In today’s episode, Eric Sandler, chief strategy officer for Pushkin Industries, details the audio studio’s fall slate, which includes a look back at “The Big Short” with Michael Lewis and Pushkin co-founder Malcolm Gladwell taking on an infamous Alabama murder case on “Revisionist History.” Also, Jem Aswad, Variety’s executive editor of music, details his recent sit-down with the inimitable David Byrne.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily dose of news and
analysis for entertainment industry insiders. It's Thursday, September fourth, twenty
twenty five. I'm your host, Cynthia Lyttleton. I am co
editor in chief of Variety alongside Ramin Setuda. I'm in
LA he's in New York, and Righty has reporters around
the world covering the business of entertainment. In today's episode,
(00:29):
we'll talk to Eric Sandler, chief strategy officer for Pushkin Industries,
a purveyor of fine podcasts. And we'll hear from jem
Ales Wad, Variety's executive editor of Music, on his recent
sit down with the inimitable David Byrne. But before we
get to that, here are a few headlines just in
this morning that you need to know. Plan B is
(00:50):
making big moves after being acquired by France's Media One.
The new owners of Brad Pitt's production Banner have set
up Plan B Europe. Baby Reindeer producer Ed MacDonald will
run it out of London. Parents, mark your calendars. Disney
and BBC Studios have dated the Bluey feature film for
release on August six, twenty twenty seven, and Roku has
(01:12):
tapped Lisa Holme as head of content. She was most
recently with Peter Churnan's North Road Company. She's also worked
in strategy and content licensing for Warner Brothers, Discovery, and Hulu.
All of these stories and so much more can be
found on Variety dot com right now. Now we turn
to conversations with Variety journalists and industry leaders about the
(01:35):
business of entertainment. Today, my guest is Eric Sandler, chief
strategy officer for Pushkin Industries. He's here to talk about
the company's slate of new shows. They include Revisiting The
Big Short with author Michael Lewis and a new season
of Revisionist History with Malcolm Gladwell. If you are a
fan of great narrative podcasts, you know this sound Pushkin.
(02:05):
Eric Sandler, chief strategy Officer for Pushkin Industries, thank you
so much for joining me.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Thanks for having me. I'm e's SciTE to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I'm a Pushkin fans. You do my kind of podcast,
very thoughtful, deep dives into corners of history that I
didn't know about. Eric, you have some news, you have
a broad new slate, some really interesting stuff coming. I
wanted to talk first about the macro podcasting environment. Where
are you seeing the most pockets of growth, the biggest
opportunities for your top titles.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
The industry has been around for quite a few years now,
but in some ways it still feels really new. You
still have people who have never listened to a podcast,
even though that percentage is shrinking at this point. What
we find is that quality matters, right, The more quality
storytelling you put out, the more audience you will grow
from there. But there's been some turmoil in the industry
(02:59):
and some changes to the models of how things are consumed.
We continue to see more and more people come to
this medium and because of the intimacy of it. Malcolm
Gladwar co founder, always like to say that if you
want to make someone think about something, then he'll write
it in a book. If he wants to make someone
feel something, he'll put it into audio.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
It's a different way to absorb, especially complicated information. In
the hardcore business of pushkin you have ads supported podcast,
but you also do have a subscription platform as well.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
That's correct, so we're at support of the cross our
podcast bill so have push and network wide subscription. We
offer ad pre content, we offer binge opportunities, early access,
bonus content. Another pillar of what we do is audiobooks, though,
which is pushed in. So many of our hosts and
our creators are also authors, and so we see a
(03:49):
really cohesive audience across podcasts and audiobooks. And there's a
really interesting pipeline that we're creating, which is a space
that used to be held by magazines and newspaper And
this is something that Malcolm's thought a lot about. When
he wrote The Tipping Point, his first book. It was
first an article in The New Yorker, and there were
so many of his peers that were growing up in
(04:09):
this industry that was building them to be the next
best selling authors, the next script writers, the next movie
script writers. That ecosystem has changed, and podcasting is filling
that space. And so what we see is the ability
to take a podcast series that's a couple episodes and
then expanded into an audiobook and a print book and
a TV film option as well. So an example that
(04:32):
would be Malcolm's Bomber Mafia series. It started four episodes
in Revision's History a couple of years ago, got turned
into an audiobook and we did a little bit of
a reversal of the pipeline and we sold the print
rights and that got optioned by A twenty four for
a TV film, And so we want to create more
opportunities for more storytellers to use this as a testing
ground for content, really drive home really impactful stories and
(04:56):
be able to explore the funnel in a different way.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
Part of the the news that we're talking about today
also is you have re upped your Pushkin Industry's relationship
with iHeart Podcasts, who you've had at partnership for about
five years. Are there things that you've been able to
do in tandem with iHeart that you don't think you
would have been able to do on your own.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
iHeart is a remarkable partner for us. They continue to
really excel it at scale and distribution as well as positioning
Pushkin as a premium ad sales opportunities. They continue to
treat us as a network with premium storytelling that can
bring that to brands, and their ability to do that
has increased year over year.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
At within the partnership with iHeart, are you able to
still be a free agent in other areas like content licensing?
