Ep 74 – Their Finest – Wartime Propaganda with The Donut Dollies

In this episode of Rosie the Reviewer, we’re joined by Winnie and Gabby from the Donut Dollies podcast to discuss Their Finest (2016), Lone Scherfig’s adaptation of Lissa Evans’ novel Their Finest Hour and a Half. Together we unpack the film’s blend of romance, tragedy, and wartime propaganda, as well as how it compares to the book. Surprisingly much debate about Sam Claflin’s casting, the power of women in the Ministry of Information, and why Bill Nighy steals every scene as Ambrose Hilliard. Plus, the real history of women in Britain’s propaganda machine.

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Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Welcome to Rosie the Reviewer. We're your host.
I'm Sam. And I'm married you.
And we like World War 2 media, and we want to talk about it.
Welcome back to Rosie the Reviewer.
This week, we're talking about the movie Their Finest, which
came out of 2016. It was directed by Lana Scherfig

(00:22):
and written by Gabby Cape. And it's based on the 2009 novel
Their Finest Hour and a Half by Alyssa Evans, which I believe
was retitled Their Finest to match the movie.
It's a fictional account of a British Ministry of Information
team making a propaganda film about the Dunkirk evacuation.
And we are joined this week by the two hosts of another World
War 2 podcast that you all should check out, the Donut

(00:43):
Dollies. Winnie and Gabby, welcome to
Rosie. Hello, thank you for having us.
We're really excited to be here.So we're very excited to talk
about the book and the movie. So let's give our general
impressions. Mark, what did you think of the
movie? I think I'm the only one who
hasn't read any part of the book, so the movie is all I have

(01:04):
to go on. And I really like the movie.
Or at least I thought I did. And then no, I'm not gonna lie,
I still like it. But I was a little bit shocked
by the almost ending of the movie and I did not see it
coming. And it made me a little sad
because before a certain point in the movie, I was like, this
is going to be my feel good movie when I'm sort of sad and I

(01:27):
want to get into something happy.
And then something happened in the movie and then I was like,
oh, wait, it's no longer that happy.
So yeah, I liked it. I thought the acting was good.
The Guest is fantastic. I especially liked Bill Nighy,
think he's great. And well, I think I will watch
it again. How about you, Woody?

(01:47):
What did you think of the movie?I really enjoyed it.
I thought I had seen it before but it turns out I was getting
it mixed up with the Potato PeelPie Society that has Lily James
in it. So when I turned on their finest
I said oh I haven't actually seen this so it was a nice
surprise. I really enjoyed it.
I also loved the calf. I really loved Helen Mcgrory in

(02:09):
it because she's always excellent.
Yeah, I really, I enjoyed it. I felt the same as you, Martha,
where I was like, oh, this is going to be one of those movies
that I can watch, and it's supercomforting.
And then that almost ending, it's so unexpected.
If you haven't read the book, you do not expect it to happen.
So I was sort of, oh, no. And then I was crying, of

(02:30):
course, because it was very sad.But yeah, I agree, I would watch
it again but I'm glad I know theending now.
But I wish I had finished the book first so I could expect it.
It was very unexpected but yes, enjoyable.
I liked it. Well, I also really liked it.
I read the book 1st and it was also, I mean the ending was
pretty unexpected in the book too.

(02:51):
And they do a sort of thing where you don't immediately know
what has happened to everybody. They sort of give you the
aftermath, I guess, and little drips and drabs.
You're like, Oh my God, what happened to Ambrose?
What happened to all these different characters?
I thought all of the characters were a treat.
I really love Ambrose Hilliard in the book and in the movie.
I think he's just such a fun, delicious character.

(03:11):
I love that there's tons of women with things to do in this
book. I think it's particularly
interesting how sort of the maincharacter is hired to write the
women's dialogue or quote UN quote, write the slop as they
call it, and she has this character has agency and gets to
actually do things. And this book was, of course,
written by a female writer. And so it was just like, really

(03:33):
fun to sort of get that side of things a little more than we
often do in war media. And yeah, I had a really good
time. I highly recommended the book.
And I have a few quibbles about the, I guess, the transition
into movies. Like, there's a few things that
they change where I was like, I don't know about that.
But overall, I really enjoyed it.
What about you, Gabby? I really enjoyed the movie and

(03:55):
like you, I read the book beforeI watched the movie and I found
myself as I typically do and there's a book and a movie
adaptation is comparing 1 to theother.
And I did in a sense prefer then.
I know you can't translate everything over to a movie, but
I did in a sense prefer the bookas far as characters being
fleshed out more. Like just knowing more about

(04:16):
Ambers Hilliard and about Catherine Cole and about
Buckley. I just found that you got more
of a sense of their personality in the book.
And then when I watched the movie, I had a completely
different picture of of Tom Buckley in my head.
Just not good looking Sam Clayton, but a completely
different picture in my head. But I did love that there seemed

(04:38):
to be this intellectual bond between him and Catherine Cole,
which was just, it really drove everything forward in the movie.
But it was very feel good. Very you could find yourself
watching it over and over again.The ending didn't surprise me,
obviously, because I had read the book.
But reading the book, I got teary eyed at that big, what you

(04:59):
think is going to be this big, you know, happy ending.
And then there's not. I got teary eyed there in the
book. I got teary eyed at a completely
different point in the film. But I did love them.
But I think I like them both equally.
I would just, you know, leave itthere that I love them both
equally. Well, that are perfect first
impressions, I would say they'renothing concise.

(05:20):
Sometimes we talk for like 10 minutes, but this is good.
So I would say let's get into the plot.
Take it away, Sir. It's London in 1940, were
introduced to Tom Buckley, played by Sam Claflin, who

(05:43):
they've put glasses on. But there's really no hiding
that man's sparkle. And he's a cynical film writer
and he's taking in this really overwrought propaganda reel at
the cinema. They used to play these like
sort of little propaganda moviesat the start of other movies
and, you know, some mixed results.
And so he's kind of gauging the audience reaction and seeing how
it goes over. And it's it doesn't seem to be

(06:03):
really catching anyone's attention or doing particularly
well. Sam Claflin.
What can I say about Sam Claflinthat I haven't already been
saying? In my head, I was like, he does
not look very nerdy, even thoughthey've like cut his hair all
weird and put some glasses on him.
But I do like he's very British.Like he's acting more British, I

(06:27):
think, than he is, which I like.And just the opening of the
movie, it's immediately kind of quaint, quirky, and it's like it
feels like it's going to be one of those really quiet,
delightful movies. And it is.
I think it is. So I was excited from the moment
it opens. And also Sarah told me I think
he would like this one because before I watched this run, we

(06:49):
watched run that we weren't too keen on, so this run was a nice
challenge. I wasn't expecting the opening
to, especially the opening credits to be like that.
And I loved that The Full Groundwas a real movie from that time
period. But then I also loved how they
brought the two axes forward, and you could watching it in our

(07:11):
time period, you could see the green screen, obviously.
But I thought that was so smart and such a great idea to
introduce the movie in that way and in that sense.
Yeah, I love how Katrine was introduced.
I was expecting the actress Gemma to put on the Welsh
accent. I thought she would keep her
regular accent because I've seenher in a few other things.

