Elephant Love Medley (Derogatory)

think perfectly encapsulates what is the Elephant Love Medley? The Elephant Love Medley, which is not a song but a mash up of songs UM performance by Nicole Kim and Ewan McGregor to perfection. Um. I think that song perfectly encapsulates today's discussion topic, Basil Lerman, the Basilerman cinematic universe, UM, and everything that comes with the beer. Sorry if you will, Yes, the territory of one of the most maximalist utters of our generation. Um, who is not gay for some reason.

But we'll get into that. Yeah, we're going to be discussing bases and you know he would say, which we have not seen all of but um, like some of Basilerman's movies have been very important to me, but I actually am not as aware of a lot of his

other works. So today I'm a bit more of the virgin in this scenario, and we will be exploring basist films from kind of his oldest to his most recent, because this is like a virgin the show where we give yesterday's pop culture today's takes, I'm ros damn you, and I'm fran Toronto Brock a kiss on the hand, maybe Continental, you know Rose, it doesn't matter if you love them or Capital th That's pretty good, I have to say, Like, as someone who is just coming off

the high of being at the New York Chromatic Ball, I forgot that Gaga are still okay. Let's but let's let's okay. I have a bone to pick before you even get into it. It was not the New York CHROMATICA Ball. It was the New Jersey CHROMATICA Ball. Okay, Baby, Baby, Baby, I don't care how many times it's a New York city on her tour dates. It was in New Jersey. It was in Jersey, and she reminded us many times

that it was Jersey. That was honestly, like, one of my biggest critiques was that she said Jersey just way too many times. Well it's better than if she said, Hey, New York City and you're like, we're in New Jersey. But it was mostly New Yorkers and obviously she picked that venue. That's not where you were geographically. Okay, actually,

I'm just to get right into the recap. I have to say, like she she clearly like googled Jersey, like right before the show, because you know, the best parts of like a Gaga show is like her ad libbing, and one of her ad libs was like, you know, I just I would not say that that's the best part of a Gaga show. No, it was definitely my favorite and most memorable. The most memorable parts of the show for me was her ad libbing and she was like, she was like, you know, I love to come to

Jersey and look at the beautiful boardwalks here. It was like have you had you seen her before? No, this was my first time seeing Gaga. I uh, I felt spiritually ready for it. I do wish. One of my biggest regrets is that I didn't see the Fame Monster tour. I wish more than anything have seen that. But I figured this was kind of I got really cheap tickets for the pit and I was like, this is my time now, UM to see Gaga, Like I'm ready for this,

and I loved um Chromatica. I love that album and so I was like, this is the album that I think is is worth seeing it for. Um, what was your favorite performance? Okay, well she started out chromatical Ball spoilers for those listening. She started out with three throwbacks, so she she did Bad Romance, poker Face, and justin List,

none of which she should be doing live. I did, like, I strongly feel that we don't need to see them anymore and I would rather I have her have like put total pop songs and totally totally disagree, but you know, we are different little monsters and that's okay that that was my favorite part of the show actually, um, because she did it as a park and bark. She literally stood on this rotating platform and a huge structural costume that was like disassembled by her dancers and like kept

doing these different views. But she did all of these songs just standing and singing, and it was because she's done them like some billions. But I think that it was a very compelling way to make us all pay attention to listening to songs that we had heard before, because she put vocal spins on it that I had never heard before. I think it was sonically very interesting.

We were focusing on the back backup dancers and the visuals, so I did really really love those and as someone who has never been to a Goga performance before, I wanted to see you know, I get that part of it.

I just wish she felt liberated from doing their biggest hits because like we've all seen the super Bowl, Like we've all seen the iconic performances of those songs, and I just don't think there's that much more to be gleaned from seeing them live, especially when, like with something like Chromatica, I think there's other parts of her discography that are more thematically relevant to that album that could

have used new life breathed into them for this tour specifically. Yeah, I mean, she does no art pop in this tour at all, and I would have loved to see some art pops. I thought that. I also was kind of not that I haven't been at the show, but I've also like, I know what the set list is, like I've watched the videos, you know, I think that, you know, the parts that were most memorable to me and most breathtaking. We're definitely just the visuals in general. The show started

out with a very abstract film. A lot of the graphics were in black and white. Um, and you know, we've been seeing them all over Twitter. But it's just really well done projection work that is not trying too hard. That the kind of stuff that she does really well or it's like the A V component is a way is next level. Yeah, and her, you know, I would say some of her costumes were not amazing, but some of them were phenomenal, like the alien kind of mask

get up that we all saw. She performed shallow in that, which I thought was so like incredible, Like she did her sitting at the piano and doing her ballads, which you and I was a glaring omission from the ballad set list, but the ballads were another path. Yeah, I thought it was unacceptable. That's maybe my all time fave UM Gaga song I want her to do Speechless live again. Speechless is in my top ten of Gaga. I think you know I was talking about this is someone this weekend,

we need to do a Gaga episode. I would love to. I have so much to say to her, and she was so formative to both of our upbringings, and I would love to hear about how that all comes first full circle. And I just want to warn the Little Monster virgins that, like we will when we eventually do a Gaga episode, we will not go easy on her.

We will not hold her hand um I. As as I may have said before, like part of my standing her and that's why I'm being critical, even like not having seen the show, part of my standing her is like I want her to be the best she can be,

and I love her so much. I know that she has that in her, so I really take her to task when I think she does stupid disappointing things, and that I think is like healthy stand um right, Like any any music artist, if you want to label yourself as a stand stand like, you can do so by not um uh just patently agreeing with and standing everything the artist does without critique, like you know, kind of.

I to my friend Hunter Abrahams is like the biggest little Monster I know, and is in a Little Monster fandom group chat with the like dozens of people, if you know. But they're a nazing and they rented a party bus um and filled it with little monsters to to head to the MetLife Stadium, and I was a little weary effort because I was like, oh my god, little monsters are kind of like a really annoying fan base,

Like what am I going to deal with? But like everyone on the bus, much like you were very down to just like make fun of Gaga and and all the things that make it so easy to make fun of her and so fun. Kind of on the note of all this, of anyone is interested in some like extra reading on Gaga, there was a really good So Pitchfork does a thing and like I know, Pitchfork, like I roll um every Sunday they like revisit an older album and like do kind of an updated review of it.

