This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:14] Jesse McAnally: Hello, I'm Jesse McAnally.

[0:15] Alan Seales: And I'm Alan Seales.

[0:17] Liz Eston: And I'm Liz Eston.

[0:18] Jesse McAnally: And welcome to Carrey'd Away, a podcast where we explore the films and television shows starring the one and only Canadian James Eugene Carrey.

[0:25] Alan Seales: Alright, and we have an extra special guest on this holiday episode.

[0:30] Jesse McAnally: We are breaking tradition because we did not want to cover The Grinch and A Christmas Carol in the middle of July of next year.

[0:30] Alan Seales: The Grinch.

[0:51] Jesse McAnally: Jim Carrey is The Grinch.

[0:59] Alan Seales: How the Grinch Stole Christmas is a film that was released on November 17th in the United States, written by Jeffrey Price and Peter Seaman, starring Jim Carrey.

[1:08] Alan Seales: Yes, November 17th, 2000, starring Jim Carrey, Taylor Momsen, Jeffrey Tambor, Christine Baranski, Bill Irwin, and Molly Shannon, directed by Ron Howard, the plot of which is on the outskirts of Hooville, lives a green revenge-seeking Grinch, who plans to ruin Christmas for all the citizens of the town.

[1:24] Jesse McAnally: Please join me in welcoming Michigan's own beaming Broadway star and former resident of Hooville on stage in two different shows. It's Andrew Keenan Bolger!

[1:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Hey, what's up, gang?

[1:37] Alan Seales: How are you doing, Andrew?

[1:38] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm so good. I'm ready for, yeah, let's get in this holiday season.

[1:43] Jesse McAnally: Yes, yes, yes. I'm very excited to have you on. But first and foremost, what is your history with Jim Carrey?

[1:55] Andrew Keenan Bolger: If you have one. If this is the first Jim Carrey movie you've ever seen, like that's fine too.

[1:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: No, I think the first movie I saw was like Ace Ventura, or maybe The Mask. I'm a child of the 90s, so he loomed large in I think my friend's circles. Like, that was as good as it got in terms of comedy in the 90s. So yeah, I think one of those two early introductions.

[2:19] Jesse McAnally: Now, later in life, you would go on to be JoJo in Seussical and as well Young Max in How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the stage show. Did you find any influence from Jim Carrey's interpretation of this film or anything into either of those productions?

[2:34] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Honestly, I don't think so. I know, well, the Grinch movie came out while I was in Seussical. Um, so it was that same year. And I remember they did a special screening for our cast, like before everyone else got to see it.

[2:49] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Okay, forget everything else we have to say. Tell us all about that screening.

[2:52] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like, oh my gosh. Um, it was in the Times Square AMC. It was literally just our cast. It was like 30 people in like a giant movie theater. And yet they just showed it to us. Just, I think, as a Seuss Brothers kind of IP project. Like, now you're brothers from another mother.

[3:17] Jesse McAnally: So you had to have been the target audience of this film. What was your reaction of it at the time?

[3:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um, I remember honestly being like a little critical of it. I think because I was so immersed in Dr. Seuss and like in preparation for Seussical, because I was like 15 at the time, so I was a little bit older than my character from Seussical. But I used to be a good one. And I remember it all would be pandering, not pandering, but like pointing towards like the teen crowd that's like, hey, come on in. This is a million percent. And I think I remember thinking Jim Carrey was amazing, as I still do today, having rewatched it, where you're like, that is an incredible performance. But I remember not loving the movie. And I remember being backstage, I think probably this is actually more accurate, with a group of catty gay men all like dunking on it. So I think that might have also influenced some of my reactions to it.

[4:29] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Well, that it is not a movie that I have ever seen again until yesterday. From that time that I saw it in the theater. I feel like when it came out it was inescapable, almost ignoring the entire conceit of the movie of, you know, like capitalism isn't great, where the marketing is like buy all these toys at Toys "R" Us, and don't forget to go to Wendy's and get your Grinch toys. It was marketed to blitz. Like in New York, I have to imagine it was everywhere, like on every doorstep.

[5:00] Andrew Keenan Bolger: If there's something you want, better start, run, get on a train, hop on a bus. It's holiday cultivation and Toys "R" Us for Universal Pictures release on three lucky Who's Who win Dodge Caravans, imagine the shouts. Imagine the hotlers. One another. He's a million three.

[5:19] Jesse McAnally: Oh, a million percent. Yeah, and I think my generation, and certainly the generation just below me, this is their Christmas movie. This is their White Christmas, their It's a Wonderful Life. Like, it is The Grinch.

[5:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um, I guess, like, alright, since we're going into that, and that was such a great intro into it, and also a little bit like, wow, you were there when it happened. You saw before all of us, and you had you are in the world of Seuss while you had to go and see the world of Seuss. That being said, how much influence, because in my opinion, every adaptation of The Grinch afterwards has taken a lot of influence from this movie and a lot of characteristics from it. And then when you're in The Grinch on stage in the national tour, if I'm correct, did you feel a lot of that influence from like, oh, that's we're just doing some Jim Carrey stuff?

[6:10] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Alright. It's funny, I really, this is not a compelling answer. I would say literally none. When I got cast in The Grinch, I never had the desire to go and rewatch it. Maybe also because I was playing Max the Dog, and I'm like, what am I gonna glean from this live animal that doesn't talk? Um, but no, I'm not gonna be. I grew up on the Chuck Jones version, the animated. I think it's only like twenty or thirty minutes, but that is definitely the one that, yeah, that was the one that I still to this day think of when anyone says The Grinch.

[7:06] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, me too. Absolutely. Like the animated version with little Cindy Lou Who, who real life actress is thirty years old now.

[7:13] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Uh, Taylor Momsen.

[7:15] Jesse McAnally: She's a punk rock singer who famously exposes her body a lot. That is part of her performance. So a lot of people are like, oh, my childhood. People get older. How dare they? She's also like a bitch on Gossip Girl.

[7:30] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So like I just met earlier this year, I met the actress who plays the young Christine Baranski in it, the like Martha May Who-vier. And she's now grown up and an actress as well. And I met her at a party, and somehow people were talking about being a child actor, and they're like, Andrew is a child actor and like Dr. Seuss stuff too. And she shared the anecdote that at least once a week, a like college-educated older man will slide into her DMs and say creepy stuff about her performance as like a 10-year-old in that. She's like, that not a week has gone by where someone has not like over-sexualized that character. And now with me as a 30-year-old, feels the need to share it with me, as though I am going to like join in on this creepy fantasy.

[8:15] Jesse McAnally: Ooh. No.

[8:16] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Though that being said, the movie does that no favors. It does sh, it's a little flirty. It's a little more than you would want from a 10-year-old representation of a lot of things. Like they basically have like the seductive saxophone playing in the background. It's really unpleasant. As a Ron Howard film, there's a couple things in here that I was like, really? Ron Howard? I interesting. I have a lot of things to say about this, and I am excited to say about it.

[8:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So this film was a huge hyperfixation for me in my early days. So literally, I did not rewatch this. I know this film beginning to end without having to revisit it at all. Um, and truly, it was a horrendous experience for everyone involved by all accounts. And there was a lot of push and pull between people who didn't know what they were trying to make it. A lot of folks, more like on the Brian Grazer side, were like edgy comedy, let's try to embrace that side of it, make it a little bit raunchier. Where on the Jim Carrey kind of Ron Howard side, it was like, let's bling in the ambulance, let's make it a little sweeter. And then they met in the middle, and I think most of the negative response was that doesn't know what it is, and I can't help but agree with that.

