Newcomers: Scorsese, with Nicole Byer and Lauren Lapkus - Taxi Driver (w/ Action Boyz)

Episode Date: April 16, 2024

Lauren and Nicole are back with season seven of Newcomers! This time, they're getting into the filmography of legendary director Martin Scorsese, beginning with Taxi Driver (1976). Lauren and Nicole are joined by none other than the Action Boyz (Jon Gabrus, Ben Rodgers, and Ryan Stanger) to contextualize Robert De Niro’s portrayal of Travis Bickle, get into the nitty gritty of that mohawk, and pass explicit judgment on Travis’ taste in movies. Listen to the Action Boyz hereFollow Gabrus: Instagram, TwitterFollow Ben: InstagramFollow Ryan: Instagram, TwitterNext week tune in for our next episode covering The Last Waltz (1978)! Like 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.

This is a HeadGum Original. Yeah, people do anything in front of a taxi driver. I mean anything. People too cheap to rent a hotel room. Don't drive a hurry up, will you? People want to embarrass you. It's like you're not even there. It's like, you know, like a taxi driver doesn't even exist. This city here is like an open sewer, you know? It's full of filth and scum.

I think I know what you mean, Travis. But it's not gonna be easy. How do you guys get to be a Secret Service man? What? I was just curious, because I thought maybe I'd make a good one. Hey, what kind of guns do you guys carry? .38s,.45s,.357 Magnums. Something bigger, maybe.

Hi. I'd like to volunteer. Why? Why? Because I think that you are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. The taxi driver is looking for a target. Getting ready. Getting organized.

Preparing himself for the only moment in his life that will ever mean anything. How much for everything? $350 for the Magnum. $250 for the 38. $1.25 for the 25, $150 for the 380. That taxi driver's been staring at us. You talking to me? You talking to me? I don't know who's weirder, you or me. You talking to me?

Then who the hell are you talking to? You talking to me? Well the hell say you're talking to? You're talking to me? Well, I'm the only one here. I don't believe I've ever met anyone quite like you. Oh yeah? You will never see a more chilling performance than this. Taxi driver. Okay, wow! I'm Nicole Byer.

I'm Lauren Lapkus. And this is season seven, somehow, of New Can You Believe? Oh my God. You thought you were just going to watch Star Wars, and here we are. Here we are. We've seen everything in the world. And this time, we are making our way through the filmography of director. Ever heard of him?

Martin Scorsese. We don't know. Here's the thing. I've heard about him, but I know nothing about old Marty. Well, is it? I looked it up and it was Scorsese. I think it's Sesi. I thought it was Scorsese.

Bruschetta. We got to get this right. If I want to be saying it a hundred more times. We've never seen his films. We gotta get this right if I want to be saying it a hundred more times. We've never seen his films. We know of him. We've seen a couple of them. We did have to take those off the list. Yeah. Wolf of Wall Street. Yeah. Yeah. Liked it.

I did. It was pretty good. It was a nice time. We also have producer Allie and producer Anya here with us. Thank God. Yes. Totally lost. Thank you. This season's going to be 10 episodes. So we picked all of the essential movies of Skuskies.

Warmer. Warmer. That's it. Got it. That might have technically been racist, Nicole. Oopsies. Well, he's had a whole long career and we can't get to everything. But today, so yeah, get over that right now.

But today we're going to be discussing his mainstream breakthrough film, Taxi Driver. Ever heard of it? Again, very, very famous. His mainstream breakthrough film, Taxi Driver. Ever heard of it? Again, very, very famous. Mark Scorsese has done 27 feature-length films and 17 documentaries. I don't think newcomers should skip any of his movies. They should do every single one. Thank you, Reddit.

So Taxi Driver is available for free on Tubi, which honestly shocked the heck out of me. me which is very funny or you can pay to watch it on a streamer 2b does throw in a commercial here or there i you know it was a it didn't break the flow but it is free that's how marty wants us to watch it intended when it was happening i I was like, this is exactly how not to watch it. He goes out. But it worked for my ADD. I prefer people watch it on Tubi with ads. So obviously we're going to spoil this film. I think, honestly, we're the last people to see it. Go watch it first.

It was crazy because as I was watching, I was like, oh my God, so many things have referenced this. And now I get it. You know what? Like you talking to me. Oh my God, Lauren, I screamed. I was like, that's what that's from?

That's been so butchered. Like that's like, it's so not a big deal in this. No. Like what? Okay. I'm obsessed. We're so excited for our guests today. We have John Gabrus, Ben Rogers, and Ryan Stanger here. They're comedians, actors, and writers who you might know from TV shows like Brooklyn

Nine-Nine, Workaholics, and 101 Places to Party Before You Die, which is a fantastic show that I loved so much. You also might know them from their podcasts, High and Mighty, The Dumbbells, and of course this podcast, Newcomers. But when they come together to dissect and ruin your favorite action movies, they are the Action Boys. With a Z.

What a great introduction. No regrets on that Z. We couldn't think of a better trio to kick off the season. Oh my God, yeah. We're kicking off the season. This is the first episode of the season yeah this is the first episode of the season this is the first one holy okay this is where we're starting you guys are at your blankest slates when it comes to scorsese and yeah we have now watched this film and that's where we're at we we as the action boys all kind of got together before we did this.

And the big question we have for you guys is why? Why are we doing it? Well, no, this is the natural progression from Marvel and Batman to Scorsese. Well, I thought it was hilarious, actually, to do this leap. Because it came to me when I was in the car with my husband, Mike, and we were talking about his movies, Martin Scorsese. And I was like, oh, yeah, I haven't seen any of those. He's like, it'd be so funny if you did newcomers, Martin Scorsese.

And I was like, that's just it's like we'd watch like all really good movie. We've never like really had the experience of sitting down watching some of the greatest movies our country has produced in the last 40 years and isn't that kind of amazing to jump from marvel and batman to this i think it's so great i think it's really fun he is quoted as like saying marvel like ruined movies right didn't he say something like that yeah that makes the rounds well he didn't say they ruined movies he just called them uh not movies he said they're more like rides. Theme park rides.

Which is correct. That's a cool way to put it. If you watch Taxi Driver and Guardians of the Galaxy 3 and you go, which one's a movie? I think you're going to be able to answer that question. And which one's a ride? Taxi Driver's a ride. I mean, he's an 80-year-old man.

He's not going give like the fucking guardians of the galaxy a glowing review problem or watch it ever yeah yeah that movie would kill joe biden if they made joe biden watch guardians of the galaxy 3 it would in a 40x chair so scorsese is is there an element of troll bait to this do you guys kind of want to rile people up a little bit i i don't want that at all. No, I don't want anyone mad at me over Scorsese. No, I want people to be happy that we're doing something else that we haven't seen that is really important. Everything that we've watched, honestly, is important to the culture in one way or another.

So this is another one. And I hope that people give us grace with our opinions as we discover this for the first time. Yeah, I think the internet is a place for grace. So we're going to be fine. Here was my fear in coming into this is that people can-

You have fear. Yeah, people cannot like Scorsese and that's totally fine. I don't feel the need to go online. I mean, his movies are celebrated. People go to him. We could walk out right now and find a theater where a taxi driver's playing somewhere.

He doesn't need to be defended. It's definitely a film bro thing to go after people that don't like him. It's like, who gives a shit? We could walk and find a theater with a taxi driver right now. Yeah, dude. taxi driver right now yeah yeah yeah right now you got you can walk and find a theater with simple shepherd and watch a porno right now if you want they were obsessed with that in this film yeah the porno theater

i think them i haven't watched it in quite a while and and it not only holds up, I think it's more relevant now than it ever has been. It had a lot of stuff that felt really current. I felt like I knew some improvisers who were like this guy. Yeah, I truly watched it, and I was like, I know people like this. Also, is this like an incel? Is this where they got it from? Yes, 100%. It's where they got it from.

They watched it, and they're like, I see myself in that man. That's what I'm gonna do. No joke, there are people who are like, oh shit, yeah, I guess I'm the Travis Bickle of my friend group. And it's like, no, no, he's not the guy you wanna be. That's like when people go, I'm a Carrie, and I'm like, you're a sociopath and narcissist.

How much do you guys know about John Hinckley Jr.? Who's that? So John Hinckley Jr. shot's that? I mean, that's... So John Hinckley Jr. shot Ronald Reagan and said he was inspired by this movie. He did it to impress Joey Foster. Wait, someone shot a...

