"Paul Thomas Anderson"

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Okay, here we go. This is going to be a Smartless episode.
Let's tune up the ears, get the wax out. What are you doing? The papers are getting set.

The prep is done.

Okay, ready?

Here we go.

You guys ready to talk?

Guys, guys, guys.

What?

It's an all-new Smartless.

Oh, God. Smart.

Smart.

Smart.

Smart.

Smart. smart less smart less okay hey guys look wait check this out oh sure yeah yeah start right away yeah start have you been preparing chan you see that look at the construction no that sign right my finger is chicago oh wow wow wow wow did you know that a week ago that you were going to be staying in that apartment i knew i knew where the name of it but i didn't know where it was yeah sean uh for the for the listener uh sean um started his stay there what is it going to be like a multi-month stay in chicago right the first night he was there was Valentine's, and appropriately, he and Scotty saw a couple

consummating Valentine's right across the street.

And like in kind of like, it wasn't even like,

it was all the lights were on.

It was somewhat impromptu.

We won't get into the graphic details of it, but it was clearly not a planned consummation. No, all parties were upright is the point.
It was half a wobbly H. Isn't that wild? And Scotty's like, I go, what are you looking at? And he's like, come over to this window.
How long was he looking out the window before you noticed he was staring? Quite a while. It was a minute.
And he kept saying, come look at these people in love. Right? He kept saying, look at these people in love.
I mean, they were going at it. Sean, this is love.
In case you didn't know, it's Valentine's Day. Okay, this is what love is.
Okay? Now, do you think they wanted to be seen? That's why the shades were up? Yeah. No, I think people are just used to living.
Well, Will, you can speak to this. You've lived in New York City.
Do you just get used to the fact that people might be watching you, or do you, well, that? I think you go back and forth. I think that you have moments where you're like, oh, my God, and then you also have moments where you're like, you just live your life and you don't think about it.
You can't. You can't think about it all the time.
I mean, you could pull the shades down. Sure.
I would suggest that those people who are engaged in that, in that moment, didn't care. And in fact, that that probably was there to heighten their experience.
Now, Shani, you're back out on the road. We'll get to our guests here.
Apologies. But Shawnee, how's the first few days of rehearsal going? Are you having regrets? How's Oscar Levant? Good.
So, Shawnee's doing a, it's not a musical, right? It's got some music in it, but it's a play. No, no, it's a play.
It's a play. Okay.
So, he's going, so he's there now. He's a week into rehearsals, and it's pretty arduous to rehearse a play for the listener.
And And Sean, are you loving it or having regrets? Oh, my God. I love it so much.
I mean, it's pretty arduous to to rehearse a play for the listener and sean are you loving it or or having regrets oh my god i love it so much i mean it's a ton of work but um thank you for asking it's it's uh yeah it's a ton of work but but really rewarding you know what i love the most is the we're in the process of sitting around talking about the play page by page making sure everything makes sense and the backstory informs what the characters are doing it's kind kind of... Is this the first time the play is being done? Yeah, it's a brand new play by Doug Wright, who won the Pulitzer for I Am My Own Wife, and he wrote the movie Quills and amazing writer.
Well, let's plug Doug for sure. You know...
Does he have a website? Jesus. Oh, by the way, it's called Goodnight Oscar.
It called Good Night Oscar. We know and we have told every audience across the country knows Oscar Levant backstage at the Tonight Show.
Nobody's going to go to the play now. Everybody feels like they've already seen it.
Well, maybe they'll check out Murderville again. Yeah, exactly.
Let's give that another play. It's not a bad idea.
It's not a bad idea. How's that doing, Will? People seem to really be enjoying it.
It's been very nice to see people enjoy it and have fun with it. Listener, that's a show on Netflix called Murderville that Will Arnett brought to all of us.
It's very good. And, you know, so we'll go from that.
So from Goodnight Oscar to Murderville to the other big question we got a lot on the tour, which is, Jason, when are the final six episodes of us? I out? It's seven, but not a big deal. I wanted to surprise people with the seventh.
Sorry. There's a bonus.
Yeah. After the credits, there's one more.
They're going to announce that soon, but it's going to... So you can't say.
I cannot say, but it will be soon. All right, here comes our guest, y'all.
Okay, okay. All right.
Sean, well, today I get into a little bit of trouble with you guys i apologize i know that you hate it when i bring an academic on or scientist big brains in general but this guy seems to not really just hold on he seems to really be liked by those who have taken his class all right he's been teaching filmmaking for almost 30 years now and out of some of the top institutions in town. He's taught his students mostly through doing in that he's managed to gather the funds necessary to himself make nine films on subjects as odd as a single digit, nighttime mucus, party drinks, hemophilia, major golf tournament, addiction, haunted textiles, and Italian candy.
And if you can believe it, these films have yielded him 11 Academy Award nominations. Most importantly, though, he's got four kids, a house in the valley, and married to the coolest woman we three know.
Gang, it's Paul Thomas Anderson. No.
Yes. Oh, my gosh.
Yeah. Hello.
Oh, my gosh. Hi, guys.
It's so good to see you. Did you guys have a guest with that list of subject matters? You really had me reeling on that.
Did I bury it good? That's a great intro. Huh? I worked on that for a full nine minutes this morning.
Paul, would you have been able to guess yourself with that intro? Come on. Now, let's guess it.
So a single digit, which one is that, man? I did it in order. A single digit obviously is heartache.
Nighttime mucus? Nighttime mucus. Come on.
Boogie nights, y'all. Party drinks? Oh, my God.
Oh, my God. Okay.
Party drinks. We've got punch drunk love, hemophilia, there Will Be Blood, Major Golf Tournament, Obviously the Master,

Addiction is Inherent Vice, Haunted Textiles,

We Know and Love Phantom Thread,

and Italian Candy out in theaters now.

The Valley Famous Licorice Pizza record store.

That's incredible.

All right.

Pretty good.

I'm so proud of myself, Paul.

