Summer is almost upon us. The weather is warming up and May is officially behind us so it’s time to summarize what we have been up to over at the Uncut Gems Podcast and its Patreon bonus content.
We decided to dedicate the month of May to the cinema of Elaine May in what we called half-jokingly Elaine May May. Over the course of four weekends we re-traced May’s entire directorial filmography which includes A New Leaf, The Heartbreak Kid, Mikey and Nicky and Ishtar. We spent a considerable amount of time digging into these movies to understand their importance and just how inspired they were despite the fact May fought many battles to preserve her vision. In fact, we emerged convinced that she was a completely misunderstood auteur, maligned by the Hollywood environment so much that her last movie, Ishtar, stood for years as one of the worst movies of all time before being eventually reappraised. We also tied into these conversations with a chat about a movie she officially co-wrote (and she did uncredited work on way more movies than anyone knows) the Warren Beatty-directed Heaven Can Wait.
Episode 223 (A New Leaf)
Episode 224 (The Heartbreak Kid)
Episode 225 (Mikey and Nicky)
Episode 226 (Ishtar)
Bonus Tie-in 48 (Heaven Can Wait) (full episode on Patreon)
Our 50-30 series continued unabated as well where we celebrated, almost on the day, the 30th anniversary of the release of Tony Scott’s Crimson Tide.
The 50-30 Series 05 (Crimson Tide) (full episode on Patreon)
Finally, the Mike Nichols Marathon continued with a conversation about his fifth, perhaps the most bizarre, movie, the 1973 The Day of the Dolphin starring George C. Scott, talking dolphins and conspiracy plots. Suffice it to say, we had a lot of fun while also trying to wrap our heads around this utterly discombobulating movie.
Flasz On Film 
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