035 Likable Villain transcript (Alan Rickman)

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Amit: This is Famous and Gravy, a podcast about quality of life as we see it one dead celebrity at a time. You can also play our mobile quiz game at deadorliveapp.com.

Michael: This person died in 2016, age 69. He made his television debut in 1978 playing Tybalt in a BBC version of Romeo and Juliet.

Friend: Ah, Muhammad Ali?

Michael: Not Muhammad Ali.

Friend: Ah Jeez.

Michael: I'd love to see the Muhammad Ali Tybalt performance. In an acting career of more than 40 years he played a panoply of characters.

Friend: Panoply. Good word, obviously, including Tybalt. , British Shakespeare actor. There's so many. Ian Holm.

Michael: Not Ian Holm. Though he was never nominated for an Academy Award, he shrugged off the value of awards in general. "Parts, win prizes, not actors."

Friend: I was gonna say Gary Oldman, but it's not Gary Oldman.

Michael: Not Gary Oldman, but right in that category. He gained worldwide audience in Die Hard playing Hans Gruber, the devious well-spoken terrorist who took over the fictional Nakatomi Plaza.

Friend: Also played Snape in Harry Potter.

Michael: Correct. Yeah.

Friend: Also in the basically Star Trek actors, you get abducted by Alien.

Michael: I believe you're thinking of Galaxy Quest, Correct.

Friend: Alan Rickman. Alan Rickman. Yes. Alan Rickman. There we go.

Michael: Today's dead celebrity is Alan Rickman.

Friend: Oh yeah, baby, hahaha.

Alan: I have an absolute mantra, which is that you only speak because you wish to respond to something you've heard. So the notion of an actor going away and looking at a speech they have in their bedroom alone at night is a complete nonsense to me. What you have to say is completely incident. All I want to see from an actor to me is the intensity and accuracy of their listening, and then what you have to say will become automatic and then it will be free and alive in How alive are you to your fellow actors and how accurate is your response?

And how bold.

Michael: Welcome to Famous and Gravy. I'm Michael Osborne.

Amit: I'm Amit Kapoor.

Michael: And on this show we choose a celebrity who died in the last 10 years and review their quality of life. We go through a series of categories to figure out the things in life that we would actually desire and ultimately answer a big question, Would I want that life today?

Alan Rickman died 2016, age 69, category one, creating the first line of their obituary. Alan Rickman, the accomplished British stage actor who brought an aite dignity to film roles like Hans Gruber, the nefarious mastermind of Diehard and Severus Snape, The doer master of potions in the Harry Potter series died on Thursday in London.

He was 69. Can I start

off the bat with a question, Aready? Yeah. I'm not, I can picture it on like the overhead projector and preparing for the

s a d. I'm just gonna Google it real quick. Aready means I was a math score

Amit: guy.

Michael: having or showing great knowledge or learning. So it's like a,

Amit: a learning person. A learning.

Okay. Yeah. Yes.

Michael: Date

Amit: Aite. A aite.

Michael: There is no I, uh, aite. I was a theater. A Aite. Aite. It is Aite. It is a. It's not aite. I was adding a syllable mother fucker. Clearly neith of us

Amit: are, if we're, no, we can't come off dumb at the beginning. .

Michael: So that's the word you wanna talk about Aite? Well, I

Amit: think you said it.

It's just a complicated way to say Learned. Learned.

Michael: Yeah. Aite dignity though. I mean, it's a modifier. To back up a little bit, one thing that's interesting to me about this obituary is they name I think is two most memorable performances

Amit: without a doubt, which were bookend his entire film career. They

Michael: actually managed to get quite a bit into this obituary.

There's a lot of shoehorning going on, but they say British stage actor. Yeah. So they got stage actor in there. Dy Dignity is referring to a lot of. Performances, the general performances of Val Rickman? Correct. Who brought an Ady Dignity to film roles like Hans Gruer, and then they describe him as a nefarious mastermind.

And then sever Snape, who's a doer, master of potions. Doer. Doer.

Amit: Okay. Let's, let's go into that word.

Michael: I love it. I mean, I love it. It's a crazy complicated sentence, but I love the, like, the words that are in here because you, I mean, I, I don't know, to, I guess one thing that's kind of funny to me about like the vocabulary, the wordsmithing and the, um, you know, word choices that are going on in this obituary is that they're all like, you want to apply all of them to Alan Rickman.

Yes. Not just his performances. Right. So I think the blurring of lines between the man and the characters he played, I think they're having some fun with that here.

Amit: Yes. Is that there's always dignity, but half the time there's a villain behind it. Yes. Which is the opposing words like aite nefarious. Yes.

Uh, I think they captured it

Michael: really well. Yeah. And accomplished British stage actor. Yes. I feel like it's been a while since we've come across a first line of an obituary where they really got out the, this arus to, you know, put this thing together. Do you do the man a disservice by calling to, you know, memory and, and calling to attention His two most memorable roles.

I mean, they're the first two I think of Snape and Oz Gruber. Yep. But I don't know, I mean, is there even a third that should be talked about? Not really in.

Amit: No, and I think that's an opinion too. Everything in between tends to be somebody's opinion. What would be an alternative structuring, You might remember him from love actually in

Michael: dogma.

Yeah. I mean, no. Was

Amit: there a direct reference to the voice?

Michael: No, actually that's really interesting cuz I think you could honestly say that's an omission. But no, there's no reference to the voice. And I do think that that is, I mean, he is on the Mount Rushmore of most important, memorable voices.

Amit: I think we'll get to that.

I mean, there was a scientific study behind it. Oh, I didn't

Michael: see the study. I think I got my score. Do you want me to go first? Yes. I'm gonna go eight. Okay. Yeah. I'm docking two for the voice. I think that that's worth two points.

Amit: Uh, what's funny is I'm actually only docking one for the voice. Ooh. Cause I like the extensive verbiage.

Yeah. As we've discovered. So I'm going nine.

Michael: All right. Eight and a nine. Yeah. Bravo. New York Times. Okay. Category two, five things I love about you here. OIT and I work together to come up with five reasons why we love this person, why we want to be talking about them in the first place.

Amit: I've got a lot. I think you need to go first, and I think we need to talk

Michael: about the book Madly Deeply, the Diaries of Ellen Rickman, which was

Amit: just released a few days ago.

A few

Michael: days ago. Right. Which, uh, the publisher sent us an advanced copy, which is very cool. Yes. And you read it as much as I possibly could. It's not like a page turning book in terms of like it's diaries. Right. It's a lot of Simmons fragments, but yeah, I mean, I combed through it very heavily. All right.

All

Amit: right. Uh, well kick us off then,

Michael: Michael. I think this is the right language for this. I might invite you to help me come up with better words here. I wrote mistaken first impressions. Okay. What I mean by that is people often had the wrong take on. What we thought about him and what is actually true about him.

