The podcast, “This American Life,” engages listeners from all across the United States each week with collections of true stories. Episode 714, released on August 14, titled, “A Day at the Beach,” aims to bring listeners to experience the beach as the end of summer nears. Host Ira Glass begins the episode by discussing his own experiences with the beach before introducing a story about a 66 year old man who was a lifeguard at Jones Beach in New York State. As we listen to the story we come to understand the man’s passion for lifeguarding and are drawn in by the story of how he comes to leave his beloved job and sue the state for 5 million dollars over speedos and jammers. In the second act of the episode, we meet Shane Dubow, who tells the story of his experience kayaking around deserted beaches in Baja California, where he receives medical help from a peculiar man named Johnny Tequila. Finally, in act 4, we delve into a more serious beach story, told by David Sedaris who loses his youngest sister to suicide.
Throughout the episode, humor and seriousness are woven together with light jokes, music and sound effects, transitions between narrators and audio clips, and the transitions between the acts themselves. In the beginning of the episode, sounds of waves crashing against the beach set the atmosphere for a relaxed, enjoyable beach vacation. However, Ira Glass begins by discussing his dislike of the beach. He jokes about how uncomfortable it is to lie under the sun for hours, and how he “ha[s] no desire to ever be seen in a bathing suit by anyone ever for the rest of [his] life.” He also tells us about his 7 day beach vacation he goes on because the people he loves love the beach. Giving this introduction both draws in listeners by letting them relate to the host and think about their own beach experiences and shows listeners what the episode will be about. Interestingly, the topics Glass discusses in the first few minutes are very similar to the topics of the four acts in the episode.
Although Ira Glass is the host the stories are each told by different narrators, each of whom are introduced at the beginning of each act. Act 1 is set up so that narrator, Dana, narrates a conversation that she has with the character of the story, Roy Lester. This allows the listener to feel a part of the conversation with Roy, while also allowing the narrator to comment, and add both context and humor to the story. An audio clip of Roy’s argument with the director of Jones Beach State Park is also included which helps the listener understand and sympathize with Roy to an even greater extent as he is told he will not be allowed to take the swim test unless he wears a speedo.
Act 2 is also set up as a conversation, but instead of having a narrator, Alex, a producer has a very friendly conversation with his friend Shane, about Shane’s beach story. This creates a much more lighthearted atmosphere. Shane talks about the amateur chiropractor who helps him by saying, “[it’s] a simpler life– just crack people’s necks, drink tequila, sing in the cantina, and go home to my naked lady. Did I not tell the story to make it seem good? It seemed great.” Act 3 is a very short excerpt from a 1979 podcast episode from “Ocean Hour.” The excerpt is narrated by an anonymous man who discusses the wonders of living on the beach, where everything he needs to live is delivered to him by the ocean. The atmosphere is very peaceful and inspiring, and I felt that Act 3 set up Act 4 and helped smooth the transition from Act 2. Finally, in Act 4, the entire story is told by David Sedaris, who tells his own story about his beach vacation. However, although this story takes place on the beach and matches the theme and atmosphere of the rest of the podcast, I felt that it wasn’t really about the beach. It was about the loss of his sister and the impact this has on him as he reminisces about the beach vacations his family would take during his childhood and about his memories of his youngest sister. Although there are still light moments as he tells the story, it is much more somber as he often mentions how his family of formerly six siblings, now only has five.
In this episode, the use of Ira Glass and other producers’ commentary, as well as music and sound effects, help fit together four individual beach stories into a single, much more captivating “This American Life,” beach experience episode.
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Hi Amy!
I LOVE how you structured your description of the podcast – chronologically but loaded with great analysis (I really want to listen to it now!). I’ve never listened to “This American Life”, but based on your post, I can already tell that it is well-produced, with a great mix of stories and narration. What stood out to me the most was the contrast in stories, and specifically how the producers chose to order them, from a lighthearted tone to a serious and thoughtful one. By specifically choosing what story to place when, the podcast would certainly be smoother and connected, just as you mentioned. In the podcast that I listened to, “The Mortified Podcast”, there were also different stories told by different people; however, was not a clear reason why they ordered the stories the way they did, and they were thrown together with only a sentence by the narrator connecting the two. After reading your post, I realized how the disjointedness stood out when stories are ordered almost at random with hardly any context for each one.
Additionally, while each episode in “The Mortified Podcast” also has a common theme, the stories are monotonous in comparison to the stories you listened to, mainly because my podcast’s one narrator barely participated, and the guests on the show were left to solo-read their own story. I think the mix of narrators and storytellers that you described in “This American Life” added character to the stories, with additional humor and a greater sense of casualness, like you mentioned. I like your note about how Dana’s conversation with Ray in Act 1 “allows the listener to feel a part of the conversation with Roy”; I believe human interaction during a podcast episode, like an interview or discussion, enhances the listening experience in that exact way, as instead of sitting on our couch in the living room listening to the conversation, it feels as if we are sitting directly across from the interviewee, learning about them firsthand. The podcast sounds like it would thus be engaging the whole way through, as we personally get a glimpse into the lives of the guests. While “The Mortified Podcast” had various speakers, there was no interactions between the narrator and the speakers, leaving the podcast more flat and less personable.
When making my own podcast, I think I will certainly try to employ these methods (varying who speaks, ordering stories/content in a specific way, and including a conversation or interview), as I think they all have the advantage of making a podcast more entertaining and memorable. On the other hand, the use of interviews or conversations may be confusing or drag on, so I will be sure to channel my inner Dana from “This American Life” if I do choose to include them. Similar to how you concluded your post, I hope to be able to tie together commentary, music, and individual stories to create one well-produced podcast when we start!
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