Radiolab- “What’s left when you’re right”

This episode was a strange one. The typical format of Radiolab’s shows involves one main story that is thoughtfully explored using a scientific lens by hosts Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich. There are guests who speak about their experiences and audio clips from producers who go out into the field to investigate these stories. What’s interesting about this episode is that there are three very different stories that are categorized by this title: What’s Left When You’re Right. The audience is first introduced to the Golden Ball game show where at the final stage, two contestants must decide whether to share the grand prize or lie and steal it all. Then it transitions into the story of Sue and Lulu. These two college friends decided to take a bike trip, and along the way they experience events that questions how people should view the world- whether to demand and confront people to be better or to take a more optimistic though passive approach to life. Finally, the episode ends with the story of a fighter exploring genetic advantages of being left handed.

It’s not obvious as to why these stories were told together. This choice made by the producers forces the question asked in the title onto their audience, especially since the name is only truly explained in the final story’s introduction, placing importance in the order of the stories.  To keep this particular show centered on their chosen theme, Robert and Jad reintroduces themselves at the beginning of each new story, acting as a transition and building suspense. These introductions act as moments of reflection for the people to absorb the previous message, an intermission, before launching into the next story. The audience has to be more attentive than usual to try and understand how the first two stories are similar because very little is given away in the first two introductions. Because of the extra effort required on the audience’s part due to the structure, this episode is stronger than telling each story individually. There are different messages that each story conveys but they all fall under the umbrella category of confrontation in some form or another. Now the overall takeaways are more holistic because of the different messages from each story. The question posed with the name is approached from different angles: a game show viewpoint using competition, whether it was better to react to the world in a passively optimistic way or to be aggressive and demand better by comparing different instinctual actions by the two friends, and in a literal sense (is being better at combat an evolutionary reason why the percentages of left handed and right handed people the way that they are?).

Though each narrative was different in content, each used a similar mixture of the hosts narrating, using interviews and audio clips, and use of music to move the story along. The balance was engaging. Music would grow louder or softer in volume to emphasize certain aspects that were key to each storyline and used to signal a transition to an ad or a new speaker. Sometimes new speakers were introduced before their voices were heard, often times experts and specialists (game hosts and defenders of lefties in this case), other times a new voice would speak without any warning, creating moments of interest because we get to hear from the other perspective.   

The consistency of format within each narrative is a norm that an audience can rely on while they grapple with what’s left when you’re right in three distinct ways.

(Word Count: 590)