Near, as I can tell, are not easily seen. And I kind of like that there's a mysteriousness about him, even in what's knowable about him. There's a mysteriousness about the inner life. But more than that, I like the misinterpretation of Alan Rickman. So I think first and foremost, as people thought he was cold, he was asked a lot in interviews, you know, you get cast as the villain a lot and he would say, Think about how many roles have actually been cast in the villain in that's not totally true.

You've misinterpreted me. People also thought of him as very unapproachable. And actually I'm gonna read from the Emma Thompson tribute, just cuz I feel like this captures some of what I'm trying to get at the contradictions. She says, Of all the contradictions in my blissfully contradictory friend, this

Amit: combination

Michael: of profoundly nurturing and imperturbably distant.

He was not of course distant. He was alarmingly present at all times. The Inscrutability was partly a protective shield. He was generous and challenging, dangerous and comical. Sexy and androgynous. Virile and peculiar, temperamental, and. Fastidious and casual. The list could go on. I'm sure you can add to it, like what to make of this man.

He's just not easy to read and I love that. Adam, you feel like sort of like, I got it. I mean, you don't Got it. You know, and I actually, here's why I wanted to put this as thing number one too. I think you and I also both kind of enjoy this. People often have the wrong take on me. You know, like the bearded Texan.

Yeah. I'm easy to sort of slap a stereotype on and like I've got 'em figured out and I enjoyed the process of watching somebody say, Oh, you're not who I thought you were. Yes. You know, I've had that experience with you. This came up in a previous episode where we were talking about going to the widespread panic show.

I was like, This guy's into panic. Yes. And and, and I guess it's cuz people have a lot of unconscious bias or assumptions about who others are, but I like that there's just so much to like discover about Alan Rickman and it's a reminder of how much I like to discover about other people

Amit: overall. Yeah.

It's that physical appearance, body language and voice can be incredibly misleading. And I like

Michael: that play of throwing somebody off that scent of who you actually are. Yeah.

Amit: It's kind of like when you, like you're in elementary school and you're winning like the thumbs. Game. Yeah. It's You've thrown them off.

Yeah. Right. With the clue because you tap their thumbs so gently that they don't know who you are. Exactly. And that's kind of what I feel the same kind of victory if somebody gets

Michael: me wrong. And obviously that does lend itself to like a great acting talent. And I think he is a top shelf actor, right? He is one of the greats.

So that's my number one. Okay. I thought you'd like that

Amit: one. I do. Okay, so I'll take number two. I'm gonna go turn back the clock a little bit. The leap into acting a little late into his professional life, Alan Rickman was cast and die hard at the age of 41.

Michael: Which, can I pause on that? Were you shocked when you discovered that, that that was his first role?

Well, or that he was in his early forties when he was in diehard?

Amit: No, that number seems about right to me.

Michael: I think he plays younger. I think he, he could've easily passed for 32 for Die Hard. Really? Yeah, I think so. Like when to learn that he was 42 when diehard came out. Surprise me.

Amit: I, I have this thing that like if anybody's playing a German, I'm just gonna assume.

Forties at a minimum. That's fair. I don't think Germans are younger than 40.

Michael: Back to judging the vice cover . That's good. Yeah. Um,

Amit: what I'm talking about, what I'm talking about is that even his stage acting was a late leap. Yeah. So out of school he was in theaters, you know, casually, but out of school he started a graphic design business with his buddies.

What that actually did pretty well. And he decided after a few years to take the leap into acting, um, from there into stage acting

Michael: 26 years old when he made that

Amit: decision. Correct. So he was a graphic designer that owned his own agency. Then he became a dresser, literally like after he left that dressing stage stars.

Yeah. And then finally getting into roles and eventually by his late thirties landing leading roles. What I love about that is that it's possible it's that simple. I hate to say it's a movie like story, but it is, you know, you have this thing about somebody working in a creative. Business or doing something, but they're dreaming about being on stage or being on film because that's their true calling.

And then they actually do it. And it may take 10 years, it may take 15 years, but they do it and they like nail the shit out of it. Yeah. And so I love that this is not a fairy tale, but it kind of sounds fairy tale when you describe it that way.

Michael: Well, I also do feel like, so this is a little bit of a addendum to your number two.

I do feel like he was a little bit more well equipped to deal with the trappings of Hollywood fame by becoming famous at age 40. Oh, completely. Yeah. That, that he knew how to handle. I don't think he knew how to handle it exactly, but I think like, it didn't go bad for him. The way it goes bad for some people who experience fame before they're

Amit: ready.

Yeah. It's the perfect narrative for an aite actor. Yeah. Right. Like the cocaine era was pretty much over. He wasn't gonna get like thrown into this like, uh, fast and loose Hollywood

Michael: life. Well, but it's not even just the timing. I'm also speaking to like where he's at in his life. Like by mid forties, you know, he's, we will get to the love and marriage category later, but some like bigger questions about who am I and what am I doing on this planet have been answered for Alan Rickman.

You know, by the time he's like, and now you get fame and now everybody's gonna remember Die hard. It's gonna be one of the biggest movies of all time. And your role is gonna be talked about even in the first line of your obituary.

Amit: Yep. Yeah. Yeah. So that's why number two jump from professionalism into

Michael: acting.

Beautiful. I'm so glad you got that one. All right, I'll go. Number three. I wrote Actors, Actors or maybe performers, performer. I know that's not real creative, but this is something that you and I were talking about before the interview. This is something I really come to care about on Famous and Gravy.

When others in your profession say he is a great amongst us amongst. Collective amongst our fellowship, but it's not just that other people said he is a great actor. It was also that he was like a super generous actor. Some of the examples were this like he kept going to Daniel Radcliffe's performances well after Harry Potter and he would've lunch with him.

He kept up with Jason,

Amit: Kevin Smith. Kevin Smith and Jason Muse. Yeah. Yeah. That Jay and Silent Bob. But

Michael: yeah, like he would hang out with them years after dogma. Rarely in this life do you meet anybody as fucking good at their job as this man was at his job. But he was such a fucking good dude. Like a really fucking good dude.

And here's how I know. When he died, the first thing I thought about was, fuck. I didn't get to tell him how important he was to me and my family. The man like maintained a friendship with me and this is what I was thinking about the other day. I never reached out to him because he was fucking Allen Rickman, you know what I'm saying?

I didn't wanna bug that guy, but I hung out with that guy a lot. He went to a lot of family things like my wife's birthday and stuff. And I realized that every time he instigated that relationship, like he wanted to be fucking friends with me. And this was like a genius. Never fucking understood that in this life.

But the dude actually fucking kinda liked me and like my work. And it also sounds like the friends that he had in the UK that he came up with in the theater, like he kept up with them regardless of their success. He didn't ditch his friends once he became famous. And it sounds like he was like a truly giving spirit and very nurturing of everybody.

I think this is a guy trying to lift everybody up. I think he's trying to make everybody better and feel welcome. And in doing so, in giving, he becomes a great at his craft. And I don't the life lesson there, I mean it's not just actors actor. It's sort of like, I love that kind of spiritual idea that the more you are giving of yourself, the more you find out who you really are and the more you become self-actualized.

