Episode Overview

Podcast: New Books Network – New Books in Film Studies
Host: Nathan Abrams
Guest: Lester D. Friedman
Book Discussed: Citizen Spielberg (2nd Edition, University of Illinois Press, 2022)
Date: November 17, 2025

This episode features an in-depth interview with film scholar Lester D. Friedman about his acclaimed study of Steven Spielberg. The discussion spans Friedman’s intellectual journey, the evolution of Spielberg's career, the writing and restructuring of Citizen Spielberg, and an exploration of Spielberg’s recurring themes, his handling of genre, questions around his “intellectualism”, groundbreaking films like Schindler’s List, and the filmmaker's strengths and weaknesses.

Guest Background and Journey to Film Studies

[02:36 – 05:23]

• Lester D. Friedman describes his "idiosyncratic" academic career, beginning with a PhD in 19th-century British literature (Percy Shelley), and how he pivoted from teaching literature to film studies after being inspired by influential directors and critics.
  • Notable quote:

    “I grew up in the era where my mother would deposit me Saturday morning in the movies...I always loved movies and I never thought you could deal with them in the same way you could deal with literature.” (04:10 – Friedman)

• His early writing moved between literature and film, noting that even doctoral work on Shelley led “full circle” back to film via Frankenstein (Mary Shelley).

Conception and Evolution of Citizen Spielberg

[05:23 – 08:41]

• The idea for the book stemmed from student interest and a surprising lack of serious critical studies on Spielberg at the time.
• Friedman was not initially a devoted Spielberg fan, but grew interested as the director's output diversified post-70s.
• Early critical consensus on Spielberg as "a simple-minded, P.T. Barnum-esque figure" struck Friedman as incomplete:
  • Notable quote:

    “He was sort of being painted as this simple minded, P.T. Barnum-esque figure...and nothing more. And I thought to myself, there's something more here. There's something more even in a film like Jaws, which I think is still a great film.” (06:26 – Friedman)

• After the first edition (2006), 10–11 more Spielberg films prompted a substantially revised second edition.

Spielberg’s West Side Story and Auteurial Eye

[08:41 – 11:29]

• Friedman discusses his initial trepidation and eventual admiration for Spielberg’s West Side Story, highlighting Spielberg’s visual innovations and the subtle socioeconomic commentary about the gentrification of neighborhoods:
  • Notable quote:

    “Let's just take this moment, and it's such a Spielbergian moment...Their neighborhood is being demolished. What is it being demolished for? It's being demolished for Lincoln Center, a playground for rich people who can afford to go to the arts...that’s a subtle socioeconomic comment.” (09:21 – Friedman)

Approach to Structuring the Book and Understanding Spielberg

[12:03 – 14:52]

• The book shifted from a chronological to a genre-based analysis, at the suggestion of a peer reviewer. This approach illuminated how Spielberg’s recurring themes—broken families, the reconstitution of communities, threats, masculinity—recur across genres.
  • Notable quote:

    “Spielberg is quintessentially an American genre filmmaker.... you can see in the first Spielberg film...the same themes you see in West Side Story, you see it in film after film after film.” (12:48 – Friedman)

Spielberg as Genre Filmmaker and Intellectual

[14:52 – 18:32]

• Friedman argues Spielberg’s mastery lies in his ability to refresh genre conventions and make us care about characters, balancing personal obsessions with broader, often "culturally expansive" themes.
  • Notable quote:

    “We actually do care about them. So Spielberg is… managing a trick that I think good and great artists manage...to take their personal obsessions...turn them into, if not universal, at least culturally expansive themes...” (15:45 – Friedman)

• Spielberg’s growth: starting with The Color Purple and Empire of the Sun, tackling grand historical subjects (Schindler's List, Lincoln), and literally spanning American cultural history via genre.

Is Spielberg an Intellectual Filmmaker?

[18:19 – 21:54]

• Friedman challenges the notion that Spielberg is not an intellectual director, offering a reading of films like Jurassic Park as critiques of technology, power, and commerce—paralleling Frankenstein’s themes:
  • Notable quote:

    “Just because we can do something, should we do it? ... There’s a commercial technological union here that I think Spielberg is questioning because it results in disaster.” (20:03 – Friedman)

• He admits Jurassic Park succeeds both as a “rollercoaster movie” and a sophisticated morality tale, enriched by irony—in order to critique technology, the film must showcase technological advances.

Evolution from Jaws to Jurassic Park, and on Munich’s Complexity

[22:04 – 25:15]

• The distinction: Jaws is about human responses, while Jurassic Park contemplates the consequences of technological hubris.
• Friedman praises Munich as “very interesting” for openly questioning Israeli policy, noting that Spielberg’s willingness to critique both American and Israeli actions makes him controversial even among his own communities.

Schindler’s List as Spielberg’s Masterwork

[27:08 – 34:48]

• The book devotes a full chapter to Schindler’s List, seeing it as Spielberg’s signature achievement.
• Friedman addresses persistent criticisms—about narrative structure, character focus, and depictions of trauma and victimization:
  • Notable quote:

    “Who else would have had the chutzpah to make a three hour film in black and white that had subtitles through much of it? I don’t think anybody else could have made that film.” (27:56 – Friedman)

• He interprets Stern (not Schindler) as key to the film’s moral shift:
  • Notable quote:

    “Stern manages to save X amount of people with Schindler's help, as it were. So, I mean, I think reading the film that way, you know...He begins to see them as individual human beings, as we begin to see them as individual human beings. And that's Stern's doing.” (31:44 – Friedman)

• On criticism for sexualization, narrative conventions, and imagery, Friedman defends Spielberg’s choices as authentic attempts to convey helplessness, trauma, and humanity within impossibly fraught context.

