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60 Minutes - Season 58 - Episode 02: Vaccine Court; The Tequila Heist; This Is Rob Reiner
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00:06The chances of serious vaccine injury have been likened to lottery odds,
00:11lightning strikes. But if you are one of the unlucky few, you can file a case in
00:16vaccine court. I represent both vaccine injured children and adults. Most of them will start the
00:22conversation by saying I'm not anti-vax. Why do you think they need to tell you right off the
00:25bat? They're not anti-vax. But there's a lot of public pressure that people think you're some
00:29kind of a crazy person or you're out there. And also because most people have never heard of a
00:34vaccine injury. They're rare. Tonight's story involves a celebrity chef, a rock star and a
00:42highway heist that even Hollywood couldn't dream up. Well, when the president of your company calls
00:47you, says, you're not going to believe this, but you lost two truckloads of Santo tequila. Lost.
00:52I said, well, is this a hijacking? Not quite. International cyber criminals have found new
00:59ways to steal hundreds of millions of dollars of goods. It looks like a Costco in here. You've
01:04got everything. Yes. 41 years after the cult classic, This Is Final Tap. All right, here we go.
01:14Rob Reiner and the band have come back together for a sequel. Close. Yeah. Very close. He's totally
01:22ad-libbed. Half a wheel. It's all improvised. We schnadel with each other and whatever comes
01:27up. We schnadel with each other? Yeah, it's like doing schtick, you know. Are you and I schnadeling
01:30right now? We are schnadeling right now. We're in the process of schnadeling right now.
01:37I'm Leslie Stahl. I'm Bill Whitaker. I'm Anderson Cooper. I'm Sharon Alfonsi. I'm John Wertheim.
01:43I'm Cecilia Vega. I'm Scott Pelley. Those stories and in our last minute, what viewers thought about
01:50last week's broadcast. Tonight on 60 Minutes.
02:02If you've never before heard of the National Vaccine Court, you're hardly alone. It sits
02:07inconspicuously a few hundred yards from the White House and stands as a model of effective public
02:13policy, balancing the societal good of widespread vaccination with rare individual harm. Founded in
02:20the 1980s, the court has, with little fanfare, paid out billions of dollars to Americans who have
02:26claimed injury after getting a vaccine. Today, with vaccine skepticism rising and given voice in the
02:32highest ranks of government, we wondered, can this singular court block out the noise, withstand the
02:38political winds, and stay true to its mission? You ready to go? Yeah. All right, say go. Go.
02:45Jacob Thompson is 13 years old. He loves airplanes, swimming, and Chick-fil-A. But Jacob can speak
02:56only a handful of words and needs help walking more than a few yards. Jacob was born in St. Louis
03:03on New
03:03Year's Eve 2011, rounding out a family of four with sister May Lee and parents John and Wally. He a
03:11pilot
03:11for FedEx, she, a recent immigrant from China. We had this perfectly normal, happy little baby.
03:18He would be able to jump up and down on my wife's lap and very alert, recognized who mom and
03:24dad was.
03:25At his six-month checkup, Jacob received a combination shot that included the recommended
03:31childhood vaccinations against diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis, or DTAP, all deemed safe and
03:37effective in clinical trials. Hours later, Jacob began to seize. Doctors hoped it was a one-time
03:44reaction. It wasn't. Within, I'd say, six months or less, he didn't know that we were mom and dad
03:51anymore, and he was slithering on the floor like a snake. Unrecognizable from the child you knew. Yeah.
03:58By age two, Jacob could suffer up to 700 seizures in one day. He was diagnosed with a rare and
04:06severe
04:06form of epilepsy. Is he getting blue? The Thompsons became increasingly convinced that his condition
04:12could be traced back to his six-month vaccinations, and they began to seek accountability. They took
04:18their case to attorney Renee Gentry. That's circumstantial evidence because it's not direct
04:23evidence. She's a leading vaccine injury litigator and director of the Vaccine Injury Litigation Clinic
04:29at George Washington University Law School in Washington, D.C. Perfect. I represent both vaccine-injured
04:35children and adults. All of my clients are vaccinated, and most of them will start the
04:40conversation by saying, I'm not anti-vax. Why do you think they need to tell you right off the bat
04:44they're not anti-vax, but? There's a lot of public pressure when you say that you have a vaccine
04:48injury, that people think you're some kind of a crazy person or you're out there, and also because
04:54most people have never heard of a vaccine injury. They're rare. So rare that, while hard to quantify
05:00precisely, the chances of serious vaccine injury have been likened to lottery odds,
05:06lightning strikes. Bear in mind, in total, global immunization has saved an estimated 154 million
05:13lives, six lives each minute. But when an injury does occur, families can come to vaccine court,
05:20seen in this informational video. Part of the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program,
05:26the court was established in response to a public health scare in the 1980s.
