Werner Herzog Keeps Up With the Kardashians

Despite the fact that he will soon appear in a new Jon Favreau series set in the Star Wars universe, my father, director Werner Herzog has never seen a Jon Favreau film, a Star War, or pretty much any other movie. Here is a list of the things Herzog has seen: The (not Favreau-directed) Lion King, poetry from Greek antiquity, Wrestlemania, and Keeping Up with the Kardashians.

In a recent interview with Variety Herzog says that he believes one of the reasons Favreau chose him for a part in the upcoming Mandalorian series is because Favreau’s series is “a bit of an homage to my films and to my storytelling and to my way of putting emphasis on world stories.” However, though Favreau has seen Herzog’s movies, the appreciation has heretofore not been mutual. When asked if he felt pressure to perform given Favreau’s recent string of box office success, Herzog replied, “I do not know what other films he has made.”

When the interviewer pressed by throwing out the names of some of Favreau’s hits, Herzog remained a Disney purist, perhaps because he was not aware of a reboot, or perhaps because he was too polite to say he had heard and simply does not care for reboots: “Well I like The Lion King, but the animated version 30 years back or so. That was a wonderful film, the music was particularly great, Hans Zimmer’s score.”

But Favreau should not take Herzog’s failure to see his films (and perhaps inability to pick him out of a lineup) personally. By his estimation, he has time for about four films a year at the outside. Mostly, Herzog reads, but when he does carve time for popular culture, Herzog is a man of the people:

“Sometimes, just to see the world I live in, I watch WrestleMania…You have to know what a good amount of the population is watching. Do not underestimate the Kardashians. As vulgar as they may be, it doesn’t matter that much, but you have to find some sort of orientation. As I always say, the poet must not close his eyes, must not avert them.”

Could someone please go ahead and put the audio of that comment over footage of albino alligators and get it submitted to the Academy?