[9:32] Andrew Keenan Bolger: However, film techniques and the things that it like really shines now, especially like now that we've removed ourselves from like the practical sets and the makeup appliances and having physical actors that do physical things on screen and torturing our actors by putting them under mountains and mounts of yak hair and fake noses and contacts. It is an impressive feat, and there are some cinematography choices that I found interesting in concept but baffling in execution.

[10:05] Alan Seales: Um, do we know anything about Ron Howard as a director?

[10:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like was covered in yak hair?

[10:12] Alan Seales: Yeah.

[10:14] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh my god. Oh, wait, no. So the Seuss suit was actually yak hair?

[10:18] Alan Seales: Yes, fully yak hair.

[10:20] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Entirely yak hair and that sounds yakky. It's uh, 90 days Jim Carrey had to be on set. So ninety days getting there at 3 a.m. before everyone else, um, getting poked and prodded at for three to four hours every morning, and then having to go and perform uncomfortably under contacts and all these things. He was very, very unhappy with having to do this and made it known in his pre-model way, because this is a few years removed from The Cable Guy where he was getting twenty million dollars for one role. He is on top of the world. He thinks that he should not be having to deal with this. And then the producers paid for, like, you know, torture, like people to train him to deal with torture and things like that, which, in my opinion, is a little too much.

But then he s, they basically recommended, like, you meditate, take up smoking, but he has to smoke out of a Cruella de Vil style cigarette holder, or else he will ignite the yak hair he's covered in. Um, and eventually Ron Howard is like, Okay, forget it, you're bitching so much. I'm gonna wear the suit for a whole day and just see how bad it was.

[11:25] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And he's like, It wasn't great, but it's fine. And he directed at least one day entirely dressed up as The Grinch.

[11:32] Alan Seales: No kidding.

[11:34] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Good on you, Ron. That is like the epitome of decent director trying to be like, Alright, I get that you're going through pain, I get that this is difficult, but it's every actor in this film has to undergo a lot of makeup just for an everyday. It's done by Rick Baker, who is very, very famous, one of the best to do it, got his start in the Star Wars world, became acclaimed through An American Werewolf in London and The Howling, back-to-back werewolf transformations, two of the best, and would go on to win an Oscar for all the makeup effects that he would do for this film, and well-deserved, one of the few well-deserved things of the colors.

[12:07] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, they look amazing.

[12:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um, and to the test of time, like look better today than they did back then, in all honesty. Like the clarity of HD and 4K restorations of this film has only done it favors in a way that a lot of other VFX heavy films have not.

[12:24] Alan Seales: I maybe others will agree. Aside from like the sledding down the hill piece, um, in the latter half of the film, all the CGI and visual effects pieces kind of hold up very well.

[12:34] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, there are some close-ups on Jim where I'm where like you can tell it's sort of like the spongy material on his face, but it still looks good. If you know what you're looking for, you can see it, but it looks amazing.

[12:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I think it absolutely held up. This has been a long time coming. Basically, a movie studio is just waiting for Dr. Seuss to die.

[12:52] Jesse McAnally: Um, and I that sounds horrendous, but that is the truth.

[12:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Well, um, Liz, you can explain it better.

[13:02] Liz Eston: Oh, do you want me to explain?

[13:03] Jesse McAnally: Okay.

[13:04] Liz Eston: Yes, please. So, yeah, they're basically just fighting for the right to The Grinch in any Dr. Seuss thing. They're just waiting for this old guy to kick it. Like, we can only adapt this once he dies, and he has a widow we can get permission from. So she is, I wouldn't say litigious with it. She is very much like, yeah, well. She got more litigious post-2004, but that was for a good reason.

[13:30] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Uh, so yeah, basically she had very specific stipulations, and she said any actors submitted for The Grinch must be comparable to the stature of Jack Nicholson, Jim Carrey, Robin Williams, and Dustin Hoffman. She had a lot of power, and she got her way.

[13:47] Jesse McAnally: She did. She won. She got a bunch of money from it. So, um, and this is one of the highest grossing films of all time when it came out, and it's still quite up there. I mean, even compared to like the Marvel stuff today. While the VFX and the visuals have aged well, I don't know if the narrative has. So, Andrew, I'm very curious. You coming back into this nearly two decades later.

[14:13] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Well, it's funny. I was watching it in my dressing room in between shows yesterday. I'm in Dracula, a comedy of tears right now off Broadway. And James Daly, who plays our Dracula, was like, oh my god, are you watching the Grinch? I'm like, yeah, it's for this podcast. And I had my AirPods in, and he started reciting in the background every single line, like in Jim Carrey's voice, like to the exact dialogue. Same intention. He's like, This is like maybe one of my absolute favorite movies and like a huge influence for me when it comes to comedy. So I was seeing it through his lens, which was super sunny. And then my other castmate Arnie Burton came in and he was like, Ugh, are you watching The Grinch?

The worst Christmas movie ever made. It's a good Arnie. Basically, it started a huge fight, a loving fight between James and Arnie. So I was sitting very agnostic, right in between, like trying to take like the most absolute superlatives and like the most iconoclast, like burying this film. And I think I felt somewhere in between. I was really impressed with, like you were saying before, the special effects and how much like practical stuff they used. I think especially in comedy, so rarely when you were like CGIing something to death is stuff funny. And I think it's because like that little girl is looking up at Jim Carrey, he looks exactly like how he looks to the audience. So her reactions are real, the comedic moments are all real.

Versus if she was staring up at a guy in like a flesh-colored suit with a bunch of X's all over him, you're gonna have a different reaction as an actor. And so I think, especially with comedy, like all of the practical stuff makes such a huge difference. And I was so glad to see how much it stacked up. In terms of the narrative, I guess I just didn't remember how much they had changed it. And I think it doesn't make sense to me. I think they missed the point of the entire book, which is they make the who's these kind of grotesque capitalist, like super consumer-y type creatures. Merry Christmas! Thank you for shopping carbon. Thank you for the one. Or your uncle. And a fan pie for your cousin Leon.

So we just need all out for me. And in the book, they are these like lovely, cheerful, kind of pure creatures, and the thought in the movie is like, and then he steals away all their stuff and they get so upset. Whereas in the book, they steal all their stuff, and the who's don't care at all. They're like, it's not about any of that. What we are about is love. And I was like, oh wait, that movie. I think it did the opposite. Where it's like, yeah, how terrible there's and I get that they're like, oh, but it's about like rehabilitation and everything, but we as a society are much more like the who's in the Jim Carrey version than in the Dr. Seuss version, but I don't know. I feel like it's sort of I was confused by that choice and why they decided to do that. If it feels like of course you would want to do that though, because you're like, let's make the who's reflect more who we are.

[17:48] Andrew Keenan Bolger: You know, I gotta say, I think, and don't shoot me here. This was my first time seeing this movie. Oh. So with that said, I came into this with again the animated version, the short version of like and the book, right? And coming into this, I was like, oh, they gave him a backstory and a little bit of a love interest. And I guess this is a little bit to your point, Jess, of to like it doesn't know what it wants to be, but I sort of enjoyed that because it was a different universe of the same story that we know about. So I actually I really enjoyed that they humanized the who's and the Grinch a little bit, and I found them relatable because they were real. And so I will pleasantly disagree that I think the changes did work from at least for me.