Speaker 2 (05:42):
So iHeart is our exclusive ads and monetization partner across
our podcasts. What that means is the dynamic odd opportunities
across our inventory are handled by iHeart. But in terms
of the IP and the audiobooks and things like that,
Pushkin remains independent, and we're creatively independent as well. You know,
we remain sort of best of both world.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Do you have a basic volume of titles that you
want to have in a given year or a given
half year. Do you think about it along those lines
in terms of organizing your sleep.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
No, not necessarily a volume. We have quite a few
ongoing shows that work on different cadences. So obviously we
have always on shows. We have shows that comes easily,
we have shows that are bi weekly, We have shows
on sort of all different kindences, and we want to
continue growing new shows and giving those new shows opportunities
in the network.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
So two of your boldest names in the Pushkin firmament
have new projects coming. Malcolm Book Gladwell is back with
a new season of revisionist history, this time taking on
capital punishment, looking at a case that played down in Alabama.
When you have a new Malcolm project, now that's really
like a tenth poll for you, can you give us
a sense of how this will be rolled out.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
I was talking to Malcolm recently and he made the
comment that he thought this could be one of the
best things he's done since starting Pushkin. The fact that
the creators that we work with Malcolm, specifically our creating
content that gets better and better is absolutely remarkable to me. Like,
we also have Jake Halprin on the network, who Variety
named one of the ten storytellers to watch for twenty
twenty five, and you just published the sixth season in
(07:13):
deep Cover and it hit number one for the first time.
That show continues to get better and better and better.
I think this season, specifically for Malcolm, will be something
new for folks. It's not quite true crime, but it
has elements of the true crime series that people are
familiar with in the Malcolm style that gets his message across.
So it's going to be seven episodes and it's launching
(07:35):
October second, and you'll see quite a bit of the
press around that. Of course Malcolm will be speaking about.
It's a hefty topic.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Else Michael lewis as if I understand this right, Pushkin
is going to re release The Big Short as an
audio book as part of that Michael Lewis is going
to host a companion series as part of his ongoing
Against the Rules series that will launch October fourteenth, And
look back now at ten years since the Big Short,
what's changed, What's not? It sounds so good. This is
(08:03):
the kind of thing that now you're going to use
this to bring attention to other new shows.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Absolutely, I mean, I think this is one of the
coolest projects that we do with Michael, honestly, and it
speaks to the depth of the content that the creators
we work with. May you know, it's ten years since
the book, but it's almost like a content pipeline reversal.
Fifteen years ago, it was a best selling book, ten
years ago as an Oscar winning film, and next month
it's going to be companion podcast with an audiobook, which
(08:28):
he never did when back in the day when he
wrote the book. It's still as relevant today as it
was when he wrote it.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
And a title coming up called The Chinatown Sting, a
six episode limited series that is premiering September sixteenth. It's
from Lydia Jean Caught. Anybody who listened to Michael Lewis's
podcast coverage of the Sam Bankman Freed Trial knows Lydia
Jean she was a star of that series and can't
(08:54):
wait for her to dive into its late nineteen eighties
Manhattan's Chinatown massive un Undercover Drug Bust sounds like a
lot of things to revisit.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
I could not be more excited for this one. We're
launching it and shortly and then we're doing a live
event with her at Amajong Parlor with Michael interviewing LJ.
