Contending at the Water Cooler

Latest episodes

• 2026 Middleburg Film Festival: Recapping Our First Few Days

  October 17, 2026

  Joey and Clarence are joined by Mark Johnson to recap the first few days of the 2026 Middleburg Film Festival. Joey, Clarence, and Mark gather in the luxurious Salamander Resort room of Variety’s Clayton Davis to record a podcast quickie…

• Oscars 2027: A ‘Reckoning’ Over Cruise and the Best Actor Five

  October 13, 2026 · 1 hr 4 min

  This week, we’re breaking down the 2027 Best Actor race which could include Digger‘s Tom Cruise and will not include anyone from The Social Reckoning. It’s truly two wildly different conversations on this week’s Contending at the Water…

• ‘Digger’ Review: Cruising Into Climate Disaster? [VIDEO]

  October 6, 2026 · 58 min

  On this week’s Water Cooler podcast, Joey and Megan take nuanced, thoughtful, opposing stances in their Digger review. Alejandro G. Iñárritu and Tom Cruise teamed up to deliver the most polarizing film of the year, Digger. Is it a climate…

• ‘Primetime’ Review Podcast: You See How This Looks, Right?

  September 29, 2026 · 39 min

  Yes, we do see how this looks–and we think it’s good! With Lance Oppenheim’s Primetime lighting up the box office for A24 this weekend, it was obvious that Megan and Joey were eager to dive into their thoughts of the film. How did the…

• Oscars 2027: First Fests Wrap-Up, Updates on 2027 Oscar Race

  September 22, 2026 · 44 min

  With Joey, Megan, and Frank all back from the first rounds of film festivals, we take stock of the 2027 Oscar race and see how the landscape has changed. The recent Telluride, Venice, and Toronto film festivals gave us our deepest view yet…

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