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Field of Dreams - Making Grown Men Cry Since 1989 · the arc.fm

0:03
There's so much to say.
0:04
And neither knows how to say it.
0:07
They're sharing little moments,
0:09
and they're about to hold off.
0:13
It's so fucking beautiful.
0:16
It really is.
0:20
I have just created something totally alive.
0:23
Circle. Him. You melded.
0:26
You will come.
0:30
If you feel what is him and that happens to
0:37
is your invoices.
0:38
Ray is.
0:39
Did you hear the voice two? Did you hear it?
0:42
Go the distance?
0:43
This field.
0:44
This game.
0:46
reminds us all that once was good.
0:48
Hey, is this heaven? No.
0:52
It's Iowa.
0:56
I have been in, in situations and I've met people
0:59
who who don't like baseball at all.
1:00
I find it incredibly boring and therefore they just won't take it at all
1:04
seriously because, you know, they want to or they won't give it a chance.
1:09
And I mean, this is a different situation because we bring movies to each other
1:13
and we understand, like these are meaningful experiences to us.
1:16
But like, if, you know, if you just talk like, oh the baseball
1:23
It may be obvious to
1:24
anybody who knows it is Virgo season, but who?
1:29
Moran's field of dreams and why?
1:32
The person who's watched it for 34 years on their birthday brought it.
1:36
Yeah.
1:38
I brought it because this is the movie I've watched almost every year
1:41
since I've turned. It was either 20 or 21.
1:45
But for the most part, I watch it either the night before or the day of. Why?
1:50
So when I was in college, I had this friend named Mark Charity,
1:54
and he and I had the same birthday, he was the first friend I made there.
1:59
when I saw it with Mark when he asked his father
2:02
if you wanted to have a catch, I inexplicably started to cry.
2:08
Inexplicably, I feel like that's the whole crying point.
2:11
Yeah.
2:12
it was the way he said it.
2:13
It was the way his voice choked up that I was like, I was.
2:18
I was a puddle. so. Oh.
2:21
So I was really shocked by my response to it. So.
2:24
And we did it again this the next year And then, and then I just started to do it.
2:34
Field of Dreams moves at the speed of baseball.
2:37
to achieve something truly poetic.
2:39
Field of dreams is a movie that is dripping
2:42
in sentimentality, but in the best possible way.
2:45
Field of dreams doesn't shy away from how complicated love is,
2:48
but it's smart enough to not hit us over the head with it either.
2:51
Field of dreams is an enormous test of.
2:55
Do you have any childlike wonder left in you?
2:58
it isn't like I'm watching my relationship with my father play itself out.
3:03
It's the way the movie works is so magical
3:06
that it gets to that point and I'm
3:11
I'm I'm a blubbering mess. I'm.
3:13
You can tell when somebody is writing an email
3:15
and they're crying while writing the email.
3:17
I know you can't see their faces, but you can tell
3:20
when somebody is writing an email
3:21
and they are crying while they were writing you.
3:24
The email.
3:25
I agree, I was like, it's a movie about baseball, but it's not.
3:28
It's about building a field, but it's not.
3:30
We don't even see it.
3:31
The field just goes up and looks gorgeous.
3:33
It's about farming, but it's definitely not.
3:36
You know,
3:36
it's like,
3:36
how does this man who's never owned a farm, who then, like, leveled
3:39
half of it has have the most gorgeous corn you've ever seen?
3:42
But they're also still broke and, like, are they even harvesting it?
3:46
Because it is, it's like gorgeous and like,
3:48
they have all this caught, but they're they're bankrupt.
3:50
But it's because, like, are they not like
3:53
picking their
3:54
corn like, and yeah, it's
3:58
about fathers and sons, but it's not like we don't even see the dad as dad.
4:02
We see a dad is a young man, and only at the end.
4:04
which is like a really strange framing to have a whole film on.
4:08
So it's like about that, but it's also not about that.
4:11
When I was a kid, I was a huge Detroit
4:13
Tiger fan, My dad had grown up watching the Tigers.
4:17
It's.
4:17
He took my brother and I to, to the games,
4:22
and we we watched and listened to it on the radio all the time.
4:26
And I would I would just go to baseball diamonds
4:30
and hang out and wait for games to start or or or play with my friends.
4:35
You know.
4:36
I just loved playing it.
4:38
I love the way the game looks.
4:39
I like baseball diamonds. I just really like to be around it.
4:42
when I was a kid, I lived and breathed that.
4:45
And then after I became interested in theater, I sort of dropped it.
4:49
Like I dropped off.
4:51
I think in 1994, I read a book
4:55
called October 1964,
4:58
I read this book, and it exposed this really human side to the game.
5:02
To me, that that that was really fun to explore.
5:05
And so I just started reading baseball books
5:07
after that and, and became more enmeshed in the history.
5:11
And, and we found the love for the game.
5:17
what did you know about the movie going into Field of Dreams?
5:21
Had you seen this movie before?
5:23
Like, did you.
5:24
I thought I have, I think I have, I would have seen it when I was little,
5:29
and I know I had talked to Cole about it and I was like,
5:33
it's just a really good movie.
5:35
Like, I don't remember it, but I remember that it's very good.
5:38
And then I watched it, and every single second of it was a surprise.
5:43
I knew that there were like these like lines, right?
5:45
That got repeated.
5:46
Like, if you build it,
5:47
they will come or he will come, Yeah, surprised the whole time.
5:52
right? It it's a one line wonder.
5:54
The only thing I knew about it was if you build it, that's it.
5:57
They will.
5:58
And I knew it incorrectly, because. Yep.