Alongside a bunch of big short events too, So it
really shows the network effect of Pushkin.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
You have a number of other titles coming listeners. You
can read a whole separate story about this on Variety
dot com right now. Anything you'd like particularly like to highlight.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
I'd say Heavyweight, Heavyweight, Heavyweight. We are so thrilled that
Heavyweight joined the Pushkin network. It came up through the
Spotify ranks and the production had stopped about a year
and a half ago, and we just couldn't let Heavyweight go.
Is one of those shows that either you've never heard
of Heavyweight or this is your favorite show of all time.
It is such an amazing journey that it takes listeners
(09:48):
on and I think There's something so special about investing
in stories that unfold over time. So we're thrilled to
be bringing a new season of that coming shortly a
couple of weeks here.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Eric, my last question for you is the name Pushkin.
Alexander Pushkin was a very colorful figure, a literary figure,
a poet and writer active in Russia in the early
eighteen hundreds, and he met an Alexander Hamilton like end
in a duel. Do you know the origin story of
why they called it Pushkin Industries.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Pushkin represents a multicultural creator who wasn't afraid to shift
the boundaries and explore storytelling and creativity whatever that format
may look like, and that goes to the core of
how Pushkin Industries was started and the type of work
that we want to do. We want to blow the
lines between genres and formats, and we want to have
(10:40):
diverse voices across our network, and we want to create
content that stands with tests the time and also makes
a real impact of people's lives.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
Eric, thank you for your time, thanks for having me.
And now jam Oleswad talks to us about his profile
of musician David Byrne, the former Talking Heads front man
has lived many lives in music, and Jem has followed
them all. Here he guides us through his fruitful hour
with a seminal artist, Jem Oswad. Thank you for joining me.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
Always a pleasure, Cynthia.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
This is one of those stories that I knew before
it went out the door. Your profile of David Byrne
truly a seminal figure, at your passion for him and
his work and his eccentricities, it just leapt off the
page and I knew that I was going to have
you on to talk about it.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
Well.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
Thank you for saying that.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
It's very clear from reading it that you are a
longtime fan. You are somebody who has been able to
see Burne evolved from the talking heads to the global
music figure that he has become. For your fourteen year
old self, as you talk about in the stories, what
was it about David Byrne? What was it about his
music that spoke to you?
Speaker 3 (11:47):
I grew up in Bingham to New York, which is
hardly a cultural mecca for anyone, although there's a university
in town. Obviously, the local record store had a lot
of new wave fans working there, and they had the
talking heads in for an in store appearance when I
was fourteen years old. Chris France, the drummer, the nicest guy,
(12:07):
being really friendly with my fourteen year old self, but
David Byrne was kind of awkward and people seemed reluctant
to approach him. And I got everyone's autographs and he
signed his in block letters, which I just thought was
the strangest thing. Over the next few years, especially in college,
I saw them twice, and like a lot of people
(12:29):
in the early to mid eighties, they were one of
my favorite bands. The tour that became the Stop Making
Sense film I saw also in Binghamton, and it's still
one of the best shows I've ever seen in my
whole life.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
I just want to stop you there to say I
saw the Stop Making Sense to our that is so cool,
and because it was captured in this incredible film that
I must have seen about twenty five times.
Speaker 3 (12:53):
Broom County Veterans Memorial Arena.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
Can you take yourself back and remember what it was
like to experience that show that so many of us
know from the movie, but to experience it live.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
Oh it was. I tend to remember concerts very well. Anyway,
I remember him dancing with the stand up light during
Naive Melody. I remember, especially the song that really stays
with me from it is Once in a Lifetime. It
really literally gave me chills, especially the part towards the
end where they're singing letting the Days go by, and
(13:25):
the two backing singers they're sort of like leaning over
backwards and they slowly come back up. The whole show
is just unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Did you get the big suit?
Speaker 3 (13:35):
The entire thing? I noticed that they like switched a
song from the first album from the show I saw
to the version that's in the film. Other than that,
the show was identical it.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
So, Jim, you've tracked his career at various stages. This
is your first sit down with him. Your story is
fantastic for the detail of what it's like to be
David Byrne's space. What was that like for you?
Speaker 3 (13:57):
Well, so here's the funny thing. His office is what's
downtown New York. As you would expect, of course, he
rides his bike there. He rides his bike everywhere. It's
a loft like space. It's sort of one long room
and he's got a private office at the end. But
walking in there is this vast floor to ceiling wall
(14:18):
of shelves that are just loaded with stuff, And it's
sort of like looking at his brain because it's tons
of vinyl and tons of CDs and tons of DVDs.
