CHILLPAK HOLLYWOOD HOUR

Back on schedule, your friends in podcasting offer up a fun grab bag of audio goodness this week ... Dean reports on "Ironfest" and discusses his future "X-Files" convention appearances. Lily Holleman reports live from a film festival in Miami where she is attending the screening of a movie in which she co-stars. Phil is in Los Angeles, of course, where he discusses the revival of the Los Angeles Breakfast Club, a truly bizarre cop film from the 1970's, and a recent epic movie about a real-life explorer. All that plus Dean and Phil remember both a country music great and a beloved (diminutive) cinematic sidekick.

Delayed by 36 hours so that Phil could work on materials pertaining to the forthcoming release of The Lady Killers and so Dean could get some chiropractic work done pertaining to his recovery from knee surgery, this week's episode begins with updates on both these tales before your friends in podcasting launch into "Celebrity Deaths", where they remember a former first lady of the USA, the star of a classic Kubrick film, a multiple-Oscar-winning filmmaker, a comedy impresario, a comedian and magician turned sitcom star and a talk radio pioneer. This week's show features the return of "What We're Reading" wherein Dean and Phil discuss how to maintain better focus at the contemporary art genre known as "minimal fantasy". The movies Blade Runner 2049 and Faces Places get discussed in greater detail than ever before on the show and the "clearinghouse" approach to television embodied by the likes of Netflix and Hulu versus the "curated" approach taken by HBO and Showtime gets analyzed. A handful of shows get discussed in the process. All in all, this belated episode is choc-full-o-goodness and because it's later than we like, it comes with a bonus 6 minutes!

Your friends in podcasting have a lot of personal news to share: Dean's continued recovery from knee surgery, details for the upcoming release of their movie The Lady Killers, the latest on Fuzz Aldrin's miraculous return to health, and where in the world Dean will be living next! A couple of conversation threads from past weeks are picked up and amplified, as Dean and Phil discuss Dean's feelings about film noir and why the box office success of the Star Wars franchise has always been unrelated to the films' quality (or lack thereof). More than a half dozen current and recent movies get analyzed, including Atomic Blonde, A Quiet Passion, Blade Runner 2049, Red Sparrow, Ready Player One, A Quiet Place, Game Night and more.

Your friends in podcasting have been teasing episode #568 for weeks! They had really been looking forward to counting down their all-time favorite Mystery films and the final results prove to be a lot of fun. So, get those Netflix queues handy, because Dean and Phil will hit you with more than two dozen movies they discuss at length with four films actually finding a place on both their Top Tens. There are comedy "whodunits" from the 1930's, foreign language allegories from the 2000's, independent films that launched careers, classics from international masters that launched entire sub-genres, mysteries based on books, mysteries based on plays, mysteries set in the farthest reaches of space, mysteries full of post-war romance and cold war anxiety. The biggest mystery of all is after almost eleven years, how do Dean Haglund and Phil Leirness keep managing to provide an hour (plus) of free audio entertainment each week?!

Endings seem very much on the minds of your friends in podcasting. Dean and Phil discuss the final screen performance for the great character actor Harry Dean Stanton. They weigh in on what might have been the final episode of "The X-Files" ever. They mourn the loss of both Toys''R''Us and its founder, and they look back at the loss of previous home entertainment media in the wake of the current AT&T vs. The Department of Justice lawsuit (over an enormous corporate merger that reflects much of where home entertainment is heading). All that, plus Ben Affleck's Live By Night and the Jennifer Lawrence vehicle Red Sparrow. It's YOUR Chillpak Hollywood Hour. Enjoy!

On this week's episode, we've got movies, including a discussion of some classic mysteries, and a brand new sci-fi masterpiece that sadly shows the sorry state of movie distribution! We have lawsuits, including one nasty battle between the US Department of Justice and media conglomerate AT&T, and a very different case about set safety on independent films in Canada! We have fond farewells to two true icons, one a scientific giant, the other a fashion legend! We have a show biz scandal featuring the august Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences! All that plus we tease huge life-changing news for Dean Haglund!

In addition to the latest updates on Dean's post-surgery recovery and the miracle of Fuzz Aldrin, as well as the de rigueur rounds of "Celebrity Deaths" (where Dean will get quizzed about a pioneering comedian, a legendary sci-fi writer, an award-winning horror writer, two singers and an iconic television actor), there is a lot of movie news for your friends in podcasting to discuss. Dean and Phil analyze the Oscars, including the winners, the host, the politics, the ratings and the ensuing and on-going conversation about diversity and inclusion in the motion picture workplace. They will also discuss a handful of films, including one of the Best Foreign Language Film nominees, the 1974 winner for "Best Actor", an early Horror classic (also an Oscar winner for "Best Actor), and the supposed "greatest romantic comedy of all time". Oh, and if you have yet to enjoy last week's show, you are missing out on one of our funniest hours EVER!

