‘Best in Show’ With Bill Simmons, Mallory Rubin, and Joanna Robinson
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Hi.

Hi, everyone. It's Amy Poehler, and I'm launching a new podcast called Good Hang. In preparation for that, I asked some of my friends to send in some videos and give me some advice. Just be yourself and the guests will come. Don't be the celebrity that this is their, like, sixth thing they're doing. I love true crime and cooking podcasts. Is there any way you could combine the two? Well, everyone has an opinion and a podcast. So join me for Good Hang. It's rough out there. We're just trying to lighten it up a little.

The Rewatchables is brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where you can find a house of R with Mallory and Joanna. You can also find us all together on the Prestige TV podcast doing White Lotus. Yeah, that's right. Every week. It's probably my most fun hour of the week. Oh! We talked about a whole stunt penis conversation last time. That was just a delight. I'm having the time of my life. I dreamt of the hand gestures that Mallory made during the last podcast. Well...

Joanna's here. She's in LA for a few weeks, which means we can still wait for the rewatchables. Who had the over under at 45 second mark for Bill mentioning that Joe is in LA? I just mentioned she's here. And I sent her a list. I sent her, make a list of rewatchables movies. And she mentioned a few of them. One of them, which is Best in Show, a movie that we all dearly, dearly love. Well, because we're doing White Lotus together, we might as well do Best in Show, which has a couple of White Lotus stars in it. And a 25 year anniversary, right? Is that true?

Is that this year? The movie came out in 2000. Oh, look at that. Great point. Wonderful stuff. Coming up next. That goal is that best in show ribbon. Actually, poodle means puddle in German. You want your busy bee? Come get your busy bee. Come.

It's not in here. You left it at the hotel. Go to the hotel and get busy, B! That's my favorite, the miniature schnauzer. You'd think they'd want to breed them bigger, wouldn't you, like grapefruits or watermelons? Don't look at the fathead losers or freaks. You look at me! He went after her like she's made out of ham.

All right, so I don't know what it says that we've done two rewatchables with Joanna and they've been crash and best in show. That sounds, that's my brain. I think. It tracks. Sounds right to me. Okay. Then we've got to go like some sort of sci-fi or Marvel or something. Then you would have to watch a sci-fi or Marvel movie. I really liked Iron Man. You already did. You did. The Mockumentary. The three best Mockumentary movies of all time. No, we used Species. Sheesh. What do you mean? Oh, Species. Species. The Mockumentary.

Spinal Tap, Bested Show, and Borat have to be in the Mount Rushmore if you're doing it. I think those three have to be in. And then the fourth one is kind of open depending on what you think. Well, are you keeping it to movies only? Because otherwise, obviously, it would be The Office. No, movies only. Movies only. I think those three all have to be in.

I think I really like Waiting for Guffman and A Mighty Wind. I would have Guffman as my fourth. I think so, too. I would put Guffman in there. Some people would throw Popstar in there. Some people would do a little Bruno. But I would have Guffman as the fourth. But Best in Show, which came out in 2000, right around the time when things would come out and then immediately go on DVD. And you could watch them over and over again. And this movie you just jump into. And it's great. And Mal, Dogs. Yeah.

On top of the comedy, dogs Lots of different dogs Here's some things I love, I love to laugh I love cinema and I love an animal It just absolutely has it all I was going to do this later But what's your favorite dog Out of all the dogs I'm ready to do this now And just completely blow up the structure of the pod Great, let's go rogue I really am fond of Winky It's hard not to be fond of Winky I love a terrier But I feel the pull of Hubert

Winky was a Norwich terror. Yeah. Just for the. Yeah. You're going to go. Which I guess just means short legs, short legs. It looks kind of like a hedgehog. Honestly, this is like of the like star dogs in this. Yeah. Yeah. It's really between Hubert and Winky, right? You don't want a Shih Tzu. Yeah. You don't want Rhapsody. Rhapsody is frankly the villain of the movie. Yeah. And you don't want Beatrice.

No. I feel tenderly toward Beatrice and I think that none of this is Beatrice's fault. It's all obviously the Swans, the two best characters in the history of film. But do you think Beatrice landed at a better home? Yeah, that was one of my unanswerable questions for later. I'm like, what is the rest of Beatrice's life like? Does Beatrice thrive? You don't think they took her to a rat on a farm? No! One-way drive? Stop that.

No! That's what my parents did when I was six. Did they? Got a dog named Barney that was just the meanest, angriest puppy. No. And then one day they were like, we have to bring Barney to see his parents and the farm never came back. Barney found a good mom. I can't believe they actually used the farm line on you. I was like, oh man. When did you find out? Is he happier on the farm? They told me when I was like 16. And you're like, wow, the world is a lie. We took Barney back and they probably put him down because he was an absolute sociopath. I thought we were here to laugh today. This is part of the life.

Sorry. My answer is Hubert the Bloodhound. Yeah, he's great. Every time I watch this movie, it makes me want to have a bloodhound. And I guess they drool. A lot of drool. Slobber puss, as they call them in the film. And they're kind of put on earth to do certain things. Then they're not to live in L.A. and just be in somebody's house would be a waste of a bloodhound. You would have to move to Pine Nut, North Carolina. That's true.

My wife is a big play with the dog's ears person. And the bloodhound, it's like, that's the number one set of ears you would get to play with. Since I am more of a cat person than I am a dog person, I like a small dog that sort of acts kind of cat-like. But there is something you said for a huge dog that like, instead of petting them, you like pat

them right and that's that's what they do for for hubert in this it's a lot of like heavy patting on the dog and the dog seems to love it good personality he's just mellow his face squishes i love when harlan's moving his face around that could be good shot gordo his little face wrinkles he can say macadamia night uh exactly he can communicate telepathically that is the most scene i've ever felt in a film when harlan pepper is just like yeah my dog can talk

Right. Like we have a conversation. Of course we have conversations. He understands. Yeah. He understands. He can communicate. He's trying to convey a deep, meaningful truth. That's how I feel about my cat, Halo. That's how you feel about your cat, Bug. It's true. How do you feel about all your dogs? Do you talk to your dogs? You talk to Murph, for sure. Deep relationships with my dogs. One of the things I like about this movie is it was pretty early on pet people are great and weird. The internet was in the early stages of...

It was one of those things, like, especially with my dad and my stepmother. My stepmother, they were getting golden retrievers since the mid-80s. They gave them human names. They treated them like kids. They had birthday parties for them. All the stuff Mallory does. I love all of this. They just got a new puppy. It had to have an IE human name because that's what the other seven golden retrievers they've had over 40 years have. And my stepmother, she's super weird. Like, she talks to the dogs. None of that sounds weird to me at all.

Makes out with the dogs. Oh, okay. You know, not make out, but like the dog's just licking your face. What about clothing for the dog? Now that's the only thing they don't do. They don't do that. Even for like warmth out in the winter? They morph into dogs. And I was always like, man, my stepmother, I love her, but she's really weird with the dogs. But now you do that. You see a movie like this and you're like, yeah. You maintain an Instagram in the voice of your dog. Murph. Yeah. He's become more threatening. What?

Well, he's hilarious. Agreed. He's got a lot of comedy in that dog. What about people who have like one breed of dog they love and all the decor in their house? I knew a Scotty dog person. I mean, this is sort of Winky. Where everything was Scotty dog. They have the Winky mailbox. They've got all the terriers. Like a vase. He's got Winky on his hat, which like that's a great hat. I would wear that hat. But you've never dogged it up though? We had a dog briefly when I was like 14.

very young. Um, but yeah, I love all animals. I'm not like a dog versus cat, but I am a, I am a cat lover. I've had two cats in my life. You're a one relationship with a pet. You could never have two pets. As you guys know, I have nothing left for anyone else in my life, including my husband. It all goes to halo. Yeah. That's it. You guys get a little bit. Adam's got nothing. We've actually had ringer high level conversations without Mal and them

Strategy planning for if anything ever happened to Halo, what would happen to Mal? Like, just what would happen? And we honestly don't know and she doesn't know either. I don't... I hope to never find out. I don't ever want to know. I don't ever want to know. How old's Halo now? 16? He's 15 and a half and he is thriving. We were...

We were a cat family growing up, but when I went to college, my parents bought a dog to replace me, right? And it was a show dog, a Portuguese water dog show dog. Oh my God. My mom became like a show dog person. Whoa, like a handler? Yeah. Really? Yeah. I did not know that you were going to have this level of perspective to bring today. Not as a career, but she handled the family's dog. Yeah, the Portuguese water dog. Yeah. I don't know what a Portuguese water dog is. Do you? No.

They're like a heartier poodle. I've looked at them. Yeah, they're... Oh, Barack Obama had... The Obamas had a... Yeah, they're kind of cool. Yeah. How wonderful. The one... Well, I mean... Not the replacing the part. Not the like, bye, we got a dog, you know? The one I've always been fascinated by that's always in the dog shows is the Border Collie. Mm.

Which I'm really surprised they didn't have one in Best of Show. Best in Show. I keep calling it Best of Show for some reason. Best in Show. Because of all the commands. Best in Show because they're good athletes. They're super smart and they're pretty hyper. And we looked into getting one once and it's just... They're cute. It's a lot. Like, they're ready to go. They're ready to like, yo...

Let's go outside. You got to throw me a ball for like an hour. Let's do this. So that's why I think a lot of them go in. But anyway, you know what a cat does? It's like you're reading a book. Let me sit in your lap. Yeah. Oh, no. The cat goes, I might sit in your lap. No, no, I might. You will earn that.

Then it will be the memory. Some cats don't want to sit in your lap. Sure. They're discerning. Yeah. It makes it feel all the better. Dogs are, dogs have low self-esteem and they just want to know what you're doing at all times. They're just available. And they're like, can we do it with you? Cats are like, you're on my terms and I'll decide when, how this relationship's going to go. Yeah. Anyway, the mockumentary. Yeah. Christopher Guest said,

We did an oral history about Best in the Show. I know, I read it. It's really good. 2020, which I don't remember because, as you know, the vaccine, I don't remember anything from 2020. I know that this is the thing you've started saying on the podcast a lot. Don't remember it. Don't remember anything that happened that year. But Christopher Guest said...

His mockumentary is about people who don't see themselves very clearly. The audience can see something happen that they don't see. They obviously take what they do very seriously, whether it's folk music, dog show, whatever. The world is ripe. And at the core of all this, when you see characters, Eugene and Catherine play the cookie, Jerry Fleck. Icon. It's pretty sad. You know, most of it's sad, actually, if you look at it. So he's fascinated. And these people are...

Kind of losers, but they're lovable. And there's a lot of comedy that could come out of this. And he did this for four movies. They're caricatures. They're heightened versions of a thing that is true, right? Do you think Christopher Guest should make a movie about podcasters? Yes.

That would be fucking great. There's too many of them. I think there's too many podcasters. The thing with the dog show world is it is such a limited, weird world. In the last 25 years, the Westminster, I think, became a bigger cable outlet. And you watch and you're like,

man, these people seem weird. But there's like specific strains of podcaster that would be really fun to sort of explore on a deeper level. Yeah, you could have like a guy, for example, call him like the sports guy. Yeah. That'd be great. Okay, should we make a podcast documentary? Should we do a documentary? That'd be great. He also said...