There was a Grammy, There was an Oscar. I think
there was a VMA moon Man as well. There were
a couple of other things in there, but most striking
(14:40):
were anatomical models. There was a couple of the human
brain and he actually opened the American Utopia Broadway show
holding up a brain and talking about how our brains work.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
How did you find him as an interview subject? Did
you find him forthcoming?
Speaker 3 (14:58):
He was a to put it that way. You could
tell he knows the dance. He's been doing this for
a long time. He was warm, he was personable. I
had really thought about the questions and he seemed to
appreciate that, and the answers are very good and thoroughly
thought through. But when we hit the hour mark, I
(15:20):
could tell he was ready to do something else. He
had given me the hour and he's busy. When we
were done.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
We were done.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
Thank you Jim for giving us this glimpse into David
Byrne's brain.
Speaker 3 (15:32):
Thank you Cynthia for saying such nice things about the article.
Speaker 1 (15:35):
Naturally, we'll end this segment with a clip of the
man himself. Here's David Byrne's most recent pop tune, Everybody Laughs.
It's from his new album Who Is This Guy, to
be released September fifth on Matador Records two one, two three. Damn.
(16:02):
Everybody laughs and everybody, Everybody lives in, Everybody does, Everybody eats,
and everybody loves. Everybody knows what everybody does.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
Everybody's going to the changes, every commation.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Now it's time for a Vintage Variety segment. As Emmy
Week approaches, I figured it was a good time to
look at the history of the varieties. Language word kudo
cast kudo cast means an award ceremony that is broadcast
live or nowadays live stream. A kudo is defined by
Webster's Dictionary as meaning either praise or compliments, or an
(16:49):
award or accommendation. Variety's kudo cast is one word spelled kudocast.
It's t me, but the first use of kudo cast
and variety didn't come till February seventeenth, nineteen ninety one.
It appears to have been coined by my treasured former
(17:09):
colleague Tom Bierbaum, who wrote rating stories for decades. He
used it to refer to the Grammy Awards, referring to
the kudocast's strong performance. Four weeks later, Tom used kudo
cast again in another rating story in reference to the
People's Choice Awards. For context, Variety had regularly used the
(17:31):
terms oscar cast and Emmy cast for more than thirty
years prior to Tom's coinage of kudo cast. Oscar cast
was first mentioned in the March twenty eighth, nineteen fifty
eight edition in a rating story. That year, the Academy
Awards aired from ten thirty pm to twelve fifteen am
on a Wednesday night on NBC. It drew forty six
(17:55):
million viewers. A term Emmy cast was first used in
Variety the following year, back to kudo cast. The first
person not named Tom Bierbaum to use it in a
story was my old boss and a predecessor of mine
as co editor in chief, Timothy M.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Gray.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Tim Pendacolumn published on June twenty sixth, nineteen ninety two,
about the problems with producing award shows. Side note, Tim Gray,
of all people would appreciate me pointing out here that
he now works for the Golden Globe Awards. By nineteen
ninety three, Kudo cast was in heavy rotation in varieties, pages,
(18:34):
in stories, and in headlines. The letter K looks great
in sixty point type. Thanks Tom. As we close out
today's episode, here's a few things we're watching for The
Toronto Film Festival starts today. We have a big group
of reporters and editors up there ready to cover all
(18:54):
the screenings and track all the deals. The paper premieres
today on Peacock Scranton Forever. Next week, Fariety will unveil
its annual Producer's Impact Report, we look at the state
of the art and the state of the deals for
movers and shakers in television. Before we go, congrats in
advance to all of this weekend's Creative Art semi winners.
(19:15):
I'll be there on Saturday with my treasured colleague Jazz
tank A, covering Night one, and Jazz will also be
back for Night two on Sunday. Follow all of the
creative Art semi news in real time this weekend on
Variety dot com and on our social channels, And next
week it's all hands on Deck as We Marshall team
(19:35):
coverage of the seventy seventh Emmy Awards, airing Sunday, September
fourteenth on CBS. Thanks for listening. This episode was written
and reported by me Cynthia Lyttleton, with contributions from jem Oswad.