You can see I'm just beaming. Guys, we can't do early morning records.
I'm still up from last night. That's like the USA Today crossword version.
You know what I mean? Oh, man. Wait, but Oscar Levant is one of my heroes.
Really? Oh, really? Oh, you go. You too, you too go.
He's amazing, isn't he? Yes. You know, there's a great Oscar Levant show that he did that was here on KTLA Channel 5, and Fred Astaire was one of the...
That's exactly right. It was impossible to find forever and ever and ever.
I have the whole thing if you want it. No, well, but I remember it was this impossible to find thing, and then when this thing, YouTube, came around, I remember thinking, I'll see if this thing can really find something I want.
And I put it in the Oscar Levant show, and there it was. I said, oh, my God.
I like YouTube. It was there.
Isn't it great? Yeah, yeah. Dear Mr.
YouTube, great job. What's your, while I'm thinking of it, because my brain doesn't hold stuff well, the first shot in Magnolia, was that when you go through the hallways and you go onto the soundstage, isn't that the Tonight Show stage? Yes.
Yes, right? Yeah. Speaking of the Tonight Show, Oscar Levant, all that stuff.
Yeah. What is it called officially? It's NBC.
It's where the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, you know, they did that, but they also did the local news there. They had, you know, I remember a big deal was that we were shooting and we had to, we had, it was the days of Paul Moyer.
Do you remember Paul Moyer? Oh, yeah. And we just needed to move his space over, you know, a couple spots.
And it was like, you know, three days of negotiations to move Paul Moyer's spot.

I do remember he—

He was not having it.

And it was on a Sunday.

He wasn't even shooting.

Oh, my God.

He wasn't even there.

He just didn't want his stuff messed with.

He just didn't want his spot messed with.

Somehow I remember—I don't know how I'm remembering this.

He had a bright—I think it was a bright red—911 DPp targa like one of those with the big whale tails um yeah did he cut you off once on no i just remember being taken that a local newsman uh would have some big ass flashy cool car and he pulled it off that guy very very cool yeah he was a hand it was hand-to-hand fight with him and

ron burgundy would be great it was a very similar kind of you know uh speaking of cool uh network uh uh newsmen kind of a little bit of a reach your dad was the voice of abc for all of my years growing up in los angeles oh really yeah like if i if i played that voice for you you would you'd it'd knock you out.

You'd be like,

oh my God,

that's Paul's dad.

No question. Oh, really? Yeah.
Like, if I played that voice for you, it'd knock you out.

You'd be like, oh, my God, that's Paul's dad?

No question there.

I just want to mention that as something very, very cool.

Well, actually, so, Paul, we've talked about this briefly before once

because you mentioned your dad was the voice of ABC, as you said,

and he was like the original real promo guy on networks. Yeah.
And my recollection is, and so I'm going to say this and then you can tell me what you know about this and if I'm wrong. He would record the promos for all the networks, and the promo guys are, when you watch the show, when you're watching a network and you hear coming up tonight at 8pm, it's an all new blah blah blah, followed by Buck.
Oh, that was your dad? That was your dad? And your dad would sit in the room with room with the engineer right next to the board and he had a 416 a shotgun mic and he was the first guy to do that in that way is that right i don't know for sure if that's exactly that technical thing but that the image of that shotgun mic uh you know he would never go into the booth he wanted to do do it in the control room. Was he, because he was actually in real time telling the guy how to modulate his voice and do all the EQ and stuff? I think that had something to do with it, too.
And I think he was smart enough or had done it enough to know, like, I'm not going in the booth. I'm going to be with you guys.
You know, it's going to be exactly the same. I'm not, you know...
He also liked to smoke while he was doing it, too. Right.
Willie likes that. Willie does a little of that.
Not in the booth. Not anymore.
But I will say that, like... And then I'll get out of the weeds on this.
So, traditionally, all the voiceover guys, especially in New York, where a lot of it used to be done back in the day, everybody used the mic that's a very common that I do have over here, what we refer to as an 87, a U87, and it's a great microphone. Oh, thanks.
Your dad changed that by using that shotgun mic, and he forever changed, and it became the West Coast microphone. So when I would come out here and go to a recording studio, they'd always have a shotgun mic, and it was because of your dad that that became the standard out here.
Is that like the Johnny Carson one that was on his desk? Is that what a shotgun mic is? What is that? No. No.
Okay, bye, everybody. Oh, see you later, Sean.
So, Paul, you did not know that, huh? No, that sounds fantastic to me, and it doesn't seem too far from from accurate even you know um he he he did obsess over that kind of stuff and i probably passed a little bit of it on to me were you close to him yeah very oh that's nice i got to go you know i had had that opportunity to go to prospect and talmage was where he would go work at ABC. And, you know, generally, that was sort of my first taste of being around anything that was show business related.
And that was magical to me. How old were you at that point? Anywhere between the ages of probably five and, you know, nine, 75 to 70.
Did it strike you as being like a peculiar thing

for your dad to do?

I can say from my own experience,

and I ask this because I say to my kids sometimes,

like, it's when they do stuff or I do stuff,

they come in a work-related environment,

like, it's weird, right?

That this is what you're, because it's weird to me.

Yeah.

If my dad had done it.