Where I thought you were

Amit: going with actor, Actor was that he is an actor who is very well regarded by his peers, which is true. But what you were saying is beyond that, he is one who gave to the peer group and to the younger people

Michael: and lifted them up. He's an ambassador for the whole profession in a way, actors, actor, at least that.

But it's more than that. Like leader of actor and actresses and other performers on set. Yes. I mean, he also would apparently hang out with the crew. I mean, he was real. He wasn't above it even. And this is one of his contradictions. Even though he kinda looks like a upper class snobby guy, in a way, I think he was like really ready to get dirty with anybody.

Amit: Yeah. This quality exists far beyond acting. Yes. Right. It's the same thing as being, you can be a programmer's programmer, you can be an accountant's accountant. Yeah. You can be in anyone's, anyone. It is a human trait that it can be replicated if you are someone that is good at

Michael: something and passionate about what you're doing.

And I think to your point, it's desirable to find your thing and then like be part of the crowd of people doing that thing. Yes. Yeah. Well said. So I've got the wrong language there, but that's my number three. Okay.

Amit: I'm going to go with, and maybe I'm being a little loose with these words, uh, I'm gonna say turned a deformity into an.

Uh,

Michael: are you talking

Amit: about the voice? Yeah. Yeah. So he was born, I don't know what the exact name is, but with a very tight jaw. Yeah. And he actually had to go to, um, a speech therapist. A speech therapist. Right. He couldn't talk properly, but the results of doing all of that speech pathology work, and this is a shout out to, I have a few friends who are speech pathologists.

He came out with this miraculous voice and one

Michael: teacher said, You, you have a voice that sounds as if it's coming out of the back end of a drainpipe. So there was a great deal of hard work going on. It's an act. Whatever one's voice is, is a mixture driven accident of nature because it's like, what's the architecture driven inside of your mouth?

I happen to have this very high roof. Yeah. So I suppose there's some kind of resonance chamber there. Yeah. Which is as much a curse as it is a blessing. That's

Amit: heartwarming. Yeah. If it is not anything more than that, it's desirable. Certainly because it's encouraging for anybody that has an insecurity or has something that's sort of judged negatively, be that in a physical sense or an emotional sense, and became as great as asset.

When

Michael: I was doing research for this episode, I was, uh, in the bedroom, like watching a YouTube clip, and uh, Allison, my wife walks in and goes, Yeah, that voice does something. And like she was like clearly charged up.

Amit: I mean, in 1995 by Empire Magazine voted the 34th sexiest man alive. Yeah.

Michael: Right. And it's mostly, I think the

Amit: voice.

It's all the voice. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the hair was kind of okay,

Michael: I think. Sure. He's not an unattractive man. Exactly. But I think the voice is doing something really rich and resonant. You know? I mean, he's asked about it a lot in some of the interviews. He said, Look, you know, I don't hear what you hear cuz I deal with the same thing we all deal with when I hear my voice on an answering machine.

Doesn't sound like me. So I don't know what to tell you, . That's why we have a category about that. Yeah, indeed. Uh, okay, so that's number four. That's grit. That's uh, good, good way of getting the voice in there cuz I had the voice is a whole separate thing, but your answer is way more creative. Gosh. I just wanna go with great taste.

I think especially in movies, one thing that is kind of maybe the most fun thing about this memoir that came out is his snap judgment movie reviews. Like I, I've got a couple here, Let's see. Forrest Gump, I had sworn I wouldn't go. I went and it was as horrific as I thought, but in a totally different way.

A clear attempt had been made to dilute the sentimentality, but along the way, the film had, its. Aided Spatted out with Vietnam, unnamed viruses, et cetera. Like I love that take on Forrest Gump. Let's see, He had Shawshank Redemption. Expertly done would be the review. Not a move wrong. Classic. I just wish they had not extended the immaculate hairdos to all of the inmates.

when will the director tell a hair person to stop hiding everyone up? It's an awful reflexive action. I mean, the great taste thing goes way beyond that in his memoirs. You get a feel for what the dinners taste like and what the vacations smelled like and felt like. I mean, he is living a very tasteful life, kind of like all throughout night and day as somebody who's experiencing life.

He's got great taste. Whenever young actors now say to me, What advice do you give me? Uh, you know, I'm thinking about training. I wanna be an actor. Whatever I say, forget about acting. Um, , and I really mean it at, at that point in time because whatever you do as an actor is, is cumulative. It's about, so I say go to art galleries, listen to music, know what's happening on the news in the world, and, uh, form opinions.

Develop your taste and judgment so that when a quality piece of writing is put in front of you, your imagination, which you've nurtured, has something to bounce off of. Yeah. And you're in uniqueness. His life is very, very rich. Not in a materialistic sense, but in an experiential sense. You know what I mean?

In terms of his pursuit of quality. Exactly. And I mean there's almost an Anthony Borden like quality to his to, to the way he describes his day to day life, where he's going, who he's meeting, what he's doing. I mean, it really is just like very rich with adventure. I could see that. Did

Amit: they ever cross paths?

Did that come across?

Michael: Well, actually it's, I don't know, but it's one thing they do have in this book is a great. Louis Borgese? No. No. Elizabeth Bowen. No. Feels like they should've, but no.

Amit: You know that movie where those two British guys like Drive across Spain, they just eat and talk a lot? Yeah. That's what I could kind of see being a cast across from Bordain.

Yeah, I could totally

Michael: see that. As soon as you picture that, it's

Amit: good. Maybe that's happening on the other side right now. Yeah,

Michael: I'd like to think so. I'd like to think so. So that's my number five. Okay. Let's recap. I said mistaken first impressions you had, uh,

Amit: later leap from professionalism into acting.

Yeah.

Michael: Uh, I had actors, actor, although it's more like leader of actors and actresses and performers overall, that I had

Amit: number four, taking a disadvantage into an extreme advantage,

Michael: and then I had great taste. Okay. Category three, Malkovich Malkovich. This category is named after the movie being John Mal. In which people take a little portal into John Malick's mind and they can have a front row seat to his experiences.

What do you

Amit: got on it? Okay. I feel a little guilty because when we excavated the obituary, they only talk about Die Hard and Harry Potter. Yeah. And I'm gonna bring

Michael: in Die Hard. I'm gonna bring in Harry Potter,

Amit: so that's fine. Okay. . So we're doing the same. Yeah. Okay. So diehard, he played the villain, Hans Gruber.

Yep. This was his first film role. Yep. 1988. And if anybody listening has not seen Die Hard and does not wanna know how it ends, you may wanna just fast forward about 30 seconds.

Michael: I don't think it's gonna ruin anything. So the movie

Amit: ends, the bad guy dies. Yeah. The bad guy dies, but the bad guy dies by falling out of a window.

I think

Michael: actually, to get even more specific, he's hanging onto the wrist of Bruce Willis' wife and she's wearing a watch and Bruce Willis is fumbling around trying to undo the watch. Which causes Hans to plunge to his death. Correct.

