Episode 53 – Mike Nichols' Audio Commentaries

The best way we thought to celebrate the great writer Mark Harris’s new book Mike Nichols: A Biography, a book about the famed director filled with the instructive anecdotes he used as tools for directing actors, was to find the best examples the public has to those anecdotes in Nichols’ own voice. In the DVD audio commentaries for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, The Graduate, and Catch-22, all conducted by audio commentary-innovator Steven Soderbergh, Nichols masterclasses his way through his celebrated first three films as director. On today’s episode, Ted Haycraft is back to discuss:

• how innovative it was for a commentary to have Nichols to discuss his perceived failures on Catch-22;

• if these first three films were indeed his peak, his reputation on New York stage and on film as the “Michael Jordan” of directing actors;

• how he runs a rehearsal;

• and what particular directing questions and techniques he reveals in these commentaries.

Also:

• Last year’s oral-history biography Life Isn’t Everything: Mike Nichols, as Remembered by 150 of His Closest Friends by Ash Carter and Sam Kashner;

• Nichols’s editor Sam O’Steen’s great book on editing Cut to the Chase: Forty-Five Years of Editing America’s Favorite Movies;

• Soderbergh’s other incisive commentaries for his and others’ films;

• how Elizabeth Taylor inspired a scene on a toilet in Catch-22;

• if The Graduate is the Citizen Kane of the American New Wave;

• and where Nichols stands among that New Wave.

Ted Haycraft is film critic for Evansville’s WFIE-14 and co-hosts Cinema Chat on its Midday show. He can also be found on Cinema Chat’s Facebook page.

The Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? commentary is available on Blu-ray from Warner Archive. The Graduate commentary is available from Criterion on DVD and Blu-ray. Catch-22’s commentary is available from Paramount on DVD.

Episode 48 – 'Rumble Fish'

Crossover episode! Joining this episode are AJ Gonzalez and Bryan Connolly, hosts of The Directors’ Wall podcast, currently going through the filmography of Francis Ford Coppola, to discuss the second half of the filmmaker’s Oklahoma-shot S.E. Hinton adaptations. On this episode we talk:

• this “art-house film for teenagers” (that teenagers sadly rejected);

• its dream-like black-and-white images;

• its young man’s inventive energy;

• why French filmmaker Chris Marker didn’t even last a week as the film’s 2nd Unit Director;

• the influence of Koyaanisqatsi on the film;

• and how it’s a film about time in the past, present, and future.

Also:

• Nicolas Cage’s speaking-part film debut;

• Mickey Rourke’s whispering Camus-influenced performance;

• the film’s musically balletic gang fight set piece;

• its Touch of Evil vibe;

• the push-pull in Coppola’s career between bombastic epics and intimate character studies;

• and his commitment to be experimental in both modes.

Along with co-hosting The Directors’ Wall podcast, Gonzalez writes about film, alongside his wife (and past guest-host) Lani, on their blog Cinema Then and Now.

Connolly, along with co-hosting The Directors’ Wall podcast, also co-hosts The World is Wrong podcast, which positively celebrates movies the world is wrong about, with Andras Jones. A filmmaker, painter and author living in Austin, TX, Connolly also co-wrote Destroy All Movies: The Complete Guide to Punks On Film and numerous shows for Adult Swim.

Rumble Fish is available to rent VOD and on Blu-ray from Criterion.

Episode 47 – 'Nothing Lasts Forever' & 'SNL' Cinema

Filmmaker Kyle Smith is back, along with first-time guest co-host and old friend of the show (and me), writer and performer Dustin Levell, to pick and talk one of Saturday Night Live’s founding filmmakers, Tom Schiller, his lone feature film, and its bizarre underground relegation. On this episode, we also discuss:

• Schiller’s self-description as a “foreign” director,

• how out of place this style is from SNL’s current formatted format,

• why SNL films are less about format than characters,

• and how truly amazing it is that a movie with these stars and filmmakers was shelved at the height of the comedy boom that SNL helped create.

Also:

• If this is or isn’t Lorne Michaels first produced narrative feature,

• is or isn’t the first “SNL movie,”

• what its failure to even secure a release might have done to Michaels other produced films,

• the relationship between him and Schiller,

• the filmmakers from Adam McKay to Christopher Guest that have sprung from SNL ranks,

• and outsiders who’ve made short films for the show such as Robert Altman, Paul Thomas Anderson, Martin Breast, and Jim Jarmusch.

Kyle Smith is writer/director of the films Blue Highway and Turkey Bowl, which debuted at the 2011 SXSW Film Festival. Currently in development on his third feature, you can find Kyle and his film thoughts on Letterboxd.

Dustin Levell is a Chicago-based comedy writer, performer, and stage director.

Nothing Lasts Forever made its television premiere on Turner Classic Movies, which means it will hopefully air again in the future. Bootlegs are also available for purchase.