Culture Gabfest

The Culture Gabfest “Beauteous Sprout” Edition

Slate’s Culture Gabfest on Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri; Wormwood; and Slate’s 2017 Movie Club.

Listen to Culture Gabfest No. 485 with Stephen Metcalf, Dana Stevens, and Julia Turner with the audio player below.

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On this week’s Slate Plus, Dana, Stephen, and Julia discuss their current favorite piece of clothing.

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This week, the gabbers discuss Martin McDonagh’s Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, unpacking why critics are so divided over it and wondering whether Frances McDormand will get any awards-season love for her role. Next, they talk about Errol Morris’ Netflix docudrama series Wormwood, about the death of CIA employee Frank Olson in 1953. What makes this incident right for the Morris treatment, and would the project have been more effective if it weren’t as long? Finally, the gabbers discuss the Slate Movie Club, the other critics who will be joining Dana this year, and movies that may not have received enough recognition yet.

Links to some of the things we discussed this week:

Endorsements:

Dana: Owen Ellickson’s Twitter thread about playing his dad in Scrabble

Julia: The books of Tana French

Stephen: The Lost Ark Studio Compilations, and the David Hockney exhibit at the Met

Outro: Tah’s Theme” by In Motion Collective

You can email us at culturefest@slate.com.

This podcast was produced by Benjamin Frisch. Our production assistant is Daniel Schroeder.

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