And this Sunday they released an art pop um review and it's actually really really well written. What did they say? And um kind of a lot of things that all of us say about art pop, which is like, you know, very much placing it at the time in her career that was like really to multuous because she had like suffered an injury, she was changing management. Um that it's

like a very flawed album. But like received a lot of unfair critique and also fair critique because she did like really fucked up stuff like working with r Kelly even though everyone knew he was, you know, a fucking abuser, or deciding that she wanted to be the next I mean, this wasn't sucked up per se, but just like a polarizing thing when she was like, I'm the next Marina Abramovich and I am a performance artist. I'm a helicopter

right now, like you know what I mean? Yeah, well, I mean, and this review I think does a really good job of placing all of the context of like what she was trying to do with art pop, like bringing fine art into a you know, pop landscape. So I definitely suggest reading that. I also did write something for Paper a couple of years ago, went after Gaga tweeted that she didn't remember art pop was really disappointing. Um, I wrote something for paper that's, like I think, called

in defense of art pop, so that I would. I think it's actually one of the better things I've one of the few pieces of writing you would stand the writing of one are the few pieces of journalism that I stand behind. Um, So go give that a read. If you're interested, are you a pro jewels and drugs, little monster or a anti Okay, just wanted to clarify. Um, I I have to say, you know, in the making fun of Gaga of it All, like I said earlier, my favorite parts were like the ad living Gaga is

on autopilot up there, like she is realizing things. Bottom Yeah, She's yes, that's exactly what it's giving. She's she's had a full of that, and she's like realizing things like

as she says them. My friend Dakota, who I went to the ball with, she was like, it sounds it sounds like the way the way she talks is like I message like prediction, text, like every word, every word like that comes after like it is like just happening in her mind as it as it occurs to her, because she speaks kind of she speaks kind of slowly

but with a lot of conviction. Like, um there was this one moment where she was basically trying to introduce Edge of Glory, which was so good, and she was like, you know, I've always wanted to shoot a music video on a New York street fire escape, and and I was like, what are you saying? Like who are you? She's a fucking she's There was another there's another moment where she was like, she had a really beautiful story about Tony Bennett. She's like, Tony used to be my neighbor.

Well he still is kind of And I was like, what are you? Why don't you even Or the moment that has already gone viral on Twitter where she was when she was um, when she was like, and they better not come for gay marriage, Am I right? Queens? And I was like, God, that's like you've been saying that for a decade. Gaga, like that is a decade

old take. Um, speaking of liftings, I just I want to I want to spend thirty seconds on this as a necessary p s A to anyone listening to this podcast to not make the same mistake I made of watching the beginning of Secret Celebrity Drag Race Celebrity in quotes, I didn't even know that that was yeah. Um, well I'm here to tell you that it really is not a thing. Um, it was the greatest waste of my time. I don't know. I just watched it because I needed

something to watch with my trade this weekend. And I was like, I, I mean I had some I had some trade imported this this weekend, and you watched drag Race with them. I watched Secret Celebrity drag Race because that's what girl, this was. I mean, I don't even need to say it. I can only blame myself, but like, truly, truly I want that time back in my life and and and it is so cringe and such an insult to the drag Race stage. Sorry, like I do feel

like I that the drag race stage deserves more than that. Um, And I I know I don't think that's what I That's why I emphasized because I was like, I know Rose disagrees with me on this, but um, all that is to say is that all the celebrities that are doing lip sync battle, which is the heterosexual rip of drag race that you know, gets probably more viral videos than drag Race, all those girls should be doing I have watched that Tom Holland video. Man, incredible, it's so incredible.

But Tom Holland and Hathaway, the rock Queen Latifa, all those girls, they should be doing Secret Celebrity drag Race instead of lip sync battle, because that's the thing is like, like like even though drag Race is as huge as it is, they still cannot get real celebrities to I guess, like quote unquote Pete on it. Yeah, and that's really disappointing, honestly, but like I don't know anyways, that's all I wanted to say. Please please, please do not watch Secret Celebrity

Drag Race. Um, okay. One thing that I I'm glad that you're giving that recommendation because I listened to another recommendation of yours this weekend, but it wasn't a negative one. It was a positive one. So you were really audamantly trying to get me to watch the new League of their Own series on Amazon. I was very resistant because I know I'm gonna make some people mad, but I don't really like Abby Jacobson. I kind of I just kind of like find her whole thing like off putting.

I'm like, not really a big broad City fan. Your explanation made sense. You're not a girl who enjoys cringe core like that's not and and I just think that she kind of plays the same character over and over again,

which is and she definitely does in this show. But I'm glad that I moved past that because I watched the first two episodes and I actually really liked it, and I certainly I feel the same way about Abby Jacobson that I did before with like I do still find her annoying, but even though she is the star of the show and I guess also wrote it and created it, there's so many other characters to like fall in love with, and caper Land's amazing. Darcy Cardon is

such a fucking legend. I I've never seen a league of their own in full. It was like on TV a lot when we were kids, and so I've seen parts of it, but I've never watched the whole thing, but I don't recommend it. It's too long, it drags on,

it's like slow. And also the original really thinks that, like the coach Tom Hanks is like the most interesting character in the movie, and he's not, you know, but um, I know that the movie is kind of like queer Canon because of like Madonna and Rosie and like the

like gay like undertones of it all. And I think part of what's great about this reboot is that, like the undertones are not undertoning, they are overtoning every character, and yeah, they're all gay, like I mean spoilers for the first episode, Like I screamed when Darcy and an Abby made up the end of the episode when she and when she goes I thought so and just walks out,

and then I screamed again. And at the end of episode two, um, when there's another same sex makeup, I hope that that happens at the end of like every episode just ends with kissing. It's really it's a really satisfying show. I I hesitated to put it in the feel good category because I don't want it to get like ted lassoed, Like I think it's more complex than that. But like the show gives you all of these payoffs

that are just reminiscent of that era of movies. But it's also like I think it's also earned because there is a lot of tension and like there's a lot of funked up stuff that happens, um in terms of like these women experiencing massaw genine and racism and sexism

