Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing,
Speaker 1: My chance to talk with artists, policymakers and performers, to
Speaker 1: hear their stories. What inspires their creations, what decisions change
Speaker 1: their careers, what relationships influenced their work. Good stories teach
Speaker 1: us about people. Great ones alter the way we see ourselves.
Speaker 1: For many, the new podcast s Town has done just that.
Speaker 1: The seven episode series from the folks who brought us
Speaker 1: Serial and This American Life, provides a window into the
Speaker 1: world of an eccentric Alabama horologist named John B. McLemore.
Speaker 1: Released on March, it reached critical acclaim almost instantly, garnering
Speaker 1: sixteen million downloads in the first seven days. But to
Speaker 1: focus on its commercial success would be missing the point.
Speaker 1: S Town isn't about celebrity, viral tweets, or even the
Speaker 1: alleged Alabama murder that led host and producer Brian Reid
Speaker 1: to McLamore in the first place. The front door of
Speaker 1: the house opens and a man comes bounding out of it.
Speaker 1: I found it nice to meet you. There's no nice
Speaker 1: to meet you back, No how you do in no handshake.
Speaker 1: John just takes off around the side of the house
Speaker 1: with a pack of dogs following him. She's like the same. Next.
Speaker 1: It's about a brilliant, cynical man whose very existence challenges
Speaker 1: modern notions of masculinity, homophobia, and mental illness. A man
Speaker 1: who had a story to tell, just not the one
Speaker 1: he thought. As the world continues to devour s Town,
Speaker 1: I sat down with Brian Reid to talk about the
Speaker 1: critical acclaim the series has received. I don't know. I'm
Speaker 1: getting a taste of it and I'm and I'm enjoying
Speaker 1: it and I'm grateful to people like it. It doesn't
Speaker 1: feel overwhelming, you know. Do you also feel it's an
Speaker 1: enormous opportunity for you to channel this energy into you
Speaker 1: big production deal and get things going and start making
Speaker 1: some more content. Oh maybe I don't know, Maybe I
Speaker 1: should be thinking that way. I mean, I'm back in
Speaker 1: my day job right now. I work at this American
Speaker 1: life and I'm just making stories now work. Yeah, Like,
Speaker 1: the day after this came out, Ira was like, are
Speaker 1: you back at work tomorrow? Like, basically, I've been gone
Speaker 1: for a year on hiatus, and they wanted to who
Speaker 1: are you? I knew you were. I'm sorry, but when
Speaker 1: you did this, you obviously didn't predict the success. No.
Speaker 1: I thought it was going to be if anything, like
Speaker 1: a cultish thing. And I started working on this even
Speaker 1: before Cereal was out, you know, so like or invented,
Speaker 1: they were just started starting serial. So tell us that, Um,
Speaker 1: what is s Town? And I mean, what is it
Speaker 1: for a listener in an encapsulated kind of Uh? If
Speaker 1: if there was the equivalent of TV guide like radio guide,
Speaker 1: what would you say in a pithy para. It's really hard.
Speaker 1: We struggled with this because there's certain things you don't
Speaker 1: want to tell about the story. You want people to
Speaker 1: learn them in the story. So that's been challenging because
Speaker 1: it's a story that shifts a number of times throughout it.
Speaker 1: Things happened that change that kind of the story shifts
Speaker 1: underneath It happened underneath my feet in real life as
Speaker 1: I was reporting it, but then also as that story.
Speaker 1: That's what we've tried to reflect in the story as well.
Speaker 1: But it's about a man named John B. McLamore who
Speaker 1: contacted me. Um, he contacted you. He wrote our show,
Speaker 1: and I saw his email and responded. He says in
Speaker 1: his first email, I'm a longtime listener who recently started
Speaker 1: listening again, which is sometimes crazy to be this whole
Speaker 1: seven part. The thing is just about a listener, you know,
Speaker 1: like of which we have millions, which is nuts. But um, yeah,
Speaker 1: he'd been hearing the show and um he heard a
Speaker 1: couple in particular stories we've done. Um I Rea did
Speaker 1: a story um investigating a judge and some possible malfeasance
Speaker 1: that a judgment UM doing in rural Georgia. He'd heard
Speaker 1: that story and in a show we did called getting
Speaker 1: Away with It, which actually wasn't investigated at all, but
Speaker 1: I think the title caught his attention. And uh, and
Speaker 1: he wanted us to come down and investigate some wrongdoing
Speaker 1: that he said was going on in his small town
Speaker 1: in Alabama. So he reaches out to you. He talks
Speaker 1: to you first. He wrote our general account, I want
Speaker 1: to alert your producers to some stuff that's going on
Speaker 1: in my town. And the and the subject line was
Speaker 1: John by McLamore lives in Shiptown, Alabama. That was his title.
Speaker 1: It was a liveliness to it, there was he had
Speaker 1: you with that subject. Yeah, and there was a liveliness
Speaker 1: to it, even even like the capitalization was erratic in
Speaker 1: a way, that caught my attention in the email, and
Speaker 1: then you know, he said, I would hope that you
Speaker 1: guys could come down here and investigate some of the
Speaker 1: terrible things that are going on in this ship town
Speaker 1: would Stock, Alabama and bib County, Alabama. And he mentioned,
Speaker 1: um two incidents, one of which was this murder that
Speaker 1: he said had taken place, Um that a local kind
Speaker 1: of rich kid had allegedly beating someone to death and
Speaker 1: then was out bragging about it, had not gone to jail,
Speaker 1: gotten away with it. And so that's what he was
Speaker 1: telling us about. But it was also like just generally,
Speaker 1: you need to check this place out. It's so fucking terrible.
