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#51. The Substandard on Sam Shepard, Chuck Yeager, and G.I. Joe
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Dudes Chatting — Sam Shepard, Chuck Yeager, and G.I. Joe Planes: The hosts remember Sam Shepard, who died at 73 from ALS. Vic notes that not having mentioned Shepard before seems to have spared him from "the curse." JVL presents his Hollywood Sams ranking: Sam Elliott #1, Samuel L. Jackson #2, Sam Waterston #3, Sam Shepard #4, Sam Mendes #5 (Sonny disputes whether "Samuel" counts as "Sam"). Sonny reports that a recent rewatch of Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven — one of Shepard's early film roles — left him stunned: Shepard looked barely 20 but was actually 35. Vic highlights Shepard's Oscar-nominated performance as Chuck Yeager in The Right Stuff, including the harrowing NF-104 flight to 108,000 feet and the detail that a stuntman died during production. JVL notes that Chuck Yeager is still alive at 94. A G.I. Joe tangent follows: JVL recalls that the toy line repurposed the SR-71 Blackbird as a Cobra jet (the Cobra Night Raven) and gave the A-10 Warthog dog-fighter and VTOL capabilities, making it the greatest imaginary aircraft ever conceived.
Micro-episode; no Reviews or Box Office segments.
Full transcript
Sonny00:00:00Hello and welcome to another micro-episode of The Substandard, sponsored by Dollar Shave
Vic00:00:26Club. I'm Victor Matus along with Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. Just a quick reminder that full episodes of The Substandard are available every Thursday at 11 a.m. and Substandard show notes are posted by Jonathan Last every Friday at weeklystandard.com or some Fridays. So, on a sad note, Sam Shepard died. The actor and playwright was 73. I believe he had Lou Gehrig's disease. Do you boys have thoughts on Sam Shepard? Are you familiar with his work as a playwright? Because he's very prominent and yet my memories of him, of course, are as an actor.
Sonny00:01:04Yeah, no, I actually had no idea he was a major figure in the dramatic playwright scene until, I think it was six or seven years ago, The New Yorker did a big profile of his work but also focused very heavily on his off-Broadway stuff. It was really eye-opening. I just had no, I am not a, believe it or not, I am not a lover of legitimate theater, you guys, so I was like totally blown away and fascinated by all this. I had always just kind of known him as the stoic character actor type.
Vic00:01:37Real man's man, a cowboy, that kind of a thing. And in fact, not just a playwright, but he won the Pulitzer in 1979 for Barry Child and then he was nominated for a Pulitzer a couple years later, I think. Yeah, that sounds right. So, really impressive. JVL, do you have any thoughts?
JVL00:01:51I was just... I'm happy that this one's not on you. Yeah, we, did we comb through the archives? Did we comb through the archives? I believe you have never mentioned him on the show, and so he went home to God via natural causes.
Vic00:02:04That happens to some people, believe it or not, that I don't mention. We'll talk about that at the end. We will talk about this weird thing that's going on or not going on at the end of this episode. But more about, I'll tell you what I loved about Sam Shepard, obviously, was the Oscar-nominated performance that he delivered. In the right style. And he played Chuck Yeager, and there's a terrific scene-
Sonny00:02:26Chuck Yeager, who has now outlived Sam Shepard.
JVL00:02:29Really? I thought Chuck Yeager died already.
Vic00:02:31I'll effort that. My goodness. Keep talking. And it's particularly a terrific scene in the right stuff where he gets on the NF-104, which I'm not sure if it was a Starfighter, but it was the experimental prototype, and he's basically riding an engine to see if he could break the record for the ceiling limit that the Soviets had. And-
?00:02:52Yeah.
Vic00:02:52And apparently that the actual thing that took place, not quite the same as the movie The Right Stuff. Oh, really? Believe it or not. They said the only thing they get right is that he flew up there. All the other details about him jumping in the plane, oh my gosh, he's just getting out there and flying, is not quite accurate. They knew that he was going to do this. Nevertheless, he reached 108,000 feet before the plane stalled and everything else, and then he crashed to the ground. It's a terrific scene in the movie, and Shepard escapes. However, the stuntman in that movie died. Yeah, really awful. Couldn't get his, I think, so he had to obviously with his chute, and his helmet got stuck or something terrible. But I'm not sure if it was a Ben-Hur situation where they kept, because there's a scene where the guy can't get his helmet off, and I'm not sure if they kept that in there, like that was the stuntman, which is kind of weird. I'm pretty sure that was Faces of Death you're thinking of. I know.
Sonny00:03:46Go to the clip. That was the show that you showed your son right before he went to bed last night. That was the VHS copy.
Vic00:03:52The guy with the sunglasses.
JVL00:03:54Chuck Yeager, 94 years young. God bless him.
Vic00:03:57God bless him. And he did that in 1963, actually, when he broke that ceiling limit and everything else. But in that particular scene, JVL, with Sam Shepard, you know what it reminded me of? It reminded me of our friend from The Weekly Standard Cruise, Pat Halloran. Do you remember Pat Halloran was a pilot? Oh, yeah. He was a test pilot for the SR-71. What a good guy. He was the Blackbird. He was a Blackbird guy. Yeah, he was a Blackbird guy. And he flew the U-2, as a matter of fact.
JVL00:04:25And there's a scene in The Right Stuff where he gets— I remember us having lunch with him on the Lido deck once. It was so great. I love— We should ask him everything. —Pat Halloran. I did. I asked him everything.
Sonny00:04:33So this guy flew the X-Men jet, and he flew the Irish rock band around? I don't under— Who is this? No.
