Xanadu: LIVE! w/ Michaela Watkins (HDTGM Matinee)

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If you're a roller skate, this movie is for you.

We saw Xanadu, so you know what that means.

Now it's time for

this.

here at the Largo Theater at the Coronet, one of the greatest theaters here in LA.

And we have an amazing show for you.

But to begin begin the show, I need to introduce my co-host.

Please welcome Jason Manzucas.

What's up, jerks?

June, Diane, Rayfield.

And our very special guest for tonight, Michaela Watkins.

All right.

All right.

Like I said,

this movie has been told to me that we need to do this movie.

I never believed people until I saw it.

This movie is insane and insane in a way that I feel like

it was like it was late night Art Deco furniture, cocaine use.

And like, I feel like there was a like, I literally feel like someone was fucking someone as they pitched this idea.

And another person was in the room going, yes, yes, yes.

That person was Jeff Lynn.

Who was like, who's like, oh, you want to make a super fucked up roller skating movie?

Let's do it to Electric Light Orchestra so everybody can be miserable.

I'm about to ruin the Traveling Wilburies in a couple of years.

So for now, I will create this tone poem Monstrosity.

It's weird, though.

I have to say, like,

I know what the movie is.

You do?

I do.

Oh, my God.

But for me...

Well, then we can get to this much quicker than normal.

I'm so sorry.

June?

I'm so happy.

What is this movie about?

Oh, I don't know what it's about.

But what I know for myself is like there's lots of lip gloss lots of roller skating lots of dancing like i'm on board you know on a very real level like i'm just on board

yeah it's just you're it's from that moment on wait was there my sensory experience it's a it's a good time

you know

i mean it is it's a good time

i had that thing of like i had chills you know when it started and then by the end i was like hiding under my bed.

So scared.

So, like, it all felt like that the whole movie by the end felt like in the shining when he sort of fantasizes the whole room coming alive.

Like, that to me was the entire whole thing.

Well, this to me, this whole movie could be seen as, as far as I'm concerned, a Jacob's ladder kind of.

The whole movie is just the moment before the main character dies.

It is a

perhaps a fever dream, or it's like people are saying that all of Birdman might be a psychotic break for someone.

This is that movie.

Well, that's what I feel.

Like, I feel like,

it feels like one of those things where, like, some Hollywood executive was like, I like roller skates.

Oh, a fat cat?

A fat cat.

You know what I'm at?

Yeah.

You know what did great?

Starlight Express.

We need to do it again.

Let me just say, by the way, about something about the roller skating in this movie.

Flawless.

Nobody looks comfortable on skates.

Nobody ever

put on a skate or took off a skate.

But like the camera would pan back to them.

No skates.

Yep.

Skates.

No skates.

The only, I will say this: the only person who seems to me effortless on skates, who is effortless and glides and skates his way through the whole movie is Gene fucking Kelly.

Of course.

Who, at

age, I don't know, what, 1,000?

It shames every other dummy in this fucking movie.

That's why it looks bad.

Yeah, watching Gene Kelly was like, wow.

I feel like Gene Kelly was, he doesn't look like he's aged.

They look at pictures of him.

He looks like, oh, he just continued doing these movies and he just happened to be kind of a bad one.

Or those movies were just bad and we didn't look at him this critically.

I don't know.

Yeah, I don't remember watching it because I watched it a long time ago as a kid and I don't remember thinking like, I hope Olivia Newton-John fucks Gene Kelly.

But this time I did.

I really hope he got the girl in the end.

You weren't when you originally saw it as a, did you see it as a little girl?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Because you weren't like, oh, I hope the mom fucks the granddad in this movie.

But I do hope she fucks the guy from taxi.

Yeah.

Who's not the guy from taxi, but just looks like him.

Oh, boy.

I'm not going to talk about things like plot and character development.

No, please do.

Paul, I would love for you to talk about it.

Here's my issue about this movie.

The simplest thing, right?

It's about this artist who has no focus, right?

He's doing like portraits, he's doing still life, he's doing machine parts, and I don't know what to focus on.

Where are we going to start this movie?

We'll start it with someone drawing.

Action-packed.

And he's a frustrated artist.

He rips up his art.

The art flies away.

Seemingly cross town, lands in front of a mural that he did not paint.

And that opens up a portal for Zeus's daughters to come out.

Oh, if you thought this movie didn't have connections to the Greek pantheon of gods,

you're fucking wrong.

Because guess what, assholes?

Zeus is all over this shit.

Zeus makes a vocal appearance in this movie.

Not since Clash of the Titans has it been so good.

And an uncredited Hera walk-on.

By the way, not even in the credits are they called Zeus and Hera.

They're just called Heavenly Voice and female heavenly voice.

As if they could have gotten sued by the author of Greek mythology.

But

I wish as a Greek person I could sue this movie.

I wish I could as a guy, just under the subheading, how dare you?

Here's what's weird though.

You bring up a good point about the musing of it all because you would think that he would be touched by a muse, that she would come to life and inspire him, which is not really what happens in the movie.

No, that's what,

hang on, wait a second.

Really?

Isn't that exactly what happens in the movie?

That's exactly what's happening.

But here's the thing.

There's exactly

what he's doing.

But nothing he does in the entire movie has anything.

Anything to do with him being an artist.

That's exactly it.

His dream that he succeeds in at the end, spoiler alert, has nothing to do with being an artist, which is clearly the one thing he is the most talented in.

He is not talented in club club owning.

And here's what's really weird too.

Like, why make him a painter who then goes to paint...

This whole thing confounded me, but paint replicas of replicas.

Oh my god, he invented.

I don't understand why that's confusing.

That's totally normal.

Okay, so he's going to paint a large replica.

You can only paint them so big.

Right.

So he's playing replicas.

We need humans to make them bigger.

A large replica.

Back in the olden days, they would paint every billboard by hand.

By the way, were they even billboards?

They play them on record stores.

On the outside of Tower Record Store.

Okay, fine.

For advertising of the album, he paints the album, but bigger.

But not, but

they don't want the painting to be that good, though.

Yeah.

It's not supposed to look good.

Don't make it.

He keeps being told, don't make it look good.

Don't give it your flourishes or whatever.

Just paint it, make it look stupid and go hang it up, dummy.

And my question to that is: why?

Yeah.

Such good question

i wrote that a lot but but

i just want to bring i just want to bring up this one point because i i before we get too far away from it wouldn't it just i i just wouldn't it make so much more sense that if he painted that first album cover the where the girl was on it then she came to life and then i don't even mind the club stuff but like he painted the muse you could then she came out not a rant who painted those that mural yeah because that guy like it seems like that guy needs to be.

Or you could argue she is actually the muse of the man who shot the album cover because she first appears in his art.

So that's a really weird scene because when Sonny Malone goes to talk to that very guy

to find this muse, the guy, the photographer, says that she just appeared suddenly.

Yeah, he says I took 100 pictures of only the building.

And when I was in the dark room, I developed it.

And there was what, in this one picture, there is a girl in it.

No, no, he said she, didn't he say that she rolled in on Roller Skates for one shot and then she took off and they're like, hey, we never got her name, so he couldn't get her to sign the contract.

And then she wasn't.

And by the way, I would say this has sort of happened throughout the entire movie, although Gene Kelly had one moment.

Nobody's really crazy fucking surprised to see her show up everywhere.

Like, he's always got a chip on his shoulder, like, hey, oh, well, my boss is really mad at me.

I'm like, uh, she just appeared at a thing.

Okay, at some point, this is such a good scene.

Things apply together.

This is such a good scene because, in this moment, I realized I had a real epiphany, which is the scene in which Sonny Malone is painting in his

room.

Okay,

inside of Hillary.

Maybe you don't understand what the fuck is going on in this movie.

Because we're saying she's his muse, which they don't establish until much later in the movie.