He talks about the connection he makes with music and improvising because he was a big musician. I look at this as a band with great musicians. I mean, everyone has to be able to hold up their part. You cannot have a weak link in that. The whole thing falls apart. So he's really careful about who's in these movies. The sad thing for me is that there aren't more of them. And some of them have worked better than others, but I almost don't know why it ended.

Something that Eugene Levy said in an interview is because he co-wrote this and the best stuff Eugene Levy also worked on. And he said sort of it felt wrote to him after a while. Like they had sort of done it and he didn't want to wear it out. So he didn't want to do it anymore. But like...

I feel like I would have a bottomless appetite for this. At the same time, I didn't think mascots was great, you know, and for your consideration was okay. It wasn't. Maybe it petered out. I hope that they do feel like the moment arrives when they're ready to return. It's one of those things where you crave more, you want more because you love the thing so much, but the logical part of your brain kind of acknowledges that there's value and discretion. Can I give you another theory?

Let's do it. I think Larry David and Christopher Guest were more on each other's corner than people realized. Hmm.

And Curb kind of became the TV outlet of this kind of stuff. And it was more built around Larry's universe. But all the characters and the way they structured that show, the outline was a little deeper. But it was a lot of improv. And it was a lot of people like, you're in this situation. This happens. And a lot of the recurring characters, like Richard Lewis, who's basically the Eugene Levy, right? Jeff Garlin is whoever. And so he would have his eight to ten people.

year after year and then J.B. Smoove entered the cast and I just feel like that was kind of the cousin of this movie. Curb is a good point but as Mal mentioned there's The Office both the UK version the American version and then like Parks and Recreation like the whole like Cherverse Greg Daniels like all that sort of stuff bites off of this a bit as well. And The British Office was just a year after Best in Show right? So then it became like

the way that people were making the things that became the monoculture. But when they did The Office, like, they had a 16-page outline for this movie, and then they just kind of went nuts with it. Like, they don't do TV shows like that. My favorite thing that I learned from the great Ringer oral history that came out in 2020, a year that I do remember, despite having the vaccine. I don't remember that.

Was I in L.A. that year? I don't remember. What happened? This was, like, two things I want to say. One is that this was probably Fred Willard's last interview he ever gave before he died. And so there's, like, a lot of tribute to Fred Willard inside of that oral history that's really... Because he had, like, just passed away when it was published. But also...

The process that you learn about how Christopher Guest does this, that they shoot it, shot it in 25 days and then he edits it for a year. 60 hours, right? That's amazing. That's incredible. Even beyond how he they write down every single scene in every single bit and they put it all structurally and then they just start chipping away at it. Yeah. It's a jigsaw puzzle. Yeah. It's really interesting. Yeah. And they know they're going to have to lose a lot of good stuff.

Yeah. It's the opposite of our strategy where we just have long podcasts and we don't edit anything. Is that a shot at House of Art? It's a shot at all of our pods, including this one.

we don't do any editing christopher gets slaving away for a year to get a 90 minute movie and probably could have been like there's this whole there's a whole parker posey just get stoned yeah yeah the pills and the weed yeah the weed i kind of want that cut honestly i'd love to see that you have it on dvd are there like a lot of good outtakes that are on there's not no i feel like he and i don't know this to be true but what i've deduced is that he's maybe a like

We do it all. Yeah. We get the 60 hours, the however long we spend the eight months. Yeah. And then we have whittled the marble into its perfect form. And you don't get to see the dust, the marble dust. There's a lot of there's a lot of movie makers who had this philosophy. Mm hmm.

that they're like, look, this is the finished product. If I offer you stuff we didn't decide should be in the movie, it's going to taint how you see the movie. There's a reason it's not in the movie. Yeah. So just watch this. What do you think of that compared to like the Ridley Scott, here's my director's cut approach? As you know, my theory is 99% of the time scenes are deleted for a reason. Yeah. Very rarely do you get like the Boogie Nights situation where there's like six or seven like awesome, awesome deleted scenes where you're like, oh, fuck. Yeah. That would have been awesome if that was in the movie. I think...

The better the filmmaker is, probably the better their content is. Stuff like this. I'm sure they have another three hours. There was an alternate Anchorman movie. I think Anchorman 2. There was a whole entire alternate movie of all the takes they had that when you get the DVD, there's a second version of it. Is there a director's cut that you do swear by? Blade Runner. Blade Runner.

Boogie Nights is probably the standard for me. Okay. Yeah. There's some good, like, there was some interesting Pulp Fiction stuff that they cut. Yeah. Wasn't mastered the same way, but...

You know, but for the most part, it's deleted for a reason. Comedies, you'll see like the outtakes are really funny. Like they'll have those like Tommy Boy is really good outtakes. They're movies. They're not necessarily deleted scenes, but they're hilarious. They're cracking each other up. Yeah. And I think this had a lot of that, too. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Can only imagine. So, Guest said he got the idea because he was walking his dog near his house and it was a rescue dog. And he said, a woman with a pure breed of some sort came up to me and said in a fashion, what is that?

And he said, it's my dog. He's a mix of this and that. And her expression was one of not even that's not acceptable. Basically, that's an awful thing to have happened in the world. I was struck by how bizarre it was. And there we go. Like the kind of...

Yeah, the elitist. The pure breed people. Yeah, of course. And then he just became fascinated by the dog show world and we were off. I love to adopt. I believe in adopting. We adopted Halo. We rescued him. I do always think, though, that it can stray into blaming the animal for a thing that is not the animal's fault.

fault. Yeah. But the people it's obviously a very rich satirical text here to mine. We had two rescues in a row and then Murph was we got from somebody. Yeah. Because I was tired of the body language. He's definitely the best behaved of all of your dogs. And he turned out to be worse behaved than both rescue dogs. My parents also bred the dog. To replace you. Yeah. The dog that replaced me also they like

Did puppies and sold them and stuff like that. So Levy said much wider appeal for this movie than the other ones that did because quote, people just love dogs.

Which makes me wonder because we were always talking about should we have a dog month on the rewatchables? There's just not enough dog movies. You'd have to go into the Marley and Me kind of area. Must love dogs. But it feels like there should be one that comes out every year. All of the Air Bud. The Air Bud. Yeah. You know, complete works. What's the... Dog's Purpose is big. Simmons Family has a lot of fans. When you made me watch The Art of Racing in the Rain. Another good one. Yeah. It's a sad one. You have to

watch this tonight because it's going to come up on rewatchables tomorrow I believe it was when we were doing draft day and then it did not come up but I did watch it. Homer Bound Incredible Journey? Oh I used to watch Homer Bound like every. The one with Paul Walker is good. Is it Snow Dogs? Snow Dogs. One of those. That one's good. I have not seen that. Is it worth checking out? Yeah.

It's weird that Netflix's algorithm hasn't discovered this yet, that people just like dogs. Man. They're going to go on a huge dog run at some point. I'm sure somebody is being served a dog's homework bar. Eight Below is the Paul Walker. Eight Below is... But Snow Dogs is Cuba Gooding. That one was good, too. Yeah, that one's good, too. See? A lot of good dog movies. Well, you can definitely do a month on the rewatchables, even though you're doing best in show right now. Look at that. Great news. This is your favorite one of all the Chris guests? Not even close.

This is my favorite comedy, period. This is one of my five favorite movies of all time. What is your single favorite thing about it? Like a moment?

Or an essence. Just everything. Like your single favorite thing about Best in Show. My favorite thing about it is the absurdity. Like that heightened quality of capturing something that seems simultaneously impossible and yet really true to a certain type of life. And that is Christopher Guest's genius, obviously. If you made me drill down beyond that, I would say, so my dad loves Christopher Guest. Like Christopher Guest's Bob Dylan impression is probably my dad's like platonic ideal of comedy. Yeah.

We saw this together. We watched all of the Christopher Guest movies together. I don't know that the Rubin household has laughed at

In a heartier and more fervent fashion than watching Cookie Fleck. Try to walk. Try to walk. The limp. It might be the hardest I have ever. I don't know how she did it. It's one of the great athletic. She said something her like dad used to do. It's like a funny walk her dad used to do and they all learn how to do it as kids. And it's I mean, Busy Bee is a close second.

Like, Busy View is just a recurring bit of comedy in our house after the movie. I just, I love it. I love it. What would be your number one favorite thing about this movie? Um, this is not my favorite Christopher Guest movies. Spinal Tap? Waiting for Guffman is my favorite just because I did a lot of theater. I really like Guffman too. Plus it was first and it was so original. Yeah. Yeah. Um,

My favorite thing about this is I like that it's as much a relationship movie as it is. Yeah. You know, because we're like checking in all these people are like, are they going to be OK? Yeah. After all this, after everything that happens here, is everything going to be OK? And it is surprising. What about you? What's your favorite thing?

I have two. Scott? I think Higgins and McKeon are the... I can't believe how much joy I get from every moment. Higgins is so good. If you only saw this movie and you knew nothing, you would think Higgins went on to be one of the biggest stars in the entire world. I know. He's like, oh, this guy was on SNL for nine years. I was like, no, not really. He played David Letterman in a movie, did some other stuff, and was a character actor. He's so... He's unbelievable. Every single...

split second he's in. He's just like alive and those guys are so good together. McCain had some quote like they figured out like

He was the string and Higgins was the balloon. And that's how they kind of did it. And it was like, that's perfect. And then Fred Willard is just so fucking funny. Like, you can watch this movie 20 times. And he... He might be my favorite thing, actually. It's hard to pick. When Cookie's out there, he's like, she looks familiar. Like, he's just got... Single best recurring through line of the movie. That's the other thing that kills me. It's so good. That was the other thing that I thought was so...

impressive when I read that Ringer post was that they were looking at nothing when they were doing all of that commentary. That they recorded all the commentary stuff in one day. Yeah. And that the whole arena was empty and it was just Christopher Guest describing what they would be looking at at any given moment. And then...

So we should talk about that because the English guy was like the straight man that they told him. I love him. Study as much dog stuff as possible, Trevor. Trevor Jackwith. Jim Piddock as the straight man. Who was only there for one day for the shoot. He had to like film everything in eight hours. Fred Willard is amazing. But re-watching it, I was just like, I was watching Jim the whole time because it was just like his just micro escalation of frustration and annoyance masked in like British politeness. Right.

And like the camera's on, so I have to behave sort of thing. I thought it was incredible. It's the highlight of Fred's career. And he had a really fun career. But I think this would be the first thing. So good. I mean, he was parodying this parody on The Bachelor. Yeah. You know, until months before his death. Like, this is just such an iconic. I don't know if this is true, but I feel like if you asked 100 people, what's your favorite part of Best in Show? The majority of them would say Fred Willard.

Probably. Like, that's like the... Right. That emerged and transcended the movie in a way. Yeah, I agree. And it's...

When did Dodgeball come out? Just like a couple years later? So just like thinking about the color commentary comedy bit in both of those movies, I think really had a lot of mileage. Also, it made more sense in 2000 because there really were announcers, like at least in the vicinity of this guy, like doing baseball games and football games where you're just like, man, is this guy drunk? What's happening to this guy? Good way to judge a woman. Right.