And I sort of acknowledge it. Was it, did it seem strange or just because it was your dad? Um, it seems strange only because it was not, I was proud of him, but no one else could recognize this, the pride, you know, it's just such a behind the scenes gig.
There's nothing, there's nothing kind of famous about it. You know, you don't walk down the street and somebody say like wow there he is you know or it's your dad's a baseball player he's like well you you know there's no recognition to it really it was this but he that's what he loved about it so much was that he could just kind of have this independent life coyoteing around town and you know doing his work and getting paid for it so you sitting there, you're watching kind of the sausage get made for television in some aspect.
And were you at that point starting to gather these images and interest in this process? And what it, oh, these are the people that are behind the curtain that create at least this lane of fake life. And that started to build an idea for you about what you might want to do or get or can you can you track the moment that you thought uh i i want to do something like this i can't remember because for as long as my memories are there i've wanted to to make films for sure um but you have to remember i mean jason you'll remember that there was like such a dividing line between making films and making television.
Television back then was like, you know, anybody can do it, you know? Movies was like this gold ring, like not everybody gets to make movies, you know? Right. So you started to experiment with little home movies.
Yeah, I did all that. It's not an uncommon story, right? No, it's the same exact story as everybody else.
But I had the camaraderie and it was so crazy. Now, I mean, I look around my life right now and I see my relationship to all the people in dark rooms that I work with, engineers and things like this, through the entire process of making a movie.
And you're like, this is exactly what my dad did. You go to a dark room each day and, you know, try to make something happen.
And the friendships that he had with those guys, I look back and I think, I was really inspired by it. I always just thought that's what a friendship was.
You know, he's kind of, he was very close with all these technicians and guys that he worked with. So those are the people that were around our house.
Yeah, one of my first experiences was people that were very, very close with the crew, or at least a full understanding of the importance of the crew, as opposed to sort of this sort of terrible traditional kind of look at like, Oh, you know, the, that's, you know, some people look at crew as sort of soldiers and that, you know, the, the folks that are in front of the camera, the ones that are, that are super important when it could, when the, when the opposite is actually the truth. And so was that, uh, did, did that start then understanding that, oh my God, this is, this is really difficult and there's actually nobody on the set there that doesn't need to be there well the only people that don't need to be there are like studio executives and producers and you know that's what i learned probably from my dad it was like whoever's whoever's you know you kick all the people out of the room that are not completely completely essential to the product you.
You know, you learn pretty quickly who isn't, you know, they scatter. Yeah.
Yeah. So grabbing those early video cameras, movie cameras, stuff like that, that sort of pretty common story where you kind of point a camera at stuff and you kind of take little kid films and little army men and that's not uncommon.
But what about the writing part? Do you remember your first experience looking at a blank piece of paper and trying to figure out how to start from zero? Do you remember that being humbling or surprisingly easy? That's a really good question because I think you're right that the story of the filmmaker with the 8mm camera and then onto the video camera, it's like there's a million of them and that's generally how everybody starts. But the writing part always excited me because I liked it.
I think I got lucky that I liked it. I liked putting paper into a typewriter and typing out ideas and I liked liked the, I liked seeing it on the page.
I liked, I liked looking at that idea. Um, I, I don't know.
I, from an early age, I've always liked writing and formulating things on, on paper. And when you learn on a typewriter, you learn how to make it right the first time because the last thing that you want to do is go through that.

And I had the one script.

Do you still use a typewriter?

No, I don't.

From time to time, I will just for fun to mix it up.

But no, I don't use a typewriter anymore.

But remember the one script that I had?

I think I have to credit my mother for this.

I had the script for Holy Grail. Oh, wow.
Monty Python. Monty Python? Monty Python.
It was published as a little book, and I loved that movie so much. This would be like probably 78 or 79, whenever they came out.
By the way, they're both like, Monty Python? No, the actual Holy Grail, you fuck. We're helping Tracy, okay? So I had what was the script for that, and then I just copied that.
I just copied how the formatting was of that. It was a great way to learn.
So I think writing is either something that you like doing or you don't like doing. I mean, you know, it's, yeah.
I got a dummy question. What? No shit.
When you drive, when you're just driving around, like, driving around during the day with your kids or whatever, do you constantly think in images or see images and think of filmmaking? Like, is it hard to turn it off? Yeah, it's, no, um, it's easy to turn off. okay never mind it's not no i don't like walk around like rain man or something like that because i i always think of like like whenever i'm driving around i always see like images there's like god that'd be such and i see like a frame around it or something i'm not a filmmaker but especially when i'm you know like when you're listening to music do you find that happening sean all the time you basically start cutting videos right on the big beat change your eyes go right you know and i dork out like that how many how many wham inspired movies have you made sean in your head oh there's got to be like 12 i mean you know they wake me up before you go go was my holy grail i understand they're like i was like i can't believe there's just lends itself to a real cinematic.
Paul, what was it? This could be the best interview. Just, I like, I just.
You don't get to talk, Paul. I know, and this is why I like it.
I just want to hear you guys. I have to tell you, my favorite, I listen to, I don't listen to.
You haven't listened to this. I have, of course I have.
But the one joke that stuck with me forever and ever and ever was Will sing something about your father, Jason. And by father, he meant the security guard at the 20th Century Fox lot.
That sounds about right. Don't make Jason cry.
Don't make Jason cry. It stuck with me where I think about it.

That's what I think about, Sean, when I'm driving down the road.

Every once in a while, I'll think about something pops into your head.

You think, God, that was really, really, really, really funny.

Surprising when you're in the car and you're driving around,

you're not thinking about Sean's dad peeling away from the house.

Because he was real handy in a car.

Yeah, still hasn't come back. Exactly.
And we will be right back. HBO's biggest series, The Last of Us, returns with a new season on Max.
Starring Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey, the show picks up five years after the events of the first season as Joel and Ellie are drawn into conflict with each other and a world even more dangerous and unpredictable than the one they left behind. CNN calls The Last of Us exquisite, fully realized, and worthy of the hype.
And The Daily Beast calls it a riveting and suspenseful triumph. Based on the groundbreaking video game, the Emmy-winning HBO original series, The Last of Us, premieres Sunday, April 13th, 9 p.m.
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Paul, and forgive us for just being such fools.

I'm sure we ruined many of your days having to listen to it.

Wait, I want to know about...

Okay, definitely.

Yeah, just cut them off, Sean.

If you get an idea, start talking.

Go ahead, Will.

Wait, I just want to get this out of the way.

Real Oscar Levant over there.

I think I've seen... I'm pretty sure I've seen every single one of your films okay and always been amazed by each one but i just want to get this out of the way before i forget boogie nights is it true that that leo was up for the part but mark got it or leo turned it down because he did titanic or is there any truth to any of that sean loves the dirt paul that is very true is that i asked leo to be in Boogie Nights, and he spent many, many months agonizing and debating about it.
Months. And ultimately, what I didn't realize, or kind of came to realize about halfway into that, this sort of long decision-making process, is that he had a choice to make, which was to either do Titanic or to do Boogie Nights, and he chose to do Titanic, which, of course, in the long run, catapulted him to this massive worldwide fame, but on the other hand, I think, possibly, but I think it was, we laugh about it now, but he regrets missing the experience and doing it, but yeah, that's true.

Yeah, that's right. I just always wondered that.

Well, now you know.

I would have never

known. Will, was your question

as good as that? Not as good as that.

Actually, that was very interesting and well done, Sean.

Congrats. I like the idea.

Back to Google. Back to Google, Sean.

