Sup Doc: A Documentary Film Podcast

How did the innocuous indie comics character Pepe the Frog turn into a meme of the alt-right and join the Anti-Defamation League's list of hate symbols? Chilled out artist Matt Furie learns the hard way how a meme can run out of control and along the way we learn about the culture of 4chan and the evolution of trolling in Arthur Jones' debut feature documentary that was a cause celebre at Sundance 2020.George interviews director Arthur Jones and producer Giorgio Angelini about their feature documentary film Feels Good Man. Jones details Furie's attempt to undo the wrongs done in his character's name, including a showdown with Alex Jones. First time director Jones debuted the film at Sundance and ended up winning the U.S. Documentary Special Jury Award For Emerging Filmmaker. The film is on the festival circuit but if you have even a passing interest in online radicalization, intellectual property law, or comics culture, this is a story you will want to know.Follow Arthur on:Twitter: @futuresmellsFollow G

On Ep 136 host Paco Romane sits down with comedian Brooke Heinichen to recap and discuss the Netflix documentary Miss Americana. Brooke guides Paco thru the life and albums (seriously, Brooke made a album to album synopsis) of Taylor Swift. They also talked about being a woman in entertainment, technology, ageism, Brooke’s pet peeve and you get to hear Paco do a horrible British accent!Watching Miss Americana you get the feeling that the entire documentary wants you to see Taylor Swift as we first see her – sitting relaxed and drinking coffee, looking through her journal and talking about her past relationships and what kind of person she sees herself being in the future. These quiet solo moments are a world removed from her giant, arena shows that are packed with adoring fans. In one telling moment we see Taylor look from behind a curtain as if she is still surprised that fans come see her shows. This documentary can feel like its made more for long time fans of Taylor’s. If you watch Mis

Paco and George watched Killer Inside: The Mind of Aaron Hernandez on Netflix, directed by Geno McDermott. This three-part series really speculates on the motivations of the fallen sports star, but since he committed suicide in prison, there is no definitive interview to explain what happened. Nonetheless it's a twisting tale that touches on NFL culture, special treatment for athletes, toxic masculinity, and mental health.Follow Sup Doc on:Twitter: @supdocpodcastInstagram: @supdocpodcastFacebook: @supdocpodcastsign up for our mailing listAnd you can show your support to Sup Doc by donating on Patreon.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

On Ep 134 Hosts Paco Romane and George Chen recapped the twisty and terrifying Netflix documentary Don’t F**K With Cats (like we don't know what "F**k" means) with the hilarious and insightful Tara Jepsen. We had no idea that there was such a thing as “Rule Zero” of the Internet. It makes sense, especially because cute cat videos have been the best thing the Internet has brought us. The rule says, “Don’t fuck with cats, or we’ll find you.”TRIGGERS - a guideline to triggering animal abuse scene timecodes (in episode one) were kindly shared with us by @hilldawgIf you've never heard of Luka Magnotta, consider yourself lucky. Someone is anonymously torturing and killing kittens and posting videos online. A home-schooled Canadian sociopath creates a bunch of sock puppet accounts about how cool he is with poorly photoshopped images and plants rumors about dating a serial killer. The heroes of the piece are facebook sleuths who crowdsource clues, tearing apart aspects of the video to try and loca

George is joined by Brian Miller of Deathbomb Arc, Foot Village, Rose for Bohdan, etc to discuss the only doc he taped off of PBS, Frederick Wiseman's 1968 classic High School.High School took a look at a a month of footage from a Philadelphia high school that was miles removed from the Summer of Love and splays open the ongoing generational conflict between the Greatest Generation and The Boomers, the latter starting to question social values and the former clinging to them for dear life. There was no official screening of this film in Philadelphia till almost 30 years later.*if you have Kanopy, you can stream the whole film at https://kanopy.com/video/high-schoolByron Preiss' The Secret - https://www.discovery.com/shows/expedition-unknown/articles/a-beginner-s-guide-to-the-secret-treasure-huntJames Renner made a documentary about The Secret before the third box was discovered. http://twelvesecretkeys.blogspot.com/Follow Brian Miller on:Twitter: @deathbombarcInstagram: @deathbombarcFollow Sup Doc o