He's like, I'm used to that. I'm more used to them running away. Oh, God. The Chris Guest Collection. Yeah.

Which is all these movies. But I went back with him. I didn't really know him until I didn't see Spinal Tap till high school. But the first time I saw him was he was on SNL for a year with Martin Short and Billy Crystal. And he was in when they loaded the cast. They did like the Yankees. Murderers Row. And he did his two best things was he was on Jackie Rogers Jr. $100,000 jackpot. What? He played Raheem.

Which was like just this crazy character that was hilarious. But then they did the one, the synchronized swimmer swimmers with him and Martin short. Yeah. That was basically a short version of one of these movies where it was like these two males synchronized swimmers, but Martin short wasn't a strong swimmer and he had to wear life vests.

And they were doing the routines. And it was just like, I'd never seen anything like that. So then Spinal Tap was a big 80s high school movie. Yeah. I love that movie. And it was one of those that nobody saw in the theater. It was like a belated on cable. Yeah. It was like, what's this? And it just all of a sudden became a classic. That's a movie that I was quoting for years before I saw it. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like it was just in the water. Like a proto-meme. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Same. And then, of course, Princess Bride. Yeah.

He kills in Princess Bride. But then McKeon ended up on SNL replacing Phil Hartman and it just wasn't good. I don't know what it was. It wasn't the right fit for him. So then this is a big comeback for him. The movie was written by Gaston Levy as we mentioned. 10.8 million budget made 20 million. Roger Ebert, three and a half stars. Come on, Rog. What the fuck, man? A wickedly funny mockumentary. He did say that.

Not enough character? Well, not every movie can be Crash. Roger Ebert's favorite movie of that year. Did he give that four? Yeah, he did. It was his favorite movie of that year, is what he said. He did say the movie is consistently just plain funny and sometimes ascends to a kind of crazed...

genius great i would say the whole entire thing all 90 minutes crazed genius this is a four star like the first time i saw it i was like this movie's in my life now no question it was an immediate dvd purchase yeah absolutely um i hadn't seen it for a couple years

And I just, I watched it twice in the last week and I was just fucking laughing. And I was laughing at different things during the two viewings. That was what was surprising. Anyway. It's a tough one for rewatchables because every single scene is rewatchable. I know. We'll take a break and then we're going to do rewatchable scenes.

This is tough. Really hard. I think I structured this correctly, but I also have too many already. This is actually, this is the only thing that's easy for me. Really? Yeah. The rewatchable scenes? You didn't write down every single scene? I started to be more disciplined as I got further into the film. Well, so we'll start here. Yeah. The opening meet and greet because we get Hamilton and Megan therapy, but then we go right to Jerry and Cookie Fleck. Yeah. So I'm going to combine those two. Okay. And got myself in a position that wasn't.

Very easy for me emotionally. It's called the Congress of a Cow, where the woman is bent over, the hands are on the floor, and the man is behind. What did she do when she saw you? It's just so they're staring at us.

She didn't say anything. Didn't say a word. She was doing the Congress of the Cow? Congress of the Cow. Got myself in a position that wasn't very easy for me emotionally. It's called the Congress of the Cow. Did you look up the Congress of the Cow? Not on my work computer. Okay, but you did look it up. I think you did. She describes it. The woman is bent over. The hands are on the floor.

And the man is behind. I will just say right now, I don't know if I'm picking it for most rewatchable scene. I think this is in the running for best opening scene of a movie ever. It's pretty, well, the belated shot to the dog. Yeah. You think they're talking, even though you know the movie's about dogs, you think they're talking about a human child who has seen and been scarred by watching them have sex. And then they pan to their sad dog on her chase. Yeah. At therapy. Super comfortable. That's incredible.

Wine murmur? I don't know how to pronounce that. I don't really like those dogs. Poor Beatrice. But then we go right to Jerry and Cookie Fleck. This is iconic. Who was very popular back then. Dozens of boyfriends. Hundreds. No, hundreds. Hundreds. Yeah. She was very popular back then. She had dozens of boyfriends. Hundreds. Hundreds. Yeah, hundreds. I did not know that. Hundreds. Hundreds.

Well, not that I didn't have a reputation myself, because, you know, I was considered, you know, by some to be quite the Casanova myself.

back at Ponce de Leon. Hundreds. It's the pan down to the two left feet. No, but wait. I was considered to be quite the Casanova myself when they cut to the ugliest picture possible. With the eyes crossed. Oh my God. He looks like Austin Powers in that picture. Two left feet. They used to call him Loopy. I don't know how you come up with two left feet. I don't know how much... How stoned do you need to be? Like what...

That is actually a great one to drill down on in terms of their creative process, how much is structured and known in advance and how much is improv. Because you want to believe they know that because they're working toward Jerry's going to have to be the handler. And he's going to have to do that little loop.

Turn Winky around at the end. They said that they wrote complex backstories for all of them. So even though they're improving this movie, they have like the full backstories. They knew exactly what it was like when Cookie and Bulge fucked on the roller coaster. They knew all of that. Bulge was the roller coaster. Yeah, girl. Cookie Googleman? I love working with you. Cookie Googleman?

I have meeting Scott and stuff and Stefan and then right to Leslie and Sherry where we get there and they're in the grocery store, the meat market. Every one of those pepperoni sticks out. I just want to hold it. He's just coming out of the gates on fire. You can take the membranes off. He was a wild man on campus on a Friday night. I'd have three Saturday nights and go home. And then the photo. Another flash to a great photo. Yeah. Sensational.

I don't think there's a single second where they're not hilarious in this movie. Even when they're like decorating their hotel room with the thing on the wall. He's like quietly hammering a quilt into a hotel room wall. And he's got his little bleach tips and like a little ponytail in front. And he's doing like his thing with his... Oh my God. But then we go right to Leslie Ward Cabot doing a Joe Biden impersonation next to Jennifer Coolidge. Wow.

We could not talk or talk forever and still find things to not talk about. We both love soup. He eventually became blue in old school. Three years later. What a run for him. This is a huge moment for...

Jennifer Coolidge comedian, right? Because she had already done American Pie, but like this was a completely different mode and level for her. She's incredible in this. And everyone always says she was like during the SNL 50 stuff. I think she was one of the people that auditioned and didn't get it where they were like, ah, maybe, you know, she was close. We couldn't get there. She was definitely something. Everybody knew she was something. She knew everybody. She was friends with everybody. And then it just happened.

I also love the like web of, you know, Christopher Guest has this staple of actors, but I like that he recruits from like, she does American Pie with Eugene Levy. Yeah. And Eugene Levy's like, you gotta meet Jennifer Coolidge. You know what I mean? Yes, the degrees of separation collapse onto themselves at some point and then we get to hear Sherry Ann say, we love Snow Peas. What a fucking gift. We love Snow Peas. Will you have me stop podcasting when I get to my Leslie Ward Cabot stage? No. No. No. Honestly,

By then, you have to like put your mouth. I think by then you'll just be able to beam a podcast into someone's mind. Yeah. And you do not talk about things for hours at a time. That'd be cool. Yeah, exactly. I have We Meet Christy Cummings. She's just a handler. Yeah. This is one of my favorite moments of the movie when she lays out the whole family dynamic.

How she's the taskmaster like her father. Oh, my God. Her mom's the heart and soul. And she was there with unconditional love until my mom committed suicide in 81. Worked for my family. Just an unbelievable... Wild line. And then it just cuts to the next scene. Unbelievable. And the two of them together...

Oh. Just great. Perfect. Unbelievable. It almost could have been its own show. Oh, yeah. That is... Like, that could have been an NBC sitcom in, like, 2002. No question. The American Bitch spinoff. Right. I mean, running a publication together with Christy and Sherry. That's where we hired Mal from. Yeah, American Bitch. American Bitch and Sports Illustrated. Oh, exactly. It wasn't Horse and House. It was her first job. Okay. Intern at American Bitch. One day. That's still the dream. That's still the dream. It is amazing now to, like, go back because Jane Lynch is such a...

indispensable part of our comedic fabric and like I never saw her before this no me neither she did stuff I don't remember it but then anytime I saw her after I was like Jane Lynch yeah of course best in show and then when Glee happened it was not surprising yeah um

Well, Jerry and Cookie have dinner with their old boyfriend. I just got to tell you guys, this is my pick for most rewatchable scene. It is. I think this is a really good pick. And here's why. This is what I I don't like. I know. Can I make the case? Yeah, do it. Zach, the son absolutely kills me. Oh, that's great. Playing with his parachuter. The guy openly flirting with her at the table while also talking about how he's a chief hostage negotiator.

Her head got stuck in the gargoyle. And then Eugene left me getting mad and complimenting the wife on her beautiful, luscious breasts. I forgot to compliment you on your luscious melon breasts tonight. How does this happen? My favorite part is when she's like, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank

And he starts doing his hostage negotiator. Please, honey, this is what I do. Don't be mad at him, please. I'll gouge your left eye out with my thumb. Shit, you're not, you freak. Get down here right now. I'm going to punch you in the eye until it turns to jelly. Get down here. Wait.

It doesn't surprise me, Mallory, that this is one of your favorite. This is my pick. I love Max and Cookie. I think my again, like there's just the through line of cookies X's being so brazen with Jerry standing right there. Like, obviously, Max, she must have been a dynamo. No, but the other.

I think I prefer the other ones who just randomly come across them in the wild. Or in the recording studio at the end. All of that stuff is really good. Great stuff. I will stab you with forks until you bleed. How about that?

Do you have any other rewatchables before we get to the pre-show party? My number one is... No, I have a bunch more. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. In the sequencing. Yes. A couple more that we've passed in the chronology of the film already. Well, we can go back after. The pre-show party. Yeah. There's a butch eye sculpture. Yeah. The party's over when it melts. So,

Someone recognizes Cookie. Yeah. That's our pod counter. Should we do a ringer party and do an ice sculpture and when it melts, the party's over? We had an ice luge at the 2016 ringer Christmas party. Did you? Yeah. Back when we used to have parties. Boy. Yeah. What a night that was. The mint julep. You were working as a waitress there. You were the best. Yeah. You know, I banged a lot of waitresses. I banged a lot of waitresses. That was

That is so good. You were the best. I banged a lot of E.E. But she's kind of a drag. You don't forget the best. Yeah, you don't forget the best. Absolutely incredible. But I love how she always keeps apologizing to Jerry. You know, like earlier when they went to the Berman, she's like, who's my future? Who's my future? I'm with him now. Yeah. So good. Oh, man. I wrote down They Can't Find Busy B. This is my. Which Parker Posey performs like she's in a Scorsese cocaine film. I think this is Shakespeare.

