Episode 1: It’s going to be a bumpy podcast…

Courtney: This is episode 01 of the Ticket to Ride podcast.

Blair: It’s gonna be a bumpy podcast.

- INTRO MUSIC –

Courtney: I’m Courtney

Blair: And I’m Blair

Courtney: And we’re going to talk about classic movies!

Blair: Also we're probably going to talk a lot of nonsense.

Courtney: And there are two office dogs present, so you may occasionally hear some commentary from them. They are pretty vocal when it comes to their favorite actors.

Blair: They are, yes. So, one of the reasons we decided to do this podcast is because for over a year now, Courtney and I have gotten together at least once a month and we watch a classic film. And we talk about it. So we figured what better way than to record ourselves (because we’re slightly narcissistic) and share that with the world, and try to get some engagement.

Courtney: Exactly. Now, one of the things we wanted to talk about in this first episode, besides  introducing who we are, is one of our favorite films. Not necessarily, because favorite is such a big word in this case I don’t even know if I can get a top 5 narrowed down, but one of the classic movies we appreciate the most or watch the most, or is the one we would share if someone asked us to recommend a classic film.

Blair: Also I'm curious Courtney, as to how you got into classic films? What sparked your interest? 

Courtney: Yeah, absolutely. It was my dad actually who got me started on classic films. He was very much of his time period, he was in high school in the sixties, and so when I was with him it was all classic films, classic music, Elvis on the radio all the time, classic car shows whenever those happened in my hometown. Even now, I can go visit him and we can spend the afternoon watching a classic movie and have a great conversation about it. Then as I got older I started branching out finding actors I preferred, genres I preferred. You know my dad's a big John Wayne fan…

Blair: Who isn’t though? I love John Wayne.

Courtney: What dad isn’t a John Wayne fan at some point? But you know I'm just finding the movies that also spoke to me more than maybe would have been his favorite. But he is definitely the reason that I got started with this. 

Blair:  It’s funny it was your dad for you, because it was my mum that got me into classic films. I remember very vividly there was a weekend that we were alone togetherm I can't remember why, we went to Blockbuster. Which is dating ourselves, when Blockbuster was still a thing.

Courtney: Just a little bit.

Blair: For those of you that are not aware, Blockbuster was a physical store that you can go into and rent tapes and DVDs, when DVDs came out. You would rent them for 24-48 hours and return them. It was the best Friday night. My mom and I went to the local Blockbuster and I went straight for whatever had been released that weekend, some Nicholas Spark film, but my mum pulled me back and she picked out  Funny Girl, with Barbara. She kind of approached it in a weird way of, I want you to try this film. Because I was that little obnoxious kid, like “Oh, it’s old. I don’t wanna watch it. I’m not going to identify with it. There’s gonna be nothing there.” But we watched it and that sparked this whole thing for our relationship really. Still to this day, if movie theaters are open and there’s no pandemic again, we would go  on a Saturday and spend the entire Saturday: 10:00am first matinee to 8:00pm, go watch three or four films and spend a day at the movies. 

Courtney: I love that! I have never done that and I think that is something I would love to do. 

Blair: I will tell you that the people look at you funny when you go up to buy the tickets and you're like yes we want the 10 a.m. of this show and then the 12:15 of the show...Sometimes you have to time it out perfectly, like I know this is a 123 minute film and the next one starts two minutes later, we can make it! The cinema people are always like, “What?” But it’s fun, it’s a good day.

Courtney: Well, in my hometown, the movie theater only had two screens. So if you were to do that you would only get to watch two movies. But, fun fact, I grew up in a town that has one of the few drive-in movie theaters left in the whole state, and so in a little way, I grew up in a time capsule. Because during the warm months, if we wanted to see a movie we’d go to the drive-in and do the whole thing. Whoever had the biggest car, everyone piled in, or even better if you had a truck. Which I did. So I was very popular on drive-in movie nights and we would go and you got to see two movies for five bucks, and they had a little concession stand very back, and that was my Friday-Saturday nights for pretty much my entire life until I left to go to college. 

Blair: I love that. I've never been to drive in and it's on my bucket list. There are so few of them.