JVL00:04:39What he flew— Cody. Cody. Vic, what was the Cobra name of the SR-71? Because it was a Cobra jet. Remember, G.I. Joe turned it into a Cobra fighter jet.
Vic00:04:51I barely remember it. I know. I just keep talking about Pat Halloran. I will effort that as well. The only Cobra plane I know was the Rattler. I didn't realize they did that. That was too much plastic. Okay. So in The Right Stuff, however, there's a scene where just before he peters out at about 108,000 feet, and you get a glimpse in the movie of stars. Like, it was—you know, he flew during the day, but he got up there that you actually saw stars. So I remember wanting to ask this, and I did, ask Pat Halloran, had he ever seen stars? And he says, no, it's just dark black. But he said, no, it's just dark black. And the other pilots he spoke to, they claimed to have seen stars. So that could have very well happened. Thank you, JVL. Oh, yes, I never owned that plane.
Sonny00:05:29The Cobra Night Raven S3P?
Vic00:05:31No, that's after my—I grew up by then. I was like, you know, like, a year or two later, you had it. I had it. Uh-huh, of course you did. I had it. Not even the son of a doctor, and you had that plane.
JVL00:05:40This is—so this is the—in keeping with the G.I. Joe, what they did for aerial combat was they would take the coolest-looking planes and they'd just make them fighter jets, regardless of whether the plane's in real life or not. The plane's in real life function as fighter jets, which is why the A-10 became a fighter jet. Dog fighter. Dog fighter, which went head-to-head with the F-14.
Vic00:06:03Not only that, but it had VTOL capabilities. So you could just go, you know, it's everything.
JVL00:06:08To be honest. Yeah. And a cannon, a turret cannon. Yeah, like it's a bomber, too. It does everything. It's a multi-role aircraft. If that existed in real life IRL, it would be the greatest plane ever.
Vic00:06:20So, you know, maybe Elon Musk could make that.
JVL00:06:22I'm wondering if it was electric powered, though. So I was just going to say, maybe, look, we don't have to do this, but I myself have Sam Shepard as number four in the Sagran ranking of the Sams.
Sonny00:06:36Oh. Oh. What are the other Sams?
JVL00:06:38But I don't know if you guys are interested in this or not. I'm definitely interested.
Sonny00:06:42I was not prepared to rank the Sams. No, neither was I.
JVL00:06:44The Hollywood Sams.
Sonny00:06:45Okay. Go on.
JVL00:06:47Number one, Sam Elliott. Oh, thank you. Yes. And don't you say his name.
Vic00:06:52That guy. You shut your mouth. I loved that guy, and I said, I hope he mentions. There.
JVL00:06:58Thank you. Number two, Sam Jackson. Number three, Sam Waterston. Number four, Sam Shepard. Very high on the list. Number five, Sam Mendes. That's my top five.
Sonny00:07:08What about Sam Worthington?
JVL00:07:09Yeah, what about Sam from Cheers? I would put Sam Worthington pretty far down, I think.
Sonny00:07:13What about, first off, Samuel L. Jackson is not a Sam. He's a Samuel.
JVL00:07:17Everybody calls him Sam.
Sonny00:07:19Nobody calls him Sam. Oh, good friends, too. Sam Jackson. Yeah.
JVL00:07:22No, everybody, nobody calls him Sam. In Hollywood, they say Sam Jackson. It is like William Kristol, Bill Kristol. This is nobody, nobody calls him. Hi, William Kristol. How are you, sir? It's nice to meet you, William.
Sonny00:07:31I call him Mr. Jackson. Yeah. Yeah, you do. Mr. Jackson.
Vic00:07:34Okay, well, do you have any other further Sam Shepard thoughts before I talk? Well.
Sonny00:07:39No, my one thought about Sam Shepard is I recently rewatched Days of Heaven. Oh, yeah. The Terrence Malick movie.
JVL00:07:48It came out in 78 or something like that. It's been in the world the entire time. It just, the tension in it and the action, it's an amazing, amazing piece of cinema. It just, the whole movie is on rails.
Sonny00:08:04Well, it's definitely one of the key portions of the Terrence Malick cinematic universe.
Vic00:08:08JVL, was it the entire TFE?
JVL00:08:11I actually like to think that all the Malick movies actually do take place within the same universe.
Sonny00:08:17All right within his head.
Vic00:08:18Did you notice Pocahontas ran through the cornfield in Days of Heaven very quickly?
Sonny00:08:22Barefoot. But I was watching it, and Sam Shepard comes on the screen, and I didn't recognize him at first because he looked so young. I was like, oh my God, I can't believe Sam Shepard was like 20 when he made this movie. And then I looked it up on IMDb. He was actually 35. He was actually five years older than I was when I watched it. I was like, oh my God, I got to stop drinking. I got to cut that out.
Vic00:08:43You know, again, I enjoyed Sam Shepard because he was a real man's man. He didn't look like a pretty boy, you know, like what they call rugged good looks, you know. He was a man. And I'd like to say, I don't think I've spoken about Sam Shepard before. I don't think I jinxed him. And the whole idea, I mean, this started with Carrie Fisher, right? No, it started with somebody else. No, I think I made a joke about her, and then she died the next day, I think. But I think that's really it.
Sonny00:09:12I think literally in between taping and release of the podcast, she died.
Vic00:09:16And all of a sudden, everybody's, yes, it's actually true. And now everybody's scared here that, you know, anytime I mention, people, that something bad happens to them. But that's not true at all. For example, I'm a big fan of Ned Beattie, Christopher Plummer, and Max von Sydow. And they're doing okay, right? I'm sure they're fine.
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