Newcomers: Scorsese, with Nicole Byer and Lauren Lapkus - Killers of the Flower Moon (w/ Ryan Redcorn)

Episode Date: June 18, 2024

For the season finale of Newcomers: Scorsese, Lauren and Nicole are joined by Reservation Dogs writer, comedian, filmmaker, and Osage member Ryan Redcorn to discuss Killers of the Flower Moon (2023). On location in Oklahoma during the film’s production, Ryan generously shares his behind the scenes scoop with Lauren and Nicole, adding important and thoughtful historical and cultural context to this harrowingly true story. Follow Ryan: InstagramLike the show? Rate Newcomers 5 stars on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and leave a review for Nicole and Lauren to read on the pod!Follow the podcast on Letterboxd.Advertise on Newcomers via Gumball.fmSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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See Mint Mobile for details. You know, you got nice color skin. What color would you say that is? My color. The Osage. They have the worst land possible. But they outsmarted everybody. The land had oil on it.

Black gold. Money flows freely here now. I do love that money, sir. This wealth should come to us. Their time is over. It's just gonna be another tragedy. When this money started coming, we should have known it came with something else.

They're like buzzards circling our people. We're still warriors. I ought to kill these white men who killed my family. I need you here. I am right here. You've got to take back control of your home. I was sent down from Washington D.C DC to see about these murders. So you worried about them? See who's doing it.

Expecting a miracle to make all this go away? You know they don't happen anymore. I'm Nicole Byer. I'm Lauren Byer. I'm Lauren Lapkus. This season, boy oh boy, we're diving head first into a Martis Casés in movies. Also our producers Anya and Allie are here. We are on our 10th episode.

This is our last episode of the season. We did it! Anya and Allie did an amazing job picking 10 essential movies for us out of Scorsese's super long and prolific career. And today we will be discussing the film based on the nonfiction book, Killers of the Flower Moon, The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grant, Killers of the Flower Moon. And guess what? Killers of the Flower Moon is available on Apple TV Plus or any of the major streamers for a little fee, and we're gonna spoil it.

Yes, we are. Duh-duh. And we're so excited for our guest today. Ryan Redcorn was born in Telequa, Oklahoma, and is known for co-founding the indigenous comedy troupe, the 1491s. He's also the owner of Buffalo Nickel Creative Ad Agency, where he is the lead commercial director.

And Ryan was a writer on the FX series Reservation Dogs, along with being the show's still photographer and behind the scenes director. Thank you for being here, Ryan. We're so excited to have you. Oh, thank you. Shane Brown was the still photographer. I was the key art photographer. Thank you.

Do you want me to say that again? No. I just want Shane to know that I got his back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You didn't just take the credit. Sometimes, sometimes when the, uh, their pictures go out, it'll, it'll be credited to Shane Brown or be credited to me, even though it was Shane's picture. And I know it drives him.

That's annoying. Yeah. Yeah. And that's my bro. So, I mean, everybody on the show is friends. So, I'm trying to take anybody else's credit for anybody else's work. Well, thank you for that. No, I love that. That's nice. That's very nice, Ryan. Here's a question. What is your relationship to Marty Scorsese?

I don't have one. Okay. What about to his work? Do you feel any movies that, do you have a connection to his movies before this one or anything else? I am a big fan of Wolf of Wall Street. Yeah, yeah.

I really I really like Wolf of Wall Street. I think it's a it's just a beautifully structured film. The film structure is scaffolded by the lead character. Yeah. And so like there's a really good relationship between like how that's written, how it's performed, and then on top of how it's edited, how the whole piece comes together from chunk to chunk to chunk.

And it's just a, I don't know, it's just a really well done, sophisticated, really great, fun film to watch. We love his editor. Yeah. Thelma. She's amazing. And did you do-

The film is beautifully edited. Yeah. I know sometimes people say a good editor like disappears into, you don't notice the editing. Yeah. But I think you definitely notice the editor in that film but in the best way possible. Yeah.

I feel like that human is fearless in the choices that they're making for on behalf of that film. And there's a lot, I think sometimes people get too precious with the raw material. Maybe there's somebody lording over their shoulder that isn't willing to like take a chance because of, you know, I don't know whatever reason. Is that the only Martin Scorsese film you've seen? Because for me, that was the only one I have seen up until we did this podcast. No it's not, But that's my favorite.

Yeah. I recently, in the last year, got Criterion. Uh-huh. And Criterion released some of his early work, some of his short films and stuff like that. And, you know, as part of just trying to understand his decision making, his growth over the entire scope of his career, I wanted to kind of see where he started. Yeah.

Yeah. And so I thought maybe that would give me maybe a better understanding into like how he thinks and makes decisions and problem solves and kind of what people are drawn to. Yeah, I'm so curious, Nicole, if we will dip our toes into more after doing so much at once. I think I will. I'm gonna give myself just a little breather,

but I really do like his films. Me too. And they're so of the moment and of the, he's so, like I've said it on other episodes, but he's great at like creating this world and this time period, but also the filmmaking is current and of the time period. Right.

Yeah, like the aviator's a very early Aughts movie. Flowers, like this one is very current, very now. And when I watch it 10 years from now, I'll be like, yes, that was filmmaking at the time. Like he really has his finger on the pulse that Martin. It is interesting in that sense, because I mean, I think that can happen to people as they get older, where they are stuck in their ways

or something. And we were talking about that with the Irishman that he was willing to use, like the fact that he used the new technology of de-aging the characters was actually really interesting, even though we didn't love that element of it that much. It's still like, oh, it's cool that he's open to trying new technologies and seeing how it works out.

I love that. Well, let's give our quick thoughts on Killers of the Flower Moon before we jump into another category, another little moment here in our podcast. But what were our general thoughts after watching this? Yeah, Ryan, what were your thoughts? I had a lot of thoughts. We'll be able to get into it very deeply, so don't you worry. But this is just our quick, like... I'll give you the cliff notes. I saw the film on opening night at the Chinese theater

with my daughter, my oldest daughter. The film was, from where I'm sitting right now, a lot of the film was made two blocks that way. Oh really? Wow. And a lot of the street scene stuff was all filmed right there. Crazy. Sometimes when you see a film that's made locally, because this is the first one, Terrence Malick's film To the Wonder was made here. August Osage County was made here and portions of Twister was made here.

But the big note, the simple note is that after watching the film, I went to the after party and I was standing there with my daughter and I was surrounded by a lot of other Osage people who were present. after party. Yeah, there's something really odd about that. You don't think about the premiere of Schindler's List as an event that has an after party. We came out of there and because we're Osage, the Osages were like shuttled onto a shuttle and taken to this after party.

And we're just like thrust in there and there's like all these people and people are drinking and carrying on and it's a party. And there's like the reserve section for Osages and I had to sit down with some of my cousins who worked on the film and we're still like, and we're still processing everything that we've seen from the film and there's just this party going on around us. That's so bizarre.

And that's the best analogy that I can give you for what it feels like to have an association with the film. Yeah. I guess. Yeah, that's really interesting. Yeah, that's very poignant. It's very interesting that it's like, you know, brutality of like people who look like you, who are you.