Busy B is missing. Has this been you ever with anything missing with Halo? You know, it's interesting because like Adam and I were rewatching this and we were the two that we've skipped so far that I would nominate are Megan Hamilton, Swan sharing their two Starbucks. That's my number one. That's just an, I think, unbelievable scene in the catalogs. The catalog conversation. We're so lucky to have been raised amongst catalogs. Hello,

remarkable line in the movie. You know, I was such a huge J.Crew person then, too. Still am. Yeah. Incredible. Yeah, yeah. And then when they arrive at the airport, and they're screaming at each other, like, Adam and I were watching this, and it's like, he's like, who are you more? Scenes from a marriage? Yeah. Are you Meg, or are you Hamilton? But he was just like, this is the experience of living with you, and then I think he walked it back a little bit as the movie continued. Yeah.

that idea of just like blaming each other for forgetting the pet toy, something going wrong, building toward the Busy B is missing stretch where like Hamilton is completely inside the crate. Like he's in a cave into the carrier looking for the toy. Just unbelievable stuff. Unbelievable stuff. It's not in here. It's not in here. It should be in the crate. It's not in the crate. I just told you that. God damn it.

It's not in here. You left it at the hotel. You go back and you get her busy bee. Go to the hotel and get busy bee. Run. Run. Go. Mommy's getting your toy. You go back and you get her busy bee. Go to the hotel and get busy bee. Run. Run. Is it that or is it her with Ed Begley Jr. and the poor woman who's playing? That scene is where I think Adam was like, just kidding. Yeah. Yeah.

It's like a little... Oh, boy. The pre-show party also has Harlan murdering the swans when he's just telling some long, boring Harlan story. And they're like... And the only drink's like...

And then Hamilton asks about his jacket. Yeah, yeah. But it was great, like, Parker Posey preview for White Lotus. I thought the same thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally. And then the you must be very proud Mary joke. Then we get to the show. Fred Willard wants to know why they don't dress up the dog like Sherlock Holmes. It's that whole thing. Not quite a rewatchable, but a little anything. All right. This is hard to do the end part, but there's a whole...

Jane Lynch part where she won't wear makeup and they talk about that. Yeah. And then she tries to psych out Harlan. She's like, oh, look at this dog. She's just like kind of little rough. She's intimidated. She's scared. She's trying to like psych him out. And then it goes right into Fred talking about the shih tzu. And Stuart is going to think of shih tzu on my carry on. And that's when Trevor's starting to get frustrated. I think that also on the Christy Cummings, Jane Lynch front,

Michael McKean and John Michael Higgins Their reaction watching it on TV Not even before the kiss Just sort of like mocking her outfit Oil rig She looks like a cocktail witch Incredible stuff Some of Fred's stuff He trained to be a priest He shouldn't find out what went wrong there But that's a whole other show He's just like ad-libbing all this stuff

He went on that run with terriers. His terrier commentary is untouched. Some countries those dogs might be eaten. How do they make it miniature? That's the best part. I still thought that was a really good question. Is there some way, some process that they can use to make them physically smaller? He has a book idea for a woman bathing her dogs. Doing it doggy style. You come up with the title. I'm not the literary guy. Trevor's like, they breed them that way. I don't know.

Would you put Meg buying a bumblebee at the pet store? Oh, the pet store scene is incredible. That's like historic. It's not a bee. It's a bear in a bee costume. It's a fish. The way that she, her, the quiet rage is actually terrifying to witness. And then I love when she selects the multicolored like rainbow rooster. It's a parrot. Yeah. Then she's like,

She's just she's broke. She's broken. Yeah. Like we have. Yeah. Her response to that is one of my favorite moments in the movie. I didn't ask for your opinion. I asked for a toy that you don't have. So good. It is one of those where you think like she should have at least had an Aubrey Plaza type of.

Like she should have led movies and done. Parker's done pretty well for herself. And she's been like a character. Yeah. Indie queen. Indie queen. Indie queen. Yeah. But this and White Lotus makes me think like, yeah, there's probably a couple more great roles in there. Capturing that like abusive rudeness of a truly hysterical person. Maniac. Yeah. She's kept in a maniac as well as anyone ever. She got actual braces for this movie. I know.

incredible commitment. Or, like, you could argue just a perk. It's like, I have to have the braces on to do the movie and then you come out and you got beautiful teeth. She has a key role in one of my favorite movies that we've already done in Rewatchables that nobody's seen. Kicking and Screaming. I love Kicking and Screaming. Yeah, she was the girlfriend. Daytrippers. Just screaming. Really good at Daytrippers. Screaming at Skippy. A couple more. Yeah. The dog attacks the judge and Fred says he went after her like she's made out of ham. Ha ha ha!

It's a shame to see that happen, but he's still a champion, even if he's set off in disgrace. Like shoeless Joe Jackson. This is remarkable.

Rhapsody has two mommies. We got to mention that one. Great stuff. More great Higgins. He doesn't have a single miss in the entire movie. He really doesn't. Not even a no here. It's a perfect game. Nobody gets on base. The makeup is impeccable. How about when he walks out and he's got the perfect stage thing? They said he was training to be in this movie and actually was in a dog show and

and he won you can tell he actually mastered the technique that he won he had to like sub in for someone and then he just won the competition i was saying that my wife would have been good at this oh yeah it's a good athlete but they're like jane lynch had that run yeah you have to have this controlled run where you don't break stride yeah the prance yeah like there's a certain athleticism that some of them seem to have jane lynch was like great at it but hagins was yeah good at too all right um

The final seven, which I guess we can lump together. Final seven. Most rewatchable scene. The movie. I mean, we get, we get the injury and the limp. This is it. That's my winner. That's my winner. You're going to show Winky. You have a good company. You didn't say it.

You think they know the championship's on the line here? Actual question from Fred. That's really good. Trevor's face in response to that. Am I nuts or is something wrong with his feet? Yeah. The proctologist joke? Yeah, I remember you said that last year. Do all the dogs bark the same? Jerry wins. But that's what I love about the Trevor character. That's his breaking point. That's the meanest he gets. You said that last year. You repeated. You had

You had to call to repeat your shitty joke. If you live in my neighborhood and you wear an outfit like that, you better be a hotel doorman. Fred's on just absolute fire. And then Jerry wins. It's an emotion. It's like a real sports movie. It is. Does this count as a sports movie for you? No question. It's a litter dog story here. And they had to win. Yeah, this was like the fucking Chiefs not three-peating. Shit, Craig, this is like quietly sports movie month. I guess it is. Yeah, well. We're two out of four.

Jeez. Gotta come up with two more now. Snow Dogs Left. That's a dog movie and a sports movie. It's amazing. Rocky. The best. Six Months Later is our last one. Every single part of Six Months Later is perfect.

It's perfect. Every single part of it. The therapy bookends. Unbelievable. Is the captain in the cookies? Beg for it. Would that be in your memorabilia? That is my second pick in the memorabilia. Behind Busy Bee? Behind Busy Bee. Busy Bee is the no brainer memorabilia pick. But the fact that it's not just Jerry and his little captain's costume and Winky looks so cute and the hilarious name they've landed on. It's the fact that it's a cassette tape.

Like it definitely could have been a CD by this point, but it's a cassette tape, which is just a perfect touch. But I would have to pick this. The way that all the musical, I mean, I know they started with Spinal Tap, but the way that all the musical stuff in here feels like an audition for A Mighty Wind, which is another perfect film. The song's like, da, da, da, da, bow wow. Mallory's like, don't try me, I've got the lyrics. Some dish. Delish. Yeah.

Fantastic. And then, of course, the studio engineer knows Cookie. Oh, yeah. I'm not wearing underwear. His name being Bulge. You've grown. I'm grown right now, girl. That's it. That's it for me. I'm grown right now, girl. And it's like, we can't do any better than this. It's like, now we're actually going to launch American Bitch Magazine now. Oh, my God. Here we go. Focusing on the issues of the lesbian dog breeder. Yeah.

And then Higgins and McKean are like, no, we're going to top that one. We're doing photo shoots of dogs in old famous movies. Maybe that's what I'm going to do. The Casablanca one is my favorite. And then we end back in the therapist's office with Kipper doing some leg humping.

And now they're wearing colorful. They're wearing monochromatic. A lot of bright ringer green in their outfits. I have an observation from your run through of most rewatchable scenes. I mean, I just basically did the entire movie. You did it very light on Harlem Pepper. I sure did. Yeah. That stands out. Tell me. And we can get to that later. Okay. Oh my God. Okay. Sheesh. Is it because you have a ventriloquism issue? No. No.

We can get to it later. So your most rewatchable was Busy B? I'm torn between Busy B and Cookie's injury. I think I have to pick the spirit of most rewatchable scene. I don't think I'm constitutionally capable of looking away if I know we're about to see Cookie. Yeah. I think that has to be the case. Why didn't Cookie's injury become one of the best Twitter memes to use anytime somebody had a dumb injury in sports? Great question.

I don't know what we're doing. It's not too late. Yeah, it's not too late. I don't know what we're doing. Joe, what do you have? It's the Starbucks. It's fantastic. And the catalogs. So ironically, that's what I had for my most 2000 thing about this movie. Oh, yeah. That entire scene. People being excited about how they met in a Starbucks over the course of a couple weeks. Yeah. Being big LL, being catalog guys and feeling lucky to be raised along catalogs. Amongst catalogs. Amongst catalogs. And now we...

Do we have catalogs? Yeah. Yes. Didn't they have a little bit of a comeback? I don't know. I only get cartoony catalogs. That's it. Why this happens to me, but like sometimes if I order something online, then all of a sudden I don't get the catalog for the thing. I only get like ones for like sports auctions. It'd be like new, new Gehrig.

jersey collection have you ever ordered something from a catalog no no okay not recently have you ordered something from a catalog not recently yeah back in the day back in the day my mom like the swans you still have a catalog and you give the like the number of the item you want yeah exactly what's it's the best mockumentary movies no question just as an art as a genre yeah craig

What the hell is wrong with your generation? Why aren't there more mockumentary movies? Well, you know, the Apatow era was very improv heavy. It's not a mockumentary, but I think they evolved from probably the Christopher Guest stuff a little bit. Also, it's honestly really hard. I think there's not more of them because it's genuinely hard to pull off a 90-minute improv movie. Most improv sucks. Can I summarize that? Craig just said, my generation is cowards. Ha!

When do you think that Craig, a married man who is a manager at this company and is in his 30s, will stop having to speak on behalf of all young people? He's 30. He's not in his 30s. He just turned 30. Right. I'm basically 29. Okay. You're holding on to it. Okay. You want it. You want that. I have one foot in the grave, personally. Actually, you guys do some What's Age is Best and I'll do mine at the end. What do you got, Joe?

Honestly, just everything. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I know that's like a bullshit answer, but I just couldn't single anything out because the whole movie's perfect. It doesn't feel dated at all. No. No. This is the second Rewatchables in a row for me where what's aged the best was basically everything and what's aged the worst and picking two categories I normally love and have a lot of fun with were nearly impossible. I didn't have any. Before Sunset and this. It's just like, I don't know. These are perfect movies that if we watch them 2,000 years from now, we would say are perfect movies. Yeah.

Mockumentary as a forum was my top one as well. I think you already said this, but parodying crazy pet people. Like, we're in the era of, you know. Well, social media is taking it to a whole other level. You can't even parody it anymore. Like, social media is pet people. I think it also just, like, launched people's interest in dog shows in general. Yeah. You know what I mean? The way that, like, Spelling Bee documentaries launched that, you know, craze. And, like, Rounders and Poker. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Catherine O'Hara and Eugene Levy is a comedic duo. I think that's a real what's aged the best. Obviously, everybody in the movie, their comedic brilliance holds up. But I'm wearing my Schitt's Creek sweatshirt today. And like we have been so fortunate to spend so many years in so many different properties with them. Going back to SCTV. And it is just this like really rare thing where it's you can act. Trust is hard to.