What? Reagan lived. Someone shot our president? Hold on. Ronald Reagan was shot at. A bullet went inside Ronald Reagan like his first year in office. Luckily, Nancy was there to bend over

and suck the bullet out. Oh my God, Harris. She's got fucking incredible... She's like a fucking vacuum cleaner. She's the most famous sucker in Hollywood. Luckily, Nancy sucked the bullet right out. She saved my life. And she gave me a happy ending to boot.

I'm sure we're going to get into all of it. She blew me. She didn't suck the bullet out. She blew me so hard it popped out. John Hinckley Jr. tried to blow me away and Nancy blows me every day best orgasm of my life Nancy popping the bullet out of me

John Hinckley Jr. specifically referenced the movie Taxi Driver cut his hair into a fucking mohawk and was doing this to impress Jodie Foster did he know Jodie Foster? no only from watching Taxi Driver he was a stalker

he was like Travis Bickle for real. And this was a note he wrote to her. Over the past seven months, I've left you- And you bought this? Like you have the original? He's wearing John Hinckley's hat. Hey, Lauren, you can buy his art. He makes music.

There's fans of him out there. He lives in Brooklyn now. He's out of jail. I wrote his art. What are we doing? He's on the Herald team. Over the past seven months, I've left you dozens of poems,

letters, and love messages in faint hope that you could develop an interest in me. Although we talked on the phone a couple of times, I never had the nerve to simply approach you and introduce myself. The reason I'm going ahead with this attempt now is because I cannot wait any longer to impress you. John Hinckley Jr.

Let's see. Oh, no. Okay, that's wild. I would never be impressed by someone shooting somebody on my behalf. I'd be like, ugh. It's good to say that. Why don't you buy me flowers? Just get out of this now.

You guys are public figures. You know what, fuck it. I'm going to go on record. I don't want anybody shooting anybody on my behalf. Don't shoot anyone for me. Me neither. I'll say it too. I feel so bad for Jodie Foster because she's

endlessly asked about this and it's very clear she doesn't want to fucking talk about it. She gets so fucking mad. Why would she ever want to talk about it? Some crazy man shoot someone for her? Don't ask me about it. They found out during the Academy Awards in 1980.

So Scorsese was there for Raging Bull. De Niroese was there for Raging Bull. De Niro won that year for Raging Bull. Spoiler. And Scorsese was in the bathroom and all these giant guys. And Scorsese's like five foot two. So like all these huge bodyguards.

And he was like, wow, the Academy Awards really took security seriously this year. And then later he found out they were all FBI agents that were there because the fucking president just got shot. And De Niro told him, he was like, yeah, I guess they shot Reagan because

the taxi driver was crazy. It'd be funny to go back in time just to help Hinckley aim better. Fucking had the HIV crisis off at the pass with the fucking just Hinkley a little higher. Hey, I like it would be great to have unions still. So could you imagine being like Jody? Could you imagine being Jody Foster and doing like press for NIAID? And you're doing like uh

you know like she's won a bunch of academy awards and shit and you're doing like a junket and like screen fling like ask you about the fucking john hinkley jr it's terrible yeah that is that sucks no it's so depressing well okay are you are you guys all deeply familiar with all of these films that we're gonna watch i've probably seen all his movies. I haven't seen all his documentaries, but I've seen probably all his movies. I'm missing a couple of his key movies that I still have yet to see. You know what I wanted to tell Gabrus about last time we were going to record this? Because I bet you Gabrus hasn't seen it.

It's great. It's American Boy, a documentary that Scorsese made right after Taxi Driver. About his parents? Starring the guy who plays the gun dealer. You know, the gun scene where he's buying all the guns and he's laying them out. And then at the end, he's like, do you want pills? I got pills. I can give you a Cadillac.

I got the pink slip. That guy used to be a road manager for Neil Diamond. And he has all these crazy, he's from Long Island. He's just a great storyteller and Scorsese after Taxi Driver just shot a documentary with him and it's incredible

you know the scene in Pulp Fiction where he stabs the adrenaline shot into Uma Thurman get ready for the Quentin Tarantino season you're gonna like that. It's from this documentary. And it's awesome.

That's crazy. Lauren and I just going, oh! Okay, so we'll do Tarantino next. Yeah. Catch up to all these points you're making. So, let's all give a quick one to two sentences on our experience watching this

movie like if you guys you already seen it i i'm sure but what did you feel watching at this time i've seen it a bunch this was the first time when i put it on i managed to go like wow lauren and nicole are watching this for the first time what's it like watching it through their eyes and then immediately Travis Bickle uses like four racial slurs for black people and I was like oh this is intense to watch through Nicole's eyes okay this is a little

different but I was like okay let's see how they would like it he's like blah blah and I'm like whoa a lot of racism in this movie a lot of racism in the world yeah it's not in the world. It's just in Taxi Driver. It was like a little unsettling,

but then I was like, oh yeah, I have to think about the time period. Like, you know, when was this made? This was made in... 76. 76. Yeah. So I guess it was more,

I don't know, people did it more and they recorded it and they were okay with showing other people. It was just really wild. There were so many moments where I was like, oh, no. Why? I know.

But I did like it. I thought it was shot well. And I liked the story, even though it made me uncomfortable at times. Yeah, me too. I thought it was, I mean, I really enjoyed the movie and I was really excited that it was a movie that I could enjoy. And it wasn't three hours long. Also, I was like, wow, it's like a normal length, a normal length. And I, uh, I was really surprised by most of it. Like I didn't know where, where it was going most of the time. And then the, the um his character truly did remind me of people that i've met and i was kind of like this is actually unsettling thinking about this little apartment he's in and his little plans he's having and what's what his perspective is on this woman and like his attempt to date sybil shepherd and it's like gross and then the whole jodie foster

i was really afraid that was going to turn into a a bad thing yeah with her which it already was but i mean with him and i was glad it didn't but then i was like what a confusing ending which i would love to dissect the ending's wild but also harvey kytel has a a coke nail and i love that it was painted red i hated really see that he had a coke i hated his nail that was one of my least favorite parts of the movie that it was painted red. I hated his nail. So you could really see that he had a coke nail. I hated his nail. That was one of my least favorite parts of the movie. It was such a good detail. He had such a great look. I mean, they, because in the script, the pimp is black.

And it changed the whole ending. So it wouldn't be Travis Bickle killing all black people. It was much more. What? It was much more. The ending was he was going to kill all black people? Yes, he way more yes he was way more racist even more than he is in the movie um so harvey kytel found a pimp to to work with for weeks and they rented a stage and the two of them would do improvs together where the pimp would be the prostitute

and heart and harvey would pretend to be the pimp and then they would switch roles and i would kill to have that footage of them doing scenes together as like teaching harvey kytel how to be a pimp how to sweet talk that. His look, that he had Stanger's hat, that wife, the wife eater shirt. He looked fucking awesome. Stanger's hat. He, he,

he fucking wrote that monologue. He says to her, and he said he wanted to do it like a Barry White interlude. Oh. It was so gross when he's dancing with her. I didn't like it.

I felt sick, and I felt so sad because the girl character obviously is so manipulated. But I gotta say, Harvey Keitel was one of my first crushes growing up. What? Wow. Where did you from?

You should watch the piano then. From Sister Act. Sister Act. Oh, shit. Have you seen the piano? I love him in Sister Act. No, I've never seen piano. He does full frontal.

You get to see his tongue. I get to see his tongue? You get to see it? Supposedly in Eyes Wide Shut, he originally was in the movie Eyes Wide Shut. He was working on it for months. Yeah, he left because he didn't like Kubrick and all his takes is what he says.

But I also heard that he might have like pulled his dick out during the orgy scene. Oh my God, wait. That movie. Not my army. At the i at the like start of the pandemic i was like i'm gonna watch all the classic movies and i put that on and i watched it and then like i never watched another movie my whole plan fell apart i liked it remove your clothes uh i am watching it this time here's's terrifying. I was struck about how there's elements that you can relate to in this movie.

Because I always understood how abstract, you know, the concept of loneliness and it being a meditation on that. But this time watching it, I was like, oh, this is a juiced up version of like relatable feelings, you know? Well, that's what's so good about it. Yeah, absolutely. you know well that's what's so good about it is that it tricks you into and and also so catholic about it of like hey i want you to really relate to this complete psychopath and then once he becomes such a full-blown psychopath he loses you you'll be mad at yourself like you'll be like oh shit but i was kind there were things i sort of empathized with but then there and then everyone's praising him so then it's really complicated.