[34:48 – 36:43]

• Ultimately, Friedman names Schindler’s List "his greatest achievement," with Jaws as number two, reflecting the full arc of Spielberg’s career:
  • Notable quote:

    “That's the perfect understanding of Spielberg's career. When you put those two films up. I mean, how does this guy feel...that one of his greatest films was when he was 26 years old?” (34:57 – Friedman)

Strengths, Weaknesses, and Recurring Themes in Spielberg’s Oeuvre

[37:38 – 42:16]

• Friedman gives a candid critique: weakest films include 1941, Always, and selected Indiana Jones sequels.
• Praises Minority Report, Catch Me If You Can, Lincoln, and sees a major, under-analyzed throughline: the formation of families (especially non-biological) and broken-home dynamics.
  • Notable quote:

    “One of the Spielberg fixations is... How many orphans or broken families are in Spielberg films? They're all over the place... but the Spielberg ethos is to try to form a family, to try to...create a family unit.” (40:41 – Friedman)

• On women, Friedman is forthright: Spielberg consistently sidelines or underwrites female characters, with rare exceptions.
  • Notable quote:

    “I wish he were better about his women characters, for example. I wish he could let an ending not be happy, though. West Side Story is not all that happy, is it?” (11:31 – Friedman) “I do think he has trouble with women characters... they're not there in any sort of complicated or mostly interesting way…” (43:16 – Friedman)

• Insists Spielberg remains attached to the “happy ending,” both as a commercial necessity and out of personal storytelling inclination.

Spielberg’s Identity, Fear, and Outsider Status

[42:32 – 46:16]

• Friedman's psychoanalytic portrait traces Spielberg’s obsessions to childhood traumas—divorce, Jewish outsider status—suggesting these fuel both the emotional power and limitations of his work.
  • Notable quote:

    "In the new preface...the title of the preface is 'Fear is My Fuel.' Well, you stop and think to yourself, what the hell does this guy have to fear about? He can make any movie he wants, and yet there is that sense of him, and I applaud this, challenging himself." (44:15 – Friedman)

• Spielberg’s Jewishness—discussed only briefly—remains an undercurrent, as does his outsider sensibility.

What’s Next for Lester D. Friedman?

[46:16 – 47:49]

• He's working on two projects:
  1. Editing a collection on "health and media" (medical humanities)
  2. A chronological study of director-composer collaborations in film (from the 1930s to present).
  • Notable quote:

    "One of the great pleasures of being an academic, my friend, is you can let your passions take you where they want to go." (47:43 – Friedman)

Final Thoughts & Future Conversations

[48:29 – End]

• Both host and guest suggest a future conversation on the Jewish roots of Hollywood—particularly in light of new museums omitting such history.
  • Notable quote:

    “The new Hollywood Museum that's opened in LA without mentioning that the founders of all the studios were Jewish. I mean, what is that all about?...Jews in film. I haven't done that in a long time.” (48:29 – Friedman)

Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• “I always loved movies and I never thought you could deal with them in the same way you could deal with literature.”
  (04:10 – Lester D. Friedman)

• “He was being painted as this simple-minded, P.T. Barnum-esque figure...and nothing more. And I thought...there's something more here.”
  (06:26 – Lester D. Friedman)

• “Spielberg is quintessentially an American genre filmmaker.”
  (12:48 – Lester D. Friedman)

• “Just because we can do something, should we do it?” (on Jurassic Park)
  (20:03 – Lester D. Friedman)

• “Who else would have had the chutzpah to make a three hour film in black and white that had subtitles through much of it? I don’t think anybody else could have made that film.”
  (27:56 – Lester D. Friedman)

• “I think it is, you know, one of the great films ever made. I really would make that argument for all its issues. I really think you see all of Spielberg's power on display.”
  (33:38 – Lester D. Friedman)

• “One of the Spielberg fixations is...How many orphans or broken families are in Spielberg films? They're all over the place...”
  (40:41 – Lester D. Friedman)

• “Fear is my fuel.”
  (44:15 – Lester D. Friedman)

Key Timestamps – Segment Overview

• 02:36 – 05:23: Friedman's career journey and shift into film studies
• 05:23 – 08:41: Conception and redevelopment of Citizen Spielberg
• 08:43 – 11:29: Spielberg’s West Side Story and compositional approach
• 12:03 – 14:52: Structuring by genre and thematic preoccupations
• 14:52 – 18:32: Spielberg’s growth as a genre and cultural filmmaker
• 18:32 – 21:54: Spielberg as intellectual: the technology parable in Jurassic Park
• 22:04 – 25:15: Comparing Jaws and Jurassic Park, and Munich’s political critique
• 27:08 – 34:48: In-depth on Schindler’s List, its meaning and controversies
• 37:38 – 42:16: Spielberg’s weakest films and persistent themes
• 42:32 – 46:16: Why Spielberg stumbles with female characters and happy endings
• 46:31 – 47:49: Friedman’s future works
• 48:29 – close: The “Jewishness” of Hollywood as a future topic

Concluding Reflection

This episode offers much more than a perfunctory book plug. Friedman’s warmth, candor, and intellectual generosity clarify why Citizen Spielberg stands out: it is not hagiography, but a study that recognizes Spielberg's cultural impact, his technical brilliance, his flaws—and why, against all odds and critical dismissals, the world still “cares” about his films.