I’ve mentioned previously about the wonderful podcast series by Stephen Tobolowsky. In the podcast series, Stephen Tobolowsky shares stories of his life, his career and his family. The stories span from his childhood to his recent open heart surgery and run the gamut from funny to touching. Now, he has translated his podcasts to a new book: The Dangerous Animals Club. The book covers the same territory as the some of the podcasts (I believe I read somewhere that there will be a total of 3 books assuming sales hold up), but it’s interesting to see it in a different format. Let’s check it out.
Category Archives: podcast
Are X-Men Human?
A podcast covering a comic book question that leads to a real-life lawsuit:
Reporter Ike Sriskandarajah tells Jad and Robert a story about two international trade lawyers, Sherry Singer and Indie Singh, who noticed something interesting while looking at a book of tariff classifications. “Dolls,” which represent human beings, are taxed at almost twice the rate of “toys,” which represent something not human – such as robots, monsters, or demons. As soon as they read that, Sherry and Indie saw dollar signs. it just so happened that one of their clients, Marvel Comics, was importing its action figures as dolls. And one set of action figures really piqued Sherry and Indie’s interest: The XMEN, normal humans who, at around puberty, start to change in ways that give them strange powers.
So Sherry and Indie went down to the customs office with a bag of XMEN action figures to convince the US government that these mutants are NOT human. That argument eventually became a court case that went on for years. Joe Liebman, former international trade attorney for the US Department of Justice, helps us understand the government’s side. And Ike, with help from director and producer Bryan Singer, reflects on the story of the XMEN, and tells us why this case is so poignant for anyone who’s fought to be different without being cast as an outsider.
H/T: Boing Boing and SlashFilm
The Tobolowsky Files
The Tobolowsky Files (which I reviewed earlier) is a wonderful podcast. Stephen Tobolowsky is a great storyteller and has a great ability to make people care about the smallest incidents from his life. Normally I talk about books after they’ve been published, but for this one time, I’ll talk about one before.
The Tobolowsky Files has received a book deal. In 2011, Stephen Tobolowsky will bring the stories he’s been regaling his podcast audience with to a book. I know you loyal Tobolowsky Files listeners won’t mind that you’ve heard a bunch of his stories and will buy the book. He deserves our support.
The Tobolowsky Files Review
The Tobolowsky Files is a podcast by the SlashFilm folks starring veteran character actor Stephen Tobolowsky. You will remember Tobolowsky as Ned Ryerson (“Bing!”) from Groundhog Day
