Two short news stories from the world of entertainment after the former Boyzone star, Ronan Keating, told Australian radio that Leonardo DiCaprio owed him some poker funds, and Matt Damon talks Rounders.
When Molly Bloom was doing the rounds, one of her revelations was that Tobey Maguire used to bring Leonardo DiCaprio to THE underground game, not because DiCaprio was a force to be reckoned with, but because he was not.
The Bloom tongue wag was that DiCaprio was the piece of meat at the table that the billionaire businessmen wanted to rub, so after the game, the yacht and tiny island owners could show people the blood on their hands and smile with glee as they explained whose blood it was.
DiCaprio’s involvement in the game isn’t purely to act as Maguire’s poker patsy. The Academy Award winner is a keen player, and this week it came to light, that DiCaprio enjoyed a spot of poker while on the set of The Great Gatsby.
Speaking on the Stav, Abby & Matt radio show, the former Boyzone star, Ronan Keating, told the trio that he once lost a few hundred bucks playing poker with DiCaprio during his time on the Gatsby set, but then went onto say that he even bankrolled DiCaprio to play in the game, for a few hundred, and never got it back.
“I think I loaned him a couple of hundred dollars to get in the game, and then I think he won and never paid me back!” Keating told the radio hosts.
Keating was in Australia promoting his new talent show: All Together Now.
Matt Damon on The Bill Simmons Podcast
The jury may be out on DiCaprio’s true poker acumen, but there is no hiding the fact that Maguire is a bit of a shark given the right game, and Matt Damon confirmed this, during a recent podcast appearance with Bill Simmons.
The pair were talking about Damon’s life in the mid to late 90s when the subject moved naturally to his appearance as Mike McDermott in Rounders. Damon referenced Maguire when asked by Simmons who amongst his acting clique was decent at the game.
“Tobey Maguire is really good.” Said Damon.
Ben Affleck also got a mention.
During the chat, which is well worth a listen, Damon talked about knowing nothing about the game, other than playing in some local home games with his father, when he was forced to appear in Rounders due to his contractual obligations to Harvey Weinstein and Miramax.
Damon also talked about Brian Koppelman’s and David Levien’s obsession with the game, and how Damon found it to be fucking cool that the pair would regularly play in the underground scene.
The other things Damon covers is how much the game has evolved over the years, how Erik Seidel always has some playful banter with him about how much of a loser he appears in the movie, and how Doyle Brunson knocked Damon out of the 1998 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event (the Godfather of poker woke up with aces at the same time Damon peeled a pair of kings).
“I was playing like a donkey,” Damon told Simmons before continuing. “I kept thinking, ‘I have to last as long as I can’. ‘Can I make it to the piss break? Can I make it to Day 2?’ I was thinking with Doyle Brunson {the AA v KK hand} it’s going to work out either way.”
And are we going to see a sequel?
If you do, I am not sure you will be watching it in the theatre.
Here is Damon talking about the appeal of superhero movies.
“You can’t put Rounders into a theatre against that shit {Super Hero Movies}. People don’t make those movies anymore.”
Simmonds responds – “Rounders is the type of movie that’s gone.”
Here is the full podcast.