6:01
It's. He will come.
6:02
If you build it, he will come.
6:04
I was looking for experts to give us context
6:08
or background of why baseball is so important.
6:12
I got dozens of very macho man writing back.
6:16
Yeah, crying at their keyboards.
6:22
Where they have to speak about Field of Dreams.
6:25
It did. It had such an impact on the men's.
6:28
I think that's all you need to know.
6:30
Yeah. No,
6:35
Oh, since we're talking names,
6:37
could you say the say your full name that you'd like to be announced as, sure.
6:42
Patrick Tate Fleming.
6:45
My last name is tape space Fleming.
6:49
Because I took my son's mom's last name,
6:53
and she took my, And you people are like, is that your middle name?
6:57
Tape?
6:57
And I'm like, no, my middle name is Reagan.
7:01
But no.
7:02
Like a solid 1980s baby.
7:05
Not like Ronald Reagan, like Reagan from The Exorcist.
7:08
Reggie. Yeah. And, from the.
7:10
I am Jaclynn and I'm a 1980s baby, and I'm named after Jaclyn Smith,
7:15
the Charlie's Angel. So there you go. Yeah.
7:20
And Cole, who are you named after?
7:22
Cole from Days of Thunder. Oh.
7:26
Is that true?
7:27
There's no way that.
7:27
So you made that up to fit in? I did
7:30
listen. To the way Cole talks.
7:31
His parents did not, did Oh, man, I thought I, I had it there.
7:37
I was like, that was him.
7:38
That's not a movie I've ever seen.
7:40
But I had the cassette soundtrack.
7:43
I totally thought in your email was like a stage name email with the tape in it.
7:47
Like, that was like, whoops.
7:49
It does it it yeah, it does have a real like, this band guy.
7:53
Yeah. And convenient. Yeah.
7:55
Do you want to have Patrick read the email?
7:57
would, I would like that because I think hearing it quoted back,
8:01
you have a poetic ness about your writing.
8:05
Let's see if I can find of hear.
8:07
Hey, Cole.
8:09
I dove into the podcast and started listening to the Princess
8:12
Bride episode, which is so great.
8:15
It got me thinking more deeply about why Field of Dreams has always hit me so hard,
8:20
personally, and I thought I'd share this little tidbit with you before we talk.
8:25
If we end up talking, what's interesting is that my father's life
8:29
kind of mirrors Moonlight Graham story in a strange way.
8:33
My dad was a professional umpire in the early 70s.
8:37
At the time, he was actually the only umpire in triple
8:40
AA who was also teaching at the umpire school in Florida.
8:44
he was really respected and was considered somebody
8:47
who was going to make it all the way to the majors.
8:50
I even have this little booklet
8:52
from the school where it says, Michael will go all the way.
8:55
But then his father died suddenly of a heart attack
8:58
and my dad had to make the decision as a 23 year old, to come back to Iowa
9:03
to run the family printing company, So he never made it to the big leagues.
9:08
what is wild is that all of his contemporaries
9:11
and close friends from umpire school eventually did make it.
9:15
He was right there with him, but life pulled him in another direction.
9:19
I think that's probably part of why Field of Dreams affects me so deeply.
9:23
there's something so beautiful and heartbreaking about unfinished dreams
9:28
and the way life ask people to sacrifice for one another.
9:33
And now that my dad has passed away, the Little League fields
9:36
I grew up playing on are actually named after him.
9:40
So I think about him all the time when I'm out there coaching kids.
9:45
It's funny because the older I get,
9:47
the more Field of Dreams feels less like a movie about baseball
9:50
and more like a movie about fathers and sacrifice, legacy
9:55
and how dreams somehow continue through other people,
9:58
even if they don't happen exactly the way you imagine them.
10:03
Anyway, I just wanted to share that with you
10:05
because your podcast really got me thinking about all it again.
10:09
Talks in.
10:15
When we're each of us in
10:17
and when we're each of us out for Field of Dreams.
10:21
I was in at the at the exposition.
10:25
it did the thing that I like, like I felt like it wrote
10:27
the first three episodes, threw them out, and then, like,
10:29
made it into, like a pretty snappy voiceover montage.
10:33
My name is Ray Kinsella. I'm 36 years old.
10:36
I love my family, I love baseball, and I'm about to become a farmer.
10:41
Everything felt so cozy, like it was.
10:43
I don't want to be a farmer.
10:45
I don't, I don't want a man who's like off on his own dream.
10:49
Like what a nightmare to be his wife.
10:51
But honestly I was like, I want to crawl in this movie and live in it.
10:54
It felt like, what a great relationship.
10:57
Even though I was also like, God, she is patient.
11:01
Like, yeah.
11:02
I could never be.
11:05
But it was.
11:06
It's so cozy.
11:07
I when I was in,
11:10
when Amy Madigan, I gave him permission
11:14
to build the baseball field and also seemed like she meant it.
11:19
Yeah. It was.
11:20
I appreciate I appreciated the dynamic that they had,
11:23
even though also like, good God.
11:27
Robbie, what's the number
11:29
one thing that you want to say about Field of Dreams?
11:32
Okay. So happy.
11:34
What I love most about it is that it moves at the speed of baseball,
11:38
which and and the more I watch it, the more I appreciate
11:42
how it transcends the parts of it that don't work
11:45
and achieves something much bigger and more poetic.
11:48
that moves at the speed of baseball.
11:50
I like I it really is like
11:54
that conversation that we had with Patrick about this really hit home about
12:00
You know, I think that you never.