I think the changes make sense for the kind of because here I think this is a smart decision. I don't love the way that they got there, but I think the idea of having Cindy Lou and the Grinch juxtaposed by having the same frustration and relating on that, which is like this shit's a little overblown, right? And they both have that, and they react to it in two very different ways, which Cindy Lou is working within the system. I'm like, she's like, I want to find meaning, and I think the meaning might be found through me connecting with other people and bringing people together. How can we preach this if we're cutting out ostracizing someone out? Maybe if I do that I will understand the meaning.

And he's like, fuck these people. They are the problem, and it's their fault that I don't understand it. And then they compromise and they relate through that. And I think as an overarching theme for a narrative film, that is at least a pretty good bone structured build this off of in reflecting these two characters. And I know the 2018 movie also tried something like this, but I think it works in a very less effective way there. And I think that's the pathos that this brings is that core relationship, which is the only thing that is completely novel to this film that I feel like works. Everything else that they take from the Dr. Seuss book really works in this film, in my opinion. Everything they take from the Chuck Jones thing also works in this film. That relationship is non-existent in the book or the Chuck Jones story. It really is the core center of this, and it's mostly because the actors have great chemistry together.

[20:15] Jesse McAnally: Yeah. It looked like it looked like a lot of fun on set. I think you know Molly Shannon was a bit underused, and like Dustin Hoffman is the narrator. Uh not Dustin Hoffman. Anthony Hopkins. Or Anthony Hopkins. Yeah, whatever. Whatever. Same same but different. Wait, this is my Jenny McCarthy uh. This is your Jenny McCarthy uh Lockley or Mr. Episode, yeah. You say that it was fun on set, um, not particularly. Not at all. Oh no. Tell me more. Tell me more. This is like one of the few because NDA crazy, but this is one of the few stories that get out about how Jim Carrey was at the top of his game a little bit of a diva, not doing his best. Kaziro Tsuji. Um he is a renowned special effects makeup artist, and he started his career on the Grinch.

So he's basically like B makeup artist to Rick Baker. Um, and has the unenviable job of getting Jim Carrey dressed and ready every morning and getting him into the makeup. Um he said that it was truly an experience he will never forget. He relived the nightmare that was the Grinch in a recent interview with Vulture via the playlist, and it turns out he checked into therapy soon after working with Jim Carrey. On set, Jim Carrey was really mean to everybody at the beginning of the production. They couldn't finish. After two weeks, we could only finish three days worth of shooting schedule because suddenly he would just disappear, and then he would come back, everything was ripped apart, and we couldn't shoot everything, so he'd just rip apart these makeup appliances.

In the makeup trailer, he just suddenly stands up, looks in the mirror, and pointing at his chin, and he goes, This color is different than the one you did yesterday. I was using the same color he used yesterday. He said, fix it, and you know, I fixed it. Every day was like that. Um he became so exhausted with Carrie that the makeup artist Rick Baker and one of the film's producers allowed him to step away from the project for a hiatus to not deal with Jim Carrey. The goal was to make Carrie realize how important the makeup artist was to the creation of the character, and the plan worked, and he received a call from Carrie two weeks after his break asking him to please return to the film, and Ron Howard also called, swearing Jim Carrey had changed his way, it was acting more positive behind the scenes, and uh Grinch like uh changed himself.

I went back under one condition, he said. I was talking with my friends, and they all told me you should ask for a raise before you go back. I didn't want to do that, kinda nasty. Then I got to the idea, how can I and he got a green card. That was the deal. So now it was all a positive, but also Jim Carrey, while under very unpleasant conditions, was not behaving very well in this film, and he was letting a lot of that fame and nonsense go to him. And this is fresh off of his Man on the Moon stint, which they made an entire documentary about his behavior on that set.

[22:51] Alan Seales: Right, yeah. Um, so I, as much as I enjoy this, obviously there was a lot of things going on behind the scenes, and that's not even unpacking, like the Jeffrey Tambor of it all, who would later come out to be a very difficult person to work with on any set.

[23:08] Andrew Keenan Bolger: As far as like Jeffrey Tambor's hard to work with? Is that sarcasm? I didn't I don't know.

[23:17] Alan Seales: Yeah. Oh well he got canned in the last season of Transparent because of the treating specifically like his trans co-workers.

[23:27] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, he's not scratched. He's not a particularly good person, but he's so wonderful and I know.

[23:36] Alan Seales: I just love him from Rest of Development.

[23:37] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, me too. Uh he used to treat Jessica Walter like garbage on that set specifically.

[23:43] Alan Seales: You're dead to me if you treat her bad priest. That's right. That's right. So there's a lot of egos going at play on this film that is supposed to be like a family like tradition. Specifically, they cite like inspiration from like A Wonderful Life. Um, and Jim Carrey said his performance was based a lot on Jimmy Stewart. I'm curious, does anyone else see that influence? Because I do not, aside from like that one speech he gives at the end where he's like, oh, it's all about gifts. And I'm like, oh, I see it. You're going you're going a little Jimmy Stewart there. I mean, it kind of you know, not just thing with a sh with his teeth. But that's about it.

[24:22] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Max, let's go. Our work here is finished. That is not a juke toy as much as it comes into play. That is the dental appliance he has. Like, even in like interviews and like bloopers, you can hear him do that, so like, oh sorry, let me try sorry, let me try to Sorry. I'm so I'm sure I'm so sorry. Um you gotta get angry about it.

[24:50] Jesse McAnally: Yes. Um speaking of getting angry, um, the critics did not love the Well, let's take a look, because we have both Entertainment Weekly and Variety reviews, both from the time the film came out. Uh the first one is by Owen Gleberman, and he says, Carrie thrusting his lower lip to the pout of magnificently mocking self-pity, speaks in a baso, rapid fire, vaguely British growl that makes him sound like a deranged James Stewart fused with Lionel Barrymore.

[25:19] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Okay, they see Jimmy Stewart too. I'm not seeing it.

[25:21] Jesse McAnally: I'm not seeing it either. I don't agree with that.

[25:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I see Lionel Barrymore more.

[25:25] Jesse McAnally: Um he plays the growled lip. He plays the Grinch as an overgrown kid who never got his candy, is now going to make the world pay for it. The Grinch sits around his mad scientist lair, munching on glass, his beetle brows locked into a sneer as he tries to dream up ways of ruining everyone else's pleasure. Madness fills him with dirty high spirits, but he's so suspicious of anything that feels good that he compulsively sabotages even his own malevolent glee.

[25:49] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I mean, that that's mostly just an insult of Carrie.

[25:51] Jesse McAnally: Um once again, not seeing the James Stewart, I see the Lionel Barrymore, like slightly, but not much. Um, there's a plot hole we haven't talked about. So the backstory here is that when he's about eight years old, right? Eight or nine years old, they were it was Christmas, and like some other kid made fun of him for having facial hair. Because he was eight, and he tried to shave it, and the whole thing he just had like little razor cuts, and then he got so bullied from that that he went to a mountain and nobody ever heard from him again. Why did nobody go after the eight-year-old boy when he ran away to live in an ice cave?

[26:26] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, including his like legal guardians.

[26:28] Jesse McAnally: Right? His lesbian brothers, yes. His lesbian moms, yeah.

[26:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Who just let him.

[26:36] Jesse McAnally: Um the keys in the car. She had a swingers party.

[26:41] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That was moment number one, Ron Howard.

[26:45] Jesse McAnally: Well, no, that was actually momentum number two, because 30 seconds before that, um, they get a baby delivered to their doorstep, and the dad's like, hey, our baby's here. Why does he look like your boss?

[26:55] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh my god.