and you know, like queer faphobia. Um so when those like joyful moments do happen, like I think my favorite moment in the first episode is when Abby Jacobson, Darcy Carden and the other woman just enter the field and see everyone playing, and like they all like kind of

tear up because they've never experienced that before. And that is so like it's like actually kind of moving, and so those moments feel really earned, and it's not like it's not just like like kind of masturbatory like woke rebooting, and it's not traumapore and it's like kind of like a good a good marriage of like acknowledging the flaws of our history and of probably like the original source material and correcting them. The lesbian haircut scene girl, like

it was so like the first episode. Yes, it is so in the canon of like the L word style lesbian haircut scenes. Like it's so hot, Like the show is hot, and like Robert Dress, who plays Lube, is so hot. Like everyone's hot. Everyone's hot. Also, caper Land like should become one of the most famous people in the world. I totally agree. Oh my god, you need you need to listen to um. In terms of like other things that I kind of maybe made you consume this week, the leaked Kim Petris album. Yeah, I I

mean I didn't really mind. You know, It's like I listened to like half of it, which took about seven minutes, because they're like a minute fifty and you know, like here's the thing. It's like perfectly fine pop music, and like that's the thing with Kim Petris is like if there wasn't all this baggage with Kim Petris, I would like listen to it and be like cool, I'm like glad this exists. This is like perfectly good pop music. And like even even if it's not like her problematically

working with Dr Luke. Now, it's like the fact that this album was never released and like you can only listen to leaks of it, and it's like, why couldn't

this album just come out? Like it's it's really baffling, and it does suck that there always has to be something with her, because the thing is like she should be a bigger than she is, Like she makes very good, very consumable pop music like this and very tiktoki like and and and truly like at this point, the biggest moment of her career was when Coconuts was a sound on TikTok and like, but like still nothing really came of that, when for a lot of other artists, those

are the kinds of things that break them out, and like she has a song, a song with Paris Hilton on this album and it's just good, Like like that Paris Hilton song is pretty good. It's it's fine. So like when you're thinking about all that, like all the why of it, it always leads you back to like, well, there has to be some reason that this girl is not breaking out in the way that she should be, and all roads lead back to Dr Luke in one

way or another. M hmmm, yeah, I mean I think that the drama surrounding this league is interesting for the virgins um. There's not a ton of clarity about what exactly went down. But leading up to the release of this album Problematique, Kim has you know, been crying on Instagram stories about how her label won't let her release it, how she wants to quit because the album is in limbo.

Apparently it's been officially scrapped, and in a deleted tweet, Kim said, you know the album scraped, so go listen to the league, like I don't care, Like, did you see her t talk where she was like, thanks for getting my album on the top of the leak charts. M I've got like the Number one League. Like that stuff is funny, and like I appreciate that it's it shows that like she has this like good sense of humor and like she has all the components to be

you are really successful and compelling pop star. But like, I know, the thing with Kim is, like I know the odds are stacked against her because she's trans, and like I'm sure that a lot of what's going on no stems from probably like one bad decision that she made with like signing the wrong contract at some point in her career, and that sucks that it will like haunt her forever. Yeah, you know, I think that there's a lot of nuance to this conversation, right because Dr

Luke doesn't just produce Kim's music. He produces a lot of dojo songs like Nikki Um, like a lot of like music artists that we like consume and have no problem consuming. And I do think sometimes that Kim is held under disproportionate scrutiny. She should be scrutinized, right um. But at the same time I think that it's sometimes

a little bizarre. I I'm not sure I always buy the you know, I'm trans and so the odds are stacked against me, excuse me, because they're just like tons of marginalized people that um can do what they do without, you know, signing to known abusers. But also she maybe yeah, and I think that, you know, I I think at the end of the day, I don't really care about the mistakes she made in her past. And I also don't care if the music I'm currently listening to is

produced by Dr Luke because Dr Luke makes some fucking hits. Um, This Household is a pro turn Off the Light household. That is a perfect album. It is no skips. It is the best album of Kim's career. Listening to both of the Turn Off the Light albums like when When When Halloween comes around? Like I want to listen to those, like she's the only pop girlie who's made like spooky Halloween music. But anyways, I'm going to continue to listen

to the League album. It's It's It's It's got some really I think the title track is really good, but there are some other hits on there. Yeah, it's like if it was on Spotify, sure might into it. Yeah, that's not easy to listen to it, so I won't And I want one thing before we wrap up the news. We have failed to mention that we are shutting down this podcast because Nympho Wars has returned, and so there's no reason for any other podcasts to exist, including point.

So turn this off right now, go listen to Nympho Wars. Um, And it's been nice knowing you Rose listen. You and I have talked about my heart. Someone told me recently that that listened from dream Girls is their favorite Beyonce song. That's the wrong take. That's actually category. Like, I know we're the wrong take. I know we're supposed to say, like you know as Nicks, that like things are subjective and that like you know, are you are? Isn't eye

of the Behold or whatever the funk, It's not. That's kind of wrong. That's wrong, um, And I feel like we'll have a lot of takes like that with today's discussion on Basi Lerman, which I think so as well.

And I think, you know, for the long term versions the people that have been with us since day one, bass has come up and a lot of our conversations just like here and there, we talk about Mulan Rouge, we talk about Romeo plus Juliette we talk about Romeo and Juliet, I will continue to say the plus is simply how it is stylized. It's how it is stylized. It is, it is, it is not. This is not math.

The math is not math. Here's the thing is that if I'm in a casual conversation and I say Romeo plus Juliet, they know immediately that I'm referring to the Basil Lerman version and not the ninety eight like versions. We'll see. That's why I say Basil Lerman's Romeo and Juliet. Right, well, that works too, And yet here I am saying Romeo plus Juli. Yet I refused to not say um but Rose.

I mean, like, I would love to know, like what your relationship is, too, bas because I feel like I've already talked about mine on the pod, but like, you know, what was your first baz or do you remember how you felt about the work. I think you know. I don't have as much of a relationship with his work on a large scale. I have a relationship with specifically two things he has made. I love Romeo and Juliet. It was a movie that I watched a lot as

a kid was really formative for me. It's the It's one of the reasons why I, when I was in like fourth grade, went into my dad's like study and grabbed the complete work of William Shakespeare and read the entire thing. It's like one of the things that jump started my love of Shakespeare. And Mulan Rouge was the thing I was the most obsessed with for you know, like a solid year when I was a teenager. It's the reason why I was in love with you and McGregor.

