#24. ‘Rocketman’ and Talking to Strangers
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The Elton John biopic Rocketman fares much better with the gang than expected, largely because everyone measures it against Bohemian Rhapsody, which a friend of the show once described as somebody reading a Wikipedia page out loud. Sonny, finally catching up three weeks late, grants that this one is actually cinematic — it takes the beats Walk Hard already parodied and builds surreal Broadway-scale numbers on top of them, and while he isn't a musical guy and was annoyed in stretches (the Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting sequence "goes on forever"), he was never bored, which he considers a real achievement. He rates Taron Egerton's acting good and his singing not, and notes the film soft-pedals Elton's temper: he snaps at Bernie Taupin once and immediately apologizes. JVL says the movie's relentless earnestness won him over despite himself, singles out the Troubadour number where everyone floats off the floor, and picks Tate Donovan's Doug Weston as his favorite performance — a tiny role that feels like it deserves its own movie, all Neil Diamond at the bar and "we're going over to Mama Cass's." He also gripes that it's plainly an authorized biography that lets Elton settle scores with his parents and Dick James while filtering out the genuinely wild parts, and keeps a deadpan bit going about the film shoehorning in a gay subplot as "one of the great hoaxes of all time." Vic goes A-minus, an eyebrow-raising jump out of his usual B range, credits the strength of the catalog (he keeps returning to Bennie and the Jets and his wife's Elton songbook that's brutally hard to play), and marvels at how Bernie Taupin's lyrics-first process is essentially the Marvel method set to music. The best runner is Vic delightedly informing Sonny that the movie is "Rocketman starring Taron Egerton, Jamie Bell and Sonny Bunch," because the pub booker in the gray double-breasted suit with the scraggly beard and glasses is Sonny's exact double. Elsewhere: Sonny's Dallas Love Field power-outage saga, where he shockingly made friends with strangers who got him onto the last flight to DCA, plus an Apple Store employee scolding him about the debris in his phone's port; Vic one-upping him by picking up two septuagenarian hitchhikers, the O'Haras, and driving them to Harris Teeter for $10 prime rib night; a $30 million win for Men in Black: International, Dark Phoenix collapsing 71.5 percent, and a long autopsy of Amazon spending roughly $50 million on Late Night.
From the show notes
#cdata-section -------------- In this latest episode, sponsored by Boosted and Calm, we review the Elton John biopic Rocketman . JVL says El...
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00So how does it feel to be a star? It's never gonna last. Let's just enjoy it while we can. First sleeping arrangements get out, all of this is gone. I just hope you realize you're choosing a life of being alone forever. Don't we want to just sing without this ridiculous paraphernalia?
Vic00:00:19People don't pay to see Reg White. They pay to see Elton John.
Guest00:00:25Sorry. Right now.
Vic00:00:30Hello and welcome to another edition of The Sub-Beacon, sponsored by Boosted and Calm. I'm Victor Matus along with Sonny Bunch and Jonathan V. Last. I'd like to remind you The Sub-Beacon is available on iTunes and Google Play. Just look at our podcast and search for Sub-Beacon. You'll easily find us. Please subscribe, tell your friends, and leave a review. Or did I hear? Wrong, and iTunes no longer exists. What happened?
Sonny00:01:04Yeah, it's like the podcast app or something. When did this happen? I don't know. A couple days ago.
Vic00:01:10They talked about it as an impending thing, but I clicked on iTunes and it still came up. I don't know. But it probably just sends you over to the music app. Nevertheless, gentlemen.
Sonny00:01:21I don't know. There's a bunch of apps. The apps. You got the podcasts on the apps.
Vic00:01:27The only apps I want are mozzarella sticks. And jalapeno poppers.
Sonny00:01:31I want unlimited.
Vic00:01:32Unlimited. TGI Fridays. Full jacket. Baked potatoes. There you go. Gentlemen, how are we? Did we have a nice Father's Day? JVL, what's going on? We don't do that in my house. JVL, what's going on?
Sonny00:01:44I like how you crossed your arms when you said that. You were like protecting yourself from the onslaught of emotion.
JVL00:01:51Everything's fine. Everything's fine. Sonny, how was your life?
Sonny00:01:56It's good, I guess. It's fine. Last week, I said I didn't have a story, but I did have a story. I forgot to tell the story. And it's a bad airport story, which is the most interesting story. People love those. People love those. So I was flying back from Dallas on Sunday, last week or two weeks ago. And I was in the airport. I'm in the Uber going to the airport, and I see some clouds coming. I'm like, okay. And then I get through security. I'm through security. It is blackout. It is like storms coming. And sure enough, there was like a tornado-ish weather event in Dallas. Some people actually died. Like a crane crashed into a building.
Vic00:02:43This is the crane that crashed in Deep Ellum. They had video of that.
Sonny00:02:46Awful. Very sad. Very sad. But even worse than that, I was inconvenienced, mildly. Because I was at the Love Field Airport where the power went out for like three hours. And then... When the power came back on, they had... Were you above ground?
JVL00:03:02Yeah.
Sonny00:03:02Yeah, yeah. Oh, okay. They had like rerouted all of the airplanes around. So the flight... I was supposed to leave at like three in the afternoon. The flight I was scheduled to be on did not leave until like nine at night.
JVL00:03:14Nine or ten at night.
Sonny00:03:16I was actually able to get on to another earlier flight because I had befriended some people in the airport, which is very unusual for me. I befriended some strangers who tipped me off to the fact that there was still one... One last flight out of Dallas to DCA that was getting in on time. So I got on that. Did you tell them that you were Vic's friend? Yeah. He's in the front. President of the... But no, it's... Being in an airport where the power is out is extremely weird because all of the restaurants closed. So I couldn't like go to the bar and get a drink.
Vic00:03:45You couldn't go to Whataburger, which is a great restaurant at Love Field.
