The Boesky: Saul playing Lymon Zherga, the whale who asks Benedict to
put his jewels, which are actually TNT, in the vault. if you've seen
Wall Street (with Michael Douglas), you'll know about Gordon Gekko, who was loosely based
on Ivan Boesky, a wall street trader who was involved in securities
fraud. That's where they got the idea of Lymon Zherga, an uber-rich
bankroller with insider information.
Jim Brown: the fight between Frank Catton, who's impersonating a
blackjack dealer, and Linus Caldwell, who's impersonating a
representative from the Nevada Gaming Commission, a fight meant to
distract Benedict so Linus could pick Benedict's pocket, getting the
security codes to the vault. after watching enough ESPN classic games
with my dad, I learned all about Jim brown, who many people hail as
the greatest football player of all time. the fight between two
characters is called a Jim Brown because it's a physical
confrontation, one of the cornerstones upon which the sport of
football is built.
Miss Daisy: references the SWAT truck the con men used as their
getaway car. Driving Miss Daisy (with Morgan Freeman) is a movie about a woman who has to
get a chauffeur to drive her around. Under the guise of the SWAT
truck, George, Brad, and the gang can escape without a hitch.
Two Jethros: refers to the Malloy Brothers, Turk and Virgil,
the hillbilly, gear-headed types who are hired to
look after Miss Daisy. In the movie, they provide general two man work
like the distraction they pull with the balloons covering the security
camera on the casino floor so Livingston can get into the video
surveillance room.
Leon Spinks: the distraction in the form of disrupting the boxing
match. An episode of NCIS had the director going
home to Chicago to investigate the death of his boxer friend. In the
episode, they mentioned this boxing match where Leon Spinks beat
Muhammad Ali, and it was a total upset that no one expected. No one
expected the power to go out in the middle of the match in the movie,
either, and it created absolute chaos, which was great for our con
artists.
Ella Fitzgerald: the idea to loop a tape of a robbery over
Benedict's security system, a robbery which had actually been staged
the previous night as a distraction while the real robbery takes
place. It comes from a 1970s commercial for Memorex where a recording of Ella Fitzgerald's
voice breaks a glass, then the voice over says, "Is it live or is it
Memorex?". The concept is that Benedict doesn't know if the robbery
he's seeing is the robbery that's actually happening.
One more post regarding this on the webz:
When Danny and Rusty (Pitt) first discuss the personnel they'll need to pull off the elaborate robbery, Rusty says, "Off the top of my
head, I'd say you're looking at a Boesky, a Jim Brown, a Miss Daisy,
two Jethros and a Leon Spinks, not to mention the biggest Ella
Fitzgerald ever!" The references don't become clear until much later,
when each conspirator's role is revealed. "Boesky," as in Wall Street
fraudster Ivan Boesky, is an apparent reference to Reiner's con man
Saul. "Jim Brown" (as in the 'Dirty Dozen' star) seems to refer to the
confrontational distraction provided by blacklisted blackjack dealer
Bernie Mac. "Miss Daisy" seems to be the getaway vehicle. The "two
Jethros" are the hillbilly-like gearheads played by Caan and Affleck.
"Leon Spinks" refers to the boxing match upset, caused in this case by
a power blackout. And "Ella Fitzgerald"? It has to do with the
videotaped robbery passed off as the real thing, a reference to
Fitzgerald's famous audiotape commercials in the 1970s in which a mere
recording of the jazz singer's high notes was enough to shatter a
glass, prompting the slogan, "Is it live, or is it Memorex?"
And this was confirmed by Steven Soderbergh
"First of all, [screenwriter] Ted Griffin and I completely made the
terms up. We felt we had to come up with some funny, Damon
Runyon-esque turns of phrase that weren't arbitrary we did sit down
and think them out. So, Carl Reiner is the Boesky, as in Ivan, the
powerful, rich magnate, inside kind of guy. Jim Brown is the
confrontation Bernie Mac has with Matt Damon the 'don't mess with me
or you're in for it' moment. The two Jethros are Casey Affleck and
Scott Caan, the idea being 'we're going to need gear heads, car
fanatics...some people who are total hillbilly under-the-hood guys.' A
Leon Spinks is the disruption of the boxing match: A sporting event
with some controversy to it that's what Leon Spinks means to me. The
Miss Daisy association is driving; that was the SWAT van, a ruse
involving transportation. The Ella Fitzgerald is the tape of the fake
vault, which they're going to play back and have [Andy Garcia's
character] Benedict think it's live. 'Is it live, or is it Memorex?'"
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