Decades before the long-form internet podcast, Henry Jaglom was taping his daily meals at Ma Maison with Orson Welles. Recorded over several years late in Welles’s life, the thousands of hours of conversation were transcribed and edited into My Lunches With Orson (Picador, $16) by veteran film journalist Peter Biskind. At their regular table the two directors discussed everything from gripes with and gossip about Hollywood, politics, art, their latest projects and the correct temperature for chicken salad. Sifting fact from fiction when it comes to the legendary Welles is a fool’s errand, but why would you ever want to? No one played the part of Orson Welles better than the man himself. Part charming hagiography, part politically-incorrect diatribe, and part crash course in the fine art of human conversation, My Lunches with Orson is more than a great book—it’s great company.