Paco and George look back at a year in documentaries as Sup Doc entered its 4th year.We also reveal the secrets of the pee tape, Disney Plus True Crime, Casey Kasem, Christopher Walken, and E-40.Docs we are looking forward to covering:The Confession KillerDon’t F*ck With CatsThe Devil Next DoorFrankie G (nee Peterson)'s show at The Pack is Nightchurch - https://www.youtube.com/nightchurchcomedySpecial year-end shout out to super-Patreon supporters - Alina Mansfield, Annette Marines, Eric Steuer, Jaan Shenberger, James Reling, Janet Flemer, Mike ShifletFollow Sup Doc on:Twitter: @supdocpodcastInstagram: @supdocpodcastFacebook: @supdocpodcastsign up for our mailing listAnd you can show your support to Sup Doc by donating on Patreon.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

On this episode of Sup Doc host Paco Romane sits down with comedian and musician Phil Johnson to rcap the 2019 Netflix documentary ReMastered: The Lion's Share.To put it bluntly the music business is brutal. From royalties and demanding record labels to artists being sued for copyright infringement, it’s sometimes difficult to remember a time when these things weren’t the norm. The Lion Sleeps Tonight is one of the most recognisable songs in our history, under the original title “Mbube” written and recorded in 1939 by South African singer Solomon Linda. Through a combination of chicanery and misunderstanding this international hit song is a complex tale of artist exploitation, though only its circumstances make it out of the ordinary. The attempts to right this wrong are the subject of The Lion’s Share, the latest episode of Netflix‘s music documentary series, Remastered.Our guest is comedian and musician Phil Johnson who because of his long hair often gets mistaken for a woman, but only by those no

On episode 130 hosts Paco and George recap the new Eddie Murphy biopic Dolomite Is My Name about Rudy Ray Moore currently streaming on Netflix. It has been quite awhile since Eddie Murphy has been cast in a R-rated movie with so much swearing as he frequently employs in “Dolemite Is My Name,” and it’s a welcome sight. It’s not just the triumphant return to cussin’ that fans have been craving, it’s also a reminder: Sam Jackson’s favorite word may be maternal-adjacent and twelve letters long, but before he commandeered it, it was owned by Rudy Ray Moore. Murphy plays Moore, the opportunistic hustler who parlayed his ability to change and his tenaciousness into a career as a stand-up comedian whose signature character, Dolemite, made him famous. Rudy Ray Moore credits his neighborhood wino as the genesis for his Dolemite stories and raps. As one person says in the film, a lot of these guys had been in jail and, to pass the time, crafted these tall tales from their own life experiences and stories

We’re recapping THE GREAT HACK (2019). Wish there was a simple way to understand what Cambridge Analytica did that will take less than two hours? It turns out they experimented on a bunch of countries before bringing their psychographic meme warfare to the Trump and Brexit campaigns. Directors Karim Amer and Jehane Noujiam do their best following CA insider Brittany Kaiser, as well as journalists and professors trying to trace what happened to all of our personal data. Our guest is comedian Casey Ley, who was voted Best Comedian in San Francisco by SFWeekly, national runner-up in The Advocate Magazine's search for The Next Great Queer Comedian, and is one of the hosts of The Gay Power Half Hour podcast. Casey performs at clubs and festivals around the country opening for Margaret Cho, Janeane Garofalo, and Nikki Glaser. His comedy can be seen on the feature-length stand-up special "Out on Stage."Follow Casey Ley on:Twitter: @caseywleyInstagram: @caseyleyFollow Sup Doc on:Twitter: @supdocpodcastInsta

Did you watch Jawline? Liza Mandelup's 2019 Hulu documentary was a Sundance hit, capturing a scene of teenage influencers and influencer kingmakers, and to a lesser extent the girls that pay to interact with them. Without a heavy-handed narration it's all shot in a gauzy dream-like way. Protagonist Austyn Tester is from a small Tennessee town and plays the naive foil to media shark Michael Weist. It all makes one wonder who this film is targeted at, and does it warrant the attention it got? Will you do what it takes to become a living meme, including drop out of high school? And is this still better than the Travis Scott documentary?George's guests are a young couple who watched this film together, possibly an awkward date night.Elijah Katz is a Los Angeles born and bred comedian who runs “Margaret: a mid-city comedy show” every other Wednesday at a vintage shop. The rest of the time no one is sure what to do with him. He loves Sophie very much.Sophie Klem is a recent graduate of Pratt Institute in New York.