I thought you were going to say,

I thought you were going to say, and to this day, I still think Leo made a huge error in judgment. You never let it go.
But what was, no, the question actually was just simply, what was that first thing that you wrote and you said, I should film this? Yeah. And that first thing you actually put to film, that you, from your own words.
Well, I did short treatments and a shot list and things like that, but really, funny enough that when I was 16, just about to turn 17, I wrote a short film that was called The Dirk Diggler Story, that was what Boogie Nights became. And it was like a 20, it was like a 23 or 24 page script.
But I did it in the format that was, it was real popular at the time. And all I had was this sort of bad video camera.
So I realized it wasn't going to look good. It wasn't going to look like a movie.
So I wrote this thing that was about 23 pages long. And it was interviews with people looking back at the life of this guy, Dirk Diggler.
Oh, A Current Affair was a very popular show at that time. I don't know if you remember that.
They would always have these insanely overdramatic, you know, and it was so preposterous that it was so trying to find a way into the story that I thought was interesting, which is the pornography that had surrounded me my whole life living where I lived. Like, it was so obvious what was around me.
And then writing it in this format was like a doable thing. Like, okay, I can get somebody and do an interview with them, you know? I mean, it's a format that's still at work, you know? But at the time, it was really like the most convenient and plausible way into a story with the equipment that you had at hand.
Have you transferred that from VHS? Was it VHS? No, it was 8mm, 8mm video, so high 8, I think they would call it. Have you transferred it to something that'll last, and are we ever going to see it? Hopefully not.
Hopefully it's somewhere. No, it's transferred within an inch of its life.
It's available. I think maybe it's on YouTube.
I'd have to look again. Oh, really? Yeah, I'm not sure.
Wow. It's not terrible.
There's still some jokes that are the same and some pieces that remained in Boogie Nights. What was great about that was that what I didn't even realize at the time in terms of the writing, in terms of really learning how to write, was that I'd created this kind of, these fictional characters in this fake documentary, right? And then I realized what I had to do was adapt that, adapt these fake lives into a movie.
And I spent the next, well, probably about 10 years doing that. So I, like, wrote a 90-page version of this documentary.
And then I realized, well, I don't want to do that. That's a kind of, that's not the right format for this.
I want to write this as a fictional film. So I did that, you know, for 10 years.
I guess it was the way that I learned how to write, really, was practicing telling this story in multiple different ways. It's funny, that seems to be a recurring theme with a lot of filmmakers and writers.
I know, you know, Kenny Lonergan used to do, back in Naked Angels, this theater company in New York in the 90s, he did various scene nights on Monday nights where he would do the scene about a brother and a sister, and then just this guy who was kind of lost in his 20s in New York, et cetera, et cetera. And it took on a bunch of different incarnations, a bunch of different scenes, which eventually then became This Is Our Youth, the play.
Right. That my then girlfriend, Missy Yeager, was in with Mark Ruffalo and Josh Hamilton that then became kind of really, I think the inspiration for You Can Count On Me, you know, but it was like this similar story, similar theme that he told in various ways over at least 15 years before he kind of landed on that.
Yeah. I'm sure you can probably relate to that.
For sure. You know, maybe there's leftovers and you're just, I don't know, how deep is your well, I guess? Well, to that point, I mean, do you find that it was basically a peel-in-the-onion further and further back on a specific theme that you thought this sort of story was a fun example of? And if so, what is that theme? Yeah, but that's a, can you write a theme? I can never write a theme.
Well, I mean, but I mean, you tell me, you know, you're doing a theme of being, let's say the irresponsible chase of fame. No, I never, I never have anything good like that.
I always have like, just like, no, like I never ever have, I have more like facts, like, well, what would, what really happens here? And some steal from real life. Like every story was essentially the same.
You know, it was like if the exaggerated version was the guy who steps off the bus and, you know, kind of comes to Hollywood with big dreams. Right.
And takes his pants off. And then the next thing you know, he's a big star.
And it was any classic rise and fall fall story so i'm always just sort of following any steps of of reality i mean i i don't know i never i get so

scared of writing to a theme or having anything like that beforehand i can remember at a certain

point maybe needing help um like like what is the story and luckily enough coming across singing in

the rain and be like oh right it's just the same thing as like silent talkies you know it's this

Transcription by CastingWords Like, what is the story? And luckily enough, coming across Singing in the Rain and being like, oh, right. It's just the same thing as like silent talkies.
It's this transitional time in whatever industry. They're going from shooting on film to shooting on video.
Like, use things like this to tell your story and whatever themes will just emerge later. Well, yes, so you write a story and you basically just write a script because it's, uh, to oversimplify it, you, you, this, this, this event runs to this event and this event and this event.
And now we have an ending and it's a fun story. And now you shoot it and all that worked out well.
Now you're in the editing room and you start to shape this, pardon the phrase, experience for the audience. And it starts to sort of, um as a film.
And you start working with either temp music or the actual score. And maybe themes start to develop for you as a viewer, as you're viewing it, trying to keep the optics of a viewer.
Do you allow that to happen? And then does that inform the way you finish the film? And, and, oh, here's, here's a little theme that's existing underneath this crunchy story. That's kind of fun.
Um, does that, does that, do you find that that happens? I find that that's exactly what happens with the exception that, that, that it does happen a little bit earlier, you know, that, that once you, I mean, listen, I'm not blind, you know, as you're writing something, you may be, you're fighting off the idea that a theme is right in front of your face, just because you want to try to tell something factually. And what ends up emerging emerges, and you can't fight it.
Hopefully you like it, you're enjoying what's happening. But you, I think, and you keep a half an eye on it, but really you keep the other eye on what are the facts? What are the facts? What are the facts of the story? You know, why, why is that? Because I don't know, I find films that overindulge in telling me the theme are annoying, you know, and boring.
So, but yes, to your point that once you, and then you get into shooting and you're seeing dailies and you're seeing stuff emerge that is really exciting or stuff that is unexpected and you either embrace it or you say, perhaps this is not going in the right direction. But very more often than not, you can't stop what's coming, nor should you, that you have to kind of surrender.
You're guiding a ship, but you're also surrendering a bit to the path that's happening. And, you know, performances kind of get bigger or smaller, whatever ends up happening.
And then it just keeps on going, and you keep refining that through the editing and all that. One of the, if we can get into staying on the idea of themes, one of the themes of, it seems to me of your films is that they're very specific visually and stylistically, each one different in its own way.
But you, they do seem so specific in the writing. And so what is your relationship like, again, going deeper into the weeds on filmmaking, but what is your relationship like with your production designer and your DP leading up to when you actually shoot? Because it does seem like all of your films, I told you once at risk of further embarrassment to myself and to you, for instance, There Will Be Blood, I feel like it should be just hung in MoMA and left there for people to watch.
It's an incredible piece of art in every way, from the writing to the direction to the art direction, to the production. What is that like for you leading up to actually rolling film and working with those departments?

