Blank Check with Griffin & David: Star 80 with Julie Klausner

Published 2022-07-31; 1:56:25 by the feed.

As extracted (engineer-sonnet-2026-10-13)

The extraction calls the show “Blank Check with Griffin & David” and the episode “Star 80 with Julie Klausner”.

Hosts: Griffin Newman, David Sims. Guests: Julie Klausner.

Subject films: Star 80 (1983).

On the transcript: Auto-transcript with no speaker labels; many Fosse-related names garbled and a lot of crosstalk. Three mid-roll ad breaks (Video Game Town, Audible Dracula, Mubi/Live Casino) were skipped.

Films that came up

Claims (52)

people (performance model): Eric Roberts → Taxi Driver. A speaker thinks the Snyder performance would have been more interesting if influenced by Travis Bickle.
“It would have been interesting if this was sort of like more influenced by Travis Bickle as a performance.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:01:37 · unknown (0.30 sure it was them)
people (performance cost): Star 80 → Joker. A great performance in a harrowing role is called career-ruinous in the way people overstate Joker typecasting.
“I think it's an incredible performance, but I think it's the kind of performance that's like ruinous for a career.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:01:44 · Julie Klausner (0.40 sure it was them)
lineage (character lineage): Eric Roberts → The King of Comedy. Roberts's Snyder is seen as another version of what Rupert Pupkin could have been.
“I also think a group for Pupkin is another version of who this character could have been, but he was just following orders.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:02:19 · Julie Klausner (0.50 sure it was them)
theme (scene echo): Star 80 → Taxi Driver. Every scene of Star 80 is likened to the porno scene in Taxi Driver turned up to 75.
“Like every scene of this movie is like the porno scene in Taxi Driver, but amped up to 75.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:02:35 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
theme (scene echo): Star 80 → Boogie Nights. Star 80 produces the same turn-it-off discomfort as the firecracker scene in Boogie Nights.
“Combined with the firework, the firecracker scene in boogie nights.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:02:45 · David Sims (0.50 sure it was them)
theme (theme echo): Star 80 → Anatomy of a Murder. Concern for the ruined man instead of the woman echoes Anatomy of a Murder's rape-trial rhetoric.
“That reminds me of an anatomy of murder when they're prosecuting the, they're like, let's think about ruining a man's life before we convict this person of rape”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:07:34 · Julie Klausner (0.50 sure it was them)
career (career arc): Eric Roberts → Mickey Rourke. Roberts's trajectory from hot talent to unemployable-then-prolific mirrors Rourke's.
“It's a very similar arc to Mickey Rourke, I think.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:09:39 · David Sims (0.50 sure it was them)
career (comeback attempt): Eric Roberts → Christopher Nolan. Nolan's Dark Knight casting was meant as an Eric Roberts reclamation project that did not go anywhere.
“you had like Christopher Nolan giving him a good little supporting part in Dark Knight and being like, Eric Roberts reclamation project.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:10:42 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (advocacy): Eric Roberts → Mickey Rourke. Rourke repeatedly urged Hollywood to give Roberts another chance in awards speeches, which got Stallone to hire him.
“Mickey Rourke, when he was winning all his fucking wrestler awards, kept on being like, do you remember this in all of his speeches”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:10:54 · David Sims (0.50 sure it was them)
career (career sequence): Star 80 → All That Jazz. Star 80 came about because Fosse had no planned follow-up after surviving the film in which he dies.
“I think he was almost embarrassed to still be alive after all that jazz.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:16:27 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (self-identification): Bob Fosse → Paul Snyder. Fosse identified with Snyder as the man he would be without success.
“he is who I would be if I were not successful.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:18:20 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (mentor): Bob Fosse → Paddy Chayefsky. Chayefsky was Fosse's mentor/drinking buddy who told him the script needed no notes, and the film is dedicated to him.
“Patty Shayvsky says, it's fine.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:24:54 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
industry (financier): Alan Ladd Jr. → All That Jazz. Ladd gave Fosse final cut and big money for Star 80 after All That Jazz paid off for him.
“gives him final cut.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:30:02 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
craft (structure): Star 80 → Lenny. Star 80's interview framing/superstructure echoes Lenny's, and Lenny is the origin of the Chevy-Chase-style voice.
“This movie, you have the interview, this sort of superstructure that he loves so much”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:32:03 · Griffin Newman (0.40 sure it was them)
theme (critic parallel): Star 80 → A Clockwork Orange. Kael's charge that Clockwork Orange was prurient and pitied only Alex is applied to Star 80 and Snyder.
“I think the only sympathy that you see from the filmmaker is with Paul Snyder.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:33:34 · Julie Klausner (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (technique): Star 80 → Sweet Charity. Fosse's choreographic insert/isolation technique reappears in Star 80, applied to ugly material.
“There's even the, I mean, the whole fossy isolation of the body parts thing, right?”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:33:58 · David Sims (0.40 sure it was them)
