Episode 48 - Halloween

Joe chose Halloween as our theme and Amy chose a scary movie! For real! Peter Jackson's The Frighteners. Guest host Matt Marcotte selected Elna Baker's memoir The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance. 

What We've Been Liking Lately

• Big Hero 6 (Matt)
• Jenny Lawson's Furiously Happy (Amy)
• Grimm (Amy)
• We Are Still Here (Joe)
• Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (Joe)
• Ponyo (Joe)

Show Notes

• Deadpool currently has a release date of February 12, 2016 (Happy Valentine's Day!)
• Zombi 2 by Lucio Fulci is the film Joe discusses in his recommendation of We Are Still Here
• If you want your very own signed first edition of Furiously Happy and are not lucky enough to live near a bookshop that has some, Amy's favorite local bookstore, Avid Bookshop, is happy to deliver anywhere in the country.
• The Frighteners was not Weta's first film. That honor goes to Peter Jackson's previous feature film Heavenly Creatures. Their first credited work on imdb is for the television show Hercules: The Legendary Journeys. However, their own site lists works as far back as a Ray Bradbury Theatre episode from 1987, although it doesn't specify in what capacity Weta was involved. 
• Andie MacDowell was actually born in South Carolina, not North Carolina. Her family did have a summer home in North Carolina when she was growing up. She currently resides in California. 
• Here is information from the Pew Forum about religious affiliation in Chicago. If you're Team Joe, you'll note that Catholicism is the most represented denomination. If you're Team Amy, you'll note that non-Catholic Christians outnumber Catholics. And that only 1 in 3 Chicagoans identify as Catholic. Choose your side and show your work in the comments.
• Rapture Practice by Aaron Hartzler is a book similar to Baker's that Matt also recommends
• Wookey, England
• Listen to Elna Baker tell her FAO Schwarz story about the baby dolls

On the Next Show

Amy went with the simple theme, "I Liked It Better Than I Thought I Would. Way Better." Guest host Michael Guarnieri is having us read Michael Crichton's Eaters of the Dead (later made into the movie The 13th Warrior). Joe's having us watch Jon Favreau's Zathura (which is streaming on US Netflix).

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Episode 47 - Conspicuous Consumption

Guest host Diane Trap chose our theme this week. Joe picked the documentary "Queen of Versailles" for us to watch and Amy went with Scruples by Judith Krantz for the book.

What We've Been Liking Lately

• The Met Opera simulcast (Diane)
• Brooklyn 99 and Brooklyn 99 gif sets on Tumblr (Amy)
• "Slow West" (Joe)
• Inspector Maigret mystery novels (Joe)
• 
  

Show Notes

• Gladys Kravitz was the nosy neighbor on Bewitched. Amy incorrectly identified her as "Edna Krabapple" despite (or because of) having only ever seen one episode of "The Simpsons."
• David Siegel tells his employees to vote for Romney
• "Wife Swap" episode featuring the Siegels
• Jackie Collins's first novel The World Is Full of Married Men was published in 1968. The Stud, her second novel, came the next year. (Pun FULLY intended.) The Bitch was a sequel to The Stud. The later series Amy was thinking of is the "Lucky Santangelo" series, which includes, as its seventh entry, Poor Little Bitch Girl.
• It was Barbara Cartland who called The World Is Full of Married Men "nasty, filthy and disgusting."
• Judith Krantz's autobiography is Sex and Shopping: The Confessions of a Nice Jewish Girl
• Despite owning a pair of underpants depicting Felix the Cat, Amy misidentified him as the subject of Steve Krantz's X-rated animated film. That was Fritz the Cat, based on the Robert Crumb creation. 
• Clive James's review of Krantz's later novel Princess Daisy.
• AIDS was first clinically observed in 1981 in the United States.
  

On the Next Show

Joe's chosen "Halloween" as his theme. And to that end, Amy has chosen Peter Jackson's horror comedy "The Frighteners." Guest host Matt Marcotte is picking the much less scary (but still funny) memoir The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance by Elna Baker. 

Where to find the podcast

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We are also available on the Stitcher app.

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• Diane

Diane Is an Amazing Knitter

Guest host Diane is quite the knitter. If you're into that sort of thing, she's PegofTilling on Ravelry

...

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Episode 46 - Marching To Our Own Drum

Amy asked for College themed entertainment this week, so special guest Becca Gross chose the 2002 film Drumline while Joseph went with the Pamela Dean novel Tam Lin.

Quiz Time - Were The Hell Are We, Anyway?

Joe befuddles Amy and Randy with questions about fictional towns and cities in movies, books and TV.

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Episode 45 - Never Give Up, Never Surrender

Joe asked for variations on the theme "Let's get the band back together." Amy and Randy both went with metaphorical bands rather than actual ones. Randy picked an old favorite - Galaxy Quest and Amy picked an old-but-new-to-us Donald E. Westlake book: The Hot Rock.