Well, yeah, then, and that's why the movie is also completely misunderstood of like the ironic ending at the end. Most people were like, no, he's a hero.

Yeah, no, I mean, obviously not. I've seen this movie, Tiff's seen this movie a few times. I was watching it with Tiffany and at the, at the end of the movie,

she, he's like, well, he technically never does anything to Jodie Foster. Right. And I'm like, no. And he goes, so he's a good guy. And at the, after the end of the movie, she, he's like, well, he technically never does anything to Jodie Foster. Right. And I'm like, no. And he goes,

so he's a good guy. And I was like, it's a little grayer than that, babe. Wait, I have a question for everyone. Yes. Women in the chat relate to him at all.

Relate to him. Like, like Ryan, you're saying you found part parts of him relatable um no i it was i don't think i related but i was able to go well he can't sleep he's got and then i was kind of like maybe he has a mental illness or maybe he's just an insomniac but then the amount of the lack of sleep is taking him to this other place but um no i i saw him as a pathological liar and manipulative asshole and i wanted nothing to do with him but i liked watching yeah yeah i found it to be super

entitled like the fact that he just stared at a woman was like i'm gonna take her out takes everyone and then takes her to a fucking porn and then is mad and goes i don't know about movies and suddenly it's not his fault that he brought her to a porn and then is like stalking her i was like i get how he got there but it is very wild that that happened that moment when she goes i have the record already is so it's so funny it's so good the movie there's a lot of funny moments in the movie because scorsese is just like he's they're attracted to comedy but like it's so there's so many dark funny moments like that is so where she's like i already got it and i love that she was being nice to him what did we all do and she's like i already have this piece of shit you idiot

albert brooke she and albert Albert Brooks are in a whole different movie, which is so fucking, such a great juxtaposition between where they're in a romantic comedy and then this fucking psycho just shows up. And I would actually love to see the flip side of this movie where it's just like, or like an episode of some like dramedy or something where one episode, like a fucking Travis pickle,

like tries to ask out the main character. And it's like, this guy's fucking nuts. He put his Uber out front and it's just been staring at us for an hour. You're going to go on a date. There are people who watch this movie and go, Albert Brooks, stop cock blocking my man

travis bickle like that's so problematic so funny that scene where he's like just talking on the phone and it's just like let's not fight how about we don't pay for the buttons yeah we are the people is different than we are the people how about we don't pay for the buttons? He's so important in that movie. And famously, Paul Schrader approached him, the writer of the film, afterwards and said, thank you, because he improvised a lot. And he's like, thank you. I didn't ever know who that character was.

And then you brought it to life. But I like it because he's showing a healthy way to be after love somebody clearly loves Betsy Sybil Shepard she's not into him but he's able to have a working relationship and even kind of show some chivalry but not expect anything out of it so it's great to have that it's like oh this is this is a healthy way to pine after somebody you wrote you work with but then understand that it's not appropriate if she's not into you. But I just wanted to screw down on my connecting or empathizing. No, no, no, no.

We're leaving it how it was. I think empathy is a good word. Relating maybe is the wrong word, but empathize I think is the correct word. Relating in the sense that you could be like, I opened up Facebook today and I noticed friends I don't care about posted about an interaction they had.

This fucking scum didn't invite me, even though I wouldn't care about posted about an interaction they had. This fucking scum didn't invite me, even though I wouldn't have showed up if they had invited me, but it bothers me they're out there having fun. One day the world will wash away this filthy scum that didn't invite me to an event that I don't care about. I'll tell

you what, I've been in Vegas for three days. Walk the fucking casino floor, you'll relate to Travis Bickle in a fucking heartbeat. Well, I do think everybody lies to themselves in similar ways that he does, where it's like, no more pills, no more junk food. Like, I gotta work out. And then he's just popping pills and fucking eating sugary cereal. Yeah.

I've literally been in that apartment. I don't know why. I've been in there. Same. In New York, I've gone home with gentlemen who live just like that. Also, he kept drinking Coke while he was trying to go to sleep. And I was like, that's full sugar. And that's what I mean.

Hey, buddy, it's not going to work. What's his name? It's not Pickles. Travis Pickles. He's from Rugrats. It's the Rugrats extended universe. Pickles? Tommy Pickles's dad.

Travis Pickles. He's got a dumb name. You talking to me, Angelica? We have a new segment. Oh, my. Our new segment is Spotted. We're going to see if today's movie has any of the following celebrity sightings one of marty's boys recurring actors that he works with all the time robert de niro harvey

kytel joe pesci leonardo dicaprio oh marty's mom katherine scorsese and marty himself i wouldn't know what marty looked like he was in it he's in it twice obviously Robert De Niro is in the film Harvey Keitel is in the film his mom was his mom in the movie she got cut oh he cut his own mom out wow he's in it for one second at the end she's um when there was you see like all

the newspaper clippings uh-huh she's supposed to be the mom both his parents are in the in the newspaper. But she wasn't one of the sex workers in the brothel, and she was cut out of it. She was the original choice for sport. Mom, you.

His mom is incredible. Oh, yeah. Wait till you guys see Goodfellas. When you guys see Goodfellas, it's her best performance. She's in Goodfellas he did a documentary about his parents called Italian American and they are, like she is just the most charismatic, funny

person. She steals scenes from Joe Pesci and Robert De Niro. I mean, she's like incredible. And she's an amazing painter as well. Wow. Your guys are in love with her. You guys fucking love Catherine Scorsese. God, I wish I could have had her make me a big bowl of pasta. God, I would

have fucking loved that. I actually asked her out one time and took her to a porno. It did not go well. She had seen it already. It's too performative, Ryan. Nicole, there's a part where there's a guy watching his wife have an affair in the window yes that's martin scorsese in that yeah also when they first show betsy she walks by him when she's in the white dress so that was supposed to be his cameo and

then the actor that he had for that scene in the cab dropped out and he just stepped in and did it and he said de niro really helped him because he didn't feel confident as an actor and he he that you know when he tells him to keep the meter running yeah um uh de niro wouldn't do it and then so they stopped the scene he's like, you got to make me. Oh. And then he's doing some Stella Adler shit on. Yeah. And that's why he's like, keep the fucking meter running. And he's like really getting, and he's like, he did, it did work. He got a performance out of me.

I did the scene. I didn't want to do the scene. I got a bunch of offers after that. So I appeared in some other films after that, but I didn't want to do the scene. I had to sit on a phone booth to do it. I'm so small. And he just looks ahead. Then I'm not turning around. I'm trying to do the scene

I'm nervous about the filming we're over budget this will happen even more when you guys do your Quentin Tarantino series but this is an instance where a director puts himself in the film

and says the N word on camera in a movie he's directing and act it makes sense for the character in this movie to be racist especially about the situation but it's funny to all right well he's not here today

i'll play that guy it's like okay well there is a thing about the the like the guy is such a loser yeah that like in classic loser fashion he wants to try to find someone below him which makes him racist right which is i think they're touching on also with scorsese's character it's like no like this it can't be my fault that all this shit's happening to me there must be some other out there that is doing this to me even travis bickle doesn't give him like the like the i'm also a racist interact like he's just like ignores him too he's like you're pushing it too much for me buddy he's like yeah this is too racist even for me but if it was a white guy that his wife was cheating with he i don't think he would have even said the ethnicity which is a very curious thing yeah yeah this white motherfuckers up there fucking my wife yeah

yeah i don't think he would say that. It is horror. Fucking honky up there. Wait, so does Martin Scorsese, is he in all of his own movies? And does he say the N-word in all of them? Not on camera. No. Just in Video Village, just whispering it to himself right before action.

It's an actor's secret. No, he's in a lot of his movies in small little parts. Not in like giving himself meaty acting role parts, but like, you know, he's like a guy wheeled in a spotlight in After Hours and shit. Like he has like small little fun roles. He reads a great thing at the end of Killers of the Flower Moon. Oh, hell yeah. I think that's one of the few times the cameo lifts the movie overall.

The meta idea of him doing the talk at the end of Flowers is like bananas. It's so good. We'll get to that in 10 weeks. Are you guys doing Flowers? He shows an actual cameo that he did for somebody. Hey, it's Marty here. I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday. It says here that you're

into throwing pottery. He's so into cameos that he just joined cameo. He's like, I'll just do that. It's him and Stanley from The Office are the highest rated guys on there. Yeah, that guy makes so much money. Alright, we guy makes so much money. All right, we're going to take a quick break, and we will be back with more about Taxi Driver after this.