Almost at the end.

So, early on, all you know, she is a being of pure light

who arrives in and out of the sky at whim.

I wrote down, I want to read the script because the first five minutes is, and then they beam up into the sky.

And I was like,

beaming up

a fire escape.

It's a horror movie.

What this is, is a horror movie because she is some sort of devil that has the power to appear at any time.

And she just like appears to him and is like, what are you doing?

While he's painting, and he, you're right, is just kind of like painting.

Oh, God.

Yeah, he sort of seems irritated with her.

He's a frustrated artist, and I think he was cast

really

bad.

You think?

You think?

You're questioning his casting.

I mean, where are they going to find an actor who can roller skate that well?

First of all, let me tell you a roller skater who can act well enough.

Let me tell you two things here that will blow your mind.

First of all, John Travolta was offered the role of Sonny Malone.

He said no.

Probably because he just was in Greece with Olivia Newton-John.

He's like, let's not make this a thing.

Yet.

Let's not make this a thing yet.

And then...

Oh, actually, I'm sorry.

Andy Gibb was first given the role of Sonny Malone.

He, yeah, and that makes more sense.

He said no.

It went to Travolta.

Travolta said no.

And then Michael Beck was just stone cold, offered the part, no audition.

And the casting director was like,

I know a great guy that looks like Andy Gibb.

What about one of the other Gibbs?

What about Barry?

What?

The monster Gibb?

No.

We can't have Barry.

He's too dangerous.

Just I have a question, though.

Here's another thing that I found very odd.

So he's a frustrated painter because he can't find the time to do his own art.

And I sort of wanted to say, like, well,

you are painting in your day job.

Like, you are.

Sure, no.

He is being paid to do art.

He is getting paid to do art.

But also, that job did not seem to be, like, you're, I hear what you're saying.

Like, he was going to be so frustrated at as an artist.

I'm being paid as an artist.

Like, he's like, he left his job as an artist to work freelance, which the freelance work seemed to be, like, it wasn't like, I have a dream that I'm pursuing when I'm off.

He's like, I'm working freelance now.

To be fair, now I'm broke.

His first line of the movie, the first line, the first spoken dialogue you see after eight beautiful women dance and go into the sky is oh, yeah, because after the silent drawing opening, he says a six-minute like dance montage on roller skates.

Yes, so the first actual, like when they turned the mic on, was the line, guys like me shouldn't dream anyway.

I don't, I rolled that around in my brain and I'm like, guys like me shouldn't dream anyway.

Anyway, good thing he had the anyway on there.

Anyway.

Like, what were you saying before that?

I love a line that starts in the middle of a thought.

Well, and you're right, Michaela, because there is, like, who is this guy?

I mean, we find out later on that he's like a real cad and like really, you know, later on,

let him alone.

Yeah.

When he goes up to that woman and is like, can I borrow your bike?

I'll bring it back.

And they're like, sure, take it.

Never drives it into gate.

Oh, he turns the hot.

He's

never bricks up.

He drives the mope into the ocean.

And then, and it was an elaborate chase sequence, an elaborate chase sequence.

And then Gene Kelly, who was at the beginning of the chase sequence, just happens to be like, hey, kid, you fell in the water.

And I thought, oh, Gene Kelly is magic.

He's not.

No, he's not.

He's not magic at all.

I believe that he was okay to do that because he was magic.

Now that he got really almost crossed town, it seemed like, oh yeah, in a matter of seconds, he's a whole

discomfort.

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I just want to talk about just the opening montage of the women coming out of the mural, because here's another thing that in the beginning when I don't know what is happening, I'm willing to understand,

oh, they were trapped in there, because I'm going to do this, and if you're listening, you won't understand, but when Olivia Newton-John comes alive, she's like, oh, and looks at her body, like, oh, I'm free from this glass prison I've been in.

Yes.

But that's not the case either.

It's like the thing that they put General Zot in the middle of Superman 2.

In Superman 2.

It's like a two-dimensional thing floating through space.

They appear to be trapped in a mural.

But they're not.

No.

They're living in Mount Olympus.

Yes.

And they are reacting like, oh, I'm finally free.

It's like, oh, you're living in Mount Olympus.

I'm finally free, and I'm so excited.

I need to dance.

I need to dance because I am not free.

And then fly over Los Angeles in a rainbow light brigade.

Because what the fuck is happening?

Because straight out of the gate in any movie, you really want to establish the rules into the Warner Brothers lot like that that just felt like they're like yeah we're we're we're dark that day if you guys want to use the lot and then they didn't do anything to make it look like anything other than the Warner Brothers but what I was so confused at too was this record studio maybe it's time gone by like it seems like everything was done there like an office building it's like oh you want to go to accounting that's on the first floor you want to go to the music videos that's on the first you know it's second floor you want to go like like everything was in one building and it seemingly to me felt like the guy who was like, paint those things bigger, was also the head of the record company.

Like,

it seemed like he was also the guy who was operating like the music video set.

So, yeah, he was.

He was.

Showed up and was like, Hey, you can't turn this stuff on.

You think that David Geffen, when he was running Geffen Records, is like popping and going, Are we blowing up the images big enough yet?

I want these big.

favorite line.

He's like, I gave up art and now I do this.

Run a record steel.

He goes, look at that.

Guess who did that?

And it's a fucking sculpture of a guy playing drums that looks like something you would buy from a homeless person on the street.

It's like they took a couple of code headings and twisted it into garbage.

He's like, garbage art.

Can you believe I?

I can't believe I did that.

That was me that did that.

Oh, he also said,

he also said, look, I got money.

People return my calls.

Well, but

I did not think he was the head of the record company.

Okay, because

again, my thought was: if he is the head, the head of a record studio is an artistic position.

Like, that's not like you didn't give up art.

You're still, I mean, I'm not sure.

He gave up the top four.

He gave up the top four buttons of his shirt.

Here's the thing that's okay.

What we haven't really covered yet,

because guys,

this is a movie about two people people falling in love and well really three people.

Three people?

Well, because I mean, is it an audience?

Well, because of Gene Kelly.

Yeah, I get what you mean.

Yep.

And it starts, and romance starts like it always does with a man walking alone on the beach, a woman running into the back of him on roller skates.

When he turns around, she kisses him, turns into light, and flies away.

Was it a consensual kiss, you might ask?

Doubt it.

He had no time to see who was coming at him.

He turns around after being bumped from behind, straight in kiss on the mouth.

Now, again, if we, knowing what we know now, which is the end of the movie, it's more confounding because it seems to me that if he didn't get that album cover where she was on it, he would never have gone to search her out.

Right.

Like, he's like, yeah, this girl kissed me on the beach today.

Hey, I go back to work.

And then it just happens, Nance, that he saw her, but it wasn't like in her plan to.

Well, that's, I mean, honestly, maybe that's what I'm saying.

And maybe that's what happened though because ultimately she wasn't his muse Jason oh boy okay

she wasn't because what you said and Michael accepted what

you said is absolutely right he never fulfilled his artistic dream he became part owner of a club yeah well

they have a roller skating club of a roller skating club that was never his dream so why not just she didn't why not just say in the beginning of the movie oh it's my dream to have like a roller skating club and then the movie would be so much more fulfilling.

Like, wouldn't it?

Like he said,

in case you're not entirely sure, it's 19 to 80 or 79.

He says, I'm tired of painting vans and murals and album covers.

Those are the only three things that deserve to code a pain.

But I think there's a different reading of this movie where you could say that he's actually her muse and he touches her within.

The muse's muse?

Whoa, I actually agree with what you just said.

I agree with that.

You're saying that this movie is about a muses, muse?

Amuses muse?

An earthbound muse?

Yep.

Nope, I'm not accepting it.

Think about it.

Because

he convinces her to stop being a muse, to stop her musing.