[26:58] Jesse McAnally: This movie's weirdly horny.

[27:01] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It is obscene. And there was when he was trying to catch a taxi and he was like, he couldn't catch a taxi. He's like, 'cause I'm green.

[27:09] Jesse McAnally: Yep. Yep.

[27:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um, that one's not too bad. That one's like in any other kid's movie, that would be fine. The other ones, maybe not so much.

[27:17] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, no. Or when he puts a mistletoe over his butt and tells him to kiss it, like he's sleeping.

[27:25] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That was a good one. And then the dog crawls away with his butt on the carpet like it really hurt or something.

[27:30] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, that was that's pretty good. I like that.

[27:32] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um that's comedy.

[27:34] Jesse McAnally: I did like that one. That was my favorite.

[27:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I hated that.

[27:37] Jesse McAnally: I hate that. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it.

[27:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um, I think you and I are uh on one camp.

[27:45] Jesse McAnally: And they're on the other camp.

[27:47] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh, yeah, so you guys are pro dogs.

[27:50] Jesse McAnally: I made it specty.

[27:52] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm still pro this movie.

[27:55] Jesse McAnally: Um we're gonna go with that.

[27:57] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Umvince me otherwise.

[27:59] Jesse McAnally: Well, let's hear what Todd McCarthy says. Um, Todd. Um, for decades, late Theodore Geisel showed the door to all filmmakers who approached him about making live-action versions of his popular 1957 story, How the Grinch Stole Christmas. It's too bad his wishes did not continue to be honored, as this lavishly appointed production reps a sweet and simple tale gone enormously sour.

[28:20] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Shrill, strenuous, and entirely without charm, Ron Howard's attempt at a Christmas classic is an elaborately wrapped empty box that will fool many people into buying it, but will not greatly please its recipients.

[28:31] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Too scary for tikes, the film lacks the magic and fun that older kids want.

[28:36] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And many middle American grown-ups who dutifully drag their sprigs along will end up resenting the film's unpleasantly negative vibes and its failure to provide a good family time.

[28:47] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um that felt like a Roger Ebert quote with the use of the word tikes.

[28:51] Jesse McAnally: He says I don't agree with that.

[28:55] Jesse McAnally: I think kids love this film.

[28:57] Jesse McAnally: Um because I think I'm a little bit younger, Liz and I are a little younger.

[29:01] Jesse McAnally: Uh I was about four or five when this film came out.

[29:04] Jesse McAnally: Um, and once that kind of hit, uh there was it was it it became impossible to escape from the kids.

[29:10] Jesse McAnally: Every kid was quoting this every it was like watching Eddie Murphy's Raw for the first time, where every kid suddenly became a stand-up just because the film existed.

[29:20] Andrew Keenan Bolger: There is that famous speech where he's like four o'clock wallowing self-pity, five o'clock stare into the abyss, five o'clock self will her old hunger tell no one, six o'clock dinner with me.

[29:30] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I can't cancel that again.

[29:31] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like that that line has survived its own.

[29:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: But what will I wear?

[29:35] Jesse McAnally: Exactly.

[29:38] Jesse McAnally: Because like like Ace Ventura, you talk out of your butt.

[29:42] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Uh the mask you somebody stop me.

[29:45] Jesse McAnally: Like from this one, what's the one line you come away with?

[29:47] Jesse McAnally: And I think, you know, what will I wear?

[29:49] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Is that what it is?

[29:50] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That's I don't even lot on their TikToks.

[29:54] Jesse McAnally: Yeah.

[29:54] Jesse McAnally: Before we go on to the other side of our critical corner, Andrew, I do want to ask you, as a director, about some of the directorial choices in this film.

[30:03] Jesse McAnally: Um, cinematography-wise, um, for those of you that don't know, Andrew made this wonderful film um called Sign, um that was written by Adam Wachter correctly.

[30:12] Jesse McAnally: Do I think um very, very tal talented composer as well.

[30:16] Jesse McAnally: Um love the film.

[30:18] Jesse McAnally: I've loved it for a while.

[30:19] Jesse McAnally: So glad I get to meet you and tell you how much I love that movie.

[30:22] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um thank you so much.

[30:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Very, very well done.

[30:24] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um and I want to talk to you about some of the choices that he made and whether you would have uh made these choices as well if given the task.

[30:30] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah.

[30:31] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I I think honestly, some of my issues might be a little bit more with like the art direction.

[30:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I think on a rewatch, it does look a little tacky.

[30:46] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I thought like I was impressed by the sets, but it is very that kind of like early two thousands maximalist, like it if you can put a bejewel on it, like do it.

[31:00] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I I feel like it weirdly the book is so beautiful and the lines are so clean and Dr. Seuss weirdly is about simplicity, even though the ideas are so huge.

[31:12] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And his it does not reflect the book's aesthetic in any way, I thought, other than the who's having a slightly upturned nose.

[31:19] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um but it it feels real real extra in a way that hurts my eyes a little bit.

[31:29] Jesse McAnally: Um Would you have made it brighter?

[31:31] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Is it a color or No, I think it it's it's like the it's costume set, lighting, all of the above.

[31:39] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I think I think they could have uh taken the like Coco Chanel, like take off one uh article of clothing.

[31:47] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It said I think they're like, let's add everything.

[31:50] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Aside from I think the Grinch, that those special effects are pretty astounding.

[31:55] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And the fact that Jim Carrey is able to really break through all of that is I think really impressive.

[32:02] Andrew Keenan Bolger: But like, if you look at like Cindy Lou Who's wig, it's like, ew, I don't want oh, what is that?

[32:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And I don't know what any of it is referencing other than like just too much.

[32:16] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It's tacky.

[32:17] Andrew Keenan Bolger: What I think happened, and this is me putting on my tinfoil hat, um, at the same time, at the same production company, the first film about five or six months before that, was released that used DIT digital intermediate technology to color correct in um technology.

[32:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um, and that is Oh Brother, where art thou, where they very brilliantly used it to keep the blues of their overalls very blue, but make all the leaves very orange.

[32:44] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I think that they just handed that off and they're like, well, what if we make the first half like really dissaturate and then at the end we'll bring out all the colors all of a sudden?

[32:51] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And since the it was so much of its infancy, it's very distracting and very primitive in that style.

[32:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Uh this has not been confirmed, but this is me being like, this would make sense.

[33:04] Jesse McAnally: I'll buy it.

[33:05] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah.

[33:07] Andrew Keenan Bolger: This tracks for me from all the information.

[33:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: But you know what? No one cares what I think about this.

[33:12] Jesse McAnally: You know who really cares?

[33:14] Jesse McAnally: The opinion we really want.

[33:16] Jesse McAnally: It's those of the truly sane and normal people over on Letterboxd.com.

[33:20] Jesse McAnally: It's time for the letterbox game.

[33:22] Jesse McAnally: One star or five star.

[33:24] Jesse McAnally: Alright, Andrew.

[33:25] Jesse McAnally: That's another great transition.

[33:26] Jesse McAnally: You're you're two for two on this.

[33:28] Jesse McAnally: I'll give you that.

[33:29] Jesse McAnally: Normally it's transitions are really not this good.

[33:32] Jesse McAnally: Um I sometimes I make it funnier because they're not good.

[33:36] Jesse McAnally: Um, because I just want to get on to the next thing.

[33:38] Jesse McAnally: How this works is we Liz has pulled real life letterbox reviews.

[33:43] Jesse McAnally: And Alan, Andrew, you guys are gonna go head to head, and you have to guess just based on the review alone, whether they are a one-star or a five-star.

