should have done earlier when you were talking about Gotti.

[1:32:12] Were you just planning to do that one line and you were practicing the whole day?

[1:32:16] That's right.

[1:32:18] I want to applaud my own restraint for not going into a long digression where I was like

[1:32:25] a Jersey guy talking about how great Gotti was.

[1:32:28] So thank you to me, Elliot, for not doing that and instead going with the much more

[1:32:32] profitable holes tangent.

[1:32:34] Yeah, I love the idea that Elliot is congratulating himself on restraint.

[1:32:42] So before we go, as always, check out MaximumFun.org for a bunch of other great shows, podcasts.

[1:32:49] You like podcasts.

[1:32:50] You're listening to one right now.

[1:32:51] Why not try it?

[1:32:52] I mean, we don't know what your reaction is to this.

[1:32:54] You may hate it.

[1:32:56] Also, if you like the show, give us a review on iTunes, tweet about us.

[1:33:02] Tell your friends, tell your family, introduce it to the made men or women in your life.

[1:33:09] It'd be really funny if they wanted Gotti to be more of an accepting movie so they're

[1:33:14] like, you're now a made man or a woman as the case may be.

[1:33:20] But yeah, tweet about us, Instagram about us, Facebook about us, leave a review on iTunes

[1:33:25] or wherever you listen to podcasts.

[1:33:26] The Flophouse, as Jan mentioned, it's a production of Maximum Fun.

[1:33:30] Go to MaximumFun.org for other great podcasts.

[1:33:32] There's lots of great ones.

[1:33:33] I don't know why you need to repeat it.

[1:33:34] I covered all this stuff.

[1:33:35] It's just undermining me at this point.

[1:33:37] Once again, get the fuck out of here.

[1:33:39] Forget about it, my ron.

[1:33:42] And I'm Dan McCoy, 2.0.

[1:33:45] I'm Elliott Kaelin, and I'm Stuart Wellington.

[1:33:48] I guess we're ending this thing.

[1:33:50] Goodbye.

[1:34:05] Now, here's the thing about Home Alone.

[1:34:08] He also had that neighbor, the scary old man with the snow shovel, who also could have

[1:34:13] come over and helped him at any time, but instead was just kind of waiting outside like

[1:34:17] a sentry, like as in the Judas Priest song, The Sentinel, just waiting for someone to

[1:34:22] come by so he could hit him with that shovel, right?

[1:34:24] Yeah.

[1:34:25] But maybe Kevin McAllister had put some sort of supernatural ward on the house that would

[1:34:30] only allow the wet bandits in but would bar entry for any other adults.

[1:34:33] Have you thought of that?

[1:34:35] I think that's certainly possible.

[1:34:37] I mean, I don't know what's in their basement.

[1:34:38] They already had all those cardboard cutouts and stuff.

[1:34:41] They probably have some kind of books on esoterica.

Ep. #274 - Gotti

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