The Troubadour Podcast
"It is the honourable characteristic of Poetry that its materials are to be found in every subject which can interest the human mind." William Wordsworth The Troubadour Podcast invites you into a world where art is conversation and conversation is art. The conversations on this show will be with some living people and some dead writers of our past. I aim to make both equally entertaining and educational.In 1798 William Wordsworth and Samuel Coleridge published Lyrical Ballads, which Wordsworth called an experiment to discover how far the language of everyday conversation is adapted to the purpose of poetic pleasure. With this publication, he set in motion the formal movement called "Romanticism." 220 years later the experiment is continued on this podcast. This podcast seeks to reach those of us who wish to improve our inner world, increase our stores of happiness, and yet not succumb to the mystical or the subjective.Here, in this place of the imagination, you will find many conversation with those humans creating things that interest the human mind.
The Troubadour Podcast
Dissecting Romance: From 'An Affair to Remember' to the Realities of Love
As the golden age of cinema meets contemporary skepticism, my guests Mark Pellegrino, Jax Schumann, and Jennifer Buoani help me peel back the layers of the beloved film "An Affair to Remember." We grapple with whether the idealistic portrayal of romance in this classic can still kindle the fires in our modern hearts. Join us as we navigate the complexities of love and self-discovery through the lens of film and literature, examining the characters' quests for authenticity against a backdrop of societal expectations and exploring the transformative power of deep emotional connections in our own lives.
This episode isn't just a critique; it's a rich tapestry of discourse offering insights into the personal growth within relationships, inspired by Ayn Rand's philosophy and Torey Backman's storytelling tenets. We dive into the realm of romantic narratives, pondering the balance between artifice and genuine chemistry on screen, and how these stories inform our personal experiences. The authenticity of Cary Grant's on-screen charm provides a springboard for our debate on the nature of love's tabloid expectations versus its profound reality—how does one truly become worthy of another?
Our candid conversation takes you on a journey through heartbreak, betrayal, and the pivotal moments that forge our identities. We uncover raw tales that test our principles, shape our sense of self, and ultimately, reveal the steel within us. By examining love's capacity to transform and the role of individuality in art, we offer a unique perspective on the essence of love, its trials, and its triumphs. So, if you're ready to confront the highs and lows of romance both in the cinematic world and within the intricate web of our own lives, settle in for an episode that promises to resonate with anyone who's ever dared to love.
Welcome everybody to the Viewing Room. I have Mark Pallogrino, jax Schumann and Jennifer Buoni with me to talk about An Affair to Remember and maybe other affairs We'll see. So stick around. I think this is going to be a fun one for sure.
Speaker 1:And if you haven't seen Affair to Remember, it's 1957, cary Grant, deborah Kerr, and it's about two people Terry McKay, played by Deborah Kerr, and Deborah Carr. Deborah Carr sorry, Deborah Carr, deborah Kerr sounds like a slur, and Cary Grant plays Nikki Florente. Is that correct? Am I getting that? Florente, nikki, florente, niccolo, they're on a cruise, they're both a cruise, they're both engaged to other people, but they fall in love. And he says you know, we'll meet in six months, famously to meet at the top of the empire state building. This is in sleepless in Seattle, and many other movies have talked about this. We're going to talk about it now. It's our time to talk about an affair to remember. So before we get into it, team, what do you think? Thumbs up, thumbs down, thumbs middle, two thumbs, three thumbs what are you thinking? Uh, we'll start with Jack's this time.
Speaker 2:Oh right, as I'm like chewing my food.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, we'll, we'll, we'll come back. Okay, it didn't stand the test of time for me. Oh man, I even wore a special shirt for this one.
Speaker 2:huh yeah, I even wore it's saint patty's day, so that's as we record just recording yeah so this will be released in a couple weeks.
Speaker 1:but okay, so two thumbs. So I'm gonna do my best to see if I can turn those sideways thumbs up upwards. We'll see, I'm gonna do my best. Um, okay, jack. So, mark, what do you think?
Speaker 4:I sort of got. I have to agree with Jackson, I love romantic stories. So despite my thumb sideways, I did drop a tier or two at the end, I have to say, because that's just the way it rolls for me, and and, and a few other places as well, I have to say.
Speaker 1:Okay, Uh and Jennifer.
Speaker 3:Um, I just, I guess I'm the eighties and John Hughes, and and then Harry Met Sally and all of these great romantic comedies that really stand out to me.
Speaker 4:Say anything, come on.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this one was a little dated for me, but there were. There were moments that I appreciated and were real, and we can talk about that.
Speaker 1:Okay Now I definitely give it two thumbs up, so I'm going to see if I can convince anybody by the end. If not, that's okay, I'll still love it, but I've always loved this film. I think it's great for a variety of reasons, but I'd like to dig into what the story is.
Speaker 2:So wait, what's your special shirt?
Speaker 1:What? But I'd like to dig into what. So wait, what's your special shirt? What's the? What's the? Oh, just like a romantic shirt.
Speaker 2:That's all, just like you're wearing a romantic shirt.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, I've gone on dates with this shirt.
Speaker 3:This is your date shirt. It's exactly one that the ladies have said oh, this is definitely my date sweater yeah, like we'll try to.
Speaker 1:You know, like I don't have the, so we can talk about carrie grant a little bit. So this is a romance, it's. I don't even think it's a romantic comedy. This is like just romance. It's. Romantic comedies, I think, come a little bit later. I think they do exist at this period to some degree. I don't know the origins, but, uh, it's probably like roman holiday and those types of things, but where there's a little bit more of a lighthearted thing that's pulling them apart. This is a little bit more serious about what's pulling them apart and that's. That's basically. By the way, I would say, I don't know if you guys agree with me, but I think that's.
Speaker 1:The essence of romantic stories is that you have two people, but something is getting in the way of them getting together, and that's it. And you know, in this case there's they're both engaged at the first half of the movie and then the second half of the movie. Okay, by the way, everyone, the spoilers are happening, definitely right now. So if you haven't seen it, go watch it and then come back. So, okay, bye, okay, here we go. Spoilers are she gets hit by a taxi and she is maybe crippled for life Can't walk. That's kind of what brings them apart the second half. So this is a more serious romance in that sense.
Speaker 1:I think, than a lighthearted romantic comedy, in my opinion. So now I really love this story because I think it fuses idealism of romance with the problems and the tribulations of reality, and so it's really that to me that those two things are dominant throughout this story in many different ways and they're hit on different angles. But we'll get into that a little bit more. And I'd be curious to hear from all of you, because you all had tepid views of it, and Mark said he really loved the ending, and the ending is powerful. I don't know how anybody could not have any kind of reaction to that unless you already knew it going in. But you all mentioned movies today. What is it about this movie that fell? Mediocre or tepid is the word I'll use for each of you and whoever would like to start with your thoughts. Yes, mark, what do you got? Okay?
Speaker 4:Well, um, I, I thought, I thought this may be in the writing, it may be in execution, but, um, the, the execution of the scenes where they're. They're attempting to avoid social censure. They don't want to be too out in the open because he's famous and people are going to start talking and the news is going to get back to their, their betrothed, you know, on the mainland, and they're going to get in trouble. So they try to sneak around a little bit on the ship. But all the ways in which the, the, the, the, the passengers find them out were were very, uh, contrived. You know where? They're sitting at a table together, they. They're sitting at a table ostensibly apart, separated by a partition. They don't know that they've actually gotten single tables that are right next to each other and the whole place is turning looking at them and laughing yeah, it's, it's.
Speaker 4:It's naive in a way and and just it makes me it's. It's too on the nose. There's a lot of on the nose acting oh yeah, in this. That doesn't leave up a lot up to the imagination. Um, I did like the chemistry between the two people, although I didn't see charles boyer's version, the earlier one, the love affair, which is supposedly better, um is that what this is based on?
Speaker 2:was it like a remake of?
Speaker 4:it a whole. Yes, it's like a.