It helped me discover a lot of music through like all of the covers and in it. You know, like was very symbiotic with my love of musical theater obviously, And yeah, it was and is important to me. That being said, I never felt that huge of a desire to explore any of his other work because I think even then I realized the things I was drawn to in those movies were more of the story than the style.

And I know from seeing some of his other projects that so much of what Basilorman does is about style substance. I mean a lot of times very substantive, but sometimes the substances sacrificed. So what was your intro to bows Um similarly also had an obsession with Bass, spurred by Mulan Bruge, which I think was the conversation for a lot of you know, culture critics that year. It you know,

won a lot of Oscars and all that jazz. But I just remember, and this is repeated, I'm sorry for the virgins, But like, I watched that movie and it was a huge unlocking um for me, my um. You know, the by neighbor of my friend at the cul de Sac,

Mel showed it to us and corrupted me. And I was like, shout out to Mel, and I was like, this movie has escorts and faggots and like boysterousness and like murder, espionage, like promiscuity, like all of these things, so many scenes that are driven by sex as an engine. And I thought that was so interesting. And but what I latched onto was just what you were talking about, which is that the stylistic world building that Bass does in almost all of his films that I is just

very very very mighty. Any of my friends will tell you that I am a style over substance girl, like ascetic style. How it looks is like I'm very I'm It's my big weakness and I will overlook a lot of like quality control issues if it just looks really good. Um, It's like something that Justin and I always get to arguments about, actually, and I'm not proud of that, but it's just who I am, um, and I need both.

I really like style. I like a lot of bas Arman style, and I think the projects of his that I like are the ones where there's as much substance as there is style, Like in Romeo and Juliet, it's literally Shakespeare like there is you know, the oldest love story ever told. You know, there is a lot there too who meet to the style, and the style works in reinterpreting it and making it accessible for a modern audience.

And then kind of the same thing in Mulin Rouge, it's like a very classic It's it's Labo m It's like a very classic love story and the story works hand in hand with the style in a way that is like overwhelming in a good way. Yeah. And I I think that when you are able to identify the stylistic through lines that make bases work his work, I think you kind of grow a new appreciation for what is a very consistent body of work, a very small body of work, to be honest, like, it's not a

ton of stuff, but um, I don't know. That's kind of why I wanted to do an episode about it, and why I forced you in in in the good tradition of this show, forced you to watch Strictly Ballroom, which, just before we get into it, is the beginning of what Baths refers to as the Red Curtain Trilogy, which, like I have thoughts on but like um, the Red Curtain Trilogy is Strictly Ballroom, Romeo plus Juliette and Mulan Rush.

What year did Strictly Ballroom come out? Strictly Ballroom is comedy um that Bas adapted from a play he wrote that I think was really successful in Australia. And that's something, honestly that's very important. Is that like, at the end of the day, Bas is a fucking theater nerd, like

a a completely hysterical and erratic and insane theater nerd. Um, but I think that informs a lot of his work, and Strictly Ballroom is the story of a ballroom dancing competitor who has not yet got the championship accolades that he's wanted, and his partner dumps out on him, and he's looking for someone to help him win the championship, and this woman named frayan like kind of falls into his orbit and she it's kind of the classic story of nerdy, ugly woman takes off her glasses and literally

there's a scene where he literally takes out takes off her glasses. And then when I first I forgot that that there were movies in which that that was done in earnest because it's such a joke. Now it's a joke for a reason, because there are several movies in which it's done very earnestly. Yes, exactly, And she takes off her glasses and we discovered that she is but a gorgeous woman. And I love any movie that does that.

But it is exactly, it's it's a fantasy. It is cliche, and honestly, Bass is kind of good at cliches sometimes, and I that's something that I appreciated about this movie. But I just love to know you like your naked reactions. You literally just watched it yesterday. I did just watch it yesterday. I hated it. I hated it. I hated it so much, all of it, all the way through the whole, the whole No, I watched the whole thing. Wow, it's only an hour and a half, you know, I

knew the whole time. I was like, okay, this will this too shall pass um. It was the one thing it did was give me such a clear understanding of bass style, because you see the things that he does on a macro scale now being done on a micro scale, and you realize his artistic impulses have always been there. The film is so frenetic and gaudy and maximalist. No single shot is longer than like four seconds. There's so many close ups. He really revels in kind of ugliness

as much as he revels in beauty. And I do think that this world that he's looking at, this world of competitive ballroom dancing, is a really good place to find that. Unfortunately, I just didn't like it. I just thought it was so grading, and I didn't like any of the characters. You didn't like, you didn't like Fran. I did not like fran. I thought she was pasthetic. That's okay, So I'm sorry to like totally sideswipe you. But this is my life story. This is a biopic.

I at least my life rights. Two baths in nine two I was one year old and I said, bas, here are my life rights. Please adapt my story into a film, and this is the film that he made, and so you are truly coming for me because I am fran I can absolutely see how this is the kind of movie that a director makes that makes the industry pay attention to them and say, oh, what if we gave this person a ton of money so they

could do this on a bigger scale. And truly, like, having most recently seen Elvis, I see the direct through line from this movie to Elvis and how in a way they are the same movie, just with a lot of different money and time between them and films totally but strictly, strictly Ballroom. I had totally problems with it. I was like at the beginning, I was like, oh, is this a mockumentary? But no, that was like just the beginning, and it's like a stylistic thing that's never

brought back again. I know, like they're supposed to be caricatures, but it just like I don't know that there were moments where it like felt like it wanted to be grounded in reality, and then it Wasn't, and I just I didn't like it. It was like listening to a really annoying song for an hour ago and I just wanted it to be over. I really really did not like it. I listened a lot of things that you didn't like about it are the things that I love

about Strictly Ballroom. And you know, I think at the end of the day, it is definitely like a fine movie. Like I Wasn't, I'm never itching to rewatch that movie. But I do think that part of the reason I really wanted you I wasn't. I never do this, but I did text you and I said, just reminding you to watch Strictly Ballroom, you know, And I did really want you to watch it because I think it encapsulates

