Making Sense of Nathan Fielder’s The Rehearsal with Pretty Much Pop: A Culture Podcast #136

in Comedy, Podcasts, Pretty Much Pop, Television | November 2nd, 2022

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Mark Lin­sen­may­er, Lawrence Ware, Sarahlyn Bruck, and Al Bak­er con­vene an emer­gency pod­cast record­ing to react to this mind-bend­ing, pos­si­bly immoral HBO com­e­dy docuseries, where­in Field­er helps ordi­nary peo­ple rehearse dif­fi­cult per­son­al con­fronta­tions, but this plan goes off the rails after 1.5 episodes out of the six that made up its first sea­son.

This series builds upon Fielder’s pre­vi­ous show where he comed­ical­ly tried to help busi­ness­es, Nathan for You, whose ground-break­ing finale (“Find­ing Frances”) dis­cov­ered The Rehearsal‘s for­mat. Is Nathan him­self the main butt of the joke, or is he punch­ing down? Are there bet­ter ways to show the fail­ings of real­i­ty TV? How does this kind of embar­rass­ment humor dif­fer from Borat and its ilk? Maybe the show is not as much about these peo­ple going through their rehearsals as an exam­i­na­tion of the process of rehears­ing itself that Field­er has devised.

Feel free to lis­ten to us to find out what it’s all about, but you will be best served by watch­ing this inde­scrib­able show your­self before expe­ri­enc­ing this episode.

A few rel­e­vant arti­cles also con­sid­er­ing the show include:

Fol­low us @law_writes, @sarahlynbruck, @ixisnox, @MarkLinsenmayer.

Hear more Pret­ty Much Pop. Sup­port the show and hear bonus talk­ing for this and near­ly every oth­er episode at patreon.com/prettymuchpop or by choos­ing a paid sub­scrip­tion through Apple Pod­casts. This pod­cast is part of the Par­tial­ly Exam­ined Life pod­cast net­work.

Pret­ty Much Pop: A Cul­ture Pod­cast is the first pod­cast curat­ed by Open Cul­ture. Browse all Pret­ty Much Pop posts.

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The Breaking Bad-O-Verse — Pretty Much Pop: A Culture Podcast #135 Considers “Better Call Saul”

in Podcasts, Pretty Much Pop, Television | October 25th, 2022

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Giv­en the end of Bet­ter Call Saul, your Pret­ty Much Pop host Mark Lin­sen­may­er, plus NY Times enter­tain­ment writer/philosophy pro­fes­sor Lawrence Ware, novelist/writing pro­fes­sor Sarahlyn Bruck, and philosopher/musician Al Bak­er dis­cuss this strange TV “fran­chise” that amaz­ing­ly pro­duced a pre­quel that was arguably bet­ter than the orig­i­nal. We cov­er the char­ac­ter­i­za­tion and pac­ing, nov­el­is­tic TV vs. not hav­ing a plot roadmap in advance, and whether we want to see anoth­er install­ment in this world.

A few arti­cles we con­sult­ed includ­ed:

Fol­low us @law_writes, @sarahlynbruck, @ixisnox, @MarkLinsenmayer.

Hear more Pret­ty Much Pop. Sup­port the show and hear bonus talk­ing for this and near­ly every oth­er episode at patreon.com/prettymuchpop or by choos­ing a paid sub­scrip­tion through Apple Pod­casts. This pod­cast is part of the Par­tial­ly Exam­ined Life pod­cast net­work.

Pret­ty Much Pop: A Cul­ture Pod­cast is the first pod­cast curat­ed by Open Cul­ture. Browse all Pret­ty Much Pop posts.

 

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Unpopular Music Fandom — Musicians and Philosophers Discuss on Pretty Much Pop: A Culture Podcast #134

in Music, Podcasts, Pretty Much Pop | October 19th, 2022

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With the dis­so­lu­tion of pop­u­lar music cul­ture by the Inter­net, what is it now to be into music gen­res that aren’t cur­rent­ly pop­u­lar? Is it still an act of rebel­lion, or is even that passé?

Your Pret­ty Much Pop host Mark Lin­sen­may­er is joined by com­poser/­mul­ti-instru­men­tal­ist Jonathan Segel from Camper van Beethoven, philoso­pher Matt Teich­man of the Elu­ci­da­tions pod­cast, and musi­cian and Inter­net DJ Steve Petrinko to talk about our rela­tion to the main­stream, the dif­fer­ent types of unpop­u­lar music (pop­u­lar 30 years ago vs. nev­er pop­u­lar avant garde), post-irony, and more.