05:30The health of millions of children may be at stake because...
05:33When families of injured children went to civil court and successfully sued the manufacturers
05:38of the DTP vaccine, an older version of DTAP, it caused all but one of those drug companies to
05:45pull out of the market, resulting in vaccine shortages. Congress acted, crafting a bipartisan bill
05:52that partially shielded drug manufacturers from liability so they would continue to develop
05:57life-saving vaccines. And at the same time, Congress acknowledged that vaccines can cause injury.
06:04As bill sponsor Senator Ted Kennedy described, when children are, quote,
06:08the victims of an appropriate and rational national policy,
06:12a compassionate government will assist them in their hour of need.
06:15It was hailed as such a unique accomplishment back in the day because you had
06:20these disparate groups. You had the parents of vaccine-injured children together in the room
06:24with the manufacturers. And everybody agreed that this was the best case scenario.
06:30Is that fair to the public? They think they have an injury caused by a vaccine,
06:34but they can't sue the vaccine manufacturer directly?
06:36You can still opt out of this program and sue a manufacturer. You have to just start in this
06:41program. But it's a lower burden of proof in our program, so it's an easier thing for vaccine
06:46injured people to get compensation. Drug companies are not only not being sued,
06:51they're not part of the proceedings. Vaccine court is a no-fault court, meaning in cases like Jacob
06:57Thompson's, negligence does not need to be proven, just that the vaccine more likely than not caused the
07:03injury. Vaccine court is not your typical court. There's no jury. Cases are decided in front of one of
07:10eight judges called Special Masters. Since the program began in the late 80s, 12,000 Americans
07:16have received almost $5 billion in payouts. There are no financial windfalls for lawyers. The court
07:23pays them by the hour. Where does all this money come from? A 75-cent tax imposed on recommended
07:30childhood vaccines goes into a trust fund earmarked for vaccine injury compensation.
07:36In July, the Thompsons received a judgment of $2.1 million based on the Special Masters ruling that
07:43it was more probable than not that Jacob's six-month vaccinations aggravated an underlying genetic
07:49mutation. Jacob also received a lifetime annuity to cover his future care.
07:54Is there any doubt that the vaccine caused Jacob's injury?
07:59We can't ever prove scientific certainty on it.
08:01Does that not mean, though, that some cases are being compensated when, in fact,
08:05the science might not support it?
08:07Sure. Sure. And that's what Congress intended. There's very clear indication that said it would
08:11be better to compensate somebody that wasn't injured than to miss somebody who was.
08:14How do you feel about that?
08:16I think that's fine. While vaccines are critically important public health tools, they're not magic.
08:20You know, you can have an allergic reaction to aspirin. So it's a lot of different factors
08:25come into play to have a person be injured by a vaccine. Their genetics, their immune system,
08:30that's why the no-fault part is critical. The vaccine caused it, but there's no bad actor in this case.
08:35The program is structured around a vaccine injury table, basically a conversion chart of vaccines
08:41and eligible injuries. If your child, for instance, got a rubella vaccine and developed chronic arthritis,
08:47within 7 and 42 days, you may be eligible for damages. The most common compensation is for
08:54shoulder injuries suffered from a misplaced injection. You can file for an injury not on
08:59the table. Overall, half of all claims have been dismissed. Today, vaccines on the table have jumped
09:06from the original 6 to 16, including the annual flu shot, though notably not COVID. As for the eligible
09:14injuries, autism is not one of them. That decision did not come easily, as retired special masters
09:21Denise Fowle and George Hastings explained. There's been a lot of talk lately about a possible link
09:28between vaccines and autism. This has been litigated and decided in your court 15 years ago.
09:35You know, I spent many, many years of my life almost full-time looking at that issue.
09:42In the early 2000s, cases alleging vaccinations caused autism flooded the court.
09:48Val, Hastings, and a third special master oversaw what was a class action of sorts,
09:53a vaccine court proceeding that spanned almost a decade, incorporating testimony from dozens
09:59of medical experts, and hundreds of scientific articles. What did you ultimately conclude?
10:06Ultimately concluded, there simply was not the evidence. I hoped there would be.
10:12Why?
10:13Because the parents of children with autism go through so much.
10:18But Val said she could not decide cases based on sentiment.
10:21I had to apply the law. And the law was that if there is a preponderance of evidence of vaccine
10:29causation, I rule for them. If there isn't, I rule against them.
10:33All three special masters concluded there was no link between vaccines and autism.
10:39On appeal, eight additional federal judges unanimously upheld the vaccine court decisions.
10:46This has not been persuasive to Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
10:49After 30 years of steady rises in autism rates, I don't know we know the answer to that. We should
10:56know the answer.
