WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.899 Welcome to the deep dive. You know, when you 00:00:02.899 --> 00:00:07.099 picture an archaeological dig, you naturally 00:00:07.099 --> 00:00:09.900 expect to uncover towering monuments. Oh, right, 00:00:09.939 --> 00:00:12.140 like pristine temples buried under the sand. 00:00:12.199 --> 00:00:15.460 Yeah, exactly. Or, you know, intact tombs covered 00:00:15.460 --> 00:00:18.800 in gold. It's just human nature to look for the 00:00:18.800 --> 00:00:21.379 biggest, shiniest pieces of the puzzle first. 00:00:21.660 --> 00:00:24.199 Right, because we assume the sheer size of the 00:00:24.199 --> 00:00:26.559 discovery is what actually tells the story. Exactly. 00:00:26.760 --> 00:00:29.769 But ask any actual archaeologist. And they'll 00:00:29.769 --> 00:00:33.210 tell you that the most staggering, world -shifting 00:00:33.210 --> 00:00:36.130 realities about an ancient civilization, they 00:00:36.130 --> 00:00:38.509 almost never come from the giant statues. No, 00:00:38.530 --> 00:00:40.310 they really don't. They come from the everyday 00:00:40.310 --> 00:00:43.609 refuse. They come from, like, a single tiny jagged 00:00:43.609 --> 00:00:46.149 little shard of clay pottery. Because that single 00:00:46.149 --> 00:00:48.689 shard tells you about the tools everyday people 00:00:48.689 --> 00:00:51.189 used. It shows you the trade routes they navigated 00:00:51.189 --> 00:00:53.369 or, you know, the raw materials they had access 00:00:53.369 --> 00:00:55.429 to. You just have to know how to read it. And 00:00:55.429 --> 00:00:58.250 today... for you listening. Our Shard of Clay 00:00:58.250 --> 00:01:01.390 is a Wikipedia stub. A very short one at that. 00:01:01.829 --> 00:01:05.150 Extremely short. It's a remarkably brief entry 00:01:05.150 --> 00:01:09.069 for a largely forgotten 1939 Paramount Pictures 00:01:09.069 --> 00:01:13.010 film called $1 ,000 a Touchdown. It really is 00:01:13.010 --> 00:01:15.230 the perfect micro -history. I mean, on the surface, 00:01:15.349 --> 00:01:17.510 you're just looking at a few paragraphs of basic 00:01:17.510 --> 00:01:20.829 metadata and, well, a pretty wacky plot synopsis. 00:01:20.930 --> 00:01:23.349 Yeah, super wacky. But when we start pulling 00:01:23.349 --> 00:01:26.829 on those specific threads, the sheer industrial 00:01:26.829 --> 00:01:30.709 scale of 1930s Hollywood completely unravels 00:01:30.709 --> 00:01:33.250 before us. It's wild. Okay, let's unpack this. 00:01:33.980 --> 00:01:36.560 Imagine you are stepping back into October of 00:01:36.560 --> 00:01:39.859 1939. Setting the scene. Right. We are looking 00:01:39.859 --> 00:01:42.159 at an American black and white comedy. And it's 00:01:42.159 --> 00:01:44.700 directed by a guy named James P. Hogan. And the 00:01:44.700 --> 00:01:46.500 very first thing that jumps out is the runtime. 00:01:46.780 --> 00:01:50.159 Oh, yeah. The film clocks in at a brisk 71 minutes. 00:01:50.299 --> 00:01:52.680 Barely over an hour? Yeah. I mean, if you go 00:01:52.680 --> 00:01:54.340 to the theater today, you're strapping in for 00:01:54.340 --> 00:01:55.939 two and a half, maybe three hours. Recently. 00:01:56.420 --> 00:01:59.459 But back then, 71 minutes wasn't just a creative 00:01:59.459 --> 00:02:02.140 choice. It was a highly calculated business metric, 00:02:02.280 --> 00:02:04.980 wasn't it? Absolutely, it was. That 71 -minute 00:02:04.980 --> 00:02:07.560 runtime was basically the standard currency of 00:02:07.560 --> 00:02:10.620 the studio B -movie system. Meaning what, exactly? 