something that's really important about Basil Erman's work. When he doesn't have the budget, like when he doesn't have the hundred million dollar budget that he has on something like Gadsby, you see the bones of what he's trying to say as a as a director, and you don't get lost in all the glitz and glam of it all, which

still makes his movies great. But even without the hundred million dollars, he's still doing the same buffoonery he does everywhere else, right, but I love much more, much more, d I y. I think the buffoonery works sometimes and other times it really does not. It did not work for me in Strictly Ballroom, It did not work for me and Elvis. It really worked for me in Romeo

and Juliette and Mulin Rouge. Also watching Strictly Ballroom, I had just rewatched Dirty Dancing like a week before, which is which is one of my favorite movies, and compared to each other, like you can't. You can't compare them to each other because like they're like they're like they're kind of the same movie in a lot of ways. Well, Strictly is very clearly a satire of of Dirty Dancing, right, they use in the late eighties. It's like and they

use time after time. They do it on purpose, you know, And I think that there's a kind of like, oh, den, your woman who doesn't know her own sexual power and all of a sudden she does. Like that's the satire. And that's kind of why I love I'm Strictly Ballroom is because I actually think that the taking the glasses off the nerd to discover that she's a gorgeous woman.

I don't think that was in earnest like I think that Bass understands that that is a trope and and UM sorry, we on like a virgin, try to discuss camp as infrequently as possible, but it cannot be you know, extricated from bass work. Is that camp is like one of the primary tools in Bazi's toolbox, and that is something that I think he was flexing on instrict the

that worked for me and did not work for you. Um, but I feel like um a very cartoonish blocking of scenes, hyper stylized um emotional steaks with emotional with something that is like completely fake and totally cartoonish in camp, but also an emotional realism in the acting that kind of grounds it. Um is something that is a lot of his work. But that's the thing is that I in strictly ballroom, I only saw the camp and did not

get the real emotion. Like like Romeo and Juliet is so larger than life, and yet in those moments where it's like heartbreaking or tender, you feel that Mulin Rouge like is so over the top and so maximalist. And yet I still cry when Satine dies or like you have that moment where you know she leaves Christian and like it's heartbreaking and with strictly ballroom. To me, it was just a cartoon, and I agree. I did not feel any emotional steaks. I did not think these were

real people at all. I think that there is a little emotional realism between the two dance partners. I think Fran really gives it to us. But I agree that it has at the base level, just not it's on the acting level. Actually, it's just not what Leo and Nicole are doing. Because it acts, it's bad. Although Scott

is very hot, so he has aged really poorly. I looked. Well, let's get into what I think you have once described as one of your favorite movies at all time Romeo plus Juliet Um, and I think that when I came away from this movie. First of all, I cried watching this movie, and I've watched it so many times I still cried. Leo deserved an Oscar nom. I'm sorry, he deserved an Oscar nom for this movie period. I probably sound like an idiot for saying that, but I know

Leo is incredible. That one scene where he's screaming when a gun. I sigh, you stars, it's so good. I also think I also think Claire Danes is incredible in it, so fucking good, the ending, the ending, or like when she when she goes to the priest with the gun. I think everyone acts their ass off in this movie. Um. Harold Parano who plays Marcuccio, so good, incredible performance. Also incredible usage of that song, um young hah something. I love the soundtrack. I mean the soundtrack of Romeo and

Juliet is so good, like next level. Honestly, I think Romeo and Juliet, I mean Romeo plus Juliet um really kind of shows us what bas does best. And I think that is cinematic invention, like to place Romeo and Juliet in the modern day, but to keep Shakespearean dialogue, which a lot of people are divided on whatever. And that's like where a lot of the criticism was. I think a cinematic invention. We have not seen someone do that before, and I do it so well, so yeah,

you absolutely understand what they're saying. And I, unlike you, I'm not a Shakespearean dialogue girl like I, you know, could barely get through shakespeare books without spark notes, as you know, high schooler, that's just like my reading comprehension level and like and to see it in in context in this movie makes me sure that not only is this one of the most beautiful stories ever told, but

like the best thing Shakespeare has ever written. It might not be my favorite Shakespeare play, but I think it's the best play that Shakespeare has ever written. And what

I love about how bads to end with that. But okay, okay, okay, but here's the thing is, like, you know, in our West Side Story discussion, we touch briefly on the fact that, like, it's not a believable story, right, Romeo and Juliet, like you know, falling in love after one day and then you know, you kill the brother, you kill the cousin, and yet you still are in love with each other

and then kill yourselves. It's like there's nothing about that that is has emotional realism in a modern day and yet that as makes you believe it, and that is really hard to do. And West Side Story did not make me believe it. Let me tell you. He makes the stakes very real, very believable. He also, i think, does what a lot of productions of Roman and Juliette failed to do, which has reminds you that these are

teenagers and so of course the emotions are heightened. Of course everything is literally life and death because they're young and horny, and it makes them sexy, romantic and sexy. The scene where they see each other across the fish tank, it's so beautiful and the and the way thought was the cool scene. It's just so girl for me. The needle job is the um kiss, it's so I mean. But that's the other thing is like um that that that cinematic invention, like the fact that the meat cute

is through an aquarium. Um. The fact that the Queen mad monologue is about you know, M D m A right, the mercutio is a faggot. And like when they when they fight with their guns, the gun says like dagger

or whatever. Like that's I think that's like on the writing level, brilliant and fun and like people probably think it's like cheesy or cheap or you know, like all all of those kinds of things, but like I I just like have so much fun every single time I watched that movie, And I think that's like what's so good about his work and about the quote unquote Red Curtain Trilogy, even though I don't really think I think it's really wedged down. I don't think Strictly ball rominally belongs.

