Broadcast News with Dave Schilling

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi listeners. Caitlin here with a quick content warning for
this episode. Sexual assault and date rape are brought up
in a few different parts of the episode. It's not
an extensive part of the movie nor our discussion, but
again it is discussed throughout the episode, so we wanted
listeners to be aware of that. Enjoyed the episode. On

(00:24):
the Bell Cast, the questions asked if movies have women
in them? Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands
or do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef invest start
changing it with the bec Del cast. Hey, Caitlin, Yes, Jamie,
what do you think the devil looks like? Well, the

(00:46):
movie would have you think, or at least the character
of Aaron in this movie would have you think that
it looks like William Hurt. But I think it looks
like Albert Brooks's character. Oh and he's the devil. I
think that I the devil looks like who in this movie?
Who does the devil most look like? This is actually
a challenging question. Is it is it Jack Nicholson? Could

(01:09):
it be him? He's refused to give up any of
his salary to save any anyone else's job. It was
all a big joke to him. Oh my gosh, that part.
I was just like, I can't wait to talk about it. Also, honestly,
he looks like how I would imagine the Devil would
look like, just like eyebrow Wise, do you remember the
movie which is of Eastwick where he was play the Devil? Yes?

(01:33):
I do. And there's like some production crossover between which
is of Eastwick and this movie. It all comes together.
Did Jack Nicholson confirmed the Devil? It's hot here first
that he's played the devil. It would have been a
real waste of waste of his vibe if he did not.
At one point, I hate to see a vibe wasted.

(01:55):
So that's right. Yeah, well that was my little opening.
Although I loved it the Bectel Cast, I was gonna
do do you want to hear what I would have done? Yeah,
if if I were opening it, I would have said
breaking news do do do do, and then like done
some like news jingle, and then I would have been like,
this is the Bechtel Cast. I like it. I like it,

(02:19):
Thank you. I think we have two strong options. I
think everyone should sound off in the comments of what
they the stronger opening was, and that will be that
will be helpful for us moving forward. We love feedback,
especially with unsolicited Oh good grief. Okay, well, this is
breaking news. This is the Bechdel Cast, and this is
our podcast in which we examine movies through an intersectional

(02:43):
feminist lens, using the Bechdel Test simply as a jumping
off point to initiate a larger conversation. The Bechdel Test
being a media metric created by queer cartoonist Alison Bechdel,
sometimes called the Bechdel Wallace test, in which are standard
these days. Two people of a marginalized gender have to

(03:07):
have names, they have to speak to each other about
something other than a man, and ideally it is a
conversation that is narratively meaningful, right, and it's and it
really cannot ultimately be about Albert Brooks, which is where
I struggled in this one. Uh, there were somewhere I'm
like oh, and then it's like, oh, but that was

(03:29):
about William Hurt or Albert Brooks, wasn't it? You know?
That was What was the name of this new station?
What was the name of the fictional w Oh who cares?
W who cares? Recovering broadcast news today we are I'm
I'm really excited to talk about this movie. There's so
much to talk about. There's a lot to unpack, and

(03:51):
we have an amazing guest. We certainly do. He's a writer.
He's a host of the new Polygon podcast Galaxy Brains.
It's Daveilling. Hello, Welcome. What a pleasure it is to
be here today to talk about a movie that is
one of my favorites of all time. But I also
do believe that it is in fact not going to

(04:12):
pass the test. We'll go through it later. But when
I racked my brain thinking about this movie that I love,
that I've seen many times that I own a blue ray,
I think no, definitely. First of all, huge flex with
the blue ray when someone drops a blue ray physical
media baby. Um yeah, Well, I I think I I

(04:35):
have um a compulsion towards owning movies that I love
because they do disappear often, like they leave streaming services,
um for years at a time, sometimes more than that,
you know, decades. So I want to make sure that
when I want to see my favorite movies, I I
have them. For instance, the movie Crossroads, which we always

(04:57):
get requests for, but it's literally not not accessible to us.
It is unavailable. We've even set up episodes for this
and then been like, wait a second, this movie has
been disappeared. Why is that? I don't know, erased from
human existence? You can buy it on DVD, but the
DVD is also like sixty dollars. What is going on
with that? There's another movie that I think you two

(05:20):
should do at some point, um, Catherine Bigelow's movie Strange Days,
which was really on my mind quite a bit last
summer during during all of the protests and uprisings over
the George Floyd killing, because as that movie was about,
you know, our relationship with law enforcement and all of

(05:40):
that stuff, and it's nowhere. You can't buy it on
on physical media. You have to you have to find,
you know, a used copy on eBay or something. I
just happen to have one from college because I was
a physical media collector when it mattered back then. But
otherwise just unavailable. And it's a shame because that's a
movie that people need to be watching right now. That

(06:02):
is so I yeah, I've I've never seen it and
now I have no options. You can borrow my pan
and scan DVD if anyone has copies of either of
those movies lying around. We do have a po box.
I like Crossroads was sorry to go basket to cross Road.
Cross Roads was written by Shonda Rhymes, Like, there's just

(06:24):
so much going on for cross Roads. I completely forget
what happens in the movie. Maybe it's really fucked up
and they don't want us to see it. I don't
remember what happens right. I haven't seen it. It feels
like I never will because of it being so inaccessible.
We might be fucked uh So, Dave, you said that

(06:44):
Broadcast News is one of your favorite movies of all time.
What's your history? Boy? I must have seen it for
the first time in film school because that was when
I first started getting into Albert Brooks movies. Um. You know, Unfortunately,
if you are a young film enthusiast at a certain age,
you are and you are like me Jewish, I'm I'm

(07:07):
I'm Jewish on my mother's side, you are pushed into
a filmography of someone who we don't have to talk
about that he's out there and he made a lot
of movies for people of that ilk and Albert Brooks
is was never given that same amount of credibility. With
the film community. He was never a box office success,

(07:28):
he's never won an Academy Award, but his movies are
so much more rewarding than other people playing in this
kind of nebushy jewish millie you because in every film
that he is in, at least the ones where he's
written and directed them or co written them and directed them. Uh,
and this one he did not do either, but it's

(07:49):
still fit into that sort of vibe. He's the villain,
he's the bad guy, and I was glad that we
got to do this because it does This movie and
in his work in general, really underlines certain toxic qualities
about the masculine id and the masculine id of people

(08:10):
who believe themselves to be smarter or better or more
self aware. In reality, they're the least self aware people
that there that there is. But he's kind of the
fake ally in this movie because he says to Jane, like,
you know, I'm your best friend, I'm your only friend.
We have this special connection. He's gaslighting her the entire movie.

(08:30):
He is manipulating her the entire movie, and he's created
this codependent relationship with this person. Uh that is damaging
to her to an extreme degree, and I think it's
really brave of him to have been willing to play
that character in all of these films, and to write
and direct movies where he's playing this unlikable character. I

(08:52):
think the only movie that he is in that he
wrote or co wrote and directed where he's not unlikable
is Defending Your Life. But the rest of him, he's
kind of like he's the reason why everything is going wrong.
And I think that's a really laudable, wonderful thing. And
uh so that's one of the reasons why I love
this movie is it it shines light on certain things

(09:14):
that we don't like to talk about about masculinity. Yeah, totally.
He didn't write or direct this movie, but a different
Brooks did, Yeah, James L. Brooks, which I was like,
are they related? And I don't think they are. They're not.
James L. Brooks though, was in another film that Albert

(09:35):
Brooks is and one of Albert Brooks's directorial efforts, Modern Romance.
He plays a film director. Um I don't believe he's
playing himself, but he does play a film director in
that movie. Um. So they were kind of friends from
the comedy community of that time. A kind of alternative
comedy scene of that moment um. And I believe that
he was also in um he was in terms of

(09:56):
endearment before this too, Like, yeah, there's all sorts of
fun overlap. It seems like James L. Brooks really, I
mean I I sort of knew this, but you know,
in researching the production of this movie, I was like, Oh,
he has like a crew that he works with over
the course of like what like forty years at this point. Yeah,
and co creator of the Simpsons, And that's one of

(10:18):
the reasons why Albert Brooks was in so many Simpsons
episodes in the early part of the run of that show. Wow, Jamie,
what's your relationship in history with this movie? I liked
this movie. I think I also first saw it in college.
I remember liking it then, and I didn't revisit it
for a long time after, and then I don't I

(10:41):
think it was. It wasn't until a friend of the cast,
Karina Longworth, put out an amazing season of her show
You must remember this last year about Polly Platt, who
was really integral in this movie, worked with James L.
Brooks a lot and produced this movie. And when I
was listening to that series. I think, like last summer
or fall, I was watching kind of her filmography as

(11:03):
I was listening, and so I revisited this movie and
was like pretty blown away by it and was really
excited to revisit it for this show. I think that
this would have been kind of my introduction to most
of these actors. When I saw these I wasn't like
a huge film buff in high school or anything. I
was very very normal in my tastes. I take no

(11:24):
shame in it, but it but it was true. Like
to before I saw this movie, I was like, like,
literally most of these people were Pixar characters to me,
because Albert Brooks is the dad and finding Nemo and
Holly Hunter is Mr is incredible. So long story short,
I've I've never worked in broadcast news, but I have
worked in news news, and it was really interesting to

(11:46):
watch after having some experience in that space, and I'm
really excited to talk about it. What about you, Caitlin,
I too, saw this movie for the first time in
film school and push on. Yet they really want film
students to watch broadcast news. I think it's one of
the only movies they want to show that's like entertaining.

(12:07):
It's like, oh, this is funny. We're gonna show this
funny movie instead of you know, yeah, maybe that's why
I remembered because I was there were so many movies
in film school, like in the film program I was in,
and I was like, I wow, boy did I hate that.
I'm sure it was competent, but what a drag? I
am going to sleep through this? Yeah, there would always

(12:29):
be an intermission like Okay, we're gonna pause for a
little bit so you guys can go to the bathroom
and stuff, and I would just go back to my
door to sleep. I don't want to watch The Blue
Angel by Max Offals. I want to sleep. Well, I'm
about to be the villain the Albert Brooks of this
episode and say that I wasn't as enamored with this

(12:52):
movie and I find it to be longer than it
needs to be. Well, that that's absolutely true. I will
not pretend that that it's not true. Why is this
movie two hours and thirteen minutes. It could be a
breezy minutes. I'm not sure why it's as long as
it is, and therefore I find it a boring movie

(13:13):
punctuated by some really fun scenes. It's not really my
type of movie, although I you know, it is obviously
competently made, incompetently written and directed, and the performances are
really good. But it's just I don't know, it's not
really my jam. But there are many things to talk about.
I'm excited to unpack it, and I will never not

(13:35):
be better that it's two hours and thirteen minutes long.
It used to be longer. There's an entire subplot that
was cut out. Oh my gosh, it was a longer movie.
I know. Do tell what was what else could have
possibly happened? Um? I believe these scenes were shot because
I think they're on the criterion. But the shooting script

(13:57):
that I read had a sub lot where Tom be
friends a State Department official or employee. I think he's
kind of a low level State Department person, but his
roommate knows a bunch of people, and so there is
um a transference of information for uh, flirtation that occurs, um.

