Adam Scott

“I’m going to start with Defending Your Life. Now, this movie, I know a lot of people pick it, and rightly so. I think it’s incredibly moving. The performances are great, but Albert Brooks, he’s such a beautiful writer and such a disciplined, simple director that he leaves all of this room for the comedy, but while he’s leaving room for these big comic moments and set pieces, he’s also ushering in all of this emotion and all of these big, big questions. It’s one of my very favorite movies.”

“The Irishman. Okay. This is one of the other movies that I went back the next day and saw again. Certainly one of Scorsese’s most underrated, I feel like it’s underappreciated. I mean, it’s about death and it’s about coming to terms with your life ending. One of the great De Niro performances. That phone call he makes at the end is heartbreaking. And it’s a Martin Scorsese mob movie with no rock and roll in it, and I think that is significant. I think it’s an extraordinary movie.”

“Sex, Lies, and Videotape. I would say this is in my top three movies ever, probably. This blew my mind when it came out. When I was around 16, this came out, and this and Do the Right Thing came out the same year. This is when I realized people in a room talking is all you need. And James Spader’s performance in this is... I’ve stolen from him so liberally.”

“On that note, Do the Right Thing. Incredible. I remember I used to read Spike Lee’s journals. He would publish them for each movie back then. And Giancarlo Esposito had those glasses that made his eyes bug out, and I remember reading that he had contact lenses to reverse the glasses’ prescription so he could actually see, and just thinking that was the coolest actor move ever.”

“The Big Chill. Again, child of the ’80s, so when this came out, I was a pretty little kid, and just watching the adults in my life react to this movie, not quite understanding what these grown-ups were talking about and what their problems were, but loving their clothes and their cars. As I got older and understood the movie, I realized just what a great movie it was. And I can say that I do understand The Big Chill now. Incredible group of actors here.”

“Yeah, Blue Velvet. I love the David Lynch-Kyle MacLachlan kind of mind meld they had for a few years there. There’s a certain amount of audience surrogacy a leading man needs to do, and Kyle MacLachlan did that really well, but he also left enough room for weirdness. He was able to really carry a movie that was ushering in kind of a new era and showing the audience a lot of new things that they hadn’t seen much in American movies before, in a new way.”

“Oh, His Girl Friday. I did a reading of this once. The script for this movie is, like, 200 pages. They talk so fast. When I got a small role in The Aviator, I watched His Girl Friday by myself in a screening room. And then it ended and they brought me to set and Scorsese was like, 'Do you see... You watched the movie? Did you like it?' And I was like, 'Yeah, I love His Girl Friday.' And he’s like, 'Great. Yeah, talk like that. That’s... Get it? That’s good, right?'”

“Okay, I love this movie so much, The War Room. It’s a documentary about the 1992 election. I watch this every election season, every single one, because it’s just people in a room with a white erase board trying to figure it out, beating their head against a wall, and you watch them, little by little, just hack away. And they win the fucking election, they win the presidency. Just a great movie. Always worth watching again.”

“Two Days, One Night. Marion Cotillard. I know that this movie is beautiful and she’s always incredible. I look forward to seeing this. I have not seen this movie and I am now the owner of this movie. Thank you very much.”

“Oh, yeah, The Before Trilogy. I love these movies so much. I remember when the first one came out, Before Sunrise, it was 1995 and I went to see it by myself and loved it. And Ethan Hawke was so important to me in that era. But now looking at them, and them as a trilogy, it’s timeless, and we’ve kind of moved through the decades with these three people, and I would love to see another one. I hope they do another at some point. This is a really important trilogy.”

“The Wes Anderson Archive. Holy cow. I love Isle of Dogs so much. It’s one of my favorites. My son, he was a little kid when that came out, and we used to listen to the soundtrack. I think it’s just because it was beautiful and because the movie is beautiful. And the movie, if you’re a dog lover, the movie is really a joyful experience, but also an emotional experience. I love these films, as does anyone with a head on their shoulders.”