Now, Voyager

“Now I’m picking Now, Voyager. It’s Paul Henreid and Bette Davis. It’s the one where Paul Henreid puts two cigarettes in his mouth and lights them both and gives– “Shall we have a cigarette on it?” And I’m leaving out Claude Rains, who may be my… one of my very favorite actors ever. Great character actor. A little taller, he would’ve been a leading man, but he got better parts because he’s a little on the short side, I guess. In this he plays her psychiatrist, and he is so touching and warm with her. I love him. I love Claude Rains.”

“Okay, and this, this film is by Irving Rapper, who's not, you know, a celebrated director as we're discussing, but something happened with Bette Davis at the prime of her career with this film, Now, Voyager. It is a perfect film.”

“Right next to it. Okay. It’s Now, Voyager. This was my mother’s favorite movie. She told me. So, I made sure and watched it. And, again, it’s Bette Davis, who was one of the most interesting women. Really strong. Just sort of knew who she was and put that in all of her characters. It was really important to see, I thought. I also thought, when I was young, “What happened to women?” Isn’t that funny? They had barely any rights. Right? Not barely. I mean, they could vote. Just. And I thought, “Wow, they’re so much stronger.” That’s how it felt. And then, of course, I started on Friends, went out to the Stage 24, when we were on that stage, and looked at the plaque at Warner Brothers, and they shot some stuff from Now, Voyager, it was on the plaque, and I was so excited to tell my mom. Yeah, that was thrilling. Private Benjamin shot there, too, and that was exciting.”

“Now, Voyager. More boat stuff.”

“You know what? Now, Voyager is something so great and it’s so underrated because I guess it’s long and it’s melodramatic, but what would we do without a long, melodramatic Bette Davis picture, okay?”