Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988)

*This transcript is produced using transcription software and reviewed for quality. Despite our best efforts, some passages may be incomplete or contain errors due to audio quality or software limitations.*

Krissy Lenz:
Hello and welcome to The Most Excellent 80s Movies, the podcast where a filmmaker, a comedian, and their fabulous guests con our way through the 80s movies we think we love or might have missed, with these our grown-up eyes, to see how they hold up. And today we’re talking about Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, a movie selection from 1988, about which Letterboxd says: nice guys finish last, meet the winners. Con artist Lawrence Jamieson is a longtime resident of a luxurious coastal resort, where he enjoys the lavish fruits of his deceptions.

That is, until a competitor, Freddy Benson, shows up. When the new guy’s lowbrow tactics impinge on his own sophisticated work, and believing him to be the infamous con man, the Jackal —

Nathan Blackwell:
Infamous. Insane.

Krissy Lenz:
— famous, Lawrence resolves to get rid of him. Confident of his own duplicitous talents, he challenges Freddy to a winner-takes-all competition: whoever swindles their latest mark, American heiress Janet Colgate, out of fifty thousand dollars first can stay, while the other must leave town. So that’s basically all of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels — they sort of gave you the whole shebang right there. I’m Krissy Lenz, one of the directors at the Neighborhood Comedy Theatre in downtown Mesa, Arizona.

Nathan Blackwell:
And I’m Nathan Blackwell, an independent filmmaker with Squishy Studios.

Krissy Lenz:
And joining us today is one of our favorites. He is a podcaster and a pod boss and a producer, and just a doer of so many awesome things in the TruStory FM universe. It’s our good friend, Andy Nelson.

Nathan Blackwell:
Yay!

Andy Nelson:
Hey everybody, thanks for having me back. I’m thrilled to be here.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah. And I’m so excited to talk about Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. For me, this was a core comedy movie.

Nathan Blackwell:
Agreed.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, I have it practically memorized, so I was a little nervous to rewatch it. Mm-hmm. Because I think I’ve seen it a few times since I was a kid, and I was fairly confident it would hold up. And hold up it did. Classic, it is, and I was just thrilled to watch it again. I’m sad I couldn’t force my fifteen-year-old to watch it with me, because I had to watch it at a time when it was just me. But I’m confident he would have loved it. He’s seen the remake with Anne Hathaway, but I think he would have enjoyed this more. So, this was a core comedy for you too, Nathan?

Nathan Blackwell:
Yeah, this was one of the ones — it’s, you know, when you’re growing up, it’s whatever you have access to, whatever they show a lot on TV, or you just happen to rent and your parents allow it. This was one of those movies that was for sure in the rotation that directly informed my comedic sensibilities. There were some Steve Martin movies, particularly this one, and Three Amigos, that kind of formed that comedic identity. I love it.

Krissy Lenz:
And what about for you, Andy?

Andy Nelson:
Oh yeah, this — I mean, ever since I saw this in the theater, it’s just always stuck with me. And then this was one that, as a young film lover, I started my VHS collection back in the day, and this was one I bought on VHS and watched a lot. I hadn’t seen it in many, many years, decades probably, but I was amazed at how many things I could repeat and just quote as the film was playing. I remembered every bit of it.

And it’s absolutely a core comedy memory. It really struck me this time too — this was really an era of just some great scores. The score for this fits so well in the movie, and it helps define everything that’s going on. It’s a great comedy score. I just loved it, all the little details of the score throughout. It’s great.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, it really adds a layer of fun to it. And this movie is so fun — if you haven’t seen this movie, what are you doing?

Andy Nelson:
Pause. Pause this podcast, and go watch Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. It’s so fun. You don’t think of Michael Caine as being a comedic genius, but the man can do literally anything.

Mm-hmm. He can act with Muppets, he can act with Steve Martin, he can do anything, and he’s so good at the comedy because he plays it so serious the whole time — but there are several moments where he gets thrown off guard and he just freezes for a minute. Like the moment where he’s being Dr. Emil Schaffhausen and he gets recognized by someone who knows him as the prince of whatever country he claims to be from, and he just pauses for a moment and then deftly maneuvers her: “Oh, she was one of my former patients — unfortunately incurable.” And Steve Martin, in the backseat, just rolls his eyes. And then, to spoil the end, when Janet the Jackal comes back and says, “This is Chips O’Toole” —

“Mr. Australia himself.” That’s right. Yeah.

