Pod Casty For Me

Scrub in, folks - we're headed back to the operating theater for the second and final season of The Knick! Doctors Thack and Edwards and the gang are up to even more bleak shenanigans this time, and we're talking about it all. It's a bonafide Pod Casty cornucopia of context as we chat medical hypnotism, eugenics, Black Nationalism, sideshows, addiction treatment, urban revival churches, condoms, New York City corruption, and a bunch of other stuff. Plus, Kimi's really one on this time.
Further Reading:
Soderbergh interview on AI by Brent Lang
Counterrevolution: Extravagance and Austerity in Public Finance by Melinda Cooper
Melodrama and Modernity: Early Sensational Cinema and Its Contexts by Ben Singer
The Showman and the Slave: Race, Death, and Memory in Barnum's America by Benjamin Reiss
André Holland interview by Rodrigo Perez
"The Rise and Fall of Marcus Garvey" by Paul Prescod
"The Shadow of Booker T. Washington" by Jervis Anderson
"A Short History of the Condom" by Hallie Lieberman
"The Wedding Night" by Ida Craddock
Further Viewing:
THE MOSQUITO COAST (Weir, 1986)
MAD MEN (various, 2007)
J. EDGAR (Eastwood, 2011)
Follow Pod Casty For Me:
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Artwork by Jeremy Allison:
https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month.
We're back with another commentary track, this time for a movie by a director we almost covered: David Cronenberg. His 1988 identical twin gynecologist horror-tragedy DEAD RINGERS deals with all kinds of themes we love: the nature of the self, of experience, of the body, of morality. It's also got the guy from Soderbergh's KAFKA and the lady from TIGHTROPE and OBSESSION. Listen to this along with the film or just listen on its own - it works either way, in our opinion!
"Dead Ringers" by Ron Rosenbaum & Susan Edmiston
Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music and Jeremy Allison for our artwork.

Get ready for one (second-to-)last ride! We're hopping on the food truck with the Kings of Tampa to talk MAGIC MIKE XXL, Greg Jacobs's 2015 sequel to MAGIC MIKE, on which Soderbergh served as both cinematographer and editor. Returning to the show is our pal, movie person and social media producer Marie Bardi! We talk nontoxic masculinity, female pleasure, the film's response to race-based criticism of MAGIC MIKE, and whether the Kings can be considered a leaderless worker collective. Grab your cheetos and water and give it a listen.
Further Reading:
"Where Mike Got the Magic" by Tressie McMillan Cottom
"The Subversive Phallocentrism of Channing Tatum," by Katie Warfield
"The Lived Experience of Male Sex Work." by Michael G. Cutris and Joshua L. Boe
Further Viewing:
GOLD DIGGERS OF 1933 (Mervyn LeRoy, Busby Berkeley, 1933)
THE STORE (Frederick Wiseman, 1983)
BEAU TRAVAIL (Claire Denis, 1999)
STEP UP (Anne Fletcher, 2006)
STEP UP REVOLUTION (Scott Speer, 2012)
NOCTURAMA (Bertrand Bonello, 2016)
DOG (Reid Carolin, Channing Tatum, 2022)
Follow Marie Bardi-Salinas:
https://www.instagram.com/mariebardi/
https://www.mariebardi.com/
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/blank-check-with-griffin-david/id981330533
Follow Pod Casty For Me:
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https://www.youtube.com/@podcastyforme
Support us on Patreon:
https://www.patreon.com/PodCastyForMe
Artwork by Jeremy Allison:
https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart

This is a preview of a premium episode from our Patreon feed, Paid Costly For Me! Head over to Patreon.com/PodCastyForMe to hear more for just $5 a month.
Prepare to get real BOSS BABY vibes, folks. Making good on a tweeted threat, we had our friend, filmmaker Christopher Jason Bell join us to try to make sense of 2017's THE BOSS BABY, an animated film for children that baffled us all. We end up talking about what it means to compare films, whether there is a use to analyzing any text at all, and if one can be a boss without any productive process over which to boss. Plus, we sing the praises of the brilliant 2022 Boss Baby Symposium, which you should all check out. Also: a message from Maxwell!
Follow Chris Bell:
https://x.com/UpdateTheGrids
https://linktr.ee/christopherjasonbell
The Boss Baby Symposium:
https://bbsymposium.weebly.com/last-years-event.html
Thanks as always to Jetski for our theme music and Jeremy Allison for our artwork.

May the pods be ever in your feed-ver. Or whatever! We're screwing with the chronology a little bit today because we decided Steven Soderbergh's second unit work on Gary Ross's 2012 YA adaptation THE HUNGER GAMES was worth doing on the main feed after all. And we were right! There's a ton to talk about, from the film's style and what it means to try to find Soderbergh in it to the whole series's depictions of class, political struggle, war, and propaganda, to the popularity of dystopian young adult fiction, to the effectiveness of "political" art like ANDOR and ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER, to the surprisingly enduring legacy of Hunger Games imagery in real protest movements around the world, to how much this film (and later ones in the series especially) remind us of Gaza. Good stuff, please check it out.
Further Reading:
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and the Missing Revolution by Vincent Bevins
"A Radical Female Hero From Dystopia" by Manohla Dargis and A.O. Scott
"Suzanne Collins Talks About 'The Hunger Games,' the Books and the Movies"
"'Hunger Games': The Real Story Behind Steven Soderbergh's Involvement" by Philiana Ng
"Hunger Games: Israel Forces Gazans to Choose Between Starvation and Risking Their Lives" by Nir Hasson
"'The Hunger Games' Turns 10: Director Gary Ross Reflects on Filming, Story's Resonant Themes" by Lexy Perez
"Mark of the (Mr.) Beast" by Veronica Phillips
Further Viewing:
THE RUNNING MAN (Glaser, 1987)
VOCES INOCENTES (Mandoki, 2004)
THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE (Lawrence, 2013)
THE HUNGER GAMES: MOCKINGJAY - PART 1 (Lawrence, 2014)
THE HUNGER GAMES: MOCKINGJAY - PART 2 (Lawrence, 2015)
ANDOR (Various, 2022-2025)
ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER (Anderson, 2025)
THE LONG WALK (Lawrence, 2025)
REALITY CHECK: INSIDE AMERICA'S NEXT TOP MODEL (Loushy & Sivan, 2026)
 
Follow Pod Casty For Me:
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Support us on Patreon:
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Artwork by Jeremy Allison:
https://www.instagram.com/jeremyallisonart