Amit: So this being the late eighties was pre cgi. Yeah. Right. So in order to do a scene like that, you have, you know, your green screens, you have to have a stunt actor do it, but you have to have the initial actor take the, the plunge at first.

Yeah. And so how they did that is they actually did do a 20 foot drop where they built a wall and there was a mattress at the bottom. Uh, and the stunt coordinator, whoever it was, was holding on to Rickman, which was the, the, the stand in for this watch. Yeah. And then was gonna drop him, uh, so they could get the footage of his face dropping.

Yeah. How this stunt manager did it is he told, Alan Rickman said, Okay, I'm gonna count to three and then I'm gonna drop you. So he goes, Okay, one and. You know, he pulled like the old elementary school trick. And so then for the next, uh, however many seconds, at 9.8 meters per second squared, uh, Alan Rickman is falling.

So that is my mavi. Is that fall, because I wanna see what is going through his head and a couple of questions I have that I want to know. Is number one, I'm a man of the theater, , and this is my first film, and this is the bullshit they're gonna do to me. who fuck Hollywood. Exactly. Fuck Hollywood. And number two is probably when Fuck this guy.

Yeah. You know, like I'm, I'm the lead villain here. Yeah. Don't pull this bullshit on me . And number three is like, you never outgrow this stuff. Like the same things at the playground or in middle school, pe, whatever are still showing up in your professional life, in your forties. And I think that's actually like really important.

Yeah. All these ideas of escapism and arrival and fame and success. You know, you think you leave behind like some of these trappings and all, but no, he's still getting dropped on the count one . And so I wanna know all those things that are going through his head in that free

Michael: fall. You know what's great about that?

Is we've got a video to watch it. Like you can see it in his face. . Yes. Right. Like it's really memorable the way his like, Oh shit. His face contorts.

Well, I hope that's not a hostage. God, that's a good one. I thank you. Yeah, I really like the way you made it about like, Damn it. I will never be validated as a human . Yes. All right. I said I was gonna make mine about Harry Potter. So the timing of Harry Potter's kind of interesting. I hadn't put this together until I did the research for this episode that only like two or three books had come out by the time they decided they were gonna make these films and they knew that there were gonna be seven books, but nobody knew how it ended.

So the books are being written by JK Rowling at the same time that the movies are being shot with a little bit of lag in between them, right? So he gets cast maybe one of the best castings of all time. He's so fucking perfect as Snape. So he is trying to get his head around sever Snape and the character, and he's really struggling.

And he finally requests to talk to JK Rowling and said, I've gotta know where this is going a little bit. And so he reached out and uh, and said, Can we have a phone call? She was with her sister at the time, and she said, I can't talk now. So that's how close she held everything to herself. And so we arranged to speak the next day when she was on her own.

And then she gave me one very small piece of information, which I always have vowed I would never, ever repeat, even though the books are now down and everything. So I, I won't repeat it. It wasn't a fact. It was just a kind of clue that made him a little, there was something more human. It is, by the way, revealed in this book, and I'm not gonna reveal it here because even though it's knowable and even though you can read the book, what I love about this is that he kept a secret even beyond when he had to, even when it became public, what we know about Snape.

He said she asked me never to tell, and so I'm never gonna tell. Yes. So I love that. I also like to be let. On where this character is going and it, and it's you and the author that know kind of the direction of this and nobody else like that is top secret. That is high security clearance, you know, stuff.

And he gets to,

Amit: these are the nuclear codes really to know the end being a very potter

Michael: and, and I mean if you, you know, if you go back and watch the movies or read the books, like this character that's presented to us as a villain ultimately ends up becoming kind of a hero. Right? Yeah. In some ways the second most important character of the whole series, I mean it's really a outstanding story art, and he's hanging onto this one little piece of information because of a phone call, which I they outing.

Yes. I love that. I just want to know like what that feels like to know that, to be let in on that and then to hang on it all the way to your grave.

Amit: Would you want to

Michael: hold something like that? You know, if you had asked me 10 years ago, I'd have said no, I have come to take it. Very seriously that I want to be a man who can keep secrets.

So yeah. You're goddamn I want to know. Yeah, I mean, and I'm not talking about the voyeuristic like interesting part of it, but it's more important. I think what's more admirable here is the trustworthiness of it. I realize that should I ever spill the beans that costs you, me, the franchise, everything, everybody, something, and I'm somebody who can be trusted.

So that's my malkovich moment. Okay, great. One, one last thing on Melich, just cause I gotta get this out. I wonder, this is speculation, but I wonder if he had a gripe with John Malkovich himself. So before he got cast in diehard, Alan Rickman played in some play I can't even pronounce. It's like it's dangerous liaisons, however you say that in.

And he did not get cast in the movie John Malkovich did. And then later one of his reviews in the diary was for, in the line of fire on the plane, watched in the line of fire, unbelievable, die hard, rip off adversaries on the phone to each other, falling from a skyscraper, et cetera, et cetera. And I was like, Ish.

Didn't come up a whole lot more in this diary. I wonder if he's like, Fuck that guy. Yes. Anyway, wanted to get that in. All right, let's pause. Former Attorney General, Janet Reno alive.

Amit: The rules are simple.

Michael: Dead are alive. Lost her in 2016. Dan Quale, former vice president. Oh, he is alive. Correct. Dan Quale is still with us at 75 years.

Author Jackie Collins Alive. . We lost her in 2015, I'm afraid. Test your knowledge. Dead or alive? app.com.

Category four. Love and marriage. How many marriages? Also how many kids? And is there anything public about these relationships? It's very public. I love this one. I think it's fascinating. You do. It's why it's just so unique. So Rema, they met when they were teenagers in like an acting class or something and they were friends Yes.

For a number of years. Then they became partners did not marry until 2012. Alan is age 66. He dies at 69. So they're married a little less than four years. It's like three years plus. Yeah.

Amit: They've been partners for something like 48, 49 years.

Michael: Right. So we have one marriage, three and a half years, you know, and that's it.

Right. And she's, you know, sort of an interesting figure in her own right. In political circles and so forth.

Amit: Yes. She was a councilwoman. Ran for parliament. Yeah. Yeah. She was a politician

Michael: and no. And no kids,

Amit: and that's it. Okay. But that there's more to it. I think we gotta discuss

Michael: some of this. Oh God. Yeah.

What did you make of this?

Amit: So first thing is seemingly like no other partners or

Michael: lovers. Yeah. Right. If they, I mean, he's not documenting any other affairs in his diary. Maybe he wouldn't, maybe they don't exist. Hard to know. I, I don't know the nature of this relationship with

Amit: Rema. Let's assume no other relationships.

Um, that's a safe assumption. Yeah. Outside of, of their relationship or even before the age of 16 that he met. Yeah. So you have a single partner for 50 something years. You do get married, but that even just seems to be ornamental or a, a formality due to his

Michael: terminal illness. That's the story is they got married after he got diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, which is what took him out.

