Biopic: A Podcast Story

Episode 37: Radioactive, Starring Rosamund Pike as Marie Curie!

How do two astonishing gifted women—director Marjane Sartrapi and actor Rosamund Pike—make a movie together about 2x Nobel Prize winner Marie Curie and have it come out this boring? Start by combining masterful visual style with dull, on-the-nose words, and then add weird, apocryphal character quirks (Marie Curie is afraid of hospitals for … reasons) and stick the most interesting elements of the story in the epilogue cards (Marie and Einstein were friends—where’s this movie?).
When Rena and Sara are not postulating theories and formulating equations, they are discussing the merits of child performers with hair darker than the actor they grow into, the hotness of various nuclear scientists on film throughout history, how Marie and Pierre were essentially X Men given their constant exposure to radiation like it was NBD, and the struggle of the meet-cute in the modern age.
Radiation was directed by Marjane Satrapi, and stars Rosemund Pike as Marie Curie, Sam Riley as Pierre Curie, Simon Russell Beale as Professor Lippman, Drew Jacoby as Loie Fuller, and Aneurin Barnard as Paul Langevin.
Spoiler Warning: We spoil everything. And we enjoy it.
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Episode 36: Spartacus, Starring Kirk Douglas in the Movie that (Debatably) Broke the Blacklist!

We all are Spartacus this week. Sara and Rena watch this astonishing epic that masterfully Trojan-horses a bunch of crazy messages about communism, righteousness, and self-sacrifice in a movie that pretends to be about toxic masculinity and oiled-up, 1950s-fit men gladiating.  
Of course we love this movie: So much Peter Ustinov, so much Stanley Kubrick being forced to work within the rubric of the studio system, so much Dalton Trumbo getting to use his name after HUAC, so much Kirk Douglas with an anachronistic buzzcut that we don’t care about, so much Tony Curtis being the world’s most unskilled slave laborer, so much folklore about Laurence Olivier and Charles Laughton hating each other's guts. 
Also: Are crucifixions ineffective? How did Sara ruin her chances to be recruited into the army? How many babies played Spartacus Jr.? How on earth did UK citizen Varinia become a slave in Rome? 
Spartacus was directed by Stanley Kubrick, written by Dalton Trumbo, and stars Kirk Douglas as Spartacus, Laurence Olivier as Crassus, Jean Simmons as Varinia, Charles Laughton as Gracchus, Peter Ustinov as Batiatus, John Gavin as Julius Caesar, Woody Strode as Draba, and Tony Curtis as Antonius. 
Sources: Sources used in the episode include…
The Storm Before the Storm: The Beginning of the End of the Roman Republic by Mike Duncan.
Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic by Tom Holland.
Spartacus and the Slave Wars: A Brief History with Documents Translated, Edited, and with an Introduction by Brent D. Shaw.
Crassus: The First Tycoon by Peter Stothard.
Spoiler Warning: We spoil everything. And we enjoy it.
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Episode 35: Bohemian Rhapsody, Starring Rami Malek as Queen Frontman Freddie Mercury

People wanted this, so we did it, and one of us is WAY happier about it than the other. Is Bohemian Rhapsody an efficient, joyful look at the life and genius of Freddie Mercury and his fellow geniuses in Queen, or is it a Wikipedia-skimming, nightmarishly-edited, lie-filled romp through fan-service hell? Things we can agree on: Adam Lambert is unconvincing as a truck driver, Bob Geldof’s fame is mystifying, and Mike Myers should not have been allowed in this movie. Things we can’t agree on: the offensiveness of the false teeth worn by our film’s star, Rami Malek, whether Freddie Mercury’s innate decency and Queen’s glorious gifts as a rock outfit are used as a shield against criticism of this film’s flaws, and whether this movie has any value given the liberties it takes with anything resembling reality. 
Other questions, resolved and unresolved: Is Freddie Mercury actually Santa Claus, given that his time-bending ability to visit every Jim Hutton in London on the morning of Life Aid and establish a healthy relationship is similar to Santa’s capacity for visiting a billion households in one night? Could you buy a wild animal at Biba? Which member of the cast of Game of Thrones is a more convincingly crappy John Reid?
Bohemian Rhapsody was “directed” by Bryan Singer and actually directed by Dexter Fletcher, and stars Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury, Lucy Boynton as Mary Austin, Gwilym Lee as Brian May, Ben Hardy as Roger Taylor, Joseph Mazzello as John Deacon, Aidan Gillen as John Reid, Allan Leech as Paul Prenter, and Tom Hollander as Jim Beach.  
Spoiler Warning: We spoil everything. And we enjoy it.
Sources include: 
Somebody to Love
Matt Richards
 