And then people are like, wow, let's drink now because this triumph happened. That was awesome, yeah. Yeah, it's very, it's fucked up. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. My thoughts on the movie were, I thought it was really beautiful, and I know a lot of the discussion centered around like, we should have seen more from the Osage perspective. But I'm like, I don't want Martin Scorsese speaking for indigenous people. In the same way we're like, for a minute, I was like, how come there's never any black people in his movies? And I'm like, well, that's not his life. That's not his experience. So I'm glad he's not speaking for people

he doesn't know about. But then I was like, I hope this opens the door for more indigenous things to be made from the indigenous perspective, just like I hope more black films continue to get made. But it is interesting. Yeah. I felt similarly, I thought that I thought it was very

beautifully shot. I was captivating in that sense, because when I saw that it was three and a half hours long, I was like, hell. But it did keep me engaged the entire time. The story is so tragic and

I think a lot of what I was thinking about was what it would feel like for the people who were actually affected by that in their lineage to watch that. So I'm glad that we have somebody here who can speak to that experience and not just me going like... I liked the part one. Yeah, so...

Lily Gladstone, my God. She's amazing. She can do so much by doing so little, which is the opposite experience of my life, where I'm like, I'm always doing the most and hoping you like it. So good. She was so, like, I want to say stoic,

but also just like a sort of calm presence. It was like a quiet fury. Yeah, yeah, it was really a beautiful performance. And there was so much hype around her during award season, which I hadn't seen the movie yet, so it's great to see, like, oh, my God, she really should have... She could have easily won an Oscar for this role. Okay, well, let's jump into our little segment called Spotted. -♪ Spotted, Spotted, Spotted. -♪

Where we're gonna see if today's movie has any of the following celeb sightings. Do we get one of Marty's boys? We get Robert De Niro. Yes. Really interesting role for him. Very different. I thought he did a great job. Harvey Keitel?

No. No. Joe Pesci? No. Unfortunately, no. No, I would have enjoyed seeing him do anything at this point. Leonardo DiCaprio, yes. Yes.

And Marty himself. Do we see Marty himself? Yes, we do. We do? That long ending piece right before the last shot, when he's in the radio play, it's him speaking. Oh, wow. I have missed him in every single movie. I had heard people talking about that moment

and saying it ends on his face. And think, it didn't actually, like it wasn't the actual last shot of the movie, which was good, but it was a long beat of him reading from the radio play, whatever you would call it. It was very interesting that he was in it at that point. Cause we haven't really... All of his cameos have been very...

And the ones we've seen have been very, very brief. But yeah, I'm curious why he was featured heavily. Maybe because he's getting older and he wants to, like, be in a movie, you know, as a legacy thing. I don't know. Do we know anything about that? I mean, I don't. Maybe in our trivia, maybe in our trivia, we'll hit a little backstory on that.

I mean, I've had to take several runs at the stories for different publications, so I'm super familiar with the material from that book, from Dennis McAuliffe's, he wrote a brilliant book called Deaths of Sybil Bolton. from that book, from Dennis McAuliffe's, he wrote a brilliant book called Deaths of Sybil Bolton. I produced an episode for Lisa Ling on the subject and then worked on another deal for a PBS project.

I think that decision for him to be in it at the end, one, I think it was a brilliant decision. I was actually my most favorite part of the film because it does something that everybody who tackles this story has a lot of the same problems. And part of that is just the way that we're, I guess, trained to tell stories or told to tell stories from a structural perspective.

This story has so many details and so many moving parts that what happens is when you begin to tell it that you lose all of the story real estate to trying to explain how something happened and you don't get to the part or you lose the part or you lose story real estate to the who. And that gets you away, that gets you further away from the heart of storytelling and it, because you lose all this real estate to exposition. Yeah.

And you sacrifice to exposition in the trade off there. When you sacrifice to exposition and plot as you get away from the people. Yeah. And, and I don't know, just to put my head inside the head of the screenwriters, I guess, I would say that maybe there was that sentiment that existed there. And that felt like that moment felt like the most honest, real moment. Like if you've really been inside the guts of this story, then this movie would have been 10 hours long in order to do it.

And in order to explain to somebody that this movie should have been 10 hours long, and we gave you three hours, then you have to take a shortcut. Or you have to find another way to do it. And I think that moment, that final moment with him was a kind of a love letter, so to speak, because if you've been down in the trenches with all those facts and all the figures and all the deaths and all that trauma, you can't spend your time explaining it all.

You just have to eventually just tell people how you feel about it or show them how you feel about it. And I think that's what happened at the end. Yeah. He was, he was speaking to the woman who it's really about and, and seemed to give reverence to that, like personally. Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. Um, okay. Let's take a quick break. We'll be back with more about killers of the flower moon. Did you find any subscriptions you forgot about or did you pay twice and didn't realize it? Did rocket money cancel a subscription for you that was otherwise time-consuming? Did Rocket Money alert you to an increase in your subscription price or negotiate it

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2023, very current last year. Written by Eric Roth and Martin Scorsese. Okay, so we're gonna jump into the plot and then talk about our thoughts as we go. So Osage Nation elders bury a ceremonial pipe mourning their descendants assimilation into white American society. Wandering through their Oklahoma reservation

during the annual flower moon phenomenon of fields of blooms, several Osage find oil gushing from the ground. The tribe becomes wealthy as it retains mineral rights and members share in oil lease revenues. The law requires white court appointed legal guardians to manage the money of full and half blood members, assuming them incompetent.

Which is so fucking wild. It's crazy. Oh, I got something more wild than that. Please. You want to hear something more wild? Yeah. That system of government was in place all

the way till 2006 what what and and the part about the Guardians and the incompetency That is still in place. What? when I finished my master's degree in 2021, my brothers have, two of my brothers have PhDs that they've completed. One of our relatives passed and we inherited a portion

of a portion of a portion of a head, right? The Bureau of Indian Affairs automatically categorized us all as incompetent. What? That's so fucked up. That's insane. So that's that's still in place. Wow. So that that literally rocks my fucking world. I know. I don't even know. It blows my fucking mind. I'll let you sit with that for a little bit. That's like truly, that's just insane.

So in 2004, after democracy came to the country of Iraq through liberation by the United States Army, Osage has got a law passed through that Congress that was signed into law by, on the very last day, avoiding a pocket veto by President Bush, signed it into law. It was a law that was sponsored by Representative Frank Lucas out of Oklahoma. And it went all the way through both houses, signed into law, and it gave us the right to determine our own membership

and design our own form of government. So the stuff that's not in the movie is that in 1882, I think, Osages wrote their own constitution. That constitution was dissolved almost immediately after the discovery of oil in 1899. And an interim government was put in place. And then a law was passed in the United States Congress in 1906. That is what set up the mineral estate and all of the chaos that you saw take place in the 20s. Oh my God. It's so fucked up.