12:04
The second you have no idea
12:06
what it feels like until you've lost,
12:09
a father or, a mother or,
12:14
sibling or, you know, or even a partner or whatever. And,
12:20
and just having.
12:24
I think most people would give it all up to have the, the one more day,
12:28
right, with the, with the one that they,
12:31
you know, loved the most or whatever.
12:33
And I think this movie does such a good job
12:37
of fulfilling that fantasy or fulfilling that, that dream.
12:42
it's a, it's a thing that
12:45
that we passed down from generation to generation.
12:50
And this movie really puts it in perspective of,
12:54
of connecting, to your dad
12:57
and getting that one more, that one more time just to play catch
13:01
or to us go the distance with them
13:05
and just and just see the world through their eyes.
13:18
My father's name was John Kinsella.
13:21
suppose dad did the best he could instead of Mother Goose.
13:24
I was put to bed at night.
13:25
The stories of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, and the great Shoeless Joe Jackson.
13:31
Dad was a Yankees fan, and so of course, I rooted for Brooklyn.
13:35
But in 58, the Dodgers moved away.
13:37
So we had to find other things to fight about.
13:40
We did, and when it came time to go to
13:43
I think the thing about baseball that is so unique
13:47
is that it's generational, you know, that it's passed down
14:02
Right, right.
14:09
Sure.
14:14
Correct.
14:14
Right.
14:15
So how I came to love the game was basically
14:18
how I came to love the game was basically through my father.
14:21
my father and I shared a special bond with baseball.
14:25
And my late father also had worked in television.
14:27
My dad was a sales guy.
14:29
He wasn't on the air, but as a little boy, he would bring me
14:32
to the local CBS station in Hartford, Connecticut, where I grew up,
14:36
and I got to meet the sportscasters.
14:38
So sports, particularly baseball, baseball has always been
14:42
my favorite sport because of my relationship with my father.
14:46
my late father died in in 1999, and
14:53
a year before
14:53
that I was about 26 years old, living in San Diego.
14:57
I was working at a radio station part time, I'm not rich, but I'm not poor.
15:01
I think I'm going to go see as many ballparks as I can.
15:04
And you know what? We went on that first trip.
15:07
If you build it,
15:09
they will come.
15:10
I went to the Field of Dreams with my brother.
15:12
In fact, I have a picture of me and my brother when I went to the field,
15:15
the dream site, you could just pick up a bat and play, and my brother and I did.
15:19
I got a picture even on my website, Mr.
15:21
Sports travel.com.
15:23
Now, since then, I ended up sort of in my dad's memory,
15:27
finishing all 30 ballparks
15:29
about six months after he died at the end of the 99 season,
15:32
it meant a lot to me to do it because on the 98 trip, I was calling my dad.
15:37
I didn't have a cell phone, so I was calling my dad from the hotels.
15:40
Dad, I'm in Minneapolis.
15:42
And then from there at springboard, where I've seen baseball all over the world.
15:46
So that's kind of how I got started.
15:48
there were times when we would go to a Minnesota Twins baseball game
15:52
and my dad would call his old umpire buddies and be like, hey,
15:56
we're coming to the game.
15:57
You know, it'd be fun to see you and the and the professional umpires
16:00
would invite us down to the umpire room
16:03
and, you know, whatever, my older sister would be there.
16:05
So they would be like, are you proper or, you know, like.
16:07
And they would be like, I mean, they're like boxer shorts
16:10
and they'd be rubbing the baseballs before the game because they rub
16:14
like 80 some baseballs for every game with Mississippi mud.
16:17
It's like mud
16:18
that only comes from this little area right off the Mississippi River.
16:22
And they rub baseballs.
16:24
And they rub baseballs.
16:26
And it was great to hear these guys telling old stories about my dad.
16:31
Oh, your dad,
16:33
and, when when he got into that umpire room
16:37
with them, they all, like, snapped back and it was like he was one of them.
16:40
He wasn't like the data for who runs this printing company.
16:45
And of course he was.
16:46
He lit up, you know, it was like he was with his his buds or you know, it's
16:51
probably like you like how my son sees me when I get together with my old band
16:56
mates or something, you know, it's like, oh, yeah, you have that pact,
17:00
Now that I think about this trip, I remember, you know,
17:03
they're not even having a phone.
17:05
that it was pure, kind of like the movie Field of Dreams.
17:07
So I had a great time Today I look back on all the travels I've done.
17:10
I've seen sports and like 176 different countries and territories
17:14
around the world.
17:15
I still go back to that trip, but I think
17:18
the thing about Field of Dreams that is so unique is that
17:23
it's a living,
17:24
breathing thing that you can go to the Field of Dreams
17:28
movie site, which I've been to three separate times.
17:32
and it's it's a sense of community.
17:34
It is an experience.
17:35
And that's what's different
17:36
than other most other movies where you don't have a movie.
17:40
And then it's it's still a living, breathing organism.
18:08
Well, but the difference
18:09
So your experience is actually quite normal
18:12
because many baseball fans have that aspiration of wanting to see all 30 parks.
18:17
And most of them, if you ask them how many went to I, about six.
18:20
And, so you did pretty good.
18:23
And you're not even a fan.
18:32
I feel like a kid,
18:33
honestly, when I go to a baseball game, even now, to say that you were there.
18:38
I've been to the World Series, have been to All-Star games.
18:40
I've been to the World Baseball Classic,
18:42
I've been to every baseball that you can think of,
18:47
it's really fun hearing so many people talk about their love for it.
18:50
And then
18:52
embracing that.
18:56
Cole, what about you?
18:57
What's the one thing you want to say about Field of Dreams?