Sonny00:03:49I went... I ended up going to the Whataburger once the power came back on because I was there... Thank God. I was there at dinnertime. Oh, yes. Instead of at home at dinnertime like I was supposed to be. So the power is off. And an airport where the power off is very weird because there's just nothing to do. So everyone just sits around and it gets like steadily hotter. It's like some sort of weird, terrible experiment. Was your phone working? My phone was working, but... Running out of juice really fast. My phone was working. I was running out of juice. And because my iPhone was broken at the time, I was having trouble charging it. I took it in. I actually took the iPhone into the Apple store a couple days ago. And the very cute Apple lady looked at it. She's like, I think there might be some debris in there. And she takes it to the back and cleans it out and comes back. And she's like, Sonny, there was a lot of debris in there. I felt very, very judged by my Apple lady. You don't clean out the porch on a regular basis? No, it's just like... I don't think I've ever... She's a wooden toothpick. She's just like...
JVL00:04:56On canned air.
Sonny00:04:56She was like, you need to be more... More careful how you put this in your pocket. Yeah. Yes, ma'am. Okay.
JVL00:05:02Do you put it port up when you put it in your pocket?
Sonny00:05:04I try to, I guess. I never really think about it.
JVL00:05:07You should never put it port up. You should always put it port down.
Sonny00:05:10No, I thought you put it port down. I thought putting it port down gets the debris in there. That's right.
Vic00:05:15No.
Sonny00:05:15Do you know how gravity works?
Vic00:05:17Yeah. It's coming in. You're saying that it's coming in and from the air and into the...
Sonny00:05:21How would it come from the air into my pocket randomly? Because it's all linked from the top of your pocket. The link is at the bottom of the pocket. At the pocket. The link is already at the bottom of the pocket. I'm just jamming it in there. Anyway. So, I have a dirty phone.
Vic00:05:34I just keep it deep inside my pants.
Sonny00:05:38Anyway. On vibrator.
JVL00:05:41Another fun fact about... Did you read or nap or talk to people?
Sonny00:05:44So, I was reading a New Yorker and the lady next to me was like, oh, is that a good issue of the New Yorker? And I said, I don't know. It's just the one I grabbed off the top of my pile.
JVL00:05:52And we had a good laugh about that because when you subscribe to the New Yorker,
Sonny00:05:58you have a pile of New Yorkers at any time that is mostly unread. And then you throw most of them away and the pile gets a little smaller and then it gets bigger again.
JVL00:06:07Did you say to her, oh, that Andy Sedaris kills me.
Sonny00:06:10The Borowitz.
JVL00:06:11The Borowitz. Borowitz. Borowitz is great. Borowitz is something else. Steve Martin hasn't done a shout or a murmur recently.
Vic00:06:19Did you read the newest article from David Foster Wallace? It'll blow you away.
Sonny00:06:25Sorry. That wasn't funny. That wasn't funny at all. Not least of which is because that's not how we did it. But no, we had a fun chat about the New Yorker and then she started talking about why they were going to the city. And these are the people who got me on the flight out, who got me on like the last helicopter out of Hanoi. I was clambered on with them. So this just goes to show sometimes if you talk to people, good things happen. I never believed this was true. Hillary 2016. Trust me. Never believed this was true. It always happens. But this was a... It was a big, big, exciting experience for me having a conversation with a stranger that didn't go poorly.
Vic00:07:04Well, welcome to my world, Sonny.
Sonny00:07:05This is what it's like to be Vic all the time. He just talks... Vic would enjoy that.
JVL00:07:10Every time Vic goes to the airport, he's praying for a power outage. Hey, come on around. Let's gather rail. Let's gather rail. There's a piano there. There's a couple of airports that have pianos. Have you ever been in one like that? Yeah, yeah.
Vic00:07:20Vic would be like, well, tickle the ivory. It's like there's a great scene in High Anxiety and Mel Brooks is there with Madeline Kahn at this hotel. There's a hotel bar and there's a guy, a lounge singer, and he takes a break and they go, doctor, do you sing? And he goes, oh, no, no, not professionally. And the next thing you know, he's doing a song and dance number.
Sonny00:07:40But no, it was very... So that's my story of the airport. I talked to somebody and it didn't go poorly.
Vic00:07:46Sonny talks to people. News at 11. That's the big news. Speaking of which, so last Thursday, it's funny you should talk about this. I'm going up. I'm taking up dinner at our favorite Thai restaurant and I'm pulling out of the parking lot onto the main road. But there's all this traffic coming through, so I'm just stuck there waiting so I can turn. While I'm waiting, an old lady comes to my car on the passenger side window and gestures for me to roll down my window. And, of course, you did because you thought, I could make friends. The first thing I thought was, is she opening my door because the door was unlocked? You know, I wasn't going fast enough that the door locks.
JVL00:08:24Question, before you go any further, JVL. I've seen the teaser trailer for It Chapter 2. Yes, she looked like her.
Vic00:08:32She looked like her. And nobody ever dies in Derry. And I rolled down the window out of curiosity like, what the heck? Let's see what's going on here. And she says, excuse me, are you going down this street towards Harrison? There's a bus stop there. I'm wondering, would you be able to bring us to that bus stop? And I'm like, who's us? And I look and it's an old man. Both in their 70s, I think. And I stopped and I thought, ah, what the heck? Come on in. And I picked up these two septuagenarian hitchhikers. And they get in the car. The husband sits in the front. She sits in the back. The O'Haras, who spend most of their time in Fort Lauderdale.
JVL00:09:17You know their names?
Vic00:09:17Yes, I do. And then we start riding, driving. And they go, well, we just want to get to that bus stop because there is a bus that will take you up Harrison towards. The supermarket. I said, oh, you mean the Harris Teeter at, you know, the Lee Harris Shopping Center? She goes, yes. And I said, I'll just take you there. So I drive them. And for like the next 10 to 15 minutes, I was like an Uber driver. And I realized.
Sonny00:09:41I was going to say, I was going to say, why don't you just tell them about this wonderful app called Uber? They could use to call a car.
