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Culture Gabfest: Daily Summaries Delivered
by Slate Podcasts
The award-winning Culturefest features critics Stephen Metcalf, Dana Stevens, and Julia Turner debating the week in culture, from highbrow to pop.
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- Aug 21, 202623 min
Announcing: Julia's New Show!
L.A. World is a new weekly podcast from L.A. Material, the local news outlet that Julia Turner helped launch earlier this year. The show helps you understand what's happening in Los Angeles. Every episode, Julia is joined by hosts Hayes Davenport and Antonia Cereijido to walk you through L.A.'s top stories, offering context and distinctive insight you can't get anywhere else. A great listen for Angelenos, and for curious people everywhere.Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- Jul 1, 20261h 37m
So Long, and Thanks for All the Granola Edition
A eulogistic weepfest? A “valediction forbidding mourning”? A conscious unthroupling? All of the above?Believe it or not, the time has come for Steve, Dana, and Julia to convene the Culture Gabfest panel for the very last time. Before saying goodbye, they look back at the very first piece of culture they ever gabbed about on their inaugural episode in February 2008: the film Juno. Does the indie darling written by Diablo Cody, directed by Jason Reitman, and starring Elliot Page as a sardonic, pregnant teenager hold up after 18 years? And, what does rewatching it in 2026 reveal about how culture has changed? They discuss.Next, the panel welcomes on the grand poobah of SFOPs June Thomas to counsel them through the inevitable change in one’s cultural habits that comes after a big life transition. They get into why June stopped watching TV and the truly wild mix of things in her YouTube algorithm. Finally, we hear from you our dear, dear listeners. Steve, Dana, and Julia respond to some of your many beautiful emails and voice memos. In our bonus episode for Slate Plus subscribers, past Gabfest producers spill the beans on what it was like to make this show over the years.And, as always, thank you so much for being a listener.EndorsementsDana: The forthcoming book about translating ancient texts by beloved past Gabfest guest Emily Wilson, Crossing the Wine-Dark Sea: Journeys Through Ancient Literature.June: The podcast Drafting the Past hosted by Kate Carpenter about the craft of writing history.Julia: Manhattan Beach's indie bookstore Pages and On the Calculation of Volume (Book 1) by Solvej Balle (definitely the first 30 pages and maybe the whole five book series).Steve: In addition to the music of Red Garland, I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith, and the poem “The Writer” by Richard Wilbur, Sparrowbush Bakery, a tiny, rustic bakery in Livingston, New York that is only open Fridays and Saturdays and serves the best bread made from fresh stoneground flour from locally grown grains you’ll ever taste.Where in the World to Find the Culture GabfestDana: Writing film reviews on Slate.com and kicking around a book idea that is still in the early stages. You can find updates and commentary on Bluesky. Steve: In the wind, to the sands... and also working on a new book about, among many other things, the 1980s.Julia: Editing L.A. Material and soon appearing weekly on L.A. Material's about-to-launch podcast L.A. World. Also, on Twitter/X, Instagram, and Bluesky.June: At her newsletter Where Are All the Emails?For the time being, listeners can also still reach the panel
- Jun 24, 20261h 20m
Toy Story 5 Crushes It at the Box Office Edition
The Gabfest’s end is nigh but we’ve still got a few bits of culture to gab upon. This week, Steve and Dana are joined by longtime Gabfest star pinch hitter Dan Kois. First up for consideration: Pixar’s Toy Story 5. In this fifth installment of the computer animation studio’s flagship franchise, the threat to the vital bond between toy and child are computers themselves. Will Pixar, of all entities, save us from the threat of screentime? Maybe not. Is it nice to be back with Woody, Buzz, Jesse and the gang of plushies, dolls, and various transitional objects? Maybe so.Next, the panel drops into the indie comedy ecosystem of the streaming service Dropout TV and talks about its chaotic cult hit game show Game Changer, now in its eighth season. Does the goofy hijinks therein offer a framework for the future of TV? They discuss. Finally, supreme, very special friend of the program (SVSFOP) Wesley Morris joins to talk about the New York Times’ package on the six sentences that define America and his essay in it about Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam.”In our bonus episode, Wesley sticks around to theorize with Steve, Dana, and Julia about the point of even having podcasts about culture.EndorsementsDana: "What Steven Spielberg Taught Me About Fear, Catharsis, and Being Human" by Wesley Morris in The New York Times as well as, maybe for the first time ever for Dana in Gabfest history, a piece of technology: the MacBook Neo.Julia: The ongoing career—after composing the Gabfest theme—of the composer Nicholas Britell including his work for the NBA and particularly the composition "Agape" on the film score of If Beale Street Could Talk. Wesley: The potato salad recipe in Pearl Bailey's cookbook Pearl's Kitchen: An Extraordinary Cookbook.Dan: Writing fan mail to authors whose work you love. Also, the music of the recently departed South African jazz pianist Abdullah Ibrahim, particularly the album Mindif.Steve: The semi-fictionalized documentary about David Hockney A Bigger Splash and Philip French's review of it for BFI. Also, David Denby's 1990 New York Review of Books essay "The Real Thing" about the documentarian Frederick Wiseman. --Email us your thoughts at culturefest@slate.com. Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch.Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Ac