Lis­ten to Jonathan and Steve talk­ing about their own music on Mark’s Naked­ly Exam­ined Music pod­cast. Lis­ten to one of Matt’s elec­tron­ic com­po­si­tions from col­lege. Lis­ten to Mark and Matt on Matt’s pod­cast.

Watch Richard Thomp­son sing “Oops I Did It Again.” Here’s that attempt to give a 2022 remix to the 80s hit “Come On Eileen.”

As rec­om­men­da­tions, Jonathan men­tioned Venet­ian Snares, Steve rec­om­mend­ed ear­ly Weath­er Report. Read Jonathan’s blog about var­i­ous ver­sions of The Grate­ful Dead’s “Dark Star.” Read Pat Methe­ny pick­ing on Ken­ny G.

Hear more Pret­ty Much Pop. Sup­port the show and hear bonus talk­ing for this and near­ly every oth­er episode at patreon.com/prettymuchpop or by choos­ing a paid sub­scrip­tion through Apple Pod­casts. This pod­cast is part of the Par­tial­ly Exam­ined Life pod­cast net­work.

Pret­ty Much Pop: A Cul­ture Pod­cast is the first pod­cast curat­ed by Open Cul­ture. Browse all Pret­ty Much Pop posts.

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Why Predator — A Discussion of the Film Franchise on Pretty Much Pop: A Culture Podcast #133

in Film, Podcasts, Pretty Much Pop | September 29th, 2022

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Thanks to the new film Prey by Dan Tra­cht­en­berg and Patrick Aison, we now have six films (start­ing with 1987’s Preda­tor) fea­tur­ing the dread­locked, cam­ou­flaged, infrared-see­ing race of alien hunters who have appar­ent­ly been fly­ing around col­lect­ing our skulls for 300 years.

Thank­ful­ly, the new film is good, and adds to the recent spate of Indige­nous-cen­tered media, with its young, female Comanche pro­tag­o­nist tak­ing on evil French bison-killers, her sex­ist peers, and a moun­tain lion, in addi­tion to a rel­a­tive­ly low-tech ver­sion of what many com­ic books have called a Yaut­ja.

We talk about what makes for a good Preda­tor film, the appeal of the mon­ster (and when in the films it gets revealed), the pac­ing of the films, the music, direc­tion, effects, humor, social com­men­tary, and more.

A few of the arti­cles we con­sult­ed includ­ed:

This marks the first episode of Pret­ty Much Pop sea­son three, where Mark Lin­sen­may­er’s recur­ring co-hosts will by default ten­ta­tive­ly be those you will hear today: Phi­los­o­phy prof/entertainment writer Lawrence Ware, novelist/writing prof Sarahlyn Bruck, and ex-musi­cian, ex-phi­los­o­phy grad stu­dent, and now ex-research man­ag­er Al Bak­er. The var­i­ous con­vo­ca­tions of musi­cians, come­di­ans, et al, will still hap­pen too, but will at least alter­nate with some per­mu­ta­tion of that core group.

Hear more Pret­ty Much Pop. Sup­port the show and hear bonus talk­ing for this and near­ly every oth­er episode at patreon.com/prettymuchpop or by choos­ing a paid sub­scrip­tion through Apple Pod­casts. This pod­cast is part of the Par­tial­ly Exam­ined Life pod­cast net­work.

Pret­ty Much Pop: A Cul­ture Pod­cast is the first pod­cast curat­ed by Open Cul­ture. Browse all Pret­ty Much Pop posts.

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When Is a Joke “Too Soon”? — Comedians Discuss on Pretty Much Pop: A Culture Podcast #132

in Comedy, Podcasts, Pretty Much Pop | September 15th, 2022

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To hon­or the death of Gilbert Got­tfried, Pret­ty Much Pop address­es jokes like the 9–11 one he was pil­lo­ried for. Can com­e­dy real­ly be “too soon” in rela­tion to trag­ic sub­ject mat­ter? Is com­e­dy real­ly tragedy plus time, or are jokes most need­ed imme­di­ate­ly when pain and dis­com­fort are most acute?

Your host Mark Lin­se­may­er is joined by three come­di­ans: Adam Sank (of the LGBTQ-themed Adam Sank Show), Twitch-stream­ing song­ster Meri Amber, and return­ing guest Daniel Lobell (graph­ic nov­el­ist and pod­cast­er). We get into tai­lor­ing jokes for an audi­ence, cop­ing with grief, and of course some talk about trig­ger­ing, hyper-sen­si­tive audi­ences, and can­cel­la­tion (Chapelle, any­one?).