It was edited by Aaron Greenwald stix nixx hick Picks.
Please leave us a review at the podcast platform of
(19:56):
your choice, and please tune in Monday for another episode
of Daily Vary
Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily dose of news and
analysis for entertainment industry insiders. It's Thursday, September fourth, twenty
twenty five. I'm your host, Cynthia Lyttleton. I am co
editor in chief of Variety alongside Ramin Setuda. I'm in
LA he's in New York, and Righty has reporters around
the world covering the business of entertainment. In today's episode,
(00:29):
we'll talk to Eric Sandler, chief strategy officer for Pushkin Industries,
a purveyor of fine podcasts. And we'll hear from jem
Ales Wad, Variety's executive editor of Music, on his recent
sit down with the inimitable David Byrne. But before we
get to that, here are a few headlines just in
this morning that you need to know. Plan B is
(00:50):
making big moves after being acquired by France's Media One.
The new owners of Brad Pitt's production Banner have set
up Plan B Europe. Baby Reindeer producer Ed MacDonald will
run it out of London. Parents, mark your calendars. Disney
and BBC Studios have dated the Bluey feature film for
release on August six, twenty twenty seven, and Roku has
(01:12):
tapped Lisa Holme as head of content. She was most
recently with Peter Churnan's North Road Company. She's also worked
in strategy and content licensing for Warner Brothers, Discovery, and Hulu.
All of these stories and so much more can be
found on Variety dot com right now. Now we turn
to conversations with Variety journalists and industry leaders about the
(01:35):
business of entertainment. Today, my guest is Eric Sandler, chief
strategy officer for Pushkin Industries. He's here to talk about
the company's slate of new shows. They include Revisiting The
Big Short with author Michael Lewis and a new season
of Revisionist History with Malcolm Gladwell. If you are a
fan of great narrative podcasts, you know this sound Pushkin.
(02:05):
Eric Sandler, chief strategy Officer for Pushkin Industries, thank you
so much for joining me.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Thanks for having me. I'm e's SciTE to be here.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I'm a Pushkin fans. You do my kind of podcast,
very thoughtful, deep dives into corners of history that I
didn't know about. Eric, you have some news, you have
a broad new slate, some really interesting stuff coming. I
wanted to talk first about the macro podcasting environment. Where
are you seeing the most pockets of growth, the biggest
opportunities for your top titles.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
The industry has been around for quite a few years now,
but in some ways it still feels really new. You
still have people who have never listened to a podcast,
even though that percentage is shrinking at this point. What
we find is that quality matters, right, The more quality
storytelling you put out, the more audience you will grow
from there. But there's been some turmoil in the industry
(02:59):
and some changes to the models of how things are consumed.
We continue to see more and more people come to
this medium and because of the intimacy of it. Malcolm
Gladwar co founder, always like to say that if you
want to make someone think about something, then he'll write
it in a book. If he wants to make someone
feel something, he'll put it into audio.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
It's a different way to absorb, especially complicated information. In
the hardcore business of pushkin you have ads supported podcast,
but you also do have a subscription platform as well.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
That's correct, so we're at support of the cross our
podcast bill so have push and network wide subscription. We
offer ad pre content, we offer binge opportunities, early access,
bonus content. Another pillar of what we do is audiobooks, though,
which is pushed in. So many of our hosts and
our creators are also authors, and so we see a
(03:49):
really cohesive audience across podcasts and audiobooks. And there's a
really interesting pipeline that we're creating, which is a space
that used to be held by magazines and newspaper And
this is something that Malcolm's thought a lot about. When
he wrote The Tipping Point, his first book. It was
first an article in The New Yorker, and there were
so many of his peers that were growing up in
(04:09):
this industry that was building them to be the next
best selling authors, the next script writers, the next movie
script writers. That ecosystem has changed, and podcasting is filling
that space. And so what we see is the ability
to take a podcast series that's a couple episodes and
then expanded into an audiobook and a print book and
a TV film option as well. So an example that
(04:32):
would be Malcolm's Bomber Mafia series. It started four episodes
in Revision's History a couple of years ago, got turned
into an audiobook and we did a little bit of
a reversal of the pipeline and we sold the print
rights and that got optioned by A twenty four for
a TV film, And so we want to create more
opportunities for more storytellers to use this as a testing
ground for content, really drive home really impactful stories and
(04:56):
be able to explore the funnel in a different way.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
Part of the the news that we're talking about today
also is you have re upped your Pushkin Industry's relationship
with iHeart Podcasts, who you've had at partnership for about
five years. Are there things that you've been able to
do in tandem with iHeart that you don't think you
would have been able to do on your own.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
iHeart is a remarkable partner for us. They continue to
really excel it at scale and distribution as well as positioning
Pushkin as a premium ad sales opportunities. They continue to
treat us as a network with premium storytelling that can
bring that to brands, and their ability to do that
has increased year over year.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
At within the partnership with iHeart, are you able to
still be a free agent in other areas like content licensing?