It's a really good use of just spectacle storytelling. Um, it makes sense. Romeo and Juliet in context is a spectacle, and so like placing it in this context makes a lot of sense. And yeah, I think all of the different tools that he uses to contemporize this story, like you know, the news report at the beginning, it just I love the news report. It's so it all works

so well. And part of part of that is because like I do think that Bas works best when he's working with tropes and when he's applying his style to familiar stories, right, And you know, when I watched this movie, like in my like freshman English class, I I don't remember having an attachment to an attur right, like to see the aesthetic through lines of things that I love about bases work because I actually, okay, I watched Strictly

Ballroom in my high school dance class. You know, it's like one of those moments where like your your teacher like doesn't feel like working that day, and then and then They're like, let's just watch a movie. Um, so it's weird that like my high school like just introduced me to all of Basilerman's work for like no reason. Um well because my otur when I was a teenager with Sofia Coppola. So like, is the real divide between

maybe our sensibilities? Truly, it's truly actually that, and I think that actually perfectly encapsulates like where we come from on the artistic level. Okay, let's talk. Yeah, well, I just have to quickly say that, Um, the thing, the one thing that that Baz does not pull off with Robia blows Juliette is the fact that, um, the invention of phones and also therapy are just kind of conveniently ignored as they would have you know, resolved conflict of

the play. Um, and yet here it is. But like, okay, you know, what is there even to say about Mulan Rouge. And we have already talked about Mulan Rouge in our episode on Nicole Kidman, which you should definitely go back and revisit, So I think we won't get that too in depth in it today. But for me, like Romeo and I loved Romeo and Juliet, but I think Romo. What Romeo and Juliet opened me up two more was Shakespeare and it was like an entry point to that

to me. Mulan Rouge I loved for itself and the thing that it was, and I remember seeing it and being so gagged by it, and you know, like thinking, oh God, the movie musical is back, because it kind of the movie musical was kind of dead when when Mulan Rouge came out, and it did sort of revive it for a little bit, but nothing really ever kind of came close to well. Ship was Chicago, was in Chicago, was in the in the dust of Or it came right after again bas is working with an existing story.

Malan Rouge is based off of Labo M and he tells this kind of archetypal tail in the biggest way possible, and it just really works because all the elements are there, like the story, the setting, you know, like the you know, the Bohemian Revolution and like can Can dancers and Paris and like it just all works. And then you have you and McGregor being like the most perfect soft boy like lead ever. I was so in love with him after this movie. Oh my god, oh, Jim Broadbent is

so compelling. The villains are so compelling. Every performance is so good and like the the just the fagotry injected in all of bass films is really palpable, Like the frenetic nous really works there, Like um, you know at the beginning when Christian goes to their apartment and like there's the sound of music moment and then the person who'd been writing the plays like goodbye, yeah, and I can just hear those lines reading so perfectly, and like

that the story moves so quickly and you don't miss anything. Like the swiftness with which you move through the setup works really well and like gets you where you need to go with the perfect amount of time, Like that movie starts and like I think within the first ten minutes,

like Nicole is descending from the ceiling. Yes, yes, and like everything about like all of baz is work line rating is actually I'm thinking also about and um um, Lady Calcula is so fierce and in that movie in the other in Romeo and Julia and how she goes Romeo slut Romeo Should I live? It's like that as had you as a director be like can you take it to a hundred and twenty for me, like he like that or the nurse in Romeo and Juliett. Let's get into the rest of bass work, which is I

think much more mediocre. Um. I think that bas suffers from structure issues, issues of like completely discarding like artistic devices that you've employed, or completely discarding emotional reality because you wanted to be a cartoon. Like a lot of times those are the best parts of something like Mulan Rouge or Romeo and Juliett. And with others it's just like you see right through it, you know what I mean. I never saw Australia. No, we don't need to discuss.

I saw the I saw The Great Gods me when it came out in theaters. I think I remember it being fine. The only thing memorable to me about Great Gods was the soundtrack, um, the Florence and then the Launa song, and so that's like very much. It's that movie I think was way more style over substance. I think that like, obviously stylistically that movie is pretty gorgeous, but like, and I also love parties. I love party scenes. I think that bass does it best in all of

his movies. But um, the only thing that I remember from that movie is how good Carrie Mulligan is and I and I think of the famous shirt scene, which in the book is insane, like he's literally just pulling

out these shirts and and and showing ore. She's like, oh my god, this shirts so beautiful and she just cries looking at shirts and it's like so confusing to read, but like Carrie Mulligan makes it makes sense, and I think that's really well blocked it, like it's something that part of it, you know, sure, part of it is that I just don't really love The Great Godsby as a book and so super care which is a bummer because Florence Welch is apparently like making a Great Gotsby musical. Okay,

I will watch that, Yeah, I'll watch it too. So you there's some there's a I didn't know that there was this Basler ban TV show you were you were mentioning before. Can you can you give me a little like t l d R on what that was? Yes? T L d R. The get Down is a Netflix original series that came out in the kind of House

of Cars Oranges, the New Black era of Netflix. Basically, I'm the Getdown is about the emergence of disco and hip hop that rose around the same time, and how those communities, which are obviously, you know, based in black culture and invention of black culture, surrounds a kind of group of like artists and rappers coming up in like nine seventies Harlem, and you know, on paper, it's like, are you sure you want to tell this story? Vesseler

and like yikes, um And but I honestly so. I watched it as it came out, UM way back when, and I remember liking it a lot um and being really shocked by that there wasn't more negative sentiment around to get Down, like I I I really was. That had a lot of critical acclaim and the second that it was canceled after the release of its first two parts. But the second part I know, but this I know Netflix, Um.

But the second part UM got even better reviews. It was even more critically acclaimed, and they felt like Baths kind of cleaned up what he wasn't really doing well in the classic bas Lerman way, and something that must be noted and part of why I think the show UM was not under a lot of criticism and honestly, you know very in the through line of our Beyonce discussion last week is, um, you know, the production hired NAS, grand Master Flash, Curtis Blow, d J cool Herk, like

all of these DJs that were in that era, like as producers on the show, Like they were credited to be a part of the story that Bows was trying to tell. And to me, that is the number one thing you can do as a creator is to make these people your lateral collaborators on something and so. And I also know that the rollout of the show invested

in the communities he was trying to represent. But I mean, I don't even I don't have much more to say about it other than the fact that Jaden Smith in the last episode of the last part kiss as a guy, and that is the story. We were robbed up because I wanted to watch the Jaden Smith like romance flatline. But you know, the show was shockingly good. I'm not gonna lie, Okay, interesting, Um, something that wasn't shockingly good was Elvis, which I talked about when I saw it