00:02:10.699 --> 00:02:13.219 Well, it meant the film was specifically engineered 00:02:13.219 --> 00:02:15.719 to be consumed quickly. It usually served as, 00:02:15.719 --> 00:02:18.240 like, the opening act of a double feature. Oh, 00:02:18.240 --> 00:02:20.599 right, to get people in and out. Exactly. The 00:02:20.599 --> 00:02:23.759 studios had to keep you, the audience, cycling 00:02:23.759 --> 00:02:26.199 through those theater seats multiple times a 00:02:26.199 --> 00:02:28.659 day. It was purely a volume game. Because the 00:02:28.659 --> 00:02:30.979 tickets were so cheap. Yeah. They needed rapid 00:02:30.979 --> 00:02:33.539 turnover to turn - profit on the razor -thin 00:02:33.539 --> 00:02:36.759 margins these specific movies operated on. That 00:02:36.759 --> 00:02:39.639 makes sense. And the plot they were projecting 00:02:39.639 --> 00:02:42.259 onto that screen to keep you on that seat is 00:02:42.259 --> 00:02:44.860 genuinely wild. It's so absurd. It really is. 00:02:45.439 --> 00:02:48.159 So we have this character, let's say Marlo Mansfield 00:02:48.159 --> 00:02:51.139 Booth, played by Joey Brown. Right. And his wife 00:02:51.139 --> 00:02:54.240 Martha, played by Martha Ray. The summary specifically 00:02:54.240 --> 00:02:56.759 notes that they inherit a tapped out college. 00:02:56.900 --> 00:02:59.360 Such a funny phrase, tapped out. Right. Like 00:02:59.360 --> 00:03:01.819 they have absolutely no money, total bankruptcy. 00:03:02.030 --> 00:03:05.150 Which sets up the classic desperate situation. 00:03:05.550 --> 00:03:08.650 They need a master plan to increase funding and, 00:03:08.650 --> 00:03:10.990 you know, save the institution. Wait, I'm looking 00:03:10.990 --> 00:03:13.909 at this inheritance plot. A bankrupt college, 00:03:14.229 --> 00:03:16.930 a desperate couple, and my mind immediately goes 00:03:16.930 --> 00:03:19.689 to, like, a heist movie. Oh, sure. Or finding 00:03:19.689 --> 00:03:23.349 a wealthy, eccentric donor or maybe uncovering 00:03:23.349 --> 00:03:26.669 oil under the library. How do they land on football 00:03:26.669 --> 00:03:29.569 as a financial savior? Because in the cinematic 00:03:29.569 --> 00:03:33.430 universe of 1939, logic is entirely subservient 00:03:33.430 --> 00:03:35.689 to the trend. Ah, of course. Sports comedies 00:03:35.689 --> 00:03:38.069 were incredibly popular at the time. So naturally, 00:03:38.389 --> 00:03:40.789 the solution to extreme academic debt had to 00:03:40.789 --> 00:03:43.129 involve the college football team. But it isn't 00:03:43.129 --> 00:03:45.409 just a scrappy underdog story where winning the 00:03:45.409 --> 00:03:48.419 big game brings in alumni donations. That would 00:03:48.419 --> 00:03:50.759 make too much sense. Far too much sense. Their 00:03:50.759 --> 00:03:53.860 grand strategy is to strengthen the team by offering 00:03:53.860 --> 00:03:56.740 an astronomical bounty of $1 ,000 to their players 00:03:56.740 --> 00:03:59.500 for every single touchdown scored. That might 00:03:59.500 --> 00:04:02.599 tense the title. Right. Let's just frame the 00:04:02.599 --> 00:04:05.319 mechanism of that absurdity for a second. It 00:04:05.319 --> 00:04:08.580 is like trying to save a bankrupt tech startup 00:04:08.580 --> 00:04:13.219 by offering a $10 ,000 cash bonus to your coders 00:04:13.219 --> 00:04:15.800 for every single line of code they write. That 00:04:15.800 --> 00:04:17.959 is a perfect analogy. Like how does spending 00:04:17.959 --> 00:04:20.279 massive amounts of money you literally do not 00:04:20.279 --> 00:04:23.930 have somehow save a tapped out institution? It 00:04:23.930 --> 00:04:26.910 makes absolutely zero economic sense. Well, what's 00:04:26.910 --> 00:04:29.029 fascinating here is that the economic absurdity 00:04:29.029 --> 00:04:32.170 isn't a flaw in the writing. It's not. No, it's 00:04:32.170 --> 00:04:34.910 the entire engine of the comedy. The premise 00:04:34.910 --> 00:04:37.490 isn't supposed to hold up to the scrutiny of 00:04:37.490 --> 00:04:39.110 an accountant. Right. You're not doing the math 00:04:39.110 --> 00:04:41.170 in the theater. Exactly. When you only have 71 00:04:41.170 --> 00:04:43.509 minutes to entertain an audience that just sat 00:04:43.509 --> 00:04:47.910 through a newsreel in a cartoon, logic has to 00:04:47.910 --> 00:04:50.850 take a backseat to pacing. So the plot is essentially 00:04:50.850 --> 00:04:53.610 a clothesline. Just a clothesline to hang a barrage 00:04:53.610 --> 00:04:56.350 of chaotic jokes on. Wow. And looking at the 00:04:56.350 --> 00:04:58.089 cast list, you can see exactly what kind of texture 00:04:58.089 --> 00:05:00.610 this movie had. Oh, the cast list is amazing. 