And I think it just rolled around in your head.

We'll get to it, but I think a case could be really made for this right here.

Look, can I just say that?

The reason sort of she comes to life is to get this other dream.

So she is a muse, and I know that.

She's brought to life by his failed art.

Not really.

But she doesn't exist in the middle.

No.

But she doesn't exist in the middle.

No, but.

She's.

But that to me seems like a portal.

That's what happens.

But it's also a portal.

Like, that's like the entrance to,

like, that just has to.

To Mount Olympus?

Yes.

Yeah, I know.

There's fucking columns, bro.

There's columns in the mural that fucking thinks I mean, it's a portal.

I know we're dead.

It's your culture piecemeal by this.

And you gotta hold on to it, but you gotta.

Damn it!

You have to admit, there's something very magical about the way that the paper finds its way across all those different highways and byways to land right on that mural.

Forrest Gump clearly stole from this.

But then, then, it wakes her that finds him.

He was drawing a Viking.

I don't know.

I don't.

I don't know.

But to me, it's like...

Don't talk about Vikings to me.

He should have drawn her, ripped ripped it up, sent it away, then the papers magically form a girl and she's like, hey, now I'm a beam of light.

Like he didn't do anything.

But because it was mad.

He didn't do anything.

He had such a chip on his shoulder.

I don't want to be the, I'm not told I'm the best painter.

I'm told I'm the fastest.

What if she is his muse, but it is to find what he is truly meant to do, which is not be an artist which is to be a good partner to Gene Kelly and to run this club and hire his art bros and have them be because it is artistic that if you're a muse you don't need inspiration too

no no no because you're a beam of light

you're a beam of light but her dad is like on her ass going you gotta go make this guy into a great photographer you gotta make this guy into a great actor she said i was sent here to make xana do happen which that is her mission.

And by the way, she did with the inspiration and the musings of Sonny Malone.

Yeah, of this loser.

Of the losers.

Oh, boy.

She's like, what I need is a real loser.

This is actually,

this is like a microcosm for the relationship between women and men in this big sense, where it's like, behind every man is a great powerful woman.

And so, what she is, she finds some loser, right?

And then she's like.

And then she's like, you know, I'd really love a club, but, you know, what I need is this loser.

I don't, I don't know.

It's also interesting.

Because here's again, Gene Kelly, not magic, right?

So the chances, like, I would actually say Gene Kelly is the one who has a very clear

goal.

He from the beginning says he wants to open up a club called Xanadu.

and he wants to realize it.

And so

she is brought to him.

But what should have happened, again, simple connective tissue should have been like she introduces them.

That doesn't happen.

He's on a mad search for this girl.

He stops to get some popcorn because, look, when you're on a mad dash to find someone, you gotta fill up on some delicious popcorn.

He also

flirts with the popcorn girl.

I thought this is the love of his life that he's chasing.

Just wants to get some dibs on other action in case it doesn't work out.

Then continues on, but then's like, oh wait, there's a weird flute noise.

Let me go check that out.

And then, and then, so it's Gene Kelly playing the clarinet on a rock, and he's like, who died?

And so he said,

he's like,

pick up the pace, kind of, like, who's his asshole?

Like, I'm playing an instrument on a rock on a beach, and some guy's like, it sounds like a funeral dirge.

And then, so he picks it up, and he's like,

you're right.

In that moment, I thought there's a lot of space on this beach.

Like, if you don't like what he's like, you don't like

it's a beach.

Like, go walk.

And then he says something like...

It was 1980.

Everybody was criticizing everybody.

And he goes, whoa, guys.

And he goes, is that better?

And then this loser goes, well, it was faster.

And then, and then when he bumps into him again, goes, Hi, Clarinet.

Because that's how inventive he is.

His imagination is so big that he, like hot dog guy, he's like, hi, hot dog.

I only,

to be fair, I only referred to Gene Kelly in my notes as clarinet.

Hi, clarinet.

Oh, hi.

He also, upon meeting Gene Kelly, recaps the last 15 minutes of the movie for him.

Gene Kelly's like, well, what are you doing?

He goes, okay, well, I paint art.

Real art?

So you're an artist?

Oh, no.

They give me album covers.

We've just seen this.

But let me tell you, we know what's going on.

Let me tell you about, in 1980, people were leaving the theater a lot to do blow and they would leave and they come back and they don't want to miss stuff

so they needed someone because this movie is full of recaps every 20 minutes there's like a one minute recap of the last 20 minutes i just had it i just had a thought the fact that's how confusing the movie is the first image of the movie is Gene Kelly playing the clarinet.

Yes.

And then the second image is him drawing.

So maybe his art and Gene Kelly's music kind of meshed in the air and hit at the right spot and that activated the muse.

I like that.

I like that.

That's interesting.

She brought them together.

Yes.

She brought both of their needs together.

But what's interesting, she has already been Gene Kelly's muse.

Right, apparently.

In like the 40s or 50s, in the big band shit.

She knows what he's got.

Yeah.

But I couldn't figure out why.

She's like, I was confused.

I was like, I'm not going to be able to see why.

Why he was like, wait, but aren't you?

And she was like, I have no idea what you mean.

Does she forget being people's muses?

Is she like a Terminator where the Terminator, the one that was in the first place?

Or in Battlestar Galactica, there's like a million nines?

Yeah.

You know, there's a whole bunch of nines running around or whatever.

I think she felt uncomfortable being two muses to two different men at the same time.

She's like, oh, I fucked you, but I want to fuck this other guy.

She's a musician.

She's like, I don't know.

I don't know.

I don't know.

But can I piggyback on that for a sec?

Okay, so let's go with the theory that maybe she is pairing these two creative souls together to make one giant wunderblast of creativity.

And let's just say, it reminds me of, remember in like

the superhero thing where they were like, form of, shape of,

yeah.

So it's like, Wonder Twins, I remember they had to pick up an ice, they were going to make an ice ball to like throw at somebody.

And so one's like, one's like form of

But they're like, one is like form of a ball, you know, ice.

And the other one's like ball.

And I was like, why couldn't it just be a ball?

Why'd it have to be an ice ball?

If you take these two people.

Well, hold on.

I know only one.

Jane has to transform into something with body while Jane can't.

But

they didn't need him.

They didn't need him or her, whatever.

Just like they don't need.

They don't need that other.

They don't need Andy Gibb guy.

No, they don't.

They don't need to.

Like, she could have just worked with.

Yeah, it just could have been Mom Kelly.

She's like,

and it could have been a really cool, nice joint that actually made some monocrum of sense.

Sure.

But it also seemed like Gene Kelly was like, this is perfect.

Like, Gene Kelly was a little crazy, too, because he loved the end idea.

But it goes back to like...

Gene Kelly, also, I'm sorry to interrupt, but was he, did he say at one point that he was in the family construction business?

Yes, yes.

What does that mean?

He constructs families all over the United States, wherever they need putting together.

He left music, but what is the...

To make buildings.

Yeah, in construction.

That's how he got all that bread.

His family's construction business.

His business.

Okay.

Wait, did you really think it was the construction of families?

No, I did not.

I did not.

Like, I'm putting mommies and daddies together.

I'm giving them children, top to bottom.

I'm constructing these families the American way.

Just a little background on Gene Kelly.

He's rich as shit because of it.

But here's the thing.

Sorry, Paul.

But

he wanted

Malone to go into business with him because he felt like Malone would know where the hot commercial real estate spots were.

Yeah, he gives him, he gives him that.

That was the task.

He's like, hey, kid, you find me a space to run my club.

And he's like, well, this guy's making me find, like, he's making him a real estate agent.

Another thing that he's not equipped to do.

Yeah.

Well, except that, well, then his muse is like, well, what about this place?

You know, and then that's he, she puts him on the path.

That part actually did add up for me.