10:57We wanted to know RFK Jr.'s views about vaccine court, the court his uncle championed, because
11:04today, as Secretary of Health and Human Services, he is imbued with the authority to add or redefine
11:10injuries on the vaccine table.
11:12He declined our request for an on-camera interview, but said via email that yes, he would like to
11:18expand the table, which he hopes will create an easier path to compensation.
11:23In particular, he wants to broaden definitions for seizures and encephalopathy, two neurological
11:29conditions that can be associated with autism.
11:32Although the original intent was idealistic, compassionate, and sensible, the court, RFK Jr.
11:39told us, has become a disaster for the families of injured children.
11:44Its effective function is delayed denial and systematic cruelty.
11:49Yeah, right there.
11:50Vaccine court delays are something Ryan Farrell knows only too well.
11:55Husband to Angela and father of three, Ryan worked as a lineman for a Boston-area power
12:00company, hanging electrical wires 100 feet high.
12:04Oh, yeah.
12:05On the job in 2017, Ryan cut his hand on rusty metal and got a tetanus shot.
12:10Yeah.
12:11A few days later, the pain started.
12:13I felt like my back was just, like, being stabbed.
12:16He would take a shower.
12:17He was like, I feel like there's razor blades hitting my skin.
12:20Over the next few years, Ryan was hospitalized multiple times.
12:25Doctors diagnosed him with a rare autoimmune disease.
12:28I didn't want to live for a long time.
12:31You know, that's how I felt.
12:33When did you make the link that, I have this vaccine, maybe there's some correlation here.
12:38I need the correlation.
12:40Like most Americans, Angela Farrell had never heard of vaccine court, but she stumbled upon
12:45it online and found a lawyer.
12:46They filed a case in 2019, and only in July did the special master rule.
12:52The tetanus shot, more likely than not, led to Ryan's illness.
12:57Do you feel like you were treated with compassion?
13:00I mean, the special master was kind to me and my family when we were in the courtroom.
13:04Court was intended to compensate people for vaccine injuries.
13:08I want to quote this quickly, easily, and with certainty and generosity.
13:12That couldn't be further from the truth.
13:15What do you mean?
13:15I feel like they made it way too, way too long.
13:19Ryan remains unable to work.
13:21Six years in, the court has yet to determine his damages.
13:25The court acknowledges the delays.
13:28Citing a backlog of more than 3,000 cases, its chief special master has, in documents obtained
13:34by 60 minutes, asked Congress for more resources four years running, saying it becomes more difficult
13:40each year to resolve the huge number of case filings in the expedient fashion they deserve.
13:47Congress has yet to act.
13:49Our reporting suggests that this inaction is in part because vaccination has become such a loaded,
13:55heavily politicized issue that legislators are reluctant to wade in.
14:00The Thompsons are not invested in the heavily charged vaccine debate.
14:04They're invested in their son, Jacob, an anguishing exception harmed by what's otherwise a public health force of good.
14:12I do wonder if people aren't going to hear your story and be terrified of giving their kids vaccinations.
14:19We're definitely not anti-vaxxers, we think.
14:22I mean, vaccines are great.
14:24They've done a lot to help people.
14:26But I think that parents need to know what can happen.
14:31If what you care about are vaccine-injured people and them being compensated,
14:34then you want this court to work and you want this court to be here.
14:38We have this program that incentivizes the manufacturing of vaccines,
14:42but also acknowledges that in some rare cases there are injuries and damages.
14:49It's bipartisan, it takes everyone's views into account, and everybody compromises,
14:54which is a dirty word now, but that's the goal of it.
14:58And it's helped these people.
14:59Jacob will be taken care of for the rest of his life because of this program.
15:11There's no shortage of unbelievable stories that start with tequila, and this is one of them.
15:17It involves a celebrity chef, a rock star, and a highway heist that even Hollywood couldn't dream up.
15:24Last November, two semi-trucks carrying more than a million dollars worth of Santo Tequila,
15:29a brand founded by Food Network star Guy Fieri and former Van Halen frontman Sammy Hagar,
15:36disappeared on its way to the warehouse.
15:39If you're wondering how in the world that much tequila can just vanish, we did too.
15:44It turns out international crime groups have found new ways to infiltrate the global supply chain online
15:50to steal hundreds of millions of dollars of goods.
15:54Guy Fieri got a crash course on this sophisticated high-tech theft
15:58after a sobering call from the president of his company.
16:03Well, when the president of your company calls and says, we have a problem,
16:07what's up?
16:08And he goes, you're not going to believe this, but we lost two truckloads of Santo Tequila.
16:13Lost.
16:14I said, elaborate on lost.
16:16He says, well, they disappeared.
16:19I said, well, wait, wait, wait, is this a hijacking?
16:21I said, are the drivers okay?
16:22I said, is this a, because all my mind goes to is goodfellas,
16:26and, you know, that's what I'm thinking is happening.
