Curated by Chance

EPISODE 47: Double Jackpot All The Way

PROMPTS: Bridge, Tangerine, 1077

This week, Neal and Lauren balance on the edge—of collapsing bridges, spiritual awakenings, and the line between realism and mysticism. It’s an episode about burden and beauty, as we trace the paths of two vastly different artists connected by one thing: the courage to push beyond what’s expected and into something sublime.

Neal dives into William Friedkin’s Sorcerer (1977), the sweaty, pulse-pounding remake of The Wages of Fear. It’s a tale of four desperate men driving trucks full of nitroglycerin across a rotting jungle bridge—but it’s also a story about fate, failure, and Friedkin’s quest to make something raw and real. Neal explores the movie’s notorious production chaos, its moody Tangerine Dream score, and why this film—long overshadowed—might just be a masterpiece.

Lauren brings light to the life and work of M. Louise Stowell, a Rochester-based artist and educator, who wove mysticism, nature, and design into luminous works of watercolor, posters, and illustration. A founding member of the Rochester Arts and Crafts Society, Stowell studied with Arthur Wesley Dow and taught at what is now RIT. Her work—dreamlike and spiritually charged—blended Japanese aesthetics, feminist ideals, and celestial symbolism. With glowing moonlit forms and reverence for line, space, and color, Stowell built quiet, meditative bridges between the physical world and something deeper.

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EPISODE 46: I'm Gonna Go Take A Bath

4PROMPTS: Sweet, Disguise, Violet, 1166

This week, Neal and Lauren unwrap stories that look sweet on the surface—but dig a little deeper and you’ll find layers of longing, legacy, and lawsuits. It’s an episode about beauty, disguise, and the unexpected depth behind desserts and string sections.

Neal revisits Bitter Sweet Symphony by The Verve, a song so instantly iconic that it dominated 1997—and nearly destroyed the band that made it. He traces how a borrowed Rolling Stones sample led to one of music’s most infamous copyright clashes, why Richard Ashcroft’s swagger couldn’t save The Verve from implosion, and how the song’s legacy was shaped by ego, irony, and a long-overdue apology two decades later. Also: Liam Gallagher shows up, because of course he does.

Then Lauren brings us a rich and frosted journey through the work of Wayne Thiebaud, the painter who made cakes, pies, gumball machines, and deli counters into pop art masterpieces. With thick brushstrokes and brighter-than-life color, Thiebaud made the everyday delicious—and deeply emotional. Lauren explains why his art isn’t quite Pop, what makes his shadows so satisfying, and how stillness and sugar can say more than satire.

⁠www.whosampled.com⁠

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The Show - ⁠@curatedbychance⁠

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Check out Neal's newest book on Cristiano Ronaldo and his other books available now and for pre-order!

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EPISODE 45: The DMV of the Afterlife

PROMPTS: Bath, Copper, 949

This week, Neal and Lauren step into two seemingly very different worlds—one of foster kids, foul balls, and 90s baseball magic, the other of copper plates, religious politics, and some seriously metal Renaissance art. It’s an episode about faith, fandom, and just how much you can say with a single image (or a single angel).

Neal revisits Angels in the Outfield (1994), a feel-good Disney sports fantasy that came out just as Major League Baseball faced one of its darkest real-life chapters. From Christopher Lloyd’s mischievous angel to Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s hopeful foster kid, Neal dives into the film’s quirky backstory—including its origins in a Jesuit radio play, why Disney picked the California Angels, and how four Oscar winners somehow ended up in this kids’ movie. Plus: Tony Danza’s arm bath, major Major League references, and life lessons on and off the field.

Then Lauren gives us a crash course on the art, politics, and religious drama behind the prints of Albrecht Dürer, the Renaissance engraving genius whose copper-plate works helped define the German Reformation era. From The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse to Melencolia I to an eerily accurate rhino he never saw in person, Dürer’s art was moralizing, mathematical, and meticulously beautiful. Learn why his prints spread across Europe (and schoolbooks), how they avoided the wrath of Protestant iconoclasts, and why his self-portrait was basically Renaissance Instagram thirst-trap energy.

Neal's Topic: Angels in the Outfield (1994)

Lauren's Topic: Albrecht Dürer

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Episode 44: Pollen the Size of Cotton Balls

PROMPTS: Teal, Pizza, 236

This week, Lauren and Neal wander down wildly different (but equally satisfying) paths—one lined with sumptuous portraits and queer-coded brushstrokes, the other dripping with melted cheese, pizza lore, and ’80s teen movie mayhem. It’s an episode about beauty, indulgence, and the long, strange history of how we present people and pizza.