I'm just now realizing this movie was so cuckoo bananas that this part I was like, I'm willing to buy this movie.

I've actually

again, my whole thing is like, he's a fucking painter.

At least when they have the club, we'll go, and you can paint your giant mural here.

He doesn't do anything.

He's like, burst on the floor.

Yeah, you would want it to be like, leather chairs,

you know, white.

Like, he doesn't describe anything.

He's not even a designer.

He doesn't seem to be a designer.

He doesn't bring anything to the club on any level.

He brings nothing to the club.

To the degree that he also, once she kind of accomplishes her task and is like,

I know my job here is done.

I now have to turn into a yellow beam of light and disappear from the staircase.

He's like, I can't go on.

I can't do the club.

And Gene Kelly has to come to the beach and be like, we're going to miss you tonight at the grand opening of the club.

Which, seemingly, this movie happens in four and a half days.

And max.

Max.

And the club is an abandoned, like, weeds growing in front of it.

Wreck.

Yeah.

And then it is transformed into a multi-million dollar club.

Yeah.

Overnight.

Seemingly.

If this movie had at the end...

And no magical powers were used to do that.

It was real construction and labor.

If it had at the end, like,

whatever, all of the music and had pulled back pulled back pulled back and then like it had like pulled out of his head while he was like in a coma and then it was like boop boop boo

that would have been the most satisfying ending because this movie is a movie or this or if it had just been like if it had pulled back and he was just painting and then his workmates were like sunny sunny

and he was like huh

and he was like ah I just had the weirdest daydream.

I was going to say,

what if it was more like a New Heart ending and Zeus wakes up next to Hera and you're like, oh my God, I had the craziest dream about our daughter last night.

I would have believed that.

I would have believed it.

This could have been a movie about a man and his imaginary friend, Olivia Newton-John.

Or Olivia Newton-John wakes up and it's like 2018.

Right.

And she's like

on skates, and everybody's like, ha!

Hang on hang on

I feel like I lost you guys there

I

love her I want to talk about

I want to talk about the

the gene the Gene Kelly memory boner scene as how I call it

where they make the most bizarre choice he's listening to an old song and remembering it.

And instead of like going into his memory, he stays in the left corner of the screen.

The screen is in the right, in focus, and he's just like,

It made me, I wanted to shine my eyes away from it.

Yeah.

That I felt like was directly meant to be like a jerk-off scene.

That's what I thought.

That's a memory bone.

Let me tell you a couple things about Gene Kelly.

First of all, is on record as saying he only took the role because filming was a short drive from his Beverly Hills home to the set.

The big dance number between Gene Kelly and Olivia Newton-John was filmed after production had rapped as an afterthought.

Like, oh yeah, we should get these two together in the movie.

And he.

The boners, the one you're talking about, the...

Yeah, the boners.

Without that scene,

you would never know that those two were connected at all.

And it's terrific.

And Gene Kelly choreographed it, and this tells me something about what he thought about the movie.

He only would agree to do it if it was a closed stage with only him,

with only him, Olivia, a cameraman, and two other people.

And that guy, Sonny, as far away from you as humanly possible.

That's amazing.

In fact, nobody could talk about the weather.

That's how much

I don't want to hear Sonny.

Nothing.

Because every time they showed those two in a two-shot, it was Gene Kelly, and then you see like the back of

poor Michael's head.

That's the actor's name, is Michael.

And he's just like,

everything's ADR'd.

Every single thing I'm saying is completely ADR'd.

Gene Kelly being totally charming.

And then more ADR'd stuff from that guy.

Gene Kelly really, like, I was enamored with him in this.

I was like, wow, he's gorgeous.

He's amazing in this movie.

And it's kind of a sequel.

There's a 1944 movie called Cover Girl in which Gene Kelly starred and he played Danny Maguire.

Dancer, dancer, Covergirl.

Really?

I don't know if that was intentional.

Ooh, I kind of like that, though.

Can I just play you a clip of the director?

Now, by the way, this director didn't direct any other

dramatic films after this.

He went on to be a fantastic documentarian and directed Out Foxed and the Walmart documentary.

Like,

this director is a very established, great director.

But here, this is the director just talking about the movie.

Here we go.

I remember very clearly getting this script.

It was like 45 pages.

It was very weak to be polite about it.

And I said, oh, well, I guess they're going to fix it.

Universal called me back and threw the thing at me and said, we want you to rewrite it.

So now I have an original script and rewritten.

I have another script and I'm rewritten.

He did did it one more time, maybe two more times.

Well, lo and behold, the script never got fixed.

It became longer than 45 pages.

But for myself, there was always frustration that we really never had a script and we never solved the script.

My solution was to dream up the most interesting, magical musical numbers, do a great, good old-fashioned musical,

only brought up to date.

So that was it.

There was no script.

Shocking.

Shocking.

A 45-page

script was rushed into production.

45 pages?

I told you.

By the way,

that makes so much sense.

Because that's about the amount of movie there is here.

If you don't think these people kiss themselves into an animation sequence,

you'd be wrong.

By the way,

some facts about the animation sequence.

Done by Don Bluth.

That's why it looks like Fern Gully.

But more interestingly, the movie was running a little short on time.

Oh, really?

And

instead of going in for reshoots, it was cheaper to do an animated sequence after the fact.

I am not surprised by that in the least.

And

just to show you

the, I just want to show you this one thing.

This is the thing that was so interesting to me was that the animated Olivia Newton John is wearing leg warmers.

This, Paul, can you stop right there?

This

entire animation sequence, if you watch it, because it starts with them kissing, is the sex scene of this movie.

The entire sex scene takes place with magical cartoon characters like blasting each other into flower shapes.

And that is real.

I watched it again and jerked off.

And it works, guys.

It works.

It being my dick.

I want to throw one more fact at you and then we can get back to talking about it.

How much would you say it costs to build the Xanadu Club?

$14.

How much is a porn set?

Priceless.

Well, weird?

There are so many, that's one thing I walked away with.

There are a lot of like cavernous, large

spaces in this movie.

Like there are, there's the huge like space where they shoot the music video or the music video stuff is.

There's the club.

Like there are just big spaces.

A couple actors walking into

enormous spaces.

And would you say that that would mean that the movie was like really expensive or really cheap?

I, you know, I think for this time, like 1980, I bet you this was a big budge.

$20 million to make this movie in 1980, which is like, I feel like $100 million today, right?

Yes.

Yes.

$20 million.

The whole movie.

The whole movie.

The Xanadu set only a cool mill.

They spent a million on the movie and $19 million on just Coke.

Coke and roller skates.

More roller skates.

Coke and skate lube.

I want these skates skates lubed up.

I need them going faster.

I need all these mustachioed weirdos on skates to be unsettlingly, uncomfortably on their feet.

I would love it if that director was only like, well, it was 45 pages, so we did a lot of cocaine.

And we did the best we could, which was very poor.

Joel Silver, Joel Silver, producer of movies like Leave the Weapon, Die Hard, he was one of the producers and apparently locked the screenwriter in a room for over three days straight because he wouldn't finish the rewrite.

And the screenwriter that we saw there, who looks like an ex-drummer for the Ramones?

Yes.

And he says the Joel Silver quote is: that son of a bitch wouldn't deliver, so I locked him in a room.

I wish we were making movies in the 80s.

So I'm just realizing now, like, yeah, why wasn't Sonny Malone a musician even or a dancer yeah great he doesn't dance he doesn't sing he doesn't do anything act he doesn't know

i gotta tell you though i did love his co-workers at the art factory oh that one guy

just

i mean this is an old reference but wouldn't that one guy his like the sassy guy remind you of uh from johnny miller oh oh the one with the glasses yeah the guy i love when he said to him this is the this is the act out line like before it would go to commercial if it came on network television.