Pre-recorded on Friday, this episode is a bit of a grab-bag, though it certainly is an hilarious grab-bag! Your friends in podcasting spend the first half of the show discussing their ambivalence about this year's Academy Awards, with some predictions of who will win Oscars, including those likely victors that disappoint or even disgust them, and which victories might please them, and why. Then, Dean and Phil switch gears by welcoming two guests via Skype. Brandon Marsh and Alina Brazdeikene are on the team that created the game "The X-Files: Deep State" and they file a live report from the green room at X-Fest, the 25th celebration of "The X-Files". Finally, Dean and Phil wrap up with two rounds of their new game-show rendition of "Celebrity Deaths". This week Dean is quizzed about a jazz great (and legendary anti-Apartheid figure) who Dean does not recognize and a female icon of World War II that Dean DOES get right!

In an absolutely hilarious installment of YOUR Chillpak Hollywood Hour, Dean shares his challenging recovery from knee surgery and addresses a rumor. Phil describes appearing on stage with his cat Fuzz Aldrin at a screening of The Lady Killers, shares the importance of the venue to his development as a filmmaker, reveals that the film has secured full North American distribution, and oh, yeah, how he got engaged to his long-time lady love, Lily Holleman, during the post-screening Q&A. Dean and Phil compare notes on "Star Trek: The Animated Series", the future of "The X-Files" (including a potential spin-off series), and such movies as It, Winchester, Criminal and Black Panther. All that, plus a couple more "Celebrity Deaths" discussed in their brand new game show format where Phil gives the name, and Dean has to guess for what that individual was celebrated. Enjoy it now, wherever good podcasts can be found and share it with your friends!

After two weeks of pre-recorded (and absolutely hilarious) episodes, your friends in podcasting are back at it, doing what they do best: Making sense of a world gone wild through insightful, irreverent and inspiring conversation. Dean tells tales of recovery after complete knee reconstruction surgery. Phil tells tales of Fuzz Aldrin's attempted recovery from neurological damage. They preview this week's screening of their film The Lady Killers in San Jose! Then, Dean and Phil roll up their sleeves to tackle the 8th US school shooting of 2018 and what Hollywood can do to affect positive change. On their most recent shows, Dean and Phil turned their usual “Celebrity Deaths” segment into a bit of a game show. They will be doing more of the same as they celebrate the lives and careers of an actress involved with the Hollywood Ten, an influential gospel singer, the lead singer of The Cranberries, the founder of the American Foundation for AIDS Research, a young Australian actress, the creator of “WKRP in Cincinnati” and the inspiration for Austin Powers. We are into the 2nd half of what seems likely to be the final season of “The X-Files”, even though, it’s been quite a good season. The first season of “Star Trek: Discovery” has come to a close and although it was pretty darn bad, there will be a second season. Dean and Phil analyze both these shows and where they fit into the cultural landscape. All that plus a brief discussion about Stanley Tucci’s latest directorial effort and the opening salvo in what promises to be a barn-burner of an ongoing argument over the merits of “Twin Peaks: The Return”.

In a fascinating and very funny installment of your Chillpak Hollywood Hour, Dean Haglund and Phil Leirness begin by catching up on some of the many "Celebrity Deaths" from early this year that you might not have heard about! Not only that, but for the first time ever, they turn these celebrations into a sort of game show. As they discuss doing just that there is a few second-long audio glitch, so bear with us. Also, Phil promises to go easy on snacking during future episodes! A female TV cop, the Emmy award-winning brother of Dick Van Dyke, the Queen of the Blues, the detective who investigated the Zodiac killer case, a classic heavy metal guitarist, the last remaining original Mouseketeer, the voice of college football, and the first female US general are all remembered. Then Marc Hershon rejoins your friends in podcasting for the 2nd half of the show to discuss hilarious stories about his career in corporate branding, his career as a comedy impresario (replete with stories of big stars), depictions of improv and stand-up comics in film and TV, and robots! You'll be laughing so much, the insight of some of the discussion might just sneak up on you!