To build and maintain. But you can trust in the two of them together in something. And like revisiting that is just like such a gift. And I think that the roses from Schitt's Creek, they're

modern icons but it's tough to top the flex it really is tough to top the flex i think also the swans really aged well as uh you know the cruelest caricature maybe in the film a yuppie examination yeah exactly scott aged well the odd couple broadcast booth that's a real what's aged the best it feels like it's been ripped off in other movies yeah yeah yeah i have a couple the best okay rhapsody losing

Yeah, true. Right. It's like the Patriots in 07 and the giant favorites. You said it, man. I have what's aged the best. Just Busy B being this toy that dominates everybody's life. It's hilarious. So good. A dog on a treadmill, I think, is now a real thing. Yes, correct. I think that's the best just in general. Eugene Levy's weird teeth commitment. Oh, my God. Just like how far he'll go. He'll go like cross-eyed for 10 minutes. Yeah, it just seems so uncomfortable. He'll wear like crazy things in his teeth.

I have for what's aged the best the Spinal Tap callback by Ed Begley Jr. Yes. About the rock being trashed in their room and rushing to go. They didn't know there was a toilet in the room. Ed Begley Jr. is so good at this. He's so great. He's so good at this. He's trying to sell the utility closet as like a comfortable place to stay for 48 hours. Well, the kitchen's right next door, so don't worry about it. It's fine. The AM Philadelphia guy when they're about to go live, he goes, energy. Yeah, it's great. I thought that was good. Yeah.

Brockworth and Shillelagh's. Paging Dr. Freud. I don't know why that's so funny. Annoying coffee orders, which this movie ties into, but now literally everyone has an annoying coffee order, but the swans are talking about whatever they're doing. And the soy. And her face when he's like, because I'm lactose intolerant. And she's like, yeah, you are. And then...

Posey said this in the oral history about Willard. Seeing him waiting for Guffman, just smoking a cigar in a folding chair, looking out in the empty street and just coming up with brilliant, funny stuff. I'm in awe.

We would all just sit and watch him just double over. He had pages of legal pad of just bits. I have another thing. I have another thing. I think he's one of those rare guys that people, he was just like a comedy fountain. Yeah. You're around him. And this is what he does best. Yeah. Oh my God. Like better than most people. And it is the thing that he does the best. Yes. I didn't have a great Shaq Gordo award unless you guys have one. It's not a cinematic award.

But I will say the like zoom in on Jennifer Coolidge and Jane Lynch. That's my pick too. Yeah. That's a great mockumentary moment. Because we're watching it through TV with Scott and Stefan. And the camera is catching it. That's my pick as well. What do you have for Big Kahuna Burger Award best used food and drink? Because I have her complimenting the food as being like cafeteria food. That is also my pick. I know it tastes better, but it looks like cafeteria hot plate food. Yeah.

It's either that or a popcorn. Yeah, or I would say the like whatever frozen yogurt thing that Jennifer Coolidge is eating at the end when they're talking about American Bitch. That she's just sort of like they're in an interview and she's just like going to town on this froyo. Or the meat counter scene. I know you guys already talked about it, but that, you know. Wonderful stuff. Oh, that's a good one. That's probably the answer. Poor Randy the butcher.

My God. Randy was not enjoying it. No, he was not. I think the thing about the extra large bucket of popcorn is just the specificity of half butter, half salt. Yeah.

really amusing yeah keep cutting pursuit happiness where best needle drop it's one of the two songs would you go tear your song or the other song i love god yeah small sturdy bright and true the one lady's tearing up she's really getting emotional yeah they're so moved chess rock while brocklinners were for best character name um

Stephen Vanderhoof? It's Harlan Pepper! It's Bulge. And Bulge is my runner-up, but... You wouldn't go Stephen Vanderhoof? No. Also, Harlan Pepper is incredible. We haven't mentioned Bob Balaban, and I would say Theodore W. Milbank III is pretty good. And we have to do a human and a dog. We have to pick both, because of the nature of the movie. Oh, it's Rhapsody in White. It's Raph Butch. Yeah, it's Rhapsody in White, obviously. Harlan Pepper kills me. Yeah.

Yeah, dog with two different names is great. All right, Joanna, you have a flex category. Okay, mine is, it's a book about medals of war, but literally best quote or exchange. This is just like slid in the backstory. When we're first meeting Michael McKean's character and he says, I was a hairdresser about 14 years and I went to a show and I saw his nibs here having his way with a borzoi and I asked my ex-wife, who's that? And she said, that's Scott.

I was hairdresser for 14 years. I asked my ex-wife, who is that? That's Scott. It's rich. A lot of context. A lot. That's a great pick. Great pick. Butch's girlfriend award for the weak link of the film. You don't have to pick. You don't have to pick a weak link. Okay, great. Do you have one? Do you think it's Christopher Guest as Harlan Pepper?

I don't want to make me laugh. I yeah, it's it's not quite fast forward over him, but I kind of get the joke immediately. Yeah. And it's a lot of work. I think the nut monologue is really good when he's just naming nuts. I would have scaled him back and just put more of Higgins and McKeon in it. The ventriloquist stuff is is my least favorite of any of the prominent.

Correct. Cast members. Because it's funny because in Guffman, he's the funniest guy in Guffman. Yeah. And then in this, I almost think he was trying to zag really super hard the other way. And I just remember, even the first time I saw this movie, I remember being like,

Huh. But I just love so much that he's like matching the bloodhound energy. I know. That he's just like a human bloodhound. Well, the accent's great too. I like this too, buddies. What do we think? Like the rat lifts think of his accent, you know? Have the rat lifts ever made their way to the fishing hole in North Carolina? I have a lot of affection for Harlan Pepper for a couple of reasons. One, again, like we're watching the swans scream and scare their dog. And like Harlan Pepper is,

has such love in his heart for Hubert. When we get to see the photo album full of the little baby puppy photos of Hubert, that's so cute. And he calls him, he doesn't just call him loyal, he calls him noble. I just love that. Do you think he comes back and wins a couple years later as was predicted? Yes, I think no question. And that's kind of, I think, a necessary... So that cat Rufus is still my screensaver. Yeah, buddy. He's not alive anymore. Rufus. He just dropped dead one night.

I don't have any what's aged the worst I had to try really hard I really like every part of this movie and I I don't know I don't know where you go I got one well actually two I had the Harlan's ventriloquist act as one um

This is so minor. I was really grasping for something here. But we have a couple interstitials with the Mayflower Brass, the aforementioned Mr. Milbank III. Graham Chisholm. Even though it's only a few total scenes, I don't want any time going to those characters. Yeah, that's fair. I think more time with the Fab Five. The curtain moment. The curtain raising and all that. That's kind of it, though. I would rather...

The Taft Hotel stuff is all great. So I think there is value. You know, all of our time with with with the hotel manager Schaefer is wonderful. I think there's value in being with somebody other than the dog handlers and owners. But like maybe give us the judge. Give us a judge as a character. You know, what does Everett Bainbridge actually think?

That's kind of it, though. It's really hard to think of too many other things here. Did you? I could have spent more time at the at the party with the melting ice thing. Yeah. Party was great. Yeah. They got in two more minutes. I'm sure there whatever at Bainbridge who you mentioned is played by the legend Don Davis. And I'm sure there's stuff with him that they got because why else do you cast him to just be in the distance for part of the movie? Ruffalo Hannah Rubinick Partridge overacting award.

I think Hamilton cruises to the win here for, I think he dials it up the most. You go get Busy B! You go get him! Run!

Hitchcock is not my favorite in this. I have some other thoughts for him later. That's my pick as well, but I think, again, not as a demerit because dialing it up to 99 on a word normally operating on a 1 to 10 scale is sort of the point of the swans. He's also navigating. So Parker Posey got actual braces. He got special retainers made. And so he's talked about how he was trying to not lisp around the retainers he had for his adult braces. So I feel like I've seen Hitchcock be better in other things.

We're going to take a break and then do Mallory's flex choice. All right, Mallory, your flex choice is. I will be doing this movie of a porn parody. Did it? I don't know, but I'd like it to. And it should be called Best in Blow. Not American bitch.

American Bitch, also a great, maybe it can be an entire franchise. Not Breast and Show. Breast and Show, also a great one. I think this is just proof that we need the porn parody. Best in Blow is, of course, a Philadelphia convention for oral sex. Why'd you say, of course? I didn't know that. And the great news is, much like the Mayflower Dog Show, both of these can be in part about grooming.

grooming technique and also cookie wins both it's cookie definitely no question best in peep show also strong yeah also strong press don't go on your work computer you just made me think that avian the the when they have that porn weekend it's like the convention yep i went to it because we shot a segment for jimmy kimmel show when i was a writer yep and uh

That could have easily been a Christopher Guest world. Why isn't it? Or like there is still time. I mean, I know he made mascots, but why is the furry convention not been made into a movie? You know, I don't have an answer for you.

I didn't have in the rundown the Mally Rubin Award for did this movie need a better sex scene? Because there is no sex scene. No. But it's also a PG movie. A sex scene would have been a good award. Yeah, I see the swans. That would be the pick is more athletic. There's an R-rated version of this movie where she's smoking pot and we get a sex scene with them that I don't know if it's better or worse. Yeah, that's how we meet Kipper at the end is like they're actually workshopping a new page in the Kama Sutra and then we pan to Kipper who's like, you're crushing it, mom and dad. Right.

thing for... Congress of the Cow. That's all that now. The other thing would, of course, be flashbacks to all of Cookie's sexual exploits. Actually, I think that would have been great. You don't even have to make it explicit. You don't even have to make it explicit. Just sort of like... Yeah. Wonderful. The CR thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison Ford's hottest take award. This is hard. If you don't have one, you don't have one. Okay. We feel of two minds about this, but what if this had been...

a TV show instead? What if it's been a miniseries? I went further. Did Chris Guest leave like $200 million on the table? Yeah. He had this. He had the footage. Curb, The Office, all this stuff. What if he had just gone dog show, TV, sitcom, or HBO? Because HBO's around in 2000. I mean, because every year there could be new contestants in the dog show. Now, would it have worn out as welcome possibly? And is it good that we have this 90-minute perfect journey?

So my only thing with that is I think Cookie and Jerry have to be in it every year. And I think. Agreed. I think Stefan and who's got Scott. I think they have to be in it every year. Maybe everyone else changes. Scott and his kimonos. Oh, I guess Coolidge and Jane Lynch have to be in it, too. That's the thing. Oh, everyone but Harlan Pepper. Harlan Pepper is just somebody else the next year. Just hold the pepper. And maybe hold the pepper. Okay.