(07:32):
So that was such a nice surprise.
And I think she did it really well.
So I was sucked into it instantly.
So yes, we do meet our leading lady Katrine Cole, played by
Gemma Arterton, and she's a young copywriter.
She's hired at the Ministry of Information to write The Slope.
As Sam has already said, it sounds as degrading as it is,

(07:53):
but she gets to do that on propaganda reels.
But it basically means that she gets to write the romantic
dialogue predominantly geared towards women.
So the other writers which include Buckley and Raymond
Perfect, played by Paul Richer, What you heard about Fillmore,
played by Rachel Sterling, a no nonsense colleague who only ever

(08:15):
seems to bring bad news about the scripts.
But Katherine will end up being friends as the film goes on.
Yes, we love some women supporting women.
The Ministry of Information where they work had existed in
World War One and then they kindof wound it down and then they
brought it back for World War 2 and then they wound it down
again in 1946. So it really was there to create

(08:36):
propaganda and monitor public opinion.
And many people today will know their work.
If you've ever seen the Keep Calm and Carry On poster that
came out of the Ministry of Information.
And at this point in the war, a lot of the content that they
were making was quote, UN quote,domestic propaganda.
So it was kind of like, here's what you do in an air raid,
here's how to cook with rations,here's how to, you know, do all
this kind of stuff that within ayear of the war starting, the

(08:59):
British public started to find really sort of condescending.
And so at that point, the sort of nature of the propaganda
changed. But at this point, we're still
very much in the early days of treating the public with a
degree of of contempt when you make these, like really obvious
propaganda reels and you got kind of get the sense that
that's the reaction that they'regetting.
Yes. And Speaking of the Ministry of

(09:19):
Information, it had a division called Home Intelligence, which
was set up by a woman called Mary Adams, who was first a
broadcaster for the BBC. But as the BBC took on a
different world during the war, she moved on to the Ministry of
Information and set up the intelligence division where she
basically became the one to monitor the public mood.

(09:43):
And she also wrote daily reportson British Morrell, and they
were published. So that's one of the women
working in World War 2 at the Ministry of Information.
And there were more women, obviously, because most of the
men had gone to fight in the war.
So some women did profit from, so to speak, the war and the men

(10:03):
being away. And she's not the only one
because the character of Catherine was in part based on a
woman called Diana Morgan, who was a screenwriter at Ealing
Studios. And her granddaughter said in an
interview that she used to be called the Welsh bit, which is
obviously not a very nice thing to say, but she wasn't crying

(10:24):
about it at all. And she would give specifically
the man like a near fall about calling her that.
But she came on to Ealing Studios in 1940 as part of the
script writing team to produce propaganda films.
And one of the biggest ones thatshe did was went the day well,
question mark. And it told the story of an

(10:45):
English village, Bramley, and fighting back after being
invaded by the Germans. And it showed both men and women
fighting back, which was pretty amazing back in the day.
And it included a 30 year old actress called Thora Heard, who
saw her career take off after appearing in the film.
And it also featured a very shocking scene which was based

(11:07):
through by censors of an elderlyboth mistress butchering a Nazi
with an axe. So I thought that was pretty
cool. Oh fuck yeah, I want to watch
this movie. Where's that?
If I can find it on YouTube or something I'll put it on the
website and we can just all enjoy it.
I at least need a screen cap of the elderly postmistress

(11:28):
butchering a Nazi with an axe. Same.
I need that as a poster or like a canvas print or something
because that sounds excellent. I love that.
Keep calm and carry on. And that's the top.
Incredible. Love that.
Yeah. So Buckley tells Katrina about a
new movie they're going to be working on about the Dunkirk

(11:48):
evacuation. And it's based on They've heard
this story about these twin sisters who stole their dad's
boat and went out to participatein the evacuation.
And they thought, you know, a movie about these two plucky
sisters. That's what everyone needs to
see. And so Katrina has to go
interview these two sisters, Rose and Lily, played by
Francesca and Lily Knight. And when she interviews them,

(12:10):
she finds the story is not quiteas heroic as she's been led to
believe. She is going to have to judge it
up a little to make it Hollywoodworthy.
We get introduced to, I think mostly all of our favorite
doctor Ambrose Hilliard played for Bill Nighy.
He tells his agent, Sammy Smith,played by Eddie Marson, that
he's not interested to play the role of drunk Uncle Frank in a

(12:34):
Dunkirk film because he is a very well not actor.
But he's aging, so he maybe doesn't get the roles that he
wants anymore. But he ends up being quite
remarkable in it so. Yeah, he's brilliant.
He's just such a character who he is such a Dick to other
people, but he has this sort of like crotchety likeability to

(12:55):
him. I just really enjoyed his
character and just, you know, even in the book we're getting
to read a little more about his motivations and his inner
thoughts and everything. Like, I really got a kick out of
him. I enjoyed him quite a bit.
One of those like, you know, he's an aging actor who doesn't
want to admit that he's an agingactor.
And I like that first bit we getof him in the book is that he
just, I refuse to take new head shots.

(13:17):
Why do I need new head shots? Meanwhile, his head shots are
like 30 years old. You don't look like this
anymore. But I do like that you can find
some humanity in like that. You don't want to admit you're
aging or you're getting older and you're not quite, as, you
know, spry anymore. There's some humanity to that.
And to see him kind of accept itas the film and the book go on
is actually really like, really nice.

(13:39):
He was definitely one of my favorite characters.
Yeah, so Catherine and Buckley are, they're working on the
script and they're arguing aboutthe plot quite a bit.
So Buckley has a lot more experience with this than
Katrin. So he's very like, here's the
sort of stereotypical way that this story would go.
The dialogue needs to be really snappy.
There's we're allotting this much time for the romance, this

(14:01):
much time for the whatever. And Katrin wants it to be a
little more realistic. Like she wants to keep the
sisters in the spotlight. She wants their dialogue to be
meaningful in some way. So yeah, they're constantly
going back and forth. It's a bit romcommy.
Like, you can definitely tell inthe movie in a way that I think
was not obvious in the book necessarily, that they're going

(14:21):
to be paired together eventuallyin a romantic way.
And then, yeah, the Ministry of Information, they find out that
the sisters didn't actually quite make it to Dunkirk.
And they're a little pissed about this initially, but they
decided to proceed with the filmanyway because it's probably
going to be good for morale. And yeah, constantly while
they're working on it, they're hearing from various parties in
the military and the government who always have notes about,

(14:43):
well, we can't say that the motor broke because that says
bad things about British engineering, and that would be
bad for morale, or we can't say this or that because it would be
bad for morale. So they're definitely getting
lots of outside input that they don't necessarily want.
So Getran is. Quote, UN quote married.
And she's in an unhappy relationship with her husband,
who's a venture called Alice Cole.
Goodbye, Jack Houston. And he's an injured veteran.