Well, it's the great joy of collaboration,

particularly when you're doing it with somebody that you love and work with.

Like, for instance, on that film, I had never worked with Jack Fisk,

who's one of the great production designers who started his career with Terrence Malick and David Lynch.

They kind of go back to their beginnings together. Anyway, I contacted Jack Fisk and had written the script and I needed to kind of create, I need a lot of help with making oil derricks and the recreation of an early California town.
And there was only one person that helped do that. So it started a great collaboration.
Jack Fisk was, you know, we were kind of trying to learn how to get oil out of the ground and, and, and really trying to be really, you know, do, do our research. And he said the greatest thing.
He's like, you know, I found that if we can just get a children's book about this, it's really better than trying to really understand how to do it with all this, these kinds of books that are this thick. And it was one of these great lessons and like yeah get the children's book first and don't be you know because it'll have drawings it'll be simple yeah and and and it was like wow jack fisk gets the children's book first all right that's really good advice but um we had the incredible joy of going to scout locations together and find um a place to make this film and i learned from him um one incredible trick that i still try to to make true is that the more you can have a location where everything's close together the more freedom you have um here's what i mean about that is that if you shoot a if you shoot a scene over here and you see it a few days later, you think that's the worst scene that we've ever done.
We should really try to do it again, is that you can go do it again. You kind of create your own backlog.
You create your own universe and try as much as you possibly can to not move too much, but to have a variety of different looks and things happening. So that, I don't know, I'm lost in whatever your question was.
It was kind of like the collaboration. That's...
Well, the simplicity sometimes yields some of the most complex and sophisticated results, perhaps. Yeah.
Sure. That's my role.
Was there a similar process with Johnny Greenwood, who did the, for Tracy, was the composer on that film? I believe it was the first time he'd composed music for a film and the first time you guys worked together? Yeah, yeah. There was a piece of music that he had written for orchestra because he was already well-versed in how to write for string instruments.
It wasn't like, don't let him fool you. I mean, I know he's...
But obviously his score was incredible, as was everything else in the film. It was really incredible.
And it's an opportunity... You know, look, I think...
Now, there was no kind of crazy weird instrumentation or something like that. He does do funny things with instruments where he'll detune certain pieces of the orchestra and keep others in tune.
And so he has the ability to make it sound very familiar. You're hearing string instruments, but that sounds just out of body enough that you can't quite place it.
So he's brilliant like that, but that sort of stuff, it's, you know, it's nice, it's trickery, but he writes beautiful music that complements the film and they go hand in hand. It was the beginning of a beautiful collaboration.
Do you consciously keep that in mind when you're writing? Like spaces or do you listen to stuff when you write? Yeah, for sure. I mean, I had all kinds of...
The stuff that I was listening to was stuff that he likes anyway. Was it Penderecki or Schubert or, you know, even the piece that he had written for the BBC Orchestra.
So that was already kind of informing where my head was at. And it was nice to go to him and say, like, you know.
The movie lends itself, too, to just, like, wide open spaces and, like, a huge opportunity to fill long gaps of silence with music that can either be gigantically loud or even just simmering underneath. So it was quite a good entrance into the game for him.
I love that. What's the music that you put on when you go like pick up the kids from school or whatever? Like what are your bands? Yeah, what's the music you have to take off the stereo when your kids get in and put on? Well, they're already sick of that Smile record.
They've been hearing that enough. Yeah, of course.
They're like, enough with that. Enough, enough, enough.
So, well, come on. What's Pearl listening to right now? Pearl is listening to, well, you know what she's listening to is anything, and I don't know many of the the artists but we're kind of obsessed right now with this film The Worst Person in the World I don't know if you guys have seen it I saw in the trailer it looks great it's fucking magical this film and it's got this great soundtrack so we've just kind of been listening to all this variety of songs on that soundtrack which is everything from like Harry Nilsson and Todd Rundgren to a lot of new stuff that I've never heard in my life, you know.
I want to ask you something about, you know, streaming versus wide release and where we're at in the business of that. And, you know, I was having this conversation with a friend and we were talking about how, for example, West Side Story or Licorice Pizza or whatever it is that's out there that's fantastic right now, how that would have fared with a really long, wide release run.
Would anybody see these things? Are we really truly at the point where we just want to see stuff in our homes? But to the filmmaker, I imagine, you want it to be seen on that big screen because of the genre of filmmaking, right? Because of the thing that lends itself to that. So what are your thoughts about that? Well, yeah, I mean, I don't know.
I mean, I like everything, you know? I mean, I really do. I sound like Daniel Plainview.
He was like, I like all kinds of religions. They're all fucking, you know, content to me.
And then he sticks it in your back. Exactly.
But when you make a movie, isn't the idea in your head, I can't wait to see this on the big screen. Yes.
Right. Absolutely.
And so with the business of this business, it just seems to be less and less that if it's not one of these big superhero movies, it's going to... Well, listen, that's exactly right.
I mean, to that point is there's probably, you know, 30 theaters in this country where it would look great and sound great. And the rest are fucking filth.
I'm sorry, but it's like, you know, and that's the sad truth of it is that I can understand why everybody says like, Oh, piss off. I'm staying at home.
You want me to pay for babysitter and pay for parking and come in and look at this shit and look at it on a screen that you guys haven't even, you know, I don't know. It's hard to defend at a certain point.
But I'm sure that if, God forbid, the business became a place where it's only event movies in theaters and the only place that you can expect your film to be seen is at home based on it's not a big effects thing or whatever. You'd much rather people be able to make films and have them see it at home than make no films at all.
Right. But I don't know.
I think that's kind of bullshit too, because the reason why is when all these theaters were opening up again, you know, you have these huge, gigantic 25 plexes and stuff like that. And everybody was crying.
Oh, they're empty. It was like, well, what did you fucking think was going to happen? But if you go to any of the great theaters, let's say in Los Angeles or New York, that are playing specialty programming, they're packed with people.
They're all turning out. They're film lovers.
They're people that you know are going to come out and turn out for this thing. And because there's one theater with 400 seats that they can fill, and they can do two shows a day or three shows a day, and people will still turn up.
It was like everyone's scratching their head. No one's coming back for the movies.
It's like, well, they're not coming back to these weird, horrible pyramids that we've built. But Paul, I think that what maybe you're saying, and I don't want to put words in your mouth, but there is a little bit of, well, of course they're not going to come back because look what you're putting in the theaters is part of the problem, A.
and i can say that and i know it's hard for you to say because of your position in the in the films that you make and you probably don't want to be that guy who who says that but you make the kind of films that you want that are really uh incredible films and and at the same time you don't seek out um recognition for yourself in a way that a lot of other filmmakers seem to do. It's never about your own sort of, you know, increasing your personal fame.
So my question to you is, how much of that are you aware of show business, in fact? Or are you kind of in your bubble of making the films that you make? No, I do, and then I don't. I slip in and out of it because i love part of loving um movies as much as i do the history of movies and my you know my obsession with this work which has been with me forever and will is what i've made of my life um it does involve being fascinated with the the way that it moves you know um like we were talking about before, singing in the rain, that's a fantastic story, what happened to the movie business when it changed from talkies to...
So I constantly try to keep an eye on that or try to understand it or have enough friends in this business from over the years that I can call up and ask, what does this mean? What does this mean when this film is doing well? Or what is going to happen here? What ties do you see turning? And it's nice to gauge that stuff. I love this business and I love movies so much that I have a real interest in seeing it survive.
But more often than not, the volume of my day becomes more about film preservation, you know, and film history and trying to keep that stuff alive. And then just sort of looking to see what's happening and reacting, I suppose.
But I don't know. How often do you collaborate with Quentin Tarantino on those efforts? Because I know he's got a real passion for the history of cinema and turning people on to stuff that perhaps they haven't seen.
He's great about all that, but he's amazing about it, one of the best. But he also really runs in his own lane, you know, because he, the person who I collaborate the most with that is Scorsese because he has the film foundation.
He, since the 70s, since the late 70s, early 80s, went around to every studio in town and said, look, you know, this is when it was really tragic, when the products they had made since, you know, since their existence were really fading away and dying and weren't being taken care of. You have to, this is sort of just on the cusp of VHS coming around in home entertainment.
So he was really out there at the very beginning with the Film Foundation saying, this is the biggest cultural historical thing that this country has to offer and we have to preserve it and we have to take care of it. We have to invest money and time and manpower into figuring this out.
So being a part of his Film Foundation has been one of the great honors of my life. It's great.
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Plan your trip to The Beach at visitmyrtlebeach.com. This episode is supported by FX's Dying for Sex, starring Michelle Williams and Jenny Slate.