(14:24):
And that's where Tom gets a lot of the information
that he uses to then advance in his careers. Is
because this the State Department person finds him attractive, and
Tom is kind of guileless He's just like, oh, yeah,
we're just friends, but he wants to, you know, take
things to the next level with Tom, and he doesn't
understand why it. On the page it read really offensive

(14:47):
and I'm glad they cut it out, But that was
a whole like it must have been an extra twenty
pages of screenplay. Thank you. Yeah, this movie is definitely
already a bit long. I feel like that's just like
any outour movie is going to be too long. But

(15:08):
I still think that there's so I don't know that,
and I think that this is like one of those
movies that sometimes like when I learned about the production
of a movie, I like it less by the time
I've learned more. This is the opposite. The more I
learned about the production of this movie, the more interesting
I think it is. Cool. Well, shall we talk about
the story and then go from there? Yeah, okay, so

(15:31):
here's the recap. We meet our three main characters when
their children. Tom who is a nice looking boy but
who doesn't get good grades and therefore he will be
a future news anchor. Aaron is like smarty pants brainiac
he will be a future news reporter. And Jane writes

(15:57):
letters to Pen pals and like job like it's her
job achiever. She cares very much about precision, and therefore
she is a future news producer. I really loved that
scene with with Little Jane where she tells her dad
off for like not being specific enough in his criticisms

(16:18):
of her and like it's so fun. And then Jane
grows up to be Holly Hunter, who is in fact
a news producer. She works with and is good friends with,
adult Aaron, who is Albert Brooks. We see Jane give
a speech criticizing the state of like news reporting and

(16:38):
newscasting too soft, and afterward, Tom, who is William Hurt,
approaches her and he's like, hey, great job, so she
asks him about for dinner. It seems like things might
get romantic. He also was talking about how he's not
good at his job and that he's been sickly failing

(17:00):
upward and she's like, well, okay, get better and try harder,
which upsets him and he leaves. I hate Tom. I
hate Tom, so I feel like we I know, I
know that Aaron is very much a villain, but I
do hate Tom the most out of everybody. I hate.
I dislike both of the men that we're supposed to

(17:22):
be that. I don't. I mean, I don't know that
we're really supposed to be rooting for any relationship. I
don't think even know that we are. Yeah, it's it's
not a movie that is neutral in its moral judgments.
I think it does judge every character in time in
the film. And that's one of the reasons why I
like it so much, is because it casts skepticism on

(17:45):
all three of the protagonists, which is very rare in movies.
I think most of the time, when you watch a
comedy like this, or even a dramedy something that has,
you know, gravitas, you're watching and the movie decides, this
is the person you're supposed to like, This is the
one that's going to make all the good decisions, or
is at least going to um reverse course on the

(18:06):
bad decision at some point. But I think at a
certain juncture in the movie, for all three characters, and
I think for Aaron, multiple times through the movie, the
movie points fingers at him and says, you are a bad,
bad person, you are making wrong choices, you are a
selfish person, and um the movie judges him accordingly. It's

(18:27):
really it's it's fascinating, like going through the moral gymnastics
of this movie, because there's multiple points where you have
to like think about what someone just said and be like, Okay,
they said that for a selfish reason, but I don't
totally disagree with what they were saying. But they're doing
it to be emotionally manipulative, and ultimately I don't like
any of them. I wanted to read Tom's character's description

(18:52):
on the Scholarly Journal Wikipedia page because it made me
laugh a lot. Uh. It says Tom is tall and
someome likable, intelligenic, but lacks news experience, general knowledge, intelligence,
and language skills. Like I mean, I think that that
that is certainly true, but also what it's not a

(19:16):
stretch to say that he is all those things. But
the one thing that makes Tom a special, interesting, complicated
character is his intense self awareness of his faults. That
is a cool thing to me. Not that I like Tom.
That I walk away from this movie saying, ble, I
wish Tom and Jane got together because they're just great
for each other and he's so cool. No, he's he's

(19:38):
a manipulator. He is a figure who is really just
out for himself. But he doesn't know that he's not
savvy enough to understand of his problem, but he can
point out some of it. Yeah, that's what's cool about
the movie, Like, Okay, he gets it, but he at

(19:58):
the end he expressed is this belief in what he
did being okay even though Jane is like, this is
the worst, most unethical thing you could possibly do. So
he's self aware to a point, but when he gets
something out of his naivete or his perceived lack of

(20:22):
awareness or ability, he doesn't mind. Yeah that's a very
American thing, isn't it. It's it's like he knows that
this is not a meritograhy and that is going to
work to his advantage in every way. Yeah, what's the
line what's the exchange of dialogue where Jane is like,
you could get fired for that, and he's like, I

(20:43):
got promoted for that. We're like, yeah, heikes. Through the
process of the movie he is learning the full extent
of his devious powers and that it's it's sort of
like the origin story of a Marvel villain. Yeah, it is.
It's I'm so I'm like, what does that character look

(21:05):
like twenty years down the line, because it's like he's
almost like ahead of the curve and where news ended
up going to the point where like the central ethical
conversation around this movie would barely even be a discussion.
Oh he's Brian Williams. Yeah, yeah, yeah, did the same
thing of a similar thing to what happens in this movie,

(21:26):
where he's like, I was you know that helicopter and
boy it was scary. That was a lie. That was
a whole lie. Yeah. Side Well, Tom leaves Jane's hotel room,
but then he calls her right away and he's like,
by the way, I've gotten a job at your network,
so I'll see you at work. And this is the

(21:48):
beginning of a like will they or won't they get
together kind of thing between Jane and Tom. Then we
see this great sequence where Jane, Aaron, and some other
staff like this editor guy Bobby, as well as Blair
who's played by Joan Cusack. They like are putting together
this segment and they have to like really quickly get

(22:11):
it all together and like rush the tape to the
people so that it gets on air, and they like
have like not a second to lose some great Joan Cusack,
I feel like Hillary Duff one day would watch that
tape of the Sheer Pratt follery of that sequence beautiful.

(22:32):
It's it's really an obstacle. Course, she made a real
career out of playing that character in in the eighties.
This and Working Girl. It's just like, Wow, Joan Cusack
knew how to play this kind of harried, low level
employee in a high stakes work environment. She's just fantastic

(22:53):
in this movie, very very funny. She almost impaled herself
on a water bubbler at one point. It's like there
was just like I was like, oh my god, that
had to have really hurt, and the shot continued for
twenty seconds after. She's amazing. So meanwhile, Tom keeps wanting
to pick Jane's brain and she's like, I'm busy. But

(23:14):
then he starts getting better as a reporter, and Jane
is like, oh am, I still attracted to Tom even
though I don't respect him, And wow, this is happening.
Aaron is starting to feel overlooked and unappreciated. Then some
like big breaking news is happening about a fighter plane

(23:36):
and their boss, like the network president Paul wants Jane
to executive produce this story and wants Tom to anchor it,
even though Aaron is far more qualified, and Jane confronts
Paul about this, but Paul doesn't budge, so they cover
the story with Tom as the anchor, and it goes

(23:59):
surprisingly well. Jane and Tom have a great rhythm, and
she's back to being attracted to him, But then he
goes off with another reporter, Jennifer, and they have sex
and then and then she is unceremoniously written out of
the story. I know, you can't get deported to Alaska,

(24:21):
but she gets deported to Alaska essentially because of Jane.
Jane is like, we need to send her there to
cover this story because she's jealous. Um. It also should
be mentioned that throughout the movie we have seen Jane
have these like very short outbursts where she just like
bursts into tears for like a minute when she's by

(24:44):
herself and then composes herself and like gets back to
whatever she's doing. She's an Olympic compartmentalizer for sure. So
then Tom pitches a story to Jane a about women
being sexually assaulted on dates, and he wants to do

(25:05):
this story and he puts it all together and part
of it is him interviewing a woman about being a
survivor of date rape, and she's crying while she's telling
her story. It cuts to Tom crying as well, and
after Jane watches this, she's like, well, I don't know

(25:26):
about you, like cutting to your reaction, but otherwise this
was a good segment, Like it was very moving, so
let's put a pin in that, shall we. We also
learn that their boss, Paul, has to fire a bunch
of people because of a major budget cut. Aaron thinks
that he might be fired, so he wants a chance

(25:47):
at anchoring the weekend news to prove that he can
do a good job, and he begrudgingly has Tom help
him prepare, who tells Aaron like, you know, you're not
just reading the news, you're selling it. You're a salesman.
And Aaron is like, that scene is gross, but it's funny.

(26:09):
And then when Aaron does that like weekend news spot
where he anchors it, he starts sweating horribly and the
whole thing is quite sloppy. Meanwhile, Jane and Tom are
together at a correspondence dinner and they're flirting and they kiss,

(26:30):
but then Jane has to go see Aaron after his
big night. So she goes to him and she's like,
by the way, I think I'm in love with Tom,
and Aaron is like, well, Tom is the devil. Also
I'm in love. So you're like, oh, okay, so this
is a completely unbiased opinion. Good. Um. So then things

(26:52):
kind of fall apart between Jane and Tom. The layoffs happen.
Jane gets promoted to bureau chief. Tom also gets promoted.
He's being sent to London. Aaron quits and Aaron is like, hey,
Jane asked Tom how he was able to get a

(27:12):
cutaway to his reaction during that story where we see him,
you know, reacting and crying when he only brought one
camera with him. So then Jane goes back through the
footage and it shows that Aaron got that reaction shot
after the interview that he was acting, and then he
edited it into the story. And Jane is just completely

(27:36):
disgusted and appalled by this. And she was supposed to
go away with Tom before he left for London, but
she confronts him at the airport, which I thought was
a fun subversion of like, you know, people go to
the airport and like makeup and kiss. But she goes
there too to scald his ethics. Yeah, She's like, you

(27:57):
make me sick. I'm not going on this trip with you.
You committed a terrible breach of ethics. Screw you forever.
It's it's also one of the great pre nine eleven
airport scenes because she's just kind of wandering around. She's
not sure if she's gonna go or dot. She doesn't
have a ticket because he's got the tickets. He's wandering
around with like funny hats and like, hey, the airport

(28:19):
is a fun place to be. Is great. She's like, no,
I'm gonna break up with you. And then he's like, Okay,
I guess I'll just walk through this single piece of
security and get right the one metal detector and that
is it. It's just very very interesting. Yeah, it's like

(28:39):
walking into a J. C. Penny basically. Yeah. I think
people just go to the airport to have lunch. Oh
there's a Binny Hotta in the airport. Yeah, let's go there.
I can't relate. So that's the end of them. Then
we cut two several years later, where Jane, Tom and
Aaron all and into each other. Jane is considering taking

(29:03):
an even higher position as a managing editor, where she
would be Tom's boss. Tom is engaged to someone else.
Aaron is married and has a young son. So they've all,
you know, like moved on with their lives doing other stuff.
And then the movie ends on Jane and Aaron catching up.

(29:26):
So that's the story. Let's take a quick break and
then we'll come right back to discuss. And we're back.
Where should we start. I mean, I have a lot
of info on on the background of this movie that

(29:49):
we could maybe start by just like ping ponging off
each other about There is a lot of stuff that
maybe appreciate certain parts of the movie morphed for for
knowing about it. So this is this is a James L.
Brooks movie. It's his Ohtour period shortly pre Simpson's. He

(30:11):
made this movie with um Polly Platt as a producer.
She is not even on the Wikipedia page for this movie, which,
after listening to Karina season on it is baffling and frustrating,
but also fix it right now, let's franks it now.