18:59
x and y and Z happens,
19:04
and there's no questioning it.
19:06
Half of it didn't have any motivation that in my mind.
19:10
But I was like, great, this is what we're doing.
19:12
He's built a stadium.
19:13
They're on a road trip. Great.
19:16
He's kidnaping a famous off author.
19:19
That was fun, right?
19:21
And maybe the famous author is a ghost.
19:25
Great.
19:25
I don't know. But.
19:30
There was something serious I wanted to say to,
19:34
Some people have lost parents without closure,
19:40
and that,
19:43
I think, importantly, most people can easily imagine losing a parents,
19:50
because, you
19:50
know, it's everyone's going to eventually be lost.
19:53
And so I think most people can imagine losing a parents without closure.
19:59
And to see somebody
20:02
find a way to have closure
20:07
in their.
20:10
Is part of what makes people melt.
20:12
And closure only exists in fiction.
20:17
And that's why we have fiction and that's
20:21
why this movie
20:23
hit for me personally.
20:26
I think you don't even have to have closure, because I would
20:29
I would play catch with my grandpa.
20:33
My ghost grandpa, like every day of the week.
20:36
And like, I don't I don't feel like I don't have closure from his passing,
20:39
but I would still, I think, like we can all relate to
20:41
that idea of, like a person we loved who's no longer here,
20:45
gets to live out their happiest moment, and you get to also be part of it.
20:50
Like,
20:51
yeah, yeah,
20:54
Robby can I
20:56
What else did you write down about?
20:59
If there this.
21:01
I know you've got thoughts.
21:02
You've seen it over 40 times.
21:04
In your notes.
21:05
You took extensive notes.
21:06
like I'm a little bit afraid of myself right now.
21:10
You Here's nine innings
21:12
worth of Robbie's thoughts and feelings about Field of
21:15
Dreams.
21:20
Music carries the opening credits.
21:22
Sets the tone for the movie.
21:24
Mystical. Magical.
21:25
Slightly haunting. Hunting.
21:27
Underneath it all.
21:28
The opening is about Rey's father and then gets to himself.
21:31
There's never a description of anything his father did wrong.
21:35
They fought because they fought, and that's how it goes with fathers and sons.
21:39
His story mirrors his father's conventional hearing.
21:41
The voice kind of pisses Rey off. It's a nice reaction.
21:44
He doesn't like to be in that position because he's not that type of person.
21:46
Rey, here's the voice three times.
21:47
Once in the cornfield,
21:48
once while sleeping in his home, and the third time in the cornfield again.
21:51
But the third time he sees the field and Shoeless Joe,
21:54
his daughter, watching Harvey the next day.
21:55
I love the ray, says.
21:57
That man is sick. Very sick.
21:59
The home is chaotic and lived in.
22:01
The more he thinks about building the field, the more into baseball he gets.
22:03
He's closer to his father's world and closer to his father.
22:05
Any questions whether he should do this, build this field.
22:07
And Ray says he's afraid of turning into his father.
22:09
He wonders about his father as a person.
22:10
He's afraid of turning into this vision of his father.
22:14
He's beginning to understand that his father is a person,
22:16
and it becomes supportive of the idea of building the field.
22:18
She's pragmatic, but understands the need for spontaneity.
22:20
Once he starts building the field,
22:21
he starts to share the experience with his daughter.
22:23
He's becoming the best parts of his father.
22:24
It's exposition, but it's also bonding.
22:26
The best type of exposition.
22:29
Once the field is finished, him and Annie picnic on it
22:30
and raise smiles at the thought of his father.
22:31
I have just created something totally illogical.
22:33
He's proud of himself.
22:34
Impressed. He's not dwelling on the fact that Shoeless Joe isn't there yet.
22:36
He's just reveling in the accomplishment.
22:38
He spends the winter waiting.
22:38
Kind of like baseball fans wait all winter for the new season to start.
22:41
Pitchers and catchers fidget pitchers and catchers.
22:44
Pitchers and catchers, pitchers and catchers.
22:47
I just love pitchers and pitchers and catchers.
22:50
I just love pitchers and catchers.
22:53
That's totally me.
22:54
I love.
22:55
I cannot wait for pitchers and catchers
22:58
just when they're realizing the
23:00
the cost of the field to their finances.
23:03
She has a history of beers, and they know they have to keep it.
23:05
First scene with Shoeless Joe that they don't talk for a while, but nod.
23:07
Music builds the mystery for both Ray and Shoeless Joe.
23:08
They can't believe this is happening. Taking it slowly.
23:09
Ray's smiling when Joe asks him if he can pitch.
23:10
I can definitely relate to that smile.
23:11
It'd be amazing to pitch and play with the hero.
23:12
Joe Lightning Ray's curve and Ray smiles playful.
23:13
They enjoy the same parts of the game. What's with the lights? Owners.
23:14
Some parts of the game never change.
23:15
When any invites Joe inside, Joe says, I don't think I can.
23:16
Introduces a boundary to the dream that will later come back.
23:17
Moonlight Graham is the only one to cross it.
23:20
We're keeping this field.
23:22
You bet your ass we are.
23:24
And his brother Mark immediately squashes the dream.
23:26
He's going to lose the farm. Mark actually has a pretty good understanding of Ray.
23:28
You never liked Iowa? Not exactly true, but not exactly wrong.
23:30
Mark is trying to help. He cares about his sister.
23:31
But he's a villain. The other white Sox come out to play.
23:33
Same fan, same grievances. Oh, yeah. At least I got muscles.
23:35
At most you got muscles. They swear in front of Karen.