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it was written by paul schrader a frequent score stacy collaborator and the director of a whole bunch of movies like 1978's blue collar starring richryor, 1980's American Gigolo starring Richard Gere, and 2017's First Reformed starring Ethan Hawke, who's like my favorite. Should have stuck with the Richard movies. I've seen none of them. If you like drunk men writing in journals, you should watch all the Paul Schrader movies.

You guys should check out some of them. American Gigolo. Yeah, American Gigolo is very good. Both stylistically and the music. Yeah, super sexy. Richard Gere is the lead, and he's at peak sexy gear. Okay. He's in sixth sexy gear.

There's also Paul Schrader is a true psycho. Yeah. And he's dealing with all kinds of weird repressed sexual stuff he was a calvinist a dutch calvinist and so he's constantly you know reconciling with his own religion his loss of faith his sexuality he lived his whole life afraid he was going to go to hell and there's tons of stories about him like playing uh russian roulette and trying like in a jacuzzi and trying to get other people to get involved with it whoa all right He outdoes you guys as newcomers. He didn't see a movie until he was 21 years old. Any movie. Wait, really? Yeah. Yeah. Because of his like parents strict religion. You know,

this is the first time I saw taxi drivers since I moved to Los Angeles and Schrader wrote it in Los Angeles. So he was just driving around like sad and depressed, staying up all night. And that's what made him feel like a taxi driver. And it's the most LA I've like, I felt a lot more of Los Angeles in this movie than I realized before. It does have a bit of that. I always think Times Square is like the scariest place on earth back then.

It's like everything bad is happening and now it's like an M&M's store and it's like there's no cars allowed. We talk about this a lot on Action Boys but man 70s New York looks fucking good on camera. It looks the best.

It looks so cool. I love that and I love seeing that but it also just looks like it would be like the worst place to live actually um going off stanger saying relatable moments did you guys relate to when the cabbies are all sitting around i felt like that was like an action boys recording when wizard is making up a story about like sex, it's just laughably ridiculous. On this viewing... Give me a $100 tip.

On this viewing, I like Wizard more. I didn't really pay attention. He sings, Peter Boyle's character Wizard, sings in this movie, and I was so stoked to dive in. I never really paid attention to those cronies. It's him. Scorsese is great with improv.

He lets actors do a lot. I mean, obviously, the you talking to me thing was improvised. Everybody talks about that. But all of Peter Boyle's stuff was him kind of riffing in Scorsese's hotel room. He was like, hey, I have some ideas about the character. Can I walk you through them? And he just kind of made up that monologue, and then they put that in the movie wow that's cool it's it's so important because it's the only real time that uh that bickle is vulnerable at all and kind

of asking for help and the poor wizard tries to help him but like i don't even know what the fuck you're talking about yeah and like bickle is just so incapable of any kind of like human reaction i mean he's even somebody that's trying to help him he can't even fucking take it it just you know i don't know he's like man i'm just getting so sick of it i just want to fucking kill everybody and wizard's like well you know gotta talk to somebody maybe drink some water um okay we're gonna jump into the plot a bit we can obviously uh keep adding our thoughts but just to get so because we have many listeners who are not going to watch this film and they're only going to learn about it through us okay that's a nightmare that's amazing i just have

to assume that's true right nicole yeah a lot of people don't watch the movies and just listen to our beautiful thoughts so okay so in new york city tra City, Travis Bickle, Robert De Niro, gets a job driving cabs on the graveyard shift to cope with his chronic insomnia and loneliness. He also frequents adult movie theaters, but doesn't seem to jerk off in them, which I appreciate. He sure doesn't. And he keeps a diary chronicling how he's feeling

and trying to feel better. Driving around the city, he witnesses crime and urban decay, which generally disgusts him. Someday a real rain will come and wash all this scum off the city, he witnesses crime and urban decay, which generally disgusts him. Someday a real rain will come and wash all this scum off the streets, he writes in his journal. And I just like got annoyed. I was like, why do you care so much

about the scumminess of New York? Drive your cab and have a nice time. I think the porn theater too is like, that's all that's open. So that's all you can go to. The porn thing was only, because it was like that's all that's open so that's all he like on like like that's what i thought i thought the porn thing was only because it was like that time of day yeah right but he then takes that girl on a date there and i'm like you simply don't know about what a theater is like that's when you realize how fucking totally insane he is when he's like yeah he's like really stupid

he's like this is where we see movies i don't know another pictures how was i supposed to know i do know schrader was like schrader made a point of like he he does not know anything he is unpleased like he doesn't know any actors he doesn't know when she brings up chris christopherson she's like i don't know who that is like he's clueless about all because he's like not plugged into society whatsoever, because he's just this fucking weirdo. And that's such a funny angle for someone to hate everything about society,

but also just be absolutely know nothing about it. Take in nothing. It's so indicative of his hollow rottedness. He's like, I hate everything about the, yeah, exactly. I also think he wants it too. And again, that's where the Calvinism can kind of find its way in. It's like there's this pious, like, I'm above all this scum and disgust in the streets. But also, he's watching people fuck on screen.

He wants to be around it. He just goes fucking in the back of his cab. Yeah, he's like, I got to clean the jizz every night. That was wild. and the blood sometimes i was like what are you letting people do in the back of your cab dude hey we all couldn't relate to him not jerking off in the theater get your hog out rest in peace okay okay next we meet betsy civil shepherd a campaign volunteer for Senator and presidential candidate Charles.

What, it was Palentine, which was... Yeah. That's a weird name to me. Yes, okay. It was from Star Wars. Palpatine is the emperor's name, yeah. Oh, Palpatine. Okay, Travis fixates on her,

watching her through his cab window. Then he goes into her office to ask her out for coffee at the diner. Betsy confesses that she feels a special connection to Travis. But on their next date, Travis takes Betsy to a porn theater.

She is repulsed and leaves. And though Travis tries to reconcile with her, it don't work. This sets Travis off and he storms into Betsy's office, berates her, and gets kicked out.

That was so scary. That was so scary. And I also hated how he manipulated her at the coffee to be like nobody understands you you're sad and i can tell you're sad and i'm like i actually don't think she is bitch like she seems fine i would like to just interject that sybil shepherd is absolutely fucking stunning in this role she's so beautiful she's she's got fucking height she's a rebounder she's strong on the inside i don't know what you're talking about she's a rebounder she's good in the she's big yeah but she's like a six man that

could get her return or like her jersey retired you know that's what i said when i watched it de niro is de niro is so handsome oh he's so hot it's so perfect for the movie because it does make sense that sybil would go like okay yeah well that's me with this guy that's part of the issue with the movie is that he's so cool and good looking that then people misinterpret the movie right because you're like he's got to be the good guy yeah he puts that mohawk on though you're like okay this guy's a bad dude he looks as he says scorsese says that um the the they no one knew what the movie was gonna be i mean can you imagine showing those porn scenes to studio executives before they were able to oil out the like actual nudity and they're like this is the fucking movie you're

bringing us so like everybody doesn't know if anybody if this thing's even gonna get released but he says that de niro was the only one who was like, oh, this is going to be a big thing. And he was like, especially when he had the mohawk on. So De Niro was able to see himself and be like, oh, yeah, this is an iconic look that people are going to be talking about forever. It's a good Halloween costume. I also hated how he...

I was him for Halloween one year. That makes so much sense. You were? Yeah. You probably saw me. I was at a UCB party. It was at a UCB party party i remember yeah probably did yeah this is funny a little mohawk i guess he wants to be in the army

he's an army man good costume army man bye can i tell you people on the subway thought it was hilarious yeah got it rave reviews i dressed as palentine for like a whole month nobody noticed Can I tell you, people on the subway thought it was hilarious. Yeah. Got it. Rave reviews. I dressed as Palantine for like a whole month. Nobody noticed. I thought it was so funny when Palantine's like to try to get in with Travis. He's like, I learn a lot more from limo rides than from taxi drive rides than I do from limo rides. That was ridiculous.

I was like, what is happening? And then they shook hands and I was like, what, are we friends now? I love that moment when Palantin's like, yeah, I love talking to my constituents. And he's like, I'm just sick. I'm sick of this fucking city. Easy Palantin being like, oh God.