Lauren goes long on John Singer Sargent, the prolific portraitist whose mastery of fabric, personality, and sensuality made him the toast of the Gilded Age—and also got him chased out of Paris for painting a strap just a little too far off a woman’s shoulder. From the iconic Portrait of Madame X to the hotly debated Dr. Pozzi at Home, Lauren makes the case for Sargent as one of the most talented—and possibly most closeted—painters of his generation. Expect velvet, scandal, blush-toned skin, and a long detour through art historian beef.

Then Neal sets the table for a smorgasbord of pizza in film, from the absurd (Loverboy) to the iconic (Do the Right Thing) to the TV (Breaking Bad’s flying pie). With a heavy slice of Patrick Dempsey, a dash of Spider-Man, and a drizzle of grease-dripping nostalgia, Neal breaks down the evolution of pizza on screen—including the moment it first appeared, when it was called “pizza pie,” and why 85% of film pizza looks inedible. Anchovies optional.

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This week, Neal and Lauren dig deep—into Detroit’s dystopian futures and the defiant symbolism of a pink dress on the border between two worlds. From cyborg vengeance and squib-splattered satire to political identity and anti-colonial resistance, this episode is about the body: armored, wounded, and framed for revolution.

Neal takes the first swing (and squib) with a dive into RoboCop (1987), Paul Verhoeven’s ultraviolent, ultra-satirical sci-fi cult classic set in a future Detroit teetering on collapse. Come for the gunslinger-cyborg revenge story, stay for the commentary on Reaganomics, privatized policing, Nazi propaganda, and a Walkman loaded with Peter Gabriel. Learn how director Verhoeven’s childhood under Nazi occupation shaped his explosive style—and why RoboCop is both an American Jesus and corporate cautionary tale.

Then Lauren paints a political portrait—literally—by unpacking Self-Portrait on the Border Between Mexico and the United States (1932) by Frida Kahlo. In this often-overlooked work housed at the Detroit Institute of Arts, Frida dons a blush pink dress (out of character, but not out of context) and straddles cultural, national, and personal lines. From ancient Aztec ruins and industrial smokestacks to electric roots and subtle rebellion, this piece is a masterclass in using art as a weapon—and a warning. Also: unibrows, impalement, and political feminism done Frida’s way.

Neal's Topic:

RoboCop (1987)

Directed by Paul Verhoeven

Lauren's Topic:

Self-Portrait on the Border Between Mexico and the United States

(1932)

Frida Kahlo

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Episode 42: Wash Your Damn Hands!

Prompts: Kitchen, Bronze, 80

Fresh off a trip to Boston, Lauren recounts her culinary and curatorial adventures (chocolate chip cookies in bed, lobster dumplings, and one surreal encounter with a butter-yellow sculpture of a woman peeing). Her topic? The extraordinary and unsettling work of contemporary artist Kiki Smith. Known for her sculptures, prints, and bronze bodies that explore everything from menstruation to myth, Smith is a feminist powerhouse whose work challenges viewers to confront death, discomfort, and the sacred messiness of being alive. Highlights include her crawling, glass-eyed Lilith, apothecary bottles labeled with fluids like “vomit” and “urine,” and a haunting series of woodcuts documenting her mother’s death.

Then Neal flips the episode’s aesthetic and emotional tone with a loving deep dive into the career of Nancy Meyers, queen of the romantic comedy, goddess of the marble kitchen island, and the only woman in Hollywood with consistent Final Cut. From Private Benjamin and The Parent Trap to Something’s Gotta Give, The Holiday, and It’s Complicated, Neal celebrates Meyers’ buttery, beige, beautifully structured world—and her game-changing success as a writer-director who made movies about middle-aged women... and made millions doing it.

Also: urinal etiquette, olive texture trauma, and what lullabies have to do with demons.

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Episode 41: How is that better, Catholically?

PROMPTS: 30, Expose, Shadow

From the tight grip of Hollywood’s moral code to the brooding, empty piazzas of metaphysical painting, it’s all about what happens when shadows speak louder than light.

Neal exposes the strange, fascinating, and deeply moralistic world of the Hays Code, Hollywood’s self-imposed censorship system that ruled American cinema from the 1930s to the 1960s. From Fatty Arbuckle to Gone with the Wind, Casablanca, and the birth of film noir, Neal tracks the cultural panic that shaped what we could (and couldn’t) see on screen—and how filmmakers got clever with innuendo, subtext, and shadowy visual metaphors. Plus: the Catholic Church’s role in forming the hilariously named but terrifyingly influential Legion of Decency.

