The Playlist
The Playlist is an entertainment podcast from SBS Australia, in which host Fiona Williams explores the movies and TV shows that are worth your time, in conversations with show creators.
Episodes
December 24, 2021 • 28 mins
Series creator and show runner Marc Cherry joins Fiona to talk all things 'Why Women Kill', as we get set for the premiere of season two on SBS and On Demand in January. We talk 'Desperate Housewives', the origins of his love of froth and drama, and he many that ways his late mother continues to inspire him. A must listen for fans of 'Why Women Kill', of great TV writing, and 'The Golden Girls'. Catch season one of 'Why Women Kill'...
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December 16, 2021 • 27 mins
We're back with a companion to 'La Fortuna', SBS Australia's sweeping 6-part adventure-drama, written and directed by Oscar-winning Chilean-Spanish director, Alejandro Amenábar. The story spans two continents, and stars Stanley Tucci as a treasure hunter with a dubious moral compass, whose actions provoke a high profile international maritime legal case about the right to claim historical artefacts. Alejandro Amenábar joins Fiona t...
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November 26, 2021 • 61 mins
We're back with a companion to 'Muhammad Ali', an epic 4-part documentary biography of one of the best-known men of the 20th century. Fiona is joined by Sarah Burns and David McMahon, co-directors, co-producers, and writers of the epic series which screens across SBS this month, and will stream at SBS On Demand. It's a fascinating conversation about how they and co-director Ken Burns approached the task of telling the definitive st...
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June 22, 2021 • 39 mins
It's the end of an era as we break into Ben's last day at SBS to record his final episode of 'The Playlist'. We're not crying, you're crying. Instead, we're breaking into song as we celebrate movie musicals. Ben's also been watching 'Loki' and does his best to explain the plot (a trouper to the end). Then when we can't avoid the subject of his leaving any longer, Ben reflects back on the shows he's most proud of helping to get on s...
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French cinema great Julie Delpy joins us on this week's show to talk about her latest film, 'My Zoe'. which offers a unique take on motherhood than we're used to seeing on screen. Then Ben and Fiona convene the Jean Smart Appreciation Society, on the strength of Mare of Easttown and Hacks. Then they share what they've been watching at SBS On Demand.
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May 28, 2021 • 22 mins
In this episode we take a walk down the New York City catwalk with Ewan McGregor in Netflix’s series on fashion designer 'Halston', take a trip on 'The Underground Railroad' in Barry Jenkins' adaptation of the 2016 novel for Amazon, and binge on the final season of Aidy Bryant's 'Shrill' on SBS On Demand.
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This episode, Fiona and Ben are dissecting a very different Oscars ceremony this year, picking out the highlights and lowlights, evaluating the winners and losers, and asking if the Academy Awards continue to matter? Plus Fiona has an interview with Andra Day, the Oscar-nominated star of 'The United States vs. Billie Holiday'. And Fiona and Ben offer up their SBS On Demand Picks: 'See What You Made Me Do' and a new season of 'The H...
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This episode we’re in a technologically designated mood for love, as we discuss a trio of shows imagining the next step in relationships - 'Made For Love' (Stan/HBO Max), along with 'Soulmates' (Amazon Prime/AMC) and 'The One' (Netflix). Fiona also speaks to Harry Macqueen the director of a new melancholy relationship road movie starring Stanley Tucci and Colin Firth - 'Supernova'. And we offer up our SBS On Demand Picks: 'Deadwate...
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Zack Snyder's fans demanded that his vision be set free from meddling studio execs and the gun-for-hire director who replaced him on 'Justice League', and Warner Bros. listened. Was it worth it? And Fiona and Ben descend down a dark path of exposing institutional corruption, in the Oscar-nominated investigative documentary 'Collective', the second season of true crime series 'Exposed: The Ghost Train Fire', the hit British police p...
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With Oscar nominations around the corner, we take a look at awards season as it hits full swing including the recent Golden Globes, and with Harry and Meghan's royal sit down interview with Oprah capturing the world we look at what the recent trend of celeb exposes says about our fascination with fame. And in What Have You Been Watching we dissect the latest Marvel Cinematic Universe foray into the small screen - in what is very mu...