(15:07):
Is he a veteran? He's a veteran, right?
I believe. So it's not really made obvious
in the movie. I'm not so sure about the book,
but it's not made particularly obvious.
He's wearing a uniform in the movie.
I'm just completely blanked on what it is.
Well, I think he works as an artist painting the result of
the bombing. I think he that's an official

(15:28):
capacity of some kind. So he is like working quote, UN
quote for the military. I think I remember them saying
that in the book that he did serve, and then they give him
like, a limp in the movie. Yeah.
So I think there's some kind of nod to an old war injury in the
movie that's maybe not so clear in the book.
Yeah, but that's why he's home. And he's going to have a showing

(15:49):
of his art at the National Gallery, which means he has to
travel to paint the aftermath ofthe Boeing rates.
And they argue about this because she wants to stay behind
in the luncheon. She's just gotten a job she's
quite proud of and she wants to keep doing it.
Yeah, and this does happen in the book, but I do find that the
movie makes Ellis probably more invested in the relationship

(16:10):
than he is in the book. Like in the book, it's very much
like she's around and he's like,oh great, I have a wife, cool.
I'm going to go do my own shit. Can you tell me a little bit
about the changes between the book and the movie in the sense,
because you told me this before you started recording, just for
the record, about how a train has a different motivation for

(16:34):
being with Ellis then she has for her interest in Berkeley, so
to speak. Yeah.
I mean, I think that in the bookparticularly, it's quite obvious
that she's with Ellis because she was drawn to his physical
charisma. And when she ran away with him,
she was young and naive and swept up in the romance of it.

(16:54):
And we as an audience can already tell that there's these
problems, right? Like she, they're not really
married. She bought her own wedding ring
because she was very invested, far more than he ever was.
And then it's sort of contrasts against this, this relationship
she has with Tom Buckley, who's a bit of an older guy, like not
necessarily that obviously good looking, who's quite quick
witted and they're really a goodmatch intellectually.

(17:16):
And in the book, when he eventually makes a move on her,
she thinks it's a joke at first because they're such good
friends. And when she reacts in that way,
he's obviously very upset about that.
And because it's really the first time she's seen him be
like vulnerable and real with her coming out from behind this
facade of sarcasm and banter. And I feel like you get this
contrast between someone that she chose because of their

(17:39):
physical attraction and someone that's more of an intellectual
match for her. And I feel like we lose that a
little bit in the movie simply because they did cast Sam
Claflin as Tom Buckley. No, I agree.
And I like that more. So in the book you get the sense
of who Buckley might be, becausewhen he makes that move on her
and she thinks he's, she thinks it's a joke, he says.
You think me an old fool. If Sam Clayflin is to deliver

(18:02):
that line in a movie, it's not going to hit the same way
because he's just not. He's too good looking for that.
He's too good looking to deliverthat kind of line.
I also had a completely different picture of Buckley in
my head while I was reading the book.
You know, even before he says that line, I just kind of had
this kind of maybe, you know, overly pomade hair, greasy

(18:22):
mustache, like a bit of a heavier set, maybe a portly
gentleman, like significantly older than her.
And then especially because Philmakes that comment, Phyllis,
does he make smart comments to you and try to grab your rear
end? And Catherine's like, no, so
you're kind of like, oh, maybe he's not interested in her that
way, that he just sees her as a work companion.

(18:42):
But they just completely throw that at you in the book.
And I was like, oh, he is into her that way.
It's interesting to see it played both ways, like book and
movie. I didn't get the sense of
anything was going to happen between them in the movie.
I know that it was supposed to be sort of enemies to lovers
type situation, but I just thought that Katrine maybe

(19:05):
annoyed him. So I didn't see it coming.
Like when it got to that point and and Gabby and I had the
discussion about the part of thebook that I had read and then
watching the movie following on from that, I said that I didn't
expect it, even though the underlying tone is always there.
And then Gabby told me that it doesn't happen until much later

(19:26):
in the book. Like you don't get a sense of
his attraction to her. But then the way that Gabby
described how he is spoken of inthe book that when they pick Sam
Claflin, that's very, I can't say anything bad about Sam
Claflin. I love him.
We grew up very near each other.One of my close friends is very
close with him and his family. Well, I have nothing bad to say

(19:46):
about him. Yeah, I actually wondered where
he was going to fall in the casting because I waited.
I was done with the book to watch the movie.
I'm like, who did they cast him as?
And then I'm thinking, did they cast him as Arthur, the military
advisor in the book that just never appears in the movie?
And then I was very surprised tosee him cast as Tom Buckley.
I said very taken. Back.

(20:06):
This is the route we're going, OK.
Yeah, I don't think by any meansthat he poorly acted the role,
but I do think he was perhaps a little miscast.
Just a bit. I would have put him as someone
in the propaganda movie. I would have predicted him as
like Johnny in the propaganda movie, or even as I've forgotten
his name. The American.
Yeah, the American guy. Yeah, the guy from the office,

(20:30):
he's in the offices 12, but thatwas excellent.
But I would have put him as that.
I thought, oh, he's just going to stick on an American accent
and hope for the best. But no, they put him as the
gentleman they described as old,greasy and portly, all of the
things that Sam Claflin is famously not.
So that was, yes, I agree with Sam.
He was, he did it well, but I don't think he should have been

(20:51):
even spoken about for the role. That's just my that's my opinion
on that one. Yeah, age wise, I had him in
line with Parfit, Yeah. Yeah.
We get to meet Sophie Smith, played by the incomparable Helen
McCrory, who is no longer with us.
But she's always fucking knocks that out of the park and
everything she's been in, so it's always a treat to find

(21:11):
something that I haven't seen yet and see her pop up.
She tells Ambrose that her brother Sammy, who is Ambrose's
agent, has died in a bombing andAmbrose has to go and identify
Sammy. And this scene was also in the
book, which I found very emotionally affecting, where
he's going to identify Sammy, who's missing some fingers on

(21:32):
one of his hands. And Ambrose used to play this
guy who mentored a detective on TV.
So he has this whole thing wherewhen he sees the body, all the
fingers are there. So he's like, but you see, this
can't be my friend because he has all of his fingers.
And Sammy didn't have all of hisfingers.
And he's, you know, feeling so pleased with himself.
And then the woman who works there gets such a terrible look
on her face and she's like, oh, we try and make the bodies

(21:55):
complete for the family. Like, we assumed that he had all
his fingers and we found some fingers.
So we, you know, And then he realizes that, yes, it is Sammy
who has died in the bombing. So a very sad little scene and
tells you a lot about Ambrose asa character, I think.
So Sophie tells Ambrose that she's going to be taking over
the agency. And she's, well, quite a bit

(22:15):
more no nonsense than Sammy. She says she doesn't keep actors
on the payroll who don't work, and so Ambrose must reluctantly
take on the Dunkirk role, even though he thinks it's beneath
him. I just, that scene is just, you
almost forget that the Blitz is going on for a little bit in the
beginning of the movie, that theBlitz is happening and it's its
first real victim in our main cast.

