Podcast host Neal Pollack revisits his roots this week as he interviews his old friend Arthur Bradford, the director of 'To Be Destroyed)', a new short documentary about the efforts of the school district of Rapid City, South Dakota, to ban a bunch of books, including the novel 'The Circle' by Dave Eggers.
If you mess with Dave Eggers, you'd best not miss. And they did miss. Arthur was once a writer but is now a documentary filmmaker. He and Eggers had been talking about doing a documentary, but this was the obvious topic. Eggers went to South Dakota and met with students, and Arthur accompanied him. A crusade against injustice ensued. Neal and Arthur talk about the film and the issues at hand, and also about Neal's "psychological issues" surrounding his former colleague and mentor Eggers. A revealing conversation ensues about the realities of book banning and why Neal wants a camera crew to "follow me to Trader Joe's."
A more conventional but still insightful segment follows. Contributor Greg Ford joins Neal to talk about the strange new adaptation of Giovanni Boccaccio's 'The Decameron)', now airing on Netflix. They both enjoyed the performance of main character Tanya Reynolds but also found the adaptation to be overly long and needlessly silly. Greg, who has actually read 'The Decameron,' also notes that the show isn't nearly as bawdy as the book itself, which was controversial in its time for its overtly sexual and anti-clerical content, two issues that are not a problem today.
Enjoy the show!
