The Great Advice John Turturro Gave Director Noah Segan Before Filming 'The Only Living Pickpocket in New York'

Noah Segan's The Only Living Pickpocket in New York, starring John Turturro, is outstanding. I hope I can convey, quickly, this opinion is why you are getting an interview with the director of this film in this newsletter.

I've been asked a few times if there will be interviews on The Hard Pass, since a lot of you know me from doing them and have told me you like reading them (which is flattering). Interviews are very time-consuming and doing one for newsletter is not exactly cost-effective,¹ so I need to really like the film. On the other hand, my newsletter might not be a publicist's first choice for where they want their coverage. For an interview to happen here, both of these things have to align. Thankfully, this time, it did.

¹Speaking of, any support for The Hard Pass is greatly appreciated:

In The Only Living Pickpocket in New York, John Turturro plays Harry, a longtime pick-pocket who loves his craft even though it's a dying art. He's not exactly looking for a big score that will attract too much attention, just enough to get by. Unfortunately, he does, unknowingly, find himself with a big score – namely a digital code with access to a large sum of cryptocurrency – that puts him directly in the sights of an unsavory organization that would like the money back.

The Only Living Pickpocket in New York is also a great New York film, Segan's hometown, filled with a wonderful supporting cast: Steve Buscemi, Giancarlo Esposito, Tatiana Maslany, and Jamie Lee Curtis. But if you've ever just wanted to spend some time with John Turturro as he makes his way around New York City, this is your movie.

I've never met Noah Segan before, even though we have a lot of mutual friends – he is friends with a lot of other film journalists I know and have worked with before – and we have been at some of the same social events. (This comes into play later in the interview.) The Only Living Pickpocket in New York has been garnering a lot of critical attention and has played some of the biggest film festivals (Sundance, Toronto, New York), which is in contrast to Segan's last film. So what's that like? Also, Segan reveals his trick on how he assembled such a great cast and the really great piece of advice John Turturro gave Segan before agreeing to star in his film. (Also, Segan reveals his hatred toward Dunkin' and Pokemon Go.)

You are friends with a lot of filmmakers and film journalists. Can that be a detriment when making a movie like this? In a "are people being honest with me" way?

The amount of times that my wife, who is a screenwriter, and my very close friend who is a screenwriter, have said, "Oh, Lord, when I read this script, I was so relieved that you knew how to write a fucking sentence." You know what I mean. Because that is the risk that you take, man, when you surround yourself with people who, I don't know, are your inspirations, frankly. Because at the end of the day it's not just people who do what I do, but it is people who write about films, who critique films, who study film. I'm one of those people too. So, obviously, yeah, you want to impress them and you want to do right by them.

This movie is getting a lot more attention than your last film, Blood Relatives. How does that feel for you? I assume the answer is "good," but I know how hard it is for a movie to get attention...

Good and nerve-wracking.

Now there are expectations?

Well, you want to do right by your people. It takes a long time to make a movie. And especially when you're making a movie with people that you love, who you know love you. You're like, I've got to do right by these. I've got to do right by John. John Turturro is New York. I've got to do right by New York.

There's a little bit of pressure there, but that pressure does get released by having a good time. Which is why I like to say on Rian's [Johnson] sets and stuff, and hopefully on mine, it's not enough to say, "no jerks." It's like you have to have a good time. You have to be smiling your way through every bit of bullshit, because that's how you're going to get through it and want to show up the next day.

What did you know about pick pocketing? How do you research that? Are there really these networks of stores that buy stolen items then ship them off to other places?

That part is true, and I think that part is still true. There is a lot of research you can do on pick-pocketing. It just happens to be research that was done between the middle of the 19th century and the 20th century.

You know what I think hurt pick-pocketing? The front pocket.

Tight pants.

When I moved to New York I became a front pocket person.

There's quite a bit of research done into the sociological academic impact of street crime, pick-pocketing, confidence crimes on this kind of level. David Maurer wrote a book called Whiz Mob after he wrote The Big Con, which is what The Sting was based on. And he wrote it much like The Big Con, from a sociological perspective, as a piece of academia. And that was useful for some mechanics. That was useful for some insight. It doesn't really give you much of a story or character, which is fine. And quite often pickpockets worked in couples, or they worked as even larger teams of four or five people. So, to have the lone pickpocket was something that I had to redesign for the 21st century, but it made sense because there aren't many of these guys. He has to go alone. Right? So not really by design, more by necessity, if that makes sense.

John Turturro in this kind of reminds me of his character in Rounders, just a guy grinding it out...

Oh, yeah. And Rounders is a great Turturro movie. It's a great... I guess you'd call it a crime movie...