Watch Got­tfried’s infa­mous joke your­self:

A few per­spec­tives we may have reviewed before talk­ing:

Fol­low us @AdamSank, @meriamber, @dannylobell, and @MarkLinsenmayer.

So maybe instead of the “Mac­cabees,” my Bible cam­p’s Pol­ish jokes instead made the “Canaan­ites” the butt of their humor. (Unless that actu­al­ly again refers some mod­ern, extant peo­ple…)

Hear more Pret­ty Much Pop. Sup­port the show and hear bonus talk­ing for this and near­ly every oth­er episode at patreon.com/prettymuchpop or by choos­ing a paid sub­scrip­tion through Apple Pod­casts. This pod­cast is part of the Par­tial­ly Exam­ined Life pod­cast net­work.

Pret­ty Much Pop: A Cul­ture Pod­cast is the first pod­cast curat­ed by Open Cul­ture. Browse all Pret­ty Much Pop posts.

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Jordan Peele as Auteur of the Film Nope — Pretty Much Pop: A Culture Podcast #131

in Film, Podcasts, Pretty Much Pop | August 29th, 2022

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Jor­dan Peele’s launch from a sol­id com­e­dy base with Com­e­dy Cen­tral’s Key & Peele show to the unex­pect­ed hor­ror film Get Out was so impres­sive that he’s gen­er­at­ed a huge amount of good will that allows him to play the full-on auteur with huge bud­gets. Did that pay off with his third film, the mon­ster movie Nope?

Your Pret­ty Much Pop host Mark Lin­sen­may­er is joined by Lawrence Ware (phi­los­o­phy prof. and enter­tain­ment writer), Sarahlyn Bruck (nov­el­ist and writ­ing prof.), and Nicole Pomet­ti (media artist and pod­cast­er) to sec­ond guess Peele’s var­i­ous cre­ative deci­sions.

A few arti­cles we reviewed include:

Fol­low us @law_writes, @sarahlynbruck, @remakespodcast, @MarkLinsenmayer.

Hear more Pret­ty Much Pop. Sup­port the show and hear bonus talk­ing for this and near­ly every oth­er episode at patreon.com/prettymuchpop or by choos­ing a paid sub­scrip­tion through Apple Pod­casts. This pod­cast is part of the Par­tial­ly Exam­ined Life pod­cast net­work.

Pret­ty Much Pop: A Cul­ture Pod­cast is the first pod­cast curat­ed by Open Cul­ture. Browse all Pret­ty Much Pop posts.

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Oscar-Winner CODA and Deaf Representation in Film — Pretty Much Pop: A Culture Podcast #130

in Film, Podcasts, Pretty Much Pop | August 10th, 2022

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The 2022 Oscar win­ner for Best Pic­ture was CODA, a sto­ry about a musi­cal­ly inclined girl with a deaf fam­i­ly. Kam­bri Crews, her­self a CODA and author of a much dark­er sto­ry about this called Burn Down the Ground, joins your Pret­ty Much Pop host Mark Lin­sen­may­er, writer Sarahlyn Bruck, and jack-of-many-intel­lec­tu­al-trades Al Bak­er to talk about how deaf cul­ture inter­acts with film.

Films tend to show deaf­ness as trag­ic, which is not nec­es­sar­i­ly how the deaf com­mu­ni­ty views them­selves. We talk about bal­anc­ing the demands of a sto­ry, how real life works, and the need for pos­i­tive rep­re­sen­ta­tion. Also, deaf bowl­ing!

In addi­tion to CODA, we talk about The Sound of Met­al, A Qui­et Place, Chil­dren of a Less­er God, Mr. Hol­land’s Opus, See No Evil Hear No Evil, Eter­nals, Dri­ve My Car, and more.

Note that this dis­cus­sion was record­ed in May but got bumped with all the shows wrap­ping up at that time and sum­mer movies launch­ing.

If you liked this, see our pre­vi­ous episode on dis­abil­i­ty rep­re­sen­ta­tion.

Hear more Pret­ty Much Pop. Sup­port the show at patreon.com/prettymuchpop or by choos­ing a paid sub­scrip­tion through Apple Pod­casts. This pod­cast is part of the Par­tial­ly Exam­ined Life pod­cast net­work.