unmapped (timeline): Star 80 → Body Double. Melanie Griffith was Fosse's first choice; Body Double (her comeback) came right after.
“Bob Fossey wants Melanie Griffith.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:44:14 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
contrast (tonal contrast): Star 80 → Body Double. Body Double is pulp that deals with similar Hollywood grime and is fun, whereas Fosse could not treat it as pulp.
“But like, I mean, fossi, for better or worse, I don't think could view things as pulp.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:44:52 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
people (casting veto): Hugh Hefner → Harry Dean Stanton. Hefner refused archive access if Stanton played him, so Cliff Robertson was the compromise.
“if you cast Harry Dean Stanton as me, I will not let you like use the Playboy, like archives or the mansions”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:49:33 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
craft (craft): Star 80 → Sven Nykvist. Fosse brought in the European master Nykvist to shoot Star 80 rather than his usual cinematographer.
“Like, so it's Fosse working with a great cinematographer, but not someone he knows.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:52:19 · host (Griffin Newman or David Sims, unattributed) (0.40 sure it was them)
people (composer): Ralph Burns → Cabaret. Burns scored Star 80 after winning Oscars for the last two Fosse movies.
“who did the score for this and had won the Oscar for the last 2 fall scene movies.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:53:14 · unknown (0.40 sure it was them)
craft (craft): Ralph Burns → Star 80. Burns scored Star 80 with two stings, one a creeping-dread cue that the speaker finds upsetting even isolated.
“There's that... Well, then there's the creeping, like, dread, you know... Whenever that that truly makes my skin crawl whenever that plays.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:53:21 · host (Griffin Newman or David Sims, unattributed) (0.40 sure it was them)
verdict (verdict): Star 80 → Billy Joel. The pop-song needle drops (Billy Joel at the prom and the rest) are judged the worst soundtrack from a great filmmaker.
“The worst. Just the way you are.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:53:54 · host (Griffin Newman or David Sims, unattributed) (0.40 sure it was them)
unmapped (same phenomenon): Star 80 → Manhattan. Both star Hemingway and are about older men fixated on young women, one romanticized and one murderous.
“2 movies that are essentially about the same basic phenomenon, but in very, very different ways”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:56:26 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
career (career pivot): Mariel Hemingway → Personal Best. After Star 80 and Manhattan she pivoted to roles outside male obsession, becoming an LGBT icon via Personal Best.
“it's like one of the 1st Hollywood movies to have a lesbian relationship in it.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:59:09 · David Sims (0.40 sure it was them)
unmapped (counterexample): Star 80 → American Psycho. American Psycho, made by a team with female voices, succeeds as critique where Star 80 lacks her point of view.
“American psycho has 2 female voices behind it and is therefore such an insightful and even funny critique”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:07:33 · Julie Klausner (0.50 sure it was them)
lineage (satire lineage): American Psycho → Body Double. American Psycho is described as the Reductress version of Body Double.
“it's almost like the, the, you know, reductress version of, um, body double in a way.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:07:36 · Julie Klausner (0.50 sure it was them)
theme (theme): Star 80 → Kate Plays Christine. Kate Plays Christine is cited as a film about the compulsion to tell tragic victims' stories and play them.
“it is a movie about an actor trying to play a tragic, you know, a person who killed herself on news.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:16:03 · Griffin Newman (0.40 sure it was them)
career (career bookend): Star 80 → The Ward. Both are final films that dim a director's career, though The Ward is less toxic.
“a film that is a bummer on a career, which on what?”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:20:33 · Griffin Newman (0.40 sure it was them)
unmapped (sibling pair): Star 80 → All That Jazz. All That Jazz is who Fosse wanted to be, Star 80 is where he really is.
“that all that jazz was sort of like who we wanted to be and maybe Star 80 was saying, well, this is where I really am.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:20:59 · Julie Klausner (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (restraint example): Cabaret → Liza Minnelli. Fosse shot Sally Bowles walking onstage in a medium shot from the back, trusting his lead.
“I think the restraint and the confidence in his lead actor is so fortifying”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:22:15 · Julie Klausner (0.60 sure it was them)
theme (character empathy): Star 80 → Cabaret. Fosse's female characters like Sally Bowles and Honey Bruce got rich interior life, which Star 80 lacks.
“I would even argue, honey, Bruce, like, you know, who really is, like, pretty wonderful.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:23:50 · David Sims (0.40 sure it was them)
unmapped (creative partnership): Bob Fosse → Gwen Verdon. Verdon was trusted with choreography and direction, the family jewels of an auteur's ego.
“those are the family jewels when it comes to an auteur's ego and that he was able to let her in”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:24:48 · Julie Klausner (0.70 sure it was them)
people (collaborator parallel): Bob Fosse → Polly Platt. Young 70s film geniuses (Bogdanovich/Platt, Lucas/Marcia) lost their creative edge after divorce as with Fosse and Verdon.
