Listen to Culture Gabfest No. 167 with Stephen Metcalf, Deborah Needleman, John Swansburg, and Julia Turner by clicking the arrow on the audio player below or opening this player in another tab:

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In this week's Culture Gabfest, our critics Stephen Metcalf, John Swansburg, and Julia Turner meet The Muppets, again. Next, they are joined by author Deborah Needleman to discuss her new book on decorating, The Perfectly Imperfect Home. For their final segment Gabfesters come a-wassailing with their favorite Christmas carols.

Here are some links to the things we discussed this week:

Dana’s Slate review of The Muppets.
Slate’s Troy Patterson on Kermit.
EW’s complaint about Muppet overload?
Delightful Muppet parody trailers.
The Muppets film’s official web site.
Deborah Needleman’s new book, The Perfectly Imperfect Home.
Deborah Needleman’s 10 elements of style.
HGTV’s review of Deborah Needleman’s new book, The Perfectly Imperfect Home.
An interview with Deborah Needleman, at Casasugar.
Nathan Heller’s Slate article on the history of Christmas Carols.
David Bowie and Bing Crosby sing “The Little Drummer Boy.”
The Christmas carol that made Stephen cry.
Stephen’s favorite, “God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman.”
Gawker’s list of the 10 most annoying Christmas songs.

The Culture Gabfest weekly endorsements:

John’s pick: The television miniseries Carlos about Venezuelan revolutionary Ilich Ramírez Sánchez.  
Julia’s pick: The store Top Hat! in New York City, the great Chritmas song “We Wish You The Merriest” and John Lennon’s to-do list.
Steve’s pick: From TIGI, the people who brought you Bedhead, it’s Pethead, shampoo for pets. Also, the Beatles’ Christmas messages to their fans.

Outro Music: "Christmas Wrapping" by the Waitresses

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This podcast was produced by Jesse Baker. Our intern is Matt Sigl.

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