(22:37):
And it's pretty effective to remind you that they might not
be Edward, but they're still in the war.
I think there was something in the book that I not enjoyed more
of, but you get pulled into the the war a little bit more.
There's more instances of the blitz is happening all around
them. And I think maybe it's because
there were more characters in the book that we didn't get in

(22:58):
the movie. And you can see each one
separately affected by the blitz.
Like you get a moment where eachcharacter is affected in some
way by the blitz. Yes, I think the author did a
really good job of painting thisreally vivid world of the
Homefront in 1940. I really like that.
The Secretary of War, played by Jeremy Irons.

(23:18):
Again, a big in this movie. It's often that the Americans
won't be motivated to get into the war with the film as is, so
they are instructed to write a role for an all American hero
pilot Carl Lundbeck, played by Jake Lassie.
Everyone likes him, but he can'tact to save his life.
Yeah, So the Secretary of war, he's unnamed, but he's probably

(23:41):
meant to be Anthony Eden, who isthe Secretary of State for war
from May to December 1940. Eden had resigned as foreign
secretary in 1938 in protest of Chamberlain's appeasement
policy, and he ended up being appointed Secretary of State for
war once Churchill became Prime Minister.
And then at the end of 1940, Eden sort of returned to his
former post in the Foreign Office.
I thought it was interesting if it is meant to represent him,

(24:03):
since he was pretty well known to be critical of Churchill
prioritizing the relationship with the US at the expense of
other allies. And of course, in the future,
he'll go on to be Prime Ministerin Churchill's wake in 1955.
And we did do an episode on The Darkest Hour, which is about
Churchill and the Dunkirk evacuation and all that kind of
stuff. So you can definitely go check
that out if you want to hear more about that.
What do we think about Jet Leslie and his role as Golden

(24:26):
Buck? I thought he was very, I thought
he was excellent. I like him anyway.
In the few things I've seen him in, I do feel like in a lot of
things he's very typecast. But I'm glad in this.
He played a bit of a himbo because I just enjoy a Himbo,
truly. I thought he was very funny.
He killed it. He did really good.

(24:46):
I don't like him with that bright blonde hair, though.
He should have kept his regular hair color.
But yeah, I thought he was very good.
I enjoyed him in this. I enjoy him in the office.
There was something else I've seen him in where he was also
great, but the show itself was not good.
Yes, I thought he was very good.I really got a kick out of the
scenes where he is because the character that he's playing is a
terrible actor. So I really got a kick out of

(25:09):
the scenes where we're seeing that.
And, you know, you see him turn to the other actor and he's
like, no, don't go out there. And this really like overwrought
voice. And then he turns and smiles
directly into the camera. Very funny.
He's trying to break the 4th wall.
Look at me. It was, yeah.
It shows how good of an actor heis that he can play a bad actor
so well that I cringed every time I heard him speak because

(25:30):
he was trying so hard to be thisall American hero.
And then in the end they have todub him post for this for the
dunk maybe they had to dub over him anyways.
Listen, he's just start to look for the he's like the male
version of the bimba and usuallygot to talk to himself.
Exactly. Yeah, and he's there to motivate

(25:51):
the Americans to get into the war.
I suppose so. But I did like, I feel like you
get a bit more depth about it inthe book where they rewrite a
bunch of his scenes so that whenhis back is to the camera,
that's when his dialogue happensso that they can just dub in his
dialogue. And actually in the book, it's
Ambrose dubs in all of his dialogue, and Ambrose doesn't
want to at 1st and then he sort of gets talked into it because

(26:12):
it's like, Oh well, you know, you'll get paid extra, you'll
get credited, et cetera. Ruthless turned his back to the
camera and dug over him. Just Ruthless.
I found it very funny. Yeah, yeah.
Well, there are very small snagsas they progress to you filming
on location on the beach, obviously not at Dunkirk, but at
the beach in England. And Katrin saves the day by

(26:33):
beefing up the role for Uncle Frank in exchange for Ambrose
teaching Carl how to say his lines.
And there's this whole bit in the book where they ask Carl
asks Ambrose himself. He's like, look, can you teach
me how to act? And Ambrose is like, teach you
to act. This is my profession.
There's a lifetime of work that goes into knowing how to act, et
cetera. And then he's like, well, can
you just tell me how to say the lines?

(26:53):
And I'll repeat after you kind of thing.
So there's this really funny scene in the movie as well where
Ambrose says the line and then Carl tries to repeat it after
him in exactly the same voice. I like that it was in the movie,
it was Catherine kind of presenting that opportunity to
Ambrose. Like, you know, hey, if you do
this, you know, you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.
Because I think it opened up thedoor for that kind of, you think

(27:15):
you see more of the humanity of Ambrose because he starts to
kind of not grow protective of Catherine.
But they kind of formed this very unexpected friendship where
the minute something goes wrong for him, he's looking for her.
He's looking for her and I like that kind of came to a
culmination. I'm not gonna ruin the end
because we're not there yet, butI like that kind of wrapped
itself up nicely with a bow at the end of the movie.

(27:37):
Whereas in the book there is like literally none of that.
Like there is no Catherine and Ambrose relationship or
friendship at all. So it was a nice change in the
dynamic in the film for sure. Yeah, I agree.
I liked it. I feel like they make Katherine
kind of the glue between all theother characters.
Like she has a relationship witheverybody that's there in one

(28:00):
way or another. So it's quite nice.
I also like and I don't think we've named them in the in our
notes, but I like the fact that they show you obviously
different actors for the people that are in the proper got a
movie as well. Like the trends are our guest.
One of them is Claudia Jessie, who I didn't even like a class

(28:22):
at first, but I love her. I think she's great and I find
it a really interesting subject for a movie to be about movie
making. But we got a little bit of that
in in Gloria's Masswords in a very different way.
It's very matter. Catherine Rochester, Alice's
exhibition, which she always misses, but she kind of has to

(28:44):
make some arrangements together away from work.
And then when she gets home, shecatches him in bed with another
woman and they break up. And there's a quote in the movie
where Alice says, that's the first time I've painted you, I
shouldn't have painted you walking away.
And that's what he does in the film.
He always paints her into his scenes, but always walking away.

(29:08):
And she replies, no, that's not it, Alice, you shouldn't have
made me so bloody small. And it's kind of sad.
Like it's a really sad. It's extremely sad.
And I felt that even though a lot of the things she did was to
sort of not protect him, but shebought her own wedding ring and
they never were officially married legally.