Speaker 4:Everything's the same, except for the for the actors interesting and and they have an interesting chemistry together and I noticed sparks of uh connection, which I look for as an actor. That's what draws me in to the characters. But but the execution was naive and I thought I thought the obstacles, the obstacle of social sensor, that's a real thing, but it's, it's delivered to me in a naive way. As a 21st century man I can't quite get behind. And the obstacle in the second part of the movie seems like a contrivance to me, because if I love somebody and I can't get to them because I get into an accident and I'm paralyzed and in the hospital but I eventually come to my senses, I'm going to get to that person and say I couldn't make it because I just want you to know I tried. I'm in the hospital right now. That would be me.
Speaker 1:And so that's it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's an interesting thing. I have a different take on that, but that's what I would be.
Speaker 4:That's what I would be doing. That would be the focus of my, of my attention is getting back with that person to let them know I showed up. I want you to know I showed up. They reject me now because I'm, you know, I'm not the same person in a way that I was before, but I showed up.
Speaker 4:So the idea of her not doing it, imposing this obstacle on herself that she's going to walk first before she she goes to see him, just felt like a contrivance. Now, it might not be. It may be what people actually do in life that I'm not acquainted with it, I don't, I don't know people like that, but it may be. However, it struck me as a contrivance. All that aside, there's still. There's still.
Speaker 4:You know, you still want, as a viewer, the tension to be resolved between the two people by actual reconciliation. You do want that because you see, you see them they don't kiss until halfway through the movie, pretty much the crew almost over. So there is a there's a part of you as a natural uh, you know observer to the narrative that wants the tension to be released by by that coming together of the two of them. They do build up that quite well and when it finally does happen, you do experience an emotional release when he sees the picture and puts two and two together. It was a beautiful thing for me still, despite the fact that I thought it was naively rendered.
Speaker 1:Okay, I have a lot to say about that, but I do want to hear from everybody else. Okay, I have a lot to say about that, but I do want to hear from everybody else. So about your, particularly your views of the tepidness that you felt?
Speaker 3:why did you feel the tepidness, Jennifer? Let's start going this way this time.
Speaker 1:Well, what you put thumbs sideways like Mark.
Speaker 3:So what were your reasonings for doing that? Well, I'm going to bounce off of what.
Speaker 3:Mark said I agree with Mark on two things and not on one. So I was right in there with the chemistry on the boat. I thought they did a really good job of being natural and I felt like that felt real, especially when they got to the grandmother's place, especially when they got to the grandmother's place. And I also had an issue with some of the contrivedness of the situation. But for me that carried most strongly at the end, when Mark was crying, I was going oh, come on, he just happens to go into the bedroom and happens to have uh, remember the story about the the um painting that was sold to a person like I?
Speaker 1:that was you don't think he would remember the first painting he had. He sold every ad of the story why would you walk across the room and go in the bedroom like because he remembers?
Speaker 2:because it's in the script. Jennifer, it's in the script.
Speaker 4:He doesn't see the painting and there's another room. He doesn't see the painting in the room, so he goes into the room that has the closed door to see if it's there. Yeah, it's interesting. That's. It's quite a leap. I mean, I was wondering how they were going to make that resolution, and so I it. It does feel a bit cheap, but it I still. I still took the leap too. I still took the leap all right, let's keep going.
Speaker 3:Jennifer, I'm sorry, I uh what else what well, what I did, like I really like their choices that they had to make. Um. So, after this romance has started and they're sitting, um, hanging over the the railing of the boat it's about to dock and she's like, yeah, you boat. You realize that the reality of their world she's she's dating a very wealthy man and she doesn't have any other options. Yet and he's stating he's getting married to a wealthy woman and he really doesn't have any work skills. And they realize if, for their love to work, they're going to have to take some major risk and be independent and living on their own. And they decide to do that for six months. And I really appreciated that part of the story. I thought that was really strong and realistic, yeah.
Speaker 2:She doesn't really do that, though. That's the problem, that I had with that. She doesn't, I didn't think she did well she becomes a singer again yeah, yeah, I guess she does, but she, she does. She becomes a singer and a teacher, but she still has the, the, the fiance is like still hanging around and she lets him kind of take care of her too, doesn't she? She's becoming, I think she's becoming independent.
Speaker 4:It was when that stuff, part of the movie, happened I was asking myself why wouldn't objectivists actually like this movie? But it was that section where it started to come alive to me, because they became individuals for the first time, not dependents, they became, you know, he. He went to his art that he didn't have enough confidence to do before and he started painting and living as a painter. And she pursued her dream, you know, she went to school to become a singer and music and literature and it was unfulfilled in the life that she was going to lead with this new man. And so she went and pursued that and that was like, ah, that was a light for me, like, oh, I could see why this could be interesting on this level, at least for an objectivist. But I'm still dying to know more.
Speaker 1:So, Jax, what was you had the tepid response as well. What was your reasoning for it?
Speaker 2:I mean kind of the sort of along along the same lines. I didn't have as much of an issue with the the ending as jennifer did, just in terms of the um of the painting, although I did fall asleep and sadly I had to make my boyfriend watch it three times over and before because it was late, um but, and he wasn't really into it, uh but, but I liked um, uh, okay, so what? I let me say what I liked about it. I did, I liked their um, I did like their, their chemistry on the boat. I did think that it was. It was a very quick setup and that's kind of. I think that's one of the reasons why it didn't stand the test of time. For me it was a very quick setup, like boom, you know, they meet within like the first two minutes basically of the film and uh and like instant chemistry. But I do think that they did a really good job with that um. That can't happen. You can't have this, okay, you can definitely yes you can you can definitely you can.
Speaker 2:Maybe we should all talk about. Maybe we should.
Speaker 1:Oh, you were going to talk about love.
Speaker 3:Our chemistry stories Maybe.
Speaker 2:Maybe we could. We'll talk about love affairs, but I, I think for me it I kind of missed the mark. For me it didn't, um, it didn't feel like truly, were like a more insecure version of me. I guess I wouldn't, I would, I would be sort of, oh, he's not going to want me now I'm, I like I don't have the use of my legs and and I identified, you know, I've always identified with being able to walk around and you know, and I was a singer and you know, and and a beautiful right, and now and now who would want me? And so I could, I could actually understand that.
Speaker 2:I could understand why she wouldn't say anything, despite how much she loved him. So that part, I was actually kind of okay with that part, but the I just I also I really didn't like her poor fiance was so supportive of her and he's so in love with her and and I just didn't know how to feel about how like he was just allowing his own heart to get trampled, right, just, and he was going to, he was getting nothing out of it, right, he's there, their relationship was over. I kind of felt like she was using him a little bit.
Speaker 1:Well, she was honest with him, though it's not like she said At least she was honest with him. It's one thing if she's like, yeah, maybe I'll be with you and then he's taking care of her. She was clear and he still wanted to, but he was such a nice guy. Sometimes the nice guys I don't know if you've heard of this sometimes the nice guys don't get the ladies. Nice guys finish last.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sometimes, I will say I don't think that there's anything I've seen Cary Grant in that I don't like. I really love Cary Grant.
Speaker 4:You don't like his own laces.
Speaker 1:Pardon grant I I pardon, did you say arsenic and old lace?
Speaker 4:yeah, you don't like that, I do like it, but he's, he's huge. In that huge, it's appropriate. It's appropriate for the piece because the piece is very okay, I love.
Speaker 1:I also love that.
Speaker 2:It's one of my I just I, just I love his mannerisms. He's just very, he's cool.
Speaker 1:I want to buy a suit and yeah, classically, I want to, like, get some cigarette. I love his mannerisms, he's just very, very classic. Yeah, classically, I want it like.
Speaker 2:I want to be able to sit down and cross my legs like he does and put his hand in his pocket and it just looks so like not feminine at all. Like if any other man did that you know it would look feminine, but he just makes it look like fricking manly.
Speaker 1:He's classy, as like he's the definition of classy af he is he's really cool. So I want to talk about this ending and then we can move on.