Harlem Pepper. But yeah, it does feel like there was, I mean, I'm sure these movies that are right, this movie made 20 million, so it made some money back, but there was some giant TV idea with this world. Yes. All these people he had access to. No question. Casting what ifs couldn't find anybody. Neither could we. Nope. So best that guy award, there's a bunch of them in here. Yeah. The guy who plays Leslie Ward Cabot, who's also blue and old school. I did not know his name. I had to look it up and he's an all time that guy. His name is Patrick Crenshaw.

And I don't know how you top it. I was going to throw out Malcolm Stewart, who plays Malcolm. One of Cookie's many flings. What about Rachel Harris, who's been in The Hangover and a bunch of stuff and has a tiny role in this as their friend at the backyard barbecue? I didn't even notice her in that. Oh, shit. That's a good one. Yeah. I like that one. And Bob Balaban's Bob Balaban. Yeah. It's like he's not. Don Davis, who we mentioned, who was one of the judges, is famous.

Famous from Twin Peaks. He plays Scully's dad on X-Files. Like he's he's been around. This movie is all that guys and that girl. That's that is. Because like Larry Miller, the one whose son goes on the shed. He's kind of Larry Miller, but he's also a really good that guy. Yeah. Dion Waiters Award. Larry Miller's one of them. That's that's the pick. Max Berman. I'd like to also offer you Leslie Ward Cabot. Mm hmm. Even though it is not maligned. Okay.

Harlan's two buddies in Pine Nuts. That was my favorite Harlan part. Don't forget that funny tape I told you about. He's like, if you get tired, pull over. If you get hungry, eat something.

I want to shout out the pet shop owner because like, yes, to be able to hold that together opposite what Parker Posey is doing and actually an incredible achievement. Yeah. Yeah. Remarkable. Yeah. Recasting couch director city. What do you got, Mel? Does this need to be Philadelphia with apologies to CR? Like, is there any Philly specificity in the movie? Where would you put it inside Baltimore?

Sure, why not? Yeah, fuck. Yeah, let's go to Baltimore. I think it needs to be someplace like high toned. So like a Boston or Philadelphia. The like old money America. I don't know. There's no actual. I'm going to win this category. All right.

Parker Posey's husband in this movie we've already mentioned. Yeah. Hitchcock. He's fine. Yeah. Wonderful. Will Ferrell is right there. Oh, my God. Will Ferrell and Parker Posey together as the swans. I can see him screaming, but I'm not sure I can see him in like the uptight. Oh, he can definitely do that. Yeah, he did that in a show. I think he can do it. He did in a bunch of the sketches where he had an uptight character he used to play. I just feel like he always has a twinkle in his eye, which like.

is not right. But maybe that needed it though. Hamilton's like a real drip. Yeah. Hamilton sucks. Yeah. You know, and I don't think that Will Ferrell ever sucks. Craig, thoughts?

I love Feral. I thought Hitchcock was really good for what the role called for. I think Feral could have done it. It's just a slightly different character. It would have been very, like a little moment like Hamilton talking about whether to change, you know, but he likes the way the- Oh, the Mock Turtle. Should he go to the Mock Turtle? But oh, this like Burgundy really matches with the slacks. Like Will Feral would have made it. It's so hard because we're using what we think of Feral now. In 2000, Feral was not Feral yet. So maybe it would have worked. Yeah. I love the Swans.

I already did my flex category, so we got to keep going. Have fun doing your research.

Filming took place in Vancouver and LA. They had to stage their own dog show because their dog show would let them do a dog show. That was interesting. Kind of surprising. I think that's where some of the budget went. Why? Some of the judges have been real dog show judges. You know what I mean? I guess Westminster did not want them there. I guess they're like, because you're mocking us. But they're celebrating. They are. Chris Vergas doesn't even like the phrase mockumentary. That's right. He gets a little precious sometimes.

Fred's character, Buck Laughlin, was based on Joe Garagiola, who was an old baseball announcer from the 80s and 90s and had done the Westminster show. He shot his whole part in a day and a half. Was specifically instructed by Christopher Guest not to research dogs in any way and just go completely blind. You can tell. Whereas Jim Pinnock had to learn everything about dogs so that he could respond with actual information. So funny. The first poodle, first Rhapsody and...

Got fired? Yep. Wild. How embarrassing for that dog. Because the first Rhapsody's handler was a piece of work. Yeah. Yeah. I know the Brandy Booth Award is not one of our categories today, but who would you have given it to? I mean, come on. Best Performance by a Pet? I mean, Hubert's amazing. I will make the case here that it's Beatrice. I love... Because that's the most range is required. That's true. To play Beatrice. Not my favorite, but startling performance. Interesting. I should have put Brandy Booth in there. Why didn't I do that? I love that you love Hubert and you're not into Harlan Pepper. He's so sweet.

I love Tarleton Pepper. It was just a lot of the same joke. Yeah. Guest said in the research, Fred Willard makes a joke when the person handles the dog's testicles. Yeah. But they found out why they do that. Did you know why they do that? Yeah. Because they want to make sure. They didn't put fake testicles in there. Apparently some dogs will have one testicle and they get disqualified. So it's got to be double balls.

Who knew? But then sometimes they would put a fake testicle in there to sort of like... So I just wanted to speak to the people who craft fake testicles for dog shows. What's the application process like? That's what's been in the sequel. Also, why are we shaming dogs as one ball? That's what I was going to say, Craig. All of these elitist assholes and their dogs are... Let them compete! Yeah. That's what dog shows are. Let your one bald dog be proud and free. Good lord. Higgins said...

He's like a big voice guy and he formed, he forms vocal groups on any movie or TV show he does. And he got a good one going on this with, he said, Jane was the soprano. Catherine was the alto. I sang tenor. Gene did the bass. You get really bored in the set. Higgins just sounds like an MVP.

I thought he was great as Letterman. I love the Leitch. He's one of my favorite TV movies. He's awesome in that. He did a really good Legend of Korra. Did incredible voice work for that. He's done like he's had a really good voice work career, but he should have been in everything. Yeah, he should have talked to daddy.

Apex Mountain. The best. This is hard. This is hard. I think for a guest, it probably is. Oh, yeah. I think so. Yeah. I feel like he had the most juice after this. For Fred Miller? Because this movie, even though it only made $20 million. Fred Miller's tough because he was on the show in the 70s with Martin Muller. That was like a pretty massive comedy hit. Fernwood something. What about John Michael Higgins then? I think it is. Yeah. Yeah.

I think if probably at this point, if somebody mentions a movie to him, it's probably this one. O'Hara, no, but I don't even know what. I mean, she's... It's almost impossible to pick. It's probably Home Alone. Beetlejuice. I mean, she's the mom in Home Alone. Schitt's Creek? Schitt's Creek, where she won Emmys for? I mean, Moira Rose is like... She's the mom in Home Alone. It made like $700 million. She's the mom in Beetlejuice. I was thinking about this because Schitt's Creek is one of my favorite recent shows in Home Alone. It's somewhere 80, 90, 89, 90 range. Yeah, she just is...

How many people can compete? After hours? Yeah. Geez. Never on SNL. Showed up. They hired a new head writer. The guy was acting like a crazy person and just went back to Toronto. She was in like the second year of Eddie Murphy. John Michael Higgins, yes. McKeon? No. It's not. It's probably... Better Call Saul. Saul. Yeah. Yeah. Which also starred Ed Begley Jr. Jennifer Coolidge. White Lotus. White Lotus.

I think White Lotus. Is White Lotus or Legally Blonde? She's doing commercials now. Yes. White Lotus propelled her to a level of like rediscovered fame and relevance that I think is inarguable. But Legally Blonde, people imitating her scenes from Legally Blonde is sort of like what made her this sort of figure. You know, you do this sometimes, but Coolidge is a rare, like maybe there is more than one April.

Apex Mountain. Because the time gap is so big between them. Stifler's mom was one of the iconic characters. And there was even a song about her, an alternative song that I forget who did that one, but it became... Not Stacy's mom?

No, somebody had Stifler's mom. I thought there was a Stifler song. Or was that Stacey's mom? I think it's Stacey's mom. Is that about Stifler? No, no. I'm mixing. But maybe there's a Stifler's mom parody set to Stacey's mom. I thought Stifler's mom was in something. Fred Willard, we said no. Dog shows? Sure. Maybe. I mean, or the actual Westminster dog show. Roasting a goat, definitely. AM Philadelphia, 100%. Terror songs, yes.

Pet People movies? America Bitch Magazine, yes. Pet People movies, yes. Yeah, I think so. Jane Lynch, gotta be Glee, right? It has to be Glee. No question. Kimonos? Just kidding. How about Posey?

Oh, that's tough. I feel like part of the frustrating thing about her career is that there was never an Apex Mountain. It was always like, oh, I love Parker Posey. Part of your old house. She was the it girl. She is unbelievable in this, though. Unbelievable in this. She's pretty great in Days of Confused. She's so good in Days of Confused. Guffman. She's great in Guffman. Probably somewhere in the mid-90s. Cruiser Hanks. Wait. What? What about Eugene Levy?

No, it's Schitt's Creek. It's Schitt's Creek. Or Splash. Oh, yeah. I just watch Splash all the time. No, it's Schitt's Creek. Because you also have your kid in the same thing. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And they're making like... You also get credit for that as an apex. I wanted to ask you this. Yeah. Because you're a comedy expert. Yeah. Thank you. You're welcome. Comedy ensemble cast? Oh, for a movie? Oh. What do you think? It's at least in the conversation. It's in the combo. It's in the top 10. Yeah. Yeah.

So who's the competition for this? Anchorman? Yeah. Bridesmaids? Bridesmaids. Yeah, it's a bunch of Apatow movies, probably. Yeah. Trying to think. 80s. Oh, shit. You should have texted that one to me. I would have wanted more time on that question. 80s is tough because you've got like high school party. This is like when Amanda asked you about fictional movie houses. Oh, yeah. You were enraged. I still don't have the answer to that. Enraged. Such a great question. Because like 80s high school party comedies like have a bunch of heavy. I don't feel that I have the expertise to answer this. You got one, Craig?

Honestly, I think Anchorman's a really good one. I think it might be Anchorman. So many people on that. It's like an entire decade of people who either were stars or became stars. It's up there, though. Cruiser Hanks, what do you got? Tom Hanks. Also from Pine Nut. Who does Hanks play? He'd be a great Harlan Pepper. And I do think he could do Hamilton Swan. Yeah, I agree. I think he could have done McKee in too. I don't even know. I wouldn't be able to process it.

Hanks in the Black Jeopardy sketch from SNL and you put him in Best in Show. You have a great time. Scorsese or Spielberg? Spielberg. Yeah, Spielberg. What role would Philip Seymour Hoffman have played? I thought this was easy. I did too, actually. Oh. Who do you have? I had Stefan.

Interesting. Yeah. What did you have? I had, uh, I had, uh, Parker Posey's husband. Hamilton Swan. You just want to recap. I'd say he would have been good with her. I think maybe as much as I loved him, Piddick, Trevor Beckwith, uh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That really like just increasing exasperation. That would be really, you know, Craig, you get a flex category.