Yeah, the Russian mob is involved. There's crime.

It's a crime movie. And filmmaking in general, as I said, I think of every movie as a genre movie, so you have to acknowledge the tropes you are going to touch upon. The tagline on the poster for Across 110th Street is, "When you steal from the mob, it's not a robbery, it's suicide." Like, boom, that was there. You know what I mean? You have to see where you're from to think about where you're going.

What were your influences for this?

The Friends of Eddie Coyle, which is, surprisingly, a Boston movie. The only good thing that ever came out of Boston.

See, we were just saying nice things about a Matt Damon movie, and you had to even that out.

Even it out. Even it out. Can't let them get too impressed with themselves...

Well, Dunkin's pretty good.

Mike.

What?

Come on.

What?

We're better than this.

It's a block away. They have a point system.

You get the points, hey, whoa. You got points? I understand. All you have to say is, "I got my points." I've got points at Starbucks. I go to Starbucks, I've got points.

They do, but the point system is better at Dunkin'...

I love Mikey and Nicky, which is a Philadelphia movie.

Elaine May. Peter Falk and Turturro, there's some shared DNA there of how they play these characters...

Definitely, definitely. Sweet Smell of Success is a movie we talked a lot about.

Why?

I think because it is a very go, go, go mentality, and yet the anxiety is not 100 percent all the time. You know what I mean? You're kind of on a journey and it's very well meted out. And also just great dialogue and the Odets dialogue and those performances. Later on we talked a lot about The Linguini Incident.

What's interesting with Sweet Smell of Success, you've got Tony Curtis's daughter in your movie.

Yes. Yes, we do.

What comes first, that influence or wouldn't it be good to be influenced by that movie since Jamie Lee Curtis is in this?

I think it's the rare occasion where you're like, "Oh, here is one of the best New York movies ever made, and also Jamie Lee Curtis will happen to come out and be in our movie."

Was that influence a selling point to her?

The selling point was, "please."

Wouldn't have Sweet Smell of Success as an influence be better than "please"? I'm glad "please" worked.

I don't know. It was, "please."

Wait, was that your pitch to everyone, "please"?

There was a lot of please, but there was also a lot of, "And you get to work with John Turturro," and people go, "I'll be there."

Okay, that does help.

Ninety nine percent of the cast shows up because they're like, "John? Sure. I love John." Or, "I've never worked with him and I need to work with him." or, "Oh, I've worked with him 10 times and all I want to do is work with him."

Did "please" work on John Turturro? Is that all you needed with John Turturro?

No. John read the script. He said, "I want to have lunch with this guy." I freaked out. I got on a plane. I went to meet him at Bar Pitti and we had lunch together. For a real lunch, like we ate. It wasn't like we had a salad and picked around. It was like we sat down and we ate. He is a big believer. He said Albert Finney taught him that. That if you want to sit down with a director, you eat a meal with them. A real meal.

That's great advice.

And we did. We broke bread. We had soup, salad. I think we had a little pasta. We did the whole thing and just talked and just got to know each other. And then it was like, I can't imagine doing this otherwise. Just take time. Just take your time.

Well, speaking of time, I am out of it...

Oh, well, I really hope I get to see you in person, Mike.

At the after parties, when you see Rian making Pokemon Go trades, a lot of times that's with me.

Oh, no. You're part of that?

I'm part of that. Yeah.

Wait, is that Leopold? Oh, wait. Leo, jump in. Uh-oh, he's going to defend your honor here.

[Producer Leopold Hughes shows up on screen with Pokemon Go open. Hughes says, "I'm not going to say his screen-name, but Rian's got a great name on Pokemon. I love you for this."]

Rian is no joke into it, yes.

I know. Believe me, I know he's into it. Because I'll be trying to talk to him and be like, "Man, I don't know what to do about this edit in the movie. It's really driving me crazy." And he'll be like, "Oh, I caught a fucking flippity-doo. Look at this."

Yes, the world famous Pokemon, "flippity-doo."

He does this all day. They all do this. And it's the one thing I don't share with them.

The Hard Pass only exists because of paid subscribers. If you do become a paid subscriber, you can then read about the time I accidentally tricked a Lost actor into spoiling the ending, this Tom Cruise story I was told by a famous person that is now my favorite Tom Cruise story, the time Larry King called me “a freak“ and asked if I was “a nerd,” and asking cast members from Ocean's Twelve if their characters all know they look like famous people since Tess knows she looks like Julia Roberts.

If you want more interviews on The Hard Pass or have questions for the mailbag feature, email me at mike@thehardpass.net