Speaker 2 (05:42):
So iHeart is our exclusive ads and monetization partner across
our podcasts. What that means is the dynamic odd opportunities
across our inventory are handled by iHeart. But in terms
of the IP and the audiobooks and things like that,
Pushkin remains independent, and we're creatively independent as well. You know,
we remain sort of best of both world.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Do you have a basic volume of titles that you
want to have in a given year or a given
half year. Do you think about it along those lines
in terms of organizing your sleep.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
No, not necessarily a volume. We have quite a few
ongoing shows that work on different cadences. So obviously we
have always on shows. We have shows that comes easily,
we have shows that are bi weekly, We have shows
on sort of all different kindences, and we want to
continue growing new shows and giving those new shows opportunities
in the network.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
So two of your boldest names in the Pushkin firmament
have new projects coming. Malcolm Book Gladwell is back with
a new season of revisionist history, this time taking on
capital punishment, looking at a case that played down in Alabama.
When you have a new Malcolm project, now that's really
like a tenth poll for you, can you give us
a sense of how this will be rolled out.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
I was talking to Malcolm recently and he made the
comment that he thought this could be one of the
best things he's done since starting Pushkin. The fact that
the creators that we work with Malcolm, specifically our creating
content that gets better and better is absolutely remarkable to me. Like,
we also have Jake Halprin on the network, who Variety
named one of the ten storytellers to watch for twenty
twenty five, and you just published the sixth season in
(07:13):
deep Cover and it hit number one for the first time.
That show continues to get better and better and better.
I think this season, specifically for Malcolm, will be something
new for folks. It's not quite true crime, but it
has elements of the true crime series that people are
familiar with in the Malcolm style that gets his message across.
So it's going to be seven episodes and it's launching
(07:35):
October second, and you'll see quite a bit of the
press around that. Of course Malcolm will be speaking about.
It's a hefty topic.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Else Michael lewis as if I understand this right, Pushkin
is going to re release The Big Short as an
audio book as part of that Michael Lewis is going
to host a companion series as part of his ongoing
Against the Rules series that will launch October fourteenth, And
look back now at ten years since the Big Short,
what's changed, What's not? It sounds so good. This is
(08:03):
the kind of thing that now you're going to use
this to bring attention to other new shows.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Absolutely, I mean, I think this is one of the
coolest projects that we do with Michael, honestly, and it
speaks to the depth of the content that the creators
we work with. May you know, it's ten years since
the book, but it's almost like a content pipeline reversal.
Fifteen years ago, it was a best selling book, ten
years ago as an Oscar winning film, and next month
it's going to be companion podcast with an audiobook, which
(08:28):
he never did when back in the day when he
wrote the book. It's still as relevant today as it
was when he wrote it.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
And a title coming up called The Chinatown Sting, a
six episode limited series that is premiering September sixteenth. It's
from Lydia Jean Caught. Anybody who listened to Michael Lewis's
podcast coverage of the Sam Bankman Freed Trial knows Lydia
Jean she was a star of that series and can't
(08:54):
wait for her to dive into its late nineteen eighties
Manhattan's Chinatown massive un Undercover Drug Bust sounds like a
lot of things to revisit.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
I could not be more excited for this one. We're
launching it and shortly and then we're doing a live
event with her at Amajong Parlor with Michael interviewing LJ.
Alongside a bunch of big short events too, So it
really shows the network effect of Pushkin.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
You have a number of other titles coming listeners. You
can read a whole separate story about this on Variety
dot com right now. Anything you'd like particularly like to highlight.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
I'd say Heavyweight, Heavyweight, Heavyweight. We are so thrilled that
Heavyweight joined the Pushkin network. It came up through the
Spotify ranks and the production had stopped about a year
and a half ago, and we just couldn't let Heavyweight go.