[33:52] Jesse McAnally: And they're gonna get unhinged, so this is this is where we get to the horny section of letterbox game.

[34:02] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh my god.

[34:03] Jesse McAnally: Yeah.

[34:05] Jesse McAnally: That's this is the this is the one Jess is looking at.

[34:07] Jesse McAnally: There's some weirder ones I didn't include because they just made me uncomfortable.

[34:11] Jesse McAnally: Like whole.

[34:14] Jesse McAnally: Alright, Alan, you're up first.

[34:16] Alan Seales: Okay, okay.

[34:18] Alan Seales: Liz, you want to be on Andrew's team?

[34:19] Liz Eston: I didn't even ask whose team.

[34:21] Alan Seales: Oh, yeah, I'll be on Andrew's team.

[34:22] Liz Eston: Yes.

[34:23] Alan Seales: Andrew, Liz will ask you the question.

[34:25] Alan Seales: Alright.

[34:25] Alan Seales: The dead was dummy thick.

[34:30] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Was dummy thick?

[34:32] Andrew Keenan Bolger: He did have like a butt implant.

[34:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Dummy.

[34:36] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh god.

[34:37] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I think I think that's a thick with a with a K.

[34:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yes, with a K.

[34:42] Alan Seales: Or I'm going five star.

[34:44] Jesse McAnally: That is a one-star.

[34:46] Andrew Keenan Bolger: No!

[34:47] Alan Seales: Coming out.

[34:48] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Weak.

[34:48] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Swingin' a miss.

[34:49] Alan Seales: Oh.

[34:51] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Damn it.

[34:52] Alan Seales: Alright, Andrew, are you ready?

[34:54] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Let's do it.

[34:55] Alan Seales: Had a dream that he lived in the woods behind my house and set them on fire and tried to eat my dog.

[35:03] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm gonna go with one star.

[35:05] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It's correct.

[35:06] Jesse McAnally: No, you're in the lead, Andrew.

[35:09] Alan Seales: Oh boy.

[35:10] Alan Seales: Alright, Andrew, you ready?

[35:14] Alan Seales: Every time I do drugs, I have a really intense experience with some type of green man.

[35:22] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh, the shnike farts.

[35:24] Alan Seales: I'm gonna go five star on that one.

[35:26] Jesse McAnally: That is correct!

[35:27] Alan Seales: Yes!

[35:28] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Tide it up.

[35:29] Alan Seales: This movie saved my marriage.

[35:34] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I mean, if if that's not a five-star, I don't know what else.

[35:38] Jesse McAnally: That's correct.

[35:39] Alan Seales: Maybe we can be married, you know?

[35:43] Andrew Keenan Bolger: We bonded over that max butt thing.

[35:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That was great.

[35:47] Alan Seales: Um, if this was about my ex-wife, it would be how the bitch stole my kids.

[35:54] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh, the bitch stole my kids?

[36:00] Andrew Keenan Bolger: One star.

[36:01] Jesse McAnally: That is correct!

[36:03] Alan Seales: Yes.

[36:04] Alan Seales: That one was one I I immediately caught, and I'm like, oh, that's unhinged.

[36:10] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Literally a horror film.

[36:14] Alan Seales: Uh I'm going one star.

[36:16] Jesse McAnally: Correct.

[36:18] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Natural talent for this letterbox chip.

[36:20] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, it's what a great talent to have.

[36:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm gonna add that to my CV.

[36:25] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Someone wanna help me with my taxes.

[36:27] Jesse McAnally: Special skills.

[36:28] Jesse McAnally: One star, five star, baby.

[36:30] Alan Seales: Alright, Alan.

[36:32] Alan Seales: Yes.

[36:32] Alan Seales: My son made me rewatch this today.

[36:43] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm going one star.

[36:44] Jesse McAnally: That is correct.

[36:45] Alan Seales: Yes.

[36:47] Alan Seales: I get so competitive over this game.

[36:50] Andrew Keenan Bolger: You do.

[36:50] Alan Seales: You do, Alan.

[36:51] Jesse McAnally: I know.

[36:52] Jesse McAnally: I know.

[36:52] Alan Seales: It's really hard.

[36:53] Jesse McAnally: It's really anyway.

[36:54] Jesse McAnally: How do you get competitive over this game?

[36:56] Alan Seales: This game is like basically like, oh my god, who can hit their head against the wall to heart?

[37:01] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It's literally- And I want to win that contest.

[37:05] Alan Seales: Okay.

[37:07] Andrew Keenan Bolger: He's just a silly little guy.

[37:10] Jesse McAnally: Who is this a silly little guy?

[37:12] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Subtle guy.

[37:13] Andrew Keenan Bolger: He's a silly guy.

[37:15] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm gonna give that a little five stars.

[37:17] Jesse McAnally: That's a five-star for the silly.

[37:22] Alan Seales: Silly little guy.

[37:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yes.

[37:24] Alan Seales: Grinch could get it.

[37:27] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Especially in that suit.

[37:31] Alan Seales: That suit's a five-star suit, baby.

[37:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: You bet your ass it is.

[37:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh yeah.

[37:37] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like the relationship between him and the hu humans.

[37:41] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like, how is that supposed to work?

[37:43] Andrew Keenan Bolger: How are you supposed to have a relationship with Martha Mayhuver?

[37:47] Jesse McAnally: Nugg, not to point this out.

[37:48] Jesse McAnally: You don't wear clothes, my dude.

[37:50] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I I'm assuming that there's nothing anatomical going on down there.

[37:55] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I mean, if we want to go down that rabbit hole, it could be like the fish from Shape of Water who doesn't visibly have a penis, but like Is that a red rocket situation?

[38:04] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It might be.

[38:05] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Here comes the lipstick.

[38:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: There comes the lipstick.

[38:13] Andrew Keenan Bolger: They have a who swinger party.

[38:17] Jesse McAnally: I'm going honestly five stars.

[38:20] Jesse McAnally: That is correct.

[38:21] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Guess who you're taking home?

[38:25] Jesse McAnally: I see what you did there.

[38:29] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Wait, is that is that what I have to guess?

[38:30] Jesse McAnally: No, no, no.

[38:31] Jesse McAnally: No, that no, that was just just making a joke.

[38:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah.

[38:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh.

[38:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Brutal.

[38:36] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That is the review.

[38:38] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That's it?

[38:38] Jesse McAnally: Yep.

[38:39] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I mean, I don't know if you'd throw it in there unless you're trying to trick me, but it seems so obvious I've got to go with one star.

[38:47] Jesse McAnally: That is a five star.

[38:48] Andrew Keenan Bolger: See!

[38:48] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I see, I told you!

[38:50] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I told you!

[38:52] Jesse McAnally: You actually I didn't write these!

[38:54] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I didn't write these, Alan.

[38:55] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm just trying to trick you.

[38:57] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I knew that was a five star.

[38:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: But I went against my gut.

[38:59] Jesse McAnally: That's the first, like that's why Andrew's killing it.

[39:04] Jesse McAnally: He's just kind of going with the initial reaction.

[39:05] Alan Seales: Yeah.

[39:07] Alan Seales: You've played this game too much, I can tell.

[39:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, he's overthinking.

[39:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, you can't you can't overthink letterbox review.

[39:12] Jesse McAnally: So when you get when you get fed your review, like this is just a cute little guy.

[39:17] Jesse McAnally: Obviously, that's a five star.

[39:18] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh, okay.

