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I talk about Beau Is Afraid on the “A Good Story Well Told” podcast

March 10, 2026

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I used to do a podcast with story guru Matt Bird called “The Secrets of Story,” and we had a good run of 48 episodes exploring idiosyncratic, counterintuitive writing advice. Matt and I disagreed about just about everything, so we were always arguing on the show, which gave it a Siskel-and-Ebert vibe.

Well, that podcast is over, and Matt now has a new podcast about storytelling called “A Good Story Well Told” with kids’ author (and five-time guest on “The Secrets of Story”) Jonathan Auxier. They disagree much less! But Matt can’t quit me: last week he and Jonathan had me on as a guest. In this season of “A Good Story Well Told,” they’re inviting on guests to talk about “Guilty Treasures”—that is, books or movies that were either commercial or critical failures (or both!) that we like anyway.

Now, I’m a fan of director Ari Aster because of his movies Hereditary and Midsommar, but for some reason I didn’t watch his third movie Beau Is Afraid at first because people told me it was a bloated, self-indulgent mess. I should’ve known better: I love self-indulgent! All art is essentially self-indulgence! And when my friends Arthur and Amy sat me down and made me watch Beau Is Afraid, I was immediately hooked. Indeed, it’s now my favorite Ari Aster movie, and I don’t understand why it doesn’t have a better reputation. (Actually, I do understand. People are wrong about a lot of stuff.)

Anyway, here I am talking for about an hour about how much I loved Beau Is Afraid. Matt and Jonathan are rather less enthusiastic than me, but maybe I talked them around to liking it a bit more.

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