Is one of those shows that either you've never heard
of Heavyweight or this is your favorite show of all time.
It is such an amazing journey that it takes listeners
(09:48):
on and I think There's something so special about investing
in stories that unfold over time. So we're thrilled to
be bringing a new season of that coming shortly a
couple of weeks here.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Eric, my last question for you is the name Pushkin.
Alexander Pushkin was a very colorful figure, a literary figure,
a poet and writer active in Russia in the early
eighteen hundreds, and he met an Alexander Hamilton like end
in a duel. Do you know the origin story of
why they called it Pushkin Industries.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Pushkin represents a multicultural creator who wasn't afraid to shift
the boundaries and explore storytelling and creativity whatever that format
may look like, and that goes to the core of
how Pushkin Industries was started and the type of work
that we want to do. We want to blow the
lines between genres and formats, and we want to have
(10:40):
diverse voices across our network, and we want to create
content that stands with tests the time and also makes
a real impact of people's lives.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
Eric, thank you for your time, thanks for having me.
And now jam Oleswad talks to us about his profile
of musician David Byrne, the former Talking Heads front man
has lived many lives in music, and Jem has followed
them all. Here he guides us through his fruitful hour
with a seminal artist, Jem Oswad. Thank you for joining me.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
Always a pleasure, Cynthia.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
This is one of those stories that I knew before
it went out the door. Your profile of David Byrne
truly a seminal figure, at your passion for him and
his work and his eccentricities, it just leapt off the
page and I knew that I was going to have
you on to talk about it.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
Well.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
Thank you for saying that.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
It's very clear from reading it that you are a
longtime fan. You are somebody who has been able to
see Burne evolved from the talking heads to the global
music figure that he has become. For your fourteen year
old self, as you talk about in the stories, what
was it about David Byrne? What was it about his
music that spoke to you?
Speaker 3 (11:47):
I grew up in Bingham to New York, which is
hardly a cultural mecca for anyone, although there's a university
in town. Obviously, the local record store had a lot
of new wave fans working there, and they had the
talking heads in for an in store appearance when I
was fourteen years old. Chris France, the drummer, the nicest guy,
(12:07):
being really friendly with my fourteen year old self, but
David Byrne was kind of awkward and people seemed reluctant
to approach him. And I got everyone's autographs and he
signed his in block letters, which I just thought was
the strangest thing. Over the next few years, especially in college,
I saw them twice, and like a lot of people
(12:29):
in the early to mid eighties, they were one of
my favorite bands. The tour that became the Stop Making
Sense film I saw also in Binghamton, and it's still
one of the best shows I've ever seen in my
whole life.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
I just want to stop you there to say I
saw the Stop Making Sense to our that is so cool,
and because it was captured in this incredible film that
I must have seen about twenty five times.
Speaker 3 (12:53):
Broom County Veterans Memorial Arena.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
Can you take yourself back and remember what it was
like to experience that show that so many of us
know from the movie, but to experience it live.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
Oh it was. I tend to remember concerts very well. Anyway,
I remember him dancing with the stand up light during
Naive Melody. I remember, especially the song that really stays
with me from it is Once in a Lifetime. It
really literally gave me chills, especially the part towards the
end where they're singing letting the Days go by, and
(13:25):
the two backing singers they're sort of like leaning over
backwards and they slowly come back up. The whole show
is just unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Did you get the big suit?
Speaker 3 (13:35):
The entire thing? I noticed that they like switched a
song from the first album from the show I saw
to the version that's in the film. Other than that,
the show was identical it.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
So, Jim, you've tracked his career at various stages. This
is your first sit down with him. Your story is
fantastic for the detail of what it's like to be
David Byrne's space. What was that like for you?
Speaker 3 (13:57):
Well, so here's the funny thing. His office is what's
downtown New York. As you would expect, of course, he
rides his bike there. He rides his bike everywhere. It's
a loft like space. It's sort of one long room
and he's got a private office at the end. But
walking in there is this vast floor to ceiling wall
(14:18):
of shelves that are just loaded with stuff, And it's
sort of like looking at his brain because it's tons
of vinyl and tons of CDs and tons of DVDs.