Krissy Lenz:
And he freezes for a moment, and then he just deftly recovers — “We’ll throw some shrimps on the barbie for you.” And it’s like, wow, what can’t he do?

Andy Nelson:
Pulled every Australian cliché possible. But it worked.

Krissy Lenz:
So I love him in this as a foil to Steve Martin. Steve Martin, who is one of my favorites, a hero of mine, of course. And they play so well together, and there’s such a nice dichotomy to Lawrence Jamieson attempting to teach Freddy Benson the ways of his con. It’s sort of fun to see at the end that Lawrence Jamieson is going to get a little bit of an education in a different kind of con from the Jackal, and Freddy Benson will just be there.

Andy Nelson:
It’s fun to see how the overlapping cons play over this, right? Like, getting a sense of the con men trying to figure out how to out-con each other over the course of this. You’ve got the fantastic initial conning of each other, and then you’ve got Freddy saying, “Train me, I want to be like you,” and then you’ve got all the fantastic montage stuff, and then we get to the point where they’re like, “Well, I’m as good as you now” — and that’s when we really get into this competition, which makes it really fun, as they’re pushing to outdo each other, trying to woo the money away from the soap queen. And then all of that works so well, all the little details of it, even to that final switch of the con for the last minute, where it’s not about the money but about the girl. All of it just plays so well — it’s just a great bit of overlapping with all the different elements of the story. I think it’s really well crafted.

Nathan Blackwell:
Yeah, a con artist movie lives and dies on how clever it can be — not only how clever the characters are at outmaneuvering each other, and the reveals, but just the progression and the escalation as things get thrown in their way. That’s one of the things this movie does so well: it sets the stage for the progression of the relationship. It’s nine minutes into the movie when Steve Martin appears, and you immediately know what the core dynamic of the film is, because we’ve already seen Michael Caine — we’ve established him so early and so effectively — and as soon as the door opens on the train, we immediately know what the dynamic of the movie is going to be and how they’re going to play off each other. It does such a great job with the escalation of that conflict.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, and I think it was so well cast. I have a little tidbit here of the other actors who were considered to play Lawrence Jamieson: Rowan Atkinson, John Cleese, Richard Dreyfuss, Eric Idle, Dudley Moore, Leslie Nielsen — and Michael Palin, and Gene Wilder.

Andy Nelson:
John Cleese on that list is the one who I think could have carried it.

Nathan Blackwell:
Gene Wilder — that’s fascinating. That’s an interesting idea.

Krissy Lenz:
I think — Wilder could have — I mean, they all would have leaned into whatever they do well. I’m comparing everyone to Michael Caine, and Michael Caine is incredibly smooth and suave, but I’m guessing that no matter who you would have picked, they would have leaned into whatever they do well, and Michael Caine does that suave sophistication so well. And it is interesting, because I don’t think I realized this until I was reading about it, that this itself is based on another movie. It’s based on the —

Andy Nelson:
1964 movie called Bedtime Story, I think. Marlon Brando and David Niven. And so I imagine that Frank Oz and the other filmmakers, and even the actors themselves, probably all had David Niven in their head as they were trying to figure out what their performance would be, because David Niven certainly has a very posh British way that he would carry himself. So — to Nathan’s point, some of those people I could see working, finding whatever it is they would do best to deliver the role. But if they were trying to do it like a David Niven-esque thing, John Cleese seems to be the only one in my head, other than Michael Caine, who I think is probably the best choice. I’m glad he ended up getting it.

Krissy Lenz:
So, they said Eddie Murphy passed on the Steve Martin role.

Andy Nelson:
I could see that playing, though — that could be fun. And it’s interesting, because Frank Oz would go on to do Bowfinger with Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy.

Krissy Lenz:
It would have been, I think, more silly with Eddie Murphy — Steve Martin is a silly guy, but he also plays a believable scumbag so well. Those are his two speeds —

Nathan Blackwell:
That’s the biggest thing. He still works within the confines of the plot.