“Get divorced and never fucking get back in the groove again, ever again.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:25:46 · David Sims (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (declined): Bob Fosse → Thriller. Michael Jackson asked Fosse to shoot the Thriller video; he declined because Jackson was weird.
“Michael Jackson asks him to shoot the music video for thriller, which is crazy.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:27:19 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
theme (reception parallel): Star 80 → Peeping Tom. Peeping Tom was also savaged on release but was later vindicated, unlike Star 80.
“Except Peeping Tom is like eventually kind of vindicated and this people were like, no, fuck you.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:28:09 · unknown (0.30 sure it was them)
lineage (source pattern): Sweet Charity → Big Deal on Madonna Street. Fosse repeatedly adapted Italian films into musicals (Sweet Charity from Fellini, Big Deal from Madonna Street).
“Adapting fucking Italian.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:29:57 · unknown (0.30 sure it was them)
lineage (adaptation lineage): All That Jazz → 8½. All That Jazz is 8 1/2 adjacent and Nine adapted 8 1/2 as a musical.
“All that jazz is so 8.5 adjacent.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:30:05 · David Sims (0.40 sure it was them)
unmapped (white whale): Bob Fosse → Robert De Niro. Fosse wanted De Niro for Snyder and was attached to a Winchell film with him.
“a Walter Winchell movie that's going to star Robert De Niro, his big white whale at this point”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:30:19 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (technique): Liza with a Z → Cabaret. Fosse's concert film is the best example ever of shooting theater for the screen, with edits shaped to hand flicks.
“I've never seen a better example of shooting theater.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:35:31 · Julie Klausner (0.60 sure it was them)
contrast (muse contrast): Liza Minnelli → Gwen Verdon. Verdon was precision and brain; Reinking sensuality; Liza personality and singing.
“Verdon was precision.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:38:55 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
industry (box office): Star 80 → The Big Chill. The Big Chill was number one the week Star 80 opened in limited release.
“Number one of the box office is a generational classic.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:40:26 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
people (director mismatch): Deal of the Century → William Friedkin. Friedkin directing a Chevy Chase arms-dealer comedy is an unlikely fit.
“Not someone who screams Chevy Chase comedy.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:45:43 · David Sims (0.40 sure it was them)
career (career trail): Cocktail → All the Right Moves. Cruise's early film at number five leads to a riff on Cocktail's drama-minded reshoots.
“And then at some point they were just like, we got to make it a fucking Tom Cruise movie.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:48:04 · David Sims (0.40 sure it was them)
lineage (SNL sketch source): The Dead Zone → Christopher Walken. The film inspired the SNL sketch Ed Glosser Trivial Psychic.
“Inspiration for one of my favorite SNL sketches of all time.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:48:32 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
industry (awards rivalry): Cabaret → The Godfather. Fosse beat Coppola for the best director Oscar for Cabaret while The Godfather won picture.
“Francois Coppola in the Godfather, the guy we use as shorthand for directing a movie.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:50:55 · Julie Klausner (0.40 sure it was them)
verdict (ranking): Sweet Charity → Star 80. A lumpy joyful film is ranked above the powerful but hateful one.
“sweet charity is a lumpy movie that brings me joy versus star 80, a film that just makes me think very deeply about everything I hate about the world.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:52:10 · Julie Klausner (0.50 sure it was them)
career (career parallel): Bob Fosse → Francis Ford Coppola. Both followed a run of 70s masterpieces (Cabaret/Godfather, Lenny/Godfather II, All That Jazz/Apocalypse Now) with a decline.
“Cabaret, Godfather, Godfather to Lenny, all that jazz apocalypse now.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:56:39 · Griffin Newman (0.40 sure it was them)
unmapped (what-might-have-been): Michael Bennett → Bob Fosse. Julie wonders what a film career for Bennett, another director-choreographer lost to AIDS, would have looked like.
“I think very frequently about what kind of filmmaker a Michael Bennett would have been or could have been.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:57:44 · Julie Klausner (0.60 sure it was them)
unmapped (posthumous reach): Howard Ashman → Bob Fosse. Ashman had films with his fingerprints released after his death, showing a creator's ripple effect despite lost time.
“there are like 3 films with his fingerprints on them on top of Little Shop, right?”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:58:31 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (heir): Adam Shankman → Bob Fosse. Hairspray's visual language takes cues from choreography and editing as Fosse's did.
“And so much of the visual language takes cues from the choreography and the editing.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:59:04 · Julie Klausner (0.50 sure it was them)
unmapped (series handoff): Star 80 → A Clockwork Orange. Julie asks them to remember Star 80 when covering Kubrick's rape depiction.
“Think about, you know, how, you know, people say rape isn't about sex, unless you shoot it real sexy.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 2:00:09 · Julie Klausner (0.60 sure it was them)