Vic00:09:46No, no. This one's for free. And they were going to they were going to take mass transit. Oh, forget about that. And it was warm outside. And they were old. And we had a lovely conversation Thursday night is. Prime rib night at Harris Teeter. Ten dollars. And the prime rib is so big that I can't even talk. I can't even look at JVL's face. But they could split the prime rib and it's got all the fixings. And I realized that if I were the Uber driver, I'd be the the chatty. Like I'd be that you'd have to. Oh, yeah. You'd have to. One hundred.
Sonny00:10:15If you think if Vic were an Uber driver, you would 100 percent have to turn. You'd have to flip the switch midway through. And he would know that you didn't want to talk anymore.
Vic00:10:25I would say it was about the conversation. It was like 60, 40, 70, 30. Me asking questions and talking about the neighborhood. And yes. At what point?
Sonny00:10:33At what point did they regret getting in the car with you as opposed to just dying, walking to the bus?
JVL00:10:41Yeah, I would probably like, where do you live? That question. JVL. Did you go into the Harris Teeter and shop with them? Because I'm already picturing the three of you walking down the aisles together. Oh, let me get that. I can lift that for you. Mrs. O'Hara.
Vic00:10:58No, O'Hara. Yes. No, I briefly thought maybe I'll just wait. But I had food that I had to bring back. It was getting cold. So I just said, OK. And he enjoyed the ride. Mr. O'Hara said he liked the car, my Subaru. And that was it. But I thought to myself that that would be a, you know, now I know what it's like. And I think I would much enjoy it. I don't think the passengers would enjoy it. But I would enjoy it because I was just very, I don't know, I like learning about new people. It's kind of these things. Of course, if I did it, of course, if I did it, I would be an Uber Black driver. And I'd have to wear the, you know, Uber uniform every day. But, you know, I can get used to being one of those men in black. Speaking of which, over the weekend. I was very, very scared about where that was going. I saw you ready to do this. Why would you do that? Men in Black International took the top spot at the box office with 30 million, followed by the secret life of 30 million. 30 million, a whopping 30 million, followed by the secret life of Pets 2 with 24 million. In third place was Aladdin at 17. And in fourth place, this is really interesting. In fourth place was Rocketman with 9.4 million. When I originally checked Box Office Mojo on Monday, it said Dark Phoenix was ahead. But then after they made all the adjustments, Rocketman turned out to win in a come from behind victory. You know why?
Sonny00:12:23Just blew it away. You know why? It's because Dark Phoenix dropped. 71.5%.
JVL00:12:28That's amazing.
Sonny00:12:29That's a little bit of a decline. So what you're saying is... First weekend to second weekend.
JVL00:12:32That's almost a record.
Sonny00:12:33That's...
JVL00:12:34High score wins, right? Yes. It dropped to... I mean, it's a record of a sort.
Vic00:12:38It dropped to fifth place.
JVL00:12:40Yes.
Vic00:12:40Does that mean... Is it because movie theaters were like, that's it, we're taking it out of theaters so it's no longer in theaters?
JVL00:12:46Nope. Is that what happened? Same number of theaters. Well, that's just because it got steamrolled by a juggernaut, which made all the money this weekend, right? Yes. The new movie, Men in Black.
Sonny00:12:56Men in Black and Shaft, which we didn't even get to on the... I cannot believe Shaft is even out. Shaft, $8.9 million. Yeah, bad. That's a bad number.
Vic00:13:07And it was amazing because everybody was demanding a new Men in Black.
Sonny00:13:10It's all anyone wanted. It's all anyone wanted.
JVL00:13:13This is kind of amazing. I mean, so we are now... So Hollywood seems to be freaking out, per Richard Rushfield, because we have now had The Secret Life of Pets, Men in Black. Like, Gajira, King of the Monsters, and the X-Men. And it just looks like people don't want to see these franchise movies that aren't very good. And nobody in Hollywood can figure out why they don't want... They're pre-aware. Don't they understand? These titles are pre-aware. It's built in. People already know about them. Why don't they want to go? And we are fighting a battle where awareness is high. And interest is low.
Sonny00:13:59It's kind of awesome. It's definitely weird. I mean, look, I'm not totally sold on the idea that we're seeing some sort of massive sea change here. Aladdin is still going to end up grossing over $300 million, despite being bad and having high pre-awareness. You know, John Wick 3 is doing better than any other John Wick movie has done. Avengers Endgame. Avengers Endgame is a good movie.
JVL00:14:28What we're seeing is that you can't force feed people to a $50 million opening anymore.
Sonny00:14:35So this is, I think, the real lesson here is that it is not so much that people don't want to go see franchises. It's that they have no interest in seeing bad franchises. Like, if you give people totally unnecessary sequels and remakes and reboots and soft reboots or whatever you want to call whatever Men in Black International was, I didn't even see it. I have no idea what it is, if it's a sequel or what. And I'm literally paid money to see movies. So if you can't get me to go see it, good luck getting people to pay to go see it. But no, I mean, look, there's a secondary level of concern here, right? Over movies like Late Night and Booksmart, which are these critically acclaimed... Well, they're the best movies. Indies. You're supposed to see them and like them. In theory, audiences don't really... That's a movie that doesn't have to open to $30 or $50 million. That's a movie that can open to $15 or $20 million and be a big hit. Well, when it's on 3,000 screens, it has to open to $20 million. Except exactly right. So Late Night, Amazon did something very interesting with Late Night. Amazon, about, I want to say, two weeks before it came out, maybe three weeks or maybe even a month. I don't know. A few weeks before it came out, Amazon shifted Late Night from a full-on 2,500 to 3,000 screen opening to a limited release opening in L.A. and New York on four screens without changing the wide release date. So what they did was they basically just created a preview weekend that they hadn't planned on doing. And then there are some suggestions that shenanigans were in play to get up the per-screen numbers on that movie, on those screens. I have no idea as to the... I'm so nasty of this, but Amazon reported something like $65,000 per screen.
JVL00:16:29That's so good. That's good.
Sonny00:16:30Which is extremely good. That was the best per... They had the best per-screen average of the year for late night. And then when it expanded to 2,500 screens this... I'm sorry, 2,200 screens this weekend, it did an average of $2,367 per screen. That's so good, too. Very bad.
