Book Vs Movie Podcast

Book Vs Movie Psycho Norman Bates in book & movie forms are discussed here as the Margos talk about the Robert Bloch novel versus the Alfred Hitchcock masterpiece The Margos are here Mother, and we are going to talk about Psycho whether she likes it or not! The 1960 masterpiece by Alfred Hitchcock is considered one of the best horror films of all time and typecasted Anthony Perkins for decades as the nebbishy killer Norman Bates (though he eventually embraced his most recognizable...

Book Vs Movie The Stepford Wives Ira Levin’s Terrifying 1972 Novel Vs The 1975 William Goldman’s Screenplay (Or is it?) Also, the really bad take by Roger Ebert in 1975 (and the sequel!) The Margos are heading back to the Burbs with our long 70s flowing hair and obsession with waxing kitchen floors in the Ira Levin classic novel The Stepford Wives that was turned into a film in 1975 and directed by Bryan Forbes. Stepford, Connecticut is the fictional setting where families move in and...

Book Vs Movie The Phantom of the Opera The 1910 Novel Vs. the 1925 Lon Chaney Classic The Margos had an excellent suggestion for this episode--The Phantom of the Opera which first appeared in a series featured in Le Gaulois in 1909 & 1910 by author Gaston Leroux. Inspired by events that happened at the Paris Opera in the mid-19th Century, including a secret underground lake that was used for firefighter training as well as a chandelier crash that was a source of mystery at the...

Book Vs Movie Of Mice and Men John Steinbeck’s Classic Story Vs the 1992 Adaptation The last week in September is “Banned Books Week” and the Margos want to celebrate by talking about one of the most controversial of John Steinbeck’s work-- 1937’s Of Mice and Men. Censors have attacked the story for its use of vulgarities (including racist language) and it is listed by the American Library Association’s list of “Most Controversial Books of the 20th Century.” Steinbeck grew up in the...

Book Vs Movie The Perks of Being a Wallflower The Margos Discuss Stephen Chbosky’s Book & Film The Margos continue their back-to-school September episodes with a redo of one of the most asked-for books by our listeners--The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. Pittsburgh native Chbosky based the story in his hometown in the early 1990s as we follow the story of freshman Charlie who is dealing with a recent psychiatric hospital stay after his best friend’s death by suicide....

Book Vs Movie Emma/Clueless The Jane Austen Beloved Novel Vs the 1995 Classic Alicia Silverstone Film We are continuing our September “Back-to-School” films talking about Jane Austen and possibly her lightest novel--Emma and pair it with the incomparable Amy Heckerling-directed film Clueless. Both are revered for their humor & having a wonderful female lead. Released in 1815 (the last novel she published before Austen’s death at 41), Emma tells the story of a spoiled, willful woman...

Book Vs Movie The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie The Muriel Spark Novel Vs the 1969 Maggie Smith Film The Margos are celebrating September with a series of “Back to School” episodes starting with 1961 classic The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark. Brodie is a popular teacher at a girls' school in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1931. Each year she picks a group of students to be an elite part of the “Brodie set”--under her tutelage learning mostly about the arts & beauty (and not...

Book Vs Movie A Room With a View The E. M. Forster 1908 Novel Vs the 1985 “Merchant/ Ivory” Film The Margos are closing out our “80s in August” with the James Ivory/Ismail Merchant film A Room With a View which is based on the 1908 novel by E.M. Forester. The book took a few years fro Forster to complete before his better-regarded works Howards End and A Passage to India but he felt it was “much nicer.” The story centers on Lucy Honeychurch who comes from a strict English background...

Book Vs Movie Steel Magnolias The 1987 Play Vs The 1989 Classic Film The Margos are making sure Shelby drinks her juice and that Drum doesn’t shoot Oiuser in this special episode talking about a play to movie adaptation from the 80s. Based on a true story about his sister’s death at a young age after giving birth, Robert Harling’s Steel Magnolias is the smart, funny tale of strong women who are underestimated by the men in their lives. The play, which opened Off-Broadway in 1987, is...

Book Vs Movie The War of the Roses The Warren Adler 1981 Novel Vs the Danny DeVito 1989 Film The Margos are still hanging out in the 80s and this episode is devoted to a book and film that were considered controversial for the time. (Some of our Facebook fans said “no thank you!” to this one.) The War of the Roses is based on a novel by Warren Adler and Danny DeVito directed the dark comedy. In the book (which author Adler based on a conversation he had with a gentleman getting...