Paco and George are joined by magician Andy Deemer to discuss both of the Amazing Johnathan documentaries out now: Always Amazing (Steve Byrne 2018) from All Things Comedy and The Amazing Johnathan Documentary (Ben Berman 2019) on Hulu.Whether sawing into his arm with a butcher’s knife or pulling pranks with audience members, The Amazing Johnathan was a reliable source of manic energy at many a ’80s and ’90s stand-up show. The Amazing Johnathan described himself as the “Freddy Krueger of Comedy,” and used that manic energy to regularly catapult his way onto Late Night With David Letterman and Comic Strip Live. His gory, smart and silly deconstructions of magic and coked-up circus geek tricks eventually earned him Las Vegas headlining gigs for a decade or longer. Then, in 2014, he announced that he’d been diagnosed with a serious heart condition, saying doctors had given him only a year to live. The Amazing Johnathan retired, seemingly destined to fade into the annals of cult comedy and the memo

Dropping Monday Oct 14th!There are two documentaries out about The Amazing Johnathan, the magician/comedian who rose to drug-fueled heights throughout the '80s-'00s.The Ben Berman-helmed The Amazing Johnathan Documentary was on the scene before comedian Steve Byrne's Always Amazing but the saga gets twisted when both film crews start running into each other at the extremely-ill Johnathan's comeback tour.Joining Paco and George on the twisty walk through the funhouse mirror of these dueling docs is raconteur and magician Andy Deemer. In addition to working for Macaulay Culkin's comedy brand, Andy has been the producer of fast food horror film Poultrygeist, a China-certified taxidermist, and probably even more weird stuff we have yet to discover.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

On episode 126 Paco is joined by comedian Jesse Hett to recap the 2019 Netflix documentary Westside vs The World. This documentary tells the history of the Westside Barbell Powerlifting Club and its founder Louie Simmons. The doc is narrated by Ron Perlman and focuses on Louie’s youth, his discovery of the Culver City Westside Barbell club, his journey into powerlifting and his accomplishments. Plus a lot of powerlifting drama. If you follow the sport you’ll be sure to recognize many of the club’s famous names and accomplishments. The doc follows Westside from its origins to its its domination through the 90s and early 2000s and to relative obscurity in the era of raw powerlifting.Our guest is comedian Jesse Hett. Jesse is a stand-up comedian based in Oakland, California. He has appeared on the front page of the Wall Street Journal doing comedy while wearing a virtual reality helmet. That sounds made up but it's true, you can look it up. He has performed in SF Sketchfest and the Savage Henry Comedy Festi

Paco talks with Bay Area comedian and baseball coach Ben Kolina about the 2018 Netflix documentary Screwball. Screwball Recounts the high-profile doping scandal that rocked Major League Baseball. This entertaining doc takes us into the surreal Miami underworld that provided performance-enhancing drugs to Alex Rodriguez, Manny Ramirez and other star players. They say South Florida is a sunny place for shady people and this is certainly true of steroid peddler Anthony Bosch. While Bosch's medical credentials may be lacking, his storytelling skills are first rate. The documentary also raises serious questions about doping and ethics in sports.The incredible nuttiness of “Screwball” could someday be adapted into an award-winning feature film a la “I, Tonya.” It has that same kind of out-there, Coen-esque feel in which people’s greed and stupidity lead to national news. There are plenty of dumb people out there, but only a select few that end up playing on as big a scene as Tony Bosch and Porter Fischer,