Fun items (25)

fun, about Eric Roberts: Roberts was only about three films in and was persuaded into Star 80; after it he never gave another memorable performance until villain parts in The Specialist and Heaven's Prisoners.
“He had to be persuaded to take this role.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:01:22 · unknown (0.30 sure it was them)
fun, about Star 80: The soundtrack is a Jock Jams pile: Billy Joel's Just the Way You Are, YMCA, Do You Think I'm Sexy, Sing Sing Sing, Steppenwolf, played at the prom.
“One of the worst soundtracks from the best filmmakers.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:05:34 · unknown (0.40 sure it was them)
fun, about Eric Roberts: Roberts is Julia Roberts's brother and Emma Roberts's father; hosts joke that Julia was the annoying kid sister on his sets.
“And like, Julia Roberts was like his annoying kid sister who would be on set and people, ugh, Eric Roberts' sister is here.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:10:24 · Griffin Newman (0.40 sure it was them)
fun, about Bob Fosse: Fosse expected All That Jazz to be his last act; his planned follow-up was nothing, and he turned down Chicago because he could not get it up for old material.
“I can't get it up again for old material.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:17:15 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Paddy Chayefsky: At Chayefsky's funeral Fosse kept a promise to dance publicly, doing it for about 30 seconds, and E.L. Doctorow called it the most touching moment.
“Apparently he danced for 30 seconds about it.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:25:40 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Julie Klausner: Julie played one of the women who sexually assaulted young Fosse in Fosse/Verdon and was on set when All That Jazz moment was filmed with Sam Rockwell.
“and Fosse's daughter was in the audience and Lynn and Lynn got to do the run and then Sam Rockwell got to do the run”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:26:11 · Julie Klausner (0.90 sure it was them)
fun, about Star 80: Fosse had his location scout break into the real murder house without a permit to recreate the carpet and details.
“he made the location scout break into the murder home without a permit and, uh, you know, take pictures”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:30:54 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Bob Fosse: Late projects: Chicago, Dreamgirls, a Vampire Lestat musical with Bowie and Jagger, interest in Good Morning Vietnam, and a Winchell film with De Niro.
“starring David Bowie and Mick Jagger.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:30:57 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Mariel Hemingway: She campaigned for the Stratton role; Fosse said she was not voluptuous and she famously got a boob job, which she says was not for the movie.
“She like campaigned for the role.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:45:45 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Mariel Hemingway: Fosse asked Hemingway to seduce De Niro into the role; she refused, and she said Fosse took De Niro's rejection very hard.
“He asks Hemingway to try and like seduce Robert De Niro to like convince him of the role.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:47:59 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Hugh Hefner: Sam Shepard was first choice and Fosse wanted Harry Dean Stanton; Hefner vetoed Stanton by threatening to deny Playboy archive access, so Cliff Robertson played him.
“So Cliff Robertson is the compromise.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:49:41 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Star 80: Fosse phoned Cliff Robertson mid-shoot, saying he did not want to get to the murder and did not want to see these people die.
“he's going to kill her and I don't know how to stop him.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:50:39 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Star 80: Roger Ebert liked it and called Roberts's performance the year's best; Hefner hated the intercutting of the photo sessions with the murder.