(30:32):
By the time you hear this, she'll be there it.
I mean, it is pretty like ridiculous that she's not.
She had worked she had worked with James L. Brooks
on his I think it was his immediate previous movie
in terms of endearment. James L. Brooks had a pretty
good track record in centering women in stories, particularly women

(30:53):
in the workplace. He was a producer on The Mary
Tyler Moore Show. He centered women and women's stories at
a time where it was kind of unusual to do
so as a white male. Ohtour, So that was his background.
Polly Platt came on for this movie. She had previously
worked in terms of endearment as well. She had worked

(31:15):
on a number of Peter Bagdanovich's best movies when they
were married, but she was never credited as an actual producer,
and that was kind of the story of her life
up until broadcast news that she had been repeatedly contributing
on a producer level but was never credited. That way

(31:35):
was always overlooked. Was supposed to direct her own movies.
There was like a time in I think the late
seventies early eighties where she was projected to be like,
quote unquote the first great female director. But she never
did direct a movie for a lot of reasons, but
you know, one of the big ones was how frequently
she was erased from the projects she did contribute to

(31:58):
on a really high level and broadcast News was the
first movie that she was actually formally credited as a
producer on. I have a question, did she receive an
Academy Award nomination for Best Picture for this or was
she not one of the credited producers on that? That's
a good question. Let me let me check that that

(32:20):
the because is it the executive producer who gets the
nomination for the Best Picture Academy Award? Is that the case?
Possibly she she I'm not seeing that she was. I'm
not saying that she was nominated for an Academy where
she was nominated for an Academy Award for Art Direction
on Terms of Endearment, which was kind of her It's

(32:44):
so into like that that and we'll just like link
to that series because I'm going to like fumble my
way through the summary of her life. But a lot
of the ways that she was credited and she worked
in an art director capacity really frequently because that was,
you know, considered more traditionally to be women's work in film,
and also she was really good at it. But she

(33:05):
you know, she didn't really have much trouble getting credited
as an art director, but when it came to the
actual production, she was never credited. So yeah, I don't
think that she was an executive producer, and it doesn't
look like she was nominated for the Academy Award, which
is ridiculous. Yeah. I don't know if the requirements for

(33:29):
being the Best Picture nominated producer have changed since then,
but they certainly should have because of that. Um. She
was the executive vice president of James EL Brooks's production company,
Gracie Films, so she was involved in quite a few
of the movies that he was involved with, both as
a director and a producer going forward. Yeah, and if
it wasn't for her, the Simpsons wouldn't exist. She introduced

(33:50):
Matt Grinnig too, if that's how you say his name
to dubious James L. Brooks. So she's like, she's like
she is the reason that Cameron Crow had a career,
which I guess Wes Anderson, she her whole career was
like making things happen for men and never getting credit

(34:10):
for it. But yeah, I highly recommend listening to that.
You must remember this season because it will shine a
light on somebody who was primarily in her career overshadowed
by people who didn't deserve the limelight as much as
she did, right, Yeah, because she was for the most part,
very much like the common thread in like their best work.

(34:31):
So it's like, well, you know, who is here for
all of your best work, and especially for like Peter Bogdanovich,
which I guess film majors can jump in my mentions
if they feel like it. But she was involved with
his two best regarded movies ever and his career, you know,
kind of that kind of absolutely certainly did take a

(34:52):
downturn after he decided to divorce her. Yeah, he had
an affair with um Civil Shepherd. Shepherd on the set
of Last Picture Show, and that was kind of the
swan song for him being considered a top level a tour. Yeah.
So Polly Platt, which I just want to make sure
she gets her her do And it also sounded it

(35:15):
sounded like there was a really good on the ringer.
There was a really good piece on the production of
this movie. It's been written about pretty extensively at this point,
but there were elements of Jane's character that were pulled
from both Susan Zarinsky, who I think was like the
main source for Jane's life, who ended up becoming the

(35:35):
head of CBS News up until like this year, I guess.
But but there are elements of her character that we're
pulled from Polly Platt and James Brooks's relationships, so she's
very present in the movie. She she also had to
take on the movie that I super disagreed with, but
I thought was interesting because I think from her perspective

(35:58):
it makes a lot of sense because she, you know,
her career was very much the story of like trying
to quote unquote have it all and have a successful
marriage and a successful career in film, and she was
never able to have you know, both at the same time,
as is somewhat common experience, especially in the you know,
seventies and eighties. Um, So she really really really wanted

(36:22):
Jane to be able to go with Tom at the
end of the movie, even if the relationship was doomed.
She was really frustrated that James L. Brooks wouldn't let
Jane have some sort of romantic Catharsis, even if it
was like not the guy for her she was. She
seemed really really like upset about it that but then

(36:46):
she says in her unpublished memoirs that Karina Longworth read
a lot from in her series that she's She's like,
I suppose I am a living example that you can
have the career, but you generally don't get the man.
So I think she wanted this ending for Jane that
she didn't get for herself, and that also didn't happen

(37:06):
in the movie. I think that that would have sucked
in the movie. But perspective it makes sense. I think
you know, a lot of creative people will do this,
where they will project themselves onto the characters, and that's
I think a function of the fact that when you
become a creative person, it's usually because you have a

(37:26):
surplus of empathy. Sometimes it's because you are a sociopath,
raging narcissist, super narcissist. But I think, you know, for
the people who really do the best work, the people
who you know, we we are beginning to laud more
than those narcissists, it's empathy. It's being able to put
yourself in the characters and see their perspectives. And I

(37:51):
can see doing that. But James L. Brooks was a
d percent right. Jane going with Tom is a rejection
of bathing that Jane stood for as a character. Right,
It's just wrong and it would have been terrible and
it would have made you dislike Jane even more than
you might have just through the course of the movie.

(38:12):
So I'm glad that it is the way that it is.
And Jane does get a boyfriend in the in the
flash forward, Yeah, she does, and and I'm all for
and we've we've you know, gone back and forth about
this on our show for Forever, Caitlin. It's like, yeah,
I don't know, it's like she she It's clear throughout
the movie that she does want some sort of companionship,

(38:33):
and so it's like, yeah, I'm rooting for her to
get a companionship that is equitable and good for her.
But like, I'm definitely glad she didn't end up with
either of the men in this movie. When I'm watching, yeah,
when I'm watching the film, I don't think of her
having a boyfriend or a husband or something as the goal.

(38:53):
The real goal for her. It's to have peace, you know,
internal peace, like the feeling of of intentment and this
is enough. And that's the part of it that I
relate to. And I think a lot of people probably
relate to is I need more. I need more. I
need to be more successful. I need to have more
esteem from my peers, more acclaim. I need to be

(39:14):
a bigger personality. I need to be like the most
huge and loved human being within my sphere of influence.
And that's what she wants, and that drives her to
kind of struggle internally for the entire movie, and she thinks,
maybe Aaron will be the person to give me that piece,

(39:34):
Maybe Tom will be the person to give me that piece.
But she has to find it in herself, and by
being able to say to Tom, no, you are wrong.
I'm gonna stand up for myself. I have limits, and
then to be rewarded for her talent and her and
her intelligence and her ability, that's what gives her the

(39:54):
piece at the end, and I feel like she she's
the one who wins the jackpot. At the end, Tom
gets what was always coming to him because Tom is
the white man, the handsome white man in a world
run by handsome white men. And Aaron gives up and
he decides, I'm just gonna go to Portlands and you know,
start growing weed, you know, do local news and stuff.

(40:17):
Jane is the one who gets to really feel like
she's accomplished what she wanted to accomplish, and she worked
for it. Tom didn't work for anything. Tom is the
scion of the American capitalist system. The way in which
he fails upward and is aware that that's what's happening,

(40:39):
it's just so frustrating to watch. And yeah, but the
movie is really astute about pointing that out. In the
eighties when we were lauding those people more than anybody else,
those were our heroes. Yeah, for sure. Well let's let's
kind of I mean, this is kind of a good opportunity,
I think, to kind of pivot the discussion to Jane

(41:01):
as a character. I guess the last thing I wanted
to say about the production of the movie was that, um,
because again, Caitlin, like we talked about this on the
show all the time of like, when men are writing
female characters, what kind of research are they doing? Who
were they talking to when they're preparing for a person's

(41:23):
experience would be wildly different from their own? And it
does seem like James Brooks is pretty at least by
the accounts that I read that he was pretty solid
in this department, And I think it does come across
in the movie where he researched women who were working
in broadcast news in the early to mid eighties pretty extensively.

(41:45):
He interviewed Susan Serinski for I think over the course
of months, but he spoke to I think it was
like as many as ten women working in that field,
and you know, just kind of doing the work of
trying to figure out what the common threads were, um
in the struggles they experienced at work. And so I did.

(42:06):
And and also Susan Zarinsky was an associate producer on
this movie too, so she was also you know, like
cut in and worked with Holly Hunter. And as as
far as you know, a male author writing a female character,
I was. I was like, I mean, I guess it's
like the the bar is so extremely low, but I
was like pretty impressed. I was like, Okay, he actually

(42:29):
did his homework. He brought someone into the production who
is an authority on this field in this specific role,
who worked with the actor, and like it seemed, you know,
I was um impressed light with that. I thought that
that was cool that she was like accredited producer as well.
I can't speak for how how women respond to this movie.

(42:52):
But it always felt natural to me, like it didn't
feel as though he was making things up. And part
of that probably is his own background in journalism and
working in in I think of a CBS news when
he first started. That might have helped him see how
he needed to go about the process of actually making

(43:13):
this is not to just make it up pull cloth,
which is I think how a lot of male writers
and directors will approach a woman's story, and this is
ultimately Jane's story. He looks at it. It seemed like
he looked at it more from a journalistic standpoint and
and said, I need to bring some fair similitude to
a story that I have some understanding of but not

(43:35):
the full picture. I'm I'm all for male writers doing
their homework like it's just it's a breath of fresh air.
It's really nice. Yeah, let's talk about Jane. Jane, sweet Jane.
She I mean some just pretty obvious stuff here. She

(43:58):
is extremely competent at her job. We see this constantly,
which is something that I feel like in a lot
of movies that center a female character or female protagonist,
even that is good at her job. We are mostly
only like told this or like other characters talk about

(44:20):
how good she is at her job, but we don't
actually see any like visual evidence of this. So the
fact that we constantly see her working and see the
ways in which she is good at her job again
bare minimum stuff here, but uh, you know, it's it's
worth noting that that's a very important aspect of her character.

(44:43):
We see her be appreciated for the work that she's doing.
We see her being valued and recognized. There's one scene
where the president of the is it the network president
or I think the head of the network news the
network news division. Yeah, because this is a broadcast network.

(45:05):
This is this is like an ABCC major yeah, right, right,
right right, as opposed to like today news channels and stuff.
Then right, so their boss Paul is like observing her working.
There's a scene where she's like screaming into the phone
at someone about like a parking issue. She does like
body shame someone during that, so we don't love that,

(45:28):
but she's like getting the job done, and Paul says
something like I had no idea she was this good,
and then that leads to her eventually getting like a
major promotion. So even though it's perhaps not always the
most realistic thing, especially for a woman in the eighties,
to be like really acknowledged for the hard work they're

(45:52):
putting in and being rewarded for it. Because I mean, again,
looking at Polly Platt and how often she was overlooked,
it's not uncommon for women, especially of that era, to
do amazing work and never get any recognition or acknowledgement
for it. But on the other hand, to see that
on screen as an example of something that can happen

(46:13):
and should happen was just really cool to see. So
I appreciate that aspect of her character. The other kind
of major thing about her is that she's looking for
love in all the wrong places. Yeah, yeah, I think that.
I think there's a little bit of the well, this
is who is who is the closest person to me?

