Podcast Episodes
Back to SearchKing Kong (1933) & Fay Wray: The Making of the Original Scream Queen — RKO, Damsels in Distress, and Hollywood's Impossible Spectacle
Episode 20
The first in our October Halloween series: four weeks of classic Hollywood's darker, stranger, and more monstrous stories.
Fay Wray was already one of…
3 days, 11 hours ago
Edward G. Robinson: Hollywood's Literal OG — Little Caesar, the Blacklist Era, and the Man Behind the Movie Gangster
Episode 19
Edward G. Robinson helped invent the modern movie gangster. As Rico Bandello in Little Caesar, he made the short, sharp-eyed criminal not only the ce…
1 week, 3 days ago
Judy Garland's A Star Is Born (1954): Hollywood's Most Complicated Comeback — A Fragile Icon, Studio Butchering, and an Infamous Oscar Upset
Episode 18
By 1950, MGM was done with Judy Garland — and so, it seemed, was Hollywood. A Star Is Born was the film that was supposed to change all of that.
After…
2 weeks, 3 days ago
Veronica Lake: The Making and Unmaking of a Movie Star — Film Noir Stardom, a Fallen-Star Story, and the Woman Behind It All
Episode 17
Veronica Lake was one of the most unforgettable faces of 1940s Hollywood: blonde, beautiful, elusive, with a curtain of hair falling across one eye. …
3 weeks, 3 days ago
Charlie Chaplin, Part 2: The War Against Hollywood's Most Famous Man — Private Scandals, Political Persecution, and American Exile
Episode 16
This is Part 2 of our two-part series on Charlie Chaplin.
At the height of his silent-film power, Charlie Chaplin was one of the most famous and succe…
1 month ago
Charlie Chaplin, Part 1: The Making of the World's Greatest Comedian — Victorian Poverty, Silent Superstardom, and a Troubling Private Life
Episode 15
This is Part 1 of our two-part series on Charlie Chaplin.
Charlie Chaplin, one of the greatest icons of silent cinema and film comedy, built his legen…
1 month, 1 week ago
Shirley Temple: Hollywood's Most Famous Child Star — Depression-Era Stardom, the Studio System, and an Extraordinary Second Act
Episode 14
Shirley Temple was the most famous child star Hollywood had ever seen — a six-year-old who became America's biggest box-office attraction, helped car…
1 month, 2 weeks ago
Dorothy Dandridge, Part 2: Hollywood's First Black Leading Lady — Island in the Sun, Porgy and Bess, and the Promise Hollywood Couldn't Keep
Episode 13
By 1955, Dorothy Dandridge had done what Hollywood once seemed determined to make impossible — become a genuine leading lady, carry a major studio pi…
1 month, 3 weeks ago
Dorothy Dandridge, Part 1: A Star of Her Own Making — Baptism by Show Business, Carmen Jones, and a Historic Oscar Nomination
Episode 12
Dorothy Dandridge was one of the most electrifying talents Hollywood ever tried to contain — a trailblazing performer who would become the first Blac…
1 month, 4 weeks ago
Sunset Boulevard (1950): Hollywood's Autopsy — Billy Wilder, Gloria Swanson, and the Film That Shook an Industry
Episode 11
In 1949, Billy Wilder sat inside a theatre in Evanston, Illinois, and watched his new film, Sunset Boulevard, fall apart in front of its first audien…
2 months ago