JVL00:16:51Very bad.
Sonny00:16:51That's a very bad number.
JVL00:16:53Oh. So... I'm sorry. I thought this was low score wins, like the drop rate. No, no, no. Oh, they're switched, aren't they? Yeah, right, right.
Sonny00:17:01So, Booksmart, similarly, had a decent... I'm sorry, it did not have a decent... So, Booksmart, again, Booksmart is a sort of movie what should have been opened on four screens. Should have been opened on maybe eight screens or 16 screens. And instead, they opened it on 2,500 screens for an average gross of $2,700. $2,700 per screen. You can't open a movie with no stars and no awareness. Oh, Mindy Kaling's not a star now? Not a star. Absolutely not a star. She's in Ocean's 8. The girls from Booksmart, not a star. None of them are stars. I'm sorry. You cannot open movies without stars and telling original stories for indie comedies that need a little bit of a push to get over the hump. On 2,500 screens, it's irresponsible. It's irresponsible. And you can't blame the audiences. We're not going to see what they don't know about. I had a bunch of people say to me, I don't even know what this is. I just started seeing ads for this. What is it?
JVL00:18:01So, Amazon purchased the rights to Late Night for $5 million. No. $13 million. $13 million. And then spent $15 million on... $35 million. Oh, $35 million on the marketing. That's three... When you spend $3x the budget on marketing for an indie comedy...
Sonny00:18:24$35 million on a wide-release film is not unreasonable. That's not an unreasonable amount of money to spend.
JVL00:18:32When the budget is $15 million or $13 million it is, that's a crazy amount. But, exactly.
Sonny00:18:36So, they basically ended up spending about... If we are to believe reports, they spent about $50 million on this movie. Which means that we need to gross in the range of $200 million to turn a profit around the world. I don't understand what Amazon is doing unless... Amazon is simply buying something for its library that they think people will come to Prime for.
JVL00:18:58At this point, I raise a question about Lord Beesauce. Every single thing Amazon touches, the great Lord Beesauce disrupts and perfects. Because he's amazing. Everything that Amazon gets into, they're awesome. And then they come into Touching Hollywood and even Jeff Beesauce turns into a blithering idiot. Now, this is the Richard Rushfield complaint. Hollywood is so weird and the economics of the industry are so effed up that even Jeff Beesauce walks into it and gets his drawers dropped on him.
Sonny00:19:42Here's the question, though. I don't know what Amazon actually wants out of the filmmaking portion of their business. I don't know what the endgame on a movie like Late Night is. If you're spending, again, if you're spending about $50 million on this movie and you have to gross about $200 million on this movie, that will never, ever, ever gross $200 million. It's just, it's not going to happen. Crazy rich Asians did. You have to have an idea of what to do. So my guess here, I have one guess that is less cynical and one guess that is more cynical. Less cynical guess, they're just building. A library, they're building the prime library. So they're spending a lot of money. They're doing essentially the Netflix thing, um, and spending money to, to build a library of Indies. I don't know that this is necessarily a successful, uh, business strategy. Uh, but it is, it is at least one that sort of makes sense, right? The more cynical allow me to suggest that given the, uh, Trouble Amazon finds itself in with a certain segment of the woke left, what you're going to go here. They are potentially trying to allay some of that concern by investing in, uh, a, a form of movie making that would appeal to the, again, more woke diverse left. I, I don't, I don't think that this is actually what they're doing because I don't think it actually gets them that right. I, this is, it's, it's an argument I've heard. And I kind of am sympathetic to, but I don't think it actually gets them what people think Amazon thinks it will get them. If that makes sense.
JVL00:21:31Allow me to present a third possibility. Lord Bezos is on the rebound and he thinks that Mindy Kaling is a okay.
Sonny00:21:40And so he said, go on and get her movie. I want to be able to meet her. Uh, it's possible. It does, but he's already got a new lady, right? Isn't that why the first lady split?
JVL00:21:49Does he?
Sonny00:21:49Yeah, we have, but did she stay with him?
Vic00:21:51I don't know because it was the brother that.
Sonny00:21:53No, I just think, I think, I think, I think the first less cynical explanation here is the right one that they are basically building a library. They could just buy Disney.
JVL00:22:03No, I think Disney's too big now. Is Disney now too big to be swallowed by a tech company?
Sonny00:22:09Disney is probably too big to. Except for Apple.
JVL00:22:13Apple could do it because they have cash on hand.
Sonny00:22:15Apple has, Apple has what a trillion dollars in cash or something. I mean, like some, some absurd amount of money. Apple could literally buy a continent.
JVL00:22:23Just pick one. They could only buy one continent.
Sonny00:22:25Like it maybe could only be Eurasia. They could buy like Australia. I don't know if they could really buy. I don't know if they could buy. Australia. I don't know if they could buy like Asia or Europe. South America maybe.
Vic00:22:40But is late night supposed to be funny? I mean, is it funny? Are people saying, hey, you know, I didn't see it. Is it supposed to be funny? Sorry, I didn't mean to say supposed to be funny. I mean, I mean, is it one of these things of, oh, I'm not going to see it. I'm not really. But hey, oh my gosh, if you ever see it, it's hilarious. You don't know.
Sonny00:22:57Did you see it? You don't know. I didn't see it. You'll never know. You know what? I did go see Booksmart and that movie sucked. That movie. I was so bored. I was bored and annoyed. And it is one of these movies. Oh, because girls can't be funny? Girls can be funny, but those girls weren't. And, you know, they just it just I was so I was bored and annoyed with them. And it did not resemble anything like high school that I remember. Or that like or frankly that people that people high schools that people go to now like this idea that these kids. So like the plot of the movie is these two like these two friends who are giant nerds and one is the valedictorian and they're like, we're going to great colleges and you losers are going to be stuck here in town. And all the other kids are like, I'm going to Yale. I'm going to Brown. You know, I got a job at Google. Like, how would these people not know? How would these people not know what their classmates are doing? That's nonsense. That's ludicrous nonsense. That's true.