(46:36):
And I think that that's probably true of a lot
of people, um, you know, in in a variety of
different fields, but especially in these kinds of high stress,
um high impact jobs. You look for someone who understands
your plate, who understands why you're freaking out and you're unhappy.
You're bursting into tears once a day every day exactly yeah,

(46:59):
it's so she looks for these people who are going
to fulfill her. But boy, you know these are not
the best options, but they're the only options. I know.
It's like I wanted and this is so I mean,
it's like so upper middle white issues that that everyone
in this movie is having, if not just like full

(47:19):
blown rich person ship going on. But I'm like, we
gotta get Jane on Riya, like we gotta we gotta
get Jane like some we gotta get her on up
on a dating platform. She needs to date someone outside
of this industry who understands high stress environments but not
the one that she's in every day. I just was like,

(47:40):
let's let's get let's get Jane into like two thousand
and twenty one and see and see what's up then,
because give her a yoga class, some crystal juice regimen,
get her good, some goop. Tell Jane about Goop, like
you just you know what, girl, wash your face, Okay,
watch your face. The thing with Jada is she is

(48:02):
an unrepentant girl boss and like the kind it's it's true,
and it's like and it bearss saying that. The kind
of news that's being done here which I guess it's
like it's hard for me to go into like seven
audience brain here because now I feel like there's been
there's been so much discussion around news bias and mass

(48:23):
media news bias um that now when you see this
kind of stuff, you're like, oh, this is this. You know,
this news has a very clear tilt. It's always going
to prioritize the West. It's always going to prioritize the
white West, and and on and on and so in
some ways, it's like, if I'm looking at Jane on paper, No,

(48:44):
I don't really like her that much, but I do
appreciate her commitment to two ethics and I can empathize
with her on I mean, I guess on I got
kind of like lost in my how how I actually
like fall on this because we see Jane have these
like literally like power cries at multiple points in the movie,

(49:08):
and I do think it kind of becomes a joke
as the movie goes on that like she's going to
just take any moment she can find to herself, which
is not often, to like have a power cry, and
then she'll either pull it together or someone will walk
in and she'll be forced to pull it together, which
I think is like, you know, I don't hate that choice.

(49:29):
I don't know she she is so tricky. I mean,
it's like there's no one in this movie that you
are rooting for because it's like, Okay, I want you
know Jane too. I don't know. I mean, I guess
I I like her on the Okay, where is this going?
I think that Jane has a problem that I don't

(49:50):
think he's really often seen in movies, where Jane is
like primarily valued for her skill at her job, which
I don't think we see female characters valued for primarily
at least in movies very often. But it also shows
the offset of that and what I what I think
is like a pretty logical thing that she feels is

(50:12):
missing from her life is like, oh, people value me
for my ability so much, but like what about me?
And like what about who I really am? And like
my desires and what I want in life? And both
of the men in this like sort of love triangle
we're being presented with do seem to value her ability
over who she actually is. And that I thought was

(50:35):
like a pretty interesting thing to see on screen. And
I don't think that there's a lot of movies that
have really done that because I think that, like there
is this whole current wave feminism of like it is
really good to be valued for your skills, which it is,
but also like to be valued for your skills and
not yourself, Like that sucks and that feels bad. And

(50:56):
I I think it's interesting that that comes through in
her character and her storyline. I think that there's still
a an element of vampirism to the relationships she has
with both men. Is even though oh great, you know
they value her her ability, they want that ability for themselves.

(51:17):
The seduction in this movie, the grand scene where Tom
is like, whoa Jane? Okay, now I really notice her,
is when she allows him to do the nightly news
without ruining it, without saying something inappropriate or you know,

(51:39):
getting something wrong. She guides him to where he needs
to be in his career. Aaron similarly, is constantly looking
to her for approval and acceptance and some kind of
help in his career. And he said, Aaron is always saying,
you know, I know you better than you know yourself,

(52:01):
for like we're best friends, were doing all this stuff
because that's Aaron needs her to give him this validation.
So they're constantly just taking from her, but they never
asked her how she's doing, or what's going on in
her mind, or why she feels the way that she does.
It is just it's constantly like psychically sucking the energy
out of her. And that's why she has to pick

(52:23):
neither of them, because if she went with either one
of those guys, they would just like whittle her into
a little tiny nub. Yeah, I mean, I'm I'm very
glad that she picks neither of them. I would have
been simply furious if the movie had her ended up
with one or the other of them. It would have sucked.

(52:46):
But then you have this yet another example of a movie,
and this is something we've talked here and there about
on the podcast of a very career driven woman who
is very successful in her line of work and very competent,
who doesn't it's sort of that like women can't have

(53:10):
it all thing where we see her not able to
you know, she again she's looking for love, she has
trouble finding it, and when she does find something that
seems like it might be a romantic prospect, she can't
maintain a relationship. And even at the end when she

(53:30):
has this like boyfriend who she's known for like three
months or something like that, and you know, we don't
know how serious it is or if that's going to
be kind of fleeting or whatever. But well, that's also
like one way of looking at it where it's like,
you know, she's she's really good at her job, but
that's the only thing she gets to have. She can't
have love because women can't have it all. But then

(53:52):
there's also like, but then you could see it like, well,
she doesn't need a man. Her her passion and her
love is her job, and so I'm kind of torn.
But it's like she wants one, but she wants love. Yeah, right,
I think that that's such an like it's interesting and
I don't think I don't know, it's almost like an

(54:13):
impossible puzzle to solve right where It's like I feel
like if she if this movie resolves with like her
being like, oh wait, there was this guy I knew
from college who respects me and like fulfills me in
every way, like that would be I guess it's like
I was struggling with that too. Or it's like it's

(54:34):
like it's idealism versus the reality. Of her time and
her profession, which which does come off as bleak because
it is. And that's why I was really interested in
how frustrated Polly Platt was by how her story ends,
because we all agree that she shouldn't have ended up
with one of the assholes in the movie, But it

(54:56):
seems like Polly Platt very much wanted the more idealistic
ending to this, which is that she was able to
be fulfilled on every level, which I know is possible
and I know that women of this era were able
to have that. But I would be interested to hear
from our listeners of this generation who are women uh
in the workplace at this time as well, because it

(55:18):
does seem like there is kind of this very bleak
realism to Jane's character of or that's like one way
to look at it, Like I can see it as like, well,
funk James L. Brooks for not giving this very motivated,
intelligent female character at the happy ending she deserved. But
then I can also see it as like, well, what,

(55:40):
we're very intelligent, highly motivated women in the workplace at
this time actually getting and what does this movie reflect
of that? And I don't know, Yeah, it's it's really
thorny and tough, and I mean, I I like that
this movie kind of engages with that, but it is
like it's a bummer for I Like, I feel it
is kind of a cool choice to at the end

(56:02):
add the flourish of like, maybe this is going to
be the relationship that works for her, and maybe she
is like on the brink of having it all because
she had to deal with all this bullshit and got
her career in line and rejected these two assholes and
moved on with her life. But but we don't know.
I don't know. Yeah, I've always liked the kind of ellipsus,

(56:23):
the elliptical nature of it, where it just kind of
leaves you wondering. I hope she gets what she wants,
but you don't know because she's still herself and she
still is grappling with these things because she hasn't had
the complete like revelation, Oh, this is how we solve
the problem, because none of us really ever do. That's
the thing that I think separates great films from very

(56:44):
good films is the acceptance of the fact that most
of us will never solve the one big problem in
our lives because it's hard. That's work that never ends.
We're constant only trying to perfect ourselves and and perfection
is impossible. Um. It is worth noting that the year

(57:05):
after this movie came out, that was the year of
Working Girl, directed by Mike Nichols, starring Melanie Griffith, Harrison Ford,
Sigourney Weaver, and that movie, in contrast to this one,
is about where where Jane is kind of you know, um,
I think, always destined for success, upper class kind of person,

(57:29):
lauded for her her intelligence. Melanie Griffith's character in that
movie is considered lower class and doesn't belong on Wall Street,
which is certainly a less morally upright profession than broadcast
news at that time. Neither are great, but that one's
definitely you know, yeh, like yeah, on the list. At

(57:53):
least you know they were trying to tell the truth
on some level, but not really. Um, Mellie Griffith gets
everything she wants the end, She gets the corner office,
she gets all the fancy clothes, she gets Harrison Ford
at the end, even though Harrison Ford in that movie
is kind of a jerk. Oh god, she sucks, he sucks, yeah, exactly, Like,

(58:14):
but like that was the inverse of this. And if
I like Working Girl because it's funny and it's it's
kind of like an amusing fairy tale. But of the two,
Broadcast News is far superior to me because it does
paint the realistic picture of human beings constantly stepping on themselves,

(58:36):
trying to succeed and trying to be better people and
failing miserably. And that's how I feel as a human
being all the time. Yeah, And it's like and I think, like,
and that's part of why it's like a tough pill
to swallow. But it's like this this movie doesn't present
itself as the bizarro like Reagan era fairy tale that

(58:58):
Working Girl does. And you and listen to our episode
about Working Girl on on the Patreonic that we did
I think a year and a half ago, even years ago,
yah know when that was. We've covered it. But but yeah,
I agree that, Like, I think that this movie has
endured more and it's partially for those reasons, Like I

(59:23):
don't know, it's it's I I like that Jane's ending
is pretty ambiguous and like opens up this kind of discussion.
It's cool to have these discussions, and you know, how
the discussion of a woman's career in seven would be
different than now, hopefully in some ways. And it does
seem like a cool I don't know, just like marker

(59:45):
of of where things were at, especially because and again
I don't want to give James Albert too much credit here,
but he was he was engaging with very popular female
characters who were in the workplace, um for fifteen years
before this movie came out, and he or over fifteen
years where he was working in the Mary Tyler Moore Show,

(01:00:06):
which was like a huge component of second wave feminist entertainment,
where it was like a huge deal that a career
woman was being centered in any way, regardless of what
she was doing, even and and now it seems like
pitally nothing because you're like, okay, a white woman working
in an office like I'm asleep, but but you know, like,

(01:00:29):
but that wasn't always the case, and it's he he
seems to have been engaging with kind of this story,
you know that not this story, but just like this
social movement pretty consistently, and it's interesting to watch it
kind of bear out in this way where like by
the late eighties, it's clear that characters like Jane have
benefited from second wave feminism and that she is highly

(01:00:51):
respected in her profession, but she's still a person, and
she is still experiencing sexism in this space, and she
is still being you know, vampired and used by the
people around her in spite of the successes of the
past you know, ten fifteen years of feminism. It's wild.
One thing. I do think that in terms of like

(01:01:13):
how her character has written that I feel like there
was room for that. I would have liked some of
the time to be reallocated. I'm not advocating for the
movie to be longer, but um I will it's it's
four hours. Why not. I wish that she had a
woman to talk to in the story. I feel like

(01:01:34):
those characters were present, especially with right there, like I
I understand probably I can imagine James Brooks's argument for like, well,
she was intimidated by her and blah blah blah. But
it's like there was room for two women in this
workplace to have meaningful conversations that would have lifted the

(01:01:54):
story in general. And I wish that there had been
room made for that because the characters are literally there,
like it's frustrating that they don't engage with that at all. Yeah,
the conversations between Joan Cusacks character Blair and Jane are
really minimal, to the point where every time Blair popped

(01:02:15):
up again in the story, I'm like, all right, John
Cusacks in this movie, Like, she's there so infrequently that
you could basically write her out of the movie and
it wouldn't be different at all. And as much as
we love to see her run through that obstacle course
to get the tape in on time, that kind of

(01:02:38):
could have been anyone. So the fact that she's not
a more important character is pretty glaring. It stands out
only because of the performance. But the female character that
I want to talk about before we move on that
always chaps my ask the most is Jen of her

