Culture Gabfest - Algorithmic Rosebud
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Slate
3.9 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 9 December 2020
⏱️ 60 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week Steve and Dana are joined by co-host Laura Miller, books and culture columnist for Slate. First, the three of them talk to Slate's own Matthew Dessem about what's real and what's made up in the new David Fincher movie, Mank. Then Julia Turner joins the show for a discussion about Spotify's end-of-year "wrapped" feature. For the third segment, Laura talks about the best books of 2020.
In Slate Plus, Laura talks about a debate that keeps cropping up in literary circles about whether kids should be taught more contemporary literature.
Podcast production by Cameron Drews. Production assistance by Rachael Allen.
Outro music: "Ruins" by Origo
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I'm Stephen McHoff, and this is the Slate Culture Gab Fest Algorithmic Rosebud |
| 0:14.2 | Edition. It's Wednesday, December 9th, 2020. On today's show, Mank tells the story of Herman J. |
| 0:20.5 | Mankowitz and his authorship of the |
| 0:22.6 | screenplay for Citizen Kane. It stars Gary Oldman in the title role. It was directed by David |
| 0:27.5 | Fincher. We'll be joined by Slate's own Matthew DeSem to discuss. And then Spotify has held its |
| 0:33.9 | annual mirror up to who we really are. Its so-called wrapped feature shows us what music we've listened to most over the previous year, |
| 0:42.3 | Julia Turner will join us to discuss. |
| 0:44.7 | And finally, with Laura Miller as our co-hust this week, we decided we had to ask her, |
| 0:48.7 | what are your best books, favorite books of the year? |
| 0:50.8 | She's made her list, and we will discuss. |
| 0:53.4 | Joining me today is Laura Miller, |
| 0:55.0 | the book critic for Slate and general cultural maven and critic for Slate. Hey, Laura. Hi. And of course, |
| 1:01.7 | Dana Stevens is Slate's film critic. Hey, Dana. Hello, hello. All right, well, the movie |
| 1:08.5 | Mank is now out on Netflix. It tells the story of how Herman J. Mankowitz came to write what many people regard as the |
| 1:15.3 | greatest screenplay of all time for the movie Citizen Kane. |
| 1:19.4 | Mack started his career as a New York journalist and member of the famously clever Algonquin |
| 1:24.3 | Circle in New York City. |
| 1:25.9 | When the movie opens, he's a Hollywood screenwriter, |
| 1:28.3 | an alcoholic who is largely pissed away his immense talents, writing bad movies and playing |
| 1:32.6 | court jester to the powers that be. He's now being tasked by a wonderkind named Orson |
| 1:38.1 | Wells to write a movie about a press demagogue based on the unscrupulous, fervently right-wing |
| 1:42.9 | William Randolph Hearst, who was, I think it's fair to, the Rupert Murdoch of his time. Here's the twist, though. Mankowitz once knew Hearst and knew him actually quite well. He was part of his rarefied inner social circle, about a not quite a full decade before the opening of the movie in the 1930s, mostly because for Hearst, he played the part of |
... |
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