Speaker 2:So, mark, go ahead, you're going to say something I don't know if I should yes, you should more of the dark side no, it's more of the dark side of oh, okay, okay not in the life in that sense with carrie grant, because yeah, I'm sure that's very common, unfortunately.
Speaker 1:Yeah, uh, but yeah for the ending. So, mark, you were saying you didn't like the contrivance of the ending in the sense of one that she wouldn't go to him when she was hit. Now it's interesting.
Speaker 4:So jacks was saying that she wouldn't at least tell him. Now I can understand what Jax is saying and I can, you know, not wanting to be a burden on somebody, being self-conscious about how different you are now than you were before, and not wanting to be rejected Like you could see, like now that you're different, now that you're potentially problematic, somebody might not want to be with you again, but I would have to communicate with them that I showed up.
Speaker 1:So one of the things I've noticed about a lot of movies, my criticism of a lot of romance movies where they throw in the word love, is that I never buy that the two characters are actually in love. I don't know anything about other than they say that they're in love here, and I'm going to give you a couple of examples. I think it's so clear why these two characters are magnetically attracted to each other, and it's not just their beauty, I mean there's that's obviously the surface level at a certain point. But like, just as an example, when you see the opening right before they're about to meet the meat cute, if you, as as you, as you will like what Cary Grant says. So this guy is big old under chin comes up to him like, do you want to come and hang out with my wife and sister and play poker with us? And you remember what Cary Grant says.
Speaker 2:Oh, he says that he's a cheat.
Speaker 1:He says I cheat and it's an addiction Right.
Speaker 4:And then he walks over.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he walks, so like, and he is, he's a playboy. He was just talking to Gabriella, right, and she's like you're married, that's okay, uh, and and so. And then he goes, uh, and he says I think you have my jewel case now. What does uh, mackie, terry mackie, the, the actress deborah curse. What does she say? Her first line to him so he's a cheat. She says I'm a. She has a cigarette case, silver jewel thief. They're the same person.
Speaker 1:They're both this and they both have a similar background. They're in the sense of you know, she, she comes up from a place where she's dancing, singing in nightclubs from when to when, from 10 pm to 3 am. I mean, this is the dark hours, right, this is the erotic era. Like she is, she's like a stripper, she's essentially, I think, a 1940s version of that kind of thing and he's a playboy going around the world sleeping with different women and living that kind of lifestyle and being a Lothario and things like that, and so, in other words, I don't think they're great people in that sense, right, and they're very lighthearted on this love thing, and but they connect with each other, they find this love with each other and they see that because they're also similarly matched in their repartee right, so the repartee is on point and and she can really attack him and go back.
Speaker 2:Like they play the game yeah, she's definitely a worthy adversary.
Speaker 1:She's a worthy adversary 100%. She plays him as much as he plays her. The lines and the dialogue, I think, is phenomenal. I have a whole bunch of these quotes here. The dialogue is great. There's so much subtext. Every line is subtext, which to me is great. Maybe some people don't like that as much and maybe that's the writer in me or something.
Speaker 4:No subtext is great. That's the way modern screenplays and plays are written. It's what's underneath the words. The words could be saying exactly the opposite of what their intent is, and that's great. There's lots of innuendo in the things that they say. It's very, very good.
Speaker 1:There's lots of innuendo in the things that they say. It's very, very good. So all I'll say is so I think their characters, before they meet, are very similar. She comes from this seedy place where she's getting pinched by her manager and then he's going around sleeping with women and then they meet and then they have to figure out how to actually make a love work, and that's the complex part. And I think they fall in love in the you know, southern what is it? Southern France, where they go to the grandmother, where it's basically an Eden. It's, it's very the cults of love there's, there's all kinds of reverence, commentary, and that's where they fall in love. And then they come down to earth. There's a great line where she says, you know, there's a joke, like he says, oh, it looks beautiful down there. And she's like, oh, do you know the old joke? And he's like what joke? Yeah, you know, if it's so beautiful down there, why'd you bring me up here? Right, and but it's like this idea of how to navigate it, classic romance, classic rob connor. In that sense now I'm interested. It's interesting that you think it's contrived though the, the ending, um, because so yes, in a sense, like you could say it's.
Speaker 1:I think it's some characters, might some people. I probably would tell the person like, uh, I, I I shouldn't admit this, but, like you know, when I've had a breakup and it's like and I almost felt like man, if I did get in a bad accident, I could call this person and be like, like something, like it's not a great fantasy, it's a horrible thing, but it's like. You might say that kind of kind of thing, you might feel that, but the whole point is that they want to become worthy of each other. That's the whole point of the six months, that's the whole point. And so when she kind of gets knocked down remember what's their line about pedestals he holds them up right. What's the problem with pedestals? They wobble and topple. She was toppled and now she's like well, I'm not on the pedestal anymore. So she's afraid. And I think a lot of us have this fear when it comes to romance, about we build a pedestal for somebody and then if it wobbles it's not going to be. You know what we thought it would be. So those are some of my thoughts about why I loved it so much.
Speaker 1:I think they're great characters, are great people. That great people. They're the same kind of person going through the same kind of thing. They meet in this scenario, they're magnetically attracted. I'll say that. I mean I just I'll be honest. I experienced this this last summer at a conference where when you're attracted to someone in a confined space like that, and it's like they're every time they just run into, like they literally bump heads in the swimming pool and I I don't know if you have you guys ever felt this in real life where it's just like you know you're not supposed to be with somebody and it's just like it's just you cannot get away from them and you draw into them so intensely and I thought they did a great job of that. Anyway, I don't just think of that stuff who wants to go?
Speaker 2:Uh. So I, I, I did like the, um like I I will double down on the. I did like the ending, um and uh, I I liked the, I did like the chemistry between the two of them. I've definitely been in that situation too, where you just you like you keep running into somebody and you're like, and they're, and they're like're like. You know, in my case it was like the wrong person that I should have been running into, but we couldn't, like you know, keep ourselves apart, uh, but um, normally that's the way it is with chemistry attractions like yeah yeah, yeah, wrong person and that's why I think.
Speaker 2:But what's, what is good about that is that they wanted to be. They wanted to become the right person for each other. Yes, you know they wanted to be.
Speaker 3:I want to earn it.
Speaker 2:I do like that aspect. They wanted to become worthy. They did it. They chose six months for a particular reason. It wasn't just. You know, as soon as we get off the boat, we're going to ditch our fiancés, and you know let's get married, you know. So I did think that was I did.
Speaker 4:I mean, I would never put it in that way, but you put it, you frame it in a way formulation is interesting to me that they wanted to become the right person. I took it more, as they're taking the six months, to see if the feelings still persist, if they're still thinking about each other. It's a trial period at which they will see whether the relationships they're already in are indeed the right ones to go with or or this feeling still persists with them and if it's still there after six months and there's something real there, the why do you think that, though, because they break up very quickly after they leave the boat with both their partners?
Speaker 1:because I think like, so I took it as they were my argument.
Speaker 4:I just I took it again as they're in the throes of this passionate feeling and they, they simply can't sit with the other person. In that I've been there before. Oh yeah, I think we all have with another person. But you're with somebody else and you're like you really can't, you really can't be there. Um, even though your, your, your mind is telling you I want to give this some time, I want to see what the fuck is going on, you get with the person and it's all wrong. It's all wrong, and so you're. You're still feeling. Your feelings compel you to sort of go ah, this isn't working for me. I gotta, this isn't right. Yeah, I've been on both sides of that issue, with, with, with people before. So that's why I took, that's why I took the six months, as did they explicitly say let's not, let's just be, let's be. We want to become better for each other.
Speaker 1:Yes, he says that. He says that specifically and in fact, that is also the 1939 explicit thing is he needs to become worthy of specifically him and more than her.
Speaker 4:Where does he say that this is before they leave the ship? So he says that then?
Speaker 1:Yeah, because like he look he's, his character is he's bored about life. He's good at everything. Life is boring to him. He doesn't try anything. All he does is sleep with women who are rich, go on their yachts and be taken care of. So he needs to learn how to take care of her and that's part of the whole point of his journey. And he says explicitly that I want to take six months to try something to become.
