Feeling Seen

Greta Gerwig’s solo directorial debut tells the story of Lady Bird (nee Christine) in her final year of high school – dabbling with not just a new name, but also new boys, new hobbies, pushing the boundaries of her old relationships, and somehow disappointing her mother just by being herself (and applying to out-of-state colleges). Relatable much? Mary Kate Wiles (Lizzie Bennet Diaries, Fairly Odd...

W. Kamau Bell ( United Shades of America , We Need to Talk about Cosb y) has carved out his own, personalized niche in media, a blend of comedy, documentary, and community. His path didn’t always make sense to his peers, but he forged ahead because he felt that his mission was clear. That’s just one thing he has in common with Denzel Washington’s Eli from the underloved 2010 “ post-apocalyptic neo...

Writer ( The Daily Show with Jon Stewart , Mystery Science Theater 3000 , Maniac of New York ) and co-host of the The Flop House Elliott Kalan has loved film and New York City almost all his life. While cinema has offered him no shortage of characters to relate to, there was one character that Elliott related to as a teenager that, for him, represents the very things he is most happy to have grown...

As Kristen Meinzer ( Movie Therapy , By the Book , Romance Road Test ) observes, Anne of Green Gables does something relatively rare in media: it centers the story of an adopted heroine. Growing up in Minnesota, there were many aspects of Anne Shirley’s character than Kristen saw in herself, for better and worse. She and Jordan unpack that, get meta about podcasts (Kristen did, after all, write th...

Rebeca Huntt’s debut feature is a personal documentary that, even through its specificity, tells a story that is familiar to many but rarely depicted on screen. So it follows that when she thought hard about what character made her feel seen, no one character jumped out. But the ones that she named – Frances Ha, Poetic Justice, Lady Bird, Matilda – had something special in common with one another,...

Growing up, writer/producer Ali Schouten-Seeks saw herself as a total Kathleen Kelly (that is, Meg Ryan’s quirky character from YOU’VE GOT MAIL ). But as she got older, she began to learn the value of owning even those quirks that some would have women tamp down…much like Sally Albright in WHEN HARRY MET SALLY (also Meg Ryan, of course). Only on FEELING SEEN does rom-com comp lit meet self discove...

Brianne Tju has starred in series like Light as a Feather, I Know What You Did Last Summe r, and Scream , and plays the lead in the new Blumhouse movie Unhuman . She’s broken barriers and had several “firsts” under her belt. But for her, seeing the films of Wong Kar-wai was a major first – the first time she saw complex romantic relationships between characters who looked like her.  Then, Jordan h...

When he was a kid growing up in Beverly Hills, writer/director Christopher Landon (DISTURBIA, FREAKY, HAPPY DEATH DAY) watched MOMMIE DEAREST with his older sister, on repeat. The 1981 film is now a camp classic, and Faye Dunaway's Joan Crawford is, to put it mildly, over-the-top. But on today's show, Chris tells us why he sees himself in the character of Joan's daughter, Christina Crawford (whose...

How is an overprotected ballerina on the brink of a major career coup like an up-and-coming director with a huge debut thriller on her hands? It’s not a riddle — it’s the topic of today’s episode with Chloe Okuno, director of the brand new movie WATCHER . She’s talking about how she sees herself in Natalie Portman’s Nina Sayers in BLACK SWAN. Then, it’s even more women on the brink with Jordan’s o...

It all started in 1979…Meredith Salenger felt seen by the sweet-but-feisty Carrie (aka “Frog”) in SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT. And Field’s starring role in NORMA RAE called to her long before she got involved in political fundraising and activism. An actor with a decades-long career, and now the co-host of the podcast ’ Did You Get My Text? ’ with husband Patton Oswald, she shares how she’s still inspir...

Norwegian writer/director Eskil Vogt (on both solo projects and those co-written with frequent collaborator Joachim Trier) is intrigued by the idea of “coming of age”...regardless of what age that might be. So it makes sense that he “felt seen” at an early age by The Breakfast Club ’s Brian Johnon (Anthony Michael Hall). More recently, Eskil saw himself in Julie (Honor Swinton Byrne) from The Souv...

Finnish director Hanna Bergholm put her creative spirit into her new body-horror coming-of-age film for IFCMidnight, Hatching . But she's hear today to tell us about feeling seen by another creative spirit: the titular Lucy Muir in Joseph L. Mankiewicz's 1947 classic The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. Then, Jordan has one quick thing about Tron , obviously. Hatching is in theaters and will hit streaming in...