(29:29):
He sacrificed so much for him, you know, leaving her family,
moving to London to be with him.She sacrificed a lot and she got
nothing back from it in terms ofthat relationship she received.
No, I feel like with him, it wasa lot of her giving and him
taking. So when I got to that scene in

(29:51):
the movie, I was disappointed, not surprised.
I knew it would be a case of youweren't giving me enough
attention or you're at work too much.
There was no excuse for it for what he does, but it was this
typical manly behavior, I think.But it really shows her strength
and just walking away immediately.
Yeah, there was like 0 hesitation on her part. 0

(30:11):
hesitation. She ditches her wedding ring,
takes it off, ditches it in likea lake or a fountain or
something, and she just walks away and.
Except her bags and goes. I think you know, you and I
always say this, you know, a strong woman is, especially in
that era. I mean, yes.
Absolutely. They were all over, you just had

(30:32):
to look for them. Yeah, I think that it's
interesting that the more she gets into this world of
Hollywood, of making movies of fantasy and make believe and
even more sense than usual because they're making this
propaganda movie about a story that's not quite true.
And they're getting all these notes from all these various
other entities within the government being like, make it
like this. No, make it like this, that sort

(30:53):
of thing. And the more she gets into this
world to make believe, the more the kind of blinders fall off
and she perceives the reality ofher own life a little bit
better. Yeah.
Absolutely. Yeah.
Buckley and Katrin have a momentin the moonlight because she's,
you know, single and ready to mingle now.
And. But of course, it's they don't
live happily ever after. They have a little argument.
And he has all these thoughts about her relationship with

(31:13):
Alice, and she's pretty defensive about it.
And then they sort of take a little break from each other.
And Buckley's really out of source because of this argument.
And he is supposed to write a new ending for the film, but
he's really struggling and he's having a hard time kind finding
his voice. I liked that they didn't
immediately give them their moment together.

(31:35):
I like that they put a little conflict in there because it, I
mean, there's conflict in it forKatrina, I guess, with Ellis,
but there has not been any conflict for Buckley in the
movie. So it's nice to also see him
having to work through that first.
It makes to pay off a little bitbetter, I think.
But yeah, they do have great chemistry.
Sam Coughlin and Gemma Orcheston, I think such a soft

(31:59):
spoken, gentle actress and she fits the role really well
because even though she's soft spoken, she's determined in that
way. And I quite like how they
portray that. You can also be soft spoken and
still get stuff done because very often they'll cast someone
who's really out there, really self confident and really loud.

(32:20):
And she's not loud. She just says what she needs to
say when she needs to say it. And it works for her.
And I quite like that Katrin writes the new ending as well as
a new version of the scene, whatI quote where she and Buckley
argued she leaves it on his deskfor him to find because she
really regrets the way they parted.
And when she returns home, her house has been destroyed in one

(32:43):
of the first lights of the bombing yet.
So that's another instance of the Blitz for you.
Yeah. So in 1940, towards the end of
the Battle of Britain, which wasthe first major military
campaign fought entirely in the air, the Germans developed this
new strategy of conducting massive bombing raids against UK
cities. And the goal was to attempt to
bait more British fighters into the air so that they could try

(33:05):
and wholesale destroy the RAF. And this campaign was known as
the Blitz, which is short for Blitzkrieg to refer to a
surprise attack. This sort of started in
September of 1940 and carried onfor about 8 months.
At one point early on, London was bombed for 56 out of 57
nights in a row and though 40,000 civilians were killed and
more than a million homes were destroyed, of course also

(33:27):
including warehouses and shipyards and military munitions
factories and all that kind of stuff, it didn't really
materially impact the British war effort.
Buckley turns up at the studio, having read the apology pages
that Katrin left on his desk. And they have a little make out
and then unfortunately, moments later, it's not to last because

(33:48):
this large studio like that, thecrew have sort of been
struggling with crashes down, killing Buckley in a terrible
workplace accident. And it made me think of this
conversation they had earlier inthe movie where they're talking
about someone who's died. And Katrin says it must be worse
when they die for no reason. And Buckley says, well, it's
always for no reason. I want to cry just again,

(34:11):
because the writer scene is shot.
You don't really know if he's dead for like 2 seconds and then
they just saw him being carried away on a structure with like a
Draper for him. He's like, no, this can't be
true. They've just got in their
moment. This cannot be happening right
now. The timing of this is wrong.

(34:32):
And also, it would have been Catherine going that way because
Ambrose has called for her and he goes instead because he knows
that there's catching guys, thatAmbrose will keep her early.
He wants her to him suffer for alittle bit longer.
So it's like telling him fair that he dies.
And also unexpected and very sad.
And I hate it. Yeah, don't do it again.

(34:54):
They say it comes in threes and it was one thing after another
fucker tree. Like she finds out Ellis is in
bed with someone else and then she loses her home and then
right after that the man that she she is in love with dies.
So I thought that was kind of sick on everyone's part.
I wanted the instant gratification of them being
happy together after these horrible events had taken place

(35:17):
1 by 1. And then they said, actually,
no. And they just kick you in the
stomach with that. It was very, very, very sad.
And I felt it was also extremelyunfair that unfortunately,
things do come in threes. And for Katrine, it was 123
instantly one day after the next.
That almost made it a bit sadder.

(35:37):
Like she's just seen the man that she loves die in a freak
accident. And then second of all, she's
gone through the past three daysof having now no husband and no
home, and now she has nowhere togo or anyone to be with.
So yeah, the unfairness made me extremely sad too.
Well, it certainly saves her from being a predictable ROM

(35:59):
com, I suppose. That is very true.
That was one thing I was afraid of going into the movie, where I
was like, oh, it's enemies to lovers and they're going to end
up together and I could do the chain of events off top of my
head. So not that I'm giggling and
kicking my feet over the fact that Buckley dies so tragically,
but I liked that they slipped that in.

(36:20):
I had to like, hold on to my armchair kind of moment, like,
Oh my God, because I didn't get there in the book until I didn't
get there at all. But it wasn't.
It wasn't expected for me. I was almost expecting something
to happen to them both in the blitz but not this.
Like this just freak accident wasn't in my head at all.