There was a Grammy, There was an Oscar. I think
there was a VMA moon Man as well. There were
a couple of other things in there, but most striking
(14:40):
were anatomical models. There was a couple of the human
brain and he actually opened the American Utopia Broadway show
holding up a brain and talking about how our brains work.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
How did you find him as an interview subject? Did
you find him forthcoming?
Speaker 3 (14:58):
He was a to put it that way. You could
tell he knows the dance. He's been doing this for
a long time. He was warm, he was personable. I
had really thought about the questions and he seemed to
appreciate that, and the answers are very good and thoroughly
thought through. But when we hit the hour mark, I
(15:20):
could tell he was ready to do something else. He
had given me the hour and he's busy. When we
were done.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
We were done.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
Thank you Jim for giving us this glimpse into David
Byrne's brain.
Speaker 3 (15:32):
Thank you Cynthia for saying such nice things about the article.
Speaker 1 (15:35):
Naturally, we'll end this segment with a clip of the
man himself. Here's David Byrne's most recent pop tune, Everybody Laughs.
It's from his new album Who Is This Guy, to
be released September fifth on Matador Records two one, two three. Damn.
(16:02):
Everybody laughs and everybody, Everybody lives in, Everybody does, Everybody eats,
and everybody loves. Everybody knows what everybody does.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
Everybody's going to the changes, every commation.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Now it's time for a Vintage Variety segment. As Emmy
Week approaches, I figured it was a good time to
look at the history of the varieties. Language word kudo
cast kudo cast means an award ceremony that is broadcast
live or nowadays live stream. A kudo is defined by
Webster's Dictionary as meaning either praise or compliments, or an
(16:49):
award or accommendation. Variety's kudo cast is one word spelled kudocast.
It's t me, but the first use of kudo cast
and variety didn't come till February seventeenth, nineteen ninety one.
It appears to have been coined by my treasured former
(17:09):
colleague Tom Bierbaum, who wrote rating stories for decades. He
used it to refer to the Grammy Awards, referring to
the kudocast's strong performance. Four weeks later, Tom used kudo
cast again in another rating story in reference to the
People's Choice Awards. For context, Variety had regularly used the
(17:31):
terms oscar cast and Emmy cast for more than thirty
years prior to Tom's coinage of kudo cast. Oscar cast
was first mentioned in the March twenty eighth, nineteen fifty
eight edition in a rating story. That year, the Academy
Awards aired from ten thirty pm to twelve fifteen am
on a Wednesday night on NBC. It drew forty six
(17:55):
million viewers. A term Emmy cast was first used in
Variety the following year, back to kudo cast. The first
person not named Tom Bierbaum to use it in a
story was my old boss and a predecessor of mine
as co editor in chief, Timothy M.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Gray.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Tim Pendacolumn published on June twenty sixth, nineteen ninety two,
about the problems with producing award shows. Side note, Tim Gray,
of all people would appreciate me pointing out here that
he now works for the Golden Globe Awards. By nineteen
ninety three, Kudo cast was in heavy rotation in varieties, pages,
(18:34):
in stories, and in headlines. The letter K looks great
in sixty point type. Thanks Tom. As we close out
today's episode, here's a few things we're watching for The
Toronto Film Festival starts today. We have a big group
of reporters and editors up there ready to cover all
(18:54):
the screenings and track all the deals. The paper premieres
today on Peacock Scranton Forever. Next week, Fariety will unveil
its annual Producer's Impact Report, we look at the state
of the art and the state of the deals for
movers and shakers in television. Before we go, congrats in
advance to all of this weekend's Creative Art semi winners.
(19:15):
I'll be there on Saturday with my treasured colleague Jazz
tank A, covering Night one, and Jazz will also be
back for Night two on Sunday. Follow all of the
creative Art semi news in real time this weekend on
Variety dot com and on our social channels, And next
week it's all hands on Deck as We Marshall team
(19:35):
coverage of the seventy seventh Emmy Awards, airing Sunday, September
fourteenth on CBS. Thanks for listening. This episode was written
and reported by me Cynthia Lyttleton, with contributions from jem Oswad.
It was edited by Aaron Greenwald stix nixx hick Picks.
Please leave us a review at the podcast platform of
(19:56):
your choice, and please tune in Monday for another episode
of Daily Vary
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