How Does a 70-Year-Old Film Still Get Hollywood and Broadway So Right?
Youre maudlin and full of self-pity, Addison DeWitt tells Margo Channing midway through All About Eve. Youre magnificent! It might not be the most famous line in the 1951 best-picture Oscar winner (that would be Margos own, Fasten your seat belts, its going to be a bumpy night)but, as Richard Lawson points out on this weeks Little Gold Men podcast, its one of many that feels even funnier and more relevant today. Written and directed by Joseph Mankiewicz, All About Eve remains a blistering satire of both Broadway and Hollywood, of actors and their egos, of critics and their desire for attention, and of people who think the theater is anything more grand than, as the director character Bill Sampson puts it, a flea circus. It even takes the time to skewer awards, opening and closing at the fictional awards ceremony for the Sarah Siddons Society, where the scheming backstabber Eve Harrington effusively thanks all the people she spends the movie trying to destroy. On this weeks Little Gold Men, former cohost Mike Hogan makes his long-awaited return to look back at All About Eve, and share some of the best details from Vanity Fairs 1999 story about the making of the film. He, Richard, Katey Rich, and Joanna Robinson also discuss the newly announced Cannes lineup and the theatrical release, at long last, of In the Heights, which is poised to continue the hopeful trend of people actually returning to movie theaters. And speaking of In the Heights: The episode concludes with a conversation between Katey and Jimmy Smits, who is part of that films starry ensemble. Theres also an interview with Ethan Hawke from Vanity Fair TV critic Sonia Saraiya, discussing Hawkes role as the abolitionist John Brown on the miniseries The Good Lord Bird. Listen to the episode above, and find Little Gold Men on Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get your podcasts. More Great Stories From Vanity Fair   An Oral History of A Different World, as Told by the Cast and Crew   Home Truths: How HGTV, Magnolia, and Netflix Are Building a Massive Space   Cruella de Vil Is WickedBut Tallulah Bankhead Was Even Wilder   Why Mare of Easttown Always Had to End That Way   Cover Story: Issa Rae Says Goodbye to Insecure   Kathryn Hahn All Along   Why Kims Convenience Matters   Court Dismisses Anti-Trans Assault Lawsuit Against Rosario Dawson   From the Archive: When Jennifer Lopez and Alex Rodriguez Made Perfect Sense   Sign up for the HWD Daily newsletter for must-read industry and awards coverageplus a special weekly edition of Awards Insider.