Speaker 1:I don't remember exact line, I'm about to look it up now, but yes, he does, I think, very explicitly say that that's what he's trying to do. And in fact, in the interview, when, remember, he's interviewed, when he with his wife, when he comes home and and she's like um, you know, and the reporter's like you do you want to? Um, you know, what are you going to do to take care of her? Remember, she's 600 million dollars 1957, that's how much she's worth, right, like? And he's like what are you going to do to take care of her and keep up in a lifestyle? He's gonna, I'm gonna be a painter. And she's like you're gonna do what? And it doesn't, because he wants to do this thing to become worthy. And then he like paints a lot he does, painting on advertising posters, like he does whatever it takes to try to become worthy of her. He tries to build his own life, which he never did.
Speaker 4:He used other people to have his life maybe I didn't see enough of him going through the transformation. It was that's, it's, yeah, it's, you know. I see him selling a painting to trying to sell his paintings to a art dealer, and then I see him at a billboard and like, oh, he must have progressed quite a bit. Now he's doing it for a living, but it wasn't I never. That's a regression?
Speaker 1:the painting of the billboards a regression of his career?
Speaker 4:no, no, but it's not To me. It's not To me. It's not a regression, because this is a guy who would hang out with multi-millionaires and do nothing. And here he is working.
Speaker 1:I mean to me.
Speaker 4:I found that as a step up. He's now deciding that he's got to get his hands dirty.
Speaker 1:Yes, it is a step up, but I think his first career goal was to be a painter of his actual paintings. He can't sell them. He cannot sell them, and on his own, because, remember, he doesn't want to use his own name. So the art dealer's like, if I could use your name, I could sell these, and he's like, no, I got to do it on my own and so he cannot sell his paintings as an artist, so he paints advertisers for other things. Now I agree with you, it is a step up from like you got to start at the bottom and work your way up.
Speaker 4:It's morally it's a moral?
Speaker 4:yes, absolutely, but it is a step down from what he had envisioned at first, which was to be a painter right and then he eventually does get that, uh, I think, I think about the transition didn't work for me, even if he did, explicitly, I must have, I must have missed it because I didn't. I didn't know that this was the time at which he was going to, you know, put himself through ordeals to become a better man. This was, this was the trial by fire so that he could meet up to the standards of what it would take to actually be married to the woman that he loves. Um, that's a, that's very good. I like that concept. I just didn't, I just didn't, I didn't, I didn't. Uh, I wasn't on board, I didn't, I was I love.
Speaker 3:This is what I loved about it.
Speaker 4:I love that they were pursuing their dreams, but I didn't know that it was for the purpose of. Yeah, that was the directed purpose of becoming better people for each other, because she doesn't strike me as near stripper.
Speaker 3:No, I didn't pick up on that.
Speaker 4:He strikes me as a fob, but not as morally decrepit as a playboy.
Speaker 1:Well, but he's clearly morally decrepit as a playboy. And she has just said that that's where she comes from.
Speaker 4:And then that was her thing. Thing doesn't make it so, by the way.
Speaker 1:strippers a little harsh. All I'm saying is she, like the 10 to 3 am crowd, is a particular crowd that she's catering to.
Speaker 2:I think she's like a cabaret. I saw her more like cabaret.
Speaker 1:That's fair. I don't have any problems with it personally. By the way, I'm saying in the world that they're in I think there's, you know, think they're on the outskirts of socially acceptable in a lot of ways and they're using other people her, the man who's a banker in mergers and him an heiress.
Speaker 2:To legitimize themselves, you think, are they using them to…?
Speaker 1:Yeah, to live this, to continue this fairy tale thing that they don't actually like. It's not really them, it's really the tab, tabloid-esque vision, vision.
Speaker 4:so let me ask you, let's move on to the tabloid part so I like that because they do go to finding their authentic selves. And yeah, I would like that.
Speaker 1:That's part of it. So let's talk. I'm curious if you guys um jennifer Jacks, some tabloid stuff, so you notice it starts with tabloid. Ask right, you have these three, two or three radio announcers talking about the love affair between Nikolai, nikolai and uh, what's the um?
Speaker 2:Gabriella, is it Gabriella?
Speaker 1:No, that's the one he's having an affair with.
Speaker 2:That's the one he's having, yeah.
Speaker 1:He has. He's marrying Lois Clark.
Speaker 2:I think happening. Yeah, he has. Yeah, that's right she's. He's marrying lois clark, I think it's her name and uh, oh, that's right, because it was reminded it was.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it reminded me of lois and clark. Yeah, I don't know if that's, I don't, yeah, lois, so anyway. So you know, there's all these, there's all these expectations, and I thought you know, of what their love is like. In a sense, it's like ooh la la, she's got a lot of lettuce and what a tomato. Right Is what he said. That's not the one guy said, and there's, you know. So I'd be curious, like there's the expectations of their love that everybody else has of them, and then there's the actual experience and this seems to be very much like the tabloids today and of all times Of we have our visions of what love is, of these stars, and then there's the reality of it, in a sense, where they're not really even enjoying that experience. What do you guys think about that?
Speaker 4:I think that's very real. I think most people have this experience now with social media, where people advertise their relationships as something they're not, everybody thinks, oh my my, they're happy, they have the perfect relationship. Look at them traveling all over the world.
Speaker 2:Look at all their Facebook posts and Instagrams.
Speaker 4:Yeah, miserable, they're actually miserable together, yeah. So yeah, there's definitely. There's definitely that idea that, uh, you know, there's a there's a wide gap between the ideal and what actually is.
Speaker 1:Yes, which I think is the theme of this story. Jennifer Jacks comments Interesting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's interesting. I like that. It was interesting that they started with the reporters right All around the world that are reporting on Nicky. It's Ferranti, right, Is it Ferranti?
Speaker 1:Ferranti. Yeah, Niccolo Ferranti.
Speaker 2:Niccolo Ferranti and kind of all throughout, as their romance is growing on the ship, they're fighting against the tabloids, right Against being found out. He takes the negatives out of the camera and throws it up, but then it kind of like, then they were like selling them right and the reporters kept taking pictures and then selling pictures of them somewhere. So I thought that I don't really have much more to say, though, just about, like, the tabloid aspect. I don't know if Jennifer's got anything to to add to it. It wasn't it. I mean, it wasn't like a, it didn't like strike me in a particular way. So maybe there was something you were seeing in it, kirk, that I, that I missed Well.
Speaker 1:I think it goes. So there's. I see this theme hit in different ways over and over again. I mean, let's just take the little boy, right. So there's a, there's a scene with a little boy where he's tangled up. What's the point of this scene? So you have a little boy, he's, he's like a little, um, cary Grant, almost like he's like a you know cute little boy who's tangled up in something. And then she comes to try to untangle him and, uh, you know, he looks. And he looks at Cary Grant. He's like what you're, you're?
Speaker 1:Or the Cary Grant says to the little boy you're quite a little fellow. And he says and the little boy says you're quite a little fellow, right, it's the same thing, and people are talking about you. And then when he, when Cary Grant, walks away, he's like it it's on you. And so what does she do, she? She tries to console him. She puts her hands on his leg and says into the little boy and like oh it's. You know, you got to be careful because you might break your leg, and I did that. I fell out of a tree and broke my leg.
Speaker 4:When, and the little boy says um, good, now or something, yeah, he says like so what's wrong with your leg now?
Speaker 1:she's like nothing, it's fine. He's like so what are you crabbing about? The idea to me, the idea of falling from the tree right, going from the high to the low, yeah, you might get a little bit of hurt, so what? Get over it. Like, go for it.
Speaker 2:And to me was that like a uh an. I didn't even think of that. Yes, I know.
Speaker 1:I thought of that. I did not think of that. That's really good, but to me it's this high-low theme, over and over and over and over, all the time. The grandmother can literally not descend down because she is heavenly. The Empire State Building is the high. That's the whole point. And remember, why does she get hit? What is she doing?