Because Dean Haglund is going "under the knife" to get a new knee this weekend, he and Phil Leirness, recorded two podcasts worth of material, just in case it takes him a little while to feel up to podcasting again ... In the first of these two shows, Dean and Phil discuss the short Buster Keaton made for the National Film Board in Canada in 1965 and the documentary about the making of that short. Then, it's the return of "Lawsuit of the Week", with the great Warren Beatty being sued by the distributor of his recent, and sadly overlooked, box office failure Rules Don't Apply. And somehow, that leads into a discussion of modern musicals, La La Land, The Shape of Water, Richard Jenkins, and Holy Motors. As long as it had been since the last time your friends in podcasting covered a "Lawsuit of the Week", it had been even longer since they offered an "Explanation of the Week", but that is at long last remedied, as Phil tells an amazing story about his beloved sick kitty Fuzz Aldrin, and that story leads into a fascinating explanation about brain waves, the power of visualizations, the healing nature of creativity and more ... There is barely any time to make a dent in all the "Celebrity Deaths" that have been piling up, but legendary astronaut John Young does get remembered just before Dean and Phil are joined by long-time friend to the show, Marc Hershon, the producer and host of the Comedy Podcast "Soundcast", Succotash. In part 1 of a 2 part conversation, the end of "Succotash" and the rampant proliferation of podcasts (and podcast listeners) are discussed. Marc shares an hilarious story about the rather brilliant TJ Miller. All in all, a truly nourishing, inspiring, thought-provoking and hilarious installment of YOUR Chillpak Hollywood Hour.

Dean is having surgery this week and Phil's cat, Fuzz Aldrin, continues her brave recovery. Because some of you asked for updates on these matters, your friends in podcasting begin this week's epic installment with fascinating and inspiring stories pertaining to them. Then, it's all about movies ... The critics groups have all awarded their favorites. The professional guilds and unions have honored theirs. The Academy Award nominations were announced, which your Dean and Phil analyze a bit on the show. For the most part, however, this week it's Dean and Phil's turn. Keep those Netflix queues handy as the gents count down their Top Ten Films of 2017. And, of course, far more than 20 films will get discussed in what is an extra-long installment of YOUR Chillpak Hollywood Hour, one that truly stretches the definition of "hour"! Trust us, they go off the beaten path for their choices this year in an effort to champion some films that were sadly overlooked or under-marketed. Discover cinematic gems and regale in hilarious, irreverent, and occasionally insightful bickering.

This week's show begins with an update on how the fierce, determined and ridiculously cute cat Fuzz Aldrin is recovering (you can help with that recovery by visiting http://gofundme.com/save-fuzz-aldrin"). She had to have another emergency procedure this week, which leads to a rather hilarious story about Lily Holleman, "Junior Pet Detective". It also leads to a conversation about a surgical procedure Dean Haglund will be undergoing the first week of February. Then, Dean and Phil Leirness discuss movies - two "classics" (the comedy To Be or Not to Be and the musical Brigadoon), and five recent releases (Darren Aronosky's Mother!, Noah Baumbach's The Meyerowitz Stories, Dan Gilroy's Roman J. Israel, Esq., Guillermo Del Toro's The Shape of Water and the big winner at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, MIssouri). For the first time in weeks, your friends in podcasting tackle "Celebrity Deaths", celebrating the life and careers of record producer Rick Hall, actress-singer Rose Marie and film noir icon Peggy Cummins. Then, they tackle the "small screen", with Phil weighing in on the new Fox sitcom "LA to Vegas", with Dean assessing the most recent "mirror universe" episode of "Star Trek: Discover" ("The Wolf Inside"), and the two of them discussing the thematic meanings of Season 11 of "The X-Files", of the most recent episode ("Plus One") and what the future might hold for the show with or without Gillian Anderson.

Wow! What a show! This week's episode begins with your friends in podcasting sharing some of the many messages they received regarding their respective Top Ten lists of their all-time favorite War Movies. Several of these messages, and Dean and Phil's responses, are hilarious! From there, they turn to heartfelt thoughts about how much animal companions have meant to their lives and their work. Dean confides that his dobermans (who were both featured in The Truth Is Out There) were his muses, and even after their deaths, they still are. Phil shares the heart-wrenching struggle to save his beloved feline companion, Fuzz Aldrin and how Chillpak nation has been helping to give this story a happy ending (join Team Fuzz and help share her story at GoFundMe.com/save-fuzz-aldrin). The rest of the show is dedicated to the return of three iconic television brands. David Letterman is back, returning with a new Netflix show. Dean and Phil tackle why he's back and the role this show might play in the current cultural landscape. "Star Trek: Discovery" is back, with the second part of its inaugural season. Why its return might actually hint at both improvement, and perhaps, increased acceptance, even though, as Dean reveals, they are still finding ways to "stub their toes" on each episode. Finally, "The X-Files" is back, debuting with a season premiere that was greeted as another clunker, but which was followed up by a VERY interesting episode of television ("This"). Dean and Phil tackle what the show has to say about the world today, about the ways in which the show has been retconned (a la "Twin Peaks") for its return, about how the return of Dean's character came about, and where that return might lead, about the inclusion of "This Man" and what that inclusion says about some of the misgivings the creators of "The X-Files" might have about the show's cultural impact. Trust us, this discussion is positively mind-blowing. The hilarious. The heartfelt. The mind-blowing. Sure sounds like YOUR Chillpak Hollywood Hour (with 10% more "hour") to us!