Book Vs Movie Top Gun Yes, it was based on a magazine article so it counts! In 1986, a movie entered the popular culture starring Tom Cruise--Top Gun. It was a massively successful hit and San Diegos’ Margo P. as a teenager saw it almost every week that summer which is a thing that teens used to do to pass the time. Meanwhile, on the opposite coast, a teen Margo D. stubbornly decided she hates four things: Madonna, Bon Jovi, Tom Cruise, and sushi. None of those things would enter her...

Book Vs Movie Cyrano de Bergerac/”Roxanne” The 19th Century Play by Edmond Rostand Vs the Steve Martin Movie The Margos are feeling poetic in this play vs movie combo that is a tale of love, bravery, and wit. The original play of Cyrano de Bergerac was written by Edmond Rostand in 1897 and has been adapted several times over the last 120 years. Mel Ferrer was the most famous/acclaimed Cyrano in the 1950s but Steve Martin’s C.D. Bales gives his own take on one of the oddest romantic...

Book Vs Movie The African Queen The C.S. Forester Novel Vs the John Houston Classic Film We are feeling the heat and humidity of summer in the city so the Margos decided to have some fun and travel to Africa for early 20th Century adventure with The African Queen by C.S. Forester. The book was published in 1935 and Forester was an expert on nautical tales with his Horatio Hornblower novels. The African Queen is the story of missionary Rose “Rosie” Sayer, who has lived and worked...

Book Vs Movie Blue Crush The Susan Orlean Article Vs the Kate Bosworth 2002 Film The Margos are ready to hit the beach with this episode devoted to surfing in Hawaii. In 1998 Susan Orlean penned Life’s Swell in Outside magazine talked about a group of Maui girls who loved to surf and dealt with poverty and sexism to enjoy their passion. That’s pretty much the whole story and in the early 2000s, dozens of magazine articles were turned into movies which is what happened here. The...

Book Vs Movie Total Recall The Philip K. Dick Short Story Vs the Arnold Schwarzenegger 1990 Film If memory serves, this is the first movie the Margos are covering that stars action star, Arnold Schwarzenegger. This time we are visiting Mars and it is nothing like David Bowie would have enjoyed. 1990’s Total Recall (directed by Paul Verhoeven) is based on the short story We Can Remember It for You Wholesale by prolific writer Philip K. Dick. The short story (first published in...

Book Vs Movie The Return of Superfly Vs American Gangster The 2000 New York magazine article from Mark Jacobson Vs the 2007 Ridley Scott Film The Margos are heading back to NYC in the gritty 1970s talking about the New York magazine article The Return of Superfly by Mark Jacobson which appeared in their August 14, 2000 issue and was immediately bought as a film property for Imagine Entertainment/Universal Pictures. It took seven years and went through many different hands before...

Book Vs Movie Urban Cowboy The 1978 Esquire article from Aaron Latham Vs the 1980 John Travolta Film The Margos are ready to rock out in cowboy boots after reading the Aaron Latham Esquire magazine article “The Ballad of the Urban Cowboy: America’s Search for True Grit” from 1978. He also wrote the “Perfect” article from Rolling Stone which became another John Travolta film. (Travolta is our movie lead here.) In 1977 Lathan married CBS News anchor Lesley Stahl and they have one...

Book Vs Movie Like Water for Chocolate The Margos are ready to talk about “magical realism” in Laura Esquivel’s 1989 novel (that later became the 1992 movie of the same name) Like Water for Chocolate. This may sound familiar to long time fans but we originally recorded this topic five years ago and the quality of that show--left much to be desired. This is a story filled with interesting characters and set in Mexico in the early 1900s. We meet Tita, a 15-year-old girl who was...

Book Vs Movie Gentlemen Prefer Blondes The Anita Loos 1925 novel Vs the 1953 Howard Hawkes classic film The Margos are heading back to the 50s (well, really the 20s if you want to be technical about it!) Gentleman Prefer Blondes was first published in 1925 by Anita Loos in Harper’s Bazaar magazine as a serial. The book itself was so popular at the time that Edith Wharton dubbed it “the Great American Novel” considering it came out the same year as Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby--that...

Book Vs Movie Saturday Night Fever Based on a short story in New York magazine, the 1977 movie is dissected in this special episode The Margos are suffering from a case of “Night Fever” and the only sure is taking a deep dive into one of the most successful films of the 1970s--Saturday Night Fever. The film was directed by John Badham and stars John Travolta in his first Academy-Award nominated performance as an actor. The idea for the film comes from an article from New York...