“Hugh Hefner thought it was disgusting the way it linked sex to violence.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 0:54:32 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Becker: The room goes down a loving Becker rabbit hole: unstreamable, a few seasons on Pluto, Shout Factory box for $37; Julie has never seen it and is told to place an order.
“Wow, Becker is truly hard to stream.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:00:49 · unknown (0.30 sure it was them)
fun, about Star 80: Prom scene: Snyder stabs a football player in the butt with the filing end of a nail clipper in revenge for how he treated Stratton.
“The filing end of a nail clipper.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:02:28 · unknown (0.30 sure it was them)
fun, about Robert Wuhl: Griffin's friends bought him a Robert Wuhl cameo after surgery; Wuhl told a story of Glenn Frey vowing to live so well after a heart attack, a counterpoint to Fosse's reaction after his.
“I'm going to live so well.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:13:04 · Griffin Newman (0.80 sure it was them)
fun, about Bob Fosse: After near-death experiences Fosse would try to live healthier for a month and then go back to chain smoking and squeezing nurses.
“smoking cigarettes until they're burning in his mouth and squeezing every nurse's ass”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:14:08 · David Sims (0.40 sure it was them)
fun, about Bob Fosse: Michael Jackson asked Fosse to direct Thriller; he declined because he found Jackson weird.
“Bob Fosse declines because he thinks Michael Jackson is weird.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:27:37 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Bob Fosse: Fosse died in Verdon's arms at an intersection in Washington DC during a Sweet Charity revival; friends dined on his tab per his will; a producer's last message from Bobby was about a script.
“All his friends go out to dinner on his tab, which was specified in his will.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:31:56 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Liza with a Z: Julie calls the concert film the best example of capturing theater on film, with exactly timed medium shots and cuts to Verdon in the audience.
“I think Liza with a Z is such an incredible example of how you can direct theater for film.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:34:52 · Julie Klausner (0.60 sure it was them)
fun, about Box office week: Nov 1983 chart: Big Chill, Never Say Never Again, Richard Pryor Here and Now, Deal of the Century (dropped from #1), All the Right Moves; Return of the Jedi at 18.
“Number 5 of the box office is an early film from a big star.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:46:22 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Cocktail: Cocktail was reshot from a darker Bright Lights Big City-style script into a Tom Cruise romance, with Bryan Brown playing it like a drama.
“That movie is bizarre.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:47:10 · unknown (0.30 sure it was them)
fun, about Cabaret: Cabaret beat The Godfather for best director; to Julie it keeps getting more relevant, with the distorted Nazis in the brass at the end.
“Cabaret beat the godfather.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:50:17 · Griffin Newman (0.40 sure it was them)
fun, about Fosse ranking: Griffin: Cabaret, All That Jazz, Lenny, Star 80, Sweet Charity; David: Cabaret, All That Jazz, Sweet Charity, Lenny, Star 80; Julie argues Sweet Charity above Star 80.
“I go cabaret.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 1:55:36 · David Sims (0.50 sure it was them)
fun, about Kubrick miniseries: Next is Kubrick, starting with Fear and Desire and Killer's Kiss in one episode; Julie asks them to think of Star 80 when discussing Clockwork Orange.
“But yeah, 1st our 1st cubric episode is killer kiss and fear and desire.”
Blank Check with Griffin & David · Star 80 with Julie Klausner · 2:00:44 · Griffin Newman (0.50 sure it was them)