16:28He said, no, no, no, no.
16:30The trucks, they were appropriated, but we don't know where they are.
16:34I'm like, it's not a needle in a haystack.
16:37I mean, this is a semi-tractor truck.
16:39My mind is swimming in exactly how do you lose, you know,
16:44that many thousands of bottles of tequila.
16:4624,000 bottles of tequila, enough alcohol to fuel a lifetime of bad decisions.
16:54The tequila started out like every other Santo batch in Western Mexico,
17:00where it was distilled and bottled.
17:03From there, it was trucked to the U.S.-Mexico border,
17:07through customs, and unloaded in Laredo, Texas.
17:10The next day, it was moved into two semi-trucks
17:14that were supposed to head to the Santo Tequila Warehouse in Lansdale, Pennsylvania.
17:20When was the first indication something's not normal here?
17:23The product was due on Wednesday to our warehouse in Pennsylvania,
17:27and on Thursday morning, the logistics company told us
17:31there was a water pump cooler problem with the truck.
17:35It's just going to be a slight delay.
17:36Dan Butkus is the CEO of Santo Spirits.
17:40He told us, like many small businesses,
17:43Santo doesn't have their own delivery trucks.
17:47So they rely on a logistics company
17:49to hire trucking companies to ship their tequila.
17:53On Friday, two days after the shipment was supposed to arrive,
17:57the trucking company started sending more excuses about why it was late.
18:01Dan Butkus was informed that the truck was near Washington, D.C.
18:06with a water pump issue.
18:08The logistics company emailed him a video
18:10they received of a broken-down semi with a note.
18:14Looks like the issue is bigger than he thought.
18:17Mechanics advise the truck will be fixed Saturday.
18:20He says he can deliver Sunday,
18:22but I know y'all are closed so he can be there first thing Monday.
18:26So the tequila's late,
18:28but you don't think anything's wrong because they're sending emails?
18:31Yeah, we don't think anything's wrong.
18:33We're a day or two behind delivery.
18:35And meanwhile, they track these with GPS.
18:38So someone's checking to make sure the truck is where it says it is.
18:42And on GPS, it looks like it's in D.C. where they say it is.
18:46Then on Monday, we get an email that the truck is close.
18:52GPS says it's within a couple miles of our warehouse in Lansdale.
18:56Can you let us know when it arrives?
18:58The tequila never arrived in Pennsylvania.
19:02Here's what happened.
19:04The logistics company that worked for Santo hired a trucking company
19:08to move the tequila from Texas to Pennsylvania.
19:11But then that trucking company outsourced the job
19:15to two other trucking companies who then hired drivers.
19:18The problem is those second trucking companies were fake,
19:22with phony letterheads, email addresses, and phone numbers to appear legitimate.
19:29It's a bit of a tractor-trailer shell game called double brokering.
19:33It happens more than you might expect.
19:36Santo's CEO Dan Butkus learned it was all part of an elaborate ruse
19:41set up to buy time and steal the tequila.
19:44So the email that came to you guys was fake.
19:48The picture was fake.
19:50The GPS was phony.
19:52The GPS signal was spoofed.
19:54They call it spoofed or emulated.
19:56The thieves had manipulated the GPS to make it look like the tequila
20:00was still on its way to Pennsylvania.
20:03This is the essence of real tequila.
20:08Making matters worse, Guy Fieri and Sammy Hagar
20:11had been heavily promoting a new special tequila
20:14ahead of the holiday season
20:15that took three and a half years to make.
20:18And all of it was on those two missing trucks.
20:22It's not like we're sitting on huge reserves.
20:25So you can't just say, turn it up, we're going to keep making more.
20:27That's exactly what we couldn't do.
20:29And then you have to go back to the retailer and say,
20:32you're not going to believe this.
20:34How did this impact the business?
20:37Oh, it hurt.
20:38It hurt bad.
20:39You know, here we are, we're coming right into the fourth quarter.
20:42We lose all the tequila.
20:43We can't fill the shelves.
20:45We had to lay off players, you know.
20:47And that's the hardest thing,
20:49knowing how many people are counting on you.
20:51So, yeah, it hurt all the way around.
20:53Did you think you were being targeted?
20:57Well, there's a side of me that still says, yeah.
21:00It wasn't a truckload of screwdrivers, you know.
21:03It wasn't a truckload of baskets.
21:06They were coming across the border.
21:07Someone knew what it was.
21:09And tequila is a hot commodity.
21:13That's why Keith Lewis was called in.
21:15He's a former cop who runs operations for CargoNet,
21:19a company that works with law enforcement to solve these kinds of crimes.
21:23Lewis says last year, U.S. businesses lost more than $230 million of goods to physical heists
21:31and those engineered online.
21:34Let's start with the tequila case.
21:36How common is something like that?