He said, you're going to make it as an actor, you're going to make it as an artist because you're nuts.

Are you developing this for

TV?

Yeah, yeah.

I would like to see the further adventures of Xanadu.

What happens two days after it closes?

The idea of Xanadu is the idea of Xanadu, because, again, the movie is like, well, we're going to have a club that is like the 40s and the 80s.

But then it really is just a roller skating club.

Well, there's also music.

There's a bunch of music being played by

the Tubes.

The band, the new wave band, The Tubes.

Yeah, but there's nothing, there was nothing 40s about the

ball.

But what's his face, the dummy kid?

He's like, I like rock music, man.

Yeah.

But that wasn't rock music.

No, he wasn't.

No, it's like, synthesize.

He was like, we need synthesizers and six guys in jumpsuits, also known as the tubes.

Can we get Devo?

No, we can get Devo rip-off band The Tubes.

And also, another thing this club was kind of missing was any libations.

There was no glass.

There was nobody having a beverage.

There were no spectators.

But there were only people who were in the choreographed dance.

But to me, my thought was, is that part of the deal?

You are performing when you go to this club.

Right, you cleared the numbers.

Why else would the club have a curved

part of it that goes all the way around, like a roller derby ring?

Yeah.

Like, the club is built as if it's like a

what's it called?

Where you race 100 bicycles.

That did seem like fun, though.

Yeah.

It did seem like a lot of fun.

And I love it.

I also thought he would play clarinet at the end.

Yeah.

No.

Yeah.

No, they didn't really tie any threads.

Olivia Newton.

Olivia Newton John broke epoxics.

But the takeaway from this movie really is: if you're an artist and you have a dream to do your art, like you should give that up.

You really should.

And like

you become a businessman.

The person who wins in this movie is Simpson, his boss, who's like, you should take business more seriously.

When I do it as a series,

you're going to die.

You're going to play it.

His philosophy is actually the one that is true.

Oh, guys.

I'm sorry.

While you were talking, I just happened to look at one of my notes.

I did tell you the budget was $20 million.

It was budgeted for four.

And

production costs and delays increased it by $13 million.

It went.

Hey, hey, so what?

$13 million over budget.

So I just came from Xanadu, and we're a little over.

We're a little over right now.

Oh, yeah, sure, no.

We got, well, what?

A couple hundred thousand now.

We're going to triple the budget

over

right now.

So,

um.

4 million and it went 13 million over.

Ooh, also, the lead actor murdered someone.

And also, everybody has broken legs from the roller skater.

So, we just have been giving skates to extras.

Ooh, also, Andrew Lloyd Weber is furious.

He even says, he even says back to his coworkers,

I'm jumping back, but he says, you know that dream of mine?

Well, I'm finally doing it.

That's him when he quits.

And I'm like, what?

What?

What?

What dream?

I mean, I don't care.

I don't care that you're doing it.

Just tell me what it is.

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Well, I feel like

we obviously have a lot of questions, but I want to open it up to you guys out here who might have some questions.

And I'm going to bring some stuff with me.

Here we go.

All right.

So who raise your hand if you got a question?

All right, here we go.

Good questions from the people down here.

Good people.

Good people.

All right, here we go.

What is your name?

What you would call this movie?

Oh, someone's playing a How'd This Get Made Bingo.

How are we doing?

Let's see.

Wait, there's a How Did This Get Made Bingo?

Jason, say dumb-dumb.

Haven't I already?

No.

According to this bingo, you have not.

Dumb-dumb.

Close.

You got a very close nanomation.

Does that mean somebody is going to scream bingo in the middle of this show?

Is this a thing that's happening that I'm unawares of?

Question back here.

Your name, sir, what you would call Xanadu.

Your question.

My name's Jay.

I would just call it what the fuck.

And my question is, you guys haven't talked about the scene where they go into the music recording studio that has pompadies and a rooftop scene and a wind machine and rain.

And the boss suddenly shows up and says, this stuff is expensive.

Well, that.

I thought you were going to say we didn't talk about the Gene Kelly makeover scene.

His coming out.

Which we didn't.

His coming out of the closet scene.

Now we know why it didn't work with him and Olivia Newton-John in 1945.

Oh, interesting.

Well, I was fascinated by that because it was a recording studio.

that looked like a music video.

Oh, no, I think it was for music videos.

No, it wasn't.

It's the recording, and all that stuff was to inspire them.

So

no, Paul.

Paul.

Paul.

My friend here, Paul.

Wait, how'd it go?

By the way,

hold on.

Hold on.

How many people agree with me by a pause that I am right?

Because I am right.

How many people agree with us?

All right, don't try and juice it.

No, it's.

What do you even say?

He says it.

He said, when they walk in, he goes, this is our recording stages.

We have these things to inspire our artists.

No.

Yeah.

No.

Remember, he goes, I don't know how to work this stuff.

Beep, boop, boop, beep, boop, boop, boop, beep, boop, beep, boop, beep, boop.

And then all of a sudden they skate and things have everything.

But wait, I have a question.

What do you imagine the artists would do on these things?

Yeah, they'd be like, ooh,

deserted island.

Ooh, that makes me think of something.

But that also.

Just go for a walk.

But that also, again, it shows no knowledge of the music business because you'd be like, all right, let's get into the studio and just start.

I mean, is that how it works?

You just start with the music.

Also, you know what you don't do?

You don't record music in like an airplane hangar full of fucking

rooftop scenes drop from the ceiling.

Yeah.

What?

No!

Right, that's why you record.

They both fly in that scene briefly and he does not react to it.

Again, I do believe this entire movie is about someone's mental illness.

It's like Birdman, where there's stuff that you're like, did that really happen or is he just in his head in that scene?

Like that could be this.

This is the first Birdman.

Mike, your name, your title, and your question.

My name is Brie.

My title would be, you don't have to do this, Gene Kelly.

And I was wondering if you found in any of your research what was the impetus for this movie?

What was the inspiration?

Because when I was watching it, it was, I just kept thinking, they must have thought, let's make a movie where we just piss all over Gene Kelly's corpse, and then they found out he wasn't dead yet, so they put fired on because this just keeps mocking all these musicals.

So you're asking, who's the muse for this

movie?

I do, in the notes compiled by our great intern, Nick Kelly, Kylie,

I do have what it's based on.

It's based on an older movie, but I can't imagine, I mean, the idea of a muse inspiring someone is a classic tale that could have been executed.

So, like, that's a thing.

So simple.

So simple.

Have a dream,

make it.

I love, too, that in the movie, when she reveals that she's a muse in a section that is, you know, how DVD chapters have titles, it's called Kira's Secret.

And she says, I'm a muse.

Why don't you believe me?

Look it up in a dictionary, which he does.

They then close in on the dictionary so you can follow along.

I guess, in case you're a dummy and you need to be explained what a muse is, and then the TV talks to you.

No, there's a joke, and yeah, there's a joke which is, do you believe me now, sonny?

And then the TV shows like TV, and the TV turns on.

Oh, that was nice.

And then the people on TV talk to him.

Oh, I hated this movie.

I like that part.

I liked everything except him being like, instead of going, holy shit, is going,

oh,

what?

Let's do no.

Like, he's so pissy.

Yeah, he's like, I would am I a real estate agent and she's like, oh, I'm on my place.

I've never seen your place.

I heard you.

You have sisters.

I get it.

He was such a jerk.

He seems like, I'm like, you're going to leave your amazing life where you get to travel time and be with all these people and do all these amazing things for this guy?

Are you kidding me?

I still want to crack into the end at one point, too, because what exactly happened?

Yeah, is that the crux of the movie that she has to make this decision to be with him or to go back to the immortal?

She made this decision, but Zeus is like, you got to stay.

I need him all my muses.

It just occurred to me.

That's when they blew our minds, I think.