23:37
Karen says it's all right.
23:38
We find out that not everyone can see them.
23:39
Annie calls Ray into dinner, and the ballplayers make fun of him.
23:41
I'm noting I'm melting.
23:43
There are a lot of people at this PTA meeting.
23:44
It may be backward, but it's well attended.
23:45
Camera shakes a bit when the woman is talking about the Terrence Mann book
23:49
being smut.
23:50
You know, I stopped writing books, don't you?
23:51
Because he masturbates.
23:53
Why did they leave the meeting?
23:54
Ray realizes he has to ease Terence's man man's pain.
23:56
And to do that, he needs to go to Boston.
23:57
And is the one torn between magic and reality
23:59
until she realizes they are having the same dream.
24:01
And then she's back in the magic
24:02
Ray, coming in with his hand in his pocket, pretending it's a gun. Is amazing.
24:04
The way this scene plays out is fantastic.
24:06
Kevin Costner plays it straight,
24:07
and Terry's response to him, the softening to Ray makes sense.
24:09
No, I mean, what do you want? Shows him the concession stand.
24:11
Oh, talking of beer.
24:12
Terry admires Ray's passion.
24:13
Says he used to feel that way, but doesn't anymore.
24:14
Ray, refusing to involve Terry anymore, convinces Terry to come clean.
24:16
Road trip music.
24:17
Ray goes for a walk and finds himself in 1972, just before Doc Graham dies.
24:19
Burt Lancaster. What a face!
24:21
The camera finds him at a distance and then swoops in on him. Great entrance.
24:23
It was like coming this close to your dreams
24:24
and watching it brush past you like a stranger in the crowd.
24:26
His dream was to bat once in the major leagues.
24:27
Ray would go that far to see this through. Doc Graham walked.
24:29
He's at peace with his life in a way that Ray isn't his younger self.
24:31
So we'll take that journey.
24:33
It's not my fault you wouldn't play catch with your father.
24:36
Terry's face when he sees and meets everyone is amazing.
24:37
He's like a kid. He's bent over and flabbergasted when he shakes Joe's hand.
24:39
Hey, how about a warning? Sure, kid. Watch out! You don't get killed.
24:41
The look between Graham and Ray. Mutually grateful.
24:42
Terry gets more childlike as the movie progresses,
24:43
and he finds the thing he had a hard time believing is real.
24:44
When Karen says people will come and buy a ticket, everyone
24:45
but Mark believes her because they have bought into the magic.
24:46
The people will come.
24:46
Ray is not my favorite speech, but it makes sense why it's there.
24:48
It continues with the magic and explains why Ray refuses to sign.
24:49
Ray genuinely feels bad that Doc Graham can't go back.
24:50
Mark finally sees the ballplayers and says they can't sell the farm.
24:52
You lied to me.
24:54
You said your finger was a gun.
24:58
Ray's father comes out of nowhere.
25:00
He wasn't there before, and now he is.
25:03
Ray introduces him to his family, which he mentioned earlier
25:07
he never got a chance to do.
25:09
Neither knows how to act with the other.
25:11
There's so much. Fun.
25:31
There's so much to say.
25:32
And neither knows how to say it.
25:35
They're sharing little moments,
25:37
and they're about to hold off.
25:48
They're sharing little moments,
25:49
and they're about to hold off on expressing it until.
25:52
Dad, do you want to have a catch?
25:58
Oh my God.
26:07
It's so fucking beautiful.
26:10
It really is.
26:15
That was a lot.
26:18
Robby's got feelings.
26:20
That was about the.
26:23
Robbie, that was beautiful.
26:26
Thank you.
26:26
That was, that was unexpected.
26:31
what exactly made you burst into tears?
26:37
It was picturing them.
26:39
there's this idea that there are a bunch of ghosts in the field playing
26:42
baseball, and, and, and they all have
26:45
the memories of, of their full lives,
26:48
when Ray's father finally comes, it
26:52
there's not like, an overt recognition of
26:57
father and son looking at
26:59
each other like it's very, like I see in Kevin Costner.
27:02
Oh, my God, it's my dad.
27:04
But I don't see.
27:05
And John, his father, oh, my God, it's my son in the same way.
27:10
It's all about trying to find their way into
27:13
Of recognize each other as father and son.
27:15
And the build up to that is is is pretty impressive.
27:21
And I've never really understood if my response to
27:24
it has been their acting or my knowledge of what's happening.
27:29
I love that breaking down of walls.
27:31
And that's very moving to me.
27:32
That's incredibly moving to me.
27:35
When two people don't know how to talk to each other and then find something
27:39
that they can do together, that shows how much they love each other
27:42
and how much has been referenced before, you know, like, that was the
27:47
that was the basis of their breakup.
27:50
You know, it's very earned.
27:51
Yeah, yeah.
27:54
When he said he is beginning to understand that his father is a person,
27:59
Because one day, Connor will see you as more than just dad.
28:04
Yeah, that's such a that's such
28:06
a big part of growing up.
28:10
Realizing your parents are people is.
28:11
Like, just realizing that you're. Human.
28:14
this is part of what it is to be a human being, like, you are a child,
28:18
and then you realize your parents part, a part of growing up is just realizing
28:23
that your parents are not like mommy and daddy, but like they're their own
28:26
people who are dealing with their own, you know, are dealing with their own shit.
28:34
Because it's funny that you recreated a similar situation, but like, in your own
28:38
way, like that, like you and your dad have a lot of parallels him as an umpire.
28:41
And in Europe as like an indie rocker.
28:43
it is very similar, and I've never really thought about that parallel at all,
28:48
other than being young and broken, you know.