Kind of like, it's like meeting a podcast fan. Huge fan of Action Boys. Oh, cool. It's like, yeah, you ever want to just take a submachine gun to your workplace? You're like, oh, all right, man. Well, well see you around thanks for your eight dollars a month i'll see you later in modern therapy speak in this diner that we're talking about does he does he love bomb her he kind of love bombs her right gas lights yeah yeah yeah i mean it is it's like

he's convincing her that he can see her and like it's totally like saying that she's special and only he can see it and that other guy doesn't get it yeah it's a move that as i understand it a lot of directors use on actors uh to try to get in with like get either a performance or then end up being in a relationship with an actor that they have yeah interesting that's how i ended up sucking off john mackie peter bogdan after a funny or die video he's like i can tell you're sad you're like i am i just got 75 dollars in a bag of doritos they paid me a pizza i am sad in speaking to you know, why he takes her to this, like, porno movie, like, trying to understand that, Paul Schrader will say, like, it's because he's stuck in this perpetual cycle of loneliness and he wants to blow it up. Like, he wants, he knows he doesn't, he wants to either take her down or he wants her to go away, you know, like, because he can't, he can't accept. He can't handle.

Yeah, the intimacy or being and i think it fucking surprises him like he picks somebody unobtainable and then she's like fuck i'll go out with you and he's like what he's like he takes you to a porn how do i blow this up yeah and it's also the like they were saying earlier it's the only theater he knows it's the only thing open he doesn't know shit so it exists on like all these different kind of weird levels it's cool yeah my record player's broken i don't know i don't it exists on like all these different kind of weird levels. It's cool. Yeah. My record player is broken. I don't know. I don't really do music.

Once you went to go listen to it at her place, I'm like, you better go to her place. That is such a funny idea to give a girl on a first date a record and go, we should go to your place and listen to this. A record that she told you about. Yeah. That's from like five years ago. Silver Tongue Devil came out in like 71 or something. Wait, did she mention it to him first?

Yes. Or no? Oh, wow. She was like, you remind me of Chris Christopherson. Oh, and then that's the record. Have you ever heard the record? It's the Pilgrim, chapter 33. That is such a perfect bad gift, though.

It's like, I was listening. It's like, but if you were listening, you would know that i've heard that a million times because i probably own it um so i don't i don't know i don't my record player is broke here you go hey hey i got you a picture of your parents remember that blender you have that you're telling me about that you liked. Here you go. I got you one. I bought you one. So watching the city through his cab window every night, Travis confides in a fellow taxi driver named Wizard Peter Boyle. And it's the dad on Everybody Loves Raymond. I was trying to figure out what show he was on about his violent thoughts.

So in an attempt to find an outlet for his anger, Travis begins a program of intense physical training. I think he does like five sit-ups. I don't know. Yeah, he does five sit-ups, two pull-ups. Doesn't have a lot of body fat. He's definitely strong looking. He buys four handguns from

a black market gun dealer named Easy Andy played by Stephen Prince and at home Travis practices drawing the weapons in his mirror. I hate it. This was very scary to me and modifies one to allow him to hide and quickly deploy it from his sleeve. He begins attending Palantine's rallies to scope. What the hell's going on here? to me and modifies one to allow him to hide and quickly deploy it from his sleeve he begins attending palentine's rallies to scope deploy the hell's going on here wikipedia

one night travis shoots and kills a man attempting to rob a convenience store that was also one of the most racist and that was the most fucked up parts of the movie yeah yeah that's i'm like yeah you really saved the day here i think it was actually nothing was gonna happen probably and that guy would have run away with like 20 dollars the and then the owner was like i'll figure it out and i was like what that's the most fucked up part when he's like it's all good go i'll i'll take care of it like this happens all the fucking time the shit then beats the shit out of him. I was like, he's already been shot. That made me sick. And it was so like,

is this what the 70s in New York, like where it's like, it's lawless and like you can just leave and this guy's going to just dispose of this person somehow. And it's- I think it's also building on the loneliness factor. Like, so he starts acting out

so people will notice him and then he fucking kills somebody. And the guy's like, this never happened. and he's just like what okay and then he keeps going out in his cab more and he well he also yeah he learned like no no consequences whatsoever for what he did there either so now he feels even more greenlit into doing whatever fucked up shit he wants to do it's impossible to watch i i wanted to ask you, what do you think of when he's on the phone and he's trying to get her back and the camera moves away?

Because this is a famous thing that people talk about when the camera leaves him on the phone booth and then shows the empty hallway. Oh, well, I feel like he wasn't even talking to her. I mean, honestly, it was like so, to me, that was just a weird, like she's going to answer and talk to him and do all this?

I didn't think he was talking to her. I thought he was, like, leaving a message. But to him, leaving a message felt like he was speaking to her. I think this is, like, before the leave a message era. So, like, he's calling her at work and, like, she's just picking up the phone and, like, you can't shake this guy. I mean, this is before you could screen your calls. I bet you he got so insane that she had to start going to a different desk like i bet you got to that level and this is the first and i think scorsese says like it's it was just so painful to watch that

the camera can't even watch it oh wow interesting which is it's also the cool thing about Scorsese is that he, and I don't know if any other director can really do this. He is able to make you think like the camera. So you start to see from Travis's point of view throughout the movie, which kind of freaks you out of like, God, why is he fucking looking at this guy like this? And then he starts to almost give the camera personality, how it looks at objects and stuff in a way that nobody ever really does. I was struck how many lines are done without the actor in the frame. Yeah, yeah.

Where he's like, people are talking and he's looking at a fucking plop, plop, fizz, fizz, like fucking Alka-Seltzer thing. That's what was refreshing to to me you know having watched now 4 000 hours of everything from star wars to marvel that like it was like oh there's like just interesting choices being made some direction or being artistic yeah like interesting i agreed and like the um the dp on this this the film the director of photography was saying his whole crew had a hard time

because he would be like you know Scorsese would be like and then just move out and leave the frame have the actor leave the frame and they'd be like what the fuck are you talking about and he's like trying to tell a story there and I even took it this isn't what they what he says about it but I took it as like this whole movie

instead of being in his point of view you're almost witnessing it all happening and then it makes you complicit so it's like okay i have to co-sign everything that's happening here and to me this is like right when he's really snapping and he's going to really start stalking or enacting out and this is like your opportunity as his accomplice to leave. It's an empty hallway. And then you don't. You fucking stay there with him. Hold on. I'll stay with him. I love that.

He cares about Jodie Foster. Dude, the moment when he goes back to Jodie Foster, he's like, remember I was in the cat? Like that's. And she doesn't remember, which I was like, yeah. Of course not. Her life is a horror every day. She's traumatized. She's incredible in this movie.

She's such an amazing actor. She's one of my favorite actors of all time. She's so amazing. I love her in everything. And this blew my mind, honestly, because I'm like, how do you even know how to do this at 12? How do you know how to be a 12-year-old sex worker? She worked with Scorsese on Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore,

which came out before this, and she's also incredible in that. She's so good in that. As a kind of girl from the wrong side of the tracks, bad influence, and she's so magnetic. You're like, wow, she's incredible. Her cigarette work is bananas for a 12-year-old.

Even the outfits and everything, I was just so 12 year old. Even like the outfits and everything. I was just so impressed by her. Well, the outfits were intense because they were like slutty and childish at the same time. Yeah. And I didn't like that. But that's like, oh, this is a dangerous, disgusting combo. But just to jump back to him saying like, don't you remember me? How many interactions have you

guys had like that with like a paris where someone comes up and is like dude hey what's up remember six years ago i was the guy who tweeted that i was visiting long island and you liked it and i'm like oh well nice to meet you man well pleasure see you around jesus fucking christ people and i felt so real like he just showed up he was like I was at your live show when you did Munch Madness and she's only interacting with creeps her whole life is weird old men they all kind of blend together at a certain

point and yellow cabs there's a million of those in New York City thank you very much Long Island guy 21 I can count on your $5 next month. So this is when he starts to notice Iris, who's Jodie Foster,

12-year-old sex worker on his night shifts. He poses as a client in order to get her alone and tries to convince her to leave her pimp sport, Harvey Keitel. Later, Travis cuts his hair into a mohawk, attends a rally where his plans to assassinate Palantine are thwarted by Secret Service agents who see him unzipping his jacket and putting his hand inside.

He escapes and makes it back home. Okay, the part where he's talking to the Secret Service guy, he's like, I think I could be a Secret Service agent. Oh, weird. And the guy is, of course, clocking him and going like, he's a threat. Something's happening here. But he's like, oh, really? What's that like?