21:38It happens multiple times a day.
21:41How does all of this impact consumers and the prices they pay?
21:44100% falls back on the consumer's shoulders.
21:47100%.
21:48We pay at the pump for this.
21:49We pay at the grocery store at the point of sale.
21:52Lewis started investigating and began to piece together how the tequila heist was pulled off.
21:57He says the criminals created fake online profiles of trucking companies,
22:02bid on jobs they suspected might be valuable,
22:05and hired unsuspecting drivers online.
22:09Then, instead of sending the drivers to the Santo Warehouse in Pennsylvania,
22:14the criminals redirected them to deliver the shipment into their hands.
22:18And instead of taking it to the destination that was on the bill of lading,
22:22they told them to take that load to Los Angeles.
22:26And the drivers are not in on this.
22:28The driver that picked it up has no idea that he's committing a crime.
22:32He thinks he's taking a legitimate load to a legitimate place.
22:35Yes.
22:35Doing his job.
22:36Doing his job.
22:37And he's being directed instead by criminals.
22:40Correct.
22:41Once investigators determined how the tequila was diverted to California,
22:46they tried to figure out who did it.
22:48But that was tougher, because unlike the kind of cargo theft you typically think of,
22:54like this, with guys in mass breaking into trucks with bolt cutters,
22:58there was no suspect description or fingerprints.
23:01Lewis says the tequila heist was orchestrated entirely online.
23:07You're saying that these folks don't even need to be in the same country sometimes.
23:11No, and we've tracked them to over 40 different countries around the world.
23:15And investigators say the tequila heist had all the characteristics of a criminal gang operating out of Armenia,
23:237,000 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border, where the tequila was last seen.
23:29Keith Lewis says that kind of theft, where criminals remotely redirect cargo to steal it, has spiked 1,200 percent
23:38in the last four years.
23:39If you think about online dating, for example, you can be anywhere in the world and set up a date
23:46with someone.
23:47It's the same thing in the supply chain.
23:49You can be anywhere in the world, go online, and book that load.
23:53And we don't do business face-to-face anymore.
23:55We don't have the hand-to-hand transactions.
23:57We're doing business by PDF file, by rate confirmations.
24:01We book that load with this individual.
24:03We've never met him.
24:04And bam, you have a million-dollar load of electronics going down the road, hopefully to the right destination, or
24:10maybe it's not.
24:11It's become a global threat to our supply chain.
24:16Nowhere is that threat higher than California.
24:20Last year, California had more goods stolen from trucks, trains, and by cybercriminals than any other state.
24:28That's because California's ports and highways make it a favorite target and hiding place for cargo thieves.
24:35To respond, the Los Angeles Police Department created a special unit to tackle all kinds of cargo theft.
24:44We were allowed to tag along with them one morning in August.
24:49Before dawn, officers swarmed this block in southeast Los Angeles, where they suspected a shipment of rifles stolen from a
24:57train were being hidden.
24:59They found the rifles, but also stacks of stolen sneakers, piles of power tools, and designer clothes.
25:09They've also recovered pallets of protein shakes, energy drinks, and vitamins.
25:16Typically, it all ends up in an LAPD warehouse until the rightful owner can claim it.
25:22It looks like a Costco in here. You've got everything.
25:25Yes. This is from a major manufacturer.
25:27Alan Hamilton is the chief of detectives at the LAPD.
25:31He told us all this had been recovered by the cargo theft unit just a week earlier.
25:36So we've got beer here that was stolen. We've got washing machines.
25:40We've got large appliances. You see the Sub-Zero back there.
25:43These are high-end appliances.
25:45Some of these are very high-end, high-priced computers.
25:48The technology will be turned back around and sold for like 30 to 40 percent on the dollar.
25:53The LAPD says the stolen swag is typically sold online or in stores, including this one, to unsuspecting customers.
26:02In August, they busted two hardware stores stocked with stolen goods, $4.5 million worth.
26:10What's the value of all the goods that you've recovered over the last year?
26:15So just for instance, in 2024, the Los Angeles Police Department cargo theft unit alone, $42.8 million in recovery
26:24just in the city of Los Angeles.
26:27And it was that unit that cracked open the case of the missing tequila.
26:32Detectives tracked down one of the drivers who picked up the tequila in Texas.
26:36He moved on to other jobs but told investigators he was directed, by what he thought was a legitimate trucking
26:43company,
26:43to leave the shipment at this industrial site in the San Fernando Valley.
26:48That information ultimately led police to this warehouse in southeast L.A. and 11,000 bottles of Santo tequila.
26:57Guy Fieri told us the thieves and that second truck of tequila were never found.
27:02It feels like a movie plot.
27:04The celebrity chef, the rock star, the small tequila company, you know, it all comes together.
27:11The special shipment.
27:12Did you think they were going to find it?