28:51
Having a dream.
28:52
Yeah, but but in, in reality, you know, it's kind of beautiful
28:57
that like most people in their retirement would just want to do
29:02
the things like travel and do the things that they love to do.
29:07
And so as, like, whatever a 30 year old, I was getting to travel the country and
29:12
play music every night that is like,
29:15
wow, I'd rather do that at 30 than 70, right?
29:19
And my dad got to go and, watch a baseball game
29:22
and travel with his friends when he was 25.
29:25
Right. It's really cool.
29:26
And so that he never got to
29:28
have those retirement years because he worked until the day he died.
29:33
He did get to have what some people might
29:36
consider the most incredible retirement.
29:39
You got to watch a baseball game every day.
29:41
You got to be a part of it,
29:43
and you got to travel and you got to do it with his friends.
29:46
That sounds pretty incredible.
29:51
much like baseball.
29:52
It's sort of like if I try to tell you what baseball is about, you can't.
29:56
But you can talk about the moment and the things that they come together
29:59
and like the pace and the slowness and the experience.
30:01
But it's like, let it be and like, let the experience be what it is.
30:06
call it makes me appreciate what you had to say about it because like,
30:10
it is just presenting itself and you either are going to accept it or not.
30:14
And like, I hadn't really thought about the cars at the end coming like,
30:19
they're just all coming all of a sudden and you're like, how did they know?
30:23
You know?
30:24
And you're like, well, okay, I guess because the movie said so.
30:28
Yeah. It's like,
30:31
right.
30:32
Because you give a speech which I don't particularly like, or particularly great.
30:36
But not great, not well written.
30:38
But you said it was going to happen. So okay, here we go.
30:41
A very wholesome thing about the cars is that
30:47
those are actual Iowans who,
30:49
heard a call out on the radio.
30:54
X, Y, and Z time.
30:56
We need to, I'm on this exact route.
31:00
So, please, 5 p.m.
31:03
Thursday.
31:04
Wow. Please, everybody in Iowa drive up.
31:08
That's so cool.
31:10
It was such a beautiful shot.
31:12
It looked real.
31:13
So I love that I love that it wasn't.
31:15
I love that, and I could imagine, like,
31:19
being in the theater and being like, I wonder which cars us.
31:22
Right?
31:22
Yeah.
31:25
So, so another another part of
31:27
that is they they didn't have enough cars so they had them
31:32
alternate between their brights and their
31:35
and their regular so that it looked like the,
31:38
their bright lights and the regular lights.
31:40
So they were flickering their lights.
31:41
So it looked like there were more of them.
31:44
Or it did have a funny twinkle to it.
31:46
But yeah.
31:47
Normal lights don't have.
31:52
did you say the phrase toxic masculinity?
31:54
Jaclynn?
31:55
Probably at some point today.
31:58
Not in this film.
31:59
there's a running joke, probably in a lot of people's circles about
32:04
things, especially in movies,
32:07
things that men will do to avoid going to therapy.
32:12
Yeah.
32:14
A classic example.
32:18
A for ghosts?
32:21
for ghosts?
32:22
For Shoeless Joe Jackson?
32:24
For Shoeless Joe Jackson?
32:26
Those those are.
32:29
For the white ghost ways
32:31
For the white ghost ways to.
32:35
It's it though.
32:37
Is it like, in reality. Right.
32:39
That would be pretty bonkers.
32:42
Hey, guys.
32:42
Just want you to know I'm dating this guy.
32:44
And don't worry.
32:48
I don't know, he left to go kidnap my favorite writer.
32:52
when I have this big moment and I, like, have this political beautiful moment.
32:55
He didn't hear it at all.
32:57
He was too busy realizing he was going to kidnap my favorite writer.
33:00
And he's gone now.
33:01
But, guys, I think it's going to really work out.
33:03
He took all of my savings.
33:08
And he's building a baseball field in a cornfield.
33:11
But I think it's okay, guys.
33:13
I think it's love.
33:16
Okay.
33:17
All of that.
33:19
You said it was wholesome.
33:26
All of it.
33:26
To get from
33:28
you with your dead father.
33:33
I will say,
33:35
Kevin Costner gets away with a lot for being so handsome in this film.
33:40
Yeah.
33:41
He's so good looking. My goodness.
33:44
he gets away with a lot because he's just sort of moving
33:47
forward, he's not thinking about this, Yeah.
33:50
Like, there's a lot of people who would be like,
33:52
I'm going to build a baseball thing.
33:53
And then they never get.
33:54
He built a beautiful baseball field.
33:57
He did manage to kidnap an author.
34:01
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
34:02
They did go to a game like the manager leaves the things he sets out to do.
34:06
And that is impressive.
34:08
Yeah. it's very much a baby boomer movie.
34:11
He's, full disclosure, baby boomers as a generation drive me nuts
34:16
because we're so crazy, you know, because like,
34:18
my understanding of them is that they're so incredibly selfish.
34:22
I didn't find the masculinity toxic, but I found it very on point, you know?
34:27
Yeah. It's very of a time.
34:29
It's like you just you can you can see the birthplace of where we've ended up.
34:34
Yeah. Yeah. Right. This is like every, like.
34:37
Oh at all costs, follow your dreams and you're like and that's how we got to 2026.
34:41
Yeah yeah yeah. Yeah. Exactly right. Yeah.
34:47
does things slowly happen, and then all of a sudden
34:50
we're going to Minnesota and then we're driving, we're driving, we're driving,
34:55
we're talking about this thing, and then suddenly we see somebody
35:00
hitchhiking and oh my God, it's well, you know, like like
35:05
they're just these bursts of of things that move the story forward.