Krissy Lenz:
Right. Whereas Eddie Murphy would have been so much sillier — I don’t see him as being a believable sleazebag, but maybe I’m not thinking hard enough about it.

Nathan Blackwell:
Although, to be fair, to do a direct comparison — in Bowfinger with Steve Martin, Eddie Murphy definitely out-energized him, but I felt like he still worked within what the story needed.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, I mean it still would have been great, but it wouldn’t have been the masterpiece we got.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, it would be a very different Ruprecht the Monkey Boy. Yeah, it would be — oh, Ruprecht.

Krissy Lenz:
Ruprecht, we’ve got to talk about Ruprecht. That, of course, to me as a kid, was all the moments that stood out in my head. Oh, “glamour.”

Nathan Blackwell:
For me it was, “Excuse me — please use the bathroom.”

Krissy Lenz:
Yes, again. Thank you.

Nathan Blackwell:
Yeah. Why is the cork on the fork? The cork is on the fork to prevent him hurting himself and others. Ruprecht — eat your applesauce. I love that, and I noticed it on this watch for the first time with my grown-up eyes: he’s saying that to her because, of course, his con is to con all these rich women out of their money, and these are the little cadre of women who want to marry him, and he’s scraping them off by introducing Ruprecht, his little brother who is banana pants.

Um, but they’re sitting having a very elegant dinner, and Michael Caine says to the woman, “I’m so sorry you were interrupted — you were saying you don’t think the poor should be allowed in museums.”

Nathan Blackwell:
That was good. Yeah. It’s interesting — the only thing I cut differently as an adult was that Michael Caine is really spinning this romantic fantasy of his character, and really drawing them in with the same kind of appeal that a romantic novel would. That’s an interesting point.

Andy Nelson:
There’s definitely a level to the way he’s approaching each of the relationships where it’s like he’s selling a fantasy. It’s very romance-novel-esque, the way Lawrence is selling this to these women, right? He’s creating this fantasy for them: I’m a king of this small kingdom, or the prince, and I’m in need of help, we need people to help fund these fights we’re doing — and so he’s selling them on this idea of doing something big and exciting, a romantic adventure, and you can see this exact sort of thing playing out in a romance novel.

And I think that’s how he sells it. But it’s interesting that later in the movie, when he’s talking to Freddy about why he won’t continue the con with the Jackal, he says, “I only go after women who have no scruples,” or something like that — and I was like, I don’t think any of those women really came across that way. They all came across as just rich women, and he’s just going to sucker them. So it was funny the way he sold it later, because I don’t really think that’s true of any of the women we’d seen before.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, poor Lady Fanny of Omaha.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, right.

Krissy Lenz:
There’s a really funny recurring bit with Lady Fanny of Omaha, where she’s first approaching the prince on the veranda, and Anton, his sort of police-chief henchman, keeps shoving her into a bush.

Nathan Blackwell:
Right — and I was trying to count how many times they shoved her into a bush, and it was five times.

Krissy Lenz:
Five times! I remembered three, so I’m glad you were counting. That’s a great little bit. It was so funny — it’s one of those little subtle things where you’re like, this is hilarious, and it’s another level they add where it’s a visual bit. It’s very smart, cerebral comedy, to just shove this woman into a bush over and over again. So funny. And Lady Fanny is so sweet. I remember all the words to this movie so completely.

Andy Nelson:
That’s an interesting point about making a comedy film, because that’s the sort of thing you wonder — I’d love to look at the script and see how much of that ended up getting scripted, or if that was the sort of stuff that, because they shot all of this along the French Riviera, makes you wonder if Frank Oz and the team came up with it on the spot. Like, “We need something to jazz this up,” and they’re like, “Well, what if I just push her into the bush?” And you can see them workshopping these sorts of scenes, because it plays like something the writer wouldn’t necessarily have thought of until they’d actually seen the space. So I love that it felt so naturally designed for the location they were using.

Krissy Lenz:
And I read that Michael Caine took the role because they’d be staying at a villa in France that was very near a bunch of his friends, so he was just like, “Oh, I’ll get to hang out with my friends at their French villas.” And it said no such accommodation was made for Steve Martin, who was probably just happy to be there.