He's like, why don't you write down your name and address? Your fingerprint? His street is like Henry Krinkle. K-R-I. And you forgot some digits here. Yeah, he's like, oh, sorry. I got that confused with my phone number.

My zip code and phone number got confused. But was he trying to be the weirdest person? Like, what was he trying to do? He was, like, casing the security. So when he assassinates Palantine, like, he'll be able to know who's coming after him. He was trying to say, like, oh, there was somebody over here that was shady or whatever. And so it would be like throwing him off the scent of him. But he got in his own way because he's such a fucking freak goofball.

The shorter guy, so the two secret security guys, there's the really tall guy and the shorter guy. The shorter guy was a Vietnam vet and was the one that told Scorsese and De Niro that guys on missions in Vietnam would shave their head into the Mohawk. So that's where they got the idea from that guy. Especially when something real bad was going to go down. And so you wouldn't even fucking talk to him.

Here's something to think. So as you guys are doing these movies, I would say with Scorsese, especially everything is in there for some kind of reason. And sometimes he doesn't even fully know like what it is. Like I saw this in a film by Godard and I don't know how, why it made me feel this way, but it me feel away but like so everything like every shot in there like there's something behind it and so you can always ask yourself especially if it's

weird like why why is he showing me this like what is what is this and it's worth kind of screwing down on and you can make it more fun for yourself because even if you're watching something that you that is a miss for you there's usually some kind kind of reason. It's a shot that's in there for some reason or something that feels a little against the grain and that can make his stuff kind of fun. Living in Scorsese's themes is so much more appealing than living in various people's interpretations of Batman. So it's going to be so rich for you guys

to find these commonalities amongst the movies. And yet we still found stuff to like in them. I know. Of course. I like about 60% of the Batman movies. I can safely say that. But I like 99% of the Scorsese movies. Finding all these commonalities, stuff like Catholicism and all these patterns he always has.

I'm curious as you guys pick up on stuff like, you know, I'm curious. I'm excited to listen to episode 10 and find out what you guys have picked up on and are seeing now in Killers of the Flower Moon. Because the dude has been like, you know, making bangers for like half a century. He's been like relevant. It is crazy that he was good straight from the jump. Like you watch his short films and it's like, oh yeah, the guy's amazing.

He's, so giving you guys more information on him, like he's a true virtuoso and like cinema fucking freak. It's all, and he has like this cinema fluency. It's all accessible to him. So as a kid, he's like an- Like Paisan. Yeah, he's an asthmatic kid. So all he does is go to movies

and he becomes obsessed at a young age and just goes to movie after movie after movie and not only that he can like access you know specific shots and reference you know foreign films american films and he kind of loves it all and then he studies it and then from the very beginning he's just really fucking good at it and he's found this weird way not, not even a weird way, but he's managed to make very personal films throughout his entire career. And if you look, even when he is like, oh, I'm going to sell out, he does a legacy sequel to The Hustler

and makes The Color of Money. Or his big supernatural movie is Shutter Island. It's like he never, he's able to do this shit. He can't make, not make a personal movie despite himself. Cool. Yeah. Fun fact,

him and De Niro accidentally grew up, like unbeknownst to them, they grew up like a block and a half away from each other in the same neighborhood in New York.

Wait, who did? De Niro and Scorsese. They were at like neighborhood dances together and stuff. Oh my God be that's cute and and scorsese's loyal to his like groups of guys uh his his actors so you'll see a lot of repeats and i'm like like get pumped for like you know a lot of uh leo dio a lot of deniro a lot of these like a lot of fucking greats yeah and crew like starting from raging bull he works with the same uh editor for every single movie yeah thelma schoonmaker

she's some some people uh she's a legend uh film editor but everyone's always kind of surprised especially back in the day that marty's editor is a woman and one time she was asked in an interview thelma how do you handle editing all these violent movies of marty's and she goes they're not violent till i edit them and it was just like the fucking coolest fucking response that is cool huge yeah and like you guys as actors would like to work with them because he fucking loves actors he loves people that can improvise and add and that are funny. And that are funny.

Well, that's our goal with this. We want to get into Marty's next movie. You just get him as a guest on the podcast. We've tried to be in every franchise we've talked about. Yeah, and it honestly worked out for us. I'm open to all Tyler Perry films as well as Star Wars the angle may be through his youngest

daughter do you know Francesca Scorsese well we've seen I mean I've seen her I've seen her tiktoks yeah yeah and he'll do her tiktoks that's cool yeah that's his daughter let's get her on let's get her on maybe we could be in his daughter's tiktok we tried I hope I book one of his daughter's tiktoks well let's get her on. Maybe we could be in his daughter's TikTok. We tried. I hope I book one of his daughter's TikToks.

Well, let's finish this plot so that we can, the people who are listening who are like, what happened next can hear what happened. Yeah, okay. So that evening, Travis goes to see Iris again, planning to shoot Sport. He enters the building and engages in a shootout with Sport and one of Iris' clients right in front of her

while she begs Travis to stop. This was wild. This is shot several times but manages to kill the two men and the bouncer outside travis tries to commit suicide this shocked me but is out of bullets severely injured he slumps on the couch next to sobbing iris as police respond to the scene a delirious travis uh imitate shooting himself in the head using his finger which is covered in blood that was scary all of it was wild no when he was trying to shoot himself i thought he shot to like test if there were bullets like not at himself and i'm like you're wasting the one if you do want that one like is it i didn't did that happen or am i like mixing it or did he do it at his head first i think he did it at his head first and then to the guy.

That's so intense. You're just going to ruin this girl's life. What are you doing? So many movies don't end anymore. You know what I mean? They kind of are like, well, of course, we're going to do 19 more of these movies. So Samuel L. Jackson shows up and is like, Travis, we need you in the Avengers. We're all dust particles now.

Bickle and the Incredible Hulk? Hell yeah, dude. We've got a taxi driver. Driving for the Avengers now. We will wipe Loki and the scum off the earth. Travis, leave Falcon alone. We will wipe Loki and the scum off the earth. Travis, leave Falcon alone.

Man, that weird point of view shot of Falcon is really disturbing. But this movie ends so strongly and so intensely that, like, there's an ending for every character and then, like, a weird kind of global ending for the viewer where you, like... And the idea that this guy was one minute from killing,

from blowing his head off and dying there. Also, arguably, her life is not going to be that great. She's going to be completely fucked up. Yeah, she's going to be even more fucked up witnessing all this murder. You almost kill yourself and then you don't and then you become a fucking hero. Well, there's that great line where he calls,

when he's trying to be hip, like, you think you're hip? You're not hip. And then he calls Sport a killer, and she's like, Sport didn't kill anybody, and he had just killed somebody, like, the day before. Yeah. Yeah.

He is a walking contradiction. Isn't that interesting great reading great read acting of like travis journaling and be like dear mom and dad and then the dad sending the letter at the end where it's like dear mr bickle we missed you in new york yeah i know and the letter he writes to his parents, he's like, I have a girlfriend named Betsy. She's beautiful. I'm like, you're such a psycho.

Yeah, I was like, so hot. He falls into a coma from his injuries, and we see that the press has painted him as a hero, so he's not been prosecuted for the murders, which is just wild. And then we hear a voiceover from Iris' parents in Pittsburgh who thank Travis for returning their daughter to them. When he recovers travis grows out his hair and returns to working in the taxi where he picks up betsy as a passenger they have a pleasant interaction and betsy says she's

been following his story in the papers he drops her at home didn't like that i was like now he knows where you live yeah that's what i thought i was like girl don't do that doesn't let her pay and drives off with a smile. He suddenly becomes agitated after noticing something in his rearview mirror, but continues driving. It's almost like a fantasy when he picks up Betsy. Like, I almost question if that's even real of like, yeah, it's almost like, yeah, I don't even need you anymore. Like, yeah, once you like and then that weird sting of him looking in the mirror of it, because the whole movie is shot like a horror movie. And that is the kind of like jumping out of the grave kind of moment of like, oh, the bad guy's still around. Yeah. And if she he's imagining her being like, you're amazing.