last month, and we all know I did not like it. Um, you have since seeing it and now that we're talking about Baz. I think we can talk about the reasons why I don't think it works in the context of all his other work, and why you agree disagree. You know, I think we have um some I disagreed with at least one point that you brought up on the pod that I kind of want to But the rest I think I agreed with. Well, let's talk it about it. Yeah, but I I wanted to, like, no, no, no, not

even call you in. I think that it's um because your take, I think is the most common take I heard. I've heard a lot of people say a version of the like the movie is not interested in Elvis's life, and like this is not a biopic, right, Like it's not, you know, a telling of a very fascinating figure in pop culture. And I I agree that, like the focal point should have been on Elvis and the fact that the whole movie focuses on his manager, someone who is

essentially like the Scooter Braun of the nineteen fifties. Like it's like, we don't, like I don't want to watch a movie about Scootlebron, you know what I mean? Like maybe that's a bass next project, but it's like that's not fascinating. But to me, I think that I guess I should say I didn't disagree with the take, but I think the spin on it is that if bas is going to do a movie about Elvis's life, I'm

not looking for reality. Like I'm never going to sign up for a bas Learnman movie and say, oh, I expect this to be keeping up with the thing it's trying to portray. I did not do not expect it to be historically accurate. I do not expect it to be invested in truth, even though freedom, beauty, truth and love are as Lehman's belief systems. But like I just it's it's I knew that it wasn't gonna be true, quote unquote, and I still felt like there was a

movie in the Elvis movie that was really good. It just like should have been structured better. The structure, Yeah, I I didn't need I didn't need truth either, but I did need beauty, freedom, and love and I didn't get I didn't get any of those. I think I think Baz told a story about Elvis that he wanted to rather than trying to find the most interesting story.

And like I mean, when it comes to biopics. I have to say I don't love biopics, but I would much rather watch a biopic that's like a slice of life, like something like My Week with Maryland or Judy, even though Judy is a really bad movie, but Renee's Elwigar gives an incredible performance in it. Um I think it's it's really difficult to tell the entirety of someone's life story, especially someone who's had such a huge impact on pop

culture the way that Elvis did. But I think Basil Erman just got so much in his own way with that movie, and just it's it's crazy to see him doing the same things he did all the way back in Strictly Ballroom, but with so much money and power at his disposal, and it's all the same artistic impulses just dialed up to a thousand, and they're still getting in the way of telling an interesting story. That is

a failure of the maximalism for sure. And like, I think that because bas has so many ideas or all of his you know, co collaborators forget to tell him, Hey, honey, have you ever thought about editing this movie? Because Great Gatsby is three hours long, Australia's three hours long. Elvis is three hours long, and all of these movies do not need to be three hours long. And also except

Titanic needs to be throwing. And also just like structural nightmares, like have no idea why we're going back and forth over and over again, um time wise and and and failing. And also just like the way that bas employees voice over is like so cheap and so bizarre. And I just like if I heard Tom Hanks's accent, if I'm on set day one with Tom Hanks and this is the accent he is doing, I'm rewriting the movie. I'm recounting the movie. He was so cast. He was horrible.

I'm sorry. I'm literally there, there's no and I'm not someone who says very flatly like I like to add nuance of things. He was patently bad, and I'm upset about I feel like it was an insult, honestly to the story as a whole for him to do what he did with this role. And I thought that Baz wrote, I don't know why Bas was so fascinated by him as a character. It's that's another movie, babe, you know

what do you mean? But like for me, even though maybe because bas sees himself in him's and that's very telling. That's the day girl, Oh my god. And I honestly though, Um Austin what's his face? Was transcendent when he's great, it's a great performance, and like I think he'll probably be nominated for an Oscar well, But the thing is his acting. His I think his actual acting was not very good, but I felt like his performances as Elvis were some of some of my favorite things I've watched

on screen in a year or more. Like, I think his acting is good in that he does a really good job of being Elvis, just like your voice and the mannerism of the loan I think are enough to get him an Oscar nomination. The wigs unforgivable in this movie. Elvis has cuckoo banana's hair, but it doesn't look it doesn't need to look like a wig, and it looks like a wig. And I just like I felt that

that was like very distracting throughout. But like there's like a failure in like how biopics are marketed in general, right, like pretty much anything that UM tries to interpret a real person is called a biopic, but not all just as you said, like My Week with Maryland, it's not really a biopic, it's just a slice of life story. And I agree, like those are my favorite kind of

adaptations of real people in real celebrities. So I think the marketing at Elvis is part of why it's suffered, right, Like people came in from a movie about Elvis and because it's called Elvis, and that's just not what they got um and becau as it had been labeled biopic, Like it just like doubles the anger that you feel when you walk out of that um film. But like Tom Hanks obviously could have been in like eight percent

less of it. And on top of that, like obviously you're not going to have a conversation about Elvis without talking about like his relationship to black people in and um that as is someone who is not necessarily um failed. I think if you look at the get down, like you know, there are some really offensive things um and how people are portrayed. Sure, um, but at the end of the day, he like you know, he tried, they

tried whatever. But like I thought that like what they were trying to say about like Elvis, you know, coming up in the Black Church, or like being having this transcendent moment in the Black Church and then being really sad when Martin Luther King died. It's like it was offensively shallow, Like there was shallow and like it was a spin on what actually happened, because what actually happened is that Elvis stole black music, yeah, and appropriated it.