Pret­ty Much Pop: A Cul­ture Pod­cast is the first pod­cast curat­ed by Open Cul­ture. Browse all Pret­ty Much Pop posts.

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Quentin Tarantino & Roger Avary Rewatch Cult-Classic Movies on Their New Video Archives Podcast

in Film, Podcasts | July 29th, 2022

Quentin Taran­ti­no has count­less fans all around the world, increas­ing­ly many of whom are too young to ever have rent­ed a tape from a video store. But when those twen­ty-some­thing cinephiles learn his ori­gin sto­ry as a film­mak­er, they must sus­pect they missed out on a valu­able expe­ri­ence in the VHS era, what­ev­er its incon­ve­niences. When Taran­ti­no broke out in the nine­teen-nineties with Reser­voir Dogs and Pulp Fic­tion, he was pub­licly cel­e­brat­ed not just for those films, but for his hav­ing made them as a video-store-clerk-turned-auteur.

Indeed, it real­ly does seem true that Taran­ti­no’s cin­e­mat­ic sen­si­bil­i­ty owes some­thing to the years he’d spent exer­cis­ing his movie exper­tise behind the counter at Video Archives in Man­hat­tan Beach. When the store closed in 1995, the fresh­ly ascen­dant Taran­ti­no seized the oppor­tu­ni­ty to buy up its thou­sands of VHS tapes. Roger Avary, his fel­low Archives alum­nus and col­lab­o­ra­tor on the screen­play for Pulp Fic­tion, bought the Laserdiscs. Though much of Avary’s col­lec­tion has suc­cumbed to the “disc rot” that noto­ri­ous­ly afflicts that for­mat, Taran­ti­no’s col­lec­tion has held up for more than a quar­ter-cen­tu­ry.

Now Taran­ti­no’s pri­vate tape stash pro­vides the mate­r­i­al for his and Avary’s lat­est col­lab­o­ra­tion: The Video Archives Pod­cast, to which you can lis­ten on plat­forms like Apple Pod­casts and Stitch­er. On it, the two of them aim to re-cre­ate the vehe­ment­ly cinephile envi­ron­ment of Video Archives by dis­cussing the movies from its stock — after watch­ing them on the actu­al VHS tapes the store once rent­ed out. As Taran­ti­no explains it, each episode of The Video Archives Pod­cast will fea­ture three titles. But the con­ver­sa­tions will go well beyond the films them­selves, involv­ing details of the par­tic­u­lar home-video releas­es popped into the VCR as well as the his­to­ry of the dis­trib­u­tors that put them out.

Nat­u­ral­ly, the hosts also get into their per­son­al his­to­ries with these movies — which in some cas­es go back near­ly 50 years — as film-lovers and film­mak­ers. Owing to the need to intro­duce the show itself, in the first episode they dis­cuss only two pic­tures, both from the nine­teen-sev­en­ties: John Car­pen­ter and Dan O’Ban­non’s anti-estab­lish­ment sci-fi com­e­dy Dark Star, fol­lowed by Ulli Lom­mel’s rock-Mafia dra­ma Cocaine Cow­boys, which fea­tures a cameo from Andy Warhol. Rep­re­sent­ing a younger gen­er­a­tion is Avary’s daugh­ter Gala, pro­duc­er of the pod­cast, who in a mid-show seg­ment (and her own after-show) offers anoth­er per­spec­tive on the movies of the week. She clear­ly knows how to appre­ci­ate a cult clas­sic, even if she’s nev­er paid a late fee in her life.

via IndieWire

Relat­ed con­tent:

Quentin Taran­ti­no Gives a Tour of Video Archives, the Store Where He Worked Before Becom­ing a Film­mak­er

Quentin Taran­ti­no Reviews Movies: From Dunkirk and King of New York, to Soul Broth­ers of Kung Fu & More

Quentin Taran­ti­no Explains How to Write & Direct Movies

An Analy­sis of Quentin Tarantino’s Films Nar­rat­ed (Most­ly) by Quentin Taran­ti­no

The Last Video Store: A Short Doc­u­men­tary on How the World’s Old­est Video Store Still Sur­vives Today

Based in Seoul, Col­in Mar­shall writes and broad­casts on cities, lan­guage, and cul­ture. His projects include the Sub­stack newslet­ter Books on Cities, the book The State­less City: a Walk through 21st-Cen­tu­ry Los Ange­les and the video series The City in Cin­e­ma. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall, on Face­book, or on Insta­gram.

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