Um, but I forgot to tell you guys — they actually pitched this movie as a vehicle for David Bowie. Because the “Dancing in the Street” video was so popular, they wanted Mick Jagger and David Bowie to be in a film together, and this was that film when it was originally being developed.

Andy Nelson:
Interesting.

Krissy Lenz:
Isn’t it? I can’t even picture either of them in either role — like, what a —

Andy Nelson:
Strange initial concept. Wow, weird.

Krissy Lenz:
They would have had to both be posh.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah — like, who would be Freddy? That doesn’t make sense to me. Weird, weird choice.

Krissy Lenz:
Isn’t that weird? Well, it didn’t happen, but Mick Jagger was disappointed that it didn’t happen, so I just thought that was so funny. There was one moment that caught me this time too — he’s sizing Freddy up, and he says, “What’s your education?” and Freddy says, “I have a high school diploma,” and he says, “What did you major in?” and Freddy says, “Metal shop.” And I’m like — you don’t major in something in high school, that’s not how it works. But he doesn’t bat an eye, he just answers, so that was just the writer being weird, I guess, but it took me out of it for a moment, and I had to write that down because I thought it was so weird.

And then the rest of my notes are just, “I love this,” and “I love this,” and “I love this.” But the story Freddy tells to get Janet Colgate — his whole bit is that he can’t walk because of a psychosomatic fear of dancing, because his fiancée-to-be left him for the host of Dance USA — I was like, this story is so fact-checkable, no wonder she was onto them, because you could just fact-check this so easily.

Andy Nelson:
Well, in 1988, not quite as easily — there was no internet.

Krissy Lenz:
Oh, okay, yeah, that’s a good point. But I guess I’m —

Andy Nelson:
thinking —

Krissy Lenz:
it’s still one of those things — I mean, they’re still picking a national dance show. If he was smart, he would have done a local Tulsa-station dance show or something smaller that’s harder to actually check, because I mean, I’m sure you could just call —

Andy Nelson:
a network and ask who won the dance show last year, or whatever. I honestly don’t know, because I wasn’t making those sorts of phone calls back in 1988.

Krissy Lenz:
Right, exactly. But there’s still the odds that she could be like, “Oh, I watched that show.”

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, right, exactly. Remember —

Krissy Lenz:
that is a dangerous thing to —

Nathan Blackwell:
pick. Yeah. It’s interesting — Steve Martin always chooses pity as the driving emotion he’s trying to con with, rather than that romantic-novel allure that Michael Caine uses. So it’s interesting how they have such different tactics.

Andy Nelson:
That’s an interesting point, and I wonder if it speaks to — I haven’t seen the original film, so I can’t say if it does it the same way — but in this one, some of that also comes across as more of a Steve Martin sort of thing, as opposed to a Michael Caine sort of thing. Steve Martin just doesn’t seem as much like the person you’re falling in love with.

But also, at the same time, part of the setup of the story is that Michael Caine is now going to train him to be a little more smooth and suave.

Krissy Lenz:
So maybe that’s part of it — he’s supposed to come across —

Andy Nelson:
as the one who’s a little less the lover boy, and more — I mean, even later, he’s still using the same pity tactics, right? “I’m in a wheelchair, my grandma needs an operation” — it’s always these sorts of things.

Nathan Blackwell:
He makes it — it’s funny when he does it, he makes it so delicious how scuzzy and desperate he can be. So, I skipped through Bedtime Story, the original version, with David Niven and Marlon Brando as the Steve Martin character. And what I saw is that they definitely have a competition, and Marlon Brando is pretending to be in a military uniform in a wheelchair to try to get the woman. And they have the scene where David Niven gets dragged into the army truck and beaten up by the sailors.

Andy Nelson:
Nice, interesting.

Krissy Lenz:
I love those sailors.

Andy Nelson:
That scene plays so well, right? Because everything Michael Caine is doing at that point to Freddy — when you look at it from an outside perspective, you’re just like, man, what a dick move. She’s the worst, and he’s just taunting him — “Come on, why don’t you just get up and dance with her, then?” The things he’s doing and saying are just the worst, and it comes across so funny because of them being on the outside. It’s so smartly crafted, the way they play that up. And those later — so perfect.