I'm going to go with the Dan Campbell scale for holy shit. Are they really going for this right now? And it's when Larry Miller, the guy who plays Max, when he makes Cookie hand the dog off to Gary and then just kisses her right on the mouth in front of everybody. I was like, oh, damn. The Cookie storyline. Like dips her. That's like fourth and ten in the first. You're like, wow. Cookie click. Cookie. Picky knits. Again, very hard. The utility closet's a reach.

That one always jumps out at me. I love that. It's so funny. I know they had to do it, but it's kind of ridiculous. They also drove up in a Winnebago. Could you not just sleep in the Winnebago? Can we get room services in here? Great question. Could you not just sleep in the Winnebago? Can we get room service in here? It's like, you have $34. You're not getting room service. What are you getting? Peanuts? No.

I would say, so we get the Busy B in the hotel search. Yes. We get the pet shop scene. Yeah. And she comes back and he's like, you've been gone for 30 minutes and you couldn't find it? I'm like, that, she has to have been gone much longer than 30 minutes. Yeah, that's like two hours. Agreed. Yeah, that's a great one. I will posit that Harlan Pepper of nut naming fame does not name that many nuts. Yeah.

Sure. You wanted like 60 nuts? Well, that's the thing. Does it say hazelnut? No. No. No, he does. He says peanut, hazelnut, cashew nut, macadamia nut, pine nut, pistachio nut, red pistachio nut, natural, all natural, white pistachio nut. Now, getting three pistachio nuts is impressive, but he leaves walnut on the table. No almond, no pecan, no Brazil nut, no chestnut. We're supposed to be impressed with this? Aren't also pine nuts technically seeds? There were a lot of nuts left.

I think pine nuts are seeds. This is why you're you. I just want to go on the record with Harlan Pepper. Yeah. I like the character. That's clear. Yeah. High usage rate is my only point. He's the only solo character. Oh, you're like, Christopher Guest didn't do a heavy enough edit on himself. Interesting. I didn't want to say it, but I'll say it.

Okay. The point about the partner is interesting. Everyone else is playing off somebody else and he's always just kind of... Yeah, I like that we have a single pet owner there because that relationship is very special. But you're right that there's no other voice in this scene. It's a high usage rate. Did everyone else find out that Christopher Guest is a baron while doing research for this? Yes. I didn't.

Did he have a seat in the House of Lords? He has an official title. What? And so does Jamie Lee Curtis. Yeah, he's Baron Hayden Guest and she's Lady Hayden Guest. Is this not astonishing? What does that even mean? His father was like the British diplomat to America and had a seat in the House of Lords. And so...

Christopher Guest. But Christopher Guest is like, I refuse to take the seat until they reform. And then they sort of did a bunch of stuff. And now he doesn't really have a seat anymore. But he's still a baron. He's a baron. I would have taken the seat. And he's married to Jimmy Lee Curtis. So he's winning. He stays winning. Christopher Guest. Take the seat. Baron Zemo. You know, so many of the greats. That's a Marvel joke for you, Bill. Yeah. I know you love Marvel. I'm right over my head. Yeah.

One more pick and knit. Are you sure the Terrier should have won? All right. So this is a big talking point. Can we really get into this? Was that the best dog? Short legs? It's like, whatever. No, Winky's a great dog. I won't have you just smirch Winky. I'm thinking from like the story perspective, what do we think we're building toward? Hubert. We think we're building toward Hubert. Now, I think the reason I like the Winky choice ultimately is because the movie does such a good job of making clear that Hubert is the dog of the future.

Yeah. Like he will come back and he will take Best in Show without question. Five star prospect. Kind of like Lamar Jackson. Craig, we almost made it through a whole podcast without Bill being mean to me about the Ravens. No reason. I don't know if that's something

Hubert won three MVPs but never pulled off the dog show. But also doesn't Jerry need a win after having been cuckolded the entire movie? And that's why I think Winky is ultimately the choice. It's because it's just as much a cookie Jerry family victory as it is a Winky victory. And they're so happy they really need it that we're staying in the fucking utility closet.

Yeah, that's fair. I just didn't like that dog the most. Now they're celebrities because they got to do three radio interviews. Hubert Wynne? I think it's a solid point. He was a year away. He was only two. Not great dog shows ahead of him. Um...

sequel prequel prestige tv all black cast are untouchable uh the cookie fleck prequel no my sounds amazing oh yeah the sex the the sex cookie in high school cookie holy shit cookie in like 1982 just running hey girl it's like fast times ridgemont high multiplied by 80 yeah oh my god the roller coaster episode yeah the waitress oh man and a lot of friends

Is this movie better than Wayne Jenkins, Danny Trejo, Doris Burke, Sam Jackson? No. Byron Mayo, Barney Cousins, Tony Romo, Harley Mays, Chris Collins, or Daniel Plainview, Long Legs. Oh, man. Or Wilford Brimley in The Firm. He's got two left feet, Jim. Chris is not here to do Romo as one of the commentators. That's like. I actually have a better option than that, though. But you guys go. I genuinely think Danny Trejo could kill in this film.

Interesting. Yeah. Because he hasn't done that much comedy. Yeah. But like when he does, he kind of crushes. And I think he could just like take it really seriously, which is what Christopher Guest asked them to do. Yeah. And I think he could actually kill him. I was thinking Sam Jackson. Maybe not in this, but in the sequel. But there's a Sam Jackson character that I think would be pretty great. What kind of dog? I don't know. OK. I don't know. We could go. One thing with the dogs in this movie, there weren't enough bigger dogs.

It was like a whole category. Yeah. I just wish we had... Yeah. Because sometimes they'll have, like, freaking Great Danes and, like, giant ones. Like, I wonder... Yeah. I don't know. I thought Sam could have done good, though. I would really enjoy the version of this movie. Uh-oh. Wayne Jenkins? Set in Philadelphia, where Wayne Jenkins just takes the Amtrak up to Baltimore. Ha ha ha!

And he's there with his Rottweiler. And he would get into the most memorable fight with Hamilton Swan. Oh, yeah. Backstage. Can you imagine Wayne Jenkins having to escort Hamilton Swan out of the arena? I just think that would be an absolute thrill. Didn't know we were dealing with Super Handler. Yeah. You better go find Busy B right now. You're going to be long way for a long fucking time. Just one Oscar. Who gets it?

Christopher Guest. Are we just talking performance? Are we talking about like... It can be anything you want. Would you do it for directing? He wrote and directed this movie. I think screenplay has to be like ineligible though because of what we know about the improv. Best editing. Best editing. Christopher Guest. Greg! Great call. That's a fucking good one, man. You're riding that Sean Baker high right now. I know you are. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I want to make the case for Catherine O'Hara.

I think that what because there are so many extreme performances in the movie, I think she is actually doing something. It's all relative, of course, but kind of understated compared to a lot of the other really heightened caricatures. And it is. You're saying that with a straight face after watching her wobble her knee. That would be the clip they play at the Oscars.

Do you want me to give you the best actress in a supporting role for that year? Please. Our winner was Marcia Gay Harden in Pollock, which is travesty. Judy Dench in Chocolat. That was a Weinstein special. Kate Hudson, Almost Famous. It was Kate's year. Julie Walters, Billy Elliot. And the person I think should have won, Frances McDormand in Almost Famous.

Frances McDormand has so many Oscars. She's unbelievable in Almost Famous. She is. Of course she is. Rock stars have kidnapped my son. Have you two talked about Almost Famous together? A little bit. He knows that I... You'd go with Kate over Frances McDormand? In that film? Penny Lane? Yeah. Kate Hudson's great. You can't do that rewatch of us without Juliet. She will never forgive you. I'm...

Just get them both together. The first time I ever talked to Bill about anything, you were at home and you had Almost Famous like ephemera behind you. You had Stillwater stuff behind you. And I was talking about Almost Famous and you said to me, you could never do Almost Famous on rewatchables because it would be the end of your team because people would quit if they weren't on that pod. We might have to just do two or three different pods just released all at the same time. Like an alternate broadcast? Yeah.

Oh, when they have like different announcing teams. Yeah. Francis McDormand in Almost Famous is incredible. But I have this thing where like if someone already has an Oscar. She hadn't won. Oh, she's won at that point. So example, for example, Timothee Chalamet should have won instead of Adrian Brody. Absolutely correct.

But like that was a pivot point in Kate's career. If she had won the Oscar that year. A pivot point to do fucking rom-coms. No, but I'm saying she wouldn't have had to do rom-coms. She could have continued to do. You love rom-coms. She could have continued to do incredible things like The Four Feathers. I've enjoyed a lot of Kate's work. I just thought the mom's amazing in that movie. She's so good. Yeah, she's fantastic. Every moment she's in that movie. What a film. Great one. Who are you picking for your Oscar? Russell Hammond.

I'm thinking Fred Willard. Yeah. For best supporting actor. But I really like the, I like your, that O'Hara takes really good. I almost want to switch my pick. I'm with Craig. Best actor supporting role that year was Del Toro won for Traffic.

Jeff Bridges for the contender, who's great, who is like the perfect president. Willem Dafoe, Shadow the Vampire. Albert Finney, Erin Brockovich. She's really good in that. And then Phoenix and Gladiator, which tougher category to crack. That's a crowded field right there. I like your, I think Mal's right. I think that's the pick. Catherine O'Hara? The math I did with myself was Catherine O'Hara for Oscar, and not to spoil it, but Willard for who won the movie.

So instead of the Oscar, the case for you can argue Catherine O'Hara again for that and Parker Posey for that. Honestly, we also have to do the who else could have played these people. Right. Game. Right. And I think those are the two that I think are like, I don't think anyone else could do what they do in the movie. I think Levy, too. Eugene Levy. Like, yeah, that's true. And Parker Posey. Parker Posey. And Jennifer Coolidge and Jane Lynch. It's true. Like, it's just really hard to. Their wars are all so high. Yeah.

It's a great movie. It's one of your favorite baseball stats. Probably Inhanceable Questions. Boy, this is a fun one. What was Fred Willard's character's name? Buck Laughlin? Yeah. Was he one of the first Me Too's, you think? I mean, Fred Willard himself had his own. Oh, did he? I forgot that part. Oh, man. Oh, my God. So Posey posits this in the oral history about how she wore all these capes and cloaks and beiges.

And all the colors that felt and looked like Beatrice as the movie went on. That's what's so fun about the movie is how people are like their dogs and they look like their dogs. And she goes, I mean, Coolidge is like a poodle. Do you believe people start to look like their dogs?

unanswerable question i do but more importantly i think people tend to gravitate towards dogs that match i think it's that vibe and energy yeah they pick the dog that reminds them of them in the first place because people are inherently narcissistic correct you think that's what it is definitely yeah because i really i mean your energy no but i'm just used to golden retrievers because that's what my dad always had but i don't know that there's really no other reason you do occasionally have golden retriever energy what is that in a happy way like look how happy

happy you were when I just said that. And you were like, I do? They're great dogs. Beloved by all? Yeah. What would be a bad energy dog? Great mean? Uh, bad energy dog. I think all animals are great. Wow. Joanna was ready to just send a stray toward the schnauzer community. See, little dogs will never have another little dog. I don't like the barker, but I don't like the barker. A yipping. A yipping bark is like a mouth. Goldens are cool.