Who's talking

Griffin Newman (host): Respects the craft of Fosse and defends Star 80 as powerful and aware of its own evil, while admitting it nearly unbearable. Loves the structural play of Fosse's films and Alan Ladd-era filmmaker faith. Cannot endorse or recommend Star 80, hates the soundtrack and dwells on true-crime and victim culture.
David Sims (host): A film critic who respects movies that provoke a reaction but gives no credit for mere upset. Loves film-history trivia and box-office lore, responds to Star 80 strongly but wants to put it away, and calls Cabaret his sentimental top pick.
Julie Klausner (guest): A serious Fosse devotee who loves Cabaret, All That Jazz, Sweet Charity and Liza with a Z, and praises collaborations with women. She finds Star 80 powerful but ugly, a prurient pornographic film made by a man who will not look at the victim, and she is haunted by it.

The show's recurring bits

The box office game: Guessing the film's opening weekend and what it was up against.
The sung theme: "Blank Check with Griffin and David", sung; the transcriber garbles it.

Names the transcriber got wrong

Fosse rendered as Fossi / Fossie / Bossy / Bobbas / Bob Fossey / Bob Fossi (Bob Fosse)
Patty Shayevsky / Shayvsky / Tchaivsky (Paddy Chayefsky)
Gwen Vern / Glenn Verdon / Gwenton (Gwen Verdon)
ranking (Ann Reinking)
Baganovich / Bergdanovich / Bragdanovich (Peter Bogdanovich)
Dorothy Stratton sometimes Stratton (fine)
Roger Reese (Roger Rees)
Merrill / Molly / Mario Hemingway (Mariel Hemingway)
Roy Schider / Ray Scheider (Roy Scheider)
Jessica Chastain (Jessica Lange, as Angel of Death)
Valerie Prine (Valerie Perrine)
Don Johnston (Don Johnson)
Johnny Smith / Alex Farrell / Alex Dessert (Becker cast confusion)
Mubi 'movie' (MUBI)
Camp my asthma / cat miasma (Camp Miasma)
Jane Schoenberg (Jane Schoenbrun)
Muskerner and Clements (Ron Clements and John Musker)
killer kiss (Killer's Kiss); Kate plays Christine (Kate Plays Christine); Cubric (Kubrick)
Robert Will / Robert Wool (Robert Wuhl)
Glenn Pray of the Eagles (Glenn Frey)
Ed Glosser (Ed Grimley?? unclear); possibly 'Ed Glosser Trivial Psychic' sketch
Kyle Rittenhouse (as said)
Sven Nykwish (Sven Nykvist)
Irvin Kirschner (Irvin Kershner)
Carnival cruise / Kristen Applegate (Christina Applegate)

Blank Check with Griffin & David: Star 80 with Julie Klausner

As extracted (engineer-sonnet-2026-10-13)

Films that came up

subject (1)

passing (50)

compared (20)

anecdote (13)

recommended (8)

dismissed (1)

Claims (52)

Fun items (25)

Who's talking

The show's recurring bits

Names the transcriber got wrong