- Jun 17, 20261h 27m
One Last Strut Edition
Steve, Dana, and Julia gather once more—for almost the last time—to unpack the week’s culture. This week, conversation has to include the cultural, cinematic juggernaut Steven Spielberg and his new film Disclosure Day. Starring Josh O’Connor and Emily Blunt, it’s a sci-fi, action thriller about the longheld Spielbergian obsession: extraterrestrial life. Does it deliver that trademark Spielberg sense of wonder or tired cliches… or both?Next, they welcome longtime friend of the program Isaac Butler to discuss his new book The Perfect Moment: God, Sex, Art, and the Birth of America's Culture Wars and threats to free expression past, present, and future. Finally, and for the final time, beloved chartologist Chris Molanphy joins the show to remember Summer Struts past and curate the ultimate shortlist of shortlists. The panel shares their most adored songs from previous years and the tracks that never made the list but should have.Listen to the final, ultimate, best of Summer Strut shortlist here. And for even more struttin’, you can listen to ten years of Summer Strut shortlists in one playlist here.For Slate Plus subscribers, our bonus episode includes even more propulsive, groovy tracks and reflective conversation about what was Summer Strut.EndorsementsDana: Slate’s Spielberg Week and the 2023 conversation between the three philosophers John Vervaeke, Iain McGilchrist, and Daniel Schmachtenberger on "The Psychological Drivers of the Metacrisis."Chris: The 2025 music video, directed by Mike Mills and starring Saoirse Ronan, of the Talking Heads classic Psycho Killer.Julia: L.A. Material's upcoming Culinary Cup, a tournament of Los Angeles restaurants from the national diasporas represented in World Cup teams. Steve: Sports. (Latecomers and bandwagon fans welcome! Go Knicks!)And don’t forget to preorder Isaac Butler’s book The Perfect Moment: God, Sex, Art, and the Birth of America's Culture Wars.--Email us your thoughts at culturefest@slate.com. Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch.Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- Jun 10, 20261h 22m
One Last Taylor Swift Throwdown Edition
As you may have heard in last week’s episode, the Culture Gabfest is hanging up its microphones after 18 years of cultural commentary. But before our final episode, we’ve still got much to discuss!On this special guest-packed show, Steve, Dana, and Nadira Goffe have the power! That is the power to get into it with VSFOP Jamelle Bouie about Masters of the Universe, the latest attempt by Mattel to launch their own cinematic universe. They assess the state of IP-driven superhero movies and whether this newest entry—starring Nicholas Galitzine, as the buff, loin cloth-wearing He-Man, and Jared Leto, as the slightly lascivious Skeletor—is more than brand management.Next, they turn to the wild, surreal revenge thriller Is God Is, written and directed by Aleshea Harris based on her stageplay. They talk about how this tale of twin sisters seeking vengeance fits into the growing pantheon of Black horror as well as the ancient canon of revenge tragedies.Finally, and for the final time, it’s time to talk about Taylor Swift. In the wake of her newest release, the song “I Knew It, I Knew You” for the Toy Story 5 soundtrack, the gang assembles one more time to take up the long-simmering Tay debate. Jody Rosen and Julia jump on the call/enter the Thunderdome for this, of course. In a bonus episode for Slate Plus subscribers, the panel pours one out for the recently shuttered Hampshire College and reflects on the changing landscape of the liberal arts.EndorsementsDana: The interactive, Jazz-playing, transit-obsessed, single purpose website Train Jazz. (Hat tip once more to Rusty Foster's Today in Tabs.)Nadira: The Black Film Archive which showcases Black films made from 1898 to 1999 currently streaming. Also, the year 2016 in music. Jody: For some Gabfest replacement therapy, watching academic lectures on YouTube such as the lectures of art historian John Walsh at Yale Art Galleries—including ones on Vincent Van Gogh and Dutch masters— and cultural historian Eric Lott on Racial Masquerade in America and Philippe Petit's legendary tightrope walk between the Twin Towers. Julia: Patrick Radden Keefe's new book London Falling and the song "Come Tomorrow" by Patti Scialfa.Steve: Following up on last week’s endorsement, Steve can confirm that Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee is, in fact, good. Also recommended: Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald. --Email us your thoughts at culturefest@slate.com. Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch.Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for
- Jun 3, 20261h 14m
Stuck in the Backrooms Edition