And in the movie it's very like, oh, they were so happy for his success. Yes, black people give him and he was such good friends with BB King, like of course, and he wasn't like he they were friends. Yeah, but like that was just like a quote unquote cinematic invention, so to speak. Um, Like it just was not it was not right, and it has everything to do with us exactly. And I just like I um, for me, the movie, and I'd be curious to know, like what

is the Elvis movie you want to see? Because for me, it's like Elvis versus the American Moral Crisis of the nineteen fifties is an amazing movie. Like the censorship of it all was so fascinating and that should have been the whole thing. Yeah, Like I honestly think a movie that is entirely about like that one concert he did at the baseball field, like and everything around that is

a really interesting movie. I also think like a movie that's just about his time in Hollywood would be a really interesting piece of his life, um or something if you wanted to do something this little darker, something about his final years, Like is there a movie that's like about one show that he did in Vegas? You know, like, because I do think at the end of the movie, when he's doing those Vegas performances like that, to me

were some of the parts that worked the best. And so I think like that movie with like an older actor who's like Elvis at the end of his life could be really interesting. But that's the problem with this movie is that it tries to be all those different movies in one movie, and it is also still this movie about Elvis's manager. And and that's the thing is like I love villains, Bats loves villains right like Tible, Oh my god, John Leguizamo, we forgot to talk about

John Leguizamo and fucking Romeo and Juliet. Like Bass is good at villains, And so because we understand him as an outur, we understand why he might focus on Tom Hanks's character. But it's just not always interesting heroes, and Elvis was not a hero in his own movie to me.

And yeah, but also like Elvis was kind of a piece of ship in his later life and and at least in his later life, And I think I would have really loved to see, you know, the growth between this like country boy who was you know, so modest, yet his hips didn't lie back when he did those like recordings, which when I first watched the movie, I started revisiting like the earliest, early early recordings of Elvis and how different he sounds, and the movie I think

gorgeously adapts like how um Elvis thought about um blues music and grass and and and that I honestly had never really thought about Elvis in the tradition of blues, honestly because Elvis music is almost became its own genre because a white person had never really done it before. Um. And so this like rock hybrid became like it started a whole new generation of rock pop, right. Um. But I was revisiting all this like old Elvis music, and

like it really is like stunning, stunning music. It sounds like it's it was recorded through a tin can but it's still so just the movie did not make me want to revisit Elvis's music or learn anything else about him. I just was so put off by all of the shenanigans and the sparkle and the editing and the fucking Dojakat song and it just like it just left me

completely like apathetic about all of it. And that's the thing is, like it's almost like the things that you and I really love about Basil Ermann are the things that his last three films have really suffered from, right, a surplus of ideas that the plot suffers from. And like, you know, I agree that, like this is kind of a lame movie, but like I had the opposite reaction. I became much more fascinated with the reality of Elvis's life and so he did deep dive and revisit a

lot of his work. And and you know that's something that I think I can credit the movie for, Like it's still created Wikipedia. Yeah, that was it. I know that. And I would rather have just read his Wikipedia than I have seen that movie. I would left those three hours of my life. Well that's and that's the other thing is like the movie was very Wikipedia like it really, And that's like, if you're going to do a biopic,

like Slice of Life is the way to go. It was very wikipedia and then still glossed over all these uncomfortable aspects of his life, like the fact that he was a fucking groomer, child predator. I forgot about that? How did you gloss over that? And that's also like

back to the piece of ship of it all. It's like, it would be so fascinating to go from you know, po dunk country boy to the horrendously corrupt Vegas sell out that he became like the death of a soul, which I think the movie trying to get at was very fascinating to me. And how Vegas was a kind of moment of sellout created obviously by a very evil manager,

but that's still something that's like really fascinating. And to become someone who was angry, who was depressed, who you know, routinely took out a gun and shot TVs or whatever, Like that's the movie I wanted to watch. What do you think could be next for Baslorman or what would

you like to see from him? Whatever it is? It's not original material, right, like Bas only adapts existing material with the exception of Strictly ball Room, but even you could argue that that was an adaptation of Dirty Dance, a bas Lerman Marvel movie. I Well, Bass has said that he wanted to adapt guys and dolls like Bass. I mean, I don't know if y'all I reread the

New York Times profile. I remember reading it back when it came out and and being and remembering how absurd it was, um, and that it really actually changed my relationship to someone that I really really loved. But like, he's this like whackadoodle man who like lays in bed and has like four assistance like surrounding him, like recording everything he says, and like you know, when he says, comes sit by the bed, they come sit by the bed, right, and he like hops out of the bed and he's naked,

and he's like it's nude Fridays. And like he's laying in bed with his collaborator. Inappropriate. Yes, it's it's so inappropriate. It's literally sexual sexual harassment. UM. But also like him and his collaborator slash wife is fascinating to me. Her name is CM. She goes by CM, like everyone calls her CM, and she won two oscars from Mulan Rouge right, the bas famously has no oscars from Mulan. I mean

has the oscar. Sure, But like those awards went to his wife for production and costume, and I think that the whole thing, you know, to to polish of the convo. Bass would probably be better at making movies if he was just gay, but he's not. He's not, and but he has this like costume designer, production design wife and they have a bizarrely kind of chased business production relationship.

Like it's so I would love to meet and talk and have dinner with him because I feel like I can't fully grasp Bas as a human even I think that we're all the profile. I would think that would be so infuriating conversation with him, Yeah, because he's clearly a narcissist, but anybody that rich and famous has to be. We are going on vacation, it's the end of summer. We're gonna, you know, like live our lives a little bit. So the next needed TLC. Yes, So the next two

episodes are prerecorded, but they're really good. They're going to be sort of like the bonus episodes we were doing in June where we get a little deeper, a little more personal and vulnerable. They're less timely, but still listen. Are really good, um, and support us because we all deserve vacations. We've been working very hard all summer, especially producer Phoebe, to get these apps edited and out and as always post about the show tag our finsta at

like a virgin for um. Tell us what you think of these special apps honestly, like we're always shaping the show, figuring out what you guys like, what you dislike, and we don't always take it into consideration, but like always curious to know, like what you're responding to. Yes, Um, you can leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It really helps us a lot, even if it's like sassy or well not negative, because if you don't like the show,

then don't listen to it and don't tell us. Um. I'm your co host Rose Damn You, and you can find me anywhere online at Rose Damn You, and I'm your other co host Fran Toronto. You can find me at friends, switch co on all social media and TikTok. I finally finally finally started when I noticed you. But you've been making TikTok's I've I've been enjoying them, been trying to follow your guidance and just post things without

just ship post um. Subscribe to Like a Virgin anywhere you listen to podcasts and leave us a rating on Spotify or a review on Apple Podcasts. Like a Virgin is an i Heeart radio production our producers Phoebe Unter, with support from Lindsay Hoffman, Julian Weller, Jess Crane, Chitch and Nikki Etour until next week, Bye Choo