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All right. Back to the show.

Paul, I know you're a huge, you're a big comedy fan and

you've obviously collaborated with

Sandler.

And married the funniest woman in

Hollywood. Yeah.
Or in the world.

Maybe we can just say the world. Or Tracy.

Maya Rudolph Tracy. Maya was one of our first

guests. I said that to her.
I said, you were one

of the first guests. She's like, no, no, I was.
I said,

I think you were. She was like one of the first

Thank you. Maybe we can just say the word.
For Tracy. Maya Rudolph, Tracy.
Maya was one of our first guests. I said that to her.
I said, you were one of the first guests. She's like, no, I was.
I said, I think you were. She was like one of the first two or three, right? Yeah.
Maya's one of those people, as you know, Did you give her a piece of the pie? No, no. You should have.
We sent her a cake, though. Yeah.
She should have gotten that. But she is one of those people that anytime you're doing anything funny, you go, so then it would be great.
And then you go, God, if we could get Maya. Just to stamp it.
Yeah. You know, because she's so just.
How did you guys meet? Where did that, as Will was saying, you've been a huge fan of comedy for a long time. Was it just, did you just fan out on her and say, will you have dinner with me? It was just like that.
Yeah. It's simple.
Or did you swipe left or right? I don't know how it works. See, Paul? See, Paul? It's not easy, is it? It's not easy to bite your tongue with Bateman.
He wants to hurt me, I know. You know, it's funny.
I'm not sure what it is. I guess it's like anything like, you know, I don't know.
There's like, you know, actors that wanted to be rock stars or, you know, musicians wanted to be actors. Like people making serious films really just like, the one thing they really loved was comedies, you know.
Like I had made these films. I thought that they were funny, but people were saying like, you know, it is not.
You make really funny shit.

Well, I think really, really. But you never ask for a laugh, and that's what makes it so goddamn funny.

There's no winking.

It's great.

Sorry, go ahead.

Thank you.

Because I, yeah, because everything that I watched

or in my daily kind of existence was just like,

I just devoured that stuff.

And I met Maya when she'd started SNL.

And yeah. What was that meaning? How'd you guys meet? Well you know the funny thing is Does she make you laugh at home too Paul? She sure makes us laugh She just must be a cut up at home Somebody once said to me, that reminds me, I think I told this once, somebody said to me years ago, when Amy and I were married, they said, what's it like being married to the funniest person in America? And I said, you'd have to ask my wife.
I love that. Do you find that funny people are generally pretty serious when they're at home? Yes.
Uh-huh. Nothing funny about it.
But I do want to know that. How did you meet Paul? How did you remind me? I really do want to know.
We, we, we. At SNL, right? At SNL.
That was at the time with Will Ferrell and Molly Shannon. And I had met Molly Shannon.
And she said, you know, you could come and you can see how we do this. And at the time I was writing Punch Drunk Love and I was obsessed with that time that Sandler had been there, so I accepted that offer to come and watch behind the scenes.
And then Molly said, well, you know, you can direct a short. So I directed a short with her in it and just got to kind of witness the inner workings of this whole thing.

And at that time, I was also getting to know Sandler

and asking him about his time there.

I was getting ready to make Punch Drunk Love with him.