Speaker 1:She's looking up, she's looking up and sometimes when you look up you get hit by a car. That's reality and that does happen and that is a part of the looking up. But it's a danger. That doesn't mean don't look up, it means deal with it, Like the little boy says you okay, Get over it, Stop being crabby. Yeah, Like it's worth it. In other words it's and I have to think about fountainhead like same kind of scenario. In a sense it's like, yeah, there's pain, but it only goes so deep and let it happen, it's okay. It doesn't mean give up on the ideals and that's what I see so many people doing today Loved and lost, the never to have loved at all.
Speaker 1:Well, there's that too, which is by the way that's from Tennyson in memoriam.
Speaker 1:It's a great poem and that's actually about a death and there's. But that's the idea behind that is, I think there's pain is part of loving. It can happen, but that doesn't mean don't love and don't go after romance. And what these two characters were doing was they're going after the pure practical. And I have to say, in our era I don't know I see this as like the dominant theme of love and relationships, where people basically give up on the idea of a real romantic connection not everybody, but a lot of people and they just like let's go for the practical, pure practical, versus let's go for the ideal and make the practical come along with us, we'll figure it out. Yeah, life's going to be hard, maybe a little harder, but it's so much better to try a little bit. Yeah, it's, life is champagne.
Speaker 1:Life should shouldn't life be pink champagne, as he says? And it should. And the only way to do that is to have the high ideal. You're gonna fall, yeah, you could fall and you will fall, probably, and you just gotta mend that leg and get back up there. That's why I love this movie. It's because everything is so coordinated around that theme. It's just hitting it over and over again, and I think these old movies are so much better at like having a simplified plot theme and just hammering away at that. One thing from different angles Mother, grandmother to grandson, grandmother to her widowed husband, the, you know, the, these two lovers, the lovers with their exes, the. The man with his what? The kind of shabby wife where he thinks he can reach up to the heavens, like everywhere, this theme is just hitting you over the head and it's. I think it's beautiful. All right, there's my defense.
Speaker 2:What did you guys think of the, of the singing, the like the kids singing're like the kids singing. Yeah, the kids singing. Just they just needed to be cut. It was very creepy that some of those kids looked so creepy well it did.
Speaker 1:I thought it went on for a long time. It was like it went on too long. I was like are we?
Speaker 2:in Sound of Music now, like that that I mean. But it's stuff. It was stuff like that that didn't allow me. It kept popping me out of the narrative and and I think that's, you know, one of the reasons why my response is so tepid. There were not just the singing scenes, but I thought. I thought that the the scene in in um with the grandmother um, even though I understand its reason, but I thought that went on too long. There there were, there were just, there were places where it dragged and it either went on too long or I didn't think it should have been there in the first place and it just and it popped me out. And when I get popped out of a narrative I can't, I can't embrace the story like I want to, um, and I think in modern, I don't think it would survive a modern day cut. I don't think it would survive a modern day.
Speaker 1:Edit to the detriment of modern day. I think this is our problem. But go ahead, mark.
Speaker 4:I'm going to defend this again I mean, I agree with all your, your, uh, your connections. I agree with all your, your, uh, your connections. I agree with all your formulations. It's actually making me think about the movie in a way that I wasn't before. But I still like the grandmother scene, not not even because it represented the higher, the ideal, but from the human perspective, as as as a playboy who seems not have any connections or attachments. That's true, anybody see him so connected to his grandmother and love her so much.
Speaker 1:Marius and the dog.
Speaker 4:Yeah and all that. It it anchored him, it brought him down to earth. In a way I even for for Terry's character to see him human, not not and not you know some two-dimensional character in a tabloid, but a man with a life and a past and real loves, not just the stuff that passes before us on the tabloids, but this deep, genuine, real human being who's lived life and has her roots deeply planted in the earth. So that actually made him more human to me. It gave him dementia. It was like a save the cat moment, almost what you're supposed to have.
Speaker 4:So in the first five minutes of a script, put you on the page with the main character. That got me actually feeling more for him as a as a human being.
Speaker 1:Which is interesting because they go up to do that right. That's again the up to learn about his past and the down, in a sense.
Speaker 4:Now I wonder, I wonder if the, if the writer has all of these, this thematic ideal in mind as he's writing. So sometimes writers aren't privy to the, the themes that they're, that they're writing.
Speaker 1:What was well, we'll have to watch. I think we should watch, you know, if we want to, the the love affair movie, because I I wonder how much of it is in there, because I have not seen that and because it may, because one of the things about writing something that's like a remake is you, you can see it critically also, you could tear it apart and see, oh, look at all these things, and you could purposefully I think it's easier to purposely do that uh- for example, when I see, when I see the movie dogville.
Speaker 4:Have you guys ever seen the movie dogville? No yeah, lars von triers is one of my, one of my favorite directors, but he, yeah, there's a movie called dogville um, with nicole kidman plays the main part in it, and lars von Trier simply said it's a movie about revenge, which, frankly sorry for the spoiler, it doesn't happen until the very end, but it's. It's not in my view. I mean, and so I don't know he could have a completely different theme in his mind with thematic elements.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4:Me as the, as the person viewing it got something else entirely. I had this whole whole metaphor going in my mind that that works when we made it one of my favorite, favorite movies, particularly because happening at a certain time. So I'm wondering, and maybe you guys as writers can talk about, and I write, but I and I think about thematic elements, but it's not. I'm not, it's not like I put the theme up there and try to hit it all the time. It's like it sort of has to come intuitively right.
Speaker 3:It's, you know, there's conscious elements to it but I like to settle on a theme and then, like Kirk was saying, try to tackle it at different angles with the subplots. That's really good writing. It's hard to achieve.
Speaker 4:You have to give your subconscious some direction, for sure. But when it's coming out it sort of doesn't it feel like it writes itself it's coming out of. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:I feel like that, Like I. Well, when we write, when Jen and I write together, we do, we talk about what are the themes that we want to write around. But what often happens with me when I write is maybe we'll have talked about a theme and as I begin to kind of embrace the characters, I kind of start realizing maybe that's, maybe the theme is a little bit different, you know, because it's just they're wanting to pull me in a particular direction and so sometimes I think the theme gets modified.
Speaker 2:And I have had the experience too, where I had no idea I was writing about a particular theme, but when I got done with it, no idea I was writing about a particular theme, but when I got done with it, I'm like, oh, I actually was. So, yeah, I think when you I think it's possible to have both and I think that you know, kind of reading into certain themes, even if the writer didn't intend it, you know it could be that it was, it was part of the subconscious coming out of the writer.
Speaker 3:Well, I will say what the audience member is going through at the moment like they're going to latch on to certain things because they can relate to it and not latch on to others because they can't, and so that that also happens too, and where you make up your own thing yeah, so ayn rand had a concept called plot theme, which was her.
Speaker 1:So I really recommend for anybody who wants to be yeah, who wants to be a writer, you need to read the books uh that are edited by torah backman uh, the, the principle, or the art of fiction, and also there's the art of non-fiction. It's a great course. You can listen to it now, I think for free, uh, online through the internet didn't she do?
Speaker 2:didn't those books start out from her? Weren't those books based on her lectures?
Speaker 1:that's what I'm saying. Yeah, it's a course yeah she gave to a select group of people in new york. Yeah, they were just asking, like how do you do what you do? And of course I ran over the books because what's that? I recommend that over the books. What's that?
Speaker 2:I recommend that over the book. The book part of fiction. I like both. I didn't think it when I listened to the lectures. I got so much more out of it than I did from the book.
Speaker 1:If you want to be a writer, just do both. Quit crabbing about it. It's great. Quit crabbing, yeah, because the book is. I listened to the book and read the book 20, 25 times when I was in college. It was like my Bible. And then I did listen to the courses later and it was great too.
Speaker 1:Uh, anyway, point is she talks about the plot theme, which is, uh, which is her concept of trying to bring from the abstract theme to the actual events and it's the connector between the two for a story and it's critical to have that plot theme, in her view, to be a good story, because you need it as a writer and that's, you know.