Krissy Lenz:
They’re so great, and they’re so charming. And later, when he tosses Steve Martin into the room with them, and he comes back in the morning and they’re all laughing and talking with Steve Martin, you’re like, “Oh, he won them over,” okay — and then you find out he’s glued to the wall. So funny. I love that they have a playful sense of justice.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, all of that plays really well. It’s very funny.

Krissy Lenz:
It really does. There was — aside from the wheelchair stuff, if he wasn’t so scuzzy, I think that would have played a little questionable. And then when he makes the bet to sleep with her, that’s a little ooh — but the way it plays in the movie, I didn’t feel queasy about it at all, which I was worried I would. I was just like, yeah, this is the next step. And I think it’s because I knew she was in on it, since I’ve seen the movie before.

Andy Nelson:
Well, and also, I think the film is doing a good job by that point of setting Michael Caine up as the good guy and Steve Martin as the bad guy, right? Michael Caine is the one who’s just like, “We can’t do this to this woman, she’s not who we thought she was.” And when they change the bet and Steve Martin says, “Okay, whoever sleeps with her first,” Michael Caine is just like, “Do you ever not think with your crotch?”

And Steve Martin’s like, “No.” So it just plays into how sleazy this guy is, and to that end, it works because it’s amplifying his grossness, right?

And I think that’s what makes it play. Even Michael Caine, when he’s saying, “Okay, the bet is I don’t even want to sleep with her, I just want to make sure you don’t sleep with her” — that’s again why he’s kind of our good guy, right? He’s like, “That’s below me.” And I think that’s an interesting way to make it seem okay — it’s pretty disgusting, but it’s also kind of the character we’re not meant to like as much. So, as our villain, that’s what a villain would do.

Nathan Blackwell:
They turn him into a chivalrous scamp.

Krissy Lenz:
Even in the moment where he gives her the fifty thousand dollars, and when he realizes she’s stolen it and that she’s the Jackal, he smiles and says, “Isn’t she wonderful?”

Nathan Blackwell:
She’s deceitful, she’s a brat, she stole his money, and he’s like, “Isn’t she wonderful?” You really feel like maybe he’ll fall in love with her when she comes back and they’re in on the scam together. I want a sequel to this movie — I want to know what the real estate scam is going to be. If you made a list of eighties movies you watched as a kid that you expected a sequel to, needed a sequel — this would be in the top three for me.

Because it just seemed like they’re now off to another one, especially the way it ends — you just want to hear what the next scene or conversation is going to be. Obviously, a lot of movies you really wanted sequels for got them, but the ones that didn’t — if I had to put together a quick list, I’d say, like, when’s the Goonies sequel coming?

Krissy Lenz:
I would have gone to see Three Amigos go to Hollywood.

Nathan Blackwell:
For me it was, oh, Beetlejuice going Hawaiian-style.

Andy Nelson:
Not quite what we got when they finally made that.

Nathan Blackwell:
No, not quite. No.

Krissy Lenz:
Maybe they’ll do a legacy sequel now, and we get to see them all again.

Andy Nelson:
Get Michael Caine out of retirement to do something — that would be fun.

Krissy Lenz:
Okay, so on a scale of one cork on the fork to ten corks on the fork — which are for your safety as well as others’ — how many corks on the fork do we give Dirty Rotten Scoundrels? But before we do that, we haven’t even talked about Glenne Headly, and how terrific she is. She’s so believably innocent and sweet.

Nathan Blackwell:
She’s Tess Trueheart from Dick Tracy, too.

Krissy Lenz:
I don’t remember seeing her much other than those two roles, but she just completely nailed it.

Andy Nelson:
Mr. Holland’s Opus is probably the only other movie I really remember her in — that one’s been a while. I know she was a busy person, I just wasn’t watching the movies she was in, largely. But I love her in this. She plays the innocent Janet so well, and you’re buying it — especially when you rewatch it, because you’re looking for, okay, how is she playing all of this? Because she’s obviously gaming them the entire time.