This week Steve, Dana, and Julia convene once again—this time with some big news. Also, they make a classic Gabfest episode. First up, it's the alienating fluorescent buzz, infinite carpeted sprawl, and liminal horror of Backrooms. The new release from A24 is directed by 20-year-old Kane Parsons based on his YouTube series which itself was inspired by deep internet lore and a viral piece of creepypasta. Does the uncanny maze of Backrooms go anywhere? They step into the labyrinth to find out. Next, they’re joined by Gabfest fave Leon Neyfakh to get into another parallel dimension: the world of OnlyFans. They discuss Leon’s new podcast about the ubiquitous platform OnlyFantasy—produced with comedian and OF creator Gracie Canaan.Finally, it’s a conversation that’s as lively as… well, that’s the question. They take up a recent piece of data journalism in The Pudding analyzing the most common similes.In a bonus episode, Carl Wilson joins the call (as well as a special endorsement segment) to talk taste. Specifically, they get into how discussions of taste have changed since Carl wrote authoritatively on it 18 years ago in his book Let’s Talk About Love: Why Other People Have Bad Taste.EndorsementsDana: The recent Zadie Smith essay in The New York Review of Books "Art for Our Sakes." Carl: The live album Happy Today by Jeff Parker and ETA IVtet as well as the anthology of poetry On Occasion: Poems for the People, with a special Canadian shoutout to the poem "Oh Americans" by Gary Barwin.Julia: The tranquil, koi fish-rich, and very SoCal Self-Realization Fellowship Lake Shrine. Also, L.A. listeners should join the folks of L.A Material, Punch List, and New York Review of Architecture on June 7 for the event LACMA Therapy Session to process all their complicated feelings about the new David Geffen Galleries.Steve: The band The Durutti Column as sampled in the Blood Orange song "The Field." Plus, Steve would love to know what listeners make of the author J.M. Coetzee, particularly his novel Disgrace.(Also, make sure to subscribe to Carl's fantastic newsletter Crritic!)--Email us your thoughts at culturefest@slate.com. Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch.Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- May 27, 202658 min
I Love Boosters Heightens the Contradictions Edition
This week, the OG three Steve, Dana, and Julia dig into the visually stuffed, Marxist smorgasbord that is Boots Riley’s latest film I Love Boosters. Starring Keke Palmer and Demi Moore, the candy-colored agitprop is about exploitation, the fashion world, shoplifting as class warfare, and— as they discuss—perhaps more than one movie can handle. Next they turn from Marx to Freud and analyze the critically adored reality TV phenomenon Couples Therapy, now entering its fifth season. Is the office of Dr. Orna Guralnik a site of transcendent psychological revelation or panoptic exploitation? They unpack.Finally, they talk lingvo itself by way of a recent article in Harpers by Katie Thornton about the unlikely resurgence of interest in the artificial language Esperanto. In a bonus episode for Slate Plus subscribers, they answer a listener question about what long-running pieces of culture they’ve stuck with over years.Ĝuu!EndorsementsDana: The book The Artificial Language Movement by Andrew Large about the centuries-long history of utopic language projects.Julia: Lena Dunham’s memoir Famesick and Dialed.gg, the internet’s latest color perception test.Steve: The music of the indie shoegaze band Slowdive—particularly the album Souvlaki—and the solo efforts of its frontman Neil Halstead—particularly the song “Witless or Wise” and the album Palindrome Hunches; check out Steve’s mega playlist for more.---Email us your thoughts at culturefest@slate.com. Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch.Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- May 20, 202655 min
You’re My Obsession Edition
This week, we’ve got an all-guest-host panel with Gabfest faves Isaac Butler, Sam Adams, and June Thomas guiding the discourse… straight to hell. In this case, hell is the romantic relationships depicted in the buzzy indie horror Obsession. This rom-com/horror mashup—marking Curry Barker’s impressive feature directorial debut—deals with questions of codependency and consent. But the real question: is Obsession worth the online obsession? Next, they turn their gaze to the spooky titular island of Widow’s Bay and discuss the new series starring Matthew Rhys in another horror/comedy genre experiment. Finally, they debate whether most kids’ books are “crud?” Or really, is the recent online furor over comments in children’s book creator Mac Barnett’s new book Make Believe: On Telling Stories to Children merited?In a bonus episode for Slate Plus subscribers, the gang gather over the topic of book clubs.EndorsementsJune: Get In: The Inside Story of Labor Under Starmer by Patrick Maguire and Gabriel Pogrund, a detailed and readable analysis of Keir Starmer's unlikely rise to power.Sam: The latest film of indie, animated short auteur Don Hertzfeldt "Paper Trail." Isaac: The novel The Oppermanns, a family saga by Lion Feuchtwanger written in real time during Hitler’s rise. (And, as a bonus peek into Feuchtwanger's post-war milieu, check out Salka Viertel’s autobiography The Kindness of Strangers.)--Email us your thoughts at culturefest@slate.com. Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch.Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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About Culture Gabfest
The award-winning Culturefest features critics Stephen Metcalf, Dana Stevens, and Julia Turner debating the week in culture, from highbrow to pop.
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