John Cameron Mitchell: New Hollywood Film Buff

Transcript

OPHIRA EISENBERG, HOST:

Please welcome back our very important puzzler - the actor, writer, director and winner of a Tony for the Broadway smash hit "Hedwig And The Angry Inch," John Cameron Mitchell.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: So here's what we've devised - the Broadway show and the film "Hedwig" is about being in transition, forging a singular identity out of two different elements. So that's what we are going to do with your ASK ME ANOTHER challenge. It is called "Two Movies, One Title."

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: We're going to test your film knowledge by giving you short descriptions of two movies whose titles share a word. To answer, you'll give us the one long overlapping title. Now, we know you're a big fan of New Hollywood films, films from the late '60s to the early '80s that broke the traditional studio style and established a new generation of filmmakers, so we are going to have you play with someone that is very excited to come on our stage - Jordan Shavarebi.

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EISENBERG: The last time Jordan was here, we asked him what his favorite movie was. And you answered - what did you answer?

JORDAN SHAVAREBI: "Something's Gotta Give."

EISENBERG: And then you said Diane Keaton's my girl.

SHAVAREBI: Yeah, yeah, she is my girl.

EISENBERG: And you were saying that to impress someone, right?

SHAVAREBI: I was not impressing him, no I was not. So it was this date - I do this thing called Internet dating - I don't know if anybody...

EISENBERG: Sure. That's pre-Tinder, right?

SHAVAREBI: Right, yeah, yeah. And so I found that I had, like, 12 dates to accomplish in, like, two weeks. So my mom made a spreadsheet...

EISENBERG: To accomplish?

SHAVAREBI: Yeah, I wanted to do them all. So my mom made a spreadsheet, named after a Diane Keaton movie, Waiting for Mr. Goodbar, where she goes on a bunch of dates and she gets murdered.

JOHN CAMERON MITCHELL: "Looking For Mr. Goodbar."

SHAVAREBI: Looking - "Looking For Mr. Goodbar," thank you.

MITCHELL: Very bad date.

SHAVAREBI: But so he was just like a cell on the spreadsheet that's all it was.

EISENBERG: Oh yeah.

SHAVAREBI: And he didn't - I mean, I ended it, OK? I ended it.

EISENBERG: Did you tell him you're just a cell on my spreadsheet?

SHAVAREBI: No, I didn't tell about the spreadsheet. I didn't tell him about it.

MITCHELL: Ophira, every guest is a host.

EISENBERG: I know.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: That's why we have the games to break people back down.

SHAVAREBI: This one sounds hard.

EISENBERG: It's super hard.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: Both ready?

MITCHELL: Yeah.

SHAVAREBI: Mhmm.

EISENBERG: Here are your first two films - first Natalie Wood, Robert Culp, Elliott Gould and Dyan Cannon played two married couples who all climb into bed together. Then, Ellen Burstyn is a young widow who leaves her former life and ends up working at Mel's Diner in this Martin Scorsese film.

MITCHELL: Bob And Ted And Carol And Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore.

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EISENBERG: What is it, puzzle guru?

GREG PLISKA: Well, John I have to tell you, the correct - the correct title is "Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice." I don't know.

(BOOING)

MITCHELL: I was using the original title.

PLISKA: I don't know why you put Bob and Ted together.

(LAUGHTER)

SHAVAREBI: Things have changed, things have changed guys.

PLISKA: I think we'll give it to you. Absolutely, we'll give you the point.

EISENBERG: All right, first in this Terrence Malick film, Richard Gere urges his girlfriend to marry a dying farmer so they can inherit his spread. Then Kris Kristofferson stars in this Western by Michael Cimino, a legendary bomb whose budget crippled United Artists.

SHAVAREBI: Days of Heaven's Gate.

EISENBERG: That's right.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: "Days of Heaven," "Heaven's Gate." So we thought that this was going to be really hard, but so far...

MITCHELL: Come on, hit me with some harder ones.

EISENBERG: All right, let's do it.

MITCHELL: Come on.

EISENBERG: Here we go.

MITCHELL: I'm very old.

(LAUGHTER)

MITCHELL: I was in all these movies.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: All right, this one is harder. First, this satirical look at the court system has Al Pacino declaring "you're out of order. This whole trial is out of order." Jordan, so far - how do you feel about that?

SHAVAREBI: I want to say "Scent Of A Woman," but that's wrong.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: You'll need help.

SHAVAREBI: The '90s.

EISENBERG: Then Roy Scheider plays a workaholic theater director in Bob Fosse's semi-autobiographical musical.

SHAVAREBI: OK, OK um...

EISENBERG: Yeah?

EISENBERG: They're conferring, they're whispering. And they're whispering back and forth.

SHAVAREBI: OK.

EISENBERG: Yeah, yeah?

SHAVAREBI: Justice For All That Jazz.

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PLISKA: I'm not going to say what it says on the paper here.

SHAVAREBI: And justice?

PLISKA: Oh there we go, we'll take it.

EISENBERG: Yeah. I mean, still good, but all we know is justice has been served.

SHAVAREBI: Yeah.

EISENBERG: This is your final question. First, Jill Clayburgh is an upper Eastsider whose husband leaves her for a younger woman before she finds love with a sensitive artist - on the upper East side. Then, general plays a suburban wife and mother having a mental meltdown.

SHAVAREBI: I think it's An Unmarried Woman Under The Influence.

EISENBERG: You think correct.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: So Jordan, John, you guys got it all right.

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EISENBERG: We were all - we were actually really concerned this would be super difficult.

MITCHELL: I would - if it was '90s or 2000s, I would have failed miserably. And he would've one.

SHAVAREBI: No, I wouldn't. I would've lost too probably.

MITCHELL: Really?

SHAVAREBI: Yes. I thought I was good at, like, '60s movies, but I guess I'm not.

MITCHELL: Those are '70s.

SHAVAREBI: '70s.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: You need a new spreadsheet.

SHAVAREBI: Yeah, I do.

EISENBERG: So you both won the most prestigious prize that we can offer you in the word of live entertainment, an ASK ME ANOTHER Rubik's cube.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: Let's hear it for our VIP, John Cameron Mitchell.

MITCHELL: Thank you.

(APPLAUSE)

JONATHAN COULTON, BYLINE: (Singing) You know the sun is in your eyes. And hurricanes and rains and black and cloudy skies. Running up and down that hill, you turn it on and off at will. There's nothing here to thrill or bring you down. And if you've got no other choice, know you can follow my voice through the dark turns and noise of this wicked little town.

(APPLAUSE) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.