00:05:00.769 --> 00:05:02.670 You've got actors like Susan Hayward and Eric 00:05:02.670 --> 00:05:05.910 Bloor, the main cast, and John Hartley and Joyce 00:05:05.910 --> 00:05:08.370 Matthews. Yeah. Yeah. Standard leading players. 00:05:08.670 --> 00:05:11.870 But the uncredited roles, that is where you really 00:05:11.870 --> 00:05:14.269 see the DNA of the film. We have a character. 00:05:14.889 --> 00:05:17.970 literally credited as Hysterical Girl, played 00:05:17.970 --> 00:05:19.610 by Dot Farley. Which tells you everything you 00:05:19.610 --> 00:05:22.149 need to know. And you cannot forget the animal 00:05:22.149 --> 00:05:24.329 and bird impersonator, played by Bill Thompson. 00:05:24.509 --> 00:05:26.689 You really can't. Which honestly makes me wonder 00:05:26.689 --> 00:05:28.910 how these roles even function in the script. 00:05:29.329 --> 00:05:31.410 Like, is the bird impersonator just standing 00:05:31.410 --> 00:05:33.529 in the background during a dramatic locker room 00:05:33.529 --> 00:05:36.589 speech, making pigeon noises? Honestly, pretty 00:05:36.589 --> 00:05:39.790 much. I mean, these specific details reveal a 00:05:39.790 --> 00:05:43.269 very chaotic vaudeville -style atmosphere. Vaudeville? 00:05:43.370 --> 00:05:46.149 Yeah, vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety 00:05:46.149 --> 00:05:48.449 entertainment. And Hollywood essentially strip 00:05:48.449 --> 00:05:51.209 -mined it for talent in the 1930s. Oh, wow. So 00:05:51.209 --> 00:05:53.350 they just pulled stage performers onto the screen. 00:05:53.430 --> 00:05:56.519 Exactly. The studios maintained massive rosters 00:05:56.519 --> 00:05:59.100 of contract players who possessed one highly 00:05:59.100 --> 00:06:01.779 specific, highly marketable skill. But he had 00:06:01.779 --> 00:06:04.480 Bill Thompson doing animal noises. Right. And 00:06:04.480 --> 00:06:06.480 you had Tom Duggan playing the popcorn vendor, 00:06:07.439 --> 00:06:10.019 and Adrian Morris playing a guy named 2 Ton Terry. 00:06:10.480 --> 00:06:13.250 2 Ton Terry. So it's basically a sketch comedy 00:06:13.250 --> 00:06:15.930 variety show disguised as a sports narrative. 00:06:16.189 --> 00:06:18.490 That's exactly what it is. The director didn't 00:06:18.490 --> 00:06:20.870 need to give them deep character arcs. The core 00:06:20.870 --> 00:06:23.970 premise, that $1 ,000 bounty, was just a flimsy 00:06:23.970 --> 00:06:26.470 excuse to march these eccentric characters onto 00:06:26.470 --> 00:06:28.629 the screen. Let them do their bit. Yeah, let 00:06:28.629 --> 00:06:30.529 them do their three -minute vaudeville bit and 00:06:30.529 --> 00:06:33.029 march them right back off. So imagine yourself 00:06:33.029 --> 00:06:37.550 sitting in that theater in October 1939. You've 00:06:37.550 --> 00:06:39.829 paid your dime, you're exhausted from a long 00:06:39.829 --> 00:06:42.370 work week, and you aren't looking to be intellectually 00:06:42.370 --> 00:06:44.930 challenged. Well, you just want catharsis. Right. 00:06:45.149 --> 00:06:48.129 You go in, you laugh at the guy making animal 00:06:48.129 --> 00:06:51.029 noises, you watch football players tackle each 00:06:51.029 --> 00:06:53.410 other for a ridiculous sum of money, and an hour 00:06:53.410 --> 00:06:55.290 later you're walking out into the street feeling 00:06:55.290 --> 00:06:57.769 a little lighter. It's pure escapism. It sounds 00:06:57.769 --> 00:07:00.829 like a genuinely fun, mindless time at the movies. 