Then Lauren steps into the surreal with Giorgio de Chirico, a metaphysical painter who helped pave the way for Surrealism—and then completely rejected it. With eerie cityscapes, haunting shadows, and mythic stillness, de Chirico’s early work captivated the likes of Magritte and Dalí… until he denounced it all as forgeries. We explore his moody brilliance, his retreat into classicism, and how his lonely mannequins and Roman arcades still echo through modern art and cinema.

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Episode 40: Disquieting Genitals and Inscrutable Plotlines

Prompts: Dystopia, Stone, 6

This week, Lauren and Neal go big—Biblical-apocalypse-meets-Renaissance-sculpture big. From marble perfection to multi-chapter madness, the duo tackles two cultural landmarks that both obsess over the body, prophecy, and, somehow, time travel.

Lauren kicks things off with Michelangelo’s David, that iconic slab of Renaissance idealism carved in quiet defiance of the world around it. She explores how David’s oversized hands, tense posture, and famous nudity turned him into more than just a pretty statue—he was a political message, a symbol of divine strength, and an unexpected sex symbol. From debates over feather placement to anatomical precision, Lauren walks us through the myth, mystery, and modesty of Florence’s most famous resident.

Then Neal unpacks Southland Tales (2006), Richard Kelly’s gloriously overstuffed follow-up to Donnie Darko. With a cast that includes The Rock, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Justin Timberlake, this apocalyptic sci-fi satire is either a misunderstood masterpiece or a glorious mess. Neal breaks down its Cannes controversy, its vision of a fractured America, and the film’s bonkers blend of prophecy, porn, and political panic. Oh, and Neal tells a horrifying story that you don't want to miss...

Lauren's Topic:

David

By Michelangelo (1501-1504)

Neal's Topic:

Southland Tales (2006)

Directed by Richard Kelly

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Episode 39: Curve Is The Thinking Man's Axe™

Prompts: Mauve, Fabergé Egg, Sale

From a glittering egg-based heist to the rebranding of manhood via cologne, this episode has everything: tilt-shift cinematography, Romanov decadence, and a scent trail that leads straight to 2001.

Neal kicks things off with a love letter to Game Night (2018), the mid-budget comedy-thriller that delivers both gut-busting laughs and cinematic style. With Jason Bateman and Rachel McAdams leading a cast of surprisingly intense suburbanites, this one’s shot like a Fincher film but plays like Clue on steroids. Neal breaks down the film’s unique look (including tilt-shift photography), standout performances (hello, Jesse Plemons), and why the Fabergé egg scene is memorable. You’ll never look at a 3-for-1 Tostitos sale the same way again.

Then Lauren explores the glitzy, imperial, and slightly cursed world of Fabergé eggs. From their origins in the Russian court to being used as coded political messages, these decadent eggs were more than just baubles—they were status symbols, love tokens, and eventually, product lines. We’re talking jewels, missing treasure, imperial drama, Joe Namath getting shaved by Farrah Fawcett, and Brut cologne. (Yes, somehow it all connects.)

Neal's Topic:

Game Night (2018)

Explanation of the Egg Oner

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71Yj6Ur52ok

Lauren's Topic:

Fabergé eggs

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EPISODE 38: Funky Cold Messina

PROMPTS: Black, 1350, Fire

In this episode of Curated by Chance, things get dark—literally and historically—as Lauren takes us on a deep dive into the Black Death, while Neal brings the dad-movie heat with a Clint Eastwood thriller that simmers with guilt, glory, and Secret Service showdowns.

Lauren unpacks the devastating second wave of the bubonic plague that ravaged Europe in the mid-1300s, touching on its impact on global populations, religious structures, art, medicine, and even nursery rhymes (ring around the rosie just got darker). She explores how the plague may have helped birth the Renaissance, inspired deeply weird fashion (plague doctor masks, anyone?), and led to history’s earliest known version of quarantine.

Then Neal talks In the Line of Fire (1993), a political thriller starring Clint Eastwood as a guilt-ridden Secret Service agent and John Malkovich as a creepy would-be assassin. From moody jazz scenes and rooftop chases to wooden guns and visual effects that predate Forrest Gump, Neal makes the case for why this underrated dad movie deserves a second look—and maybe a burrata on top.

Lauren's Topic:

The Black Death (1346-1353)

Neal's Topic:

In The Line of Fire (1993)

Directed by Wolfgang Petersen

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