Books And Arts - Full Program Podcast

This week it’s all about curry, capes and … sex clubs. The PM’s social media obsession with posting his curries hit new highs of engagement when the internet noticed the chicken in his questionably-garnished korma was also questionably cooked. Is the curry discourse a distraction, or can we talk about curry and scrutinise the campaign at the same time? For those who observe, the first Monday in May is known as Met Gala Day. This year’s theme of ‘Gilded Glamour’ had celebrities turning up in capes and tails. Kim Kardashian went to extreme lengths to fit into Marilyn Monroe’s famous ‘Happy Birthday Mr President’ dress and her mother, Kris Jenner, dressed up like Jackie O. Yumi Stynes drops by to chat about season "Sex" of ABC podcast Ladies, We Need to Talk and how she gets women to open up on taboo topics.  Finally, BW and BL dig into Severance. Show notes: PM Scott Morrison’s curry: https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=554652889363411&set=pb.100044561133947.-2207520000 Vogue Met Gala live blog:

British actor Hugh Bonneville (Downton Abbey, Paddington) talks about playing the writer Roald Dahl in the new film To Olivia, set in the late 1950s, early 1960s, a period when he was married to American actor Patricia Neale and the couple lost their young child to measles. Plus, African American Italian director Jonas Carpignano on To Chiara, which won Best European Film at Cannes and follows a young Calabrian woman who learns some difficult family truths upon her father's disappearance.

What do artists think about when making huge public art? Lindy Lee is making the most expensive work commissioned by the NGA, and Judy Watson's bara will grace Sydney's harbour with a giant Gadigal fish hook. Then, the US art lab addressing the problem of confederate monuments to racist causes... and Indigenous artists Julie Gough, Nicholas Galanin and Yhonnie Scarce on Australia's own colonial memorialising.

Richard Wagner's epic fantasy opera Lohengrin is a fairy-tale romance, but a disconcerting German nationalism lurks beneath its surface. French director Olivier Py confronts the opera's complexities head on in his upcoming production for Opera Australia. Also, we trace the influence of theatre practitioner Konstantin Stanislavski and his impact on modern acting and theatrical storytelling with Isaac Butler, author of The Method: How the Twentieth Century Learned to Act (Bloomsbury).

We meet some of the most remarkable mothers in recent fiction, with authors including Dawn French, Douglas Stuart, Anne Enright, Lisa Taddeo, Larissa Behrendt and Alice Pung. These literary mums can be loving, neglectful and sometimes cruel – and they often reveal something about the author’s own relationship with their mother or children. Other featured authors include George Haddad, Craig Sherborne, Lydia Kiesling and Kate Mildenhall.

This week, BW and BL writhe their way through their feelings about the world’s richest man’s moves to buy twitter. BL shares his bulging dossier documenting the rise of full frontal male nudity on television, and what to make of it.  Meanwhile in Australia, Jimmy Rees, formerly known as Jimmy Giggle, discusses exploring Australian history via the world of miniatures in Tiny Oz, life after Jimmy Giggle and how he reinvented his career as a social media comedian during the pandemic. Show notes: Tiny Oz: https://iview.abc.net.au/show/tiny-oz#:~:text=Comedian%20Jimmy%20Rees%20and%20tiny,ABC%20iview%20and%20ABC%20TV. Jimmy Rees: https://www.jimmyrees.com.au/ Jimmy Rees TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@jimmyrees?lang=en Elon Musk’s twitter takeover: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/apr/25/five-things-in-elon-musks-in-tray-after-twitter-takeover https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/25/business/elon-musk-twitter-trump-return.html Ben Law’s full frontal dossier: https://www.menshealth.com/entertainme

Two interviews with directors who have made films about families, parenting and memory…...you’ll meet Korean-American writer director and film critic Kogonada, who talks about his mysterious, gentle sci-fi film After Yang, set in a near future society where androids can be bought as companions. Plus, French filmmaker Céline Sciamma , who’s new film is called Petit Maman, and asks the question, what if a child could travel back in time and meet their mother or father at the same age?

Rebecca Belmore is one of Canada's most important artists and is now having her first Australian solo show. Plus, visit Sally Smart's studio, inspired by one of the most influential dance companies of the twentieth century. And Yuki Kihara's Venice Biennale entry Paradise Camp, where the artist reimagines tropes used by Paul Gauguin and Samoan tourism brochures, with a Fa’afafine cast.

Red Stitch Actors' Theatre has just 80 seats, but the company is acclaimed for their bold programming of the buzziest new work from abroad and for developing new Australian plays. Now in its 21st year, we meet their artistic director Ella Caldwell. Also, Kaitlin Tinker summons the strength of Alien heroine Ellen Ripley in her play about pregnancy and childbirth, Earthside, at the Blue Room, and we take a closer look at Hamlet with two high school students and members of the current Bell Shakespeare production.

Jennifer Down doesn't turn away from uncomfortable truths in her Stella Prize shortlisted novel, Bodies of Light, about the systemic failures of the residential and foster care systems in the 70s and 80s. Also, we revisit our interview with Jonathan Franzen who talks about faith and family, which are two themes in his latest book, Crossroads.