So it’s like, okay, she knows what she’s doing, she knows what they’re up to, and she’s constantly buying into every little detail in the way that’s needed for us to buy into her as this innocent person, all the way up through the end. And there’s always those small moments in a movie — like, there’s a moment where she mails the letter to Dr. Emil Schaffhausen, and then a courier, or the little message boy, walks by with “Dr. Emil Schaffhausen, Dr. —”

Krissy Lenz:
Emily. Which, again, I just burned into my brain.

Andy Nelson:
But nobody is watching her — why does she react the way she does in that moment? Because he’s around the corner, and she plays it like, “I’m still innocent Janet, oh, he’s over here.” So there are those moments you can catch where it’s like, well, okay, as the Jackal, she probably wouldn’t be completely in the role every single moment, assuming somebody’s watching her.

But those are small little things that, when you think about it, I’m not going to worry too much about, because otherwise it plays so well.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, I love it. And it’s fun to look back and see, okay, she’s definitely onto them at this point — she’s definitely rolling her eyes inside, but she plays it so sweet. And then when she comes back at the end with that other accent and that fabulous triangle purse, and her hair is all eighties fabulous — it’s just so good, and I really loved it. So, I give this movie nine corks on the fork.

Nathan Blackwell:
Wow, very good.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, I would have given it ten, but I don’t know, something’s holding me back. I don’t know what it is.

Nathan Blackwell:
Yeah, absolutely — yeah, I concur.

Krissy Lenz:
You also give it nine corks on the fork?

Nathan Blackwell:
I’m gonna give it eight and a half. I’m strongly tempted to go nine — at the beginning I would have given it a nine, and it drifted to an eight and a half. But I still thought it was delightful — guys, if you haven’t checked it out, check it out.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, it’s so good. What do you think, Andy?

Andy Nelson:
I really do love this movie — it’s just absolutely a core memory of my childhood. I have a hard time going over eight — I feel like eight forks on the fork is really solid for me. I do think there are times some pacing issues that slow it down here and there, but largely it’s just so much fun, I have a blast with it.

Nathan Blackwell:
Yeah, and it’s great to rewatch once you know what happens.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, absolutely — and it plays really well. I was watching for anything that felt dated, and I’m like, this actually — nothing about this makes it feel like an eighties film. Everything felt like it really could have been recent — the production, the camera work, everything felt really clean and crisp. It just felt like a kind of timeless comedy.

Nathan Blackwell:
Classic, yeah. Frank Oz does a really good job with comedies that aren’t overly cartoony — they’re very natural, with real humans, and I think because of that it holds up, and you believe the characters to be people.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, and it really stands the test of time. I agree with you, Andy, one hundred percent — it was not dated, and I always watch for that too, because I still love movies that are like a time capsule, where it’s so eighties — I still cling to those movies — but this one is not that, and it’s such a good point.

So, what about a deep-cut recommendation? I went with — because I’m a big Steve Martin fan, as I said — I think I’d want to recommend some of Steve Martin’s other work. If you haven’t read any of his novels or novellas, and I’m not just talking about the humorous essays, like Cruel Shoes or anything like that, but his legit novels — I recommend The Pleasure of My Company, which is from 2003.

Andy Nelson:
I love his titles — that’s —

Krissy Lenz:
perfect. Yeah, it is such a funny book. It’s funny, but it’s really heartfelt in that way Steve Martin is so good at. It’s the story of a young man who has OCD and can’t leave his apartment, and the people who come into his life who help him find a way back to the world. It’s really short, it’s a totally good read, I highly recommend it if you haven’t checked it out. I think it’s a good companion piece to this movie because it’s very funny, very silly in the way it approaches itself, but it’s also really heartfelt and makes you feel good about yourself and the world at the end. So I recommend The Pleasure of My Company, by Steve Martin. Fantastic — what do you recommend, Nathan?

Nathan Blackwell:
So, when people think of con-artist movies, the gold standard right now is probably Ocean’s Eleven. So this is not a super deep cut, this is more of me, the film teacher, trying to get you guys to see something a little older. If you love the comedy and the twists and turns of a good caper con-artist film, and you haven’t seen the movie The Sting, with Robert Redford and Paul Newman — it is an effing classic, and if you love those twists and turns, you’re really going to like The Sting. It’s just a solid con-artist movie on a big scale, and it’s kind of like the Ocean’s Eleven, or Dirty Rotten Scoundrels level, of just escalation and twists and turns. So if you haven’t checked it out, it’s a lot of entertainment.