Is This the Real life?: The Untold Story of Queen
Mark Blake
 
Queen: The Ultimate Illustrated History of the Crown Kings of Rock
Phil Sutcliffe
 
https://slate.com/culture/2018/10/bohemian-rhapsody-fact-fiction-freddie-mercury-movie-accuracy.html
 
https://www.bustle.com/entertainment/what-happened-to-paul-prenter-the-bohemian-rhapsody-villain-had-a-more-complex-relationship-with-the-band-irl-13040678
 
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/10/movies/rami-malek-bohemian-rhapsody.html
 
https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2018/11/freddie-mercury-true-story-relationships-mary-austin-jim-hutton?srsltid=AfmBOooRbDLOBmoF94EEP8M_dwYsmu-ipnFDN_UUrB4J3Nu-admbHKgw
 
https://www.mirror.co.uk/film/bohemian-rhapsody-brian-wanted-different-13730594
 
https://www.indiewire.com/features/general/bohemian-rhapsody-bad-editing-video-essay-watch-1202051342/ 
 
https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2018/10/bryan-singer-bohemian-rhapsody-behavior-report?srsltid=AfmBOorS9ytUWYPmvYNkl4hi6FCVNJtvTasBfzL9FIIvapan8hT9MSiB 
 
Where the Live Aid Money Went:
https://www.spin.com/2015/07/live-aid-the-terrible-truth-ethiopia-bob-geldof-feature/
 
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Episode 34: Maria, with Maria Callas Biographer Sophia Lambton

Maria is nominally about a profoundly gifted opera singer, but seems a bit more about how ponderous and remote character studies never fail to trap the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Two hours of visiting Paris (aka Budapest) as it would look if Jesus raptured the city and left behind only Satan and a few journalists, with some diversions to the shared cinematic universe of fellow sad gal Jackie Kennedy, left us exhausted.
Additionally, our brilliant guest, award-winning Callas biographer Sophia Lambton, points out that roughly four things in the movie are real:
 There was a woman named Maria Callas. 
She had dark hair. 
She was an opera singer.
Toward the end of her life, she resided in Paris, France.
Not going to recommend the movie but please do join us for another episode filled with characters’ codependent hijinks, adorable pets, and agonizing lip synching.
Sophia Lambton is the author of The Callas Imprint: A Centennial Biography, available at https://www.amazon.com/Callas-Imprint-Centennial-Biography-ebook/dp/B0BRYPL5WN
Her Substack is: https://sophialambton.substack.com/
You can find her on social media at:
https://www.instagram.com/thecrepuscularpress/
https://www.tiktok.com/@thecrepuscularpress
https://www.facebook.com/thecrepuscularpress
 
Maria is directed by Pablo Larrain and stars Angelina Jolie as Maria Callas, Pierfrancesco Favino as Ferrucio, Alba Rohrwacher as Bruna, Haluk Bilginer as Aristotle Onassis, Stephen Ashfield as Jeffrey Tate, Kodi Smit-McPhee as Mandrax, Valeria Golino as Yakinthi Callas, and Caspar Phillipson as JFK.
Spoiler Warning: We spoil everything. And we enjoy it.
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Episode 33: The Private Life of Henry VIII, Our First Tudor Movie!

Why are we watching yet another movie about trashy royals, this one from 1933? Because this one’s pretty seminal: it introduced the world to auteur filmmaking pioneers Charles Laughton and director/producer Alexander Korda, and actresses Merle Oberon and Elsa Lanchester.
If you’ve seen the musical Six you know the story: Henry VIII has an easy time getting married, but finds it challenging to stay married. In this movie, we meet five of his six wives, and hijinks ensue. 
Was Henry VIII actually attractive? Did Jamie Lee Curtis use Elsa Lanchester’s performance as inspiration for Trading Places? What is a Plantagenet again?
The Private Life of Henry VIII was directed by Alexander Korda, and stars Charles Laughton as Henry VIII, Robert Donat as Thomas Culpepper, Merle Oberon as Anne Boleyn, Wendy Barrie as Jane Seymour, Elsa Lanchester as Anne of Cleves, and Binnie Barnes as Katherine Howard. 
Sources:
Sources used in the episode include…
Henry VIII, the King and His Court by Alison Weir.
 