If she was Gene Kelly's muse in the big band era, right?

And he's like, I got my own band, blah, blah, blah.

Why?

I guess maybe she was just his muse only in as much as he had the success that he had, because I guess once she disappeared, he didn't play clarinet anymore.

But I'm also confused.

Well, he says, doesn't he say, though, that when she left, he stopped.

Yeah, that's when it went out of his dream died.

Isn't that antithetical to being a muse?

Yeah, it is.

When she left, when she left a music at all.

Like, a muse, I believe,

she's like, I changed this for the best, and now

again, she's a business muse

because it brings him into the business of constructing families.

Yeah, like stop being a good clarinet player.

Go be a great player.

Hang up the clarinet.

Hang up your paintbrushes.

Be a club owner.

Be a construction worker.

Everybody stop trying to be artistic.

By the way.

It was the 80s.

I think we figured out the best title for this movie, Business Muse.

But there was a, what was it?

I also had an issue with him because he also seemed like he was a singer and I don't know many clarinet players who can

sing.

Yeah.

Gene Kelly did, yes.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

How are you a clarinet slash singer?

Like that, like you're like, I play the clarinet and I sing.

That would be a real hard combo to pull off.

But I think that's why to answer

that young woman's question is that that's that was the impetus for the film is to show that Gene Kelly can do everything.

And he really could.

Like when he was dancing, especially in the scene, the one with Olivia Newton-John when his boner fantasy comes to life.

But yeah, that was transformative.

Like that was phenomenal.

He is effortless and so, and he, I don't know, how old is he when this is done, someone?

70s.

He looks 60.

He's 68 years old.

He died shaming everyone else.

He was alive for 16 more years, but said, no more movies after this one.

Oh, is this the last one?

Yep.

1980.

This was really his last one?

Yep, and then he didn't, he died in 1996.

It's like, oh, he only died right after that.

Even when he's doing the horrible makeover montage, it's still, he transcends

what's going on.

He doesn't need to be.

He's really quite wonderful.

The only issue I have with that dressing up montage is he's like, I got to get new duds, but his new duds look like his old duds.

He looked like an old man at the end, and he looked like an old man at the beginning.

He didn't look bad, but he didn't really get new duds.

He looked deep into his eyes and said, I never had a partner before.

Take me shopping.

All right,

your name, your title, the movie, and your question.

My name's Ben.

Title will be Xana Don't.

Boom!

Whoa, there it is.

You should just sit down, Ben.

It doesn't get better than that.

And I'd like to know Mary Kilfuck, the three main characters.

Okay.

Mary Kilfuck.

Okay.

I'm really going to think about this.

Marry Gene Kelly.

I love the guy.

Mary Gene Kelly.

I think everybody agrees that.

Oh, guys, this is so easy.

Yeah,

kill the bad guy, and I'm going to

fuck

Olivia Newton-Johnson.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, of course.

I was.

I married.

And then I'm going to fuck Gene Kelly for the rest of my life.

Wait a second, guys.

Great.

You guys have it all wrong.

First of all.

Fuck the guy who yells at all the painters.

That guy is wow.

Second of all.

He said the three main characters.

Oh, three main.

Okay, I was going to say penis pubes, married.

Deathly.

By the way, speaking of random characters.

What about that guy that Sonny runs into as he's searching for his muse who offers to show

you?

Lou.

That was disgusting.

He's like, hey, you're single.

You're single.

What about my daughters?

And he unfolds his wallet.

Lou.

Pictures?

Lou!

That was called Exposition.

That's Horrible.

We got to show that he, everybody wants to set him up.

He's real hot to trot.

But to be fair, and I will say as a single man, men offer me their daughters all the time.

All the time.

They're just like, please, Jason, fuck my girls.

No,

please, they don't, because that's a lunatic's behavior.

And what to me was really disturbing about it was that he was pulling out like wallet-sized pics.

Yeah.

I don't think.

I think they were his daughters.

Yeah.

They were like high school senior pictures.

These are my girls.

I got all kinds of pictures.

Tall girls, short girls.

This one's got a lisp.

Come on, Sonny.

All right, here we go.

Another question.

Your name, your name of the movie, and your question.

My name is Caitlin, NIM Movies Career Killer.

And

I was just curious if you guys noticed when

Sonny Malone meets Gene Kelly outside of the record store, he's putting up those large stupid records, and he just walks off, leaves the ladder there, leaves the rest of the pictures there.

Oh my god.

So many things.

He's going to go to his house, this mansion, huge mansion.

By the way, thinking about that as well, leaving all of his equipment there, that's a big no-no.

But secondly, why is he even putting it up?

It's a real full-service job.

Like, he's hanging them up as well.

Yes.

You finished painting it.

Now go hang it outside the record store.

For this you get a terra Reed sticker.

That's a really good question.

Who has faith in their question?

Oh, this guy in the front.

Oh, you got one too.

All right.

What's your question?

Your name, your title of the movie.

It's Joe.

Can I sing the title?

100%, Joe.

Shit, doo-doo.

That's pretty bad.

I liked it, but I wish you would have just continued it on.

That was good.

All right.

Shit, doo-doo.

Here, here we go.

Your questions.

Given the sexy short shorts and the radical roller skates, who would be more likely to be recast as Sonny Malone?

Yourself or Jason?

Oh,

me or you, Jason, as Sonny Malone.

To be cast as Sonny Malone?

Gosh, we both have so many qualities.

Yeah, I mean,

I feel like we, you know what?

We could both probably do it together.

Yeah.

You know, it would be the combination of both of us that would be the true embodiment of Sonny Malone.

I mean, I mean, you know, it's also, I mean, if you think about it, Gene Kelly is the original Sonny Malone.

Yeah.

And then, you know, so I'll be the older guy, you'd be the younger guy, and we got a whole new movie.

Sure.

June, you want to be the muse?

Yes, please.

All right.

Is there anything for Michaela?

Oh, I can see.

I was going to offer Michaela the great big casting role here, Zeus played by a woman.

Boom.

Neil done.

And I can say that.

Zeus in a Tron-like world.

I wanted to be one of the painters in the office at the beginning who's always

believed in you, sonny.

Not to upset the boss.

And, you know.

I'll make an excuse for you.

Your name, your title of the movie, and your question.

You seem very confident that you have the best question.

My name is Dave.

Title of the movie, My Friend Thought of It, Graffiti Girls from Greece.

Oh, I like that.

Graffiti Girls from Greece.

I like that you gave your friend credit.

Friend, do you get a sticker, the not-the-beast sticker?

My question is: when they're talking to Zeus, Zeus is a Greek god.

Why does he have an English accent?

Great question.

And his daughter has an Australian.

His daughter's Australian.

Let's actually, let's maybe play that scene just for a second.

And she, I have a question while you're getting that ready.

Was she Australian the whole time?

There was like the first 20 minutes, I was definitely sure she wasn't Australian.

Yeah.

And then she was very Australian.

Here we go.

This is the Mount Olympus.

That was before they paid for the dialect coach.

This is Mount Olympus in a Tron-like world.

We need to be together.

All right, that's enough.

You're leaving.

Kiera's staying.

No more discussions.

Those are the rules, and that's all there is to it.

On the other hand, dear, rules were made to be broken.

We'll talk about that later.

Which is later.

Which is earlier.

I keep forgetting.

Just a minute.

Isn't anyone interested in my feelings?

What do you mean, feelings?

Oh, you remember, Pet.

We learnt about feelings in our mortal history class.

Yes, feelings.

I guess that's what you call them.

$20 million.

On a movie where they're

black.

$20 million.

You've never asked to leave here?

Not ever.

Not once in the whole time I've been here.

No, it's true, dear.

She hasn't.

Not in all these centuries.

Well, is it minutes?

I do believe that.

This is what the movie looks like.

Can't we just have this one night?