And like, here's where I live. Bye. Thank you for letting me out at my house. I'm single now. Yeah. I didn't wear underwear today. me out at my house i'm single now yeah yeah i didn't wear underwear today he commits this ultimate act of violence and then he's seemingly relieved in the whole movie he's invisible like as a cab driver he's invisible people are telling him where to go what to do you know all this kind of shit and then he's like at this when he picks her up at the end she um calls him by name nobody's ever addressed him in the cab before she doesn't tell him to take me home he just does it and then he ultimately doesn't have to pay and she gives him like respect and seems to like him and so you think wow maybe

that's it it's he you know he got the reaction he wanted and then him looking into the mirror like just starts all over again yeah and like the next time it's not gonna be good one thing we didn't talk about is how absolutely fucking incredible the score of this movie is bernard herman it's his final score he ever recorded uh and even the sting was like something like yeah this is cool he asked him for that like did you hear that story saying about him being like just play it backwards yeah? Yeah. So it was too much. It was like, cling. It was too much. And Scorsese's saying, I feel like it's too much.

Looking at the mirror, it's too much. And then the last thing he says to Scorsese is like, just run it in reverse. And so it does this. And he walked out of the room. Yeah. Like, without even listening to it. He was like, yeah, and he was right. And he recorded this.

And then died, like, having dinner with Larry larry cohen yeah like he had dinner with larry cohen then had a heart attack and i think john williams recorded a couple of quick things that like they needed to fill in after he was dead bernard herman you guys would know you know the psycho score right the yeah he did that i mean he's like famous and did all kinds of shit but i saw that for the first time this past year at the disney philharmonic where they played it the oh played live company yeah that's awesome yeah it was really great ben and i saw 2001 a space odyssey like that it was fucking awesome uh the saxophone and the scores this guy tom strong who's like a fucking genius the alto sax which which kind of adds that like noir element to it.

And like this guy played with like fucking Steely Dan and like all kinds. He's doing like the... A session guy. Yeah. Legend. It's incredible how much all of you know about this movie. I'm like, I'm sure like our entire trivia section has been deleted while you've been talking yeah truly well we are a movie podcast host so we do the research

i don't know if you guys that's not how it works that's not how it works you get someone else to do the research and then you spend time on your phone as you watch the movie that's not true nicole we don't do that anymore. You watched the wrong movie. That's it. That is true. I did. I watched the wrong movie for this podcast. Your confusion made sense, though, because I think it came out before this or something.

It did not. Oh, never mind. Oh, okay. Great. So Taxi Driver opened to nearly universal critical acclaim with Roger Ebert saying it was one of the greatest movies he'd ever seen. It was nominated for four Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Actor for De Niro and Best Supporting Actress for Jodie Foster. That's so cool. She was 12 and won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.

So that's really amazing. Everyone loved it right away. De Niro was right. He was right. And honestly, I loved it. Here's some trivia. De Niro worked 15 hours a day for a month driving cabs in New York City as preparation for the role of Travis.

No. No. No, he did it for like a week. The problem with the IMDb on this is it's like telephone. These are all kind of like- These are all off. They're all wrong on IMDb. Yeah.

How do you know the official time? Because you can hear Scorsese and De Niro talk about it straight from the horse's mouth. About 10 days. 10 days. Okay, fine. Great, this is good. That's why we have you here.

Okay. So he did it for 10 days. Honestly, that's still a long time. That's a lot. That's 150 hours. He has said that despite having won an Oscar for for the godfather part two two years earlier he was still a relatively unfamiliar face and was only recognized once interesting score says he loves that story where it's like an act he picked up an actor who recognized him because he just won

academy award and so the actor was like oh my god you're robert de niro and then he was like i'm starting out as an actor he's like is it really this hard even after winning awards you still need a job as a cab driver and he was like yeah maybe some of us have podcasts um de niro also met his first wife on the set of this film diane abbott she plays the concession worker at the movie theater that's so cute yeah it's there's no everybody hates that no i love it there's a story that sybil shepherd tells that supposedly de niro asked her out which is we all know to be probably not true

we and we can we can tell you why i think nicole will like this fact about robert de niro i don't know i know he he only likes black women. That is correct, which is why we think he did not ask out Sybil Shepard. That's so funny. Why would she say that? They didn't like Sybil Shepard. She didn't know a lot of her lines. And I think she's fabulous in the movie and she's perfectly cast.

But she was a model before and she had some juice because she's really good in last picture show and she does this movie and she's just kind of having fun and is a natural and i think it just you know not taking it serious and so they struggled and this is from julia phillips um who produced the movie she wrote a great book um called you'll never have lunch in this Town Again where she fucking dishes on everybody. She's the first woman to win. Have that book in my bathroom, by the way. That sounds like a good bathroom when you just pick up and read some gossip.

Yeah, take a shit, learn about close encounters of the third kind. I'm watching Francesca Scorsese's TikToks on the can every morning. I do Duolingo and then an hour of Marty TikToks. That's all toilet time? Yeah. I have two and a half hours to fill every

morning. Well, not to fill, but to empty. You have to fill. He fills it to the brim every morning. I fill my time while I empty myself. Okay. We're going to take a quick break and we'll be right back with a little more Taxi JV. And we're back. So we have a new segment called the New Academy Awards.

Get on board. So despite his films having been nominated for over 100 combined Academy Awards, Marty himself has only won one. Wow. So we're here to correct the record, presenting the prestigious first annual New Academy Awards. So Anya's going to read off the nominees and we all will vote on what we think. I just remember Goodfellas losing

to Ordinary People or some shit was always maddening. I can't believe you only won one. That feels crazy. Yeah, it's pretty wild. Okay, we're going to do this quickly. So best food scene nominees are the date scene where Travis gets

a slice of apple pie with cheese and coffee. Melted yellow cheese. I thought that was a good choice. I thought it was a good choice. The scene in the diner where Iris makes herself a jam and sugar sandwich. Or the scene where Travis makes himself a disgusting bowl of crumbled bread, peach brandy,

and milk, a meal that trader said he would make for himself when he was a heavy drinker. And that's the scene. That's the scene that convinced the, the, uh, Bernard Herman to do the movie. Yeah.

He's like, I really like that. Yeah. You're supposed to like, you're like, that was his favorite part of the character. Yeah. I really liked the jam and sugar

sandwich because i felt like she's such a kid like it was like sweet like she just sat down and like put together that little and she clearly did it all the time and yeah that juxtaposed to like what she's talking about and how she's talking about it while making like a little kid sandwich is such a fucking complex bit of storytelling. Cheese on pie is also weird. Is she going to go into a diabetic coma? Jam is already sugary and you're adding sugar to it? When I was a kid, I would eat brown sugar out of the bag and cake mix out of the bag.

Oh, yeah. Dude, I was the same. If you went to a restaurant that had sugar on the table, I would drink sludge. I would just keep my sugar and my water being like, it's actually really good. One of those cans of frosting, my brother and I would just eat the whole can.

I did love frosting as a kid. Yeah, my parents never had any junk around. I'd be eating fucking pie filling. I'd be like, shit, I guess you can do this apple pie filling. Just trying to get cherries when you're really desperate. Trying to get some of those disgusting

just eating spoonfuls of Cool Whip that you're like yeah I would eat chocolate chips anything that was like oh god remember eating the

like the the non-sweet chocolate chips the semi-sweet yeah oh they're semi they're disgusting and you keep eating them

tastes like fucking medicine and you're convincing yourself hey hey, it's chocolate. My grandma had tea. I'd straight up do sugar cubes. I'm like, fuck, this sugar cubes are. I get it. I get why the horses are into it. Get why the horses are into it.

Thanks, grandma. Wow, these horses are onto something. Do y'all agree on that? Cheddar on pie. Cheddar on pie is one. I think I got to go cheddar on pie. That's the least disgusting to me That sounds so gross but that's like Why would you put cheese on pie

No don't people do that It's weird but people do do it And also apples and cheese kind of work together But if you're thinking more brie and goat They work Yes I'm sorry With my baked brie I serve my baked brie with sliced green apple. I love baked brie.

I'm not a brie girl. Okay, sounds like the votes are split, which is controversial, but we have to keep going. Well, the good thing is it's meaningless. Well, that's why Betsy- Lauren, this means everything. My vote's for RFK Jr. I'm sorry. My vote's for RFK Jr.