(01:03:00):
played by Lois Childs, who was also in the James
Bond film Moonraker and I believe was a model for
many years. Interesting that, Yeah, I think that was maybe
her first movie. But um, I mean, she has done
no favors in this film. She is there specifically to
be derided and to be an obstacle of a sort

(01:03:24):
for Jane, and I think they have one conversation and
this is I guess getting ahead of ourselves about the
Bechdel test. But they have one conversation and I believe
it is specifically about Tom. Oh yeah, and there is
nothing else going on there. They don't have any rapport
related to their unique position in a broadcast network newsroom

(01:03:49):
in they don't talk about their own hopes and dreams.
They don't talk about UM, the struggles that they have,
or or the conflicts that they have. It is just
about Mom. And I mean, she's played for UM for
comic relief the entire time, and we're supposed to be
so amused by the fact that she has banished to Alaska,

(01:04:14):
which but I feel bad. I feel bad for her.
Tom was cute. She just wanted to hook up with Tom.
The thing is, like, I like Jennifer. I feel like
Jennifer is. I wish that she's been written out more,
and I wish that Jane had been taken to task
more for doing what she did, because she derailed did

(01:04:36):
Jennifer's life and career entirely where I thought it was
like I thought. I mean, I don't know, Klin, I'm
interested in your opinion on this as a well, But
like when when Jennifer goes up to Jane at whatever
that news hard Heart and it's like, hey, I'm interested
in Tom, Like I wasn't sure if there's something going

(01:04:57):
on with you. I just wanted to check in. I
was like, wow, O, that's like she didn't technically have
to do that. They weren't friends. It was like I thought,
I was like, oh, that's that's what a what a
nice person does um or if not nice, conflict a verse.
I could relate with it. But she she was just like, hey,
I'm interested in Tom. Is there anything going on? And

(01:05:17):
then she gets a feeling from Jane that oh Jane
is interested and she's like, okay, fine, then I'll back off. Fine.
And then Jane is the one who acts like, you know,
just bizarre about it, and it's like, oh no, go
fuck him right now, kind of like she's very immature
about it. And then Jennifer is like okay, and then

(01:05:39):
she does, and then she's punished for it, like, yeah,
it's not cool. I think that, like Jane is written
to be cool, and so the fact that she is
like so unceremoniously written out as a punchline rather than
like it, it would have been like another interesting thing
that could have happened is like and again I'm just like, yeah,

(01:06:00):
tell James Brooks what I think he should have done
thirty years ago. But like, you know, there are other
you know, maybe there's another person in the at the
news station who would have been piste off on Jennifer's
behalf for the fact that she was clearly banished to Alaska, Like,
did Jennifer have any friends that we're going to stick
up for her? Why is no one mad about this? Nobody?

(01:06:22):
Because Jane was Jane was being an asshole, and like
that is one of the things that for me watching
in one, I was like, Oh, Jane can be a
real like, you know, really weaponize her insecurities against other people.
I mean, especially because she gets on her high horse
about ethics in reporting the news. And then she's she

(01:06:45):
makes this choice too, because she had the choice between
a character named George, who we could also talk about,
and Jennifer as the person who they're going to send
to Alaska to report on some Alaskan serial killer, and
without a moment's hesitation, the second Jane, here's Jennifer's name
as an option. She's just like Jennifer Son, Jennifer and

(01:07:07):
it's because she's trying to get rid of her so
that she can move in on Tom, who, by the way,
had called the reason that Jane was like, yeah, Jennifer,
you can go after him, I don't care is because
Tom went up to her and he's like, you look
so pretty and clean, because normally at the office you
have this gross layer of film on you. Oh my god.

(01:07:29):
She was like, well that, thank you. It's so it's
so frustrating, yeah, because it's I mean, it's like I think,
I hope that we're supposed to you know, that's supposed
to be like audience wise, a strike against Jane, and
clearly like you know, she she's like you're saying, Caitlin
constantly on her high horse about ethics, but then in
practice her record is spotty or than she'd like to admit.

(01:07:51):
But the most frustrating thing is if Jane had just
been straightforward and been like, no, I'm interested in Tom,
like I would appreciate if you didn't hook up with him.
It sounds like Jennifer would have been like okay and
moved on with her life and this never would have
been a problem. Jennifer is kind of cool. She's cool.
She's a very chill lady, and she's just kind of like, yeah,

(01:08:12):
I was living my life whatever Tom's. There's a scene
where I felt bad for Jennifer too. I think it's
pretty early on where all the reporters at the station
are kind of like asking each other ethics questions where
they're like, oh, would you tell a source you love
them to get information out of them? And they were
all like, yep, of course I would. And then when

(01:08:35):
when like Jennifer confirms that she would, Aaron is like, yeah,
Jennifer didn't know that there was any other option, as
if to be like, wow, Jennifer, what a floosy She's
out there loving and having sex with all of her sources.
I do wonder, basically, I do wonder if there was,

(01:08:56):
like in My Okay two things like, I wonder there
was some sort of deleted scene where this is addressed,
because it does seem like Jennifer is a pretty like
heavily set up character to completely disappear with a throw
a joke. It does feel kind of bizarre to me,
given the rest of the characters in this movie. Nothing
else for Jennifer. She is long gone to Alaska, that

(01:09:18):
is the end of Jennifer. I liked this scene. I
liked the other like one of her moments where after
she and Tom do hook up, Tom notices that she
has like a spare room in her apartment maybe that
is like for her clothes, and Jennifer gets defensive before
he even says anything, and it's like, oh, well, I
had that extra space, and you know, it felt like

(01:09:40):
kind of you know, however you feel about it, like
commentary on how female news anchors have a higher pressure
to look a certain way than their male counterparts, to
the point where she felt the need to like get
ahead of his potential criticism. And that was like another
like pretty thoughtful moment, I thought. And then she just
she just disappears. I hope that she wins a Pulitzer

(01:10:03):
in Alaska. That's my head canon for she catches the
serial killer. They make an incredible docuseries about it, and
Jane is kicking herself. Yeah. I mean, I think this is,
like you said, Jamie, a very very tricky movie because
it isn't cleanly moralistic. It isn't cleanly one side or

(01:10:27):
the other. It is very messy with the perspective, and
I think that that is one, as we've all pointed out,
a fault of the fact that it came out of
but also I think it's because this is a movie
that is conflicted about its own subject matter. It's conflicted

(01:10:49):
about the idea of the news and whether or not
the news is good as it is portrayed in the world. Um,
there's the that whole sequence when they're in the um
involved in the the war. I don't even remember what country,
nicarag I'm glad that they actually had a country instead

(01:11:09):
of just like, we're in a war zone and there
are people that don't speak English. Um, it's it's played
not for laughs necessarily, but they are oddly not engaged
with anything. They're kind of detached from the fact that
they're in a war zone, that there are people losing
their tea. Yeah, it's opportunistic. It is not empathetic. It

(01:11:32):
is not oh my goodness, this is this is a
situation where people's lives are being lost, that there's political
upheaval and you know whose side are we on? You know,
why is this happening. It's just here's the thing that happened,
and can we get a shot of the boots? Okay,
we got a shot of the boots. Great, nobody got shot, Okay, wonderful.
It's just very matter of fact. And I think today,

(01:11:54):
you know now we would say, you know that detachment
is actually bad. That the the people who are nostalgic
for the days of the news being told for thirty
minutes every five five o'clock every day and we're objective
is not realistic or feasible. You can't be objective in

(01:12:15):
the news when horrible things are happening. You have to
speak out and you have to tell it not like
it is, but tell people what it shouldn't be, if
that makes sense. Um. And so this movie I think
has that ambivalence about the news, and it's satirical about
that world. So it makes every character's decisions more glaringly negative. Um,

(01:12:39):
everybody is doing the wrong thing because the movie isn't
sure if the thing that the career, the industry that
they have given their lives too is even good. Yeah,
And I think that's that's kind of where like Jane's
Girl Boss angle does kind of come in is like, yes,
you you are, like ten did as an audience member

(01:13:01):
and as someone who generally is like women succeeding could
could be good, uh to say like, well, look, she's
succeeding at a really high level in this field, but
what is she actually doing and like what are the
ethics and what is the impact of what she's actually doing.
It's not like it's not universally good at all. And
I like that the yeah that the movie like that

(01:13:24):
that the scene where they're reporting in Nicaragua, I feel
like at least now like comes off as pretty embarrassing
for them too. It's like they can barely communicate with
the people that they are supposed to be reporting on
and about. And then it's ultimately kind of played as
this little romantic tension when they're in the middle of

(01:13:45):
like you're saying, to have a war zone where people
are dying, and they're kind of like, wow, this is
so exciting. She'll be kiss no, and it's like they're
just like centering themselves in this way that looks ridiculous. Yeah,
And I think the movie, to its credit, does recognize
how ridiculous it is, right, Yeah, Yeah, I I do.

(01:14:05):
I do. I do like that because it's like there,
you know, it's what what Jane is fighting for in
this industry is I guess on this watch for me.
It was like, it's like she's just fighting for like
a two percent better thing than what she's currently doing,
which is better. Like, I agree that Jane's version of
the news is better than Tom's version of the news,

(01:14:29):
But is it better enough to justify rooting for it? No?
But is she right? Yes, it's the eighties were an
era of incremental progress, the nineties eighties, Yeah, you're the
two thousand's. On some level, it's like, okay, well, you know,
we we've made some strides, right, ladies, right, everybody. You know,

(01:14:51):
black people can be senators now, isn't that amazing? Dude? Dude?
Do dude, dude? And is Obama and Hillary and oh
you know, black people can can operate drones to like this,
is this wonderful? We can have a Korean head of

(01:15:12):
the CIA or whatever it is that like we're starting
to like look at it that way. And now people, finally,
you know, in in this era, are seeing it's not
enough to just have incremental progress to put people of
color or marginalized groups into these jobs that are fundamentally

(01:15:32):
bad for the planet. It is not just about having
a person of color as the head of the CIA,
because it's the CIA that is the problem, right, that
those are the things that we couldn't fathom or grapple with.
That now people are are are able to to to
grapple with because we don't have the illusion that the

(01:15:54):
system itself is good. And I think in broadcast news
and in a lot of other quote unquote feminist movies
from that era, baby baby boom, um with um Diane Keaton,
you know, that's like, oh, look at how great it
is that Diane Keaton is able to have a kid
and you know, be a boss. Like, that's not good.