Speaker 1: Like that was like the general vibe with a couple
Speaker 1: of examples. But I would imagine that beyond the kind
Speaker 1: of fulk Ner esque tableau of the area, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean this kind of southern idol and the crazy
Speaker 1: characters and the and and the implication of some crime
Speaker 1: or some evil or what have you, I would imagine
Speaker 1: that you must get variations of that pitch to you
Speaker 1: all the time. We do. Yeah, that one made you
Speaker 1: what what was it about this when they made you go, Okay,
Speaker 1: let's go down so the next thing is should go
Speaker 1: down there. Correct. Well, I talked to him for a
Speaker 1: while in the phone. It took a year for me
Speaker 1: to get on the phone with him because it was
Speaker 1: not a priority for me, like I was working on
Speaker 1: other stuff that seem more real, you know. And then
Speaker 1: eventually we got on the phone because he sent me
Speaker 1: like a news report about some actual police corruption that
Speaker 1: had actually happened, which reminded me that I should check
Speaker 1: in with this guy you call him in what happens.
Speaker 1: I mean, we talked about the alleged murderer, but then
Speaker 1: also he just starts talking about his life in general.
Speaker 1: He you know, he's forty eight at the time we
Speaker 1: started talking, I think around there, late forties, um, And
Speaker 1: he'd lived there his entire life, in this town of
Speaker 1: people are less. He'd never left. He desperately hated it.
Speaker 1: He wanted to leave, but wouldn't leave if he lived
Speaker 1: there alone, in the house he'd grown up in that
Speaker 1: had been there for centuries, in a century and a half,
Speaker 1: you know, with his mother who had dementia who we
Speaker 1: took care of, and you know, a large number of
Speaker 1: dogs fluctuating between thirteen and twenty one dogs and he
Speaker 1: built a giant hedge maze in his backyard. I mean,
Speaker 1: he was, he was. It was just one of those
Speaker 1: conversations where, yeah, I was getting the information about the murder,
Speaker 1: the alleged murder, but also he seemed to be going
Speaker 1: through something in talking to me. It wasn't even just details,
Speaker 1: like all those details are interesting, but he was wrestling
Speaker 1: with the fact that he had never left this place.
Speaker 1: He despised and that caught my attention and I was yeah,
Speaker 1: and I was like, maybe there's a murderer. If there's
Speaker 1: a murder, this guy is part of it. This is
Speaker 1: what makes the story special. You know, it was always
Speaker 1: going to be. He was a big part of it
Speaker 1: from the get go. I mean, that's interesting to me
Speaker 1: that when you you talked to this guy on the phone,
Speaker 1: he's a good talker, and he's compelling, and his voice
Speaker 1: is so kind of theatrical, and I know you're telling
Speaker 1: yourself this, this has some possibilities. We are a radio show, absolutely,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean you need I mean, in order
Speaker 1: for a radio story to work, you need a good
Speaker 1: talk sound like. That's the phrase that said many times
Speaker 1: in our office. Every day of this American life is
Speaker 1: he a good talker, and a story can live or
Speaker 1: die on that. A story that in a pitch on
Speaker 1: a piece of paper, UM, could have all the beats
Speaker 1: of an interesting story and surprise, we'll call him, do
Speaker 1: a pre interview with someone and it just doesn't live.
Speaker 1: You need a good talker to you know, great stories
Speaker 1: happen to those. So a year goes by between when
Speaker 1: you first picked this up when you call him, how
Speaker 1: much time goes by after that from when you first
Speaker 1: go down there. We talked on the phone for I think,
Speaker 1: you know, eight to ten months, because I was working
Speaker 1: on other stuff and I did try to see if
Speaker 1: I could find anything about this murder from Afar. Basically
Speaker 1: I was doing just getting into the court system and
Speaker 1: stuff UM and I couldn't and eventually got to the
Speaker 1: point where like, I just need to go down there.
Speaker 1: But in the course of that I would be checking
Speaker 1: in with John, and we invariably had these very long
Speaker 1: conversations that were about much more than the murder. So
Speaker 1: we're getting to know each other, you know. I got
Speaker 1: to know about his obsession with climate change and about
Speaker 1: this relationship that he had with these um you know,
Speaker 1: this local guy that worked on his property. That was
Speaker 1: interesting to me, Like there were just elements where it's
Speaker 1: just like I want to go. He's the other protective.
Speaker 1: Um what what was the root of his obsession with
Speaker 1: climate change? What was he because of changes that were
Speaker 1: happening down there? I don't know for sure, and I
Speaker 1: didn't talk about. My sense is that what I've been
Speaker 1: told this isn't in the story, is that, Um, he
Speaker 1: got a computer only in the last few years of
Speaker 1: his life, and stay the last five years someone at
Speaker 1: town Hall hooked him up with an old computer before.
Speaker 1: I mean, he was incredibly intelligent and in touch with
Speaker 1: the world. Um, but like I think he had like
Speaker 1: books shipped to him from the library is how he
Speaker 1: did it. Um, but he he was given a computer.
Speaker 1: And I think my sense is that the climate change
Speaker 1: and energy and peak oil fixations, and you know, him
Speaker 1: teaching himself about that, like he really went down some
Speaker 1: rabbit holes with the computer. But it's interesting. I wonder
Speaker 1: also how he's so connected to the land to borrow
Speaker 1: that cliche that he knows sort of to notice changes
Speaker 1: in that. Yeah, and I think you're I mean, he
Speaker 1: would talk about like I'm seeing less butterflies, you know,
Speaker 1: he would notice things like that things are getting brown er,
Speaker 1: we haven't had rain in this long so yeah, I
Speaker 1: think that was party was very connected to his environment. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you go down and meet him for the first
Speaker 1: time and describe that situation. It's just me. That's one
Speaker 1: of the great things about radio reporting. It's super lean.