Just one night.

Somebody should go by all these things.

Just one moment.

Goodbye, Sonny.

Alright, so this scene is garbage.

It's almost like Hera has dementia in in it as well.

She's like, I don't remember what's earlier and what's later.

That's when I was just like,

this is so heavy.

She's right because she says, see you in a moment or centuries.

And

all right, there's a couple, a couple more.

Well, you know what?

Like, let's not answer those.

See you in a moment or centuries.

Let's not answer those weird, hard questions.

Now, obviously, we have an opinion about this movie, but there are other people that have a different opinion.

It is now time for second opinions.

Second opinions!

These are five-star reviews called from Amazon, Real People, talking about a classic film.

There were so many of them.

The one that thing that we noticed in compiling these is there was quite a few, more than 10, that the review was five out of five stars.

My wife loves this movie.

Things like, I'm going to get some brownie points for this one.

My wife loves it.

But literally, my wife loved it.

My wife loves it.

Like 20 reviews of my wife loves this movie.

And it might as well be, my wife loves this movie and I love Blowjobs.

But like, why do you need to write a review on Amazon?

Because, like, in case anybody's like, why are you watching it for the 20th time?

My wife.

Here's another.

I don't really want it in writing.

There are so many great ones in here.

I'm just going to kind of give you a sampling of them.

This is from J Trillo, Miss Mustang Mary.

And she writes, I need this so that I could do a drag number for a show, but the show was canceled.

I love the movie.

Five out of five stars.

This one

was kind of great too.

Okay.

All right.

I'm just going to cut to the middle of it.

This film was created to make you dream, for your mind to be mesmerized by the colors, the music, and the beauty of its entirety.

The music was great.

The plot was cute.

And while many may laugh at the roller boogie of the last scene, it takes me back to my high school years, going to the rink.

That was the thing to do.

All in caps.

Thank you, Olivia, Gene, and ELO, for making a movie and music that I still enjoy to this day.

Five exclamation points, T.

Johnson, North Potomac, Maryland, five out of five stars.

I like all that specifics.

Come find me if you've got a problem with it.

North Potomac.

I'm I'm here and I'm ready to defend myself.

I'm on skates.

I love this movie.

From Mandela.

I don't know if it's the same one.

I hope so.

It's him.

I hope so.

This movie should not be seen for the first time if you're over the age of nine.

But if you're under the age of nine, it is simply fantastic.

I am buying it for my fiancé's nieces.

Weird, weird, weird.

Super weird.

It is a good idea.

I'm buying it for my nieces.

Cool.

I'm buying it for my fiancé's nieces.

I'm a creep.

Now, as Mandela puts in brackets, I'm buying it for my fiancé's nieces.

Being raised by two older sisters, he knows the words to all these songs.

Close quotes.

So we don't know what's going on there.

But he goes, Mandela goes, this is a great intro to the Gene Kelly musicals of yesteryear, as well as classic mythology.

So just take it for what it is and share it with the little girl in your life.

Five out of five stars.

Oh, that's so creepy.

Right?

So creepy.

You guys weren't on board in the beginning when I thought he was a creep, but at the end, 100% fucking creep.

Now, little did we know, Nelson Mandela.

Nelson Mandela had a lot of time in prison to write

good Amazon reviews.

It's one of the only movies they had in prison.

Guess we ever watched Xana Dew again?

Yep.

That was in the movie.

Idris Albo was like, are we watching Xanadu?

They're like, nope, we're going to do it.

No other movies from yesteryear.

Nope, that's it.

Just Xanadu.

My favorite one here, this is from Malia.

My three daughters have been watching this for the last month from Netflix, and I'm going to buy a copy.

They are now roller skating and singing and having a great time, just like I did when I was their age.

Yes, this movie won't solve the world's problems.

I disagree.

I disagree with that.

It does not like most movies.

That's what it aspired to.

I disagree.

I absolutely think it will.

It won't solve the world's problems, but it's good.

It's clean fun.

No sex.

No risque anything.

And a few chaste kisses.

One woman in a bikini, lots of music, and dancing.

I counted.

I see it.

Just a heads up, there's one toothpaste in it.

Goofy?

Oh, God.

Yes.

Worthless?

No.

Because those are the two things that are in opposition to each other.

Watch it,

have fun,

find a roller rink, and take your kids skating.

Leave the cell phones at home and have some real fun.

Five out of five stars.

Wow.

I think, June, you'll probably agree with me on this.

I think they did have sex in the animated thing when they both jumped into that flower and the flower closed around them.

It looks like it.

That animation sequence was the sex sequence.

That was sex.

It was birds, it was bees, it was flowers, it was humping, it was sexy.

And also, just to point out, the movie was based on a 1947 film called Down to Earth.

I think you'd be surprised.

I'd be surprised, though, and I've saved this kind of for the end of where the movie's inspiration came from.

And here, we'll just play this for a second.

Alright, so here we go.

I was living in Santa Monica or the Palisades, and I was a writer, producer, and a friend kept bugging me about doing a story on what had started as a small little thing at Venice Beach and just kept growing and growing, which is roller skating.

The friend was Brian Grazer.

I think he's emerged a little bit bigger than the assistant that he was then.

I built the storyline to go toward a big rock club at the end, which I called Xanadu.

And I took it, yes, both after

the house that

Orson Welles named in Citizen Kane, and of course he took it from the Coleridge poem.

In Xanadu, did Kubla Khan, a stately pleasure dome, decree?

That's it.

But so Brian Grazer, in passing, said, make a movie about a club named Xanadu, and that is it.

Brian Grazer, not a producer, but inspired the entire movie.

So he was the muse.

He was, that's what I was going to point out.

Brian Grazer is the muse of the Xana.

Xanadu.

The Xana muse.

In summation,

I'd like to respectfully ask this movie to go fuck itself.

You were not inspired.

I did not find it inspiring, although Gene Kelly was amazing.

I thought Olivia Newton-John was great, too.

Yeah.

Yeah.

No,

I thought she was fine.

I just,

I just, she had very, I felt like she had very little to do, actually.

She was just roller skating and was kind of positive vibes in the Tron universe.

It's enough for me.

But like Gene Kelly, I was like, wow, this is fantastic.

This is incredible.

I would say you have to watch this.

Like, I feel like this is the most important movie ever made.

Because we take for granted, like, we see movies like, oh, I hated that movie.

Most movies do the job of creating a cohesive plot that goes like, uh-huh, got it, got it, got it.

This one disregards that.

We should be thankful.

This makes you thankful for every bad experience.

You're right.

You're never ahead of the movie.

You're never like, I bet I know where this is going to go.

Yeah.

You're never like, you're never trapped in that thing of like, oh, I bet in 15 minutes there's gonna be like a nine-minute dance montage in a costume shop.

Oh, yep, here it is.

And I really love at the end the way they move into the Xanadu song with the whole like dancing and the clomping of the roller skates.

I've heard shit about that.

So why when she's when they're in the Tron universe and they're like, no, you can't go back to Earth, you can't, whatever.

But then when they open Xanadu, she's there.

Because Zeus is like, all right, kid, take the car.

Moment or century.

Yes.

They forget.

Okay.

Zeus and the wife kind of continue the talking.

Yeah.

And they're like, you should let her go.

And he's like, oh, all right.

And he lets her go with all the muses, and they all perform.

I guess that's true, yeah.

But then here's the trick.

They all blast up into heaven.

No one reacts.

As everyone, no one reacts.

There's nobody in the club anymore.

Everybody's gone.

Oh, yeah, I guess you're right.

Yeah, no, it's done.

Because everybody appears to be gone.

But then he's like looking at the empty stage.

But then he walks over to Gene Kelly and it's crowded.

again.

It's crowded again.

He's wearing his Xanadu jacket.

Worst.