(01:16:15):
What does her company even do? It's probably like selling
arms to the Contras or something. I don't know. This
isn't right, baby, So we did, and that baby is
going to end up inheriting millions of dollars and probably
being a bad person. Um. Yeah, it's it's just a
different way of looking at the world. And I'm glad

(01:16:37):
that we are outside of the expectation that incremental progress
is going to save us. It is not. Yeah, let's
take another quick break and then we'll come back for
more discussion. And we're back. Is there any other stuff

(01:17:00):
we wanted to talk about? Jane? Before we started going
into I have like a few little things, but to
take it away. UM. Oh well, one of the one
of the exchanges that I really did like, and I
watched the scene back a couple of times because it
was like, I don't know, Hollyhunter is really good in
this scene where I I do again, it's like, this

(01:17:22):
is in the context of what Jane is doing is
ultimately not good for the world. I do think it's
like there are a few elements of her character where
she she is a huge advocate for the people who
work for her, um in a way that I thought
was was really cool, Like when she's trying to get
Aaron to be the anchor on the story about Libya

(01:17:43):
because he actually knows what he's talking about, has expertise
in this area to an extent, and you know, can
unlike Tom, can like do the job that Tom admits
he cannot do. UM. I thought it was it was
cool to see her really, you know, go up against
the superior and advocate for someone who she knew would

(01:18:04):
do a better job. And that whole exchange of like,
you know, being patronized and like she it's that complicated
girl boss thing where you're like she is being met
with some misogyny but doesn't justify the ends, not really,
but you know, it must be terrible being the smartest
person in the room is, you know, being kind of
patronized by her boss, and she says it's awful, and

(01:18:26):
it's like she means it. I loved that. I loved
I mean because it's like she she's right, she is
right in this situation, and we know she is. And
there are still these like these little misogynistic ways where
she's treated where I feel like with her relationship with Aaron,
there's this expectation that she's going to be maternal towards

(01:18:49):
him in a way that in terms of a working
relationship makes no sense at all. But like that he,
you know, feels entitled to bargein in her life in
whatever way he pleases. He feels entitled to her emotional
energy at the drop of a hat for reasons. You know,
It's like she has to go see him the night

(01:19:12):
that he anchors the news she has you know, she
adjusts his clothes, She does all these little maternal things
that are not her job, but she clearly feels, you know,
compelled or obligated to do for him. That does feel
like very I don't know, it's interesting to see those
like moments that you're like, oh, this is very intentionally.

(01:19:32):
I felt like it was like written very intentionally. It
was like a half step towards progress of like is
she technically his superior, Yes, but look at how he
still feels so entitled her time and her energy in
spite of that. This this makes me think about the
concept of the work wife, which is I think best

(01:19:53):
left in the twentieth century, but it's the thing that
people still talk about a lot, maybe less so now
that we are in a post COVID world where we
are not going to offices and there isn't that forced
camaraderie between employees and in a workplace anymore. But there

(01:20:13):
was certainly for many, many years this idea of oh boy,
those two they just like they're like peas in a pot,
you know, that guy and that woman, and they just
have this great relationship. And she's my work wife and
he's my work husband. And it's a blurring of the
lines that people thought was funny. That was the cause
of you know, there was the launching pad for a

(01:20:33):
lot of sitcoms and things of that nature. But it's
really like inappropriate ultimately. Uh. And I can look back
on you know, workplace relationships friendships where it's like this
is we should just be co workers. But because we
no one talked about this stuff back then, it was like, oh,
this is just how it's supposed to be, you know,

(01:20:53):
we we can you know, have this kind of a
meshed codependent work relationship that is allegedly platonic but not
necessarily so. And I think that holds back a lot
of workplace equality. Is this idea that you can't have
these platonic relationships with people, um where you don't have

(01:21:17):
a line, there is no line in the sand of
this is okay, this is not okay, and this is
work and this is personal. And Aaron certainly has that
work wife relationship with Jane that has become terribly inappropriate
and it is gendered, as you pointed out, that he
is having her mother him. Yeah, he wants her to

(01:21:40):
be his mom, he wants her to be his girlfriend,
he wants her to be his best friend. Like it's
it's really icky. Yeah, yeah, And it wouldn't be that
way if she was not a woman in this situation,
that she was not you know, she wouldn't be that

(01:22:01):
for him if she didn't fit the the idea of
what he wanted romantically, and if she wasn't a woman,
you know, if it was a man, he would probably
be intimidated by him, because he's very clearly intimidated by
Tom in constant and chech Nichols. Yeah, every event around him,
he's constantly being like, well, I'm smarter than you. You

(01:22:23):
know that, right, And it's likely he was a child
and he rightfully gets beat up. Scene. Yeah, I was
kind of on the bully's side. I hate to say
it in that first, I mean to get into the
air and stuff. I agree with you, Caitlin that he
is definitely the character I like the least of these three,

(01:22:49):
but all I don't know. But it's like, also, I
really do hate Tom. I don't know, I have a
special kind of hate for Tom. I hate them for
different reasons. I guess. I don't know which one's more.
I guess. Yeah, it's like the rankings will become clear
with conversation. A tough choice. They're both so little bad,

(01:23:10):
Aaron Is. I mean, it's I do feel like it's
at least I guess again, the amount of intention because
it's It does kind of evade me a little because
they feel like there are so many characters that you
know throughout history of old media that we're supposed to
be like, oh, the lovable misogynist guy, and like, sure

(01:23:32):
he's a little insecure, and sure he punches down to
every woman he comes in contact too, but he's a door.
He's insecure. And the eighties are like the peak of
that had a sad sack. Nebish is the hero in
so many of these movies, and you realize in retrospect
they are the the antagonists in all of these movies.

(01:23:52):
They're the cause of every problem. It comes off the worst,
and it's it's because it's like constantly air And is
kissing his female coworkers without their consent, just like really
lunging and making a go for it. He feels entitled
to their time. He makes comments like like that comment

(01:24:13):
you mentioned Dave to Jennifer that was or Kaylie, I
forget who said, but like that completely inappropriate, like oh
you you must you know you would tell anyone you
love them, uh kind of thing. The way he acts
when the date rape segment is at when you know
he's the worst person in the world if there was

(01:24:34):
any doubt he is horrible, and like, I mean, we'll
we'll get into that segment because that's like very very interesting.
But you know, he has a lot of uh, dislike
and just dismissal towards women even when and I think
it is kind of like I mean, we've talked about

(01:24:55):
this all the time of of how it tends to
be at least more narratively interesting and you know, applicable
to see male characters who male audience members can see
themselves in. And I can, I can see, you know,
watching broadcast news. The casualness of his misogyny and the
casualness that he feels entitled to feels not unrealistic. And

(01:25:20):
it's not like a cartoon villain of a misogynist. It's
someone who is just projecting onto people who he doesn't
think are more powerful than him, and people who he
clearly doesn't think are gonna, you know, bring it up
or do anything. And I feel like his character is
so emblematic of that. He's like, what do you mean,
I'm a good guy? Like he's that kind of character,

(01:25:44):
But it's written, so I don't know. I like how
his character is written because it does. It feels like
a recognizable person who is saying despicable stuff really regularly.
But it's so it makes sense that it's normalized in
this Yeah, I think it's. Um it's important to note
that they cast a comedian in this role. So then

(01:26:07):
and if you cast a comedian, most likely you're going
to look at that person as sympathetic, especially when that
that type of character was considered heroic. Um. So casting
someone who is used to kind of begging for affection

(01:26:29):
in the way that all great comedic performers do. Even
if you if you have ever performed out a stage
and try to get people to laugh, you know how
kind of desperate that is, and how like he doesn't
want to be loved and I know, right, And so
Albert Brooks is able to bring that and that is
I think why he was only successful to a point

(01:26:52):
playing the lead in movies like this because one, he
and his co writer Monica Johnson, we're writing characters that
were loathsome and satirical for him most of the time.
But also because even when he's trying to be likable,
he's kind of annoying. You kind of don't like this
person because he just has this um like you said, this,

(01:27:17):
this underlying kind of menace and misogyny to his characters,
um that is softened in probably his most popular movie,
like I said, Defending Your Life, where he is the
romantic lead and he is trying to be a better person,
and he does get the girl at the end, and
he does kind of almost maybe possibly sort of deserve it,

(01:27:37):
but he's still it starts the movie as this self centered,
narcissistic person um. So I think there was never a
point where he was when he was going to be
a super duper movie star on the level of Steve
Martin or other other contemporaries of his because he was
so attracted to these parts that when a comedian had

(01:27:57):
to be unlikable in a in a lead role in
a movie, he was the one you went to because
he could be just likable enough but not afraid to
be completely unlikable. And that is again why I love
his work so much, is because he projects projects this
awareness in this vulnerability and also this um menace that

(01:28:20):
is recognizable. I think for a lot of people, a
lot of men who are looking at themselves and saying
I'm not so great. You know, there's a realism and
in an honesty to it that is incredibly rare. Even
when you're playing the most loathsome character in a TV show,
if you're Steve Carrell in the office, you still kind
of want to be liked. Albert Brooks most of his movies,

(01:28:41):
he's like, you don't have to like me. Stink and
does does he stink? That scene towards the end of
the movie where Jane is like, I'm going on this
trip with Tom, this is my last chance to see you.
Let's have lunch or whatever, and he and they're like
kind of saying goodbye, and they're like talking about their

(01:29:03):
futures and stuff, and then he says something like, oh,
here's what's here's how it's going to go down, will
you know, drift apart a little bit, and then we'll
reconnect a few years down the road and my son
will be there and he'll say something really mean to you,
and I'll have to jump in and be like, it's

(01:29:24):
not nice to say something about lonely fat women like that.
And it's just really a painful scene. Bad saying that
to your best friend. I was like, she still kind
of forgives him. Yeah, she I feel like there is
very much a vibe of like, that's our erin and

(01:29:44):
you're like, but why, why why are you friends er
this jackass? Yeah, I think she feels that way. I
don't think the movie is saying that it's okay. I
do think that the movie judges him harshly. And but
then when they like, the movie ends on what I
think is meant to be this like tender moment of

(01:30:07):
them reconnecting after like seven years and they're catching up,
and it's like, Jane get away from him, like this
guy sucks. You know, you've got your issues too, but
you can do better. And I was just I don't know,
I was just very disappointed. Yeah, it would have been
nice to have some Catharsis for her at some point

(01:30:28):
where she could really tell him off, But the movie
does not grant her that, or any of the characters
that really. I guess the scene in the airport where
Jane gives it to tom And and expresses her outrage
at his behavior is the only scene where any character
is truly dressed down. Everybody else kind of gets away

(01:30:49):
scot free with their with their problems, at least at
least their actual problems, you know, when when Aaron confronts
Jane in that restaurant at the end, he is not
saying anything true about her. He's not he's not expressing
any real issue that she has in her personality. He's
just being cruel for the sake of being cruel. Yeah,

(01:31:10):
I mean, he just like very much projects. I mean,
he's just he's the worst. And yet he is not
totally wrong about everything that he says, and that is like,
I feel like that kind of dovetails into the Tom
discussion a little bit. We're that scene with with him

(01:31:31):
and Jane where Jane is like, I think I'm falling
in love with Tom, and Aaron is just being a
total fucking baby about everything. He's like, but you're my
mom and my wife. What like, He's like spiraling, having
a total meltdown and just like peeing his diaper about it.
But then he brings up a point that is a

(01:31:53):
pretty good point about how Tom approaches the news and
how you know, you know, he said as Tom is
the devil and which is dramatic, but but also he
does bring up a point that Jane doesn't want to hear,
which is also kind of I thought, like a pretty
interesting thing that is like brought into her character of

(01:32:14):
like she knows, she's well aware that Tom doesn't know
what he's doing, and she knows that because she's doing
it for him a lot of the time, and sometimes
Aaron's doing it for him. In the case of that
big story about Libya where uh, you know, Aaron called
Jane and gave Tom the information he needed to look good.
She knows that because she told Tom off when she

(01:32:35):
first met him, like why are you whining to me?
Learn how to do your job? Then like why are
you telling me this? Like fuck you? But she's still
attracted to him, and she's struggling with that, which I
guess like if you're a comedian who's head sex with
a comedian, then you can understand that maybe that I

(01:32:57):
was like that interaction. I was just like I see
my life in this at times relatable, Like why doesn't
anyone laugh when I talk? I'm like, that's a you problem? Um.
In any case, like Aaron's view of Tom isn't wrong,
and that like Tom does it is kind of the