Speaker 1: You don't need like a film crew, you don't need
Speaker 1: the Golden Hour. Yeah, but it's just like a little
Speaker 1: kid that I'm paying on my neck in a tiny
Speaker 1: you know, like a medium sized microphone. So it's pretty
Speaker 1: like I'm just in my car rental car. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's pretty much as I described in the story,
Speaker 1: like I missed his house, you know, the first time
Speaker 1: pass Birmingham, um, like forty five minutes rent a car
Speaker 1: for if miss to an hour gets pretty I mean,
Speaker 1: it's the kind of the beginning of like rural part
Speaker 1: of West Alabama. Like they're they're the first county kind
Speaker 1: of after you leave Jefferson County, which has um Birmingham
Speaker 1: and Bessemer, which is kind of like the you know,
Speaker 1: the end of the Metro era, I'd say, is my
Speaker 1: understanding of it. You're driving, you're driving kind of southwest
Speaker 1: out of Birmingham, UM, but it's bib Counties kind of
Speaker 1: between Birmingham and Tuscaloose are these two kind of like
Speaker 1: things on each their cities on either side that are
Speaker 1: each about forty five minutes outside. He'd give me directions,
Speaker 1: but he was like Google Maps doesn't really work, like
Speaker 1: you should use latitude and longitude would be more helpful.
Speaker 1: So I put that into Google Maps. Yeah, exactly. I
Speaker 1: had you know, a compass with me. Missed his house
Speaker 1: because it's just a little like driveway path through the woods.
Speaker 1: Eventually like came back by and went down there, like
Speaker 1: I think it was feet into the woods, and then
Speaker 1: you had this clearing and it is this very old house.
Speaker 1: And you know, I've been in Alabama once before, kind
Speaker 1: of just passing through, and I've been in the South before,
Speaker 1: and but I was kind of just like, all right,
Speaker 1: well maybe this is just like a normal house and
Speaker 1: like place to live in the South. This land that's
Speaker 1: like this house in the middle of a clearing. You know,
Speaker 1: that's very old. But I've since you know, spent a
Speaker 1: lot of time in Alabama and talked to a lot
Speaker 1: of people and everyone who know, even lifelong residents of Alabama.
Speaker 1: I said, no, that place is not normal. When I
Speaker 1: first went to John, that was like, where the hell
Speaker 1: am I like, I'm stepping back in time? That That's
Speaker 1: what's curious to me, is I mean, I'm not I
Speaker 1: don't want to say. He sounded to me and I
Speaker 1: only experienced him on your show and his voice in
Speaker 1: your show, and he sounded to me like he was
Speaker 1: pretty wound up and pretty intense, and he's very colorful
Speaker 1: in a way that would make me entertained by him
Speaker 1: alternately and concerned about him alternately. So when you go
Speaker 1: down there, you're not nervous, You're not worried for your safety.
Speaker 1: I wasn't worried for my safety. I was a little
Speaker 1: you know, I was aware that I was going somewhere
Speaker 1: kind of off the grid. You know. I don't remember
Speaker 1: being conserned my safety with John. I don't mean you've
Speaker 1: spoken to him so many times trust with him, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess so. Um, But he certainly was very intense
Speaker 1: and he was exhausting to be with, you know, both
Speaker 1: thrilling and could be frustrating and exhausting, you know, like
Speaker 1: his it wasn't like a normal interview, like what we're
Speaker 1: doing right now, Like I could not get him to
Speaker 1: do that. You know, there were a couple of times
Speaker 1: I tried to sit down and just talk to him,
Speaker 1: and he was just he couldn't sit there and talk.
Speaker 1: Do you attribute too, I think it's his personality and
Speaker 1: whether that's you know, certain mental health issues or as
Speaker 1: I talk about in the story, there's a question of
Speaker 1: mercury poisoning. Yeah. I wasn't nervous, but it was like
Speaker 1: just really trying to get a grasp on like you know,
Speaker 1: like you know, you're reporting, you don't just like normally
Speaker 1: let someone talk. That's not reporting, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Like you have questions and you have a focus, and
Speaker 1: where were those questions and what was the focus when
Speaker 1: you began well with him? I mean, like I definitely
Speaker 1: was like, you know, we've got to do this murder
Speaker 1: investigation stuff. So were certain steps I wanted to take,
Speaker 1: you know, that were seemed safe but defined with him.
Speaker 1: But then I was also open to like, I'm interested
Speaker 1: in him in his life. I want to talk to
Speaker 1: him about his life. I'm interested in this relationship he
Speaker 1: started to tell me about with Tyler Goodson and some
Speaker 1: of the locals there, So hopefully I'll get to like
Speaker 1: get inside that a little bit. So that was those
Speaker 1: were all kind of like through lines in my head,
Speaker 1: you know, as I'm down there. But then he had
Speaker 1: his own agendas to like, well, he wanted to teach
Speaker 1: me about climate change. Like he literally, like the second
Speaker 1: morning I was there, you know, called him. I'm like,
Speaker 1: I'm up, I'm going to drive over there. You know,
Speaker 1: I was staying like fifteen or two minutes away, and
Speaker 1: he's like, Okay, I'm preparing a lecture for you on
Speaker 1: climate change. I timed it, it's like five minutes. It
Speaker 1: will only take twenty minutes. But did you sense he
Speaker 1: wanted to teach you out of some kind of intellectual
Speaker 1: vanity or was he the Obi wan Kenobi of climate
Speaker 1: change and want you to run out and go fight
Speaker 1: the fight somewhere? What did the artic constantly had this
Speaker 1: feeling with John where in all my time knowing him
Speaker 1: and to this day, his mind and his ability to
Speaker 1: understand particularly science, um was so beyond mine. Like like
Speaker 1: what he would talk about climate change, it was I
Speaker 1: could get like two percent of it. And so I
Speaker 1: constantly have this feeling of like either he is a
Speaker 1: freaking profit or completely looney. I have no idea, and
Speaker 1: it could be either at any points either I still
Speaker 1: don't know, I mean, and I I hired to research
Speaker 1: her to look into like a lot of his writings
Speaker 1: on climate change, like to try and figure that out.
