We post our final podcast of this year about a Christmas movie a day early, even though The Lion In Winter is only tangentially a Christmas movie at all. James Goldman wrote a complex King Lear story based on real people in director Anthony Harvey's authentic, dirty, unkempt Oscar-winner. Peter O'Toole and Katharine Hepburn lead a fabulous cast (well, except for one person), as they fill the movie with sound and fury, although perhaps all the machinations take them back where they started. We took shots at the concept of royalty (then or now) and also the incestuous nature of those who wear silly crowns, but at least The Lion In Winter is engrossing and entertaining about such silliness. So be kind enough to let your spouse out of the hoosegow for the holidays as our 557th jingle bell digs into King Henry II, Eleanor Of Aquitaine and their not-so-loving children.

Well, Actually: Walter Brennan won 3 Oscars for Best Supporting Actor back in the '30s, so Hepburn was only tying him with her 3rd win for this performance (winning her 4th in 1981). And Ingrid Bergman had 2 Oscars, but would go on to win a 3rd a few years after Hepburn won THIS one.

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