<p>On this week’s show, Dana is joined by Slate’s own Nadira Goffe and Richard Lawson, of the <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/critical-darlings/id1885681327" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Critical Darlings</em></a><em> </em>podcast. Their first agenda item is <em>Jury Duty Presents: Company Retreat</em>, the second installment of the workplace comedy/reality show hybrid which places an unknowing everyman in a made-up scenario populated entirely by actors. Does the second season deliver a heart-warming moral test in the form of comedy or a manipulative prank? They discuss.</p><br><p>Next for more funhouse mirror television, they take up <em>Bait</em>, the Riz Ahmed-starring and created show about a Riz Ahmed-like actor vying for the role of James Bond. The show is stuffed with ideas and Ahmed’s charm, but they debate whether its conceptual martini sufficiently shaken or stirred.</p><br><p>Finally, it’s time to go out, wear something nice, and push as they take a listen to <em>Sexistential</em>, the new album by Swedish dance pop queen Robyn. Though the “Dancing On My Own” singer has a new partner on the dancefloor in her young son, motherhood and midlife make for some real club classics.</p><br><p>On a bonus episode for Plus subscribers, they take up the question, as posed in a recent <em>New Yorker </em>article, of whether “plagiarism is that bad?”</p><br><p><strong>Endorsements</strong></p><br><p><strong>Richard</strong>:&nbsp; The compulsively watchable time travel family drama <a href="https://www.hallmarkplus.com/details/TV_SHOW/collection/WAYHNA00/the-way-home" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>The Way Home</em></a>, a Hallmark Channel Original. (And subscribing to <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/critical-darlings/id1885681327" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Critical Darlings</a>)</p><br><p><strong>Nadira</strong>: The ten minute disco cover of "<a href="https://open.spotify.com/track/1O5KH9jazzisCNv2AXOUyo" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Bridge Over Troubled Water</a>" by Linda Clifford and the album <a href="https://music.apple.com/us/album/wor%24t-girl-in-america/1867530577" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>WOR$T GIRL IN AMERICA</em></a> by Slayyyter.&nbsp;</p><br><p><strong>Dana</strong>: The new book by Mason Currey <a href="https://bookshop.org/p/books/making-art-and-making-a-living-adventures-in-funding-a-creative-life-mason-currey/48d2061522305029?ean=9781250824523&amp;next=t" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Making Art and Making a Living</em></a><em> </em>as well as his newsletter <a href="https://masoncurrey.substack.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Subtle Maneuvers</em></a><em>.</em></p><br><p>--</p><br><p>Email us your thoughts at <a href="mailto:[email protected]" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">[email protected]</a>.&nbsp;</p><br><p>Podcast production by Benjamin Frisch. Production assistance by Daniel Hirsch.</p><hr><p style='color:grey; font-size:0.75em;'> Hosted on Acast. See <a style='color:grey;' target='_blank' rel='noopener noreferrer' href='https://acast.com/privacy'>acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.</p>