The Empire Film Podcast

This week's Empire Podcast sees Simon Farnaby, Mathew Baynton, and Kiell Smith-Bynoe, three members of the gargantuan cast of Ghosts: The Possession Of Button House, the big-screen debut of the beloved BBC sitcom Ghosts, possess the podbooth and have a delightful and deliciously daft chat with Chris Hewitt which, at one point, involves trying to explain the concept of Taskmaster to Farnaby. Either side of that, Chris is also joined in the podbooth by Helen O'Hara, James Dyer and, visiting us from the US of A, Anthony Breznican, who makes his pod debut in excellent fashion. Our intrepid quartet discuss the week's movie news, including the new issue of Empire and Steven Soderbergh stepping in on The Batman Part II, chat about their favourite documentaries, review Wildwood, Ghosts: The Possession Of Button House, Clayface, Klara And The Sun, and Fatherland, and take a listener question from a most unusual source. Enjoy!

Another cracking episode of The Interviews this week, folks, as Chris Hewitt sits down on Zoom with Tom Rhys Harries, who plays the title role in Clayface as a hotshot actor who goes on a rip-roaring rampage of revenge armed with a newfound ability to perfectly mimic anyone he meets. But they also talk torn ACLs, an inability to grow beards, and Chris' dreadful golf game. Then Chris sits down in person with Klara And The Sun writer/director, Taika Waititi, for an insight into Taika's writing process as he adapts the novel by Kazuo Ishiguro. And finally Dan Jolin has a lovely chat with the young stars of Travis Knight's five-star Laika epic, Wildwood, Peyton Elizabeth Lee and Jacob Tremblay. Don't worry, they move at normal speed. Enjoy!

Travis Knight's Wildwood is the latest film from Laika, the Portland-based stop-motion animation studio behind the likes of Coraline, The Boxtrolls, and Kubo And The Two Strings. And, with Wildwood about to hit cinemas, the Empire Podcast has teamed up with Wildwood to bring you this special podcast in which Chris Hewitt, Helen O'Hara, and James Dyer discuss the evolution of Laika through the years, going film-by-film through their back catalogue, and track the journey along the road to their most ambitious film yet. You'll Laika it. You'll Laika it a lot. Enjoy!

This week's Empire Podcast sees Tom Hiddleston return once again as our star guest (for what we are guessing is a record — let us know if that's the case, we don't keep records!) to tell Chris Hewitt all about his new movie, Tenzing, and he brings his co-star with him, the Tibetan actor Genden Phuntsok, who plays Tenzing Norgay, the Sherpa who was there every step of the way with Edmund Hillary as they became the first people to climb Mount Everest in 1953. Either side of that, Chris is joined in the podbooth by James Dyer and Amon Warmann for a fun episode in which they celebrate the Prince Charles Cinema, discuss the worst movie posters, run their eyes over a bunch of new trailers, including Narnia: The Magician's Nephew and The Exorcist: Martyrs, review Tenzing, Whalefall, Forgotten Island, and Street Fighter, and engage in an impromptu quiz eventually called Name That Stath!, which features a guest cameo or two. Enjoy!

This week's episode of The Interviews sees two dynamic duos drop in for lovely cinema-connected chats. First, Chris Hewitt comes face-to-face with Austin Abrams and Josh Brolin, the actors who play out a fractious father-son relationship in Brian Duffield's Whalefall, in which Abrams gets trapped inside the stomach of a sperm whale, and they talk about what scares them as actors, filming inside a giant stomach, and more. Then, Alex Godfrey has a lovely chat, some of it concerning pick & mix, with Kitao Sakurai and Andrew Koji, the director and star respectively of Street Fighter, the film which adapts the classic fighting video game. Hadoukens at the ready!