Speaker 1: At one point it's I mean, it was so complicated,
Speaker 1: like basically it seems like he's right. He's not like
Speaker 1: putting factual and accuracies in these in his theories, but
Speaker 1: he is. The general sense I got after the researcher
Speaker 1: looked into it was that, um like he you know,
Speaker 1: he's he's choosing things to focus on that serve his thesis,
Speaker 1: you know, that serve his negative worldview. So you start
Speaker 1: with him down this path of exploring the crime, and
Speaker 1: then you find out that none of it is what
Speaker 1: it was purported to be. Some of it is, but
Speaker 1: one important detail is different, important detail different. When you
Speaker 1: discover that, what prevents you from just packing up and
Speaker 1: leaving and going we're done. I discovered it after I
Speaker 1: So I did a visit there in October, but I
Speaker 1: didn't actually really put it all, like come to the
Speaker 1: conclusion of that until early summer. I still was interested
Speaker 1: in him. He had other pieces of corruption that he
Speaker 1: was telling me about. I was like maybe. And I
Speaker 1: was interested in his relationship with Tyler Goodson, and so
Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, maybe they I'll look into one
Speaker 1: of these other things. Because what he was telling me
Speaker 1: it happened. Everyone in town believed it. It happened exactly
Speaker 1: as he told me. He didn't make it up. It
Speaker 1: was just that, you know, one important detail was different
Speaker 1: that didn't make it as bad of a crime as
Speaker 1: he had said it was. So I was talking to
Speaker 1: him like, I'm gonna come back down there. You know,
Speaker 1: there are a couple of loose ends I wanted to
Speaker 1: put to bed with this initial murder investigation, um, and
Speaker 1: then just talk to him, you know, like kind of
Speaker 1: get inside his and Tyler's relationship a little bit more. Um,
Speaker 1: possibly look at another piece of corruption or you know,
Speaker 1: wrongdoing that he was telling me about. So that was
Speaker 1: in like June. We were having these conversations. I was
Speaker 1: working on a big story that was coming on on
Speaker 1: July four, and I was like, right after July four, John,
Speaker 1: I want to come back down there, you know. And
Speaker 1: he was all like, um, oh my god, it's gonna
Speaker 1: be the dead of summer. It's gonna be so hot,
Speaker 1: and I need to get the house cleaner out here,
Speaker 1: and it's the house is full of fleas and oh
Speaker 1: my gosh, and I'm gonna have to prune the maze
Speaker 1: and gracious. Yeah. And I was like, oh, I don't
Speaker 1: worry about to worry about it. So right after July
Speaker 1: four and then he he, um, I guess we're not
Speaker 1: talking about this. That's the truck tricky part. But he
Speaker 1: did the thing that he does in the story on
Speaker 1: June two, and so that, um, do you do? You
Speaker 1: want to tell it? You because you want to? Can
Speaker 1: you tell people to maybe you like, go with the
Speaker 1: show first before I say that was the next part. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're gonna stop here. Here's where you press pause, pause
Speaker 1: now and go listen to S Town, which in total
Speaker 1: is what six hours or six and change. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: we mean it. If you haven't listened to S Town
Speaker 1: and don't want more details about what happens, stop listening
Speaker 1: to this right now. Go download S Town and come
Speaker 1: back here in six hours if you are sticking with us.
Speaker 1: Coming up, Brian Reid reveals why he can never eat
Speaker 1: calamari again. Hint, it involves pork Brian started at This
Speaker 1: American Life as an intern in two thousand ten. He
Speaker 1: says he can't imagine another place where he would have
Speaker 1: gotten to make s Town, in large part because of
Speaker 1: the creative wisdom of his boss, Ira Glass, who I
Speaker 1: spoke to a couple of years ago. I mean this
Speaker 1: show because my taste, but also I have to say
Speaker 1: the taste of my coworkers, you know, like it's not
Speaker 1: just mine at this point, Like it's something that we
Speaker 1: all share, and I happened to be the frontman, and
Speaker 1: in that way it's different than than it was from
Speaker 1: the beginning, Like I am the frontman for this thing
Speaker 1: that we make together, like somebody who's in a band
Speaker 1: that's been playing for a long time. To hear more
Speaker 1: of my conversation with Ira Glass, take a listen at
Speaker 1: Here's the Thing dot Org. This is Alec Baldwin and
Speaker 1: you were listening to Here's the Thing. When Brian Read
Speaker 1: replied to an email sent to This American Life from
Speaker 1: John B. McLamore, he intended to get more information about
Speaker 1: an alleged murder in rural Alabama. Instead, he met a
Speaker 1: most compelling character who, after hours of interviews, left him
Speaker 1: in an unusual position. So I was talking to Hi,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna come down after life. Fourth John. I was
Speaker 1: beginning of June, you know, first couple of weeks of
Speaker 1: June that I was having these conversations with him. Um.
Speaker 1: And then on June's twenty, he killed himself, and so
Speaker 1: I had there wasn't like did you see that coming? No?
Speaker 1: I mean it was like it was a little bit
Speaker 1: like the boy cried wolf with him and on and
Speaker 1: on the show. You sound crushed. Yeah, it was one
Speaker 1: of those things where you know, he talked, he said
Speaker 1: he was going to kill himself, like he said, I'm
Speaker 1: going to do it many times, and I knew he
Speaker 1: said to other people. And it was still utterly shocking.
Speaker 1: Where were you when you heard that he died. I
Speaker 1: was in a studio in this American Life, recording it,
Speaker 1: which I did not expect. How do you feel? I
Speaker 1: felt shocked. I felt disbelief, but then kind of of course, Um,
Speaker 1: did you feel angry? I didn't feel angry yet. Um,
Speaker 1: you know other people you did. No, he didn't. He didn't.
Speaker 1: He didn't know me anything. Here you've given him the
Speaker 1: attention that he craved on a level he could never
Speaker 1: have gotten it, you know. I mean, that's my I
Speaker 1: get paid to do, right. I'm I'm not saying you're
Speaker 1: doing any favorites. I'm just saying I found it interesting
Speaker 1: that he did that, even in spite of the fact that,
Speaker 1: you know, had he lived, he could have been like
Speaker 1: Lance Loud, like this cult figure. I mean, I don't
Speaker 1: think he didn't want that, No, IM not. I don't
Speaker 1: know how he felt about I mean, I don't know
Speaker 1: how he felt about that. I just think I was
Speaker 1: not the biggest part of his life, Like you know,
Speaker 1: that was that was something that was going on in
Speaker 1: his life. He really felt, you weren't the biggest part
Speaker 1: of his life. I'm definitely not the biggest part of it. Now.