(36:41):
Part of me also thought, right, is this just a scene in a movie
that they're imagining is happening?
But now he actually did that. I thought because the lighting
for that specific part where he begins to walk backwards is the
same sort of filter and lightingthey use for the propaganda
movie. So I also assumed visually that

(37:02):
we had gone back to the propaganda movie.
And I was like, oh, he's not really dead.
And as they carry him out, you see the lights change back to
the natural light as the camera turns back to Katrine, which I
thought was an excellent visual.I thought that was so well
thought out that they had made the propaganda movie light, and
then as it turns to her reaction, the light completely

(37:25):
changes back to the real life ofit.
So I thought that was a really good choice.
Oh, the settling in of her new reality.
Yeah, absolutely. It was like, it's like looking
at it happening through rose colored glasses and then you
take them off and you're like, wait, it actually happened.
Very smart. Yeah, very clever.
Despite being really devastated and grieving, Catherine reports

(37:48):
back to work because Embers was also hurt in the accident and
they can't film the scene they wanted.
So Catherine gets the ending shewanted all along with the
sisters saying themselves, whichis nice touch but also it's done
very sad because it just remindsyou of what happened.
I loved it because so much of the propaganda posters, for

(38:10):
example, that you see of women at the time is very like women
are crucial to the war effort, comma supporting the man's job.
She's going to come and do the man's job.
She's supporting the man. It's all about women in context
to what the men are doing. And even in this movie, there's
this reference to like, like Katrina's fighting for the
sisters to be the heroes. She gets told, well, women want

(38:32):
a hero, they don't want to be a hero.
That kind of messaging in the propaganda of the time.
And then we get this ending on the movie where it sort of falls
into place where actually the women do get to be the heroes.
So I did kind of enjoy that. And Berkeley would have to,
probably, hopefully. Well, he's kind of the one who
wasn't letting her have that ending in the 1st place, but.
Don't say that. Not too late.

(38:54):
Let me live in my dream world for two seconds.
Exactly. Yeah.
So Ambrose is visited by his agent, Sophie, in the hospital.
It seems like there's much work ahead for him, lots of new
opportunities, including a little romance.
And once he's well, he visits Katrin and persuades her to work
on his new project with him. And he tells Katrin that they're

(39:15):
in this sort of narrow window oftime wherein there are a lot
more opportunities for quote UN quote, people like them than
there would be otherwise. Because all of the young men are
away. And we also find out that Rose
and Lily, the two sisters upon whom the film was based, they
were inspired by their own movieand they ran away to join the
ATS, the Auxiliary Territorial Service.
So they're they're doing their bit.
Yeah, this scene with Embers is so sweet when he comes to visit

(39:40):
her and she's still so heartbroken.
He's himself, but he's also a little softer so.
He's not as cocky as he was at the beginning of the movie.
I feel like when we first introduced to him, he still
feels like he's this young, spry, very sought after actor
and I think he, a part of him believes that.

(40:01):
He is the spy that he played or the detective he played in his
early days. And I think taking on this role,
albeit he took it with no choice, I think it somehow made
him mature a tiny bit in terms of seeing life for its
realities. Even though he says he wasn't my
friend, he was my agent. When he identifies the the body

(40:24):
towards the middle of the movie,it seems like he is the only
true friend that he had. So I think his storyline is so
good purely for the fact that even though he's older than the
rest of them, he grows the most,I think.
I was a little disappointed. I understand why they did it, of
course, because there's just simply is not enough time to

(40:45):
cover everything. But Sophie is not his love
interest in the book. His love interest is this woman
called Ceci that he worked with.You see him at the beginning of
the film when he's working on a propaganda movie with this older
lady and like, that's his love interest in the book.
And I kind of liked it because they're both sort of aging stars
and they speak each other's language, so to speak.

(41:06):
He shows up to see one of her performances and he's late, so
he lies and tells her that he's like, oh, you really hit your
mark. You really got a laugh on that
one, etcetera. And I really enjoyed that
because they're both sort of an odd fit as people.
And that's kind of one of the themes of this book.
All of the pairings that end up together are a little bit sort
of odd couples. And I really like that.
So I mean, it's not terrible that he ended up with Sophie.

(41:26):
I understand. You know, she's the female
character in his age group that appears in the film.
So I get it. But yeah, I was a little
disappointed not to see the booklove story on the screen, just
because I thought it was very cute and quite.
No, I liked the pairing of Ambrose and Cece in the book,
and I like that he wouldn't really, He wouldn't acknowledge
it, that she was really his loveinterest.
He kept making digs at her appearance and her age, as if he

(41:50):
wasn't graying and wrinkling andaging himself.
He just kept making digs, like he wouldn't let himself
acknowledge it. And then at the end, he just
lets her in, which I think is sosweet in the book.
But I did, like I said earlier, I liked the bit of humanity they
gave him in the movie. Like, he does have a heart.
There's, you know, not a cold, empty pocket in his chest.

(42:13):
He is a human being with feelings.
And it was nice to see him continue that bond with
Catherine. And it was nice to see that at
the end, it really did wrap up. The strong woman.
Catherine carries on. She sits behind Buckley's
typewriter. She picks up his job and does it
on her own. And the twins join the ATS.

(42:34):
And it's like they find the power and the strength to move
on without a man. And I love that.
I love that. Hell yeah.
So near the end of the movie, Catherine showing off the
Dunkirk movie that they've made in the cinema, which is quite
emotionally affecting given how much silliness went into making
it and they got their authenticity and optimism after

(42:55):
all that they were looking for. The film ends with Catherine
working on on Ambrose's new project with Perfect and Phil.
So it is a happy ending for Catherine and I do really like
the scene in the cinema because the people are so moved by it
and it made me cry, maybe harderthan Buckley said.

(43:16):
Well, and it's really a contrastright, to the the real that
Buckley is taking in the very first scene of the movie where
people are not paying attention and they're not inspired and
they're not finding it interesting or entertaining.
And then we get to see this movie where in spite of all
everything that happened making it, people are really finding
something in it that they can grasp onto despite.

(43:38):
Having a lump back who doesn't know how to act.
But he does save a dog though, so let's be fair.
Everybody likes when a dark outside.
Exactly. I, I particularly enjoyed the
that and ending scene in the cinema because Katrina sat
between a soldier and this lovely lady who the the man next

(43:59):
to her says, if you watch it a second time, you'll find
something to laugh at. And then the lady next to her
says, I've seen it five times and I've cried every time, so I
don't know what he's talking about.
So yeah, it goes back to everyone find something
different in that particular film.
And it wraps up very nicely thateven though there was so much
tragedy and devastation in her personal life and going on in

(44:22):
the world around her, Katrine achieved so much in such a short
space of time, and it's so well received and everyone loves it.
So I think that is something that would have stayed with her
as a person and spurred her on to continue.
Even if Ambrose hadn't asked herspecifically to write his part
in this next movie, I think she would have been spurred on by

(44:44):
the response that she witnesses herself.
Yeah, they're making jokes, the writers, about quote, UN quote,
authenticity and optimism. But like, that was kind of her
vibe the whole time. She's like, I do want this story
to be kind of real. I don't want us to be sidelining
the sisters or making this sillyeven though they're making a
propaganda movie. She did want there to be
something real in there, and that's what she got.
And she got to see other people pick up on that.