It's so disturbing. It's impossible to squeeze so much of that into one thing. I mean, let alone like here I am, I told you just a second ago that I'm more concerned about the heart and here I am like in exposition. Well yeah, but I mean that's also trying to like give you, I mean the context is really fascinating. I yeah it is I mean it's also kind of as we've like learned from watching these movies it's kind of his style to show like bits and pieces of daily life more than to do exposition. and pieces of daily life more than to do exposition.

But it does feel really necessary to understand the context surrounding these scenes. I mean, yeah. So fucked up. It's just so wild when it's like, I don't, people are like, we want the money. We want to rule over these. Like, it's just, it's wild. In 1919, Ernest Berkhead, Leonardo DiCaprio,

returns from World War I to live with his brother Byron, Scott Shepherd, and Uncle William King Hale, Robert De Niro, in Hale's large reserve ranch. Hale, a reserve deputy sheriff and cattle rancher, poses as a friendly benefactor of the Osage, speaking their language and bestowing gifts. This is so fucked to me, because I'm like, I guess that's what it is, smile on people's faces,

gather their trust, and then fucking ruin them. Like, he's so awful. And then I'm like, that's how he got his reserve, right? By just like being kind and being like, oh, I'm... Robert De Niro? Yeah. Or the character? Or, yeah, his character. I don't mean to say Robert. Yeah, Robert De Niro. Yeah. Or like. Or yeah, his character.

Yeah, Robert De Niro. But I was like, how did he get his large reservation? Like how did he, how did he get property? Cause that was Osage property, right? Yeah, there's a lot of tactics that are used. One, the most common of which was that they would not give Osage's access to their own money. Like under that guardianship system, you had to have a guardian, you had to get your money

through the guardian. So they would basically like temper the money on like some kind of a monthly allowance or something like that. And what that caused is if you ran out of money or if there was medical expenses or you need to make a large purchase, something of that nature, you're a guardian or another guardian,

there was just this nexus of corruption that operated together. They would give you a loan and you would put up your land as collateral. And they knew when the head right payments were going to come in. And so then they would call the loan in early, when they knew that they were out of money. And then they would confiscate the land as payment. Damn, God. That is how a lot of the landowners, current landowners, had come by their titles. And with this, like in this example, when I'm watching this story, obviously I'm going, I don't trust him, but he seems like he is friendly.

He speaks the language. All those things are like, oh, he's really like tapped in. Is is are all the people understanding that he's a bad person? Or is there this feeling of he might actually be a nice guy? Do you know what I mean? Like in this type of context, like, is he getting away with anything or are the indigenous people going, oh, well, he's obviously horrible, but we have to do this. Because this is just the way that the system works. Yeah. I mean, you have a limited amount of merchants. I mean, even in my grandfather's lifetime,

there were people when I was a kid that he would say, I don't trade with them. Because the double the double tiered pricing system that existed like well into my childhood, and you can still see it now. So when the tribes trying to buy land, often they will go through an intermediary lawyer to mask who the buyer is so that there's not inflated pricing. My God. So that's more exposition. That's good. if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing.

I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing.

I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing.

I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. I'm not sure if that's a good thing. Lizzie Q, Tantoo Cardinal, while her sisters, Anna, Kara, Jade Myers, Rita, Janay Collins, and Minnie, Jillian Dion also live in town. She meets Ernest when he gets a job working as a cab driver. Ernest develops feelings for Molly and they eventually get married,

and during the wedding, Hale notices Minnie looking sad and speaks to her. Okay, the relationship with Ernest. First of all, I thought, can we talk about Leo's look for a second? Uh-huh. So, he looks... He looks wild, but he looks... He's aging into himself in this really interesting way

that I actually really liked this role for him. I thought it was like, he was very authentic feeling in it. I was like, not really thinking about him as much as I sometimes do. His mouth situation was kind of fascinating. I was like, does he have chewing tobacco in his cheeks at all times? It was like a permafrown. Yeah, he had a real, and it was like in front of his mouth.

Like I don't know, his mouth was like in front of his face. Yeah. Really interesting. But then, so when he has this relationship with her, I really just don't trust it, but, like, I'm seeing him, he does seem to have feelings for her. Like, he does, it does seem to be authentic in many moments of the film,

even though he's obviously horrible by the way. Yeah, it's just so gross. And I'm like, I just hate how he used her, but then also seemed to love her. And then, I mean, later we find out that he was putting shit in her insulin. And I was like, this sucks. This sucks. This is it's so nefarious. It's like, who fucking thinks of this? It's so wild.

Yeah. And thinking that all these people are like living these sort of double lives, like all the white people being assholes and like having these relationships where they're secretly Ready to just take everything from these people whenever possible. It's just very dark to watch So Minnie later dies of a wasting disease that is affecting some of those sage during Minnie's funeral Lizzie tells Molly that she saw an owl fly into her room Which is supposed to be an omen of death days Days later, Anna is found murdered after being shot in the head. Molly speaks to a private investigator, but Hale sends Ernest and Byron out to assault him and get

him off their backs. Ernest also engages in criminal activities such as gambling with stolen jewelry taken from Osage victims. Meanwhile, Ernest has three children with Molly. Like that is, yeah, like you were saying earlier, like it's wild that he's stealing from the Osage, married to someone who's Osage and is just, yeah. I'm like, don't you get confused with the lies? The owl part was so beautiful. Did you think that? I loved how they shot that.

I thought that was really, just a really cool moment, but the murders are so brutal in this movie, especially we've seen so much gore watching all these movies, so much violence. These were much harder to watch than some of the other ways that they shot these things in the past in different movies. I think it's because in the other movies, everyone has kind of like in Goodfellas, everybody in it knows that there is a chance they might be murdered. They're all doing bad dealings.

This is just like innocent people that they're just fucking murdering. And the scenes themselves are really hard to watch, but then also just the special effects are so realistic that it was upsetting to me. Again, this also speaks to what you were saying, Nicole, about it being like a very 2023 film though, because it's really well done in that sense.

A lot of the older movies they didn't have, I don't know. I mean, I feel like the way that they created those looks were really, the person who did that is very talented. I was feeling ill watching it. I guess that's the point. Yeah. An OSAG Council discusses the murders and how to respond to them.

Their current situation is compared to the Tulsa race riots in the same state. Molly starts to suffer from the wasting disease, worsened by earnest, since he begins to drug her by putting a toxin in her insulin for her diabetes. Baby Anna also begins to suffer from the wasting disease worsened by earnest since he begins to drug her by putting a toxin in her insulin for her diabetes. Baby Anna also begins to suffer from a cough and is taken to get help even though Molly will not see traditional doctors. So what is the wasting disease?

That's actually happening. That's not someone doing something slowly being poisoned, right? No, but I mean, the insulin was after she was already the poison was somebody else was poisoning her and then he adds the insulin. Poison or was I did I miss something? The insulin is already poisoned. He just gets wise to that late later and is told to like mix it in because I was like she already was. I was just a diabetes. She suspected he knew.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I was, yeah, I was like, sadly disappointed, like stupidly disappointed by him doing it to her though. I was like, really? Like, he's actually gonna...