35:09
And I just really enjoy that.
35:11
But every single one of these things is a choice he chooses to make.
35:15
He chooses to drive to Boston to take Terrence Man to a baseball game.
35:20
He chooses to build this baseball field.
35:22
He chooses and it was all because he didn't make the simple choice
35:26
as a, as a kid to just go out and play catch with his dad.
35:35
come on, Ray.
35:40
It's the bottom of the ninth.
35:42
Bases loaded.
35:44
The crowd can feel it,
35:47
and they've got five minutes till dinner.
35:59
When you were doing the drive
36:01
from the East coast back to Iowa
36:05
how much did that help you
36:08
picture what Terance Mann and Ray would have been feeling
36:12
in that drive from Boston back to Iowa?
36:16
Yeah, that's that's so nice.
36:18
That's a such a cool scene in that movie.
36:21
Because of course, you know, the magic of film.
36:24
You can drive from Iowa to Boston just like that.
36:27
And I've done New York City too, Iowa,
36:33
Sibley, Iowa, after a CMJ show.
36:37
And I know from the Lower East Side of Manhattan, too, Iowa,
36:43
takes 26 hours and moves and you lose an hour.
36:48
This country is so big.
36:50
And we left as a band, you know, the Lower
36:53
East Side of Manhattan at like, 10:00 at night, right?
36:57
but it took 26 hours straight.
37:00
So from Iowa to Boston, it would be very similar, probably 25 hour
37:06
drive The amount of time that Terence man
37:10
and Ray had to connect on everything from
37:15
writing,
37:17
protesting in the 60s, being a father, baseball like,
37:22
because you can tell by the time that that they get back to Iowa
37:27
that they feel like they've been lifelong friends
37:30
and that they've gone through something together.
37:32
And I feel like that was always the thing about being in a band or,
37:36
or doing some sort of epic trip that you've been through something together.
37:41
You know, I always, I always tell people who are starting a relationship
37:44
like a couple that maybe you shouldn't go on vacation together.
37:48
You, because you're either going to be you're either going to fall in love
37:52
with each other or that the vacation's going to be the the end of it,
37:56
you know, because you have to it's it's it's
38:00
it's it's an experience to travel with somebody.
38:02
But yeah, you don't get to see all those conversations they had.
38:07
It's just it just shows them in the night driving in the rain.
38:11
And they're just having kind of a very mundane conversation about dads.
38:15
And then all of a sudden there's moonlight Graham, you know,
38:19
just let's pick up this hitchhiker, because it would be good
38:23
to have another person in this car to carry on a conversation.
38:26
Yeah.
38:27
I really like how they show don't tell.
38:30
And that, like, they don't there's not a lot of exposition of like,
38:32
wow, we're having such a bonding experience over 26 hours.
38:35
You just see the change in their relationship
38:37
from when they started, right?
38:39
The fake gun and like the kidnaping to like this familiarity and friendship
38:43
that has clearly grown out of them spending so much time together,
38:45
I thought that that was it's just really it's shown.
38:50
Just as a side note, in the book, the author is J.D.
38:53
Salinger, who he goes to kidnap.
38:56
Oh, interesting.
38:57
Yeah. Yeah.
38:58
But yeah I guess I didn't occur to me
39:00
that James Earl Jones in this Terrence is was a ghost.
39:04
I can't believe I missed that. I feel very
39:07
ignorant.
39:08
Is that the.
39:10
Oh, I didn't think that at all. Okay.
39:12
I didn't think that Cole said it.
39:14
Okay. I didn't think that Cole said it.
39:16
Oh, okay.
39:17
They gave it a wildly liberal read.
39:19
Okay.
39:21
But I would actually
39:25
say to other people he became a ghost.
39:28
Yeah, that's the thing.
39:29
He did die, right?
39:30
Like they sent him into the cornfield to die, right?
39:33
No, no, just to report.
39:35
I think he's going to come back.
39:38
Robbie, that's so cute. Did.
39:39
Do you have a lot of animals go upstate to a farm?
39:42
Every one of them on.
39:44
So. No, but I think.
39:46
I'm gonna.
39:47
Come back. Now.
39:48
I think. I think he's coming back.
39:50
I think he's coming back.
39:53
Nice.
39:53
You think. He's coming. Back?
39:55
No. That man is dead. And.
40:00
No, that was that was him going to become a ghost.
40:03
I believe the kids and Willy Wonka did die.
40:06
I do not believe.
40:07
That, Terence.
40:07
Man, I don't believe that he died in this movie.
40:12
you both think he died.
40:14
You both think he went into the field and just.
40:17
Yeah, it's the ghost field, ma'am.
40:20
Oh, God. That's.
40:22
What do you think happens back there?
40:23
You think they're all just actually,
40:24
like, in there, like changing clothes and stuff?
40:26
No, I, I, I just feel like he's he's gone back there.
40:31
He's, he's, he's going to look around and experience that.
40:34
And you to come back and write about it.
40:35
Where do you think he's gone? Back there.
40:37
Become a ghost.
40:39
And then he's going to come back a man.
40:41
Yeah.
40:41
Because they, like, disappear into the corn.
40:43
Yeah. Because they, like, disappear into the corn.
40:45
No, I think I know I don't think he he becomes a ghost.
40:49
I think he, I think he enters the ghost realm and then he just returns.
40:56
Well.
40:58
Jack, are you looking at me like, oh, that's adorable.
41:01
That's really.
41:02
It's very sweet.