[39:19] Jesse McAnally: Okay, everyone always criticizes the way that the other person delivers.

[39:23] Jesse McAnally: Like it's Are you saying I'm cheating, Alan by just?

[39:32] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And being an actor?

[39:32] Andrew Keenan Bolger: With that one star, you were leading the witness.

[39:37] Jesse McAnally: Maybe I'm just trying to cheat it so Andrew wins.

[39:39] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um I really like the village people.

[39:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Referring to the who's or referring to the band.

[39:48] Jesse McAnally: I don't know, maybe they just like the village people.

[39:50] Jesse McAnally: This has nothing to do with the Grinch.

[39:52] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um, I'm gonna go five stars.

[39:54] Jesse McAnally: That's correct.

[39:56] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh, see, see.

[39:58] Alan Seales: Alright, Alan, this is the last one.

[40:01] Alan Seales: Alright.

[40:02] Alan Seales: Can't come back.

[40:02] Alan Seales: So this is.

[40:09] Alan Seales: I have no one to blame but myself.

[40:11] Alan Seales: It won an Oscar.

[40:12] Alan Seales: What else is there to say?

[40:15] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Five star.

[40:16] Jesse McAnally: That is a one star.

[40:17] Andrew Keenan Bolger: But shot in the fucking.

[40:19] Alan Seales: See, I went with my gut wrong.

[40:21] Alan Seales: If I if I had said it the other way, it won an Oscar.

[40:24] Alan Seales: What is there to say?

[40:25] Jesse McAnally: See?

[40:26] Jesse McAnally: That would have been a one star.

[40:28] Jesse McAnally: So because I said he's a solid guy, like he's a silly little guy.

[40:31] Jesse McAnally: It was five star, but if I said he's a silly little guy, it's a one-star.

[40:36] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yep.

[40:36] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yep.

[40:37] Jesse McAnally: Listen back to this episode when you edit it.

[40:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yes, I'm the one editing this episode, Alan, and I will edit this conversation out.

[40:44] Jesse McAnally: No, keep it in.

[40:46] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Double it.

[40:48] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Actually extend it, make it super long.

[40:51] Andrew Keenan Bolger: This entire episode is this just this conversation now.

[40:53] Jesse McAnally: It's not about the Grinch.

[40:55] Jesse McAnally: How what like what do we think this has impacted as far as culture?

[41:00] Jesse McAnally: Like, cause this did have like a really big thing, and then it kind of fizzled out, and then nearly 20 years later there's been another remake of the Grinch.

[41:07] Jesse McAnally: Like, has this impacted the story in getting it out there to more people that wouldn't have initially brought it out, or has it kind of diminished its overall impact?

[41:14] Jesse McAnally: Because Andrew, you you stated that you think that this basically um takes the original moral and kind of defeats it, which I don't entirely disagree with, but I feel like as a film there are things I like about it.

[41:26] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um like do we think this has been a net positive for getting Dr. Seuss's story out there or a net negative for misinterpreting what its original intent was.

[41:37] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I mean, I would say it's a positive.

[41:39] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Also, if you look, I I just Googled this last night.

[41:41] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I was like, what are the most successful Christmas movies?

[41:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm like just curious.

[41:46] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And number one is the Grinch, but not this one.

[41:51] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Literally the one from 2018 that I didn't even know really existed.

[41:56] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, that is the top grossing Christmas movie ever.

[42:00] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, so I would say it's had a huge massive effect on Hollywood.

[42:06] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um the fact that this is that strong of an IP.

[42:09] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And this Grinch is the number four highest grossing.

[42:12] Andrew Keenan Bolger: With like the two home alones in between.

[42:14] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, the animated one for 2018 with Benedict Cumberbatch.

[42:18] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Which I've never seen, and I don't know anyone who's seen that, but maybe that's just like a generate.

[42:24] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I have two kids.

[42:25] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, there you go.

[42:27] Andrew Keenan Bolger: They love it.

[42:28] Jesse McAnally: Which one would you recommend of the two of them?

[42:31] Andrew Keenan Bolger: If you were exposing someone to the Grinch.

[42:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: The anime my children, my younger one especially, who still gets scared.

[42:38] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Uh we watched Into the Spider-Verse last night, and he got scared at that.

[42:42] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So he's still he's a little shining.

[42:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: He's a little goblet.

[42:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: He's just a little gog.

[42:48] Andrew Keenan Bolger: He's definitely my five-star little guy.

[42:50] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I do want to say, post uh inflation, because I did was curious, like, after inflation, what would be the highest gross thing?

[42:57] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Number one is Home Alone.

[42:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Number two is the 2018 Grinch, and number three is How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

[43:04] Jesse McAnally: Interesting.

[43:05] Jesse McAnally: So out of the top five, two of them are Grinch movies and two of them are Home Alone movies.

[43:10] Jesse McAnally: Can you guess the because the other Home Alone 2 is number four?

[43:13] Jesse McAnally: Can you guess what number five is?

[43:16] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I am looking at it, so I will not say anything.

[43:18] Jesse McAnally: Um Andrew, you gotta guess?

[43:20] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I mean, I did look at this last night, but I do not remember.

[43:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Uh uh.

[43:25] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm going with Elf.

[43:26] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I I bet it's like something stupid like Polar Express or something.

[43:30] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Just I'm underestimating the ability of incredibly good guesses.

[43:35] Jesse McAnally: Um, Polar Express is six.

[43:38] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yes.

[43:38] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh, okay.

[43:39] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm glad to see Elf up there.

[43:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I feel like that is the correct position for the.

[43:42] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So the Grinch was a big success in 2000.

[43:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: They immediately green light the uh the Cat in the Hat with Brian Grazer still producing it.

[43:50] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Ron Howard takes a step back, and Bo Welch takes over directing.

[43:54] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Cat in the Hat is what the Cat in the Hat is.

[43:57] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um, and then they released the same weekend as Elf, thinking, oh, this Will Ferrell comedy, um, whatever.

[44:04] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And then Elf just ate its fucking lunch and destroyed it.

[44:07] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Nobody likes Mike Myers against Will Ferrell.

[44:11] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And they just didn't quite know how and because this was his first post-SNL film, Let's Test You as a movie star, and John Favreau was the director of Elf, so he would go on to destroy the entire mega movie blockbuster for the rest of the year or for all time.

[44:27] Jesse McAnally: And yeah, so it it's Elf's fault that movies don't exist anymore.

[44:34] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Andrew, will you write Starbellied Sneeches?

[44:37] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I want to be a Sneech.

[44:38] Jesse McAnally: Aww.

[44:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I will be a cute.

[44:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I do a little Doctor Seuss.

[44:42] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I will be a cute little Sneech.

[44:44] Jesse McAnally: I mean out of all the Hoovills you've been to, which one would you prefer to be in?

[44:49] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like which Hooville that you've seen on screen would you like to live in?

[44:53] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I I'm going with that the original animated one from when was that like Chuck Jones?

[45:00] Andrew Keenan Bolger: 66, yeah.

[45:01] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I feel like that one is so pleasing.

[45:03] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And short.

[45:09] Jesse McAnally: Well, then your kid is like, let's watch it again.

[45:12] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh yeah, I guess this is coming from someone without a child.

[45:15] Jesse McAnally: I have no idea how kids work.

[45:17] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh, wait, one thing that we did not talk that I actually have a huge gripe on.

[45:21] Jesse McAnally: Let's go.

[45:21] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Let's go.

[45:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: The song Where Are You Christmas?