So my question

Amit: that I pose to you is this one and only partner for a life. Time. Yeah, and I'm not, I'm not even talking about marriage. I'm saying like he may not have ever been on a date with anyone else.

Michael: Here's how I read it. There's no question I'm gonna put my foot in my mouth right now, but I'm gonna go ahead and say it.

You mentioned a minute ago he was ranked as one of the sexiest men on the planet. I mean, I think he was, especially after he achieves Hollywood fame, I'm sure there were women throwing themselves at him. His wife is not, I don't wanna sound like an asshole here, but not a knockout. He's not like he's married to or partnered with a supermodel.

I love that actually. That to me, speaks to a genuine connection that I see him as a man who sees inner beauty, and I see that in his friendships as well as with his relationship with Rema. I also, you know, the way she comes up in the diary and the way they're talked about like it is soulmate stuff. I mean, it really does sound like, you know, kindred spirit kind of connection.

I also. Maybe it's just they're British and they can get away with it or something that the not getting married and not having kids, but there's nothing awkward to me about the fact that they don't have children and the fact that they weren't married. It seems like sort of an artist's move or something.

That can only happen if you're a truth espen and stage actor or something. And I'm not sure anybody sort of falls into a non-married partnership and long-lasting monogamous commitment like this. But from what it looks like, to me, this looks like high marks that we've had on other show. Whether you're talking about Ruth Biter Ginsburg and her husband Marty or Yogi Bera, this looks like a fucking great relationship.

Yes, from what I can. I mean, he even says, I saw this quote. We're just as messy and complex as any other couple. We go through as many changes, but I respect her. I can sit in a room and just read and not say anything to each other for an hour, and then she'll read something to me and we'll both start giggling.

There's a picture that's not hard to see to me of a soulmate. So

Amit: you don't think there's any missing out on life itself by not, uh, you know, just even just experiencing the love, however you define that of, of more than one romantic partner.

Michael: No, I think that you may ask yourself questions at times. Um, what I see more than anything else is friendship at the root of a partnership.

I'd say the one thing that is, I mean, you know, so there's two really interesting things here. One is that they didn't get married until the very, very end and almost it seemed like a formality, so that it would make the, you know, inheritance estate. Yeah. The other thing is no kids, which is striking in a way, especially for two people who seem to be in love.

And one thing he said, and this is a little coy, he said, You should remember there's two of us. I'm not the only one involved. There's another person here. I would have loved a family. Sometimes I think in an ideal world, three children, age 12, 10, and eight will be dropped on us and we will be great parents for that family.

Here's what I took away from that quote. That he respects our decisions. Yeah. It seemed like they both made this decision not to have children, and it does seem like maybe even a regret, um, but one that he's willing to. And, you know, doesn't talk a whole hell of a lot about, I do think that, uh, his instincts as a sort of father, I mean he has described on set sometimes as a, a foster parent to other actors.

I also think that there's something about the lifestyle itself. I mean, he is jetting all over the place, whether it's on set or on vacation or to go to high society parties or whatever. That would have made a, you know, kind of routine, simple family life. A little bit complicated. So I think. Maybe it's good

Amit: and it brings up a question which we have no real answer to in modern life because we don't have a generally accepted way to conduct ourselves or live to find meaning, purpose, and legacy.

Yeah. Right. The, the simplest way to do that is to have children, which just, just been passed on forever, but. The times are changing. Yeah. And we don't have a good answer for that. I'm not saying that Alan Rickman has posed any sort of answer or solution to that, but maybe that's what we get to eventually at Famous and Gravy as we kind of go through more of these people because there is no answer in some situations.

You have a lot of people having children where they either maybe didn't really want to or one of the two didn't really want to. Yeah. Cause there's not a clear alternative to purpose, meaning, and legacy.

Michael: Yeah. There's all this societal pressure to do it. You and I have talked about this before. Uh, you know, I think that there is a kind of gift here.

I mean, that's the thing is that there, there is, despite the fact that he doesn't have children, he has a clear commitment to family, both Rema, but also his sibling. Maybe I'm wrong about this, but sometimes I perceive a discomfort in people I know who either have not had children or are choosing not to have children sometimes.

And it's because there's this fucked up weird societal pressure to have kids come hell or high water. Right. It's really nice to be able to point to somebody and say, You don't have to have kids and you can be a mech. You know, I, I

Amit: agree, but we don't have the alternative answer to meet and purpose and legacy.

Aren't

Michael: the films legacies?

Amit: I don't know. I mean, isn't, this is a whole other spinoff of the show, but yeah, I mean, there's all sorts of legacies. We all leave behind legacies in certain ways. And for him, yes, the films are legacies, but will the name Alan Rickman even ring a bell in 20? Uh, it's a healthy public conversation Yeah.

To be had.

Michael: Yeah. I agree with that. We don't have that many examples of that on this show.

Amit: See, it's uncommon period. Up until this point. I think we'll see a lot of people in our generation Yeah. Where that's more common. I agree. And certainly the generations after us, but yeah. You certainly don't see it very often at all.

Yeah. In

Michael: fame. Yeah. And I think he loved kids among other things. I mean, I think that there's actually a lot of evidence that he really connected with the children on the Harry Potter set. He would apparently make time, I mean people, kids on the street would say, Ah, it's Snape. And he would like hang out.

He was like, I'm not really Snape, you know?

Amit: Yeah. Well there, there you go. Back to your number one of misconceptions, right? Yeah. Like you can kind of assume that somebody who is married or partnered, but chooses not to have kids, or they collectively decide to not have kids. That they don't like children.

Yeah. This is not. In this

Michael: case. That's right. So thank you for that. Ellen Rickman? Yes. All right. Next category. Category five net worth. I saw 16 million. That is, Yeah, that's right. That seemed a little low. Really. Harry Potter. Did you hear these stories? That they'd take friends out to dinner and he would actually like seek out the, before they brought the check, cuz he didn't want anybody else to get the bill.

And when anybody would say, Alan, what are you doing? He would say two words. Harry Potter. That franchise is insane. Correct? It's seven films.

Amit: How big was that cast though? It

Michael: was giant, I guess. I mean, but I don't know. I, I, 16, I, I was very happy with it. I just, if, if I had seen a hundred million I'd have believed

Amit: it.

Maybe, but never a leading. Never's True Academy Award. Uh, but that is shocking. And the money didn't start coming in until his mid forties, you know? Yeah. If not later than that. And he, besides these things that we're talking about of Die Hard Love, actually Galaxy, Quest, Harry Potter, it's a lot of arthouse stuff in between.

Michael: Yeah. I, and a lot of stage work. I, now he talks me into it. It's the right number. Yeah.

Amit: Let's call it the right number. And there's the question, where does it go? I mean, Rema has it, She's not gonna live forever.

Michael: No. Good chunk of it. Went to charities when he died, and I mean, they've really committed to a lot of causes in Africa.

