Show Notes
The anarchic comedian, writer and filmmaker Mel Brooks turns 100 years old this June. Across a career spanning more than seven decades, Brooks has turned cinematic satire into an art form, through razor-sharp spoofs like Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein and Spaceballs. But while these films are now acclaimed as all-time comedy classics, the broader genre of the spoof has often struggled for respectability. Not least Scary Movie - one of the most commercially successful film franchises of recent years, despite widespread critical panning. With Scary Movie 6 on the horizon, Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode ask - what makes for a truly great movie spoof? Critic and Screenshot regular Anne Billson talks Ellen through a selection of spoofs, from classic Hollywood-era films from the Marx Brothers and Bob Hope, to the parody boom of the 2000s, including films like Date Movie and Epic Movie. Mark talks to David Zucker - one third of the filmmaking trio Zucker Abrahams Zucker -about the landmark disaster spoof Airplane!, and why he believes the recent attempt to revive the team’s hit The Naked Gun series missed the mark. And Ellen speaks to Keenen Ivory Wayans, the creative force behind the Wayans entertainment dynasty, and the director of a string of spoofs, including I’m Gonna Git You Sucka and Scary Movie - about why he feels his films have been misunderstood. Producer: Jane Long A Prospect Street production for BBC Radio 4
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The writer-director Billy Wilder was responsible for some of the most unforgettable stories in cinema history, from Double Indemnity and Sunset Boulevard, to Some Like It Hot and The Apartment. Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode celebrate his extraordinary career and ask - what was the Wilder touch? Born in Sucha, in what was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in 1906, Wilder began his career as a journalist in Vienna, before moving to Berlin in the 1920s. In 1933, as a Jewish man fleeing the Nazi regime, he left Europe for Hollywood, where he became one of the leading figures in the studio system. Ellen talks to critic and film historian Pamela Hutchinson about Wilder’s early years as a journalist, his experience in Hollywood and some of his most significant works, from The Lost Weekend to A Foreign Affair. Meanwhile, Mark speaks to two people who knew Wilder and his work firsthand. First, he talks to actress Juliet Mills, who starred alongside Jack Lemmon in Wilder’s 1972 Italian-set romcom Avanti! And then, Mark talks to German director Volker Schlöndorff, who got the chance to ask his cinematic hero, 'Billy, How Did You Do It?' in a series of conversations filmed in the late 1980s, and later broadcast by the BBC. Producer: Jane Long A Prospect Street production for BBC Radio 4
Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode delve into the ubiquity of the care-experienced person (someone fostered, adopted, or in a children's home) on screen, from Superman to Annie. What can we learn from film and TV about the experience of care and the care system for young people? Ellen speaks to poet, broadcaster and lifelong film fan Lemn Sissay, who grew up in the care system, about some of his favourite care-experienced characters, from Buddy the Elf to The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. And Mark talks to actor and returning Screenshot guest Samantha Morton, who drew on her own childhood for her 2009 directorial feature debut The Unloved, about an 11-year-old girl moving through the care system. Producer: Jane Long A Prospect Street production for BBC Radio 4
Ellen and Mark investigate the relationship between graphic novels and film, asking if the graphic novel is an inherently cinematic artform. Mark talks to critic and lifelong comics fan, Kambole Campbell about the history of comics and graphic novels on the silver screen. Mark then speaks to graphic novelist, Joff Winterhart, about his 2012 graphic novel Days of The Bagnold Summer, and its 2019 film adaptation directed by Simon Bird. The film stars Monica Dolan and Earl Cave as mother and son spending a bittersweet summer together. Mark talks to Joff about what it was like seeing his graphic novel on the big screen. Ellen talks to multimedia artist Sook-Yin Lee, about her film adaptation of the graphic novel Paying For It. A comic that examines the breakdown of her relationship and written by no other then her ex partner, cartoonist Chester Brown. Producer: Queenie Qureshi-Wales A Prospect Street production for BBC Radio 4
As movie megastar Tom Cruise returns to our screens, and the world awaits the revelation of the next James Bond, Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode examine the evolution of the leading man. Critic and broadcaster Christina Newland talks to Mark about the changing face of the Hollywood heartthrob, from the silent era's 'Latin lover’, Rudolph Valentino, to contemporary stars Timothée Chalamet, Michael B. Jordan and Glen Powell. Ellen speaks to acclaimed casting director Susan Shopmaker, whose eye for talent has helped shape the careers of some of the hottest actors working today, including Jeremy Allen White, Riz Ahmed and Callum Turner. And Ellen also talks to a real-life leading man - actor Jason Isaacs. Jason’s many celebrated roles have included Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter series, an Emmy-nominated turn in The White Lotus, and playing the archetypal leading man Cary Grant in the biographical ITVX series Archie. Producer: Jane Long A Prospect Street production for BBC Radio 4
Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode consider the role of natural history film and TV today. Ellen speaks to the wildlife cinematographer, Sophie Darlington ASC who has spent decades recording wildlife for primetime documentaries for the BBC, National Geographic, Netflix and beyond. Meanwhile, Mark talks to Ed Sayers, director of recent feature film Super Nature, a global love letter to the natural world, filmed on Super 8. Mark also speaks to the Oscar-winning director of My Octopus Teacher, James Reed. Producer: Mae-Li Evans A Prospect Street production for BBC Radio 4