Vic00:23:54You know what movie really holds up still? Mean Girls. That really does.
Sonny00:23:59Mean Girls is great. It's fantastic.
Vic00:24:01Lacey Chabert is so good. That's all I'm going to say.
Sonny00:24:03She's very, very good.
Vic00:24:04But they're all very good. Amanda Zavria. They're all very good. All the girls are good.
Sonny00:24:08I'm not sure if we're judging this on the same.
Vic00:24:11What are we talking about? Oh, where are we? Anyway, OK. Well, we're not actually talking. Where are we? We did almost no banter. Almost no dudes chatting. This is what we just talked about the industry. This is what the industry chatter. The other people did it. They already tuned out. So we're not talking about those that we're not talking about men in black because we didn't see that. But we are talking about Rocket Man, which I believe we all saw. We have all seen.
JVL00:24:34OK. Did anyone else see it? Oh, don't.
Vic00:24:38Don't you hold out on me. You're going to don't do it. I think you might have to use some elevator music for this, Sonny. OK. Oh, God. I'm going to bleep this whole thing. Rocket Man takes a long, hard look at Elton John. He was gushing with talent at the Troubadour. He blew the entire audience away. But manager John Reed was only using him and milked him for what he was worth. In the end, he comes out on top. Five stars.
Guest00:25:11Yay, Gene.
Vic00:25:13Quick and to the point. That's how I like it. Sonny. I tried. I tried to work in cream of the crop, but that was like, okay, let's move on. Okay, go ahead. Sonny, how about a quick review of Rocketman, which I enjoyed editing.
Sonny00:25:31So, yeah, I just, I just, I finally have reviewed it. It's been out for like three weeks. I just, I've been so behind. I've got, I've got things percolating. But the, this movie, so here's the only way I, I wasn't sure how to review this movie except to compare it to Bohemian Rhapsody, which is basically. You kind of have to do because Bohemian Rhapsody was just a big hit and won a bunch of Oscars. You're the same director. Well, Dexter Fletcher wrote Bohemian Rhapsody and I think produced it and he directed this. Bryan Singer, of course, directed. Oh. Directed. Who? You better bleep that. Bohemian Rhapsody. I hope you bleep that name. But the, so Rocketman is, so Bohemian Rhapsody, a friend of ours, comfortably smug. Well, maybe not JVLs anymore. I think you guys got a little. You guys got in a little fight. But described Bohemian Rhapsody as like somebody was just reading a Wikipedia page out loud. And that's exactly what that movie felt like. And Rocketman does not feel like that. Rocketman actually takes the basic plot points of the musical biopic that were so capably mocked and parodied in Walk Hard, the Dewey Cox story, and then kind of builds upon them with these fantastical. Uh, surreal moments and these giant musical numbers that look like something off a Broadway show. Uh, and it, I, this is what I will say for it is that it is never boring. I was never bored by Rocketman. I was sometimes annoyed by it. I was, I don't, I'm not a big musical guy. I don't like, if I want to go see a Broadway spectacular, I'll go see a Broadway spectacular. Um, uh, and you know, I'm not, I'm not a, uh, a huge Elton John fan, though I do like some of his music. So it was kind of toe-tapping and catchy and great. Um, uh, but the, the, but what it was, it never was, was boring. I was never, I was never, uh, annoyed, uh, or at least I was never bored by it. I was never, I was never bored like I was watching Bohemian Rhapsody. Um, so it has that going for it. Not boring. Still not great. Uh, I, I don't, uh, Taron Egerton has charm and talent. In certain things.
Vic00:27:52And he can sing. Kind of.
JVL00:27:54Yes. I, I liked it.
Sonny00:27:56Did you think he was that good in this?
Vic00:27:57I thought he was a little bit. I thought he was great. I thought he was great flat. Uh, thank you, Sonny. I, I like. You're crazy. He was great. Thank you, JVL. Fine. And that's coming from a, a singer. So, uh, I liked it. Um, and I, it certainly didn't shy away from his various addictions as he talks. Sure. And, and, and, and, and all this time, I mean, you, you just feel like all he wanted was, you know, it's this search for inner peace. If only he could find that inner peace somewhere. JVL.
JVL00:28:26I am here to talk about our friends at calm.com. That's C-A-L-M.com. Calm.com. It is an app for your phone with breathing exercises and meditations and sleep stories. And I am here to share with you once more my week with calm. So my, uh, my girls were all out of town last week. It was just the boys. Boys can do anything they want. And so without the girls around me to, to fall asleep and listen to calm, I did not have the girls doing their calm.comming. And I found from the very first night, it was a little bit hard for me to go to sleep
Sonny00:29:05without it.
JVL00:29:06Here I am all alone in this giant bed. There's nobody for like two floors around me. And so I was lying. I'm tossing, I'm turning, I'm tossing, I'm turning. And then I realized, wait a minute, I don't have to wait for my girls to be here. I get to do it myself. And so I pulled out. One of the adult sleep stories, what with Miss Tamara Leavitt, the waterfall, a sleep
Guest00:29:31story for grownups, Tamara's so great.
JVL00:29:37And you know, again, hand to God, I don't even take need to take melatonin when I've got Tamara Leavitt and calm.com. It's so great. And the library is ever changing. They're always adding new stuff. They have great readers. People with just fantastic voices. I love it. And we use it in my family all the time. Right now, Sub-Beacon listeners will get 25% off a calm premium subscription at calm.com slash Sub-Beacon. That's C-A-L-M dot com slash Sub-Beacon. 40 million people have downloaded calm. You can find out why at calm.com slash Sub-Beacon. Get it today because it's awesome. Thank you, JVL. So. What did you think about Rocket Man? Well, it's funny you ask. You were not here for our Bohemian Rhapsody episode. Were you or was Sonny not here? One of you was not here. I was Sonny because we had Mike Warren. We had the great Mike Warren. That's right. And Mike talked about how he is a queen devotee. And so he was annoyed with some of the ahistorical nonsense that was shooed into that. And that was interesting. And I, to be honest, felt a little bit like that. What? So this rocket man goes to enormous lengths to shoehorn in this this gay subplot when Elton John was actually straight.