Courtney: There are so few. If we're able to go, soonish,  I don’t know if they’re open with the pandemic? Because you are in your own car, I would have to find out. But we could always take a little, mini-road trip and go to the drive-in.

Blair:  I’m for it! I also really like road trips, so I’m up for getting out of this area for a while. I’ve seen the same four walls for far too long.

Courtney: This is true.

Blair: So, what film do you want to talk about today?

Courtney: Well, I know I mentioned one film to you the other day when we were discussing this and I'm afraid I lied.

Shocking! I’m so hurt! (sarcasm)

I was going to talk about His Girl Friday, which is a fantastic film. You should look it up. It’s even free on Amazon right now, if I’m not mistaken. But that's not the one I want to talk about as the one that I would say I re-watch the most. The one I think I watch at least, I'm going to say five times a year or more, is Niagara. Niagara stars Marilyn Monroe, Joseph Cotten, Jean Peters and Max Showalter. Although in this one he went by Casey Adams.

Blair: Which is weird. I feel like we should dive into that, because I’m really intrigued by actors changing their name halfway through their career. Like, what are you hiding?

Courtney:  I can see changing your name if there’s already another actor or singer who has your name or it’s really close, but some of these older actors just completely changed it. And even alternated, because when I was looking up his screen name for this particular film, it showed he kind of flip-flopped throughout his career. Some films he was Casey Adams and some films he was Max Showalter. So we’d have to look into that. But the reason Niagara is one of the movies I watch the most often, besides it being Marilyn Monroe who is the love of my life... 

Blair: You and me both, man. I love Marilyn.

Courtney: It’s such a great plot, it's such a great story, and you get to see all this amazing scenery because they did film it at Niagara Falls. 

Blair: Woohoo!

Courtney: A little nod to Blair there.

Blair: Blair is Canadian, if you can’t tell by when I speak. Occasionally, when Canada is mentioned, I get excited for no reason. 

Courtney: But the other reason I love this movie, is that it is the only film I can think of where Marilyn Monroe played the villain. She did have some serious roles before she really got pigeonholed into that sex symbol, musical, bubbly Persona that she ended up cultivating, (and  did very well!) but she also was really good at playing serious roles. Again this was her only one where she was the antagonist, or the bad guy, of the film and that's just awesome to see her. You can tell she's having fun in that role. The other thing that's just a cool fact about the film is that, even now, it still has the longest walk of a character walking away in cinema history. It’s over 116 feet of film used to show her walking away from the hospital to the clock tower where her secret partner in crime / lover, where she thought he was waiting for her. I don’t know if this is true, because I’m sure stories get muddled over the years or exaggerated. Apparently she got a little frustrated by the number of times they made her walk away. 

Blair: I mean if I were watching Marilyn Monroe walk, there are very few iconic walks in the world that I would say you can identify who that person is. Marilyn Monroe has an iconic walk.

Courtney: Okay, we need to research this. If anybody knows the answer to this and you want to tell us, we’re going to set up an Instagram account (@tickettoridepod) and all that good stuff, definitely let us know and give me a source. I want to find out if this is true: I heard a rumor, that one of the reasons she had that wiggle, hip-swing walk was because she would always file down one of the heels on her shoes, just a little bit, and it forced her to walk in that exaggerated way. Somebody told me it was just for Niagara that she did that, and then somebody else has told me she did that for anytime she had to play a sexy character like that. She would file down one shoe just enough to make her have to walk like that. 

Blair: See I heard, and this just like goes to show you that the internet has trouble, that it was actually because one of her legs was significantly shorter than the other. 

Courtney: It could also have been that. Yeah.

Blair: To which, if I was going to mimic that, the only way is to break your leg. And that’s very morbid.

Courtney: Or file a shoe down.

Blair: If you want to do things simply, Courtney.

Courtney: Anyway, that’s my pick for this episode for the movie that I watch the most, or generally recommend to somebody who has not watched many classic films. Now, which one would you do? 