George welcomes back three-time guest Wayne Federman (comedian, author, adjunct professor at USC, comedy writer, musician) to talk about his History of Standup podcast. Straight comedy nerd talk!We talk about music documentaries on David Crosby (Remember My Name), Dylan (Rolling Thunder Revue), and Laurel Canyon (Echoes In the Canyon). Also Hannah Gadsby, Gary Gulman, Bob Newhart, The Holy City Zoo, Tom Petty, standup in Asia, and Once Upon A Time in Hollywood.Follow Wayne on:Twitter: @federmanInstagram: @instafedermanFollow Sup Doc on:Twitter: @supdocpodcastInstagram: @supdocpodcastFacebook: @supdocpodcastsign up for our mailing listAnd you can show your support to Sup Doc by donating on Patreon.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Trigger warning? It's about Ted Bundy. That's a lot of triggers.Paco and George look at Joe Berlinger's double dip into Bundy on Netflix, Conversations With A Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes and this narrative version starring Zac Efron and Lili Collins, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile.We also ponder what was considered handsome in the 70s, twitter Stan wars, Tarantino, John Wayne Gacy, James Hetfield, and what was the worst product of Phil Collins.*The necrophilia movie George is thinking of is called Kissed.*Rolling Stone article on the Manson/Bundy Stan twitter feud.*Snopes on Debbie Harry's near abduction.*BTK Killer aka Dennis RaderSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We recap the 2019 HBO documentary series I Love You, Now Die with comedian Florentina Tanase. I Love You, Now Die: The Commonwealth V. Michelle Carter centers around the suicide of Conrad Roy. Who was responsible, Conrad or his virtual girlfriend Michelle who encouraged him? This two-part series explores their complicated relationship drawing on thousands of texts exchanged over two years chronicling the courtship and its tragic outcome. We also get into The Staircase, Amanda Knox, historic Massachusetts misogyny, Romeo and Juliet, GLEE, plus a game of Cast This Doc.Florentina is a San Francisco-based, Romanian-born comic who has performed at Cobb's, The Punch Line, and The Comedy Store. She produces a monthly show in San Francisco called "Bottomless Standards” at the MILK Bar on Haight.Follow Florentina on:Twitter: @florentificInstagram: @florentificFollow Sup Doc on:Twitter: @supdocpodcastInstagram: @supdocpodcastFacebook: @supdocpodcastsign up for our mailing listAnd you can s

George talks to the director of 2018’s BATHTUBS OVER BROADWAY (2018) Dava Whisenant. Bathtubs Over Broadway (streaming now on Netflix) is the story of Letterman comedy writer Steve Young and his journey into an obscure sub-genre of theatre, Industrial Musicals. It starts off as a story about collecting weird records but turns into something much more emotionally involving. Along the way there are interviews with Don Bolles, Jello Biafra, Martin Short, Florence Henderson, and many other names that you'll know by the end of the film.Dava Whisenant received the Albert Maysles Award for Best New Documentary Director at the 2018 Tribeca Film Festival and the 2019 Writers Guild Award for Best Documentary Screenplay.Follow Dava on:Twitter: @davawhisenantInstagram: @cactusflowerfilmsFollow Sup Doc on:Twitter: @supdocpodcastInstagram: @supdocpodcastFacebook: @supdocpodcastsign up for our mailing listAnd you can show your support to Sup Doc by donating on Patreon.See Privacy

This is the pilot episode of our new sidecar project Biopsy!Our new show format recaps BioPics in a loose, funny way and we'll drop occasional episodes into your regular Sup Doc feed.We think BioPics are the real life version of our game Cast This Doc. We hope you enjoy it and let us know what Bi-OP-Pics you want us to cover.On the premiere episode we look at Rocketman (Dexter Fletcher, 2019) about the life and music of Elton John. Yes THAT Elton John. Both George and Paco agree that Rocketman is a formulaic, paint-by-numbers biopic. One glaring problem was that the musical numbers are not in order of when the songs were released. Rocketman begins oddly at a moment of a huge crossroad in Elton's career, then backtracks to show us how he ended up there—a narrative device that already was a cliché when “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story” parodied it back in 2007. Taron Egerton does an admirable job with what he's given.Paco and George also talk about how Rocketman is seemingly prepackaged for the Broadwa

Paco and George have a new format where they discuss biopics - it's still film and reality adjacent! The first episode drops next Monday July 8th where they recap the Elton John musical bio Rocketman.You’ll find episodes of Biopsy right here in your Sup Doc Podcast feed. Just subscribe![Cold Funk - Funkorama by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license] See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.