Yeah, he's just like blindly doing things. And then he seemed conflicted when they were giving him the idea. Like, you just put it in, it'll just slow her down. And he obviously knows that it's very bad, but he looks conflicted, but then he just starts doing it and doesn't stop. Yeah. And I did like the mention of the Tulsa race riots

because it was just like, this is the world that like people of color at this time, no matter what you did to get ahead, the lovely whites in charge were time, no matter what you did to get ahead, the lovely whites in charge were like, no, no, you just won't. You won't have a very rich community. You won't have, you know, rich people with oil money who are brown people.

Like it was, it's just, it's really wild that these things happened basically at the same fucking time. Well, yeah, they're like some of the murders are only like a week or two difference in time between the act, the Tulsa race riots. Oh, wow. And in addition to that, actually, like the street that's right there behind me is Lahey Street. And I could be wrong. So you might want to verify this, but I think he was the lawyer that

defended the sheriff that deputized the white mob in the Tulsa race rights. Oh, wow. That's how, that's how incestuous the legal nexus was that kind of helped to facilitate and authorize and validate a lot of the violence that took place. Yeah, because the riots lasted days before they called anyone. I think it was like three days or something like that, which is absolutely insane. Yeah, there was a, this isn't in the movie at all. And this is not in any book either. But there was a, there's a man who is from Greyhorse that I was good friends with. He

just passed away from cancer a couple of years ago. His name was George Pease. And I had the pleasure of photographing him when his cancer was in remission. When I was over there, he was talking to me and he told me that, so after they did the allotment, his family allotment was right there in North Tulsa. So North Tulsa is Osage Reservation. And what he told me is that when the race riots popped off, that there was a family,

black family that had walked up the railroad, because the railroad went through their property and had sought refuge at this house. And his grandmother had taken this family in. And they were there and not long after they got there, there was a group of white men that came up that same railroad track and said, hey, we know that they're in there. We don't want nothing to do with you.

Just hand them over and everything will be fine. And he told me that his grandma went and grabbed her shotgun, cocked it like that and started shooting, shooting the tree branches above their head and ran that ran those people off. Wow. So this is like that's how close like there it's literally like Osage reservation is North Tulsa. Yeah, it is North Tulsa. Same area. happening in the same area. The Osage Reservation, the Creek Reservation, the Cherokee Reservation, all connect right there in Tulsa. Wow.

That's fucking wild. Well, one local man, Henry Ronan Williams, who was Molly's first husband before Ernest is seen around town drinking and bemoaning his mistakes and resigning himself to an early death. Hale orders Ernest to arrange the murder of Henry. One of Hale's men takes him out of town before shooting him in the back of the head. He was supposed to make it look like a suicide. Hale beats Ernest for the botch killing with a paddle. That was so pathetic feeling.

It was so wild. But also, I just hate it when that man like befriended him. And it was like it was a thing where he was like, this is my friend. I guess I'll get the job done. And it was so cowardly to shoot him

in the back of the head. Like, yeah, all of it. And you also know you're not doing it, right? Like, I mean, that's like, you were told... That whole... I mean, all of these, like, unexpected, like, shots in the head are really just... It was just...

It's... The idea of you talking, Ryan, about having to go to a party after that is really... Is wild, because there's so many murders in this movie, and it's like, one after the other after the other. And Molly's whole family, it's so devastating. So the number of murders that you see in the film is not even the full account. Wow.

If you look, so this is just a statistical analysis that Dennis McAuliffe does, where he takes the morbidity rate or the mortality rate for the country in the area. You can see how long people are living based off of the medical science at the time. and you look at the base population growth, and you compare that to the Osage census numbers. And if you do that, the number possibly goes up to somewhere between 200 to 300. So that would include... So there's an official list from the FBI of 24 cases. They also had, after that case wrapped, they also had 24 people ready on arraignment and

Jager Hoover decided not to do anything with those. They just pretty much let it go. But if you expand that, your net out, that would include my great grandfather as well, who died pretty young in 1930 or 1931. You really can't throw a rock here and not hit a family that's been affected by it. But part of the thing that's lost on an outsider telling the film, and I think it would be unfair to expect an outsider to know the things that I know about my own community. That wouldn't be fair to level at somebody, especially somebody who's like a well respected, obviously talented, like very skilled filmmaker

and a team of people. But the, I think the most valuable thing that the community could offer the world is how the community responded to this time period. The volume of murders and the things that were happened and the schemes that were leveled against us should have annihilated and destroyed this community. It should have decimated the entire community. And for a lot of families, that's exactly what happened. But by and large, because I think the

nature of our community values, our culture, and our belief system, and the social structures and ceremonies that we have in place, that didn't happen. And I think the way that we responded afterwards, I think is a much more valuable thing to learn from the events themselves. And if you really get down into the weeds of this story, the FBI didn't do anything. If you read the book, it may not say it explicitly, but sometimes it's implied in the telling of the story that once this case was finished, the murders stopped. They didn't.

What stopped the murders was the Osage Nation Council. Years and years of lobbying without the ability to vote, lobbying the United States Congress and the Senate and the executive branch to change the law that gave people the motivation and the legal ability to do what they did. Most of the stuff that they were doing, not everything, but a lot of the stuff that they were doing was perfectly within the framework of the law.

And the Osage Nation Congress worked really, really hard to change that. And if there's a hero in the story, it's not just one person because that Congress was a revolving set of people. And I don't want to get into like how our gender dynamics work here either. That's a whole other hour. But I assure you that all the voices were heard and they make themselves known through our council, despite it being the council being a structure that is meant to not have any power based off the 1906 Act that I mentioned earlier. But I think Osage people are very forward-thinking

and very diplomatic, very strategic, and very intelligent, and very aware. I mean you go back and look at the Senate committee hearings on this topic, you can see what the chiefs are saying. And they're very, very aware about every single minutia of the law that is holding this thing in place. And it was, it was them that were responsible for stopping for this stop. It wasn't the FBI. Wow. That's amazing though.

Like I said, the FBI had, they had people ready to try and more people ready to go to trial and, uh, Jager who dropped it. I mean, it sucks, but it does make sense. Cause I feel like you're like, if you ever watch like unsolved murders where it's like, Oh, it's this person and then they don't do anything about it until like, you know, like a mother of someone murdered is like, I will stop it. Nothing till this person gets processed.

And then they're like, oh, I guess we'll arrest them. It's like, it's really incredible that people have to get their own justice or change laws for them when the government could just easily do it. Well, part of that is, I mean, the thing that they don't say is that obviously prior to colonization, Osage people handed their own crimes and adjudication their way.

That power was taken away from you. The ability to adjudicate and manage the criminal repercussions of what happens in your jurisdiction was taken away from them. And it was replaced by the Indian police, which you mentioned earlier. One of my other great-grandfathers that wasn't killed, he was one of the Indian police

during that time. And if you read David Grant's book, there's a photograph that he talks about where he mentions that the devil being on one end. And I have that photograph and William Hale is cut off of that photograph. But also in that photograph is my grandfather as a 13-year-old boy and his future father-in-law, who was Indian police. And that photograph itself is also important. It's a warm-up.

