Apple TV releases the Being Heumann trailer, and sets Heart, Karen Kilgariff's true crime podcast, for 19 OctoberApple TV releases the Being Heumann trailer, and sets Heart, Karen Kilgariff's true crime podcast, for 19 October

Apple released the official trailer for Being Heumann on 12 October, its film about the disability rights activist Judy Heumann, which reaches Apple TV on 13 November.

On the same day Apple TV announced Heart, an eight-episode true crime podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff, which starts on 19 October. One is a feature film and the other an audio series, but both are Apple originals with dates inside the next five weeks, and both are released in a way that rewards paying subscribers.

What is Being Heumann about?

The film follows the 1977 occupation of the San Francisco Federal Building by disability rights protesters, which 9to5Mac says lasted 28 days and Apple's synopsis calls the longest occupation of a federal building in American history. Ruth Madeley plays Heumann. Siân Heder, who directed CODA, wrote, directed and produced it, and iClarified says Rebekah Taussig co-wrote the screenplay. Apple's listing names the main roles:

• Mark Ruffalo as Joseph Califano, the official the protesters press to act.
• Dylan O'Brien as Evan White.
• Madeline Delp as Kitty Cone.
• Michael Patrick Thornton as Ed Roberts.
• Antwan Tolliver as Brad Lomax.

9to5Mac and iClarified also name Rob Delaney, and iClarified Daniel Durant. Apple TV says the ensemble "includes the largest assortment of Disabled actors ever", as quoted by 9to5Mac. The film opens in selected cinemas on 6 November, a week before streaming. The listing gives a run time of 2 hours 7 minutes and a US R rating for language, some sexual material and drug use, with audio description and SDH subtitles. iClarified says it opened the Toronto International Film Festival and has a gala screening at the BFI London Film Festival.

When can you hear the Heart podcast?

From Monday 19 October on Apple Podcasts. Apple TV subscribers get all eight episodes that day. Everyone else gets the first three, then one a week every Monday until 23 November. The series follows Sonny Graham, who received the heart of Terry Cottle, fell in love with Cottle's widow and later died the same way Cottle had. Both deaths were officially ruled suicides. Kilgariff co-hosts My Favorite Murder. iClarified says Plan B and Blanchard House produce Heart and that it draws on three years of reporting, court filings and public records; 9to5Mac says only years.

Our take

The Heart release is the more useful news for subscribers. An Apple TV subscription now buys the whole series on day one, while free listeners wait five weeks for the ending. That is the same paid early access Apple is building across audio: it has told podcasters that video is coming to Apple Podcasts Subscriptions, with early and ad-free episodes. Neither source explains how the subscriber unlock works inside the Podcasts app, such as whether it simply follows the Apple Account. That is the detail to check on 19 October.

For Being Heumann, a week in cinemas before streaming is short. It reads as positioning for awards attention rather than a box office plan, which is the route CODA took before it gave Apple its first Best Picture Oscar in 2022, as 9to5Mac recalls.

APPDOOK's reading is that the casting claim is the part to watch. A film about disability rights that lists audio description and SDH from the first day is meeting a minimum, not going beyond it. Apple's claim about Disabled actors is bolder, and reviews from Toronto and London, rather than the trailer, will be the fair test of it. The R rating may surprise anyone expecting a gentle history lesson; Apple's own synopsis promises an irreverent one.