Speaker 1: We would talk occasionally and I went to visit him
Speaker 1: for the better part, but he died before the podcast
Speaker 1: came out. I know. I'm just saying, like, once the
Speaker 1: podcast came out to it, you think he would have
Speaker 1: been thrilled by the by the attention he got. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think he would have really liked it. I think
Speaker 1: he could have, though I don't totally know, because he
Speaker 1: had such an unpredict He was such an unpredictable person
Speaker 1: that he could have any number of reactions and I
Speaker 1: wouldn't deign to like get inside of his head about it.
Speaker 1: You know, I appreciate that, which is very which because
Speaker 1: he could also be annoyed by like the think piece
Speaker 1: reactions and the you know, I think he would be
Speaker 1: upset that I didn't have more climate change stuff in
Speaker 1: the story, Like I think he would have criticisms and too.
Speaker 1: We're gonna leap back a bit. Where are you from?
Speaker 1: I'm from Shelton, Connecticut. And when you like an hour
Speaker 1: and a half from New York. And when you were
Speaker 1: growing up was radio and communications that kind of thing
Speaker 1: the goal were, you know? I never listened to radio. However,
Speaker 1: my parents didn't know what MPR was Like. We're not
Speaker 1: that kind of house. I feel there are a lot
Speaker 1: of people who go work at MPR in public radio
Speaker 1: who have this whole Like I grew up in an
Speaker 1: MPR household. I did not have any clue what you
Speaker 1: did it as a house painter? What'd your mom? She
Speaker 1: a different jobs growing up. She always wanted to be
Speaker 1: a teacher, but never became one fully, so now these
Speaker 1: days she teaches adult head in different You have a
Speaker 1: younger brother, what's he doing. He's in sales, door door salesman.
Speaker 1: He's a door to door salesman. Your dad, your dad
Speaker 1: was was a professional painting contractor. And how do you
Speaker 1: get into this radio game? Where'd you go to college
Speaker 1: to Yale? Would you study Yale theater and history? And
Speaker 1: you wanted to be? I don't know. I think I
Speaker 1: went in. I did like, you know, high school musicals
Speaker 1: and stuff in high school. Going into college, I wanted
Speaker 1: to be I would liked acting, but then I very
Speaker 1: soon realized there are people far better at it than me.
Speaker 1: So I did some performances in college, but I got
Speaker 1: a little more into directing. Um, So I directed a
Speaker 1: few shows and that was a little more my focus
Speaker 1: in the major. And then and um and writing and stuff.
Speaker 1: I started to fancy myself a writer. I did some
Speaker 1: journalism some friends and I took a road trip one
Speaker 1: summer and like brought up cam quartering, like finagled some
Speaker 1: grants and bought an old van and interviewed people about
Speaker 1: what makes them happy, you know, and like tried to
Speaker 1: write a book about it. I was just looking for
Speaker 1: kind of jobs that were journalists, the you know, kind
Speaker 1: of like writing that your initial direction was writing in journalism,
Speaker 1: and yeah, writing, I fancy myself a writer, I guess.
Speaker 1: I worked from a forum, an alternative weekly company for
Speaker 1: very briefly for a few months in Washington, d C.
Speaker 1: But got this fellowship at NPR called the Croc Fellowship,
Speaker 1: which was funded by Joan kroc Um, which gave me
Speaker 1: my career. Like I, I hadn't listened to radio, but
Speaker 1: I went and did. It's a year long fellowship for
Speaker 1: people who are shortly out of any kind of school.
Speaker 1: You could do four different jobs in the organization, including
Speaker 1: reporting and producing, and it's really trial by fire. And
Speaker 1: at the end of it, I was like, Wow, radio
Speaker 1: is really hard, but I really like it and I
Speaker 1: think I'm getting better at it. I wasn't like love
Speaker 1: at first sight like that, but I was like, I'm
Speaker 1: engaged by this. This is you know, there seems to
Speaker 1: be opportunities here. And then shortly after that, I moved
Speaker 1: to New York and got the internship what was then
Speaker 1: the internship and is now the Fellowship at this American Life. Um,
Speaker 1: what was that like when you got there? Because I
Speaker 1: always show was such a monolith, you know, It's like
Speaker 1: it's a great program, and yeah again, I was still
Speaker 1: kind of new to it. I started listening to it
Speaker 1: in the last year or two, just because I'd only
Speaker 1: gotten into radio. I didn't listen to a growing up
Speaker 1: and stuff. I think I was aware of it. I'd
Speaker 1: heard some episodes, but um very soon after getting there,
Speaker 1: Ira put me on a very big project. He was
Speaker 1: producing an MPR reporter named Frank langfit on a hour
Speaker 1: long story about a car plant called New me in California.
Speaker 1: And really that's one of my favorites. I love well
Speaker 1: was the first thing that produced, the one that one
Speaker 1: with the one of that bung. I'm the one who
Speaker 1: did the taste test, who got it wrong at you know.
Speaker 1: So in actuality, Seth is eating calumari. The chewing you
Speaker 1: hear from Brian's mic that is the sound of a
Speaker 1: Calamari lever eating fried pig recton. I should also add
Speaker 1: there were actually two varieties of bung on the plate
Speaker 1: that day. One bung that my sister had blanched over
Speaker 1: and over to mellow any organy fecal flavor and then
Speaker 1: untreated straight up bung that one. The latter one bung
Speaker 1: at its purest, at the height of its bungy nous.
Speaker 1: This is what Brian was eating. I can't calmara legend?