(01:33:17):
antithesis of what Jane claims to stand for. But she
thinks that maybe she could get an area of her
life filfelt that she hasn't had fulfilled in a long
time through him, and so she's getting to the point
where she's like, well, maybe I can overlook the ethics
of it, and Aaron does bring her back to earth,
and it's like, are you sure you can see overlook

(01:33:38):
the ethics of it? And it's just so like everyone
in this situation sucks and is making a huge compromise
of their morals And I hate that it's Aaron that
makes a good point, but I do think he he
makes a really good point there, Like he's simply not
wrong in that case. I almost wish that it had
been her to put the pieces of the puzzle together

(01:34:02):
and figure it out on her own. That Tom had
like brought only one camera and that he must have
staged it, and like, yeah, I don't. I feel like
the fact that it's Aaron doing it out of spite
and rage and selfishness is it takes some of the
thrill of victory away. But I wonder if you know

(01:34:25):
that too. Is The point is is you know, Jane
is so lost in her fantasy of who Tom is
or could be that she can't see so it has
to be someone else. But it has to be someone
acting in self interest as opposed to someone who really cares,
because none of them really care. All of them are

(01:34:47):
self interested at the end of the day, none of
them are truly altruistic in their behavior at all. There
is no truly good person in this movie. Everyone just
once love or approval or acclaim or esteem. Nobody is
thinking about how can I help someone else? I guess

(01:35:09):
on some level there is some altruism from Jane in
regards to her her coworkers a little bit, but not really.
Or Aaron choosing to leave instead of sticking around so
somebody could keep their job. Maybe, but not really. It's
still about yourself and self interest. Yeah, not enough not

(01:35:30):
to take the promotion. She's very nice to the people
who are laid off, but she still takes the promotion.
You know, in the same way that like Jack Nicholson,
when everyone's laid off, he's the clearest valid where they're
you know, they're like, oh, you want to shave a
million off of your salary, and he gets like, he's
like yeah. He starts histing and spitting, and then Paul

(01:35:51):
is like, I'm so sorry, that was the worst joke
I've ever made. What a silly joke I made. I
would never that is why I was not being serious.
It was very much a joke. And then Jack Nicholoson
goes but then it's like, but but Tom and Jane
are very involved in this too, where they you know,
they're they're nice to the people who were laid off,
but they take their promotion and they're going to go

(01:36:12):
on vacation about it. Like I got to clear my head.
Oh boy, that's that was hard for me. Okay, I
have a job so hard. I better go to wherever
they're going to go about it. Like you know, if
if you're if you put yourself in the in the
shoes of you know, Joe Cusack who just got laid off,
you'd be like, fuck you, you're going on vacation for what.

(01:36:34):
And I do like that exchange between um, Joe Cusack
and and Jane where she's like, except for socially, you're
my role model, which I think passes the Bechdel test.
I think that's as close as we get. Wow, that's
that's something right, that's something something. It's kind of a
funny path. I like it, But I did want to

(01:36:58):
talk about the the actual story read that I think
is like, you know, I feel like there's this little
ambiguity of like, Okay, so Tom is self aware that
he doesn't know what his job is, but how far
is he willing to go? Is he just going to
fail upwards passively or is he going to actively fail upwards?
And the moment where he the story he chooses is

(01:37:21):
particularly It's again, it's just like this like such an
ambiguous thing, or it was for me when I like
put my seven goggles on, because he does a story
on date rape, which in n was barely a term
that existed. It was not a popular discussion and at
that time would have been a risky broadcast. And I

(01:37:42):
feel like that is reflected in the way that it's received,
I mean, especially by Erin's like this isn't news. But
but I don't think that that is like as despicable
as a reaction as it was. I don't think it
would have been an uncommon one um at the time.
If this isn't the salt to nuclear dis armament talks,
who cares? Right? That was? That's the Aaron Altman attitude

(01:38:04):
about the news, and to a certain extent, Jaane's attitude
about the news, which is it has to be about
powerful men and countries and money changing hands and that
kind of stuff. But in this I mean, I thought
it was really well done the way the way that
scene was like shot, especially where we know as an
audience by the end that Tom spotlighted this story for

(01:38:28):
completely selfish reasons. He does not actually care about women
who are, you know, experiencing date rape. He does not
actually care about their stories. This is a side note,
but the woman who appears on screen and that news
item is accredited as date rape woman, so that's unfortunate
and in any case, uh like he's doing it for

(01:38:51):
selfish reasons, but he is championing a story that would
probably not have been told on the news otherwise, so
that's difficult. And then also watching the way that the
women in the room react to that story as they're
watching it was also really interesting where I think that
was one of Joan Cusacks more plot relevant moments where

(01:39:15):
she tells um she tells Jane like, oh, that happened
to someone I knew, And there's other women in the
room who were like reacting in a way of like, oh,
I recognize what she's talking about. And there is this clear, Like,
you know, we can't know because it's fiction, right, But
like I would guess that a story like this, even

(01:39:36):
though it was done for the most despicable, selfish, manipulative reasons,
which is why Tom did it, had probably a net
good impact because it had the potential to start a
conversation no one else was willing to have, to the
point where it even got to Jane, who Jane is like, well,
you know, fuck you for cutting to yourself, like literally
a Brian Williams move. But I was moved by the story,

(01:39:58):
which is a lot from Jane, who does prioritize these
stories about war and politically influential men, and for for
her to kind of hand it to any reporter about
a story that is about something that commonly happens to women,
those don't seem to be the kind of stories that
she champions, And so I feel like that makes that
almost I don't know, maybe I'm like reading too far

(01:40:20):
into it, but I feel like that that almost from
her perspective, makes the betrayal of him doing it disingenuously
even worse of Like, you know, he got her to
consider something as news that she hadn't previously considered as
news and then it turned out to be for this
really selfish reason and so not only is it unethical,

(01:40:41):
it was like he locked he you know, he was
able to get through her bullshit meter, which she can.
You know, it seems like she can handle almost any
level of bullshit, but he it was. It just is
like a betrayal on so many levels. There's another kind
of side note love to this where when this movie

(01:41:02):
was being filmed, William Hurt who plays Tom and again
another trigger warning here for sexual assault, but William Hurt
sexually assaulted his girlfriend at the time. Oh my god,
Marley Matlin, Wow, I did not know that. Yeah, I
didn't either. So you have this actor playing this character
who's like championing this story for very selfish reasons, and

(01:41:27):
an actor who is committing these atrocities that his character
is speaking out against, and the whole thing is just
a huge mind fuck. I mean, yeah, I think that
that's the movie makes a point about our society and
how we function with each other and the reasons why

(01:41:48):
things happen and why people what motivates people, and that
particular story is really telling because you know, you can
look at this movie and say, oh, this you know,
this was a movie that projected a lot of good
things about a gender equality and all of all that
into the world. But then, you know, you hear about

(01:42:11):
something like that and you say, oh, well, this person,
this real human being who's in this movie was in
this movie that you know, a lot of people hold
up as as as a step forward for feminism in
in entertainment. He did it for selfish reasons, the same
for the same reason. You know, the character he plays
in the movie puts this story onto the news, and that, unfortunately,

(01:42:35):
is why anything happens in a capitalist society. That is
the that is the form and function of capitalism when
it is going well, which is people will do good
things to satisfy themselves in their own egos, and that
is how it works. And that's good. You know, good
things will happen if people have you know, a financial

(01:42:58):
or personal stake in it. But that's ultimately not a
positive for the world. It is not good for people
to claim to be doing the right thing but for
it to really be you know, just for their own benefit,
and hypocrisy grows and grows and grows because that is

(01:43:19):
how we think the system should work, which is giving
people a praise for doing things in their own self
interest as opposed to doing things collectively, or doing things
altruistically or for a good reason that is centered on
other people as opposed to ego. It really breaks your brain. Yeah,

(01:43:44):
does anyone have any other things they want to talk about? Shockingly,
little black or brown faces in the movie. Oh, this
is a very very very white movie about a very
white industry. Oh and that, Yeah, that's there is one
black reporter, George, who, similar to Joan Cusack's character, could

(01:44:05):
be written out of the movie and you wouldn't notice
because he is in it so infrequently, and his character
is extremely insignificant to the larger narrative, which is extremely
unfortunate yet not surprising for a movie. Tokenism was certainly

(01:44:25):
very popular back then and still is to a certain extent. Yeah. Yeah,
and it's like of of of the many I mean,
it's of the many things that James Brooks seems to
want to point out, like, Hey, isn't this exclusion or like,
you know, change funked up in this industry? Whiteness never

(01:44:46):
comes into the equation. He that's like he interrogates the
gender dynamics of this workplace, constantly, but he never, never,
never interrogates the race dynamics of the workplace. Yeah. I
think there was a point in American culture and we
only recently got past it where there was this idea

(01:45:07):
of well, racism was solved in the sixties. We solved
it and everything's fine, and there's a black person in
the newsroom, and isn't that cute boy? He's got a
job and everything and died a little tie and su wow,
amazing and does he do what's his life? Like? It
doesn't matter? Um, yeah, it is not about him, So

(01:45:27):
move along, sir. Uh. That that is a very common problem,
and it is why we go from you know, the
gains of civil rights to seemingly regressing so significantly to
this point is because we were told the fiction that
it was solved through things like film and television and

(01:45:49):
literature the news like yeah, look at this, look at
we have diversity. The United Colors have been it on.
It's real. Everybody's equal. And I think token is had
the exact opposite result of what they wanted it to have,
which is that it it made people, um unaware of

(01:46:10):
the prejudice that exists. That it made people think that
things were fine. It created a fiction, and the actual
fiction perpetuated that that deception for decades until now when
it's all starting to boil over and people are finally
talking about it again and saying, it's not enough for
there to be a black judge in a movie. It's

(01:46:30):
not enough for the cops to be black. It's not
enough for there to be you know, one Latino actor, um,
and they happen to be playing a criminal and like, well,
no diversity. Look, we have this whole gang of of
of criminals and they're they're diverse, Like that is not
how it works. And it took forever for people to

(01:46:51):
see that that is just as harmful as having nothing
but white faces in a movie, if not more harmful.
I think it might be more harmful because it perpetuates
the fiction. The lie. Definitely. James Brooks, I feel like
it's just simply ill equipped to like he's he's he's
accomplished a lot, but commentary on race in any meaningful way.

(01:47:14):
It doesn't seem to be anything He's ever even really attempted,
and when he does, it seems like it is never gone.
Did you see spanglish? Oh wait, I forgot Spanglish did
solve racism? Am I right? Correct? Um almost ended his career.
It was so bad. I saw Spanglish I think in

(01:47:35):
elementary school, and I thankfully don't remember a single minute
of it. I've never seen it. You're fine to say
he did he direct that? Yes, that was he was
full on tour still at that point, you know, as
good as it gains has just recently come out Banglish. Yeah,

(01:47:56):
I think it was based on his actual housekeeper. No, wait,
this is all don't quote me on that. Looking up
on literary and academic resource Wikipedia if you want to
be sure, but I believe that he said something about
how it was inspired by his own life. Wait, this

(01:48:17):
is boom, holy sh it. Okay, this is news to me,
and I'm upset. This is broadcast news, this is brought.
Yet I feel a deep sympathy for James L. Brooks.
Just kidding. Yeah, well, fuck, folks, just take this as

(01:48:38):
a lesson if you are if you think you are
the hero of your own story, you're not okay. And
that is what I think movies and TV shows and
literature have done for men of all races, is to
say you are the hero of your story and everyone
wants to hear your story. Isn't that great? No? Now,

(01:49:02):
Albert Brooks was right. He is the villain of his
own story. I am the villain of my own story,
and all I can do every day when I wake
up is to be slightly less bad. I don't think
I'm horrible, but I think that I make tons of mistakes.
And uh, this movie is it has its heart in

(01:49:24):
the right place ultimately, but it is very unsuccessful at
a myriad of things, and I think we pointed most
of them out. I'm sure we missed some, but you
could always be better, folks. That is. That is the
one thing I hope everybody takes from from life is like, man,

(01:49:45):
we're messing up all the time. We can try to
be a little bit better tomorrow. Maybe you know where
where a work in progress all of us, and some
of us are progressing at a different rate than others,
or backwards or going the other way. We're simply refusing it.