We're fixing the Academy Awards. Okay, we've got a couple more to get through. Best line delivery, we have Didn't You Ever Hear of Women's Lib, Iris in the Diner, You Talkin' to Me, Travis in the Mirror, or Hey Travis, This Here's Doughboy, We Call Him That Cause He'll Do Anything for a Buck, Wizard at the

Cafeteria. I mean, I think it's gotta be You Talkin' to Me. Yeah, I really like that You Talkin' to Me. But I really have to say, it was not how everyone's been doing it forever it has nothing to do with what everyone's been doing all the bad actors trying to do it what was your old impression of him

this is how I would have been like you talking to me you talking to me and he repeats it over and over and then he says it once I think and it's like subtle who the fuck are you talking to he's having a back and forth with nobody and it's a conversation

and I would have thought it was a real scene I thought it was from a scene where he was talking to another person who was talking back and maybe a fight ensues but I'm like no this is a man descending into madness pretty quietly and the level of loneliness well I'm like, no, this is a man descending into madness pretty quietly. Yeah. And the level of loneliness, well, I'm the only one here. Well, I'm the only one here.

Fuck, are you talking to me? The idea of saying you're the only one here to an imagined version of yourself is crazy. There's layers to how crazy that is. Well, I'm the only one here, so you must be talking to me. You must be talking to me. Are you talking to me. You must be talking to me. You talking to me? Because it's also, he's a fucking loser

playing make-believe and everybody's like, God, what a fucking badass. Yeah. That's me. It is wild. That's me. I'm a fucking virgin freak loser.

Half the people who think they're Travis Bickle wouldn't even get into the Marines in the first place. Well, yeah, if you were to properly cast Travis Bickle now, it would be like one of the fat gravy seal guys yeah those guys would look like those guys who stand outside drag queen

readings to protect kids from reading with guns thank you for your service you fat neck fuck so we have a new title for our review segment which we are calling score sazy or says however you want to say it so once again this season we'll be reading reviews from letterboxd and we will each give this film a one sentence review ourselves and a star rating so for anyone who doesn't know letterboxd is a social platform people can write reviews of films and you can follow us on letterboxd at newcomers all of our reviews ever are there um do you guys have letterboxd for action boys is that a thing you do no we we try to avoid social media which is probably bad for our lives and business so the letterboxd review that we have is from jamie and i think it's oh half a star i don't

want to be anywhere near men who claim this as their favorite film wow okay my review and my star rating i'm gonna give it five stars i liked it even though it was kind of racist and unsettling and pretty bloody and a little disturbing and there was a 12 year old who i thought needed a better life and that must have been bad for jodie foster to film but five stars yeah i want to i want to take that review to task for a hot second like i think if you should not date men that like say i can relate to stuff that travis pickle does like don't date like a ryan stanger but if a guy says this is his favorite movie like if someone says like independence day is their favorite movie and you're like don't date a guy like that because aliens aren't real

like it's we're talking about a fucking movie being a fan of a movie that features bad shit does not mean that that person is necessarily bad. If someone is a grown man who still has taxi driver posters on his wall and shit, yeah, take heed. But there are worse things to be a fan of than 70s cinema. You could date a guy who's into fucking Funko Pops. Yeah, there's bigger red flags, I think, out there than liking one of the best movies ever made.

Get after Jamie. Take that, Jamie. The bigger red flag is if think, out there. I love it. I've been liking one of the best movies ever. Get after Jamie. Take that, Jamie. Take a red flag as if the guy does improv. That's why I saw so much of Travis and people I know. There's something here that is so real. Just saw a one-person show. Hey, I wear an army jacket.

The scum of the earth is getting put on Maud Knight, and I an army jacket. The scum of the earth is getting put on Maud Knight. And I'm sitting here. I'm sitting here writing Yelp reviews. Lauren, what is your review? My review is classic for a reason. Love Jodie Foster, amazing performance. And Travis Bickle scares me, though.

I feel De Niro did an amazing job. I want to also add, not as part of my review, that I immediately Googled when Jodie is kissing Harvey Keitel and it's her 19-year-old sister who is kissing him. Oh, good. Because I was like, what is happening here? And why is this happening? And so she wasn't 12 and having to kiss a grown man,

just so everyone can know that. What a relief. Yeah. I mean, it's like, it's still, you know, gross. Well, you don't trust Hollywood now, no less 40 years ago. Yeah, I assumed it was really happening. Oh, I didn't give my stars. I'm going to give it four stars.

Four stars. Like, this is good. Yeah. I gave it five. I loved it. Oh, is there five as an option? I was going four out of the four. Four stars. I really, I think this is good. Yeah. I gave it five. I loved it. Oh, is there five as an option? I was going.

Oh wait, we only have four. No, no, it's five is right. Five. I give it five. Give it five.

All right. Four stars. I don't know where I got that. Um, I'll just say to that reviewer to find, uh, the letterbox reviewer, fine to give it one and a half and not like the movie.

And, uh, definitely don't date somebody that says it's their favorite movie you don't like the probably smart probably smart yeah smart that's a smart move um for me i give it five stars and i would say expertly shot directed and acted this movie will scare the shit out of you it's a good way to go into it uh my review would be it's uh five stars despite it being more and more poignant every year uh as we somehow a movie that came out 50 years ago we are spiraling towards it i don't know how but uh yeah five stars also sybil she's got she's fucking strong in the paint and she's fucking rebounds She's fucking strong in the paint and she's fucking...

Rebounds. Good to go over the middle. Good from deep. Good inside. Five stars. Met my wife reviewing it. Met my wife in the porn theater. That's where I go to watch review Letterboxd movies is the porn theater that's where I go to watch review letterbox movies is the porn theater and also

by the way it is playing at the Pasadena Playhouse very soon so you can walk there so you can just walk outside and see Taxi Driver we got to get oh man too bad Fred Willard RIP would have been a great Travis Bickle to check in with him now Travis man, too bad. Fred Willard, RIP. Would have been a great Travis Bickle.

To check in with him now? Travis, Fred Willard, Paul Rubens, they're all in heaven jacking off. You guys. We need to wrap it up. We forget what it's like to podcast with other people.

Do you guys have anything you want to plug before we we get out of here we unfortunately ali and i have to give our letterboxd reviews this time as well oh okay yeah go go go please ali go ahead five stars one word jody yes thank you okay um mine was four stars um sometimes men think they're being very helpful when actually they're being very harmful and but good movie overall. Yeah. Yeah. And then they get praised for it. Good advice. All right. So do you guys have a podcast you want to plug?

I'm a podcast you want to talk about. I'm honestly afraid I'm cutting out. So I'm just getting right to the point. We have a podcast called Action Boys. It's a Patreon podcast at actionboys.biz with a Z in both boys and biz. And if you don't want to pay, which I totally understand, we have some free episodes at free.actionboys.biz.

So maybe you get a sniff. Maybe you get addicted. Maybe you come crawling back. Remember me? I listened to the free Lawnmower addicted maybe you come crawling back remember me i listened to the free lawnmower man episode don't you remember me yes a lot of people listen to lawnmower man episodes around here pal very good action boys listener 69 i learned a lot from listeners just like you uh lawnmower man is a bananas movie based on a very short story by Stephen King.

And it's... It's our longest episode. We did a four-hour episode. Four hours? We had to edit it for Patreon because Patreon cannot put up longer than a four-hour podcast episode. We had to trim it.

We had to trim it down to three hours and 59 minutes and 15 seconds. That's very funny. If you ever see it, just imagine us doing four hours on it. It's not good. It's not good. It's very bad.

This is not a plug to listen to it. It's just, it's out there. It's a horrible movie. Yeah, if you want to fucking end up like Travis. This is also a plug for friendship. The fact that you could talk for four hours

about something called Lawnmower Man. Well, you know, the director does think he's like Scorsese and he's like putting like Catholic imagery in this fucking piece of shit movie. And a movie that also features a monkey. Yeah. It also features a monkey with a helmet and a pistol. That sounds good. Yeah, I know.

We can sell you on it. Believe pistol. That sounds good. Yeah, I know. We can show you about it. Believe me. Sounds like fun. Well, everyone out there, please write a review for us on Apple Podcasts. You can go give us five stars on Spotify right now, too. And we'll be back next week. You guys were the best first guests we could possibly hope for for this new venture we're on. Thank you guys for having us.

Thanks for having us. We are coming back next week with The Last Waltz from 1978. So watch that if you want to know what we're talking about. And we'll see you then. Newcomers is a HeadGum original hosted by us, Nicole Byer and Lauren Lapkus.

Our executive producer is Anya Kanovskaya. Our producer is Ali Khan. Our theme music, editing, sound mixing, and mastering is done by Faris Manji. Listen to new episodes wherever you get your podcasts every Tuesday. Thank you. That was a Hiddem Original.