Speaker 1: Can Calamaria a legend among my friends? You know? That's
Speaker 1: a very similar. The way that the Calamari story came
Speaker 1: about is very similar to uh, the way East Town
Speaker 1: came about. It was a tip line kind of email
Speaker 1: where someone was like, I was in a pork I
Speaker 1: believe it was someone saying, like, I was in a
Speaker 1: pork processing plant and I saw boxes labeled with like
Speaker 1: imitation Calamari, And that was how that's and they emailed
Speaker 1: us about it. That was got what got us hooked
Speaker 1: on that I don't I don't need Calamari anymore. And
Speaker 1: even if I did, I would be like so uh
Speaker 1: terrified because I loved it. So when you when you
Speaker 1: do segments for that show, when you produce reports for
Speaker 1: that show, you get to a point with some of
Speaker 1: them where it becomes aborted. You sit there and go, well,
Speaker 1: this isn't really holding together in terms of you find
Speaker 1: somebody with many of them then you do. So that
Speaker 1: is a condition when you work. There's some of it
Speaker 1: just crashes and and it's considered the laws. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: and it's I mean it's built into it, like I
Speaker 1: were very wisely, I believe, from the beginning of the show,
Speaker 1: and they had like no money still built on their
Speaker 1: budget to be able to kill a third of the
Speaker 1: stories that we start and it's now it's probably around there.
Speaker 1: And that could mean one interview, it could mean a
Speaker 1: pre interview, but it can also mean you know, I've
Speaker 1: gone on entire trips to four different states, come back
Speaker 1: and like, can you give us an example, like of
Speaker 1: a killed story. I mean an example of the story
Speaker 1: that you're really keen and you think you go onto
Speaker 1: something and then it dies, And how do you feel
Speaker 1: about that? Yeah, I love killing stories because I know
Speaker 1: I'm serious, But that's a are the culture. It's not
Speaker 1: it's built into our budget. But it's also I think ideally,
Speaker 1: Like not everyone who I work with like agrees with this,
Speaker 1: but I believe like it was instilled in me by
Speaker 1: Ira and Julie Snyder and the people who run this
Speaker 1: American like that it's a triumph to kill a mediocre story,
Speaker 1: like and it is so much hard, like when you've
Speaker 1: been through this enough, like something that's not working so
Speaker 1: well that you get in so deep that you're trying
Speaker 1: to bring across the finish line to make it good
Speaker 1: enough to be on the air. So much harder than
Speaker 1: something that's got got all the goods and it's going
Speaker 1: to be great, you know what I mean? I don't know,
Speaker 1: but it could be a million things. So, like I
Speaker 1: went on one story that I was excited about. It
Speaker 1: was a Scottish reporter who was going to look back
Speaker 1: at a single like photograph of a shooting that had
Speaker 1: happened in a rack ten years on that he'd been
Speaker 1: therefore embedded with a with a battalion or something. I
Speaker 1: can't remember all the details. And we went to three
Speaker 1: different states, four different states. We were like in a
Speaker 1: week to interview different players back from that time. But
Speaker 1: there was this one interview we really wanted to get
Speaker 1: um that was going to make it come together. I
Speaker 1: think he was a chaplain in the unit and we're
Speaker 1: so we flew to Colorado. He was like the key
Speaker 1: interview who would like it kind of like helped everyone
Speaker 1: deal with their grief. And we got to the airport
Speaker 1: and he can't. He was like, I can't do this.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to do this anymore. I don't want
Speaker 1: to do the interview and We're in the Denver airport,
Speaker 1: like calling and begging, and we came all the way
Speaker 1: out here. We like you have dude had flown here
Speaker 1: from Scotland. Um he did not meet with us. Um
Speaker 1: we went home. No. I think he was just like
Speaker 1: it was dredging up. It was a traumatic thing. He
Speaker 1: just I don't know why exactly. So we flew home
Speaker 1: and I was like, maybe I can salvage this, Maybe
Speaker 1: there's some way to do it. And I pulled some
Speaker 1: tape and ultimately it was just like, you're gonna be
Speaker 1: happier if you kill this now, Like it's not you're
Speaker 1: gonna be working so hard to make up for what
Speaker 1: many people. Um, we've grown a lot in the last
Speaker 1: couple of years, but like not many, like fifteen to
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen are less producers. And then there's you know
Speaker 1: other staff, you know doing operations and tech and stuff
Speaker 1: like that administration. Do you feel that there's a uh
Speaker 1: philosophically and uh politically, there's a d NA to the
Speaker 1: kind of stories they do over there. Oh yeah, how
Speaker 1: would you describe that? Not politically but but in terms
Speaker 1: of philosophy, Like we're trying to amuse ourselves that's the
Speaker 1: philosophy and amuse use the term, you know, that's that's
Speaker 1: irish statement. But I believe in that, you know, um
Speaker 1: thesis like um amused can be broad like it can
Speaker 1: be into you know, you can learn something, you could
Speaker 1: be engross in a character that's going through something. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but we're doing it for ourselves, like we're trying to
Speaker 1: do things that we would want to listen to. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And so that's like one overarching principle. But then there's
Speaker 1: actually just specific ingredients we're looking for in stories like that.
Speaker 1: Stories have to have for the most part to work
Speaker 1: on our show. And that's a good you know, a character,
Speaker 1: a main character who's a good talker, who goes through
Speaker 1: something like with plot um surprise that leads to an
Speaker 1: interesting idea about the world. Those are the ingredients we're
Speaker 1: looking for. But do you feel like with your success
Speaker 1: of your podcast you want to kind of go off
Speaker 1: now and do your own thing? Would you like where
Speaker 1: you are as a good hub. That's a good mothership
Speaker 1: for you. I get to work with the best podcast
Speaker 1: creators in the world, Like it's so yeah, there's yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm very happy. And I think last is such a
Speaker 1: blindingly bright. Guy's great, you know, I you know, I've
Speaker 1: learned like a lot of what I know from him,
Speaker 1: and but it's a place that because of him we
Speaker 1: get to make things like S Town. There is a
Speaker 1: spirit of invention. They're like we're constantly trying to fend
Speaker 1: off boredom and try things that are new, and like,
Speaker 1: I don't think there's many of the places where I
Speaker 1: could say, like, let me leave my job for a
Speaker 1: year to make this thing that you're going to help fund,
Speaker 1: you know, that is S Town, Like it's I imagine
Speaker 1: pitching that a lot of places the show Best Town, Yeah, yeah, stuff,
Speaker 1: And were some of the things that were said positive
Speaker 1: and negative that resonated with you. I mean, they're really nice.
