Culture Gabfest | The 3 Blake Lively Problem Edition

Slate Culture

Slate Podcasts

Arts, Tv & Film, Music

4.4 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 14 May 2025

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On this week’s show, Steve, Dana, and Julia gab about Another Simple Favor, the sequel to Paul Fieg’s 2018 A Simple Favor, which again pits Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick in a twisty, noir comedy. Next, they discuss Amy Sherman Paladino’s new Franco-American ballet TV confection Étoile. Finally, they confer on the shocking conclave pick of an American pope with New York Times journalist and Vatican-watcher Ruth Graham. In the exclusive Slate Plus Bonus Episode, the panel spoils the heck out of all the many wild plot turns of Another Simple Favor. Endorsements: Dana: The new film April by up-and-coming Georgian filmmaker Déa Kulumbegashvili. Julia: An essay by Keith Phipps’s about six crucial seconds in The French Connection and the experience of seeing this William Friedken film classic at a repertory cinema near you. Steve: The enduringly nourishing poem “Peeling Onions” by Adrienne Rich. Podcast production by Jessamine Molli. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:44.0	I'm Stephen Metcalf, and this is the Slate Culture Gap Fest, the three Blake Lively Problem Edition. It's Wednesday, May 14th, 2025. On today's show, another simple favor
0:50.5	is a sequel to the Kinky 2018 noir, a simple favor. This one returns Anna Kendrick
0:55.8	and Blake lively as a pair of frenemies embroiled in a game of cat and mouse. And then Amy Sherman
1:02.1	Palladino is probably familiar to our listeners as the showrunner, creator of such beloved hits
1:07.6	as Gilmore Girls and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. She, along with her husband, Daniel Paladino, returned with a toile.
1:15.1	I'm told that's French for a star.
1:17.0	It's a serial dramedy about French and American ballet companies that swap their biggest stars.
1:22.9	You can watch it on Amazon Prime.
1:25.2	And finally, Holy White Smoke, the new Pope is an American. We discuss with the New York
1:30.0	Times journalist Ruth Graham. But first, we're joined by Julia Turner, a fellow at the
1:34.7	Annenberg School of Journalism at the University of Southern California. Hey, Julia.
1:39.2	Hello, hello. And Dana Stevens, the film critic for Slate. Hey, Dana.
1:43.1	Hey, Stephen. Hey, Stephen.
1:47.7	Julia, what does this program and Taylor Swift now have in common?
1:50.3	Being awesome? I don't know.
1:56.5	Oh, are we doing Steve Dana and Julia's version?
1:58.2	That's exactly right.
	...

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