Show notes

What We're Into Lately:

Amy - Inspector George Gently (available streaming on Netflix and Acorn) and The Brokenwood Mysteries (streaming on Acorn)

Randy - Rectify 

Joe - Watership Down, now available as a Criterion Blu-Ray

• The entire list of Dortmunder books
• Trailer for the film adaptation of The Hot Rock
• The Friends of Eddie Coyle
• Yes, it's true - Enrico Colantoni played René Angélil, husband to Celine Dion, in a tv biopic
• Kathy Griffin saying the names "Celine Dion" and "René Angélil"
• More .wav clips from Galaxy Quest

Music

Intro: "Across the Atlantic" - The Budos Band (YouTube)
Outro: "Galaxy Quest - Main Theme" - The City Of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra

Next Episode

We're meeting up in Chicago in a few weeks to record our first ever live episode (a quiz, but still). So Amy chose "Chicago" as our next theme. Randy selected Michael Mann's Thief and Joe picked Joe Meno's Hairstyles of the Damned.

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Episode 44 - Some Legal Eagles Soar, Some Go Splat

Randy requested "courtroom drama." Joe selected Dominick Dunne's retelling of the O.J. Simpson trial Another City, Not My Own. Amy chose  The Lincoln Lawyer starring Matthew McConnaughey.

Show notes

What We're Into Lately:

Randy - U2's new tour. And Mad Max: Fury Road

Amy - Still more of The X-Files 

Joe - H is for Hawk by Helen McDonald and Up in the Air (better late than never)

• The incomparable Joe Bob Briggs (aka John Bloom) 
• Clearing up some of O. J. Simpson's criminal record: He was convicted in 2008 on multiple felony counts and sentenced to 33 years in prison with the possibility of parole. He was granted parole from some of the convictions in 2013, but is continuing to be held for other charges. It is possible he could be released in 2017.
• Court TV launched on July 2, 1991. On January 1, 2008, it was renamed TruTV.
• The novel The Lincoln Lawyer was published in 2005.
• The AV Club's "Random Roles" with Bob Gunton. 
• The beginning of the McConnaissance is hard to pinpoint... Was it with his excellent comedic cameo in Tropic Thunder (2008)? But that was followed by Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (2009) - which Amy will happily defend but was critically drubbed and a commercial flop. The Lincoln Lawyer comes out in March 2011, followed later that year by Bernie and Killer Joe. So was Lincoln Lawyer the very tiniest beginning of the McConnaissance? Maybe.

Music

Intro: "The Miracle (of Joey Ramone)" - U2
Outro: "Hot Rod Lincoln" - Charlie Ryan and the Livinsgton Bros.

Next Episode

Joe's chosen the theme "Let's get the band back together." Amy and Randy both went with metaphorical bands rather than actual ones. Randy's giving us all the chance to rewatch Galaxy Quest and Amy's reaching back for Donald E. Westlake's Hot Rock.

Where to find the podcast

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Randy

Episode 43 - Mothers And Daughters

As Amy starts on a road trip with her mother and since this is also Mother's Day week, Amy asked us for mother and daughter stories.  Randy went with the high-strung people in Seattle novel Where'd You Go, Bernadette, by Maria Semple [Amazon] [Goodreads] and Joseph chose the 1993 drama The Joy Luck Club  (Amazon).

Show notes

What We're Into Lately:

Amy - The latest novel from the Fugg Girls, The Royal We [Amazon] [Goodreads]

Randy - The new Alabama Shakes album, Sound And Color.

Joseph - The new monster romance Spring [Amazon] [iTunes]

• While we discussed Jupiter Ascending and Joseph expressed his...feelings about it, Amy mentioned her disappointment at the Chicago locations not including the Harold Washington Library.  For those not familiar, here it is with its striking red walls and fantastic aluminium sculptures on the roof:

• The actress who played Auntie Lindo in The Joy Luck Club, Tsai Chin, is also notable for her history in the Bond films.  She betrays Bond in the beginning of You Only Live Twice (1967) and is Madame Wu, one of the fellow high-stake Texas Hold Em players in Casino Royale (2006).

• A good profile of Andrew McCarthy, travel writer, can be found in Details.

• We didn't know about it at the time, but apparently there is a movie in the works for Bernadette which Richard Linklater is in talks to direct.  Randy thinks Julianne Moore is perfect for the part, Amy goes for Amy Aquino but Joseph has the nutty idea of Courtney Cox (but may have been watching too much Cougar Town).

• If you're interested in all in TED Talks, which Joseph is probably completely unfair to in describing a lot of them as woo-hoo, you can browse them at the TED website.

Music

• Opening Music: Mr. T, "Treat Your Mother Right," possibly the greatest Mother's Day video ever:

• Closing Music: Taylor Swift, "The Best Day."

Next Episode

Randy decided he wanted to do with courtroom stories for our next podcast.  For the movie, Amy went with the 2011 Matthew McConaughey vehicle The Lincoln Lawyer (sorry, not streaming anywhere but dirt cheap on Amazon).  Joseph went all meta and went with Dominick Dunne's fictionalized version of covering the OJ Simpson trial for Vanity Fair, Another City, Not My Own [Goodreads].

Where to find the podcast

Listen at Podomatic

Subscribe and rate us at iTunes 

We are also available on the Stitcher app.

Our Twitters:

The Podcast's Own Account

Joseph

Amy

Randy