Speaker 1:Uh, I think that's a very valuable tool and I think, even if they I think in film school they call it like the through line they have different terms for this kind of idea but you do want to have like a one line synopsis of what you're trying to create, of idea.
Speaker 1:But you do want to have a one-line synopsis of what you're trying to create and the better you are at creating that and understanding the elements of the abstract theme and the concrete that you're bridging and creating something, I think the better you are as a writer, and great artists of all kinds do that really well, and I think this does that well because he has the visual of the Empire State Building, I think, as a solidifying theme. So the high-low he hits it all the time. I don't know if he said like, let me do high-low all the time, but he just has like, okay, ideal high, problems with the world, concrete low, something like that. He's just hammering it away with this story, which is a story he's rewriting from something he's already done and he's trying to. Maybe even he did it when he was younger. Now he's older, he's wiser, he's more.
Speaker 2:So was it the same writer that did the Love Affair?
Speaker 1:Sorry, I don't know if it's the same writer. Is it the same writer? Yeah, definitely same director. So, yeah, it's like they got to do it again and they did it. Probably maybe they did it better the second time, I don't know, let's see. No, okay, so before we go, I think that this time to go already, Wow Well.
Speaker 1:I don't know when Mark might have to go, but there's a, I mean, to me there's a lot to talk about. I can talk about every scene in this movie, cause there's so much good stuff, but I I think that there's something universal in this experience for me. Like you know, I told you I was at a conference and that like the scene of the elements, of them being magnetically drawn to each other when they're not supposed to be, because they're supposed to be with other people, and yet they cannot get away from each other in a sense. Now, yes, I think there is a contrivance, as Mark, I think you're right, but to me, that's kind of what I like about the older films sometimes is that it is, you know, because it's not like natural isn't what they're going for. They are.
Speaker 1:Art to me is artifice, it is the artificial, and they're trying to show you in different ways.
Speaker 1:This thing Now we could argue like having some naturalism is good sometimes because it can get you in as an audience, it can get you more invested or, you know, lost in the story, in a sense like cause you, your active mind goes away if it's good naturalism.
Speaker 1:But I also think that there's something valuable to this kind of artifice where we have all these kinds of contract contrivances, cause I can see them in my own life, not in the way that they did it, but in unique ways. So the love affairs that I've had so we're going to talk about real love affairs for those who are interested. You don't have to say your story, of course, but the love affairs that I have had have almost always followed this exact model in if you take just the abstractions of what they're doing with this story and you apply it to your own specific concretes, it's a hundred percent very similar. In my experience, um, and I don't know if you guys are comfortable sharing a love affair that might be similar, but the idea of you meet somebody you're not, you feel like you're like. You feel like you're like for some reason you're societally not supposed to be with them because you're with somebody else.
Speaker 2:So there's some pull from something else, but you cannot either Either you're with somebody else or just the the circumstances of of the of the two of you being together is not something that other people would approve.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so you have these kind of pull. Now the pull may be internal. They could just say, forget it and just be together, but they can't. By the way, this is Anna Karenina, it's the whole story of Anna Karenina, and this is a very long trope of this romantic story. But you cannot resist each other. There's something dynamic and magnetic about it. You try to make it work and then it kind of does topple.
Speaker 1:And then the question is do you make, do you figure out how to put the pieces together and work it in the practical world, or do you just give up on it and and a Corona spoiler jumps under a train? Like those are your choices. So what do you do? And now I'm a romantic, like I consider myself a high romantic, I believe you take your romantic vision of what you want out of love and life and productive work, and you try to figure out how to make the practical world work with you. In that regard, I've had this experience in my past several times, but I am single at 38. So what are you going to do? I'm jaded, okay.
Speaker 3:So what is everybody?
Speaker 1:else's honest opinion. So, jennifer, you're jaded.
Speaker 3:I'm jaded because I have that romantic in me. That's what I loved about the story was that he um wanted to be a better person, so he stepped up and he went and he did the hard work to do it because he loved her that much. That all sounds great in the movies. In reality, I find it's a different story, at least in my experience.
Speaker 1:Do you have an example?
Speaker 3:I you have an example I have a couple examples, okay, but um, first of all, I was proposed to on the top of the empire state building. Okay, many years again I guess was because of this movie, and I didn't even know there you go okay yeah um, but that was uh. Did you like that proposal? By the way, I did, but it clouded my judgment I think I was very young and and the whole world thought, oh, that's so romantic.
Speaker 3:And I got swept up in that and without really listening to my heart, um, that's the danger of romance, yeah yeah, I was recently on a cruise, last October, and had a little spark flying with a fellow cruise person, which was instant, pretty, pretty instant conversation, I think, a sense of humor that just locked in an intelligence that was similar to mine. It was, it was fun, but we don't live in the same town and there's going to be work. If you've got to make a long distance relationship work, and how do you turn a fling into something meaningful, that's the question.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that is, and it takes both people having that romantic ideal and both people working towards it, and if you don't, then it just doesn't work, it can't.
Speaker 1:and it's heartbreaking.
Speaker 3:It is heartbreaking because that you, as the romantic, you can see exactly what it could be.
Speaker 1:Yes, you're like why can't you see? Yeah, I have this literally, like just in the last several months, the same same exact scenario, and it's like, yeah, you could see it happening, you could see the value, but the other person does it and that, and they're in this different state or whatever you know, and you can't. You can't make them see it. Now, in this movie, they do both decide, and I think that's the critical thing, and so, yes, if you both decide to do it, you can do it. And then the whole, to me the whole anxiety, or the conflict, is are they going to be able to do it and are they actually going to stick by their decision? Okay, does anybody else want to share?
Speaker 2:I'll share my tragic, tragic, tragic heartbreak. Uh putting it all out there.
Speaker 1:This is. We're gonna turn this into a therapy session at the end affairs.
Speaker 2:I hope I don't cry, okay, oh no, since you guys have, since you guys are sharing, I'll I'll share. So.
Speaker 1:I'm holding it back myself, don't worry. That's why I smiled it was.
Speaker 2:It was, um, uh, there there were so many things wrong about it. It was a workplace affair. Uh and uh, and we, we just our chemistry was off the charts, off the charts. And I was at first I was very blind to it, I was very like, naive. I did like because he was with another person, um, and uh, like was married and uh, and I was like, no, he couldn't be, he couldn't be flirting with me, he couldn't be. You know, uh, but everybody else that you know, all my co-workers, were like what? You didn't see it. And you know like, we just coworkers were like, well, you didn't see it. And you know, like, we just couldn't like stay away from each other.
Speaker 2:And um, and so we began a, uh, very passionate affair. But I was like, but it can't be like this, you know, because you know I'm nobody's mistress, Right, and uh, and so, um, he actually decided, decided, he decided it was, it literally was like six months, it was, I have, I have to give the, you know, because he, eventually he told his wife and, and he was, but then his, his wife, basically fell on her sword and was like, no, it was all my fault. And you know, let's go to. She basically made him go to like Catholic reconditioning camp and to bring their marriage back together. But he, you know he's and I had actually stopped being with him because I was like this isn't you know, if you know, if we want to be together, it has to be in an honest way and in a good way.
Speaker 2:And you know, I was just so in love with him and I know that he was absolutely in love with me as well, like I know that he wasn't just, like you know, playing around and he had made the decision that he was going to leave on this day. He bought a plane ticket, he was going, you know, he was preparing, you know everything. And the day before he was supposed to come and be with me so that we could be together forever, he called me up and said I can't do it, I can't do it. And I was heartbroken, absolutely heartbroken. Jennifer was there for it, actually.
Speaker 3:You were at my house. I was at her house when.
Speaker 2:I got that call and I was just heartbroken absolutely in a million pieces, but I was so, you know. So I, but I, truly I believed in the love, you know, and I believed in the romance of it and um and it, and it took everything to not get jaded over. It Uh, but um, uh. Anyhow, that's my story, mark, do you have one? Thank?