My understanding of it, it's a war mother's dance. It was held for a woman named Marishi and she had used a lot of her oil money to buy war bonds during World War I. And right during the time of these murders, that's when those war bonds paid back. In order to honor her, they had a huge feast and a huge dinner for her and dance. And the War Mother Society is still active, we support our veterans when they come home

from war. And it's still, I think, an integral part of our, of who our community is and how we take care of people. And you know, those things are there, but they're not necessarily like entering the story framework from a value place or like, or how Osage people prioritize Osage values or express them. It is in there a little bit because a lot of our, a lot of my family, a lot of our people, they did work on the movie. And so you, it's unmistakable that there are Osage fingerprints, like all over that movie.

And I think the movie is better for it. And I think, I think Martin Scorsese has said as much. Yeah. I mean, that feels essential. If you're going to be telling a story like this. Since Hale is the local political boss and both the local sheriff and judges are in his pocket, no investigations are conducted. Lizzie falls ill and Molly and Retta, is it Retta? Rita.

Rita. Rita. Rita stay by her side. In her final moments, Lizzie appears to see elder Osage people guiding her to the afterlife. Later, while Ernest and Molly sleep, an explosion wakes everyone up. This is so wild. This was a crazy scene, oh my God. God, coming fromest and Molly sleep, an explosion wakes everyone up. This is so wild. This was a crazy scene.

Oh my God. God. Coming from Reda's home, wait, Rita, sorry. Ernest goes to investigate and finds her husband, Bill, Jason Isbell, begging to be killed after his injuries. Well, Reda's, Rita, my God, it's the E. It's spelled R-E-T-A. It's the E.

Just to give you. Rita's dead. Ernest confirms to Molly that Rita didn't make it. It's that E, it's the E. Rita's dead. This scene was so shocking. So I talked to my dad about this. My dad opened his photographic archive for the film films researcher to look at. Oh, wow. And he has inside that archive, there's several pictures of the house after it was blown up.

And it's very important to remember that, and I think this gets lost, it's like one of the things that gets lost because of confirmation bias or some type of bias is that that's a crime scene. There are white people walking all over that crime scene, picking through that family's belongings. And I think the way that conversation that my dad had with them, I don't know this for sure, but I know I've had that conversation with my dad.

I know he had that conversation with the historian that worked on it. I think it heavily influenced that scene, those photographs and that idea of what actually was happening there. I mean, yeah, there's people in there that are looking for bodies, but there's people that are there a full day later walking through an active crime scene. Right.

Like that's the level of disregard for law. That's a level of disregard for human life. That's a level of disregard for somebody else's property. They just did it and nobody stopped them. Right. Like you, it literally says you have no intent of solving. Figuring it out, yeah, exactly. Yeah.

I felt like they did a good job of really making it clear how much these crimes are not investigated. Which was, but that scene, I mean, that's such an insane, it's such an insane crime to blow up someone's house because also it blew off the windows of all the houses around it. Like everyone's terrified. And then I just feel like Molly's story is so tragic

because she's begging to know whose house it is. And you just she has so. And again, this actress is so amazing because she has so many moments where she's like brought to her knees and she does such an amazing job. But yeah, like the bed sick because her husband is poisoning her. It's like she doesn't even get to properly grieve that death. Right. It's yeah, it's she's been robbed of so much. It's like she's been robbed of her family, but also just

the human desire to grieve is taken from her because she's in a bed. And then like to understand that Ernest is involved with the explosion and all these things like. It's such a he's such a twisted character. And watching her, like, in her own home, reacting in her basement. And he's like a sociopath, I mean, horrible person. Molly's health starts to falter.

She takes it upon herself to travel to Washington, DC, to personally speak to President Calvin Coolidge, Mark Landon Smith, so that a proper investigation may be taken into the murders. Because of this, Hale orders Ernest to poison Molly's insulin to slow her down. Molly's condition worsens and Ernest exhibits similar symptoms after ingesting the poison himself. Okay, what do we what was that moment about where he decides to drink a little? It's like he's like, let me see what she's feeling. I was sort of like, what's the intention with him having a little bit of it?

It was just to kind of go like, what am I doing to her? Like I had a little curiosity about what it is. I was I don't know. I was wondering about that. I mean, maybe he feels like it's inevitable for him and he would have control over it. It feels like a certain level of it feels like that's inevitable for him and he would rather have control over it. It feels like a certain level of, it feels like, I mean, he's a coward. He's written as a coward.

And he's, I think, well aware of what he's been a part of and possibly sees that as an easier exit than what's going to happen to him. Oh, yeah. And all in his conscience, I'm guessing. Yeah. That's all speculation. The only actual, I won't call it firsthand, but the only person, I have a friend of mine, close friend of mine, who saw when Ernest

Burkhart got out of jail, he came back here. And my friend saw him eating at a cafe when he was with his father, when he was a boy. And they just whispered and they pointed at him. And he said, you know, they all knew who he was. They all talked. And so he's kind of a boogeyman figure. And he said, he goes, I looked over at him and he said, he just looked pitiful. He just pitiful. That's how he explained him. It wasn't, it just like he was this weak human.

And I think if you look at like the decisions that he makes through there, and even the idea to like center him in this story, it makes it interesting because it's complicated and you can kind of walk that line and show that tension. But I think that's accurate. I would describe him as a weak man who makes low character, weak man decisions

when the time matters. I mean, that's like the long and the short of it. Yeah. And I don't know if, it's hard for me to try to understand if that is what other men in the outside of the community see in that character or don't see themselves in that character or if they put in a position where they're not making, I guess, moral decisions when they are the head of the household or their family depends on them or any kind of situation like that where you're,

situations as a man that you're placed in where you are being asked to step up on behalf of your family. I don't know, I can't talk to that. There's a lot of like leachy type people that hang around our communities to this day. And I think he comes from a long line of that. But like I said, I don't know him. All we have is the historical record

and some of the accounts and kind of what he did. And the situation that left the most food on the table from a storytelling perspective, I guess was the possibility of exploring a dysfunctional relationship and the steps that you take in order to find yourself or maintain the structure of a dysfunctional relationship. That's universal.

I feel like it's something, if any human has been alive, they've been at one time, they've been in a relationship that was not great and that may be a way in but like I said, that's that's the decisions they made and I think you know given what was on the table Lily performed way above and beyond what Anyone could have asked for and given given what was on the page,

and what she put on screen. And also, I think Leo did what that guy was. I mean, that's what that is. Maybe it's not, maybe it doesn't give you answers, but maybe that's the point of it. In that moment, I felt like he was trying to make himself the victim. but maybe that's the point of it. In that moment, I felt like he was trying to make himself the victim. She's laying there incapacitated because of him, but he's like,

oh, I don't feel good either. I'm sick too. That's what I got from it, a real cowardly move to be like, me too. Yeah, and I was gonna say- He's very toxic. Yeah, he's toxic. I mean, they can't use that language in 1923, but. Yeah, it was toxic. Oh, what was I gonna say? Oh, when you mentioned that Lily, what was on the page, actually, when you think about it,

it's like there really isn't that much written, like she doesn't say a whole lot, but she just carries it so well. She's amazing. I mean, I thought her performance was so amazing. Same. There's a couple of people who've asked me, this isn't the first time I've been asked about this film.