00:07:01.089 --> 00:07:04.339 It was. But the highbrow press of the day did 00:07:04.339 --> 00:07:07.120 not view that escapism favorably. Oh, of course 00:07:07.120 --> 00:07:09.199 they didn't. And that gives us an incredible 00:07:09.199 --> 00:07:12.399 clue about the cultural divide in 1939. Because 00:07:12.399 --> 00:07:14.959 you'd think a movie basically throwing physical 00:07:14.959 --> 00:07:19.199 comedy at the wall for 70 minutes would be recognized 00:07:19.199 --> 00:07:21.699 for what it was a massive crowd pleaser. You 00:07:21.699 --> 00:07:24.199 would think. But Frank Nugent at the New York 00:07:24.199 --> 00:07:27.459 Times completely dismissed it. The very next 00:07:27.459 --> 00:07:30.639 day, after the film was released, on October 00:07:30.639 --> 00:07:35.069 5th, 1939. He published a review. A pretty harsh 00:07:35.069 --> 00:07:38.970 one. Yeah, he buried the film with one very specific, 00:07:39.149 --> 00:07:41.970 very cutting critique. He called it unoriginal. 00:07:42.350 --> 00:07:45.230 Ouch. Just one word. But it carries an immense 00:07:45.230 --> 00:07:47.269 amount of historical weight when you understand 00:07:47.269 --> 00:07:49.610 the context. I really have to push back on Frank 00:07:49.610 --> 00:07:51.970 Nugent here, though. Oh, do you? Yeah. I mean, 00:07:52.209 --> 00:07:54.810 is it actually fair for a New York Times critic 00:07:54.810 --> 00:07:57.930 to demand sweeping, groundbreaking originality 00:07:57.930 --> 00:08:00.889 from a 71 -minute college football comedy featuring 00:08:00.889 --> 00:08:03.290 a guy doing bird noises? It does seem a little 00:08:03.290 --> 00:08:05.110 unfair. Right. Like, I'm reading this review 00:08:05.110 --> 00:08:06.930 and thinking, wasn't he missing the point of 00:08:06.930 --> 00:08:09.350 these movies entirely? You don't buy a ticket 00:08:09.350 --> 00:08:12.350 to $1 ,000 a touchdown, expecting a profound 00:08:12.350 --> 00:08:15.189 shift in the cinematic paradigm. No, you definitely 00:08:15.189 --> 00:08:17.850 don't. You go for Tooton Terry and the Hysterical 00:08:17.850 --> 00:08:20.810 Girl. Your pushback is completely justified. 00:08:20.990 --> 00:08:23.610 But if we connect this to the bigger picture, 00:08:23.990 --> 00:08:26.069 Nugent's exhaustion actually makes perfect sense. 00:08:26.170 --> 00:08:29.709 How so? Well, that word unoriginal is the ultimate 00:08:29.709 --> 00:08:32.570 proof of how the Hollywood studio system operated. 00:08:33.330 --> 00:08:35.330 Nugent wasn't just being an East Coast snob. 00:08:35.429 --> 00:08:38.210 He wasn't. No, he was suffering from severe formula 00:08:38.210 --> 00:08:41.230 fatigue. Ah, meaning he had probably seen this 00:08:41.230 --> 00:08:43.870 exact same movie with slightly different window 00:08:43.870 --> 00:08:47.000 dressing a dozen times that year. Precisely. 00:08:47.159 --> 00:08:49.600 Look at how the Wikipedia page itself categorizes 00:08:49.600 --> 00:08:54.000 the film. It explicitly places it under 1930s 00:08:54.000 --> 00:08:57.539 sports comedy films and films set in universities 00:08:57.539 --> 00:09:00.460 and colleges. Oh, wow. Yeah, alongside an entire 00:09:00.460 --> 00:09:03.879 list of American football films. This wacky sports 00:09:03.879 --> 00:09:06.460 scheme to save the school wasn't a unique idea 00:09:06.460 --> 00:09:09.330 at all. It was a genre. It was a rigidly defined 00:09:09.330 --> 00:09:12.450 subgenre, a template that the studios churned 00:09:12.450 --> 00:09:14.669 out on a totally predictable schedule. Oh, I 00:09:14.669 --> 00:09:17.590 get it. It's the 1930s version of a Hallmark 00:09:17.590 --> 00:09:19.950 Christmas movie. You know the big city executive 00:09:19.950 --> 00:09:21.649 is going to fall in love with a small town baker 00:09:21.649 --> 00:09:23.970 before the opening credits finish rolling. You 00:09:23.970 --> 00:09:26.070 know exactly what the beats are going to be before 00:09:26.070 --> 00:09:28.210 you even sit down. That's a great comparison. 00:09:28.710 --> 00:09:31.149 And there is a specific technical detail in the 00:09:31.149 --> 00:09:34.330 source that proves just how mechanized and relentless 00:09:34.330 --> 00:09:37.429 this formula was. What's that? The music. Yes. 00:09:37.710 --> 00:09:40.690 Oh, I wanted to talk about this. For a 71 -minute 00:09:40.690 --> 00:09:44.649 movie, they utilized three separate music composers. 