Speaker 1: You know, there's a lot like there's some really nice
Speaker 1: stuff that's been said that it's just a lot of
Speaker 1: credible example of empathy, which I couldn't have. I did
Speaker 1: not even occur to me that it was like more
Speaker 1: empathetic than other things, Like it just felt like me
Speaker 1: making the thing that I've heard a lot of that
Speaker 1: and that was super cool in that way that your storytelling,
Speaker 1: I mean, who you wanted to direct and do plays
Speaker 1: and you wanted to act and what were some of
Speaker 1: the negative things that hit you. It's been interesting. It's
Speaker 1: I'm still sorting through all this, you know, it's only
Speaker 1: been a few weeks. But I believe people have different
Speaker 1: reactions to it that kind of betray like their background
Speaker 1: a bit. Um. So there's a certain reaction I've heard
Speaker 1: from mostly like white Northerners, um where like the podcast
Speaker 1: makes them uncomfortable. They'll use that word like uncomfortable. I
Speaker 1: don't quite know what they mean. Like in a couple
Speaker 1: of cases, you know, it's been a reaction to there's
Speaker 1: this one this one scene in the second chapter where
Speaker 1: I was inside of this tattoo parlor, black sheet bank
Speaker 1: and some very terrible racist contents, um. And so there's
Speaker 1: this there's a certain reaction I've gotten from mostly like
Speaker 1: people in the North, white people, like black people are
Speaker 1: like yet, uh, but did you have the same reaction
Speaker 1: your stuff when you were there? Do you find it
Speaker 1: even for you when you went down the My god,
Speaker 1: this is the same country I live in. I didn't
Speaker 1: have that feeling, but I was cut. But that's the thing,
Speaker 1: Like I'm wherever I'm reporting, I'm trying to find things
Speaker 1: that are surprising. That's what I'm doing when I'm reporting,
Speaker 1: I don't affect you know, it affects me. It's the
Speaker 1: whole point, you know. But it wasn't because it's like
Speaker 1: the South, the racism, It didn't. What surprised me about
Speaker 1: it was how open people sometimes were. Not everybody, but
Speaker 1: that there were moments where people would be open on Mike.
Speaker 1: That surprised me. I certainly was not surprised that that
Speaker 1: racism exists, and that you know, people would say things
Speaker 1: even to a stranger. You know, that didn't surprise me.
Speaker 1: And so anyway, so the react what did surprise you?
Speaker 1: Um in general? You say, I do this to be amused?
Speaker 1: What amused me? Like they're just like the only reason
Speaker 1: to do this story is because I like it. Like
Speaker 1: I realized in the middle of writing it, like there's
Speaker 1: no news peg for this, there's no like business imperative
Speaker 1: like to do this, like I like this story. And
Speaker 1: so it was actually like a joy to write, even
Speaker 1: when I was like staying up all night on deadline.
Speaker 1: And the reason I like it is just a million
Speaker 1: different moments, like you know, I I you know, there's
Speaker 1: a moment where one of the characters talks about wanting
Speaker 1: to like cut like someone's nipples off. I've just never
Speaker 1: heard someone say that before, you know, to get someone's
Speaker 1: gold nipple rings. I've never heard that on tape before.
Speaker 1: That amused That amused me, Like, Um, there's you know
Speaker 1: moments where John goes on at second rant talking about
Speaker 1: like Putin should bomb us all and we're just living
Speaker 1: in some crazy country, you know, Like that's just a
Speaker 1: rant I can't even replicate because I've just never you know,
Speaker 1: totally extemporaneous. There's a moment where, um, you know, an
Speaker 1: old love interest of John's at the end of chapter
Speaker 1: six lays out, you know, just exactly what he wanted
Speaker 1: to do to him one day that he never actually did,
Speaker 1: Like he wanted to make a move and he wanted
Speaker 1: to kiss him on his belly. I've never heard anyone
Speaker 1: do that on the radio before. That was wonderful And
Speaker 1: so it was just like those moments they surprised me
Speaker 1: and they were the reason to do the story to me.
Speaker 1: So when you when you talk about writing and when
Speaker 1: you're stitching the whole thing together and doing the tracking
Speaker 1: of where you kind of bring it all together, you've
Speaker 1: got to write all that down for you when you've
Speaker 1: got to write heavily edited and right, and now you're
Speaker 1: doing all the writing, the writing and who was doing
Speaker 1: the editing. To have a good editor well, editing means
Speaker 1: something I think maybe different to me in radio than
Speaker 1: it would it to you and UM in shaping. So
Speaker 1: so basically I worked with Julie Snyder, who's who is
Speaker 1: the co creator of Cereal and um was the senior
Speaker 1: producer of This American Life for years until she created Cereal.
Speaker 1: Now I have her job, UM, but we made it
Speaker 1: this together, and you know she so she she was
Speaker 1: working at This American Life as senior producer when John
Speaker 1: first contacted me. So she was my editor as I
Speaker 1: was going down to Alabama in the early days and
Speaker 1: then we kind of stayed on it together and saw
Speaker 1: came up with a vision for this together. So she's
Speaker 1: the person I would be checking in with on my
Speaker 1: reporting trips because there's a million decisions you're you're editing
Speaker 1: even as you're reporting in deciding what leads to follow,
Speaker 1: what to spend your time on, who to talk to you,
Speaker 1: what to talk to him about. So she was constantly
Speaker 1: in the process with me, and it's so important of
Speaker 1: a good editor. I mean, she's she is the secret
Speaker 1: to what makes things so good. So so then finally,
Speaker 1: after like you know, a year of reporting or more,
Speaker 1: we had like a month where we sat down or
Speaker 1: first we had a month where we went through all
Speaker 1: the tape and kind of made summaries of every interview.