(01:50:06):
But we said enough about this movie, haven't we? I
think so. I think it does pass the Bechdel test.
In the like again, Blair is like, hey, Jane, can
I tell you something? Jane? Yeah, Blair, except for socially,
you're my role model. It also, I does think passes
while they're watching the broadcast of the date rape story

(01:50:32):
where Blair says that happened to my cousin Donna and
Jane says really. So those are two extremely bleak passes,
potentially their technical passes that again are not I think
they are like impactful towards this story, but they're they're
not particularly uplifting or long. I would say that this

(01:50:56):
does technically pass, but not well, can I disagree it passes? Okay,
So two reasons why I think it does not pass.
Number One, in that scene in question, where there is
the video package about date rape, they are talking not
just about the thing that has happened to junqu sex

(01:51:17):
character's friend, they're also talking about the package itself that
is produced in Stars Tom. So Tom is still kind
of centered in this conversation. They're not able to separate
the contents of the package from the fact that it
is made by Tom, so they never really have a
true conversation about that issue. It is in reference to

(01:51:40):
this thing by a man exactly. And then when um,
she's talking about how Jane is her role model except
for socially you could interpret socially to mean romance of
a heterosexualat and so I just feel like it so

(01:52:00):
marginal and so fleeting that it would be unfair to
the test itself to pass this movie. This happens all
the time where we'll come upon conversations in which a
man is not explicitly mentioned or talked about, but it's
like implicit or the context or the subtext is still

(01:52:23):
about men do to quote a great to quote Homer Simpson,
a James L. Brooks creation, perhaps dough. I'll give it
a light pass, but also ultimately it's a flawed metric

(01:52:43):
that we barely with all due respect to Alice, Yes, yeah,
but but the nipple scale, though, is an amazing metric.
That's what I call em. Actually is awesome, and that's
what I call a metric. Um So the nipple scale
is our scale of zero to five nipples based on

(01:53:07):
an examination of intersectional feminism as it applies to the movie,
or how the movie fairs looking at it through that
particular lens. As we've discussed, this is a challenging movie.
This is a complex movie. This is a very interesting
movie that tackles a lot of things, that explores characters

(01:53:31):
and develops them in such a way that they are
far more just like complex and interesting than your average
romantic comedy dramay narrative. And like Jane, especially the way
that she's depicted, the way in which the toxicity that

(01:53:53):
the men are displaying, the way that all these characters
in these situations are being commented on. I mean, there's
a lot happening. Um how effective it is. You know,
it was the eighties, so certain things get overlooked, but
other things, like the commentary is very clear and present

(01:54:13):
and interesting. And I'm just stalling because I have no alright,
is there a number? How many nipples? I give it? Yeah?
Maybe it's just sort of like a split down the middle,
So maybe a two point five nipples situation. I wish

(01:54:36):
I don't know, I don't even know what I wish
for this movie or for movies like it. I wish
we could all kick William Hurt in the face. How
about that. I want to kick him, give him a
big old wedge. I want to thank you for that
context of him too, because I did not know that,
and that is, yeah, very upsetting. I came upon that
in my research a link to there's an article pulls

(01:55:00):
quotes from Marley Matlin's memoir Shout Out Marley Matlin Who Rocks,
in which she details the nature of her relationship with
William Hurt, which sounds like it was extremely emotionally, physically
and sexually abusive. So fuck William Hurt, his character, the

(01:55:22):
character of Aaron. Everyone just needs to go to therapy. Yeah,
I'm gonna I'm gonna give it to you and a
half as well. I feel like this is like a
really really I think the movie is really great, and
I like every time I watch it, I get something
new out of it that I didn't get before. I

(01:55:42):
think in terms of commentary on women, it's pretty limited
just based on the setting that we're being put in.
We're really only getting to know a single woman who
is very complex but also very ethically complex. And you know,
I'm not like saying that every email character needs to
be a role model. That's an unnecessary thing that's pushed

(01:56:04):
on a character that's marginalized in any way of all
of a sudden, they have to be a role model
for fucking everybody. That's not true. But Jane is ultimately
a girl boss who's in it for herself, like I
don't think we're getting a ton of I think that
we do get some really valuable insight into the ways
that she has to suppress herself and she has to
suppress her own emotions. She's under a lot of pressure.

(01:56:27):
There is a lot of pressure for her specifically to succeed.
If she fails, it indicates something larger to this industry
than an individual failure. Like I think that that all
comes across and the fact that like you, like you
mentioned earlier, Davi, the men around her are vampires who um.
I think it is an interesting look at a character

(01:56:47):
that it has been, you know, somewhat liberated by the
feminist movement as a you know, upwardly mobile white woman.
You know, she has been liberated to an extent, but
there are still all of these asterisks associated with her
being able to function in this space. She's still going
to be treated like a mother. She's still going to
be you know, if she's valued for her intelligence, it

(01:57:11):
that is at the sacrifice of something else. And there's
still a lot of stuff that play there, and she
she shouldn't have done that to Jennifer, you know, like
there was an opportunity to explore the relationships between women
in a workplace like this that didn't end up happening
in favor of this, you know, love trianglly bizarreness, like

(01:57:32):
there was just room for more. But I do think
that what is explored holds up maybe in a way
that's kind of unfortunate, that is like, oh, maybe not,
you know, maybe James Brooks hoped that more would be
different by now. I don't know, but it's definitely like
a really well thought out movie. And you know, and
and go Polly Platt. I'm glad that she got her first.

(01:57:55):
I mean, like her story alone and how it intersects
with this movie is a fascinat ending look at women
in the workplace at this time too. So give it
two and a half. I'll give one to Polly, I'll
give one to Holly, and I'll give a half to Joan.
Give it to Joan. Do I have to give nipples? Yes? Please?

(01:58:16):
All right? I mean I feel ill equipped to rate
this on any sort of inter sexual, intersectional feminist scale
because I'm a guy, and because I think for many
years I saw this as a paragon of feminist theory
in thinking, and that is because of my own Um,

(01:58:38):
you know, lack of understanding or awareness of of these things,
because it's not we're not taught these things in school,
you know, we're not taught how to look at things
differently and to empathize and put ourselves in the shoes
of marginalized people were taught to be. It's like I said,
it's very selfish and very self self centered, and to
look at the world through a white male lens. So

(01:59:00):
it's hard for me to say this is acceptable or unacceptable,
or this is enough or this is not enough. But
I will say just from my own perspective and what
I took from it as a man who is of
a certain age and from a certain generation, and seeing
the flowering of of people's perception of the world and

(01:59:21):
our our collective common struggle. Um, it was enlightening to
me every step of my life. Every time I watch it,
I think I learned something new, like you do, Jamie,
every time I watch it. And you know, when I
watched it the first time, it was, oh, this is
a you know, this is a feminist masterpiece, etcetera, etcetera.

(01:59:41):
When I watch it now, I get so much more
from the male characters because I can put myself into
the shoes of these loaths and male characters and say, oh,
here are things that maybe I thought before. We're okay
and aren't okay. And I can understand my effect on

(02:00:02):
people a little bit more. I can understand my effect
on women in the workplace a little bit more. I
can understand why I want or need certain attention from
women a little bit more, and why that may or
may not be damaging to them. That is what I
take from this movie more than anything else, is it
forces me to be a bit more introspective about who

(02:00:25):
I was raised to be and who I would like
to be going forward. And I think that's that's what
makes it a movie that I keep coming back to,
is because it is ultimately a satire about how we
talk to each other and why the world is the
way that it is from the micro level of the
news and the macro level of how men and women
or genders or sexuality functions in the world. So, yeah,

(02:00:47):
I will give zero nipples, but I will give it
two thumbs up, just like my good friends Siskel and Ebert. Yeah,
I just I just don't think I could. I can
judge it that way. I have to. I have to
judge it based on like what I'm learning from and
I think totally fair. Well, Dave, thank you so much
for joining us. What an I could have continued to

(02:01:12):
talk about this movie for another two hours, but that's
just that's too much. We went as long as the
actual movie right to do Right tell us where people
can follow you on social media, plug anything you'd like
to plug. Uh, I am at Dave underscore shilling on Twitter.

(02:01:34):
Please when you have time free, spare time, subscribe, follow,
Listen to Galaxy Brains. Uh. It is my new podcast.
My co host and I Jonah Ray talk about movies, television,
all of the pop culture things that we love, but
from a kind of comedically analytical perspective, hence the title

(02:01:56):
Galaxy Brain. So we we we will take a an
outlandish theory about a movie or a television show and
extrapolate upon that too. It's most absurd uh logical or
I guess illogical conclusion. We've done episodes about the Zack
s Nyder Justice League where we talk about the nature

(02:02:19):
of Superman and I end up giving a kind of
passionate speech about why Superman should be sad because he
is responsible for everyone else in the world. And why
he should be black. We talk about Godzilla versus Kong
and try to figure out what Godzilla represents in that movie. Uh.
We have an episode about Mortal Kombat and my moral

(02:02:41):
Kombat and professional wrestling are basically the same thing. Uh.
We talked to Patton Oswalt about Star Wars and uh,
the efficacy of animation versus live action in that universe.
And the episode I'm most excited about that we just
finished recording is a look back at Joe's and the
Pussycats for the anniversary, and we discussed whether or not

(02:03:05):
Josie and the Pussycats is not just a feminist film,
but also is it the most anti capitalist socialist movie
of all time? And our guests for that episode are
the writers and directors of Josie and the Pussycats, Deborah
Kathleen Harry Elfont. They were such a treat and spoiler alert,
they agreed with everything we had to say, and they

(02:03:27):
were very much appreciative of our reading of the movie.
So I hope you listen to that one at the
very least, because I think that's the one I'm the
most proud of because we got to really chop it
up with the people behind the movie and hear their
perspective on why they were able to and what they
hope to gain from making a movie that was so
very much about collective action and socialist thinking and feminist thinking.

(02:03:51):
I mean, Josie and the Pussycats is the best movie
ever joined the army because we did talk about subliminal
advertising too, and how it clearly worked on me because
I've seen the movie so many times. Oh my gosh,
it's same. I have not one, but two T shirts.
Did you get to do your T shirt? No, but
I have seen it on super yocky and I am

(02:04:15):
getting ready to buy it. Yeah. I know. Um well, Dave,
thank you so much for being here. You you can
follow us on social media at Spectacle Cast on Twitter
and Instagram. We've got a Patreon a k a Matreon
to subscribe to. It's five dollars a month and it

(02:04:38):
gets you access to two bonus episodes every single month,
plus access to the entire back catalog. And you can
grab some merch over at t public dot com. Slash
the betel Cast. Get some masks if you're still getting masks,
Got some T shirts if you're still wearing shirts. Live
your life not my business. Uh and are we signing off?

(02:05:00):
Oh my gosh, good night and good luck more at
eleven A great way to end it.

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