00:09:44.850 --> 00:09:47.669 Three of them. Charles Bradshaw, John Leipold, 00:09:48.029 --> 00:09:51.710 and Leo Shuken. Three composers. for basically 00:09:51.710 --> 00:09:54.789 an hour of football gags and vaudeville routines. 00:09:54.950 --> 00:09:57.190 It sounds like overkill, right? It sounds completely 00:09:57.190 --> 00:10:00.190 unnecessary. Why on earth would you ever need 00:10:00.190 --> 00:10:01.970 three different people to score this? Because 00:10:01.970 --> 00:10:04.759 it wasn't about... artistic collaboration. It 00:10:04.759 --> 00:10:07.740 was a studio music by committee approach. Music 00:10:07.740 --> 00:10:09.899 by committee. Yeah. This is where you really 00:10:09.899 --> 00:10:12.399 see the factory floor of Hollywood in action. 00:10:12.799 --> 00:10:14.639 When you have a strict release schedule to meet, 00:10:14.779 --> 00:10:17.159 you do not have time for one composer to sit 00:10:17.159 --> 00:10:21.039 thoughtfully at a piano and craft a unified thematic 00:10:21.039 --> 00:10:23.279 masterpiece. You just need the music to hit the 00:10:23.279 --> 00:10:25.700 cues and get out of the way. Exactly. So how 00:10:25.700 --> 00:10:27.879 did that actually work in practice? Were they 00:10:27.879 --> 00:10:29.860 all in the same room arguing over sheet music? 00:10:30.240 --> 00:10:33.179 Not at all. They were likely physically separated, 00:10:33.580 --> 00:10:35.419 working on entirely different sections of the 00:10:35.419 --> 00:10:38.440 film simultaneously. Wow, just to maximize efficiency. 00:10:38.740 --> 00:10:41.039 Right. The music department head would get the 00:10:41.039 --> 00:10:44.179 locked picture, literally chop the physical film 00:10:44.179 --> 00:10:47.639 reels up, and hand reel one to Bradshaw, reel 00:10:47.639 --> 00:10:51.039 two to Leipold, and reel three to Shuken. Just 00:10:51.039 --> 00:10:54.230 dividing up the labor? Yep. They'd say, I need 00:10:54.230 --> 00:10:57.570 chase music for reel one, romantic music for 00:10:57.570 --> 00:11:00.590 reel two, and funny tuba music for reel three 00:11:00.590 --> 00:11:03.009 by Tuesday morning. And they just had to deliver 00:11:03.009 --> 00:11:05.549 it. They would write it, record it quickly with 00:11:05.549 --> 00:11:07.450 the studio orchestra, and the editor would stitch 00:11:07.450 --> 00:11:09.230 it all together. That is incredible. They weren't 00:11:09.230 --> 00:11:11.370 trying to reinvent the wheel. They were just 00:11:11.370 --> 00:11:13.169 supplying the parts to keep the machine running. 00:11:13.509 --> 00:11:15.870 Exactly. Here's where it gets really interesting. 00:11:17.190 --> 00:11:20.100 The person overseeing all of those parts. The 00:11:20.100 --> 00:11:22.200 guy standing at the very center of this assembly 00:11:22.200 --> 00:11:25.840 line was the director, James P. Hogan. Oh, his 00:11:25.840 --> 00:11:28.899 story is fascinating. When you look at his workload, 00:11:29.419 --> 00:11:32.179 it is almost unbelievable to a modern audience. 00:11:32.940 --> 00:11:36.000 His filmography is essentially the ultimate monument 00:11:36.000 --> 00:11:38.480 to the working -class studio director of this 00:11:38.480 --> 00:11:40.600 era. When you look at the list of films directed 00:11:40.600 --> 00:11:43.620 by James P. Hogan and our source, it spans from 00:11:43.620 --> 00:11:46.960 1920 with a silent film called The Skywaymen, 00:11:47.200 --> 00:11:50.259 all the way to 1943 with The Mad Ghoul. That's 00:11:50.259 --> 00:11:53.879 a long career. It is. That is over 50 films in 00:11:53.879 --> 00:11:56.519 just over two decades. It is a staggering output. 00:11:56.639 --> 00:11:58.740 But it's only when you zoom in on the logistics 00:11:58.740 --> 00:12:01.419 of a specific year that the physical reality 00:12:01.419 --> 00:12:04.200 of his job truly sets in. Let's just look at 00:12:04.200 --> 00:12:07.980 the year 1939. The exact same year $1 ,000 a 00:12:07.980 --> 00:12:10.559 touchdown came out. Okay. In that single 12 -month 00:12:10.559 --> 00:12:13.360 period, James P. Hogan released four separate 00:12:13.360 --> 00:12:16.179 feature films. Four films in one year. Four. 00:12:16.330 --> 00:12:19.049 And they weren't even the same genre. He releases 00:12:19.049 --> 00:12:21.230 Bulldog Drummond's Secret Police, which is a 00:12:21.230 --> 00:12:24.149 mystery. Right. Then $1 ,000 a touchdown, our 00:12:24.149 --> 00:12:27.070 wacky college sports comedy. Then Grand Jury 00:12:27.070 --> 00:12:29.850 Simbritz. And finally, Bulldog Drummond's Bride. 