Hollywood Remixed

Latest Episodes:

Logan Browning – “From School Daze to Dear White People: The Different World of Black College Narratives” Sep 22, 2021

In honor of Dear White People, whose fourth and final season is now available on Netflix, star Logan Browning joins the show (35:05) to talk about how the series has represented a diverse range of perspectives and backgrounds among its student body, and also to share a little bit about her own college journey. THR culture writer Evan Nicole Brown also joins to add more dimension to the discussion about college experiences for Black students and to accompany host Rebecca Sun on a campus tour through Hollywood's history of Black-centered college movies and TV shows.

”Hollywood Remixed” is a topical, diversity-focused podcast from The Hollywood Reporter, hosted by Rebecca Sun. Each episode will be dedicated to a single theme – a type of character or story that has been traditionally underrepresented or misrepresented in pop culture – and feature an expert co-host as well as a special guest whose latest work exemplifies a new breakthrough in representation. We’ll revisit groundbreaking classics and introduce listeners to hidden gems, in order to better understand how film and television in the past has shaped progress in the present.

Hosted by: Rebecca Sun

Produced by: Matthew Whitehurst

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Justin Chon – “Documenting the Undocumented” Sep 15, 2021

This week we're discussing undocumented immigrant narratives with two very special guests. Pulitzer-winning journalist Jose Antonio Vargas, the founder of the media advocacy nonprofit Define American, joins us as the ideal expert who can speak both to the experience of living in this country without documentation as well as to the significance of media representation on this issue. Then, Blue Bayou director and star Justin Chon (41:30) comes on the show to talk about his new film, which tells the story of a Louisiana man who discovers that when he was adopted from as an infant, his new family never filed the proper paperwork to get him naturalized. Now married with a baby on the way, he faces deportation to a country that is foreign to him – and more importantly, away from the only home he has ever known.

Hosted by: Rebecca Sun

Produced by: Matthew Whitehurst

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Asia Kate Dillon – “Beyond the Binary” Sep 08, 2021

This week we'll be learning about non-binary gender identity and exploring how film and TV represent characters that are neither exclusively male or female. This episode is inspired by Billions star Asia Kate Dillon, who will join us in the latter half of the show (57:23) to talk about their groundbreaking character, how they approach their roles and why acting awards categories should be gender-neutral. THR associate editor Abbey White serves as this week's guest expert to share what non-binary representation has meant to their own identity formation and to teach us about the genres that – perhaps surprisingly – have done pretty well with gender non-conforming inclusion.

Hosted by: Rebecca Sun

Produced by: Matthew Whitehurst

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Simu Liu - "(Not) Everybody Was Kung-Fu Fighting" Sep 01, 2021

This week's theme is a special twofer: We're tackling the martial artist stereotype, and its close relationship to portrayals of Asian masculinity in Western pop culture. Our special guest is none other than Simu Liu (48:33), star of Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, out exclusively in theaters on Sept. 3. To kick off this episode, I've invited my friend Keith Chow, editor-in-chief of the pop culture blog The Nerds of Color, to talk about how the pervasive martial artist trope has affected Asians growing up in America in real life, and also to discuss how Hollywood's martial arts projects have employed Asian and Asian American performers from narratives inspired by their own cultures of origin.

Hosted by: Rebecca Sun

Produced by: Matthew Whitehurst

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Yahya Abdul-Mateen II – “Horror Noire” Aug 25, 2021

Candyman star Yahya Abdul-Mateen II joins the show (47:34) to discuss how the franchise’s first all-Black creative team updated the horror classic to tell stories about how American society makes monsters of Black men and other truths about the structural violence of gentrification. THR contributor Richard Newby also joins Hollywood Remixed to walk us through the history and tropes pertaining to Black representation in the horror genre.

Hosted by: Rebecca Sun

Produced by: Matthew Whitehurst

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Marlee Matlin on ‘CODA’ and Authentic Deaf Portrayals Aug 18, 2021

In the second season premiere, “Amplifying Deaf Representation,” Marlee Matlin joins the show (1:01:13) to share about her unparalleled career as a deaf actor, from her Oscar-winning screen debut in 1986’s Children of a Lesser God to her latest performance as the mother of a hearing daughter in writer-director Sian Heder’s family drama CODA, which was released on Apple TV+ on Aug. 13. Deaf producer and film executive Delbert Whetter also joins Hollywood Remixed to explain how authentic portrayals of deaf characters enhance storytelling and simplify the filmmaking process, as well as to shed some light on some of the cultural nuances and differences among people who are deaf.

Hosted by: Rebecca Sun

Produced by: Matthew Whitehurst

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Stephanie Beatriz – "Nine-Nine Characters but a Latina (Usually) Ain't One" Dec 25, 2019

In the first season finale of Hollywood Remixed, the Rebeccas turn the spotlight on the most disproportionately underrepresented onscreen demographic: Latinas. While they constitute about 20 percent of American women in real life, on television they represent 7 percent of women with dialogue (and just 2.8 percent of speaking characters overall). Film hasn't fared much better – two-thirds of the 1,200 highest-grossing movies from the past dozen years were entirely devoid of Latina characters. Fortunately, peak TV has yielded not just more Latinas on the small screen, but a more heterogenous array of them. In honor of our episode guest, Brooklyn Nine-Nine star Stephanie Beatriz, we run down the growing group of queer Latinas on television, and Beatriz discusses the responsibility she feels to represent the intersection of two communities.

Hosted by: Rebecca Ford and Rebecca Sun