Speaker 1: Then she and I just sat there and we're like, okay,
Speaker 1: so how does the story start? And it was like
Speaker 1: a good month of just like you know, I'm what
Speaker 1: I imagine it's like to be in a TV writer's
Speaker 1: room of just you know, talking through the story and
Speaker 1: kind of jamming, you know, kind of like well what
Speaker 1: if it went this way? You know, so you get
Speaker 1: an email, then you write him back. Now you don't
Speaker 1: need the writing back part goes straight to the phone
Speaker 1: call like, no, this part we want to save for later.
Speaker 1: And just like trying it with each other, you know,
Speaker 1: she'd say, well, what if we want this and this
Speaker 1: and this, and I'd be like, no, that part's boring,
Speaker 1: Let's cut that part where that's too much explanation, and
Speaker 1: and we would just go through it, write it on
Speaker 1: a white board, and then move on to the next chapter.
Speaker 1: Eventually we got to a point where we couldn't see
Speaker 1: it at all and we were feeling overwhelmed in our heads,
Speaker 1: and so we started again from the beginning with note
Speaker 1: cards on a wall and stretched all around the corner.
Speaker 1: I'm a big fan of note cards, and it was
Speaker 1: just that. So then we came more. Taught me that
Speaker 1: they really is that the sketches and stuff, how he
Speaker 1: pieces the show together, it's all not cards. Giant. It
Speaker 1: was the first time I've done that. I can't imagine,
Speaker 1: like to put that thing together six hours. That's incredible
Speaker 1: in the time and the effort involved. What are you
Speaker 1: working on now? Um, I'm back in my day job.
Speaker 1: I'm my ideas. I'm helping other people with their stories.
Speaker 1: So I do a lot of editing. So like people
Speaker 1: i'm talking, you know, we're working on the show next week. Um,
Speaker 1: that's a political show, so I'm editing a story about that.
Speaker 1: I'm ading a story about a Somali pirate right now,
Speaker 1: but it's someone else's story. But so they're reading it
Speaker 1: to me and I'm telling them structural changes and different
Speaker 1: changes to make, and we're going through that process, which
Speaker 1: I'm grateful for. I don't have a story in mind
Speaker 1: that I love as much as s town and so
Speaker 1: I can kind of wait for it to come to me,
Speaker 1: you know, while I help other people with their stuff.
Speaker 1: Hello privates, Alick, Hi, alec Hey, Brian. I realized after
Speaker 1: we spoke that I did have one more question for you,
Speaker 1: and all right, I'm very curious what that is. Burning
Speaker 1: I think it's I think it's a pretty obvious one,
Speaker 1: which is, do you see any of yourself and John? Um, yeah, definitely. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I really respect like people who forged their own way
Speaker 1: in the world, and I don't know, certainly like a
Speaker 1: way of being in the world that I aspired to
Speaker 1: that I don't know if I always accomplished. And that's
Speaker 1: what I enjoyed about talking to him and being with him.
Speaker 1: He was so unabashedly himself. When I'm able to do
Speaker 1: that in my own life, I feel good about it,
Speaker 1: you know. I admire that and John a lot. And
Speaker 1: it seems like he was somebody who insisted that he
Speaker 1: could be himself regardless of who he was with. Do agree, absolutely? Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think he was aware that he had a very
Speaker 1: polarizing effect on people, and he was aware of that,
Speaker 1: but his his personality could overwhelm people or turn people off,
Speaker 1: or people really just loved being with him. Um, and
Speaker 1: he kind of had a sense of bath, I feel
Speaker 1: like this is me and take it or leave it.
Speaker 1: Do you make people on comfortable? You could, yeah, Or
Speaker 1: you bring people along for like a very special ride
Speaker 1: and the right type of person is willing to go
Speaker 1: there with you. But one more thing that occurred to
Speaker 1: me was if he were around, what was one question
Speaker 1: you still wanted to ask him? Um? Something I wish
Speaker 1: I did with John that I never did is to
Speaker 1: like push back on some of his racial views that
Speaker 1: he expressed. Sometimes. Um, you know, sometimes it would come
Speaker 1: up in the course of some other discussion about something else,
Speaker 1: and I would kind of note, like I want to
Speaker 1: talk to him about that at some point, like why
Speaker 1: he seems to be so enlightened in some ways and
Speaker 1: that so kind of backwards and like thoughtless and others.
Speaker 1: And I just never got the chance to do that.
Speaker 1: Do you attribute those views if it's just a certain
Speaker 1: kind of stereotypical regionalisms or did you think he really
Speaker 1: was a racist? I mean I think you certainly. I
Speaker 1: don't know his Like his professor said, when he got
Speaker 1: to college, as a really young guy, like, you know,
Speaker 1: he bore kind of the markings of someone who've grown
Speaker 1: up in that part of the world at that time
Speaker 1: in terms of the way he talked about about race
Speaker 1: and the words he used. I get the sense from
Speaker 1: talking to people knew him that he got better over
Speaker 1: the years as he read more and engaged with the
Speaker 1: world more. I mean, I don't know, I don't even
Speaker 1: know it's in someone's heart, Like he was both things
Speaker 1: at once, but he, you know, sympathized with and felt
Speaker 1: for people who are affected by racism, and he understood
Speaker 1: that racism can be systemic. But then he would be
Speaker 1: thoughtless and you know, really really shitty words and um,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of retreat back into a cruder way
Speaker 1: of talking. And it was one of the things where
Speaker 1: it would have been like a whole thing to talk
Speaker 1: about that I wanted to talk about with him and
Speaker 1: always meant to, and he died before I could. You know,
Speaker 1: I wish I had. I wish I could have kind
Speaker 1: of pushed back on some of the stuff he would say,
Speaker 1: you know, because he knew better, all right. That's so
Speaker 1: that's kind of what I wanted to talking about. It's
Speaker 1: like why why do you sometimes still kind of retreat
Speaker 1: into this way of talking when I know you know better?
Speaker 1: You know well, thank you so much, and listen seriously.
Speaker 1: I still look forward to discovering what's the next thing
Speaker 1: you're gonna do. I'm really looking forward to seeing you
Speaker 1: do another show. It would be great. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you were listening to Here's
Speaker 1: the Thing