[45:26] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Is the worst worst Christmas song.

[45:30] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That is the worst thing about this movie is that it gave us that schlocky.

[45:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And I like Faith Hill, but that song is terrible.

[45:39] Jesse McAnally: I would say that's as bad as Christmas Shoes.

[45:42] Andrew Keenan Bolger: As like different kind of up there, yeah.

[45:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh god.

[45:46] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Why can't I hear music play?

[45:55] Andrew Keenan Bolger: My world is changing.

[45:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Umbrella.

[46:04] Jesse McAnally: Does that mean Christmas to you seen the music video for that?

[46:19] Andrew Keenan Bolger: For Where Are You Christmas?

[46:21] Jesse McAnally: Yes.

[46:21] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It takes place in the world of the movie.

[46:24] Andrew Keenan Bolger: She is on the Grinch's Mountain.

[46:26] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like, we start by going into the snowflake.

[46:29] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like, let's just go through this.

[46:31] Andrew Keenan Bolger: She goes into the snowflake.

[46:32] Andrew Keenan Bolger: The snowflake falls on Cindy Lou's face, and who saves it?

[46:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It's Faith Hill!

[46:36] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It's Faith Hill.

[46:37] Andrew Keenan Bolger: She's like, Oh my god.

[46:39] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So this was Taylor Momson's music recording.

[46:42] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Creepy legend.

[46:43] Jesse McAnally: Wow.

[46:44] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like, look at how much Okay.

[46:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Not to be this guy harping on this.

[46:47] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Look at the dynamic range of these and how like right here in the music video world, it looks so colorful.

[46:53] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And then we cut to the movie, it is so gray and drag.

[46:57] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like it's She's in front of a green screen.

[46:59] Jesse McAnally: No, she's physically there.

[47:00] Andrew Keenan Bolger: They kept the set.

[47:01] Andrew Keenan Bolger: The sets are still up at Universal.

[47:03] Andrew Keenan Bolger: You could go to these.

[47:04] Jesse McAnally: But wait, really?

[47:05] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yes.

[47:06] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It is the biggest set in film history when it was built, and they did not tear it down.

[47:10] Andrew Keenan Bolger: If you ride the Universal like backlog tour, you will see Hooville.

[47:14] Jesse McAnally: No kidding.

[47:16] Andrew Keenan Bolger: We wish you could just do this over Zoom.

[47:20] Jesse McAnally: But not to harp on the fucking shit I was harping on.

[47:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: But look at like the blacks are properly black, like the dog came out.

[47:26] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And all that.

[47:27] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And then you cut to the movie and suddenly it is so much more desaturated and low contrast.

[47:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: She looks great.

[47:34] Andrew Keenan Bolger: She looks incredible.

[47:35] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah.

[47:36] Andrew Keenan Bolger: The cramp I question, but everything else.

[47:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That being said, um, the last thing I want to talk about before we wrap this up is the dog actor.

[47:47] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um wonderful dog actor named Kelly was rescue, was a rescue dog from the pounds.

[47:56] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um just a month before they brought it in.

[47:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um and just nailed it, apparently, by all accounts.

[48:02] Andrew Keenan Bolger: It is just like uh uh was game to do anything better than most movie dogs.

[48:06] Andrew Keenan Bolger: And most of the audio commentary is Ron Howard being like, oh yeah, the dog was wonderful.

[48:10] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Kelly was great, and she just loved this, and she just enjoyed doing this, and it was like no one was ever hurt.

[48:16] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Jim Carrey loved the dog, and the dog was just so game for everything.

[48:19] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So I just wanted to shout out how incredible the dog actor was, and we sh we should probably save more dogs from the pound, um, just in general.

[48:27] Jesse McAnally: And put them in movies, yes.

[48:28] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah.

[48:29] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Because they're the best thing.

[48:31] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Maybe I don't know.

[48:31] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I watched Homeward Bound recently, and I had to watch a pitiful try to fight a bear, and I'm like, did anyone stop?

[48:37] Andrew Keenan Bolger: What who was who was running the set?

[48:42] Jesse McAnally: It's not great.

[48:43] Andrew Keenan Bolger: No.

[48:44] Andrew Keenan Bolger: But speaking of who is running this set, what is our overall thoughts on Dr. Seuss?

[48:49] Jesse McAnally: That was not a good one.

[48:51] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That was a five out of ten.

[48:52] Jesse McAnally: That was five out of ten transition.

[48:55] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Not so good.

[48:56] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um what is our overall thoughts on Dr. Seuss's How the Grinch Stole Christmas and our ratings of either an alrighty then or a no spank you?

[49:05] Jesse McAnally: Um, so yeah, Alan, why don't you go first?

[49:08] Alan Seales: You know what I'm gonna say.

[49:09] Alan Seales: This is this is an alrighty then for me.

[49:12] Alan Seales: I'm gonna give this an alrighty then.

[49:14] Alan Seales: I enjoyed it.

[49:16] Liz Eston: Um, how about you?

[49:18] Liz Eston: I was that weird kid uh growing up that I would only want to watch the Chuck Jones version, and then when that was over, I wanted to watch the stop motion Rankin' Bass shorts.

[49:27] Liz Eston: That's all I wanted to watch for Christmas as a kid.

[49:29] Liz Eston: Like and then ABC Family, now freeform, uh when I was like 2002, only showed the Jim Carrey Grinch movie, and it made me so angry as a child I resented this movie my most of my life.

[49:42] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So you you're unobject you're yeah, you're uh unable to be unobjective.

[49:45] Liz Eston: But then I didn't watch it for a long time, and then I watched it today, uh, this morning, and it was like, okay, it's not that bad.

[49:52] Liz Eston: I'm waiting way too hard on it.

[49:54] Liz Eston: Is it good?

[49:55] Liz Eston: No.

[49:56] Liz Eston: I don't like it that much.

[49:58] Liz Eston: I agree with Andrew about the theming.

[50:00] Liz Eston: I don't think it works, and I don't like think it works at all.

[50:03] Liz Eston: Like, is a narrative.

[50:04] Liz Eston: I but I think Cindy Lou is great and him and her and Jim Carrey have great chemistry.

[50:09] Liz Eston: The Christmas song is evil, and if you pay attention, it's in the score every other scene.

[50:13] Liz Eston: And it makes me angrier because it's always in the score.

[50:17] Jesse McAnally: Like that being said, Liz, you have every right to be angry every time it's on freeform, because when it's on freeform, it is a half hour longer.

[50:27] Jesse McAnally: They include deleted scenes not present on the DVD, and you can only catch it on freeform.

[50:33] Jesse McAnally: Including uh a wrap-up to Molly Shannon's subplot with the lights, where she does not win the lighting contest, as well about 15 other deleted scenes, more Jim Carrey riffing.

[50:45] Jesse McAnally: Thing there is like at least thirty minutes added to the freeform version, and it's fascinating.

[50:51] Liz Eston: Wow.

[50:51] Liz Eston: That's why I hate it so much.

[50:54] Liz Eston: Two hours of commercial filled uh uh TV into three hours where it just is on all the time.

[51:02] Jesse McAnally: That's a redness.

[51:03] Jesse McAnally: Dear lord.

[51:04] Liz Eston: Yeah, no wonder I hated it as a child.

[51:06] Liz Eston: Uh but yeah, I'm gonna give this a very light no spank you only because I just like didn't enjoy it that much.

[51:13] Liz Eston: I c I don't know.

[51:14] Liz Eston: I'm kind of in the middle between already and then no spank you.

