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[0:00] Martín Acuña: Hello, and welcome to another episode of Backstage Talk, a podcast about performing arts, films, and other things. This is your host, Martín Acuña speaking, and today we are going to review our first film. It is called A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood. You might have heard about it or might have seen it because it was nominated at the Academy Awards. This 2019 movie tells the story of how the journalist Lloyd Vogel and Fred Rogers, or best known as Mr. Rogers, became friends. It is based on a real-life friendship between Mr. Rogers and a journalist called Tom Junod. A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood portrays, in a little more than a hundred minutes, the challenges of dealing with one's old wounds and unspoken feelings due to a broken family.

I think a lot of us can relate to this topic because even though we've grown up, we've come to understand that there will always be ghosts that haunt us from our past and from our family dramas and our family traumas. But this is actually a happy movie and I loved it. It's a drama, obviously, but I think it is really powerful with that kind of storytelling that we need today and we need right now in this world. Even though this movie is not a biopic of neither Mr. Rogers or Tom Junod, it is a required movie. It's a must-see film for these hidden messages that it carries, the subtext that this movie has. And it is to be a little bit kinder with oneself, with the people around us, and with the world.

We can always be a little kinder, especially with ourselves. I know a lot of people, myself included, that are really hard with ourselves and this is the kind of movie that let us take a step back, breathe, think what we are doing right now, and then continue. And yeah, that is one of, like, the biggest subtexts this movie has. And ultimately, this movie does not concentrate on the friendship between these two men. It concentrates on becoming a more kind, a more vulnerable, a more responsive, forgiving, and involved human being. Not only with ourselves, but with our families, with our partners, with a parent. And I think this is a really powerful movie that engages you in a very fun, child-like narrative that will help you be inside this story.

[3:27] Martín Acuña: I especially want to talk about the cast, because I think that the main role and the supporting actor are over the top. The role of the journalist, Lloyd Vogel, is played by Matthew Rhys. He is best known for playing characters in TV series and TV dramas like Brothers and Sisters and The Americans, for which he won two Golden Globe nominations and a Primetime Emmy Award. Matthew Rhys is a Welsh actor, married to a fellow actress Kerry Russell. You might remember her as a dancer in a couple of movies, or as the cello player in August Rush. In 2012, Matthew Rhys was part of the cast of Look Back in Anger, the off-Broadway play produced by Roundabout Theatre Company, and has moved a lot between film, TV, and theatre productions.

And this is like his latest work, by the hand of the supporting actor, film legend Tom Hanks. He is a 63-year-old actor that began his career in the late 70s and the early 80s. As a fun fact, he was a college dropout after being an intern at the Great Lakes Theatre Festival for more than three years. He was studying theatre, and as he became an intern, he started working. He had several jobs between stage management, lighting design, costume design, being an assistant director, and finally he dropped school and became a full-time actor that won his first nomination for the Best Actor Academy Award in 1988 with the film Big. This is actually the first movie I remember seeing with him. I'm from 1994, but I remember I had the VHS, well, my dad had the VHS.

And one of my favorite scenes from this movie, from Big, is the Fowl Schwartz piano scene where he is in New York and goes to this toy store and starts playing a song in the piano on the floor. And I remember my first time in New York, my dad took us to see the live piano at the Fowl Schwartz store. It's really nice. And Big is a nice comedy, if you want to see it, it's really fun, and you're going to enjoy it. Then he won his second Best Actor Academy Award in 1994, the year I was born, with Forrest Gump, after he won it with Philadelphia. He is the second actor that wins this award consecutively. In 1996, he was the voice for Sheriff Woody in Toy Story, the animated amazing movie from Pixar and Disney, and he's been Sheriff Woody in Toy Story 2, Toy Story 3, and Toy Story 4.

In the late 1990s, he would have a debut as a director with a film called That Thing That You Do, and as a producer with HBO for several series, and especially a docudrama, and then he would start doing other collaborations with Steven Spielberg. He played characters, or the main character, for The Terminal and The Polar Express in 2004, The Da Vinci Code in 2006. He also had a cameo in The Simpsons movie, playing himself. Like, Tom Hanks, I'm sorry, is there something you have not done yet? Then, in 2013, he played characters for Captain Phillips and Saving Mr. Banks. In Saving Mr. Banks, he was Walt Disney himself, and Saving Mr. Banks is the story of Walt Disney convincing the author of Mary Poppins to give him the adaptation rights so he could do the musical film.

And finally, in 2019, he was a nominee again for the Academy Awards as Best Supporting Actor in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. So yeah, Tom Hanks is a film legend. He has a lot, a lot, a lot of work on his back, and I just hope I can work with him someday because I think he is an amazing actor. I think we all have a lot to learn about him because he is always kind, he is always smiling, and he moves hearts. He moves people's hearts in every single character he plays.

[8:14] Martín Acuña: Now, back to the film. And before we go, I think that this film stays true to the caption, a story of kindness we need right now. With everything that's going on worldwide, I do think that we need to be a little bit kinder with everyone, with people we see on the street, with people that maybe need help, and we can afford to take a second and ask them how they are. I think this film never loses that childlike innocence when it has to introduce and deal with adult deep emotional scenarios like death, like confronting your fears, like forgiving yourself and forgiving others. And I have three lessons that I learned from this film. The first one is to love unconditionally to whoever goes down your path.

The second one, and I am going to quote Mr. Rogers, is there is no normal life that is free from pain. That's true. Pain and suffering is part of life, and you have the decision on how to deal and how to manage that suffering and that pain to get through it. Recently, I was listening to a podcast of one of my favorite singers, and she said that she's been dealing with a lot, and she like went under the radar for almost two years, and she just reappeared, and she said that one of the most toxic things that she had in life was someone that kept pushing her and saying power through. That's dangerous, because we need time to heal, and we need to take time to manage with our feelings, and I think this movie is a great example of how to do that.

And finally, the last lesson that I learned watching Tom Hanks and Matthew Rhys is there is still human kindness, and we can work to install it in our daily life. We can always work to become better people, better professionals, better family members, better sons, and we can always be better with ourselves.

[11:03] Martín Acuña: Now to say goodbye, I want to do a little recommendation from my theater family, and I am going to name a couple podcasts that I've been listening to lately, and I absolutely loved them. The first one is Page to Stage. I think they are amazing. They really, really, truly know what they're doing. I'm still figuring out what the hell I'm doing with my podcast, but shout out to Page to Stage. I'm going to leave all the links below, but I want to give a shout out to Broadway Babies Podcast, Jim and Tomek Musical Theater Happy Hour. You're gonna have a lot of fun with them. The Musical Man Podcast, The Original Cast Podcast, and finally one podcast that is called What the Musical. You will have fun.

They are obviously mostly musical theater podcasts, but some of them also review and have conversations about other stuff that is not related to Broadway. And yeah, thank you for tuning in for another episode of Backstage Talk. Remember to review and rate if you're listening in Apple Podcast or any other platform that lets you comment and rate. I will also leave my social media below or in the comments here at this episode. And thank you. See you next week. Bye-bye.