SOUNDS OF FILM with Tom Needham

The Sounds of Film presents a special podcast episode hosted by Tom Needham and featuring Emmy-winning producer and talent manager Rory Rosegarten, an Executive Producer of Everybody Loves Raymond and Ray Romano’s manager.

Rosegarten has represented many performers including Robert Klein and Tom Green, produced the Broadway musical Late Night Comic at age 25, co-executive produced the TNT drama Men of a Certain Age, and won two...

The Sounds of Film welcomes writer-director Michael J. Weithorn for a conversation about THE BEST YOU CAN, a new relationship dramedy that world-premiered at the 2025 Tribeca Film Festival and will be available off the record on VOD platforms beginning November 25.

Reuniting Kyra Sedgwick and Kevin Bacon on screen for the first time in twenty years, the film offers a smart, sharp, and emotionally resonant look at connection, ch...

Filmmaker Joel Gilbert joins Tom Needham on The Sounds of Film to talk about his new documentary, Roseanne Barr: Is America. In the film, the still hilarious and outspoken Roseanne recounts her unusual upbringing and rise to television stardom. A master storyteller, she shares her take on cancel culture, politics, and the challenges facing free expression in America.

Gilbert discusses Roseanne’s resilience, her lasting cultural ...

This week on The Sounds of Film, host Tom Needham speaks with Guggenheim Fellow Alan Govenar about his new documentary Quiet Voices in a Noisy World: The Struggle for Change in Jasper, Texas.

Opening in New York theaters on November 14, 2025, through First Run Features, the film explores community, race, and healing in the wake of one of America’s most painful tragedies.

Govenar discusses the making of the film, his upcoming NYC...

The next episode of the Sounds of Film features an interview with award-winning filmmaker Cody Sheehy, director of The Last Dive, which will be featured at the Port Jefferson Documentary Film Series on Thursday, November 6 at 7 PM.

Sheehy’s stunning new documentary follows Terry Kennedy, a legendary diver and American veteran whose extraordinary friendship with a giant manta ray named Willy Wow transformed him from a man with a ...

The Sounds of Film welcomes filmmaker Tim Roper, co-director of the powerful new documentary For the Living.

The film tells the extraordinary true story of Marcel Zielinski, a 10-year-old Holocaust survivor who, in January 1945, walked 60 miles by foot from Auschwitz-Birkenau to Krakow in search of his family. Decades later, hundreds of cyclists from around the world retraced his path in a moving event called Ride for the Livin...

The next episode of the SOUNDS OF FILM features an in-depth conversation with Tom Needham and British filmmaker Elliott Hasler, the writer and director of VINDICATION SWIM, the inspiring true story of Mercedes Gleitze, the first British woman to swim the English Channel.

VINDICATION SWIM tells the extraordinary story of Gleitze’s 1927 accomplishment and her subsequent struggle to reclaim her achievement after being falsely accus...

Today’s episode of THE SOUNDS OF FILM features Tom Needham’s interview with director Craig Renaud and producer Juan Arredondo discussing the powerful HBO Original documentary short, ARMED ONLY WITH A CAMERA: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF BRENT RENAUD. The film tells the remarkable and heartbreaking story of filmmaker and journalist Brent Renaud, who was killed by Russian soldiers while covering the war in Ukraine—becoming the first America...

On this episode of The Sounds of Film, host Tom Needham talks with Swiss filmmaker Barbara Miller about her documentary Wisdom of Happiness, in which she films an intimate dialogue with the Dalai Lama about compassion, peace, and resilience in times of crisis.

They explore how she captured such candor and warmth, her collaborations, and why kindness is at the heart of lasting transformation.

The Sounds of Film has featured p...

The Sounds of Film presents an inspiring conversation with Perri Peltz, the award-winning filmmaker behind She Runs the World, which is featured at the Port Jefferson Documentary Series.

The film tells the electrifying true story of Allyson Felix, the most decorated track and field athlete in Olympic history, who risked her career to fight for what she knew was right.

At the height of her fame, Felix became pregnant and disc...

The Sounds of Film is spotlighting Richard Ladkani, the award-winning director of YANUNI, a breathtaking new documentary featured at the Hamptons International Film Festival. The film follows Indigenous leader Juma Xipaia from her remote village in the Brazilian Amazon to the political frontlines of climate justice.

After surviving six assassination attempts, Juma becomes Brazil’s first Secretary of Indigenous Rights, while her husb...

The Sounds of Film features an interview with Jeremy Power Regimbal, director of Between the Mountain and the Sky, a powerful new documentary about humanitarian Maggie Doyne. The film follows Doyne’s journey from a young American traveler to the founder of a children’s home, school, and women’s center in Nepal. Her inspiring partnership with Tope, a Nepalese orphan, leads to global recognition when she is named CNN’s 2015 Hero of t...

The Sounds of Film will spotlight Ari Selinger, the writer-director of On The End, as the film makes its world premiere at the Hamptons International Film Festival on October 4th.

The feature debut is a moving love story and a powerful David vs. Goliath tale, inspired by the real-life struggles of Montauk mechanic Tom, who fought to keep his home and repair shop from being taken by the town of East Hampton.

Starring Tim Blake Ne...

Academy Award Winner Marshall Curry Talks NEW YORKER AT 100 & Hamptons International Film Festival on SOUNDS OF FILM

The Sounds of Film welcomes Academy Award–winning filmmaker Marshall Curry for a conversation about his new Netflix documentary The New Yorker at 100.

The film offers unprecedented access inside the offices of The New Yorker during its centennial year, revealing the obsessive craft behind its reporting, fictio...

This week on The Sounds of Film, host Tom Needham speaks with journalist and author David J. Lynch about his new book, The World’s Worst Bet: How the Globalization Gamble Went Wrong and What Would Make It Right.

Lynch joined The Washington Post in 2017 after covering white-collar crime for the Financial Times. He has also served as cybersecurity editor at Politico and as a senior writer at Bloomberg News. Earlier in his career, ...

The latest episode of The Sounds of Film spotlights Ask E. Jean, a powerful new documentary directed by Ivy Meeropol. The film takes viewers on a journey through the extraordinary life of journalist, advice columnist, and cultural icon E. Jean Carroll.

Known for her fearless voice and sharp wit, Carroll has lived a life that reflects both the struggles and triumphs of women redefining their roles in media, culture, and society....

This week on The Sounds of Film, host Tom Needham welcomes writer, director, and producer Jacqueline Christy, whose feature debut Magic Hour will screen October 4th and 5th at 5:30 p.m. at the Hamptons International Film Festival.

Starring Miriam Shor (American Fiction, Younger), Sendhil Ramamurthy (Heroes, Never Have I Ever), and Austin Pendleton (My Cousin Vinny), the film follows Harriet Peterson, a cinephile stuck in the su...

On this week’s Sounds of Film, host Tom Needham speaks with award-winning filmmaker and biotech entrepreneur Bill Haney, director of Cracking the Code: Phil Sharp and the Biotech Revolution.

Narrated by Mark Ruffalo, the documentary traces the extraordinary journey of Phil Sharp, a Kentucky farm boy born in a one-room, dirt-floor house who overcame severe dyslexia to win the Nobel Prize for his groundbreaking discovery of RNA s...

On this week’s episode of The Sounds of Film, host Tom Needham speaks with Annie Roney, founder of the In Real Life (IRL) Movie Club. Roney’s national nonprofit is dedicated to strengthening communities and bridging America’s political divides through the simple act of gathering together for films and conversations.

The club’s upcoming nationwide screening of My Omaha will take place on October 12 in over 100 theaters across th...