Episodios

  • Laurent Binet on Perspectives: Michelangelo, Mannerism, and Murder

    Laurent Binet on Perspectives: Michelangelo, Mannerism, and Murder
    Feb 25 2025
    On this episode, we were joined by Laurent Binet, the Prix Goncourt-winning author of HHHH, to discuss his new novel, Perspectives—a murder mystery set in Renaissance Florence, where Giorgio Vasari (possibly the world’s first art critic) is tasked with finding the killer of one of the city’s most prominent painters.

    Like much of Binet’s previous work, the novel is a historical counterfactual: the period’s mise-en-scène is precisely rendered, but the story he tells is playful and inventive.

    "Playful" is also a word that can be used to describe Binet himself. As a guest, he’s funny, laid-back, and happy to go down the rabbit hole with us as we discuss everything from Proust to Philip Marlowe, Simenon to Stanley Kubrick.
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    37 m
  • RaMell Ross on Nickel Boys: Colson Whitehead’s Masterpiece on the Screen

    RaMell Ross on Nickel Boys: Colson Whitehead’s Masterpiece on the Screen
    Jan 7 2025
    On this episode, we were joined by Oscar-nominated filmmaker RaMell Ross, director and co-writer of Nickel Boys, the new screen adaptation of Colson Whitehead's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel.

    Rated five stars by The Times and The Guardian, hailed as a "masterpiece" by The Independent, and recently named Best Film of 2024 by the National Society of Film Critics, Ross' film is a transformative adaptation of Whitehead's novel, employing a first-person POV that faithfully translates the book's prose experience into the language of cinema.

    RaMell spoke to us about the daunting task of adapting the work of a literary icon, his unique journey from potential NBA prospect to artist, his love of J.D. Salinger, and whether genre-oriented books make for the most successful screen adaptations.
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    33 m
  • Lili Anolik on Didion & Babitz: Joan’s Bethlehem vs Eve’s Bedlam

    Lili Anolik on Didion & Babitz: Joan’s Bethlehem vs Eve’s Bedlam
    Dec 24 2024
    On this episode, we were joined by Lili Anolik, contributing editor at Vanity Fair, and author of Didion & Babitz, a provocatively entertaining account of the feud between two key countercultural voices of the 1960s and '70s – the iconic Joan Didion and the lesser-known Eve Babitz.

    Lili spoke us to about her decade's long obsession with Eve Babitz, her scepticism of the Didion mystique, Pauline Kael, and the crucial role that Los Angeles played in the development of these two literary titans.

    Covering everyone from Charles Manson to Marcel Duchamp, Lili takes us headlong into two tumultuous decades, demonstrating why Eve Babitz considered Los Angeles in the 1970s to be the Moveable Feast that Hemingway and Fitzgerald experienced in the Paris of the '20s.

    Hosted by Ryan Edgington and Matt Hennessey. Produced by Lily Woods.
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    41 m
  • Karl Ove Knausgaard on The Third Realm: Transcendence, Translation, and Twin Peaks

    Karl Ove Knausgaard on The Third Realm: Transcendence, Translation, and Twin Peaks
    Oct 22 2024
    In this episode, we were joined by Karl Ove Knausgaard, author of one of the key literary phenomenons of the 2010s, My Struggle, to discuss his latest novel, The Third Realm, the latest instalment in the riveting Morning Star series.

    Karl Ove spoke to us about his journey toward becoming more at ease in literary interviews, his relationship with his work in translation, and how music informs one’s sense of identity—contrasting, for instance, his youthful love of punk and R.E.M. with his daughter’s of Ariana Grande. We also discuss “artistic preciousness” and how he has evolved from seeing writing as “sacrosanct” to being able to work at the kitchen table despite constant interruptions.