It's like the last time around the waiting.

You got to brand it, guys.

And Gene Kelly's like, someone's waiting for you.

And it was her.

As a waitress.

And it's not her because she doesn't appear to know who he is.

Right.

Well, now I'm thinking, though, that.

Do you think, like, okay, what do you think?

Well, I don't know.

I'm thinking.

Work it out.

Do you think she, I mean, are we supposed to be a little bit more like that?

Be like, who wants to be a millionaire?

Hear it out loud.

Yeah, say what's going on out there out loud.

It's just tricky because I don't know who she is, you know?

I don't know.

Who the last girl is, you mean?

The girl,

the waitress, the waitress girl, you mean, right?

I guess what I'm saying is, like, maybe there's a world in which these men, these weak men, like start to sort of see the same woman.

Like, they're not really.

All women to them are Olivia Newton-John.

Yeah.

That's all they see.

None of them are her.

None of them.

That's what what I'm saying.

All of them are played by her, but none of them are her.

Yeah, none of them are Kira, is what I'm saying.

They're all sort of like

projections of their form.

I can't hear anything.

Vaginas.

Wait, so Kira is...

Yes, vaginas that top.

Like, they're not.

By the way, such a better movie.

So, like, it's Kira just like a form that is sent.

So, like, that Kira that, like, Zeus kind of threw him a bone and was like, take this soulless Kira.

Like she looks like the one that you love, but she's not.

I think it could have been answered if he acted the last line of the movie.

He says, like, can we, the last line of the movie is, can we go somewhere and talk for a while?

Okay.

Now, she's the waitress, right?

Olivia Newton-John is playing the waitress.

She's the waitress.

But is not

the character she has been playing the whole time.

We don't know.

Because if he said it to her, like,

can we go somewhere and talk?

And then he looked at her and gave her like,

I know who you are.

And she gave him like a.

Yeah, how would you know it's been a while?

Then you would go, she became immortal.

But if he's like,

hey,

you look in his mind, telegraphing on his face, you look like that girl that I was following around for the whole movie, but not really that impressed to see her all the time.

Can we go somewhere and talk?

Then it'd be like, oh, you met the mortal version of your muse.

Wait, so they can be like, they're immortal versions of it?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because now I'm confused too, because

she's immortal.

Like she should have said, like, hey, I did this for you.

I got to say, this, okay, if she did become a mortal at the end.

A mortal, not immortal, right?

A mortal person.

If she became a mortal, then it sucks that she's just like a waitress at this club.

Again, my point, why would you leave your amazing life

for this giant?

She's just performing on stage and looks nothing different.

Like, so if they put her in a black wig at the end, you're like, oh,

interesting.

She was just performing, and then like, and then two seconds later, like, ma'am, Martini, please.

Maybe what they're saying, you guys,

you guys, maybe what they're ultimately saying is that this whole thing of like, I was touched by muse, I was inspired, like, we're looking to these outside things to inspire us.

Ultimately, like, that comes from within, really.

Wait, wait, wait.

No, you know, you're going to go in a different way.

Wait, I was going to say this.

I was going to say this.

We're so busy looking for our muse that we don't notice one right under our nose, a cocktail waitress.

But he does notice her and says, let's go talk for a while.

But this is what I would argue.

They don't even have drinks at that point.

Because the dummy guy is watching Olivia Newton-John and the other muses.

They're dancing and they're doing a whole thing.

And then they all, boom, go into the sky, right?

And then it appears as though he's alone in the club looking at the stage.

Am I, would you think, would you be surprised to find the rest of the patrons of the club didn't see any of those people dancing on that stage?

And that only he saw that, that it existed only in his mind.

I think it was.

And Gene Kelly wasn't like, whoa, what a great show.

Let me get you a drink.

Gene Kelly was like, go, go, talk to that girl over there.

I want to jump on your theory about how the movie should have ended.

Yeah.

He's a homeless guy who lives inside that place, that abandoned club.

And this is all been in his head

the entire time.

So

when she sees her, let's go talk, everything just goes away, and he's just in the corner with like a bottle, just drinking.

A pet rat.

I have a theory that's a blonde rat that he touches.

I think I have a theory that Mary's all your theories, which they got to the end of the movie.

And then they're like, we don't fucking care how it ends, just end it because we're $13 million

over budget right now.

Yes, and also more Coke, guys.

We need more Coke.

If you want an ending, you got to give us $5 million more dollars.

And you're not going to like it.

And get real comfortable with being shamed.

Oh my gosh.

So I think we're mixed on whether or not we would recommend it.

I mean, no, watch it.

I do think watch it.

For sure.

For sure.

If the music is amazing, I like it.

The music is actually really good.

I fast-forwarded through any scene that Gene Kelly and Olivia Newton-John were not in.

Really?

It's probably like 80 minutes?

I fast-forwarded a lot in this movie.

Every time the guy was talking to the dummies, the artists that he worked with, I was like, buzz, buzz, buzz.

No, thank you.

Do we know what he's doing now?

Do we have any?

Yes, I actually did a little bit of research on my own.

Whenever I'm watching one of these movies, I'm like, I wonder what what they're up to now.

Two things always come up.

They've never worked again, and they were in the movie.

Right there!

Say hi!

And they were in the Warriors.

This guy.

So those are the two kind of runners that happens.

This guy actually, though, has, surprisingly, not surprisingly, he works constantly.

And it's continuing to work.

He's pretty much an episodic guy.

Like, he's been on every single day.

Since 2004?

That's like the last thing I saw on IMDb.

Oh, I thought he was in something like just like, yeah, I thought he was in.

Like, I looked him up because I was like,

what's he up to?

But then I thought when you said you know what he's doing, like, you're going to be like, oh, he's got a vineyard.

Oh.

He makes great wine.

Warriors wine.

Braves, come out and play.

Come out and Chardonnay.

Oh.

Can't do better than that.

By the way,

Michaela is right.

He has not worked since 2004, but he did a lot up until 2004.

Michael?

Mike, you might want to check, did he die in 2004?

He is 65 years young.

Great.

Michaela, you have a brand new, well not brand new, but a very new show that's hilariously funny out right now, Benched.

When is that on again?

It's on Tuesdays at 7.

Sorry.

No, Tuesdays at 10.30 on USA.

So there is.

I'm not in it.

I know, but it's your show, right?

Mine.

Come on.

It's mine.

It's mine.

I want to give.

Are characters welcome on it?

I'm just curious.

You know what?

Thanks for asking.

Yep.

And the answer is they sure are.

Oh, that's so great.

They come on over anytime.

I'm going to wrap, well, we'll wrap this up in the studio, but my question to you guys is who here is from the furthest away?

Who do you think they're from the furthest away?

Raise your hand.

Ooh, where are you from, sir, in the front?

Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

Alberta, Canada, where are you from?

Miami, Florida.

Miami, Florida, where are you from?

Minneapolis.

Miami.

Anybody internationally?

Detroit.

Back there.

My old husband.

Whoa.

Have you.

Does someone drag you or did you come here intentionally?

Yeah, I don't know what the hell they're talking about.

Right.

Alright, so out of the people who do know what we're talking about, we got Detroit, Pittsburgh,

Scranton.

Really?

Did you come?

You live here, though.

You live here.

Anyone else?

Anchorage,

Miami, New York.

Moscow?

Anchorage.

Anchorage, really?

That's pretty good.

That's good.

Did you come here for this?

All right, you're going to get a t-shirt.

Come and greet me.

You're going to get a t-shirt with Hulk Holgan on it that says

sad doll hair

to you.

Sad doll hair t-shirt.

Thank you so much for coming from Alaska.

I love all the TV shows that are based on your home state.

And, well, I think we've done it, it guys i think we did that is the end of our show thank you guys so much for coming

give it up for michaela june jason

at the show good night everybody

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