Ep. 21 - Griffin Newman and Woody Allen
Well, Woody Allen isn't ON the show, but he's talked about
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A Well-Examined Life
Griffin Newman is the guest on our latest episode. He’s an actor, primarily, but also a comedian and a podcast host. You may have seen him on The Tick, which I hope you have because it was a great show. You probably didn’t see him in the Woody Allen movie Something Something New York (not the real name) because people don’t watch Woody Allen movies so much anymore because everything is so sad and broken.
I mention this in the show but I think it bears repeating: something that I think Griffin does really well is self-examination. He knows that he’s dealt with depression and anxiety for a long time, he knows that suicidal ideation has been an issue, and he takes those things into account when he looks at the decisions he’s about to make or has already made. He learns from that.
And even within that knowledge, Griffin dodges two common traps: one, he has done his homework and has a clear idea how these things play out within a person, and thus he avoids the common misconceptions. And two, kinda related, he is clear-eyed about the extent of his mental issues, neither exaggerating them nor downplaying them. Everything goes better that way.
A lot of folks try hard to get rid of depresh and anxo. Or they decide that they have gotten rid of them when that isn’t the case. Griffin works within the parameters of what’s actually going on and he manages it.
Ooh! And he was in Draft Day with Kevin Costner, a movie that I alone have seen.
On Length
I’m perpetually at a crossroads when it comes to podcast episode length. I’ve been at those crossroads for years now. I built a house there and raised my kids there and they are products of the Crossroads Public School System. Go Corners!
I spent 14 or so years in public radio before ever focusing on pods and that always meant adhering to a strict clock. Often, in a public radio show, there are “hard breaks”, meaning that the first segment of your show needs to be precisely, say, eleven and a half minutes to the second. So you cut out what you need to cut and often it’s more than you want to cut. Or you pad with music and leave in stuff that isn’t really great. And obviously that’s not great. The strictness doesn’t serve the actual content very well.
But maybe the rigidity of the format serves the listener well. I can listen to All Things Considered and have a pretty good idea when a segment will wrap up, so if I’m driving I can kind of control my planning.
Podcasting, it ain’t like that. There are five minute shows and five hour shows. And everything in between. There are five hour shows, mind you, that are very very popular and do very well.
This is PART 6 of a 6-part series of Hardcore History:
This show is a massive hit.
And while some people will tell you there’s an ideal length, those people are being foolish. Much of the time, those people (and I have known several) are merely stating what they prefer.
So what barometer should one use? Certainly, I’ve heard shows that are two hours long and I wouldn’t change a thing and I’ve heard 25-minute shows that I mentally slice 15 minutes off of.
I think, in the end, those people being foolish maybe have the right idea but are being overly preachy about it. In the end, we all just have to go with what we prefer because it’s the only thing close to a standard that we have. It’s a narrow one but the length that the creator of a pod episode feels is right will at least be consistent with one person’s vision: the creator themselves.
This week’s podcast episode is well over an hour. I did that because Griffin’s answer on The Tick and Woody Allen ended up being really lengthy but also really good. So I kept all of it. My radio instincts said, “No! No! Cut stuff! Get that down to a tight 15 minutes!” and indeed I have worked with radio editors who would tell me something like that. But podcasting ain’t radio and there’s still no way you’re supposed to do it. I hope there never is.
Also, Griffin Newman’s film podcast, Blank Check, regularly blows past the 2-hour mark and I think it’s terrific.
Let’s Google News Search “Mental Health” and Get Upset About Something
My secret formula for third items in the newsletter!
Get vaccinated!
COVID-19 long haulers experiencing long-term mental health impacts
The National Center for Health Statistics revealed between April and June of 2019, 11 percent of Americans experienced anxiety or depression. During the same time in 2020 when COVID-19 really hit the U.S., the CDC reported 35.6 percent of Americans had symptoms of anxiety or depression. A study published in the Lancet Psychiatry found that 1 in 3 patients who recovered from COVID-19 later developed neurological or psychiatric conditions within 6 months of infection. Topping the list was anxiety and depression.
If you’re eligible for the vaccine but refuse to take it, you’re no longer allowed to read this newsletter.
Depression Doesn’t Care If You’re Famous and Good Looking and King of the North
It will try to get you anyway. It’s a jerk is why.
Former Game of Thrones star Kit Harington is opening up about his struggles with alcohol, admitting that he contemplated suicide during moments of depression. The British actor has been sober for two and a half years following a 2019 stay at a Connecticut treatment facility for “substances” and “behaviors," which he describes as “mainly alcohol.”
I still remember Kit Harington from the original One Day at a Time show.
Whoops, I’m being told that’s PAT Harrington. Easy mistake.
You know nothing, SCHNEIDER.
Until Their Heads Are On My Desk
Jason Isbell, who I KNOW, NAME DROP, has had it with people who aren’t team players.
Here’s the new theme song - not by Jason - about how the team players among us are going to view the ballhogs:
Viva Voce was a band made up of a married couple. When they split up, there wasn’t a band anymore. Boy, I love this song.