00:12:30.110 --> 00:12:32.110 Just jumping back and forth. And if you look 00:12:32.110 --> 00:12:35.549 at the years surrounding 1939, his filmography 00:12:35.549 --> 00:12:38.190 jumps wildly between genres. Oh, absolutely. 00:12:38.490 --> 00:12:40.850 He's directing westerns like Desert Gold and 00:12:40.850 --> 00:12:43.789 the Texans. He's shooting action films like S 00:12:43.789 --> 00:12:46.470 .O .S. Perils of the Sea. He is directing an 00:12:46.470 --> 00:12:48.789 entire mystery series with the Ellery Queen film. 00:12:48.929 --> 00:12:51.649 He was doing it all. Hogan wasn't a bespoke chef 00:12:51.649 --> 00:12:54.529 carefully crafting a tasting menu. He was the 00:12:54.529 --> 00:12:57.039 foreman of a cinematic factory floor. I like 00:12:57.039 --> 00:12:59.679 that. A foreman. Yeah. He was like the ultimate 00:12:59.679 --> 00:13:02.620 fast food chef of early cinema. He was flipping 00:13:02.620 --> 00:13:05.559 cinematic burgers, whipping up a bulldog drum 00:13:05.559 --> 00:13:08.080 and mystery one month, serving up a football 00:13:08.080 --> 00:13:11.100 comedy the next, and moving right into Texas 00:13:11.100 --> 00:13:13.340 Rangers' ride again. And this raises an important 00:13:13.340 --> 00:13:16.220 question about the actual mechanics of filmmaking. 00:13:16.340 --> 00:13:19.500 Like how he survived. Yeah. How did a human being 00:13:19.500 --> 00:13:22.710 actually manage this volume? Think about the 00:13:22.710 --> 00:13:25.509 physical reality of writing, shooting, editing, 00:13:25.789 --> 00:13:27.970 and releasing four feature films in a single 00:13:27.970 --> 00:13:30.370 year. Seems physically impossible. How do you 00:13:30.370 --> 00:13:32.350 physically achieve that level of efficiency without 00:13:32.350 --> 00:13:35.009 the whole thing just collapsing? Well, you certainly 00:13:35.009 --> 00:13:37.149 aren't waiting three days for the sun to hit 00:13:37.149 --> 00:13:39.450 the perfect angle for a wide shot. Definitely 00:13:39.450 --> 00:13:40.970 not. You have to be cutting corners everywhere. 00:13:41.429 --> 00:13:44.500 Exactly. You shoot on standing sets. Meaning 00:13:44.500 --> 00:13:46.919 what? Meaning the studio already built a generic 00:13:46.919 --> 00:13:49.860 college Tampa set, a generic police station set, 00:13:49.860 --> 00:13:52.340 and a generic mansion set, and you just reuse 00:13:52.340 --> 00:13:54.600 them constantly. Oh, so you don't waste time 00:13:54.600 --> 00:13:56.600 building new ones. Right. And you shoot with 00:13:56.600 --> 00:13:58.519 flat, bright lighting so you don't waste time 00:13:58.519 --> 00:14:01.220 adjusting shadows between takes. Just blast it 00:14:01.220 --> 00:14:03.139 with light and yell action. Pretty much. And 00:14:03.139 --> 00:14:05.580 most importantly, you rely entirely on those 00:14:05.580 --> 00:14:07.960 tropes we talked about earlier. Right. If you 00:14:07.960 --> 00:14:11.240 are James P. Hogan, and you only have three weeks 00:14:11.240 --> 00:14:14.009 to shoot a college football comedy, before your 00:14:14.009 --> 00:14:16.970 mystery film goes into production, you lean heavily 00:14:16.970 --> 00:14:20.549 on the hysterical girl screaming. Yes. You use 00:14:20.549 --> 00:14:23.389 what is proven to work and you move on. Which 00:14:23.389 --> 00:14:26.350 completely recontextualizes the New York Times 00:14:26.350 --> 00:14:29.110 calling it unoriginal. Doesn't it? It was unoriginal 00:14:29.110 --> 00:14:31.850 by design. If it were highly original, it would 00:14:31.850 --> 00:14:33.850 have taken too long to make and gone over budget. 