Spoiler Warning: We spoil everything. And we enjoy it.
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Episode 32: Priscilla, the Priscilla Presley Biopic Directed by Sofia Coppola

Rena and Sara venture into the much-documented world of Elvis Presley and the people who he trapped in his hunka-hunka-burning-emotional-tractor beam from a heretofore unconsidered POV: his wife, Priscilla Presley. Never has grooming a minor looked so glamorous.
While Sofia Coppola has undisputedly crafted another remote, beautiful piece of art and we loved many things, there are, of course, questions: should Elvis have just gone to college to go through his experimental drug-and-religion phase in relative privacy? How on earth did Priscilla manage to wrestle away control of Elvis’s estate from the Colonel? Was the mansion in The Jerk based on Graceland? 
Come for the discussions of why we’re “meh” on Elvis, stay for the utter joy of an unapologetically female gaze. 
Priscilla stars Cailee Spaeny as Priscilla Presley, Jacob Elordi as Elvis Presley, and Dagmara Dominiczyk as Ann Beaulieu, and is written and directed by Sofia Coppola.
Sources:
Elvis and Me by Priscilla Presley.
Several A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs episodes on Elvis Presley.
Spoiler Warning: We spoil everything. And we enjoy it.
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Episode 31: Tennessee Johnson, the Life of Our Terrible 17th President, Andrew Johnson

Presidential month continues apace as Sara and Rena watch Tennessee Johnson, a garbage movie that would be better titled Battle Cry of FreeDumb.
Outrage, the likes of which our microphones and households have never experienced, is on the menu this week as we bear witness to this trashfire hagiography about one of America’s worst presidents, the drunken, corrupt, racist monster Andrew Johnson, who was apparently named after preceding drunken, corrupt racist monster Andrew Jackson. This rightfully-forgotten 1942 motion picture asks the question, “Why do we have to be so mean to the South after the Civil War?”
AJ tries valiantly to reunite a shattered country–but that evil and wicked Thaddeus Stevens wants accountability from the defeated Confederacy. We find fault with this film’s perspective that the Civil War was a forgivable misunderstanding, rather than a catastrophe that killed hundreds of thousands of men and was fought over a state’s right to legal slavery, and subsequently set our nation on a course to literally never take responsibility for our bad actions.
Some other issues: Van Heflin’s Robert Wuhl-ish open-mouthed “huh” style of acting, the villainous portrayal of Mr. Stevens (itself a war crime), and whether AJ’s wife is actually history’s greatest monster (it is always a woman, after all). Zero Mostel wanted this movie burned; we can’t really argue with that. Content warning: Sara’s thwarted Juilliard audition monologue is included in this episode. 
Tennessee Johnson stars Van Heflin as Andrew Johnson, Ruth Hussey as Eliza Johnson, Lionel Barrymore as Thaddeus Stevens, and a top hat from a prop closet playing Abraham Lincoln.
Sources: 
Wikipedia: Andrew_Johnson's_drunk_vice-presidential_inaugural_address 
The 1865 podcast
A bunch of stuff from the internet and some sources that we also used on the Lincoln episode but are far too despondent to remunerate at the moment.
Spoiler Warning: We spoil everything. And we enjoy it.
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Episode 30: Amistad, Directed by Steven Spielberg

Apparently we watched this movie. Amistad is an unusually mediocre (for him, and only for him) and sort of forgettable Steven Spielberg movie about a captive mutiny against slave runners, John Quincy Adams, and the awkward game of hot-potato that was the pre-Civil War era U.S. government. Come for the uprising, stay for the utterly depressing and real depiction of the American legal system.
Some of the important questions that come up: What part of Philadelphia is the part where they say “y’all” and scissor-kick like LBJ? Is any actor more capable of creating a discomfiting environment like Arliss Howard? What would have happened if Will Smith got the part of Cinque, instead of Dijmon Hounsou?
Amistad stars Djimon Hounsou as Cinque, Matthew McConaughey as Roger Sherman, Anthony Hopkins as John Quincy Adams, Morgan Freeman as Theodore Joadson, returning champion Nigel Hawthorne as Martin Van Buren, David Paymer as Secretary John Forsythe, Pete Postlethwaite as Holabird, Stellan Skasgard as Tappan, Anna Paquin as Queen Isabella, and Chiwetel Ejiofor as Ensign Covey.
Sources: Mutiny on the Amistad : The Saga of a Slave Revolt and its Impact on American Abolition, Law, and Diplomacy by Howard Jones.
John Quincy Adams: A Man for the Whole People by Randall Woods
Podcast: Totalis Rankium episodes on John Quincy Adams.
“The Amistad Case in Fact and Film” by Eric Foner
https://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/74/
https://screenrant.com/amistad-movie-true-story-every-change/
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