(45:06):
And that's the end of the movie.It's a great movie.
Everybody should watch it. It's one of those yeah, feel
good movies. Apart from that little blip
towards the end of now, I'm crying for the last half an
hour. That was the bit at the end,
right? So Buckley dying in the book.
That's where I'm sitting there crying.
The end. Catherine in the theater

(45:27):
watching it. I ran right into the bathroom
for a Kleenex. I was like, Oh my God.
I like that part too. I'm like, oh, her work was
fulfilling and meaningful after all.
Exactly. So we do have some notes, not

(45:51):
very many because we've already told you a lot of notes.
But Sam, take it away. I thought it was neat.
The author of the book, Lissa Evans, has a little cameo in the
movie. So early on, there's a scene
where Ambrose is working on a different propaganda movie, and
he's kind of being snarky with everyone, and he has all these
notes on the script, and there'sthis makeup lady fussing over

(46:12):
him, and that's Lissa Evans wearing a wig and you know, the
fun little outfit. It's really cool.
I love movie trivia. Honestly, after I watch any
movie, I will then go on IMDb and look up every single piece
of trivia about the movie I justwatched.
And I did it with this and I didn't spot that one.
I think I just glazed over it. So that's really cool because I
I love movie trivia. Yeah, that's cool.

(46:34):
We'll. Have to go pick and watch it
again. Let's do it again.
Let's do it over again, yeah? So I looked up what other women
I could find that were working in a propaganda scene at the
time, and one of the bigger onesI could find was a woman called
Kyle Mander, funnily enough, in 1935 secured a job as a

(46:55):
secretary at Joseph Hubel's international firm Congress in
Berlin. So this is before the war, which
is, you know, to be in Berlin. And, yeah, that specific film,
this of all must be strange. And then later in 1940, she
started working for what was called the Shell Film Company
and for the Ministry of Home Security.

(47:16):
And there she directed around 50instructional and promotional
films for the UK and also offices.
And during the war, she actuallymoved up from doing like
continuity work in the movie industry to being a director.
So that's another one of those when the men are away, the women
get to do some cool stuff. That is pretty cool, despite the

(47:38):
fact of who she worked for initially.
I'm not sure how to interpret that.
I'm like, did she secure a job as a secretary comma at the Film
Festival? Like she got a job, like working
somewhere else while she was at the Film Festival.
I think that's the case, I don'tknow for sure.
Like I don't get to imprison that she actually worked for
Goebbels, but I don't I mean. No, but she did find her job

(48:01):
there. And I think she also found like
a lot of connections from the UKindustry that that later lets
her be part of the Ministry of Security.
But it's just interesting to me that Joseph Goebbels, he's such
a big person in a propaganda scene.
Like if you've known, if you know anything about him, he made

(48:22):
so many crazy propaganda movies from Germany.
Well, we talked about him in ourSonny Boy episode because he was
the one who made the Nazi Titanic movie.
Yes, he did. Wow.
I feel like we need to just briefly update the dollars on
this please, because I. Am there was this big German
cruise liner and then during thewar Gribbles was like, I want to

(48:45):
make a not version of the Titanic story.
So he did. And then when he saw the
screening of it, he's like, thisis too sad.
It's going to be bad for morale.No one can ever see it.
And so the movie sort of got shelved.
And then a couple of years later, the boat that they had
used as the Titanic, it was at sea.
It was basically used as towardsthe end of the war when they

(49:06):
were moving Pows and concentration camp prisoners out
of the way of the coming Russians and Americans.
They reached a point where they got to the sea and they didn't
have anywhere to put them. So they put like 5000 Pows and
concentration camp prisoners on this big boat that looks like
the Titanic. And the Allies saw it from the
air and thought it was a military ship and they bombed
the shit out of it and like almost everyone died.

(49:28):
Oh my God, that's horrific. It's.
Really just was one of those fuck up spider Brits that is
really like he's still really don't quite now if people knew,
but they must have known at least a little bit about it.
So that was a roller coaster, bythe way.
I didn't think it was going to go, yeah, Any way that you were

(49:51):
saying that. I was like, oh, it's just a
movie, No. I know I remember talking about
it and I, I was reading about because one of the characters in
the book that we had read like dies in the bombing.
And then I was thinking about itand I was like, wait, is that
the same boat that was in Nazi Titanic?
And I like looked it up and I'm like it was.
It's the same one Jesus lot of stories.

(50:15):
Right. Well, we should rate this movie.
Give me thought, Smart. What should we rate it out of?
Good. Question.
I think we maybe should rate it out of them.
Thrown away fish and chips out of 10.

(50:35):
Maybe we didn't talk about it inthe plot after.
All you can talk about it now. I will talk about it now.
There's a scene where Katrina and Berkeley are sitting on like
a bench and she's eating, or he's eating fish and chips and
they're kind of flamefully venturing.
And then she picks up his fish and chips and tracks it into the

(50:56):
sea. And then later that's what you
see in the movie, The propagandamovie at the very end.
So I remember when I was watching the movie, Sam said to
me when I was mentioning the scene, she said wrote the little
bow around that because it's coming back and it did.
And it sounds really that's. Cute.
So I'm gonna rate this movie maybe 8 1/2 thrown away bags of

(51:21):
fish and chips out of 10 becauseI just really found it quite
delightful and I think I will watch it again and it will be my
comfort movie. Even though it has A and it's
interesting to see a movie aboutthe propaganda making machine
without it being too on the nose.

(51:41):
It's still a feel good movie andit's still a war movie, but it's
not a particularly sad war movienor a very heavy 1.
So I enjoyed that for once. Who's next?
Oh, OK. I would rate it and eight out of
10 bags of fish and chips thrownaway.
I thought that it yes, it was delightful.
It was very sweet. I will say I did enjoy the the

(52:03):
tiny bit of conflict because everything was going a bit too
well. I would watch it again.
Yeah. I think it would go also on my
little comfort movie list, apartfrom, yeah, the sad events that
take place, yeah. We can just pretend those didn't
happen, OK? Yeah, we'll just forget.
Oh, we'll just skip it. Yeah, I think it's a really well
made movie. I recommended it to my mom,

(52:24):
actually, who's probably listening.
Hi, mom. Because I think that you could
get into it even if you're not really into war media.
I think there's a little something for everybody.
The characters are really vivid and interesting.
The sort of world that's built around them is really
effectively constructed. I thought the book was really
good and I did like the movie asan adaptation as well, so I'm

(52:45):
going to give it. I think I'll also give it 8 1/2
bags of chips thrown in the sea out of 10.
I always love when there are female characters that have lots
to do and are really richly written and are different from
each other and all have their own very well articulated
motivations and everything. I thought that the author did a
great job and it translated wellinto the movie too.

(53:05):
I would probably go with, I think 8 out of 10 Fish and
Chips. I loved the movie.
I loved that it was a war movie,but it wasn't a particularly
gruesome war movie. You weren't really pulled into
like the battle of the war. You were reminded that life was
still going on for the people that lived in London.

(53:25):
They were living through the Blitz, but they were still
living through it. There was still grocery shopping
to be done and daily chores and work, and I liked that it kept
that kind of levity. I did miss certain parts that
were in the book that we didn't get in the movie, but I would
watch it again and I would recommend it definitely.
I really enjoyed it. Well, I think now is the time to

(53:47):
ask everybody what are you reading?
Or are you reading anything you want to talk about A?
Plethora currently well over in the club mobile.
We have a book club, so come check that out.
We put that on our Instagram andour stories and stuff currently
of the four books we have for the quarter, I'm currently back
in the middle of damn lucky by Kevin Mora.