27:15Gosh, no.
27:16They found it when?
27:18Three weeks after, I'll say.
27:20So by then, who knows what's happened to it, who knows what condition it's in, so forth.
27:26I'm just thinking, this is all going to go down the drain.
27:29But after an inspection of the recovered bottles,
27:33Santo was able to put it back in stores and take a shot at a happy ending.
27:39There's a lot of companies that this has happened to, but they don't want to talk about it.
27:43Why did you decide to speak about what happened?
27:47It's not a thing I want to go and brag about, like, hey, we got ripped off.
27:51Yeah.
27:51It's, you know, that's not fun.
27:53But if it can happen to us with what I believe were pretty strong measures and security and awareness
28:00and, you know, communication and, you know, the way we do business and to get ripped off for two full
28:06semi-truck loads of tequila.
28:08But in today's age, then everybody's vulnerable.
28:22For many of us, Rob Reiner will forever be Meathead, the liberal foil to Archie Bunker in CBS's All in
28:31the Family.
28:31But it's as a director that he's really made his mark with some of the most memorable movies ever.
28:38When Harry Met Sally, Stand By Me, A Few Good Men, and The Princess Bride.
28:45But Reiner's first film almost didn't get made.
28:48All he had for This Is Spinal Tap about a failing, made-up British rock band was a four-page
28:56outline.
28:57No script because the movie was totally improvised.
29:02Released in 1984, it became a cult classic and is ranked as one of the funniest films of all time.
29:10Now, 41 years later, Reiner and the band have come back together for a sequel.
29:17We join them on the set in New Orleans.
29:25If it looks like a real rock concert, that was the idea.
29:30But these are pretend rock fans cheering on the, well, older pretend band, Spinal Tap.
29:40The new film reunites frontman David St. Hubbins, played by Michael McKeon.
29:47Lead guitarist Nigel Tufnell, played by Christopher Guest.
29:52And bass player Derek Smalls, played by Harry Shearer.
29:56Give me all three. There we go. Okay, tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.
29:59And as in the original...
30:01My name is Marty DeBerge. I'm a filmmaker.
30:04Reiner is both director of the actual film...
30:07All right, here we go!
30:08And he plays the director in the film.
30:11What do you see next?
30:13Earnest, but hapless documentary filmmaker Marty DeBerge.
30:18Straight man to the band members' eccentricities.
30:21It doesn't look that rock and roll.
30:24No, I was going to say...
30:26So I could do this.
30:27Well, that looks even more or less rock and roll.
30:30Okay.
30:31Don't walk away right away.
30:32All day we watched Reiner go back and forth between the stage...
30:37I'm going to have a heart attack.
30:39...and his director set up behind the stage, always playing one role or the other.
30:45You got him right here.
30:46You're the director directing yourself...
30:48I know, it's crazy.
30:49...and the documentary.
30:49It's crazy.
30:50It's making me nuts.
30:52But he still had time for a little shtick.
30:55Are you a method actor?
30:56We have a good lunch.
30:57Is there a good break that I can lie down?
31:00That's my method.
31:01No, I don't know.
31:03Reiner trained in theater and improv at UCLA.
31:07Then, at 23, was cast by producer Norman Lear, a family friend,
31:12to play left-wing meathead opposite Carol O'Connor's Archie Bunker.
31:17You resent our attitudes, our politics, even the clothes we wear.
31:21You know, I don't think there's one thing about us you agree with.
31:23I agree with that.
31:25He thought the show would last 13 weeks.
31:28It turned into eight years, five of them as the number one show in the country.
31:34So, it's the early 1980s.
31:36You've just finished All in the Family.
31:38The whole country knew who you were.
31:40Now, nobody knows.
31:42You decide you're going to direct your first feature film.
31:45Right.
31:46You try to do something really safe.
31:49Well, people would say, well, I can't believe your first movie would be improvised.
31:54There would be no script.
31:55And that's scary.
31:57And to me, it was the opposite.
31:59I wasn't scared.
32:02The film was a fake documentary about a fake band that satirized the antics of real rock musicians
32:13on stage and in the green room.
32:18There's some problems here.
32:19I don't even know where to start.
32:21Apparently, Van Halen had a rider in their contract, no brown M&Ms.
32:27So, some roadie had to sit there picking out the brown M&Ms.
32:32It's crazy.
32:33So, we looked at that.
32:33We said, there's a scene.
32:36Nigel's complaint, the bread's too small.
32:39You'd like bigger bread?
32:40Exactly.
32:41I don't understand how...
32:42You could fold this, though.
32:43Well, no, then it's half the size.
32:45No, not the bread.
32:46You could fold the meat.
32:47Yeah, but then it breaks apart like this.
32:50You put it on the bread like this, see?
32:52But then if you keep folding it, it keeps breaking.
