Why are they taking the machines?
We got busted.
It never even occurred to me that
the game was illegal.
But for over three decades, pinball
was banned in New York City.
Most people have no idea that
pinball was illegal in New
York from the early 1940s
until 1976,
when a journalist named Roger Sharpe
finally won his crusade against
the city to free the flippers.
The story of that insane ban
is the subject of the new movie
Pinball: The Man Who Saved
the Game, which Richard Brody
of The New Yorker called "better
than all ten of the Best Picture
nominees." The film was written
and directed by Austin Bragg and
Meredith Bragg, long-time producers
at Reason, best known for
collaborating with Remy on his
massively popular song parodies
and for making libertarian versions
of Star Trek, Star Wars, Game
of Thrones and other pop-culture
franchises.
Who you're sending holograms to
is information about you and your
personal life.
Are you telling me the crown is 3
million in debt?
Actually, it's 20 trillion.
How could you let this happen?
Entitlement spending, a bunch of
wars, that bullet train to
Riverrun didn't help.
How did you hear about Roger
Sharpe and this story?
Because it's, I mean, it's
just, it's a great story that
this at first freelance journalist
for GQ ended up kind
of changing a whole legal reshape.
I cold e-mailed Roger.
I got on the phone with him and he
told me about all the other things.
Meeting a single mother
and starting a relationship with
her, his time at GQ,
his back story.
That made it more universal.
It was a lot more than just
essentially a sports movie about one
person making a particular shot.
And about 3 hours later,
I hung up and I texted Austin
and I said, "I think this might be a
feature."
This was the first pinball machine
I'd found in the city.
It never even occurred to me that
the game was illegal.
I just knew I needed to play.
Fiorello La Guardia is
kind of the villain of the piece.
Why did La Guardia ban pinball?
Yeah, La Guardia came in definitely
on a crusade to stop organized
crime, which I think
was a laudable goal.
But it's, it was very hard to do and
it's very hard to to show
people that he was succeeding.
In 1933, Fiorello La Guardia
ran for mayor, promising to rid New
York City of corruption and
organized crime.
Pinball, he said, was gambling,
ruled by the mob, a racket to steal
lunch money.
So he banned it, you know,
for the children.
And it wasn't just a ban.
It was a public relations crusade.
Major raids throughout the city,
squads of police swarming into
bowling alleys, bars, anywhere they
could find them.
Let's talk about your body of work
at Reason.
You're best known for comedy
videos. You are principal
collaborators with Remy and
doing the song parodies.
Do you have a favorite Remy
parody or Remy video that you guys
have worked on?
I think that the one that we did,
I think you edited it, the black and
white with the...
Oh, well, "Why we fought."
Why we fought and died.
I love that one.
If you asked a dying patriot,
he would tell you that they fought
for random screenings at the airport
with the TSA all grabby
while we place our toiletries out
in transparent plastic baggies.
And if you ask them why they fought
and died, they'd give you the same
answer so you
get pics taken of your junk while
slowly getting cancer.
I think you guys are particularly
well-known for the libertarian
takes on various things like Star
Wars, Star Trek, Game of Thrones.
And in that vault is the Social
Security trust fund, where all of
the money goes that will one day be
paid out to retirees.
Nothing.
Yeah, it's pretty much Ponzi scheme.
What is the, what's the secret
sauce there?
Time. I mean,
truly, it's about going through
it and looking for every opportunity
to take a libertarian angle on
something.
Am I being detained?
I'm filming. You have a right to
film you. I'm in a public place.
How did you each come to
libertarianism?
We grew up in a fairly conservative
household, in a fairly liberal
area, so I think it
was pretty natural that we ended up
somewhere between the two.
I remember in an early interview,
Nick, with Penn Jillette, and he
said, I don't believe that
I or anyone else has the right
answers for other people
about how to live their life.
And that that resonates pretty
strongly with me.
And I don't think there's anything
you can do more insulting
than acting like you know what's
best for someone else.
That, I think instilled in me this
idea that we
should allow, again I'm going to
steal another phrase, of experiments
in living and allowing people
to flourish, you know, to pursue
their own happiness as long as
they're not a detriment to someone
else doing that.
He's not, he's not hurting anyone by
playing pinball.