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PODCAST

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso is a weekly series of intimate conversations with artists, activists, and politicians. Where people sound like people. Hosted by Sam Fragoso. New episodes every Sunday.

society & culture film interviews

All Episodes

73:12

Play It Again: Jeff Daniels

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/11/27

Today, for your holiday week, we’re returning to one of our favorite 2024 conversations with actor Jeff Daniels. Daniels is always writing. Plays, songs, a script or two. Even in interviews you get the sense the Michigan native is trying to relay the stories of his life in a way he’d find compelling as a reader, or listener. Bystander — as a viewer. We sat in April around the latest chapter of his crime series American Rust (12:30), reprising his role as Police Chief Del Harris. It’s a performance

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62:39

Jesse Eisenberg Steps Into His Past

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/11/24

Actor, writer, and director Jesse Eisenberg’s latest project, A Real Pain, is perhaps his most personal to date. He joins us today to unpack the journey that shaped the film (9:18), memories from his travels to Poland (15:40), and what he observed about his family growing up in East Brunswick (22:23). Then, Eisenberg reflects on his first jokes written on post-it notes (29:20), his breakthrough acting roles in Roger Dodger (31:35) and The Squid and the Whale (34:37), and formative visits to his aunt

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85:17

Actor Josh Brolin: A Life in Vivid Color

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/11/17

Since the turn of the century, actor Josh Brolin has had quite a run. From No Country for Old Men and Hail, Caesar! from the Coen Brothers, to Inherent Vice from Paul Thomas Anderson, to Sicario and the Dune films from Denis Villeneuve. His new memoir, From Under the Truck, contains stories about the life in between. We discuss his upbringing bouncing from Paso Robles to Santa Barbara (8:49), the influence of his mother (10:05), and his entry to writing (19:40). Then, Brolin reflects on his vivid

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69:21

What Can Be, Burdened By What Has Been (with Astead...

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/11/10

It’s been a week. To help us through it, we’ve enlisted The New York Times political reporter Astead Herndon. We start with election night 2024 versus election night 2016 (6:35), what Astead discovered about the electorate reporting across the U.S. on his podcast The Run-Up (9:25), and how insider Democrats arrived at a second Biden run in 2023 (13:30). Then, we discuss politicians’ “lowercase racist” assumptions about Black and Latino voters (16:02), Herndon’s telling one on one interview with Vice

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60:44

Ta-Nehisi Coates (‘The Message’) is Live in Los Angeles

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/11/03

On the heels of his latest book The Message, author Ta-Nehisi Coates joins Sam for a conversation in Los Angeles. At the top, we discuss how his Atlantic piece The Case for Reparations guided these three new essays (6:10), Coates’ early education growing up in West Baltimore (14:57), and his powerful dispatches from South Carolina (22:00) and the Middle East (29:30). On the back-half, Coates unpacks why he believes the mainstream media prioritizes “factual complexity over self-evident morality”

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62:19

Actor and Director Anna Kendrick: Life Imitates Art

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/10/27

Anna Kendrick (Pitch Perfect, Up in the Air) has been a fixture in Hollywood for the past fifteen years. She joins us this week to discuss Woman of the Hour, her directorial debut and most revealing project to date. At the top, we dive into the film’s true crime story (7:00), its examination of gender politics in the 1970s (19:29), and the personal Hollywood experiences Anna embedded into this project (22:00). Then, Kendrick reflects on her early years as a child actor: commuting from Portland,

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83:12

This Conversation with Author Jason Reynolds is a Gift

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/10/20

For the past decade, Jason Reynolds has become an inspiring voice in the literary world. He’s a New York Times bestselling author and as of this month, a 2024 MacArthur fellow. Reynolds sits with us today to share his latest YA novel Twenty-Four Seconds from Now… (7:45), why he was interested in writing a story about boyhood and masculinity (12:05), and an early passage from the book (15:52) that captures the distinct rhythm of his writing (17:59). Then, we talk about the story structure of this new

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85:19

Wesley Morris Returns with ‘The Wonder of Stevie’

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/10/16

Today, culture critic Wesley Morris (The New York Times) returns to Talk Easy for a conversation about The Wonder of Stevie, his new podcast with the Obamas’ Higher Ground Productions. At the top, Wesley unpacks Stevie Wonder’s legendary five-album run from 1972-1976, his recent “battleground states” tour in the run up to the election, and how his relationship to Stevie’s music has evolved in the process of making this limited series. To listen to The Wonder of Stevie, stream here or wherever you

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62:02

Director Jason Reitman’s Love Letter to ‘Saturday Night’

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/10/13

Since his directorial debut in 2006, Jason Reitman has made the kind of films they say Hollywood doesn’t make anymore. Today, we sit to discuss his latest project Saturday Night (9:09), the influence of 1970s movies like Michael Ritchie’s The Candidate (12:46), and the details Reitman and his co-writer Gil Kenan collected from dozens of interviews leading up to production (17:45). Then, Jason describes the dynamic between Lorne Michaels and his father, the late director Ivan Reitman (21:55), his

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64:24

Francis Ford Coppola Stays in the Picture

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/10/06

Director Francis Ford Coppola doesn’t just want to make movies. He wants to change them. This was true in 1969 when he co-founded Zoetrope Studios with George Lucas, and it remains true today at age 85. We begin with the historical context of his modern-day Roman epic fable Megalopolis (9:40), his decades-long process developing the film (12:18), and the inspiration he’s taken from Georges Méliès (22:25) and Jacques Tati (24:59). Then, Coppola reflects on the origin of how he became ‘Francis Ford