Speaker 1:you for sharing, jax, I know that's. Yeah, I think that think that's a good I mean a good example to me, because I think a lot of us have felt that for sure. I had the same exact experience. Yeah, mark willing to share, or?
Speaker 4:well, I have one um, I feel like, um, I feel like I have been to the pits of hell and the highest heavens with women, and without a woman in my life, I would not know who I am, I would not know what my metal was, I would be, I wouldn't be. They have compelled me to the highest heroism I've ever achieved interpersonally and, um, or my love for them has propelled me into that. To that I mean crazy heights of of, uh, romantic um, and I was going to use a word that wouldn't be very good, uh for objectivists, but what feels like sacrifice. But you know, you're, you're loving, you're just loving somebody and possibly can for them. I mean, I think, I think my relationship now is what has, you know, spurred me into a deeper study of objectivism and to become a deeper, honest, better person who's stands by his, his principles? Uh, which makes life a little bit hard. Uh, because it's becoming harder and harder for me to smile through anything If I don't feel like, if it's not appropriate, if it's not right, and I don't know that I could have achieved that without my, my woman, my, my love and we have a very intense, intense relationship is I'm, I am.
Speaker 4:Sometimes it's like an immovable object meeting an unstoppable force, and that's the way we roll. You know she's not used to that. In her life, her previous relationships, it was a yes person, I'm not a yes person, I'm a convince me person, or no, or my way, or you know. So we, we can smash heads, but we're both, um, we're both strong, and I I don't know that I've that I necessarily change her for the better, but I know that it's changed me. I feel like oftentimes it's the relationships that I have had as as tragic as many of them have been. It's this, it's the fire that has forged steel to me and as I mean, I have been in crazy experiences, I could, I could go, I could tell you experiences that would you'd be like what the fuck?
Speaker 4:we have to do a movie about this um okay, well, you, we should do maybe yeah, let's do it um, but uh, I don't regret any of it, even though maybe I should, but I don't, I don't um I think that's a really good theme, though, mark, that you that you are touching on, and it does go back to the movie.
Speaker 2:We should have also done as good as it gets, because that's probably got one of the best lines ever.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we could still do that.
Speaker 2:You make me want to be a better man and I think that that is very much like the essence of that big love. Yeah, we could still do that person, but the great thing about it is you want to do it for yourself. You really like any. Any good love that I've had and and it it also works. Conversely, any toxic love that I've had, you know, I've felt like a bad person or like a, like a miserable person, and I don't feel good about myself. But the good big love that I have, I feel really good about myself and I want to be better for that other person, for myself.
Speaker 4:Sometimes. Sometimes those toxic relationships, though, can force you into defining yourself.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 4:If, if, if you and maybe it's subjectivism that helps with that Like, once you have philosophy and you have a bit of a moral compass, a lot of those toxic folks are narcissists and you can see, you start to see what's happening and you and, and, and, instead of going along like a person with no self-esteem, you start to say no, yeah, you define boundaries in a way that you didn't, didn't before. I wasn't at Socrates. That was asked by his followers why? Why he's his, why are you with your wife? She so cruel to you? Do you guys know this story?
Speaker 4:oh no, I didn't even it's in the symposium yeah, right is it right, right it was, it was like I don't remember exactly, but there's, and I think you said something like I'm working on the virtue of uh, what was it? It was something like I'm working on the virtue of patience, and if I could be patient with her, I could be patient with anyone. It was some virtue that he was sorting out. Yeah, oh my gosh, the tool of working out this virtue. And there's always space to practice, you know, getting more clear about who you are, and I don't think you can really do that without another person. You can't do it. I mean, bachelors are boys, right, and that's what Cary Grant's character is. He's a boy, a boy, and then he becomes a man for his love for her. I mean, waiting there on the 102nd floor of the Empire State Building the whole day until it rained and stormed, until he's the last person standing, that's what a man does.
Speaker 1:And remember his grandmother says like she's worried when he actually faces a failure, a trial or something like that, because he's never faced anything. He's good at everything. He gets all the women, they all want him and they all pamper him and put them on yachts and things like that. He doesn't have to do anything and if you ever I'm sorry you could help me, but uh, cause I don't know this world but if you read or listen to interviews or like the stars, actors, like this seems to be a dominant problem that some of them have where, in a sense, like you, they get everything handed to them, especially when they're young, and they get it really young, and this is a common theme where you see this Venus, yeah, I'm sure you've seen it. Every door in the world is open for these individuals.
Speaker 4:The door in the world is open and nobody says no.
Speaker 1:And nobody says no and it's shocking.
Speaker 4:After a while it becomes shocking to them if somebody says no, which was funny. It was funny to watch my wife teach james franco after he became a sport I didn't know that she would stop his exercises within two minutes because they were so bad.
Speaker 4:No other teacher would do that and get so infuriated because nobody stopped james franco, yeah, he's such a genius. Every time she hated his work and she would just be like she. You know, I, I mean, I don't think without her he could have gotten better, because he, he got better. I mean, he got better for a lot of reasons. Before his, his real character came out for the four, for everybody to see what a jag off he was. But um, but, but yeah, you're right. When you, when you get in the habit of everybody thinking, or pretending at least, that everything you say is gold, it's, it's, it's like buddha talking you, you get a very distorted perception of who you are and the weight of what you're saying. And that's why some of these celebrities, I mean people, accuse me of this. But they come out and they say shit and you're like what the fuck?
Speaker 1:is this guy?
Speaker 4:thinking, but I still have people who tell me no, I don't surround myself with people who tell me yeah, you have a lot of no people. I mean, we tell you no today and you moved my my no, no, mark, no no it's a little bit okay oh, is it moving
Speaker 2:that's moving okay yeah, mine, mine moved a little bit too kirk.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all right yes, I got a little bit thumbs up I think it's the date shirt that did it for me this is how I work on the ladies.
Speaker 2:They come to me and they're like at the tepid and I'm like all right, let me see if I can move that up.
Speaker 1:The pheromones are coming through the headphones I try to go in, but yeah, I mean I. It's an interesting thing about the, the forging a character through, desiring something that you really want, and especially when you want it right. Ayn rand has that line the to say I love you for one first. Or how it worked for one of my first to know how to say the I. That's what I think Dominique has to learn in that story. That's the fountainhead in a certain sense, and that's what you do when you say like I love this, it's not, those people are those, but like, and that is a radical discovery and it's why it's.
Speaker 1:You know, to me it's really rare that young people can really find eternal love, because they haven't often found the ability or the voice to say I know if they have, because maybe they had good parents or whatever, or they were just a good person, or they had like whatever the reasons they might just be, I don't know but they did have it at great age. I have met people like this who were like you know, I think of I'll throw his name out here Like you're on, brooke right Like he's been married since he was like 18 years old and he's 62 now, and like when he I've heard I don't know if you've heard his story, but I've heard similar stories to things like this and yeah, I think that guy had like his eye pretty early. She had her eye. They found each other, they love and then they forged a life together.
Speaker 2:But if you don't have that, and they're still very much in love. I love watching the two of them together. You know when you'd see them at conferences and he's he's very it's amazing. Very attentive to her. I mean he's so you run like he's he's one way on his, on his podcast, and he's, he's very in charge and he's, you know, obviously very opinionated Um, but there's there's a really lovely there's, there's a really lovely tenderness that comes out when he's um, when he's with his wife.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely yeah, and but like that is part of the becoming an individual is loving something, and that's what is the show in this story. So we all say the word love. Oh, I love that, I love that performance. So it's one of my problems whenever I listen to Hollywood people, by the way is they love everything and everybody. And it's like what are you talking about Really? You know it's oh, I loved you in this, I loved it. Do you really love everybody? Do you really love everybody? It's like anyway. So like when you really like, deep down, see something and you identify what you love about that thing or person who represents certain core values, you learn about yourself and what you really love. And when he's seen, when Cary Grant's character sees that he loves this jewel thief, who's witty, and she pushes back and she says no, I'm not going to sleep with you. I don't go home with men. I don't go into men's room. My mother told me not to go into a man's room in any month. That ends in.
