David Marchese

Well, no, I 100% agree with that aspect of it. The aspect of the film that to me feels very much like a time capsule and representative of a specific Gen X attitude that has basically disappeared is the anxiety about the possibility of selling out. And I think now young creative people, it's like maybe just because they've realized it's so hard to actually make a living, the concept of...

Selling out is a total phantom that doesn't exist for people anymore. Because it's almost like... It's like, anybody's going to give me money? Of course I'll take it.

Selling out is a total phantom that doesn't exist for people anymore. Because it's almost like... It's like, anybody's going to give me money? Of course I'll take it.

I don't know what's the connection. I don't.

I don't know what's the connection. I don't.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And, you know, another project I think you wanted to make for a long time was an adaptation of what makes Sammy run. Yeah. Bud Schulberg novel. Yeah. You tried for years to get that made. Yeah. And I thought, this...

And, you know, another project I think you wanted to make for a long time was an adaptation of what makes Sammy run. Yeah. Bud Schulberg novel. Yeah. You tried for years to get that made. Yeah. And I thought, this...

So for people who don't know the book, it's a story about a Jewish character named Sammy Glick, who's sort of a conniving, amoral striver in Hollywood and his unquenchable thirst to succeed in that world. And I thought that's an interesting movie for a young, successful Jewish man in Hollywood to want to make. What was it about that book that resonated with you?

So for people who don't know the book, it's a story about a Jewish character named Sammy Glick, who's sort of a conniving, amoral striver in Hollywood and his unquenchable thirst to succeed in that world. And I thought that's an interesting movie for a young, successful Jewish man in Hollywood to want to make. What was it about that book that resonated with you?

Do you think that was the resistance to making it? I think so.

Do you think that was the resistance to making it? I think so.

Do you think there are ways in which after October 7th, being Jewish in Hollywood has been trickier to navigate or have things felt different?

Do you think there are ways in which after October 7th, being Jewish in Hollywood has been trickier to navigate or have things felt different?

But has any of that reality in any way filtered into your working life? Um...

But has any of that reality in any way filtered into your working life? Um...

I have no smooth segue to get out of the anti-Semitism portion of this conversation. So I'm just going to take a hard left there. You know, in my reading of your career, around 2010, there's a real change happens. Starting 2010, you really did a lot fewer of kind of like the big, broad comedies. And you started to do films like you did, I think, three Noah Baumbach movies.

I have no smooth segue to get out of the anti-Semitism portion of this conversation. So I'm just going to take a hard left there. You know, in my reading of your career, around 2010, there's a real change happens. Starting 2010, you really did a lot fewer of kind of like the big, broad comedies. And you started to do films like you did, I think, three Noah Baumbach movies.

You did Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Brad Status. And these are all movies that are really about middle-aged guys working through the big questions. Was doing those films the result of a conscious decision that you wanted to start doing a different kind of film and stop doing what you had been doing before?