    Hosted by Ryan Edgington and Matt Hennessey. Produced by Lily Woods.
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    40 m
  • Richard Ayoade on The Unfinished Harauld Hughes: Salinger, Sanctimony, and Spinal Tap

    Richard Ayoade on The Unfinished Harauld Hughes: Salinger, Sanctimony, and Spinal Tap
    Oct 8 2024
    On this episode, we were joined by the iconic actor, writer, and filmmaker Richard Ayoade to discuss his latest comic novel, The Unfinished Harauld Hughes, a fictional accounting of his quest to canonise the most significant British playwright of the 20th century (who also happens to be entirely made up).

    Richard spoke to us about the figures that influenced the invention of Hughes–among them Harold Pinter and Orson Welles–and the ill-fated film Hughes authored, "O Bedlam, O Bedlam", which stopped the prolific playwright from ever writing again.

    He expressed scepticism about the myths and exaggerations that create "great lost works" and literary recluses and discussed why it is important to approach comic writing from the inside out rather than trying to make fun of your characters.

    For good measure, we also discuss his deep love of "Spinal Tap", Joan Didion, and the time he spent acting in Wes Anderson's "The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar."
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    39 m
  • Simon Russell Beale on A Piece of Work: Shakespeare, Stalin, and Sam Mendes

    Simon Russell Beale on A Piece of Work: Shakespeare, Stalin, and Sam Mendes
    Oct 1 2024
    On this episode, we were joined by the legendary British actor, Sir Simon Russell Beale CBE, to discuss his first memoir from a life on the stage, A Piece of Work: Playing Shakespeare & Other Stories.

    Often described as the "best stage actor of his generation," Simon shares insights into the whopping 18 Shakespeare characters he has played throughout his career with the RSC and the National Theatre.

    He generously invites us into his process as an actor and explains why the personal and working relationships he has formed with collaborators like Sam Mendes and Nicholas Hytner are essential to his extraordinary success.

    Lastly, we discuss encounters with performing legends such as Stephen Sondheim and Lauren Bacall and an example of what it means to recieve a "bad note" from a director.
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    53 m
  • Alan Hollinghurst on Our Evenings: Acting, Aging, and Adventures in Wonderland

    Alan Hollinghurst on Our Evenings: Acting, Aging, and Adventures in Wonderland
    Sep 24 2024
    On this episode, we were joined by Booker Prize-winning author Alan Hollinghurst to discuss his new novel, Our Evenings, releasing 3 October.

    Immersing us in the revolutionary world of British theatre in the 1960s, the novel follows Dave Winn, an English actor of Burmese descent, through his experiences of success and failure, love and heartbreak, acceptance and hatred, and a final coda that reshapes our entire understanding of this extraordinary story.

    Alan shares insights from his decades-long career of portraying queer life in Britain across the 20th and 21st centuries, highlighting how cultural and political shifts have influenced his storytelling.

    He also offers us a sense of both the attraction and repulsion that draws him toward a world of wealth and privilege, leaving his characters—and perhaps himself—on the outside, looking in.

    Hosts: Ryan Edgington and Matt Hennessey Producer: Lily Woods
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    38 m
  • Elif Shafak on There Are Rivers in the Sky: The Tigris and the Thames

    Elif Shafak on There Are Rivers in the Sky: The Tigris and the Thames
    Aug 6 2024
    On this episode, we were joined by Booker Prize-shortlisted author Elif Shafak to discuss There Are Rivers in the Sky, her centuries-spanning new novel that follows three historical characters connected by ancient bodies of water.

    We cover matters great and small, from the idea of water as a holder of memory to whether Elif is the type of person who will dispose of a tea mug or article of clothing once there is visible damage to it. We explore her relationship with The British Museum, inevitably weighing in on the much-politicised Elgin Marbles debate, and whether cultural artefacts belong to a region’s government or its people.

    Finally, we discuss Elif’s years of investigation by the Turkish government following the publication of The Bastard of Istanbul, with its depiction of the Armenian Genocide, and the surreal nature of seeing your fictional characters be put on trial in a court of law.

    Hosted by Ryan Edgington and Matt Hennessey.
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    50 m