Late auteur Peter Bogdanovich is still just a handshake away per his posthumous podcast, “One Handshake Away.”
Prior to Bogdanovich’s January 2022 death, the filmmaker recorded a series of interviews with fellow directors such as Guillermo del Toro, Quentin Tarantino, Ken Burns, and Rian Johnson to discuss their biggest cinematic influences.
Per Deadline, Bogdanovich named the podcast “One Handshake Away” to honor the relationship between contemporary directors and pioneering filmmakers, with each filmmaker being “one handshake away” from one another in film history.
After Bogdanovich’s passing, del Toro took over the podcast and recorded the final three episodes, interviewing Greta Gerwig, Julie Delpy, and Allison Anders, which included discussing the works of Howard Hawks, Fritz Lang, and Raoul Walsh.
Filmmakers Alfred Hitchcock, Don Siegel, Orson Welles, and John Ford were reexamined in episodes Bogdanovich recorded; the podcast additionally features exclusive archival interviews with Hitchcock, Welles, and Ford that have never been heard by the public before. Actress/producer Louise Stratten, who was formerly married to Bogdanovich, narrates the Audacy podcast.
“Peter Bogdanovich is the epitome of a Hollywood legend — a master behind the camera and a devoted student of the greats who came before him,” Jenna Weiss-Berman, EVP of podcasts at Audacy said in a press statement. “Guided by Louise Stratten, ‘One Handshake Away’ is a treasure trove of intimate, fascinating conversations with leading directors of our time.”
The official description of “One Handshake Away” reads: “Before he passed away, iconic filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich began working on a podcast that he lovingly called ‘One Handshake Away.’ In doing so, Bogdanovich sat down for intimate conversations with his favorite contemporary directors to discuss the greats from Hollywood’s Golden Age and revisit never-before-heard interviews that Bogdanovich conducted early in his career with luminaries like Alfred Hitchcock, Orson Welles, John Ford, and Howard Hawks. These conversations are a love story to cinema, bringing the listener just ‘One Handshake Away’ from the icons of Hollywood, past and present.”
The podcast is executive produced by Audacy‘s Jenna Weiss-Berman, with narrator Stratten producing along with Oren Segal, Luke Moore, Jon Teague, Stak’s Charlie Morgan, and Ian Mandt. “One Handshake Away” is directed by Perry Crowell, who also produces.
On February 5, TCM will air Hitchcock’s “Notorious,” “The Wrong Man,” and “I Confess” with clips from the podcast.
“Peter loved doing the TCM podcast ‘The Plot Thickens,’” the “One Handshake Away” narrator Stratten said. “He loved working with Ben Mankiewicz on that. It inspired him so much that he wanted to take his old recordings of his interviews of these original directors that mentored and inspired him and started his career.”
She continued, “He had the idea to come full circle and share his treasure chest with the current directors that he admired and were friends with to have a conversation about them and to keep these directors that inspired him in the current conversation. Hence ‘One Hand Shake Away.’ He would be very excited and proud that we have finished it in partnership with Audacy, and that TCM is also involved.”
Bogdanovich died at age 82 in 2022. Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, and more of his peers paid tribute to the “The Last Picture Show” director. Del Toro tweeted that Bogdanovich was a “dear friend and a champion of cinema,” especially since the late filmmaker “single-handedly interviewed and enshrined the lives and work of more classic filmmakers than almost anyone else in his generation.”
“One Handshake Away” is not the only project from a late director that del Toro has recently advised on: The Oscar winner served as assistant director on William Friedkin’s final film “The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial.”