Krissy Lenz:
It’s such a fantastic movie — I’m a huge Paul Newman stan, and I love The Sting, that’s such a great recommendation, I would never have thought of that, that’s genius. And they have such a fun dynamic too, Robert Redford and Paul Newman, the two of them together.

Nathan Blackwell:
It’s so entertaining, it’s so rewarding. They were great in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and then they’re great in this, in The Sting.

Krissy Lenz:
All right, perfect — you knocked it out of the park, Nathan. Wonderful.

Nathan Blackwell:
What do you think, Andy?

Andy Nelson:
I’m gonna go with — if you enjoy Michael Caine and this sort of crime comedy, absolutely worth checking out the 1966 film Gambit. The Coen brothers did a remake — well, it was made, they wrote the script, they didn’t direct it. It wasn’t nearly as good as the original.

He’s an aspiring cat burglar, I guess we’ll say, and he recruits a showgirl, played by Shirley MacLaine, to help him steal a priceless bust from a millionaire played by Herbert Lom, who most people would probably recognize from the Pink Panther films. He’s the owner of the piece, and the film is so much fun because the whole thing first plays out and you think you’re watching how everything is going to go — it’s kind of like the end of Ocean’s Eleven, where you don’t realize you’re watching what he thinks, how he wants everything to go — and then the film shifts, and you watch the reality, and see how it plays, and it’s just failure after failure, and it’s so funny. It’s a brilliant film. Ronald Neame directed. Check out Gambit — it’s a lot of fun seeing Michael Caine in these kinds of crime comedies. It’s a really good one.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, I love it — Michael Caine, such a brilliant performer. All right, excellent. So we’ve reached that point in the pod, it’s time to plug, plug, plug. Andy, where can people find your brilliant musings?

Andy Nelson:
Pete Wright and I run TruStory FM, so you’ll find all the stuff over there at TruStory FM — you’ll be able to see all the stuff we’re busy doing. The show that probably keeps us most busy, that we’re actively hosting, is The Next Reel, where we do our own film reviews on that show. And as of this recording, we’re currently recording a fun and interestingly timed political satire series called Smoke and Mirrors, where we’re looking at Bob Roberts, Wag the Dog, and Bulworth — some very interesting and pointed nineties political satires that weirdly feel very fitting with today’s eyes.

Krissy Lenz:
So it’s fun, yeah, right — so that’s The Next Reel, you can find it over at TruStory FM, along with all the other stuff you’re busy doing. Great, love it, highly recommend — such a fun podcast, and you guys have such amazing insights. Whenever I listen, I’m like, these guys are so smart.

Nathan Blackwell:
I feel like such a dummy — y’all are so smart. Thank you, I’m glad we come across that way. I don’t always intend to. Duped them again, yeah.

Krissy Lenz:
Nathan, where can people find your filmmaking?

Nathan Blackwell:
SquishyStudios.com is probably the best source, and our movie, The Last Movie Ever Made, is on Amazon, Apple, and Tubi.

Krissy Lenz:
Yeah, watch it, it’s so good. Uh, you can listen to me also on TruStory FM, on Gank That Drank, a Supernatural drinking game. If you like the show Supernatural and you like to imbibe, either or both of those things, you’ll enjoy Gank That Drank. We’re in our last season, we’re coming up on the end, so come and join us while we go out with a very Supernatural-esque bang. Thank you so much for listening, thank you for being with us here at the end. Because you’re here at the end, I know that you want a little bit more of The Most Excellent 80s Movies.

You want to know what me and Nathan and Andy, uh, who we would choose as our celebrity con-artist partner. And you can only get that content if you’re a member — so scoot on over to TruStory FM, click the little podcast, click the little join button, and become a member. You get every episode early and ad-free, which is worth the price of admission right there.

But you also get some super fun bonus content with me and Nathan and the guests after the show. And of course, if you want to support without spending any money, do all the things that help podcasts you love — rate, review, subscribe, tell a friend, tell a neighbor, tell that charming prince from a war-torn country you’ve never heard of to listen to the pod.

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