32:54Why don't you keep folding it?
32:55We all love rock and roll.
32:56The four of us, we grew up on rock and roll.
32:59So, that was the trick, is to make fun of it and, at the same time, honor it.
33:05But it wasn't easy raising money for a film with no script that the audience might think
33:11was about a real band.
33:14Reiner made a demo reel and gave it to an executive.
33:17And he went, no, not this.
33:20No, we don't want this.
33:22After multiple rejections, Norman Lear and executives at Embassy Pictures agreed to take a meeting.
33:30And I go through this insane pitch about why they should make the movie, and it's going to be successful.
33:36It's about rock and roll.
33:37The kids will like it.
33:37They'll watch it.
33:38They'll be repeat business.
33:39I'm going crazy.
33:40I walk out of the room.
33:42Norman tells everybody, you got to let him do it.
33:47He's so crazy.
33:48And so passionate.
33:49So, they said, okay, I'll give this kid a shot.
33:52Do the dead bird.
33:53The film featured cameos from Billy Crystal.
33:56Mime is money.
33:57Let's go.
33:57Paul Schaefer, Fran Drescher.
34:00Bobby Pugger.
34:01Bobby, of course.
34:01But what Reiner says really made the film was the talent of Christopher Guest, Michael McKeon,
34:08and Harry Shearer, who wrote and played all the songs themselves and improvised every scene.
34:17Good drummer, yeah.
34:18Good drummer.
34:19What happened to him?
34:20He died.
34:21He died in a bizarre gardening accident.
34:24It's really one of those things that was, you know, the authorities said, you know, best leave it.
34:30It's not so bad.
34:31Unsold, really.
34:32So, when Marty DeBerge, Rob, was interviewing you, did you ever know what the questions were?
34:40After he asked them, yes.
34:42The numbers all go to 11.
34:45As in perhaps the film's most famous scene.
34:48Does that mean it's louder?
34:50Is it any louder?
34:51Well, it's one louder, isn't it?
34:53It's not 10.
34:54Why don't you just make 10 louder and make 10 be the top number and make that a little louder?
35:03These guys were 11.
35:04What was the first audience reaction?
35:06They didn't know what the heck was going on.
35:08We went to a screening in Texas and two girls commented, these guys are so stupid.
35:15The film did okay in theaters, but became a sleeper hit on home video, credited with launching the mockumentary genre
35:26and stylistically inspiring some of the most popular TV shows of the last few decades, and some rave reviews.
35:35It's a sacred rock artifact, the citizen cane of rockumentary.
35:41Aye.
35:41Well, that's pretty good.
35:44When you read that, what a bar.
35:45I mean, what a wood.
35:46Are we crazy to do another one?
35:48It's crazy.
35:49The bar is just way too high.
35:51Rob Reiner knows a little something about a high bar.
35:55His father, Carl Reiner, was one of the biggest, funniest, and most beloved actors, writers, and directors of his day.
36:04What do you suggest I do with all of these now?
36:06I heard there was a time in your life that you wanted to change your name.
36:11My father thought, oh, my God, this poor kid is worried about being in the shadow of a famous father.
36:17And he says, what do you want to change your name to?
36:20And I said, Carl.
36:23I just wanted to be like him.
36:25You have said your father didn't get you.
36:28No, not when I was little.
36:30Norman Lee was the first person that got me.
36:32I mean, I was playing jacks with his daughter.
36:34Norman says to my dad, you know, this kid is really funny.
36:37My dad said, well, that kid, that kid, he's sullen.
36:42He sits quiet.
36:43He doesn't, you know, he's not funny.
36:45He didn't think I was in any way.
36:47I'm no good.
36:48My dad said it, I'm no good.
36:50He doesn't know you.
36:51Reiner told us this painful scene in his 1986 movie Stand By Me was autobiographical.
37:00He hates me, I'm no good.
37:03That's a scene I wrote in a hotel room in Oregon.
37:06And as I'm writing this scene, I'm crying.
37:09I'm actually crying.
37:11When I was making it, I knew that he loved me and he did understand me.
37:16But as a little boy, that's what I felt.
37:19But I've got to tell you, when I was 16 years old, my dad and Mel were working on a
37:23routine.
37:24I came up with an idea for a joke and they used it.
37:26And it was the greatest validation at age 16.
37:29Did people always do that in the old days?
37:31Very sophisticated.
37:31It was a bit for Reiner and Mel Brooks' 2,000-year-old man routine about the ancient origin of
37:39applause.
37:39You'd go, whoa, oh, is that good?
37:43Wow, wow.
37:44If somebody was great, you could kill yourself.
37:47People actually hit themselves in the face.
37:50That hurts, though.
37:51Yeah, you bet it hurts.
37:52So, Bernie was the first guy when nobody was looking, he pulled his head out.