And as I was getting ready to leave,

after my week there, my head was spinning.

I was like, well, that was great,

but I don't want to fucking do that again

because it was so much, it was a different pace of work. And I was thrilled to have done it, but that was enough of a taste.
They said there was a piece of paper that somebody had put in my hands or something like that and I looked at it and the information was on it that there was a new cast member starting next week and her name was Maya Rudolph and I can remember seeing her name on that piece of paper and if you've had any feeling like this but you see something for the first time and you realize that's my life has just changed I don't know how I don't know why I don't know what just happened and so wow but you know you quickly you kind of move on you just whatever you you have something else to do you have to you know, you quickly, you kind of move on. You just, whatever, you, you have something else to do.
You have to, you know, but looking back, I obviously that impulse, whatever that kind of, that shining kind of feeling that, that can happen to any of us if we're open to it happened. And so I, um, I roamed around and then I, I saw her, um, on television and I saw what she was doing.
And I had stayed in touch with a few people from the show. And I was like, my God, this woman's amazing.
And on my way back through, I stopped to watch and we met at the show. And then I had to go on to London to work on Punch Dr work on punch drug love and then i got to london i said well something didn't feel right and i just came back to new york wow and i came back and then uh that's fucking beautiful man yeah for real so you come back to new york because you felt drawn back to her and called her and said let's go out out? Yeah.
No way. I wanted to make a joke in there so badly, but I love that story.
He's melted my cold heart. Sean had that feeling, that same feeling of seeing something written when somebody pushed a flyer for a new Vons that was opening around the corner for a new...
Oh, I thought you were saying when he drove by a new chin-chin and he had to double back. He knew his life was changed.
I turned back and I haven't left since. Jason felt the same way when he found out that Deadline Hollywood had an app.
But, but, but, that is, that's fucking incredible, man. I love that.
Maya reminds me too, Paul, that you and I born the same day, same year. Every year she reminds me.
I think of it all the time. We're one and the same, Sean.
June 26th, 1970. You two guys are.
Yeah. But what city were you born in? Chicago, Evergreen Park.
I was born in the hospital Evergreen Park, but I just say Chicago. Yeah.
Wow. You? I was born here in Los Angeles at what is now the Scientology Center, which was St.
John's, I guess it was. Oh, wow.
No, it was Cedars of Lebanon, it was called. On Franklin? Or no, no, the far east of there.
Right there where Sunset and Hollywood meet, that big blue building. Almost near Prospect.
Yeah, right around the corner from there. It went from Catholic to Scientology, that building? That's right.
That's amazing. Hey, you know, you mentioned Sandler.
What was it you saw in Adam earlier than anybody else did? Well, I always liked it when Adam would get angry, you know, the violent part of him would come out. And it was like, and I guess I saw, the story that I remember, there was a sketch called The Denise Show, where he's talking to his ex-girlfriend, Denise, who's played by Shannon Doherty.
And it's a funny enough premise. And he keeps trying to woo her back.
But there's a moment when he starts screaming. I think his dad calls up and is on the speakerphone and he starts screaming at his father.
And there was a moment where Sandler screamed. He's so invested in it that the whites of his eyes turn black.
And there was a level of anger and commitment to this performance. I said, that is something else.
That he's not just screaming and being like, he potentially is completely psychotic underneath all of this. And I loved it.
That's great. I love that.
Yeah. And it was, you know, he has a great physical way about him, and I, yeah, loved working with Adam.
Do you ever have any desire to, especially now that there makes so many of these sort of limited series, does that ever appeal to you, the idea of being able to tell a 400-page script over a longer, yeah? Okay, I don't know. I want to be careful what I say here, because I only in the past couple weeks have become a little bit preoccupied with what seems to be a real unfortunate turn of events, which is 80-minute stories being turned into nine-part things that it just seems to be the call of the day.
Like, this is what we're doing. Yeah.
When in fact, you know, it's like, piss off. I don't, this is stretched out way too much, you know.
I mean, I was watching The Purple Rose of Cairo last night, which is about 92 minutes and absolutely perfect. And it packs so much story.
You know, it's so interesting because people say that all the time. They're like, did you see so-and-so? Did you see the new series blank or whatever? And they're like, I tried to get into it.
No, you got to wait nine episodes in. Yeah, just wait till the third one.
I know. Fuck, piss off.
Can it be good after the first one? Yeah. No, so I, but I only have been really feeling this lately when I'm, and I don't have a leg to stand on because I haven't really, I don't want to sound like an asshole here, but I haven't seen much of it because my viewing always goes, like if I have opportunity to watch TV, I fucking end up, I'm watching old movies, you know, it's just sort of like my, gravity pulls me that way with the time that I have in the day.
But, you know, sometimes you have a story that's very large, like a large-scale story, any kind of epic stories, and those are great. And there used to be this opportunity they would have like The Winds of War or, you know, Roots or these huge miniseries.
It was like, okay, that's fantastic. That used to be a kind of work of art in and of itself.
But now I feel this kind of slow motion turn towards stories stretched out too much, I think. I guess underneath it, I have a fear that the painfully difficult challenge of telling a story in preferably under two hours, hopefully 90 minutes,

will start to get lost.

Because I think it's a very, very valuable story telling.

You know, that structure is great.

I don't want to see that get lost.

There is the risk that we're rewiring

how we appreciate those things.

