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Welcome to Kicking the Seat!

Ian Simmons launched Kicking the Seat in 2009, one week after seeing Nora Ephron’s Julie & Julia. His wife proposed blogging as a healthier outlet for his anger than red-faced, twenty-minute tirades (Ian is no longer allowed to drive home from the movies).

The Kicking the Seat Podcast followed three years later and, despite its “undiscovered gem” status, Ian thoroughly enjoys hosting film critic discussions, creating themed shows, and interviewing such luminaries as Gaspar NoéRachel BrosnahanAmy Seimetz, and Richard Dreyfuss.

Ian is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association. He also has a family, a day job, and conflicted feelings about referring to himself in the third person.

Ep191: Arts for the Society

It's all fun and games until someone gets detained at the airport. Consider today's installment of the Kicking the Seat Podcast a digital protest sign, a rallying cry for several nuanced, national conversations we so desperately need to have. David Fowlie of Keeping it Reel joins Ian to talk about Lloyd Kramer's alternately haunting and uplifting documentary, Midsummer in Newtown, about how an unusual school play helps a community rebuild in the aftermath of tragedy.*

Also, Ian shares a letter from the Chicago Film Critics Association to our newly minted POTUS, regarding last weekend's Muslim travel ban (fear not, Conservative listeners: Ian's got a few choice words for the Left, too).

We promise a return to the Ha-Ha times soon enough, but Episode 191 is a Works Project for the soul, a pebble-skip in the ocean of public discourse.

You can keep up with the latest seat-kicking goodness by following, liking, rating, and subscribing to us on TwitterFacebookiTunes, and Stitcher!

*You can see Midsummer in Newtown this Thursday at the Gene Siskel Film Center, with special guests in attendance!

Ep192: Making Hay

Ep190: TONI! TONI! TONI!