Vic00:31:00He was married.
JVL00:31:01He was married. He had a living girlfriend. He was married. And I don't know what they were going for by pushing this in there. But it's one of the great hoaxes of all time. So I, you know, like it's a real movie in a way that Bohemian Rhapsody isn't, as you point out. Sonny, because it like does things to tell stories cinematically.
Sonny00:31:26It's it's cinematic.
JVL00:31:27You know, like when he's in when he's doing the show at the Troubadour, which I thought was a great number. They do this weird thing where nobody in the way it was shot the way it was like where he starts floating in his feet and everybody else is floating. And it's like it's like holding a note. Yeah. And I got to say the movie, I was annoyed by it at various points as well. But Rocket. Man is so damn earnest all the way through that it kind of won me over in its own strange way. You know, I was like, so this is clearly like an authorized biography. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Sonny00:32:07He approved it. I think he tweeted it out. So, you know, he's going part of he like appears at the end and the little montage where we learn about his his AIDS charity. That's just like it's like totally like, oh, by the way, he has an AIDS charity that's raised four or five million. Yeah. I.
JVL00:32:21OK, that's I would say it annoys me slightly because Elton John has a wildly interesting life and it would have been nice to have had a more. I'm sorry, a less filtered look at that life, because, you know, so he says at one point, you have to write this down. The problem is that I've been a for the last 25 or since 1975. I've been a since 1975. And in from everything I have ever read about Elton John understates things. Yes, to an amazing degree, but also I'm sure would have been a highly entertaining degree.
Sonny00:32:56You get very little of that from the movie. Early in the film, he talks about how he has like anger issues and you never see any of that, really. No, no. Yeah, like he snaps at his writing partner once. Yeah. And then immediately is like, I'm sorry.
JVL00:33:12Yeah. No, I mean, the Elton John, Simon Cowell was in many ways a housebroken version of Elton John. I always thought this was like the key way to understand the Simon Cowell phenomenon in America. So I know, Victorino, did you?
Vic00:33:29Yeah, well, first of all, the first thing I want to talk about in this movie was I can't believe, you know, people say, you know, it's Rocketman starring Taron Egerton. But really, it's Rocketman starring Taron Egerton, Jamie Bell and Sonny Bunch.
Sonny00:33:43There was the Expanded Universe folks noted that guy. And when I saw him on screen, I was like, yeah, I could see that.
Vic00:33:51I loved your, there was a guy, they're doing the first gig, the first gig in the English pub.
JVL00:33:55And there was a guy who runs the club and wants to book them.
Vic00:33:58Wants to hire them to be the backing band for the soul guys. And so prior to, I had forgotten, I had seen this on Twitter because the Expanded Universe said Sonny's appearance in Rocketman is amazing. And I thought that's funny, but who knows? I had forgotten it. And then I'm watching this movie. Oh, is he by the pool? No, no, no, no. This is in the English pub. I've only seen him for a minute.
JVL00:34:21Sorry, you, wow.
Vic00:34:23Wow, that one, the assistant. No, no, no, this is the booker. And he's wearing this wonderful, it's a double-breasted gray suit, blazer.
JVL00:34:32And he has the hair, the mustache, the beard, the eyeglasses.
Vic00:34:36The kind of scraggly beard. Scraggly beard. And as soon as I saw him, I remember what they said and I laughed out loud. I just said, I just couldn't believe it. I said, there he is. There's Sonny. So that was great. It was, it's definitely weird, I think. It wasn't really, I didn't expect it to be as much of a musical going into it. And the first thing I thought as soon as they get into the bitch's back is, the first thing I thought was hairspray, you know? I mean, this is kind of like this feeling, you know, dancing in the streets. And I'm like, oh, okay. Well, then once I got to accept that.
Sonny00:35:08That Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting sequence goes on forever. Yeah, yeah. Goes on forever. Right. And it just, ugh. That was pretty great.
Vic00:35:19But the catalog, but he has a great catalog. He does. That's the thing. And I liked his music. My sister had the cassette of his greatest hits with him in the gigantic glasses. And it's all in there. So there are parts of it I definitely enjoyed. But I could tell obviously.
JVL00:35:36The Dodger Stadium concert where he comes out in like the blue sequined.
Sonny00:35:40See, I thought that was great. That is like, where he gets, he gets taken from the pool through like, you think he's going to the hospital, but it's backstage at the concert. And then he comes out on the stage. I thought that was all very well done. And very, again, like, musically without being like, yeah, we're fighting.
JVL00:35:58It was more of a, yeah, I see that. Yeah. And there's a Sharks and a Jets aspect to the Saturday Night's All Right for Fighting. Yeah, definitely.
Sonny00:36:06As I mentioned in my review.
Vic00:36:09When he comes out to, I guess it's Shea Stadium. And he has this sort of depressed look. But as soon as he comes out on stage, you know, is it Shea or is it Yankee Stadium? I can't remember. That's where he was at. It might have been Shea. And he stands on top. All of a sudden, he's got to be on. You know, and I can relate to that. That's how I feel like when I'm on the show. That's how you feel in life. That's how I feel in life.
Sonny00:36:31That's how you feel when you're picking up the O'Haras off the street. Hey, old people, get in my car.
JVL00:36:37We got stuff to do.
Vic00:36:37As soon as I walk out the door, got to be on.
JVL00:36:40When you go home at night and you finish brushing your teeth. When you look in the mirror, all of a sudden, are you like in the Joker? Where are you just like staring?
Vic00:36:49Yeah, I am. I am. You're so angry and unhappy.
Sonny00:36:53In the morning, when you put your Warby Parker glasses on. Thank you. What's that sponsor? Do you do the smiling exercises? Yes, I do.
Vic00:37:04I often do it in the bathroom.
Sonny00:37:05Here, I have to work on that.