41:04
I'm not going to kill that bubble.
41:05
He does.
41:05
He he lives.
41:06
He's fine.
41:11
Well then
41:12
when you said with each revelation someone says
41:16
this is really interesting,
41:19
all caps very midwestern.
41:23
Yeah.
41:23
But it is this movie is so Midwestern.
41:28
You're Midwestern.
41:30
I it's just I mean I do that all the time and like, oh, cool.
41:35
You know, it's like.
41:37
Know like something happens and it's like, Oh that's interesting.
41:41
That's a really cool thing.
41:43
You know?
41:45
I just it's the.
41:46
Blind support is that it's Midwestern. Just saying.
41:48
Yeah, I like it.
41:49
I know it's a very Midwestern response like, oh, that's great.
41:54
That's really cool.
41:55
And not yeah, I do that a lot.
41:58
I do that a lot.
41:59
like I would imagine that
42:01
like a more New York response or an East Coast response would be like an eyeroll.
42:06
Or, or fuck.
42:07
Yeah. Yeah. I once was at a party.
42:11
Like, I don't consider Colorado a midwest, but it's also not not Midwest.
42:15
And I was at a party once, and this woman told me that,
42:18
her whole job was, like, scooping eyeballs out of corpses
42:21
and, like, for research or, you know, but that's like, that's her whole job.
42:26
And, like, very similarly, I just was like, oh, cool.
42:29
Like, no,
42:30
better like you, you would never be like, that's fucking crazy.
42:33
Like you'd just be like, oh, cool. Wow. That's really interesting.
42:35
Yeah.
42:35
Like, it's like, so polite and just supportive and, like, would,
42:39
I think,
42:40
I mean it's been decades since I've had that moment
42:44
and I think about it probably like every week and I'm always like
42:46
I have so many follow up questions and I honestly have I have a lot of reaction.
42:51
But I just was like, oh, cool.
42:53
Totally normal. Yeah, totally.
42:56
I work at Starbucks and you scoop eyeballs.
42:59
Like.
43:00
You're building afield because you heard voices.
43:02
Yeah. Cool. Yeah, sure.
43:03
Let's eat some green bean casserole.
43:05
We're all just going to drive to this field because there's ghost
43:07
playing baseball.
43:08
Sounds it is Midwestern, but I don't know what it makes it.
43:11
Midwestern.
43:13
It's like poor, you know what?
43:14
What? Do you see it?
43:15
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
43:16
Yeah.
43:22
the mystique about it is, is it's generational.
43:25
And I also think it's the father son bond
43:29
you know, that's why I love the game and that's why it's my favorite sport.
43:32
And I've seen more than 100 sports across the world.
43:35
So it's it's saying something that that baseball is my favorite sport.
43:39
I think, because of the uniqueness of it, it's just so different from the other
43:44
sports, the game of failure, Well, I mean, in baseball,
43:48
you know, if if a guy Well, I mean, in baseball, you know, if
43:53
if a guy fails seven out of ten times
43:57
as a hitter, he goes to the Hall of Fame.
44:00
Well in baseball you really have to have the mentality of,
44:04
geez, I may only get one hit this game if I get two hits in this game.
44:08
Holy cow, I'm kicking it out of the park.
44:11
So on average you get about four at bats,
44:14
and if you get one hit out of every four, you've had a great day.
44:25
Oh yeah I mean there is a guy into the movie.
44:28
Absolutely absolutely.
44:30
All the, all the obstacles that
44:34
and then I think that's what baseball fans and even the general public resonate
44:37
with, you know, and that's why it's it's a movie that has been so long lasting
44:42
and it gets someone to watch it on his birthday for 35.
45:22
Well I think yes I think that's one of the thing.
45:25
Yeah.
45:25
I think that's one of the things
45:26
that is unique to baseball, especially for a younger player,
45:29
So in the movie, they see the potential in Archie,
45:34
and they see the they see the fire in his eyes
45:37
and his love of the game, which they all share.
45:40
And so in baseball and of course, it was a movie, you know, even
45:45
the slightest bit of a contribution can be you could be considered the hero.
45:49
it was written in the gospel that he was going to go the distance
45:53
As I say, was so young to you.
45:55
There's like probably
45:55
that false assumption of there's time, it's inevitable and there's time.
45:59
Yeah.
46:00
And that and that it says that and that it says Mike will go all the way.
46:05
a year after he passed away of,
46:08
you know, they renamed the Little League baseball field.
46:11
So that I grew up playing on, you know, Mike Fleming Fields.
46:15
you know, it's it's not Fenway Park or Wrigley Field or whatever, like.
46:19
No, it's Mike Fleming Field. Yes, sir.
46:21
When something goes on there, goes on that field, you know,
46:25
or they're, a seven year old kid and they're going to go play their first
46:29
baseball game.
46:31
And they look at that and they're like, well, I wonder who that guy was.
46:34
You know, it's why why are these fields named after him?
46:37
And like and it's cool because they have a like a picture of him there like a,
46:41
like a plaque, and that I grew up playing on it and coaching on it.
46:46
And, it is our probably family's little field of dreams in a sense,
46:55
and you have to remember that
46:58
in this in this film,
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Ray says it.
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Ray says one of the reasons that he stopped playing catch with his dad
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is because he read this person's book so that he.
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That was so funny influence of a father to this, to this writer.
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He didn't know what this idolizing of a human being that you don't know.
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But their ideals connect with you more than even your closest
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relative.
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And then Terence,
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man, when they're in the van,
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he says, you see, that's the sort of crap people are always laying on me.
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It's not my fault you wouldn't play catch with your father.