And I think for the community, and I'm just talking like in very, very broad terms, that the fact that this movie got made, the fact that she was cast, and I think she was like an absolutely amazing choice and she's an amazing human being. She stopped by the office here like almost regularly during the week after filming and we'd visit and I've known her for quite a while. She's just a very, very high character person and to get an opportunity like this, it couldn't have happened to a better person.

That being said, the thing that I think is the most valuable for the community is that to your point earlier, what you're saying about Indigenous voices, because of this movie, Lily Gladstone may get to act in anywhere between 30 to 70 more films in the course of her life. And that body of work, the body of work that comes after this film for her, they will be films that she says yes to. Yeah. And because she says yes to those stories, those are the stories that get made. So many times in communities there's a tendency to rush to the tragedy and the tragic and away from the wins. We don't often get to see our wins in

TV and film. But Lily is a very, very smart person. She's very, very intelligent. She knows exactly what she's doing. And I can't wait to see the films. I mean, Fancy Dance is one of them that she filmed almost immediately after. Okay, I don't know about this. Apple bought it. I actually have a cameo in it as a Powemc. It was made by Erica Tremblay, who's also a Reservation Dogs writer. Cool. It was made by Erica Tremblay, who's also a Reservation Dogs writer.

She wrote and directed it. There's a co-writer on there as well. It's a beautiful film. But films like that, the volume of that body of work is going to mean so much more over the lifetime of her career, then this might be what's known for now. But I think because of her acting chops, she's the type of actor you can put the film on her back and ask her to carry it. And those kind of people are not, they don't make a lot of those kind of people. No. And I think to me, that's the most interesting, most beautiful, most promising thing that can come out of this film.

Yeah, that's so amazing. I fully agree. Because yeah, this film's just going to give her like huge opportunity. She'll like, she'll get films made that that are important to her, like you said. Like she'll get films made that are important to her, like you said. So back into the plot, due to Molly's lobbying, the burrow of investigation, BOI sends agent Thomas Bruce White,

senior Jesse Plemons, who's great in this, to investigate and they quickly discover the truth. Hale tries to cover his tracks by murdering his own hit men, but White arrests Hale and Ernest. While Ernest is being interrogated, two agents are sent to question Molly and find her near death. Doctors discover that she's been repeatedly poisoned

and notified White and the other agents. Molly recovers. Ernest ends up taking some of the toxin for himself and suffers its effects while he's being interrogated. Hale's attorney W.S. Hamilton, Brendan Fraser, tries to urge Ernest to say that he was beaten and tortured so he cannot testify with the implicit threat of harm against him and his family if he refuses to comply.

This whole section, it's really picking up. And the, I love the interrogation scene where Leo's standing there and like out of it and trying to get the information to try and get the information out of him. And then Brendan Fraser comes in and I was like, I didn't expect this moment. No.

And I didn't know he was in this. Me either. But so- I did, I saw him in town. Okay. That must have been exciting. And I just, I thought this was all really interesting how he's like, you know, threatening to turn against his uncle.

And they're all basically saying like, that's a horrible idea. And then when he was like, you were tortured, you were beaten. And he was like, no, I wasn't. Yes, you were. Yes, I was. And I was like, God, this guy's really how cowardly he is. Yeah. He turned so easily with like whatever they're saying. He's like, oh, OK, I had conviction for like a second. Yeah. So baby Anna soon dies from whooping cough.

Ernest learns the news from White, which breaks him causing him to finally turn against Hale and decide to testify against him. During the trial, Ernest speaks to prosecutor Leeward, John Lithgow, who I love. I love him. He's great. And states that his uncle coerced him

into committing crimes against those sage But specifically Molly and her family so that they can profit off her wealth When Leeward asked earnest if hail had ordered him to marry Molly to get closer to her earnest says he genuinely fell in love Molly later asks if he told the whole truth when she asked if he was What he was injecting her with earnest still lies and says it was just insulin Molly finally leaves him I was really glad that she what he was injecting her with, Ernest still lies and says it was just insulin, Molly finally leaves him. I was really glad that she didn't believe him and could see through the whole thing.

And I was also so relieved that she was taken in by the doctors when that whole scene is happening, when he gets arrested. Cause it's like, oh God, there's maybe a chance that she's gonna feel better and we see her get better. And I love that she left him. And then I thought this ending was so interesting, this is an interesting way to wrap it up.

Yeah, instead of having just like title cards that tell you what happens, I was like... But then I also was like... I mean, it also kind of was like another level of like people fighting entertainment and trauma. And to have it... I'm like, totally, I'm, trivializing it a little bit. Yeah. And I thought that was a really fucking interesting choice.

Well, like, the audience of white people watching this radio play. So, I'll just read what happened. So, radio drama years later reveals the aftermath. The Shone brothers who gave Ernest the poison for Molly and were implicated in other wasting deaths were never prosecuted due to lack of evidence. Byron was tried as an accomplice to Anna's murder

but served no prison time due to a hung jury. Hale and Ernest were sentenced to life imprisonment. Both were paroled after years of incarceration despite Osage protests to the parole board. And the show's producer, Martin Scorsese, comes out to read Molly's obituary as she had divorced Ernest and settled down with a new husband before dying at the age of 50 and being buried next to the rest of her deceased family. The murders were never mentioned. The final scene of an

Osage drum ceremony is the present in the present day with the Osage gathered together, singing and dancing still thriving. So the radio play is like, first of all, it's fun just to see how they made those things, because it was like all the sound effects happening in real time, the Foley art or whatever. But yeah, just how tragic it is what they're reading, it's kind of a quick summation of, I'm sure, what Ryan would say, as you said, would take 10 hours to tell.

So they're kind of like, and then this happened, this happened, this happened. And then the audience is just like enjoying like enjoying like, oh, look, they're writing a pen on a paper to make the pen sound like, you know, there's something about it that is it was pretty wild, especially because earlier, I think it's Anna who when she dies, they like took her body apart. They like dismembered that scene when they're describing that brutal. And then it's like for white people's enjoyment, we're like, tee hee hee, ha ha ha, foley art.

Like it's really fucked. Yeah. But it does, I think you're probably right, Ryan, with the idea that, like Scorsese coming out to read at the end, it does give some weight to Molly's story specifically. And because it's him, we're kind of all perked up a little more listening than like, you know, watching these actors play out

the story where it does give it a little bit more of a of a weight. But still a really unique way to end some story like that. There's also a really weird cameo from Jack White from the White Stripes in that moment, which I thought was post-credits. Oh, really? I didn't recognize him. Yeah, he comes and does part of the radio play.