Vic00:37:07No, so there are parts of it that, I mean, obviously, again, because Elton John basically endorses this movie, that means that he approves of going after, you know, the various villains, whether it be his parents, and by all accounts, the parents were not great, and certainly, the father, but interestingly, he also goes after the first manager, Dick James, and other
Sonny00:37:30people. Who I, like, couldn't place. He's the actor from Game of Thrones, which I looked up afterwards, but I kept seeing him, and all I could think was, he looks like a miniature Henry Cavill, like, the whole time. Oh, no, not that guy.
Vic00:37:42Not that guy. You're talking about John Reed. Oh, Stephen James? Yes. Yes, and he was from, like, Snatch. You're thinking about Richard Madden?
JVL00:37:49That's right. Yeah, yeah, I was thinking about Richard Madden. Richard Madden was Rob Starlin. Rob Stark. Sorry, sorry, sorry.
Vic00:37:51Rob Stark, but the other guy, Dick James, who the actor who plays him has been in Snatch in those movies. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Things like that.
Sonny00:37:58Well, he was, like, the label executive. Yes, the label executive. Not his manager. I'm sorry.
JVL00:38:02Yes, the label executive. Stephen Graham. Stephen Graham.
Vic00:38:05Stephen Graham, and, you know, by other accounts, he was a nice guy, and so the idea that he said, play me a few, play me some music.
Sonny00:38:12Was Stephen Graham in both Bohemian Rhapsody and this? I'll look that up.
Vic00:38:17No, no, Aidan Gillen played the same manager. The different, yeah. Okay, so, but the idea that he said, play me a few, you know, bars, and he starts playing off the hits like Daniel or whatever, A Candle in the Wind, and he's like, it's right! You know, I don't, I don't, you know, I just didn't buy that, and probably not true. So, I didn't like that, but overall, I did find it better. I mean, the music's better than Bohemian Rhapsody.
JVL00:38:43So, the perfs are pretty good. So, Taron Egerton, my favorite thing he does. is the fake smile. It is, man, that's a good fake, when he sort of turns himself on, and he is not doing an impression.
Sonny00:39:00Yeah, yeah. He is acting and not doing a bit. I thought, I will modify what I said a bit earlier. I think his performance was good, I just, I didn't think the singing was that good.
JVL00:39:12I thought it was, but my favorite performance in this movie, Tate Donovan.
Vic00:39:20I mentioned it, he's in my notes right here.
JVL00:39:22Wait, who is that? Doug Weston at the Troubadour. He ran the Troubadour. He's the guy who runs the Troubadour. I've never seen Donovan comes into this with a very small role, and he's just got something going on. Like, you can just tell that this character deserves his own damn movie, because he's like, you know, Neil Diamond's at the bar, hey, we're going over to Mama Cass's.
Vic00:39:44What did he say, Cass Elliott? No, Mama Cass.
JVL00:39:46He doesn't say Mama, does he? Yeah, Mama Cass's.
Sonny00:39:49He says Mama.
JVL00:39:49And that's him. He doesn't go over to Mama Cass's. I just wanted to, maybe it's because I had just seen the trailer for the Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, but I just thought to myself, I would love to get a closer look into what this whole world was actually like.
Vic00:40:06Yeah, absolutely. The teepees. Yeah, the teepees, right. No, I love that scene. Tate Donovan was great, because he's sort of a leading man kind of a guy whenever he's done roles.
JVL00:40:15But he's like, maybe he's gay, but maybe he's only Southern California. Oh, I thought he was. No, but like, I mean, he's just cool. Interesting. Everything he's got is interesting and going on.
Vic00:40:23Here's a little bit of trivia for you. You know who was a doorman at the Troubadour? John Taffer.
Sonny00:40:30Oh, look at that. You could picture that, too.
Vic00:40:32Who's that? Bar Rescue, the host of Bar Rescue. Oh, so. Brenda Vic Madden. Brenda Vic Madden. Occasionally, we've run into each other. Great guy. Anyway, A-minus. That's what I give this movie. A-minus. A-minus.
Sonny00:40:46Out of the B-range for you.
Vic00:40:48Yes. That's a lot. Yeah, no. That's a lot. Let's not get crazy. I'll tell you what, though. It is me, though. And the music would linger with me, you know?
Sonny00:40:57That's just because the songs are good. They're good songs. The songs are very good.
Vic00:41:00I mean, I didn't have enough. I didn't have problems with a lot of the scenes.
Sonny00:41:05What's your guys' favorite? Can We Fight?
JVL00:41:08Okay.
Vic00:41:08Okay. Throw it out.
JVL00:41:09What? Elton John, Greater Signed Queen.
Vic00:41:12Oh, yeah. No, no, no. No, I'm with you.
JVL00:41:15I would say. Oh, I thought this would be a controversial. Everybody go. Mike Warren is going to knock you out. He's going to knock down my door tonight, isn't he?
Vic00:41:21There's no way that Mike Warren thinks that Elton John is not as, really? Mike Warren, So You're the Queen.
Sonny00:41:28I'm kind of torn because I was going to say Elton John's catalog is deeper. Like, he has more hits, even if they're not ones that I love. But Queen has a lot of hits, too. I don't know. I would have to think about that.
JVL00:41:38Elton John, Greater Signed Billy Joel. No.
Sonny00:41:41No. How dare you? That's a New Jersey heresy, is it not? That is Levittown. He's from Long Island. He's a New York guy. He is not a Jersey guy.
JVL00:41:49Elton John, Greater Signed. Elton John, Greater Signed. Bruce Springsteen.
Sonny00:41:52Oh, that's not. Wow.
JVL00:41:53Now you're just being provocative. Yeah. Yeah. Now you're trolling. I am. But you know what? I am. What time is it, Sonny? On Elton John. Elton John is okay. Well, I'll tell you what.
Vic00:42:07You know, I have the Elton John. Well, my wife bought the Elton John songbook for the piano. And it's hard. I'm trying to play some of that stuff. It is hard.
JVL00:42:17But also, I mean, the songs are hard. The songs are hard. No, no, no. It just gets hard. When you try playing it over and over.
