Arthur Brand once held a €50 million Picasso in his apartment overnight before handing it to the police, and the only person he called to share the moment was Octave Durham.
Where this was said
At 18:38 · chapter starts 16:46
The origin of Brand and Durham's friendship is one of the episode's most cinematic turns. Durham, serving his sentence under the Dutch 'open camp' system that allowed weekend leave, was walking near the Van Gogh Museum when someone tapped him on the shoulder — Arthur Brand, who had followed the 2002 case obsessively and always thought of Durham as his archenemy. [1] — Rebecca Rossman "Brand had always seen Durham as his archenemy — the art thief to his art detective. When they bumped into each other near the Van Gogh Muse…" 16:40 Brand gave him his number. Durham threw it in the bin. But shortly after returning to jail, Durham caught Brand's TV documentary and was struck by how Brand operated: people didn't get arrested, it was all about recovering stolen art, and Brand seemed genuinely clean. Durham tracked Brand's number down online and called him — from inside his prison cell — leaving Brand speechless for 10 full seconds. When Durham got out, they met up, immediately hit it off, and formed an alliance built on a shared love of the hunt and a language only they could speak. Brand even confided to Durham about the night he held a €50 million Picasso in his apartment before handing it to police, saying Durham was the only person who could truly understand what that felt like.
Brand once held a €50 million Picasso in his apartment for one night before handing it to police. Overwhelmed, he needed to tell someone — and the only person he called was Octave Durham, the art thief. Because Durham was the only one who would understand.
The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring was stolen from the Singer Laren Museum in March 2020 and not recovered until September 2023, remaining missing for over three years.
Six months after the Van Gogh was stolen, a photo appeared on the dark web — the painting next to a fresh newspaper, the underground version of a proof-of-life ransom note. To Brand and Durham, it was good news: the painting was still out there.
The music conservatory Mark Manson attended had a dropout rate of approximately 87–90%, illustrating how few people reach the 'religious' stage of commitment to a creative calling.
A novel called 'Call Me, I'll Hide the Body' triggered a 14-publisher bidding war and sold for $2.4 million before critics alleged it was predominantly written by AI.
John Mulaney cold-texted Robby Hoffman out of nowhere to offer to produce her Netflix special, which became Wake Up.
Robby Hoffman posed as a courier to hand-deliver her spec script directly to the president of HBO Canada early in her career.
Robby and Mulaney filmed two shows in one night for the Netflix special; after the first they knew they had it, so the second was a victory lap.
Jimmy Carr performs up to 300 shows a year, often doing two shows per night, which he says reduces nerves rather than increasing them.
Jimmy Carr says that speaking at roughly 92 beats per minute is the optimal cadence for comedy and public speaking, including political speeches like Obama's.
The oldest recorded joke appears in a Roman book called 'The Lover of Laughter' and is still funny — a barber asking how a man wants his haircut, who replies 'in silence'.
Jimmy Carr argues that comedians like George Carlin, Richard Pryor, and Dave Chappelle have permanently expanded the conversational Overton window on sex, politics, and taboo topics.
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