They were committed to the arts. I mean, I, I suspect

Amit: that And very politically active,

Michael: correct. In, in Britain. That's right. That's right. I mean, he was hanging out with Tony Blair before he became Prime Minister. All right. Category six Simpsons Saturday Night Live are Hall of Fame. This category is a measure of how famous a person is.

We include both guest appearances on SNL or the Simpsons, as well as impersonations. All right. On The Simpsons never voiced himself. There is a tribute to both him and David Bowie because they died something like four Days Apart. Yes. Alan is voiced by Benedict Cumba. Yes. Who did? Apparently a great impersonation.

I don't know. Did you see that Jimmy Fallon thing where there's the I did. Oh God. Okay. Uh, rolling down the street, Smoking in Dough, sipping on gin and juice.

back

The Simpsons episode is called Love Indu. Okay. Um, but, so that's what we got for The Simpsons. I would like to make an emergency decoration of love to my poor, but cheeky secretary. What mes the common bottom?

Love is more powerful than all my magic. Hard to believe that country used to rule anything. Saturday Night Live, Martin Freeman hosted Saturday Night Live in 2014. There was a joke in the opening about how all the British actors are friends, and Alan comes on. He's impersonated and he's wearing the character of Snape.

But other than that, I never saw him on Saturday Night Live. There is no Hollywood star. Which sort of shocked me. There are some people calling for the Star, but it hasn't happened yet. Interesting. I know the Home Globe pro's got a star, however, he did show up on our city hall.

No

Amit: way.

Michael: Post Die hard. I was gonna say, do I need to retire this our city hall thing?

Actually it was Prince of Thieve. This may

Amit: just be a joke cause Robin Hood, Prince of Thieve. Cause that was perfect

Michael: timing. Totally perfect. And what's interesting is on the subject of Prince of Thieves, it, it came up over and over again that he upstaged Kevin Costner. Yes. He was asked about this over and over and he's like, I had my role.

He'd, you know, you like, he, he didn't seem to wanna trash Kevin Costner, even though that's another like, iconic Alec Rickman roll. Yeah, the, the, I mean, he's

Amit: hilarious. I'm surprised his take was this long in the episode for it to come up. Seriously.

Michael: Cancel the kitchen scraps for Leos and orphans. No more merciful beheadings and call off Christmas. I think overall, if we're talking about the nature of Alan Rickman's fame, I think you really can't overplay the Snape thing. This was a little bit, you know, I didn't get really into the movies, but there are generations of people who grew up with those movies and you know, I mean, it's, it's like, you know, Han Solo or something, you know, I mean, they are gonna forever associate Alan Rickman with Snape.

So, and I do think that they, those movies are timeless. Like they're gonna be watched 50 years from now and they'll be as great because the books are so good and the stories are so good. The name

Amit: recognition though, is a name gonna hold.

Michael: I don't know. That's a good question. I kind of think, I don't know.

He's of a class, he's sort of cut from a cloth of like great thespians. The, the presence and depth he brings to every character and the range. I mean, I, he's, he is one of those actors who disappears into the roles. Like I don't see Alan Rickman, when I watch is movies. I see the character he's portraying, which is not an easy trick.

So I don't know the name may live on, I mean, I guess doesn't have. Casual name recognition.

Amit: Yeah. I, I speculate that it won't, I don't, I mean, I'm rooting for his legacy, right? So I speculate that it's just gonna be like, Oh, that guy. Yeah. And that's what we're gonna think of him. Baby. Final note on the pop culture category.

Did you catch the family guy? No. Okay. It's gonna, it's gonna fit in absolutely perfectly in a later category, so I'll bring it up.

Michael: Wonderful. Oh, can't wait for this. All right. Category seven over under, in this category, we look at the life expectancy for the year they were born to see if they beat the house odds and as a measure of grace.

So getting data on the Brits is not easy cuz the websites I'm finding break it out into five year chunks. So I had to go, uh, he's born in 1946. The data for 1945 was 64.01 years for a British man. He died at 69. So he's over by the UK stats I found. Yeah. And those, I

Amit: mean, they've probably changed drastically those years.

Cause that's two. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So we can say right about average,

Michael: I think so. Although it, he feels young, 69

Amit: feels young. He does feel young. And it was, it was tragic cuz of the way too that he guarded the disease. Yeah. Because he died of pancreatic cancer. Um, It was a surprise. It's a surprise. Yeah.

Yeah. More than it was tragic. Yeah. It's without it out sad. Is it Robbery? Is at God stealing? I, I don't know.

Michael: You're right. It is right on the cusp there. It looks young to me and we've been on a little bit of a. The last few episodes of people dying Young. I hear you get a lot of sixties. Yeah. I mean the, And here's the thing is like somebody dies at 71.

I'm like, eh, young, but I get it. 69 is like, yeah, they're young. There's, it's not a two year difference between those two somehow to me. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like the sixties versus seventies are, are really, there's a psychological thing that happens with how we consider them young and tragic. Rob.

Yeah, I think so. I, I, I mean, he even made a joke once that like, this is an industry obsessed with youth and I'm still getting casted and I'm grateful for that. I'm still getting roles. I think that there would've been roles available to him. He had begun to move into directing and I do think that he is somebody who's like trying to lift everybody up.

So I think he, he left a void. I was saying this to Allison, um, yesterday. I was like, this is the first one where I almost. Like I got really sentimental and sad, like in revisiting him and just looking at the outpouring of when he died. You know, I think it says something that we're 34 episodes into famous engraving.

This is the first time a death has hit me hard , you know, maybe I'm just like starting to get honest about what our fucking show was about. Right. But I,

Amit: I admitted it in John Prine. I think that was the first of our episodes that I really felt it.

Michael: I didn't expect to, I didn't have some deep connection with Alan Rickman, but there was something, and, and maybe it is the generousness of spirit that I see sort of expressed in the background throughout his career that made me like sad that we lost this guy.

Amit: Yeah. I mean, I'd like to imagine that the, the later chapters would've been incredible. Like, Yeah, I think he could've, I hard to picture that. Yeah. I think about, what's the name of the guy that plays Logan Roy in Oh, yeah,

Michael: yeah, yeah. Brian Cox. And they were, they were buddies by the

Amit: way. Yeah. And that would totally, I could totally see Alan Rickman doing that type of character.

Amen. In another Amen.

Michael: Another 15 years or so. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I mean, on the grace front, you know, he looked good up until the end. Yeah. Well,

Amit: he hit himself, right? I mean, it went fast. Pancreatic cancer, when it, when it kicks in, it goes fast. And this is our third pancreatic cancer death celebrity.

Right. We had, uh, RBG and Aleck. Yeah. Yeah. It's fast and it's awful.

Michael: There's tragedy to it, and I think a graceful man, and I think that Grace was there in as much as we saw it publicly up until the

Amit: end. Did you catch Lee planned his own funeral? Yes. ? Yes. So he like, you know, he, he, he knew he was going. Yeah.