We're all over Everything Everywhere All at Once, the multiverse-hopping sci fi action movie starring Michelle Yeoh as Evelyn Wang, an exhausted mother and business owner with a tax problem. You'll hear from Daniels, also known as Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, the filmmaking creative forces behind EEAO. BW and BL also share their review. Also discussed: Harry Styles and Shania Twain at Coachella, worshipping Jesus Christ at 30,000 feet in the air and the Japanese toddler errand-runners of Old Enough. Show notes: Everything Everywhere All at Once: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/everything_everywhere_all_at_once Ke Huy Quan: From Short Round to Romantic Lead in Just Four Long Decades: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/05/movies/ke-huy-quan-everything-everywhere.html Michelle Yeoh breaks down her most iconic characters: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHOSiFzcHJ8&t=913s Worshipping our King Jesus 30 thousand feet in the air!:https://www.tiktok.com/@jackjenszjr/video/7084616506868387114 Coach

Director Tom Gormican on The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, and how he convinced Nicolas Cage to play himself in a meta-comedy-thriller about fame, bankruptcy and movies. Plus, British actor Tom Blyth is Billy the Kid in a new streaming series from Vikings creator Michael Hirst. He explains how a kid from Nottingham ended up playing one of the most famous figures of the wild west.

Marco Fusinato is representing Australia at the 2022 Venice Biennale with work for 'monstrous times'. Plus, artworks that tell queer stories selected from the collection of the National Gallery of Victoria, for NGV Queer. And who was Lala Deen Dayal? The pioneering Indian photographer who documented a vast nation.

At this year's Australian Playwrights' Festival, writers gathered to interrogate some of the most challenging questions facing theatre-makers today. We hear two panels from the festival about the craft and responsibilities of writers telling other people's stories. Panellists: Tommy Murphy, Angela Betzien, S. Shakthidharan, Alana Valentine, Stephen Sewell, Vanessa Bates, Dylan Van Den Berg and Andrew Bovell.

Hannah Kent reflects on her time as an exchange student in Iceland and how it allowed her to pursue writing, and Michelle Johnston tells Claire Nichols about her novel, Dustfall, for the international literary event called Literature Live Around the World which was hosted by the Bergen International Literary Festival in Norway.

This long weekend we’re going red red red. First up, Oscar-winning director Domee Shi on Turning Red, about 13-year-old Meilin Lee’s  struggle to tame her inner Red Panda. Shi is the first woman to direct a feature-length film for Pixar, and talks to BW + BL about the film’s setting in her hometown of Toronto, Canada, and the universal themes in Turning Red’s coming-of-age story. Then, Billy Porter — fashion’s king of the red carpet — joins the House of Stop Everything! The Emmy, Tony and Grammy-award winner discusses his 2021 memoir Unprotected, his life-changing role as Pose’s Pray Tell and the importance of fashion.  Show notes: Domee Shi: https://www.instagram.com/domeeshi Turning Red: https://www.disneyplus.com/movies/turning-red/4mFPCXJi7N2m Bao: https://www.disneyplus.com/movies/bao/2NOY3PbUN9os Bill Porter: https://www.instagram.com/theebillyporter Billy Porter Emmy acceptance speech: https://www.emmys.com/video/71st-emmy-awards-billy-porter-wins-outstanding-lead-actor-drama-series Unprote

Hollywood director Robert Eggers on his Viking epic The Northman, a revenge thriller that follows a Prince seeking justice for the murder of his father, with an all-star cast including Alexander Skarsgård and Nicole Kidman. British actress Imogen Poots on the trippy neo-Western thriller Outer Range, and Audrey Diwan, winner of the Golden Lion at Venice Film Festival discusses her intimate film Happening, which follows a bright young student seeking an abortion in 1960's France.

Victor Ehikhamenor is one of Nigeria’s most prominent artists and calls for the Benin bronzes, the looted cultural treasures of Edo State, to be repatriated. So what did he do when he was asked to make an artwork in response to the memorial to the 19th C. British leader of the looting? Plus, South Australian artist Helen Fuller turns her hand to unconventional ceramic pots -- and an original way to exhibit them. And why tropical fruit, low-cost bejewelling and a Thai auteur inspire artist Nathan Beard.

Dan Giovannoni is a prolific writer of plays for young people and adults. His work as a playwright and as a teaching artist demonstrate his belief in how creativity can change the world. Dan has new plays at Barking Gecko and the Melbourne Theatre Company. Also, Maree Johnson, Broadway cast member of Phantom of the Opera now performing on Sydney Harbour, shares her Top Shelf and we explore the 'repertory theatre' model that has inspired Belvoir's rep season of plays by Caryl Churchill and Alana Valentine.

Pulitzer-prize winner, Jennifer Egan, is "interested in the ways technology interacts with our psychologies". Her new novel, The Candy House, plays with a deliciously dangerous idea: what if you could externalise your memory? And two books set in small town Australia: Mandy Beaumont's The Furies and Yumna Kassab's provocatively titled Australiana.