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65:09

The Joaquin Phoenix Interview

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/09/29

Joaquin Phoenix is one of the greatest actors of his generation. For three decades, he’s moved seamlessly between auteur-driven films (Her, The Master) and box-office sensations (Gladiator, Joker). We sit today for a rare, long-form conversation with Phoenix, starting with his latest film, Joker: Folie à Deux (9:10), his free-wheeling collaborations with director Todd Phillips (11:32), and the nomadic upbringing that marked his early years (15:00). Then, he reflects on his childhood television

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57:07

Why Myha’la (‘Industry’) is Playing the Long Game

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/09/25

For actor Myha’la, the role of a lifetime arrived less than a year out of college. “Lightning struck,” she says, “and in so many ways I have been preparing my entire life to be here.” In this case ‘here’ is Industry’s Harper Stern, a fiercely ambitious New Yorker who has come to London to join Pierpont, a prestigious financial investment bank. With the season finale of HBO’s breakout hit approaching, we sat down with Myha'la to discuss all things Industry (4:42): how the evolution of Harper can be

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54:23

Actor Ken Leung (‘Industry’) Enters a New Season

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/09/22

For the past couple decades, actor Ken Leung has played scene-stealing characters in films like Rush Hour, Keeping the Faith, and A.I. Or, prestige TV shows like Lost and The Sopranos. Today, he joins us to discuss his spectacular turn in HBO’s Industry (7:30), how he created his character in baseball-bat-wielding manager Eric Tao (9:55), and his Brooklyn upbringing to a family of Chinese immigrants (17:35). Then, he shares how he found his footing as an actor (23:30), a memory of his late younger

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56:50

Abbi Jacobson Interviews Sam

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/09/15

To commemorate his 30th birthday, Abbi Jacobson interviews Sam! They talk about Sam's early days in journalism (8:00), his Almost Famous-like experience as a teenage film critic (10:30), making Talk Easy and how the show evolved post-pandemic (13:15), and the email from the late Roger Ebert that changed his life (22:30). On the back-end, they discuss Abbi’s annual birthday questions (28:00), why Sam’s episode with filmmaker Werner Herzog has stayed with her (31:57), and how he approaches asking hard

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59:34

The First Gen Z Congressman’s Fight for Gun Reform

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/09/08

To start, Sam sits with another week in American life, before returning to our timely conversation with Congressman Maxwell Frost (FL-10). At the top, we discuss the five-year aftermath of the horrific shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida (10:29), his first two months in office as the first Gen-Z Congressman (12:10), and the legislature he’s fighting for to reduce gun violence (17:14). Then, we walk through his impassioned response to the Sandy Hook shooting (19:40), how it

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51:04

Filmmaker Lee Daniels (‘The Deliverance’) Finds His...

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/09/01

This week, our guest is trailblazing filmmaker Lee Daniels. At the top, we discuss his fifteen-year journey to the new Netflix film The Deliverance (5:00), Daniels’ relationship to spirituality (9:16), and his memories of directing theatre at eight-years-old (14:55). Then, we dive into the therapeutic quality of filmmaking (17:14), his work as a casting director at Warner Brothers in the 80s (19:48), and what it meant for Daniels to manage young performers like Morgan Freeman and Loretta Devine

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44:49

Director Steven Soderbergh: Scene by Scene

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/08/29

Since 1989 (Sex, Lies, and Videotape), filmmaker Steven Soderbergh has been a pioneering voice in American cinema. Part free-wheeling iconoclast, part exacting technician. Today, we return to our conversation with the legendary artist. First, Soderbergh describes his process making No Sudden Move amid the pandemic (8:38), his ability to push past creative blocks (14:34), the importance of 1998’s Out of Sight (31:00), the seismic impact of his late mentor, Mike Nichols (27:28), and how a formative

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91:50

We Are So Back (at the Movies) with Sean Fennessey...

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/08/25

We’re so back at the movies… with head of content at The Ringer and co-host of The Big Picture, Sean Fennessey! At the top, Sam and Sean discuss Sean Wang’s Dìdi (8:52), the father-daughter story at the heart of M. Night Shyamalan’s Trap (15:52), and why the documentaries Brats (19:39) and Faye (22:35) make the perfect weekend watch. Then, they talk about the real-life story behind A24’s Sing Sing (27:45), what Borderlands reveals about post-strike Hollywood (29:57), the anticipation building around

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63:25

A Tea with Amelia Dimoldenberg of Chicken Shop Date

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/08/18

What’s the difference between an interview and a first date? For the past decade, Amelia Dimoldenberg has been walking that fine line on her hit YouTube series, Chicken Shop Date. The premise is in the title: filmed at various chicken establishments across London, the show features a series of funny (sometimes awkward) ‘dates’ with everyone from Paul Mescal to Billie Eilish. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of her beloved series, Amelia and Sam have a cup of tea to discuss her recent sit-down with

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85:27

Author Vinson Cunningham on our ‘Great Expectations’...

Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso ·

2024/08/11

Vinson Cunningham has been a staff writer at The New Yorker for the past eight years, covering theater, television, and politics. He joins us this week to unpack his personal debut novel Great Expectations. At the top, we discuss the state of the US election (5:00), the emergence of the new Democratic ticket in Kamala Harris and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (10:00), and the fickleness of internet hype (15:00). Then, Cunningham explains how his new book dovetails with his time working on Barack

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