So he basically said like, These are the songs I want played. This is who is speaking. Yeah. And this is who, uh, this is the order

Michael: that they're in. Here's the schedule of event. Yes. A full fucking play bill. Right. Did

Amit: you catch, did you catch the songs? No. So there was a Tom Wait song. Fine. Like that's appropriate.

Then there was also uptown. Oh, is that right? Yes. Alan Rickman specifically selected Uptown Funk to be played at his funeral.

Michael: I got something to say about Tom Waits in the book. This is the only all caps I saw. I mean, he is meeting all kinds of celebrities, right? He's giving poetry readings for, you know, the Prince and uh, I mean he is going to Paul Allen's co-founder of Microsoft. Yeah, I mean, he is going to like his parties and like everybody's there.

He's hanging out with Mick Jagger and there's the class he's floating around in is stunning in terms of its celebrity power. The only person in the book where it's got all caps is I met Tom Whites all big caps. He's big fucking Tom Whites fan. Uh, good stuff. All right, let's pause.

Are you looking at my books?

Amit: I am. I'm actually looking at your bookshelf. I wanna see if there is anything that I can give as a gift to somebody,

Michael: uh, with my permission, I assume. Well, no, I was just

Amit: gonna take it off your

Michael: shelf. Wait, wait, wait. Whoa, whoa. Don't take it from me. I put time into this bookshelf.

I actually want these books there. However, if you're looking to get some of these books, no a great story. You can go to Half Price books. They're likely to have this entire catalog in their bookstore, and if not, in their bookstore there, they can order it for

Amit: you. But the thing is, I trust you. There is nowhere else that I can find a trusted book seller to give me an equal recommendation.

Michael: Sir, I disagree. You can find. Trusted book seller at Half Price Books. Ask a Half Price Books book seller. If you don't know what to read next or if you're looking for a gift idea. Really? Oh my goodness, yes. The Half Price Books book sellers are knowledge keepers. They're there to help you navigate their tremendous catalog.

Excuse me, I've got to go now. . Oh good. Because Half Price Books is the nation's largest new and used book seller with 120 stores in 19 states, and Half Price Books is online@hpb.com.

The first of the Inner Life categories is Man in the Mirror. What did they think about their own reflection? I'm inclined to say he liked

Amit: it. I'm inclined not like over the top tempted.

Michael: One of the things that people are trying to get at is like, what makes you a good actor? There's one that I really love where he is talking about how actually one thing that actors and dances.

Do is to actually use both sides of their brain at the same time because you have to hand yourself over completely to whatever are the emotional demands of a part. There's this kind of ge get counter at exactly the same time assessing what's happening out there and what's happening there. Yeah. To the person you're talking to and did this word land or now that one didn't land.

Now I'm gonna have to pick up that word, but that's the punishing part of acting, is taking the rest of your body into this strange place that it finds it hard to recover from. I think part of what made him great was his presence and and his roles, and therefore I think that there's a lot of acceptance that comes with that and therefore a reflection that he likes.

That's my logic for why I'm going. Yes. To

Amit: Man in the Mirror. There's certain amounts of evidence that one could argue no. Yeah, but I'm going

Michael: Yes. I am to. And let's leave it at that cuz I don't think we can know. Yes. All right, let's move on. Category nine, Outgoing message like man in the mirror. We want to know how they felt about the sound of their own voice when they heard it on an answering machine, and would they leave their outgoing voicemail?

I'm gonna jump to the second part first. I think he'd leave his outgoing voicemail. I don't think he's high minded. This is where I'm gonna bring

Amit: in the family guy.

Michael: Hello, you've reached Alan Rickman at 5 5 5 0 1 2 2. Please leave a message at the beep. Hello, Alan Rickman. It's Alan Rickman reminding you to move the pork chops from the freezer to the refrigerator so they defrost properly.

Do not disappoint me.

Amit: All right. But I, I agree with you, and that goes very back to your number one, the idea of being aite. Yeah. One would assume that you would be a little too snobby, but I think that is part of the great irony of Alan Rickman. Yeah. Is that I think he would've left it, and now we go to the first part.

Yeah. Okay. Did he like the sound of his own

Michael: voice? Mm, I didn't overthink it. I went.

Amit: I mean, the world loves the sound of his voice. Yeah. And this is where I made a reference earlier in the show to like, there is even science to prove it. Yeah. So there was a study in 2008, the University of Sheffield. They did a study to figure out who had the most perfect voice.

So they'd used something like 50 voices of people recording a sentence, how they define perfect. It's which registered the most emotional response. Mm. So sending shivers down our spine was the quote that they used, and they found the conclusion of this study that it was a combination of Alan Rickman's and Jeremy Iron's voice was the most perfect voice in the world at the time.

That's

Michael: wonderful. Good stuff. All right, let's move on. Category 10 Regrets, Public or private. What we really want to know is what, if anything, kept this person awake at night? I got one thing, uh, I regrets. It said nothing obvious. I, I wrote maybe some roles here and there, but not really on private, you know, the no kids thing.

I wondered. Yeah.

Amit: That I definitely wrote down just because of the hints that he

Michael: dropped. Yeah. But didn't sound like it tortured him. I don't know exactly how to talk about this, but I do feel like whether you become a parent or not, that we all do have paternal instincts or maternal instincts, and I think he found an outlet for his paternal instincts.

And I think that that's the important thing. I think like we should all know about ourselves, that we do want to fulfill a kind of parental role, whether it's formal or not. He's clearly, if you read the journal, there are some mood swings, right? It's not like this guy is steady Eddie or anything like that.

But I also think that. He doesn't look like a necessarily tortured soul to me. Yeah. All right. Category 11, Good dreams, bad dreams. This is not about personal perception, but rather does this person have a haunted look in the eye? Something that suggests inter turmoil, inner demons, or unresolved trauma.

This is a guy

Amit: I think, that gets very emotional and passionate about minor injustices. You know, when you talk about the little details that he wrote about in film, and he was also, you know, pretty involved in politics and aligning with the party he's married or partnered with a politician. Yeah. I think the larger causes of the world and the state of the world and the way that it's going is a problem for him.

Yeah. And I think that that if anything, he would lose sleep over just humanity and where we're heading societally or environmentally or so forth, I think is something He's the type of guy that was generally bothered by it. Yeah. I think he was that genuine, that authentic and that

Michael: heartfelt. So you were in bad.

Amit: You know, I didn't go bad dreams in the way of trauma. Yeah. But I went bad dreams in the way that like sensitive to the world or something sensitive. I think sensitive is greater than optimism for this guy. Yeah. I

Michael: also went bad dreams. I mean, you know, his dad died at a young age. I mean, he was eight years old and he had a very close knit family.

And it sounds like a hard scrabble kind of life. I do see something of a haunted look. I do see bad dreams, actually. You know, I mean, he just look in the eye and there's like, Well, there's something

Amit: going on there, . Well, he's not well rested, you know, And Emma Thompson said this in her eulogy. Yeah. You know, she said that, uh, Ariman was someone that gave so much of his time to other actors and other people in the industry.

I don't understand where he ever found time for sleep. Yeah. So maybe some of that is true. Yeah.