00:14:34.490 --> 00:14:37.330 Precisely. Originality was a luxury the B -movie 00:14:37.330 --> 00:14:40.289 unit could not afford. Wow. But to pull this 00:14:40.289 --> 00:14:42.970 off, Hogan also needed a crew that operated with 00:14:42.970 --> 00:14:45.289 the same ruthless efficiency. He couldn't do 00:14:45.289 --> 00:14:48.629 it alone. No. And the source gives us a glimpse 00:14:48.629 --> 00:14:51.370 of this team. You have a screenplay by Delmer 00:14:51.370 --> 00:14:54.029 Daves, produced by William C. Thomas. But crucially, 00:14:54.409 --> 00:14:56.570 you have cinematography by William C. Miller 00:14:56.570 --> 00:14:59.409 and editing by Chandler House. Right. In this 00:14:59.409 --> 00:15:01.850 system, the director is heavily dependent on 00:15:01.850 --> 00:15:04.129 these technicians to keep the pace. Because he 00:15:04.129 --> 00:15:07.070 literally cannot be in two places at once. If 00:15:07.070 --> 00:15:09.730 he is directing four movies a year, there must 00:15:09.730 --> 00:15:12.230 be massive overlap in the production schedules. 00:15:12.610 --> 00:15:14.990 Significant overlap. And this is where an editor 00:15:14.990 --> 00:15:17.559 like Chandler House... becomes essential. Because 00:15:17.559 --> 00:15:19.200 they're doing all the heavy lifting and post 00:15:19.200 --> 00:15:22.179 -production. Exactly. Back then, editors in this 00:15:22.179 --> 00:15:24.620 tier of filmmaking weren't waiting for a director 00:15:24.620 --> 00:15:26.659 to sit with them in a suite and discuss their 00:15:26.659 --> 00:15:29.159 artistic vision for a scene. There was no time 00:15:29.159 --> 00:15:31.720 for that. None at all. Chandler House was likely 00:15:31.720 --> 00:15:34.100 cutting the camera negatives for Real One while 00:15:34.100 --> 00:15:36.259 Hogan was still on a soundstage shooting Real 00:15:36.259 --> 00:15:38.659 Three. Oh, wow. So they were basically building 00:15:38.659 --> 00:15:41.840 the plane while it was flying. Exactly. The editor 00:15:41.840 --> 00:15:44.399 was matching continuity based on rigid script 00:15:44.399 --> 00:15:47.269 supervisor notes. the film at lightning speed. 00:15:47.830 --> 00:15:50.289 So by the time Hogan yells cut on the final day 00:15:50.289 --> 00:15:52.570 of the football comedy, Chandler House already 00:15:52.570 --> 00:15:55.070 has three quarters of the movie edited. Yep. 00:15:55.269 --> 00:15:57.690 The three composers are already recording their 00:15:57.690 --> 00:16:00.950 disjointed musical cues in separate rooms. Right. 00:16:01.570 --> 00:16:04.110 And Hogan is literally walking across the Paramount 00:16:04.110 --> 00:16:08.049 lot to step onto the set. of his next bulldog 00:16:08.049 --> 00:16:10.590 drum and mystery. That is the exact reality. 00:16:10.889 --> 00:16:12.690 Hogan wasn't out there trying to make precious 00:16:12.690 --> 00:16:15.509 art. He was a highly skilled tradesman keeping 00:16:15.509 --> 00:16:17.809 the lights on at Paramount Pictures. That is 00:16:17.809 --> 00:16:19.970 such a cool way to look at it. The A movies, 00:16:20.289 --> 00:16:22.690 the giant prestige pictures with the massive 00:16:22.690 --> 00:16:25.210 stars, those took time and they lost money if 00:16:25.210 --> 00:16:28.190 they flopped. They were risky. Very risky. It 00:16:28.190 --> 00:16:30.750 was the B movies churned out by guys like Hogan 00:16:30.750 --> 00:16:33.429 that provided the steady, reliable cash flow 00:16:33.429 --> 00:16:35.870 that kept the massive studio ecosystem afloat. 