[51:17] Liz Eston: Like, I'm gonna like a fifty percent.

[51:19] Liz Eston: Like, I can't lean on an edge.

[51:21] Liz Eston: Like, I'm very conflicted.

[51:23] Liz Eston: I I didn't hate it, but it was also kind of bad.

[51:26] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So Alright, Andrew.

[51:29] Andrew Keenan Bolger: You know, I was going into this with a already then, just based on Jim Carrey.

[51:36] Andrew Keenan Bolger: This is a Jim Carrey podcast, and his performance is pretty spectacular in it.

[51:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah.

[51:40] Andrew Keenan Bolger: But now knowing that he was like cranky the whole time.

[51:47] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I don't know.

[51:48] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm I'm gonna give this a no spank you.

[51:51] Jesse McAnally: That's oh, I'm on my own.

[51:53] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Jess, I know what you're gonna give it.

[51:55] Jesse McAnally: I'm giving this a pretty hardcore already.

[51:58] Jesse McAnally: Yeah.

[51:59] Jesse McAnally: That's great.

[52:00] Jesse McAnally: Andrew and I are on a team right now.

[52:03] Jesse McAnally: I've got too much childhood nostalgia linked into this, and every time I can just spew out all the information I've got.

[52:10] Jesse McAnally: Every time I watch this, I thoroughly enjoy watching it beginning to end.

[52:14] Jesse McAnally: There's like stupid parts that I look forward to making fun of.

[52:17] Jesse McAnally: Like it is truly an insane film that they could not and would not make today, so I find that even more fascinating.

[52:25] Jesse McAnally: And as a time capsule of early 2000s, hey, pre 911, the world's alright, we're doing great, we have money to just throw at things.

[52:34] Jesse McAnally: Um, I find it as a maximalist interesting piece of media that could not and would not be made today, no matter how interesting a director you got on, and sadly enough, Ron Howard was not an interesting enough director to make anything of this.

[52:48] Jesse McAnally: Like Tim Burton really wanted to do this movie and just couldn't work out the scheduling conflicts with Sleepy Hollow.

[52:54] Jesse McAnally: And imagine what the Jim Carrey, How the Grinch Stole Christmas would have been directed by Tim Burton.

[53:00] Jesse McAnally: That would have been a whole different universe.

[53:02] Jesse McAnally: That would have changed my life, probably.

[53:04] Jesse McAnally: It would have been a whole different vibe.

[53:06] Jesse McAnally: We're talking good vibes, and if you want good vibes, why don't you go hang out in Andrew?

[53:11] Jesse McAnally: Andrew, you've got a lot of incredible.

[53:13] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I'm terrible at transition, so um good vibes.

[53:16] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Here's a good vibes.

[53:18] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Here's a knife.

[53:20] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Go see Dracula.

[53:21] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Um please promote all the incredible things you're doing, Andrew.

[53:25] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh yes, uh, come see uh Dracula Comedy of Terrors.

[53:28] Andrew Keenan Bolger: You can also uh check out a podcast that I I make with Alan called Dracula the Podcastula, which is the companion podcast to Dracula, and then find me on social media at Keenan Blogger.

[53:41] Jesse McAnally: Alright.

[53:41] Jesse McAnally: Did you have a good time with us, or was this kind of like uh an afternoon?

[53:45] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Lame.

[53:46] Andrew Keenan Bolger: No, this was wonderful, and I like the homework assignment of get in and watch a Jim Carrey movie.

[53:52] Andrew Keenan Bolger: How bad can that be?

[53:53] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Who can be who can be watching anything he made in the nineteen eighties?

[53:57] Jesse McAnally: Wow, yeah, that's fair.

[53:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah.

[54:00] Andrew Keenan Bolger: He basically made porn in the eighties.

[54:04] Andrew Keenan Bolger: The first episode comes out at his.

[54:06] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Yeah, his I'll send you the link.

[54:08] Andrew Keenan Bolger: His first couple films are softcore Canadian porn.

[54:12] Jesse McAnally: Yeah.

[54:12] Jesse McAnally: Wow.

[54:13] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Okay.

[54:14] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Imagine trying to do in a podcast episode on that.

[54:18] Jesse McAnally: Well, it wasn't easy.

[54:21] Andrew Keenan Bolger: No one else is an easy talk about Jim Carrey.

[54:24] Jesse McAnally: Thank you guys for listening.

[54:24] Jesse McAnally: Please follow us on iTunes Spotify, Stitcher Add Carried Away podcast with Jess and Alan.

[54:29] Alan Seales: It's not Stitcher, Stitcher doesn't exist.

[54:30] Jesse McAnally: We're on Twitter at Carried Away Pod, Instagram Carried Away Pod.

[54:33] Jesse McAnally: Email us at carried away podcast at gmail.com.

[54:36] Jesse McAnally: Our title card is created by the amazing Grace Aki.

[54:39] Jesse McAnally: Go follow them on Instagram at It's Grace Aki.

[54:42] Jesse McAnally: This show is produced and edited by Elizabeth Eston.

[54:44] Jesse McAnally: Thank you so much, Liz.

[54:45] Jesse McAnally: You're doing a great job.

[54:46] Jesse McAnally: Our theme song is I choose you by the band Thanks.

[54:49] Jesse McAnally: Thank you to the Broadway Podcast Network for having us on the platform and for not kicking us off for talking about the Grinch's red lipstick.

[54:56] Jesse McAnally: Uh if you know what I mean.

[54:58] Alan Seales: Alright, do we have anything else we have left to say?

[55:01] Jesse McAnally: Your transitions uh need a little bit of press.

[55:05] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Can we burn that Faith Hill song, please?

[55:07] Jesse McAnally: Whoa!

[55:08] Alan Seales: Whoa!

[55:09] Jesse McAnally: Christmas is here!

[55:13] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That's another part of it where it doesn't know what it wants to be.

[55:16] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Is it a musical?

[55:17] Andrew Keenan Bolger: We're just gonna have this random musical number.

[55:19] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Two of them, I guess.

[55:20] Jesse McAnally: That's enough, right?

[55:21] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Well, he sings the classic song, yeah.

[55:23] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Sing Dahu Gori.

[55:25] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Three songs, two and a half songs.

[55:27] Jesse McAnally: Yeah, that's right.

[55:28] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That's right.

[55:29] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That's not a musical.

[55:30] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I like how at the end though that he doesn't know the words to that song.

[55:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Why would he?

[55:33] Andrew Keenan Bolger: That's a realistic choice.

[55:34] Andrew Keenan Bolger: So he's just like flubbing it.

[55:38] Andrew Keenan Bolger: You can see the frustration on Christine Baranski's face.

[55:41] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Like very clearly there.

[55:43] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I don't think she's acting.

[55:44] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I think she's just like I'm feeling the Tommy Lee Jones vibe of I cannot sanction your buffoonery.

[55:51] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I have to be in love with this guy.

[55:52] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Fuck.

[55:53] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Oh god, where's his dick?

[55:55] Andrew Keenan Bolger: At least I'm getting paid.

[55:56] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Where's his dick?

[55:57] Andrew Keenan Bolger: This is worse than Kelsey Grammar.

[55:59] Andrew Keenan Bolger: I need some lipstick.

[56:02] Jesse McAnally: Alright, we're done.

[56:03] Jesse McAnally: We're done.

[56:03] Jesse McAnally: The Grinch is over.

[56:05] Jesse McAnally: Bye, everybody.

[56:07] Andrew Keenan Bolger: Bye.