37:55And he just went like that.
37:57Don't hurt your faces, folks.
37:58Just a simple little clapping will suffice.
38:03This is the sword that Wesley used in The Princess Bride.
38:07Reiner's study is full of mementos from a career that would make any father proud, not to mention a mother.
38:15Reiner gave his a star turn in Meg Ryan's famous deli scene.
38:20Yes!
38:21Yes!
38:22Yes!
38:23In When Harry Met Sally.
38:26I'll have what she's having.
38:28But it can be awkward having your mom on set, as Reiner discovered when Meg Ryan needed a little coaching.
38:36First couple of times, she didn't do it full out.
38:38And finally, I sat across from Billy, and I acted it.
38:41I said, this is what, and I'm pounding the table.
38:44Yes, yes, yes.
38:45And I'm realizing I'm having an orgasm in front of my mother.
38:48You know, there's my mother over there.
38:49And fun fact, Reiner actually changed the movie's ending to a happy one after he met his now-wife, Michelle,
38:59with whom he has three grown children and who's now a producer of his films, including the new Spinal Tap.
39:06Start the thing.
39:08So why, at age 78, make a sequel to his very first film?
39:13Fans clamored for one for years, but neither Reiner nor the actors owned the rights, until Harry Shearer sued and
39:22got them back.
39:24Now, it's 40 years later, we have these rights, what do you do with them?
39:27And we started throwing out ideas.
39:29As Reiner showed us in his Los Angeles edit room...
39:32This is about me tracking down all the band members.
39:36They haven't talked to each other in 15 years.
39:37He finds Nigel in the north of England running, of all things, a cheese and guitar shop.
39:45And you sell both?
39:46Yes and no.
39:47Sometimes people come in with a guitar and they trade for cheese.
39:52Really?
39:53Yeah.
39:53And sometimes it's the opposite.
39:55What I do is I go like this.
39:57Yeah.
39:58Then I go like this, let's say.
39:59Yeah.
40:03Close.
40:04Close.
40:05Totally ad-lib.
40:06So a half a wheel of that cheese would buy you that.
40:09We schnadel with each other and whatever comes up.
40:11We schnadel with each other?
40:11Yeah, it's like doing schtick, you know.
40:13Are you and I schnadeling?
40:14We are schnadeling right now.
40:16We're in the process of schnadeling right now.
40:18We're on my brain.
40:19The new film features some repeat cameos.
40:22I became Buddhist.
40:23And some new big ones.
40:26Elton John.
40:27Hey, guys.
40:28And Paul McCartney.
40:29Paul here.
40:30No.
40:31Is that the Paul?
40:32It's one of them.
40:33Paul, who also did some schnadeling.
40:37How concerned are you?
40:39You know, sequels can tarnish the reputation of an original film.
40:43I'm hoping it tarnishes someone else's reputation.
40:46Maybe all those aging rockers who, like Spinal Tap, are still at it.
40:52Look at Mick Jagger.
40:53You know he's a great-grandfather.
40:55Yes.
40:56And he has been for a while.
40:57Those kids are not little kids.
40:59No, I think one of them is 70, in fact.
41:02Which is, you're thinking, oh, the math of that doesn't work.
41:06But doesn't it?
41:08So will this new film work?
41:10I have no idea ever.
41:12All the films I've made, I never know what's going to work, what's going to not.
41:16I try to get something I like.
41:18Go to black.
41:19Go to black.
41:19Go to black.
41:20Final 10!
41:23If I like it, then I say, well, at least I like it.
41:25Somebody, hopefully somebody else is going to like it.
41:33Leslie Stahl on interviewing a fake band.
41:3660 Minutes, of course.
41:38Of course.
41:38Famous, the world rhyme.
41:40At 60MinutesOvertime.com.
41:47The last minute of 60 Minutes is sponsored by UnitedHealthcare.
41:52Coverage you can count on for your whole life ahead.
41:58In the mail this week, comments about Utah Governor Spencer Cox and his campaign to lower
42:04the temperature of political debate.
42:06Many were like this.
42:08Thank you very much for your episode with Spencer Cox, so refreshing and uplifting in these divisive
42:16times.
42:17We also received notes about our profile of Dana White, the hard-driving CEO of Ultimate
42:23Fighting Championship.
42:25White is planning a cage match next year at the White House to celebrate the nation's 250th
42:32birthday.
42:33What is next for 300?
42:35Gladiators and Lions?
42:37And there was this.
42:39How can you feature Utah Governor Cox's decades-long campaign for peaceful disagreement versus UFC
42:47glorification of and profit from literal conflict and violence in the same show?
42:56I'm Scott Pelley.
42:58We'll be back next week with another edition of 60 Minutes.
43:05The CBS Evening News Week Nights.
43:09The CBS Evening News Week Nights.
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