When MaxFun’s own Janet Varney saw Peter Jackson’s HEAVENLY CREATURES as a teen, she didn’t let the movie’s whole matricide thing keep her from feeling seen. The daydreamy, obsessive devotion of a young Kate Winslet and a young Melanie Lynskey for one another was what really stood out. She and Jordan unpack all of that, plus talk about queer murderers in film, the “danger” of women alone together,...

Even if you don't know her name or face, you know her voice -- at 16, Auli'i Cravalho was the voice of Moana (and like Moana, she was a 16 year old Hawai'ian with a lot to carry). Now she's starring in live-action projects like Hulu's new queer high school rom-com, CRUSH , in which she plays the hardworking and mysterious A.J. But before all of that, Auli'i saw herself in another mold-breaking Dis...

When Krys Marshall (FOR ALL MANKIND's Danielle Poole) told us she felt seen by Clementine from ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND, Annie from ANNIE HALL, and Selma from DANCER IN THE DARK, we couldn’t wait to get together and hear the full story. Krys and Jordan talk about how these free spirited (and sometimes misunderstood) women speak to Krys as an actor and as a person.  In one quick thing,...

As a kid, he was Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Data in The Goonies. But as he got older, Ke Huy Quan began to feel that there wasn't really a place for him in front of the camera. After decades of telling himself he didn't miss acting, Crazy Rich  Asians made a splash, and Ke began to think that maybe it was time to get back to acting. Ke opens up about all of that, and l...

Every creative starts somewhere. Could it be that Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen), the messy, gutsy heroine of Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark , was the spark that kickstarted screenwriter Liz Hannah’s creative career? Liz shares her love of Marion with us, along with stories of Longshot , The Post , and her latest miniseries, The Girl From Plainville , which she co-created with Patri...

Anybody can go crazy, it just takes one bad day. All-around great guy Josh Johnson – stand-up comedian, writer for The Daily Show with Trevor Noah , and the list grows on – explains the ways he sees himself in one of the most iconic villains of the Modern Era, particularly as played by Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight. Then, Jordan has one quick thing to say about the new action epic hitting US scr...

Now and Then : a mid-’90s coming of age movie with nostalgia for the ‘70s, beloved by kids who wouldn’t be teenagers until the aughts. Jordan and co-host Laura Leigh Abby (whose podcast is Seventeen: Conversations with my Teenage Self ) both hold the film as a beloved classic, but as adults they notice some things in the film they didn’t see as kids.  Before we go, Jordan X -plains it all! Listen...

Mariama Diallo’s new debut feature film, MASTER , may be a horror movie, but just like Kasi Lemmons’ first feature, EVE’S BAYOU , it tackles themes of ritual and the supernatural. Mariama was about the same age as Eve (Jurnee Smollett) when she first saw the film. She and Jordan discuss both films, and the ways in which the promise of progress in ‘90s entertainment have been slow to materialize. T...

Acclaimed director Hany Abu-Assad is a real standup guy. Randle McMurphy…eh, not so much. But ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST has us rooting for McMurphy nonetheless, and for a young Hany, he offered a glimpse into the nature of oppression, and the power of creativity as a form of resistance. No, really!  After Jordan and Hany have a deep and thoughtful conversation about all that, and about his n...

Kali Reis is a champion boxer, but as she shares in this interview, she has always been "boxing for a cause" -- in particular, that of Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women. In her feature debut, 'Catch the Fair One' (directed by Josef Kubota Wladyka), she plays a  woman whose world is shaken when her sister goes missing.  Reis, who is of Wampanoag and Cape Verdean heritage, brings us a character...

When it comes to film characters, author and commentator Charlie Jane Anders found that she had to took way back to a movie she loved as a child, AUNTIE MAME (1958) , to name someone that made her feel seen in an aspirational way. But in that special FEELING SEEN way, the search for a character to identify with ends up revealing a whole slew of exuberant women who aren't afraid to live their big,...

Jordan's dreams come true as she and fellow-Oregonian Jasmin Savoy Brown (THE LEFTOVERS, YELLOWJACKETS, SCREAM) have a heart to heart about Raven in THAT'S SO RAVEN, Meg in WRINKLE IN TIME, and the girls of PLAN B...and dairy, queer representation, standing up for what you believe in, and why releasing music is scarier than making TV and movies. Then, Jordan's hoping for that DEEP WATER will be bo...

Comedian, author, actor, and pop culture commentator extraordinaire Guy Branum steps into the Feeling Seen-iverse with his own special mélange of characters: both The Reverend Mother AND The Baron from David Lynch's 1984 adaptation of DUNE. Then, in One Quick Thing: Jordan addresses action fandom's "irrepressible thirst" for Alan Ritchson's Jack Reacher.  *** Follow us on  Twitter ,  Instagram , a...