Speaker 2:R. I love that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and he's like what? And he's struck back by her. He doesn't know what to say. And then he gets embarrassed when she's like, well, look at that man, oh, he must be really handsome if I could say no to you. And if I say no to such a charming person as you. And he's like he doesn't know what to do and he's even embarrassed. He's like, well, all right, I guess. And then, but he still pulls it through and he like asks her well, would you like to go to dinner?
Speaker 1:She's like yes, and then they go out just like him figuring out how to love something is the whole point of the story, and her too to some degree, and that's that's what you get in the end is is because even in the end, I will have to say, in that last scene he's psychologically. That is. So it's. It's an artistic portrayal of real psychology in the sense of he's protecting himself, he's protecting his heart by lying to her. So remember, he's lying the whole time by saying I didn't go. And then she thinks like oh whoa, so then he never showed up. Oh okay, so he doesn't even know. And then then she realizes that that's not the case, that he's mad and he's like wouldn't you have done this?
Speaker 2:This is why the subtext of this, this, the dialogue, to me was just phenomenal stayed out there in the rain and the pouring rain yeah, exactly, and it's just oh, it's so good, anyway, I'll, I'll keep going I will say one of um, one of my favorite things, that ayn rand um said and I'm not sure what the context of it was, or if it was in a book, or if she just said it, um, but it was. Show me, show me the woman that a man sleeps with, and I'll tell you all of his values.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's Atlas, shrugged it's.
Speaker 1:Francisco D'Ancona says that Was it?
Speaker 2:was it Francisco saying that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, Show me the woman that a man chooses to sleep with, and I'll tell you his philosophy of life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, which I think is just when you, when you talk about, like when you love somebody, you really learn a lot about yourself, um, and about your values and or lack of values.
Speaker 1:yeah, like with james taggart right, oh right, that's it. Like the people who I mean look, most of us probably have had mark already said he went to the pits of hell with women. We've probably all been with people and had affairs with people that we should not have had in certain sense, and it really was bad for us in the moment.
Speaker 4:But it felt so good, so bad, it was good, so bad, it was good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sometimes those great ones or those bad ones are the best. Let's not lie about that in terms of but it may not be the best for us in our soul long term, but it definitely has. And, like finding the match of those two, of having the great ideals and all as much of the practical as you can, is the art of love, I think, and that's an affair to remember alright, so I'm a little like this now.
Speaker 1:Yes, so any last thoughts you guys have on this story before we move on to the next? You know, sign off this time.
Speaker 4:No, I love your formulation of the, of the themes and and and how the plot really, really hammered that thematic element home. It makes the movie a lot, despite its naive rendering. I still think you could probably remake a movie like this today and I think it could be interesting Remade because Try the Warren Beatty one.
Speaker 1:See what you think of that. That's 94. I haven't seen that one either, so it'd be interesting to see that Is that a direct remake of it? Yeah, same kind of concept.
Speaker 4:Who was the female I?
Speaker 1:can't remember, I'll have to look it up Warren Beatty affair, love affair, something like that. That's 94.
Speaker 4:And that.
Speaker 1:Benning and that Benning.
Speaker 4:Terry Mack. That's where they started there, catherine.
Speaker 1:Hepburn, as Ginny, I think, the grandmother oh wow, that makes sense.
Speaker 3:I think he's perfect.
Speaker 4:I mean, he's a totally corrupted guy In real life. Oh my God, oh my God.
Speaker 3:I kept seeing George Clooney in this role. I could not. I don't know if George is.
Speaker 4:He would be good in it. I don't know if George is good he would be good in it.
Speaker 4:He's got the charm. But I mean Warren Beatty's that guy who said you know, being a movie star is like being in a whorehouse with an unlimited American Express card. He banged everybody and, okay, this is inside, this is inside. Oh my God, I mean I know something that happened with an actress friend of mine who was doing a play, I mean only a decade ago, and stuff that he said backstage. I'm like, wow, this guy, this guy still, I mean whatever works for their relationship, they seem to seem to be still going, but he's not.
Speaker 1:I see me that's my cynical side Like there's no way a guy as corrupted as Cary Grant's yes, personally, um given and this is the beauty of movies and art is it's honing in on something and just focusing on this what's good about that is like it's like you know I have issues with this in in some of rand's work.
Speaker 4:It's like where is that line when you are, when you cannot go back, when you cannot change? You know like, uh, peter keating, like how far, how, how much corruption can the body take before it's irreversible? Yeah, I tend to think that it's always reversible at some point. But you know there are guys like like the warren baity type, but they're always good, they can't change, even if they fall in love. It's they're too cynical, they're it's been too long and too never going to become that guy that tries to reform.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I did think there's probably a point of no return. But if if you believe in free will, then I think you have to acknowledge it as possible anywhere and at least possible. But it becomes harder and harder with age, obviously, and experience and because you're making integrations about the world so you'd have to disentangle all of that. So the older you are, the more integrations you've made subconsciously and consciously, so it's going to be harder and harder as you get older.
Speaker 2:I went through that to a certain extent because just I mean very briefly I was traditionally always attracted to the wrong kind of man. Like I mean, I would say the FBI should like just put me in the square somewhere and all the psychopaths will show up like the 10 most wanted you know I would be like the perfect person to toxic men.
Speaker 2:Come find me, no, but. But I was actually physically attracted to those kind of men and then I went through a really you know a lot of uh, psychological stuff and depression and and went through therapy and through years of therapy I gradually became attracted to a different kind of man and that changed in me on like a subterranean level. Right. But it's very difficult and it takes a long time and I still sometimes will have that like initial attraction and that's kind of how I know like oh, that guy's bad for me because I actually like him or I'm actually like attracted to him and and I have to like talk myself kind of out of it. But it is possible. It just takes a really long time and a lot of work and a lot of introspection.
Speaker 1:Well, I'll just so I can leave with a quote from Ayn Rand on romantic love. Then we can stop there, unless any other last thoughts. Jennifer, do you have a last thought before I did this? No, I was looking forward to your final quote, okay.
Speaker 1:So romantic love in the full sense of the term is an emotion possible only to the man or woman of unbreached self-esteem.
Speaker 1:It is his response to his own highest values in the person of another, an integrated response of mind and body, of love and sexual desire. Such a man or woman is incapable of experiencing a sexual desire divorce from spiritual values, and that she attaches it to self esteem. And I think that's very interesting to think about and why I really bought that. Both of these characters needed the six months at least. And that's just like a room, and to me that's a romantic time-lapse almost, because it probably would take longer, but at least six months to gain a little bit of self-esteem on both sides, to be able to go up to that tower, meet, be in love and make it work. And something happens, and so they have to do it. They can't do it at the top Like they want to, they have to do it on the bottom, when she's crippled and unable to move, and we don't know if she will ever move or walk again. That's not certain.
Speaker 2:It's indicated, maybe um she did, Didn't she get up at one point? No, I thought no, she it is there, there, that's.
Speaker 1:The whole point is. It's uncertain whether he will be successful in his painting or whether she will walk, but she believes that as much as he could do it with his. She says this you could do your painting as much as I will. I believe that I will walk. And the question is you with the audience? You believe that they will have a love affair that will last forever and they'll end up with the grandma at the top, or will they not? And I believe they, I think.
Speaker 4:I think they're going with granny, I think so they're gonna make it.
Speaker 3:They're gonna make it all right, everybody.
Speaker 1:Well, this has been a lot of fun. Um I? I love romance, as you know, so I hope we will do more romantic stories in the future.
Speaker 3:This will be great, and Should we talk about the next one, so our audience can watch?
Speaker 1:Do you want to Just make sure we actually do it in the next one? Go for it. What's the next one?
Speaker 3:Masters of Air.
Speaker 1:Masters of the Air, yeah, so, we'll do that in a couple of weeks. Look out for that one. We'll go back to the TV show and maybe we'll do another movie after that, so all right. Thank you everybody, it's been fun.