And I watched the story of Neville Chamberlain signing the Munich Agreement with Hitler over the Sudetenland, et cetera, et cetera, trying to avoid war. This was just to unwind the other night.
Just to unwind. Yeah.
On Tubi, I think it was on Tubi. What was interesting was that he was telling this really simple story that was just a snapshot of that time and of that very specific story and these two guys who try to alter the course of...
And I realized halfway through, I thought, to your point, I was like, I'm surprised that they didn't try to stretch it out and that they'd actually made this film became quite surprising to me while I was watching it because we've become so accustomed to and our brains are wired to, you know, great, there's going to be 12 episodes of this now. Right.
Yeah. Let's talk about the opposite, trailers.
I think you love trailers based on how incredible your trailers are, and I think you cut them yourself. I love trailers.
Trailers are their own little art form, and I have cut them in the past or collaborated with people. The last one that we did was not cut by me.
It was cut by a guy named Joel who's got a company called Aspect Ratio, and it was one of those great moments where I just handed the film over and said, can you do something and and it was so perfect right away that we didn't say anything we just said that's it you know it was great and that was a really fun feeling but yeah i always um that was one of the joys to me of going to sit in a movie theater um i guess there's people there's probably two types of people in the world people that like to sit down and watch trailers and then people that like to watch the credits of movies people like to watch the credits and people that don't like to watch the credits I like to watch the credits you once described having four kids in the best way I thought possible I think I mentioned this when we when we had Maya on, which was, and I'll mash this up, you correct me, that having four kids is like having four cozy fires burning in the house. Just hearing them run around, and it sounds like you're as much of a homebody as I am.
How do you manage to work as hard as you do and still be an incredible father to not one, not two, not three, but four kids. Well, I hope so.
I mean, time will tell. Yeah, this is very dangerous.
I remember there's these great episodes with Lucille Ball doing these radio interviews from the mid-60s. I don't know if you've heard those.
They were on SiriusXM for a little while. And you hear all these people talking about their strengths as parents.

And then you sort of realize, you know, that time has really proven quite differently.

That, you know, there are these people talking about, you know, we really spend time on the weekends and everything else.

And you're like, uh-huh, uh-huh.

Stay tuned for the book.

But I don't know.

You know, one of the benefits of writing, I suppose, is the ability to work from home, the ability to be present at home. And shooting movies about the valley.
Well, that helps too, to not go too far away. But even still, I think that, you know, I don't know.
When I went to London to make Phantom Thread, they did come for some of the time,

but then they understood that for two months

you're not going to see me, you know.

But that's okay.

Out of 12 months and a year,

as long as I'm with you the other chunk of time,

you won't miss me that much.

Sorry, Jason, when he says be present,

it means that you are where you are

and that you're aware of the surroundings

and of other people, et cetera. Got it.
Not just getting filled in. Yeah.
Right. Understood.
So, um, boy. Oh, I do, I will say I do love, and this is such a, this is almost trite to say, but your, your, your affinity for your, your love of telling stories about Los Angeles in so many different ways and so many different times.
I find it really fascinating. You tell stories about the experience of California unlike anybody else.
Because I think that there's always been that rub that California is not as interesting because it's newer, that it, that it's not the East Coast and it's always kind of looked down on in this way. But you tell these stories about actually how rich it is.
It's just different. And they've got the Dodgers, right, Paul? Yes, they do.
You know? Yes, they do. Are you a Dodger guy? Yeah, I catch him up once in a while.
Come on. Hey, so Tarantino says any great filmmaker only has ten films in them.

You've made nine.

Tell me that's not true.

Oh, that's horse shit.

I don't know.

I don't understand what he's on about.

Okay, great.

It's just like I can't with that.

Because I need more than one more from you.

Yeah.

You got it.

I mean, I don't know.

Are you going to do it like Clint East until until they cart you off yes i don't know you have to yes i think what else are you gonna do i think yeah what else are you gonna do you have to because you're because i would imagine your perspective on stuff changes as you get older in other words you would have made heart eight differently today than you did then no better, no worse. Just differently.
You haven't made one bad film. Yeah.
I want to see what your brain is like when you're 85, what's interesting to you and how you compose shots and all that stuff. So don't stop, please.
Well, thank you. Thank you for saying that.
Thanks for making really good shit, Paul. Yeah, Paul.
Your batting average is insane. You're one of the fucking greats, man.
I always tell you that when I see you in person because I can't dress it up. I just can't dress it up, man.
You really honored us with hanging out for an hour, Paul. Yes, thank you, Paul, so much.
Are you kidding? Thank you, guys. Please say hi to my ass.
I sure will. I sure will.
Our love. I hope I see you guys in person for real soon.
I hope I can come see your Oscar Levant play, Sean. I genuinely am like, I love Oscar Levant.
I would love for you to. Are you playing? Who's playing Oscar Levant? That would be me.
You're playing Oscar Levant? I'm playing Oscar Levant, yeah. You should hear him play Rhapsody in Blue, too, on piano.
You know, he's a classically trained pianist. It's insane.
Paulie, thank you for being here. We love you.
We love everything. Honestly, thank you, man.
Are you kidding? Thanks, guys. Hopefully, we'll see you out at the stadium if baseball gets our act together.
Fingers crossed. They will.
They will. All right.
Have a great day, man. See you, man.
All right. See you.
Bye, buddy. Bye, Paul.
That was a good guy, Jay. I love him.
Jay, oh my God.

I mean, I've been working this for a couple of weeks with you guys saying I booked somebody that I'm excited about that you guys won't be excited.

I tried to kind of fake it a little bit.

I can't believe it.

You know, it's true though.

You know, when you name all his movies for Tracy, again, I know you said at the top of this episode, but it's Boogie Nights, Magnolia, Punch Drunk Love. There Will Be Blood.
There Will Be Blood. Licorice Pizza.
The Master. He doesn't miss.
He never misses. And there's so many years in between him making those.
That's why it's so long, because he invests everything that he is into these things. That's why, what you said, nine, right?

He's only made nine?

Yeah.

Something like that.

Yeah, and they've all been great. He's, what a talent, that guy.
I'm really, I'm just, I think I seem pretty casual all the way through that, but my goodness, is that guy a hero to me. Yeah, he's amazing.
Yeah, same. I know him just a little bit over the years through Maya,

and every time, I think every time I'm always right on the edge at risk of embarrassing myself. And I do end up saying stuff like, your movie was incredible and I can't get over it.
And then I have to walk away. Most of the time I have to walk away.
I really, I would, I'd love for him to make some

big, broad comedy. The ones that I know he's a fan of.
Yeah, I know. The stuff that, uh.
I was going to ask him that. Yeah.
I mean, I'm sure he gets that question a lot. So I'm glad, glad none of us did.
Cause I wanted to ask him that too. But like, you know, you think about his affinity for that kind of comedy.

You know, Monty Python,

SNL,

I bet it would just be stunning. Yeah, he used to be around SNL so much, obviously.
He must love it. But, you know, I liked our conversation about, you know, the streaming versus the wide release stuff.
Because, you know, the wide release movies, when you go see them, you have to pay for them. But when they're at home, they kind of feel like they're free, so you don't have to...
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