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March 1, 2021 • 25 mins
Today we're joined by the one and only Mads Mikkelsen, who jumps on a Zoom call with Fiona, to talk about his star turn as a day-drinking teacher in Thomas Vinterberg's Another Round. How much is too much when you play drunk on screen? How did the team overcome a personal tragedy to pick up and carry on with the film's production? What does he recall of making 'Unit One' - a 2000s detective series that's just dropped at SBS On Dema...
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February 15, 2021 • 50 mins
In our first The Playlist for the year, we take a look at 'Minari' - the story of a Korean migrant family attempting to start afresh in rural Arkansas - which is attracting plenty of awards season buzz - and Fiona speaks with the film’s writer/director Lee Isaac Chung. We also think back on the year that was, and what’s exciting us for the year ahead.
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November 27, 2020 • 52 mins
Fiona speaks to Brandon Cronenberg, the writer/director of new sci fi horror flick 'Possessor' starring Andrea Riseborough and Jennifer Jason Leigh, Ben takes a look at the new season of The Crown with Olivia Colman and Gillian Anderson as Margaret Thatcher, as Prince Charles finds his Princess and lives happily ever after (maybe?), and in a very special wedding edition of What Have You Been Watching, Fiona and Ben compare notes on...
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November 12, 2020 • 46 mins
Fiona speaks to the stars of Italian filmmaker Luca Guadagnino’s ('Call Me By Your Name') first foray into television 'We Are Who We Are', we chat about political coverage in the media including the ABC’s flagship current affairs program '4 Corners' which made waves with its recent report "Inside the Canberra Bubble", Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant tell one another big little lies in new drama 'The Undoing' and we offer some Aborigin...
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Fiona speaks to director Jeremy Sims about his new Aussie flick 'Rams' with Sam Neill and Michael Caton, a remake of the Icelandic hit, we catch up on 'Leap of Faith', a documentary going behind the making of William Friedkin’s 'The Exorcist', and check out Anya Taylor-Joy as a woman making waves in the male-dominated 1960s chess world in 'The Queen’s Gambit'.
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October 22, 2020 • 36 mins
Sacha Baron Cohen and Eddie Redmayne fight for their right to protest in Aaron Sorkin's film of the 1960s true story 'The Trial of the Chicago 7', we get Fiona's reaction to 'Borat Subsequent Moviefilm' and discuss upcoming documentary 'AKA Jane Roe' and give the lowdown on the latest season of the Coen Brothers television adaptation 'Fargo'.
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September 22, 2020 • 40 mins
For a second year running, Ben is joined (remotely) by John Beohm, to re-enact the spectacle of the 2020 Primetime Emmy Awards complete with hazmat suits, hotel phones ringing, Jennifer Aniston putting out garbage fires, Canadian bubbles, and an alpaca.
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Our minds are very much on U.S. politics this week, given that Americans will head to the polls for the 2020 presidential election in less than 50 days. We're joined by documentary filmmaker Nanette Burstein, who talks to Fiona about making a landmark biography of Hillary Rodham Clinton. Nothing was off limits during the 35-hours spent interviewing Hillary about her life as a feminist trailblazer and polarising figure in US politic...
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September 10, 2020 • 44 mins
With 'Hungry Ghosts' now streaming at SBS On Demand, we take a deep dive into the show, with a special guest who offers exclusive insight into the writing process. Vietnamese-Australian writer Jeremy Nguyen joins us from his lockdown abode in Melbourne, to talk us through the experience of drawing upon his own family's experiences, to inform the story.
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September 9, 2020 • 42 mins
The horrors of 1950s America become all too real in the new HBO series 'Lovecraft Country', prompting a deep dive into recent HBO dramas 'Perry Mason' and 'Watchmen'; a tribute to Chadwick Boseman in 'Get On Up'; and a look at Netflix health and wellness exposé '(Un)Well' and SBS On Demand's 'Sydney Super Tunnel'.
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