The Empire Film Podcast #645: Auli’i Cravalho, Ralph Fiennes & Stanley Tucci & Isabella Rossellini

Hollywood may be enjoying a long weekend giving thanks, cooking turkeys, and parading supersized Spider-Mans (Spider-Men?), but that doesn't mean this week's Empire Podcast is any less stuffed to the gills with guests, greatness, and guesty greatness than usual. And talking of guesty greatness, our first guest this week is Auli'i Cravalho, Moana herself, who sits down with Chris Hewitt to talk about returning as a master wayfinder in this week's newly released Moana 2 — and to talk about the art of not talking to people on planes [16:03 — 29:35 approx]. And then, tripling down on the guesty greatness, Ian Freer has an audience with… well, if not the Pope, then the next best thing in the guise of legendary trio Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, and Isabella Rossellini, the stars of new papal conspiracy thriller Conclave [46:49 — 1:04:52 approx].

Either side of those, with Chris incapacitated by a last-minute case of *checks notes* neck-knack, Helen O'Hara hosts and is joined by James Dyer and Amon Warmann for a fun episode in which they discuss what they're thankful for this year and, thanks to a cunningly worded listener's question, find themselves talking about mountains while desperately trying not to talk about one particular South Dakotan rock face (Maui is the *only* Rock face permitted this week!) They also run their eye over some juicy movie news, including the live-action Lilo & Stitch teaser trailer, Charlize Theron joining the all-star cast for Christopher Nolan's new movie, Barry Keoghan reportedly playing Ringo Star in Sam Mendes' Beatles biopics, and — on a non-news tangent — discuss the merits of Colman Domingo's Batman voice. All that, plus the team review Conclave, Moana 2, and Dear Santa. Forget Thanksgiving, give us thanks — for the podding gods have delivered another banger! Chee-hoo!

You can listen to this week's episode (and over 600 more) on the pod app of your choice.