Vic00:42:22Playing it over and over again. But like the chord, the opening chord of Bending the Jets, that's a beautiful chord.
JVL00:42:27Okay. I will say one more thing. Okay. True. The writing method of Bernie Taupin and Elton John strikes me as so crazy and immediately analogous to the Marvel method. It is the musical version of how Stan Lee ran Marvel Comics. It should never work.
Vic00:42:49Because Stan's not right. It did. Right. Bernie has like zero musical talent per se. He doesn't play an instrument. So it's not like Lennon McCartney. Nope. And I appreciated that he was a prominent, he figured prominently in Rocketman because there would be no Elton John without.
Sonny00:43:05I had no idea that was the case. Me neither. Going into it. I had no idea that Elton John had a writer.
Vic00:43:11Whenever I see his works for Elton John, I always noticed the credit was Bernie Taupin. I was like, who is this Bernie Taupin? But clearly he was important. So now we know. Okay. Favorite Elton John song. I don't need a whole ranking.
Sonny00:43:25I don't need a whole ranking, but just off the top of your head, favorite song.
Vic00:43:28At the moment, it's Benny and the Jets. It's great because it makes fun of all the flavors of the month in terms of bands and music. Hakuna Matata. Okay.
Sonny00:43:39I don't think that wasn't him. I don't think that's him. Yes, it is.
Vic00:43:44Lion King. Of course it is. The Lion King thing. Circle of Life. He sings that. Right. He sings Circle of Life. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But not. I believe he does all of the music for the Lion King.
JVL00:43:51Okay. I will effort while you tell us what your favorite is.
Sonny00:43:54I'm pretty sure Nathan Lane does Hakuna Matata, doesn't he? Yes. He may sing it, but I don't believe it at all.
Vic00:44:01Also, a most amazing piano solo at the end of Benny and the Jets. Go ahead, Sonny. Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road. That's a good one.
JVL00:44:07That's a good one.
Vic00:44:07Pretty great. Okay, great. You know what was interesting is they, you know, Live Aid figures very prominently in Bohemian Rhapsody, but of course, Elton John was also at Live Aid.
Sonny00:44:18But this movie ends before. Before Live Aid, doesn't it? Yeah, it does.
Vic00:44:21It would have been a great crossover to see that.
Sonny00:44:24Yeah, Rami Malek shows up. Yes.
Vic00:44:26I don't know why. Although I'd say, I still say JVL. I'd still say the best performance in Live Aid was probably Phil Collins. And why? Why Phil Collins?
JVL00:44:35Because he gave the free tickets to the kid who watched and he was there to like, yeah, I'm going to tell you. No, no, no. Do you remember this urban legend about?
Vic00:44:42Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that one. He drowned. He watched him drown. No, because he performed on both continents. Do you remember this?
Sonny00:44:50He got on the Concorde.
JVL00:44:53Yes. Elton John wrote Hakuna Matata. Okay. Thank you. But Nathan Lane performed in what's the greatest song ever written?
Vic00:45:02Okay, great. Thank you. Anyway, yes, I was always amazed how Phil Collins got from point A to point B easily.
Sonny00:45:07I can't wait to hear Billy Eichner do it.
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Guest00:46:20Mmm. We're good.
Vic00:46:22Oh, we're off next week? No.
Sonny00:46:25We are off next week. We're off next week? I'm not going to be here next week. If you guys want to do a show, I'm out all week.
JVL00:46:31Can we bring Emcon in and talk about Men in Black? What's coming out this weekend?
Vic00:46:35Nothing.
Sonny00:46:36It's Toy Story 4.
Vic00:46:37Oh, this weekend?
JVL00:46:39Yeah, let's take next week off.
Vic00:46:40I want to see it. Okay, that's all the time we're giving to this episode. Questions, comments, complaints, compliments, tweet us at Victorino Mattis at Sonny Bunch. Again, be sure to subscribe to us on iTunes or Apple anything, really. Google Play. Just type in Sub-Beacon under podcasts. We're there.
Sonny00:47:00Wherever you can find a place to review us. Yes. Click that five-star button.
Vic00:47:04Please do. Leave a review. Tell your friends. Until next time. Outtake, Stingers. Any other thoughts?
Sonny00:47:19Did you guys see? Did you guys see the thing I tweeted out today? Oh, yeah. About the GE. That was so funny. The GE light bulb resets. I missed this. What is this? I have no idea what you're talking about. So, there are smart light bulbs that connect to the Wi-Fi, right? They're so smart. We need them. Otherwise, our hackers won't know how to turn our lights off in our house when they rob us. Exactly. So, they have these dumb light bulbs. And there was a video. The GE had a video up explaining how you reset them. And I swear to God. It's like something out of a Family Guy bit. Because it goes on for three minutes. And it's literally just a guy. Like a solid 90 seconds of it is literally just a guy saying, All right. So, first, you have to turn your light off for five seconds. Then you turn your light on for two seconds. And then off. And then on for eight seconds. And then off. And then on for two seconds. And off. And on for eight. It goes on like this for 90 seconds. Just like. And then at the end of it, it like blinks three times. And it is. It is dystopic. It is. It is the. It is. We have this fantastic technology for lights. We have this amazing technology. It's called the switch. You got light switches. And you flip them on and off. And the lights work perfectly well. But now we've got this amazing device where you have to go through a whole 90 second process to turn it on, to make it work with your apps.
JVL00:48:44I want to turn the lights off with my phone, though.
Sonny00:48:48Why would anyone? Why would anybody want that?
JVL00:48:51The light isn't as good if you don't use your phone to turn it on. This is, you know what? Welcome to my world. Because this is my argument for Uber and taxis. Just because you can do something with your phone doesn't make it better.
Sonny00:49:04But Uber is better.
JVL00:49:05Uber is more convenient.
Sonny00:49:07You order a car to your house in a minute. Do you remember the other day?
JVL00:49:11You get a nice conversation like this guy. That's why you got the button where you can turn them off. I'm sure it's fine.
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