I thought that was crazy. I have no idea. It's like him putting Gwen Stefani in, I guess. The reception of this movie, it received 10 nominations at the 96 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Costume Design, Best Original Song, Best Original Score, Best Production Design, Best Editing, Best Cinematography,

and it received zero awards. What? Which is wild to me. This is like his curse, though. Like, I feel like he's always got nominations, but this is... Who's best cinematography. Cause I thought it was really beautifully shot. I just feel like poor things kept winning everything

this year, but I don't know who, I don't know if they won cinematography, but they won best film. It was, I think Oppenheimer. Oh, okay. Or yeah, exactly. Oppenheimer was also winning everything, which I haven't seen.

Sorry. I haven't seen it.. Haven't seen it. Here's some trivia though. This is very funny to me. Robert De Niro was irked by Leonardo DiCaprio's frequent ad-libbing, according to Martin Scorsese. Every now and then Bob and I would look at each other and roll our eyes a bit and we'd tell him,

you don't need that dialogue. I'm like, first of all, this feels like a weird environment to just start ad-libbing. I feel like you want to stick to the script. But it's also funny that they openly talked about how it was annoying. That is very funny to me, probably because they probably did that on other films. And it's like, dude, read the room. This is a different tone. Yeah. Scorsese claimed that he decided to appear on screen

during the radio scene to read Molly's obituary because he wasn't sure if he could direct an actor to express the shift in tone to sincerity mid-scene. And he wanted to be upfront about his own responsibility in those sage murders being used for entertainment. Oh! Well, now we got our answer, first of all. We are kind of right.

That's really interesting. Well, I appreciate that. I mean, I think that's like that's a really it's kind of a smart reason to throw yourself in there, especially because, as we've said, all the cameos we see him in are just kind of like they happen for weird reasons and whatever. Or they were more just like inconsequential or like, oh, this actor didn't show up. So I hopped in and then it seemed to become a tradition.

But that's that seems very thoughtful to me. Well, the community met with him. They had dinners with him. Oh, yeah. He was in regular conversation and regular dialogue with people in the community. And I mean, I even saw him at our dance. Oh, wow. I was out there dancing. community. Hawaii and I was having to film Native Hawaiians. I'm not Native Hawaiian, but they have the same kind of issue with the extractive nature of storytelling and people coming in and mining. And for that relationship, I don't know. I mean, I'm not going to sit here and say what the relationship is going to be going forward with the people that were involved in the film that were not from here

and whatever their relationship is going forward. But I think for Lily, we've continued to see her here in the community and people have continued to call her name and say her name and I know that there's a lot of respect that the community has here for Lily. And of the people, of the names called here, you hear Lily's name the most. Wow.

And I think she's aware of, maybe more aware, of the importance of establishing and maintaining that relationship to people and place long after the thing is the thing. But during the time while they were here, I would say that that's what those guys were doing. And I think maybe through Lily's guidance or maybe on their own, it definitely wasn't, like Lily wasn't standing in the way of that, I don't see.

But it was definitely part of their process Now ultimately it's still up to them You know what goes in the movie what doesn't go in the movie what they're still there to make the movie but Everybody that was that had decision-making Abilities had access to and was interacting on a regular basis with Osage's on many levels, professional and cultural and just socially. And I feel like if that didn't happen, this would be a completely different film. And I'm not even sure the film would have been made here. different film.

And I'm not even sure the film would have been made here. I mean, there was a film in the 50s called the FBI Files or Story or something like that. I think it's called FBI Story. It was made in Arizona. They had Navajos dressed like Lakotas that were supposed to be Osages. I mean, it's like the 50s, it's like whatever goes. It's just their idea. Is Lily Osage? Sorry to interrupt you. No, no, no. Oh, okay.

No, no, no. She's Blackfeet. Okay. And I think a couple other tribes, but if I try to guess what they are, I'll mess it up. She reps Blackfeet. Oh, okay. And is that okay?

Is that, what is like the... Because I know in Asian communities, I don't remember what it... But some actors don't play Taiwanese when they're not Taiwanese. Is it the same in the indigenous community? You know what? Genocide was so effective that I'm not sure we have that liberty to stand. Fair. Okay. I mean, there's a... With the guys in the 1491s, we co-wrote...

I co-wrote a play. We wrote a play together that premiered at the Perlman in New York City. And in the cast, we have a very, very amazing actor, Korean actor named James Ryan, who's in that play. And in the opening monologue, our unreliable narrator, Larry, played by Judd Gautier, is out there and he's like, do you know how hard it was to,

white people were so good at killing Indians, you know how hard it was to, white people were so good at killing Indians, you know how hard it was to cast this play? And he goes, he turns and points to James Ryan, he goes, we even had to cast a Chinese guy to play one of the Indians. And he goes, actually Korean, but whatever. Oh my God. And so, it's fine.

It's fine. I love that being said, it's fine. Yeah, there's no, there's, there's no, there's, I never, I, you know, this is an Osage story. I didn't hear one Osage person the entire time go, why do they have Lily Gladstone? Right. Why isn't it? Why am I in there? I didn't hear that. Yeah.

Maybe if it was said, it was not said in front of me, I would have talked to somebody with harsh words. Cause Lily did fantastic. Yeah. And part of that is her own process of knowing what to do when you get into a community where you're a guest, you learn as much as you can. And in the process of her doing that learning,

she's integrating all of that into her character and that on top of her talent is what made that performance so compelling. And then the other thing, it's just a small, stupid thing, but Leonardo's accent, a lot of people do try to do a, the movies that have been made here, a lot of people step into a southern accent, and the southern accents are very regional. And a lot of times they sound like they're from Georgia or South Carolina or North Carolina or even Louisiana. But like the Texas, Oklahoma accent,

and depending on where you are in further South Texas, East Texas, West Texas, Northern Texas, Oklahoma, that the accents do shift. And it's a really small detail that no one will maybe shout them out for. But if he didn't get it right, everybody here would be like, what the hell is that? Well, that's good. Yeah. I mean, it's like this small attention to detail. Yeah, it's important.

And just being really good at your job, those kind of things make for, hopefully in the end, like a really enjoyable or accurate project if that's what you're going for. Yeah. Okay, we need to take a quick break. We'll be back with more Killers of the Flower Moon after this. ["The Star-Spangled Banner"] This episode of Newcomers is brought to you by Schedule 35, my go-to for staying productive

and getting my creative juices flowing. I've been there, having a million things to do and no motivation to do them, or waiting around struggling for the right ideas to pop in my head. I recently discovered microdosing with schedule 35 and it's been a game changer amid life's chaoses. It helps me stay laser focused on important things in my mind to stay open to creative ideas, which helps me make this show even better. Their vegan capsules are accurately dosed to give you the edge you need on your toughest

days. There's accurate doses, discreet shipping. It's the most trusted consumer brand in North America. So get 15% off at the code NEWCOMERS at SCHEDULE35.CO. That's 15% off at SCHEDULE35.CO and use the code NEWCOMERS. We're back and we're doing the new Academy Awards. So despite Scorsese's films being nominated over a hundred combined times, Marty's only won one.