00:16:35.980 --> 00:16:38.019 So he was the backbone of the studio. He really 00:16:38.019 --> 00:16:40.500 was. He delivered the product the studio demanded, 00:16:40.740 --> 00:16:42.919 right on schedule. When we look at that list 00:16:42.919 --> 00:16:45.740 of over 50 films, we really aren't just looking 00:16:45.740 --> 00:16:48.220 at a list of titles. No, not at all. We are looking 00:16:48.220 --> 00:16:51.820 at a career defined by incredible endurance, 00:16:52.679 --> 00:16:55.899 rapid adaptability, and an absolute mastery of 00:16:55.899 --> 00:16:58.539 the studio's required formulas. It's a testament 00:16:58.539 --> 00:17:01.779 to a very specific kind of craftsmanship. Not 00:17:01.779 --> 00:17:03.799 the kind that wins Oscars, but the kind that 00:17:03.799 --> 00:17:06.220 builds an entire industry. So what does this 00:17:06.220 --> 00:17:08.539 all mean for you? Right. It means that you don't 00:17:08.539 --> 00:17:11.119 need to be overwhelmed by giant history books 00:17:11.119 --> 00:17:13.519 to be a true learner. You really don't. You don't 00:17:13.519 --> 00:17:16.279 need a PhD in film studies to deeply understand 00:17:16.279 --> 00:17:18.220 the mechanics of the golden age of Hollywood. 00:17:19.000 --> 00:17:22.200 By just critically reading this one stub, this 00:17:22.200 --> 00:17:25.359 little digital shard of pottery about a forgotten 00:17:25.359 --> 00:17:29.299 71 minute comedy from 1939, you can vividly picture 00:17:29.299 --> 00:17:31.700 the entire Hollywood assembly line. You really 00:17:31.700 --> 00:17:34.180 can. You can see the exhaustion and the relentless 00:17:34.180 --> 00:17:36.700 pace of directors like James P. Hogan. Right. 00:17:36.880 --> 00:17:38.599 You can picture the three different composers 00:17:38.599 --> 00:17:40.720 frantically writing music in separate rooms, 00:17:41.079 --> 00:17:42.980 pasting it together just in time for release. 00:17:43.160 --> 00:17:45.759 And you can completely understand the bizarre, 00:17:46.079 --> 00:17:48.160 gag -filled entertainment people actually sought 00:17:48.160 --> 00:17:52.240 out. Yeah, a tapped out college, $1 ,000 a touchdown, 00:17:52.539 --> 00:17:54.700 and a theater full of people who just wanted 00:17:54.700 --> 00:17:57.859 to sit in the dark and laugh at a guy doing animal 00:17:57.859 --> 00:18:00.579 impersonations before they went back out into 00:18:00.579 --> 00:18:03.680 the harsh reality of 1939. And we found all of 00:18:03.680 --> 00:18:05.839 that in a few paragraphs. We really did. And 00:18:05.839 --> 00:18:08.380 it leaves us with something really fascinating 00:18:08.380 --> 00:18:11.359 to consider about the media we consume today. 00:18:12.039 --> 00:18:15.359 Like what? Well, we tend to look back at the 00:18:15.359 --> 00:18:18.900 1930s studio system with its rigid formulas, 00:18:19.279 --> 00:18:22.119 its three -win shooting schedules, and its directors 00:18:22.119 --> 00:18:25.240 churning out four pieces of content a year as 00:18:25.240 --> 00:18:28.380 this archaic, quaint piece of history. Sure. 00:18:28.440 --> 00:18:30.420 We think we've moved past it. But think about 00:18:30.420 --> 00:18:32.240 today's landscape. Oh, I see where you're going 00:18:32.240 --> 00:18:34.680 with this. Right. If a 71 -minute movie pasted 00:18:34.680 --> 00:18:37.039 together by three composers and an exhausted 00:18:37.039 --> 00:18:39.619 director was the standard for high -speed content 00:18:39.619 --> 00:18:43.970 creation in 1939, Are today's massive blockbuster 00:18:43.970 --> 00:18:46.609 superhero formulas really that different? Or 00:18:46.609 --> 00:18:49.309 are we just looking at the exact same Hollywood 00:18:49.309 --> 00:18:52.210 assembly line, relying on the exact same rapid 00:18:52.210 --> 00:18:54.910 -fire formulas just operating at a modern scale? 00:18:55.529 --> 00:18:57.769 Which of our massive blockbusters today will 00:18:57.769 --> 00:19:00.329 just be a forgotten two -sentence stub on the 00:19:00.329 --> 00:19:03.339 internet 80 years from now? That is such a brilliant 00:19:03.339 --> 00:19:05.920 point. The medium changes and maybe the budgets 00:19:05.920 --> 00:19:08.220 get bigger, but the conveyor belt never actually 00:19:08.220 --> 00:19:10.380 stops. Never stops. It's definitely something 00:19:10.380 --> 00:19:12.299 to think about the next time you find yourself 00:19:12.299 --> 00:19:14.960 mindlessly watching the latest formulaic action 00:19:14.960 --> 00:19:17.500 movie, looking for your own modern version of 00:19:17.500 --> 00:19:18.279 the hysterical girl.