Michael: Category 12, this is second to last category, cocktail coffee or cannabis. This is where we ask which one would we most want to do with our dead celebrity. It's maybe a question of what drug sounds like the most fun to partake with this person, or another philosophy is that a particular kind of drug might allow access to a part of them.

We're most curious about. What you got? I'm gonna go the fun

Amit: part and I'm gonna go cocktail. Ah, do you watch Bottle Shock? It's like the early days of Napa Valley. He is a person that owns a wine shop in France. He's a British, or seems like Alan Rickman is kind of playing himself. Mm-hmm. . He invents this idea for promotion, which is a contest between two tests, French wines against United States wines.

Michael: I do kind of remember

Amit: this. So a good bit of the movie is just them, him and this American sitting in a wine shop in France and just drinking wine and bantering back and forth. , which is exactly, that's what I like. Yeah. Which is exactly what I ex like expect hanging out with Alan Rickman to be like Totally.

And he's funny and he's condescending and you get to hear the. That's what I want. Yeah, I want, I wanna have that kind of fun. I wanna do the one-on-one. It can be wine, it can be scotch. I went to sit across a bar from him for several hours. I think I would get to the point of just the giggles. Yeah. I think I would really,

Michael: really enjoy it.

I went basically the same with a different substance. I went cannabis. I wanna be high and listen to him. That voice, You know, we mentioned earlier the Jimmy Fallon thing with Benedict Cumberbatch. Uh, well, Rickman comes on the show the next week and says, You were joking with me. And they like, bust out some balloons and suck helium together.

Yes. I pictured Alan Rickman like taking a hit off something as he's hitting that balloon and thinking, Wow, that'd be really fun to just get high with him. And I think, you know, and it's mostly just to like hang, I, I don't think he's like a barrel of laughs necessarily. I think he's got a gleeful side, but I think he's got a tremendous amount of range.

I think he really understands like the human condition and uh, I think he gets pain. I think he gets rage. I think he gets gleefulness, you know, And I think to be a great actor, you have to understand that about people. And I'd love to get there probably hitting a bong.

Amit: I like this idea of you go getting the munchies.

And with that taste of his just reaching

Michael: for the, for gra , that's ex, it's a nice. All right. Final category. The Vander Beak named actor James Vander Beak, who famously said in Varsity Blues, I don't want your life based on everything we've talked about. The big question is, do you want this life almed? So

Amit: the positive I get, it's all there.

It's all what are other things? A Cinderella story of success. Lauded by your peers. Long lasting, deep loving connection. Yeah. Known for your generosity. Mm-hmm. ,

Michael: Uh, the lifestyle is also, The lifestyles a good one. That's the thing I think to talk about. Because the lifestyle looks extraordinary. I mean, in some ways it looks like all the things that on a, the surface make celebrity desirable, that who he's hanging out with and where he goes, and the travel and the great meals and the, I'll pick up the tab and off New York and then it's onto Vienna and you know.

Amit: Yeah. He's living between New York and London and a lot of time in California

Michael: with trip and trip to Africa and the Caribbean and like, I mean, he's going all over the world and is living a very rich, finer things in life, you know, kind of thing. Literally a man of the world. I mean, the comparison with Bordain I think is actually really mental health issues aside.

Apropo. Yeah.

Amit: The strikes against pancreatic cancer at 69. Awful. Awful. Yeah. What else?

Michael: It's whether or not that lifestyle actually looks all that great to begin with. I don't know. Like what's funny is that on the flip side of that lifestyle, for me there's a sort of never slowing down. There is a kind of all consuming demand to be present as an actor.

I mean, I think that that is what makes a great actor great, is that fully inhabiting the role in a nonjudgmental way is not exhausting. I don't know. I hear

Amit: what you're saying and I see what you're saying. I contrast that with the, you know, sitting in the reading book or playing crossword puzzles and getting into a giggle trance with his partner.

Yeah. But I see what you're saying. There's no slowing.

Michael: It is fame and all the things that suck about it. It sort of brings me back to first principles and like, I don't think I ever want to be famous cuz I think that the loss of privacy, you know, other people assuming they know you, the kind of, um, disconnect that you might feel from the rest of the world, I think is something that's sort of haunting and troubling and hard.

I think one of the things I love about 'em actually is that. Fame at 42, that he got to live 42 years or so as an avory man, right? As it may be respected, you know, almost a small community, but it wasn't Hans Gruber just walked into the room. You know, I think I'm a yes om it. I want your life, Alan Rickman, because some of those things we just talked about in terms of his lifestyle and great taste.

I think it's not just material wealth. I think it is experiential wealth, and I think to be present and to connect with a wide swath of people, even if they don't get to know who you really are, and I don't think anybody ever really knows who anybody ever really is. I think I just see too much here that I find desirable.

This is a good life, man. This is a

Amit: good life. It's possible. You're looking too hard for the negative. Yeah, I

Michael: think that's right. And I think, I don't wanna overthink it, you know, not having kids maybe hurts, but I like the way he didn't have kids. You know? I, I, I like the way he was paternal and a foster parent or whatever.

Yeah. I'm a Yes,

Amit: I too, but I'm a resounding yes. You were a bit of reluctant. Yes. I think I'm a resounding yes. Pancreatic cancer side. I'm not forgiving that. I'm not at all calling that anything but extremely, extremely, extremely difficult. And painful. Yeah. I, I would like to know more about this kid's conversation.

I would like to know and we never will. Cause these are private conversations between him and Rema of what the reason was and, and ultimately how he justified it. Yeah. You know, because he is a person, like I said, that is, that is ponderous and I wanna know what he thinks about, you know, legacy and where do you leave this world if you're not doing it by reproducing.

It's not something that is holding me back so much that I'm not giving a rezoning. Yes. So yes, I want your life Alan Rickman,

Michael: like, and if we can't see, like look at this one and say that's a good life, then you know what are doing. Yeah.

Amit: Okay. Michael, Uh, you are Alan Rickman. I am St. Peter. Uh, the proxy for the gateway to all things after life.

Yeah. I understand you have played the voice of God before. However, that is not gonna count here. So make your case as

Michael: to why you should go forth. Acting is above all else about trying to put on display what it means to be human. I chose a range of roles to try and express the complexity of all of humanity.

I tried to put that on display as a gift to audiences and to friends, which in my heart is a fundamentally generous act. I did that in my profession, but I also did that in all my relationships. And in actually everything I did, I tried to be as generous and as of service as possible. I was always trying to give more than I took, and I think that's the simplest case I can make.

And for that, let me in.

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of Famous and Gravy. If you're enjoying our show, please tell your friends about us, help spread the word. Find us on Twitter. Our Twitter handle is at Famous and Gravy, and we also have a newsletter which you can sign up for on our website, famous and gravy.com.

Famous and Gravy was created by Amit Kapoor and me, Michael Osborne. This episode was produced by Jacob Weiss, Original theme music by Kevin Strang. Thanks for listening. See you next time.