 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 Sharp 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, longtime 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 three million in debt? Actually it's 20 trillion. How could he let this happen? Entitlement spending, a bunch of wars. That bullet trying to river run didn't help. How did you hear about Roger Sharp in this story? Because it's a great story that this at first freelance journalist for GQ ended up kind of changing a whole legal regime. I called email 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 backstory. That made it more universal. It was a lot more than just essentially a sports movie about one person making this particular shot. And about three 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. Fiorella LaGuardia is kind of the villain of the piece. Why did LaGuardia ban pinball? Yeah, LaGuardia came in definitely on a crusade to stop organized crime, which I think was a lot of a goal, but it was very hard to do and it's very hard to show people that he was succeeding. In 1933, Fiorella LaGuardia ran for mayor, promising to rid New York City of corruption and organized crime. Pinball, he said, was gamble, 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 is I love that one. If you ask the dying patriot, he will tell you that they fought for random screenings at the airport with the TSA all grabby while we place our tour the trees out in transparent plastic baggies. And if you ask them why they fought and died, they'd give you the same answer. So you can get picks 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 then that fault 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. I'm 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 Gillette, 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 resonates pretty strongly with me. And I don't think there's anything you can do more insulting than acting like you know it'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 hurting anyone by playing pinball.