So we have our own new Academy Awards dedicated to Marty's films. And this is the last episode of the season. So it's our final new Academy Awards and, uh, the ceremony will be a retrospective of the last 10 episodes. Oh, yeah. So let's vote for our favorite film of the season to pivot away a little bit from Killers of the Flower Moon, not to do it so harshly. We're like, and now talk about the others. Goodbye.

But we are we are wrapping up our season. So the nominees are Taxi Driver, The Last Waltz, Raging Bull, Goodfellas, Gangs of New York, Casino, The Departed. Oh my God, we've watched so many. The Aviator, The Irishman, and Killers of the Flower Moon. Ryan, you're welcome to vote. Allie and Anya are also welcome to vote. Maybe we can get since we've all, you know, I don't know what you've seen, Ryan,

so feel free to say whatever you want. But I think Nicole and I know what our answer is. Goodfellas. Yeah. Anya, same? Same. Hard same. Yeah, I'm going to go Goodfellas as well. Okay, Ryan, you get to pick one, but we don't care, I guess, because it's going to be goodfellas.

And Ryan, the only reason we didn't do Wulpa Wall Street was because it was the only Scorsese movie born into culture. We all love that one too. Okay. Well, in that case, I'm picking Taxi Driver. All right. Okay.

It's a good pick. The new Academy Award goes to Goodfellas with an honorary mention of Taxi Driver, which we also enjoyed. Oh my God. Ryan, thank you so much for being here, because that was so enlightening and informative and necessary. And I really appreciate that so much. Yeah. And I appreciate you taking the time because it's like it's not your job to educate. You know what I mean? It's like I can go do this research on my own.

But it was just really interesting to talk to someone who is Osage and has so much like a wealth of fucking information and is so connected to what this movie was about. So thank you. Yeah, thank you so much. Thank you. I can tell you my favorite part about the whole process though. The most amazing thing was watching my relatives and my uncles perform at the Oscars on stage.

Wow, yeah. That's so cool. And, you know, I know all those guys, I dance with those guys, I've sung with those guys and to see them do what they do on that stage and for the world to get to see them. There's no editing there. There's no that that that is like, that's what we do. That's us. That's amazing. And that's them talking for themselves. That's them showing the rest of the world,

who we are and how we do things and how we care ourselves. And I'm just so proud of those guys and the people that did their part and helped put their fingerprints on the project, but for it to culminate with Scott George's nomination, he's an excellent high character person. He's one of our head singers. And it was just a really, really beautiful moment for our community.

And on top of all the work that everybody else did on the project. Yeah, that was really amazing. And I'm sure felt long overdue. And it's been very cool to learn so much more about indigenous culture. I have not been as informed as I wish I was. So it's been this, I mean, and hearing from you, I honestly, it's kind of funny, because I'm like, I'm always complaining about how long all

these movies are. But here's me, I'm like, I actually this one could be longer, because it could be good. Could be a two parter, baby. So thank you for that. Ryan, do you have anything that you want to plug? I guess I'm a free agent right now. Ryan, do you have anything that you want to plug? I guess I'm a free agent right now. I'll plug myself. Yeah. Good move.

Yeah, I wrapped up season three on Reservation Dogs. And I'm about to finish a feature script that I'll start sending around. And, you know, uh, yeah. Yeah. Plug yourself. That's what anybody has a TV show or, or, or has a bunch of money laying around that wants to make a feature film on ex pro wrestler that goes back to a reservation and ends up with two little rugged ass little kids about to be taken away by the government.

That it's funny. Yes, yes. I'll say this. It is really difficult to separate people from their money based off of indigenous comedy. Now, I don't want to sound like I'm dogging the movie, but people are all too quick to pony up to see Indians dying on screen. They will pay money, special effects, they'll pay all that shit to see Indian people dying on screen. But Indians laughing and making jokes and being funny, a lot more difficult, but reservation dogs, I think, prove that it's economically feasible. So maybe that'll loosen the.

Yeah. All all Scrooge McDucks out there. Seriously. Wait, I have a question. Do you prefer indigenous or Indian? Man, you know what? I have a question. Do you prefer indigenous or Indian? Oh, man. You know what? I hate that question. Sorry about it. No, no, no. It's not a bad question. I just hate it because all growing up, everybody said Indian. And then when I was in high school, people said Native American. And then recently people were saying Indigenous.

The words are interchangeable in my head. I don't think there's a right or wrong way. Even when I was out in Hawaii, I caught myself referring to Hawaiians as Indians. And the way that I'm saying it, Indians, is not Indians. It's just like a thing that just people just say when they're referring to other Indigenous people. It's just like the thing that happens among Indigenous people when referring to each other. I really don't get caught up in the nomenclature or the semantics of it or whatever, the vernacular of it.

If you wanna be really specific, always just refer to them by their nation. Okay. Like, cause I've got asked like, do you consider yourself Indian? I say, I consider myself Osage. Like I don't talk for other native communities. I don't even talk from, I mean, I'm talking here right now

because you guys are asking me questions, but I am not an elected leader of my community. And there's a long line of people in front of me that could have been on this podcast and are perfectly valid options to talk on behalf of the community. So if you're ever in doubt, just say Osage Nation, Pawnee Nation, or Seneca Nation, or Cayuga, you know, Shoshone Nation, you know, whatever the specific one is, you just go through that and use those terms. But anyone that's trying to get mad at you for not doing that right, they really feel

like somebody who has a really strong Twitter presence and just waiting for something to be mad about so they can validate their identity as a mad person. Yeah. Yeah. Ryan, will you just tell people where they can find you online? Like your handle? I'm on Instagram,

at red corn, because I was the first red corn to get onto Instagram. You nabbed it. I did. I was not, I wasn't the first red corn on so many other platforms. on Instagram. You nabbed it. I did. I wasn't the first Red Coran, so many other platforms. I had other relatives that beat me there, but I have a big family and a lot of them worked on the film.

A lot of them were in the film and front of the camera and behind the camera. And, but yeah, they were slow to Instagram. So I won. So you win. Yeah. R-E-D-C-O-R-N. Thank you. R-E-D-C-O-R-N.

Well, listeners out there, please write a review for newcomers on Apple Podcasts and rate us five stars on Spotify. And it's our last episode of the Scorsese season. Thank you, Marty. Thank you to all our amazing guests that joined usese season. Thank you, Marty. Thank you to all our amazing guests that joined us this season. And thank you to Marika and Katie from Headgum for all their help behind the scenes.

We'll be back next week with season eight of Newcomers, which will cover legendary sports movies. You know the only sports movie I've seen is Air Bud. We'll see you then. I've seen Mighty Ducks. Bye. Bye. We'll see you then! I see mighty ducks! Bye! Bye! Newcomers is a Headgum Original hosted by us, Nicole Byer and Lauren Lapkus. Our executive producer is Anya Kenovskaya and our producer is Ali Khan.

Our theme music, editing, sound mixing and mastering is done by Ferris Monchi. Listen to new episodes wherever you get your podcasts every Tuesday. That was a Hid Gum Original.