(54:09):
It's the the story of John LuckyLuckadoo of the 100th Bomb
Group, and I'm about to restart American Fly Girl, the story of
WASP, Hazel Ying Lee, and that is by our friend Susan Tate and
Kenny. And it's an excellent book and
Hazel was an incredible person. It's one of those books that I
want to shove into everybody's hands and say read it because

(54:30):
she was excellent and such a sparkle of a person that it
makes her story so enjoyable that you feel like she's your
friend because it's just so wellwritten.
Yeah, I am currently reading Spitfires by Becky Aikman, which
is the real story of the American women who flew with the
ATA during the war. And it's very interesting

(54:53):
because we've done a plethora ofresearch on the WASP.
So it's very interesting to see the other side of the American
women who flew during the war and how they had more freedom
with the ATA, but I'm finding less friendship.
Whereas the women in the WASP, because they went through these
Army, Air Force training coursesfor I think it was like 6 or 8

(55:16):
weeks before they were graduatedand given their wings.
They became like family. So it's very interesting to see
how 2 very diverse groups of American women with one very
similar passion, which is flyingand serving in the war, can just
be very different. And it's interesting to see.
Jackie at the epicenter of all of it and how she's portrayed in

(55:39):
the ATA through their eyes versus how the Wasp saw her.
So I'm really looking forward tocontinuing on with it.
So look out for a review on thatone very soon.
Nice. I am.
I don't remember if I talked about this already.
I'm sort of working my way through several different books
because I'm also studying at thesame time.
So forgive me if I did already mention it on a previous pod,

(55:59):
but I'm reading the whole picture, The Colonial Story of
the Art in our Museums and Why we Need to Talk about it by
Alice Proctor. I picked it up when I went to
Scotland for a wedding this summer.
I went to Kelvin Grove Museum with George, our SAS Rogue
Heroes correspondent, and they recommended this book and it's
super interesting. It's almost like a written
museum tour where the author takes you through all these

(56:19):
different items and paintings and objects and museums and then
talks about sort of what they represent in terms of like
colonization and imperialism andall that stuff.
So it's super interesting. I can confirm that you've not
talked about this on another episode.
So first, nice. I'm not reading anything.
I've been under the weather for quite some time so I cannot read

(56:42):
much so it's just watching movies and TV shows for me.
Nice. That's a pretty good deal.
Yeah, that's a pretty good deal.I would do the same.
There's worse things to be doing.
Exactly. Sure.
Can I ask you girls another question?
Yeah, sure. If our listeners are going to
listen to your broadcast, which episodes should they listen to?

(57:07):
Oh, OK, well. OK, I have a couple of favorite.
Let's see if our favorites are the same.
Probably the same One of my top favorite is our episode with
Harriet Leach, who played Tatty Spats in Masters of the Air.
That was so fun and she has become such a wonderful friend.
Our three-part series on the WASP where we were lucky enough

(57:29):
to speak with Doctor Kate Landec, who wrote The Women with
Silver Wings and Susan Tay Ankeny, who I mentioned wrote
American Fly Girl. That three-part series was such
a labor of love that we're stillcarrying on today, and I'm super
proud of the fact that we had really just started doing the
pod together and we instantly got stuck into something like
that. Recent favorite, This is, again,

(57:51):
this is like top three. My recent favorite is our
episode with Jacqueline Bazelone, who is the great niece
of John Bazelone. She is so fun and funny and
everything. I believe that John would have
privately been had he survived the war.
And again, she has become such awonderful friend to Gabby and I
like we're all little besties and it's really sweet and.

(58:15):
The group text is fun. Yeah, the group text is.
Fun. But yeah, we have a few that are
excellent, but those are my top ones.
That's where I would start is with I.
Would the Wasp, I would go with that as well, but I would also
throw in I really enjoyed the episode you and I did on our own
on the road on Rosie the Riveters, and I thought that was
a lot of fun to dive into and I had a great time learning about

(58:40):
these women. I would also add in our episode
with Dan Rosenthal. Yes, that's one of our most
recent ones. This is like, you know, asking
somebody to pick their favorite child.
But I would add, in the episode with Dan, Dan is quite possibly
the sweetest human being and he's got a very dry sense of
humor. So it's so.
Funny and he's. Very, very funny.

(59:02):
And he's very, I think, happy. He's, I think he's very proud to
be Rosie and Phyllis's son. And it comes across in the way
that he speaks so highly of his parents.
And it was nice. I mean, everybody knows the
story of Rosie Rosenthal. Everybody knows that he re upped
twice and served three tours with the 100th.
But learning about Phyllis, it was just the absolute treat of a

(59:24):
lifetime. And I adore Dan, so nothing but
love for that family. Yeah, they're great.
And it's every single person we meet is sort of like becoming a
member of this little family that we create.
And I feel like if you are a newlistener, you will hear that
from us and you'll hear that from the guest is that we are
always by the end of it, it feels like we've been talking to

(59:48):
a best friend for an hour and we're and we're lying enough
that it carries on post recording.
So. I say it all the time that the
World War 2 historical communityis such a niche community and
that everybody within it is so kind because.
History is important. History must be preserved and to

(01:00:09):
help tell the story of people who aren't here to tell their
own stories anymore. Everybody that we come across
and everybody that we sit down and talk to is just so nice.
Nothing bad to say about anybody.
Everybody has just been so nice.And we're very lucky to be part
of it. Very lucky.
I love that we have done this together as well because again,
there's that thing of everyone we meet sort of becomes part of

(01:00:32):
this tiny family that we create and we're so happy to have done
this with you guys. This has been so fun and I hope
we can do it again. It was great.
Next time you guys come to us. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. Sounds good.
So I guess all that's left is for me to thank you both for
being on so much. This wasn't really fun.
It was fun. This was.
Great. Thank you.

(01:00:53):
Thank you for having us. First of all, where can we find
you dollies? Gabby, go ahead.
You can find us on Apple, Spotify, and wherever else you
get your podcasts and on YouTube, and you can also find
us on Instagram and Facebook. At the Donut Dollies podcast, we
have coffee and Donuts. Come on over.
They're very nice, promise. So I would like to thank

(01:01:14):
everybody for listening. You can find us wherever you get
your podcast. You can follow us on Instagram,
advise it overviewer podcast. You can set this episode to a
friend and to other people who need to join the club mobile and
you need to listen to Rosie and to everybody who likes a good
ROM com and maybe to all the guyfriends who think they're not

(01:01:38):
going to like this movie becauseI think they might anyway, like
secretly. And if you want, you can rate US
five stars or you can find us onIMDb, which is pretty cool.
And if you want more informationabout us or the dummies, I'm
going to put some links on our website, rosiethereviewer.com.
See you next week. Hi.