Claim OwnershipFilm Stories with Simon Brew
Subscribed: 762Played: 52,912
Subscribe
Description
Film Stories with Simon Brew is a podcast that looks to dig into the stories behind popular movies.From troubled productions, to rights issues, to difficulties with release to films nearly falling apart, the podcast will be looking at the stories that don't always seem apparent when watching a movie!
The podcast is hosted by Simon Brew, the founder of Den Of Geek. Support the podcast at www.patreon.com/simonbrew. Thank you!
434 Episodes
Reverse
1You want a Christmas movie? Look no further than Rocky IV, surely the raging highlight of the Rocky saga. Written and directed by Sylvester Stallone, and with montages coming out of its armpits, the movie was not without a few challenges (and injuries.) Not least: how do you follow up the relentlessness of Mr T's Clubber Lang from Rocky III?
The answer arrived in the sizeable shape of Dolph Lundgren, a one-time guest on this very show. But then, decades later, Sylvester Stallone decided that he had problems with Rocky IV. And a very different cut was born...
The stories are told in this very episode....
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Now in UK cinemas is the spoof movie Fackham Hall, which crosses the likes of Airplane! with Downton Abbey.
But how do you write a spoof movie? And what are the challenges? We've brought together 66.6% of the writing team The Dawson Brothers to tell us more, and explain why a CG house was required to make a sex scene involving pigs...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
There was originally a plan to bring the much-loved Christmas book The Polar Express to the big screen in live action, with Rob Reiner potentially directing. But eventually, the project ended up with Robert Zemeckis. Looking for something between live action and animation, a different kind of technology was to be used for the film - but would audiences respond to it? Especially when they tried to look the characters in the eye...
The second part of this episode is a return to the podcast for writer/producer/director James L Brooks, chatting about his new film, Ella McCay. Plus, getting films for grown-ups made, Mike Nichols, previewing his movies and a whole lot more.
Ella McCay is in UK cinemas from 12th December 2025.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Dan Cadan may not be a name familiar to too many, but he's had quite the career. In this special Film Stories episode, he tells his tale of how the lad growing up in Huddersfield went on to work with Guy Ritchie (including writing a remake of The Wild Geese), Stephen Graham, Madonna and more.
Then, getting a film made, the sole UK release from the Fox International label, Walk Like A Panther. He takes us into the highs and lows of that, his letter about it to Kermode & Mayo, and what mischief he's up to now. Quite the story this...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Go down the box office charts for 1992, and you need to look a long way before you find The Muppet Christmas Carol. Directed by Brian Henson, the movie was in 45th place at the box office that year, with surprisingly few choosing to check it out on its initial cinema release.
The film had come together following the death of Muppets creator Jim Henson, and there'd been some difficulty cracking what the next Muppet film should be. Even when they settled on an adaptation of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, there were a few different choices that were nearly made.
The story of the film is told in this episode...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In a very special episode of the Film Stories podcast, Simon is joined by two of the team behind Disney's new animated movie, Zootropolis.
There's producer Yvett Merino, an Oscar-winner for Encanto, who came to Zootropolis 2 hot off the heels of Moana 2. And then writer/director Jared Bush returns to the podcast, for what's becoming a very welcome annual check in with the chief creative officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios.
The conversation covers the new Zootropolis/Zootopia film, a four minute sequence that got cut out of the film, a dog with a dodgy tummy, and a whole lot more...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
After the, cough, 'underwhelming' A Good Day To Die Hard in 2013, the assumption was that the Die Hard saga had run aground. But for a while, that wasn't the case, and by 2015, there was a plan hatched for one final movie in the series.
Bruce Willis was set to return as John McClane, Len Wiseman - after Die Hard 4.0 - was coming back to direct. And this time, we were going to be told the origin story of John McClane too.
The film was active for nearly half a decade. And this is the story of the Die Hard that never was.
Plus, a small update too on the Film Stories podcast...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In a special episode of the Film Stories podcast, Simon is joined by Oscar-winning production designer Nathan Crowley. He won his Oscar for Wicked, and you can now see his work in Wicked For Good on the big screen.
This chat takes in those films, as well as Christopher Nolan's garage, nine seconds with Ridley Scott, early work with Francis Ford Coppola, and a whole lot more...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In a special episode of the Film Stories podcast, Simon brought Mark Kermode and Jenny Nelson to his home town of Birmingham in the UK. There, Mark and Jenny were on stage to talk about movie music, as they talked about their new book, Mark Kermode's Surround Sound.
You're getting the full, lively conversation here, complete with audience questions at the end. With huge thanks to the team at the Midlands Arts Centre in Birmingham.
Mark Kermode's Surround Sound is available now, published by Picador. Please buy it from an independent bookshop if you can!
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Director Ruben Fleischer's latest film is the third in the Now You See Me franchise, entitled Now You See Me Now You Don't. A movie stuck in development for a fair amount of time, it's now in cinemas.
In this Film Stories special, Reuben tells the story of how he got involved in the film, in a conversation that also takes in films such as Zombieland, Gangster Squad, Venom, a little bit of Uncharted, and a bit of HTML coding talk as well...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In the first of a small collection of episodes over the coming weeks to celebrate 500 episodes of Film Stories with Simon Brew, by popular demand it's a return for Mr Kevin Smith.