Blair: So I'm also going to throw out a Marilyn film. My pick that I watch fairly frequently, it has a special place in my heart for a couple of different reasons, but mine is Some Like It Hot. Love Some Like it Hot, love Tony Curtis and Jack Lemon. So, it stars Tony Curtis, Jack Lemon and of course Marilyn Monroe. There is a Broadway (version), Sugar is the musical if you go see it on stage and it's phenomenal. I was very lucky enough to see Tony Curtis play Osgood on stage, live, and he was phenomenal! He still was able to do the tap dance right at the end. That’s the memory I have most, right at the end of the show he did this tap dance sequence. Of course it was a standing ovation, you just think, My god you are eighty-five years old! I can’t do that on the best of days.

Courtney: I knew this about Blair, that she got to see that. I am so jealous that she got to see Tony Curis live. And how great for him, to have played one of the main younger roles in the film and be able to come back and play an iconic older character in the Broadway version. Was the film based on the musical or vice versa? 

Blair: I actually don't know, both the film and the musical were based on the same source material, which was a book. The other reason I love Some Like It Hot, is that it was pretty queer-coded as a movie. We’ll do an entire episode on things like Some Like It Hot and queer-coded film, but I just love the idea of having something filmed when it was filmed, and played when it was played, and have it so obvious, you know. And I want to make this clear: The two main characters are in drag for 90% of the film. They are treated somewhat like a joke, it’s a comedy,  but it's never like haha it's funny because there are drag queens or something like that. It's just, it's such an iconic gay film that, you know, little queer Blair is all about. I love it. I also really love gangster films, so having them on the run, in the ‘20s Jazz Age, you know they start out in Chicago, they witness the Valentine's Day murder, and then they’re hiding as female musicians. And of course fighting after the affections of Miss Monroe. 

Courtney: Yes, and again touching on the gangster films, don't you just love giving nicknames? I don’t know if real, (somebody help me out), I don’t know if real Mafia members during that time period had these crazy nicknames?  But you know these characters, their names are like Toothpick Charlie or Spats Colombo! 

Blair: As you’ll learn, dear listeners, I watch a lot of documentaries, and I have watched a lot of Mob documentaries. The nicknames are 100%. Spats was a really common nickname, and like Little Tony or Fat Tony. Those are all actual human beings. And now the Mob is going to come after me, because I know their secrets.

Courtney: Well, it’s been nice hosting this podcast with you, Blair. 

Blair: All one episode of it!

Courtney: Tune in next time, when it will just be me.  

Blair: Because I am swimming with the fishes. Actually, that is a concern of me that I’ll get into trouble because I like to research weird things. Courtney will attest to this because she also writes a lot of things where she has to do some weird research. So, if the NSA or FBI, you know, if we just randomly disappear it’s because of our internet search history.

Courtney: I don't have this mug, but I feel like I should have it. It says: Pay no attention to my browser history, I’m a writer not a serial killer. I feel like I need a sign up saying that, just in case my house gets raided or something they can walk in and see, oh she's a writer. Okay, wrong house. To touch briefly Some Like It Hot, I know we went off on a little Mafia tangent there, which we will probably do often. Just sit back and enjoy the ride. 

Blair: Bumpy podcast.

Courtney: Yes, it’s: Fasten your seatbelts,

Blair & Courtney: It’s gonna be a bumpy podcast!

Courtney: We like that, we came up with that a couple weeks ago. So, Some Like It Hot, and like Blair said we are going to do a whole episode focused more on this. But I just love that one of the main reasons that film was done in black and white at a time when color was king, Technicolor was everywhere, and to film in black-and-white was considered ridiculously old-fashioned. It was based in the ‘20s yes, but the main reason is because the makeup that Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon had to wear. The amount of it for them to even pass as maybe they were disguising themselves as women and getting away with it, was so thick and so garish that they had to film in black-and-white. Otherwise it would have looked like two clowns running around!

Blair:  It essentially was two clowns running around, but I love that! I didn’t know that fact. I love that fact about Some Like It Hot. I love learning new things about my favorite films and hopefully that’s what this podcast is for. We’ll inform each other, we’ll inform you.

Courtney: And just have a good time  

Blair: Yeah, it’s going to be fun. It's going to be all over the place but, that’s what this is.

- OUTRO MUSIC -