Although we have one of the only like semi-unfriendly goldens ever right now. But COVID dogs. Goldens have a lot of like hair that gets everywhere. How do you manage that? That's true. We comb them. Yeah. The English goldens are a little better. Less hairy. Yeah. Interesting. Everyone I know who has a golden, like their furniture or their cars are just like covered in fur all the time. You got to stay on it. Any other probably answerables for you?

A few, yeah. I'd like to ask you for the Vegas odds. How heavy of a favorite was Rhapsody in White heading into this? Like minus 400 on FanDuel. Whoa. Two-time winner. Minus 400. Whole armada behind her. Christy Cummings. Christy Cummings, best trainer in the country. Okay. They're... Heavy favorite. They're smoothing with the judges. That's my next unanswerable question. So Buck says, let me ask you this. Money ever exchange hands? Trevor's, of course, no.

offended and wounded by this yeah but we saw christy try to whine and dine yeah millbank so did money well they exchange hands no because millbank was like holding the line but ever do you think christy ever well they throw the party every year which is no it's all kind of it is it is that's like a ten thousand dollar party with an ice thing yes um so did someone sabotage cookie

with the carpet. Did somebody put something down? You know, I rewound that a couple of times. That fall comes out of nowhere. It's a borderline nitpick because it's like, it's just even trip on anything. It's a bad fall. Okay. All right. So you think that was pure, not sabotage. Great. Um,

How many tapes did Jerry and Cookie sell? You think they're on anybody's Spotify wrapped in the future? I don't know. You don't think they made it big? Do you think Scott and Stefan made it big with the calendar business? Yes, I think so. I think that's a home run. Especially if in the future they did other people's pets like you can put your own pet in a calendar. That's the business. What a great idea. That's the business. Oh, my God. So they give you.

the filter or the shell and you can put your pets in the, oh my God. That's a billion dollar idea right there. I'm sure it exists. If it doesn't, get on it right after this. That's a great one. Did American Bitch last into the digital era? What do you think? I had a cookie tapes thing though. I think she was on some tapes. They just weren't music tapes. Yep.

I think there was some vintage stuff from the 80s that she might have popped in. And she would be very proud of it. Couldn't have been more pleased that they're out there. She'd be very proud of it. Some of her best work. There's actually a Moira Rose plot line about that. I love that. That sounds great. Oh, my God. We talked about it already, but did Beatrice thrive?

without the swans i like to think she did i like to think that beatrice went on and lived a full life they'll think she was to the farm i don't i don't like that what was cookie's actual number that's my last one for unanswerable questions you know she said hundreds hundreds so do we think that's like she said hundreds twice 350 people like about how old was cookie do we think in her 40s 42 43 yeah yeah and how long do we think she'd been with jerry

Oh, it was like eight or ten years. They met at a dance. Yeah. So early 30s. So that gives her about 15 years. Yeah, possibly. 15 years. Yeah. Go like 50 a year. So we're in like the 600 range. That sounds low to me. 50 a year. That's one a week.

So what do you think it is? But when she's in a small town, though, at some point you're going to run out of people in the town. But the fact that she's like running into people across the country. She's made her way around the country. Yeah. I don't think we're limiting this to state borders. All right. If it's 75 a year for 15 years, that gets us to a thousand.

And I love that for her. Good for her. She's living a great life and I'm thrilled for her. It sounds like she had like a trick. She had like a calling card. You never forget the best. The legs behind the head move. She was a memorable sexual encounter. That's clear. But then, you know, Jerry Fleck took her heart. Locked it down. With his two left feet. It's kind of a Casanova himself. Yeah.

What piece of memorabilia would you want or not want from this movie? It's clearly Busy B. It has to be Busy B. If I brought Busy B in right now and said I bought it from an auction nine years ago, you'd have a stroke. I would die. If it's not Busy B, it might be the traveling quilts that they nail up behind their bed in the hotel room. They're only there for two nights and they brought their quilt from home to hang up behind the bed. There's one other thing. The giant framed American Bitch magazine. I thought you were going to pick that. American Bitch, the dog magazine for women and their dogs.

Great title. So good. Also anything in the Swan household, everything they have there is like from the Sharper Image catalog. So any of the

vintage sharper image items in there. The massage chair, something like that. The kickboxing dummy that you pointed out. Very alarming. Coach Finstock Award for Best Life Lesson. I mean, there's a lesson, which is we need more documentaries. The life lesson would be, hey, even if you have two left feet, just hope in sight. That's

Really sweet. I like that. You never know when you're needed in a dog show. If you get the chance to fuck Cookie Googleman, you better do it. What about always have a backup of your pet or child's favorite toy? Yeah, don't leave home without a busy bee. Oh, that's really sweet. Especially going to a dog show. Multiple busy bees. You can never pack too many kimonos.

Correct. That's another life lesson. Yes, certainly. We have this wishbone toy for Murph and we have like nine of them. There you go. Yeah. And it's sometimes I'll just triple down on the wishbones. We do that with Halo's minstick. Yeah. Yeah. Risk running out of a minstick. My, my youngest cousin had this like puffy and they were like nine different puffies and they were all bedraggled. Cause it turns out pets are dumb and they don't know there's multiple versions. That is not true. Best double feature choice.

Why don't we get a marathon? Do Waiting for Guffman, Fest and Show. I had Guffman in this. I think you go Guffman here. I like that. If we're allowed to mix movie and some TV, I would like to go from this right into a Schitt's Creek rewatch. We're not allowed. Who won the movie?

I can't decide between, I think it's Higgins. Higgins, Posey, O'Hara, and Willard. I just can't decide. They're all incredible. For me, it's Higgins or Willard, but I think it's Willard because he's more known for how good he was in the movie than Higgins is. Higgins is like the stealth, I've seen this movie so many times, choice. Yeah.

But Willard's like, people kind of know this. Yeah, that's true. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like if you see clips from this movie, it's him. Or it's somebody mentioning him. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. All right. Big moment. Producer Craig has missed a couple. He's been traveling. He's busy. Busy bee. Oh, and this is your first time watching it. That's right. Yeah. This is one of Liz's favorite movies. And I don't know. I can't believe I missed the best in show...

I don't know why. I've always known about it. I've always been circling it. Very happy I got to watch it. I mean, I thought it was hilarious. Every character is worthy of their own movie, honestly. You could have a spinoff for every single character.

One thing I think this comedy does really well that most don't is third acts of comedies are usually the worst part of every comedy movie. And it's the exact opposite in this film. I think it actually builds suspense and stays funny, which is incredibly hard, especially with improv. And I think in general with improv,

I think it's definitely the purest form of comedy and watching it work is better than watching something scripted work. It's like, I was telling Joe and Mal earlier, it's like sports where watching professionals play sports, um, is like watching professionals do improv where the amateur version of it is truly unwatchable. Like bad improv is terrible, but good improv is better than scripted comedy, in my opinion. Um, so I absolutely love this. I do worry about, as Mal pointed out, I am 30. I'm not, I'm not 20. Um,

I don't really represent Gen Z, but Bill, I kind of think this comedy is for adults, not because of necessarily the subject matter, but I don't know if a 15 year old, like I think a 15 year old would like Anchorman. I don't know if a 15 year old would like this movie and I don't even really know why. I think you're right. It's a little bit more mature. Yeah, but it's not even the subject matter. I mean, it's PG. Yeah. But for some reason, I don't know if it translates down to like teens. Yeah.

The only thing I'm worried about it was whether because the dog community is so weird and in so many different places on social media now, it's like people have a better handle on it. So this movie seems less weird if you just are on Instagram reels for an hour. I just also this movie made $20 million in America in the year 2000 with no big star in it. Yeah. Which is just like 20 million is more than a Nora or Brutalist made domestically.

Is that true? Yeah. Oh my God. That's wild. That's unbelievable.

That's great. Did you have any Rocky thoughts while you're here? I mean, I love Rocky. I've seen him a million times. I do think it's like Austin Powers one though, where when you go back and watch it, you're like, wow, this is way slower than I remember it being in my head. And two, three and four actually move a bit quicker. Yeah. Also, this movie is the greatest that guy movie of all time, I think. Yeah. Best in show. It's Hall of Fame. Because I think, as you know, I think your guys' bar for who qualifies as a that guy is way too fucking high. Yeah.

Like Ed Begley is a that guy. Like every normal person in the world does not know it's Ed Begley. Come on. You guys got John Michael Higgins, Fred Willard. John Michael Higgins is a that guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I would, even the average person, I would say could not just immediately name Catherine O'Hara.

That is not true. That's not true after Schitt's Creek. We work at the ringer. We work at the ringer. After Schitt's Creek, that's not true. Maybe. Maybe. Well, no, he's making it. It's a fair case that normal people. No, not after Schitt's Creek. Eugene Levine and Catherine O'Hara. Schitt's Creek is one of the most popular beloved shows of the last decade. That's fine. That's fine. But when this movie came out. Absolutely. When this movie came out. Okay. Yeah. When this movie came out. Yeah.

Everybody was that guy in this movie. Yeah. I don't know. But we are recording this podcast in 2025. I just always love when it's like, is Bob Balaban that guy? No, he's Bob Balaban. I'm like, there's no normal person who's like that. Yeah, that's true. I love Bob Balaban.

Oh, man. Severance star Bob Balaban? It's valuable feedback, Craig. All these people are bad guys. Wait, there's one more thing I saw researching this movie. Did you know that Ariana Grande is a massive fan of this film? That's right. Really? She did a YouTube parody with her friend and co-star from the TV show she was on. Was it Victorious? I forget the name of it. Cat and something, right? Oh, maybe it was that one.

But they do a 10-minute remake, like a recreation, where she plays Jennifer Coolidge because she can obviously do that impression. And she also plays Jerry. Yeah.

And her co-star plays Cookie and Max. And it's hilarious. And it made me think that there should be a full remake of this movie with a completely different plot and younger new actors. How dare you? It wouldn't be about a dog show. It's just like Christopher Guest doing something like this again. Like we should be ushering in a new young cast to try something like this. A new movie. That would be great. But a remake?

Well, it's a new movie. Well, it's like in the universe. In the universe. I would like that. I would like to be in the world, but also to check in with the characters. Like, what are the flecks up to? 25 years later. Oh, see, I don't want that. I hate the rehashing. No, but what if we did Best in Show... Like Cobra Kai style? What if we did Best in Show 2, all new contestants...

But like our original cast members could be around. Maybe Cookie and Jerry were on the dog show or something and you could check in with them. Exactly. Yeah. The Cobra Kai comp is a great one. Last question. Yeah. Who is Liz Kelly's favorite character in this movie? Who did she laugh at the most?

I would say Catherine O'Hara hurting her knee was up there. And then honestly, we both died at Max berating his son on the shed. Just me alone on this island. That's fine.

It's just so good. It's so good. That guy's the perfect cast for that role. Incredible. All right. That's it for The Rewatchables produced by Craig Horlbeck. You can watch this video on Spotify. You can watch it on The Ringer Movies YouTube channel as well. You can see these two on House of R. Yeah. And on Prestige. That's right. White Lotus as we're taping this. So this will run on Monday. So there have been four episodes heading toward a monster fifth episode on a show we like very much. Thanks, guys. Good to see you.