Hear the legend of a Texan Yeti-hunter in a new podcast starring Owen Wilson

Tom Slick led an interesting life, even without the Yeti hunting. But that's not why we're here.

From Tom Slick Mystery Hunter and In Search of Tom Slick; courtesy of the author Catherine Nixon Cooke

Everything’s bigger in Texas, especially the personalities. Even though San Antonian Tom Slick, “the most interesting man you’ve never heard of,” only lived to see 46 before dying in a plane crash, he left a lasting legacy of daring adventures and scientific explorations in his wake — the most notorious of which involved hunting for a Yeti in the Himalayas in 1958. That very mission is the subject of Tom Slick: Mystery Hunter, a star-studded new podcast.

Listeners get up close and personal with well-known voice actors and Texans including Dallas' Owen Wilson starring as Tom Slick; Quitman's Sissy Spacek from as Tom’s daughter, Claire Slick; and Schuyler Fisk (Spacek’s real-life daughter) as Tom’s granddaughter, Liv Slick. The eight-episode podcast mashes up Slick’s real-life escapades with a fictional, scripted narrative following Tom’s forgotten tapes that Claire finds in her mother’s attic.

Tom Slick: Mystery Hunter cover art.Image courtesy of Tom Slick: Mystery Hunter

Even without the chase for a mythical creature in the name of science, Slick’s life was one for the books — and podcasts. His grandfather, the oil tycoon Charles Urschel, was abducted at gunpoint by Machine Gun Kelly (the gangster, not the rocker) in 1933. Plus, Tom Slick himself was long rumored to be an anti-Nazi spy based in Chile during World War II. This has neither been confirmed or denied, but Slick working with the CIA is a fictional storyline in the podcast.

“It's always been cocktail fodder for the family that he was a spy,” says writer and director Caroline Slaughter, who previously wrote the podcast Astray, about people searching for enlightenment and finding darker fates. “It was also alleged that he helped get the Dalai Lama out of Tibet, because it so happened that one of his Yeti expeditions was happening at the same time the Dalai Lama escaped from Tibet to India. So I think people like to play with the idea that he was involved, and he was potentially part of the Skull and Bones [secret society at Yale], and maybe he had a hand in it.”

Slick also collected many famous friends, including Howard Hughes and Jimmy Stewart. In fact, Stewart was the one who smuggled back a “Yeti” finger that a member of Slick’s expedition, famous cryptozoologist Peter Byrne, stole from a Buddhist monastery in Nepal.

“Byrne actually took the Yeti thumb and replaced it with a human thumb so the monks wouldn't freak out about it,” Slaughter says. “He brings this Yeti thumb to Kolkata and [hands] it off to Jimmy Stewart. Stewart ends up smuggling it to London through this film casket. They end up getting it to the London Museum, where this guy, Dr. Osman Hill, ends up examining it.” (The bone was eventually proven to be human.)

Tom Slick showing off cast of Yeti footprint Tom Slick showing off a cast of a "Yeti footprint."From Tom Slick: Mystery Hunter and In Search of Tom Slick; courtesy of the author Catherine Nixon Cooke

Tom also had a lasting impact on the growth of San Antonio’s medical community. He founded five research institutes in Alamo City, three of which are still around today, including the Texas Biomedical Research Institute, which recently helped develop Pfizer’s Covid vaccine.

Slick helped develop the Brangus cattle, a crossbreed of Brahman and Scottish Angus cattle, and was interested in exploring the link between humans and primates to advance healthcare. At the same time, he delved deep into cryptozoology, or investigating the possible existence of unsubstantiated animal species. This potent mix of science and mythology eventually led him to go looking for a Yeti — multiple times.

“He thought the Yeti was the missing link between humans and apes,” Slaughter says. “So he really did go at it with this sort of scientific bent. He didn't want to hunt it down; He wanted to bring it back to the Institute and study it.”

Slick did make some interesting discoveries during the five or so Yeti-hunting expeditions he took. “He found a 13-inch Yeti footprint,” Slaughter says. “He took a plaster cast of it, and he brought it back home.”

Slick’s fascination with mysticism and legendary creatures started early in life: He went to Scotland with some Yale friends in 1937 to look for the Loch Ness monster, since there had been a recent sighting. A nod to his far-flung explorations sits much closer to home at Tom Slick Park in San Antonio, which was built on land donated by the Southwest Research Institute: a silhouetted sculpture of Nessie rising from the pond.

Movie Review

Highly anticipated Wicked movie adaptation deserves to be popular

Photo courtesy of Universal Pictures

Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande-Butera in Wicked.

The musical Wicked is indisputably the biggest Broadway smash of the 21st century, having grossed more $1.6 billion in New York alone and achieving the rare feat of running for over 20 years. All of which is to say that the long-awaited movie adaptation of The Wizard of Oz prequel will most likely be a massive success whether it lives up to what longtime fans envisioned or not.

Part one — yes, this 2 hour and 40 minute film is merely the first act of the musical; part two arrives a year from now — introduces Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo), the green-skinned witch who goes on to become Dorothy’s nemesis, and G(a)linda (Ariana Grande-Butera), the pink-garbed “good” witch, as they meet at Shiz University in Oz. Glinda is the ultra-popular one with sycophantic hangers-on, while Elphaba is shunned by almost everyone, sometimes including her disabled sister Nessarose (Marissa Bode), who’s desperate to make her own space away from Elphaba.

Her mistreatment by others leads Elphaba to get angry, which manifests itself in uncontrollable magic. Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh) notices this and takes a personal interest in her, giving her one-on-one instruction in hopes of harnessing her power. In the meantime, Elphaba and Glinda attempt to go from forced roommates to actual friends, although Glinda’s entitled personality is more of an obstacle than anything else they encounter.

Directed by Jon M. Chu and written by original book writer Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox, the film does a great job of distinguishing itself from the stage version while still remaining true to what made it so beloved. As Chu showed in his last film, In the Heights, he has an innate feel for how to tap into the essence of the source material while expanding it into something befitting the scope of a blockbuster movie.

In this case, he finds a way to give even greater emphasis to the bigotry that Elphaba faces simply because of her green skin; the fact that she is being played by a Black woman drives home the point even more. The story remains light and fluffy for the most part, but the ostracization/otherness that Elphaba feels is delivered in a powerful way, as is her empathy for talking animals like Dr. Dillamond (voiced by Peter Dinklage), who are facing their own persecution.

Of course, the highlight of the film is Stephen Schwartz’s music, and while not all of the songs are equal in impact, they still make for a cohesive whole. The number of songs and order they appear in the first act is identical to the stage musical, with the standouts remaining “The Wizard and I,” “Popular,” and “Defying Gravity.” While there is some superfluous action and cutaways added to certain numbers, it’s not enough to distract from what makes the songs effective.

Oddly, the progression of the friendship between Elphaba and Glinda works better on stage when the timeline is accelerated, but Erivo and Grande-Butera make up for this slight lack with their fantastic performances. The emotion each brings to their characters fits them almost perfectly, and there’s simply no denying the strength of each of their voices. Bode, Jonathan Bailey as Fiyero, Ethan Slater as Boq, and more make for a solid supporting cast.

The well-known ending of the first act of Wicked is a huge high point that is so good that it almost makes up for the fact that audiences won’t see the second film for a long time. But if part one is any indication, part two should turn out to be another great musical theater adaptation in a decade that has already seen its fair share.

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Wicked opens in theaters on November 22.

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