The last week in September is “Banned Books Week” and the Margos want to celebrate by talking about one of the most controversial of John Steinbeck’s work-- 1937’s Of Mice and Men. Censors have attacked the story for its use of vulgarities (including racist language) and it is listed by the American Library Association’s list of “Most Controversial Books of the 20th Century.”  We pair it with the Gary Sinise/John Malkovich 1992 film.

The Margos continue their back-to-school September episodes with a redo of one of the most asked-for books by our listeners--The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. Film stars Ezra Miller, Emma Watson, Logan Lerner. (Spoiler--we love both!)

The Margos are continuing our September “Back-to-School” films talking about Jane Austen and possibly her lightest novel--Emma and pair it with the incomparable Amy Heckerling-directed film Clueless. Both are revered for their humor & having a wonderful female lead.

The Margos are celebrating September with a series of “Back to School” episodes starting with 1961 classic The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark. Brodie is a popular teacher at a girls school in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1931. Each year she picks a group of students to be an elite part of the “Brodie set”--under her tutelage learning mostly about the arts & beauty (and not science!)

The Margos are closing out our “80s in August” with the James Ivory/Ismail Merchant film A Room With a View which is based on the 1908 novel by E.M. Forester. The book took a few years fro Forster to complete before his better-regarded works Howards End and A Passage to India but he felt it was “much nicer.” 

Spoiler: We love both book & movie!

The Margos are making sure Shelby drinks her juice and that Drum doesn’t shoot Oiuser in this special episode talking about a play to movie adaptation from the 80s. Based on a true story about his sister’s death at a young age after giving birth, Robert Harling’s Steel Magnolias is the smart, funny tale of strong women who are underestimated by the men in their lives.

The Margos are still hanging out in the 80s and this episode is devoted to a book and film that were considered controversial for the time. (Some of our Facebook fans said “no thank you!” to this one.) The War of the Roses is based on a novel by Warren Adler and Danny DeVito directed the dark comedy.

In 1986, a movie entered the popular culture starring Tom Cruise--Top Gun. It was a massively successful hit and San Diegos’ Margo P. as a teenager saw it almost every week that summer which is a thing that teens used to do to pass the time. 

Meanwhile, on the opposite coast, a teen Margo D. stubbornly decided she hates four things: Madonna, Bon Jovi, Tom Cruise, and sushi. None of those things would enter her life. (This is a dumb stand. I am Margo D. by the way.)

The Margos are feeling poetic in this play vs movie combo that is a tale of love, bravery, and wit. The original play of Cyrano de Bergerac was written by Edmond Rostand in 1897 and has been adapted several times over the last 120 years. Mel Ferrer was the most famous/acclaimed Cyrano in the 1950s but Steve Martin’s C.D. Bales gives his own take on one of the oddest romantic leads we have covered.

We are feeling the heat and humidity of summer in the city so the Margos decided to have some fun and travel to Africa for early 20th Century adventure with The African Queen by C.S. Forester. The book was published in 1935 and Forester was an expert on nautical tales with his Horatio Hornblower novels.