Around the time that the very first episode of Season 4 was uploaded, I embarked on a months-long journey to prepare & record the podcast's first entry in a new spotlight series devoted to some of the greatest character actors in screen history. Reaching out to good friends & past guests who I knew had a special interest in the life, films, characters, & performances of our first subject, Dennis Hopper, over the course of two months, I interviewed every participant one by one. Kicking off each conversation by inquiring what it was about Hopper that they found most compelling as a viewer (as well as their earliest memories of the actor), I challenged them even further, asking each guest to choose one or more of their favorite roles to dissect with me in a limited amount of time. While most people immediately gravitated to BLUE VELVET, I was thrilled by their willingness to touch on a number of his lesser-known or celebrated works, including some of the films that Dennis Hopper made as a director, & soon wound up with over 3.5 hours of stellar audio, primarily focused on the 1970s-1990s. Knowing that my overly ambitious idea for one episode was best reconfigured as a 3-part miniseries, I cut highlights from these conversations together & incorporated excerpts from interviews with Dennis Hopper I'd discovered in my research & then read them aloud as Hopper to add some variety to our stellar yet mostly masculine* lineup. Today, we're kicking things off a week ahead of Dennis Hopper's birthday with a look at the first part of his career. Although it's primarily set in the 1970s, we take a few forays into his earlier years as an actor & his iconic feature filmmaking debut EASY RIDER, plus flirt briefly with the '80s in order to cover his reunion with APOCALYPSE NOW director Francis Ford Coppola in RUMBLE FISH as well. Along with those titles, you'll also hear us discuss THE LAST MOVIE, THE AMERICAN FRIEND, KID BLUE, & others in Dennis Hopper - Part 1. Boasting a wonderfully insightful roster of contributors, this episode features the following guests in alphabetical order: Mitchell Beaupre, Duncan Birmingham, William Boyle, Elizabeth Cantwell, S.A. Cosby, Jordan Harper, Blake Howard, Mike Miley, & Travis Woods. Following this installment, next week's Part 2 is a must for fans of Dennis Hopper's '80s Renaissance era, including his iconic turn as Frank Booth in BLUE VELVET, & Part 3 will take us to the '90s. I hope you enjoy this long-in-the-works series & if you'd like to encourage the show's efforts to try new things like this in the future, please consider joining our Patreon (HTTPs://www.patreon.com/FilmIntuition) to support our research for as little as $1 per month, if you haven't joined us already, & be sure to recommend Watch With Jen to others to help spread the word. Thank you so much! *Note: our next subject is the remarkable Julianne Moore so I'm hoping that will help balance things out a little! Originally Posted on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/82813775 Theme Music: Solo Acoustic Guitar by Jason Shaw, Free Music Archive Logo: KateGabrielle.com