It's a long conversation covering Dogma, The 4:30 Movie, Martin Scorsese's response to Clerks, Robert Redford, Yoga Hosers, Christopher Nolan, Film Stories, the year 2009 and a whole lot more.
Thanks to everyone who has supported, in any way, this podcast over its 500 episodes. More episode 500s shortly...!
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Nicholas Hytner is a legend of British (and Broadway) theatre, but on the quiet has amassed seven films as a director too. His latest is The Choral, reuniting him with writer Alan Bennett. Ralph Fiennes takes the lead.
Simon chats to Nicholas about the film, Lady In The Van, The Madness Of King George, a bit of Mr Scorsese, Nigel Hawthorne, and even a dab of Demolition Man...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Christopher Nolan, for a brief moment in time, was set to make The Prestige just ahead of directing Batman Begins. But circumstances meant that by the time the window of time was right, the Batman reboot was already a hit. Nolan thus jumped into a movie that was modestly costed, and didn't involve having to travel the world to shoot. The author of the original book The Prestige? Well, he sounds like a guy with notes...!
Then! Ryan Lambie had a long conversation with Predator: Badlands, Predator: Killer Of Killers and Prey writer/director Dan Trachtenberg. He talks about his new film, and bit of Weyland Yutani too...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Writer/director Nia DaCosta is the guest on this episode of Film Stories, with her latest film - Hedda - now available on Prime Video.
She joins Simon to chat about the movie, and in a far-reaching chat, they also get into videogames, 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, her love of genre, a bit of nerding out about Doctor Who, and a touch of The Marvels as well. And lighting! We chat lighting, too.
Hedda is on Prime Video now.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
It's a Martin Scorsese special episode of the Film Stories podcast, kicking off with the tale behind 1980's immense Raging Bull. This is the film the Scorsese for a long time didn't want to make, but Robert De Niro did. It was also the film that involved some trading off with Rocky II to get the money to make in the first place. And it'd involve De Niro going to extreme lengths to get his Oscar-winning performance right.
Martin Scorsese is also the subject of five-part Apple TV documentary series Mr Scorsese, that's been directed by Rebecca Miller. She joins Simon to chat about how the documentary came together, the five year path to getting it made, and nuns...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Oscar-winner Edward Berger joins us for a very special episode of Film Stories with Simon Brew. The pair meet to chat about Edward's new release, Ballad Of A Small Player, starring Colin Farrell. And the chat also goes back to Edward's early years making films for German television, through to finding himself on the awards circuit with All Quiet On The Western Front and Conclave.
As we'll discuss, not a bad journey for someone who took a huge gamble and turned down a safe job with Ang Lee's company...
Ballad Of A Small Player is on Netflix now.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
There was a bit of a bidding war when an upcoming writer called Kevin Williamson penned an idea called Scary Movie. It'd change its name to Scream a little way down the road, but having been inspired by a creepy night when he was housesitting, Williamson went with a lower offer, and the company most likely to actually make the film.
The problem? Nobody wanted to direct Scream. At first, including the man who did.
The brothers Strause meanwhile had huge successes in visual effects, and made their directorial debut with the, er, 'less successful' Aliens Vs Predator - Requiem. For their next film as directors? They wanted something they had more control over - Skyline - and it turned out it was really useful one of them had just bought a new apartment...
Stories of both are told in this episode...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Quite the story, this. Phil Johnston, in a special episode of Film Stories, takes us through his own tale, and how it led to a nomination at the Academy Awards.
He and Simon chat through the struggles to get The Twits - an adaptation of Roald Dahl's book - off the ground, and how for a few weeks it all looked like it'd fallen apart. Plus, how he landed at Disney with Wreck-It Ralph, how Ralph Breaks The Interest earned him an Oscar nomination, and a bit of Cedar Rapids too...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
There's a time travel theme to this latest episode of Film Stories with Simon Brew, starting with Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. Quite the story behind this, too. The distributor going bankrupt just as the movie was being finished, the year-long delay to its release, the audition that threw Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter together...? There's quite the story behind it all.
In the early 2010s too, one interview ignited a whole conversation about a possible Doctor Who movie, around the era when Matt Smith was in the TARDIS. In theory, this would have been made in America, seperate to the TV show that was being put together in Wales. Things, er, went awry...
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In a very special episode of the Film Stories podcast, writer/producer/director David Zucker joins Simon for a conversation about his work.
Amongst the films that come up in the chat? Airplane!, which is shortly getting as we'll hear an unusual director's cut, Top Secret!, the original The Naked Gun trilogy, My Big Fat Important Important (better known as An American Carol), Baseketball and more.
Plus: a pair of books, bring excluded from the latest The Naked Gun film, trees, The Star Of Malta and a whole lot more.
You can find David Zucker on social media at @TheDavidZucker, and you can find MasterCrash Comedy at www.mastercrash.com.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Download from Google Play
Download from App Store
United States
Good enjoyable podcast with lots of interesting facts